Introduction
After over a year of playing ADV I have finally hit over 1500 ELO and made it onto the top 500 ladder. After achieving this it has made me reflect on what has helped me improve my ADV game the most. Upon reflection I think the biggest defining turning point that took me from floundering in 1300's to greater consistency was a challenge I set myself earlier in the year based on Vapicunos excellent Archetype and Cores team building thread. The simple idea of the challenge was to create a team for each of the 9 archetypes as described in Vapicuno's thread, create a new alt account for each (starting with CR94) and play 25 games. After mentioning this challenge around a few ADV discords and gaining some interest I thought I would document the challenge and experience in a more detailed format.
As should go without saying this was not by any means a scientific experiment, clearly a very large factor in these results is my own subjectivity (I have clear biases and preferences for certain archetypes, namely offence based ones) and to a lesser extent the volatility of low ladder. Also of note is that many archetypes contained numerous sub archetypes, where this was the case I just chose the one I preferred building at the time. I am not going to go over the teams I built in any great depth although I will mention any key Pokemon that I felt stood out or helped make the team more unique.
The Results
1. Milotic/Celebi Balance
25 Battles:
ELO - 1257
GXE - 65.6 %
W - 16
L - 9
Notes:
The first team I built as part of this challenge and one that helped me get off to a great start and really commit to the idea of this challenge. At the time of the challenge I had never made use of this core or even really used Milotic at all. This team also featured my first consistent use of Wish CM Jirachi a Pokemon I used in other teams in this challenge and still think is great. Overall I really enjoyed using this archetype and using a different paced team helped me improve.
2. Magneton Offense
25 Battles:
ELO - 1273
GXE - 65.2%
W - 17
L - 8
Notes:
An archetype I had already had some experience playing with mixed success. In the end I made a pretty standard physical offence team although I did make use of a bulky bulk up Machamp lead which I actually still think is pretty good. The team also contained the often mocked DD Salamence which whilst it can win games I think unfortunately is the worst Salamence (though overall I still think Salamence is great especially mixed more on that later). The first couple of games I had a Gyarados in the team which I played poorly and wrote off; but long after this challenge I have since used a rest Gyarados with the well known UD Gyarados-Steelix team and found it a solid Pokemon. Overall I understand the flaws of this archetype but a well built team can work well using it and Mag in general in a Skarm heavy meta is great.
3. Skarm Bliss TSS (AKA Big 5 TSS)
25 Battles:
ELO - 1269
GXE - 66.9%
W - 16
L - 9
Notes:
Not much to say on this one big 5 TSS everyone knows it, I used Starmie (it's good) as my last. There is lots of interesting innovations and variations but not a build I run much, a team where I've probably spent far more time on how to beat it rather than win with it.
4. Spikeless (sorry BKC)/Mixed Offense
25 Battles:
ELO - 1364
GXE - 72.4%
W - 19
L - 6
Notes:
Spoilers but my best performing team in this challenge. Built around late game DD Tar which is just a fantastic sweeper. Also as if to demonstrate the huge gaps in my play at the time my first (definitely not my last) serious use of Mixed Salamence which goes without saying is fantastic. Really what I like most about this archetype is the hard offence it enables and flexibility in team building around the biggest as well as the most obscure threats. I suppose it is here where I will make my defence of Snorlax as a fantastic offensive and defensive threat. Pretty much essential on these builds, curse + 3 attacks or all out 4 attacks a must.
5. Porygon 2/CM Spam
25 Battles:
ELO - 1195
EXE - 59.7%
W - 15
L - 10
Notes:
An archetype I have used before and after this challenge but never quite got working. I changed the team a bit in the beginning so probably its results should be a bit better. The modern lead Raikou is a great early threat. First use in this challenge of one of my favourite ADV Pokemon Suicune (calm mind Suicune has no weak as the saying goes). I do like Porygon 2 and it can sometimes put in loads of work in a game but I think the next time I experiment with CM spam I might drop it and deal with Dug in other ways. That said the other grounded threats it enables is cool such as Hera which can fit on this kind of team.
6. Pursuit Tyranitar
25 Battle:
ELO - 1278
GXE - 64.6%
W - 17
L - 8
Notes:
This was another archetype I had a lot of fun playing as I was able to include Pokemon I had not used much such as Forretress, Flygon and Venusaur. Pursuit Tyranitar enables so many threats it really does open up a lot of teams. Black glasses for that extra power on Gengar is good.
7. Special Spikes Stack/Jolt Spikes
25 Battles:
ELO - 1278
GXE - 64.6&
W - 17
L - 8
Notes:
The first archetype I used when I started out and one commonly used by many beginners for its intuitive play. Always fun to play and still a solid playstyle to use. Not too much to say it was a style I had probably used the most at that point but was still useful rebuilding a team from scratch and really thinking about it.
8. Dugtrio Stall/Balance
25 Battles:
ELO - 1215
GXE - 59.5%
W - 16
L - 9
Notes
Again another playstyle that took me out of my comfort zone. The biggest lesson I took from using it was bulky rest Zapdos is a great Pokemon and sometimes nigh impossible to KO. If building in this style it's still important to have offensive threats beyond just spikes, CM wish Jirachi again proved how it can win games. I forfeited one game that turned into a PP war with the end far in sight, not worth it for ladder on an alt.
9. Spinner/Mag Balance/Bulky Offence
25 Battles:
ELO -1156
GXE - 51%
W - 13
L - 12
Notes
The worst performing team of the challenge although almost completely through my own fault. I was getting a bit burnt out towards the end and couldn't settle on what team to build and changed the team a lot. A team built around a spinner and bulky offence Pokemon (Snorlax, Suicune etc) can do better than this. I didn't want to redo it seen as I did the challenge a while ago.
Bonus - Rain Offense
25 Battles:
ELO - 1283
GXE - 67.5%
W - 17
L - 8
Notes
At the start of the challenge I knew at the end I was going to do a bonus rain team. An archetype that is fun to play although one that you have to know how to take care of its key threats. Thanks to Sadlysius's A deep look at Rain Offense thread for getting me started. I think this is an under utilised archetype and one that isn't a gimmick. Also Ludicolo isn't as bad as some people make out. Rain doubling speed and power of water moves has lots of potential.
Conclusion
As stated in the introduction this challenge that I did earlier in the year really did represent a turning point in my ADV playing. Building a team and playing 25 games in every archetype helped me to use moves, sets, Pokemon and playstyles I had never used before. From this challenge I really did get a much broader understanding of the teams I was building, playing and competing against. If anyone has the time to do it or a similar challenge I really would recommend it to round out your ADV. Thanks to Vapicuno for his amazing thread and inspiring this challenge, the Smogon OU Pokedex and BKC for his every Pokemon in ADV Youtube video, the three things you need to try the challenge for yourself. The other important thing i took away from this challenge is I now test out every serious team I build with 25 games on a fresh alt.
After over a year of playing ADV I have finally hit over 1500 ELO and made it onto the top 500 ladder. After achieving this it has made me reflect on what has helped me improve my ADV game the most. Upon reflection I think the biggest defining turning point that took me from floundering in 1300's to greater consistency was a challenge I set myself earlier in the year based on Vapicunos excellent Archetype and Cores team building thread. The simple idea of the challenge was to create a team for each of the 9 archetypes as described in Vapicuno's thread, create a new alt account for each (starting with CR94) and play 25 games. After mentioning this challenge around a few ADV discords and gaining some interest I thought I would document the challenge and experience in a more detailed format.
As should go without saying this was not by any means a scientific experiment, clearly a very large factor in these results is my own subjectivity (I have clear biases and preferences for certain archetypes, namely offence based ones) and to a lesser extent the volatility of low ladder. Also of note is that many archetypes contained numerous sub archetypes, where this was the case I just chose the one I preferred building at the time. I am not going to go over the teams I built in any great depth although I will mention any key Pokemon that I felt stood out or helped make the team more unique.
The Results
1. Milotic/Celebi Balance
25 Battles:
ELO - 1257
GXE - 65.6 %
W - 16
L - 9
Notes:
The first team I built as part of this challenge and one that helped me get off to a great start and really commit to the idea of this challenge. At the time of the challenge I had never made use of this core or even really used Milotic at all. This team also featured my first consistent use of Wish CM Jirachi a Pokemon I used in other teams in this challenge and still think is great. Overall I really enjoyed using this archetype and using a different paced team helped me improve.
2. Magneton Offense
25 Battles:
ELO - 1273
GXE - 65.2%
W - 17
L - 8
Notes:
An archetype I had already had some experience playing with mixed success. In the end I made a pretty standard physical offence team although I did make use of a bulky bulk up Machamp lead which I actually still think is pretty good. The team also contained the often mocked DD Salamence which whilst it can win games I think unfortunately is the worst Salamence (though overall I still think Salamence is great especially mixed more on that later). The first couple of games I had a Gyarados in the team which I played poorly and wrote off; but long after this challenge I have since used a rest Gyarados with the well known UD Gyarados-Steelix team and found it a solid Pokemon. Overall I understand the flaws of this archetype but a well built team can work well using it and Mag in general in a Skarm heavy meta is great.
3. Skarm Bliss TSS (AKA Big 5 TSS)
25 Battles:
ELO - 1269
GXE - 66.9%
W - 16
L - 9
Notes:
Not much to say on this one big 5 TSS everyone knows it, I used Starmie (it's good) as my last. There is lots of interesting innovations and variations but not a build I run much, a team where I've probably spent far more time on how to beat it rather than win with it.
4. Spikeless (sorry BKC)/Mixed Offense
25 Battles:
ELO - 1364
GXE - 72.4%
W - 19
L - 6
Notes:
Spoilers but my best performing team in this challenge. Built around late game DD Tar which is just a fantastic sweeper. Also as if to demonstrate the huge gaps in my play at the time my first (definitely not my last) serious use of Mixed Salamence which goes without saying is fantastic. Really what I like most about this archetype is the hard offence it enables and flexibility in team building around the biggest as well as the most obscure threats. I suppose it is here where I will make my defence of Snorlax as a fantastic offensive and defensive threat. Pretty much essential on these builds, curse + 3 attacks or all out 4 attacks a must.
5. Porygon 2/CM Spam
25 Battles:
ELO - 1195
EXE - 59.7%
W - 15
L - 10
Notes:
An archetype I have used before and after this challenge but never quite got working. I changed the team a bit in the beginning so probably its results should be a bit better. The modern lead Raikou is a great early threat. First use in this challenge of one of my favourite ADV Pokemon Suicune (calm mind Suicune has no weak as the saying goes). I do like Porygon 2 and it can sometimes put in loads of work in a game but I think the next time I experiment with CM spam I might drop it and deal with Dug in other ways. That said the other grounded threats it enables is cool such as Hera which can fit on this kind of team.
6. Pursuit Tyranitar
25 Battle:
ELO - 1278
GXE - 64.6%
W - 17
L - 8
Notes:
This was another archetype I had a lot of fun playing as I was able to include Pokemon I had not used much such as Forretress, Flygon and Venusaur. Pursuit Tyranitar enables so many threats it really does open up a lot of teams. Black glasses for that extra power on Gengar is good.
7. Special Spikes Stack/Jolt Spikes
25 Battles:
ELO - 1278
GXE - 64.6&
W - 17
L - 8
Notes:
The first archetype I used when I started out and one commonly used by many beginners for its intuitive play. Always fun to play and still a solid playstyle to use. Not too much to say it was a style I had probably used the most at that point but was still useful rebuilding a team from scratch and really thinking about it.
8. Dugtrio Stall/Balance
25 Battles:
ELO - 1215
GXE - 59.5%
W - 16
L - 9
Notes
Again another playstyle that took me out of my comfort zone. The biggest lesson I took from using it was bulky rest Zapdos is a great Pokemon and sometimes nigh impossible to KO. If building in this style it's still important to have offensive threats beyond just spikes, CM wish Jirachi again proved how it can win games. I forfeited one game that turned into a PP war with the end far in sight, not worth it for ladder on an alt.
9. Spinner/Mag Balance/Bulky Offence
25 Battles:
ELO -1156
GXE - 51%
W - 13
L - 12
Notes
The worst performing team of the challenge although almost completely through my own fault. I was getting a bit burnt out towards the end and couldn't settle on what team to build and changed the team a lot. A team built around a spinner and bulky offence Pokemon (Snorlax, Suicune etc) can do better than this. I didn't want to redo it seen as I did the challenge a while ago.
Bonus - Rain Offense
25 Battles:
ELO - 1283
GXE - 67.5%
W - 17
L - 8
Notes
At the start of the challenge I knew at the end I was going to do a bonus rain team. An archetype that is fun to play although one that you have to know how to take care of its key threats. Thanks to Sadlysius's A deep look at Rain Offense thread for getting me started. I think this is an under utilised archetype and one that isn't a gimmick. Also Ludicolo isn't as bad as some people make out. Rain doubling speed and power of water moves has lots of potential.
Conclusion
As stated in the introduction this challenge that I did earlier in the year really did represent a turning point in my ADV playing. Building a team and playing 25 games in every archetype helped me to use moves, sets, Pokemon and playstyles I had never used before. From this challenge I really did get a much broader understanding of the teams I was building, playing and competing against. If anyone has the time to do it or a similar challenge I really would recommend it to round out your ADV. Thanks to Vapicuno for his amazing thread and inspiring this challenge, the Smogon OU Pokedex and BKC for his every Pokemon in ADV Youtube video, the three things you need to try the challenge for yourself. The other important thing i took away from this challenge is I now test out every serious team I build with 25 games on a fresh alt.