SV UU Time is Short, This is Our Fate: A Hyper Offense Story (1669 Peak - top 10)

Crushy · Jun 26, 2023

Timid Iron Thorns + Venomoth Hyper Offense
:sv/brambleghast:

https://pokepast.es/506422ff835b8c08
:sv/iron-thorns:

Table of Contents:
I. Introduction
II. Proof of Peak
III. Team Members
IV. Building Process
V. Replays
VI. Closing Thoughts

I. Introduction:

Howdy everyone, welcome to my first ever RMT. This post was also done on mobile so i apologize if the formatting ends up looking weird on a monitor. With the beginning of the end for pre-home metagames drawing near for the lower tiers, the timing felt appropriate to making this post in sharing not only a team that grew dearly on me, but to also capture the essence of this moment in the UU metagame timeline, a unique point in time that will fade into our memories before transforming into a brand new era within the Scarlet and Violet generation. This particular team was made for a Secret Santa project within the UU forums and i definitely hadn't expected just how much i would enjoy this team, so to see a kind gesture thrive in this manner is priceless. This team was made during the earliest stages of SV UU, a time period where nothing could get banned just yet so it was quite a beautifully chaotic time to say the least, and even then the team seemed to also pass the test of time in remaining usable throughout the tier change that have ensued within UU so far. When i was laddering consistently at the time, this team got up to top 10 more than once and usually maintained a rating above 1600 with it. For how 'new' SV truly still is, it already feels like so much has happened despite what is yet to come. Circumstances like this really put into perspective just how short the generations really are and how quickly metagames can pass us by before it all settles in. While it may take a bit longer before the other lower tiers drastically adapt to Home, I encourage other lower tier players that happen to stumble upon this post to do the same in sharing a special team to capture the moment before the new chapters unfolds. I've never really been a forum user, which is unfortunate at times, but sometimes it's nice to share things like this.

II. Proof of Peak:

III. Team Members:

Armarouge @ Weakness Policy Ability: Weak Armor Tera Type: Fighting EVs: 248 HP / 8 SpA / 252 Spe Modest Nature IVs: 0 Atk - Endure - Armor Cannon - Focus Blast - Stored Power
	Brambleghast @ Focus Sash Ability: Infiltrator Tera Type: Normal EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 Spe Jolly Nature - Spikes - Rapid Spin - Strength Sap - Curse
Iron Thorns @ Booster Energy Ability: Quark Drive Tera Type: Grass EVs: 248 HP / 20 Def / 240 Spe Timid Nature IVs: 20 Atk - Swords Dance - Rock Blast - Fire Punch - Tera Blast
	Bisharp @ Eviolite Ability: Defiant Tera Type: Fire EVs: 120 HP / 252 Atk / 40 SpD / 96 Spe Adamant Nature - Swords Dance - Iron Head - Sucker Punch - Night Slash
Venomoth @ Heavy-Duty Boots Ability: Tinted Lens Tera Type: Bug EVs: 80 HP / 236 SpA / 192 Spe Modest Nature IVs: 0 Atk - Bug Buzz - Sludge Bomb - Quiver Dance - Sleep Powder
	Mimikyu @ Life Orb Ability: Disguise Shiny: Yes Tera Type: Ghost EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe Adamant Nature - Swords Dance - Play Rough - Shadow Sneak - Wood Hammer

IV. Building Process:

So based on the mentioned project, (feel free to look at the Secret Santa project link to get an idea of build at the time of its creation and how it's developed into this) the build request was based around Armarouge. This will be a more intensive analysis of the team. At the time, this was still a new mon that i hadn't yet gotten to use and in finally being able to see its stats movepool carefully i was intrigued. However, given that this wasn't exactly a team for me, i had to consider what kind of team the recipient might enjoy, but i also didn't want to give a team that i myself wouldn't use. Eventually, i just decided to go the offensive route with Armarouge and wanted to see how it could work on HO. In the early meta, many didn't really know what to think of this mon and i believe most were dismissive of it at first just based on it's abilities and stats so a clear direction with its sets was not yet established, but some that i remember seeing at the time were Choice Scarf/Specs, and Calm Mind sets and i recall Flash Fire getting a decent amount of use too while assuming that Weak Armor was not worth using (only to end up becoming standard after all). I decided to try out something new compared to what I'd experienced of this mon in facing it. A few of the complains I'd hear about this mon were that it was too slow, and in seeing that it's speed tier reached promising numbers with Weak Armor, i decided to try it out. Sets with at least 3 attacks seemed like the way to go with it and i tried out a few different moves in that 4th slot before finalizing on Endure; some of the attempted 4th slots involved Calm Mind, Disable, Destiny Bond Will-O-Wisp, and Substitute, but eventually found that Endure helped in really utilizing its ability consistently. Also considering that it's typing seemed to lure many super-effective hits, i figured that it might be a good Weakness Policy user especially in combination with its ability and Endure. The health investment made it a lot easier to get the WA/WP going. As it turns out, I was correct: the set was quite lethal and really took advantage of many forms of speed control in outrunning things like Scarf Staraptor, +1 set ups in Salamence/Gyarados/Baxcalibur/Haxorus to name a few, Booster Sandy Shocks, and outlasting First Impression mons like Slither Wing and Lokix. Now some may wonder why I chose to run Focus Blast over the traditional Energy Ball variants here, and this mainly due to the existence of Hydreigon and eventual Tyranitar drop as well. Hydrei was a lethal mon that you didn't want to give free turns to in setting up a substitute for itself and Tyranitar was an Arma check that also threatened actually triggering the Endure because of the sand, so being able to clear it out immediately was important as well as offensive ttars being a major threat to more offensive teams in general too. Not only that, but in some scenarios you did not want to Armor Cannon right away because of the defense drops, and considering that you couldn't really reky on Stored Power until set up, Focus Blast was another decent middle ground for strong coverage you could go for. Endure ended up being a means for taking on opposing set up in being able to turn the tides against already set up mons and dealing it back after Weak Armor, which can be important for teams of this sort. In past gens, i remember scarfers being more commonly seen on HO to handle opposing set up; in more recent gens and this gen in particular, many of the newer mons like unburden mons in terrains/fast Megas like Lopunny/Zeraora/Dragapult/many of the paradox mons have really challenged up traditional speed tiers for what makes something a proper form of speed control and the paradox mons have had a similar impact on UU with things like Sandy Shocks/Iron Jugulis making it difficult for typically established scarfers that worked well in past gens to succeed in SV, and having a rather bulky mon in Arma being able to act as a semi-speed control mon for HO was very clutch a lot of the time. This mon also helped against psychic terrain teams in being a psychic resist that could check itself and with max hp also lived a +2 acrobatics from Hawlucha. This turned out to be one of the MVPs of the team.

:armarouge:

In going the HO route, i needed to support Arma's set and figured I'd start by picking a dedicated lead and went with another new mon in Brambleghast. At the time and even in the current meta, bulkier sets were commonly ran on it, but it's movepool reminded me a lot of Excadrill, namely the lead sets that have existed in past gens, and thought that being able to spinblock simultaneously seemed nice so i was inspired to try out a similar lead set. It's typing helped cover some of the things that Arma was weak to, namely the water and ground weakness. Many might wonder in why not just use another lead in something like Froslass or booster Sandy Shocks, and that's mainly because Brambleghast unironically had a solid match up against many of the other dedicated leads that were getting usage at the time that involved not only the two mentioned mons, but also things like lead Scream Tail, Hydreigon, Krookodile, Iron Thorns, Cloyster, Tinkaton. All this and only considering many of the standard hazard setters outside of HO in mons like Gastrodon, Hippowdon, Quagsire, other Bramble, etc. The main point here is that the role compression this mon offered was great in that it not only could prevent opposing hazards while setting them up, but the typing also helped tremendously in spinblocking and also serving as somewhat of a defensive backbone for the team. Visually, the team did have an awkward ground matchup (part of what inspired Arma's weakness policy in making a ground weakness into a potential advantage), but the grass typing was a decent glue for the team. Because of Strength Sap, this allowed Bramble at times to become a lead with longevity in that you could use it in a few different ways rather than how most leads are just set up do only one thing, and also help create scenarios that put another mon in the back in a position to set up easier. Curse might seem like a funny option, but it worked out decently in practice in being able to deny Defog attempts while creating momentum for the team as well. Along with Infiltrator, Curse could also be used to rack up chip against opposing mons with Substitutes. In some cases, Curse in combination with Arma's Endure could allow you stall out for a few extra turns of a 25% chip, which adds up fast. Of course, some of the other mons on the team could utilize this strategy too. Tera Normal seems like an odd pick for this mon and admittedly I don't remember it coming up, but it was chosen for the off chance that it did come up, you could instead begin using Curse to set up and would allow Rapid Spin to deal decent damage.

:armarouge:

One of the other mons that appreciated Bramble's Curses was Iron Thorns, a true MVP of this team. In early SV UU, the tier had a decent amount of spinners, which were all rather covered with this team, but as far as defoggers went, Talonflame was the most prominent of them. In some matchups, a Bramble lead vs a Talon lead would end up resulting in just 1 spike going up, which is fine, but to really get value of even just that, Talon was an important presence to really account for since there wasn't really much at the earlier time that could immediately threaten this mon, so preventing its turns were difficult. At least, this was the case before this Iron Thorns set came to be. Inspired by SM OU's Timid Kartana sets, it just so happened that while Iron Thorns was too slow to really thrive in SV OU, it was just fast enough to go off on the UU tier and thus Booster Energy Timid Swords Dance Iron Thorns came to be. This mon was fast enough to outrun the entire unboosted tier, and this particular spread gave it a ton of bulk that really helped it set up easier against a lot of stuff. Despite having a -atk nature, the base stat is still essentially about an univested base 114 mon, so it wasn't as weak as you'd expect it to be. Some may wonder why not just run max max on atk and speed, but that's the funny thing about this set: many seem to underestimate just how valuable the immediate speed could really be in any given match. Unlike past random scarfers on offense, Iron Thorns had the benefit of acting as speed control that wasn't locked in to any one move. Being a mon that could immediately threaten the defoggers of the time in Talonflame and Noivern was a great quality to have. Even if it still wasn't fast enough to outrun the scarfers and speed control of the tier, it still could potentially beat some of them. Things like Staraptor, Iron Jugulis, Sandy, Gengar, Rotoms, etc. and some priority mons like Azumarill, Pawmot, Brute Bonnet lol, could all end up potentially losing to Thorns. In fact, even Slither Wing and Lokix could lose to it if it was healthy enough and they weren't Choice Banded. Raptor/Jug/Sandy/Azu could all lose to well timed Tera, Gengar had to rely on Focus Blast to threaten it.. we all know how that ends. Despite what many say in Iron Thorns' typing being bad, it actually turned out to be a good one for HO. Being an Electric/Flying resist had real value for teams of this sort. This mon could pivot in on a lot of attacks that could really threaten some of the other memebers. Through tera, Thorns could help take out something like Gastrodon for Arma, and even some of the other grounds for the other physical mons of the team. Fire Punch might seem like an odd pick for coverage, but realistically its electric stab isn't needed to deal with mons of the tier and while Earthquake is a good move especially along with rock coverage, eq could hit many things neutrally, but fire punch proved to be a lot more convenient in being able to hit some things nicely in things like Gyro Ball Forretress, still hit Tinkaton, and could hit a pre-tera Wo-Chien for good damage. If i had to guess, I'd say this is the mon I've swept with the most in UU so far; truly one of the most lethal sleeper picks and continues to remain one :/.

:armarouge:

The next member was Bisharp, a notorious threat in past gens. If you've played any generation with this mon in it, you know how strong it can be especially with Defiant. The addition of Eviolite really elevated this mon in being very annoyingly tanky in living a lot of stuff you wouldn't expect it to. This was my least favorite mon to face in UU for awhile. It's main role for the team was to have a backup defog deterrent, but to also serve as a ghost check to things like Gengar and Polteageist, but also to check Iron Jugulis since this was a very tricky mon to have an answer for on HO. To my knowledge, i was one of the first to use Tera Fire as a means for avoiding Will-O-Wisp burns, but tera fire turned out to be useful on Bisharp in general against certain mons like special Salamence, Noivern, Talon, Armarouge, Jugulis without Earth Power, Hatterene, etc. At times, this could really take advantage of Talon and the occasional wisp Rotoms and Altaria, in being able to switch in on a defog turn only to further boost itself as it tera fires on a wisp O.o it is as terrifying as it sounds. This mon's ability to trade vs some major threats was a nice quality for the team. Additionally, this was a steel/dark that could actually annoy Tinkaton, something that could be nuisance for offense thru its Encore sets. Knocking off its Eviolite could be considered a bad thing, as if Bisharp hasn't thrived all these years without it. Priority users are always good for HO as well, especially those that can utilize it to sweep as well. This things ability to break some defensive cores was well worthwhile in supporting the other members of the team. The speed was useful in outspeeding Azumarills and some of the other mons within that speed range like Wo-chien and Hariyama. Bisharp also helped improve the Psychic Terrain matchup in even being able to soft-check Hawlucha with tera.

:armarouge:

The 5th member was none other than Venomoth, an unconventional pick but one that could really hold its own within UU. I chose this mon in that UU in general has a many more physical attackers than special ones, especially special mons that can set up too, and the team was already heavily leaning in the same sense outside of Armarouge so it complimented the team in this manner nicely. Additionally, Toxic Spikes can be a huge threat to HO and so having a mon that can clear them up for the others was a valuable quality as well. Not only that, but Moth really improved the offense mirrors via Sleep Powder in combination with its massive damage output and sweep potential. Who would've guesses that Tera + Tinted lens could be a dangerous combination? Originally, i thought that this mon was banworthy in UU, and maybe if it hadn't been for Tinkaton's dominance it would have been a more common presence in the meta. As far as it's ev spread goes, the hp was for stall matchups that included Blissey in making Seismic Toss become a 4hko instead of a 3hko and the speed allowed it to not only outrun base 130s at +1, but at +2 it was able to outrun scarf Gengar and by default that meant most forms of speed control outside of weather mons like Floatzel/Scovillian and Terrain Hawlucha. It's base typing also helped it withstand the First Impression mons in being able to take them on as well as times. Venomoth was essential to the team in being able to cripple most of the defensive mons in being to significantly chip things like Talonflame, Gastrodon, Quagsire, Hippowdon even, and also helped improve the ground matchup through its pure tera. This thing was a huge threat to a lot of offensive mons too in being able to drop a lot of them to a +2 tera Bug Buzz. Even Grafaiai at the time could lose to this mon, which was rare to see at the time in that seeing set up mons that Grafaiai didn't want to switch into were in fact rare. The benefit of Sleep Powder also could help position some of the other members of needed. On some level, even if the meta is a lot different at this point in time, i still consider Moth to be the Quiver Dancer available in UU with the most sweep potential, even more than that of the Oricorio forms. Moth could also occasionally pivot in on fighting moves for Bisharp and was another method for threatening any Substitute mons. This was another mon that could use Bramble's curse to rack up damage through sleep.

:armarouge:

The final member of the squad was Mimikyu, first and foremost a backup spinblocker that also served as another priority wincon. With Disguise, this mon was clutch in some matchups in significantly improving the weather matchups and could soft answer opposing set up as well. One of the other main appeals about running this mon was that it kept Wood Hammer, a strong move that allowed it break some of the most common ground and bulky water types of the tier, like Alomomola, without the need to exhaust it's own tera. Importantly, this mon also helped as another Jugulis check and even Hydreigon check before it could tera steel. Being a fairy that could also deal a lot of damage to Tinkaton really helped Venomoth a lot in weakening it's biggest check. It's ability itself also made it a good partner to utilize Bramble's curses and keeping up hazards when possible. Tera Ghost helped boost up its Shadow Sneak damage to make it easier to clean and sweep. Not much else to say for a mon that's rather straightforward in what it does. If i had to choose, this was the 'weakest link' of the team but even in saying that, i wouldn't replace it; every member held their own.

Threats:
:baxcalibur:

Offense is always bound to have a handleful lf threats but of the bigger threats to the team involved Baxcalibur, Lucario, dual priority Lokix, Staraptor, Roar Hippo, Jugulis, Haxorus, and Hydreigon. Everyone of them could be outplayed,but some were tougher than others. Bax and Haxorus were two of the mons that could set up and break through the counterplay, namely loaded dice sets from Bax and Hax depending on its coverage and tera could prove to be tough to handle if i was unable to chip it down. Lokix and Staraptor are notorious offense slayers and could both potentially outlast the team as well. Lucario was a tricky one whenever i ran into jolly sets since it could answer everything outside of a healthy Thorns. Iron Jugulis is bulky enough enough to tank many hits and dish out hefty damage to where i really had to preserve either Bisharp or Mimikyu to handle it, or hope that i could force booster out to later on outspeed with Thorns. Hydreigon was fast enough to annoy everything and tera steel made it tricky at times too, but Thorns could handle non-flamethrower sets and sub via rock blast and again Bisharp and Mimikyu played into this too. Roar Hippo could prove to be annoying if managed to outlast Thorns and Mimkyu.

V. Replays:

In no particular order, here are many replays of the team in action. In some, you may see some slight movepool variations from the finalized ones, but these would be from when I was still optimizing them. For the most part they are randomly ordered, but i did try to put some of the higher ladder games towards the end. These are all replays from me, though i think it is worth mentioning that there were a few times it got used in the SV UU kickoff tour as well.

VI. Closing Thoughts:
Time really does fly by. One moment you're doing thing, suddenly you're doing something else not even knowing how you got there. I've been on Showdown since late XY and early ORAS, though i was way younger then and I've always been more of a casual player even now though i don'tmind an occasional tour once in awhile. The earliest smogon related thing that i remember was Aegislash getting suspected tested in OU for perspective. I've gotten to experience a few different generations and I'm sure many that have spent a similar or even longer time can relate to how short it truly all feels in retrospect, let alone the different metagames that can exist in one generation too. All things must come to an end, and all we are really left with are memories of the games we played and the teams we have used and no matter how much we'd want to re-experience the peak sensations of it all over again, we simply cannot because time's flow doesn't stop. Things coming to an end are always bittersweet, and we have every right to feel any ways we do towards losses, but that doesn't mean we have to fear what comes next, of all the uncertainty that we can't be sure of. In a game full of many competitive tryhards, it's always important to not always get constantly caught up in more serious ventures while forgetting to simply do some fun things in the game and mess around with less serious things on the ladder or similar every now and then. Here's to hoping that the future metagames to come will be enjoyable ones!

I'm not really sure where to start with acknowledgements, but a huge shoutout to the UU community. At earlier points, i wasn't really a main to any tier and played all sorts of tiers, but UU has always had a special place in my heart and in time it did become the tier I'd play the most. I could mention many names here but some from the UU community I'd like to shoutout are pokemonisfun, ThatTheDamned, BigFatMantis, naviii 1, Mystras, JustFranco, Queen of Bean, Indigo Plateau, Liz Angeles, pomfpomfpluff, dunoks.

A few other players I'd like to shoutout are TheKingKarp, Feliburn, georgiethefirst, Storm Zone, Typhlosion4, Fusien, Fusion Flare, ian-yo, HTCL, Dr. Elite, and the PIA server!

Let's give one final farewell to the pre-home SV UU and onto what comes next...

SV UU Time is Short, This is Our Fate: A Hyper Offense Story (1669 Peak - top 10)

Crushy

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