Ladder Smogon Triples

Just thought I'd share a pretty great replay I had today (I'm Lordmayormuffsniff)

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogontriples-308927311

If anyone's interested in my sets (particularly my Flygon) I might edit this later with some more replays of high ladder battles showing how the team functions and a sort of RMT. On this alt from only using this team I'm currently sitting at 8th with an elo of 1474 and a glicko of 1803. I Had a pretty good streak of 32 wins vs 4 losses (i started the alt with 3 losses with another team, never expected this one to function as well as it does). Kudos to Drakestears for a great battle!

Edit: To add a bit more substance to this post, i thought I'd share some underated/ creative mons and sets I've been using to some success

Flygon @ Yache Berry
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 248 HP / 8 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Feint
- Tailwind
- Protect
- Draco Meteor

Flygon was a late addition to my team- although it is extremely niche, its combination of Feint, Tailwind, Levitate, decent speed tier and resistance to rock slide made it an excellent partner to my tyranitar

Tyranitar @ Chople Berry
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Rock Slide
- Assurance
- Protect
- Taunt

TTar suprisingly has great synergy with Flygon- Feint allows it to spam rockslides (especially under tailwind) and double the power of assurance. Between taunt and assurance, nearly every TR user is shut down, with the exception of Aromatisse (but in my team it gets nuked by Exca's Iron Head.) This means it is rare for me to lose the speed control battle.

Lastly, a mon i posted in the viability ranking thread-

Wartortle @ Eviolite
Ability: Torrent
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
- Follow Me
- Water Pledge
- Scald
- Icy Wind

Wartortle is an excellent support mon for a number of mons- It takes the three most common forms of priority, bullet punch, ice shard and aqua jet, as well as tanking brave birds and mach punches nicely allowing crucial support for pokemon such as Sylveon, Gardevoir, M-Diancie, Terrakion, M-Salamence, Landorus, Garchomp, Aerodactyl- the list goes on. I used water pledge in tandem with focus sash blaziken- this gives scald a 60% chance to burn and rock slide a 60% chance to flinch. Icy Wind for speed control.

What other creative or underated mons have you guys been using? The Smogon Triples discussion has been pretty much non existent lately, it'd be nice to try and revive the forum as I know I've seen a lot of creativity on the ladder. Hoopa Unbound is another mon who i think deserves some discussion.
 
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All right, this thread seems to have died down but here's a poor attempt at sparking some discussion around because I absolutely LOVE Smogon Triples. (I'm not 100% sure if this is the place for this BUT I see other people discussing here and I don't see a thread for Smogon Triples, only for Battle Spot Triples, which is lame)
I'm very content with the banlist and clauses and I believe creativity has little to no limit on Triples, where you don't exactly need to run X or Y Pokemon to counter Z because you can deal with thing without deviating too much from your core strategies.

Now, I'm not 100% versed on how the whole metagame works, but it seems like weather and pseudo-weather can be quite dominant, because of its ability to play the Speed Control game quite effectively. I'm particularly intrigued about Sun, because of Mega Charizard's Y's Drought being able to to pretty much shut off all other weathers when going mega. I don't know if Abomasnow can be considered a considerable threat for the same reason, but Abomasnow is quite slow and Ice types aren't exactly going to be taking the Rock Slide and Fighting moves from the likes of Mienshao and Hitmontop.

As for Trick Room, I have no idea how it works because I've never seen a full Trick Room team. The closest I've seen is a random Trick Room mon on a team that is meant to shut off Trick Room when it's unfavorable or to set it when it's necessary (to beat Tailwind and speed-boosting abilities, I presume)

But hey, I'm happy discussing anything about Triples. Let's get some ideas rolling!
 
All right, this thread seems to have died down but here's a poor attempt at sparking some discussion around because I absolutely LOVE Smogon Triples. (I'm not 100% sure if this is the place for this BUT I see other people discussing here and I don't see a thread for Smogon Triples, only for Battle Spot Triples, which is lame)
I'm very content with the banlist and clauses and I believe creativity has little to no limit on Triples, where you don't exactly need to run X or Y Pokemon to counter Z because you can deal with thing without deviating too much from your core strategies.

Now, I'm not 100% versed on how the whole metagame works, but it seems like weather and pseudo-weather can be quite dominant, because of its ability to play the Speed Control game quite effectively. I'm particularly intrigued about Sun, because of Mega Charizard's Y's Drought being able to to pretty much shut off all other weathers when going mega. I don't know if Abomasnow can be considered a considerable threat for the same reason, but Abomasnow is quite slow and Ice types aren't exactly going to be taking the Rock Slide and Fighting moves from the likes of Mienshao and Hitmontop.

As for Trick Room, I have no idea how it works because I've never seen a full Trick Room team. The closest I've seen is a random Trick Room mon on a team that is meant to shut off Trick Room when it's unfavorable or to set it when it's necessary (to beat Tailwind and speed-boosting abilities, I presume)

But hey, I'm happy discussing anything about Triples. Let's get some ideas rolling!
If you or any body else know some good sets, please post em! What works the same as in doubles? What's different?
 
Now, I'm not 100% versed on how the whole metagame works, but it seems like weather and pseudo-weather can be quite dominant, because of its ability to play the Speed Control game quite effectively. I'm particularly intrigued about Sun, because of Mega Charizard's Y's Drought being able to to pretty much shut off all other weathers when going mega. I don't know if Abomasnow can be considered a considerable threat for the same reason, but Abomasnow is quite slow and Ice types aren't exactly going to be taking the Rock Slide and Fighting moves from the likes of Mienshao and Hitmontop.
Sand is an incredibly effective playstyle, with the primary caveat being that it's easy to make yourself overly reliant on Wide Guard-able moves and run into trouble against teams carrying Wide Guard. I've had exactly two teams that avoided being overly match-up based, and a Sand team was one of them.

I haven't seen Hail much. The potential for Blizzard spam is theoretically nice? But Ice types mostly run slower than base 100, tend to be fragile, the exceptions tend to have poor Special attack... ultimately Sand tends to perform better.

Rain is a viable playstyle, though bulky Water Absorb Surf spam seems more effective overall in my experience. Still, Rain has some good advantages. Most notably, reliable Hurricanes for smacking enemies on the other side of the field.

I actually almost never see Sun. Mega Charizard Y, yes, but actual dedicated Sun teams?... not so much. The only really good Chlorophyll abuser is Victreebell (Venusaur has Weather Ball and Chlorophyll, but can't combine them) and Heat Wave spam isn't that effective. (Heatran is still a very solid Pokemon in Triples, for example, and Wide Guard is an issue too) Solar Power Heliolisk isn't as good as you might hope, either, and honestly you'd rather have Dry Skin Heliolisk tossing out Thunders and Surfs on a Rain team -especially since Paralysis is amazing in Triples.

As for Trick Room, I have no idea how it works because I've never seen a full Trick Room team. The closest I've seen is a random Trick Room mon on a team that is meant to shut off Trick Room when it's unfavorable or to set it when it's necessary (to beat Tailwind and speed-boosting abilities, I presume)
Trick Room is amazing. I class most viable Triples Trick Room teams as "surprise/semi-Trick Room", as Trick Room teams are often not obvious at a glance as Trick Room teams, often allowing them to get Trick Room up while the opponent is making things worse by stalling to get up Tailwind. Often times a Trick Room team getting up Trick Room is game right there -many teams in Triples are heavily reliant on going first and murdering the enemy before they can do anything, and completely fall apart when the situation is turned against them. Triples is so Speed-oriented that "surprise/semi-Trick Room" is a thing because you can be up in the range of base 80 Speed and still expect your entire team to outslow the enemy's entire team after a Trick Room, which incidentally opens up Trick Room's options, allowing it to practicably field Pokemon that in Doubles would be a terrible idea, or at least a huge risk.

Most teams just cannot manage to stall out Trick Room to turn the match around, not before half or more of their team is down.

As far as pseudo-weather goes, Gravity is actually viable in Triples. My favorite team since XY has been a Gravity team, and it's my other "not overly matchup-based" team. I tweaked it for ORAS -replacing Mega Lucario Focus Blasting things with Keldeo so I could have Sableye run as Mega Sableye to deal with fast Taunters 100% reliably- but the team made the transition fairly well. ORAS even added Meowstic as a Prankster Gravity abuser, if you want options. I anticipate Gen VII making Gravity teams even better, honestly. (Zygarde 100% Forme spamming Land's Wrath in Gravity sounds amazing)
 
Honestly, I feel like the overall counter, or at least preemptive measure against Weather is just carrying a Wide Guard user that is decently bulky. Sun seems to rely a lot of Heat Wave, Rain has Surf, Sand has Rock Slide and Earthquake and Hail has Blizzard spam. I'm going to try out a standard team with a Cloud Nine user and see how I do vs weather teams. I'll be posting sets about it and stuff maybe tomorrow.

I remember seeing a pretty good Sun team around with Megazard Y and Typhlosion, pretty good stuff. Venusaur can be quite a problem in the sun with its Sleep Powder and Weather Ball.

As for Trick Room, I definitely agree that getting a surprise Trick Room up can completely change the tides of the battle and I would even go as far as to say it's nigh impossible to out-stall it. However, I feel that as the meta develops, we'll start to notice a pattern for that one "Trick Room mon" on the team that is out of place and we'll be able to prepare accordingly, be it with a Taunt, Fake Out, or even an Imprison user.
 
Honestly, I feel like the overall counter, or at least preemptive measure against Weather is just carrying a Wide Guard user that is decently bulky. Sun seems to rely a lot of Heat Wave, Rain has Surf, Sand has Rock Slide and Earthquake and Hail has Blizzard spam. I'm going to try out a standard team with a Cloud Nine user and see how I do vs weather teams. I'll be posting sets about it and stuff maybe tomorrow.

I remember seeing a pretty good Sun team around with Megazard Y and Typhlosion, pretty good stuff. Venusaur can be quite a problem in the sun with its Sleep Powder and Weather Ball.

As for Trick Room, I definitely agree that getting a surprise Trick Room up can completely change the tides of the battle and I would even go as far as to say it's nigh impossible to out-stall it. However, I feel that as the meta develops, we'll start to notice a pattern for that one "Trick Room mon" on the team that is out of place and we'll be able to prepare accordingly, be it with a Taunt, Fake Out, or even an Imprison user.
Typhlosion isn't good I swear. to have any real power it runs eruption+specs usually, and it's totally abused by rain/priority/wide guard/anything faster than will target it/FF mons. Tran is usually the better choice.

edit: so this isn't a total shit post, min speed mega diancie is a baller TR mon because absolutely fucking no one expects it. like nobody. it does get undersped by actual TR mine the opp might have but it still works wonders. being able to go max attack/SpA is sick (fuck bulk who needs that shit).
 
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All right, so as promised. I got some sets I've been using for a bit to raise some discussion. First up, I made a TR Blizzspam core that seems to be pretty effective, given that I don't run into a few things that seem to shut it down.


Obamasnow (Abomasnow) (M) @ Abomasite
Ability: Snow Warning
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
- Protect
- Blizzard
- Giga Drain
- Ice Shard

sorry i had to call it like that
Anyways, here we have the star of the show. It's a very standard set, I don't believe there's much to be said here. It has priority, dual STAB and Protect to play mindgames and be able to beat Megazard Y's Sun sometimes if the opponent chooses to Mega Evolve right away. Next up...


Jellicent (F) @ Mental Herb
Ability: Water Absorb
EVs: 60 HP / 24 Def / 252 SpA / 172 SpD
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Trick Room
- Hydro Pump
- Shadow Ball
- Blizzard

Mental Herb ensures that Taunt doesn't entirely destroy it and that it doesn't get Prankster Encored right after setting Trick Room. Water Absorb because it helps vs Surf-spammy teams. The spread grants max SpA to ensure its Blizzard is powerful, Shadow Ball can do a large chunk to Aegislash and Hydro Pump pretty much blasts Charizard Y into oblivion, or at least somewhere close. This spread can live Aegislash's Shadow Ball and has a chance to live LO Shadow Ball from it as well. I feel you can change this spread to your liking, maybe a defensive Jellicent, if you're up for it. I just like the idea of a strong Jellicent, that's just me. Lastly...


Goodra (F) @ Life Orb
Ability: Sap Sipper
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Protect
- Dragon Pulse
- Blizzard
- Feint

Not only is Goodra absolutely adorable, but it has a fun combination of Blizzard + Feint. Life Orb gives extra power. Sap Sipper because other abilities are bad for this particular strategy (Gooey just makes my opponent faster on TR). The spread maximizes bulk and power. Dragon Pulse over something like Draco Meteor because it hits across the board and doesn't force Goodra to switch out afterwards. Feint ensures that Wide Guard is nullified while I use Blizzard with Obama and Jellicent.

As for what shuts down this strategy, kangaskhan's Scrappy Fake Out nullifies Jellicent completely and causes a big problem because of this. However, if you manage to lead out with Jellicent in the correct position, khan may not be able to flinch Jellicent. Another thing that may shut down the strategy is Imprison + Trick Room. It bypasses Mental Herb and pretty much forces the core into a very unfavorable position. There may be other things that shut it off right off the bat, but this is what I got so far.
If you have any ways to improve this core, or know of any counterplay to it, let me know!
 

marilli

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Hi i know this meta's kinda dead but this looked kinda fun so I tried playing it for the first time ever today.

Unfortunately i've been getting p low quality games for the most part on the ladder so far. So I've not been getting much counterplay no matter what I'm using.

Hoopa-based Trick Room looks to be an incredibly centralizing strategy. Have Fake Out / Redirection / Wide Guard / Quick Guard support, and lead with the appropriate one depending on your opponent's anti TR measures in order to set up Trick Room safely. If you're using redirection, I found that redirector in the middle slot is the most effective, as it can redirect single-target moves from all 3 opponents, denies them from going across the board, and it forces your opponent to give you a free sack in the middle for a free switch to a spread attacker with your speed control active.

Once TR goes up and a spread attacker and Hoopa starts spamming attacks, you literally cannot switch into it because very few things eats both Eruption / Pixilate Hyper Voice + Hyperspace Fury. Wide Guard and Protect are nullified and it's nearly impossible to recover from by stalling out turns.

As a result, Trick Room seems to be nearly mandatory on all teams, even non-TR teams, in order to allow yourself to get a Fake Out to relieve the pressure + reverse the Trick Room on the same turn, instead of having to wait for 4 turns for it to go away.

If you're interested in this hook me up!
 
Follow Me is actually only +2 priority, so Fake Out (+3 priority) can be used to either prevent the Follow Me and free up other attackers to do their thing or block the Trick Room drop if the dropper isn't a Ghost type. (Or if you're running Mega Lopunny, even if it is a Ghost type) Riolu is the only Prankster to have either of Follow Me or Rage Powder, and +3 priority Follow Me can still be outsped by Fake Out, which Riolu's 60 base Speed is not going to let it beat stuff like Mienshao without, you know, a Choice Scarf, which is just silly and vulnerable. Trick Room is definitely a powerful force in the meta that any halfway-competent team needs to be prepared for because otherwise you'll just lose anytime you meet one, but there are tools for beating even a redirection strategy backed by Wide Guard. It's only if you have a Wide Guard+Quick Guard-capable 'mon like Machamp that things start getting truly tricky and you have to successfully outpredict the foe to have any chance. (But outpredicting the foe is important in general in Triples)

Even then, Hoopa-Unbound doesn't like (Physical) priority, and priority is strong in Triples -Talonflame is one of the best general-purpose Pokemon in the meta, and

252+ Atk Choice Band Talonflame Brave Bird vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Hoopa Unbound: 355-418 (98 - 115.4%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO

Choice Band Adamant, while other Talonflam builds are probably more generally good, has validity and will usually OHKO Hoopa-Unbound. It will always do so if backed by effects like Sand Stream. This is obviously dependent on clearing out the Quick Guard Pokemon, but that's not necessarily a tall order, especially if it's not actually Wide Guard-capable -also, you can use Feint (Or your own Hoopa-Unbound's Hyperspace Fury) to support spread move spam and bypass the entire dynamic in the first place. The only risk is if they're using well-placed Ghost types, and even that can be bypassed with Mega Pinsir's Feint. (Also, no Ghost type has either of Rage Powder or Follow Me anyway, so a Follow Me+Wide Guard strategy is always going to be possible to Feint+spread-move spam)

The fact that basically nothing can switch in isn't substantially significant. Triples is like that anyway. It requires amazing prediction+good supporting tools to have any chance of pulling off a switch that's not just a waste of time and Pokemon.

It's not remotely necessary to have a Trick Room-setting Pokemon on your team to beat enemy Trick Room. It's merely one of the simpler tools, and even then it's heavily reliant on prediction to beat the kind of team you're describing -you need to successfully anticipate the Trick Room on the first turn and go for it to undo their own attempt, and you need for them to not counter-predict you and turn your un-setting Trick Room into setting for them. (Or predict you and just murder your un-setter, either way)
 

marilli

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Yes, for many teams Fake Out and priority are important means to deny this strategy. This is why Quick Guard needs to be on your team as well, in order to stop such threats. Earlier on my ladder run I didn't have that because I thought that defensive synergy is necessary, and I was using a Doubles team. Turns out defensive synergy isn't enough because there's too many slots that need be defensively switched into, to the point that it's not really feasible.

It's not broken by any means yet most people on the ladder seem completely unprepared for everything, which prevents people from actually learning anything about what's good and what's meh. I was only able to play against 2-3 real teams at most, so it really doesn't help. I look forward to better games vs better prepared players!
 
I'm not sure you really read my post in full. Part of my point was that spread move spam backed by Feint ignores the entire issue entirely -Quick Guard is no protection.

Worse, Quick Guard is only +3 priority. You can actually Fake Out the Quick Guarder. (Or ignore the Quick Guarder entirely, and Fake Out the Trick Room setter) As Trick Room teams tend to run slower than all other teams by a substantial margin, this is very much a valid problem for Trick Room Quick Guard.
 

marilli

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is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Top Contributor Alumnusis a Past SPL Championis a Former Other Tournament Circuit Champion
Chill, i'm not trying to pick a fight. I know how moves work. I'm not even saying it's broken, just that it'd be nice to face opponents that can counter it because there's ways to beat it.
 
I'm plenty chill. I'm just puzzled as to why you're re-iterating "Bring Quick Guard to deal with Fake Out" when A: part of my statement was you can deal with such Trick Room teams without priority at all and B: Quick Guard is not remotely a reliable answer to Fake Out stopping you setting Trick Room. It seems strange to respond to "Quick Guard is bypassable" with "Yeah, that's why I bring Quick Guard."
 

marilli

With you
is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Top Contributor Alumnusis a Past SPL Championis a Former Other Tournament Circuit Champion
I've been using Quick Guard Talonflame. It's faster than most Fake Out users, and having a fast mode is great because as you said, you can't always set up Trick Room. I'm also not sure why you think I said I use Follow me to stop Fake Out, but I'm not making a fuss about it because I'm not a jerk. Feint is a great move and it really throws a wrench in a lot of strategies like this. More players should use it to be completely honest and would let more teams prep against Trick Room.

Still not sure why you're being a condescending asshole when I said I'm still trying to learn how this metagame works.
 
I've been using Quick Guard Talonflame. It's faster than most Fake Out users, and having a fast mode is great because as you said, you can't always set up Trick Room. I'm also not sure why you think I said I use Follow me to stop Fake Out, but I'm not making a fuss about it because I'm not a jerk. Feint is a great move and it really throws a wrench in a lot of strategies like this. More players should use it to be completely honest and would let more teams prep against Trick Room.

Still not sure why you're being a condescending asshole when I said I'm still trying to learn how this metagame works.
I'm not, and I'm not sure why you think I am.

But yeah, Quick Guard Talonflame is one of Trick Room's best options for forcing the matter. Gotta make sure you have a Wide Guard in back and correctly predict how the enemy will lead, but Talonflame is too fast for any Fake Out user (Bar an already Mega Evolved Mega Lopunny, but this is Triples, so that's basically a technicality) to slam it if you've maxed its Speed, and meanwhile Gale Wings means it still gets to go first once Trick Room is up. It can also mess with expectations -the more obvious thing for Talonflame to be doing alongside a slow team is drop priority Tailwind, and this can lead to people making errors in the first turn that cost them the match, particularly if you're using one of the less well-known Trick Room setters and they don't realize that's what it does.

And yeah, Feint is an amazing move and I'm always a little surprised by how rarely I see it. Mega Pinsir, in particular, really seems like it should be a more popular 'mon -Stealth Rock is uncommon and less influential, and you can largely protect against Rock Slide with Wide Guard, so unless the enemy is using Feint themselves Mega Pinsir is both a wonderful supporting tool to a lot of strategies (like Eruption Sun) and a generally powerful hole-puncher in its own right.
 
Re-reviving this thread to throw in my two cents, which is that Triples is an underutilized playstyle that I wish more people ran, and that yes, Trick-Room can absolutely kill most teams in this metagame if you're not careful. I can't count the number of teams I've gone up against that used either this strategy or Whimsicott/Terrakion/usually Hitmontop to completely whomp on opponents, so much so that I've had to change up my usual team's strategy to compensate. Granted, I'm not exactly working with the best team possible, after all my Legendaries that I have on my team have the right EVs and decent IVs but the wrong natures, but it's what I have to work with.
 
Honestly Eruption Sun seems like such a good strategy in this meta. I run Tailwind Char-Y and Eruption Tran... so far im 14-0 after about an hour. ive got talon, sylv, and sharp in the back, mainly to help deal w TR.
 

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