This Snake I feel like I had a better grasp on the metagame than ever before. Over the course of the tournament, I used a number of sets that were seen as fringe or never before seen that I believe had a place on certain teams in the metagame. While I may (rightfully) be known as a standard player, there has been a ton of room for creativity most of this generation and I feel like I was able to display some of it firsthand this Snake. Below are some examples. After these examples, I will go over some games and teams of my own as well (at length).
Week 1 and 5:
Mr. Roboto (
) @
Choice Scarf
Ability: Magnet Pull
EVs: 24 Def / 252 SpA / 232 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch
- Flash Cannon
- Body Press
- Thunderbolt
Absolutely not a set I came up with historically here; this one has been around since its debut in generation 4. Scarf Magnezone never really took off this generation though; prior to SSD, the only time I saw one was when ABR briefly had it on a team on the OLT ladder. With this said, I saw a lot of promise in it on teams that relied on Pokemon like Excadrill under Sand or Alakazam as their "fast" Pokemon. While you do lose the breaking power of Choice Specs, you are able to trap fast Corviknight, which surged in usage throughout Snake to try to outpace normal Magnezones, and pick off fast SD Scizor, which also picked up later in the tournament. It also was a great surprise revenge killer against Gengar, Rillaboom, Kyurem, Crawdaunt, Hydreigon, etc. after chip. Finally, one big thing is that this paired especially well with CM + Thunderbolt Clefable, which I used it with during week 1. Oftentimes, Magnezone lures in Excadrill and with Body Press being a clean 2HKO, you are able to eliminate Excadrill in most match-ups if you play it well, which opens the door for CM + Thunderbolt Clefable to clean sweep if they lack a secondary measure, which both teams do as we were already strapped to cover all of the different CM Clefable variants as is.
Week 2:
Aja (
) @ Life Orb
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 240 HP / 204 Def / 64 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Moonblast
-
Psyshock
- Soft-Boiled
"FinchFable1" - Eo. Stored Power is better in most match-ups, including the one I played unfortunately, but CM Psyshock hits harder right off-the-bat / early in CM wars, which goes a long way against things like AV Amoonguss, Volcarona, Primarina, Gastrodon (forcing Recover PP), Toxtricity, and Gengar. In general, CM + Psyshock or Stored Power works well on more teams than we give credit. You lose the flashy super effective coverage and instant gratification progress of a coverage move like Flamethrower or Thunder(bolt), but you gain the ability to win a lot of CM wars and this opens up totally different structures in teambuilding if you are a stickler for covering the most you can overall. The main drawback of lacking the aforementioned coverage is that it can be more challenging to muscle past things like Corviknight, which is one of a plethora of reasons why I paired this with the Alakazam set below in my Week 2 game against 1 True Lycan.
Golden Lady (
) (F) @
Choice Scarf
Ability: Magic Guard
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Focus Blast
- Recover
-
Trick
This Alakazam set was probably one of the most interesting brings of the tour for me. The main premise, as I alluded to above, was to cripple Corviknight as it was seeing absurd amounts of usage earlier in the tournament. However, it is also a great anti-cheese measure as it can outrun many Swift Swim or Chlorophyll Pokemon, getting a surprise revenge kill. This was still pretty close to when OLT's ladder phase was concluding, so those playstyles were more "in" than they may have been towards the tail-end of Snake, too. Anyway, another benefit of this Alakazam is that it can completely ruin set-up sweeps from things like Reuniclus, offensive Clefable, opposing Alakazam, and even Volcarona, all of which my own Psyshock Clefable, which I alluded to above, was less capable of handling in a 1-on-1 scenario. This duo made me feel safe and given that Trick also was capable of handling things like SDef Hippowon, Mandibuzz, Mantine, Blissey, and the rare Jirachi, I knew that this set was a good fit. It actually did its job very well in the game, too, detering an otherwise threatening Reuniclus.
Aqualung (
) @ Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Flash Cannon
- Flamethrower
- Roost
This one is nothing special and I was hesitant to even include it, but I feel like most people did not look at Hydreigon for what it truly could be this generation. Everyone saw it got Nasty Plot and tunneled in on making sure every set included it, to the point that Hydreigon was: NP, Draco, Flame/Flash/Roost x2 for a while now. 1 True Lycan and various others did not use things like Blissey, so I did not see much of a need for NP when Flash Cannon hits Clefable, which was on every team at the time, Flamethrower hit Corviknight, Skarmory, Ferrothorn, Excadrill, and Aegislash, who were all super common at the time, and Roost helped with longevity against Rotom-Heat, which was also very common at the time. At one point in the game, I had revealed Draco, Flash Cannon, and Roost I think, so I actually got a surprise kill with Flamethrower, which helped me quite a bit, too, as he expected Nasty Plot to be my last move.
Week 3:
Up to Me (
) (F) @
Rocky Helmet
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 248 HP / 232 Def / 28 Spe
Bold Nature
- Moonblast
- Soft-Boiled
- Knock Off
-
Seismic Toss
"FinchFable2" - Eo. Rocky Helmet Clefable actually saw a significant amount of usage after I brought this set week 3 vs xray, which was super cool. I'm glad that it caught on and I think it deserved to, too, as it punished Urshifu, U-turn spam, and random physical moves on Pokemon lacking recovery in general. Seismic Toss did not catch on nearly as much, but I still find it to be cool. It forces recovers from Toxapex, does plenty to Excadrill and Rotom-Heat, and can cheese past Calm Mind sweepers that are paralyzed if used on the right team. I admit Seismic Toss is a luxury more than a necessity on some builds, but it can do very well in longer games and with paralysis/Spikes support I feel. Rocky Helmet is absolutely the main takeaway from the set though and I am glad it picked up in usage as the weeks of the tournament went by.
Kashmir (
) (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 240 HP / 248 SpD / 20 Spe
Careful Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Rock Blast
-
Toxic
-
Thunder Wave
As the tournament went on, Rest Tyranitar dipped in usage due to things taking advantage of free turns more and more (see: rise in CB Rhyperior, HO teams, Bug Buzz Volcarona becoming the main set, and Urshifu's prevalence). I also feel like Tyranitar's niche shifted a bit. While it was still a good switch in to special Kyurem not clicking Focus Blast, Ghost moves, Rotom-Heat, and Volcarona in the early game, it had to accomplish more than just setting up SR to warrant running Sand structures as they oftentimes mandated Excadrill, too, and that limited team compositions quite a bit. Because of this, I noticed that Toxic hitting Hippowdon, Rhyperior, Kommo-O, Gastrodon, and Slowbro tilted a ton of those match-ups from being uphill to favorable. Putting Rhyperior on a timer in particular is huge, especially when Excadrill is the main Stone Edge resist or Tyranitar is your main switch in to CB Heat Crash. Needless to say, if you run something like Tangrowth, this eases up a ton, but I did not have that luxury here and Toxic was wonderful in that regard.
Shoot to Thrill (
) @ Leftovers
Ability: Stance Change
EVs: 224 HP / 252 Atk / 32 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Shadow Sneak
-
Swords Dance
- Iron Head
- Shadow Claw
One of the first SD Aegislash showings. It died out for months after it surfaced in SPL earlier this year, not seeing much usage at all after DLC1 or during WCOP/OLT. To me, it felt super underrated with Mandibuzz usage taking a nose-dive during the earlier period of Snake and Corviknight being super common. It sets up all over Defog Corviknight and I liked running a slower spread so that they could not U-turn on SD, but had to risk their pivot taking an attack and oftentimes had to go to something more passive on the SD because of this. Of course, you still want to be quicker than slow Clefable and Tyranitar, so it leaves you in a fringe speed tier, but it still works. The spread is really what makes this stand out, too. In my game against xray, this spread would have actually won me the game pretty easily by luring him into a false sense of security after a roll if not for him getting absolute max damage. People thought I was just losing a 50/50 and honestly that was very incorrect. Nobody expects this much bulk on Aegislash, especially if it is not SubTox, and xray almost definitely thought Brave Bird killed from his position. I absolutely lost hours of sleep after this game when public perception went in the total opposite direction than it should of and I did not get rewarded for being outside the box here with some unfortunate luck. But that's the game we play sometimes.
Week 5:
#TPWK (
) (M) @
Black Glasses
Ability: Unseen Fist
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Bulk Up
- Wicked Blow
- Iron Head
- Sucker Punch
Nothing too crazy, but everyone had been using LO up to this point since the start of Snake (even during OLT when HO was at its peak, Black Glasses was still fringe at best). Imo, Black Glasses has and always was the best item on BU Urshifu in this metagame. There are only a few calcs you miss out on with Iron Head damage and most of them you are not missing out on a ton with anyway as the idea is to pair this Urshifu with other things that appreciate Clefable, Tangrowth, or G-Weezing being weakened. Hawlucha was the best example that came to mind and was what I picked to use against Leo when I pretty much 6-0d with this set. Not taking LO allows for bluffing (Ada Black Glasses is close to CB damage output) and longevity, which enables sweeps such as the one I had in that game. Black Glasses picked up a little after this, but also my HO or 5/6 Pokemon variants of it saw a solid amount of usage in later weeks and it was cool to get that part of the metagame back-in-business.
Week 6:
The Grand Illusion (
) @ Life Orb
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 212 HP / 200 Def / 96 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Moonblast
-
Grass Knot
- Soft-Boiled
"FinchFable3" - Eo. CB Rhyperior was really hard to keep in check without using Tangrowth + a Rock resist, which was not in the cards for that week given the schemes I liked. In addition, I had multiple weeks where I was quite vulnerable to Rhyperior and I figured Jyt would continue going with the trendy, hot teams he normally does without trying to reinvent the wheel. With Rhyperior being a top 10-15 pick at the time, I wanted to have technology for it on deck. This was the solution. It OHKOs Rhyperior and outruns CB Rhyperior always. The famous Teleport into CB Heavy Slam Rhyperior combination dicking Clefable was rendered impossible by this. Unfortunately, I ran into cheesy HO instead, but I was hoping this would work and it worked in numerous tests. It is also worth noting that if you are not knocked, you can 1v1 Mantine with Grass Knot on the Roost (and if they are 0 speed Mantine fsr, +1 Moons do a lot, too, so it tilts the field in your favor either way in that match-up PP wise as they will exhaust their Roosts quicker than otherwise). Grass Knot also is able to hit Gastrodon, which was cool. The main idea was trying to enable Rotom-H as a win condition, which this Clefable does super well as it takes out Rhyperior and at worst keeps Gastrodon very low (at best it takes it out eventually, leaving teams Rotom-H vulnerable). Really wish this one hit and got the LOOOOOOL SmogTours chat moment it deserved as I thought it was super practical with both Rhyperior and Gastrodn trending, but it never ran into either and I did not want to whore out the set in case we wanted to recycle it for a future week.
Songbird (
) @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Overcoat
EVs: 248 HP / 84 Def / 120 SpD / 56 Spe
Impish Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
-
Taunt
- Foul Play
- Roost
- Defog
This one is not rocket science or anything super crazy. In fact, we saw Taunt Mandibuzz surface in SPL a few times, but never really since then. People slapped on U-turn a ton post-WCOP for momentum purposes as Mandibuzz was on more proactive teams that did not mind a Defog user that lot to Spikers like Mandibuzz did. Taunt helps mitigate that and other problems -- Clefable, Blissey, etc. healing up, bulky-set up sweepers using you as fodder, and status infliction from slower Pokemon. The main issue with Mandibuzz during the early stage of SSD was that people tried overly compressing it and team structures with it were just less consistent than Corviknight because of this. I could write a novel on the comparison between the two and why one trended while the other fell and vice versa over time honestly, but I feel like Taunt enabled Mandibuzz on more dedicared balances and I was glad to use it. U-turn Mandibuzz still was perfectly viable and so was Toxic or Knock Off, but Taunt helped it fit onto different teams that usually had to pick between Spikes coverage (Corviknight) or Ghost resist (Mandibuzz) with some other pros and cons weighing in on both ends as well.
Week 8:
Here Today (
) (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Stance Change
EVs: 80 HP / 252 SpA / 176 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- King's Shield
- Shadow Ball
- Flash Cannon
-
Steel Beam
Hatterene and CM Clefable were super problematic to a team I brought. Unfortunately, I faced a 220 Clefable and no Hatterene, so this did not come into play, but the idea was that if either got a CM up and saw I was Leftovers, they knew they were in the clear to trade 60-65% net health for a clean kill on Aegislash. Steel Beam killed both and also had some funny scenarios against Kommo-O, which opened up for my Zarude I brought this week. All in all, I did not really need filler and this one ended up giving me a surprise out in multiple relevant match-ups. I do not think it would fit on many teams, but the few that it fits on can now rest a little easier when it faces these Pokemon, knowing a surprise KO is pretty likely and very easy to set-up under normal conditions.
Week 8 and 9:
Inner City Blues (
) (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Bulletproof
EVs: 248 HP / 184 Def / 76 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Body Press
- Flamethrower
-
Clanging Scales
Substitute Dragapult is a pain in the ass for a lot of balance teams, including the ones I had planned for the last two weeks. With other forms of status on my teams, I elected to go with Clanging Scales. It goes through Substitute and kills Dragapult. Most of them are Dragon Darts nowadays, too, so it is easy to tank a hit and kill back, having a great chance to kill even if they are at 100% health coming in. Seeing as Dragapult oftentimes believes the most Kommo-O can do is get off a Toxic or a neutral, non-STAB EQ without any attack investment, it was great having this in-hand to tilt that match-up in my favor. Unfortunately, I did not face a Dragapult, but this won me test games singlehandedly (especially by catching it on the switch-in) and I think it should have been semi-standard on Kommo-O for months prior. Surprised not many others picked up on it in all honesty, but it's really good.
Week 9
to (
) (M) @ Choice Band
Ability: Solid Rock
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge
- Heat Crash
-
Megahorn
Last one here is nothing remotely crazy, but Megahorn > Heavy Slam changes how Rhyperior plays a bit and it ripped the game wide-open for me. Had I not gotten haxed out 2-3 times over, it pretty much won me the game singlehandedly honestly. The initial idea was that Megahorn made it so that I did not lose 6-0 to Reuniclus, which seemed like a good bring vs me. However, on top of this, it also hits Tangrowth and Slowbro, meaning that no Regenerator pivots actually scouted Rhyperior all too well and this means it was able to force progress with a single correct prediction in almost all match-ups. Having this sort of instant progress paired with Teleport Blissey on a balance team with a durable enough backbone defensively is amazing. Of course, all bets are off when a rogue Togekiss lucks you and your Rhyperior goes blind. Yes, I am very salty, but regardless this set is amazing and nothing is safe switching in to Megahorn Rhyperior. The only note is that you need a check to both CM variants of Clefable (Flamethrower and Thunderbolt) in order to afford dropping Heavy Slam. This is hard enough as is and most Rhyperior teams rely on something like TWave + Teleport Blissey into Heavy Slam CB Rhyperior to minimize the issue. Obviously this cannot be done without Heavy Slam, so you must be conscious with your build overall if you wish to change up the moves.
---
Week 1:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-516155 | team:
https://pokepast.es/18b236406d16a07d
dice forgot Natural Cure on his Blissey and that opened the door for me. I made some nice, momentum based plays to help speed up the process and assure that he could not make up a relatively early deficit I feel, so ultimately I was able to suffocate his team and win in routine fashion. My match-up would have been harder if he had the right Blissey or he did not play his Rhyperior in such an aggressive fashion early on, tossing out lots of health to a Giga Drain from Amoonguss, but thankfully I had both of these things going in my favor. I did not feel too threatened beyond this point and sometimes the game just smiles at you like this. Of course, dice is a great player and while this may not be his best generation, he could've won for sure with the right set or a few turns going differently, but I was confident walking away with a decisive w1 victory here.
Week 2:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-516451 | team:
https://pokepast.es/fd45898d991cad5b
This was one of my most creative teams conceptually and I describe this at length in my descriptions of Psyshock Clefable, TrickScarf Alakazam, and non-Nasty Plot Hydreigon above, so I'll spare you guys that blurb once more. As for the game, I think I played this one really well aside from turn 74. I clicked Recover with Alakazam as his Foul Play took me out with Mandibuzz after I tricked him a Life Orb. To be fair to me, if I clicked Focus Blast there as he attacked and we essentially traded, then I had the game virtually won and I really believed 1TL was going to Roost, but either he predicted me to be Recover last + predict him to Roost and get greedy or he did not see this through the same way I did, so I got burnt because of this. I believed that when I took this risk, even without Alakazam I was strongly favored in that position and it still was true. Just did not play out super fortunately from there. If I got either of two 50/50s with Rotom-H correct, then I also won the game on the spot. And getting my Clefable crit + dropped in a super untimely fashion made a would-be winning long-term gameplan no longer possible as the Toxapex was able to escape with 1 Recover ultimately. That one is less easy to pinpoint as there were countless chances for crits and drops on both sides, even if I fished a little more, so that was more the cherry on top than anything else. I cannot really say I got "robbed" here and I am not trying to take any credit away from a very deserving opponent, but this game felt like I had a pretty good long-term plan in mind and the little things just all went the wrong way. I was happy with everything I did besides the one risk I mentioned above and knew that despite odds not going my way, I had a lot of confidence moving forward and 1TL is a great player, so there is no shame in losing to him. Massive props his way for another strong season, btw.
Week 3:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-518255 | team:
https://pokepast.es/7cffb0fd9fe9127f
Really don't know what to say here beyond what I described above. I got myself in a pretty great position and knew he would not expect the amount of bulk I had on Aegislash given the situation, so I baited the Brave Bird I lived barring absolute max damage and he got it. I remember reading an Eo prediction post the following week calling it a 50/50 and got so upset about this in private because my spread not being clear was the reason I risked the entire sequence as I did and was why he confidently Brave Birded there -> didn't know it was a roll after, as the battle chat obviously showed. Instead of a clear-cut victory, I slowly bled out to death over the next 100+ turns and then got made fun of for weeks. I think the loss was something I could tolerate, even if it was unfortunate, and same with the mocking of me for xray's "Max Attack Skarmory" joke -- sure, it's all in good fun at the end of the day and while I was salty at the time because it was a rough week for my team overall, I can appreciate a good joke and even joked about it myself. But a lot of people took it too far and resorted to personal insults and that wasn't cool. You guys know who you are and I spoke to you about it, so I hope you do not do this to anyone else in the future if you're reading this. It's best to keep that shit far away from Smogon. Honestly, that was a bit of a turning point for me and absolutely motivated me for future weeks and it got to the point where I just started coming up with different motivators each week to try and make sure I was not going to let any nonsense derail my season (spoiler: it ended up doing so at the end anyway, but at least it was nonsense that was largely out of my hands). I think a big part of these longer team tournaments is the mental game and finding a way to keep yourself motivated to be at your absolute best. There have absolutely been big games I just have not shown up for at 100% and had to reinvent myself to win, which is possible, but it is much easier when you are levelheaded and at your best because the competitors in these tournaments are the best in the world after all.
Circling back to the game and away from my tangent, xray played well after he managed to keep his Skarmory. He did not need to risk the Trick and if I went to Amoonguss on that turn, giving him an Assault Vest, he actually had a lose condition, but he got it right, was favored regardless, and played the end-game super safe/properly overall. While I feel I should have won this far earlier clean and do not believe I made any outright misplays after going over this multiple times with multiple people, xray played the whole game well and the main issue was just his match-up earlier on. xray went on to turn his season around during some weeks with some strong performances, much like his SPL showings. Was glad to see he went positive ultimately.
Week 4:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-518513 | team:
https://pokepast.es/ee06d91d02034c62
Came in to this with a bit of a chip on my shoulder at 1-2, wanting to salvage a season I felt like I had been playing well in thus far. FLCL had a lot of similar structures or balance in his scout, so I tried my best to take advantage of it. I knew I liked Reuniclus with Spikes, the rest just fell into place from there without as much attention to his specific trends I admit. Thankfully, Reuniclus was the right call. There's a lot less to discuss here as this was just a 1-mon-show. Reuniclus got in and never left, winning handily. Not much FLCL could have done, absolutely not his fault. Was glad my prep worked after I feel like it should have in prior weeks and felt like I was back in business, but did not really feel like I had to do too much playing wise.
Week 5:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-520267 | team:
https://pokepast.es/2055369754c2b595
Leo and I had probably seen better days coming into this, but it was still really fun to play him as we had worked together quite a bit in the past. He knew me for my high-attention to detail that virtually forced standards onto me at times and I knew he had a knack for trying to take advantage of that, which led to his key victories against Eo in SPL and Sacri' earlier in Snake. I was by no means going to take this one lightly as I knew Leo wanted to keep his starting slot and keep up his good start to the season after the aforementioned victory. I noticed that despite his awareness of what the opponent uses, he still did not deviate a ton outside the realm of conventional bulky-o/balance teams with a few specific calls to be catered towards the opponent. Because of that, I felt very comfortable pulling out HO without fearing an unwinnable MU. This HO in particular had very few of these and this 6 and 5/6 ended up being used a number of times later on in the season because of this I feel. I love the Urshifu + Hawlucha synergy and, thankfully for me, they did the trick here. With the latter getting some chip in, the former was able to clean sweep with the aid of Black Glasses not making Urshifu slowly die like Life Orb. This one went just according to plan and I was very happy with the result and execution, aside from a little bit of regret for picking Volcarona as a lead in a match-up it also did pretty well in. I would have been better off with something else there in hindsight, but thankfully it did not cause me much of an issue.
Week 6:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-522197 | team:
https://pokepast.es/20783bc788521d36
Another week, another game against a teammate from Snake the year prior. Felt like I had some good momentum off of the past two weeks and I knew I wanted to stay on top of my old teammates, so I was excited here. Jyt was another strong opponent. I penciled him in for using pretty standard stuff without a ton of attention to specific detail, but rather a more general idea of what the opponent would use and plan to tackle that. It was the gist I got from talking to some people familiar with him and also preparing with him during the Snake prior. It turned out he just said fuck it and used the cheesy G-Slowbro HO, which seemed to be a variant of the Lil Pigg team. I am not sure if he was using this all along or deviated to using it after they clinched the week with a prior victory, but either way it was an ok, but not amazing, match-up. I got a bit luckier overall and had one turn I regret sequence wise with my Excadrill, but thankfully nothing crazy happened from that misstep and I think I won in a close one. I say I think because I sure as hell am not watching that cheesy HO anymore now that I am done with it for the time being with DLC2 being the current metagame, so don't catch me rewatching these anymore than I already tirelessly did during Snake itself to reflect on my play then and there.
Week 7:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-523122 | team:
https://pokepast.es/8c2b81b7bcba9404
This was the most frustrating loss for me probably. This was the last OU game played between my team and the Nagas and all week they were clearly a step ahead in prep. We got fortunate in one game and their player mishandled another game, so we managed to break even, but regardless they clearly had a leg-up in figuring out what we had planned and this was due to taking some great risks in the builder. Knowing what I saw in the three prior games, I wanted to change up my squad, but ultimately we decided against it because it was the night before. Then I ran into Chandelure, rest is pretty much a wrap. I also got outplayed pretty hard in the mid-game and honestly even in a neutral match-up, Sacri absolutely wins this if we both play the same because he was all over me, but yea this was the one that got away for me. Wish I just swapped teams and did not pull the trigger on that. Don't think I made any outright misplays, but Sacri had momentum and used it amazingly. Major credit to him for some smooth gameplay and a strong team choice, well played.
Week 8:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-523865 | team:
https://pokepast.es/839ec03c9a00af37
There are some pre-game antics about this one that still leave a bad taste in my mouth and I wish I was not as generous in shifting a scheduled time, but just to throw a free team at yall:
https://pokepast.es/f2b57595e8017f68 -- I was initially planning on this, but ran out of time trying to fix some minor holes like a Hatterene vulnerability, so ultimately I went with the team I used. For my teammates listening to me going crazy about losing the extra day to prep after working all week, I am so sorry you guys had to witness my literal descent into full-on anger for hours LOL oops
Anyway, the game itself was actually just as much of a shitshow. I fell behind early because he had 220 Clefable, which did well against the team I had picked ultimately and was the main reason why the team I mentioned in the first paragraph had Haze Weezing-G honestly. Yea, I'm salty. Rexus proceeded to make some really weird plays in the mid-game that gave my Kommo-O an opening after his Weezing-G was no longer able to check it, but it did not quite get the job done as he outplayed me in one of the closing sequences to make up for it, which was really well done on his end. I had to get quite a few sequences right to cover the ground I needed to there anyway. My only misplay was when the game was already over because I blanked on Power Whip being contact -- my main excuse is that I was exhausted as I had to wake up early on my day off to play the guy, but please let the record show the game was already lost by then and this is not an excuse for the result obviously. This one just annoyed me because I regret accommodating to their scheduling forgetfulness, so catch me playing a substitute next time my opponent has issues in a team tournament because I hate knowing that hurt my team's chances instead of just my own. I apologize to my team for that sincerely.
Week 9:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8oudlc1-525228 | team:
https://pokepast.es/a6675064fa981cb2
Season was pretty much on the line here and I had this won if not for lame stuff, but it happens. I'm not going to go on a rant about how I feel he played or the game should have gone. I'm just tired at this point -- it was fitting that this was the end of the tournament. I'm happy with how I played for the most part, so that's what's in my control and that's my take-away. Just gotta focus on what you can control when all else fails to meet your expectations. Luck will always even out over time, so you just need to give it time and it will. Not going to go quit or burn bridges over a single lame game, like some would, when you can end up getting fortunate to win a game or multiple games the next day or week or month etc.
Overall, I was happy with how I played all but 1-2 weeks and I was happy with how I prepared all but 1 week. I know this will go down as another mediocre showing with a below average 4-5 record for me and the sheet does not lie, but I feel like I was really thriving in this metagame and that record did not match my performance. That happens sometimes and it is probably why I did not post this sooner, I just wanted some time to distance myself from the whole result. But now that I have reflected, I still wanted to share all of my thoughts and the sets above. It was a blast preparing and playing still. My teammates were amazing, the tier was fun despite Urshifu being pretty busted, and these officials will always get my heart pumping, for better or worse. This was a great experience and I find myself learning lots of new things every tournament even if I have been playing this game since 2011. Thanks to everyone for everything, cannot wait to play more SS in tours.