ImKoolKidz
I COULD BE BANNED!
That’s very unhelpful.
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Metagame USUM AG Metagame Discussion Thread
- Thread starter Pigeons
- Start date
Ok, so this thread got revived from the 26th for incoherent ramblings and double posts, which is basically AG in a nutshell. Anyway just trying to help I'd strongly advise asking Anything Goes room authorities (anyone with a + symbol or above is an auth) for some teambuilding help. Most of them are good players who can help make improve your teams. As we've seen from these recent interactions, AG has a tendency for some people (not naming names) namely, P4ndaK1ng11 to go off on weird tangents that are spoken in English but I still have to put in Google Translate. Another thing I would advise is to not just make a post to quote someone and say thanks. You've recently said that you "don't like life orb" which is fine, but Life Orb is one of the strongest items in competitive pokemon, so closing your mind to using that item because you've had bad experiences with it is not a very smart move imo.
Anyway, I reviewed your team, and managed to come up with this. Hope you like it! n.n
Anyway, I reviewed your team, and managed to come up with this. Hope you like it! n.n
Hey, since AG Open is coming to a close, have a couple teams I made when my old ones were lost in the Great Deletion of Early 2019.
Team 1 is Bettah Meta, a soft trick room team, more focused on having fun with arc grass and mega maw than really taking advantage of anything, though it did turn out at least decently solid.
Team 2 is Magic Room Ultra, another fun one, this time with tapu lele and magic room, a move which stops the effects of all items for 5 turns. Using this move and a choice scarf, lele has the unique ability to both outspeed under its own psychic terrain, and has the option to remove the choice scarf temporarily in order to deal massive damage at an opportune moment.
Team 3 is Scarfray Standard, and is exactly as it sounds. I threw it together quick, so I'm sure it can be improved.
Team 1 is Bettah Meta, a soft trick room team, more focused on having fun with arc grass and mega maw than really taking advantage of anything, though it did turn out at least decently solid.
Team 2 is Magic Room Ultra, another fun one, this time with tapu lele and magic room, a move which stops the effects of all items for 5 turns. Using this move and a choice scarf, lele has the unique ability to both outspeed under its own psychic terrain, and has the option to remove the choice scarf temporarily in order to deal massive damage at an opportune moment.
Team 3 is Scarfray Standard, and is exactly as it sounds. I threw it together quick, so I'm sure it can be improved.
Thanks for reading nerds
Greetings AG community, I am an old player all the way back from PO and I came here today to be a member of the AG community, nice to meet you all and I hope we can be good friends ahaha
( I also have some interest in 1v1 as well but I feel like expanding sooner or later )
Once again, nice to meet you all
( I also have some interest in 1v1 as well but I feel like expanding sooner or later )
Once again, nice to meet you all
Hey guys,
I'd like to bring a new topic to the table: Vikavolt. It was mentioned in the AG chat room as a potential trick room abuser that could deal with several plagues that threaten trick room, such as support waterceus and primal kyogre. This caught my attention and I immediately started looking for sets.
This is the set:
Vikavolt @ Choice Specs
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Bug Buzz
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Volt Switch
HP Ice is there for zygarde-c/mega ray, doing a huge chunk to the former (nearly killing even defensive variants). Tbolt is for a strong general attack, volt switch is for momentum, and bug buzz hits psychic and dark types really hard as well as being an alternative STAB move. Obviously, this has good matchups with many things that normally destroy trick room teams. I'll probably test this more in the coming days during the AG ladder tournament.
This obviously requires further study, and i definitely will pursue this.
I'd like to bring a new topic to the table: Vikavolt. It was mentioned in the AG chat room as a potential trick room abuser that could deal with several plagues that threaten trick room, such as support waterceus and primal kyogre. This caught my attention and I immediately started looking for sets.
This is the set:
Vikavolt @ Choice Specs
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Bug Buzz
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Volt Switch
HP Ice is there for zygarde-c/mega ray, doing a huge chunk to the former (nearly killing even defensive variants). Tbolt is for a strong general attack, volt switch is for momentum, and bug buzz hits psychic and dark types really hard as well as being an alternative STAB move. Obviously, this has good matchups with many things that normally destroy trick room teams. I'll probably test this more in the coming days during the AG ladder tournament.
Calcs:
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Arceus-Water: 450-530 (101.3 - 119.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO - Support waterceus vs vikavolt
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 168+ SpD Kyogre-Primal: 284-336 (70.2 - 83.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO - Defensive kyogre vs vikavolt
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Thunderbolt vs. 32 HP / 0 SpD Kyogre-Primal: 348-410 (99.7 - 117.4%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO - offensive kyogre vs vikavolt
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Hidden Power Ice vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Zygarde-Complete: 488-576 (76.7 - 90.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery - defensive zygarde vs vikavolt
0 Atk Power Construct Zygarde-Complete Thousand Arrows vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Vikavolt: 106-126 (29.6 - 35.1%) -- 16.3% chance to 3HKO - side note, defensive zygarde does little to vikavolt, so maybe it can be a zygarde check on even faster teams? i dunno, more exploration needed
offensive zygarde vs vikavolt:
228+ Atk Power Construct Zygarde-Complete Thousand Arrows vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Vikavolt: 144-171 (40.2 - 47.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Hidden Power Ice vs. 0 HP / 48 SpD Zygarde-Complete: 464-548 (80.9 - 95.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Arceus-Water: 450-530 (101.3 - 119.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO - Support waterceus vs vikavolt
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 168+ SpD Kyogre-Primal: 284-336 (70.2 - 83.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO - Defensive kyogre vs vikavolt
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Thunderbolt vs. 32 HP / 0 SpD Kyogre-Primal: 348-410 (99.7 - 117.4%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO - offensive kyogre vs vikavolt
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Hidden Power Ice vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Zygarde-Complete: 488-576 (76.7 - 90.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery - defensive zygarde vs vikavolt
0 Atk Power Construct Zygarde-Complete Thousand Arrows vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Vikavolt: 106-126 (29.6 - 35.1%) -- 16.3% chance to 3HKO - side note, defensive zygarde does little to vikavolt, so maybe it can be a zygarde check on even faster teams? i dunno, more exploration needed
offensive zygarde vs vikavolt:
228+ Atk Power Construct Zygarde-Complete Thousand Arrows vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Vikavolt: 144-171 (40.2 - 47.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Levitate Vikavolt Hidden Power Ice vs. 0 HP / 48 SpD Zygarde-Complete: 464-548 (80.9 - 95.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
This obviously requires further study, and i definitely will pursue this.
This sounds interesting, but aren't there better options avaible ? Sure, Vikavolt's 145 SpA is impressive in its own right, but not all that impressive when you consider Xurkitree's existence, which does the same job of beating support ogre and waterceus while not needing to run specs (you can run Electrium Z instead) due to its much higher 181 SpA, and even has late-game sweeping potential because of Tail Glow. Now, Xurkitree's speed is a liiittle high to be ran in a TR team, but nothing that can really threaten it will be slower (Ferro and Celesteela can't really touch it), and Dialga, which has 90 base speed (7 points higher than Xurk) is still considered a good TR mon so that's kind of a moot point. Xurkitree and Vikavolt's bulks are also really similar and Xurkitree has an arguably better typing defensively speaking (but neither are meant to be taking hits anyways). It also has the advantage of not being weak to SR, which allows it to be brought in more times. The only reason I could see to run Vikavolt instead of Xurkitree is because of the Zygarde matchup, but even then, Xurk also lives a Thousand Arrows from defensive variants, allowing it to setup and kill, and while it does get OHKOed by offensive variants, it also OHKOes them with HP Ice meaning it'll win anyways if TR is up.
Because of all the aforementioned points, I don't really see the point of running Vikavolt in TR, but maybe there's something I'm not seeing here.
Oh shit ima noob..... Yeah, xurkitree's just better. It's definitely on the faster side, but its certainly slow enough to be usable. I'll probably spend some time figuring this out.
Pdon says hi
This pokemon is the main reason why vikavolt, or any electric type for that matter except maybe zekrom is not viable in AG. Even with specs, the best vikavolt can do is solar beam, and obviously being choice locked into solar beam is an incredibly bad idea that's just begging mega ray to set up on you and sweep. Not to mention that vikavolt really needs trick room to do anything since its slow and gets destroyed by everything, and it can't set it up for itself so you have to set up trick room with something like bronzong, then blow up to get vik safely in, and you only get a turn or 2 to deal damage before your opponent figures out you're specs and send in something to use you as setup fodder. Btw, those calcs you showed are absolutely meaningless, nobody is gonna switch their arceus water into a vikavolt, or their pogre.
Xurkitree doesn't really fare that much better against pdon, and it also has the same issues that vik has if you're trying to use it on trick room. If you're going to use xurk, I think your best bet is to use something like this:
Xurkitree @ Psychium Z
Timid Nature
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
- Tail Glow
- Thunderbolt
- Grass Knot
- Hypnosis
Even at +3, grass knot doesn't even OHKO specially defensive pdon:
+3 252 SpA Xurkitree Grass Knot (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Groudon-Primal: 312-368 (77.2 - 91%) -- guaranteed 2HKO.
But you can try and abuse sleep cheese tactics and put it to sleep, then hope for a two turn sleep. I feel you have better odds of breaking pdon with this then with trick room.
I do encourage you to keep trying to find new trick room strats, I think its an under explored strategy in AG. Electric types are not the way to go though imo. Have a nice day!
I think you might have forgot that vikavolt has levitate, and as such is immune to ground attacks.....Pdon says hi
This pokemon is the main reason why vikavolt, or any electric type for that matter except maybe zekrom is not viable in AG. Even with specs, the best vikavolt can do is solar beam, and obviously being choice locked into solar beam is an incredibly bad idea that's just begging mega ray to set up on you and sweep. Not to mention that vikavolt really needs trick room to do anything since its slow and gets destroyed by everything, and it can't set it up for itself so you have to set up trick room with something like bronzong, then blow up to get vik safely in, and you only get a turn or 2 to deal damage before your opponent figures out you're specs and send in something to use you as setup fodder. Btw, those calcs you showed are absolutely meaningless, nobody is gonna switch their arceus water into a vikavolt, or their pogre.
Xurkitree doesn't really fare that much better against pdon, and it also has the same issues that vik has if you're trying to use it on trick room. If you're going to use xurk, I think your best bet is to use something like this:
Xurkitree @ Psychium Z
Timid Nature
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
- Tail Glow
- Thunderbolt
- Grass Knot
- Hypnosis
Even at +3, grass knot doesn't even OHKO specially defensive pdon:
+3 252 SpA Xurkitree Grass Knot (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Groudon-Primal: 312-368 (77.2 - 91%) -- guaranteed 2HKO.
But you can try and abuse sleep cheese tactics and put it to sleep, then hope for a two turn sleep. I feel you have better odds of breaking pdon with this then with trick room.
I do encourage you to keep trying to find new trick room strats, I think its an under explored strategy in AG. Electric types are not the way to go though imo. Have a nice day!
But good points.
I think to add on more to what Drakus said, as a whole, Trick Room is a p terrible playstyle and has been throughout all of
Gen 7. It just lacks any kind of consistency, can't break most balance teams, and Trick Room is too short to exploit enough. The surge in TR teams on ladder is mostly trying to make a mediocre playstyle work, and at the end of the day, no matter how much innovation occurs, Trick Room is not something people are going to use in serious games, and is really just a meme. Also, idk how the fuck levitate matters when vikavolt is a bug type and Pdon is a fire type.
Gen 7. It just lacks any kind of consistency, can't break most balance teams, and Trick Room is too short to exploit enough. The surge in TR teams on ladder is mostly trying to make a mediocre playstyle work, and at the end of the day, no matter how much innovation occurs, Trick Room is not something people are going to use in serious games, and is really just a meme. Also, idk how the fuck levitate matters when vikavolt is a bug type and Pdon is a fire type.
It can use fire and rock type attacks as well...
Mega Mawile, destroyer of worlds, smasher of many. A powerful destructive force..
Goddamnit i can't keep up that.
So, Mega Mawile is completely outclassed by literally every other mega outside of trick room. But in trick room, it is the premier choice for a mega. It can put holes in many common pokemon in trick room, such as zygarde (which tr usually has a bit of trouble breaking), other dragon types, etc. It often doesn't need a boost to take these on, but if you want a full sweep, it's probably prudent to get a boost first.
Unlike most other trick room abusers, it's not useless outside of trick room. It can check marshadow quite well, and pivot around and throw off intimidates in base form if you want to. It also can beat ferro w. fire fang. Oh, and it can do sucker punch shenanigans with all the necrozmas, as well as other sweepers such as scarf/specs ogre that threaten tr without tr up, by threatening to sucker their ass/actually suckering their ass.
Calcs:
252+ Atk Mawile-Mega Fire Fang vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ferrothorn: 212-252 (60.2 - 71.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Mawile-Mega Play Rough vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Marshadow: 336-396 (104.6 - 123.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 Atk Life Orb Marshadow Close Combat vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Mawile-Mega: 207-243 (68.3 - 80.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
(w/o intimidate)
-1 252 Atk Life Orb Marshadow Close Combat vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Mawile-Mega: 136-161 (44.8 - 53.1%) -- 30.9% chance to 2HKO
with intimidate
252 Atk Marshadow Soul-Stealing 7-Star Strike vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Mawile-Mega: 255-301 (84.1 - 99.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Now for it's problems.
Pdon says hi
Obviously this beast is a pain. Teammates must be relied on to keep this beast in check. However, getting off intimidates when it swaps in can often ease other pokemon's jobs.
Replays:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7anythinggoes-915456290 mawile dealing w/ marsh very nicely.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7anythinggoes-915450556 mawile dealing with marsh very nicely again, but against the player that was #1 at the time.
I'll get more along the ladder tour. Until next time, my friendos!
You calced those without huge Power loltime for another meme lol
Mega Mawile, destroyer of worlds, smasher of many. A powerful destructive force..
Goddamnit i can't keep up that.
So, Mega Mawile is completely outclassed by literally every other mega outside of trick room. But in trick room, it is the premier choice for a mega. It can put holes in many common pokemon in trick room, such as zygarde (which tr usually has a bit of trouble breaking), other dragon types, etc. It often doesn't need a boost to take these on, but if you want a full sweep, it's probably prudent to get a boost first.
Unlike most other trick room abusers, it's not useless outside of trick room. It can check marshadow quite well, and pivot around and throw off intimidates in base form if you want to. It also can beat ferro w. fire fang. Oh, and it can do sucker punch shenanigans with all the necrozmas, as well as other sweepers such as scarf/specs ogre that threaten tr without tr up, by threatening to sucker their ass/actually suckering their ass.
Calcs:
252+ Atk Mawile-Mega Fire Fang vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ferrothorn: 212-252 (60.2 - 71.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Mawile-Mega Play Rough vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Marshadow: 336-396 (104.6 - 123.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 Atk Life Orb Marshadow Close Combat vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Mawile-Mega: 207-243 (68.3 - 80.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
(w/o intimidate)
-1 252 Atk Life Orb Marshadow Close Combat vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Mawile-Mega: 136-161 (44.8 - 53.1%) -- 30.9% chance to 2HKO
with intimidate
252 Atk Marshadow Soul-Stealing 7-Star Strike vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Mawile-Mega: 255-301 (84.1 - 99.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Now for it's problems.
Pdon says hi
Obviously this beast is a pain. Teammates must be relied on to keep this beast in check. However, getting off intimidates when it swaps in can often ease other pokemon's jobs.
Replays:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7anythinggoes-915456290 mawile dealing w/ marsh very nicely.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7anythinggoes-915450556 mawile dealing with marsh very nicely again, but against the player that was #1 at the time.
I'll get more along the ladder tour. Until next time, my friendos!
252+ Atk Huge Power Mawile-Mega Fire Fang vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ferrothorn: 424-500 (120.4 - 142%) -- guaranteed OHKO
Also you forgot +2 calcs, this one I consider very important
+2 252+ Atk Huge Power Mawile-Mega Play Rough vs. 240 HP / 252+ Def Arceus-Fairy: 352-415 (79.8 - 94.1%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
Conclusion: Mega Mawile is good but only in trick roon with Memento support or something
Hello everyone would you people say that Arcanine is a good fire type to use within AG?
Can someone help me fix this team and make it a star team by pointing out the flaws and helping me fix the terrible ev spread?
https://pokepast.es/15bf17f4fe959a9e
https://pokepast.es/15bf17f4fe959a9e
I'd honestly just start this team over, because all the sets are really bad, especially that Marshadow set. Not only is it sash, it's not even invested in Attack, its best stat. Besides, I don't think that team is even legal in-game.
I would really like to ask why Ghostceus is B- while Gothitelle is B. Most players in the AG chat that I've talked to agree that there should be the changes of:
Ghostceus to B
Gothitelle to B-
Thank you in advance.
EDIT: This isn't a nomination. I want people's opinions on Ghostceus and if it's good enough for B.
Ghostceus to B
Gothitelle to B-
Thank you in advance.
EDIT: This isn't a nomination. I want people's opinions on Ghostceus and if it's good enough for B.
Last edited:
Goth I could definitely see in B-, but personally think B is still fine. It's just still really strong at trapping, and falling out of favor isn't quite the same thing as being unfavored in the meta right now. Goth is still a pretty strong, workable Pokemon that can be hard to play against and I feel like B- might represent how little it's been used recently, but not its total threat potential.
Can't see why Ghostceus would rise at all though. It doesn't see much usage nor does it seem all that undervalued. Darkceus and Marshadow have only been getting better recently and I can't say I've seen anything new from Ghostceus that would warrant the bump. A nomination would need to explain what's changed for it cuz I'm lost there.
thanks for the explanation
P4ndaK1ng11
Banned deucer.
Tho Arcanine is a great meme plus I have a team with Arcanine and it total did great, I got 1900 with it but that was in the old days but I don't think it would be as good with all tryhards in the ladder of ag.
What "meme" are you referring to? Pdon's better in (almost) every stat.
Unicorns
Banned deucer.
In short, offensive forms of P-Groudon are significantly less common in AG than Ubers, due to the centralization of Mega-Ray. Additionally, Arc-Steel provides a Toxic immunity, which is a much more appreciated in the bulkier AG metagame, and can act as a fairly basic win-conditon with CM Earth Power.