Banning Blaziken... Was it really the best choice?

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Inigo Montoya

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Now, if you are unfamiliar with Blaziken in Gen 5, here's a breif summary. Blaziken has always had mediocre stats, barring 120 base attack and 110 base special attack, and has never seen much competitive use in OU. However, in Gen 5, this changed, because of his new Dream World ability Speed Boost. Previously the only Pokemon to get Speed Boost was Ninjask. But because of this, Blaziken's 120 base attack would now become faster and faster with every turn that passed. Combining that with Swords Dance, you could receive a massive attack stat and great speed after a single turn. Now with Hi Jump Kick's power raised to 130, Blaziken wrecks everything that doesn't resist both his STABs.

Now, Blaziken has been suspect voted by Smogon and has been promoted to Uber status, making it the only thing that is non-legendary, Wobufett, or psuedo legendary to become uber. Now, normally Smogon raises things to uber because they have no counters. But there exist several counters to Blaziken, namely Jellicent, Chandelure, Gliscor, Sharpedo, and several others. I have used Blaziken and his power is not exaggerated, but his sweeps stop very easily.

The main point of this thread is to talk about how good or bad a decision Smogon made by promoting Blaziken to uber.
 
Hmm. Well I could understand both views. I don't have much experience with Gen5 Competitively yet, but I can say that I'm actually proud of Blaziken. This proves that it can do some damage. But enough damage for UBERS? I feel like it will be very underused UBER.
 
OK. Let's break that statement down. Just to start, blaziken never saw much OU Play in gen 4. In gen 3, it was extremely OU. Just pointing that out. :p

Now, Smogon does NOT, I repeat, DOES NOT promote something to the uber status because it has no counters. If I remember correctly, they ban under 3 categories:

Sweep- Where something can sweep the vast majority of the metagame, and would be overcentralizing (Stuff like Garchomp and Latios)
Wall- Something can wall the vast majority of the metagame, and would be overcentralizing (Stuff like Lugia)
Support- Something is supportful to the degree where certain Pokémon would become overcentralized (Stuff like Shadow Tag)

Smogon does not put something in ubers due to no counters. Take the following 4th generation ubers for example: Latias, Garchomp, and Salamence. All 3 of these pokemon had their specific counters and checks. The main strat for Garchomp and Salamence were to lock them into outrage, and then revenge kill them with something like Heatran, Scizor, or Weavile. Latios had plenty of counters and checks. Tyranitar gets a SpDef boost in sand, is immune to psychic, and can hit with either Crunch or Pursui. Scizor can do the same, although it resists Dragon as well, and can use Bullet Punch. All 3 of these pokemon were ubers, but they had their own counters. They were voted ubers because Garchomp And Salamence pretty much forced you to run 2 steel types on your team, or you lost to them every single time. Latias made you run something like Scarfgon or Tyranitar, or you lost every single time. That's called overcentralizing.

Another thing, Blaziken does not really have any TRUE counters. Jellicent and Chandelure can be taken out by Shadow Claw. Gliscor will still fall to a SD boosted Flare Blitz, and Blaziken does still use Hidden Power Ice (base 110 Special Attack after all.) Sharpedo is not close to a counter- whoever gets the first speed boost in wins. So, what if your opponent leads Blaziken? He gets the first speed boost. It's much similar to salamence- it has no TRUE counters. You coudl argue USE HEATRAN and SCIZOR! Ok. Salamence has access to Earthquake and Flamethrower/Fire Blast. There isn't one true counter. It's impossible to predict the set until it's too late.

I for one approve of the decision of voting Speed Boost Blaziken to ubers, and am happy to be rid of another obvious Ubers pokemon (I was also happy when the banned Shaymin Sky, Manaphy, and Inconsistent.)

EDIT: @safariblade: A pokemon is not put into ubers because it would do well in the ubers tier. It is put into ubers because it's too good for OU. Look at wynaut. Is it ever used in Ubers? No. But it's too good for OU. So it's an uber.
 
Maybe by making Speed Boost Blaziken Uber that might help Infernape's popularity in OU for Gen 5 since Blaziken outclasses Infernape in ever way possible due to Speed Boost.
 
@TPO3: Apparently, I don't know anything about ban status-ing. :p

And by Sharpedo, I was pointing to Aqua Jet, not other water moves. Adamant LO Aqua Jet is always a OHKO on Blaziken. Blaziken never uses Flare Blitz, at least none that I've seen, so no OHKO on Gliscor either. +2 Blaze Kick IS a 2HKO however. And also, Night Slash>Shadow Claw.
 
I really, really don't think it needed to happen. I've been dabbling in Gen V OU, and I have never found Blaziken a problem. Every team probably needs 1-2 forms of priority anyway, so Blaziken's worst enemy is hugely prominent. I don't see it, but it's not like I've talked to the people who decided to ban it. Maybe after hearing from someone smarter than me, my opinion will change.
 
To be perfectly honest, I haven't been nearly as involved in Gen 5 as I should be, but I'll share my thoughts. I've never had much trouble with Blaziken, and am fairly surprised he got banned over the other suspects like Deoxys-S, Latios, and Excadrill. My teams tend to always be stacked against Blaziken, which isn't exactly purposeful. On my Drizzle team I would use gliscor since he laughs at Blaziken's STABs at that point, and on other teams, simply put, Slowbro is amazing.

For those of you who don't agree with Blaziken's banning, you can't deny how good he is. He has 120 base Attack, which admittedly isn't as impressive now with Latios, Terrakion, and Thundurus running around. But when you have 120 base Attack, and you get a boost to your speed at the end of every turn, good luck. Fire and Fighting is also one of the better STAB combos in the game. Now that Hi Jump Kick got the power boost to 130, it can get really hard to stop, especially if Blaziken somehow got an SD up. Draco Meteor, Leaf Storm, Overheat etc are the only other moves that compare in power to that, but they have the -2 drop, which puts Hi Jump Kick a good ways ahead. Imo, it's really hard to downplay how good Blaziken got in Gen 5.
 
A counter is something that can switch in and then immediately destroy the threat. I don't feel such a Pokemon exists. Jellicent is OHKO'd by a +2 Stone Edge. Even Gliscor is 2HKO'd by Flare Blitz. Blaziken was really capable of sweeping entire teams on its own. Priority was one of the only ways to get rid of it. Players should not be forced to use Aqua Jet Azumarill even though it isn't bad. Lucario can dish out damage to it, but the Blaziken must be weakened first. I totally support the banning of Blaziken.
 
^This. Blaziken was banned because it was overcentralized. Every other team I faced had a blaziken in it and they were a nightmare to take down. Other very commonly used pokemon may be way too popular but aren't broken (cloyster for example is completely walled by empoleon).
 
STAB on two of the best offensive types in the game, nearly impossible to revenge once he gets going, and once his counters are gone (use Wobbuffet), there is no stopping him. Shadow Claw nukes Jellicent and if you're playing in the sun his Flare Blitzes are so powerful they kill Heatran.

Also, Infernape wasn't _completely_ outclassed; he is still naturally faster and doesn't have to rely on Speed Boost to outspeed certain threats.
 
Blaziken overcentralized the meta. That's one status of banning. This means it deserved to be banned. Also, Sharpedo CAN'T switch into ANYTHING Blaziken uses. Even HP Ice can deal like 25% due to horrible defenses. Slowbro is maybe the only true counter, but then there are those HP Grass Versions.
 
I think you guys are the fact that blaziken also possesses baton pass. Since it can stand on it's own, support others, and kill everything in it's way (it does have rock slide, so chandelier is worthless), it really should be banned.
 
Slowbro, Jellicent, and everything else Blaziken fears is taken out by Wobbuffet. They're not counters if they don't exist. Once they're gone, he's free to rip your whole team up, and even if you do manage to revenge him, you've lost half your team in the process.
 
^tell me about it. I have seen combinations of blaziken and scizor that have done that sort of devastation that you mentioned above. Once your bulky water bites it, your history unless you pull off a strategic miracle.
 
Oh so what I'm getting at is Speed Boost Blaziken is both banned in OU and Uber Tier or is it just in Ubers along with Salamence?
 
Its only banned in OU. Ubers doesn't have a ban list. Salamence is not Uber this generation either.
 
To clarify, Blaziken is uber regardless of his ability. If you have Blaze Blaziken on your team, you are still using ubers.
 
Just because someone brought it up, the only effective way of using sharpedo is if you use it as a lead. And even then it's poor. It has nowhere near the same sweeping capabilities blaziken did.
 
Personally, I think bannings should be made if you can ban an Ability on a specific Pokemon. I've heard there's currently no way to do that (well...figure it out guys you have the time :F), but there's no reason Blaze Blaziken should be banned because I don't consider that combination Uber. That's just IMO.

dmaster out.
 
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