Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4 [ new survey -- see post 21,148 ]

[eliana[]samia]

Hi
I want to make a post here again to share my experience/teams in OST.

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I joined OST as my first tournament, and it was really fun to build teams for a specific purpose and play against other players who are actually trying to win. These are the teams I made:

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Round 1
I was paired against heileone who I heard is a very good player. I knew I would not be able to beat him by bringing a traditional team, as he would likely outplay me. So I decided to build some more unique sets that he might not be prepared for.

For the first game, I used a team with similar pokemon to the team I was building but with more proven sets (paste). This team worked surprisingly well but it was very standard, so there is not a whole lot to explain. He used his tera very early and I actually managed to win the game.

For the second game it was time to bring the team I had made.
Paste: -----
with Expert Belt is a mixed attacker who is very good at breaking slow and bulky teams early. Earthquake and Stone Edge obviously hit hard, and with 44 special attack EVs, will fall to Grass Knot. Tera Blast ice can get around , enemy and some other pokemon. While it is a great tera that offers a lot offensively, you should only use it if your other pokemon cannot break a certain structure since other team members would rather have the tera otherwise.
with Life Orb and Trick Room might seem like a weird set on a team like this at first, but the team is not actually that fast compared to other offense teams. This makes it hard to regain the upper hand after the opponent knocks out one of your pokemon. The solution is Trick Room Hatterene. She can get trick room up quite easily, and with a very high special attack stat + Life Orb she can force KO's. Tera Stellar is there to get extra damage and allow you to OHKO things like , and . Even if Hatterene dies, most of the teams attackers prioritize bulk rather than speed, so they might still move first in Trick Room, flipping some matchups on their head.
is an obvious pick for where this team is heading. It is an amazing offense pokemon already and it pairs well with Trick Room and Grassy Terrain. I went with Tera Ghost and Air Balloon to beat bulky + structures since they are hard to break. The set is pretty flexible though.
it can set spikes and hit hard. It is a great partner for Kingambit being able to overwhelm each others checks. I like to Swords Dance early and just click Ceaseless Edge until it dies. Black Glasses Sucker Punch hits harder than people expect too.
with Grassy Seed has fantastic staying power and is the best partner for Rillaboom on offense teams. It is very good after the opponents team has been weakened a bit. With high bulk and Focus Blast you beat things like and . Gholdengo does it's thing of keeping Samurott's hazards up. Great set that makes the team much better against BO without tera, though it can still make good use of that.
I mentioned it a few times prior but this team benefits a lot from Grassy Terrain. I opted for a bulkier Rillaboom with Bulk Up and Miracle Seed. It is not as explosive, but many of the team already is. This set is much less prone to getting revenge killed and still hits hard. High Horsepower is an option but I prefer Knock Off since most of the things you want to click High Horsepower on the team has switch ins for.

Many of the choices made in this team double up on certain structures, with the idea being that you utilize one 'tech' to open up the rest of the team. I managed to win the game and the set utilizing this idea. Overall very happy with this team.

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Round 2
I was paired against halzz and I was building a hyper offense team with Stored Power Iron Crown. Unfortunately he missed our time and told me I could call act, so I didn't get to play.

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Round 3
I was paired against txlix and for this round I wanted to make a team using Choice Scarf Landorus Therian. Unfortunately after days of teambuilding I couldn't get to a team I felt happy and comfortable with. I was pretty dissapointed but luckily Hon07rial gave me the idea to make a team around Choice Scarf Pecharunt instead.

I spent the whole day building the team since the game was the next day, and I am happy with the result.
Paste: -----
is not the strongest Choice Scarf holder, but with Malignant Chain you still threathen many switch ins with a poison + confusion. With Foul Play you outspeed and KO setup sweepers like and terastalized , as well as . Choice Scarf Parting Shot is also a very safe click that allows you to pivot around things much easier as well as stop Dragon Dance and Body Press . I think this set has a ton of potential.
has Heavy Duty Boots over the trending Choice Band. The speed boost + encore is very good to stop setup sweepers that Pecharunt can't handle, and in return Pecharunt hits the things Ogerpon does not like and creates Swords Dance opportunities with Parting Shot. I think Choice Band Ogerpon would still be a great parnter for Choice Scarf Pecharunt, but not on this team.
with Wish is the next team member and it makes a lot of sense here. Since Pecharunt has no defensive investment, a secondary physical wall is welcome. Wish can heal up Pecharunt and Ting-Lu since they lack recover. Also, it is pretty easy to predict switching in so you can Wish on that turn and then switch into Pecharunt and heal back to full. The other team members also benefit a lot from the slow pivot and Rocky Helmet helps with chipping opposing Rapid Spin or U-Turn users.
is the special wall of the team. The team loves hazards and Ting-Lu can set up spikes. It crucially switches into and who are major issues for the team otherwise. There is not much else to say about Ting-Lu, we all know he is good.
with Temper Flare benefits the team in many ways. Of course it has Rapid Spin, but I also wanted it to set up Stealth Rock since Ting-Lu can't afford to have both hazards on this team. Temper Flare is the way to make it work. I can hit without needing to predict as well as hitting very hard for Ogerpon. This move is very unique and I think it is much better than Ice Spinner if you want to have Stealth Rock + Rapid Spin on Great Tusk.
with Choice Specs is the teams main breaker. It also helps with who is a pretty bad matchup for the team otherwise. Volt Switch is amazing too, allowing you to reposition and chunking switch ins hard. It makes this team feel very complete.

The team worked well and I won game one with it, but unfortunately I was not prepared well for this round.
I brought a sun team in game two that someone was kind enough to send me for round two, but I wasn't familiar with how it worked and I lost pretty badly.
For game three I decided to change some sets of my game one team that I talked about last second, but this was a pretty bad choice as my team was not made around those sets. I might have had a better shot if I just brought the same team twice.
My poor preparation aside, my opponent played well and I hope he does well in the rest of the tournament.

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From this I have learned that it is important to prepare well, and to be familiar with what you are playing. I had a lot of fun partaking in the tournament, and I hope to join one again in the future. The atmosphere around the tournament was quite postitive. I think everyone should give it a shot even if you are not the most qualified player, we all start somewhere and the point of the game is to have fun. :)

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I hope this post can be helpful to someone. <3

 

[Magcargo]

Some thoughts on a few mons:
I've gotta apologize to this mon. I thought for the longest time it was mid, but on the right structure that's able to support it, its truly exceptional. Specifically most CM variants, because that set is crazy. A set I've been trying out is Wish / Protect / Moonblast / CM. I thought a set be flawed, but it has been managing just fine. Wish doesn't have many of the same issues that Moonlight does, so you can easily slap this set on a Sand / Slowking-G build with little issue. Protect in general is such a nice move on Clefable to rack up additional leftovers recovery, scout what choice locked mons like Raging Bolt / Ghold are planning, and stall out sun / screens turns depending on MU. I've even been able to beat a few mons like Pecharunt 1v1 because I was able to stall out their Malignant Chain PP with protect. Really nice set.

Been using this mon more and I've been kinda impressed by it. On paper, it loses to 90% of the metagame. This has been true in multiple past generations like 8 or 6 when threats like Urshifu, Lando-T, or Keldeo were running the metagame. It feels a fair bit worse now however with the threats TTar is facing now like Zamazenta, Ogerpon-W, etc. being difficult to dance around and other Pokemon its tasked with handling have pivoting moves to bring these threats in (which are also hitting TTar for super effective damage). That said, its got its own advantages. Sand chip is actually so amazing, esp combined with other sources of passive damage to wear down misc threats like Ogerpon-W, Zamazenta, Primarina, etc. in the long game. This pairs really well with Knock Off, which is similarly great at wearing down most of its switch-ins when supported with hazards. Sand itself is really nice against a lot of styles like Rain, Sun, etc. And of course, its movepool is very well rounded and customizable, with multiple tools like T-Wave, Roar, Rocks, and misc coverage like Low Kick for Gambit, Heavy Slam for Tera Fairy mons, Ice Punch for Gliscor, etc. And of course, while it is weak to everything, it can still take a hit in a pinch to deliver the killing blow to many mons. I think its speed tier - being above Kingambit - is also a very nice quality to have. I think its main flaw is really that horrible MU against Tusk since that mon feels very difficult to account for with the standard Ttar team.

 

[moore's law]

What do people think about using Chandelure to counter the screens outbreak? I think it is a decent anti lead into HO, but especially into screens with infiltrator + trick room. Something like this:

Chandelure @ Focus Sash
Ability: Infiltrator
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 240 HP / 252 SpA / 16 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Fire Blast/Flamethrower
- Shadow Ball
- Trick Room
- Haze

Flamethrower gets the job done against most of OU, but Fire Blast has a good chance to OHKO offensive Great Tusk on the switch and 2 shot Zamazenta. Haze prevents any setup cheese with fast sweepers once Chandelure has been brought down to sash, so they're forced to kill you, especially if you got trick room off. Modest nature + 16 speed EVs means you outspeed all adamant gambits, letting you neuter it in the end game by switching hard into Chandelure and hazing away any boosts. It's also decent into Ceruledge provided sash has been preserved, because Chandelure can chip it down without triggering Weak Armor and deny significant bitter blade recovery, letting a teammate finish it off.

It is food for Ting-Lu, so it has to be paired with something like Taunt Wellspring or Taunt Gliscor. Gambit is always a good teammate and can be very threatening with a few trick room turns.

I think random Trick Room for disruption in general can mess up a lot of offense teams. Glowking's 4th moveslot is usually a mystery, you can easily slap trick room over there instead of t-wave/ice beam/toxic if you run stuff like specs Kyurem to cover for ground types and other mons for status. Hatterene can also do this, but it usually doesn't have a moveslot for Trick Room outside of dedicated Trick Room teams, but post #21201 above has an excellent example describing the thought process.

 

[Eviolite Bisharp]

I've been trying on a rain build this last days and i've been really surprised by how effective it is at some matchups. I can definitively see potential on this mon on the rain archetype and even outside of it.

Iron Jugulis @ Booster Energy
Ability: Quark Drive
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Tera Type: Ghost
Timid Nature
- Hurricane
- Dark Pulse
- Earth Power
- Taunt

First, speed basically outspeeds the entire meta besides Booster and some niche scarfers like . Second, Hurricane is extremely spammable in rain and there are very few things that resist it, hitting hard a lot of the Grass and Fighting centered meta, and the Steel types and who would want to take Hurricanes are hit very hard by Earth Power. Taunt allows it to beat 1v1 walls like or , opening holes on the defensive core of the opposing team for a partner like or . It is also a full on check to under rain thanks to . Some hazard stack structures also like to use Knock Off instead of Dark Pulse but i think that are better abusers of this strategy like

It Is also a very decent anti-lead against HO teams. Considering specifcally the default HO Vert Screens team, Mugulis can beat , and , and force tera in , Tera Fairy or .

 

[Bold School]

What do people think about using Chandelure to counter the screens outbreak? I think it is a decent anti lead into HO, but especially into screens with infiltrator + trick room. Something like this:

Chandelure @ Focus Sash
Ability: Infiltrator
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 240 HP / 252 SpA / 16 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Fire Blast/Flamethrower
- Shadow Ball
- Trick Room
- Haze

Flamethrower gets the job done against most of OU, but Fire Blast has a good chance to OHKO offensive Great Tusk on the switch and 2 shot Zamazenta. Haze prevents any setup cheese with fast sweepers once Chandelure has been brought down to sash, so they're forced to kill you, especially if you got trick room off. Modest nature + 16 speed EVs means you outspeed all adamant gambits, letting you neuter it in the end game by switching hard into Chandelure and hazing away any boosts. It's also decent into Ceruledge provided sash has been preserved, because Chandelure can chip it down without triggering Weak Armor and deny significant bitter blade recovery, letting a teammate finish it off.

It is food for Ting-Lu, so it has to be paired with something like Taunt Wellspring or Taunt Gliscor. Gambit is always a good teammate and can be very threatening with a few trick room turns.

I think random Trick Room for disruption in general can mess up a lot of offense teams. Glowking's 4th moveslot is usually a mystery, you can easily slap trick room over there instead of t-wave/ice beam/toxic if you run stuff like specs Kyurem to cover for ground types and other mons for status. Hatterene can also do this, but it usually doesn't have a moveslot for Trick Room outside of dedicated Trick Room teams, but post #21201 above has an excellent example describing the thought process.

Chandelure isn't great. It is the third best Fire/Ghost type. It would be fourth if A-wak was in the game to also be better on TR. If you want a special attacking Fire/Ghost, use the faster H-phlosion with the threat of Eruption. And if you want an Infiltrator Ghost type, just use Pult.

I also don't see how a Ghost type slower than Ceruledge can be anti-meta to it. If you face Sash + Sneak, you just lose any situation. If you switch in with Flash Fire to absorb the Bitter Blade, you still need a turn to set up TR. Or you just take a Ghost move to the face first afterwards. It is possible you could maybe do something with Scarf/Trick, but the speed tier is pretty bad for an OU metagame where many mons with speed over base 80 use Booster Energy.

Surprise TR is interesting. Athough, base 80 is a bit awkward for this. Either way, I do think there is merit inpacking surprise TR to beat faster offensive teams. It is likely an under the radar tactic.

 

[Karxrida]

Surprise TR is interesting. Athough, base 80 is a bit awkward for this. Either way, I do think there is merit inpacking surprise TR to beat faster offensive teams. It is likely an under the radar tactic.

The problem with surprise Trick Room (outside of all the already existing issues with the move in Singles) is that there's a very good chance you'd want to run it on a team that doesn't telegraph and/or commit to it. So if something goes wrong you could very easily cripple your team for a couple turns because the non-TR abusers are very likely too fast. Imagine giving an enemy Kingambit an easier chance to reverse sweep because you put TR up, for instance.

 

[ArcadianSkies]

Chandelure isn't great. It is the third best Fire/Ghost type. It would be fourth if A-wak was in the game to also be better on TR. If you want a special attacking Fire/Ghost, use the faster H-phlosion with the threat of Eruption. And if you want an Infiltrator Ghost type, just use Pult.

I also don't see how a Ghost type slower than Ceruledge can be anti-meta to it. If you face Sash + Sneak, you just lose any situation. If you switch in with Flash Fire to absorb the Bitter Blade, you still need a turn to set up TR. Or you just take a Ghost move to the face first afterwards. It is possible you could maybe do something with Scarf/Trick, but the speed tier is pretty bad for an OU metagame where many mons with speed over base 80 use Booster Energy.

Surprise TR is interesting. Athough, base 80 is a bit awkward for this. Either way, I do think there is merit inpacking surprise TR to beat faster offensive teams. It is likely an under the radar tactic.

I agree with all of this, but to add on further, I think the gimmick that Chandelure will get the most value out of is the Blunder Policy Inferno set

 

[Eviolite Bisharp]

The problem with surprise Trick Room (outside of all the already existing issues with the move in Singles) is that there's a very good chance you'd want to run it on a team that doesn't telegraph and/or commit to it. So if something goes wrong you could very easily cripple your team for a couple turns because the non-TR abusers are very likely too fast. Imagine giving an enemy Kingambit an easier chance to reverse sweep because you put TR up, for instance.

Maybe of way of dealing with this Is using one slow wallbreaker that also sees usage outside of TR like Ursaluna or Hatterene, that way you could take advantage of the surprise factor