SwSh Battle Facilities Discussion & Records

I was considering using a very similar water set to Eisenherz: DMax Gyarados+Dracovish+water/ground mon(was going to use Seismitoad). This seems to be the most intuitive choice. However Eisenherz explained that the exact strategy I planned to run(Gyara in lead, Toad in back) was problematic, so I may have to reconsider.

Some other type sets that might be interesting, especially for 'harder' types like ice and bug:
Fighting: Terrakion + Urshifu-SS + Lucario
Ice: Darm-G + Lapras(G-max) + Mamoswine
Bug: Durant + Volcarona + ??????
 
I've been having a lot of fun with this, I think it's the most interesting post-game single-player challenge since gen 5 with PWT. I got to 33 wins with Mimikyu, Primarina, and Clefable. I'm trying to see if I can get to 15 wins with each type... or something like that

edit: I can't think of the right item to use on Clefable, any ideas? My other thought was Clefable: Leftovers, Primarina: Expert Belt, Mimikyu: Shell Bell, but Leftovers is pretty nice on Mimikyu over Shell Bell since I use Swords Dance every battle, and it heals up the Disguise damage. I also want Healing Wish on Clefable but not sure what I can sacrifice, maybe Protect. Encore is another useful way to get wishes back to Primarina or a busted Mimikyu. I could also just use a 3rd sweeper instead of Clefable (or even a sweeping Clefable) but I found that without it, a toxic, burn, or paralysis pretty much ends Mimikyu. Klefki and Mawile have incredible type synergy with the first two but I can't think up a good set for either of them that would be any good in this format.

Mimikyu @ Leftovers
Ability: Disguise
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Shadow Claw
- Shadow Sneak
- Play Rough

Primarina @ Shell Bell
Ability: Torrent
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Surf
- Moonblast
- Ice Beam
- Energy Ball

Clefable @ Babiri Berry
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Toxic
- Heal Bell
- Wish
- Protect

EbIuP8jUMAAbcJU.jpg
 
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Eisenherz : Nice teams so far. You're definitely taking a different approach than I am, but hopefully I'll have something to share soon and we can compare notes.

I am curious though: how often did you find your leads getting chipped? Specifically, I'm wondering about Indeedee and Gyarados. Chip attrition in my experience is one of the biggest hang-ups for obvious reasons (no auto-heal, limited switching opportunities, etc.)
 
EisenherzI am curious though: how often did you find your leads getting chipped? Specifically, I'm wondering about Indeedee and Gyarados. Chip attrition in my experience is one of the biggest hang-ups for obvious reasons (no auto-heal, limited switching opportunities, etc.)
I was surprised to see so many choice items on his teams. I've basically been putting leftovers and shell bell on every team. I'm gonna try giving my Primarina specs so I can give my Clefable leftovers, and see how it goes.
 

meddle

boomer user
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I decided I was ready to stomach more needlessly long dynamax animations and try out the restricted sparring format, reaching 20 wins with Bug typing, with two different teams.

There is certainly more potential with bug than 20 wins, especially considering I lost to stuff I could have easily played around if I were paying more attention. Not sure if I'll end up trying to push this higher before I collect all the easy BP with other, less difficult(?) types. I'll revisit this with more PP on my moves, as well.


:durant: :heracross: :galvantula: 20 wins
:durant: :heracross: :volcarona: 20 wins
________________________________
:durant: ♂ @ Wide Lens
Ability: Hustle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dig
- X-Scissor
- Iron Head
- Rock Slide
Durant carried hard, and I don't think you could really find a better bug type for this format. I'm running Wide Lens because offsetting low accuracy after dynamaxing is too important IMO to avoid taking unnecessary damage. There are enough bulky things/sturdy users in the format to outlive your dynamax turns, and when that happens you're stuck with Hustle and inaccurate moves.

Air Balloon Magnezone was Durant's arch-nemesis, and it's the reason I had to heal up the first time. My 2nd heal usage was due to Amoonguss' Effect Spore putting Durant to sleep.


:Heracross: ♂ @ Assault Vest
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Aerial Ace
- Brick Break
- Earthquake
- Megahorn
Heracross was the 2nd best 'mon I could conceive of for this format, at least with my current approach (OHKO stuff) since it can snowball with Moxie and Max Airstream (albeit with super weak Aerial Ace). It has the glaring weakness of having a weak fighting move and carrying the super inaccurate Megahorn after dynamax fades, but overall I'm not sure you can find a better bug for the second slot, but I'm definitely interested to see what other battle facility fanatics come up with for streaking with this typing. There's probably a better Heracross moveset as well. Maybe it's the right play to have low PP Close Combat. IDK.

Assault vest is a weird item choice probably, but I thought it complemented Hera's above average spdef and the special bulk was appreciated at times, especially under dynamax. Choice Band also seemed unnecessary with the ability to get Moxie boosts.


:Volcarona: ♂ @ Choice Specs
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Hurricane
- Bug Buzz
- Giga Drain
- Flamethrower
I originally got to 20 wins with Galvantula, running a set of Bug Buzz/Energy Ball/Thunder/Thunderbolt with Specs, and found it just couldn't net the KOs it needed to for this format. It also fell over to basically any netural hit.

I actually don't think this format is very kind to Volcarona either though, and I think I'd search for yet another replacement in a future run. At the same time though, it's pretty slim pickings for bugs, and Volcarona is one of few with a decent statline. It's possible that a bulky QD roosting set might be better, though, like I said above, I was committed to seeing what I could do with a "strictly net KOs and snowball" strategy for my first foray into restricted sparring.


Threats I encountered that caused me to have to heal up:
:amoonguss::porygon2::pyukumuku::magnezone:
Effect Spore Amoonguss, Porygon2 (bulky + Trick Room), Pyukumuku (Innards Out + Counter), Yawn, and Air Balloon Magnezone

I'm curious to see what 'mons and sets people use for streaking higher with bug since I'm not very confident in the Heracross + Volcarona roster. Out of the rest of the acceptably-fast bugs, Galvantula, Accelgor, and Ribombee all seem to have the same problems; speedy but unable to net KOs without dying. A Scolipede or Ninjask with full attack investment might be usable?

 
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Eisenherz

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Eisenherz : Nice teams so far. You're definitely taking a different approach than I am, but hopefully I'll have something to share soon and we can compare notes.

I am curious though: how often did you find your leads getting chipped? Specifically, I'm wondering about Indeedee and Gyarados. Chip attrition in my experience is one of the biggest hang-ups for obvious reasons (no auto-heal, limited switching opportunities, etc.)
I was surprised to see so many choice items on his teams. I've basically been putting leftovers and shell bell on every team. I'm gonna try giving my Primarina specs so I can give my Clefable leftovers, and see how it goes.
My thought process was kind of basic: you get chipped down a lot less if you pick up OHKOs. So I focused on outspeeding and making sure things go down. Indeedee didn't really tend to get chipped, the issues were about having to eat one big hit every once in a while (for example on a lead Ribombee, nothing to do except Dynamax and tank the big hit), so it comes down to matchups and how long it can go without facing these particular Pokémon. Gyarados is a bit of a different situation because Gastrodon was often enough a good switch-in for faster things, and also the main concern was usually not so much getting worn down but running out of Bounce PP, in which case it can probably not stick around for much longer regardless of its HP.

Picking up OHKOs without Dynamaxing / when Dmax is over is mostly why I use a lot of choice items, but I think items that are also useful while Dynamaxed might be better in a lot of cases (AV, E-Belt, type boosting items).

Leftovers sound good on offensive Pokémon only if they can pick up a lot of OHKOs without additional power, so they counteract the chip / one big hit over time, but I'm not sure how many Pokémon have the power to pull that off (maybe more than I realize). Otherwise, something has to be really bulky, or have reliable recovery to make good use of them, something too middling in these areas is likely to go down without seeing much of the benefit (for example, I've been using an offensive Rotom-W with Leftovers on Electric, and they haven't been too helpful, even with Pain Split).
 

Eisenherz

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Another day, another report! This time, I tackled Mono Electric, and got a better result than I expected!

Pokémon Sword-Shield Screen Shot 2020-06-23, 1.42 PM.png


The pool of viable Electric Pokémon for this mode is pretty barren and I had a hard time making a team I was really happy with, but I ended up with this:
@

Jolly | Hustle
IVs: 31/HT/31/HT/HT/31
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpDef / 252 Spe

Bolt Beak / Outrage / Low Kick / Aerial Ace

@

Timid | Sturdy
IVs: 31/0/31/31/31/31
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe

Thunderbolt / Rising Voltage / Flash Cannon / Body Press
@

Modest | Levitate
IVs: 31/0/31/31/31/31
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe

Thunderbolt / Hydro Pump / Dark Pulse / Pain Split

I won't pretend every member played an intricate part in the streak... Dracozolt carried the team on its shoulders. It swept, and swept, and swept some more. I started with Earthquake over Low Kick, but I found myself needing to use it significantly less than the other moves, so I switched to Low Kick since having a means to boost Attack sounded really useful – and it definitely was! Aerial Ace is for the obvious, all-important Airstream, and Outrage is Dracozolt's strongest Max move, very useful for picking up things at neutral like Marowak or Seismitoad. I initially had an Assault Vest to extend its lifespan, but I noticed a lot of Max Knuckles and Max Airstream left foes weak to them at low HP, stuff like Passimian or Kangaskhan. It makes sense, since Airstream from Aerial Ace only get 110 BP as a Max move (and Knuckle is 100 in this case), so I reluctantly tried out Expert Belt, and it did its job really well. There are times where the AV was missed, in front of Starmie or Ribombee for example, but overall I think it was a worthwhile trade, and I don't think I'd change anything to this Dracozolt for further runs.

Though Rotom wasn't getting through teams as easily as Dracozolt, it did fill an important role as a switch-in, allowing Dracozolt to stick around longer than it might otherwise have. I thought offensive Rotom with Pain Split would be great; with Rotom's low base HP, Pain Split would heal a lot and allow it to stick around much longer. That wasn't really the case, foes kept outdamaging it to the point where it was barely worth. For the same reason, Leftovers didn't have a big impact, since the hits it took were heavy. On the upside, its damage certainly exceeded my expectations, though it still often lacked just a little oomph to OHKO stuff at neutral. I think Rotom was good overall, but if I was going to try and optimize this team further, I would definitely go for a much more defensive Rotom, and I would be open to testing different formes as well, probably Mow first, but Fan may not be too bad either!
I'm usually not a fan of Dark Pulse on Rotom, but it was kind of necessary to deal with Palossand, one of the main threats to the team. It has a Passho Berry, so Rotom's water moves can't OHKO, and it packs Energy Ball, which does like 75%, so Max Darkness was my much needed answer to it as a lead. It was also Rotom's only real way of hitting Grass types, racking up useful SpD drops (I actually bred and trained a Signal Beam Rotom for this reason in Gen 7, only to find out upon transfer that the move had been removed from Gen 8... a true facepalm moment).

Outside of being the dedicated switch-in for Starmie, Magnezone kind of did its thing on the side. It's pretty hit and miss, it can run through several matchups really nicely, but its speed tier and lack of special bulk can shorten its lifespan within just a battle or 2. In this particular streak of 38, it didn't shine through much, but in testing, I had some really nice runs with it. It's the most powerful special Electric attacker currently available and it offers a typing that synergizes really well with the other 2 on paper, so I still think it might be the best pick for this slot, but I can't say it helped nearly as much as Dracozolt did. The scarf came in clutch in many occasions – outspeeding Starmie is an important one – but I'd be open to testing out Assault Vest on it, which could make a world of difference whenever it Dynamaxes. Either way, a 4x weakness to Ground and no way to OHKO several of them (Max Steelspike tends to just fall short) is definitely not ideal.
While it's initially quite weak, Body Press becomes a really nice move after a couple Max Steelspikes, and I really enjoyed having that option on Magnezone (its coverage is incredibly lacking, so it's not like it has much competition).
Double Electric move was quite handy; when making use the Scarf, being locked into Thunderbolt does significantly more damage, but after Dynamaxing and setting terrain, Rising Voltage's power is ridiculous, and this also provides a 140 BP Max move (same as Thunder)! Thanks to ReptoAbysmal for lobbying in favour of that move, since I was initially thinking of having Magnet Rise on there, which I think would have been less useful.
[edit: I forgot to mention it initially, but Sturdy is obviously pointless for this format, it's just what I already had on Magnezone. Analytic would be much better!]

I'd be interested to revisit the team in the future and try to improve it to hit 40, but for now, this was a relatively fortunate run overall and I'm really happy with 38, so I'm moving on to Mono Grass!

This run was streamed in its entirety, and can be viewed here:

 
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I really wanted to get to 50 wins with Fairy, but that sneaky fast Weavile (why does it have Shadow Claw?!?) had other plans. But I'm happy with this result, so I'm gonna move on to some other types.

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Mimikyu @ Shell Bell
Ability: Disguise
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Shadow Claw
- Shadow Sneak
- Play Rough

Primarina @ Expert Belt
Ability: Torrent
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Surf
- Moonblast
- Ice Beam
- Energy Ball

Clefable @ Leftovers
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Toxic
- Heal Bell
- Wish
- Protect

Similar team as I posted before, but with Wood Hammer instead of Shadow Sneak, because Grassy Terrain is really helpful in this format. And I settled on Expert Belt for Primarina and Leftovers for Clefable. I tried Togekiss over Clefable but found it has too many weaknesses and doesn't get enough OHKOs in Dynamax, and I really missed Heal Bell. I also considered Sylveon as a replacement for Clefable, but Unaware is too useful so I never tried it.

Mostly I just Swords Dance with Mimikyu every battle and then Dynamax and get 3 OHKOs. Shell Bell heals up pretty much any damage I take if I don't. I try to use Max Overgrowth whenever I can use it and still get an OHKO, both to put up the terrain and to save PP on my STAB moves. I switch to Clefable when my other 2 Pokemon either get hit with status or don't get 3 OHKOs and the last Pokemon is threatening. Or if the lead is faster than Mimikyu. When Dynamax runs out, it leaves Mimikyu very vulnerable. Big threats that outspeed Mimikyu are Froslass with WoW, Weavile with Shadow Claw and Taunt, Boltund which you probably know is just a PITA, and to a lesser extent, Ribombee. I usually switch to Clefable when those are a lead.

Bonus pics from the 46th battle. Notice how Mimikyu still has nearly max health (it would be higher without the sand). And yeah, I got the struggle KO
EbN8RYYVcAIN_9F.jpg

EbN8RYYUEAEFWBw.jpg
EbN8RYnUwAAxWcg.jpg
 

Attachments

Threw together a rough team for Rock of Tyranitar, Terrakion and Lycanroc-Dusk and got a few wins. Only successful run was Bug with Volcarona (should probably try Specs over the Quiver Dance set I did), Scizor and Golisopod.

Quick question though where do y'all grind out PP Ups? If you guys have enough to boost the teams for this in-game mode there has to be something I'm missing.
 
Threw together a rough team for Rock of Tyranitar, Terrakion and Lycanroc-Dusk and got a few wins. Only successful run was Bug with Volcarona (should probably try Specs over the Quiver Dance set I did), Scizor and Golisopod.

Quick question though where do y'all grind out PP Ups? If you guys have enough to boost the teams for this in-game mode there has to be something I'm missing.
Hammerlocke Pokemon Center, 10 BP for 1 PP Up. It's the person to the right of the normal mart stuff. I just bought 50 because I was running low and I know I'll be using them a lot. I actually got Spite'd down to 0 Swords Dance PP in my last run. it's PP maxed now haha
 
Bleh.

7 Consecutive Wins with a Mono Grass team consisting of:

Rillaboom @ Choice Band
Grassy Surge
252 attack / 252 speed
Adamant
Grassy Glide
Knock Off
High Horsepower
Wood Hammer

Lilligant @ Wide Lens
Own Tempo
252 Sp. Attack / 252 Speed
Quiver Dance
Sleep Powder
Giga Drain
Hyper Beam

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Iron Barbs
252 HP / 252
Iron Defense
Body Press
Power Whip
Explosion

This was simply a team scraped up to get 5 wins. I know this team could have easily gotten to 15 wins as I didn't even use up any of my healing slots, but I fudged up during battle six against a Scizor and didn't immediately switch into Ferrothorn to beat it. I let my Rillaboom get KO'd for no reason, then Scizor only had a turn 1 sleep to OHKO Lilligant, and then I stupidly mashed my way through the text so I wiped through Battle 7 without healing.

Rillaboom is self-explanatory since it has a lot of new toys to play with as of recently. Spam Grassy Glide and if something doesn't get at least two shouted by Grass Glide, Gigantamax and run a Drum Solo through them. Grassy Glide not only does a lot of damage for a priority move, but has a lot of PP too. High Horsepower/Knock Off is for coverage as well as for their Max effects. Wood Hammer is basically only used during Gigantamax because even though Grassy Glide has 32 PP, pressure mons can eat through it if you're not careful, and its also your main move.

Lilligant is there for sweeping potential and for the mons that are faster than Rillaboom, but not too fast (which is why I'm using it over Venusaur). Main thing is to Sleep Powder (preferably on a special attacker or certain physical attackers like Shell Trap Turtanator), use up Quiver Dance, Dynamax if available, and then sweep. Giga Drain is for sustain and Hyper Beam is for Max Strike damage (cause Lilligant's coverage is buttcheeks and I'm too lazy to Home a Lilligant with something like Dream Eater). Yes Venusaur has much better coverage and bulk but Lilligant outspeeds a lot of things after one QD and is a better snowballer because of that.

Ferrothorn is a fillermon for the most part cause I don't know what else to put there, or until I find something better. It helps against contact physical mons, like Scizor (who I shouldn't have had problems with if I wasn't such a dummy) and can typically sustain through them with the combination of Grassy Terrain and Leftovers. I'll most likely replace Explosion with Leech Seed down the road.

Mono Grass has a lot of issues as many grass types are slow, have bad coverage, or aren't meant for sweeping potential. There's a ton of mons they have issues with such as Salazzle, bug types, steel types, Certain Weavile if Rillaboom is knocked out and/or Grassy Terrain is out of commission, Centiskorch , Sap Sippers, Charizard (might as well quit if you see one), fast mons, OTHER grass types, etc. It just keeps going and going and going... Maybe I'll swap out Ferrothorn for Virizion just so I don't get destroyed by every fire-type under the sun. Maybe Calyrex will be really fast (or GOOD)...

But as I said, this team (with a few adjustments and a teeny bit of Fortune's Favor) can easily get to Battle 15, but beyond that, I don't think its worth the loss in sanity.
 
After much iteration and experimentation, I did it. I scored a 50+ win streak:

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Ladies and gentlemen, I present my Dark team "Krafty Krew":

:ss/krookodile:
"Krusha" the Krookodile @ Shell Bell
Adamant Nature
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spd
- Throat Chop
- Earthquake
- Thunder Fang
- Fire Fang

:ss/incineroar:
"Klobber" the Incineroar @ Leftovers
Adamant Nature
Ability : Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP, 252 Atk, 4 Def
- Blaze Kick
- Drain Punch
- Earthquake
- Bulk Up

:ss/mandibuzz:
"Necky" the Mandibuzz @ Rocky Helmet
Careful Nature (Yes, this is bad. I explain below.)
Ability : Overcoat
EVs: 252 HP, 4 Def, 252 SpD
- Air Slash
- Taunt
- Roost
- Toxic

This team is the result of several iterations of trying to maximize Krookodile. Its dual-typing and ability seemed like a good fit, so I took Restricted Sparring as an opportunity to try out one of the new toys from the Isle of Armor. I originally tried to make a Ground team around Krookodile, but I realized that most of Krookodile's blind spots were related to its ground type rather than its dark type. I made the type switch and ended up training up Incineroar and Mandibuzz and, after a couple more iterations, landed with final version you see above.

On top of all of that, Krookodile's naming made it quite convenient for me to name the entire team after a certain group of grunts:


As previously mentioned, Krookodile is the key piece to the team. Great dual-typing, a respectable 92 base speed, and Moxie make him threatening enough as is. But when you max out the PP on all of his moves, he ends up with a whopping 88 total PP. This Kroc has a serious motor on it and can go for a long time before it runs out of gas. Throat Chop and Earthquake are your STAB's, with Throat Chop chosen due to the consistency of its second effect (as situational as that may be.) Thunder Fang and Fire Fang are for coverage and generally get the most mileage under Dynamax. They are particularly important from the lead position for getting clean kills with their max moves, although after a Moxie boost they can be used somewhat more liberally to preserve STAB PP. In particular, Thunder Fang/Max Lightning hits Water/Flying dual types like bulky Intimidate Gyarados (because that's apparently a thing now,) and Fire Fang hits a couple key blindspots such as Heracross.

Krookodile is not without flaws though, and they are pretty significant:
  • Average bulk. He's not a glass cannon, but type disadvantages tend to rip him up.
  • No way to boost speed outside of the awkward tutor move Scale Shot. This means that even in the middle of a +2 Dynamax sweep, something like Ribombee can come in and still threaten to wreck his day.
  • Before Moxie boosts (and occasionally even at +1,) tanky Grass and Normal types (many carry Fighting moves) are very problematic.
That's quite a lot to try and get around, which is why this team took a lot of iterations. I really like Krookodile and what he brings to the table. He's definitely a poke with pronounced strengths and weaknesses. I liked his strengths enough to try and build a strategy around covering his weaknesses, with the hope that--in this mode filled with risk--the synergy would keep as many options on the table for as long as possible.

So instead of opting for a "true" second string sweeper, I focused instead on building a one-two defensive core that would allow me to take the risks I wanted. Both Incineroar and Mandibuzz have been fine-tuned to capitalize on certain (lead) matchups and maintain momentum, all while staying healthy.

Incineroar is mainly to switch in on several (but not all) bulky normals, though Intimidate allows him to be a decent physically defensive catch-all. Try to get 2-3 Bulk Ups if the matchup allows it, then use Drain Punch to KO and heal yourself back up. From there, boosted Incineroar is in prime position to move through the rest of team. Blaze Kick is your STAB, with Earthquake chosen over Dark STAB to help cover Electric types for the other half of the defensive duo. He's a little one dimensional and the most niche member of the team, but he has his moments and can absolutely solo some teams on his own.

Mandibuzz has been tuned to be the specially defensive wall, allowing both her and Incineroar to play off each other if momentum does not end up on their side. Toxic is its main weapon of choice, but Air Slash is chosen over Foul Play (I started with this, which is why the nature is wrong) since Mandibuzz often is coming in on special attackers and things like Amoongus with Toxic immunity. Taunt is used to prevent other bulky foes from stalling. Taunt also pairs well with Rocky Helment, giving it excellent versatility for both physical and special matchups. Although a lack of Leftovers theoretically hurts its longevity, its unique combination of tools has turned out to be key not only in winning matchups but also in winning them quickly. More on that later.

So that's the team. Let's look at some examples of them in action:

Story Time

So first, a breakdown of the run. Here is the win breakdown, with my full restores separating each phase:

First Phase : 17 wins
Second Phase : 15 wins
Third Phase : 22 wins

The second phase ended with a rather pompous wet fart. I switched Mandibuzz into an Octillery who near immediately inflicted poison with Gunk Shot. It would proceed to land every Gunk Shot thereafter, activate Starf Berry for +2 Spd after Toxic damage and finish me off with a 5 hit Rock Blast. Roost spam couldn't save me from that RNG disaster. Krookodile was on the verge of defeat as well, so I naturally took my last restore and headed into the final phase of the run. That's where the real fun started.

First, RNG paid me back in match 33. To my utter dismay, Wacan Berry Kingler was the first lead matchup I encountered after my full heal. I decided to roll with it and kept Krookodile in. Kingler uses Crab Hammer... and misses. Boy oh boy, I'll take that. Easy 2HKO and no notable problems with the rest of the match.

The next several matches are fairly uneventful. In Match 38, I end up calling on my defensive anchors and... it doesn't go as well as I'd hoped. Incineroar is almost dead and basically worth an Intimidate switch-in. Mandibuzz is in far better shape but she has enough chip to where she needs a solid matchup to switch and heal on.

We power through for a win in Match 38. Match 39 is next, and...

:ss/mienshao:

Crap.:psycry:

This thing has High Jump Kick and the speed to go with it, easily shredding Krookodile and Incineroar. Mandibuzz with Rocky Helmet can maybe swing a switch and Roost off the HJK PP... at full health. Thanks to Match 38, its not. If that weren't enough, it blocks Intimidate if its running Inner Focus as its ability, so that's not even a consistent last resort. As a Dark type killer, this thing wrecks hard.

Thankfully, Krookodile was near enough full health that, under Dynamax, he could tank the hit. Krookodile gets slammed down to around 25% of his max HP but dispatches of the menace with a Max Quake. The karate beast is down, but Krookodile is now one good hit away from taking his final bow. Good thing Krookodile is resilient... and a big part of that is because of Shell Bell.

Chip is pretty much impossible to avoid. At some point you're bound to get a bad speed matchup or a type disadvantage, so someone is taking the heat for it one way or another. What's worse, its impossible to know when those "trouble" matchups are going to crop up... and if they'll crop up in close proximity. Although that last part is out of our control, the idea is that you have enough good matchups to carry you a decent distance. That's the idea with Shell Bell: if I can stay in that comfort zone long enough, I can heal enough to weather the next bad matchup. This alleviates some of the pressure of taking risk as well, because if I have to make a tough decision between staying with Krookodile or switching to a defensive anchor, I can lean into my star player since he has a long-term comeback mechanic.

(Also, its worth noting that Shell Bell is better than Leftovers for an all-out offense poke like Krookodile. Not only can it outpace Leftovers on a turn-to-turn basis if you consistently get OHKO's, but it also has the advantage of snagging HP off the final kill, whereas Leftovers does not.)

2020062319144600-3C66B776DB1AA06323037049FACD96D3.jpg


Match 40. Already, you can see Krookodile has moved beyond ~25% HP and was able to gets some heals in Match 39. Krookodile gets back to doing what he does and uses Shell Bell to start gaining back steam. He's make significant headway, despite only dominating 3 out of the next 5 matches (40-44). The other 2 matches would fall to Mandibuzz, whose combination of Rocky Helmet, Taunt and Dynamax solo'd two entire teams: Rocky Helmet negating Passimian's Drain Punch recovery, Taunt blocking Amoongus from Ingrain and Max Guard stalling some tricky matchups like Facade Tauros were some of the highlights. This is one of those situations where the defensive anchors really shine, allowing Krookodile to stay in its lane long enough to get healthy.

Krookodile would only get about 4 solid matches before it hit another trouble spot. Match 46 saw this lead matchup:

:ss/malamar:

Malamar isn't a bonafide end runner, but she can't be OHKO'd without a boost or crit. She's also packing Superpower which does around 50% of Krookodile's max Dynamax HP. Without Shell Bell, this would have been "goodbye Krookodile." Thankfully, it was not:

2020062319401600-3C66B776DB1AA06323037049FACD96D3.jpg


The Kroc lives on and the train keeps moving. In fact, by the time the team closed out Match 50:

2020062319572800-3C66B776DB1AA06323037049FACD96D3.jpg


Krookodile is back at full health. This is the power of Shell Bell.

Sadly, I would make a critical error shortly thereafter. Against a lead Exeggutor, I clicked Max Flare in favor of preserving the PP of Max Darkness. This ended up being a huge mistake, with Exeggutor living and using Solar Beam (which it would have had anyway with Power Herb) to bring me into the red. Krookodile would still take the match and try to start the comeback, but sadly another iffy matchup in Air Balloon Magnezone would shortly follow. Obviously Mandibuzz had no business switching into Magnezone, so Krookodile did what it could; Magnezone would follow up my attack with Steel Beam, which at the very least meant they went down together.

2020062320045800-3C66B776DB1AA06323037049FACD96D3.jpg


Well, preserving PP doesn't mean much if you're down and out. Still, over approximately 20 tag-team battles, you can see that Krookodile still had a little left to give should he have been able to stay in the game. He puts in serious work.

Mandibuzz would hold things down a bit longer but the lead matchup for Match 55 all but guaranteed there would be no "last hurrah:"

2020062320144800-3C66B776DB1AA06323037049FACD96D3.jpg


Despite the avoidable mistake, I'm pretty happy with where the team is at right now. Despite there being a fair amount of RNG to contend with, I think this team meshes together really well, mixing short-term showstopper offense with long-term survival tools. Not sure where I'll go next; maybe I'll take my beloved Krusha and company for another spin, or maybe I'll see if I can't find another precious gem to play around with. Thanks for reading, and hopefully these insights will help you design your own teams. Until next time!
 

Eisenherz

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I just spent a few hours leading Ditto + a Knock Off user in Mono Normal to figure out sets quicker. Not there yet, but the spreadsheet is getting close to complete, thanks to everyone who's been contributing!

A few notes:
  • There are a lot of multi-hit moves we had missing from the sets, and that's because the AI is similar to the last few gens, where it never picks those moves because it only sees the base power, and doesn't understand the multi-hitting part.
  • Many of the sets are mixed, and this tends to support a theory I developed when damage calcing during my runs: I think all the Pokémon have a neutral nature, but regular facility investments (252/252, maybe there are some 168/168/168). I also think the IVs might be imperfect. I'll be interested to see if that's the case when this gets datamined! [edit: now that it's been many weeks, I can say with confidence that 1. natures are not neutral, and 2. IVs are indeed imperfect]
  • The sets were very clearly created to highlight the new moves, they're everywhere.
  • We have 149 Pokémon listed... I suspect we're missing just 1.
  • The Rotom item is, as ANTS put it, either 0 IQ or 200000 IQ.
 
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I wasn't expecting to get this high with the bugs, but it turns out there are a few bugs that can heavily utilize Dynamax.

EbTno2AUwAAdevo.jpg


Durant @ Shell Bell
Ability: Hustle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Iron Head
- X-Scissor
- Rock Slide
- Superpower

Heracross @ Leftovers
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Brick Break
- Megahorn
- Earthquake
- Aerial Ace

Volcarona @ Expert Belt
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Flamethrower
- Bug Buzz
- Hurricane
- Giga Drain

Prior to this, I found Vikavolt to be pretty viable with max speed and Max Airstream, but I ended up dropping it because there were just better choices. Durant is the main player here and an obvious choice because of its ability, which boosts attack 1.5x without the drawback of low accuracy while in Dynamax. Since Durant is fast, it can boost its defense with Max Steelstrike when you expect a physical move to be coming. You can also use Max Flutterby to lower their Special Attack, but I would only do that when I knew a special move was coming AND I couldn't OHKO it with another move. It's much more situational than the defense boost. Considering you have Shell Bell healing back damage, these small differences in effective bulk can make a big difference in sustainability. It often PP'd out of 1 or 2 moves before going down.

Rock Slide is a great coverage move and puts up Sandstorm which doesn't hurt Durant and can also take out the few endure users. Max Knuckle gives an attack boost, I just wish it got Brick Break for more PP. I considered trying Metal Claw over Iron head because of the PP, but the base power of it in Dynamax is only 100 and I thought I would lose a lot of neutral OHKOs. You could consider running Stomping Tantrum over Rock Slide, and then you'd be able to buff your defense and your Special defense. But I think in combination with the other three moves, Rock Slide has better coverage.

The other two are straightforward. I went for Brick Break on Heracross because it has more PP than Close Combat and only sacrifices 5 base power in Dynamax. Aerial Ace is for boosting speed and also good coverage. It seemed like a better Dynamax sweeper than Volcarona, so I put it in the second slot. This left Volcarona as a swap in for obvious fire moves but only when necessary. And I also used it as a revenge killer when my Durant went down. I don't like using my second Pokemon when my first goes down, because I want my second Pokemon to be at full health when it starts its run. And Volcarona is faster than Heracross out of the gates, so it made more sense as my third.
 
Bleh.

7 Consecutive Wins with a Mono Grass team consisting of:

Rillaboom @ Choice Band
Grassy Surge
252 attack / 252 speed
Adamant
Grassy Glide
Knock Off
High Horsepower
Wood Hammer

Lilligant @ Wide Lens
Own Tempo
252 Sp. Attack / 252 Speed
Quiver Dance
Sleep Powder
Giga Drain
Hyper Beam

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Iron Barbs
252 HP / 252
Iron Defense
Body Press
Power Whip
Explosion

This was simply a team scraped up to get 5 wins. I know this team could have easily gotten to 15 wins as I didn't even use up any of my healing slots, but I fudged up during battle six against a Scizor and didn't immediately switch into Ferrothorn to beat it. I let my Rillaboom get KO'd for no reason, then Scizor only had a turn 1 sleep to OHKO Lilligant, and then I stupidly mashed my way through the text so I wiped through Battle 7 without healing.

Rillaboom is self-explanatory since it has a lot of new toys to play with as of recently. Spam Grassy Glide and if something doesn't get at least two shouted by Grass Glide, Gigantamax and run a Drum Solo through them. Grassy Glide not only does a lot of damage for a priority move, but has a lot of PP too. High Horsepower/Knock Off is for coverage as well as for their Max effects. Wood Hammer is basically only used during Gigantamax because even though Grassy Glide has 32 PP, pressure mons can eat through it if you're not careful, and its also your main move.

Lilligant is there for sweeping potential and for the mons that are faster than Rillaboom, but not too fast (which is why I'm using it over Venusaur). Main thing is to Sleep Powder (preferably on a special attacker or certain physical attackers like Shell Trap Turtanator), use up Quiver Dance, Dynamax if available, and then sweep. Giga Drain is for sustain and Hyper Beam is for Max Strike damage (cause Lilligant's coverage is buttcheeks and I'm too lazy to Home a Lilligant with something like Dream Eater). Yes Venusaur has much better coverage and bulk but Lilligant outspeeds a lot of things after one QD and is a better snowballer because of that.

Ferrothorn is a fillermon for the most part cause I don't know what else to put there, or until I find something better. It helps against contact physical mons, like Scizor (who I shouldn't have had problems with if I wasn't such a dummy) and can typically sustain through them with the combination of Grassy Terrain and Leftovers. I'll most likely replace Explosion with Leech Seed down the road.

Mono Grass has a lot of issues as many grass types are slow, have bad coverage, or aren't meant for sweeping potential. There's a ton of mons they have issues with such as Salazzle, bug types, steel types, Certain Weavile if Rillaboom is knocked out and/or Grassy Terrain is out of commission, Centiskorch , Sap Sippers, Charizard (might as well quit if you see one), fast mons, OTHER grass types, etc. It just keeps going and going and going... Maybe I'll swap out Ferrothorn for Virizion just so I don't get destroyed by every fire-type under the sun. Maybe Calyrex will be really fast (or GOOD)...

But as I said, this team (with a few adjustments and a teeny bit of Fortune's Favor) can easily get to Battle 15, but beyond that, I don't think its worth the loss in sanity.
And here's my 16 wins with Grass:

Restricted Sparring Grass.jpg


Only reason I couldn't go any further cause Lilligant ran out of PP for its attacking moves. Due to unfortunate circumstances and bad luck (getting paralyzed and not hitting some ranges), Rillaboom croaked around the 10th battle. Luckily, Lilligant was able to carry the next six battles with some help from Ferrothorn (who then croaked around the 15th battle itself). I do enjoy this semi-optimized

Lilligant has pretty poor PP compared to its other teammates which is a shame, but Quiver Dance is just so hard to pass up on. I could swap out Giga Drain for Petal Dance but then Lilligant has way less sustain and being locked into a Grass move like that is more trouble than its worth. Unless Calyrex is a Pokegod (let alone allowed in Restricted Sparring), I probably won't attempt any further since high attempts with grass are so highly stressful as so many things can go wrong at any given moment.

Also, Volcarona is an auto-loss unless Lilligant has a few stacks of QD up already, which I learned the hard way in a previous attempt.
 

Eisenherz

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Well, it looks like the antes just keep rising, seeing people slowly crack this format is really nice! I have a new personal best to submit myself, this time with Mono Grass:

Pokémon Sword-Shield Screen Shot 2020-06-24, 4.43 PM.png


The team:
@

Jolly | Grassy Surge
IVs: 31/31/31/x/31/31
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe

Grassy Glide / High Horsepower / Low Kick / Acrobatics

@

Modest | Swift Swim
IVs: 31/0/31/31/31/31
EVs: 12 HP / 4 Def / 236 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe

Scald / Giga Drain / Solar Beam / Ice Beam

@

Relaxed | Iron Barbs
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/0
EVs: 252 HP / 148 Def / 108 SpD

Iron Head / Body Press / Leech Seed / Protect

The team originally had Flapple over Ludicolo; that iteration got me a record of 37 wins before needing its first heal, but then lost at 47. Despite the great showing, Flapple had done basically nothing the entire time, while Rillaboom and Ferrothorn had gone all the way through their combined 180 PP and both died to Struggle. I did a few runs after that with Flapple as a lead to test its potential as a standalone, and to my surprise... it sucked. Despite Hustle + an attack stat higher than Dracozolt's and a much better Max Airstream, its lack of bulk and speed tier were unredeemable. I repeatedly struggled to get it to 5. Then L51 suggested Ludicolo since my main concerns were Volcarona and Talonflame, I gave it a similar try, and it was night and day. Ludicolo was able to carry on its own plenty, and earned its spot on the team.

Despite a lot of attempts that I had to give up on early to bad luck (2 streaks in a row, Miltank paralyzed Rillaboom with Thunderbolt within the first 10 battles.....) or bad plays, the team still felt a lot more solid as a unit. Unlike my other teams, it's very common for this team to switch around, ie. dozens of times whenever possible to get recovery on the entire team. With enough luck, you can run into what I now call "healing stations" when you need them most: Pyukumuku, Toxapex, Politoed, and a few others. These sit there and do nothing, as long as you do the right switches at the right time, allowing Ferrothorn to Leech Seed and then heal the entire team to full without using a heal.

There's no question that this team can reach 100; aside from achieving 37 without healing previously, I used my heals here at 30 and then 64. I could have waited a bit more before the second, but I had run out of High Horsepower PP and got scared of losing without using the heal, which would have felt horrible. The point is that the team can go through most of its PP without healing most of the time, but the loss was extremely premature here. I had plenty of PP left, but I lost Ferrothorn early, it got worn down by a combination of Scizor, Braviary, and in the end... Beheeyem.

:rillaboom: Rillaboom's G-Max was obviously chosen for the 160 BP G-Max Drum Beating, boosted by Grassy Terrain, an absolute nuke. Grassy Glide, which thanks to priority, OHKOs stuff like Starmie or Alakazam leads, also has more PP than other Grass moves, the ideal move for this format in so many ways! High Horsepower is used over Earthquake because Grassy Terrain. The Expert Belt allows Max Knuckle and Max Airstream (a weak 110 BP Airstream, sadly, but does the job) to pick up a lot of OHKOs they otherwise wouldn't. I'm sure I don't need to detail how great Atk and Spe boosts are for unilateral sweeps.

:ludicolo: Funnily, when looking for Flapple replacements, I was looking for Grass types with a Flying move for an all-important Airstream, but in the end, Ludicolo's Swift Swim does that a lot better, with STAB. I tried more coverage as the 4th move (Mud Shot/Focus Blast), but both were wholly unnecessary for Ludi. I noticed I was quickly running low on Giga Drain PP since I also used it for healing purposes, so I added Solar Beam, a move I exclusively use as a Max move, it solves the PP problem and also gives it more power (140 vs 130). Leaf Storm would have provided the same power, but obviously, a lot less PP.

:ferrothorn: Ferro is the backbone of the team, it tanks and heals everyone with Leech Seed when the occasion comes. It can also transform into a powerful sweeper thanks to Max Steelspike boosting Body Press after the fact. I was initially going to use Gyro Ball, until I realized how little PP it had. Iron Head was great despite the lower power. I especially loved how Ferrothorn interacted with the Trick Room setters of the facility, making them reverse, and then set again when instantly switching, etc. until they're out of PP. Still, while Leech Seed stalling, I had to be very mindful of my Protect and Iron Head usage, because PP can run low very quickly, so switching around for tens of turns is often the optimal thing to do. Patience required.
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Threats:

:golisopod: The biggest threat to the team by far, First Impression murders the first 2 if they aren't / can't Dynamax. The Ferro switch is nice, except it also has Close Combat. If Ludicolo is healthy, I can let it tank it, but then I need to use Max Overgrowth if I want to OHKO, which isn't always available. Not OHKOing means it comes back and gets another First Impression. Ferro can tank a CC (it does about 50%) and heal a lot from Seed etc., but this requires Ferro to be very healthy to begin with, and means it and probably at least another team member will be low by the end of the exchange. All in all, it needs to be encountered in favourable circumstances, and finding a more passive Pokémon shortly after is necessary to heal.
:volcarona: It either speed ties or underspeeds Rillaboom, I'm not 100% sure at this point. [edit: after a couple more encounters, it looks like my Rillaboom is always faster!] If it comes out when Ferro is on the field, something is basically guaranteed to go down. I encountered it a few times in this run, but thankfully, always in circumstances where I could tank a hit and OHKO. When Rillaboom does outspeed and KO with Airstream, it's a huge sigh of relief.
:talonflame: I learned how to play around it over time after seeing what the AI does. Overheat does very little to Ludicolo all things considered, and Ferrothorn can be used on the expected Fly, Leech Seed it, and Ludicolo can then be switched on the next Overheat, and prevent Roost with a Scald. Still, it puts a stop to any ongoing Rillaboom sweep, which is not great.
:scizor: Ferrothorn usually 1v1s it quite well, but ends up trading 50% or more of its HP in return, which can be bad at the wrong time. Optionally, if Rillaboom is very healthy, letting it tank a X-Scissor in Dmax and KOing Scizor with Max Knuckle into Max Quake can work (double Max Quake is a roll), after which Rillaboom can heal over time.
:braviary: Similar to Scizor, a job for Ferrothorn which can end up costing about 50% of its HP or more. Thankfully, Ferro can usually go from no HP to full in little time on many Pokémon, but in the wrong situation...
:drifblim: & :froslass: Burn. Only Ludicolo can take absorb the burn, which is what I've done for the 2nd leg of this run. Ludicolo went through close to 30 battles burned, and while not ideal, it at least meant it couldn't get paralyzed. Still, in addition to burning, they both can do good damage to Ludicolo, and leave it in desperate need of healing, so they're dangerous.
:torkoal: Max Quake barely misses out on that KO, and risking Rillaboom getting burned is never a good idea, so Ludicolo is the switch. In the sun, Lava Plume does a lot of damage, and a burn is never good, but it's the only choice. Still, works out fine most of the time.
:magneton: Sturdy + Thunder Wave as usual. Ferro is my Thunder Wave absorber when need be. It spent most of the first leg of this streak paralyzed. Sometimes it works in my favor by preserving PP and preventing more hurtful statuses, but we all know what paralysis leads to with enough bad luck...
:tangrowth: What a bother! It has Grassy Seed, so its physical bulk is out of this world, but has Grassy Glide, so Ludicolo can't just safely Ice Beam it. It usually burns through my entire Dynamax, as I'm forced to go for 2 Knuckles into an Airstream. I particularly hate that because it drains my PP.

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

I'll give this team a few more tries before moving on to Ice, as I'd really like to get that 100, but if it takes too long I'll move on for now, since I'm excited to teambuild some more!
 
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I wanted to try something different than all out offense, so I thought of a team consisting of Regenerator mons and using mostly chip damage to take out opposing Pokémon.

poison_regen.jpg

Toxapex @ Black Sludge
Ability: Regenerator
Level: 50
EVs: 246 HP / 12 Def / 252 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Hex
- Toxic
- Recover

Amoonguss @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Regenerator
Level: 50
EVs: 238 HP / 252 Def / 20 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Giga Drain
- Clear Smog
- Toxic
- Synthesis

Slowbro-Galar @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator
Level: 50
EVs: 246 HP / 12 Def / 252 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Shadow Ball
- Flamethrower
- Slack Off

(the EVs are to maximize Regenerator recovery since the idea was I'll be using that the most)

So the basic idea is to use Toxic with either Amoonguss or Toxapex and then just switch between Pokémon until the Toxic kills the opposing Pokémon. The other moves are to deal with threats, Poison-types, and Steel-types, or to preserve Toxic-PP if you can oneshot/twoshot an opposing Pokémon. Sometimes you can even take down a Pokémon without wasting a single PP by switching Amoonguss in and out and using only Rocky Helmet to get damage in.

The big threats are mostly psychic types, most notably Musharna, Starmie, and Gardevoir (didn't face any Alakazam in my run).
I dealt with it by using Toxic and then switcingh to my Slowbro-G to tank hits (possibly Dmax to survive some more hits and to get Max Guard). I think Toxic Spikes might be better than Toxic because against most threating Pokémon you wouldn't have to waste a turn using Toxic and you can immediately start healing or go to the Pokémon to counter it, and there aren't that many Pokémon that remove Tspikes.
Butterfree is another huge annoyance because it has Quiver Dance, Hurricane AND Substitute, which counter the Toxic strategy and threatens my Amoonguss from using Clear Smog. This is just a first draft of the team so Haze on Toxapex might help in that situation.
I didn't face any Cloyster but because of Shell Smash I think that would pretty much end your run unless you have Amoonguss in against it and can Giga drain it.
Exploud is also a huge threat, and it's the one that ended my run because it took out my Slowbro-G when I was out of heals and if you lose 1 Pokémon it's only a matter of time before you get overpowered.

Against Poison types you just use Psychic with Slowbro-G and against Steel types you can use Flamethrower (or any non-resisted move from your other Pokémon).

I know 23 isn't that high but I'm posting this because I think the principle behind it is solid and I wanted to let other people know about my idea so they can give their insight into it and test it as well if they want. Like I've already mentioned, I think Toxic Spikes might be better than Toxic because there aren't that many absorbers and it should really help against threats by insta-poisoning them. I've also thought about adding a Poison/Dark-pokémon instead of Slowbro-G to deal with Psychic-types specifically and use the Pex-Guss core for the rest.
A battle will take much longer than with any other strategy so only try it if you're really invested into it :p
EDIT: I also thought about using Slowbro+Slowking together with either Gyarados or Indeedee as first slot sweeper (or Reuniclus as extra Regen Pokémon) but haven't tried that out yet, I'll definitely try it out later when I have more time (and more PP Ups :p )

While playing I added some blanks into the google sheet document Eisenherz started so I hope that will help others!

This is my first (long/detailed) smogon forum post so I'm sorry if it's all over the place or if things are not clear. You can always ask me specific questions so I can explain further if something isn't clear!
 
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meddle

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I went into Steel typing just testing and knowing I wasn't prepared (zero PP ups on these guys) but ended up doing decently anyway, getting 34 wins. Steel type seems S-tier for this format, and I imagine people will take it to 100+ wins eventually for sure. This trio felt extremely strong even with no pp up investment, and could go much further with more enemy moveset knowledge/better piloting. When I was down to Ferrothorn stall mode, I lost to a Burning Jealousy crit from a Skuntank, lol.

I'm getting the feeling that theorymonning and teamcrafting for Restricted Sparring is more fun than actually playing it. The frequency of dynamax animations is just zzzzzz


:durant: :ferrothorn: :duraludon: 34 wins
________________________________
:durant: @

Ability: Hustle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dig
- X-Scissor
- Iron Head
- Rock Slide

I stand behind my original moveset/item here from my bug run since Ferrothorn is a clean switch into Air Balloon Magnezone (who I keep running into), and Dig provides more Leech Seed recovery outside of dynamax vs a passive opponent. The coverage of (low pp) Superpower nor the attack boost from Max Knuckle were missed in this run.

As others have discovered, Shell Bell is a godly item (probably best in slot for this format), but Durant gets cleaner sweeps than Duraludon and therefore usually takes less chip damage, so Duraludon got the Shell Bell this run. It's hard to calculate the value Wide Lens has, but I found myself outside of dynamax often enough (getting leech seed recovery) that offsetting Hustle accuracy seemed good in theory.

:Ferrothorn: @

Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 172 Def / 84 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Protect
- Leech Seed
- Body Press
- Iron Head

This was a Ferrothorn I had in my box from from Gen7, and I'd probably adjust its stats for a future Steel run since it needs much better special bulk to switch into all the things I needed to switch into, since Durant and Duraludon can't take anything on the special side at all. I copied Eisenherz's Ferrothorn moveset for this, thinking I'd be dumb not to at least as a starting point with 83 wins to its name, but I think for this team specifically I might opt for a grass move over Iron Head in the future since I'm not missing steel coverage too much with Durant carrying that move and Duraludon running Flash Cannon.

This team abuses resistances pretty well, so Leech Seed is extremely useful for healing everything up (and can be helpful while running Dig on Durant and Protect on Duraludon).

:Duraludon: @

Ability: Heavy Metal
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Protect
- Thunderbolt
- Dragon Pulse
- Flash Cannon

Duraludon performed much better than I thought it would. It didn't take much damage from faster mons, so I never felt its lack of speed, and the recovery from Shell Bell worked well with the pacing of its sweeps. Heavy Metal was chosen here to switch into Rhyperior's Heat Crash better, which was responsible for taking out Durant once in my Bug run. That's literally this ability's only value though since Duraludon is usually dynamaxed and immune to weight-based moves. Conkeldurr always went for Focus Punch vs me, so Low Kick was never a factor for Light Metal to be of any use. It's a real shame this thing has such bad abilities for Singles battling.

Protect was here for Leech Seed recovery and was useful once for getting Mienshao to kill itself with High Jump Kick (though it then started to use Aura Sphere in a future battle, odd). I'm not sure if there's a better move to put here?

Max Lightning/Thunderbolt's coverage was a godsend for bulky waters, since Ferrothorn doesn't carry a grass move.

Duraludon in general being neutral to fire attacks was a huge boon for this team, switching into physical fire quite often and healing up with leech seed or shell bell. If you abuse this thing's resistances and remember you can't take any special hits, you'll find Duraludon performs quite well in this format, I think.

 
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Quick question though where do y'all grind out PP Ups? If you guys have enough to boost the teams for this in-game mode there has to be something I'm missing.
Do or did you Surprise/Wonder trade a lot in the past? If you traded away hundreds of breedjects and didn’t mass release the pokes you received, you would then be left with hundreds of unique IDs.

The Lotto game played with the PC has extremely good odds of paying out PP Max with at least 20-24 full boxes of unique IDs and at that point the worst you can do is a PP Up. Not only that, time travel abuse allows you to collect these in seconds. Put on a movie while doing this and you’ll have a few hundred of each.
 
I wanted to try something different than all out offense, so I thought of a team consisting of Regenerator mons and using mostly chip damage to take out opposing Pokémon.

View attachment 256871
Toxapex @ Black Sludge
Ability: Regenerator
Level: 50
EVs: 246 HP / 12 Def / 252 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Hex
- Toxic
- Recover

Amoonguss @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Regenerator
Level: 50
EVs: 238 HP / 252 Def / 20 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Giga Drain
- Clear Smog
- Toxic
- Synthesis

Slowbro-Galar @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator
Level: 50
EVs: 246 HP / 12 Def / 252 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Shadow Ball
- Flamethrower
- Slack Off

(the EVs are to maximize Regenerator recovery since the idea was I'll be using that the most)

So the basic idea is to use Toxic with either Amoonguss or Toxapex and then just switch between Pokémon until the Toxic kills the opposing Pokémon. The other moves are to deal with threats, Poison-types, and Steel-types, or to preserve Toxic-PP if you can oneshot/twoshot an opposing Pokémon. Sometimes you can even take down a Pokémon without wasting a single PP by switching Amoonguss in and out and using only Rocky Helmet to get damage in.

The big threats are mostly psychic types, most notably Musharna, Starmie, and Gardevoir (didn't face any Alakazam in my run).
I dealt with it by using Toxic and then switcingh to my Slowbro-G to tank hits (possibly Dmax to survive some more hits and to get Max Guard). I think Toxic Spikes might be better than Toxic because against most threating Pokémon you wouldn't have to waste a turn using Toxic and you can immediately start healing or go to the Pokémon to counter it, and there aren't that many Pokémon that remove Tspikes.
Butterfree is another huge annoyance because it has Quiver Dance, Hurricane AND Substitute, which counter the Toxic strategy and threatens my Amoonguss from using Clear Smog. This is just a first draft of the team so Haze on Toxapex might help in that situation.
I didn't face any Cloyster but because of Shell Smash I think that would pretty much end your run unless you have Amoonguss in against it and can Giga drain it.
Exploud is also a huge threat, and it's the one that ended my run because it took out my Slowbro-G when I was out of heals and if you lose 1 Pokémon it's only a matter of time before you get overpowered.

Against Poison types you just use Psychic with Slowbro-G and against Steel types you can use Flamethrower (or any non-resisted move from your other Pokémon).

I know 23 isn't that high but I'm posting this because I think the principle behind it is solid and I wanted to let other people know about my idea so they can give their insight into it and test it as well if they want. Like I've already mentioned, I think Toxic Spikes might be better than Toxic because there aren't that many absorbers and it should really help against threats by insta-poisoning them. I've also thought about adding a Poison/Dark-pokémon instead of Slowbro-G to deal with Psychic-types specifically and use the Pex-Guss core for the rest.
A battle will take much longer than with any other strategy so only try it if you're really invested into it :p
EDIT: I also thought about using Slowbro+Slowking together with either Gyarados or Indeedee as first slot sweeper (or Reuniclus as extra Regen Pokémon) but haven't tried that out yet, I'll definitely try it out later when I have more time (and more PP Ups :p )

While playing I added some blanks into the google sheet document Eisenherz started so I hope that will help others!

This is my first (long/detailed) smogon forum post so I'm sorry if it's all over the place or if things are not clear. You can always ask me specific questions so I can explain further if something isn't clear!
Well nuts, you beat me to the punchline.

This is exactly what I've been playing around with lately, although it happened somewhat inadvertently. I have my own Poison team that I've been testing in some "mini-runs" and I'm confident enough in it at this point that I'm going to lay down the PP Up's and go for a big streak. I will vouch for this strat and say there is definitely potential behind Regenerator switch play. I'm going to hold my cards on it for now though... maintain some suspense before I do a full post-streak report, lol. The only thing I will say is that my team doesn't go full Regenerator spam; my lead enforcer for the team is something a little different.
 

meddle

boomer user
is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
I wanted to try something different than all out offense, so I thought of a team consisting of Regenerator mons and using mostly chip damage to take out opposing Pokémon.
Like Photon, got beaten to the punchline here on Poison typing but I'm sure others saw it as well: a Regenerator core allows you to effectively take out a whole team for only 3 PP of Toxic.

I've been testing the waters with a Regenerator core for a poison-typed run for a couple of nights now:
:toxtricity: :toxapex: :amoonguss:

Theorymon about Regenerator Poison that might be useful for people attempting it:
  • I led Toxtricity in this test team to attempt a sweep at the start of battles, the mode of play being if at any point it looks like you can't sweep, you resort to Stall. Unfortunately Toxtricity is a terrible dynamaxer, so it may be that triple Regenerator is better, but might be worthwhile to consider a lead sweeper + Dual Regenerator. I also tried Scolipede but found it missing KOs (could be fixed by me going Jolly > Adamant, however). Gengar is probably too much of a glass cannon for the format.
  • Toxic Spikes might deserve a moveslot to go the distance with PP. Toxapex certainly has enough bulk to survive putting layers down, and I found myself switching out more than actually clicking moves.
  • Threats to this strategy: :cloyster: :gallade: :oranguru: :drapion:
    • Shell Smash Cloyster is a big threat, so relying on Amoonguss to remove stat ups is risky. I think Haze on Toxapex might be mandatory.
    • Similarly, SD Gallade can hit both Amoonguss and Toxapex for super effective.
    • Wise Glasses Oranguru dented my core pretty hard, so I ran with Foul Play on Amoonguss with extra SpD investment, but there could be a better way to deal with it (not as much a problem if you run a defensive G-Slowbro).
    • Acupressure Drapion is scary if you can't land a Scald burn on it with Toxapex.
Godspeed to anyone doing this strategy since it's going to require a ton of patience to go for longer streaks (in the context of Sparring; not compared to Tree/Maison, obviously), but I wouldn't be surprised to see someone streak past 100 with such a team.
 
Part three of...

Slowthings Used Suboptimally!

"I'm often asked if I regret approving anything for the Pokemon franchise and my answer is always, unequivocally, the Iron Ball" -Junichi Masuda

The expansion was very kind to me and TR aficionados in general, adding almost two dozen more viable [citation needed] abusers as well as the ridiculously potent Magearna who, between SuMo and the Home rewards, could have two TR sets with unique EV spreads! A fat slab of icing on a delicious cake, if you ask me. I'd imported these guys before I'd even known the full dex (going by the species that were missing the Do Not Enter icon.) Several even got new toys!

Like Klinklang before it, I had a 0 speed Quiet Porygon-Z born late in Gen 6's lifespan that wasn't used in the fairly difficult Tree Randos format, and the fact that I still had it meant Smuckem didn't want it at the time. Because I was giving chances to other bad ideas with some success, I decided to retool it a bit so it wouldn't merely be a frail Porygon2. I went with a meme set meant to create terrains or perhaps utilize weather, with Solarbeam/Thunder/Psyshock. ...yeah...

As Eisen would immediately demonstrate with his normal RS run, Expanding Force was a ridiculous move in Psyterrain and this game made it easily abusable. I taught it to nearly all of my Psychic abusers, though the odds of all of them being able to use it in terrain is perhaps weak at best. I also taught a few of my Ghosts Poltergeist, since they were hurting for any physical STAB that wasn't Phantom Force.

As always, I tended to strongly prefer running abusers that hadn't been rolled before or used in interesting pairs; this was disappointing only for Klinklang, who I can recall popped up several times and was always passed over. Even with its new move Steel Roller. Sadly, it may even be put back into Home! How does it feel knowing you're in line for the chopping block just as Blissey gets added to the roster, Klinklang??
:jellicent::palossand::escavalier::bewear:
Dmax has the benefit of making Water Compaction more feasibly activated without being KOed immediately afterward. Tree's Palossand4 could get nasty with WP if you didn't OHKO it, a memory which encouraged me to try it myself. Jellicent4 was a pain in the ass for my leads. It holds Assault Vest with max SDef, and thus was able to survive +2 Overgrowth (a mistake; my mind thought "Water type" before "weak to Ghost STAB") followed by a Shadow Ball from Jellicent. It also runs 252 SpA and so Hydro Pump was nearly able to 2HKO Palossand.

:hatterene-gmax::porygon2::arctozolt::tangrowth:
In spirit of Eisen trying to do randos without dmaxing if the team showed potential, I had been trying to dmax as little as possible even if EVELYN rolled in favor of it. This run saw it only twice; I typically reserve it for RNG bullshit situations, such as missing consecutive 100% moves to Brightpowder or an enemy getting too cute with QC, enticing me to kill accuracy checks and double my bulk. Tangrowth finally has a chance to use Nature Power on a semi-regular basis, and it actually did once this run, against a team of four Fighting types. It was surprisingly useful this run, not the least due to Regenerator.

This run would be the first of several for the Pokemon affectionately (or notoriously) referred to by several Discord posters last gen as one of the "ducks." The slight reduction in IVs plus rarity of enemy dmax makes P2's bulk all the better, and it makes an excellent co-setter. I've had the good fortune of frequently picking up SpA boosts from Download. I use both a Sassy one with no offensive investment and a Quiet 252, with the only moves unique to them being Shadow Ball and Thunderbolt, respectively. I have a third P2 without TR in its moveset, but it's still at Home.

:bronzong::primarina::marowak-alola::lickilicky:
The roll with this squad had really poor synergy in general, including Appletun and Abomasnow. I went with these four mostly because they at least worked well in one or more pairs, and consciously tried not to have rain up if I knew I'd be sending Marowak in. ...worrying aside, this team managed to have an extremely easy run, with only one KO sustained and dmax never used once. I also never exploded Lickilicky, who mostly OHKOd various Ghosts (including multiple Drifblim) with Knock Off. Cloud Nine helped more than it hurt, killing Sandtorm and with it Sand Veil, and at one point letting Marowak use Flare Blitz in the rain. Rain Dance on Zong also went a long way in patching up the holes in Liquid Voice and was used every battle. Between rain and Throat Spray, the split penalty wasn't enought to prevent Leon's Zard from being OHKOd.

Rather than tell Coeur the team outright (which I usually do after a really good run) I had him guess using a set of clues. It was... fun.

:magearna::jellicent::gastrodon::bisharp:
The Magearna used in this case is Relaxed with no offense, instead attempting to help with damage as the partner picks up KOs and grants Soul-Hearts. It's barely less destructive than full offense Magearna and allows it to survive things like Brave Rhyperior HH. Easily one of the most broken setters in the game.

Which is not to say the AI didn't create issues for it. One battle featured a Roserade that did nothing but Protect and Giga Drain, still providing a challenge to my two Waters but most of all just stalling out TR in an irritating manner. This also featured a Frosmoth which set Aurora Veil before Bisharp could KO with LO Iron Head. Rosie, having spent all of her Giga Drains, attempted a triple Protect and fortunately failed. Enough damage was done over time that Magearna had reached +5 from both friend and foe.

Leon was a much bigger outrage, with more of his severe upredictability nonsense, choosing to resist switch with a guaranteed KO at his fingertips and launching Overgrowth into Bisharp's slot as it was to be replaced by Gastrodon... ...so you know how that turned out. I was left with Magearna by itself in the rain, against a Cinderace and Rillaboom in the red. Cinderace would Blaze Kick for around half my HP and Rillaboom would seed me, then Protect, then Drain Punch. I survived the DP on 37 HP and would connect a Hail Mary Fleur Cannon to murder the stupid gorilla (grass plus lefties and seed had restored it almost to full, and Magearna was sitting on only the SH from killing Cinderace.)

:cofagrigus::lurantis::gastrodon::dragalge:
I was happy to learn that Contrary triggers before being ovetwritten by Mummy, a scenario that played out when killing a Crustle that had previously knocked off Cofagrigus. Lurantis never dmaxed at its own peril but wracked up quite the body count nonetheless.

:magearna::slowbro::azumarill::conkeldurr:
The new sprites haven't been added to Smogon yet, but that is none other than Galarian Slowbro. I have two sets for this fellow, a Quick Draw set with Quick Claw and a Regenerator set with a Sitrus Berry. This was the QDQC one.

On the one hand, with Slowbro easily having the first-turn advantage in TR, QDQC looks really dumb and redundant. The tradeoff was that having fairly strong odds of moving first during the first turn and picking up a quick OHKO was really useful. This set ran no Poison STAB or Ice Beam in favor of Fire Blast and Hydro Pump, as well as Grass Knot. It had no shortage of frontlines weak to at least one of these moves. While Water typing was useful for Slowbro, I found myself appreciating the loss of an Electric or Grass weakness and there's no shortage of grass types in the tower that can't hit Psy/Psn particularly well.

:musharna::politoed::magnezone::mudsdale:
Weather Ball and Earth Power for Politoed! Remember when the AI sets ran shit like Psychic? Even with an Expert Belt, Toed doesn't hit as hard as I'd like, but it was by no means a weak link. A bigger issue is that all of the abusers on this squad normally have AV as their preferred item. Politoed took the aforementioned Expert Belt, while Magnezone took a Weakness Policy (it seemed like a crapshoot at the time, and I hate Air Balloon.) Because Zone ideally uses AV, the loss of Singal Beam was compensated by Mirror Coat and not Ally Switch.

This team had a few nasty encounters. An Excadrill flinched Magearna with Shadow Claw and the following turn a Kingler easily KOd it with rain-boosted Liquidation. I won because that same Kingler and the Flygon next to it would throw the game, allowing me to KO Flygon without damaging Magnezone, putting Kingler into checkmate. I would later take a freeze to Politoed at 1HP and immediately thaw and not be targeted by the remaining Mandibuzz. Leon would destroy Musharna with Inteleon/Aegislash Shadow Balls, preventing TR but not without losing Aegislash in the process. Magnezone dmaxes and survives Mud Shot, and Politoed survives Overgrowth, resulting in both Inteleon and Zard being OHKOd. The worst of it over, Haxorus would KO Toed with Breaking Swipe then be easily murdered by Zone.

:musharna::flapple::wishiwashi::throh:
This run really cemented my favorable opinion of Flapple in TR. Grav Apple hits so frigging hard, and even after Hustle it's common to have at least one or two more boosts for it, not the least of which Gravity. Dragon Rush was also doing a lot of work. I did long for Dark coverage at times, however, and seeing the surprisingly fat chunks of damage from U-turn prompted me to immediately replace Acid Spray with Sucker Punch once the run was over. My fellow High Priests at the Temple of Ferro were "bewildered and disgusted" and to my knowledge are still deciding on a form of sacrifice brutal enough to atone for my level of blasphemy.

This team was fucked pretty hard by a lead QC Copperajah that would proc three straight times. Partnered with Xatu/Garbodor/Snorlax, I would win because of Wishiwashi coming in with a clutch dmax. I would also see TR prevented by Chandelure3 (Scarf) and FO Rillaboom, and won that battle because the backline, Mamoswine/Gourgeist, were more interested in setting hail, rocks, and curse than inflicting direct damage.

Throh mostly acted as a meat shield, and I frequently allowed it to die without doing much, but I was still proud of it! Eating Copperajah's supereffective SFPR and still standing isn't easy!

:oranguru::slowbro::marowak-alola::tsareena:
Second Galarbro set, Regen/Sitrus. Was originally Sludge Wave until Coeur suggested Belch, and it seemed easy enough to trip reliably. The downside is that my setters have long been accustomed to Sitrus for themselves, and because it's eaten any time below 50% it was allowing them to survive secondary, slower, more powerful hits than the faster enemy. Because Oranguru was now using a Figy berry, there was a strong risk of being left at 49% or lower without healing and then falling to something moderately strong.

This team also lost its first run to Beauty Rita, with Greedent/Mandibuzz/Silvally/Bisharp. Between not using dmax when it clearly should've the moment things went south, and Bisharp being sashed, wasting a precious turn of Marowak in KOing it, I was only able to get Silvally by itself and weakened before losing. Greedent was otherwise the biggest issue. Because this loss occurred early and was due to constant poor decisions, I hopped right back in instead of declaring the team an utter failure.

Apart from almost losing a second time to a QC Golisopod/Centiskorch/Vikavolt/Arcanine, this team did far better. I was maxing Slowbro frequently with poor options, as Ooze boosted SpA and made a huge difference in my damage output. Sitrus was also very easy to trigger in this form without being at risk. Scald was used just as frequently as Ooze/Expanding Force.

:comfey::gastrodon::escavalier::hydreigon:
Geez, Gastro could not catch a frigging break! First battle lead Ludicolo/Eldegoss; 2nd, Ferrothorn; 3rd, Bullet Seed Cinccino (survived three uses); 4th, HA Rillaboom; 5th... ...well, no Grass leads but Aromatisse did reset TR; and 6th, a Dhelmise. Which is not to say Gastro spent much of the time cowering in the back, but many battles were won by Escavalier tanking shit for it and Hydreigon coming in to make kill assists.

The Leon battle was highly amusing because of his lead Seismitoad3, which was the only unit of his to actually attack. By tripping Storm Drain and allowing Gastro to pick up two SDef boosts and steamroll through his other three pokes, Seismitoad then began selecting moves at random instead of trying to Sludge Wave for shit supereffective damage to Comfey. I found it very amusing when it switched to Focus Blast then Muddy Water again, as if to say "I'm fucking programmed to pick moves until you kill me, just, please"

:porygon2::runerigus::dragalge::clawitzer:
Araquanid was my trademark abuser last gen for a reason. Araquanid4, sporting its Choice Band, was able to do tons of damage to Porygon2 even after losing Water Bubble to Wandering Spirit, and survived Adaptability Sludge Bomb at -2 SDef, so my "attempts" to neuter it were not that effective.

Otherwise, this run was super smooth. Clawitzer, my favorite gen 6 abuser, is back with a vengeance and murdered a lot with and without Fake Tears support. During the Zeraora event I was quite fond of TR Runerigus, but couldn't pass up FT because of the backline. It enjoys Poltergeist and was even inflicting a lot of damage with it (albeit with LO) after a Dugtrio zapped it with Memento.

:mr. rime::porygon-z::primarina::melmetal:
I passed on running Rime x Kyurem again! The novelty of running PZ for the first time was too strong. Like I alluded to previously, its "terrain set" was very odd and while it picked up most of the KOs, I thought most enemy teams were really bad and that alone was the driving force behind PZ having no problem steamrolling. Not only that, the higher speeds of the enemies made the debuff from Max Strike pretty inconsequential, and I was using that often for the aburd 300 base power.

Leon would open with Cinderace and Rillaboom, and I knew there was no chance to set TR like that, so I opted to Fake Out Cinderace. Unfortunately, Rillaboom was Set3, Life Orb, and murdered Rime with Darkest Lariat. I was able to OHKO Cinderace, and with a Grass type already on the field I figured I'd try to bait it with Primarina. Just my luck that Charizard came in next, which let Melmetal tank Overgrowth and Body Slam of all things; my guess is that the speed drop from PZ's Max Strike made the paralysis chance from Body Slam a desireable choice to offset the speed cut it suffered. Zard is murdered by Max Strike (Adaptability Hyper Beam) and then Rime enters, to fall easily alongside a third MS and Double Iron Bash.

:cofagrigus::porygon-z::araquanid::jirachi::
Two battles in and I'm convinced that the last run should not have happened. PZ was having a real problem netting kills outside TR, especially with typings like Grass/Ghost, and Fake Tears was of little help for moves like Psyshock, or with the unwieldy properties of Solarbeam/Thunder. But I was still determined not to run carbon copies of either Porygon2 set, so I kept Hyper Beam and instead tried Blizzard/Thunderbolt/Dark Pulse. Blizzard maintained some of the meme status and was a fairly strong spread move outside TR with good coverage. Dark Pulse for the SDef debuff and Thunderbolt for terrain and a move that isn't mostly useless outside TR.

Afterward, this team sailed quite smoothly. I had the pleasure of Soaking a Protect-spamming Vileplume that had also eaten a burn, and that damage combined with Black Sludge helped whittle it down very nicely.

This roll included Jellicent, Crawdaunt, Gastrodon and Drednaw. Sometimes EVELYN is very persistent.

:musharna::avalugg::beartic::marowak:
I was happy to notice that Avalugg could tank a crit Hawlucha HJK. I was less happy with the fact that Cinccino had already knocked off its WP. I was pretty lucky with Icicle Spears during this run, almost always getting at least three of them, which with HH and +2 was too much for anything with average bulk.

:bronzong::braviary::drednaw::porygon2:
Braviary went all out this run. Unlike Milotic it was picking up lead Intimidates, including two off the same Eject Button Mawile, and also ate a Defog for reasons I don't understand (possibly the same reason an Alcremie would Decorate my Escavalier.) Anyway, versus Gengar4/Vanilluxe leads, Braviary survived an Explosion and the recoil from killing the Gengar that prevented TR; because TR was off, it also was able to outspeed and OHKO a backline Cursola, surviving on 2HP.

Bronzong tried Speed Swap for the first time; while way more situational than Rain Dance, it was nonetheless put to very good use by swapping with Drednaw, allowing it to outsped and OHKO another Cursola. I see it being valuable again under the same circumstances, since I have a lot of 60-65s now.

:aromatisse::heracross::cursola::dracozolt:
Moxie Heracross is a damn beast. Was slow enough to outspeed and OHKO a Vikavolt and Shiinotic, and took less than 50% from a Ditto's copy of mine. I was particularly lucky in landing all of my Megahorns. One highly unusual occurrence was an Accelgor2 skipping its favorite T1 Protect in order to Final Gambit the Heracross slot; I had swapped to Dracozolt because two Swoobat sets carry Air Slash, and the FG left it at 10HP, easily wiped by Swoobat's Heat Wave.

:comfey::perrserker::torkoal::necrozma-dawn wings:
Perrserker ripped things to shreds without dmax, but it wasn't enough to prevent two battles from going to shit. One scenario that could've been bad, but wasn't, involved an Imposter Ditto turning into Perrserker; I won the speed tie OHKOd with Close Combat before it could potentially murder Comfey.

The first ugly bout was against Lazlo, who lead with Inteleon1, who murdered Perrserker with Max Quake and earned a SDef boost for itself and Vaporeon. I'm already way up shit creek because Torkoal is not going to do much before being killed, while Inteleon is practically guaranteed to use Phantasm against Lunala, and 3/4 Vappies carry Shadow Ball, with T1 Protect confirming that this one does. I think my only option is to bring in Lunala and dmax it, then HH Mindstorm the Inteleon. Between Prism Armor and insane special bulk, it can then eat a Shadow Ball from Vappy.

Like a fucktard I fail to click dmax first and HH Geyser, while extremely strong, does not KO. Lazlo had other ideas, however, and uses Wish with Vappy while hitting Comfey with Hailstorm. Inteleon goes down and Vaporeon CRITS Shadow Ball with a SDef drop. Jolteon replaces Inteleon and I manage to crit through Vappy's SDef with Geyser, OHKOing, while Jolt sets Light Screen. TR is now off, and Comfey manages to reset it on 1 HP before dying to hail. Thankfully Light Screen is not enough to spare the lastmon, Barbaracle, from Torkoal's Solarbeam. In addition to the late dmax of Lunala, I had also forgotten that Psyterrain blocks Triage! Shhhiiiiittttt..!!

Second rough battle was with Leon, who else? He lead Cinderace/Rhyperior, Set4 of the bunny as I would come to learn, and prior to that was sure that I'd need to make deliberate sacks. Rhy protects while Perrserker is burned to a crisp, and I regretfully acknowledge that Lunala must eat a LO Sucker Punch from this thing. It survives, but because Comfey is also killed, I'm forced to send in Torkoal and trip Drought for Charizard, leaving no way to survive Wildfire. I also can't just let Rhyperior sit there and get a free hit on Torkoal. As promised, Zard barely survives Mindstorm in terrain and I lose Lunala, but Rhyperior thankfully was Passho set and it destroyed without moving. Aegislash enters and shields while Eruption picks off the frail Zard; not content to lose without making me clench my asshole, Aegislash successfully uses KS again and thus TR is now off. I'm waiting for Set3 to crit Shadow Ball and end me, but it's Aegislash4, who uses critless LO Psycho Cut for a modest chunk and dies immediately to Weather Ball.

Fuck Cinderace4. If that were Libero it probably would have OHKOd with SP.

:porygon2::alcremie-gmax::druddigon::necrozma-dusk mane:
I was an advocate for Gunk Shot Druddigon but for the time being am running both Rock Slide and Fire Punch for their coverage. I also chose max bulk support gmax Alcremie, who still manages to pick up some OHKOs with Finale, such as Ditto and Bewear. With Iron Ball, it outspeeds even Greedent, necessary during this run because it used Belly Drum. The guaranteed healing from Finale was also really useful for both itself and P2. Nearly all battles were spent using Decorate at least once on P2 before maxing, or twice if the leads failed to do anything of substance (there were even two occasions they attempted to Taunt.)

Alcremie had excellent survivability, and I decided I'd try to kill Leon's Zard with P2 instead of looking for a window to send in Druddigon. He lead Haxorus/Rhyperior, and after taking under 50% from Rhyperior's HH I decided I would Decorate P2 a second time. On top of the Download boost, Zard was murdered by +5 Tri Attack (with Helping Hand for good measure) and Dragapult/Rhyperior fell shortly afterward, with Alcremie being the only casualty that battle!

:dusclops::haxorus::octillery::blissey:
I used a First Impression Haxorus in my naivete thinking I could get some cheap easy kills on dark leads, but they never appeared and thus I only used Flutterby a couple times to bop bulky Psychics. I wish I had gone with Assurance, since Clops with Nightshade is an easy way to get the 120BP.

However, the real star of this show was Blissey, who took physical hits like a champ, healed lots of damage with Heal Pulse, cured some burns and paralysis for Haxorus, and even used Ally Switch for some cheese. AV Mamoswine/Scope Lens Machamp/Sitrus Dhelmise/Rindoperior managed to force this team down to Dusclops x Blissey, who cleaned up through sheer staying power. Blissey was used every battle to do something very helpful.

For one fun example of retarded AI, Octillery was brough to 14 HP on a forced switch and the AI declined to touch it, allowing an Octosweep. What's more, Diggersby HAD QUICK ATTACK THE ENTIRE FUCKING TIME. WHY.

:runerigus::toxtricity::arctozolt::conkeldurr:
Roll #20 -- Archetype: Trick Room
Setters: Bronzong, Solgaleo
Abusers: Arcozolt, Toxtricity, Alcremie, Runerigus, Conkeldurr, Bisharp
Dmax Rule: Go Nuts

The fun of using Runerigus as a setter against Zeraora was encouragement to try it with this team, as disadvantaged as it was. I had always wondered when I would have an ill-fated encounter with Seismitoad4 using pokes unequipped for it, and I finally had that encounter. Chandelure4 nearly KOed Runerigus with Shadow Ball and Lapras made up the difference; Toxtricity was able to KO both of them with two Overdrives, but not before Chandy claimed another head: Conkeldurr. I now had Arctozolt and Tox left to take down an Orbeetle, along with Seismitoad; I mused that it could be Set4, and sure enough it was; without TR my dmax Zolt did not matter in the least and it easily cleaned up with LO Earthquake. Orbeetle helpfully set Reflect so that my one hit was even more fruitless.

That wholly deserved loss occurred on only Battle 2, so I decided to pass on novelty and try again.

:bronzong::conkeldurr::alcremie-gmax::arctozolt:
That's more like it. Snorlax4 tanked LO Hammer Arm and after eating its berry survived +2 Iron Head, prompting a... reaction. Also of note was Ditto copying Conkeldurr, and after its first move became quite clear that it was Scarfed Ditto4 and so I let it sit, possibly more than I should've. Even at -2, Alcremie still outsped, so I was able to pick it off without eating a Poison Jab. This Alcremie was offensive, including Giga Drain and more readily using Max Flare instead of focusing on healing. Leon was beaten without suffering a KO or using dmax.
"Occasionally I wish we marketed the game exclusively to adults, so that we wouldn't feel bad about automatically deleting players' Pokemon as punishment for using them in an idiotic manner." ~Satoshi Tajiri

"We enjoy programming things that appear ridiculous in order to mock certain players. Every game we release, we hold a contest to see which of our intentionally bad moves is used the most, and I won with Stone Edge for four generations in a row until this young dev beats my tally with this gimmick called Acid Spray. And like Stone Edge, it wasn't even a new move. Where did this sudden popularity come from? I'm not going to lie, they cheered for this guy and I completely lost my shit and had to be escorted out of the building." ~Shigeki Morimoto
 

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