Thank you very much for this super interesting information! The way of battling are so different between west and east! Can you tell me more about this "Increase attack move concept?" Maybe more examples of other pokemon doing the same thing? Do you also have other concepts? Can you tell me some of them?
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3v3 Singles Metagame Discussion Thread [The Pentagon is back!!]
- Thread starter Hulavuta
- Start date
So I'm a bit rusty since my 3DS was broken for a while, but I'll be back to playing this metagame soon after I get over my team builders block!
Something I'm curious about though: are there any Pokemon you guys currently feel are rising threats? I remember last season + looking at statistics, I saw that Mamoswine has made quite a leap in usage! I'm not too surprised, I've always thought Mamoswine is a pretty badass Pokemon! Icicile Spear is awesome at ruining Garchomp Focus Sashes, that Ground type STAB is great, and of course, its always fun to make dragons cry with Ice Shard!
So I'm wondering: What Pokemon do you guys feel are starting to trend up at the moment?
Something I'm curious about though: are there any Pokemon you guys currently feel are rising threats? I remember last season + looking at statistics, I saw that Mamoswine has made quite a leap in usage! I'm not too surprised, I've always thought Mamoswine is a pretty badass Pokemon! Icicile Spear is awesome at ruining Garchomp Focus Sashes, that Ground type STAB is great, and of course, its always fun to make dragons cry with Ice Shard!
So I'm wondering: What Pokemon do you guys feel are starting to trend up at the moment?
iv faced so many rock slide kangaskhan it makes me want to cry on the inside. pretty much every mence bar very few are sub variants. Rotom-H is seriously good. AV Mamo feels like it's more common than scarf and sash. I've seen a fair share of scald toxic protect azus. Mega Heracross is a dominant force must respect. idk if any of this helps but yeah. 1 more thing: Sitrus Thundurus-I with nasty plot is also its most common build.
(Writing this on my phone so hard) Yeah Mega Kangaskhan is still the undisputed best pokemon but so long as you bring a couple of capable checks he's manageble. Common checks include Gengar (who at least burns or destiny bonds) and physically defensive Cress, Suicune, Hippowdon (often runs yawn and is a great stealth rock setter) and even Serperior who often runs reflect, glare and synthesis (surprisingly effective actually) with all of these pokemon usually running rocky helmet. Also as was mentioned Thundurus-I is everywhere and often runs a bulky boosting set. Good old Garchomp is still very capable (choice band is my favourite) but the issue I have with him and both Mega Salamence is that almost everything runs an ice move and the aforementioned bulky and common pokes can take any hit and usually just KO back. They are still good though. I've seen Sub/toxic and weakness policy (often a swords dance variant) Aegislash around as well. Talonflame is common and is good at basically everything it does with life orb swords dance and bulky stallish variants being more common I find than CB. Bulky Heatran is usually what is switched into to face the Bird. Sand rush Excadrill is not common but I've seen a few of the top players use it and in the right hands is absolutely deadly with it usually running an air balloon and swords dance. Other common Mega's include defensive Venusaur ( ugh damm this bulky thing it just doesn't die) and as was mentioned Heracross who is deadly. Just be sure to bring something for Talonflame though. Landorus -T is not quite as ubiquitous as it once was but is still very good and a solid, powerful check to almost every physical sweeper. I've tried trick room and it's solid with swords dance Mega Mawile being very dangerous under it along with Mega Heracross too (he doesn't need trick room though to be good). Blaziken, with good reason, is fairly common too with about half running the Mega set and the other half a life orb physical or special sweeper. I just want to say as well that 3vs3 battle spot is my favourite battle format due to it's often fast paced, intense feel and something else I like about it is that it feels a bit more 'international' in that many Japanese players frequent the ladder too.
Also I want to say that bulky minimize Clefable with that berry that raises defense when hit, calm mind, recovery move and stored power is just evil :).
Also I want to say that bulky minimize Clefable with that berry that raises defense when hit, calm mind, recovery move and stored power is just evil :).
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chuckaboomboom
I believe I can HM02
1 in 4 have rock slide actually, so it's not that rare.
Attachments
I tried this with Secret Power, paraflinch M-Kang is real!
I'll be back from overseas in a few days and I'm looking to get back into the 3v3 after I spend my first day back playing the Pikachu Cup, and I'm wondering what underused megas people are feeling at the moment. I had some success with DD + Facade M-Altaria last season so I'm thinking of bringing it back (esp. since I now have a perfect Heatran to pair it with), but I'm open to suggestions!
Several notable underused megas (that aren't bad) are:
Altaria
Gyarados
Latias
Metagross
Sceptile
Alakazam
Out of these, Altaria is perhaps the most used. Gyarados goes mega sometimes but I believe it often has competition with its own Rocky Helmet set. Latias has a cool niche as a Sub/CM/mono sweeper and destroying certain archetypes, but can be very hit or miss. Metagross often competes with Aegislash for a slot (and also gets checked by it), but its Speed is a redeeming quality. Sub/Hone Claws/ZHB/EQ may be worth trying out. Sceptile is the fastest nonScarfed Dragon in the game and I'm sure that has its uses. Mega Zam can do a lot of fun stuff with its Speed, Trace, and Encore (like stealing Parental Bond from Zam and locking it into Sucker Punch, stealing Prankster from Klefki/Thundurus and locking them into Sub/Nasty Plot, snagging Protean from Greninja, etc)
Altaria
Gyarados
Latias
Metagross
Sceptile
Alakazam
Out of these, Altaria is perhaps the most used. Gyarados goes mega sometimes but I believe it often has competition with its own Rocky Helmet set. Latias has a cool niche as a Sub/CM/mono sweeper and destroying certain archetypes, but can be very hit or miss. Metagross often competes with Aegislash for a slot (and also gets checked by it), but its Speed is a redeeming quality. Sub/Hone Claws/ZHB/EQ may be worth trying out. Sceptile is the fastest nonScarfed Dragon in the game and I'm sure that has its uses. Mega Zam can do a lot of fun stuff with its Speed, Trace, and Encore (like stealing Parental Bond from Zam and locking it into Sucker Punch, stealing Prankster from Klefki/Thundurus and locking them into Sub/Nasty Plot, snagging Protean from Greninja, etc)
Mega Aerodactyl is a pretty fun one at the moment that can check quite a lot of the faster meta with its 150 Speed and Rock/Flying STAB, notably shutting down threats like Talonflame, Charizard, Volcarona, Blaziken, Breloom, Zapdos and Serperior in one slot while resisting some key types such as Normal and Ground. A wide range of coverage moves such as Aqua Tail, Ice Fang and Fire Fang ensure it can also check Ferrothorn, Garchomp and Mega Salamence with some degree of success. Finally, Mega Aerodactyl makes for a reliable out against Mega Lopunny, a mon that not many teams have a concrete way of winning against.
Mega Beedrill has also been pretty cool as a cleaner but also fairly inconsistent and reliant on support in the few games I've used it in. Fast, strong U-Turns and a dedicated Fairy slaying move are both great, but it struggles to beat a lot of things and requires heavy support to function properly. Still makes a great win con against a whole bunch of teams, especially with an easy out versus Heatran in Drill Run.
Mega Beedrill has also been pretty cool as a cleaner but also fairly inconsistent and reliant on support in the few games I've used it in. Fast, strong U-Turns and a dedicated Fairy slaying move are both great, but it struggles to beat a lot of things and requires heavy support to function properly. Still makes a great win con against a whole bunch of teams, especially with an easy out versus Heatran in Drill Run.
I have been out of things for a few weeks but I'm still having good results with Mega Sharpedo. At first I thought it'd be an inferior Mega Blaziken or Mega Gyarados but it stands out as a really nice and unique cleaner since having what is essentially a CB STAB Crunch off of 140 Attack is incredibly good. Shame that it's forced to run Protect and needs to give up Water STAB to run Destiny Bond though. Also has to be careful not to set up on stuff that can take advantage of the Protect turn. It doesn't seem to need too much specific team support to function given that Crunch and Ice Fang alone covers a lot, as long as the opposing team is weakened enough Crunch often takes care of the rest. Ice Fang misses are very demoralizing though. Really the biggest downsides are the forced Protects and how frail it is.
Sub + HC Metagross sounds fun though, might give that a try.
Sub + HC Metagross sounds fun though, might give that a try.
Congratulations to mamo for making top 12 :-)
Not too surprised by this, mamo has been on so many teams lately and i feel like its one of the best leads right now, if not the best, with access to rocks and a multihit move that hits the most common sash mon 4x. and its stabs are so hard to switch into as well. really cool pokemon im pretty happy to see this in the top 12.
Not too surprised by this, mamo has been on so many teams lately and i feel like its one of the best leads right now, if not the best, with access to rocks and a multihit move that hits the most common sash mon 4x. and its stabs are so hard to switch into as well. really cool pokemon im pretty happy to see this in the top 12.
Wow! RIP Charizard I guess.. Not sure what happened to all the double-dance Zard-X's that were running around, I still think it's one of the most powerful megas available and to see it drop off the rankings like it has been is really shocking to me! Also the fact that Mamo has broken the top 12 and not Serperior is really interesting, I wonder how Serp usage has been changing since nouthuca posted the statistics last season, he was last seen at no.13!
Yeah ive ran into a couple mamos with toxic and helmet. I kinda wanna try it myself. Anything out of the ordinary with helmet interests me. Any idea what kind of ev spread those run?
Max/Max+ HP/Def Impish gives Mamo an okay chance of surviving +1 Adamant Mence Double Edge (will always survive Jolly), will survive +1 Outrage/Blitz from Adamant ZardX (if it's Swords Dance you're toast tho), and won't be 2HKOed by Garchomp Outrage or Talonflame's Life Orbed Brave Birds.
I get that Mega Beedrill is kinda crappy in the current meta, but could it work? His Mega Evolution turns him from garbage into an extremely powerful offensive presence as well as a great pivot. Its most common set consists of U-Turn, Poison Jap, Drill Run, and Protect. It functions extremely well as a lead, because of its ability to Protect and search for threats, and annihilate stuff when it needs to. The only problem is that it legit CANNOT take a hit, and because a lot of switching will be done with Mega Beedrill, that raises a huge problem. This thing in Mega form is so frail it's almost comical. He basically needs a free switch, or some sort of Pokemon with Eject Button. I can see it fitting on a lot of hyper-offensive teams. What do you guys think?
I'll quote what I said above:
Usually it's best used with some Electric Pokémon so that it gets Volt Switch and a Talonflame check in one; Zapdos and Raikou both work well. Mega Beedrill's best trait is being able to come in after a sack (or a successful VoltTurn) and click U-Turn with almost complete impunity, only fearing priority from stuff like Azu and Talonflame. Most U-Turn resists are obliterated by Poison Jab or Drill Run, and those that aren't can be U-Turned on anyway as you bring in your check with some free damage as a bonus. Most of the time, Mega Beedrill is fast and strong enough that it doesn't care about slower stuff as it U-Turns around but it has a severe allergy to Thundurus and Talonflame in particular, and there are a bunch of other things that force you to bench it at team preview as well (Gengar and Aegislash come to mind). But yeah; as long as you bring answers to Flying types, Steel types, and Ghost types (Tyranitar, Raikou and Mamoswine all stand out as good teammates) Mega Beedrill is more than capable of chunking or outright KOing everything else, especially Fairies, bulky Psychics and Heatran.
As electric Pokémon i think AV raikou is the best ally since it check well both talonflame and thundurus
Ok so I really did not want to make a post about anything but I elt this was going to be super helpful. As you guys know, Jibaku has done the honor of sharing a blog site that keeps sharing high ranked battle spot players' teams. For this season, I've had the misfortune (misfortune because of why I had to play so much) and fortune (because of my fortunate yet temporary 1930 peak) of playing many games throughout various point intervals (1900+, 1800s, 1700s, 1600s, and unfortunately right now 1500s as well as early season 1400s for a good ~12ish games) for a current total somewhere in the mid 400s. My point of posting is, I've also went thru the blog site Jibaku shared many times looking for teams I might be interested in and seeing what I can make a team of and using them. I haven't made nearly as many teams as I've gone over. However, one thing that has appeared time and time again: I have faced nearly the same exact teams from that site multiple times! I only have so many of them in my memory but when I see them and play em as if I saw their team already, everything works out exactly as planned which leads me to further be convinced. This is season 11 but that doesn't mean I see season 10 teams only either. I also saw the same exact team I used for 1930 that was a season 9 team iirc and while I lost a winning game due to a disconnect, everything worked exactly as I thought due to the fact the exact same team was being used! Also keep in mind, this team was not even in the top of the blog's listing. It was a team that had no pokemon images for it on the main blog site that I searched forever for to fit my specifications. I also don't know all of them off of my memory of course so maybe many more of my opponents' teams have been from the blog! Basically my main point is: you will see teams exact or near exact to the ones (and there are many if you count past seasons like you should) that are on that blog site!
Thought this would help to the very determined individual who might want to have a ctrl+f and a translation tab open to potentially find a match to your opp's team and figure out what they might be using to have a better time laddering! Poor man's version of sub rom laddering.
Good luck all and remember luck (i'll add matchup advantage/disadvantage in the same luck factor) plays quite a part in Pokemon so don't get too upset (hard I know it's not cool using the same team and losing in the 1600s similar to winning in the 1900s). Also, if you want to use teams from that blog site, don't get discouraged if you do poorly with many of the higher ranked teams. Team familiarity but more importantly, playstyle, plays a huge role in determining how effective a certain team is when you are using it. Until this day I can't use a M-Kangaskhan team other than xy seismic toss special khan and do any well laddering with it. Personal issue not the team's. Apply this to yourself accordingly
Thought this would help to the very determined individual who might want to have a ctrl+f and a translation tab open to potentially find a match to your opp's team and figure out what they might be using to have a better time laddering! Poor man's version of sub rom laddering.
Good luck all and remember luck (i'll add matchup advantage/disadvantage in the same luck factor) plays quite a part in Pokemon so don't get too upset (hard I know it's not cool using the same team and losing in the 1600s similar to winning in the 1900s). Also, if you want to use teams from that blog site, don't get discouraged if you do poorly with many of the higher ranked teams. Team familiarity but more importantly, playstyle, plays a huge role in determining how effective a certain team is when you are using it. Until this day I can't use a M-Kangaskhan team other than xy seismic toss special khan and do any well laddering with it. Personal issue not the team's. Apply this to yourself accordingly
Mmh, this season I didn't play so much but I must admit that I am one of those people that copy those teams. But is just 'cause I like many of them (like the Mega Gyarados- or mega Gallade-teams). However it's very hard to keep in mind all that stuff, I guess is almost impossible check every team that looks familiar, even 'cause the site is japanese and who are the people that know pokemon names kanji?
Pokemon names actually aren't written in Kanji due to the game's target age demographic; just Hiragana and Katakana. Both of which can be learnt in a matter of weeks.
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I used Mega Charizard X with Flame Charge and Swords Dance for the first time a few nights ago...the legends were true
It's an incredibly effective set, I can see why it's so popular. I didn't actually have to use Flame Charge or Swords Dance yet, which I guess just shows how effective and versatile it is. Mega Charizard X is deceptive, it hits much harder than I estimated. It almost works like a physical Hydreigon, pretty much busting through anything slow, including common threats like Rotom and (unlike Hydreigon) Sylveon.
Ferrothorn seems to be a pretty good partner for it too.
It's an incredibly effective set, I can see why it's so popular. I didn't actually have to use Flame Charge or Swords Dance yet, which I guess just shows how effective and versatile it is. Mega Charizard X is deceptive, it hits much harder than I estimated. It almost works like a physical Hydreigon, pretty much busting through anything slow, including common threats like Rotom and (unlike Hydreigon) Sylveon.
Ferrothorn seems to be a pretty good partner for it too.
What other moves did you have? I assume DClaw and FB?
After a sdance I suppose flame charge is enough. Earthquake or Substitute (that gives you a momentum and a chance for a free dance) are better.
Imo, obv
Imo, obv
Well actually, as I understand it, this is more in the way of a double dance set. Most of the time you'll be using either Swords Dance or Flame Charge, but not both. Otherwise, it'd be better to use Dragon Dance since it boosts both and gives you another moveslot. Against a faster offensive team, you use Flame Charge to finish off a weakened Pokemon or on a switch, and then you're faster and you can sweep. Against a slower team, you are already faster so you can use Swords Dance to be able to break through defensive Pokemon.
The attacks are Flare Blitz and Outrage. I was using Fire Punch and Dragon Claw when I was using Dragon Dance, but I feel like the stronger moves are more appropriate. If Charizard doesn't take out a Pokemon in one hit, it means a lot of trouble for him. With Outrage over Dragon Claw, he can OHKO Rotom at +0, and can OHKO Gliscor at +2, just to give you an idea. Earthquake's an option to replace Flare Blitz to hit stuff like Heatran and Azumarill, but I personally just like Flare Blitz.