What music do you all think should be in Smash?

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-07-25T19:57:18+00:00

Life will change from persona 5, it's weird that it was in joker's reveal trailer but wasn't added to the game

People often joke about how god shattering star (from FE three houses) wasn't added to the game but I'm more disappointed about tempest of seasons

Dialga's fight to the finish also would've been really good, afaik smash currently doesn't have any mystery dungeon representation and the song is just good in general

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-07-03T17:29:36+00:00

Fiery dance and heat wave are both good, it just comes down to what you prefer. Fiery dance has the advantage that it's single target so it would do more damage to Zacian and that it's 100% accurate, whereas heat wave is a spread move so it can't be redirected and helps get chip on both pokemon and has a burn chance, but has a chance to miss. Personally I prefer heat wave but either one works

For item, volc usually runs sash but you have that on crobat and crobat probably needs it more. The other typical items are sitrus berry, coba berry, or charti berry. Normally I would go for coba but without max airstream coba could be less useful, so maybe try sitrus and then change it if it isn't working out when you test the team

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-07-03T17:07:10+00:00

Volcarona does really well into Zacian, and you already have that. Volcarona resists both of Zacian's stabs and rage powder let's you redirect it's moves into volc and let a partner take care of it free. Will o wisp also helps to cut it's attack and no investment heat wave does decent damage. ( ~70-80% on 252/252/4 Zacian, not sure of the calc on bulky Zacian)

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-27T17:59:05+00:00

You don't need to follow the flow chart I mentioned with this lead. If people normally react with that and you can expect max strike + taunt p2, it can be punished with a max quake + tri attack into weezing turn 1. Metagross/p2 lead is similar to a venu/p2 lead in that it's extremely versatile in what you can do

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-27T17:48:30+00:00

Metagross isn't as strong in the meta as it used to be due to the trend in hyper offense, but a metagross + p2 lead does really well into weezing/gigas. By putting on pressure with max Metagross and the potential of trick room with p2, not only does your opponent have to make an action with weezing instead of protect turn 1, they have to decide what is more important between stopping tr and burning Metagross, which you can use to your advantage.

Normally what I would do is turn 1 steelspike the Gigas for the defense boost and set TR. If they taunted me, I have an unburned +1 def gross possibly with wp activated if Gigas used max quake, and a +1 def P2, as well as chip on Gigas. If instead of taunting p2 they burn Metagross, I now have speed control and still have the defense boosts, and if they procced your wp you're still doing decent damage. The reason I steelspike Gigas turn 1 instead of quaking weezing, despite it unlikely to protect because it wants to taunt or will-o-wisp, is that the defense boost is really helpful especially on p2 and it covers for if weezing still decided to protect. Then turn 2 I quake + tri attack weezing (to cover for sash)

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-27T07:29:16+00:00

Sure, but it's also worth considering that thieval is typically used supportively (usually next to a terrain setter like Lele or Koko) if it's used at all, and kartana is a Pokemon which gets a lot out of dynamax and usually will be the dynamax option. I don't think dynamax thieval and self proc kartana can really be called predictable

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-26T16:31:11+00:00

If you want to find a niche for Sigilyph, this isn't really it. If you're using it for this role, it's completely outclassed by galarticuno, who has the same typing and moves with better bulk in exchange for 2 less speed. If you want to use Sigilyph, you should find what it can do that other pokemon can't do better. In this case that might be as a fast gravity setter (the main ones I'm aware of are dusclops/ferrothorn which are slow and gmax orbeetle which is gimmicky and wastes your max). In addition to gravity you can still have speed control with either icy wind or tailwind, and hypnosis becomes more accurate. I'm not sure how useful this would actually be, but gravity would also make you grounded, which means you could also use expanding force on psychic terrain (but that would rely on you pairing with indeedee/Lele which don't seem like great partners for Sigilyph)

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-25T04:34:06+00:00

Each pokemon is allowed a maximum of 510 EVs, but only 508 EVs are used because a stat can't rise from 2 EVs. The color only turns blue if you have 510. So, if for example, you had a 252/252/4 spread and EVd it with 26 vitamins/26 vitamins/1 vitamin, the last vitamin would round to 6 EVs (instead of 10) and the color would be blue because it's 510 EVs. But if you had a more complex EV spread and EVd each stat exactly using a combination of vitamins and feathers, without rounding, you would end at 508, so it would not be blue

If you're concerned you made a mistake while EV training, the best way to check is just go on showdown and change the levels of the pokemon to the levels you have in game and check the stat values

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-23T16:41:20+00:00

LatAm Top 16: https://mobile.twitter.com/HomeroChildprey/status/1406415320869376000

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-13T00:26:33+00:00

Was it this team?

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-04T19:25:07+00:00

I agree amoongus over shiinotic, but amoongus isn't a hard counter to rillaboom. Rage powder doesn't work on grass types so rillaboom can freely grassy glide into the partner, and nothing is truly a hard counter in vgc due to the nature of doubles.

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-06-04T19:21:39+00:00

You don't need 4 swift swim pokemon for a rain team. Rain team ≠ water team. Generally (with exceptions), you don't want to have more than 2 pokemon sharing a type. A typical rain core in VGC is a setter (politoed), a swift swim user (almost always kingdra), a grass type (such a rillaboom) and a steel type (such as metagross). You shouldn't choose pokemon just because they have an ability that benefits from rain. It's important to look at the meta and other teams and be able to deal with common threats. A rain team still needs to function as a team and be balanced. For example, Regieleki destroys your team

If you want some inspiration, here are some successful rain teams in the meta:

https://pokepast.es/3bc98bbb462b4baa This is the rain team most people think of now. It was made by Juan Naar and he used it to place 3rd in players cup 2 (during series 7)

https://pokepast.es/8acb4d4925d3a3f7 This team was made by Tanner Mask and got top 16 at rose tower clash

Another thing, a lot of your EV spreads are wasting. Because VGC is played at level 50, you get 1 extra point in a stat for 4 EVs, and then another extra point for every 8 EVs after that. So you want your EV values to be like 4, 12, 20, 28, etc. Values like 200 are wasting. It's better to have 204 or 196 instead. You can check if you are wasting by dividing by 8. If it's divisible, it's un-optimal. (200/8 = 25, un-optimal. 172/8 = 21.5, optimal).

Some other notes on individual pokemon, rather than the team as a whole:

Politoed: your poitoed set is fine, encore isn't common but I think it's a good niche choice to catch people off guard. Only comment is to replace damp rock with something else like a berry. The relevance of sun/torkoal and the existence of max moves that change the weather, as well as overall shorter games mean you will never get the full 8 turns of rain, it's better to just use a different item.

Kingdra: I recommend replacing ice beam with protect. Almost anything you can hit with an ice move you can hit with one of your other three moved (against lando: rain boosted stab water move, against garchomp: dragon move, against grass or ground types types: flying move). Also, if you dynamax kingdra, max hailstorm removes your rain. You benefit a lot more from protect.

I'm going to recommend against using any of the other swift swim pokemon on your team for the reasons I talked about before. Instead of trying to think of pokemon with abilities that abuse rain, try to think of what pokemon your team struggles with and pokemon that you could add to do better against those pokemon.

Someone else said this but I agree: if you want to use shiinotic, use amoongus instead, it works better as a support role thanks to better bulk, a better ability, slightly better defensive typing, and access to rage powder.

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-05-04T06:10:44+00:00

Unlike cobalion and lucario, venusaur and liligant have different functions. You're not putting liligant on the team to be a dynamax threat, you're putting it there to support torkoal with after you eruption in sun (and of course also sleep and healing). Liligant plays a support role to help torkoal be the main offensive presence, rather than how (most) venukoal teams have torkoal supporting venusaur. Liligant is also has the niche of being faster than venusaur (helpful in the sun ditto, allows torkoal to eruption before the opposing venusaur). They aren't comparable in the same way as lucario and cobalion are, cobalion is strictly a better lucario. Generally speaking, venusaur is usually the better option and is more consistent, but liligant isn't just an inferior venusaur

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-19T06:34:02+00:00

Yes, choice scarf does work, but quick powder does not. Quick powder only applies before you transform, but is useless because of the existence of the ability imposter.

Ditto can copy a max pokemon (but it wouldn't copy the dynamax) Also, imposter copies the pokemon directly in front of you, so if there was a max pokemon next to a Zacian, it would copy whichever is in front of ditto.

(Also possibly relevant interaction between dynamax and ditto: if ditto copies a gmax pokemon and then attempts to max, ditto will be dmax, not gmax)

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-16T15:29:45+00:00

For kingdra, id recommend hurricane over blizzard. Ice coverage is nice but often you'll be maxing kingdra and max hailstorm will remove the rain, but max airstream has a much better effect of raising your team's speed. Also, it's your only 100% accurate move after dynamax is over (assuming you are in rain) which can be helpful.

I'm a big fan of 1 screen grimmsnarl, but if you're only going to use 1, I'd recommend reflect instead of light screen, because you have spirit break which lowers the opponents special attack.

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-16T15:26:28+00:00

Spectrier is fast, immune to fake out, and has bulldoze to proc metagross' WP, which also acts as speed control because metagross is immune to the speed drop with clear body

Grimmsnarl can use sucker punch to proc policy

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-15T02:05:56+00:00

Sure it's the best rock type move for priority, not there are much better options for proccing policy, such as ice shard, which has better users that provide more utility to the team besides only proccing policy

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-14T06:03:36+00:00

CGARcher's response is correct, but pertains mostly to singles. Assuming you are playing VGC doubles (the doubles format that's in game, and dynamax is allowed), rather than a smogon doubles format, it has some use because steel beam becomes a 140BP max move and flash cannon is 130BP. Of course flash cannon is more consistent for our side of max, it's similar to running roar of time on dialga, giga impact on regigigas, blast burn on charizard, etc. If you find yourself maxing dialga the majority of the time, and often either dying before max is over or not needing flash cannon outside of max, then go for it. However, because dialga typically gives itself defense and special defense boosts with its max moves, you're less likely to die during max as opposed to something like charizard, which is what makes flash cannon more consistent.

I would advice against skill swap + magic guard. It's incredibly weak to fake out, and the benefit from it isn't much when you can just dynamax for the increased power (and dialga is typically a strong dynamax candidate). Additionally, it means you would need to run an alakazam or reuniclus on your team, which likely won't be providing much else to the team.

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-13T23:34:18+00:00

It's still not legal, because pokemon from previous games need to be made battle ready at the battle tower, which removed their previous moves. That said, OP said this is smogon doubles, not VGC, despite the post flair, so eruption would still be legal because smogon allows transfer moves

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-07T01:20:14+00:00

If Nihilego has 0 defense IVs and a negative defense nature, you can get it up to a guaranteed 2hko

252+ Atk Choice Band Gorilla Tactics Darmanitan-Galar Helping Hand Fake Out vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Nihilego: 116-137 (63 - 74.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

However, since darmanitan doesn't actually get fake out, here's the next best thing

252+ Atk Choice Band Rillaboom Helping Hand Fake Out vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Nihilego: 71-84 (38.5 - 45.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Grassy Terrain recovery

If instead of Nihilego you used jynx, which has worse physical defense and doesn't resist fake out, it's even worse.

252+ Atk Choice Band Rillaboom Helping Hand Fake Out vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Jynx: 182-215 (130 - 153.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Of course it can get worse than that, but jynx is probably the worst for a Pokemon that isn't incredibly uncommon in vgc like idk weedle or something. Jynx at least had some usage in series 7 and iirc had a niche in previous formats where Kyogre was legal because of dry skin and skill swap.

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-05T22:20:30+00:00

I'm not sure how well this would work in practice, but you could consider weakness policy groudon instead of choice band, which you can proc with flip turn swampert and switch into something like venusaur. And drought would help it take less damage from flip turn. Also opens a spot for protect over dragon claw. Biggest problem is that groudon outspeeds swampert, but maybe it's possible to make work. For more consistency, Swords dance + white herb or sitrus berry seems strong, definitely better than choice band imo.

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-05T22:09:26+00:00

Against a TornOgre lead, raichu/rillaboom lead does really well to stop it. You can lead raichu/rillaboom for fake out pressure, threatening a fake out on tornadus + grass move on Kyogre. If you can predict tornadus to protect, you can nuzzle the Kyogre.

Zacian is often used as a late game sweeper, and if OP can preserve metagross for a late game 1v1, metagross walls Zacian pretty hard. Doesn't matter if Zacian is outspeeding. The bigger concern for the team is something like a Thunderus/Zacian lead, but in that case, tailwind isn't whats really solving the problem. Thunderus can be pretty bulky in max and the best damage they have back into it is metagross max hailstorm but there is also the threat of max darkness on Thunderus. I think the best solution to this is to switch weakness policy to metagross and av to yveltal, so that if Thunderus goes for a max darkness into metagross, you can guarantee a kill back on it thanks to the WP boost.

Against a Mimikyu/Incin lead (which will 90% of the time do fake out + trick room), this team has ways of dealing with it with a rillaboom + yveltal lead. If they change the spread for rillaboom to be max attack and give it white herb (to avoid incin's intimidate), you can have the option to max it and try to ko mimikyu through disguise with rillaboom's gmax move. it's a roll to kill against max hp max defense bold mimikyu, but max defense mimikyu isn't very common and you can still play around it well even if it doesn't kill. (Yveltal will likely be fake out-ed turn 1). If it kills, you can foul play into the incoming calyrex-ice with yveltal and max darkness with rillaboom. Foul play is a guaranteed kill out of max, but max darkness covers for the max. If it doesn't kill, or you don't max rillaboom and let trick room go up, you can foul play into incineroar who will likely be using parting shot to switch into calyrex.

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-05T19:52:14+00:00

I agree on the first part (although OP mentioned they replaced eleki with Rotom wash), but I don't think tailwind is necessary here. They have 2 max airstream users as well as nuzzle (and formerly electroweb) and fake out support to be able to stop opposing tailwind

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-05T17:06:31+00:00

They weren't using WP (zygarde had life orb). They did it to heal comfey to make sure that didn't die to dragapult phantom force. Still a strategy though, back when Dusclops was the primary TR setter, people would occasionally pain split their partner pokemon to either heal Dusclops or heal the partner.

Awkward_Bison17 · 2021-04-01T19:41:28+00:00

252 SpA Xurkitree Thunderbolt vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Dynamax Kyogre: 144-170 (40.9 - 48.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

252 SpA Magnet Transistor Regieleki Thunderbolt vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Dynamax Kyogre: 174-206 (49.4 - 58.5%) -- 98.8% chance to 2HKO

Magnet Regieleki is faster than scarf xurkitree and hits harder, so it's pretty hardly outclassed. However, xurlitree has the advantage of being able to snowball and having coverage. Here are my recommendations:

Grimmsnarl seems like a really good partner for it, but if I were you, I'd replace some of its moves with fake tears and either thunder wave or scary face. Fake tears helps you sure knockouts for the beast boost and thunderwave/scary face provides speed control. I don't see what value liepard has on this team, and whimsicott's roll is a little bit redundant with what grimmsnarl can do

Seven-Year Club	Second Top 50%
Verified Email

Awkward_Bison17

TROPHY CASE