[overview]
**Draft Order**: Round 8
**Price Range**: 1-2 points
**Overview**: Alcremie is a serviceable budget Fairy-type that can occasionally be a surprisingly solid setup sweeper. Aroma Veil is an incredibly valuable ability in the metagame, making it immune to Taunt and Encore so that it is even harder to stop once it gets going with defensive boosts. It also has excellent Special Defense, allowing it to check many of the most prominent special wallbreakers while staying healthy with Recover. However, its lack of coverage makes it get completely walled by many prominent types including Steel-types, and its setup variants get shut down by phazing and Toxic, making it difficult to pull off.
[strategy comments]
Common Roles
========
**Setup Sweeper**: With Acid Armor and Calm Mind, Alcremie can become unbreakable, especially since it cannot be stopped by Taunt and Encore. These sets are often paired with Draining Kiss to keep it healthy, Stored Power to do massive damage to Fairy-resistant foes, and Recover to remain healthy, though it often needs all five of these moves, making it tricky to choose which one is unnecessary.
**Special Wall**: Even without Special Defense investment, Alcremie can check special wallbreakers and stay healthy with Recover or Draining Kiss. It isn't reliable against foes that resist Fairy and ones that can safely set up on it, however.
Common Moves
========
**Primary STAB Moves**: Draining Kiss, Dazzling Gleam, Alluring Voice
**Setup Moves**: Acid Armor, Calm Mind
**Utility Moves**: Encore, Recover, Rest, Sleep Talk
**Coverage**: Giga Drain, Energy Ball, Psychic, Psyshock, Stored Power
Niche Moves
========
**Endeavor**: With its great bulk, Alcremie can often survive hits from its checks and weaken them in return with Endeavor.
**Endure**: Endure can be used with Endeavor and Custap Berry to severely weaken a foe, though this is often predictable after using Endure. It can also let Alcremie attack a faster foe with one of its damaging moves.
**Misty Explosion**: Misty Explosion gives Alcremie a form of pivoting, sacrificing itself to get a teammate in safely while dealing a reasonable amount of damage to the foe.
Common Items
========
**Leftovers**: Leftovers keeps Alcremie healthy, especially since it can already tank many hits effectively. It synergizes well with Recover and Draining Kiss to keep it as healthy as possible.
**Heavy-Duty Boots**: Heavy-Duty Boots keeps Alcremie healthy and makes it immune to Toxic Spikes, which make it really difficult for it to do its role.
**Sitrus Berry**: When Alcremie is expected to take strong hits, Sitrus Berry is preferred to turn a 2HKO into a 3HKO, letting it switch in more safely and attack afterwards.
Niche Items
========
**Weakness Policy**: On setup sets, Alcremie can easily survive super effective attacks after boosting its defensive stats, activating Weakness Policy and making Stored Power incredibly strong.
**Eject Button**: Since Alcremie is very bulky but relatively passive, it can take a hit from many wallbreakers and pivot out with Eject Button to bring in a teammate safely.
**Resistance Berries**: Resistance Berries let Alcremie take a super effective hit, allowing it to set up more reliably.
**Chesto Berry**: If a foe is expected to have Toxic, Rest is often preferred over Recover to remove the status effect. Chesto Berry lets Alcremie immediately wake up so that it isn't passive for two turns.
Tera
========
Alcremie is not often made a Tera Captain, since higher-tiered primary and secondary Captains are almost always preferred, but it can strongly benefit from Tera to gain additional coverage. Although its Fairy typing is already a great defensive typing, other Tera types like Tera Water, Poison, and Steel are sometimes preferred to set up on or check specific foes. Tera Poison and Steel also make it immune to poison, making it more annoying to take down. Offensively, it benefits from Tera Ground and Fighting to gain necessary coverage to beat foes that it normally cannot touch. Tera Fairy can also be used to make Draining Kiss much stronger, further increasing Alcremie's longevity and making it much stronger.
Draft Strategy
========
Alcremie works best as a final pick to cover specific weaknesses and be an occasional setup sweeper that can catch opponents off guard. Teams should be able to function fine without it, and it enjoys teammates that can check Dragon- and Dark-types so that it isn't relied upon more than needed. It is often difficult for opponents to prepare for Alcremie on top of other threatening sweepers and wallbreakers on its team, and many people completely underestimate it, making it a solid wincon in the occasional matchup.
Checks and Counters
========
**Steel- and Poison-types**: Alcremie has no reliable way of dealing with Steel-types like Gholdengo and Kingambit and Poison-types like Clodsire and Pecharunt. They resist its STAB moves and generally only get beaten by Stored Power after many boosts. Poison-types can be beaten by other Psychic-type coverage, but this coverage is almost never used due to Alcremie's need to run other moves.
**Toxic**: Alcremie has no way of healing from status effects other than Rest, and it needs many turns to get its setup sets working, so Toxic can easily put it on a timer and prevent it from sweeping. Many non-Poison-types like Terapagos, Dudunsparce, and Gliscor can poison it with Toxic.
**Disruption**: Alcremie can be shut down by moves that remove stat boosts like Haze and Clear Smog as well as phazing options like Whirlwind and Roar.
**Physical Wallbreakers**: Before Alcremie gets a chance to use Acid Armor, many physical wallbreakers like Meowscarada, Gouging Fire, and Palafin can break through it, even if it's fully invested in Defense. If it can survive a hit with reasonable health left, however, it can become much more difficult to take down when its Defense is boosted, making these not the most reliable answers.
[credits]
Written by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/techno.527276/
Quality checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/nyx.564960/
Grammar checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/solarbeam.470115/
**Draft Order**: Round 8
**Price Range**: 1-2 points
**Overview**: Alcremie is a serviceable budget Fairy-type that can occasionally be a surprisingly solid setup sweeper. Aroma Veil is an incredibly valuable ability in the metagame, making it immune to Taunt and Encore so that it is even harder to stop once it gets going with defensive boosts. It also has excellent Special Defense, allowing it to check many of the most prominent special wallbreakers while staying healthy with Recover. However, its lack of coverage makes it get completely walled by many prominent types including Steel-types, and its setup variants get shut down by phazing and Toxic, making it difficult to pull off.
[strategy comments]
Common Roles
========
**Setup Sweeper**: With Acid Armor and Calm Mind, Alcremie can become unbreakable, especially since it cannot be stopped by Taunt and Encore. These sets are often paired with Draining Kiss to keep it healthy, Stored Power to do massive damage to Fairy-resistant foes, and Recover to remain healthy, though it often needs all five of these moves, making it tricky to choose which one is unnecessary.
**Special Wall**: Even without Special Defense investment, Alcremie can check special wallbreakers and stay healthy with Recover or Draining Kiss. It isn't reliable against foes that resist Fairy and ones that can safely set up on it, however.
Common Moves
========
**Primary STAB Moves**: Draining Kiss, Dazzling Gleam, Alluring Voice
**Setup Moves**: Acid Armor, Calm Mind
**Utility Moves**: Encore, Recover, Rest, Sleep Talk
**Coverage**: Giga Drain, Energy Ball, Psychic, Psyshock, Stored Power
Niche Moves
========
**Endeavor**: With its great bulk, Alcremie can often survive hits from its checks and weaken them in return with Endeavor.
**Endure**: Endure can be used with Endeavor and Custap Berry to severely weaken a foe, though this is often predictable after using Endure. It can also let Alcremie attack a faster foe with one of its damaging moves.
**Misty Explosion**: Misty Explosion gives Alcremie a form of pivoting, sacrificing itself to get a teammate in safely while dealing a reasonable amount of damage to the foe.
Common Items
========
**Leftovers**: Leftovers keeps Alcremie healthy, especially since it can already tank many hits effectively. It synergizes well with Recover and Draining Kiss to keep it as healthy as possible.
**Heavy-Duty Boots**: Heavy-Duty Boots keeps Alcremie healthy and makes it immune to Toxic Spikes, which make it really difficult for it to do its role.
**Sitrus Berry**: When Alcremie is expected to take strong hits, Sitrus Berry is preferred to turn a 2HKO into a 3HKO, letting it switch in more safely and attack afterwards.
Niche Items
========
**Weakness Policy**: On setup sets, Alcremie can easily survive super effective attacks after boosting its defensive stats, activating Weakness Policy and making Stored Power incredibly strong.
**Eject Button**: Since Alcremie is very bulky but relatively passive, it can take a hit from many wallbreakers and pivot out with Eject Button to bring in a teammate safely.
**Resistance Berries**: Resistance Berries let Alcremie take a super effective hit, allowing it to set up more reliably.
**Chesto Berry**: If a foe is expected to have Toxic, Rest is often preferred over Recover to remove the status effect. Chesto Berry lets Alcremie immediately wake up so that it isn't passive for two turns.
Tera
========
Alcremie is not often made a Tera Captain, since higher-tiered primary and secondary Captains are almost always preferred, but it can strongly benefit from Tera to gain additional coverage. Although its Fairy typing is already a great defensive typing, other Tera types like Tera Water, Poison, and Steel are sometimes preferred to set up on or check specific foes. Tera Poison and Steel also make it immune to poison, making it more annoying to take down. Offensively, it benefits from Tera Ground and Fighting to gain necessary coverage to beat foes that it normally cannot touch. Tera Fairy can also be used to make Draining Kiss much stronger, further increasing Alcremie's longevity and making it much stronger.
Draft Strategy
========
Alcremie works best as a final pick to cover specific weaknesses and be an occasional setup sweeper that can catch opponents off guard. Teams should be able to function fine without it, and it enjoys teammates that can check Dragon- and Dark-types so that it isn't relied upon more than needed. It is often difficult for opponents to prepare for Alcremie on top of other threatening sweepers and wallbreakers on its team, and many people completely underestimate it, making it a solid wincon in the occasional matchup.
Checks and Counters
========
**Steel- and Poison-types**: Alcremie has no reliable way of dealing with Steel-types like Gholdengo and Kingambit and Poison-types like Clodsire and Pecharunt. They resist its STAB moves and generally only get beaten by Stored Power after many boosts. Poison-types can be beaten by other Psychic-type coverage, but this coverage is almost never used due to Alcremie's need to run other moves.
**Toxic**: Alcremie has no way of healing from status effects other than Rest, and it needs many turns to get its setup sets working, so Toxic can easily put it on a timer and prevent it from sweeping. Many non-Poison-types like Terapagos, Dudunsparce, and Gliscor can poison it with Toxic.
**Disruption**: Alcremie can be shut down by moves that remove stat boosts like Haze and Clear Smog as well as phazing options like Whirlwind and Roar.
**Physical Wallbreakers**: Before Alcremie gets a chance to use Acid Armor, many physical wallbreakers like Meowscarada, Gouging Fire, and Palafin can break through it, even if it's fully invested in Defense. If it can survive a hit with reasonable health left, however, it can become much more difficult to take down when its Defense is boosted, making these not the most reliable answers.
[credits]
Written by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/techno.527276/
Quality checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/nyx.564960/
Grammar checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/solarbeam.470115/
Last edited:
