a loser's OMPL BH Review: Week 4
This was an interesting week of BH with some surprisingly quick games that'll likely cut down on the length of my review (in theory). Let's begin!
a loser vs XxSevagxX
Team preview shows that both sides brought offensive looking builds. In reality, either team could be much fatter than they appear though, depending on what roles the Ho-Oh and Eternatus from each side play. It looks like I've got no great switch-ins for Lunala and like sevag might not have great switch-ins for Kartana, so it should be interesting.
Both sides lead with Eternatus, which could lead to a 50/50 with a Speed tie but sevag clicks Final Gambit and removes both Etern's from the game ASAP. My plan was to tank a hit (hopefully) and click Substitute and then Baton Pass, and stick with this plan by sending out Giratina next. Sevag chooses Lunala, but swaps it for Xerneas as he was likely scared of Spectral Thief but I get the sub on on the switch. I pass the baton to Ho-Oh who tanks a LO Boomburst from Xern and use Shift Gear as the opposing Ho-Oh comes in to take its place. We see it is Prankster as it Parting Shots away to bring in Regigigas who takes a chunk from Dragon Ascent. Gigas breaks the sub with LO Extreme Speed and then dies to Desoland V-create, which allows Lunala to come back in safely. Lunala proceeds to stomach a V-create for 97% and double omni-boost with Simple No Retreat, making it very threatening. Here, knowing I have priority in the back, I sack Ho-Oh and bring in Extreme Speed Xerneas to revenge kill it. At this point, sevag's Xerneas is very threatening to my team with my two best Xern answers gone so he sends in his Xern to face mine and starts things off with a Quiver Dance. Had he known that my Xern couldn't really touch his Ho-Oh he might have made a different play, but my Xern gets enough chip with Boomburst and Extreme Speed to cause his Xern to die from LO recoil after taking out mine. Over the next couple turns, I come out on the right side of a Speed tie and a 50/50 and end up winning cause his Ho-Oh can't touch impostered Yveltal.
This was a fun, quick match. But it was one of the quick matches where a small difference in pretty much every turn could have led to very different results. I was fortunate here to come out on top of the momentum battle and ended up in a winning position.
cityscapes vs Onyx Onix 7
Team preview shows that each player has brought mons they are comfortable with, with city rocking Celesteela and Lunala and Onyx having Dusclops and some lvl 99 guys. Two Dialga is kinda weird because no one on the planet uses this mon in public.
Things get started with a Heatran / Imposter lead, showing that Heatran is strangely running RegenVest and city brings in Tapu Fini to take a Nuzzle. I say strangely because I have no clue what RegenVest Heatran does in this meta outside of improof the Xern and likely Eternatus that Onyx is using this battle. Fini reveals Prankster as it pivots out with Parting Shot while DesoLand Ho-Oh comes in for the stat drops. City sends Chansey back in on a hard switch, meaning that it is most likely holding a Shed Shell, and dodges a Sacred Fire. He then switches out to bring in Lunala, maybe to bluff the held item after scouting that Ho-Oh is running Anchor Shot, while Onyx gets a layer of Spikes up. Both players switch around for a bit and Chansey gets paralyzed as it also gets a layer of Spikes up and then city finally gets the slow U-turn he needed to safely bring in Regigigas to activate its Toxic Orb. It took 10 turns to do this because city didn't have a pivot outside of priority Parting Shot, meaning that he couldn't risk sending in Gigas with moves like Nuzzle and Sacred Fire being tossed around. Gigas clicks Facade as a Rocky Helmet Dialga comes in to take 14%, revealing Fur Coat, and pivots out to bring in Xerneas who now faces city's chipped Dialga. Here we have a pairing that Pixi Xern normally dominates, but Dialga is speedy so it moves first and Anchor Shots Xern while taking nothing from Boomburst thanks to Soundproof. So Xern dies the next turn, which is big considering it pressured a majority of city's team, at least on paper. Several turns later, after we see that Dusclops is the Onyx standard Prankster Parting Shot, city brings in Celesteela who uses Nasty Plot followed by Earth Power to heavily dent Heatran. Ho-Oh comes in to force it out though, and city brings in Lunala and over the next several turns he makes some great plays that pave the way to victory. Lunala, now burned and chipped below half its health, refuses to recover but rather uses Nuzzle and Hex to chip Heatran enough to where it dies from Rocky Helmet chip on a U-turn. Now, Onyx's improof to Etern is gone but he brings it in and reveals non-choiced Adapt that KO's Tapu Fini that catches an untimely full para. I'd think that city would send in Chansey here to attempt a 1v1, but instead he sends in Dialga who gives Etern a Choice Scarf and is KO'd by the Black Sludge it received in return. This allows city to bring back in Celesteela, who is probably his best remaining wincon, and he ends up catching Ho-Oh with Toxic on the switch. This is big cause Ho-Oh is now on a timer and can't stall Imposter or reliably check Celesteela. City continues to make great plays with Lunala by basically refusing to heal up when most players would and this keeps the pressure on Onyx's team that is chipped and statused. This results in Onyx being left with one mon that can't do anything so city wins.
I thought that sl42 played extremely well here, which helped him have momentum all game and ultimately win. Onyx's team wasn't bad, but I thought the Heatran was strange and that his Dusclops use was a bit too predictable. I say this because sl42's Lunala, Celesteela, and Dialga all have methods of crippling and/or breaking past the neutral Prankster users that Onyx tends to favor.
PinkDragonTamer vs sugarhigh
From the preview, it looks like PDT brought rain based on Palkia and Kyogre while sugar brought HO and potentially Final Gambit spam with Blissey and Zyg-C in tow. This seems to favor PDT so far, unless the Blissey is actually Imposter.
Gambit is immediately confirmed as sugar uses it back to back with Blissey and Zyg-C to take out PDT's (non Imposter?) Chansey and Kyogre. This leads to Palkia being sent out to face Kyu-W. Likely expecting Swift Swim Dragon Energy, sugar takes out Kyu-W and sends in Dusk Mane but Palkia just uses Shift Gear instead and sweeps with Fishious Rend. This was a bold play from PDT, but kinda makes sense with two Steel-types in the back to check Kyu-W if it went sideways. PDT might have been nervous about missing Draco Meteor to KO Kyu-W, but other than that he won easily.
Rain is a neat choice from PDT and I think a good one considering his opponent. Sugar's team looks fun from preview, but the lack of priority from either a Prankster or Triage seems like a bad choice for offense. Maybe he was running Belly Drum spam or something, but even so some Speed control outside of Unburden or Triage would be needed.
xavgb vs Quantum Tesseract
At preview, we see that QT changed things up by not bringing Imposter but instead brings triple Dragon, double Steel, and double Ghost. This could be some prep for Zac-C, which stresh has brought every week and also brings for this battle alongside some fatmons and Regigigas. Spectrier stands out here, making its OMPL debut, but it doesn't look great for it at preview.
QT leads Reshiram, which stresh's Chansey imposters and reveals as Scarf Regen with STABs, pivot, and Trick. This confirms that QT was definitely expecting to face Zac-C but I think leading with the Zac-C lure was a mistake. Resh pivots on Chansey to bring in Scales Zyg-C that tanks Dragon Energy and QT doubles out to bring in Zacian-C. This turn is weird to me, cause it leads me to believe that Chansey might be Scarf and gambled the Speed tie and this is backed up a bit by stresh not clicking Dragon Energy again on Zyg-C. Anyway, Zacian-C clicks Grav Apple in front of stresh's Tapu Fini but stresh brings in what looks like FC Giratina who stays in to take a big chunk from Sunsteel. Tina returns the favor though, critting Zac-C while stealing its boost with Spectral Thief. QT goes for the KO here, but stresh smartly switches out to bring in Imposter that is tickled by Sunsteel. While scouting Zac-C, stresh says sapple on accident which was funny, and maybe the highlight of the game for the spectators. QT sends Zac-C back in to face Tapu Fini and stresh boldy stays in, knowing it can at least survive anything that doesn't crit, and ends up forcing out Zac-C after its Strength Sap gets an Encore. This gives stresh an opportunity to pivot in Regigigas and activate its Toxic Orb. At this point, QT's team is in great shape and stresh has two mons with a lot of chip, but at least is getting free healing by bringing Chansey in on Reshiram. Stresh brings in his Zac-C who gets a layer of Spikes up on the Reshiram switch, who ends up missing a Blue Flare on stresh's Lugia that comes in. Lugia clicks Boomburst, revealing an odd choice in Aerilate, and both make some switches that end up giving stresh's Giratina a chance to recover. A couple Court Changes later, QT decides to Trick away Resh's Scarf and we find out that Chansey is Eviolite. To me, this seems like a weird time to do this as Scarf Imposter is still annoying and maybe moreso than Eviolite. Soon after this, we are treated to 69 (haha) turns of classic BH PP stall as Zyg-C is forced to stuggle and opens up a chance for stresh to set more Spikes with Zac-C. It does get a layer up and QT brings in Spectrier off a Volt Switch who uses Nasty Plot and then reveals Prankster as it puts Tapu Fini to sleep before it can move. Stresh sacks Lugia as we see the full set of Moongeist Beam with Boomburst coverage. QT is able to sack his PP-less Zyg-C to impostered horse and brings in Prankster Haze Giratina as stresh brings in Gigas. Gigas starts phazing QT's guys with Dragon Tail until Zac-C gets brought in, which is actually good for QT considering that Chansey is now holding a Scarf. Zac-C ends up taking out Chansey with V-create but this lets stresh safely bring in his own Zac-C that takes out QT's with Anchor Shot. This leads to an important 50/50, because stresh doesn't have any legitamate switch-ins to Reshiram currently but QT is pressured to click Blue Flare just in case stresh doesn't transform with Zac-C. QT does go with Blue Flare as Zac-C transforms to take minimal chip and proceeds to win the Speed tie that severely weakens Resh's damage output. This leads to a Tina vs Tina matchup that stresh comes out on top of thanks to a well-timed Speed tie win after some good rolls. Now, QT doesn't have great options to check Zac-C and can't put it to sleep thanks to the Sleep Clause, and it ends up winning the game.
This battle is a great example of how you could go out of your way in prepping for Zac-C and still lose to it. Two-thirds of QT's team had methods of getting past Zac-C and each of these mons fell to a Zac-C in some fashion.
Metagame Observations
It is hard to imagine making observations about a metagame that is now drastically changed, but one thing I know for sure is that the high Xern usage last week will stay high now that Zac-C is gone. Etern also saw higher usage this week and this will also be high for the remainder of OMPL. Offense was very prevalent this week and led to faster games, but I'm not sure if this will hold up just yet with the potential of Zac-C being gentleman'd out of the week. I also want to mention that Rocky Helmet has been seeing lots of use lately and is putting in some real solid work.
Upcoming Matches
a loser vs xavgb - honestly who the F is stresh fart and where does he get these teams that win every single time and how come I've never seen him play a single gen8bh ladder game??? Wish me luck.
Smove_$wag vs XxSevagxX -
Onyx picking up his third loss in a row QT playing MnM leads to TTTech taking the reigns. His ice cold mixtape is pretty solid ngl, but honestly I hope he and
Onyx QT can build something new and cool cause they're going to need it to be ready for sevag.
PinkDragonTamer vs cityscapes - most of us have seen what PDT is capable if you give him even an ounce of momentum, and this should make you nervous. However, city has a big edge here as long as he brings his A game.
Apathetic Inaction vs MAMP - this should be an interesting game. Not sure what to expect from MAMP here, but one can only hope that MAMP shows up this time, reignites their passion for BH and starts dominating us again, and posts a video review of their game to show off the amazing voice. Might be some wishful thinking here though.
Edit: Looks like I got TTTech's team wrong so disregard what I said about him building with Onyx