Battle Maison Discussion & Records

[ReptoAbysmal]

Formal posting of a terminated streak of 1,571 wins in ORAS Super Triples.

That warped POS is apparently supposed to be Origin Giratina, which I'd gotten with Platinum and forgotten about despite it sitting right next to Cubone on my little figurine shelf. I probably would have included it in my 1,000th win photo, given that it's the only other piece of Poke paraphernailia I own, but that stuff which I believe is supposed to be ominous fog does a very good job making it look like unrecognizable garbage, and my eyes would have missed it. But not this time.

Pokemon X was the first time in an extremely long time I'd broken 300 in a battle facility. Before Trick Room existed I know I had a pretty good run with a Rain Dance team in Emerald, but the progress escapes me. Doing so with random teams was overwhelmingly due to luck, though TR in itself is as good as it's ever been in gen VI with many new effective toys and Triple mode allowing for much better lead combos. I wasn't going to repeat that success without a genuinely effective strategy built on a solid team, though in 1500 battles I can still say with some certainty that luck played a sizeable part. First and foremost, my lasting close to 300 battles with a Slowbro that had absolutely no chance of surviving Serperior4's Leaf Storm on a clean hit, and second, using a team with shared weaknesses to common types on common specialty teams. Landorus had to be subbed for Aron or Camerupt very selectively for this reason. Still, what my team lacked in utility it compensated in sheer firepower. I love these guys for that, and had the pleasure of reaching this far with a back line I brought out of preference and less so out of necessity (I haven't considered who those would be if I had to replace Gardevoir or Landorus, but another Intimidate would be all but mandatory.)

I honestly am surprised I didn't throw my 3DS after what happened yesterday, because I've lost my shit over less. Even if I were getting tired of using that team, which I absolutely was, my pride was as strong as it had been when VaporeonIce first posted his streak and urged me onto 1,000, prompting me to play 50 battles a day. Afterward my progress dipped to nil for months at a time, but I vehemently refused to play one battle with my randoms. Throwing away all that work would have been so frigging carelessly stupid. And, I can say this now that I'm done, I was getting more and more pleased with the small (and likely temporary) jumps in the leaderboard, which also made my playing sessions a little more substantial over the past few weeks. I had no intention of stopping yesterday, either, and I don't know what the fuck I did wrong. I set the 3DS down with the lid already closed, which has never done anything before; when the screen has blacked out, the thing was always open at the time, and I was setting it down quickly but not what I considered roughly. After staring at the thing in my hands for a solid minute and reluctantly tapping the power, it of course turns on and I know what that means. I button through the snarky message and look at my streak, which of course is what I'd last saved at. Sighed, dropped quietly glum F-bomb, and I remember mumbling something about organizing my boxes of randoms sooner than later :/

My team did not change apart from losing shiny Camerupt to rebreeding for a perfect, but I have no intention of using this team anymore, so I'll give it a sort of tribute with a nice little recap. Rather than repeat their functions, I'll try something a little different.

Slowbro @ Rindo Berry
Female, Oblivious, Sassy (252 HP, 4 Def, 252 SDef)
Speed at lv50: 31
-Trick Room
-Scald
-Flamethrower
-Heal Pulse

Fondest memories: Casually noting that an inflicted burn from Scald will kill the target and prevent taking another turn, and frequently having said scenario actually play out; OHKOing Rhyperior4, frequently a bitch and a half to my randoms teams due to Hammer Arm speed drops on my setup turn

Bitterest memories: Plunking away at TR when frozen then remembering Scald thaws the user, when it won't do me an ounce of good; clenching my asshole when Marowak or Druddidon 4 are present, as crit Thick Club/Banded Outrage does way too much damage and of course has to pick the target fucking randomly, and fervently hoping that said occurrence does not accompany spread damage

Aron @ Berry Juice
Male, Sturdy, Gentle (0 EVs)
Speed at lv1: lol
-Protect
-Endeavor
-Sunny Day
-Spite

Fondest memories: Getting to LOLnope basically everything by acting first, including and especially Shuckle, and making the AI want to Focus Blast like it's going out of style, thankfully one of few moves I can switch into and take less than 20 damage with an uninvested Gardevoir

Bitterest memories: Who the fuck thought it'd be funny to make a multi-hit move with priority? Starter trainer? Well let's- YES OF COURSE YOU BROUGHT GRENINJA
Also, if I'd never looked at its page once before I'd insist that Garchomp's standard ability is Rough Skin.

Camerupt @ Cameruptite
Female, Solid Rock, Quiet (252 HP, 4 Def, 252 SpA)
Speed at lv50: 40
Mega Speed at lv50: 22
-Protect
-Earth Power
-Solarbeam
-Eruption

Fondest memories: Camerupt without mega evolving. Or rather, the turn order mechanic. Many Iron Ball holders died without leaving so much as a footnote in history. Also, more water types need to be OHKOd by Earth Power, though Starmie and Greninja are good starts. Floatzel doesn't count because it's seemingly coded ingame as taking a minimum of 40% from everything, including its own Leftovers.

Bitterest memories: Camerupt without mega evolving. Of course you speed tie with Escavalier4, so it's still unsafe to just leave Aron there and select Eruption. And never mind the STAB water moves, as HJK and Head Smash and Aurorus4 Hyper Beam and probably numerous other moves easily destroy it. Steelix4 and Avalugg4 serve as reminders that base 20 speed isn't infalliable. What it boils down to is base Camerupt is worthless and nearly always had to open with Protect.

Gardevoir @ Iron Ball
Female, Telepathy, Quiet (252 HP, 252 SpA, 4 SDef)
Speed at lv50: 38
-Grass Knot
-Moonblast
-Dazzling Gleam
-Psychic

Fondest memories: I don't normally run two STAB moves. But when I do, I prefer.. Dos Equis (I believe is Spanish for Fairy type)

Bitterest memories: Queen of low damage rolls. While they never screwed battles in themselves, Grass Knot was a huge offender of this and often made me wonder why the hell I was even using it if it wasn't going to do the job cleanly.. but there was really no much more desireable alternative offensively, and if I were going to use support moves on a back line poke it wouldn't be Gardevoir.

Clawitzer @ Life Orb
Male, Mega Launcher, Quiet (252 HP, 252 SpA, 4 SDef)
Speed at lv50: 57
-Aura Sphere
-Water Pulse
-Dark Pulse
-Ice Beam

Fondest memories: Wanting to use Water Pulse and yet hastily selecting Dark Pulse out of habit several times (easily most common move used) and smirking when I reassure myself that DP is a guaranteed OHKO anyway; most frequent recipient was Chandelure4. I've said on numerous occasions that this bad boy OHKOs Slowbro4 and yet-

Bitterest memories: I switched him in for a routine attempted murder and this fuckknuckle called Metagross4 nails it with Trick, which otherwise would have targeted and failed to work on Camerupt! I actually DID acknowledge that risk when choosing the switch, and Metagross ended up killing itself and one of its partners, but come on! Who the fuck uses Trick when Aron is right there? At least Reuniclus would go for Aron, damnit!

Landorus-Therian @ Power Anklet
Male, Intimidate, Brave (252 HP, 252 Att, 4 SDef)
Speed at lv50: 43
-Knock Off
-Earthquake
-Rock Slide
-Hammer Arm

Fondest memories: BARELY has a guaranteed OHKO on Drifblim4, generally a non-threat but I dislike Custap berries; What with all the terrible Earthquake users in the Maison, and even the powerful ones like Mamoswine4, I'm pleased that the indicated damage output for this guy is always so damn high without being able to use an offensive item

Bitterest memories: In over 1,500 battles, Intimidate was needed to spare Slowbro easily a single-digit number of times, but naturally it would be the times I played against those odds that it'd bite me in the ass (which is exactly how I lost Slowbro to an Escavalier 4 speed tie)

WANTED: Preferably dead

All representatives (and frequent offenders) of the kinds of shit that gave me grief. Druddigon would normally not be on the list but it was always one of those coin flip guys, counting on it not using Outrage, and it has just enough bulk to survive Earth Power. This means without a Mold Breaker warning, I'm gambling on Rough Skin. If it or Garchomp were in positions where leaving them alive wasn't much of an issue, I'd often wait for Aron to die and then just have Gardevoir deliver the OHKO.

Battle #1,245: KWCW-WWWW-WW3N-H62X
VS Hex Maniac Anastasia - Froslass/Spiritomb/Reuniclus/Starmie/Dusknoir/Mismagius

One of the more "of course" varieties of bullshit-laden battles for a pretty large number of reasons.

Battle #1,253: TFSW-WWWW-WW3N-H6P9
VS Veteran Howell - Latias/Moltres/Regice/Virizion/Regirock/Landorus

Sky Attack. Can barely live with it, can't live without it.

Battle #1,430: 9XCG-WWWW-WW3N-H838
VS Scientist Rosalind - Toxicroak/Carracosta/Rampardos/Cradily/Raichu/Roserade

Carracosta and Rampardos are in very bad locations and things get off to a shitty start (or I wouldn't be uploading this.) I took two forced gambles on both turns and the second ended up working out in my favor.

Battle #1,469: RBYG-WWWW-WW3N-H9BJ
VS Furisode Girl Nigella - Umbreon/Vaporeon/Glaceon/Flareon/Jolteon/Sylveon

If I had a nickel for the number of times Glaceon led opposite Slowbro, or otherwise screwed with me, I'd be annoyed as nickels are usually annoyingly difficult to amass and sit in my coin bank for ages until I get enough to make one measly roll. Two bucks! Woo.

Battle #1,480: 48LG-WWWW-WW3N-HANH
VS Worker Ivan - Golem/Torterra/Aurorus/Armaldo/Carracosta/Bronzong

Dude, it's hailing! Get outta there! Nah bro, my squad is rockin that shit

Battle #1,521: AJ6W-WWWW-WW3N-HBGM
VS Owner Cyril - Bronzong/Zoroark/Dragonite/Seismitoad/Steelix/Shuckle

Did not expect things to go as they did. I'm... glad I made the choices I did :P

Battle #1,563: HV8W-WWWW-WW3N-HC4E
VS Garcon Darcy - Druddigon/Bisharp/Blastoise/Vileplume/Whiscash/Feraligatr

Bloody pains in my ass. This battle started off badly and for the most part stayed that way, but by using a kinda shitty team against me, he never really had the upper hand... it just took me a nervously long time to get mine.

This is the last I'll be trying to obtain an absurdly long streak, I think. Monotony is a pretty stinky cologne. When I next play it'll be back to the RNG rubbish, and big thanks to NoCheese and turskain for being the primary users to comment on those teams, which I think is what prompted me to join in some of these discussions. I stopped lurking because of you guys. It's always a pleasure to read Jumpman16 Altissimo and The Dutch Plumberjack warstories. And it bears repeating that VaporeonIce made this team a lot more fun (or bearable, perhaps) to use for so freaking long. I hope everyone in the community continues to visit this topic until Sun/Moon, and then migrates to the inevitable Battle Facility thread there!

Edit: For those that simply skimmed, I don't have a loss battle at #1,572 because I had actually progressed beyond that point. I'd stopped at 1,580 and put down the 3DS to get my recharger, and somehow managed to bork things and kill the power (light was not flashing yet.) I can't actually prove I won battle 1580 but I thankfully saved shortly before that.

Also, turskain deserves thanks again for taking the time to put the Maison sets into the damage calc, which I consulted liberally when possible.

 

[Anna says hi]

I'm not exactly pissed at how this ended. After all, I only made one mistake, and substantial hax got me in the end. On the other hand, I know I can do much better than this, and should have. Posting a streak of 863 wins in ORAS Super Singles.

The teams used during the run:

1-200

Azumarill @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Huge Power
Level: 50
EVs: 244 HP / 252 Atk / 12 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 6 Def / 29 SpA / 21 SpD
- Belly Drum
- Aqua Jet
- Play Rough
- Knock Off

This is not something a lot of people would use. I myself was a fan of it. Play Rough wasn't used that much. Knock Off is the go-to kill move on things slower than you. Boost always if it's safe, then wreck stuff with Aqua Jet.

Blaziken @ Blazikenite
Ability: Speed Boost
Level: 50
EVs: 12 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD / 236 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Low Kick
- Flare Blitz
- Knock Off
- Protect

This OHKOs most everything that is offensive, and 2HKOs a lot of the defensive stuff as well. Protect is generally safe to use to bring you up to speed. The EVs were a leftover from when I used this in Multis.

Sylveon @ Choice Specs
Ability: Pixilate
Level: 50
EVs: 220 HP / 4 Def / 248 SpA / 36 Spe
IVs: 30 SpA
Modest Nature
- Hyper Voice
- Psyshock
- Hidden Power [Electric]
- Shadow Ball

This is kind of an oddball(then again, the entire team is). The only moves you'll be using almost all of the time are Hyper Voice and HP Electric. The EVs allow this to switch in to Carracosta4 and outspeed it. You'll be OHKOing a lot of the Maison with Hyper Voice, and most of the stuff you don't is either resists, Soundproof, or stuff like Blissey. This and Blaziken can beat more stuff than you can shake a stick at.

The team I used here is horribly sub-optimal, and I vowed to change it as soon as I got the Berries. Even I have a hard time believing I got to 200 with this. Don't ever use this in a serious run. I will give this team that it racks up BP at an amazingly fast rate, but most people who read this already have more BP than they know what to do with. The link to the post where I first used this team is http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/battle-maison-discussion-records.3492706/page-170#post-6608071

201-864

Kangaskhan @ Kangaskhanite
Ability: Scrappy
Level: 50
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 0 SpA
- Return
- Sucker Punch
- Power-Up Punch
- Earthquake

Suicune @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
Level: 50
EVs: 196 HP / 252 Def / 60 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 13 SpA
- Scald
- Rest
- Calm Mind
- Icy Wind

Gliscor (F) @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
Level: 50
EVs: 236 HP / 4 Atk / 4 Def / 252 SpD / 12 Spe
Careful Nature
IVs: 15 SpA
- Earthquake
- Substitute
- Protect
- Toxic

The above team is Jumpman's Kangliscune, without the revised Suicune EV spread, as at the time this team had played, I had gotten used to the old spread and didn't like the idea of changing it. Gliscor's spread was changed at around 830(8 EVs were shifted from Defense to Speed).

As for the loss, I have an IRC snippet from the battle.

length

<Annasayshi> i'm fukcing dumb
<Annasayshi> i just lostin all likelihood
<Annasayshi> yup i lost
<turska> what happened?
<Annasayshi> ugh
<Annasayshi> horrible misplays vs feraligatr1234 combined with a toxic miss
<Annasayshi> that was 864
<Annasayshi> typhlosion1234 comes out, go to suicune, immediate solar beam
<Annasayshi> use icy wind, charges solar beam, go to gliscor, sub/protect for like 15 turns until i get a sub, then EQ ko
<Annasayshi> feraligatr1234 comes out, i'm behind a sub
<Annasayshi> toxic miss, it uses waterfall
<Annasayshi> which confirms set 4
<Annasayshi> i go to kanga, it does like over 50% with waterfall, which means sheer force
<Annasayshi> in a panic i run the calcs and return isn't a guaranteed ohko
<Annasayshi> so i go to suicune on the waterfall
<Annasayshi> i use icy wind, it subs, it dd's 3 times and finishes cune off with an intact sub
(note: it needed a CH Crunch to guarantee the KO on cune from that point, which it got)
<Annasayshi> and i need a sucker punch crit from there, it doesn't happen
<Annasayshi> i should have gone for return right off the bat and used scald if i didn't ohko
<Annasayshi> the backup was a torterra set
<turska> eq on gliscor (preventing subs) and saccing it to set up kanga could work too, instead of toxic

I feel wrong just letting this sit here, so I'm showing it for everyone. I let myself sit on this for a day to debate about posting this streak. I eventually decided in favor due to the fact that I can't let Azu/Blaze be forgotten. I feel like I've let Jumpman down just by doing this right when he returns. Here's hoping that SuMo is more favorable to me than this.


No battle videos because personal reasons (and i forgot to save a lot of them).

 

[VaporeonIce]

ReptoAbysmal , that team is still awesome. I'm sorry it didn't get the dignity of working its way to an honest loss. Congratulations!

The Dutch Plumberjack , we've already talked over chat, but your streak is super awesome and well-earned. Thanks for everything you bring to the thread (and to the rest of the site!); I can't get enough of marathon Maison posts, and you write some of the most enjoyable ones of all. It's worth noting that my Team Growl loss was also totally avoidable if I had been thinking clearly, so you're certainly not the first one to lose a long streak to a misplay!

Yessss Jumpman16 posts. Poetry in motion.

All this awesome posting has inspired me to play the Battle Maison more. Hopefully I manage to scrounge together something worth posting...but then, Jumpman's posts also tend to make me want to post less, just for the sake of having that cool aura of mystery. But then, Jumpman and I are different people, and I have way too much fun posting about my adventures with ragamuffins like Moody Smeargle, Mega Audino, and Mega Lopunny. So the next time I post a streak, just know: it will absolutely be a team that has a ragamuffin on it.

 

[Anna says hi]

Adamant Zoroark and I did some theorymonning on IRC about Lead Sneasel on a Durant + Drapion team. It's quite surprising to see what it can do - Being able to beat Espeon without locking Durant into a move and completely shitting on all Blaziken variants - even Speed Boost Blaziken1 - is very much welcomed. Here's what we've come up with:

Sneasel @ Focus Sash
Ability: Inner Focus
Level: 50
EVs: 68 Atk / 220 SpD / 220 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Taunt
- Knock Off
- Counter
- Protect


Using any NFE without Eviolite is laughable in almost every scenario. Here, the unique combination of Inner Focus + Taunt + Counter + High speed allows Sneasel to bait out many moves from threats that Durant hates and outright KO them. The SpDef EVs allow Sneasel to avoid the "OHKO" from Blaziken1's Flamethrower, forcing it to use High Jump Kick. The speed EVs allow it to outspeed Espeon.

 

[Adamant Zoroark]

Posting after a discussion with HeadsILoseTailsYouWin about Sneasel. I see she posted while I was typing this up, but I'll go ahead and post anyway since I'm actually not using Drapion on this team (Can I sit around for 42 turns to fully set up Acupressure? Yes. Do I wanna? Nah, not really, but I will admit it would make everything easier vs. anything with Double Team)

So I am currently using this in Super Singles, which I call Team Razor Claw. (Yeah I know, hella inventive, I just picked the item used to evolve Sneasel into Weavile.)

Sneasel (M) @ Focus Sash
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 68 Atk / 220 SpD / 220 Spe
IVs: 31/31/0/xx/31/31
Hasty Nature
- Taunt
- Counter
- Knock Off
- Protect

So, yeah, turskain was skeptical about this set, but Sneasel is one of the few Pokemon that gets the combination of Taunt, Inner Focus, and Counter (Bisharp gets the combination of Taunt, Inner Focus, and Metal Burst, but low Speed + over-reliance on Sucker Punch kinda sucks). From my use of it, it's a Counter-Sash lead which also has the ability to cripple if necessary. In general, it makes life easier for Durant for a bunch of leads, a few examples:

Espeon: You just OHKO it with Knock Off. lol, no more needing to worry about this thing
Klinklang4 (or really anything with Protect): Just Taunt it then safely get into Durant, who is then free to use Entrainment.
Cobalion3: Taunt to prevent it from going for Swagger or setting up a Substitute or whatever, then Knock Off the Lax Incense. Missing is still an issue, but it's also an issue with Prankster leads and just straight Durant leads (and you'd much rather have Sneasel miss than Durant...)
Breloom4: As far as I can tell, it will just use Focus Punch, but even if for some reason it doesn't, you Knock Off the Toxic Orb.
Aerodactyl1: This thing won't end your streak early. You're safe from Rock Slide flinches thanks to Inner Focus.

Otherwise, if it's a lead that Durant doesn't have much issue with AND can safely switch in on, you can switch Sneasel out. A few such leads include Leafeon, Crobat, Victreebel, Venusaur, and

turskain brought up that it's basically similar to a lead like, say, Whimsicott, but in general, since Sneasel's goal is to outright take out an unfavorable lead as opposed to just cripple it, it also makes it such that your sweeper getting crippled by a second-Pokemon Flame Body/Static is quite rare.

Credit to HeadsILoseTailsYouWin for the EV spread. As she said, the 220 SpD EVs are there to lock Blaziken1 into going for High Jump Kick instead of Flamethrower, then the Speed beats Espeon (which is all you really need.)

Durant (F) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Truant
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Spe
IVs: 31/31/31/xx/31/31
Jolly Nature
- Entrainment
- Aerial Ace
- Iron Head
- X-Scissor

Yeah, I still need to optimize EVs on this. I think we all know what Durant does so I'll skip too much of an explanation on it.

Dragonite (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Multiscale
EVs: 172 HP / 124 Atk / 212 Spe
IVs: 31/31/31/xx/31/31
Adamant Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Protect
- Dragon Claw
- Fire Punch

The same Dragonite I used on Durant / Dragonite / Mega Absol, basically unchanged. However, what may need tweaking is the EV spread. But in general, Dragonite is just strong as all hell and is incredibly tanky thanks to Multiscale, making it a pretty solid sweeper with Durant. The EVs here are such that no Aggron set with Metal Burst ever OHKOes Dragonite with Metal Burst, even if I get a max roll with Fire Punch, while also providing for additional bulk. 124 Atk also hits a jump point with the Adamant Nature.

Threats:

Aggron: Okay, so Dragonite can't quite KO this thing (as far as I can tell, Fire Punch 2HKOes all Aggron sets), but the concern here is Metal Burst. I once lived one from Aggron with just 4 HP remaining. It may be vital to conserve Sneasel to use as death fodder if possible, but otherwise, I could up Dragonite's HP investment to make sure it will always survive Aggron's Metal Burst, even with a max roll.
Double Team: Yeah, I know, I could fix this by running Drapion > Dragonite, but I just want to build a streak more quickly right now to test Sneasel. I can test with Drapion as soon as possible, but I'm just way too impatient to actually sit there and Acupressure up for a millennium.

EDIT: lol I forgot to click profile and see "Female." Checking for instances where I use he instead of she, I mean come on what the hell is my excuse I oughta know by now that girls exist on the internet

EDIT2: I fixed up Dragonite's EVs to ensure none of the Aggron sets with Metal Burst ever OHKO it on a max damage roll, barring a crit (which would be like the only instance ever where it'd be bad for me if I got a crit, LOL)

EDIT3: Drapion has since been swapped in over Dragonite (I wanted to see exactly how far I could go with Dragonite, until I totally derped and forgot to Protect on Custap Berry). I'll post about the streak with Drapion when it gets to like, idk, 80-90ish or so.

 

[Smuckem]

Holy crap, this page real interesting real quick. Excellent progress on all counts, will be commenting on some of it later.

On my end, I've dropped the whole Chef Berger experiment for the time being. My second-most recent loss has gotten me thinking about going the 'Scientist vs Maison' route instead. I'm working on creating the Scientists' roster, with a few minor tweaks to certain Maison sets and one major tweak to Manectric4. I'll be back to report on that at some point.

On an amusing side note, to get rolling on this I had to throw the streak I was working on with Chef Berger mk.III (Floatzel3/Gyarados3/Kingdra3/Samurott/Froslass3/Lanturn3), but doing so ended up being a struggle in and of itself. Chef Florentine's team in this instance was so piss-poor (Walrein1/Quagsire1/Flareon1/Ferrothorn1/Lapras1/Slowking1) that, despite me deliberately playing sloppy while distracted, the bastard still took twenty turns to beat me...and it still came down to Lanturn3 vs. Ferrothorn1. You can imagine how that crawled along.

Note to self: When using the Set 1 Chefs' roster, take your time teambuilding...just yuk.

 

[Anna says hi]

You do know you can run from a Maison battle to forfeit?

 

[Smuckem]

You do know you can run from a Maison battle to forfeit?

By the time it crossed my mind during the battle, it was down to Kingdra3/Lanturn3 vs. Ferrothorn1, the former being at low health. Figured I've have some fun with it, thinking, "I know Ferrothorn1 has got the type matchup here, it's Ingrained, let's see what it can do when I'm just dicking around." Took it another six-seven turns from that point to wrap things up. Thing's good in Doubles/Triples for spreading T-Wave with relative impunity and not much else, it seems.

On a separate note...knew I'd dig this up at some point:

ok im having a bit too much fun not to post this, i dont have a big streak or anything yet but who says that should be the only time i post? not me

Blastoise @ Blastoisinite ** Blastoise
Ability: Torrent -> Mega Launcher
EVs: 4Def/252SpA/252Spe
Lv. 50 (Mega)stats: 154/102/141/205/135/130
Nature: Modest
~ Water Spout
~ Aura Sphere
~ Dark Pulse
~ Protect

I love spread moves a whole bunch. Anyone who read ~The Eruptran Project~ could guess how much I delight in the sheer joy of spread moves. The moves themselves are standard, no Dragon Pulse necessary because I rely on Dark Pulse to kill TR pokes and the rest of my team is considerably FUK DRAGON anyway.

Whimsicott @ Focus Sash ** Cotton Candy
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 4Def/252SpA/252Spe
Lv. 50 stats: 135/77/106/141/95/168
Nature: Modest
~ Tailwind
~ Dazzling Gleam
~ Endeavor
~ Fake Tears

Still deliciously broken! The Tailwind setter, with a flashy bit of punch to spread my love of spread moves. Fake Tears is as useful as ever, and it guarantees that every TR user will die no matter where they are on the field due to Blastoise's sniping abilities. When I decided on Whimsy, I wondered if it really needed to be "defensive" and quickly came to the conclusion that "fuck sturdy and sash pokes, go HAM on em Candy". Or something like that? Modest 141 SpA DZ does more than enough to the Dragons that resist Water Spout and Eruption and you can never go wrong with guaranteed damage on three foes (barring priority or other technicalities obviously).

I'm still auditing Focus Sash—it very rarely uses it, meaning it's usually either double targeted (which necessarily renders sash useless no matter a pokemon's defenses) or it's hit by one move that doesn't kill it. Then there's moves like Poison Jab, Sludge Bomb and Blizzard in the hail which further render sash useless when my other two are Protecting. Or EQ happy foes that see Heatran and go apeshit and leave Whimsy at like 70% or whatever. Sash does have its appllcations, of course, but they are more intermittent compared to Doubles especially given that Whimsicott has to be in the middle. I "want to" change this to Lum for idiot Confuse Ray and Thunderwave bullshit, but I haven't lost yet so...

Every battle I ask whether Sash was useful, meaning "is Whimsicott alive and at 1HP at the beginning of turn 2?" Obviously 1HP Endeavor is the bees knees and people still say that, but if I find that the answer to that all-important question is no like 95% of the time, I'm going to swap Sash for Lum. This may also make Endeavor less important, which would free up a slot for any number of fantastic moves Whimsy may make better use of, like Encore, Energy Ball, Worry Seed, Taunt and Safeguard. We'll see I guess.

Heatran @ Flame Plate ** ヒードラン
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 4Def/252SpA/252Spe
Lv. 50 stats: 167/110/126/199/126/116
Nature: Quiet
~ Protect
~ Eruption
~ Earth Power
~ Taunt

Oh Eruptran, will I ever make a serious non-Singles team without you? Probably not! Standard moves are standard, Taunt to shut down Trick Room pokes on my right (foe's left). I have used it like once in over 100 battles, but TR sucks and I don't want to lose to it so I have Taunt as a backup to Fake Tears + Blastoise Dark Pulse. Most of the times I've wanted to use Taunt, Heatran couldn't because of EQ or fighting move, so there's that to consider I guess. Heatran doesn't really want to use anything else though—WoW and Swagger have imperfect accuracy and I don't have a REAL use for Flash Cannon or even Incinerate, so if anything I'd use either DP or...DP lol.

199 SpA because I used HP something on it for The Eruptran Project and I don't have 31SpA/31Spe IV one (like anyone does). 232 speed is plenty in Tailwind, enough to get Scarfchomp(3) by one point for what it's worth.

Latios @ Life Orb ** unban me
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4HP/252SpA/252Spe
Lv. 50 stats: 156/92/100/182/130/178
Nature: Timid
~ Dragon Pulse
~ Psyshock
~ Thunderbolt
~ Tailwind

Secondary TW setter, with near-perfect synergy with Heatran should I have to switch out on Turn 2 (not often at all). DP reaches across the field, Psyshock is a much better fit on this otherwise special-attack–heavy team, Thunderbolt for Gyarados and other waters that Spout/Eruption can't dent (and dragons of course die horribly to DP). Gluemon #1, but a lot of my non-singles teams since even DP have had Latios so yeah.

Sylveon @ Choice Specs ** Patience
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 4HP/252SpA/252Spe
Lv. 50 stats: 171/76/85/178/150/112
Nature: Modest
~ Hyper Voice
~ these
~ dont
~ matter

I am so in love with you, Patience. I know this was posted about recently but I didn't steal it—the first time I used Sylveon was on a Doubles idea with lead Tailwind/Sludge Wave Tornadus and Hyper Voice/CM/Stored Power/Protect Sylveon@Weakness Policy. You can see that the idea was for Sylveon to be at +2SpA (or +3 if I could safely CM Turn 1) and for Stored Power to be a base 100 (or 140) move. This was hilarious when it worked but, well, "Sludge Wave", and I recall it not killing Slowking, scrapping the idea, and shelving Sylveon...until I wanted something to spitekill anything that fainted my beloved Cotton Candy after it got Tailwind up Turn 1.

Turns out that I love spread moves even more than I knew—the only thing that resists Water/Fairy/Fire is Tentacruel, and even then who cares, everything absolutely dies. Most battles go like this:

(Mega)Protect/Tailwind/Protect, Whimsy gets double targeted and dies, 5-6, out comes Sylveon in the middle
Water Spout/Hyper Voice/Eruption, everything dies, 5-3
Water Spout/Hyper Voice/Eruption, everything dies, 5-0

Water Spout goes first, then Eruption, then Hyper Voice at "224 speed" for what that's worth. I still shake my head at how powerful these spread moves are in practice, much more than I thought they'd be in theory.

The other moves do actually kind of matter—I actually have Dazzling Gleam for Soundproof stuff if I'm paranoid, and Protect, which I actually used when stuff got really hairy one battle. In case I'm paranoid of missing something like Tangrowth4 or Walrein4, Swift is 78 base power with Pixilate, and would be better than the redundant Disarming Voice, even without the 30% tie-breaking boost that Pixilate grants Swift over it. Heal Bell is probably better than Dazzling Gleam but "effort" and Sylveon is my second-slowest poke so it wouldn't heal anything in time anyway probably. Maybe Psyshock if I really want Tentacruel but Tentacruel is not something I'm worried about.

Scrafty @ Assault Vest ** im so hood
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 4HP/252Atk/252Spe
Lv. 50 stats: 141/156/135/52/135/110
Nature: Adamant
~ Fake Out
~ Drain Punch
~ Knock Off
~ Ice Punch

My lone physical attacker (Psyshock doesn't really count) and Gluemon #2. Fake Out is incredibly useful at buying time to get TW up in a pinch or protect one of my spread attackers, but sniping low-HP stuff for quick Moxie boost makes my day every time. I literally just threw a Scrafty on the team when I was going through my boxes of stuff I wanted to use and I haven't looked back (aside from changing the Intimidate, bulkier Scrafty I originally had in there). Usually too slow to get Moxie boosts outside of Fakeout, but I rarely even need to use Scrafty because lol at how gross Spout/HV/Eruption is.

So there we have it...I'm at like 108 now and loving every minute, actually saving some "tough" battles and mock playing even though I have yet to lose (I never really mock battled my own saved battles for any reason).

As a side note...I never really got into Triples because a few posters really early on said "triples battles takes forever" and...I disagree? Maybe it's just my team but every battle is like five turns max and the only real time spent is thinking about the best optimal move because I'm a triples noob (literally only found out "Shift" was a thing upon my first battle in the regular Triple Battle mode like last week) which doesn't really count as "slow". So that deterred me from ever really starting in Triples ("time remains the great equalizer", etc), but I'm also refreshed that this team is an absolute blast which probably matters more to me at this point. I tend to get serious "leaderboard-induced apathy" and not pursue fun modes that have been "broken" by the top players, myself included (there are so many Singles ideas I write down and then never try because "lol can this team even win 300/400/500 battles in a row". Like, "who gives a shit about your cute team if it's not either obviously super unique while great on paper or making a serious run at a respectable rank in a given mode?" I still feel that way in general and probably will as long as I play, but that feeling did not shadow me when I was theorymonning nor has or will it during gameplay. Sounds cheesy, especially from a cutthroat leaderboard hawk like me, but I'm very literally actually playing for fun, and I can't tell you have refreshing that is.

Kinda wish I had found this sooner, kinda wanted an update from him on it the other day, when he reported on his great success. I'm so stealing this one of these days. In the meantime, given how much he dismissed Tentacruel as a threat here, it's just pushing me harder to try and work with into in my faux-Scientist teams. No matter what configuration I end up rolling with, it's going to include:

BM212 (Tyrantrum) (M) (Lvl. 64) @ Choice Band
Ability: Strong Jaw
EVs: 252 Atk/4 SDef/ 252 Spd
IVs: 31/31/31/31/xx/31
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Earthquake
- Head Smash
- Crunch
- Dragon Claw

After seeing so much written about Tyrantrum4, I figured I might as well turn one of the Maison's biggest weapons against it. Of course, this isn't quite Tyrantrum4, and the change from Adamant--Jolly is quite deliberate: this is an extended test to see if the loss of Adamant power can be offset by the Choice Band usage.

While on the subject of Sicentist sets: while I see the great utility offered by the Drapion sets used by the Singles stalwarts here, and applaud their ingenuity and patience...there is something to be said for being a little more on the nose with it, acquiring Sniper Drapion4, and unleashing unholy hell upon the Maison. I know I have been today...

 

[SwampySwampert]

Posting here for team-rate request. ORAS Super Singles. My strategy with this team? All-out offense.

Gallade-M Galladite
Ability: Steadfast/Inner Focus (Mega)
EVs: 4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
IVs: 31/31/x/x/x/31
Jolly (+Spd, -SpA)
- Protect
- Knock Off
- Close Combat
- Zen Headbutt

Protect lets me Mega Evolve freely, so that I can exploit the base 110, max-invested Speed to outrun most stuff in the Maison. Close Combat, Zen Headbutt, and Knock Off give it near perfect coverage with a truly insane base 165, max-invested Attack stat.

Darmanitan @None (saving up for Life Orb)
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
IVs: x/31/x/x/x/31 (I got it on Mirage Island)
Nature: I forget. I'll edit it in what it is once I check later.
- Flare Blitz
- U-turn
- Rock Slide
- Superpower

Darmanitan hits like a truck, and will be even better once I get my Life Orb.

Exploud Choice Specs
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 HP/252 SpA/4 Spd
IVs: 31/x/x/31/x/31
Nature: Modest
- Boomburst
- Fire Blast
- Surf
- Focus Blast

Specs Boomburst has 338 base power when factoring in STAB, so that's obviously the go-to move. The other three are coverage moves.

How is this team? Is there anything I can do to improve it?

 

[Adamant Zoroark]

I just completed Battle #70, so I'm posting about (ongoing) streak re: updated Team Razor Claw.

Sneasel (M) @ Focus Sash
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 68 Atk / 220 SpD / 220 Spe
IVs: 31/31/0/xx/31/31
Hasty Nature
- Taunt
- Counter
- Knock Off
- Protect

I established already why Sneasel is used: The combination of Taunt, Inner Focus, Counter, and high Speed is uniquely possessed by Sneasel, making it an extremely consistent Counter-Sash lead. Sneasel is able to get problematic leads like Espeon, Aerodactyl1 (early-game), Klinklang4 (or really any Protect lead), Breloom4, and Explosion leads (they'll just boom, or some Physical attack or whatever) either crippled or out of the way entirely, making Durant's job pitifully easy. Once again, credit HeadsILoseTailsYouWin for the EV spread, which gets Blaziken1 into not going for Flamethrower and outspeeds Espeon. And of course, 0 Defense IVs and Hasty Nature maximizes Counter damage.

Now, in my original post, I botched the explanation for lead strategy vs. Cobalion3. It seemed to work in my head at the time, until I realized that Psych Up goes through Substitute. However, given my experiences against Breloom4 lead (I will post a Battle Video of battle #69 when I faced it as soon as I get back to my room, it's actually kind of hilarious), Cobalion3 should just go for Iron Head, thus meaning Counter does it in barring a miss due to Lax Incense. In fact, it might just be best to click Counter if Cobalion leads at all, given that the only special Cobalion set is non-problematic. How much of a non-issue Cobalion is actually makes Sneasel an incredible lead for this team, given that Cobalion3 seems to be the streak-ender for Drapion teams.

Durant (F) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Truant
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Spe
IVs: 31/31/31/xx/31/31
Jolly Nature
- Entrainment
- Aerial Ace
- Iron Head
- X-Scissor

Durant really doesn't need an explanation.

Drapion (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Battle Armor
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
IVs: 31/31/31/xx/31/31
Adamant Nature
- Acupressure
- Protect
- Knock Off
- Substitute

Honestly, Drapion is just ridiculous. +6 in everything including accuracy and evasion is basically gg. Durant + 1 teams really need a "jack of all trades" type Pokemon, well, Drapion is the master of all trades. Holy fucking shit, this thing is broken.

Threats:
Cobalion3: Sneasel substantially improves the match-up vs. this, but it's still not perfect as Counter can miss thanks to Lax Incense. In that event, knocking off the item is required, but Drapion will still have a headache thanks to Psych Up, barring a crit or something.
Misplays: I fucked up against Glaceon4 once due to not paying attention and not seeing that Entrainment missed, or, I don't know, just knocking the Bright Powder off before I tried that shit.

Replays:
#41: DT4G-WWWW-WW3N-QVWV
I'm pretty sure I could have played better, but this shows how Sneasel can basically wreck the Psychics by itself.

#54: BEPW-WWWW-WW3N-QV5D
This was my complete and utter fuck-up against Glaceon4, where my own idiocy led to me not realizing that Entrainment missed. Still, I realized my fuck-up and turned it around.

#69: 2WEG-WWWW-WW3N-QV7R
Breloom4 sucks now!

EDIT: Well, misplaying already ended this streak (at 76).

7D8W-WWWW-WW3N-RA3M

Yeah, my playing against Jolteon2 was... The exact opposite of smart. This is just completely disappointing.

As per suggestion of HeadsILoseTailsYouWin, I will be breeding a new Sneasel with 31 IVs in Defense (still Hasty) as this forces Lickilicky4 to go for Explosion, while also running Confide on Durant to be able to get Yanmega4 to -2 so Drapion can set up even without Entrainment. Oh, and next time, don't let the streak end due to misplaying.

 

[Anna says hi]

<Annasayshi> holy shit something happened
<Annasayshi> abomasnow4 lead, normally you go to suicune and set up fully
<AdamantZoroark> did it freeze or something
<Annasayshi> no, that wouldn't be noteworthy
<Annasayshi> it uses protect on the suicune switch-in
<Annasayshi> go for CM, focus blast crits, does a max roll
<Annasayshi> i go for rest, focus miss crits again, and gets a max roll again
<Annasayshi> if i hadn't rested, i would have lost suicune (it had snow warning too)
<Annasayshi> which is insanely low odds
<Annasayshi> not only of all the hitting and critting
<Annasayshi> but it needs to not go for protect
<AdamantZoroark> ouch
<AdamantZoroark> anyway, brb for real now
<Annasayshi> the odds of that happening are 1/401241

Probability theory states that weird stuff happens if you play the Maison for long enough, but this is ridiculous. And yes, it absolutely needs both of those max rolls (Suicune has 200 HP, Max roll CH Focus blast does 94, Hail does 12 which cancels out Leftovers and goes before it.)

 

[HYDRA78]

I managed to get a 107 consecutive win-streak in the Super Single Battle Maison in ORAS. The team consisted of Salamence, Cresselia and Scrafty. Here is my story, I hope you enjoy reading this :)

When composing a team, I believe balance is the most important thing. I think a single team should always carry at least one physical and one special Pokémon. And if able, also one Pokémon that can set itself up. Second, I think every team that wants to achieve a solid win streak in the Battle Maison, must have answers to legendaries, critical hits, status abuse, typing abuse, trick room, set-up Pokémon, and so forth. I will try not to make this post too lengthy, but I will add thoughts and side-information so you may better understand some of my tactics. In the end, speed and bulk is vital for any team.

While playing ORAS, I quickly learned that generation VI turned my good-old Salamence into a total annihilator. Unbelievable, it now has 324 attack after one Dragon Dance, and to add to this it is granted with a STAB flying-move (Return) with 100% accuracy and 198 power. That is just incredible. The power of a neutral Return is almost as strong as an Earthquake hitting for super effective damage. Earthquake however, grants great coverage along Flying as it hits hard on Steel, Rock and Electric Pokémon.

After a short bit period of testing, I found out Salamence could 1HKO relatively Bulky Pokémon like Hydreigon, Swampert, Landorus, Dragonite, Togekiss and Scizor with a neutral +1 Return. I figured that if I sent out Salamence as lead, it could wreck entire teams if not severely endangered in turn 1. Ice Beam, stab-Moonblast, Swagger and Thunder Wave were my main concerns. Obviously, my other two teammates must be able to cover these weaknesses properly. As Outrage is no longer needed, I replaced it with Roost. This helped Salamence to stay alive longer, cope with weather/status damage, and incidentally assist in achieving multiple Dragon Dances. Flamethrower and Rock Slide were other options, however I didn’t think they would make a big difference as far as coverage goes, and in the long run a more defensive approach seemed wiser.

Mega Salamence @ Salamencite
Intimidate + Aerilate
IV’s: 31 hp / 31 att / 4 def / 31 spa / 31 spd / 30 spe
EV’s: 252 att / 152 spe / 106 hp
Adamant nature
Lvl 50 stats (mega) hp 183, att 205 (216), def 87 (137), spa 117 (126), spd 100 (110), spe 139 (159)
- Return
- Earthquake
- Dragon Dance
- Roost

As you can see, it’s defence-IV is far from perfect, but Intimidate makes up for this very well. I bred this one long ago but since it’s other IV’s are nearly perfect I never felt the urge to rebreed it. Maybe I will in the near future because of improved Destiny Knot. Intimidate is also very good when switching to Cresselia or Scrafty, making it even easier for them to wall physical Pokémon. Still, 137 defence in Megaform is very high and allows Salamence to survive stab-Stone Edge. Full EV-investment is put in attack, the rest is put into speed and hp. 159 Speed already outspeeds a fair amount of Pokémon, but after just one Dragon Dance (238 speed) it get’s bananas. I think there is no Pokémon in the Battle Maison that can outspeed 238 speed. Priority moves, Choice Scarf, Trick Room and Paralysis are the obvious exceptions here.

Mega Salamence killed an outrageous amount of Pokémon. I think about 60% in total, and it proved to me it’s current position in Uber is justified. The best battles were those of 4 turns, which occurred quite a lot. Salamencite, Dragon Dance. Return. Return. Return. Repeat.

As mentioned before, balance is key and all the aforementioned threats have to be factored in. My first attempt on the Super Single, a team with Salamence, Milotic and Scrafty, stranded at 54 wins. After I lost, I decided I wanted to continue with Salamence and Scrafty because those two alone wrecked SO many Pokémon. During that time, I realized Cresselia is MUCH easier to catch nowadays. I was very delighted to see that Cresselia got Moonblast. That move is insane. Since it’s effective on Fighting and Psychic thus is no longer necessary, I opted for a solo Moonblast set along with Toxic. Calm Mind and Rest are added for obvious reasons. I had no idea if this would work at all.

Cresselia @ Leftovers
Levitate
IV’s: 25 hp / 19 att / 31 def / 15 spa / 31 spd / 31 spe
EV’s: 252 hp / 252 def / 6 spe
Bold nature
Lvl 50 stats: hp 224, att 75, def 189, spa 87, spd 150, spe 106
- Moonblast
- Calm Mind
- Rest
- Toxic

When Crescent Isle finally appeared, I booked first class tickets as soon as I could. Once again, I wished I could personally thank the designers for adding so much goodies for the competitive players. Every legendary Pokémon apparently now always carries 3 IV-stats at max! Wow! After all these years, it is finally able to get proper legendaries like Cresselia. The one I kept was of course Bold and has almost perfect Bulk: 25 hp, 31 def and 31 spd. 25 hp with max ev-invest would give it 224 hp at lvl 50, and despite not being maxed out 227 hp, it still gave me maximum Leftover recovery (14 hp per turn), so I figured this one was good enough. 31 Speed is not bad either, and 15 spa is pretty much irrelevant because of Calm Mind. The other 252 ev went into defence.

Cresselia did wonderful and replaced Milotic very well. Most of the time, the Battle Maison just had no answer to Toxic in combination with Calm Mind, Rest and Leftovers. Toxic sets the timer at 6 turns, and I could write a long list of Pokémon names that had absolutely no chance of winning this 1 on 1. In addition, 24pp Moonblast provided solid overall damage output. Steel and Poison Pokémon could have been troublesome for her, Heatran in particular, but Scrafty and Salamence eat Steel for breakfast and Poison Pokémon are weak in general so these types never caused any real problems. The real danger, most of the time, came from strong special sweepers like Thundurus.

Scrafty @ Sitrus Berry
Shed Skin
IV’s: 31 hp / 31 att / 10 def / x spa / 27 spd / 26 spe
EV’s: 252 hp / 252 spd / 6 def
Careful nature
Lvl 50 stats: hp 172, att 110, def 125, spa 57, spd 181, spe 76
- Fake Out
- Drain Punch
- Crunch
- Bulk Up

This must be one of the most underrated Battle Maison Pokémon on Smogon. I’m very surprised to see that only ONE winning team in this thread used Scrafty.

Simply put, Scrafty was essential in this team for the fact that it is a VERY self-sufficient Pokémon that dealt with many, many different enemies that threatened Salamence and Cresselia. Sitrus Berry was the obvious item because it supplied him with instant recovery when needed, mostly at the beginning of the game before any Bulk Up’s were used. It’s stats are incredible and provide mayor bulk. 172 hp combined with 181 special defence enabled Scrafty to easily sponge multiple strong special hits like Ice Beam. It’s bulk gets even better when Bulk Up is used, boosting a 187 defence stat after just one Bulk Up.

Drain Punch and Crunch were my main attacks. Drain Punch is a wonderful move with 100% accuracy, 75 power and replenishes your health every time it does damage. This granted Scrafty longevity. The way I see it, a Fighting move is almost mandatory in any team and in this case it took good care of Magnezone, Weavile, Glaceon, Tyranitar and other dangerous Rock and Ice Pokémon that threatened Salamence. Crunch is also a strong stab-move, but was mostly used for coverage.

Drain Punch shined throughout the entire run and I recommend anyone to try this move out on any one of your Pokémon, you may be surprised as to how good this move is. I remember a funny moment when I was fighting an Articuno, who thought it was a good idea to use Roost in the middle of a match. This turned Drain Punch into super effective, KO’ing the arctic bird and replenishing about 40% of Scrafty’s health in the process. Despite Scrafty being vulnerable to common types as Fighting and Fairy, it stood firm against many bulky threats and provided good odds to most legendaries I encountered, for example Suicune and Raikou.

Fake Out is a delight for any team, even in single battles. In this team, it also helped dealing with Pokémon carrying Sturdy and Focus Sashes checking Salamence, as well as assisting Cresselia utilizing her Toxic further. Last but not least, Shed Skin is an outstanding ability, offering a 1/3 chance of self-restoring status problems each turn, triggering BEFORE the damage from the status even would be done. This made Scrafty a fine switch for the many Pokémon in the Maison abusing Thunder Wave, Toxic and Will-O-Wisp.


Unfortunately, the streak had to end someday. As one might expected, I lost to a team that carried both Ice and Fairy (Abomasnow and Florges). I was always aware of the fact that Ice Beam is common and that two Pokémon in my team were afraid of Fairies. Sad thing though, the BM had to threw out a bit of a hex to accomplish this loss. A Blizzard that critted AND froze Cresselia at the same time… what are the odds? The odds for this are 0,625% (1 in 160 times). But after 107 straight wins, I can’t complain. I accepted my loss with pride. I got much further than I expected and this was accomplished with Pokémon and movesets I thought out myself.

Below are my pictures taken as proof. I uploaded the video from the final loss in round 108, the code is: EWLW-WWWW-WW3N-EFRJ. I hope you enjoyed reading this and maybe you got inspired somehow. I’m afraid this post got a bit lengthy after all, I’m sorry for that :) Please feel free to comment, reply or ask me anything. Thank you for reading!

 

[NoCheese]

Posting here for team-rate request. ORAS Super Singles. My strategy with this team? All-out offense.

Gallade-M Galladite
Ability: Steadfast/Inner Focus (Mega)
EVs: 4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
IVs: 31/31/x/x/x/31
Jolly (+Spd, -SpA)
- Protect
- Knock Off
- Close Combat
- Zen Headbutt

Protect lets me Mega Evolve freely, so that I can exploit the base 110, max-invested Speed to outrun most stuff in the Maison. Close Combat, Zen Headbutt, and Knock Off give it near perfect coverage with a truly insane base 165, max-invested Attack stat.

Darmanitan @None (saving up for Life Orb)
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
IVs: x/31/x/x/x/31 (I got it on Mirage Island)
Nature: I forget. I'll edit it in what it is once I check later.
- Flare Blitz
- U-turn
- Rock Slide
- Superpower

Darmanitan hits like a truck, and will be even better once I get my Life Orb.

Exploud Choice Specs
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 HP/252 SpA/4 Spd
IVs: 31/x/x/31/x/31
Nature: Modest
- Boomburst
- Fire Blast
- Surf
- Focus Blast

Specs Boomburst has 338 base power when factoring in STAB, so that's obviously the go-to move. The other three are coverage moves.

How is this team? Is there anything I can do to improve it?

If you're looking for a team that will do a respectable job of harvesting BP, this, like most squads of reasonably well-paired, hard-hitting Pokemon will serve you well. That you're all-in on attacking moves likewise means that battles will go quite quickly, giving a decent time to bp earned ratio. But if you're looking for a big streak, say getting to 200 or so, you're going to have difficulties. A few reasons why:

1. Ability to take advantage of good matchups. One of the best ways to preemptively avoid problems in the Maison is being able to take advantage of Pokemon you dominate. Usually, that means having some way to set up. With something like Dragonite, for example, even a bad second or third pokemon matchup can become no problem if, thanks to a dominated first foe, you were able to previously get in two Dragon Dances. With no boosting moves on your team, you won't be able to take advantage of non-threatening enemy leads, and so are likely to have more awkard matchups with second and third foes.

2. Accuracy. A well-buit Maison team should have little difficulty winning the "average" Maison battle. Streaks typically end when bad matchups align with bad luck. Unlike against a human opponent, where a little innacuracy is okay when a hit will secure you an OHKO, in the maison, successful teams really need to be built for the bad state of the world, when a key die roll could go against you. Accordingly, if you look at the list of top teams in the OP, you'll see very few that are reliant on low accuracy moves. Even 90% is heinously unreliable over the course of a long streak. Conversely, each of your Pokemon uses at least one innacurate move, and though some of these are just uncommonly used coverage moves, untimely misses are still going to cause you a lot of problems.

3. Pokemon quality. STAB Boomburst is unquestionably a great move. Sadly, Exploud is just an awful Pokemon. Low SpA means that Boomburst still isn't going to get as many OHKOs as you might like. And for your non-STAB coverage moves, the power issue is going to be worse. With Exploud's bad defenses and Speed, a lot of the stuff that Exploud can OHKO is going to still be able to get a powerful hit in first. There are a lot of Focus Blast using foes in the Maison, and though it's an awful move for you, when you need to win every battle, it's a great move for the foe, who just needs to win one to stop your streak. I see Exploud taking a lot of painful hits from powerful Fighting-type moves, particularly Focus Blast.

4. The finer points. Any team where one of your Pokemon's natures is "I forget" requires refining. Putting together a big streak means really sweating the details, and not just winging it with a "that's probably good enough." Darmanitan hits like a tank, but its defenses are paper thin. You really, really want to be able to outrun as many things as possible. That means that with a Life Orb, you absolutely want Darmanitan to be Jolly. Another fine option, which I had some fun with last generation, is Choice Scarf Adamant Darmanitan. You'll want to take a look at the maison Speed tiers, available here (and linked in the OP) to decide what you're okay with being outrun by. Similarly, all your Pokemon are breedable. Take advantage of this, and breed up some 5 IV specimins, a relatively easy task with a Destiny knot. There are people in the WiFi forum who will happily give you a flawless Ditto if you need one for breeding, and if you'd like I can help on this too. After battle 40, all your foes will have perfect IVs, and a little extra Defense or the like can make the difference between surviving a hit or not.

Again, if you're just looking for BP and maybe beating the Chatelaine at 50, go for it. *Edit: Though Nita and her fast Flying-types match up very well against your team.* You certainly will dish out enough damage to get plenty of early wins, and heck, I first got to 50 in super singles with an awful in-game team that this surely betters. But if you're looking to go any deeper, you'll probably have to do some significant reworking. Exploud, in particular, seems painfully underpowered and vulnerable.

Best of luck!

 

[blookazoo]

You do know you can run from a Maison battle to forfeit?

Don't understand why anyone would ever do this. If you think you're going to lose and forfeit you might as well play on and see if you actually do lose. It probably won't take up that much more of your time (note though I've never come across an endless battle in the Maison).

 

[Smuckem]

2. Accuracy. A well-buit Maison team should have little difficulty winning the "average" Maison battle. Streaks typically end when bad matchups align with bad luck. Unlike against a human opponent, where a little innacuracy is okay when a hit will secure you an OHKO, in the maison, successful teams really need to be built for the bad state of the world, when a key die roll could go against you. Accordingly, if you look at the list of top teams in the OP, you'll see very few that are reliant on low accuracy moves. Even 90% is heinously unreliable over the course of a long streak. Conversely, each of your Pokemon uses at least one innacurate move, and though some of these are just uncommonly used coverage moves, untimely misses are still going to cause you a lot of problems.

4. The finer points. Any team where one of your Pokemon's natures is "I forget" requires refining. Putting together a big streak means really sweating the details, and not just winging it with a "that's probably good enough." Darmanitan hits like a tank, but its defenses are paper thin. You really, really want to be able to outrun as many things as possible. That means that with a Life Orb, you absolutely want Darmanitan to be Jolly. Another fine option, which I had some fun with last generation, is Choice Scarf Adamant Darmanitan. You'll want to take a look at the maison Speed tiers, available here (and linked in the OP) to decide what you're okay with being outrun by. Similarly, all your Pokemon are breedable. Take advantage of this, and breed up some 5 IV specimins, a relatively easy task with a Destiny knot. There are people in the WiFi forum who will happily give you a flawless Ditto if you need one for breeding, and if you'd like I can help on this too. After battle 40, all your foes will have perfect IVs, and a little extra Defense or the like can make the difference between surviving a hit or not.

To elaborate slightly on these two points:
2) If you're going to use Megallade, you might as well stick with Psycho Cut > Zen Headbutt--the power boost from being Mega will handily offset the gap in Base Power.
4) If you took the trouble to find a 31 Atk/31 Spd IV Darumaka, you might as well keep going and hunt down a 31 HP IV on top of that--not investing in HP EVs makes it more vital that you have those extra precious points handy should Darmanitan get opportunites to sweep with Flare Blitz. Those extra HP might make the difference between blitzing a shutout and him getting two KOs, then having its recoil screw you over just when it's getting on a roll. Also echoing the usage of Choice Scarf Adamant Darmanitan--I've created an Imperfect Darmanitan4 (Impish-->Jolly, non-31 SAtk IVs) and even with the loss in power from not using Adamant, she was wrecking shit in Festive Feud and Scrappy Skirmish--imagine what you can manage against the Maison with something like that (and, unlike myself, not rolling the dice with running Stone Edge).

Don't understand why anyone would ever do this. If you think you're going to lose and forfeit you might as well play on and see if you actually do lose. It probably won't take up that much more of your time (note though I've never come across an endless battle in the Maison).

I don't blame him for sharing the sentiment; I was trying to throw the match, after all, and that would have saved me three-four minutes. Every match is another potential piece of data, though, so I have little problem with riding matches out.

 

[Magicxgame]

Hello, everyone. I'm posting an update of 2100 ongoing wins in Super Triples.

Battle #2100 - VS Veteran Jake (Thundurus / Cresselia / Latias / Raikou / Landorus / Registeel)
6M9G-WWW-WW3Z-62XA

I returned to the old squad of Greninja / Mega Blastoise / Talonflame / Garchomp / Scizor / Rotom-W around battle #1800.

Hide

Greninja @ Focus Sash
Ability: Protean
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Mat Block
- Dark Pulse
- Grass Knot
- Ice Beam

Standard Maison Greninja.

Blastoise-Mega @ Blastoisinite
Ability: Rain Dish -> Mega Launcher
Level: 50
EVs: 20 HP / 236 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Water Spout
- Aura Sphere
- Ice Beam
- Protect

The HP EVs ensure that Mega Blastoise survives Leafeon4's Leaf Blade and Ludicolo4's Grass Knot, while giving it just enough juice to OHKO Hydreigon4 with Aura Sphere. (12 HP / 4 Def / 4 SDef would be more efficient since it trades 1 point of HP for 1 point of Defense and Special Defense, but it wouldn't allow Blastoise to survive the attacks.)

Normal Blastoise's ability doesn't matter, since it always Mega Evolves immediately. Theoretically, Rain Dish is more useful since it provides some extra healing, while Torrent is pointless since a weak Blastoise will barely inflict any damage with a spread Water Spout.

Talonflame @ Sharp Beak
Ability: Gale Wings
Level: 50
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Adamant Nature
- Brave Bird
- Tailwind
- Taunt
- Protect

Talonflame always survives Bastiodon4 and Krookodile4's spread Rock Slide. I tried other EV spreads, but they would require me to cut Talonflame's Attack (which is infeasible) or HP (which would limit the number of Brave Birds it could fire).

Garchomp @ Life Orb
Ability: Rough Skin
Level: 50
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Dragon Claw
- Swords Dance
- Protect

The remaining 4 EVs are placed in Defense to give Garchomp 183 HP, minimizing residual damage, and survive Hydreigon4's Dragon Rush. It could survive Haxorus4's Dragon Claw and Slowbro4's spread Blizzard with a little additional investment, but it seems pointless since it already outspeeds and OHKOs Haxorus and will faint to Life Orb recoil after Blizzard anyway.

Scizor @ Choice Band
Ability: Technician
Level: 50
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 236 HP / 164 Atk / 4 Def / 52 SpD / 52 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Bullet Punch
- U-turn
- Superpower
- Knock Off

The defensive EVs give Scizor 175 HP, minimizing residual damage, and allow it to survive Zapdos2's spread Heat Wave. The Speed EVs allow it to outrun the numerous 90 Speed Pokemon and outrun base 115s after Tailwind.

Rotom-Wash @ Choice Specs
Ability: Levitate
Level: 50
EVs: 228 HP / 208 SpA / 4 SpD / 68 Spe
IVs: 30 Atk / 30 Def / 30 SpA
Modest Nature
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Water]
- Dark Pulse
- Trick

I bred a new Rotom-W, thanks to Buckert's HP Water Ditto. (Ideally, it would have a 0 Attack IV to minimize confusion damage, but I didn't feel like endlessly breeding for one.) This Rotom-W survives Armaldo4's Stone Edge, Braviary4's Giga Impact, Typhlosion4's Solar Beam, and Florges4's Petal Dance. It OHKOs Politoed4 and Empleon4 with Thunderbolt, and outruns Landorus2 after Tailwind. It misses out on outspeeding some Pokemon after Tailwind, such as Terrakion2, but it doesn't matter since Rotom-W is a backup and all but one of my Pokemon hit Terrakion for super-effective damage. For a lead Rotom-W, a faster spread is the way to go.

I played around 300 battles with Landorus-T and Thundurus-T. I liked Landorus-T, but didn't care for Thundurus-T. It was too frail even with some defensive investment, and it made two of my backups weak to Ice-type attacks. I felt more comfortable with the old team, so I just switched back to it and never looked back.

The threats are still the same. Trick Room is still terrifying if it goes up; Zapdos2 and Lati@s1 are pains; Pokemon Rangers are annoying due to all of their Water resists; Quick Claw Leafeon and Donphan are never fun; and Cradily4 and Lanturn4 cause battles to drag on longer than they need to. However, the team is still as strong as ever, and all of the threats are managable.

That said, I nearly lost in battle #2043 against Chef Cobb (BV: P4YG-WWWW-WW3Y-J53K) due to Trick Room and some Snow Cloak hax. I should have double-targeted Slowbro on turn 1 since Jynx rarely uses Fake Out, but of course it used Fake Out the one time it was paired up with a TR user. Minimizing residual damage on Scizor really helped, as it survived the skirmish with 2 HP.


I also have a 889-battle Super Singles streak. I used turskain's Dragonite / Aegislash / Greninja and Jumpman16's Mega Kangaskhan / Suicune / Gliscor v1 team with some minor modifications before losing to Psychic Haskell. I didn't want to post the embarrassing BV, but figured I might as well since it's still a long streak.

Battle #889 - Psychic Haskell (Jynx / Mismagius / Spiritomb)
XTZG-WWWW-WW3Z-62SJ

I lose 3-0 against Jynx4 due to some questionable plays and a crit. I was worried about Jynx, and went on tilt here. In retropsect, I should have PP stalled Blizzard since Suicune could always unthaw itself with Scald if necessary.

I also updated turskain's lead list for Dragonite / Aegislash / Greninja, making some adjustments as well. Some of the plays may not be optimal, but most of them are safe moves.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1lu16RfWhzkwpTH75hKt_y__Pk4Jtb6TldYfhsybW_d8/edit?usp=sharing

The Future
​

I'm pleasantly surprised that I was able to make it to 2100 wins. Ever since mercury's 2000-win streak, I wanted to reach 2,000 wins, but thought it was just a pipe dream. It's surreal how 2100 wins barely cracks the top 10 nowadays; in fact, when the 4000-win Japanese player's team is taken into account, mercury's 2000-win streak doesn't even crack the top 10 anymore!

That said, I probably won't reach 3000 wins. The generation's winding down, I'm busy with work, and I'm playing a lot of Fire Emblem Fates during my free time. But most importantly, the Battle Maison is just boring now. You can only fight the same 100 trainers and questionable Pokemon movesets so many times before you get sick of it.

As I alluded to previously, I'm still searching for the optimal Mega Blastoise team. Initially, I just ripped the backline of Garchomp / Scizor / Rotom-W from turskain's team. I've made some modifications so that they fit my team, but Scizor and Rotom-W still feel like filler, and I think I could do better.

Right now, I'm thinking of using Sash Greninja / Mega Blastoise / LO Talonflame / Assault Vest Landorus-T / CB Scizor / Specs Hydreigon. AV Landorus-T gets a (pseudo) Defense boost on both sides, provides valuable Intimidate support, and helps make up lost ground against Workers due to the lack of Rotom-W. It doesn't hit as hard as LO Garchomp, but my other Pokemon can help snatch up some kills. In turn, Talonflame finally gets to hold the Life Orb, which gives it guaranteed OHKOs against Pokemon like Leafeon4 and Gardevoir4, and lets it use LO Flare Blitz to anhiliate Ice-types such as Regice.

I briefly considered using Hydreigon a couple of times in the past, such as when -FG- posted his amazing Mega Blastoise streak, but ultimately rejected it since it had trouble killing bulky Waters and had to forego the inaccurate Draco Meteor. However, after running some calcs, a Specs Hydreigon with Dragon Pulse / Dark Pulse / Flamethrower / Earth Power seems appealing to handle Water-types and Trick Room. Dark Pulse hits the Psychic- and Ghost-types that often accompany Trick Room, while Specs Earth Power smacks Electrics around. Dragon Pulse and Dark Pulse are also cross-field moves, which is a plus. I could go Draco Meteor over Dragon Pulse for some OHKOs since Greninja and Mega Blastoise also have Ice moves, but the 90% accuracy is a drag.

The team is adaptable. I've considered switching my physical attackers' items around; Sharp Beak Talonflame, Choice Band Landorus-T, and Life Orb Scizor is one option I considered, since it gives Scizor more versatility and lets Landorus-T use an absurdly powerful Explosion. However, Explosion is pretty risky due to all of the things that can stop it (Normal resists, Damp Pokemon, Wide Guard, Bright Powder misses), so I think the option listed above is better. Sylveon is also an option for the last slot as a backup spread attacker, but it doesn't resist Water and does worse than Hydreigon against Psychics and Hex Maniacs.

The team lacks a second Pokemon with over base 100 Speed, which is one of the main reasons I picked Garchomp over Landorus-T in the first place. However, I can consistently set up Tailwind, Talonflame and Scizor have priority moves, and Timid Hydreigon can outrun neutral base 100s, so it shouldn't be a big deal.

I've also considered a Sylveon team of Sash Greninja / LO Sylveon / Sharp Beak Talonflame / Assault Vest Landorus-T / Leftovers Aegislash / Mega Kangaskhan just for something different, based on the Japanese player's team. Specs Sylveon hits harder, but LO Sylveon can use Protect against Pokemon like Muk4, and use Helping Hand to boost its teammates' attacks if Hyper Voice isn't effective. It lacks a Water resist in the back, but Tailwind, Fake Out, and Wide Guard should help against Beauty Lana and other Water specialists.

I'm working on a guide that debunks the myth that the Pokemon AI cheats, and may contact a gaming publication like Kotaku about my streak and the Battle Maison enthusiasts. (Obviously, I'll give credit where credit's due!) Thanks to so many people who inspired me to get this far, and special thanks to turskain and SimiCCombine for providing the inspiration for this team in the first place.

Battle on, trainers!

 

[Smuckem]

Excellent work there, Magicxgame --every team featuring Talonflame pushes me a little closer to putting in the work necessary to breed a decent one. I suspect at this point that I haven't done so simply due to him being a non-factor in the Maison; as an opponent, it's been pretty forgettable. Maybe it needs to whip me a couple of times...Anyways, great work, particularly in your Rotom-W usage.

Unfortunately, this update has gotten me to start going back through the thread and liking every damn Triples team that has been presented (even the bad ones). Addicting stuff indeed...

EDIT: RE: The post below this one

YYYYYEEEESSSSSS IT HAS RETURNED

No chance of a YT vid of these early shenanigans? While I have loved the concept in general (and sure, it made have been only the first quarter of The Gauntlet), you pulling out Carbink for this may very well be the highlight of this whole TR-RNG experiment (and that includes your first effort, along with turskain's). Much appreciated.

 

[ReptoAbysmal]

I figured you had passed my streak, but wasn't sure by how much. Good job with that.

I spent a little while cleaning my boxes yesterday, with the intent of reducing my supply of flunkies to 90 (would have tried for lower, but there were more than 60 sets I really enjoyed using or didn't want to remove after taking the time to deliberate a set and breed them, particularly some unreleased DW abilities we had only just gotten.) I also removed a handful of setters and megas that were either redundant (Dusknoir) or just plain shitty in triples (Mega Banette, sadly.)

And then I got to playing some battles with them, and geez the Aron Army spoiled the hell out of me. Gone are the days of relative safety but most importantly the element of predictability in the AI's actions. Protect usage is much more of a guessing game, unfortunately, and while Team Aron didn't have many scenarios where switching was extremely safe or effective, it still had more than my random teams usually do. If nothing else I could generally tell who would be sacked and by what, and commence damage control accordingly.

That said, I'm a teensy bit glad I lost my streak when I did, because the Poke bug is pretty strong right now and I'd forgotten how much fun I was having doing this. I've played up to 40 and the first three teams were not -that- shitty, while the fourth team was extremely fun and effective throughout ten battles, with mebbe five of them being pretty difficult without the sorts of overpowering advantages that my old team relied upon. I'll talk mostly about them.

Battles 1-10: Carbink/M-Camerupt/Torterra/Vaporeon/Eelektross/Hydreigon

Apart from having no solid switches for strong physical attacks, especially bug or fighting (which reared its head a few times) these guys did well. What they lacked in broad tanking ability they made up for in sheer strength and Torterra & Eelektross get particularly high marks for their surprisingly valuable contribution. Wide Guard was a great help and EB Wood Hammer murdered a lot, and with two quake immunities I got to utilize it. Eelektross on the other hand disappointed with its 85/80/80 defenses but otherwise was a killing machine.

Battles 11-20: Aromatisse/M-Tyranitar/Carracosta/Marowak/Absol/Empoleon

Take what I said about bad switching prospects of the first team and double it. These guys could not switch to save their lives, for the most part, but what little I had to do worked out all right. Tyranitar with its absolutely ridiculous 700 BST both ate a ton of shit and inflicted it. I love how it just annihilates with its STABs, and Earthquake was handy for setting off Carracosta's Weakness Policy; several battles involved using Heal Pulse to restore it from the red afterward, as the enemies were unable to defeat my turtle before then. I don't believe Razor Claw + Super Luck is a guaranteed crit rate, but Absol did a lot of attacking and never failed to crit unless it also wasted its turn failing with Sucker Punch.

Battles 21-30: Cofagrigus/M-Camerupt/Shuckle/Golem/Porygon2/Goodra

These guys almost never switched unless they had to via fainting. Surprisingly, Shuckle went 9-1 on staying alive, partly due to frequent Ally Switch usage, which kept it away from physical killing blows (Cofagrigus was rarely targeted by anything besides Ghost moves, if at all) and partly due to Power Tricked Rock Slides & Camerupt's grossly overpowered spread fire damage in tandem being unsurvivable by most things. I learned that if you target the empty middle slot with a corner poke and then switch places via Ally Switch, it will successfully attack the opposite corner enemy if there is one. The AI doesn't really use the move intelligently, ever, so I wouldn't have known this without trying myself.

For reasons I don't understand Sucker Punch is only obtainable on 4th gen Golems but fortunately I've still got one. It doesn't miss any new moves that are unobtainable without losing that attack. Most of the fighting it did was exclusively with that move, after setting off its WP. Porygon2 never left its pokeball once, but Goodra did a little bit of cleanup after Cofagrigus committed suicide. I want to make a physical variant to take advantage of Sap Sipper but the special one functioned well enough.

Battles 31-40: Slowbro/M-Heracross/Regirock/Heatran/Dragalge/Sylveon

These... THESE guys make the teams that make me enjoy this method so much. I struck silver with these ugly nuggets, and I kind of want to keep using them to reach Dana before boxing them, just so I can maintain the gratifying feeling of rounded coverage, useful speeds, and destructive force. I had yet to be able to use Adaptability Dragalge on a really decent squad, so this was the first time I got to see it really shine and inflict some severe damage. Sylveon is also strong as fuck and I'd forgotten how powerful Hyper Voice was, especially when single-targeted, which happened often because everyone else on the team save Heracross would move before her, and if she were in play, Heracross was typically already dead.

But the MVP was Regirock. God damn that thing is difficult to OHKO, and it doesn't even have Sturdy (I don't believe the Bank DW Regis are able to be resetted for, so I'm not counting on getting a usable Sturdy one from there.) Mine is Sassy to get as much out of its SDef as I can without sacrificing too much attack, and the only thing to straight up kill it in ten battles was Clawitzer4's Specs Water Pulse, which I allowed it to eat as I didn't want to switch Dragalge into a potential Blizzard, as Abomasnow was right next to it. It usually opened with Gravity and then began laying waste with +2 Stone Edge (it was frequently hit supereffectively turn one) and eventually exploding. Among the moves that failed to OHKO it were Sawk4's LO Close Combat and Milotic3's Hydro Pump. It also ate consecutive Surfs from Slowking4 and Starmie. Much like team #2, Regi chugged along with some Heal Pulses to avoid needing to blow up too soon.

I was mildly surprised to note that of all ten opponents, only three ran Set3 pokes- a Gardener, Breeder and a Furisode Girl. The rest were three Psychics, two Hex Maniacs, an Owner and a Scientist. Since I enjoyed this team so much, I saved the replays just to be able to recall the battles more easily: <_<

Starmie/Slowking/Gardevoir/Cofagrigus/Reuniclus/Jynx - Set 4

Slowking would block the first TR and force Heracross to choose its poison; Regi ended up having to detonate just to get rid of Slowking and Starmie, but at least I witnessed that it could tank a Surf from each of them before doing so. Very ugly start and not a particularly friendly battle for Heracross given some opponents with lower speed, but Heatran and Sylveon mopped up well.

Weezing/Nidoqueen/Toxicroak/Nidoking/Cradily/Bastiodon - Set 4

Frontline was not friendly for Heracross at all, with horrible target options for all of its moves and bringing in Nidoking as the first replacement didn't improve things. On the plus side, Weezing opted for Toxic and not Will-O-Wisp, so no one was crippled. Second, Nidoqueen was happy to use Earthquake, killing Toxicroak and setting off Regi's WP, needed to assist Heracross in taking down Weezing. Queenie would similarly help finish off Nidoking as well. From there, Heracross finally had suitable targets.

Milotic/Zoroark/Ampharos/Flareon/Gyarados/Escavalier - Set 3

Roughest battle of the bunch, easily. Zoroark took the appearance of Escavalier, and with a Life Orb, there was no surviving Megahorn, so I just withdrew it and brought in Heatran. The SDef drop from the CC that obliterated Zoroark would make Heracross easy pickings, especially after I stupidly opted to attack and not Protect during the next turn. Regirock wasted Milotic with +2 Stone Edge and would be easily finished without TR. Fortunately things got a little better with Slowbro back (opposite corner from Ampharos now) and Escavalier showing up last, with a healthy Heatran being able to waste it.

Umbreon/Jolteon/Flareon/Sylveon/Espeon/Vapoeon - Set 3

For once Vappy is on the back line, as well as Sylveon, a good thing because they were capable of being the biggest problems together. Letting Umbreon stick around was a mistake as it'd end up Swaggering Heracross and getting it killed via two hits of confusion and some side damage. Umbreon was the only poke to survive a +2 Explosion from Regirock, which it did with a fairly large chunk of HP remaining. Gravity was also effective in stopping some Muddy Water hax horseshit.

Exeggutor/Gourgeist/Cofagrigus/Mr. Mime/Drifblim/Espeon - Set 4

This battle was amusing and interesting, to say the least. I've come to appreciate Heracross' lousy base speed of 85 and lousier TR speed of 75, because it enabled him to easily outspeed and kill enemy setters, as well as doing so before Cofagrigus would get a chance to burn him (not that Exeggutor could survive five 4x Pin Missiles off retarded 185 base attack)

What made it better was Cofagrigus' burn target: partner Gourgeist. Gourgeist would use Trick-or-Treat on Regirock; the ensuing Ghost typing would make it weak to Mr. Mime's meager Shadow Ball, setting off WP and basically expediting this team's loss. Lots of Explosion immunities, but nothing that can laugh off +2 Stone Edge either. I allowed Gourgeist to die from burn damage while spamming Phantom Force, purely out of spiteful satisfaction.

Bronzong/Reuniclus/Cofagrigus/Spiritomb/Trevenant/Musharna - Set 4

A battle with no TR. Amusingly Heracross outsped this entire team and it was just as well to leave it that way, going so far as to use TR purely to cancel it out should the AI keep trying to use it, which it did. Cofagrigus never bothered to burn me, so Pin Missile continued to reliably OHKO. Sylveon took care of Cofagrigus/Spiritomb.

Clawitzer/Abomasnow/Florges/Cofagrigus/Manectric/Noivern - Set 4

I didn't want to sack Heracross but it was kind of inevitable. Snow Warning was in play, and M-Heracross speed ties with Abomasnow4; this basically guarantees that Florges is ensured to kill in one turn with Moonblast (impossible OHKO but the damage is easily made up from hail.) But Heracross was my best bet at reliably OHKOing Clawitzer, who had pretty solid prospects by spamming Water Pulse. Either way I'm glad I didn't attack Abomasnow because it opened with Protect.

Not wanting to risk a Blizzard hitting Dragalge, or letting a combination of that plus WP hit Sylveon, I resigned and let Regirock faint without doing anything. Fortunately there were otherwise no threats to TR and once that ugly second turn finished, things were much smoother. Florges slayed Heracross as expected (with better switchings, I would have tried Rock Blast, which always OHKOs 0/0 Florges and let something else deal with Clawitzer.) I was pleased to learn that the back line of this team as well as the front, save Clawitzer, was very easy pickings for my own backup. I'd also forgotten how much I liked Psyshock on Slowbro. While it's not that strong uninvested, it still is capable of getting some KOs and as in this battle, it inflicts moderately high damage on wafer Pokemon like Florges.

Ahhhh fun fun fun! I think I'll let these guys reach Dana before boxing them back up.

 

[Smuckem]

Your team is pretty much fine (I mean, it doesn't have a good answer to leads with status, but many teams don't).

I may have thought to ask you to expand on this, but of course I wasn't a Smogonite at the time--was this a statement specific to Singles, or have you found in your experiences that this can apply to all modes? I would imagine that good Rotations teams are able to have multiple ways of having team members absorb status for each other, and in Triples you can generally wipe out the offender's teammates and gang up on it later. Then again, perhaps in Rotations the AI's unpredictability makes that trickier than it sounds, and in Triples being a status user and being a stallmon are not necessarily mutually inclusive (so you can't just always dismiss them initially).

If the latter, have you found in the time since this statement that the leaderboard now does contain teams that can handle status leads reasonably well? If not, I think we can all put our heads together and start coming up with strategies that cover across the modes (TruAnt would have Singles covered well, and Safeguard/Taunt Pranksters may have Triples covered reasonably well, I imagine, but the other modes may not give you the time to work these).

 

[VaporeonIce]

I may have thought to ask you to expand on this, but of course I wasn't a Smogonite at the time--was this a statement specific to Singles, or have you found in your experiences that this can apply to all modes? I would imagine that good Rotations teams are able to have multiple ways of having team members absorb status for each other, and in Triples you can generally wipe out the offender's teammates and gang up on it later. Then again, perhaps in Rotations the AI's unpredictability makes that trickier than it sounds, and in Triples being a status user and being a stallmon are not necessarily mutually inclusive (so you can't just always dismiss them initially).

If the latter, have you found in the time since this statement that the leaderboard now does contain teams that can handle status leads reasonably well? If not, I think we can all put our heads together and start coming up with strategies that cover across the modes (TruAnt would have Singles covered well, and Safeguard/Taunt Pranksters may have Triples covered reasonably well, I imagine, but the other modes may not give you the time to work these).

If you want any team to go particularly far, it will need to have a way to deal with status; I don't remember the context, but it certainly wasn't meant to imply that Singles teams can get a ton of wins without having any answers to status; that said, you can probably get to a couple hundred wins without any amazing ways to deal with secondary status effects. You'll notice that all of the top Singles teams have Substitute, Lum Berry, or Prankster Taunt on the lead, or they have Gliscor + Suicune as back-ups (Gliscor deals with Electric-type paralysis, Suicune deals with burn/freeze). Rotations teams will generally utilize Substitute or Heal Bell/Aromatherapy (or both); it's worth noting that that format really wasn't "cracked" very well (except by turskain), and I consider the differences in the top (non-turskain) streaks there to be largely due to luck rather than "superior" teams due to the rather middling streak length (I mean, someone beat my best streak there with my own team, and in responding to their loss post they made it clear that I was using strategies they hadn't considered). In Doubles and Triples you have little time to really avoid status (while Talonflame's Taunt can do some work in this regard, Trick Room is usually a more important target than status for teams that use Talonflame), and it's generally less important because 1) you should be trying to kill everything really fast, and 2) you have more Pokemon, so a single Pokemon getting hit by status is generally less of a problem. In Rotations, you generally rely on a single set-up sweeper more, simply because you don't know what the opponent will rotate to, making status defense more important.

 

[Smuckem]

So, I've been trying out an amalgamation of the various teams that have gotten me previous streaks, mixed in with one of my in-game 'mons and two new folks into the fray. Will update on this when I lose.

In the process of doing this, I went and cleaned out my SD cards of replays I no longer needed, coming across various Scientist battle vids in the process. I'm still interested in going back to that at some point (my most recent attempt at this got me to 41 wins), so I'll throw it to you: of these teams (all encountered during my four or five most recent runs), which one would be the most suitable for my next "Scientist vs. the Maison" run?

- Cradily/Eelektross/Victreebel/Weezing/Luxray/Electrode
- Aurorus/Jolteon/Electivire/Archeops/Raichu/Luxray
- Victreebel/Ampharos/Venusaur/Tyrantrum/Luxray/Muk
- Cradily/Crobat/Zebstrika/Victreebel/Carracosta/Roserade
- Aerodactyl/Aurorus/Raichu/Jolteon/Manectric/Skuntank
- Lanturn/Raichu/Electrode/Muk/Cradily/Toxicroak
- Magnezone/Lanturn/Ampharos/Bastiodon/Venusaur/Crobat
- Bastiodon/Vileplume/Muk/Nidoking/Tyrantrum/Jolteon
- Magnezone/Aerodactyl/Crobat/Cradily/Archeops/Zebstrika
- Gengar/Weezing/Archeops/Armaldo/Tentacruel/Electivire
- Carracosta/Cradily/Nidoking/Muk/Drapion/Crobat
- Tentacruel/Armaldo/Ampharos/Bastiodon/Luxray/Vileplume
- Drapion/Archeops/Armaldo/Jolteon/Crobat/Magnezone
- Crobat/Victreebel/Ampharos/Riachu/Bastiodon/Crobat
- Nidoqueen/Zebstrika/Nidoking/Armaldo/Muk/Ampharos

This is in addition to the Scientist teams that others have posted on with their replays.

 

[ReptoAbysmal]

EDIT: RE: The post below this one

YYYYYEEEESSSSSS IT HAS RETURNED

No chance of a YT vid of these early shenanigans? While I have loved the concept in general (and sure, it made have been only the first quarter of The Gauntlet), you pulling out Carbink for this may very well be the highlight of this whole TR-RNG experiment (and that includes your first effort, along with turskain's). Much appreciated.

Unfortunately I'd already deleted any replay during 1-40 as I only wanted to better recall the teams in order to post about them. I saved some battles during 41-50 but otherwise had no plans to make a recording, to be honest.

Nice of you to be hyped though, lol

I straightened out the google doc compiling my various turds and their ill-conceived sets, if you'd like to see that instead. Some of my pokes make the Maison sets look brilliant, which is prolly why they were put in the discard pile without being used hah

Edit: on my phone, but this should do it: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MQyjrSHbvJ0BkSt4eer10kpYPgNgyrN5LMClGtDPl3E/htmlview

 

[Ames]

Just wanted to say thanks for this! I know very little about doubles but this team seemed like a good fit for me so I bred them all and with some minor modifications to movesets, finally made it to 50! I may continue the streak after a short break and try to customise the team further. Is there a reason you avoid Slowbro / King in place of Jellicent? Regenerator + Assault Vest seems like a good combo and it gets Flamethrower to give you another answer to steel types which threaten Sylveon if you are forced to double switch.

So I got around to continuing this streak last night with some more modifications and hit 100 wins in super doubles. Assault Vest Slowking with Dragon Tail seems to outclass Jellicent in every way for this role. I was expecting this second set of 50 battles to be a struggle but I powered through it in a couple of hours - I love how offensive this team is.


I am kind of interested in trying another doubles Steel/Fairy/Dragon team based around a Protect-Disable Mega Gardevoir (that Hyper Voice...) but am having a tough time deciding on team mates for her. My current thoughts are:

At least one Intimidate user (Scarf Landorus or Bulky Gyarados?)
A Dragon (Hydreigon / Garchomp / Kingdra)
Heatran
Azumarill
Greninja

Any team building help is appreciated as I am experienced with competitive battling but not so much with Battle Maison or Doubles :)

 

[Smuckem]

Posting an ongoing streak of 102 wins in Super Triples.

The team itself is essentially a hodgepodge of the various teams that have carried me to previous streaks, along with several new faces. The concept of the team was twofold:

• Application of the "Grafting" concept I've mentioned in prior posts
• Creating a basketball-like team in execution: a starting five that always participate in battles, with a sixth (wo)man that rotates and constantly changes

The Starters

"Ben" (Talonflame) (M) (Lvl.64) @ Sharp Beak (Left)
Ability: Gale Wings
Nature: Adamant
IVs: 31/31/31/15-16/31/10-11
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spd
- Flare Blitz
- Brave Bird
- Tailwind
- Protect

My tribute to The Dutch Plumberjack and his main man Bob. Works much more as a suicide Tailwind lead, though I often fin that it can last through the battle and put in BB work, due to my limited encounters with Hikers, Wokers, and the like to this point. My youngest brother received this in Y and had it collecting dust there, so I pulled it out. The OT is listed as Ben, and has odd symmetry with Bob, hence the 'nickname'.

Blizzmarck (Bisharp) (M) (Lvl.53) Focus sash (Center)
Ability: Defiant
Nature: Adamant
IVs: 31/31/31/0/17/3
EVs: 108 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD / 140 Spe
- Protect
- Knock Off
- Iron Head
- Sucker Punch

My tribute to R Inanimate and his TR killer Bismarck, this was the replacement for my Mega Scizor that netted me the 347-win streak a while back. I wanted to replicate his Surf team exactly, and though that version of the team only got me to 144 wins, it definitely works.
Here, Bisharp functions in several roles--he actually may be the most important member of the team:
- TR counter
- lure for attacks that would normally head for "Ben" (mainly, luring Rock/Ground attackers into going for Ground, leaving Talonflame free to set Tailwind without fear)
- Intimidate absorber ("Ben" is mainly there for Tailwind and doesn't mind the Attack drop)
- as the slowest starter, exploit Tailwind more than anyone else
Shitty IVs, but the low speed does help in case TR does go up.

SamiClone (Greninja) (M) (Lvl.53) @ Life Orb (Right)
Ability: Protean
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
IVs: 31/13/31/31/31/31
Naïve Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Grass Knot
- Dark Pulse
- Scald
- Mat Block

My tribute to R Inanimate and his Greninja Samidare (hence the nickname). Much like the first version of his Mat Block setter, the nature is imperfect for what he's trying to achieve, but that's part of his charm. No Ice Beam, due to the existence of the other two starters, and I find that Dark Pulse is handy for picking off weakened opponents that would screw over "Ben" and Blizzmarck with direct contact abilities.

Garchomp (Lvl. 75) (F) @ Expert Belt
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
IVs: 31/31/31/30/31/31
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Protect
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Dragon Claw

My youngest brother's Singles Garchomp, part of the squad that netted me the Triples trophy in X. Pretty much physical filler, not fitting too well with rest to the team due to being unable to freely spam Earthquake, but he's handy to have for physical cleanup once Blizzmarck goes down. Also, of the four starters who are meant to exploit Tailwind he's the second-slowest, so he has his fun under it too. Due to Blizzmarck taking up the Focus Sash, I've stuck an Expert Belt on, any suggestions for something different are welcome. Iron Head would help over SD for this set, but I find that having SD around allows Garchomp to smash stallmons who I've isolated and speed up battles that are dragging.

BM860 (Starmie) (Lvl.51) @ King's Rock
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP/252 SAtk/252 Spd
IVs: 31/13-14/31/31/31/31
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Surf
- Psychic

My Imperfect "graft" for this team, the main reason this team was created, and my awesome special cleanup, with excellent coverage to help end battles. It outruns some threats on his own but loses to others, so much like Garchomp, it appreciates Tailwind.

The sixth member of the team changes every so often, with the frequency of change varying a lot. The 'bench' is a motley crew of mons, most whom I've bred over this past week specifically for this purpose. Most are filler, but excellent filler, and a couple do fulfill roles within this team. You'll notice I've haven't calculated imperfect IVs on these guys 'n' gals for that reason.

The Bench

Gardevoir (F) (Lvl.100) @ Gardevoirite
Ability: Synchronize
EVs: 4 HP/252 SAtk/252 Spd
IVs: 20/20/20/31/20/31
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Shadow Ball/Energy Ball/Thunderbolt
- Moonblast
- Psyshock
- Hyper Voice

Diantha's trade Ralts from X, used as part of my OR in-game team. Mainly here for Tailwind exploitation and Hyper Voice spam. As you can see, the first move changes damn near daily.

Megavoir was used for the first 51 battles. Post-Dana, the cast has rotated between:

AnotherHulk (Heracross) (F) (Lvl.50) @ Heracronite
Ability: Guts
EVs: 4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
IVs: xx/31/31/31/xx/31
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Feint
- Bullet Seed
- Arm Thrust
- Pin Missile

My tribute to Faroth and his Skill Link spam Megacross. I was too lazy to breed Rock Blast onto it, so I stuck Feint on there to deal with the things Feint deals with, particularly when multiple Protect/Detect users are on the field.

WhatTheFuss (Kangaskhan) (F) (Lvl.50) @ Kangaskhanite
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
IVs: 31/31/xx/31/31/31
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Fake Out
- Power-Up Punch
- Crunch
- Double-Edge

Named and created with the express purpose of finding out why people love this thing so much--I've never caught the fever, so to speak. I had meant to use Return for STAB, but the father is a Snorlax and passed on DE without me really noticing, so I've stuck with that for now. Crunch over Sucker Punch due to Blizzmarck already carrying it and as a way to deal with Dark-weak threats not interested in attacking much. I literally flipped a coin when deciding between Adamant & Jolly.

Now? I understand all the fuss.

Azumarill (F) (Lvl.77) @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Huge Power
EVs: 252 HP/252 Atk/4 Spd
IVs: 31/31/31/xx/31/31
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Belly Drum
- Superpower
- Play Rough
- Aqua Jet

Another one of my youngest brother's creations and another member of the X trophy run. She was arguably the least-used member of that team, so I stuck he here specifically to give her some shine, have another source of priority, and actually have a Sitrus user around (an odd quirk of mine is to strive to always have Sitrus featured on my teams).

These next two replace Blizzmarck on the center position when on the team:

Testnectric (Manectric) (F) (Lvl.50) Manectite
Ability: Lightning Rod
EVs: 4 HP/252 SAtk/252 Spd
IVs: 31/31/31/xx/31/31
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Protect
- Flamethrower
- Volt Switch
- Thunderbolt

Same idea as with The Dutch Plumberjack and The Snow Dog. I got impatient when breeding for Lightning Rod, hence the imperfect SAtk Ivs. It does not appear to be too far off though (150 to the 157 of the mother), and in any case this lady is here, as the name implies, to test the efficiency of TDP's frontline strategy. Having an extra Fire handy to let Talonflame go crazy with Brave Bird is cool too.

InspireZheng (Aron) (Lvl. 1) (M) @ Berry Juice
Ability: Sturdy
EVs: N/A
IVs: xx/0/31/0/31/31
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Sleep Talk
- Toxic
- Protect
- Endeavor

As the name implies, inspired by R Inanimate and his FEAR Aron. Same old story, although having the zeroed offensive IVs will come in hand at some point I imagine.

Kotoge (Salamence) (M) (Lvl. 51) @ Salamencite
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 4 HP/252 SAtk/252 Spd
IVs: xx/31/31/31/31/31
Naive Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Protect
- Flamethrower
- Dragon Pulse
- Hyper Voice

Speical Megamence, dedicated mostly to the same functions as my Megavoir. Also allows as an extra Flying attack to have handy with "Ben" is near KO range and/or needs to do something other than BB. With two Hyper Voices in place, I'm considering using this as part of a tribute to one of the very early posters to this thread, who tried the whole Triple STAB Round strategy, before Round's mechanics were fully understood. Named after "Skywalker" Atsushi Kotoge.

BM823 (Gengar) (M) (Lvl. 53) @ Gengarite
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP/252 SAtk/252 Spd
IVs: 31/0/xx/31/31/31
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Dazzling Gleam
- Sludge Bomb
- Shadow Ball
- Destiny Bond

My Imperfect Gengar4, adapted from Kanto Classic and adapted for Mega Usage. The most filler-y of the team, no real purpose other than to have Ghost, Poison, and Fairy coverage on hand.

As you can deduce from the frontline, Tailwind-Knock Off-Mat Block 1st turn and sweep. Otherwise, dependant on who the sixth man is, switch one of either Talonflame & Greninja, allow the other one to fulfill its function, and go with Garchomp. When Meganectric or Aron are involved, Endeavor or Thunderbolt/Protect in the center 1st turn.

As you can see, there is very little bulk at play here, so I'm forced to play carefully and attentively--switching is highly discourged here, which I believe is helping me hone my skills at Maison play. While I gang up on TR and am able to effectively neutralize it (it has only gone up once during this run so far), there is no real answer to weather (although to be fair, sand and hail don't bother me too much for whatever reason); just knock foes down before weather goes up and go from there. I have been blessed to have Grass-types be quite common so far--Talonflame has had a buffet several times during this run.

I have several other mons who will be potentially be added to The Bench, and the strategy will come to bite me in the ass eventually, I'm sure. But:

• As mentioned a bit earlier in this thread, FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN
• Evidence that Maison sets can function against the Maison itself, as BM860 shows, and evidence that the "grafting" strategy has a little merit
• A personal success--already my best streak with a completely legitimate team. Not having to rely on PokeGen to achieve appreciable streaks is a good feeling

I meant to wait until a loss to post on this, but I'm interested in a couple of "Maison vs. Maison" concepts rattling in my head and will be putting a hold to this to work on those. Still, I can't see myself holding off for all that long--too much FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN to be had.

Side note: The AI seems to have adapted to the relative lack of spread moves on The Starters--the Wide Guard users have been MIA for this streak, and Weezing4, who ended my most recent streak, has dropped off the grid. Coward...

Battle #102: vs. Illisha (Umbreon/Exeggutor/Magmortar/Drapion/Rapidash/Chandelure) (Set 4)
9B5G-WWWW-WW3P-2RRZ

For a Set 4 B trainer, she sure has the whole Punk Girl/Hex Maniac vibe going with this squad.

Keep the ball rolling, guys/gals/kids.

 

[ReptoAbysmal]

Battles 51-60: Hypno/M-Mawile/Regice/Vileplume/Porygon2/Lickilicky

First, I love Inner Focus on a setter. Hypno took a lot of lead FO and some Rock Slides, so it was nice to not be screwed by that. It's pretty terrible at assisting cleanup with no investment, but it did what it could. I didn't get to abuse Lickilicky's Own Tempo much at all, and the opportunity should be rare enough that I might as well breed a Cloud Nine one...

I was wrong to be very concerned about fighting-heavy teams as the primary threats were fire types, helpfully those that either couldn't or wouldn't have incentive to target Regice. That said, Regice was a terriffic sponge of damage and had as many if not more KOs than Mawile. Lickilicky can take heavy abuse after Intimidate, also, notably tanking Cobalion's LO Close Combat with over a quarter HP remaining. On top of getting a new Lickilicky, I'll replace Vileplume's Gastro Acid with something...

Battles 61-70: Claydol/M-Slowbro/Carracosta/Emboar/Chesnaught/Thundurus-T

This team shall henceforth be known as The Team That Wasn't Supposed to Win. Claydol was targeted in two separate battles by Suicune's Hydro Pump and Serperior4's Leaf Storm, both OHKOs, and of course both missed. In another battle, lead Tyranitar flinched it and then landed a Dragon Tail, preventing the second attempt as well. That particular battle went south a number of ways and I barely managed to win.

But Light Screen makes PHENOMENAL support for Mega Slowbro, who always sat on at least one Calm Mind and was rarely targeted the opening turn (thanks, Carracosta.) In one battle with a Veteran it ate four Thunderbolts from Raikou and Zapdos, two apiece, and still was not in the red. Shell Armor is fantastic on it as is the disgusting defense. It packs an okay wallop at +1, but I went full defensive and so it doesn't truly rip things apart until two CMs.

Bulletproof never came in handy, but Chesnaught and Emboar did a ton of damage throughout this team's fairly challenging battles and I hope to roll them some more.