Metagame np: Stage 3 - 9(9) Problems

[jake]

song (explicit)

With the advent of ORAS, we have 9 new Megas who are all gonna wreak havoc on the meta (heh heh awful C&C lingo). Y'all know almost all of them right off the bat, but here's a quick refresher:

All Megas in NU are currently usable barring Mega Altaria for some reason (it'll be fixed). Some Megas may be banned or otherwise dealt with by upper tiers; I ask you to be patient and not bitch if you like a Mega and an upper tier bans it. It's going to happen, probably several times over. We will almost 100% guaranteed not retain more than a handful of these, so abuse them to your liking while you can. Talk about them and anything else about the new metagame here. Be sure to note all cool tutor moves you think might have an impact on a given Pokemon. To quote Molk once again:

• New Stage - If there are tier shifts, make some predictions on what the metagame will be like or comment on the changes
• Suspect Testing - If you believe that anything is worthy of a suspect test, post about it and why you think it deserves a suspect test. (nothing will be chosen as a suspect until at least two weeks in though, if even that)
• Metagame trends - What are the most common or effective strategies? Are there any Pokemon that you think will rise in usage?
• Top threats - What should the main priorities be when considering a team for NU?
• Playstyles - Which are most effective? Are there any that cannot succeed?
• Cores - What are some popular or solid cores? Why do they work so well, and what can be used to beat them?
• Underrated Pokemon - Just because a Pokemon isn't used much doesn't mean its bad! There are plenty of hidden gems scattered throughout low NU and PU, and possibly even Little Cup!
• New sets - If you have a unique set that you've had success with recently, share it.

WORD OF WARNING. I am going to talk with Raseri ASAP about what we are going to do in regards to banning / suspecting Pokemon for ORAS. If you post about bans and banning, I will delete your post and will not hesitate to infract you if necessary. I will post what we are going to do as soon as we establish it.

Just have fun, guys. Take the new megas out for a spin. Don't complain, and don't shitpost.

Soulgazer is a major turdgobbler who only wants to be accepted by our lovely community, so please be kind and tell him he's pretty.

 

[Ares]

Well I haven't had a chance to test out M-Lopunny and M-Altaria but so far all of the megas are fun to play around with. Unfortunately the ORAS tutor moves aren't available on the ladder yet so I can't use any of my teams on the ladder. Gonna post one of my favorite megas right now in Camerupt, I've been using this thing on a modified Trick Room team and it just tears shit up. Its also bulky enough to take multiple hits on a bulky offense team. Fun Pokemon to play around with and not as main stream as the other megas.

Camerupt @ Cameruptite
Ability: Solid Rock
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
- Fire Blast
- Earth Power
- Rock Slide
- Will-O-Wisp

Edit: also nice song lol

 

[Punchshroom]

Lemme just say that Weezing is going to be so, so viable in this new meta. Between DD Mega Altaria, Cro-Mega Audino, Mega Beedrill, and especially Mega Lopunny (plus Mega Steelix I guess), Weezing can check a large amount of these threats; you'd want Clear Smog to actually be able to handle CroDino though. A better option to deal with Mega Audino would be Taunt, but only if you can afford to outright give up an attacking move.

Weezing @ Black Sludge
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
- Will-O-Wisp
- Pain Split
- Sludge Bomb / Clear Smog
- Flamethrower / Clear Smog

Some of the tutored Pokemon I am most excited to try would be Pangoro and Kecleon. Pangoro has much better STAB now and a lot more coverage moves to abuse; it, alongside Mega Camerupt, will easily be the powerhouses of my Trick Room team, and would be perfectly usable outside of it as well as one of NU's most potent wallbreakers.

Pangoro @ Life Orb
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
- Swords Dance
- Knock Off
- Hammer Arm
- Gunk Shot / Parting Shot

Pangoro @ Life Orb
Ability: Iron Fist / Mold Breaker
EVs: 72 HP / 252 Atk / 184 Spe (outspeeds 4 Spe Mega Altaria)
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Knock Off
- Drain Punch
- Gunk Shot / Earthquake

Kecleon is an interesting case since Protean, combined with its tutored arsenal, gives it plenty of options. I worked on the Assault Vest priority set as it shares many of Kangaskhan's moves and thus is more familiar. Kecleon exchanges speed, physical bulk, and raw power for slightly increased special bulk, better longevity, and most importantly, STAB coverage. The combination of Drain Punch + Sucker Punch alone allows Kecleon to go toe to toe against a wide variety of special attackers in the tier with HP to spare; add STAB Knock Off into the mix and even bulkier Pokemon won't simply shrug off Kecleon's presence. I even tweaked the Assault Vest set's EVs to obtain the most efficient bulk, due to Kecleon's odd difference in HP and Special Defense making max/min HP & SpD builds unoptimal. I am sure that eye-catching Kecleon sets that don't use Assault Vest will pop up in due time, especially with Protean making tech moves easy to fit, but this is what I have for now:

Kecleon @ Assault Vest
Ability: Protean
EVs: 176 HP / 252 Atk / 80 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Fake Out
- Drain Punch
- Sucker Punch
- Knock Off

 

[marilli]

• Top threats - What should the main priorities be when considering a team for RU?

nice copypaste zeb

First thing that catches my eye is Mega Lopunny. I don't think there's a single Pokemon in NU that avoids a 3HKO from Mega Lopunny. It's impossible to resist both Return and Hi Jump Kick because of scrappy, and 'counters' such as Weezing get 3HKOed, and they don't exactly have good way to recover health. She has Healing Wish, can play Kangaskhan with Fake Out. We may even see more random protect users just to foil Mega Lopunny, because it blocks Fake Out and Hi Jump Kick. Things that can take it on without getting 2HKOed on the switch are: Weezing, Granbull, Qwilfish, Musharna. Weaker Poison-types like Vileplume and Garbodor just have huge chance to be 2HKOed on the switch by Return. Maybe there's more checks but this thing is most definitely a threat.

Sceptile's a huge threat with Dragon / Grass / HP Fire coverage being amazing here. He was already amazing, and this just makes him so much better. Even Focus Miss over imperfect speed IV for HP Fire is probably really good. I see 2 main counters for Mega Sceptile: Mega Altaria, and Togetic. Togetic also avoids 2HKO from mega Lopunny Return, and x4 resists Hi Jump Kick. Maybe she will see increased usage. Who knows. He also gets revenged by Mega Glalie, so actually Sceptile has a couple of Megas going against his way.

Alongside these two, there's also Mega Pidgeot and Beedrill as great offensive choices. They're fast, and they're strong. They have well-defined counters, though, such as Rock-types like Regirock, or Steelix for Beedrill as well. Every team already needed a Rock-type anyways so I see no reason to not invest a teamslot on somethig like Regirock. Stuff like Weezing also takes on Beedrill really well, too. I do not believe they will serve as the initially centralizing presence, but I have no doubt they'll be good.

When there's so much fast offense flying around, I actually see Trick Room teams with Mega Camerupt as a very viable and strong metagame presence to tech against all these super fast hyper offense teams. We'll see all these super fast teams get wrecked by TR, and maybe we'll see some more variety in team flavor, but it's hard to say with all these offensive threats in the tier.

Montedit: fixed it

 

[jake]

@ ama I cp'd it from the other thread so blame raz...

Slurpuff @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 44 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def / 208 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Substitute
- Belly Drum
- Play Rough
- Drain Punch

Slurpy is gonna be fantastic while it's still here (not long, I would bet). Drain Punch is huge additional coverage, and now it can kill stuff while simultaneously making itself harder to KO. Kangaskhan and its ilk can't try to wear it down with Fake Outs anymore, since Slurp will just recover it all back with a safe Drain Punch. Sub blocks potential statuses; can be replaced with whatever you want if you feel like it. Spread outruns Scarf Rotom (benchmarks might change, so play with the spread if you like) and maintains an even HP WHICH YOU MOST DEFINITELY NEED.

Also, Weezing being used to check almost all the megas sounds like a negative but it's certainly a positive; Weezing lacks true recovery so wearing it down with something like Mega Lopunny (who can support Slurp even more by Encoring moves) will help a ton.

 

[CanadianWifier]

Em-Pidge is here, ready to cause more damage than Katrina and Sandy ever dreamed of!

(Empidge) Pidgeot @ Pidgeotite
Ability: Keen Eye
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Hurricane
- Heat Wave
- Roost / HP Grass / Defog
- U-turn / HP Grass / Defog

• Seriously though, a fast bird with a never-miss Hurricane and coverage to hit Steel-types; along with plenty of filler moves for the last slots [Defog, Roost, HP Grass, U-turn, etc] means this thing will be a force to be reckoned with. I can already see the Lanturns and SpDef Rotoms being brought out to not only check this monstrosity, but also to pair very nicely with it in a Voltturn core. Empidge will leave it's mark on the tier - prepare your windsocks, it's about to get craazy.

Weezing @ Rocky Helmet / Black Sludge
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Will-O-Wisp
- Sludge Bomb
- Flamethrower
- Pain Split

• Seconding Punchshroom's point about Weezing being super viable. At the moment, it beats the new Pluff, m-Beedrill, Physical m-Scep, m-Audino, m-altaria, m-lopunny, can check m-steelix, can take on Kekleon to an extent.. It seriously shot up like 99 places in viability overnight. Everyone go use one :]

Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
- Return
- Facade
- Dragon Dance
- Roost

• Lastly, gotta touch on a set I've seen work really well for a friend of mine, Reverend - Facade m-Altaria. Basically fucks on things that try to status you as a way of dealing with it, and practically makes you immune to burn. Don't know the exact spread, but I know the set he's had a lot of success with is DD / Roost / Return / Facade.

Go have fun out there, ORAS NU is so much more infinitely better than XY NU I can barely even put it into words :]

empidge4lyfe

 

[Zenza]

Mega beedril is an absolute fucking monster atm. It has a touch of 4MSS (it would like to run u turn/poison jab/drill run/knock off/protect) but besides that it is absurdly powerful. Mega beeedril makes volt turn SO much better this gen, and beedril has good synergy with other users of volt switch and u turn like rotom and lantern. The core of beeedril and sawk is very good atm because u can u turn on the rock/steel types that love to switch into drill and destroy their lives with sawk :). Also mega lopunny + klinklang is SO GOOD. I'll post in more detail about it later. This is such a nice change of pace from the rather stale XY Meta :)

 

[Ares]

Mega beedril is an absolute fucking monster atm. It has a touch of 4MSS (it would like to run u turn/poison jab/drill run/knock off/protect) but besides that it is absurdly powerful. Mega beeedril makes volt turn SO much better this gen, and beedril has good synergy with other users of volt switch and u turn like rotom and lantern. The core of beeedril and sawk is very good atm because u can u turn on the rock/steel types that love to switch into drill and destroy their lives with sawk :). Also mega lopunny + klinklang is SO GOOD. I'll post in more detail about it later. This is such a nice change of pace from the rather stale XY Meta :)

Mega Beedrill doesn't really have 4MSS cause pretty much anything aside from Pjab and Uturn is not that good on it. You're better off using uturn to switch into something than trying to use a coverage move, but i can see how you might think that. Rocky Helmet Weezing with rocks up says no to Beedrill btw, and honestly even though Mega Beedrill is really really good, I think its probably one of the easier megas to wall (which is kind of mitigated by Uturn).

 

[soulgazer]

xy wasnt that stale, its just that you guys can't build without a hariyama on your team rofl.

Slurpuff is a little bit too good now. What can take on Fairy + Fighting coverage at +6? Poison-types? But then you realise Slurpuff can learn Psychic and potentially 2HKO some of those Psychic-types with it if it goes mixed or just go full Calm Mind, lure the Drum counters in, and remove them so easily for like Beedrill, Altaria, Special Mega Sceptile, or Lopunny (which loves Poison-types removed).

edit: ye return does a fk ton to poison types rip

smh teambuilder doesn't allow me to use HJK on Lopunny :( I wanted to abuse it w/ Return / Baton Pass / Healing Wish

Also the metagame will probably be priority spam /choice scarf users everywhere for a while, so honestly I can't see mega beedrill doing much when every teams are trying to not lose to the other megas (which most of them are arguably better than beedrill).

 

[Zenza]

Yea for things that "wall" beeedril (mainly weezing ugh), it's not like you ever really click anything but u turn lol so u can just u turn out into a psychic or something on the switch. But yeah rocky helmet would be annoying..also I agree puff will be too good..it obviously has no reason to run protect anymore because drain punch stops kanga and Yama from revenging with fake out anyway, so I really think the best set is just return/play rough/drain/BD considering return lets you OHKO fat poisons like plume and some variants of garb iirc. (Fuck weezing though oml).

Also, I don't really get the big mega camerupt hype. Obviously it's a stupidly good wall breaker (I'd imagine fire blast 2 hit ko's audino after rocks)?, and has great coverage between Earth power/fire blast/hp grass. But it's bulk isn't THAT amazing (70/100/105) is very good but not terrific, and in a tier with water types everywhere and strong fast threats around every corner, I just can't see mega camerupt being that amazing. It does have some nice qualities about it, but overall I just don't think it deserves quite as much hype as it's getting.

Edit: btw these are just my very quick not well thought out thoughts while I sit in a dentist chair waiting for my appt lol

 

[Quite Quiet]

With risk of sounding slightly insane.

don't click if you can't take something fun

Marill @ Eviolite
Ability: Sap Sipper
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Impish Nature
- Encore
- Rest
- Sleep Talk
- Play Rough

Revealing the legend joke I brought up first for countering mega sceptile during the oras nu tour. I really wasn't expecting much when I brought it onto the ladder, but it's honestly not done that bad of a job earning its spot. Walling most water types thanks to sap sipper it loves rain/ludicolo as well as a bunch of fighting types like Sawk. Sure it's outclassed like nothing else, but this is the only time you've had a real, serious reason to consider marill for a team :)

Because sg asked: +2 252 Atk Mega-Sceptile Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Marill: 140-165 (40.6 - 47.9%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

Other than that I can safely say Mega Pidgeot is a good amount of fun to play around with. Hurricane hurts and it got a decent speed tier. It's just a shame all the coverage options really doesn't do enough damage most of the time and it's still the slowest of the speedy megas we have at the moment :/ 121 might be a good speed tier but it's not enough to outspeed any common scarfer and it doesn't have the bulk to live many hits either.

Don't get me wrong, it's very impressive what it does, but compared to the other megas it really can't stand up to them. Fun pokemon to play with either way though.

 

[skies]

Just had a fun battle with iTeddeh, no replay unfortunately because the server problems. Anyways, it showed some cool Pokemon like Lead Archeops, Mega Sceptile, Slurpuff, and Mega Audino. Mega Audino really threatened me, Teddeh was running a CroDino, and its insane bulk was scaring me. Furthermore, I lacked a Steel-type to beat it! Backed up by this was Musharna, which was also a Calm Mind user, and the two were difficult to take down without some plays that cost Teddeh the game. Mega Sceptile is intriguing, it's really hard to switch into and has so much raw power. It fails to break through bulkier Pokemon such as Mega Audino and Musharna for example. Slurpuff swept for the win, even without Drain Punch, and was a very dangerous Pokemon. Really though, it was all thanks to Lead Archeops, which brought down two Pokemon early game. Here are the sets:

Sceptile @ Sceptilite
Ability: Overgrow
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Giga Drain
- Focus Blast
- Dragon Pulse
- Substitute

Archeops @ Focus Sash
Ability: Defeatist
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Taunt
- Endeavor
- Head Smash

 

[HJAD]

I'll be honest and say, this tier isn't very balanced at all ATM , to say that the tier is borked af would be an understatement: but all with this hubub, there is a way to check all these brand new megas all at once, which people are seemingly finding difficult to do.
Its called WEATHER and I'll be honest and say it isn't the most exciting play style in the world to play against or play with; however, a distinct characteristic of all weather teams (sun or rain) is that they completely disassemble any team that isn't prepared for it.
Today, on the ladder, I have used the new borked megas as well as weather and I have to say; with all these new fancy shiny megas here, people simply cannot afford to prepare for it as much as they did in the late XY NU period. I've often found that by keeping strong offensive pressure on the opponents team, the opponent has no time or way to abuse mega-sceptile or mega lopunny because everything outspeeds and kills them in 1 or 2 hits with ease. The teams that are still prepared for weather (by accident or not) still take a decent player to follow through with plays.
But honestly, I've scraped the idea that I have to 'teambuild' my way around these new mons, checking them all at once by using SUN or RAIN makes a much more enticing proposition for myself and as a result I can see me using weather until these mons leave and the meta settles a bit.
If you haven't tryed weather out yet, please do. Its a quite solid means of checkingn all these mons at once, and right now, it might be one of the best (if not the best) play style in current NU meta ATM.

 

[TheTraininator]

Also, something VERY, VERY IMPORTANT TO NOTE: X and Y now allow ORAS obtainable things that are in X and Y's code to be traded over the PSS, such as the Soul Dew, Lati@site, Shiny Reshiram and Zekrom, and Adaptability Skrelp and Dragalge. That's right, since the Dex Nav allows for the capture of Pokemon with Hidden Abilities and Skrelp can be found in Omega Ruby on Mirage Islands, we finally can get Adaptability Dragalge!

 

[xzern]

Sneasel @ Life Orb
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Knock Off
- Ice Punch
- Ice Shard
- Low Kick

Glalie @ Glalite
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Ice Shard
- Return
- Earthquake
- Explosion

So here are some pretty rad checks mega sceptile, but obviously they arent full-on counters since theyre outsped by sceptile and sceptile usually carries focus blast anyway (unless you want to run brightpowder to get the skillful focus blast misses). As you may or may not know, mega sceptile boasts a not-so-impressive 4x weakness to ice, and sneasel/glalie are the better ice shard users of the tier, bar lapras if you're real

 

[boltsandbombers]

Sneasel @ Life Orb
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Knock Off
- Ice Punch
- Ice Shard
- Low Kick

Glalie @ Glalite
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Ice Shard
- Return
- Earthquake
- Explosion

So here are some pretty rad checks mega sceptile, but it's obviously they arent full-on counters since theyre outsped by sceptile and sceptile usually carries focus blast anyway (unless you want to run brightpowder to get the skillful focus blast misses). As you may or may not know, mega sceptile boasts a not-so-impressive 4x weakness to ice, and sneasel/glalie are the better ice shard users of the tier, bar lapras if you're real

While certainly not as strong as the previous two, dont forget about dear piloswine :[

Piloswine @ Eviolite
Ability: Thick Fat
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Adamant Nature
- Ice Shard
- Earthquake
- Icicle Crash
- Stealth Rock​

 

[Mistrals]

Mega altaria will make weather a bit harder, though things like victreebel would beat it I assume.


Coil huntail looks interesting, as does sucker punch, giving it a couple niches over gorebyss(it also gets coil, but why would you want to use coil gorebyss over huntail)

I would assume no, but does anyone know if Raichu can get icicle crash/all that stuff from Pikachu?

 

[TheTraininator]

Sneasel @ Life Orb
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Knock Off
- Ice Punch
- Ice Shard
- Low Kickl

You forget, Sneasel can run Icicle Crash and Knock Off simultaneously now.

 

[Magis4Life]

Mega steelix is certainly an interesting monstrosity for this meta. I remember seeing the sheer force variant several times in the tier, as steelix can tank many physical hits while actually sporting a significant amount of damage. With the new attack buff, it appears steelix can pose to be more of a tank than it's ever been and comfortably checks threats such as mega beedrill, mega glalie, the even more popular sneasel, and some of the usual physical attackers it kept in check before. With the new buff to special defense, I wonder if a mixed wall sounds viable (sounds like a very solid slurpuff check, if you ask me). Sorry for my previous post. That was uncalled for. I think the excitement got to my head.

 

[Flare Blitzle]

Adaptability Skrelp confirmed! This is pretty for important for NU+RU.

 

[trc]

I've been really enjoying this tier so far, I signed up for the ORAS NU minitour after a couple of months of reading some of the NU threads to get a handle on the metagame, and man, it's really one of my favourite tiers. Maybe just because it's so new to me, so nothing feels stale yet, but I just feel like NU has just the metagame I enjoy playing in terms of the levels of playstyles and Pokemon diversity. Since I started playing PU, I definitely learnt a lot more about NU in the process and I think I'm going to play this tier often, so why not post in the threads!

In terms of the effect of the ORAS Mega Pokemon joining NU (Audino, Beedrill, Camerupt, Lopunny, Glalie, Sceptile, Steelix, Pidgeot, and Altaria), as well as the new move additions to Pokemon like Slurpuff, Pangoro, and Kecleon, I think the metagame will shift towards Poison-types initially, because of their intrinsic ability to check Slurpuff provided they have the bulk for Return, something Steel-types can no longer do, as well as check Pangoro, Mega Audino, Mega Beedrill, and Mega Sceptile decently well among the specific Pokemon, whether they sway towards physical bulk like Weezing, or special, like AV Muk.

Speaking of AV Muk, I'm a fan of it after using a team of HJAD's with it because it's really bulky and makes a great counter to special Mega Sceptile. Pity it doesn't get EQ though cause Garbodor can switch in for free which kinda sucks.

I had more to post but I got lazy ;~; but I like NU n_n

 

[Evan.]

I HAVE A NICHE (Barbaracle) @ Focus Sash
Ability: Tough Claws
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpAtk / 252 Spd
Naive Nature
- Grass Knot
- Stone Edge
- Taunt
- Stealth Rock

With the addition of Stealth Rock, Barbaracle now makes for a great suicide lead for Hypers Offense teams. Being faster than Lead Crustle, Kricketune and Lead Rampardos, as well as having taunt allows Barbaracle to prevent hazards from common hazard leads. It also has Tough Claws Grass Knot to deal with Seismitoad as well as Stone Edge to bop Xatu switch ins. It also finally has a niche over Carracosta which is cool.

 

[g]

Can't wait to try out Adaptability Dragalge to be honest. With Draco Meteor rivaling V-Create power after STAB and almost no switch ins already I feel like it would be a great Pokemon as it also switches in for free on the very common Poison-types (weezing and qwilfish) that are now seen around to beat Pokemon such as Beedrill, Slurpuff (and potentially mega altaria).

 

[CanadianWifier]

Been playing around for about 8 hours on ladder, and I have to say this tier is really really fun. First time I've genuinely enjoyed pokemon in a while.

Pangoro @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 152 HP / 252 Atk / 104 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Taunt
- Swords Dance
- Drain Punch
- Knock Off

• This thing is downright amazing. Taunt prevents defensive stuff from statusing you or recovering their own health, Swords Dance turns you into a terrifying wall breaker, and the Dual STAB coverage is only resisted by Fairies - which are few and far between in NU. Simply put - it eats stall for breakfast after a little bit of residual has accumulated, [the amount of times QueenOfLuvdiscs complained about this thing in call is a testament to its success], and can generally disrupt balance cores as well. It's a monster now, so try this set out if you haven't yet!

kekek (Kecleon) @ Life Orb
Ability: Protean
EVs: 152 HP / 252 Atk / 104 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Drain Punch
- Knock Off
- Shadow Sneak / Stealth Rock
- Sucker Punch / Stealth Rock

• Here's something that a) you've probably already heard a lot about; and b) was something I though was going to be rather mediocre.. until I tried it out. Oh my fucking god. Being blessed with Drain Punch and Knock Off with Protean has turned this little guy into a total monster. 306 Attack with Lifeorb hits very surprisingly hard, especially when everything is STAB. Having access to 2 forms of priority somewhat makes up for the fact it's pretty slow; however, they are highly predictable. The mindgames and amazing doubles / plays you can make with this mon are amazing, [drain punching predicting switches out of frail shit that's trying to dodge suckers, etc] well worth the fun if you're dedicated to learning it. Also if you haven't fit Rocks onto your team yet, it can work as a (fairy unreliable) Stealth rock setter as well; though you have to drop one of your priorities. Super fun mon, highly recommend, go slap it on a team.

Little Boy (Dragalge) @ Choice Specs
Ability: Adaptability
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Sludge Wave
- Dragon Pulse
- Scald

Standing by my nickname for this thing as one of the best I've ever come up with.. "dropping nukes all over your team, ye I'm Little Boy"

• I mean.. what do you even say about this. It gets ample switch-ins due to everyone running at least some form of Poison-type on their team; otherwise they just lose to M-Beedrill / Pluff. It outspeeds pretty much every wall / tank, up to and including Garbodor. It drops Draco Meteors to the likes that NU has never really seen before. It's just downright beautiful.
  
  Pair it up with M-Beedrill / other things that force in poison-types [M-drill is fantastic though, as you just U-turn off of them], go out to this thing, and you now have a simple checklist:
  1) Do they have something that can set up on you after -2?
  If the answer to that is no, you click Draco Meteor, drop a nuke, and claim a pokemon. It's that easy. Hell, sometimes just click Draco anyway. This thing is unreal.
  If they have Slurpuff, you're basically stuck clicking Sludge Wave all game - but don't think for one second like it doesn't hit hard as fuck either. Super fun. Suuuuper fun. Go use it.

That's all I have for now, gonna keep playing and learning this tier. Pokemon being fun - what a concept.


empidge4lyfe

 

[Zenza]

I see dragalge becoming a corner stone for this metagame (until it goes RU). The main reason I love galge so much atm is not only due to its destructive power by itself, but it partners greatly with like all the new megas. Beeedril struggles with the fat poison types that galge can switch into for free and demolish with specs Draco, sceptile similarly dislikes those damn poisons, but also doesn't really appreciate strong fire types which galge can switch into no problem. Pidgeot is hard walled by rock and some steel types, which dragalge can either severely dent with a Draco, or demolish with a scald/hydro pump/focus blast. So yeah, basically dragalge makes an awesome pair with most of the megas, and even if most of them leave the tier, galge is still a wrecking ball on it's own