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During the early stages of National Dex, multiple Pokémon previously in Ubers—such as Naganadel, Deoxys-S, Cinderace, and Magearna—were voted to be brought down into the OU tier. One of the most notable of these is Zamazenta; in Generation 8, there was little to no discussion on bringing it down into the OU tier, but in Generation 9, Zamazenta received heavy nerfs that made it appealing as to whether or not it could be tested into the tier. These nerfs included a change in its ability, Dauntless Shield, which now only activates once every battle, as opposed to it activating every time Zamazenta was on the field. The other nerfs were more indirect if anything; the environment around it was simply incredibly hostile, giving it behemoths like Flutter Mane to deal with. Once the metagame settled and Pokémon like Naganadel were banned, Zamazenta rose to the top as one of the premier wallbreakers of the tier. Following the attention it garnered, Zamazenta was chosen to be suspect tested on March 22nd, 2023.

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Right off the bat, it's clear as to how Zamazenta could be seen as overbearing. It boasts an incredible spread of offensive stats, with base 138 Speed and 120 Attack to boot. Zamazenta's claim to fame, however, was its excellent use of Terastallization on its flagship Choice Band set. With Tera Fighting, Zamazenta was able to 2HKO or at least significantly dent the majority of the metagame, including Fighting-resistant Pokémon like Tornadus-T, Landorus-T, and Toxapex. Zamazenta's Speed tier was also a huge factor in what made it so offensively threatening; it naturally outsped the majority of offensive threats considered fast by OU's standards, including the likes of Mega Lopunny, Tapu Koko, and Iron Valiant. With Terastallization, it could 2HKO or even OHKO the latter two after slight chip damage as well.

Zamazenta wasn't always going to be using Close Combat either; if need be, it could always predict against would be checks like Landorus-T and Gholdengo with coverage like Ice Fang and Crunch. This made switching around it incredibly difficult without the proper means to scout against it, which mandated walls like Toxapex and Buzzwole on most teams to beat it adequately.

As for offensive counterplay goes, this was made equally as difficult thanks to its ability Dauntless Shield. The Defense boost granted means that physically oriented revenge killers like Choice Scarf Kartana and Dragonite would have much more trouble trying to do their job, making counterplay all the more difficult. Choice Band was far from Zamazenta's only set, though; it could easily make use of an Attack-boosting set consisting of Howl, Close Combat, Wild Charge, and Ice Fang or a bulky IronPress set that could take advantage of physical attackers and simultaneously boost its Defense and the power of Body Press.