Welcome to the New ORAS Battle Spot Meta + Gimmicky Gravity Team

New ORAS Battle Spot Doubles Meta

So if anyone of you guys have been living under a rock for the past few days, or just don't know about the Pokemon Global Link, which about 99.999%  of all of you don't know TPCi have announced a new ruleset change for all Rated Battles. Don't worry about that ninety-nine percent crap  since I'll bring everyone up to speed. Basically the new Battle Spot format allows for non-pentagon Pokemon into all Rated formats from Singles, Doubles (the one we are concern with), Triples, and Rotation. Special Battle Spot is doing their own thing with a competition with ORAS League and the XY League battle each other out, but that's not the main focus of today.

With the removal of the pentagon rule from the Battle Spot ORAS ladder, this has allowed the return of several past generational Pokemon such as Sheer Force Landorus, Defiant Thundurus/Tornadus, previous move tutor Pokemon (I.E  XD Pokemon like Helping Hand Togekiss, Follow Me Magmar/Electabuzz), event Suicune with Sheer Cold, Kangaskhan with Seismic Toss, Follow Me Blastiose, Clefable with Soft-boil, Quiet Heatran with Eruption, and a host of other past gen Pokemon. Honestly there wasn't that many other notable Pokemon (maybe Flare Blitz/Extreme Speed Entei) but that's about it, though the fact we are allowing all generational Pokemon means that the metagame will most definitely shift, but in what way we don't know. In XY, there wasn't that much of a change, maybe Mega Kangaskhan having Low Kick + Elemental Punches, Gardevoir and Sylveon getting Hyper Voice, and a host of other Pokemon getting move tutors attacks, but most of them return with ORAS. with the new ORAS Megas and the fully weight of all available Pokemon since generation 3, there might be some new cores but I think there's nothing too notable that could shake the format.

Keep in mind, this isn't the VGC 2016 format, since those rules haven't been announced, though its extremely likely given that TPCi and the Organized Play has allowed generational Pokemon in VGC before, notably in Gen 5. Despite the lack of confirmation, I'm still going to ladder on the site mainly because of the fact this COULD be the new format, but we may never know for sure. The only negative I fine with this is we've lost an official online ladder to play VGC 2015 rules so people will resort to using Pokemon Showdown for full 100% practice. Course people can write off their losses from a Pokemon with generational moves or abilities, but they have to know how to deal with those threat if it becomes the format.

Maybe after 2-3 months I'll  write a summary about the season, but for now I'll focus on the team I've used for the new Battle Spot format. Since I did have some generational Pokemon from my Poke Bank to use, I thought it be fun to base a team around a couple of them. Sheer Force Landorus and Defiant Thundurus was the first thing that came to mind since I wanted to try out these two. While searching for these two, I found a Dynamic Punch Metagross a friend of mine likely genned and gave to me. I do have a legit Metagross from Emerald which has like 25+ IVs all across the board, didn't feel like going through my game again for transfer and soft resetting for a Beldum again. Then it dawn on me about making a dumb gimmick team with Gravity so Landorus can fire Earth Powers at will, and Mega Metagross can use Dynamic Punch in place of the speed dropping Hammer Arm. Here's the results of the team so far and the overview:

THE SQUAD

Sableye @ Mental Herb

Ability: Prankster

Level: 50

EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD

Calm Nature

- Will-O-Wisp

- Taunt

- Recover

- Gravity

**Note: Cannot win against Fire types if Sableye is the only one left


Hopefully the star and the main instrument of the team's success on Battle Spot. This is pretty much a standard Prankster Sableye set with Will-O-Wisp to burn targets, Taunt to stop any setup (especially against support Thundurus since I have the Mental Herb), and Recover to replenish Sableye's health. The last moveslot definitely is the most interesting; Gravity. No I'm not running Gravity because I don't like Will-O-Wisp missing, though it can help. The idea of Sableye's Gravity is to use it to disrupt Landorus-T and any other Earthquake users into attacking themselves. At the same time, this "grounds" all Levitate users, Flying Pokemon, and Balloon item holders as they lose their immunity to Ground. At the same time, everyone on the field has their evasiveness dropped by a pseudo  -2 stages so  this allows for some of my other Pokemon to run more "inaccurate" attacks to overpower my opponents. So here are a couple of examples:

Metagross-Mega @ Metagrossite

Ability: Tough Claws

Level: 50

EVs: 44 HP / 204 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD / 252 Spe

Jolly Nature

- Zen Headbutt

- Iron Head

- Dynamic Punch

- Protect

Note: Dynamic Punch is a move tutor found in Pokemon Emerald

Same Mega Metagross set I've ran for the past 4 months now without any changes to the set or EVs except for one move: Dynamic Punch. So why Dynamic Punch of something like Hammer Arm? The latter is be more accurate, fact over 100% accurate with its Hammer Arm attacks so why again?  Yes its true that Dynamic Punch will only receive a boost to 83% accuracy, factor in the fact that it has a guarantee 100% chance of confusion when it attacks the target is rather huge IMO. With the target inflicted with a 50% probability to hit itself, this gives my team additional "free turns" to inflict damage against my opponent. Another reason why I forgo Hammer Arm was because it drops my Mega Metagross speed by 1 stage. Usually I'm somewhat "forced" to run speed control such as Tailwind and Thunder Wave. Nevertheless, Tough Claws boosted Dynamic Punch basically does what Hammer Arm was used for and that's to hit against any Mega Kangaskhan, Ferrothorn, Hydreigon, Heatran, Mega Gyarados, Bisharp, or Tyranitar on the field. STAB Zen Headbutt is for Amoonguss and Fighting types plus it gets a nice accuracy boost from Gravity. I kinda like how Gravity has made Mega Metagross much more reliable now now at least its main Psychic STAB can hit, though at the cost of a rooster and moveslot from Sableye.

Landorus @ Life Orb

Ability: Sheer Force

Level: 50

EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe

Timid Nature

IVs: 30 Atk / 30 Def

- Earth Power

- Psychic

- Focus Blast / Hidden Power Ice

- Protect

(Disclaimer: Going to refer to Landorus-Incarnate form as Landorus from now on)
Note: Sheer Force 
Landorus can still be obtain from the Pokemon Dream Radar on the 3DS ESHOP. 

The big guns of the team and a Pokemon to be feared if the new Battle Spot format turns out to be VGC 2016,  Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus-I. This Pokemon is probably one of the most efficient wall-breakers in the game given how much of the boost Sheer Force grants to much of Landorus's attack. In my opinion, Landorus has been the main MVP of this run since it able to consistently apply pressure against most teams. The first two moves I included on its roster where Earth Power, Psychic, and Focus Blast. Let me just say this, Sheer Force LO Earth Power is nothing to laugh at from a Landorus since now it can practically 2HKO the the format bar those resisted. Remember why I have Sableye for this team? That's right to fuck up some birds and washing machines:

• 252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 148+ SpD Rotom-W: 179-213 (114 - 135.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
• 252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Earth Power vs. 236 HP / 128+ SpD Thundurus: 226-268 (122.8 - 145.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
• 252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 140+ SpD Zapdos: 205-244 (104 - 123.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO

All three of these Pokemon are now vulnerable to a powerful Earth Power meaning that my opponents have zero switch ins bar maybe Cresselia or Porygon2. At first, I thought maybe Sludge Bomb was a viable option to KO Fairy types like Sylveon or Mega Gardevoir, but all three have a high Special Defense stat and Earth Power already 2HKOs them. Instead Psychic was opted since aside from Mega Metagross, I don't have a great response from Fighting and Poison Types like Mega Venusaur, Amoonguss, Conkeldurr, or Virizion. Honestly most of these Pokemon can still take a Sheer Force Psychic but at least I want to heavily damage them for the rest of the team to revenge kill. For my last moveslot aside from Protect it was kinda of a toss up between Focus Blast and HP Ice. I really wanted to try out Focus Blast + Gravity since it can OHKO +4 HP Mega Kangaskhan, but the threat of Dragons and the Double Genies makes HP Ice too valuable not to give up.   

Thundurus @ Expert Belt / Safety Goggles

Ability: Defiant / Prankster

Level: 50

EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe (First Set)
EVs: 212 HP / 108 Def / 20 SpA / 100 SpD / 68 Spe  (Second Set)

Jolly / Timid Nature

- Superpower / Thunder Wave

- Knock Off / Hidden Power Ice 

- Thunder Punch / Thunderbolt

- Protect

Note: Same as Landorus, Defiant Thundurus can be obtain from Pokemon Dream Radar from the 3DS ESHOP


To be honest, Defiant Thundurus is somewhat underwhelming presence for the team compared with maybe it Prankster support. Rarely did it even put a decent amount of work aside from getting a couple KOs on Mega Kangaskhan with its Superpower and me being a dumbass in my first loss with this team. Superpower and Knock Off form perfect coverage for Thundurus while Thunder Punch is the main STAB option. Wild Charge is something to consider in the future when comparing the damage output to that of Thunder Punch. Well here's a one some notable calculations:

Expert Belt Thunder Punch (with Defiant boost)

+1 252 Atk Expert Belt Thundurus Thunder Punch vs. 252 HP / 100+ Def Suicune: 158-187 (76.3 - 90.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Sitrus Berry recovery
+1 252 Atk Expert Belt Thundurus Thunder Punch vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Milotic: 180-211 (89.1 - 104.4%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO

Expert Belt Wild Charge (with Defiant boost)

+1 252 Atk Expert Belt Thundurus Wild Charge vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Milotic: 211-252 (104.4 - 124.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+1 252 Atk Expert Belt Thundurus Wild Charge vs. 252 HP / 100+ Def Suicune: 190-226 (91.7 - 109.1%) -- 50% chance to OHKO

with Life Orb

+1 252 Atk Life Orb Thundurus Wild Charge vs. 252 HP / 100+ Def Suicune: 205-244 (99 - 117.8%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO
252 Atk Life Orb Thundurus Thunder Punch vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Mega Charizard Y: 187-221 (101 - 119.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO (Only here to demonstrate a point)

As you can see, Defiant Thundurus with a +1 boost from its ability can do heavy damage against two of the premier bulky Water types currently. The last damage calculation with the Life Orb Wild Charge as it can clearly beat Milotic with only the Expert Belt boost already (Life Orb hits harder by about 30% compared to 20%), and has a 15/16 chance of OHKOing the most standard Suicune set. However the problem is Thundurus needs the Defiant boost, Wild Charge, and Life Orb just to enough damage to get KOs on targets. However LO Thundurus can one shot the standard Charizard Y set shown compared with the 50% chance from a LO Timid Thunderbolt.

However since Landorus has the Life Orb, Thundurus has to settle with the Expert Belt just so it can stick around longer, though kinda ironic since I removed it for a Safety Googles set following a really bad experience with Mental Herb Amoonguss. Both my losses I realized Prankster Thundurus would have been so much better just to paralyze the opposing team and allow Mega Metagross to hit hard and apply para flinches from Zen Headbutt, Iron Head or heck even parafusion with Dynamic Punch if I'm playing risky. After my 6th game with Thundurus (4th rated game ) I dropped it for the the Prankster set shown. It really pairs well with Dynamic Punch Mega Metagross with because of the above stuff I mentioned. Damn just realize that one Pokemon could be paralyzed, confused from Dynamic Punch, and get repeatedly hit with Iron Head from Mega Metagross... pretty fucked up indeed.

Volcarona @ Sitrus Berry

Ability: Flame Body

Level: 50

EVs: 252 HP / 188 Def / 4 SpA / 4 SpD / 60 Spe

Timid Nature

IVs: 0 Atk

- Fiery Dance

- Giga Drain / Bug Buzz

- Quiver Dance

- Rage Powder / Protect / Bug Buzz

Milestones:

-Outspeeds Smeagle by one point (though should outspeed Excadrill)

-Defense investment enough to take a Double Edge from Mega Kangaskhan with Sitrus Berry

Until July, I never actually used Volcarona competitively in VGC Doubles since I felt that Rock Slide just makes it life harder. Honestly after toying around another Mega Metagross team with Volcarona on the Battle Spot Special 11 ladder, I decided to bring an updated version of the it. Fiery Dance and Quiver Dance allows Volcarona to become an immediate offensive threat on the field, often in which my opponents tend to double target. Though weaker than Flamethrower, Fiery Dance give Volcarona a 50% chance to further boost its Special Attack. Despite the Quiver Dance boost, +1 Flamethrower doesn't get the OHKO on 4 HP Aegislash nearly all the time bar a high damage roll. Giga Drain is essentially coverage for Water types like Rotom-W or Suicune after it gets a Quiver Dance boost up since now it can get back some health. For the last moveslot, I kinda want to revisit it here since Volcarona has Rage Powder just to protect Mega Metagross from Sucker Punches and maybe get a burn from the Flame Body. To be honest, I could see myself running Quiver + 3 attacks mainly because I don't have a response for Hydreigon or Cresselia so Bug Buzz be an option. Giga Drain has came in handy in matches where Volc is setup and just needs to KO a target with Giga Drain to get HP back.

Hydreigon @ Lum Berry

Ability: Levitate

Level: 50

EVs: 48 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 204 Spe

Timid Nature

- Draco Meteor

- Dark Pulse

- Taunt / Earth Power

- Tailwind

Milestones:

Outspeeds base 95 Pokemon with positive speed natures

Since I'm running Mega Metagross, its a no-brainer not to run Hydreigon as my last Pokemon since I needed a resist to the elemental types (Fire, Grass, Water, Electric) and deals with Aegislash. This Hydreigon set normally has a Life Orb set because of its "supportive" role for the teams its seen action, but Landorus has it so I'd just slapped Lum Berry here. Honestly might want to reconsider the item choices but don't know since I'm doing moderately well with this team. Basically I only have STAB Draco Meteor and Dark Pulse to round up its attacks. To be honest, I find it hilarious that there are now over 40% of Hydeigons carrying Tailwind, a move I've been using on it since like mid-May. Before Mid-May, I've been using Modest Specs Hydreigon just to wall break opposing teams with its immense coverage but I alway had issues with opposing Tailwind users like Suicune, Talonflame, and Zapdos. The idea was to setup Tailwind to match their own just so my Pokemon can still outspeed them. Even more funny enough, was the fact that experimental Tailwind Hydreigon set took my team from the 1600s all the way up to 1865 on a 23-2 record. Taunt was just there as a means to surprise my opponent's setup Pokemon from achieving their intended goals and its a nice tech. Probably should run Earth Power to improve my matchup with Fire and Steel *cough Heatran Cough*. 

First Impressions

Though not the most well-thought out team (it has a clear weakness to Pixilate Hyper Voice with 3 Pokemon weak to Ice, 2 weak to Water/Rock), its putting its weight for now. Before going on the ladder, I did practice 2 battles on free battle just to test if there's any connection issues and if it fairs well. Both games featured teams with Mega Metagross and Mega Venusaur so with some careful maneuvering I was able to get 2 wins with a Volcarona and Landorus. Afterword I took my team unto the ladder to see how it fair, Funny enough, our first team was against a Guard Swap Carbink + Minimize Chansey with Mega Sableye and I have two taunters + a Gravity user.... lets see how that came out. 

Following suit, the second battle I suffered a bad I'm pretty still upset about I called Arcanine to Protect and have both Landorus and Thundurus (with the Defiant boost) gang up on Suicune, but it reveals Protect.  I do the same thing again, but the player switches out to Landorus and I double target the Suicune....again with ....a Thunder Punch and Earth Power as Arcanine burns my Thundurus which I knew was coming so but didn't attack with an EP on it. Here's a calc for what LO Sheer Force boosted EP does to the specially defensive Arcanine.

252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Arcanine: 198-237 (100.5 - 120.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Notice unless Arcanine has Shuca Berry, it ain't living that attack.... so yeah. Worse part was my opponent had Mega Venusaur, AV Landorus-T, Intimidate defensive Arcanine, and Suicune mentioned earlier and I still had Volc and Metagross in the back. Technically speaking had I targeted Arcanine, the battle would have fallen in favor of me but I was more concern about the potential Ice Beam on Thundurus/Landorus and felt doubling up was my best possible play. AV Landorus-T won't be an issue as I can Knock Off Landorus-T and HP Ice for a sure KO which happen afterward. Yeah it even upsets me that I didn't target the Arcanine slot just because it might have protect but its movepool was Snarl, Protect, Flamethrower and Will-O-Wisp, which missed my Thundurus the first time, but the double target on the Landorus-T switch in kinda makes it even worse on my end. Funny enough, once Landorus-T lost it item from Knock Off, Volcarona was able to aggressively setup with a Quiver Dance + Fiery Dance boost so it could have won me the game. However, I double onto the Mega Venusaur with Metagross and Volc and it barely survives what looks like 1 HP and Volc gets poisoned by Sludge Bomb from Mega Venusaur and faints with having little heath left.

My second loss was mostly due to Rock Slide literally saving my opponent's ass since they went for a terrible misplay with his Thundurus by going for Sky Drop on Mega Metagross (course it fails due to Metagross being among the heaviest Pokemon in the game)  as I double target with Metagross and Landorus getting a knock out. Landorus-T is sent out and all I did was HP Ice the Landorus-T with my own Sheer Force Incarnate form and Iron Head it in case it has a Sash. The opposing Landorus-T is faster (obviously Scarf), Rock Slides, and flinches both my Pokemon as Sylveon goes for Hyper Voice and KOs Landorus-T. Best case scenario I'll admit no matter what, Landorus goes down but it kills its other form at the very least as Metagross doesn't flinch and gets heavy damage down to Sylveon to the point Thundurus and Volcarona beat it. My opponent still has a Mega Kangaskhan in the back but it would have been a 3 v 1 (discounting the heavily weaken Sylveon). Of course, Landorus-T flinches both Mega Metagross and Thundurus again and Sylveon beats Thundurus as well. I only got remotely close as Landorus-T misses the RS on Volc I KO it with a double target. Honestly I can't view that as a "loss" on my end for that matter mainly because it was literally around a ~80% chance (factoring in the miss and not flinching) where Landorus hits HP Ice and unfortunately got 20% roll. I'll leave it at that.

The other 11 battles were mostly due to the fact people were likely unprepared for Gravity and the antics my team has from Sheer Force Landorus, Double Taunt, and, Dynamic Punch Mega Metagross.  While weak to Water, Volcarona was able to provide Landorus redirection support and basically it can dismantled teams cores mid to late game. Sableye is very important to the team's success as its a great disruptor with Will-O-Wisp and Taunt. I find it funny that Gravity Dynamic Punch hasn't missed not once given it has a 17% chance in doing so factoring in the -2 evasion drops on all Pokemon on the field. There where only 2 battles where I was able to get a KO on Mega Kangaskhan with Dynamic Punch with prior damage and disrupt any other Pokemon with the 50% chance of confusion. If I see a Fire type Pokemon in team preview, Sableye will probably not make an appearance because it cannot touch them is forced to rely on Toxic or Foul Play if I ever elect to swap out a moveslot. The team has somewhat of an item slot issues with Thundurus, Hydreigon and Volcarona since Landorus has the Life Orb. Thundurus has Safety Googles for now but I think it will have to swap this for Sitrus Berry from Volcarona since Thundurus doesn't have no recovery while Volc can easily Giga Drain. Somehow I see myself running Weakness Policy Hydreigon again since most people often target it with super effective attacks that won't normally KO but do a decent chunk to it.  With a +2 Special Attack a pseudo +2, or double its speed stat, Hydreigon can hit harder than Modest Specs so that's definitely something to consider. Here are some items choices I seen some Hydreigon run lately.
 
The following stats have been taken from the Pokemon Global Link as of 9/18/2015 regarding the item choice for Hydreigon:

• 1 Safety Goggles 28.1%
• 2 Choice Specs 26.4%
• 3 Chople Berry 19.8%
• 4 Choice Scarf 11.6%
• 5 Life Orb 6.6%
• 6 Focus Sash 3.3%
• 7 Black Glasses 1.7%
• 8 Lum Berry 1.7% 
• 9 Bright Powder 0.8%

Safety Googles is become the norm for Hydreigon apparently so it can avoid Rage Powder or Spore from Amoonguss, though +2 SpA +2 Spe for Hydreigon sounds interesting to try out at best. Earth Power on Hydreigon can definitely help in my Fire matchup and especially against Heatran or Arcanine. Going back to Mega Metagross, while its certainly a strong Mega Evolution that's viable in VGC, it lacks the proper firepower and STABs like Mega Kangaskhan, Mega Salamence, Mega Gardevoir, or Charizard Y. What does those 4 have in common? All of them have incredibly spam-able movepools to abuse, as Mega Metagross only has Steel / Psychic STAB. Unfortunately aside from Fairy, Poison, Ice, Rock, or Fighting, that's really all what Metagross can do. To make matters worse, the format is filled with Intimidate users, Prankster disruptors, and Steel types like Aegislash and Heatran who all give Metagross a poor matchup.

In the coming weeks I'll  attempt to make a team where Mega Metagross can be the main cleaner rather than the sole offensive presence since that's probably the best approach to using the Steel / Psychic Mega. Again this team isn't too seriously well built, though given the record, I'll continue using it and update the how its doing. Maybe it can evolve into something that's I could use in the new format, but again this was only to test out the non-pentagon ladder so far.

1st UPDATE: Where I Plan to take Faraway Island from Here

You guys won't stop seeing these Mew gifs anytime soon

With only like a few post and a couple of days into this blog, I feel as though its time to have some sort of "proper" stop for this month of September. For every month now, I'll have about 2 update posts regarding the content and future post people should anticipate for as well as thoughts and opinions on how I'm doing so far. Before I go on with any debriefing, I'd like to thank all the people who supported me for motivating into making this blogspot mainly since I love to write, even if it sounds like crap at time, but for sure I'll avoid devolving myself into going into BS tangents. That's what I absolutely promise not to do for this blogspot which is to try not to half-ass all my works and follow-through with my schedule (unless real life intervenes). The welcome post, I admit was somewhat more of a guidelines and a rant in the end there. I'd want to amend and makeup that here with what I have to offer for the readers of Faraway Island.


So regarding what I plan on posting for now on until the next update.

1. "Experimental" and "Successful Ladder" Teams: Basically if I have an idea of a team, I'll write a very brief theorymon about what its suppose to accomplish and how successful it is. For sure people can comment about the experimental teams but please try not to scrutinize it as much as maybe my ladder and tourney teams. Its honestly just thoughts and ideas about what I hope can work with over time and improve it myself over time. There might be some teams that I'll keep "hidden" if I do decided to join the VGC circuit for 2016 but only time will tell. Feedback about the team from anyone is great, but please don't say crap like "oh you are using legendaries", "you stupid newb", "Smogon fucker" or any derogatory comments that doesn't contribute to the site. Its completely unnecessary at all. Don't expect me to write about how I'm making Pachurisu viable again or use unviable stuff when there's an something like an Aegislash, Mega Salamence, or Sylveon right there to use. Of course my examples are regarding VGC so its free game quite honestly.
2. Language: Last time I'll address this, with that above post, I'll try my best not to censor myself about regarding my language or thoughts about a certain thing. Obviously I'm not going to go on huge rants against a certain person I dislike in the Pokemon community (maybe if I see that it gets annoying but no huge rants) ....no I'm not that kind of person at all. In fact, I'm very quiet if you mean me in real life, but once any of gets to "know me", you'll see I'm just someone trying to fit in everyday life. Lets be honest, everyone jokes around and says random crap every now so often. Yes I'm going to cuss every now and then and maybe joke around here just to spicy things up here since it already feels sucked out of its life. However if you feel offended by by just the language or me just throwing a cuss word like fuck every so often then this is not a blog post for you. 
3. Real Life Updates: I'll keep my IRL stuff to a minimum here since the whole blog post will focus primarily on the competitive Pokemon scene from Singles or VGC. If I really feel like opening up, then yes I'll make one of these post once in a blue moon if it interferes with time being taken from battling. If there's an emergency update, then I'll give a debrief on potentially how long I won't post here depend on how serious the matter is. 
4. Contributions to Pokemon Forever: For sure I have to address this one since people from the site will ask. No I'm not leaving Pokemon Forever because I'v started a blog post here. I'm going to be frank and say that I'll contribute to the site in whatever way I can. Still visiting Pokemon Forever so expect Team Reports, RMTs, Pokemon analysis and other guides to be posted there. However, most of those Team Reports, Pokemon Analysis and any other stuff will be posted here first before going onto Pokemon Forever. For sure some language and other add ons will be taken out just to follow community guidelines. This is probably the "best compromise" as I can post about the teams here and then the follow day just edit, format it, and eventually post it onto the site. For sure I won't rewrite the majority of the stuff I'll say but at least people will get to see my content at Pokemon Forever and here. 
5. Battle Codes and Maybe Videos on Youtube Soon?: Until I get another copy of ORAS, I really don't have any space for Battle Videos to show with most of them being reserved for PFA battles and tournaments. Of course I could just go on Showdown, but interest ladder there has dropped for me since I kinda want to focus on Battle Spot (yes even with the no pentagon format) for the time being, There are some old teams I plan on talking extensively about but I have to search and look for old battle  replays videos on showdown. Definitely gonna organize these so I can show something. This only applies to 3 teams that are going to be posted here in the upcoming weeks. For the future, I might consider uploading past battles on Youtube with my phone so expect that late next month.
6. Battle Spot/Showdown Progress: For this, I'll show brief updates about how the Battle Spot Double ladder is from the in-game carts. I'll try not to show my teams as much and reserve that for the "Experimental" and "Team Reports" so yeah. For Showdown, again interest isn't there since I'm working on the site but its the only place to get 100% VGC 2015 practice at the moment so there will be something akin to this.
7. Taking Somewhat of a "Mini Break" from Battling: Since there has been a restart of the Battle Spot Ladder and hopefully on Showdown soon, I'm going to take a break from battling competitively for about until October. This will give me time to focus more on the site here and maybe craft a couple of team ideas. Not gonna lie but the reason why I'm taking a rest from battling with the exception of league battles is mostly due to burn out (I'll make a personal post about this soon to elaborate and share).

Now that's everything is covered, here are a couple of planned write-ups I aim at doing for this site and on Pokemon Forever.

• Experimental Team: Gravity + Sheer Force Landorus-I (New Battle Spot Doubles Team)
• Team Report: Mega Gardevoir Sand Room (Won't post on PKMN4EVER because team is somewhat similar to someone else's team
• Team Report: Mega Gengar Stall Team (Peaked 7th in the US Rankings for BSD)
• Team Report: Mega Garchomp Sand Room Team
• Opinions: Mega Gardevoir or Sylveon: Who's Better?
• PFA: VGC DRAFT TEAM + TRADES
• PFA: Regular Season Report for Singles
• PFA: Regular Season Report for Doubles 
• (Still haven't decided if I want to include playoffs with the regular season but I'll decide eventually. This might be postpone till Late October / November)
• Pokemon Analysis: Mega Salamence
• Pokemon Analysis: Ferrothorn
• A couple of personal thoughts regarding what I mentioned

For sure, I'll try to finish at least 4 of the 10 items here by the end of September. Probaby gonna start working on the one of the team reports today and at least finish 1 by the end of the month and have scheduled releases on October. That's about all I have to say about my UPDATE post so see you all in the next one. 

WE'RE BURNING IT DOWN! Another 1st Place Tourney Team from a Small Online Tourney

Artist: DarthOwen

Prelude

If there's one Mega Pokemon that's alluded me throughout the current VGC 2015 ruleset and still today, its definitely Charizard Y. Early on around late January 2015, I'd built a duel Mega Evolution core between Mega Charizard Y and Mega Venusaur just to bluff the sun mode, yet eventually realized Charizard Y was brought only a handful of times while I opted for bulk my other Mega provided. Admitably, this was my most successful iteration of using Charizard Y since it did put in a great amount of work, however I'd lose more often with it than Mega Venusaur. Ever since I've tried but failed to make another "successful" Charizard Y team.  Soon afterward  my attention turned to the other viable Megas and even some "obscure" ones until recently I revisit it for the 5th time.

One of the biggest nemesis to Charizard Y is not a Pokemon, rather the move: Rock Slide. This attack inflicts quadruple effectiveness against Charizard Y and the added 30% flinch factor, in case it happens to take the hit, but likely will OHKO most of the time. With Pokemon like Scarf Landorus-T and Terrakion running around, its near mandatory to have a Pokemon who can deal with these threats, or at least carry Wide Guard. The ever so popular Mega Kangakaskhan and Mega Salamence can easily destroy Charizard Y with just one Double Edge, let alone Heatran can single-handedly wall most Charizard Y sets. The rise of certain archetypes didn't help my outlook for Mega Charizard Y such as "Japan Sand", Double Genies, Redirection, Rain, and the well-establish CHALK teams.

The funny thing is Charizard Y CAN beat these teams, or the Pokemon built around them since very few of them are capable of taking Drought-boosted Fire attacks head on.

TEAM BUILDING GUIDE 

Since I wanted to build around a Charizard Y core, I thought it be a "good" idea to use some of the more successful Charizaed Y team that did well at their respective competitions. It wasn't long before I chose to ditto Angel Miranda/Jeudy Azzereli's US Nationals team: Flamethrower/HP Ground Charizard Y, Scarf Tyranitar, "Special" Landorus-T (this is what I meant Pod/Mudkip/Anime), Will-O-Wisp Jellicent, Sub Aegislash, and Calm Mind HP Ground Sylveon. The only notable edits I made from their team was change the Aegislash for my Leftovers Ferrothorn everyone loves, and replace Ice Beam with Toxic on Jellicent to improve my matchups with CM Cresselia and bulky Water types. To be honest, Ferrothorn and Jellicent is probably the one of the nastiest defensive core I've ever tested out and they can stalled out entire matches to the point where Scarf Tyranitar, Calm Mind Sylveon, Landorus-T, or Charizard Y just cleanup the game. Aegislash gave this team some issues, but it wasn't that problematic when you have Flamethrower Charizard Y, Earth Power Landorus-T and Tyranitar plus the other team members bar Jellicent can take a hit. I've later found out that Terrakion/Bisharp/Hydreigon is an absolute matchup nightmare to face with this team as they can pick off most of of them as I didn't have much speed control. After some thoughts, I've settled with this...

As you all can see, I'd made some considerable changes to the first team such as replacing Scarf Tyranitar for Cresselia for speed control with immense bulk, and Jellicent for Greninja for immediate hyper offense. The only notable edits was I replace HP Ground for Tailwind on Charizard Y, swapped special Landorus-T for my occasional Assault Vest set, and edited the team (bar Ferrothorn) with some minor speed increases for Tailwind "speed" tiers. While this team wasn't as great as the other team in practice, it felt somewhat improved since I've felt more confident using Charizard Y now I had speed control options in the form of Tailwind and Trick Room. Essentially the Trick Room mode was Cresselia, Sylveon, Ferrothorn, AV Landorus-T, and Charizard Y while the fast "Tailwind" mode was with Charizard Y, Greninja, AV Landorus-T, and Sylveon. The only issues I encounter was Kangaskhan can plow through this team much easier now that I didn't have Jellicent or any Ghost types for that matter. Rocky Helmet Moonlight Cresselia was my main "check" to Mega Kangaskhan but she can get worn down immediately. Double Genie surprisingly became more annoying to face as in practice my team would get Rock Slide flinched by Landorus-T, paralysis and swagger confusion by Thundurus on game deciding turns with me getting the short end of the stick.  I made some moderate changes afterward so this is the finalized version of the team.

THE TEAM

Charizard-Mega-Y @ Charizardite Y
Ability: Blaze
Level: 50
EVs: 252 HP / 12 Def / 44 SpA / 4 SpD / 196 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Flamethrower
- Solar Beam
- Tailwind
- Protect

Milestones:
- This is Blake Hopper's Nationals Charizard Y
- Survives most Rock Slides after an Intimidate drop.
- Slight speed creeps against those who outspeed adamant Landorus-T
- Just go to the link already....

Without any doubt. Mega Charizard Y is among the top 5 Mega Evolutions in the VGC 2015 format given very few Pokemon are able to take Drought-boosted Fire attacks and Solar Beams to the face. While threats such as Mega Kangaskhan, Mega Salamence, Thundurus, Heatran, and any other Pokemon with Rock type coverage/STAB (Tyranitar, Landorus-T, Terrakion) can beat Mega Charizard Y one versus one, it has a relatively good matchups against the rest of the VGC format. I mean c'mon... who and their right mind would switch in a Pokemon to a Drought boosted Heat Wave / Flamethrower without taking massive chunk of their HP down. The problem with Charizard Y is knowing when to use it in battle instead of losing it indiscriminately to any of these after mentioned threats so I tried to adapt. The first notable thing about Charizard Y is it doesn't utilize the once standard Overheat and Heat Wave set anymore, rather Flamethrower.  Here's are my reasons for running Flamethrower:

1. With Flamethrower, Charizard Y is able to avoid playing with the Wide Guard mind games from Aegislash, Hitmontop, Conkeldurr, etc. 
2. Flamethrower Charizard Y deals more damage on the opposing Pokemon due to it being a single target unlike Heat Wave. The most notable aspect is Modest 44 SpA investment is enough to KO Shield form Aegislash even if it has 252 HP and 164 SpD investment 100% of the time. Unless Aegislash is fully specially defensive or has an Occa Berry, it certainly won't live the hit. 
3. Flamethrower doesn't have a chance to miss or potentially give Heatran an immediately Flash Fire boost (unless my opponent switches in correctly). 
4. Unlike the move Overheat, Flamethrower does not harshly reduce Charizard Y's special attack by two stages. This mean Charizard Y will always have a reliable single target attack to use which is still boosted by Drought.

Solar Beam is fairly standard on Charizard Y as it hits all Water, Rock, and Ground type Pokemon for super effective damage, though I always caution myself to use this move when faced with opposing weather teams. Tailwind on Charizard Y definitely changed the perception of how I felt about this Mega Evolution since it had a rather poor matchup against increasingly faster metagame capable of OKHOing the Fire Starter. Not only does it double the speed of Charizard Y, but as well as the rest of my team who appreciates the Tailwind boost. Often when Charizard Y is able to setup a Tailwind boost, my opponent will try to protect or stall out the field condition. The problem with this is Charizard Y + anyone of its partners under Tailwind can handle most switch ins: Conkeldurr deal powerful "Iron Fist" attacks,  Landorus-T/Sylveon can fire Earthquakes/Hyper Voices freely, Aegislash can setup a fast Sub, and Cresselia can even T-Wave when necessary, speaking of Cress... 

Cresselia @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Levitate
Level: 50
EVs: 220 HP / 132 Def / 124 SpA / 4 SpD / 28 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Thunder Wave
- Moonlight
- Psychic
- Ice Beam

Milestones:
-Slight speed creep against Pokemon with Base 80 speed
-Guarantee KO against non-Sash / non-invested Breloom with Psychic
-Takes Specs Dark Pulse from Modest Hydreigon
-Takes Banded Knock Off from Adamant Bisharp. (Main Benchmark)
-Return from Mega Kangaskhan and Mega Salamence is a 3HKO (assuming no positive attack Nature)
-Takes Life Orb Shadow Ball from Modest Aegislash
-Probably gonna update this spread since its honestly not as optimal for today's present meta

DUCKHUNTSWAN RETURNS! In all seriousness, I felt the team needed a reliable Pokemon who can provide some form of speed control without being incredibly frail at the same time. Cresselia is probably my main signature Pokemon since she can reliably provide speed control due to her incredible bulk and access in recovery in Moonlight. The main goal for Cresselia is to spread paralysis with Thunder Wave to allow Charizard Y and friends to outspeed and eventually OHKO. Of course support Thundurus was considered but Cresselia doesn't share the same Rock weakness as Charizard Y so my opponents won't elect to use Rock Slide as often. Funny enough, the moveset for Cresselia is virtually unchanged from my original Mega Charizard and Mega Venusaur team since its was the most consistent Cresselia set not named Calm Mind. While I've used Trick Room and Icy Wind on Cresselia recently, very few people expect Thunder Wave as Cresselia is bulky enough to take hits and spread paralysis. Moonlight adds to Cresselia's longevity and makes her difficult to take out factoring the potential 67% healing factor (of the usual 50%) if Charizard Y's sun is still up. One thing I'd like to point out is Moonlight works in tandem with her item Rocky Helmet as any contact moves from notable physical attackers like Mega Kangaskhan will taken 1/6 damage to their health to make up for Cresselia's lack of offensive presence. Basically if Mega Kangaskhan or Mega Salamence try to Double Edge Cresselia, both will be taking massive damage to themselves and while she can easily recover off the damage or finish them with either Psychic or Ice Beam. The only notable thing Psychic offers is STAB option, capable of OHKOing non-Focus Sash Breloom and doing chip damage when needed. Originally I had Icy Wind for speed control, however the rise of Milotic and resurgence of Bisharp has forced me to use Ice Beam instead.

I'm 100% sure I'll probably start running more "offensive" Cresselia sets which can at least do some damage against my opponent. The EV spread could be tweaked a bit to reflect on the increasingly number of Cresselia running special attack investment.  For sure, I can just run about 124 defense EVs just to take a Banded Knock Off from Bisharp, but really people are going to soften up Cresselia for the finishing blow. Rocky Helmet-Moonlight surprisingly enough deals more damage against Mega Kangakhan or any other contact based physical attacker as the opponent will takes "unnecessary" damage while Psychic and Ice Beam barely get notable KOs. Toxic might be another interesting move choice since it can at least wear down Double Genies (notably support Thundurus), opposing Cresselia, Sylveons, Milotic, Rotom-W, or anything considered "slow". Then again these are just some thoughts about some of my future Cresselia sets.












Landorus-Therian @ Assault Vest
Ability: Intimidate
Level: 50
EVs: 132 HP / 84 Atk / 20 Def / 84 SpD / 188 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Superpower
- Rock Tomb

Milestones:
-Outspeeds neutral base 95 speed Pokemon and some Standards: Ex. Arcanine and 188 Speed EVs Charizard Y (clocks in at 144).
-Can take 2 Heat Waves and 2 Hyper Voices from either 44 SpA+ Charizard Y in Sun, 252 SpA+ Mega Gardevoir, and/or 252 SpA+ Sylveon (Not Specs / CM). Of Course can only take 1 of each.
-No notable offensive kills whatsoever other than KOing quad weak stuff  (Charizard, Tyranitar, Talonflame, Heatran) without any attack drops.


Jolly Assault Vest Landorus-T. I thinks that's a mouth-full to say so I'll break down the set for everyone. Originally I was gonna run Choice Scarf Landorus-T for this slot but always hated having to be choice lock into an unwanted attack like Rock Slide on Terrakion or Aegislash where I can easily could Earthquake. To me, the best Landorus-T sets are those that offer multiple options and lets it used its STAB Earthquake, or Fly. IMO if you want a Landorus-T set that's able to take any special (even random) Ice/Water attacks while giving it enough staying power and longevity to spread Intimidate drops, just run Ass Vest. K Ogloza you got me on that one.  Ever since the announcement of the VGC 2015 format, I've tried and tested mostly Assault Vest Landorus-T because I thought the special defense increase would allow me to take incoming Ice Beams, special Water hits, and most special hits comfortingly without no "aggressive" investment to its special defense already. I never really understood why people would Choice Scarf their Landorus-T sets other than maybe outspeed Mega Gengar and the obnoxious 30% flinch factor which easily sway the battle against the opponent. My Assault Vest Landorus-T set early on was 184 HP / 232 Atk / 92 Spe (enough to outspeed Bisharp), and then moved to Aaron Taylors Landorus-T's spread onced revealed. Now I've moved on from Adamant Landorus-T since I realized it Landorus-T needs to outspeed most Mega Charizard Y and slower Mega Kang sets if the AV set were to be "effective". Prior to this change, one of the biggest issues with Adamant Landorus-T was its speed benchmark since either after-mentioned Megas can deal a chunk of damage to Landorus-T before it can give a proper response. The best counter measure for this issue to to run a Jolly nature with a reasonably high speed EVs without compromising what AV Landorus-T is meant to do in the first place. With a speed reaching about 148 speed, Landorus-T is able to outspeed all base 95 Pokemon by one point and hopefully all the standard Charizard Y and bulkier Mega Kang with the slight increased investment.

The moveset is somewhat standard: Earthquake for STAB, Rock Slide for Talonflame / opposing Charizard Y, and Superpower for Mega Kang, Tyranitar, and others weak to Fighting.  The only move that seems out of place is Rock Tomb which definitely helped me out in the Finals against Delta. The idea of using Rock Tomb is to cancel out the Choice Scarf from opposing Landorus-T and drop the speed of threats like Mega Kangaskhan, Charizard Y, Thundurus, etc. Though it might not seem much, the speed drop helps my own Charizard Y outspeed any potential base 100 mentioned since it needs all the speed control to function well.










Conkeldurr @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Iron Fist
Level: 50
EVs: 108 HP / 116 Atk / 68 Def / 132 SpD / 84 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Drain Punch
- Mach Punch
- Ice Punch
- Wide Guard

Milestones:
-"Almost" the same EV spread as Blake Hopper's Nationals Conkeldurr in terms of Attack, Speed and HP.
-Survives 252+ Atk Mega Kangaskhan's Double Edge without Sitrus Berry, in turn....
-Iron Fist Drain Punch + recoil from Double Edge OKHOs most Mega Kang variants
-Ice Punch + Mach Punch OHKOs 4 HP Landorus-T with Intimidate drop
-Has a 6.3% to live a LO Draco Meteor from Timid Hydreigon
-Survives Banded Brave Bird from Talonflame with Intimidate drop.
-Outspeed Adamant Mega Kang in Tailwind. (This applies to all base 100 Pokemon with a neutral nature).

What's this, a non Assault Vest Conkeldurr... blasphemy. Well after giving my Landorus-T the Assault Vest item, Sitrus Berry was the next best thing to run on Conkeldurr. Essentially Sitrus Berry allowed Conkeldurr to have either Protect or Wide Guard (which I elected the latter) and gives it a better matchup against physical attackers now with the 25% recovery from its item in addition to Iron Fist boosted Drain Punch. Speaking of Iron Fist, Conkeldurr receives a 1.2x boost to its "punching" moves so Drain Punch, Mach Punch, and Ice Punch do more damage the Guts variants until they receive a status condition. The moveset is pretty standard for a non AV Conkeldurr set: Drain Punch for consistent STAB damage with recovery, Mach Punch for priority to pick off weaken Pokemon, and Ice Punch for Double Genies (Landorus-T Thundurus), Zapdos, Amoonguss, and Mega Salamence. Wide Guard can surprise my opponents expect an AV variant and block all spread damage for my team. The only notable thing to explain is why the speed investment. Originally this Conkeldurr was modeled after Blake Hopper's version from his 3rd Place Nationals team and it has the same speed investment as well. The idea here to setup Tailwind (or spread Thunder Wave) and basically outspeed most Adamant Mega Kangaskhan, clocking in at 154 speed where most adamant max speed with a base stat of 100 have. Recently the VGC format has had this "love crazy" for speed creeping around 134-148 speed so having a Tailwind Conkeldurr outspeed something like an AV Adamant Landorus-T, Specs Modest Hydreigon,  bulky Thundurus, or anything around that speed creep area can be a huge shock to my opponent.










Aegislash @ Leftovers
Ability: Stance Change
Level: 50
EVs: 236 HP / 28 Def / 76 SpA / 100 SpD / 68 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shadow Ball
- Flash Cannon
- Substitute
- King's Shield

Milestones:
- Speed Creep for opposing Aegislash and Sylveon
- Survives Heat Wave from +44 SpA Charizard Y: 44+ SpA Mega Charizard Y Heat Wave vs. 236 HP / 100 SpD Aegislash-Shield in Sun: 134-162 (81.2 - 98.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
- Survives Modest Specs Hydreigon's Dark Pulse 12.5% of the time: 252+ SpA Choice Specs Hydreigon Dark Pulse vs. 236 HP / 100 SpD Aegislash-Shield: 144-170 (87.2 - 103%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO
- Survives LO Sucker Punch from Adamant Bisharp: 252+ Atk Life Orb Bisharp Sucker Punch vs. 236 HP / 28 Def Aegislash-Shield: 133-159 (80.6 - 96.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
- Has a 85.5% chance to 2HKO 4 HP Mega Salamence with either Shadow Ball / Flash Cannon: 76+ SpA Aegislash-Blade Shadow Ball vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Mega Salamence: 82-97 (47.9 - 56.7%) -- 85.5% chance to 2HKO
-Tailwind Speed: Outspeeds both Terrakion and Mega Metagross (base 108s and 110s) under the field condition.

There's a bit of a story with this Pokemon slot, namely something about my playstyle in question. After I lost to Justin Flynn in the 32 Person Tourney and a following week of some of the worse hax-filled battles against me on Battle Spot (after a 21-4 run with a variation of this team), I just quit using Life Orb Aegislash for several reasons. To me, Aegislash has always been a powerful Pokemon in its own right, often considering it to the be "true" pseudo-legendary of Gen 6 with a technical BST of 720 if played well. I asked myself this question since it troubled me a bit: Why am the fuck I'm running Life Orb on a Pokemon who's probably the superglue to the team? With Aegislash having a very limited timer with the Life Orb and paired with its low 60 HP, I began questioning myself seriously about running Life Orb Aegislash in the long run. Of course LO Aegiaslash can just punch holes against teams, especially when paired with a Helping Hand user, but the meta has changed to the point even Cresselia...CRESSELIA opts for protect to "force" the Aegislash user into playing aggressive and be exposed to an attack! While testing both Life Orb Aegislash and Leftovers Ferrothorn on Battle Spot, I realized double Steel on a team isn't as good as anymore considering if my opponent has a Heatran or Charizard Y in team preview. This severally limits my options against these two Pokemon as they'll know I'm going to be bring either 1 of them + the other 3/4 members of the team. While Ferrothorn is an amazing defensive Pokemon in its own right, Aegislash was just the overall 'better' Steel type pick since it can handle CHALK, defeat Cresselia by itself, and potentially deal wall most Pokemon like Terrakion, Choice-Locked Landorus, Mega Salamence, Mega Gardevoir, and even Mega Kangaskhan.

 A friend of mine (I'll keep their name anonymous since he's probably gonna use it in a tourney) told me about using Substitute Aegislash, heck even went far to out the famed "Billaslash" coined after a notable German VGC player with Substitute and Wide Guard (since German Engineering, or Theorymoning is fun). At first I questioned the EV spread of the Aegislash but after trying out "Billaslash" I really liked it. Some time latter, I edited the EV spread so that the HP stat is 4n+1 to get an optimal recovery and just dumped it into defense and that's how I got the EV spread you see above. I should probably quit stalling at this point. Since Conkeldurr carried Wide Guard now, I'm pretty much have a "free slot" for Aegislash so...Substitute was given (well no shit after like 2 minutes of explaining this). For sure I could have been "that guy" and ran 2 Wide Guard users to get a thin assurance that Charizard Y won't die to pebbles but as Angel Miranda just perfectly about Aegislash in his co-national report, "Aegislash is a pokemon that can win games on its own." While I've familiar with offensive Life Orb Aegislash, defensive Substitute Leftovers allows Aegislash to stick around more in the long haul and hopeful be the teams main win condition. Shadow Ball and Flash Cannon are the main STAB options for Aegislash so not really much to explain there aside to hit Fairy, Psychic, Ice, Ghost, and Rock types hard. The speed investment allows Aegislash to hopefully outspeed Sylveon and slower Aegislash variants, though I'm fairly certain some Aegislashs are much faster now. Another thing to note about this Aegislash is with Tailwind support from Charizard Y, it  outspeed most threats like Terrakion and Mega Metagross and dispatch them with its powerful STAB attacks. Not much else to say about the Steel/Ghost sword other than it being the main superglue of the team.

Sylveon @ Pixie Plate
Ability: Pixilate
Level: 50
EVs: 156 HP / 116 Def / 120 SpA / 116 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 SpA / 30 SpD
- Hyper Voice
- Calm Mind
- Hidden Power [Ground]
- Protect

Milestones:
- Speed Creep against opposing Sylveon, Aegislash, and even slow Politoeds/Tyranitars
- 93.8% chance to knock out 4 HP Mega Salamence: 120+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Hyper Voice vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Mega Salamence: 170-204 (99.4 - 119.2%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO
- OHKOs 4 HP Heatran with +1 HP Ground from Calm Mind: +1 120+ SpA Sylveon Hidden Power Ground vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Heatran: 172-204 (102.9 - 122.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
- Under Tailwind, outspeeds Mega Salamence by one point.


Last, certainly but not least, the one of the best Fairy type in the game, Pixilate Sylveon. Like seriously, do I even need to explain what Sylveon does? Well... its a cute little Fairy that screams at you all day and will fuck you up with its feelers...ok I'm not gonna go that far. Most of my Sylveon sets I started out with were mainly supportive with a couple niche support moves like Helping Hand, Screens, Quick Attack, and even Baby-Doll Eyes/Charm of all things just for opposing physical attackers just look at them...

LOOK AT THEM!!!!!

... but this Sylveon is different than most of the others I ran before. Lately, Calm Mind Sylveon was an extremely alluring option to use since after one boost, Sylveon has a pseudo Choice Specs and Assault Vest boost which can only get stronger after every increase. Basically after one boost, Sylveon is already hitting harder than most Specs sets thanks to its small  x 1.2 boost from the Pixie Plate. What's the best part about CM Sylveon you ask? Basically since Sylveon has a natural base HP stat of 95, Special Attack of 110, and Special Defense of 130, Calm Mind just turns Sylveon into a "special" tank capable of taking some of the strongest special attacks in the format. Not even most special Steel hits from Heatran or Aegislash are able to KO Sylveon after one boost while Sylveon retaliates with Hidden Power Ground. At this point in the metagame, Hidden Power Ground should be standard on virtually all Sylveon sets to be able hit Steel and Fire types like Aegislash, Arcanine, Heatran, Blaziken, Excadrill, etc. Of course some of these targets will be faster so that's where Charizard Y and Cresselia come in. With Tailwind from Charizard Y, Sylveon is able to outspeed the likes of positive speed Mega Salamence with the full investment! Yeah Greninja might be an issue (unless Conk, Cress or Aegislash has something to say), but anything else below that speed tier of 120 will get hit with a powerful Pixilate Hyper Voice. In fact, in combination with Charizard Y, the only notable Pokemon that can switch in on any of these two's attacks are Heatran and just any other Flash Fire user. Practically anything else will likely get KO'ed between the two. Usually the goal when deploying Sylveon is to either knock out any Steel types on the field, KO / paralyze any target that can OHKO it, leave out any special attackers in the end so Sylveon can Calm Mind and sweep my opponent's team

TOURNAMENT:

I was gonna use this team for Justin Subscriber Tourament, but I was kinda tired the whole day having not slept for 19 hrs (with 30 mins naps) before the tourney started. Fortunately for me it was a Sunday so regardless of what happens, I'm knocking out immediately. (btw This wasn't due to "overpreparing", just some IRL stuff that happen). Instead I tested the team in Pod's Tourney and here's what happen.

Just a quick note I'll separate the Pokemon from the back with this ; punctuation

ROUND 1: VS ZigZagger456 (Team: Mega Salamence, Thundurus, Gastrodon, Aegislash, Heatran)

Leads: Cresselia, Sylveon ; Charizard Y ,?????? (forgot either Aegislash or Conkeldurr)
He Brings: Gastrodon, Aegislash  ;  Heatran, Mega Salamence

To be completely honest, this was the most loop-sided battle from the single elimination tourney, all because of Cresselia did her job spreading paralysis and my opponent's Mega Salamence, Heatran and Aegislash getting paralyzed almost every turn. Basically this allowed Sylveon to setup two Calm Mind and just sweep his entire team from there. If anything, this battle showed that CM Sylveon is a monster if setup.

ROUND 2: VS ELMIGUELVGC (Team: Landorus-T, Mega Metagross, Thundurus, Bisharp, Politoed, Ludicolo)

Leads: Charizard Y, Cresselia  ;  Conkeldurr, Aegislash
He brings: Ludicolo, Thundurus  ;  Bisharp, Charizard Y

This battle... was like as if I called almost every possible play despite facing  El Miguel before who's kinda notorious of running somewhat unorthodox sets, but hey they work so you can't complain much. However in this battle I was kinda on fire, literally with some of the calls. Turn 1 I decided to swap out to Conkeldurr thinking that he'll paralyze the former Charizard Y spot, but to my surprise (and relief), he went for Rain Dance with Thundurus and Fake Out on Cresselia which took damage from the Rocky Helmet.  Then Miguel double targets my Conkeldurr with both his Pokemon, and despite Ludicolo getting a critical hit Scald and the Thunderbolt from Thundurus, Conkeldurr manages to live on a sliver of HP (thanks to the Sitrus Berry) and retaliates with  Drain Punch onto the Ludicolo, which Crits and leaves it low on health about 20%. Surprisingly, Cresselia also crits Thundurus with an Ice Beam doing over 50% to Thundurus and revealing no Sitrus Berry. At this point I can easily get 2 free KOs with Mach Punch and Ice Beam, but he switchs out Thundurus for Bisharp and lets Ludicolo faint to the Mach Punch. Metagross comes in in place of Ludicolo and knocks out Conkeldurr with a Bullet Punch and Bisharp actually does about 80%- 95% to Cress with Knock Off as she paralyzes Bisharp with Thunder Wave.

 At this point, I only have a healthy Charizard Y and Aegislash, with a weaken Cresselia to beat the rest of his team. I was in a great position as Charizard Y can easily faint either Steel types with Drought boosted Flamethrower and elect to target the bigger threat, Bisharp. However, Miguel switches out his Bisharp, preserving it for the late game I suppose, and sacks his weaken Thundurus. Metagross fires a Zen Headbutt onto my  Cresselia and KOs it with ease. Now this point its Mega Metagross and a paralyzed Bisharp against my Charizard Y and Substitute Aegislash. At this point, I'd decided to go after the Bisharp since he's "forced" to Sucker Punch and Metagross protects, while setting up a Substitute for Aegislash. LITERALLY BEST FAIL SAVE DECISION EVER. The Metagross crits Charizard Y with a Bullet Punch and Sucker Punch actually picks up the KO while Aegislash subs up. This terrified me as I'm forced into playing with King Shield-Stance Change against both a healthy Bisharp and Mega Metagross. So my only win condition was to target the Bisharp and go for King's Shield when Metagross attacked. Fortunately for me, Miguel attacks into Aegislash 2 times with Metagross so it's attack stat is greatly reduced, as Bisharp keeps Sucker Punching. Then it dawn on me that Bisharp was Banded or choiced in some fashion as I did left my Aegislash exposed to get a Substitute so I continuously Kings Shield and attack the Bisharp unto I was able to knock it out in three hits. Basically at this point, it was a -6 Mega Metagross against healthy Aegislash with Substitute up. I forgot how exactly it ended, but I finish the battle with a crit, or even a high roll most likely. Miguel was able to beat me last time off a really high roll with a +1 Zen Headbut (he had Power-Up Punch) unto my heavily physically defensive Thundurus so this battle was kinda a bitter sweet win in honestly. There was hax on both sides but I think had he not Sucker Punched my Charizard Y it would have been over for sure


So I actually have the battle codes for the Semis and the Final matches against Token and Delta. If you like to watch the video, then sure go on since it I'm still going to give my after thoughts about the battles.


Semi Finals Bo3; VS Token (Team: Mega Kangaskhan, Togekiss, Nidoking, Hydreigon, Ferrothorn, Terrakion)

Game 1

I bring: Cresselia, Landorus-T ; Charizard Y , Conkeldurr
He brings: Togekiss, Nidoking ; Mega Kangaskhan, Hydreigon

Battle Code: 8A4W - WWWW - WW2Z -Q9X8



Game 2

I bring: Sylveon, Landorus-T ; Cresselia, Charizard Y
He brings: Hydreigon Togekiss ; Nidoking, Mega Kangaskhan


Battle Code: FKHW - WWWW - WW2Z - Q92Q


Finals: VS Delta (Team: Charizard Y, Landorus-T, Breloom, Mamoswine, Staraptor, Milotic )

Game 1:

I bring: Charizard , Cresselia ; Landorus-T , Aegislash
He brings: Mamoswine, Breloom ; Landorus-T , Staraptor

Battle Code: X4JG - WWWW - WW2Z - Q93U


Game 2:

I brings: Charizard Y , Landorus-T ; Cresselia , Conkeldurr
He Brings: Breloom, Charizard Y ; Staraptor , Landorus-T

Battle Code: K79G - WWWW - WW2Z - Q95W

Friendly Match (Game 3): 9B4W -WWWW - WW2Z - Q95R

Conclusion 

For sure I'll leave a description of when I take out the battle code for potential future battles. I've probably discuss the team as extensively as I can so in the future there'll be a follow up post for any changes I make to this squad whether is from the EVs spread, item choices, or individual Pokemon. If I had to chose my MVPs of every battle, it had to be Charizard Y simply because the offensive pressure it provides with the Drought-boosted Flamethrower and the Tailwind to boost the speed for the rest of my Pokemon. Subsitute Aegislash and Thunder Wave Cresselia are the centerpiece of the team's defensive effort aid by AV Landorus-T thanks to the Intimidate drops and ability to freely use any attack. Conkeldurr and Sylveon make up the backbone of the team's overall offense give how powerful their attacks are and sometimes how very teams have capable switch ins when paired with Charizard Y.

I'm definitely going to test out other types of archetypes centered around Charizard Y and a host of other Megas for this blogspot. Thanks for reading and leave a comment below about the team if you like.

Very Late Welcome Post / Opening to Faraway Island

THE LATE GRAND OPENING!

Alright we've all been through this cheesy crap over a thousand times ready, but...

or... Faraway Island!

So just as the title says, I've started this website / blogspot of sorts to share my thoughts, opinions, and insight in about just about anything in the competitive Pokemon community whether its from VGC, Smogon, events from Pokemon Forever/NB/Smogon, etc. Though the main focus of this site is to basically postings anything that interest me competitively, I'll broaden my scope to recent Pokemon new such as Corocoro leaks, latest bans, trends, IRL events, and anything else that fits the overall aim for this site. For those who are really into competitive Pokemon with wealth of experience, much of the posts I'm going to make are practically informal to my own writing style, but at least well-thought out hopefully. For anyone (probably younger audiences) whose just getting into competitive battling, this is not the blogspot for you as I'm not posting any guides on EV training, IV breeding, RNG abuse, battling/game mechanics (unless to report discovered glitches),  or anything of that matter soon. Maybe once I get a hang of typing since I'm not a keyboard warrior sorts and my typing speed is really fucken bad to the world standards. ....Yeah expect some off IRL tangential anecdotes like that so expect some "story time" stuff as well lol

For sure I want to get this grilled on everyone's head since it kinda is obligatory for a blog like this...I don't and never claimed 109% to be the "best player" in all of competitive Pokemon. Honestly I just like to battle on Battle Spot/Showdown and post my thoughts about the teams, playstyle, and individual Pokemon I've used. I've only gotten into singles battling back in late BW2  in August 2013 just before XY was about to drop, and VGC around December 2014 after participating in a subscriber tournament and getting hook from there. However I've known about the competitive communities like Smogon and Nugget Bridge beforehand and "lurk" in the forums constantly just to get stuff for my in-game semi competitive teams back prior to August 2013 and til today. Now I feel that I'm relatively decent enough (especially on the VGC end recently) to post stuff. Here are some other guidelines for this site as well in bullets:

1. A great deal of post will be about about teams and cores "experimental" posted here so just don't take these seriously as maybe my ladder teams. 
2. If I do get relatively high on the ladder with a certain team (1800+ on Battle Spot, 1600+ on Showdown, finish high in an IRL tourney) then you can bet your ass I'm posting that team here. Trust me since this will happen more than once. 
3. Some of the "Team Reports" will be posted unto the Pokemon Forever site since I feel as though we need some quality teams on there. Don't be surprised those team reports will be taken word for word. So yes I admit I'm going to plagiarize... myself. Nah though I'm probably gonna censor some stuff since the Pokemon Forever site has some young people on the site and I'll still follow community guidelines there.
4. I'm open to any comments of constructive criticism only regarding anything in the Pokemon competitive battling, so please keep out any IRL issues, politics, social issues, and anything else aside as this isn't the site just not to create any "divisions". 
5. As I said before, I'm not the best battler but only above average at times. Don't come complain to me if the team I've posted here doesn't work well on the ladder or events. Those teams aren't meant for you at all, just to fit my play style. 
6. For sure we all know there are "Grammar Nazis" who just pick apart anyone's writing style. I'm not gonna hide this fact but I honestly dislike them so much mainly because they "never" show me what is proper language. Of course I'll try my best to learn advance grammar (even though the schools I've went never formally taught it to me or my peers), please don't be the dick or ass to only highlight about my grammatical errors and not contribute about the competitive scene. If its that obvious, then sure I'll make the edits, however don't just highlight the damn page with "your" stylized writing. Well I guess my rant about grammar pricks is over now. 

With all that out of the way, here's an adorable gif of Mew!

Though since this is the "internet"

This picture seems to sum this opening up well ...

TOURNAMENT ACHIEVEMENTS in the POKEMON FOREVER COMMUNITY

I was bored the other day after a few weeks of some rather haxy battles where I could have won, but my opponent gets the full "get of jail free" card and "magically" win with the games stroke of its RNG wand or whatever crap I like to call it. For sure I'll make a thought post about this, but for now I wanted to motivate myself and see all the achievements I've done in the Pokemon Forever website and its community (formerly known as the Justin Flynn.tv).  Just the following to note.

1. This is by no way demeaning anyone here or attempting to "show off".
2. Though at the same time, this is just a post showing all of my achievements here in the community just to show I'm at least "decent". 
3. Last point  I made is this post just to for transparency purposes in case people ask about the tournaments we hosted in the Pokemon Forever Community. So without futher ado... 

Here's a List of Tournament Achievements in the Pokemon Forever Community:

1. 2nd place in first subscriber tourney single elimination with 16 people (Last VGC 2014 Tour) (Lost to ItalianG62): Record 3-2 ; Date December 13, 2014
2. 1st place in second subscriber tourney single elimination with 16 people (First Tour with VGC 2015 ruleset) : Record 5-0 ; Date December 27, 2014 *Note: Rest of tournaments participated follow VGC 15 ruleset from here on out.
3. 64 Person Tourney: Top 32 Record 1-1 ; Date January 2015
4. 1st place in "No Legendary" Tourney: Overall 10-0 ; Top Cut 4-0 ; Swiss 6-0 ; Date January 11th, 2015
5. 1st place in Podfighterninja's First Tourney: Swiss 4-2 ; TC 4-0 ; Overall 8-2  ; Date January 17th, 2015 
6. 1st place in Eeveeli's Tourney: Swiss 4-1 ; TC 6-2 ; Overall 10-3  ; Date January 18th, 2015
7. 1st place in "Own Tourney":  Swiss 4-1 ; TC 6-1 ; Overall 10-2 ; Date February 7th, 2015
8. 1st place in MudkipLegend and Chimchar's Single Elimination Tour: Record 5-0  ; Date February 15th, 2015 
9. 3rd place in third subscriber SE tourney: *byes in first round & 3rd place match ; Record 1-2 (Lost to eventual winner Papulito) Date July 11th, 2015 
10. Top 8 in fourth subscriber SE tour: Record 1-1 Date August 8th 2015 
11. 2nd place in fifth subscriber SE tour with 32 people: Record 6-2 (Lost to Flynn) ; August 15th, 2015
12. 1st place in Podfighterninja's 2nd tour (16 SE): Record 6-0 ; Date September 6th, 2015 
13. Top 2* in the Dodrio Cup Season 2: Personal Swiss 6-0 ; Personal TC: 2-1 Personal Record: 8-1 ; Team Record (Swiss): 11 - 3 ; Team Record (TC): 6-1 Overall Team Record: 17 - 4 ; Paired with GMX and MudkipLegend (Team Shadow Ballin') Date July 2015 - September 2015 (Tourney Suspended)
14. "Unofficial" Winner of the PFA Spooky Cup (Different from BS tour); Record 9-0 (was canceled but given the title) October 2015
15. "First" Pokemon Forever Association Champion (Technically the Season 2 Champion since the 1st Season was cancelled) ; PFA Season 2 Records here ; Record Season 11-0 ; Total 15-0

As of  February 8th, 2016 

(VGC Tours from Pokemon Forever)
Total Records: 74 wins - 16 losses - 90 game participated ;  W/L Ratio: .8222222 (as of 9/15/2015)
1st Place Count: 7  ;   2nd Place Count: 3* ;  3rd Place Count: 1
Successful Top 3 Placements Record Runs: 11-13 ; Other Placements ; 2 
Megas used to win 1st: 3 Mega Kangaskhan ; 3 Mega Charizard Y (Duel Mega: 2 Solo: 1) ;  2 Mega Venusaur (Duel Mega 2 : Solo 0) ; 1 Mega Metagross
Megas used to win 2nd: 1 Mega Salamence ; 1 Mega Manetric (VGC 2014)
Megas used to win 3rd: 1 Mega Metagross

Pokemon Forever Draft League (Smogon Singles)

Foreword

For a long time I was interested in participating in a competitive league of sorts,, similar to the GBA, EXPNU, or UCL from Youtube considering the amount of preparation and planning needed to win games. Simply you don't bring the most common set, rather everyone is encouraged to counter team each other. Obviously the phrase "counter team" is somewhat of a bad word or thing to mention competitively but honestly that'swhat it is. Now I got that opportunity to be apart of one in the newly formed Pokemon Forever League featuring both an Singles and VGC Sub-League I'm currently in. The drafts took place about around August 17 for the Singles and 18 for VGC. Honestly, I really did not want to participate at first in the Singles league and just focus VGC primarily, but I realized this is only to get back into playing Smogon considering I've stopped playing since early March. Now heading into week 4 I'm where I'm currently 4-0 in the Singles division and and 3-0 in the Doubles so hopefully the Los Angeles Nidokings can take a double crown.

Here I'm only going to take about the picks and recent trades I made for the Singles draft.  These analyses will be short since I'm not gonna say everything about the Pokemon and their qualities...I'll let my opponents figure it out themselves.

Singles Draft:

OU: Mega Altaria, Weavile, Hippowdown
UU: Entei, Shaymin, Empoleon
RU: Uxie, Scrafty, Bronzong
NU: Sandslash, Stoutland, Shiftry
PU: Ninetails, Clefairy (Swapped with Swanna), Raichu (Swapped with Swoobat)

Analysis of Draft: 

OU Draft

Getting the 4th pick in the 16th person draft meant I can potentially get whatever Pokemon I wanted bar someone sniping me. Since this was the OU tier, I felt it be best to get a self sustaining Mega Evolution/sweeper capable of fulfilling many roles for my team. Mega Charizard X and Mega Scizor came to mind as both were arguably the best Megas to build around since I had a great amount of experience with using both. However I've only played early ORAS until March 2015 so I didn't know how much the OU metagame changed. After looking at the viability rankings from Smogon, it became very clear Mega Altaria was the best Mega for this format with one of the best defensive typing in the game (Dragon/Fairy), access to a plethora of setup options, and can run multiple sets such as Mono Fairy attack-Dragon Dance, all-out special attacker, or even a cleric set. What sold me into drafting Mega Altaria was its sheer unpredictability it has in the singles metagame so I can easily take advantage of this fact and force my opponents to play the guessing games where I have the advantage. To be completely honest, Mega Altaria alone can carry the team behind her back us because of these traits alone and wouldn't be surprised if it were the main MVP of my team.



Of course, this meant I had to build around Mega Altaria, but the snake style draft setting made me wait awhile until I get my next picks. As mentioned, I could have easily picked up Tyranitar and Excadrill to form a sand core option with massive offensive pressure, however when I saw Weavile wasn't picked yet, I knew I had to draft it onto my team. Weavile was selected to be the dedicated revenge killer with access to priority, STAB Knock Off, Sword Dance to sweep teams, and basically become main offensive presence of the team itself. With 120 attack and 125 speed, Weavile alone can pick off weaken targets and wall-breaks teams if played well. I heard Weavile is currently one of the best revenge killers right now in OU so hopefully Weavile pays off for this league.



For my last OU pick, Hippowdon was chosen to act as the team's main physical wall with access to Stealth Rocks, Whirlwind, Slack Off, and STAB Earthquake. The main reason why Hippowdon was picked was due to my experience using Hippo during XY OU and XY UU so I knew the plethora of defensive and even offensive capabilities it can do. Hippowdown pairs really well with Mega Altaria as it can take any Poison or physical Steel type attacks which threatens my Mega. Ice types would be somewhat problematic, but I have to play around it or get some Fire and Steel type Pokemon in my later picks. Since I didn't pick Excadrill, Hippowdown's Sand Stream ability isn't as needed unless I get to a couple of Pokemon from the NU tier. Basically Hippowdon would run Sand Stream as a means to wear down frail sweepers enough so that Weavile, Altaria, and some of my other sweepers can potentially beat or revenge kill at worse.

UU Draft

I cannot stress how essential it was to draft the main core of my team in the UU tier since none of my top 3 OU members have the best synergy typing wise. Considering I drafted Mega Altaria, a Fire type was required to have a strong response for Steel and Ice types but my main target Pokemon, Arcanine and backup Rotom-H were sniped from me. Fortunately for me, Entei wasn't picked so I scooped of this Pokemon since it still had access to Extreme Speed, Sacred Fire to burn switch ins about 45% of the time, and even Flare Blitz for even more fire power. Man I'm not gonna lie but this was the only pick I was kinda unsatisfied at first since Arcanine had a better movepool with Intimidate while Rotom-H gave me a Will-O-Wisp/Thunder Wave immunity and even a potential Volt Turn core. Entei is just honestly a scare crow for this team as its main task is to burn targets with Scared Fire on the switch ins, take those incoming Ice hits for Mega Altaria and Hippowdon and pick off weaken Pokemon with Extreme Speed.

The 2nd UU pick I was extremely excited to get Shaymin-Land on the team and extremely dumbfounded how it wasn't picked up earlier. Shaymin is essentially my "Mew" or "Celebi" of sorts as it has 100 base stats across the board meaning it can be a special attacker, physical sweeper, secondary cleric, or even a wall if granted. For me there are two main selling points of Shaymin: Seed Flare and Natural Cure Rest combo. Seed Flare is IMO the best Grass move in the game due to its 40% chance to drop target's special defense by about -2 stages, effectively a powerful wallbreaker if it gets those drops. With access to Giga Drain, Air Slash, Earth Power, Dazzling Gleam, Energy Ball, Psychic, Leaf Storm, and Ominous Wind (lets not forget the potential HP Power Types), Shaymin can break some of the sturdiest walls period especially if it gets the Spd drop from Seed Flare. On the support/defensive side Shaymin is no slouch either with access to Leech Seed, Tailwind, Endeavor (Quick Attack), Toxic, Aromatherapy, and Healing Wish. However, since Shaymin's main ability is Natural Cure, it can easily recover up all its health lost with the move Rest, switch out, and come back ready without any sleep ailments. This is  why I was excited to pick up Shaymin as it can come back fully healthy ready to fight again.

For my 3rd UU pick, Empoleon was chosen since I didn't have any way to remove any hazards on the field with either Defog or Rapid Spin. This was especially noted now the team had three Pokemon weak to Stealth Rock, including my Mega Altaria initially before it loses the Flying type for Fairy. Empoleon is unique unlike most Defog users as it has access to Stealth Rock itself so it can attempt to "beat" opposing Stealth Rock setup with Defog and get its own on the field. Empoleon can be used as the team's primary special wall being resistant to 10 types and a relatively ok support movepool with Knock Off, Yawn, Icy Wind, Sleep Talk-Rest, Scald, Roar and Toxic. Offensively Empoleon is no slacker as it can run a potential Petaya berry agility set with Hydro Pump, Ice Beam, Flash Cannon, or even Grass Knot to great effect and has a strong base 111 special attack stat to back up a sweep. Finally with Empoleon on the team, this gave me great partner for Mega Altaria as it can easily switch in for any Poison/Ice moves which Empoleon would take little to no damage at all from those attacks.

RU DRAFT

Now that I got a FWG core from the UU tier, it was virtually time to patch up my teams weaknesses by getting some bulky walls. Honestly it was really tempting to get Eviolite/Scarf Magneton for my team, but I realized two main flaws which proved otherwise. 1) The team had no switch ins for Fighting or Ground types. Mega Altaria can take these attack but I don't want my Mega to take unnecessary damage and my opponents can easily exploit this by running ice coverage. 2) The team had no "true dedicated" support Pokemon (bar Shaymin) who has access to speed control (Thunder Wave), or maybe even screen options for my Mega Altaria to setup and sweep. Uxie does all of the above and more (as I'll explain later) so it was pick immediately as my first pick for RU. While some might see Uxie as a Poor Man's Cresselia, I see opportunity in this psychic pixie. What differentiates Uxie from Cresselia is it has access to the much needed U-turn, a faster base speed of 95 speed, access to Foul Play to hit physical attacker (especially Ghosts), Stealth Rocks, and a surprisingly "better" coverage both specially and physically. The only thing Uxie lacked was a form of recovery, which I didn't mind too much with an overall defense of 75/130/130. For now, Uxie remains as the team's dedicated support Pokemon who can setup Reflect/Light Screen, Thunder Wave support and provide rare switch initiative with U-Turn.

For the 2nd RU pick I chose Scrafty simply because of familiarity with in my short 3 month time in XY UU. With Dark/Fighting typing, the only super effective hits Scrafty would take are Flying, Fighting, and Fairy type attacks. Scafty is a unique similar to Shaymin and Mega Altaria has it has a great amount of sets to chose from thanks to its three abilities. Moxie complements Scrafty for a potential Dragon Dance set with 3 attacking moves such as Drain Punch for recovery, Knock Off for Dark STAB with item removal, and coverage like the elemental punches, Poison Jab and Stone Edge for coverage. Shed Skin complements a Bulk Up set with Knock Off, Drain Punch, and Rest so it can wake up when hopefully instantly or the following turn thanks to its ability. Intimidate is usually seen in VGC to reduce the attack stat by one stage, a defensive Scrafty set is still  viable as it has  65/115/115 defenses and a wide array of support options from Super Fang, Fake Out and even Counter.  Scrafty definitely pairs well with my RU pick Uxie since both can take hits relatively well and can just form great defensive synergy due Uxie taking on Fighting hits and Scrafty absorbing Ghost and Dark attacks for Uxie.

There was one particular type which breaks my RU draft and its must definitely the   Fairy type. For my last pick, I chose another dedicated support Pokemon, one I've been familiar with since Gen 4 and that's the Steel/Psychic Pokemon Bronzong. I really hate the fact that Game Freak nerf both Bronzong and Metagross since Steel/Psychic use to take neutral Dark and Ghost hits relatively well, but now they can't anymore with the type chart change in Gen 6. Rant aside, I've extremely familiar with Bronzong as a defensive pivot as its only weak to Fire, Ghost and Dark types (if we consider Levitate as its main ability to block Ground type hits). Defensively, Bronzong is somewhat on par with Uxie and Scrafty with 67/116/116 and has an offensive rating of 89/79/33. Bronzong can provide the team with Stealth Rocks, Light Screen/Reflect, Hypnosis, Trick Room, and even Gravity. Offensively it can use Earthquake, hit powerful Gyro Balls, Rock Slide, Psychic and even setup some Calm Minds if needed. Bronzong was drafted since my team was starting to look extremely weak to Fairy types and Bronzong can aid in Entei and Empoleon's efforts to protect the team against them.

NU Draft

At this point I was satisfied with all three of my OU, UU, and RU picks so any of these Pokemon where consider supplemental. Remember when I said Hippowdon really didn't need Sand Stream since the team didn't have access to Pokemon capable of abusing it? Well now its time to patch that up. For my first NU pick I chose Sandslash manly because its fulfilled this role relatively fine. There really isn't not much to say about Sandslash as it offers the team Rapid Spin support, Stealth Rocks STAB Earthquake, both Rock Slide/Stone Edge, Super Fang, Brick Break, Poison Jab, Knock Off for Ghosts, and Sword Dance. While Sandslash is no Excadrill, hopefully I get to use it in some of my matches really soon with maybe a sand sweep.

The second NU draft pick was honestly the only Pokemon I wanted in the NU draft an it was the mighty dog Pokemon introduced in Gen 5 Stoutland. First off, Stoutland is not a bad Pokemon at all just because its somewhat often compared with Snorlax as the premier Normal type in competitive. In no way can Stoutland beat or is better than Snorlax, however lets focus on the positives For starters, Stoutland has access to Intimidate and Sand Rush so now I have a secondary Intimidate Pokemon and Sand Rush user on hand. Stat-wise, Stoutland has a base attack of 110 which is passable and a speed stat of 80 which is a great stat to be in for a weather sweeper. Defensively its no slouch with an above average defense of 85/90/90 so it can take at least one strong neutral hit. Here's a list of notable moves it gets: Superpower, Return, the elemental fangs, Crunch, Play Rough, Rock Tomb, Wild Charge, Thunder Wave, Charm, Pursuit, Yawn and Iron Head. Its really unfortunate Stoutland doesn't have Sword Dance to boost up its high attack stat, but I guess it has to settle being a Sand Rush user that can pick off weaken targets.

My last NU pick was Shiftry as I wanted another relatively fast Pokemon with setup opportunities and can potentially Defog hazards away. Shiftry is somewhat interesting as it has access to both Nasty Plot, Sword Dance, and even Growth with base 90 attack and 80 special attack so it can easily patch up its mediocre stats by double. Offensively it has access to Leaf Storm, Giga Drain, Knock Off, Dark Pulse, Seed Bomb, Low Kick, Quick Attack, Foul Play, Rock Slide, X-Scissor, Focus Blast, and even Explosion.  Not gonna lie but Shiftry was just drafted just to replicate something I hope to do in my future matches. (PS: I already mentioned it).

PU Draft + Trades

This is probably the only section where I'll take a break from giving individual Pokemon analysis for the team so I was fairly confident with my overall draft and anything else was icing on the cake. There wasn't any Pokemon I really wanted for the draft in PU since again wasn't familiar with the tier. Not gonna lie but there was one rule that struck out where weather abilities are allowed, just that the Pokemon has to count for I have a limit of bringing 3 OU Pokemon per battle. The second rule was that no team was allow to carry 2 Pokemon with weather shifting abilities in battle (Charizard Y and Tyranitar) but one of them must carry a non weather ability. Therefore it became clear who I wanted to get...


Ninetales was probably the best draft pick from the PU tier simply because it has access to Drought, powering up Fire moves while weakening Water attacks. Its support movepool is simply amazing since it can setup spread Will-O-Wisp burns, induce sleep with Hypnosis, Power Swap-Overheat, Disable, Foul Play, and Pain Split. Since Ninetales is receiving a additional boost to its added Fire STAB thanks to Drought, its capable of potentially wallbreaking teams by setting up Calm Minds or Nasty plot and just roasting the field with Flamethrower, Solar Beam, Hex, Extrasensory, Psyshock, Overheat, Dark Pulse, etc. I really believe getting Ninetales was a steal in the draft since this gave me two weather modes I can use to great effectiveness with my Sand and Sun core.

Honestly I'm just gonna talk about these two here since I really have no use for them until they were traded.  Swanna was picked up only because I felt the team needs another Water type Pokemon and possibly another Defog user. That's literally all I can think of to be honest. Swoobat was probably the only other pick that I only got just for trade purposes which I'll get to later. I knew for a fact that Swoobat had access to Simple so it can setup a couple of Calm Minds and sweep teams with Stored Power, unless they had a Dark type. Swoobat has some decent coverage like Giga Drain, Heat Wave and even some interesting support moves like Thunder Wave./Trick Room to help the team. If anything, I should have definitely tested Swoobat in battle first, but I realized a couple trade opportunities to take action before people realized.


The first Pokemon I  kinda fucked up and forgot to draft was Clefairy since I needed another Fairy Pokemon who can pair well with Hippowdon. Back in XY OU, I was able to ladder a sand team with Hippowdon,Mega Pinsir, and Clefable up to the 1780s which was a great achievement itself for getting back into competitive after a break to focus on school. Around that time, there was a UU RMT which caught my attention that featured a Clefairy on the team and it was able to do just as much defensive work as her older sister. Basically Evolite Clefairy was almost like Clefable but without the higher HP, Unaware, and a limited item choice. However, in my time in VGC I realize how bulky Clefairy was for taking double target attacks as it Follow Me and redirected enemy attacks to itself. Now it only has to worry about one target so  unless my opponent has a powerful Steel or Poison user, Clefairy isn't going down anytime soon. With access to Soft-boiled, Thunder Wave, Calm Mind, Healing Wish, Encore, Stealth Rocks, and a strong movepool (Flamethrower, Moonblast, Ice Beam, Thunderbolt), Clefairy can be somewhat successful as my Clefable from my XY days. As of right now, I've traded Swanna for Clefairy from the Dallas Dunsparce owned by Princessgamer.

If anyone noticed, I really didn't have any Electric Pokemon on this team and it was rather concerning for several reasons. The team lacked a Volt Switch users so I can effectively gain momentum for someone like Mega Altaria, Entei or Weavile. Second, the team lacked a someone that can hopefully take an Electric hit bar maybe Mega Altaria, Hippowdon, Sandslash, or Shiftry. However it was the lack of a "good Volt Switch" user which concerned me so I looked for trading my Swoobat from something that can fit this description. After looking at the team listings, ItalianG62 had a Raichu on his PU team and as well as a Thundurus-T so I thought maybe he'd trade for my Swoobat. He agreed since Thundurus-T basically outclassed Raichu for his main Volt Switch Pokemon so helped me get an much needed Electric type. Aside from Volt Switch, Raichu can setup with Nasty Plot, use an array of support moves such as Fake Out, Encore, Thunder Wave, and has a good attack movepool with Thunderbolt, Grass Knot, Surf and Focus Blast. I'm not gonna lie that Raichu isn't the best Electric Pokemon but the fact the team was in need of a fast Volt Switch user was reason enough to get Raichu.

Conclusion

So that about wraps up the analysis for the Singles draft and latest trades so I'll discuss my VGC draft team in the next blog post. I do plan on revealing all the teams I used to go to the finals of the Dodrio Cup so be sure to be on the lookout for that piece in the future. Lets go NIDOKINGS!