[HGSS] Salamence Retest

Discussion in 'Past Gens Discussion' started by IFM, May 23, 2012.

  1. Platinum

    Platinum ~tilde~

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    @Tomahawk: how did you use SPdef Ttar? I used it before, the Restalk defensive set and the Curse set. While it is not an outstanding Pokemon, it is by no mean bad or disappointing, however providing the right team support may be tricky. Just want to say it's usable.
     
  2. monferno

    monferno blazing

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    Okay Curse Tyranitar is actually good yes, I thought you meant the exact same SDef Tyranitar that is being used in Gen 5, that one honestly is pretty bad.

    Also you don't really have to predict that perfectly with Latias. Just Surf on the first switchin and you know what their counter is, meaning you can make the appropriate move after. Unless they have two Latias 'counters' (which obv means it's broken if you need two counters to beat it), you know what move to use to beat/cripple their Latias counter.

    Rash Salamence isn't really good with Outrage, I'll give you that.

    Anyways, can we stop most theorymonning here and just allow Latias on the ladder for two weeks? That would make things a lot easier for me.
     
  3. pokemonnerd

    pokemonnerd Only uso listens to pnerd. Devo too. Article Contributor Article Contributor

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    Silly Bad Romance, every pokemon with a Choice item can predict perfectly. I thought you learned that while looking at BW NU's Exeggutor suspect thread!

    EDIT: Actually, on a serious note, why not try Latias without Salamence after this little stint? Pretty sure it never got a chance to be in a metagame without Mence also roaming around.
     
    Last edited: May 24, 2012
  4. monferno

    monferno blazing

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    Oh right, I forgot, the opponent facing the Latias will always predict right.

    Point is, if you have to rely on prediction to beat it, it's broken. Same for Deoxys-A.
     
  5. fidgety

    fidgety Active Member

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    @PN did i not suggest that on the first page.

    @tomahawk then tell me why do checks get disscussed in suspect they need prediction, oh yah, not everything NEEDS hard counters this is a game of CHECKS, checks can come in on most things not all. if counters were needed then Gengar and Luke would have long since been banned.

    also the issue is the old meta was NEVER balanced, does anyone know where heatran's average usage was, 45% about was OGRE was seeing in DPPHGSS Ubers. more centralizing than the 2 dragons. the only reason to use a different fire type is beating Skarmpiss without blowing it up, in short only 2 fire types really saw usage tran and Ape, and there were a bunch of pokemon who only saw usage because Tran was already doing something else or the Water/Fighting/Ground weaknesses would have been pushed beyond help with tran. so i don't see why people are complaining that the meta is less healthy with the dragons than it is with Tran, it is actually less healthy, the dragons gave reason not to use tran who is 1-2HKOd by them most of the time.
     
  6. pokemonnerd

    pokemonnerd Only uso listens to pnerd. Devo too. Article Contributor Article Contributor

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    Honestly, the reason why no one likes the "YOU NEED TO PREDICT TO BEAT IT" argument is because no one predicts that consistently when they're actually battling. Difference with Deoxys-A is the fact that it actually has the speed and power to not need to predict 90% of the time. It's kind of hilarious that you're basically comparing Latias to Deo-A as well.

    Latias is also vastly different than Salamence(and Deo-A for that matter) as well in that regard, simply because it's one dimensional. All of the Latias you will ever come across will always be a special set, and the only real "special" thing it has is Trick. Which in turn makes it much weaker if it actually does use it.
     
    Last edited: May 24, 2012
  7. Trotski

    Trotski Member

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    The fact is that Mence has been ban by only 9 "council" wile the majority of the players was against it's ban. Knowing that the criterias to ban mons are ALL subjective and changing among people, this "council" system isn't legitimate (hope i spell it right, i'm not english) at all and because of that, it needs a true suspect test like we have always done.

    Now, imo, we should elarge the test to latias as well but wait and see and how it goes on for mence first then.
     
    Last edited: May 24, 2012
  8. Fakes

    Fakes Member

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    Salamence is the easiest shit ever to check xD
    today i faced about 20 and 5 of the killed one poke not more
    the other 15 litarly did nothing :/
    just a fact to consider i have one steel type
    idk at the moment i don´t would say latias is necresarry
     
  9. shrapn3l

    shrapn3l Member

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    again, that's your opinion. i'm not sure many people would agree with you and besides there is less variety in team building so from a competitive standpoint, 3 steels on every team is worse than a fwg core on every team. it's also a symptom of overcentralization because fwg cores are just solid defensive cores, they aren't formulated with countering ONE TYPE (dragons) as a focus like the 3 steel core is. also preserving the metagame so that it's actually SOLID when you use it for tournaments should hold priority over "ladder activity." sorry, but again, you're just trying to make the metagame fun for yourself and that is not a valid reason to unban broken pokemon. you shouldn't ruin the balance of an old established metagame making it much worse for competitive tournament play just to generate activity on the ladder.

    heatran being used the most is not overcentralization, salamence and latias causing the whole metagame to shift is. consider how much worse off heatran is, the #1 pokemon now, when salamence and latias come back? consider WHY heatran is so overused. it is the best stealth rock user in the game, it is excellent with scarf, specs, or in a support role. it stops/revenges big threats like scizor, lucario, zapdos. it's part STEEL which is one of the best defensive types in the game. it's also by FAR the best fire pokemon in the game and the only fire pokemon nearly as good is infernape. every other fire pokemon is garbage. therefore, heatran is an integral part of most fwg cores. heatran being abused provides balance for the metagame because it is a pokemon that is an excellent counter to a large portion of the metagame and can fit into many teams, but is also a pokemon that is not difficult to counter and is consistently checked by the same pokemon regardless of which set it is running (obviously unless it is running moves designed to beat those pokemon, like taunt for blissey for example, but then it is limited by the number of moveslots it has. salamence can destroy you regardless of which set it's running if you mispredict just once.). i think you are confused about what a healthy metagame vs an unhealthy metagame. unbanning pokemon that have been ALREADY JUSTIFIABLY DEEMED BROKEN is not the solution for heatran, a perfectly balanced pokemon, being the #1 used pokemon in the game. it is overused for all of the right reasons. once again, if you are simply sick of heatran being overused, or you think heatran being everywhere is no fun or something, that's not a valid reason to unbalance the tier.

    like you said, you've peaked at #1 many times on the ladder over the course of 15 months. i'm sure you would wreck people just as easily, in fact probably much more easily, if you used salamence yourself. that's the problem with running a test on a metagame that doesn't get the same activity as it used to: there aren't as many good players as there used to be. it's a WASTE OF TIME that could ruin a metagame that there's no reason to try to "fix" anymore because it isn't broken and it's been played that way without complaints for years.
     
  10. -Manaphy--

    -Manaphy-- Overconsumption

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    Can we please stop this "Unban Latias" crap. As far as I can tell, a lot of the reason to Unban Latias is because of people supposed definition of "fun" which isn't an argument and is variable. Also many of these supposed counters will fall to one of it's moves (Tyranitar) or Trick (Blissey) And yes, I did and have played the metagame before and after Latias was banned. It was quite an overcentralizing force. Just the fact that Scarftar started to become popular (a normally stupid set to use in my opinion) shows it's effect.

    Also, you should not use the "2 broken things check each other" argument because if something is broken it should be banned regardless.

    I still think testing Salamence is a good idea because it was a quite questionable ban.
     
  11. Fakes

    Fakes Member

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    i don´t wanna make the metagame fun for myself :/
    i just write that wrong :(
    well i let toher guys speak now cause my english sucks and i can´t write it so that ppl get what i mean :333
     
  12. Tobi

    Tobi Obito, une autre réalité

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    Latias must be ban, Salamence is very abused too, he has few counter and he is played with Magnezone.. (Porygon 2 is the only true counter.) You will see for yourself.
     
  13. pokemonnerd

    pokemonnerd Only uso listens to pnerd. Devo too. Article Contributor Article Contributor

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    Not really, I think it should be retested because it was quite easy for Mence to sweep after Latias blew holes with Specs(and of course, the user will always predict perfectly with it). At the very least it truly is much easier to have an answer for than Mence, even if it somehow always tricks on a Blissey switch in. It never got a chance to be tested without Salamence's presence, while Salamence itself barely needs another dragon to overpower its counters.

    I also never saw how Salamence was easier to play around, as people keep implying.
     
  14. zeroality

    zeroality Artificial Insanity

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    Yeah, I don't know. I never felt Latias was uber myself either. I ran +spdef CB pursuit Tyranitar so I never really had problems with it.

    We'll see how this goes first.
     
  15. shrapn3l

    shrapn3l Member

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    latias was banned first because it was more obviously overpowered than salamence in that metagame since latias itself was a common check for salamence and there were fewer solid checks for latias than mence. but they both were and ARE overcentralizing forces. choiced latias still forces people to use MULTIPLE steel types and/or scarf ttar. arguing that latias is not broken without salamence in the metagame makes absolutely no sense... getting rid of salamence doesn't make latias less powerful. but all of that is beside the point because this thread is about the pointless salamence retest that's going on and not any potential latias retest which is an equally dumb idea.

    anyway salamence is harder to play around because you have to guess which set it has correctly or you lose, but latias can just bully teams with huge specs draco meteors and it doesn't matter if you know it has specs or not because draco meteor is punching holes in your team regardless.

    also running oddly specific counters for a pokemon and succeeding in beating it because of said counter does not mean the pokemon isn't broken. the fact that the pokemon forces you to use things that you would otherwise never use is a symptom of overcentralization. do you guys just not get what overcentralization is and why it is bad or what? in ADV, you could potentially beat kyogre with ou pokemon like blissey with max sdef psych up and thunder or like lanturn or some shit but that doesn't mean kyogre should be unbanned, because unbanning kyogre would force everyone to use those otherwise worthless things in ou. i realize that this is a bit of an exaggerated example but sincerely hope that it will at least get people to stop chiming in with pointless comments like "yeah i used 3 steel types and max sdef haban berry tyranitar on every team and i never had any problems with latias." honestly, in what other scenario is +sdef cbtar better than +atk? no other pokemon in the metagame forces cbtar to use +sdef. latias is that much of a hindrance.
     
    Last edited: May 25, 2012
  16. LizardMan

    LizardMan Member

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    It doesn't matter if SpDef Tyranitar counters Latias in gen 4. It is an obscure counter. When Latias was OU in that metagame, it was quite rare. People didn't use it to counter it, because there was no reason to. Steels + Scarf Tyranitar were the primary checks.
     
  17. Xdevo

    Xdevo Phrasing Super Moderator Tour Director Super Moderator Tour Director

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    Honestly, if we are going to test Latias again, we should give Manaphy another shot. Both were barely voted Uber in the end of the 3rd Stage. Manaphy had plenty of checks, at least more than Latias ever did. Tail Glow doesn't give the +3 boost it does today, there is no Perma-Rain, things like Vaporeon, Shaymin, Ludicolo, Abomasnow, Celebi, Suicune with Roar or HP Electric, Blissey, etc. all make great checks to it.

    I'm not going to blatantly say that Manaphy probably isn't broken, but it has just as many faults as Salamence and Latias, and if we are going to go back and mess with the tier just for the sake of it, Manaphy deserves its own test.
     
  18. M Dragon

    M Dragon Active Member

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    No, thats false.
    Manaphy was never OU, and in the only OU like metagame it was voted Uber.
    Also latias is a pokemon that was voted OU a lot of times, and Uber once, the suspect system was very unfair, more like a lets vote latias until it gets uber. Latias want broken at all.

    Like GSC lax, or ADV t-tar, or Heatran and FWG cores in general right now.
    And I disagree, salamence is better than latias

    So Dragonite still forces people to use MULTIPLE steel types

    anyway infernape is harder to play around because you have to guess which set it has correctly or you lose.
    What you say for latias is true for any hard hitter.


    I never felt they were Uber
     
    Last edited: May 25, 2012
  19. T-Dogg

    T-Dogg Member

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    While we're at it, can we test Deoxys-S? I never felt that was Uber.
     
  20. Xdevo

    Xdevo Phrasing Super Moderator Tour Director Super Moderator Tour Director

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    What the hell are you talking about?

    Manaphy was voted OU a bunch of times just like Latias, in fact the only times that Manaphy was voted uber in Stage 3 were the same times that Latias was as well (so no it wasn't only voted uber once, it was actually twice with both votes being around 55%). Honestly the only reason either was voted OU in the early stages was the fact that they were overshadowed by the other, much more broken suspects like Latios and Garchomp.


    @ T-dogg, The funny thing is, Deo-S was removed from the ladder before the vote because so many people complained.

    Deo-D on the other hand...
     
  21. M Dragon

    M Dragon Active Member

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    Deoxys-S was Uber because the lead set (screens or hazards) under the old support characteristics.
    Also, Im not talking about stage 3 (where lati@s, manaphy, skymin, deoxys-s and garchomp were being tested). In the first round Deoxys got an early ban, and Latios and Skymin were voted Uber, in the second round garchomp was voted Uber, and in the third round (with manaphy and latias left as suspects), manaphy got supermajority Uber, but that was in Suspect Ladder, Manaphy was never OU, while Latias was OU for more than a year, where it was voted multiple times, until it got Uber.

    Manaphy was a suspect, it was never OU, and in the suspect test, when the metagame was similar to the standard (chomp, latios, skymin, deo-s uber), manaphy was voted Uber, so yeah, it was voted OU in a metagame with Latios, Garchomp and Skymin
     
  22. Trotski

    Trotski Member

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    Deo-S has nothing to do in DPP OU as it's already quiete broken in BW OU.

    A mon that has never been tester or questioned in dpp OU and that really needs his test is Deo-D which for odd reasons, has never been tested in OU (i think) and is definitevely not as broken as deo-s.

    Now, concerning Salamence, as i said, his criterias to be ban are all subjective and cause of that, the council members aren't eiligible as they do not represent the opinions of the majority of players.

    Also, MixMence isn't hard to handdle knowing that it's taken off by the first Scarftar who will SE/pursuit , depending on the mind game and knwing that salamence never eq first in the first turns and then it will either less eq if he doesn't know yet you're playing scarftar.
     
  23. Xdevo

    Xdevo Phrasing Super Moderator Tour Director Super Moderator Tour Director

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    No, not at all. Stage three was where they put all the suspects on the ladder and voted them out in smaller stages (3-1 was Latios, Skymin, Deo-S and iirc Wobb, 3-2 was Chomp, 3-3 and 3-4 were Manaphy and latias alone, and 3-5 is where Latias got its second Uber vote. The only reason Latias was voted beforehand was in Stage One and Two where the suspect leaders had very little idea what they wanted to do.

    Manaphy was voted Uber in the EXACT SAME FUCKING METAGAME AS OU. Chomp, Latios, Skymin, and Deo-S were already banned when Manaphy got its uber vote. The only other suspect on the ladder when it was banned was Latias. If you keep lying like this, you'll lose that big reputation that you love to have.
     
  24. pokemonnerd

    pokemonnerd Only uso listens to pnerd. Devo too. Article Contributor Article Contributor

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    I don't think you get my point. At all. Like I said before, Latias is just way too one dimensional; there's hardly any guessing involved, as it's either going to be subCM or just Choice Specs. It's much easier to predict what it will do than Infernape, what with its ability to Nasty Plot, Swords Dance, just U-Turn out on anything to gain momentum(which latias can't do as well), or just hit hard from both the physical and special side, like Salamence can do. The main difference is that Dragon STAB is just amazing in and of itself which puts Salamence in an entirely different league when you're talking about a mixed set; you know, since you basically only have to worry about steel types.

    Actually I just noticed you completely misread what I said in my post. So yeah, read more carefully. Also, jog your memory a bit, I definitely remember a Manaphy vote. Although it's a lot more threatening than Latias seeing as how it can boost up to +2 immediately and doesn't need specs to (possibly)overcome its would be counters. Plus those possible 101 subs...ugh.

    Then again I don't see why exactly we're messing with DP now, although if we're retesting Mence might as well try something else as well. As long as we're not stupid enough to say something like Skymin isn't broken.
     
    Last edited: May 25, 2012
  25. monferno

    monferno blazing

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    I think Tail Glow Manaphy is still very dangerous. 100 / 100 / 100 defensive stats makes it very hard to revenge kill, Tail Glow with three attacks also has great coverage and with 100 base Speed you at least speed tie with all Grass-types you'll commonly see, and +2 Ice Beam KOes. Most Water-types and Dragon-types bar Kingdra and Starmie lose to it as well. And there's always the option of dropping coverage for RainRest which lets it beat a ton of otherwise counters, Blissey becomes setup fodder and if you use Calm Mind you can even set up on Tinkerbell Celebi. Kingdra loses to CM Manaphy as well since Outrage doesn't do much to 252 HP / 252 Def Bold with those base stats and it can be Rested off in one turn. Though I'll admit I have never played with Manaphy in DP OU so it might be awful I don't know, but it was banned for good reason. Stage 3-3 np thread here.

    On a side note, I've created a channel on PO called DPP OU Suspect for discussing.
     
  26. M Dragon

    M Dragon Active Member

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    You are wrong, Manaphy was never allowed in the STANDARD OU ladder, while Latias was.

    Stage 3-3 voting results:
    Latias: 40.0% Uber (18 OU, 12 Uber, 2 Abstain)
    Manaphy: 64.3% Uber (10 OU, 18 Uber, 4 Abstain)

    You are confusing the Suspect ladder and the Standard ladder.
    In the first latias voting (NOT stage 3-1), latias got 17 votes OU, and 4 votes Uber, so it was included in the Standard ladder.
    In the first Manaphy voting, Manaphy got 13 votes Uber and 10 OU, so it wasnt included in the Standard ladder.

    After that, in the SUSPECT ladder, in the stage 3, manaphy got banned in stage 3-4, while latias got uber in stage 3-5, after more than 1 year in standard ladder.

    Difference is that Manaphy was never OU, because it was never allowed in the standard ladder, and thats a fact.



    Many good DP players agree that the latias metagame was better than this one, but im not sure if its a good idea changing an old metagame


    I was quoting shrapn3l , and he was talking about Salamence
     
    Last edited: May 25, 2012
  27. pokemonnerd

    pokemonnerd Only uso listens to pnerd. Devo too. Article Contributor Article Contributor

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    Well then, I need to take reading classes apparently. Never mind me.
    Could have sworn that didn't say who you were quoting when I first loaded that post.
     
  28. Manxer

    Manxer I'm Asian, that's why :P

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    I think DPP should be left as it is, if you want to use Mence, you can do a fun tournament that allows Mence, and maybe Latias as well
     
  29. shrapn3l

    shrapn3l Member

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    Last edited: May 26, 2012
  30. Jamiroquai

    Jamiroquai New Member

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    I made a forum account just to post in this discussion :P

    Been playing competitve for a couple of months now, had baout 150 OU 4th Gen battles (as I dislike 5th Gen), so perhaps my opinion is not the best or most prefound as I'm sort of playing in the past.

    I came up against 2 Mence's in a row and noticed the unban for the retest. Seeing as I had no idea (For the 2 Mence's) that he was unbanned I couldn't have prepared at all, and I'm not one of these people who finds their name on the PO server list to view their team (as so my team is hidden). Firstly, he switched into my Banded Breloom. I predicted him to bring out an earlier seen Gyarados, but he decided to bring in a Mence, to which died after SR damage. Circumstances where in my favour. The next encounter he siwtched in on my Nape and DM'd. I brought Starmie in and Ice Beam'd for the KO.

    In circumstances like this, earlier game, it's easily defeatable, but then again most poke's are if you still have your checks & counters alive. I decided to use it for myself. I first ran it alongside a Ninjask baton pass lead. With a SD & +2 Speed (In essence like 2 DD's), I was able to sweep his entire team bar his Empolean, who Mence died on via LO recoil (I scored a few 2HKO's hense my lower health).

    Through playing I realised that if I concelead my Mence for wallbreaking or late game sweeping he was pretty deadly. Sure, Mence is super powerful, but so is a load of other OU material if their checks & counters are removed.
     
  31. Trotski

    Trotski Member

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    These are typically subjective posts that have nothing to do on Salamence unban threat. Come on, what's the point of saying that "mence isn't broken, i killes it yesterday with my starmie" or "do a tournament with mence if you want to unban it", come on guys, try to be serious a bit.^^
     
  32. Platinum

    Platinum ~tilde~

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    04:33:31 Deria: as a backseat spectator I am just going to make a blanket statement that pkmn is serious business
     
  33. Xdevo

    Xdevo Phrasing Super Moderator Tour Director Super Moderator Tour Director

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    Did I ever say that it was on the Standard OU ladder? But when Manaphy received its two votes for Uber, the ladder was the same as OU + Manaphy (and Latias, but it was on the ladder anyway)

    Manaphy had to receive two Uber majority votes (and 64.3% isn't a supermajority) the next round both it and Latias received Uber votes, which forced a round 3-5 in which Latias was voted Uber for its second time. Both of these votes were on the Suspect ladder, the only place that ratings to keep things in OU or ban them counted.

    I was talking about the Suspect ladder the whole time.
    Yes, this was when we were testing Latias with Latios and Garchomp and Skymin etc. to see which ones were Uber. Latias was of course the least Uber out of the suspects so it would get voted OU. Especially since the Specs set had yet been used for Latias.

    Did I ever say it was on the OU ladder? No, I said it was in the same METAGAME, which round 3-3 and 3-4 were. The only difference was Manaphy being ubanned.



    A lot of good DP players also thought the Latios Metagame was fine, or the metagame with Garchomp was fine, and a lot of them say the metagame was also good without either Salamence or Latias.
     
  34. Jamiroquai

    Jamiroquai New Member

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    I was simply trying to give insight and share my recent experiences with it, and in fact my post ends with the point I was trying to make throughout the entire post, encouraging it to be unbanned.
     
  35. zeroality

    zeroality Artificial Insanity

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    Actually it came in handy vs Starmie - especially scarf/specs variants. Pursuit was usually a OHKO even if they didn't switch. My team also didn't have many that could take hits on the special side well, so it came in handy in taking random tbolts or whatnot from whatever.

    It also let Tyranitar take hits better from stuff like Heatran and Celebi.
     
  36. george182

    george182 Active Member

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    The point of unbanning is to create a better metagame.

    Salamence and Latias cannot both be in the OU metagame, it created a horrible metagame where the best strategy was triple dragon, triple steel.

    The metagame without Salamence and without Latias was the most balanced metagame gen4 has ever had. There was the most diversity in top level teams (at a low level you can use anything, so diversity should only be consider at high levels of play). I guess there was a slight overuse of FWG cores, but I really don't see what's wrong with that, considering the core itself achieves nothing special and is very easy to break. Heatran is also extremely popular, but that is because Heatran can fill so many different roles, so while the pokemon is being used loads, the set it's using are different e.g. sp.def, scarf, LO, specs, shuca, torment etc. But based on the most balanced and most diverse metagame, that is a metagame without Salamence and without Latias, where Stall, Semi Stall, Bulky Offense, Offense and Hyper Offense are all usable strategies. You can also use so many different pokemon, the use of sets like sp.def Roserade, Quagsire, Hitmontop, Moltress in the current metagame shows this.

    You only need to look at the useage statistics to see that Dp OU is the most diverse. Looking at the statistics for March 2012, the 20th most used pokemon in each generation:

    ADV OU: Heracross 9.23%
    Wifi OU: Landorus 8.11%
    Dpp OU: Gliscor 11.31%

    The 20th used pokemon has the highest useage percentage in Dp OU, which suggests that the useage in Dp OU is more spread out and not just centralised around the top few pokemon.

    Manaphy was allowed in OU for about 2 weeks after being voted OU in round 3.2 of voting in December 2009. But smogon decided to have a round 3.3 of voting and it was quickly sent back to the uber tier. Shoddy battle and the pokedex entry for Manaphy both stated that it was OU during this period of time. Regardless, Manaphy is most definitely uber, the tail glow sweeper is just too good. It outspeeds or ties with all OU grass types and can OHKO all of them with a +2 ice beam. No common scarfer can OHKO Manaphy. The only offensive OU pokemon that can check it are electric types and none of them enjoy switching into surfs. Basically it's really really hard for any offensive team to handle. Defensive teams are also in huge trouble, if they cannot hurt Manaphy then it just sets up to +6 and then your screwed.

    All this talk of Latias back in OU is stupid. Specs latias was a very dangerous set, that could easily wear down it's counters. The main problem with specs Latias is it's great typing, Latias checks so many threats and finds it so easy to switch in and then it's so easy to just spam Dracco meteor. You can also scarf Latias so it checks basically all sweepers. You can run a cm set and even a bulky cm set is stupidly effective. Latias can just switch in far too easily in this metagame.

    All Deoxys forms are broken, they are either too threatening offensively, or ridiculously good in a support role. Discussion around them is stupid.

    I also have to question how testing in a dead metagame, where very few good battlers still play, will be of any use.


    Now onto the point of this thread, why Salamence is broken.

    Salamence has two main offensive sets at the high level. Mix Mence and DD mence. Both are incredibly destructive. Mix mence can 2hko basically every commonly used pokemon in OU and DD mence can sweep through practically anything. Both of these sets have completely different checks and counters. The only 100% safe way to handle mence for an offensive team is to switch to something that DD mence cannot set up on and that you want to sack as death fodder. Anything else is a game of guess work, note this is not prediction based at all as you have no way of knowing what the opponents mence will do.

    The point I'm trying to make is that in order to just scout Salamence's set you have to sack a pokemon. Then after that you still have to force it out and then suffer it's wrath when it switches back in again. It is a very destructive pokemon and this causes problems in the metagame.

    Due to Salamence's destructive nature, it overcentralises teams based on handling it. Scizor was the no.1 used pokemon when Salamence was OU, mainly because Scizor served as a check to Salamence. Note that Scizor was only a check and it was easily trapped by Magnezone, yet it was still used more than any other pokemon because it could check mence and resist outrage. Salamence also encourages the very unhealthy overuse of choice scarfs. The Salamence metagame was unhealthily obsessed with speed because Salamence after a dragon dance is stupidly fast and another way to 'check' salamence is to outspeed the DD varient.

    Salamence also had a huge impact on the lead metagame. Salamence's presence in the metagame forced teams to get stealth rocks up early on. You had to get stealth rocks up as soon as possible, because you could not allow Salamence to switch in as many times as it wanted, because every time it does you have to play a guessing game to force it back out.

    Salamence discourages the use of stealth rock weak pokemon. Lots of teams use Salamence, so they are less likely to want to use another stealth rock weak pokemon as well. As previously mentioned, Salamence encourages the use of more stealth rocks, which makes other stealth rock weak pokemon less effective, thus discouraging their use.

    Salamence is unhealthy for the gen4 OU metagame. There is also nothing wrong with the current metagame and I have no idea why people are trying to change it. To quote nintendo when they were talking about the design of the diamond and pearl pokemon games "You can't fix what ain't broke".
     
    Last edited: May 29, 2012
  37. Jamiroquai

    Jamiroquai New Member

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    ^^ That's a good point you've made. I can't comment on what it use to be like, only now. I suppose early game it's easier to deal with (But then again what's not). I see a lot of scarfed starmie's and scarfed Flygon's, both of which (Flygon down to a speed tie after 1 DD) can revenge kill it. I think your right though, despite it's counters, it's just too powerful.

    Will a LO scizor KO it after SR with a bullet punch ?
     
  38. george182

    george182 Active Member

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    No, a choice band technician Scizor can't even OHKO after stealth rocks

    Adamant CB scizor vs 4 def Salamence:
    58.9% - 69.2%

    Adamant LO Scizor vs 4 def Salamence:
    50.8% - 59.8%
     
  39. pokemon0078

    pokemon0078 Member

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    I just want to point out that Smogon messes with ADV tiers subtly, like UU to OU, OU to UU, BL to OU, UU to NU, NU to UU, etc. because of the Smogon Premier League, which has all generations, and things that get used a lot, not at all, a little bit, etc. may change tiers.
    Using Smogon as a basis doesn't work because they never do something this drastic.
    On the topic of Salamence, why reverse a decision made by 9 of the most influential and proficient battlers of the time? I know nothing about Salamence OU, so that's all I've got.
     
  40. shrapn3l

    shrapn3l Member

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    it may be able to take hits better against a few special attackers (obviously) but it can counter all of those pokemon easily with just max atk. and as a result of going +sdef you are able to handle latias better and a few special attackers about the same as you could before, but you're dealing less damage against the entire metagame.

    also i must say this george182 fellow seems to be quite wise.
     
    Last edited: May 30, 2012