DIANCIE
Type: Rock/Fairy
BST: 50 HP / 100 Attack / 150 Defense / 100 Sp. Atk. / 150 Sp. Def. / 50 Speed
Ability: Clear Body (The user's stats can't be lowered by the opponent)
OVERVIEW
Notable moves:
- Body Press
- Calm Mind
- Diamond Storm
- Draining Kiss
- Earth Power
- Encore
- Iron Defense
- Light Screen/Reflect
- Moonblast
- Power Gem
- Rock Polish
- Spikes
- Stealth Rock
- Tera Blast
- Trick Room
Notable movepool losses:
- Explosion
- Magnet Rise
- Meteor Beam
- Misty Explosion
- Mystical Fire
Signature move: Diamond Storm (100 Power/95 Acc/5 PP; 50% chance to sharply raise the user's Defense stat, basically Stone Edge v3.0)
* Bold denotes STAB.
Pros:
- Extremely high 150/150 split defenses that allow it to take hits well despite its low HP of 50
- Decent 100/100 split offenses mean that it's not a passive Pokémon
- Rock/Fairy typing is very useful offensively, with only Steel-types resisting its STAB; it's also immune to Dragon and resists Dark
- Usable coverage it needs in Earth Power; boosting options in Calm Mind and Iron Defense; and support options like Draining Kiss, Trick Room and Spikes, the former of which it gained in this generation
- Low Speed can be a blessing in disguise, allowing it to work in Trick Room teams, which are more viable in this generation
Cons:
- 100/100 split offenses are, sadly, only passable in the current metagame
- Very slow at 50 Speed, forcing it to take a hit and then retaliate; it sadly can't run a neutral Speed nature since it usually needs both offenses to work
- Rock/Fairy typing, despite being good offensively, is generally bad defensively, giving it common weaknesses and especially an allergy to Steel
- Quite a shallow movepool, forcing it to use Tera Blast to patch its offensive holes
- Dondozo and Toxapex
- Rihanna's got better songs than Diamonds, just let it go man
Terastallization potential:
- Fire: Turns its Grass and Steel weaknesses into resistances and gains a powerful coverage option that's reminiscent of its ORAS HP Fire days; slightly better offensively than defensively (it retains weaknesses to Water and Ground)
- Fighting: Escapes all of its weaknesses while retaining its Dark resistance, and grants STAB on Body Press
- Rock: Purely offensive; further power up its STAB Diamond Storm, making it very difficult to switch into
- Fairy: Arguably its best Tera type; lets it escape its weaknesses granted by Rock and alleviate its 4x weakness to Steel at the cost of being weak to Poison, and further powers up both its Moonblast and, surprisingly, Draining Kiss
POTENTIAL SETS
CarbonPress (IronPress)
Diancie @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
Tera Type: Fairy / Fighting
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpA
Relaxed Nature
- Iron Defense
- Body Press
- Draining Kiss
- Diamond Storm
It's hard to pass up the opportunity to try an IronPress set, especially since Diancie has lots of unique traits that help it differentiate itself form the competition, and it's the best set it can run without being entirely outclassed. Its surplus 150 physical Defense stat means that, after an Iron Defense boost, its Body Press rivals that of Great Tusk and Zamazenta, and outside of Haze Toxapex, no Pokémon is able to lower Diancie's Defense thanks to Clear Body. Draining Kiss, while weak, offers Diancie a form of recovery combined with Leftovers. Diamond Storm lets Diancie hit the Fire-types that would otherwise wall it such as Volcarona and Skeledirge, and has a chance to further boost its Defense, thus powering up its Body Press even further. Of its Terastallize options, Fairy is its best option due to its defensive profile and powering up its Draining Kiss; 8 SpA EVs guarantee Tera Fairy Draining Kiss will always OHKO Roaring Moon. Tera Fighting gives it STAB on Body Press, powering it up to outstanding levels and potentially letting it turn the tables on Kingambit. While Tera Water sounds like an enticing option worth considering, it leaves Diancie just as easy to handle by Meowscarada, and as such it's not a very effective option. If run on Trick Room teams, lower its Speed IVs to 0 to make it faster during TR.
Offensive Trick Room
Diancie @ Life Orb
Ability: Clear Body
Tera Type: Fairy / Fire / Rock
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
- Moonblast
- Diamond Storm
- Earth Power / Body Press / Tera Blast
- Trick Room
With its very low Speed and mixed offenses, Diancie can also find an offensive niche in Trick Room teams. Unlike the IronPress set, this sets aims to hit hard right off the bat. Moonblast is its main STAB option, being a very spammable move with few switch-ins. Diamond Storm, although coming off its uninvested Attack stat, is a solid secondary STAB that can hit the Fire-type Pokémon that resist Moonblast, and its chance to raise its Defense potentially makes it harder to take down. Earth Power and Body Press take care of the Steel- types that give Diancie trouble, with Earth Power also hitting Poison-types like Clodsire and Body Press hitting Steel-types harder despite no investment. Trick Room ensures it can get another chance at sweeping, and gives Diancie some form of utility beyond attacking the opponent. Tera Fairy is, once again, its Tera type of choice, relieving its weaknesses granted by Rock and buffing the power of Moonblast to the moon (pardon the pun). Tera Fire, however, is a solid option in combination with Tera Blast, allowing Diancie to more easily pick on Corviknight and Air Balloon Gholdengo. 0 Speed IVs and a hindering nature ensures it will almost always go first under Trick Room. A Quiet nature and maximum Special Attack investment is more recommended, as the current defensive options in the metagame are better equipped to handle physical threats with the exception of Clodsire; if opted for a physical approach though, a Brave nature and max Attack investment should be used, and Tera Rock should be the Tera type of choice to boost Diamond Storm's damage output instead.
CONCLUSION
Despite the prevalence of problematic Pokémon like our dear friends Great Tusk, Kingambit, Ursaluna and Gholdengo, I believe that the lack of other Steel-types in the metagame, the direct buffs Diancie has received, the limited Dex and the re-introduction of good Trick Room setters AND abusers in this generation makes this iteration of OU quite kinder to Diancie, and especially after the bans of Magearna and Zamazenta-Crowned, Diancie is able to carve out some good niches for itself, as a Trick Room abuser and as decent competition for an IronPress mon. For the first time, this perennial lower tier mon could work quite well in this generation of OU by itself.
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