Hi everyone, I hadn't originally planned to write all this, but after reviewing my games/teams I figured I had some interesting things to say and decided to cover it all with post. I hope these resources can help inspire you.
Round 1, against Malekith
I felt really lucky to face Malekith, a player I respect a lot. But I knew it would be a big challenge for me. I didn't really scout him, but I knew that historically, he's always preferred to play offensive teams, so I focused more on being good against common offensive mons/cores than stall. I started with the Swampert/Skarmory core. Both have very good defensive synergy. I added latias, which provides good balance against threats like heatran/Gengar/zapdos/breloom, etc., and so I wanted to run cm, the team's wincond, since swampert/skarm are very solid against his checks (steels in general, tyranitar, latias...) and hazards help a lot. I've added Gengar, which provides an anti-fight/ground measure, pressures jirachi and Clefable, which is much appreciated in this core. Spikes abuser etc. I run lum mainly for spore breloom, but it also helps against thunder wave starmie/latias/jirachi/zapdos, random burn/freez... With these 4 I thought I needed a scarfer and magneton came to mind, making the team even more consistent against HO, and also allows you to check SD Lucario which is a threat to the core with the right setup. For the last slot I thought I needed another steel, mainly to check latias, and scizor seemed a natural for me as it takes advantage of magneton's support (trap skarmory) and allows me to trap latias and restalk rotom.
Skarmory @ Leftovers
Ability: Keen Eye
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 12 Spe
- Spikes
- Roost
- Whirlwind
-
Toxic
Toxic is nice now that donphan has become popular. Not bad against offense since iIt targets mons like swampert/suicune/Gyarados. It's also nice against stall as you can toxic mons like gliscor/zapdos.latias/quagsire/hippowledon... And to end up, the surprise factor is nice aswell.
Latias (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
-
Safeguard
- Calm Mind
- Dragon Pulse
- Recover
Since the team is a little weak against clefable, thanks to safeguard you're able to win the 1v1 against thunder wave version and it's not that bad against encore version because you can just pp stall it. It also helps against Jirachi, restalk rotom, and twave/toxic users in general. Definitely a move I like a lot.
Scizor @
Lum Berry (No superpower)
Ability: Technician
EVs: 248 HP / 228 Atk / 4 Def / 24 SpD / 4 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Pursuit
- Bug Bite
- Bullet Punch
Lum zor is fantastic against wishtect jirachi, machamp, breloom, restalk rotom, wisp gengar, paras in general. I really like this mon but unfortunately it's hard to build around. Also removing superpower sounds crazy, but hey you have magneton support to trap empoleon/heatran/Mags/Lucario/Skarmory and others. Bug bite is just way better than superpower against mons such as reflect latias/swampert/metagross/Flygon/wishtect Jirachi, etc. And I really needed pursuit, otherwise gengar/latias would be too threatening
ForteDosReisMagos (Magneton) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Magnet Pull
EVs: 244 SpA / 12 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 3 Atk / 30 SpA / 30 SpD
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Ground]
-
Sunny Day
- Thunder Wave
I came to sunny day mainly for the MU stall. If you're facing a stall with Tyranitar scarf, there's a good chance you'll manage to kill it with spikes in early/midgame (about hippo, you can toxic it), and then you can remove the sand with magneton. Clefable will have a hard time to check latias/gengar, and you can turn the situation to your advantage.
The team's weakness is that you're sometimes forced to use latias early to deal with threats such as Specs starmie/Breloom/Empoleon, but this makes you vulnerable to Tyranitar entries and losing latias early in the game is not a good start. Dealing with clefable can be painful in the long run. Beside from that I think it's decent.
Review of my first game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-690421
The game starts, I see azelf lead and I am like "ok, it's offense, potentially HO or a bulky offense with mons such as tranloom/rotom/rachi, etc etc, I should have a correct MU". I decide to use waterfall T1 in the obvious taunt, in order to scout his set. It's a bulky set so I figure gengar is my best play because it's faster and kills azelf, so I'm switching to it. He sends Jirachi. I get a spdef drop and i make a very questionable play. I see a jirachi without leftovers that switches to gengar. Generally jirachi without leftovers are either mixed 4 att's with lum berry, or superachi with shuca berry. I tell myself that I don't want to switch to swampert on psychic because it hurts lol, and I want to keep it healthy to handle other threats. So at that moment I say to myself: either he uses pshycic or he double switch, so I send magneton and he reveals thunder wave jirachi and I am like "holyyyy shit. For me thunder wave on jirachi without leftovers is rare, especially since I could have gone to swampert and it would have been too free for me. I don't know, it was a weird turn. Anyway I lose my main anti HO tech so I will have to keep the hp of skarmory and swampert well. I immediately go to swampert to get my rocks up to put pressure on gyarados and dragonite which are natural in this kind of team. He sends gyarados, as expected, which is a threat to the team now. I have no choice so I immediately send skarmory. I manage to burn it with gengar and I immediately pivot on skarmory to add one spike. And at that moment I am like: ok, skarmory and swampert are full, I have the hazards, I am in a good position. He sends tyranitar as a skarm answer… ok, if that's his answer to skarm it looks threatening to his offensive core so I'm going to keep it healthy.
Going on swampert was therefore my play to pivot on a possible fire blast/band stone edge, and at worst if he anticipates that and uses crunch I can still punish with earthquake (helps latias) or double on skarmory. Until he revealed natural gift, I wasn't expecting it at all. In fact it was extremely well done on his part because I guess he anticipated me going on swampert to kill me then. At this point of the game I felt bad because I lost skarmory/swampert/magneton, my 3 good anti offense measures. Anyway, I then get an opportunity to setup my latias on donphan but I don't feel too comfortable since he managed to spin with donphan. He then sends jirachi and I immediately use safeguard on thunder wave but it's a jirachi with ice punch, which was the worst case scenario for me. I managed to weaken it and I tell myself that everything will be played on Scizor. I send magneton instead of gengar to be able to paralyze it (and also because I remember being afraid of custap jirachi when I played this game lol) then setup with scizor and finish the game. That was basically my gameplan. Then i realise that i have a very little luck to win because jirachi has a good chance of killing me with fire punch and dnite has surely extreme speed. So I finally changed my gameplan, which was to try play on choke, by forcking Malekith to send donphan to rk gengar with ice shard, and then I'll have a good chance of finishing the game with scizor. Unfortunately malekith just plays really well and doesn't fall into my trap. He sends dragonite and I figure my only chance at that point was to pray he didn't have the lum berry on WoW, but he obviously had it and that's how the game end up
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Classic HO. I started with Metagross/Gyarados/Tyranitar core, one of the most influential offensive cores in DPP OU. I coupled Specs Latias to help against waters mainly, gengar for his defensive role, check to breloom/physical Jirachi, etc. For the last slot I needed a second steel, a check at SD Lucario and magneton was the best fit for me, allowing me to run healing wish latias instead of thunderbolt/ and leftovers rocks metagross without being too skarmory weak. And in general the Latias/Metagross/Gyarados/Tyranitar core doesn't really like skarmory so the trap benefits the whole team. In any case, I think this team is correct in general, but a bit weak at Agility Metagross and Mix Jirachi end game. You will have to play smart around them.
Tyranitar @ Liechi Berry
Ability: Sand Stream
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 32 HP / 188 Atk / 36 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Crunch
- Fire Punch
- Natural Gift
Not really from me but I like the way how it's able to bait swampert/quagsire, which helps the team a lot. Decent coverage overall. The EVs is to live mach punch Breloom after rocks if I remember correctly.
Review of my second game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-690449
Gliscor lead against latias specs, I know that Draco meteor is my play (rather than surf) because it hurts more Clefable, jirachi and steels in general. Unfortunately I had a miss on a tyranitar switch then a lucky crit. In the scenario where I didn't miss draco meteor, the game would have been very different because he could have used pursuit on a turn where I was switching, as he could have used crunch on a turn where I was switching (a 50/50 basically), then the game would have continued its course in a different way. I don't know how much the crit mattered, but it definitely put me in a comfortable position. He then sends empoleon and I didn't really know what to do. I thought of sending gyarados, but on this version he had no earthquake and I thought that metagross could come and threaten it with EQ, and in this case I get the rocks up. Unfortunately it reveals specs empoleon so I am forced to send latias. I decide to dm on an obvious switch out (and in case he stayed I could still punish with mag). I managed to find a way to setup with tyranitar but then I made a mistake. This tyranitar doesn't have so he can't kill empoleon, sure, but malekith doesn't know my set he can't afford to take such a risk imo, so sending latias was natural and i should have predicted that. From this moment I was a bit tilted and I think it can be seen that I really didn't feel confident during this game, I felt like I was behind all along. Turn 11 was weird to me, can't remember why I used thunderbolt, but I believe my reasoning was that Thunder Wave/HP Ice were the most likely moves, and therefore u-turn jirachi covered both options, so he would have sent it. Also, I said to myself that he doesn't want to let para his latias, otherwise DD Tyranitar and my last, were going to be threatening. He decides to stay and I'm like "ok fuck, it's over". I then start clicking without really thinking, trying to setup tyranitar against the gliscor for no reason, literally if he had EQ that turn I think I would have just lost the game. Anyway, I managed to kill the latias and figured gyarados can just clean up with the right stance. I managed to handle mixgon and that's how I won.
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For G3 I decided to play a solid bully offense with tools against offensive teams, without being too weak to stall. I started with Suicune, excellent lead. With the lum berry it allows to put pressure on the defensive teams, because wishtect jirachi will need a lot of luck to win the 1v1, latias and clefable can't paralyze you. Basically, in most cases, you make a sacrifice early game, and very often on Clefable / Latias which helps your teammates a lot. I coupled it with heatran in order to switch on mons such as Latias/Elecs, and immediately put the rocks up. It's able to boom on Clefable/Latias, helping suicune, and in return, Suicune can switch on certain tran checks such as waters/grounds etc. I added Specs Latias to the core, it synergizes very well with them thanks to its defensive role (fight/elec/ground/grass etc resists) and allows to lure and weakensteels, in which heatran can take advantage on them. Weakening tyranitar also helps rotom and heatran to break. Rotom for the second elec resist, scarf which takes advantage of core support, and check SD Lucario. I needed a second steel that was bulky, that could handle jirachi and DD Tyranitar, and without giving skarmory too much freedom: iron ball metagross was the best choice here. And finally I wanted a wincond, an endgame breaker, an anti-stall measure, lucario came to mind.
(EDIT : I though about this lucario team, and i'm pretty sure Machamp is also a viable option on this team, so here are two versions of the team)
Lucario @ Life Orb
(No extreme speed)
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Ice Punch
- Close Combat
- Bullet Punch
- Swords Dance
The reason of this set is that I really wanted bullet punch for DD Tyranitar and Gengar, which are both threatening to the team. But at the same time I wanted another coverage against defensive teams otherwise I would struggle to break mons such as zapdos/latias/gliscor. So why not play both?
Review of my third game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-690467
After this win I told myself that I had made too many mistakes and that I absolutely had to win this third game. Seeing Malekith para Latias and Heatran, I was expecting a paraspam and had to play well around Jirachi and Machamp, which are the two biggest threats in this type of team. Anyway, Malekith missed ice fang on my latias, which at first glance seems lucky, but when I think about it, the miss didn't benefit me that much because it allowed him to have a free sub with mychamp, something he might not have tried if my latias was weakened. Anyway, after my latias was paralyzed and confused, I knew he was going to use substitute this turn, so I immediately sent suicune to threaten him. Then I tell myself that if I'm confused that turn (turn 13), I have a good chance of losing my suicune so early in the game when he hasn't accomplished much, so I would be in a really bad position. So I decide to pivot to rotom on the obvious dpunch, and then I know he was going to use payback (because I could have used trick/thunderbolt etc.) so I immediately sent lucario which was able OHKO with Close Combat. I thought that in this structure there is probably no gengar, or even rotom because scarf latias is usually the superior choice thanks to healing wish, which is very appreciated on parspam. So I tell myself that in any case, I will cause damage. After he uxie sacks and sends jirachee, I figure he doesn't want to throw fire punch on a obvious heatran switch in, so he'll probably double switch to mychamp. I strongly hesitated to CC again this turn, but a little too early to take such a risk. I send suicune that covers both Jirachi and a machamp switch in. After weakening the machamp I knew that his team does not like to switch on Lucario at all so I send it again to ensure damage. He sends scarf Latias and I know he knows he's in extreme speed range, so I figure he'll probably pivot on Jirachi next turn. So I'm doing a risky (but worth it imo) play of CC again. He actually used healing wish, a little surprised by this play but in any case it helps me a lot. On turn 20 I send metagross instead of heatran, I don't know if it was the right play, but I was really afraid of the machamp and I didn't want to give him a free turn. Dragonite is revealed later, and since this lucario doesn't have extreme speed he can't even kill jirachi, so I had to keep this rotom. I am therefore forced to take the risk of sending para metagross + take the risk that dnite isn't yache (unlikely imo). Fortunately it was not the case and rotom just ended up the game. crazy series, ggs.
Round 2, against Oiponabys
Facing my friend Oipon wasn't fun to me because he knows me very well, what I like to play etc. I had no idea how I was going to approach the prep, but I wanted to play a track that I usually don't play. Mix Flygon came to mind, a weird mon that was highly overrated, but is now forgotten while still good imo. Anyway, I started the core with Flygon/Empoleon. The idea is that empoleon is a steel that can witch on Flygon checks, such as Suicune/Latias/Gengar, scarfers in general. Empoleon can also knock clefable, so Clefable can no longer a switch to mixgon so you can use it as your stall breaker (also, I decided to play +Spa because there are already a lot of anti- jirachi). So I started with that core. I then added SpDef SKarmory as a second steel, check to Specs Latias. It synergizes very well with roar empoleon, and Clefable/Flygon are two of the biggest abusing spikes in the tier. Since the core was too passive against defensive starmie, I added resttalk rotom to prevent it from spinning for free, plus it's a good anti-fight/ground measure, sleep absorber etc.
Clefable @ Leftovers
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs:
252 HP / 216 Def / 40 SpD
Impish Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Thunder Wave
-
Cosmic Power
- Seismic Toss
- Soft-Boiled
This set is eveil, I honestly hesitated to share it. Originally I had protect instead of cosmic power (which is a cool set too), but cosmic power seemed better to me against threats like DD Tyranitar/Gyarados, and mainly Calm Mind Clefable. It's also good against Jirachi, focus punch breloom, suicune, etc. The options for checking it in offense boil down to trick/explosion, and a few mons such as lucario/machamp/breloom... - hence why there are spikes. It's just really good imo and i'm sure it's going to be popular in the future
Gliscor @ Leftovers
Ability: Hyper Cutter
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
-
Payback
- Earthquake
- Ice Fang
- Roost
Thanks to DeepBlueC for this set. For the last slot I needed this mon to have a good check against breloom/SD Lucario, second fight/ground resist, spdef tank, a backup against dd tyranitar. Good synergy with the rest of the team, especially empoleon. I run payback mainly to bait gengar, in which clefable can take advantage later in the game. I'm pretty happy with this team, but you have to be careful with SD Ice Punch Lucario. You will have to prevent it to setup, and keep rotom healthy as much as possible.
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For some reason I thought oipon was going to hard stall me for G2 (he finally used a very offensive team lol), so I wanted to make sure I was good against defensive teams. I started with Specs Empoleon + CB Scizor. The idea is simple, empoleon lures and weakens Latias, she gets trapped, empoleon just spam hydro pump. I added Latias (with surf otherwise heatran was too threatening) as the team scarfer and she fits well defensively with the core. Latias gives mementum to jirachi and especially SD Lucario, so infernape can punish them, plus it fits very well with Pursuit Scizor. Empoleon + Scizor can give free turns to breloom, in which case Lum gengar can take advantage, plus his fight/ground resistances are very useful against threats like scarf flygon, gliscor etc. And finally I needed another steel that could trade with oppo jirachi (I didn't want to rely too much on infernape), rocks user, defensive pivot, so jirachi (also because this is jirachi)
I think the team is still correct, offensiveness of the squad is good, but it's less the case defensively. The team has a very good MU against most stalls, but is a little weak against elecs and heatran
As a note these teams are similar and probably better, a lot of options are possibles for the sets :
Review of the second game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-691797
He leads with infernape, very bad lead MU for me. I immediately send gengar on close combat. And at that moment I didn't know what to do; I was really afraid that he would send scizor to trap me because it's a bit like "losing gengar to lose gengar", I don't necessarily get any benefit from weakening zor, but on the other hand, it must help him a lot (especially infernape). Also, if I use shadow ball/Focus blast, he'll probably be in range of Blaze and kill me on the way back. So I take the risk of wisping in a potential scizor/ttar switch in (I thought infernape was choice band) and unfortunately I have the wrong prediction. I then rk'd him with scizor, but then he got a para crit on my jirachi, but at least I manage to get my rocks up. Once he revealed scarf rotom, I tell myself that I will be able to trap him and if I kill ape/scarf rotom, my infernape would most likely be a huge threat to his team and that he n probably didn't have latias. So my gameplan was to send it at the end of the game. I managed to weaken his team little by little and I finally didn't need to reveal infernape. I think my MU was good in general, ggs to oipon for this fun series.
Round 4, against Tricking
I didn't know tricking at all, well all I knew was that he liked paraspam. But honestly I didn't care. I was a bit lazy this week so I only built one team and I recycled two teams that I like, but I hadn't tested MU a lot against paraspam, I was like "I like these teams, and any team can win against paraspam as long as you respect the opposing jirachi and play well". I think that's still more or less the case today, but I definitely underestimated this kind of team and realized my mistake during my first game. In any case, I decided to play a team that I had built a year ago for the DPP PL. One of the reasons I like it so much is because I won my first in a serious tournament, against Mendeez
(replay for those who are interessed : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-634508.)
I started with Scarfloom + Mixnite. Simple core: the idea is that loom prevents rocks early games, which helps dnite, and on the other hand loom is able to rk mons such as DDGyarados, which is able to setup against nite at -2. It can also give momentum to specs latias/Jirach, so metagross can take advantage and put rocks up. Breloom can find opportunities to spore a mon against this core, so lum gengar is here to punish, plus he can threaten Jirachi/Gliscor and pivot on fight/grounds attacks. DD Tyranitar as the wincond of the team, in addition to make the team stronger against the elecs. It benefits from metagross support which can boom bulky waters/grounds. I decided to play taunt for the MU stall, especially since metagross/swampert/breloom are really weak to skarmory. For the last slot I added swampert in order to make the team more solid against threats such as agility metagross/Jirachi/Zapdos/Tyranitar, etc.
Swampert @ Leftovers
Ability: Torrent
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 Spe
Quiet Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Earthquake
- Ice Beam
- Hidden Power [Electric]
The idea with this set is that by being max SpA, I put more pressure on skarmory / restalk rotom / wisp Gengar, which are all annoying for the team. The main reason to run EQ instead of Earth power is that it's better against suicune and Clefable. HP Elec for Gyarados.
Dragonite @ Life Orb
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 52 Atk / 252 SpA / 204 Spe
Rash Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Fire Blast
- Outrage/Extreme Speed
-
Aqua Tail
In the paste I have the standard mixnite set, but I am pretty sure Aqua Tail is revelant since you're able to bait hippowledon and have a good chance to kill it with draco meteor + aqua tail (maybe you can add more att EVs), which mean DD taunt Tyranitar is going to be crazy, especially that most of hippo stall rely a lot on hippo to check dd taunt ttar.
Review of the first game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-693414
The game starts, I immediately sprore the jirachi, but unfortunately it will wake up right after and para my metagross, which already mattered a lot. The way he played (staying against a potential sash focuspunch loom, para my metagross), I knew he was playing a very bulky team and probably a paraspam. On turn 15 I decided to send scarf breloom instead of gengar (which, in theory, threatens the switch in much more than scarfloom). I then immediately sent swampert, I think I thought he was going to send zapdos and I wanted to weaken and keep it low hp, but maybe that was a mistake. He finally sends jirachi, and I could have used earthquake, but my swampert is not invested in att, and if I have an opportunity not to give a free para against this type of team, I take it. He then sends Machamp and at that point I'm so pressured that I have to fish. I have to take the risk of mmash again. The fish worked, I'm not taking the risk again (not worth), so I send breloom to break the obvious sub (and it wasn't good in this MU anyway). And at that time, I know his team, I know that they don't like gengar at all so I told myself that I have to keep it healthy. Unfortunately I miss focus blast on the blissey switch in, but it didn't matter since blissey couldn't hit gengar...until he revealed shadow ball. I felt too bad LOL, it made the game so different and the MU became much harder for me, so I had to take risks and outplay him (that was my reasoning). I still keep gengar because it's still a threat. I'm desperately trying to do aggressive doubles, outplay etc, but I knew it wasn't enough. I managed to set up my Tyranitar, and this end of game, what I expected after this strange set of blissey, was limited to: pray. I don't know if I could have done better during this game so I had to rely on luck, but unfortunately I didn't get it and jirachi did jirachi things. Tricking played a good game too, I think before playing he scouted me and saw my monstrous use of gengar, hence the random sball blissey.
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This team is, in my opinion, the most interesting one that I have built during this tournament. I wasn't very happy with the empoleon team specs I played against Oipon, so I wanted to try a new formula, with Choice band Tyranitar. Two big breakers that synergize very well with each other: Tyranitar traps Latias and takes advantage of elecs, while empoleon can take advantage of iron head jirachi, skarmory etc. So far everything looks good but this core is extremely hard to finish, I knew I had to be careful not to be too weak to ground / fight etc. I added donphan who goes very well with these two guys. No sash empoleon likes a good switch in to Zapdos and elecs in general. Tyranitar gives momemtum to mons like Metagross/Jirachi/Gliscor etc (lots of physical mons), donphan can take advantage of them and put the rocks up. And in return, Tyranitar trap rotom so that donphan is able to spin. In any case, this core greatly appreciates a good check to Breloom, fight/ground moves in general, that's why I added Lum Gengar. In addition, it allows you to put pressure on Jirachi (mainly wishtect version).
I added CM Lum Latias because I had needed a second water resist, a good breloom switch in, and while pressuring body slam Jirachi. For the last slot I knew I needed a scarfer to rk the sweepers, since I have 2 choice locked mons and a breaker which can be -2 sometimes. So I added scarf metagross because it allows to rk SD Lucario/Gyarados/DD Tyranitar, while having good defensive utility in general (especially against Breloom/wish tect Jirachi), that's exactly what the team needed. It's not even useless against defensive teams thanks to trick. His biggest concern is that after using trick, it gives free turn to skarmory, but it's compensated by the fact that there are Specs Empoleon/CB Tyranitar/Gengar, three one of the best stall breakers in the tier, and donphan can still punish it thanks to rapid spin. Like any offense it has weaknesses, it is a bit soft against SD Scizor (if it bothers you too much you can use scarf jirachi instead, with fire punch) and Gengar. Beside from that I really like this team.
Edit : Now I use Chople taunt ttar to improve breloom/gengar MU. Taunt hleps to not give a free turn to hippo/skarm. Seed bomb donphan is mainly to bait swampert (it helps metagross and Tyranitar)
Replay of the second game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-693427
I immediately Hpump the skarm t1 and it reveals focus sash, so I knew it was a very offensive team. I tell to myself that it is always valuable to add rocks early game against this kind of team, so I immediately send donphan on the obvious spikes. Obviously I could have used apid spin but it was definitely greedy as play and he probably had a ghost anyway. After he sends rotom I figure he doesn't want to use shadow ball and get trapped for free by Tyranitar, or even give me a free empoleon switch in. So I say to myself: either he will use Hydro pump to target tyranitar, or use thunderbolt to target empoleon (while being ok against Tyranitar), or the most likely option: he will just double switch. So in any case going to Latias is my play. He sends metagross and from there I'm pretty sure I'm facing the BIHI team he played in SPL, so I know his set and his lasts. I knew my MU was going to be complicated, but still winnable and I had to play well, I really wanted to win. I knew the metagross was ironball (and then that's easily guessed with the way he played) and was probably going to trick or use meteor mash (I was sure it wasn't going to drop a random earthquake), so I immediately send empoleon. Then, since his only water resist was latias, he was going to either send it or sack lskarm, so I used ice beam and got the correct prediction. Once he sent latias, I didn't know what to do. I knew that LO thunderbolt had a high chance of killing empoleon, I could have sent latias but too risky because he could have just outplayed me. I tell myself that Tyranitar is not very valuable in this MU so I sac it. I decide to send godgar and burn his Metagross, because I knew that was his only good answer to jirachi (because originally I had scarf jirachi instead of metagross during this game), so my gameplan was to clean with jirachi in end game. Then I know he will either use meteor mash or earthquake (anticipating empoleon, more than I needed to handle rotom specs), so I send donphan to cover both options. He obviously doesn't want to give me a free rapid spin so I use head smash on the rotom switch in, then I double switch on empoleon which covers shadow ball/hydro pump + a switch in. He could have outplayed me and used thunderbolt, but I had no better choices and at this point of the game I was forced to take risks. Suicune then comes in and I immediately send latias to paralyzeit (because before I was using a weird set it was lum latias with thunder wave/thunder/Grass knot/HP Ground), so donphan can force him out afterwards or spin for free. He sends Lucario thinking to kill donphan but he didn't, and that's how the game ends.
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For the third game I decided to recycle the team that I had used against Luigi in SPL. It's a classic team with LoomTran which is a good core, gyarados adds a good balance, latias as scarfer + second fight/elec resist, jirachi as second steel, check to SD Lucario and oppo jirachi. The 5 is strong and balanced enough, so the last can be more or less anything. I added machamp because it takes advantage of paras, improves MU against stall, good lead, etc.
Review of the third game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-693434
When he revealed rain dance with uxie I knew from the start that I had little chance of winning because my MU would be really bad. Also, I haven't played seriously against rain in years so I had a hard time playing against this MU. On turn 7 I managed to predict the steel switch in (I was more thinking about bronzong), and I have to risk WoW because I know that everything will be decided on jirachi in the end. On turn 14 I wanted to send breloom into the rain dance, but I was really worried that he would use hypnosis - and if he didn't miss I had almost no chance of winning. I figure I can use body slam, spam iron head until I feel like he switches to using body slam (I was relying on prediction). Unfortunately I was unlucky as he dodged the para twice and hit hypnosis afterwards. On turn 17 I really wanted to send jirachi to draco meteor, but since hydro pump was enough to kill loom he could have just used this move. I managed to heal my jirachi and was praying to get as many flinches as possible... which unfortunately I don't have. I don't necessarily have regrets for this game, my MU was just horrible. Well done Tricking for this prep.
Round 5, against Conflict
For the first time of the tournament, I decided to scout my opponent and from what I remember Conflict used old school offenses, with a lot of elecs, scarfgon, suicune, etc. His teams looked relatively weak to stall, but despite that I wanted to keep playing offense because I don't like to play stall at all in general. Finally I had no time to prep so I decided to this stall G1 with a lot of tools anti offenses, and jirachi endgame, a G2 offense that I had built a little before the start of the tournament, and for G3 a semi-stall with SD scizor as wincond (I built this team a few months ago)
Review of the first game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-694597
When i saw Latias I already had an idea of the team he was playing and I was not mistaken, given that he plays very standard teams. As soon as he sent heatran t2 I was sure that I was facing this team and I know that they are extremely weak to jirachi so I wanted to keep it at the end of the game to clean. On turn 6 I knew it was not worth for him to stay with his flamethower heatran against spdef tran, so I decided to roar. Tyranitar is coming, and it's his wincond so does he want to risk it? I don't think so, so I roar again. Same against jirachi. After spamming roar I figured he was annoyed and was probably going to attack that turn, so I used earthquake and got the correct prediction. Then I wasn't sure if he was going to stay or switch, so I decided to heal myself which covers all the options. I sacrifice my skarm (not very useful in this MU in any case) to add a spike which was very valuable, and I decide to pivot on clefable then. On turn 16 I was really pressured against breloom, I send my resttalk rotom to absorb a spore but I suspected that it was not going to immediately put me to sleep, it would have been too free for me and then I would have a free latias switch in and breloom would no longer be threatening.
On turn 17 I was afraid that he would use seed bomb again but if that was the case I could have weakened it with shadow ball, and he would have had trouble coming back with spikes + sand. Finally he put my rotom to sleep so I was happy. From that moment he lost jirachi, trick latias and spore mon rotom; he has already used his best options against stall, so I decide to play very passively and especially not to let the DD Tyranitar set up if my hippo is weakened. On turn 14 I could have healed my clef against latias, but I prefer to scout his set before because I was a little afraid of healing wish. When the I saw him used draco meteor instead of surf I was pretty sure it was the case. On turn 26 I make the small mistake of sending jirachi to latias at -2. It wasn't really a "mistake", but in my opinion it would have been ideal to really reveal it at the end of the game. The goal was to force the heatran switch in so I can double switch with hippo. At turn 40 I was thinking that it was the best opportunity for him to use healing wish and that he was going to believe that I was going to switch out (+ a mixture of inexplicable feelings that I had ingame), so I decided to use earthquake. When I saw him send Tyranitar I was like "but nah it can't be shuca ttar, not in this team.... I was really surprised with a second shuca user, especially with 3 ground resist/immune. I failed my plan to not let Ttar set up, but that was so unlikely to me. I think I could have played safer, but well… Besides, his ttar is at 29%, I wasn't even sure that seismic toss could have killed. I was forced to take chips on Clefable + Jirachi, which made this ingame much harder than I thought. But I finally managed to take control of the situation and win. Well done to conflict for having closed the game despite his bad MU.
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I wanted to create a team with infernape + pursuit but which was out of the ordinary. I was super bored with scizor so I wanted to try with Tyranitar. I wanted to play scarfloom lead because it can rk SD Lucario, prevent hazard early (helps infernape), and sleep resttalk rotom (helps spin starmie). I then added spdef bronzong because infernape likes a good switch in to starmie/Latias/scarfgon, while being correct against jirachi. The problem is that it lets in skarmory for free so I added starmie to punish (also to have a water/fight resist). For the last slot I wanted a last fight/ground resist, a check at jirachi, breloom, etc, so godgar. Infernape has all the support he needs: chople tyranitar who can trap all his checks, breloom prevents hazards at the start of the game and starmie can remove them in the middle of the game, bronzong can pivot on his checks, etc. Personally, I'm less a fan of the team than before (mainly because it's a little weak against elecs and wish tect jirachi), but I'm still sharing it because I think it's still viable and fun
Infernape @
Shuca Berry
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 144 Atk / 8 Def / 164 SpA / 192 Spe
Naive Nature
- Nasty Plot
- Fire Blast
-
Close Combat
- Grass Knot
This set is interesting, shuca's idea is that I didn't like my MU at all against hippowdon, moreover that it helps against scarf flygon and earthquake users in general. I wanted a special wincond that is able to OHKO clefable, so that's how I came to this set. Lum is also a cool option against body slam jirachi.
Review of the second game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-694611
When I saw Gliscor + Aboma I was almost sure that I was facing the kristy team, because it is a unique team that I have faced a lot on the ladder. On turn 4 I don't feel like giving a free skarm switch in and mie can take advantage against most bronzong switch ins anyway, so I switch on it. Then I figure there's probably no ghost and even if there was I revealed leftovers less starmie, so he might have expected choice specs or a very offensive set so he doesn't want to send rotom on a hydro pump after the rocks, so I just spin. When I saw wish tect jirachi I knew it was a problem and that this team relies a lot on infernape and gengar to counter this kind of jirachi stall. So I try to preserve them as much as possible. On turn 38 I made a play that I still feel bad about now lol. I use fire blast after jirachi used wish. I don't remember why I did that, I think I wanted to win quickly but it could have been a very shameful choke. Anyway, his jirachi wasn't cursed enough and I still managed to win. Ggs!
Round 6, against Kristyl
It was definitely the weirdest week for me. Even if it was my hardest MU of the tournament, I was out of ideas and I felt like I had already used my best teams.
I built this team in 2 mins. I started with loomtran, classic core. Empoleon because it is a good lead and gives good entries. I wanted to play scarf rotom, even if I don't like this scarfer at all I was tired of scarf latias. In addition, pain split allows you to not be walled by wishtect jirachi, which was very appreciated here (+ take advantage of the heatran support which can burn tyranitar). Jirachi as a second steel, and for the last slot I wanted a second water /fight/gronud resist so I added dnite. Basically I had played DD Lum Dnite to check breloom and weaken bulky grounds/waters (help jirachi), but maybe mixnite is just better here? I don't know, I haven't done anything with this team since this game, I'm not a big fan of this team.
Review of the first game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-695660
When I saw sash empoleon + flygon I was expecting mixed LO gon, which the team was not ready to face at all. Sash skarm + mixgon is probably the scariest offensive combot for the team, and if I was less lazy during the week and tested the team, I would have realized that and played something else or changed the team. So I send rotom and I double switch on empoleon anticipating a steel or tyranitar. I knew DD Tyranitar could come in and kill empoleon with earthquake. Maybe sending jirachi instead would have been better but I really didn't want to reveal it that early in the game and breloom could still punish ttar. On turn 14 I had to take a big risk, and if I had extreme speed... I don't know why I played a dnite without extreme speed in such a team, it was a big mistake. Honestly, if I had extreme speed, I think I had decent odds to win because my jirachi was looking menacing against her team and could still live flygon. Flygon finally managed to get the upper hand and I lost as fuck. gg.
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From what I remember her teams looked weak to SD Lucario, sometimes she relied on max def zapdos to check it. So a few hours before playing lol I wanted to try SD Ice punch with pursuit support. I had tried a few quick 6 quickly, for example this one,
but I didn't like them too much. I was desperate so I asked excal to help me and we came down to this 6. Excal liked the team (and it's still the case I believe), but it was not really the case to me. I find that it is a little weak to Jirachi , CM hp fire Latias and scarf mag. Anyway, the idea is that pursuit zor helps lucario because you trap ghosts and latias. I added latias to take advantage of mons like zapdos/gyarados which can annoy those 2. I was forced to play CM Lum to make the team less weak against jirachi. I needed a second steel that could boom boring stuff, handle jirachi, etc, so I added heatran. Rotom because I needed a scarfer, a second elec resist. It benefits from the support of heatran and Latias which can weaken Tyranitar. Skarmory as a suicide lead, as hazards are very valuable. Like I said, I'm not a big fan of this team but it's not terrible either, and it's still one of the only teams that Lucario has exactly the support he needs.
Rognure (Lucario) @ Life Orb
(No priority)
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Close Combat
- Crunch
- Ice Punch
After this lose I came down to this set. The idea is that the team is a bit soft against stall (you have to play extremely well), so this lucario set helps so that you're able to beat restalk rotom/latias etc, while being good against gliscor and zapdos. Maybe extreme speed over crunch is just better, but since I already have tools against offense (bullet punch zor, shuca boom tran, hazards and latias, scarf rotom) this set is worth considering I think.
Review of my last game : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-695668
When I saw discharge rotom lead, I was sure I was facing a stall team, and I knew it wasn't going to be easy. But I still have the options against this kind of team, so I had to play well. On turn 3, considering that I added one spikes/rocks with skarmory, I figured she was going to expect specs heatran or an offensive set like life orb, so I was sure she was going to prioritize latias/scarf tyranitar rather clefable. So either way scizor is my play… but she got a crit. And at that point, after my G1 loss, I just gave up. I was close to forfeit but figured I could still crit or try to play for the choke, even if it was unlikely. So I continued to play brainless. I found an opportunity to setup but the rotom was impassable, I wish I used this lucario set... I could just not break her defensive core, no way to win. I think I could have won the game without the crit (but still hard), but hey... I was mostly disappointed with my prep, I should have taken these games more seriously... Ggs.
Huge thank to
Excal -
DeepBlueC and
Le Don for the help and the interessing discuss we had during the tournament.
Insane art made by Brumirage 
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