Metagame Doubles NU

[zee]

-DNU Founder

banner by zeefable she's so epic
​

Doubles NU (commonly referred to as DNU) is the lowest usage based "tier" in doubles. It contains all the Pokemon that fail to achieve DUU or higher status by usage, and is marked by (DUU) in the teambuilder. The metagame currently doesn't have a ladder on Pokemon Showdown, but has been a niche theory topic for a few Doubles community members ever since the DNU Minitour. Despite this, we really don't have a centralized place for DNU discussion, which is what prompted this thread's creation.

To challenge someone on PS to a DNU game, challenge in DUU or use the code:

/challenge doublesuu @@@ -duu

Resources

*** Sample Teams (give me your teams) ***
zee's Hard Azumarill Setup


Fespy's Manual Rain


*** Viability List ***

we don't have a VR council or a proper VR currently. However, if you're interested in a potential list of viable Pokemon, this should serve you well:

Viable Pokemon List

Aegislash
Araquanid
Arctovish
Azumarill
Bisharp
Blacephalon
Blaziken
Braviary
Buzzwole
Chandelure
Charizard
Clefable
Clefairy
Cobalion
Conkeldurr
Corviknight
Darmanitan-Galar
Dragonite
Drednaw
Duraludon
Dusknoir
Electabuzz
Entei
Escavalier
Flygon
Garchomp
Gardevoir
Gengar
Golurk
Goodra
Gourgeist
Gyarados
Hydreigon
Jellicent
Jynx
Keldeo
Klefki
Kommo-o
Latias
Latios
Lucario
Ludicolo
Mamoswine
Magmar
Marowak-Alola
Mienshao
Mimikyu
Moltres
Mr. Mime
Nidoking
Nidoqueen
Noivern
Persian-Alola
Pheromosa
Pincurchin
Raichu-Alola
Raikou
Registeel
Reuniclus
Ribombee
Roserade
Rotom-Heat
Sableye
Salamence
Salazzle
Seismitoed
Silvally
/ Slowking / Slowking-Galar
Snorlax
Starmie
Suicune
Swampert
Talonflame
Tangela
Terrakion
Tornadus-Therian
/ Thundurus / Thundurus-Therian
Venusaur
/ Weezing / Weezing-Galar
Zarude
Zygarde-10%

*** Minitour Usage Stats ***
-do note there was a tier shift in between the minitour and now, so the usage stats may not be entirely reflective of a more current DNU metagame


Feel free to post any teams, replays, or thoughts you may have on the metagame. If enough people are interested, maybe we can put together another minitour soon and/or a proper Viability Rankings. Peace.

 

[Idyll]

Tours Plaza Premiere - Doubles NU Replays

Week 1

Zoaw vs LTG
vs
Crunchman vs queso
vs
Surfy vs Memoric
vs
Shadowmonstr7 vs SingleThunder
vs

Week 2

Ninja vs queso
vs
LTG vs Memoric
vs
Crunchman vs SingleThunder
vs
Surfy vs Shadowmonstr7
vs

Week 3

Zoaw vs Crunchman
vs
Surfy vs toxya
vs
Drivetacos vs Memoric
vs

Week 4

Zoaw vs Surfy
vs
Shadowmonstr7 vs RICEMAN
vs
Drivetacos vs LTG
vs
Memoric vs Queso
vs

Week 5

Memoric vs Sificon
vs
queso vs Drivetacos
vs
LTG vs Shadowmonstr7
vs
Crunchman vs Surfy
vs

Week 6

Zoaw vs SuperEpicAmpharos
vs
SingleThunder vs Surfy
vs
queso vs LTG
vs

Week 7

Zoaw vs Drivetacos
vs
queso vs Surfy
vs
RICEMAN vs LTG
vs

Semi Finals

queso vs Memoric
vs
Surfy vs Zoaw*
vs

Semi Finals Tiebreaker

crying vs Memoric
vs

Finals

Surfy vs Memoric
vs

Finals Tiebreaker

Surfy vs Memoric
vs​

Notes: 1) There are typically 4 games per week but some had deadgames; and 2) a tier shift happened right before Semi Finals.
*Zoaw's team was illegal by usage rules because it had a Clefairy lol, refer to Note 2

 

[Idyll]

Now that TPP just ended, I'm gonna post my teams here. I only really signed up to kill some time in DNU, and it did end up being a cool experience overall. Going 9-0 and winning the whole thing through two tiebreakers was p neat and exciting. I think I only did like around 6 or 7 test games max the entire tour though lol and built my teams the night before if not an hour before the actual game, pretty much all of these teams were just based on intuition and shower thoughts.

Week 1 vs Surfy

Notes

This was the first game of DNU of the tournament so I had no idea what the metagame was still and what level of play my opponents were at. So I brought two broken set-up sweepers and Pokemon to enable them. Kommo-o probably shouldn't be here in DNU; considering it was already demonic in old DOU metas, this tier shouldn't have that much to beat it. Double FM is to facilitate all the set-up; I wanted to just overwhelm my opp and see how it goes, in order to be as safe against random stuff as I could be. Choice Scarf Blacephalon is to have very reliable speed control as I didn't know what Speed tiers were gonna be relevant, so a fast Scarfer felt safe.

This game was one of my closest games in the entire tour. Surfy brought a really good-looking team which shared a bunch of mons with mine. I think I fucked around early-game, which compromised my Azu. Midgame was when I turned it around; I absolutely had to grab the Aegislash with my Azumarill Turn 5, as my Kommo-o was Aura Sphere and couldn't hit it (I only started running Flamethrower later on). Aqua Jetting Aegislash was still overall correct as pinning Aegi meant my Kommo-o sets up, as I didn't have to fear Roar or anything else from the Entei (it later revealed Scarf). Getting Kommo-o boosted gave me a good-enough endgame, though it still came down to a 50-50-ish scenario as Surfy could have AJet + Clang / FT on my Venu to get the win there. I don't believe that Clangorous Soul on their Kommo-o was optimal as they had to either 2v1 my Venu or have Azu 1v1 my Kommo-o, but that happened and I made it out alive there.

Week 2 vs LTG

Notes

Since the formula of redirection + set-up did work W1, I decided, hey, might as well do it again. Only brought one this time, though, while committing to more generally good Pokemon. This team did have an interesting tech though; while Persian-A and Terrakion are just good Pokemon on their own right, I gave Beat Up to Persian-A to have an insane pressure tool. The team wasn't built around it, but it can be game-winning so it was def worth. Unaware Clefable is here instead of Clefairy, as I really valued Unaware + typing for being really favored against Kommo-o as well as Azumarill SemiTR teams.

Game was interesting, to say the least. I got the trade on Meowstic I wanted early, I didn't want to see its tricks for any longer than I have to. Psychic Terrain + Gardevoir was interesting, I assume it was to beat Kommo-o + Azumarill + Venu. I just kinda 2v6'd the whole game with my Aegislash and Venusaur as they have overall favorable match-ups this game.

Week 3 vs Drivetacos

Notes

While I was looking at the list of Pokemon, I realized Weezing-G was here. Considering Weezing-G was a demon in the last SS DOU DLC meta, it's probably a demon here too. I then decided to include Regigigas here; the goal with it wasn't to be cute with a strong attacking Regigigas, rather it really was just a really fat Attacker that can statcheck the whole metagame that occasionally gets to hit hard as well. With Leftovers and Grassy Terrain, Regigigas can feel quite immortal. CB Zarude is here to give the team instant breaking power + strong Speed control, as CB Grassy Glide in terrain can be reliable even if I fuck up againt opposing Tailwind or TR.

This game I kinda fucked around lol. I went for a T1 play that I felt like could probably bite me in the ass, but I got away with it somehow. It was then just a matter of setting up Kommo-o and winning lol. Not going for Grassy Glide on T10 was kinda trolling by me but it was otherwise smooth sailing.

Week 4 vs queso

Notes

This was a match-up I felt excited about as I think queso was among the best in building in the pool. This team that I brought, though, in retrospect was the most trolly by me as I only had one Dragon resist (i.e. loses to Kommo-o) while also being really slow. My goal was to just make sure queso doesn't get any set-up going; I had Duralodon to ignore FM, Entei to Roar stuff out, Weezing-G to remove Huge Power, and Keldeo to Icy Wind Kommo-o, beating redirection.

Not much interesting in the game happened lol. Perhaps the most game-defining turn was Turn 9, where I switched Regigigas to Duralodon as I was pinning a Terrakion with my Thwackey, covering a switch to Clefairy that indeed happened. This let me put pressure on the Azumarill and prevented it from doing more damage than it should've.

Week 5 vs Sificon

Notes

This time I just wanted to build around Coil Milotic, another demon that was good in an older DOU meta. I figured the best way to support it was with Sticky Webs, and considering I didn't really need Tailwind on this team since my mons were either defensive or had priority, I also just decided to give Ribombee Speed Swap for some real demonic action. I used Body Press Kommo-o since I did feel that I need something more physically defensive, but I realize in retrospect that the Clanger is overall better in every case. It did work in this game, though.

Not much interesting happened, either. I was respecting Simple Beam on Latios a lot. Play was run-of-the-mill for me otherwise.

Week 6 vs Crunchman

Notes

I didn't feel like playing and didn't really build shit, so when I saw the chance of a deadgame I took it lol

Week 7 vs Shadowmonstr7

Notes

This match-up was in particular one that I was looking forward for as it's against an actual experienced, good DOU main. While I did actually have a team prepped, it was just my W2 team with some minor tweaks as I felt that Unaware Clefable could win me the game if they bring the usual SemiTR that they usually do. Alas, this game ended up not mattering and Shadow asked if I wanted to deadgame, and I'm not one to be impolite.

Semis vs queso

Notes

My goal with this team was to build something that's solid that, at the same time, has some game-winning techs that, while "out there", still fit seamlessly with what the team wants to do. I was pretty confident that I could play myself out of pretty much anything at this point, so all I had to do was just make sure I didn't get exposed by any particular threat. I personally feel that this is one of the two most solid teams that I've built for this tour, the other one being the Finals TB team. LO Adamant Pheromosa is there as a strong attacker that can pin threats so I can do stuff with the extra space, with U-turn being handy for both momentum and massive chip damage. Psych Up on Entei is an old XY DOU tech in the BD Azu meta, and it works on this team as I have two targets in Azumarill and Kommo-o; there isn't much opportunity cost to it as Entei only really needs Sacred Fire and Extreme Speed to do its main job of pivoting (Roar is nice but doesn't really work against what I want to Roar usually), and if I can catch my opponent unawares with a Psych Up, it's pretty much GG.

My game against queso was a bit of a rough-ish match-up. Sticky Webs was a bit tough as it makes my Kommo-o wincon worse and invalidates an entire Pokemon on my side. At the same time, I had to deal with Duralodon, which prevents me from using Azumarill as a wincon. Basically, I had to get every trade right, making sure I get the most out of my pre-Webs attackers and then capitalizing on type advantage and strong priority later on. The Turn 9 switch to Kommo-o from Azumarill was super important as I had to make sure I force the Duralodon to hit something other than Entei, and queso had to attack Kommo-o the next turn as it beats both Entei and Duralodon; I made the switch there as staying in to trade with Azumarill is a low-percentage play as it was accuracy dropped, and I fully expected Thunderbolt to be queso's play there anyway.

Semis Tiebreaker vs crying

Notes

This team is pretty much the exact same team as the last one lol, except I changed the order and one move on Clefable. I changed the order so maybe crying doesn't recognize it or something lol, or thinks I could have different sets. I changed Icy Wind to Encore on Clefable, as this was the sort of move change that could end up game-winning if it works and I didn't need Icy Wind that much anyway.

When I saw the team preview, I thought that this game was beyond saving as I literally got hard CT'd lol. Right away I knew it was Discharge spam, which meant that any aspirations of winning w/ Azu look quite doomed; at the same time, Webs Ribombee and Dazzling Gleam on Xurk means I could never get anything out of Kommo-o unless I lead it (I did). Webs, like last game, will also invalidate my Pheromosa, and then there was also Lanturn which checks Azumarill, Entei, and Kommo-o by itself. I got screwed over by Xurk by the mid-game and had to manage my resources to take it down, though this left me with what was effectively a 2v5 disadvantage as Pheromosa was gonna die to anything. I did my best in playing to my outs by, on Turn 9, facilitating a position with Entei + Azumarill where I can get a BD off, hoping that crying elects to just Scald my Entei. When I saw the Scald on my Azu, though, that was the greenlight for me to just instantly go for the perceived win by Psyching Up my Entei on the double target to a Protecting +6 Azumarill; I thought that double targeting was would be crying's play 100% since Psych Up on Entei had never been revealed in the tour so far and it would probably never cross the mind of someone not so experienced with doubles, and the Scald on Azumarill gave me the read that crying didn't have an Electric-type move for some reason. After pulling it off, I basically won the game as Azumarill and Entei weren't in range of anything too dangerous and Entei should beat even a 2v1 against Zygarde and Thwackey in the lategame.

This was the game where I was the most mortal in both match-up and actual gamestate, which is why this is the one win that felt so good when I got away with it lmao. It felt even better when my asspull was necessary in my team proceeding to the finals as we beat the #1 Seed in a 2-1 tiebreaker set.

Finals vs Surfy

Notes

Surfy was one of the more poppin' players in the tour and he gave me a good run for my money in our first game, so I knew this was gonna be a banger. Going into the builder for this match-up, I knew that I had to make sure I absolutely win the Registeel match-up, as from what I've seen it was with Registeel that Surfy had his success in the tour. I also kept taking into account my match-up against Toxapex, making sure I could beat it without the need for boosts. I was also aware that Crunchman was helping, so I was making sure I didn't lose to any bad cheesy stuff Crobat and Talonflame. Even though I think it's bad, I was also making sure that I beat Crunchman's cheesy Week 1 team just in case Surfy decided to go that route, reviewing my optimal lines and making sure that I win the match-up even with my eyes closed.

I decided to go with Sticky Webs as Ribombee was a reliable way to curb most aggressive strategies, with Toxtricity as the main beneficiary as strong spread damage is great for overwhelming pressure and beating over possible plays with redirection. Toxtricity was also nice for an instantly advantageous match-up against unboosted Registeel and Toxapex. Choice Scarf Rotom-W also had these two in mind as I could Trick them and render them useless, while the speed can be handy in checking even the most aggressive stuff like Crobat and Blacephalon. The rest of the team is fairly default stuff from me, though I mayhaps have went overboard with Psych Up; in truth, I really just couldn't be bothered to think of a better move on Rotom-W, while on Clefable I figured, hey Psyching Up any boosted threat Surfy could come up with like Registeel or with SmashPass could be both funny and gamewinning. From my position, I was building around Kommo-o, and then I was building to not lose.

The game went better than anticipated for me. On team preview, I thought, okay I have two ways of winning here in Kommo-o and Toxtricity, and I just have to make sure I don't lose to Registeel. Gardevoir wasn't really threatening as +1 Kommo-o still outruns Choice Scarfed variants. Turn 1 was a courteous exchange of Stick Webs, though I did end up revealing Choice Scarf on my Rotom-W. The next turn, though, I figured that I could confidently dump my Choice Scarf on the Persian-A slot as Surfy's best switch to Rotom-W / Ribombee was Registeel, and even if the Scarf goes to just the Persian-A for some reason then it was still an entire Pokemon denied either way; this proved successful, and I kinda just rolled over Surfy with Toxtricity the rest of the game,. Ribombee was on the field from the start and thus didn't have -1 Speed from Webs, so I could even reliably Tailwind for my Toxtricity when I'm not Pollen Puffing it back to a healthy HP. I did get a crit on the Moltres which I apologized for, but I don't think that mattered. I did feel that Registeel stayed too long spamming Body Press against two resisting threats, and I also kept respecting the Wide Guard on Araquanid which never happened. We take those.

Finals Tiebreaker vs Surfy

Notes

Still the same prep range, mostly. I was still wary of Toxapex and Registeel as well as fishy Crunchman suggestions. This time I was playing particularly safe against weather; I wanted to make sure that I could beat their abusers if not just outright prevent weather from going up entirely. I thought of the possibility of pulling a fast one with Keldeo and Rain Dance Thundurus, as it's a seemingly normal combination that won't be able to handle Arctozolt. In the end, I just went with regular Weezing, as the Galarian Edition went to DUU in a tier shift. This Weezing is nice for weather as well as beating Registeel. I brought Choice Scarf Rotom-W again, too, but this time with Toxic over Psych Up just so I don't get randomly swept by something like CM Latias. Weezing also let me bring back Regigigas, and I hoped I could use it as a surprise pick as the rise of Weezing-G made it relatively indescript.

To my own surprise, it was a Regigigas mirror! More interestingly, I matched up against a Slowbro-G; I didn't know what it did except maybe set Trick Room and check my standard Clefable, but either way it was kinda spooky so I just took it out the first chance I got lol. Getting the position that I got Turn 2 was fortunate for me as I basically got to dump my Choice Scarf on someone that didn't want it; I knew instantly that it had to be Entei just by who the rest of Surfy's team was, and I kinda let him know about it lol, but this turn was also good for knowing that Surfy's own Rotom-W was also scarfed. This information proved useful as I basically got the safest Clangorous Soul of my life on Turn 6, and considering Surfy didn't have any Clanging Scale immunities (Weezing gives me agency againt the Kommo-o mirror), I was then poised to close out the tournament. I think Surfy had to hard switch out to Regigigas or Kommo-o (or even both) on Turn 5, anything just to make sure he didn't have Thwackey + Choice-locked Rotom-W against a Kommo-o, but even then it still looked tough as it seemed like he had no immediate answers. The rest of the game post-Clang was really just making sure I don't botch it as my Kommo-o got paralyzed. I also did get to use Psych Up Clefable for once this game lol, but it wasn't really necessary and moreso me just wanting to see it happen lol.

Metagame Impressions

Playing was honestly quite a refreshing and enjoyable experience for me. It a features a bizarre set of Pokemon (and offshoots of them) that have been good in the past; the set of Registeel, Venusaur, Kommo-o, and Thwackey (which is just Rillaboom but smaller) have all been DOU usage at some point in this generation, and it was cool to revisit them. At the same time, the tier also features an assorted set of stuff like Regigigas of all things, Azumarill, and Entei that can viably stack up with the rest of the tier. It was fun to fuck around in a tier that had familiar territory and, at the same time, elements that I wasn't exactly sure what to make of.

From my experience in playing this tier, though, I can definitely say that Clangorous Soul Kommo-o is a centralizing element much like GSC OU Snorlax. I think every DNU team should pretty much have it as it'd be trolling otherwise; the metagame isn't really equipped to deal with a strong booster that has a strong spread move with great neutral coverage, and it can be simple to push to an advantage with it. At the same time, every team should have at least two immunities to Clangorous Soul in order to not lose to Kommo-o, which means teams have even more incentive to have their own. Kommo-o and Clefable, in particular, are so easy to just slap onto a DNU team as they're both a wincon and a way to put opposing wincons in line. DNU, essentially, runs through Kommo-o, and I feel that teams should be built with the match-up against it in mind primarily, with match-ups to other things coming secondary; maybe some teams can not run Kommo-o, but I feel like it comes at such a steep opportunity cost of both wincon and simple check to a top threat that it's usually just worth it to run even where it seemingly doesn't make as much sense to do so.

Old heads within the DOU community will understand when I say this meta feels like SM DUU Kommo-o metagame; it has that exact same feel where it's a bunch of maneuvering with what is essentially a queen in chess terms. Of course, SS DNU feels much more fair as boosting a Kommo-o doesn't have the same kind of tempo swing. I don't suppose that this kind of style of playing a tier is for everyone, but at the very least it was different enough from DOU and even DUU to be a worthwhile experience for me personally.