Pokémon Pinsir

[ScraftyIsTheBest]

I have a question about Mega Pinsir. What use does it have over Talonflame? His main niche seems to be Flying-STAB priority, but Talonflame can do that too AND can run a STAB Flare Blitz for Steel-types... whereas Pinsir is forced to run an un-stabbed Earthquake.

Even though both are subpar defensive typings, Mega Pinsir has the worse of the two as well.

+2 252+ Atk Life Orb (Aerialate) Mega Pinsir Quick Attack vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Terrakion: 231-274 (71.29 - 84.56%)
+2 252+ Atk Sharp Beak Talonflame Brave Bird vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Terrakion: 411-484 (126.85 - 149.38%)

I'd love to be enlightened, since I love Pinsir and would love to have a reason to use him in OU. :]

Well, I guess Pinsir also has Bug STAB and EQ, so it has much better insurance against Tyranitar, whereas Talonflame has to resort to Steel Wing, and kinda has 4MSS. Yes, Pinsir doesn't smack Steel-types as hard, but it does far better against Tar, so it's probably a better bet if you're for some reason afraid of Tyranitar. Pinsir has better bulk too iirc.

As for Pinsir itself, Pinsir is definitely looking better in Gen 6 btw, Mega Pinsir finally gives it a niche over Heracross, and with great Attack and Speed along with good bulk, it could fare rather well in whatever tier it ends up in, and Aerilate is a cheap ability. This will definitely be good in whatever tier it ends up in, and should finally rise out of NU.

 

[Thorhammer]

Well, I guess Pinsir also has Bug STAB and EQ, so it has much better insurance against Tyranitar, whereas Talonflame has to resort to Steel Wing, and kinda has 4MSS. Yes, Pinsir doesn't smack Steel-types as hard, but it does far better against Tar, so it's probably a better bet if you're for some reason afraid of Tyranitar. Pinsir has better bulk too iirc.

As for Pinsir itself, Pinsir is definitely looking better in Gen 6 btw, Mega Pinsir finally gives it a niche over Heracross, and with great Attack and Speed along with good bulk, it could fare rather well in whatever tier it ends up in, and Aerilate is a cheap ability. This will definitely be good in whatever tier it ends up in, and should finally rise out of NU.

Earthquake yeah, but Pinsir shouldn't be using Bug STAB. Flying/Ground coverage is all it needs; of the few things that resist the combo, most resist Bug too, and a neutral X-Scissor is barely more powerful than a resisted Return anyway.

I think Pinsir has a good shot at OU now, but the simple fact that each team is locked to one Mega means its use might not match up to its effectiveness as well as for regular Pokemon. I could easily see it as a high-tier UU with a solid OU presence, but then, if UU can't handle the powerful Megas it's likely to receive, it could end up banning Pinsirite and letting Pinsir itself slide all the way down the tiers, only able to reach its true potential in OU. I hope that's not the case, but without a UU tier even existing yet, it's hard to say what'll happen.

 

[Recursion]

I've been working on a team base around setting this guy up. His biggest problem is going to be things that resist ground/flying, things that can hit him with priority, and prankster status.

alexwolf already ran the calcs on priority - after stealth rock, Pinsir can take pretty much any single priority attack, except for Talonflame hitting him with priority Brave Bird. Even at 100% (Which it probably won't be), Pinsir can still fall to a max attack Brave Bird.

• 252+ Atk (custom) Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Pinsir: 236-282 (87.08 - 104.05%) -- 25% chance to OHKO
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Quick Attack vs. 0 HP / 4 Def (custom): 170-201 (57.23 - 67.67%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock

Assuming Pinsir had the chance to set up and stealth rocks, he can go for Quick Attack for the KO, but unless Talonflame tries a fire attack he's going to be outsped.

The following Pokemon resist his flying/ground combo:

• Rotom - All of them
• Skarmory
• Aerodactyl
• Zapdos
• Thundurus (T)
• Bronzong

Calcs:

• 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Rotom-W: 117-138 (38.61 - 45.54%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
  
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Rotom-W: 233-274 (76.89 - 90.42%) -- 18.75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
  
• 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 224 HP / 252+ Def Skarmory: 70-83 (21.4 - 25.38%) -- possible 5HKO
  
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 224 HP / 252+ Def Skarmory: 140-165 (42.81 - 50.45%) -- 54.3% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
  
• 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Aerodactyl: 195-230 (64.78 - 76.41%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
  
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Aerodactyl: 390-460 (129.56 - 152.82%) -- guaranteed OHKO
  
• 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 80 HP / 0 Def Zapdos: 142-168 (41.64 - 49.26%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
  
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 80 HP / 0 Def Zapdos: 282-333 (82.69 - 97.65%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
  
• 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Thundurus-T: 164-194 (54.84 - 64.88%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
  
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Thundurus-T: 328-386 (109.69 - 129.09%) -- guaranteed OHKO
  
• 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Bronzong: 81-95 (23.96 - 28.1%) -- possible 4HKO
  
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Pinsir Return vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Bronzong: 160-188 (47.33 - 55.62%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock

A lot of this stuff doesn't want to switch in even when he's unboosted. Get a swords dance in, you prevent anything but steels from switching in safely, and with stealth rock up everything gets 2HKO at minimum.

If he gets hit with burn or paralysis, he'll go down hard. It's essential to get rid of things like Klefki beforehand to guarantee his sweep. With that in mind, does anyone have good suggestions for possible team mates?

 

[Thorhammer]

If he gets hit with burn or paralysis, he'll go down hard. It's essential to get rid of things like Klefki beforehand to guarantee his sweep. With that in mind, does anyone have good suggestions for possible team mates?

Spinning is a must. I use Excadrill, personally, which in turn loves to partner with Sand Stream users, especially ones with a Smooth Rock. With that kind of dedication to spinning, you can have other team members take advantage of it as well, in particular being able to use Focus Sashes more freely. Although if they're vulnerable to sand it can take some tricky playing to keep the sash safe.

 

[S0L1D G0LD]

Spinning is a must. I use Excadrill, personally, which in turn loves to partner with Sand Stream users, especially ones with a Smooth Rock. With that kind of dedication to spinning, you can have other team members take advantage of it as well, in particular being able to use Focus Sashes more freely. Although if they're vulnerable to sand it can take some tricky playing to keep the sash safe.

I personally like using mold breaker exca, as it totally wrecks rotom and others like him who normally wall or check exca.

 

[Thorhammer]

I personally like using mold breaker exca, as it totally wrecks rotom and others like him who normally wall or check exca.

That's certainly another option. I've seen a lot of it, and as a Rotom-W player, it's caused me no end of pain. But if you can spare the space for a Sand Stream user, I'd say Sand Rush is well worth it.

 

[Recursion]

I personally like using mold breaker exca, as it totally wrecks rotom and others like him who normally wall or check exca.

That's a really good idea - in addition to rapid spin, Excadrill can hit Rotom and Bronzong super effectively and check the other counters except for Skarmory.

 

[Banryu]

If he gets hit with burn or paralysis, he'll go down hard. It's essential to get rid of things like Klefki beforehand to guarantee his sweep. With that in mind, does anyone have good suggestions for possible team mates?

I've been running a Defogger to clear rocks, clerical Sylveon to pass Wishes and clear status, Magnezone to clear things like Klefki and Skarmory, and Rotom-W to counter Talonflame. It's been working quite well for me so far.

 

[pedro702]

I've been running a Defogger to clear rocks, clerical Sylveon to pass Wishes and clear status, Magnezone to clear things like Klefki and Skarmory, and Rotom-W to counter Talonflame. It's been working quite well for me so far.

i use kinda of the same xD

Spdef togekiss with defog to remove rocks,Mgnezone to trap skarmory,klefi,scizors and so on,phisicaly defensive rotow-w to help against tallonflame,mixmence to do some walls alot of damages to be in range of mega pinsir and ferrothorn to get rocks up i run jolly SD,EQ,Return and quick attak on mega pinsir.

 

[Scammel]

From my own experience with this monster, the issue isn't so much setting up an SD as even with Jolly a neutral Return KOs a ridiculous amount of stuff. The main problem is actually finding an opportunity to transform in the first instance as the base form isn't the fastest thing out there and even once ME it can't take much in the way of reasonably powerful hits. Typically I find something of my own has to die before I get it in there to revenge kill with QA but after that it's pretty smooth sailing.

With regards to tier placing, I can't help but wonder if a lot of MEs are going to end up languishing in BL for a long while. MPin and others are clearly going to dominate UU and will be treading a very thin line with regard to getting banned, but with MEs being one per team I think a good many won't be able to hit the necessary usage over 'mons like Gengar and Blaziken to be fully-fledged OU.

 

[Kabuto Mushi]

does anyone have good suggestions for possible team mates?

I've been running this "core" in Showdown/pokebank OU, with th Pinsir as a late game sweeper/cleaner:

Magnezone @ Choice Specs
Ability: Magnet Pull
EVs: 252 SAtk / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
- Volt Switch
- Thunderbolt
- Flash Cannon
- Hidden Power [Ice]

Slowbro @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 Def / 252 HP / 4 SAtk
Bold Nature
- Slack Off
- Scald
- Thunder Wave
- Fire Blast

Pinsir @ Pinsirite
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spd / 4 Def
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Quick Attack
- Return
- Earthquake

Magnezone is a must if you ask me, to take care of Skarm and a few other steels that Pinsir doesn't like. Also a useful resist to Flying and Ice for Pinsir. Volt Switch is a really choice way to bring him in at the end of the match too. Slowbro walls Talonflame and other Fire/Ice pokemon really well (in addition to Fighting for Magnezone), and spreads paralysis like nobody's business, which makes it easy for Pinsir to go for Adamant over Jolly.

Not sure where I should go from here with it, but I've had at least some success with Defog support (just dunno from which pokemon exactly).

 

[Recursion]

From my own experience with this monster, the issue isn't so much setting up an SD as even with Jolly a neutral Return KOs a ridiculous amount of stuff. The main problem is actually finding an opportunity to transform in the first instance as the base form isn't the fastest thing out there and even once ME it can't take much in the way of reasonably powerful hits. Typically I find something of my own has to die before I get it in there to revenge kill with QA but after that it's pretty smooth sailing.

With regards to tier placing, I can't help but wonder if a lot of MEs are going to end up languishing in BL for a long while. MPin and others are clearly going to dominate UU and will be treading a very thin line with regard to getting banned, but with MEs being one per team I think a good many won't be able to hit the necessary usage over 'mons like Gengar and Blaziken to be fully-fledged OU.

I was able to solve this problem for the most part with a good baton passer. Speed boost Scolipede with swords dance can do all of the boosting, then Pinsir just needs to survive hazards and a single attack before sweeping. Since Scolipede is also passing x2 speed, Pinsir doesn't need to rely on priority most of the time.

 

[Scammel]

It's that 'single attack' thing that seems to be the issue. Having sub-par SpDef and weaknesses to staple special attacks like Ice Beam and Thunderbolt is really not helpful and if rocks are up even neutral hits are going to be a problem (admittedly any half-decent team using MPin will probably be able to get of 'em pretty easily by necessity, but still). Again, once it's in though devastation is usually assured so it's not put me off using him.

 

[Recursion]

It's that 'single attack' thing that seems to be the issue. Having sub-par SpDef and weaknesses to staple special attacks like Ice Beam and Thunderbolt is really not helpful and if rocks are up even neutral hits are going to be a problem (admittedly any half-decent team using MPin will probably be able to get of 'em pretty easily by necessity, but still). Again, once it's in though devastation is usually assured so it's not put me off using him.

He only has a weakness to fire, flying, and rock attacks. He's bug type until he goes mega.

I do agree that he has a hard time taking hits from strong attackers, but I try to switch him in against a wall or something that can't hurt him a lot.

 

[Thorhammer]

He only has a weakness to fire, flying, and rock attacks. He's bug type until he goes mega.

I do agree that he has a hard time taking hits from strong attackers, but I try to switch him in against a wall or something that can't hurt him a lot.

He's Bug-type when he switches in, but he's Bug/Flying on the turn he transforms, while still having just 85 base Spe on that turn.

Fortunately, the Spe isn't a big deal if he can kill something with Quick Attack on that turn.

 

[BigWorldJust]

How do you teach Pinsir Quick Attack? I don't see it on his level-up moves, and I thought he didn't get any new egg moves?

 

[Adonzo]

He's had it as an egg move since gen 4

 

[S0L1D G0LD]

How do you teach Pinsir Quick Attack? I don't see it on his level-up moves, and I thought he didn't get any new egg moves?

.......

It's been an egg move since gen four.

 

[Nysyr]

I think Mold Breaker EQ has some merit over Hyper Cutter on Pinsir before you mega EVo since it allows you to Guarentee that Rotom-W coming in on a SD won't be able to force you out.

 

[pedro702]

I think Mold Breaker EQ has some merit over Hyper Cutter on Pinsir before you mega EVo since it allows you to Guarentee that Rotom-W coming in on a SD won't be able to force you out.

i use moxie it works since i only send pinsir after something is weakneed get a boost and then mega evolve without the need to SD

 

[Scammel]

I think Hyper Cutter is almost certainly the ability of choice as I really can't envisage any situation in which you wouldn't want to ME straight off the bat - I don't want to be frail, item-less and only averagely fast for any longer than I have to.

 

[Zandock]

Hyper Cutter is definitely useful. I've had a few people switch Gyarados into me on the turn I MEvolve on Battle Spot.

 

[The Gentleman Gamer]

Time for a summary of the abilities:
Hyper Cutter - Useful in case Intimidate users switch in on the turn you Mega Evolve. Good if you can switch in on something you know you can force out in order to set up SD
Moxie - Useful if you can get a KO with regular Pinsir. Tricky to use, but means you can have a 4 attacks instead of SD
Mold Breaker - Useful for regular Pinsir using Earthquake to hit Levitate users. Okay for the surprise factor on specific mons, like Bronzong, who won't expect it, but offers no long-term usefulness.

Each of them does have their uses, depending on the situation, but I would personally go with Hyper Cutter, as it means you can Mega Evolve on the first turn Pinsir is in battle.

 

[magic123]

I don't understand why they made him part flying.

I would have rather seen Gamefreak give Pinsir a regular evolution, and have it been Bug/Dark. Would make sense thematically, and would be better than a 4x weakness to SR. Just because it has wings doesn't mean it has to be __/Flying, gamefreak...

A different ability would have been nice too, like a way to make Normal moves Dark, or maybe it should have just kept Guts.

It also doesn't make sense to me that gamefreak threw ten points into its SAtk. That should have gone into SDef...

While I do agree with the Special Attack part,remember that Gamefreak does not give two shits about the singles metagame.They were obviously thinking doubles when they made this thing.It gets Close Combat,which get phenominal coverage when combined with flying (while Bug/Dark would be just walled by fairy types all the way,even with Close Combat).If you remember from the past generations,Gamefreak made no effort to balance out anything,if they did Rain would not have been in rampage.They only started to think about it now,just because VGC doubles players keep spamming Dragons,Rain and Spore.Since Stealth Rock does not exist there,Gamefreak does not care about it.

EDIT:Now that I think about it,even though it will be a Heracross clone,Bug/Fighting would be really cool.

 

[Scammel]

Moxie - Useful if you can get a KO with regular Pinsir. Tricky to use, but means you can have a 4 attacks instead of SD

Mold Breaker - Useful for regular Pinsir using Earthquake to hit Levitate users. Okay for the surprise factor on specific mons, like Bronzong, who won't expect it, but offers no long-term usefulness.

Each of them does have their uses, depending on the situation, but I would personally go with Hyper Cutter, as it means you can Mega Evolve on the first turn Pinsir is in battle.

Despite how much I love the fella (if you couldn't tell), regular Pinsir just doesn't cut it. Picking an ability based on the expectation that you'll use him as regular Pinsir seems mad to me. I especially wouldn't consider dropping SD because of the possibility of a Moxie boost (though I might drop it anyway for Substitute or even Protect).

As for MPin being 'made' for any particular format, I fail to see how this is the case at all. 'Weak to SR' does not mean 'Made for Doubles'. This guy will do perfectly well in both formats.