Rate of the Week V3: Week 21

[IronBullet]

Rate of the Week
​

Welcome to Rate of the Week! This is a project that looks to bring quality individual rates into the spotlight and recognizes the hard work of unbadged raters. Here's how it will work:

• Each week, official Team Raters will be paying close attention to the RMT forum and reading the rates posted in their respective tiers. They will then shortlist a few which will be in contention for the Rate of the Week award.
• From the pool of shortlisted rates, one will be chosen which most exemplifies the qualities of an excellent rate. That rater will be the winner for that particular tier!
• A post will be made by an official TR who specialises in that tier, explaining how and why the particular rate won. This will allow aspiring raters to gain an idea of what constitutes high-quality rates, and hopefully incorporate those aspects into their own rates.
• There will be multiple winners every week, one from OU and a couple from other tiers depending on the quality of the rates posted. We hope that in this way we can expand rating activity in less popular tiers, while maintaining a weekly OU winner.
• Official Team Raters are eligible to win, but unbadged raters will have priority since that is the main focus of this project.

So what's in it for the winners? Well, they will earn a place in the Hall of Fame, which will be kept in the OP of every thread, and will earn more consideration for the Ladybug

and Team Rater

badges. Also, after gaining three places in the Hall of Fame, a rater will be eligible to earn voice status in the RMT room on PS! on the condition that they've shown an interest in getting involved.

We hope that this project will encourage people to put more effort into their rates and become better and more experienced raters, which will consequently increase the quality as well as the quantity of rates in the forum. Good luck to you all!

Hall of Fame

Week #1 - Toon Linked (OU)
Week #2 - Nedor (OU), Arifeen (UU)
Week #3 - Fireburn (Ubers), Do A Bibarel (UU)
Week #4 - AM (OU), Raiza (PU), Kiyo (NU)
Week #5 - FlamingVictini (OU)
Week #6 - Cyndequil. (UU)
Week #7 - BreloomMyHomie (OU)
Week #8 - FlamingVictini (OU)
Week #9 - oml it's too ez (OU), Cyndequil. (UU), MrAldo (RU)
Week #10 - Nedor (OU), Cyndequil. (UU), Cranham (Ubers), Lax (Monotype)
Week #11 - AM (OU)
Week #12 - Lange (OU), Amaroq (UU)
Week #13 - all falls down (UU)
Week #14 - Manipulative (UU)
Week #15 - mil (OU)
Week #16 - Tricking (OU)
Week #17 - Hector Hard Mode (OU), Christo. (UU)
Week #18 - p2 (OU), all falls down (UU)
Week #19 - ez (OU), Chakra (RU), S0LID G0LD (LC), Memoric (Doubles)
Week #20 - nv (UU), GradeAGarchomp (VGC), Joshz (Anything Goes)
Week #21 - King Sun (OU), PrinceLucian (NU), GradeAGarchomp (VGC), NOVED (Battle Spot)

 

[Draconid997]

This week's winning VGC rate is once again from GradeAGarchomp! His rate continues to be well presented, separating his smaller suggestions from his larger improvements, whilst adding sprite art to his post which makes it all the more enjoyable to read.

He begins his rate by informing the writer of the VGC 2016 Teambuilding Frameworks, in the intention of helping the writer understand the new format in greater detail.
He then moves onto his rate, suggesting a change from Mega Scizor to Ferrothorn so that the team has a more reliable way of dealing with primal kyogre, as well as providing extra offensive pressure whilst under trick room.
Interestingly, he provides two equally viable sets for ferrothorn, allowing the writer to choose based on either a more defensive or offensive playstyle.
After this, he offers several more refined sets for the rest of the team, which allow for important and specific benchmarks to be hit that the previous spreads could not accomplish.

Overall, this rate produces a much more refined outcome that contributes to the team's so-called 'Boom Room' archetype.

Thanks to his well presented and in depth rate, GradeAGarchomp has again proved worthy of a place in the Hall of Fame. Congratulations!

 

[cant say]

This is the first time I've come here with a Battle Spot rate; this week I'd like to draw attention to NOVED's rate of KidNeedler's Singles team. As with any new user who we haven't seen around Battle Spot; NOVED goes into great detail to first explain why certain things on the team won't work, then offers alternatives to those backed up by remarkable metagame knowledge. He emphasises educating the player, rather than plainly suggesting improvements.

First we look at Magneton and why its role in the team as a Steel trapper is redundant with Mega Charizard Y and Garchomp on the team, and why it as an Electric-type is simply outclassed when options such as Thundurus exist, who also significantly improves KidNeedler's matchup against Talonflame and Mega Salamence. KidNeedler's team more closely resembles an OU team, with things like standard OU TankChomp, Clefable, and Heal Bell Chansey. NOVED makes sure to suggest more Battle Spot Singles-friendly sets and spreads for each of them (and replacing Clefable with Sylveon) while also explaining why those sets are preferred over their similar OU counterparts.

What began as a solid attempt at a first Battle Spot Singles team, ends with something looking very competitive, thanks to NOVED's in-depth rate!

 

[HJAD]

This weeks winning NU Rate is from PrinceLucian !

This winning rate combines a lot of key features I look for in a solid rate; simplicity, effectiveness and an elegant format.
Onto his rate, and he starts off by identifying a key weakness to Holiano's team, the fire weakness. He realised a Wacan Poliwrath wasnt going to be enough in practice, so he made a slight tweak to Musharna's EV Spread, as to not really effect the overall, delicate synergy of the team. The spread he suggested avoids 2HKO after Rocks from key fire types in the tier: LO Pyroar and Magmortar, meaning Holiano will often have a much more viable switchin to either Pokemon should his Steelix, or indeed Haunter be pressured by either of these prevalent metathreats. What makes this change really nice is that he didn't upset the balance of the team. He realised Musharna still needed its physical bulk to take on the tiers fighting type pokemon, as well as others such as Tauros and Kangaskhan. He therefore engineered the optimal spread to take on both types of Pokemon.

He also suggested to Holiano to edit the EV Spread of Skuntank when he realised Abomasnow could win a speed tie and hit Holiano's team for a lot of damage. He therefore decided to edit the spread to incorporate that extra speed point. He took this out of Skuntanks HP EV's, he also decided to take the rest of these EV's and dump them in Attack (in order to max it out, and improve Pursuit Trapping Potential) and Special Defense. He realised Skuntank was hardly ever going to face a physical attack ideally, so by dumping the rest of the EV's in special defense, he is improving Skuntank's ability to deal with what it should be checking, such as Lilligant, Mesprit and Rotom. Finally, he made a set edit to Poliwrath, swapping out Ice Beam with EQ. He identified that the coverage Ice Beam gave was essentially redundant due to the nature of Holiano's Balance Core, and as a result, he decided to swap said Coverage for Earthquake. Although it sounds awkward in theory, when Fighting gives much of the same coverage, but EQ actually fulfills quite an impressive niche, along with the Wacan Berry Holiano had originally. It gives Holiano the ability to lure Electric Types in general, such as Lanturn, Electivire and Manectric. A very oppurtuinistic swap, but could mean all the difference in a big battle.

Overall, this rate is super impressive, so be sure to have a read. PrinceLucian really does deserve a place in the Hall of Fame. Congratulations!

 

[Enki]

This week's OU winner is King Sun with is well-written and detailed rate! He started making a quick analysis talking about Mandibuzz and Entei being redundant while not cleaning up that much for Mega Metagross, since they aren't good against bulky water-types, so he considered the fact that with Tank Chomp in the team is not needed to have more solutions against Scizor and Jirachi. He talked about how these mons let the team lose momentum because they are slow and easily checked. Therefore, he started talking about some general threats mentioning Keldeo first which with Specs is able to threat the whole team, he talked about CM Slowbro which is a threat as well, considering that Rotom-W isn't able to beat it, and last thing he mentioned was the stallish cores, which are threatening, mentioning MSab - Chansey and Alomomola - Skarmory, which are common cores and making the team struggle against them. So his first change is tp put Manaphy over Entei, giving the team a nice wallbreaker, which provides nice answers to Pokemon such as Slowbro and Suicune, while also being able to deal with bulky ground-type that usually deal with Mega Metagross such as Hippowdon and Landorus-T. It also helps against stuff like Jirachi and Scizor which usually deal pretty well against Mega Metagross. Additionally, with the Rain Dance set he suggested he is also able to be a nice status absorber how he mentioned. His second change consists of putting Latios over Mandibuzz giving to the team a big offensive presence, being still able to Defog. With Latios in the new version, he is now able to check Keldeo and Volcanion, which are a little threatening, as well as checking Electric-types thanks to Roost. Finally he suggested some small changes like Pursuit over Ice Punch on Metagross, due to the latter being redundant with the presence of Manaphy and Latios, considering that Pursuit helps let Manaphy clean up by eliminating Latwins. The last thing he fixed is Rotom-W's speed: he added 88 EVs to the Speed, making it able to outspeed other Rotom-W, Jolly Azumarill, and Volcanion.

Thanks to his cunning rate, King sun has earned a spot in the Hall of Fame. Congratulations!