Infrequently Used Moves

Initially the discussion was just going to be on individual infrequently used moves with a separate thread for each move but I figured those threads wouldn't get enough discussion so I combined it into a giant thread. This is kind of meant to be a fun thread too ;)

This is a competitive discussion of infrequently used moves. Please, don't bring up shit like Absorb or Astonish just because they are infrequently used in competitive play. Also, I ask you avoid things like Dragon Rush - at least make the moves interesting!

I picked a couple of lesser used moves (this definition is open to interpretation - but try to be reasonable. Don't list Draco Meteor or something) that I've used competitively / seen used and made some comments on them. Feel free to contribute other moves or experiences you've had with the ones I've listed. I'm also linking the page on the move in case people aren't aware of the moves so ignorance isn't really an excuse here.

Gravity: Probably one of the most interesting underutilized moves. I decided to bring this up because of ET's video posted (thread is "Ho-oh is not uber (lol)" ). I'm asking is Gravity competitively viable? With Spikes, Stealth Rock, and Toxic Spikes support this move can be devastating on stall-ish teams. Robbing things like Gyarados, Bronzong, and Cresselia of their immunity to Toxic Spikes / Spikes can be quite devastating. Unfortunately, Levitate is also cancelled so Gengar can then absorb Toxic Spikes as well. It's not utilized much, partially because of the limited number of Pokemon that can use it (let alone effectively); but I'm asking do you think it is usable to begin with? I personally believe so, setting up entry hazards and then using Gravity could be a very potent strategy for some stall oriented teams. Offensively Gravity doesn't have much use, it removes Earthquake immunities and what not, but this isn't really as effective as removing immunities to entry hazards. Also, move like Thunder and Blizzard become more usable under the effects of Gravity. However, Gravity is a limited number of turns so it's questionable just how useful those few turns could possibly be. Thoughts - is it competitively viable or just a novelty move?

Block: This is occasionally seen (albeit rarely) on Pokemon such as Calm Mind Bronzong and while it has some use, overall I don't feel it's particular effective. Usually, you'll be switching in something with a favorable match-up and then Blocking as they switched to a counter. It's not particular useful to Block your counter. However, it can work on something like Calm Mind Slowbro if you opponent decides to go to some weak wall like Swampert to set up Stealth Rock first before going to their counter. Overall, somewhat usable but not really viable.

Charm: Extremely undervalued move that sees very little use. Charm really works best on stall teams with entry hazards on the field such as Stealth Rock and Spikes to take advantage of the switches it will cause. It's mostly useful on special walls that can take special hits with ease but have trouble taking physical hits. Arguably the best user is Blissey (I suggest using Charm with Flamethrower in case Scizor / Lucario decide to be cute and stay in even after you have charmed them on the switch in). Latias (assuming it becomes OU), Umbreon, Togekiss, and Gardevoir are also excellent users of the move since they can also use the free-turn on the switching opponent to set-up something or support the team. All around, in my opinion, a very underestimated move.

Lunar Dance / Healing Wish : I have no experience with these moves so I can't honestly comment but I've seen them occasionally used. These appear to be novelty at best but I suppose could have some utility.


There are some other moves I could bring up but I don't want this to be an annoyingly large wall of text so I'll leave it at that. So, anyone here utilized some rarely used moves rather effectively care to share :D.

I've seen Block Bronzong as an effective Toxic Staller and Calm Mind user. It's capable of entirely removing Pokemon from the game when used correctly.

And Gravity is extremely interesting. Combined with a Choice Band and Trick Room, it would essentially make Rhyperior unbeatable for a short time. Obviously this wouldn't last very long, as Rhyperior would get about three turns of overlap, but it is certainly an enticing prospect to have an ultra powerful attack from an insane CB attack stat hitting everything for inane damage. I've always wanted to do this, but never have. Now maybe I will.

Gravity teams, imo, could work just as effectively as TR teams. Jirachi could Gravity and abuse Thunder with Serene Grace, and let in Rhyperior with a Trick Room/U-turn.

Nice thread.

Didn't one of our researchers frequently use a Gravity based team a while back? I don't remember his name as it has been a while and he's probably not going to see this, but if he does I'd like to have his input on it.

The only move on that list that I've used even remotely is Charm, and I will say that, like you said, it's quite scary when you've got some entry hazards on the field. The old timer Bold 252 def/HP Bliss is surprisingly sturdy against physical hits after a charm. I made a set once that used a weird EV spread for sustaining hits from the most popular physical attackers at the time, and it worked pretty well. So well in fact to the point that I could see it being viable in today's metagame.

Calciphoce said:

Didn't one of our researchers frequently use a Gravity based team a while back? I don't remember his name as it has been a while and he's probably not going to see this, but if he does I'd like to have his input on it.

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I think that was Boa. I played a few matches with him back in the day. Fun times. He did indeed use a Gravity team.

By the way, is this thread only about the utility of lesser-used moves in single battles? There's a whole truckload of moves that have greatly increased usability in double battles, including everything on Caelum's list (with the possible exception of Healing Wish/Lunar Dance).

TheMaskedNitpicker said:

I think that was Boa. I played a few matches with him back in the day. Fun times. He did indeed use a Gravity team.

By the way, is this thread only about the utility of lesser-used moves in single battles? There's a whole truckload of moves that have greatly increased usability in double battles, including everything on Caelum's list (with the possible exception of Healing Wish/Lunar Dance).

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My intent was single battles but if there are cool moves with nice double battle utility feel free to post.

educate us nitpicker !

The problem with Spikes + Gravity is that the turn Gravity is used, your pokemon is opened up to Rapid Spin. There are few Ghosts who operate well in Gravity, since they lose their Ground immunity and generally don't like to suffer Stone Edge, Meteor Mash, or other otherwise inacurate but powerful moves.

The primary weakness of the strategy is that you have to spend 3 turns eating damage or having your opponent set up.

Dusknoir and Jirachi learn both TR and Gravity. Dusky has the added benefit of Rapid Spin immunity. Problem is that it's Pursuit bait.

You could also try Gravity + Dugtrio. Hiya Skarm/Zapdos/Gengar.

Last note: Featherdance is the flying equivalent of Charm.

Is this a thread for Infrequently Used moves or Undervalued moves? I swear there used to be a thread for UM...

For my contribution, Featherdance is a parallel of Charm, although the only really noteworthy user of it is Altaria.

Flail is another lesser-used move. It is much more widely available than Reversal and on occasion hits harder. It also has very good coverage with Ground (+Fire) or Fight (+Ghost).

Heal Block merits a mention. It can allow Latios to beat Blissey and is an acceptable replacement, in my opinion, for anything lacking Taunt.

EDIT: http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=46823

I was (I quit a while ago but I'm back) a frequent user of Lunar Dance with Cresselia and I thought it was amazing. It works best with CBers and Life Orbers etc. It's like a better wish but it costs you a pokémon.

The best thing about it is that it can act as a semi-U-Turn giving you free switches. For Example:

I switched in my low health cresselia into an enemy attack (say, CBearthquake) and I know the opponent will switch in his/her CBHeracross. I can now use lunar dance to bring my near dead CBsalamence back to perfection and force heracross out.

A free turn like this can be game breaking late-game and has saved me many times.

Hope this made sense.

I tried a team with gravity clefable lead and cb groudon and chomp in ubers, but i didn't work well, as groudon failed to 2hko defensive groudons and in ou celebi and hippowdon are too common to be effective with gravity imo

block bronzong was a funny way to kill other lead bronzong, but with all those trickleads around in platin I guess you also can forget this :/

I used a Gravity team back during the Summer. Boa and I ran a different Gravity team around the same time, so we both had plenty of experience with the move Gravity.

For one, I used Gravity very offensively alongside Magma Storm Heatran. This allowed me to Trap incoming Blisseys, Tyranitars, and other Heatran, then follow up with either Earth Power or Explosion. It was cute at the time. I also used Thunder+UTurn Jirachi and Choice Scarf Garchomp to sweep with earthquake (mind you this was before the whole berry craze).

And I remember Boa using the multi-spikes Defensive side of Gravity that was showcased in ET's video. At the time, Blissey and Garchomp were the highest used Pokemon and Gravity just didnt work as well as we both hoped for that metagame. It was a hyper offensive metagame, only slowed down by the latest and greatest Hail Stall teams, and Gravity just took too much time to set-up.

Maybe now in Platinum Gravity has a chance to re-emerge as a viable strategy. Who knows, I think Ill try to do that myself. Good luck to all of those who try.

Oh and an edit about Healing Wish: I tried out a Healing Wish Clefable in the new UU. I used it as a back up for whenever my baton passer was low on health. It was useful in maybe 1 out of every 20 battles. Most of the time I wish I just had Wish instead. Maybe I just didnt support the move Healing Wish correctly, but regardless once you actually use it (or dont use it) in battle you realize how subpar it actually is. Maybe it could be used in conjunction with a really weakened Ho-oh? hmm.

TheMaskedNitpicker said:

I think that was Boa. I played a few matches with him back in the day. Fun times. He did indeed use a Gravity team.

By the way, is this thread only about the utility of lesser-used moves in single battles? There's a whole truckload of moves that have greatly increased usability in double battles, including everything on Caelum's list (with the possible exception of Healing Wish/Lunar Dance).

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Ah, that was his name. I remember now.

I too would love to hear about underused double battle moves.

Memento is another forgotten move. It was used in the classic jumpluff + bellyzarrd combo. It can also be used by Uxie after setting up light screen/reflect so your opponent is almost always forced to switch, giving you a free turn to set up.

speaking of Dual Screen + Killing yourself, it is extremely useful with Healing Wish/ Lunar Dance since your next pokemon is guaranteed the set-up needed now

I think Endeavor deserves a mention. It can be used effectively on many leads assuming a Focus Sash. Swellow and Sceptile have exceptional speed, making them good candidates. Swampert and Rampardos both deserve mention as well because of the complete element of surprise, and because of the fact they are also immune to sandstorm.

Aromatherapy/Heal Bell is the most underrated move imo. Though it is used more than some of the aformentioned moves like Block or Healing Wish, it is rare nevertheless. Some may say that platinum is too fast paced for a cleric, but Blissey gets more free turns than anyone, making her an oustanding choice for the role.

I think Confuse Ray is worth mentionin, a 100% accurate move that always confuses. It could give you a nice chance to set up. One example would be the Rotom forms - Confuse Ray then Calm Mind up on the switches or just hope for them to be hit in confusion.

Since I'm bad at making long and descriptive posts, I'm just going to mention Attract here for a moment... I'm shocked at how many people haven't seen the potential that Infatuation has on Pokemon who don't know any paralyzing moves. Unfortuntely, you have to have the correct gender on the Pokemon using it (Protip: go for Female).

Rolfkip said:

I think Confuse Ray is worth mentionin, a 100% accurate move that always confuses. It could give you a nice chance to set up. One example would be the Rotom forms - Confuse Ray then Calm Mind up on the switches or just hope for them to be hit in confusion.

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That is the same with Teeter Dance.
It's more used in Doubles paired with someone like Slowbro to confuse all the pokemon.

Although I agree with Momento, I often see it on Uxie after setting up Dual Screen and using it for Baton Pass chaining.

Psycho Shift also deserves a good mention. The ability to pass on status is pretty good while having to remove yours.

spite is actually a really good move imagine if zappy got it but more importantly spiritomb does get it discuss.

iKitsune said:

spite is actually a really good move imagine if zappy got it but more importantly spiritomb does get it discuss.

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Spiritomb is actually a poor PP staller, since, besides the lack of reliable recovery and speed, no one sits around and whales away at it with weak attacks. A good player will either set up on it or switch to something that can O- or 2HKO it.

Psycho shift is definitaly a great move, used to use it on my old UU Noctowl. Too bad not much gets it. Although, Psycho Shift+ Flame Orb Cressy is being used, and yesterday I got owned by a Psycho shift, bulky, NP Togekiss. Its like Lum berry, but better

Grudge, though situational, could have huge payoffs. When Tyranitar comes in to Pursuit your spin blocker, turn into your own advantage.

I'm not too sure about this one... I'd like to hear each of your thoughts.

Sing is a good mention for those high risk players. It gets power from being learned by Pokemon who people don't expect to use a sleep move (Blissey). Although 55% accuracy is depressing, considering Hypnosis is 60% now, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw it more.

Oh, and Skill Swap. In the old UU, I got owned by a Skill Swap Toxic stall wormadam. It took away Clefable's magic guard, zapped my sunflora's solar power and stole my Claydol's levitate. Oh! Almost forgot when it showed it's extreme potential and stole my ninetail's flash fire getting rid of it's only weakness.

Attract and Teeter Dance/Confuse Ray can combine with a Primary status effect to produce a practically unwinnable situation. I once used a Pokémon who had Toxic and Protect together to make a trap gimmick (it was level 5, so pride caused almost no one switch to out of it, and on the switch-in they took a Teeter Dance most of the time.

i still want to find a way to use Adaptibility flail eevee and launch 400 BP flails even from 229 max attack 400 BP is still gonna leave a mark and anything that 2x resists it still eats a 200 BP attack

AJC said:

i still want to find a way to use Adaptibility flail eevee and launch 400 BP flails even from 229 max attack 400 BP is still gonna leave a mark and anything that 2x resists it still eats a 200 BP attack

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Little Cup?