An unstabbed fire punch may KO a specially defensive nat, but it won't KO in the rain, which many nat are used in, and it forces you to give up extremespeed, one of D-nites only advantages over Mence. Even at +1, dragonite is no speed demon, it needs its priority.
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- Thread starter reachzero
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Dragonites advantage over mence is not only ESpeed, but the fact that Dragonite can easily set up multiple Dragon Dances with ease. Its incredibly easy to boost up to +2(possibly more than that) once your opponents ice Shard users are gone.
Also wth about Nattorei in the rain. Salamence can't KO it either.
Perhaps you could offer some evidence? Dragonite's bulky is only barely better than mence, it needs at least 2 DDs to have the power of a Mence at +1 if it's running lefties, it has significantly lower SpA and can't wallbreak nearly as well, and it is quite a bit slower
Athenodoros
Official Smogon Know-It-All
The bulk comes from the ability, not the stats. And it can easily get those 2 DDs and more. It really is incredibly bulky even with no investment.
I just want to say I am entirely pro-dragonite, but in order ofr it to effectively use its ability to sweep, it needs lefties and/or roost to counteract both sand and stealth rock. Once it is a single point beneath 100% HP, it becomes a worse Mence, and if you DO run roost and/or lefties, as you should if you plan on a bulky sweep, your coverage won't be as good and you won't be able to power your way through Nat unless you run Roost/DD/Outrage (or Dragon Claw)/Fire Punch(/Blast), which is pretty lolzy in my opinion
I just want to say I am entirely pro-dragonite, but in order ofr it to effectively use its ability to sweep, it needs lefties and/or roost to counteract both sand and stealth rock. Once it is a single point beneath 100% HP, it becomes a worse Mence, and if you DO run roost and/or lefties, as you should if you plan on a bulky sweep, your coverage won't be as good and you won't be able to power your way through Nat unless you run Roost/DD/Outrage (or Dragon Claw)/Fire Punch(/Blast), which is pretty lolzy in my opinion
It's not necessary to use Extremespeed if you're going with Roost for Multi-Scale abuse. As long as it keeps decent health and recovers it's health (which is very easy), it easily gets more than a couple boosts. And Nattorei is 2 hit koed although paralysis will suck unless you have Heal Bell. Dragonite as a Dragon Dancer is bulkier although Salamence is very effective at it as well although Salamence is likely to like abusing the mixed or mixed dance sets anyhow (and Salamence doesn't ohko with max special attack Fire Blast in rain, I fail to see how that is relevant for Fire Punch). And outspeeding pretty much all Latios (except a rare Scarf) and Dragons after 1 Dragon Dance eliminates the major major threat of Draco Meteor. Or it could be really bulky with special defense investment with or without Light Screen and just insanely hard to kill specially (no special attack will be breaking through Light Screen+Multi-Scale+Roost pretty much).
Also, the DD/D-Claw/Roost/F-Punch is very effective against everything but Heatran and a very bulky Dragonite can get past even that (I almost did once except it was SUBTORMENT and stalled me to death) after enough boosts.
@masterful
I don't know if you use CBnite or not but I've rarely had trouble wall breaking when it came right down to it. Also that Extremespeed is incredebly useful for the CB set and has rewarded me well in the past. Also what are you talking about where if it runs lefties it has significantly lower SpA? I would like to know what Dnite set majorly runs lefties and SpA Attacks. As was stated before Extremespeed somewhat mitigates it's low speed with +2 priority.
How is that set lolzy in any way? I mean I can understand Heatran or Skarmory / Bronzong but apart from that it's got grand coverage. At +2 once those threats are eliminated Dragonite's gonna tear shit up.
I don't know if you use CBnite or not but I've rarely had trouble wall breaking when it came right down to it. Also that Extremespeed is incredebly useful for the CB set and has rewarded me well in the past. Also what are you talking about where if it runs lefties it has significantly lower SpA? I would like to know what Dnite set majorly runs lefties and SpA Attacks. As was stated before Extremespeed somewhat mitigates it's low speed with +2 priority.
How is that set lolzy in any way? I mean I can understand Heatran or Skarmory / Bronzong but apart from that it's got grand coverage. At +2 once those threats are eliminated Dragonite's gonna tear shit up.
Athenodoros
Official Smogon Know-It-All
That is exactly the set people tend to use. Great coverage given how much Heatran is not used any more, and can power through teams if given chance. There's nothing wrong with it, and it fact it works wonders.
Just fyi, Mence has a base attack of 135 while Nite has a base attack of 134.
Nite's defenses are 91/95/100, Mence is 95/80/80. Factoring in multi-scale, Nite's bulk is clearly superior to mence's.
About getting 2 DDs in, here's what you do:
1)Switch in free against something you will force out(this may be on revenge or on an EQ)
2)DD on switch
3)considering you got in for free at first, DD again while being protected from being OHKOed due to Multi-scale
4)Sweep
This is considering you managed to eliminate all opposing ice sharders. If not, you are still sitting comfortably at +1/+1 while their sharder failed to KO you.
Basically what I'm trying to say is that Nite is more of a bulky booster while mence is superior as a purely offensive DDer. Its more or less the same as Latios vs Latias.
..........I probably wrote this up poorly but eh.
EDIT: lol ninja'd horribly.
I'm sorry, but I'm having a lot of trouble understanding your points. CB Nite isn't a sweeper, I admit I would rather use a CB Nite over CbMence if I was gonna go that route, but as a DDer, Dragonite either has to go all-out bulky to the point that it really NEEDS those 2 DDs to do much of anything, I find it outclassed by Mence, which is able to come in and immediately threaten, not needing those two or even three turns of set up (including roost) to damage things, only to get forced out before it can finish setting up. DD Mence can easily run Fire Blast to wallbreak and take out Nat, D-nite needs to run unstab, lefties Fire Punch if it wants to beat Nattorei, which really hampers it against other steels which don't share that 4x weakness to fire. At +2 D-nite is pretty damn great, but it takes too long to get there and doesn't possess the ability to immediately threaten and force things out when it first comes in, which I value so highly in any offensive poke. That is basically why I find D Mence a much more preferable option than D-nite
@Fluffy Otters
The rain sweeper majorly runs Life Orb and I honostly don't understand why you would run Lefties sense your gonna be sweeping in the rain so there's no need to really run it.
@Masterful
I never said CBnite was a sweeper. I was responding to the part of your post that was stating Dnite wasn't as good a wallbreaker as Salamence. CBnite is a wonderful Wallbreaker from what I previously stated.
At +2 it's really not gonna matter how much power Fire Punch has because it's just gonna destroy stuff anyway. Also, I'll admit that Unboosted Fire Punch is just terrible but it's still a viable option on the BulkyDD set because apart from heatran no Steel types and truly threaten Dragonite's sweep whereas with Earthquake Skarmory, Bronzong, and any ballon steel will stop your sweep easy.
As stated earlier it's rather simple to Get up to +2 if your smart enough to save your Multi Scale on the switch. Coming in after something is killed or the expected earthquake couldl easily get you up to +2.
However, I will agree with you that one of the major flaws of BulkyDD nite is that it lacks immidiate power whereas Salamence has brutal power but that's always been a con of BulkyDD. That's not what the set is for. The set is for using your bulk to set up and sweep. You need immidiate bulk not power. Otherwise it'd be an offensive dd lol.
The rain sweeper majorly runs Life Orb and I honostly don't understand why you would run Lefties sense your gonna be sweeping in the rain so there's no need to really run it.
@Masterful
I never said CBnite was a sweeper. I was responding to the part of your post that was stating Dnite wasn't as good a wallbreaker as Salamence. CBnite is a wonderful Wallbreaker from what I previously stated.
At +2 it's really not gonna matter how much power Fire Punch has because it's just gonna destroy stuff anyway. Also, I'll admit that Unboosted Fire Punch is just terrible but it's still a viable option on the BulkyDD set because apart from heatran no Steel types and truly threaten Dragonite's sweep whereas with Earthquake Skarmory, Bronzong, and any ballon steel will stop your sweep easy.
As stated earlier it's rather simple to Get up to +2 if your smart enough to save your Multi Scale on the switch. Coming in after something is killed or the expected earthquake couldl easily get you up to +2.
However, I will agree with you that one of the major flaws of BulkyDD nite is that it lacks immidiate power whereas Salamence has brutal power but that's always been a con of BulkyDD. That's not what the set is for. The set is for using your bulk to set up and sweep. You need immidiate bulk not power. Otherwise it'd be an offensive dd lol.
Life Orb renders Multi-Scale Useless though, so maybe thats why he doesn't run LO.
@Unhandled Exception
I can understand that however your losing alot of power with Lefties and your very first perogitive with the Rain Sweeper is gonna be to set up an agility or come in on something that cant threaten you. Life Orb would be the superior option in this case.
I can understand that however your losing alot of power with Lefties and your very first perogitive with the Rain Sweeper is gonna be to set up an agility or come in on something that cant threaten you. Life Orb would be the superior option in this case.
1)Wallbreaker means mixed attacker in the sense I was using it. Dedicated defensive walls with reliable recovery can usually hold their own against CBNite
2)The metagame is still largely ruled by stealth rock and sand, so "preserving" your multi-scale pretty much always requires you run Roost and/or lefties, putting you in a position of meh coverage or forcing you to run a spinner all in exchange for a poke that requires at the very least 2 DDs (which frequently means 3 turns of set-up when not running a dedicated spinner) to threaten ANYTHING, as its only offensive moves are Dragon Claw and Fire Punch, leaving it wide open to something like Cb Tar or Hippo with Ice Fang to KO you before you can reach both boosts.
3)At +2 speed, you STILL can't outspeed doryuuzu (unlike Mence), unless you run Extremepseed, leaving your coverage entirely laughable. This means that sand teams will essentially always beat you if they carry Tyranitar (or Ice Fang/Stone Edge Hippo) and doryuuzu, which is pretty much a given at this point
Nope. Mence is still taking something down with him unless you're using P2 or Cresselia. Dragonite is annoying for like ten seconds after the "oh shi-" factor of Multiscale kicks in, but then you start to realize that he's running bulk, which makes him easier to wall and having Rocks up makes him about the same as he used to be. But Dragonite's role in the current metagame cannot be denied; you really don't want Mence switching into random Fire attacks or much of anything that isn't slower and physical unless Rocks are gone.
Dragonite is more flexible than Mence on most teams, and bulky offense is definitely in. Still, it's not entirely unheard of for the bigger threat to go less used for whatever reason. I can name plenty of things less threatening than Wobbuffet was during 4th gen while he sat in the backseat.
Ok this post is more like nitpicking than anything else.
1. The same can be said with pretty much any Wallbreaker you know. Salamence was the exception last gen but this gen pokes with Ballon and evolution stone and a plentora of new pokes can take Salamence's attacks much more easily. So I'll say it again. The same can be said for any wallbreaker.
2. This is the major weakness of Multi Scale. I already realize that however, sandstorm is negated by Lefties and Stealth Rock can be spun away. Also the bulkydd set doesnt have any imidiate power because it's just that. Bulky. I can understand that Dragon Claw and Fire Punch arent to powerful but the bulky sets job is to set up using it's bulk. While lacking the power to force things out it could still come in on stuff that it needs to and set up.
3. Once again your nitpicking. The way your speaking at #3 is like your saying Salamence and Dragonite are doing the same job with their dd. While I'll admit that this is a major problem in the Dragonite vs Salamence Dragonite doesnt have the speed to outspeed Doryuuzu in the sand even with max speed. so what your basically saying is that Dragonite's worse speed makes it a worse pokes to set up dd than Salamence.
Hey guys, apparently there was a miscommunication while I was on vacation this weekend about whether or not the ladder ratings were going to be reset. I'm sorry for the inconvenience and the late action here, but the ladder ratings are about to be reset right now for this round of testing. Happy testing everybody, and special thanks to reachzero for posting this thread while I was away, and to Super for being the server boss that he is! :D
Wait resetting now, after I get off my "haxed by noobs" streak and start my "Beating on high ranking players" streak? ...I knew there had to be some catch when I started getting some good luck (or in most cases, lack of bad luck. which is good luck for me).
Anyway, about the heatran is rare so it dnite doesn't need to face it, I faced plenty of heatrans in the past few hours. Not that they accomplished much anyway...
Other than an over-reliance on focus miss, I've found a RD (Swift Swim) team to work. I used Voltolos/Tornados/Kindgra/Ludicolo/escavelier/virizion (origionally toxicroak, but I needed an electric resist, and the better speed also helps greatly).
Anyway, about the heatran is rare so it dnite doesn't need to face it, I faced plenty of heatrans in the past few hours. Not that they accomplished much anyway...
Other than an over-reliance on focus miss, I've found a RD (Swift Swim) team to work. I used Voltolos/Tornados/Kindgra/Ludicolo/escavelier/virizion (origionally toxicroak, but I needed an electric resist, and the better speed also helps greatly).
1)Once again, wallbreaker=mixed attacker. This is the context I'm using
2)It will probably spend the first turn roosting, and will then be forced out . That's the majority of what this dragonite can do if you want to "bulky" bost, as without its ability, it IS a worse Mence
3)You need to run max speed on a DDer, as a no-EV Dragonite, even at +1, won't be outspeeding ANYTHING. And then you just basically agree with me there. Mence at +2 is instant win, while Dnite at +2 is a possible win. Also, Dnite takes more time to set up, and is overall HARDER to set up with than Mence, outside of being able to deal with Ice Sharders
1. I know that's the context of what your saying. I wasn't responding to it like I don't know what your saying. I was saying any wallbreaker can be stopped by a powerful enough wall with recovery.
2. The beginning of this is basically a worst case scenario which any smart player shouldn't be doing. What should be happening is you coming in on something that you could force out like a cb earthquake or something that can't properly take on Dragonite and set up from their. If your smart enough to do that you shouldn't really be roosting on the first turn.
3. No you shouldn't. You should be running 176 to 204evs in speed to outspeed threats before the dd then try to set up on stuff that comes in. The rest of the evs are poured into your bulk. Also at +1 204 speed evs it reaches a speed of 370. That outspeed 115Positive natures.
3.5 No Dragonite is actually easier to set up with than Salamence. I'll admit it's not easy getting to +2 and Salamence only needs +1 to start sweeping but it's even more difficult for Salamence to get to +2 than Dragonite.
It feels to me like your trying to compare the offensive DDmence to the Bulky DDnite. Though they basically do the same thing they have different situations and different ways of setting up. Salamence sets up straight away with immidiate power and sweeps right away. Dragonite takes it time and takes hits while getting up to an acceptable level. Your comparing the 2 like Dragonite is using an offensive dd set. They have different scenarios and ways of setting up. When you realize that you'd see that much of what your saying makes no sense.
1)Few walls run both great SpD AND Def, which is the point of a wallbreaker. A dedicated PHYSICAL wall can stop CBnite, but it can't stop a mence
2)Stealth rock exists. That pretty much means you either run a dedicated rapid spinner for this mediocre (IMO) sweep, or use roost first turn to have a chance at an actually bulky sweep.
3)What are you outspeeding before the DD? And even after, every scarfer ever will be able to reliably outspeed you 100% of the time, which is a major handicap that Mence does not face.
3.5)EVIDENCE PLEASE. How exactly do slightly better defenses and far lower offensive capabilities/ability to force pokes out make DNite easier to set up with? +1 Mence is nearly as threatening as a +2 DNite and takes a single turn, while DNIte takes at least 3 to be a "bulky" set up
Athenodoros
Official Smogon Know-It-All
What you need to notice is that you choose what your Dragonite goes in on. You send it in against something which can't hurt it. You then Dragon Dance on the switch and Roost afterwards back to full health because you outspeed much of the metagame already, after which you start boosting and sweeping, because often they will use Draco Meteor or something with lower accuracy, giving you turns to set up. It is not the classic Mence style of Come in, DD once and then kill some stuff before being revenge-killed. It is a slower setup which ends up giving many more boosts and so higher stats overall.
The problem with that is that you can be so easily forced out by anything with an ice move, which can essentially just sit there, wait for you to try to set up a DD, and KO you. Mence can KO those threats right off the bat after 1 DD, as his offensive power is SO much greater
1. Fair enough then as I was only refering to the fact that CBnite can indeed pose a threat as a wallbreaker but to give you an example you'd feel would make more sense to this argument. Mixnite has Superpower and Extremespeed which makes it different MixedDragon and gives it niches like reliably taking on Ice Sharders and Blissey.
2. A dedicated Spinner works fine for helping a sweep and +2 is just fine to initiate a sweep. What could a +1 Outrage take on that a +2 Dragon Claw cant? What could an unboosted Fire Blast take on that a +2 Fire Punch cant?
3. At +1 your outspeeding +Nature base 115s. With unboosted speed your outspeeding Jolly Tyranitar.
3.5 First off the offensive capabilities of a pokemon have nothing to do with the set up processs other than forcing something out which Dragonite does well enough to allow it to set up successfully. Secondly your speaking as if Multi Scale will NEVER be active when Dragonite is going to set up. With a little bit of prediction, and a spinner Dragonite has Multi Scale which allows it to set up much more easily to +2 and sweep away. Also I wasn't comparing to setting up a +2 to a +1. When you stated that Salamence at +2 could outspeed Doyuuzu in the sand while Dragonite at +2 can't I was simply stating that it's easier for Dragontie to get to +2 than it is for Salamence to get to +2. Also no Dragonite only needs +2 to start a sweep. You stating it needs +3 obviously means you don't have enough exp using BulkyDD nite.
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