Fun tid bid: Terrakion didn’t drop to PU naturally. Because it was a new addition to the Indigo Disk, it skipped right past every other tier solely because it missed every possible usage threshold in OU during the Indigo Disk’s first month. Low ladder wasn’t spamming it like they did Meganium or Bastiodon and Iron Boulder’s existence meant nobody was interested in finding a niche for Terrakion during that time.
I was there trying to keep Meganium in NU when the dlc dropped. I remember the first like 2 weeks no one used Terrakion and then everyone went, wait wtf. And suddenly it was a problem and it was banned.
@@skeetermania3202 If you’re asking me. A Pokémon needs to have a (I think) 4.52% usage rate in a tier or they fall to the tier bellow. I wanted Meganium to not fall, it did.
@@skeetermania3202 Whenever there's a DLC drop (Crown Tundra, Indigo Disk, etc.), Pokemon are quickdropped into lower tiers (e.g. falling to RU or NU from OU) instead of dropping one tier per month. I believe you'd need .15% to fall to RU, .07% to fall to NU and below that to land in PU. It's impossible to quickdrop to ZU.
@@ryukthedarkrai4259 Don’t any returning Pokémon start in OU by default, then drop to a tier if they don’t have the usage stats to, not dropping any further than the tier they reach the usage quota for? I know this was how it was handled in Gen 8.
@@noivernblast3366 Not only that, but Comatose is the perfect ability for Snorlax and it could make Snorlax a viable competitive Pokémon, even when still relying on Rest. Instead, it's wasted on a gimmick Pokémon.
@@hitoshura01It’s so funny that every time a new batch of mon got added it was like “NOW it shouldn’t be too oppressive”… and every time they were wrong
Snorlax really needs slack off for recovery. If it got slack off snorlax could not only run a bulky sweeper set, but it could also be a special wall with the right support moves such as yawn and encore.
Snorlax: "Don't you get it!? I'm a loser! I lost my title, my viability, everything!" Pikachu: *gasp* "Even with your best items?!" Snorlax: "Nobody wanted me to use them, so I had to eat them!"
This assessment is partially true. Ive been arguing for years that the 4.52% threshold is too high and needs to return to 3.41% once the dex surpasses 400 pokemon. Our tiers are unstable because of this.
I personally think the addition of Boots and Terastalization both played a part in Staraptor's downfall. As a cleaner/sweeper, Staraptor really likes hazards damage on the opponent in order to better execute its role, because its role as a nuke that KOs itself with recoil isn't really going to change. However, the addition of HDB makes it harder to chip the opponent's team with hazards. On the other hand, Staraptor can't afford to wield Boots itself to fix its Stealth Rock weakness, since it needs to wield Choice Scarf or Band in order to execute its role as a nuke. The end result is a mon that kos itself too easily while everything around it got more resilient. Remember that Staraptor was not in gen 8, so there was a real chance that we would've seen this downfall sooner at that point. But Tera was the nail in the coffin, as while it makes Staraptor an extra nuke, the mechanic means that more Pokemon can do what Staraptor does without the prospect of it ko'ing itself with recoil.
it's funny people think boots "pulled" up rock weak mons; when a ton of them actually relied on the chip to score important OHKOs or to scare the opponent into switching less haphazardly. Boots mostly made good pokemon better, most of the "bad" mons can't really afford to swap to boots or could already teambuild around that weakness. Like Great tusk currently runs Boots about 22% of the time and he RESISTS rocks and carries rapid spin. Risk-Free switching was the reason hazards had to be added in the first place.
Makes me think that Staraptor will rise again, honestly a lot of these may rise in Gen.10 if they appear if Tera leaves and (hopefully) some of the really bad min maxers don't make it
Funny how Galar was, in-universe, one of the most hypercompetitive regions in Pokemon, only for Paldea, the region after it, to feel like a larger proportion of their Pokemon be significantly more viable than their counterparts. (e.g. Inteleon vs Quaquaval, Coalossal vs Garganacl, Cursola vs Houndstone, Mr. Rime vs Espathra, ...)
Generation 9 Power Creep is so bad to the point where Garchomp is UU and Terrakion is RU Also, Terrakion falling to PU because of usage has to be one of the funniest Smogon tiering moments of all time
Terrakion being RU meanwhile Wobuffet being banned to uber for gens 3 and 4 and even having Wobbuffet + leftovers banned from Uber before the existence of anything goes
@@emdal4055to be fair, wobuffet wasn't banned because it was too good, it was banned because it lacked counterplay are generally didn't result in fun gameplay. You cannot switch out, it can taunt to make you have to attack If you don't have a mixed set it's near garanted to take down at least one pokemon by counter/mirror coat. And if you do have a mixed set it's just a coin flip to do the same. There is no counterplay, either have a mixed set and win a coin flip or trade at least one pokemon with wobbufet.
Game Freak either needs to make more of an effort to buff Pokémon that were swept away by power creep, or they need to slow down with making such busted Pokémon. Paldea’s been fucking bewildering.
I think part of the problem is they add so many moves in the dlc that Pokémon that were held back by coverage get it and then destroy a tier. But then other Pokémon get nothing and can’t keep up.
They won't slow down. The DLC, two gens in a row, has proven to be pay to win, so every time now the powercreep will get exponentially worse at the end of every gen because they have to introduce increasingly busted mons to entice people to buy them to keep up with VGC
@@WingedFish66 this argument is just stupid the dlc is pay to play not pay to win. It's no worse than having to buy platinum or black 2 and white 2 or Omega ruby and alpha sapphire or ultra sun and ultra moon to compete when you already own diamond and pearl or black and white or x and y or sun and moon. One could argue it's better since you don't have to buy a whole new game
One thing I’ll say about the current state of the metagame is, yes there’s power creep but it also just feels like certain mons not being in the game really dictates which Pokémon are going to be good and which ones aren’t going to be used that often.
It's also rough in higher tiers; Either you're the best at what you do, or you fall. Lots of roles don't have room for a second best. Like Tusk pushed Garchomp to UU, but the tier couldn't handle it; because it's not been powercrept, it's still a powerhouse, it's been "role crept".
Terrakion’s fall to PU here is kind of a misnomer. While it actually happened, it’s because it received so little usage on release it dropped straight down. Smogon uses an accelerated drop the Month after a DLC where you can drop multiple tiers under OU if you have severely low usage. It was hilarious to see though.
Is it really worth reaching such heights if the fall is so great? Perhaps the truly fortunate ones are those who have always rested at the bottom of the ladder...
@@artisticcannibalism1350 Indeed, a grim spectrum. While those laid low can enjoy never feeling the shame of failure, they still yearn for some accomplishment to their name, some far-off land where they could have touched the stars.
@@artisticcannibalism1350I would argue that that very thing culminated in some of those Pokémon's inevitable downfall (or lack there of since they weren't good to begin with). Look at delibird for example, he yearned for the laid back lifestyle, yet if he were to follow his gen 9 brother's footsteps, he would have been able to accomplish such an outstanding breathtaking record that even garchomp would be fearful. Foolish indeed.
Mew & Porygon2 are also quite frankly insane drops, with Mew having Uber records alongside OU usages, to just dropping straight to PU, while Porygon2's case was its a lower tier mon with relatively legit OU niches, until SV where its just ZU completely.
Mew at least has an excuse that it lost a ton of moves. It would be a lot better if it still had reliable recovery in roost back. P2 tho yeah it's only gonna get rough for him with every new gen. Pour one out for him
Uhh Mew is one thing but Porygyon2 has never been more than fringe in any OU tier. it's never seriously been good at all, like the only time it saw serious play was last gen when Spectrier was loose but that was just a sign the horse was busted, as Porygon2 was a shitmon otherwise. It's not even remotely surprising to see it fall so far.
@HowlingOneify P2 has also always been a noob trap in most Lower tiers it has ended up in. Last gen it was RU and it was downright horrible there. It's terrible type meant that there was nothing it could really check other than Chandelure. And even Chandelure could easily beat Porygon2 by changing its ability to Flame Body and running Sub Calm Mind And while it didn't drop to Nu proper, it likely would've been terrible there too as the tier is infested with amazing fighting types like passimian, toxicroak, gallade and scrafty
@@albabimam1114 Yeah. I have no idea how Porygon2 of all things ends up being such a frequent trap for less experienced players. Like maybe people see mon with solid bulk that gets eviolite and they auto assume it must be good for some reason.
Gyarados has benefitted from mechanical/meta changes for six generations in a row up to now. Intimidate+DD, Phys/Spec split gave it physical STAB, Permaweather OU, Mega Evo, Flynium-Z, Dynamax+Boots, and then gets told to go kick rocks.
I love how a consistent theme of this vid is "Yeah these guys ruled for years. And then Gen 9 nuked them from orbit." SV really is one of the wildest gens to date and its both funny and bittersweet to see how much it uprooted
Salamence 🤝 Terrakion Meeting in RU I'd like to imagine they're friends sharing stories of their glory days and how to deal with the world passing them by at an increasingly faster pace.
@@aztumtheknightofwumbo7060 that's what i was going for. I'm just not familiar enough with youtube's emotes to be able to replicate it so i settled for the handshake.
Ehh Salamence's fall is overstated here. Yeah it's RU right now but it was a top UU pick this gen up until Teal Mask DLC and only really fell off because TornadusT and later Zapdos came to outclass it. Even then it's still viable in UU and has slowly been picking up in play again recently.
This channel has been indispensable since I've started working on building competitive teams. I like hopping to smogon for basics but it's extremely helpful to have a deeper understanding of how these pokemom have interacted with each other and why they don't work in unique situations I wouldn't have thought of otherwise. Great work man
Maybe introducing 20 570 bst monsters was not a good idea. In the old days older pokemon had moveset as an advantage. But now. The newer more optimized mons have the same movesets as good ol'pokemon. So they cannot even get a niche throught movesets.
There's power creep and than there's gen 9 power creep. Many gen 2-5 Pokemon were still going up and down in gens 6-8 thanks to megas, Z moves, new abilities, new skills, etc. However that all changed in gen 9 and all of those Pokemons dropped so sharply it's utterly mad.
Not even close. It's a mono normal with shallow offensive capabilities and poor speed which makes it extremely exploitable. It does nothing useful defensively either. It might be good in NU, maybe have a tiny niche in RU, but Slack Off does not solve all its issues as it has other huge ones.
@@danka1167 Tornadus is still winning VGC tournaments! Recent Wolfe video has him playing one and facing many more in the most recent DLC. To be fair, prankster tailwind is pretty pointless in singles and that's Torn's best trait.
I had an idea for a couple theorem videos but idk enough about pokemon to know which ones would work. But, the ideas are: Why Teammates are Everything and Why Opposition is Everything. These would explore pokemon that lose relevance once a particular teammate or opponent gets banned from the tier.
The saddest thing about Staraptor in Gen 9 PU is that just a year before SV, Staraptor finally hit OU in BDSP before everyone decided that playing BDSP OU wasn't interesting enough to abandon SwSh OU
Listen, I don't play competitive AT ALL, but all the same this is very entertaining. I've got my popcorn, I'm snuggled and comfortable, let's watch the Pokemon Singles soap opera unfold!
Snorlax of all Pokemon falling to zeroused hurts so, so, so much. Honestly, giving it slack off is long overdue. Wouldn't be a massive game changer, but it would at least be something.
Fun fact: almost 10% of all pokemon are legendary/mythical at this point, not even counting 'pseudo-legendaries' like garchomp, mence, etc. The cutoff for a tier is 3.4% usage, which means the population of OU and UU combined could not contain all legendaries unless you had a whole OU tier worth of pokemon banned to ubers. So yeah OU is basically ubers now.
It’s still in Ubers at this point, but the fact that a select few people want to unban Lugia in a generation with Multiscale *and* Heavy-Duty Boots is freaking crazy 💀
Lugia is kneecapped too hard by Pokemon Far too bulky for any lower tier, but has so little to abuse that bulk with these days Best I’ve found is Whirlpool and Psychic Noise
Not so much, Gen 5 discourse at the moment also has "drop Lugia to OU" as a way to balance the tier, and has some legitimate traction with a few top players of the gen. Lugia hasn't been good for a very long time. Gen 9 has been the first gen to have a real "Ubers UU" tier for bad ubers, and Lugia is perfectly reasonable there.
@@reddragon100 You know what’s funny about that? I’d sooner unban Arceus-Bug than Lugia. It notably can’t hold Boots because of its required Insect Plate, and while Terastalizing might make it too strong for OU in this generation in particular, we’re getting to a point where base 120 stats across the board doesn’t seem as overwhelmingly dominant as it might have used to, especially with the nerfed Recover and removal of Defog for many Pokémon.
Snorlax buff to make it OU or UU viable- 1. Signature Move- Munching Pancake- 140 bp, Normal Tye, Physical Attack. Move can't be used twice in a row. 2. New Ability- Presistence (Thick Fat+ Scrappy+ Natural Cure) 3. Give it Slack Off too for reliable recovery.
I wonder how much tera comes into it. Its a lot easier to play around choice items now, especially of normal, ground and fighting attacks as you can often tera into an immunity. All the pokemon mentioned here are also physical attackers, so I imagine there's other factors at play too.
It’s hilarious from a doubles standpoint and as a much newer player, because physical attackers seem balanced and special attackers feel really broken this Gen.
It's not nearly that simple as burning a tera to try and handle a choiced attacker can be very exploitable. It's really only done in emergency situations.
The pay-to-win DLC is something not enough people are talking about. Powercreep has been getting exponentially worse because GF has to make the mons locked behind that extra paywall that much more broken to entice the VGC crowd to buy them
It might not be an astronomical drop, but seeing Zapdos in UU was a shock to my system. It's not like Zapdos is the greatest pokemon of all time or anything, but it's been such a consistent presence in OU as king of the electric types since gen 1 and seemed to always find itself a niche no other pokemon could quite fill.
some pokemon that I believe are one-two power creeps or nerfs away from dropping are: -solgaleo (just remove morning sun from its movepool, it will immediately go to OU and possibly even drop.). -dragapult (if deoxys speed gets buffed with better movepool/ability then it is going to struggle to stay relevant). -weavile (if chien pao either gets nerfed or faces some good checks/counters then it will drop to OU thus permanently overshadowing weavile). -annihilape (either make several good normal types or simply nerf the rage fist).
@@Cobalt957 Very possibly, will be interesting if they do let it in. Personally I think the meta is volatile enough without it (though much better recently)
Oof some really bad takes here. Solgaleo: This one just wouldn't happen because it's literally the sun mascot. They'd never do it. Dragapult: This doesn't even work because DeoS is a very dominant presence and still rising now in OU as we speak. Dragapult is a top tier pokemon regardless because it's got a premium typing, speed tier and wide movepool for both offense and utility. They do very different things. Weavile: Nevermind that there aren't anything that could seriously keep Chien Pao in check as both SD and Choice Band sets are just too powerful for how fast it is, Weavile having access to knock off and triple axel give Weavile a distinguished role that Pao could never fill. Annihilape: What would normal types do lol. Drain Punch.
The fact that staraptor dropped from being too good for the second tier to being good but not even the best in the lowest tier in one generation is so wild, its not because of it losing any moves, items or ability or anything just plain old power creep.
Specifies that the list isn’t pokemon we thought would never fall off, just pokemon we didn’t expect to fall of this far Five seconds later: Pokemon we thought would never fall off
One thing I will mention is that outside of staraptor and salamence somewhat, all of these mons did fall in singles but enjoy a healthy level of use and power in doubles vgc.
While SV power creep is ludicrously nonsensical, imagine the other end of the spectrum if they end up nerfing/buffing 100+ pokémon starting in gen 10. Honestly I’d rather be in that universe.
There should be a video for Pokemon that need buffs to help them survive power creeps and still become relevant in competitive play since SV was massive and some old Pokemon are in need of redemption.
I genuinely can't even comprehend how Tornados fell so easily. It has great mix attackers stats, decent coverage, Prankster as an ability, substitute, and set up. Yeah it's hardest hitting moves don't have good accuracy, but man it still has decent moves (not trying to say it should be high tier, it's just wild it's untiered and has so many good things).
One big factor is that Thundurus was in NU at the time (which is its own honourable mention tbh), which completely eclipsed Tornadus's possible niches. To add insult to injury, Thundurus gained Acrobatics in Gen 9, all but ensuring Tornadus would not see the light of NU's day
NU. Mono normal just isn't what it was and its poor speed and unimpressive offensive options limit it too much (especially as between Curse and stab, plus recovery you get only one move for coverage).
I'd be very interested to see another video of Pokemon falling off in their own generations - the stories of things like RBY Golem, RSE Snorlax & Suicune, B/W Gengar falling far out of the meta, would be really interesting!
Flying got such a massive boost in Gen 7 with Flynium Z and an even more massive one in Gen 8 with Max Airstream that there was no way a bunch of strong Flying types wouldn't fall.
Swampert It was always a solid Pokémon in OU ever since Gen 3. It never dominated any tier but that’s not what it was meant to do. Now I don’t think it even has a niche in RU Also Blaziken. They had to ban it to Anything Goes at one point.
@@JCBro-yg8vd Not completely no. Chansey sure, more due to the prevelance of hazards and knock off, but Blissey is still viable in OU, albeit limited to Stall teams (and it's OU by usage anyways).
@@JCBro-yg8vdLosing Softboiled PP definitely hurt, but losing Toxic is the real kicker since they can't meaningfully contribute anymore outside of hardcore stall. Teleport only mattered in gen 8 but it was a huge aspect of their viability as well
Not really? Except Salamence since that only recently hit RU this gen as it was great in UU for some time, but both Staraptor and Gyarados had much steeper fall offs this gen than ThundyT who just got banned from RU.
Gen 9 is so weird, man. I really wish there were battle facilities in gen 9 so I could still use these Pokemon somewhere that wasn't the PvE-est of PvE in raid dens.
Prankster Tailwind is meta defining in VGC and... almost entirely worthless in singles lol. It only lasts 4 turns including the turn you use it so you have to Tailwind -> Switch -> 2 turns of boosted speed and then it's gone. Outside of very specific circumstances (like Wind Rider Shiftry using it for +1 Attack into Explosion) you just never really see Tailwind cause it's such a small benefit
Lando T will stay. This generation had a rough start for him and he almost dropped to UU but now hes at a really solid point in OU, remaining a top 10 mon. Lando will never be bad
LandoT remained a top 10 at WORST pokemon in OU this gen, and has been steadily moving higher in viability despite having many moves gutted from its kit. It's not going anywhere sorrry (not sorry).
as someone in ZU top 200 i can say having snorlax is very nice its not op its decent and can be good if used properly but not the big dog but dont be sad for lax it could have been worse befoare the dlc first dlc it was a fighting heavy meta and aweso ursaring used tobe top dog until it went to BL but ye lax has been good down in ZU very good for his neich(hope i spelled that right)
@@poboi-lt5673well I hope pokemon going into lower tiers wasn’t the sole reason considering Gen 10 will only bring more power creep 😭 tho hopefully not as drastic
Swolax, Snorlax cuts 400 pounds of fat but in the process gains 500 pounds of muscle and becomes a bulky normal/fighting type with Huge Power. Genuinely though just give him a mega evolution when megas get brought back for the next Legends game (and, god willing, the next mainline game as well)
Get 20% OFF + Free International Shipping with promo code FALSESWIPE at
Manscaped.com! #ManscapedPartner #FathersDay
Dragalge, magcargo, drifblim or rotom and all of his forms! 💪💪💪
Thanks for the timestamsp
@@YesImJoeKing0😊
manscaped + false swipe seems like a dodgy combination ngl
It seems appropriate to say, "Rest in peace, Snorlax."
The thumbnail art makes me want to adopt that Snorlax
Not before shedding tears of pity
Not me I want Nemona
I feel the same
Nice (69 likes)
I would give the fella lots of snacks and belly rubs!!
The power creep of Gen 9 is honestly fucking absurd
Is like gen 5 powercreep x5
Welcome to modern Pokémon.
I wouldn't be surprised that later on we will be telling our grandkids about the *_GREAT GEN 9 POWERCREEP_*
But Oricorio is doing better for itself, and that is enough to make me happy
If Ultra beasts were in the game, Kartana would be RU😭
Fun tid bid: Terrakion didn’t drop to PU naturally. Because it was a new addition to the Indigo Disk, it skipped right past every other tier solely because it missed every possible usage threshold in OU during the Indigo Disk’s first month. Low ladder wasn’t spamming it like they did Meganium or Bastiodon and Iron Boulder’s existence meant nobody was interested in finding a niche for Terrakion during that time.
I was there trying to keep Meganium in NU when the dlc dropped. I remember the first like 2 weeks no one used Terrakion and then everyone went, wait wtf. And suddenly it was a problem and it was banned.
What usage thresholds are you talking about?
@@skeetermania3202 If you’re asking me. A Pokémon needs to have a (I think) 4.52% usage rate in a tier or they fall to the tier bellow. I wanted Meganium to not fall, it did.
@@skeetermania3202 Whenever there's a DLC drop (Crown Tundra, Indigo Disk, etc.), Pokemon are quickdropped into lower tiers (e.g. falling to RU or NU from OU) instead of dropping one tier per month. I believe you'd need .15% to fall to RU, .07% to fall to NU and below that to land in PU. It's impossible to quickdrop to ZU.
@@ryukthedarkrai4259 Don’t any returning Pokémon start in OU by default, then drop to a tier if they don’t have the usage stats to, not dropping any further than the tier they reach the usage quota for? I know this was how it was handled in Gen 8.
Snorlax fell off? But he spent so many generations slowly getting up in the first place!
Thanks to Charitard
Poor guy has been begging Slack Off and the Comatose ability to Game Freak for eons, now.
@@AgsmaJustAgsmano slack off? What?
@@SourAttmozyep, Snorlax doesn’t get Slack Off, but Infernape does. Make it make sense…
@@noivernblast3366 Not only that, but Comatose is the perfect ability for Snorlax and it could make Snorlax a viable competitive Pokémon, even when still relying on Rest. Instead, it's wasted on a gimmick Pokémon.
Staraptor casually chilling in BL for four generations
Power Creep: It would be a shame if we sent you all the way to PU in Gen 9
To be fair if it was in gen 8 it likely would be in rubl
Makes me sad. Staraptor is one of my faves and I hate to see it dethroned.
Iron Hands carrying the torch for the new BL knight, getting sent to BL 4 times in one gen
At this point it should be a hate crime to let any 3 stage pokemon have a BST below 500
@@hitoshura01It’s so funny that every time a new batch of mon got added it was like “NOW it shouldn’t be too oppressive”… and every time they were wrong
Snorlax really needs slack off for recovery. If it got slack off snorlax could not only run a bulky sweeper set, but it could also be a special wall with the right support moves such as yawn and encore.
Or give it Poisen Heal over Immunity for the ultimate curse set
There’s still Recycle + Gluttony.
Slack Off would also fit for flavor. I mean, is the poster child for "sleeping Pokémon" and still can't learn Slack Off? Come on!
@@larsweise7866Immunity is fine. Don't need any more stall mins.
@@overlord3481recovery is not synonymous with stall. Stall means you have no plan but to survive until surrender or using up all opp’s relevant pp.
raptor in gen 4-7: There is nothing that can stop me now!!!!!!
raptor in gen 9: ruin, has come to our family....
"You remember our venerable house, opulent and imperial. It is a festering abomination!"
@@thisrandomdude2880 I beg you return home. Claim your usage. And deliver our family from the ravenous clutching shadows………of the darkest power creep
Darkest Dungeon is a beautiful and grotesque game.
It deserves to return to focus.
@@nullpoint3346 damn right
@@nullpoint3346too bad the second game was hella mid 😔😔😔
Snorlax: "Don't you get it!? I'm a loser! I lost my title, my viability, everything!"
Pikachu: *gasp* "Even with your best items?!"
Snorlax: "Nobody wanted me to use them, so I had to eat them!"
This assessment is partially true. Ive been arguing for years that the 4.52% threshold is too high and needs to return to 3.41% once the dex surpasses 400 pokemon. Our tiers are unstable because of this.
When not even Nemona would train you then you know you've fallen off hard
Oh dear me..
Oh hello serperior fan number 3
I personally think the addition of Boots and Terastalization both played a part in Staraptor's downfall. As a cleaner/sweeper, Staraptor really likes hazards damage on the opponent in order to better execute its role, because its role as a nuke that KOs itself with recoil isn't really going to change. However, the addition of HDB makes it harder to chip the opponent's team with hazards.
On the other hand, Staraptor can't afford to wield Boots itself to fix its Stealth Rock weakness, since it needs to wield Choice Scarf or Band in order to execute its role as a nuke. The end result is a mon that kos itself too easily while everything around it got more resilient.
Remember that Staraptor was not in gen 8, so there was a real chance that we would've seen this downfall sooner at that point.
But Tera was the nail in the coffin, as while it makes Staraptor an extra nuke, the mechanic means that more Pokemon can do what Staraptor does without the prospect of it ko'ing itself with recoil.
It also lost Roost which... I don't know if it ran it much but does mean it has 0 recovery for its recoil moves
Boots were also pretty instrumental in the Blaziken fall off for the same reasons
Also it lost roost in gen 9 so it couldn’t even try a defensive set if it wanted to
it's funny people think boots "pulled" up rock weak mons; when a ton of them actually relied on the chip to score important OHKOs or to scare the opponent into switching less haphazardly.
Boots mostly made good pokemon better, most of the "bad" mons can't really afford to swap to boots or could already teambuild around that weakness.
Like Great tusk currently runs Boots about 22% of the time and he RESISTS rocks and carries rapid spin. Risk-Free switching was the reason hazards had to be added in the first place.
Makes me think that Staraptor will rise again, honestly a lot of these may rise in Gen.10 if they appear if Tera leaves and (hopefully) some of the really bad min maxers don't make it
Funny how Galar was, in-universe, one of the most hypercompetitive regions in Pokemon, only for Paldea, the region after it, to feel like a larger proportion of their Pokemon be significantly more viable than their counterparts. (e.g. Inteleon vs Quaquaval, Coalossal vs Garganacl, Cursola vs Houndstone, Mr. Rime vs Espathra, ...)
Generation 9 Power Creep is so bad to the point where Garchomp is UU and Terrakion is RU
Also, Terrakion falling to PU because of usage has to be one of the funniest Smogon tiering moments of all time
Terrakion being RU meanwhile Wobuffet being banned to uber for gens 3 and 4 and even having Wobbuffet + leftovers banned from Uber before the existence of anything goes
It's up there with Shuckle's 1 month rise to OU from PU or untiered back in gen 8 for sure
Garchomp being UU is wild, just absolutely crazy.
@@eeyuup Sorry to burst your bubble, but Garchomp is in BL right now. It got banned from UU.
@@emdal4055to be fair, wobuffet wasn't banned because it was too good, it was banned because it lacked counterplay are generally didn't result in fun gameplay.
You cannot switch out, it can taunt to make you have to attack
If you don't have a mixed set it's near garanted to take down at least one pokemon by counter/mirror coat.
And if you do have a mixed set it's just a coin flip to do the same.
There is no counterplay, either have a mixed set and win a coin flip or trade at least one pokemon with wobbufet.
This time, Nemona was only half in the thumbnail.
Game Freak either needs to make more of an effort to buff Pokémon that were swept away by power creep, or they need to slow down with making such busted Pokémon. Paldea’s been fucking bewildering.
I think part of the problem is they add so many moves in the dlc that Pokémon that were held back by coverage get it and then destroy a tier. But then other Pokémon get nothing and can’t keep up.
@@JamienautMark2 or get multiple things taken away :^)
They won't slow down. The DLC, two gens in a row, has proven to be pay to win, so every time now the powercreep will get exponentially worse at the end of every gen because they have to introduce increasingly busted mons to entice people to buy them to keep up with VGC
I doubt they'll stop power creeping, this is the same developer who removed Rapid Spin and Defog but _not_ Stealth Rock and saw nothing wrong with it
@@WingedFish66 this argument is just stupid the dlc is pay to play not pay to win. It's no worse than having to buy platinum or black 2 and white 2 or Omega ruby and alpha sapphire or ultra sun and ultra moon to compete when you already own diamond and pearl or black and white or x and y or sun and moon. One could argue it's better since you don't have to buy a whole new game
Seeing Terrakion in PU in SV was incredible.
Surreal tbh, but incredible
One thing I’ll say about the current state of the metagame is, yes there’s power creep but it also just feels like certain mons not being in the game really dictates which Pokémon are going to be good and which ones aren’t going to be used that often.
It's also rough in higher tiers; Either you're the best at what you do, or you fall. Lots of roles don't have room for a second best.
Like Tusk pushed Garchomp to UU, but the tier couldn't handle it; because it's not been powercrept, it's still a powerhouse, it's been "role crept".
Terrakion’s fall to PU here is kind of a misnomer. While it actually happened, it’s because it received so little usage on release it dropped straight down. Smogon uses an accelerated drop the Month after a DLC where you can drop multiple tiers under OU if you have severely low usage.
It was hilarious to see though.
It was why Zygarde 10% dropped to PU in Gen 8
@💀🙏Deinonychus2
Snorlaxes are always hungry, but seeing the boi starving is just sad...
It’s a poignant lesson. No power or privilege lasts forever. Savour what benefits you have in your prime and be braced for the inevitable
Is it really worth reaching such heights if the fall is so great?
Perhaps the truly fortunate ones are those who have always rested at the bottom of the ladder...
@@artisticcannibalism1350 Indeed, a grim spectrum. While those laid low can enjoy never feeling the shame of failure, they still yearn for some accomplishment to their name, some far-off land where they could have touched the stars.
@ES-dp6tw Those who yearn to reach the stars are surely fools. Tis far better to live a simple life of everyday comforts and pleasures.
@@artisticcannibalism1350I would argue that that very thing culminated in some of those Pokémon's inevitable downfall (or lack there of since they weren't good to begin with). Look at delibird for example, he yearned for the laid back lifestyle, yet if he were to follow his gen 9 brother's footsteps, he would have been able to accomplish such an outstanding breathtaking record that even garchomp would be fearful. Foolish indeed.
i lime pokrmon
Mew & Porygon2 are also quite frankly insane drops, with Mew having Uber records alongside OU usages, to just dropping straight to PU, while Porygon2's case was its a lower tier mon with relatively legit OU niches, until SV where its just ZU completely.
Mew was mentioned in the first vid fwiw
Mew at least has an excuse that it lost a ton of moves. It would be a lot better if it still had reliable recovery in roost back.
P2 tho yeah it's only gonna get rough for him with every new gen. Pour one out for him
Uhh Mew is one thing but Porygyon2 has never been more than fringe in any OU tier. it's never seriously been good at all, like the only time it saw serious play was last gen when Spectrier was loose but that was just a sign the horse was busted, as Porygon2 was a shitmon otherwise. It's not even remotely surprising to see it fall so far.
@HowlingOneify P2 has also always been a noob trap in most Lower tiers it has ended up in. Last gen it was RU and it was downright horrible there. It's terrible type meant that there was nothing it could really check other than Chandelure. And even Chandelure could easily beat Porygon2 by changing its ability to Flame Body and running Sub Calm Mind
And while it didn't drop to Nu proper, it likely would've been terrible there too as the tier is infested with amazing fighting types like passimian, toxicroak, gallade and scrafty
@@albabimam1114 Yeah. I have no idea how Porygon2 of all things ends up being such a frequent trap for less experienced players. Like maybe people see mon with solid bulk that gets eviolite and they auto assume it must be good for some reason.
Gyarados has benefitted from mechanical/meta changes for six generations in a row up to now. Intimidate+DD, Phys/Spec split gave it physical STAB, Permaweather OU, Mega Evo, Flynium-Z, Dynamax+Boots, and then gets told to go kick rocks.
Whoever it is that does these thumbnails is amazing.
In the description
@@Raidraptor_-_Ultimate_Falconoh
I love how a consistent theme of this vid is "Yeah these guys ruled for years. And then Gen 9 nuked them from orbit."
SV really is one of the wildest gens to date and its both funny and bittersweet to see how much it uprooted
Another FSG discussion video, another Nemona on the thumbnail.
Nemona fans eating good today
She pretty basic. It fits.
Most memorable gen 9 pokegal
Magikarp will never fall off in my heart
Feesh
Lucky for you! Theres no more distance left for it to fall
He was never on
"Feesh" -Michael
@@thefirespecialist9007 i thought John did it first
Salamence 🤝 Terrakion
Meeting in RU
I'd like to imagine they're friends sharing stories of their glory days and how to deal with the world passing them by at an increasingly faster pace.
Like that meme of Arny and his friend from an old film, giving each other that signature handshake, uttering the lines, "You sonuvab***"
@@aztumtheknightofwumbo7060 that's what i was going for. I'm just not familiar enough with youtube's emotes to be able to replicate it so i settled for the handshake.
Ehh Salamence's fall is overstated here. Yeah it's RU right now but it was a top UU pick this gen up until Teal Mask DLC and only really fell off because TornadusT and later Zapdos came to outclass it. Even then it's still viable in UU and has slowly been picking up in play again recently.
"The bigger they are, the harder they fall" has never been more true for gen9.
Grass knot makes sense now.
Don't forget Low Kick.
This channel has been indispensable since I've started working on building competitive teams. I like hopping to smogon for basics but it's extremely helpful to have a deeper understanding of how these pokemom have interacted with each other and why they don't work in unique situations I wouldn't have thought of otherwise. Great work man
Staraptor went on a depression arc after dexit. It was never the same without it's former glory after joining Larry
Maybe introducing 20 570 bst monsters was not a good idea.
In the old days older pokemon had moveset as an advantage.
But now. The newer more optimized mons have the same movesets as good ol'pokemon.
So they cannot even get a niche throught movesets.
There's power creep and than there's gen 9 power creep. Many gen 2-5 Pokemon were still going up and down in gens 6-8 thanks to megas, Z moves, new abilities, new skills, etc. However that all changed in gen 9 and all of those Pokemons dropped so sharply it's utterly mad.
that's a tiny Snorlax
Like a dwarf snorlax
Its actually a large Snorlax, but those are the Pokestar lady legs in a different outfit
Hasn’t been eating well 😢
@@Birdsflight44 i thought it was Nemona
10 years later:
Gholdengo is in RUBL
Why does GF refuse to give Snorlax slack off? Will instantly push it to UU at the very least and most likely OU with it's special bulk and moveset
Nah def not ou, it's still a normal type after all. It will def be a good UU Mon.
Not even close. It's a mono normal with shallow offensive capabilities and poor speed which makes it extremely exploitable. It does nothing useful defensively either. It might be good in NU, maybe have a tiny niche in RU, but Slack Off does not solve all its issues as it has other huge ones.
...You weren't there for the old days, were you?
Its because they're afraid.
They know.
Tornadus is currently at ZUBL which just might not be an official tier. But a legendary Pokemon with no hindering ability falling that far is insane
Isnt torn also the single best mon in vgc history?
@@danka1167 Tornadus is still winning VGC tournaments! Recent Wolfe video has him playing one and facing many more in the most recent DLC.
To be fair, prankster tailwind is pretty pointless in singles and that's Torn's best trait.
@@2LettersSho same with incin. incin has been used a total of 8 times in OU and is used in every vgc match
Gen 9 is clearly a paradox.
A bad paradox. I just hope Gen 10 course corrects alot of Gen 9s flaws.
And in 20 generations:
We see Mega Rayquaza getting a new coverage move, allowing it to finally make its way back into a niche in RU!
Megas will only come back for the gen 6 and 7 remakes.
I know Braviary exists but, in my heart Staraptor will always be the Bravest Bird. 🦅
I had an idea for a couple theorem videos but idk enough about pokemon to know which ones would work. But, the ideas are: Why Teammates are Everything and Why Opposition is Everything. These would explore pokemon that lose relevance once a particular teammate or opponent gets banned from the tier.
Snorlax living up to his name at last
The saddest thing about Staraptor in Gen 9 PU is that just a year before SV, Staraptor finally hit OU in BDSP before everyone decided that playing BDSP OU wasn't interesting enough to abandon SwSh OU
Listen, I don't play competitive AT ALL, but all the same this is very entertaining. I've got my popcorn, I'm snuggled and comfortable, let's watch the Pokemon Singles soap opera unfold!
My heart skipped a beat when I saw Staraptor in NU in the drop list. My boi was the BL king for 4 whole gen and then just drop off like that?
WTF😭😭😭😭
Snorlax of all Pokemon falling to zeroused hurts so, so, so much. Honestly, giving it slack off is long overdue. Wouldn't be a massive game changer, but it would at least be something.
From an outside perspective, it feels like OU is actually Ubers. Or maybe even UU is actually Ubers.
Gen 10, PU is Gen 9 AG
@@SourAttmoz I cant wait to fight an opposing Zacian with my Mega Rayquaza in Gen 10 PU. Hopefully Urshifu doesnt drop from NU to PU to ruin it :`D
@@necron__7103 mega rayquaza has 0% usage in gen 10, it gets outsped by the new legendary who has minmax hyper
Fun fact: almost 10% of all pokemon are legendary/mythical at this point, not even counting 'pseudo-legendaries' like garchomp, mence, etc. The cutoff for a tier is 3.4% usage, which means the population of OU and UU combined could not contain all legendaries unless you had a whole OU tier worth of pokemon banned to ubers. So yeah OU is basically ubers now.
The Pokémon equivalent of peaking in highschool
It’s still in Ubers at this point, but the fact that a select few people want to unban Lugia in a generation with Multiscale *and* Heavy-Duty Boots is freaking crazy 💀
Lugia is kneecapped too hard by Pokemon
Far too bulky for any lower tier, but has so little to abuse that bulk with these days
Best I’ve found is Whirlpool and Psychic Noise
Not so much, Gen 5 discourse at the moment also has "drop Lugia to OU" as a way to balance the tier, and has some legitimate traction with a few top players of the gen.
Lugia hasn't been good for a very long time. Gen 9 has been the first gen to have a real "Ubers UU" tier for bad ubers, and Lugia is perfectly reasonable there.
A lot of people think Arceus-Bug should be unbanned
@@fractalisomega9517 Lugia should be much more viable if it was water type instead of psychic.
@@reddragon100 You know what’s funny about that? I’d sooner unban Arceus-Bug than Lugia. It notably can’t hold Boots because of its required Insect Plate, and while Terastalizing might make it too strong for OU in this generation in particular, we’re getting to a point where base 120 stats across the board doesn’t seem as overwhelmingly dominant as it might have used to, especially with the nerfed Recover and removal of Defog for many Pokémon.
7:05 Choice Banded Swords Dance Terrakion got me kinda lost for a second there
Probably said Choice Band or Swords Dance
Im pretty sure he said "and" inbetween
Swords dance with choice band is like using salt on a plate full of nothing.
Use magic room lol
I'll say, seeing these Pokemon fall off makes me feel better about my boy, Blaziken, in UUBL. Could have been a hell of a lot worse.
Snorlax buff to make it OU or UU viable-
1. Signature Move-
Munching Pancake- 140 bp, Normal Tye, Physical Attack. Move can't be used twice in a row.
2. New Ability- Presistence (Thick Fat+ Scrappy+ Natural Cure)
3. Give it Slack Off too for reliable recovery.
I wonder how much tera comes into it. Its a lot easier to play around choice items now, especially of normal, ground and fighting attacks as you can often tera into an immunity. All the pokemon mentioned here are also physical attackers, so I imagine there's other factors at play too.
Physical Attackers don't get anything beneficial to them tbh.
It’s hilarious from a doubles standpoint and as a much newer player, because physical attackers seem balanced and special attackers feel really broken this Gen.
It's not nearly that simple as burning a tera to try and handle a choiced attacker can be very exploitable. It's really only done in emergency situations.
2:42 sometimes i feel like they've worked harder on their older animations than their newer ones
2:30 Just realized Snorlax's cry is just it farting...
They really put a hurricane in the playground when they added Terrakion in PU.
The pay-to-win DLC is something not enough people are talking about. Powercreep has been getting exponentially worse because GF has to make the mons locked behind that extra paywall that much more broken to entice the VGC crowd to buy them
The number of times kellen gets sponsored by companies that specialize in balls is hilarious to me.
"Spare change? Spare change maam?"
Terrakion falling into PU was like a dream.
It'd be funny if Gen 10 just, undid all the power creep. I would hate it a lot, and love it so much too..
That thumbnail made me feel bad for snorlax
I guess they can’t all be football-playing kings in space.
With a mustache
It might not be an astronomical drop, but seeing Zapdos in UU was a shock to my system. It's not like Zapdos is the greatest pokemon of all time or anything, but it's been such a consistent presence in OU as king of the electric types since gen 1 and seemed to always find itself a niche no other pokemon could quite fill.
some pokemon that I believe are one-two power creeps or nerfs away from dropping are:
-solgaleo (just remove morning sun from its movepool, it will immediately go to OU and possibly even drop.).
-dragapult (if deoxys speed gets buffed with better movepool/ability then it is going to struggle to stay relevant).
-weavile (if chien pao either gets nerfed or faces some good checks/counters then it will drop to OU thus permanently overshadowing weavile).
-annihilape (either make several good normal types or simply nerf the rage fist).
OU is thinking of letting Solgaleo in as is, and it doesn't even seem like it'd be that broken tbh
@@itztaytay2Agility into weakness policy is defenetly broken. Tera will push this thing over the edge, Im telling you
@@Cobalt957 Very possibly, will be interesting if they do let it in. Personally I think the meta is volatile enough without it (though much better recently)
@@itztaytay2 No it's not, don't spread bullshit please. A few people threw the idea out there but no one took it seriously (nor is anyone now).
Oof some really bad takes here.
Solgaleo: This one just wouldn't happen because it's literally the sun mascot. They'd never do it.
Dragapult: This doesn't even work because DeoS is a very dominant presence and still rising now in OU as we speak. Dragapult is a top tier pokemon regardless because it's got a premium typing, speed tier and wide movepool for both offense and utility. They do very different things.
Weavile: Nevermind that there aren't anything that could seriously keep Chien Pao in check as both SD and Choice Band sets are just too powerful for how fast it is, Weavile having access to knock off and triple axel give Weavile a distinguished role that Pao could never fill.
Annihilape: What would normal types do lol. Drain Punch.
The fact that staraptor dropped from being too good for the second tier to being good but not even the best in the lowest tier in one generation is so wild, its not because of it losing any moves, items or ability or anything just plain old power creep.
Can't believe maractus has feel off. It had such an extremely specific niche in Gen 6 ZU
Specifies that the list isn’t pokemon we thought would never fall off, just pokemon we didn’t expect to fall of this far
Five seconds later: Pokemon we thought would never fall off
Taunt Gyarados is still a monster. Taunt to setup on stall. Dragon dance. Physically bulky. Waterfall + Bounce. It's underrated.
Gyarados no longer has Bounce in gen 9
Parasect was such a huge threat that the gen 1 meta really shocked me when it saw Parasect fall off. Powercreep in gen 1 was ridiculous.
One thing I will mention is that outside of staraptor and salamence somewhat, all of these mons did fall in singles but enjoy a healthy level of use and power in doubles vgc.
While SV power creep is ludicrously nonsensical, imagine the other end of the spectrum if they end up nerfing/buffing 100+ pokémon starting in gen 10. Honestly I’d rather be in that universe.
There should be a video for Pokemon that need buffs to help them survive power creeps and still become relevant in competitive play since SV was massive and some old Pokemon are in need of redemption.
You should talk about pokemon that have quietly been consistently solid over the generations despite power creep now
I genuinely can't even comprehend how Tornados fell so easily. It has great mix attackers stats, decent coverage, Prankster as an ability, substitute, and set up. Yeah it's hardest hitting moves don't have good accuracy, but man it still has decent moves (not trying to say it should be high tier, it's just wild it's untiered and has so many good things).
One big factor is that Thundurus was in NU at the time (which is its own honourable mention tbh), which completely eclipsed Tornadus's possible niches. To add insult to injury, Thundurus gained Acrobatics in Gen 9, all but ensuring Tornadus would not see the light of NU's day
Unfortunate that Staraptor fell out of Boy's Love and landed in the realm of not showering.
I'm always going to keep Iron Thorns as something that will *never* fall off
Imagine where Snorlax would be if Game Freak just gave it a (non-Rest) recovery move like Slack Off
NU. Mono normal just isn't what it was and its poor speed and unimpressive offensive options limit it too much (especially as between Curse and stab, plus recovery you get only one move for coverage).
I'd be very interested to see another video of Pokemon falling off in their own generations - the stories of things like RBY Golem, RSE Snorlax & Suicune, B/W Gengar falling far out of the meta, would be really interesting!
It seems appropriate to say, "Rest in peace, Snorlax."
I love how Nemona has become prominent in this videos, is she a channel mascot?
Flying got such a massive boost in Gen 7 with Flynium Z and an even more massive one in Gen 8 with Max Airstream that there was no way a bunch of strong Flying types wouldn't fall.
Dynamax was banned in singles extremely early so Max Airstream is moot
16:08 unfortunate doesn’t begin to descr
while i do miss the “How great was” series i have to admit these videos have been banger after banger after banger keep it up FSG team
Swampert
It was always a solid Pokémon in OU ever since Gen 3. It never dominated any tier but that’s not what it was meant to do.
Now I don’t think it even has a niche in RU
Also Blaziken.
They had to ban it to Anything Goes at one point.
chansey and blissey: **are uu and ou respectively for every generation since blissey was released**
gen 6 and 7: guess what chucklenuts
One of the two is still OU in every gen.
You think *THAT'S* bad? Gen 9 nerfing the PP of softboiled completely killed their viability. They basically got Thanosed because of that.
@@JCBro-yg8vd Not completely no. Chansey sure, more due to the prevelance of hazards and knock off, but Blissey is still viable in OU, albeit limited to Stall teams (and it's OU by usage anyways).
@@JCBro-yg8vdLosing Softboiled PP definitely hurt, but losing Toxic is the real kicker since they can't meaningfully contribute anymore outside of hardcore stall. Teleport only mattered in gen 8 but it was a huge aspect of their viability as well
Blissey is still OU
The thumbnails are always peak! 😂
Seriously, that Snorlax thumbnail broke my heart!!!!
That is the saddest thumbnail I’ve ever seen in my life
I think Thundurus-Incarnate’s fall off was way harder than like 3 of the pokemon mentioned in this video
Not really? Except Salamence since that only recently hit RU this gen as it was great in UU for some time, but both Staraptor and Gyarados had much steeper fall offs this gen than ThundyT who just got banned from RU.
He mentioned Thundurus in the first video
@@HowlingOneify Not Thundy T's, Thundy I's. I also forgot that thundy was in the previous video
@@suryave i forgor
Gen 9 is so weird, man. I really wish there were battle facilities in gen 9 so I could still use these Pokemon somewhere that wasn't the PvE-est of PvE in raid dens.
I've watched so much wolfie that tronadous incarnate beeing untiered sounds wrong.
Given that its one of the best pokémon in VGC (double battles)
Prankster Tailwind is meta defining in VGC and... almost entirely worthless in singles lol. It only lasts 4 turns including the turn you use it so you have to Tailwind -> Switch -> 2 turns of boosted speed and then it's gone. Outside of very specific circumstances (like Wind Rider Shiftry using it for +1 Attack into Explosion) you just never really see Tailwind cause it's such a small benefit
I've been around since this channel started which makes this video even weirder to watch
At this rate Landorus-T will find itself on PU before Gen XI ends
Lando T will stay. This generation had a rough start for him and he almost dropped to UU but now hes at a really solid point in OU, remaining a top 10 mon. Lando will never be bad
LandoT remained a top 10 at WORST pokemon in OU this gen, and has been steadily moving higher in viability despite having many moves gutted from its kit. It's not going anywhere sorrry (not sorry).
Salamence is my favorite Pokemon. Not just because he's strong, but the backstory alone when he was a bagon made him so relatable
snorlax's source of healing was nerfed in gen8, which put a hole in it's kite.
as someone in ZU top 200 i can say having snorlax is very nice its not op its decent and can be good if used properly but not the big dog but dont be sad for lax it could have been worse befoare the dlc first dlc it was a fighting heavy meta and aweso ursaring used tobe top dog until it went to BL but ye lax has been good down in ZU very good for his neich(hope i spelled that right)
i like how in the footage, terrakion hits 20 stone edges in a row xD
I'll never forgive game freak for nerfing talonflame and gale wings. Biggest blow.
Gen 9 has been ridiculous... and honestly, I've been thinking for a little while now, Snorlax needs an Evolution.
It had a gigantimax form, but then dynamic got banned. If it was a mega evolution it would work well.
I've decided to totally skip this generation all together and it's paying dividends.. However I'm looking forward to the gen 10 reboot 😊
@@poboi-lt5673well I hope pokemon going into lower tiers wasn’t the sole reason considering Gen 10 will only bring more power creep 😭 tho hopefully not as drastic
It doesn't. You can't improve perfection.
Swolax, Snorlax cuts 400 pounds of fat but in the process gains 500 pounds of muscle and becomes a bulky normal/fighting type with Huge Power.
Genuinely though just give him a mega evolution when megas get brought back for the next Legends game (and, god willing, the next mainline game as well)