Since we're in a very different metagame than what we had prior to the cruci and nect nerfs, I have a bunch of things to cover here. I'd like to start with a couple mons that have returned from obscurity recently:
Tapu Koko @ Shuca Berry
Ability: Electric Surge
EVs: 32 HP / 224 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Roost
Although Tapu Koko as a whole hasn't really fallen out of the metagame at any point due to its place on screens, offensive koko sets had been mostly out of the picture until recently. This set aims to gain momentum via Volt Switch whilst 1v1ing Ground types that get in its way and chipping down offensive checks that aren't Grass types. Offensive Tapu Koko in general benefits from a shortage of Ground types that aren't 4 times weak to hp ice, but I've highlighted the Shuca Berry set because it can Roost off chip damage more freely and is also less prediction reliant than Choice Specs when going up against a team with a Ground type. Tapu Koko is actually fairly desirable right now due to its ability to check Torn-T over a sustained period of time, and unlike other Tornadus-T checks it is very difficult to take advantage of following a U-turn, as its best checks are Grass types that serve defensive roles on teams as opposed to wallbreaking ones. This allows the koko user to shift momentum in their favour by volt switching out to a wallbreaker that can abuse Grass types, such as Aurumoth or Heatran.
It is imperative that Tapu Koko is paired with mons that can abuse Grass types well; without these threats koko's abilities are wasted as it barely damages these mons on their own. Heatran, Tornadus-T, Volcarona, and Aurumoth carrying Blizzard or Bug Buzz are particularly good at taking advantage of grasses, but other breakers such as Mega Mawile, Mega Pinsir and Kartana can work with the right team support. It is worth noting that since Ferrothorn, Tangrowth and Jumbao have different typings and coverage, teams featuring koko appreciate having more than one of the aforementioned breakers, ideally having methods to take advantage of all three of these mons between them. Tapu Koko also appreciates support that can take advantage of faster threats, mainly Mega Alakazam and Choice Scarf Kitsunoh/Volkraken. These often fit in well with the build anyway, with the likes of Rocky Helmet Torn-T being able to punish Kitsunoh along with the support it provides against grass types, whilst Arghonaut gives the team Spikes, which is very helpful for any momentum-based build.
Kartana @ Steelium Z
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Smart Strike
- Sacred Sword
- Leaf Blade
Swords Dance Kartana lost its relevance a while ago, back when it struggled to break balance due to the omnipresent Defensive Tomohawk, but nowadays with a lot of the more reliable answers to Steelium Kartana on a downwards trend in favour of using Tornadus-T as a general check to Kartana, I think this set can rise again. I've chosen Corkscrew Crash over Breakneck Blitz since Cyclohm, Zapdos and Pyroak aren't particularly relevant in the meta, and Z-Smart Strike is capable of hitting Kitsunoh and Magearna much harder whilst allowing it to check Pajantom and Mega Crucibelle more effectively. On top of this, Smart Strike is much more spammable after burning the Z-Move. The most notable feature of Swords Dance Kartana in the current metagame is that it's able to OHKO its most common check, Tornadus-T, on the switch using its Z-Move; this forces the opponent into very awkward scenarios where they are forced to predict correctly between resists to the Z-Move such as Heatran, and simply going to Torn-T anyway hoping to catch a Sacred Sword. It is worth noting that the reward for the Kartana user predicting correctly is huge, as these mindgames almost always target Steel types and Tornadus-T, which are both integral parts of teams that feature them. Additionally, since some teams opt out of solid Steel resists by having Magearna or Kitsunoh as their own Steels, Kartana can sometimes freely use Corkscrew Crash to claim heavy damage on anything that could come in.
Kartana pairs very well with Pursuit users such as Choice Scarf Weavile and Mega Tyranitar, with the former being able to remove Mega Alakazam (one of the few fast threats that can take advantage of Kartana if it finds a free switchin) and the latter notably setting Stealth Rock and trapping Tornadus-T. Once Tornadus-T is taken care of, Kartana may even be able to clean some teams due to the fact that other speed control options such as Kitsunoh can't damage it very well. Kartana also appreciates pivots such as Tapu Koko and Tornadus-T to get in safely, and it is capable of benefitting either of these mons in return by forcing out Ferrothorn for Tapu Koko and Mega Tyranitar/Mega Crucibelle for Torn-T. In particular, Tapu Koko makes for a great partner as it can steal momentum from Tornadus-T, which most teams are running to check Kartana at the moment. Lastly, Kartana can pair well with Mega Alakazam, as they are both solid breakers that can put pressure on Celesteela and other Steel types.
Now that I have those sets out in the open, I would like to talk about something that is a big deal when building in the current metagame, namely our usage of steels. After following along with a bunch of discussions during CAP26's Concept Assessment, I noticed a bunch of references to the prevalence of running two Steel types on a team, as a counter to Psyspam. Whilst this is technically true, I think that it misrepresents the point of having two steels on a team in the first place; Psyspam is a particular playstyle that generally refers to running Lele+Zam on the same team, and not only is it fairly uncommon, it's also far from the only reason that a team would need two Steels. In order to illustrate what I mean by this, I am going to go through the roles that our top 5 Steel types perform due to their typings:
- Heatran is a top wallbreaker in the meta, but in terms of its Steel type roles it doesn't actually do much. Tornadus-T can annoy it with Knock Off or even hp ground, whilst Aurumoth and Tapu Lele are both able to chunk it with Focus Blast. Additionally, Heatran variants not running Steelium Z are actually checked by Mega Alakazam, leaving it free to start wallbreaking. Heatran's most notable asset as a bulky Steel is its ability to take on Magearna and Mega Mawile, but even in this case, it often makes sense to treat Heatran as a Fire type and a wallbreaker primarily, with the weaknesses to Torn-T and Psychic types often being patched up by a "secondary" Steel type.
- Celesteela may be the best individual performer when it comes to checking mons that steels are expected to check over the course of longer games, as it can come in on Tapu Lele, Mega Alakazam and Shift Gear Magearna more reliably than the other steels on this list. However, Celesteela really needs its Leftovers in order to fulfil this role effectively, meaning that it cannot act as an effective Tornadus-T switchin, since nearly all variants of Torn-T carry Knock Off.
- Ferrothorn, as the other Steel on this list that is weak to Fighting, also struggles to check Tapu Lele and Alakazam, and once again it would like to keep its Leftovers recovery so can't switch into Torn-T very well. Similarly to Heatran, Ferrothorn's place on a team is largely based on its other typing, and the Water and Electric resists that come with it, as well as its role as a hazard setter. However, Ferrothorn can notably deal with some of the more fringe threats that warrant steel types, such as Mega Crucibelle, Mega Diancie, and certain variants of Jumbao.
- Magearna is the only Steel type on this list that can do a decent job of taking all of the bigger threats (Tornadus-T, Tapu Lele, Mega Alakazam), and as a result it is the defining Steel type in the metagame. Magearna also has the added bonus of being a better check to Aurumoth than the rest of these steels, as Overheat is a less common filler than Focus Blast or Thunder. Unfortunately, since non spdef Magearna sets struggle to check psychics in the long term, it needs to be paired either with good offensive pressure or a secondary steel type to handle these mons in the long run.
- Kitsunoh provides a fantastic typing with a valuable resistance to Psychic and immunity to Fighting, and it can use this to support other steels, whilst also being a nice speed control option that can claim momentum with U-turn. Kitsunoh can soft-check Tapu Lele, Mega Alakazam and Mega Crucibelle as well as other offensive threats such as Mega Diancie if it can avoid catching an Earth Power on the switchin. However, unlike the other mons on this list, Kitsunoh can actually let in Tornadus-T whilst getting punished by Rocky Helmet chip, so it needs support to take advantage of Torn-T.
The important thing to note with all of this is that the 5 Steel types listed here all perform different roles for a team whilst actually being a poor pick to deal with some of the mons that they technically resist. This is why I believe that it's not necessarily the threat of Lele+Zam that drives a lot of teams to run two Steels, and it would make much more sense to attribute this trend to those two mons' individual abilities, as well as the prevalence of Tornadus-T.
Although I've made it seem like double steel is the optimal method of building, there are some nice ways of getting around the pressure put on steel types in the meta that don't involve stacking them. To give some examples:
+
- This is a fairly generic idea that can be found on a lot of balance teams. As I mentioned earlier, Celesteela struggles to act as a reliable Torn-T resist, and therefore it appreciates the support from these more reliable checks. Mega Tyranitar is listed first here because it is generally the easiest to fit out of these 4 due to its bulk, with Mega Diancie being the next most efficient fit since it is able to significantly improve stall matchup. The last two are generally placed on more offensive teams so they don't always make sense to pair with Celesteela, but depending on the build they can actually fit in nicely; I've placed Koko higher than Mcruci here due to the threat of Hidden Power Ground from Torn-T.
(
Choice Scarf) -
Scarf Weavile has the ability to check Aurumoth and Pursuit trap Mega Alakazam, providing nice insurance against these threats that can sometimes get out of hand against offense. It is important to accept that Scarf Weavile has very little bearing on the Tapu Lele and Tornadus-T matchups, so it should be paired with a soft check to those mons (like Magearna), and a generally offensive team that can take advantage of Tapu Lele's average Speed stat. There's not much else to say here, but I will also add that when the above conditions are met, this option probably brings the least need for bulky steels; despite this fact, as Weavile is a scarfer that helps the matchup against Psychic types, it competes with Kitsunoh, meaning that any team planning to use it needs to weigh up the benefits of Pursuit and being a better moth check against having an extra switchin to Tapu Lele.
(
Payapa Berry) - Okay I admit it's really weird to put Toxapex on a list whilst talking about Psychics, so I'm going to justify myself a bit here. Tapu Lele is the main breaker to deal with on bulkier teams, and it generally sources its free switchins from bulky waters such as Arghonaut and Toxapex. Depending on what other entry points the rest of the team allows,
Payapa Berry Toxapex can shut out Lele by stopping it from coming in, weakening its threat against the team as a result. This also pairs very well with Magearna since Mage can absorb Knock Off from Torn-T and Weavile, and pex must hold onto its item in order to keep out Psychic types.
There's one more thing that I'd like to talk about, which is somewhat on topic with Psychic types in the metagame. I call him Bob.
Aurumoth @ Iapapa Berry
Ability: No Guard
EVs: 40 HP / 172 SpA / 124 SpD / 172 Spe
Modest Nature / Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Quiver Dance
- Psyshock / Blizzard
- Thunder
- Focus Blast / Blizzard
This thing is really becoming a strain on building and playing. Aurumoth's ridiculous coverage means that finding a working set of answers is incredibly difficult, and it has the ability to straight up bypass nearly everything i've mentioned about checking Psychic types; Celesteela is hit by Thunder and Kitsunoh can't even check it because Shadow Strike doesn't do nearly enough. This lack of defensive checking leaves a couple options:
1) Trying to revenge kill Aurumoth - The spread and item given here take care of this. As long as Aurumoth's hp is preserved, it is able to beat every relevant scarfer in the meta (other than Weavile) at +1, even surviving Volkraken's Fire Blast. From there it can get to +2 and then outspeed and remove all of those scarfers, likely taking the rest of the team with it. Alternatively, if the opponent tries to chip Aurumoth into a range where the scarfers can get to it, they can still allow Aurumoth to get to +2 Speed. The best bets come down to Tricking it with Kitsunoh (still a straight loss vs any Z-Move variant, as well as just giving up the scarfer against what is probably an offensive build), and the combination of scarfer+priority (which still normally loses due to Iapapa Berry unless they're running the uncommon Mega Pinsir).
2) Trying to avoid letting Aurumoth set up - Aurumoth's wide coverage and great bulk make this nigh impossible to achieve, because of the implications that come along with this. It's unreasonable for teams to never let Aurumoth set up, especially with the pinch berry helping out; this mon already sets up freely on most Grass types and bulkier mons such as Arghonaut whilst being able to set up in a more awkward fashion on most of the meta (as an example it even lives Hurricane from Rocky Helmet Tornadus-T). The other problem with this method of beating Aurumoth is that it requires you to actually stay in. Naganadel is an example of a mon that proved too much to handle despite being frail, due to the fact that it could come in on important win conditions, leaving the opponent in a scenario where they don't have a good play - they either stay in and lose an important mon, or they switch out and lose to setup. Aurumoth is a very different mon overall to Naganadel, since it has bulk over speed, but similarities can be drawn in the way it can force these scenarios - it doesn't outspeed revenge killers after one set up, but if it is left at full it will simply beat its revenge killers 1v1 and get +2/+2/+2 in the process.
I should also point out that any team relying on these methods of counterplay against Aurumoth will just lose to screens+Aurumoth - which is yet another problem with exclusively using offensive checks to mons. Additionally, this is just one Aurumoth set; any time that people bring defensive counterplay to one moth set it's likely that they still run into issues when they face the appropriate adaptation. The most common example of this would be running Overheat in order to hit Magearna, not only blowing its own answer out of the water but also clearing it for teammates in the process. That being said, I tend to stick to the above Aurumoth set to take advantage of the lack of offensive counterplay, since it can play well with support to wear down Magearna (not too difficult given how much Magearna beats). Aurumoth isn't exactly unbeatable - rocks chip might wear it down, maybe the setup baits don't need to come out for this particular game, maybe scarfer+priority does actually take care of it, or maybe there is a convenient answer to the particular coverage in there; however, all of this counterplay is fairly unreliable and out of the control of the person building or playing against it, and even when the answers can prevent Aurumoth from sweeping, they can't prevent it from making progress, as it still breaks or heavily chips its answers.
Customary lol Aurumoth replays to go with the lol Aurumoth post:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7cap-880742922 - Remember when I said this lived Torn-T? This is an example of me getting rewarded for finding one of the worst setup opportunities available on the opposing team.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7cap-848442063 - lol moth #2
