OMotM/LCotM Spotlight: Gifts of the Gods and Return'd

By nv. Art by anundeadboy.
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OMotM/LCotM Spotlight by anundeadboy

What is an OMotM/LCotM?

The OMotM, or Other Metagame of the Month, is the metagame that is voted by the players to be showcased on the main server for a specific month. The LCotM, or Leader's Choice of the Month, is one that is chosen specifically by Eevee General and The Immortal. For the most part, the LCotM is a metagame that needs more love, as it may not be able to compete with the metagames that get nominated for the OMotM voting.

Introduction to Gifts of the Gods

Gift of the Gods allows a team to carry one Pokémon from Ubers and bestow its stats on the rest of the team in numerical order. This means a Pokémon in slot 1 with a Giratina as their "God" will have base 150 HP, while a Pokémon in slot 3 on the same team would have Giratina's fantastic base 120 Special Defense stat. This enables an overall increase to a stat on a Pokémon that may be lacking, making special walls more physically defensive or making faster Pokémon with average offensive stats to become big offensive threats.

Threats in Gifts of the Gods

Threats in Gift of the Gods can come from being a God and offering up fantastic stats to being an amazing receiver that appreciates the stat boost.

Gods

Deoxys-Attack

Deoxys-A is arguably the best God for offensive teams thanks to its awesome 180 / 180 offensive stas and base 150 Speed, giving any Pokémon a powerful attacking stat or a good Speed stat. Sadly, Deoxys-A brings with it very bad defensive and HP stats, leaving it very weak to any forms of priority from opposing offensive teams.

Arceus-Normal

With even 120 stats across the board, Arceus can fit on nearly any playstyle, but it works best on balance, where its teammates can appreciate the fantastic HP, bulk, and offenses it offers up. The cool thing is Arceus can also run other sets based on holding a different Plate, allowing it to customize itself to not clash with its teammates.

Giratina

Giratina, with its fantastic defensive typing and 150 / 120 / 120 bulk, makes for a really great God for defensive teams. Being able to give up great defenses stats or the highest HP stat out of all the Ubers means a multitude of Pokémon that have good defensive typings and/or abilities but lack the bulk to take advantage of it, such as Quagsire and Clefable, can now become behemoths that can wall offensive threats with ease.

Receivers

Swellow

With a vastly improved base 180 Special Attack, Choice Specs, and Scrappy, the only thing stopping Swellow from spamming Boomburst is Rock- and Steel-types that can still end up dying to its coverage. Heat Wave nails Pokémon such as Scizor and Ferrothorn while Hidden Power Fighting can help hit Rock-types, mainly Tyranitar. The last slot is pretty much filler, allowing Swellow to customize itself to the team.

Mega Sableye

Gaining a massively improved HP stat, Mega Sableye becomes a very bulky threat that has a way to cripple physical attackers, boosts its special bulk, and reliable recovery. Sadly, a set like this can lose to Unaware Clefable, but once that is taken down, it is hard to stop. Furthermore, the new HP means it doesn't have to worry about Mega Evolving right away either, allowing it to play around with Prankster for longer before setting up.

Ditto

Ditto has a very solid niche in Gift of the Gods, as it can still copy the foe's stats, but it can now do it with an improved base HP stat. This means Ditto can work on nearly any team archetype as a catch-all check to setup sweepers and powerful threats, as most Ubers have a base HP stat higher than 48. Sadly, this means a lot of the good setup sweepers will make sure they are behind a Substitute to avoid Imposter/Transform, leaving Ditto to not do much throughout the match.

Introduction to Return'd

In Return'd, the Pokémon's first moveslot calculates a move's Base Power similarly to Return and Frustration, which means at max happiness the first move has 102 BP. This allows a lot of weak priority moves to become very powerful and make offense in general the metagame's main playstyle. This mechanic, however, doesn't affect multi-hit moves, weight-based moves such as Grass Knot and Low Kick, and other "fixed" BP moves such as Dragon Rage and Sonic Boom.

Threats in Return'd

Mega Pinsir

Mega Pinsir defines the Return'd metagame with its access to an Aerilate-boosted STAB Feint, leaving it to outspeed most, if not all, of the metagame. Feint can also break Protect and its variants, meaning there is no way to rack up Toxic damage or avoid a hit. Furthermore, with its access to Swords Dance, it can even power through Pokémon that resist its moves, meaning a lot of teams have to run more than one check to Mega Pinsir. Earthquake and Close Combat allow Mega Pinsir to wear down would-be checks and counters, allowing it to sweep easier late-game with Feint.

Azumarill

With Aqua Jet being boosted to a 102-Base Power move, Waterfall is no longer necessary, allowing Azumarill to run both of its coverage moves and smack things even harder. The priority also means that it can bypass its subpar Speed stat and pick off weakened threats a lot more easily. Assault Vest can be used over Choice Band to give Azumarill some decent special bulk and allow it to act as a pivot more easily.

Tyranitar

The Choice Band set becomes even more potent with a 102 Base Power STAB Pursuit (204 if the opponent switches out), and it pairs well with Mega Pinsir, wearing down a lot of its checks so Mega Pinsir can sweep. Unfortunately, Tyranitar is fairly slow and has to deal with powerful attacks, since it has common weaknesses and doesn't have any means of recovery.

This set aims to mitigate Tyranitar's subpar Speed stat and still taking advantage of a very powerful Pursuit. This set only needs to worry about priority, as most Pokémon are outsped by Choice Scarf Tyranitar.

Conclusion

Gift of the Gods and Return'd have a ton of possibilities, making them both appealing metagames, and are bound to make the month of October one to remember.

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