BW OU BW OU Discussion

Discuss BW OU here!

 

This tier is fucking unrecognizable, even more than modern RBY which is excused for obvious reasons (mechanics).
Literally every single tiering decision we had since 2015 could have been avoided by just not touching it in the first place
I really hope the tier gets unplayable to the point they start to consider to push the 'RESET' button
Killing Jirachi and Amoonguss was definitely the right step towards that direction, yeah that will definitely accelerate things.
Give me Legacy BW!

/rant off

 

This is a horrible take. BW has improved over the last 2-3 years and this is almost universally agreed upon by accomplished players. We have slowly, but surely, improved the metagame one decision at a time and we are now at a point where it is considered one of the better generations of OU.

 

Yeah sure universally agreed by a circlejerk of 10 people
I hope Breloom keeps pounding your prolapsed assholes, that's the only place it fits in anyway

 

From a "nobody" pont of view (like me) i can understand your frustration about how the Smogon BW TDs are doings suspect tests. However, saying that they are doing bad decisions and destroying the meta is not true.
From the point i restarted playing BW at a competitive scene (early 2017) until now, all the suspect decisions have made an improvement in skill base of the tier (even if i didn't concour at some of then when implemented: sand rush ban as an exemple).
The new sleep ban meta is a wonderfull tier restart as new builds need to be tested, new strategies can find competitive play and (more important) new players can arise in this beta / test stage. Everyone that i talk about this sleepless meta, either "Smogon circlejerks", ladder dudes and "random noobs" are agreeing that this is the best BW OU we have since it starts in 2010.
We still have a lot to improve in the tier (hello Latio suspect and Chlorophyll retest) and again i'm not happy with the way Smogon TD do the BW votes but THEY ARE making good decisions and making the tier the best OU gen we have.

 

Completely missing the point, are we? The voting requirements are fine -- I've had a bad 2019, it's my fault -- the problem are the suspects themselves that shouldn't be happening in the first place.

The room we gained by banning sleep is pretty much...insignificant. Most teams running Sleep Talk had no problem doing so, and teams not running Sleep Talk were still perfectly viable as long as they had some semblance of a plan. You like to talk about new strategies and all but if you take a look at the builds people are using in SPL you will easily notice how literally nothing changed regarding team structures, except for the fact Amoonguss is dead and Rain teams relying on Jirachi to check Latios now are forced to run as many Protects as possible to scout for Trick. And let me assure you, these two things alone are BAD for the metagame and do not help new players at all. Amoonguss was awesome to splash for new players, because it provided a blanket check to a lot of threats while not being a sitting duck thanks to Spore. By removing Spore, we effectively removed the most of the proactivity it had and now it's just too passive to fit into most teams.
Was it worth it? What did we gain? By scrolling through my teambuilder I gained a team similar to what dice used last week (without Zapdos), a single rain team that really needed the spare moveslot for Scarf Landorus, and then a plethora of strange shit like Gyarados+Chansey rain and Forretress and Donphan teams...while losing two of my favorite teams that required sleep to execute their strategy
If we look at the top of the crop i.e. the most consistent builds possible, we gained almost nothing because those kinds of teams had no problem whatsover running stalk, and Breloom still needs two checks like before.
Oh and we also gave ferrothorn easier spiking lol nice

First of all, were you and the people you talk about even around in 2010? And even if you were, what's the point of comparing BW1 to BW2 given they are completely different games?
If anything, a comparison can be made between the more fast paced, bulky-offensish 2013-2014 metagame and the current excuse of a metagame that still holds the name of BW. I prefer the former because the current one gets "readjusted" every six months and I hate instability (since I actually build).

We already lack the tools to deal with Venusaur and you also want to ban one of its soft checks, how interesting. No, there's no way these two decisions can work together; Venusaur was only tolerable during a certain phase of the metagame which I happen to consider the best there ever was, when Latias was as viable as Latios, priority moves were all around the place and Stoutland could easily "trade kills" with it.
And even then...Chlorophyll was way too much to handle for most Rain teams and it single-handedly invalidated non-DragMag Weatherless as a playstyle, so it's always been a controversial subject and I simply can't see how you would prevent Venu to simply feast on every balance lacking Heatran nowadays. Dugtrio being gone doesn't mean shit since MixSaur with EQ and SubSeed are a thing. Sleep ban definitely hurts it but again, it's a matter of speed-endurance-coverage, if Sun is up you just can't dance safely around it. And it's not like venu is the only viable abuser after all. Only way to make Chlorophyll acceptable would be to revert to the pre-2015 metagame, but that's impossible since I'm the only one who would support that proposal.

Regarding Latios...I have to admit I don't use it much. Usually I try to counter everything so rather than relying on the Rotom+Latios core (which only checks Keldeo well during the early game) I prefer Amoonguss, Celebi, fat waters, etc., therefore it's natural for me to have a pretty low Latios usage. In spite of having to face Latios rather than wielding it most of the time, I still think it's manageable and should be allowed in the tier, even after all the indirect buffs it got during the last few years. I don't think a player who is using Latios has more chances to win against a player who isn't using it, in short.

 

History of Bans in BW OU - Smogon University This article exists on BW, although it's in an unused (and maybe inaccessible outside of google) corner of Smogon and hasn't been updated since 2013; having an updated version with all of the many changes since would definitely be helpful.

 

I am a fairly new BW player and considering so many changes over years I am sadly unfamiliar with how the teir decisions work or how and why they where made when they where. However for newer players like myself I only have a 1440-1450ish elo atm on showdown. I really feel like its hard to find a place to start. And if new changes are planning on happening and even more changes to a meta that has been around for a few years now. How is this stuff really helping anyone in general. I just don't know where to begin I suppose and at the same time am puzzled at huge changes to a huge teir like this one when other old gens may have had changes but usually a lot smaller or a lot less of them. I agree with Christos and others that say we should prob have a list of these changes. As theres been quite a few. And very helpful for people such as myself and others that are new that want to have a bit more history knowledge or background to help with the understanding of what has been happening what may happen and how do go from there. Helps build a foundation. something that would be more updated then just something form 2013. But this is just my thoughts and I am fairly new and any help is welcomed for BW.