All Gens Playstyles throughout the Gens

[sandshrewz]

Hi! :) /me alive

With a total of 4 past generations, playstyles definitely changed with each generation. Different generations made different playstyles viable; the newer the generation, the more viable playstyles there are in general. So what are all the playstyles throughout the generations? What did each playstyle do and which was more dominant? Which playstyle rose and fell throughout the generations? It's generally known that there are generations that highly favor certain playstyles over others and using some others will just make you fail straight out.

So yea, let's start by identifying playstyles in each gen and what each playstyle did and what charaterized them in every gen. Hopefully we'll get to nominate which are the more dominant playstyles in each gen or even as a whole. ^_^ /start thread

RBY

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GSC

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ADV

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DPP

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[Jorgen]

It's hard to think of playstyles in RBY (which I'm assuming are dictated by team type). There's the "normal" team which has many variations, and then there's the gimmicky "Wrap" team that abuses Wrap to its fullest. I guess there's also subvariations of the normal team that are different enough to be worth explicit mention: the "stall" team which is outfitted with all the tools needed to force a stall war (Reflect Zam, Reflect Chansey, Reflect + Amnesia Lax), and the "offensive" team which basically just ditches Chansey for something more actively offensive.

In GSC there's definitely more well-defined playstyles. To be as broad as possible, these styles are:

• Slow (I don't like calling it Stall, because it doesn't truly "stall"), which is characterized by a reliance on Spikes and/or heavily offensive mons (e.g., Drumlax) stratified from the heavily defensive core. Offensive pressure requires skilled play in the Spikes war, use of the Spikes-Roar strategy, good Toxic placement, capitalizing off of Rest turns, and of course frequent double-switches to one of your few instantly threatening Pokemon (it's often just Snorlax).
• Medium Offense, which is basically a team that keeps up more consistent offensive pressure. Pretty much everything forces defensive plays in some sense, although the amount of fallback it has to undo losses of momentum is reduced - no Skarmory or Suicune here. This is usually easier to use than the slower team since the consistent offensive pressure it provides necessitates fewer double-switches. However, it is riskier because of the reduced defensive capabilities and its tendency to rely on Explosions to break through the opponent and prevent setups.
• Hyper-Offense, which is usually just a Baton Pass-centered team looking to get an Agility off to LK Drumlax or Marowak. You could just call this "BP" because that's exactly what this is. High risk, high reward team right here, and while not terribly common, it is a very relevant threat to look out for.

 

[Crystal_]

Yeah, rby basically consists on the same team with some possible variations in pokemon or in few movesets. And a lot of the variations you could think of are probably just inferior unless you get a surprise factor boost or something. The speed of the battles sometimes varies depending on teams and maybe playstyles but there are not "defined" strategies per say.

As for GSC, imo I'd expand what Jorgen said about Hyper-Offensive teams, or at least separate between "slow offensive" and "fast offensive". You'd agree that Borat's well-known team is medium offensive, but then, while a team that looks something like machamp/wak/cloy/sdlax/egg/zap or king/gar/egg/lax/cloy/zap is faster-paced, it would also fall in same medium-offensive category behind post#2's criteria. Just changing the movesets can also alter the speed of a team drastically.

 

[Jorgen]

I don't really think those two teams you posted are really different enough to deserve different categorization. If anything I might separate group #2 based on Boomhappy v. Mixsweeper reliance, and even then it'd only be different enough to deserve a subcategorization. Something like Ttar/Lax/Hera/Zap/Cloy/Nido would fit in #2 but isn't as reliant on explosions as you might expect.

 

[Borat]

I like that team actually, but with Machamp over Heracross, and Egg over something else, I think Nido. That's what I gave Earthworm for the longest time, and it was pretty damn good without being over explosion happy.

Then again, this is what I'd consider a formulaic team though. But most of these offenses fall within the same category. You can pretty much pick any 4 "offensive pokes" + lax + zap/kou. If you wanted to narrow it down further, 3 offensive pokes + lax + zap/kou + spiker. Narrowing it down further, 2 offensive pokes + offensive phazer + lax + zap/kou + spiker. Narrowing it down more, I like to have at least one normal resist in there, and at least one sleeper.

Mix and match to your heart's desire and you literally CANNOT go wrong. Secret to gsc teams guys, all right here.