Research Week #4 (Crawdaunt, Pinsir, Eelektross)

Texas Cloverleaf

Texas Cloverleaf

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Research Week retruns with another installment, with several interesting Pokemon up for grabs. I'm sure you'll have have lots to say on these three!

Research Week looks to investigate Pokemon that have potential in RU, be it in stats, movepool, or supporting their team, to serve as an innovative choice in today's metagame. These are Pokemon that, for the most part, remain relatively untested. I've selected 3 Pokemon I feel, with help from everyone else, could see the rise of new and powerful sets, or the fulfilment of a particular niche. Perhaps the title is a bit of a misnomer; in fact, this installment (and likely future ones) of Research Week will continue as long as the discussion does, and that's where you all come in.

If you have anything to say about any of these Pokemon, please post about them! It doesn't matter if you've used them or have just faced them in battle, anything is fine (but please, do try them). Just be sure to back up your posts with good competitive reasoning!

-Be open-minded, don't just say something is terrible and walk away; at least look into them and see what options they may be able to utilize!
-Feel free to theorymon, but make it clear that you are theorymon'ing. At the end of the week, however, I want discussion to move towards how useful the Pokemon actually are in RU, and what sets are effective on them.
-Just because an analysis has been done for a Pokemon doesn't mean there isn't more to explore; it's quite possible that something might have gone unnoticed or is missing.
-Do not post in this thread complaining about the Pokemon I choose and/or suggesting ones we should do for future weeks. I want discussion to stay on topic about the 3 Pokemon we are "researching". Feel free to VM / PM me these suggestions, but don't expect the next research week to have all the Pokemon you suggested, or any of them.

So, the 3 Pokemon we will be looking at this research week are Crawdaunt, Pinsir and Eelektross
crawdaunt.png
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pinsir.png
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eelektross.png


How useful are these Pokemon in RU? What sets can they run effectively? What gives them trouble? What advantages do they have over other Pokemon?

Discuss; the discussion that come out of this will surely be illuminating! Don't forget, you're not just limited to this topic to discuss these Pokemon. The #rarelyused irc channel is a perfectly suitable place to discuss them as well. At the end of the discussion period, I hope we can reach a general consensus on how good these Pokemon really are, and that we might find some interesting discoveries.


Alright, now that that's out of the way we can get to the fun part of this. First up, Reasearch Week will now have a duration of roughly two weeks. The reason for this is as follows:



The Research Week Challenge:
  • Users will use one of the research week mons on their team
  • The user(s) that have peaked at #1 with a 1450+ rating before the end of the two week period will get temporary status (hops) in #rarelyused
  • Users will be expected to post their experiences with the pokemon they use
  • If they do not participate in the discussion they will be passed over
The first week of the challenge will be open for initial speculation on how one of the Research Week Pokemon will fare, previous experience with the Pokemon, or even just to say that you will be participating in the ladder challenge and on what alt (mandatory, new alts are required). The second week is where I expect the main discussion to occur and to heat up. This is when you can post battle logs, experiences with your team on the ladder and generally how a Pokemon has worked out for you.

Remember, if you are peak at #1 on the ladder before the end of the round with at least a 1400 rating you will get temporary hops in #rarelyused, which can become permanent depending on your track record. (If you already have hops+ we'll work something out)
 
Omg fuck yes I love you texas

Crawdaunt!! <33

Also loling @ SilentVerse right now

I'll get an alt later or something :o

mmk forgot my alt, it's: -hai-
 
Well, then, I guess I'll be the first to give Elektross a try. Should be amusing.

Alt: MrKrabbs

EDIT: Yeah, Elektross sucks. Gonna try Crawdaunt
 
Omg fuck no why would you pick Crawdaunt Texas ahhhhh.

My personal hate for Crawdaunt aside, Eelektross seems to be the most interesting Pokemon out of these, so I'm going to ladder with it:

Alt: Eelectricity
 
I have been using crawdaunt relatively well, but in most games my hitmonlee ends up doing more work. Can i change sets?
 
M'kay, so I tried SubCoil Eelektross for a bit, and it was honestly pretty lackluster. I had to run 124 Speed EVs to beat Sandslash, as otherwise I'd just get Toxic'd by it as I tried to Substitute against it, but without maximum Special bulk, it's Substitutes kept breaking against most walls. Slowking's Psychic, Tangrowth's Giga Drain, and Roselia's Sludge Bomb all could consistently break Eelektross's Substitute, which basically only allowed it to set up on random Ground-type attacks. However, it also required a ton of entry hazard support, and the problem is, Eelektross is just so slow that most Rapid Spinners can just sacrifice themselves to spin the hazards away, or Sandslash just comes in and spins since you can only hurt it with Dragon Tail, which allowed other mons to beat Eelektross. Actually, I would rather use something like SubCoil Serperior over SubCoil Eelektross, simply because it outspeeds Rapid Spinners and can actually KO them with Leaf Blade, while retaining somewhat similar bulk. Sure, its a lot weaker, but when you're already boosting your Attack anyway, I think that its extra speed would be much more useful. Eelektross wasn't always bad though I guess, since there were a few times that it managed to sweep, but ehh, I just didn't really find it that great. It just requires so much support; entry hazards, removing stuff like Tangrowth who are going to wall you no matter what, removing the opponent's Rapid Spinner, etc that it just didn't feel worth it.

Now I will see how the special set does, and hopefully it does better than Eelektross's SubCoil set. I will post back later with my thoughts on it.
 
Time to post my experiences

So I was using Pinsir and tried out the following set on both an offensive and defensive team.

Pinsir @ Lum Berry
Mold Breaker
252 atk / 252 spe
Swords Dance / Earthquake / X-Scissor / Close Combat

So PInsir is pretty much an awesome stallbreaker, as Mold Breaker nullifies a lot of abilities that could harm you, such as Levitate, Mummy or Sturdy. After a Swords Dance its quite powerful, and its base 85 speed means that it can easily run through defensive teams. The Lum berry allows it to a) set up on threats like Tangrowth and b) take random WoWs without an issue.

However, Pinsir had a really big problem with opposing Ghosts. While it could beat Misdreavus no problem thanks to Levitate, it would lose to the common Cofagrigus, as well as Dusknoir, due to its inability to overpower them. Along with the fact that Pinsir is both frail, and SR weak it made a sweep difficult. Furthermore, it really only got a chance to set up once in a match, meaning that any scarfer would force it out, especially after a Close Combat, making it near useless the rest of the way.

I used it in both a defensive team, to take advantage of its ability to beat stall, and in an offensive team, to take out pokemon such as SlowGrowth; and while it functioned reasonably well in both teams, it never shined primarily due to its frailty giving it little occasion to switch in.

Overall, Pinsir is a decent Pokemon, but nothing spectacular in my experiences using it.
 
Im pretty busy with irl stuff right now (college finals suck) but I want to give pinsir a try

P over H


First thoughts

Choice Band (Jolly, Mold Breaker) Superpower, X-scissor, Stone Edge, Quick Attack

Very average for a choice band user, hits hard enough for sure, but it really can't take hits well enough and the weakness to all entry hazards make this set very hard to warrant use over other Choice Banders. I prefer Muk


Swords Dance (Jolly, Mold Breaker, Life Orb) X-Scissor, Swords Dance, Earthquake, Stone Edge.

Now we are talking. This hits hard. Unfortunately the item choice is a big issue here. (Lum Berry makes it harder to power through certain walls such as Dusknoir and Cof. LO leaves it very vulnerable to status) I'm not a big fan of Lum Berry on something that is so easily forced out. I've found Pinsir's bulk hardly worth protecting so Life Orb just fell into place.

Unfortunately I just can't see a big enough reason to use this over Scolipede in the case of both Choice Band and Swords Dance. (the higher speed more than makes up for Scolipede's lesser attack/attack options in my opinion)

I'll keep trying stuff out. I'm thinking of trying a SR, SD, x-scissor, SE set next.
 
Alright guys, its been roughly a week so i expect to see posts here and discussion on irc. So far I've seen very little of either which makes me disinclined to consider victors. Remember that you are expected to be discussing on irc as well as making posts in here and laddering.
 
I've tested out Crawdaunt, and it works marvelously with paralysis support. As long as you can eliminate fast threats such as Choice Scarf Manectric and Scyther, and get it in on something you can set up on, such as Spiritomb, it's pretty much gg from there. Crunch / Waterfall is really all you need, nothing outside of Ferroseed / Poliwrath walls that combination. Qwilfish can't stop Crawdaunt if it has managed to get a DD up, because it can simply use Substitute while Qwilfish futilely Taunts or uses Thunder Wave. From there Crawdaunt can do as it pleases. The tough part about using Crawdaunt is that it is so frail on the special side, as most neutral, and even some resisted special attacks will break its Substitute. However, Crawdaunt is really quite powerful with Adaptability. The only thing that really gives me trouble is OTR Cofag, since my team isn't really built specifically to counter that mon. I usually have to play carefully, and make sure hazards of some sort get up, as +1 Crunch from Crawdaunt fails to OHKO 252 HP Cofag iirc :/
 
I ran DD Crawdaunt in RW and it was pretty effective although it didn't live much up to its potential. 1 thing I like about Crawdaunt is that even status can't stop it I can't tell you how many times I've got burned or paralysed and still dented everything in the team tans left the remainders for others to pick up. the reason why it wasn't successful is that most of the time it didn't have the bulk to facilitate a sweep even with its counters gone it still can't take powerful neutral hits well. That's the experience I had when i used the Crayfish
 
Ok I've played a bit with Pinsir (using the set Texas posted) and it's just dead weight on my team. Most of the time, it just ended up being death fodder. Being Stealth Rock weak and having a lot of common weaknesses in general, I found that Pinsir has a hard time sweeping as its longevity is seriously limited. Things like Cofagrigus, Scyther, Moltres, and a few others cannot be touched by Pinsir, while other Pokemon such as Mandibuzz and Sandslash could take a hit and retaliate with a super effective attack. While I do agree that Pinsir is a good stallbreaker, its base 85 Speed really hinders its ability against offensive teams. Many things such as Rotom, Rotom-C, Sigilyph, and Lilligant were able to come in and KO Pinsir after some prior damage from Life Orb and Stealth Rock. Pinsir was a real letdown :(
 
I got to 1300 (currently 1301) with eel which is a big accompllishment considering how lazy i am. Plus, the ladder was / is really dead so finding battles was difficult. eel, was pretty cool using volt switch / grass knot / flamethrower/ thunderbolt but was really too slow. The only times it shined was after TR Cofagrigus died. Its not a terrible pookemon but it is not one i would use on a standard RU team considering Rotom C bascially does its job ten times better
 
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