What If? - Alternate Timelines (AT Shox [Wall + No Recovery] - Stats Submissions!)

Normal/Steel

This typing trades 3 weaknesses for 10 resists and 2 immunities, resisting both stabs of over half the metagame. However, its 3 weaknesses of fire, ground, and fighting are to some of the most common coverage types in the game. Fighting in particular is a quad-weakness due to normal, which only really adds the quad weakness and a ghost immunity. However, the pokemon that don't run one of those 3 types of moves generally have a really hard time breaking normal/steel. In particular, the ghost types that prey on the current low-normal type metagame really struggle with normal/steel. Focus blastless :gholdengo:, most :dragapult: variants, :kitsunoh:, and boosting :necturna: have no real way to hit normal/steel, and :pecharunt: physically cannot damage us. Other top pokemon really struggle to land neutral hits on steels in general, like :slowking-galar:, :rillaboom:, :clefable:, :chuggalong:, or :weezing-galar:.

But the thing that sets normal/steel apart from other steel type combos is the fact that the matchups that we don't win at, we lose really badly. This lets us put more stat-points into bulk and thus wall the good matchups even better. Only 3 types deal neutral damage into normal/steel; dark, water, and electric. This is tied for the second least number of neutral matchups in the game (steel/ghost has the least, with 2). Additionally, steel/normal has all of the positive traits of steel types when it comes to resisting getting worn down: poison immunity, sandstorm immunity, and stealth rock resistance.

I don't really have much to say about normal/steel offensively. Both of these types are horrendous in that department and while I guess steel can cover rock types for normal, we probably are gonna be more utility reliant than stab reliant. If we really want damage we can run one stab with fitting coverage. Oh, and also iron defense is a universal move so that might be worth something.
 
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Electric/Poison

Think this typing's pretty underexplored for its defensive merits because it has only been seen on Toxtricity, an offensive Pokemon, and Plasmanta... whose concept was literally to die. Granted, even Plasmanta is sometimes difficult to get rid of due to its combination of moves and an extra immunity, but that's besides the point (or maybe to the point, due to it managing to do that despite its paltry bulk).

Ground is the main weakness and Psychic is relevant due to Future Sight, but these can be worked around (especially because Obliteryx is immune to both of them). In exchange, you get resistances to eight types, which is pretty cool for a non-Steel-type. Fighting and Fairy are the key resistances and can give you a niche to come in on Triage Drain Punch or Pixilate Extreme speed. The other six resistances make you resilient to common moves like U-turn, Volt Switch, Doom Desire and Beak Blast. For the meta, I think this has enough potential to define a niche, especially on the physical side.

We don't solve our hazard problem just yet with this typing but also do not possess a weakness to them; additionally, absorbing Toxic Spikes is nice and adds a bit of extra team support.
 
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Water/Bug

Water/Bug has arguably been underrated since it got decent representation 5 generations later, after the only one of it’s kind initially, Surskit. With a neutrality to Grass and Fire, a resistance to common types Fighting and Ground, and plenty of non-Recover ajacent status moves to use from both types in Sticky Web, Aqua Ring, Life Dew, etc. With the right stat distribution, the potential for a grand Water/Bug defensive Pokemon is present. It’s glaring weaknesses are Electric and Stealth Rock, so there are options to work around such a type combo. Stealth Rock mitigates its hazard weakness, allowing it to reasonably check things it can switch into and hit it back with, potentially, STAB Leech Life for another recovery option.

Bug as a defensive type itself is underrated, and types that assist in that endeavor, I believe, should be explored in some capacity.
 
Dark/Steel

This typing's currently used by Kingambit, which is supposed to be a late-game cleaner but is often thrown in mid-game as an emergency check to certain mons, which should speak to the typing's defensive merits. It has immunities to Psychic and Poison and 9 resists on top of that, with some of the most relevant being Dark, Ghost, Ice, and Dragon. It switches in with impunity on mons like Pecharunt, Gking, non-FB Darkrai and Gholdengo, some Pult sets, a lot of random junk like Latios, and with good bulk it probably checks Kyurem reasonably well. Some of these are tough mons to answer, so the typing does a lot. There are other mons like Iron Crown where they probably have coverage but you're kind of constraining their options by existing.

It's also a pretty good dual stab typing for alleviating passivity. Stab Knock is an option but specially based might be preferable since some of these guys can carry wisp and you're less vulnerable to contact punishing that way. I think better STAB coverage & better matchups vs. certain Dark types are the main selling points over Normal/Steel, which is functionally very similar.
 
Poison / Dark

Its an oldie and a goodie. Great offensive stabs for a wall, a single weakness, and enough resists to make it work. Darkrai, Rev (to an extent), Pult, Pech, Gking, Ghold, D-speed are all mons we can target pretty easily due to our typing. I don't have a ton more to say, this is just a goodstuffs typing that will do a lot of work for us. Being "slightly better A-Muk" isn't that hard and gets us used.
 
First off, as always, a reminder that voting now occurs in the CAP AT Voting thread in CAPcord but here is the slate for AT Shox's typing! So without further ado...

Normal/Steel
Dark/Steel
Poison/Dark
Electric/Poison
Water/Bug

You will have 24 hours to cast your votes! See you then!
 
The results are in and...
Normal/Steel - 11
Dark/Steel - 17
Poison/Dark - 12
Electric/Poison - 12
Water/Bug- 5
...AT Shox shall be Dark/Steel!

Now it is time to discuss ability and again as a reminder we are building a wall with no recovery and points of contention are general wearing down of AT Shox and so I ask what abilities help to give AT Shox staying power to not be overwhelmed by the rampant use od entry hazards as well as the bigger Fighting-types in the tier that can one shot it such as Great Tusk, Revenankh, and Zamazenta? Just a fyi but ability submissions are allowed under the requirement that the submitter provides solid reasoning as to why the ability aids the typing in sticking around and outlasting the opponent.

I'll leave discussion open until the end of the week/the weekend to which I will hopefully have a slate to vote on!
 
With a solid rock resist, hazards are a lot less of a problem. Still, we can definitely get worn down without a protective ability. Levitate and magic guard are both very natural ways to alleviate the spikes weakness, freeing up access to leftovers and improving our ability to switch around. Both have advantages besides alleviating hazards: levitate removes our crippling ground weakness, letting us check pokemon like gliscor, iron treads, lando-t, and equilibra. Magic guard, on the other hand, is a little more concept focused, as it removes many damage-over-time effects that a traditional wall would be able to heal off, like burn damage, salt cure, and partial-trapping moves.

I think there's definitely another route where we give ourselves a high impact ability or movepool that justifies usage over the potential to get worn down in long games. Pokemon like ting-lu and to some extent hatterene can't wall their checks forever, but they wall them for long enough for their teammates to do their jobs, and they bring something else to the table in return for their healing. If we pick an ability like, for example, toxic debris, I'm sure we would be viable despite a lack of permanence. I don't really like toxic debris, it's just an example, but I'm curious to see if anyone can make this route work.
 
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Boasting a stealth rock resist, AT Shox is already barreling towards Leftovers as its item of choice. With that mind, and considering we won't need a move slot for recovery (or likely Steel STAB for that matter) we should be inclined to run Protect. I'll go deeper into more benefits when we look at movepool, but for now, it's complement to Leftovers is enough. AT Shox should want to sit on the field as much as possible and maximize Leftovers recovery. So then, how can we lean into this playstyle with our ability? Pressure.

It's been brought up how exactly AT Shox will make progress as a wall before its HP inevitably runs out. One answer is resource depletion. The Achilles Heel of AT Shox is going to be that quad weakness to Fighting. This is especially notable for Pokemon like Darkrai:Darkrai: and Gholdengo:Gholdengo: where our typing should make us natural checks. Fortunately for us, the two most common Fighting moves, Close Combat and Focus Blast, are constrained by low PP. Pressure means opponents have half the opportunities (4 turns) to use these moves. Pressure + Protect means they have a quarter of the opportunities (2 turns). Pressure + Protect + Leftovers means AT Shox is reliably recovering 12.5% HP every time it comes in while draining its opponent's best answers to it. This pushes every interaction with AT Shox into a mind game that a good player can use to call opponent's bluff and make progress with other moves.

The elephant in the room here is Kingambit:Kingambit:, a reasonably defensive Dark/Steel type with no recovery. It has Pressure, but rarely uses it. Well, that's because it has two other abilities and a stat line and movepool that greatly pushes into being a tank or late game sweeper. We can easily avoid that with AT Shox and push it the opposite direction.
 
I like a stats-focused build here in the mold of something like Heatran or SpDef Stakataka (or even base ST Ram), where you've got a few significant weaknesses but you can sometimes tank those hits in a pinch with raw stats. Not being 4x weak to ground is significant for this build because it means you can take on things like Kyurem / Dragonite potentially. You're not as reliant on your ability as a crutch but it's still an important piece.

Pressure is neat for the reasons Azoth described. It does a surprising amount for a mon with this typing.

I was thinking about Sand Stream and Corrosion as leaning into protect stalling but I'm not sure either of them do enough in the end.

Quz mentioned Filter and I like it because Mega Aggron is sick, and imagine if it could run leftovers. And was a dark type. And probably had a bit less stats. Yeah. It's mainly angling for ground moves which makes it largely inferior to Levitate, but Levitate is stupidly good here so maybe lesser Levitate is fine.
 
I think it might be interesting to explore routes that the more proactive aspects of walling (Ik, sort of an oxymoron). ST Shox's primary ability Electromorphosis was an attempt in that direction; however, Electric moves being hard walled by Ground-types and Ice Beam not being powerful enough, along with competition from Sticky Hold aka progress denier 3000, led to it more or less falling off. But there are more purposeful options.

traceysketchit has already brought up Toxic Debris, which would be scary on something with bulk and a typing with as many resistances as this. I'm also bullish on Perish Body. Having limited healing, AT Shox wants to preserve its HP and discouraging hits does that. This is only really scary with a trapping move; otherwise things come in, hit you twice, and switch out at their own leisure--a very sad fate indeed. Might be polljumpy to suggest this but hey No Guard did it with Inferno for Ramnarok so I will abuse precedent. I imagine we will get either chip damage in or time to use our utility options with the switches we force due to this interaction while healing from Leftovers as well. It also punishes Knock Off which is a nice way to preserve our item.

On the flip side, stuff like Poison Touch could be cool but I feel anything with a non-guaranteed effect is too risky here with no healing. Same for stuff like Poison Point, Cursed Body, etc.
 
Ive had my eye on Iron Barbs/Rough Skin since punishing progress is always a nice way to justify taking irreversible damage (outside of wish), though I dont really know how to justify it specifically, outside of the common pivot move U-turn and potentially as a knock switch-in if you had your item knocked off earlier in the match.

An ability I can justify is Bulletproof, allowing AT Shox to switch into gholdengo and darkrai much more reliably, two pokemon a dark type should be able to check well.
Its unfortunate that theres no way outside of tera to gain immunity to physical fighting moves, but bulletproof does enforce tera ghost (which you’re probably running anyways, unless maybe tera flying) with its immunity to Shadow Ball

traceyscetchit mentioned Levitate earlier and I’m inclined to agree with the reasoning. Spikes and ground immunity, simple and effective.
 
So irl was an absolute menace to me and I kinda neglected this but I wanna try and wrap up this AT before CAP 38 gets going, so without further ado, here is the ability slate for AT Shox!

Bulletproof
Filter
Levitate
Magic Guard
Pressure

Short and sweet so I will give 24 hours for votes to be submitted in CAP AT Voting in CAPcord!
 
And the winner is...
Bulletproof - 9
Filter - 7
Levitate - 12
Magic Guard - 10
Pressure - 10
...Levitate!

With that, we have now moved on to a quick stage of defining moves so besides the universally assumed moves for Dark and Steel, what other "stat warping" moves do we think Shox would want to potentially have access to? Anything stand out that would allow AT Shox to be a complete nuisance in making progress against the opponent? Gonna give us about ~48 hours for this stage since it tends to go by fairly quickly before releasing stat limits and stat spread submissions!
 
Phazing moves are an obvious source of progress that we can use to remove mons switching in with fighting moves while racking up hazard damage, and are a very consistent source of damage that chips pokemon that would otherwise be safely on the backline. The switches that these moves force also stall for leftovers recovery.

Pivoting moves are very similar to phazing moves and let us more easily control our matchups, and pivot is definitely a role that a wall without recovery could be decent at filling, but we need to be careful with this one because it denies one turn of leftovers.

Hazards are extremely spammable and are good at making progress on what would otherwise be a very passive wall (and we should be an active wall due to our lack of healing). Spikes and/or stealth rocks are no brainers. Ceaseless edge is REALLY strong, but could definitely work, but the coolest option in my opinion is stone axe, as it rips moltres apart (somewhat, that bird has crazy bulk) while setting rocks. This isn't very pro-concept, as fires are likely a check we want to keep in order to preserve power budget for bulk in our better matchups. Still funny though.

It would be criminal to deny knock off to a dark type that relies on utility.

Also because we're steel/dark it's really hard to not mention metal burst and comeuppance but I don't know if they actually have much synergy with what we have right now.
 
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Hello
Leech Seed
It is not reliable recovery, and making Celesteela 2: This time we're red would be awesome. Knock/Hslam/Leech/Protect is an absurdly stupid set of moves to switch into, and the lack of competition from both Cele and Ferro this gen means we can basically be some unholy, ungodly union of the two, like US Steel trying to enter the weapons manufacturing business.
 
Okay so after a quick little discussion of moves, it doesn't seem like there is  too much to be defining for AT Shox! Therefore, as a reminder, below are the stat limits for ST Shox

Final Limits

BSR Limits:
Physical Sweepiness (PS)112
Special Sweepiness (SS)112
Physical Tankiness (PT)198.28
Special Tankiness (ST)198.28
PT + ST295.53
Total Base Stat Rating (BSR)546.67
T Value (found on T value tab)3
Minimum Base Speed29
Maximum Base Special Attack115
Click to expand...
The only penalty I am gonna apply here is for Leech Seed which will be an overall penalty to BSR of -10 just because it is still a "form" of recovery but, for the points quz mention, a great tool for AT Shox with the right stats.

So have fun and I will try to keep subs open through the weekend and hopefully begin voting ~Tuesday unless otherwise noted in CAPcord or here :)
 
Final Submission

66 HP / 84 Atk / 105 Def / 62 SpA / 230 SpD / 32 Spe (580 BST)
PS: 61.17
SS: 53.05
PT: 97.65
ST: 197.86
PT + ST: 295.51
BSR: 536.48
Defining moves: Leech Seed (-10 BSR), Spikes, Stealth Rock, Knock Off, Roar
Assumed Spread: 252 HP / 252 SpD / 4 Def, Careful

The record's only 135!? Pitiful. ALL IN :aggron-mega:

This spread attempts to leverage dark's immunity to psyshock and psychic noise, as well as knock off, to provide a blissey alternative for psychic-weak teams and/or hazard stack comps (it's a blissey alternative because it's nearly immune to special moves but dies to physical or fighting moves).

The special bulk is as high as I could physically justify, with high SpD instead of high HP to maximize leech seed recovery. Low HP leech seed combined with leftovers and protect saps enough health each time that the opponent has a chance to attack that this can be an effective wall even into pokemon like choice specs raging bolt. Offensively, the attack stat is barely enough to 2HKO offensive gholdengo uninvested with knock off, and the physical defense is just all the points that are left, which is still respectable bulk and neatly hits the defensive BSR limit. 31 speed is to outspeed assault vest glowking and the 32nd point is because there was a tiny bit of BSR left over to outspeed turtwig with. I went for a 580 bst with special attack because the big number is giving regieleki vibes.

In terms of defining moves I'm anticipating leech seed/protect/knock off/hazard of choice as the standard moveset, with roar as a decent option over protect or leech seed on full hazard stack. I orginally had u-turn and stealth rocks but the more I've thought about it the more toxic u-turn seems, especially paired with wishpass alomomola, and it makes it less like blissey, so I've axed it in favor of roar. Roar does a better job at walling sweepers anyways. Rocks were chopped and then unchopped, I think they're probably fine.
Special Side:
252+ SpA Choice Specs Raging Bolt Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 97-115 (28.8 - 34.2%) -- 99.2% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
132 SpA Iron Moth Fiery Dance vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 102-120 (30.3 - 35.7%) -- guaranteed 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Gholdengo Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 204-244 (60.7 - 72.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Choice Specs Dragapult Flamethrower vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 96-114 (28.5 - 33.9%) -- 97% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 SpA Mollux Lava Plume vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 84-102 (25 - 30.3%) -- 0.1% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
+2 252 SpA Tera Water Chuggalong Surf vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 108-127 (32.1 - 37.7%) -- 0.3% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Ramnarok Inferno vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 114-134 (33.9 - 39.8%) -- 24.6% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

Physical Side Good MU's:
168 Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (4 hits) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 72-88 (21.4 - 26.1%) -- approx. possible 5HKO
252+ Atk Dragonite Extreme Speed vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 47-55 (13.9 - 16.3%) -- possibly the worst move ever
252+ Atk Obliteryx Beak Blast vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 84-100 (25 - 29.7%) -- 0.1% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Kingambit Kowtow Cleave vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 75-89 (22.3 - 26.4%) -- possible 5HKO
+2 252 Atk Ogerpon Ivy Cudgel vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 147-174 (43.7 - 51.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
And a few other pokemon that over-rely on ground coverage

Physical Side Bad/Neutral MU's
0 Atk Arghonaut Circle Throw vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 268-324 (79.7 - 96.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 Atk Sharpness Samurott-Hisui Razor Shell vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 153-181 (45.5 - 53.8%) -- 2% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 Atk Wellspring Mask Ogerpon-Wellspring Ivy Cudgel vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 178-210 (52.9 - 62.5%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Life Orb Ledyba Focus Punch vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kingambit: 348-411 (103.5 - 122.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO
Pretty much every mon with a neutrally effective physical stab 2hko's unless they run fighting type coverage or a stab fire move

Offensively:
0 Atk Kingambit Knock Off (97.5 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Gholdengo: 188-224 (59.6 - 71.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO even after Knock Off BP reduction
It 2HKO's most other frail dark-weak mons but does minimal damage into everything else. Knock is for item removal and weak pressure (especially into ghold/hatterene/necturna/spinners, who deny leech seed), and not really KO's.
 
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WIP

99 HP / 73 Atk / 92 Def / 56 SpA / 146 SpD / 79 Spe (535 BST)

PS: 75.00, SS: 66.75, PT: 108.75, ST: 163.13, PT + ST: 271.88, BSR: 546.45

Defining moves: Knock Off, Spikes, Stealth Rock, Protect, Rapid Spin, Phazing (Whirlwind, Roar, Dragon Tail, etc)

Figure we were owed a build without Leech Seed. So allow me to present the Turbo Tinkaton™ build. We're sacrificing a little bit of speed for a lot more bulk.

The main thrust of the spread is to always survive Shadow Ball/Dark Pulse + Focus Blast from full against Gholdengo and Darkrai after Leftovers. Thanks to Leftovers + Protect you can even survive this if Stealth Rock or one layer of Spikes is on the field.

On the physical side, it's enough to always live 60 BP Low Kick from Kingambit again after Stealth Rock or one layer of Spikes.

The asumed spread is 248 HP and 252 SpD Careful. The additional 8 EVs can subsequently be put into Atk or Speed dependent on movepool. 8 Atk EVs doubles your chance to 2HKO Gholdengo with Knock Off. If you opt for Rapid Spin, 8 Spe EVs allows you to outspeed Timid Gholdengo at +1.

On that note, you obviously won't be able to click Rapid Spin into a Ghost-type. However, the combination of AT Shox's resistance to all hazards, it's resistance to common setters like Ting Lu and Equilibra, and Knock Off's threat to Spin Blockers like Gholdengo makes Rapid Spin a natural fit.

252 SpA Darkrai Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 296-352 (73.8 - 87.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 Atk Wellspring Mask Ogerpon-Wellspring Ivy Cudgel vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Kingambit: 199-235 (49.6 - 58.6%) -- 70.3% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 SpA Choice Specs Dragapult Flamethrower vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 136-160 (33.9 - 39.9%) -- 24.6% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 SpA Gholdengo Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 292-348 (72.8 - 86.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

0 SpA Slowking-Galar Flamethrower vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 78-94 (19.4 - 23.4%) -- possible 6HKO

252+ Atk Kingambit Low Sweep vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Kingambit: 316-376 (78.8 - 93.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery (using 60 BP Low Sweep here as a substitute for 60 BP Low Kick)

252 SpA Tornadus Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 280-332 (69.8 - 82.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

+2 252 SpA Tera Water Chuggalong Surf vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Kingambit: 153-181 (38.1 - 45.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 Atk Sharpness Samurott-Hisui Razor Shell vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Kingambit: 172-204 (42.8 - 50.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
 
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