CAP 2 - Playtest

[papainfernape95]

I won't pretend I'm some analytical genius, but I've tried this set and used it to decent success, though it requires quite a bit of team support:

Necturna @ Leftovers
Ability: Forewarn
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spe
Nature: Adamant

-Substitute
-Pain Split
-Shadow Sneak
-Focus Punch

Ghost/Fighting give 100% perfect coverage. Focus Punch hurts Heatran and Tyranitar really badly, and it's not too hard to get a Sub up against them if you come in on a teammate that Necturna forces out. Shadow Sneak is for anything that doesn't die to Focus Punch, and of course it gets STAB. Pain Split keeps her healthy. Works marvelously if you've got a ton of hazards up. Interestingly it doesn't use a Sketch move.

Feedback appreciated!

[Groudon ex]

Necturna @ Life Orb
Trait: Forewarn
EVs: 252 Atk / 136 SAtk / 120 Spd
Naughty Nature (+Atk, -SDef)
- Power Whip
- Hidden Power [Fire] / Hidden Power [Ice]
- Earthquake / Close Combat
- Shadow Claw / Pain Split

Quite a simple, yet effective wall-breaking set I've been toying with. It's pretty unexpected and can quite easily do a large chunk to defensive cores due to its pretty wide coverage.

Power Whip is the main attack you'll be using obviously, hitting everything that doesn't resist it very hard, coming from 484 Attack due to Life Orb, as well as easily OHKOing all bulky Waters bar physically defensive Gyarados.

The Hidden Power used allows Necturna to hit certain Physical walls that can easily take Power Whips; HP [Fire] OHKOs Forretress and Scizor and 2HKOs Skarmory and Ferrothorn (outside of rain), whilst HP [Ice] OHKOs Gliscor and 4/0 Dragonite (after Stealth Rock) and 2HKOs specially defensive Dragonite (also after Stealth Rock).

Earthquake allows you to OHKO Heatran and 2HKO Jirachi/Metagross, although Close Combat could be used as an alternative due to doing more damage to Ferrothorn in Rain and to Chansey, as well as OHKOing Hydreigon who otherwise walls this set.

Shadow Claw is preferred in the last slot as coverage against Celebi and Lati@s, although Pain Split could be used as a situational yet useful method of recovery as a result of LO recoil damage.

@papainfernape95: Cool concept, although you may as well run Recover > Pain Split due to the reliability of the healing, which would be important in order to keep your Necturna's HP up so it can continue to use Substitute.

[the dead mans oddysey]

I think necturna should try to use a more supportive role in the game. So I'm making it learn gravity.

Necturna @ leftovers
Gravity
Equake
Will-o-wisp
Toxic spikes/Hp ice
Jolly
100 hp/ 156 atk/ 252 spE

This set utilises necturna's most controversial move when the move set was being decided upon.
Gravity provides perfect accuracy to any move originally with 70% accuracy.
This means WoW becomes perfectly accurate, rendering SCIZOR bust.
Earthquake will hit any Pokemon under gravity, so skarm cAn be seen as useless.
Toxic spikes allows for some residual damage, but blizzard is good for extra coverage.
Hp ic can be used instead of toxic spikes for extended coverage against landorous and gliscor.

This set requires a dedicated team to gravity. This set can be a great if used correctly.

Good teammates for this set would be Nidoking, and dugtrio.
Nidokings access to near perfect coverage in a 4 moves LO sheer force set
Because of gravity, all attacks will hit, unless sand veil+ sand stream is there.
This means that Nidoking king can abuse his higher powered moves and use them to perfect accuracy.
Dugtrio can also be good because you can trap and kill certain threats to necturna (hydreigon, heAtran) with ease becAuse of them both being grounded by gravity.

I would like to say that gravity only lasts 5 turns, so as I said, a dedicated team is needed to run this set effectively.

[bluemon]

i used a sun necturna with v-create and it wrecked.

the choice band sets compare real well to OU dragonite.

[nihilist]

Toxic Spiker

Necturna @ Leftovers
Trait: Forewarn
EVs: 252 HP/ 4 Atk/ 252 Sp Def
Careful Nature

- Circle Throw
- Shadow Sneak
- Toxic Spikes
- Leech Horn/Pain Split

Spin-blocker, Toxic Spiker, Phazer in one. Perfect coverage etc. Could be a winner. So much synergy in just one set.

[ssbbm]

i think the shell smash set is the best: you can sweep so many teams 5-0 with it that it's not even funny

basically if you can get sr up and +2 then you will 9/10 times win the game unless they have both heatran and skamory: the point of the game, then, is to simply kill either heatran or skarmory then sweep because what stops a +2/+2/+2 necturna?

[cardshark000]

I've actually found Necturna to be an extremely efficient pokemon to use with trick room, providing that your team supports it, as with the following set it can rack "up" speed in trick room with v-create, and kill a large amount of pokemon, one of the most notable being ferrothorn. Hp ice is largely for gliscor, so if your team handles it well stone edge is always an option as well. However, it is weak to shadow sneak from opposing necturna. Also, expert belt was my choice so as to allow Necturna to sweep as much as possible while still retaining its ability to kill foes with SE moves.

To everyone who worked on nectuna, great job, it's a blast to use.

Necturna @ Expert Belt (or life orb)
Trait: Forewarn
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 SAtk/ 6 Def
Brave Nature
- V-create
- Power Whip
- Hidden Power [Ice]/stone edge
- Shadow Claw/stone edge

[kid with chemicals]

Necturna @ Leftovers
Trait: Forewarn
EVs: 252 HP/72 SpD/192 Spe
Careful Nature (+SDef, -SAtk)

-Toxic Spikes
-Will-o-Wisp/Spore
-Recover/Pain Split
-Shadow Claw/Shadow Sneak

The move set is fairly self explanatory, but i will mention that Recover and Spore are illegal together.

Now then, as far as the EV's go...

The original set i came up with was the WoW/recover one so i wanted as much Spec D bulk as possible, and 184 EV's in speed to tie with standard Gliscor and defensive Rotom-W. Then i realized that if i were to raise it 8 more points, i give her the ability to outpace Adamant CB'ed Dragonite before taking a full powered outrage to the fotch, or at all.

Soo, yea.

[Imanalt]

i suspect you're better off investing more in hp. With how low her hp is, 252 hp/64 SpD gives comparable special bulk, and much more physical bulk

(glancing at calc's it appears the maximized hp actually gives a bit more special bulk!)

[phoopes]

Yeah, I use 252 HP on all the bulky Necturna sets I've used. These have included SubPunch, Special Wall, Bulky Physical Attacker, and Bulky Special Attacker. However, I haven't used a Necturna set that completely works for me yet. Hoping to find one. Though the one I like the most out of the ones I listed above is a SubPunch set. Surprises a buch of people.

[Porii Sames]

So far I've just been using a standard mixed Smash set, with enough speed to outpseed Scarf Rotom-W. Smash, Power Whip, Shadow Ball, HP Ground. Works very effectively, as i have numerous counters to Skarm on my team as is.

[kid with chemicals]

Originally Posted by Fat Imanalt

i suspect you're better off investing more in hp. With how low her hp is, 252 hp/64 SpD gives comparable special bulk, and much more physical bulk

(glancing at calc's it appears the maximized hp actually gives a bit more special bulk!)

thanks bro..it actually works pretty wel for thepast few matches ivehad.

[DTC]

Shell Smash is quite an annoying set to fight against.

When I have the chance, I want to use Quiver Dance and Shell Smash Necturna more. The set shrang posted is really cool too, although personally I'd probably use it with more defense investment.

Lately I've been using:

Necturna @ Leftovers
Ability: Forewarn
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Nature: Jolly
- Substitute
- Sacred Fire (sketched)
- Horn Leech
- Stone Edge

It's a great set and can deal a lot of damage to the opposing team. Just make sure you eliminate Heatran, otherwise you won't be doing that much.

Also, what's with all the Magnezone's running around? In like 70% of my battles in the past 2 days I've seen Magnezone. It's quite annoying, especially since I use Skarmory a lot, but it's manageable.

[ssbbm]

i've run a

Necturna @ Leftovers
Ability: Forewarn
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 SpD
Nature: Careful
- Substitute
- Power Whip
- Shadow Claw
- Dragon Tail

it's pretty good with spikes support and sr support

also yeah steels are running rampant so people are running maggy and duggy (if you run skarm you need to run shed shell)

also it's kinda sad i got to the top with drag/drag/dug/nect/mag/starm

[Rising_Dusk]

I've actually been thinking about disallowing anyone with a "provisional rating" from being considered for playtest champion. The way ACRE works on PS! is very easily exploited insofar as making new alts with a good team and beating a few top players once or twice. You can theoretically make the top of the ladder after a mere three games on an alt, which is crazy. Removing accounts with provisional (and very volatile) ratings serves to remove these accounts from the running unless they play enough to get rid of their provisional rating and are thus consistently winning. This may be worth further investigation, and I will talk to the mods about it.

That said, Steels are everywhere thanks to them being Necturna's best responses. This of course results in Magnezone being the top response to a majority of them. Running Shed Shell is very helpful.

[Imanalt]

Several things:
First of all, about when will the playtest end?

secondly, i havent had a chance to try it yet, but I'm thinking about the viability of a coil + ingrain set, which could function both as a stallbreaker and a potent sweeper once a couple key threats are removed.
Im thinking something along the lines of:
EVS: 252hp/252sdef@leftovers
Nature: Careful
- Coil
- Ingrain
- Power Whip / Horn Leech
- Stone Edge

[Deck Knight]

It might just be my teams but I'm finding Machamp with Encore to be very effective. It's bulky enough to be able to identify any Necturna set, and if it catches Necturna using a stat-up and Encores it, it nullifies Necturna's immediate threat and also gives your team valuable information to help fight it. I've been running Dynamicpunch / Encore / Stone Edge / Ice Punch since it works against basically everything people have been using in Necturna cores (including Necturna itself), save Starmie who still doesn't want to deal with confusion.

I've also had limited success with a defensive Flygon, but nothing definitive there really.

[Rising_Dusk]

Originally Posted by Fat Imanalt

First of all, about when will the playtest end?

The playtest lasts exactly 2 weeks, thus we have roughly 8 days remaining.

[ssbbm]

hm, after testing some teams, i came to the conclusion that the metagame isn't badly affected by necturna. the only thing it does is slightly shift the metagame towards being more steel and dragon dominated, but this metagame allows for stall, balanced, and heavy offense. it also is a godsend for spike stacking teams; it's arguably better than jellicent as a spinblocker (though getting 2hkoed by lo ice beam is annoying)

the following sets for necturna are good imo

-shell smash
-sub / dtail
-choice band
-sub + 3 attacks
-sub / qd
-spore + tspikes + 2 attacks or just 3 attacks

[kid with chemicals]

Necturna @ Leftovers
Trait: Forewarn
EVs: 252 HP/172 Def/ 84 SAtk
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)

-Calm Mind
-Giga Drain
-Shadow Ball
-Aura Sphere/Focus Blast

I ran quite a few EV calcs, and this seems to be the best spread i could come up with, and has been working really well for me. Basically i just make sure Heatran/ Skarmory are out of the picture and then she wreaks havoc.

I find that a fighting move, rather than hp fire works better, thanks to all the rain teams running around.

I personally prefer Aura Sphere to Focus Blast for obvious reasons. The only dilemma with doing so is that even at plus one, you can't 2 shot CB Scizor.

I haven't tried it yet, but i imagine this set could be used to its full potential in the rain.

Soo yea. Let me know what you think guys.

[DetroitLolcat]

Okay, by far my favorite Necturna set is the Toxic Spiker

I've been using:

Necturna@ Leftovers
252 HP/ 4 Atk/ 252 Special Defense (Careful)
-Spore
-Toxic Spikes
-Shadow Sneak
-Horn Leech

Any way I could improve this set? I think maybe a little more Attack to give Shadow Sneak some more punch?

Also Rain is great in Necturna playtest.

[BlackLight]

Originally Posted by Fat kid with chemicals

Necturna @ Leftovers
Trait: Forewarn
EVs: 252 HP/172 Def/ 84 SAtk
Impish Nature (+Def, -Atk)

-Calm Mind
-Giga Drain
-Shadow Ball
-Aura Sphere/Focus Blast

I ran quite a few EV calcs, and this seems to be the best spread i could come up with, and has been working really well for me. Basically i just make sure Heatran/ Skarmory are out of the picture and then she wreaks havoc.

I find that a fighting move, rather than hp fire works better, thanks to all the rain teams running around.

I personally prefer Aura Sphere to Focus Blast for obvious reasons. The only dilemma with doing so is that even at plus one, you can't 2 shot CB Scizor.

I haven't tried it yet, but i imagine this set could be used to its full potential in the rain.

Soo yea. Let me know what you think guys.

Try a bold nature so that your attacks do more damage. Impish nature is lowering your Special Attack.

[DarkShiftry]

Necturna @Leftovers
Trait: Forewarn
EVs:64HP/252Atk/188Spe
Ability:Adamant
Movepool:
-Belly Drum
-Horn Leech
-Shadow Sneak
-Stone Edge

Hits really hard At +6 and it has the priority from Shadow Sneak and recovery from Horn Leech, plus, its really bulky so it can set up on Rotom-W, Jirachi, Gastrodon, Magnezone, etc.
188 speed EVs lets it outspeed Adamant Tyranitar, Adamant Scizor, Adamant Breloom, Bulky Heatran and Standard Rotom-W, then max attack for max power and the the rest in HP.
If you eliminate Hydreigon, Offensive Heatran or Skarmory you are good to go.

[kid with chemicals]

Originally Posted by Fat BlackLight

Try a bold nature so that your attacks do more damage. Impish nature is lowering your Special Attack.

thank you for pointing that out. i meant to put bold. i'll go back and edit that.

[Efferalgan]

What about Soak ?
You could just set up Spikes and/or StealthRocks with any teammate and just bring him in. He has coverage problems with Grass/Ghost not being very efficient STABs. You just change the opponent's type to Water, and rape him with STABbed super-effective HornLeech or PowerWhip. The opponent will have the choice between staying there and dying (or trying to attack without his STAB) or switching and taking damages from Spikes. As Necturna spinblocks as well, he could quickly become very annoying.