Greninja Banned from OU

[LarsINTJ]

Smogon has banned Greninja to Ubers

Spoiler

Much needed breathing room for ORAS OU team building?

What do you guys think?

Remember that you're never forced to play by Smogon's entirely unofficial tiers, so please calm yourself if you find this decision offensive.

 

[chuckthesmashlover]

I'm really glad that I don't play by Smogon's rules now.

 

[UltiMario]

I voted ban

it was broke

the end

 

[ThatNintendoDude]

I don't follow competitive Pokémon too much, I just have a basic knowledge of tiers and stuff like that. What was the reasoning behind this? Is it mainly that Protean gives Greninja a ton of STAB coverage options or am I missing something?

 

[chuckthesmashlover]

I don't follow competitive Pokémon too much, I just have a basic knowledge of tiers and stuff like that. What was the reasoning behind this? Is it mainly that Protean gives Greninja a ton of STAB coverage options or am I missing something?

Yes, that's the main reason.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Protean can be a double-edged sword though, since if Greninja uses Ice Beam and becomes an Ice-type, that pretty much makes it a big target for Bullet Punch, especially against Scizor or Mega Metagross.

I don't really study competitive Pokemon though, so I'm guessing that Greninja's ban isn't just because of Protean, but also because of its 122 base speed being quite high for most OU Greninja counters to outspeed.

 

[UltiMario]

No one attribute of something breaks it.

Gren's problem was a combination of incredibly good coverage, of which was all backed by STAB, that could be spread over decent mixed offenses and supported by the highest speed tier in OU (outside of Scarfers and the like) that resulted in a serious lack of ways to deal with the thing. It had a whopping 3 counters in Umbreon, Chansey, and Porygon 2. Chansey was a shaky one at best.

It'd be one thing if it was trivial to revenge kill Greninja, but usually it required a scarfer, or a priority user with very strong STAB priority to ensure it killed Greninja regardless of its type change. Greninja was essentially immune to revenge killers that functioned based off their speed, since it was faster than all but Weavile.

Generally those are the things that put the frog to rest.

 

[LarsINTJ]

Vaporeon could also deal with Greninja, specifically EV'd to take gunk shots, although critical hits or poisons were an issue.

The addition of low kick and gunk shot for Greninja pushed it over the edge.

What about the other Gen 6 starters in ORAS?
- Delphox received signal beam, foul play, dazzling gleam, shock wave and a bunch of support moves including trick.
- Chesnaught received super fang, iron head, dual chop, thunder punch, superpower, drain punch, synthesis, zen headbutt and some support moves.

Greninja actually received the least new moves, but the power of those mentioned was overwhelming given how good it was already. Funny though, froggy was also given some highly questionable moves like endure, snore and role play.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

The funny thing is, Gunk Shot is not very reliable with its accuracy being 70%.

Edit: Whoops, I didn't realize that Gunk Shot's accuracy got increased to 80%.

 

[Marthmario]

The funny thing is, Greninja is not even going to be picked in Ubers.

 

[UltiMario]

The funny thing is, Greninja is not even going to be picked in Ubers.

This is usually the fate of most things that stick around in the OU tier for a while before getting banned. They're strong in OU but are outclassed by a 670 BST version of themselves somewhere in Ubers.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

This is usually the fate of most things that stick around in the OU tier for a while before getting banned. They're strong in OU but are outclassed by a 670 BST version of themselves somewhere in Ubers.

The Froakie family and Kecleon are the only Pokemon who can legally have Protean though, so you won't even see any legendaries with that ability if they don't have access to Role Play.

 

[UltiMario]

They don't need Protean to be a 670 BST copy. Instead, their attacking stats could be so incredibly high that they're stronger than Gren regardless of the Protean boost, have much higher damage on their STABs, and similar damage on their coverage moves.

Case in point, there is literally no reason to use Greninja over Scarf Kyogre, Scarf Palkia, or LO Yveltal. They offer similar movepools, but Kyogre's tremendous power and utility pushes it far past Greninja's capability, while Palkia offers similar levels of strong coverage that Gren does while countering a few top threats (where Gren can't switch in on anything at all), and Yveltal supplies the tremendous power over mixed attacking stats and using Sucker Punch to more than compensate Greninja's higher speed stat. They don't have a copy/paste of Gren's movepool, ability, and stats but better, but they serve similar roles to a much more effective degree.

 

[Xavdul]

I've never had much problem with greninja, i use char y ofter, which takes about 60% from hydro pump then kills with solar beam, but then id be down a sweeper which isn't fun. I've always had more trouble with talonflame, but thats cause he smells funny and has gale wings.

 

[PlayR489]

What banned him? Was it Gunk Shot, the move that he can learn at the battle resort? I have it on my Greninja and I think it makes him CRAZY strong now.

 

[chuckthesmashlover]

What banned him? Was it Gunk Shot, the move that he can learn at the battle resort? I have it on my Greninja and I think it makes him CRAZY strong now.

That and Low Kick are what pushed it over the edge.

 

[PlayR489]

That and Low Kick are what pushed it over the edge.

HOLD UP, GRENINJA HAS LOW KICK NOW? O_O WOAH

 

[chuckthesmashlover]

HOLD UP, GRENINJA HAS LOW KICK NOW? O_O WOAH

Greninja can learn it through move tutor.

 

[Gamr_8]

In the ORAS meta it was Unhealthy to have Greninja in there, because more of the pokes in the meta, are either slower than Greninja and get OHKO'd by it. Another reason is that Greninja had no switch ins as greninja dealt too much damage to the poke switching in, rendeing it usless. IDK how he became such a threat, coming from the XY meta, but hey I guess what's done is done. Greninja is banned, and I believe those are the reasons why.

 

[BaPr]

I'm a bit disappointed Greninja was banned, because I loved using him, but I'm not complaining. He definitely had reasons for being in Ubers.

 

[toadster101]

I'm glad. It was pretty pretty much impossible to counter the Life Orb variant. Occasionally I'd be able to wall sets that didn't have Grass Knot with my Water Absorb Seismitoad, but it was unreliable. Even Blissey can no longer counter it thanks to Low kick.

 

[Omegascizor456]

Even though i personally do not agree with the decision because i mean at least in my opinion even though i like the idea of tiers, every single of the 719 current pokemon have a weakness and if you exploit that then it will not sand a chance. But i do see how it was making appearences on 99 percent of the OU tier teams. As well as it was a dominant pokemon! So i am fine with this change in the end... I will see some more variety and that is a very good thing!:D

 

[A Gray Person]

I'm both disappointed and relieved at the same time. On one hand Greninja was a really unique sweeper that was introduced in XY and now there's nothing like it now. But on the other hand it's move pool in ORAS got pretty ridiculous making it pretty much sweep anything in it's way.

Some may argue "But X Pokemon in a lower tier can counter it! It ain't broke!" but that's part of the problem when you have to use obscure strategies and obscure Pokemon that don't work on anything but on the Pokemon in question is just bad team building and may as well be a Jenga game where taking out that piece let's the team fall apart.

As a bit of an example of a similar situation, Serperior since BW has been in NU and now it has the ability of Contrary giving it a niece of using Leaf Storm as a form of Nasty Plot plus damage. Some players argued "Use a Sap Sipper Bouffalant!" but while it will work it's the only thing that can go against it. It means if anything takes out that Bouffalant it will cause the team to easily be swept and results in Seperior overpowering the team in question with consistent boosts from Leaf Storm. And the end result? It ended up finding a new home in the UU environment, which was a decision done to have a healthier meta for NU.

Though not really in a similar light though since Ubers is not only it's own tier but the banlist for OU mean anything banned from OU isn't guaranteed to be good in Ubers but since it's also a ban list that situation doesn't matter and with Serperior, it was already in the lowest meta to begin with so people tested it to find a meta which it would be balanced in.

tl;dr: Stuff like this happens regardless of tier and for OU it's pretty much necessary that nothing overpowers the major bulk of the Pokemon in that tier and can only be beaten with something obscure which would have to mean if you don't have that obscure strat you'll lose regardless.

 

[CMonster1221]

have not played non vgc in a long time. Did not know he was banned.

 

[chuckthesmashlover]

have not played non vgc in a long time. Did not know he was banned.

Smogon can't ban anything from VGC. You don't have to worry about it.

 

[CMonster1221]

Oh i know that. Its just been a while since ive played Singles OU. Have not done so regularly since Gen 4

 

[LunarWingCloud]

Smogon is more happy swinging their banhammer than a cosplayer at a ramen shop.

 

[chuckthesmashlover]

Smogon is more happy swinging their banhammer than a cosplayer at a ramen shop.

Pretty soon, everything except Magikarp will be banned

 

[Dastardly Ridleylash]

So I guess you could say that Greninja's movepool is...too big for Smogon?
*rimshot*

 

[UltiMario]

Smogon is more happy swinging their banhammer than a cosplayer at a ramen shop.

Yeah, and Mega Metagross, the current suspect, isn't getting banned.

Sure love swingin them banhammers... They suspect something and don't ban it... yep... totally still the ban happy society.

 

[KoE]

People keep complaining even now about it. If they went on showdown and did the calcs, they would understand. My best friend was salty about it until he saw the destruction of Greninja's dominance in Ubers, it fits in quite nicely.

 

[LunarWingCloud]

Yeah, and Mega Metagross, the current suspect, isn't getting banned.

Sure love swingin them banhammers... They suspect something and don't ban it... yep... totally still the ban happy society.

That is legit the only exception out of all the suspect tests recently. Do you even know how many bans have been made this gen?

 

[UltiMario]

Ye, and almost all of them were deserved.

Aegis and Gene are the only questionable ones, and theres a lot of talk about unbanning them. It's quite likely that among other changes (Mega Sable might get banned), Aegis and Gene both drop. That's pretty reasonable, ESPECIALLY since a big reason this Gen had so many suspects to begin with is because we retried super broken **** to make sure it was still super broken (which it was).

 

[Grizzlpaw]

Greninja was Genesect all over again.

Yes, you need prediction to bring it in.

Dosn't matter when it Checks/Counters +90% of OU

 

[db132]

Honestly I kinda expect more things to get banned in the future on Smogon compared to previous generations until the powercreep stabalizes. There's just so many things out there that have insane damage outputs

 

[Soul.]

*Maybe if Mega Evolutions didn't exist, Gen 6 wouldn't have Power Creep™.
Aegi comes back to OU and suddenly it's XY all over again. Bring all the Zapdos; Starmie, Jirachi and Celebi go back to UU. Gengar is rarely seen. King's Shield shenanigans. 50/50. Prediction-inducing metagame.

Genesect in OU is pretty much "your metagame is screwed." There would be no reason to not run it. Scizor drops in usage just like in XY OU though not to the point where it's UU.

Of course I'm not saying it's a bad thing. Mega Sableye isn't as centralizing as it was back in early ORAS OU, so...
"Let the metagame stabilize."

*no, I don't hate Megas.

 

[UltiMario]

*Maybe if Mega Evolutions didn't exist, Gen 6 wouldn't have Power Creep™.

We'll, there's an OU No Megas ladder, and it's pretty much Gen 5 (rain is even the dominant team type). Gen 6 didn't really power creep, Gen 5 is where like 90% of the power creep in Pokemon's history happened. Megas fall in line with where Gen 5 stands in terms of power if you remove the ridiculous ones that were designed to be fan service (and as such, broken). Its honestly really boring and unfun for the same reason why Gen 5 was probably the worst Gen competitively.

Aegi comes back to OU and suddenly it's XY all over again. Bring all the Zapdos; Starmie, Jirachi and Celebi go back to UU. Gengar is rarely seen. King's Shield shenanigans. 50/50. Prediction-inducing metagame.

Zapdos and Gengar TBH wouldn't really budge that much in usage. The usage of Psychics would go down though.

The meta as is currently is mostly 50/50s anyways. I can't think of a single tournament game I've seen this entire meta that didn't come down to like 10+ 50/50s. Aegis doesn't really add to that any more than it already exists.

Genesect in OU is pretty much "your metagame is screwed." There would be no reason to not run it. Scizor drops in usage just like in XY OU though not to the point where it's UU.

Not really? No reason not to run something would be like dropping Arceus down, there's literally no reason not to run that, it makes every team better. Gene makes most offensive teams better, but its influence is not to that effect. The vast majority of Scizor usage at high levels is Mega Scizor anyways, so its usage would only take a modest hit (1%, maybe?) to usage since Mega Sciz and Genesect roles don't overlap at all.

Of course I'm not saying it's a bad thing. Mega Sableye isn't as centralizing as it was back in early ORAS OU, so...
"Let the metagame stabilize."

At least this is true. I think the suspect test showed what solid counters to Sableye really exist, but the thing is still infuriating to deal with. The meta is adapting better to ORAS threats, and as a result is keeping Sab, Alt, Mgross, Diancie, etc out of Ubers. I do think that eventually Aegis and Gene should get a retry though, since their main role is a pivot, so they counter the power creep harder than they add to it imo.

 

[Soul.]

We'll, there's an OU No Megas ladder, and it's pretty much Gen 5 (rain is even the dominant team type). Gen 6 didn't really power creep, Gen 5 is where like 90% of the power creep in Pokemon's history happened. Megas fall in line with where Gen 5 stands in terms of power if you remove the ridiculous ones that were designed to be fan service (and as such, broken). Its honestly really boring and unfun for the same reason why Gen 5 was probably the worst Gen competitively.

Yes, this is true.

Zapdos and Gengar TBH wouldn't really budge that much in usage. The usage of Psychics would go down though.

The meta as is currently is mostly 50/50s anyways. I can't think of a single tournament game I've seen this entire meta that didn't come down to like 10+ 50/50s. Aegis doesn't really add to that any more than it already exists.

Maybe I'm just assuming things. The only reason why I mentioned Zapdos is because apparently it checks Aegi (unless I'm wrong and have been seeing misinformed posts on the Smogon forums). Psychic-types yes, they would go down.

Not really? No reason not to run something would be like dropping Arceus down, there's literally no reason not to run that, it makes every team better. Gene makes most offensive teams better, but its influence is not to that effect. The vast majority of Scizor usage at high levels is Mega Scizor anyways, so its usage would only take a modest hit (1%, maybe?) to usage since Mega Sciz and Genesect roles don't overlap at all.

I know Genesect and Scizor have different roles, but out of the two you'll see Genesect the most. Because although its main role is that of a pivot, it's easy to put on a team due to how effective it is (see: early XY. Nearly every team ran Choice Scarf Genesect). If I'm not mistaken Mega Scizor is either a Defog user or a bulky SD sweeper.

At least this is true. I think the suspect test showed what solid counters to Sableye really exist, but the thing is still infuriating to deal with. The meta is adapting better to ORAS threats, and as a result is keeping Sab, Alt, Mgross, Diancie, etc out of Ubers. I do think that eventually Aegis and Gene should get a retry though, since their main role is a pivot, so they counter the power creep harder than they add to it imo.

Sableye is pretty dumb in that it is the reason why stall is good. There are ways to counter the thing but I haven't played OU a lot to see how. The ladder is somewhat... uh, dull. Bottom ladder that is.

 

[UltiMario]

Still unfair to compare Sciz/Gene just because they share a typing.

Nobody compared Forry and Sciz in Gen 4 beyond typing because what they did was radically different.

It was Band Gene eating away at Sciz usage more than Scarf Gene anyways since Band Gene and Band Sciz serve the same role in the exact same way. Still not touching mega sciz usage since balance and stall teams are using that, while Gene was more showing up on the offensive teams.