It seems that, reading this thread, I had misjudged what we apparently wanted Sketchy to turn out to be. Based on the typings and arguments presented, we appear to be wanting to go for a generic bulky attacker typing, rather than something that forces us to make use of Sketch to be effective in OU. Now, there's nothing wrong with that, of course... just different to what I had expected we wanted. So, let's roll with this. We want something that gives us good offensive and defensive presence. Given that we are allowed to suggest any typing that we want in this thread, that makes for a hell of a lot of options, and I'm finding it increasingly more difficult to work out exactly what people are putting forward for their options.
Here's what I would like to see, from an offensive standpoint, such that we are making the most use out of Sketch that we can:
- More than one viable option for Sketch to be a coverage move. This is absolutely crucial, in my opinion. Some of the typings that have been suggested may well give us very nice two-move coverage but if we are always using Sacred Fire as our coverage move, we have a problem. For example, for a Bug-type (example), we may want a Ground-type move, or a Psychic-type move, or an Electric-type move, or a Dark-type move, or indeed any number of nice combinations we might have.
- A clear choice to be made between set-up moves and coverage attacks. This should be fairly obvious, though minor. If Sketch is required for coverage, then all sets will likely be 4 attacks + Leftovers or Life Orb. If it requires Shell Smash or Tail Glow to be effective, then it will use that. There should, therefore, be a clear balance where both are effective, but the setup sweeper loses a significant coverage advantage for the boost, and the non-setup attacker is less effective because of its lower power. If one is simply a better choice than the other, it will be used more. For this reason, I would speak out against any type combination that gave perfect coverage on its own or with any one coverage attack (allowances made for weaker attacking types, of course)
- Another option for our friendly neighbourhood Sketch Artist is improving its own existing STAB moves. Here, the extra raw power comes in the form of the typing itself. Because of this, I would shy away from types like Dragon, where the strongest moves, such as Draco Meteor and Outrage, are almost mandatory options regardless. A typing like Fire, on the other hand, can reinforce itself with V-create, Blue Flare, Sacred Fire… lots of nice options here.
- Support moves or defensive moves are a real option. This is a pretty grey area for us really. We all know that offensive moves are almost always going to be the pick of the bunch, but there’s no harm in us choosing a typing that can facilitate somewhat a supporting role, or else moves like Taunt or Recover. Basically what this means is “make it ok defensively”. So as long as this doesn’t mean Ice/Rock… seems ok.
At this point, I’m still vying for Psychic. You really will have to choose between Ghost-type and Fighting-type moves, or maybe even Fire or Ground, to take care of those pesky Steel-types, particularly stuff like Jirachi, Reuniclus, Skarmory, Tyranitar… the list goes on. As for set-up moves, we all know that Psychic isn’t the strongest of STAB moves, so there is a very real need for both coverage and setup. Hence we have on our hands a real thinking game as far as Sketch is played. As previously mentioned, Psystrike and Psycho Boost are really up there as far as new STAB moves are concerned, and yes, we can afford to put on stuff like Recover or Rapid Spin if we want to.
But I will be honest, defensively it may well be lacking. Therefore, a nice secondary typing to reinforce it defensively is ideal, preferably one that resists our core weaknesses of U-turn and Pursuit.
Fighting seems like the obvious one here, as it resists both. But it is a stupidly good typing and we’ve done it so many times before, not to mention that it messes up the crucial balance mentioned above. Also, Pursuit seems a lesser problem if our Pokemon is bulky – it essentially becomes a base 80 nonSTAB attack for stuff like Scizor, and ideally we will have coverage or set-up power sufficient to overpower such foes. So what else resists Bug? We have Fire, Poison, Flying, Ghost, and Steel. Fire has already been ruled out for sun and strong move abuse, Flying gives us a Stealth Rock weakness, Ghost exacerbates the Pursuit problem and Steel is too easy as a way out. Thus,
Psychic/Poison seems to be our best choice here. True, it gives us a Pursuit and an Earthquake weakness, but it also gives us a 4x Fighting-type resistance and a resistance to Grass. Good egg, not too shabby. Doesn’t give us many set-up opportunities, but who cares? This is about Sketch, not a random bulky attacker. I really like the idea of this typing.
Then again, perhaps this is too little, too late. Take with a pinch of salt. Hopefully, once we have a typing, Sketchmon will be a bit more focused and we can get down to the bigger details. I live in hope.
