The Dark Horse Project (NU Edition)

Pokemon Showdown! Username: Checkm@te
Hall of Fame Standing:
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Raichu/(Leafeon/Liepard(own set))
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!: 1613 ± 48



I should try to get my liepard set to be more popular, it works well to keep forcing those switches, if played well that is. Also, switched my Golurk for Drifblim to give that a try, I'm not really sure it is what I'm looking for though. Despite this, Raichu seems underwhelming in the end.

Also tried a Raichu-support set on a different account, it was suprisingly bad, then again it's bulk leaves much to be desired. But with that kind of movepool it was worth a shot.

I can imagine the OP can be annoyed by my frequent changing of this post and the pokémon I work with, too bad I'm such a theorymonner that I want to give everything a shot.

Switching from Machoke to Dunsparce, was not doing well with Machoke

Pokemon Showdown! Username: DunsparceLegend
Hall of Fame Standing:
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Dunsparce
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!:

Let's try this !

Pokemon Showdown! Username: Hol Horse
Hall of Fame Standing: - Silver
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Riolu
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!:

W: 19 L: 5 (DAMN HAX -.-)
Ranking: 1926 ± 98

How did you choose your Dark Horse Pokemon for this project?
I've recently see some discussion about Riolu and i think that this can be a good occasion to try the infamous Prankster set.


How did you go about building a team for your Dark Horse Pokemon? Which kinds of teammates did you consider?
Well...with a pokemon like Riolu that rely on hazards to functions, the first idea is a stall team...and i love stall team :3
So i need an SR setter, a Spike setter and pokemons that can covers all the types (playing with Riolu is like playing with 5 pokemons because Riolu is simply here to do his duty, not to cover types)
I also have to consider wich item is better for Riolu between Focus Sash and Eviolite, but actually i think that Eviolite with 252HP stat has less flaw then Focus Sash (that is basically screwed if SR are on the field since i don't run a spinner ;D)

Do you think it is more difficult or less difficult to ladder with a Dark Horse Pokemon? Why? The surprise factor is always welcome to me.
I love when the opponent goes crazy because he/she can't understand what's going on and what he can do to counter my strategy.
But against a good/pro player, every turn counts, so if you don't have the patience to play stall with pratically 5 mons waiting for the right moment to play Riolu, that's not a strategy for you. (Oh and most players rage quit because i play stall :P)

Pokemon Showdown! Username: Super Circle
Hall of Fame Standing: None as of yet!
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Camerupt, masquerain, and Sandshrew
Current Ladder Standing: 1730

I changed raichu to sandshrew because raichu is doing absolutely terrible and i thought i might want a rapid spinner and a better answer to rock type attacks.

Been needing an excuse to NU more :>
Pokemon Showdown! Username: post acid
Hall of Fame Standing: N/A
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Mawile and Frillish :)
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!: ----

Pokemon Showdown! username: Luxray FTW
Hall of Fame standing: None as of yet
Dark Horse Pokemon currently working with: Fraxure, Luxray, Articuno
Current Ladder standing on Pokemon Showdown!: None as of yet

I started using Machoke as well, for if you don't notice the edit in my first comment.

Ok, for all of you wondering why Gardevoir is prohibited from this challenge: It has been placed S-Rank by the people, but DTC is too lazy to edit (Unless he already did in my sleep).

JirachiCelebiMew said:

• Please put all changes within your Registration Form. WhiteDMist will update based on those forms, not individual posts randomly scattered throughout the topic.

Click to expand...

NaruMon, put that in your original post.

Pokemon Showdown! Username: MrLeafshield
Hall of Fame Standing: No standing as of yet
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Parasect, Dewgong, Flareon
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!: N/A

User: spacial drift
Hall of Fame Standing: Bronze i guess?
Dark Horse pkmn: DODRIO / STUNFISK / RAMPARDOS / DUOSION / VILEPLUME / GOTHORITA
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!:

Couldn't be bothered screenshotting so i c/ped it
46 Snover 1854 83.6 1925 ± 50
47 spacial drift 1852 85.6 1971 ± 87
48 Jakiro 1851 86.3 1988 ± 97
49 Sakurai 1850 84.6 1947 ± 69
50 Champion Master 1849 84.9 1954 ± 74

sets:

jcm, do I have to start another alt? I was using gardy on my team as it was not in the ban list in the OP and is not S rank. If I replace him (it is set to always be male :P ) then can I keep my current rating? :(

Pokemon Showdown! Username: raseriDH
Hall of Fame Standing:
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Butterfree, Lairon, Combusken, Lickitung
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!:

Pokemon Showdown! Username: CatTurtle42
Hall of Fame Standing: None Yet
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Swoobat
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!:

Sorry, Celever, you have to restart. ;__;

so I made some changes in my first post there, I think the team is complete, though I'm still working on it, slowely but surely. If anybody has suggestions feel free too (^)

Also I'd like to suggest that Riolu is moved to the list of pokémon not allowed to be used in this project, with proper support (i.e. hazards) it's very easy to rack up wins with it's easy terror-shuffling.

ZandgaiaX said:

so I made some changes in my first post there, I think the team is complete, though I'm still working on it, slowely but surely. If anybody has suggestions feel free too (^)

Also I'd like to suggest that Riolu is moved to the list of pokémon not allowed to be used in this project, with proper support (i.e. hazards) it's very easy to rack up wins with it's easy terror-shuffling.

Click to expand...

You wold be better off requesting that in the NU Viability Rankings thread, not here. The ban-list is already set. Besides, Riolu isn't that hard to stop if you know what you are doing (priority, protect, Prankster, hazard control, etc). Anything can become threatening with proper team support, so that argument doesn't really help.

Pokemon Showdown! Username: Darth Meganium
Hall of Fame Standing:
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With:Meganium, Octillery
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!:
User: darthmeganium
Format ACRE GXE Glicko2 W L T
nu 1353 49 1493 ± 99 (provisional) 6 9 0

Meganium is a great cleric and wall for me so far..... octillery is just to slow to be useful outside of a trick room team... might think about making one of those.

Ok, I'll do it and I'll honor my most gimmicky player nomination with my very boss pokes.

Pokemon Showdown! Username: Jesus Columbus
Hall of Fame Standing:
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Togetic, Golduck
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!:

(I might add some more since my team is not finished, watch for a possible update)

Yeah sorry guys. My new alt keeps getting itself kicked out and refuses to let me access it. I'm dropping out.

Pokemon Showdown! Username: Dark Pony
Hall of Fame Standing:
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Dragonair, Glaceon
Current Ladder Standing: 1000

Played some randbat to register, that's ok right?

Glaceon:


Dragonair:

Pokemon Showdown! Username: Canadia™
Hall of Fame Standing:
Dark Horse Pokemon Currently Working With: Dragonair, Linoone.
Current Ladder Standing on Pokemon Showdown!: Battling.

I'n using mantine now. I updated my first post yesterday but no one noticed, so I thought I'd give you a quick heads up since it's an easy thing to miss.

To make this post worthwhile, I'll talk about how the pokemon so far are doing and how I have been using them, since I think it should be compulsory.

Linoone is definitely the best out of the three I am using (linoone, machoke and mantine) since if weezing mementos a pokemon then linoone can sweep very easily. The main thing linoone has problems with is golem - it easily survives even a fully boosted extremespeed and sucker punches linoone killing it when I try to seed bomb. As such, I try and lead with weezing to burn the golem leads therefore making them a redundancy. Sometimes I just go "what the hell" and have weezing use memento as well to get linoone set up safely really early, since later on in the battle weezing may die and linoone becomes fairly bad.

Machoke is extremely under-rated - especially the set that I am using. It is ResTalk BU set with dynamic punch and no guard (he is holding eviolite) and it can out-stall fierce attackers, hitting them back with massive force. Dynamic punch has disappointingly low PP, but the confusion is very nice. It does make it so that I only tend to bring machoke in when the opponent has 3 or so pokemon left, but sometimes that is needed to get rid of the guy's gardevoir and exeggutor anyway.

Mantine is nice. I have used him only in a few battles, but so far he has been a great switch-in on those choice gardevoir locked into psychic and is a flawless counter to roselia. Mine is another ResTalk set, with surf and air slash as the 2 other attacks, and from what I have seen so far it is great on mantine and I think mantine very under-rated.

celever said:

I'n using mantine now. I updated my first post yesterday but no one noticed.

To make this post worthwhile, I'll talk about how the pokemon so far are doing and how I have been using them, since I think it should be compulsory.

Linoone is definitely the best out of the three I am using (linoone, machoke and mantine) since if weezing mementos a pokemon then linoone can sweep very easily. The main thing linoone has problems with is golem - it easily survives even a fully boosted extremespeed and sucker punches linoone killing it when I try to seed bomb. As such, I try and lead with weezing to burn the golem leads therefore making them a redundancy. Sometimes I just go "what the hell" and have weezing use memento as well to get linoone set up safely really early, since later on in the battle weezing may die and linoone becomes fairly bad.

Machoke is extremely under-rated - especially the set that I am using. It is ResTalk BU set with dynamic punch and no guard (he is holding eviolite) and it can out-stall fierce attackers, hitting them back with massive force. Dynamic punch has disappointingly low PP, but the confusion is very nice. It does make it so that I only tend to bring machoke in when the opponent has 3 or so pokemon left, but sometimes that is needed to get rid of the guy's gardevoir and exeggutor anyway.

Mantine is nice. I have used him only in a few battles, but so far he has been a great switch-in on those choice gardevoir locked into psychic and is a flawless counter to roselia. Mine is another ResTalk set, with surf and air slash as the 2 other attacks, and from what I have seen so far it is great on mantine and I think mantine very under-rated.

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Weezing + Linoone is indeed a good combo, but there is indeed the problem that weezing faints somewhat unexpectably fast sometimes. On the other hand, have you tried Scarf Mr. Mime? With healing wish you can basically suicide it into giving your weezing a second chance at life, combined with Psychic, Thunderbolt and Trick it could work in theory. I don't know your whole team though.

Also, do you have a wishpasser on your team? If so you could try a Substitute Set with Machoke: combining D-punch with Payback, substitute and either bulk-up or Toxic.

God I'm such a theorymonner.

Updated my post again, I'm very happy with Raichu as a revenger/scout and Liepard as a force-switcher, Vileplume has made place for Leafeon and Kecleon for Lickylicky: Kecleon did ok, but it still was too frail for my liking, I think kecleon could work, but it requires a really high skill level of the player to pull him off. I am also working on some of my own sets right now, I like theorymoning so that's a'right. Also, drifblim with sub spamm and D-bond is a b!tch.

Also if anyone is interested who is part of this project, shoot me a PM on Showdown if you see my name on Showdown and see if we can arrange a match between two of these teams.

Edited three times now!: Other pokémon I'm interested in trying are Muk(Instead of Lickylicky) and Grumpig (Instead of Golurk) I'll see what'll happen though.

Before this occurs, let's make this clear: it's fine if you change your Dark Horses, but at least ONE of your Dark Horses MUST REMAIN THE SAME or else you will have to restart the challenge with a NEW alt. Also, you should indicate in your application what Pokemon were changed, since otherwise they all look the same to me.

Edit: Thanks JCM! And yes, I don't memorize everyone's Dark Horses instantly, so if you don't indicate that it's been changed in your application, then I'll assume that nothings different.