Online Competition Ultra Kalos Classic

[Tox]

Fair enough, what item does it hold then? Life Orb? Weakness Berry? Mental Herb?

Leftovers is definitely the go-to. Only the first sleep turn is guaranteed and the way Vivillion should in most cases be played out is that you keep using Sleep Powder and Substitute while squeezing in Quiver Dances when you are not in danger of taking damage.

As regards this competition in general, forgive me for being the one to state the obvious since it hasn't been posted in this thread yet with sufficient emphasis, but these competitions have a long and storied history of people clicking Outrage on Dragonite. Whether they do it after a Lum/Weakness Policy Dragon Dance or just come bearing Choice Band, it's going to happen. This has been such a thing in the past that towards the end of gen6, Dragonite was removed from a few consecutive competitions. But it's back. So be prepared and collect your free day 1 wins.

And here's a list of fun (bad) things I have experimented with:

abandon all hope and what have you

Assist Spore SwordsWeavile or Liepard with Amoonguss or Smeargle and Ditto or Wobbuffet

Prankster Encore/Baton Pass Volbeat/Illumise (Volbeat gets Tail Glow / Seismic Toss; Illumise has Wish / Growth; both can BP Double Team, of course.

Unaware Stockpile Quagsire

Unburden Belly Drum Slurpuff

Cripple lead (e.g. Klefki) into Drifblim pass

2:1 trading offensive Sash Endeavor Scolipede faking Baton Pass

Suicide lead Drought Torkoal into Growth Chlorophyll Venusaur, Scarf/Specs Solar Power Helioptile etc.

 

[Kong Harald]

Fair enough, what item does it hold then? Life Orb? Weakness Berry? Mental Herb?

Leftovers. The combination of accurate sleep powders, subs and lefties buys enough time to set up.

 

[Marzbar]

Leftovers. The combination of accurate sleep powders, subs and lefties buys enough time to set up.

Okay now I get it

 

[cant say]

Fair enough, what item does it hold then? Life Orb? Weakness Berry? Mental Herb?

Vivillon @ Leftovers
Ability: Compound Eyes
EVs: 44 HP / 212 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Sleep Powder
- Substitute
- Quiver Dance
- Hurricane

cycle sleep + sub + quiver until you have a million boosts and then win. pair with something that provides speed control / beats Goodra / breaks Gale Wings

 

[Marzbar]

Vivillon @ Leftovers
Ability: Compound Eyes
EVs: 44 HP / 212 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Sleep Powder
- Substitute
- Quiver Dance
- Hurricane

cycle sleep + sub + quiver until you have a million boosts and then win. pair with something that provides speed control / beats Goodra / breaks Gale Wings

Testing it out for fun. So far it's come unglued against / been wrecked by a Sap Sipper Goodra, a Hyper Voice Sylveon, and a Stored Power Espeon. Yay Pokemon XD

 

[DreamPrince]

Can somebody explain the Vivillon thing? Is it just because it's the only decent Quiver Dance user?? (Though Masquerain I

Can somebody explain the Vivillon thing? Is it just because it's the only decent Quiver Dance user?? (Though Masquerain I would argue can be better with Intimidate)

would argue can be better with Intimidate)

Vip

Fair enough, what item does it hold then? Life Orb? Weakness Berry? Mental Herb?

Leftovers for Substitute.

 

[SadisticMystic]

The battling window (at least for your first 15 battles) is now open!

 

[cant say]

streamed my day 1 games, if you missed it here's the video: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/254968523

went 11-1, the one loss was against a mega garchomp that flinched my sylveon, which would have been a win otherwise... didn't really run into anything too meta though. vivillon destroys

 

[Tox]

https://pokepast.es/e62d865141842ee5
12-3; low 1630s.

Lost to a crit+spdef fall from Aegislash on Venusaur; another to a CB Play Rough miss on Belly Drum Snorlax; very last game got 3-0'd by lead Charizard X with DD + Thunderpunch due to mindgaming myself.

Should have lost another due to three consecutive turns of Venusaur confusion from a burned Dizzy Punch Kangaskhan (lol) into getting frozen on Rotom by Greninja. One game only got turned around by Aegislash living a +2 M-Lucario Earthquake after an Azumarill mirror opening in which mine got crit Knock Offed and crit Play Roughed consecutively, followed in due course by a Leech Seed miss.

 

[Marzbar]

Went 9-3. Also had a few disconnections which sucks because they still count as battles. Thanks crappy Australian internet.

I have gone with a Hydreigon and Aegislash core, which is great and all, but it sucks because everyone else had the same idea. I am also running Mega Venusaur, Pelipper, Kingdra and Vivillon. Kingdra has been great. Pelipper not so much apart from its Drizzle. Vivillon can indeed destroy unprepared teams or ignorant players. There's a lot of Hyper Voice Sylveons out there though to ruin the day.
Hydreigon definitely MVP so far though. Amazing coverage, bulk and speed (with Scarf) and can lead with it and U-Turn out.

 

[PPB]

After 30 battles I barely reached 1600s. I got: first turn Zapdos Discharge (when it mattered), Gyarados flinch into avoid Rock Slide, gotten Frozen when it mattered, and gotten double Flinched by Scarf Hydreigon for the win when I outplayed them hard. I've also gotten 2 Mega Manectric Matchups and 3 Weavile Matchups when my team is extremely weak to them. Somehow I won against two out of the three weavile teams, which goes to show how bad Weavile is since I have: Hippowdon, Noivern, Garchomp, Aerodactyl on the same team. I think I could be a lot higher if it weren't for this ridiculous hax; so many stolen points, once even losing to a 1400s player :sobad:. This ladder hates me.

 

[Marzbar]

After 30 battles I barely reached 1600s. I got: first turn Zapdos Discharge (when it mattered), Gyarados flinch into avoid Rock Slide, gotten Frozen when it mattered, and gotten double Flinched by Scarf Hydreigon for the win when I outplayed them hard. I've also gotten 2 Mega Manectric Matchups and 3 Weavile Matchups when my team is extremely weak to them. Somehow I won against two out of the three weavile teams, which goes to show how bad Weavile is since I have: Hippowdon, Noivern, Garchomp, Aerodactyl on the same team. I think I could be a lot higher if it weren't for this ridiculous hax; so many stolen points, once even losing to a 1400s player :sobad:. This ladder hates me.

It happens. And then when you hope for hax to go your way it never happens. Like when I counted on a Waterfall Flinch on Scizor and never got it after 8 tries. Let's just say that as a result, Scizor spammed Roost and Swords Dance until there was no hope of surviving Bullet Punch :(

 

[cant say]

unfortunately I was just way too busy this weekend to play much of this after the first day. think I finished with like 16-2 with about 1670+. All my opps were in the 1500s so I didn't earn many points... I honestly think if I was able to keep going I could have gunned for high 1700s/1800s, but that's just speculation based on how the competition felt. who knows what kind of players I might have ran into on the last day.

http://pokepast.es/3bac0864b69f5df1 << the team I used.

I just built it around Vivillon with Sash Chomp slowing things down for safe Sleep Powders. Kang/Chomp/Aegi is just a solid core from back in the day so I slotted them in as a backup to Vivillon. Had to use Stoss Kang just because it's legal, and the "ethan06 special" Aegi, which is a super legit set. Then Sylveon and Conk were kinda just slapped on as Goodra/Greninja checks but they worked out really nicely.

How did everyone else go?

 

[Arcticus]

Long time lurker, howdy y'all!

With a few disconnects (Marzbar Australian internet truly is the worst), ended up squeezing all 45 matches in there with a final record of 28-29 wins, had a couple of nice streaks and managed to not lose multiple matches in a row so had a final rating of about 1660, which is a PB for these infernal competitions.

Here's my team: http://pokepast.es/4c8b2cca6767dd96

I generally went with Kang/Aegi/Greninja - T-tar ended up being dead weight most of the time (too slow and too many fighting 'mons), and Band was probably not the best item for Chomp with so many Greninjas running around. Scarf Hydreigon was OK, got a couple of wins but also missed a Meteor which cost me the match haha - didn't occur to me to use U-turn in the set which probably would have been a good idea.

cant say, I actually came up against you on Saturday (being in Australia it may have been Fri for you) - you were around 1645 and I was around 1623ish, I was moderately terrified of Vivillon (having been keeping an eye on this thread) but you didn't bring it to my immense relief, and I ended up getting the W although it was a close one. Cheers for a great match

 

[PPB]

Ended up around 1700 (maybe like 1699 idk yet), which is a pretty bad score for this comp since everybody is getting over 1700. Also kind of sad since I got quite 1700 early on then sorta stayed there. Had a terrible day three where a couple of haxxy losses also brought my score down... my peak before then was around 1750. Might post team later.

 

[G50]

I had a couple of teams that I used, a main one and a troll one.

The troll one was -

Grip Claw Shuckle (Toxic/Infestation/Rest/Shell Smash),
Choice Scarf Chandelure (Flamethrower/Memento/Shadow Ball/Energy Ball),
Leftovers Lapras (Freeze-Dry/Surf/Perish Song/Rest),
AV Tyranitar (Crunch/Rock Slide/Earthquake/Iron Head),
Haban Berry Haxorus (Poison Jab/Dragon Dance/Outrage/Earthquake)
Mega Lucario (Dark Pulse/Flash Cannon/Dragon Pulse/Aura Sphere)

As expected it did pretty bad lol. 22-23 overall. A couple of awesome moments -

- Shuckle got a sweep when one opponent started with Supporter Klefki and it was stuck there for 7 turns while Shuckle became impossible to kill. Shuckle was mainly used when I expected opponents were starting with a bulky supporter Pokemon using screens. It got to take down quite a bit of opponents.

- One opponent used a Double Team/Baton Pass/Focus Energy/Stockpile Drifblim while I led with Lapras. Lapras used Perish Song, and on the final turn of it, the Drifblim Baton Passed the boosts to a Kingdra. lmao

-------------------

My main team started 10-0 which is something I never did before in any competition, ended day 1 12-3. Day 2 I made some poor predictions on moves and switches, plus was hit with a lot of flinch hax, ended that day 8-7. Day 3 I did much better, even defeated Pokemon I struggled against in day 2. Went 10-5, for an overall record of 30-15.

The main team was -

Lum Berry Hippowdon (Fire Fang/Earthquake/Slack Off/Curse)
Mega Aggron (Heavy Slam/Earthquake/Dragon Tail/Rock Slide)
Expert Belt Ludicolo (Giga Drain/Scald/Ice Beam/Leech Seed)
Life Orb Shiny Greninja (Night Slash/Waterfall/Ice Beam/Grass Knot)
Weakness Policy Aegislash (Shadow Sneak/Shadow Ball/Flash Cannon/King's Shield)
Leftovers Vivillon (Bug Buzz/Hurricane/Quiver Dance/Sleep Powder)

Only two opponents that had Vivillon on their team brought it into battle, not too surprising as this team was about as anti-Vivillon as it gets xD. I was shocked at how many opponents struggled with the Aggron/Vivillon/Ludicolo core of the team.

 

[Unibot]

The ranking is now published on the Pokémon Global Link.

 

[SadisticMystic]

Only 2019 competitors this time, so the top 30 usage counts (which only count teams from players who finished at least three games over .500) look absolutely barren:

Aegislash 193
Greninja 179
Garchomp 151 (6 mega)
Charizard 114 (62 mega-X, 51 mega-Y)
Rotom 88 (55 wash, 27 heat, 5 mow, 1 frost)
Venusaur 70 (62 mega)
Gyarados 69 (50 mega)
Zapdos 61
Kangaskhan 58 (all mega)
Sylveon 57
Dragonite 56
Azumarill 53
Scizor 50 (18 mega)
Lucario 47 (41 mega)
Goodra 44
Tyranitar 43 (11 mega)
Conkeldurr 38
Ferrothorn 37
Gengar 37 (22 mega)
Cloyster 36
Gardevoir 32 (20 mega)
Hydreigon 31
Klefki 27
Vivillon 27
Gliscor 27
Mawile 26 (all mega)
Hawlucha 24
Weavile 24
Manectric 24 (23 mega; the other one was holding X Attack for some reason)

Other less-used counts

Blastoise 13 (10 mega)
Pikachu 1
Raichu 1
Nidoqueen 1
Nidoking 14
Wigglytuff 1
Vileplume 1
Dugtrio 4
Poliwrath 2
Alakazam 22 (14 mega)
Machamp 8
Victreebel 2
Golem 1
Slowbro 6
Electrode 1
Exeggutor 2
Rhydon 1
Seaking 1
Starmie 2
Mr. Mime 1
Pinsir 7 (all mega)
Lapras 4
Ditto 9
Vaporeon 4
Jolteon 16
Flareon 1
Aerodactyl 8 (6 mega)
Snorlax 18
Articuno 4
Moltres 5
Crobat 9
Ampharos 5 (1 mega)
Politoed 5
Quagsire 11
Espeon 13
Umbreon 15
Slowking 2
Wobbuffet 2
Gligar 1
Shuckle 6
Heracross 4 (all mega)
Ursaring 1
Piloswine 2
Skarmory 12
Houndoom 2 (both mega)
Kingdra 4
Smeargle 2
Miltank 2
Linoone 7
Ludicolo 3
Swellow 2
Pelipper 6
Ninjask 2
Shedinja 1
Exploud 2
Hariyama 1
Sableye 6
Aggron 5 (all mega)
Medicham 12 (11 mega)
Volbeat 1
Sharpedo 1
Torkoal 3
Flygon 1
Zangoose 1
Crawdaunt 2
Kecleon 1
Banette 3 (all mega)
Absol 2 (1 mega)
Gorebyss 1
Salamence 14
Staraptor 16
Bibarel 1
Roserade 12
Wormadam 1 (sandy)
Vespiquen 1
Drifblim 3
Chatot 1
Hippowdon 21
Drapion 3
Toxicroak 6
Abomasnow 2 (both mega)
Magnezone 11
Rhyperior 6
Yanmega 4
Mamoswine 22
Simisear 1
Gigalith 2
Scolipede 10
Krookodile 11
Crustle 3
Scrafty 1
Sigilyph 1
Zoroark 3
Reuniclus 5
Vanilluxe 2
Escavalier 1
Amoonguss 9
Alomomola 2
Chandelure 16
Haxorus 2
Beartic 1
Accelgor 3
Mienshao 5
Bisharp 9
Chesnaught 11
Delphox 21
Diggersby 6
Talonflame 21
Pyroar 4
Florges 7
Pangoro 4
Furfrou 3
Meowstic 6 (all male)
Doublade 3
Aromatisse 1
Slurpuff 3
Malamar 13
Barbaracle 4
Dragalge 6
Clawitzer 2
Heliolisk 7
Tyrantrum 6
Aurorus 2
Dedenne 2
Carbink 1
Trevenant 7
Gourgeist 4 (1 small, 3 super)
Avalugg 3

In juniors it's even worse: the raw player count is just 55, Greninja and Charizard were co-#1s with a mere 6 qualifying users, by #15 the counts have already dropped to 1, and there isn't even a #30 since they ran out of qualifying teams before then.

 

[knobfire]

Top 10 in the world! 25-7 record - 13 games left to play.

Spreads here

Very happy with the team, all members saw significant play except Conk, who would only come when I was sure of a mega Kang matchup. Dual megas worked a treat. I'd change energy ball on Alakazam for disable in retrospect as I only used it once. MVP was undoubtedly scarf adamant Mamo. It ran the show and was brought it to almost every game. It could out-speed most leads and get the KO on pesky threats like LO Gren, Sash Chomp and Vivillon (which I didn't lose a single matchup to). Losses were usually against teams that had mega Gyarados - once it'd set up, it was basically game over.

Mixed feelings about this comp, I just couldn't get into it. Got bored quickly and decided I'd stop at my target (~1750) with 13 games left. It seemed like others felt like it wasn't even worth participating - only 2019 players?! Even without the Japanese players, that's really low! Hopefully this knocks some sense into the guys behind the comps - we need more interesting formats! Bring back spooky cup/festive feud/tiny tourney style comps with interesting ban lists and rules!

 

[Unibot]

SadisticMystic Where did you find this stats ?

 

[SadisticMystic]

I compile these stats based on the PGL summaries. If you click on Aegislash in the "post popular" list, for instance, it tells you that 97.9% of the people who used Aegislash (and had a good enough record to qualify for tabulation) used King's Shield, 85.0% had Shadow Sneak, 74.6% had Shadow Ball, and so on. The trick is that, however many people are included in that sample, it has to be a number that can serve as the denominator to a fraction in which some numerator is capable of rounding to 0.979, a different numerator rounds to 0.850, and another one rounds to 0.746...Already with just those three pieces of data, 193 is the smallest denominator that's capable of producing those results, but even after you add in all the use percentages listed for moves, items, and natures, the lowest possible denominator remains 193. Furthermore, there are oddball item choices like Safety Goggles and Choice Band that show up with 0.5% each (as well as someone running Rash nature with the same percentage), which certainly appear as though they could represent the usage for a quantum of 1 (as would certainly be the case at 193) to serve as extra evidence, Continuing down the popularity list gives monotonically decreasing numbers as expected.

It didn't get a chance to apply in this particular case, but there's one other optimization worth noting: if all of a Pokemon's elements show up with 100% frequency, you can also turn to the list of top 10 most popular partners for that Pokemon. If it indeed has only one qualifying representative, there will only be a top-5 in that list; having 6 or more entries there means that at least two different people must have been running it (with identical sets).

This analysis is completely incapable of tracking numbers above 1000, and is rather unreliable above 600 (not being able to zero in with any kind of confidence that the lowest denominator that's consistent with the data is indeed the actual count), but as attendance in competitions fell (and thus so did the usage counts of the most popular Pokemon), No Holds Barred with its player count of 14469 (a 50% drop from the previous month's tiny tourney) was the key point where this method really became usable for the most part. After a catastrophic drop all the way to 2019 this month, the signal comes through loud and clear with this sample size.

 

[PPB]

Damn. If I had quit while I was ahead in the 1750s, I could have finished top 2 in US and top 11 in the world. Now not even top 10 in the US with 1702 :( This is really disappointing for me...

Well, lesson learned I guess.

On the flipside, I did get to have some fun with Chesnaught! I will be uploading my team later when I feel less lazy, but here is the Chesnaught set:

Chesnaught (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Bulletproof
Level: 50
EVs: 252 HP / 124 SpD / 132 Spe
Bold Nature
- Taunt
- Wood Hammer
- Synthesis
- Block

Inspired by the Battle Agency's Taunt Chesnaught, this little jerk sits there, blocks your pokemon, and PP stalls (especially against slow pokemon that don't have many high PP attacking moves) It wasn't a something I brought very often but it is still hilarious to see your opponent struggle to death! Pokemon I successfully PP stalled include Ferrothorn and Klefki, and I also killed a Rotom lol.

 

[Gallazard]

Hey, I was in this competition too. Ended up finishing 19th overall and 5th in the US with a rating of 1726. Here’s my team: http://pokepast.es/67a9d0e68c7d91ea
I was super busy around the time of this competition, but I decided to enter anyways. Most of my team was made up of mons I already had in game, but the team still ended up working really well and I’m happy with how well it performed.

Most of the time I went with some combination of Mamoswine, Talonflame, Venusaur, and/or Gyarados. I didn’t end up bringing Aegislash or Dragalge too often, but the times I did bring them, they usually put in a lot of work.

Mamoswine was definitely the MVP of this competition for me. Originally I just chose it to help me deal with Garchomp better, but it ended up being amazing. It was great for dealing with Vivillon as well as other common mons like Charizard and Aegislash.

Overall I’m pretty happy with how I did in this competition, though it’s surprising how few people actually participated. Hopefully there will be more interest in future competitions.

 

[Unibot]

You can now claim your participation prize of 50 Battle Points before July 30, 2018, at 23:59 UTC.

 

[Tox]

26-6; 1728 pts
#17
My team is in a previous post in this thread.

edit: no Japan obviously watered down the competition (as it will for the upcoming NoHoldsBarred18), worst loss (-20pts) was getting savaged in a bizarre series of events by Chimecho/Drapion/Chandelure of all things.

edit2: Looks like the highest guy I played ended at #6, so here's that replay: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/262326898
...and I think you'll agree that, despite the result, both players deserved to lose after those plays.