OU SPL XII - RBY Discussion

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Plague von Karma

Banned deucer.
  • [RAI] Aliss vs rozes [CLA]
  • [SCO] Serpi vs Heroic Troller [RUI]
  • [BIG] Hayburner vs SMB [WOL]
  • [TIG] dice vs Kiichikos [SHA]
  • [TYR] spies vs Nails [CRY]
 

Melbelle

nerve endings
is a Pre-Contributor
[RAI] Aliss vs rozes [CLA]
[SCO] Serpi vs Heroic Troller [RUI]
[BIG] Hayburner vs SMB [WOL]
[TIG] dice vs Kiichikos [SHA]
[TYR] spies vs Nails [CRY]
 

Volk

Demonstrably alive.
is a Community Contributoris a Contributor to Smogon
Needed to get a stand-in coin again. Hope no matches were played yet.
  • [RAI] Aliss vs rozes [CLA]
  • [SCO] Serpi vs Heroic Troller [RUI]
  • [BIG] Hayburner vs SMB [WOL]
  • [TIG] dice vs Kiichikos [SHA]
  • [TYR] spies vs Nails [CRY]
No comment.
 

EB0LA

Banned deucer.
  • [RAI] Aliss vs rozes [CLA]
  • [SCO] Serpi vs Heroic Troller [RUI]
  • [BIG] Hayburner vs SMB [WOL]
  • [TIG] dice vs Kiichikos [SHA]
  • [TYR] spies vs Nails [CRY]
 
[RAI] Aliss vs rozes [CLA]
[SCO] Serpi vs Heroic Troller [RUI]
[BIG] Hayburner vs SMB [WOL]
[TIG] dice vs Kiichikos [SHA]
[TYR] spies vs Nails [CRY]
 
[RAI] Aliss vs rozes [CLA]
[SCO] Serpi vs Heroic Troller [RUI]
[TIG] dice vs Kiichikos [SHA]
[TYR] spies vs Nails [CRY]
 
[RAI] Aliss vs rozes [CLA]
[SCO] Serpi vs Heroic Troller [RUI]
[BIG] Hayburner vs SMB [WOL]
[TIG] dice vs Kiichikos [SHA]
[TYR] spies vs Nails [CRY]
 

emma

is a Forum Moderatoris a Community Contributoris a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis a Community Leader Alumnusis a Smogon Discord Contributor Alumnusis a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnusis a Dedicated Tournament Host Alumnusis a Past SPL Championis a Past SCL Champion
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Sets and Team Highlights - WEEK 7
thank you Hipmonlee Volk Heroic Troller pacattacc for the help!
H I G H L I G H T T E A M
Heroic Troller vs. Kiichikos - Game 1 & Game 2
:rb/jynx: :rb/exeggutor: :rb/porygon: :rb/snorlax: :rb/chansey: :rb/tauros:

The King of RBY finally returned in Week 7, and graced us with not one but two wins using Porygon. To put it nicely, Porygon is generally regarded as quite the subpar Pokemon, and sees extremely minimal usage throughout high-level tournaments. It's has zero usage so far in SPL, zero usage in Smogon RBY Playoff Circuit, and zero usage last SPL. Porygon's only niche is that it completely walls Snorlax -- it's never 3HKO'd barring a 5.86% critical hit, and even if Snorlax lands one, following up with Hyper Beam is only a roll to kill. if Snorlax is carrying it. If Snorlax wants to reliably beat down Porygon it needs to explode. Snorlax can also go for the freeze, but that lets Porygon spam its own Ice Beam. There was a very solid discussion about Porygon in the RBY Community Server with great input from Volk Heroic Troller and pacattacc
[9:35 PM] Volk: Porygon is incredibly simple. It walls Lax and occasionally even Freezes it. Thankfully, pretty much everyone runs Lax, so Pory will always end up facing the desired target. The only downside is Ice Lax can potentially Freeze it and Amnesia Lax completely steamrolls it. That, and Porygon is kind of dead weight against everything else, besides Paralyzed Tauros (which is still a little shaky thanks to crits) and some Pokemon without status moves (which is still shaky for the same reasons). Like Porygon can technically stall Sing/Counter/Ibeam Chansey, but I can't say I have ever seen that in action. [9:36 PM] Volk: Well, maybe not incredibly simple. The gameplan is basic, but actually doing it right can be a little tricky at times.
[9:38 PM] Heroic Troller: well said
[9:40 PM] Heroic Troller: it might be worth to add that despite being useless vs amnesia, pretty bad versed vs ice lax, and still needing not bad luck vs hyper beam, when it faces slam boom reflect there is nothing lax can do to break (two crits in a row, but that's absurd even for rby)
[9:41 PM] Heroic Troller: other than that porygon is extremely weak and frail to anything else, even rhydon is almost a 50 50 (speed tie, both 2hko, freeze chance helps but well)
[9:41 PM] Heroic Troller: eating a slot means the team will be horribly weak to either psychics, zapdos or rhydon
[9:42 PM] Heroic Troller: i have decided to go for zapdos weakness hoping not to find it, had to do some ugly things like going exeggutor on tbolt, not what you would want to do usually
[9:42 PM] pacattacc: so, is there a specific team that actually... benefits from Porygon?
[9:43 PM] pacattacc: or is it more that you build around it sometimes and it can work occasionally
[9:43 PM] Volk: Thank you. Body Slam/Earthquake essentially can never break Porygon. Body Slam/Self-destruct forces a switch or Boom. Non-Rest variants are counting on a crit and are on a timer otherwise. For all intents and purposes, I would describe Porygon as viable, though on the cusp with a few other mons.
[9:43 PM] Heroic Troller: porygon allowed me to run 4 atk lax which is still an amazing power house but usually bad because lax wars are too important to pass by
[9:44 PM] Heroic Troller: since porygon was supposed to stop lax your lax is free to be whatever he wants, even amnesia
[9:44 PM] pacattacc: yeah that makes sense
[9:46 PM] pacattacc: wait so what is the optimal play against a porygon? do you fish for crits as lax, or switch?
[9:47 PM] Heroic Troller: you ice attack it, if you don't you have, you can fish crit if you have hyper beam
[9:47 PM] Volk: Depends on your set, but usually it is forcing you to switch, unless you want to try to PP Stall it, which is dangerous due to Ice Beam.
[9:47 PM] Heroic Troller: if you are walled, the thing is simple, lax shall not attack, no reason to
[9:47 PM] Heroic Troller: booming lax is a bad play because porygon guy gets what he wanted, and you are down a lax
[9:50 PM] Volk: Alakazam can kind of bully Porygon as it will never stay in (a Paralyzed Porygon cannot wall Lax) and it has a decent matchup against Chansey (the likely switch in) if it gets a Spec drop on the switch.
[9:50 PM] Heroic Troller: exeggutor too, starmie too
[9:50 PM] Heroic Troller: porygon can't take a psychic
[9:50 PM] Heroic Troller: otherwise hb lax breaks
[9:50 PM] Volk: Starmie and Exeggutor can accomplish simialr stuff with more risks (beat me to it lol)
[9:51 PM] Heroic Troller: i would not trade psychic from eggy to do twave
[9:51 PM] Heroic Troller: it does like 50
[9:52 PM] Volk: Starmie has a worse Chansey matchup and would prefer not to take a Pory Tbolt and Eggy has no ability to heal off the damage. Still your best course of action though if you have no Alakazam. I suppose Jynx might be okay too here, especially if a Freeze is on the table.
[9:52 PM] Volk: Also, if Eggy has Stun Spore, your Pory is basically dead.
[9:53 PM] Heroic Troller: Porygon Thunderbolt vs. Starmie: 115 - 136 (35.6 - 42.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
[9:53 PM] Heroic Troller: i don't think starmie minds that much
[9:53 PM] Heroic Troller: twave is an ohko move on porygon
[9:53 PM] Heroic Troller: porygon must switch out from every pokemon besides lax
[9:53 PM] Heroic Troller: and tauros in 1v1 full
[9:53 PM] Volk: No, it doesn't, but Starmie will likely need to heal after taking that hit, so it won't be able to pressure the incoming Chansey as much. Of course, you can always just predict the Recover.
[9:54 PM] Volk: Depends a bit on the Chansey set.
Heroic Troller put on an excellent display of Porygon use in their Week 7 games against Kiichikos. In Game 1, Porygon is able to switch in on Snorlax, take a Body Slam, and Recover back up on Turns 17-18, 20-21, 23-24, 26-27, 29-30, 34-35, 37-38, and 44-48. Finally, on Turn 54, Kiichikos is forced to explode to finally make some sort of progress in the match. Porygon, a pokemon with zero (0) usage in the last three major RBY Smogon Tournaments, was able to deny 6-0 SPL Player Kiichikos from making advancement for 36 straight turns. Porygon even directly got Kiichikos's Tauros paralyzed. Since she couldn't break through the space duck herself, she had go for a Tauros critical hit or Chansey paralysis on Turn 40.

Naturally, Troller also played excellently the rest of the match and was able to secure Game 1. Porygon, unironically, might have been the MVP of the match. It walled Kiichikos's Snorlax to hell and back, and she was only able to break through by sacrificing a Pokemon no serious RBYer ever drops on any team. At that point, Troller's Snorlax was a huge threat. Kiichikos had to resort to trying to use Alakazam to take it down (spoiler alert: it didn't work) and was left with only Starmie to check Snorlax + Tauros.

I'd like to bring attention to Troller's play on Turns 68-70. On Turn 69, Troller Body Slam'd again, which lead to Kiichikos (probably) believing Troller wasn't carrying Self Destruct and wouldn't be able to take it down. If Troller didn't boom his Snorlax on the right turn (for example: booming on sleeping Jynx) Kiichikos could have had a chance to win. By slamming again and bluffing the no Self Destruct, he was able to secure the boom on Starmie, which led to Tauros being able to clean up.

In Game 2, Kiichikos exploded her Snorlax turn 4 and dropped the appropriately named Spatial Rift, but I think Troller (and any RBYer) would take a Porygon-for-Snorlax trade every single time. I'm really glad we were able to see the RBY Goat back in action this week, and despite using Porygon, they were able to put on an extremely impressive performance and taken down the only other remaining undefeated RBYer. It's a shame he wasn't able to go for the undefeated record, but Troller showed us once again why it's considered the best RBY OU player on the site.

USAGE STATS TRENDS
1. :rb/zapdos: 6 uses once again, after six last week, and only 10 in the first five weeks. Could this be because of only 25% Rhydon usage, compared to 38% in RBY Circuit Playoffs?
2. :rb/rhydon: Only two Rhydon this week, the lowest it's been since Week 1 (only 2 as well). It peaked at 10 in Week 2 and averaged 6.33 uses through the first six weeks.
3. :rb/exeggutor: :rb/alakazam: Exeggutor overtook Alakazam once again in usage, and has now flip-flopped in three straight weeks.
 
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emma

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Moderator
Week 8

Moves and Teammates | Usage | Leads
Code:
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| Rank | Pokemon            | Use  | Usage % |  Win %  |
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| 1    | Snorlax            |   26 | 100.00% |  50.00% |
| 1    | Chansey            |   26 | 100.00% |  50.00% |
| 1    | Tauros             |   26 | 100.00% |  50.00% |
| 4    | Starmie            |   21 |  80.77% |  47.62% |
| 5    | Alakazam           |   14 |  53.85% |  50.00% |
| 6    | Exeggutor          |   12 |  46.15% |  41.67% |
| 7    | Jynx               |    6 |  23.08% |  83.33% |
| 8    | Zapdos             |    5 |  19.23% |  60.00% |
| 8    | Cloyster           |    5 |  19.23% |  40.00% |
| 10   | Slowbro            |    3 |  11.54% |  66.67% |
| 10   | Jolteon            |    3 |  11.54% |  66.67% |
| 10   | Rhydon             |    3 |  11.54% |   0.00% |
| 13   | Gengar             |    2 |   7.69% |  50.00% |
| 14   | Victreebel         |    1 |   3.85% | 100.00% |
| 14   | Dodrio             |    1 |   3.85% |   0.00% |
| 14   | Lapras             |    1 |   3.85% |   0.00% |
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from MAGITEKKNIGHTALICE.

Weeks 1-8

Moves and Teammates | Combos | Leads
Code:
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| Rank | Pokemon            | Use  | Usage % |  Win %  |
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| 1    | Snorlax            |  196 | 100.00% |  50.00% |
| 2    | Chansey            |  194 |  98.98% |  50.52% |
| 3    | Tauros             |  192 |  97.96% |  48.96% |
| 4    | Starmie            |  154 |  78.57% |  48.05% |
| 5    | Exeggutor          |  100 |  51.02% |  55.00% |
| 6    | Alakazam           |   83 |  42.35% |  51.81% |
| 7    | Jynx               |   48 |  24.49% |  47.92% |
| 8    | Rhydon             |   43 |  21.94% |  48.84% |
| 9    | Jolteon            |   32 |  16.33% |  43.75% |
| 10   | Zapdos             |   27 |  13.78% |  44.44% |
| 11   | Cloyster           |   25 |  12.76% |  60.00% |
| 12   | Gengar             |   23 |  11.73% |  43.48% |
| 13   | Slowbro            |   20 |  10.20% |  65.00% |
| 14   | Lapras             |   11 |   5.61% |  36.36% |
| 15   | Articuno           |    8 |   4.08% |  37.50% |
| 16   | Victreebel         |    6 |   3.06% |  33.33% |
| 17   | Porygon            |    2 |   1.02% | 100.00% |
| 18   | Dodrio             |    1 |   0.51% |   0.00% |
| 18   | Dragonite          |    1 |   0.51% |   0.00% |
| 18   | Sandslash          |    1 |   0.51% |   0.00% |
| 18   | Moltres            |    1 |   0.51% |   0.00% |
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from MAGITEKKNIGHTALICE.
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from TIBA.
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from SPIESC.
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from HAYBURNER.
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from HAYBURNER.
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from FUYURI.
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from SMB.
  • Missing 1 Pokemon from NAILS ☎ ☎ ☎.

Screen Shot 2021-03-06 at 10.31.16 PM.png

Screen Shot 2021-03-06 at 10.31.53 PM.png
 
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EB0LA

Banned deucer.
[RAI] Aliss vs Kiichikos [SHA]
[WOL] Leru vs Nails [CRY]
[RUI] Heroic Troller vs spies [TYR]
[CLA] rozes vs dice [TIG]
[SCO] Serpi vs Hayburner [BIG]
 

Volk

Demonstrably alive.
is a Community Contributoris a Contributor to Smogon
It has been fun, effectively signing up to lose.
  • [RAI] Aliss vs Kiichikos [SHA]
  • [WOL] Leru vs Nails [CRY]
  • [RUI] Heroic Troller vs spies [TYR]
  • [CLA] rozes vs dice [TIG]
  • [SCO] Serpi vs Hayburner [BIG]
By the way, at the very start of the tournament, I asked the coin who would win SPL and it told me the BIGs would beat the Raiders in the finals. I'm not feeling great about that prediction, needless to say. I'm pretty sure the BIGs have been mathematically eliminated, but I think the Raiders may still be in contention. Nobody understands SPL scoring anyway, so screw it, maybe the BIGs will end up taking it, who knows.

Next time, I'll probably just use my own predictions. The coin was a clever gag, but it honestly became pretty depressing. It makes RBY look good though, that's for sure. Not only are the games a little less random than a coinflip, but people who have some understanding of this meta can reasonably outperform a coin in guessing winners. RBY is an amazing tier and I hope it doesn't leave the tournament scene anytime soon. Cheers everyone.

edit:
Note to emma: The only way you can stop Ninja from winning this prediction tour is if you predict against all of their choices this week. You and Amaranth are the only ones who can catch him, but Amaranth's predictions are too similar for him to pull ahead. Do with this knowledge as you wish. Best of luck to all three of you. Not trying to pick favorites, but I am trying to stir some interest.
 
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[RAI] Aliss vs Kiichikos [SHA]
[WOL] Leru vs Nails [CRY]
[RUI] Heroic Troller
vs spies [TYR]
[CLA] rozes vs dice [TIG]
[SCO] Serpi
vs Hayburner [BIG]
 

emma

is a Forum Moderatoris a Community Contributoris a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis a Community Leader Alumnusis a Smogon Discord Contributor Alumnusis a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnusis a Dedicated Tournament Host Alumnusis a Past SPL Championis a Past SCL Champion
Moderator
Sets and Team Highlights - WEEK 8
:starmie: :chansey: :cloyster: :snorlax: :tauros: :rb/dodrio:
Dodrio
Heroic Troller vs. Serpi - Game 1

Heroic Troller followed up making Porygon work last week by whipping out Dodrio in his Game 1 against Serpi. Dodrio's Base 100 Speed lets it outsped metagame staples such as Chansey, Snorlax, and Exeggutor (it also outspeeds Victreebel, which would have been relevant in 2018-2019) and also gives it a near 20% critical hit chance. Combined with the same Base Attack stat of Snorlax (110), it can be somewhat threatening in the endgame.

Unfortunately, in practice, Dodrio is pretty bad. It struggles to break through Snorlax and Reflect Chansey, it's outsped and 2HKO'd by Tauros, Starmie and Alakazam, and gets stone walled by any Rhydon. It can kind of function as a "mini-Tauros" but almost always you're better off using something actually good. It saw 0 usage last SPL, 0 usage in RBY Circuit Playoffs, and 0 usage in current SPL until now, and I don't think it's ever going to be an actual metagame trend.

Dodrio was actually really close to winning a game!!!! All it needed was one full paralysis on Snorlax or a Hyper Beam miss on Turn 55 and we would have actually gotten to see a mini-Tauros sweep. Even though we were on the verge of greatness, this game is a great example of what a hindrance having Dodrio over an actual Pokemon is. Mie-Cloy teams typically have Jolteon as their last non Big 3 member, and it turns out when you replace Jolteon with Dodrio the Zapdos matchup is a lot harder. Instead of having an actual Zapdos check, Troller was forced to let his Tauros take 45% and get paralyzed (can it could have been way worse, if it weren't for Body Slam paralysis and a full para). While the team probably would have been better with Jolteon over Dodrio, it woudn't be half as fun!

USAGE STATS TRENDS
1. :rb/alakazam: :rb/exeggutor: Alakazam overtook Exeggutor in usage (14 uses to 12) and the two have now flip-flopped in usage for four straight weeks.
2. :rb/zapdos: Zapdos has been surging with usage, with 6 uses, 6, and 5 in the past three weeks after only 10 in the first five weeks.
3. :rb/rhydon: On the opposite trend, we see Rhydon who only had 3 uses this week and 0 wins. Could these two trends in usage be related?
 
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