Metagame np: Stage 4.5: Meditation (Medicham Suspect Test)

[PrincessGardevoir]

Hello, this is my first time going into the PU forums, and I know I can't comment on everything that dropped because, well, I started playing PU just today, but I really like this guy and I wanted to talk about it!

Pop Team Epic (Golem-Alola) @ Magnet
Ability: Galvanize
Tera Type: Electric
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Explosion
- Body Slam
- Stone Edge
- Stealth Rock


He's very funny. Even without any defense investment, if he Tera's he can survive virtually every unboosted or only +1 neutral phys hit in the game, and can tank a lot of EQs/Stomping Tantrums/High Horsepowers (Passimian scarf EQ does 65% max.) With Tera Electric, Galvanize, and Magnet, he is able to dish out a frankly comedic amount of damage to even resists, and has a decent chance to instantkill a LOT of mons from full with Body Slam - Passimian is a 25% chance from full, Medicham dies instantly, Eviolite Gurdurr takes 50% unless fully def invested, and if they don't die to Body Slam, they absolutely die to Explosion.

252+ Atk Magnet Galvanize Tera Electric Golem-Alola Explosion vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Abomasnow in Snow: 344-405 (89.8 - 105.7%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO

This is my favorite calc ever. There's a level of seretonin that you get when your opponent U-turns out on your Golem, and they have to select which mon dies while they salute their sacrifice. Arboliva? Gone. Trevenant? Gone. +1 def Farigiraf because of Grassy Seed? Don't even think about it. Weezing? Mate that ain't a resist! Eviolite Magneton? 117% Minimum, and it has nothing that actually threatens you (STABs are resisted, Tri attack is resisted, almost every tera is neutral)

Max speed means you can get a jump on a bunch of mons that might not always run speed - Houndstone, Farigiraf (i think?), I outran a Honchkrow earlier that was kinda funny. Because of Golem's innate physical bulk, if it's in against anything that isn't a Ground type they have to pivot out or risk a Body Slam. SR means even if there's a Whiscash or jumpscare tera ground on the opposing team you can still make some progress, too.


I know he's slow, and looking at him funny with literally any special attacker will just melt him, but probably my biggest worry with him is that he's a tera sink. He NEEDS Tera Elec to actually start OHKOing non super effective hits, and when he can't get that, my boy is fishing for that 30% cheese or clicking Boom to still OHKO everything. He also can't exactly break through EVERYTHING, since max bulk Gurdurr at +1 def will not give a damn. But Explosion still deletes it, sooooooooooo...





basically i like golem and i will not accept slander that Golem is anything less than C tier for Cool.

 

[asa]

Gonna go into a little detail about some of my responses to the survey, which you should definitely fill out if you haven't already!

While I'm worried that a ban on Damp/Heat Rock will gut rain/sun too hard, I still voted to take action on both of them. Defensive counterplay to weather is naturally somewhat limited, and the rocks remove a fair bit of weather's offensive counterplay, too. Combined with how easy our new Prankster users make setting weather and generating free turns + no individual Swift Swim/Chlorophyll user clearly standing out as broken (think Qwilfish-H and arguably Golduck from earlier metas), I think it's worth specifically looking at the rocks. Admittedly, I don't feel too strongly about this and think people could stand to use Pokemon with decent weather MUs more (Abomasnow, Cramorant, defensive Houndstone, Chansey, etc.), but it's hard to ignore the recent outcry against weather.

Poliwrath can sort of do whatever it wants with its great movepool and good all-around stats, and it's pretty annoying on rain, but I don't think it needs tiering action. The only consistently threatening sets to me are Belly Drum and Bulk Up, but the former becomes much less consistent outside of rain and the latter hates how fast-paced a lot of teams are + needs several free turns to get going imo.

More on the fence about Victreebel. I personally think it on sun is more broken than Poliwrath on rain and voted to take action on it, but now I'm a little unsure. Outside of sun it's mostly fine, though I do find its STAB combo a little annoying to switch into unless you specifically have Muk, Chansey, or Tera Steel Dachsbun. Vic can also just tear through SpDef checks to it with Swords Dance sets just fine, though this does make you more vulnerable to Weezing and Orthworm. Maybe I'll end up viewing it the same way I view Poliwrath, but I also wouldn't mind a ban on it.

The butterfly. As someone who really hated Vivillon's presence in the earlier stages of the tier (and also voted to quickban it at the time), I really don't think it's an issue now. I don't think it *can't* become an issue as the meta progresses, QD + Tera is an annoying combination and 91% accuracy sleep can really throw a wrench in your gameplan if you aren't careful or get unlucky.

That said, it feels pretty easy to include counterplay to Vivillon on teams, both offensive and defensive. There are enough viable Choice Scarfers that can outspeed +1 Vivillon and KO/heavily chip/otherwise screw it over (Basculin, Dug-A, MaleDD, Morpeko, both Raichu formes, Rotom, Sneasel-H, Swanna, Tauros-P) and plenty of Pokemon that can take even boosted hits from and trade with it (this one is dicier all things considered, but Orthworm, Chansey, Articuno, Cryogonal, Rotom, Rotom-F, Ursaring, Muk, Cramorant, Komala, etc.). Getting more than one boost can genuinely be difficult, too, since relying on sleep to help you is luck-dependent and can easily backfire + it still has pretty mediocre SpD at +1 and will always have paper physical bulk. With how fast a lot of teams are, pressuring Viv out of boosting in the first place isn't impossible either. It really only gets safe points of entry against Grass- and Fighting-types, which aren't even completely helpless against it, or when it Teras into a Ground-type against Electrics, which can be pretty easy to telegraph (especially if it literally switches in against an Electric). Like weather, it is a little hard to ignore the outcry about Vivillon, but weather feels much more deserving of its backlash imo.

Somewhat on the fence about these Flying-types, but for now, I don't think Charizard needs any tiering action and I don't really have a strong opinion about Braviary. Both of them may see a resurgence as "standard" continues to develop, but they've both gained new offensive and defensive checks that feel easy and natural to include on teams. Gonna be keeping a close eye on them, though, it wasn't that long ago that they were both incredibly dishonest..

I don't think we should resuspect Lilligant right now, if only because we've already got a lot of offensive threats running around as is, but I am on board with resuspecting it at some point in the future. It doesn't seem like it would nearly as suffocating as it was earlier on, and it also seems like it would be easier to both wall and revenge kill with our pool of viable mons continuing to expand. I feel the same way about Oricorio-Pa'u btw, and I'm a little more interested in it since that would mean we get to toy around with another new remover, but that's another discussion.