Mega Abomasnow

[ryan]

Mega Abomasnow
Ability: Snow Warning
Type: Ice / Grass
Stats: 90 HP / 132 Atk / 105 Def/ 132 SpA / 105 SpD / 30 Spe
​

Of all the new Mega Evolutions to be introduced in XY, Mega Abomasnow seemed to be the most underwhelming. Hail has never been a very good weather, and to add to that, the XY weather nerf only gave weathers five turns before they ended. As though these qualities weren't bad enough, they took arguably the worst weather starter and cut its Speed significantly to make sure it wasn't going to outspeed much of anything. In a singles environment, all of these nerfs make Mega Abomasnow very underwhelming, but in doubles, Mega Abomasnow really gets a chance to shine. Hail is a much better weather in doubles than in singles because a perfectly accurate 110 Base Power Ice-type spread move is a very powerful tool for special attackers. Furthermore, the nerf to weather only lasting five turns means a lot less in doubles, where it is possible for games to last only five turns and where they rarely exceed fifteen. The loss of Speed is also not a bad thing for Mega Abomasnow; on the contrary, it even furthers the viability of the Hail Room playstyle, where Abomasnow works alongside Trick Room starters and powerful Blizzard users to take out as much of the opponent's team as possible in the turns that follow. On top of this, lower Speed for Mega Abomasnow means that its base form won't mind running a minus Speed nature with no IVs, making hail the prospering weather most of the time on first turn matchups against other weather starters. In fact, the only other weather starter that "outslows" regular Abomasnow is Hippowdon, a rare sight in doubles. Overall, Mega Abomasnow is a really potent Trick Room attacker that can both spam really strong Blizzards and offer hail for its teammates to do the same.

What do you guys think about Mega Abomasnow? I'll archive some sets in the OP if you guys have any to offer. The set I've been using that Arcticblast came up with is:

Abomasnow @ Abomasite
Ability: Snow Warning
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Blizzard
- Ice Shard
- Energy Ball
- Protect

 

[Typhlito]

I guess its saving grace to be used will always be its hail. Its priority stab ice shard is also very helpful coming off its high attack. (is this guy also weaker than regular obama wit life orb?) But I think it will benefit more from giga drain than energy ball for recovery at the cost of being slightly weaker. Its definitely going to need all the recovery it can get since it loses leftovers.

Arcticblast edit: Giga Drain is a BW tutor move only

edit: Oh really? Well it still can be used in the pokebank tier until pokebank actually comes out. Oh and one thing I didnt mention is that if obama gets sent down to the lower tiers, its soundproof may end up being kinda useful to avoid moves like boomburst and hyper voice altho it might be a bit situational.

 

[Pen Ink]

Abomasnow @ Abomasite
Ability: Snow Warning
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 SAtk / 4 HP
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Blizzard
- Ice Shard
- Wood Hammer
- Protect

this is the set i've liked the most. i run mixed because energy ball cant muscle its way through bulkier rotom-w, plus wood hammer actually hits harder than energy ball most of the time.

i can't say that aboma is going to be a top tier mega but it's definitely going to be good under trick room and as an anti-metagame pokemon vs other weather, besides the fact that it hits hard as fuck with blizzard. mega mawile kind of hard presses it when you can just run based tree alongside mawile and still check rain.

 

[Audiosurfer]

Actually the main problem with a Wood Hammer set is that you're not OHKOing Tyranitar anymore since you don't have a gem boost (RIP Whammer) so while you're doing good damage they can still come back and KO you with a Low Kick, especially since you're taking massive recoil, so that sucks. I think a useful idea would be to use Hidden Power Fire > Ice Shard to get rid of Scizor & Genesect. Scizor fails to KO even with Bug Bite (252+ Atk Technician Scizor Bug Bite vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Abomasnow: 312-368 (81.25 - 95.83%) -- guaranteed 2HKO) and only does 53-64% with Bullet Punch, so you can use Hidden Power Fire to catch it. Ice Shard is still useful as a priority move to circumvent Abomasnow's low speed, but HP Fire is worth considering for some teams.

While Mega Abomasnow can be used as a single Blizzard user, I think an even better way to take advantage of its increased Special Attack is to pair it with another Blizzard user such as Kyurem. With an Iron Ball it could function under Trick Room, and the opponent would have a hard time taking Blizzards from both Pokemon. You could even use other things to play around Abomasnow's low Speed such as paralysis or Tailwind and then pair it with a Choice Scarf or Substitute Kyurem to clean up after Mega Abomasnow has punched holes in opposing teams. Definitely gonna be a cool (no pun intended) mon to use in XY.

edit: forgot it was that low yeah scratch tailwind altho para is still nice

 

[youngjake93]

Actually the main problem with a Wood Hammer set is that you're not OHKOing Tyranitar anymore since you don't have a gem boost (RIP Whammer) so while you're doing good damage they can still come back and KO you with a Low Kick, especially since you're taking massive recoil, so that sucks. I think a useful idea would be to use Hidden Power Fire > Ice Shard to get rid of Scizor & Genesect. Scizor fails to KO even with Bug Bite (252+ Atk Technician Scizor Bug Bite vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Abomasnow: 312-368 (81.25 - 95.83%) -- guaranteed 2HKO) and only does 53-64% with Bullet Punch, so you can use Hidden Power Fire to catch it. Ice Shard is still useful as a priority move to circumvent Abomasnow's low speed, but HP Fire is worth considering for some teams.

While Mega Abomasnow can be used as a single Blizzard user, I think an even better way to take advantage of its increased Special Attack is to pair it with another Blizzard user such as Kyurem. With an Iron Ball it could function under Trick Room, and the opponent would have a hard time taking Blizzards from both Pokemon. You could even use other things to play around Abomasnow's low Speed such as paralysis or Tailwind and then pair it with a Choice Scarf or Substitute Kyurem to clean up after Mega Abomasnow has punched holes in opposing teams. Definitely gonna be a cool (no pun intended) mon to use in XY.

You can't fix 30 base speed with TailWind, trust me. 60+ base speed is good under it, but 30 is still awful. After a turn of set up, you are still outsped by base 110s and base 60 scarfers... And that's with a positive nature. I'm sure you'd rather run +SpA
Even paralyzed scarfers could still outspeed an uninvested base 30.

Max speed without a boosting nature beats +speed 95s by 1 point at +2. That's kind of lame, but I guess I could see it being helpful if you're very aware that you're still not a speed demon

 

[The Wolf]

From my personal experience, Mega Abomasnow is awesome when it comes to being that anti-metagame Pokemon since Trick Room really helps its slow speed so it can just fire off Blizzard as already mentioned. Anyway, Wide Guard mechanic change somewhat hurts Mega Abomasnow since Blizzard is pretty much its best move. I’ll admit that I find myself in a bit of a frustrating situation where an opposing Talonflame is in the field while my Mega Abomasnow is also in the field, because Talonflame does not care if Trick Room is up or not since Gale Wings give Talonflame that +1 priority Brave Bird, which does a lot of damage to Mega Abomasnow. I’ll probably use some Quick Guard support or whatever to check Talonflame. At the moment, I think Mega Abomasnow is very fun to use, and I’ll definitely keep playtesting.

 

[sarysa]

Mega Abomasnow is squishier than its stats would indicate. I can say with personal experience that building it as a tank is a bad idea. It seems like anything can pierce through that defense and OHKO it. (most notably the bird) A lot of fighters OHKO it, non-stab fire does it in, Brave Bird, etc.
It also pretty much demands that you run a Trick Room, unless you want it to hate you.

I don't run it as my mega anymore, but if you can get rid of its omnipresent threats...maybe?

...nah, just run Mega Ampharos. :P Better moveset, better typing, and higher SpAtk. You sacrifice the atk side but there are better options to get rid of Blissey.

 

[ryan]

...nah, just run Mega Ampharos. :P Better moveset, better typing, and higher SpAtk. You sacrifice the atk side but there are better options to get rid of Blissey.

Mega Ampharos can't fulfill all the same roles. Mega Abomasnow offers all of hail (the main reason to use it), a really strong spread move, priority, and swag, none of which Mega Ampharos has. Plus, Mega Abomasnow was pretty much built for Hail Room.

Also, covering for Talonflame isn't all that hard. You've got Protect on Mega Abomasnow for a reason, and under Trick Room, you can even snipe it with an Ice Shard. Also why are you concerned about Blissey lol? You're not taking a Blissey out with Ice Shard anyways, and this is doubles, where 1. Blissey isn't common and 2. you have plenty of partners that can take it out without forcing you to switch.

 

[tofucocoa]

i dont think whammer is completely useless w/o a gem offensively, it just takes a little more effort to ohko 252 hp tar (i expect 252 hp 32 def ttar to die out b/c metagross's meteor mash was the main thing it was supposed to live, which is now 90 bp). 1), you need a brave nature and ~44 attack evs or a quiet nature that reaches the same attack stat if that makes you feel more comfortable 2), you need a turn or two of hail damage, or equivalent chip damage (the ladder is incredibly easy to accomplish, though you shouldn't depend on the former) and 3) TR's gotta be up (obvs). if you play smart, you can easily snipe or criple ttar. also, it ohko's politoed, which is obviously very nice.

defensively, i don't think you should worry about keeping megasnow alive like you would with basically anything else with ~90/~105/~105 defenses. the only reason those defenses matter is because of stray mach punches or weaker neutral moves, which is admittedly pretty neat, but you're not going to survive an attack anything that has a fire move or close combat without a sash, which is something megasnow obviously lacks. if you want to play it safe, use sash abomasnow with giga drain. if you want to go balls to the wall and stomp everything that is weak to blizzard or grass STAB (whammer), use mega abomasnow.

 

[mimi]

i'd also like to mention in BW doubles aboma never really ran LO as its item, it was focus sash or a gem for the most part.

 

[sarysa]

Also, covering for Talonflame isn't all that hard. You've got Protect on Mega Abomasnow for a reason, and under Trick Room, you can even snipe it with an Ice Shard. Also why are you concerned about Blissey lol? You're not taking a Blissey out with Ice Shard anyways, and this is doubles, where 1. Blissey isn't common and 2. you have plenty of partners that can take it out without forcing you to switch.

Haha, I probably should've added some kind of ;P after mentioning Blissey. I was only intending to poke fun at the reduced role of physical attacks, since this generation adds priority Will-O-Wisp to neuter physical attackers along with the old Intimidate and Reflect.

It's really the 4x fire weakness that hurts Abomasnow in the end...makes it vulnerable to non-STAB attacks which can be put on a large number of mons. This element of surprise is what could ruin your plans. Existing threats like Ferrothorn (common) and Mega Scizor demand sticking fire on at least a couple mons lest you be walled or swept. IMO you're going to have to use Protect a lot with it in hopes to identify your opponent's unexpected mons that could OHKO the thing. (like my non-target practice Togekiss with Flamethrower, plus I recently battled a high-ranked player with Fire Blast on their Assault Vest TTar ;P )

Outside of a Trick Room, Abomasnow is often just screwed. Ampharos generally fares a bit better...and you only get one mega, after all. 'twas the only point I meant to make. :)

 

[CavemanCossy]

Abomasnow @ Abomasite
Ability: Snow Warning
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 SAtk / 4 HP
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Blizzard
- Ice Shard
- Wood Hammer
- Protect

this is the set i've liked the most. i run mixed because energy ball cant muscle its way through bulkier rotom-w, plus wood hammer actually hits harder than energy ball most of the time.

This is the exact same set I've been running too, except my EV spread is different; 252 HP / 48 Atk / 208 SAtk. Wood Hammer already hits hard as fuck, 48 EV's is actually enough to score OHKO's on Azumarill, bulky Rotom-W, and Tyranitar, or at least deals enough damage to let something else priority kill them. I also like to have max HP investment because it lets Abomasnow survive weak priority moves.

I've found that Trick Room Chandelure, Rotom-Wash, and Talonflame (yes, Talonflame) are good partners for Mega-Abomasnow. Chandelure sets up Trick Room and has amazing synergy with Abomasnow, Rotom-Wash takes care of oppossing Fire-types, and Talonflame has priority Brave Bird to not give any fucks about Trick Room and deals with Mawile with Flare Blitz.

 

[Mylo Xyloto]

I've actually been trying out Doubles and one of the first pokemon I used was M-Aboma. With Trick Room support from Aromatisse, it really shines. I've actually been using the same set the OP covers. Another cool perk is Abomasnow's unique Grass/Ice dual typing. Which lets it check annoying Rain teams that rely on Drizzle to boost their Muddy Water or other Water moves. Resisting common spread moves like Discharge and Earthquake is also p cool.