We're running a survey on ADV DOU - we're mostly looking to gather whether or not the community thinks boom should be suspected/voted on, but there is an additional question to gather responses on some top meta Pokemon. Anyone is welcome to respond.
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Lower Tiers ADV Doubles
- Thread starter NinjaSnapple
- Start date
unfortunately I am once again here in this thread. my doubles derby team didn't draft an adver so I had to support it p heavily and ended up putting more time into the tier since advpl than I thought I would oops. we lost partially thanks to a generationally ass showing by me in tb but I did win my only adv game of the tour and the slot finished 6-2, which would be the best record if it wasn't split between 3 people LOL. felt like making one last post before the boom vote for my final vr, to dump teams, and complain yippee.
not vastly different from my last one because it's been like 2-3 months LOL so won't talk about everything
current feeling is I think the bird and meta are pretty interchangeable top 2, I still think meta is the most warping pkmn in the tier but zap is def the most consistent and equally if not more splashable
last time I felt like I was putting celebi kinda low already and since then I've only grown on it. good coverage, viable screener, cm tect is dangerous despite having to drop a key attack, perish song keeps bullshit in check. held back by explosion and 4mss, but great glue
after continuing to build they aren't as splashable as aero and celebi to me and I think their threat level is more in line with other Tier 3 pkmn
tbh nothing changed for me about suicune between my last post and this one I just had it a bit too high, I think it always has High Potential but is awkward to fit on teams. I still don't like gyarados but unfortunately it's better than Tier 4. both of these guys love marowak and hate explosion
before I was kinda unsure on how I felt about weather but I think both of these guys are solidly Tier 4. quite powerful pkmn, can run away with the game if you aren't careful. kingdra has the better typing both offensively and defensively, isn't total dead weight outside of rain, and can run a spread move. exeggutor doesn't have to care about accuracy but is much worse outside of sun than kingdra is outside of rain, with the upside being it can go boom. the other weather guys are clearly a tier below to me they're all ok on full weather
derby rly reaffirmed how I feel about these. regirock good lead, continued to see success in derby. also think non demon registeel also cool lead after building with it, still have not used the demon set bc I dislike the nature of it but clearly viable. and regice is just not good I struggle to find a real reason to put it on a team
built teams with it that weren't instantly deleted for the first time during derby. higher celebi usage gives another target I guess but the weaknesses are still so bad. clearly usable, I'll just never feel good about it. sometimes it's cool to have a second zapdos
last time I kinda just threw all the fake out users into Tier 5 but after further consideration this is the only one I'd actually want to load, feels the most consistent to me bc it won't instantly die and can do some damage if needed
too weak too frail and slower than aerodactyl, have struggled to find teams I like with them but the niche is still there I suppose
overrated it before because there was 1 team I liked it on, maybe 2. still think it's cool as a special flying intimidator but hard to fit
I was convinced to move this up to Tier 4 last time but since then I still have not had the urge to use it and nobody has loaded it into me or my teammates. I do see the vision still but I would not want to choose this as my wincon ever tbh
fringe tier is full of pkmn who just Aren't Quite There, ranges from inconsistent mu fishes or gimmicks to mons that are mostly outclassed or perform a role that I just dont think is needed. these can all def win and I could probably be sold on any of them, but personally I looked into nearly all the mons here and couldn't find a team with them that I like in the current metagame
for the survey I put 4 enjoyment (3 in tournament but 5 outside) and either 2 or 3 competitiveness idr. free deo-s it'll save the tier
not vastly different from my last one because it's been like 2-3 months LOL so won't talk about everything
current feeling is I think the bird and meta are pretty interchangeable top 2, I still think meta is the most warping pkmn in the tier but zap is def the most consistent and equally if not more splashable last time I felt like I was putting celebi kinda low already and since then I've only grown on it. good coverage, viable screener, cm tect is dangerous despite having to drop a key attack, perish song keeps bullshit in check. held back by explosion and 4mss, but great glue after continuing to build they aren't as splashable as aero and celebi to me and I think their threat level is more in line with other Tier 3 pkmn tbh nothing changed for me about suicune between my last post and this one I just had it a bit too high, I think it always has High Potential but is awkward to fit on teams. I still don't like gyarados but unfortunately it's better than Tier 4. both of these guys love marowak and hate explosion before I was kinda unsure on how I felt about weather but I think both of these guys are solidly Tier 4. quite powerful pkmn, can run away with the game if you aren't careful. kingdra has the better typing both offensively and defensively, isn't total dead weight outside of rain, and can run a spread move. exeggutor doesn't have to care about accuracy but is much worse outside of sun than kingdra is outside of rain, with the upside being it can go boom. the other weather guys are clearly a tier below to me they're all ok on full weather derby rly reaffirmed how I feel about these. regirock good lead, continued to see success in derby. also think non demon registeel also cool lead after building with it, still have not used the demon set bc I dislike the nature of it but clearly viable. and regice is just not good I struggle to find a real reason to put it on a team built teams with it that weren't instantly deleted for the first time during derby. higher celebi usage gives another target I guess but the weaknesses are still so bad. clearly usable, I'll just never feel good about it. sometimes it's cool to have a second zapdos last time I kinda just threw all the fake out users into Tier 5 but after further consideration this is the only one I'd actually want to load, feels the most consistent to me bc it won't instantly die and can do some damage if needed too weak too frail and slower than aerodactyl, have struggled to find teams I like with them but the niche is still there I suppose overrated it before because there was 1 team I liked it on, maybe 2. still think it's cool as a special flying intimidator but hard to fit I was convinced to move this up to Tier 4 last time but since then I still have not had the urge to use it and nobody has loaded it into me or my teammates. I do see the vision still but I would not want to choose this as my wincon ever tbhfringe tier is full of pkmn who just Aren't Quite There, ranges from inconsistent mu fishes or gimmicks to mons that are mostly outclassed or perform a role that I just dont think is needed. these can all def win and I could probably be sold on any of them, but personally I looked into nearly all the mons here and couldn't find a team with them that I like in the current metagame
most of these are mine I think but some are just from SEA and others are teams we worked on together, plus I steal her spreads a lot. v strong mind for the tier and always a pleasure to work with, shoutout to her for being ok with me including anything of hers. assuming boom gets banned these will all require edits or could just be completely unviable
https://pokepast.es/7d3a384cbec98f32
this is one of the 3 tiers on the site where im rly confident in my own builds (other 2 being bw zu and adv ubers xd) so im v happy to have at least gone positive in advpl+derby this year compared to last year, and to have continued my success as a supporter asw. s/o zoe mizu idyll for trusting me
https://pokepast.es/7d3a384cbec98f32
this is one of the 3 tiers on the site where im rly confident in my own builds (other 2 being bw zu and adv ubers xd) so im v happy to have at least gone positive in advpl+derby this year compared to last year, and to have continued my success as a supporter asw. s/o zoe mizu idyll for trusting me
there have been whispers of banning boom for as long as more than 5 people have played this tier and it's not hard to see why. at best boom is able to ohko both of the opponents pkmn in a single turn at the cost of your own, and at worst you kill off your own pkmn for nothing in return. the moves definitely add more variance to the tier and create very swingy games, but these fast paced games were what I found so fun about adv to begin with and to me that's how it carved out an identity for itself. in the past I always felt like wanting boom banned was kind of a skill issue and that it's strength was a bit overstated. counterplay definitely exists with protect and gengar blocking the move being the most obvious examples, though misreading a boom is almost as deadly as getting your own boom read. so really the best way to not get cooked by boom is to keep up your own pressure and try to create scenarios where you simply do not care about boom (very hard, but rewarding). the most prominent boom users (meta/lax/gar) are all important pieces to any team both offensively and defensively, even if you land a boom with them there is a potential drawback so it has to be v high value. additionally boom is one of the best ways to deal with any form of setup from cm celebi to dd gyarados to demon registeel, helping keep those in check. so yeah idt boom is quite as unga bunga as its often made out to be, although it does undeniably create some pure coin flip moments. to me there is definite skill in both playing around and using boom and it gives the tier a unique identity which is why I was always against banning it, but I've come around a bit on the idea. my main gripe with the tier is the high variance, gen 3 critical hits are extremely bullshit and a single crit is likely to completely change the game in such an offensive metagame with very limited support tools where most pkmn are simply there to attack attack attack and trade damage. boom adds to this variance itself by introducing more coinflippy turns and being partially responsible for the tiers fast pace, both because of its strength in game and the threat of it in the builder dissuading players from using less offensive teams. while I'm far from convinced that banning boom will make the tier more fun or remove a significant amount of variance, I can understand the thought process and respect wanting to try one last thing to improve the tier. I'm kinda leaning ban because there's clearly plenty of dissatisfaction with adv rn and the obvious ban to try to change the tier is boom, but idk will have to think about it more
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advance battle!
w2 vs NinjaSnapple
https://pokepast.es/b6bd32e3dfb99f65
https://pokepast.es/958270e288e4c31c
I started off building here since I took an act loss in New Orleans w1 to enjoy my frozen pina colada. It was very good. Unfortunately I got called out of the house for an impromptu outing with my dad so I ended up having to make these teams on mobile in a restaurant. The first team is the very safe type of build that I would rely on several times throughout the duration of the tour, though notably with screens bi instead of CM. No idea why the lax is body slam but I don't really remember that coming up either way. I really like using protect lax, it's a set I've caught several metagrosses and opposing snorlaxes try to boom into me with in orre cup and I figured it'd port over well here. Team 2 kicks off my trend of bringing one more balancey comp and one aggressive build. Yes, the gengar is missing EVs and the Gyarados was 252hp/252 atk/4 speed. Idk either. It was aggressive enough that it won before the holes could be called out.
w3 vs Flying Beagle
https://pokepast.es/41c26d1008392abb
https://pokepast.es/032e095ed9a15d66
This time I wanted to set up with celebi after seeing some CM users in week 1. Gotta be honest though, I'm not the biggest fan of hp fire bi, but more on that later. Team 2 was the new HO idea of the week, using Jolteon + Tauros to put lots of pressure on in the early game and sequencing into a board where Breloom can spore slower mons and Gyarawak can get to work on a turn where the opponent is caught out of position. In the game I remember having to make a ballsy call and leave my Marowak open in front of Solar Beam to get ahead, and I did that to close out the game. Think this game is what really gave me gyarawak addiction
w4 vs Sunrose
https://pokepast.es/d8bc81bad2689396
https://pokepast.es/d7849a2d7588e152
https://pokepast.es/dc0d8ab814fada4b
At this point I had been using celebi balance + gyarawak stuff so I said let's merge em together. I think this works out decently okay, and in the game vs sunrose I was able to use Mie + Wak to some good effect. The sun team should've cooked but I got double crit to lose the game. Sun is really good, I like it more than rain, but again more on that later. Magmar + CB Bi was a super fun concept with the back pieces all having a nice flow to them.
i used reuses vs For 4LOM since we won the week
w6 vs Idyll
https://pokepast.es/61d847722922427e
https://pokepast.es/47b417b61e8b24ed
https://pokepast.es/d73d42713667a1b1
team 1 is just this week's bi balance. omastar rain took a win, still not really the biggest rain fan. registeel sucks but it also sucks to play against so ban registeel (skill issue or whatever). all in all i think i messed up trying to cheese hard with that one. the balance game loss was close iirc but i got a few endgame turns wrong.
I used reuses vs Gma, I think I was just extremely burnt out on building. It worked out this time at least
semis vs Xrn
https://pokepast.es/40bb6a7e46f57604
I only built one new team for semis because I was still in my builder slump. I also don't think this team is really that good and I got swiftly owned by rain as my gyarawak bi balance got owned by HP Elec mie in game 2. Ngl I did not even know they implemented the HP Elec thing on main, that was pretty clever.
finals vs NinjaSnapple
https://pokepast.es/ff6ecea480757493
https://pokepast.es/a59c38df25c8ed0a
https://pokepast.es/00cb5260c7aff140 - bonus team
bi balance of the week. this time it's calm arc to try and take hydro pumps but I bothered with too much speed on the guy trying to catch speedy metagrosses when I should've just ran more HP to turn the 20% chance to die into 6.3% + Acc or something. Thankfully I was able to get some turns right and position bi effectively to avoid losing to the same build twice. team two is a sun redux. I decided to use Gar + Lax kinda like how rain teams do Gar + Meta so that if my opponent lead weekly into Lax I could just boom and go into Exeggutor. Charizard was not missing any Fire Blasts and it + Exeggutor found themselves in a perfect position after a few turns. the bonus is what i made for g3 but I'm kinda glad I didn't have to use it, Ninja was clearly prepared for Gyarawak.
At the end of the season I'm relieved I don't have to play ADV for a while but honestly despite how frustrating this tier can be sometimes I love it all the same. Meeting SEA through this format in goofy roa roomtours is still one of my fondest memories on Smogon and every time I play this tier I can't help but get flashbacks to those good times. ADV feels like a Mario Party minigame version of competitive DOU. It's fun as hell to play but if you spend too long on it you can tell the designers just wanted a mode where anyone can beat anyone way easier than future installments.
shouts SEA Xrn and BIG WILL. and Xzern.
w2 vs NinjaSnapple
https://pokepast.es/b6bd32e3dfb99f65
https://pokepast.es/958270e288e4c31c
I started off building here since I took an act loss in New Orleans w1 to enjoy my frozen pina colada. It was very good. Unfortunately I got called out of the house for an impromptu outing with my dad so I ended up having to make these teams on mobile in a restaurant. The first team is the very safe type of build that I would rely on several times throughout the duration of the tour, though notably with screens bi instead of CM. No idea why the lax is body slam but I don't really remember that coming up either way. I really like using protect lax, it's a set I've caught several metagrosses and opposing snorlaxes try to boom into me with in orre cup and I figured it'd port over well here. Team 2 kicks off my trend of bringing one more balancey comp and one aggressive build. Yes, the gengar is missing EVs and the Gyarados was 252hp/252 atk/4 speed. Idk either. It was aggressive enough that it won before the holes could be called out.
w3 vs Flying Beagle
https://pokepast.es/41c26d1008392abb
https://pokepast.es/032e095ed9a15d66
This time I wanted to set up with celebi after seeing some CM users in week 1. Gotta be honest though, I'm not the biggest fan of hp fire bi, but more on that later. Team 2 was the new HO idea of the week, using Jolteon + Tauros to put lots of pressure on in the early game and sequencing into a board where Breloom can spore slower mons and Gyarawak can get to work on a turn where the opponent is caught out of position. In the game I remember having to make a ballsy call and leave my Marowak open in front of Solar Beam to get ahead, and I did that to close out the game. Think this game is what really gave me gyarawak addiction
w4 vs Sunrose
https://pokepast.es/d8bc81bad2689396
https://pokepast.es/d7849a2d7588e152
https://pokepast.es/dc0d8ab814fada4b
At this point I had been using celebi balance + gyarawak stuff so I said let's merge em together. I think this works out decently okay, and in the game vs sunrose I was able to use Mie + Wak to some good effect. The sun team should've cooked but I got double crit to lose the game. Sun is really good, I like it more than rain, but again more on that later. Magmar + CB Bi was a super fun concept with the back pieces all having a nice flow to them.
i used reuses vs For 4LOM since we won the week
w6 vs Idyll
https://pokepast.es/61d847722922427e
https://pokepast.es/47b417b61e8b24ed
https://pokepast.es/d73d42713667a1b1
team 1 is just this week's bi balance. omastar rain took a win, still not really the biggest rain fan. registeel sucks but it also sucks to play against so ban registeel (skill issue or whatever). all in all i think i messed up trying to cheese hard with that one. the balance game loss was close iirc but i got a few endgame turns wrong.
I used reuses vs Gma, I think I was just extremely burnt out on building. It worked out this time at least
semis vs Xrn
https://pokepast.es/40bb6a7e46f57604
I only built one new team for semis because I was still in my builder slump. I also don't think this team is really that good and I got swiftly owned by rain as my gyarawak bi balance got owned by HP Elec mie in game 2. Ngl I did not even know they implemented the HP Elec thing on main, that was pretty clever.
finals vs NinjaSnapple
https://pokepast.es/ff6ecea480757493
https://pokepast.es/a59c38df25c8ed0a
https://pokepast.es/00cb5260c7aff140 - bonus team
bi balance of the week. this time it's calm arc to try and take hydro pumps but I bothered with too much speed on the guy trying to catch speedy metagrosses when I should've just ran more HP to turn the 20% chance to die into 6.3% + Acc or something. Thankfully I was able to get some turns right and position bi effectively to avoid losing to the same build twice. team two is a sun redux. I decided to use Gar + Lax kinda like how rain teams do Gar + Meta so that if my opponent lead weekly into Lax I could just boom and go into Exeggutor. Charizard was not missing any Fire Blasts and it + Exeggutor found themselves in a perfect position after a few turns. the bonus is what i made for g3 but I'm kinda glad I didn't have to use it, Ninja was clearly prepared for Gyarawak.
At the end of the season I'm relieved I don't have to play ADV for a while but honestly despite how frustrating this tier can be sometimes I love it all the same. Meeting SEA through this format in goofy roa roomtours is still one of my fondest memories on Smogon and every time I play this tier I can't help but get flashbacks to those good times. ADV feels like a Mario Party minigame version of competitive DOU. It's fun as hell to play but if you spend too long on it you can tell the designers just wanted a mode where anyone can beat anyone way easier than future installments.
Tier 1: Zapdos is the best mon in the tier. Thunderbolt/HP Grass/Flex off its power speed and bulk is just unmatched and it will continue to be the best mon in the tier until we actually decide to free Deo-S. Snorlax is not far behind Zapdos. It sits on every special attacker including double ups, can threaten the strongest boom in the tier to easily delete a 90/90 bulk mon at -1, and has very specific counterplay. Celebi patches almost all of the holes lati left behind in its ban. It's an Electric and Water resist, it can click screens, it can set up Calm Mind, or even run weather moves and perish song. I don't like CM HP Fire, I don't think it's really for much more than opposing Celebi and Metagross, and even boosted HP Fires aren't wearing these guys down a lot, I'd rather just build more counterplay into teams and run dual stabs which is way better into the remaining 90% of the metagame.
Tier 2: Yeah I actually don't think I would rank Meta tier 1. Fires are way easier to use now, Zapdos being tier 1 and increased Gyara usage forces it to boom way earlier than it would like in a lot of boards. It's still a Metagross and will contribute something to every game it comes to, but I think the same is true for the other guys I ranked here. Gengar: speed, utility, normal immune, business as usual. I really like bulky gar. Starmie stands out to me as the dominant Water now, I think with Raikou usage decreasing as Zap usage increases and it not having to play a tie anymore it's just a lot more favored, plus Waters are just much more important now with Fires being everywhere. I do genuinely think Arc is Tier 2. Killing Gross, Intimidate, and its arsenal of support moves generally make it the go to Fire type, not to mention the incredible bulk just makes it crazy hard to remove without hitting a Hydro Pump.
Tier 3: I think Pert's fine here, great typing and moves but doesn't actually beat much 1 on 1 due to speed and having to be a mixed attacker. Icy Wind is a good move to click with him. Tauros is a great mon but easy to catch out of position and frail so I don't think it can ever go higher than top of tier 3. Gyarawak has a decently high ceiling but is always respected and can be difficult to execute so same bounds apply here. I think Ttar has it even worse. Aerodactyl has impressed me as a speed ceiling for the tier, just a nice guy to send in and do 50 to whatever's in range. Dogs are cool. I think sun and rain are tier 3 archetypes so their best representatives here. I'm giving the edge to sun since it can function as BoomSpam and doesn't have to hit Hydro Pump.
Tier 4: Registeel.... basically all the other Fires, Fake Outs, Fightings, Follow Mes, and the Fysically defensive Explosion users.
Fringe: I think it's time to UR Scept and Zam. Very limited roles, if you're gonna go fast you might as well be going faster and run Aero.
Tier 2: Yeah I actually don't think I would rank Meta tier 1. Fires are way easier to use now, Zapdos being tier 1 and increased Gyara usage forces it to boom way earlier than it would like in a lot of boards. It's still a Metagross and will contribute something to every game it comes to, but I think the same is true for the other guys I ranked here. Gengar: speed, utility, normal immune, business as usual. I really like bulky gar. Starmie stands out to me as the dominant Water now, I think with Raikou usage decreasing as Zap usage increases and it not having to play a tie anymore it's just a lot more favored, plus Waters are just much more important now with Fires being everywhere. I do genuinely think Arc is Tier 2. Killing Gross, Intimidate, and its arsenal of support moves generally make it the go to Fire type, not to mention the incredible bulk just makes it crazy hard to remove without hitting a Hydro Pump.
Tier 3: I think Pert's fine here, great typing and moves but doesn't actually beat much 1 on 1 due to speed and having to be a mixed attacker. Icy Wind is a good move to click with him. Tauros is a great mon but easy to catch out of position and frail so I don't think it can ever go higher than top of tier 3. Gyarawak has a decently high ceiling but is always respected and can be difficult to execute so same bounds apply here. I think Ttar has it even worse. Aerodactyl has impressed me as a speed ceiling for the tier, just a nice guy to send in and do 50 to whatever's in range. Dogs are cool. I think sun and rain are tier 3 archetypes so their best representatives here. I'm giving the edge to sun since it can function as BoomSpam and doesn't have to hit Hydro Pump.
Tier 4: Registeel.... basically all the other Fires, Fake Outs, Fightings, Follow Mes, and the Fysically defensive Explosion users.
Fringe: I think it's time to UR Scept and Zam. Very limited roles, if you're gonna go fast you might as well be going faster and run Aero.
Just in case it wasn't clear by my writing so far, I am really, really glad we banned Latias. A mon that forces the meta into Speed ties where it's best check is itself is just not fun, especially when you know it's going to have 100% usage. I much prefer the current meta to the one where 4 out of every 5 teams started with Latias Metagross Gengar as soon as you opened the builder. Celebi really does fill the majority of Latias's defensive benefits while being a far less toxic mon in the metagame, and I think it's a good thing that you actually want to run Fires now.
Been thinking about whether or not to ban boom since my game wrapped up today and I looked to post the tier survey. I do think I'm going to vote ban. While it's true that ADV's identity is almost centered around Boom, I think there's a clear correlation between this reputation and the community's attitude towards it. I think there are a lot of things that can still define ADV in the wake of a boom ban: the spread mechanic still applies to many more moves, the power level -boom is honestly quite balanced, and it's just interesting to play a pre-phys/spec split tier to me.
I mentioned Registeel in doucord but also I don't think I'd seriously want to ban it or anything, it's just the Cosmic Power Mew of this generation. Ngl I do think Deoxys-S would probably be /fine/ in the tier, remember we banned that guy in '22 before the '23 money tour happened and everyone suddenly optimized the tier. I think we should probably do some testing with it though. We definitely didn't test enough with Latias and look where that got us.
Been thinking about whether or not to ban boom since my game wrapped up today and I looked to post the tier survey. I do think I'm going to vote ban. While it's true that ADV's identity is almost centered around Boom, I think there's a clear correlation between this reputation and the community's attitude towards it. I think there are a lot of things that can still define ADV in the wake of a boom ban: the spread mechanic still applies to many more moves, the power level -boom is honestly quite balanced, and it's just interesting to play a pre-phys/spec split tier to me.
I mentioned Registeel in doucord but also I don't think I'd seriously want to ban it or anything, it's just the Cosmic Power Mew of this generation. Ngl I do think Deoxys-S would probably be /fine/ in the tier, remember we banned that guy in '22 before the '23 money tour happened and everyone suddenly optimized the tier. I think we should probably do some testing with it though. We definitely didn't test enough with Latias and look where that got us.
shouts SEA Xrn and BIG WILL. and Xzern.
tbf i mainly reused teams i had in my builders of genesis 4lom and mine so im gonna post the only 2 teams i build for this tour and had fun with it :
Jirachi Time
This is a team builded aroung what makes jirachi unique and not a bad a metagross while having mons that can use the tempo disruption is gonna provide. 10/10 fun team and somehow viable.
CounterPert
This one is a most serious team builded with a enemy Zapdos Lead in mind (even tho is good vs most leads tho). Celebi is eved so is slower than timid zapdos and faster than modest zapdos, that way that pert ev spread can survive hp grass with enought live in both cases to :
A) kill with counter and B) still be useful the rest of the game thanks to lefties and tect
The zapdos lure and the LS lead means that marowak can have a ofensive ev spread and pressure a lot and than gyarados is better here than suicune while gar and bulkygross are the glue the team need. 9/10 fun and 9/10 viable.
Jirachi Time
This is a team builded aroung what makes jirachi unique and not a bad a metagross while having mons that can use the tempo disruption is gonna provide. 10/10 fun team and somehow viable.
CounterPert
This one is a most serious team builded with a enemy Zapdos Lead in mind (even tho is good vs most leads tho). Celebi is eved so is slower than timid zapdos and faster than modest zapdos, that way that pert ev spread can survive hp grass with enought live in both cases to :
A) kill with counter and B) still be useful the rest of the game thanks to lefties and tect
The zapdos lure and the LS lead means that marowak can have a ofensive ev spread and pressure a lot and than gyarados is better here than suicune while gar and bulkygross are the glue the team need. 9/10 fun and 9/10 viable.
Everyone that has read me clearly knows what i think about boom being healthy, one of the biggest skill shows of the gen and part of adv identity so im not gonna enter in that at least for now.
That said, what I want to express is that if you find Boom to be broken or uncompetitive, then by all means, vote for a ban. However, please don't vote for a ban just because people who dislike the generation and haven't played a single game are complaining about it. (It just happened to be Boom that ended up being the target, but it could just as easily have been crits, the lack of team preview, or the way switches after KO work... they just don't like the generation).
Let's keep the tier with its unique identity—fun and enjoyable for those who appreciate ADV as a generation—instead of watering it down to appease tourists who don’t really care about it. If I have to choose between having a small community with a tier I truly enjoy and a larger one with a mediocre tier, I have no doubt about what I want
That said, what I want to express is that if you find Boom to be broken or uncompetitive, then by all means, vote for a ban. However, please don't vote for a ban just because people who dislike the generation and haven't played a single game are complaining about it. (It just happened to be Boom that ended up being the target, but it could just as easily have been crits, the lack of team preview, or the way switches after KO work... they just don't like the generation).
Let's keep the tier with its unique identity—fun and enjoyable for those who appreciate ADV as a generation—instead of watering it down to appease tourists who don’t really care about it. If I have to choose between having a small community with a tier I truly enjoy and a larger one with a mediocre tier, I have no doubt about what I want
A private vote was ran on Explosion & Self-Destruct in ADV DOU. The vote was private as I was recommended not to use Blind Voting as ADV DOU votes are not eligible for Tiering Contributor. The criteria to be a voter for this suspect was the following:
4 wins in ADVPL + Doubles Derby combined, or 3 wins in one of the two tournaments: zee, Grandmas Cookin, For 4LOM, Idyll, Lhions, Genesis77, eragon, Xrn, zoe (9)
ADV cup top 8: Amaranth, Staraptor, Mishimono, AIRedzone, MADARAAAA (5)
(For 4LOM, Genesis77, and Lhions qualified via both criteria)
The votes were cast as the following:
Ban (8): Grandmas Cookin, zee, AIRedzone, eragon, Idyll, Mishimono, Staraptor, Genesis77
DNB (4): Lhions, Amaranth, MADARAAAA, zoe
Abstain (1): Xrn
Hasn't Voted Yet (1): For 4LOM
With Xrn's Abstain, 8 of the 13 remaining votes is enough for the 60% ban margin. Therefore, Self-Destruct and Explosion are now banned from ADV Doubles OU. If anyone would like to see proof of these votes, please let me know.
I would like to know people's thoughts on running a retest on this vote at some point. This has potential to be an impactful vote for the trajectory of the tier, and I would consider it healthy to revisit this after some time. In my eyes, we don't have to worry about spamming votes since this tier doesn't count for TC progress. Not exactly sure when, could be after the oldgen invitational, after next ADV Cup, or never if people don't feel like this is necessary. We would look for ways to add to the voter pool if we decide to look into a retest.
Samples will be updated shortly, I'd like to extend my thanks to all the voters that participated.
4 wins in ADVPL + Doubles Derby combined, or 3 wins in one of the two tournaments: zee, Grandmas Cookin, For 4LOM, Idyll, Lhions, Genesis77, eragon, Xrn, zoe (9)
ADV cup top 8: Amaranth, Staraptor, Mishimono, AIRedzone, MADARAAAA (5)
(For 4LOM, Genesis77, and Lhions qualified via both criteria)
The votes were cast as the following:
Ban (8): Grandmas Cookin, zee, AIRedzone, eragon, Idyll, Mishimono, Staraptor, Genesis77
DNB (4): Lhions, Amaranth, MADARAAAA, zoe
Abstain (1): Xrn
Hasn't Voted Yet (1): For 4LOM
With Xrn's Abstain, 8 of the 13 remaining votes is enough for the 60% ban margin. Therefore, Self-Destruct and Explosion are now banned from ADV Doubles OU. If anyone would like to see proof of these votes, please let me know.
I would like to know people's thoughts on running a retest on this vote at some point. This has potential to be an impactful vote for the trajectory of the tier, and I would consider it healthy to revisit this after some time. In my eyes, we don't have to worry about spamming votes since this tier doesn't count for TC progress. Not exactly sure when, could be after the oldgen invitational, after next ADV Cup, or never if people don't feel like this is necessary. We would look for ways to add to the voter pool if we decide to look into a retest.
Samples will be updated shortly, I'd like to extend my thanks to all the voters that participated.
Unfortunately I have been knocked Doubles Vintage so I think now is a good time to share the teams I have created in the post boom meta as well as give my general thoughts on the tier as a whole.
Biggest Winners
Prior to the boom ban, Suicune was an uncommon sight in tournament play due to requiring a couple turns of setup for it do to any real damage which made it a prime target for explosion. But now as that's no longer an option, Suicune has become an absolute menace. When paired with intimidate users as seen here, here and here it can become extremely difficult to remove from the field, and due to the lack of explosion, Suicune can take advantage of its great bulk and and drop protect entirely in favor of a rest-talk set which prevents the opponent from beating Suicune by slowly whittling down its hp over the course of the game.
Celebi was already good pre-boom ban but I wanted to write about it anyway as it being tier 4 on the viability rankings was and currently is extremely fraudulent. Celebi fills a similar niche to Suicune but arguably does it better due to psychic/grass having surprisingly good offensive coverage meaning celebi doesn't have to set up as much to be an offensive threat while also having a more reliable recovery option with recover. Celebi also isn't limited to just this one niche as it can also support its teammates as an effective screens setter.
I do believe Baton Pass to be a legitimate threat that people are not currently respecting in the teambuilder. The cost of multiple Pokemon specifically to help facilitate the Baton pass and all the turns of setup required is more than worth the price. Ninjask is probably the best Baton Pass user as with the combination of Swords Dance + Speed Boost it can quickly turn hard hitting Pokemon with otherwise middling speed stats into terrifying offensive threats as seen here.
Biggest Losers
Gengar has definitely been hit the hardest by the boom ban as it got so much of its value out of its explosion immunity which has now been rendered completely redundant. Though that being said, Gengar still has an excellent movepool with plenty of options to disrupt setup like taunt, haze, will-o-wisp and perish song which could become quite relevant if teams like the one zee showcased here start to become more popular.
I figured I'd include this two in the same section as the boom ban has affected them both in pretty much the same way. Explosion/ self destruct was a pivotal part of their toolkits and losing that has almost certainly removed both of them from tier 1 contention. Though both Pokemon did already have alternative movesets that didn't use explosion, see here, they are now much more less threatening.
Teams
Thoughts on the Boom Ban
My opinion on this is certainly subject to change as the meta continues to progress but as of right now I feel like it was the right call. Games have generally felt a lot less swingy while still generally being pretty fast paced. If bulky setup teams become optimised to a point where it feels egregiously bad to play against I may reconsider but I think there are enough options to deal with those kinds of teams that people just aren't using yet.
Biggest Winners
Prior to the boom ban, Suicune was an uncommon sight in tournament play due to requiring a couple turns of setup for it do to any real damage which made it a prime target for explosion. But now as that's no longer an option, Suicune has become an absolute menace. When paired with intimidate users as seen here, here and here it can become extremely difficult to remove from the field, and due to the lack of explosion, Suicune can take advantage of its great bulk and and drop protect entirely in favor of a rest-talk set which prevents the opponent from beating Suicune by slowly whittling down its hp over the course of the game.
Celebi was already good pre-boom ban but I wanted to write about it anyway as it being tier 4 on the viability rankings was and currently is extremely fraudulent. Celebi fills a similar niche to Suicune but arguably does it better due to psychic/grass having surprisingly good offensive coverage meaning celebi doesn't have to set up as much to be an offensive threat while also having a more reliable recovery option with recover. Celebi also isn't limited to just this one niche as it can also support its teammates as an effective screens setter.
I do believe Baton Pass to be a legitimate threat that people are not currently respecting in the teambuilder. The cost of multiple Pokemon specifically to help facilitate the Baton pass and all the turns of setup required is more than worth the price. Ninjask is probably the best Baton Pass user as with the combination of Swords Dance + Speed Boost it can quickly turn hard hitting Pokemon with otherwise middling speed stats into terrifying offensive threats as seen here.
Biggest Losers
Gengar has definitely been hit the hardest by the boom ban as it got so much of its value out of its explosion immunity which has now been rendered completely redundant. Though that being said, Gengar still has an excellent movepool with plenty of options to disrupt setup like taunt, haze, will-o-wisp and perish song which could become quite relevant if teams like the one zee showcased here start to become more popular.
I figured I'd include this two in the same section as the boom ban has affected them both in pretty much the same way. Explosion/ self destruct was a pivotal part of their toolkits and losing that has almost certainly removed both of them from tier 1 contention. Though both Pokemon did already have alternative movesets that didn't use explosion, see here, they are now much more less threatening.
Teams
Thoughts on the Boom Ban
My opinion on this is certainly subject to change as the meta continues to progress but as of right now I feel like it was the right call. Games have generally felt a lot less swingy while still generally being pretty fast paced. If bulky setup teams become optimised to a point where it feels egregiously bad to play against I may reconsider but I think there are enough options to deal with those kinds of teams that people just aren't using yet.
Attachments
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Zapdos is definitely good enough that it deserves its own tier. You need a really good reason to not use zap on your teams. It's fast, hits stupidly hard, is impossible to OHKO (nobody's using glass zap anymore right?), and has a ton of flexibility.I'll explain the tier 1 and tier 4 but not gonna touch on most of the tier 2/3 guys because we all know what they do. tiers are ordered
premier win condition in the tier. CM with Natural Cure and both damage-dealing recovery and normal recovery is just really good. Has a great defensive typing for the metagame. Really just needs to be kept away from strong physical damage but it already fits so well with Arcanine at a minimum so you should always have at least one guy to help manage Aero/Metagross/Tauros Nothing is safe from this thing in a vacuum and that's what makes it so dangerous. It's the best revenge killer in the tier and forces reactive gameplay from the opponent as soon as it hits the field. Healthy waters can check it but it's hard to keep waters healthy when the two best mons in the tier are Electric and Grass types. Very easy to get value out of this Pokemon and I'm never displeased with it. I think everybody thought this guy was gonna be a monster following the boom ban because how else are you threatening the bulky CM water. Well refer to what I said above about the two best Pokemon in the tier. You aren't setting up in front of Zap without a switch to Maro which then leaves you with 2 slots vulnerable to Celebi and you're not really beating Celebi ever if it boosts before you. Top of tier 3 because I still think it's a strong win condition but it does take proper play to pull off and you might just brick with it. Gonna choose to give this guy a little faith so he's at the bottom of 3 but even this might be too high for it. It's got a great toolbox of coverage but the problem is all that stuff hits its targets for 50% +- 10 and why do that when you can hit things with Zap/Arc/Bi/Waters. Still he's got fast Wisp, Skill Swap Levitate, and can cheese with dbond. Walls curselax and cheese registeel I guess?? The threat of the Pokemon's existence is definitely enough to get me to build teams in a certain way so I guess that's enoughTier 4 - what are these guys doing?
- sun. rain functions basically the same post boomban except you cant do t1 boom + rain dance gar but sun imo has retooled itself entirely from being a Shiftry + Exeggutor boomspam to Exeggutor and Charizard firing off strong, fast attacks. That definitely isn't as threatening as the former so I've dropped it to 4 but I do think this is probably the strongest option for things not in the top tiers. - functions like a mini zapdos on marowak teams. these don't really need arc as much because they're probably using gyarados. surprisingly hard to remove if you cant tbolt it, especially if behind a sub.
- walls celebi. we probably need to start using fire blast arc which can also just contend with the mon more provided you hit but yeah if you ever Really want the matchup i guess this is the guy for you
- annoying cosmic power cheese mon, don't use CM on this guy just use celebi instead - the other rain mon, not kingdra so tier 4 - if you really wanna whack snorlax and ttar these are the guys for you. might be good on some cm spam stuff or just rain.
- follow me, adv follow me is pretty cool but i think these guys arent super necessary because all of the best cm/dd guys can kinda just position themselves with proper pressure from allies.
- again a guy that leads pretty hard into setup with fake out/icy wind/encore but I don't find it worth a lot because all the top 3 hit it for SE - fake out + decent offense - fast encore that you can't fake out is pretty cool. it doesn't really kill anything but it does have the punches - generally inferior cm/dd counterparts to the higher ranked guys but can hit the right boards and sweep
- sits on zap and aero, kinda cool?
- bulky water with recovery but not really doing much else 
- remnants of past meta that probably are just kinda bad now but i'll leave em here.realistically you never need to dip into anything below tier 3. you can play a full tournament just bringing zap/bi/aero + 3 every week and never lose on matchup because that's how strong the top mons are in this meta. I'm glad we banned boom, I think it feels fun to play without it. i think baton pass stuff is really bad, so bad i wont even rank it.
Sandslash has an excellent niche as a Tyranitar counter with a set like this:
Sandslash @ Choice Band
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 252 HP / 212 Atk / 44 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Hidden Power [Bug]
- Aerial Ace
Being able to OHKO any Tyranitar that isn't 252 HP EV's and 228 DEF EV's, is a powerful trait.
Sand Veil is a nice, yet unfair bonus in the matchup too.
Only taking 20-40% and 20-50% after a Dragon Dance boost from each of Tyranitar's moves makes it a great switch-in.
Max HP lets it take 1 max SpAtk, Gengar Ice Punch, unlike running max Speed and getting OHKO-ed by it.
Aerial Ace and Hidden Power Bug let it heavily chip Celebi 87.3 - 102.9%, or OHKO Heracross and Exeggutor.
The Speed investment lets it outspeed uninvested Metagross, letting it win the 1v1.
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Dewgong is a great support mon with a near perfect kit:
Dewgong @ Lum Berry
Ability: Thick Fat
EVs: 164 HP / 188 Def / 56 SpD / 100 Spe
Calm Nature
- Fake Out
- Icy Wind
- Encore
- Protect
Fake Out is the best support move (In My Opinion) and can let Dewgong win MUs it really shouldn't with the help of strong Physical Attackers like Aerodactyl and Tauros deleting the HP of mons before they can even move.
Encore lets it get the jump on the likes of Tyranitar, Suicune and Celebi that would otherwise freely set up on it.
Icy Wind is excellent move that can easily change the tide of the battle by letting Zapdos and the other Base 100s outspeed everything else in the tier with just 112 Speed EVs
The bulk on this set lets it survive any move in the tier and live after sand, other then a Choice Band Tyranitar's HP Rock, or a Magnet Zapdos's Thunderbolt.
The Speed investment lets it outspeed Standard Celebi and Zapdos after an Icy WInd
Celebi is an excellent partner for Dewgong because of the combitation of Dewgong's Fake Out and Celebi's Calm Mind. Often your opponent wont have 2 Celebi Counters on the field at the same time and you basically get a Calm Mind for free.
Another surprisingly good partner is Mixed Zapdos, because it struggles to outspeed other mons without Thunder Wave (which it really can't fit) and really likes the Icy Wind support so it can utterly destroy Celebi (this is the set for reference -----> https://pokepast.es/fdaca559f0ef1880 ) so now I finally have a decent partner for it! :D
mishmish
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This is a post about 4 funny unique sets for viable mons in the metagame:
Mixed Zapdos:
Zapdos @ Lum Berry
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 140 HP / 140 Atk / 192 SpA / 32 Spe
Mild Nature
- Thunderbolt
- Drill Peck
- Thunder Wave / Hidden Power [Grass]
- Protect
I feel Zapdos has so much to offer when it comes set variety and this set is an example.
Zapdos's Drill Peak 2HKOs Offensive Celebi and Exeggutor and OHKOs Heracross
The EV Spread let it do regular Zapdos things (Not getting OHKOed by anything, slapping things for huge damage with Thunderbolt and HP Grass, etc.) while also hitting flying weak mons for huge damage, mainly Celebi, Exeggutor and Heracross.
Thunder Wave lets Zapdos paralyze the likes of Tauros, Aerodactyl and Arcanine, slowing them to a halt.
Yeah all-in-all its just a Zapdos that beats Celebi instead of Celebi beating it.
Really hurt by only having 4 Move Slots though.
Fire Blast Offensive Arcanine:
Arcanine @ Lum Berry
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 12 Def / 172 SpA / 72 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fire Blast
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Protect
- Helping Hand
This is a very simple set, all I'm doing is moving the SpDef EVs into SpAtk and taking some from Speed (Still outspeeds Tyranitar though)
Running Fire Blast over Overheat enables Arcanine to just sit there with no drawback and spam Fire Blast until something dies.
The investment in SpAtk lets it 2HKO Celebi, barely miss out on the OHKO on Swampert with HP Grass, but does KO after a Fire Blast if Swampert switches into it, letting it significantly threaten it.
Much less specially bulky though, so keep that in mind.
Offensive RestTalk (A.K.A. Crocune)
Suicune @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 240 HP / 128 SpA / 140 SpD
Modest Nature
- Waterfall
- Sleep Talk/Ice Beam
- Rest
- Calm Mind
RestTalk Suicune is incredibly scary in this tier, and is a very consistent win-con with the combination of Calm Mind and Rest making it really difficult to KO on the special side.
The provided EV spread lets it get 3HKOed by Zapdos's Thunderbolts and +1 Gyarados HP Flying and 4HKOed by Celebi Giga Drain and Arcanine HP Grass. The rest of the EVs are dumped into SpAtk.
This set really shines behind screens, mainly setup by the likes of Celebi or Starmie, when during screens, this mon becomes an unkillable mon for 5 turns and can deal huge damage in that time.
With 2 Calm Minds, it's 2HKOing most neutral targets, and absolutely destroying the Water weak mons.
Bulky Dragon Dance Tyranitar
Tyranitar @ Lum Berry
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 204 HP / 52 Atk / 80 SpD / 172 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Hidden Power [Rock]
- Earthquake
- Protect
- Dragon Dance
This is one of the more niche sets on this post, only really applicable on screens.
The spread I give you lets it tank a Suicune Hydro Pump, a Snorlax Brick Break, a Swampert Hydro Pump, and an Aerodactyl Earthquake and even a Metagross Meteor Mash. (at full health) 3HKOed by Zapdos Thunderbolt, Non Stab Earthquakes (Non Choice Band) and the various HP Grass-es in the tier.
The Speed investment lets it outspeed the Base 100s after a Dragon Dance
This set is an absolute monster behind screens, easily setting up 2-3 Dragon Dances, but suffers from the fact it has not a single reliable recovery option.
With 3 Dragon Dances, it can just throw out Earthquakes and HP Rocks and 2HKO everything in its path.
Not the most reliable set, but is very fun to use.
Mixed Zapdos:
Zapdos @ Lum Berry
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 140 HP / 140 Atk / 192 SpA / 32 Spe
Mild Nature
- Thunderbolt
- Drill Peck
- Thunder Wave / Hidden Power [Grass]
- Protect
I feel Zapdos has so much to offer when it comes set variety and this set is an example.
Zapdos's Drill Peak 2HKOs Offensive Celebi and Exeggutor and OHKOs Heracross
The EV Spread let it do regular Zapdos things (Not getting OHKOed by anything, slapping things for huge damage with Thunderbolt and HP Grass, etc.) while also hitting flying weak mons for huge damage, mainly Celebi, Exeggutor and Heracross.
Thunder Wave lets Zapdos paralyze the likes of Tauros, Aerodactyl and Arcanine, slowing them to a halt.
Yeah all-in-all its just a Zapdos that beats Celebi instead of Celebi beating it.
Really hurt by only having 4 Move Slots though.
Fire Blast Offensive Arcanine:
Arcanine @ Lum Berry
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 12 Def / 172 SpA / 72 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fire Blast
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Protect
- Helping Hand
This is a very simple set, all I'm doing is moving the SpDef EVs into SpAtk and taking some from Speed (Still outspeeds Tyranitar though)
Running Fire Blast over Overheat enables Arcanine to just sit there with no drawback and spam Fire Blast until something dies.
The investment in SpAtk lets it 2HKO Celebi, barely miss out on the OHKO on Swampert with HP Grass, but does KO after a Fire Blast if Swampert switches into it, letting it significantly threaten it.
Much less specially bulky though, so keep that in mind.
Offensive RestTalk (A.K.A. Crocune)
Suicune @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 240 HP / 128 SpA / 140 SpD
Modest Nature
- Waterfall
- Sleep Talk/Ice Beam
- Rest
- Calm Mind
RestTalk Suicune is incredibly scary in this tier, and is a very consistent win-con with the combination of Calm Mind and Rest making it really difficult to KO on the special side.
The provided EV spread lets it get 3HKOed by Zapdos's Thunderbolts and +1 Gyarados HP Flying and 4HKOed by Celebi Giga Drain and Arcanine HP Grass. The rest of the EVs are dumped into SpAtk.
This set really shines behind screens, mainly setup by the likes of Celebi or Starmie, when during screens, this mon becomes an unkillable mon for 5 turns and can deal huge damage in that time.
With 2 Calm Minds, it's 2HKOing most neutral targets, and absolutely destroying the Water weak mons.
Bulky Dragon Dance Tyranitar
Tyranitar @ Lum Berry
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 204 HP / 52 Atk / 80 SpD / 172 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Hidden Power [Rock]
- Earthquake
- Protect
- Dragon Dance
This is one of the more niche sets on this post, only really applicable on screens.
The spread I give you lets it tank a Suicune Hydro Pump, a Snorlax Brick Break, a Swampert Hydro Pump, and an Aerodactyl Earthquake and even a Metagross Meteor Mash. (at full health) 3HKOed by Zapdos Thunderbolt, Non Stab Earthquakes (Non Choice Band) and the various HP Grass-es in the tier.
The Speed investment lets it outspeed the Base 100s after a Dragon Dance
This set is an absolute monster behind screens, easily setting up 2-3 Dragon Dances, but suffers from the fact it has not a single reliable recovery option.
With 3 Dragon Dances, it can just throw out Earthquakes and HP Rocks and 2HKO everything in its path.
Not the most reliable set, but is very fun to use.
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ok so, i made this post for 2 reasons
A) Zapdos is inarguably the best mon in the meta, being able to fit on every team and dealing loads of damage but there is no (at the time of me writing this) updated Zapdos Analysis, so new players can learn why Zapdos is so good
B) I can't read LMAO
yeahhhh so I made this before I was told that I can't rewrite the analysis, so I now have a completed Zapdos Analysis just rotting in my Google Docs. What made itfunnier worse is that in the Past Gen DOU Reservations Thread, there is a line that says "do not start working on the analysis until your post is liked"
So why not put it to use?
Zapdos @ Lum Berry
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 168 HP / 220 SpA / 120 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 SpA
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Grass]/Hidden Power [Ice]
- Thunder Wave/Substitute/Roar/Light Screen
- Protect
A) Zapdos is inarguably the best mon in the meta, being able to fit on every team and dealing loads of damage but there is no (at the time of me writing this) updated Zapdos Analysis, so new players can learn why Zapdos is so good
B) I can't read LMAO
yeahhhh so I made this before I was told that I can't rewrite the analysis, so I now have a completed Zapdos Analysis just rotting in my Google Docs. What made it
So why not put it to use?
Zapdos @ Lum Berry
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 168 HP / 220 SpA / 120 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 SpA
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Grass]/Hidden Power [Ice]
- Thunder Wave/Substitute/Roar/Light Screen
- Protect
- Thunderbolt is an extremely spammable move that does huge damage and is 2-3HKOing most of the Pokemon in the metagame that aren’t immune. Hidden Power [Grass] makes it so Zapdos isn’t walled by Swampert, and Hidden Power [Ice] is for Flygon and Salamence. (both work for Marowak).
- Thunder wave is an excellent support move that can help Zapdos in slowing down the likes of Starmie, choice band Tauros and Aerodactyl with paralysis, ridding them of their high speed stats so Zapdos or its partners can pick away at them with ease. Roar is good because of the popularity of bulky setup sweepers such as Snorlax and Suicune, being able to completely stop them in their tracks.
Other moves for Zapdos, like light screen and weathers, are used because of Zapdos’s high bulk, letting it set it up fairly easily. - Lum Berry is generally preferred over leftovers because of Lum berry allowing Zapdos to dodge paralysis burn or even freeze, but leftovers is used for longevity on substitute sets because of sub letting you dodge status and safely spread damage.
- Zapdos has an incredible defensive typing that gives it plenty of opportunities to switch in, the typing is so good because Zapdos is immune to Earthquake, and resists flying, grass and steel, some of the most common powerful attacks in the metagame
- The provided EV spread lets Zapdos tank a helping hand Metagross Hidden Power [Rock] after sand at full health, it can also tank a lot of other popular moves in the meta.
- The speed investment is so it outspeeds 0 speed Metagross after an icy wind speed drop. The rest of the EVs and Zapdos’s nature are dumped into Special Attack.
- Zapdos also happens to have one of the best Metagross matchups in the tier, because of its immunity to earthquake and resistance to meteor mash, forcing it to either switch or predictably attack the other slot, enabling partners such as Celebi, Aerodactyl and Gengar to click buttons without fear of Metagross.
- Tyranitar and Aerodactyl are also great partners for Zapdos because of Zapdos’s earthquake immunity and great matchup into Metagross, Starmie and Marowak.
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hello, i'm fully derbed up and want to talk about adv doubles, in the form of a personal VR (within a tier mons are also ordered left to right)
Additional thoughts:
Item Play (Lum vs Leftovers)
I think Leftovers are super good but TWave into 0 Lum Berries is even better. Having just enough Lum Berries to dissuade your opponent from blindly TWaving you is ideal, but then you still want that juicy Leftovers regen if it can be helped at all. From my derb experience I think a lot of people underrate either how fucked they are vs twave spam with full lefties, or how fucked they are with full unused lums vs an opposing team with actual items. Basically I think the correct way to play this meta is to maximize the number of leftovers you can squeeze in while still having enough Lum that your opponent can't just blindly TWave you without fearing losing a turn. SEA and SMB also had good tournaments going heavy on the Lefties (and I hardly ever ran Lum on anything non-lead as well), I think if you really watch a lot of games you start to realize just how important they are, but you can definitely overdo it - I had a really comfortable win in g2 of the final against SEA because her Lum usage was actual zero so I got to spam TW and get the upper hand on everything. So yeah put a lot of thought into your item picks and try to make sure that on the whole you're using enough Lums to deter opponents from yellowing your whole team with no repercussion, BUT ALSO, really try to get as many leftovers as you can manage without compromising your match ups against twavers
Roar and Cheese dynamics
I think Roar is slightly overrated now, it was good as a panic response to all the BPass devilry and fat rest cune stuff that took over shortly after boom ban, but things have stabilized and now these things have other answers (to the point that you don't really see people even trying to use these full commit setup mons anymore). However Roar falling out of favor like this probably means that there's room for that kind of cheesing to find its footing again, and I also want to play around with Wobbuffet just to make sure (you know how I feel about Shadow Tag as a whole) but that kind of stuff takes time and effort to lab out and I'm not overflowing with either
Zapdos
Zapdos runs the tier, viability of any other pokemon is strongly defined by how it matches up against it. It just randomly 2hkos huge swaths of the metagame, every time you try to run a new mon you look up the calcs against Zapdos and it fucking dies it's unusable. It gets a large variety of utility moves (TWave, Light Screen, Roar) too. There is no real reason not to use Zapdos. Leads that can't survive Zapdos (and especially Zapdos+Tauros) are not viable leads.
Tauros
Tauros outspeeds Zapdos and can almost kill it in one if it doesn't get Intimidated. This is good, as we just established. It also hits other pokemon like a truck and has Intimidate himself. Unlike Zapdos it generally needs a Choice Band (or a White Herb) to function which means no Lum which means TWave is a big threat to it, and enemy Intimidates also significantly neutralize it, so there are real weaknesses here; but it's still a highly warping force, and if your team doesn't pack the right answers you frequently get in positions where you just lose multiple entire mons to Tauros. Much like Zapdos, leads that can't survive Tauros are imo generally quite poor.
Metagross
Agility/Mash/EQ/Protect Metagross is a fucking menace; Clear Body means you cannot beat this with Intimidate and there's not much that can out-trade a Metagross without finding a slot for dedicated coverage, other than, of course, Zapdos (who resists both attacks and somehow casually 2hkos with tbolt in classic Zapdos fashion). Earthquake being as widespread as it is is also a bit rough for this pokemon. However on balance Metagross is still pretty absurd, you just need a turn to setup and then you completely invalidate anything that can't tank a Meteor Mash (which is quite a lot of things in a mid-lategame scenario), the good defensive counterplay options are just really few and far between so if you're not adequately prepared / positioned this pokemon will just run you over. Also you can probably sneak HPRock over Protect if you really want to make sure the Zapdos is taken care of
Celebi
Celebi resists Thunderbolt. It also has SpDef boosts from CM + artificial phys bulk from Intimidate support + good coverage options + ability to cheat on Lum because of NatCure + healing from Giga Drain. But really it's mostly the Thunderbolt resist thing tbh
Aerodactyl
Goes fast and hits hard, susceptible to Intimidates but all the intimidates are Rock weak and the only one that isn't (Tauros) doesn't run coverage to really hit this. You know who else is Rock weak? Zapdos, hence Aerodactyl is good. White Herb + Sub sets might be underrated, as they really punish a lot of typical defensive counterplay attempts, but I'm unconvinced that this does enough damage without a CB even still
Arcanine
An interesting Intimidate with a lot of neat options - strong fire moves are useful into many of the top threats, Charm and Helping Hand are moves and you can tech random stuff like ESpeed or Toxic or HP Electric or whatever. For the most part though it switches in for Intimidate and scares a few select mons out with STAB and then switches out or dies, which is perfectly fine as this tier doesn't have better pivots than this
Raikou
Hits almost as hard as Zapdos, is faster than Zapdos (and also Tauros), has basically the same movepool as Zapdos plus also Calm Mind, and it switches into Zapdos Thunderbolt without dying in two. Sadly being EQ weak as opposed to EQ immune is a really big deal, but electrics don't really have good counterplay, so stacking them is perfectly valid especially vs opponents that don't go out of their way to get good MUs against these guys
Suicune
After boom ban this guy looked like the terminator but the meta has adapted to be more offensive and now it really doesn't have many turns to be clicking cm a million times; and its damage off the bat is just not that scary unless it does get the infinite calm minds. Still rather annoying and you can easily lose games to it, but it's hard to provide this with all the support it would want (screens, lightningrod, intimidates) the builds feel really awkard and if this mon isn't running away with 2-3 CMs then it really struggles to do anything too scary
Regice
Extremely positive MU vs Zapdos and super hard to switch into with Ice+TBolt (or even Ice+HPGrass) plus either IcyWind or TWave, this guy can be annoying to almost anything in the game. Lower PhysDef and weaknesses to Rock and Steel really hurt it but if you find positioning, it will be hard for opp to send in the mons that can hit this. Regice+Arcanine I've found to be a really nice combo as Arcanine can switch safely into MMash and burn Metagross to a crisp, and Intimidate obviously allows Regice to be more of an asshole into Tauros and various assorted Rock attackers
--- the next mons have clear niches but also clear issues that prevent them from being all that splashable ---
Swampert As people are incentivized to HPIce on their electrics to hit Celebi (and Salamence I guess), Swampert carves itself a pretty sick niche as a rare Zapdos switchin. EQ IcyWind and a bunch of interesting coverage moves that you can tech depending on your team
Regirock Rock+Superpower+TWave and Clear Body make this quite an annoying trading machine, but the existence of Lum Berries and overall base slowness means it's susceptible to dying without doing anything in more situations than I'd like
Starmie Very nice pokemon on paper but Electrics run the tier and this guy drops in one hit. Light Screen or LRod support can mitigate that effect and you can navigate an early game and spread TWaves quite advantageously sometimes, especially vs people who cheat on their Lum Berry quotas
Gyarados Very nice pokemon on paper but Electrics run the tier and this guy drops in one hit. Getting chain intimidated also makes the game hard to play. But can be useful as the threat of DD is quite forcing - your opponent will almost always stop it but they will sacrifice tempo and positioning to get there. Haven't tried TWave support sets much, they might be good
Snorlax In theory trades positive with Zapdos, in practice one Intimidate and this guy needs to switch out. It's also obviously slow as sin. Annoying bastard to actually take down but you can kind of just ignore it and kill the other slot as long as you can keep this guy at -1 attack. Honestly want to put this lower, it forces the intimidate to come through but once it's at -1 it's so deadweight
Salamence An unfortunate side effect of Celebi being good is that electrics now have random HP Ices and this mon has to fear the random oneshot any time it pivots in. Suicune also always has Ice Beam and everyone is running Rock attackers and so on. Strong mon on paper but everything is quite unfriendly to it, still can find its spaces occasionally as it's 1. intimidate 2. ground immune 3. not quad weak to tbolt like gyarados
Marowak EQ is a busted move and LRod enables you to do things that would otherwise be illegal with the water types that you'd really want to use (Starmie etc) but this mon is a bit frail and quite slow and it doesn't really hit particularly crazy etc etc
--- the t3 mons i think are generally kinda bad but they're fine as one-offs in teams built to their strengths ---
Tyranitar Look this mon is OK or whatever but it's slow and weak to EQ and weak to everything and it doesn't hit very hard and it can DDance but then you get intimidated once and you're back to not really dealing that much damage. Sand chip is good if you make a team that largely doesn't take sand chip and I reckon that's the main draw to TTar nowadays
Blissey Ignores Zapdos and TWaves it. Tauros has a hard time harding into it also because of TWave. Surprisingly fat even against physical hitters. No offensive presence outside of TWave (CM seems a bit bad to me but maybe it's ok)
Flygon EQ + EQ immune + the evil men who try to snipe your swampert with hp grass now don't have HP ice and are walled by this instead. Decent guy
Kingdra and Ludicolo rain is playable i guess
Heracross mon is strong but playing into a meta of flying type intimidaters is pretty miserable. and also zapdos. but sometimes megahorn just hits so hard it transcends type match ups and intimidates and everything else
Jolteon for when zapdos and raikou are not enough electrics (you can genuinely run all three and still have a solid team) charm is a cool move too
Registeel is hard to kill and clicks twave but like why not just blissey most of the time
Gengar can switch into tauros's default clicks safely which is quite neat, and is fast and has bolt+icepunch type stuff to hit into stuff. willowisp is kind of a pain to switch into as well sometimes. just kind of hard to make use of him unless you get to cheat out a free turn on an enemy tauros as the starting point
Moltres is a fire type (strong vs metagross celebi and so on) that isn't weak to EQ. sadly it is instead weak to tbolt and it doesn't have intimidate, so overall you'd usually rather run arcanine and deal with the eqs, but like maybe sometimes moltres exists and is fine
Dewgong and Mr. Mime have good utility moves but often struggle with Doing Anything, don't really rate them but they're fun on paper at least
i either havent tried or dont believe in anything that isnt on this list
Zapdos runs the tier, viability of any other pokemon is strongly defined by how it matches up against it. It just randomly 2hkos huge swaths of the metagame, every time you try to run a new mon you look up the calcs against Zapdos and it fucking dies it's unusable. It gets a large variety of utility moves (TWave, Light Screen, Roar) too. There is no real reason not to use Zapdos. Leads that can't survive Zapdos (and especially Zapdos+Tauros) are not viable leads.
Tauros
Tauros outspeeds Zapdos and can almost kill it in one if it doesn't get Intimidated. This is good, as we just established. It also hits other pokemon like a truck and has Intimidate himself. Unlike Zapdos it generally needs a Choice Band (or a White Herb) to function which means no Lum which means TWave is a big threat to it, and enemy Intimidates also significantly neutralize it, so there are real weaknesses here; but it's still a highly warping force, and if your team doesn't pack the right answers you frequently get in positions where you just lose multiple entire mons to Tauros. Much like Zapdos, leads that can't survive Tauros are imo generally quite poor.
Metagross
Agility/Mash/EQ/Protect Metagross is a fucking menace; Clear Body means you cannot beat this with Intimidate and there's not much that can out-trade a Metagross without finding a slot for dedicated coverage, other than, of course, Zapdos (who resists both attacks and somehow casually 2hkos with tbolt in classic Zapdos fashion). Earthquake being as widespread as it is is also a bit rough for this pokemon. However on balance Metagross is still pretty absurd, you just need a turn to setup and then you completely invalidate anything that can't tank a Meteor Mash (which is quite a lot of things in a mid-lategame scenario), the good defensive counterplay options are just really few and far between so if you're not adequately prepared / positioned this pokemon will just run you over. Also you can probably sneak HPRock over Protect if you really want to make sure the Zapdos is taken care of
Celebi
Celebi resists Thunderbolt. It also has SpDef boosts from CM + artificial phys bulk from Intimidate support + good coverage options + ability to cheat on Lum because of NatCure + healing from Giga Drain. But really it's mostly the Thunderbolt resist thing tbh
Aerodactyl
Goes fast and hits hard, susceptible to Intimidates but all the intimidates are Rock weak and the only one that isn't (Tauros) doesn't run coverage to really hit this. You know who else is Rock weak? Zapdos, hence Aerodactyl is good. White Herb + Sub sets might be underrated, as they really punish a lot of typical defensive counterplay attempts, but I'm unconvinced that this does enough damage without a CB even still
Arcanine
An interesting Intimidate with a lot of neat options - strong fire moves are useful into many of the top threats, Charm and Helping Hand are moves and you can tech random stuff like ESpeed or Toxic or HP Electric or whatever. For the most part though it switches in for Intimidate and scares a few select mons out with STAB and then switches out or dies, which is perfectly fine as this tier doesn't have better pivots than this
Raikou
Hits almost as hard as Zapdos, is faster than Zapdos (and also Tauros), has basically the same movepool as Zapdos plus also Calm Mind, and it switches into Zapdos Thunderbolt without dying in two. Sadly being EQ weak as opposed to EQ immune is a really big deal, but electrics don't really have good counterplay, so stacking them is perfectly valid especially vs opponents that don't go out of their way to get good MUs against these guys
Suicune
After boom ban this guy looked like the terminator but the meta has adapted to be more offensive and now it really doesn't have many turns to be clicking cm a million times; and its damage off the bat is just not that scary unless it does get the infinite calm minds. Still rather annoying and you can easily lose games to it, but it's hard to provide this with all the support it would want (screens, lightningrod, intimidates) the builds feel really awkard and if this mon isn't running away with 2-3 CMs then it really struggles to do anything too scary
Regice
Extremely positive MU vs Zapdos and super hard to switch into with Ice+TBolt (or even Ice+HPGrass) plus either IcyWind or TWave, this guy can be annoying to almost anything in the game. Lower PhysDef and weaknesses to Rock and Steel really hurt it but if you find positioning, it will be hard for opp to send in the mons that can hit this. Regice+Arcanine I've found to be a really nice combo as Arcanine can switch safely into MMash and burn Metagross to a crisp, and Intimidate obviously allows Regice to be more of an asshole into Tauros and various assorted Rock attackers
--- the next mons have clear niches but also clear issues that prevent them from being all that splashable ---
Swampert As people are incentivized to HPIce on their electrics to hit Celebi (and Salamence I guess), Swampert carves itself a pretty sick niche as a rare Zapdos switchin. EQ IcyWind and a bunch of interesting coverage moves that you can tech depending on your team
Regirock Rock+Superpower+TWave and Clear Body make this quite an annoying trading machine, but the existence of Lum Berries and overall base slowness means it's susceptible to dying without doing anything in more situations than I'd like
Starmie Very nice pokemon on paper but Electrics run the tier and this guy drops in one hit. Light Screen or LRod support can mitigate that effect and you can navigate an early game and spread TWaves quite advantageously sometimes, especially vs people who cheat on their Lum Berry quotas
Gyarados Very nice pokemon on paper but Electrics run the tier and this guy drops in one hit. Getting chain intimidated also makes the game hard to play. But can be useful as the threat of DD is quite forcing - your opponent will almost always stop it but they will sacrifice tempo and positioning to get there. Haven't tried TWave support sets much, they might be good
Snorlax In theory trades positive with Zapdos, in practice one Intimidate and this guy needs to switch out. It's also obviously slow as sin. Annoying bastard to actually take down but you can kind of just ignore it and kill the other slot as long as you can keep this guy at -1 attack. Honestly want to put this lower, it forces the intimidate to come through but once it's at -1 it's so deadweight
Salamence An unfortunate side effect of Celebi being good is that electrics now have random HP Ices and this mon has to fear the random oneshot any time it pivots in. Suicune also always has Ice Beam and everyone is running Rock attackers and so on. Strong mon on paper but everything is quite unfriendly to it, still can find its spaces occasionally as it's 1. intimidate 2. ground immune 3. not quad weak to tbolt like gyarados
Marowak EQ is a busted move and LRod enables you to do things that would otherwise be illegal with the water types that you'd really want to use (Starmie etc) but this mon is a bit frail and quite slow and it doesn't really hit particularly crazy etc etc
--- the t3 mons i think are generally kinda bad but they're fine as one-offs in teams built to their strengths ---
Tyranitar Look this mon is OK or whatever but it's slow and weak to EQ and weak to everything and it doesn't hit very hard and it can DDance but then you get intimidated once and you're back to not really dealing that much damage. Sand chip is good if you make a team that largely doesn't take sand chip and I reckon that's the main draw to TTar nowadays
Blissey Ignores Zapdos and TWaves it. Tauros has a hard time harding into it also because of TWave. Surprisingly fat even against physical hitters. No offensive presence outside of TWave (CM seems a bit bad to me but maybe it's ok)
Flygon EQ + EQ immune + the evil men who try to snipe your swampert with hp grass now don't have HP ice and are walled by this instead. Decent guy
Kingdra and Ludicolo rain is playable i guess
Heracross mon is strong but playing into a meta of flying type intimidaters is pretty miserable. and also zapdos. but sometimes megahorn just hits so hard it transcends type match ups and intimidates and everything else
Jolteon for when zapdos and raikou are not enough electrics (you can genuinely run all three and still have a solid team) charm is a cool move too
Registeel is hard to kill and clicks twave but like why not just blissey most of the time
Gengar can switch into tauros's default clicks safely which is quite neat, and is fast and has bolt+icepunch type stuff to hit into stuff. willowisp is kind of a pain to switch into as well sometimes. just kind of hard to make use of him unless you get to cheat out a free turn on an enemy tauros as the starting point
Moltres is a fire type (strong vs metagross celebi and so on) that isn't weak to EQ. sadly it is instead weak to tbolt and it doesn't have intimidate, so overall you'd usually rather run arcanine and deal with the eqs, but like maybe sometimes moltres exists and is fine
Dewgong and Mr. Mime have good utility moves but often struggle with Doing Anything, don't really rate them but they're fun on paper at least
i either havent tried or dont believe in anything that isnt on this list
Additional thoughts:
Item Play (Lum vs Leftovers)
I think Leftovers are super good but TWave into 0 Lum Berries is even better. Having just enough Lum Berries to dissuade your opponent from blindly TWaving you is ideal, but then you still want that juicy Leftovers regen if it can be helped at all. From my derb experience I think a lot of people underrate either how fucked they are vs twave spam with full lefties, or how fucked they are with full unused lums vs an opposing team with actual items. Basically I think the correct way to play this meta is to maximize the number of leftovers you can squeeze in while still having enough Lum that your opponent can't just blindly TWave you without fearing losing a turn. SEA and SMB also had good tournaments going heavy on the Lefties (and I hardly ever ran Lum on anything non-lead as well), I think if you really watch a lot of games you start to realize just how important they are, but you can definitely overdo it - I had a really comfortable win in g2 of the final against SEA because her Lum usage was actual zero so I got to spam TW and get the upper hand on everything. So yeah put a lot of thought into your item picks and try to make sure that on the whole you're using enough Lums to deter opponents from yellowing your whole team with no repercussion, BUT ALSO, really try to get as many leftovers as you can manage without compromising your match ups against twavers
Roar and Cheese dynamics
I think Roar is slightly overrated now, it was good as a panic response to all the BPass devilry and fat rest cune stuff that took over shortly after boom ban, but things have stabilized and now these things have other answers (to the point that you don't really see people even trying to use these full commit setup mons anymore). However Roar falling out of favor like this probably means that there's room for that kind of cheesing to find its footing again, and I also want to play around with Wobbuffet just to make sure (you know how I feel about Shadow Tag as a whole) but that kind of stuff takes time and effort to lab out and I'm not overflowing with either
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Dumping my best teams from Derby, inviting Yoda2798 SEA SMB to do the same
As standard and balanced as it gets, the best and most threatening lead duo backed up by a solid flexible FWG and a fast revengekiller/lategame threat. A lot of options can be tweaked to your liking (Lum or TWave of HPIce Zapdos, more offensive phys pert, like 20 other options on Arcanine, different coverage on Bi, different Aero set)
Tyranitar PhysOff - sand chip + spam EQs. a lot of synergies with different physical attackers who all require slightly different counterplay and all benefit from sand chip to kill things while being immune to it. a lot of things can be tweaked (maybe lumgross, pert moves, ttar moves, zapdos hpgrass, even aero moves and maybe white herb)
Starmie + Tauros bait Tbolts and Twaves respectively, often setting up very advantageous positions with the ability to get the right screen up T1 + start twaving everything. Zapdos is mandatory, Metagross and Gyarados round things out nicely and make good use of screens but you can try a number of other mons in these two slots. Monoattacking IB Mie annoys Zapdos and packs a bit of surprise effect after you reveal the other moves, but Psychic or Pump might be saner options
Regice + Arcanine is a very nice lead combo, getting momentum on Zapdos while doggo scares out Metagross and intims Tauros so that Regice can hit freely on T1. And then I just added the four best mons in the back
Same lead duo as the above but with a more particular back 4. It's even more Zapdos hate + EQ spam. Enemy Zapdos loses to everything and enemy Celebi is targeted by multiple HP Bugs, so if the opp is relying on these to switch into EQs, they will have a hard time handling things. Use the Pert+Flygon duo to scout the Hidden Power appropriately
And another similar idea with EQ Spam + Zapdos hate, this time it's triple electrics dunking on it (and any other fliers who are trying to switch in). Celebi looks scary but is easily overloaded. Some sets might be a bit troll (Toxic Flygon never gets enough turns for the tox chip to matter, Peck Zapdos does no damage even to Celebi) but the team overall works
As standard and balanced as it gets, the best and most threatening lead duo backed up by a solid flexible FWG and a fast revengekiller/lategame threat. A lot of options can be tweaked to your liking (Lum or TWave of HPIce Zapdos, more offensive phys pert, like 20 other options on Arcanine, different coverage on Bi, different Aero set) Tyranitar PhysOff - sand chip + spam EQs. a lot of synergies with different physical attackers who all require slightly different counterplay and all benefit from sand chip to kill things while being immune to it. a lot of things can be tweaked (maybe lumgross, pert moves, ttar moves, zapdos hpgrass, even aero moves and maybe white herb) Starmie + Tauros bait Tbolts and Twaves respectively, often setting up very advantageous positions with the ability to get the right screen up T1 + start twaving everything. Zapdos is mandatory, Metagross and Gyarados round things out nicely and make good use of screens but you can try a number of other mons in these two slots. Monoattacking IB Mie annoys Zapdos and packs a bit of surprise effect after you reveal the other moves, but Psychic or Pump might be saner options Regice + Arcanine is a very nice lead combo, getting momentum on Zapdos while doggo scares out Metagross and intims Tauros so that Regice can hit freely on T1. And then I just added the four best mons in the back Same lead duo as the above but with a more particular back 4. It's even more Zapdos hate + EQ spam. Enemy Zapdos loses to everything and enemy Celebi is targeted by multiple HP Bugs, so if the opp is relying on these to switch into EQs, they will have a hard time handling things. Use the Pert+Flygon duo to scout the Hidden Power appropriately And another similar idea with EQ Spam + Zapdos hate, this time it's triple electrics dunking on it (and any other fliers who are trying to switch in). Celebi looks scary but is easily overloaded. Some sets might be a bit troll (Toxic Flygon never gets enough turns for the tox chip to matter, Peck Zapdos does no damage even to Celebi) but the team overall works
Sure, why not!
Here's some I'd like to highlight in particular:
Fun, pretty strong anti-offense team that is kinda all-in on Agimeta with some screens support. I was pretty upset about this game after the crits that happened here since I think the team is really neat, but that's just Pokemon. Haze on Articuno (and in general) is a really cool support move, it helps both with opposing setup threats but also helps clear your own Intimidate drops.
A team I actually brought 4 times total (4-0!), once as a Marowak variation. Thunder Wave is an exceedingly stupid move and Registeel is really good at clicking it. The bulked out Heracross is pretty cool too, there was an endgame vs SMB where I had my Heracross set up to eat both Kingdra Hydro Pump and Aerodactyl Ancient Power, but the AP crit and the Hydro missed so it didn't end up mattering.
More paraspam. Lead Regirock is extremely good vs basically everything except Starmie, spread paralysis and win with broken Suicune. Seismic Toss is on Snorlax and Regice for any lastmon cheese, something I was very conscious of trying to build around this tournament. The game this featured in showed Aerodactyl being a scam by failing to actually kill my Regice at like 75%.
More Regirock offense, this time utilizing Choice Band as a trade Pokemon rather than as a paralysis spreader. HP Rock Agility Metagross to help out more with opposing Zapdos is really the only super special thing to note here, but this showcases another way you can use Regirock effectively.
Probably my favorite team I built for the tournament. Somewhere along the lines I changed the Arcanine to HP Grass, but it didn't save on smogtours and it cost me super badly in the game. It has a bunch of pretty cool techs, Heal Bell Celebi + Rest Suicune since I figured a lot of people were kinda just throwing Toxic on stuff like Arcanine to be like "Ok I beat Suicune now", and the HH lead to snipe Tauros turn 1. Heracross in particular is a really hard matchup for this team, so be careful.
Here's the rest of my teams I used, some of the later teams should have HP Grass but either the changes didn't go through, or I was lazy in copying my own sample sets oops
All in all, I think this meta is genuinely quite a bit worse than pre-boom ban. There's more dumb setup stuff (like we knew would happen), there's more Thunder Wave (like we knew would happen), and none of the actual issues this tier has are fixed (mostly RNG). Sure, games last longer than 9 turns now, but I wouldn't say that the better player wins more than before Explosion was banned. That being said, I still had a lot of fun playing this tour. Doubles as a format is so cool, and I wish I was a lot better at it! I would give my own metagame thoughts, but I think by the pastes you can tell that I think Aerodactyl is terrible and that I think Snorlax is really good LOL.
Here's some I'd like to highlight in particular:
Fun, pretty strong anti-offense team that is kinda all-in on Agimeta with some screens support. I was pretty upset about this game after the crits that happened here since I think the team is really neat, but that's just Pokemon. Haze on Articuno (and in general) is a really cool support move, it helps both with opposing setup threats but also helps clear your own Intimidate drops. A team I actually brought 4 times total (4-0!), once as a Marowak variation. Thunder Wave is an exceedingly stupid move and Registeel is really good at clicking it. The bulked out Heracross is pretty cool too, there was an endgame vs SMB where I had my Heracross set up to eat both Kingdra Hydro Pump and Aerodactyl Ancient Power, but the AP crit and the Hydro missed so it didn't end up mattering. More paraspam. Lead Regirock is extremely good vs basically everything except Starmie, spread paralysis and win with broken Suicune. Seismic Toss is on Snorlax and Regice for any lastmon cheese, something I was very conscious of trying to build around this tournament. The game this featured in showed Aerodactyl being a scam by failing to actually kill my Regice at like 75%. More Regirock offense, this time utilizing Choice Band as a trade Pokemon rather than as a paralysis spreader. HP Rock Agility Metagross to help out more with opposing Zapdos is really the only super special thing to note here, but this showcases another way you can use Regirock effectively. Probably my favorite team I built for the tournament. Somewhere along the lines I changed the Arcanine to HP Grass, but it didn't save on smogtours and it cost me super badly in the game. It has a bunch of pretty cool techs, Heal Bell Celebi + Rest Suicune since I figured a lot of people were kinda just throwing Toxic on stuff like Arcanine to be like "Ok I beat Suicune now", and the HH lead to snipe Tauros turn 1. Heracross in particular is a really hard matchup for this team, so be careful. Here's the rest of my teams I used, some of the later teams should have HP Grass but either the changes didn't go through, or I was lazy in copying my own sample sets oops
All in all, I think this meta is genuinely quite a bit worse than pre-boom ban. There's more dumb setup stuff (like we knew would happen), there's more Thunder Wave (like we knew would happen), and none of the actual issues this tier has are fixed (mostly RNG). Sure, games last longer than 9 turns now, but I wouldn't say that the better player wins more than before Explosion was banned. That being said, I still had a lot of fun playing this tour. Doubles as a format is so cool, and I wish I was a lot better at it! I would give my own metagame thoughts, but I think by the pastes you can tell that I think Aerodactyl is terrible and that I think Snorlax is really good LOL.
Here are all the teams I used in Derby III, and my thoughts behind them. I had very limited experience in the tier beforehand, so I mostly started from SmogDex sets or copying from other teams and then editing from there based on what I thought. I also compiled two sets of usage from 2024 (see below) from before and after the boom ban to help estimate what I would see and look for inspiration. If you want to see usage from this Derby I compiled that here.
On the point of Dex sets, they could use some updating, like Zapdos has no mention of a bulky spread which is a big one, the Aerodactyl set is outdated (max Speed and no HP Rock which drops Speed is important for the tie), to some smaller things like Swampert not mentioning Icy Wind at all. One that's slightly more personal preference but I personally think is just clearly better is Fire Blast on Arcanine instead of Overheat, which between the two Dex spreads (which has a very defensive Metagross) isn't even a guaranteed OHKO by the way which is especially weird. The drawback of Overheat is pretty bad, and even with White Herb it's very easy for that to just get wasted on Intimidate. Charcoal Fire Blast does only marginally less but is much better, and the 5% accuracy difference effectively cancels out with the 10% Burn chance. Not to say that I necessarily think Charcoal is the best item, Leftovers and Lum Berry are both strong, but just that apples to apples I think Fire Blast is better, and if you're using a non-offensive item then I think Fire Blast is probably even better.
I can't weigh in on any pre- vs post-boom ban debate but I enjoyed my time with the tier, and best-of-3 was manageable enough to prepare for even without much history in the tier (though as mentioned above the Dex sets could use some updating, and the sample teams were to be frank not super useful when teammates would use them for testing). I would struggle to do a proper VR as my thoughts aren't completely solidified, but I agree Zapdos is by far the best Pokemon in the tier, then the next best Pokemon are like Celebi, Aerodactyl, Tauros, Arcanine, and Metagross in some order, while Swampert, Snorlax (though maybe I'm just not on SEA's level), Raikou, Suicune, Marowak, Regice and perhaps a couple other things are a bit below in being good but more team-specific than the previous tier. I don't have a ton of experience to draw from so more niche stuff I'm less sure on, like Salamence seemed like it should be better to me but has always felt awkward when I've tried it. I do however feel pretty strongly that Gyarados is bad, and Gengar is annoying for Tauros/Snorlax but otherwise also bad now post-boom.
Week 1 Game 1 vs SMB
Week 1 Game 2 vs SMB, Week 1 Game 3 vs SMB
Week 2 Game 1 vs Grandmas Cookin
Week 2 Game 2 vs Grandmas Cookin
Week 3 Game 1 vs Amaranth
Week 3 Game 2 vs Amaranth
Week 4 Game 1 vs NinjaSnapple
Week 4 Game 2 vs NinjaSnapple
Week 5 Game 1 vs SEA
Week 5 Game 2 vs SEA
Massive shoutouts to GenOne and Schister for support (and the rest of the team), also NinjaSnapple for helping teach me the tier and being someone to test with and bounce ideas off.
On the point of Dex sets, they could use some updating, like Zapdos has no mention of a bulky spread which is a big one, the Aerodactyl set is outdated (max Speed and no HP Rock which drops Speed is important for the tie), to some smaller things like Swampert not mentioning Icy Wind at all. One that's slightly more personal preference but I personally think is just clearly better is Fire Blast on Arcanine instead of Overheat, which between the two Dex spreads (which has a very defensive Metagross) isn't even a guaranteed OHKO by the way which is especially weird. The drawback of Overheat is pretty bad, and even with White Herb it's very easy for that to just get wasted on Intimidate. Charcoal Fire Blast does only marginally less but is much better, and the 5% accuracy difference effectively cancels out with the 10% Burn chance. Not to say that I necessarily think Charcoal is the best item, Leftovers and Lum Berry are both strong, but just that apples to apples I think Fire Blast is better, and if you're using a non-offensive item then I think Fire Blast is probably even better.
I can't weigh in on any pre- vs post-boom ban debate but I enjoyed my time with the tier, and best-of-3 was manageable enough to prepare for even without much history in the tier (though as mentioned above the Dex sets could use some updating, and the sample teams were to be frank not super useful when teammates would use them for testing). I would struggle to do a proper VR as my thoughts aren't completely solidified, but I agree Zapdos is by far the best Pokemon in the tier, then the next best Pokemon are like Celebi, Aerodactyl, Tauros, Arcanine, and Metagross in some order, while Swampert, Snorlax (though maybe I'm just not on SEA's level), Raikou, Suicune, Marowak, Regice and perhaps a couple other things are a bit below in being good but more team-specific than the previous tier. I don't have a ton of experience to draw from so more niche stuff I'm less sure on, like Salamence seemed like it should be better to me but has always felt awkward when I've tried it. I do however feel pretty strongly that Gyarados is bad, and Gengar is annoying for Tauros/Snorlax but otherwise also bad now post-boom.
Includes Doubles Derby II, ADVPL IV, and ADV Swiss Top Cut
2024 Pre-Boom Ban Cumulative Usage
Moves and Teammates | Combos
Moves and Teammates | Combos
Code:
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| Rank | Pokemon | Use | Usage % | Win % |
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| 1 | Metagross | 296 | 71.50% | 48.65% |
| 2 | Zapdos | 294 | 71.01% | 49.49% |
| 3 | Gengar | 252 | 60.87% | 44.44% |
| 4 | Snorlax | 165 | 39.86% | 53.03% |
| 5 | Tyranitar | 115 | 27.78% | 42.17% |
| 6 | Tauros | 114 | 27.54% | 49.56% |
| 7 | Celebi | 106 | 25.60% | 55.19% |
| 7 | Swampert | 106 | 25.60% | 42.45% |
| 9 | Aerodactyl | 97 | 23.43% | 56.70% |
| 10 | Starmie | 96 | 23.19% | 47.92% |
| 11 | Arcanine | 87 | 21.01% | 47.13% |
| 12 | Marowak | 76 | 18.36% | 43.42% |
| 13 | Raikou | 72 | 17.39% | 47.22% |
| 13 | Gyarados | 72 | 17.39% | 43.06% |
| 15 | Suicune | 33 | 7.97% | 56.06% |
| 15 | Kingdra | 33 | 7.97% | 39.39% |
| 17 | Registeel | 24 | 5.80% | 45.83% |
| 18 | Moltres | 22 | 5.31% | 34.09% |
| 19 | Sceptile | 20 | 4.83% | 60.00% |
| 19 | Blissey | 20 | 4.83% | 40.00% |
| 21 | Exeggutor | 19 | 4.59% | 47.37% |
| 22 | Kangaskhan | 18 | 4.35% | 38.89% |
| 23 | Heracross | 15 | 3.62% | 50.00% |
| 24 | Ludicolo | 14 | 3.38% | 42.86% |
| 25 | Regirock | 13 | 3.14% | 69.23% |
| 25 | Alakazam | 13 | 3.14% | 69.23% |
| 27 | Shiftry | 12 | 2.90% | 50.00% |
| 27 | Steelix | 12 | 2.90% | 33.33% |
| 27 | Machamp | 12 | 2.90% | 25.00% |
| 30 | Salamence | 11 | 2.66% | 54.55% |
| 30 | Charizard | 11 | 2.66% | 36.36% |
| 32 | Jolteon | 10 | 2.42% | 50.00% |
| 33 | Dewgong | 7 | 1.69% | 71.43% |
| 33 | Magmar | 7 | 1.69% | 57.14% |
| 33 | Regice | 7 | 1.69% | 42.86% |
| 36 | Mr. Mime | 6 | 1.45% | 16.67% |
| 36 | Dugtrio | 6 | 1.45% | 16.67% |
| 36 | Hariyama | 6 | 1.45% | 16.67% |
| 39 | Dusclops | 4 | 0.97% | 25.00% |
| 39 | Medicham | 4 | 0.97% | 0.00% |
| 41 | Houndoom | 3 | 0.72% | 66.67% |
| 41 | Jirachi | 3 | 0.72% | 66.67% |
| 43 | Electrode | 2 | 0.48% | 100.00% |
| 43 | Omastar | 2 | 0.48% | 50.00% |
| 43 | Wobbuffet | 2 | 0.48% | 50.00% |
| 43 | Breloom | 2 | 0.48% | 50.00% |
| 43 | Politoed | 2 | 0.48% | 50.00% |
| 48 | Slaking | 1 | 0.24% | 100.00% |
| 48 | Porygon2 | 1 | 0.24% | 100.00% |
| 48 | Lanturn | 1 | 0.24% | 100.00% |
| 48 | Gorebyss | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Cacturne | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Hitmontop | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Typhlosion | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Jynx | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Flygon | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Gligar | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Linoone | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Nidoqueen | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Claydol | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Sneasel | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Venusaur | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |
| 48 | Skarmory | 1 | 0.24% | 0.00% |Includes 2024 Doubles OldGens Invitationals and Doubles Vintage Top Cut
2024 Post-Boom Ban Cumulative Usage
Moves and Teammates | Combos
Moves and Teammates | Combos
Code:
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| Rank | Pokemon | Use | Usage % | Win % |
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| 1 | Zapdos | 54 | 79.41% | 51.85% |
| 2 | Metagross | 41 | 60.29% | 41.46% |
| 3 | Tauros | 29 | 42.65% | 55.17% |
| 3 | Aerodactyl | 29 | 42.65% | 51.72% |
| 5 | Celebi | 27 | 39.71% | 62.96% |
| 5 | Swampert | 27 | 39.71% | 44.44% |
| 7 | Gyarados | 26 | 38.24% | 57.69% |
| 8 | Tyranitar | 25 | 36.76% | 40.00% |
| 9 | Marowak | 23 | 33.82% | 52.17% |
| 10 | Arcanine | 22 | 32.35% | 59.09% |
| 11 | Gengar | 14 | 20.59% | 7.14% |
| 12 | Starmie | 11 | 16.18% | 9.09% |
| 13 | Suicune | 10 | 14.71% | 70.00% |
| 14 | Salamence | 8 | 11.76% | 75.00% |
| 14 | Raikou | 8 | 11.76% | 25.00% |
| 16 | Snorlax | 5 | 7.35% | 20.00% |
| 17 | Ludicolo | 4 | 5.88% | 75.00% |
| 17 | Blissey | 4 | 5.88% | 75.00% |
| 19 | Kingdra | 3 | 4.41% | 66.67% |
| 20 | Heracross | 2 | 2.94% | 50.00% |
| 20 | Breloom | 2 | 2.94% | 50.00% |
| 20 | Moltres | 2 | 2.94% | 0.00% |
| 23 | Regice | 1 | 1.47% | 100.00% |
| 23 | Dewgong | 1 | 1.47% | 100.00% |
| 23 | Magmar | 1 | 1.47% | 100.00% |
| 23 | Hariyama | 1 | 1.47% | 100.00% |
| 23 | Kangaskhan | 1 | 1.47% | 100.00% |
| 23 | Jolteon | 1 | 1.47% | 100.00% |
| 23 | Registeel | 1 | 1.47% | 0.00% |
| 23 | Mr. Mime | 1 | 1.47% | 0.00% |
| 23 | Skarmory | 1 | 1.47% | 0.00% |
| 23 | Ninjask | 1 | 1.47% | 0.00% |
| 23 | Clefable | 1 | 1.47% | 0.00% |
| 23 | Togetic | 1 | 1.47% | 0.00% |
| 23 | Flygon | 1 | 1.47% | 0.00% |Week 1 Game 1 vs SMB
From the start I went for what I viewed as the most solid Pokemon overall based on a combination of the VR/posts in the thread, 2024 usage, and my own intuition, which was that I seen all three of Zapdos/Celebi/Aerodactyl as a must, Tauros as the best lead (at least other than Zapdos) and generally one of the best Pokemon, and then Arcanine as the best Intimidate (Tauros technically kind of is but often leads and dies early so doesn't fully count) and Celebi/Metagross check. Swampert is the Pokemon my opinion has dropped the most on from here, but I usually ended up with it to fill out teams due to completing a nice FWG core, with it being a secondary Thunderbolt resist (even if weak to HP Grass), positive into Metagross and to a lesser extent Arcanine for Celebi, and generally decent into all the physical attackers of the tier.
Set-wise you'll be seeing a lot of repetition between teams with minor tweaks, but I'll try to explain anything new as I go, which will be a lot for this first team. For Speed, I originally used Jolly Metagross as the benchmark for Zapdos/Celebi/Arcanine, but in an early test game I rain into Rain which was kind of annoying so I decided to up to outspeeding Modest Kingdra, which also meant a nice amount of creep on the previous benchmark I assumed most people would be going off (I then made the Speeds slightly different to avoid ties, I did not put any time into optimising which of the three you want to be faster but given KOs are immediately replaced it was something on my radar I never got around to). Swampert Speed is just creep for the mirror if you're wondering.
The rest of the Zapdos spread is some random one I grabbed from another team because I wanted bulky and couldn't come up with anything, and I had quickly identified people don't actually click Thunder Wave much because Lum Berry is assumed so decided to go for Magnet instead (unsure if there's anything specific that picks up but it helps a bit). I don't love the other third move options on Zapdos, so with HP Grass I'm a big fan of Roar because otherwise you're just complete bait for Celebi (which can also absorb Thunder Wave). I was overall expecting to see more Swampert throughout the tour based on previous usage, and though I didn't end up using it before the end of the tour I was increasingly liking the idea of HP Ice with Thunder Wave if you feel comfortable into Swampert or that you won't see it.
For Celebi I think the first 3 moves are pretty standard, though what surprised me was I had debated on Recover vs Protect before deciding Protect was better, and despite there being a good amount of Recover usage previously it seemed everybody else also went with Protect this tour. Protect is a super important move in this generation with all the immediate replacements after fainting meaning doubling into a slot and taking 2 KOs is possible, but also I think it's especially big for setup as you can Protect on the strong Choice Band attacks (your biggest threat) you don't want to eat as you use your other slot to help deal with it. Meanwhile you still have recovery from Giga Drain and Leftovers, Recover is a bit win more where if you can safely click it you were probably in a good spot anyways. Spread wise I went for a different direction than other people, going for full physical bulk (after Speed), since like I said physical attackers are your biggest threat, so minimising the damage of an Aerodactyl HP Flying or Tauros Double Edge (which do a lot even with Intimidate) is massive. Meanwhile, Calm Mind still boosts your damage enough, Modest with investment can sometimes give 2HKOs you wouldn't otherwise get but I'm very much a believer in going defensive.
Arcanine I've already discussed its Speed and Fire Blast vs Overheat, my plan was to use Charcoal to begin with until I decided on a set I liked better. I'm not a big fan of options like Helping Hand or Extreme Speed, so I went with Roar again as my third move of choice to help deal with setup, in particular RestTalk Suicune. Based on previous usage this was the set I was expecting to see, so informed my choice of Roar over Toxic, but towards the end of the tour that changed and I now think Toxic is just better and best overall. Arcanine spread hits the below benchmark to live basically any one physical hit even without Intimidate, then hits the Speed benchmark mentioned earlier and dumps in Special Attack.
Set-wise you'll be seeing a lot of repetition between teams with minor tweaks, but I'll try to explain anything new as I go, which will be a lot for this first team. For Speed, I originally used Jolly Metagross as the benchmark for Zapdos/Celebi/Arcanine, but in an early test game I rain into Rain which was kind of annoying so I decided to up to outspeeding Modest Kingdra, which also meant a nice amount of creep on the previous benchmark I assumed most people would be going off (I then made the Speeds slightly different to avoid ties, I did not put any time into optimising which of the three you want to be faster but given KOs are immediately replaced it was something on my radar I never got around to). Swampert Speed is just creep for the mirror if you're wondering.
The rest of the Zapdos spread is some random one I grabbed from another team because I wanted bulky and couldn't come up with anything, and I had quickly identified people don't actually click Thunder Wave much because Lum Berry is assumed so decided to go for Magnet instead (unsure if there's anything specific that picks up but it helps a bit). I don't love the other third move options on Zapdos, so with HP Grass I'm a big fan of Roar because otherwise you're just complete bait for Celebi (which can also absorb Thunder Wave). I was overall expecting to see more Swampert throughout the tour based on previous usage, and though I didn't end up using it before the end of the tour I was increasingly liking the idea of HP Ice with Thunder Wave if you feel comfortable into Swampert or that you won't see it.
For Celebi I think the first 3 moves are pretty standard, though what surprised me was I had debated on Recover vs Protect before deciding Protect was better, and despite there being a good amount of Recover usage previously it seemed everybody else also went with Protect this tour. Protect is a super important move in this generation with all the immediate replacements after fainting meaning doubling into a slot and taking 2 KOs is possible, but also I think it's especially big for setup as you can Protect on the strong Choice Band attacks (your biggest threat) you don't want to eat as you use your other slot to help deal with it. Meanwhile you still have recovery from Giga Drain and Leftovers, Recover is a bit win more where if you can safely click it you were probably in a good spot anyways. Spread wise I went for a different direction than other people, going for full physical bulk (after Speed), since like I said physical attackers are your biggest threat, so minimising the damage of an Aerodactyl HP Flying or Tauros Double Edge (which do a lot even with Intimidate) is massive. Meanwhile, Calm Mind still boosts your damage enough, Modest with investment can sometimes give 2HKOs you wouldn't otherwise get but I'm very much a believer in going defensive.
Arcanine I've already discussed its Speed and Fire Blast vs Overheat, my plan was to use Charcoal to begin with until I decided on a set I liked better. I'm not a big fan of options like Helping Hand or Extreme Speed, so I went with Roar again as my third move of choice to help deal with setup, in particular RestTalk Suicune. Based on previous usage this was the set I was expecting to see, so informed my choice of Roar over Toxic, but towards the end of the tour that changed and I now think Toxic is just better and best overall. Arcanine spread hits the below benchmark to live basically any one physical hit even without Intimidate, then hits the Speed benchmark mentioned earlier and dumps in Special Attack.
Code:
252 Atk Choice Band Aerodactyl Hidden Power Rock vs. 240 HP / 84 Def Arcanine: 323-380 (84.7 - 99.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recoveryWeek 1 Game 2 vs SMB, Week 1 Game 3 vs SMB
Another very basic team but this has Choice Band Tyranitar which is something I had theorised early on. I had been trying bulky Dragon Dance, which the bulk is nice on but I think Dragon Dance as a move is just not very good in this meta, particularly because most of the time whatever uses it still loses Aerodactyl, but also because Intimidate is annoying (even with White Herb which is a nice option, though means no Lum Berry for Thunder Wave). So instead I came up with Choice Band, which keeps the great bulk Tyranitar has, but also forgoes the need for a setup turn to be a threat, and gets access to 4 attacks which is a lot better than just 2. HP Bug is obviously nice for Celebi, random HP Bug on a lot of things is pretty helpful if you can fit it, and it isn't one that drops Speed either which is nice. Non-Earthquake spread moves are pretty terrible in this gen due to the heavy spread reduction, but with Tyranitar's attack and Choice Band I decided Rock Slide was worth it as a nice spread option for flyers.
Week 2 Game 1 vs Grandmas Cookin
Speaking of Dragon Dance being bad, we have Agility Metagross which is effectively the same kind of thing but better! This deals with both my issues I had with Dragon Dance, as it is immune to Intimidate and after a boost outspeeds and threatens a KO on Aerodactyl (one of the very few ways to do so with the lack of speed control so that's very big). Up until this point I had tried Choice Band and Lum Berry sets on Metagross but not liked either, and thought it was just not that great a Pokemon anymore without boom, as it was fairly slow and 2HKOed by all the faster stuff (also Earthquake weakness is quite bad in this meta), but Agility really changed my view on it. Something I hadn't realised initially as well was just how annoying Metagross is for standard Celebi, there isn't much that walls it anywhere near as well.
In other news, I seen everybody using Leftovers Zapdos and so made the switch, it can very easily turn 2HKOs into 3HKOs and I didn't feel the loss of Magnet. Also, I made the switch from HP Ghost to HP Bug on Tauros, as my suspicions had been confirmed that nobody was really using Gengar after the boom ban as it kind of sucks. While Double Edge obviously does a lot to Celebi, the reasoning is that it makes it easier to play to an endgame where can you just knock out a healthy Celebi in one hit. Both of these changes are ones you'll see continue going forwards.
In other news, I seen everybody using Leftovers Zapdos and so made the switch, it can very easily turn 2HKOs into 3HKOs and I didn't feel the loss of Magnet. Also, I made the switch from HP Ghost to HP Bug on Tauros, as my suspicions had been confirmed that nobody was really using Gengar after the boom ban as it kind of sucks. While Double Edge obviously does a lot to Celebi, the reasoning is that it makes it easier to play to an endgame where can you just knock out a healthy Celebi in one hit. Both of these changes are ones you'll see continue going forwards.
Week 2 Game 2 vs Grandmas Cookin
At this point I was beginning to look into leads other than Tauros + Zapdos to have some variety, and eventually settled on Arcanine + Celebi as one I liked (notably not matching bad into the previous one, which I view as the gold standard you need to be able to deal with). Originally, however, it was a dual screens Celebi set with Psychic and Protect, but I felt this was too passive and gave up any threat Celebi had. Then came a brilliant suggestion from GenOne of combining screens with Calm Mind, so I settled on replacing Protect with Reflect (which makes sense since from my previous reasoning Protect is mostly to help against strong physical attacks anyways), making it flexible as both a lead that could do either and still a potent win condition if switched out for later.
The other new appearance on this team is Snorlax, who like Metagross I had kind of underrated a bit from overestimating its reliance on boom. Curse can struggle with Intimidate slowing it down, but defensively is a beast, especially with Reflect here to help shield it while setting up. The EV spread is just the dex one (a very fake spread) with a little Attack moved to Speed creep for the mirror (which is less worth it because of Curse but it's not a lot).
The other new appearance on this team is Snorlax, who like Metagross I had kind of underrated a bit from overestimating its reliance on boom. Curse can struggle with Intimidate slowing it down, but defensively is a beast, especially with Reflect here to help shield it while setting up. The EV spread is just the dex one (a very fake spread) with a little Attack moved to Speed creep for the mirror (which is less worth it because of Curse but it's not a lot).
Week 3 Game 1 vs Amaranth
With multiple teams to scout from a couple weeks of usage this is where I began preparing more against my particular opponent, in this case I seen that Amaranth used little Roar so decided to try and counter that with setup. I tried both this Registeel set and Curse, but the damage output on Curse is lame and I think this is better with Toxic meaning you don't have to click an attack 10 times to kill anything. No Protect isn't ideal, but I like having both stat boosting moves, you largely just need to worry about being crit. In addition to Toxic, I think Seismic Toss so you have an actual attack is important as well. The Registeel spread is 1 point faster than Swampert so as not to tie, and importantly means you can move before opposing Swampert does which is pretty useful. Since Registeel is hard walled by Gengar I did make Tauros HP Ghost on this particular team to help deal with that.
Week 3 Game 2 vs Amaranth
Going in a different setup direction this is the team where I finally used Suicune (+ Marowak), but not with the EVs you might expect. Up until this point I had largely viewed Suicune as a worse/secondary option to Celebi for Calm Mind, notably being far worse into opposing Celebi, and largely requiring Marowak (half a Pokemon with Lightning Rod) to handle Zapdos. What made me confident to finally use Suicune was the idea of going turbo fast to be faster than Zapdos and Celebi, as with their mutual weakness to Ice Beam, Suicune can flip the script and take them out before eating a hit. For the Speed I went for the usual benchmark of Kingdra but making sure not to tie my other Pokemon, hit the below benchmark and dumped into physical bulk.
For Marowak, its primary job is redirecting Thunderbolt, so I decided to go full special bulk, which notably makes Zapdos HP Grass/Ice a 3HKO rather than 2HKO, with a little Speed creep for the mirror. Marowak is so slow and has so much attack already that investment isn't helping much either, I do think special bulk is the way to go. I don't like the more common third move options on Marowak, since like I said it's not really great to focus on offensively and EdgeQuake coverage is good enough, so I settled on Icy Wind in the same vein as Swampert. With there being so little Speed control this gen Icy Wind is a strong option, slow Icy Wind has a particularly nice quality in this gen in that your partner can KO a slot, and Icy Wind serves as a catch-all to slow down whatever comes in, with -1 Speed swinging a lot of matchups in this meta. While I have the Speed on Suicune, Icy Wind also serves as a backup option to let Suicune outspeed any faster Zapdos or Celebi sets at -1.
The Arcanine EV spread also got tweaked at this point, with the same Speed but shifting EVs from bulk to Special Attack to hit the following benchmarks. I decided that I could probably safely assume I'm not facing the Dex spread for Metagross, so being confident I could OHKO was useful, and that living a hit from Aerodactyl when you can't really hit back anyways (though hitting a partner can still be nice) is less important than that.
Code:
+1 48 SpA Suicune Waterfall vs. 76 HP / 0 SpD 30 IVs Aerodactyl: 321-378 (100.3 - 118.1%) -- guaranteed OHKOFor Marowak, its primary job is redirecting Thunderbolt, so I decided to go full special bulk, which notably makes Zapdos HP Grass/Ice a 3HKO rather than 2HKO, with a little Speed creep for the mirror. Marowak is so slow and has so much attack already that investment isn't helping much either, I do think special bulk is the way to go. I don't like the more common third move options on Marowak, since like I said it's not really great to focus on offensively and EdgeQuake coverage is good enough, so I settled on Icy Wind in the same vein as Swampert. With there being so little Speed control this gen Icy Wind is a strong option, slow Icy Wind has a particularly nice quality in this gen in that your partner can KO a slot, and Icy Wind serves as a catch-all to slow down whatever comes in, with -1 Speed swinging a lot of matchups in this meta. While I have the Speed on Suicune, Icy Wind also serves as a backup option to let Suicune outspeed any faster Zapdos or Celebi sets at -1.
The Arcanine EV spread also got tweaked at this point, with the same Speed but shifting EVs from bulk to Special Attack to hit the following benchmarks. I decided that I could probably safely assume I'm not facing the Dex spread for Metagross, so being confident I could OHKO was useful, and that living a hit from Aerodactyl when you can't really hit back anyways (though hitting a partner can still be nice) is less important than that.
Code:
72+ SpA 30 IVs Charcoal Arcanine Fire Blast vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Metagross: 367-432 (100.8 - 118.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 Atk Choice Band Tauros Earthquake vs. 248 HP / 12 Def Arcanine: 324-382 (84.5 - 99.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKOWeek 4 Game 1 vs NinjaSnapple
Inspired by what I seen other people using, I finally tried out Raikou this week. Previously I had thought that I would rather just use Zapdos and not want to have both together, but I had come around on the fact you aren't losing too much by using both together. After all, they don't share any weaknesses and the few Electric-type resists are manageable. A notable thing I liked about Raikou was its viability as a lead, taking little from Zapdos and faster than Tauros, while also meaning you get to keep Zapdos healthy in the back for later without feeling like your lead suffers as a result. Set-wise, I had liked the route of Calm Mind Raikou with screens Celebi (possibly the opposite way around of what people would expect though that wasn't really the reason I used it). I did originally consider Protect Celebi, but again went the route of just throwing in Calm Mind to keep the option of that threat open. With dual screens typically you need Protect less anyways, and it was very much intended for screens first in this case to support Raikou and the rest of the team. Agility Metagross also appreciates screens, while pairing nicely with Raikou to deal with Aerodactyl.
Week 4 Game 2 vs NinjaSnapple
This week I had ended up busier than expected so hadn't fleshed out anything else new to feel comfortable using so decided to reuse my week 2 team vs Grandmas Cookin with my updated Arcanine set. I had also actually intended to change Snorlax to Immunity before playing but forgot (which would have helped during the game). Toxic is one of the few ways to reliably stop Snorlax, which Immunity entirely prevents, while Thick Fat is mostly a luxury. Arcanine Fire Blast or Regice Ice Beam goes from doing ~15% to still only ~30%, and the assumption of Thick Fat can even discourage going for moves affected by Thick Fat anyways.
Week 5 Game 1 vs SEA
SEA had a very interesting scout (from weeks 1-4 at least) to prepare for, with 100% Snorlax but no Curse or Protect revealed, lots of all three Regis but little Celebi and no Aerodactyl, and reverse engineering spreads from replays I discovered SEA used bulky Heracross and super Specially Defensive Zapdos which surprised me. There was also a lot of Thunder Wave usage in general, which spurred me to make the change from Leftovers to Lum Berry from for this week - I agree with Amaranth's point about getting the balance right between the two mattering a lot.
The high Snorlax and Regi usage also encouraged me to look at Fighting-types, eventually deciding on Heracross as I thought a fast Choice Band set should outrun any Zapdos/Arcanine/Celebi, taking advantage of the zero Aerodactly usage and limited Tauros usage which would outspeed it. Another Fighting-type I had prepared a team with was Hariyama (shoutouts to Schister for), but didn't reach game 3 which was when I'd have used it.
The Registeel Speed creeps standard Swampert then is max physical bulk. I liked double status, as Toxic was strong into the slow, bulky Pokemon such as Snorlax and the Regis that SEA was fond of using. The Arcanine spread is still the Charcoal one, but is now only a 50% roll on max HP Metagross instead of a guaranteed KO, if I had more time then I would have ideally came up with a different spread but I decided that one was still good enough.
The high Snorlax and Regi usage also encouraged me to look at Fighting-types, eventually deciding on Heracross as I thought a fast Choice Band set should outrun any Zapdos/Arcanine/Celebi, taking advantage of the zero Aerodactly usage and limited Tauros usage which would outspeed it. Another Fighting-type I had prepared a team with was Hariyama (shoutouts to Schister for), but didn't reach game 3 which was when I'd have used it.
The Registeel Speed creeps standard Swampert then is max physical bulk. I liked double status, as Toxic was strong into the slow, bulky Pokemon such as Snorlax and the Regis that SEA was fond of using. The Arcanine spread is still the Charcoal one, but is now only a 50% roll on max HP Metagross instead of a guaranteed KO, if I had more time then I would have ideally came up with a different spread but I decided that one was still good enough.
Week 5 Game 2 vs SEA
Another thing I noticed from SEA's usage was a lack of Roar or Toxic, which pointed me towards using setup, and I decided Curse Snorlax (notably being indifferent to the Thunder Wave usage mentioned earlier) was the route to go. I spent a lot of energy looking at more experimental options like the Fighting-type angle, so for this team I just ended up tweaking the one I used twice before in weeks 2 and 4. I mentioned wanting Immunity previously, but not expecting any Toxic from SEA's usage intentionally stuck to Thick Fat this time, and as with the other team used Lum Berry on Zapdos/Arcanine expecting Thunder Wave. On Swampert I decided Icy Wind was much less useful into the slow Pokemon SEA was fond of, so instead used Counter mainly for Snorlax, but also as an option against any other physical attackers like Heracross or Tauros too.
Massive shoutouts to GenOne and Schister for support (and the rest of the team), also NinjaSnapple for helping teach me the tier and being someone to test with and bounce ideas off.