I figured I'd make a bit of a post about a mon that's been getting a bit more of a spotlight as of lately, and for good reason: Brute Bonnet.
So to the surprise of many, Brute Bonnet isn't just viable in OU: with sun support, it's actually quite great! This is a bit of a far cry from how it was viewed the first couple months after SV released; back then, Brute Bonnet was an absolute joke as far as Paradox mons go and didn't really have a discernible niche. Nowadays, I'll go so far as to make a very, very bold claim: Brute Bonnet is arguably the second-hardest mon to switch in against in the metagame, behind Baxcalibur. Seriously; this thing is fucking infuriating to switch in against since it has such good STABs, it has strong coverage in CC or a Fire-type Tera Blast, it has strong setup in Growth, and the ever-dangerous Spore can put a would-be switchin out of commission and force a switch that Brute Bonnet can capitalize on hard.
What Changed for Brute Bonnet Lately?
Well, the biggest change that benefitted Brute Bonnet was the obvious introduction of Walking Wake into the metagame, and now that it's here to stay sun teams are a very legitimate part of the metagame that every competent player must account for when teambuilding. Walking Wake fulfills such an important role on sun teams that gives the remaining four slots a lot more flexibility. You'll often see some variant of Great Tusk on most sun squads, and Eject Button Hatterene is also pretty common, but you can fit a lot of cool stuff into those remaining two teamslots even after these two are slapped onto a team. You'll see some Sandy Shocks, some Roaring Moon, some SD Ceruledge, the occasional Scovillain, you might even see stuff like Breloom or Meowscarada every so often, and so on, but I think Brute Bonnet's role on these teams can't exactly be replicated by many things except Breloom (and this mushroom has a VERY clear niche over Loom).
Otherwise, though, nothing's too out of the ordinary in this metagame. Kingambit being everywhere isn't great for Brute Bonnet, and Gholdengo and Garganacl are on a bit of a decline, but Brute Bonnet doesn't necessarily lose to Kingambit off the rip even with a favorable Tera pick, and Gholdengo and Garganacl, despite their status immunities, have absolutely no business trying to beat this absolute beast of a mon one-on-one.
What Does Brute Bonnet Do?
Surprisingly... a lot! STAB Sucker Punch is extremely common in this metagame thanks to Meowscarada and especially Kingambit, and Brute Bonnet is yet another hard-hitting Sucker Punch user, but that's about where the similarities end. Vert's Brute Bonnet Sun team showcases a pretty clear example of a team that it fits nicely on, and I'd recommend that folks at least give that team a try, but it's actually quite a bit more customizable than just what you're seeing there:
Brute Bonnet @ Loaded Dice
Ability: Protosynthesis
Tera Type: Fire / Dark / Fighting
EVs: 152 HP / 252 Atk / 104 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Bullet Seed
- Tera Blast / Crunch / Close Combat
- Crunch / Sucker Punch
- Spore / Growth
Loaded Dice+Bullet Seed hurts, especially with Protosynthesis active. Grass isn't a great offensive typing, but it hits Garganacl, Dondozo, Great Tusk, and has decent enough neutral coverage. It also shithouses those Sash PsySpam teams since multi-hits are the bane of those squads' existences. Tera Blast makes Brute Bonnet a bit of a greedy Tera user, but the newfound defensive utility it provides (it forces Kingambit and Tusk to really think about what they're trying to click) and the astronomical power of a Sun-boosted STAB Tera Blast ensures that Steel-types like Corviknight and Kingambit don't want anything to do with it in the first place. Crunch is nice and consistent, and CC offers really good coverage at the cost of nailing Corv harder. Sucker Punch drastically improves Brute Bonnet's matchup against offensive teams that aren't PsySpam since it's such a strong priority move. Spore and Growth are both very threatening moves for radically different reasons: Spore ensures that Brute Bonnet has absolutely zero safe switchins (Grass-types and status-immune mons get annihilated if it predicts the switch and clicks the right button, and a post-Tera Skeledirge doesn't appreciate being put to sleep), while Growth can let Brute Bonnet reach upwards of 1000 Attack while Sun's active, which ensures that those Bullet Seeds and Sucker Punches hurt a lot.
Brute Bonnet is not all that slow, all things considered; now, base 55 Speed isn't even remotely fast, but it means it doesn't need all that much Speed investment to get the jump on Corviknight, and only needs one point more than this to get the jump on the standard 144 Speed Kingambit set. And, more uniquely, Brute Bonnet is really bulky for a wallbreaker of this caliber, and this distinguishes it heavily from Breloom despite them being Spore users known for running a strong Bullet Seed, having good priority, and often running Tera Fire+Tera Blast for coverage. 111/99/99 is unilaterally better bulk than Skeledirge (even though it doesn't invest into it like Dirge does), so Brute Bonnet can eat a neutral hit surprisingly easily and OHKO something in return or land a Spore and get a kill thereafter. Breloom can't eat hits to save its life, but Brute Bonnet can trade against almost everything.
TL;DR: Give Brute Bonnet a try! This thing's pretty highly-ranked on the OU VR right now for such a specific mon, but there's a damn good reason for it. I think that it's still a little underrated despite it and Sandy Shocks being acknowledged as legitimate parts of the OU metagame. The more I think about it, the more I feel like Brute Bonnet is quickly bringing the same level of consistency to sun teams that Hatterene does (in other words, it's a borderline staple!).
So to the surprise of many, Brute Bonnet isn't just viable in OU: with sun support, it's actually quite great! This is a bit of a far cry from how it was viewed the first couple months after SV released; back then, Brute Bonnet was an absolute joke as far as Paradox mons go and didn't really have a discernible niche. Nowadays, I'll go so far as to make a very, very bold claim: Brute Bonnet is arguably the second-hardest mon to switch in against in the metagame, behind Baxcalibur. Seriously; this thing is fucking infuriating to switch in against since it has such good STABs, it has strong coverage in CC or a Fire-type Tera Blast, it has strong setup in Growth, and the ever-dangerous Spore can put a would-be switchin out of commission and force a switch that Brute Bonnet can capitalize on hard.
What Changed for Brute Bonnet Lately?
Well, the biggest change that benefitted Brute Bonnet was the obvious introduction of Walking Wake into the metagame, and now that it's here to stay sun teams are a very legitimate part of the metagame that every competent player must account for when teambuilding. Walking Wake fulfills such an important role on sun teams that gives the remaining four slots a lot more flexibility. You'll often see some variant of Great Tusk on most sun squads, and Eject Button Hatterene is also pretty common, but you can fit a lot of cool stuff into those remaining two teamslots even after these two are slapped onto a team. You'll see some Sandy Shocks, some Roaring Moon, some SD Ceruledge, the occasional Scovillain, you might even see stuff like Breloom or Meowscarada every so often, and so on, but I think Brute Bonnet's role on these teams can't exactly be replicated by many things except Breloom (and this mushroom has a VERY clear niche over Loom).
Otherwise, though, nothing's too out of the ordinary in this metagame. Kingambit being everywhere isn't great for Brute Bonnet, and Gholdengo and Garganacl are on a bit of a decline, but Brute Bonnet doesn't necessarily lose to Kingambit off the rip even with a favorable Tera pick, and Gholdengo and Garganacl, despite their status immunities, have absolutely no business trying to beat this absolute beast of a mon one-on-one.
What Does Brute Bonnet Do?
Surprisingly... a lot! STAB Sucker Punch is extremely common in this metagame thanks to Meowscarada and especially Kingambit, and Brute Bonnet is yet another hard-hitting Sucker Punch user, but that's about where the similarities end. Vert's Brute Bonnet Sun team showcases a pretty clear example of a team that it fits nicely on, and I'd recommend that folks at least give that team a try, but it's actually quite a bit more customizable than just what you're seeing there:
Brute Bonnet @ Loaded Dice
Ability: Protosynthesis
Tera Type: Fire / Dark / Fighting
EVs: 152 HP / 252 Atk / 104 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Bullet Seed
- Tera Blast / Crunch / Close Combat
- Crunch / Sucker Punch
- Spore / Growth
Loaded Dice+Bullet Seed hurts, especially with Protosynthesis active. Grass isn't a great offensive typing, but it hits Garganacl, Dondozo, Great Tusk, and has decent enough neutral coverage. It also shithouses those Sash PsySpam teams since multi-hits are the bane of those squads' existences. Tera Blast makes Brute Bonnet a bit of a greedy Tera user, but the newfound defensive utility it provides (it forces Kingambit and Tusk to really think about what they're trying to click) and the astronomical power of a Sun-boosted STAB Tera Blast ensures that Steel-types like Corviknight and Kingambit don't want anything to do with it in the first place. Crunch is nice and consistent, and CC offers really good coverage at the cost of nailing Corv harder. Sucker Punch drastically improves Brute Bonnet's matchup against offensive teams that aren't PsySpam since it's such a strong priority move. Spore and Growth are both very threatening moves for radically different reasons: Spore ensures that Brute Bonnet has absolutely zero safe switchins (Grass-types and status-immune mons get annihilated if it predicts the switch and clicks the right button, and a post-Tera Skeledirge doesn't appreciate being put to sleep), while Growth can let Brute Bonnet reach upwards of 1000 Attack while Sun's active, which ensures that those Bullet Seeds and Sucker Punches hurt a lot.
Brute Bonnet is not all that slow, all things considered; now, base 55 Speed isn't even remotely fast, but it means it doesn't need all that much Speed investment to get the jump on Corviknight, and only needs one point more than this to get the jump on the standard 144 Speed Kingambit set. And, more uniquely, Brute Bonnet is really bulky for a wallbreaker of this caliber, and this distinguishes it heavily from Breloom despite them being Spore users known for running a strong Bullet Seed, having good priority, and often running Tera Fire+Tera Blast for coverage. 111/99/99 is unilaterally better bulk than Skeledirge (even though it doesn't invest into it like Dirge does), so Brute Bonnet can eat a neutral hit surprisingly easily and OHKO something in return or land a Spore and get a kill thereafter. Breloom can't eat hits to save its life, but Brute Bonnet can trade against almost everything.
TL;DR: Give Brute Bonnet a try! This thing's pretty highly-ranked on the OU VR right now for such a specific mon, but there's a damn good reason for it. I think that it's still a little underrated despite it and Sandy Shocks being acknowledged as legitimate parts of the OU metagame. The more I think about it, the more I feel like Brute Bonnet is quickly bringing the same level of consistency to sun teams that Hatterene does (in other words, it's a borderline staple!).
/ 
if raptor already hits hard, then add some hazards in and your 2HKO, get translated into 1
like I said before, Kingambit LOVES Staraptor, its ability to take so much stress off him makes it easier to take games
Tusk removes rocks, Staraptor removes Volcarona and can potentially remove Fairy Skeledirge
/ 
and 
(if physically defensive): these 3 just take a massive dump on raptor, Staraptor cannot break through these 3 at all, Rotom runs special defense for Walking Wake these days tho, so not all hope is lost
Lmao
if it is Booster Energy AND has Tbolt then Staraptor gets zapped (fun fact about my personal life, I once saw a bird being electrocuted to death in front of my house because the fucker decided to mess around with the cables of the line, it also caused a blackout for 3 hours)
