[2013] Cresselia (QC 0/3)

[Tobes]

This analysis is currently available to an experienced writer with VGC experience.

[Overview]

• Possibly the best Pokemon in the metagame
• Bulky as all hell
• Tons and tons of support options: so many in fact that rather than make one support set it's easier to build a set around specific moves.
• Levitate makes it an excellent partner for Ground-types
• No slouch offensively either when EV'd for it
• Can struggle with Dark-types, Bug-types, and Steel-types (Tyranitar, Scizor, Bisharp, Heatran, etc.)

[SET]
name: Trick Room
move 1: Trick Room
move 2: Light Screen / Helping Hand / Swagger
move 3: Psyshock / Psychic
move 4: Ice Beam
item: Sitrus Berry / Mental Herb
ability: Levitate
nature: Sassy
evs: 212 HP / 60 Def / 28 SpA / 208 SpD

[SET COMMENTS]

• Cresselia has the bulk to set up Trick Room very reliably
• Helping Hand to power up slow sweepers
• Swagger to pump up Lum / Persim Berry sweepers (Metagross, etc)
• Psyshock hits targets that invest in Special Defense harder, but Psychic is also an option when you need the kick.
• Ice Beam hits Garchomp, Salamence, Latios, etc
• Light Screen to bolster team's Special Defense.

[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]

• Specially bulky. Sitrus preferred but Mental Herb is a viable option when Taunt is prevalent
• 220 HP / 108 Def / 180 SpA: OHKOes Salamence with Ice Beam (252 HP / 180 SpA / 76 SpD?) Ray Rizzo's World Championship spread
• Safeguard
• Reflect
• Skill Swap
• Sunny Day / Rain Dance
• Partners with Trick Room; "Double Room"
• Intimidate to blunt the threat of Tyranitar, Scizor, etc. Hitmontop and Scrafty get special mention for being Fighting-types
• Generic Trick Room sweepers

[SET]
name: Swagger
move 1: Swagger
move 2: Icy Wind / Trick Room
move 3: Helping Hand / Safeguard
move 4: Psyshock / Psychic / Ice Beam
item: Sitrus Berry
nature: Calm / Sassy
evs: 212 HP / 60 Def / 28 SpA / 208 SpD

[SET COMMENTS]

• Swagger can be used to give physical partners a quick +2 with the right preparations, or can be used to confuse and possibly cripple opposing special attackers.
• Icy Wind / Trick Room for Speed control.
• Helping Hand to further supplement Swagger recipients, or to give Cresselia an option for benefiting special partners.
• Safeguard to make entire team immune to Swagger's confusion, and for general utility against things like Spore and Thunder Wave.
• Standard STABs

[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]

• Special bulk, Sitrus for more bulk, etc.
• Thunder Wave
• Reflect / Light Screen
• Ice Beam
• Lum / Persim teammates: Metagross, Tyranitar, Conkeldurr, etc. If using Trick Room, Metagross should have a Speed IV of 14 and an Adamant nature, and Tyranitar should have an Adamant nature with 4 Spe EVs. This way under Trick Room Cresselia will move before either of them, allowing her to use Swagger and pump them before their attack. Recommended that the partners run Protect so that they'll be safe when Cresselia initially sets up Trick Room.
• Lum / Persim Garchomp is a good option if using Icy Wind.

[SET]
name: Offensive
move 1: Psyshock / Psychic
move 2: Hidden Power Fire
move 3: Ice Beam / Icy Wind
move 4: Grass Knot / Trick Room / Protect
item: Expert Belt / Choice Specs
nature: Modest
evs: 220 HP / 20 Def / 248 SpA / 20 SpD

[SET COMMENTS]

• Catches opponents off guard when they don't expect Cresselia to have offensive presence. Best-case scenario they waste a turn Taunting it only to find that this set doesn't care.
• Standard STABs as per usual.
• Hidden Power Fire roasts Scizor / Ferrothorn
• Ice Beam smashes Dragon-types, but Icy Wind is also an option for Speed control.
• Grass Knot to hit Tyranitar, Gastrodon, etc. Trick Room is also an option for team support, or simply for reversing an opponent's Trick Room. Trick an option if using Choice Specs to cripple something.

[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]

• Max Special Attack and remainder in bulk.
• Expert Belt for best increase to power without sacrificing bulk.
• Choice Specs for more power and access to Trick, but has to switch out more.
• Thunder Wave
• Helping Hand
• Various support moves: Reflect, Light Screen, Safeguard, etc.
• Best on goodstuffs teams that need some insurance against dedicated strategies such as rain or Trick Room.
• Garchomp is a great partner; beats Heatran whichs walls you otherwise and can fire off Earthquakes with no worry.
• Tyranitar is a threat; partners like Hitmontop and Scizor can make short work of it.

[SET]
name: ChestoRest
move 1: Rest
move 2: Icy Wind / Trick Room / Thunder Wave
move 3: Helping Hand / Swagger / Light Screen
move 4: Psyshock / Psychic / Ice Beam
item: Chesto Berry
ability: Levitate
nature: Calm / Sassy
evs: 220 HP / 60 Def / 28 SpA / 200 SpD

[SET]
name: Skill Swap
move 1: Skill Swap
move 2: Icy Wind / Trick Room
move 3: Helping Hand / Light Screen
move 4: Psyshock / Psychic / Ice Beam
item: Sitrus Berry
ability: Levitate
nature: Calm / Sassy
evs: 212 HP / 60 Def / 28 SpA / 208 SpD

[SET COMMENTS]

• Skill Swap is an excellent move. It can be used to steal beneficial abilities from opponents, reset beneficial teammate abilities such as Intimidate or Weather, or trade off Cresselia's Levitate to a Pokemon who benefits from it.
• Icy Wind / Trick Room for Speed control
• Helping Hand for offensive support. Light Screen helps bolster defense since you'll usually be using Intimidate support with this set.
• Standard STAB

[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]

• Specially bulky blah blah blah
• Thunder Wave
• Sunny Day to remove rain or sand, or to power up Heatran
• Heatran / other Ground-type weaks
• Intimidate (Hitmontop, Salamence, Scrafty, others)
• Weather (Tyranitar, Politoed)

[Other Options]

• Magic Coat
• Gravity
• Life Orb
• Flame Orb + Psycho Shift
• Moonlight

 

[Sixonesix]

ok I guess this is a pretty good reason to log in

- Most Cresselia want their HP stat below 224 HP in order to take 13 damage from sandstorm/hail every turn instead of 14. Cresselia with Sitrus Berry want an even numbered HP to recover instantly after a Super Fang. So Sitrus Cresselia = 212 EVs (222 HP), non-Sitrus Cresselia = 220 HP (223 HP).

- Taking that into account, 60 Defense is desired to survive Adamant Tyranitar Dark Gem Crunch (212 HP / 60 Def)

- 88 SAtk EVs is the minimum to OHKO 4 HP Breloom with Psychic (Psyshock requires way more and isn't really worth it)

- Ice Beam should usually take priority over Cresselia's Psychic STAB, it hits more relevant Pokémon and the freeze chance is always something to look out for even if you're only doing chip

- Light Screen should be slashed over Helping Hand/Swagger rather than the Ice move

- Cresselia is usually the Pokémon that you want to give your Sitrus too but if you have something that needs it more (Rotom-W or Thundurus for example) Leftovers also kind of works

 

[Tobes]

Thanks Six, those EV spreads are really helpful. I'm going with most of your changes, although I've slashed Ice Beam after the Psychic STABs on most sets on account of Icy Wind being a primary slash on most of them.

 

[tofucocoa]

I dunno if Skill Swap deserves its own set. It pretty much works like any other supporting cress which is outfitted according to the team it's on, so maybe change that to a general supporting Cresselia with 1 or 2 slots dedicated to speed control, one for HH, screens and Ice Beam and of course the last for Psychic (make the 'general support' the first set too imo). I'm also not sure that Swagger should be its own set following the same logic, but I'd be OK with it if you mention different Speed EVs and IVs for certain partners like Scrafty and Metagross, but off the top of my head I only know of Ray's meta with 14 Speed IVs, along with Trick Room being the main slash since a lot of good Persim/Lum users are slow and bulky.

ps this thread reminded me that i need to retrain some of my cresselias :p

pps calm mind in oo because (by my experience) it can wreck teams that have too many special attackers because they can't do enough damage to it before lefties heals it back up or it rest+chesto's in their face, though it needs a lot of support, namely good intimidators and ttar/metagross counters (landorus-t) and speed control, which goes against the main reason to use cress i guess pbth

 

[Tobes]

We had separated the sets mostly to avoid the shitload of slashitis a single Cresselia set would have, but maybe something like

[SET]
name: FUCK THAT'S A LOT OF SLASHES
move 1: Icy Wind / Trick Room / Thunder Wave
move 2: Helping Hand / Swagger / Skill Swap / Light Screen
move 3: Ice Beam / Swagger / Skill Swap / Safeguard
move 4: Psyshock / Psychic / Ice Beam
item: Sitrus Berry / Mental Herb
ability: Levitate
nature: Calm / Sassy
evs: 212 HP / 60 Def / 236 SpD

could work? This is about as reasonable as I think you could make a single Cresselia support set, which is why I'm still leaning towards move specific-oriented multiple support sets, but if people want to go this route I'd be fine with it too.

Oh also I'll be adding a ChestoRest set in a minute.

 

[tofucocoa]

yeah i forgot how slashy that would make things lol

i would also like to see mental herb in OO and/or in AC in the trick room set because taunt isn't common enough to justify giving up cress's only options for recovery. slash lefties in for the sake of item clause, and mention how it gets canceled out by sand and isn't as effective as sitrus unless cress sticks around for 5 turns or more (iirc)

idk about sassy on every set too. probably the main reason for trick room on other sets other than the dedicated one is to counter trick room. in all other circumstance it's not worth being outsped by metagross and politoed (so you can twave em or do chip damage before you get maimed by double targeting).

 

[The Knights of Wario Land]

Idk why on the Swagger set it says the Psychic moves and Ice beam for the selection of the last set: Psyshock/Psychic and the Ice move are absolutely essential to the set, and I think Ice Beam should at least be the first slash over Safeguard and Helping Hand, as you're more likely to be using Trick Room anyways if you want to use Swagger on a slower Metagross.

EDIT: also Energy Ball should be mentioned on the offensive set because it does more damage to Gastrodon and Rotom-W than Grass Knot does.

 

[tlyee61]

EVs in SpDef & SpAtk could also use a little work IMO

176 EVs in SpDef allows you to live Hitmontop's Fake Out followed up by a +1 Bug Buzz from Volcarona.

28 SpAtk EVs allows you to 2HKO standard 252 HP Top with Psyshock
92 SpAtk EVs lets you 2HKO non-bulky genies (and Thundurus-T / Landorus-T)

 

[Cybertron]

EVs on your offensive set can be better too

120 speed allows you to outspeed max speed Latios after 1 Icy Wind by 1 speed point which is pretty huge IMO an offensive set

Icy Wind should also probably have priority over Ice Beam, offensive Cress doesn't seek to get KOes as much as setting up for other Pokemon to get KOes that they otherwise would not be able to get, speed control is very important because of this

 

[Magicxgame]

So I'm not pro like some of the previous posters, but I think I can make a contribution.

• Cybertron's right, Icy Wind needs to go before Ice Beam on offensive Cress since speed control is typically preferred. Psychic Gem should also be listed somewhere since it allows Cress to have a guaranteed OHKO on Hitmontop, deal more damage with its STAB, and possibly OHKO Amoonguss (if it's running an outdated spread like 252 HP / 4 Def).
• ChestoRest has a ton of slashes. Most of what I've seen are pretty simple Ice attack / Psyshock / Thunder Wave or Helping Hand / Rest sets, at least that's what I'd put as the primary options. (Someone correct me if I'm mistaken.)
• Also think HP Fire should be listed at least as an other option for some of the sets other than the offensive set in order to smack Scizor/Ferrothorn, though it won't OHKO.
• Also: Despite what the current analysis says, 84 SpA EVs are needed to 2HKO Tornadus and Thundurus-T with Ice Beam and a neutral nature. (I feel kinda responsible for this, since whoever changed the analysis put this after I suggested 28 SpA EVs for the 2HKO on Top/Hariyama.)
• Also agree w/lucariojr that Calm Mind at least deserves a mention in Other Options, since Cress definitely has the bulk to set up a CM or two.

 

[tlyee61]

120 speed allows you to outspeed max speed Latios after 1 Icy Wind by 1 speed point which is pretty huge IMO an offensive set

this is for HP fire I assume (i mean who doesn't run hp fire on offensive cress) but if you have a 31 speed EV, 116 gives the same stat point.