Steely Start - UU Monotype Challenge Week 1 - 1 Days left to Vote!

[KM]

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UU MONOTYPE CHALLENGE WEEK 1 - STEEL​

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Hey everyone! :)

I am very excited and proud to reveal the ~UU MONOTYPE CHALLENGE~ (fanfare). Basically, I will be posting a RMT of a different UU team every 2-3 weeks.

General Rules:
- Each team must be a different Monotype.
- For each Monotype Challenge, I am allowed 1 (count 'em, one) Wild Card. A Wild Card is basically any pokemon in the UU- tiers that does not necessarily have to be the type of my Monotype.
- Every type will be eventually done, no matter how many viable pokemon there are.

But wait.... there's more.

I wanted to make this project more community-involved, so I decided to let you guys choose the Monotype that I do next. I obviously chose myself for the first one, and I decided to start with something that would be a real challenge to see if I could even do this.
The only way to make this work is if you guys get involved. I know that there are a lot of you out there reading it, and I'm not asking all of you to give in-depth rates or even just luvdisc the thread, but if you could please just reply to this post with which type I should next choose for the Monotype challenge. As an incentive to make people actually vote, if you end up choosing the type that gets the most votes, therefore meaning that the next Monotype challenge will be of that type, I will nickname one of the Pokemon in that team after you. (If you prefer to have it named something other than your forum username, leave that as well as your vote for the type.) Voting will end on Friday May 17 @ 8:00 p.m. EST in order to give me time to make the new team before the next RMT.

Current Available Types:

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Bug
Dark
Dragon
Electric
Fighting
Fire
Flying
Ghost
Grass
Ground
Ice
Normal
Poison
Psychic
Rock
Water

At this point, some of you may be thinking "Okay, I get it, monotype teams. But where's the challenge part of it?" My goal for this series is to reach an average of a 2.00 W/L ratio across every single team. For each individual team, anything lower than a 1.50 W/L ratio will be deemed a failure, anything between a 1.50 and 2.00 W/L ratio will be deemed a sort-of failure, anything between a 2.00 and 2.50 W/L ratio will be deemed a success, and anything over a 2.50 W/L ratio will be considered fucking fabulous. Ties count as half a win and half a loss. I will keep battling with a team I am happy with after much playtesting until I get to 100 battles, at which point I will stop.

Without further ado, the statistics for the first, steel-oriented monotype challenge.

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Alt: Kitten Steel 13 (Yes, this means there were 12 versions of the team before this.)
Overall W/L stats: 73.5/26.5
W/L ratio: 2.77 = Fucking Fabulous
ACRE: 1734
GXE: 76
Glicko2: 1797 ± 45
Average W/L ratio: 2.77
Average ACRE: 1734
Average GXE: 76
Average Glicko2: 1797 ± 45
Current "best" Monotype: Steel
Total W/L: 73.5/26.5
Challenge Percent Complete: 6.25%

Some of these statistics seem kind of silly now, but I'm just setting up a template to follow for the future RMTs ^.^ (this actually takes a lot of time, believe it or not).

Anyway, I've babbled on for long enough. Hopefully you all understand the basics of the Monotype challenge, and if you have any questions feel free to ask me via a reply to this thread.

Teambuilding Process

"I guess there's something to be said for limited choices" (Twilight 154).​

Yeah, I just fucking quoted Twilight in a Pokémon RMT. (problem?) What I'm trying to get at is that I really didn't have a wide array of choices in this team. I had a little teambuilding session about halfway through the process with CoolStoryBrobat (thanks, btw), and he basically confirmed what I'd already been experiencing, there really aren't that many viable steel pokes in UU and lower. That said, I still did make a couple of changes before I was happy with the team I'd created.

I actually started out the teambuilding process with my wild card. I figured that my main priorities would be something that could sponge both fire and fighting attacks as well as deal strong damage on the special side, something that steels aren't renowned for. I also thought I'd have trouble with being too slow, so I chose a fast pokemon. (Later found out that there's plenty of SpA and Spe in Steels). Chandelure fit all of these requirements.

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I chose SpD Bronzong as a SR set-up as well as an emergency counter to special attackers in case Chandelure couldn't deal with them. It also had the nice quality of levitating on a team full of ground weaknesses.

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To cover Chandelure's Dark weakness and add some more speed into the team, I decided to try an offensive Cobalion set.

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I added a Bisharp to give myself some much needed priority and some more offensive threat as well.

[pimg]639[/pimg] [pimg]442[/pimg] [pimg]668[/pimg] [pimg]655[/pimg]

I put a Rock Polish Aggron in because... I was sort of running out of ideas, and it seemed smart at the time.

[pimg]639[/pimg] [pimg]442[/pimg] [pimg]668[/pimg] [pimg]655[/pimg] [pimg]306[/pimg]

Finally, I put in a Durant for some more offensive power and as an effective late game sweeper.

[pimg]639[/pimg] [pimg]442[/pimg] [pimg]668[/pimg] [pimg]655[/pimg] [pimg]306[/pimg] [pimg]662[/pimg]

So, (at the time), I thought that was it! I tried out the team and it did...... kind of shit. I just had extreme redundancy in SubSD Bisharp, Durant, Offensive Cobalion, Rock Polish Aggron - they were all just filling niches that didn't need to be filled. I realized what had been in front of me the whole time and I replaced Aggron with Empoleon.

[pimg]639[/pimg] [pimg]442[/pimg] [pimg]668[/pimg] [pimg]655[/pimg] [pimg]398[/pimg] [pimg]662[/pimg]

Man, Empoleon helped a ton. It covered up my crippling fire weakness that Chandelure couldn't always handle, and had some decent offensive capabilities as well. I stole my SpD Anti-Chandy Anti-Nido set from my Hail RMT, but I fiddled around with the moveset a lot before I found what I really liked. The team still wasn't up to my standards, however, and I went to my wonderful Bro-buddy CSB to ask for some help, and he suggested a Magneton. I replaced Cobalion with Scarf Magneton and haven't looked back since, the thing is a beast.

[pimg]639[/pimg] [pimg]442[/pimg] [pimg]82[/pimg] [pimg]655[/pimg] [pimg]398[/pimg] [pimg]662[/pimg]

I liked where the team was going, but Chandelure just wasn't holding up its end of the bargain. It obviously could deliver on the offensive side, but I felt like I desperately needed to bring something in to the endless swathes of Victini/Darmanitan/Arcanine without having to worry about being OHKOd by a Bolt Strike/EQ/Rock Slide/Wild Charge etc etc. I first tried Porygon2.

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Don't get me wrong, I love P2, but it just was shit for this team. A total momentum loser, and opened me up further to fighting types. I thought about it and decided to try one of my all time favourite underrated UU pokemon, Qwilfish.

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Qwilfish officially solidified my team. Toxic Spike and Spike support made sweeping all the easier, and he was a hard stop to all of the physical threats that destroyed my team otherwise.

So, there I had my team! I was finally feeling confident enough to start laddering with it, and ladder I did~!

In-Depth Analysis

Slate - Empoleon @ Leftovers
Torrent
248 HP/252 SpD/8 Spe - Calm Nature - 0 Atk IVs
- Scald
- Protect
- Ice Beam
- Grass Knot​

Specially Defensive Empoleon is an absolute monster on this team. As I've stated in previous RMTs, he has exactly enough bulk to take a Earth Power from Nidoqueen/king, get knocked down into torrent, and OHKO them with scald. It can also take 2 Fire Blasts from Scarf Chandy, which is a nice bonus. Protect is extremely useful for scouting on choiced leads, most effectively Flygon, Rotom-Heat, Darmanitan, Victini, etc. In terms of the attacking moves, Scald and Ice Beam are for obvious coverage, and Grass Knot is more filler than anything. It's honestly not too useful other than to deal damage to bulky waters, but even then it's not powerful enough to even 2HKO anything. It is definitely the most expendable move I'm using, and if anyone has suggestions on what to put in its place I'd be happy to hear them. (Maybe Roar?) Not much else to say about Empoleon other than that it will always lead unless I suspect something like a Raikou or Zapdos to lead.

Silver - Magneton @ Choice Scarf
Sturdy
4 HP/252 SpA/252 Spe - Timid Nature - 0 Atk IVs
- Thunderbolt
- Volt Switch
- HP Ice
- Flash Cannon​

Scarfed Magneton is a fucking find. This thing is probably only outclassed by scarf Raikou in terms of an electric-type choiced attacker for UU, and has the second highest base SpA, only surpassed by aforementioned Raikou. This set relies totally and completely on surprise factor. It has multiple elements of surprise, the first being the fact that it is Scarfed. This allows me to kill lots of unsuspecting things, like say, a weakened LO Mienshao, or a banded Darmanitan, etc, etc. Scarfed base 70 still outspeeds a large portion of the metagame, so a win condition of a Magneton sweep is very viable and common. The second surprise is Sturdy. Most people don't even realize it gets Sturdy, and even if they do they'll automatically assume I'm running magnet pull. In this manner Magneton can be used to stop sweeps early-game when no hazards are up, for example, if there's a double down of Kingdra v. Magneton, I can T-Bolt as they rain dance, get knocked down to sturdy as they attack and kill them off, eliminating major threats to my team. Volt Switch is for momentum, and Flash Cannon is mainly a filler. HP Ice was chosen over HP Grass or HP Fire because of Flygon and Gligar, things that I have a rather hard time dealing with. I can always OHKO Flygon and Gligar if SR is up, and it is once again a surprise factor. At the teambuilding process, I thought that I wouldn't have any good choices for a special attacker on a Mono Steel team, and even when I was suggested to use Magneton I was iffy about whether it would even work, but it's played an amazing role on this team.

Midnight - Bronzong @ Leftovers
Levitate
252 HP/252 SpD/4 Att - Sassy Nature - 0 Speed IVs
- Gyro Ball
- Stealth Rock
- Toxic
- Explosion
​

Bronzong acts another attempt to counter the specially offensive pokes like Raikou that I face with all too often with this team. If I suspect a lead Raikou, I will lead with zong and get up Rocks as they Volt Switch, because that's honestly my best answer to a Raikou. I chose a specially defensive varient because Qwilfish provided almost all of the defensive bulk that this team needed, and because it is a steel monotype team, even the sweepers have decent bulk. Toxic is for general wearing down of threats that I can't directly deal with, and gyro ball is the go-to move for a Bronzong. Explosion is more of a filler move and a move for gaining momentum and some quick damage- I'm not sure if EQ or something would be better. Oftentimes, people think I'm running heatproof because it's on a mono steel type, so they'll literally go into a ground type and EQ me, giving me like 4 free turns. Other than that, it's a pretty typical Zong set, not much to say ^.^

Dusk - Bisharp @ Life Orb
Defiant
252 Atk/252 Spe/4 HP - Jolly Nature
- Iron Head
- Sucker Punch
- Substitute
- Swords Dance​

SubSD Bisharp represents the main win condition as a sweep for this team. There's a lot of prediction involved in using it, which I love. I can usually win the mindgames and get up a free SD or sub during the match, and with enough hazard support Bisharp can easily sweep. (especially because a lot of people forget about defiant, so I get lots of free boosts ^.^). I chose LO over lefties for the pure power of it, although it does limit the effectiveness of my substitutes and doesn't allow me to sub below like 40% in order to be able to actually start a sweep without killing myself in the process. I suppose I could change Sub into another coverage move, like Brick Break, but I honestly don't feel the need for it much and Sub does help me in situations with status - say for example I send Bisharp out against a Dusknoir and I predict a WoW, I can sub up as he wisps, SD as he's forced to switch/night shade me, and then go from there. Jolly Nature allows me to outspeed all the way up to uninvested Base 110s, although I'm not exactly sure how necessary that is, and maybe I'd be better off with Adamant. Either way, Bisharp is a major component of the team and can transform losses into sweeping comebacks.

Gunmetal - Durant @ Life Orb
Hustle
4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spe - Jolly Nature
- Hone Claws
- Iron Head
- X-Scissor
- Superpower​

Durant is an awesome pokemon in RU and UU, and people never expect just how damn powerful he is. After a Hone Claws, he can easily sweep like, 75% of the metagame, and his coverage gives him SE moves against many common "physical walls" (e.g. Registeel, Slowbro). Those that he can't hit super effectively will still be absolutely slaughtered by an Iron Head or an X-Scissor to the face. I chose Jolly over Adamant because it allows me to 100% outspeed all Mienshao as well as Modest base 115s, like Raikou. Although his speed and offensive presence are ridiculous, Durant actually doesn't really fit a role as a sweeper as much as he does a wallbreaker and a mid-game player that can eliminate threats and weaken the opponent's team, allowing Bisharp or Magneton to sweep.

Pink as Fuck - Qwilfish @ Air Balloon
Bold Nature
248 HP/252 Def/8 Spe
- Pain Split
- Waterfall
- Toxic Spikes
- Spikes​

Where to fucking start. This thing is an absolute monster, and it patches up every single hole that my team had. With a balloon, it completely laughs off any physical attack from fire, fighting, or ground pokes, which are "conveniently" all of Steel type's weaknesses. Switching it in on scarfed Flygon EQ/scarf MoxieDile EQ lets me get lots of free hazard support, and Pain Split was chosen over Explosion for the purposes of longevity. Although Qwilfish has full investment in bulk, it still has a menacing base 95 Attack to smack frail things with. Sometimes I do miss having black sludge, but Air Balloon gets me out of tricky situations once Bronzong is down. Overall, Qwilfish is the ultimate wild card for this team and probably the MVP of most of my matches.

Final Comments​

So, yeah! Thus concludes my first Monotype challenge, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. It's important to note that just because this is a Monotype challenge and not a normal RMT, that doesn't mean that I don't appreciate any feedback that you have to give me. This challenge is also about exploring the viability of different types in UU, and if there's any suggestions you might have to better a team, I'd be more than glad to hear them. Monotype teams present an interesting challenge, and each person thinks about it different, so you might be able to point out something I missed entirely.

Remember to vote down below on which type you'd like me to do monotype next, and remember that votes close on Friday May 17 @ 8:00 p.m. EST.

Thanks for reading!

<3 ~ Kitten Milk/Pleasure Kitten

 

[patrick11756]

Hey I like the team, just a few points.
1. Qwilfish is amzing, I've been running it on my teams and its my favorite wall.
2. Since qwilfish is so amazing and the glue that holds your team, do you think that a physically defensive set on zong would do better so you don't overwhelm qwilfish with continous blows? And earthquake hits raikou and with all the ghosts, I think explosion is kinda blech.
3. Just theorymoning, but have you tried subsalac berry set on bisharp? If you're running jolly it may be something to consider. Otherwise perhaps adamant would be better to get more bang for your buck?

Other than that good team! Watch out for heracross though.

I vote for normal (I think you'd have fun with snorlax/meloetta/cinccinno/ zangoose fyi) : )

 

[relaunched]

Hey this is a pretty cool team and idea, KittenMilk. I like the idea of a wildcard poke, which makes monotype an even more interesting challenge, by giving you one thing to cover your weaknesses. A couple things to try:

1. As Patrick1088 said, Earthquake over Explosion on Bronzong is good. This lets you take on Raikou a bit more easily. I know Gyro Ball does more than a quarter but the 2HKO is pretty nice. It's also nice to not have to blow it up against a lot of things, while doing better against Empoleon, Cobalion, etc.
2. Spikes and Toxic Spikes on Qwilfish is ridiculous because getting Qwilfish 5 turns of setup is almost never happening. Plus your team is easy to Rapid Spin against and there are tons of Poison types in UU, so I would remove Toxic Spikes and add maybe Thunder Wave. There are a lot of good choices for that slot actually.
3. Try out Rock Slide on Durant. I know your team doesn't like Cobalion without a Fighting move but without Rock Slide it doesn't really like Zapdos. Just try it, not sure if it's the best move for it on your team.
4. You just have to have Leftovers on sub-Bisharp. Life Orb has such bad synergy with Substitute if you don't have a recovery move so this is pretty important. Also, try out SubSD Cobalion (maxatk maxspe iron head close combat substitute swords dance leftovers) in Bisharp's place. This gives you more speed plus it allows Rock Slide to go more comfortably on Durant. Like with the Durant suggestion, just try it.

For your next I vote mono-fighting. This seems tough to make because of Fighting's prevalence of the metagame (and thus all the Fighting checks and counters out there), and not many good Special Fighting types, but if you can pull it off I think it would be great.

 

[Exbo]

Umm well, if I understood that right... you ought to switch Empoleon to--

LOL ijk. Great team, great score and most of all, GREAT IDEA!

Suggesting Fire type for next challenge!!


Bonus, use a Scarfed (Specs maybe?) Typhlosion (not shiny) to give it my name (if I end up getting most votes).
Actually I wanted to suggest Grass type with a Typhlosion wildcard but that'd be too restricting.
If the challenge ends up getting more than 2.5 W/L, I will keep your team for at least 3 months as my sig :)

Um and I vote for myself obviously :P

 

[KM]

Hey, thanks for the rates Patrick1088 and relaunched :)

Totally agreeing with the Defensive Zong, I'll try that out. Same with EQ. I actually find Toxic Spikes to be much more helpful than spikes, so if I were to replace one of them it might be spikes. Toxic Spikes helps me out by poisoning things that I otherwise don't have a direct counter to, like HTop, Recover Milotic, Blastoise, Cofag, etc etc. I may play around with changing spikes to something like Poison Jab/Thunder Wave/Destiny Bond/Explosion, though.

I'm really, really eh about Rock Slide on Durant. After Hustle, it would have a pitiful 72% accuracy, and Superpower just seems too valuable for Cobalion/Registeel/Empoleon etc. to give up. I realize LO has awful synergy with Substitute, but I really can't sacrifice the power. That said, I could just ditch substitute and add coverage. I have tried out Cobalion on this team before, and it is fast, but it just doesn't have the usefulness of priority as a last-ditch counter against things like Chandelure, Victini, weakened Raikou/Kingdra/Darmanitan etc.

Exbo - Thank you so much for the awesome feedback and encouragement ^.^ I will most definitely try out Typhlosion if Fire ends up winning ;).

That 2.5 challenge is an awesome incentive too, I'll try my best but some monotypes are going to screw me over big time (I'm looking at you, bug).

Honestly I'm happy that so far people haven't been voting for something that'll screw me over on week 2 xD (Don't get any ideas)

Thanks for all the suggestions, though, and I'll definitely fiddle with some things.

~PK/Kitten Milk

 

[Harbinger of Peace]

I've gotta say, this monotype challenge is a cool idea! Steel is also one of my favorite monotypes to do! Pretty cool team, and I vote for Bug Type! Bug is also an awesome type, and I think it would be a cool challenge!

 

[Farobi]

Electric Types please. Sorry don't have much of a rate.

 

[PTJon7]

Cool team Kitten its cool to see a well done mono-type team. I think I'll second Bug type, seems like a good challenge.

I think Durant may benefit from a Lum Berry over a Life Orb, mostly because after a Hone Claws Durant is plenty powerful. A Lum Berry will greatly increase the number of things it can set up on as well and create insurance against random statuses coming Durant's way.

I really like the Scarf Magenton set, seems really cool actually.

 

[acreland]

Hey Kitten Milk

Not much of a rate, just two suggestions:
1) I'd take the previous suggestion of EQ > Explosion on Bronzong but keep it specially defensive to be a perfect Raikou counter.
2) Change Qwilfish' nature to Impish > Bold so you don't power down Waterfall.

Other than that cool team. On the topic of your next mono-type, I vote Normal.

Luvdisc* for the awesome monotype RMT idea!

 

[Iron Manatee]

Dragon type in UU. idk what there are in UU though

 

[Moog2]

I'll have to vote for an Electric mono, as JosuaMunoz said above. But if you're nicknaming after people, PLEASE don't nickname after me. Use something cool, like 1.21 Gigawatts. I love this idea, it's really cool. Just battled you bug mono, don't know if you'll remember me, but eh. ^_^

 

[Iminyourcloset]

Hm. Can't give much of a rate; I'm not that good at doing Monotype things. (My mind just goes "wtf, huge weakness bro; why are you doing this to yourself?" and I just stop.)
But may I suggest something else on Durant? You could use a Lum Berry to not care about status, or use something like Wide Lens to make sure your Iron Heads/X-Scissors hit, plus it can bluff a choice item.
But otherwise, idk. But I do want to see an Electric Mono; But I think I'll vote with Bug; it seems kinda hard. and if Bug win, name me Closet after my PS! name.

 

[Psylink]

I have no comments for the team itself, but I think you should do Mono Fighting. There is plenty of sweeping potential, and defensive too (Cobalion, Virizion, Scrafty, anyone?)

 

[CoolStoryBrobat]

Really decent team, you got here, I know you already talked with me about this team but I'mma post in here saying mucho respect for using monotype in UU, I wonder which one you'll get the farthest with...Just as Closet said, I kinda suck at rating Monotype stuff, so I guess I could poke your repertoire of common knowledge by filling it with things you already know:

Beware of Chandelure, Flygon, and Rhyperior. Among other threats, I see those guys all as being pretty scary, and it wouldn't be unlikely to have two or more of any on the same team together. Rhyperior especially, as with Solid Rock it's going to be able to tank most non 4x-effective moves (Durant's Iron Head, Magneton's HP Ice, Bisharp's Iron Head, etc.) and be able to threaten a huge chunk of your team. Even though you have Empoleon, Rhyperior can simply rely on its teammates to fall back on. And switching in Rhyperior is a hard task, as even Qwilfish would hate to take an Earthquake, even from -1. I guess Bronzong's your best candidate to wear it down, but if Bronzong's dead due to one cause or another (lol explosion) Rhyperior is basically going to have a field day with this team. But anyway that's my 2 cents, and I'm sure you've found ways to mitigate these flaws if not at least play around them a bit.

Oh yeah, I also vote Fighting

 

[KM]

I wanted to thank you guys all for the awesome support and votes - I know it may not seem like much, but it really does make my day better when I see that 12 of you took time out of your day to vote for my challenges ^.^

That said, there is still time left to vote, but only about TWO DAYS. If you want your vote to be counted, please submit it as a reply to this thread by 5:00 P.M. EST on Friday May 17.

Thanks again and love you all, even the noob Iron Manatee who wants me to do fucking dragon. (which will be hell)

 

[Konata Test]

You got a good team there PK, i also love the idea you're using monotype.

I would vote for, ghost.

 

[KnoLawjick]

I love the idea of scarfed magneton, I'll have to try that one out sometime. If I were you, I would replace grass knot with SR on Empoleon, and try a duel screens Bronzong. It's not really better than what you've got, but I think it could work well.
My vote for the next one is Bug type

 

[sugarhigh]

I vote dark cause i wanna see liepard hax ;)

 

[Shuckleking87]

bug!

 

[Explorer]

I vote for Rock. Use the name CRYSTAL as opposed to Explorer if this type wins.

This is overall a great team and I plan to edit this post later with an actual rate. This is a great challenge overall.

 

[Jirachee]

Can you please not host votes in RMT threads? If you want to do your challenge, you can use social groups for that. RMT threads should be dedicated to teams only. Sorry!