Following week 1 of the Ekans Draft, the LC council has decided to ban Gastly, Gothita, and Moody.



Gastly is among the most immediately threatening Pokemon in the tier due to a combination of its fantastic 19 special attack and 18 speed, strong STABs in Sludge Wave and Shadow Ball, and a plethora of coverage moves that includes Thunderbolt, Energy Ball, Fire Punch, Psychic, and Sucker Punch. It has improved enormously with the new generation due to what had previously been its primary counterplay in Pursuit getting removed, in addition to Knock Off having its distribution greatly lowered and several faster threats like Abra and Staryu disappearing. Life Orb Gastly in particular is able to OHKO the vast majority of Pokemon that aren't wielding Eviolite, as well as 2HKO most that do, allowing it to reliably get KOs almost every time it comes into play against teams that lack one of its select few checks. These checks have their usage dramatically skewed upwards, as the only other significant option to deal with Gastly is revenge-killing it with faster threats, all of which are unable to safely switch in and are generally less threatening than Gastly.



Gothita is noticeably bulkier than the other common LC trappers, and has access to a variety of coverage and support moves including Thunderbolt, Energy Ball, Trick, Charm, and Thunder Wave. This allows each of its major sets to be tailored to switch into and trap a fair number of defensive Pokemon, as well as guarantee a revenge-kill on many more offensive and defensive Pokemon. The ability to actively switch into many of its targets means that it can effectively invalidate them from team preview. The options to countertrap Gothita are quite limited - Pursuit is no longer available, and Eviolite Gothita variants are generally able to avoid being countertrapped by the likes of Trapinch and Diglett - meaning Gothita will often be able to trap multiple threats per game. Gothita is able to support many of the top offensive threats in the metagame to an extreme degree by removing their strongest checks in a manner that allows limited counterplay.



To address why we're only banning Gothita and not trappers as a whole: because LC naturally leans towards offense at level 5, the defensive cores that can be easily invalidated by having a Choice Scarf tricked onto them in OU simply don't exist in LC. Even the most defensive Pokemon will be able to 2HKO a decent portion of the metagame instead of attempting to whittle the opposition down through passive means. Most trappers will need significant support just to perform their own supportive roles, as they struggle to come in and then will often require further chip to actually come out on top against their targets. This allows for significant opportunity to play around opposing trappers. It's worth noting that even if their defensive answers have been removed by a trapper teammate, the diversity of LC's available offensive answers means that most offensive threats will still face multiple soft checks instead of immediately being able to sweep. Gothita differentiates itself from other trappers by having the bulk to actually switch in on its checks (Wynaut, while bulkier, is outright ineffective at trapping many bulkier targets due to its movepool), in addition to simply being able to trap a greater variety of threats. Trapinch is only slightly less effective in these areas, though, so we will likely be looking into it next.



Moody is currently available on two Pokemon in LC, Remoraid and Snorunt, and we have deemed it to be uncompetitive on both. Because of how damage rolls work at level 5, as well as how most passive options such as hazards, status, and leftovers have their effects rounded down, LC naturally skews towards offense; options to consistently deal with Moody abusers that might be available and common in OU, such as (p)hazing and Toxic, would be close to unviable in the LC metagame except to deal with Moody. As such, the opponent to the Moody abuser simply has to hope that Moody doesn't grant favourable boosts in time; if Moody does grant favourable boosts, then the Moody abuser will generally be able to sweep with no room for counterplay, leaving the outcome of the game entirely up to random chance instead of player skill.





All of these bans will be in place for Ekans beginning in week 2. We will continue to keep a close eye on the metagame, and may look into another wave of bans following week 2 of Ekans Draft.