Pseudo-boosting - a double battles tactic

I don't know if this has been discussed before, but I had an idea for a tactic in double battles, which I call 'pseudo-boosting'. This is all hypothetical at the moment, I haven't playtested it (seeing as how double battle isn't on current Shoddy and I don't battle WiFi)

The idea is simple - you attack your own Pokemon to activate their abilities, or gain some other advantage.

The obvious example is something like Thunderbolting your own Electivire. Of course if you have a known T-bolter (say Gengar) and an Electivire in, your opponent might expect this, and attack the Electivire to try and kill it before it's a threat. But if you have Gengar and something else, you could switch in your Electivire into your own Thunderbolt.

Other examples spring to mind. Poisoning your own guts Machamp - you not only activate Guts, but protect Machamp from other status like burn (and if you use a regular poison move, you block toxic poison). You could even use an attack that will damage your own Pokemon to put it in pinch berry or ability range.

Pseudo-boosting has the advantage over regular boosting and baton passing that you don't have to give up attacking move slots.

The examples are pretty situational, and so may not come up a lot. But the options are there.

Have people tried things like this? Can you think of anything else that works or might work? Or conversely, can you explain why it doesn't really work all that well?
 
Pseudo-boosting has the advantage over regular boosting and baton passing that you don't have to give up attacking move slots.

I actaully don't understand that part :/
 

VKCA

(Virtual Circus Kareoky Act)
I don't know if this has been discussed before, but I had an idea for a tactic in double battles, which I call 'pseudo-boosting'. This is all hypothetical at the moment, I haven't playtested it (seeing as how double battle isn't on current Shoddy and I don't battle WiFi)

The idea is simple - you attack your own Pokemon to activate their abilities, or gain some other advantage.

The obvious example is something like Thunderbolting your own Electivire. Of course if you have a known T-bolter (say Gengar) and an Electivire in, your opponent might expect this, and attack the Electivire to try and kill it before it's a threat. But if you have Gengar and something else, you could switch in your Electivire into your own Thunderbolt.

Other examples spring to mind. Poisoning your own guts Machamp - you not only activate Guts, but protect Machamp from other status like burn (and if you use a regular poison move, you block toxic poison). You could even use an attack that will damage your own Pokemon to put it in pinch berry or ability range.

Pseudo-boosting has the advantage over regular boosting and baton passing that you don't have to give up attacking move slots.

The examples are pretty situational, and so may not come up a lot. But the options are there.

Have people tried things like this? Can you think of anything else that works or might work? Or conversely, can you explain why it doesn't really work all that well?
I've seen a couple doubles battles on youtube, and I see people using surf on vappy, or discharge on jolteon quite often. I thought it was a fairly common strategy.
 
yea same with double intimidate, you can go to another extreme and use the good old gastro acid (shuckle is very good at this) to DISABLE a power too, removing slow start of truant can be very useful.
could do it with fire too, powering up heatran :D
 
Pseudo-boosting has the advantage over regular boosting and baton passing that you don't have to give up attacking move slots.

I actaully don't understand that part :/
If you use a move like Calm Mind to boost the attacking power of a Pokémon, that moveslot is somehow "wasted", i.e. it does not serve any other purpose besides boosting. On the contrary, if you use a Flamethrower to activate someone else's Flash Fire, unless you put Flamethrower on a crappy Pokémon like Smeargle, you can still use Flamethrower as a... well, as a Flamethrower. You can use it for attacking purposes (or support purposes in case of Toxic - a thing, anyway, which you can't do with standard statup moves like Swords Dance)
 
Pseudo-boosting has the advantage over regular boosting and baton passing that you don't have to give up attacking move slots.

I actaully don't understand that part :/
If you want to use a stat-upping move, the boosting Pokemon has to have that move, meaning it can only have three attacks. If you want to Baton Pass, then your passer can only have two attacking moves (although in practice you'll more often run things like Substitute). Whereas a Pokemon can get a pseudo-boost with both the booster and boostee having four attacking moves for maximum coverage.

For example if you have Heatran on your team, then any other Pokemon carrying a fire move can use it both to attack and to support Heatran, using one move for two different jobs.

Eye said:
I've seen a couple doubles battles on youtube, and I see people using surf on vappy, or discharge on jolteon quite often. I thought it was a fairly common strategy.
It might be common. Although that's a special case, in that you manage to attack and pseudo-boost (or heal) simultaneously, which is especially beneficial.

phalanx said:
yea same with double intimidate, you can go to another extreme and use the good old gastro acid (shuckle is very good at this) to DISABLE a power too, removing slow start of truant can be very useful.
could do it with fire too, powering up heatran :D
Double Intimidate isn't quite what I'm referring to, that's just general good doubles synergy.

According to Bulbapedia Gastro Acid can't be used on your ally. Which kind of sucks.
 
I'd prefer to stick to attacking the opponent's active as well as boosting, so moves like Discharge are superior than Thunderbolt IMO(after all, you aren't doing any real damage, as Electivire will be fast, but only able to attack a single pokemon).
 
This thread reminds me of a time when I was playing PBR in a two-on-two match against the computer, it was me against the opponent's Ambipom and Drapion. Ambipom uses Fling on its teammate's Drapion and raises its speed because the item that was flung was a Salac Berry. But that kinda seems like a waste as it's only a one-time only shot (unless if it REALLY pays off).
 

Alaka

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This works best with spread moves so that you still get to do your damage (dishcharge electivire, lava plume heatran, surf water absorbers)
 
Now that's a REALLY unusual tactic (Flinging a Berry). But yeah, probably too limited generally. You might be a little better off using Pluck or Bug Bite on the intended recipient, provided you make sure your berry donor takes little damage from the attack. That way you can nick opponent's berries too
 

mattj

blatant Nintendo fanboy
In preparation for Nationals, i came up with the oh, so clever, and never before seen idea of a "flash fire team!" >:D My team was....

Rapidash (Band), Heatran (scarf), Typhlosion (specs), Arcanine (orb).

The plan was to have Tran rush out front and Lava Plume to do some damage, plus boost Rapidash's Flare Blitz. The rest was just a repitition.

Yeah. It tested badly. Very, very badly. T_T

I ended up just going with a speedy goodstuffs team with a bunch of spreader moves like Heatwave, Eruption(typhlosion), Rockslide, and Earthquake. Got me into Worlds! xD

I'm not saying it's "unusable", but unfortunately, Lava Plume and Discharge just don't have as much punch as say, Heatwave or Thunder. In competitive VGC Doubles, it really does come down to 1HKOs or 2HKOs most of the time. :/

Just my experience.
 

makiri

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This idea isn't all that new, this idea has been around since double battles were implemented in ADV. One of the first I remember was an opponent in Pokemon Colosseum that used Guts Swellow and Crobat. The Crobat would Toxic the Swellow and the Swellow would go to town with Facade.

But this pseudo-boosting is very situational, your example of Toxicing Machamp would be better off using Toxic Orb and Protect, you get your Guts boost, but also get to have Protect on your moveset which is a very good move in doubles. It also allows the 2nd Pokemon to something a bit more productive, like using Trick Room, Fake Out, or even just attacking the opponent. And your Thunderbolting Electivire or even switching Electivire into your own Thunderbolt is also a waste. By attacking your own Pokemon you wasted a turn that the opponent used to attack you or set up his own easier to execute strategy.

If you really want that Electivire speed boost consider using a Pokemon with Discharge, which attacks the opposing Pokemon as well as boosting your Electivire's speed, and has an added bonus of possibly Paralyzing your opponent's Pokemon. Attacking your own Pokemon just doesn't accomplish much, its a wasted attack to gain a nearly negligable boost.
 
A good combo is Rotom uses discharge, speeds up Electivire who Earthquakes but misses Rotom due to levitate. I have seen this done and it is very effective.
 
Being all weak to EQ and Surf is surely a major part of the problem there. They're gonna be popular moves in doubles I expect. With VGC only allowing 4 Pokemon per team you need each of them to do more.

Also although you've got lots of choice of Flash Firers, you're rather more limited with Lava Plumers. If Moltres or Charizard learnt it the idea would probably have a better chance of flying.

With Discharge, the situation is the other way around. Only three Pokemon can benefit from it, but many more Pokemon can use it, including Rotom, Zapdos, and Magnezone, all of which can cover the ground weakness.

Surfing Water Absorbers are probably even better. Vaporeon + Quagsire might be best. Both Pokemon just spam Surf, healing each 25% every turn. I said Quagsire because it stops dischargers ruining your fun, and generally means you don't have two electric weaknesses.

Or, any Pokemon Surfs while Vaporeon subs.

EDIT: @zerowing - I admit I forgot about the hits-everyone moves when I made the first post. They probably are the best way to pull off this sort of thing.

Also I wouldn't build a team around this idea. Rather, what I'm saying is it's something to be aware of.
 
I've thought of running Rage Salamence paired up with Spike Cannon Cloyster for +5 Attack but as you can see, it's very flawed :X
 
I don't think you get an attack boost for every hit of a multi-hit move when you Rage. Smogon's info seems to imply it's one boost if you're hit at all, none if you're not.
 
I don’t have anything to add directly to the discussion, but this thread reminds me of an interesting factor in competitive Pokemon in recent years, that being so-called “gaps” or “imbalances” in the metagame created, intentionally or not, by Gamefreak, and only fixed gradually over future generations.

Type-dependent absorption abilities are one of the simplest examples of this. In Gen 3, when abilities were first introduced, three types (Electric, Water and Fire) had absorption abilities of some kind associated with them, but only the Electric type had a counter-ability to go with it (Lightningrod). Come Gen 4, Water was also given a counter-ability in the form of Storm Drain (albeit with shit users), as well as the introduction of “hit-all” moves in order to make it an ‘abusable’ strategy for oneself. However, Fire still lacks this elusive counter-ability, so I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw some kind of Fire-drawing ability come Gen 5. Although I would also expect something else to maintain an imbalance in return, such as more type-absorbing abilities without the added countermeasures available. Interesting food for thought IMO.
 
A good combo is Rotom uses discharge, speeds up Electivire who Earthquakes but misses Rotom due to levitate. I have seen this done and it is very effective.
I think that would be very good if the Rotom is in its grass forme because then the two cover each other's weakness. Leaf Storm checks grounds that hurt Electivire, Shadow Ball against ghosts against Rotom, and Cross Chop against dark types.
 
What about a Gengar and Electivire combo? Since Gengar is fast, it may likely move faster than Rotom and thunderbolts Electivire who will then be the second Pokemon who move who Earthquakes but misses Gengar due to levitate. It would beat the Rotom + Electivire combo.
 
Does Motor Drive activate immediately, or at the end of the turn?

What I mean is, suppose the setup is Scarfed Rotom (447 Spe) and Vire (317) vs Salamence (328) and Suicune (295).

If Rotom uses Discharge, who goes next - Electivire or Salamence?
 
I've heard of people using Swagger on Slaking
There isn't much with Own Tempo to take advantage of Swagger, though. Although I suppose Smeargle could Baton Pass the boosts off while not having to run a boosting move itself, giving it room for more support moves. You could also use it on something with Tangled Feet (that is, Pidgeot, as Spinda and Chatot are useless) if you're feeling lucky.

What about a Gengar and Electivire combo? Since Gengar is fast, it may likely move faster than Rotom and thunderbolts Electivire who will then be the second Pokemon who move who Earthquakes but misses Gengar due to levitate. It would beat the Rotom + Electivire combo.
Indeed. Gengar also has better type coverage to get rid of more threats that can use Earthquake against Electivire.
 
There isn't much with Own Tempo to take advantage of Swagger, though. Although I suppose Smeargle could Baton Pass the boosts off while not having to run a boosting move itself, giving it room for more support moves. You could also use it on something with Tangled Feet (that is, Pidgeot, as Spinda and Chatot are useless) if you're feeling lucky.
I have never tested it but Swagger is supposed to work on a pokemon that is behind a sub, as in it gets the attack boosts but does not get confused.
 
Does Motor Drive activate immediately, or at the end of the turn?

What I mean is, suppose the setup is Scarfed Rotom (447 Spe) and Vire (317) vs Salamence (328) and Suicune (295).

If Rotom uses Discharge, who goes next - Electivire or Salamence?
attack order is determined at the beginning of the turn
 
Surf hits all things in gen 4(it didn't in gen 3) so I see lots of people using vaporeon specifically for this.w
 

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