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Greninja Discussion
- Thread starter Minedreigon
- Start date
Mr. Reloaded
Cause a pirate is free
So apparently after doing some research the only arguable counters this thing has are
Chansey
Porygon2
And Alomomola
Problem with this is Chansey is the only mon here considered viable in OU, Alomomola works on stall and its only really niche is dealing with Greninja.
Yeah....
Chansey
Porygon2
And Alomomola
Problem with this is Chansey is the only mon here considered viable in OU, Alomomola works on stall and its only really niche is dealing with Greninja.
Yeah....
So apparently you've never seen a correctly EV'd Rotom-W or Tentacruel.
Also, if something is on the OU viability rankings (which everything mentioned is) it is viable to some extent.
I can see why people would want Greninja banned, and I'm not 100% against it myself, but c'mon guys, at least make your arguments factual.
Porygon2 is extremely viable, Trace is an amazing ability. Makes it easy to come in on stuff like Lando-T and Heatran with ease. And overall it's probably the best Greninja check after Tentacruel and Rotom-W.
Mr. Reloaded
Cause a pirate is free
@Ger9119 Porygon2 doesn't want to come in on Knock Off, no Eviolite users can.
Sp.def Tentacruel still doesn't appreciate Extrasensory.
I can't argue with Rotom because HP grass is such a piss weak move and Grass Knot is weak on Rotom.
Greninja's issue's weren't so much switch-ins, but rather scouting its movepool (while having your whole team take damage in doing so).
Greninja isn't Mega Mence where it just plowed through teams with little risk. It forces you to run at least 1 check for it which hurts teambuilding.
People complain about OU's lack of originality, Greninja is a cause of this.
And this is coming from a guy who originally was 50/50 on a ninja ban.
Sp.def Tentacruel still doesn't appreciate Extrasensory.
I can't argue with Rotom because HP grass is such a piss weak move and Grass Knot is weak on Rotom.
Greninja's issue's weren't so much switch-ins, but rather scouting its movepool (while having your whole team take damage in doing so).
Greninja isn't Mega Mence where it just plowed through teams with little risk. It forces you to run at least 1 check for it which hurts teambuilding.
People complain about OU's lack of originality, Greninja is a cause of this.
And this is coming from a guy who originally was 50/50 on a ninja ban.
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I think a Greninja ban would be premature at best. While it did get a few new toys to play with, it still has a few big problems: it is extremely frail, and doesn't actually have such a great special attack stat (so, while it may neutral hit almost everything, it's neutral STAB moves aren't as good as, say, an Alakazam's neutral STAB, for example.). ORAS also introduced several new mega evolutions which can try and counter it. Eg. Lopunny mega outspeeds it and can likely OHKO. So does beedrill mega. Then comes the priority stuff from the likes of Mega Pinsir and Scizor. And then you get into a multitude of scarf users, who can destroy it quite easily. Honestly, there is so much stuff that is already on most peoples teams to counter it that there really isn't any reason to think that it is broken. The only time when having counters doesn't prevent you from being broken is when the counters are either 1) Obscure and not otherwise viable or 2) Few and far between, neither of which is the case.
Afrodisiac
break up w yo gf, im bored
I totally disagree.
First of all, it's bulk doesn't mean anything when Gren is outspeeding almost the whole unboosted metagame, and 2HKO them easily on the switch. It's like the same Mega Lucario or Blaziken argument months ago, yet they were banned (for other reasons, but still their bulk is piss poor just like Greninja's).
Yeah, there are several new threats that outspeed Greninja and serve as soft checks (i.e. Mega-Sceptile, Mega-Lopunny, Mega-Beedrill, etc as well as previous megas like Alakazam & Manectric) But 1), they take a turn to outspeed due to Mega evolution speed mechanics, and 2), you can only ever face 1 of those in a team so, with good teambuilding it shouldn't be a problem at all. Scarfed threats are more of a challenge, however. But with a bit of predicition and skill you should be able to know who's scarfed and play around it.
Honestly Greninja is the best Pokémon in the tier right now, it is an extremely "low risk, high reward" Pokémon, it doesn't even take your mega slot. Simply a nightmare to Hyper Offense & Balance teams, and makes you look for unoptimal team members to deal with it like Porygon2 or Empoleon, both of which doesn't really fit on HO. Btw, regarding a previous post, Rotom-Wash is 2HKO'd by Dark Pulse/Gunk Shot anyway so there goes your "counter". It also takes several turns to guess what moves Greninja is running, since it can effectively lure Pokémon like Ferro & Scizor and destroy them with HP Fire, same with Tentacruel/Conk and Extrasensory, etc. To me, the only viable answers to Greninja are still Chansey, Tentacruel (w/o Extrasensory), Alomomola (w/o Grass attack) and RestTalk Mega Gyarados. P2 is a shaky, unconvincing check, while Empoleon is destroyed by Low Kick which is rising in popularity atm.
Also I'm suprised PO already banned Greninja, I don't expect the same scenario on Smogon honestly, while i'm pro-ban i'm sure it will stay in OU.
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While Porygon2 definitely doesn't like Knock Off, this isn't relevant to Greninja since it doesn't get it. Otherwise I'd definitely think Greninja absolutely warrants a ban.
Going to add that RestTalk non-Mega Gyarados also works, doesn't necessarily need to be Mega in case you want to run a different Mega. Regular RestTalk Gyarados also has the advantage of Leftovers and not getting 2HKO'd by Grass Knot variants like Mega but Grass Knot is kind of a pain for both. As for Rotom-W, 252 HP/212 Def Bold is only 3HKO'd by both Dark Pulse and Gunk Shot last I checked (I'm sure there's a better spread out there at the moment but lazy).
While I agree that it's not quite so easy to name something as a counter to Greninja, I'm still not 100% convinced Greninja needs to go. I definitely see why people want it gone though, it has so many options and Gunk Shot alone makes its would-be Fairy counters obsolete. Honestly, it might just be my overall view of OU at the moment but I'm personally indifferent towards whatever happens to it. Ban or no ban, I can't say I'd really care either way.
Afrodisiac
break up w yo gf, im bored
Yeah, I think if Greninja goes to ubers, the biggest impact will be on casual competitive/low ladder players whom rely on Pokémon like Greninja, Talonflame and previously Aegislash (Kalos holy trinity).
Well then they should actually try to teambuild. That pretty much makes the case to ban it , is that it's so great and so easy to use that it can get you wins even if you're skill level isn't there. Same thing was with Aegislash, and with Greninja he gets 4 STAB moves and excellent coverage.
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Priority pretty much takes Greninja out of the game. After you get SR up vs it, it gets like 8 or 9 hits maximum or something, then it dies from LO. As for it outspeeding the whole metagame? A lot of the metagame are things like Mega Lop that you mention later and really just fake out free of and risk and can ko next turn if you are foolish enough to even stay in on Fake Out in the first place. Blaze/Lucario didn't take damage every attack they put out. And they didn't really have good counters.
It's low risk until you run into a stall team and you realize that Greninja get absolutely shut down when it can't do any real damage. It's the same with every offense/ho team, really. Chances are, there is something on your opponents team you won't have a 100% safe switch in to, and you'll have to sack something. This has been true in the past and current times, whether its just bad team building or just something your core was weak to, whatever.
Rotom-W is only 2hko'd by Greninja if your EVs are not optimal.
I don't know why people say that its hard to guess Greninja's moves...?
You have the mandatory three moves; Dark Pulse, Ice Beam, and Gunk Shot. Then you have your fourth slot which is usually Low Kick, if it isn't then your counter works even better. I've laddered to 1600 twice now on the main ladder and saw HP fire Greninja MAYBE once, and it may have been a hallucination. The argument saying, "I don't know what moves it has" was more valid during XY.
If you are running extrasensory just to beat greninja's counters, you are missing out on so much coverage with another move, that chances are you won't be able to damage something else on your opponent's team.
Porygon: Not OU ≠ not a good counter
tl;dr:[Edited] If you don't have something to deal with EVERYTHING in OU, you'll lose.
Right.
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Blaziken and Lucario-Mega are both bad examples. Firstly, Blazikens speed boost ability lets it realistically outspeed choice scarf users and hits with a much higher attack stat and move power (and furthermore, in Blaziken's case, every gen has had a slightly more powerful OU tier than the last, which makes Blaziken even stronger compared to the metagame it was in), and Lucario-Mega has significantly more power and versatility than Greninja, as well as resisting more common priority moves, and having extremespeed, which is a far better priority move than anything Greninja gets.
Saying, "Well, if you can predict switches 100% of the time…" also doesn't cut any cake. To this i could simply use a random number generator to decide whether or not i switch (which, technically, we should all be doing anyways, with some weights on the probabilities based on how good the outcomes are for us)
As for the other checks taking a turn to outspeed Greninja, this assumes 2 things: 1) they weren't already out before and 2) they don't carry protect. Beedrill usually carries protect anyways to make sure it gets the chance to mega, for example.
Saying, "well, if you are good at predicting" also is a really dumb argument. I could easily just use a weighted RNG to determine my moves (which is what mathematicians would tell us that we should have been doing anyway, regardless of almost all circumstances in pokemon), or that i could be better at predicting than the Greninja user.
Saying, "Well, if you can predict switches 100% of the time…" also doesn't cut any cake. To this i could simply use a random number generator to decide whether or not i switch (which, technically, we should all be doing anyways, with some weights on the probabilities based on how good the outcomes are for us)
As for the other checks taking a turn to outspeed Greninja, this assumes 2 things: 1) they weren't already out before and 2) they don't carry protect. Beedrill usually carries protect anyways to make sure it gets the chance to mega, for example.
Saying, "well, if you are good at predicting" also is a really dumb argument. I could easily just use a weighted RNG to determine my moves (which is what mathematicians would tell us that we should have been doing anyway, regardless of almost all circumstances in pokemon), or that i could be better at predicting than the Greninja user.
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Elite_Grovyle_Master1
A Pokémon Master
I believe a strong Grass type like Grovyle or something would be a good Greninja check. For example, the Greninja's moves like Water Gun wouldn't effect a Grass type. Even better, it could use a grass attack and do super effective damage. Combined with Greninja's subpar defenses, a grass pokémon would be an effective counter.
Except Ice Beam exists, Even though Grovyle is in the top percentage of Grovyles
DarkSword39
Heehouhouhouhou!
So is the Greninja, and Greninja outspeeds Grovyle.
I always found things with above 123 speed can check Greninja. However, I haven't found a real counter, yet.
Tentacruel
Porygon2
Rotom-W
All come to mind. There's counters just not super standard things.
Greninja also doesn't really have a good answer to Gyarados other than to just hit it with a neutral move. Tentacruel, however, isn't a counter, as Greninja has a good chance of carrying extrasensory. Nor is porygon, as it takes too much damage from low sweep, unless it runs a physically defensive set, which would work.
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40 Atk Life Orb Protean Greninja Low Kick (60 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Eviolite Porygon2: 125-148 (33.4 - 39.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
I'm assuming you mean Low Kick, because Low Sweep is just generally garbage. <40% MAX really isnt much when Porygon2 has recover.
Extrasensory isn't even close to Standard or Common. And overall it's a lot worse than the other options it can run. Meaning that Tentacruel is a reliable check.