Hi. Thought you might be interested to know, Hyper Beam sucks. OK. Now that that's out of the way, I'll explain why it sucks and attempt to make anyone who uses it feel insulted. OK?
As stated before, in a competitive enviroment your foe will take huge advantage of your attack. They can stat up, sub, or just KO your poke during the downtime. If you think that's no big deal, then explain why that Raikou you're facing has 6 CMs right now.
HB fails on Slaking. It either kills or seriously dents a poke, then gets outta there so it can do a little more harm. There's no such luck when you use HB, as after KOing something, they can just send in their FPer or w/e, and you end up taking a lot more damage than you want to.
TyraniRay I believe you mentioned that people ridiculed you for using SDVenusaur. Right? Well, you were probably playing some competitive wannabes, as anyone good would know that it can be used to good effect.
Hyper Beam CAN NOT be used as a finishing move. Just get a poke with Explosion or w/e. Something as situational as that isn't worth using. If you're using it as a last resort (a "mini-Explosion" if you will) and it isn't your foe's last poke, even if you do KO, your foe still gets a free set up.
Tyranitar-Rex said:
The Commander makes a good point/argument however IMO, and through battle experience in the frontier, I find a CB Slaking with Hyper Beam to be very deadly(given that the attack doesn't miss and/or the opposing poke doesn't sub as C.Blizz stated). But about 98% of the time when I Hyper Beam a poke in the frontier with a CB Slaking, I OHKO them, and with its decent speed, it goes 1st most of the time. In spite of all that said, I also say that it is very risky and it can bite you in the *** as well.
It's too bad that Return would OHKO most of the same stuff that HB would. HB can OHKO a Suicune at 90% or less damage, however, that is really the only exception that Return wouldn't do the exact same (yet better) job.
Orion Master said:
Why is that? Because, as you experts say, it's luck-based. Hax is a loosely-used term. In fact, Hax implies illegal actions, not luck-based ones. It's an already established term in the videogaming community... and it's downright cheating to win. Hax is a Tyranitar with Aeroblast, or a Charizard with Thunderbolt. THAT is Hax. Double Team, OHKOs, and luck-based Items AREN'T Hax. They're legal, as they can be used by everyone and even receive a bit of support here and there. This isn't cheating. It's just relying on luck-based moves. I don't encourage the use of luck-based strategies, but I acknowledge that they CAN be beaten, and should be admitted instead of claused. After all, if ANYONE feels lucky enough to trust sheer luck, then so be it. If you lose against someone that used "Hax" (And I use this term loosely too...), then your Team wasn't prepared for such situations. Yes, I know NO Team is made to beat everything, but you should adapt to the Metagame, as I said. If I see the use of Bright Powder, Quick Claw and the like rising, I fit a Pokémon that can use Thief or Knock Off so their Item is rendered useless. If there's an up rise in the use of OHKOs, I bring in a Sturdy Pokémon to stop them right in their tracks. I already counter Evasion with Aerial Ace and Magical Leaf, because those are actually nice attacks, and I'm not power-obsessed, as are most NBers...
So now we have to use the dictionary definition for everything even though it's the internet? In a way using something like Quick Claw or Focus Band is cheating, as it gives you an unfair advantage. Moves like Odor Slueth and Foresight are a waste of a moveslot on a poke, for something so specialized as this, and there are often better things a poke that could learn one of those moves spend doing. As for Haze, do you really think it would be fun it every team had the same three Hazers? That's about how many useful ones there are. There are many more pokes can learn PHazing moves, and make for a more interesting metagame. The never-miss moves have too low of a base power to be worth using except for something like AA. What? These are just excuses? Well, I'd suppose so, but then you consider how common Salamence is. Its old standard had AA iirc, and since 607 Atk power
really hurts, it fell out of favor and people started usinghP:Flying. Plus, what happens when 6 DTs get passed to a Suicune or whatever? The move is broken. After only two DTs, your foe has less than a 50% chance of hitting you with a 100% accuracy attack iirc. Now what about Fire Blast? Sure this might sound like complaining, but you have to consider what happens when one player uses this move.
Competitive battling is a test of skill, not luck, and is the primary reason this move has been banned, as have OHKOs. DT can make it so that your foe misses every time, even after a single one. If you somehow manage to get up to 6, your foe can hit every time. It's all about luck. What is competitive battling about now? I thought so.
Oh, and btw, luck based "strategies" CAN NOT be countered. Quick Claw has an 8% chance of working. It either works or it doesn't. Neither player has any control over it.
Now, after reading through this rant, some of you might be thinking, "but what about moves like Meteor Mash and Fire Blast; you still use those, don't you?" Well, yes. We do. They have a reletively high success rate, however, YOU are the one taking the risk of using these moves. Your opponent has nothing to lose when you use an inaccurate move. You are not giving yourself an unfair advantage by using somehting with only an 85 or 90 chance of hitting. In fact, you're hindering yourself somewhat.
There is not a SINGLE METAGAME.
Well, of course not. There's 386 OU, 386 UU, 386 Uber, GSC OU, GSC UU, RBY OU, RBY UU, 200 OU, 200 UU, mono, and the list goes on and on. Of course I realize that there is a metagame anywhere you look. Each and every place, each neighborhood has its own metagame. However, you will find that sets from NB will be used in competitive link battles quite commonly (however far and few between they are), with small variations such as replacements for HPs.
For people who hate getting told "use this or lose", well, in some cases that's the truth. We used to get a lot of people in RMT who used... less than useful movesets that were basically random. That's how we got the reputation of flaming anyone and everyone that came in there. Which is not true. You'll notice new sets popping up all the time, and we don't flame them if we think they have a chance to succeed. If they are completely stupid (like a HP:Water Golem) well, what would you expect? There have also been many things proven wrong. They just don't work.
Now, let's get one more thing straight. JUST BECAUSE YOU BEAT THE ELITE FOUR WITH YOUR TEAM OF 6 POKEMON THAT ARE 20 LEVELS ABOVE THEIRS DOES NOT MAKE YOU DA POGEYMONZ MASTA. All it means is you can beat poor AI with poor teams with a HUGE level advantage. Oh, and while I'm at it just because you got all 7 Gold symbols in the BF or because you can beat all your friends in a link battle does not mean you are DA POGEYMONZ MASTA either. Ingame =/= competitive.
I'm done for now, but I'll edit with more later if I think of anything.
To recap, Hyper Beam sucks. If you use it on a poke not named Pidgeot or Tauros (or Slaking to an extent, as I know how it can look tempting if you don't have all the facts) you are a noob. DT is hax, and if you have to rely on hax to win you suck at pokemon. If you've got some major ingame accomplishment but have never been on NB don't be so sure of your skills. You're probably not that good.