Project SV PU Personal Viability Rankings

asa

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last day of this meta, so i'm Literally Obligated to post a personal vr

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Persian-A gives cats a bad name.

S- isn't necessary anymore. Gogoat and Misdreavus are still very good Pokemon, but both have some serious competition for their respective roles, are easier to pressure, and don't feel as automatic as they used to. Misdreavus has these issues especially imo, hence its lower placement, but you could convince me that it's better than Basculin.

Whiscash is a bit of a fraud at times, but the WhisKlawf core is undeniably good and effective. Couple its contributions to that core (and most teams in general) with how reliably it blocks Volt Switch, being a solid blanket check to most offensive threats, and its presence forcing a lot of Grass coverage/Tera Grass, and you have what I consider the third best Pokemon atm.

Dugtrio is perfectly fine, y'all are just haters.

Setup Wyrdeer is A- with Grassy Terrain support and probably like B+ without it. Still incredibly cheap either way, though. Choiced isn't bad either btw, I swear!

A lot of what's in the B ranks honestly deserves more exploration (esp. stuff like Lycanroc-N, Camerupt, Rabsca, Fraxure, and Sneasel), but I get that they can be incredibly awkward to fit or are incredibly specific in what they do. Still, they're pretty kewl.

Houndoom and Fantom aren't real Pokemon.
 

UberSkitty

28 on Smogon in cat years
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I'll start off with my impressions so far (each tier organized by alphabet):

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Figured it was too early to be giving mons specific ranks, so went slightly vague. The letter rankings are more an reference/approximation of the tier than what I'd actually rank the individual mons. Now for some random thoughts, mostly about the new mons:
:sableye: The most meta defining mon imo. It checks so much and is one of the best spinblockers in a hazard-filled meta. I run Tera Dark on a lotta my mons just to not be Encored/Wisped by this thing, and even then it can just click Knock Off. Pairs great with a lotta the other popular walls, notably Weezing. It's also probably the main thing keeping mons like Tauros, Tauros-P, and Medicham from being borken.
:tauros::tauros-paldea-combat: Just reinstating that these cousins would prob be borken if not for Sableye.
:morpeko: It may seem innocent, but once this thing starts spamming Aura Wheel and can just sweep through teams. Also it's a Rapid Spinner that threatens Sableye so that's nice.
:naclstack: On paper other bulky Rocks like Probopass, Klawf, and Carbink seem better with their wider array of utility and much easier to fit on teams. But all Naclstack needs to is Salt Cure and you're good to go. Recover helps too.
:swanna: Might be overrating it, but that movepool... *licks bird lips*
:raichu-alola: Not completely sold on this, but with so many teams lacking a Volt Absorber it's pretty easy to just spam. Morpeko and Frostom existing also give it competition as pivoting electric mons, but I'd say the speed is barely enough to keep it above Mid.
:trevenant: This thing just hits so hard with CB. While not as fast or hard to switch into as other physical mons Medicham or Mabosstiff, it's STAB combo is near-unresisted and it's def one of the better of the Mid-ranked mons.
:chimecho: Fun Starf Berry+Recycle sets aside, this mon's healing movepool is amazing; Wish, Healing Wish, Recover, and it's even the only non-Chansey line mon to get Heal Bell.
:magcargo: Flame Body gives it an actual niche over stuff like Naclstack as a wall. I'm yet to try Shell Smash, but what could go wrong with that?
:arbok::furret::phione: I just want these mons to be viable so badly, even though they prob aren't.

Will update over time, hope to see some other people post their VRs too!
 
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throwing my hat in the ring, my current perception of the meta ,also ordered alphabetical within the tiers. almost put sableye in A+ then i realised how many mons i'm running tera dark on rn so that's why that's out of alphabetical order. viability looking quite offense oriented but the S tier is honestly holding it off from being totally that.
 

asa

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More or less my first impressions of the new meta. I didn't want to use letter rankings because it feels too early for me to tell what exactly is S, A+, etc. compared to just how viable they are, which is what this list represents. I don't have a lot of time rn to explain most of these, but I'm open to answering any questions about it :)

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woah, what are you doing here?

rankings within tiers are done alphabetically (except for the times where i put something in the wrong spot) and are not ordered. the guys in s through a do their job really well most of the time if not always. a- and b+ do theirs pretty well save for some really bad matchups. b guys have a lot of untapped potential but usually hit a snag or two in-game and/or are awkward to include in the builder. b- guys are trolling and only really do one thing for the most part, c guys are simply fictional or only fit on legit One Teamstyle.
 
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My general viewpoint of the meta right now, im probably not right on a lot of stuff, but im just happy we have a lot of viable mons currently, many different mons work here and teams are very creative currently. My tiers are kinda ordered but it does get messy the farther you go. Im open to answer whatever questions anyone got
 
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General thoughts on the meta so far. Rankings are very general and not ordered, anything not ranked I don't think really has much reason to be used but I could be wrong on some of them. There's some mons I just haven't seen or used that I'm just kinda guessing on and am probably wrong about.
 

Hera

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everything unranked is unviable. c is big cause it's early on in the meta and i can see these mons having a niche but as the meta settles i expect c to shrink massively.

medicham is definetely busted, only way to be safe vs it is by using bulky ghost + tera psychic ngas weezing and even that can lose over time or to the wrong tera. imo bu lum berry is the best set rn since you set up on all of your "counters" and then click the funny tera button and win. i thought trailblaze would break it and tb is good, it just really wants the ability to setup AND a way to tech past counters. aoa is probably good too, just replace bu with trailblaze and you have the best cleaner in the meta.

braviary is something i'm more iffy on but i can't see it being balanced long-term. imagine tauros but with another stab, more power, and uturn cause fuck you. yeah it's slow but its bulk is good enough to force trades and usually it wins, and if that wasn't enough it gets roost + bu/agility to take advantage of free turns. it's got too much set malleability to end up being manageable imo
 

Melt Gibson

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this is where i'm at rn, feel free to give me a shout if you have questions/comments/concerns! didn't wanna use letter grades since it's so early into the meta, so a lot of this is kinda touch-and-go.

best - top of the tier. contenders for s rank, hard to justify not slotting on a team.
great - really strong mons, either the best at their role or just good at a lot of things.
good - just generally solid with a few issues here or there
alright - fine, there are better choices out there at times but by no means are these bad.
niche - serves one hyper specific role or exists primarily for when you're not using something else. not great but does do a job.
bad - unviable

:weezing:
This is the best mon in SVPU right now, full stop. Answers literally every single physical threat in the tier bar a few Grounds and sometimes Medicham, and you can even gimmick your way out of those matchups with clever building and/or Tera Psychic/Ghost. Neutralizing Gas is almost always a net positive interaction in every situation it's in since a lot of things in PU right now rely on their abilities. Regenerator, Guts, Pure Power, Swift Swim and co., Purifying Salt, No Guard, Prankster, Blaze, Sand Stream, Snow Warning, Psychic Surge, Grassy Surge, Well-Baked Body, Contrary, Sheer Force... I could literally go on for fucking forever. The ONLY thing keeping this fat fuck balanced is the fact that it has no real recovery and admittedly poor special bulk, but it's still the best thing we have and it isn't close.

:braviary:
Used this in BOTW and good lord the damage output on this is insane, doing over half to AloPersian through Fur Coat with no boosts is already kinda nutty and this thing gets Defiant and setup moves??? SubBU sets seem to be the trend at the moment, and those are definitely good, but I think AoA Boots, Scarf, or Band all have potential as well. The coverage on Braviary is really good, especially when you account for Sheer Force boosts on most of the options. Defiant is also actually good now since we have Defoggers to let Braviary function as Defog bait. Oh, and it also has Defog itself! I don't think this is busted yet, but this does seem like one of those things where it's just a matter of time until someone finds The Set and all hell breaks loose.

:poliwrath:
I think I love him??? The frog has been very consistently surprising me. What I expected to just be a killbot on Rain teams has ended up being a very solid and well-rounded threat,. Tera + immunity ability is great as always, and while Swift Swim variants are super cool (Banded hits like a TRUCK), Bulk Up and utility sets seem to be just as good. Encore, Haze, Hypnosis, and Taunt are all super cool to have, and Water Absorb is extremely helpful in dealing with things like Basculin. Definitely feels like a repeat of SS where he's got just the right stew of qualities to make him good.

:volbeat:
I think this is flying under a lot of radars. Prankster with a STAB U-Turn that isn't weak at all is really cool! The Prankster niche in this tier is pretty much monopolized by Sableye, but I do believe pivoting access gives Volbeat a purpose that isn't just playing second banana.

:probopass:
It's... weird? Having an actual, honest-to-god, fat Steel that doesn't rely on its item to take a hit is a MASSIVE breath of fresh air. I just... really wish it wasn't Probopass. Even with access to Tera, those 4x weaknesses are always going to hold it back so much. Slow Volt Switch on a fat hazard setter is pretty sick, although funnily enough you can't afford to try and lowball opposing Probopass because you'll actually lose the matchup if they decide to Body Press you. Sturdy is practical and helps you assure that at the very least you'll get Rocks up. Wish we had like, actual targets for Magnet Pull to trap, that'd be really cool. This probably ends up being Alolan Golem's #1 victim next month. In fact, Alolan Golem probably just kills Probopass and takes its job in literally every aspect. The Rocks, the Steel trapping, the slow Volt Switch, the facial hair... At the end of the day, though, in a meta where Stealth Rock setters are not at the top of their game, I appreciate Probopass for what he is.
 
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Gonna post thoughts in the VR thread, but here's my rankings.

  • For the most part the first and last mon in each tier is what I think are the baselines, and then everything in between is roughly ordered, so for example I think Cryogonal is the top of B tier and Dachsbun is the bottom,
 
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