Meta Implications: GBL Season 5 Changes

Season 5 is going to play out a little differently from past seasons. Only 3 weeks long with a special format running each week, it’s not what we’re used to. However, it’s still coming with a few balance changes: one new move, one buffed move, and one move given to new Pokémon. Let’s run through them!

Incinerate is a Fire-type fast move. At least for now, it’s only accessible to Rapidash, Typhlosion, Ho-Oh, Darmanitan, and Chandelure. In PvE, it has 29 Power, generates 20 Energy, lasts 2300 ms, and has a 500 ms-2300 ms damage window. It’s...okay? At 2.3 seconds, it’s the new longest duration fast move, which isn’t great, and the numbers don’t quite make up for it. It’s worse than Fire Spin, and worse than Fire Fang. It’s fine, just not exciting. It’s an upgrade for Typhlosion and Ho-Oh (which only had access to Ember and Hidden Power Fire, respectively), and not worth noting for the other three. For the two where it is better, though, their attack stats don’t quite do enough to make them worth using over other Fire-type attackers.

As for PvP, though, it’s probably a little bit more interesting! It’s a 3 Damage Per Turn/4 Energy Per Turn move (on par with known heavy hitters like Shadow Claw and Volt Switch), with a 5-turn duration. That’s 2.5 seconds, half a second longer than Confusion, Volt Switch, and Gust! The stats are solid, but you will certainly faint partway through your fast move more than you’d like.

Sadly, you can pretty much continue to write off Rapidash. Unimpressive bulk and a poor pool of charged moves (Drill Run is great, but Fire Blast and Heat Wave not so much. It does get Flame Charge now, but we’ll discuss that below.) do a lot to rein in the fire horse. Rapidash enthusiast(s?), your time may come eventually, but it’s not now.

Ho-Oh really appreciates Incinerate. With such an expensive set of charged moves, it’s needed more energy generation to actually leverage them, and Incinerate provides! It’s actually got some real meta-relevant wins! Running Incinerate with Brave Bird and Earthquake (remember when that happened?) its 2shield wins include Metagross, Groudon, Snorlax, and Togekiss. In the 1shield, though, it gets way more impressive, keeping all those and picking up Mewtwo, Dialga (without Thunder), and even Melmetal! As a Fire/Flying-type, the fact that it can handle the Rock Slide-spamming Melmetal in the 0 and 1shield scenarios is super impressive. However, it’s...probably not enough to make the Rainbow Pokémon relevant. It could really use a bit of a boost with a cheaper move. Maybe we’ll get lucky, and Sacred Fire will be, like 40-45 energy? (hi, Niantic, if you’re listening, something like 70/40 would be great).

This is something of a sidegrade for Typhlosion. The Volcano Pokémon already has access to Shadow Claw, a Ghost-type 3 DPT/4 EPT move. For sure, it’ll be really nice for Typhlosion to have the option to go for Fire damage, making it more consistent at answering Grass- and Steel-types. However, Typhlosion in general has issues with being useful. While its energy generation is the highest of all the Blast Burn users, the fact that it has no bait move (like Charizard’s Dragon Claw) means it ends up playing out slower overall, and getting walled out by shields. Maybe Typhlosion can shine in a limited metagame. Maybe it’ll get a cheaper move to run over Solar Beam. Otherwise, though, think about Typhlosion about as much as you did before (which is probably not much.) This just doesn’t make the mon meaningfully better.

This is an...interesting addition for Darmanitan. Darmanitan’s...really bad, right now. Fire isn’t necessarily well-positioned in any league, and Darm has cripplingly low bulk. So, does Incinerate help? Ehhhkindanotreallyno. There just isn’t any format where it has super notable wins. It never really thrives, especially not over other Fire-types.

Chandelure appreciates Incinerate on the Fire side. Ignoring the duration, it’s just an upgrade over Fire Spin’s energy generation (same damage), letting it spam out Shadow Balls/Overheats/Energy Balls way quicker. On the other end, it deals more damage than Hex while keeping the same energy. All of this makes it seem somewhat appealing, and it kinda is! However, like Darmanitan, its low bulk is a huge issue for its performance. In the Master League Premier Cup, Incinerate gives it 0 new wins that it couldn’t get with either Hex or Fire Spin. That said, with Flame Charge it’s a little more interesting (read on below).

Poison Sting’s energy generation is getting cranked up, bringing it from a 1.5 DPT/3 EPT move to a 1.5 DPT/4 EPT. Not a lot of relevant Pokémon actually get Poison Sting, as it’s generally relegated to not-fully-evolved Pokémon. So let’s ignore most of these and just look at Vespiquen, Qwilfish, Drapion, and Ariados. Getting this out of the way: the move isn’t super exciting, necessarily. Normal 4 EPT moves are 2 DPT, and the good 1.5 DPT moves are typically paired with 4.5 EPT. That said, 4 EPT is still really solid when paired with good charged moves. Again, let’s run through one by one.

Vespiquen has quite the array of fast moves, from balanced ones like Air Slash and Bug Bite to high energy ones like Fury Cutter and the now-buffed Poison Sting. Just by the numbers, Fury Cutter is just better than Poison Sting (2 DPT on FC, without accounting for STAB), but it’s not unlikely that there will be a meta where Poison Sting performs better. Notably, Poison is Super Effective against Azumarill, whereas Bug is resisted! Don’t expect any huge changes to Vespiquen’s performance, but more options isn’t bad (outside of making it harder to roll with TMs).

Drapion already has a high energy generation move in Infestation (1.66 DPT/4.33 EPT). That’s just better than Poison Sting, outside of STAB, and potentially type effectiveness. Feels bad to say, but you’re not likely to see much Poison Sting Drapion running around.

Ariados is a bit of a stretch to even include on this list, in all fairness. Like Drapion, it also has Infestation. Unlike Drapion, it actually gets STAB on Infestation. You never saw Ariados, and you will likely continue to never see Ariados.

Qwilfish, on the other hand, is actually interesting! It has a powerful pool of charged moves. Aqua Tail has always been core, but then there’s been the choice between Sludge Wave and Ice Beam (and it technically has Acid Spray and Fell Stinger, though those aren’t as good). However, with Water Gun’s low energy generation, it hasn’t been able to spam them particularly effectively. Poison Sting, though, has the chance to create a new variety of Qwilfish, with more emphasis on charged moves rather than making use of Water Gun’s solid consistent damage. It was a heavy hitter in Halloween Cup recently, as well as some other limited metagames. This could give it a new chance to shine!

Flame Charge is now available to 4 more Pokémon: Rapidash, Entei, Emboar, and Chandelure. Sadly, Flame Charge just...isn’t a great move? 65 Power for 50 Energy is just a bad going rate. While the guaranteed +1 Attack is nice, it’s too expensive for any Pokémon to effectively leverage it. Of the Pokémon here, it’s probably going to be most effective on Rapidash. Incinerate + Drill Run and Flame Charge is about as good as a Rapidash is going to get. Read that they’ll shield, use the Flame Charge, hit harder with your Incinerates and Drill Runs. Entei will continue to be happier with Iron Head + Overheat/Flamethrower (and it’s not very good anyway). Emboar is stuck with Ember as its best fast move, so it’s still not worth paying attention to. Chandelure is probably the most interesting of the bunch, though. As its new cheapest charge move, it can enable more effective baits when you’re trying to line up a hard-hitting Shadow Ball. Even better, this increases your attack rather than lowering it! The lamp is still pretty squishy, though, which may keep it stuck as an offmeta pick.

Flame Charge is a bit of a weird move. It typically can’t really carry its weight for damage, and it’s too expensive to be an effective bait most of the time. Still, though, the more Pokémon that learn it, the better a shot it has at seeing play.

Season 5 is weird, and most of the changes honestly don’t really matter. Hopefully whatever changes come along with Season 6 in a few weeks are more meaningful and exciting!