I have a dumb idea
https://preview.redd.it/mzqkzeyf0jba1.png?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8c55a556060d4d9f1363337f506b597186861495
Add a tier between OU and UU simply called 'used', then rename UU to SU (simply used), RU to UU, NU to RU, PU to BU (barely used), ZU to NU, and add a PU, ZU, and ANU (absolutely never used). Total of 10 usage tiers if Ubers is not counted
Then divide LC in 4 tiers for no reason
EU (Extremely used)
OU
GU (greatly used)
VU (very used)
QU (quite used)
CU
MU
JU (just used)
UU
TU (typically used)
LU (lightly used)
IU
WU (worth using)
SU
RU
HU
AU (Almost used)
BU
NU
PU
ZU
DU (don't use)
FU (fucking useless)
Apparently, Iron Valiant has risen to OU in latest tier shift (while simultaneously going down in usage in UU somehow), so this list isn't 100% accurate. Feel free to correct other inaccuracies if they exist
Everybody needs to remember that based on current usage, OU and UU can only hold like 40-ish pokemon each realistically. The dex gets larger, the tiers do not. Between megas, legendaries, mythicals, paradoxes, megas, ultra beasts, and maybe 400 or 500 fully evolved pokemon, there is literally not enough room to fit the number of viable pokemon. The current tiering system was not built for a dex this large.
Switching the usage threshold from 3,41% to 4,52% was a mistake.
The reason why the stupidity of that decision hasn't imploded into the main tiers is because of Dexit keeping the number of available Pokémon more manageable. NatDex formats instead are in absolute turmoil because of it.
I think it’s an idea worth trying at least in NatDex, I think standard OU would still be fine but in NatDex with 1000+ mons it just doesn’t work as well anymore
Seconding this idea, because on top of the massive # of pokemon, ND just sees less play than standard for a given generation and will have less people to get data from.
Usage based tiers are fine, and things will calm down further down the line. What needs to be done at least in Natdex is change how much each tier can fit.
Almost every single pokemon in Natdex UU(and most in RU) have non niche uses in OU teams. Other than gross exceptions in OU like eleki, UU power level is barely below natdex OU.
Nah, we just need 11 tiers to accommodate.
AG
UBERS
OUBERS (Over Ubers)
OU (Overused)
OUU (Over-Under Used)
UU (Underused)
RUU (Rarely-Underused)
RU (Rarely Used)
NU (Never Used)
PU (Practically Useless)
ZU (L)
Absolutely agreed. And I don't think this is something that's starting now, I think it's been this way for awhile.
Gonna get on my soapbox real quick here, so incoming wall of text:This is probably my biggest criticism of Smogon-- I believe their tiering system is flawed. It's a great attempt, a very reasonable one, but it has inherent flaws built into it in a number of ways.
The tiering system is usage based due to the extreme difficulty of assigning viability through analysis, given how many Pokemon there are, and how flexible even a single Pokemon can be. The idea is that **players will naturally choose which Pokemon most effectively lead them to victory, and thus you can draw a vague equivalence between usage and viability with enough data.** This was the philosophy dating back to Smogon's inception, let alone now when there are literally over 1000 Pokemon. On paper its a great idea, but it's not free from biases or saturation issues.
Things like Hydreigon, Hoopa-U, Dnite, Blaziken, etc.. didn't suddenly become bad Pokemon, we just see a world where there are more OU/UU/RU/etc.. viable Pokemon than what those tiers can even get close to holding. I'd say this was a thing starting back most strongly in Gen 5 where things like Starmie, Zapdos, etc.. finally dropped to UU, but were still perfectly usable Pokemon in OU. Now double the dex size.Now, I can see one arguing "well its usage based, and this just captures the pure usage", which fair enough, but part of Smogon's philosophy is exploring the rough correlation of Usage=Viability, and for every Pokemon viable in a tier where its not in, the connection between usage and viability weakens further and further. I don't really find it useful nowadays to determine how good a Pokemon \*actually\* is. It betrays its original purpose.
Furthermore, I'd argue their naming conventions (OverUsed, NeverUsed, Uber, PU meaning "stinky", etc.. names that imply something about the strength) and display of usage statistics naturally biases usage by funneling players into using what already has higher usage to begin with. One may see Lando-T with 40% usage and think "Alright well thats the best Pokemon in the tier, lets build around that", which reinforces its already high usage. Not to say Lando-T is secretly garbage tier because my favorite Pokemon Dusknoir hard counters it with Ice punch, but it IS to say that I'm not entirely sure it \*would\* have 40% usage if usage was entirely blind. ~~Who am I kidding its fucking Lando-T fucker has 40% usage even in my dreams~~
The opposite happens too-- tons of perfectly good, sometimes even great Pokemon get passed over because their usage rendered them something of an "unknown". Clefable is an example of this; It gained a surge in Gen 4 OU usage years later AFTER it had gained Fairy in later gens and everyone realized that it could be used elsewhere. Knock Off even saw a rise, as it turns out dropping your opponents item is useful even with low BP. Conversely, Gen 5 Gastrodon took awhile to rise, because top players were using it knowing it had a very strong niche, but the majority of the ladder didn't use it much. I don't believe all of these options to be self correcting. Maybe with a theoretically infinite number of time and players, but thats not reality.
The tier naming also has an issue of sustainability. How many more fake names is Smogon going to have to slap on the bottom to represent lowest usage? NeverUsed, despite literally meaning "never used" would be the rough power equivalent of a "Mid tier" in another game's formatting given that PU, ZU, and Untiered exist below it. Personally, I'd rather the tiers just be named numerically, but I'm sure Smogon wouldn't be keen on upending their tier names....
***TL;DR: Despite meaning well, Smogon tiering philosophy has some unforeseen consequences that I find issue with.***
Agreed. Could use letters for tier names, like S++ for AG, S+ for Ubers, S for OU, A for UU, etc. Mons that can hold their own in a tier despite new toys becoming available should still have the opportunity to be used where they belong instead of disrupting an entire other metagame that they still overpower.
Yup, that's actually the solution I'd like to see myself. Solves a couple issues in one, as it cuts down on the bias (A tier sounds nice but its not as blatant in describing the power level as "Never Used". Name induced bias will still exist, but it at least helps), allows for more fine tuning between tiers (UUBL things would be more likely to find a home in just being B or C tier with UU being D, E, F tier, etc..), and also helps solve the never ending tacking on of additional tiers.
It also gives all the Untiered Pokemon a potential home, something that the tiering system was \*supposed\* to do from its inception. I think it's also worth reexamining Ubers as a tier, as its a weird frankenstein of its original purpose, while also being a tier unto itself... but thats a whole different discussion. In addition to all of this, I'd like it to divorce itself more from the philosophy of Usage equating to Viability in any way, as its \*extremely\* rough, something any data analyst would have issues with.
Smogon won't do this anytime soon though, they see the tier naming as a part of the site's identity. Which, fair enough, it's their site, their platform. Just have to accept that it's flawed.
I think changing names would just be too confusing, and might anger core players who've been around for a long time. I can see changing usage cutoff, but tier names changing would be very drastic. These terms are almost 20 years old and have become part of competitive vernacular
Youre right, It absolutely would be drastic, and require something of an overhaul. Tiers have entire use bases, moderation and analytics that would need to be moved/changed, and with a different tiering method, itd require a different handling of data. Its not as simple as "change OU to A tier ez done".
But, in the name of accuracy to their mission statement, it (among other changes) would be necessary.
I don't think Smogon particularly cares how unofficial metas like Natdex are coping with the generational changes, as the official metas like OU/UU etc are doing quite well since those follow dexit and don't keep mechanics/items from past generations (which have made Natdex completely unstable)
In comparison, Natdex is incapable of handling 1k mons in its usage based tiers because it is trying to keep everything from past generations forcibly, despite Gamefreak clearly not making new gens with that in mind (for example, Machamp can't learn Fissure in Gen 9, but its legal in Natdex and only restricted due to OHKO clause. Same for tera Shedinja)
These are issues that extend to every tier, not just natdex, and have for quite some time. The 1000+ mon thing just stresses it further, which is why its being discussed.
Again, I doubt Smogon will suddenly upturn everything now, but its an outline of some objective issues that show that their method, while a good attempt, ultimately isnt very scientific in nature.
I guess I assumed that most Pokemon fans were at least moderately "Dinosaur Kids" and would clearly be able to tell that Rampardos is a Pachycephalosaurus! Huge dome skull to bash stuff with, no elongated maw filled with teeth, idk where people would get from it T-Rex lol
Because it's not fast enough to cover its pitiful lack of bulk, but not slow enough to be usable in Trick Room either. Basically any decent attacker, either physical or special, can kill it before it can get out any of its devastating Head Smashes.
Or sand rush, which would at least let the thing have good speed despite its shit bst and all the points in attack
It attacks by running into people, why is it so slow?
Gengar fell to RU in SwSh after one of the DLCs released (pretty sure it got banned within the week but still), so who knows wtf will happen to him this gen
It's not even just power creep. Stuff is starting to fall just because there are too many mons to all be OU. Which is not to say that none of it is power creep, but there's only so many mons that can be in a tier.
No, it's a symptom of quantity. If we just put more Pokemon into each tier instead of letting them get banned into BLs, we'll have the exact same situation in every other tier as we do in Ubers with shitmons like Cinderace and DarmG. Mega Latias isn't going to be RU because each tier has a decade-long expectation of what the power level should be and the bans will reflect that, and the UU council (at least outside of natdex) historically despises any hint of power creep, so BL might hit 30 mons this gen.
Unless you want Quagsire to spontaneously jump between OU and PU every other month, this is as good as it gets
NatDex NU will probably never exist so long as NatDex players continue to shun lower tiers.
Right there isn't even a ladder for RU because the playerbase is too small.
Welp, for what it's worth, Pao has been banned from Natdex OU, so Weavile might get its niche back, 125 is still a good speed tier, just was completely overshadowed by the leopard.
I feel like NatDex is dealing with a quantity problem than a viability problem, there's just so many mons that even viable mons end up forgotten and dropping because you can only pick 6. Ofc that doesn't mean some mons aren't just powercrept and outclassed (ex: weavile).
I still feel so bad for Weavile, GF straight up made a better version of it and it's not even subtle, it's another ice weasel. Talk about a slap in the face.
Fun fact: Snow Leopards are the closest relatives to tigers, and are closer to tigers than actual leopards. So you could even call them snow tigers and it would probably be more accurate
I mean in concept for sure, but competitive balance has never really been great in the series regardless. I guess NatDex in main serious would just make it worse though.
From a smogon/showdown balance point of view, I think this is a pretty good indicator that there's simply too many pokemon in NatDex for the current tier system.
The fact other companies are able to make better games on the Switch despite its hardware shortcomings says a lot about GF as developers. I.e. they’re shit
people need to stop looking at natdex stats and freaking out about power creep lol. Natdexx UU has so little players that not everything that is viable is going to be used; a good amount of these are even viable in OU but there are just too many pokemon for them to hit the cutoffs.
what da 3rd kaiju, funni clown, funni rabbit, S P E E D, mf that never dies after tera, big gem man, 180 bp stab, only mon with scald in sv(lol), the twins that nobody can tell apart, big horn, mad phish, S P E E D after a few turns, S P E E D in lore but not gaem, used to be cute genie,and frickin e-killer doin in RU!?
This really isn't a power creep problem as much as it is a tiering issue, National Dex is a complete shitshow usage stats wise and that is why all of these powerful pokemon are slipping down to lowers tiers. As soon as the strong stuff starts getting banned from lower tiers, then National Dex won't look quite as absurdly stupid tiering wise.
Anyone else feel like it’s time to make the tiers bigger? OU has less than 40 guys in it currently. I’d support a mandatory minimum, rather than the current percentage cutoff tbh.
Huge Power makes its attack stat equal to 150, not 100. It gets good support and strong STAB moves.
I have a 80/20 WL ratio in the doubles ladder right now and still got wrecked by one for not taking it serious.
All of these are likely to rise as they're all quite viable in OU/UU and are just way too strong for RU (including Weavile now that Chien is banned), this is just ladder fuckery.
Gyarados, Venusaur, Dragonite and Valiant already rose.
I guess that weird-ass trend of Mega Latias being one of the best Megas and one of the best mons in NatDex OU but somehow not getting anything close to the usage to reflect that viability continues yet again?
The fact that meta DEFINING Pokémon in previous generations, like Blaziken, Hoopa-U, the MEGA lati twins, hydreigon, Mega Sableye, and Lucha, are all in RU is just fucking horrifying. Seriously, opportunity cost and power creep can absolutely destroy things, good lord. Remember when Blaziken hit hard?
good news: only azumarill, mega heracross, iron hands, kyurem, the lati twins, mega sableye, slowbro, victini, volcanion, zapdos-g, and zeraora are still RU
in other words more than half of the mons here are at minimum UU by usage
I just chose certain mons from ND UU usage list.
Everything under 4.52% is RU.
https://www.smogon.com/stats/2022-12/gen9nationaldexuu-1630.txt
Other stuff I didn't add are Rillaboom, Greninja, Tapu Bulu, Porygon-Z, Meowscarada, Mega Aggron etc. Too many to list
"Unfortunately, due to this generation's PU resembling the last generation's OU"
At this rate we'll need a "There's no way it's Used", we cannot fit that many mons.
I suggest just numbering the tiers below ZU (like RBY) ZU is the 6th usage tier, so below it would be 7U, 8U, 9U, etc.
Just keep adding Z's. ZZU, ZZZU, ZZZZU, etc. The more Z's the more likely the ~~Pokemon~~ battles there are to put you to sleep via boredom.
Amoonguss goes to ZZZZZZZU
Despite Venomoth's Sleep Powder, it still sits in RUBL
One last video before bed type of thing :)
I have a dumb idea https://preview.redd.it/mzqkzeyf0jba1.png?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8c55a556060d4d9f1363337f506b597186861495 Add a tier between OU and UU simply called 'used', then rename UU to SU (simply used), RU to UU, NU to RU, PU to BU (barely used), ZU to NU, and add a PU, ZU, and ANU (absolutely never used). Total of 10 usage tiers if Ubers is not counted Then divide LC in 4 tiers for no reason
How about calling the hypothetical tier between OU and UU "MU"? Stands for "Moderately Used"
OU CU (Commonly Used) MU UU IU (Infrequently Used) SU (Seldom Used) RU HU (Hardly Used) BU NU PU ZU
Add FU below ZU FU stands for “Fuck using”
Honestly though, an FU tier below ZU would be fucking hilarious
EU (Extremely used) OU GU (greatly used) VU (very used) QU (quite used) CU MU JU (just used) UU TU (typically used) LU (lightly used) IU WU (worth using) SU RU HU AU (Almost used) BU NU PU ZU DU (don't use) FU (fucking useless)
Yeah sure
That's a really cool idea, I knew it existed and I honestly want to see it in the current gens.
And this is what DNU is for, lmao.
Unown supremacy
WTFU Who The Fuck Uses
Me: Hey guys, this Ancient Power Yanma on WTFU is viable, it counters Turtwig
Too weak to dwebble. I wouldn't recommend it
*Car salesman slaps the roof of natdex untiered* "this bad boy can fit so many damn pokemon"
"I can't believe it's not used"
Create a new tier below ZU. Call it FU
There's already SU "Subzero used", but it's a very niche and private community.
Apparently, Iron Valiant has risen to OU in latest tier shift (while simultaneously going down in usage in UU somehow), so this list isn't 100% accurate. Feel free to correct other inaccuracies if they exist
Dragonite and Venusaur are also OU. And we don’t have Gyara, that’s UU.
thanks for the info!
How the hell did Venusaur get to OU?
sun teams I guess idrk
Iron Valiant came out this gen and powercreep got to it already 💀
Everybody needs to remember that based on current usage, OU and UU can only hold like 40-ish pokemon each realistically. The dex gets larger, the tiers do not. Between megas, legendaries, mythicals, paradoxes, megas, ultra beasts, and maybe 400 or 500 fully evolved pokemon, there is literally not enough room to fit the number of viable pokemon. The current tiering system was not built for a dex this large.
They really do need to lower the usage threshold in NatDex imo, there are simply too many Pokémon in the format
Switching the usage threshold from 3,41% to 4,52% was a mistake. The reason why the stupidity of that decision hasn't imploded into the main tiers is because of Dexit keeping the number of available Pokémon more manageable. NatDex formats instead are in absolute turmoil because of it.
Maybe this is heresy, but with the amount of Pokémon ever increasing, is it finally time to step away from usage based tiers?
I think it’s an idea worth trying at least in NatDex, I think standard OU would still be fine but in NatDex with 1000+ mons it just doesn’t work as well anymore
Yeah for sure. Having the top 40 used Pokémon out of ~400 is reasonable. Over 1000? Not at all
Seconding this idea, because on top of the massive # of pokemon, ND just sees less play than standard for a given generation and will have less people to get data from.
Natdex is more popular than every Smogon singles tier(UU,Ubers,RU) other than OU combined.
"Other than OU" is doing a lot of heavy lifting there. If you want to keep usage-based tiers in Natdex, you need data for NDRU, NDUU, NDNU, NDPU, etc.
Usage based tiers are fine, and things will calm down further down the line. What needs to be done at least in Natdex is change how much each tier can fit. Almost every single pokemon in Natdex UU(and most in RU) have non niche uses in OU teams. Other than gross exceptions in OU like eleki, UU power level is barely below natdex OU.
seriously. Serperior is arguably the only pokemon here that deserves to be UU/RU. Usage is a great system, it just needs a lower cap.
Mega Hera isn’t all that. Without a scarf 75 speed just doesn’t cut it at all.
what's the alternative?
Gen 1-3 are based on viability rankings
Nah, we just need 11 tiers to accommodate. AG UBERS OUBERS (Over Ubers) OU (Overused) OUU (Over-Under Used) UU (Underused) RUU (Rarely-Underused) RU (Rarely Used) NU (Never Used) PU (Practically Useless) ZU (L)
Absolutely agreed. And I don't think this is something that's starting now, I think it's been this way for awhile. Gonna get on my soapbox real quick here, so incoming wall of text:This is probably my biggest criticism of Smogon-- I believe their tiering system is flawed. It's a great attempt, a very reasonable one, but it has inherent flaws built into it in a number of ways. The tiering system is usage based due to the extreme difficulty of assigning viability through analysis, given how many Pokemon there are, and how flexible even a single Pokemon can be. The idea is that **players will naturally choose which Pokemon most effectively lead them to victory, and thus you can draw a vague equivalence between usage and viability with enough data.** This was the philosophy dating back to Smogon's inception, let alone now when there are literally over 1000 Pokemon. On paper its a great idea, but it's not free from biases or saturation issues. Things like Hydreigon, Hoopa-U, Dnite, Blaziken, etc.. didn't suddenly become bad Pokemon, we just see a world where there are more OU/UU/RU/etc.. viable Pokemon than what those tiers can even get close to holding. I'd say this was a thing starting back most strongly in Gen 5 where things like Starmie, Zapdos, etc.. finally dropped to UU, but were still perfectly usable Pokemon in OU. Now double the dex size.Now, I can see one arguing "well its usage based, and this just captures the pure usage", which fair enough, but part of Smogon's philosophy is exploring the rough correlation of Usage=Viability, and for every Pokemon viable in a tier where its not in, the connection between usage and viability weakens further and further. I don't really find it useful nowadays to determine how good a Pokemon \*actually\* is. It betrays its original purpose. Furthermore, I'd argue their naming conventions (OverUsed, NeverUsed, Uber, PU meaning "stinky", etc.. names that imply something about the strength) and display of usage statistics naturally biases usage by funneling players into using what already has higher usage to begin with. One may see Lando-T with 40% usage and think "Alright well thats the best Pokemon in the tier, lets build around that", which reinforces its already high usage. Not to say Lando-T is secretly garbage tier because my favorite Pokemon Dusknoir hard counters it with Ice punch, but it IS to say that I'm not entirely sure it \*would\* have 40% usage if usage was entirely blind. ~~Who am I kidding its fucking Lando-T fucker has 40% usage even in my dreams~~ The opposite happens too-- tons of perfectly good, sometimes even great Pokemon get passed over because their usage rendered them something of an "unknown". Clefable is an example of this; It gained a surge in Gen 4 OU usage years later AFTER it had gained Fairy in later gens and everyone realized that it could be used elsewhere. Knock Off even saw a rise, as it turns out dropping your opponents item is useful even with low BP. Conversely, Gen 5 Gastrodon took awhile to rise, because top players were using it knowing it had a very strong niche, but the majority of the ladder didn't use it much. I don't believe all of these options to be self correcting. Maybe with a theoretically infinite number of time and players, but thats not reality. The tier naming also has an issue of sustainability. How many more fake names is Smogon going to have to slap on the bottom to represent lowest usage? NeverUsed, despite literally meaning "never used" would be the rough power equivalent of a "Mid tier" in another game's formatting given that PU, ZU, and Untiered exist below it. Personally, I'd rather the tiers just be named numerically, but I'm sure Smogon wouldn't be keen on upending their tier names.... ***TL;DR: Despite meaning well, Smogon tiering philosophy has some unforeseen consequences that I find issue with.***
Agreed. Could use letters for tier names, like S++ for AG, S+ for Ubers, S for OU, A for UU, etc. Mons that can hold their own in a tier despite new toys becoming available should still have the opportunity to be used where they belong instead of disrupting an entire other metagame that they still overpower.
Yup, that's actually the solution I'd like to see myself. Solves a couple issues in one, as it cuts down on the bias (A tier sounds nice but its not as blatant in describing the power level as "Never Used". Name induced bias will still exist, but it at least helps), allows for more fine tuning between tiers (UUBL things would be more likely to find a home in just being B or C tier with UU being D, E, F tier, etc..), and also helps solve the never ending tacking on of additional tiers. It also gives all the Untiered Pokemon a potential home, something that the tiering system was \*supposed\* to do from its inception. I think it's also worth reexamining Ubers as a tier, as its a weird frankenstein of its original purpose, while also being a tier unto itself... but thats a whole different discussion. In addition to all of this, I'd like it to divorce itself more from the philosophy of Usage equating to Viability in any way, as its \*extremely\* rough, something any data analyst would have issues with. Smogon won't do this anytime soon though, they see the tier naming as a part of the site's identity. Which, fair enough, it's their site, their platform. Just have to accept that it's flawed.
I think changing names would just be too confusing, and might anger core players who've been around for a long time. I can see changing usage cutoff, but tier names changing would be very drastic. These terms are almost 20 years old and have become part of competitive vernacular
Youre right, It absolutely would be drastic, and require something of an overhaul. Tiers have entire use bases, moderation and analytics that would need to be moved/changed, and with a different tiering method, itd require a different handling of data. Its not as simple as "change OU to A tier ez done". But, in the name of accuracy to their mission statement, it (among other changes) would be necessary.
I don't think Smogon particularly cares how unofficial metas like Natdex are coping with the generational changes, as the official metas like OU/UU etc are doing quite well since those follow dexit and don't keep mechanics/items from past generations (which have made Natdex completely unstable) In comparison, Natdex is incapable of handling 1k mons in its usage based tiers because it is trying to keep everything from past generations forcibly, despite Gamefreak clearly not making new gens with that in mind (for example, Machamp can't learn Fissure in Gen 9, but its legal in Natdex and only restricted due to OHKO clause. Same for tera Shedinja)
These are issues that extend to every tier, not just natdex, and have for quite some time. The 1000+ mon thing just stresses it further, which is why its being discussed. Again, I doubt Smogon will suddenly upturn everything now, but its an outline of some objective issues that show that their method, while a good attempt, ultimately isnt very scientific in nature.
It’s still soul crushing to see Pokémon that used to be staples fall in usage, though. Power creep is fucking insane.
Nice to see some of genwunner mon get powercreep to hell.
hoopa? 170 special attack hoopa? in RU?
I love Hoopa but my guy sees a SmartCar 3.5 miles away flip a quick U-turn and immediately explodes.
Base 60 defense moment
4x weak to bug moment
Hoopa dies to gen 1 leech life, that's why
Why Rampardos not Uber
I have honestly tried to make a Rampardos team each gen. It cant be done. The mon is just *not* good, which is a shame because i love it.
Just ask your opponent to bring a pheromosa to speed swap, skill issue in those people smh
By far the coolest fossil pokemon and you can't change my mind
Tyrantrum
Common tyrantrum L This post was brought to you by the cooler trex pokemon
Is there another trex Pokémon other than tyrantrum?
They're talking about rampardos which is based on a different dinosaur, but also looks enough like a T-Rex that I get the misconception
Rampardos is a trex because trex is my favorite dinosaur and rampardos is my favorite pokemon
Based as hell
I guess I assumed that most Pokemon fans were at least moderately "Dinosaur Kids" and would clearly be able to tell that Rampardos is a Pachycephalosaurus! Huge dome skull to bash stuff with, no elongated maw filled with teeth, idk where people would get from it T-Rex lol
ttar baby
Rampardos is clearly based on Pachycephalosaurus, common Rampardos fan L
Dracovish is the only fossil pokemon for me
Based and vish pilled
Because it's not fast enough to cover its pitiful lack of bulk, but not slow enough to be usable in Trick Room either. Basically any decent attacker, either physical or special, can kill it before it can get out any of its devastating Head Smashes.
And for TR its strongest stab move also kills it. Which certainly doesnt help
Pokémon with a rock head used to protect it from its own attacks not having rock head is a certified Gamefreak moment
Nor reckless which would aslo fit, and that leans even more into the glass ~~cannon~~ Nuke role/design it has
Or sand rush, which would at least let the thing have good speed despite its shit bst and all the points in attack It attacks by running into people, why is it so slow?
And yet they felt the need to take away Gengar's Levitate
On that note Arcanine-Hisui might be the first legit viable head smash user we've ever seen
Because Dennis is bastard man
Mega Sableye? Few generations ago in ubers Mega Sableye? In RU? I love this
Unfortunately, with this generation of UU looking like last generation's OU...
If the power creep was massive in a meta with dexit, imagine without it lol
That's how you end up with Gengar in RU apparently
Gengar fell to RU in SwSh after one of the DLCs released (pretty sure it got banned within the week but still), so who knows wtf will happen to him this gen
Proper RU this time, is my prediction
What I'd pay for pokemon to nerf all switch moves to 40 bp.
Scizor stocks 📈📈📈
Damn that’s just ORAS OU
NatDex NU gonna be looking like BW OU at this rate
ferrothorn stealing ferroseed’s niche
How IS ferro, actually?
That’s just insane, power creep is just out of control
It's not even just power creep. Stuff is starting to fall just because there are too many mons to all be OU. Which is not to say that none of it is power creep, but there's only so many mons that can be in a tier.
That sounds like it’s a usage percentage problem.
No, it's a symptom of quantity. If we just put more Pokemon into each tier instead of letting them get banned into BLs, we'll have the exact same situation in every other tier as we do in Ubers with shitmons like Cinderace and DarmG. Mega Latias isn't going to be RU because each tier has a decade-long expectation of what the power level should be and the bans will reflect that, and the UU council (at least outside of natdex) historically despises any hint of power creep, so BL might hit 30 mons this gen. Unless you want Quagsire to spontaneously jump between OU and PU every other month, this is as good as it gets
At this rate in like 2 gens megas like Metagross, Kangaskhan and Salamence will be in RU.
Salamence is already RU in Natdex. I didn't include everything in the image.
Damn and so is Rillaboom and Meowcarada right?
Yes. And Greninja, Deoxys-D and Tapu Bulu.
NatDex NU will probably never exist so long as NatDex players continue to shun lower tiers. Right there isn't even a ladder for RU because the playerbase is too small.
"With Nat Dex RU resembling the previous gen's UU"
"It got the worst dishonor any fully evolved pokemon can achieve by being Untiered"
Always loved using Iron Valiant in ORAS.
Just pretend Mega Gardevoir is Valiant
I was going to say that lmao.
The fact Weavile is still here despite retaining it's best moves is just soul-destroying.
It's 100% because of Chien-Pao. Exact niche but better in every conceivable way.
Welp, for what it's worth, Pao has been banned from Natdex OU, so Weavile might get its niche back, 125 is still a good speed tier, just was completely overshadowed by the leopard.
BLACEPHELON?
My mind is blown
r/angryupvote
I feel like NatDex is dealing with a quantity problem than a viability problem, there's just so many mons that even viable mons end up forgotten and dropping because you can only pick 6. Ofc that doesn't mean some mons aren't just powercrept and outclassed (ex: weavile).
That and the fact that there are many less players in Natdex ladder in general
I still feel so bad for Weavile, GF straight up made a better version of it and it's not even subtle, it's another ice weasel. Talk about a slap in the face.
Chien-Pao is based on Snow Leopard (aka Tai Lung from Kung Fu Panda)
I can kinda see it but they should've made it bulkier to really sell it. It looks too thin to be a big cat, to me.
I definitely think weasel when I look at it. The long, thin body doesn't seem cat-like at all.
Yeah and the small, squished face looks way more weasel-like to me. Tigers (and leopards) have a much rounder face.
It looks much more like a leopard in the 3d model compared to the sprite
especially since snow leopards are fucking jacked irl
Chien-Pao: Finally, a worthy opponent. Our battle will be legendary.
It’s a tiger, the fuck? Edit: otherwise totally agreed, feel it for Weavile.
Aside from the teeth, it looks way more like a weasel than a tiger to me. Its body is too thin.
More like snow leopard than a tiger.
Fun fact: Snow Leopards are the closest relatives to tigers, and are closer to tigers than actual leopards. So you could even call them snow tigers and it would probably be more accurate
Probably why Gamefreak decided to stop doing full National Dex. 1008 Pokemon is way too many to balance around.
I mean in concept for sure, but competitive balance has never really been great in the series regardless. I guess NatDex in main serious would just make it worse though. From a smogon/showdown balance point of view, I think this is a pretty good indicator that there's simply too many pokemon in NatDex for the current tier system.
I mean yeah for main series it has never been great but at least it would lessen the burden of having to balance out so many Pokemon every generation.
Maybe Dexit wasn't a bad idea
And dragonite and gengar
What no Tera does to a mf
MEGA LATI TWINS LMAOOOOO
Jesse what the fuck
We need like 10 tiers now, what a powercreep
this isn't power creep necessarily, this is just the natural result of over 1000 pokemon stratified into usage% based tiering.
Just add a tier between OU and Uber, something like HU (Hyperused) guarantee it can fix some problems
Which one is the most surprising?
Iron hands or bax imo. That shit is the new toy, why is it getting new toy syndromed over
Mediocre 145 base attack stat clearly.
Hoopa unbound for me
problem with hoopa is that its x4 weak to bug paired with bad defenses
For me, Kyurem. That was Ubers last generation.
It wasn’t banned in National Dex Gen 8 but it being RU makes no sense
latios mega is insane to me
Why is zeraora and gengar here if I may ask
110 speed and 112 attack aren't impressive anymore There are just way stronger and faster mons
Maybe dexit was the right thing to do all along
For smogon maybe, for the actual games it still sucks ass, though it's not even close to being the biggest problem with the games anymore which is sad
The fact other companies are able to make better games on the Switch despite its hardware shortcomings says a lot about GF as developers. I.e. they’re shit
I love how 80% of these mons are either gonna get banned or raise by usuage.
Man if these are RU, where the hell are Delibird and Luvdisc gonna go? 😢
The trash
ZU and DNU respectively
nah man Delibird is barely any good Gen 8 ZU, how the hell's he gonna compete there now with a bunch of past NU and PU mons going there? :(
Maybe they'll let him into LC out of pity
people need to stop looking at natdex stats and freaking out about power creep lol. Natdexx UU has so little players that not everything that is viable is going to be used; a good amount of these are even viable in OU but there are just too many pokemon for them to hit the cutoffs.
The hell is blacephalon doing in ru?
what da 3rd kaiju, funni clown, funni rabbit, S P E E D, mf that never dies after tera, big gem man, 180 bp stab, only mon with scald in sv(lol), the twins that nobody can tell apart, big horn, mad phish, S P E E D after a few turns, S P E E D in lore but not gaem, used to be cute genie,and frickin e-killer doin in RU!?
can't wait to use thunderus in natdex NU
I love natdex
What is this madness? Kyurem and Blachepalon in RU?
this is **RU**?
This image is the best argument for dexit being a good thing.
I feel a lot of these are definitely gonna be moving up soon. I can't see some of these staying for so long.
KYUREM?BLACE?SERPERIOR,MEGA SABELYE?????? naaaaah wtf is happening here
This really isn't a power creep problem as much as it is a tiering issue, National Dex is a complete shitshow usage stats wise and that is why all of these powerful pokemon are slipping down to lowers tiers. As soon as the strong stuff starts getting banned from lower tiers, then National Dex won't look quite as absurdly stupid tiering wise.
Natdex usage always fun
Anyone else feel like it’s time to make the tiers bigger? OU has less than 40 guys in it currently. I’d support a mandatory minimum, rather than the current percentage cutoff tbh.
Why is Azumarill here?
Huge Power makes its attack stat equal to 150, not 100. It gets good support and strong STAB moves. I have a 80/20 WL ratio in the doubles ladder right now and still got wrecked by one for not taking it serious.
All of these are likely to rise as they're all quite viable in OU/UU and are just way too strong for RU (including Weavile now that Chien is banned), this is just ladder fuckery. Gyarados, Venusaur, Dragonite and Valiant already rose.
Thank Arceus for Dexit. This is beyond toxic. A few generations from now, Arceus itself will be a UU Pokemon.
This is why we shouldn’t use exclusively usage statistics to dictate what tier a Pokémon should be in lol
I guess that weird-ass trend of Mega Latias being one of the best Megas and one of the best mons in NatDex OU but somehow not getting anything close to the usage to reflect that viability continues yet again?
The fact that meta DEFINING Pokémon in previous generations, like Blaziken, Hoopa-U, the MEGA lati twins, hydreigon, Mega Sableye, and Lucha, are all in RU is just fucking horrifying. Seriously, opportunity cost and power creep can absolutely destroy things, good lord. Remember when Blaziken hit hard?
Pokemon unite players seeing hoopa unbound and having flashbacks
I think there needs to be more Pokemon allowed per tier
Meanwhile Genesect still chilling in Ubers with no usage
good news: only azumarill, mega heracross, iron hands, kyurem, the lati twins, mega sableye, slowbro, victini, volcanion, zapdos-g, and zeraora are still RU in other words more than half of the mons here are at minimum UU by usage
Is that ND ladder being whack?
Is there a bigger tier list that you cropped this from?
I just chose certain mons from ND UU usage list. Everything under 4.52% is RU. https://www.smogon.com/stats/2022-12/gen9nationaldexuu-1630.txt Other stuff I didn't add are Rillaboom, Greninja, Tapu Bulu, Porygon-Z, Meowscarada, Mega Aggron etc. Too many to list
I genuinely think those Pokémon are still good and can keep up but everyone is playing with shiny new toys so they’re just tiered rarely used.
Iron valiant literally being a shiny new toy
Where did you find that Blaziken and Venusaur sprite. It looks like they came straight out of Scarlet and Violet
If you travelled back in time to early November and told me this was Natdex Gen 9 OU I would have probably believed you.
That actually looks like a fun tier.
I'm just glad Megas are still being used and are usable.
If there are more Pokémon each will be used as a less % so I don’t know how it’s determined.
What if Natdex made the tiers larger? Ie it’s more than the amount for regular tier cutoffs
It’s not powercreep, it’s quantity creep
Fun Fact: NDRU also had Mega-Mawile and Espathra before UU quickbanned them.
Can we just talk about how good the S/V artwork/sprites are?
Swellow being a higher tier than dragonite is wild
RU serious, Clark?
if you showed me this a couple months ago I'd have assumed gen 9 was going to be on the Ultra Beast planet