Metagame np: NU Stage 11 - I'm A Star [SAWK is BANNED]

[Raseri]

OK that is it for part 1 of the test. Thanks everyone for participating, tagging The Immortal so we can get the No Sawk ladder up ASAP

Here are the requirements for the No Sawk ladder

The b value for portion 2 of the test will be 9. The COIL requirement will be 2500. Some sample values are below.

100 14
90 17
85 21
80 26
78 28
75 34

To find out how many matches it'll take for you specifically, take your GXE, and put it into this formula
9.0/log2(40*gxe/2500)

The ladder will be up until March 3rd at 11:59PM EST

going to close this thread until the ladder has been up for 24 hours, and then re-open it and hope everyone discusses the ladder!

 

[Raseri]

ladder is up

 

[Raseri]

free

 

[Shadestep]

re: rain and other weather

I have honestly lost count of the amount of times I have faced this, or some other variant, on the ladder. And it frustrates me.
Suspect Tests always attract players who are foreign to the tier to play, and get a good feel of the meta, by playing countless games on the Suspect ladder and facing many different teams, playstyles, archetypes. All of these combined should craft a decent image of how the current NU meta is.

Many people only play the NU Suspect ladder to get their beloved Tiering Contributor badge, and don't really care about the metagame at all. I completely understand that and there is no-one stopping you from this, but please don't create an entirely wrong image of the metagame by spamming Rain for 100 games straight if you don't know the tier. I've also seen some respected NU players get their reqs with a rain team, and I can also understand that. Getting reqs is an annoying task and rain makes it a lot easier for most people, but it gives people that are new to NU the idea: 'Oh, all I see on the ladder are staple Rain-teams and stall. What a boring tier this is. Let's stay away from this tier as long as possible after I get my reqs.'

This frustrates me not because I have faced Rain-teams on the ladder a million times, but because the outcome of the Suspect Test will be decided by a lot of people that have only seen Sawk in action a few times, because the other times they faced a Sawk, they would just OHKO it with a Rain-boosted Hydro Pump and forget it existed. I know all tiers have the same problem of people who are foreign to the tier voting for a Meta that they don't even know, but I feel as with this Suspect Test, it's worse than others (including other tiers).

I know that there isn't really a solution to the problem of Suspect Test outcomes being slightly altered by people who don't know the tier, if so the TLs would've found a different way to find out which users do and do not know the tier well enough to give their vote on the Suspect. I just wanted to address the annoyance that me and a lot of friends have which is the ladder being infested by Rain-teams that give a twisted view of the actual NU Meta.

This is not meant to be a personal attack to people or the ladder or anybody here. I get frustrated by the ladder just as much as anyone else does and it's not only because of people using rain-teams.

Ok sorry for the rant, here is my opinion on Sawk.

after playing without Sawk for +- 40 battles and discussing it with people I'm not 100% convinced that Sawk should go. Yes, playing without Sawk was a big relief for teams that rely on Colbur Mesprit to check Sawk and most Physical attackers in the tier, but on the other hand I think Sawk leaving the tier will influence the tier in a bad way. I think it will bring kind of an awkward mix between superduper Offensive teams and Semi-Stall, with no real in-between covering both Balls to the Wall-offense, and Fuck I have nothing to break this team-Semi-Stall. I think the ladder meta will easily adapt to this and find out new toys to play around with, but it will definitely change the high quality Tour-meta a lot. after chatting with Cased in the NU chat a bit yesterday he wasn't so sure either of the Sawk suspect but he definitely said if Sawk get's banned, it will change the NU meta quite a bit. Making teambuilding more open to handle more offensive threats will make it a choice between: Bringing offensive shit or Bringing mons that handle the offensive shit. I'm just a ladder scrub myself so I can't really judge the SPL/NUPL-Meta changing that much but I am interested in the outcome.
If I were to vote on Sawk I would personally not ban it, but I'm not 100% convinced of my own opinion yet. I'm very interested in seeing people's opinion on here.

tl;dr: don't use rain in the second suspect phase, convince me of sawk :o

 

[Punchshroom]

Suspect Tests always attract players who are foreign to the tier to play, and get a good feel of the meta, by playing countless games on the Suspect ladder and facing many different teams, playstyles, archetypes. All of these combined should craft a decent image of how the current NU meta is.

I feel that if these newer players want to get a feel of the meta, it's on them if they choose to do so in a suspect meta instead of the regular ladder. On regular ladder they can do all the experimentation they want with little consequence and face other such diverse teams, but in the dog-eat-dog world of the suspect ladder, success and efficiency are all that really matter, and you can't really fault Rain for that. If these newer players opt to begin exploring the NU meta on the pretense of getting the TC badge instead of out of genuine interest (they would've probably first lurked the Neverused room instead of trying to experiment in the suspect meta) and have the 'misfortune' of repeatedly encountering Rain teams as a result, well that sucks for them I guess, but it's their decision.

Many people only play the NU Suspect ladder to get their beloved Tiering Contributor badge, and don't really care about the metagame at all. I completely understand that and there is no-one stopping you from this, but please don't create an entirely wrong image of the metagame by spamming Rain for 100 games straight if you don't know the tier. Getting reqs is an annoying task and rain makes it a lot easier for most people, but it gives people that are new to NU the idea: 'Oh, all I see on the ladder are staple Rain-teams and stall. What a boring tier this is. Let's stay away from this tier as long as possible after I get my reqs.'

On the other hand, there is no guarantee that those same players who visit the NU meta purely to get reqs for their TC badge would really stick around even if the suspect meta didn't present itself as 'Rain-heavy'. Also, are you referring to the Rain spammers creating this image for themselves (since you highlighted 'if you don't know this tier'), or creating this image for newer players? Because if it is the former, there isn't really anything wrong with that since that is just their own opinion. As for the newer players, I've already mentioned that it's up to them whether they choose to explore the NU meta on suspect meta or regular ladder, and once again, it's not really Rain's fault.

I get the message you're tying to convey, but I just want to address some of your arguments.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now for the elephant in the room:

Sawk has been a part of the NU meta since the very beginning, and while it certainly wasn't too problematic back then, several things have happened for it to achieve the dominance it has today. The departure of several fellow threats, as well as its checks such as Doublade, Qwilfish, Spiritomb, and others, have allowed Sawk to inch its way up the hierarchy, but the likely tipping point is around the release of ORAS, where it received Zen Headbutt as a tutored move. With this move, Sawk now attains utterly flawless Fighting / Dark / Psychic / Rock coverage. The departure of Granbull didn't help matters, as Choice Band Sawk now threatens a 2HKO at worst on pretty much everything bar Colbur Musharna and Colbur Gourgeist-Super, and when your sole counters require resist berries just to keep you under proper control, you're on pretty shaky ground as is.

Of course, there are several other factors to Sawk's suspect status. Its raw strength and perfect coverage are tough enough to deal with, but Sawk happens to sit in an above average Speed tier (ahead of other premier hard-hitters like Shiftry, Magmortar, and Kabutops, neither of which hit as hard as Sawk does btw), and basically defines the Speed tier for wallbreakers. Sawk is almost guaranteed to outspeed at least two members of a team even if it is built offensively, but Sawk is far from helpless against faster opponents thank to Sturdy, most of them it can OHKO, so an unharmed well-played Sawk is extremely difficult to deal with without suffering huge casualties. Sawk's presence has been clear in this current meta: Xatus are practically forced to run the same 252 HP / 176 Speed Timid spreads with Colbur Berry or fail to consistenly check Sawk, and of course the fact that Colbur Berry has become a standard on most Ghosts and Psychics (especially the aforementioned Gourgeist-Super and Musharna) when they could otherwise consider other items is a testament to Sawk's power. It doesn't help that Sawk's two best counters are rather exploitable, especially with a Snow Warning teammate.

Even if Sawk's primary favorable matchup is against slower teams, Choice Scarf Sawk has proven to be a strong alternative threat, especially in the previous suspect meta. As it turns out, cleaning games with Scarf Close Combat can be pretty easy when Sawk's coverage moves in Knock Off, Mold Breaker Earthquake, and Stone Edge are also fairly comfortable choices to lock Sawk into, especially with that kind of power backing them up. It shows that Sawk does not falter even in a faster metagame that attempts to curb the presence of Sawk with its natural Speed. Speaking of Sawk's other sets, Sawk can make use of Expert Belt or Black Belt to bluff sets and take advantage of opponents who rely on Sawk to be Choice-locked to counter it, which is a lot of them. Hell, Sawk can even make use of Taunt to best one of its hard counters in Gourgeist-Super while tripping up some of its other checks.

With that said, these are thoughts I've had about Sawk when it is present in the meta, and from my experiences in the Sawk-less meta, I might just have to say...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

...that people have been a bit pampered by Sawk.

The other Fighting-types in Hitmonchan, (offensive) Hariyama, Primeape, etc. are somewhat capable of filling the void left by Sawk, except be a bit less, you know, ridiculous at it. Sawk may have been blessed with its flawless coverage and even its offensive stat distribution, but it's not like the other Fighting-types "scrape by"; they still have the potential to threaten enough of the meta, while possessing adequate coverage to cover a large majority of would-be checks, just not practically all of them like Sawk does. Now people may actually consider their teambuilding issues and/or what tech moves to put on their Fighting-types instead of just resorting to Sawk's picture-perfect coverage and stats; there's a difference between banning a threat with respectable coverage and be left with alternatives with poor / limited coverage and offensive potential, and banning a threat with flawless coverage and be left with options that still have workable coverage and offensive prowess, and Sawk's case definitely feels like the latter. I believe Sawk has been the 'role model Fighting-type' for a tad too long in this meta, and other Fighting-types should have a better chance to shine and be considered more on teams.

Tl;dr: I would likely be in favor of banning Sawk, slightly on the grounds of it being OP, and more on the grounds of its departure leading to a more diversified meta.

 

[boltsandbombers]

If it wasn't clear on the previous page in this post, we are not tolerating any complaints in this thread solely on what we decided to suspect. If you would like further clarification as to why Sawk was chosen over Sceptile read the post below the one linked above.

Thanks.

 

[Deej Dy]

I'm slightly hungover so I'll keep this short and sweet.
I still don't think Sawk should be banned, but my stance is more tenuous than before the suspect, so I'll post both sides.

My reasons for a no-ban are as follows:

- It's a threat, but there are enough checks in the meta to balance it out (Pelipper , Gourgiest, and Vileplume to name a few)
- The Scarf set is more underwhelming than people make it out to be, it basically cannot get past Vileplume or Gourgy.
- The speed tier is nice, but not great, for the clearly superior band set.
- This is literally the only thing besides Primeape that uses band in this tier that is B rank or above, and its departure may shift the meta further towards Special Attack saturation (23 Predominantly Special attackers in A rank compared to 16 Physical attackers (including Sawk)).

My reasons for Ban are as follows:

- Got better as Xatu got better again with Sturdy as a viable option
- Gourgiest sucks and I hate running it.
- Paired with U-turn or Volt Switch this thing is deadly as hell.
- We have sort of a threat overload in NU at the moment which is restricting teambuilding creativity

 

[erisia]

Just wanted to summarize my thoughts on Sawk during my ladder experience. This isn't going to be a huge essay but just a collection of thoughts I've had really. Overall my stance from those games is DO NOT BAN.

• Sawk seems to be a lot more threatening on paper than it is in practise. There's only a handful of defensive counters that can beat the Band set with 100% certainty (Colbur Gourgeist, Colbur Musharna, etc) but most of the time people can play around it due to its Choice sets being by far the most common. If it CC's and you predict it, you get a free turn with your Ghost-type, or if they Knock Off, you can switch in Mega Audino and throw out a Wish, because you know it's going to switch. Even if they catch your Vileplume with Zen Headbutt or something, Sawk's last two slots are usually very easy for teammates to exploit (bring in Malamar on Zen Headbutt or even your own Sawk on Stone Edge). While Sawk has a lot of power, this predictability means it can be played around more easily than something like Sceptile in my opinion.
• Sawk has a centralizing influence on the metagame, but not overtly so. Colbur Berry is the item of choice for many Psychic- and Ghost-types, but I feel that this didn't really change in the meta without Sawk, as Fighting-checks still have to run the items to deal with Hariyama and Gurdurr reliably, not to mention dealing with Skuntank. And you still have to run Fighting resists because otherwise Gurdurr will run you over, not to mention things like Primeape.
• The main difference I see in Sawk leaving the tier is a plethora of new Scarf users to take its place, such as Scyther, Primeape, and Pinsir, and more people using stuff like Choice Band Hitmonchan. This would increase the diversity of the tier as Scarf Sawk is often the optimal choice for a lot of teams, but that doesn't justify banning Sawk in my opinion. It's just one of the best Scarfers, not a broken Scarfer. I never won any matches I shouldn't have running it over other cleaners such as Swellow and even Scarf Pyroar, due to it not overpowering opponents it shouldn't be able to beat as a fast cleaner.
• Sturdy is probably one of the main reasons why I would consider Sawk suspect-worthy, as it's a characteristic unique to Sawk as a fast offensive Pokémon that makes it difficult for offense teams to beat with brute force alone. However, in practise it's relatively easy to break Sturdy without too much risk outside of a lead matchup, using entry hazards, Hail, priority attacks, status effects, or Rocky Helmet and Iron Barbs.

I never gained a huge advantage from running Sawk on my teams compared to a similar Pokémon to fill its roles, and I never felt like opponents had a huge advantage while running Sawk against me because of the opportunities for counterplay its Choiced nature provides. So I definitely don't think it's broken.

 

[Teddeh]

Without adding to points already being made, because i'm very much no ban too, is that sawk doesn't add anything in the way of team synergy and often will leave gaps to weaknesses in your teams as it doesn't add defensive synergy like hariyama / gurdurr who both hit hard whilst add something in that department. But yes, I'm very much in agreement with points being made, with the only real reason in my opinion to ban it is the cluster of threats we have in our tier, but i believe sawk is a lot more managable than most threats due to its speed tier and choiced item popularity.
If we were going to ban sawk for this reason, it would go against banning philosophy, whereby it traditionally means we ban pokemon that are too good/unhealthy or just plain broken, but sawk is none of these. It's very much manageable and as deej pointed out, it's a very good physical threat which is healthy for a tier, whilst also having a lot of checks / counters. Banning it simply to reduce the number of threats we have in a tier is wrong, hence I am no ban.

Also people spamming rain to get reqs for a sawk suspect, i think it's the most retarded thing. It's for people who want TC badge and want to get it the quickest way possible without caring about the decision of ban / no ban and will most likely just pick a 50/50 or even have their mind made up before this suspect took place, which is just wrong and defies the point of the suspect test, or at least this suspect test anyway. I think that mont had to encourage people to use sawk earlier on in this thread also suggests that sawk isn't exactly the most spammable pokemon due to its lack of defensive attributes also, so i don't really see any reason to ban sawk from my experiences.

 

[ryan]

People using rain to get suspect reqs isn't retarded—it's just optimal. Any sort of ranked game play with a time limit is going to encourage fast games because the quickest path is favorable over the consistent path. This example might be lost on many, but Hearthstone's ranked play is the perfect parallel. In Hearthstone, there are 25 number-based ranks, and after you have climbed past all of them, you reach the rank of legend. Legend rankings have their own hidden ELO, and you can continue to climb to legend rank 1, so only one person can ever sit on the top rank, similarly to how ladders function on PS. The ladder, including both number-based ranks and legend ranks, is reset at the start of each month, so legend players have to climb all the way back up once again. For many Hearthstone players, legend is the goal, and for some others, legend is inevitable. For those who will always hit legend because their skill level is so far beyond the others, climbing is often done with either fast decks or gimmick decks because they want to reach legend again as fast as possible or have fun along the way. Control Priest and Patron Warrior are two of the best anti-meta decks in Hearthstone right now, but you don't see them often on the ladder because people prefer to climb with fast decks such as Zoo Warlock, Secret Paladin, and Midrange Druid. Their win rates when piloted by a top player are probably (no stats to base this on) notably higher, but the games take longer. In the time it takes to win one game with Control Priest, you could have won three and lost one with another deck, overall netting you more points (or stars, in Hearthstone speak).

This very closely resembles suspect ladders on Smogon. Just like hitting legend in Hearthstone, attaining suspect reqs is a lengthy and often inevitable grind for many players. Now, a nice balanced team might do really well on the suspect ladder, especially the one without Sawk, where there is one less wallbreaker to cover in teambuilding and teams will often be suboptimal due to replacing Sawk directly with an incomparable Pokemon or simply not understanding the metagame without Sawk. But you could also ladder with rain or hazard offense and have your games last a considerably smaller amount of time while maintaining a consistent win rate.

Obviously, I would hope anybody who does this still takes the time to understand both metagames and make an informed decision, but unfortunately, you don't have to do that. Suspect testing is inherently flawed, which is why few other competitive games allow for the masses to make game-altering decisions. But here we are, and this is the status quo. Just remember that Sawk's influence on the metagame is heavily skewed when you play strictly one style, regardless of what that style is, and take it into heavy consideration while voting. If you read this entire post, please enjoy this token of my appreciation: a baby bunny hiding in a person's hand.

 

[honchkrow]

hi so since i got reqs i figured id post my 2 cents. So unlike most people, i actually chose the stall route for laddering. This was mainly because stall had a good matchup vs weather, was consistent, and i had been meaning to learn different playstyles to kind of improve myself as a player. During the ladder with sawk, i found myself soooo much more pressured to win games and keep my pokemon healthy. I had musharna and pelipper as my fighting resists and even then, i felt uncomfortable checking sawk reliably because cb knock off does a ton to mush and forces me to heal everytime i come in to sponge a hit, and pelipper can easily die to a stone edge or thunder punch shoutout Realistic Waters. I know this is partly due to stall being so passive as a playstyle but i still feel sawk is just a bit too good to handle. The ladder without Sawk was much easier for me. I used a different stall team and felt much more in control when laddering. I was able to run lefties defensive rotom which is absolutely wonderful btw. Being forced to run colbur on everything weak to knock off says a lot about sawk's impact on the current meta. I had said from the beginning of this test that im voting no ban but as i laddered and laddered, it made me change my decision. sorry if this isnt super well written btw its 3 am and Raseri encouraged me to write a post

 

[Steakburgers]

Just a question, why is sawks defensive attributes being called into play when talking about banning it? Typhlosion was banned because of its insane offensive power, i dont remember anyone saying anything about its defensive attributes. Mega Glalie was banned right? Although its got a crappy defensive typing, it more than made up for it with its offensive powers
Sneasel is one as well. Sneasels got horrid defensive attributes but yet and still it destroyed teams
So i dont understand that, and if someone could explain, I for one distaste sawk. Banded CC, knock off is insanely hard to switch into, and the mons i gotta use or risk getting bopped is dumb. Gourgeist and pelipper and mushy are granted, good mons. but ive never felt forced to use them like do when sawk is around
How does that send a message to newer players who say hey i wanna play nu, and you gotta say well better use pelipper gourgeist or mushy, cause sawk is around
Thats basically forcing them into a place they may not want to be in. I hate this gotta run speedy mons meta or risk getting destroyed stuff, its not fun to build nowadays, and i feel like the change to a better balanced meta starts with sawk leaving

 

[kay]

Because it affects how it synergies with the tier, and if it has a lot of defensive uses then it becomes super splashable. Sawk is a stand alone mon much like how, for example, Malamar is. They both do their thing and don't add much in terms of synergy. They're stand alone mons.

As for the other mons you listed, they had a lot more going for them. With Typhlosion you had a mon that could spam 1 move and if it was at full hp nothing besides dedicated counters could switch into it, and it had enough coverage to get past most of those fire resists. Mega Gallade you had a mon that could run like 5 different sets and beat out basically the entire meta. Sneasel hit at the time a god-tier speed tier while also having Pursuit + Ice Shard + some times SD which really messed with the meta in such a negative way.
Besides Typhlosion they all had more to them then just 'it hits hard', and even if you used Typhlosion as an example, we have the option with Sawk to run things like Colbur psychic types, Typhlosion lacked any kind of option like this and forced you into running the same 3-4 mons on every team. It also had a base 100 speed tier which at the time was really solid; right now Sawk is sitting at base 85 and the meta has only gotten faster.

In all, I think Sawk is manageable and it lacks the same kind of 'oomf' that our past bans have had.

 

[Teddeh]

My point of "defensive presence" is that sneasel, typh and even sceptile right now have defensive synergy going for them in ways of "these check my fire types or psychic types" etc etc, by adding to what kay has put, sawk adds nothing in the way of checking things on a team besides rock, by which is usually paired with edgequake and i am most definitely risking switching sawk in on anything. The difference between gallade and sawk is that gallade was way too unpredictable with its sets / coverage / items etc whilst it also had sneasel in the tier at the time of the suspect which affected most peoples decision to ban it, being that it was a pretty broken splashable core that really ripped the tier in half. Sawk right now has skunk, which outside of checking psychic types, does not much and is bait for most things in this tier, hence why sawk would struggle a lot more right now in comparison to gallade during the time of the previous suspect. But i hope I've explained my point well.

Responding to ryan, I agree that using rain for a suspect if you actually know the tier and know what sawk does, then it's viable. My message was at people who'd never played a game of nu in this current meta whilst using rain, hence having 0 knowledge on how sawk would actually function in the tier as the majority. Nevertheless, i agree with the rest of your post.

 

[HJAD]

i think im gonna input my opinions on the whole sawk debacle now.

I was extremely interested in this suspect since not a whole lot changed for Sawk, it always has been one of the premier NU Wallbreakers as far back as Gen 5 NU, but in this meta, its taken on a whole new level of meta revolution.
Some key aspects to Sawk as has been discussed previously is its Movepool, and what comes about as a result. Sawk's sky high attacks coupled with Perfect 100% Tier Coverage make it, the best wallbreaker in the tier. Stuff like Colbur Musharna, Colbur Mesprit and Colbur Gourgeist have all spawned predominantly due to Sawk's Knock Off coverage, and generally, it has gained coverage in the form of Zen Headbutt to hit the likes of Weezing or Vileplume which used to be pretty safe switchins since XY. Garbodor, Scyther and Pelipper are a plethora of defensive threats used to take on Sawk, however none are still 100% switchins thanks to some other Sawk Coverage like EQ / Stone Edge. Sawk's abilitys are quite nice too, it has the choice between Sturdy and Mold Breaker which each have their respective uses; Sturdy can act as a one time revenge killing tech whereas Mold Breaker can be used to bypass abilities such as Levitate used by Weezing and Rotom-N, turning less situations into 50/50s. To add to all these advantages, Sawk's influencing factor in this meta is quite big as well. I havent seen too much discussion about this but, Sawk's superior band set has been driving several people into using more offensive based teams. So, rather than allowing Sawk the oppurtuinity to click CC or a respective coverage move, you minimise these oppurtuinities by using fast, hard hitting mons, and choke it out of being too useful to the opponent. The problem with this offensive based team style is that it falls perfectly into the hands of its "other" set. The Scarf Sawk set feasts on Offense, using its still relatively high power CC's and coverage moves to outspeed the likes of Sceptile, Swellow and others which previously would have stopped Sawk right in its tracks. It functions more like Tyrantrum in RU rather than your other typical scarfers. It's purpose is to provide offense with a huge issue, as apposed to being a revenge killer. This set loves the fact that Banded Sawk is so heavily prepared for at the teambuilder in terms of team structure, and why it is a threat in this current metagame.

These features are the making of a great pokemon in this tier, practically 0 switchins, ok speed, good ability. However, something that i emplore people to think is, Sawk, probably looking at it from a Theorymon perspective is a bit overpowered. If you rely on Mesprit or Rotom-N as your only Sawk switchins, yeah it will seem broken. However, in terms of the metagame, im yet to be convinced Sawk leaving is healthy for the NU meta. Sure, you might see less congestion in terms of Fighting Checks, but we have to look at the big picture. What will we use after Sawk to break common Balance Builds? Uhm, as far as im concerned the only thing that comes close to lacking switchins as much as Sawk would probably be like Magmortar, Samurott, Aurorus and Abomasnow and Beheeyem. All of which are very situational. Magmortar has switchins that are beginning to become more common like Hariyama as well as that crippling SR weakness, Samurott depending on its set has Switchins, Aurorus and Abomasnow have that nasty typing which means they can often be redundancies throughout a match. I was very open to banning Sawk at the start of the new suspect ladder, i would test the water to see whether Sawk being gone is actually beneficial for NU, and i didnt really find it that way. If anything, i found the tier less enjoyable, and an obvious trend towards much, much more bulky builds started to occur. I found this quite frustrating, since NU didnt really have the devices to break a hugely bulky team, a service which Sawk provides. Sawk provides that dominant threat towards Balance / Stall builds, so that there is an oppurtuinity cost in running these types of teams. You know when you play Balance / Stall in the current NU that a well played Sawk will make mince-meat of your build, whereas now, whats really stopping you from running Wish + 4 Bulky Mons and Glue. Hazards? As much as Sawk is centralising, i dont want to have to actively build vs Balance / Stall in the knowledge if i dont use something niche that i will be punished.

tl;dr, sawk is really really good, but we need it so that balance / stall dont take over the tier and make playing / building more of a chore than it currently is. No Ban for me imo

 

[fish anemometer]

I am going to disagree with Hjad's post as it has it's flaws. Even with Sawk gone, stall in particular will never take over the tier. The Pokemon he mentions (0 switch in mons) are just a fraction of the stall-breakers this tier has. Cm Xatu (6-0es a lot of defensive teams, barrier Mush, Jynx, 108 speed Weezing, Malamar, Shiftry, SS sweepers like Barbaracle and Omastar, Skuntank, Mismagius, taunt Pyroar Vivillion and more are all definitely not niche options and deal with stall very well depending on some of the members of a the team. Pair some of these with some hazards and/or volt-turn and NU without a doubt has the devices to break past fat teams.

Also, if we need Sawk (lets just say its broken) to check balance and stall which would presumably be broken in the Sawk-less meta, wouldn't that be using the flawed broken checks broken argument?

 

[Punchshroom]

More nitpicks from me:

Imo, the biggest arguments against Sawk's 'brokenness' is that 1) most of its checks and counters actually have reliable recovery and/or decent sustain, unlike most of the suspects in the past, and 2) Sawk has a rather predictable moveset. The first point is a decent enough case, though the fact that a good chunk of Sawk counters' recovery can be nerfed by Hail can be problematic when Sawk can wear them down as quickly as it does. The second point however ties in with just how flawless Sawk's coverage is: Sawk has very little need to deviate from its moveset when it already covers literally everything. And when I mean everything, I don't mean you can employ some super niche shit like Frillish / Vibrava / Lunatone in the Typhlosion + MRupt meta or SpD Torterra in Magneton / Heliolisk meta or other super obscure mons; CB Sawk pretty much 2HKOes anything that isn't a super fat Ghost / Psychic that carries a resist Berry. This can be an utter pain to prepare for, and between Sawk's power, Speed, and even ability in Sturdy, every single team has to keep a very watchful eye out for this, much more so than most other wallbreakers.

Now having a centralising force in the meta isn't really all that bad. However, continuing my 'flawless coverage' argument, this would imply that Sawk doesn't really so much adapt to the metagame, rather that the meta has to revolve around what kind of set Sawk chooses to use. Even something as powerful as Sceptile had to start paying attention to what kind of moves it is packing depending on the state of the meta (ex: Rock Slide when Zard stepped in), but Sawk can carry pretty much the exact same moveset for each set that it does now and be basically intact regardless of the state of the meta. In other words, Sawk has reached what I would consider "perfection", and it is the rest of the meta that has to keep up with it now.

HJAD's suggestion that Sawk is absolutely imperative to breaking Balance builds only reinforces my belief that people are getting pampered by Sawk and getting lazy with their teambuilding due to just how much Sawk provides in one slot. I literally tried to address this issue earlier by bringing up the fact that other Fighting-types, or even other balance breakers in general, are still competent at punching open bulky cores at a decent degree as opposed to the ridiculous efficiency of Sawk. Perhaps you can try to break those builds with your team using a 2 to 3 mon core, as opposed to the one-man show that is Sawk? Honestly, considering the whole deal of the Abomasite ban in RU is that it threatens whole balance teams in just one slot, the fact that Sawk does so in NU at an arguably even better capability only reaffirms my stance for Sawk.

 

[Raseri]

I usually avoid posting in these types of threads because I have a lot of influence over people, but I think the pro-ban side of Sawk is being very underrepresented right now.

Even if you run 2 solid fighting resists, Sawk is still always a huge threat in matches, things like Pelipper and Gourgeist, which in theory are great switch ins, just get worn down too easily by a Sawk combined with entry hazards, particularly after they lose their items :)

The biggest thing I've seen with the No Sawk ladder is diversity, a lot of different types of teams and sets have been popping up that you would never see in a Sawk metagame. Sure, some psychics and ghosts will stiill run Colbur berry, but the beauty of it is that they don't have too, other options become more viable.

Sawk isn't as broken as something like Sneasel or Mega Camerupt, but to me it is about as broken as Typhlosion, its ability to muscle its way through would be checks and counters, while having a humongous effect on teambuilding is what makes Sawk broken to me. A metagame without Sawk is one with more diversity and freedom in teambuilding.

 

[GyRro]

I wanted to add my opinions on the upcoming vote on Sawk. I'll try to keep it short and not repeat anything anyone has really said. I haven't been around as long as some of the guys around here but like to think I have at least a decent grasp of the meta and a few previous metas as a whole and can add somethings to the discussion. I do enjoy the more offensively styled meta that has formed from the recent drops, and generally enjoy playing in this style. However, after speaking shortly to Shaneghoul about it, I realized my motivations for me to vote no ban was because I wanted the meta to stay how I enjoy it more. The point I am trying to make is that (in my opinion) this isn't how you should look at whether to ban Sawk or not. We all know teambuilding is rather restricted by the coverage and variation in sets Sawk possesses, and this in turn makes team building less flexible. Without Sawk here, although it removes an offensive threat from the choice, team building should definitely be less restricted, making playing in NU, in general, more enjoyable due to the variation.

Even though the ban will make me slightly unhappy due to the way the meta will shift, it will definitely improve the meta as a whole in my opinion. And I think people should look at the bigger picture a little more when making their decision.

 

[Joe Career]

I know ya'll are busy with the Sawk discussion, just thought you should know Sturdy Regirock is going to be released this Friday!

 

[warzoid]

As someone who doesn't play NU as a career and basically just spammed rain Ferroseed for ez reqs, I'd like to share my opinions on Sawk. I think that it is dumb to have to use Colbur Berry just to have a hope of switching in against Sawk. In a metagame with almost no relevant fairies (that resist fighting), Close Combat + Knock Off + Mold Breaker EQ is really tough to handle.

I thought that the no Sawk ladder was a more enjoyable experience overall. I encountered a few banded Hariyama and a lot of Weezing. Weezing is lot better without Mold Breaker Sawk running around. I tried out Primeape a little bit, and although it's no Sawk, it's a decent replacement as a scarfer, especially since it gets U-turn. It was nice to not have to deal with opposing Sawk spamming Knock Off and single-handedly wearing down all my fighting checks.

As for concerns that NU is going to turn into a stallfest because of a ban on one pokemon, I think that that's kind of silly. Maybe once Abomasnow goes RU, but even then there are a lot of options for breaking down fat teams. It may require slightly more creative teambuilding than just slapping on a banded Sawk, but that's hardly a bad thing.

 

[Blapperl]

Concerning the points made about "It is stupid that I have to carry Colbur Berry just to handle Sawk": This is just not accurate. Colbur Berry isn't just for Sawk. It is for the lovely move called Knock Off, which other Fighting Types happen to carry too. Ít sucks that GF broke the balance of Ghost/Psychics being a natural check to Fighters, but it is as it is, and in order for say a Xatu to check Yama/Gurdurr without fear of being killed still need a Colbur. It is also used bc our Psychic types often carry Bug moves, so they can kill Dark types, for which the tier is short in answers, before they kill the Psychics. I ran a couple of different non-Colbur Psychics in No-Sawk-Ladder and found that I'd still want a Colbur Berry on these mons in a good amount of matches.

Sawk being able to 2HKO nearly the entire tier with the correct coverage move certainly is a point that deserves attention. As far as I'm concerned, I waved goodbye to the hope of having the possibility for a full fledged counter to many threats in the tier. Sawks wallbreaking-power looks less amazing when you compare it to other powerhouses in NU: Charizard, Pyroar, Magmortar have an incredibly small amount of switchins, which mostly lack recovery and invite in Sceptile. Special Samurott, how many teams do actually have decent switchins to that? Zangoose is nearly unwallable and slow teams can only hope to play around it with prediction. (Sceptile: No problem we got sliggoo.) The list goes on.
With all the wall breaking power in the tier, Sawk or the things used to check it would need a special trait in order to be considered broken, and in my eyes that isn't the case. It has OK speed, but it is slow enough to the point that offense teams will always have around 3 mons that are faster. The Scarf set is no different from other Scarfers - Offense will get into trouble if they enable it to click CC freely in the late game, but I'd rather play around to having something that takes a CC left than eg. things that can either take Psychic or Ice beam (from Scarf Jynx).
As far as slow, fat teams are concerned: This obviously is where most of the problems with Sawk come from. There is no way to create a fat team that will never struggle with Sawk. However, in order to break said team, if it is built with Sawk in mind, Sawk will have to predict. If you look at it from a theorymon side, Sawk destroys every core (Oh, your weezing can just get eqed/zenheadbutted and your scyther can get stone edged) but in practice this core can stall Sakw's success till the very end. It doesn't help Socks that many of its checks get recovery - a trait that checks to other dangerous NU mons don't share. I admit that Mold Breaker limits the possibilities for cores that can achieve that goal - but is is possible, and, afterall, you are dealing with the pokemon that is supposed to be "The Silver Bullet" vs your fat kind of team.
TLDR: Sawk is just another hard hitter among equal others that has some edge over them but also some disadvantages. In my opinion, banning something should be the last resort if the tier clearly can't take on a Pokemon for good, not an instrument to create a metagame that is "more fun".

 

[Luck O' the Irish]

Incoming massive wall of text sorry D:

I don't think it's fair at all to say that "Sawk is just another wallbreaker". The fact that we are considering Sawk for a suspect and also that it's been S rank for like half a year now, even through the December drop that saw previous S rank staples like Archeops plummet to the bottom of A ranks, says a lot about Sawk's prowess and consistency.

Anyway, I chose to get reqs using stall since I felt like I had enough experience using more balanced and offensive builds. Even though I carried various anti-Sawk measures (which included running protect on 2 mons that Sawk could at worst 2HKO) Sawk was still a pain in the ass to deal with. The problem with more passive teams is you will always have a mon that Sawk can get into a threatening position on, especially in a metagame where curse sliggoo usage is surging, since if sliggoo is awake, Sawk can literally just switch in mindlessly since you can't click outrage or you lose your check to half the opponents team. As users above me have mentioned, it is very possible to play around sawk since it is often choice locked. However, due to the nature of stall vs more offensive builds the offensive team has the advantage when it comes to predictions. Sure, you can go into steelix and sawk stone edges, go into audino as it knocks etc, but all it takes is one clean prediction for sawk to get a kill or turn something into death fodder. And against more passive builds, sawk gets many more opportunities to get into position. This is just the nature of passive builds vs. insane wallbreakers, but sawk is more effective than other insane wallbreakers (I'm going to use Magmortar and Aurorus for comparison purposes) for the following reasons:

1. Guaranteed Sawk switchins are harder to fit onto teams.
Colbur gourgeist only works well if youre using a fatter team. Musharna does fit onto most stall and balance builds fairly well however. On the other hand, you have grumpig and hariyama for both aurorus and magmortar, which fit onto any balance build and most fat builds, restalk magmortar for stall, and piloswine for aurorus works on balance builds, and sliggoo walls magmortar to hell and back and fits on balanced fairly well and is really nice for stall. Sp def Clefairy also takes whatever AV magmortar wants to throw at it and fits onto the same builds that sliggoo does. Overall, magmortar is the easiest to fit a dedicated switchin for on non purely offensive teams. aurorus is probably the hardest to switch into but that mainly stems from the lack of aurorus usage and therefore preparation, whereas a lot of teams carry two fighting resists because of sawk.

2. Sawk switchins, although they have reliable recovery, are much more passive and open the door for other breakers to come in for free.
Whenever you bring hariyama into magmortar or aurorus, you take little from whatever it uses and then you're clicking cc or knock off from a fully invested base 120 attack. When you go into grumpig, you take little and then get the option to click twave to cripple incoming attackers or solid coverage to hit switchins with. Piloswine has a respectively powerful eq. Sliggoo is obviously the exception here, but it does provide a threatening presence in that if you don't deal with it, it has the ability to sweep you. On the other hand, whenever you bring in musharna and gourgeist, youre pretty much forced to recover if it clicks knock off (which they tend to do when there's gourgeist or mushy in the team preview). Musharna provides some sort of offensive threat, but it's a free switchin for skuntank and steelix. Gourgeist is a free switchin for every fire type in the tier, and it's one of the most passive mons the tier has, relying on leech seed, wisp, and non stab foul play to damage things. The point is, when you switch in a Magmortar or Aurorus counter, most of the time you get the momentum and you get the opportunity to set up stealth rock or fire off a powerful attack. When you switch in a reliable Sawk counter, more often than not the momentum remains with the opposing team.

3. Sawk offers these wallbreaking capabilities without sacrificing as much of the matchup against offense or balance.
Sawk's higher speed tier (especially now that it more commonly runs jolly with cb) means that it will threaten a much larger amount of even offensive mons for a kill. This is what makes sawk much better than aurorus-- it threatens more offensive builds to a significantly higher degree. Magmortar can be used defensively of course, which separates it from the other wallbreakers, but it's not insane when you use AV, which is the most common set. Additionally, scarf Sawk is a huge threat to offensive teams since it still has enough power to break through less bulky checks while outrunning the entire unboosted metagame. Putting scarf on magmortar holds it back from using its wide coverage, which is why scarf magmortar is not recognized as "a thing", while scarf aurorus lacks the speed to beat sceptile, the most threatening mon in the metagame outside of sawk. Sawk doesn't have its insane power when holding scarf of course, but it is much more effective against offensive builds when holding it compared to other wallbreakers. Sturdy is also really nice-- even if cb sawk is slower than your entire opponents team, it's still getting a kill as long as you have hazard control.


With this being said, I will now respond to some other anti-ban arguments.

re: Possible to play around Sawk
Most of the arguments I've heard feel like some sort of variation of the classic "prediction" argument. Even when I used protect with say, defensive omastar against a choice-locked sawk (happened many times over the course of getting my reqs) this didn't stop them from doubling to shiftry as i went to my close combat switchin. Similarly, if you bring vileplume in on zen headbutt it's not just "oh ok i can go into my malamar now" since a good sawk user will recognize that possibility, leaving you with at best a 50/50. I find it hard to believe none of you guys ever brought steelix or megadino in predicting stone edge or knock only to eat a cc. Playing around sawk is basically making godly predictions over and over again. Which is doable, but not this easy process I feel like some people are making it out to be.

re: No defensive synergy
I've been in many games where Sawk's sturdy was literally someone's wincon, as it prevented something like rain dance ludicolo from sweeping. Sure there's a lot of ways to remove it but I can't recall it being so easy to keep hazards off the field with xatu alone thanks to all the people running steelix and defensive garbodor as their hazard setters. Sawk is one of the biggest reasons why sturdy/sash offense exists and is effective. Even if you don't run sturdy, sawk can still switch in on rock moves and really passive mons like cradily and ferroseed (watch out for twave tho). I've obviously hyped up sturdy quite a bit and it's not the most incredible thing ever, but don't underrate it's usefulness.

re: "We need it to break balance"
KJ corp already touched on this, but I just want to echo this point further- NU has tons of balance and stall breakers; there are a ton that don't get much usage, as other users above me have pointed out. I also have a hard time believing that every single one of your teams have had choice banded sawk on them; if balance were really that unbreakable without sawk, we could expect something closer to 100% usage of sawk, which of course isn't the case. This logic also goes against Smogon precedent- we have never used any "broken checks broken" policies. If we did use this policy, aegislash would never have left ou.


Finally, I'd like to add that Sawk is much more of a constricting presence in the teambuilder compared to anything else. The ability to not have to run colbur on every ghost or psychic type is really nice. There are also a ton of things that speed creep banded sawk, which will actually be able to run more bulk without sawk in the tier. When's the last time you saw an offensive mesprit? They're all max phys def now since they can't outrun sawk anymore and they die to knock off if they don't run bulk. A sawk-less metagame opens up so much more freedom for mons that are trying to check sawk and opens up much more creativity in terms of balanced breakers that are being used.

damn that took too long

 

[Punchshroom]

Just wanted to get my thoughts out of the way:

Concerning the points made about "It is stupid that I have to carry Colbur Berry just to handle Sawk": This is just not accurate. Colbur Berry isn't just for Sawk. It is for the lovely move called Knock Off, which other Fighting Types happen to carry too. Ít sucks that GF broke the balance of Ghost/Psychics being a natural check to Fighters, but it is as it is, and in order for say a Xatu to check Yama/Gurdurr without fear of being killed still need a Colbur. It is also used bc our Psychic types often carry Bug moves, so they can kill Dark types, for which the tier is short in answers, before they kill the Psychics. I ran a couple of different non-Colbur Psychics in No-Sawk-Ladder and found that I'd still want a Colbur Berry on these mons in a good amount of matches.

I was waiting for someone to bring up this argument. You are correct that Colbur Berry is not just for Sawk, as it can still be beneficial for your Psychic-types if you're short on Fighting checks. However, Sawk made it nearly mandatory to use Colbur Berry, due to its combination of speed and power. Without Colbur Berry, Mesprit would just be 2HKOed, if not outright OHKOed, on the switch, though neither case doesn't really matter since Sawk is faster; even if Mesprit should survive the Knock Off, it likely won't be able to take Close Combat at that point. The same goes for Xatu, and it still needs a specialized EV spread to keep Sawk under 'control', by which I mean 'just avoid the Stone Edge and you're good'. Meanwhile, mons like Gourgeist-XL and Musharna couldn't leave home without it. Colbur is nowhere near as necessary for the other Knock Off Fightings, which are slower and/or do not hit as hard off the bat; Mesprit no longer has to worry about having to check a faster Fighting-type with a powerful Knock Off, whereas Xatu can actually afford bulkier spreads that don't use Colbur now. The point about Colbur allowing Psychics to beat Darks is merely a byproduct from the mandatory use of Colbur; Psychics shouldn't really try to mess with Darks in the first place, arguably Malamar included.

Sawk being able to 2HKO nearly the entire tier with the correct coverage move certainly is a point that deserves attention. As far as I'm concerned, I waved goodbye to the hope of having the possibility for a full fledged counter to many threats in the tier. Sawks wallbreaking-power looks less amazing when you compare it to other powerhouses in NU: Charizard, Pyroar, Magmortar have an incredibly small amount of switchins, which mostly lack recovery and invite in Sceptile. Special Samurott, how many teams do actually have decent switchins to that? Zangoose is nearly unwallable and slow teams can only hope to play around it with prediction. (Sceptile: No problem we got sliggoo.) The list goes on.

With all the wall breaking power in the tier, Sawk or the things used to check it would need a special trait in order to be considered broken, and in my eyes that isn't the case. It has OK speed, but it is slow enough to the point that offense teams will always have around 3 mons that are faster.
TLDR: Sawk is just another hard hitter among equal others that has some edge over them but also some disadvantages. In my opinion, banning something should be the last resort if the tier clearly can't take on a Pokemon for good, not an instrument to create a metagame that is "more fun".

What should be brought into attention when comparing Sawk to other wallbreakers is how much overall advantages it has in comparison to them.
- Firstly, Sawk's main attack itself is an incredibly strong and perfectly accurate move with minimal drawbacks and doesn't weaken itself like things such as Leaf Storm or Knock Off or whatever. Of course, insinuating that Close Combat is a broken move is ridiculous, but compared to every other Fighting-type in the tier that gets it, Sawk has the Speed (unlike Hariyama), coverage (unlike Primeape and arguably Hitmonchan), and of course raw power (lol Monferno >.>) to fully capitalize on this move.

- Second, what particularly concerns me is not just how perfect Sawk's coverage is, but how overall safe it is. Close Combat may have many resists, but it's your main nuking attack anyway and it's still not a bad move to test the waters with for reasons listed above, so it keeps the opponent on edge. Knock Off is infamously safe to just throw out, Stone Edge and Mold Breaker Earthquake aren't bad attacks to be locked into, and even Choiced Zen Headbutt isn't too punishable since Sawk resist Pursuit. Some people assume Sawk uses Choice Band over Life Orb simply because it wants both the power boost and to preserve Sturdy, but may fail to realize that Sawk can rather easily afford to be Choice-locked (evidenced by the existence of Scarf Mold Breaker Sawk). Primeape's moves may also be pretty safe for it, but it doesn't tear things down anywhere near as quickly or efficiently as Sawk can.

- Thirdly, I do acknowledge that Sawk is far from the only thing in the tier that has minimal switch-ins (though one could still resort to some gimmick answers to wall the other things at the very least), though some rather obvious advantages Sawk has over its holepunching brethren include a Stealth Rock resistance and its health not dwindling every turn. At that point, Sawk's most notable disadvantage compared to them is its Speed, which isn't even that bad; in fact it's good enough that the majority of teams have at least 2 Pokemon (that aren't Sawk counters) that are outsped by Sawk. I'd say Sawk is a big contributing factor as to why mons like Shiftry, Kabutops, special Samurott, Abomasnow, and LO Magmortar have not been seeing much use as of late, as there isn't much reason to justify offensive mons that are frail / don't offer much defensive synergy and get picked off by Sawk. When Sawk's supposedly weakest trait compared to its wallbreaking brethren is still enough to be meta-defining, you start to realize that Sawk does indeed have an edge up over the competition.

 

[marilli]

as to why mons like Shiftry, Kabutops, special Samurott, Abomasnow, and LO Magmortar have not been seeing much use as of late

Not sure if I've been playing the same NU tier as you, but I've been seeing tons of Shiftry. LO Mag isn't the common set and if that were actually the problem it says nothing about why it's AV and not Life Orb. It's clear that you're just seeing offensive teams teched vs. offense, which is why you see lots of priority Pokemon. Like Shiftry, and using SD Samurott over the special variant (I've seen a lot of special + Aqua Jet sets recently as well, in the same vein). Of course it may tie down to how they get forced out vs. Offense, but it's more than just Sawk at play here. If it were, then people wouldn't use Shiftry. But they do. Maybe Sawk's influence has a lot to do with why offense is so common. But Sawk has been in this tier for literally 4 years. What has recently changed with the tier is, well, something entirely different.

All the pro ban people seems to conveniently ignore that Sawk just doesn't seem to be that broken in practice. Sawk is pressured by opposing offensive Pokemon and it's shown by the ginormous scarf usage on Sawk. And it's not just on 'bad players', despite the long-held stigma that Scarf Sawk is the "bad players' set" which isn't true but I digress. Sawkless metagame might feel more 'diverse', but basically you're trying to say with one less threat, there's less accounting to do in teambuilding. Either this 'diversifies the tier', or just promotes lazy teambuilding, who knows. However, what's most likely is that even in the Sawkless 'diverse' meta, it will eventually settle. What's broken and what isn't will pop up pretty soon, and that diversity will disappear again.

You are simply seeing the undeveloped metagame without Sawk - of course it's more diverse, because it's underdeveloped. I honestly doubt that will stay the same unless some other drastic changes occur in the tier in addition to the removal of Sawk. As a meta develops, people figure out what's good and what's not, and this further heavily centralizes the tier. There's a bunch of other "Broken" Pokemon with no counters remaining in the tier, and they also have as easy of a time throwing out STAB moves and hard-to-switch-into coverage that covers almost everything in just 2 moves.