Pokemon Thread

[Orpheus]

(20:06:15) +RankingBot: Your rank in Standard OU is 144/16816!

 

Ah, cool. At this rate, I might get the ability to vote in the next suspect test.

[Zaaps1]

Is Magma Storm glitched or something? It doesn't seem to trap the targeted pokemon when it hits...

[Demoli]

I'm wondering, what's your team? I'd like to battle with you once or twice for fun :P

 

Edit: Zaaps, i dunno about that, when i used heatran, i also ran Magm a storm with wide lens, and i gotta say ti always trapped everything, have you downloaded the most current version?

 

Edit2:

(16:18:16) +RankingBot: Your rank in Standard OU is 354/16959!

1160~

 

Almost there!

 

edit 3: (17:00:26) +RankingBot: Your rank in Standard OU is 248/16993!

1197

 

Now watch me loose a +1-30 match

[Zaaps1]

The current version thing might very well be the problem.

 

Also, what's that variance thing mean?

 

My team, can anyone provide some feedback? It's doing pretty good as is, but dies horribly to good stall and rain. Sun and Sandstorm I can deal with. Doryuuzu is a problem but if I'm careful I can deal with it.

 

Machamp@Lum Berry@No Guard

Adamant, 252attack, 252 hp, 4 hp

Dynamicpunch, Ice punch, Payback, bullet punch

Anti-Lead and general trolling purposes. Sometimes if I don't lead with him, I'll save him for later just to troll something. It's pretty bulky, so it can take a hit and confuse the opponent.

 

Heatran@Balloon@Flash Fire

Timid, 252spatk, 252spd, 4 def

Fire Blast, Stealth Rock, Earth Power, Will-o-Wisp

Absorbs random will-o-wisps directed at Machamp and sets up rocks. If he still has a balloon, he can deal with Dory. If Dory has Brick Break, Latios can deal with it. When I meet a rain team, I generally send Heatran in first to outspeed Politoed and set up rocks. Then I can burn Politoed since FB and EP aren't going to do much, sacrificing Heatran. (Heatran can take a rain-boosted Surf or Boiling Water from Politoed if it is at full health and Politoed doesn't have specs).

 

Voltolos@Choice Specs@Mischevious Heart

Timid, 252spatk, 252spd, 4hp

Volt Change, Thunderbolt, Hidden Power Ice, Dark Pulse

Former Jolteon, sacrificing speed for more power and durability. Very good sweeper. The first two things I look for on an opponent's team are the Dragon-resist and Electric-resist. I try to take care of both of those first before sweeping with Voltolos. Voltolos hits HARD. Anything that doesn't resist it is pretty much 2hko'd or better. It can OHKO Roobushin which is pretty cool.

 

Latios@Choice Specs@Levitate

Timid, 252spatk, 252spd, 4 hp

Dragon Pulse, Thunderbolt, Surf, Trick

The second special sweeper. Voltolos and Latios function similarly so between them, they can tear apart a team.

 

Salamence@Life Orb@Intimidate

Naive, 200atk, 252spd, 56spatk

Dragon Dance, EQ, Outrage, Flamethrower

Punches holes in the team. I never actually get to sweep with Salamence, so I was thinking of just using the Gen IV mixmence.

 

Scizor@Choice Band@Technician

Adamant, 252atk, 252hp, 4 spd

Bullet punch, U turn, Superpower, Pursuit

Voltolos actually fills two roles. Sweeper and Scout. In sweeping, Latios is its partner. In scouting, we have Scizor.

[Demoli]

You need something to stop stall. Also, having a weather changer is quite the welcome change. Specstoad hits like a truck, but it's kinda frail and slow, plus you need to pair it with a lot more stuff to actually make it effective.

 

I'd like to say build a sandstorm team, but aparently the guys at the nomination thread (lowest score to enter was 1400, I have no chance :P ) are dumbily nominating everything that moves. Some are willing to nominate ludicolo, manaphy AND kingdra for the sake of not banning drizzle. and one guy posted this:

 

"Confuse Ray, Supersonic, Swagger, Flatter, Dynamic Punch, Attract, Quick Claw, Focus Band Introduce elements of luck with no other purpose than introducing luck."

 

Man, what have some guys been smoking. Oh and not nominating Latios but instead nominating Landlos (something so easily counterable it's ridiculous) it's beyond me.

[Alg]

I'm guessing those guys built winning "strategies" on those things, but not the ones they nominated? Or they nominated the main counters to their teams? :razz:

 

Ban Kingdra and Manaphy, you still have Kabutops and Hydration Vaporeon :lol:

[Orpheus]

I've talked with some of the smogon staff, apparently if I can maintain a constant rank at where I'm at, and provide a decent paragraph, I should get voter rights. Then I'll vote for no Drizzle or Manaphy.

 

I've argued that by virtue of my timeframe for getting online is impossible to get 1400 with (late night in the US), it just can't be reached. They do make special cases if you can present a decent argument.

[Zaaps1]

Damnit this whole game is luck with all the critical hits and accuracy ratings...

[Buzzcut3]

I've talked with some of the smogon staff, apparently if I can maintain a constant rank at where I'm at, and provide a decent paragraph, I should get voter rights. Then I'll vote for no Drizzle or Manaphy.

 

I've argued that by virtue of my timeframe for getting online is impossible to get 1400 with (late night in the US), it just can't be reached. They do make special cases if you can present a decent argument.

 

I've heard the argument though that with rain gone, Sandstorm would then be overpowered and we'd be back to square one wanting sand stream, Doryuuzu, Landlos, etc. banned, which makes sense to me.

 

A Manaphy ban I completely understand and agree with.

[Orpheus]

I've talked with some of the smogon staff, apparently if I can maintain a constant rank at where I'm at, and provide a decent paragraph, I should get voter rights. Then I'll vote for no Drizzle or Manaphy.

 

I've argued that by virtue of my timeframe for getting online is impossible to get 1400 with (late night in the US), it just can't be reached. They do make special cases if you can present a decent argument.

 

I've heard the argument though that with rain gone, Sandstorm would then be overpowered and we'd be back to square one wanting sand stream, Doryuuzu, Landlos, etc. banned, which makes sense to me.

 

A Manaphy ban I completely understand and agree with.

 

Let me make a simple argument to answer the whole cycle: Drizzle is utterly overcentralizing by comparison to all other weather. Teams that don't carry a weather changer generally can't win against the likes of Kingdra, Ludicolo, and friends. There are a SLEW of rain abusers with awesome movepools and the speed and power to abuse it, and constant rain would make even Nattorei ridiculous. I personally run a Hippowdon just to be sure that Rain doesn't overrun my team. There are only two direct sand abusers, Doryuuzu, who would be better served by banning Sand Throw than Doryuuzu himself. As for Landlos, he's powerful, but a lot of things can outspeed and easily come in on Earthquake. I'd argue that Poison Heal Gliscor is even worse because of his absurd defenses, the fact he can easily find setup opportunities, Taunt (Landlos is an offensive beast and can't give up a move slot for that), and the fact that unless you can corner it, it won't die easily. And Doryuuzu has actual counters: Gliscor laughs, as does Landlos, Breloom, and Birijion.

 

And if Sand Stream was banned, we'd effectively be banning Tyranitar and Hippowdon from standard play, as that's their only abilities that are currently released, and that is NOT a move anyone would want to do.

 

As for Drought, there are a small pool of good abusers (Venusaur, who is a [bleep] because of his goddamn Sleep Powder, Heatran, Volcarona (Ulgamoth's English name)), but one theme befits Chlorophyll users: Their movepools are abysmal. They mostly have to rely on HP for coverage, and Grass is a terrible attacking type.

 

As for Snow Warning, there are no real abusers of it outside a crappy gimmick set on Froslass, and Walrein (although it can't work as well anymore). It's summoner is the worst weather summoner of the entire lot. Pathetic defenses, slow speed in this metagame, passable offensives and a fair movepool. He also has seven utterly common weaknesses: Fire, Rock, Fighting, Bug, Steel, Poison, and Flying. Ok, Flying is only somewhat more common than before, and Poison is non-existant outside of Toxicroak. Still, that's a lot of weaknesses, compounded with his Stealth Rock weakness. He's the worst of the lot.

[Buzzcut3]

Victreebel/sun in general is a pain to face without Heatran. It's very under rated IMO.

 

But you're right in that there are less sand abusers than rain abusers. Probably helps as well that something like Bronzong (OTR Bronzong is a monster this metagame) and Skarmory completely wall Dory/Landlos, effectively ruining sand. Some would argue that that's over centralizing in itself.

 

I also saw a suggestion to ban Swift Swim which also is intriguing. IDK, I'm kind of conservative when it comes to banning as I find it more fun to handicap myself and find solutions rather than ban something.

[Demoli]

I think that what seperates Rain from other weathers i not only the sheer ammount of abusers (i mean, i think around 70% water types have SS has an ability), but that it gives them a speed boost AND a power boost. Yeah, doryuzzo is an awesome sweeper, Landlos is a freaking beast late game and Clorophyll users are great in general, but look at these cases: You either get a Speed boost (Dory) or a power boost (Landlos), while rain gets both.

 

Plus, water as a type has very few weaknesses, only grass and electric. Kingdra looses these weakneses in trade of the best typing in the game, dragon, and is immediatly able to sweep thanks to the increased speed and double Stab rain provides. For a comparisson, imagine Doryuzzo with Sand Power and Sand Throw at the same time.

[Alg]

Or fire types with chlorophyll. Fire gets a power boost while some grass types get a speed boost. Neither gets both. It'd be similar if only ice types had swift swim but water types still got a power boost in rain.

 

That and water is still the most common type. 70% of them is still a lot.

[Zaaps1]

The other thing is that Electric gets a huge advantage in the rain with 100% accurate Thunder. Electric is already an AMAZING type, which makes it even better than stuff like Sun-boosted Solarbeam (Grass sucks for attacking) and Hail-boosted Blizzard (since ice is fail typing). Then you have the fact that you have stuff like Lightning Rod and Volt Absorb on Electric types, completely canceling out the Water types' weakness to electric.

[Demoli]

My grasp with electric type is that it can have immunity nto only in the classic earth ype immunity, it also gets screwed with the new lightningrob/minus/plus/Volt absorb mechanics.

 

Also, people are seriously trying to ban randoruso. This is seriously the most pathetic nomination i've seen outside of possibly reunicklus (yeah, people are actually njomintating him, but i admit he is harder to take down than oposing Randos). I've been using him since the beggining of gen V and he is no where near broken status, hell even Overpowered status. He has Sand power and a trolly 101 speed, so what? Earth-Flying may be great on Gliscor, but thats because of it's amazing defences and resistences to fighting moves, rando gets taken down byany kind of unstabbed ice atack. Hippowdon OhKOs with only 30 Att ev investments, and KO's with rocks without any investments at all. Gliscor with icefang (or acrobat) laughs at any non HP ice- carrying rando and any 102+ base speed with scarf utterly crushes non rockpoilishing variants, and these can be stopped by any kind of decent wall/bulky mon. Hell, priority laughs at him!

 

And whats even better than all of this, people who are nominating Reuniclus and Landlos are seriously nominating Deoxys-N back to OU. No kidding.

[Alg]

So basically, Smogoners aren't as smart as we think? So much for playing again when they figure out the tiers. Losing faith in their ability to get it done, especially if they're seriously considering Deoxys.

 

If they ban Reuni, you can use Shinbora the same way. Landlos might even be taken out by ice shard from something slower. Shell Break / Cloyster maybe?

 

That said, any word on Chomp/Ononokus?

[Demoli]

Ononokus is not getting banned, it isn't even nominated and possibly never will due to that sub-100 speed. People are considering banning Sand Veil though, so if that happens, no chomp til DW Rough Skin is released.

 

Also, why the hell people are saying Deoxys N needs a "fair testing"? Yeah, it's outclassed by A, but something like 150/150/150 is something to yell "Insta-ban" instantly, plus he's even bulkier than A, and cosmic power allows it to take some punishment before going down.

[Orpheus]

Ononokus is not getting banned, it isn't even nominated and possibly never will due to that sub-100 speed. People are considering banning Sand Veil though, so if that happens, no chomp til DW Rough Skin is released.

 

Also, why the hell people are saying Deoxys N needs a "fair testing"? Yeah, it's outclassed by A, but something like 150/150/150 is something to yell "Insta-ban" instantly, plus he's even bulkier than A, and cosmic power allows it to take some punishment before going down.

 

Eh, it was blanket banned, which goes against their philosophy. The Rankurusu nominations piss me off though. Just because you idiots run six stall pokes with one attack each and rely on hazards does not mean he's broken.

[Demoli]

Well, since you have voting rights and all, what is your opiion about rando? I'm really curious about it :-P

[Orpheus]

I'm personally on the fence regarding Landlos.

 

And most of us are proposing just banning Drizzle and Swift Swim from being on the same team. It's more reasonable, so that we can further figure out if Drizzle is truly broken because of Swift Swim or what. It's the best solution, so that Drizzle can be seen without Swift Swim abuse, and Swift Swim is kept in check to where the user uses Rain Dance. I still find those suggesting Reniculus to be rather stupid. Nearly all of them had weak pokes offensively on their stall teams, so of course Reniculus could eat them for supper.

 

I'm still nominating Latios, Manaphy (OF COURSE!), and I'm currently on the fence regarding Excadrill/Doryuuzu.

[Dizzle229]

So I've played a few of these games now and... is it just me, or are they all the same [bleep]ing game :-| ?

[Alg]

So I've played a few of these games now and... is it just me, or are they all the same [bleep]ing game :-| ?

They pretty much are. The difference is what 'mons are in each game.

 

And that's not mentioning the different versions.

 

It's an excuse plot. The real game is training and battling with your mons of choice.

[krimi]

Does anyone have any interest playing some rse matches?

[Zaaps1]

Hmm I looking for someone who can decently replace Scizor. He's not been doing too much on my team.

 

Basically, I'd like something that can tank well and scout with U-Turn (already have a Volt Changer and I feel two would make my team too weak against Ground). Steel typing is preferable but not necessary for synergy. I'd also like it if it had priority so it could revenge and clean up afterward, but Scizor rarely does that on my team as it is, so I don't suppose that's of high priority (no pun intended). Also, it should be a physically-based pokemon or could at least use an effective physical set.

 

Was looking into Genesect, but its physical movepool isn't so great. I suppose I could go mixed, but I plan on giving it a Choice Band so...

[Orpheus]

Hmm I looking for someone who can decently replace Scizor. He's not been doing too much on my team.

 

Basically, I'd like something that can tank well and scout with U-Turn (already have a Volt Changer and I feel two would make my team too weak against Ground). Steel typing is preferable but not necessary for synergy. I'd also like it if it had priority so it could revenge and clean up afterward, but Scizor rarely does that on my team as it is, so I don't suppose that's of high priority (no pun intended). Also, it should be a physically-based pokemon or could at least use an effective physical set.

 

Was looking into Genesect, but its physical movepool isn't so great. I suppose I could go mixed, but I plan on giving it a Choice Band so...

 

Barujina isn't a bad option, despite the SR weakness. That won't matter though, as it's defenses are so spectacularly high nothing can really OHKO it. 110/105/95 is nothing to scoff at.