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VGC's Metagame
- Thread starter acinod
- Start date
Disagreed. It's got the second most powerful EQ in doubles, a convenient 102 speed, nice defenses, and excellent typing, as it's only weak to Ice and Dragon. Dragon moves really aren't common at all, and are really only used by Lati@s and Salamence, the latter of which is outsped by Garchomp. Yache Berry really comes in handy, although it still struggles at best against Hail teams. I think you'd see a lot more Garchomps if Abomasnow wasn't so popular.
Garchomp/Zapdos seems to be one of the more popular and solid lead sets, though. Heat Wave covers Abomasnow leads, and Garchomp is immune to Discharge and Zapdos is immune to EQ giving them both relatively powerful STAB moves that hit both enemies. Neither Yachechomp nor Zapdos dies to a scarfed Abomasnow (or Glaceon) Blizzard and they both outspeed the two of them. Only weakness seems to be the Trick Room teams with Dusknoir/Smeargle, where fake out on Chomp leads to TR being set up and some powerful ice type like Lapras or a physical powerhouse like Machamp or Marowak comes in while Smeargle Dark Voids.
Yeah
I'm not saying he's terrible in VGC or can't be used, of course not. But it just seems like too many people throw him out there and think "Ha! What'cha gonna do now!" And he gets mashed by a Crobat with HP Dragon and a Sceptile with Dragon Pulse (that's not what I used at Nationals, but I just recently used that combo to sweep a team with a Garchomp Lead.)
Agreed. He is good though.
I'm not saying he's terrible in VGC or can't be used, of course not. But it just seems like too many people throw him out there and think "Ha! What'cha gonna do now!" And he gets mashed by a Crobat with HP Dragon and a Sceptile with Dragon Pulse (that's not what I used at Nationals, but I just recently used that combo to sweep a team with a Garchomp Lead.)
Agreed. He is good though.
Just to be clear, VGC, or Double Cup rules are essentially doubles Battle Tower rules. All of the banned pokemon are banned because they are banned in the Battle Tower as well (except for the unfortunate case of Tyranitar, which cannot be obtained below lv. 51 and thus is ineligible for Double Cup mode). The banlist is not at all subjective, contrary to popular belief.
Yeah.
VGC's metagame is far more original than smogon's artificially created 6on6 shoddy metagame. But I won't rant on that, it's to no avail.
On topic:
We have a very diverse metagame. In a nutshell, it's trick room > rain dance > goodstuff > trick room.
Of course one cannot say that a certain type of team always has the upper hand against a team that is inferior to it according to the "triangle" stated above. A well-constructed team can of course beat every other type of team but you need near to perfect prediction/reading for it.
Another important and interesting point to discuss would be the difference between western and Japanese style of VGC play. Think of Pokémon used, EV spreads and moves, for instance. Understanding how they think and outsmart them is the way to go for worlds.
This is just going to bug me if I don't point it out, since you claim to be "totally amazing" at doubles. Flatter only raises SpAtk one notch.
Just looked it up and yeah it is only +1. I thought it was +2 also. Bulbapedia also says you can't even use it on your partner, unlike Swagger.
Trick Room always has one up over any strategy other than anti-trick room, because there's always that threat of an impending trick room setup. Other teams have to stop the trick room being set up, which wastes turns and leads to the taunters getting killed without really doing anything. e.g. Metagross and Gengar Vs. Metagross and Bronzong. The trick room user can easily protect with Bronzong, stopping taunt, while bullet punching Gengar. That's one of the goodstuffs user's pokémon out of the picture already, and if they don't have any more taunters then they're screwed due to the impending trick room. Rain doesn't have any of that threat, really. While double surfs are indeed powerful, most rain-based sweepers are very frail. Kabutops in particular gets whacked by bullet punch or even more by the rare mach punch. Plus swift swimmers are ruined by trick room. Most goodstuffs teams can simply outgun rain teams. Latios, Gengar and Metagross were particular problems for me because they're hard to OHKO and they will probably OHKO you right back. Anti-trick room is also rubbish because it sucks against anything that isn't trick room. I didn't fight a single trick room team at London and only know of 3 people who used one (Shoe, Luigi and my brother whose team was made by me anyway), which should prove a point. A lot of noobs were there, too, and they always use hyper-offensive goodstuffs. Anti-trick room could quite easily be caught off-guard by noob goodstuffs, leading to a humiliating defeat.
So, in short, I think trick room has an automatic advantage over any team. Moreso when you use a 'dual-mode' team like Batpig's: a very good team there. I don't quite understand Dusknoir or Lapras though. Whenever I've used them, I've found them to be crap. Dusknoir isn't even that bulky and is predictable, while Lapras is just weak with mediocre stats across the board and a lot of weaknesses. There are other, better pokémon to be using imo.
From a primarily rain user's perspective I'd say it's trick room > rain < goodstuff > anti-trick room > trick room > goodstuff.
Trick Room always has one up over any strategy other than anti-trick room, because there's always that threat of an impending trick room setup. Other teams have to stop the trick room being set up, which wastes turns and leads to the taunters getting killed without really doing anything. e.g. Metagross and Gengar Vs. Metagross and Bronzong. The trick room user can easily protect with Bronzong, stopping taunt, while bullet punching Gengar. That's one of the goodstuffs user's pokémon out of the picture already, and if they don't have any more taunters then they're screwed due to the impending trick room. Rain doesn't have any of that threat, really. While double surfs are indeed powerful, most rain-based sweepers are very frail. Kabutops in particular gets whacked by bullet punch or even more by the rare mach punch. Plus swift swimmers are ruined by trick room. Most goodstuffs teams can simply outgun rain teams. Latios, Gengar and Metagross were particular problems for me because they're hard to OHKO and they will probably OHKO you right back. Anti-trick room is also rubbish because it sucks against anything that isn't trick room. I didn't fight a single trick room team at London and only know of 3 people who used one (Shoe, Luigi and my brother whose team was made by me anyway), which should prove a point. A lot of noobs were there, too, and they always use hyper-offensive goodstuffs. Anti-trick room could quite easily be caught off-guard by noob goodstuffs, leading to a humiliating defeat.
So, in short, I think trick room has an automatic advantage over any team. Moreso when you use a 'dual-mode' team like Batpig's: a very good team there. I don't quite understand Dusknoir or Lapras though. Whenever I've used them, I've found them to be crap. Dusknoir isn't even that bulky and is predictable, while Lapras is just weak with mediocre stats across the board and a lot of weaknesses. There are other, better pokémon to be using imo.
Actually, like rest, every pokemon that learns tms learns psych up.
Actually, I employ this same strategy in Wi-Fi doubles matches, and Flatter raises it TWO stages.
Thank you, Wichu!
EDIT: Sorry for double posting, by the way :(
Nope, Flatter only raises it by one stage, Time/Space Mage was right. It still could be a good strategy though...
SOURCE:
you are completely wrong http://www.smogon.com/dp/moves/psych_up
modest scarf glaceon vs. 4/0 yachechomp (105.43% - 125.00%)
And because there's a partner who can hit it as well, Garchomp will possibly never survive Ice moves, even if it has Yache. Habanchomp needs more love. Without Life Orb/Draco Plate Garchomp always survives Latios Draco Meteor without prior damage. Needless to say that surviving Dragon Pulse with ~50% left is also possible.
And why do the Japs use Glaceon? They have a uselist with Metagross and Snorlax being #1 and #2 on it and Glaceon sucks hairy balls against these two, lol.
And zog, nice analysis of the metagame so far. And because one cannot always hinder the opponent to successfully install trick room, there have to be other ways to play around it. That is use of protect to out stall trick room turns, status berries against Smeargle and whatnot - and of course having Pokémon with good match ups against the respective trick room sweepers.
More thoughts on this later, maybe..
And why do the Japs use Glaceon? They have a uselist with Metagross and Snorlax being #1 and #2 on it and Glaceon sucks hairy balls against these two, lol.
And zog, nice analysis of the metagame so far. And because one cannot always hinder the opponent to successfully install trick room, there have to be other ways to play around it. That is use of protect to out stall trick room turns, status berries against Smeargle and whatnot - and of course having Pokémon with good match ups against the respective trick room sweepers.
More thoughts on this later, maybe..
good job latios315, I was going to call you out on the calculation saying you probably missed the damage reduction for Blizzard, but you took it into account. Good work.
On other things....
Flatter raises Sp. Attack by one stage, not two.This is a glitch on NetBattle Supremacy, among other things. You can use it against your partner, it'll confuse them like Swagger does and raise their SpA by one stage.
http://www.smogon.com/dp/moves/flatter
Dugtrio does not learn Psyche Up:
http://serebii.net/pokedex-dp/051.shtml
http://serebii.net/attackdex-dp/psychup.shtml
http://www.smogon.com/dp/pokemon/dugtrio/moves
http://www.smogon.com/dp/moves/psych_up
http://pokemon.marriland.com/platinum/pokedex/dugtrio/#dex_nav_moves
I think that, yes, a good Trick Room team > most weather teams(outside of something like TrickHail, that benefits from Trick Room itself). Now, obviously TR is not perfect, as this is evident last year when Chris Tsai beat a TR team with a Rain team at LA showdown. Generally though, the instant speed advantage with almost no way of 'decreasing' the speed (which would have to be increasing it's speed to beat themselves) is what gives advantages. Plus, hard hitters like Machamp become a lot more viable under TR.
I have used Focus Sash to some extent on Garchomp, and it works decently. It allows it to survive any Ice or Dragon Attack, but the Hail at the end of the turn is what hurts it if it's in Hail. HabanChomp is fun to use, like drug_duck was hinting at.
1) Yes, let's keep it that way too. :\
2)Yes, this is due to events, basically. Nintendo understands that not everybody can make it to their events, as recently stated. So they do this to keep things fair. Also, Tar is banned because it's evolution is lv.55.
3) Why not try the Metagame for yourself? And I'll just keep it simple and say Metagross is the most dominant Pokemon in VGC Doubles, because it's as surprising and/or effective as Gengar can be. And what the hell do you mean "Does stall work with Garchomp present?" You are highly, highly, highly over-rating Garchomp. Seriously.
Garchomp has been so good in singles because of its dual stabs Earthquake and Outrage which tears apart stall teams if played correctly. In VGC, Garchomp isn't that huge of a threat anymore because of its loss of Outrage (targets random Pokémon) and the addition of Latios/as which both can be seen as counters to Garchomp somehow. Scarf Obamasnow is also present in this metagame so you basically have to choose an anti berry or focus sash which limits its firepower even more. Life orb does still work but its more important to be able to live through the assault of its enemies once.
Don't get me wrong, he's still a fine Pokémon in doubles but isn't nowhere as broken as it is in singles. This point has been made several times in this topic now and I don't think there is any more room for discussion on that.
Ad 3) Stall basically doesn't work in doubles. At least not in the way it works in singles. The basic premise of "stallers" in VGC is to live through the assaults of one or two Pokés in the end and win the game. Cresselia is predestined for that job but it needn't necessarily work out (check out this for the answer to why) - Pokémon beats Pokémon with move.
Don't get me wrong, he's still a fine Pokémon in doubles but isn't nowhere as broken as it is in singles. This point has been made several times in this topic now and I don't think there is any more room for discussion on that.
Ad 3) Stall basically doesn't work in doubles. At least not in the way it works in singles. The basic premise of "stallers" in VGC is to live through the assaults of one or two Pokés in the end and win the game. Cresselia is predestined for that job but it needn't necessarily work out (check out this for the answer to why) - Pokémon beats Pokémon with move.
Let us pray.
I can agree with this statement, except with "Garchomp is broken in singles" =P
Perish Song, Surf, Protect, Ice Beam. It was for Smeargle's Transform (Double Surf = both of them get +25% HP, and nice damage to the opponents), so they could both Surf Heal each other. Perish Song was to pressure the opponent. :D
Guys just wondering:
If I led with a scarf Metagross with a choice scarf to get rid of threats like Garchomp, Smeargle (lvl 1 FS ones w/ Dark Void), Zapdos, and latiases with running Ice punch, and paired it up with a ES Togekiss so I can abuse EQ with it, should I use trick, and/or bullet punch? I'm worried that even with a scarf, things could still outspeed me, so I want a priority attack to be sure lol.
If I led with a scarf Metagross with a choice scarf to get rid of threats like Garchomp, Smeargle (lvl 1 FS ones w/ Dark Void), Zapdos, and latiases with running Ice punch, and paired it up with a ES Togekiss so I can abuse EQ with it, should I use trick, and/or bullet punch? I'm worried that even with a scarf, things could still outspeed me, so I want a priority attack to be sure lol.
That's 6 Pokemon if I counted right.. but the way you smashed it into 1 sentence, I really can't tell. Put it into proper format, and BTW, the VGC can only have 4 Poekmon (with 2 extras to switch items and Pokemon between battles).
Well, from what I can decipher from your sentence... neither. A scarfed Metagross will not get rid of garchomp, zapdos, or lati@s in one hit unless you explode, in which case running it with togekiss would be pointless. I don't get what you are asking after that though.
Well, at least I was partially right.
As far as Doubles goes, I've run a Trick Room team, and I've run a Hail Team. I have to play a lot more intelligently/carefully with the Hail team, mostly because the members are a lot more fragile, but I seem to be able to handle many different teams with it, instead of having a distinct advantage against some and a distinct disadvantage against others with my Trick Room team. Then again, the Trick Room team was my very first doubles team, so I'm sure going back to it now I could build a much better one.