right, i'm going to weigh in on the discussion around gholdengo, because the primary arguments fail to understand the function gholdengo performs on the problematic archetypes it appears on, its power level, & its influence on the meta.
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the first, most common argument is one of "exploiting gholdengo", usually via means of u-turning with corv (6% chip on goldie in exchange for rocks damage on corv, & rocks+spikes on the incoming mon. incredible trade.), or predicting it on the switch with your spinner, etc. the oversight in this argument is that, in both cases, hazards remain on the field. this is seen by any decent ho player as a more-than-acceptable scenario, as gholdengo has already done its job. keeping hazards up is the core principle of hazards ho, and gholdengo does this with a level of ease & consistency unlike anything we have ever seen before.
furthermore, any decent hazards ho will have means to abuse the spinners (tusk/treads) should they manage to eliminate gholdengo. for example,
here is a (suboptimal but fun) team that demonstrates this. here we have iron valiant, which either a) revenge kills the spinner, leaving hazards up still, or b) applies intense pressure whilst hazards are up. not only this, we have tera water sd duckster, & balloon gholdengo to limit the options of tusk/treads, dissuading them from clicking earthquake, forcing them to break the balloon first or knock off on the switch.
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now, on to speak about gholdengo's power level. it is my belief, irrespective of good as gold, that gholdengo is too powerful. this discussion is absent, though, as all anyone is talking about is its influence in the hazards game, and the discussion around a couple of more obviously broken pokemon such as chi-yu overshadows any discussion around gholdengo in this regard. another factor contributing to this is that is the chaotic state of the new meta, and as the meta becomes more stable, there will be a flourishing in exploring other sets than balloon & scarf (some are already doing this btw).
here is what gholdengo is: an incredibly versatile pokemon, with the possibility to run many viable sets (sub plot lefties, balloon plot, t-wave plot/hex, scarf, specs, etc.). along with this, it has an insane set of stab moves, perfect coverage, one of the best typings in the game (hello g6 aegi), plot, great stats, & trick. the result of this is that gholdengo is effectively uncounterable. some have said that home might normalise this, but unfortunately, not only is this irrelevant as we're months away from that, it is also just incorrect. it possesses an infinite capacity to adapt to any metagame shifts that may mitigate its power. really, though, it won't necessarily need to adapt, as balloon & trick+scarf already negate any viable, reliable answers.
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regarding its position in the meta, i assert that gholdengo has an undue level of influence in the meta compared to its peers, & is destabilising. other than tera, which is currently the very fabric of the meta, there is nothing with more influence in the general structure of the meta than gholdengo.
should gholdengo's presence remain, i don't think we will ever see the end of the easy layers/screens+gholdengo teams. granted, gholdengo isn't the only element that makes these teams problematic, as some credit goes to annihilape & cyclizar, but gholdengo is undoubtedly the linchpin, and these teams will continue to constitute a sizeable portion of the meta. not only this, there is a common & powerful archetype of non-ho teams featuring a spiker (such as ting-lu) & gholdengo. gholdengo's negation of removal will continue to be problematic on those teams, too.
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in conclusion: the issues with gholdengo will only intensify & become more apparent as the more pressing issues are resolved & the meta matures. i cannot foresee any path for development that the metagame can take with gholdengo around that produces a well-rounded, stable, & deeply competitive meta.
would be able to just shit on all of these with ease, man Chesnaught would have been so good in this meta, but now i have to scrap for things
