Explaining Banned & Broken Pokémon

[@ThisAintGood.]

Rage Fist doesn’t work like that, it increases in power when you get hit, not when you use it multiple times

[@samrubin8201]

Also, it maxes out at 350 bp

[@enrywars5089]

@@samrubin8201 *At 300 BP

[@michaelnelson1127]

Why does that mistake with a move with “rage” in the name sound familiar?

[@supersentaii5590]

Can't forget, the metronome battle where alex was about to get railed by rage fist if it wasn't for god miltank to save him!

[@demi-femme4821]

Still busted. Bulk Up+Rage Fist meant that Annihilape could easily set up on any physical attacker and then blow past entire teams

[@KlementtM]

So, today we learned that Pokémon are banned for their potential to: - Completely break the game’s balance - Say the N word

[@JoeMH1995]

Cofagrigus was banned from online trades without a nickname because its name has a mean word for gay person in the middle of it.

[@99999bomb]

@@JoeMH1995 sharkpedo too

[@subzero-ws7wt]

Hard R?

[@1zxtv]

@@subzero-ws7wt as a white man there's really no other way to say it

[@subzero-ws7wt]

@@1zxtv Ever thought about the soft “A?”

[@grunkleg.2934]

Things not included in this video: - Every generation starts with the box legendaries in the Uber tier, and everything else down in OU before the lower tiers form. Some banned Legendary, Mythicals, and Ultra Beasts not mentioned in the video include... --- Landorus-Incarnate for being really hard to beat with its Sheer Force sets. --- Hoopa-Unbound in Gen 6, wallbreaker extrodinaire. --- Genesect for how difficult it is to beat every viable set it has. Download boosted STAB U-turn off a good attack stat will never be bad. --- Magearna in Gen 8 for very similar reasons to Genesect. Could basically beat anything in OU with the right set. --- Marshadow for its very optimized stats and strong Ghost/Fighting STAB combo. --- Chi-Yu for being able to click the delete button on anything in the game. --- Chien-Pao for being able to click the delete button on a bit less than Chi-Yu, but he's also really fast. --- Pheromosa for being a Bug/Fighting Deoxys with U-turn. --- Dark Urshifu for its vicious Wicked Blow + Close Combat + Sucker Punch combo. --- Spectrier for its great offensive stats and Grim Neigh helping to support a bulkier set-up Substitute Will-O-Wisp set that beat the Normal and Dark types that were supposed to win vs it. IIRC you could even get away with running Dark Pulse over Shadow Ball so that nothing was immune, though your 5 other teammates were always options to deal with Normal-types too. --- Aura Break Zygarde 50%, who really took advantage of how good a move Thousand Arrows is alongside great bulk and other great moves like Glare, Coil, Extreme Speed, and Substitute --- Regular Kyurem in Gen 8, who got a bunch of great options like Freeze-Dry, Dragon Dance, Icicle Spear, and Heavy-Duty Boots that really let it bully whoever it wanted. --- Naganadel for Nasty Plot/Draco Meteor/Sludge Wave/Fire Blast with Beast Boost Speed increases taking no prisoners. Even dominant without Dragonium Z in Gen 8. - No mention of Megas except Mega Ray oddly enough. Some of the problem children were... --- Mega Lucario, because Adaptibility with those stats means nothing is safe --- Mega Kangaskhan because Parental Bond. Nerfing the Ability doesn't matter when Power-Up Punch gets you to +2 and Seismic Toss always deals 200 damage. --- Mega Salamence, because on top of its incredible stats, they gave it powerful Flying STAB with Aerilate --- Mega Gengar. If its staggering Sp. Atk and Speed wasn't enough, Shadow Tag. --- Mega Metagross in Gen 7. Barely manageable and highly contentious in Gen 6 due to balanced yet incredibly high stats alongside good moves usually backed by Tough Claws, Megas instantly gaining their new Speed in Gen 7 combined with Mega Meta loving Terrains was too much to handle. --- Mega Mawile in Gen 6, due to just how much damage it could do, alongside priority Sucker Punch, top tier defensive typing, and moveset versatility. --- Mega Sableye in Gen 6 for being a giant enabler of suffocating defensive stats when combining good defensive typing, good defensive stats, good defensive moves, and Magic Bounce shutting down common answers to defensive play. - It's not just Zacian-Crowned that got banned to AG. Base Zacian was also way too strong for Ubers. Intrepid Sword is still really good on the base form, and it can hold a non-Rusted Sword item. - Cinderace was banned in Gen 8 for very similar reasons to Greninja in Gen 6. Except this guy had a lot more high power physical moves and was a better U-turn abuser due to its higher Attack stat. - Galarian Darmanitan, or Garmanitan, or Garm, for 140 base Attack backed behind Choice Band the Ability. Give it Icicle Crash, U-turn, two more high power physical moves, and Band/Scarf, and you're probably gonna win. - Rage Fist gets stronger every time you get hit, not every time you use the move. - Cyclizar is currently unbanned. It's Shed Tail that's now banned. - Certain Abilities have been banned from 6v6 singles. --- Moody is banned due to how uncompetitive it is. Just sit there and hope you get good boosts. So OP, even Bidoof was a problem in Ubers with Moody. The nerf to Moody in Gen 8 that prevented it from affecting accuracy and evasion still wasn't enough to make it competitive. --- Evasion clause often bans Snow Cloak / Sand Veil. A few notable effects of this: Garchomp was finally allowed in Gen 5 OU once this clause was created, and Alolan Sandshrew is infamously banned from Gen 8 NU due to having no legal Abilities. (Slush Rush was banned in that tier due to the dominance of hail teams). --- Shadow Tag and Arena Trap are hella banned in most 6v6 formats (Dugtrio in Gen 3 OU and Diglett / Trapinch in Little Cup being major exceptions). Switching is such an integral part of compstitive Pokemon, especially 6v6, that preventing a switch so easily is an incredibly powerful boon. Magnet Pull is allowed since it only traps a single type. - Arceus in Gen 4 was banned from Ubers. Primary reason being people didn't like its effect on the tier and no one knew what else to do with it. - Freeze Clause and Sleep Clause originated from the Stadium games. - Freeze Clause is still a thing in the Gen 2 games. Only having a 10% thaw chance in those games is a long time to be a sitting duck, meanwhile the team on the offensive could really pressure a few of freezes, considering Gen 2's slow pace. - Semi-invincibility clause just straight up bans Dig and Fly. A glitch exists in RBY where if a Pokemon using Dig/Fly gets fully paralyzed during the semi-invincible turn, the semi-invulnerability sticks. - Tradebacks are actually a niche format in the Gen 1 games. Notable beneficiaries of Tradebacks include Amnesia Persian and Amnesia Hypno who also gets the elemental punches. - Most Pokemon from Incineroar to Serperior were never actually banned.

[@theschnozzler]

Algorithm reply to boost the comment

[@ctoooc]

Agree with all

[@Biro_the_Ukrainian]

great comment, also wanted to note that shed tail isn't cyclizar's signature move, orthworm also learns it. After Cyclizar got banned orthworm rose to OU as the new shed tailer

[@Gspoink]

Great comment bro, pushing algorithm.

[@Deadpool-ri3rq]

To be fair the title says banned AND broken

[@luisgarcia1337]

You can kinda tell that Aura has been working on this video for a while because he mentions Cyclizar being banned in Singles. That's actually been changed and now Cyclizar has been allowed back into OU while the move Shed Tail has been banned instead.

[@Freezerboy69]

Personally I can't believe it took this long to ban shed tail, clearly it was the problem but at least they made the right decision in the end. Now cyclizar can find some usage outside of shed tail.

[@ctoooc]

@@Freezerboy69 its a policy that a moves need to be broken on 2 mons to get banned which is why Annihilape doesn't just have rage fist banned, Primeape wouldn't be broken in OU with it so yeah. Orthworm became extremely problematic with Volcarona and Roaring Moon and sometimes there were other set up sweepers and you physically cant prep for all of them without making some weird looking bad team and sacrifice that to just not lose to Shed Tail

[@nicolaistuhlmuller8718]

@@Freezerboy69 for a long time Orthworm was pretty mediocre despite having Shed Tail too. It only recently picked up, and so the move was broken on multiple mons and thus got banned.

[@duck_man1048]

@@ctoooc I made an Orthworm/ Roaring Moon team and I felt like a genius when I did it, but I never knew how common it was until it got banned lol. Even when I got decently high on the latter I only ended up seeing it like once or twice

[@luisgarcia1337]

@@Freezerboy69 i can understand why it took so long, because Cyclizar as a mon is also pretty good. Very fast, fairly good moves to attack with, utility as a hazard remover with Rapid Spin and Boots, Regenerator as it's ability to heal the Shed Tail damage. It made sense that players saw those traits and assumed the problem was Cyclizar. It wasn't until Orthworm started to get a lot more usage with Shed Tail that the player base realized that the move was the main problem between these two mons.

[@comedyman2817]

Chatot banned for racial slurs

[@StrangerForever85]

I actually have a funny story about Blaziken. My little cousin’s favorite color is red, so he would pick Fire starters early on (only exception was Froakie, but that’s because he loves frogs). We were debating the Legendary/Mythical status of Deoxys as of ORAS, and I mentioned how it was banned, then mentioned how Blaziken was banned. He starts crying because he thinks he can’t use his Blaziken anymore in his game. It takes about twenty minutes for me to realize he thought his Blaziken wasn’t allowed to be used in his actual play through. I then explained, laughing, “I meant in a tournament setting.” He calmed down after that, and we had a good laugh about it.

[@roxlife8173]

That’s so ducking cute 😂

[@bunnycat24]

awee the froakie detail was so adorable lol

[@ragingpotato2236]

It brings me joy that he mentioned Pokémon Unite and the Zacian issue, the devs refuse to nerf it and this sword dog has caused so many players to quit cause of how busted it is

[@ctoooc]

It made Ubers really bad too it's crazy how it is broken everywhere it goes

[@cds7012]

Not really into competitive that much, but I do like to know things like these! Great video!

[@rontheauraknight9606]

You forgot to mention that Regular Zacian is also AG, not just Crowned. Also Dondozo is quite good in Singles due to unaware huge bulk, curse talk, and Terastalizing Another Mon to mention in the Dondozo section is Flamigo. There’s an well known strategy of having Tatsugiri die in Dondozos mouth after enduring and toxic orb activating, give Don the boost then Flamigo comes out and gets the boost due to its ability Costar which copies ally boosts

[@c.-.jordan723]

14:31 - In stadium if you were frozen you would stay frozen forever. Freeze was far worse than sleep.

[@TunaBear64]

It was basically a OHKO.

[@pocketvices]

You can thaw out if hit by a fire move, but yeah freeze in stadium is premium jank

[@luisgarcia1337]

@@pocketvices that's common knowledge, the problem is that no good competitive player would do that against a frozen Pokemon.

[@epicponedge1177]

Wobbuffet was not banned in Gen 3 OU because of Counter/Mirror Coat, it was banned because of Shadow Tag. In Gen 3, no Pokémon could flee from Shadow Tag (Ghost Types, or Mons with Shed Shell or another trapping ability can now). If two Wobbuffet face each other while holding Leftovers, the game softlocks as neither can kill the other with Struggle and Lefties out heals the recoil (doing 1/4 damage dealt as recoil in gen 3).

[@luisgarcia1337]

I think you forgot the gen number. Just for clarity sakes since Wobb was banned in both Gen 3 and Gen 4.

[@epicponedge1177]

@@luisgarcia1337 Yeah, my laptop's keyboard sucks. I noticed and edited it already.

[@CodeHK]

Bravo, I came here to say exactly this. Lemme tack on some context. Before Showdown even existed, I played NetBattle for my online Pokemon fights. A key driving factor behind Wobbuffet's boost from OU to ubers was that every player's win/loss count was publicly viewable. *Almost everyone* used Leftovers back then, so even *accidentally* pitting two Wobbs together meant a softlock. *Somebody* needed to forfeit and accept the permanent loss on their record. Highly competitive and immature kids didn't want to deal with those arguments, so it was easier just to push Wobb out of OU. It's for that reason that Wobb was ironically out-matched in ubers. It's not that Wobb was so OP that it could kill ubers easily -- most ubers ran Calm Mind and even the ones that didn't would 2HKO the poor punching bag as soon as he switched in.

[@siddhantkamble9502]

Thats why Wob can hold lefties in Gen 3 Ubers

[@animejerk05]

shadow tag wasnt even broken in gen 3 it was just because of the stupid lock thank god for the nerf

[@spongeb27]

One of the only KZbinrs thats been going for this long and is still producing great content. Appreciate you, mate :) been watching for the vast majority of those years!

[@supersentaii5590]

Many of the poketubers are still active today, goes to show how much great this community is!

[@spongeb27]

@@supersentaii5590 definitely more than some other communities, but (no disrespect AT ALL intended to Alex) my two favourite Pokétubers of all time have both either stopped or... I mean, I think one of them just took a half decade hiatus but same diff, that being AlmightyMandals and the Pokémon Professor.

[@supersentaii5590]

@@spongeb27 pokemon professor!? He was such an amazing poketuber! What about kangascloud? By the way I've heard JubilePlays switched content

[@THE_CHANNNEL]

It seems like a lot of the banned Pokémon are more recent generations Great video ❤

[@GravityIsFalling]

As the generations go on, more and more mons are made specifically for VGC, so more bans happen But hey, that’s just a theory

[@Lankpants]

Gen 9 is particularly bad because offence has outpaced defence by so much, and it doesn't help that GF has completely gutted a lot of defensive options. Any time there's a broken offensive threat in gen 9 there's just no way to deal with it other than to try to out offence it. We don't have the old defensive stalwarts like Blissey/Chansey, Toxapex, Lando T and Heatran standing in their way like they used to. Recovery moves are far worse now and we lost access to a lot of useful status spreading moves.

[@luisgarcia1337]

@@Lankpants hell, toxapex with attacking moves started to pick up some popularity recently due to it's defensive sets being gutted as hell.

[@oles9196]

@@Lankpants I hate Gen 9 for its powercreep. Gen 9 was the first Gen were i really wanted to get into vgc and when i finally had a team battle ready i could do nothing against Goldengo except watching it one shot half of my team. A Pkm that can only be countered by one shotting it turn 1 is stupid because prankster + tailwind or rage powder support can f you up even if u have a Pkm built to specificly outspeed and one shot that thing.

[@GravityIsFalling]

@@oles9196 Bro ain’t no way you complaining about gholdenjoe in reg C. What is your team? 6 ice types?

[@demi-femme4821]

Something to note is that Arceus was banned from DPP Ubers after Rayquaza invented AG. This is notable because Arceus was stuck running 100 EVs in every stat due to how EVs worked in Gen. 4.

[@dimetrodon2250]

Chatter's power was also based on the volume of the sound you recorded on it, making it less predictable. This may also contribute to it being banned. If Chatter recorded the volume of a sound, but still only used the default noise in game, it might still have been banned. Another example of a combination of unpredicatble stats and "being offensive" resulting in a ban is Miis in Super Smash Bros. In Smash 4, a Mii fighter's weight (which determines how far they fly when launched at any given percent) was determined by the body size of the Mii when it was created in the Wii or 3Ds Mii creator. This is the true reason they were banned, although many people believed it was because you could make them look offensive. In Ultimate, all Miis weigh the same, so despite them potentially looking like dictators, religious figures, hate symbols, offensive caricatures, or human anatomy, the were still playable online.

[@EukalyptusDerana]

I like how you also acknowledge Zacian in Pokemon Unite too. Not only Zacian is powerful on its own, but there's Comfey to make things worse by keeping Zacian alive

[@techno_otaku]

The (Almost) Immortal duo of Unite

[@navybluegacha2119]

THOSE TWO DEATH

[@navybluegacha2119]

@sleepy mei funny enough When I play Zacian 50 50 I get left for dead Or actually winning

[@RedTHedge]

A Zacien 1v8'd my team only dying after we all came a second time and I was the lone survivor with like 1 HP

[@navybluegacha2119]

@sleepy mei remember Even with a god The player can jinx

[@whatgsaid]

I did an all-dog run for Violet and Houndstone was my ace for exactly the reason you mentioned. I rarely got down to my last mon, but when I did, it was OVER.

[@sapphiresupernova]

Ooh, that's a good idea for a rerun in my older games, I love doggos

[@KirbyMario12345_939]

Not mentioned in this video is that although the Legends of Galar (the wolves) were, at the time, unavailable in Scarlet and Violet, they both had their stats nerfed in this game, thanks to how broken Zacian was in Gen 8. -10 Attack on both Hero of Many Battles formes and Crowned Shield, -20 Attack on Crowned Sword, and -5 Defense and Special Defense on Crowned Shield. In addition to this, the abilities Intrepid Sword and Dauntless Shield were changed to only activate the first time that the Pokémon enters battle.

[@ChicagoMel23]

I think Home changed that and they are there now

[@invisibilius1978]

bro why did they nerf zamazenta homie did NOT need that

[@oslonicl6251]

​​@@invisibilius1978had to keep their bsts the same oohhh!!! even though they could've just moved some of zacian's attack to special attack 😭

[@chilln0648]

I know you were probably making the script for this video when it happened, but Cyclizar isn’t banned anymore. Orthworn started abusing Shed Tail after Cyclizar got banned, so the move itself was banned recently, and Cyclizar was unbanned in the same decision as that was what made it broken For semi-invincibility clause, you explained it in a weird way. Dig and Fly are just banned altogether because a glitch lets you keep the invulnerability if you get fully paralyzed while in that phase

[@General_C]

When you think about it, Aegislash effectively had a 720 base stat total considering how easy it was to swap between forms. Thank CHRIST it was banned in the 3DS era.

[@dhans9662]

He was easily countered by slow mons

[@skazka3789]

​@@dhans9662it had no counters in gen 6

[@dhans9662]

@@skazka3789 ....except slow mons.

[@skazka3789]

@@dhans9662 no slow mons in Gen 6 could safely switch in, the definition of a counter is a defensive mon that can switch in safely, none existed

[@MirageUchiha]

Was waiting for a new upload! 💯

[@nolanhock8888]

The ability on flabebe has been and is still on loads of cards on the tcg even in the newest set at this time (Scarlet and violet base with Scatterbug and spewpa) The problem was a floette was getting printed around the time that had a very disruptive ability (when you evolve into floette, choose a card at random from a players hand at random reveal it and that player shuffles that card into their deck) The ban on that card was specifically for that combination of cards. Alot of tcg bans are only for if the card can disrupt your opponent too much, or before they can do anything.

[@joemomma2347]

Yea, I don't think a lot of his TCG picks were well explained or even true. I've been out of the TCG loop a bit, but were all those cards really banned? More likely in Expanded but that would have been useful context. But he's probably not a TCG guy so I'll let him off the hook

[@TheForeverRanger]

@@joemomma2347 All of those cards were banned in the Expanded Format. That Milotic was printed years before TrevNoir. He also didn't mention the reason why Archeops was banned. It wasn't just the ability but you could cheat it out with Maxie's Hidden Ball Trick.

[@TheForeverRanger]

They will ban disruption but refused to ban ADP despite the fact that it almost killed the game.

[@TheOneTrueGesta]

I'm honestly surprised that you never brought up Miraidon in this video with how insanely busted it is.

[@Rarest26]

It hasn’t been banned *yet* in Ubers (regular Ubers, natdex is a separate can of worms), so it’s not as worth mentioning as the green noodle or murder dog.

[@ThisAintGood.]

I think it’s cause it’s too predictable, when you fight Rayquaza, you don’t know what’s coming it could be an earthquake, Dragon Ascent, Draco Meteor, Outrage, waterfall, E Speed, V Create or whatever Miraidon is kinda just stuck with Electric and Dragon moves. That’s kinda the case for Zacian but it’s just too stupid to be hindered by this. Miraidon isn’t at that level of stupidity or versatility

[@demi-femme4821]

It's a boxart legendary. It's expected to be banned. The only time a boxart legend wasn't banned was Kyurem.

[@grunkleg.2934]

We'll see if Miraidon gets banned when more Ubers get released. You currently need like 2 - 3 Pokemon just to beat it when it's 1 of 2 box legendaries in the tier. When more powerful Pokemon get released into Ubers, it'll likely get way more difficult to justify the use of specific Miraidon answers

[@ThisAintGood.]

@@grunkleg.2934 Idk, Iron Treads seems like a pretty solid answer to Miraidon and it’s really good, not as good as Great Tusk but still good

[@Juli_is_Online]

Competitive Pokemon history like this is always very fun to look back on.

[@r3x427]

I think wobbufet was banned in gen 3 because it could force infinite games with other wobbufets as leftovers healed more damage than struggle did and wobbufet has no attacking moves. In gen 3 shadow tag didn’t provide immunity to other shadow tag users

[@noble0155]

Yeah, that sounds right.... but also players really hate shadow tag

[@myselph1761]

When I played the TCG most back in 2021, it was a time where there were broken cards left right and center. Can confirm, the TCG meta using Milotic was absolutely infuriating.

[@myselph1761]

Also, f*ck Galarian Slowking VMax with a rake

[@infamousinferno2506]

Don't let this video distract you from the fact that Pokémon Showdown getting rid of the National Dex Anything Goes tier means Mega Rayquaza won't exist ever again until we recieve it in another game.

[@buzzwithdrip6347]

Let's appreciate The Aura Guardian is still putting out quality content for us even after all these years!!

[@infinityalbi9840]

I'm still kinda pissed he doesn't do troll vids anymore...

[@buzzwithdrip6347]

@@infinityalbi9840 reacting to my Pokemon save files video is still peak

[@infinityalbi9840]

@@buzzwithdrip6347 agreed. I still laugh at "gay card" to this day XD

[@ctoooc]

I watched him as a kid, I mean I'm still technically one but I was some little kid and now I'm a teenager

[@bobchipman4473]

Unlike Gamefreak

[@Freezerboy69]

I still think people exaggerate how strong lando-t is, it's very good but it is not broken, what makes lando-t good is its versatility since it can run multiple different sets to fit into any team, it's a glue for teams since you don't need to build around it, you use it to fill gaps in a team. You don't need to run something to specifically counter lando-t since any well built team will have something that can beat it with ease.

[@kailesperance1922]

Landorus-Therian is basically a Garchomp on steroids

[@staringcorgi6475]

Lando-I is overpowered though because it was way too strong and quick. If lando t had the same speed than it’d be banned

[@ctoooc]

Dracovish is like Iron Bundle ngl, Tera Water with it would be horrific

[@Imamotherfreakingavocado]

I used Blaine's quiz show so much when I played Pokémon cards with my friends in secondary school, it's honestly a really fun card to use lmao

[@Yhit_0]

Woah, Alex talking about competitive pokemon?!

[@dylans.1741]

No one would have used Chatot in professional battles anyway, which is why I think that it was only banned as a formality, just to circumvent the possibility of some jerk using it's signature move to yell racial slurs or other forms of hate speech. I guarantee that at least one person got that idea in their heads when they found out it was possible.

[@DogIsCat-Kitten]

I used to think that Mega Rayquaza was extremely overpowered, until this happened: Me and my friend were doing a battle to see what kind of strategy we could use to take down Mega Rayquaza, since it was starting to become a problem, my friend had only a Mega Rayquaza on his team, while I had Abomosnow and Frosslass. You might know where this is going. Snow warning, snow cloak, and blizzard until the Rayquaza died. It was so easy.

[@mr_stuckinthebackrooms]

Oh my god it’s been so long scince I last watched you and you’ve only gotten better!

[@TheForeverRanger]

With Archeops in the TCG, while its ability is busted as Hell, the main reason it was banned was that it was easy to get out with a card called Maxie's Hidden Ball Trick which allowed you to cheat it out rather than evolving it. It was a combination of busted ability and a way to cheat it out. The current meta has an Archeops that is also broken and can be cheated out Lugia VStar.

[@theghost00]

4:19 I still love the idea of getting a time machine just to tell people that in 2023, (a form of) Delibird will be banned to Uber 😂 Also, there’s the infamous Sky Drop glitch which resulted in a ban (?). In Doubles, your first mon uses Sky Drop on an opponent and your second mon uses Gravity. The target is now stuck in limbo and can’t attack anymore unless it’s switched. Another broken Double glitch was the Symbioses glitch. One mon has an Eject Button, is hit, uses the button, receives the item from the Symbioses ally before switching and the effect of the item will be doubled when the Eject Button mon returns to the field. Like, Lefties will be triggered twice at the end of each turn which results in 1/8 HP recovery per turn or Life Orb will apply the damage boost twice, but also damages twice.

[@luisgarcia1337]

Another banned glitch was Acid Rain in Gen 4 Doubles, which basically crashed the battle and made Castform useful for once.

[@ltstheprogamer]

The Aura Gaurdian back with another Amazing video!!

[@TheHappyDino7]

"Making Talonflame nowhere near as good at it once was" this feels kinda ironic since Talonflame has been getting a bit of resurgence in Scarlet/Violet's current day VGC. It'll never be as good as before, but it is nice to see it get use even after its nerf.

[@kailesperance1922]

It feels amazing how Talonflame still sees good usage (mostly in early formats) despite having its ability heavily nerfed

[@matteoiacomini6313]

Cool format, it's like the duel logs one. I like it

[@robertlupa8273]

Fun fact: Blaziken actually saw _more_ usage than its Mega due to the ability to be able to hold any item being better than the stat boost provided by Mega Evolving (as both regular and Mega Blaziken have Speed Boost).

[@ShiningSilvally]

Interesting stuff! Another cool video, Alex.

[@mizusenshisongs]

I guess that explains why when I participated in the Mythical Melee one-off tournament for SwSh basically everybody was using Landorus. (That tournament is also an example of event Pokémon being allowed, since while most of my team was legendaries from the Crown Tundra, my Melmetal and Shiny Zeraora were event Pokémon.

[@sonofab30]

Gen 4 Arceus deserved a mention, bro was banned from Ubers before AG even existed

[@llmkursk8254]

Pretty sure Wobbufett was banned because if two Wobbufett entered the field at the same time, each holding Leftovers, it would be a stalemate due to Shadow Tag.

[@hikomoriko]

I was just thinking about you then I saw this. Thank you for making my day

[@Semystic]

Toxapex was one of my favorite pokemon before I even learned how good it was (also gen 7 is when I learned about competitive pokemon builds). I just loved the design! And now I love it more because people hate it so much lol

[@momandianism]

Flabebe wasn’t just banned because it could evolve on turn 1 going second, but it was actually preemptively banned due to a Floette that removes cards from your opponent’s hand when you evolve it, which (due to the aggressive, fast-paced nature of Expanded format at the time) led to disgusting turn 1 hand lock combos.

[@ihaveyourmemes]

7:14 I had this on while doing something else admittedly and got sent into a fight-or-flight response. Why has the internet ruined Amoonguss for me 😭😭

[@Mothsune]

2:23 loses to quagsire though, the REAL PERFECT POKEMON

[@frankunodostres473]

good video. one of the better pkmn history lessons

[@MrMshaft]

Ah yes a legendary sword wielding mon is counter by Mighty Wooper evolution

[@brainfreeze3793]

8 years yet the editing style never changed

[@mytoysarethicbruh]

Did you know that Fishious Rend can have up to 24480 power? here’s how: As he said, you need to outspeed the opponent to deal double damage, which would be 170 power, and with choice band and strong jaw it reaches 340 power. If you hit super effectively, you hit get 680 power. A crit would take you up to 1360 power, which is the maximum amount in singles. In doubles, it’s 2040 if you use helping hand that is. But that’s without stat boosts,rain and quad effective. So I think the maximum attack for this move is: 85 x 2 + 100% x 2 x 4 x 1,5 x 50% x 4 (from +6 attack) = 24480 power! Now remember, my calculations may be wrong, but that’s a REAL high number!

[@deathbacon4518]

Inceroar also gets access to parting shot, and that, along with Zacian and excadrill were the reason I stopped doing vgc in gen 8

[@lovelyluna733]

Unfortunately they probably come to Gen 9 too

[@luisgarcia1337]

@@lovelyluna733 i can't speak for Incin or Excadrill but Zacian got nerfed in Gen 9. Hackers found out that Intrepid Sword only gives 1 boost per battle now, meaning that after Zacian first switches in it doesn't get any more boosts from it. Pretty good nerf I'd say, even if it did also make Zamacezenta worse too (it's ability also got the same nerf which it definitely didn't need)

[@RocketPropelledMexican]

Surprised you didn't mention Garmanitan (Darmanitan-Galar), that thing was probably the most powerful non-legendary ever released. Turns out when you give a pokemon a free choice band it's pretty OP. The thing had perfect coverage and had some ridiculous calcs, with the choice band set it was literally hitting anything that should have been neutral for STRONGER THAN SUPEREFFECTIVE damage. Hell when it was banned to ubers, it was still a meta relevant wallbreaker since ubers is filled with dragons that scarf Garm would wreck through.

[@supersentaii5590]

There's another pokemon he didn't mention, the highest damage stat Shuckle!

[@Amelia4111]

You're supposed to say the form before you say the name, NOT fudging after!

[@ZeHamberglar]

I'm sure it's no coincidence that I've never heard of 90% of these pokemon because they're too new. And the ones I have heard of were generally made broken by a change in more modern games. Something tells me that Game Freak is just not that good at balancing.

[@SevNeijizawaVt]

Remember the Soul Dew? The reason why the item was banned in gen's 5 & onwards was bc of the number of ways & times it nerfed KO's during gameplay. I remember it was an in-game pre-banned item in PoKéMoN XY's Battle Academy in Lumoise City & Battle Maison in Kiloude City.

[@mettatonex7221]

If I can provide an adendum, Wobbuffet's playstyle wasn't all that busted, in fact it was rather easy to play around, but it had to be banned because the only ability it had access to, Shadow Tag, was banned, which is why baby Wynaut was banned as well, and also why the duo became unbanned as soon as it got access to Telepathy. Sure, if played correctly and the opponents hand was bad, it could completely go to town, but more often than not, it was just a gimmick. An extremely linear gimmick.

[@Tumbleflop]

2:52 I've said this since it was first revealed, and I will still die on this hill. *The Greavard line should've been Ghost/Normal.*

[@sapphiresupernova]

I may be a filthy casual that doesn't really do online battling, but I do enjoy videos like these. Pokémon is one of my hyperfixations so thank you.

[@TheAnimationStationTAS]

Can your next video explain every non-banned and nonbroken pokémon?

[@coolguyhino92]

11:35 If you squint your eyes, it looks like he's throwin it back. Vigorously

[@KlldbyCuriosity]

You didn’t mention the worst part about Dracovish: Switching counts as Dracovish moving first. You can’t switch to counter it

[@7ItalianStallion]

Great video 👍

12:49 Only way OHKO moves can have their accuracy manipulated is with No Guard. Only Pokémon with No Guard that could learn a OHKO move is Machamp with Fissure if you give it an Ability Patch in SV, but that cannot be used in competitions because it is not ‘battle ready’, which would require it to first forget all of its moves, including Fissure.

[@MineONite]

Love that aura calls amoongus *AMONGUS*

[@redauraforlife]

i’ve been doing competitive pokemon for 9 years and i just learned STAB= same type attack bonus. i didn’t know it was an acronym

[@tripledreigon6417]

Wobbufett was banned due to causing locked battles, because the the fact that they couldn't damage each other and couldn't switch out due to shadow tag.

[@Amelia4111]

It's Wobbuffet, NOT Wobbafett!

[@Cresp06]

Ting-Lu is recently getting some use in VGC. HP: 155 Attack: 110 Defense: 125 and decent Special Defense: 80 What makes it good is that it’s ability lowers special defense so you can focus the EV spread on HP and Special Defense plus let it run an assault vest. Lastly it knows fissure which despite it being 30% accurate, if it hits then good. If it missed, then it can use stomping tantrum which it’s 150 base power.

[@lovelyluna733]

All my homies hate Fissure Ting Lu

[@zestysword]

As someone who used Ting Lu in Reg C I can confirm that it was a great mon to use. You didn’t even need to use it as a tank either. Banded Ting Lu was a decent threat if piloted correctly and could still tank a Flutter Mane Moonblast pretty well

[@lthefifteenth661]

In doubles, people use endure/toxic orb so Tatsugiri dies after activating Dondozo's stat buff, thus rendering it still 2v2.

[@GravityIsFalling]

people don't do this

[@lthefifteenth661]

@@GravityIsFalling They did in Season 1. At least 7/10 Ranked matches I personally did had that strategy

[@verylostdoommarauder]

I like to imagine Zacian as the war goddess (For some reason, they made Zacian genderless despite the Pokedex saying that it is female) of the Pokemon world.

[@anhquantran1934]

Fun fact: Dunsparce has been banned in an official Smogon format, Little Cup.

[@Eddie_Enfer]

4:43 Guard, you forgot to mention said stab priority move is stronger than an average priority move. Those are 40bp, Jet Punch is 60bp, it is between espeed and average priority moves

[@OlavRH]

just a fyi, the species clause also makes it impossible to have two regional variants of the same pokemon, for instance Paldean and Johtoian Wooper

[@Slooof]

2:45 the same can be said for Pokémon Go PvP in the Master League! It’s such a dominant Pokémon

[@nsneddon24]

Fun fact, the only thing that can actually outspeed bundle with a scarf is scarf Dragapult Unboosted anyway

[@gaminglyon6735]

Zacian is so OP even in Pokemon Unite that thing team wipes but then comes comfey with so many heals💀💀💀

[@cron1807]

Didn't mention Archie's Ace, a TCG card that you could use if you were losing to suddenly not be losing. It also has good card art

[@hobbes2234]

We're getting to a point in powercreep where Slaking without Truant would be a Pokémon nobody would bat an eye at.

[@yellowcaballerofan110]

I feel like I learned something important from this. Thanks

[@byeguyssry]

10:00 Massively oversimplified Archeops's ban. It was legal and completely unviable for a while, because its preevolution, Archen, was a Fossil pokemon which means that unlike other unevolved pokemon, you can't simply play it; instead you have to use some roundabout way to play it. This made it hard to actually play Archeops. However, when a card that allowed you to put a Rock/Fighting type mon onto the battlefield and ignores the typical conditions, among other things, got printed, it was able to easily cheat out Archeops. There were "harsh" restrictions on the card, but it's really not that harsh.

[@ctoooc]

I see some VGC players or casual fans shocked that mons like flutter mane and other ridiculous threats like Dracovish got banned when they havent played the metagame at all at an attempt to call Smogon trash and it really makes me scratch my head. Mainly verlisify and his fans though

[@ctoooc]

I saw a comment doing exactly this a bit above this comment, would you look at that 😂

[@sephikong8323]

Most of the time VGC players (at least those I interact with) perfectly understand why a mon would be banned and they find it quite logical that Flutter Mane or Bundle can break open Singles for example. The real thing is that there are two camps amongst VGC players when it comes to these hyper powerful and centralizing threats (like gen 8 Zacian or current Flutter Mane) in their meta : -Those who like that there is no bans and that they have to adapt to these metagame warping threats and see how the meta evolves from there -Those who wish GF banned some mons like they did in that one format in gen 8 (don't recall the number of the series it was, there were no major tournaments under it and the banlist was whack, but it did exist) even if they know it's not gonna happen and they'll have to suffer through Iron Bundle But both sides, at least at the top level, know that Singles operates by different rules and that if an offensive mon is broken in Singles, it's way harder to play around it

[@afvpegknight]

In official 3v3 singles i can literally beat every pokemon smogon calls broken with no problems. So what if it isn't 6v6? There is no way to play 6v6 ingame save for the random link battle button which is full of noobs using arceus right now. So am i just supposed to blindly believe what smogon says about fluttermane when in my 3v3 battles fluttermane is easy to kill?

[@ctoooc]

@@afvpegknight yes, you can kill a Dialga with a Eviolite Vibrava as well...

[@FunkyFreshCaesar]

I know it was a very pried mention but damn, Ancient Mew brings back one of those rage inducing childhood memories. I had one along with quite a few rarer cards from the base and first few TCG expansions back when I was in school during peak pokemania, and somebody went into by bag at lunchtime and stole almost all of my cards. They were never caught and I never got my cards back.

[@daniellejackson6543]

2:50 now last respects had 2 altercations. First, 2/3 new pokemon gained access to it being white striped basculin as well as its evolution Basculegion which has a physical and special form based on gender as well as a ban to the move allowing all these mons into lower tiers. Basculegion m is basically houndstone on crack. It is 3 points faster than dracovish, has water stab, swift swim which boosts water damage, higher attack, and adaptability which makes last respects even more dangerous. A personal favorite set of mine is an agility adaptability set with heavy duty boots.

[@-_E-_]

I've seen crazy Dondo Tatsu strats where the little guy uses endure and has toxic orb. upon switch in to the dondo, it will boost all of its stats before tatsu faints, enabling you the user to bypass the 2 v 1 situation

[@zestysword]

It wasn’t really a great strat though. Sacrificing a mon turn 1 still puts you at a disadvantage and haze just shuts down that strat entirely. Pretty sure that toxic orb tatsu was never used in top level play

[@owenpeck4857]

​​​​@@zestyswordAbout the move Haze, that, prankster, and tailwind are why Murkrow is often used in gen 9 competitive. Whimsicott can't Haze, so Murkrow is used.

[@schaffs2]

I had a small little tournament with a couple of friends a while after SV came out, and I won the whole thing because I used Tyranitar and Houndstone to sweep through everything

[@DracoFire3000]

A serious Aura video? Ain’t no way

[@plentyofpaper]

I remember the Ancient Mew card. What I think is even more problematic than the unreadable text is that the back of the card had a unique design. The card wasn't good at all. But tossing one in your deck, then shuffling until you see it on top and tossing it into the prize pool then never drawing it effectively means you could play with a 59 card deck, which is more reliable than the normally mandatory 60 card deck. Even if you could be forced into a true random shuffle where you can't know the position of the card, if it's a prize card or on the top of the deck, you'd know. Pretty funky.

[@Grenadadwi]

The fact that greninja protean ability got changed to when it enters and use a move its will be the type untill shiched out

[@gameboy3d943]

5:36 GAME FREAK: “But I’m not done yet!” (gives Incineroar Helping Hand in Gen 9: Indigo Disk)

[@chaosdog4265]

Not sure if this bean was mentioned in the comments, but i know it was missed in the vid: Shedinja, or more specifically Wonder Guard. Give it to an electric type w Air Balloon or theoretically Tera-Elec Shedinja w Air Balloon and the 'mon becomes untouchable

[@GravityIsFalling]

hazzards

[@zestysword]

Status will still kill it

[@sdj0914]

I feel kinda sad that Basculegion will get an automatic ban when it comes in SV due to access to Last Respects and ability of Adaptability

[@ObziLuky]

He's not gonna get banned, LR will

[@turtley8581]

when Basculegion comes out, he will be allowed in OU, Houndstone will come back to OU, and Last Respects will be banned

[@noahboat580]

I started my pokemon TCG in the black and white era, and man, Archeops decks and reshiram/zekrom decks were truly formidable decks to battle against at the time 😂

[@AmethystMoon444]

Idk if anyone else ran into this too with Blaziken but its defense is absolutely insane. If you’re not hitting it with a psychic or hydro pump max it’s only gonna take 10 damage on anything else and that’s without a vitamin boost

[@carlsoll]

Wow 😯 There’s a lot of these. Pretty cool, or maybe not 🤔 *Neat video!*

[@3_LollipopOfTheMoldiKind]

I've done the swagger thing in-game with my Luxray. It was usually in Platinum.

[@_Xiagax_]

13:21 Ah yes, the Funbro strat. I remember laughing my ass of when I found somewhere on reddit that Smogon was official banning that strategy. That said though as funny as the strat was, I can't help but agree with Smogon that it had to be banned because no one wants to be on the other side of said strat. All that happens is if you can't sweep Slowbro, the match just becomes a pissing contest of who has more patience and usually, it's going to be who ever is running Funbro. Anyone running that strat is very obviously a troll, and are going to be looking for somereactions.

[@petertimowreef9085]

3:24 "Speaks for itself". If it did why would I be watching your video genius

[@BrofNeeko]

Awww man the old TCG GameBoy music …my heart…it hurts for simpler days