CAP 14 CAP 3 - Part 5 - Stat Limits

[capefeather]

lol, sorry for the delay. Stat limits! This is NOT the place where we submit stats. Rather, this is where we use the powers of calculus and determine upper limits to the stat spreads that can be submitted. (Okay, I lie, there is no calculus involved. Unfortunately.) These limits will help to define what we consider when making and talking about stat spreads for CAP 3. We will look at limits to CAP 3's physical and special attacking prowess, its physical and special tanking capabilities, and the overall power of its stats.

This is a relatively tricky stage of the process if you're not familiar with what it is we're doing and why we're doing it. For that reason, I strongly encourage those who intend to participate to read the entire OP thoroughly and ask questions where needed.

Please do not poll jump by talking about specific stat spreads or suggesting specific abilities.

Be forewarned that there is no poll for this stage of the CAP. The Topic Leader (Deck Knight) will decide the stat limits for CAP 3 upon the conclusion of this thread.

Stat Bias Limits

Stat bias limits set the general stat bias of a Pokemon from an offensive and defensive standpoint. Stat biases are not solely for limiting stats, but they also describe the overall build of the Pokemon in offensive and defensive terms. However, the stat spread is the only part of the project that will be constrained by Stat Bias Limits. There will be four stat biases selected and a total Base Stat Rating (BSR) limit. The Stat Biases are:

Physical Tankiness (PT)

The rating of the Pokémon's physical defense.
​

Physical Sweepiness (PS)

The rating of the Pokémon's physical offense.
​

Special Tankiness (ST)

The rating of the Pokémon's special defense.
​

Special Sweepiness (SS)

The rating of the Pokémon's special offense.
​

A spreadsheet for calculating the biases can be found here. The formulas themselves can be found here. (I have edited the BSR calculator post to say that OpenOffice.org Calc can open Excel 2007+ spreadsheets! Just sayin'!)

If you're a newer member of CAP, we highly recommend that you do some good lurking during this stage in the process. Read this page thoroughly to understand what exactly we're doing here. If you're still confused, check out some of the old Stat Limits Discussion threads for past CAPs in the CAP Process Archive. If you're still uncomfortable with posting here, then I suggest you watch how experienced users post; you can learn a lot from them!

CAP 3 so far:

Concept: Extreme Makeover: Typing Edition

Name: Extreme Makeover: Typing Edition

General Description: The idea here is to create a Pokemon who's typing, while normally considered poor defensively and/or offensively, becomes a strong selling point of the Pokemon itself via help from an ability, stats, and/or movepool.

Justification: There are a lot of typings we scoff at on a daily basis because of their serious flaws, often forgetting about their strong points. For example, Poison is a really terrible offensive typing, but a decent defensive typing, while the Ice typing is good offensively, but awful defensively. Instead of just accepting that some typings will just ruin a Pokemon, this CAP concept aims to take that "terrible typing", and find ways to fix it (usually via ability, movepool, or stats) to the point where the formerly terrible typing becomes the CAP's strong point! The reason this CAP could benefit OU is because a Pokemon who makes a "bad typing" into a great one could find many unique offensive and/or defensive niches that aren't currently found!

Questions To Be Answered

-What does it take for a Pokemon to overcome its "bad typing" so much that its typing becomes good? Are the stats the biggest contributer, is the ability the thing that saves it, does movepool make it a force, or is it a combination of the above?

-How does the typing makeover effect the Pokemon's playstyle? Does the Pokemon become a unique wall that uses its makeover to overcome its typing's normally fatal flaws, does the make over make a terrible offensive typing into a fearsome sweeper, does the makeover make it into a formidible combination of deffense and offense to a typing that brings it neither, or does the makeover bring forth something none of us see coming from the typing?

-Which resistances and immunities are the most relevant to the metagame? Sure, this concept is aiming to have a "bad typing" become good, but part of that will require the bad typing to have some key resistances and/or immunties to certain typings to defend against or set up on, while still having a very unorthodox competitive typing. This works the other way around too, what are the typings most relevant to hit super effectively or at least neutral?

-How will the rest of the OU metagame react to this extreme type makeover? Will Pokemon start carrying moves they normally wouldn't carry to break through a new defensive threat, will some Pokemon take on new defensive roles due to resisting the unorthodox STABs CAP 3 may carry? Or will This Pokemon, despite being a very real threat, not have many "custom made sets" to beat it, being more of a Pokemon that is a reaction to the metagame than causing a metagame reaction?

-Finally, how will this effect the teams CAP3 is on? Will this be the kind of Pokemon who needs a lot of support to become a threat, will this Pokemon be more of key team member to execute another strategy, or will this be the kind of Pokemon that's part of the glue that holds the team together?

Typing: Fire / Poison
Abilities: Dry Skin / ??? / (???)

 

[Deck Knight]

And so now we arrive at my little social experiment.

Basically what I want to discuss is how we should orient CAP 3's stats to take advantage of its ability to be used against Rain teams. Since Dry Skin gives a Water Immunity, we don't have as much to worry about Water STAB, but where should we focus stats?

One of the greatest advantages to the typing we selected, despite its mediocre offensive prowess is its excellent list of resistances. A large number of them are to commonly used physical attacks like U-turn and Close Combat. Even with a Stealth Rock weakness, it should still be feasible for CAP 3 to switch into many of these threats on a resisted STAB and threaten a burn, or else be able to take a non-STABed Stone Edge if necessary.

When I prepare arguments for Stat Limits, I usually have a spread in mind. The one I have in development right now (which I haven't done calcs for on the specifics) has the following ratings:

PT: 181.4875
ST: 120.2583
PS: 111.1142
SS: 172.6017

In general I think the biggest problem with Fire types in OU is they lack enough defense to really abuse the Attack drop Burn inflicts on most foes, and are often too slow to capitalize on Fire STAB. This particular build actually isn't that fast comparatively, but that's because I have it at a speed choke point I think is reasonable for our threats list, which is reproduced here:

Threat List

THREATENED BY

Rock- / Ground-types
Tyranitar
Terrakion
Landorus
Dugtrio
Gliscor

Other
Offensive Heatran
CAP 3
Dragonite

THREATENS

Water-types
Politoed
Tentacruel
Jellicent

Other
Defensive Heatran

What I want to discuss is whether we should go Physical or Special on offense, and how much of a factor should Defense or Special Defense be? Burn is a powerful status, both because we're immune to it and can inflict it with STAB and support, and it's a very important feature of the typing we've selected. Later on I'll post a few limits and their variants as far as Atks/Spe and HP/ Defs, but for now I want to figure out exactly how we should be building our CAP.

 

[capefeather]

In general, I don't care that much about the specific stat limits, but I do think that they could be raised a bit here for the sake of submission versatility, which was one of the reasons people chose this typing in the first place. In particular, I think that a case could be made to have higher special bulk than the just-proposed limits allow. Even if CAP 3 is switching into Water-types, it may suffer even on a resisted attack due to the 25% taken from Stealth Rock. There's also the threat of alternate STABs from, for example, Wash Rotom, which some submitters may want to sponge a bit better.

What interests me more is the BSR limit. I see this as a good opportunity to test the soundness of the typing, to see how much it really needed to be "saved" by stats, if at all. Gyarados, a Pokémon with quite a few similarities in its typing advantages and disadvantages, sits at 316.7952, so 320 seems like a decent enough limit.

 

[TheStarRapper]

I believe that special defensiveness might be more appropriate, as the stealth rock weakness does necessitate a higher level of bulk, although resistance to the special attacks of fire, water, ice, and grass mitigates the need for too much special tankiness. I agree that physical bulkiness would actually give CAP3 the ability to stay in against rock attacks long enough to get the burn off, which would really define the way that CAP3 is played. Deck Knight, I am confused by your wording when you say "speed choke point", does this mean that the speed stat is the exact mean of the speed stats of the mons in the thread list?

 

[V4Victini]

I think that we should aim for a Special Offense. Flare Blitz's Recoil would definitely hamper CAP 3's durability alongside its SR Weakness. Poison also has a stronger 100 Acc Special STAB with a greater chance to inflict Poison.

I say the stat spread should be more inclined towards Special Defense. This will allow it to get more out of its resistances because, without spin support, CAP 3 has to deal with at most 75% of its original health each time it wants to switch into a resistance. We also have Will-O-Wisp to cover our Physical Tanking abilities.

 

[LouisCyphre]

I'm inclined towards special offense as well, but with some physical potential. Much like how Virizion is primarily special, but also has potential as a Swords Dance user.

Not that I'm specifically aiming for a physical boosting move, just that I feel that looking at an existing Rain check for ideas will carry us quite far. Bulky Virizion, I feel, is a positive example of what we want in most regards from CAP3.

 

[Bughouse]

long explanation is long

I think the most important thing to focus on now is that we make CAP3 function well against rain teams, but precisely poor against Sand Teams. By that, I don't mean that CAP3 should struggle playing in Sand itself. Indeed, it should be able to function on a sand team as a check/counter to rain teams. But CAP3 must not be particularly effective as a check/counter to Sand teams as a member of a rain team.

If that were to happen, CAP3 would just turn into an outstanding member of Rain teams rather than a check to them.

Let's start by looking at what matters most to CAP3 as a check/counter to rain teams. For my analysis of this I'm going to define "rain team" as either Rain offense which generally looks like http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3461986 (Politoed, Tornadus, Starmie, Ferrothorn, Azumarill, Scizor in this example) or Rain stall which generally looks like http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3455765 (Politoed, Tentacruel, Ferrothorn, Quagsire, Dragonite, Chansey in this example)

Against a fairly typical Rain offense team, CAP3's biggest fears are entry hazard damage from Ferrothorn and neutral (but strong) Hurricanes and Thunders. Literally. That's it. Potentially Spores from Breloom and Rock Blasts from Cloyster I suppose.

Against Rain stall teams, CAP3 might need to fear (obvious and easily predicted) Earthquake/Earth Power from Gastrodon(/Quagsire), entry hazard damage from Ferrothorn, and potentially Seismic Toss from Chansey/Blissey if we give CAP3 low base HP.

For these reasons, CAP3 is (naturally) a monster against rain teams.

This leads me to believe that the most essential thing we can do to keep CAP3 from completely decimating Rain singlehandedly is to keep the Special Tankiness low-ish (as Rain teams tend to run more special attacks relative to other teams.) Personally, I feel this should be accomplished by maintaining a low-ish base HP so that CAP3 cannot just stall things out with Protect + Dry Skin + Lefties. CAP3 must feel at least SOMEWHAT threatened by Thunders coming from a Rain Dragonite or Jirachi (and certainly from a Jolteon or a Rotom-W) and Hurricanes from Tornadus as well as I think importantly, not being able to simply sit and outstall Chansey/Blissey with an offensive + protecthealing set. I think if CAP3 wants to be able to outstall the blobs, it should need to be running Will-o-Wisp or Toxic, etc. Notably Thunders and Hurricanes are precisely the moves that are ideal for CAP3 to be most threatened by against rain teams if it is to function on Sand teams as a check/counter to rain, since those are prime opportunities to switch into Tyranitar and switch the weather.


tl;dr SO FAR: to keep CAP3 in check from not singlehandedly decimating Rain, keep ST low.


The next key part is to ensure that CAP3 does not function better ON RAIN TEAMS itself than against Rain teams. The key to this is ensuring that nothing CAP3 can do for a Rain team (generally against Sand Teams) is better than something Rain already has to combat Sand. (Naturally, by typing alone, CAP3 will function well against Hail and should be pretty neutral against Sun.) The obvious comparison for what CAP3 might be doing on a Rain team against Sand is Tentacruel, due to Poison-typing. But most of what Tentacruel provides for Rain (against sand) is by virtue of movepool more so than stats.

In reality, one key comparison is Magnezone. CAP3 stands alone as a Fire type would-be member of a rain team. This would make CAP3 stand out as an obvious help against opposing Ferrothorn, something many rain teams struggle with. Magnezone is somewhat commonly used to trap and kill Ferrothorn. I think it is important that most CAP3 not be able to OHKO Ferrothorn under Rain. Obviously this is quite dependent on movepool, but I think it is key that we make the Fire STAB not a central part to CAP3. While it's true we may decide to give CAP3 nothing stronger than Fire Fang and Flame Burst, I think it is important that we set a reasonably low limit on SS so that we can decide to give CAP3 Flamethrower/Fire Blast later if we want to. Physical Fire STAB is less of a worry, as we certainly do not need to give Flare Blitz, and even if we do, Recoil + Iron Barbs would decimate CAP3.

Likewise, having higher PS than SS enables us to examine the Physical side of Poison STAB, something less explored, given Gunk Shot being the only above-average physical Poison move. Sludge Wave/Bomb are both well understood with Nidoking. Instead, I'd love to see Gunk Shot (or maybe even a signature move... we did it for Kisunoh when Physical Ghost STAB was lacking) get some love.

tl;dr TOTAL: ST lower than PT, SS lower than PS.

Like Deck, I generally work on limits with a spread already in mind. The particular spread I've been leaning towards (also without much calculation yet) gives ratings of:

my potential spread ratings

PT: 168.6084
ST: 140.6670
PS: 126.1268
SS: 103.4174

BSR: 290.9066

However, that's the particular spread I've been working on...

For the limits, I bump things up everywhere a bit, obviously.

I say limit-wise we should be:

PT under 190 (skarmory level, but remember, weak to edgequake)
ST under 155 (gastrodon level)
PS under 150 (gliscor level)
SS under 140 (venusaur level)

As you can see, while my spread certainly focuses on PS more than SS, I am certainly open to having them be reversed. Though, if SS is higher, I would like it to be that way only because PS is particularly low.

I'm quite committed to having a high PT rating. Aside from that, things are certainly subject to change.

 

[SunnyE]

I think CaP3 should be Specially Inclined offensive wise, and physically inclined defensive-wise. The reason for this being that CaP3's STABS benefit move from Special Attack than from Physical Attack, and that CaP3 already resists most Specially Inclined Types anyway, so it would be of more use to patch up the physical side of its defense.
That way, it should have very good to excellent (150-199) PT and SS and bellow average to over average (75-124) ST and PS, maybe good (up to 149)ST, at most...

 

[Meganium Sulfate]

I think that PS should be more of a focus in this CAP. While tankiness in general is the way to go on the bulky idea we proposed, keep in mind that the objective of this pokemon is to use its typing effectively. This includes capitalizing on its near-unique immunity to both poison and burn - the poison immunity serves it well as a tank, but making it a strong physical threat will get a great use out of the fire typing, which is needed now more than ever due to its niche in rain. To get the most out of its burn resistance, I propose a much higher PS, and a much smaller SS to compensate.

 

[Rising_Dusk]

PT is completely unnecessary for this Pokemon. We specifically listed physically oriented Pokemon to threaten us (Tyranitar, Terrakion, Landorus, Gliscor, Dugtrio, I-Can-Go-On-For-Awhile, etc.). There's no reason why we should be giving our CAP such exaggerated physical bulk when it has zero reason to threaten anything with a physical attack. Seriously, let's remind ourselves of our threats lists:

Rock- / Ground-types
Tyranitar
Terrakion
Landorus
Dugtrio
Gliscor

Other
Offensive Heatran
CAP 3
Dragonite

THREATENS

Water-types
Politoed
Tentacruel
Jellicent

Other
Defensive Heatran

Everything that threatens CAP 3 is physical and everything we need to intentionally threaten is specially inclined. To me the ST limit should naturally be much higher than PT, much higher.

Beyond that, PS and SS should naturally favor SS over PS. What are we using physically? Flare Blitz to hurt ourselves? Fire Punch as a best STAB? Gunk Shot? Laughable. Special moves are naturally far superior for our typing (Fire Blast / Flamethrower / Sludge Wave), and so we should encourage our spreads to favor them. I have no issue with high PS for purposes of stat spread variety, but really, the options available to a physical CAP 3 are terrible and I really don't think we can justify a mixed CAP 3 to boot. We need to use the advantages of our typing, which includes better special options than physical options.

To give a good idea of what I think the limits should be:

PS: 160
SS: 180
PT: 160
ST: 190
​

Note that these are pretty generous, but healthily support the special side of things. I don't think we should gimp the physical side (160 is still pretty damned good) in order to promote spread diversity, but we should definitely focus special all around.

In other news, cape has an interesting proposition that I wouldn't mind taking seriously.

What interests me more is the BSR limit. I see this as a good opportunity to test the soundness of the typing, to see how much it really needed to be "saved" by stats, if at all. Gyarados, a Pokémon with quite a few similarities in its typing advantages and disadvantages, sits at 316.7952, so 320 seems like a decent enough limit.

 

[MCBarrett]

Cap3 should definitely be more focused on physical tankiness and special sweepiness.

Defensively, most of cap3's weaknesses are normally physical attacks, most notably ground and rock types. However, as one main objective of this cap is to threaten water types, and thus rain teams, the st should not be much lower than the pt. The most threatening moves on rain teams, excluding water type moves since they're already covered are thunder and hurricane which are both strong special attacks. Since the likely role of cap3 will cause it to see these moves often, it should not be be taking massive amounts of damage from them.

On the offensive side I think it should be heavily weighted towards ss. This will allow for Cap3 to use the more powerful moves of each of its stabs(fire blast, flamethrower, sludge bomb) and allowing it to use hp more effectively to improve its type coverage.

Therefore, I think a rough spread rating should go along these lines:
PT very good to excellent
ST very good
PS below average to average
SS very good

 

[jas61292]

I don't get to say this often, but I completely agree with Rising_Dusk. Seriously, take a look at that threat list. Unless we are trying to screw up our decision there, why are we even considering higher physical bulk than special bulk. Honestly, I don't even see the need for much physical bulk at all, as most physical attackers should be KOing CAP3.

On the offensive side, if we want to take advantage of the good things that the typing brings, we have to go special. As cool as it would be to try and work with Gunk Shot and the like, the Physical STAB options for this CAP are completely inferior to the special ones. The only real advantage physical would bring would be 100% accuracy on its 120 power move, but that comes at the price of recoil. Since CAP3 is likely taking on rain, and Ferrothorn along with them, adding more recoil on top of hazards and Iron Barbs is really going to kill survivability. While I have nothing against giving it the ability to go physical, I feel special offense should be the default route.

Now, I personally think that the limits proposed by RD are a bit too high all around, especially in the physical tankieness, which I really think we can dump down a bit, but I do think that the overall shape of them would fit this CAP very well. I feel we need to have stats like this if we want this CAP to make the best use of its typing and ability.

 

[Bughouse]

PT is completely unnecessary for this Pokemon. We specifically listed physically oriented Pokemon to threaten us (Tyranitar, Terrakion, Landorus, Gliscor, Dugtrio, I-Can-Go-On-For-Awhile, etc.). There's no reason why we should be giving our CAP such exaggerated physical bulk when it has zero reason to threaten anything with a physical attack. Seriously, let's remind ourselves of our threats lists:
Everything that threatens CAP 3 is physical and everything we need to intentionally threaten is specially inclined. To me the ST limit should naturally be much higher than PT, much higher.

Dusk, with all due respect, but giving CAP3 even a PT of 190 (skarmory level) would not protect CAP3 from those threats in the slightest.

Jolly Scarf Terrakion would still 2HKO. Meanwhile the WORST thing CAP3 could possibly do is hope for a 75% accurate Will-o-Wisp hit. (Not to mention if Terrakion is carrying EQ.) Landorus, Gliscor, and Dugtrio, as long as they outspeed, which I think everyone is agreeing they will, will all easily beat CAP3 with even a PT of 190. Uninvested Gliscor would still 2HKO (good chance to OHKO after Rocks), while offensive sets can OHKO. Meanwhile, CAP3 can't even cripple Gliscor since it has Poison Heal.

The only threat that might be affected by having a sky-high PT is Tyranitar, but even then CB Tyranitar has a great chance to OHKO even without Rocks and other sets (if they are running Stone Edge or EQ - which they'd have to be to be threatening CAP3 anyways) have solid 2HKOs.

And that's EVEN IF we gave a PT of 190. Which I don't even think anyone quite wants.





Also, this is Typing Makeover. That's why I'm favoring PS btw... What better to make-over typing than to have a successful Physically offensive Poison type. We have loads of special ones.

 

[Stratos]

PT of 190 is way too high.

When you're NOT getting OHKOed 100% of the time by a Gliscor Earthquake after Rocks (which shave off 1/4 of your health), then you're probably failing at your job of getting countered by physical attackers. Especially since this means you can burn tyranitar and Terrakion AFTER TAKING A HIT and completely neuter them.

I'll post with more in depth later, but i wanted to say that before people started rolling with high PT

 

[Seven Eagles]

If we're using a special spread we should probably get rid of most of the points in physical and invest them in speed. That way it could set up toxic spikes/substitutes/throw toxics and will-o-wisps at switch-ins and function as a speedy tank.

 

[Admiral_Stalfos19]

Well... personally I like Rising Dusk's suggestions on the limits for the Special side. But I'd prefer it if we forced lower limits on the physical side. We probably don't need a lot of speed at all, since a lot of our "must-threaten" mons are slow anyway (last time I checked, you can probably still threaten TormenTran even if you ran lower base speed, although that will probably mean you'll have to invest heavily), and even a good physical tankiness score rather than very good can still work well against key physical attacks, provided we invest in HP in the least. Plus we can always burn physical threats when in doubt.

My suggestion on limits:

Physical Sweepiness: <100
Physical Tankiness: 125-150
Special Sweepiness: 175-180
Special Tankiness: 180-190

That's my two cents. Take it or leave it.

 

[Deck Knight]

Dusk's view is too myopic because it only focuses on the threats we want to counter CAP3, and not more neutral or even favorable match-ups. The threats in question are so absurdly powerful that as skr notes, Skarmory level Defense wouldn't even matter.

It would matter *a lot* when switching into Ferrothorn, Scizor, or Dragonite though. One of our discussions was that Dragonite shouldn't feel free to switch in with impunity, but it should give CAP3 trouble. A high PT doesn't stop DDNite cold, but it does let it eat a +1 Outrage and retaliate with Will-o-Wisp. CAP3 would still be largely useless afterward unless it was a support set in Rain with Protect. In Scizor's case, you're still eating 25% coming in on rocks, if you can keep CB Bullet Punch damage down, you can reliably force it out instead of having it pick you off. The list of Pokemon that resist Bullet Punch but still get KO'd because of paper-bag defenses is long, and named NU. If you can absorb a U-turn and heal it off wit Dry Skin recovery, you have a good answer to half of Volt-turn. Then there's fighting types, and being able to take down +2 Lucario even if it carries Stone Edge (at a price, of course) is very useful. Conkeldurr is also countered if it doesn't choose Stone Edge over Payback.

Against Sun Teams, it will have to contend with Venusaur Earthquake, which it won't survive at +2, but might survive at +0. Making Venusaur a full-health revenge killer for CAP 3 if Drought or some other ability is selected later is not advisable in my opinion. Remember that in Rain our stronger STAB is Poison, but in Sun Fire blows opponents away, and it needs an opportunity to slug it out in sun, since virtually all Sun Sweepers carry either Earthquake or, in Exeggutor's case, STAB Psychic.

Truthfully, the resistances of the Fire/Poison type simply aren't capitalized on if a significant PT is not part of the equation. It already has excellent innate special defensiveness with resistances to Fire, Grass, and Ice (and Water through Dry Skin). It also greatly increases the value of Air Balloon, since CAP3 will actually be able to take a stray Stone Edge from something that isn't as ridiculously powerful as Terrakion or Tyranitar.

Where CAP3 will be vulnerable is against strong Thunders (Rotom-W) and Hurricanes (Thundurus) in Rain, which is why I think ST should be moderate, but not overwhelming. Remember that it can heal in Rain so damage is effectively reduced, and if Drought or something is decided earlier then it will have a more concrete answer to that that still leaves it vulnerable to a weather changer. Perhaps the best part of Fire/Poison is that, in addition to healing from Dry Skin, it can run Black Sludge as a hold item to weaken Scarf Rotom-W, heh.

Finally, remember that Fire STAB gives us access to Burn, which trumps many physical attackers. CAP3 still needs to switch in, potentially taking SR damage, and still needs to hit with the attack (which is 75% Accurate). Gliscor is immune via Poison Heal, and it's a saving throw against most of the other attackers, assuming they can't OHKO outright after a stat-up move or with a second Stone Edge. Burn is fairly pointless against Special Attackers though, and while CAP3 would appreciate moderate to high ST, burn abuse is something defining about Fire types that isn't really explored.

 

[Asylum_Rhapsody]

I'm still liking the idea of this CAP being more of a wall. CAP has plenty of bulky sweepers already, and this seems like the perfect opportunity to mix things up. I mean, look at this things major redeeming properties: it has seven resistances (Bug, Fighting, Fire, Grass, Ice, Poison, Steel), it has one major immunity (Water), it's immune to burn, it's immune to poison, and it heals in rain. What wall wouldn't kill for that? In addition, by giving it Dry Skin, we've already decided to majorly discourage it from focusing on its Fire STAB, which will either have its power reduced in rain or cause it to lose HP in sun, and I think that we all realize at this point that there's no realistic way to make it use its Poison STAB.

Given that our major weaknesses are to Rock and Ground and therefore given a lot of the Pokemon that we want to threaten this CAP, it seems essentially pointless to try to focus on Physical Tankiness, so I propose a high limit to Special Tankiness, preferably Fantastic if not at least Excellent. Beyond that, given that I want a wall, I personally wouldn't put either Sweepiness higher than Above Average, maybe Good, but I don't see any reason to necessarily limit it to that if other people have other ideas. I just want to limit for Special Tankiness to be high.



Side note:

A spreadsheet for calculating the biases can be found here.

Yeah, I can't open this. I have neither the computer savvy nor the money to upgrade my computer with the latest software every year. I'm gonna work with the other link that has the formulas themselves, but is there any way this calculator could at some point be put up somewhere more accessible? =/

 

[CressOfLight]

Fire/Poison
with good physicle defence would then allow for trainers to make switching much safer from sizor or flygon's U turn. Most times these days trainers use sizor only in good timeing against those it can deal with while mostly always go for U turn. i usally always switch to ferrorthorn with the rockyhealmet making it the best choice to switch into to take it. When having a pokemon with both fire and poison with rockyhelmet can be big help to your team to make switching safer from U turn depens on how much physicle defence it could have.

most times now these days i always have to keep in mind that sizor would be there and must have a pokemon who can take its attacks while also making u turn safer to escape from.

it might could also if its defences is high enough, it could also be good use against volcarona who has manage to use quilver dance more than once. trainers knows that when its the perfect timeing to send it out against non offenceive such as fortress or ferrorthorn before they would use stealth rocks they would make volcarona use the dance and substitute making it a big threat in a sun team with flamethrower, bug buzz solabeam or hiddenpower while outspeeding all who dont have scarf.

while it could be a really usefull to makeing switching from u turn safer theres also timing that it could be taking damage from hazards too witch is also kind of problem besides its weakness

It would also then be good use against either ninetails or politode, ninetails either flame or solabeam wont do much, While it being a poison type, if it could learn giga drain when against politode itll gain hp in rain mabie leftovers and draining its HP too. if it has atleast 10 or 20 more speed stats to peform a giga drain before it could get KO against water attack in rain.

 

[jas61292]

I understand what you are saying Deck, but I don't see the point. We want to beat the things that use special attack, and more importantly, we want to lose to things that have high attack. You give all those guys it would let us have a chance of beating, but, with the exception of Scizor, you never really state why we should beat them.

I mean, look at the first sentences of your second paragraph:

It would matter *a lot* when switching into Ferrothorn, Scizor, or Dragonite though. One of our discussions was that Dragonite shouldn't feel free to switch in with impunity, but it should give CAP3 trouble.

What the hell is Ferrothorn doing to us? Unless we give this thing massive speed, it wont care what Ferro does. We resist steel and double resist grass. And yes, Scizor can kill things that resist it, but those things are things that are frail. There is a massive gap between Jolteon and Skarmory on the Defensive side. Just because we are not a physical wall does not mean we lose to Scizor when we resist EVERY move it uses. And as for Dragonite, well, you say it yourself, we don't want to beat it. It should threaten us. Yes it shouldn't feel free to switch in, but you accomplish that with offenses, not defenses.

Basically, what I am seeing is that you are trying to take advantage of the typing, but without really any reasoning behind what you want to do with it. Additionally, as you mention yourself, fire means burn access, and burn plus high physical defense means that we are no longer beaten by physical threats. I don't care if they hit super effectively, you beat them. You and srk speak of skarmory level Defense. With those defenses, the mighty CB Terriakion fails to OHKO with Stone Edge without Stealth Rocks. And then you burn it. Suddenly, it can no longer switch into you cause if you burn it it doesn't counter you anymore. That's right, one of our number one counters can't counter you. Sure, it could carry EQ, but that is forcing the guy who is supposed to beat us to adapt. That is completely counterproductive. And that's one of the most threatening of all our chosen counters. Yes, EQs still kill us, but that is besides the point. We should be forcing the things we counter to adapt, not the things that are supposed to counter us.

At the same time, immunity to water means jack shit if we die to coverage moves. We should be making sure that we can switch into those special attackers. The point is, there is no reason to have high physical defense, and all the reason to have high special defense. Lets not screw up the little we have already decided on.

 

[Bughouse]

jas, I just want to say, I'm not actually personally advocating Skarmory level defense. I'm saying we should allow it to be limited at that height in my opinion. That would hardly be broken for example, if we gave it piss-poor offense/movepool.

The particular spread I'm working with with PT of about 168 at the moment (which of course is getting tinkered with still...) would still not quite get OHKOed by Terrakion after Rocks, but I'm more than happy to adjust that down slightly to put CAP3 in the range where it's got about a 50/50 shot of that OHKO.

I really do agree with Deck that it's imperative that CAP3 be able take with ease neutral (and resisted) physical hits. Special Tankiness is less important as it ALREADY counters the hefty majority of rain teams by typing + ability alone. Furthermore, we said this should be able to take on things like Conkeldurr, if I remember. It's not going to be able to eat Stone Edges without a good defense. It should be able to threaten Dnite. How does that work if Lum Nite can set up a DD and sweep?

 

[Yllnath]

I'm personally on the fence about PT. I agree with Deck, that I'd like something of decent PT to emphasis the one awesome resistance poison has, fighting type. I feel that it's important for the concept to highlight this resistance, as it's one of the cooler things that the poison type offers us. Neglecting the ability to take CC's well, is neglecting one of the key things the poison typing can offer us.

Yet Jas does make a good point, that WoW is a good move that can cripple physical sweepers a lot, and it may turn something like Terrakion, that we listed as a good check/counter, into not being able to switch in and threaten a OHKO with something like Stone Edge. And if we force it to run EQ, just to deal with CAP3, we can't realistically call Terrakion a counter anymore.

However, after doing some calcs for myself, I think srk stating that even 190ish PT is still doable, even assuming WoW, to let something like Terrakion threaten CAP3 with Stone Edge (not EQ).

Assuming standard CB Jolly Terrakion, vs CAP 90 base HP/ 115 base DEF = 188 PT, with a neutral nature and 252 EV's in HP. And assuming that Terrakion has switched into a burn. CAP3 takes 75%-89.1% damage, which is a cleaned OHKO after SR, even while burned.
And that's some awesome level PT right there.

Now you could argue that this only applies to a CB Terrakion, and only if CAP3 doesn't go fully defensive.
I mean, ff course, a CS Terrakion while burned, will fail to OHKO, and if CAP3 were to EV totally defensively (252HP/252DEF), even CB Terrakion would fail to OHKO. (Although sandstorm damage, which is likely when playing with Terrakion, could be close to finishing CAP3 anyway.)
Yet, I could also make the argument that 1) WoW is only 75% accuracy and 2) It needs to be on the moveset of CAP3 in the first place if you want to use it to counter physical attackers. (With that, I mean, I find it hard to believe that WoW is going to be on every moveset, as WoW is pretty much useless against rain teams who attack mostly specially. So the entire assumption that we need to balance our PT to the point that everything would be under burn status while attacking us seems unrealistic to me)


Now I agree that those defensive stats are high, and 190 should at most be the top level, however, I think that it's not unrealistic to the point that you could say that you would suddenly shout out all of our would-be counters with just 190PT and WoW. I mean, in most cases, that counter list of ours is spamming EQ instead of Stone Edge, which just does that much more damage to CAP3 (assuming we don't suddenly end up with a levitate ability next to Dry Skin)
And I just showed that the most common Terrakion can pretty realistically OHKO CAP3 with even a somewhat bulky EV'd 190 PT CAP3, with Stone Edge.


Now, I'd say that I'd be more happy to see a PT along the lines of 175-180, but not much lower. A good PT goes a long way to take resisted fighting with ease, even after SR. I feel this is important for the concept, as you'd otherwise be neglecting to make something like the poison type really shine.

(I hope I didn't poll jump too much, I wrote down the numbers I used to give more of actual data to my argument that CAP3 can still be beaten by it's would be checks, even with burn and 190ish PT)

 

[bugmaniacbob]

Right now, I'm concerning myself with two things here - the ODB and the PSB. As far as defence vs. offence goes, I am adamant that I would like CAP3 to be primarily defensive as opposed to offensive. And that means I would prefer to see both of our tankiness stats to be at least "Very Good" (and yes, I only work in these broad categories rather than the numbers) - not, perhaps, in the order of Ferrothorn, exactly, but somewhere around or above 150 for both - the reason for this being that, while Fire/Poison is still an impressive offensive and defensive type, it remains reliant largely on a successful ability to switch in to be effective. This problem is compounded by its weakness to Stealth Rock and Spikes - if it is taking 25% from Scizor's U-turn when it switches in, that means it's almost losing half of its health before it has a chance to do anything, assuming entry hazards.

This is a point which I do not believe has been addressed thus far - if CAP3 cannot comfortably switch in on at least something, it's going to be hard-pressed to be as effective as it can be, regardless of whether it has Will-O-Wisp or obscene Special Attack or whatever. We've made it so that it can switch into Water-types, thanks to Dry Skin - if it then mispredicts and eats a Rotom-W Thunder, it's bad news. This applies additionally on the physical side as well as the special - Heatran can comfortably take Scizor's U-turn, but it has a pretty high physical tankiness, a 4x resistance and a Stealth Rock neutrality and is still taking a good 15% from CB U-turn, which can indeed build up. Hence why high special tankiness is a good idea to take on Rotom-W and why a high physical tankiness is a nice idea to be able to take on Scizor, Gyarados, and what have you with greater ease.

As far as the physical/special bias goes, I don't particularly care much on the defensive side, as both are needed for their own reasons, but I will say that I believe that a physically offensive spread is ideal for the purposes of this CAP. Largely this is because it is a way to take advantage of the burn immunity, which I think is a very nice way to illustrate the concept in action, without resorting to the tired option of "well it gets good STAB options". I don't consider this a particularly imaginative way of using the typing to our advantage; granted, I don't see much imagination in "burn immunity" either, but at least we are acknowledging a natural advantage of the Fire-type that no other type in the game possesses.

Beyond that, PS and SS should naturally favor SS over PS. What are we using physically? Flare Blitz to hurt ourselves? Fire Punch as a best STAB? Gunk Shot? Laughable. Special moves are naturally far superior for our typing (Fire Blast / Flamethrower / Sludge Wave), and so we should encourage our spreads to favor them. I have no issue with high PS for purposes of stat spread variety, but really, the options available to a physical CAP 3 are terrible and I really don't think we can justify a mixed CAP 3 to boot. We need to use the advantages of our typing, which includes better special options than physical options.

Granted, Flare Blitz and Blaze Kick are awful for a defensive Pokemon and Sacred Fire is off-limits. But Fire Punch and Poison Jab are still good, honest, wholesome STAB - and perfectly adequate for a defensive Pokemon. More to the point, their lack of offensive presence could be construed as an advantage in some quarters - it prevents this CAP from turning total sweeper or bulky attacker, and also prevents it from simply steamrolling opposing Water-types - we may need more imaginative ways to combat them. In addition, it makes Drought a more viable choice - as Politoed and Ninetales are kept in check by their subpar offensive stats, this thing could be kept in check by its less powerful attacking options, especially considering the likelihood that we will give this thing a very much ordinarily usable attacking stat.

Besides, if it really bothers you that much we can give it Heat Crash and make it 2000kg or something.

(As a side note this may well also make those heavy Rock- and Steel-types even better counters, since they take less damage... similarly to Ferrothorn, in a way)

 

[Rising_Dusk]

It would matter *a lot* when switching into Ferrothorn, Scizor, or Dragonite though. One of our discussions was that Dragonite shouldn't feel free to switch in with impunity, but it should give CAP3 trouble. A high PT doesn't stop DDNite cold, but it does let it eat a +1 Outrage and retaliate with Will-o-Wisp.

Actually, Skarmory physical bulk doesn't stop you from being massacred by a +1 DDNite 4x effective EQ even when burned. (Assuming Giratina's physical bulk, 252/0 Fire/Poison takes 81% - 95.2% which is a KO after SR; Skarmory's physical bulk 252/252+ Fire/Poison takes 81.4% - 95.8%) Will-O-Wisp is also a very shitty move with its unreliability (it's practically like relying on Focus Blast); the things using it naturally have exceptional mixed bulk and can afford to miss. Essentially, that would be saying that CAP 3 must be an outright wall, and will not be adequately taking advantage of the typing or our goals. You can't beat Water-types in rain without being incredibly powerful. These guys can beat you with Shadow Ball in Jellicent's case or Hurricane from anything-that-gets-the-move or Thunder from Jolteon/Rotom-W/Dragonite/etc. Not a single Hurricane in OU would fail to ravage CAP 3 with a ST limit of 150.

If we want to actually beat rain, which was the intent behind leading with a threat list like we have and having that Drought / Dry Skin poll, then we need to keep this thing going.

We do not need a high PT because all of the physical Pokemon we're checking we do so through typing. Ferrothorn's Power Whip is not breaking even a modest PT thanks to a 4x resistance, and with moderate Speed and a 2x resistance, Gyro Ball isn't getting through either. Scizor's entire move list is resisted (4x in U-turn's case), which essentially makes Skarmory-level bulk a non-necessity. 160 is still an exceptional PT to supplement the typing, but 190 is exaggerated and unnecessary. We need that bulk on the special side so that we can actually threaten something in rain.

For what it's worth, I think it's cool that you want to explore burn, but doing so on something we've already chosen to specifically explore rain is not helping the CAP or anything, really. Heatran can barely abuse burn, prefers Toxic in basically every case, and has a far better OU typing than CAP 3. Beyond that, most of the stuff we want to threaten and even more neutral stuff in rain don't care about burn (or have no business against CAP 3 anyway thanks to a 4x weakness to Fire). CAP 3 is never burning Ferrothorn or Scizor when it can annihilate them handily with even Lava Plume. The reality, Deck, is that the myopic outlook on the stat limits is one which forces us to deal with marginal physically oriented Pokemon at the expense of doing what we set out to do, beat rain, well. That is our niche, let's please stay on target.

But Fire Punch and Poison Jab are still good, honest, wholesome STAB

Consider this: All OU Water-types invest in Defense, making these attacks far less valuable. Furthermore, these moves are by definition so much worse than the special options and would force us to have an exaggerated Attack stat in order to actually put them to use. They are unsuitable for our purposes.

 

[bugmaniacbob]

I was under the impression that the niche we had suggested was a Pokemon that could simultaneously check Fire-, Water-, and Grass-types at the same time, rather than one that beat rain. There is no reasonable stat spread we could give CAP3 that would enable us to take a Hurricane from the likes of Dragonite or Tornadus and not be 2HKOed - granted that if we assume heavy investment in Special Defence it is more likely, but we still have the issue of Stealth Rock. Even with max/max Special Defence and 100/100 stats we still get 2HKOed by Choice Specs Tornadus Hurricane.

Consider this: All OU Water-types invest in Defense, making these attacks far less valuable. Furthermore, these moves are by definition so much worse than the special options and would force us to have an exaggerated Attack stat in order to actually put them to use. They are unsuitable for our purposes.

I'm not sure how you can say that they are much worse "by definition". They're not ideally powerful, sure, but as I said before, we probably won't be using Poison-type moves anyway (Sludge Bomb is unlikely to even 4HKO Vaporeon assuming 100 base SpA), we can manipulate Fire-type moves to our advantage if we need to (Blaze Kick/Heat Crash), and excessively high offensive presence is not necessarily a good idea for this CAP in the first place, if we are trying to make it a more defensive threat.

Though, I am assuming by this argument that we do not get Thunderbolt or Power Whip. If either is assumed then the argument changes considerably.