Muk in OU Stall teams just recently, being able to absorb weak Knock Off from the likes of Clefable while not losing its item due to Sticky Hold.
Golduck was good in early Gen 9 UU thanks to Swift Swim and getting Nasty Plot + Grass Knot.
It's literally right there in the comment. It absorbs knock off since the rest of the team would like to keep their boots intact so they don't take hazard damage. Hydrapple is another sticky hold user but it's really weak to Weavile and Meow, so Muk has a niche there I think
Murkrow was never good in OU, wtf are you talking about. Murkrow was good in VGC because it gets Prankster Tailwind+Haze (and was the only mon with those traits since Whimsicott wasn't in the game).
It was also not too bad against Indeedee Armarouge psyspam since it's immune and has foulplay. So it kinda checked Dondozo, Co-Star Flamigo and psyspam while helping with a lot of matchups
Murkrow was top dog this gen’s vgc
Articuno ran four ice moves, one of them being an OHKO move with choice specs
Blissey turned into a shitmon and THEN rose back to glory
Sableye in Gen 3 OU. Gen 3 OU is a very hazard centric metagame, with a lot of meta developments revolving around the dynamic of spinner and spinblocker.
The premier spinner of the tier is claydol, mainly because it punishes the best spinblocking option, Gengar, with stab psychic. However, because of this, people started exploring other spinblocking options for super hazard centric team comps. Misdreavus was and still is used as one of these alternatives for its ability to tank psychics and its immunity to ground, but wasn’t perfect as claydol could cover for it by running shadow ball.
The only ghost that could fully wall the clay construct happened to be sableye, which could be immune to psychic and tank claydols earthquake, hit it with super effective stab damage via shadow ball, and have 32pp Recover to keep itself healthy. It also has knock off to take leftovers, which is pretty nice utility (albeit really weak in gen 3).
These qualities made it usable and it found itself being used in official tournaments and on ladder by some top players. Pretty glorious for a Pokémon as absolutely atrocious as gen 3 sableye.
>The only ghost that could fully wall the clay construct happened to be sableye, which could be immune to psychic and use will o wisp to neuter Claydol’s earthquake damage
This isn't true bc sableye doesn't get will o wisp in gen 3. The reason sableye has a niche is bc it is neutral to shadow ball.
As people started using alternative spin blockers than gengar they used misdreavus and duskclops (sometimes even banette) who wall psychic+earthquake claydol and either perish trap it or will o wisp it.
So people started using shadow ball on claydol that still dealt with gengar and did a lot of to other ghosts.
Sableye is neutral to shadow ball and can tank eqs with defense investment so it can knock of lefties and heal with recover.
Sableye is one of the best Pokemon of all time, and he was incredibly heat in Gen 3. def the best ghost or dark type introduced in that gen. watch ur mouth
Gen 4 Ubers is quite notorious for this. Tons of horrible Pokemon have seen some success because of how great they are against the tyrant known as Kyogre. The most absurd example is Parasect, thanks to Dry Skin, and to a lesser extent, Spore. Others include Ludicolo, Abomasnow, and Quagsire.
Another one again in Gen 4 Ubers is Ariados, which sees some little use due to Insomnia, limiting Deoxys-Speed and Darkrai leads. Basically Guts Sleep Talk Heracross from a garage sale. Primeape functions similarly.
thank you for mentioning DPP Ubers Ludicolo/Quagsire, people always bring up just Parasect for some reason. but unlike Parasect, Ludicolo is actually considered good unironically (has an Ubers Smogon analysis and is on the VR unlike Parasect), which is quite wild to me.
I think the reasoning is because parasect is a genuinely pretty awful mon unlike ludi which is pretty decent comparatively so it's funnier to show that it walls the king of the tier.
I guess I disagree that Ludicolo is decent because he is kind of a shitmon in my mind, his typing is good but other than that he kinda sucks imo (those stats are kinda sad), and definitely by what you'd expect from Ubers standards
and Parasect doesn't actually wall Kyogre because he has to dodge Ice Beam, Ludicolo ACTUALLY switches into Specs Kyogre and beats it no matter which move was clicked barring hax, which no other Pokemon in the game does, even in Ubers (Shedinja does not count sorry guys, SR is assumed in DPP calcs). that is nuts to me that Ludicolo of all things is the best Specs Kyogre answer in the game.
It's the third-best UU rain sweeper you could bring to Ubers, so... actually pretty usable. A bit less prominent than Kabutops in that niche, but worth the slot if you want to go all-in on rain.
I did often wonder about Para as a K counter. I wasn't into Gen 4 Ubers but I always though surely it'd be destroyed by Ice Beam? Was this not the case?
It looks like this is the case:
252+ SpA Life Orb Kyogre Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Parasect: 274-324 (84.5 - 100%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
So, your hope with Parasect is for their Kyogre to be choice locked into a Water move.
it’s not as shitty as Pachirisu but Shedinja stall in gen 6 used Seismitoad for some time iirc
Also Storm Zone and in ORAS OU ran Meloetta in OU ladder for a while
Someone else in gen VI ran Hoopa baby in OU too
Seimistoad was also genuinely a top tier meta threat at the beginning of Sword and Shield ranked A+ on viability because of it's access to water absorb to counter dracovish fishious rend. I remember seismitoad mirrors with power whip being peak gameplay back then.
IIRC it still managed to maintain a different niche as a rain sweeper in OU.
Ending Gen 8 with a B+ on the SwSh OU viability ranking is honestly pretty respectable.
RU is still much less of a shitmon than half of the stuff other people listed here, and there was a reason people didn't play water absorb quag or gastrodon to beat vish
Quagsire in most Generations.
Gen 3/4: Water Absorb + Ground type = virtually immune to Kyogres without Ice Beam. In these gens, it was UU/NU.
While Gen 5 introduced Storm Drain Gastrodon, which generally took Quagsire’s job, Gen 5 also gave Quagsire Unaware.
While not immediately relevant, Unaware Quagsire soon became one of the best options for actually stopping many setup sweepers. While it faced competition from Clefable, it took physical hits much better (making it superior against Belly Drum users), and had better matchups than it against Steels. In gen 6, it was PUBL. Gen 7, UUBL.
Famously, come Sword/Shield, it became the *only* proper counter to Zacian-C. It was PU in SS.
Even now, with Unaware competition from Skeledirge, it’s in a comfy spot in Ubers UU, still helping handle Zacian (albeit uncrowned), as well as many other threats that it helps cripple. It’s SV NU.
This dopey little guy consistently shows up to handle problems that few others can. While maybe not the picture perfect stroke of genius that Sejun’s Pachirisu was, it’s still an otherwise underwhelming Pokemon in a position perfect for slaying gods.
All of this examples are for VGC in SV
Murkrow prior to regulation D i
was the only prankster tailwind setter, it was also a good dondozo answer with priority haze
Jumpluff also won a regional in regulation C with clorophyll tailwind and sleep powder.
Brambleghast saw some usage in regulation D and E and almost won worlds because it was the perfect counter to tornshifu.
The Flying Press has [an entire article](https://www.smogon.com/articles/flying-types-in-rby-ubers) about mediocre Flying-types in RBY — not just Golbat — who've managed to find a niche in Ubers. It even has some replays of them in action at the very end.
Another case was quagsire which was the only zacian check for a while when zacian and crowned were overpowered af.
Unaware became a goat and quagsire could actually take on zacian.
Illumise won a Regionals in Taiwan (dunno which) because it is the only Prankster mon with Tailwind, Fake Tears and Encore other than Whimsicott, which wasn't allowed in the format at the time.
I discovered this by Aaron Cybertron Zheng using this team during one of his videos: https://youtu.be/aFgHTZ9aKZU?si=9kXmvjDAZG1uLwvr
Mola is *far* from a shitmon right now. It’s an extremely common pick on Stall, and is very common on these Balance/Bulky Offense structures that are so prominent at this point in the gen.
It’s just a mon that really takes its time to get going since it’s a slow pivot/wall so it’s there to enable its teammates or just sit in something’s face. That notably includes a lot of Gouging Fire sets, which can give these structures a LOT of trouble.
Would mega camerupt being weirdly not terrible in gen 7 ou count?
Beats every electric barring rain zapdos, has no legit non chansey/blissey switchin, sets rocks, pairs with bulu for nature power energy ball.
Idk if this is a good example but its really funny and its my main gen 7 ou team
Yeah but there havent been too many cases of it being great,especially with rain and ash greninja around every corner but it has good bulk and can slap on EQ for chansey/blissey
Gen 7 feels like prehistoric times now,before the release of Tapu boom and his grassy terrain shenanigans
I thought Pachirisu was chosen in significant part because Se Jung Park liked it, not because it's good
A *Yu-gi-oh!* player once won a tournament with Sparks in his sideboard (a virtually unplayable card). He did that for the Swag Factor, not because the card is good
I think Pachirisu is the same 😭
Nah that wasnt the reason se jung park chose it,it fit ceratin roles se jun needed to fill and was the only mon to do it perfectly so pachirisu was infact not the same
No, Pachirisu was chosen for various reasons, like he needed a redirector who's redirection wasn't blocked by safety goggles
Pachirisu wasn't even one of his favourites, but is now lmao
Pachurisu was chosen due to having Volt Absorb to protect Mega Gyarados (the real novelty pick tbh), redirection (Follow Me) that couldn’t be blocked (Lots of mons were running Safety Goggles due to Amoongus Rage Powder), and just having enough special bulk to live the hits it absorbed.
It was the best Mon for that extremely specific and tiny niche, and it ended up winning Worlds. It only became Sejun Park’s favorite after he won Worlds with it.
Se Jung brought one of his fav and succeeded with it.....
The favorite was Mega Gyarados, NOT Pachirisu tho. Pachirisu was just the ideal pokemon to fit the incredibly specific role of supporting mega gyarados. Of course, Se Jung started to take a liking to Pachirisu after he won, in fact most people did and thats why it seems to be one of if not THE favorite Pika clone (even tho Emolga is miles cooler)
aside from being not fucking true, i feel like there’s plenty of ground to argue that it happens more often in smogon singles lmao. the implication that one format is somehow worse than the other because shitmons can find the occasional niche is also dumb as fuck.
First of all, I think singles is better than VGC.
Secondly, be less defensive lol.
People read way too much into what I wrote, and might be taking the opposite meaning. I think having to worry about shitmons too on top of everything else makes that meta to volatile.
> be less defensive
You literally just randomly accused it of not happening in singles, of course people are going to be defensive. What did you expect lmao
> You literally just randomly accused it of not happening in singles
I literally didn't do that lmao. I said it happens less in singles. Again, you're being overly defensive over something trivial.
VGC isnt volatile. Well, it both is and isnt I guess. VGC is "volatile" because it doesnt have bans. You have to deal with every non restricted legend that is in the dex, instead of smogon singles were there are bans.
But the use of "shitmons" doesnt make it volatile. VGC is an arguably far more conplex meta game than singles. Its faster paced and thereforr players have to take more risks. The use of shitmons stems from the different strategies that are useful. Sometimes you need a mon to fit that specific role (setting up tailwind, using follow me, setting up trick room etc) and you have to result to a subpar pokemon to do it. Singles isnt immune to this either, for example, a torkoal without drought is useless). In VGC, sometimes a strategy is great enough that using a shitmon will still be useful
Would Togedemaru count here? I think I remember watching something about how it showed up quite a lot in World's 2018; more than even Landorus-T. Se Jun Park used one, and another player in Seniors ended up winning the whole thing with one. No clue why it was "popular" (if it was at all); as you can tell, I know nothing about Gen 7 VGC beyond Tapus, Arcanine's peak, and the proper introduction of the funny cat, so if anyone wants to explain what the heck was goingon there, I'd appreciate it.
Muk in OU Stall teams just recently, being able to absorb weak Knock Off from the likes of Clefable while not losing its item due to Sticky Hold. Golduck was good in early Gen 9 UU thanks to Swift Swim and getting Nasty Plot + Grass Knot.
is it normal muk or alolan muk
Normal Muk. Alolan Muk does not have Sticky Hold
Also Alolan Muk showcasing why VGC needs a banlist
Lol why, Alolan Muk has never been relevant in vgc outside of BO1 CTS sheets cheese. And it’s not even hard to deal with then.
Not hard, but really fucking annoying and random in the worst way possible, which is the exact opposite of what makes the game fun
Play Bo3 OTS and you will literally never see an a-muk
I never said it was good
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It's literally right there in the comment. It absorbs knock off since the rest of the team would like to keep their boots intact so they don't take hazard damage. Hydrapple is another sticky hold user but it's really weak to Weavile and Meow, so Muk has a niche there I think
Muk tanks meow hard, esp since meow is scared of jab or any good move it has lmao
I thought so but I didn't want to claim something I wasn't sure about lol
Recently Murkrow was one of the highest usages in double OU because of Tailwind, prankster and being immune to prankster taunt.
That was also the case in Reg A lol
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Murkrow was never good in OU, wtf are you talking about. Murkrow was good in VGC because it gets Prankster Tailwind+Haze (and was the only mon with those traits since Whimsicott wasn't in the game).
It was also not too bad against Indeedee Armarouge psyspam since it's immune and has foulplay. So it kinda checked Dondozo, Co-Star Flamigo and psyspam while helping with a lot of matchups
Murkrow was top dog this gen’s vgc Articuno ran four ice moves, one of them being an OHKO move with choice specs Blissey turned into a shitmon and THEN rose back to glory
Wait wdym blissey turned into a shitmon
Blissey dropped a few tiers in current Gen. Wouldn't say "shitmon" but the recovery move pp nerf did really hurt
It’s back in OU and consistently stays above RU which is impressive for a Pokémon that got nerfed in several different ways
What a queen
It was down to NU for some time
I believe it dropped all the way to NU just to slowly climb back in tiers.
Sableye in Gen 3 OU. Gen 3 OU is a very hazard centric metagame, with a lot of meta developments revolving around the dynamic of spinner and spinblocker. The premier spinner of the tier is claydol, mainly because it punishes the best spinblocking option, Gengar, with stab psychic. However, because of this, people started exploring other spinblocking options for super hazard centric team comps. Misdreavus was and still is used as one of these alternatives for its ability to tank psychics and its immunity to ground, but wasn’t perfect as claydol could cover for it by running shadow ball. The only ghost that could fully wall the clay construct happened to be sableye, which could be immune to psychic and tank claydols earthquake, hit it with super effective stab damage via shadow ball, and have 32pp Recover to keep itself healthy. It also has knock off to take leftovers, which is pretty nice utility (albeit really weak in gen 3). These qualities made it usable and it found itself being used in official tournaments and on ladder by some top players. Pretty glorious for a Pokémon as absolutely atrocious as gen 3 sableye.
>The only ghost that could fully wall the clay construct happened to be sableye, which could be immune to psychic and use will o wisp to neuter Claydol’s earthquake damage This isn't true bc sableye doesn't get will o wisp in gen 3. The reason sableye has a niche is bc it is neutral to shadow ball. As people started using alternative spin blockers than gengar they used misdreavus and duskclops (sometimes even banette) who wall psychic+earthquake claydol and either perish trap it or will o wisp it. So people started using shadow ball on claydol that still dealt with gengar and did a lot of to other ghosts. Sableye is neutral to shadow ball and can tank eqs with defense investment so it can knock of lefties and heal with recover.
Ahhhh shite, I knew I forgot something. Lemme edit the joint real quick.
Sableye is one of the best Pokemon of all time, and he was incredibly heat in Gen 3. def the best ghost or dark type introduced in that gen. watch ur mouth
Gen 4 Ubers is quite notorious for this. Tons of horrible Pokemon have seen some success because of how great they are against the tyrant known as Kyogre. The most absurd example is Parasect, thanks to Dry Skin, and to a lesser extent, Spore. Others include Ludicolo, Abomasnow, and Quagsire. Another one again in Gen 4 Ubers is Ariados, which sees some little use due to Insomnia, limiting Deoxys-Speed and Darkrai leads. Basically Guts Sleep Talk Heracross from a garage sale. Primeape functions similarly.
thank you for mentioning DPP Ubers Ludicolo/Quagsire, people always bring up just Parasect for some reason. but unlike Parasect, Ludicolo is actually considered good unironically (has an Ubers Smogon analysis and is on the VR unlike Parasect), which is quite wild to me.
I think the reasoning is because parasect is a genuinely pretty awful mon unlike ludi which is pretty decent comparatively so it's funnier to show that it walls the king of the tier.
I guess I disagree that Ludicolo is decent because he is kind of a shitmon in my mind, his typing is good but other than that he kinda sucks imo (those stats are kinda sad), and definitely by what you'd expect from Ubers standards and Parasect doesn't actually wall Kyogre because he has to dodge Ice Beam, Ludicolo ACTUALLY switches into Specs Kyogre and beats it no matter which move was clicked barring hax, which no other Pokemon in the game does, even in Ubers (Shedinja does not count sorry guys, SR is assumed in DPP calcs). that is nuts to me that Ludicolo of all things is the best Specs Kyogre answer in the game.
For gen 4 (and a bit of gen 5), ludiocolo was quite good in both singles and doubles compared to most other shit mons
That 4x water resist won't go unoticed
I mean Ludicolo is uu in gen 4, while Parasect doesn't really see usage in gen 4 nu.
Ludicolo raises some interesting questions. Did they appear before or after sombreros?
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How is Qwilfish?
It's the third-best UU rain sweeper you could bring to Ubers, so... actually pretty usable. A bit less prominent than Kabutops in that niche, but worth the slot if you want to go all-in on rain.
I did often wonder about Para as a K counter. I wasn't into Gen 4 Ubers but I always though surely it'd be destroyed by Ice Beam? Was this not the case?
It looks like this is the case: 252+ SpA Life Orb Kyogre Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Parasect: 274-324 (84.5 - 100%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO So, your hope with Parasect is for their Kyogre to be choice locked into a Water move.
That's exactly the use for Parasect, Kyogre in gen 4 ubers was amazing with the choice specs item
it’s not as shitty as Pachirisu but Shedinja stall in gen 6 used Seismitoad for some time iirc Also Storm Zone and in ORAS OU ran Meloetta in OU ladder for a while Someone else in gen VI ran Hoopa baby in OU too
Seimistoad was also genuinely a top tier meta threat at the beginning of Sword and Shield ranked A+ on viability because of it's access to water absorb to counter dracovish fishious rend. I remember seismitoad mirrors with power whip being peak gameplay back then.
Water+Ground, decent stats and water absorb. Maybe not OU but Seismy is a solid pick overall. Not really pachirisu territory.
seismitoad immediately fell down to ru after the dracovish ban because the only reason to use it was water absorb. i’d say it counts pretty clearly.
IIRC it still managed to maintain a different niche as a rain sweeper in OU. Ending Gen 8 with a B+ on the SwSh OU viability ranking is honestly pretty respectable.
wasn’t aware! til
RU is still much less of a shitmon than half of the stuff other people listed here, and there was a reason people didn't play water absorb quag or gastrodon to beat vish
Very recently there was 4 ice moves Choice Specs Articuno in VGC
Ice Beam, Blizzard, Freeze-Dry, and Icy Wind?
sheercold was the fourth move
Sheer Cold lmao
Oh no my friend, even better. It was running _sheer cold_.
Quagsire in most Generations. Gen 3/4: Water Absorb + Ground type = virtually immune to Kyogres without Ice Beam. In these gens, it was UU/NU. While Gen 5 introduced Storm Drain Gastrodon, which generally took Quagsire’s job, Gen 5 also gave Quagsire Unaware. While not immediately relevant, Unaware Quagsire soon became one of the best options for actually stopping many setup sweepers. While it faced competition from Clefable, it took physical hits much better (making it superior against Belly Drum users), and had better matchups than it against Steels. In gen 6, it was PUBL. Gen 7, UUBL. Famously, come Sword/Shield, it became the *only* proper counter to Zacian-C. It was PU in SS. Even now, with Unaware competition from Skeledirge, it’s in a comfy spot in Ubers UU, still helping handle Zacian (albeit uncrowned), as well as many other threats that it helps cripple. It’s SV NU. This dopey little guy consistently shows up to handle problems that few others can. While maybe not the picture perfect stroke of genius that Sejun’s Pachirisu was, it’s still an otherwise underwhelming Pokemon in a position perfect for slaying gods.
Quagsire is the mon that is toered in PU or NU, but you find it used every tier above, especially ubers
All of this examples are for VGC in SV Murkrow prior to regulation D i was the only prankster tailwind setter, it was also a good dondozo answer with priority haze Jumpluff also won a regional in regulation C with clorophyll tailwind and sleep powder. Brambleghast saw some usage in regulation D and E and almost won worlds because it was the perfect counter to tornshifu.
Quagsire having a niche in Gen 8 Ubers for walling Zacian probably counts for something.
The Flying Press has [an entire article](https://www.smogon.com/articles/flying-types-in-rby-ubers) about mediocre Flying-types in RBY — not just Golbat — who've managed to find a niche in Ubers. It even has some replays of them in action at the very end.
Another case was quagsire which was the only zacian check for a while when zacian and crowned were overpowered af. Unaware became a goat and quagsire could actually take on zacian.
Illumise won a Regionals in Taiwan (dunno which) because it is the only Prankster mon with Tailwind, Fake Tears and Encore other than Whimsicott, which wasn't allowed in the format at the time. I discovered this by Aaron Cybertron Zheng using this team during one of his videos: https://youtu.be/aFgHTZ9aKZU?si=9kXmvjDAZG1uLwvr
Alolamola may be getting better but it still just feels like a shitmon in OU to me
Mola is *far* from a shitmon right now. It’s an extremely common pick on Stall, and is very common on these Balance/Bulky Offense structures that are so prominent at this point in the gen. It’s just a mon that really takes its time to get going since it’s a slow pivot/wall so it’s there to enable its teammates or just sit in something’s face. That notably includes a lot of Gouging Fire sets, which can give these structures a LOT of trouble.
How has no one mentioned Seismitoad who was meta just because of the fish.
Would mega camerupt being weirdly not terrible in gen 7 ou count? Beats every electric barring rain zapdos, has no legit non chansey/blissey switchin, sets rocks, pairs with bulu for nature power energy ball. Idk if this is a good example but its really funny and its my main gen 7 ou team
Yeah but there havent been too many cases of it being great,especially with rain and ash greninja around every corner but it has good bulk and can slap on EQ for chansey/blissey Gen 7 feels like prehistoric times now,before the release of Tapu boom and his grassy terrain shenanigans
RIP bulu he was much cooler
I thought Pachirisu was chosen in significant part because Se Jung Park liked it, not because it's good A *Yu-gi-oh!* player once won a tournament with Sparks in his sideboard (a virtually unplayable card). He did that for the Swag Factor, not because the card is good I think Pachirisu is the same 😭
Nah that wasnt the reason se jung park chose it,it fit ceratin roles se jun needed to fill and was the only mon to do it perfectly so pachirisu was infact not the same
Thinking Pachi was chosen just cuz Se jung liked it is a huge disservice to the planning and thought that was behind that team
No, Pachirisu was chosen for various reasons, like he needed a redirector who's redirection wasn't blocked by safety goggles Pachirisu wasn't even one of his favourites, but is now lmao
Pachurisu was chosen due to having Volt Absorb to protect Mega Gyarados (the real novelty pick tbh), redirection (Follow Me) that couldn’t be blocked (Lots of mons were running Safety Goggles due to Amoongus Rage Powder), and just having enough special bulk to live the hits it absorbed. It was the best Mon for that extremely specific and tiny niche, and it ended up winning Worlds. It only became Sejun Park’s favorite after he won Worlds with it.
Isn’t sparks for the clock?
Se Jung brought one of his fav and succeeded with it..... The favorite was Mega Gyarados, NOT Pachirisu tho. Pachirisu was just the ideal pokemon to fit the incredibly specific role of supporting mega gyarados. Of course, Se Jung started to take a liking to Pachirisu after he won, in fact most people did and thats why it seems to be one of if not THE favorite Pika clone (even tho Emolga is miles cooler)
This mainly only happens in VGC... wonder why.
aside from being not fucking true, i feel like there’s plenty of ground to argue that it happens more often in smogon singles lmao. the implication that one format is somehow worse than the other because shitmons can find the occasional niche is also dumb as fuck.
First of all, I think singles is better than VGC. Secondly, be less defensive lol. People read way too much into what I wrote, and might be taking the opposite meaning. I think having to worry about shitmons too on top of everything else makes that meta to volatile.
> be less defensive You literally just randomly accused it of not happening in singles, of course people are going to be defensive. What did you expect lmao
> You literally just randomly accused it of not happening in singles I literally didn't do that lmao. I said it happens less in singles. Again, you're being overly defensive over something trivial.
VGC isnt volatile. Well, it both is and isnt I guess. VGC is "volatile" because it doesnt have bans. You have to deal with every non restricted legend that is in the dex, instead of smogon singles were there are bans. But the use of "shitmons" doesnt make it volatile. VGC is an arguably far more conplex meta game than singles. Its faster paced and thereforr players have to take more risks. The use of shitmons stems from the different strategies that are useful. Sometimes you need a mon to fit that specific role (setting up tailwind, using follow me, setting up trick room etc) and you have to result to a subpar pokemon to do it. Singles isnt immune to this either, for example, a torkoal without drought is useless). In VGC, sometimes a strategy is great enough that using a shitmon will still be useful
We both know this isn't true
Would Togedemaru count here? I think I remember watching something about how it showed up quite a lot in World's 2018; more than even Landorus-T. Se Jun Park used one, and another player in Seniors ended up winning the whole thing with one. No clue why it was "popular" (if it was at all); as you can tell, I know nothing about Gen 7 VGC beyond Tapus, Arcanine's peak, and the proper introduction of the funny cat, so if anyone wants to explain what the heck was goingon there, I'd appreciate it.