Another week down, another M Dragon win, and another post of mine taking a lot of words to describe the ubers games this week.
Soulwind vs London Beats
Soulwind has opted to go with HO. Shuckle is the lead of choice, putting both Rocks and Sticky Web on the same mon. Yveltal and Necrozma-DM are here to both provide their undoubtable offense, but also provide a sturdy backbone to Calyrex-S, Eternatus and Xerneas, which can otherwise be a big issue for HO builds to handle. Calyrex provides a spinblocker for emergencies against a random Excadrill (hey FC is on London's team, you cant rule it out) or Cloyster HO or something, but its mainly here to act as as a wincon, with Nasty Plot shenanigans sometimes letting it muscle past Yveltals. This is more conditional than it sounds, with Sucker Punch and Snarl Yveltal both making that task near impossible, and it will still always be revenge killed by Marshadow or an oppoing scarf Calyrex-S. Rayquaza and Urshifu here look to overload on the physical spectrum with Necrozma, collectively smacking their way past any Tangrowth, Skarmory or Buzzwole that might try to blanket check them. Urshifu also plays an important defensive role as a backup check to Calyrex, letting Yveltal act more freely in preventing defog in the early game, while Ray provides a breaker that is essentially impossible for most teams to comfortably switch in to, as well as strong priority to keep threats like Xerneas and Zekrom from getting out of hand.
Meanwhile London has gone for more of what we're somewhat used to this SCL, with Lando-T + Kyogre + Marshadow. It is very similar to the team Poek brought last week, overloading a (theoretical) Eternatus as a soft check to both Marshadow and Kyogre, while relying on Lando-T and the big 3 to last for long enough to outplay with his offensive mons. That bulk is necessary in this matchup to withstand the hefty offensive pressure Soulwind is looking to put on him.
Looking at the matchup, if Soulwind can keep his hazards up, he looks to have a fairly good time, with the webs making Eternatus and Marshadow unable to revenge kill Rayquaza or Urshifu, Yveltal getting overloaded, and Necrozma/Kyogre not actually beating anything on Soulwind's team 1v1 aside from the suicide lead. This all flips if the hazards can be removed though, as suddenly Eternatus and Marshadow will beat down Soulwind's team fiercely, and Soulwind doesnt have the bulk to take the game slowly at all. Marshadow's Sneak is also a very useful tool, even when Sticky Web is on the field, as it stymies Soulwind's Calyrex and Necrozma-DM's sweeping ambitions.
In the game itself we see Spout Kyogre being forced out by Red Card Shuckle, bringing in Yveltal. Lando-T comes in on the Encore, before revealling itself to be the Defogger. It gets Encore'd into this, with Soulwind deciding to capitalise on the Defog to try to force progress with Rayquaza. Personally, I dont agree with this, I feel like the Webs were too valuable considering that Defog would run out of PP long before Sticky Web, and as discussed before, without Webs up, London's team looks incredibly threatening to Soulwind. Anyway, Rayquaza SD's on the switch to Yveltal, before Yveltal shows itself to be very fast and U-Turns out of the dangerous situation, breaking what is likely to be a Sash on Rayquaza. Without Sash, Rayquaza fears a fast Foul Play destroying it, and Sash Ray is used as a stopgap on these sort of teams to prevent opposing setup sweepers from getting out of hand.
The Necrozma-DM is sack'd to the V-Create from Rayquaza, given that it is clearly the least useful of London's mons, before Kyogre comes out to threaten Ray with the idea of a Scarf Ice Beam. The Shuckle is sacked to the Ice Beam before Urshifu finds out the hard way that this Kyogre is actually not Choice'd, and it dies to Origin Pulse while doing 70% to Kyogre. Yveltal clicks Knock Off onto Eternatus, removing the Rocky Helmet and chipping itself slightly in the process, before going into Necrozma to exploit the Eternatus as it simply recovers back to full health. Soulwind doesnt want to just be easily responded to, and doubles to Rayquaza, but instead of going to Lando-T, London opts to go via Yveltal, which is now able to U-Turn again freely. Instead of taking needless chip with his Rayquaza, Soulwind goes back into Yveltal, and London chooses to go to Marshadow to punish this, with Yveltal now in range.
London has gone for Low Kick over Close Combat on Marshadow. I didnt talk about it much when Poek brought it last week, but the reason for Close Combat over Low Kick appears to be mostly inertia. Close Combat was the clear superior choice when Marshadow was first introduced to the meta with the DLC release, with things like
Quagsire and Mandibuzz being used frequently, as well as Dynamax still being allowed (Low Kick, and all other weight based moves, fail on Dynamax'd mons), and after it was the standard for a long time people didnt bother changing the 120 base power STAB move. But in the current meta, there is almost nothing taking less than 120 base power Low Kicks that you wouldnt rather use your Ghost Stabs against anyway.
Anyway, knowing that the Fighting STAB was coming out, Soulwind goes into his Calyrex and forces out the Marshadow. Sneak will prevent Caly from ever sweeping, but Marshadow is too useful for London to let it go just to bring Calyrex down to its sash. Knowing this, and knowing how behind he is in the matchup, Soulwind goes to Necrozma to catch a plausible Eternatus pivot. Instead he is forced to go Yveltal on London's own Yveltal, getting further chipped by U-Turn as Marshadow does the same dance again, Low Kicking on the Calyrex switch in and going into Yveltal, as Calyrex reveals it isnt actually Sash by clicking Sub. SubSeed Calyrex-S is less of an immediate wincon than Sash-Calyrex, it doesnt blow through teams quite so franticly, but the it can kill balance teams that rely on purely Yveltal to take on Calyrex.
London's Yveltal then reveals it is Scarf, making Subseed Calyrex almost pointless, as it will always be outsped and KO'd unless the Sub is up. Seeing this, Soulwind goes into his own Yveltal to recover some health back and not instantly lose to Marshadow, KOing the Kyogre and revealling it to be a Metronome Kyogre. London then goes into Marshadow, before going into Eternatus, trying to force out Yveltal. I'll come back to why this didnt work the way London thought it would, but it comes down to timer trouble and the calc.
Etern then Sludge Bomb's uselessly on the Necrozma switch, before he loses his Yveltal to the Necrozma, allowing Marshadow to come in on Necrozma and set up with Bulk Up and threaten to sweep, depending on rolls and Life Orb recovery. Soulwind tries to Pivot around a little and rack up Life Orb recoil, trying to force Marshadow to make predictions regarding what was coming in. It proves enough and Marshadow dies to recoil taking out the Yveltal, leaving Calyrex to clean up the endgame.
One of the key turns in this sequence was Marshadow clicking Low Kick to KO 34% Yveltal instead of Spectral Thief. Yveltal took 29% from the previous turn's Sneak, and that extra turn of Life Orb recoil from failing to KO Rayquaza in one hit was what Soulwind needed to take home the W. But why Low Kick instead of Spectral there? Long story short, London was in significant timer trouble, frequently going down to sub 20 seconds throughotu the game, and he trusted the calc to not mess up. This comes back to when he tried to force Yveltal out despite it being at 84% and took the extra damage on Eternatus and letting Yveltal recover back up to full. This is what he was seeing in the calc.
Close Combat above it shows the real roll, but due to an error in the way the calc applies Technician, he believed that he was threating Yveltal with a guaranteed KO. On Rayquaza? Spectral Thief and Low Kick look like they do basically the same damage.
An unfortunate way for him to lose the game, I believe he would have played it very differently had he realised the calc was applying an extra modifier to his moves, and that he was actually weaker than he thought he was. All props to Soulwind though, if he got one of those Life Orb turns wrong, he lost on the spot.
Poek vs M Dragon
We won again!
TrueNora vs Icemaster
Nora has brought a bulky balance build, with Xerneas and Zekrom providing him the offense. Ho-oh is great at covering a wide variety of underrated threats, and it just says alive forever while dishing out respectable damage and normally forcing status onto its targets with either T-Wave or Sacred Fire. Nora has dropped Eternatus again, with this game marking the 3rd time he has been involved in a game without Eternatus in the tour.
Icemaster meanwhile has gone for a HO team, opting for Sticky Webs as well, but with Slurpuff over Shuckle. Slurpuff is generally more reliable at getting up the webs and maintaining them, but can be exploited more easily than Shuckle through things like sub Xerneas and Ho-oh. The rest of the team is very standard looking for a HO team. Upon writing that sentence I thought 'wait it looks incredibly standard' and went to see if it was a sample, but no, the webs in the Sample teams has an Eternatus instead of a Groudon. Groudon doesnt pressure the Defogers quite as well initially as Eternatus, with Meteor Beam threatening to outspeed and OHKO both Ho-oh and Yveltal, but Groudon isnt stopped from threatening them if its item is used up, and it provides a different type of offense for Nora to have to play around.
This HO matchup looks... incredibly in Icemaster's favour. Lando-I outspeeds all of Nora's team and either OHKOs or 2HKOs all of them, leaving Nora with very little wiggle room to play around it. Yveltal can live a hit, but in doing so would be so weakened that Calyrex-S would almost instantly win, and Nora's Groudon response appears somewhat sketchy. Meanwhile, Nora's team is also very slow. Ice cant tell for certain on preview that it isnt Scarf Xerneas, but if it is Geomancy (which it is), all of Calyrex, Yveltal and Lando-I all outspeed Nora's entire team, and even Groudon has decent odds of doing so with enough speed investment, given Nora's propensity for slower Yveltal.
Ice switched up his style and got fully rewarded for it in a game where Nora couldnt really do much from preview. Yveltal crit the Ho-oh to KO it at one point, but at that stage of the game it was mostly over anyway. I wont do a turn by turn recap of this one, because this matchup is so skewed in Icemaster's favour that I dont really think its worth going over. Very good prep on his end, and a very solid win as a result.
64 Squares vs Reje
64 has opted for HO too! 1 single use of HO all tournament, then 3 in the same week. He has gone for Shuckle over Slurpuff, and I'm going to cheat a little bit here and explain why based on what he was talking about after the game. He made Weavile Focus Sash with the intent of leading off with it in every game. From that framework of "I'm going to counter-lead what they want to lead expecting my suicide lead with my Weavile", Shuckle makes a lot more sense than Slurpuff, as it has the bulk to take one hit from most mons even if rocks are up, to try to get Webs up later on in the game. It also compresses both Rocks and Sticky Webs to the same mon, while Red Card I prefer here (with it not being 64 Squares's actual lead choice) because Mental Herb doesnt matter as much, with the mons that would taunt you being forced out by Weavile, and it prevents something like Zekrom or double dance Groudon from sweeping in a pinch. The rest of the HO team looks normal, Yveltal and NDM mean you dont get swept easily by Calyrex-S and Etern/Geoxern respectively, Calyrex is a dedicated wincon, as is Zekrom.
Reje felt like going for a very similar team to Byron, who played before him in real time but whose replay we are covering next. While it was the same 6, not all of the sets were the same, and I'm not sure if the Xerneas in particular is the same innovation that Byron brought so I'll save talking about that for his game where it was revealed, but the idea is that you have a very sturdy defensive backbone, then run Magnezone + Xerneas to trap NDM and sweep with Xerneas. Instead of Darmanitan on the usual Magnezone build, reje (and byron) have opted for the extra defensive security of Lunala, shutting down the Ground Types that otherwise have a decent matchup against that structure.
With this HO Matchup, Shuckle will be able to get and maintain the Sticky Webs in all but the most dire of cases, giving 64 a lot of room to try to execute his offense. In saying that, 64's Lunala and Magnezone are both annoying to his team, with Magnezone potentially shutting down Necrozma depending on moves, and most likely beating Zekrom 1v1. Lunala and Yveltal also being boots means Reje has the tools to survive the offensive onslaught. Weavile is also cursed, it relies on the damage provided by Triple Axel, which is unreliable at the best of times. If it hits every Axel in this game, 64 Squares wins almost on preview, but it would need to get 3 hits on Triple Axel against 3 seperate mons, while being at +2 attack and having webs up. Not an enviable position to be in.
Interestingly on turn 1 we see that 64 Squares has gone for Pickpocket as his ability of choice on Weavile. Personally, I dislike the danger of Pickpocket, especially with a Sash Weavile that he intends to be his lead. Picking up the Black Sludge from an Eternatus while clicking Triple Axel just means Weavile dies for almost nothing, and the same applies to other items like Choice Scarf/Choice Specs which limit Weavile's effectiveness. Anyway, 64 sees the Magnezone lead and flees, as he doesnt want to eat the Body Press or Paralysis for no reason. Magnezone clicks T-Wave on the Shuckle and Iron Defences on the full para. Body Press then activates the Red Card and Lunala comes out, forcing Yveltal in from 64 squares after he manages to get the Webs up. We see Hex from Lunala on the Yveltal, doing negligible damage on the switch, before Reje eats the Oblivion Wing with his Lunala to burn the Yveltal. It is Life Orb Yveltal, probably mixed with Rock Slide to prevent Ho-oh from defogging, but the threat of a Life Orb Dark Pulse brings in Eternatus, just barely avoiding the 2HKO. 64 tries to suicide his Shuckle away with Final Gambit, to get lasting chip on something, but Reje goes Lunala, knowing that the worst that can happen to him in that situation is rocks going up. Indeed Rocks go up as Lunala gets back to full health, Shuckle takes a hit trying to die, and then 64 goes into his Yveltal, preserving his Shuckle for death fodder later, but taking 31% from hex, leaving it at just 16% after that and burn damage. Enough that a single Life Orb + Burn turn would knock it out.
Recognising this, and recognising that his Necrozma doesnt really matter in this matchup, reje goes into Necrozma on the expected Oblivion Wing to deny Yveltal any recovery, while 64 Squares just accepts his Yveltal's death and fires off a Dark Pulse, doing 62 to the Necrozma. Weavile comes in and picks Necrozma off with a Knock Off. Xerneas comes out, confident in its ability to take on Weavile, as 64 knocks off the Power Herb on the first Geomancy turn, and SD's on the second. The Knock Off damage actually reveals this Xerneas is incredibly physically bulky, but once again I'll talk about why with Byron's game. 64 then misses the Triple Axel, not even getting a single hit off in the process, while being outsped by Xerneas firing off a Moonblast. That Axel was a roll to KO unless I've recreated the EVs wrong, but even 3 hits does not look like a roll in Weavile's favour. Weavile then switches out, trying to be useful later on against the still alive Lunala/Etern/Yveltal, and Shuckle is finally let go.
Necrozma-DM then comes in and immediately KOs Xerneas with Sunsteel Strike in exchange for half of its health. Life Orb weakens it further, and rather than preserve it 64 Squares lets it go against Lunala. Weavile forces Lunala out, because losing its item would effectively lose reje the game against the Zekrom on the spot. 64 doesnt take advantage of this with an SD, but that is a very hard move to click when you dont KO Lunala. It could have won him the game if every Axel hit, but that relies on every Axel hitting, and knowing Lunala wont die its an incredibly risky thing to go for, when Reje might just attack with Lunala anyway if he recognises he loses if Weavile SD's. Knock Off was guaranteed progress against something for 64, SD was not. After Eternatus goes down, Magneton kills the Weavile, taking a huge chunk from Low Kick in the process.
With the Magnezone weakened so, 64 Squares opts to go into his Zekrom to try to beat it down, not wanting his Calyrex to eat a Thunder Wave. A healthy Magnezone has a decent chance of 1v1ing Zekrom thanks to Iron Defence, but this is not a healthy Magnezone so Reje goes immediately into Lunala, with Bolt Strike breaking Shadow Shield. 64 DD's up, with Zekrom poised to sweep... and Bolt Strike misses and Zekrom dies. Lunala then prevents Calyrex from Nasty Plotting, and Yveltal takes on the sash Caly 1v1 pretty comfortably to seal the win.
64 did not get the rub of the green in this game. He played it very well, and put himself in a winning position, only for Bolt Strike to do Bolt Strike things. Luck tends to even itself out over time though, so he'll probably bounce back next week against Poek imo.
Exiline vs Byronthewellwell
Exiline has opted for an offensively inclined balance build, with Rayquaza breaking for Zygarde to try to clean up lategame. Xerneas provides a cleric and another wincon, with GeoXern firmly back in vogue. Xerneas itself has been unleashed to a certain extent this tour, despite opinion of it being low at the time of SCL starting. The VR hasnt updated since then, and Xerneas is sitting sandwiched between Ho-oh and Blissey, below a fair number of mons that it has thoroughly outshone so far this SCL. On the rest of Exiline's team, the Eternatus is heavily SpDef invested, and likely has some form of counterplay to the Kyogres that try to exploit Eternatus, because the rest of Exiline's team folds in half at the sight of a Kyogre. Zygarde offers the defensively solid wincon it always has, while suring up the Marshadow matchup and spreading Paralysis for Rayquaza to exploit.
Byron's team, like Reje's, has Magnezone + Xerneas as well as a lot of fat. He has opted for a very sturdy defensive core to support the somewhat cheesy Magnezone + Xerneas. For most of the team, read what I said about Reje's team. Darmanitan was dropped because, in a blast from the ORAS past, Byron (and probably Reje) have opted for Block Xerneas as the partner. This ensures that if Necrozma-DM is the switch in, it cannot double switch out to avoid being trapped by Magnezone, and it can potentially trap other things that try to pivot in on Xerneas, attempting to dodge the Magnezone that could come in. Block Physically Defensive Xerneas can also trap weak attackers and set up to full on them, unless they are a ghost type and can switch out but its not like Xern would try to set up on them anyway.
Byron leads Yveltal and removes Exiline's Zygarde's leftovers, with Zygarde exchanging this for a Glare on Yveltal. Byron then slow pivots in Xerneas, before going into Marshadow to see what Exiline's initial response would be and baiting that he will be trying to catch NDM on the switch in. Eternatus appears to be Exiline's first response, with Byron going into Necrozma-DM to absorb literally any hit from Eternatus, and to scout out and see what set it might be. Exiline doubles into Ray, unwilling to cede the momentum in a game like this, because if he doesnt play proactively around Byron's threats, he will lose. He's actually had to play the Magnezone matchup already this season, and won a terrible matchup due to him having the momentum in that game.
Unfortunately Lunala is the sturdiest check around to things like Banded Ray, and Exiline Dragon Ascents for damage on Lunala. Seeing Dragon Ascent, instead of roosting and ceding momentum, Byron opts to go into Necrozma to paralyse the initial switch, get his rocks up and start making progress on that front. I'm surprised he clicked Twave first instead of Rocks, with Zygarde well out of range of being 2HKO'd by any of Byron's moves, but it works out and Yveltal gets paralysed for Exiline too. A quick back and forth happens, with Exiline removing Necrozma's Leftovers and the rocks it set up, before he tried to go Rayquaza on the turn Byron set them back up only to eat a Sunsteel Strike for his troubles, putting Ray on even more of a timer. Exiline V-Creates on Eternatus, bouncing off of it and forcing Rayquaza out again, and highlighting the biggest flaw that Ray has.
As a breaker, Ray has few equals. Staring down a Rayquaza with something slower than it is terrifying unless you have a full health Lunala, or are a maniac and are running something like Lugia. However the user of Ray must use the correct breaking move to actually make progress. V-Creating a Necrozma-DM makes it drop, but V-Creating a Kyogre puts you on one hell of a back foot. Same in reverse with Dragon Ascent. And its speed is not quite enough either, with Eternatus almost always able to take one hit and force Ray out. Dragon is a terrible type to lock yourself in to compared to Fire or Flying, after all.
Anyway, Eternatus forces Rayquaza out, as Exiline's Eternatus comes back in, expecting Recover so that Byron's Eternatus can do exactly what it did again later on. Byron absorbs the Mystical Fire with Xerneas, before scouting for Sludge Bomb with Necrozma. Mystical Fire sures up Exiline's weakness to Kyogre somewhat, letting him deal with it via dropping its Special Attack enough that Exiline can force it out with Ray + Yveltal. But Mystical Fire and Sludge Bomb is not a very common set, with Toxic being a lot more common to force passive damage on mons like Yveltal, Marshadow, Kyogre and Calyrex. Indeed, Mystical Fire + Sludge Bomb Eternatus will lose to SubCM Kyogre fairly consistently. But now with that information, Byron is feeling confident that Xerneas can win, as he recovers health with his Necrozma and goes into his Yveltal on the Zygarde, trying to get the slow U-Turn into Xerneas. He gets this, hits Eternatus with Block, and Geomancies up to +6 and wins the game, avoiding losing to full paras from a desperate Necrozma-DM. Because its Physically Defensive Xerneas, Sunsteel Strike into Extreme Speed would not have KO'd Xerneas.
0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Sunsteel Strike vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Xerneas: 236-282 (51.7 - 61.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Choice Band Rayquaza Extreme Speed vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Xerneas: 108-128 (23.6 - 28%) -- 91.1% chance to 4HKO
Technically Xerneas was a little less bulky than that, but not to the extent that the rolls were different enough to be impactful.
Closing thoughts for the post, HO had a really good week. It was in a very favourable position in 64 Squares vs Reje, and it won in both of the other games it was used in. I'm of the opinion HO is quite weak in this meta as a whole, but SCL has seen a lot more Specs Calyrex-S than it has Scarf, and Scarf is the set that murks HO more than any other set. I find HO to be a lot fishier than any other playstyle right now, so I tried to break down the matchup itself more than normal. It strikes me that that would be a good thing to do in every match, but I'm already 17,000 words deep in this thread only doing it three times, so thats a No from me. I'm trying to break down the teambuilding and to a lesser extent the in-game decisions, not write a thesis for my PhD to graduate from Smogon University.