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np: UU - Can't Touch This
- Thread starter reachzero
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You forgot Azumarill.
I am going to try out bulky P-Z soon, once I'm done with my Pikachu team (yeah, you can laugh now).
There's really no good stall Poke that can beat NP Recover PZ tbh. Your best bet is to Toxic it somehow, and Protect away I guess. Even at that, you're going to probably lose a Poke or two. I guess you could also Paralyze it and then switch in something that can OHKO.
Also, I've been raping pretty hard with Sub CM Cress.
You could try your hand at Sandstorm stall, seeing as Porygon-Z is a non-issue for that kind of team. However, if you want to keep things regular you just have to try and be more creative with things like Encore and paralysis.
There are a couple "not-specialized" checks for Pz on stall, come to think of it. How about SubSeed Sceptile w/ Leaf Storm? It can be EV'd to be fairly bulky and outpace Porygonz. There is also Regirock with Hammer Arm. Does Roar Steelix work? What about Toxic Registeel? or Taunt / Pain Split SpD Missy? Hitmontop (it would cover Absol as well)?
I'm sure it isn't any more difficult to beat with stall than something like Absol is, due to superior type-coverage and priority for any "fast" stall Pokemon.
I could easily not be seeing this because I don't play stall, but in theory I don't see how it's that much harder to stop than any other stat-up sweeper.
@ Phil: That Cresselia caught me off guard and beat me pretty bad, but I dunno how it'd work if I "saw it coming". Luckily i was on my alt with my alt team >.>
I'm sure it isn't any more difficult to beat with stall than something like Absol is, due to superior type-coverage and priority for any "fast" stall Pokemon.
I could easily not be seeing this because I don't play stall, but in theory I don't see how it's that much harder to stop than any other stat-up sweeper.
@ Phil: That Cresselia caught me off guard and beat me pretty bad, but I dunno how it'd work if I "saw it coming". Luckily i was on my alt with my alt team >.>
Registeel got Hammer Arm as well, so I guess it would do that better than Regirock, thus being the most viable one when considering stall due to his superior defenses and arguably superior typing.
By the way it's just astounding how many stall teams just aren't ready to face Scyther. With so many people running bulkier sets of the common ghosts, Hitmontops, Cresselias etc etc, Scyther has a field day against these teams once he gets and SD up and if some of the pokes that might trouble him have been weakened already, namely Spiritomb, Omastar and Donphan; which sgould have happened by the time Scyther comes into play. From there these kinds of teams usually have to rely on heavy prediction and Hitmontop's Intimidate to wear him down. With spikes support things should be made even easier, even though I haven't tried that myself.
By the way it's just astounding how many stall teams just aren't ready to face Scyther. With so many people running bulkier sets of the common ghosts, Hitmontops, Cresselias etc etc, Scyther has a field day against these teams once he gets and SD up and if some of the pokes that might trouble him have been weakened already, namely Spiritomb, Omastar and Donphan; which sgould have happened by the time Scyther comes into play. From there these kinds of teams usually have to rely on heavy prediction and Hitmontop's Intimidate to wear him down. With spikes support things should be made even easier, even though I haven't tried that myself.
What the hell HYU, SubSeed Sceptile with Leaf Storm on a Stall Team?
And I think we're getting close to the "I shouldn't have to use [team style] to beat [powerful threat]! It's BL! ", especially with comments like
(I don't intend to offend Lemmiwinks in any way)
I find that Registeel absolutely needs to go RestTalk/ use Wish support nowadays. It's impossible for it to take the hits of Raikou, Missy, and now P-Z like it used to.
And I think we're getting close to the "I shouldn't have to use [team style] to beat [powerful threat]! It's BL! ", especially with comments like
(I don't intend to offend Lemmiwinks in any way)
I find that Registeel absolutely needs to go RestTalk/ use Wish support nowadays. It's impossible for it to take the hits of Raikou, Missy, and now P-Z like it used to.
I don't see any issues with that particular set on a stall team.
Anyways, I've been using a primarily mono-Fire team with a decent success rate. The only complaint that I have with it is the lack of priority and typically all of my fire attackers were Specially based. In retrospect, I should use make use of Arcanine. My team looked like... Flareon-Moltres-Magmortar-Blaziken-Houndoom-Filler. The best aspect of the team is that the team is able to keep constant pressure against the opponent.
I tried a Mono-Ghost team to no avail.
First of all, this metagame is terrible. Porygon-z is definitely broken, but Cresselia is far more broken. I've generally enjoyed most of these metagames, but for me this is the worst, simply because there's finally a Pokemon that actually fulfills the Defensive Characteristic.
On a random note, has anyone tried Shuckle as a Cresselia/Porygon-z counter? It seems like the best counter in UU to those two Pokemon, as long as you don't let them set up Encored Nasty Plots/Calm Minds. It also seems like a decent Raikou stop, Encoring then switching to Dugtrio. It seems plausible, but probably wouldn't work as neatly as it does on paper.
On a random note, has anyone tried Shuckle as a Cresselia/Porygon-z counter? It seems like the best counter in UU to those two Pokemon, as long as you don't let them set up Encored Nasty Plots/Calm Minds. It also seems like a decent Raikou stop, Encoring then switching to Dugtrio. It seems plausible, but probably wouldn't work as neatly as it does on paper.
Encore is too easy to predict and nothing stops them from just switching to someone else or from them just attacking shuckle...shuckle is a good temporary counter but its just like all the other encore pokemon... also shuckle lacks a reliable recovery move outside of rest...the raikou counter sounds really good then...encore then switch to duggy, that sounds like a good strategy
Defensive poliwrath with Encore/Hydro Pump/Brick Break/Ice Punch is one of the better encore users right now, since it has the threat of running something other than encore. Alakazam is also good at encoring, but is likely to die to every pursuit user along the way.
Here's a little gimmick that functions pretty well in the metagame:
Umbreon @ Leftovers
252 HP / 252 SpDef + SpDef Nature
Payback
Wish / Moonlight
Psych Up
Heal Bell / Baton Pass
With Raikou, Mismagius, and Cresselia running sub CM all over the place right now, this set can be pretty useful. Umbreon would beat Mismagius anyway, but the other two can be troublesome. The trick is to let them get the substitute up first, then switch in Umbreon when they use Calm Mind. They are likely to attack since they have a sub up, so you'll get their boosts. You can let Cresselia get a few before coming in, since even Boosted Signal Beams aren't doing that much. The main draw of the set is that this Umbreon can beat all of these boosters either at lower health or with more boosts than the standard Umbreon, and doesn't have to worry about losing to certain Cresselia sets. If you use Baton Pass, however, there's a whole new element, as you can pass the boosts you aquire to something that can sweep with them, such as a Raikou or Cresselia of your own. You can also stop Curse users such as Registeel and Cradily, by following them to +6 / +6 and then passing to something like Sub Punch Aggron, who can use Magnet Rise and Focus Punch to foil many Curse users. Losing Heal Bell is a shame, but Wish + Baton Pass has some nice synergy at least.
Overall, it's probably not as good as the Curse set, but it does better against certain threats that are currently all over the place.
Umbreon @ Leftovers
252 HP / 252 SpDef + SpDef Nature
Payback
Wish / Moonlight
Psych Up
Heal Bell / Baton Pass
With Raikou, Mismagius, and Cresselia running sub CM all over the place right now, this set can be pretty useful. Umbreon would beat Mismagius anyway, but the other two can be troublesome. The trick is to let them get the substitute up first, then switch in Umbreon when they use Calm Mind. They are likely to attack since they have a sub up, so you'll get their boosts. You can let Cresselia get a few before coming in, since even Boosted Signal Beams aren't doing that much. The main draw of the set is that this Umbreon can beat all of these boosters either at lower health or with more boosts than the standard Umbreon, and doesn't have to worry about losing to certain Cresselia sets. If you use Baton Pass, however, there's a whole new element, as you can pass the boosts you aquire to something that can sweep with them, such as a Raikou or Cresselia of your own. You can also stop Curse users such as Registeel and Cradily, by following them to +6 / +6 and then passing to something like Sub Punch Aggron, who can use Magnet Rise and Focus Punch to foil many Curse users. Losing Heal Bell is a shame, but Wish + Baton Pass has some nice synergy at least.
Overall, it's probably not as good as the Curse set, but it does better against certain threats that are currently all over the place.
It's tempting, but it won't break Raikou's sub, which means he can pressure stall you out of it. I guess if you had Baton Pass you could just pass away at that point, but Payback seems safer. I guess it's worth a shot if your team has Raikou covered, though.
From just a few days of laddering I have to say this is probably the most fun UU metagame I've ever been a part of. Cresselia, Frosslass and Porygon-Z, while probably the 3 most threatening pokes in the tier are not tearing through teams like they are advertised (from my experience).
Back when the big 3 were crobat, shaymin and honchkrow every other team had 2 if not all 3 of these pokes and the entire metagame was centralized around setting them up or countering them. While its still really early that sort of centralization doesn't seem to be happening.
Back when the big 3 were crobat, shaymin and honchkrow every other team had 2 if not all 3 of these pokes and the entire metagame was centralized around setting them up or countering them. While its still really early that sort of centralization doesn't seem to be happening.
This. Ever since the period started I've been using CM Cress of some sorts, and quickly fell on CM Sub. With 216 Speed EVs and Timid, it can set up on/revenge kill Venusaur and many more. A speedy sub lets it surprise many, and enough SpA EVs let it OHKO Absol with a +1 Signal Beam, when most don't even expect it outspeeding, and therefore not using Sucker Punch. Psychic/Signal Beam/Calm Mind/Substitute gets about 2 kills per match on average, and has been sweeping teams rather often. It does need Registeel and Steelix out of the way, but that can be done by the rest of the team.
IMO... you cannot compare to metagame's 'brokeness'. It is case by case.
What I was wondering is that after have 10,11,12, or maybe even more BL Pokemon. Is there a point that we decided that it is time to retest? Looking at the larger scope of things... there will always be top tier Pokemon and refusing to ackowldge that is foolish. I know that we've had discussions before about the slippery slope effect of banning and new things becoming top tier (and possibly dub'd broken).
I don't think that we should keep 10 Pokemon banned without thoughts of retesting.
What I was wondering is that after have 10,11,12, or maybe even more BL Pokemon. Is there a point that we decided that it is time to retest? Looking at the larger scope of things... there will always be top tier Pokemon and refusing to ackowldge that is foolish. I know that we've had discussions before about the slippery slope effect of banning and new things becoming top tier (and possibly dub'd broken).
I don't think that we should keep 10 Pokemon banned without thoughts of retesting.
92 HP / 200 SpA / 216 Spe Timid right? I can sure attest to the effectiveness of that. Never actually saw a Steelix while using it, but with Registeel I found that if somewhat weakened beforehand I could boost up and kill it with a Sub still intact, as not even Shadow Claw breaks Subs without a crit. Still better to deal with it by other means though, for more reliability.
Just theorymonning here, but do you guys think that Curse Registeel would do really well in this meta? It can beat Dugtrio, Absol, Missy, P-Z, and probably Cresselia. Not to mention that it gets the recovery that it desperately needs in this metagame.
It also doesn't immediately roll over and die to to Arcanine, although it doesn't do anything notable back to it :(
It also doesn't immediately roll over and die to to Arcanine, although it doesn't do anything notable back to it :(
216 Speed, yes, but I remember running calcs for KO'ing Absol after SR and just settled with 188 SpA. 104 HP / 188 SpA / 216 Speed. Does your spread gain any advantage, or is it fine this way or that? Both don't really matter, though I think added SpA is more usable, even if it's a small ammount.
I just went for 101 Subs then poured the remainder into Special Attack, given that attacking is the main focus of the set. Besides, you may encounter an Absol coming in on Sub with less HP than that (SR + Spikes for example), and the extra Special Attack would give you a better chance of OHKOing without a boost in some situations.
Yes I think that's the best spread. The HP gets you 404 HP, the speed gets 286 to outspeed +nature base 80's, and the rest goes in Special Attack, which is only 13 points below what it would be if you maxed it out.
If you don't care about Chansey or Registeel, though, 252 / 252 works pretty well too.
I think Cresselia was sent down to UU to show people what it would be like if their exaggerated claims about Raikou were true.
I'm using SubSeed Sceptile on my sand semi-stall team, and it works wonders, even with sand taking away lefties recovery. I'm running a 0 IV no EV spread in HP with max speed and special attack to maximize lefties gaining, and I can heal up 16% health per turn on most bulky pokemon (usually it's bulky pokes that come in on Sceptile) and up to 25% on things like Chansey.
The teams also kept me consistently in the top 10 in the last week or so even though I have had loads of homework and all-region to practice for. It's also the first time I've broken 1600 CRE in my Pokemon career. Part of it might be me becoming better, but a big part is just the dominance that sand brings atm. Sand beats just about everything right now. I think I've said that in previous posts.
Sandstorm is something I never want to face cause' of two potential Pokemon that could single-handedly rip your team apart: Cacturne and Cradily. There is nothing you can do when you miss your attacks on Brightpowder Cacturne. If it manages to get behind a Substitute and a single SD then your screwed. Cradily on the other hand doesn't need luck involved but its just hard to take down because of Suction Cups. Its something you don't prepare for everyday. Sand is taking a rise in usage, and when good players have their hands on it, sand really becomes dominant imo. thank god i never ran into many
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