I'm happy to see I was not the only one who had the same idea!
I hope someone who has more time and insight than me breaks the format and gets over 100 with this idea, I'm definitely looking forward to seeing other, similar teams doing well ^^
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SwSh Battle Facilities Discussion & Records
- Thread starter Eisenherz
- Start date
I'm happy to see I was not the only one who had the same idea!
I hope someone who has more time and insight than me breaks the format and gets over 100 with this idea, I'm definitely looking forward to seeing other, similar teams doing well ^^
Phew... this was by far the hardest one so far, I went through so many tests and failures, but I finally have an Ice streak I'm happy with!
The team:
@
Modest | Water Absorb
IVs: HT/x/HT/HT/HT/HT
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Freeze-Dry / Surf / Solar Beam / Psychic
@
Jolly | Thick Fat
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 12 HP / 236 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Icicle Crash / Earthquake / Iron Head / Peck
@
Impish | Ice Body
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 244 HP / 204 Def / 60 SpD
Icicle Spear / Body Press / Iron Defense / Recover
Before I arrived to this exact roster, I also tested several Lapras sets, an Adamant Mamoswine, Frosmoth (with different movesets and items), Darmanitan-G and Mr. Rime, but these 3 in this specific order are the only ones that were able to get good results consistently. It was kind of counter-intuitive to me, because I really thought a Mamoswine lead made more sense, especially with Water Absorb Lapras as a switch-in to water moves. But I can't argue with results! Before I talk about each Pokémon, a few words on the ones I tested that didn't make the cut...
This was the most promising... initially I was under the impression Frosmoth got Roost, so I wanted to use it as a special wall in tandem with Avalugg, and I was very disappointed to find out it didn't. I still think its coverage, which includes Hurricane (or Air Slash) and Giga Drain, give it quite a lot of potential, but one of the team's main problem was Fighting types, and Frosmoth, with its low base speed and bad physical defense, didn't help deal with those well enough. I still feel like it could be good though... maybe it needs to be a lead, which is something I didn't try.
This runs into the issue of losing its powerful ability when Dynamaxing, yet it can't really stay locked in most of the time, and needs to Dynamax to deal with the foe. Every run I had with it was as a lead, because I can't see myself ever using it as a switch-in to something, but every time, it swept for maybe 3-4 battles, and then fell because it dynamaxed, didn't OHKO the opponent, and took way too much damage in return (it's so frail).
I think Rime has some potential, but is let down by its mediocre defense, and by being just worse than its competitors as a Dynamaxer (Lapras and Mamoswine). It's also let down by its speed tier... I considered Eviolite Mr. Mime as well, which fixes the speed tier problem and adds some super nice bulk, but then the power output would become an issue I think. Still, I think he could be usable on a good Ice run and I may just not have found the correct teammates for it.
G-Max Lapras is really good... every time I tested a version of the team without it, it did significantly worse. At first, I used Hydration with Rest (over Solar Beam, because I didn't even know it could learn it), and it worked out very nicely. It almost always sets the rain when it Dynamaxes, so having so many opportunities to heal back to full is really good. The issue I ran into was that Lapras almost always needs to Dynamax instantly to set the Veil with G-Max Resonance, the main reason it's able to stick around for so long. But then, as soon as a Water type Pokémon comes in, your entire Dynamax gets wasted as you have to wait for it to end before being able to Freeze-Dry; this also wastes turns of the all-important Veil, and some PP.
When I discovered Lapras could learn Solar Beam in LGPE, I booted the game and hunted one down instantly. Not only does it allow dealing with Water types really well when Dynamaxed, it also provides additional recovery with the Grassy Terrain. With Leftovers on top, this can heal Lapras pretty quickly! Unfortunately, it also meant Hydration wasn't available, so I decided to try Water Absorb... I think it made more sense either way, because the set now really couldn't fit Rest anymore. Even though Psychic doesn't get used a lot, it's essential to deal with things like Sirfetch'd or Mienshao; without Max Mindstorm, seeing these is an autoloss. Surprisingly, Rest wasn't missed that much, because Lapras was able to find new ways to heal: Grassy Terrain, obviously, but also baiting Water moves. For example, Cloyster seems to really want to Razor Shell Lapras for some reason. On Seaking, I can switch to Avalugg on the Bounce, and then back to Lapras on an incoming Waterfall... etc. In the many runs I led with Mamoswine, Lapras had plenty of Water moves to switch into for recovery, but the Mamoswine lead just didn't give me as much mileage as Lapras did.
The real wonder of Lapras was being able to do so well with such low speed. 252 EVs were necessary to outspeed Scrafty, a huge threat to the team, but it still got outsped on the regular; the power of Dmax + Aurora Veil just allowed it to tank constantly. Once the rain is up, it becomes rather powerful, but it's otherwise quite weak, so it doesn't get that many OHKOs. At first, I thought this would be mean PP would be an issue, but while it got very low a few times, I never ran out.
The nice part about leading Lapras rather than Mamoswine was having a safe Electric switch-in!
Unsurprisingly, Mamoswine seems to be the best straightforward sweeper in Mono Ice. Both STABs are really powerful as max moves, and both have great side-effects. I was a little nervous to use Icicle Crash, but Mamoswine hasn't missed a single one in both testing and the actual run, I got pretty lucky! (I had to connect exactly 3 in this run, but all 3 were essential)
Unfortunately, both Icicle Crash and Earthquake have 16 PP, which isn't that great, and I ended up running out of the former at battle 40, while I had 1 EQ left. Iron Head is obviously for Max Steelspike, allowing Mamoswine to boost its Defenses on both sides, and giving some important OHKOs on stuff like Abomasnow, Aromatisse and Lunatone (Power Gem does way more than you'd expect!). I hadn't considered Heavy Slam at the time, but I looked into it during the run and I think it would have been a better choice; it can score OHKOs on many fairies outside of Dynamax, which Iron Head can't, and such OHKOs are blessed because they give way more Shell Bell recovery and don't waste a turn of Dmax. It has the drawback of less PP, but I never got any close to draining my Iron Head PP, so I think that would be fine.
And the last move is... Peck, lol. Transferred from Gen 7, just for the access to the blessed Max Airstream. And it's 100% worth!! It has 90 power as a max move, which is kind of reasonable (you can OHKO stuff like Toxicroak, Heracross and Butterfree with it), but it's mostly used as the final blow when the foe is getting 2HKOd anyway. An Airstream is huge for Mamoswine, allowing it to deal with Froslass or Mienshao without getting burned or OHKOd. Peck also has the advantage of making me laugh out loud every time I manage to score a KO with it in non-Dynamax form.
The Shell Bell was... hit and miss? It was much better when I had Mamoswine as a lead, as it allowed me to heal almost entirely a couple of times. But in this run, for example, I don't think it helped Mamoswine survive any longer. You need a lot of OHKOs to make up for taking a hit, and Dynamax slows down the recovery process quite a lot. Then again, it was sort of a no-drawback item which had the potential to be helpful. Maybe Expert Belt or even Soft Sand may have been slightly better here, but we'll never know. Either way, I can definitely see the appeal of the item for this mode on the right Pokémon, and I think for example that Gyarados on my Mono Water team would have benefited from it greatly, and perhaps Charizard on Mono Fire.
Initially added in order to deal with Escavalier (god I hate dealing with the set they made), Avalugg ended up being the saviour in so many occasions. On battle 36, it took a 3-hit Technician Cinccino Rock Blast from 31 HP (not %, HP!) and got off a Recover (despite being paralyzed). Without that amazing survival, the run was doomed. There is only a very specific list of Pokémon that Avalugg deals with (Cinccino, Golisopod, Steelix, Conkeldurr, Braviary, Bouffalant, Druddigon, Bisharp, sometimes Scrafty...), but boy does it handle them nicely. Impish rather than min speed was essential to outspeed Escavalier (and, as I later found out, Rhyperior), allowing it to Iron Defense and go to town. Unless threatened by a special move, Avalugg can easily sweep through everything barring Ghosts with boosted Body Presses, but Icicle Spear / Max Hailstorm always does way more damage than I expect them to (did you know it has 117 base Atk? I didn't!), and setting the Hail activate pseudo-leftovers from Ice Body, which is really nice. Most of the time though, it's used as a switch-in and the Dynamax has already been used by Lapras or Mamo, but in the latter case, there's a good chance Hail is already up.
It also ended up being my status absorber whenever I had no other choice (lead Froslass, for example, or Body Slam spam from Lickilicky). A burn hurts it greatly, but it can at least still do a lot of its walling and Rocky Helmet chipping when burned, it's just a lot longer. +6 Body Press still does a ton with a burn, too.
There isn't that much more to say, Avalugg definitely had a lot less screen time than the others, but it played a very specific role on the team and played it so well, that I have nothing but praise for it.
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Unlike most of my other runs so far, I don't see this team going a lot further. With better RNG it can definitely reach 45... maybe 50? But that's about it, I think I squeezed most of what I could out of mono Ice for now, and I'm ready to move on to mono Fighting!
The team:
Modest | Water Absorb
IVs: HT/x/HT/HT/HT/HT
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Freeze-Dry / Surf / Solar Beam / Psychic
Jolly | Thick Fat
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 12 HP / 236 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Icicle Crash / Earthquake / Iron Head / Peck
Impish | Ice Body
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 244 HP / 204 Def / 60 SpD
Icicle Spear / Body Press / Iron Defense / Recover
Before I arrived to this exact roster, I also tested several Lapras sets, an Adamant Mamoswine, Frosmoth (with different movesets and items), Darmanitan-G and Mr. Rime, but these 3 in this specific order are the only ones that were able to get good results consistently. It was kind of counter-intuitive to me, because I really thought a Mamoswine lead made more sense, especially with Water Absorb Lapras as a switch-in to water moves. But I can't argue with results! Before I talk about each Pokémon, a few words on the ones I tested that didn't make the cut...
This was the most promising... initially I was under the impression Frosmoth got Roost, so I wanted to use it as a special wall in tandem with Avalugg, and I was very disappointed to find out it didn't. I still think its coverage, which includes Hurricane (or Air Slash) and Giga Drain, give it quite a lot of potential, but one of the team's main problem was Fighting types, and Frosmoth, with its low base speed and bad physical defense, didn't help deal with those well enough. I still feel like it could be good though... maybe it needs to be a lead, which is something I didn't try. This runs into the issue of losing its powerful ability when Dynamaxing, yet it can't really stay locked in most of the time, and needs to Dynamax to deal with the foe. Every run I had with it was as a lead, because I can't see myself ever using it as a switch-in to something, but every time, it swept for maybe 3-4 battles, and then fell because it dynamaxed, didn't OHKO the opponent, and took way too much damage in return (it's so frail). I think Rime has some potential, but is let down by its mediocre defense, and by being just worse than its competitors as a Dynamaxer (Lapras and Mamoswine). It's also let down by its speed tier... I considered Eviolite Mr. Mime as well, which fixes the speed tier problem and adds some super nice bulk, but then the power output would become an issue I think. Still, I think he could be usable on a good Ice run and I may just not have found the correct teammates for it.G-Max Lapras is really good... every time I tested a version of the team without it, it did significantly worse. At first, I used Hydration with Rest (over Solar Beam, because I didn't even know it could learn it), and it worked out very nicely. It almost always sets the rain when it Dynamaxes, so having so many opportunities to heal back to full is really good. The issue I ran into was that Lapras almost always needs to Dynamax instantly to set the Veil with G-Max Resonance, the main reason it's able to stick around for so long. But then, as soon as a Water type Pokémon comes in, your entire Dynamax gets wasted as you have to wait for it to end before being able to Freeze-Dry; this also wastes turns of the all-important Veil, and some PP.
When I discovered Lapras could learn Solar Beam in LGPE, I booted the game and hunted one down instantly. Not only does it allow dealing with Water types really well when Dynamaxed, it also provides additional recovery with the Grassy Terrain. With Leftovers on top, this can heal Lapras pretty quickly! Unfortunately, it also meant Hydration wasn't available, so I decided to try Water Absorb... I think it made more sense either way, because the set now really couldn't fit Rest anymore. Even though Psychic doesn't get used a lot, it's essential to deal with things like Sirfetch'd or Mienshao; without Max Mindstorm, seeing these is an autoloss. Surprisingly, Rest wasn't missed that much, because Lapras was able to find new ways to heal: Grassy Terrain, obviously, but also baiting Water moves. For example, Cloyster seems to really want to Razor Shell Lapras for some reason. On Seaking, I can switch to Avalugg on the Bounce, and then back to Lapras on an incoming Waterfall... etc. In the many runs I led with Mamoswine, Lapras had plenty of Water moves to switch into for recovery, but the Mamoswine lead just didn't give me as much mileage as Lapras did.
The real wonder of Lapras was being able to do so well with such low speed. 252 EVs were necessary to outspeed Scrafty, a huge threat to the team, but it still got outsped on the regular; the power of Dmax + Aurora Veil just allowed it to tank constantly. Once the rain is up, it becomes rather powerful, but it's otherwise quite weak, so it doesn't get that many OHKOs. At first, I thought this would be mean PP would be an issue, but while it got very low a few times, I never ran out.
The nice part about leading Lapras rather than Mamoswine was having a safe Electric switch-in!
Unsurprisingly, Mamoswine seems to be the best straightforward sweeper in Mono Ice. Both STABs are really powerful as max moves, and both have great side-effects. I was a little nervous to use Icicle Crash, but Mamoswine hasn't missed a single one in both testing and the actual run, I got pretty lucky! (I had to connect exactly 3 in this run, but all 3 were essential)
Unfortunately, both Icicle Crash and Earthquake have 16 PP, which isn't that great, and I ended up running out of the former at battle 40, while I had 1 EQ left. Iron Head is obviously for Max Steelspike, allowing Mamoswine to boost its Defenses on both sides, and giving some important OHKOs on stuff like Abomasnow, Aromatisse and Lunatone (Power Gem does way more than you'd expect!). I hadn't considered Heavy Slam at the time, but I looked into it during the run and I think it would have been a better choice; it can score OHKOs on many fairies outside of Dynamax, which Iron Head can't, and such OHKOs are blessed because they give way more Shell Bell recovery and don't waste a turn of Dmax. It has the drawback of less PP, but I never got any close to draining my Iron Head PP, so I think that would be fine.
And the last move is... Peck, lol. Transferred from Gen 7, just for the access to the blessed Max Airstream. And it's 100% worth!! It has 90 power as a max move, which is kind of reasonable (you can OHKO stuff like Toxicroak, Heracross and Butterfree with it), but it's mostly used as the final blow when the foe is getting 2HKOd anyway. An Airstream is huge for Mamoswine, allowing it to deal with Froslass or Mienshao without getting burned or OHKOd. Peck also has the advantage of making me laugh out loud every time I manage to score a KO with it in non-Dynamax form.
The Shell Bell was... hit and miss? It was much better when I had Mamoswine as a lead, as it allowed me to heal almost entirely a couple of times. But in this run, for example, I don't think it helped Mamoswine survive any longer. You need a lot of OHKOs to make up for taking a hit, and Dynamax slows down the recovery process quite a lot. Then again, it was sort of a no-drawback item which had the potential to be helpful. Maybe Expert Belt or even Soft Sand may have been slightly better here, but we'll never know. Either way, I can definitely see the appeal of the item for this mode on the right Pokémon, and I think for example that Gyarados on my Mono Water team would have benefited from it greatly, and perhaps Charizard on Mono Fire.
Initially added in order to deal with Escavalier (god I hate dealing with the set they made), Avalugg ended up being the saviour in so many occasions. On battle 36, it took a 3-hit Technician Cinccino Rock Blast from 31 HP (not %, HP!) and got off a Recover (despite being paralyzed). Without that amazing survival, the run was doomed. There is only a very specific list of Pokémon that Avalugg deals with (Cinccino, Golisopod, Steelix, Conkeldurr, Braviary, Bouffalant, Druddigon, Bisharp, sometimes Scrafty...), but boy does it handle them nicely. Impish rather than min speed was essential to outspeed Escavalier (and, as I later found out, Rhyperior), allowing it to Iron Defense and go to town. Unless threatened by a special move, Avalugg can easily sweep through everything barring Ghosts with boosted Body Presses, but Icicle Spear / Max Hailstorm always does way more damage than I expect them to (did you know it has 117 base Atk? I didn't!), and setting the Hail activate pseudo-leftovers from Ice Body, which is really nice. Most of the time though, it's used as a switch-in and the Dynamax has already been used by Lapras or Mamo, but in the latter case, there's a good chance Hail is already up.
It also ended up being my status absorber whenever I had no other choice (lead Froslass, for example, or Body Slam spam from Lickilicky). A burn hurts it greatly, but it can at least still do a lot of its walling and Rocky Helmet chipping when burned, it's just a lot longer. +6 Body Press still does a ton with a burn, too.
There isn't that much more to say, Avalugg definitely had a lot less screen time than the others, but it played a very specific role on the team and played it so well, that I have nothing but praise for it.
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Unlike most of my other runs so far, I don't see this team going a lot further. With better RNG it can definitely reach 45... maybe 50? But that's about it, I think I squeezed most of what I could out of mono Ice for now, and I'm ready to move on to mono Fighting!
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How are there so many good streaks already? It's only been 9 Days!
How'd you think of it? Was it genus, insanity, just a whim, or all of the above?
I can't believe someone thought using Peck on a serious team was a good idea... and I can't believe that it was actually a good idea. 0_o@
Jolly | Thick Fat
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 12 HP / 236 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Icicle Crash / Earthquake / Iron Head / Peck
How'd you think of it? Was it genus, insanity, just a whim, or all of the above?
max airstream is just a broken move on anything that gets it
Ugh. My Poison run ended without me using a single manual restore. The wrong matchup at the wrong time plus a wrong decision cost me all three of my team members. Despite the rather frustrating turn of events, going almost 28 battles without a restore shows this team has legs, and I already have an idea of what I need to do to optimize it further.
Restricted Sparring Poison Team : "High Society"
Teambuilding
Being a PvE mode with a rather unique set of rules and highly questionable AI, Restricted Sparring has seemed like the perfect invitation to bring out some "underdogs" who normally would see little attention otherwise. I again wanted to go for a balance approach between offense and survivability, but I wanted to see if I could come up with a different innovation as opposed to just copy pasting my Shell Bell strategy. So what did I settle on? How does Natural Cure Roserade with Rest sound?
With my highly questionable lead for a highly questionable mode set in place, Toxapex was an easy second choice for its ability to switch into Roserade trouble spots. I even had the crazy idea that I could posion/burn something and then let Roserade Rest stall in front of it. Now that's some spicy shenanigans right there! Of course, neither mons in their first iteration had much business going up against Steel types, so I threw on Toxtricity with some Grind Gear + Drain Punch flavoring reminiscent of my previous team's Incineroar.
Everyone on this iteration of the team kind of looked like they wanted to kill you with their pompous/condescending glares alone. They were like a bunch of snooty superiors, so that is where the name "High Society" came from and it ended up sticking.
A huge problem emerged almost immediately though: I got creamed by Psychic types, most notably Starmie who runs over most if not the entire team if not encountered in very favorable circumstances. Toxtricity definitely seemed like the one who needed to go, but what to switch him to was not a given. Not only did I need a buffer against Psychic types but someone who could adequately handle Steel types as well. Drapion and Skuntank both got a look for their Psychic immunity, but neither really gelled with the overall approach the team was taking. From there, the next best thing I could ask for was neutral Psychic coverage. That basically left me with one choice: Slowbro-G.
Wait... that ain't Falco... oh never mind...
I slapped Regenerator and Assault Vest on Slowbro; it wasn't perfect but it "gave me a chance," which is sometimes the best thing you can ask for in this format. Thankfully Slowbro has access to Flamethrower so he was decent enough for most Steel matchups. What's more, I now had a Regenerator chain I could abuse. To my surprise, it was actually quite effective and the new Regen pair were putting in serious work.
It was at this point I questioned whether or not I should just shelf Roserade. Toxapex and Slowbro were hard-walling like crazy and didn't really need her... or at least it seemed. As it turned out, Toxapex was the one doing most of the work and chewing up PP because (1) she had the most reliable way to status opponents and (2) it was so insanely tanky that it was way too easy to fall back on prematurely.
Before I nuked my lead and jumped ship to something like Shell Bell Gengar, I decided to just try and play Roserade more aggressively and see what kind of results I got. From basically step one I had been bracing for Roserade to be a flop, but I was determined to give it a fair shot. Once again, I ended up pleasantly surprised. She especially came into her own after I dropped poison coverage in favor of adding Shadow Ball, as this helped with the aforementioned Psychic types, as well as Ghost types (there are a lot of annoying sets here) and Steel Types. Combined with her defensive typing, I ended up having a pretty solid team.
Meet the Team
"Jade" the Roserade @ Leftovers
Modest Nature
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
- Grass Knot
- Shadow Ball
- Extrasensory
- Rest
Roserade was given a huge plus in 20 PP Extrasensory as an egg move. Combined with Grass Knot (20 PP) and Shadow Ball (15 PP), maxxed out it is at the same 88 PP threshold my Dark team Krookodile was at but in only three moves.
Grass Knot can be problematic outside of Dynamax but its workable and more often than not gets the job done on all accounts. Shadow Ball replaced STAB Sludge Bomb; although Roserade misses the occasional SpA boost on 2HKO's, Shadow Ball turned out to be a far more worthwhile move, especially for hitting opposing Psychics and Ghosts. The occasional other matchups where Sludge Bomb provided coverage could usually be handled adequately by the rest of team; Shadow Ball simply provided more value. Extrasensory is amazing with 20PP and hits opposing Poison types who wall Toxic from Toxapex. Finally, Rest combined with Natural Cure gives Roserade recovery potential.
"Velvet" the Toxapex @ Black Sludge
Bold Nature
Ability : Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
- Scald
- Toxic
- Baneful Bunker
- Recover
Toxapex does basically the same two things it always does : inflict status and live through (almost) everything. Scald, Toxic and Baneful Bunker combine to give it plenty of longevity in the "inflict pain and suffering" department. Black Sludge, Recover and Regenerator make it a monster to kill. Toxapex is Toxapex; what else do I need to say?
*Pretend there is a picture of Galarian Slowbro here*
"Caviar" the Slowbro-G @ Assault Vest
Modest Nature
Ability : Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP, 252 SpA, 4 SpD
- Shell Side Arm
- Psyshock
- Shadow Ball
- Flamethrower
A funky workaround to the team's Psychic vulnerability for sure, but it does the job surprisingly well. Max HP investment and Assault Vest allow it to easily switch in on several special foes, though it definitely has to lean on Regenerator hard to stay alive over long periods. Shell Side Arm is the only offensive Posion move on the team, but given the type's lackluster offensive prowess anyway this is an acceptable sacrifice and actually gives Slowbro a stronger niche on the team. Psyshock over Psychic is to further help it stand out, with it being the only pure physical attack the team. Shadow Ball is used as part of Slowbro's Psychic countering setup, while Flamethrower helps deal with pesky Steels. He isn't particularly efficient, but between Regenerator synergy and its specially defensive bulk, he doesn't always have to be. Those two roles alone often justify his existence on this team.
Gameplay
Outside of Regenerator, there is actually a lot of defensive synergy here. For example, using Roserade over someone like Gengar has had some key benefits. First off, Natural Cure can delay the inevitable status'ing of Toxapex and Slowbro by switching into things like Electric moves. On top of an electric resistance, it also is the only member to take neutral damage from ground moves, making it an ideal switch in against Scorching Sand (and Scald) users as well. Finally, despite the odd recovery tactic, Roserade's typing and decent SpD stat do actually let it get off Rest in a limited number of matchups; even if it takes a hit after using Rest it often ends up with more HP in the long run. It does a good job of not only providing offense (Grass + Ghost + Psychic,) but rounding out the team's defensive core. I'm very happy I got to take this niche poke and take it to greater heights!
Meet your new master, Restricted Sparring.
Despite this though and the obvious foreheading of Regenerator ping-pong, I would say that this team isn't particularly easy to pilot. There is definitely some nuance you want to pay attention to.
First off, balancing PP usage is critical, especially since this team relies on all three pokes being alive to really function properly. In particular, its easy to rely too much on Toxapex and to rely too little on Slowbro. Although you always want to be careful about forcing matchups, you really do need to be judicious in balancing the team's contributions. If in doubt, you should be looking to use/insert team members in the following order:
1. Slowbro
2. Roserade
3. Toxapex
Slowbro does his job very well on defense when paired with Toxapex, but offensively he can be a struggle to insert. Even with Assault Vest he can't take very much punishment before needing to switch out, and it can be particularly troublesome if you have him finishing a match (that is, he didn't get to heal by switching out.) Moving poison coverage off of Roserade and exclusively to him helped though and, if you can, preserving Dynamax in select situations can allow Slowbro to better take hits and still be healthy enough to be a switch-in next battle.
On the other end, if you can reasonably get away with not using Toxapex, then do it. Again, Toxapex is incredibly good at what it does. Its a reassuring anchor when healthy, but a source of major apprehension when weak or approaching no PP. Toxapex is really the thermometer by which one wants to measure the team's temperature; if Toxapex is out of steam (or about to be,) its probably time to heal. Make no mistake: you will have to use Toxapex liberally, but don't burn it out. Remain confident in the ability of Roserade and Slowbro to perform.
Status management is also key. Toxapex is frequently switching into fire moves which means, more likely than not, its going to be spending a lot of time burned. This is manageable though, and preferred over paralysis. Black Sludge offsets the HP chip of burn, and you still have Recover and Regenerator. On the other hand, I would say Slowbro wants it the other way: no innate recovery of his own makes burn damage very threatening, whereas if he gets "flinched" by paralysis he can almost always switch to Toxapex to get bailed out.
This is fine.
As far as opposing matchups are concerned, set-up pokes are generally the scariest thing for this team.
Braviary not only has Brave Bird but Bulk Up to go with it. Toxapex is really the only suitable answer to it, which generally means its burning up significant PP trying to stall it out. Trying to time Baneful Bunker/Recover around its haphazard use of Bulk Up is a pain.
Throat Spray Exploud doesn't even have to spend a turn dedicated to set up. If anything other than a healthy Roserade is out when it shows up, expect to take a lot of pain. This is the thing that ended my run.
Even something like Conkeldurr is annoying. It too has Bulk Up, but then I have to concern myself about it doing something like Focus Punch on a Toxapex Recover turn. Regenerator switching only really works if it doesn't start boosting, and even then you still have to be concerned about switching Slowbro into a Stone Edge.
Conclusion
At the end of the day, you have to get really creative. I went through several "mini-runs" trying to figure out what I could and couldn't get away with and, although there is a crap ton you can do with this team, the answer is still not always obvious. This team definitely took some time to get used to! The mini-streak was definitely solid even if I would have liked to have gone for a full streak, so maybe I'll try again. For now though, I'll end with a couple more highlights of the team's play. Enjoy!
Galaxy brain.
My time has finally come...
Restricted Sparring Poison Team : "High Society"
Teambuilding
Being a PvE mode with a rather unique set of rules and highly questionable AI, Restricted Sparring has seemed like the perfect invitation to bring out some "underdogs" who normally would see little attention otherwise. I again wanted to go for a balance approach between offense and survivability, but I wanted to see if I could come up with a different innovation as opposed to just copy pasting my Shell Bell strategy. So what did I settle on? How does Natural Cure Roserade with Rest sound?
With my highly questionable lead for a highly questionable mode set in place, Toxapex was an easy second choice for its ability to switch into Roserade trouble spots. I even had the crazy idea that I could posion/burn something and then let Roserade Rest stall in front of it. Now that's some spicy shenanigans right there! Of course, neither mons in their first iteration had much business going up against Steel types, so I threw on Toxtricity with some Grind Gear + Drain Punch flavoring reminiscent of my previous team's Incineroar.
Everyone on this iteration of the team kind of looked like they wanted to kill you with their pompous/condescending glares alone. They were like a bunch of snooty superiors, so that is where the name "High Society" came from and it ended up sticking.
A huge problem emerged almost immediately though: I got creamed by Psychic types, most notably Starmie who runs over most if not the entire team if not encountered in very favorable circumstances. Toxtricity definitely seemed like the one who needed to go, but what to switch him to was not a given. Not only did I need a buffer against Psychic types but someone who could adequately handle Steel types as well. Drapion and Skuntank both got a look for their Psychic immunity, but neither really gelled with the overall approach the team was taking. From there, the next best thing I could ask for was neutral Psychic coverage. That basically left me with one choice: Slowbro-G.
Wait... that ain't Falco... oh never mind...
I slapped Regenerator and Assault Vest on Slowbro; it wasn't perfect but it "gave me a chance," which is sometimes the best thing you can ask for in this format. Thankfully Slowbro has access to Flamethrower so he was decent enough for most Steel matchups. What's more, I now had a Regenerator chain I could abuse. To my surprise, it was actually quite effective and the new Regen pair were putting in serious work.
It was at this point I questioned whether or not I should just shelf Roserade. Toxapex and Slowbro were hard-walling like crazy and didn't really need her... or at least it seemed. As it turned out, Toxapex was the one doing most of the work and chewing up PP because (1) she had the most reliable way to status opponents and (2) it was so insanely tanky that it was way too easy to fall back on prematurely.
Before I nuked my lead and jumped ship to something like Shell Bell Gengar, I decided to just try and play Roserade more aggressively and see what kind of results I got. From basically step one I had been bracing for Roserade to be a flop, but I was determined to give it a fair shot. Once again, I ended up pleasantly surprised. She especially came into her own after I dropped poison coverage in favor of adding Shadow Ball, as this helped with the aforementioned Psychic types, as well as Ghost types (there are a lot of annoying sets here) and Steel Types. Combined with her defensive typing, I ended up having a pretty solid team.
Meet the Team
"Jade" the Roserade @ Leftovers
Modest Nature
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
- Grass Knot
- Shadow Ball
- Extrasensory
- Rest
Roserade was given a huge plus in 20 PP Extrasensory as an egg move. Combined with Grass Knot (20 PP) and Shadow Ball (15 PP), maxxed out it is at the same 88 PP threshold my Dark team Krookodile was at but in only three moves.
Grass Knot can be problematic outside of Dynamax but its workable and more often than not gets the job done on all accounts. Shadow Ball replaced STAB Sludge Bomb; although Roserade misses the occasional SpA boost on 2HKO's, Shadow Ball turned out to be a far more worthwhile move, especially for hitting opposing Psychics and Ghosts. The occasional other matchups where Sludge Bomb provided coverage could usually be handled adequately by the rest of team; Shadow Ball simply provided more value. Extrasensory is amazing with 20PP and hits opposing Poison types who wall Toxic from Toxapex. Finally, Rest combined with Natural Cure gives Roserade recovery potential.
"Velvet" the Toxapex @ Black Sludge
Bold Nature
Ability : Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
- Scald
- Toxic
- Baneful Bunker
- Recover
Toxapex does basically the same two things it always does : inflict status and live through (almost) everything. Scald, Toxic and Baneful Bunker combine to give it plenty of longevity in the "inflict pain and suffering" department. Black Sludge, Recover and Regenerator make it a monster to kill. Toxapex is Toxapex; what else do I need to say?
*Pretend there is a picture of Galarian Slowbro here*
"Caviar" the Slowbro-G @ Assault Vest
Modest Nature
Ability : Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP, 252 SpA, 4 SpD
- Shell Side Arm
- Psyshock
- Shadow Ball
- Flamethrower
A funky workaround to the team's Psychic vulnerability for sure, but it does the job surprisingly well. Max HP investment and Assault Vest allow it to easily switch in on several special foes, though it definitely has to lean on Regenerator hard to stay alive over long periods. Shell Side Arm is the only offensive Posion move on the team, but given the type's lackluster offensive prowess anyway this is an acceptable sacrifice and actually gives Slowbro a stronger niche on the team. Psyshock over Psychic is to further help it stand out, with it being the only pure physical attack the team. Shadow Ball is used as part of Slowbro's Psychic countering setup, while Flamethrower helps deal with pesky Steels. He isn't particularly efficient, but between Regenerator synergy and its specially defensive bulk, he doesn't always have to be. Those two roles alone often justify his existence on this team.
Gameplay
Outside of Regenerator, there is actually a lot of defensive synergy here. For example, using Roserade over someone like Gengar has had some key benefits. First off, Natural Cure can delay the inevitable status'ing of Toxapex and Slowbro by switching into things like Electric moves. On top of an electric resistance, it also is the only member to take neutral damage from ground moves, making it an ideal switch in against Scorching Sand (and Scald) users as well. Finally, despite the odd recovery tactic, Roserade's typing and decent SpD stat do actually let it get off Rest in a limited number of matchups; even if it takes a hit after using Rest it often ends up with more HP in the long run. It does a good job of not only providing offense (Grass + Ghost + Psychic,) but rounding out the team's defensive core. I'm very happy I got to take this niche poke and take it to greater heights!
Meet your new master, Restricted Sparring.
Despite this though and the obvious foreheading of Regenerator ping-pong, I would say that this team isn't particularly easy to pilot. There is definitely some nuance you want to pay attention to.
First off, balancing PP usage is critical, especially since this team relies on all three pokes being alive to really function properly. In particular, its easy to rely too much on Toxapex and to rely too little on Slowbro. Although you always want to be careful about forcing matchups, you really do need to be judicious in balancing the team's contributions. If in doubt, you should be looking to use/insert team members in the following order:
1. Slowbro
2. Roserade
3. Toxapex
Slowbro does his job very well on defense when paired with Toxapex, but offensively he can be a struggle to insert. Even with Assault Vest he can't take very much punishment before needing to switch out, and it can be particularly troublesome if you have him finishing a match (that is, he didn't get to heal by switching out.) Moving poison coverage off of Roserade and exclusively to him helped though and, if you can, preserving Dynamax in select situations can allow Slowbro to better take hits and still be healthy enough to be a switch-in next battle.
On the other end, if you can reasonably get away with not using Toxapex, then do it. Again, Toxapex is incredibly good at what it does. Its a reassuring anchor when healthy, but a source of major apprehension when weak or approaching no PP. Toxapex is really the thermometer by which one wants to measure the team's temperature; if Toxapex is out of steam (or about to be,) its probably time to heal. Make no mistake: you will have to use Toxapex liberally, but don't burn it out. Remain confident in the ability of Roserade and Slowbro to perform.
Status management is also key. Toxapex is frequently switching into fire moves which means, more likely than not, its going to be spending a lot of time burned. This is manageable though, and preferred over paralysis. Black Sludge offsets the HP chip of burn, and you still have Recover and Regenerator. On the other hand, I would say Slowbro wants it the other way: no innate recovery of his own makes burn damage very threatening, whereas if he gets "flinched" by paralysis he can almost always switch to Toxapex to get bailed out.
This is fine.
As far as opposing matchups are concerned, set-up pokes are generally the scariest thing for this team.
Braviary not only has Brave Bird but Bulk Up to go with it. Toxapex is really the only suitable answer to it, which generally means its burning up significant PP trying to stall it out. Trying to time Baneful Bunker/Recover around its haphazard use of Bulk Up is a pain.
Throat Spray Exploud doesn't even have to spend a turn dedicated to set up. If anything other than a healthy Roserade is out when it shows up, expect to take a lot of pain. This is the thing that ended my run.
Even something like Conkeldurr is annoying. It too has Bulk Up, but then I have to concern myself about it doing something like Focus Punch on a Toxapex Recover turn. Regenerator switching only really works if it doesn't start boosting, and even then you still have to be concerned about switching Slowbro into a Stone Edge.
Conclusion
At the end of the day, you have to get really creative. I went through several "mini-runs" trying to figure out what I could and couldn't get away with and, although there is a crap ton you can do with this team, the answer is still not always obvious. This team definitely took some time to get used to! The mini-streak was definitely solid even if I would have liked to have gone for a full streak, so maybe I'll try again. For now though, I'll end with a couple more highlights of the team's play. Enjoy!
Galaxy brain.
My time has finally come...
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465 | Mamoswine | Adamant | Icy Rock | Earthquake | Ice Fang | Peck | Hail | HP/Atk
"peck lets you beat heracross, dont laugh" -- Glen
4 am post incoming. Won't be very specific bc I'm tired but here goes...
Reading all of the posted teams has been really fun - I really love when some of the veterans from the Facilities threads come and dump their knowledge, and it shows in their execution and particularities in their teams. Newcomers sharing their experiences also motivates people like me to do things like these when they normally wouldn't. So...
Decided to give this a go. This was my first attempt:
Technically 2nd because on my first attempt the very 1st trainer had lead Drapion and Weavile in the back lmao. Talk about bad luck!
I didn't see any Ghost streaks in here, so I figured I'd give it a try, and given Chandelure is my favorite Pokémon, I said why not. Shedinja I decided would be an interesting thing to try given its ability. Gengar to round up the offensive core. This entirely shiny team is far from optimal, but I worked with what I had and achieved a pretty decent streak. That said, I know for a fact this team can go further with legitimate adjustments.
@ Shell Bell
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Shadow Ball
- Sludge Wave
- Giga Drain
- Dazzling Gleam
(Max PP on all moves)
Naturally, the biggest drawback to Ghost-types is their very limited selection due to being a very rare type. Fortunately, Gengar's combination of traits make it an excellent lead: its base 110 Speed allow it to strike first most of the time, minimizing damage taken, while access to Max Ooze allows it to snowball with the SpA boost, while simultaneously healing off damage with Shell Bell. Knowing Giga Drain enables it to heal off chip damage and summon Grassy Terrain when needed. Additionally, Gengar's Ghost/Poison typing has a good amount of resistances and immunities, which in tandem with Cursed Body comes in clutch more than you'd think (e.g. Disabling Dark or Ghost moves while Dynamaxed). It also synergizes incredibly with Shedinja!
Shadow Ball is very spammable, while Dazzling Gleam allows me to beat most Dark-types that would otherwise give me trouble - plus, Misty Terrain comes in clutch when you want to avoid status in a pinch.
Of course, Gengar's flaws are very obvious: it hates naturally bulky things that survive its attacks and expose its paper bulk. Pokémon faster than it or with access to Sucker Punch will be annoying to play around, and while it can usually just solo teams outright, you have to know when to conserve it as well as micromanage Sludge Wave and Giga Drain PP.
@ Leftovers
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Flamethrower
- Shadow Ball
- Energy Ball
- Calm Mind
(Max PP on all moves)
This lovely chandelier functions as the 2nd offensive backbone. The move choices should be straightforward, with Energy Ball allowing it to summon Grassy Terrain if it is able to Dynamax. Calm Mind allows you to just nuke everything while Dynamax and also brings Max Guard, which I used in tandem with Grassy Terrain + Leftovers to offset a lot of chip damage - Chandelure's typing also lends itself to a naturally good array of resistances, which helps it accomplish this.
Even without Dynamax, Chandelure's power allows it to grab KOs on frailer, slower Pokémon which proved to be clutch in a variety of situations. That said, it's most definitely the weakest team member due to having a very average speed tier and not synergizing well with the rest of the team... Still love you Chand.
@ Safety Goggles
Ability: Wonder Guard
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Shadow Sneak
- X-Scissor
- Dig
- Thief
(No PP Ups used)
Now, this guy is the star of the show and what pushed me to actually EV train these dudes to take on the challenge.
The Shedinja I used was a mishmash of moves I threw together, not even optimized in terms of PP count as I wanted to see what would work on it. The optimal version of the team would have a Shedinja from Gen 3 - more on that below.
Anyways, Shedinja thrives in a format such as this one, and I consider it to be one of Ghost's best tools in their limited arsenal. Staying healthy and PP conservation are key, and what better mon to do it than one who can be made wholly immune to entire swathes of Pokémon without so much as batting an eye... not that it can do that hehe.
The premise is straightforward - you switch it in on Pokémon that can't threaten it (refer to Eisenherz 's document, it is wholeheartedly what makes this possible!) and just stonewall the heck out of them. You bring moves with high PP and just wittle down the Pokémon until they faint... rinse and repeat. Shedinja can straight up solo entire trainer battles without so much as breaking a sweat.
Dig's pretty good for stalling out Trick Room or beating Toxapex by Max Quaking it (actually did this!)
Item choice was a bit tough, but it's hard to go wrong with Safety Goggles - it allows you to 1v1 a few other Pokémon, such as Crustle and Abomasnow.
The hard part with Shedinja is switching out on a threat after KOing a mon, and while Gengar and Chandelure can switch-in into a select few attacks thanks to their typings, there's a bunch of Pokemon (a Ground-type with Rock coverage or anything that's Ghost or Dark-type) that won't rly care for this and deal hefty damage to the team. That said, the type of support it provided was invaluable and it merits a lot of attention for Ghost imo.
How I lost:
I let Gengar get KOed by Lycanroc's Psychic Fangs (add this to the doc btw that's the last move) instead of Dynamaxing it to Max Overgrowth it but that was a careless mistake and it was a trial run anyways. Could have easily made it to 30 as I had one more heal left but oh well!
Optimizations:
- It gets a few other things it could potentially use: coverage such as Thunderbolt and Psychic could prove useful to beat certain problem Pokémon, Sludge Bomb over Sludge Wave if you want Shedinja to have an easier time beating something else (but this not only requires fishing for the poison, but also Gengar stomaching a hit), and Focus Blast if you feel like gambling and just want to delete a Dark-type that might survive Dazzling Gleam (e.g. Thievul)... the PP is an issue tho.
- As far as the set goes, Timid > Modest. And Calm Mind was a bit useful, but imo setup in this format is pretty lackluster so something like Psychic probably would be better on that last slot. Having Flash Fire (to wall even more Pokémon, such as Mienshao) would be infinitely better than Flame Body. That said, Chandelure should just be replaced with something that makes the team less Dark-weak...
- This is the guy I want to focus on in terms of improvements. A Gen 3 Shedinja could bring about 2 tools: Swords Dance or Baton Pass. The former would allow you to kill enemies faster and waste less PP overall, and could prove very useful for beating a few of the setup spammers that can't touch you (Crustle and Sandaconda come to mind). However, the latter intrigues me the most given its colossal PP, and the fact that it solves the issue of not being able to switch-in the frailer Ghosts: by chipping an opponent enough with Shedinja until they are in range of another teammate's attack, you can simply use a slow Baton Pass and then finish them off. This conserves both HP and PP, and saves Shedinja, which would go a long way. Additionally, Bug Bite > X-Scissor for the PP would be useful too. There's also a bunch of berries you can utilize for yourself as well!
Other options:
- Replacing Chandelure is pretty easy, and it is hard to go wrong with Dragapult. It is among the fastest Pokémon available and sports a gargantuan movepool that can hit much of the game SE with Dynamax moves. Something physically-based with access to a 1 turn Max Phantasm (over Phantom Force) or Max Fluttershy (Stronger U-turn vs a few Darks, and un-Dyna'd can be used in conjunction with Shedinja too), or specially-based with access to moves like Flamethrower, Surf, and Solar Beam (Grassy Terrain WEE) seem like it would patch up the team's biggest weakness in auto-losing to fast Darks such as Weavile.
- Sorta like Shedinja w/ access to Disguise. This is probably also the best Ghost-type by virtue of Disguise alone, and it was explored earlier in this thread on a Mono Fairy squad to good success.
I guess there's defensive stuff to look into such as
which can help patch some holes, but Shedinja alone provides a lot of that utility tbh.
Weaknesses:
- These Pokémon are incredibly nightmarish to face, due to their speed and STAB p much being run enders at the wrong time. Dragapult / Mimikyu can patch some of these weaknesses by dispatching them before they move though. Lead Zoroark is bound to show up eventually and just end you if you guess wrong too.
I'm going to reattempt this run with a better equipped Shedinja and go from there. I really think it can go pretty far and showcasing the cicada's gimmick is pretty cool in its own right!
Thanks for reading my ramblings~
Reading all of the posted teams has been really fun - I really love when some of the veterans from the Facilities threads come and dump their knowledge, and it shows in their execution and particularities in their teams. Newcomers sharing their experiences also motivates people like me to do things like these when they normally wouldn't. So...
Decided to give this a go. This was my first attempt:
Technically 2nd because on my first attempt the very 1st trainer had lead Drapion and Weavile in the back lmao. Talk about bad luck!
I didn't see any Ghost streaks in here, so I figured I'd give it a try, and given Chandelure is my favorite Pokémon, I said why not. Shedinja I decided would be an interesting thing to try given its ability. Gengar to round up the offensive core. This entirely shiny team is far from optimal, but I worked with what I had and achieved a pretty decent streak. That said, I know for a fact this team can go further with legitimate adjustments.
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Shadow Ball
- Sludge Wave
- Giga Drain
- Dazzling Gleam
(Max PP on all moves)
Naturally, the biggest drawback to Ghost-types is their very limited selection due to being a very rare type. Fortunately, Gengar's combination of traits make it an excellent lead: its base 110 Speed allow it to strike first most of the time, minimizing damage taken, while access to Max Ooze allows it to snowball with the SpA boost, while simultaneously healing off damage with Shell Bell. Knowing Giga Drain enables it to heal off chip damage and summon Grassy Terrain when needed. Additionally, Gengar's Ghost/Poison typing has a good amount of resistances and immunities, which in tandem with Cursed Body comes in clutch more than you'd think (e.g. Disabling Dark or Ghost moves while Dynamaxed). It also synergizes incredibly with Shedinja!
Shadow Ball is very spammable, while Dazzling Gleam allows me to beat most Dark-types that would otherwise give me trouble - plus, Misty Terrain comes in clutch when you want to avoid status in a pinch.
Of course, Gengar's flaws are very obvious: it hates naturally bulky things that survive its attacks and expose its paper bulk. Pokémon faster than it or with access to Sucker Punch will be annoying to play around, and while it can usually just solo teams outright, you have to know when to conserve it as well as micromanage Sludge Wave and Giga Drain PP.
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Flamethrower
- Shadow Ball
- Energy Ball
- Calm Mind
(Max PP on all moves)
This lovely chandelier functions as the 2nd offensive backbone. The move choices should be straightforward, with Energy Ball allowing it to summon Grassy Terrain if it is able to Dynamax. Calm Mind allows you to just nuke everything while Dynamax and also brings Max Guard, which I used in tandem with Grassy Terrain + Leftovers to offset a lot of chip damage - Chandelure's typing also lends itself to a naturally good array of resistances, which helps it accomplish this.
Even without Dynamax, Chandelure's power allows it to grab KOs on frailer, slower Pokémon which proved to be clutch in a variety of situations. That said, it's most definitely the weakest team member due to having a very average speed tier and not synergizing well with the rest of the team... Still love you Chand.
Ability: Wonder Guard
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Shadow Sneak
- X-Scissor
- Dig
- Thief
(No PP Ups used)
Now, this guy is the star of the show and what pushed me to actually EV train these dudes to take on the challenge.
The Shedinja I used was a mishmash of moves I threw together, not even optimized in terms of PP count as I wanted to see what would work on it. The optimal version of the team would have a Shedinja from Gen 3 - more on that below.
Anyways, Shedinja thrives in a format such as this one, and I consider it to be one of Ghost's best tools in their limited arsenal. Staying healthy and PP conservation are key, and what better mon to do it than one who can be made wholly immune to entire swathes of Pokémon without so much as batting an eye... not that it can do that hehe.
The premise is straightforward - you switch it in on Pokémon that can't threaten it (refer to Eisenherz 's document, it is wholeheartedly what makes this possible!) and just stonewall the heck out of them. You bring moves with high PP and just wittle down the Pokémon until they faint... rinse and repeat. Shedinja can straight up solo entire trainer battles without so much as breaking a sweat.
Dig's pretty good for stalling out Trick Room or beating Toxapex by Max Quaking it (actually did this!)
Item choice was a bit tough, but it's hard to go wrong with Safety Goggles - it allows you to 1v1 a few other Pokémon, such as Crustle and Abomasnow.
The hard part with Shedinja is switching out on a threat after KOing a mon, and while Gengar and Chandelure can switch-in into a select few attacks thanks to their typings, there's a bunch of Pokemon (a Ground-type with Rock coverage or anything that's Ghost or Dark-type) that won't rly care for this and deal hefty damage to the team. That said, the type of support it provided was invaluable and it merits a lot of attention for Ghost imo.
How I lost:
I let Gengar get KOed by Lycanroc's Psychic Fangs (add this to the doc btw that's the last move) instead of Dynamaxing it to Max Overgrowth it but that was a careless mistake and it was a trial run anyways. Could have easily made it to 30 as I had one more heal left but oh well!
Optimizations:
- It gets a few other things it could potentially use: coverage such as Thunderbolt and Psychic could prove useful to beat certain problem Pokémon, Sludge Bomb over Sludge Wave if you want Shedinja to have an easier time beating something else (but this not only requires fishing for the poison, but also Gengar stomaching a hit), and Focus Blast if you feel like gambling and just want to delete a Dark-type that might survive Dazzling Gleam (e.g. Thievul)... the PP is an issue tho. - As far as the set goes, Timid > Modest. And Calm Mind was a bit useful, but imo setup in this format is pretty lackluster so something like Psychic probably would be better on that last slot. Having Flash Fire (to wall even more Pokémon, such as Mienshao) would be infinitely better than Flame Body. That said, Chandelure should just be replaced with something that makes the team less Dark-weak... - This is the guy I want to focus on in terms of improvements. A Gen 3 Shedinja could bring about 2 tools: Swords Dance or Baton Pass. The former would allow you to kill enemies faster and waste less PP overall, and could prove very useful for beating a few of the setup spammers that can't touch you (Crustle and Sandaconda come to mind). However, the latter intrigues me the most given its colossal PP, and the fact that it solves the issue of not being able to switch-in the frailer Ghosts: by chipping an opponent enough with Shedinja until they are in range of another teammate's attack, you can simply use a slow Baton Pass and then finish them off. This conserves both HP and PP, and saves Shedinja, which would go a long way. Additionally, Bug Bite > X-Scissor for the PP would be useful too. There's also a bunch of berries you can utilize for yourself as well!Other options:
- Replacing Chandelure is pretty easy, and it is hard to go wrong with Dragapult. It is among the fastest Pokémon available and sports a gargantuan movepool that can hit much of the game SE with Dynamax moves. Something physically-based with access to a 1 turn Max Phantasm (over Phantom Force) or Max Fluttershy (Stronger U-turn vs a few Darks, and un-Dyna'd can be used in conjunction with Shedinja too), or specially-based with access to moves like Flamethrower, Surf, and Solar Beam (Grassy Terrain WEE) seem like it would patch up the team's biggest weakness in auto-losing to fast Darks such as Weavile. - Sorta like Shedinja w/ access to Disguise. This is probably also the best Ghost-type by virtue of Disguise alone, and it was explored earlier in this thread on a Mono Fairy squad to good success.I guess there's defensive stuff to look into such as
which can help patch some holes, but Shedinja alone provides a lot of that utility tbh.Weaknesses:
- These Pokémon are incredibly nightmarish to face, due to their speed and STAB p much being run enders at the wrong time. Dragapult / Mimikyu can patch some of these weaknesses by dispatching them before they move though. Lead Zoroark is bound to show up eventually and just end you if you guess wrong too.I'm going to reattempt this run with a better equipped Shedinja and go from there. I really think it can go pretty far and showcasing the cicada's gimmick is pretty cool in its own right!
Thanks for reading my ramblings~
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I can't believe I went through a whole thing trying to make Lunatone viable in Restricted Sparring, made a team that supported it, all just to find out that consumable items don't refresh per battle unless you heal your Pokemon. What a joke.
I guess I'll have to rely on Terrakion if I want a decent Rock streak.
I guess I'll have to rely on Terrakion if I want a decent Rock streak.
So anyone that tackles Ghost typing quickly learns that it's basically Mimikyu + two duds and the question is what are the least bad other teammates (though Jellicent might actually be good?). But Blitzamirin already did a thorough review of the ghost options above, and I can add some extra info on the ones I chose to go with.
I did three runs with Ghost and the best I got was 29, but Ghost suffers from some "gg" matchups, namely Zoroark (OHKOs this whole team by surprise) and Froslass (who burns Mimikyu).
29 wins
______________________________________
@
Ability: Disguise
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe ; Jolly Nature
Swords Dance / Play Rough / Shadow Claw / Wood Hammer
There's not much to say about Mimikyu that hasn't already been said, but i'll reiterate that it's a god in Restricted Sparring, getting free Swords Dances on what felt like 95% of the AI's teams. Jolly actually outspeeds SO many things, and when up against the stuff you don't outspeed, you actually threaten a good amount of them with a KO while they remove your disguise. Between Max Overgrowth and Shell Bell, Mimikyu healed from ~20% to full twice in this run, and while not the bulkiest 'mon around, that healing was just enough to keep taking a hit periodically from something weak.
I wouldn't make any changes to this moveset, it felt perfect. Mimikyu is simply an S+ pokemon in this format that will run out of PP before it dies.
@
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe; Timid Nature
Psychic / Shadow Ball / Flamethrower / Energy Ball
In this slot were two different Dragapults for my first two attempts, and between it and Chandelure I'm honestly not sure what's better. The short feelycraft is that Adamant Dragapult (Fly/U-turn/Dragon Darts/Phantom Force) lacked useful coverage and Modest Dragapult (Thunderbolt/Flamethrower/Shadow Ball/Dragon Pulse) lacked power (running speed nature on Dragapult doesn't seem to allow you to outspeed anything).
Chandelure had some clutch moments, but I think it'll get cut on a future ghost run (though all the remaining options all seem like sidegrades...). Regarding the item, I have tried Wise Glasses, Expert Belt, and Choice Scarf and honestly it seems like a stalemate between the three. Scarf isn't that great in the 2nd slot unless I know I'm healing up next round and sacrificing Mimikyu. It was a factor I think only once in my three runs, where I sac'd Mimikyu to Weavile and then outsped it for the OHKO with Flamethrower. Maybe Modest + Scarf is worth trying once we get more exact speed tiers for this format, though I don't recall Chandelure missing a single OHKO with Timid.
@
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 HP / 180 Def / 76 Spe; Bold Nature
Hex / Scald /Recover / Strength Sap
Jellicent straight up walls a decent amount of AI sets:
off the top of my head, though not all of those are scary to this team necessarily, and some it walls just by virtue of being ghost-typed. It checks some things that threaten Mimikyu, though sometimes shakily, for example: Klinklang scares Mimikyu with Gear Grind, but carries Wild Charge, which you can still stall out with Strength Sap. Scizor can Bullet Punch Mimikyu, but Jellicent relies on burning it to win since it carries Swords Dance.
Cursed Body saved Jellicent's life three times in my run to 29, which I think provided more value than Water Absorb could have ever achieved.
Recover needs to be cut as it was strictly inferior to Strength Sap every time I needed healing. I didn't click it once and I definitely overestimated the amount of healing Jellicent was actually going to need and how much stalling it was actually going to do. Will-o-wisp or Toxic are probably the go-tos, though I need to transfer some more Toxic 'mons into HOME. This Jellicent set was pretty bad theorymon lol
I think over time we will see that the most successful RS teams have at least one slow support mon, since in addition to tanking hits, they also shoulder a lot of the PP you would lose needlessly on your aces (esp. when you know you can't OHKO). Another rule of thumb for the "tank" spot in these runs I think is you want some useful dynamax power + stat buffing from your moveslots (ex. Body Press + Iron Head on Eisenherz Ferrothorn). Hex and Scald's low base power definitely let me down when the right play was to dynamax with Jellicent.
______________________________________
Threats
I saw it twice in three runs and it always went for WoW first on Mimikyu. It's a run-ender for sure.
Drapion boosting is scary, thankfully it whiffed on Acupressure every time (and seemed to use it at least twice before attacking)
Forces Mimikyu to attack off the bat, which is annoying. If Disguise is down, it forces me to sac something.
Never forget that this thing has Weakness Policy + Power Trip, lol. I honestly thought Jellicent would KO with Scald...
Just pray it's never there. I guess. I don't think it's worth playing around since I can't think of any Ghost type that would actually counter its moveset when it reveals itself. Maybe run a lead with Frisk and once you see the Eject Button... die to it anyway lol
______________________________________
Maybe Eviolite Corsola has some merit... Might have to really think outside the box for a Chandelure replacement. Blitzamirin might be onto something with Shedinja, though!
I did three runs with Ghost and the best I got was 29, but Ghost suffers from some "gg" matchups, namely Zoroark (OHKOs this whole team by surprise) and Froslass (who burns Mimikyu).
29 wins______________________________________
@
Ability: Disguise
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe ; Jolly Nature
Swords Dance / Play Rough / Shadow Claw / Wood Hammer
There's not much to say about Mimikyu that hasn't already been said, but i'll reiterate that it's a god in Restricted Sparring, getting free Swords Dances on what felt like 95% of the AI's teams. Jolly actually outspeeds SO many things, and when up against the stuff you don't outspeed, you actually threaten a good amount of them with a KO while they remove your disguise. Between Max Overgrowth and Shell Bell, Mimikyu healed from ~20% to full twice in this run, and while not the bulkiest 'mon around, that healing was just enough to keep taking a hit periodically from something weak.
I wouldn't make any changes to this moveset, it felt perfect. Mimikyu is simply an S+ pokemon in this format that will run out of PP before it dies.
@
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe; Timid Nature
Psychic / Shadow Ball / Flamethrower / Energy Ball
In this slot were two different Dragapults for my first two attempts, and between it and Chandelure I'm honestly not sure what's better. The short feelycraft is that Adamant Dragapult (Fly/U-turn/Dragon Darts/Phantom Force) lacked useful coverage and Modest Dragapult (Thunderbolt/Flamethrower/Shadow Ball/Dragon Pulse) lacked power (running speed nature on Dragapult doesn't seem to allow you to outspeed anything).
Chandelure had some clutch moments, but I think it'll get cut on a future ghost run (though all the remaining options all seem like sidegrades...). Regarding the item, I have tried Wise Glasses, Expert Belt, and Choice Scarf and honestly it seems like a stalemate between the three. Scarf isn't that great in the 2nd slot unless I know I'm healing up next round and sacrificing Mimikyu. It was a factor I think only once in my three runs, where I sac'd Mimikyu to Weavile and then outsped it for the OHKO with Flamethrower. Maybe Modest + Scarf is worth trying once we get more exact speed tiers for this format, though I don't recall Chandelure missing a single OHKO with Timid.
@
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 HP / 180 Def / 76 Spe; Bold Nature
Hex / Scald /
Jellicent straight up walls a decent amount of AI sets:
off the top of my head, though not all of those are scary to this team necessarily, and some it walls just by virtue of being ghost-typed. It checks some things that threaten Mimikyu, though sometimes shakily, for example: Klinklang scares Mimikyu with Gear Grind, but carries Wild Charge, which you can still stall out with Strength Sap. Scizor can Bullet Punch Mimikyu, but Jellicent relies on burning it to win since it carries Swords Dance.Cursed Body saved Jellicent's life three times in my run to 29, which I think provided more value than Water Absorb could have ever achieved.
Recover needs to be cut as it was strictly inferior to Strength Sap every time I needed healing. I didn't click it once and I definitely overestimated the amount of healing Jellicent was actually going to need and how much stalling it was actually going to do. Will-o-wisp or Toxic are probably the go-tos, though I need to transfer some more Toxic 'mons into HOME. This Jellicent set was pretty bad theorymon lol
I think over time we will see that the most successful RS teams have at least one slow support mon, since in addition to tanking hits, they also shoulder a lot of the PP you would lose needlessly on your aces (esp. when you know you can't OHKO). Another rule of thumb for the "tank" spot in these runs I think is you want some useful dynamax power + stat buffing from your moveslots (ex. Body Press + Iron Head on Eisenherz Ferrothorn). Hex and Scald's low base power definitely let me down when the right play was to dynamax with Jellicent.
______________________________________
Threats
I saw it twice in three runs and it always went for WoW first on Mimikyu. It's a run-ender for sure. Drapion boosting is scary, thankfully it whiffed on Acupressure every time (and seemed to use it at least twice before attacking) Forces Mimikyu to attack off the bat, which is annoying. If Disguise is down, it forces me to sac something. Never forget that this thing has Weakness Policy + Power Trip, lol. I honestly thought Jellicent would KO with Scald... Just pray it's never there. I guess. I don't think it's worth playing around since I can't think of any Ghost type that would actually counter its moveset when it reveals itself. Maybe run a lead with Frisk and once you see the Eject Button... die to it anyway lol______________________________________
Maybe Eviolite Corsola has some merit... Might have to really think outside the box for a Chandelure replacement. Blitzamirin might be onto something with Shedinja, though!
Tackled Mono Fighting, and I'm pretty happy with the result!
The team:
@
Jolly | Moxie
IVs: 31/31/31/x/31/31
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Low Kick / Megahorn / Bullet Seed / Rock Slide
@
Jolly | Unseen Fist
IVs: HT/31/HT/31/31/31
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Drain Punch / Darkest Lariat / Iron Head / Aerial Ace
@
Jolly | Justified
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Iron Head / Sacred Sword / Bounce / Stone Edge
Very early in testing, I realized that Heracross was indeed the powerhouse it had been described to be by people who tried it in Mono Bug. I expected something akin to Gyarados, since it has Moxie and a similar speed tier, but this felt even stronger, maybe because Max Knuckle boosts Atk even quicker, or maybe its coverage is just better. Picking the coverage moves on Heracross is like having to pick only 2 or 3 varieties in a candy store. I really wanted all of Low Kick (high PP and 100 BP Max Knuckle) / Megahorn / Earthquake / Rock Slide / Knock Off / Bullet Seed / Aerial Ace / Smart Strike. All of those would legitimately have come clutch against certain matchups, but I concluded that no perfect combination of 4 among these exists. I spent a long time deciding, and originally tested Aerial Ace over Rock Slide. However, Braviary, Drifblim and Torkoal made Rock Slide kind of a necessity with these partners (I shopped around for partners for a long time as well). I thought Bullet Seed would be fun to try, but after the first test run, I already knew it was a non-negotiable move. Between the Grassy Terrain recovery stacking with Shell Bell, the 48 PP (!) that allowed it to be a no-drawback choice whenever any move OHKOed (after a few boosts, this tends to happens) and the fact there are a lot of Water types in the RS roster to use it on, it was the perfect fit for this team. I flirted with the idea of replacing Megahorn, but a 140 BP STAB was very valuable on neutral targets early on. Thankfully, Heracross' speed tier is good enough where no Airstream didn't hurt as much as it could have, but it definitely made Mienshao and Froslass scarier threats.
Building around Heracross was pretty difficult. I had a list of threats I needed to check (
, 
, 
, 
, , 
and 
– these last 2 are solved by the switch from Aerial Ace to Rock Slide), and no combination seemed to work for all of them. Dual Wingbeat and Brave Bird were, in particular, moves that found no switch-in among Fighting types, except Cobalion. The need to offensively check Fairies ended up making it a must on the team, but Cobalion has terrible SpD, which made it impossible to expect switching into Moonblasts... I tried Leftovers on it when I was still hopeful it may have some chances to slowly recover, but it never did, AV was an absolute must (even then, it doesn't tank special hits well...). Its offensive stats also leave a lot to be desired... I first tried a special Cobalion because I was a bit paranoid about dealing with Skarmory, but that made it impossible to deal with Fairies too well, and it totally wasted the Atk boosts of Max Knuckle, so I went with a more straightforward set in the end. It wasn't incredible, but it played its role and had a few nice sweeps along the way. Unfortunately, it had a tendency to get worn down a bit too quickly for my liking.
Urshifu was added as the dedicated Psychic (ie. Starmie + Alakazam) switch-in. It was also the most obvious choice for a 2nd sweeper, and looking at the Fighting roster, it looked like I was pretty much forced to go the offensive route anyway. In this streak of 62 Urshifu actually didn't accomplish much, but in previous streaks it could sweep for 10+ battles in a row when Heracross was down, depending on matchups of course. The Choice Band was really clutch in scoring OHKOs on weak Pokémon and going from the red to full health in little time. Sadly, the Drain Punch PP had a tendency to run out quickly, while other moves remained close to untouched (I still think having Wicked Blow over Darkest Lariat was a bit too risky though, I had some runs where I used more than 8 Lariat PP). I had Iron Head for Fairies, but the luck of the draw didn't make it encounter any outside Dedenne, so it was used every once in a while for Def boosts. Definitely a very strong sweeper, with the high speed tier as its main selling point, but nowhere as potent as Heracross. I tried the Water Urshifu as well a few times, I think I got unlucky on matchups but it definitely has potential too. A switch-in to Psychic is nice, but not 100% necessary; most of the time it was more beneficial to let Heracross tank the Psychic with Dmax and then heal it all back within 2-3 battles between Shell Bell and Grassy Terrain.
The team is definitely still weak to Skarmory and Froslass (and Pyukumuku....), but I wasn't able to find combinations that patched all the issues without creating new ones. I also discovered Passimian as a sleeper threat in testing, it ended a few of my runs (including a really good one that went 30 without healing) with the Fling Light Ball (the AI will sadly not mind resistances and will happily Fling a full HP Heracross...). Not even Aerial Ace would have helped there, since Passimian has good bulk and lives the Airstream...
Here's a VOD of the full streak, since I was streaming it (warning, very long video which always has the same background music because I accidentally didn't pick Random when entering):
On to Poison I go!
The team:
Jolly | Moxie
IVs: 31/31/31/x/31/31
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Low Kick / Megahorn / Bullet Seed / Rock Slide
Jolly | Unseen Fist
IVs: HT/31/HT/31/31/31
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Drain Punch / Darkest Lariat / Iron Head / Aerial Ace
Jolly | Justified
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Iron Head / Sacred Sword / Bounce / Stone Edge
Very early in testing, I realized that Heracross was indeed the powerhouse it had been described to be by people who tried it in Mono Bug. I expected something akin to Gyarados, since it has Moxie and a similar speed tier, but this felt even stronger, maybe because Max Knuckle boosts Atk even quicker, or maybe its coverage is just better. Picking the coverage moves on Heracross is like having to pick only 2 or 3 varieties in a candy store. I really wanted all of Low Kick (high PP and 100 BP Max Knuckle) / Megahorn / Earthquake / Rock Slide / Knock Off / Bullet Seed / Aerial Ace / Smart Strike. All of those would legitimately have come clutch against certain matchups, but I concluded that no perfect combination of 4 among these exists. I spent a long time deciding, and originally tested Aerial Ace over Rock Slide. However, Braviary, Drifblim and Torkoal made Rock Slide kind of a necessity with these partners (I shopped around for partners for a long time as well). I thought Bullet Seed would be fun to try, but after the first test run, I already knew it was a non-negotiable move. Between the Grassy Terrain recovery stacking with Shell Bell, the 48 PP (!) that allowed it to be a no-drawback choice whenever any move OHKOed (after a few boosts, this tends to happens) and the fact there are a lot of Water types in the RS roster to use it on, it was the perfect fit for this team. I flirted with the idea of replacing Megahorn, but a 140 BP STAB was very valuable on neutral targets early on. Thankfully, Heracross' speed tier is good enough where no Airstream didn't hurt as much as it could have, but it definitely made Mienshao and Froslass scarier threats.
Building around Heracross was pretty difficult. I had a list of threats I needed to check (
, , , , , and – these last 2 are solved by the switch from Aerial Ace to Rock Slide), and no combination seemed to work for all of them. Dual Wingbeat and Brave Bird were, in particular, moves that found no switch-in among Fighting types, except Cobalion. The need to offensively check Fairies ended up making it a must on the team, but Cobalion has terrible SpD, which made it impossible to expect switching into Moonblasts... I tried Leftovers on it when I was still hopeful it may have some chances to slowly recover, but it never did, AV was an absolute must (even then, it doesn't tank special hits well...). Its offensive stats also leave a lot to be desired... I first tried a special Cobalion because I was a bit paranoid about dealing with Skarmory, but that made it impossible to deal with Fairies too well, and it totally wasted the Atk boosts of Max Knuckle, so I went with a more straightforward set in the end. It wasn't incredible, but it played its role and had a few nice sweeps along the way. Unfortunately, it had a tendency to get worn down a bit too quickly for my liking.Urshifu was added as the dedicated Psychic (ie. Starmie + Alakazam) switch-in. It was also the most obvious choice for a 2nd sweeper, and looking at the Fighting roster, it looked like I was pretty much forced to go the offensive route anyway. In this streak of 62 Urshifu actually didn't accomplish much, but in previous streaks it could sweep for 10+ battles in a row when Heracross was down, depending on matchups of course. The Choice Band was really clutch in scoring OHKOs on weak Pokémon and going from the red to full health in little time. Sadly, the Drain Punch PP had a tendency to run out quickly, while other moves remained close to untouched (I still think having Wicked Blow over Darkest Lariat was a bit too risky though, I had some runs where I used more than 8 Lariat PP). I had Iron Head for Fairies, but the luck of the draw didn't make it encounter any outside Dedenne, so it was used every once in a while for Def boosts. Definitely a very strong sweeper, with the high speed tier as its main selling point, but nowhere as potent as Heracross. I tried the Water Urshifu as well a few times, I think I got unlucky on matchups but it definitely has potential too. A switch-in to Psychic is nice, but not 100% necessary; most of the time it was more beneficial to let Heracross tank the Psychic with Dmax and then heal it all back within 2-3 battles between Shell Bell and Grassy Terrain.
The team is definitely still weak to Skarmory and Froslass (and Pyukumuku....), but I wasn't able to find combinations that patched all the issues without creating new ones. I also discovered Passimian as a sleeper threat in testing, it ended a few of my runs (including a really good one that went 30 without healing) with the Fling Light Ball (the AI will sadly not mind resistances and will happily Fling a full HP Heracross...). Not even Aerial Ace would have helped there, since Passimian has good bulk and lives the Airstream...
Here's a VOD of the full streak, since I was streaming it (warning, very long video which always has the same background music because I accidentally didn't pick Random when entering):
On to Poison I go!
I haven't really been up to the task of writing something up, but I've been playing.
Ground
I'm not very happy with my ground streak but decided to move on anyway, so here's what I got:
Excadrill @ Shell Bell
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Iron Head
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Brick Break
Krookodile @ Leftovers
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Crunch
- Earthquake
- Aerial Ace
- Thunder Fang
Seismitoad @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Water Absorb
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Liquidation
- Earthquake
- Power Whip
- Ice Punch
I also tried out Toxic/Recover/Earth Power/Surf Gastrodon over Seismitoad but just never really got a great run together with either of them. The point for either Seismitoad or Gastrodon was to absorb the water moves that the first two attracted. Excadrill and Krookodile are pretty straightforward, but they have quite a few weaknesses and I think that's what it made it difficult. Krookodile has other move options as well, in Brick Break and Fire Fang. I found Excadrill to be better, so I gave it the coveted Shell Bell. It had better support when I used it in Steel, though.
Steel
I'm much happier with this run (although my 3rd "set" of battles was cut short, so there's plenty of room for improvement):
Durant @ Shell Bell
Ability: Hustle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Iron Head
- X-Scissor
- Rock Slide
- Stomping Tantrum
Excadrill @ Leftovers
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Iron Head
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Brick Break
Duraludon @ Assault Vest
Ability: Stalwart
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Flash Cannon
- Solar Beam
- Thunderbolt
- Dark Pulse
Durant is crazy with hustle, 100% accuracy moves in Dynamax, high speed, good coverage, only one weakness, and great defensive support from Max Steelspike and Max Quake. It's probably on par with Mimikyu and Cinderace (I haven't used Cinderace yet, though) in this format. Excadrill can put up its own sand for Sand Rush, allowing you to run Adamant. Duraludon is one of the few steel types neutral to fire, and with a high natural defense and Assault Vest, it made for a good swap-in. It's also a very capable Dynamax Sweeper. I originally had the Gmax Dragon move (which, by the way, is strictly worse Max Wyrmwind for this format, but the one I had was Gigantamax) instead of Solar Beam. But as we know, grass moves are useful for recovery, especially on on Pokemon that don't hold a recovery item.
I may or may not edit this to add more strategy description. I don't know how you guys write such long dissertations! I'm also very interested in seeing how other people tackle Ground, because I had a hard time with it. I'm working on Ghost now, and after some experimentation I'm confident I can break 50, maybe 60. At some point I'll go back and try bug again, because Eisenherz pointed out that Heracross can use Low Kick and Bullet Seed. Surprisingly, I think Bug is my team with the best potential so far. I also wonder if and how people will use Aegislash in Steel, as I'm using it in Ghost.
Ground
I'm not very happy with my ground streak but decided to move on anyway, so here's what I got:
Excadrill @ Shell Bell
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Iron Head
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Brick Break
Krookodile @ Leftovers
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Crunch
- Earthquake
- Aerial Ace
- Thunder Fang
Seismitoad @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Water Absorb
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Liquidation
- Earthquake
- Power Whip
- Ice Punch
I also tried out Toxic/Recover/Earth Power/Surf Gastrodon over Seismitoad but just never really got a great run together with either of them. The point for either Seismitoad or Gastrodon was to absorb the water moves that the first two attracted. Excadrill and Krookodile are pretty straightforward, but they have quite a few weaknesses and I think that's what it made it difficult. Krookodile has other move options as well, in Brick Break and Fire Fang. I found Excadrill to be better, so I gave it the coveted Shell Bell. It had better support when I used it in Steel, though.
Steel
I'm much happier with this run (although my 3rd "set" of battles was cut short, so there's plenty of room for improvement):
Durant @ Shell Bell
Ability: Hustle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Iron Head
- X-Scissor
- Rock Slide
- Stomping Tantrum
Excadrill @ Leftovers
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Iron Head
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Brick Break
Duraludon @ Assault Vest
Ability: Stalwart
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Flash Cannon
- Solar Beam
- Thunderbolt
- Dark Pulse
Durant is crazy with hustle, 100% accuracy moves in Dynamax, high speed, good coverage, only one weakness, and great defensive support from Max Steelspike and Max Quake. It's probably on par with Mimikyu and Cinderace (I haven't used Cinderace yet, though) in this format. Excadrill can put up its own sand for Sand Rush, allowing you to run Adamant. Duraludon is one of the few steel types neutral to fire, and with a high natural defense and Assault Vest, it made for a good swap-in. It's also a very capable Dynamax Sweeper. I originally had the Gmax Dragon move (which, by the way, is strictly worse Max Wyrmwind for this format, but the one I had was Gigantamax) instead of Solar Beam. But as we know, grass moves are useful for recovery, especially on on Pokemon that don't hold a recovery item.
I may or may not edit this to add more strategy description. I don't know how you guys write such long dissertations! I'm also very interested in seeing how other people tackle Ground, because I had a hard time with it. I'm working on Ghost now, and after some experimentation I'm confident I can break 50, maybe 60. At some point I'll go back and try bug again, because Eisenherz pointed out that Heracross can use Low Kick and Bullet Seed. Surprisingly, I think Bug is my team with the best potential so far. I also wonder if and how people will use Aegislash in Steel, as I'm using it in Ghost.
Maybe I'm just washed up, or I theorymon'd really badly and there's just better choices out there for this typing, but Restricted Sparring seems particularly hostile to the currently-available Psychic types. Psychics are completely trolled in this format in the following ways:
26 wins
______________________________________
@
Ability: Magic Bounce
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe ; Timid Nature
Psyshock / Grass Knot / Shadow Ball / Dazzling Gleam
@
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe; Modest Nature
Expanding Force / Shadow Ball / Mystical Fire / Dazzling Gleam
@
Ability: Justified
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD; Impish Nature
Poison Jab / Drain Punch / Throat Chop / Zen Headbutt
I tried a lot of Pokemon in the lead spot ( 
even 
) , and got the best results with Espeon. Anecdotally, it seemed to have the best balance of speed and power out of all the choices; it barely meets the lead criteria of securing a lot of KOs without getting KO'd itself. It does have some pretty glaring weaknesses though: (1) it lacks a secondary typing and therefore a 2nd STAB option (2) it lacks a fire move, which is pretty damn critical, and (3) it's frail af. Magic Bounce is cute vs. Magneton's Thunder Wave, Froslass's Will-o-Wisp, Pyukumuku's Toxic, and Spite, but otherwise isn't really a selling point for Espeon. Espeon usually sets up Psychic Terrain via Dynamaxing, so it will be safe against priority unless you get an unlucky enemy lead. This causes an awkward tension though because three of its max moves create terrain, and you lose the safety net of Psychic Terrain by going for coverage (or healing in the case of Max Overgrowth). Grassy Terrain also leaves you vulnerable to 
and 
who all maim or KO Espeon with Grassy Glide. Expert Belt felt like the best item for boosting Espeon's relatively weak coverage moves; I also tried Shell Bell but the healing felt irrelevant, and didn't give Espeon any net uptime.
Indeedee took the second slot since I never envisioned myself wanting to Dynamax it, and it could fulfill its role of Ghost and priority counter just as well by switching in, since the AI used its Ghost and/or priority moves on a very predictable basis. As I mentioned above, it's very weak when you aren't clicking Expanding Force, but can put in a lot of work if you get good matchups. It's a lot of PP pressure on a single moveslot, though. Indeedee also carries the team's only fire move, and is thus the only efficient member of the team for killing Steel types (and honestly it's not even that great at doing it). Thankfully, a lot of the Steel types used status turn one in this run. It's hard to imagine anyone doing a respectable Psychic run without using Indeedee TBH (until
) if only for the priority protection of psychic terrain and the immunity to ghost.
Gallade is a very awkward utility counter on this team that attempts to switch into Dark-typed attacks, get a Justified boost, and heal up with Drain Punch. If it ends a battle worn down, its usefulness plummets, unless I get lucky and run into a Blissey for free healing. It was the best answer I could theorymon to have any kind of chance vs. 
and 
. In the end, I'm not sure if Gallade is worth using over a Scarfed pokemon to deal with these threats, though Scarf is really awkward to use in the format and I really hate it.
A streak of 26 doesn't really feel that good to write about TBH, but I don't think I'll be going for a Psychic streak again anytime soon due to how frustrating it is. Until and/or 
is released, maybe the best route with Psychic type is to just run 3 glass cannons (one with Choice Scarf probably) and hope for good matchups.
______________________________________
Threats
just trolls psychic teams (and gallade because it has shadow claw); would need a scarfed pokemon on the field or a healthy gallade when it shows up to not auto-lose. sometimes the AI is dumb and taunts.
absolutely dunks on this team with assault vest, special bulk, skitter smack, and poltergeist
gets a psychic seed boost immediately, and then is annoying to break through
if it shows up at a bad time, bullet punch can end the run, since it can hit Gallade for SE damage
it's weak but its super fast leech life still hurts my frail ass team
the way I answer it is max mindstorm is usually immune'd, espeon lives the night daze, and I KO with max starfall, since I'm faster. it can sweep if I've taken damage or espeon and/or gallade is down
has to whiff on acupressure and not crunch me, since nothing on this team can KO it
sometimes leads with protect so it can get KO'd with a max move; outside of dynamax it's run-ending
not that it's super powerful, but it's unavoidable damage and it can super effectively attack this whole team
this team, and I guess any team in RS, can lose to waterfall flinches
tail slap... slaps
fast crunch
fast lash out
yes, the entire roster of enemy AI Steel types are all potentially problematic if I don't have Indeedee out (my only fire attack user; Gallade's drain punch is super weak on everything except the Magneton line)
______________________________________
- They're weak to the strongest priority moves in Sucker Punch (3 known users) and First Impression (2 known users)
- Indeedee, who is the only reliable counter to the above priority moves on Turn 1, is a frail, one-trick pony
- The enemy AI has an annoyingly-big pool of fast enemies that use Dark-typed moves which all maim if not OHKO most Psychic types
- The enemy AI has an annoyingly-big pool of specially defensive-EV'd Pokemon that survive any hit I can dish out, and can OHKO back
- Defensive Psychics don't have any good resists, get worn down easily, and can't cheese recovery very well
26 wins______________________________________
@
Ability: Magic Bounce
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe ; Timid Nature
Psyshock / Grass Knot / Shadow Ball / Dazzling Gleam
@
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe; Modest Nature
Expanding Force / Shadow Ball / Mystical Fire / Dazzling Gleam
@
Ability: Justified
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD; Impish Nature
Poison Jab / Drain Punch / Throat Chop / Zen Headbutt
I tried a lot of Pokemon in the lead spot (
even ) , and got the best results with Espeon. Anecdotally, it seemed to have the best balance of speed and power out of all the choices; it barely meets the lead criteria of securing a lot of KOs without getting KO'd itself. It does have some pretty glaring weaknesses though: (1) it lacks a secondary typing and therefore a 2nd STAB option (2) it lacks a fire move, which is pretty damn critical, and (3) it's frail af. Magic Bounce is cute vs. Magneton's Thunder Wave, Froslass's Will-o-Wisp, Pyukumuku's Toxic, and Spite, but otherwise isn't really a selling point for Espeon. Espeon usually sets up Psychic Terrain via Dynamaxing, so it will be safe against priority unless you get an unlucky enemy lead. This causes an awkward tension though because three of its max moves create terrain, and you lose the safety net of Psychic Terrain by going for coverage (or healing in the case of Max Overgrowth). Grassy Terrain also leaves you vulnerable to and who all maim or KO Espeon with Grassy Glide. Expert Belt felt like the best item for boosting Espeon's relatively weak coverage moves; I also tried Shell Bell but the healing felt irrelevant, and didn't give Espeon any net uptime.Indeedee took the second slot since I never envisioned myself wanting to Dynamax it, and it could fulfill its role of Ghost and priority counter just as well by switching in, since the AI used its Ghost and/or priority moves on a very predictable basis. As I mentioned above, it's very weak when you aren't clicking Expanding Force, but can put in a lot of work if you get good matchups. It's a lot of PP pressure on a single moveslot, though. Indeedee also carries the team's only fire move, and is thus the only efficient member of the team for killing Steel types (and honestly it's not even that great at doing it). Thankfully, a lot of the Steel types used status turn one in this run. It's hard to imagine anyone doing a respectable Psychic run without using Indeedee TBH (until
) if only for the priority protection of psychic terrain and the immunity to ghost.Gallade is a very awkward utility counter on this team that attempts to switch into Dark-typed attacks, get a Justified boost, and heal up with Drain Punch. If it ends a battle worn down, its usefulness plummets, unless I get lucky and run into a Blissey for free healing. It was the best answer I could theorymon to have any kind of chance vs.
and . In the end, I'm not sure if Gallade is worth using over a Scarfed pokemon to deal with these threats, though Scarf is really awkward to use in the format and I really hate it.A streak of 26 doesn't really feel that good to write about TBH, but I don't think I'll be going for a Psychic streak again anytime soon due to how frustrating it is. Until
and/or is released, maybe the best route with Psychic type is to just run 3 glass cannons (one with Choice Scarf probably) and hope for good matchups.______________________________________
Threats
just trolls psychic teams (and gallade because it has shadow claw); would need a scarfed pokemon on the field or a healthy gallade when it shows up to not auto-lose. sometimes the AI is dumb and taunts. absolutely dunks on this team with assault vest, special bulk, skitter smack, and poltergeist gets a psychic seed boost immediately, and then is annoying to break through if it shows up at a bad time, bullet punch can end the run, since it can hit Gallade for SE damage it's weak but its super fast leech life still hurts my frail ass team the way I answer it is max mindstorm is usually immune'd, espeon lives the night daze, and I KO with max starfall, since I'm faster. it can sweep if I've taken damage or espeon and/or gallade is down has to whiff on acupressure and not crunch me, since nothing on this team can KO it sometimes leads with protect so it can get KO'd with a max move; outside of dynamax it's run-ending not that it's super powerful, but it's unavoidable damage and it can super effectively attack this whole team this team, and I guess any team in RS, can lose to waterfall flinches tail slap... slaps fast crunch fast lash out
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Normal type: 21 wins
@ Choice Band
Jolly, 252 Speed / 252 Attack / 4 HP
Huge Power
- Earthquake
- Body Slam
- Fire Punch
- Bounce
@ Choice Specs
Timid, 252 Speed / 252 Sp. Attack / 4 Defense
Psychic Surge
- Expanding Force
- Dazzling Gleam
- Mystical Fire
- Tri Attack
@ Life Orb
Adamant, 252 Speed / 252 Attack / 4 HP
Sheer Force
- Body Slam
- Throat Chop
- Zen Headbutt
- Earthquake
This came about when thinking about the Life Orb - it is commonly associated with hyper offense, but due to the recoil is an undesirable item in this format... unless you have a way to prevent the damage. I looked through the list of Sheer Force users and Tauros is one of the more obscure ones, and is also more accessible than it was in past gens (he also happens to be the fastest user of the ability). Surprisingly Tauros got a bunch of new moves in this game so I wasn't sure about coverage. You need either Earthquake or Close Combat for Steel types, but then you have your choice of Throat Chop, Zen Headbutt, Iron Head, and Rock Slide for coverage (plus a few more non-SF moves). I kind of just picked these for general variety but I didn't have any targets in mind. Diggersby was my second pick, he has immediate power and is a good Dynamax abuser, compared to Tauros who doesn't like Dynamax. Indeedee was shamelessly copied from Eisenherz's team, but provides necessary special coverage alongside two physical attackers (Tri Attack was filler so I didn't have to waste a Shadow Ball TR, but I don't think that it mattered at any point in the runs).
My initial run had a Jolly Tauros that was in the lead spot. I got 17 on my first try, but Tauros spent most of the run dead while Diggersby did all the work. After that, I decided to switch Diggersby to the lead spot and try to sweep with Dynamax. I had I think 3 other runs that all died between 14-17, and the whole time I felt that Tauros was not accomplishing anything. I finally decided to switch to Adamant for the small boost, and the opponents not having max IVs helps ease the speed a little. I also demoted Tauros to the 3rd spot, so Indeedee could be the backup cleaner and Tauros was just the revenge killer/last resort. Maybe it helped or maybe I just got lucky with opponents, but I managed to pass 20 this time. I ended up losing to Mienshao, who funnily enough is capable of sweeping through most Normal teams on its own with High Jump Kick, since unlike most Sparring Pokemon it is fully invested in Speed. But I was already down to solo Tauros and expecting to lose so I didn't feel bad about losing to Mienshao in this instance. I was more insulted by the Toxicroak-Zoroark that had killed Indeedee 2 battles earlier.
In conclusion it's hard to tell whether Sheer Force-Life Orb is viable here, but if it is, Tauros isn't the Pokemon to do it. It can't get enough OHKOs to cover its average defenses. I feel like 20 wins is a good "casual baseline" score to aim for, like getting 50 wins in the Tree/past gen Towers. While some Pokemon won't be able to streak much further than this, you can go in with suboptimal Pokemon and push them to their limits to reach this milestone.
@ Choice BandJolly, 252 Speed / 252 Attack / 4 HP
Huge Power
- Earthquake
- Body Slam
- Fire Punch
- Bounce
@ Choice SpecsTimid, 252 Speed / 252 Sp. Attack / 4 Defense
Psychic Surge
- Expanding Force
- Dazzling Gleam
- Mystical Fire
- Tri Attack
@ Life OrbAdamant, 252 Speed / 252 Attack / 4 HP
Sheer Force
- Body Slam
- Throat Chop
- Zen Headbutt
- Earthquake
This came about when thinking about the Life Orb - it is commonly associated with hyper offense, but due to the recoil is an undesirable item in this format... unless you have a way to prevent the damage. I looked through the list of Sheer Force users and Tauros is one of the more obscure ones, and is also more accessible than it was in past gens (he also happens to be the fastest user of the ability). Surprisingly Tauros got a bunch of new moves in this game so I wasn't sure about coverage. You need either Earthquake or Close Combat for Steel types, but then you have your choice of Throat Chop, Zen Headbutt, Iron Head, and Rock Slide for coverage (plus a few more non-SF moves). I kind of just picked these for general variety but I didn't have any targets in mind. Diggersby was my second pick, he has immediate power and is a good Dynamax abuser, compared to Tauros who doesn't like Dynamax. Indeedee was shamelessly copied from Eisenherz's team, but provides necessary special coverage alongside two physical attackers (Tri Attack was filler so I didn't have to waste a Shadow Ball TR, but I don't think that it mattered at any point in the runs).
My initial run had a Jolly Tauros that was in the lead spot. I got 17 on my first try, but Tauros spent most of the run dead while Diggersby did all the work. After that, I decided to switch Diggersby to the lead spot and try to sweep with Dynamax. I had I think 3 other runs that all died between 14-17, and the whole time I felt that Tauros was not accomplishing anything. I finally decided to switch to Adamant for the small boost, and the opponents not having max IVs helps ease the speed a little. I also demoted Tauros to the 3rd spot, so Indeedee could be the backup cleaner and Tauros was just the revenge killer/last resort. Maybe it helped or maybe I just got lucky with opponents, but I managed to pass 20 this time. I ended up losing to Mienshao, who funnily enough is capable of sweeping through most Normal teams on its own with High Jump Kick, since unlike most Sparring Pokemon it is fully invested in Speed. But I was already down to solo Tauros and expecting to lose so I didn't feel bad about losing to Mienshao in this instance. I was more insulted by the Toxicroak-Zoroark that had killed Indeedee 2 battles earlier.
In conclusion it's hard to tell whether Sheer Force-Life Orb is viable here, but if it is, Tauros isn't the Pokemon to do it. It can't get enough OHKOs to cover its average defenses. I feel like 20 wins is a good "casual baseline" score to aim for, like getting 50 wins in the Tree/past gen Towers. While some Pokemon won't be able to streak much further than this, you can go in with suboptimal Pokemon and push them to their limits to reach this milestone.
I tackled Ghost over the last few days. At first I tried Mimikyu/Gengar/Chandelure. No good. Then I tried Mimikyu/Gengar/Aegislash. It was a little better, but I was finding Gengar would have to get really lucky to get more than 5 or so wins on its own before healing. Then Eisen suggested Dragapult, which I had tried on the special side and found to be pretty weak (100 base Special Attack). I tried it on the physical side (120 base Attack, but questionable moves) and found it to be a much better #2 than Gengar.
Aegislash was okay, but my team repeatedly got screwed over by status, so I ran the only Ghost with Heal Bell or Aromatherapy, a bulky Polteageist. It worked okay, but still didn't feel right. And the only thing I could think to run on it was a Kasib berry. After that was used up, it got bodied by everything else the team was weak to. At this point I had hit 30ish wins a couple times, but usually end up restarting pre-first heal due to status, as anything less than 15 in the first set didn't feel worth playing out.
Then I looked more closely at all the Ghost types in the game, and noticed Trevenant had Natural Cure. That was a way to soak up status moves, at the cost of sometimes having to use it very proactively rather than reactively like Polteageist. I finally put a run together with Mimikyu/Dragapult/Trevenant. It fell short of the 50 wins that I wanted, but I was getting kind of tired of running it, so I'm moving on. The first set got 25 wins, the second got about 10, and the third had about 13, so clearly it could have gone much better.
Mimikyu @ Shell Bell
Ability: Disguise
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Wood Hammer
- Shadow Claw
- Play Rough
Dragapult @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naughty Nature
- Outrage
- Phantom Force
- Fly
- Solar Beam
Trevenant @ Big Root
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 140 Def / 116 SpD
Impish Nature
- Leech Seed
- Horn Leech
- Protect
- Toxic
----------
Other #3 Pokemon tried:
Aegislash @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Stance Change
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Autotomize
- Shadow Claw
- Sacred Sword
Polteageist @ Kasib Berry
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Aromatherapy
- Strength Sap
- Will-O-Wisp
- Hex
Dragapult's moveset kinda looks hilarious, but it makes perfect sense in Dynamax. At first I ran Adamant with Dive(!!!) over Solar Beam, but then I decided I wanted some more Grassy Terrain to go with my post-Dynamax 2-turn moves, so I made it Naughty and added Solar Beam (I briefly tried Adamant, but SB was so weak). With Leftovers and Grassy Terrain, it healed up a lot while using Phantom Force or Fly (the latter of which only has to worry about Protect, Obstruct, and Baneful Bunker - I believe there are 4 Pokemon total with those moves). That synergy is why I didn't really want to give Trevenant Leftovers, opting for a Big Root instead.
This is the first time I've ever used this item and it works pretty well here, especially against Pokemon with high HP stats. If you wanted to go crazy with the Big Root, you could replace Protect with Ingrain, but practically speaking I don't think that would work out, because then it's stuck in the battle until it faints. Trevenant didn't rack up many KOs but it did exactly what it had to, absorb one or two status moves per heal. Excluding sleep (because most of the sleep-using Pokemon aren't very threatening, and it's not permanent), here are all the status moves:
- Passimian - Fling Light Ball (paralyze)
- Froslass - Will-o-Wisp (burn)
- Drifblim - Trick Flame Orb (burn)
- Magneton - Thunder Wave (paralyze)
- Pyukumuku - Toxic (poison)
- Gyarados - Scald (burn)
- Skuntank - Burning Desire, after a Swords Dance (burn)
- Turtonator - Burning Desire, after a Swords Dance (burn)
Some of these are more threatening than others, and it highly depends on what Pokemon I had out at the time. I believe Trevenant can swap into and take care of all of these except for Froslass, and possibly Turtonator. During this run, I ran into Froslass with Mimikyu in Dynamax, and had to swap into Trevenant, let it get burned and go down to Poltergeist, and then swap in Dragapult, as it outspeeds Froslass and OHKOs with Phantom Force. If Froslass came out with Dragapult up, there's nothing to worry about. But Dragapult badly needs to be swapped out against Magneton.
I think I'm gonna try poison next, but I want to use an offensive team rather than a stally team. My teams are pretty formulaic:
#1 - Fast Dynamax sweeper with Shell Bell.
#2 - Slightly worse fast Dynamax sweeper with Leftovers (however, sometimes #3 will get the leftovers, especially if #2 has its own recovery, e.g. boosted Giga Drain, and #3 badly needs it)
#3 - "Support" Pokemon. I put support in parenthesis because sometimes it still just has 4 attacks, and the support comes from having useful resistances or immunities to swap into. But sometimes it has actual support like Wish and Heal Bell. Usually has Assault Vest, Rocky Helmet, Big Root, or sometimes Leftovers
Aegislash was okay, but my team repeatedly got screwed over by status, so I ran the only Ghost with Heal Bell or Aromatherapy, a bulky Polteageist. It worked okay, but still didn't feel right. And the only thing I could think to run on it was a Kasib berry. After that was used up, it got bodied by everything else the team was weak to. At this point I had hit 30ish wins a couple times, but usually end up restarting pre-first heal due to status, as anything less than 15 in the first set didn't feel worth playing out.
Then I looked more closely at all the Ghost types in the game, and noticed Trevenant had Natural Cure. That was a way to soak up status moves, at the cost of sometimes having to use it very proactively rather than reactively like Polteageist. I finally put a run together with Mimikyu/Dragapult/Trevenant. It fell short of the 50 wins that I wanted, but I was getting kind of tired of running it, so I'm moving on. The first set got 25 wins, the second got about 10, and the third had about 13, so clearly it could have gone much better.
Mimikyu @ Shell Bell
Ability: Disguise
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Wood Hammer
- Shadow Claw
- Play Rough
Dragapult @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naughty Nature
- Outrage
- Phantom Force
- Fly
- Solar Beam
Trevenant @ Big Root
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 140 Def / 116 SpD
Impish Nature
- Leech Seed
- Horn Leech
- Protect
- Toxic
----------
Other #3 Pokemon tried:
Aegislash @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Stance Change
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Autotomize
- Shadow Claw
- Sacred Sword
Polteageist @ Kasib Berry
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Aromatherapy
- Strength Sap
- Will-O-Wisp
- Hex
Dragapult's moveset kinda looks hilarious, but it makes perfect sense in Dynamax. At first I ran Adamant with Dive(!!!) over Solar Beam, but then I decided I wanted some more Grassy Terrain to go with my post-Dynamax 2-turn moves, so I made it Naughty and added Solar Beam (I briefly tried Adamant, but SB was so weak). With Leftovers and Grassy Terrain, it healed up a lot while using Phantom Force or Fly (the latter of which only has to worry about Protect, Obstruct, and Baneful Bunker - I believe there are 4 Pokemon total with those moves). That synergy is why I didn't really want to give Trevenant Leftovers, opting for a Big Root instead.
This is the first time I've ever used this item and it works pretty well here, especially against Pokemon with high HP stats. If you wanted to go crazy with the Big Root, you could replace Protect with Ingrain, but practically speaking I don't think that would work out, because then it's stuck in the battle until it faints. Trevenant didn't rack up many KOs but it did exactly what it had to, absorb one or two status moves per heal. Excluding sleep (because most of the sleep-using Pokemon aren't very threatening, and it's not permanent), here are all the status moves:
- Passimian - Fling Light Ball (paralyze)
- Froslass - Will-o-Wisp (burn)
- Drifblim - Trick Flame Orb (burn)
- Magneton - Thunder Wave (paralyze)
- Pyukumuku - Toxic (poison)
- Gyarados - Scald (burn)
- Skuntank - Burning Desire, after a Swords Dance (burn)
- Turtonator - Burning Desire, after a Swords Dance (burn)
Some of these are more threatening than others, and it highly depends on what Pokemon I had out at the time. I believe Trevenant can swap into and take care of all of these except for Froslass, and possibly Turtonator. During this run, I ran into Froslass with Mimikyu in Dynamax, and had to swap into Trevenant, let it get burned and go down to Poltergeist, and then swap in Dragapult, as it outspeeds Froslass and OHKOs with Phantom Force. If Froslass came out with Dragapult up, there's nothing to worry about. But Dragapult badly needs to be swapped out against Magneton.
I think I'm gonna try poison next, but I want to use an offensive team rather than a stally team. My teams are pretty formulaic:
#1 - Fast Dynamax sweeper with Shell Bell.
#2 - Slightly worse fast Dynamax sweeper with Leftovers (however, sometimes #3 will get the leftovers, especially if #2 has its own recovery, e.g. boosted Giga Drain, and #3 badly needs it)
#3 - "Support" Pokemon. I put support in parenthesis because sometimes it still just has 4 attacks, and the support comes from having useful resistances or immunities to swap into. But sometimes it has actual support like Wish and Heal Bell. Usually has Assault Vest, Rocky Helmet, Big Root, or sometimes Leftovers
This team can definitely do better, as Gengar with Drapion's swap-in support is much better than it was when I tried to use it in mono-Ghost. Dark, psychic, and ghost moves all go from super effective to either not very effective, or immune. This was yet another run ended due to Boltund's unpredictability. I expected the usual Electrify and got Crunch instead, which crit. I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have KO'd without a crit (I was dynamaxed), so I'm surprised it used it. I think the first two sets were about 16 wins, and then the third had about 11.
I wasn't sure what Venusaur set to use, but I ended up using this one. I wanted something that can heal that isn't weak to ground, and Venusaur is much tankier than Roserade and Vileplume. Those have access to Aromatherapy though, while Venusaur doesn't. I didn't try Amoonguss, but I'm sure it would be a great replacement. The only issue is it lacks Leech Seed. Also, I'm not sure which ability is better on Venusaur. The one I had ready to go had Chlorophyll, so I went with it. The offense on this team was carried by Gengar. Drapion was very useful due to its typing, but as a Dynamax sweeper it lacks a little bit of power. I'd be interested in hearing other strategies for offensive Poison teams. I thought about Salazzle, but it has no coverage.
I tried a Weak Armor Garbodor, too. I got to 21 wins with it as a lead! Mono-poison is an AWFUL offensive typing for a physical Dynamax sweeper, as its only STAB is heavily nerfed and the buff is useless.
Poison:
Gengar @ Shell Bell
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Sludge Wave
- Shadow Ball
- Giga Drain
- Psychic
Drapion @ Leftovers
Ability: Battle Armor
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Crunch
- Brick Break
- Earthquake
- Ice Fang
Venusaur @ Black Sludge
Ability: Overgrow
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Giga Drain
- Protect
- Leech Seed
- Synthesis
Haven't decided what to do next. I might take a few days off, as I have some goals I want to achieve in the Gen 4 and 5 battle facilities.
I wasn't sure what Venusaur set to use, but I ended up using this one. I wanted something that can heal that isn't weak to ground, and Venusaur is much tankier than Roserade and Vileplume. Those have access to Aromatherapy though, while Venusaur doesn't. I didn't try Amoonguss, but I'm sure it would be a great replacement. The only issue is it lacks Leech Seed. Also, I'm not sure which ability is better on Venusaur. The one I had ready to go had Chlorophyll, so I went with it. The offense on this team was carried by Gengar. Drapion was very useful due to its typing, but as a Dynamax sweeper it lacks a little bit of power. I'd be interested in hearing other strategies for offensive Poison teams. I thought about Salazzle, but it has no coverage.
I tried a Weak Armor Garbodor, too. I got to 21 wins with it as a lead! Mono-poison is an AWFUL offensive typing for a physical Dynamax sweeper, as its only STAB is heavily nerfed and the buff is useless.
Poison:
Gengar @ Shell Bell
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Sludge Wave
- Shadow Ball
- Giga Drain
- Psychic
Drapion @ Leftovers
Ability: Battle Armor
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Crunch
- Brick Break
- Earthquake
- Ice Fang
Venusaur @ Black Sludge
Ability: Overgrow
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Giga Drain
- Protect
- Leech Seed
- Synthesis
Haven't decided what to do next. I might take a few days off, as I have some goals I want to achieve in the Gen 4 and 5 battle facilities.
Due to Trevenant being ghost type it can freely switch out even after using ingrain (ghosts can’t be trapped). I don’t know if this makes ingrain better than protect, but it’s something to consider.
Hi everyone! I haven't really tried these sort of in-game challenges before, but I've been having fun with Restricted Sparring.
I thought I might share some of my more passable results and get inspiration from all the veterans here!
Pescragon (Dracovish) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Strong Jaw
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Fishious Rend
- Outrage
- Psychic Fangs
- Crunch
Still Dre (Hydreigon) (F) @ Shell Bell
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Dark Pulse
- Dragon Pulse
- Flamethrower
- Earth Power
Aluminum (Duraludon) (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Light Metal
EVs: 52 HP / 252 SpA / 204 Spe
Timid Nature
- Flash Cannon
- Dragon Pulse
- Solar Beam
- Thunderbolt
I led Dracovish to do fish stuff. Hydreigon and Duraludon had coverage for the Grass and Water types that could take a Fishious Rend. Duralduon was used and worn down way quicker than I had thought, so it might be worth trying out a bulkier build. I think a fully HO team like some other users have been trying would be a great fit for Dragon as well.
I feel like Dragon is one of the stronger types for this challenge, as it has a lot of viable mons with good coverage and resistances. I'm certain people will be reaching sky-high streaks once everybody makes their way down the type list!
I thought I might share some of my more passable results and get inspiration from all the veterans here!
Pescragon (Dracovish) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Strong Jaw
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Fishious Rend
- Outrage
- Psychic Fangs
- Crunch
Still Dre (Hydreigon) (F) @ Shell Bell
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Dark Pulse
- Dragon Pulse
- Flamethrower
- Earth Power
Aluminum (Duraludon) (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Light Metal
EVs: 52 HP / 252 SpA / 204 Spe
Timid Nature
- Flash Cannon
- Dragon Pulse
- Solar Beam
- Thunderbolt
I led Dracovish to do fish stuff. Hydreigon and Duraludon had coverage for the Grass and Water types that could take a Fishious Rend. Duralduon was used and worn down way quicker than I had thought, so it might be worth trying out a bulkier build. I think a fully HO team like some other users have been trying would be a great fit for Dragon as well.
I feel like Dragon is one of the stronger types for this challenge, as it has a lot of viable mons with good coverage and resistances. I'm certain people will be reaching sky-high streaks once everybody makes their way down the type list!
Dragon:
This team has so much potential, but I've had so much bad luck. I'm done with it.
Dracozolt @ Shell Bell
Ability: Hustle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Wild Charge
- Outrage
- Aerial Ace
- Low Kick
Kingdra @ Assault Vest
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Surf
- Dragon Pulse
- Hurricane
- Flash Cannon
Dragapult @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naughty Nature
- Phantom Force
- Outrage
- Fly
- Solar Beam
This team has so much potential, but I've had so much bad luck. I'm done with it.
Dracozolt @ Shell Bell
Ability: Hustle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Wild Charge
- Outrage
- Aerial Ace
- Low Kick
Kingdra @ Assault Vest
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Surf
- Dragon Pulse
- Hurricane
- Flash Cannon
Dragapult @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naughty Nature
- Phantom Force
- Outrage
- Fly
- Solar Beam
I didn't know that applied to self-inflicted trapping. That's pretty interesting, thanks. Maybe I'll try it out sometime when I shoot for 50 again.
Normal is well-documented already in the thread, so I'm not going to bother being too longwinded. The basic premise of this team is Diggersby + two walls. I really wanted to break 30 with this typing but I got annoyed of doing attempts after getting swept by liquidation crits the battle after maimed my team and ended up at 27.
27 wins
______________________________________
@
Ability: Huge Power
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe ; Adamant Nature
Body Slam / Fire Punch / Wild Charge / Earthquake
@
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpD; Bold Nature
Soft-Boiled / Heal Bell / Toxic / Seismic Toss
@
Ability: Fluffy
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD; Impish Nature
Taunt / Drain Punch / Thunder Punch / Stomping Tantrum
Diggersby is the best normal-typed nuke lead in my opinion. A dynamaxed Diggersby KOs a LOT of the enemy AI pool, and it has surprisingly good un-natured speed and un-invested bulk in RS, to the point that Shell Bell was very useful. I think you can get away with Adamant nature, especially when the back line is two walls. I'm not sure how much extra efficiency you actually gain by going Jolly until we get some speed tiers going. It seemed to naturally outspeed most of the threatening AI mons.
Chansey shouldn't need much explanation; it's designed to switch into fast special attackers that Diggersby struggles with. I'm not convinced it's actually that good in the format since it has trouble ending battles with high HP unless you are super liberal with Soft-Boiled and Toxic PP. A lot of sets also run mixed special/physical in SR which takes a toll on Chansey's efficiency long term. It's already pretty inefficient as it is with PP. Heal Bell cured a burn () and a paralysis (
) off Diggersby in this run.
Fluffy defensive Bewear is extremely bulky on the physical side, and seems to further abuse its ability since the AI never seemed to pick fire attacks over neutral attacks (though someone should confirm this if they use him). It's designed to switch into fast physical attackers that Diggersby struggles with. The moveset is weird here and I'm sure there's a better one. I thought Taunt would be more useful but a lot of the time you want the AI to waste turns using useless status moves on you, plus I have Chansey's Heal Bell if I get status'd. Bewear gets access to all the elemental punches, and could run a Normal stab move over something; those are probably better choices since Stomping Tantrum is very redundant with Drain Punch.
The best facepalm moment of this run was Bewear switching into's Fake Out, living the High Jump Kick, missing the KO back with Drain Punch, and then dying to the AI using Aura Sphere (I forgot it learned this and that it was potentially threatening). Maybe Assault Vest is the best item to use here if I want to switch into *all* the physical threats, but I would also need to EV for more attack to guarantee the Drain Punch kill on Mienshao.
______________________________________
Notable Threats
persona non grata for normal streaks, and it even threatens bewear with aura sphere
very annoying with all the contact moves I carry, almost always forces diggersby to take a giga drain if I dont want to waste dynamax or a bad spore
drizzle hydro pump is spooky, and it can encore & perish song chansey
this run ended to liquidation crits
bulk and scald
______________________________________
liquidation crits the battle after maimed my team and ended up at 27.
27 wins______________________________________
@
Ability: Huge Power
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe ; Adamant Nature
Body Slam / Fire Punch / Wild Charge / Earthquake
@
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpD; Bold Nature
Soft-Boiled / Heal Bell / Toxic / Seismic Toss
@
Ability: Fluffy
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD; Impish Nature
Diggersby is the best normal-typed nuke lead in my opinion. A dynamaxed Diggersby KOs a LOT of the enemy AI pool, and it has surprisingly good un-natured speed and un-invested bulk in RS, to the point that Shell Bell was very useful. I think you can get away with Adamant nature, especially when the back line is two walls. I'm not sure how much extra efficiency you actually gain by going Jolly until we get some speed tiers going. It seemed to naturally outspeed most of the threatening AI mons.
Chansey shouldn't need much explanation; it's designed to switch into fast special attackers that Diggersby struggles with. I'm not convinced it's actually that good in the format since it has trouble ending battles with high HP unless you are super liberal with Soft-Boiled and Toxic PP. A lot of sets also run mixed special/physical in SR which takes a toll on Chansey's efficiency long term. It's already pretty inefficient as it is with PP. Heal Bell cured a burn (
) and a paralysis () off Diggersby in this run.Fluffy defensive Bewear is extremely bulky on the physical side, and seems to further abuse its ability since the AI never seemed to pick fire attacks over neutral attacks (though someone should confirm this if they use him). It's designed to switch into fast physical attackers that Diggersby struggles with. The moveset is weird here and I'm sure there's a better one. I thought Taunt would be more useful but a lot of the time you want the AI to waste turns using useless status moves on you, plus I have Chansey's Heal Bell if I get status'd. Bewear gets access to all the elemental punches, and could run a Normal stab move over something; those are probably better choices since Stomping Tantrum is very redundant with Drain Punch.
The best facepalm moment of this run was Bewear switching into
's Fake Out, living the High Jump Kick, missing the KO back with Drain Punch, and then dying to the AI using Aura Sphere (I forgot it learned this and that it was potentially threatening). Maybe Assault Vest is the best item to use here if I want to switch into *all* the physical threats, but I would also need to EV for more attack to guarantee the Drain Punch kill on Mienshao.______________________________________
Notable Threats
persona non grata for normal streaks, and it even threatens bewear with aura sphere very annoying with all the contact moves I carry, almost always forces diggersby to take a giga drain if I dont want to waste dynamax or a bad spore drizzle hydro pump is spooky, and it can encore & perish song chansey this run ended to liquidation crits bulk and scald______________________________________
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Don't mean to break up the Restricted Battles party, but I wanted to report a no-Dynamax Battle Tower streak that's hit 250 and counting. The team consists of Liepard, Gyarados, Incineroar, and Manectric. I don't know how much farther it can feasibly go, since I've gotten lucky a few times and there are serious limitations to the team structure. Previous iterations of this team has fallen to streaks of 47, 37, 45, and 3 (lol), but I've had a lot of fun trying to squeeze usage out of some suboptimal pokemon when paired with a few more conventional choices. The main strategy is pretty straightforward: sweeping through with Gyarados while the other provide necessary redirection and Fake Out support. The unconventional chocies, Liepard and Manectric, do bring some interesting benefits, notably a highly favorable matchup against Leon.
Liepard @ Focus Sash
Prankster
Timid Nature, 252 HP/4Def/252 Spe
Thunder Wave
Foul Play
Fake Out
Copycat
Liepard serves as one of the leads alongside Gyarados, and primarily provides the necessary Fake Out support for Gyarados to set up. However, Liepard also offers some other benefits to the team. Priority Thunder Wave is a useful status to throw out, but its main benefit is against Leon. Leon has multiple pokemon that can outspeed Gyarados even at +1 (notably some Cinderace and the choice Haxorus). Between Fake Out and Thunder Wave, I can Fake Out that slot as Gyarados sets up and TWave on turn 2 to guarantee Gyarados is faster and can pick them off. It's also a generally solid move to throw out if I anticipate needing Incineroar to shoulder a heavy burden, as it's very slow. Foul Play is a suitable STAB, given Liepard's low attacking stats, and can net some useful KOs on pokemon like Aegislash. The last slot goes to Copycat, which has a variety of uses in this format; primarily, speed control. Copycat lets Liepard priority reverse Trick Room against a lot of the Tower's users, copy slow Icy Winds/Bulldozes/Tailwinds to negate speed control, and throw back spread moves for chip (often necessary, as Gyarados can't OHKO a lot of Tower sets). It's also the best reason to use it over Grimmsnarl in this format, so I may as well if I'm using it already.
This isn't so much a point in Liepard's favor directly, but the AI absolutely loves targeting Liepard, even when it makes little sense to do so (e.g., Stone Edge into it when Gyarados is on the field). It's definitely bought me some undeserved turns to wail on things with Gyarados by virtue of the sheer vitrol the AI seems to have for it.
Gyarados @ Lum Berry
Intimidate
Jolly Nature, 252 Att/4Def/252 Spe
Waterfall
Dragon Dance
Crunch
Ice Fang
Gyarados carries the weight of the team 90% of games. It's pretty standard, but some things of note are the choice of nature and moves. I chose Intimidate to ease setup, but in hindsight I would have used Moxie for extra power. Liepard provides a lot of support already, and I'm not convinced that the extra "bulk" is more useful than guaranteed OHKOs at +2. I use Crunch and Ice Fang as coverage. Ice Fang is solid coverage for GRass types that resist Waterfall, while Crunch is a 100% accurate neutral move for things that resist Water and Ice. Unsurprisingly, it misses a lot of OHKOs on water types, which makes them the biggest threats to the team. I could use Power Whip to combat this. However, I prefer the consistent -if underwhelming -damage to the potential of losing a streak on a vital miss. This choice is why in hindsight I think Moxie would have benefited me a lot.
Incineroar @ Sitrus Berry
Intimidate
Adamant Nature, 136(?) HP/252 Att /120(?) Spe
Fake Out
Darkest Lariat
Flare Blitz
Parting Shot
Sorry for not knowing the EVs 100%, this Incineroar was gifted to me. Incineroar provides a backup Fake Out and Intimidator. It's very much the glue that holds the team together. If I ever need to switch, there's a good chance that Incineroar is the panic play. The moves are all pretty straightforward, but it's worth noting that a second Fake Out user is important relieving pressure on Gyarados if it can't OHKO an important target on the field. Darkest Lariat is the chosen dark STAB, given the prevalence of moves like Cotton Guard and Double Team in the tower. Notably, Incineroar lives a hit from Leon's stupid Double Team Intelleon and can smack it back with Lariat, picking up a KO if it was weakened previously. Flare Blitz is strong STAB, nothing worth adding. I like Parting Shot mainly as a way to bring Manectric in safely. Either Incineroar is slower and tanks the hit, or it's faster and weakens the opponent enough for Manectric to shrug off one attack (especially in conjunction with Intimidate spam). Overall, Incineroar has the least synergy with the team but it has enough generalist strengths to pull its weight.
Manectric @ Life Orb
Timid Nature, 252 SpA/4/SpD/252Spe
Lightning Rod
Thunderbolt
Flamethrower
Snarl
Protect
I tried a few pokemon in this last slot to patch my glaring weakness to Electric and Water types. I ended up settling on Manectric. While it can be frustrating at times (it's still a bad pokemon) it's definitely been fun to dust of the one I had collecting dust in Pokemon Bank/Home over the years. The main selling point here is obviously Lighting Rod, which both protects Gyarados and boosts Manectric's already repsectable 105 Special Attack. Many other users in Galar are weak to water, and the other Electric type ones are either way too slow (Pincurchin) or are too weak (Raichu) to function as a solid secondary sweeper. Manectric is also surprisingly solid at neutral, but at +1 it starts to deal some surprising damage. This allows it to function as a legitimate sweeping threat in some situations. It also patches up (read: does not eliminate) my issues with full Water type teams. Thunderbolt is the main STAB, while Flamethrower provides useful coverage that many other Electric types don't get. Snarl is mostly filler, but is useful for spread chip against protect mind games or to help a teammate tank a hit if Manectric is going down anyways. Protect is a great fourth move as -similar to Liepard -the AI places high priority on taking out the doggo. Thus, it often buys free turns as the AI doubles into Manectric.
As a small tangent, I do also want to throw out that Manectric's offensive stats aren't actually so bad. 105s in Special Attack and Speed are both pretty good, notably outspeeding Leon's Charizard. It's slower than Raichu, the Electric Lightningrod user of choice, but only marginally and makes up for it with noticeable power. It definitely does more damage than I expected, even if it's not always as much as I'd like. I do think Raichu is still better (110 Spe, amazing utility moves), but I may explore Manectric in Battle Spot a bit to see if it has merit there. Probably not, but it's worth a shot.
Threats:
Water types in general: It's risky to hard switch Manectric in, and Gyarados usually can't OHKO with Crunch even at +1. Incineroar is weak to Water and Liepard often can't threaten enough with Foul Play. Additionally, many carry Ice Type moves which Gyarados doesn't appreciate.
Crawdaunt: Craudant eats Gyarados' set for breakfast, and like before Liepard isn't threatening it enough. Manectric also CANNOT switch in here without getting maimed until I know the set. Not a game ender, but it usually grabs a KO on something so I can bring in Manectric for free.
Arctozolt: Too bulky to get OHKOd by a +1 Waterfall, and Discharge isn't redirected by Lighting Rod. Huge momentum loss at best. Discharge is generally bad news, but Arctozolt is the worst offender IMO.
Arctovish: Extremely bulky, and often sets up Hail and Aurora Veil, both of which are super annoying to this squad. Aurora Veil in particular stops OHKOs from Gyarados (particularly against Water types), but hail also opens me up to Blizzard spam which most of this squad absolutely does not handle well. 2/4 losses with earlier versions of the team were against teams with Arctovish.
Dracozolt: Speaking of abomination fossils, 80% of the time this uses an electric move on Gyarados; the other 20% of the time, it targets the Liepard slot with something else. That makes switching in Manectric riskier than it seems.
Trick Room with Protect: Liepard handles Trick Room on its own usually thanks to Copycat. However, if either the user or abuser has Protect it messes with Copycat, preventing me from reversing it. This is a huge problem, as most of my team is both fast and frail. Additionally, my main form of speed control, Thunder Wave, is completely useless here.
Very specific Leon leads: In 95% of games, Leon is trivial. However, if Leon leads with any combination of Mr. Rime, Cinderace, or Haxorus it puts me in a bad position since there isn't a surefire Fake Out target. You really want to stop Cinderace, obviously, but scarf Haxorus can flinch with Rock Slide, Sash Haxours can Dragon Dance up, and Mr. Rime can Fake Out Gyarados to negate the vital set up turn. I usually have to switch out to Incineroar here, but depending on what the sets actually are it's no guarantee of safety. Basically, I'm sure to start off on the back foot, and if Charizard gets an Airstream off it could theoretically be GG.
Liepard @ Focus Sash
Prankster
Timid Nature, 252 HP/4Def/252 Spe
Thunder Wave
Foul Play
Fake Out
Copycat
Liepard serves as one of the leads alongside Gyarados, and primarily provides the necessary Fake Out support for Gyarados to set up. However, Liepard also offers some other benefits to the team. Priority Thunder Wave is a useful status to throw out, but its main benefit is against Leon. Leon has multiple pokemon that can outspeed Gyarados even at +1 (notably some Cinderace and the choice Haxorus). Between Fake Out and Thunder Wave, I can Fake Out that slot as Gyarados sets up and TWave on turn 2 to guarantee Gyarados is faster and can pick them off. It's also a generally solid move to throw out if I anticipate needing Incineroar to shoulder a heavy burden, as it's very slow. Foul Play is a suitable STAB, given Liepard's low attacking stats, and can net some useful KOs on pokemon like Aegislash. The last slot goes to Copycat, which has a variety of uses in this format; primarily, speed control. Copycat lets Liepard priority reverse Trick Room against a lot of the Tower's users, copy slow Icy Winds/Bulldozes/Tailwinds to negate speed control, and throw back spread moves for chip (often necessary, as Gyarados can't OHKO a lot of Tower sets). It's also the best reason to use it over Grimmsnarl in this format, so I may as well if I'm using it already.
This isn't so much a point in Liepard's favor directly, but the AI absolutely loves targeting Liepard, even when it makes little sense to do so (e.g., Stone Edge into it when Gyarados is on the field). It's definitely bought me some undeserved turns to wail on things with Gyarados by virtue of the sheer vitrol the AI seems to have for it.
Gyarados @ Lum Berry
Intimidate
Jolly Nature, 252 Att/4Def/252 Spe
Waterfall
Dragon Dance
Crunch
Ice Fang
Gyarados carries the weight of the team 90% of games. It's pretty standard, but some things of note are the choice of nature and moves. I chose Intimidate to ease setup, but in hindsight I would have used Moxie for extra power. Liepard provides a lot of support already, and I'm not convinced that the extra "bulk" is more useful than guaranteed OHKOs at +2. I use Crunch and Ice Fang as coverage. Ice Fang is solid coverage for GRass types that resist Waterfall, while Crunch is a 100% accurate neutral move for things that resist Water and Ice. Unsurprisingly, it misses a lot of OHKOs on water types, which makes them the biggest threats to the team. I could use Power Whip to combat this. However, I prefer the consistent -if underwhelming -damage to the potential of losing a streak on a vital miss. This choice is why in hindsight I think Moxie would have benefited me a lot.
Incineroar @ Sitrus Berry
Intimidate
Adamant Nature, 136(?) HP/252 Att /120(?) Spe
Fake Out
Darkest Lariat
Flare Blitz
Parting Shot
Sorry for not knowing the EVs 100%, this Incineroar was gifted to me. Incineroar provides a backup Fake Out and Intimidator. It's very much the glue that holds the team together. If I ever need to switch, there's a good chance that Incineroar is the panic play. The moves are all pretty straightforward, but it's worth noting that a second Fake Out user is important relieving pressure on Gyarados if it can't OHKO an important target on the field. Darkest Lariat is the chosen dark STAB, given the prevalence of moves like Cotton Guard and Double Team in the tower. Notably, Incineroar lives a hit from Leon's stupid Double Team Intelleon and can smack it back with Lariat, picking up a KO if it was weakened previously. Flare Blitz is strong STAB, nothing worth adding. I like Parting Shot mainly as a way to bring Manectric in safely. Either Incineroar is slower and tanks the hit, or it's faster and weakens the opponent enough for Manectric to shrug off one attack (especially in conjunction with Intimidate spam). Overall, Incineroar has the least synergy with the team but it has enough generalist strengths to pull its weight.
Manectric @ Life Orb
Timid Nature, 252 SpA/4/SpD/252Spe
Lightning Rod
Thunderbolt
Flamethrower
Snarl
Protect
I tried a few pokemon in this last slot to patch my glaring weakness to Electric and Water types. I ended up settling on Manectric. While it can be frustrating at times (it's still a bad pokemon) it's definitely been fun to dust of the one I had collecting dust in Pokemon Bank/Home over the years. The main selling point here is obviously Lighting Rod, which both protects Gyarados and boosts Manectric's already repsectable 105 Special Attack. Many other users in Galar are weak to water, and the other Electric type ones are either way too slow (Pincurchin) or are too weak (Raichu) to function as a solid secondary sweeper. Manectric is also surprisingly solid at neutral, but at +1 it starts to deal some surprising damage. This allows it to function as a legitimate sweeping threat in some situations. It also patches up (read: does not eliminate) my issues with full Water type teams. Thunderbolt is the main STAB, while Flamethrower provides useful coverage that many other Electric types don't get. Snarl is mostly filler, but is useful for spread chip against protect mind games or to help a teammate tank a hit if Manectric is going down anyways. Protect is a great fourth move as -similar to Liepard -the AI places high priority on taking out the doggo. Thus, it often buys free turns as the AI doubles into Manectric.
As a small tangent, I do also want to throw out that Manectric's offensive stats aren't actually so bad. 105s in Special Attack and Speed are both pretty good, notably outspeeding Leon's Charizard. It's slower than Raichu, the Electric Lightningrod user of choice, but only marginally and makes up for it with noticeable power. It definitely does more damage than I expected, even if it's not always as much as I'd like. I do think Raichu is still better (110 Spe, amazing utility moves), but I may explore Manectric in Battle Spot a bit to see if it has merit there. Probably not, but it's worth a shot.
Threats:
Water types in general: It's risky to hard switch Manectric in, and Gyarados usually can't OHKO with Crunch even at +1. Incineroar is weak to Water and Liepard often can't threaten enough with Foul Play. Additionally, many carry Ice Type moves which Gyarados doesn't appreciate.
Crawdaunt: Craudant eats Gyarados' set for breakfast, and like before Liepard isn't threatening it enough. Manectric also CANNOT switch in here without getting maimed until I know the set. Not a game ender, but it usually grabs a KO on something so I can bring in Manectric for free.
Arctozolt: Too bulky to get OHKOd by a +1 Waterfall, and Discharge isn't redirected by Lighting Rod. Huge momentum loss at best. Discharge is generally bad news, but Arctozolt is the worst offender IMO.
Arctovish: Extremely bulky, and often sets up Hail and Aurora Veil, both of which are super annoying to this squad. Aurora Veil in particular stops OHKOs from Gyarados (particularly against Water types), but hail also opens me up to Blizzard spam which most of this squad absolutely does not handle well. 2/4 losses with earlier versions of the team were against teams with Arctovish.
Dracozolt: Speaking of abomination fossils, 80% of the time this uses an electric move on Gyarados; the other 20% of the time, it targets the Liepard slot with something else. That makes switching in Manectric riskier than it seems.
Trick Room with Protect: Liepard handles Trick Room on its own usually thanks to Copycat. However, if either the user or abuser has Protect it messes with Copycat, preventing me from reversing it. This is a huge problem, as most of my team is both fast and frail. Additionally, my main form of speed control, Thunder Wave, is completely useless here.
Very specific Leon leads: In 95% of games, Leon is trivial. However, if Leon leads with any combination of Mr. Rime, Cinderace, or Haxorus it puts me in a bad position since there isn't a surefire Fake Out target. You really want to stop Cinderace, obviously, but scarf Haxorus can flinch with Rock Slide, Sash Haxours can Dragon Dance up, and Mr. Rime can Fake Out Gyarados to negate the vital set up turn. I usually have to switch out to Incineroar here, but depending on what the sets actually are it's no guarantee of safety. Basically, I'm sure to start off on the back foot, and if Charizard gets an Airstream off it could theoretically be GG.
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Previous post for reference.
Quit for a bit but decided to go for a streak today. Didn't do too bad.
@ Shell Bell
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Shadow Ball
- Sludge Wave
- Giga Drain
- Dazzling Gleam
Same set as last time. Does Gengar things til it dies.
@ Leftovers
Ability: Disguise
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Shadow Claw
- Play Rough
- Leech Life
- Swords Dance
Mimikyu's been explained to death, but I'll elaborate on its role on the team. First, you may notice it's using Leech Life instead of Wood Hammer. Because Gengar's the usual Dynamaxer, I can't activate Max Overgrowth consistently, and I wanted something to heal off Mimikyu consistently. Enter Leech Life, which has its fair share of uses (such as an accurate way to be rid of Dark-types). I have rebounded a few times from the red thanks to it, so it's definitely been useful. Second, it's our secondary Dynamax abuser. If Gengar dies, it takes the reigns, and in this streak I ended up depleting all of its PP Maxed moves to 3 each, which should tell you how much I swept with it. Mimi also serves as an emergency switch to things in a pinch with Disguise. It can also Dynamax if I pivot to Shedinja then to it, saving Gengar from being KOed / damage.
@ Safety Goggles
Ability: Wonder Guard
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Shadow Sneak
- Bug Bite
- Harden
- Baton Pass
THE STAR.
I revised the set a bit - I was looking through Shedinja's barren movepool to see what could help its teammates best. First, I saw Confuse Ray, but dismissed it as too unreliable. Then I noticed Harden. High PP AND buffs the Def of my teammates? I used this strategy in about a dozen battles, where Gengar > switch into Shedinja if foe can't touch it > set up Hardens, weaken the foe with STABs > Baton Pass into appropriate recipient (usually Mimi) - Mimikyu and Gengar could heal off a physical threat thanks to Harden boosts.
I'd also like Protective Pads over Safety Goggles due to the amount of RH users, but I don't have it lol
How I lost:
I wasted my first heal on battle 5 due to terrible matchup luck (Scizor BP vs unDyna Gengar and Mimi left in the red at the end of the match), then used the 2nd on battle 23 which was p awesome. Battle 28 had me facing down Cramorant with my Dynamax Gengar, and I completely forgot about Gulp Missile. Rather than go for Max Starfall, I went for Max Overgrowth to heal HP, and then got paralyzed by the Pika. I lost Gengar on Battle 29. Enter Mimi. Mimi should have been able to clutch out quite a few wins alone but on battle 31, Escavalier / P2 / Malamar team. I stared down Quick Claw Malamar critting Night Slash after an Escavalier lead that lowered my Def with Razor Shell. Harden wouldn't have saved me either lol. P2 being a bulky pos made me waste Dynamax turns too.
I've only attempted this like 5 times so I can't complain too much, my luck's been pretty good overall. Still infuriating tho haha.
New shitlist:
Aside from the previously mentioned darks...
- Outspeeds literally everything, bypasses Disguise, does too much damage, beats Shedinja. I didn't run into it this run but I've seen it a few times and I hate it completely. You're wasting a heal when you see this so hopefully you just don't run into it.
- 2HKOes Gengar if it rolls Technician with Bullet Punch, meaning you're at the mercy of Cursed Body, and sadly Shadow Ball leaves it in the red - Max Terror KOes though. Does the same thing to Mimi and it can't KO without a boost... and has Dual Wingbeat to beat Shedinja.
Quit for a bit but decided to go for a streak today. Didn't do too bad.
@ Shell BellAbility: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Shadow Ball
- Sludge Wave
- Giga Drain
- Dazzling Gleam
Same set as last time. Does Gengar things til it dies.
@ LeftoversAbility: Disguise
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Shadow Claw
- Play Rough
- Leech Life
- Swords Dance
Mimikyu's been explained to death, but I'll elaborate on its role on the team. First, you may notice it's using Leech Life instead of Wood Hammer. Because Gengar's the usual Dynamaxer, I can't activate Max Overgrowth consistently, and I wanted something to heal off Mimikyu consistently. Enter Leech Life, which has its fair share of uses (such as an accurate way to be rid of Dark-types). I have rebounded a few times from the red thanks to it, so it's definitely been useful. Second, it's our secondary Dynamax abuser. If Gengar dies, it takes the reigns, and in this streak I ended up depleting all of its PP Maxed moves to 3 each, which should tell you how much I swept with it. Mimi also serves as an emergency switch to things in a pinch with Disguise. It can also Dynamax if I pivot to Shedinja then to it, saving Gengar from being KOed / damage.
@ Safety GogglesAbility: Wonder Guard
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Shadow Sneak
- Bug Bite
- Harden
- Baton Pass
THE STAR.
I revised the set a bit - I was looking through Shedinja's barren movepool to see what could help its teammates best. First, I saw Confuse Ray, but dismissed it as too unreliable. Then I noticed Harden. High PP AND buffs the Def of my teammates? I used this strategy in about a dozen battles, where Gengar > switch into Shedinja if foe can't touch it > set up Hardens, weaken the foe with STABs > Baton Pass into appropriate recipient (usually Mimi) - Mimikyu and Gengar could heal off a physical threat thanks to Harden boosts.
I'd also like Protective Pads over Safety Goggles due to the amount of RH users, but I don't have it lol
How I lost:
I wasted my first heal on battle 5 due to terrible matchup luck (Scizor BP vs unDyna Gengar and Mimi left in the red at the end of the match), then used the 2nd on battle 23 which was p awesome. Battle 28 had me facing down Cramorant with my Dynamax Gengar, and I completely forgot about Gulp Missile. Rather than go for Max Starfall, I went for Max Overgrowth to heal HP, and then got paralyzed by the Pika. I lost Gengar on Battle 29. Enter Mimi. Mimi should have been able to clutch out quite a few wins alone but on battle 31, Escavalier / P2 / Malamar team. I stared down Quick Claw Malamar critting Night Slash after an Escavalier lead that lowered my Def with Razor Shell. Harden wouldn't have saved me either lol. P2 being a bulky pos made me waste Dynamax turns too.
I've only attempted this like 5 times so I can't complain too much, my luck's been pretty good overall. Still infuriating tho haha.
New shitlist:
Aside from the previously mentioned darks...
- Outspeeds literally everything, bypasses Disguise, does too much damage, beats Shedinja. I didn't run into it this run but I've seen it a few times and I hate it completely. You're wasting a heal when you see this so hopefully you just don't run into it. - 2HKOes Gengar if it rolls Technician with Bullet Punch, meaning you're at the mercy of Cursed Body, and sadly Shadow Ball leaves it in the red - Max Terror KOes though. Does the same thing to Mimi and it can't KO without a boost... and has Dual Wingbeat to beat Shedinja.Quickly chiming in to say that my last streak ended at 267
I'm sad the streak ended so soon after reporting on the team, but sometimes luck just really isn't on your side. I maybe should have targeted Pangoro down instead of Drapion, but the Crit spooked me I guess. I've also learned to stop playing with Wireless controllers when I'm in the middle of a long streak. On the bright side, this team was getting a bit stale for me, so it's nice to have an opportunity to start a new streak. I'm excited to try out some of the new pokemon; I'm thinking about making a team with Starmie, who's long been a favorite of mine.
Turn 1: Opponent sends out Pangoro and Drapion. I opt to Fake Out Pangoro (Rocky Helmet breaks sash) and Dance up with Gyarados. Drapion crits Liepard, which brings it down to almost no health.
Turn 2: I Foul Play and Waterfall into Drapion, seeing as I didn't want Gyarados to take Rocky Helmet chip and I thought I might kill an offensive set. It ends up living with a sliver of health though. Cross Poison kills Liepard and Pangoro crits with Payback, bringing Gyarados down to 4 HP.
Turn 3: Incineroar comes in and Fakes Out Pangoro while Gyarados finishes off Drapion. My opponent sends out Indeedee-M
Turn 4: Heartbreak; my Joycon's connection to my Switch faltered for a second, and Gyarados Waterfalls Indeedee instead of Crunching. This ends up mattering, as it lives with a sliver of health. It Future Sights (which ends up not mattering at all), but the fact it lives means I have to spend a turn smacking it. Incineroar kills Pangoro with Flare Blitz, taking serious recoil and Rocky Helmet chip. My opponent sends out Drampa.
Turn 5: Indeedee Follow Me's; it doesn't matter, since I targeted it with Gyarados. I take the kill on Indeedee with Gyarados, while Incineroar goes for Darkest Lariat on Drampa. Indeedee dies, Drampa is taken to about half, and Drampa gets a critical hit Hyper Voice on Incineroar. I'm not 100% sure it mattered, but I'm pretty sure it did. In retrospect, leaving Drampa alive was a huge mistake as Manectric outsped Indeedee and could have picked it off (not that it mattered due to Follow Me, but a mistake nonetheless). Either way, I send out Manecrtic.
Turn 6: I Protect, not remembering how long Future Sight takes to land. Drampa hits into Protect. Basically a wash.
Turn 7: I make the choice to go for a Snarl, hoping to lower Drampa's Special Attack to the point a Hyper Voice won't OHKO. Snarl lands, but Dramp gets another crit Hyper Voice. GG.
Turn 2: I Foul Play and Waterfall into Drapion, seeing as I didn't want Gyarados to take Rocky Helmet chip and I thought I might kill an offensive set. It ends up living with a sliver of health though. Cross Poison kills Liepard and Pangoro crits with Payback, bringing Gyarados down to 4 HP.
Turn 3: Incineroar comes in and Fakes Out Pangoro while Gyarados finishes off Drapion. My opponent sends out Indeedee-M
Turn 4: Heartbreak; my Joycon's connection to my Switch faltered for a second, and Gyarados Waterfalls Indeedee instead of Crunching. This ends up mattering, as it lives with a sliver of health. It Future Sights (which ends up not mattering at all), but the fact it lives means I have to spend a turn smacking it. Incineroar kills Pangoro with Flare Blitz, taking serious recoil and Rocky Helmet chip. My opponent sends out Drampa.
Turn 5: Indeedee Follow Me's; it doesn't matter, since I targeted it with Gyarados. I take the kill on Indeedee with Gyarados, while Incineroar goes for Darkest Lariat on Drampa. Indeedee dies, Drampa is taken to about half, and Drampa gets a critical hit Hyper Voice on Incineroar. I'm not 100% sure it mattered, but I'm pretty sure it did. In retrospect, leaving Drampa alive was a huge mistake as Manectric outsped Indeedee and could have picked it off (not that it mattered due to Follow Me, but a mistake nonetheless). Either way, I send out Manecrtic.
Turn 6: I Protect, not remembering how long Future Sight takes to land. Drampa hits into Protect. Basically a wash.
Turn 7: I make the choice to go for a Snarl, hoping to lower Drampa's Special Attack to the point a Hyper Voice won't OHKO. Snarl lands, but Dramp gets another crit Hyper Voice. GG.
I'm sad the streak ended so soon after reporting on the team, but sometimes luck just really isn't on your side. I maybe should have targeted Pangoro down instead of Drapion, but the Crit spooked me I guess. I've also learned to stop playing with Wireless controllers when I'm in the middle of a long streak. On the bright side, this team was getting a bit stale for me, so it's nice to have an opportunity to start a new streak. I'm excited to try out some of the new pokemon; I'm thinking about making a team with Starmie, who's long been a favorite of mine.
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As Mono Poison sent me spiralling down in a world of despair PP stalling, I took a break from Restricted Sparring, and the result is...
The SwSh Battle Facilities damage calculator! (https://to-metrion.github.io)
Huge thanks to Lego for allowing me to use his great BSS calculator code, which I simply modified a bit.
Noteworthy features :
There definitely could still be issues, so feel free to report them to me by DM (I wouldn't want the thread to be spammed by this)! If you find out more information about the investment of RS sets, you can also report it to me or add it to the spreadsheet, and I'll update the calculator accordingly!
The SwSh Battle Facilities damage calculator! (https://to-metrion.github.io)
Huge thanks to Lego for allowing me to use his great BSS calculator code, which I simply modified a bit.
Noteworthy features :
- All Battle Tower sets preloaded, including the appropriate imperfect IVs;
- All Restricted Sparring sets preloaded (note that EVs and natures are likely to be wrong for these since we still don't have datamined information. I added the info we were able to reverse engineer in the spreadsheet, and will keep updating as we figure out more);
- Customizable Dynamax levels, so the AI Pokémon can be given 0 candies for proper calculations;
- Updated mechanics for the Isle of Armor (Expanding Force, Rising Voltage, Misty Explosion, Triple Axel, G-Max Drum Solo etc. should give proper calcs);
- Default abilities on all sets that usually represent the worst case scenario, to try and prevent bad surprises;
- All Tree / Maison / Subway sets also added so it can be used for these older facilities as well.
- Adding a mass calculator (One vs. All / All vs. One) like we had in the Tree calculator;
- Adding Gen 3 and 4 Frontier.
There definitely could still be issues, so feel free to report them to me by DM (I wouldn't want the thread to be spammed by this)! If you find out more information about the investment of RS sets, you can also report it to me or add it to the spreadsheet, and I'll update the calculator accordingly!