Metagame DPP Doubles OU

[zee]

As a result of the Latios suspect test, Latios is now banned from DPP Doubles OU!

Tagging Kris DaWoblefet to implement please and thank you

 

[zee]

We've updated the VR for the first time following the Latios ban! Thanks as always to ryo yamada2001 for organizing the voting and to Mizuhime for joining the DPP council and voting.

Here are the changes:


Tiering changes:
Metagross 2 -> 1
Latias 4 -> 1
Bronzong 3 -> 2
Swampert 3 -> 2
Zapdos 4 -> 2
Raikou 2 -> 3
Rotom-Heat 2 -> 3
Rotom-Mow UR -> 3
Scizor 4 -> 3
Heracross 3 -> 4
Infernape 3 -> 4
Suicune 5 -> 4
Registeel UR -> 4
Salamence UR - > 4
Ludicolo 4 -> 5
Machamp 4 -> 5
Togekiss 4 -> 5
Abomasnow UR -> 5
Blissey UR -> 5
Clefable UR -> 5
Dragonite UR -> 5
Gengar UR -> 5
Staraptor UR -> 5
Weavile UR -> 5
Camerupt 5 -> UR
Gliscor 5 -> UR
Shaymin 5 -> UR

Voting sheet

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With that being said, I'd like to give some personal commentary about a few of the ranking changes, and other members of the council have expressed interest in doing that as well.

Metagross and Latias join Tyranitar in tier 1. By the end of Latios meta, most players had Metagross marked as a tier 1 Pokemon anyways, it has all the best traits an attacker could want in the metagame: good matchups into Latios/Latias and Tyranitar, immunity to Intimidate, the ability to work with all kinds of speed control, moveset flexibility, and even priority.

Latias takes a 3 tier jump in the absence of its blue counterpart, which shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. It boasts an incredible speed tier, is even bulkier than Latios is, and still hits incredibly hard with Specs Draco Meteor.

Bronzong, Swampert, and Zapdos are the new additions to tier 2. Bronzong is an all around great check to the tier 1 Pokemon, walling out Metagross and Latias and reliably being able to set Trick Room in front of Tyranitar. It has also become one of the metagame's best Explosion users. Swampert's defensive utility has resulted in it skyrocketing in usage as of late, forcing teams to pack Grass coverage or they'll have an extremely difficult time removing it. Couple this with its excellent offensive capabilities and you've got an incredibly solid Pokemon.

Let's talk Electrics. Rotom-H and Raikou both have fallen to tier 3 while Zapdos has risen to tier 2. Zapdos's bulk and access to utility moves like U-turn and roost have solidified it as the premier electric in the current metagame. As the meta has shifted to be much bulkier, Raikou Screens compositions have fallen out of favor, while Calm Mind sets haven't appreciated the increased usage of Swampert and Rhyperior to threaten it before it can boost enough to sweep. Rotom-H can struggle to get much done in a metagame flooded with Tyranitar usage, and Zapdos can run Heat Wave anyways for Fire coverage on offensive sets. I do wanna give a shoutout to Rotom-C, which has been ranked after seeing a few uses in Doubles Derby as a way to remove Swampert and threaten Tyranitar with Leaf Storm.

The last Pokemon I want to give a shoutout to is Salamence. I really like that Salamence has Intimidate + Fire coverage, which sets it apart from Latias, though I think they are best used in combination to overwhelm the opponent's Steel-type(s).

Updates on the sample teams are also coming very soon, so be on the lookout for that.

 

[Mizuhime]

I will comment on some of the Pokemon with bigger jumps in tiers than others and give my rational for voting the way I did on those specific Pokemon.


Latias - First and foremost in a metagame post Latios, Lati@s is the easy replacement for it, sharing everything but the same raw strength that Latios had. Lati@s finds itself instantly jumping to tier 1 because it fills the hole that its partner left in the meta upon getting banned and she's doing a very good job at it regardless of what set it's running. Lati@s can effectively use Scarf, Specs and Life orb the same way Latios could but just not quite as strong or as broken. Easy Tier 1 Pokemon and should be accounted for in every build you make from here on out.

Zapdos - Zapdos jumping all the way to tier 2 shouldn't be surprising to anyone. Having been in competition with Raikou since the latter's introduction in the GSC era, Zapdos is and always will be the better electric type. Thanks to its natural bulk, better move pool, better typing, and better attacking power Zapdos finds more ways to better support a team than clicking screens once and dying. With the recent meta shift to bulkier playstyles and teams, the screens offence that were plentiful in the early part of DPPs development has now fallen out of favour and thus so has Raikou, leaving the space for Zapdos to rise in popularity and outright usefulness.


Mowtom - Going from UR all the way to 3 we have arguably the best offensive Rotom Appliance. With the rise of Swampert, TTar, Rhyperior and others having access to Leaf Storm is one of the biggest blessings it could have asked for, paired with the fact it can also Trick to cripple an opposing Cresselia or any other fat Pokemon, Mowtom could be considered one of the best Choice Scarf Pokemon in the tier.

Scizor - The last Pokemon ill comment on for now is Scizor. Having been one of the first people to use it early on in DPP i'm personally a big fan of the Scarf Set to catch opponents off guard, however, the set that's rising in prominence right now is the SD set which finds many opportunities to set up thanks the typing and natural bulk it has, as long as you can account for Heatran, Zapdos and Gyarados, SD Scizor can be an extremely dominant late game Pokemon.


Also thank you for inviting me to the council o7

 

[zee]

DPP Post-Latios seems to be in a decent spot, though honestly I haven't seen a ton of discussion surrounding Latias. Do we think it's still too oppressive offensively? Is the additional bulk compared to Latios actually a problem?

Speaking for myself, I think the Latias games I've played are totally fine for now. It should be to no one's surprise that Latias usage is practically where Latios usage was before its ban, but the slightly lower power level goes a long way when you can make everything in this tier so bulky. I've tried experimenting with some sets that I would've never tried on Latios thanks to the bulk, such as Haban Berry + Screens and Rain Dance. So I think the Pokemon has a lot of potential but I wouldn't be surprised if other players have found issues with it.

Something we floated around the other day was adding Deoxys-Speed to the tier. Personally I don't think it would be broken, and the introduction of a viable Spikes user could see hazard stack rise as an entirely new playstyle, but its vast coverage could be an issue, as well as a likely increase in Thunder Wave, which most players already find controversial in this tier. For now, we might be running some occasional playtest roomtours in the Smogon Doubles room, but we won't be having serious talks about freeing Deo-S without thorough community support and empirical evidence of its role in the metagame.

 

[bagel]

On Latias: I've really enjoyed its potential for set variety and think its a much healthier mon for the metagame than Latios was. Personally I've found Substitute and Calm Mind sets very interesting in this generally bulkier and slower Post-Latios metagame. I don't think Latias has been close to optimized or fully explored so I could see it becoming overbearing in the future.

On the metagames as a whole: I'm a very big fan of DPP Post-Latios, I'm having the most fun playing it sense the first couple weeks when no one knew what they were doing. I think the Latios ban opened up defensive playstyles a lot more now that one mon can't just rip through defensive cores and resists (bar Boom, but thats another conversation). Bulky and slow paced setup sweepers were something very rarely seen previously, with Suicune really being the only one and even then it was a niche option, but now I've seen CM Latias, CM Cresselia, CM Jirachi, and Cosmic Power Clefable(!) all have success. As a result of this Toxic has been picking up more usage with some teams relying on bulk to outlast opponents rather than controlling speed with Thunder Wave. This was explored by some playeres during Derby but I think it can be much more fully realized as playstyle now.

On Deo-S: I don't really see what the tier gains from its addition. With a neutral speed nature it outruns basically all common scarfers allowing it to heavily invest in offenses and bulk to make it much more threatening than its stats make it seem. It has an extremely wide array of coverage options which could be hard to cover for. This is not to mention its unrivaled utility options. The idea of a viable Spikes user could be interesting but would it even use spikes with all of the optinos it has? Much of the top tier pokemon are Spikes immune already and DPP is still a fast paced metagame. As zee touched on I'm worried about an uptick in Thunder Wave usage as attempts to both deal with and take advantage of Deo-S's insanse speed. Obviously this is total speculation I could be totally wrong and Deo-S could suck but I would need to see a lot of evidence of it being a positive metagame element for me to support freeing it. I'm just worried about freeing a Pokemon with a 140BP STAB move that also doesn't have to invest anything into its speed stat to outrun the entire unboosted metagame.

 

[Willro101]

I’ve been playing dpp dou for a few days now and i believe bronzong deserves tier 1, first of all it somehow always does enough damage. it also has good speed control with trick room, giving it priority to move first. finally it is one of the explosion users, which is a clear the field button for those that don’t know. it also has a good steel and psychic typing which takes all the weakness of fighting from steel types while also taking the weakness of dark from psychic types. it also has levitate to not die to eq. in conclusion, bronzong should rise from Tier 2 to Tier 1.

 

[Bless]

Its been a couple of months since the Latios ban and the player base is taking a lot of different approaches to shape up the metagame. Just like bagel said in his post, I'm also having the most fun playing dpp since it came out in the beginning of this year. Everyone is looking at Latias now to see what its capable of and whether it can demonstrate the same power levels as its counterpart. After experimenting with a bunch of different sets, I've come to the conclusion that Latias is tier 2 at best. The only set I can see being tier 1 is the sub+cm set but that takes a lot of precise positioning to get it going. Here are some of the sets I used in tours and ladder <--- click here lol

I entered the DPP Friendly tour after being away from mons for 2.5 months and I really enjoyed teambuilding without Latios around. I want to thank the DPP council for keeping me around and for always testing games with me! I hope you guys enjoy using the teams!

1. An updated version of my sample team

2. A counterteam to opposing swampert/zapdos leads

3. Dpp Semiroom

4. Choice Item Leads are strong af lol

5. Double Trickroom

 

[Fritz420]

I feel inspired to post my dpp team. I've never played dpp doubles until just recently, but I've been finding it quite fun. It feels less gimmicky compared to gen 9. I built some teams for the dpp friendly tournament but those weren't any good and I ended up with an 0-2 record to prove how bad they were lol This team I'm sharing had gone undefeated on the ladder and room tournaments, and while those aren't the greatest indicators of a good team it's certainly better than my standard of 0 games won lol shout out to zee and DaAwesomeDude1 and other members of the doubles discord for helping me out with all my various questions.

Semi-Room


I started with the concept of leading with something really strong like metagross and something that covered metagross weaknesses like swampert. This decision was made in part by how many swampert leads I saw in replays for dpp friendly. The other idea I had was to have a rain option in the back, because most people prepare for rain on lead and by the end of the battle they have limited rain answers. Rhyperior was a good suggestion made by Zee. It allows for a back pocket trick room option. Having two different ways to gain speed control is quite nice, and Rhyperior also keeps thunder wave away from latias and kingdra. Last pokemon here is latias. Which if I'm being honest was just added for general power and Earthquake immunity.

If I were to critique this I'd say willowisp could probably be used over trick on rotom. Kingdra can also probably get away with running Muddy Water instead of rain dance. But yeah, I think this team is fun, hope you guys like it

 

[zee]

VR update for December! We have entered TIER ONE PERT TERRITORY


TIER SHIFTS
Swampert 2 -> 1
Mew 2 -> 3
Heatran 3 -> 2
Hitmontop 3 -> 4
Rotom-Heat 3 -> 4
Heracross 4 -> 3
Clefable 5 -> 4
Dragonite 5 -> UR
Weavile 5 -> UR
Breloom UR -> 5
Celebi UR -> 5

votes

 

[grayblood]

Is there any plan on rebanning explosion? It seems quite strong in the meta and was previously banned.

I do find some enjoyment in using it so if no plans then I'm fine since some of my games I win with it and it can be a good tool for a comeback with it, but it does suck sometimes that at any point a game can be just "hope your ghost switch predict/ protect predict actually pays off"

 

[Fritz420]

Is there any plan on rebanning explosion? It seems quite strong in the meta and was previously banned.

While I can't speak for the council on any future suspects, I think the general consensus on Explosion is that it's fine to keep around because not many pokemon get it, and the pokemon that do learn it often want to click other moves rather than just going straight for the Explosion.

 

[ryo yamada2001]

Is there any plan on rebanning explosion? It seems quite strong in the meta and was previously banned.

I do find some enjoyment in using it so if no plans then I'm fine since some of my games I win with it and it can be a good tool for a comeback with it, but it does suck sometimes that at any point a game can be just "hope your ghost switch predict/ protect predict actually pays off"

Good question! It was banned a long time ago when DPP was still an unofficial tier, and for a long time it was kind of maligned because people thought Explosion would be overpowered, but we've played with it freed since zee turned the tier official in March this year, and we've all learned how to play around it quite well I'd say.

Explosion is very strong, but I find that managing Explosion is a key part of skill expression and it encapsulates what DPP is all about to me: it is fun to set up positions where you can make high-risk and extremely high-reward plays, and it is incredibly rewarding to get right both offensively and defensively.

It's not so problematic because -- while some Pokemon get to circumvent difficult matchups with it -- there's few good Explosion users to start with, and those who do run it, do it at significant drawbacks. Metagross has to drop coverage to boom through Zapdos-Swampert compositions, and setting up desired positions is challenging as it needs to accounts for its own side of the field too. In games, positioning this way can be quite telegraphed and subsequently exploited, while in the builder it is hard to fit the few viable Ghost-types on your team. Bronzong needs Explosion to pose any noteworthy offensive threat, but too struggles to get into easy Explosion opportunities: when Trick Room is down it'd rather set up again, and when Trick Room is up its wasteful to force its teammate to Protect away its valuable turns. Of course, both of these Pokemon often carry great defensive- and/or utility-oriented responsibilities on their teams, so there's always a big risk of opening yourself up to e.g. Tyranitar and Latias. I'd say that anyone who manages to position themselves in a way where they can use Explosion, not hit into Protect and Ghost-types (either by scouting, knowing team compositions, or making a correct read/guess), and not wipe out their own side of the field, deserves to get that big pay off.

So to me it's a healthy and iconic addition to the metagame, and, to answer your question more directly, nobody in council chat has expressed any sentiment on banning or even revisiting Explosion.

 

[grayblood]

Good question! It was banned a long time ago when DPP was still an unofficial tier, and for a long time it was kind of maligned because people thought Explosion would be overpowered, but we've played with it freed since zee turned the tier official in March this year, and we've all learned how to play around it quite well I'd say.

Explosion is very strong, but I find that managing Explosion is a key part of skill expression and it encapsulates what DPP is all about to me: it is fun to set up positions where you can make high-risk and extremely high-reward plays, and it is incredibly rewarding to get right both offensively and defensively.

It's not so problematic because -- while some Pokemon get to circumvent difficult matchups with it -- there's few good Explosion users to start with, and those who do run it, do it at significant drawbacks. Metagross has to drop coverage to boom through Zapdos-Swampert compositions, and setting up desired positions is challenging as it needs to accounts for its own side of the field too. In games, positioning this way can be quite telegraphed and subsequently exploited, while in the builder it is hard to fit the few viable Ghost-types on your team. Bronzong needs Explosion to pose any noteworthy offensive threat, but too struggles to get into easy Explosion opportunities: when Trick Room is down it'd rather set up again, and when Trick Room is up its wasteful to force its teammate to Protect away its valuable turns. Of course, both of these Pokemon often carry great defensive- and/or utility-oriented responsibilities on their teams, so there's always a big risk of opening yourself up to e.g. Tyranitar and Latias. I'd say that anyone who manages to position themselves in a way where they can use Explosion, not hit into Protect and Ghost-types (either by scouting, knowing team compositions, or making a correct read/guess), and not wipe out their own side of the field, deserves to get that big pay off.

So to me it's a healthy and iconic addition to the metagame, and, to answer your question more directly, nobody in council chat has expressed any sentiment on banning or even revisiting Explosion.

Makes sense, I was mainly just curious since it was banned. I'm using it as a strategy and it is really only an active threat on meta zong and like 1-2 others so it is pretty linear. Plus it adds a good strategy for you and your opponent.

Another Observance from playing in the latest tour and laddering (got to #13 on ladder woot woot [not that impressive]) is how I'm glad how unique the meta is. Rhyperior, Clamperl, and Abomasnow all being solid mons is cool since I like them a lot. Hope to enjoy the meta more for the time we got left.

 

[zee]

we're banning snow cloak

zee	bage1	sunrose	may	mizuhime	farfromani	qsns
ban	ban	ban	ban	ban	x	x

someone finally used it in a tour game and evasion abilities are dumb

tagging Kris DaWoblefet to implement

 

[grayblood]

Damn my trick room hail team with glaceon be dead now

 

[Fangame10]

my b

 

[DaAwesomeDude1]

Hello friends, here are some new teams I built for DPP Friendlies. Going into this, I didn't want to reuse my Derby teams so I built some new stuff. My favorites are probably the Specs Raikou, Suicune lead, and Registeel double setup teams. Some of them also auto-lose to Heatran lol. Click the sprites if you want the pastes. Teambuilding process was me seeing something cool that I want to use and then adding goodstuffs to surround it. Shoutouts chirch for all the team vibe checks. Ping me on discord if you have any questions!

Toxic Spikes:

thoughts

Back when I played a ton of singles DPP, there was this Roserade T-spikes team that I loved to spam so I tried to recreate it. It's honestly pretty ass cause all the good mons are immune to T-spikes so if you want to use this team, drop that and use like Sludge Bomb or something idk. Fast sleep lead is super nice tho since a lot of the leads rn are pretty slow.

Lead Gliscor:

thoughts

I just wanted to use Gliscor lol

Specs Raikou Lead:

thoughts

I saw a qsns team with Specs Raikou so I stole the idea. I think it's pretty nice as a lead since there are few Electric resists, so you can just spam Discharge and do some nice damage. Bronzong can probably be a Heatran so you don't lose to Scizor.

Boom Offense:

thoughts

I was looking at singles DPP teams for some inspiration and saw this dope Explosion offense team so I tried to recreate that. The idea is Explosion to weaken stuff/position and then setting up with Scizor/Ttar. I used Mismagius because I saw Fede using it and it was putting in work lol, also it gets Thunder Wave and is surprisingly bulky.

Registeel w/ CM Lati:

thoughts

I like Registeel and I wanted to use CM Lati

Screens Lati w/ Double Setup:

thoughts

This is just qsns's screens triple setup team except I wanted to use Lati instead of Raikou lol

Lead Fast Suicune:

thoughts

I wanted to use Suicune since it's one of my favorite mons but I didn't think back Suicune was very good, cause you need either speed (IE Dragon Dance) or priority (Scizor) for late-game sweepers to pick off weakened stuff so I just stuck it as a lead. It ended up working well since a lot of leads are either bulky stuff that can't really punish Suicune or like a Scarf Ttar that you can set up on. Lrod Rhyperior is nice for the Zapdos/Raikou that almost every team has.

Normal Spam:

thoughts

Kang was putting in work for laptops and qsns so I wanted to use it too. I also had a dream about Tauros, which I saw it as an omen to add it to the team

Registeel Double Setup:

thoughts

I thought glimmer's team with lead Sub Latias was pretty cool so I tried to build with that. The idea for this team team is similar to the Roserade team, in where I wanted to spread poison and then let the residual damage from that + sand to weaken stuff to the point I can clean with Scizor/Gyarados. Double Sub is there so chip damage can rack up more. When I do use that team though, this almost never happens and I usually just end up chipping stuff with Sub Lati + Seismic Toss instead lol

I think the meta is in a really good place right now even though I think screens can be a little problematic sometimes. Loss of Latios meant overall burst damage was lower, so we're seeing a lot of slower teams that's more focused on positioning and setting up their multiple set-up sweepers, as seen in these teams, qsns's, and fespy's teams for example. There's also still a ton of room for innovation. We saw Kangaskhan gaining some steam with laptops and qsns's teams, Heatran is making a huge resurgence, and fangame/Bless's teams with Abomasnow and Lu's team with semi-rain Ludicolo and Snorlax. Overall, I'm still having a ton of fun playing DPP and looking forward to the next big tour!

 

[SlipperyOboe]

If anyone here actually battles on retail let me know, am interested in putting together more irl battles over wifi connection

 

[Bless]

Hello, fellow DPP players! I made a video mainly just talking about how cool DPP Dou is lol. I'm kind of all over the place so the topic changes about every 5 mins. Sorry for the abrupt ending! I didn't realize how fast the time went by, but I guess that tends to happen when you talk about the stuff you're passionate about :p

 

[zee]

it's time for yet another DPP VR update!

a few thanks/shoutouts:
-congrats to bage1 Farfromani and Bless for making finals of the DPP spotlight tour, which served as the main source of metagame development since our last update
-welcome DaAwesomeDude1 to the DPP council!
-thanks as always to ryo yamada2001 for organizing the voting, we all know it'd take me a week to put this together if i was doing it myself

the results!

Changes
Falls
Cresselia 2 -> 3
Rhyperior 3 -> 4
Rotom-Mow 3 -> 5
Clamperl 4 -> 5
Infernape 4 -> 5
Rotom-Heat 4 -> 5
Azelf 5 -> UR
Celebi 5 -> UR

Rises
Clefable 4 -> 3
Hitmontop 4 -> 3
Kangaskhan UR -> 4
Gengar 5 -> 4
Ludicolo 5 -> 4
Toxicroak UR -> 5
Lucario UR -> 5
Snorlax UR -> 5
Camerupt UR -> 5
Magmortar UR -> 5
Mismagius UR -> 5
Slowking UR -> 5

some personal commentary:
I think the 4 tier 1 Pokemon will continue to hold their place in the tier for quite some time, because Latias, Tyranitar, and Metagross statcheck most of the tier and Swampert's bulk + defensive typing owns anything that isn't packing a grass move. But it's quite interesting how we're seeing the fall of things like Cresselia, Rhyperior, and especially Rotom-Mow/Heat which were once lauded as some of the best Pokemon in the tier at their peaks. Conversely, a lot of the unranked Pokemon show one of my favorite aspects of DPP - the tier is certainly welcoming to out of the box building. The 4/5/UR tiers see a lot of shuffling almost every update, some of it is flavor of the month and some of it is genuinely seeing new potential in strategies like rain and setup spam. With so many opportunities coming up to play the tier this year I can't wait to see where things are heading.

Not quite related to the VR changes but I think removing Latios from the tier was an incredible quality of life upgrade, it was just a touch too strong for everything around it and I genuinely believe dialing the standard down to Latias has done wonders for the tier's stability and innovation.

 

[grayblood]

It's really funny, as soon as I used slowking as a counter to trick room and a soft counter to rain it gets put as 5th tier, which I think is the perfect place for it. Snorlax and magius I can see, but does anyone have replays for croak or lucario? Interested to see what it does in action.

 

[Fritz420]

It's really funny, as soon as I used slowking as a counter to trick room and a soft counter to rain it gets put as 5th tier, which I think is the perfect place for it. Snorlax and magius I can see, but does anyone have replays for croak or lucario? Interested to see what it does in action.

Toxicroak is a fake out user that can absorb water hits, so it can be annoying for rain. Lucario is fighting stab with interesting support options in rain dance and follow me.

 

[grayblood]

Toxicroak is a fake out user that can absorb water hits, so it can be annoying for rain. Lucario is fighting stab with interesting support options in rain dance and follow me.

So is it a bulky Lucario set with follow me? Pretty cool sounding set.

 

[bagel]

So is it a bulky Lucario set with follow me? Pretty cool sounding set.

Here's a replay where I used Sash Swords Dance Lucario with Extreme Speed to solid success. It can be a nice wincon with support from Dual Screens and Stealth Rock: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen4doublesou-2035226478

 

[zee]

BIG DPP NEWS

Today is February 2nd, which marks the 11 month anniversary of the tier. For the one year anniversary of DPP DOU, we will be running a $100 ($25 from Bless bage1 Mizuhime zee) double elimination roomtour in the DOU room on March 2nd. Stay tuned for more info.

DPP is awesome and I love everything we've been able to build up around it. Thank you all for playing and enjoying this tier :)