Gen III Battle Frontier Discussion and Records

[AgentMichaelSkarm]

You mentioned something about RNG and I thought you might like my simple quick decent IV method. It does require some hax but it saves soooo much time and you don't have to look up sets.
1. Catch a 6IV pokemon using the ruby tower glitch, e.g. blaziken as it gives you a salac berry and is of the ground egg group which is the largest most diverse. Alsp think egg moves. This is easy and if you can achieve such high streaks on emerald, you'll be able to smash through this glitch quick (rby trainers/sets not as good and less mons).
2. Hopefully now you're smiling you have access to pinch berries without buying a game cube and playing those gc pokemon games for ever (they cost so much too). RNG a good ditto (I got a 4IV one (defenses and speed), gental, ditto, and between Blaziken and ditto I can breed a lot of mons quickly especially when chain breeding (maybe not the right ones, but a lot).
3. I like to breed as many creative sets as possible and wait for a female with a nature that works. Breed that again with your 6IV pokemon and ta-da, a strong mon. You can RNG or soft reset at this stage.

I'll have to try this with my Sapphire since I don't mind restarting that game over and over anyways. As for dittos and breeding, I have a PC box with a grid of dittos matching the nature grid. I'm missing a couple key ones like Adamant and Timid but it's saved me SO much time trying to get good females. Spending a couple days to a week breeding a properly-natured mon, vs back in March when I spent the entire month trying to breed an exceptional Swampert, has been a lifesaver.

In other great news, I just caught the Pokerus !!! Very excited to not have to EV train as hard anymore. Plus with a dead battery it'll just keep spreading.

Last but not least, Happy Halloween

 

[N1c69]

Dunsparce memes aside, it actually had me thinking about a team that can take advantage of paralyzing the entire enemy team and then utilizing a pokemon that is normally too slow to act as an effective sweeper. This is what I've been thinking about:

Supportive Gyarados
Intimidate
Timid (?) to reduce Confusion dmg a bit
Invest in speed (either max speed, or pick a tier to outspeed) and place the rest in bulk
TWave, Roar, Torment, (Protect?)
Lum berry?

The aim of Gyarados is to paralyze the opponent, then roar to the next opponent and continue to paralyze. Once the entire enemy team is paralyzed or removed, you can Torment the best option and switch to your setup pokemon. You can also obviously swap-stall support with intimidate. I was thinking protect to allow better stall against tormented pokemon but perhaps there is a better move. Also, the only other good TWave + Roar poke I could think of is Zapdos, but the speed isn't too necessary since Roar is low prio anyways and I'd rather have the bulk to take hits, and the speed only matters when trying to TWave the enemy before they make a move. That decision may also come down to ability (Intimidate vs Pressure) and moveset (Gyarados learns torment, while Zapdos can use TBolt to remove opposing water types which may be an issue). With only 3 enemy pokemon it shouldn't be too hard to manage paralyzing all of them, and the combo of Torment + Roar would ruin boosters before they even get a chance to set up. As an added bonus, using Roar to cycle through the enemy team allows you to scout sets before playing around them.

To complement Gyarados, we need a teammate that can A) take TBolt and B) take Rock Slides, meaning a Ground type. We also need a pokemon that can remove opposing ground types who are immune to TWave. The obvious choice here is Swampert.

Swampert
EQ, Surf, Ice Beam, Protect
Leftovers (or leave leftovers for the sweeper)

Protect works well with torment, and Swampert can switch in and remove ground types, STAB rock users, and electric types. Swampert being slow means it can also generally take advantage of paralyzed pokemon.


Finally, we want a pokemon that can effectively sweep, but normally is too slow to do so (our "dunsparce"). In my mind I was thinking of something like a Bulk Up Ursaring. You can switch it in on a paralyzed + tormented pokemon, boost up, and go to town. Even at +2 Ursaring would be devastating, especially if it's attacking before the enemy gets a chance to move. Haven't thought of a moveset but probably something like Double Edge, EQ and RS would work.

###EDIT number 2###

This is merely an experiment on building a bulky/support gyarados/ making use of an good IV magikarp I randomly hatched. The strategy of paralise then roar can be replaced with a more lead focused role of immobilising the first pokemon and replacing the moves listed bellow with moves like: Twave; Toment; Taunt.
DD would work with the below ev's as it give gyara more bulk to set up and can use surf for Rhydon instead of DDing a bunch to KOing with EQ. EQ could damage lanturn and amphoras a bit before being KO'd. HP flying is helpful for heracross, a dangerous pokemon that can set up with SD, bulk up, reversal. HP fly is also useful for pinsir, another OHKO user. I am yet to do calcs but am sure pinsir would be 2HKO'd with minimal attack investment. OHKOing Rhydon with surf is advantages for a lead since it is generally a hard pokemon to deal with if it comes out first, especially without a sturdy user (Rhydon could crit steelix or foretress, skarmory is good but should not be the only reliable OHKO counter). Immunity to fissure and outspeeding sheer cold users helps this lead to secure some kind of move before being KO'd. CPU is likely to use electric moves, so strategies like Green Typhlosions lightnight-rod doubles may work well.
Sassy is also my prefered nature for palace, which is one of the quickest facilities to earn BP.
###

Cool idea. I randomly hatched a 'wonderfully outstanding' sassy Magikarp a while back and now am finally inspired to make a set for it using that idea. Other natures may be more suitable for higher speed teirs, but I like mixed bulk and offenses. Hope these calcs help.


Gyarados @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
EVs: 226 HP / 40 Def / 236 SpA / 4 SpD / 2 Spe
Sassy Nature
- Thunder Wave
- Roar
- Body Slam
- Surf

• Thunder wave + body slam combo lets Gyarados paralise ground types and electric types (although it loses to electric types).
• Surf + Body slam allow Gyarados to make use of its 125 base attack and SpA investment with a stab will give some power on the SpA side (base 60 isn't all that bad with investment).
• General strategy is to paralise and roar while providing chip damage to pave the way for a sweeper.
• As I'm not running rest I will have a status absorbers, guts users, a sub users.
Calcs:
• 236 SpA Surf OHKO's Horn drill Rhydon, 2HKO's Horn drill Nidoking, Aerodactyl, 91.8% chance to 2HKO Armaldo 1
• 40 Def Gyarados v.s. Intimidated Armaldo 1 3HKO's with Ancient power, intimidated Aerodactyl 3HKO's with rock slide.
• 4 SpD lets Gyarados survive a thunder from Agron and 2HKO it back.
• Gyarados can survive thunderpunches from Metagross 6 and 7, Grumpin 2 and Ludioculo 1, Weezing's thunder and some other weaker electric attacks.
• Sassy nature is not too bad here since roar has negative priority and it has twave.
• A speed stat of 91 outspeeds:
• Hax-Walrien and friends (immune to fissure, outspeeds Horndrill Rhydon)
• Thunderpunch and the leech seed Luduculos,
• Thunderpunch Metagross
• Ampharos, Lanturn (1HKO's Gyarados though)
• Outspeeds a lot of ground and water types, normal types like twave Granbull, walls.
• Gyarados can outspeed the meta when if opposing mon is paralised

 

[QuentinQuonce]

Sigh. So I've been testing several Pokemon for my Tower singles team. Alakazam has always been a favourite, and it's killer in the early rounds, so I played around with a Calm Mind build - with enough Speed to outrun the entire Frontier except that one Timid Jolteon - and hot damn is it hot garbage. Failed to KO Swampert with Psychic after 2 CMs, fails to KO Vaporeon with Thunderpunch after 3 CMs. How can something with higher SpAtk than Latios be so piss-weak?

Gyarados-wise, I ran one with a bit of bulk (check out my Doubles team a few posts back) but playing around with an IV calculator currently and wanted to share some thoughts about how to use a bulky DDer. Doubles means there's less time to boost but Singles gives more opportunity to grab two or three (or ideally six) boosts which allows for a lot more flexibility with your stats.

Impish with 252 HP/54 Attack/100 Def/16 SpD/88 Speed gets you to a few good benchmarks: equal defences (240 each), 394 HP, and 220 Speed. This outruns Starmie and Raikou after one DD, but even less speed is an option given that - as I said - boosting more than once is the goal here. With no Speed EVs at all, Gyarados outruns the entire Frontier after two DDs. So with no speed EVs at all, you can go Impish with 252 HP/58 Attack/184 Def/16 SpD instead for even more physical bulk. But it depends on what you want to do with it - those extra EVs can be shifted to SpD instead. Gyarados is surprisingly versatile given its barren movepool.

Note that this is all at level 100, and if you want to run HP Flying the best IV combination possible is 31/31/31/30/30/30 so you'll need to tweak the EVs slightly to compensate.

https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/hidden-power-iv-combinations.78083/

Anyway, Singles team research continues.

EDIT:

Cool idea. I randomly hatched a 'wonderfully outstanding' sassy Magikarp a while back and now am finally inspired to make a set for it using that idea. Other natures may be more suitable for higher speed teirs, but I like mixed bulk and offenses. Hope these calcs help.

Gyarados @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
EVs: 226 HP / 40 Def / 236 SpA / 4 SpD
Calm Nature
- Thunder Wave
- Roar
- Body Slam
- Surf

• Thunder wave + body slam combo lets Gyarados paralise ground types and electric types (although it loses to electric types).
• Surf + Body slam allow Gyarados to make use of its 125 base attack and SpA investment with a stab will give some power on the SpA side (base 60 isn't all that bad with investment).
• General strategy is to paralise and roar while providing chip damage to pave the way for a sweeper.
• As I'm not running rest I will have a status absorbers, guts users, a sub users.
Calcs:
• 236 SpA Surf OHKO's Horn drill Rhydon, 2HKO's Horn drill Nidoking, Aerodactyl, 91.8% chance to 2HKO Armaldo 1
• 40 Def Gyarados v.s. Intimidated Armaldo 1 3HKO's with Ancient power, intimidated Aerodactyl 3HKO's with rock slide.
• 4 SpD lets Gyarados survive a thunder from Agron and 2HKO it back.
• Gyarados can survive thunderpunches from Metagross 6 and 7, Grumpin 2 and Ludioculo 1, Weezing's thunder and some other weaker electric attacks.
• Sassy nature is not too bad here since roar has negative priority and it has twave.
• A speed stat of 91 outspeeds:
• Hax-Walrien and friends (immune to fissure, outspeeds Horndrill Rhydon)
• Thunderpunch and the leech seed Luduculos,
• Thunderpunch Metagross
• Ampharos, Lanturn (1HKO's Gyarados though)
• Outspeeds a lot of ground and water types, normal types like twave Granbull, walls.
• Metagross can outspeed pokemon the meta when if opposing mon is paralised

Ninja'd!

 

[Kommo-o]

###EDIT### Nature is meant to be sassy not calm and I forgot ev's

Cool idea. I randomly hatched a 'wonderfully outstanding' sassy Magikarp a while back and now am finally inspired to make a set for it using that idea. Other natures may be more suitable for higher speed teirs, but I like mixed bulk and offenses. Hope these calcs help.

Gyarados @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
EVs: 226 HP / 40 Def / 236 SpA / 4 SpD / 2 Spe
Sassy Nature
- Thunder Wave
- Roar
- Body Slam
- Surf

• Thunder wave + body slam combo lets Gyarados paralise ground types and electric types (although it loses to electric types).
• Surf + Body slam allow Gyarados to make use of its 125 base attack and SpA investment with a stab will give some power on the SpA side (base 60 isn't all that bad with investment).
• General strategy is to paralise and roar while providing chip damage to pave the way for a sweeper.
• As I'm not running rest I will have a status absorbers, guts users, a sub users.
Calcs:
• 236 SpA Surf OHKO's Horn drill Rhydon, 2HKO's Horn drill Nidoking, Aerodactyl, 91.8% chance to 2HKO Armaldo 1
• 40 Def Gyarados v.s. Intimidated Armaldo 1 3HKO's with Ancient power, intimidated Aerodactyl 3HKO's with rock slide.
• 4 SpD lets Gyarados survive a thunder from Agron and 2HKO it back.
• Gyarados can survive thunderpunches from Metagross 6 and 7, Grumpin 2 and Ludioculo 1, Weezing's thunder and some other weaker electric attacks.
• Sassy nature is not too bad here since roar has negative priority and it has twave.
• A speed stat of 91 outspeeds:
• Hax-Walrien and friends (immune to fissure, outspeeds Horndrill Rhydon)
• Thunderpunch and the leech seed Luduculos,
• Thunderpunch Metagross
• Ampharos, Lanturn (1HKO's Gyarados though)
• Outspeeds a lot of ground and water types, normal types like twave Granbull, walls.
• Metagross can outspeed pokemon the meta when if opposing mon is paralised

I'm sorry, but if I have to put this very kindly, this is one of the worst Gyarados sets I have seen and a complete waste of potential of what it is supposed to do on Tower. If you really just want a phazer, use Skarmory, Steelix or even Vaporeon. Why would you even rely on Body Slam's 30% chance to paralyze and let alone make benchmarks on Pokemon that Gyarados at most will not beat 1-v-1 if luck is not on its favor? If you want a crippler, there's a lot of better Pokemon for this role.

 

[Kommo-o]

All I know that is I Ctrl + F’d ‘Haze’ on the max stats database and the only mon who I found was a level 50 Koffing, which you obviously would only see in the first few rounds.

You can pass the focus energy boost, I imagine you can pass Lansat as well. I don’t think that would be the best strategy for it though. I’m thinking either Choice Trick on turn 1 or torment looping and boosting on the free turns, then passing to Cradily

Roar exists and it is very widely distributed on Gen 3. Haze is probably the least of concerns for teams that want to rely on Baton Pass.

 

[Kommo-o]

Dunsparce memes aside, it actually had me thinking about a team that can take advantage of paralyzing the entire enemy team and then utilizing a pokemon that is normally too slow to act as an effective sweeper. This is what I've been thinking about:

Supportive Gyarados
Intimidate
Timid (?) to reduce Confusion dmg a bit
Invest in speed (either max speed, or pick a tier to outspeed) and place the rest in bulk
TWave, Roar, Torment, (Protect?)
Lum berry?

The aim of Gyarados is to paralyze the opponent, then roar to the next opponent and continue to paralyze. Once the entire enemy team is paralyzed or removed, you can Torment the best option and switch to your setup pokemon. You can also obviously swap-stall support with intimidate. I was thinking protect to allow better stall against tormented pokemon but perhaps there is a better move. Also, the only other good TWave + Roar poke I could think of is Zapdos, but the speed isn't too necessary since Roar is low prio anyways and I'd rather have the bulk to take hits, and the speed only matters when trying to TWave the enemy before they make a move. That decision may also come down to ability (Intimidate vs Pressure) and moveset (Gyarados learns torment, while Zapdos can use TBolt to remove opposing water types which may be an issue). With only 3 enemy pokemon it shouldn't be too hard to manage paralyzing all of them, and the combo of Torment + Roar would ruin boosters before they even get a chance to set up. As an added bonus, using Roar to cycle through the enemy team allows you to scout sets before playing around them.

To complement Gyarados, we need a teammate that can A) take TBolt and B) take Rock Slides, meaning a Ground type. We also need a pokemon that can remove opposing ground types who are immune to TWave. The obvious choice here is Swampert.

Swampert
EQ, Surf, Ice Beam, Protect
Leftovers (or leave leftovers for the sweeper)

Protect works well with torment, and Swampert can switch in and remove ground types, STAB rock users, and electric types. Swampert being slow means it can also generally take advantage of paralyzed pokemon.


Finally, we want a pokemon that can effectively sweep, but normally is too slow to do so (our "dunsparce"). In my mind I was thinking of something like a Bulk Up Ursaring. You can switch it in on a paralyzed + tormented pokemon, boost up, and go to town. Even at +2 Ursaring would be devastating, especially if it's attacking before the enemy gets a chance to move. Haven't thought of a moveset but probably something like Double Edge, EQ and RS would work.

Sceptile 4 and Lati@s 1/2 are going to eat this team for breakfast. For starters, your main sweeper should be something that can rely by itself once it sets up and not completely reliant on something like "spreading paralysis on the whole team." How exactly is this strategy going to work once Gyarados gets critted to death or gets flinched / paralyzed / haxxed / etc? Don't forget that Roar gives a negative priority so Gyarados is going to be super vulnerable to whatever the AI attempts during that turn. Don't forget that there's fast Ground types like Flygon who are immune to paralysis and they can also hurt Gyarados badly (Flygon 3/4 are mixed however they carry a Scope Lens which makes crits happen more often).

Ursaring is a very underwhelming for being a main sweeper without Baton Pass on its favor. How are you going to deal with faster special attackers like Alakazam or Lati@s even if it gets to +6? You're racking up damage and Ursaring is too slow to be relied upon as the main sweeper. Without recovery, it's going to accumulate the damage and with Normal being a mediocre typing, it will easily get down. If you want to use Ursaring, you're just much better on using it as a more direct attacker like a Choice Bander. Otherwise stick to a Dragon Dancer like Gyarados (which is a superb DD user due to not being weak to Ice) or Salamence. These Pokemon gain Speed and Attack which makes them deadly on the long run and capable of destroying a whole team by themselves without relying on teammates once they fully set up.

 

[AgentMichaelSkarm]

Sorry if I've offended you. I think maybe this forum & these Frontier challenges aren't the best way for me to have fun playing pokemon. Thanks all for your time and good luck on your future streaks

 

[N1c69]

Sorry if I've offended you. I think maybe this forum & these Frontier challenges aren't the best way for me to have fun playing pokemon. Thanks all for your time and good luck on your future streaks

I feel the same. I like to play frontier casually and usually breed lots of pokemon to create the most unique sets. I think by theorymoning on this forum, we can all learn what works and what doesn't. The home page does encourage theorymoning right? I like to hear creative solutions to battle frontier challenges, otherwise we'd all copy each others teams or pokemon sets. Even if a certain set is not as viable as others, does not mean it should be shot down straight away, instead calcs and alternative moves could be used to critique them. A lot of my theorymoning is on very niche roles, more for the fun of what if scenarios than designing indestructible teams for steaks of infinity and beyond. E.g. i've used sub, curse, amnesia, hp steel registeel before but find the game becomes monotonous when setting up the same way on every possible lead. Not that this is not the optimal way to play the game. My goal atm is just designing multiple teams to win each challenge's gold medal and potentially work up leaderboards. If everyone prefers commenting only on teams that have been proven to win, I'm happy to keep my theorymoning to myself and only post what actually gives me competitive streaks. The reason I like to post ideas is so that if I come up with an idea but lose by playing it wrong, it doesn't mean it can't be considered/modified by someone else.

 

[Kommo-o]

Sorry if I've offended you. I think maybe this forum & these Frontier challenges aren't the best way for me to have fun playing pokemon. Thanks all for your time and good luck on your future streaks

Apologies if you felt offended (same goes for N1c69) if you felt that I probably came too harsh on my reviews. My intention is not to undermine any kind of creativity as long as it comes with a purpose. I just felt that the Gyarados set previously recommended was not a good set and if you really want to try a different crippler / sweeper, there are better options that you can still explore upon while achieving satisfactory results. You don't have to necessarily stick to something that is vastly overused in here but I can guarantee you there are more options in here. It's all about on how you build your team. You're not offending anyone in here and again, I apologize if you feel I did.

I did recommended on my previous comment to experiment with CB Ursaring since it's a strong hitter and it can even use some Speed EVs to speed creep some targets like Walrein / Lapras ICYMI. Ursaring is a Pokemon that has not been used a lot yet, so have a chance to make it work here. You can complement this set with a bulky DD Gyarados set that covers its Fight weakness while providing sweeping potential on the long run (Ursaring can't provide that unless you use a strict Baton Pass team). You should also check Actaeon's mono type activity since he comes up with sets that do have excellent potential and that you can even adapt from there (I used a Forretress that was based on his previous Dome runs to which I was not a big believer at first).

 

[average fella]

63 wins in Level 100 Factory

proof

I did not expect this at all. I play gen 4 frontier a lot, but only recently did I have the inclination to try palace. Yes, palace. I rng'd my mons, and realized that in order to complete slidequake metagross, I would have to amass 48 BP, and I only had 5. I noticed that I had a streak in factory of 21, that was at least 6 months old. I could simply play until I lost, start again, beat Noland a couple times, and that'd be enough for me to get Rock Slide, so that I could get a team up and running for a facility that I wanted to play.

That's not what happened.

rd 4

I didn't really have any heavy commentary on this, but I can tell you roughly what happened. The draft included Dugtrio4 and Porygon2-4, P2-4 alone was enough to beat most of the battles, Dugtrio managed to beat a couple of fire specialists, but I don't have any dramatic battles to share.

rd 5

This draft was so amazing that pretty much anyone could pilot it to a win. This includes me!
I didn't keep a log of the entire draft, but I did note the important guys:
Latios4, Suicune1, Zapdos2.

2 of these are great sets, the other is a mon with great stats who is shackled to a dumb Rain Dance set.

Battle 30 gives me a battle with a trainer with 2 mons I forget, and a Raikou3. Raikou3 is amazing, even if its only real good move is Thunderbolt. I take it over Zapdos2, and cruise to a win.

rd 6

Where it actually got difficult.
Draft is composed of:

Umbreon4, Raikou2, Blastoise4, Tentacruel1, Cradily2, Armaldo1

I take Raikou2/Blastoise4/Umbreon4.

Battle 36 is not super notable, but it does allow me to trade Umbreon4 for Salamence8.

Battle 38
Raikou has been being kind of useless, but against Electabuzz4, it can set up rain! It rain dances, takes under half from mega kick, thunder does over half to electabuzz and paralyzes it... as mega kick crits.

Blastoise outspeeds para'd electabuzz with rain-boosted surf, tanks an earthquake from Typhlosion?, and kills that with surf, and in comes their last: Snorlax4.

2 surfs do less than 2/3, in those turns Snorlax curses, and double-edges to kill Blastoise. The recoil puts it in dragon claw range, so no harm done.

I decide that I will take Snorlax4 in lead, as Raikou has done a whole lot of nothing this set.

Battle 39

Snorlax takes an earthquake from Steelix?, which wasn't good, but ultimately inconsequential. I realize this mistake, and put in Blastoise. Surf ohkos Steelix, Shuckle comes in and lays sandstorm as it gets 2hko'd by surf, and in comes...

823 Lapras7 Calm Leppa Berry Sheer Cold Horn Drill Rest Sleep Talk 170/ 0 /170/ 0 /170/ 0

I earthquake it a couple times, as sheer cold whiffs, whiffs, it then proceeds to rest, and call sheer cold which kills.

In comes Snorlax, who has a decent matchup against it, as it can ohko if it dodges a horn drill...
Which it doesn't. Salamence8 has to beat this thing by itself.

I notice a certain detail. Salamence8 has a fourth move that's pretty useless 99% of the time, Attract. Largely useless becauase it rarely gets an advantage from using it before either it or its opponent dies, compounded by only being usable on half of all mons. This mence is male, the Lapras is female. I use Attract, my chances of losing go down from 30% to 15%. Lapras uses sleep talk as it wakes up, God bless emerald AI.

Lapras rests, I crunch it twice, trying to cheese for a spD drop so I can kill this thing, either by critting so I suddenly get on pace to 3hko it, or get a spD drop so I can 2hko it with dragon claw. Immobilized by love twice, 3 crunches don't get the spD drop. I crunch again as it rests, and get the spD drop. Sleep Talk calls horn drill, which whiffs. 2 dragon claws kill.

Battle 42
Not super notable. Blastoise comes in on an Armaldo1 protect, Surf nearly kills as AncientPower does about a third, surf kills. Next up is Mr. Mime1, Snorlax comes in, shadow balls it as it reflects, gets a curse up, 2 shadow balls kill it, but snorlax is nearly dead. Suicune3 lastmon, ice beams to kill snorlax. In comes Blastoise, it rain dances as eq does about a fifth. After calcing a bit, it surfs me to under a third, as mirror coat results in cune nearly being dead. It kills Blastoise, and gets outsped by Salamence8. I just got Factory Gold without really trying. Funniest part is that I'm still 18 BP short of my BP grinding goal.

rd 7

I could not have gotten to 63 wins without getting very, very lucky. Too many people have tried for too long to be able to just plow your way there with skill alone. This is one of a few drafts where I pull an OP Lati@s set and (relatively) cruise to victory.

This time, I pull a Latias3 in the draft, get Metagross5 as a trade. Drama seems to be nonexistent...

Battle 49
I don't even remember the lead. It did half to Latias, in comes Gengar4, so I get out of the way.

It ice punches metagross, and fire punches it to bring it to within an inch of its life. My best move against it was rock slide, which did about 2/3. Next fire punch obviously kills, in comes my seldom-used third mon, Lanturn4. It uses destiny bond, it has killed 2/3 of my team and left me with a half-health Latias against their last.

Steelix2 is their last. Luckily, its only attacking move that hits Latias is Dragonbreath, so I feel somewhat optimistic, if it fails to paralyze me then I can win, since it'd do a pittance.

0 SpA Steelix Dragon Breath vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Latias: 44-52 (14.6 - 17.2%) -- possible 6HKO

First turn, ice beam does under half, it uses sandstorm. Ice beam continues to do under half, it uses... Block. Next ice beam kills. I don't understand, if the AI played optimally it still likely would have lost just because of how bad Steelix2 is, but it didnt even use dragonbreath once.

rd 8

My draft is:

nidoqueen4, crobat3, magmar1, salamence1, granbull3, tentacruel4

I take Salamence1, Granbull3, and Tentacruel4.

Battle 51
Raikou3 is their lead, so immediately I'm scared. It twaves me, and Salamence1 is parahaxed twice in a row as tbolt 2hkos.
Granbull comes in, takes a tbolt for 2/3 of its health, and eqs to finally kill it. Next up is Dragonite6/7, who takes me down to 9 health with... Surf. Double-Edge nearly kills it, and kills me.
Tentacruel comes in, outspeeds and kills the near-dead Dragonite. Last is Mr. Mime?, who Psychics me to do about half, and dies to mirror coat.

Raikou3 is an amazing trade option, I take it over Tentacruel.

Nothing else notable happens.

rd 9

Latios3 is in the draft. No more needed:

Latios3, Fearow3, Fearow2, Gardevoir1, Kangaskhan3, Whiscash1

I take Latios3/Kang3/Whiscash1.

Battle 60, I trade for Heracross?, who seems better than Kang. I only saw it use Megahorn, so I didn't know what set it was.
Battle 61
The Heracross is Heracross3, this will be important later. The opponent, a psychic specialist, leads Gardevoir, who traces Levitate. Latios3 is amazing, but a Psychic-breaker it is not, so I go into Whiscash. It ice punches it, then psychics as I... eq into levitate. This DID provide me with good info, though: this is Gardevoir4, since it didn't use Magical Leaf. Gardevoir4 loses in speed to Heracross3, so it has to hit a Megahorn...
It hits, and ohkos. In comes Alakazam, and I am fully accepting that I will lose. I click earthquake as it uses... Trick. I now have a cool choice band and Alakazam is dead, in comes Hypno.

I decide to put in Latios on a Psychic, and either A) chip it enough so that banded EQ kills, or B) die immediately so I can use banded megahorn to have a shot at winning. Ultimately, it gives me 3 sleep turns in total, only used Nightmare at the end which was rather confusing, didn't use dream eater at all, and was at about half when Latios went down. Banded earthquake took it out, jam escaped.

rd 10

I thought I'd die on a bad draft. Things aren't going as I expect. Yet another Latios3 in the draft makes me confident.

Draft is:

latios3(AGAIN), charizard3, moltres3, wailord1, heracross2, quagsire2

I take Latios3/Moltres3/Heracross2.

Battle 64
Water specialist.

Lead Blastoise4 takes a Thunderbolt for about 3/4, and ice beam does under half to me. I could not be more confident.
...It lives with Focus Band, ice beam freezes me, I don't thaw first turn and ice beam kills. This battle is now going off the rails.

Heracross comes in, eq kills. Next up is Gengar, and suddenly I am very convinced that I'll lose.
I get incredibly confused when Heracross outspeeds, and it uses Psychic. I was going to sack this, but I think for a while looking at the sets that it could possibly be. Because I am an idiot, I sack hera, put in moltres, and then rk it with Moltres, despite knowing damn well the last mon is a water type.

God throws me a life preserver, Dewgong1 is maybe the ideal water mon to face in this scenario. It tanks a fire blast, it's thick fat. It icy winds me. I use the chestorest to avoid an assured KO from the ice beam, which instead brings me to about 200/300something. I Sunny Day, now seeing the roll and seeing how unlikely it is for me to 3hko it (maybe a misplay, prolly should have gone for either a crit or a burn, which just entails clicking fire blast a lot.) Dewgong icy winds me twice as I fire blast to bring it to about 4 pixels, and now that I'm at -3, it outspeeds me and ice beams me.

Dead at 64, I absolutely got mished by the focus band-inopportune freeze-Dewgong combo.

I didn't try at all for this record, and I'd be willing to bet that anyone with, like, 20 hours+ in emerald factory could have gotten way higher than I have if they had the ridiculous draft luck I had. I guess that's Pokemon for you.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

Is Golden Blissey still active on here? Kinda itching to see my new streaks up on the board, ngl...

 

[DrDimentio]

I decided to kick a new project consisting of making teams that are good enough to grind for the Gold Symbol in Battle Tower. With my main focus being on singles (since you only get the Symbol on that format anyways) I decided to restrict myself to a pool consisting of using only Pokemon that can be obtained on Emerald.

Thanos (Starmie) @ Lum Berry / Petaya Berry
IVs: 6 Atk
EVs: 252 SpA / 6 SpD / 252 Spe
Ability: Natural Cure
Level: 50
Shiny: Yes
Modest Nature
- Surf
- Psychic
- Ice Beam
- Thunderbolt

Sorry I only just saw this (haven't been on Smogon for ages), thanks for mentioning my point about the Lum Berry - I just wanted to mention that with the restriction of an Emerald-only team, I'm fairly sure the Petaya Berry can't be obtained in Emerald without trading... that's the main reason I tried Lum Berry in the first place, but it turned out to work well!

 

[Kommo-o]

Sorry I only just saw this (haven't been on Smogon for ages), thanks for mentioning my point about the Lum Berry - I just wanted to mention that with the restriction of an Emerald-only team, I'm fairly sure the Petaya Berry can't be obtained in Emerald without trading... that's the main reason I tried Lum Berry in the first place, but it turned out to work well!

Yeah, I genuinely forgot about it and since the boost only triggers at the end of the turn, I updated the post (thanks lol)

 

[Albus]

Hello there! its been a while since the last time I logged in, and I recently found out that there is a thread dedicated to 3rd Gen's Battle Tower records (I thought there were only threads beyond 4th Gen's Battle Facilities). Anyways, I'd like to share a 127 win-streak in Emerald's Lv.50's Battle Tower Doubles. What started as a simple Battle Tower challenge just to get the Lv.50 Ribbon on some would-be Ribbon Masters ended up with a streak going way beyond what I expected (I usually stop caring about my streak after getting the Ribbons and I either lose after the 56th set or drop the streak altogether to use the cloning glitch). I made the streak in my Emerald copy in ~4 days, with the streak ending yesterday after an unfortunate loss. Fortunately, as seen in the proof below, I still have a ongoing streak in the Open Level one so I still have the chance to improve over this lost streak's mistakes, or maybe even surpass it.

Picture proof

Teambuilding process

I originally wanted to build a viable, consistent, easy-to-use 3rd Gen Doubles team just to be able to beat Pokémon XD's Orre Colosseum last year. I decided to build the team around rain based on my experiences playing VGC formats with/against Drizzle + Swift Swim teams that littered said formats. In spite of some notable limitations to the playstyle in 3rd Gen (50% spread damage reduction instead of 25%, no usable auto-rain options in Politoed or Pelipper, no Damp Rock and no good boosting items in Life Orb / AV / Absorb Bulb / Choice Specs), I knew how dangerous rain was so it was the first viable playstyle that came to my mind to build a team around. I inmediately picked Kingdra and Ludicolo over the rest of available Swift Swimmers thanks to the traits that make them the best Swift Swim abusers in the game(s) (good typings without exploitable weakness, decent bulk and offensive stats) as well as the good offensive/defensive synergy between both and the Fake Out + Rain Dance combo that lets me set up the rain with ease and makes the playstyle work as intended.

The team that I used in XD's Orre Colosseum looked like this.

Thanks to this team I was able to win the Orre Colosseum without too much problems, with my one loss being against Eldes in the final round thanks to a bad lead matchup that screwed me up (both Latis IIRC). Months later, I repurposed the team to be usable in the Doubles portion of the tower to get the Tower Ribbons for a competitively useless Charizard in a Ribbon Master quest. The initial version of the repurposed team had Raikou over Metagross for favoritism and its ability to beat most Water-types that gave trouble to the Swift Swimmers, but after finding it underwhelming when I lost in a couple of streaks I changed it for Metagross thanks to its bulk, its explosive power (pun intended) and good synergy with rain. I also tested Calm Mind Latios over Metagross in a couple of streaks, but after getting walled and destroyed by a Calm Mind Blissey in the 45th set of a streak, I changed it back to Metagross.

The "second" version of the team was the same as the final version, but with different items in Ludicolo and Kingdra. It was a mixture between MysticWater, BrightPowder, Petaya Berry and Scope Lens due to me not really caring about their items atm. However, after a disastrous loss against a Thunder Wave Starmie in an important set to get Ribbons (set 50), I realized how vulnerable the combo was against paralysis and how much I underestimated status in the Tower. Based on this loss I gave Ludicolo and Kingdra a Cheri Berry and a Lum Berry, respectively. I gave the Lum Berry to Kingdra to let it set up rain against any kind of status, especially sleep and freezes, with the latter coming into play more often than I expected.

The most interchangeable mon in the team ended up being Salamence. I changed it for the competitively subpar ones that I wanted to give Ribbons in separate sets (4 in this streak). It was usually enough with the other 3 to win most battles, except for a couple of sets where Salamence's assets would've made my life much easier.

The team

Ludicolo (GOOBY PLS) @ Cheri Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
IVs: 31 HP / x / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fake Out
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Giga Drain
The first Swift Swimmer that enables Rain Dance with Fake Out and starts dishing out heavy damage afterwards. The moves and EVs are self explanatory. Hidden Power Grass is a viable option over Giga Drain if the low PP and BP becomes a problem, especially against Suicune (This specific Ludicolo doesn't have it unfortunately).

Kingdra (Draygon) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 31 HP / x / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Hydro Pump
- Rain Dance

The second Swift Swimmer and the most important mon of the team. Sets Rain Dance with or without Ludicolo's help to activate Swift Swim and start wreaking havoc alongside the former. EVs are self explanatory. A Dragon STAB (HP Dragon or DragonBreath) is unnecessary due to it being redundant alonside Ice Beam except against a Kingdra mirror or to hit hte Latis a little bit harder. Hydro Pump is a very powerful but risky option to heavily dent or KO something that doesn't resist it and/or doesn't get KO'd with two Surfs. It also helps to KO certain bulky waters alongside Giga Drain whenever the risk is worth it (i.e Lanturn or Walrein4). This specific Kingdra has the option to run HP Grass to hit hard Water types, but I personally prefer Hydro Pump's raw power against neutral targets over it. I might try out HP Grass in the future though.

Salamence (Ascalon) @ BrightPowder
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 23 HP / 29 Atk / 31 Def / x / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Protect
- Earthquake
- Dragon Dance
- Aerial Ace

My favorite Pokémon (an old school XD soft reset that is also a Ribbon Master) that I use mostly out of pure favoritism, but also thanks to its access to Intimidate, STAB Aerial Ace to beat evasion abusers and as a set-up option with Dragon Dance. It has flawed IVs and I could easily get a better one but again, favoritism. EVs are self explanatory. Its Intimidate can be very valuable to help any of the other 3 mons to soften physical attacks and can beat and set-up on most Double Team abusers and hit them hard with boosted Aerial Aces. It can also nab free Dragon Dance boosts in the uncommon scenario of it getting a free turn thanks to Ludicolo's Fake Out. It used to have a Lum Berry but after the TWave Starmie fiasco I changed it for a BrightPowder and it has worked a fair share of times so far.

Metagross (Quadraxis) @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
Level: 50
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Atk / 31 Def / x / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Explosion
- Protect

Strong and bulky physical attacker. Synergises well with rain, nullifying its Fire weakness and/or getting its main checks/counters taken out by Ludicolo/Kingdra. Its nuclear powered Explosion is an awesome tool to remove almost anything that gives trouble to either my Swift Swimmers or Salamence (usually paired the latter) due to my Swift Swimmer's lack of Protect. The EVs are badly optimized due to the spread being thought for Lv.100 and me being too lazy to optmize it properly, but it gets its intended job done of being as strong and bulky as possible while being able to Speed creep most Metagross sets.

How to use

The logic behind the team is simple. Use Fake Out on whatever threatens either Ludicolo or Kingdra and set up Rain Dance to start spamming Surf to hell and back until everything dies in the opposing team or gets weakened enough to get cleaned up by Salamence and Metagross. In the case that both opposing mons threaten to KO either Ludicolo or Kingdra with something like, say, a Tentacruel + Latios lead, the priority should be given to whatever threatens to KO Kingdra to be able to set the rain safely. Depending on whatever is in front, or if it is impossible to flinch the opponent with Fake Out (Inner Focus or Ghost types) its also possible to just use Rain Dance and attack with Ludicolo. There are times where rain should not be set up, however. It is unadvisable to set it up against 2 opposing bulky waters that can easily stall out the rain turns by either being highly resistant to Water attacks (Tentacruel, Kingdra, Ludicolo) and/or being inmune to it with Water Absorb (i.e. Lapras, Vaporeon). While Ludicolo can deal with them with Giga Drain, the move's low PP and power can be a hindrance and it can be hit hard by the opposing Water's Ice Beams. Kingdra also becomes a sitting duck unless it gets switched out for Metagross / Salamence to either take Ice Beams threaten the bulky waters back or "redirect" the Ice attacks with Salamence's Protect. This gives Ludicolo a free opportunity to dent/KO them with Giga Drain or gives Metagross a chance to freely explode, depending on the scenario.

TL;DR Fake Out. Rain Dance. Click Surf / attacks until everything dies. With some exceptions.

Threats/Watch out for

• Opposing Kingdra: Can use the rain against me and threaten me in different ways (Dragon Dance to set up on the Swift Swimmers, Ice Beam to KO mence, Hydro Pump / Surf to heavily dent Metagross). The sight of it alone as a lead heavily discourages my use of Rain Dance and, depending on its set, forces me to play around it by either focusing on it or in the other opposing mon.
• Suicune: It can easily take all of my mons attacks (except Explosion), can stall out Giga Drain's PP and depending on its moveset can either set up Double Teams or Calm Minds, heal up its damage with Rest and give me a lot of trouble. Fortunately I only faced it once in the whole streak and it was the most manageable variant (Suicune2) so I consider myself lucky. It is still a threat to watch out for though.
• Heracross: It can survive 2 Surfs and can easily KO Ludicolo back. If it is a Swarm variant it will also be able to KO Kingdra back with little trouble. Salac Berry sets (especially if Heracross has Swarm) can be very threating if the rain turns are over. Salamence can easily take it out most of the time, but Salac + Swarm sets can easily threaten it back as well.
• Double dragon leads: This leads can be very tough to deal with especially if both are strong special attackers that can outspeed and KO Kingdra. I have to play around these by either using Fake Out on the most threatening one of the two or to switch Kingdra for Metagross. This matchup can be made worse if the opposing dragons aren't 4x weak to Ice Beam and, if I focus my attacks on one, survive 2 Ice Beams, a likely scenario with certain Latis sets.
• Double water leads: tl;dr version of what I said above in the How to use part. A lead of two bulky Water types heavily limit my Swift Swimmers and discourage me from setting up rain. Made even worse if either of them has Water Absorb of is a Kingdra. They can be dealt with by Ludicolo or Metagross to an extent, though.
• Known OHKO abusers (Whiscash / Walrein / Rhydon / Crawdaunt): Even if some of these are very weak to my Swift Swimmers, they're too threatening to be left alive and I always try to flinch + KO these as fast as possible, even if that means not setting up rain on turn one.
• Miscellaneous: The usual streak-ruining shenanigans involving unfortunate crits, Quick Claw activations, BrightPowders, Focus Bands and missing crucial Hydro Pumps / Meteor Mashes. I try to mitigate some of these as much as possible.

How I lost

Opponent's team: Lapras / Kingdra / Aerodactyl / Nidoking

I lost against a Dragon Tamer on set 128. Ended up facing a double bulky water lead involving the two worst possible ones (Lapras and Kingdra).
After using Fake Out against Kingdra to not let it set up on me, the Lapras froze my Ludicolo and everything started going downhill from there. Switched Ludicolo out for Metagross, Kingdra DD'd on me and after sacrificing Ludicolo and taking some hits with both Metagross and Kingdra I KO'd the Lapras with Metagross. Aerodactyl1 switched into Lapras' place. I switched out Metagross for Salamence to Intimidate Aerodactyl and take out Kingdra with my own (after being weakened with Ice Beams and its Double-Edge recoil). Nidoking switched into Kingdra´s place. Aerodactyl attacked Kindgra with a STAB attack, leaving it in 37-45%-ish of HP. I made the mistake of protecting Salamence to bait a possible AncientPower but it instead attacked and crit my Kingdra, and in the switch Metagross got KO'd by Nidoking's EQ. Salamence KO'd Nidoking but was useless against Aerodactyl and it was pretty much over. For extra salt in the second-to-last turn my Salamence avoided the Aerodactyl's DragonBreath with the BrightPowder just to give me some false hope lol.

This loss heavily motivates me to give Raikou another try over Salamence. Either that or change it for another strong electric type like Jolteon or Zapdos to offset my weakness against bulky waters.

If you have any comments or suggestions, feel free to let me know. Thanks for reading!

paste

Ludicolo (GOOBY PLS) @ Cheri Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fake Out
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Giga Drain

Kingdra (Draygon) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Hydro Pump
- Rain Dance

Salamence (Ascalon) @ BrightPowder
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 23 HP / 29 Atk / 31 Def / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Protect
- Earthquake
- Dragon Dance
- Aerial Ace

Metagross (Quadraxis) @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
Level: 50
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Atk / 31 Def / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Explosion
- Protect

 

[Actaeon]

Hello there! its been a while since the last time I logged in, and I recently found out that there is a thread dedicated to 3rd Gen's Battle Tower records (I thought there were only threads beyond 4th Gen's Battle Facilities). Anyways, I'd like to share a 127 win-streak in Emerald's Lv.50's Battle Tower Doubles. What started as a simple Battle Tower challenge just to get the Lv.50 Ribbon on some would-be Ribbon Masters ended up with a streak going way beyond what I expected (I usually stop caring about my streak after getting the Ribbons and I either lose after the 56th set or drop the streak altogether to use the cloning glitch). I made the streak in my Emerald copy in ~4 days, with the streak ending yesterday after an unfortunate loss. Fortunately, as seen in the proof below, I still have a ongoing streak in the Open Level one so I still have the chance to improve over this lost streak's mistakes, or maybe even surpass it.

Picture proof

Teambuilding process

I originally wanted to build a viable, consistent, easy-to-use 3rd Gen Doubles team just to be able to beat Pokémon XD's Orre Colosseum last year. I decided to build the team around rain based on my experiences playing VGC formats with/against Drizzle + Swift Swim teams that littered said formats. In spite of some notable limitations to the playstyle in 3rd Gen (50% spread damage reduction instead of 25%, no usable auto-rain options in Politoed or Pelipper, no Damp Rock and no good boosting items in Life Orb / AV / Absorb Bulb / Choice Specs), I knew how dangerous rain was so it was the first viable playstyle that came to my mind to build a team around. I inmediately picked Kingdra and Ludicolo over the rest of available Swift Swimmers thanks to the traits that make them the best Swift Swim abusers in the game(s) (good typings without exploitable weakness, decent bulk and offensive stats) as well as the good offensive/defensive synergy between both and the Fake Out + Rain Dance combo that lets me set up the rain with ease and makes the playstyle work as intended.

The team that I used in XD's Orre Colosseum looked like this.

Thanks to this team I was able to win the Orre Colosseum without too much problems, with my one loss being against Eldes in the final round thanks to a bad lead matchup that screwed me up (both Latis IIRC). Months later, I repurposed the team to be usable in the Doubles portion of the tower to get the Tower Ribbons for a competitively useless Charizard in a Ribbon Master quest. The initial version of the repurposed team had Raikou over Metagross for favoritism and its ability to beat most Water-types that gave trouble to the Swift Swimmers, but after finding it underwhelming when I lost in a couple of streaks I changed it for Metagross thanks to its bulk, its explosive power (pun intended) and good synergy with rain. I also tested Calm Mind Latios over Metagross in a couple of streaks, but after getting walled and destroyed by a Calm Mind Blissey in the 45th set of a streak, I changed it back to Metagross.

The "second" version of the team was the same as the final version, but with different items in Ludicolo and Kingdra. It was a mixture between MysticWater, BrightPowder, Petaya Berry and Scope Lens due to me not really caring about their items atm. However, after a disastrous loss against a Thunder Wave Starmie in an important set to get Ribbons (set 50), I realized how vulnerable the combo was against paralysis and how much I underestimated status in the Tower. Based on this loss I gave Ludicolo and Kingdra a Cheri Berry and a Lum Berry, respectively. I gave the Lum Berry to Kingdra to let it set up rain against any kind of status, especially sleep and freezes, with the latter coming into play more often than I expected.

The most interchangeable mon in the team ended up being Salamence. I changed it for the competitively subpar ones that I wanted to give Ribbons in separate sets (4 in this streak). It was usually enough with the other 3 to win most battles, except for a couple of sets where Salamence's assets would've made my life much easier.

The team

Ludicolo (GOOBY PLS) @ Cheri Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
IVs: 31 HP / x / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fake Out
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Giga Drain
The first Swift Swimmer that enables Rain Dance with Fake Out and starts dishing out heavy damage afterwards. The moves and EVs are self explanatory. Hidden Power Grass is a viable option over Giga Drain if the low PP and BP becomes a problem, especially against Suicune (This specific Ludicolo doesn't have it unfortunately).

Kingdra (Draygon) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 31 HP / x / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Hydro Pump
- Rain Dance

The second Swift Swimmer and the most important mon of the team. Sets Rain Dance with or without Ludicolo's help to activate Swift Swim and start wreaking havoc alongside the former. EVs are self explanatory. A Dragon STAB (HP Dragon or DragonBreath) is unnecessary due to it being redundant alonside Ice Beam except against a Kingdra mirror or to hit hte Latis a little bit harder. Hydro Pump is a very powerful but risky option to heavily dent or KO something that doesn't resist it and/or doesn't get KO'd with two Surfs. It also helps to KO certain bulky waters alongside Giga Drain whenever the risk is worth it (i.e Lanturn or Walrein4). This specific Kingdra has the option to run HP Grass to hit hard Water types, but I personally prefer Hydro Pump's raw power against neutral targets over it. I might try out HP Grass in the future though.

Salamence (Ascalon) @ BrightPowder
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 23 HP / 29 Atk / 31 Def / x / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Protect
- Earthquake
- Dragon Dance
- Aerial Ace

My favorite Pokémon (an old school XD soft reset that is also a Ribbon Master) that I use mostly out of pure favoritism, but also thanks to its access to Intimidate, STAB Aerial Ace to beat evasion abusers and as a set-up option with Dragon Dance. It has flawed IVs and I could easily get a better one but again, favoritism. EVs are self explanatory. Its Intimidate can be very valuable to help any of the other 3 mons to soften physical attacks and can beat and set-up on most Double Team abusers and hit them hard with boosted Aerial Aces. It can also nab free Dragon Dance boosts in the uncommon scenario of it getting a free turn thanks to Ludicolo's Fake Out. It used to have a Lum Berry but after the TWave Starmie fiasco I changed it for a BrightPowder and it has worked a fair share of times so far.

Metagross (Quadraxis) @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
Level: 50
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Atk / 31 Def / x / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Explosion
- Protect

Strong and bulky physical attacker. Synergises well with rain, nullifying its Fire weakness and/or getting its main checks/counters taken out by Ludicolo/Kingdra. Its nuclear powered Explosion is an awesome tool to remove almost anything that gives trouble to either my Swift Swimmers or Salamence (usually paired the latter) due to my Swift Swimmer's lack of Protect. The EVs are badly optimized due to the spread being thought for Lv.100 and me being too lazy to optmize it properly, but it gets its intended job done of being as strong and bulky as possible while being able to Speed creep most Metagross sets.

How to use

The logic behind the team is simple. Use Fake Out on whatever threatens either Ludicolo or Kingdra and set up Rain Dance to start spamming Surf to hell and back until everything dies in the opposing team or gets weakened enough to get cleaned up by Salamence and Metagross. In the case that both opposing mons threaten to KO either Ludicolo or Kingdra with something like, say, a Tentacruel + Latios lead, the priority should be given to whatever threatens to KO Kingdra to be able to set the rain safely. Depending on whatever is in front, or if it is impossible to flinch the opponent with Fake Out (Inner Focus or Ghost types) its also possible to just use Rain Dance and attack with Ludicolo. There are times where rain should not be set up, however. It is unadvisable to set it up against 2 opposing bulky waters that can easily stall out the rain turns by either being highly resistant to Water attacks (Tentacruel, Kingdra, Ludicolo) and/or being inmune to it with Water Absorb (i.e. Lapras, Vaporeon). While Ludicolo can deal with them with Giga Drain, the move's low PP and power can be a hindrance and it can be hit hard by the opposing Water's Ice Beams. Kingdra also becomes a sitting duck unless it gets switched out for Metagross / Salamence to either take Ice Beams threaten the bulky waters back or "redirect" the Ice attacks with Salamence's Protect. This gives Ludicolo a free opportunity to dent/KO them with Giga Drain or gives Metagross a chance to freely explode, depending on the scenario.

TL;DR Fake Out. Rain Dance. Click Surf / attacks until everything dies. With some exceptions.

Threats/Watch out for

• Opposing Kingdra: Can use the rain against me and threaten me in different ways (Dragon Dance to set up on the Swift Swimmers, Ice Beam to KO mence, Hydro Pump / Surf to heavily dent Metagross). The sight of it alone as a lead heavily discourages my use of Rain Dance and, depending on its set, forces me to play around it by either focusing on it or in the other opposing mon.
• Suicune: It can easily take all of my mons attacks (except Explosion), can stall out Giga Drain's PP and depending on its moveset can either set up Double Teams or Calm Minds, heal up its damage with Rest and give me a lot of trouble. Fortunately I only faced it once in the whole streak and it was the most manageable variant (Suicune2) so I consider myself lucky. It is still a threat to watch out for though.
• Heracross: It can survive 2 Surfs and can easily KO Ludicolo back. If it is a Swarm variant it will also be able to KO Kingdra back with little trouble. Salac Berry sets (especially if Heracross has Swarm) can be very threating if the rain turns are over. Salamence can easily take it out most of the time, but Salac + Swarm sets can easily threaten it back as well.
• Double dragon leads: This leads can be very tough to deal with especially if both are strong special attackers that can outspeed and KO Kingdra. I have to play around these by either using Fake Out on the most threatening one of the two or to switch Kingdra for Metagross. This matchup can be made worse if the opposing dragons aren't 4x weak to Ice Beam and, if I focus my attacks on one, survive 2 Ice Beams, a likely scenario with certain Latis sets.
• Double water leads: tl;dr version of what I said above in the How to use part. A lead of two bulky Water types heavily limit my Swift Swimmers and discourage me from setting up rain. Made even worse if either of them has Water Absorb of is a Kingdra. They can be dealt with by Ludicolo or Metagross to an extent, though.
• Known OHKO abusers (Whiscash / Walrein / Rhydon / Crawdaunt): Even if some of these are very weak to my Swift Swimmers, they're too threatening to be left alive and I always try to flinch + KO these as fast as possible, even if that means not setting up rain on turn one.
• Miscellaneous: The usual streak-ruining shenanigans involving unfortunate crits, Quick Claw activations, BrightPowders, Focus Bands and missing crucial Hydro Pumps / Meteor Mashes. I try to mitigate some of these as much as possible.

How I lost

Opponent's team: Lapras / Kingdra / Aerodactyl / Nidoking

I lost against a Dragon Tamer on set 128. Ended up facing a double bulky water lead involving the two worst possible ones (Lapras and Kingdra).
After using Fake Out against Kingdra to not let it set up on me, the Lapras froze my Ludicolo and everything started going downhill from there. Switched Ludicolo out for Metagross, Kingdra DD'd on me and after sacrificing Ludicolo and taking some hits with both Metagross and Kingdra I KO'd the Lapras with Metagross. Aerodactyl1 switched into Lapras' place. I switched out Metagross for Salamence to Intimidate Aerodactyl and take out Kingdra with my own (after being weakened with Ice Beams and its Double-Edge recoil). Nidoking switched into Kingdra´s place. Aerodactyl attacked Kindgra with a STAB attack, leaving it in 37-45%-ish of HP. I made the mistake of protecting Salamence to bait a possible AncientPower but it instead attacked and crit my Kingdra, and in the switch Metagross got KO'd by Nidoking's EQ. Salamence KO'd Nidoking but was useless against Aerodactyl and it was pretty much over. For extra salt in the second-to-last turn my Salamence avoided the Aerodactyl's DragonBreath with the BrightPowder just to give me some false hope lol.

This loss heavily motivates me to give Raikou another try over Salamence. Either that or change it for another strong electric type like Jolteon or Zapdos to offset my weakness against bulky waters.

If you have any comments or suggestions, feel free to let me know. Thanks for reading!

paste

Ludicolo (GOOBY PLS) @ Cheri Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fake Out
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Giga Drain

Kingdra (Draygon) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Hydro Pump
- Rain Dance

Salamence (Ascalon) @ BrightPowder
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 23 HP / 29 Atk / 31 Def / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Protect
- Earthquake
- Dragon Dance
- Aerial Ace

Metagross (Quadraxis) @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
Level: 50
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Atk / 31 Def / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Explosion
- Protect

Nice team. Just some thoughts of a doubles 'veteran':

• Salamence is quite underwhelming in Doubles if you ask me. Intimidate is nice, but the lack of a high power STAB move usually means its outclassed by Flygon for heavy Earthquakes and outclassed by Tauros as a Choice Bander. It doesn't have the time to setup more than one DD most of the time, and makes the team weaker to said Water-type problems. It does help against Heracross, just like you said.
• As a classic replacement, I would consider Zapdos; OHKOs many Water types with Thunder, and Thunder overrules Double team in rain. While it doesn't have Intimidate, it still works well against Heracross, has acceptable bulk and synergizes well with Metagross. It also hasn't got that nasty Dragon weakness. Another option is Latios, e.g. with Surf, Thunder, Psychic and Ice Beam.
• Another classic variant uses Leech Seed on Ludicolo. This easily gets around the best Special walls (Blissey, Snorlax, Regice and Umbreon), and also gives a lot of insurance against bulky waters like Milotic and Suicune, who can either stall out or Mirror Coat Giga Drain back.

And then we're back to the real classic: Ludicolo, Kingdra, Zapdos and Metagross.

 

[Albus]

Nice team. Just some thoughts of a doubles 'veteran':

• Salamence is quite underwhelming in Doubles if you ask me. Intimidate is nice, but the lack of a high power STAB move usually means its outclassed by Flygon for heavy Earthquakes and outclassed by Tauros as a Choice Bander. It doesn't have the time to setup more than one DD most of the time, and makes the team weaker to said Water-type problems. It does help against Heracross, just like you said.
• As a classic replacement, I would consider Zapdos; OHKOs many Water types with Thunder, and Thunder overrules Double team in rain. While it doesn't have Intimidate, it still works well against Heracross, has acceptable bulk and synergizes well with Metagross. It also hasn't got that nasty Dragon weakness. Another option is Latios, e.g. with Surf, Thunder, Psychic and Ice Beam.
• Another classic variant uses Leech Seed on Ludicolo. This easily gets around the best Special walls (Blissey, Snorlax, Regice and Umbreon), and also gives a lot of insurance against bulky waters like Milotic and Suicune, who can either stall out or Mirror Coat Giga Drain back.

And then we're back to the real classic: Ludicolo, Kingdra, Zapdos and Metagross.

Hey there! regarding each of your thoughs:

• I agree with your thoughts about Mence. Like I said in my post, I use it mostly out of pure favoritism with its flawed IVs and all of that, and that's the one mon I'll definitely change if I want to improve my future streaks.
• I agree with the Zapdos part as well. Like I said in my post, Zapdos its one of the options (alongside Raikou or Jolteon) that I'm considering over Mence. And yeah, the traits that you mentioned definitely make it a pretty cool option over Raikou - the first option that I considered over Mence - so I'll give it a try for sure. I also used Latios over Mence (Dragon Claw, Psychic, Tbolt and CM) in one of the sets of this streak, and I liked its performance. I'll experiment more with Latios as well.
• Leech Seed looks interesting, didn't think of that one due to my focus on pure offense. I usually overwhelm the passive ones like Blissey or Umbreon via Surf spam after removing their partners, but Leech Seed would surely help with Snorlax, Regice and annoying waters like Milotic. I'll give it a try and see if it fares better for me over a Grass STAB. I still like the option to remove possible turn 1 threats like Whiscash or Swampert from the get-go, though.

Thanks for your feedback!

 

[Actaeon]

Hey there! regarding each of your thoughs:

• I agree with your thoughts about Mence. Like I said in my post, I use it mostly out of pure favoritism with its flawed IVs and all of that, and that's the one mon I'll definitely change if I want to improve my future streaks.
• I agree with the Zapdos part as well. Like I said in my post, Zapdos its one of the options (alongside Raikou or Jolteon) that I'm considering over Mence. And yeah, the traits that you mentioned definitely make it a pretty cool option over Raikou - the first option that I considered over Mence - so I'll give it a try for sure. I also used Latios over Mence (Dragon Claw, Psychic, Tbolt and CM) in one of the sets of this streak, and I liked its performance. I'll experiment more with Latios as well.
• Leech Seed looks interesting, didn't think of that one due to my focus on pure offense. I usually overwhelm the passive ones like Blissey or Umbreon via Surf spam after removing their partners, but Leech Seed would surely help with Snorlax, Regice and annoying waters like Milotic. I'll give it a try and see if it fares better for me over a Grass STAB. I still like the option to remove possible turn 1 threats like Whiscash or Swampert from the get-go, though.

Thanks for your feedback!

Whiscash I can understand because of Fissure, but Swampert isn't really that dangerous aside from Mirror Coat. HP Grass Zapdos is definitely optimal for Quagsire and finishing Swampert when it's also targeted by Surf. I ran Thunder/HPGrass/Protect as the standard three moves, and altered between Drill Peck, Metal Sound, Thunderbolt and Rain Dance for the last slot, all with very specific uses.

Good luck with your team!

 

[Albus]

Whiscash I can understand because of Fissure, but Swampert isn't really that dangerous aside from Mirror Coat. HP Grass Zapdos is definitely optimal for Quagsire and finishing Swampert when it's also targeted by Surf. I ran Thunder/HPGrass/Protect as the standard three moves, and altered between Drill Peck, Metal Sound, Thunderbolt and Rain Dance for the last slot, all with very specific uses.

Good luck with your team!

I didn't word the Swampert part properly mb. I meant that Swampert is a threat to whatever is in the back with Ice Beam or EQ and is a cool bonus to KO it on turn 1 or in the mid-to-late game where Ludicolo/Kingdra might be weakened and switching either of them out is a good idea. But yeah, Whiscash is a bigger threat for me (the PTSD with Whiscash4 is real).

That moveset + Drill Peck would work fine for me if I drop the Grass STAB on Ludi, my only problem is that the HP Grass Zapdos that I have rn has a paltry BP of 40 and I can't get a better one atm lol.

Regardless, I'll still try out that particular Zapdos over mence and see how everything works out for me. Thanks again!

 

[Actaeon]

I didn't word the Swampert part properly mb. I meant that Swampert is a threat to whatever is in the back with Ice Beam or EQ and is a cool bonus to KO it on turn 1 or in the mid-to-late game where Ludicolo/Kingdra might be weakened and switching either of them out is a good idea. But yeah, Whiscash is a bigger threat for me (the PTSD with Whiscash4 is real).

That moveset + Drill Peck would work fine for me if I drop the Grass STAB on Ludi, my only problem is that the HP Grass Zapdos that I have rn has a paltry BP of 40 and I can't get a better one atm lol.

Regardless, I'll still try out that particular Zapdos over mence and see how everything works out for me. Thanks again!

Ah, then it's probably still a 2HKO on the 4x weak Pokemon, and you get the advantage of not putting Swampert in Torrent range I guess. Drill Peck is mainly used for Grass types that might threaten Ludicolo, such as Venusaur and Victreebel. Otherwise, Ice Beam works against those too. Against non-Heracross Fighters, Thunder is just as strong if not stronger, and Heracross dies to Surf plus Thunder.

I also suggest trying Zapdos as one of the leads, IMO it gives you much better sweeping potential, and a Kingdra in the back is the perfect revenge killer. Then you can ditch Hydro Pump in favor of Protect to work with Metagross' Explosion in a pinch.

 

[Kommo-o]

BEWARE THE BANDED BEAR​

So here I am. For some odd reason I decided to give Ursaring a go as part of a challenge that I imposed myself on using Pokemon that originate only from the Emerald game. Is there any secret potential waiting to be unlocked on this wonder of nature? Is there some secret ingredient on this recipe for disaster? The answer to all these questions is a big fat NO. So why I decided to use Ursaring? I just felt like doing so and even I ended up wasting one week on getting an initial seed just to RNG it on my main save file. I did all of this to set up a Wild RNG on the Safari Zone for a non-shiny Ursaring.

The current team hit 72 wins beating Anabel Gold on the process. I didn't saved a video but I live streamed the streak yesterday on the Battle Tower Discord server starting from the 28th win. I didn't saved pictures since I was doing plenty of runs with different teams involving Ursaring but a fair amount of people have seen the stream and how Ursaring even came clutch on saving the streak on some battles.

Team Building

• 
  While the experimentation for this team came later, this was initially what I theorized on the Discord chat. It made sense after all, doesn't it? Once put into practice, my precitions for this team turned out to be correct. Latios dealt with Fighting types and as the broken Pokemon it is on this generation, it pretty much carried the team forward with Milotic adding Toxic support to deal with Double Team abusers and Ursaring hitting as hard as it can do with a Choice Band. However, I was never able to reach Gold thanks to Snorlax 4 / Lapras 4 and a couple of shenanigans involving Metagross 3.
• 
  Personally I believe this team is worse than the first one but this team only had one death and it reached Gold without a lot of trouble. Difficult to say what would be the the mayor difference considering that by itself Latios is a better sweeper than Salamence. I guess having three all out heavy weights puts more offensive pressure which helps a lot. Ursaring as a lead has been really good on this team considering the fact that its great bulk allows it to tank any neutral hit and KO in return. Starmie and Salamence provide a relatively safe switch-in since Ursaring's only weakness is Fighting which gives opportunities for both to switch in.

THE BETTER BEWEAR

Ursaring (F) @ Choice Band
IVs: 30 Def / 19 SpA / 30 SpD
EVs: 124 HP / 252 Atk / 10 SpD / 124 Spe
Ability: Guts
Level: 50
Adamant Nature
- Return
- Earthquake
- Hyper Beam
- Hidden Power [Ghost]

BROTHER BEAR

There's no special promise on using Ursaring but it does well on what it is meant to do best which is wallbreaking. It's not as fast as Tauros or Slaking. It's definitely stronger than the bull and it doesn't really envies Slaking in power but with the advantage of being able to move between turns despite its low Speed. Return is a very consistent STAB with no drawbacks and while I had heavily considered using Double Edge instead, Return has not really disappointed because its strong enough for the early rounds to punch some holes on the opponent's team. I'm not talking about the NFEs that show up on the first 4 rounds of Tower, but the ones between battle #35-70 where Ursaring's Return does what it needs to do. Earthquake complements this by hitting what Return can't do and it is strong enough to destroy Metagross, Golem and Rhydon. After all, we are talking about a base 130 Attack and the bear knows no fear. Initially I used Brick Break but it still came out as a very disappointing move to use despite Ursaring's huge Attack stat. Hyper Beam took this slot and instead it has been the move of choice when you got something that it is bulky enough to tank a Return. It's mostly reserved for Umbreon and Lapras. For some cases, I take the risk on Snorlax. Overall, a heavy nuke, however, be mindful that once you use this move, Ursaring is vulnerable to whatever comes next. Hidden Power Ghost completes the set with adding coverage against Gengar and Dusclops. The best part is that Ursaring gets even stronger once Dusclops burns it and it is able to crush its plasmatic body into oblivion.

124 Speed allows Ursaring to outspeed Dewgong 3 (aka HAXGONG) and anything else below it, including its haxxor relatives Walrein and Lapras. It also gives Ursaring the advantage to be faster than some stuff like Umbreon which is cool. Max Attack to maximize its damage output and the rest goes into HP while 8 EVs are placed in Special Defense to avoid wasting EV points and increase its special bulk a little bit.

Thanos (Starmie) @ Lum Berry
IVs: 6 Atk
EVs: 252 SpA / 6 SpD / 252 Spe
Ability: Natural Cure
Level: 50
Shiny: Yes
Modest Nature
- Surf
- Psychic
- Ice Beam
- Thunderbolt

FINGERSNAP COVERAGE

Starmie is probably the most simple and easy Pokemon to use. I don't think words are needed to explain how to use. Only thing worth adding in here is that Starmie leads on the first 4 rounds because its crazy coverage pretty much destroys the line up of NFEs that shows up on the first four rounds. After that, once Ursaring leads, Starmie can switch into Pokemon that threaten Ursaring or when it is required to do so. It's also the first Pokemon to sack depending on the trainer archetype (Don't sack Starmie vs Dragon Tamers please).

Max Special Attack and Speed to make Starmie do what it knows to do best. Modest nature because you don't want Armaldo to live a Surf and base 115 Speed is already good enough. Since Starmie is switching directly into attacks, Lum Berry helps a lot on taking a random freeze and not being forced to lose momentum. Not the best Ice switch-in, mind you, but something is something.

Dragneel (Salamence) (M) @ Leftovers
IVs: 30 HP / 30 Atk / 30 Def / 22 SpA / 30 SpD
EVs: 58 HP / 200 Atk / 252 Spe
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
Adamant Nature
- Earthquake
- Substitute
- Dragon Dance
- Hidden Power [Flying] / Aerial Ace

RISE OF THE DRAGON

Dragon Dance Salamence is an ADV classic. Since Starmie is using a Lum Berry and Ursaring the CB user, I felt that it made sense for Salamence to use Leftovers and consecuently use Substitute to exploit the item. Substitute is the best move on this generation for Frontier play. Blocks status, exploits bad AI and it pretty much allows it to sweep safely behind it. Earthquake is the best coverage move to complement its Flying STAB and your pseudo-STAB in case you are using AERO ASS because that is how weak it is. While on my live stream, I used HP Flying, AERO ASS is worth mentioning on this team as otherwise it is the only way you can reliably hit Double Team spammers outside of Metagross 3 and Registeel 5 so it's definitely an option to strongly consider on this team. HP Flying is there in case you prefer more power but at the cost of not being able to reliably hit DT abusers.

58 HP gives 177 HP which allows Salamence to give it a perfect Leftovers number allowing it to recover the lost HP of a Substitute in 4 turns. While this set was focused to be used with Hidden Power Flying, if you're using Aerial Ace, modify the EVs to what a Salamence with 31 IVs on all stats should look like and put any leftovers in Attack. Ideally you only want a 177 HP stat and 152 Speed because those are the most important stats in Sub DD Salamence.

Threatlist

• Quick Claw can become a huge issue since a priority Curse can guarantee that it will survive any attack from Ursaring and it can destroy the whole team by itself. Snorlax 1 also a legitimate threat on its own without AERO ASS.
• Set 4 is the most annoying piece of shit. Can paralyze Ursaring, has evasion and a STAB that makes it impossible for Mence to set up. Get rid of it as soon as possible and if Ursaring gets paralyzed, pray that it will hit with its Guts boosted choice banded attacks.
• The team is designed to offensively deal with them but anything with a Quick Claw and a OHKO move is always something to watch out for.
• Set 3 has Double Team so it's always worth taking into account that if you allow it to get too many boosts, it becomes a massive threat.
• Because of their coverage and strong stats, it forces me to have Ursaring on almost perfect condition as otherwise they can easily destroy this team. My only loss, so far, came to Latias 3 due to Ursaring's poor HP condition.

That's pretty much the biggest threats I can think of, on top of my head, you might have others out there.

Exportable

BEWARE THE BANDED BEAR

 

[Albus]

Hello again! I dedicated the whole Sunday to continue with the Open Level streak that I still had when I posted the Lv.50 one last week. After making some changes to the team thanks to Actaeon's suggestions, I was able to surpass my previous streak... by a grand total of 2 more sets, ending with a 129 win-streak.

Proof of the streak

So let me go into the details:

The updated team

Ludicolo (GOOBY PLS) @ Cheri Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
IVs: 31 HP / x / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fake Out
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Giga Drain

Same Ludicolo from last time. I was going to change Giga Drain for Leech Seed, but I completely forgot about it and I just kept going with the streak. However, after some of the ugly experiences that I had with this streak (see the notable highlights below) I'm definitely changing Giga Drain for the next streak.

Kingdra (Draygon) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Rain Dance
- Protect

Same Kingdra from last time but with Protect instead of Hydro Pump. I liked this change and I didn't really miss Hydro Pump, except in the last set where my chances of winning would've been better with it.

Zapdos (Storm Hawk) @ BrightPowder
Ability: Pressure
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 23 Atk / 0 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Thunder
- Hidden Power Grass
- Rain Dance
- Protect / Drill Peck

• The new and most significant change for the team. I have this Zapdos since 2012 and it was a lucky soft reset of sorts from back then. The IVs/nature surely leave a lot to be desired and its HP Grass has a paltry BP of 36, but eh its the best thing I have for the role rn. I changed it over Salamence, of which I was already aware that didn't contribute anything of value on the original team, and I kept mostly out of pure favoritism. I was already set on changing Mence with either Raikou or Jolteon (with Zapdos being the third option) but after reading Actaeon's suggestions about it, I went for Zapdos head-first instead.
• I used this Zapdos as the primary Rain Dance setter over Kingdra and it worked pretty well, with Thunder being able to hit stuff very hard and threaten bulky waters from the get-go. Its damage output with HP Grass was pathetic against its intended targets, but it still got the job done.
• This Zapdos also gives me the ability to be able to KO important targets on the switch with Thunder. This is possible if I'm able to KO either both targets with Surf or KOing one and be able to hit the switch while being able to ignore its non-threatening partner. Among other things, this helped me to KO an Aerodactyl and a Suicune on the switch with Thunder. Had I not used Thunder in that Suicune slot I would've been in a lot of trouble in that set (to summarize the set, I KO'd two targets, chose to Thunder a particular slot just because, the particular slot was Suicune's and the other one was a Latios).
• I gave it a BrightPowder because I didn't think throughly of what else to give it atm, but it did its thing and it helped me avoid some crucial attacks. However, after all of this streak's experiences I'll change it for a Magnet instead.
• I tried out Drill Peck in sets 78-84, and while the option of being able to hit Heracross/Grass-types hard without relying on Ice Beams was kinda cool, I felt that it was too vulnerable to attacks when setting up or attacking, so I changed it for Protect and I didn't look back. Needless to say, the bad IVs/nature/Hidden Power hold it back significantly so yeah, guess I'll have to learn how to RNG in FRLG on emulator just to get a better one.

Metagross (Quadraxis) @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
Level: 100
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Atk / 31 Def / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Explosion
- Protect

Same Metagross from last time. There's nothing else to be said about it.

Future/possible changes

• Leech Seed over Giga Drain. See the notable highlights below.
• Change Zapdos' item for a Magnet instead of the BrightPowder. I might try out a Modest Zapdos as well, whenever I'm able to get one that is.
• Experiment with Latios over Zapdos.

Notable highlights

• PP stalling a Shedinja to death: this would-be streak killer bugger showed up in one of the sets as a lead. Needless to say, I didn't have anything to KO it so I had to get creative. My plan was simple: KO its partners and then PP stall it. Although I was a bit on the fence thanks to a Forretress1 setting up a layer of Spikes, it was thanks to Zapdos' Pressure and some clever switching and Protects that I was able to stall it out until it struggled to its death.
• Suicune2 almost PP stalling me out: In a bit of a change of roles, now I was on the receiving end of being PP stalled by Suicune2. After a Latias5 (I think) paralyzed my Zapdos before dying, and the Suicune PP stalling Ludicolo's Giga Drains thanks to Protect and with a couple of Double Teams under its belt, I was in a lot of trouble even if I was 4vs1 against it. I had to play carefully and avoid using Thunder with Zapdos until I made sure I PP stalled its Protects and Dives. After being able to do so and chip it with my Metagross' last two EQs I was finally able to KO that thing with Thunder. This, along with what happened with Shedinja and a couple of annoying sets against Double Team/Amnesia Registeel, now fully convinced me to drop Giga Drain for Leech Seed for the next streak.
• Some smartass Exeggutor5 that activated its BrightPowder two times in a row while it was in red health and decided to explode on my face afterwards. Really cool stuff.

How I lost:

In what was a bit of a rollercoaster of a run, with some annoying and cool moments/sets (with me even accidentally doing a set (71-77) with the old Lv.50 team out of pure distraction, and yet being able to come out on top with the 10 level difference), it fittingly came to a screeching halt in set 130 in an unceremonious, Werster-like bs way courtesy of PKMN Breeder Tess (Walrein4 / Vaporeon3 / Swampert3 / Jolteon1 or 4). Of all the bs ways I've lost in all of my frontier streaks, this one takes the cake for me. Everything went wrong for me, from bad luck and OHKO moves to getting hard counterteamed with the worst sets possible. You just can't make this up.

(PS: sorry for the quality, I'm too lazy to record this on emu)

And yeah, that's pretty much it for this run. Like I said before, I'm open to comments and suggestions. Thanks for reading!

 

[Kommo-o]

Hello again! I dedicated the whole Sunday to continue with the Open Level streak that I still had when I posted the Lv.50 one last week. After making some changes to the team thanks to Actaeon's suggestions, I was able to surpass my previous streak... by a grand total of 2 more sets, ending with a 129 win-streak.

Proof of the streak

So let me go into the details:

The updated team

Ludicolo (GOOBY PLS) @ Cheri Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
IVs: 31 HP / x / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fake Out
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Giga Drain

Same Ludicolo from last time. I was going to change Giga Drain for Leech Seed, but I completely forgot about it and I just kept going with the streak. However, after some of the ugly experiences that I had with this streak (see the notable highlights below) I'm definitely changing Giga Drain for the next streak.

Kingdra (Draygon) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Rain Dance
- Protect

Same Kingdra from last time but with Protect instead of Hydro Pump. I liked this change and I didn't really miss Hydro Pump, except in the last set where my chances of winning would've been better with it.

Zapdos (Storm Hawk) @ BrightPowder
Ability: Pressure
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 23 Atk / 0 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Thunder
- Hidden Power Grass
- Rain Dance
- Protect / Drill Peck

• The new and most significant change for the team. I have this Zapdos since 2012 and it was a lucky soft reset of sorts from back then. The IVs/nature surely leave a lot to be desired and its HP Grass has a paltry BP of 36, but eh its the best thing I have for the role rn. I changed it over Salamence, of which I was already aware that didn't contribute anything of value on the original team, and I kept mostly out of pure favoritism. I was already set on changing Mence with either Raikou or Jolteon (with Zapdos being the third option) but after reading Actaeon's suggestions about it, I went for Zapdos head-first instead.
• I used this Zapdos as the primary Rain Dance setter over Kingdra and it worked pretty well, with Thunder being able to hit stuff very hard and threaten bulky waters from the get-go. Its damage output with HP Grass was pathetic against its intended targets, but it still got the job done.
• This Zapdos also gives me the ability to be able to KO important targets on the switch with Thunder. This is possible if I'm able to KO either both targets with Surf or KOing one and be able to hit the switch while being able to ignore its non-threatening partner. Among other things, this helped me to KO an Aerodactyl and a Suicune on the switch with Thunder. Had I not used Thunder in that Suicune slot I would've been in a lot of trouble in that set (to summarize the set, I KO'd two targets, chose to Thunder a particular slot just because, the particular slot was Suicune's and the other one was a Latios).
• I gave it a BrightPowder because I didn't think throughly of what else to give it atm, but it did its thing and it helped me avoid some crucial attacks. However, after all of this streak's experiences I'll change it for a Magnet instead.
• I tried out Drill Peck in sets 78-84, and while the option of being able to hit Heracross/Grass-types hard without relying on Ice Beams was kinda cool, I felt that it was too vulnerable to attacks when setting up or attacking, so I changed it for Protect and I didn't look back. Needless to say, the bad IVs/nature/Hidden Power hold it back significantly so yeah, guess I'll have to learn how to RNG in FRLG on emulator just to get a better one.

Metagross (Quadraxis) @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
Level: 100
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Atk / 31 Def / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Explosion
- Protect

Same Metagross from last time. There's nothing else to be said about it.

Future/possible changes

• Leech Seed over Giga Drain. See the notable highlights below.
• Change Zapdos' item for a Magnet instead of the BrightPowder. I might try out a Modest Zapdos as well, whenever I'm able to get one that is.
• Experiment with Latios over Zapdos.

Notable highlights

• PP stalling a Shedinja to death: this would-be streak killer bugger showed up in one of the sets as a lead. Needless to say, I didn't have anything to KO it so I had to get creative. My plan was simple: KO its partners and then PP stall it. Although I was a bit on the fence thanks to a Forretress1 setting up a layer of Spikes, it was thanks to Zapdos' Pressure and some clever switching and Protects that I was able to stall it out until it struggled to its death.
• Suicune2 almost PP stalling me out: In a bit of a change of roles, now I was on the receiving end of being PP stalled by Suicune2. After a Latias5 (I think) paralyzed my Zapdos before dying, and the Suicune PP stalling Ludicolo's Giga Drains thanks to Protect and with a couple of Double Teams under its belt, I was in a lot of trouble even if I was 4vs1 against it. I had to play carefully and avoid using Thunder with Zapdos until I made sure I PP stalled its Protects and Dives. After being able to do so and chip it with my Metagross' last two EQs I was finally able to KO that thing with Thunder. This, along with what happened with Shedinja and a couple of annoying sets against Double Team/Amnesia Registeel, now fully convinced me to drop Giga Drain for Leech Seed for the next streak.
• Some smartass Exeggutor5 that activated its BrightPowder two times in a row while it was in red health and decided to explode on my face afterwards. Really cool stuff.

How I lost:

In what was a bit of a rollercoaster of a run, with some annoying and cool moments/sets (with me even accidentally doing a set (71-77) with the old Lv.50 team out of pure distraction, and yet being able to come out on top with the 10 level difference), it fittingly came to a screeching halt in set 130 in an unceremonious, Werster-like bs way courtesy of PKMN Breeder Tess (Walrein4 / Vaporeon3 / Swampert3 / Jolteon1 or 4). Of all the bs ways I've lost in all of my frontier streaks, this one takes the cake for me. Everything went wrong for me, from bad luck and OHKO moves to getting hard counterteamed with the worst sets possible. You just can't make this up.

(PS: sorry for the quality, I'm too lazy to record this on emu)

And yeah, that's pretty much it for this run. Like I said before, I'm open to comments and suggestions. Thanks for reading!

Great write up! Really enjoyed your post but I know I've seen this team before and coincidentally it is almost the same used by Golden Blissey and it's funny how you ended up with the same team members. Considering that me and Actaeon made him the same suggestions he just applied with you, we are the ones to blame in here lol. Neverless, congrats on the streak! Getting into 129 wins is still your own effort and that deserves a lot of credit.

If you actually need a Zapdos I think I have a Modest HP Grass one that I RNG abused from my XD:GoD save file. If you have the tools to dump a .pk file, let me know and I can gladly send you a copy of my Zapdos if it's ok with you. The only weakness I can see on this team is Shedinja and it might actually warrant to fit Shadow Ball somewhere but other than that, it seems that you can manage it by PP stalling and overall it's pretty solid. Leech Seed also gets rid of it, so that improves the match up as well.

 

[Albus]

Great write up! Really enjoyed your post but I know I've seen this team before and coincidentally it is almost the same used by Golden Blissey and it's funny how you ended up with the same team members. Considering that me and Actaeon made him the same suggestions he just applied with you, we are the ones to blame in here lol. Neverless, congrats on the streak! Getting into 129 wins is still your own effort and that deserves a lot of credit.

If you actually need a Zapdos I think I have a Modest HP Grass one that I RNG abused from my XD:GoD save file. If you have the tools to dump a .pk file, let me know and I can gladly send you a copy of my Zapdos if it's ok with you. The only weakness I can see on this team is Shedinja and it might actually warrant to fit Shadow Ball somewhere but other than that, it seems that you can manage it by PP stalling and overall it's pretty solid. Leech Seed also gets rid of it, so that improves the match up as well.

Wow, that's really cool! I'm glad to see that you guys built and made a better, more thought-out version of the team long before I even thought about building mine. Now I get where all of Actaeon's "classic" comments come from. Thanks for letting me know!

Anyways, I'd really appreciate it if you could help me out with that Zapdos! As long as I don't have to tamper with GC's savefiles I'm perfectly fine with that. Regarding Leech Seed, yeah, that's the other reason of why I'm dropping Giga Drain for it. I know that it is a risky option over Shadow Ball if you factor in its accuracy and Shedinja's Silver Wind threatening Ludicolo back, but I prefer Protect in Metagross for scouting, get some Lefties recovers (it helps a lot in longer, stall-ish battles against say, DD Kingdra variants or even Shedinja itself) and overall usefulness. I'll consider changing it for Shadow Ball (like in the "classic team") if Leech Seed proves to be too unreliable against that specific scenario though.

 

[average fella]

i guess its time to make an all-golds post. All of these were at level 50.

factory

i already made this post last page, got to 63 buoyed by draft luck, lost to the devastating focus band/freeze/misplay combo.

palace

Certainly unique. Unique enough that this threw me into the Emerald frontier hole for a month, and even after I got gold, I tried again to extend my streak. 53 wins.

This is a great time to tell you this: I used my Aerial Ace TM during the story, so I can't just clone bunch of 'em and use aero ass on mence. This causes much pain in numerous facilities, and my loss here is directly attributable to it.



Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
IVs: 24 HP / 18 Atk
- Surf
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Protect

Metagross @ Metal Coat
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 124 HP / 252 Atk / 132 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Protect

Salamence @ Lum Berry
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
IVs: 20 SpA
- Fly
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Flamethrower

Instantly, you can see my laziness with the Starmie HP IV, but it doesn't come into play during this loss iirc. Don't remember how the first 2 members died, final mon of the loss is Cradily4, Salamence's Fly gives it free lefties and ingrain, and it doesn't pick moves fast enough before Cradily finally picks toxic twice.

This is incredibly weak to any and all Guitarists, and the mere concept of Zapdos. This is a recurring theme.

dome

I bet I could go a lot farther than this, I didn't really face any resistance whatsoever. Don't like this one at all, kind of boring. 10 tournaments.
Slaking @ Choice Band
Ability: Truant
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Return
- Earthquake
- Shadow Ball
- Hyper Beam

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 14 Atk
- Surf
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Psychic

Metagross @ Metal Coat
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 124 HP / 252 Atk / 132 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Protect


I rebreed Starmie with a good nature for the other facilities. I don't bother rebreeding Metagross.

pike

Very fun. Even without Blissey, this isn't too hard if you know what you're doing. 211 wins without Blissey.

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 14 Atk
- Surf
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Psychic

Salamence @ Lum Berry
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 30 HP / 30 Atk / 30 Def / 22 SpA / 30 SpD
- Hidden Power [Flying]
- Earthquake
- Substitute
- Dragon Dance

Metagross @ Metal Coat
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 124 HP / 252 Atk / 132 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Protect

Lost to the obvious weakness to Electrics. Zapdos? lead, tanked a starmie Ice Beam, and then I fell behind and couldn't beat the registeel? and latias3 in back. I'll grant that the latias3 thing was largely because I whiffed 2 meteor mashes that had a good shot at ohkoing, but honestly I got so lucky for this streak that I can't be mad at whiffing 2 85% moves.

pyramid

Not going back. Least favorite facility here by far. 70 floors.

Always used:
Slaking @ Choice Band
Ability: Truant
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Return
- Earthquake
- Shadow Ball
- Hyper Beam

Starmie @ Shell Bell
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 14 Atk
- Surf
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Psychic


Flex slot members:
Salamence @ Shell Bell
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 30 HP / 30 Atk / 30 Def / 22 SpA / 30 SpD
- Hidden Power [Flying]
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Flamethrower

Metagross @ Shell Bell
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 124 HP / 252 Atk / 132 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Protect

Whoever was better against wilds was used. Linoone was in my party for 1-3, coveted a cb from beldum r1 and a shell bell from gorebyss r3, picked up a shell bell, did its job. Lost here r10f5 once and thought about just not playing emerald anymore. Hate it.

arena

Numerous unfortunate occurrences soil my perception of what is probably a good facility. 56 wins, might come back, I'm not as mad at this facility as I am at Pyramid.



also yes i know im wasting evs, and the optimal way to do it would be 8 hp 248 atk since im using the 30x5/31 spread. also yes, i have only then acquired a shell bell. once i'm in the facilities, my patience is infinite, my patience outside of it is in(credibly )finite.

Starmie @ Lum Berry
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 14 Atk
- Surf
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Psychic

Salamence @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 30 HP / 30 Atk / 30 Def / 22 SpA / 30 SpD
- Hidden Power [Flying]
- Earthquake
- Substitute
- Dragon Dance

Metagross @ Shell Bell
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 124 HP / 252 Atk / 132 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Protect


lots of hp flying whiffs resulted in a loss on the skill decision. damn, you tm40

tower

Might extend, but not now. 70 wins

Slaking @ Choice Band
Ability: Truant
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Return
- Earthquake
- Shadow Ball
- Hyper Beam

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 14 Atk
- Surf
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Psychic

Salamence @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 30 HP / 30 Atk / 30 Def / 22 SpA / 30 SpD
- Hidden Power [Flying]
- Earthquake
- Substitute
- Dragon Dance

You may notice a problem with this team: Anabel's Snorlax can come in on a truant turn and destroy everything. You are correct! I lost at 70 twice to precisely that, on my third attempt at round 10, this is my team.

Slaking @ Choice Band
Ability: Truant
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Return
- Earthquake
- Shadow Ball
- Hyper Beam

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 14 Atk
- Surf
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Psychic

Metagross @ Shell Bell
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 124 HP / 252 Atk / 132 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Explosion

Minimal effort for maximum return, didn't like burning my boom tutor to ohko +1 snorlax, but I got all golds.

 

[Actaeon]

Hello again! I dedicated the whole Sunday to continue with the Open Level streak that I still had when I posted the Lv.50 one last week. After making some changes to the team thanks to Actaeon's suggestions, I was able to surpass my previous streak... by a grand total of 2 more sets, ending with a 129 win-streak.

Proof of the streak

So let me go into the details:

The updated team

Ludicolo (GOOBY PLS) @ Cheri Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
IVs: 31 HP / x / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
Modest Nature
- Fake Out
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Giga Drain

Same Ludicolo from last time. I was going to change Giga Drain for Leech Seed, but I completely forgot about it and I just kept going with the streak. However, after some of the ugly experiences that I had with this streak (see the notable highlights below) I'm definitely changing Giga Drain for the next streak.

Kingdra (Draygon) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Rain Dance
- Protect

Same Kingdra from last time but with Protect instead of Hydro Pump. I liked this change and I didn't really miss Hydro Pump, except in the last set where my chances of winning would've been better with it.

Zapdos (Storm Hawk) @ BrightPowder
Ability: Pressure
Level: 100
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 23 Atk / 0 Def / 30 SpA / 28 SpD / 31 Spe
- Thunder
- Hidden Power Grass
- Rain Dance
- Protect / Drill Peck

• The new and most significant change for the team. I have this Zapdos since 2012 and it was a lucky soft reset of sorts from back then. The IVs/nature surely leave a lot to be desired and its HP Grass has a paltry BP of 36, but eh its the best thing I have for the role rn. I changed it over Salamence, of which I was already aware that didn't contribute anything of value on the original team, and I kept mostly out of pure favoritism. I was already set on changing Mence with either Raikou or Jolteon (with Zapdos being the third option) but after reading Actaeon's suggestions about it, I went for Zapdos head-first instead.
• I used this Zapdos as the primary Rain Dance setter over Kingdra and it worked pretty well, with Thunder being able to hit stuff very hard and threaten bulky waters from the get-go. Its damage output with HP Grass was pathetic against its intended targets, but it still got the job done.
• This Zapdos also gives me the ability to be able to KO important targets on the switch with Thunder. This is possible if I'm able to KO either both targets with Surf or KOing one and be able to hit the switch while being able to ignore its non-threatening partner. Among other things, this helped me to KO an Aerodactyl and a Suicune on the switch with Thunder. Had I not used Thunder in that Suicune slot I would've been in a lot of trouble in that set (to summarize the set, I KO'd two targets, chose to Thunder a particular slot just because, the particular slot was Suicune's and the other one was a Latios).
• I gave it a BrightPowder because I didn't think throughly of what else to give it atm, but it did its thing and it helped me avoid some crucial attacks. However, after all of this streak's experiences I'll change it for a Magnet instead.
• I tried out Drill Peck in sets 78-84, and while the option of being able to hit Heracross/Grass-types hard without relying on Ice Beams was kinda cool, I felt that it was too vulnerable to attacks when setting up or attacking, so I changed it for Protect and I didn't look back. Needless to say, the bad IVs/nature/Hidden Power hold it back significantly so yeah, guess I'll have to learn how to RNG in FRLG on emulator just to get a better one.

Metagross (Quadraxis) @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
Level: 100
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 31 HP / 31 Atk / 31 Def / 31 SpD / 31 Spe
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Explosion
- Protect

Same Metagross from last time. There's nothing else to be said about it.

Future/possible changes

• Leech Seed over Giga Drain. See the notable highlights below.
• Change Zapdos' item for a Magnet instead of the BrightPowder. I might try out a Modest Zapdos as well, whenever I'm able to get one that is.
• Experiment with Latios over Zapdos.

Notable highlights

• PP stalling a Shedinja to death: this would-be streak killer bugger showed up in one of the sets as a lead. Needless to say, I didn't have anything to KO it so I had to get creative. My plan was simple: KO its partners and then PP stall it. Although I was a bit on the fence thanks to a Forretress1 setting up a layer of Spikes, it was thanks to Zapdos' Pressure and some clever switching and Protects that I was able to stall it out until it struggled to its death.
• Suicune2 almost PP stalling me out: In a bit of a change of roles, now I was on the receiving end of being PP stalled by Suicune2. After a Latias5 (I think) paralyzed my Zapdos before dying, and the Suicune PP stalling Ludicolo's Giga Drains thanks to Protect and with a couple of Double Teams under its belt, I was in a lot of trouble even if I was 4vs1 against it. I had to play carefully and avoid using Thunder with Zapdos until I made sure I PP stalled its Protects and Dives. After being able to do so and chip it with my Metagross' last two EQs I was finally able to KO that thing with Thunder. This, along with what happened with Shedinja and a couple of annoying sets against Double Team/Amnesia Registeel, now fully convinced me to drop Giga Drain for Leech Seed for the next streak.
• Some smartass Exeggutor5 that activated its BrightPowder two times in a row while it was in red health and decided to explode on my face afterwards. Really cool stuff.

How I lost:

In what was a bit of a rollercoaster of a run, with some annoying and cool moments/sets (with me even accidentally doing a set (71-77) with the old Lv.50 team out of pure distraction, and yet being able to come out on top with the 10 level difference), it fittingly came to a screeching halt in set 130 in an unceremonious, Werster-like bs way courtesy of PKMN Breeder Tess (Walrein4 / Vaporeon3 / Swampert3 / Jolteon1 or 4). Of all the bs ways I've lost in all of my frontier streaks, this one takes the cake for me. Everything went wrong for me, from bad luck and OHKO moves to getting hard counterteamed with the worst sets possible. You just can't make this up.

(PS: sorry for the quality, I'm too lazy to record this on emu)

And yeah, that's pretty much it for this run. Like I said before, I'm open to comments and suggestions. Thanks for reading!

Nice read, thanks for the feedback. And an unfortunate loss, of course. That Fake Out miss was the biggest reason you lost I think. In general, Zapdos' bulk can be disappointing at times. Maybe a more bulky, less speedy Zapdos could be optimal to survive some STAB Ice Beams?

Vaporeon is always a high priority target for me with Thunder, even if there's a Walrein around. In these scenarios, it's sometimes useful to have Thunderbolt as a filler, so you can use Fake Out and Thunderbolt as an agressive opening instead of Rain Dance, especially when there's threatening opposing Water types.

I'm glad you feel that the team has improved by using Zapdos. That perfectly accurate Thunder is devastating. And Protect plus Explosion in the back is always a good last resort.

In all my theorymoning about Rain in doubles this is always the squad I eventually end up with, and I'm afraid losses like these can't be overcome without making the team worse in general. I think we kind of hit the ceiling with this particular strat.

But of course, I'd still like to experiment a little, e.g. with Omastar, possibly with Flatter, Sweet Scent Hydro Pumps, or in combination with Metal Sound or Fake Tears.

I have more ideas, such as CB Qwilfish (the fastest exploder with decent Attack in rain, also CB Shadow Ball and Sludge Bomb really hurt, and it can run Hydro Pump as well) even though it provides little defensive synergy to the rest of the team. Then there's Torrent plus Rain, which can be effective with the likes of Blastoise and possibly Hydro Cannon and Endure + Salac.

Last but not least, Starmie has the Speed stat that makes up for not having Swift Swim, it has more SpA than Kingdra and Ludicolo, and Thunder. An interesting partner is Jolteon, who has Helping Hand and can give Starmie Volt Absorb by letting itself get Skill Swapped. It could even Baton Pass a Petaya Berry to Kingdra, possibly making use of Starmie's Natural Cure in the process.

So many thoughts, tbh I haven't posted a definite Rain team yet because of this. It's the one team that still remains unpublished in my Doubles series. But these threads help a lot!