Article by Slow Homie, posted by me for bbcode and editing purposes.
Smogon VGC 101 - Offensive Pins
Smogon VGC 101 - Offensive Pins
Picture this, you have your Mega Charizard Y and you’re facing down the opponent’s Kingambit. You click Weather Ball into the Kingambit, aaaand they switch into Basculegion, take 30% and are now in the position to KO you with a Wave Crash. The next game you are in the same position – but this time you aren’t going to let them get away with a switch to Basculegion. So you click Solarbeam, aaaand they stay in with Kingambit, hit you with a Kowtow Cleave and suddenly you’re in range to be KO’d by Sucker Punch. You got the call wrong 2 games in a row and lost the set.
What if you could always get those calls correct? What if you didn’t have to make any calls at all? What if you had an option where you could cover both options at the same time? Well you can with “Offensive Pins!”
Welcome back to VGC 101! The series is specially designed to take you from beginner to competing with and beating the best of the best! I’m SlowHomie and today we are going to talk about “Offensive Pins”! These are one of the premier offensive strategies/tools in VGC! Today we will help you understand:
- What a Pin is and why its good
- How to set up and use Pins
- How to prevent getting Pinned by your opponent
What is a Pin and Why are they Good?
You can perform a pin with two single target attacks, but pins are often even more effective if you can use spread moves. If you can use two spread moves you can hit both slots with a pin at the same time! Some classic examples include the “Disquake” combo of Discharge + Earthquake. Sometimes if you need a little extra damage you may opt to go for a stronger single target attack plus a spread attack. But the main idea is to combine two “Complimentary” types.
And what offensive types compliment each other? Some common type combinations include:
- Ground + Electric
- Electric + Ice
- Fire + Fairy
- Ghost + Fighting
- Rock + Ground
- Fire + Ground
- Ground + Fairy
- Ground + Ice
These combinations are so good because if your opponent can be KO’d before they can attack, and they have 0 safe switches, then you are basically allowed to take a KO for free with little to no drawback! And then the next turn you’re likely to be able to do it again! And the best part is that you don’t have to rely on outpredicting your opponent! You have an option that is always correct no matter what they do!
How to Set Up and Use Pins
The first step to setting up good Offensive Pins is in the Teambuilder! If you have lots of strong offensive combos, it will make setting up and using Offensive Pins much easier in games!
For example lets look at the most prolific team of Pokemon Champions Regulations M-A & M-B. You have Fairy + Fire, Fairy + Ground, Ground + Fire, Fire + Ground. The team often carries Low Kick on Kingambit so you can get Ghost + Fighting. This team is full of some of the most powerful offensive combos in history! Almost any two Pokemon next to each other can produce a pretty strong offensive pin!
This team also is good at creating offensive pins because it has lots of Spread moves, Priority moves, and Speed Control. You cannot create an offensive pin if your Pokemon gets outsped and KO’d. So all of the mons on this team are either pretty fast, or they have priority moves. You also see a lot of offensive boosting items. This makes Offensive Pins even more deadly and effective. If your double up doesn’t KO an opponent, they can stay in and attack. So offensive fire power is really important to create offensive pins.
You can create offensive pins without Speed Control and hyper spammable Spread moves. But it may take a few turns to reposition your Pokemon. For example Balance teams often have more supportive mons and more defensive typing combos. Fire + Water is a pin into Fire types and Grass types but not Water Types. So they use tools like Fake Out, Pivot Moves, and Protecting over several turns to put themself in a position where they have the two Pokemon they want in front of the opposing Pokemon they want.
Another useful tool for creating Offensive Pins is KOing one of your opponents Pokemon. In the beginning of the game, to create a true pin you would need to hit the slot you're targeting AND both Pokemon in the back – and you might not even know what they’re bringing in back! But once you eliminate one of their Pokemon you know their only option to switch in and covering both options becomes much easier.
So if you want to set up lots of pins you have a variety of options! The most important is having complimentary offensive types, but Speed Control, Spread attacks, Priority attacks, positioning, and taking early KOs all help as well!
How to Prevent Getting Pinned by an Opponent
So now you know how to pin your opponent – how do we stop that from happening to us?
The best way to stop a pin is to stop one of the opposing Pokemon from moving! If you use Fake Out - or better yet KO your opponent before they can move - then they can only hit you with one type of attack! You can’t pin someone with only 1 type of attack (unless you have an absolute nuke button like a pokemon set up to +6)! This is the most sure fire way to stop pins! You can also sometimes use the move Wide Guard to stop a pin if the opponent is using a Spread attack.
The other important option you have is to have a good “core” of Pokemon – meaning a group of Pokemon that resist each other’s weaknesses. To take an earlier example, if you have a Water type to switch in you are not pinned by an opposing Fire type and Water type. If you have a Grass type you are not pinned by a Grass type and a Water type. We’ll talk more about this in other articles, so for now just try to make sure your team has a few Pokemon that cover for each other’s weaknesses.
The final tools that are helpful for avoiding pins are damage mitigation, recovery, and pivoting moves. These all kind of cheat by reducing the effect of pins. For example, if you have Intimidate and Light Screen up, your opponent might be able to pin you with an offensive type combination, but that pin might still not KO you!
The goal of pins is to prevent a Pokemon from attacking or switching safely, so if you lower the damage output of the opponent you can still do both of those things even in the face of complimentary offense. The Sitrus Berry also lets you effectively live double-ups as well which is why it’s one of the best items. And with pivoting moves you can sometimes take one attack with one Pokemon and the other attack with a different Pokemon!
VGC 101 Offensive Pins Video!
We’ve covered a lot of ground, but the main point is that Offensive Pins are when you use two strong offensive attacks of complimentary types to guarantee a KO on a slot whether or not the opponent switches!
To help you understand how to use offensive pins effectively we have a video featuring our very own SnoozeVGC! Snooze has been editing and posting all of our videos, but he is an amazing competitor in his own right including winning the Salt Lake City 2017 Regional! So check out the video and subscribe to SnoozeVGC!
Homework
Today’s homework is to look at the team you are using and identify what offensive pins you can produce! Look for strong offensive type combos that are hard for your opponent to switch into!
And then you should go and play 3-5 games and try to identify spots in those games you can click those move combinations!
Review
In conclusion, Offensive Pins are one of the most fundamental powerful tools in VGC! If you make sure your team has powerful attackers with types that compliment each other you can set yourself up to guarantee a KO on a slot whether the opponent switches or not! This limits the amount of predictions you have to make and will help you win games more consistently! So go out there and pin some people!
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