OU SPL XIII - RBY Discussion

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emma

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Make predictions here.


SPL XIII Introduction
Schedule
Spreadsheet

Hiiiii RBYers! With SPL XIII underway, ten teams will be competing for the glorious red trophy. This thread will be used to discuss RBY related topics, whether it’s about the players, general metagame trends, matches, predictions and so on. I will update this frequently with each week pairings, player standings, and prediction standings. Teams, replays, and usage stats can be found here.

Auction Results:


Pricelist
21k - Heroic Troller
18k - FriendOfMrGolem120
17.5k - Nails
15.5k - Amaranth
14.5k - spies
11k - Mako
10k - Hayburner, Serpi
8k - Aliss
4k - chuva de perereca

RBY Player Cores (likely starters in Bold):

Alpha Ruiners
:entei: - chuva de perereca, Kenix, dice
Circus Maximus Tigers
:raikou: - Amaranth
Cryonicles
:Suicune: - spies, Koalacance, Exiline, Groudon
Congregation of the Classiest
:Gardevoir: - Mako, ziloXX
Dragonspiral Tyrants
:tyrantrum: - FriendOfMrGolem120, TC
Ever Grande BIGS
:Snorlax: - Hayburner, Maya Chansey, Vileman
Indie Scooters
:Alakazam: - Serpi, Leru, Excal
Stark Sharks
:Garchomp: - Heroic Troller, suapah
Team Raiders
:Marowak-alola: - Aliss, emma
Wifi Wolfpack
:Lycanroc: - Nails, eden

Overall Power Rankings

RBY Power Rankings

10-3
Heroic Troller
8-3
chuva de perereca
7-4
FriendOfMrGolem120
5-4
Serpi
4-5
Nails
3-4
Hayburner
3-7
Aliss
2-0
BIHI
2-5
Mako
2-7
Amaranth
1-0
emma
1-1
Maya Chansey
ziloXX
Groudon
1-3
Koalacance
0-3
Exiline
 

Deleted User 465389

Banned deucer.
Xaviere’s Subjective Player Core Ranking
by xaviere:

1, Stark Sharks: did you know they made 6 sharknado movies?

2, Team Raiders: cool team with cool people in it :psyglad:

3, Indie Scooters: this isn’t related to scooters at all but ‘indie’ reminded me of hollow knight
hollow knight’s a good game btw

4, Dragonspiral Tyrants: cool name, but the e d g y n e s s of it drops it down a bit

5, Cryonicles: sure the name means something, haven’t figured it out yet

6, Circus Maximum Tigers: despite what he says, amaranth did not get last place in the ‘biggest weeb in denial’ smog award, therefore he is a weeb

7, Wi-Fi Wolfpack: heard nails is pretty good in doubles ou

8, Congregation of the Classiest: this sounds like the elite counterpart to ‘congregation of the masses’

9, Ever Grande BIGS: do chansey eggs actually contain mayonnaise? the world shall never know…

10, Alpha Ruiners:
 
Here is my power ranking for the battlers that are projected to start in SPL XIII.

All competitors are great battlers! The rankings are mostly based on performance in 2021 but also take the past in account to a certain degree.

1. Heroic Troller
2. FOMG
3. Nails
4. Serpi
5. spies
6. Amaranth
7. Mako
8. chuva
9. Aliss
10. Hayburner
 

emma

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Tier 1

1. Heroic Troller (Stark Sharks)

It's Troller -- he's the single most dominant RBYer today. 8-3, 7-3, 6-1 in his three SPLs as a full time starter. Easy #1.

2. Nails (Wi-Fi Wolfpack)

Five straight SPLs/SCLs/Snakes with 6+ wins playing both Doubles OU and RBY. This dude shows up and wins in every tournament no matter the format. 7-2, 6-3, 7-3 in his last three SPLs playing RBY is only rivaled by Troller. I'd bet a lot of money on Nails extending his streak to six.

Tier 1.5

3. FriendOfMrGolem120 (Dragonspiral Tyrants)

Slight step blow Troller and Nails, but still one of the best starters. Fresh off winning Global Championships and finishing second in Invitational (the only two RBY OU Tours he played all year), I expect FOMG to build off his 6-5 in SPL X and hover near the top of the pool.

Tier 2
All three of these guys are very very close so it was quite tough to rank them :(

4. Amaranth (Circus Maximus Tigers)

Amaranth has to be one of the biggest RBY tryhards around and I love it. Didn't have the most successful individual 2021 and he would have liked, but he has yet to go negative in his three SPLs (5-5, 5-5, 7-4) and after taking a break last year, I hope to see him continue his success.

5. Serpi (Indie Scooters)

Serpi dominated 2021 with 1st in Winter Seasonal, Top 4 in RBY Cup, Top 4 in Invitational, and winning the PP Circuit. I expect him to build off his successful 5-4 SBY XII debut.

6. spies (Cryonicles)

After a disappointing SPL XII, spies also dominated the rest of 2021 with Top 8 in Global Championships, Top 8 in Invitational, 2nd in Summer Seasonal, 5-3 RBYPL and 1st in RBY Cup. Let's see if he can have similar success (6-3) as he did all the way back in SPL I!

Tier 3

7. Mako (Congregation of the Classiest)

7-2 in your RBY SPL debut with one of the losses to Troller is pretty impressive, hope to see her remain great in Year 2!

8. Hayburner (Ever Grande BIGS)

5-2 in your RBY SPL debut after being subbed in Week 3 and winning your last four is also pretty impressive, we'll see how he fares as a full time starter with dedicated Maya Chansey support.

9. chuva de perereca (Alpha Ruiners)

Honorary "new played ranked last", chuva's lack of experience is made up by his great showing in circuit this year. Can't wait to see what he does on the big stage.
 

Aliss

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gonna write my reasonings bc noone else is doing it. pretty boring week 1 predicts from me, just predicting the top half in the PR to beat the lower half, but god this pool is stacked. looking forward to every single one of these games except my own, as fomg will be giving me the hands w/o a doubt.

[BIG] Hayburner vs Heroic Troller [SHA] - not much to say here. troller is statistically speaking the winningest SPL rby player of the past 3 years, and is regarded by many as the current best player. ever since emerging onto the pokemon perfect scene in explosive fashion he's had this tier in a stranglehold, and he's not looking to let go anytime soon. hay proved himself more than capable to start in this stacked field last year, and i'm sure he will get some statement wins against the top half of the pool to call his low ranking in question, but it'd take courage i do not have to bold him during this week 1.
[TIG] Amaranth vs chuva de perereca [RUI] - chuva is the only player to debut in rby this year, and the odds are stacked against him heavily, with this pool having a solid case for being the most stacked of all time. ironically, amaranth is the only player this year who started in the other year that could contend for this title: spl 9. ever after winning a trophy in his first official teamtour, tin has been a major force in the beloved tauros generation, establishing himself as a frontrunner for many metagame developments over the past years. over the course of a nine (or potentially more) week season, i do not doubt that he will show up big, with many underexplored techs ready to come. chuva is starting in this strong field for a reason though: ever since joining the site a mere 13 months ago, he's been turning heads in the oldest generation this game has to offer. after warding off some initial alt accusations that any good new player has to go through, chuva has established himself as Potentially The Next Best Thing. many players are extremely high on him, and for good reason. chuva was ranked 10th in the PRs, but i do not doubt that he will take at least some sets this year; that being said, i'm not convinced amaranth will be one of them.
[TYR] FriendOfMrGolem120 vs Aliss [RAI] - miss teaming w u pls come back to raiders
[CRY] Exiline vs Nails [WOL] - my vote for #1 in this year's pr ballot, nails is breathing down trollers neck in the race of acquiring as much RBY SPL wins as possible in the past 3 years. unlike troller though, he also has two rby cup finals to show for his prowess. while not creative to amaranth's extent, nails has also spearheaded many a revolution in his own time, most notably piledrivering lapras into the shadow realm. while perhaps a hot take for #1, i do think nails is the complete package for rby: solid play, solid teams, and most importantly solid fortune. something signficantly unusual would have to happen for the hearthstone main to not end up with a 7th consecutive 6+ win season under his belt. that being said, exiline is not a player worth counting out. "le sexiline" won the circuit championship all the way back in 2018, and has been relatively quiet in RBY since, but has been the complete opposite of quiet in other tiers. coming hot off an SCL win playing ubers for the islanders, another tier in which exiline won a ribbon, he will without a doubt be looking to continue on his hot streak of hall of fame appearances, and the first roadblock to another trophy is none other than nails. a player with a lot of flair and passion, exiline can most certainly do it big when needed. i fear his first win will have to wait though.
[SCO] Serpi vs Mako [CLA] - two players with strong positive finishes in their debut rby spl last season face off week 1 this time. while mako ended up with the better record between these two rookies last year, i dont think im having a hot take by saying serpi had the better year in 2021. despite ending up just short of the finish line in rby cup, serpi impressed many enthusiasts of the tier with his incredibly rapid improvement over the past calendar year, ending up in the top half of the field this year. while mako is nowhere near a slouch, it'll be an uphill battle for the chilean dou-turned-rby main to repeat last years succes during this week 1, as serpi as proven himself to be a worthy foe.
 

Amaranth

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Missed the action? Caught the action but want to rewatch it with my thoughts over it? Need something to fall asleep to? I've got you in any case


Feel free to discuss any lines that i call out during the video as well, obviously it's not all scripted so it's possible some of the things I say aren't fully accurate - there are a few places where I could've talked for like a half hour longer but had to cut out some nuance for the sake of watchability
 

Aliss

is a defending SPL Championis a Past SPL Champion
World Defender
another round

[CLA] Mako vs Amaranth [TIG] - Amaranth managed to defeat chuva using 5 mons last week. Creative as always, he started off week 1 of this year's SPL with a cool Lapras + Rhydon team that he barely found success with. I'm expecting him to keep up the creativity this entire season, and as long as he can keep himself in check by not straying too far off the beaten path I'm also expecting it to lead to positive results. Mako, too, is coming off a week 1 win, versus a stronger opponent than Amaranth faced. She looked ready to take on the RBY pool for yet another year with her aggressive play and is no doubt looking to add to her quietly growing bodycount again this week. Slightly leaning towards Amaranth but definitely a close matchup, excited to catch this one.
[WOL] Nails vs Hayburner [BIG] - As I said last week, Nails is the complete package. Sharp lines in game, clever calls in the builder, and timely hypnosis dodges with his Jynx when necessary. I intend to bold Nails for every game he plays this season and last week did absolutely nothing to change my mind in that regard. Hayburner on the other hand is coming off of an extremely unlucky series versus Troller, where he did not get to play the game a whole lot. It all went wrong on the turn 1 though, where Troller correctly prepared to punish Hay's habit of Blizzarding Gengar lead with Starmie. Hay definitely has what it takes to go even with the top cut of the field here, but it will take everything he's got. Expecting some solid wins from him somewhere down the line, just not versus Nails.
[RAI] Aliss vs Exiline [CRY] -
1641903191432.png

[RUI] chuva de perereca vs FriendOfMrGolem120 [TYR] - IMO the only thing stopping FOMG from getting 7+ wins is if he gets complacent. He's clearly one of the strongest competitors in the pool, and put up a solid showing vs me last week, but I was less impressed with his team choices. FOMG mentioned in his signup post that he's mostly looking to RBY this season because of a lack of time to prepare, but if he can overcome that hurdle he should have no issue here. Meanwhile chuva should be much more motivated to put in the hours, debuting this year. While I don't think chuva's play is quite on FOMG's level, he's far from a slouch and could definitely end up in the win column after this week, if he manages to keep FOMG on his toes. That being said, I'm gonna continue bolding FOMG as long as he keeps winning - which, knowing him, could go on for a long while from here.
[SHA] Heroic Troller vs Serpi [SCO] - Boring Troller bold. I really want to bold Serpi here because I trust that he has what it takes, but with money on the line I'm just hedging my bets.
 

emma

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Hi, like last year I'll try to do some sort of weekly recaps. This week I just mentioned things that I found interesting while watching all the games. I might go back to last year's format if I'm not able to catch all the games live. My classes start tomorrow so I can't really promise how much I'll be able to do these but I'll try because it's a lot of fun. Nothing on Aliss' games since I'm on her team and will hopefully dump all our teams at the end.

[BIG] Hayburner vs Heroic Troller [SHA]

Game 1
  • Clicking Thunderbolt Turn 1 as Gengar against Starmie is something we usually don't see, as most Gengar switch out to their Sing Chansey or if they're feeling risky stay in and click Hypnosis trying to catch the incoming Exeggutor. However, since Heroric Troller had scouted Hayburner's tendencies and knew he usually / never had Psychic on his lead Starmie and instead often opted to use Blizzard to hopefully freeze the incoming Chansey. Even without landing the critical hit or potentially getting a paralysis, Heroic Troller would have been in a great spot since he will likely be able to save his Hypnosis for Hayburner's Chansey or Exeggutor.
Game 2
  • On Turn 8, we see Heroic Troller click Body Slam on Snorlax after it has already switched in (and then again on Turn 9) and eat a Body Slam in return. When I was first learning RBY, I was taught Tauros could never take damage until the endgame since you needed it to duel against other Tauros and eventually (hopefully) win the game. As far as I'm aware, Heroic Troller is really the only one to do this constantly which really intrigues me.
  • Heroic Troller had multiple chances to use Sleep Powder on the Jynx (such as Turn 19) but never does. Instead, he seemed very committed to breaking it down with Mega Drain of all things, which led me to believe his plan was to eliminate the Jynx and then Sleep Powder something else, effectively getting a 2 for 1. Eventually I'm thinking he doesn't have Sleep Powder, which turns out to be true. Considering Jynx became a decent threat later on, it would have seemed better to simply Sleep the Jynx and play from there.
  • Hayburner brought Seismic Toss, Counter, Thunder Wave, Softboiled Chansey which is a really interesting combination of moves. On Jynx + Starmie compositions, you usually see Seismic Toss + Reflect Chansey to heal deal with Snorlax, which this set also (attempts) to do but in a different way.
  • Heroic Troller has lots of chances to paralyze Chansey but never does. With Exeggutor likely not carrying Sleep Powder, I was really interested as to why. Eventually he reveals Sing Lapras, which unfortunately misses. This leads to him eventually paralyzing Chansey despite nothing else sleeping or sleep blocking. While he might have been able to get the Sing off, knowing Lapras it probably never would have hit so he went the safer route instead.
[SCO] Serpi vs. Mako [CLA]

Game 1
  • Mako exploded with her Gengar against Jynx Turn 1 which immediately puts her at a huge advantage, as she's effectively going to be playing 5v4 assuming she has another sleeper in the back. This is definitely the optimal line for Gengar users to take.
  • She then exploded with her Snorlax on Turn 6 which puts her up 4v3. When you're up one Pokemon, you're comfortable trading down.
  • Around Turn 22 Mako takes a lot of damage on her Tauros, including Hyper Beaming into Rhydon and eating an Earthquake in return. While taking early damage on your Tauros is typically not the play, she got away with it because her Alakazam became her win condition.
Game 2
  • On Turn 15 Mako clicks Stun Spore with her Exeggutor against a healthy Starmie and a paralyzed Jynx which led me to believe she was running sleepless Exeggutor.
  • Mako clicks Hyper Beam on Turn 28 trying to trade paralysis on her Tauros in exchange for the Starmie, but Serpi gets the turn right and Recovers instead. I'm not sure if it would have been better to just go Exeggutor, which Starmie can't touch, and then force Jynx in which you can take advantage with as Mako did on Turn 31 with a nice double switch. If her Tauros were fully healthy, it probably would have yielded some better results and potentially could have won if she got lucky against the Starmie. On the other hand, her last was Lapras so if she were able to take out the Starmie in exchange for her Tauros' speed it would have been a great trade.
Game 3
  • Serpi's Exeggutor exploding on Turn 6 with paralyzed Jynx as the sleep block led me to believe he was carrying double sleeper, which he in fact was.
  • Really tough Sing miss on Turn 8. I think Mako should have stayed in and let Starmie take Sleep since it's very likely Chansey has Sing but she was rewarded nonetheless with a miss.
  • Serpi switches out his full health Snorlax to his 48% paralyzed Chansey to check 60% paralyzed Snorlax, which to me can only mean he isn't carrying Reflect and Chansey is Counter. Team definitely seems a bit weak to Snorlax once Exeggutor has to explode to kill the first sleep block.
  • Strange switch-in from Mako on Turn 26, since if Chansey doesn't full paralysis it's at 73% and out of range at Earthquake. I suppose the thought process was considering all the full paralysis chances (Rhydon can use Substitute to fish as well) eventually she was going to get a free turn for Rhydon.
[TIG] Amaranth vs chuva de perereca [RUI]

Game 1
  • Amaranth begins with Lead Chansey which is something you see rarely but I know Serpi used it a bit during the Invitational. Leading Chansey gives less opportunities for Alakazam to beat you down with Psychic and prevent your Sing.
  • Sacking Jolteon to sleep is interesting. I believe the thought process is it can still check the likes of Zapdos while asleep and your other Pokemon are more useful overall.
  • We see Exeggutor after revealing Chansey is Sing so like the other two sets, I'm thinking it's not carrying Sleep Powder.
  • Really fun and interesting endgame overall, props to Amaranth for winning it at the end.
Game 2
  • On Turn 12 chuva de perereca goes for the kill with the surprise Mega Drain but Amaranth finally switches out his Starmie.
  • Lapras actually does something and KOes Chansey with Hyper Beam! He had the chance to Sing on Turn 15 but didn't, which leads me to believe he wasn't carrying it.
  • Great double Blizzards at the end for Amaranth to seal it.
[CRY] Exiline vs Nails [WOL]

Game 1
  • Exiline does not click Explosion with his Gengar against Jynx and instead gets slept, his Chansey frozen, and effectively loses the game Turn 2. He knows Jynx - Starmie - Jolteon with Ice Beam + Reflect Snorlax is coming and just can't stop it.
Game 2
  • Nails uses all his Blizzards without a freeze. For these scenarios, I wonder if Ice Beam Jynx has merit but then you lose out on a lot of damage.
  • Love Turn 68 from Exiline. His Reflect Snorlax is in range of Hyper Beam, so he switches out to his Counter Chansey, absorbs the Hyper Beam, and OHKOes Nails' Snorlax with Counter.
  • Jolteon last is great for Exiline, but he turns out to be Double Edge instead of Double Kick which really costs him.

Overall
  • 3 Lapras! Heroic Troller mentioned in the RBY Discord Server that he brought Lapras to shield against Ice Beam Chansey. We saw in his game Lapras miss Sing on Chansey and overall do minimal, but we did see in Amaranth's Game 2 that when Lapras isn't always missing Sing, it can actually put in the work. On the flip side, we only saw 1 Cloyster.
  • Jynx was the most popular lead at 7 uses, and we even saw one back Jynx as well.
  • Alakazam was just slightly ahead of Exeggutor (10 uses to 9). I'm really interested to see who finishes higher.
  • Only 3 Zapdos uses, which was less than even Gengar.
 
Last edited:

Hipmonlee

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I want to talk a little about turn 8 of Nails vs Hayburner.

Nails has Jynx in against unpar chansey, Hayburner could conceivably use par eggy as a pivot, but realistically this is a free lovely kiss for Nails.

Hayburner stays in to Thunderwave with Chansey and Nails' Jynx uses Psychic.

This is a wild outcome.

I think this turn encapsulates one of the big problems Nails has. The psychic here, is a genuinely brilliant move. This is the kind of move that Nails finds all the time that other people just never do. I think, for this kind of thing he is the best RBYer going around (other than me of course). The damage on Gengar is more valuable to him than the free sleep, because he has a quakeless lax, and Gengar walls it almost as well when sleeping as when awake.

Except Hayburner predicts it. Hayburner is definitely not just giving up Chansey as his sleep fodder, because he needs Chansey for Starmie and Jynx. He is predicting Nails to try to go for the Psychic to hit the Gengar to take it out because he knows Gengar is that much of a threat to Nails' team. But, how could he possibly know that? Well, it's because prepping for Nails is too easy.

Part of the reason Nails can find moves like this is that he knows his teams so damn well because he uses them a lot. G2 is a good example of him using his experience with the team to work around Gengar (only to get Zapdosed, but that's just Zapdos). He's had success because it's not as trivial as you might think to beat him on prep. But against the strongest players around, it's still a little bit easier than it ought to be.

There's a balance to strike, and at the moment, in my opinion, Nails is a little too predictable.
 

emma

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[CLA] Mako vs Amaranth [TIG]

Game 1
  • Turn 2 Clamp Miss from Amaranth was really rough, since it forced an early Explosion. My guess is Amaranth didn't see much value in 50% Cloyster since while it likely can Rest on Snorlax, it's easy to be taken advantage of. Furthermore, he probably didn't want to risk losing to an early Freeze on Jynx if he switched to Chansey or risk missing Clamp again with Cloyster and decided to just cut his losses after the tough critical hit.
  • I don't love Mako's Exeggutor Explosion on Turn 6. Sleeping Starmie is right there and she can probably save the boom for later on. Exeggutor simply trades 1-for-1 which definitely isn't the best. Amaranth mentioned in the Smogon Tournaments Discord that he knew Mako's Explosion tendencies and that the boom was coming on that turn, so great prep work by him.
  • Ice Beam Snorlax with Cloyster seems a bit strange; maybe Amaranth was always planning to boom with Cloyster early and wanted extra Snorlax insurance?
  • Counter Snorlax is an extremely cool choice from Mako, which let her KO Amaranth's Tauros after absorbing the critical hit Hyper Beam.
  • Mako once again used a very offensive team with Explosion Exeggutor (perhaps without Sleep Powder again since Jynx was the lead) and then 4 Attack Snorlax with Explosion.
Game 2
  • Amaranth uses lead Sing Chansey for the second time in two weeks, which helped minimize the amount of times Starmie got to click Blizzard against it. He then sacked his Chansey to Sleep, which is something we've seen some players do after their Chansey had already gotten its Sleep off. He also revealed Seismic Toss as its lone attacking move over Ice Beam, which is interesting to note.
  • Mako, like Heroic Troller last week, kept attacking into Snorlax with her Tauros in exchange for damage. Again, the Tauros player was rewarded with luck -- this time a Blizzard Freeze.
  • Amaranth revealed Stun Spore on his Exeggutor. Normally this means dropping Double Edge but I'm wondering he's continued the new trend of just dropping Sleep (which would make sense with Sing Chansey).
  • Amnesia + Reflect Slowbro is cool to see, that trades the ability to slow down + perhaps eventually outspeed threats with Amnesia for more security against physical attackers. I think Mako did not play optimally against it in the end, with the biggest thing not going hard Zapdos Turn 46 when the Slowbro just entered.
Game 3
  • Another back Jynx! It would make sense if Mako was expecting either a Blizzard from Starmie or a switch to Chansey or Exeggutor when Amaranth plays Starmie against Alakazam.
  • I actually am fine with Tauros coming in on Turn 5 against Jynx. Rest is super likely and even if Blizzard is clicked you are taking a 1/3 max due to the Special drop and then Jynx is paralyzed and in range of Exeggutor Double Edge. Of course, a critical hit led to Tauros at only 12% which was not great.
  • Zapdos shows how strong it is against teams without Rhydon or Jolteon, by taking out the Alakazam, Chansey, and Snorlax, as well as setting up his Amnesia + Reflect + Ice Beam Snorlax to be in a great position to win, that was unfortunately ended by a last turn critical hit.
[SHA] Heroic Troller vs Serpi [SCO]

Game 1
  • Very cool start from Serpi. Exploding with Gengar Turn 1 takes away Heroic Troller's only likely Sleeper, while Serpi will still be able to Sleep something later on (his second Sleeper turns out to be back Jynx which is very cool!).
  • Turn 3 completely turns Serpi's advantage upside down, as he was likely going to be playing 5v4 (with a potential for Jynx to Freeze something) to a straight 4v4.
  • It was cool to see the second Slowbro this week, even though it didn't do anything.
  • Overall, after a great start from Serpi, he got a ton of bad luck and couldn't do much throughout the game.
Game 2
  • Serpi brings Lead Chansey (like I mentioned him enjoying last week) but faces probably the worst matchup in Jynx. Very interesting that Heroic Troller brought Jynx (& Rhydon!) twice this set.
  • Rock Slide Rhydon actually makes solid progress against Cloyster, but we'll see if missing either Body Slam, Substitute, or Rest proves deadly (hint: it does not).
[RUI] chuva de perereca vs FriendOfMrGolem120 [TYR]

Game 1
  • FriendOfMrGolem120 is willing to bet against the odds and explode his Snorlax against Sing Chansey, getting the lucky dodge. Really interesting that he would have been content with sacking his own Snorlax to Sleep.
Game 2
  • We see Gengar once again force out a Starmie, which is something that I don't believe has ever happened significantly until this SPL. What a cool trend development to see already!
  • chuva de perereca gets "stuck" a majority of the game and is forced to finally bring in his Zapdos on Turn 71. Despite facing no Rhydon or Jolteon, it makes minimal progress against FriendOfMrGolem120 tip-toeing around it with Chansey and Snorlax. With a little bit of RBY magic, I wouldn't have been shocked if Zapdos could have turned the momentum around.
  • chuva de perereca is able to go from 3-6 to 3-2, but can't clutch it out in the end. I think if he changes some things up starting at Turn 115 (mostly keeping his Tauros healthy) he can come away with the win, but can't win them all.
Game 3
  • chuva de perereca clicking Earthquake against Snorlax on Turn 42 to avoid Counter was amazing.
  • Not much to say here, chuva de perereca did a great job of spreading paralysis and letting Rhydon go in against a Zapdos team.
[WOL] Nails vs Hayburner [BIG]

Game 1
  • Nails and Hayburner both for the "Sing War" Turn 2, probably expecting the other to play it safe and switch back to their Psychic-type sleep absorper.
  • Hayburner is running Seismic Toss Chansey as his only attacking move next to Sing. He also brought Seismic Toss last week, but that was paired with Counter.
  • On Turn 26, Nails explodes with his Snorlax on Tauros, but instead dents the Cloyster. Since he was at 59% and paralyzed, I would assume Nails was thinking Hayburner might try to fish for full paralysis / critical hits with his Tauros, but instead makes the safe switch to Cloyster.
Game 2
  • Nails attempts to Sleep his Mono-Normal Snorlax into Gengar on Turn 2, but Hayburner actually gets a lucky miss and keeps his Sleep for another Pokemon that can actually make any progress into his team. You can see later on the game where Nails cannot let his Snorlax tough the field since it's completely dead weight. Gengar also fully beating Mono-Normal Snorlax even while asleep is funny to see.
  • Stomp Tauros got a flinch!
  • We can see how powerful Zapdos is into Starmie - Cloyster - Alakazam and the true negative of dropping Jolteon on the structure.
Game 3
  • Another Lead Jolteon + Back Jynx!
  • Hipmonlee makes a nice post here about Turn 8, and by getting it wrong Nails has to eat paralysis and sleeps the Gengar instead of the Chansey.
  • Gengar + Exeggutor + Cloyster is a really interesting combination that I'm guessing aims to spam Explosion while also sparring well against Snorlax.
Most impressed with Amaranth and Hayburner through two weeks. Heroic Troller vs. Nails is going to be a banger for Week 3.
 

emma

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Been super busy, so here's just a few things I noticed from Week 3 of SPL.

:chansey: Sing Chansey Wars :chansey:

Twice (1, 2) we saw two Chansey switch in Turn 1 and both click Sing Turn 2. I feel as we almost always see at least one switch back to Starmie or Alakazam lead to play it safe, but last week we saw a more aggressive and risky play since if you lose the "Sing War" you have most likely accepted playing 5v6.

:exeggutor: Exeggutor + Cloyster :cloyster:

We saw the combination three times (1, 2, 3) with lead Gengar from the Italian duo of Heroic Troller and Amaranth and then another time with Alakazam lead (1) from FriendOfMrGolem120. Exeggutor, Cloyster, and Gengar provide three booms and great insurance into Snorlax as Ice Beam and Earthquake struggle breaking past against Cloyster while Hyper Beam and Selfdestruct can't touch Gengar.

:jynx: Jynx Dominance & Rise of Gengar :gengar:

Lead Jynx is at an absurd 68.75% win rate through 3 weeks. With this, we've seen a sharp increase of Lead Gengar (17%, up from 9% in SPL XII and RBY Invitational II) in order to combat it. Of course, clicking Hypnosis can easily lead to heartbreak (1, 2), but when you are able to explode turn one (1) you have a massive advantage.

:tauros: Slamming into Snorlax twice getting punished :tauros:

Heroic Troller loves slamming into Snorlax a second time once it switches in. This time, Nails revealed Counter Snorlax (1) which helped in the scenario even with the critical hit. It also allowed his Snorlax to OHKO Gengar (1) showing that it's not a complete one trick pony.

:zapdos: Starmie + Zapdos / Rhydon + Alakazam :rhydon:

FriendOfMrGolem120 and Serpi (1, 2) brought these two unique structures respectively in the last two weeks. Usually you'd see an Exeggutor or Cloyster in the middle to give some sort of defensive backbone / switching ability, but these two players look a way more offensive route.

:moltres: Toxic + Fire Spin :moltres:

Up 1-0, Nails breaks out Tauros-less Toxic + Fire Spin spam against Heroic Troller (1). However, using Fire Spin means you need to hit so when Nails misses Fire Spin with Moltres on Turn 33 and gets paralyzed, things do not look great.

:jolteon: Jolteon vs. Zapdos :zapdos:

Rhydon - 20 uses (26%, #7) & 50% win
Jolteon - 13 uses (17%, #11) & 62% win
Zapdos - 12 uses (16%, #12) & 25% win
 
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