What style of play do you use?

[Stathakis]

offense.

here's the way I play, I kinda just get an early advantage and hold onto it, generally through sacrifices, while kinda "rolling downhill" until the opponent has nothing left. of course when my opponents give me the pleasure of letting me scout their team fairly early I often just sacrifice everything to soften up what I need to and pull one of those out of my ass 5-1 to 1-0 sweeps. except on most of the teams I've been playing lately, I've had maybe 2 fast scarfers and deoxys-s, and then priority eveyrwhere. that way, nothing can really get through, and I don't really have to predict at all, seeing as prediction is what I generally try to avoid. but with my new tutee, who actually prefers defensive play, I got a bit back into it, and I must say, it's much easier to win with than I remember, and I may actually turn towards stall if I keep winning with it the way I am now.

but yea, generally just keep going first (priority everywhere, multiple scarfers, etc) so that prediction isn't as important, while sacrificing whatever you need to sac. and since you're so damn fast, you can pull sweeps out of your ass in no time, so long as you sac the right stuff to get the right stuff dead/weakened.

[824545201]

My team's style depends on the tier.

OU- Stall. I love stall. I love stalling against stall. I just love everything about it. The goal of my OU team is to do absolutely nothing and to always be either one step behind or on the same step as my opponent.
UU- Balanced. I haven't done a lot of UU battling so I'm currently in the process of making a stall team for UU but for now my team is balanced with sweepers, tanks, walls and etc.
Uber- Offensive/Balanced. The uber metagame really doesn't let stall work out too well so I have to be a bit more offensive. Of course it's still fun to use something like Wobbuffet.
NU (lol)- Offensive. NU doesn't really even exist as a tier and currently my team is 5 sweepers and 1 wall that pretty much only uses aromatherapy.

[never_again]

ahh i once had a team like that
the slowest pokemon on my team was Gengar, no joke

prediction usually mean switching, so i would say i like to stay in with the current pokemon then revenge kill with something, unless of course Im choiced and Ill be stuck Megahorning a Heatran, at which point ill just sack something at low health, preferably my lead, then switch back in and close combat heatran to hell

Im my opinion, balanced teams are often the only teams that can pull off intelligent switching, and stall of course

Balanced teams are theoretically the best, but its very hard to find a perfect match between offense or defense, because only stall can come close to covering everything in the metagame, or SkarmBliss

then, with Skarm Bliss, your lead, you only have 3 attackers to choose from
and once of them goes down, it'll be very hard to beat an offensive team that just tries to overpower you, because pretty soon you'll have Blissey walling 3 opponents, then if someone pulls out a mixed wall breaker your pretty much done for

basically to summarize, i might be wrong but

5 offensive pokemon will always beat 3 offensive pokemon + 2 walls

P.S. whats ur obsession with fabbles lol

[Stathakis]

Originally Posted by Fat xxflyingsolo07xx

ahh i once had a team like that
the slowest pokemon on my team was Gengar, no joke

those teams are real fun to use

prediction usually mean switching, so i would say i like to stay in with the current pokemon then revenge kill with something, unless of course Im choiced and Ill be stuck Megahorning a Heatran, at which point ill just sack something at low health, preferably my lead, then switch back in and close combat heatran to hell

when I say sacrifice, I mean when something has gotten a kill, unless it's my only way to beat the other team, I pretty much let it die to get the next guy in without having to predict

Im my opinion, balanced teams are often the only teams that can pull off intelligent switching, and stall of course

pssh, clearly you've never played an all-choice team before

Balanced teams are theoretically the best, but its very hard to find a perfect match between offense or defense, because only stall can come close to covering everything in the metagame, or SkarmBliss

then, with Skarm Bliss, your lead, you only have 3 attackers to choose from
and once of them goes down, it'll be very hard to beat an offensive team that just tries to overpower you, because pretty soon you'll have Blissey walling 3 opponents, then if someone pulls out a mixed wall breaker your pretty much done for

basically to summarize, i might be wrong but

5 offensive pokemon will always beat 3 offensive pokemon + 2 walls

stall can easily beat offense. you just scout the team until you have a clear grasp of verything, take out a problem poke with a sacrifice (i.e. leaving blissey in on ape so that the next guy can switch in) and then basically once you wall their whole team you just sit there while poison damage racks up or they struggle.

P.S. whats ur obsession with fabbles lol

you've never been in love before?

i guess this was directed at me?

[cim]

I've done them all, and the easiest one by far has been completely resistance based all out offense. There's very little to consider here; you just burst holes in your opponents with Pokémon then clean up with Deoxys-S. It's one of the easiest, and most successful, styles of play I've ever used.

Stall is hard. You have much more to think about in stall, as especially in DP it's more of an uphill battle. You have to keep everything alive and well, get out your residual damage builders early, and try not to make ANY mistakes. I really don't think I am a good enough battler to play stall and consistently win; the best shot at that was my Suspect Free stall team, which got me to a 1600 ranking average (not CRE).

Balanced may be the "noob" way to play, but stall-leaning balanced is a good compromise between suicidal sweeping and the joys of a stall team. My example was my Deoxys-Spiker (yup, I used a Deoxys lead BEFORE he was OU! Like that matters) Screech / Metal Sound team. With a load of buly tanks that could dish out damage and wittle away the opponent with Spikes and phazing, it was a good way to maintain control of the match and worked moderately well.

[Fatal Edge]

I like Bulky Offensive. I tried to get into stall but I always failed. I got out of balanced after I found out how much offensive is ^_^.

[Venom]

I find Stall easy to win with, it's become my favorite style of play, but it ends up getting boring, so I'm playing offensive right now, but there is no dount ill go back to stalling and winning!

[never_again]

yes, heavy stall can easily beat heavy offense if played right

but heavy stall teams are usually like

DeoxysS with spikes/SR
Skarmory, to whirlwind
WoW Dusknoir to block spins/Pressure
Blissey of course
Cresselia for secondary toxic/mixed wall
another mixed wall, like Umbreon, Bronzong, or Forresstress to do some spinning of its own, or a bulky sweeper thats not Tyranitar

thats not the best stall team but im just saying off the top of my head, those are probably some of the premier defensive pokemon in the game

now how would a team of say

Lead, Bronzong, Blissey, Infernape, Gengar, Scizor
against
Lead, Gengar, Heatran, Salamence/Infernape, Scizor, Zapdos

Again, bad choices but Im just pulling names out now
You see how Salamence/Infernape crush team 1's walls, then
a team of Infernape/Gengar/Scizor just doesnt have enough firepower to overcome Infernape/Gengar/Scizor/Zapdos/Heatran

so Team 2 has:

Heatran and Zapdos murder Scizor
Scarf Heatran manhandles Infernape and Gengar
Scizor can also do some wall breaking
Gengar could take down Bronzong/Infernape

so in conclusion, Blissey and Bronzong cant wall 5 offensive threats by themselves, you either need to go full stallwall, or else it just isnt going to cut it

[TDS]

I like stalling until my opponent is worn out and then I sweep with a fast sweeper with decent coverage. No not Deoxy's, more like HP fight Azelf

[Janenmori]

I like to go out all offensive unless I reach something that I cannot overcome, then I fall back to a powerful tank. That would probably mean I play balanced. I tend to lean more to the powerhouse fast sweepers, but I like to use tricky strategies that employ status, Trick and such while battering away with heavy offense. I find it to be for the most part effective.

[RaikouLover]

IMO, balanced teams are the hardest to do. That's why I like them the most. Having a bulky team that keeps a good pace along with good offensive power and good defenses is perfect to me. If you remember my RMT, my favorite team I've ever made was

Yanmega / Heatran / Bronzong / Gyarados / Garchomp / Jirachi

Nothing frail, nothing wallish... just bulky anihilation!

Stall is just too boring IMO... fuck it. Just use 6 walls and bide your team [yawns]. Offensive is reckless to the point where I kind of don't like it unless I'm doing Rain Dance. I really like balanced teams though.

[Scofield]

I use bulky offense I guess, with 4 sweepers (ususally 1 or 2 semi-bulky, like scizor or heatran) and two walls as the backbone, like zapdos/pert. Recently I've been trying something different, with a team designed solely to break stall asap, however when it's used against balanced teams, it plays as a bulky offensive team. Yeah, I like to win as soon as possible, if I don't win against stall by the first 30 turns, I usually just forfeit.

[Legacy Raider]

All out offense is a very risky style of play imo. Many of my matches using an all out offensive team came down to a speed tie or which team had a very slight type advantage against another. I agree it is fun to use and can be very effective, but I would say it is the least reliable style of play out of the three in the OP.

Stall is hard to play properly, especially in this new metagame with Trick around every corner and extremely strong attackers. Although a well made stall team can beat pretty much any frail offensive team, it will usually have difficulty against other stall teams (a cycle of entry hazards, spinning away, blocking spin.... repeat) and certain problem pokemon (CM Clefable anyone). However, stall is definitely a more reliable and consistent style to use.

My personal favourite has to be bulky offence. A team with no walls, which relies on resistances and decent base defences (most legendaries and 600 BSTs) to foil my opponents strategy while setting up my own. No pokemon is ever 'dead weight' - each one can do damage and carries its own load. Examples of pokemon that feature in many of my serious competitive teams are things like CM Raikou/Jircachi, Shuca Berry Heatran, Specially Defensive Salamence, Bulky Gyarados, Machamp, etc.

[nardd]

balanced is what I usually end up building, but I like to play offensively the most. I feel like the fastest games take the most prediction and risks, which is one of the best parts of pokemon in my opinion.

I've never really been great with stall, though I do want to get better.

[Shiny Crobat]

I have tried every style, but I like balanced leaning towards offensive. My teams have walls in case I don't want to sacrifice a sweeper when switching, but my teams have around four sweepers to make sure I can pressure the opponent.

This strategy hasn't failed yet. Stall teams usually don't beat it because the walls can stop the attacks and spinners and sweepers stop the opponent's strategy from working. I'm sure everyone understands what this concept is about.

[Elevator Music]

I lean towards stall. Most of my more successful teams have been stall teams.

Offensive play is fun too though. It's easier to ladder with imo.

[migas140]

I normally play an Balanced/Offensive style. I normally pack 1/2 walls just to swich into attackers, and the rest are powerful sweepers. My most sucessful team was an all-out offensive team, though. I really like all-out offence, it's a very exciting kind of play and a very fast-paced kind of game.

I have never played all-out stall, the most defensive team I've done was a stall team with 2 sweepers. I really don't like stall that much, it's pretty boring IMO and I'm not really that good at stall.

[Gymdude]

I would say my most successsful teams have been more of a Balanced / Defensive type. My teams are balanced, however, the style or method in which I play is more a defensive type. I tried an all out offensive team once. It didn't work. Then, I tried a full out defensive stall team and it didn't work either. So I just sticked with using a balanced team with bulky sweppers and walls, which to my surprise, has actually done better than I thought it would in the Pt. Meta.

[Heez]

I enjoy using Annoying teams. Teams with a bunch of status moves. I also mix in a few pokemon that stat up while they are stuggling with the status. I find that Dusknoir, Breloom, Zapdos, and Bronzong work very well.

[reachzero]

Over time I've moved from pure offense with my first few teams to more of a balanced/offensive. Stall is by far the most fun to play, especially in UU, but the present OU metagame is a lot harder to play stall in than it was before the addition of the Platinum changes. It's no accident that Blissey has fallen so far from her former glory at the top of the OU list. While Platinum gave the stall style a gift in the form of the new Rotoms it
took even more away by the additions of Skymin (a massively dangerous special sweeper that can break Blissey) and Bullet Punch Scizor. And if that isn't enough to make an OU stall team sweat, there is Trick Gengar, Rotom, Metagross, etc. I love the Platinum changes, and I actually really like the new metagame. But it certainly makes stall a LOT more difficult.

[Darth Meanie]

I have alot of trouble with bulky offense, I can never keep anything alive or always turn around to find some massive weakness suddenly torn through my team.

Stall I find a lot more fun, I need to go make another team ever since my last one got a member booted to Ubers.

If I were to make an offensive team again I'll have to go with pure offense, none of that bulky nonsense. High pressure, high damage. Keep my opponent on his toes and keep dangers like stealth rock off the field by never giving my opponent the chance to use them.

[CHENN]

I lean towards Defensive and Stall. Usually with a reliable sweeper like Suicune.

[Krow]

Fun.

[Metallic]

I've used all three styles pretty effectively. My current team is between bulky-offensive and offensive.

[Gemerl]

I tend to use balanced teams, as I like them the best, though they are a bit skewed to the defensive side. I have used stall teams that I like too though.

I really dislike offensive teams... never found them very appealing, and I don't have much fun playing using an offensive team either.