Research Week Mk.III #6

Mazz

Mazz

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Welcome, UUers! It's time for a fresh instalment of Research Group!

Keep the following things in mind during every Research Group:
  • Be open-minded, don't just say something is terrible and walk away; look at its stats, movepool, and typing and think something up!
  • Feel free to theorymon early in the research period, but make it clear you're doing so. Later in the period though, you will be expected to back up your posts with hard evidence like logs, actual sets, perhaps even teams.
  • Just because an analysis has been done for a Pokemon doesn't mean there isn't more to explore; it's very likely that something has gone unnoticed.
  • Do not post in this thread complaining about the Pokemon I choose and/or suggesting ones we should do for future weeks. Feel free to VM / PM me these suggestions, but don't expect me to always listen to you.

This Week's Research Pokemon:

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Shaymin | Amoonguss | Golurk​

How useful are these Pokemon in UU? What sets can they run effectively? What gives them trouble? What advantages do they have over other Pokemon? How well do they work in the metagame? 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. Remember, discussion is not limited to this topic, you are encouraged to talk about these Pokemon in #genvuu as well!

The Research Group Challenge:
In order to participate you must do the following:
  • Post here with a fresh alt and the name(s) of the Pokemon you will be using.
  • Use at least one of the Pokemon being researched.
  • Post your experiences with the Pokemon you're using, participate in the discussion!
  • Upon the midpoint, post your PS! ranking via a screenshot and feel free to continue discussion on the Pokemon you used.

The first stage of the challenge will be very relaxed so theorymon will be allowed as long as its backed up by good reasoning. During the later stage, discussion will be expected to be backed up by hard evidence, such as teams, actual sets, and logs. The winner of the challenge will be the person who has the highest ladder ranking on the Pokemon Showdown UU ladder on the alt they registered at the time the challenge ends. If you win, you will receive temporary hops on #genvuu, but you may only claim your prize if you actually participated in the discussion. Winners will also receive a permanent spot in the Underused Hall of Fame!

I'd like to stress the point that upon signing up, you should also engage in some sort of discussion regarding this week's selection of Pokemon. This project isn't entirely a ladder-only project - it's designed to provoke discussion and creativity in the tier. Also, don't forget to post a ladder ranking next week or count yourself out of week 7.

Current Participants:
 
Yeah this thread needs to get it jumpin'.

Pokemon: Golurk + Shaymin
Alt: Bat Mannington

Golurk's gonna be a tough guy to build around as he requires some decent amounts of support, but Shaymin's pretty fun to use when you don't miss like 6 Seed Flares per game. Lol. My goal is to have Shaymin annihilate the bulky waters who annoy Golurk to no limit. I'll post some sets a bit later
 
KatsnJase said:
I'm a nub at this...are we supposed to try to come up with some sort of original set?
Click to expand...

Yeah, just test the Pokemon listed, see how good they do. We're also supposed to have some discussion, which we're kinda lacking atm...so I guess I'll take the plunge.

Right now I really like Shaymin as a strong contender, even on other teams I've had, offensive Shaymin does pretty nicely on teams that appreciate bulky waters being eliminated, so partners like Chandelure, Darmanitan, Victini, and even generally hard-hitting attackers who don't like taking a Scald, such as Heracross, Mienshao, and Cobalion appreciate its support. In past times, I've found myself disappointed with Timid Life Orb Shaymin's damage output...even though it's at a good speed tier with Timid nature and manages to get past some things with the extra speed, I've found it barely getting 2HKOs on a lot of potential targets, and thus being dealt with immediately after. As weird as it sounds, I've actually preferred Modest in this department. Granted, I've used it on teams that had relatively speedy Pokemon so Shaymin can afford the extra power, but the fact it hits that much harder is just amazing. Also, Psychic on Shaymin is a godsend. If you don't care much about Hidden Power Ice, I honestly suggest Psychic over Air Slash as Psychic's got perfect accuracy, and hits just about everything Air Slash can hit for solid damage. As a plus, it also decimates those Crobat switch-ins if you predict right. And nothing's funnier than KO'ing a Roserade switching in on a Seed Flare after the SpDef drop before it gets a chance to do anything in return.
 
I haven't made an alt for this project, but I've coincidentally been using Golurk lately so I thought I'd comment on it. On my team, I was looking for a good SubCM Raikou check that didn't get owned by Fighting-types. I also wanted a Stealth Rock setter. The main candidates were thus Golurk and Nidoqueen. I wanted a Specially Defensive variant because otherwise SubCM Raikou would be too hard to stand up to. Unfortunately, this takes away from Defense, which would make my team rather weak to fighting attacks from the likes of Mienshao and Heracross (Nidoqueen doesn't take them that well at 252 HP/0 Def), so I used Golurk. Golurk is really nice because even with this SpD investment it just counters Mienshao all day. It also spinblocks, though my team regrettably doesn't take much advantage of this capability. It doesn't care too much about Hitmontop (useful on the ladder, near useless against good players), and can even take a few Scalds from Blastoise, though it has a bit of a hard time spinblocking that. So from what you see here, you can gather that defensively, Golurk's niche is as a spinblocker who can check both Sub CM Raikou and Mienshao (and some others) a bit more effectively than Nidoqueen. Here's the set I used:

Golurk @ Leftovers
252 HP/252 SpD/4 Spe Careful
Trait: Iron Fist
-Stealth Rock
-Earthquake
-Shadow Punch
-Ice Punch

Alternatively you could use No Guard over Iron Fist and DynamicPunch over one of your punches. It's mainly useful for trolling Snorlax.

This set was used on a defensive team, so I didn't give it any Attack investment (it really needs all the SpD it can get), but it's surely good as an offensive tank as well, perhaps even with a Choice Band equipped.

This post was fairly centric to my team but I think by describing its role and the reason for my choice I gave a good picture of one of the jobs it does better than anything else.
 
Well, I don't know when this thread's gonna be updated again but I finished MY "week" of Research Week, cause it's been over a week since I made my post, lol. Anyway, as I said, I was testing Golurk and Shaymin. And I finished with an astounding record of: 1527 ACRE, (Glicko2 of 1649) and 11-9 W/L on my Bat Mannington alt. So yeah basically my rating sucks lol. But either way I had some fun with it, I liked using Shaymin on a couple of my other teams and figured Shaymin would work on the team I was using as a means to kill bulky waters for Golurk. I picked Golurk because I love Ground-types, and Golurk has one of the coolest designs among Gen V Pokemon. Anyway, as for movesets...This was my Golurk's moveset:


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Lurk Moar (Golurk) @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Fist
EVs: 8 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SDef / 244 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Earthquake
- Focus Punch
- Ice Punch
- Substitute

The goal of this Golurk set, first, I wanted to use something a bit different. I didn't want to use a standard Stealth Rock tank as listed in Golurk's UU analysis, so I decided to try a funny SubPunch Golurk set with some custom EVs. Max Atk and Adamant nature to hit as hard as possible, 244 Speed EVs were added to outspeed Gligar. Yeah, basically just Gligar, and most other bulky, slow Pokemon. So basically all uninvested base 85s get speed crept on by this Golurk. 4 SpDef EVs were for download users (Dat Porygon2), and everything else left was dumped into HP.

I know it's redundant coverage to run Earthquake and Focus Punch on the same set, but I honestly found myself kind of...disappointed, I guess, with Shadow Punch, even if it is STAB with Iron Fist, it still wasn't putting in a ton of damage. I often just used Earthquake against most Pokemon who could handle Focus Punch. Idk, maybe I would go back to Shadow Punch, it's the more recommended option. Ice Punch is a staple on this set, as once again, it was designed to outspeed Gligar, who is 4x weak and thus 2HKO'd. Not only that but it can force those Roost mindgames with Gligar, and in the meantime I could possibly get in a free Substitute on it.

Even though I kind of failed at applying the strategy (Because I'm not totally used to using Golurk, lol) the idea is if it can't find a slow bulky Pokemon to setup a Substitute on (Especially if they're using Toxic), then Golurk can come in quite affordably on Heracross and Mienshao (watch for the rare Night Slash and HP Ice, though) and setup a Substitute as a switch is forced. I also found that Iron Fist boosted Focus Punch can seriously do massive damage on a good portion of the tier, though the team I had this on wasn't fully offensively oriented, and thus no Spikes to help soften foes up, this time.

As for the cons, as I said before I'm not totally used to using Golurk, so I often had moments where I forgot to bring it in against certain Pokemon, or situations where I ended up losing simply because I misplayed Golurk. This set is very high-risk, high-reward, almost to the definition. There's times where I end up either being forced to sack Golurk (mostly against fast, hard-hitting teams that it can't afford to switch in against), or I end up completely demolishing my opponent if not getting a couple surprise kills. Not only that but even with this much investment, Golurk's Speed stat is still pretty bad as the spread given hits 207, and that's 8 points away from being maximum investment on Adamant nature. Not only that but Golurk's typing is a two-edged sword, both offensively and defensively. Golurk's got a strong STAB Earthquake and immunity to Fighting and resists against Rock and Ground moves, meaning it's able to wall the main coverage moves of most Fighting-types in UU (inb4 Scrafty/Sucker Punch Hitmontop), but it's got a lot of exploitable weaknesses, namely Grass, Water, Ice, Ghost, and Dark, on top of the fact that aside from the ones I mentioned, Golurk's resistances are otherwise lacking, which holds it back defensively. At times these flaws are what let Golurk down on my team, that and the fact it has trouble beating out a lot of physical walls and bulky waters. Now, as for the Shaymin set I was testing...

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Shayla (Shaymin) @ Life Orb
Trait: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 SAtk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Modest Nature
- Seed Flare
- Earth Power
- Psychic
- Rest

This set is pretty fun to use, and pretty straightforward. Offensive Life Orb Shaymin, as stated in my last post, I wasn't a fan of the damage output you got from Timid, so I chose to go for Modest for maximum power, and I didn't mind the speed loss. Seed Flare is that powerful STAB you should always use with Shaymin, Earth Power helps hit Steels and Fire-types, while Psychic is my preferred coverage move over HP Ice or Air Slash. I didn't really care for HP Ice, as Gligar isn't a huge nuisance for my team (lol Golurk) and Air Slash's coverage is almost identical to the coverage you get with Psychic. Psychic also hits Crobat switch-ins much much harder than HP Ice or Air Slash ever could, and it helps Shaymin to deal with things like Hitmontop and such. The only thing is this Shaymin set is highly vulnerable to Honchkrow...But other than that, I've used it on other teams (one somewhat similar to the one I used for this), and it did its job pretty nicely so I can't complain.

Anyway, that was my very first Research Week experience ever, so how bout you guys? (If this thread ever comes back to life, we should be on like Week #8 going on Week #9 by now, lol)
 
Ok guys get ready for the best rank ever! 1358 ACRE, 1487 ± 83 Glicko2, and a W/L of 8/12! lol it wasn't the best rank ever but still

Ok guys here is the set:

Go lurk (Golurk) @ Leftovers
Trait: No Guard
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Adamant Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- DynamicPunch
- Shadow Punch

This is a good set that I'm using, setting up Stealth Rock and confusing with DynamicPunch. EQ and Shadow Punch are STABs. The EVs are pretty straightforward, maximizing bulk and power. Golurk was not the MVP on my team, but it was a great SR setter and a good counter to the best revenge killers in the tier(Heracross and Mienshao). This was really fun and I hope to do this again!
 
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