Mega Salamence banned from OU

[Vinny Vidi Vici]

The thing needed to go, it was just too strong for it's tier. It's all well and good saying hit it with an Ice move, but unless you want to run an ice move on everyone of your Pokemon, that thing can find a way to come in, Substitute up, DDance up, and then it's over. It's explained incredibly well in the smogon forum itself, the thing was just way too strong for the tier. Not unlike Mega Kangaskhan when X/Y rolled around. My only question now is when does Mega Slowbro go?

 

[Astraea]

Hmm expected it to get banned from OU seeing its stats.

 

[PlatinumDude]

Mega salamence got smogon'd. Damn, didn't even got to use M-salamence. Dragonite is still better imo. Dragon claw the first turn, survives with multiscale, finish with extreme speed. Besides, any special atacker with ice beam kills M-Salamence.

Have you considered that one of the most popular Mega Salamence sets was the bulky Substitute/Dragon Dance set? With that, Mega Salamence can set up a Substitute on a predicted switch/status move, then Dragon Dance as the opponent tries to break the Sub. Sure, stuff like Protean Greninja exists, but they tend to be outsped after a Dragon Dance and decimated by Return afterward. This Salamence variant also has the bulk to shrug off some super effective hits:

252+ Atk Dragonite Dragon Claw vs. 92 HP / 0 Def Salamence: 236-278 (66.6 - 78.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252+ Atk Dragonite Extreme Speed vs. 92 HP / 0 Def Salamence: 79-93 (22.3 - 26.2%) -- 11.2% chance to 4HKO

 

[#DickBats]

Of course, Let's ban all attackers. It works like this, Pokemon: The Ultimate Stalling Simulator

As I said above, Mega Mence was OP. But, I noticed that the only things that eat the ban hammer are attackers. Quite funny, Isn't it?

^ Seconded

I'm getting tired of battling in showdown. %70 Of the teams have a Chansey. M-Salamence barely 2HKOs Chansey!

Stall teams are legit, but cheap cookie cutter stall teams make boring and annoying battles.

Have you considered that one of the most popular Mega Salamence sets was the bulky Substitute/Dragon Dance set? With that, Mega Salamence can set up a Substitute on a predicted switch/status move, then Dragon Dance as the opponent tries to break the Sub. Sure, stuff like Protean Greninja exists, but they tend to be outsped after a Dragon Dance and decimated by Return afterward. This Salamence variant also has the bulk to shrug off some super effective hits:

252+ Atk Dragonite Dragon Claw vs. 92 HP / 0 Def Salamence: 236-278 (66.6 - 78.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252+ Atk Dragonite Extreme Speed vs. 92 HP / 0 Def Salamence: 79-93 (22.3 - 26.2%) -- 11.2% chance to 4HKO

Yeah, well... It's better now.. I guess xD

 

[Nah]

Of course, Let's ban all attackers. It works like this, Pokemon: The Ultimate Stalling Simulator

As I said above, Mega Mence was OP. But, I noticed that the only things that eat the ban hammer are attackers. Quite funny, Isn't it?

I think that offensive Pokemon are usually the ones that get banned is because of the power creep that Game Freak has been doing since Gen4/Gen5. There's been way more powerful attacker pokes being introduced lately than defensive ones. If you look at the new batch of ORAS megas, only 4 of them are defensive ones: Mega Audino, Mega Sableye, Mega Slowbro, and Mega Altaria (and Mega Altaria can also be an offensive poke). The other 16 are all offensively based. There's just not enough defensive Pokemon (in singles) being introduced to counteract all these new super powerful sweepers and tanks.

A base 150 stat used to be considered huge, something that generally only Uber Pokemon had. Nowadays it's becoming common for pokes to have a base 140+ stat. And usually it's in Attack/Sp.Attack/Speed.

Ironically stall teams still eat me alive.

 

[Professor_Jared]

Yeah... But people just wants to stall. And if something is a threat to their style... They complain about it.

Take two seconds and imagine a meta with more stallers... Quite scary, Isn't it?


And, Stall teams eat me alive as well... Maybe with the time I find a way around them.

Tell me about it, the overabundance of stall teams just makes showdown boring and quite painful to play at times.

 

[Nah]

There's too many stall teams? Never seemed like that when I battle. Usually I see more offensive teams (which is what Mega Mence is most threatening to, since they tend to be frail and it outspeeds most of them).

 

[#DickBats]

Ferrothorn + Chansey + Rotom W <-- easily more than %30 has this sort of team. Or skarmory instead of Ferrothorn.

 

[The Masked One]

Of course, Let's ban all attackers. It works like this, Pokemon: The Ultimate Stalling Simulator

As I said above, Mega Mence was OP. But, I noticed that the only things that eat the ban hammer are attackers. Quite funny, Isn't it?

What's a stall team? Sorry, I'm a noob to competitive Pokemon. So I'm going to inevitably ask noobish questions.

Also, I don't want to ban any of the attackers. If anything, I think some of Smogon's bans are kinda dumb. But then again, this is coming from the guy who started competitive battling only last December. Lol.

 

[J9794]

What's a stall team? Sorry, I'm a noob to competitive Pokemon. So I'm going to inevitably ask noobish questions.

Also, I don't want to ban any of the attackers. If anything, I think some of Smogon's bans are kinda dumb. But then again, this is coming from the guy who started competitive battling only last December. Lol.

Stall teams are the ones who attempt to win by using residual damage instead of directly attacking. They use defensive pokemon and moves like toxic to wear down the opposing pokemon.

 

[Polar Spectrum]

Before whoever above mentioned it, I hadn't really considered the bans of attack vs defensive pokes. So I did some research. Chuckles were had. Some usage stats on Smogon from earlier this year (pre-aegi ban and ORAS release) reveal that Rotom Wash was on roughly 20% of all players teams in their community's battles lol. It seems by usage there are more offensive than defensive in the top used though; but when I look at the banned list... again chuckles were had.

Keeping it on topic though; nothing is surprising about the Mega Salamence ban in that community. It only continues trends I have no need to repeatedly babble on about. Bottom line is people who live by those rules and do what Smogon says will now say farewell to it; while people who do not, will simply not carry on.

I look forward to seeing what roles Mega-Mence will play in the upcoming year's VGC though :3 That - I'm pretty interested in. Wether it becomes as mandatory as Talonflame / Mega Kanga in X/Y's first year or as short lived as the Mega Lucario which went down in one turn with no KO's to show for it in this past year's matches; I will be waiting to see.

 

[WestCoastShiny]

I don't think it was a huge surprise that he was gonna get banned, but I still see people acting really surprised that he was. I mean, with a 145? Base attack stat combined with Aerilate and a solid 120 base special attack stat and a diverse movepool COMBINED with 2 great pre-evo abilities, it's just too good. However, I feel that maybe Mega Metagross is a good counter for the common set that was in one of the links. His 150 base defense and his pre-evo ability keeps him safe from intimidate as long as he doesn't mega evolve. Even then, he has tough claws and mega-mence is x4 weak to ice so it'd probably be just enough to break through. Let's also not forget that he has priority in bullet punch which I think is neutral if I'm correct. Just a thought. I don't have calcs to back this up but if someone could do that, that'd be cool. Try both a jolly and adamant nature for mega metagross with 252 attack.

 

[Dark Azelf]

It makes me laugh how offensive players moan about something and it gets banned. Mega Mence wasnt really an issue for stall as many common stall mons wrecked it see; Skarm, Zong, Zapdos, Slowbro etc. But if stall players said "Oh actually can we get rid of Mega Medicham, Gardy and Heracross because they are psuedo uncountable oh and Gothitelle because every wall in the game is at risk from its garbage" yet nothing gets done about those lol.

Also if you cant break stall your team synergy/strategy/battling style is bad/flawed and you got outplayed. Sorry but its true. You've got stuff with base 160 offenses, Life Orbs etc and you still cant wall break. Let that sink in. :|

Regardless, its a stupid argument because an ideal metagame should be an environment where all play styles flourish, including stall. Think late DPPtHGSS metagame or RSE.

Anyway, mega mence and mega Ray are a perfect example of bs power creep and show that nintendo needs to STOP with the mega failures, they've clearly jumped the broken shark as shown by mega Ray getting an ENTIRE NEW TIER JUST FOR IT. As ive said before, this isnt digimon, nor do any sane players who strive for balance want **** running around with base 160+ offenses and megas show you're scraping the barrel because they introduced like 30 original new pokemon this gen. Lastly, what have been banned most of all this gen? Megas. Case and point. Personally i would love to see a mega free metagame, then people would actually have to to try when battling and team building instead of spamming <Gee wiz un-wallable unresisted move from base 190 attack>.

Quoth the elf. Forevermore. :)

 

[Ryouta]

For normal pokemons is beat an mega evole pokemon very difficult and they are very strong.. :/

 

[SnowpointQuincy]

I wonder what will happen to Mega-Salamence in VGC. Nothings gets banned there other than Mascot Legends and such. Mega-Khan was actually fair(ish) in Doubles. Maybe the same will happen here.

Being banned on Smogon is... just look at his stats. Do you think Arcues and Mega-Mewtwo should drop down to OU?

 

[halcyonic]

yup totally, arceus-ghost best offensive/defensive spinblocker, mega mewtwo x (gg mega gallade) and mega mewtwo y (chansey exterminator yaa... 6-0s standard stall) -.-

#babagareeb

 

[skyburial]

Anything that can take a 4X STAB Ice Beam from my Physical/Mixed Kyurem-B does not belong in the tier, in my opinion. Mega Salamence is ridiculously disruptive.

 

[srinator]

Anything that can take a 4X STAB Ice Beam from my Physical/Mixed Kyurem-B does not belong in the tier, in my opinion. Mega Salamence is ridiculously disruptive.

what lol.
252 SpA Life Orb Kyurem Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Salamence: 655-769 (166.2 - 195.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO

even max spd hp mega mence cant take it, changed defences to 95/130/90 lol

 

[Vinny Vidi Vici]

Apparently max HP, max SD can take an Ice Beam from an uninvested in SA Kyurem-B (without Life Orb), but even then, it's a coin flip as to whether it OHKOs or not. Maybe Skyburial ran into the wrong Mence on the wrong day, but at any rate, I think anyone who's seen what the tier was like for the brief while Mega Mence was allowed to run roughshod in it will know that the ban was more than justified.

 

[srinator]

Why can't we just remove all mega's and have a clean ou tier :/