Doubles XY Metagame Speculation (obviously spoilers)

[DoesntKnowHowToPlay]

Tested on-cart and found Mat Block does protect against Boomburst. I consider this a good thing personally because not being able to defend against your own Boombursts with Protect or Substitute makes the move sound really unappealing to me. Unfortunately it's kinda predictable since both Mat Block and Boomburst have narrow distribution, so I don't see it going too far.

At the same time though, breaking the ears of two of the opponent's mons and one of yours is technically a win I guess.

 

[Stratos]

sadly, serebii is probably wrong about boomburst :(

otherwise that'd be legit

 

[DoesntKnowHowToPlay]

Tested that too (I thought I heard it elsewhere on here) and yep, Protect blocks Boomburst (allied ones anyway but idk why that'd matter).

 

[Sir Lemongrab]

I'd like to bring up our leafy friend, Gogoat. Between Leech Seed, Milk Drink, and Horn Leech, along with Sap Sipper for Grass- type immunity, and the right EV investment, Gogoat can be quite the beast. Not only that, but it has access to Rock Slide, squashing Fire, Bug, and Flying- type Pokemon that might stand in its way. I predict its best partner would be something along the lines Florges - it's like that entire family was made to support Grass- type Pokemon. With access to new moves such as Flower Shield and Grassy Terrain, the Fairy also has a host of key supporting moves, such as Aromatherapy, Light Screen, and the ability to set up weather. Not to mention, Florges' ability prevents allied Grass- type Pokemon from having their stats reduced. Which is helpful, considering Florges has access to Grass- type moves itself, allowing it to boost Gogoat if needed. Man, is there anything this combination can't do? Well, yes. Both of them have a common weakness in Poison. Unfortunately with the advent of the new type, Poison- type attacks will be more common, putting a dent in this duo's plan. That being said, I have high hopes for the two.

 

[Arcticblast]

So I just stumbled upon this post in the research forum. For those who don't like links, a lot of old Pokémon in the Battle Maison have Subway sets, but any set that ran a Gem now has a different item.

We may be waiting a bit longer than two months for our favorite type gems, guys...

 

[BlankZero]

Serebii says that Boomburst isn't blocked by Protect. Is this true for other similar abilities such as Mat Block? Should be simple to test but I don't have the resources. Would make Boomburst pretty huge in doubles.

Sound based attacks are not blocked by Substitute anymore. Serebii has been known to get things wrong before though...

 

[BlankZero]

I'd like to bring up our leafy friend, Gogoat. Between Leech Seed, Milk Drink, and Horn Leech, along with Sap Sipper for Grass- type immunity, and the right EV investment, Gogoat can be quite the beast. Not only that, but it has access to Rock Slide, squashing Fire, Bug, and Flying- type Pokemon that might stand in its way. I predict its best partner would be something along the lines Florges - it's like that entire family was made to support Grass- type Pokemon. With access to new moves such as Flower Shield and Grassy Terrain, the Fairy also has a host of key supporting moves, such as Aromatherapy, Light Screen, and the ability to set up weather. Not to mention, Florges' ability prevents allied Grass- type Pokemon from having their stats reduced. Which is helpful, considering Florges has access to Grass- type moves itself, allowing it to boost Gogoat if needed. Man, is there anything this combination can't do? Well, yes. Both of them have a common weakness in Poison. Unfortunately with the advent of the new type, Poison- type attacks will be more common, putting a dent in this duo's plan. That being said, I have high hopes for the two.

I just wanted to comment that Specially Defensive GoGoat running a Bulk Up set becomes very monstrous very quickly. Think Ferrothorn levels of bulk, but with no 4x weakness and actually having a decent attacking option.

 

[Augustorm]

Mat Block Greninja + Speed Boost Blaziken w/swords dance?
I'm new and don't quite understand how to gauge a pokemon's viability, and the metagame hasn't really been established yet, but giving Blaziken a turn free from damage to use swords dance and get a speed boost stack seems outrageous.
Would probably encounter problems if the enemy sees it coming and has a pokemon ready with taunt/status moves (Mat Block can't stop anything that doesn't have a base power).

 

[tofucocoa]

the problem with that becomes how easily blaziken is dispatched and how relatively harmless it is even with a speed and attack boost. stuff like excadrill, kingdra and talonflame easily outspeed mega blaziken in their weathers and due to priority, as well as the fact that blaziken doesn't have any good spread moves like the aforementioned kingdra (muddy water) and excadrill (earthquake/rock slide) do. this makes it easy to play around with protect, fake out and follow me (though i can't imagine any FM users besides blastoise would like taking a megaken's flare blitz), all of which are staples in the meta. also, that one turn of not doing anything anti-trick room related would allow a trick room setup and by extension you have two worthless pokemon on your side. that's not even beginning to touch upon blaziken's general weakness to rain/sand/tailwind teams and how it can't touch cress. greninja on the other hand looks rather useful solely because of mat block, but i haven't tried it out so i can't pass judgement. welcome to smogdubz!

 

[BlankZero]

I kinda like Greninja, but he's definitely better in Singles. Protean is a pretty monster ability to have, even if his Movepool leaves a lot to be desired (like not getting Fake Out, Helping Hand, etc). He does have an awesome STAB UTurn though and gets access to Hyrdo Pump.

 

[Lord Alchemy]

Is Sky Drop still banned in the VGC format? It could be an interesting way to screw with opponents synergy by removing a supporter or attack from the equation for a turn.

 

[tofucocoa]

as far as we know, it isn't. unless of course another glitch pops up involving it...

edit after posting this in the wrong topic at like 3 in the morning:

so after a few hours of sleep depravity i dived into the wild, wild world of gen 6 GBU, which is for the most part the same as smogdubz at this point. a few things that piqued my interest (or just plain flattened me, 7 losses to account for that lol), were stuff like genchomp being basically a full stop to non-scarfed excadrill+ttar leads with dazzling gleam+eq (the new zapchomp?), mega scizor making up for the lack of steel gem quite nicely although bug bite would certainly have braked my stupid tree, mega banette imprisoning protects behind trick room to clear a path for a partner azumarill, manectric shifting gears to mega after my rotom-w goes down to weaken tyranitar to allow a partner gyara to get more dragon dances (i won this one because i crit, just goes to show that you should be satisfied with only one dragon dance), and i can confirm that mega kangaskhan has been amazing both on my side and my opponents'. i probably would write more but it's about 4 hours past my regular bedtime, 30 minutes of which can be attributed to some asshat with minimize clefable. of course, i was the one that initiated the timer stalling, but i just couldn't let the guy win on principal alone. i wouldn't be able to sleep at night if i let something like that get past me if i had anything to say about it -_-

(BV is XX6W-WWWW-WWW2-BSGW for those interested)

 

[ReddyGo]

Meowstic (M) @ Light Clay
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 32 Spd / 252 HP / 224 SDef
Timid Nature
- Trick Room
- Light Screen
- Reflect
- Imprison

Any thoughts on this thing? Obvious utility is completely stopping Trick Room as long as it stays alive, and also the ability to unTrick Room if I need it (as opposed to taunt users). The EVs allow me to always outspeed Klefki so I can stop it from laying it's own screens. I chose SpD for leftover EVs but either defense works. I started off running Mental Herb, but Taunt isn't really that common so I prefer more longevity on Screens.

 

[n3ther]

Meowstic (M) @ Light Clay
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 32 Spd / 252 HP / 224 SDef
Timid Nature
- Trick Room
- Light Screen
- Reflect
- Imprison

Any thoughts on this thing? Obvious utility is completely stopping Trick Room as long as it stays alive, and also the ability to unTrick Room if I need it (as opposed to taunt users). The EVs allow me to always outspeed Klefki so I can stop it from laying it's own screens. I chose SpD for leftover EVs but either defense works. I started off running Mental Herb, but Taunt isn't really that common so I prefer more longevity on Screens.

Meowstic (M) definitely has potential in doubles thanks to prankster dual screens and the excess amount of support moves he can learn. Are Klefkis really investing 252 evs into speed? You could choose a defensive nature but I guess the extra bulk from calm/bold nature won't make much of a difference. With your build you'll always survive Crunch from Tyranitar through reflect and Shadow Ball from mega Gengar most of the time without light screen.

 

[Kuhni]

Klefki will completely dominate the metagame with his Prankster Dual Screens, TWave spam and Foul Play for very good damage against certain targets. Having almost guaranteed 8 turns of double screens is pretty damn frightening, I wouldn't be surprised to see Brick Break go up in usage.

 

[Arcticblast]

Actually, it seems like Klefki is already starting to die out. Prankster Screens is great, sure, but Klefki doesn't offer anything else and (apparently) ends up being a waste of a teamslot; even when Klefki is on a team, its frailty means it's not too hard to break through even with the proper Screen up.

 

[Kuhni]

Actually, it seems like Klefki is already starting to die out. Prankster Screens is great, sure, but Klefki doesn't offer anything else and (apparently) ends up being a waste of a teamslot; even when Klefki is on a team, its frailty means it's not too hard to break through even with the proper Screen up.

It only has 2 weaknesses, has incredible bulk with screens up and can run around T-Waving everything after setting up screens.
It's not frail in the slightest, and and incredible asset to any team thanks to the support moves.

 

[Arcticblast]

Thing is, those two weaknesses - Ground and Fire - are very easily exploited with strong attackers like Talonflame, MegaZard-Y and the future Landorus-T, and Klefki is facing a 2HKO (or worse) from these Pokémon even through the proper Screen. Its lack of offensive presence means it can barely run attacking moves, leaving it open to Taunt. And it can't exactly just TWave everything - this isn't OU; Trick Room actually exists.

 

[TGL-00]

Klefki is much better at setting up screens that Meowstic in my experience, purely because of its typing giving it slightly more longevity in most battles (I've used Meowstic a few times in place of Klefki just see whether it fares any better since my current team in general has a few issues with Fire- and Ground-types and it seemed really hurt by the loss of a few resistances as their defensive stats are pretty similar). Meowstic seems to have more options available though - Fake Out, Helping Hand, Trick, Trick Room, Quick Guard, Psych Up, Role Play and Misty Terrain alongside everything Klefki gets bar SwagPlay, Spikes and Metal Sound. I think it's far too early in the metagame to write off either really - lots of things have easily exploited weaknesses after all and are perfectly viable.

Neither have great defences or offences though and are easily played around with Taunt and strong SE moves. They definitely won't dominate the metagame though for reasons already mentioned in the thread. Pokebank gives us better options as well for their current niches - Thundurus-I has Prankster T-wave, Taunt as well as some offensive presence, Cresselia has far better bulk, can set up screens and use T-wave, Trick Room or Icy Wind for speed control - so I wouldn't be surprised to see their usage really drop-off come December and forced into other roles (Metal Sound Klefki paired with a strong special attacker maybe?). I've been using Mental Herb Klefki and found it does, usually, do what it needs to do before dying/being forced out but when it can't just fire off T-waves because of TR/Electric-types etc, it's more of a liability once screens are set up and shouldn't be relied on as the only means of speed control.

 

[Darkflagrance]

I find Klefki's niche to be more swagplay + dragon immune/many things resist in doubles than speed control. Right now he's on my team with priority swagger acting like a ghetto protect, stopping special sweepers with spread moves from acting while my partner kills something. Then you can run screens or twave/safeguard in the other slots. It's a little haxy but it saves matches that would otherwise be lost. Mental Herb is likely to be Klefki's best items, especially if it also heals Encore (Please tell me it does?)

Still, when I convert over to Bank I'll probably switch to Thundurus for his better stats and lightning stab or Cressy if I decide I prefer a dual screener. Klefki can't compete with their eq immune.

 

[Manibogi]

I've been using Mega Abomasnow with a Trick Room team, and I gotta say, it's both pretty fun and surprisingly effective. I doubt this will be metagame changing, but it was nice to see that Mega Aboma works well in the enviroment it was designed around.
My best Kalosdex team, though, has to be my Rain team, which uses Malamar + Metronome Draco Meteor Kingdra. It's a bit gimmicky, sure, but it's really good considering the weather nerf, and it also works well outside of that gimmick.

 

[termi]

I find Klefki's niche to be more swagplay + dragon immune/many things resist in doubles than speed control. Right now he's on my team with priority swagger acting like a ghetto protect, stopping special sweepers with spread moves from acting while my partner kills something. Then you can run screens or twave/safeguard in the other slots. It's a little haxy but it saves matches that would otherwise be lost. Mental Herb is likely to be Klefki's best items, especially if it also heals Encore (Please tell me it does?)

Still, when I convert over to Bank I'll probably switch to Thundurus for his better stats and lightning stab or Cressy if I decide I prefer a dual screener. Klefki can't compete with their eq immune.

Swagplay is not a niche. Swagplay is not a strategy. Swagplay is not a thing.