"Demi-Ubars?"

[Frostweaver]

I just wonder as I see that other thread about "Ubar" Pokemon...

Is it valid to say that "Demi-Ubars" exist? Or is it definite rather a Pokemon is an Ubar, or not an Ubar but just a OU?

The most questionable and best example is perhaps the infamous Calmkou. Though its base stats don't meet the "Ubar rank" of tier 1, reaching base stats of over 500, and its movepool isn't unexceptionally powerful either (and in fact, quite terrible in comparison), yet it is considered as one of the most dangerous Pokemon in play. The last interboard tournament has banned Calmkou and its close cousin Calmcune as well, even though the tournament allowed a maximum of 1 legendary. Obviously, their power exceeds the limit of a "legendary" and is reaching out to the "OUs," yet their movepool and stats defy them of an OU identity.

So, does this make them a "Demi-Ubars" and should be banned along with the others or not in tournaments?

But then, if "Demi-Ubars" are created, then some other super OU will follow suite, such as Dugtrio, Gengar, Snorlax, Blissey, Skarmory, Weezing and/or Vaporeon. All of them are super annoying, and will very likely doom your team if they're used together in a skilled fashion, one covering the weakness of another. They can tank, and perhaps too well at it, or sweep in the "most annoying" fashion possible. If Calmkou got into "Demi-Ubars" will this make these OU "Demi-ubars" as well, banned from tournament plays?

Discuss, and let the results go into the Advanced Trainer's Guide if suitable. =)

(if you don't know what's going on in this thread, then sadly and in the most cruel word possible, your skill level got some way to go before you can participate in this discussion)

 

[Mana Lugia]

I disagree with the Demi ubers label. Technically speaking, there's ubers, legends and then everyone else. Kou falls in Legends, that's all. It also happens to be fast and learns Calm mind. Even though we can say it will sweep teams if used correctly, but couldn't every other pokemon? Sure, Kou sweeps more teams than the BellyZard, but that depends a lot on your opponents. Kou isn't so broken yet that it has no counters. Blissey, for example, is OU just because it's used to counter special sweepers, and Kou has nothing on Bliss unless it has maybe 6 minds up already.

I would think that OUs are OUs because they are better than most of the UU, while they still have the ability to counter each other. And because Cune tanks so much better, promoting Kou from legend to demiuber will take Cune up there, if not a step higher, since it's also one of the premier pseudohazers, something Kou cannot accomplish.

Well, I dunno if this made sense, but I'm going back to my sociology textbook now bai.

 

[HellishHades]

To some degree, every monster has a counter. Calmcune can be countered by forcing-Resting Suicune with Toxic, and then abusing the 2 idle turns to set-up a KO.

The problem occurs when people begin to use multiple such "Demi-?ber" monsters. A team filled with debateable "Demi-?bers" will obviously much more of a challenge to defeat if not impossible with most teams (notice I didn't say all teams).

It is frowned upon when an opponent's team consists entirely (or nearly entirely) of such "Demi-?bers". They can be defeated, but its not really a fair challenge, because the monsters are obviously at different levels of relative usage and ease of use.

Invariably, over-use of "Demi-?bers" will lead to a small handful of monsters that are usable to counter them, leading to one of the same problems GSC had with battling.

 

[Mana Lugia]

Except with GSC, since every monster had their max stats, defending tended to be quite simple. Curselax :X

 

[Composer of Requiems]

Personally, I think that all Pokemon can be ranked, and where the line is drawn depends on each person's personal preference. If the organizers of a tournement have bad experience concerning certain Pokemon, and everyone agrees to ban them, then the next best set will become popular. People will always pick the best, most advantagous stratergy possible to win. The only reason why some Pokemon are "Overused" is because stronger Pokemon are banned. Even if any Pokemon overused and above is banned, all of a sudden, you'll see teams filled with the most efficient borderline Pokemon. Would these now be called overused?

 

[Spike Razzor]

Stuff like "Semi-legends","Demi-00ber", "OU" and so on is just a bunch of nonesense made up by people whos team have little, or no defence against some Pokemon. Look at Tyranitar and Zapdos, Tyranitar has about 30 points higher than Zapdos, so how does that makes him a semi legend? :\ . These labels have got to be pealed...

Then theres people afraid of stuff like Skarm/Lax + Skarm/Weezing/Forrtress, and hardly anyone noticed that there is an anti Pokemon that could KO all of these, and its name is Blaziken. Like Shades said, you can force CMcune to Rest and Curelax can be easly stoped by Weezing with Haze + Painsplit.

Its just that some people are just too lazy to make teams of there own and just bite off whoever beats badly them. I have beatin a fair number of people and watched them try and use some of the Pokemon on my team, only to fail and end up losing even more. :sleeping:

 

[Frostweaver]

Everything has a counter, but SOMETHING IS WRONG if there's very little valid counter, like just 2 or 3? And the major concern is that these "counters" lead to nowhere except in a big cycle, like...

Jolteon > Blissey > Blaziken > Dugtrio > Jolteon > Blissey again...?

That's one chain of example... though there are multiple ways out, it's still lead to very similiar results. Let's start with Jolteon again.

Jolteon > Lanturn > Dugtrio > Sceptile > Aerodactyl > Skarmory > Blaziken

Again, a never ending cycle... the only difference now is that we jumped to Lanturn and then directly on to Dugtrio. How did Dugtrio end up in both chains, even though the members within the chain are different? If you continue the chain on further, using Sceptile instead of Jolteon again, you end up at Blaziken, once more. Such is the trait of OUs/Legendaries.

That's because of their overachieving stats, ability and/or movepools, making them usable against much more different situations. UUs on the other hand, are much more limited and are not as flexible... but is it a "skill issue" that a player with a UU team, who are only fit to certain extents, loses to these allstars who are armed to destroy almost anything but very certain situations?

Of course, part of the problem is probably "you just got bad choices of team members on your team. Look, take out that Bellosum and use Exeggutor instead." Well well, what's the point of all the Pokemon players out there battling, if all the teams are just different rearrangements of lineups out of the same 30 or so Pokemon?

Out of most physical tanks, you can't escape from the "OU" of Weezing, Skarmory, and Steelix. (there are some other ones, but what are the chances of seeing them compare to these 3?) Out of all special sponges, automatically, Milotic and Blissey just come to our mind immediately, because we see them so often. Hazers? Weezing and Vaporeon... See the repetition now? Always those same Pokemon, over and over again... yet if you try to be creative, you get crushed...

How to make the other 340 or so Pokemon usable?
Put some discouraging labels on the other 40 or so Pokemon...

Everyone knows that I hate Skarm/Bliss, and keeps whining about it... well you honestly think that I can't beat it? Well, there are Blaziken, Gengar, Hariyama, Screechtrio, Sublax, Salamence (to certain extents) and Calmkou. There are probably a few more, but then those require a combo of Pokemon so I'll leave them out. So to beat a Skarmbliss combo, you just gotta have these Pokemon on your team... yay joy it's those bums you see everyday again. So much for team making and creativity/originality.

But... something is wrong if 2 Pokemon together can only be defeated by less than 10 Pokemon, when 389 Pokemon/Pokemon forms exist...

Get my drift?

 

[Mana Lugia]

Moderately disagree. First off, you're never gonna use Magikarp, Caterpie, Weedle, etc. So there's way less than 300 pokemon that is expected to be usable.

As well, stats are generally divided into 2 kinds:

- Exceptional in 1/2 areas
- Average in all areas

Such is pokemon. Unfortunately, pokemon in the second area are royally buttscrewed by the EV system, since in order to maintain that average stats, they must resort to an extremely low average to begin with, and if their max stats is already not too impressive to begin with, such as the case in many of the UUs, they don't have a chance of survival in the game.

On the other hand, pokemon that excel in one or two stats are always going to be used more. In the OU category, Blissey, Weezing etc come to mind. Kingdra has great all around stats added up, but because it's nothing special, there's no incentive to use it, period. If you end up banning a pokemon such as Blissey and the other "OU" gang, then people will simply turn to the Average in all stats but great total stat pokemon, such as Kingdra. By giving it a boosting personality and such, it'll turn into the next special offense superstar, beating out most of the UU mon by itself. That's not going to be fair either. Then we'll ban the average but high total pokemon, leading us to use the lower total, but high in certain areas pokemon. These pokemon, such as, oh, say Sneasel, can deal a hell of a lot more dmg than your average UU. That upsets the game once again.

By the process of banning, we're going to end up banning all but the Caterpies and the Weedles. But wait, Weedle poisons with PSN sting! Therefore Weedle will be banned, and our teams will be nothing more than 6 Caterpies (Magikarp, of course, is going to be banned on the basis of it being able to learn a 200 power attack)

That's my ideas on the subject anyhow. No matter how you look at the game today, the well balanced pokemon just don't seem to be usable. It's all about pokemon that excel in certain areas.

Of course, I didn't mention movepools at all, because really, average pokemon have average movepools, and thus average pokemon die to specialist pokemon with average movepools...

Or something like that.

 

[HellishHades]

As well, stats are generally divided into 2 kinds:

- Exceptional in 1/2 areas
- Average in all areas

"Moderately disagree."

The problem occurs when a Pok?mon excells in many areas, as is the case with Suicune. It has the tanking stats of Cradily, but with much greater attacking power. Obviously, this monster is much harder to take out than others.

I don't really have a problem with such monsters, like Suicune, since they can easily be defeated by exploding while they sleep. But I can see where those that despise them are coming from.

 

[Mana Lugia]

Suicune, unfortunately, is a Legend, and Suicune isn't hard to take down with Raikou and Blissey running rampant, so it's not a problem at all.

And why do people use Suicune? Because it's a better pokemon than Kingdra.

 

[Spike Razzor]

And why do people use Suicune? Because it's a better pokemon than Kingdra.

404 HP, Def's and CM. Kingdra has none of these =\. Speaking of Kingdra, who does its Hydro Pump always seems to hit once Rain Dance is in effect? Or am I just having bad luck here =\?

 

[Mana Lugia]

80% isn't that bad if you take into account it only gets 5-8 uses, saying you'd only miss 1-2 on average. And luck isn't scattered, it's very possible to clum the 7 hits first before hitting the 8th miss.

Also, Of course Kingdra has none of that, Kingdra's only advantage over Suicune is a lack of a weakness in Electric, one of the most popular attacks. Of course, with a Calmkou on the block, gg calmcune =/

 

[HellishHades]

There's about a 26% chance that the move would hit all times when used six times in a row ( (4/5)^6 ). I think that's right. Change 6 to suit your needs.

 

[Mana Lugia]

yes, but of the 74%, much of it is just missing once or twice, not that big =D

 

[Shiney]

I have my own part to add in this, but it's simple, and quick, and has to do with the first post in the thread, I haven't read through everything yet. I've killed a lot of legendaries on netbattle and gameboy with "non ubars" and UU pokes. With a few exceptions, every uber and legend has a good counter, so other than said exceptions, I don't feel any pokemon should be banned. It would take a mass census to really decide what is almost completely without counter, and worth banning. So far, the only three I've really found have been mnewtwo, blissey, and kyogre, I've managed to bring down every other legend (Not counting deoxys' forms) using non ubars, sometimes an OU, mostly UU and ones that fall inbetween.


Of course, this might be colored slightly as I agree with a quote from the games.

Strong pokemon, weak pokemon... It's all the foolish perception of people. Truly talented trainers try to win with their favorites.

 

[Mana Lugia]

The only problem is, like argued by several before, that quite a few Ubers require specific counters. Sure, you can argue that say... uh... something beats Mewtwo (I'm not sure what yet), but I'm sure devoting 1 spot to counter Mewtwo alone would make the game too stale for people to play in. The OUs, thankfully, have a _few_ more counters, although I don't particularly like them either. UUs have lot more counters than OU's, but there will always be a dominant pokemon that will dominate the rest and have to be banned, so =/

(IMHO)

 

[HellishHades]

Strong pokemon, weak pokemon... It's all the foolish perception of people. Truly talented trainers try to win with their favorites.

Ironically, every newb's favourites include:

> Kyogre
> Mewtwo
> Groudon
> Rayquaza
> et cetera


To answer the first question:

I believe that monsteres needn't another category. I think "legendary" -- such as Suicune -- suffices.