Building Baton pass 101
by the guy who's posting this thread (why do we need these again?)
Approved by AM
Preword: I actually put work into this, as Baton pass takes more skill than you realize. you have to time your passes and avoid priority moves and status moves that can shut down a pass early. Mindgames are involved, especially when timing your passes and removing dangerous pokemon with trappers. It's dumb to say us baton pass players are brainless. Although i must admit it takes less work regardless than other playstyles.
Types of passingThere are 4 types of passing, with examples in parentheses
Quickpass (scolipede/ninjask/Celebi/scizor), Geopass (smeargle), Quiverpass (Venomoth), and Smashpass (gorebyss)
Baton Pass team Archetypes
The team archetypes are as follows, listed in cruise controllyness.
Dedicatedpass:
Consists of an entire team dedicated to a singular sweep, like Denisspass, where you have stuff like whimsicott, azelf and goth setting up a singular pass to usually an espeon. I find this method extremely matchup based, and you pretty much win/lose from team preview. It's the most cruise control of the methods. Carries a trapper and heavy suicide leads, such as cottonee tailwinding, mementoing, azelf screening and rocks, whimsicott tailwinding and mementoing again for smeargle or venomoth. You're pretty much only passing to an Espeon.
Multipass:
This consists of a pokemon, such as Gorebyss or Venomoth passing to multible recipients, each fitted to beating different types of teams. One Example is ABRpass, Quiverpassing to 3 different recipients, Lando I, Diancie and Keldeo. Usually these recipients have magic bounce, are immune to thunderwave, carry lum berry, and are resistant to that team's priority. Usually carriers a trapper to remove threats and a suicide lead. Make sure your receivers complement each other, i.e. keldeo to take on a team with weavile for dragonite, or diancie to take on a team with talonflame for keldeo.
Quickpass:
Not limited to just Scolipede, but is almost always the pokemon doing this, as it isn't as ass as ninjask and can do swordsdance/speed boost, is small condensed baton pass, found on hyper offense, where a scolipede swords dances, protects and then passes to something like mega metagross with wide coverage and bulk. the 4 other members of the team are not baton pass centric and generally do their own thing. This is not necessarily a lead. Scolipede is probably the best one for passing the strongest boosts, as SD and speed is incredibly lethal, but isn't necessarily the best for your team, as pokemon like Celebi and Scizor can contribute defensive synergy to your team. Lacks a trapper, might have a HO type suicide lead like LumSD Chomp.
Items to run on baton pass:
Often items are required to make sweeps work. Mental herb is popular on passers, protecting the user from taunts and the like. Other common items are anti-weakness berries, such as coba on Venomoth to tank flying moves from talonflame. On the recipients themselves, if not immune to thundurus's twave, should probably run lum to avoid being paralyzed and beaten. magic bouncers can just run lefties or w/e.
Good Baton Passers and how to use each
Smeargle:
Smeargle is weak, frail and slow. not exactly alluring traits in a baton passer. but what it does get is geopass and spore. it requires heavy support from stuff like Tailwind, Screens and Memento, although both memento and screens are not required at once. Trapper is practically required, and the baton pass teams this is on really shouldn't go without goth.
Venomoth:
Venomoth has a decent speed tier unlike most others, and has quiver dance and sleep powder. It also has tinted lens to take care of some threats to it with boosted quiver dance. It should probably run coba or charti berry to tank SE moves, and requires screens/memento. Trapper is nice.
Gorebyss:
This thing can actually threaten teams by itself thanks to Shell Smash and carrys Hydro Pump and Ice beam to dish out damage even before it passes. It is kindof frail, so stuff like screens and memento are appreciated. pokemon that can sit on grass and electric types are appreciated. stuff like Screens and a trapper doesn't hurt either.
Scolipede:
Scolipede has the benefit of being accumulate speed and attack/defense boosts simultaneously, and passively, allowing it to protect stall until it can outspeed faster pokemon. It likes screens to tank things like talonflame, and can actually kill some stuff with boosted moves like megahorn and earthquake. It can actually exist on it's own with minimal support on teams because of it's ability to boost behind protect. Hence the term "quickpass". That doesn't mean it doesn't need support, as something to tank/trap talonflame like tyrannitar are great teammates.
Celebi/Scizor:
These guys don't need much support other than their regular teammates. i.e. stuff like heatran and starmie respectively, as they fit into regular teams with ease. Celebi's Nastypass is very common, and Scizor's SD pass is less common, but still effective. They have value beyond baton passing and are arguably the best baton passers because of them, as their team has minimal reliance on them as a wincon, yet still remain a strong wincon. they like passing to scarfers as they can't give them any speed.
Good Baton pass Recipients
Espeon:
This pokemon is pretty much only seen on baton pass in OU, as is pretty hated. It takes advantages of passes from Scolipede, cm boosting with iron defense and speed, or simply wrecking shit with geopass from smeargle. Beyond magic bounce, it's best asset is stored power, ripping through even jirachi, a 4x resist. carries dazzling gleam for dark types. you can also run sub to beat movephasers like tankchomp with dragontail.
Diance-Mega:
Carrying magic bounce and a effective movepool that can hit from both sides of the spectrum, as well as being resistant to talonflame's powerful brave birds and Bisharp's sucker punches make it a great pokemon to baton pass too. recommended on multipass, as if the opponent carrys azumarill or scizor you should consider other options to pass too.
Keldeo:
A strong water type who resists Azumarill's aqua jets, Bisharp's sucker punches and Scizor's bullet punches, it often rolls with dual stabs, icy wind and hp electric for maximum coverage. don't pass to this when the opponent has a talonflame. Run a lum berry to avoid being crippled by Thundurus. likes geopass and quiver pass.
Landorus i:
It's power already considered borderline broken, it's not hard to see why this pokemon is a baton pass recipient. It's also immune to twave, and has a wide movepool to smack down all sorts of pokemon with Earth powers, Sludge waves, Focus blasts and hp ices. Even Azumarill can't OHKO this thing w/ a choice band. It's also strong enough to rip unaware clefable in half even without boosts.
Dragonite:
A strong smash or quickpass recipient, it's multiscale prevents it from easily being taken down by anything, and has a wide movepool to pull from to hit stuff. It should carry lum to get past thundurus. Recommended moveset: Dragon Claw, Fire punch, Earthquake and Iron tail (luck some fairies). Don't pass to this versus an ice sharder.
Mega Garchomp:
Stall already has enough trouble dealing with this thing at +2 in sand, why not give them more? 92 is a decent speed tier when boosted, and is immune to thunderwave. Did i mention it's titanic attack? it also has insane bulk and decent special attack if thats not good enough for you. Just getting this thing a speed boost makes it a threat, let alone an attack boost too. Appreciates quickpass and smashpass. No ice sharders again. It's bulk tanks every other type of priority tho.
Altaria-Mega:
Massive bulk, great defensive typing, access to heal bell, and pixilate boosted moves. It's most effective when receiving smashpass as it can use it's mixed stats to it's great advantage, and the spectrum it hits on can be flip flopped based on however the player feels. It makes up for it's weakness to thunder wave by having heal bell. It should be receiving smashpass to boost both attack stats, and hit with EQ and fireblast and w/e stab move of choice, or Quiver/Geopass with Hyper Voice, Fblast, and hp ground. overall a solid pokemon to pass to thanks to bulk and power.
Honorable Mentions:
Metagross-Mega:
A tough cookie with 4 attacks great coverage, it picks up quickpasses from Scolipede or better yet Smashpasses from Gorebyss no sweat, it's immense bulk making it already hard to kill, as well as it's power and base speed boosted to obscene levels. Is weak to thundy twave as it can't carry a lum berry. Resists Scizor and tflame, azumarill can't hit it hard enough and even Bisharp has trouble OHKOing. not recommended for dedicated baton passing since you'll autolose to anyteam with prankster twave, but it's good on teams that pass to more than one recipient.
Gardevoir-Mega:
A powerful nuke, with speed and more power it becomes (obviously) even better. it can blow apart teams with shoddy gardevoir checks. It is weak to thunderwave however, as well as bullet punch from scizor. It's also physically frail and even neutral priority can do serious damage. it's a good recipient, but it's just not there because of how physically frail it is combined with weakness to twave.
Baton Pass Support Pokemon:
Azelf:
Azelf Suicide leads no problem, setting up screens, stealth rocks and preventing opposing hazards, before occansionally ending it all in a fiery explosion. Practically a must on full or multipassing.
Whimsicott/Cottonee:
These pokemon enable sweeps, disabling pokemon with taunt, sleep or memento, giving a baton passer time to set up. They also lay down tailwinds, giving stuff like Smeargle the speed to spore faster pokemon that would end it's life. Often found (sometimes both) on Fullpassing.
Spawn of Satan Gothitelle:
A great support pokemon, practically unmatched in it's ability to kill/cripple threats to your baton pass team. it's found all kinds of heavier baton pass, although not always on singlepass.
Baton pass weaknesses
Press the X button, top right hand corner to rid yourself of the sight of your opponent's baton pass. works 100% of the time. In all seriousness pokemon who can phase, priority moves, perish song and haze especially. taunt can shut it down early on if the pokemon lacks a mental herb, and if they have a mental herb they can be OHKO'd.
Thats all i can recall about building baton pass atm, if I missed anything pm me.
by the guy who's posting this thread (why do we need these again?)
Approved by AM
Preword: I actually put work into this, as Baton pass takes more skill than you realize. you have to time your passes and avoid priority moves and status moves that can shut down a pass early. Mindgames are involved, especially when timing your passes and removing dangerous pokemon with trappers. It's dumb to say us baton pass players are brainless. Although i must admit it takes less work regardless than other playstyles.
Types of passingThere are 4 types of passing, with examples in parentheses
Quickpass (scolipede/ninjask/Celebi/scizor), Geopass (smeargle), Quiverpass (Venomoth), and Smashpass (gorebyss)
Baton Pass team Archetypes
The team archetypes are as follows, listed in cruise controllyness.
Dedicatedpass:
Consists of an entire team dedicated to a singular sweep, like Denisspass, where you have stuff like whimsicott, azelf and goth setting up a singular pass to usually an espeon. I find this method extremely matchup based, and you pretty much win/lose from team preview. It's the most cruise control of the methods. Carries a trapper and heavy suicide leads, such as cottonee tailwinding, mementoing, azelf screening and rocks, whimsicott tailwinding and mementoing again for smeargle or venomoth. You're pretty much only passing to an Espeon.
Multipass:
This consists of a pokemon, such as Gorebyss or Venomoth passing to multible recipients, each fitted to beating different types of teams. One Example is ABRpass, Quiverpassing to 3 different recipients, Lando I, Diancie and Keldeo. Usually these recipients have magic bounce, are immune to thunderwave, carry lum berry, and are resistant to that team's priority. Usually carriers a trapper to remove threats and a suicide lead. Make sure your receivers complement each other, i.e. keldeo to take on a team with weavile for dragonite, or diancie to take on a team with talonflame for keldeo.
Quickpass:
Not limited to just Scolipede, but is almost always the pokemon doing this, as it isn't as ass as ninjask and can do swordsdance/speed boost, is small condensed baton pass, found on hyper offense, where a scolipede swords dances, protects and then passes to something like mega metagross with wide coverage and bulk. the 4 other members of the team are not baton pass centric and generally do their own thing. This is not necessarily a lead. Scolipede is probably the best one for passing the strongest boosts, as SD and speed is incredibly lethal, but isn't necessarily the best for your team, as pokemon like Celebi and Scizor can contribute defensive synergy to your team. Lacks a trapper, might have a HO type suicide lead like LumSD Chomp.
Items to run on baton pass:
Often items are required to make sweeps work. Mental herb is popular on passers, protecting the user from taunts and the like. Other common items are anti-weakness berries, such as coba on Venomoth to tank flying moves from talonflame. On the recipients themselves, if not immune to thundurus's twave, should probably run lum to avoid being paralyzed and beaten. magic bouncers can just run lefties or w/e.
Good Baton Passers and how to use each
Smeargle:
Smeargle is weak, frail and slow. not exactly alluring traits in a baton passer. but what it does get is geopass and spore. it requires heavy support from stuff like Tailwind, Screens and Memento, although both memento and screens are not required at once. Trapper is practically required, and the baton pass teams this is on really shouldn't go without goth.
Venomoth:
Venomoth has a decent speed tier unlike most others, and has quiver dance and sleep powder. It also has tinted lens to take care of some threats to it with boosted quiver dance. It should probably run coba or charti berry to tank SE moves, and requires screens/memento. Trapper is nice.
Gorebyss:
This thing can actually threaten teams by itself thanks to Shell Smash and carrys Hydro Pump and Ice beam to dish out damage even before it passes. It is kindof frail, so stuff like screens and memento are appreciated. pokemon that can sit on grass and electric types are appreciated. stuff like Screens and a trapper doesn't hurt either.
Scolipede:
Scolipede has the benefit of being accumulate speed and attack/defense boosts simultaneously, and passively, allowing it to protect stall until it can outspeed faster pokemon. It likes screens to tank things like talonflame, and can actually kill some stuff with boosted moves like megahorn and earthquake. It can actually exist on it's own with minimal support on teams because of it's ability to boost behind protect. Hence the term "quickpass". That doesn't mean it doesn't need support, as something to tank/trap talonflame like tyrannitar are great teammates.
Celebi/Scizor:
These guys don't need much support other than their regular teammates. i.e. stuff like heatran and starmie respectively, as they fit into regular teams with ease. Celebi's Nastypass is very common, and Scizor's SD pass is less common, but still effective. They have value beyond baton passing and are arguably the best baton passers because of them, as their team has minimal reliance on them as a wincon, yet still remain a strong wincon. they like passing to scarfers as they can't give them any speed.
Good Baton pass Recipients
Espeon:
This pokemon is pretty much only seen on baton pass in OU, as is pretty hated. It takes advantages of passes from Scolipede, cm boosting with iron defense and speed, or simply wrecking shit with geopass from smeargle. Beyond magic bounce, it's best asset is stored power, ripping through even jirachi, a 4x resist. carries dazzling gleam for dark types. you can also run sub to beat movephasers like tankchomp with dragontail.
Diance-Mega:
Carrying magic bounce and a effective movepool that can hit from both sides of the spectrum, as well as being resistant to talonflame's powerful brave birds and Bisharp's sucker punches make it a great pokemon to baton pass too. recommended on multipass, as if the opponent carrys azumarill or scizor you should consider other options to pass too.
Keldeo:
A strong water type who resists Azumarill's aqua jets, Bisharp's sucker punches and Scizor's bullet punches, it often rolls with dual stabs, icy wind and hp electric for maximum coverage. don't pass to this when the opponent has a talonflame. Run a lum berry to avoid being crippled by Thundurus. likes geopass and quiver pass.
Landorus i:
It's power already considered borderline broken, it's not hard to see why this pokemon is a baton pass recipient. It's also immune to twave, and has a wide movepool to smack down all sorts of pokemon with Earth powers, Sludge waves, Focus blasts and hp ices. Even Azumarill can't OHKO this thing w/ a choice band. It's also strong enough to rip unaware clefable in half even without boosts.
Dragonite:
A strong smash or quickpass recipient, it's multiscale prevents it from easily being taken down by anything, and has a wide movepool to pull from to hit stuff. It should carry lum to get past thundurus. Recommended moveset: Dragon Claw, Fire punch, Earthquake and Iron tail (luck some fairies). Don't pass to this versus an ice sharder.
Mega Garchomp:
Stall already has enough trouble dealing with this thing at +2 in sand, why not give them more? 92 is a decent speed tier when boosted, and is immune to thunderwave. Did i mention it's titanic attack? it also has insane bulk and decent special attack if thats not good enough for you. Just getting this thing a speed boost makes it a threat, let alone an attack boost too. Appreciates quickpass and smashpass. No ice sharders again. It's bulk tanks every other type of priority tho.
Altaria-Mega:
Massive bulk, great defensive typing, access to heal bell, and pixilate boosted moves. It's most effective when receiving smashpass as it can use it's mixed stats to it's great advantage, and the spectrum it hits on can be flip flopped based on however the player feels. It makes up for it's weakness to thunder wave by having heal bell. It should be receiving smashpass to boost both attack stats, and hit with EQ and fireblast and w/e stab move of choice, or Quiver/Geopass with Hyper Voice, Fblast, and hp ground. overall a solid pokemon to pass to thanks to bulk and power.
Honorable Mentions:
Metagross-Mega:
A tough cookie with 4 attacks great coverage, it picks up quickpasses from Scolipede or better yet Smashpasses from Gorebyss no sweat, it's immense bulk making it already hard to kill, as well as it's power and base speed boosted to obscene levels. Is weak to thundy twave as it can't carry a lum berry. Resists Scizor and tflame, azumarill can't hit it hard enough and even Bisharp has trouble OHKOing. not recommended for dedicated baton passing since you'll autolose to anyteam with prankster twave, but it's good on teams that pass to more than one recipient.
Gardevoir-Mega:
A powerful nuke, with speed and more power it becomes (obviously) even better. it can blow apart teams with shoddy gardevoir checks. It is weak to thunderwave however, as well as bullet punch from scizor. It's also physically frail and even neutral priority can do serious damage. it's a good recipient, but it's just not there because of how physically frail it is combined with weakness to twave.
Baton Pass Support Pokemon:
Azelf:
Azelf Suicide leads no problem, setting up screens, stealth rocks and preventing opposing hazards, before occansionally ending it all in a fiery explosion. Practically a must on full or multipassing.
Whimsicott/Cottonee:
These pokemon enable sweeps, disabling pokemon with taunt, sleep or memento, giving a baton passer time to set up. They also lay down tailwinds, giving stuff like Smeargle the speed to spore faster pokemon that would end it's life. Often found (sometimes both) on Fullpassing.
A great support pokemon, practically unmatched in it's ability to kill/cripple threats to your baton pass team. it's found all kinds of heavier baton pass, although not always on singlepass.
Baton pass weaknesses
Press the X button, top right hand corner to rid yourself of the sight of your opponent's baton pass. works 100% of the time. In all seriousness pokemon who can phase, priority moves, perish song and haze especially. taunt can shut it down early on if the pokemon lacks a mental herb, and if they have a mental herb they can be OHKO'd.
Thats all i can recall about building baton pass atm, if I missed anything pm me.
