Alrighty here ends another ompl, although sadly this will be the first time I won't be in the final week.... mostly cos we got well and truly thrashed by a definitely better krows team, riding the absolute forces that jrdn and friso have been this tour in theyr respective metas. (I also ranked them 1st for camo and nfe iirc when cata asked me to rank so ez bop.) But yeah congrats to the krows, and gl for finals! I really like corvs and spindas too, but I gotta back my favourites here soo..... KACAW
Now for my team dump for each week followed by my overall thoughts on the tour and some individual s/o's:
Week 1 vs Quantum Tesseract:
G1:
-
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1099665587
G2:
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https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1099676419
G3:
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https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1099689132
Ok so week 1 of an ompl is always the hardest imho,
especially this ompl, because its also a brand new gen and basically brand new dlc with a just recently banned mon in zera (like days before ompl started) so like there really is 0 reference point for where the meta truly is at. This is why I actually requested a bo3, because I backed my builds as probably still being better than QT's, but I thought over 3 games I was further decreasing my odds of just being caught out by something I didnt really consider 1 week into the tour. I was pretty happy with all 3 teams I brought, and they all did really well in the tests I had that week, so I felt pretty good about this series, despite obvious first week nerves.
My g1 team was built around a broken innovation which was mixed dragon rush sflo draga, which basically broke everything if you got the predicts right and hit your rushes. I paired that with another strong breaker mon in the form of magic guard lo mixed Luke with np steel beam, which again can go ham on most cores. Snorlax was my check to triage mons like kiss, as well as many special attackers like drei and garde and kyurem, whilst also just being really strong in the meta as a wincon late, and jirachi was a cool noivern answer, being a neat scarf set to catch people out with scarf ice punch, whilst also giving you trick utility to cripple teams cos trick is kinda broken when you dont expect it. Finally to round out the defensive core I had a really cool scrappy lugg which checked most physical attackers not named terrak, whilst giving me guaranteed hazard removal with spin, and hard af hitting body presses, and to pair with this I had a bounce mew which gave me nice resists and bounce is just generally quite good.
My g2 team was some rain HO which felt really good, because I managed to pair this archetype with the (at the time) broken wishport clef, which gave a play style which usually struggles in breaking down more bulky teams because mons are frail and can get chipped long term, suddenly a match up advantage vs those same bulky builds. This is because clef allows you to basically freely reset multiple times, making the team which screams cheesy offence, actually be one of my most solid teams. Swift swim rotom and specs tinted prima were the rain benefitters, and they feel really damn good under rain, whilst draga here was some anti triage and base speed control out of rain, and mew was a nice pivot and lax/ph cm prima shut down with gastro acid + tp.
Finally my g3 team was built around this broken magpull mew set which is: uturn, imprison, infestation, transform, with grip claw.... which trap kills every corv and rachi. This paired with noivern feels fucking amazing, cos those mons are usually a team's only true noivern answer, so once theyr gone noivern goes ham. The rest of the team was fairly standard, with lo dazzle rak for triage mons as well as setting rocks, bounce corv for hazard removal, and checking noivern and being my bouncer, doublade to check lax and terrak, and finally grimm as just a nice wincon vs loads of builds cos it hits so hard.
All 3 games were pretty self explanatory, and pretty lopsided as g1 and g3 my team's mu was just super strong, and g2 my mu was iffy and I pulled the trigger on ferro a bit too early. Aesf neatly summarised this series
here.
Week 2 vs Sabella:
-
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8almostanyability-495937
Ok so I wasn't overly sure what to bring for sabella, mostly because I was fairly sure geerat was doing most of the building, and I was well aware that geerat wasnt really sure about the meta either, so there was again a large scope of variance. However I did notice that the previous week sabella went with some standard-fish bulky offence, with a triage sweeper in the 6th slot, which like the same archetype he loved last gen, so I was fairly confident that was gonna come up again most likely. Therefore I was set on bringing dazzle scarf terrak which I viewed as the best anti-triage mon in the meta at the time of this week, while also just being generally good speed control. I also felt really good about my rain from g2 vs QT, so decided to just swap the draga for dazzle scarf terrak (with megahorn for triage celebi) and go with that. Because the matchup was a bit rough in that g2 I didnt even really reveal any of the rain team anyways, so I felt safe on that matter. This ended up paying off as the matchup was very good, and even though I did needlessly throw prima out by forgetting mirror coat was a thing, the dazzle rak ended up working perfectly and nabbing Sabella's sweeper kiss which was a threat otherwise, and the game progressed smoothly from then. This team actually still works in the current meta, although clef doesnt really shine nearly as much post draga meta. I wrote a slightly more in depth analysis of this game in the week 3 thread
here (although there wasnt that much more detail ngl).
Week 3 vs Dragonillis:
-
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1108022944
Ok so my thought process for prep this week was pretty simple as far as I can remember. I wanted to force the issue and try and outplay drago, whilst being resistant to cheese HO, cos the French players seem to love weather style cheese offence, so the conclusion I came to was to bring some anti-ho HO, with moldy hazards mew, scarf noivern, and adapt grimm being the 3 staple mons on it. The rest of the team was fairly standard gap filling - drago gave me some nice anti-triage + speed control + pivoting in the same slot, rachi was because I needed a special pivot for mons like noivern or intel or Kyurem which otherwise just picked and banded adapt terrak was just a really strong breaker I liked in that last slot that really capitalised on hazards going up, cos it breaks through dauntless mew and hippo with sr and t-spikes up.
As for the match, I ended up getting it spot on, as drago brought some rain HO, which looked very similar to a team id seen before, so I was fairly sure of a number of the sets on top of it all. T-spike was absolutely massive in this mu, as it shifted the entire game strongly in my favour. Furthermore, rachi being able to switchin to his specs tinted intel (barely) and pivot was huge, as it helped me massively to win the sack war here. I won't comment much more on the match as rozes made a good analysis
here.
Week 4 vs Aesf:
G1:
-
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1112310655
G2:
-
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1112325156
whewww so this was the big one, the first match I had this tour vs another top tier builder, and someone ive always looked up to in the oms community as just an amazing builder and player, and not to mention someone I had never been able to play in a tour before! I cant lie, I was hella nervous for this one and not really sure at all what direction I wanted to take my prep. We went for a bo3 for the hype, but that made the prep a lot harder ngl, as the options for what he could bring were p huge, although the solace I found was that he was probably having similar issues lol.
I ended up being super super pleased with my g1 prep tho, think I read aesf pretty perfectly with this team and the team itself just generally works really well. The team was built around the same broken trap killing magpull mew that I used in week 1 vs QT, but this time paired with both a scarf vern, as well as more importantly a specs kyurem. In this scenario, my noivern was more just my speed control whilst also benefitting of course with corv/rachi gone, but kyurem was my specs adapt wallbreaker, which benefitted hugely if thick fat corv or regenvest rachi are taken out, because those 2 mons are legitimately the only really viable specs modest adapt kyurem switchins in the meta. to pair with this I had another really cool innovation that I was super proud of which was: regen corv with lagging tail. Honestly when I started using this I was so mad that I hadn't been using it before, its actually absurdly good. It allows you to slow pivot around mons like lax and pex freely, which is massive, and on this set I also ran tailwind, allowing you to set a tailwind but then slow pivot out of it, letting something like kyurem or Cobalion in for free with a tw up for a couple turns. I liked this set so much that I proceeded to spam it quite a bit this tour, including on my soon to come g2 team rofl. Coba was just a nice rocks setter and pivot mon which is super hard to check because its such a strong mixed attacker too, and finally the last mon ended up being the mvp and this was flash fire doublade. The reason why I brought this mon is because aesf is one of the only aaa players I know who likes Cinderace, and has beaten me in tests with it before, and also he had started using heat crash lax instead of quake to hit Levi doublades, and finally this serves as a soft check to triage kiss, as usually that mon packs fire blast and will click it vs a doublade, allowing you to potentially kill kiss which otherwise smashes this team.
My g2 team was decidedly less good however, as it was a cool concept, but failed to materialise as a solid enough team. I felt sure that aesf would bring some bulky balance, so I really wanted to build around this really cool breaker core of bisharp and garde - 2 mons that I havent used this tour and generally fly a bit under the radar, especially sharp. The one big decision I made with this team too, was to not have any triage checks, and the reason for that is because in all my previous matches I had a dazzling mon on literally every team, so I thought that aesf wouldn't bring a triage mon this time as it might just be a waste of an ability slot vs me. I turned out to guess wrong here, as he opted to instead bring a more flames triage mon in prima, that beats the dazzling mons that I tend to bring, so kudos to aesf for outprepping me there. The rest of the team was quite standard, and this team is not bad by any means, its just a bit slow and frail, and therefore you have to get a pretty strong mu and play really well.
Geerat had a nice analysis of the games
here, so I won't go into much detail on them, but yeah basically my g1 matchup was really strong and I was able to close that out fairly neatly, and my g2 mu was super weak as I got outprepped on that one, and I escaped that one quite a bit.
Oh I did also make a g3 team if we went to a g3, but that was a pretty shitty team built around snow warning veil mew, and im fairly sure its just a bad team lol.
Week 5 vs Think:
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https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1128753991
Ok so this is a fairly rough untested team, although the replay I linked is actually from g3 from my ssnls match that I just played vs aesf yesterday, because I ended up using this team in that match. I was hella busy this week, and knew I wouldnt be able to play, so I kinda threw this together fairly quickly around some sets that I thought would work vs think. Judging by what he brought, I think this team probably had a solid chance at winning so im reasonably pleased with this prep. The sets that I focused around were primarily this no-rocks cancer ph seismi with knock, scald, gastro acid and tect. The first 3 moves are literally the 3 most aids moves in the meta imho, and make seismi just a nuisance for fat teams to get past, especially with everyone spamming ph prima and lax and stuff. You end up getting tons of free knocks and scalds with burn chances, allowing you to basically chip everything and cancer everything for the rest of ur team to clean up. The other set was this pretty cool work up Cobalion. Coba is really really threatening in this meta, because its one of the few mons that can run a truly threatening mixed set, while having excellent speed too in the current no-draga meta. I was unsure about whether to go sd or work up, but tnm suggested work up which seemed fire to me. Tect is heavily spammed in this meta so you get a lot of free setup opportunities too. I filled out the rest of the team with regen lagging tail corv with tailwind, who's advantages I explained above as I used that exact mon in both my games vs aesf lol, as well as an adapt grimm for lategadme sweeping once everything is chipped and some nice speed control with sucker in a pinch, and a dazzle lo rak with rocks as I needed some triage control and rocks in one slot. Finally I found myself seriously weak to other terrakion's so I filled out the last slot with a standard regen doublade. One think you will notice is a complete lack of true instant speed control, but between think's tendency to usually bring quite fat, and worst case scenario having both grimm sucker and tailwind + slow turn on corv, I felt fairly confident that it would work. The few tests I had, and most recently the match vs aesf seems to confirm that too.
Week 6 vs stresh:
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https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1120611126
Ok so yes, I didnt actually play this match, and the replay is of tnm facing megazard (because both me and stresh subbed out because the week was wrapped) and megazard did NOT bring the team stresh had prepped for me, so in fact this team doesn't look all that favourable in the replay. Also the replay didnt really showcase the real strength of the team. That being said, I was really really pleased with this team ngl. the starting core of this team was I thought really cool, because it was yawn lax + banded weav + sflo chandy. Yawn lax hadn't been brought this entire tour, and has its extreme merits, with its downside being that it reveals you to be mono normal, making ghosts free. HOWEVER, draga was banned and we agreed to no gar for this week, so I wasnt really afraid of ghosts at all this week, and even if they did show up, chandy and weavile fuck those over soooo badly. The other benefit of yawn lax is that it allows you to get weav and chandy in for free, which I thought would be absolutely massive in this game, because that offensive duo seems to absolutely nuke past most stuff provided you can get them in for free enough times. I filled this strong breaker core with a much needed bouncer in spdef pex (also checking ph primarina which was necessary), as well as a hippo which was meant to scout for a bouncer with whirlwind, and then set rocks if you find there isnt one (while also obviously checking mons like terrak and lax) and finally a thick fat corv, which was the one slot I wasnt sure about, because I needed a noivern check and hazard control, and I wanted something that could handle mamo in a pinch, so this seemed like the best option.
As I mentioned a bit earlier, this replay actually wasn't what the game would have been, as stresh prepped an entirely different team, which was fortunate for me as the one mz brought is a tough mu with incin hard shutting chandy out of the game, although lax and hippo are pretty strong in that one regardless. However stresh showed me the team he would have brought and it looked like weav might have won that one as he didnt have a long term check to it, with his best knock switchin being scarf adapt terrak.... although he had a cool drei set which made life difficult for my chandy, and he had a togekiss which might have been able to win late if he played sick.
Week 7 vs Rozes:
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https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1124408340
Yes yes I dodged rozes too, although I was pretty busy with exams this week in my defense. Also, I was pretty scared of rozes loool. That being said, if hindsight was a thing I deffo wouldnt have dodged, because I managed to luck out massively on the prep here ngl, cos the matchup I got vs rozes's prep was pretty amazing, so even though rozes is way better as a player than me, I think this might have actually been free lol. I decided to just go full fucking fat on this build, because again I truly believe that surprise factor wins games, so going for as different a team style each week rakes in loads of dividends imho. Its still a great deal of luck, cos at the top level ur opp is doing the exact same thing but still, it deffo helps lol. But yeah, I started around adapt lo zolt, because imo its one of the most annoying breakers, and ive also never used it on a team or in a test vs rozes this entire tour. Paired with this I slapped on a double ph core of spdef lax, and physdef prima, which covered special attackers like kyurem and drei v well with lax, while covering the menace that is weavile with prima. Again I have 0 ph prima usage so I figured this could work. To round off the core, I really wanted to fit in this super cool conk set: triage black belt with drain punch, bulk up, knock, and toxic. It felt great in tests and seemed to just do really well in the current meta suited for checking terrak and weavile mainly on the physical side. The only really rough mu is bounce mew for conk, and even then you can still knock it which helps a lot in whittling the mew down for zolt to claim it later. Toxic just feasts on the Dshield spam which is great. Now pex I found to be definitely an annoying mu for this core, because zolt can break it, but zolt doesnt wanna switch in on it, and ph prima and ph lax can kinda swap between each other kind of and just like stall out the gastro acids if you decide you wanna play more patiently, however the issue is I needed a mon to get zolt in freely, and to get lax/prima in freely too so that I avoid scald burn chances, so the perfect fit to me felt like the return of my regen lagging tail corv here. Slow pivoting around the pex whilst giving myself some hazard removal and checking noivern all in one slot felt ideal for the team. Finally I needed to cover on the physical side again and rocks, so I went for standard hippo that ive been using the past few weeks, as it scouts for bounce, checks stuff like terrak, bisharp, and grimm, and sets rocks if there isnt a bouncer. Overall team felt kinda meh to play with, because its not really my style to go this fat and slow, but it deffo gets the job done.
In hindsight it was potentially pretty risky, because rozes is the one aaa player ive seen use double gastro acid on teams, but I guess prep wise I got fortunate here, as the double ph core of prima + lax ended up being fairly impossible for rozes's team to break through.
Playoffs vs Aesf:
-
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8almostanyability-1128583380
I heavily procrastinated this prep ngl, and only actually started prepping when we got knocked out rofl, but regardless, this is probably my favourite post draga ban team that ive made ngl, and it worked very well. Ok so I was struggling a lot at this point in the tour, cos my idea well was pretty dry ngl, and I didnt think I would find success recycling stuff especially when most of my teams were illegal cos draga. I ended up going through all my pre-home teams in fact looking for some inspiration there, and found some fire. I ended up building around future sight healing wish triage hat, which is honestly so sick, because future sight paired with nice breakers is super good vs most teams ive found. Furthermore the triage draining kiss is nice for speed control and forces a lot of stuff out giving you free future sights, and the triage-boosted healing wish is so sick for the lategadme if your opponent doesnt see it coming, which incidentally is exactly what happened in this game. I started off pairing this hat with another pre-home set: specs mega launcher drei, which I thought might be really nice as drei isnt really prepped for, and this modest specs set does soo much, doing literally 40-47% to max spdef lax, with a flinch chance on top of that, whilst also having uturn to preserve momentum, and defog for some hazard removal in a pinch. I started off pairing this also with water absorb sd exca, because I really like exca in the post draga meta (especially as we again agreed to a no gar gentlemans) because there arent any ghost types that spin block exca and are faster than it, which makes it excellent hazard removal, whilst also being a super threatening wincon with sd quake and iron head. However, after a few tests it wasnt working, and then I happened to face think and his tinted sd silver powder golis, which I realised was actually a PERFECT fit for this team, and slotted that instantly over Exca's slot. Tinted golis + future sight did amazingly in tests and just generally is such a fire set (apparently aesf literally made the set too so s/o him for that lol). Finally to round off the offensive part of the team I had a standard scarf rocks adapt terrak, giving me speed control, rocks, and solid offensive pressure in the same slot (terrak with a future sight up is also really hard to switch into ngl). Defensively, the first thing I was insistent on is that I avoid corviknight like the plague. This is because whilst I make an active effort to build something completely different each week, literally using a different breaker each week too, the one seemingly constant was corviknight, so I figured if anyone was gonna prep for me that would be the main thing. In fact I was pretty sure magpull was coming too, hence why I avoided steels altogether on this team. I ended up going for elecvally, cos I needed a spdef pivot for noivern and kyurem, and I felt pretty confident with this mon because I have literally never used silvally before, so theres no way I felt he would prep for that. To round it off, I needed quite a bit of role compression in my last slot, and the mon that seemed to fit best was physdef prank pex. I ended up getting super fortunate with the mu here, more so than I expected, as the golis + elecvally + hwish combo just completely won, but yeah was pleased with this team, and its quite fun to play with.
General Thoughts on this OMPL:
Alright so I'll be honest, the only reason I signed up for this ompl with it being shifted up so early too, is because corona lockdown meant I had literally nothing better to do. That being said, the tour did end up surprising me by being quite enjoyable, and I think thats mostly because the aaa meta might not have been ideal, but it certainly felt a looooot better than what I thought it would be like the week before the tour started. Like in that week I straight up couldn't buy a win in a test, none of my ideas were sticking, and I felt like physically strangling the mon zeraora lmfao. However, as that devil mon was banned before the tour started, the meta ended up being actually quite fine imho, like teambuilding was fun for me at least and my ideas ended up working, and I was able to pick up wins, which all in all makes any tour quite enjoyable. I think weirdly enough, the dragapult ban mid tour almost ended up hurting the meta a bit for this tour, because I think teambuilding across the board just took a dip, as no-one really was able to figure out the very drastically different meta for a while. Even now I dont think any of us truly have a lock on the current meta. That being said, the post-draga teams I made still felt good for the most part so it wasnt like the end of the world. I am not the hugest fan of the current gen, but all in all I'm still glad I signed up this ompl! Not sure if I'll ever come back for another ompl, but it my schedule works out for it, I deffo wanna manage a team next time though, thats my next goal for sure.
#freehamhamhamhamhamOMPL2k21manager 
Team s/o's:
OM - Extremely chill and great at managing the team, not to mention came in clutch by attempting to de-stress me every time I was the deciding match LOL. Was cool to team with you for the first time, and we had a great run! I even forgive you for your computer having a spasm in the auction and for missing a few players loooool, but yeah, enjoyed all our interactions this tour and thanks for making a great team atmosphere! :Rawr:
Drampa - Ur hella chill too, hope ur feeling better and things improve irl for u man, stay safe!! Oh yeah, ur great at hyping the team up too!
Plas - GOAT PLAS OMLLLLL think this the first time ive been able to team with you too and deffo lived up to the hype. Was v gassed when om bought u in the auction, and you absolutely banged this tour jeeeeez. Was hilarious getting the weekly pm asking if plas had died this week, only for you to turn up on Sunday out of the blue and smack your next victim up loooool.
Skysolo - Good lord the plas + solo team combo is actually unmatched oml. Ya'll are hands down the best hypecrew you can get in an oms tour, and are a huge part of why I loved our team ngl. Your record is bullshit cos ur straight fire as a player, and I highly rate the fact that you exclusively bring flames new stuff each week. I stand by the claim that you just went easy and played on your phone this whole tour cos otherwise it wouldn't have been fair on everyone else. Also undefeated stab goat
Man I wish I was us south lowkey lmfaooo, but yeah hope we get to team together again sometime, was a blast!
Ho3n - Ur hella cool ngl, sick teammate and amazing at hyping us up too! Also you started the trums trums which was dope, except for the fact that autocorrect keeps making it trump trump :(((( Some of your teams are just straight wild, but I kinda love that, and I think you're generally just really good, just got a bit unlucky with mu's and stuff this tour unfort :/
SL42 - Congrats on a very successful season! Ik this gen you probably felt a lot worse about compared to last gen, but after watching you have a p unfort tour last gen was cool to see you have a solid one this time around!
Mark k - Gotta give credit where credit is due, you were an absolute workhorse this ompl ngl man. Its unfort that it didnt end up translating results wise, but ur camo builds especially seemed decent ngl, I think our camo slot was just fairly cursed :') That being said you were a very chill teammate, and I enjoyed tuning into the aaa channel to see what kind of outlandish set you had concocted this time, deffo put a smile on my face ahaha. I think the prima "noivern check" with that berry + unburden thing tho was the absolute worst LOL.
Chessking - V active solid bh support from what I could see at least, and provided some much needed bh to English translations during sl's matches! Think your own match vs pdt was a bit unfort with ur m2, but I wouldn't beat urself up about that, cos you were still v solid throughout the tour and a positive presence throughout.
The Number man - Honestly ur way too hard on urself man, this was ur first ompl and aaa is pretty damn hard. You won vs mzard despite a tough mu, and lost to think and rozes, 2 players theres literally 0 shame in losing to, and you were a fantastic presence in our cord all tour. Offered help in basically every tier and you were v active all tour, there when we needed a sub all the time, so idt you can ask for much more ngl.
Arctic - I didnt really interact with you at all this tour, but the one time you played, you played fucking sick ngl, was p dope. Shame we literally lost at preview, but was a great showing regardless lmfao.
PurpleGatorade - ngl I didnt even realise you were on our team until this last week ngl lmfao, we prob shoulda launched you into camo cos why the fuck not, might as well try something else cos nothing was working in that slot all tour lol. Ur a solid player tho, and seem really cool!
Other s/o's:
Rozes - lol kinda whack that this one isnt under the team s/o's category cos I swear it basically felt like we were teaming LOL. Like our pms were my aaa channel ngl lmfao But yeah back at you, thanks for being a sounding board for all my ideas throughout the tour! Think this is actually the first time ive ever prepped with you in a tour too, and it was deffo one of the best parts of this ompl, no chance I do as well if I wasnt able to send all my teams over to you and like test a bunch with you. Also sorry for dodging you loooooool, although its kinda ur fault, if you didnt repeatedly smash me in every test match I wouldn't have been as terrified ;)
Rest of the aaa peeps (jrdn, stresh, think, aesf, geerat, tcot) - Ya'll are fuckin sick and my fave part of the om community hands down no contest. Thanks for helping me test all tour, and giving me feedback here and there on teams and stuff the entire tour! Was originally gonna do it individually, but I realised I was saying the same thing basically for everyone lmfao, rozes was the only exception cos I prepped a bit more intensively with him this tour, but yeah y'all are amazing.
Volk, Viv, Andy,Tack, Zesty, Cata - u guys are cool, and I enjoyed chatting and occasionally testing with you all this tour!
Finally s/o to the goons so I can have my likes :)
So to sign off this ompl, in the words of the true legend of oms, tectonic destroyer
TYRANTRUMS RAWR
(Farm League Team)
. I then went with a classic defensive core of RegenVest ElecVally + Dshield Mew which can both handle the majority of the metagame. Lastly, I needed a form of hazard removal + a Gar switchin so why not Bulletproof Exca lol. I also liked how it provided a Volt Switch immunity as well and overall fit the team well.
.
Other shoutouts
Sylveon. 
hamhamhamhamham 
