Platinum/HG/SS Battle Frontier and DP Battle Tower Records

[Carl]

Alright. It's been a while since I've posted in this thread with any real news about my personal Frontier experiences so prepare for a wall of words.. Jumpman style. If you're not into tl;dr, skip down to the bolded line. For those reading the whole thing, I do sort of have a point for being this long-winded early on so be patient.


A few weeks back, I went on vacation with my family and we never fly anywhere since my mom hates flying. So we drive. And long drives mean a lot of time to kill so naturally it was the perfect time for me to start playing Platinum again. However, I forgot two things: 1) to print out the moveset lists for BT pokemon before I left AND 2) to trade over a new team to toy around with. "No big deal," I thought, "I'll just play Factory." Well, Battle Factory is a bitch and a half without a cheat sheet and I never made it past my personal best of 29. Getting more and more frustrated, I gave up and switched over to Battle Tower with my fun 1-49 speed run team (or "Gary" team) to see how far I could go.

The 1-49 team is a Choice themed team based around two pokemon I really wanted to use: Arcanine and Machamp. To round it out and glue it together I used Latios as the third member. Those early BT battles are so boring that you might as well at least make it somewhat interesting and use pokemon you like, right? The team is as follows:

Arcanine (M) @Choice Band
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252Atk/6Def/252Spe
Nature: Adamant
~ Flare Blitz
~ ExtremeSpeed
~ Iron Head
~ Thunder Fang

CB Flare Blitz is so beastly that I don't even care about recoil. It OHKOs a lot of pokemon which makes it perfect for speed running the early battles. ExtremeSpeed is a nice finisher move for after I switch out or for certain more frail yet speedy lead pokemon. The other two moves are fillers that hit resistances for super effective damage. Pretty basic stuff. The reason I also call this group "Team Gary."

Latios (M) @Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 6HP/252SpAtk/252Spe
Nature: Timid
~ Dragon Pulse
~ Thunderbolt
~ Surf
~ Draco Meteor

Yeah, I said this was a Choice team but I quickly found that Choice Specs didn't really work here and that Life Orb made things much easier. Another pretty self-explanatory pokemon. Loves the Intimidate support from Arcanine.

Machamp (F) @Choice Scarf
Ability: No Guard
EVs: 6HP/252Atk/252Spe
Nature: Adamant
~ DynamicPunch
~ Stone Edge
~ Ice Punch
~ ThunderPunch

The anti DT and finishing pokemon. You get the idea. Been there, seen that. I use Adamant here since Jolly really doesn't get me much further in terms of speed.

So that's all fine and good, but after this team did its job of clearing the first 7 sets in the Tower I found it extremely difficult to keep a streak going. Maybe that's because I didn't know the movesets or maybe it's just because I never designed it to win large amounts of battles in a row. It was for fun after all. Whatever the case, I gained a lot of BP over the course of my vacation and reaffirmed that Team Gary can do its intended job but I gave up by the time I got home.



Fast forward to last week. I decided to give my fun team a whirl again but this time in the WiFi Tower instead to see how I'd fair. And also because nobody has seemingly tried it out yet so no matter what I did I would "have a record" for the time being. Arcanine was its amazing self and tore through the early ranks 2-3 (I had already cleared rank 1 some time ago) due to the numerous amounts of Scizor and Metagross. However, rank 4 I noticed a huge flaw in my team: I was completely destroyed by the common BT Gengar and its good pal Froslass. Those two could Focus Sash/Destiny Bond my team with no trouble and leave me down 2-1 at the best case scenario. And that's if they were a lead pokemon.. which they often weren't. Obviously this was a fatal flaw and if I really wanted to pursue a record, I'd have to change out a pokemon. I went with their natural counter Weavile and subbed out Arcanine.

It seemed like a grand idea to me but then I found myself losing often when even as low as rank 2. Why? I had no way to stop Scizor or Metagross from terrorizing me without Arcanine. They're practically on every team. I first tried dropping Machamp since he never seemed to do much and reinserted Arcanine into the line up. Now anything with a rock attack, especially Tyranitar, had a great shot at beating me. So I swapped Machamp back in and switched out Latios for another powerful special attacker that also happened to be a solid switch in for Meta/Scizor: Zapdos. Things worked out alright after that, but I still lost more than I wanted to. However, the core of my new WiFi Tower team was born and with some tweaking I found the proper combination to get me to rank 10..


My Rank 10 Platinum WiFi Tower Team (catchy name not included)

Weavile (M) @Focus Sash
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252Atk/6SpDef/252Spe
Nature: Jolly
~ Fake Out
~ Ice Punch
~ Night Slash
~ Brick Break

The original Weavile used Ice Shard in the last slot but I quickly found Brick Break to be way more useful and important. Without it, other lead Weavile are a bit tricky to handle and its a nice failsafe for certain random pokemon should they appear in a tight situation. Anything that I can use Fake Out against on turn 1 will promptly be flinched. Great for negating the common Focus Sash and scouting for Leftovers vs another item. If I can OHKO on turn 2, I obviously go for it. If it's a 2HKO over turns 2 and 3, I go for it only if I know it will benefit me to do so. If not, I switch out. A 1 HP Weavile is still extremely valuable (and one with Sash still intact is even better) for common Garchomp and Salamence so I hardly ever sacrifice it early on in the match. It's so good that I've learned maximizing its potential is best done by hitting and running.

Fire leads are the most tricky here since many of them can dish out a lot of damage and I have nothing that resists them. Infernape is probably the pokemon I hate seeing the most at the start of a battle since it has so many options and so many ways to hurt me. It varies from Mach Punch or Close Combat to Overheat or Flare Blitz to even the always fun Stone Edge. Any of those moves are just as likely to be seen on a switch out so it's very dicey to do so. Yet if you stay in, Mach Punch or Vacuum Wave can potentially get you since Brick Break isn't strong enough to OHKO and the other attacks are resisted.

Zapdos (-) @Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 212HP/220Def/8SpAtk/60SpDef/4Spe
Nature: Bold
~ Thunderbolt
~ Hidden Power (Ice)
~ Roost
~ Toxic

If Weavile has to switch out, it's usually in favor of this pokemon. Zapdos started out on this team as a max SpAtk/max Spe Modest Life Orber with 3 attacks and Roost. However, the purpose of Zappy was to first and foremost counter Scizor/Metagross and an offensive version would too often die to bad luck or even sometimes just Choice Banded versions when already weakened. Even strong neutral hits were doing a lot of damage. Not enough staying power at all. I scrapped it for a more bulky version with tweaked EVs from the Smogon analysis to suit level 50. I might be able to better optimize the spread but whatever.. it does the job. Can eat a Stone Edge if it has to.. or even an Outrage from certain Garchomp and smack back with HP Ice so they can be revenge killed. Since switching to the bulky spread, Zapdos has developed a penchant for drawing critical hits. Always on the switch in, too. If I lose, it's usually because Zapdos fainted before I wanted it to (or should have) due to some timely luck.

You might be wondering where Heat Wave is if the main goal is to counter steels. Switching to a bulky spread with Leftovers loses a lot of punch.. so much so that other bulky pokemon can effectively wall Zapdos. I've been caught a few times heads up against a Blissey or Cresselia, for example, and there's just no way to win that without Toxic. Also helpful for: Hippowdon, Swampert, Dusknoir, Wobbuffet, Snorlax (haven't seen an Immunity Lax yet), Lanturn, Umbreon, Ampharos, Cradily, Regice, Ludicolo, and even Kingdra.. to name a few. An absolutely amazing Toxic staller with help from Pressure and Roost. Works great with Weavile, too, since it can buy some more time with Fake Out. Thunderbolt does enough to still cover Scizor/Metagross in a 2-3HKO depending on the scenario all while Roostin'. The only steel that makes me long for Heat Wave is Bronzong since it usually has Calm Mind and Rest. For Zong I usually spam Thunderbolt until I get lucky and/or force it into a predictable rest in which case I switch to my last pokemon. I fought one Bronzong earlier tonight with Iron Defense/Calm Mind/Rest/Flash Cannon which I was forced to Pressure stall in order to beat. I don't like Bronzong much.

Machamp (F) @Sitrus Berry
Ability: No Guard
EVs: 252HP/252Atk/6Def
Nature: Adamant
~ DynamicPunch
~ Stone Edge
~ Bullet Punch
~ Bulk Up

The only pokemon that didn't leave the original team!.. technically. I've often considered using Metagross here instead but then fire pokemon would really be a pain in the ass. Like Zapdos, I had to tweak Machamp for a more bulky variety. With two weaknesses to rock already, I needed something that could take a Stone Edge and still dish out a lot of physical damage. Choice Scarf was already putting me in a jam and Stone Edges were doing too much on the switch. With the extra HP investment, Machamp becomes much more sturdy (except when OHKO moves are involved har har). The Sitrus Berry has come in very handy as it turns potential 2HKOs into 3HKOs, etc and allows some time to Bulk Up. One attack boost turns Machamp into a monster that is hard to stop.

Since I dropped Ice Shard on Weavile, I needed a priority outside of Fake Out so I deleted the now unnecessary Ice Punch for Bullet Punch (actually I took my 2v2 Machamp and swapped RS for SE and Protect for Bulk Up but you get the idea). It's a great insurance policy against weak Scarf Chomps with sandstream support. ThunderPunch was only there for Slowbro/king in the original team which are now very well covered by Weavile and Zapdos.

Machamp is usually a "mid to late game" mon after I've scoped a majority of the opposing team. I only go to her from lead Weavile if a rock user and/or Gyarados starts. Some Gyara have SE and if they do, they will use it right away. Don't like switching Zapdos into that because a steel pokemon is usually lurking. If Gyara doesn't have SE, it will generally use DD (more than once too) so it's a gimme kill for Machamp. She can survive a Waterfall after a DD but sometimes the flinch can screw me. Zapdos cleans up if that happens but it's not a situation I enjoy being in.


This team definitely isn't perfect (Rain Dance teams usually have a good chance of beating me), but I thought I'd share the unique process that allowed me to stumble across a very enjoyable team that *gasp* doesn't contain Garchomp, Tyranitar, Salamence, Gengar, Blissey, Scizor, Latios, or Metagross. Shocking I know. It actually lost quite a bit on my way up, but that's the beauty of WiFi Tower.. you don't have to start from square one if you lose.

I faced all sorts of interesting teams the last few days (I've been doing this nonstop I have no life) and it was cool to see what the Japanese trainers are using. An extremely common Japanese team is Scizor/Mamoswine/Milotic which actually inspired me to use Zapdos (which I didn't see often for some reason) since it can wreck those 3 if it has Heat Wave. Other favorites from the Japs include Paraflinch Togekiss and Calm Mind Bronzong, though Zong isn't as common. Toxic+Evasion is also a pretty common Japanese strategy.. there's a lot of Counter/Minimize/Toxic/Softboiled Blissey running around which I find a bit odd and silly. Oh well, Machamp has no problems with that pokemon. Anyway, it's now late so I can't remember some of the other stupid things I've seen.

My current streak stands at 14 for Rank 10.. I'll post a picture once I, hopefully, improve on the number of wins. I was going to wait to post this but whatever, I already wrote it up. Hope you enjoyed and thanks for reading my ramblings..

 

[Peterko]

nice one Carl

by the way, pointing out mistakes in the record lists is not considered spam so please do it here, don´t send me PMs ;)

I am having fun in the Diamond and Pearl Tower literally as I play both versions on 2 DS lites with the exact same team simultaneously (latias-skarmory-snorlax)

at 84 on both but I only do 1 set of 7 per day...

I already had some awesome battles that were so close omg

like this 1-3 situation, of course after being gayed by metagross who missed his first MM against incoming skarm but then hit each and every hammer arm, which unfortunately has like a 50% chance to break my 43HP sub if it´s a flawless IV and + atk nature one (9/16 to be exact...I am considering going max def. because of this fact, then he´d need rand. 98, 99 or 100 in the dmg formula to break the sub and skarm has the duty to "beat" metagross in my team), it didn´t break the first one but all of them afterwards and when I was about to roost for the first time it activated QC and there was the 2-3...yeah skarmory managed to be a brave bird once or twice I think (meta was at around 85% HP so probably once)

then I went to snorlax whose new EV spread with some phys. def. could help, somehow...hammer arm, curse, hammer arm CH, snorlax fainted...there you go, this basically meant gg right there

latias vs metagross and 2 unknown...let the fun begin
latias bolt, meta MM missed
latias bolt, meta fainted
latias vs medicham
latias used bolt, medicham attracted latias
latias got through infatuation, killed medicham
I don´t remember what the 3rd one was but it was a psychic type...oh yeah alakazam...latias used thunderbolt, paralyzed, kazam paralyzed, couldn´t move, thunderbolt, 1-0 mwahahahahahahah ;)

yeah today my first battle was against a cyclist (normal & fighting IIRC) and I had to basically face a curselickilicky for about 20 minutes because I switched out latias turn1 (maybe should´ve psychiced, but on the other hand latias has to live in case something like an infernape comes later)...so yeah i toxiced, it cursed a bit, rested...now what...repeated the process until the second rest and then switched in latias to try a psychic 2HKO (sleep turn2 and when it was about to wake up), unfortunately psychic did only like 40% so I had to switch out again with the plan to draco meteor 2HKO next time it sleeps...later, everything went fine - the first DM did plenty of damage and then I thought I could miss the second which I promptly did and latias died :/

now what...had to PP stall that shit with skarmory...skarmory is a man and even can take on a +6 lickilicky :) but that (BAN ME PLEASE) just didn´t want to miss (powder) and I had only like 2 roosts and like 4 subs left when he missed twice in a row, which sealed the deal...as he started to rest snorlax pumped to +6 as well and then killed licky with his second return after licky managed to get in one struggle

still 2-2 and any incoming STAB fighting type to CH snorlax means I lose...and it´s not like CHs against a +6 snorlax are rare ._.

so yeah toxicroak I think good lord cross chop CH for sure...well he focus blasted but what´s that, so much damage? of course a CH (176 damage) but laxo lived with like 70 left and said bye bye croak...the last one was I-dont- know-what but snorlax fainted it...a 25 minute battle

then I faced some black belts or something which were pretty fast battles so the whole thing didn´t take more than 45mins

 

[Bozo]

Hope you enjoyed and thanks for reading my ramblings..

that was a fun read :) i actually really enjoy the wifi battle tower. different strategies involved, and yeah towards the higher ranks you can face the "same" teams over and over again. the enemies generally have PP maxes too, so you have to count to 8 for destiny bond, stone edge etc.....

i havent tried the plat wifi BT - is it much different to d/p? i seriously doubted the "validity" of some of the upper rank teams - i mean how many people could really get to rank 8-9 with a charizard who has fly and three fire moves? i saw a few teams with other ridiculous pokemon.....

but yeah, machamp is an awesome BT pokemon in my opinion. the ones i face in the regular BT are quite a nuissance for my team (salamence, blissey, milotic) having SE hits against everyone (i usually see one with dynamic punch, ice punch, thunder punch, and something else which it never bothers to use) and i generally have to switch back and forth between salamence and milo to waste the PP out of DP, and wear it down with intimidate.

anyway, i was mainly posting here to report a new bane for my team - a raichu with nasty plot, focus blast, thunderbolt, and something else. it is timid, and won the speed tie against my salamence after ohko'ing blissey with a pumped up CH focus blast, and of course milotic didnt have a chance. this was in the castle btw which i have been trying again. that was about the 57th match a week or so ago, and as of this morning i got back up to 49. i played the first few rounds much smarter, and im sitting at about 550CP at the moment. hopefully i will be able to go for an insane record......



EDIT: oh, and look at the newest member of my team :naughty:

 

[NinRac]

why would a floatzel crunch a whiscash is an appropriate question here :/

gonna clean up some of the mess in the records (basically no proof, you´re out)

Well...of the 4 move sets, all 4 attacks (Crunch, Brick Break, Waterfall, Ice Punch) were neutral effective damage and was trying to get the defense drop but good point...waterfall STAB + higher flinch rate. I'm definitely smiling seeing my rank jump up so high from the clean-up (and then it's going back down as the proof gets uploaded) but just wondering if you're going to keep the rankings for individual species too (that was the big reason I wanted to do this Floatzel...not for highest record, but for getting Floatzel up on the list for the individual Pokemon species list). Sure a few Pokemon won't last forever on it but we might see a few unexpected ones hang out on this list for awhile until the expected OUs rule the list (I foresee the Lati twins, Scizor, Lucario, Tyranitar, Porygon-Z, and Metagross eventually getting on there and Starmie can as long as it can luck around specific threats...maybe even Jolteon since mine kept working around it's threats but got haxed on others but I have faith someone in here can surpass my Jolteon record and hit 170).

 

[Dan Dan]

Peterko, I've upped my streak in Battle Tower to 105 now:

(sorry about the massive picture)

Same team still, Cress/Chomp/Scizor

Quick question - Can you start on another Frontier discipline, whilst keeping your streak going in another? I want to do some Battle Factory to pass some time today, as I don't have access to the Battle Tower list to keep going in there.

 

[Carl]

Yeah you can do the factory and your results there will have no effect on your battle tower numbers.

 

[Bozo]

Quick question - Can you start on another Frontier discipline, whilst keeping your streak going in another? I want to do some Battle Factory to pass some time today, as I don't have access to the Battle Tower list to keep going in there.

the list is for wimps :P


and i got a question too - are abilities fixed? ie are you likely to see an illuminate starmie? sorry if this is somewhere, but the abilities arent mentioned in the lists.

 

[darkseeker4]

Well after a long break from doubles I decide to do a fun run with 4 random pokes and I had no Idea what 4 I wanted to use.
After going through the Doubles Records I thought of giving peterko's Advance Duo a Try.(And we all know how good that is)

Zapdos @ Brightpowder
Naive
Ivs :Dont remeber but enough to get hp ice 61,They were pretty decent for a soft reset.
Evs :252 sp.att/252 spe/6 hp
~Protect
~Heat wave
~Thunderbolt
~Hp Ice

Metagross @ Occa berry
Adamant
Ivs :30/31/31/13/31/31
Evs :232 hp/252 att/16 def/8 spe
~Meteor Mash
~Bullet Punch
~Earthquake
~Explosion

These two did wonders together and I simply have to agree with peterko that this probably is the best duo in doubles.

Infernape @ Focus Sash
Naive
Ivs :26/31/18/31/19/31(31s were they need to be)
Evs :66 att/248 sp.att/196 spe
~Fake Out
~Hp Ice
~Flamethrower
~Close Combat

Back up number one.Comes in when someone dies and fakes out while the second poke finishes off the other pokemon and then cleans up the rest.works well with zappy but meta is restricted to MM and BP and can't Eq or exploud which really doesn't matter but still this guy is awsome.
flamethrower cause i love the accuracy.

Azumarill @ Choice Band
Adamant
Ivs :29/31/30/13/31/31
Evs :212 hp/252 att/46 spe
~Aqua Jet
~Waterfall
~Superpower
~Double Edge

Azumarill was my second choice for backup as he hits hard and has an awsome priority(aqua jet)
this team was doing extremely well and was hopeing to hit 100 until my luck ran out to what could be the worst hax ever done by the tower on battle 94 so my record is 93.

Metazap vs. Lapras and tentacreul
I decided to protect plus EQ.So as to dent tenta and finish of lapras with t-bolt next turn.
zappy protect Ib from lapras while tenta confuses meta who hurts itself in confusion.
Im thinking no problem.I can still win this as i have type advantage.
I t-bolt lapras which promptly misses(wtf)and meta hurts itself with confusion again while zapdos gets confused then koed by ice beam.

Now I begin to panic but decide that there is still hope and send in infernape.I Straight away attack instead of faking out which seemed useless,infernape close combat's lapras which also misses and the meteor mash aimed at lapras incase i miss ko also misses.then tenta uses toxic while lapras kills with psychic.Now I have almost given up hope.I send in azumarill to hopefully get some crit kos but double edge misses the ko by like 2% on tenta and falls to recoil after eating a t-bolt from lapras.
And metagross has no hope after that as it just dies after taking some hits from lapras and gastradon(It kills tenta with bullet punch).

I was pretty badly haxed and could have won that battle.Any suggestions on improvement of the team would be nice as I really wanted to hit 100 but after this loss my soul is shattered and I have lost the will to battle doubles for now.
I really want to try the wifi tower but no wifi can really suck sometimes.
Im thinkink of returning to the battle tower to maybe hit hundread with a new team I have planned.Kickin it old school with Bt gengar/peterkos skarm/and some mixmence.ill see how it works out!Hopefully will set a hot record.

Thanks for your time guys.Maybe my next record will be in triple digits!

 

[Peterko]

@ bozo - abilities are random

phew lost both streaks pretty early

the first one was on diamond at 90 something to a psychic team with 3 calm minders, claydol, slowking and slowbro...basically I lost turn 1 as I switched to skarm without thinking (surf would´ve been the right choice, but beware if it´s the trainer having gyarados, once I totally predicted he´d sent in gyaraods after claydol died and he did, skarmory was already out though :)...yeah but at the time I knew it was set4 physical gaydol which is skarmory bait) ...toxiced it while it CMed (didn´t know the set I thought the reason was no SE move), then after like 3 CMs it charge beamed...I switched to snorlax and he got in a heavy hitting psychic before he died, leaving me under 100 HP

then slowking, I rested and he CMed twice or three times and then surfed me for a lot of damage, I managed to get it to like 35%

then I sent in latias to finish it off but went for the "safe" bolt, which he survived with like 1 hp of course and ice beam CHed (unneeded IMO)

skarm killed it...then slowbro, CM, thrower and QC...skarmory survived 1 turn lol

continued with the pearl streak but seeing as I lost my skarmory against the hammer arm metagross again and also wasn´t liking the damage snorlax took from the special side I decided to change EVs

skarmory went from
172-101-198-49-102-91 to
172-101-210-49-91-91

the defense means 205 metagross needs rand 98,99 or 100 to break my sub

snorlax was changed from
257-134-104-?-165-51 to
257-134-94-?-176-51

for the ones who don ´t follow this topic, my starter is specslatiAs

not many close calls, but those were mostly me doing shit mistakes like trying a DM on a rapidash turn1 which missed, got promptly hypnomegahorned and then had to stall it with snorlax which was a pain...he missed the first two hypnosis :/

another one was me not resting a poisoned snorlax against oponent nidoking (special version), then oponent´s last poke charizard survived a +1 return charizard who flinched me with dragon rush r1, then DDed because he knew I wouldn´t kill him and killed me...I sent out skarmory (didn´t calc if +1dragon rush would beat lati) and he flinched me with fire fang but then went for air slash finisher lol and missed...


the streak on pearl just ended at 174 wins...again like always I did too many runs today and wanted to have a break but did another run

was a 31 IV set 4 trainer with the stronger group of pkmn, dunno which...I don´t even remember...oh I do, vaporeon was his starter

now I see I messed up again...could´ve set up snorlax maybe but went for bolt 2hko as the previous vaporeon starter I faced before used acid armor...he got in an ice beam

foe sent out tyranitar...oh fuck the worst nightmare for this team, ttar 4...please let luck be on my side

switch to skarm, stone edge miss (yay)
skarm toxic, hit (yay), dragon dance
stone edge, hit, CH... ... ... ... skarmory fainted
latias faster, draco meteor, he fainted me with I don´t know what but fainted himself due to 3rd toxic damage (toxic, toxic, DM + toxic)
now everyone in the pokémon world prayed some kind of spec. attacker would come

rhyperior

... ... ...

it did 123 damage with stone edge, I cursed...calcs tell me I can´t curse next turn because the (BAN ME PLEASE) tyranitar set up a never ending sandstorm

so I rest he then started to hammer arm until he was slower but I fucked up again and didn´t risk the possible CH quake as my only hope and rested for the 3rd time which means he had 3 hammer arms while I was asleep...owned myself

the team still works very well, I just have to get into it again and think more...I mean I already forgot half of the movesets and this causes the most trouble for me as I´m too lazy to check...now I checked vaporeon 4 and that thing is an ideal snorlax set up fodder...

oh yeah before people like ET laugh at me, yeah I know my skarm can only make 3 subs LOL...if you wanna laugh, I figured this out only like 2 hours ago, not by failing to try the 4th in a row...it occured to me just like that...there was no situation where I would´ve needed those 4 in a row yet

 

[SunshineCat]

I'm in the middle of a Battle Tower streak and it's Jump's Cress against a Wobb...I think it will last forever :(

Any way to stop it? Wobb is just Countering and Mirror Coating and bla bla and Cress has no attack moves and can't switch out...

 

[Krul]

Hope he runs out of PP first.

 

[SunshineCat]

Hope...

I just restarted since the streak was only 11 and it was boring to just Reflect and Reflect and...it doesn't take long to get a streak of 11 anyway.

Are you allowed to hack Pokemon to get a streak? As long as they're the exact same they would be normally, meaning no overpowered stats, Wonder Guard etc.

Plus the hacker made my Salamence have Levitate :/

 

[Edwin illan]

I have a 85 win streak in platinum tower (double) with this team :

Lvl 1 Smeargle@Focus sash
Protect
Endeavor
Spore
Aqua-jet

Dusknoir@Lum berry
Trick room
Pain split
Shadow punch
Brick break
Brave, 252 HP, 252 Att, 6 Sp.Def

Camerupt@Choice specs
Eruption
Earth power
Rock slide
Explosion
Quiet, 6 HP, 252 Att, 252 Sp.Att

Tangrowth@Wide lens
Power whip
Rock slide
Shock wave
HP Ice 70
Brave, 6 HP, 252 Att, 252 Sp.Att

So, this is a Trick room strategy, and I use this strategy :
Turn 1 :
Smeargle uses Protect
Dusknoir uses Trick room
Smeargle is always the target so Dusknoir can use Trick room very easily. And even if he's frozen with Blizzard, it's cured.

Turn 2 :
Smeargle uses Endeavor
Dusknoir uses Shadow punch or Brick break for the KO
The opponent uses something on Smeargle, and it activates its Focus sash.

Turn 3 :
Smeargle uses Endeavor
Dusknoir uses Shadow punch or Brick break for the KO
The opponent kills Smeargle.

Turn 4 :
Camerupt arrives and uses Eruption/Explosion (it depends on the ennemies).
Dusknoir uses Shadow punch or Brick break in order to kill something if they're still alive.

Turn 5 :
Camerupt finishes the ennemies with Eruption (or not).

I usually don't take the risk to use Spore because I'm afraid of Lum berries of Chesto berries.

There are some things which kill my strategy :
-Sandstorm and Hail. Of course, this is very annoying for Smeargle, which usually helps to kill only one enemy...
-Brightpowder, Lax incense, Sand veil and snow cloak users. Generally, it comes with Sandstorm and hail, but it's very annoying to fail some KOs.
-Damp pokemon (Golduck, Poliwrath, Politoed, Quagsire) which annihilate Explosion from Camerupt.
-Quick claw and priority users, because Smeargle is usually killed in Turn 2 with them.
-Very slow pokemon, such as Steelix, Slowbro, Slowking. They usually attacks before Dusknoir does.
-Water pokemon in general. I can't use Camerupt on them, because he's killed by any Water-type user. Water pokemon with Aqua-jet are the most thratening, because Camerupt is OHKO. So I must use Tangrowth which is less useful.


I lost with that match :

Turn 1 : Smeargle&Dusknoir v. Rhydon&Rapidash
Smeargle uses Protect
Rapidash uses Poison Jab on Smeargle (protect)
Rhydon uses Megahorn on Smeargle (protect)
Dusknoir uses Trick room

Turn 2 :
Smeargle uses Endeavor on Rapidash
Dusknoir uses Shadow punch on Rapidash
Rapidash fainted
Rhydon uses Megahorn on Smeargle (Critical hit), it lived with 1 HP (Focus sash)

Turn 3 : Smeargle&Dusknoir v. Glalie&Rhydon
Rhydon's Quick claw activates and uses Megahorn on Smeargle, Smeargle fainted
Dusknoir uses Shadow punch on Rhydon, it takes about 20%
Glalie uses Dark pulse on Dusknoir, it takes about 40%

Turn 4 : Camerupt&Dusknoir v. Glalie&Rhydon
Rhydon's Quick claw activates and uses Stone edge, but it misses
Camerupt uses Eruption, Rhydon fainted and Glalie avoided the attack
Dusknoir uses Brick break on Glalie, it takes about 60%
Glalie uses Hail

Turn 5 : Camerupt&Dusknoir v. Glalie&Heatran
I switch Camerupt to Tangrowth
Dusknoir uses Brick break on Glalie, but it misses
Heatran uses Magma Storm on Dusknoir
Dusknoir fainted
Glalie uses Blizzard
Tangrowth fainted
The trick room ended

Turn 6 : Camerupt v. Glalie&Heatran
Glalie uses Sheer Cold but it misses
Heatran uses Earth power on Camerupt
Camerupt survives with 7-8%
Camerupt uses Earth power on Heatran
Heatran fainted

Turn 7 : Camerupt v. Glalie
Glalie uses Blizzard
Camerupt fainted
The player is defeated

Yeah, I lose with haxx.



I think I'll change Tangrowth for Octillery :
Octillery@Life orb
Waterfall
Ice beam
HP Electric 70
Seed bomb
Brave, 6 HP, 252 Att, 252 Sp.Att

And I'll retry this tower later.

 

[Shelcario]

Is Jumpman ever going to continue his 462 streak in diamond/pearl? It's been there for quite a while.

 

[Jumpman16]

no, i still dont care about pearl, maybe after some more frontier battles i'll try to break 500 or something

Hope...

I just restarted since the streak was only 11 and it was boring to just Reflect and Reflect and...it doesn't take long to get a streak of 11 anyway.

Are you allowed to hack Pokemon to get a streak? As long as they're the exact same they would be normally, meaning no overpowered stats, Wonder Guard etc.

Plus the hacker made my Salamence have Levitate :/

reflect and mirror coat only have 20 pp, the strategy is to trick then stall those moves out of pp, you shouldn't have reflected against wobby cause you cant switch out

and you shouldnt be using a trickscarf for the 1-21 battles anyway, fast sweepers are a much better use of that time.

 

[Bozo]

@ bozo - abilities are random

ah thanks - in fact i had just started to think that when i encountered an effect spore breloom with a toxic orb this morning lol..... i wonder why they would go to the effort of choosing natures, but not abilities......

commiserations with your streaks - i guess even a very well thought out team can fall prey to some bad luck. i like that team even if just for the fact that it uses cool pokemon, making use of what they can do well, rather than just tricking something into repeating a move and setting something up until it is unstoppable (with absolutely no disrespect to the inventor of that most amazing idea).



meanwhile, ive just gone past 91 with my salamence+milotic+blissey battle castle team. sitting on over 600 CP too, and consulting the list (lists are for wimps) this time to see how far i can get. i want to break my 120 win streak from last time, but i also want to get beyond 200.....



and i second the advice to the guy who got stuck with wobbuffet. i used to use a team with calm mind suicune and curse snorlax. it is painfully slow sometimes, so its better to just blast through the first 35 or so battles with something like salamence+starmie+weavile or something. you know, fast sweepers - if one thing dies just start blasting with the next guy.... one day i might try out one of these trick teams :D

 

[Shelcario]

If you don't mind me asking Jumpman, why don't you care about pearl anymore? I know that there's now the platinum frontier for you to worry about but, at least you could just continue your old streak just to see what happens, and so you don't have to really worry about it anymore. But, knowing you, you'll analyze the loss jumpman style:D

 

[typhlosion23]

Platinum Battle tower

This is my first post on Smogon, as I am a knew member, so don't be too harsh if I do something wrong. Just let me know

I got to a streak of 272 in the Platinum Battle tower using this team

Infernape@Choice Band
4hp/252attk/252spe
Close Combat
Stone Edge
U-turn
Flare Blitz

This thing has ridiculous power. Not only is it fast, but it usually will at least kill the opponent's lead, if not sweep the entire team.

Latios@Life Orb
4hp/252Sp attk/252spe
Psychic
Dragon Pulse
Surf
Thunderbolt

Not too much to be said about this thing. Great to switch in on EQs and usually surf for the KO. Also good to switch in on water types, as I had the most trouble with those.

Metagross@Shuca Berry
170hp/252attk/84spe
Iron Head
Bullet Punch
Earthquake
Explosion

What a beast. Bullet punch helped me out more often that I can remember. Explosion is great for things like cresselia.

I had gotten to a hundred win streak in Diamond with a trick lead, but I got bored of that strategy and I wanted to make a team that had 12 attack moves. I came up with this.
Basic Strategy: sweep the opposing team with Infernape more or less. U-turn was a great move to use, especially against things with focus sash. Just as an example: 532 rhydon w/ focus sash. First turn U-turn, bring out Latios, make EQ miss with levitate, kill with surf. Latios and Metagross work very well together, and they are both great switch-ins for Infernape. Latios resists water, psychic, and ground, and Metagross resists flying to take care of Infernape's weaknesses. It was a fun team and I did get lucky a few times. One time that sticks out in my mind was when my last pokemon was Infernape who managed to hold on with 17 hp.

I lost to 767 swampert, 774 quagsire, and 789 Staraptor. Yea you're probably like wtf right? Well this is how it went down. Swampert leads so I u-turn and go into Latios. It uses EQ, no big deal. I use Dragon Pulse, it survives by like 3 or 4 hp, proceeds to mirror coat and kills Latios. Crap. I should have looked up all of Swampert possible movesets, but I thought I could kill it and didnt bother. That mistake cost me the match. I switch to Metagross, which I didnt know at the time was also a mistake, and Bullet punch swampert. Next comes in quagsire. I use EQ, and do about 35-40%, not enough for the 2HKO. It uses EQ and I realize I'm going to die next turn. I figure the only chance I have at this point is to hope this quagsire has water absorb and not damp. I try to explode, no such luck, and die. (It didnt matter that I chose to explode, using EQ again would have had no bearing on the final outcome, unless I got a crit hit, but that would have had to be some crazy luck.) Only Infernape left to save the day. I use Close Combat to kill it, hoping the last thing would be slow and weak enough to die from Close Combat. But as you can guess, Staraptor comes in with intimidate, survives my CC by about 25hp and kills me. GG

Problem Pokemon:

739 Crobat. Almost lost to it. Burned metagross with heat wave, flinched Latios with Dark Pulse, But luckily can only 3hko Latios with that move. Zapdos is also pretty annoying. And of course, water/ground types really gave me a problem. Eventually having two on the same team ended my streak.

You should be able to find my tower record here. Please let me know if there are any issues opening up the pic and I will try to re-upload. Thanks.
http://jumpmanbasu.x10hosting.com/Battle tower.jpg

 

[Shelcario]

This is my first post on Smogon, as I am a knew member, so don't be too harsh if I do something wrong. Just let me know

I got to a streak of 272 in the Platinum Battle tower using this team

Infernape@Choice Band
4hp/252attk/252spe
Close Combat
Stone Edge
U-turn
Flare Blitz

This thing has ridiculous power. Not only is it fast, but it usually will at least kill the opponent's lead, if not sweep the entire team.

Latios@Life Orb
4hp/252Sp attk/252spe
Psychic
Dragon Pulse
Surf
Thunderbolt

Not too much to be said about this thing. Great to switch in on EQs and usually surf for the KO. Also good to switch in on water types, as I had the most trouble with those.

Metagross@Shuca Berry
170hp/252attk/84spe
Iron Head
Bullet Punch
Earthquake
Explosion

What a beast. Bullet punch helped me out more often that I can remember. Explosion is great for things like cresselia.

I had gotten to a hundred win streak in Diamond with a trick lead, but I got bored of that strategy and I wanted to make a team that had 12 attack moves. I came up with this.
Basic Strategy: sweep the opposing team with Infernape more or less. U-turn was a great move to use, especially against things with focus sash. Just as an example: 532 rhydon w/ focus sash. First turn U-turn, bring out Latios, make EQ miss with levitate, kill with surf. Latios and Metagross work very well together, and they are both great switch-ins for Infernape. Latios resists water, psychic, and ground, and Metagross resists flying to take care of Infernape's weaknesses. It was a fun team and I did get lucky a few times. One time that sticks out in my mind was when my last pokemon was Infernape who managed to hold on with 17 hp.

I lost to 767 swampert, 774 quagsire, and 789 Staraptor. Yea you're probably like wtf right? Well this is how it went down. Swampert leads so I u-turn and go into Latios. It uses EQ, no big deal. I use Dragon Pulse, it survives by like 3 or 4 hp, proceeds to mirror coat and kills Latios. Crap. I should have looked up all of Swampert possible movesets, but I thought I could kill it and didnt bother. That mistake cost me the match. I switch to Metagross, which I didnt know at the time was also a mistake, and Bullet punch swampert. Next comes in quagsire. I use EQ, and do about 35-40%, not enough for the 2HKO. It uses EQ and I realize I'm going to die next turn. I figure the only chance I have at this point is to hope this quagsire has water absorb and not damp. I try to explode, no such luck, and die. (It didnt matter that I chose to explode, using EQ again would have had no bearing on the final outcome, unless I got a crit hit, but that would have had to be some crazy luck.) Only Infernape left to save the day. I use Close Combat to kill it, hoping the last thing would be slow and weak enough to die from Close Combat. But as you can guess, Staraptor comes in with intimidate, survives my CC by about 25hp and kills me. GG

Problem Pokemon:

739 Crobat. Almost lost to it. Burned metagross with heat wave, flinched Latios with Dark Pulse, But luckily can only 3hko Latios with that move. Zapdos is also pretty annoying. And of course, water/ground types really gave me a problem. Eventually having two on the same team ended my streak.

You should be able to find my tower record here. Please let me know if there are any issues opening up the pic and I will try to re-upload. Thanks.
http://jumpmanbasu.x10hosting.com/Battle tower.jpg

Infernape seems pretty frail to me so I don't see him surviving for too long and the part where you say it can possibly sweep entire teams, I'm having trouble believing this as he carries a choice band. This would only allow one move to be used and it's highly unlikely that the one move you do pick won't be super effective on the entire opponents' team. Therefore, you'd have to switch Infernape out, causing your next switchin to get damage and Infernape will get damage and be possibly KO'ed if you decide to switch him back in due to his frailness. Other team members look good enough though I wouldn't know all that well as I have trouble making my own battle tower teams:D Also, welcome to Smogon!

 

[Jumpman16]

he probably means that infernape uses move to kill pokemon, and if pokemon 2 resists move he switches to pokemon that resists move and can usually switch back to infernape into predicted dark move or ice move or fire move if he wants to to use other move that ohkos pokemon 2 and likely pokemon three

If you don't mind me asking Jumpman, why don't you care about pearl anymore? I know that there's now the platinum frontier for you to worry about but, at least you could just continue your old streak just to see what happens, and so you don't have to really worry about it anymore. But, knowing you, you'll analyze the loss jumpman style:D

i have the record for diamond and pearl and it doesn't look like it'll be broken anytime soon, so there's nothing more for me to do there but one day get to 500 and beyond. i'm literally not worrying about it at all anymore because there's nothing to worry about. if i had two fully functional DSes i would consider playing both plat and pearl at the same time, but if im going to be playing BT/BF i'm not going to play pearl on my ds when i could playing platinum.

i'm not really that worried about losing, after seeing what trainer challenges me i could probably get to 500 literally with my eyes closed because i know that much about the DP AI. and as i've mentioned once or twice in this thread offhand, this is the reason i'm not using CLS on Platinum for a very, very long time, since there is literally no reason for me to believe that I would lose using a team that is ~660-2 against what I know is tougher competition (aside from the three weavile that are "supposed" to be jolly, natures not being set in DP is a big pain to account for). as soon as i stop getting the battle hall stops being retarded i'll revisit the tower but i havent even tried in like two months

 

[typhlosion23]

@Shelcario

Jumpman pretty much summed it up. The only two moves I would really ever be locked into were CC and Flare Blitz with CC being the majority. I avoided using Stone Edge as much as I could. I probably only used the move somewhere around 20 times in my entire streak (and I missed probably 40% of the time, but that's another topic). Also, I found that many times it was better to attack and sacrifice Nape rather than switch and chance a crit hit. Even if CC or Flare Blitz was not very effective, it would provide enough damage for Latios or Meta to come in an kill the second poke on the next turn, essentially giving me a 2-1 advantage. I'm not saying I didnt switch out, it's just basically a judgement call that came with playing with the team. Keep in mind it was not my first run with the team, rather my third run, and I definitely learned when to switch vs. when to attack and sacrifice.

 

[drug_duck]

Hey,

I just finished Platinum Battle Tower Doubles losing to trainer #150, thus my streak ended at Battle 149.

Proof (click me, I'm a thumbnail):


Team

Garchomp @ Life Orb
~ Dragon Claw
~ Earthquake
~ Rock Slide
~ Protect

Garchomp is known for clearing the field rapidly and Life Orb aids in that objective. Rock Slide is a move I found to be very useful against some of the flying teams and its 47% chance to flinch at least one opponent rounds out this set nicely. Protect is for baiting ice and dragon move users onto it which Gengar can take care of then.

Gengar @ Focus Sash
~ Destiny Bond
~ Taunt
~ Sludge Bomb
~ Shadow Ball

This is already well known from the VGC and it gets the job done very well. Annoying doubleteamers and set ups can be taunted and it always screws up at least one opponent. Very often, the AI falls to Destiny Bond, causing them to lose a second Pokémon. Sludge Bomb is nice against Grass type users and McCainSnow.

Metagros @ Lum Berry
~ Metor Mash
~ Earthquake
~ Explosion
~ Bullet Punch

Doesn't need any further explanation, lol. Takes care of things and without it, I would instantly go down to Ice teams. You can both use Occa or lum on this but I like Lum a bit more because of random hax... Had a few freezes against Meta which showed to be no problem because of the Lum.

Zapdos @ Leftovers
~ Thunderbolt
~ Heat Wave
~ Roost
~ Detect

Chou is meant to take down the rest of the opponent's side. In addition, it can stall out certain Pokémon out of their moves and win through a defensive approach. It can take Blaze boosted Overheats and Draco Meteors, Roost off the damage and proceed from there. Chou let me down just once and that was when I lost that match #150

Because I'm too lazy to say something how that last battle went (and because I have to write a rant for a semi-oral presentation tomorrow), I'll just leave you alone with a Battle Recorder recording. The text is obviously in German but I had animations activated so it should not be that hard to decipher which moves the opponent has used X)

Video

 

[Jumpman16]

ok this game has found new ways to troll me

for the past two weeks i have been trying to get the doubles battle hall record with salamence as i hinted about 3-4 weeks ago, strategy is "lol double intimidate and sash outrage is invincible". i first thought that weavile could be addressed by protect on both salamence but i realized that if both weavile targeted the salamence that wasnt protecting then i would lose but whatever that isnt what i lost to

actually, just when i was considering just saying "fuck it here's the battle video 'lol i tied the doubles hall record at 225 after losing at 224 last week on the first try'" ian IMed me and said "it's best not to dwell on losses" cause i'd started to bitch about unwordly gay it was for me to lose at 225 after a week straight of getting gayed at 224 and 204 and 214 and 190 and 188 so fuck it i'll waste time on that later maybe, here's the video: 55-41110-03456

for posterity the pokes are:

Megazoid@Focus Sash: Outrage/Earthquake/Heat Wave/Thunder Fang, 252Atk/4SpD/252Spe, Adamant, Lv100.
Megazoid@Focus Sash: Outrage/Earthquake/Heat Wave/Thunder Fang, 252Atk/4SpD/252Spe, Adamant, Lv100.

and:

Megazoid@Choice Scarf: Outrage/Earthquake/Heat Wave/Rock Slide, 148HP/252Atk/4SpD/100Spe (i now realize I'm missing 4 EVs but whatever), Adamant, Lv100

outrage is obvious, earthquake is 99% obvious but insanely useful in doubles especially with no drawback, heatwave is because only bronzong warrants fire fang (which is why i lost to it at 185 yesterday i guess, even though missing with fire fang on abomasnow at 205 means it doesn't really matter besides the fact that heat wave double targeting makes up for the "worse accuracy" [relative when you're talking about my luck but whatever]).

rock slide is eh, it's still the fourth worst move in dp (stone edge focus blast meteor mash, rs is still worst move in advance), but by default "better" in doubles because of double targeting pokemon, i had the idea for heat wave before thinking of this for weavile and realized that on paper, rock slide was not worse than heat wave primarily since they share the same accuracy and rock slide's flinch chance is awesome not to mention 405 attack vs 214 SpA (my IVs are 28/31/30/16/31/31 i didnt think i'd ever need a special attack sue me). so of course rock slide missed weavile on the last battle i lost before the one i just posted, last night, because i like actually tried to validate rock slide's presence by using it and it missed not once (i need a flinch to win if i miss once) but twice, when double earthquake beats weavile every time and i *knew* that from earlier in the day since i saw my EQ do over 50% do like 65% to a Lv90 one or whatever but i was too stubborn or retarded to accept that double eq is the way to beat weavile, not rock slide).

finally thunder fang is because slowbro is an idiot and literally one of 3-4 water types i see out of the 39 water types lol (this may be because it's at the top of the list post-270 otherwise fuck you AI), i lost to it at like 181 or whatever because my salamence seriously split targets the foes with outrage (random target) like 90% of the time (killing one foe takes away like 100% of the threat) and they both ice beamed the same salamence nulling sash, then i outraged one to kill, IB took me to sash, and i was confused after 2 outrages and hit myself. thunderfang is the only move that does enough to not activate sitrus berry but allows outrage to kill turn two

 

[Bozo]

so jumpman, youre gonna start again?

as for me, got past 105 in the battle castle. going strong, with about 650CP :naughty:

 

[xabu1]

jumpman, why are you using adamant with heat wave, adamant lowers heat wave's power, why not naughty or lonely?