Metagame Shared Power

KaenSoul

FuegoAlma
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I think it makes more sence to ban quick feet, special attackers dont have as many options as physical attackers when it comes to general damage and quick feet + psychic terrain is what really put the team structure over edge as pretty much every other speed control ability is banned or restricted, so unless you get a beast boost in speed, play trick room or prank tailwind those teams are going to outspeed everything.
Outside of like punk rock, most of what special attackers use is also avaliable for phy attackers and trying to break ice scales is already almost impossible, removing flare boost would make any special oriented team unviable, meanwhile removing quick feet actually increase the offensive counterplay instead of just the defensive one that is already pretty good.
If Guts has been banned Flare Boost should be too. If anything it’s worse since you can use Intimidate to lower Guts users attacks, in combination with Quick Feet you’ve got a free Scarf and Specs on your entire team
Is not like Defiant isnt a thing.
 
I don’t get the sentiment of banning Flare Boost like it’s also Guts.
Special Attacking teams have far less than the Physical counterparts. Aside from Flare Boost, Mega Launcher, Grim Neigh, and Competative, there is nothing exclusively benefitting Special Attackers.
You also have to factor in that Flare Boost only boosts SpA if your’re burned, not when ever you are statuses, and you need Drifblim for it. The former is especially important as Physical attackers with stacking of Adaptability+Tough Claws+Hustle Guard+Ratio+ect. could be handled better with Will-o-wisp.
Guess what stops that counter?
Guts!
With Flare Boost, you at best get Adapt+Sheer Force+Mega Launcher, Frostbite from PLA doesn’t exist, and even if it did, Flare Boost wouldn’t just counter that since it gets boost only from burns.
Oh and there is no special version of Facade where you get a free 140 BP move boosted further by all those physical abilities.

So just to recap:
-No Fire types benefit from it
-Less stacking available
-Requires worse Pokemon than Guts
-Lot easier to bypass/counter than Guts
-Is for special attackers, which is generally worse than physical normally
 
To add to the previous points, Flare Boost (and special attackers in general) are more unilaterally checked by Ice Scales, while physical attackers can get around Fluffy with non-contact or Long Reach. This coupled with the relative lack of boosting options for special attackers has contributed to Flare Boost not feeling broken to me
 
I'd like to share a gimmicky team I made a while ago. The idea was to have as many on hit abilities activate as possible. So at max power you get iron barbs + rough skin + gooey + flame body + cursed body, with fluffy for more bulk. Not the most consistent but I still think this team is fun, obviously folds to special oriented teams.

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Leech Seed
- Protect
- Knock Off

Garchomp @ Life Orb
Ability: Rough Skin
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Scale Shot
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge

Moltres @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 248 HP / 164 Def / 96 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Roost
- Defog
- Flamethrower
- Scorching Sands

Bewear @ Leftovers
Ability: Fluffy
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Darkest Lariat
- Close Combat
- Double-Edge

Dragapult @ Leftovers
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Dragon Darts
- Dragon Dance
- Phantom Force
- Substitute

Goodra @ Choice Specs
Ability: Gooey
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Fire Blast
- Surf
- Sludge Wave
 
Sturdy seriously needs to go, since it is very challenging to play around for every playstyle bar stall which is already dumb enough
I hate to be repetitive, but Sturdy is pretty easy to play around even without stall. Skill Link’s prominence along with switch moves and just outright switching to a better matchup speak to this. Hazards also come in to play to an extent against non-boots sturdy mons. Check out my previous posts to read a bit more in-depth on how to deal with Sturdy.
 
Hi, sorry if this has been brought up somewhere in the thread already,
but should Wonder Guard really be kept around in this?

Ah, I see that Shedinja is already banned.
 
I hate to be repetitive, but Sturdy is pretty easy to play around even without stall. Skill Link’s prominence along with switch moves and just outright switching to a better matchup speak to this. Hazards also come in to play to an extent against non-boots sturdy mons. Check out my previous posts to read a bit more in-depth on how to deal with Sturdy.
:skarmory: Sturdy is bypassed by Skill Link, Rocks, Priority, Piviot Moves, Passive Damage, and just any kind of chip in general. Study feels kind of all-or-nothing to me, as you either run Boots + Terrain on your entire team and likely not be able to break all that well, as even Adaptability doesn’t outdamage Fluffy/Ice Scales. On top of that, you can’t ever account for every Cloyster and Skill Link Mons on the opposing team, or even manual weather.
You know what else counters Sturdy? Necrozma. Specifically its move Photon Geyser.
Necrozma seems like an underrated pick in this metagame. It offers Prism Armor for bulkier set up teams and can be a good stall breaker since it can just ignore Ice Scales and the inferior versions of Prism Armor. It's also a huge threat to Pex with Prankster, probably one of the only things that would stop a Necrozma Sweep.
 
I've been trying to branch out a little with my builds this time around (partially out of boredom, partially to lighten up the prankster dbond ban sentiment because I was the only person to run it anyway lol). Shared Power allows for such creativity in the builder and yet 75% of ladder is scizor/Durant/crawdaunt/doublade phys spam. So here's a creative and really successful team I've been brewing with a fun concept I haven't seen here before: prankster copycat!

:politoed::vaporeon::dubwool::klefki::heliolisk::sirfetchd:

Rain-based stall has a bunch of benefits; it gives mons full recovery that otherwise wouldn't have access to it, provides significant passive recovery without equipping leftovers and provides full status immunity. This really broadens the scope of which pokemon are usable defensively and makes it quite a lot more flexible than other defensive team structures. Here I use said flexibility to provide a considerable offensive presence for a stall team with prankster copycat - if you move last, as you tend to on stall, you can use prankster copycat to repeat your last move as a priority attack next turn. The main abuser here is Dubwool, who can set up a priority cotton guard and then sweep with a priority scrappy Body Press, courtesy of Sirfetch'd. This is brutal vs the phys spam teams on ladder and very hard to deal with without a crit-based set up or some well placed Sacred Swords. Vaporeon is another copycat user, able to throw out priority rain boosted scalds. There's other benefits to copycat too - switching in on enemy hazard setters and using copycat to set up your own is one of the key ones.

The rest is more straightforward. Klefki provides necessary bulk with screens (an underrated way to bolster defense imo). It also walls a bunch of stuff with its typing + dry skin and a Klefki with recovery is as annoying as you'd imagine. Politoed helps break enemy stall, perish trapping but also abusing scrappy Seismic Toss and binding band whirlpool for very high unavoidable passive damage, to break through the stuff that wants to u-turn on you. Sirfetch'd is chosen over other Scrappy mons because it turns out Meteor Assault is non-contact lol, so you can get a substitute up on stall and go ham ignoring Fluffy. Heliolisk is just a fast and strong mon that's useful vs offense, since it can eat aqua jets, bullet punches and shadow sneaks and hit back hard, and now you even get scrappy Hyper Voice to hit dragapult!

As with all teams in this meta it has some holes. Crit teams are tricky and you'll be relying on the offensive rather than defensive presence of the team against them, and special teams with Infiltrator Dragapult can be problematic too. But overall it's really solid, I've made it to #2 on ladder with it, and it's really, really fun. Give it a shot!

 
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Hi! After having a lot of fun using Skankovich's rain-based stall (Skankovich's Prankster Copycat Rain Stall) I wanted to make a team featuring my favorite weather: Sun! The team ended up having a very different style of play when compared to Skankovich's team.

Shared (Solar) Power:
:Torkoal::Heliolisk::Dragapult::Blacephalon::Tapu Lele::Nidoking:

Solar Power is one of the only helpful abilities you can use under the sun, so I built the team around it. With sun up, solar power gives the same boost as flare boost while also allowing you to retain your item slot. Overall, the team can be quite fun to use, but it does have some issues. For example, it can really struggle against sturdy. I use Stealth Rocks on Nidoking to help combat this weakness and provide sheer force for the rest of the team. Opposing teams with Fluffy + Flash Fire + Ice scales are also tough to play around, specifically if they have Blissey or another specially defensive normal type. I prefer Torkoal as the drought user because it allows you to spin away rocks and sticky webs which can really hurt the team otherwise. Solar Power, Choice specs, and Sun can boost Blacephalon to absurd levels of power; there are virtually no safe switch-ins unless the opponent has flash fire or drizzle. Running double Choice scarf usually catches people off guard and also serves to combat other fast offensive teams. Infiltrator Dragapult helps counters screens and prankster + substitute teams which could otherwise attempt to stall you out due to the solar power chip.

As I said before, the team is quite fun to use. I hope you'll give it a try!

Ps: Any suggestions are more than welcomed!
 
Following in line with the previous weather team, I've built a decent version of manual sun.
Whimsicott @ Heat Rock
Ability: Chlorophyll
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Sunny Day
- U-turn
- Taunt
- Energy Ball

Whimsicott is a surprisingly good sun setter. Almost everyone expects it to be prankster, so you can play some mind games there, and sun+chlorphyll almost always makes your pokemon move first for the next 7 turns. The rest of the set is mainly filler, Taunt can put in work, U-Turn if you read a switch, and energy ball for some chip damage.

Blacephalon @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Beast Boost
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Flamethrower
- Psychic
- Shadow Ball
- Dark Pulse

One of the main sweepers, Blace get's its speed boosted by Chlorophyll, and sun boosted flamethrowers are no joke. Once you get a boost under your belt, Blacephalon can sometimes just auto-win if you've set up well. Shadow Ball hit's most things that Flamethrower doesn't, whil the other moves can hit super effectively on other things. A lot of people also seem to think that this is scarfed, so you can switch to a coverage move to bop their switch in.

Juan (Spectrier) @ Choice Specs
Ability: Grim Neigh
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shadow Ball
- Dark Pulse
- Mud Shot
- Hyper Beam

The other main sweeper of the team, Grim Neigh compliments Beast Boost quite well. Spectrier outspeeds everything bar scarf Regieleki when the sun is out, and specs shadow ball deals mad damage to anything not normal typed. Once Ghost resists are off the table, Spectrier can often clean up entire teams.

Skarmory @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Sturdy
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Spikes
- Body Press
- Roost

Skarmory is generally the best lead, as you can set Stealth Rock, which can be critical for breaking sturdy. As well, Skarm has a very good matchup against Lycanroc, who is a common lead on physical spam teams. Body Press does surprising damage, and can catch surprise K.O.s against Crawdaunt, Lycanroc, and other frail attackers. A lot of players will try to switch in their abilities while you set up spikes, which body press can heavily punish.

Tapu Lele @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Moonblast
- Energy Ball
- Focus Blast

I was getting beaten frequently by priority spam with an earlier version of this team, so I decided to add Lele. Not much unique about this set, but HDB can preserve sturdy for a revenge kill, and if you hit a Focus Miss Blast, then basically everything takes solid damage from Tapu Lele. Psychic Terrain is the main draw though, not getting revenged by priority is very nice and can help unpick many teams.

Armaldo @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Stealth Rock
- Knock Off
- Sunny Day

Probably the weirdest thing on the team, Armaldo has great utility. It helps keep rocks clear to preserve sturdy on Spectrier, can set rocks itself, can knock off to annoy things, and can reset sun for a short period of time. One of the biggest boosts, however, is Swift Swim, which completely turns the tables on Rain teams (both stall and offense). Rain stall was giving me a lot of trouble, but the speed boost can be pivitol in helping Blacephalon defeat Heliolisk.
This team does surprisingly well, with a few counters that are tricky to play around. Ice Scales is very annoying to deal with, but once you nab a K.O. with both Beast Boost and Grim Neigh active, not much is standing up to a shadow ball or flamethrower. As well, good players can sometimes prevent a Stealth Rock form going up, which can threaten sweeps later in game. With careful play, however, this team can perform very well.
 
Posting some of my favourite teams from this fun format. Not all these teams are good but they were all fun to make.

:jolteon::drifblim::tapu lele::regieleki::aurorus::toxtricity:
This is probably my favourite team I made. This team uses Refrigerate to round out the coverage of Jolteon and Regieleki, with Toxtricity support making their coverage even more powerful. Tapu Lele provides necessary priority protection. Aurorus is your usual lead. Protect on Regieleki is not overkill, it proved invaluable in revenging threats like +1 Dragapult and Scarf Weavile. This team lacks hazard control, cause I couldn't really fit Rapid Spin on Regieleki, but I don't think it needs it. This team is excellent at killing opposing offense due to its incredible speed and priority control. It has losing matchups against many stalls with Frosmoth + Heatran or Blissey, teams with Zeraora or Volt Absorb in general, and teams with Last Mon God Necrozma if you can't taunt it before it gets out of hand. Still, this team is very consistent against most of the offense people run.

:scizor::tapu fini::lycanroc-dusk::mudsdale::crawdaunt::zeraora:
Here's a nice fun, simple team. A lead, some offensive mons with priority and complementing abilities and some setup sweepers. Stamina and Volt Absorb help Scizor and Tapu Fini set up in the late game, and Tapu Fini's Draining Kiss actually benefits from Tough Claws and Technician. Misty Surge is a key part of beating opposing terrains and providing status insulation. Against more offensive teams you usually want to get Tapu Fini out early to reset their own terrain. This team can struggle against stalls with Fluffy that can dissuade your setup since it weakens every attack on the team except Scald. Bewear + Frosmoth + Blissey + Heatran is among the worst since it 4x weakens Draining Kiss and Tapu Fini can't setup in the face of repeated Seismic Tosses.

:golisopod::landorus-therian::whimsicott::blissey::dubwool::flareon:
Super fun team. Prankster Rest lets you heal up to full, take a hit, then Emergency Exit pivots you out, activating your Natural Cure and Intimidate. Many threats can be stalled out in this manner. Opposing threats can also be controlled with First Impression or Prankster Copycat. This team has some big flaws, which is that it's not as well suited to handle overloaded special attackers (it might be worth trying a variant with frosmoth), and Emergency Exit can be a blessing or a curse. If you identify a game where you think you can win with Dubwool it might be worth not sending in Golisopod if you can avoid it. This team is also weak to some priority / Prankster protected threats, especially Bisharp which is a catastrophic matchup. Still though this team is super neat.

:regigigas::porygon2::nihilego::slowbro::crawdaunt::nidoking:
This team is far from optimal or anything, but it's funny how it turns Slow Start into an advantage. It's pretty stuffed by specially bulky teams and Regigigas is kind of a dead weight sometimes. Still it's fun to outslow things you would never be able to otherwise.

Might post more later. My general opinion of Shared Power is that it feels relatively healthy. I think the most unhealthy ability is probably Ice Scales, since it offers so much and makes special attackers have such an uphill battle against stuff like Heatran or Blissey. Still I had fun with this meta.
 
I think sturdy should be banned in shared power because of powercreep. Almost all of the top players are running a sturdy user and a stealth rock user. Sturdy is so good because it makes it so you can't one shot your opponents pokemon and basically shuts down all spatk teams even more than icy scales does because there in no multi hit spatking moves. The top 5 players all run it and 3 of the top 5 are just the same person running the same team. Sturdy is just to easy to access compared to other strategies because it only takes one pokemon while many offense options require multiple. Now I know what your thinking. Just run multihit and everything will be fine. But you are wrong. Multihit loses out to priority so you are forced to run a psychic terrain user weakening your multihit team more and its not even a guarenteed win making it not very good to run. Multihit gets completely shut down by stamina which is very common on the ladder and it just dies to most stall.
 
I think sturdy should be banned in shared power because of powercreep. Almost all of the top players are running a sturdy user and a stealth rock user. Sturdy is so good because it makes it so you can't one shot your opponents pokemon and basically shuts down all spatk teams even more than icy scales does because there in no multi hit spatking moves. The top 5 players all run it and 3 of the top 5 are just the same person running the same team. Sturdy is just to easy to access compared to other strategies because it only takes one pokemon while many offense options require multiple. Now I know what your thinking. Just run multihit and everything will be fine. But you are wrong. Multihit loses out to priority so you are forced to run a psychic terrain user weakening your multihit team more and its not even a guarenteed win making it not very good to run. Multihit gets completely shut down by stamina which is very common on the ladder and it just dies to most stall.
Don’t want to repeat myself, so please refer to my previous post
 
Special Gale Wings
I've not seen anyone run this team before yet, so I figured to post about it. Is it good? Not the best. However, it's fairly simple to use and is extremely fun to pilot. Teams that don't run a counter typically see themselves falling extremely easily to it.

It does have some tough matchups though. Sturdy and Psychic Surge are nearly unbeatable. A Stealth Rock from Golurk (who can easily be substituted in place of Honedge) would theoretically help, but due to Heavy Duty Boots and Skarmory's Defog, this is nearly useless. Psychic Surge is winnable if they don't have Choice Scarves or speed control as Tornadus, Talonflame and Zapdos all have respectable speed. However, this is almost never true, making teams with Psychic Surge extremely difficult to beat. A combination of Psychic Surge and Sturdy is an autoloss, most of the time. Ice Scales can also ruin this team, however is byfar the easiest to play around. Nasty Plot over Taunt on Tornadus and timing the Nasty Plot correctly also has the opportunity to annihilate stall if they do not carry a Destiny Bond Pokemon. If you're at full HP and have Nasty Plotted against stall, the game is as good as over. However, I carry Taunt because I've found it slightly more surprising and useful versus other generic Pokemon.
It's also worth mentioning this team can't beat Extreme Speed or faster priority, though that isn't too terribly common.

If this metagame has sample teams, I think this is a good one. It's not the most amazing team, however I think shows what this metagame can really be very well, is easy to pick up, and can also teach the importance of pacing your Abilities in a game on a certain team. In a few situations on this team, more than would happen with other teams I'd say, having certain abilities out at all or too early can be a detriment. Sheer Force can get rid of Zap Cannon Paralysis, Hurricane Confusion, and if you run it, Dynamic Punch Golurk. Prankster can stop Taunt, Defog, Toxic, and Will-O-Wisp from hitting Dark-type Pokemon, and in Psychic Terrain. Gale Wings does this to your Flying moves while at full HP as well.

What I love about this team the most is that every Pokemon has good chance to play a significant role in a game, aside from just turning on a good ability. AV Dragalge is moderately tanky on the special side, and can be an effective attacker with No Guard and Sheer Force activated. Doublade is much more specific, being better against earlier game Kartana and Crawdaunt, as Sacred Sword can deal with both. I don't believe it OHKOs Kartana, but Kartana will not normally be 2HKOing that early in the game either. At the very least, it can force them away, which is good. Surprise Prankster Toxic is also useful, though if you wanted me to block you you could run DBond instead. Talonflame can get some damage in with Hurricane and Burn something, and both it and Landorus are necessary for Defog so you don't instantly lose to Stealth Rock.


That's about it! This team is so much fun. Really, there's more I want to share, but I'd need to relearn how to get the sprites and such back into a post first, and I could do a team dump later on, I swear with useable teams.

As per the metagame itself, I think it is pretty difficult to say what it or isn't broke. To start off, Sturdy. Sturdy is unfun in my opinion. It requires certain methods of chip damage if you are playing an offensive team, of which a lot of the meta is. Stall or bulkier teams may not have to deal with, but for everyone else, Sturdy can be ridiculous. Especially as pointed out earlier, special-oriented teams have less good ways to play around this. There's only I think 1 multihit special move in Water Shuriken, but no one is using that. Hazards are theoretically effective against it, but HBD wipes those away. In the case there is no HBD though, a team with Sturdy may still have Rapid Spin or Defog. This puts more pressure on the hazard user as in all likelihood they're doing it to disable sturdy, so if they can't, it can be game ending. Priority isn't as effective either, as Psychic Surge is occasionally paired with it and the Sturdy pokemon will still get off at least 1 attack anyway, making it more or less to where you trade evenly, which is decent but only works if you are spamming priority, as if not they'll outpace you anyway. This is also not very effective if the mon with Sturdy is faster and has priority itself. Sandstorm and Hail are not super common either, and even so Rock, Ground, Steel and Ice Pokemon can remain unaffected in some scenarios anyway. The best thing I personally like against Sturdy is Prankster WoW, as this not only yeets Sturdy, but makes the attacker less effective as well. Though, this can't work on Fire Pokemon and is less effective against special teams. Iron Barbs/Rocky Helmet/Rough Skin is effective, but only if they do not run Decidueye or Protective Pads, and are primarily using contact attackers. I don't think this ability makes for a fun meta either.


I'll delve into next what I think is at least annoying: Psychic Surge. Similar to Queenly Majesty, this shuts down priority attackers pretty hard. It is not nearly as rigid, though, having any amount of counters over none. You can run your own terrain, and/or wait out their own. My only issue wi th waiting out terrain, however, is that it can at best create a 50/50 situation every some odd turns. You could use your priority, but if they switch you cant do anything. You could use a non-priority move in response to this, but if they attack instead you're hecked. Similar with setting your own terrain, though at least you can force these scenarios more often. I dont particularly like how it shuts down an archetype of move, either. Unlike type immunity abilities which only shut down 1 type, priority is much more diverse and common than just 1 thing. The 1 ability can shutdown a whole bunch of ways to win, and imo is a little much to keep allowed. What I really dont like is how perfect a solution it is either. Unlike Long Reach, who is used to counter about 3 abilities (Fluffy, Rough Skin, Iron Barbs, and sometimes others like Flame Body), Psychic Surge is an infinitely better general-use shutdown and isnt just targeting a specific thing. It's good in a good load of games, and while it is a counter, is one so strong it's almost a requirement if you want to run a fast team. I'm down with requirements, but this also just makes fighting against priority way too easy.


Lastly is Ice Scales. I'm not too sure what to make of this, though it is extremely hard to beat if you are using a special team. I'm not totally sure if it is worth banning, though. Special teams don't have a lot going for them. Adaptability, Sheer Force, sometimes Technician, sometimes Weather, and terrain is not as diverse as what physical has, and it shares those with it anyway. This means it has a much harder time hitting as hard, and since Ice Scales is all special moves, it makes it pretty difficult to do anything about. When paired with walls like Corviknight, Heatran, and Blissey, sometimes there can be no good way to win, especially since even just those examples all have pretty useful abilities themselves that can also be negate the number of ways to defeat them. Though I will say I think it is very fun as a special team to attempt to find a way around this, which tbh normally shows itself as spamming Taunt and slapping them around. I wouldn't be mad if this was banned as there would definitely be much more special teams and I'm always down for inviting more stuff into the meta, but I do think it can stay too.


I think the main thing I want to bring up is profit. In all of these cases, the sheer amount of profit gained from these abilities in order to counter something is, in my opinion, pretty huge. Sturdy beats out Tough Claws, Adaptability, Technician, Sheer Force, and more, as it easily defeats the reason for those to exist- OHKOs. There are ways around that, but in general, this is what Sturdy will do.
Psychic Surge doesn't beat many abilities- just Gale Wings and Psychic Surge, so on the outside it could look like Long Reach where it's just to counter very specific things. However, priority moves themselves are all over, especially since some get more access to better priority through ate abilities making their Quick Attacks or the like more useable. These are all over the place because they use many of the same things Sturdy beats- being boosting abilities. In a different manner, Psychic Surge beats these by preventing the fast attack outright, lending itself to be ridiculous on a team who wishes to have speed control, especially manual weather.

Ice Scales is the scariest example, diminishing the efforts of Sheer Force and Adaptability pretty harshly. Granted, it is not as effective as it doesn't completely counter the concept, and there will still be some boosts, but generally Ice Scales sees itself beating 2~ abilities where applicable. Again, I don't think this one is too bad since there is technically more you can do about it, though Ice Scales will always making it doubly difficult for special teams to manage.

Sorry for longer post, but as the meta comes to a close for OMotM, I thought to share my thoughts for the next time it sees OMotM. I honestly probably won't be able to play it much until then, haha.
 
I'm new to posting on smogon I reached number one on the ladder with this team.
https://pokepast.es/c0c4ca08208c2032

Its a sturdy + Heavy duty boots spam team, in my honest opinion sturdy is a problem for this meta atleast the combination of heavy duty boots. Sturdy (or HVD boots in conjuction with Sturdy) needs to be banned this is essentially magic guard + sturdy for HO.

Also there's a glitch where after getting no guard my explosion with gigalith would miss on multiple occasions.

This team switches around on the bulky Stamina + Fluffy until you have No guard, hustle and adaptabilty activated then you just sweep most stall teams with Krook. The only mons that I can see maybe walling this team is Heatran with Levitate + Water Absorb + Stamina + Fluffy or Set up Corvi but even then Krook after having adaptabilty and hustle activated, after a bulk up Darkest Lariat 2hkos.
Sturdy + HVD deals with almost every offensive strategy besisdes technician + skill link but with a mix of priority and doublades bulk you can deal with that.
From what I've dealt with as long as you play well you can deal with almost every strat. If you notice there are some weird utility moves like:
Sacred Sword > CC on Doublade (this is for set up Corvinight)
Steal Wing > Phantom Force on Dragapult (Phantom locking you in for a turn has lost me games its way stronger than Steel Wing but SW stilll deals with fairies for the most part)
Rock Tomb > Stone Edge on Durant (tbh tou can probably get away with Edge for the extra power there is no draw back but I've found the speed drop to come in clutch vs some offensive teams)
Feel free to make this a sample team if it doesn't get banned.
Screenshot (44).png
 
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It was one of the OMs of the Month of March (along with Cross Evolution), but now, Sketchmons and Flipped are on the ladder.
 

KaenSoul

FuegoAlma
is a Forum Moderatoris a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributoris a member of the Battle Simulator Staff
Bumping this thread because I got a few haters with my recent Berry team
:diggersby: :snorlax: :appletun: :klefki: :spiritomb: :cresselia:
https://pokepast.es/372eedfb32689c40
Do you know Moody? Do you know Starf Berry? Did you know they are the same person?
Team is simple, switch around mons until you have all the funny abilities active and proceed to spam sub and recycle and sweep at +6 everything, I added Spiritomb to have a better stall match up and Pressure works well with prank sub.

A replay with the team being funny (broken) https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8sharedpower-1684417440 (sorry Eli)
I had no business making a comeback after wasting klefki like that, but that's Moody, friends.

Made the team after seeing Cud Chew revealed and remembering the old harvest teams that got that ability banned.
I don't think it is broken, but It can still be optimized and is very RNG heavy and when it loses it feels like it was because of bad rolls, it does struggle against some Knock off users (it shut downs recycle), and prankster haze. Maybe we could unban harvest and ban starf berry? Not sure if it would be better, but some people suggested that in the om room and seems worth exploring.

Also, it's been half a year and I still believe we should ban quick feet, maybe we could try to reduce the power level of the tier a bit more next gen, it feels too rock-paper-scissor-like between quick feet+flare, skill link, stall and sturdy HO.
 
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