Greninja: The Smogon Frog

[AndromedaNexus]

I've been hearing a lot of talk about the desire for a suspect test on Greninja. Greninja being one of the best Pokemon introduced this generation, he is undoubtedly good, but is he ban-worthy? I would love to discuss about this with you guys. Is Greninja a problem? Is Protean what we should be concerned about?

 

[Dom]

Absolutely not, he's a glass cannon

A scarf, a sash, priority all hit him hard, he can't switch into an attack either

He isn't ban worthy people are just paranoid, nuff said

 

[AndromedaNexus]

Yes, I agree 100%, but I would be ignorant if I could not argue both sides.

We cannot ignore the fact that nothing can safely switch into any one of Greninja's attacks, as well as his horrendously diverse move pool. With Greninja getting Low Kick and Gunk Shot this generation, Pokemon like Azumarril, Clefable and Tyrannitar can no longer effectively wall him. His very existence forces players to run at least two checks for him.

 

[Senortangerino89]

Heard he already got the ban on P.O. I agree with Dom on this one though, he to frail, and sure he hits like a truck but then easily gets revenge killed

 

[AndromedaNexus]

(Guess I'll play Devil's Advocate for now)
P.O. has a very eccentric metagame, so I try not to follow them too much.

Yes, Greninja is frail, but he lives on a speed tier of his own. One of the few reliable switch-ins to Greninja is Mega-Lopunny(Bar a Hydro Pump). The most common OU scarfers at the moment are Landourus-T, Terrakion, and Latios(correct me if I left some out). None of these pokes want to take anything from Greninja, and we can't ignore that Greninja can be ran with a choice scarf as well. So we effectively left the only reliable switch-ins to Greninja being priority users.

 

[matt]

-.- this is silly...

1. Spore +sash gg ninja
2. Any priority move... Espeed/bp/sp
3. Chansey/blissey safe swaps(even with low kick it won't OHKO)

U gotta realize with his ability he can only be prepared for 4 types... Ice beam and surf/hydro are almost always 2/4 so u know half his move pool alrdy it just takes a little thought to beat it and if u get swept by it then u obviously either suck/made mistakes/or are terrible at typing for team building nuff said

 

[Jiggly]

-.- this is silly...

1. Spore +sash gg ninja
2. Any priority move... Espeed/bp/sp
3. Chansey/blissey safe swaps(even with low kick it won't OHKO)

U gotta realize with his ability he can only be prepared for 4 types... Ice beam and surf/hydro are almost always 2/4 so u know half his move pool alrdy it just takes a little thought to beat it and if u get swept by it then u obviously either suck/made mistakes/or are terrible at typing for team building nuff said

Blissey gets wiped by low kick, and chansey cant do enough damage to kill greninja before he kills her. Your point have having a counter is kind of weak though, yes greninja has a couple counters, just like mega kang and mega gengar, but his crazy potential on everything else is why we think about banning him. His counters and who he counters is a very unbalanced scale, to the point where if you can kill the greninja counter, then it's gonna be super hard to pull through.

Btw, Garchomp and rotom-w are also two common scarfers that can stop a greninja.