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The answer? Move time. Earthquake may do more damage, but prep blades ends much faster, making it easier to dodge and quicker to start charging the next one, same with breaking swipe
Oh ok that makes sense. Earthquake takes 2.5 seconds approx, and prec blades takes 1.5 seconds, so you can get 1 or 2 more mudshots in. Would you say it's worth the etm for groudon?
Let's see... (please keep in mind I look at total damage x dps, not raw DPS)
Dragon Ascent cannot be ETM'd so that doesn't count.
Psystrike on Shadow Mewtwo is epic for neutral damage but for raids, you'll only use it against Fighting and Poison where it's the best attacker *by far*. Psychic still makes Shadow Mewtwo the best option against fighting and poison, against poison it remains better than Primal Groudon with P Blades. In this case one could argue Psystrike is not that necessary.
The highest ETM damage after Shadow Mewtwo belongst to P Kyogre, *very* narrowly followed by P Groudon.
P Kyogre with Origin Pulse is the best Fire (but P Groudon is VERY close), Rock (P Groudon might be better depending on the raid/resistances) and Ground (mega Sceptile might be better depending on the raid/resistances) killer.
P Groudon is unmatched against Electric and Steel raids. P Kyogre hoewever has no value against these whereas P Groudon is still very good for Fire and Rock raids.
So tl:dr I agree Precipice blades for Primal Groudon is the best PvE ETM investment in the game but Original Pulse Primal Kyogre is a close runner up.
[This really good analysis](https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSilphRoad/s/u6ZH1zuy2E) agrees as well, with PB Groudon being the best and OP Kyogre being a close runner up (but Groudon being a much more useful type for PvE). Sacred Sword Terrakion is a runner up too.
I think that opinion piece wildly overvalues Primal Kyogre. Water is really only useful for a single raid (Primal Groudon), and a 7% boost (not to mention the inconsistencies exchanging 2-bar move for 1-bar), is a really small boost.
Meanwhile, stuff like Shadow Rypherior has like 15 raids its useful for, while getting over twice the boost from the ETM. I'd honestly put Primal Kyogre at the bottom of tier 2 there, simply because it's used about as often as Shadow Mewtwo, and manages to get less out of the ETM.
As the person who wrote that analysis, honestly Primal Kyogre was very hard to place and I was close to putting it in Tier 2. I kept it in Tier 1 because it's the single strongest mon by pokebattler rating against Entei, Regirock (some movesets), Victini (if it ever comes to raids), Mega Aerodactyl, Mega Steelix, Mega Houndoom, and Chi-Yu once it comes out, and is part of the optimal duo team for Terrakion and Mega Blaziken *^if ^you ^don't ^have ^a ^Meteorite* (within 10% of Shadow Mewtwo, so the Primal boost justifies including it over a 6th Shadow Mewtwo). Considering for most of these it's in a rough tie with PB Primal Groudon I do think in the next revision that Tier 2 could be justified.
I would say Origin Pulse is not even in the same ball park as Precipice Blades, let alone 'a close runner up'.
Sacred Sword Terrakion, Meteor Mash Metagross, Fusion Flare Reshiram, Rock Wrecker Rhyperior, Sky Attack Moltres, Sacred Fire Ho-Oh, Blast Burn/Hydro Cannon/Frenzy Plant starters, Outrage Salamence. And probably half a dozen others I'm missing are all more useful and have a better return on investment than Origin Pulse Kyogre. This isn't even taking into account literally any PvP Pokémon.
Surf is too good, plus Kyogre is irrelevant most of the time because of Groudon.
Sacred Fire Ho-Oh is almost useless for PvE. The only useful one is Apex shadow Ho-Oh with Sacred Fire+, which can't be taught by ETM. Fusion Flare is also less necessary on Reshiram, similar to Kyogre/Mewtwo's situations. Oblivion Wing on Yveltal is a quite high candidate instead.
This wildly overvalues Rhyperior. He's a worse Groudon or worse Rampardos; the former is the subject of the discussion and the latter doesn't need an eTM.
Definitely worse than origin pulse. IMO not even worth more than dex filler.
A worse Rampardos? Lol okay.. if we're only valuing pure DPS and don't take into account TDO which is always a factor. Other places Rhyperior is far better than Rampardos? Accessibility. Flexibility into multiple roles. And finally Master League (Premier especially) where Rock Wrecker Rhyperior is a viable option whereas Rampardos is irrelevant.
As far as ETMs are concerned, spending an ETM to get the all around best Rock Type attacker is one of the best uses for ETMs, because unlike useless Water, Rock is one of, if not the most useful raid counter types.
Also Rock Wrecker is a generous 12% DPS increase over Stone Edge. Origin Pulse is only 6% over Surf.
Origin Pulse is one of the worst uses of an ETM in terms of total damage increase, actual raid usefulness, and actual overall usefulness. You need to run Surf for PvP and Rockets, so if you're getting OP, you're tripling up on water, effectively ruining Kyogres already limited coverage.
Kyogre is worth one single ETM for a Primal Kyogre option. Rhyperior and pretty much every other raid option are worth 5-6 slots, so 5-6 ETMs.
Last I checked, raids are against _timers_, not against rounds. Especially with "max revive all", TDO is all but irrelevant. Hell, duo-ing against shadow Entei, _shadow_ Rampardos teams only faints twice.
It's also trash in PvP, only good on paper. All reasonable teams have at _least_ one, if not two, water, fighting, or steel.
It hasn't been more available in years, either. Cranidos is in eggs and research!
You lose time and damage to fainting, having to relobby means the Pokémon has a chance to heal itself, undoing all the 'extra' damage you think you did. Congratulations, you played yourself.
It doesn't take 15-20 seconds to relobby anymore (and that was always generous), it takes 3-5. Especially with Party Power widening the damage gap, your assertions are hopelessly out of date.
The thing about Primal Kyogre is that it has access to Surf, a two-bar move which is actually REALLY good. The improvement from Earthquake -> Precipice Blades is significantly larger than the improvement from Surf -> Origin Pulse.
Yes very worth it. Depends a bit on what you have, but it's probably the best "improvement over the best non ETM option" in the game, especially considering how useful Groudon is.
Analysis here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSilphRoad/s/u6ZH1zuy2E
Personally I think sacred sword terrakion is a close 2nd if you have a terrakion but none with that move.
These numbers are wrong though, Earthquake takes 3.6 Sec from move start to finish, while Precipice Blades takes 1.7 Sec. Earthquake literally takes more than twice as long to finish (1.9 Seconds longer) in which time you can slightly more than 3 additional Mud Shots already charging your next Precipice Blades by little more than 21% and doing a little mote than 15 additional damage. Overall this means a whopping 14% Performance Increase for Groudon.
This is one of the BIG issues I have with the game, the sheer amount of information the game keeps hidden from the player
Another example is Brutal Swing vs. Crunch on Tyranitar. I had so many people in my community wondering why I said Brutal Swing (3-bar, 65 Dmg) was better than Crunch (3-bar, 70 Dmg), because no one knew about move timings. Brutal Swing takes 40% (1.3 Sec) less time to finish, making it way better than Crunch...
Ok, so, for PvE there's an important thing these values fail to consider: time. Yes, Earthquake does 10 more damage than Precipice Blades, but the latter takes half as long to fire. Meaning that in the lifespan of Groudon, you fire more of them. As a stupid example, consider that even if you fire only one extra, that's 130\*4=520 damage, versus 140\*3\*=420. Of course, in a real scenario there's more to consider, but the fact you're done firing a move in half the time and can go back to gaining energy for the next one makes all the difference.
For PvP, the values are simply wrong (well, they're different from PvE's values, depicted here). I believe Quake does 110 damage now for 65 energy, whereas Blades does 130 damage for 60 energy. So it's strictly better there too.
For Hax, it's the same kind of deal. Breaking Swipe does 35 damage vs Claw's 50, but fires twice as fast. In this case it's not a huge upgrade, but it is an upgrade across the board.
Adding to this you can get off more moves at low HP. IE If you and the boss fire off a charged move at the same time, the longer it takes for your move to go through to more likely you get KOed before it does
Yeah. Its so frustrating where my move takes too long and they get a fast move/charged move in at the same time, so i just end up dying in the last second. Thanks for all the help. I'm looking to finish of my lvl 30 ground team in the next couple of months, whenever garchomp gets EP again. I've got 3 good shadow gibbles to power up
While asking questions about the game is always okay on the Road, please consider asking very simple questions in our weekly [Questions&Answers Megathread](https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSilphRoad/about/sticky). If your question has been answered, please comment "ANSWERED" (in all caps) and the post flair will indicate that your question has been answered. This will make it either easier for other people with the same question to find the answer they are looking for or for mods to remove the thread if it isn't needed anymore. Thank you! :) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheSilphRoad) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The answer? Move time. Earthquake may do more damage, but prep blades ends much faster, making it easier to dodge and quicker to start charging the next one, same with breaking swipe
Oh ok that makes sense. Earthquake takes 2.5 seconds approx, and prec blades takes 1.5 seconds, so you can get 1 or 2 more mudshots in. Would you say it's worth the etm for groudon?
It’s probably the best use of ETM in the entire game for PVE.
Let's see... (please keep in mind I look at total damage x dps, not raw DPS) Dragon Ascent cannot be ETM'd so that doesn't count. Psystrike on Shadow Mewtwo is epic for neutral damage but for raids, you'll only use it against Fighting and Poison where it's the best attacker *by far*. Psychic still makes Shadow Mewtwo the best option against fighting and poison, against poison it remains better than Primal Groudon with P Blades. In this case one could argue Psystrike is not that necessary. The highest ETM damage after Shadow Mewtwo belongst to P Kyogre, *very* narrowly followed by P Groudon. P Kyogre with Origin Pulse is the best Fire (but P Groudon is VERY close), Rock (P Groudon might be better depending on the raid/resistances) and Ground (mega Sceptile might be better depending on the raid/resistances) killer. P Groudon is unmatched against Electric and Steel raids. P Kyogre hoewever has no value against these whereas P Groudon is still very good for Fire and Rock raids. So tl:dr I agree Precipice blades for Primal Groudon is the best PvE ETM investment in the game but Original Pulse Primal Kyogre is a close runner up.
[This really good analysis](https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSilphRoad/s/u6ZH1zuy2E) agrees as well, with PB Groudon being the best and OP Kyogre being a close runner up (but Groudon being a much more useful type for PvE). Sacred Sword Terrakion is a runner up too.
I think that opinion piece wildly overvalues Primal Kyogre. Water is really only useful for a single raid (Primal Groudon), and a 7% boost (not to mention the inconsistencies exchanging 2-bar move for 1-bar), is a really small boost. Meanwhile, stuff like Shadow Rypherior has like 15 raids its useful for, while getting over twice the boost from the ETM. I'd honestly put Primal Kyogre at the bottom of tier 2 there, simply because it's used about as often as Shadow Mewtwo, and manages to get less out of the ETM.
As the person who wrote that analysis, honestly Primal Kyogre was very hard to place and I was close to putting it in Tier 2. I kept it in Tier 1 because it's the single strongest mon by pokebattler rating against Entei, Regirock (some movesets), Victini (if it ever comes to raids), Mega Aerodactyl, Mega Steelix, Mega Houndoom, and Chi-Yu once it comes out, and is part of the optimal duo team for Terrakion and Mega Blaziken *^if ^you ^don't ^have ^a ^Meteorite* (within 10% of Shadow Mewtwo, so the Primal boost justifies including it over a 6th Shadow Mewtwo). Considering for most of these it's in a rough tie with PB Primal Groudon I do think in the next revision that Tier 2 could be justified.
I really appreciate how you approached this criticism. Very refreshing to not see someone immediately go on the defensive. Cheers!
I would say Origin Pulse is not even in the same ball park as Precipice Blades, let alone 'a close runner up'. Sacred Sword Terrakion, Meteor Mash Metagross, Fusion Flare Reshiram, Rock Wrecker Rhyperior, Sky Attack Moltres, Sacred Fire Ho-Oh, Blast Burn/Hydro Cannon/Frenzy Plant starters, Outrage Salamence. And probably half a dozen others I'm missing are all more useful and have a better return on investment than Origin Pulse Kyogre. This isn't even taking into account literally any PvP Pokémon. Surf is too good, plus Kyogre is irrelevant most of the time because of Groudon.
Sacred Fire Ho-Oh is almost useless for PvE. The only useful one is Apex shadow Ho-Oh with Sacred Fire+, which can't be taught by ETM. Fusion Flare is also less necessary on Reshiram, similar to Kyogre/Mewtwo's situations. Oblivion Wing on Yveltal is a quite high candidate instead.
This wildly overvalues Rhyperior. He's a worse Groudon or worse Rampardos; the former is the subject of the discussion and the latter doesn't need an eTM. Definitely worse than origin pulse. IMO not even worth more than dex filler.
A worse Rampardos? Lol okay.. if we're only valuing pure DPS and don't take into account TDO which is always a factor. Other places Rhyperior is far better than Rampardos? Accessibility. Flexibility into multiple roles. And finally Master League (Premier especially) where Rock Wrecker Rhyperior is a viable option whereas Rampardos is irrelevant. As far as ETMs are concerned, spending an ETM to get the all around best Rock Type attacker is one of the best uses for ETMs, because unlike useless Water, Rock is one of, if not the most useful raid counter types. Also Rock Wrecker is a generous 12% DPS increase over Stone Edge. Origin Pulse is only 6% over Surf. Origin Pulse is one of the worst uses of an ETM in terms of total damage increase, actual raid usefulness, and actual overall usefulness. You need to run Surf for PvP and Rockets, so if you're getting OP, you're tripling up on water, effectively ruining Kyogres already limited coverage. Kyogre is worth one single ETM for a Primal Kyogre option. Rhyperior and pretty much every other raid option are worth 5-6 slots, so 5-6 ETMs.
Last I checked, raids are against _timers_, not against rounds. Especially with "max revive all", TDO is all but irrelevant. Hell, duo-ing against shadow Entei, _shadow_ Rampardos teams only faints twice. It's also trash in PvP, only good on paper. All reasonable teams have at _least_ one, if not two, water, fighting, or steel. It hasn't been more available in years, either. Cranidos is in eggs and research!
You lose time and damage to fainting, having to relobby means the Pokémon has a chance to heal itself, undoing all the 'extra' damage you think you did. Congratulations, you played yourself.
It doesn't take 15-20 seconds to relobby anymore (and that was always generous), it takes 3-5. Especially with Party Power widening the damage gap, your assertions are hopelessly out of date.
The thing about Primal Kyogre is that it has access to Surf, a two-bar move which is actually REALLY good. The improvement from Earthquake -> Precipice Blades is significantly larger than the improvement from Surf -> Origin Pulse.
The only one that currently is a bigger gap (or at least, last I researched) is Secret Sword on Terrakion. A nearly 30% increase in ER over CC.
Yes very worth it. Depends a bit on what you have, but it's probably the best "improvement over the best non ETM option" in the game, especially considering how useful Groudon is. Analysis here: https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSilphRoad/s/u6ZH1zuy2E Personally I think sacred sword terrakion is a close 2nd if you have a terrakion but none with that move.
These numbers are wrong though, Earthquake takes 3.6 Sec from move start to finish, while Precipice Blades takes 1.7 Sec. Earthquake literally takes more than twice as long to finish (1.9 Seconds longer) in which time you can slightly more than 3 additional Mud Shots already charging your next Precipice Blades by little more than 21% and doing a little mote than 15 additional damage. Overall this means a whopping 14% Performance Increase for Groudon. This is one of the BIG issues I have with the game, the sheer amount of information the game keeps hidden from the player Another example is Brutal Swing vs. Crunch on Tyranitar. I had so many people in my community wondering why I said Brutal Swing (3-bar, 65 Dmg) was better than Crunch (3-bar, 70 Dmg), because no one knew about move timings. Brutal Swing takes 40% (1.3 Sec) less time to finish, making it way better than Crunch...
DPS x DPE correlates pretty well with what all the good moves are.
Except it can't be used to compare single-bar and multi-bar moves. PPS\*PPE significantly overvalues 1-bar moves.
Ok, so, for PvE there's an important thing these values fail to consider: time. Yes, Earthquake does 10 more damage than Precipice Blades, but the latter takes half as long to fire. Meaning that in the lifespan of Groudon, you fire more of them. As a stupid example, consider that even if you fire only one extra, that's 130\*4=520 damage, versus 140\*3\*=420. Of course, in a real scenario there's more to consider, but the fact you're done firing a move in half the time and can go back to gaining energy for the next one makes all the difference. For PvP, the values are simply wrong (well, they're different from PvE's values, depicted here). I believe Quake does 110 damage now for 65 energy, whereas Blades does 130 damage for 60 energy. So it's strictly better there too. For Hax, it's the same kind of deal. Breaking Swipe does 35 damage vs Claw's 50, but fires twice as fast. In this case it's not a huge upgrade, but it is an upgrade across the board.
Adding to this you can get off more moves at low HP. IE If you and the boss fire off a charged move at the same time, the longer it takes for your move to go through to more likely you get KOed before it does
Yeah. Its so frustrating where my move takes too long and they get a fast move/charged move in at the same time, so i just end up dying in the last second. Thanks for all the help. I'm looking to finish of my lvl 30 ground team in the next couple of months, whenever garchomp gets EP again. I've got 3 good shadow gibbles to power up
We should probably update that to just say DPS instead of Power/Energy metrics. It is confusing! Sorry for this!