Alright, here's the team:
Silvally @ Wide Lens ***ChaosLemures
Ability: RKS System
EVs: 212 HP / 4 Atk / 44 Def / 196 SpA / 52 SpD
Quiet Nature
- Thunderbolt
- Thunder Wave
- Toxic
- Parting Shot
Before going any further, let me just say
my Silvally's stats here are sub-optimal. I picked up a Quiet Silvally because I intended to create some sort of bulky Assault Vest set with it for VGC. Instead, I found myself using it here in the Battle Tree. Running Modest at the very least would be better. Running a Defense or Special Defense boosting nature like Calm or Bold and investing fully into defenses would also make a good recommendation. However, even with the stat set up being sub-optimal, it at least didn't stop my Silvally from executing what it needed to.
The general idea here is to Thunder Wave the opponent, then Parting Shot to weaken them for Salamence to set up a sweep, or for Aegislash to eliminate the active Pokemon while taking minimal damage. Thunderbolt was used specifically to hit Bisharp or Milotic as they are risky to use Parting Shot against. Toxic was originally for Raikou-3, but came in handy in a few other situations throughout the run, usually as a way to corner a mon trying to set up and stay healthy with Recover or Roost. Why I needed it for Raikou-3 was because the Raikou cannot be paralyzed, has Thunder Wave to debilitate my Salamence, and has both Calm Mind and Charge Beam allowing it to boost up and become out of control in the long run. But since it takes a good 10 or so Turns before it gets out of control, Toxic keeps the damage from the Raikou well contained.
Wide Lens is crucial for comfort for using this team. While there is still that 1% chance I can miss with Thunder Wave (which happened about 6 or 7 times in 450 games), it still makes Thunder Wave into a move I can rely on repeatedly, game after game.
Salamence @ Salamencite ***WickedFlight
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 36 Atk / 4 Def / 196 SpD / 20 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Return
- Substitute
- Dragon Dance
- Roost
While I haven't been following what has been used lately in Singles, it doesn't take much to know that Mega Salamence is completely busted. EVs in Atk to get a bonus stat point. EVs in Speed to hit 143, outspeeding neutral Base 90s. Everything else into HP and Special Defense bulk.
Parting Shot support can let Salamence drop down a sub and not have it immediately broken by the opponent's attacks. Once I'm able to do that, it is pretty easy to constantly maintain a Sub up while Roosting back HP and slowly building up Dragon Dances. Once the music stops and Salamence is done dancing, there is very little in the way to stop it from running over everything with Aerilate boosted Returns.
While it's usually safe and easy to max out to +6 DD, I found myself fine stopping at +4 before going on the offense. Against some trainers, who are less likely to have bulky Rock- or Steel-type Pokemon, I can get away with fewer dances. Against certain trainers who are more likely to have Flying-type resists I'll go for the full +6.
It's important to know not to immediately Mega Evolve Salamence and instead take advantage of switching to cycle Intimidates before finally committing to set up. This will be talked about a bit more later on.
Aegislash @ Leftovers ***BLADE BEAM
Ability: Stance Change
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 84 SpA / 156 SpD / 12 Spe
Modest Nature
- Shadow Ball
- Flash Cannon
- Substitute
- King's Shield
12 Speed EVs to outspeed Tyranitar-4 by 1. 84 SpA for a bonus point of SpA, and the rest added into HP and SpDef.
Aegislash is pretty fun to use in Single Tree, and is a complete monster once it can get behind a Sub. After a Parting Shot to the opponent, Aegislash's Subs will often tank various STAB 90 power moves. And while it may take around 10 turns to do so, it can pretty much take out the opponent while having a Sub up, and still be at around 80~90% of its HP. While it does mean the opponent's active mon is no longer one that is debiliated by Thunder Wave or Parting Shot, being up 3v2 with my team being in good health, and with an active sub for Aegislash is often more than enough to maintain momentum for a win.
Using the Team:
To put simply:
The ability to switch around is very important for this team. Salamence has Intimidate, Silvally has Parting Shot, and Aegislash has an excellent set of resistances. Silvally's Ghost-type immunity, and Salamence's Ground-type immunity also creates a lot of situations for Aegislash to safely switch back out, allowing the team to cycle usage of Parting Shot and Intimidate. Ultimately, the ideal goal is to set up a situation where the opponent cannot break Salamence's Substitute, and then set up the Salamence sweep. But the team is a bit more flexible in not always needing to commit to trying to force the opportunity. Don't be afraid to just use Aegislash to safely knock out a Pokemon and create yourself a lead instead of putting in a great amount of resources to force an opportunity to set up Salamence.
Risk mitigation and patience are also traits needed for running the team. Since Silvally doesn't get sacrificed in this team in order to heavily debilitate the opponent, Salamence or Aegislash will often have to switch into an oncomming attack. If you aren't careful this can lead to some disastrous results like Mence getting OHKO'd by a critical hit through -5 Atk (hello Guzma @ Battle 450). Opponents are not locked into any moves, unlike TrickScarf strategies, so it is also imporant at times to keep track of how much PP they may have remaining in their moves in order to know when it is safe.
The team is far from foolproof as some of the teams of past days. While 449 is a pretty long streak, I had plenty of close calls throughout the run where I was barely able to scrape by, and would have lost if I was any less lucky.
Some Notable Threats:
Infiltrator
Naturally, if the opponent can just ignore my Substitutes it makes setting up a lot more difficult. Watch out for opponent Chandelures, Malamar and Noiverns.
Defiant / Competitive / Contrary
They can be Thunder Wave'd at least, but be wary of trying to use Parting shot against Pokemon such as Milotic, Bisharp, Braviary, Serperior, Lurantis or Malamar. Especially be careful about using King's Shield against Malamar and Lurantis.
Raikou-3
As mentioned earlier, it can't be Thunder Waved, it has Charge Beam and Calm Mind making Parting Shot somewhat useless, it has Thunder Wave and will use it to Paralyze Mence if I try to set up on it, and it has Shadow Ball for my Aegislash. This is why Toxic is on Silvally.
Taunt
All three of my Pokemon rely on non-damaging moves so Taunt can be pretty annoying. One thing to note, however, is that the AI is extremely trigger happy with using Taunt, so this can be exploited as you can play the battle slowly and eventually KO their active mon without taking too much damage in return.
Magnezone-4
It has Volt Switch, it has Assault Vest, it is 4x resistant to Return. I'll usually Parting Shot to Aegislash, then chip away and KO it with Aegislash. Pay attention to its damage output, as it may end up having Analytic, and will need 2 Parting Shots to allow Aegislash to wall Thunderbolts with Sub.
Thunder Wave / Toxic / Will-o-Wisp
Pay attention to opponents that have status moves. Salamence can sort of just tough it out if it gets Paralyzed or Burned due to the nerfs to those status, but it's still best to avoid dealing with those things. Getting Salamence hit by Toxic though is obviously a no-go. I often try to let Silvally get hit by status so that the opponents will not try to use a status move as I switch in Salamence, then set up Substitute. Watch out for Mega Banette as it has Prankster WoW.
Charizard-4, Gyarados-4
Dragon Dance mons that can do a real number to Aegislash if they can catch me without a Sub up. I had one game where Mega Gyarados just went really wild with using Dragon Dances, so these two can be pretty dangerous.
Mega Lopunny
Normally Aegislash would be my go-to choice to switch in against Fighting moves. Not so here. It's best to switch to Mence first, bait an Ice Punch and switch to Aegislash, and let Lopunny just KO itself by HJK into King's shields.
Soundproof / Clear Body
These will block Silvally from switching out through use of Parting Shot. Fortunately, most of these mons are also easily handled by Aegislash. As such, try not to use Parting Shot against Tentacruel, Carbink, Metagross, Kommo-o, Abomasnow (if no Snow Warning), Bouffalant or Electrode
Terrakion
There's one Terrakion set that has Swords Dance. So while it may seem like a good idea to switch immediately to Aegislash to avoid a Fighting-type move, it can quickly cause the match to get ugly if Terrakion starts setting up. As such, it's better to just go for the Thunder Wave with Silvally, even though it risks the chance that it will be OHKO'd by Terrakion-1's Close Combat. All the Terrakion sets have Earthquake, making it fairly easy to cycle switches between Aegislash and Salamence to Intimidate it down before setting up the Mence Sweep.
During my play through of the Tree, I tried to note some AI Tendencies, or at least what I can recall might be different than what it was in the past:
-The AI will usually switch out immediately if they have expended all usable attacking move PP, at least of moves that can hit your active pokemon. They'll also usually switch out if they've expended all PP of a move they are choice locked into. Often times, if they DON'T switch out despite not having any effective moves, it means that their other Pokemon are easily KOable by your active mon.
-I can't remember if this was the case before, but the AI recognizes when you have a Sub up. They will not waste time throwing status moves that will get blocked by Sub. Pain Split is a rare exception to this rule.
-if they can Mega Evolve their active mon, they will always do so immediately. Sucks for Wally when he decides it's a good idea to bring Mega Garchomp, Mega Gallade, AND Mega Altaria. lol
-AI seems to love activating weather and using Taunt. I feel they put high priority into using these moves above everything outside from using a move that can KO your active mon.
-having a stat at +6 won't stop the opponent from using a boosting move that boosts multiple stats. eg. They will still use Dragon Dance if they are at +6 Speed, but not +6 Atk. However, this doesn't seem to apply for the use of Curse as they stop using that once they hit -6 Speed.
-The AI still does not recognize Return as a 102 power move, and will instead use their other attacks over use of STAB Return
-The AI's selection of moves can become a bit strange in situations where they've run out of PP of their primary move to use against your active mon. eg. vs Raikou-4, if it has run out of Thunder vs Salamence, it doesn't always stick to using Discharge, and instead randomly throws Extrasensory at me even though it is less optimal. Another one would be Nidoqueen 3 actually being more likely to use Ice Beam instead of Flamethrower against my Aegislash after it runs out of Earth Power.
-Double Battle AI is a little bit smarter when it comes to dealing with a L1 mon. From what I could tell, the faster of their two active mons (or slower of the two when TR is active, or the one that has priority moves other than Fake Out) will be provoked towards going for a KO against the L1, but the other Pokemon will still choose moves as if it isn't on kill mode (unless it's able to KO your other Pokemon).
Other Notes:
-I didn't notice this but... the Battle Tree Pokemon do not have any Battle Resort or Battle Frontier Tutor moves anymore.
-When you are past 50, you predominantly face 2 different sets (set 3 or set 4) for non-legendaries, and 4 different sets for legendaries (though not all trainers will run all 4 sets), but there are a lot more trainers that will run both set 3 and 4 of a mon.
-the RNG on what decides what trainer you face does still seem a bit strange at times like it is in XY, where you can end up facing the same few trainers repeatedly, and never see some of the other trainers. eg. I still haven't seen Anabel to recruit her for Multi Tree =(
Reaching 500 first here is still up for grabs, hopefully this post helps for people planning their future runs at the Tree. I don't think I'll be trying another run at singles in the near future, but may try to find something good for doubles.
Good Luck.
