Get on the offense

Pocket

be the upgraded version of me
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^ golden post - post of the month! If this is facebook, I would like it :p

Seriously, those 3 golden rules encompasses all aspects that makes a competitive player, which includes prowess in team building AND battling.

Rule #1 applies to battling, and admittedly requires some raw experience and practice to get the hang of it.
Rule #2 applies to both team building and battling. It's good to know the large picture when you're making your team and battling with it. Especially with team preview, you use the main purpose of this team to outline a general plan or weight the value of each mon.
Rule #3 is an underrated rule for team building, imo. Especially balanced teams seems to break this rule more often than not. For instance, some players base their teams around one sweeper, and end up adding too many support / utility mons with no real complementary / secondary offense in case the opposing team hard counters that theme Sweeper. Rule #3 is probably why BP-chain teams, and to a lesser extent Smash Pass teams, aren't so great because they are just not flexible enough to be running plan Bs.

Anyway, sigging this :p
 
MATCHUPS OF HEAVY OFFENSE IN FIFTH GEN:

Heavy Offense vs Stall:

This is probably Heavy Offense's most interesting match-up, in my opinion. The main focus of Heavy Offense is to eliminate the few walls and sweep; in matches against stall, defeating that key wall will allow you to win 100% of the time as you do not have to worry about being revenged. Heavy Offense should always win this, in my opinion, unless it is misplayed. DD Haxorus behind screens tends to be amazing at this; Stall teams absolutely have no check to Haxorus besides Skarmory or Ferrothorn, and they are both beaten by Haxorus if screens are up.

Heavy Offense vs Bulky (Rain or Sand) Offense:

You should win this almost as much as you win stall. The only variation is that these type of teams tend to run revenge killers, so it is important to use revenge killers as set-up after they revenge a Pokemon. SD Lucario tends to dismantle Bulky Offense single-handedly.

Heavy Offense vs Sun Offense:

This match-up is actually in the favor of Sun Offense, unless you run something like DD Tyranitar on your Heavy Offense team. Since sun teams generally hate Stealth Rock, keeping Stealth Rock up works very well in assuring your victory. Also, running Dragons on your team also helps as most Sun teams cannot handle +1/+1 Dragons.

Heavy Offense vs Volt-Turning Teams:

Volt-Turning teams are actually handled quite similarly to Bulky Offense. Strong Rock types tend to hurt Volt-Turning teams quite a bit, and generally the only Dragon check will be Scizor, so it is quite easy to over load it with strong Outrages.

Heavy Offense vs Heavy Offense:

This is a match-up that comes down to speed ties and prediction, basically. You can hope to win this through superior long-term planning, but it's really hard as you both will just be firing off attacks and, oftentimes, hoping that you win the speed tie. Remember that if you set-up that you will most likely win, and capitalize on that fact.
I think you are exagerrating the favourability of matchups for hyper offense, well built stall teams, particularly ones employing things like quagsire or a revenge killer will not have a bad matchup vs HO at all in fact, stockpile quagsire can straight up 6-0 HO teams, which i did versus a highly ranked HO team a few hours ago.

Also sun offense is a horrendous matchup for HO most of the time, you either need to set up a tr reuniclus or something to take out half their team, because ddnite just wont cut it against a sun teams and will perish long before volcarona comes in for a sweep.

It really comes down to the team for matchups, i dont think it is accurate to generalise the matchups of whole playstyles
 
Bulky offense is the best matchup, as they are generally slow bar a scarfer and have cores with only 1 or 2 walls that need breaking. Bulky offense is becoming alot less common though. Volt turning are pretty much bulky or highly offensive teams. They aren't really that difficult to handle imo, but Scizor itself is a problem sometimes.

Against sun offense, you need to have something like Dragonite or Gyarados that can prove difficult for sun to check. Lum is best to stop sleep powder. Other than that, it can be very difficult if they are packing scarf darmanitan and chloro Saur.

Also, your teambuilding depends on how you fare as well. It's not that general, since dual screens teams vary alot. Quagsire isn't doing much against DD haxorus or Virizion. You can't say quagsire is the definite stop to them, and you also can't say that HO has no problems with them.
 

Myzozoa

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Except that HO runs their second taunt on haxorus (just like in dpp they ran their second taunt on gyrados) and outrage is a 2hko. Have fun using curse quags against good players. Toxic says hi, grass move says hi. 'Gimmick pokemon x beats stall teams 100% of the time, clearly stall is bad against y type of offensive team because of this.'

PS: lum berry

The stallier versions of sun are actually harder to beat then the offensive version in my extensive experience playing heavy offense. Offensive sun you just have to beat 1 or 2 revenge killers then you sweep. The stall version you probably have to break forretress, defensive tran, tangrowth, and maybe finally venusaur so its much more difficult.
 

Lee

@ Thick Club
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Quagsire can either Toxic DD Hax or Stockpile in its fce, wearing it down with EQ or Earth Power.
not as simple as that:

max Atk Outrage vs 252/252+ Quagsire = 47% - 56%
max Atk LO Outrage vs 252/252+ Quagsire = 62% - 73%

Quagsire is a shaky counter to Haxorus as he can only come out on top if he doesn't come in on Haxorus' primary attack and even then he is forced to spam Recover to outstall Outrage which is a) begging to be critted and b) poses no immediate threat to the opponent. oh, and there's always the risk that it isn't a DD Haxorus...

Max Atk CB Outrage vs 252/252+ Quagsire = 71% - 84%
 
HO seems like a great style, but I SUCK at it. Can someone help me get used to this type of playstyle? I usually do semi-stall and I want to make the change, but find it hard, to make the shift into HO.
 
HO seems like a great style, but I SUCK at it. Can someone help me get used to this type of playstyle? I usually do semi-stall and I want to make the change, but find it hard, to make the shift into HO.
Like all new styles of play or even the style of a poke in general, just play more. Of course, HO isn't just "throw attackers together, add a Deo-S, and have a blast," so it could just not be for you.
 
HO seems like a great style, but I SUCK at it. Can someone help me get used to this type of playstyle? I usually do semi-stall and I want to make the change, but find it hard, to make the shift into HO.
Just continue laddering with HO teams and get used to it.

Also, HO is just fun as hell to play and put's massive pressure on stall teams.
 
Like all new styles of play or even the style of a poke in general, just play more. Of course, HO isn't just "throw attackers together, add a Deo-S, and have a blast," so it could just not be for you.
Well in some cases the best teams I've made have come from this. In my case, at least, I've found that when I think really hard about my HO teams, I always start to deviate from my goal. I'll have Deo-S followed by Terrakion and Scizor, and I'll be like "shit I'm really weak to Gliscor," and I'll throw on a Rotom. However, Rotom goes against the point of the team I was trying to make, which is obviously all-out physical offense. So really, having five sweepers with decent enough synergy and are capable of breaking down their counters to their brethren can shine is the best way to do it. It really doesn't take a whole lot of thought to make a great HO team. What matters the most is the ability of the player, as it is not the easiest playstyle to master.
 

Adamant Zoroark

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HO seems like a great style, but I SUCK at it. Can someone help me get used to this type of playstyle? I usually do semi-stall and I want to make the change, but find it hard, to make the shift into HO.
I can relate to this, as I have been an offensive player since DPP and have trouble using teams that utilize support Pokemon or walls. Recently I had been trying to use Sableye on one of my teams as a way of crippling physical attackers like Dragonite that give me trouble, but that wasn't working out. Then when I reverted to a more offensive team with a dual screen Deoxys-S lead, suddenly everything just seemed to come back together, as I ended up being "Wow, this is something I know how to use!"

Offense is probably one of the hardest styles to just start using, and at the same time probably one of the hardest styles to stop using.

Also, @ some people saying Quagsire 6-0s HO: lol. I use DD Haxorus as one of my set-up sweepers (wow really? Offense duh), and under screens, that thing's virtually unstoppable. I think I got up to 3 Dragon Dances once. Mold Breaker also nullifies Unaware, so I wish your Quagsire luck taking that +3 Outrage. Quagsire isn't even a good tank anyway.
 

Taylor

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I'll attest to Quagsire being extremely difficult to eliminate if he suits the team well that he is on. It's also laughable to expect that Quagsire will be the only pokemon on their team to deal with set-up sweepers, so Haxorus may be dealing with Ferrothorn / defensively orientated Politoed whilst Quagsire handles your Scizor, Luke and Dragonite for fun.

I must admit it's an absolute pain to get by if your opponent has any idea how and when to use it properly.
 

elDino

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Quagsire is definitely an extremely effective Pokemon if you use it correctly, but it definitely can't beat every single set-up sweeper. It does however do a great job of messing up Pokemon like Dragonite, Tyranitar, and Volcarona (out of sun). Don't expect it to beat every set up sweeper, but it does a great job at giving a lot of common ones a hard time.

Another Pokemon that troubles Hyper Offense to a large extent is Bronzong. Although with the ban of Excadrill it's usage has decreased, it still does a great job against a variety of HO's most common Pokemon, including Lati@s, Reuniclus, Dragonite (it can handle Fire Punch with rain support), and Virizion. It can even beat Heatran if you carry Earthquake and it's raining; Bronzong can literally be that good. It also has a huge number of free turns that it can use to set up Stealth Rock, and with Wish support it's really difficult to kill.

Fighting-types give it a number of problems though, as do strong Water-type attackers. Conkeldurr, Terrakion (can't switch in), and Infernape (also can't switch in) give it problems. Bulky Politoed also gives it a good thrashing, since Bronzong is relatively weak offensively.

Otherwise though, Bronzong can be pretty decent against HO.

Do you guys have any particular problem Pokemon to highlight?
 
I can confirm that Quagsire and bulkier sun teams are the toughest matchups for heavy offense. Because of the very principles of HO, you can't rely solely on Haxorus, as any good opponent can and will force you to sac it before you can get rid of Quagsire. Conventional 5 sweepers HO just can't handle a good Quagsire player, and an effective way to adapt is to actually use choice banders. While choice items may seem to go against the principles of HO, they can definitely work well as long as you make sure nothing can set up on them.
Safeguard Wobbuffet is another sure-fire way to get rid of Quagsire, as long as you avoid switching into status. You can Safeguard any attempt to Toxic you, then either stall until he has to attack and go for the kill or switch to something that can dish out immediate damage.
 
Bronzong isn't that threatening. It is setup fodder for almost everything under screens, and it has no reliable recovery. Same with Forry. Ferro is much worse because of leech seed and iron barbs which is the biggest pain in the ass in the universe since you can find yourself loosing 60% of your health in two turns and then lose to priority before you kill anything. Don't get greedy against Ferro.

Physically defensive Quagsire is the strongest wall against physical heavy offense teams. I wouldn't resort to a choice bander, they can just switch out and make you take hazards damage, protect, as stall teams love to do. I usually have 2 sweepers that can guaranteed beat Quagsire 1v1 or scare it away. The first weakens the stall team enough so the second can bust past quag and have enough health to finish the rest of the team. Remember, stall will try and bring their hazards setters out early, so if you can weaken their ferro / forry haxorus will have a much easier time sweeping. I always carry a dedicated stall killer that can break cores too.

There aren't any specific mons that trouble these teams, it's stuff like priority that I find I lose to the most. Not just CB scizor, but having multiple priority users and sweepers makes it very difficult. If I just attack and don't setup, I get revenged by the sweepers. If I try and setup, I get revenged. They key to beating this is getting screens up and doing as much damage early game before they can revenge everything.
 
Even though I rarely play HO, and when I do its physically based, is specially-based an option? Walls that plague physical mons are easily broken by specially-based ones (Quagsire has pretty bad sp. def walling skills unless its a Thundurus case where it's immune to the STAB, Fire Blast decimates Bronzong, and Blissey is screwed over by Psyshock.)
 
Yes it is although people will disagree. We posted on it in the old megathread toward the end. Basically you have sweepers like CM Latios and Jirachi that are really good at breaking special walls and luring in counters. Psyshock is good for bliss breaking, TR reuniclus is a great cleaner, ect. There are also less special walls to break. Physical is generally more effective now, but it works.
 
HO doesn't actually have to be purely physical or special-based to be effective. This playstyle is primarily defined by the strategy of overloading your counters, and while hitting on only one end of the spectrum is the most common way to do so, it's neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition. For example, take Cloyster : its stopped by bulky waters, specially defensive steels and strong priority, but couldn't care less about Gliscor or even Skarmory (provided rocks are up). Now take SD Lucario, NP Ape and CM Psyshock Latios : from those three, its actually Lucario who has no business being paired with Cloyster on HO, while the other two synergize well enough in an HO environment. Luke laughs at Scizor and SpD Jirachi but can't get past Gliscor or Skarmory, while NP Ape and Latios bypass even Blissey but have to break through bulky waters for the former, steels for the latter and strong priority for both.

The problem with fully special HO isn't so much Blissey as the lack of speed-boosting moves and strong priority.
 
That can be true, but only for certain examples. The thing with that example is that if you have 5 different physical / special sweepers, one of them being Cloyster, chances are they will be walled by different things. Cloyster and Ice punch Lucario are both walled by Slowbro, if you throw a NP Ape, or a special sweeper walled by Slowbro, in there, then they will have Slowbro as the same counter but might be walled differently by other things. Cloyster in particular has the typing to get past most of the physical walls, but pairing it with a special sweeper will not have them have all of the same counters. I'm not saying you have to run full physical or special, just be careful and make sure you don't have too many mons walled by different things.

Quiver Dance and Trick room on Volcarona and Reuniclus are speed boosting moves. Loosing bullet punch Scizor does suck though.
 
Innocent Criminal, I just wanted to point out that Skarmory is OHKOed by a boosted Close Combat after Stealth Rock damage and Gliscor has a good shot too, not entirely sure on that one though.
 

Adamant Zoroark

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I'll attest to Quagsire being extremely difficult to eliminate if he suits the team well that he is on. It's also laughable to expect that Quagsire will be the only pokemon on their team to deal with set-up sweepers, so Haxorus may be dealing with Ferrothorn / defensively orientated Politoed whilst Quagsire handles your Scizor, Luke and Dragonite for fun.

I must admit it's an absolute pain to get by if your opponent has any idea how and when to use it properly.
I tend to disagree. Team Preview would show me "Hey, this guy has a Quagsire, I need to save Haxorus for later."

My question is, is it really that difficult to implement a wallbreaker on any offensive team? I don't think it is.

For whatever reason, I still haven't seen many Quagsires. I saw one Quagsire post-Excadrill ban, where it gave me very little trouble and went down incredibly easily. The amount of times Quagsire could theoretically present a problem are insignificant, and even if it does magically rise to OU, simply adjust your team to handle Quagsire. That's competitive Pokemon.
 
And that, in my opinion, is the best way to play Pokemon, which is also why HO is my favorite playstyle. In most cases when facing a good player, the HO team pretty much can always find an opportunity to win simply because of the nature of the team. It just matters on the ability of the player and if he can make it happen.
 

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