SPL XVI 1LDK + Ninth reports week 7
Hey, wellcome to week 7, sorry for being so late, IRL issues came up, but we are back on track with some juicy picks and news, come in and join us with a like and suscribe
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Congregation of the Classiest (7) vs (5)
Alpha Ruiners 
Kate vs
oldspicemike 
1LDK: Manaphy Webs vs no removal no boots Ting Lu HO, sure. Once bee sets webs and tricks its specs vs gholdengo, Moon spams knock off no matter how many intimidates lando gets on him, killing lando and knocking pecha's boots in the process. Ting Lu losses most of his health vs +2 dazzling gleam dengo and red cards into ceruledge who doesn't wanna sweep, tusk takes command and rams over pecharunt. Black and White relic scarf keldeo makes an appearance and OHKO's tusk with surf, this of course gives manaphy settup chances. Ting lu gets wiped out of the planet, then both manaphy and roaring moon use tera fairy to take on each other, but manaphy wins thanks to webs. Keldeo does outspeed, but cannot deal the finishing blow. Gholdengo takes a hit thanks to sash and kos manaphy, but at that point, even ribombee can just push dengo into the abyss.
leng loi vs Fogbound Lake
1LDK: I actually left this one for last because look at this bruh
View attachment 719242
People really be tired of Fogbound to be Late's bullshit lmao, anyway as for the match goes this was even funnier because the match lasted less than the scheduling. Fog traded its tera poison for damage on AV prima, both mola and prima pivot into tusk and scizor, both trade knock and damage. Leng's tusk gets rocks, then spams headlong untill mola kills it but its at low health. This is where Lengbron James pulls out roaring mid, i remember in the match thinking "what is this set, tera fairy bulky? that would do some damage" nah its tera ground baby and fog didnt wanna bet for the scald burn, so a +1 tera ground eq bonks weezer, and nite is cb so he cant take shit either and its over.
S1nn0hC0nfirm3d vs pdt
1LDK: Everyone tought this match was gonna last less than 20 turns, and it lasted 21 turns. deo-s knocks glowking's boots, and then goes gliscor to activate poison heal, dnite forces gliscor out into ninetales-a hoping to pivot an ice spinner, but instead meets a freaky tera flying tera blast, realizing that its band, ninetales can stay and get veil but ace yoinks it, but ninetales encores ace so that he can give it back or be forced out, with both players having aurora veil in their fields, deo-s knock's dragapult's boots and gets kod by hex. Gliscor uses tera normal + double dance to run the fades on dnite, both trade damage, but pdt decides to sack tusk to eq in order to save nite. Gliscor also takes a sucker punch and kills kingambit. While dnite gets the revenge kill on atales, hatterene nuzzles glowking, letting gliscor coming in while glowking suffers from paralisis, one agility, and ace gets smoothered by eq and dnite gets cut in half with facade, winning the game.
LpZ vs Laroxyl
1LDK: Ima be real while I was watching this game on the tape, my cat and my dog decided to run the fades on my room like this was a fighting anime and got distracted, btw this match was just Corviknight sweeping Laro's team
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Wi-Fi Wolfpack (7) vs (5)
Team Raiders 
Ewin vs
Eternal Spirit 
1LDK: Both ogers start the match, but wellspring decides it's better for glimm to take it, red card into tusk makes it take tspikes, hatt tanks the headlong and wants to kiss tusk but ghold quagmires the hatt. Ting Lu comes on a nasty plot, 2 MiRs and 1 shuca berry for ting lu and it's out. Gamma uses dnite to scout for the ogerpon set, which looks to be taunt + 3 moves, zama takes an eq and uses howl, tusk sacks itself to spin the t spikes and forcing zama to use cc on it. Enam comes and hatterene gets thrown to scout for scarf or specs, turns out its scarf, so glim comes to revenge kill but enam uses tera fairy to kill it, which forces dnite to use tera fire, hatt takes a fire punch and nuzzles it. Paralisis + Scale shot misses cost dnite everything and Ewin loses to enam
Stareal vs Hiko
1LDK: This is a must win game for both teams, whoever loses this one is out of SPL, and with those stakes, let's see what happened. Hiko's gliscor uses tera normal turn 1 to take a surf from prima and knock her item off. Skarmory walls gliscor but has to run away from prima and garg, yet glowking deals with both, so now everyone has to be careful, this switching / hit-and-run tactics continue until Weavile hits pecha with a knock off, but he survives and counters with a malignant chain that badly poisons it. Weavile does manage to deal half to zama with a triple axel and a 1/3 of a crit, switching around with rocks up makes skarmory get in range of a +3 tera normal facade, killing him instantly. Gliscor then deals 77% of ting lu with another facade, gets subbed out, and while ting lu does get a layer of spikes, he dies to pecha. With both walls down, Hiko's game falls apart pretty much with glowking throwing a twave on gambit but gambit powers on and suckers out weavile. Gliscor ALMOST haxes kingambit with para, but loses anyway. CM Clef tries to make one last run in, but good positioning from both Primarina with encore and zama with heavy slam ensures Stareal's victory. The wolfpack is barely alive, and the raiders have officially lost all chance to qualify
clean vs Yovan
1LDK: this was the match before hiko vs stareal, both teams really needed to win, so of course clean puts out the evil ass clef team. Corv walls Meow, +2 hands chips clef, ting lu dodges a fat focus blast, Corv and Prima brawl out a bit with prima winning, but it's effectively dead because of hazards. Both Ting Lus get max hazards, Yovan whirlwinds into weavile who barely missed the KO on ting lu and takes over half with eq, but ice shard secures the kill. Crown takes hazards and kills gliscor, ting lu takes hazards and forces crown out, hands takes hazards, dies, Meow takes hazards, kills ting lu. Yovan uses tera ghost meow to OHKO nite. Weavile kos meow. dragonite comes in clef, crown comes takes hazards kills weavile you know the drill. Clef comes back in and uses tera poison + twave, to hax dnite, winning the game
One Last Kiss vs Suzuya
1LDK: In what might be the worst game of this SPL, we see treads sacking himself for some damage, we see band pult take a hit from oger-w and pivot out from moth into ting lu, weavile hits axel but gets 2/3 and gets a red card, Moon comes in after another whirlwind and also gets whirlwind, ting lu decides to not kill moth, but instead he gets rocks + 1 layer of spikes, we then see pult showing off band by killing moth. Weavile comes in and grabs a sd on the tusk switch in and KOs it with LO ice shard. Now, if you look at the state of the game, tera fire or tera dark zama can easily win from here if he is careful with how he handles the obvious scarf darkrai on the back. But with +2 weavile, he can easily grab a turn by sacking itself while KOing corv right? WRONG, Suzuya uses tera ice and his whole game goes down, because now darkrai tricks zama for free. dragapult takes out moon, zama comes again... and uses bp when OLK's last 2 mons were ghosts, now this is obviously a missclick but man. And btw OLK still had tera so tera fairy gholdengo with dazz just pim pam pums the game
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Cryonicles (3) vs
(9) Stark Sharks 
zS vs
Niko
1LDK: This is the rare Niko bringing fat balance into sv, when he was mostly known for janky HOs, which is just what the doctor ordered for zS's team who funnily enough, it would've done well vs these teams. Clef gets rocks vs bee and gliscor gets spikes up at the cost of its life. Zama comes in to finish the bee and glimmora uses this as entry point for red carding into clef, Corv easily washes down the HO rock. What I think its shuca berry gholdengo comes in to put some good damage into corv and zama but its forced out thanks to hazard stacking and bee gets sacked. Niko pivots around zS's LO zama with clef and corv, both die but the self damage from LO is massive, which lets Kingambit kill with sucker punch thanks to the -1. Kingambit trades itself for suicune who tries to bait sucker punches with CM but fails. With roaring moon killing kingambit, both it and garg use tera, ground and fairy respectively. Id garg makes quick work of garg, and gholdengo who ends up being custap berry, cannot do any damage to it.
crying vs
Ahy Wddicted
1LDK: Crying has brought the bottom of the barrel of shit mons, peak crying gameplay with avalugg hisui who actually makes ting lu trip with mountain gale flinch, Corv comes in and avalugg sets veil on that. Corv shits on both lugg and gliscor, so raging bolt has to put in work, both ting lu and weezing galar have to team up vs it, and while ting lu dies, both manage to stall out veil, which lets ace kill. Both Gliscor and corv set up to +6, while gliscor uses tera ghost + scale shot and dual wingbeat to chip it, corv was click id + bp to stall it. Then suddenly ahy realizes gliscor is at -6 defense, and lets weezer come in thanks to a slow U-turn, gliscor then suddenly loses 100000000000000000% of its health, crying forfets.
Vivalospride vs
Lily 
ninth: Originally slated to be TPP, the Cryos decided to substitute in UU tier leader vivalospride to battle UU tier leader Lily. True to his job, vivalos has 2 UUs in Skeledirge and Moltres-Galar. His whole team is kind of a weird hyper offense that just has Samurott-Hisui, Treads, and a bunch of setup spammers between the aforementioned two and Zamazenta. Guessing the Kyurem is some kind of wallbreaker set because otherwise it might have trouble with teams like Lily's, a fat LuGholdNite balance featuring Clefable on utility duty. Ogerpon-Teal works well on fatter structures as a Boots mon with the combination of fast Encore and U-Turn for infinite momentum, complete with Knock Off. It can cycle back and forth with contact punishing demon Moltres forever to make physical attacks permanently unsafe. vivalos starts with Skeledirge, who immediately starts clicking Torch Song, but it gets Knocked, does a cool 22% to Moltres-Kanto, and gets Roared out. Roar calls in vivalos' own Moltres-Galar, who misses a Hurricane and does about as much before Lily brings in Ting-Lu, sets up a spike, and runs it out of town. This Whirlwind pulls out Kyurem, who Icicle Spears for Big Damage (it doesn't kill) before getting kicked into Treads, who can finally Rapid Spin away the spike. vivalos tries his hand at Skeledirge again, but Ting-Lu comes back out, dodges some Wisps, and believe it or not there's a spike on the floor again. Moltres-Galar finally gets the kill on the Lu, and Lily deploys her Dragonite to start setting up: this necessitates the appearance of vivalos' Zamazenta, which reveals a set that is walled by Clefable.
Gonna be honest here this whole team from vivalos is walled by Moltres and none of them have boots. Lily stays in for 6 turns just Roaring and Wisping, racking up chip until Roar eventually pulls Samurott while it's in kill range. Now Lily has to go Ogerpon and Encore on the Razor Shell drop, and the Ogerpon is the first death as Dirge torches it. Lily takes the revenge kill with Dragonite, then uses Tera Normal to stop vivalos' incoming Kyurem and force the Treads sack. His initial threat of Zamazenta doesn't work out as Lily just Roosts on the attempted double, restoring Multiscale and enabling a bit more chip on Zama. Now, there's two Dark-types, a Dragon-type, and a Fighting-type left, and Lily has a Clefable. Even when vivalos hits Tera Ghost on the Moltres-Galar, flinches the Ghold, and forces a half-health Clef to come in, Hurricane isn't a guaranteed kill from 52%; he has to pray for a Fiery Wrath flinch that doesn't come, and the Clef ends the interaction with two kills and half health. Kyurem finally kills it, but at this point the Dragonite can revenge kill it and Moltres walls the Zama to hell and back.
Pais vs
Attribute
ninth: Do you like birds? We have some birds in this game. Attribute has the increasingly common Gliscor/Corviknight bird core, but this time it's on what looks like hard HO with Roaring Moon, Dragapult, and Deoxys, alongside common HO spinner Treads. I was a little confused at first but both birds are capable of setup sets. On Pais' side we have Clefable x Torn-T, yeah nice Masters team. Those two are actually interesting choices for special attackers (and the latter as speed control-ish) complementing the Wellspring/Tusk/Gambit physical overload core, and the presence of Pecharunt allows them easier entry via Parting Shot. I figured the Torn was probably AV because this structure normally has AV Glowking, and I was right [lebron knowing kobe would get 81 voice], as it gets Knocked turn 1 by Deoxys. Bleakwind Storm is really more like Weakwind Storm as it doesn't even do half to Deoxys, who is Rocky Helmet Recover Thunder Wave (nice clef larp), meaning it takes hardly anything from Knock and paralyzes the Torn for good measure. A series of nice doubles from Attribute allows his Gliscor to get activated against Torn-T and set up SD, scout out Wellspring's Encore, confirming he doesn't have it, then Tera Normal Facade - Pais rescues it by going hard Pecharunt on the Facade, then hitting Tera Dark Foul Play on EQ to threaten the Gliscor, though it doesn't 2HKO Gliscor's bulky ass and both just leave the scene. Please note that the Ghost-type is now a Dark-type, this will be on the exam.
Another round of Gliscor vs. Wellspring ensues, but this time Gliscor isn't +2 and Pais' Wellspring can set a Spike and Synthesis on the Protects. Clef and Deoxys exchange chip and both get knocked eventually before Attribute uses Treads to remove the Spike, though Pais threatens it with Tusk and just sets Rocks. After a brief moment of Pais getting his Gambit in position before realizing it's Fallen: 0 and tickles Corv, we get another round of Deoxys vs. Clefable and I think both mons end the interaction with more health than previously. The Deoxys gets a little more chip on Torn until Pais eventually U-Turns into Gambit, and Attribute opts to Knock its Leftovers and let the Deoxys die. Pais' Flamethrower Clefable takes the kill on Treads, but not before it sets rocks. Without LO in hand, though, Moonblast narrowly misses a kill on Attribute's Gliscor, and it scares it out. What's still scary for Attribute is Headlong Rush from Tusk, and Attribute throws away Pult to that extent. Now, Mr. Bute is down 3-6, but a lot of Pais' team is heavily chipped, and wouldn't you know it - Pais Tera'd his only Fighting immunity 44 turns ago. Corviknight comes in and reveals Iron Defense Body Press (yes, this set also has Brave Bird - it's no U-Turn), takes nothing from the non-Heat Wave Torn, and the game legit just ends. Flamethrower Clef doesn't get close enough to a kill, and no crit comes from Ivy Cudgel.
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Ever Grande BIGS (6)
vs (6)
Circus Maximus Tigers 
lax vs DugZa
ninth: Milotic Clefable Gliscor balance is back on the menu...I saw that first slot on lax's team and immediately got flashbacks to that xavgb squad from SCL III. The point of Milotic on these structures is as a reasonably fast bulky Water with access to Haze and Scald that can also be a backup status sponge thanks to Marvel Scale boosting its defense. 95/125 special defenses make it a good counterpart to mons that typically skew physically defensive like Skarmory and Pecharunt, not to mention it's the only Water resist on the whole team. Darkrai is the designated attacker here. On the other side we have DugZa with just straight HO. Moth + Enamorus on HO feels like a bit of a throwback but it's cool, them and Wellspring are all in that slightly bulkier 350-ish speed range. Notably DugZa's choice of priority here is Scizor. lax and DugZa lead with Clef and Darkrai respectively. Darkrai Tricks and somehow both parties end up worse, as it acquires a Sticky Barb (and paralysis) and Clef acquires a Scarf. lax switches in Pecharunt to Parting Shot for a bit of momentum and brings the Scarf Clef right back in, trading rocks with DugZa's Tusk. The -1 Tusk proceeds to get outdueled by Pech and die, as Headlong Rush is doing a cool 39% and no crit occurs. lax's Pech even manages to survive a shot from Moth and Parting Shoot itself back out into Milotic.
DugZa intends to absorb a Water move with Wellspring, but lax reveals Dragon Tail and drags Moth back in for a kill. DugZa's Wellspring does still have the ability to force things, making lax sack Pecharunt and take heavy damage on Darkrai to take it out. It looks like an opportunity for his Scizor, but lax's Skarmory completely walls it even at +2. Whirlwind pulls his Darkrai, and lax sacks his own Darkrai to bring in his Tera Normal Gliscor. A paralysis helps it get an SD and survive Darkrai with full health, and now the only thing DugZa can do is Tera Fairy his Enamorus and pray it can oneshot. It doesn't, and somehow Scizor's Bullet Punch can't finish the kill either. lax finishes the battle 4-0 as part of his attempt to Lock In and save the BIGs.
bhkg vs 3d
ninth: I guess we're weather warring now. bhkg has Ninetales Venusaur sun HO, 3d has Veil + setup HO. I'll note that bhkg's team has more of a defensive backbone with Corv and Tusk, while 3d is just going for full-on violence - his Fire resist is Kyurem. The key here is going to be keeping weather up, as the second bhkg sets sun up, 3d hard switches to snow. Two doubles lead to two U-Turns for bhkg's Corviknight, giving his Walking Wake space to come in and Flamethrower 3d's 0 fallen Kingambit to death. This is it for bhkg's Corv, though, as 3d's LO Zamazenta comes in and necessitates its death, costing the Zama about half of its health due to Helmet. The Zama obtains half-health chip on Venusaur before dying, but this just means that the Venusaur - not under sun - is setup fodder for 3d's DD Kyurem. A DD and Scale Shot later and it's scary hours for bhkg, who has to exhaust Tera Fire on his Tusk to kill the Kyurem.
bhkg sets up Sun for a grand total of two (2) turns before 3d's own Ninetales comes back in: it gets Knocked by Moon before 3d's Red Card Darkrai ejects it, but the interaction also reveals that the Moon is not Choiced. The Wake, however, is, and forces the Darkrai sacrifice and necessitates Tera Water Hatterene from 3d. It starts clicking CM and now bhkg has to figure out a way to break it: his response is to send out Ninetales, Healing Wish his Fire-type +Attack Tusk, and mash Headlong Rush twice. Draining Kiss just barely heals enough back for it to survive two HLRs, though, and the Hatterene gets the kill and brings itself back to half health. Wake comes in to try and Draco - and this is where things get real interesting. 3d hard switches to Ninetales to absorb the Draco, and sets up Veil as bhkg's Moon comes in. However, bhkg intentionally avoids clicking the 4x effective Iron Head, instead spamming not-very-effective moves to kill it as slowly as possible and run out the truncated Veil. This times it so that Veil wears off exactly as bhkg's Moon comes in to click Draco against Hatterene for the win. (The Draco crit anywayas, but we'll call it RNG manipulation.)
emforbes vs
Storm Zone 
ninth: Is Storm Zone trying to make Comfey a thing again? It's on sun HO so Synthesis heals 66%. Also interested in the increased Venusaur Gaming this week, and Storm's still bringing good ol' Overgod (Kingambit) instead of Roaring Moon even on sun. emforbes I'm pretty sure just has the Ting-Lu Pecharunt Keldeo spikestack sample team but he replaced the Tinkaton with Iron Crown, which has no utility besides Volt Switch but does about ten times more damage. Volt Switch is the click T1 as Storm leads Torkoal, and emforbes brings in Red Card Lu as Storm attacks, pulling Venusaur - who needs to boost - and allowing him to set rocks against the incoming Wake. He is forced to Tera Water against the Wake, which allows him to set a spike. As the Wake reveals it's not Choiced, emforbes then opts for the anti-BKC maneuver and sets a second layer before Ruinating for half and dying. Weavile comes in for the revenge kill...but Triple Axel only hits twice and it gets fried by Hydro Steam. That's not good news for emforbes, and neither is the Wake turning Tera Ghost on Keldeo's Vacuum Wave, Dracoing it for a third kill before sun fades.
Storm Zone now has a secondary mission: get all this stuff off the floor. emforbes can theoretically run him out of Headlong Rushes if he gets every switch right with Pecharunt and Dragonite, and he burns two of Storm's HLRs before Mr. Zone goes hard Balloon Gambit on Pech, using this as a chance to break Dragonite's Mutiscale. Somehow this exact line repeats itself, but now that Gambit has broken Dragonite's Multiscale, +1 Kowtow just kills Dragonite straight up. Two Dark-weaks left means that emforbes realistically has no path out of this. I was hoping for the Comfey to hit the field once but a win is a win. His aura made the Triple Axel hit twice, let's say that.
tko vs
JJ09LIE
ninth: JJ09LIE has Prime Pult but he replaced the Kingambit with Roaring Moon and the Samurott with Moth. Go read the RMT. (The swap is actually interesting as Gambit has been falling out of favor in general and people are running bulky-ass Moons.) tko has an Okidogi so you know lax built this, I bet this thing is AV too. Constant threat of Knock Off and Toxic whenever it attacks kind of makes it the polar opposite of Zapdos in a way? It's a good offensive presence and method of making progress on slightly fatter structures like the LuGholdNiteZama going on here, although this is a reasonably offensive take here with Deoxys as the utility/speed piece. Okidogi ends up being the switch-in to Primarina (took 36% from Surf I KNEW it was AV), which means JJ has to bring in his Landorus, which just EQs and gibs the dog. Featured shitter is dead on Turn 3, blunder would be proud. tko sponges a U-Turn with Red Card Ting-Lu, which brings out JJ's +Speed Moon a bit early. Acro does 20%, dawg these fat Moons are out of control. The Lu gets to set Ruinate, set rocks, and Whirlwind until it dies because JJ has no Boots (although his Lando does get up rocks itself).
tko deploys Gholdengo against JJ's Crown, and Makes it Rain on the switch as JJ throws out his Moon. There is, however, another issue for tko: JJ09LIE's Iron Moth outspeeds tko's entire team and got a Fiery Dance boost on the Ghold. Tera Fairy Dazzling Gleam destroys Zama, and tko hits Tera Ground on Dragonite to set up and try to claw it back. Unfortunately for him, the Moth is Fire Blast too, which is definitely greedy as hell but it guarantees the kill on Dragonite and the game. Gotta say I fully respect this JJ09LIE take of just taking Prime Pult and changing every set.
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Indie Scooters (5) vs
(7) Dragonspiral Tyrants 
robjr vs
myjava 
ninth: This new Tinkaton sprite is incredible. It blocks the mon to the left with the big-ass hammer and it hides itself behind the mon to the right. No notes. myjava has Ting-Lu hazard/Ruination/Whirlwind spam balance, with the Lu accompanied by spinblocker Pecharunt and two Ground-immunes in Gliscor and Rotom-Wash. Rotom's popped up a bit recently as a sensibly bulky, sensibly fast Wisp and Volt Switch user that's immune to Spikes and also completely ruins Great Tusk's day. Tinkaton compresses utility and Deoxys handles speed duties, as usual, but the real funny thing going on here is robjr's team, which appears to comprise six fucking physical attackers between base 80 and 138 speed. There's a Weavile in the first slot, this is the most obvious Beat Up setup I've ever seen. He went to the builder and sorted by Attack stat. Anyways what you want to watch here is myjava's two main status inflicters in Rotom and Pecharunt, which are both physdef either naturally or by build. rob gets rocks up early but java replies with his own. Rotom forces basically all of rob's team to switch, including Landorus, and java ends up hitting Weavile with a burn, meaning rob just lets it die to Tinkaton as a result. Wellspring, who lowkey kills most of java's mons with setup, gets the revenge kill, but has to run from Pecharunt and necessitates the death of Landorus by Malignant Chain.
An opportunity arises as robjr deploys Roaring Moon, forcing myjava to hard switch to Lu as it DDs up. If this is Taunt and/or Tera Blast Fairy, it might just win here. Unfortunately for rob it is none of those sets, clicks Acro for a whopping 42%, and gets Whirlwinded out. rob tries to bring it back in to get set up again, but java just flips between Pecharunt and Lu, the latter of which still walls and Whirlwinds it. Out comes Wellspring, and rob goes for a desperation Swords Dance that doesn't pay off in the slightest as Malignant Chain nearly kills, then poison finishes the job. The Tera Fairy Pecharunt claims another kill on Moon, and it's looking pretty over, but rob has one more attempt: Tera Steel Heavy Slam Iron Defense Zamazenta. It forces the Pecharunt to hard switch into Gliscor, who has to start SDing up to try and go band for band. java narrowly escapes the predicament as Gliscor is fat enough to live 2 Presses after Protects, leaving the Zama in Rocky Helmet range, and rob's Dragonite in range of Deoxys' Ice Beam. I thought this was joever early on, because loading Beat Up into Pecharunt x Rotom is crazy, but that Zama made it pretty close. Cool game.
TheFranklin vs
vk
ninth: We're Glimmora Gaming, folks, vk has brought the weird rock flower thing. It's found itself onto a Ting-Lu HO structure, where it is the sole spinner for four demonic sweepers in Moon/Valiant/Dragapult/Wellspring. Lu on HO may seem oxymoronic at first but this mon is basically a guaranteed 100+% worth of healthbar damage over a game, which is often all you need to overcome a soft check and keep a sweep going, and Whirlwind also helps to disrupt an enemy HO setup. TheFranklin has Corviknight/Glowking/Kyurem BO, you know what this does, you Chilly into Kyurem and click Ice moves ad infinitum, Corv and Tusk are both designated removal to protect the president. Kingambit's here! Never thought I would be excited to see this bastard but he's been quiet lately. The game opens with vk's LO Dragapult whiffing a Draco but nonetheless doing a ridiculous amount of work, as it Darts the Glowking, Shadow Balls it as it cycles back in to bring it to critical health, then vk hard Fire Blasts the incoming Kingambit for 77%. That's easily his money's worth out of the Pult. vk brings out his Wellspring on Franklin's Tusk, forcing him to go hard Kyurem; vk attempts a Play Rough, but it also goes to the left and the Pon gets freeze-dried to death.
Still not a ton Franklin can do about that LO Pult, which revenges the Kyurem and gets out unscathed. Franklin gains a bit of tempo as he gets Tusk in on Lu, allowing him to set Rocks and kill the Lu, but his lack of CC and vk's Rocky Helmet means the Tusk leaves the encounter at 26% and -2/-2 defenses. Dragapult cooks again, frying the Tusk, and Franklin finally ends its reign of terror with Kingambit's Sucker. He's expended plenty of resources to get here, though, and vk's Red Card Glimmora can now free-fire to kill Gambit and chip the Glowking. I haven't mentioned this yet but Franklin's Dragapult is Band Phantom Force, which means it has to run from Roaring Moon, which means Roaring Moon gets a turn of setup. One crit Knock on the Corviknight and the game is done for.
Nat vs Fusien
ninth: This team from Fusien is fat as hell. Respect the Yasiin Bey nicknames though. The core here is double birds (Gliscor and Skarmory) paired with Ground-weak terrorist Toxapex, who has always been an extremely bulky and obnoxious mon since it dropped. Lu and Clefable do hazard stuff, Weavile is the token attacker, this is just one of those passive fat squads that outlives the opponent. Nat has a Magnezone which serves to trap and kill fat Steels like Skarmory and Corv. There's a Glowking and a Dragapult here too, this is just a SWSH team with Great Tusk. Two thirds of ZapKingLu are in attendance (the Lu is absent) to click Future Sight and switch around for eternity, assisted by more offensive pivot-move-clickers in Keldeo and Dragapult. Also Nat's really been pushing the alt rule this season but I respect it lol. Fusien's Ting-Lu runs into Nat's CC Great Tusk, and it watches Nat get up rocks, gets up no hazards of its own, and has to run from the 2HKO with CC. He has to bring out Skarmory, but Nat Headlong Rushes (this ironically works fine for her as Skarm is probably Helmet and would have killed Tusk) and then just shuffles in her Magnezone, which survives Body Press to trap and oneshot the bird. Magnezone: Mission Accomplished.
Fusien's second most active mon on this team is somehow Infestation Toxapex, but every mon on Nat's team except for Tusk has a pivot move lol. Also, Fusien's Dark/Ice Weavile is scared of Nat's Ghost/Dragon Dragapult because it's faster and oneshots with Band U-Turn (is that Band? It does a goddamn lot with U-Turn) so that's not an outstanding vector for progress on his part either. There's no contact punishment left alive either so Nat can hit U-Turn forever. Gonna be honest the rest of this game is Fusien's one-offense team bleeding out. His one method of offensive pressure (Weavile) can't oneshot Colbur Glowking even with a crit Knock and has to run whenever Keldeo or Dragapult show up. Future Sight falls out of the sky to fry the Pex. Magnezone Body Presses the Ting-Lu to kill it, and in the face of SD Gliscor, Nat accelerates her victory by using Tera Blast Ice Zapdos. This game is super over. Tera Steel Clef isn't enough and it drops to Zone too. Weavile at least revenge kills to avoid the 6-0 (and reveals the Zone was AV), but it's a completely dominant victory from Nat who seemed very ready to punish Fusien's fat. Magnezone MVP for sure.
aesf vs
Mada 
ninth: Mada has stall and aesf has Pecharunt Moltres Tinkaton status spam balance. My eyes hurt looking at this team preview. aesf says he should've eaten lunch before the game and he might be right; at least he has a raw Walking Wake to make it interesting somewhat. We got two Gliscor staring at each other, but Mada's is SD Knock and forces Tera Dark out of Pecharunt very early. When aesf Parting Shoots into Darkrai, Mada hits Tera Normal Facade on the predicted Ice Beam, though Pecharunt just comes out again. Gliscor sets up more and just two-shots the Pech, and somehow Tera Dark Foul Play does under half to +3 Gliscor. Tough scenes. aesf's Darkrai is pretty strong but can't 2HKO or flinch with Dark Pulse, meaning it also drops to Facade.
aesf deploys This A Walking Wake to finally scare out the Scor, but in comes Mada's Blissey, who gets Knocked out of its boots. This gives aesf's Gliscor a chance to set spikes, but only Moltres actively threatens Mada's Corv and it can Defog them away instantly. Moltres gets Knocked by Gliscor, then Mada deploys Infestation Toxapex to trap and very, very slowly whittle away at Tinkaton, dropping it to half health. It briefly does the same to Moltres before it gets Roared out, then nabs the Wake with yet another Infestation. This time it isn't Encored and can Toxic the Wake, leaving it dead to rights, and aesf forfeits. At least he can go eat lunch I guess.
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and thats week 7, once again sorry for the delay, this project is mad exausting ngl. as far as news go:
ninth wants me to talk about how good corv is doing, because its walling all the gliscors and pechas, I actually toned down the hate after I got some feedback. Still, this is more for charity than anything and I still dont find the apeall of the bird, and never will probably.
while not out on a mathematical standpoint, having only 1.2% chances to make it means both raiders and bigs are eliminated from the tour, -Tsunami- is already writing the eulogys even. also the
This leaves sharks, tigers, ruiners, scooters, wolfpack and tyrants as the remainder fighters
And for the final predicts ninth and 1LDK posted the same record this week at 30-27. Overall, both are trailing The Ape by a few games: ninth leads 202-207 to 1LDK's 200-209.
Now if you excuse me, theres a couple of plants I need to water because I forgot to do it yesterday and they gonna die from global warming
Nat (3-2) vs (4-1) leng loi 
Srn (0-1) vs (1-1) Kate 
hellom (2-3) vs (4-1) S1nn0hC0nfirm3d 
Thiago Nunes (0-0) vs (1-4) Laroxyl 
Storm Zone vs hellom 
DugZa vs TheFranklin 
With only 2 uses, Hoodra didn't make a huge impact, but both were wins and it did hold its own in these games. Dragon steel is a pretty solid type combo and in this heavy bulk meta, dragon tail + poison immunity is pretty valuable.
The Better Webs Setter
Storm Zone (5-2) vs (2-4) hellom 
Niko's team is not stall, not in the slightest, there's a Wellspring and a Latios. Water/Grass physical and Dragon/Psychic special covers more or less all your offensive needs combined with Heatran's anti-fat technology. Clef and Torn are for sure annoying presences though. Nat has the hood classic Kyurem/Lu/Corviknight balance, featuring Weezing-Galar for double defogging and protection of the president alongside Alo. The interesting bit here is Ditto, who a) matches well into setup mons, b) gets infinite PP, and c) can copy Regenerator. I'll spoil right now: the Kyurem is Sub/Protect/DD/Icicle Spear Leftovers, aka the PP stall set. If you've ever seen this game you know where this is going. The opening lines of this game is Nat using Ditto to write down all of Niko's sets (and learning the Clef is definitely Unaware) and dropping a Toxic Spike on Niko's side of the field. His Heatran whiffs two Wisps in a row but finally lands one on Lu, who can't oneshot it anymore. Alo takes a Wisp, which is actually important because Flip Turn does a lot lol, but Flips into Kyurem, who initially bluffs EP only to reveal it's the evil set. Bleakwind can't break the sub, and Nat somehow manages to scare out the Heatran by repeatedly landing 5 hits on Spear without Lefties, and forces Clef to come in and stop this. The Clef can't really safely set up either as it's not status immune; it gets set up a bit against Kyurem later, but Weezing takes nothing from +2 Moonblast and always forces a switch. Niko switches into Latios...and gets poisoned by the Toxic Spike. Neutralizing Gas was still active.
McMeghan (6-3) vs SoulWind (5-5) 
BIHI (3-5) vs (6-4) BKC 
SD Mold Breaker Excadrill is surprisingly potent as a spinner.
