Rate of the Week V3: Week 20

[Enki]

Rate of the Week
​

Welcome to Rate of the Week! This is a project that looks to bring quality individual rates into the spotlight and recognizes the hard work of unbadged raters. Here's how it will work:

• Each week, official Team Raters will be paying close attention to the RMT forum and reading the rates posted in their respective tiers. They will then shortlist a few which will be in contention for the Rate of the Week award.
• From the pool of shortlisted rates, one will be chosen which most exemplifies the qualities of an excellent rate. That rater will be the winner for that particular tier!
• A post will be made by an official TR who specialises in that tier, explaining how and why the particular rate won. This will allow aspiring raters to gain an idea of what constitutes high-quality rates, and hopefully incorporate those aspects into their own rates.
• There will be multiple winners every week, one from OU and a couple from other tiers depending on the quality of the rates posted. We hope that in this way we can expand rating activity in less popular tiers, while maintaining a weekly OU winner.
• Official Team Raters are eligible to win, but unbadged raters will have priority since that is the main focus of this project.

So what's in it for the winners? Well, they will earn a place in the Hall of Fame, which will be kept in the OP of every thread, and will earn more consideration for the Ladybug

and Team Rater

badges. Also, after gaining three places in the Hall of Fame, a rater will be eligible to earn voice status in the RMT room on PS! on the condition that they've shown an interest in getting involved.

We hope that this project will encourage people to put more effort into their rates and become better and more experienced raters, which will consequently increase the quality as well as the quantity of rates in the forum. Good luck to you all!

Hall of Fame

Week #1 - Toon Linked (OU)
Week #2 - Nedor (OU), Arifeen (UU)
Week #3 - Fireburn (Ubers), Do A Bibarel (UU)
Week #4 - AM (OU), Raiza (PU), Kiyo (NU)
Week #5 - FlamingVictini (OU)
Week #6 - Cyndequil. (UU)
Week #7 - BreloomMyHomie (OU)
Week #8 - FlamingVictini (OU)
Week #9 - oml it's too ez (OU), Cyndequil. (UU), MrAldo (RU)
Week #10 - Nedor (OU), Cyndequil. (UU), Cranham (Ubers), Lax (Monotype)
Week #11 - AM (OU)
Week #12 - Lange (OU), Amaroq (UU)
Week #13 - all falls down (UU)
Week #14 - Manipulative (UU)
Week #15 - mil (OU)
Week #16 - Tricking (OU)
Week #17 - Hector Hard Mode (OU), Christo. (UU)
Week #18 - p2 (OU), all falls down (UU)
Week #19 - ez (OU), Chakra (RU), S0LID G0LD (LC), Memoric (Doubles)
Week #20 - nv (UU), GradeAGarchomp (VGC), Joshz (Anything Goes)

 

[MZ]

This weeks Anything Goes winner is Joshz! His rate concisely addresses a number of set issues and provides solid reasoning for all of its changes. First he fixes the Xerneas set and adds some crucial coverage for Ho-Oh on both Xerneas and Yveltal, helping to alleviate a major threat. He also changed Mega Rayquaza's item to Lum Berry to better set up versus status users like Klefki and support Arceus formes.

Next he changed Primal Groudon to a Stealth Rock setting variant and switched Dragon Claw to Dragon Tail. This provided the team with entry hazard support and a better defensive backbone, and provided phazing for setup sweepers while still keeping the same Dragon coverage to hit Mega Rayquaza. Finally, suggested changing Kyogre to a bulkier RestTalk set to act as a status absorber and better handle opposing Darkrai.

Thanks to his great rate, Joshz has earned himself a spot in the Hall of Fame. Congratulations!

 

[feen]

This week's UU winner is nv! His rate was a well detailed one with a nice format. Firstly, he agreed with the previous rate, giving more reasons why the rate should be followed. In addition to that, NV mentioned that with that rate, the team became prone to Ice-types, and the team was relatively slow. To mitigate this problem, NV cunningly suggested to run offensive Tentacruel over Dragalge. Even though the team lost Toxic Spikes, it makes Whimsicott's job of abusing Stun Spore easier. Moreover, offensive Tentacruel not only checks Mamoswine and Krookodile, it also checks Sylveon, which was a massive threat to the team. NV gave an optional suggestion of running Acid Spray over Sludge Bomb to deal with Calm Mind users much easier.

Thanks to his cunning rate, nv has earned a spot in the Hall of Fame. Congratulations!

 

[Draconid997]

This week's VGC winner is GradeAGarchomp! His rate assesses key points surrounding general VGC '16 teambuilding, which gives crucial advice to the writer about what to expect in the new format. He then goes into a great amount of depth, making key adjustments to each pokemon choice to greatly improve the team's structure and to optimise the roles carried out by each member.

To do this, he changes 3 pokemon on the team to more optimal choices (thundurus<raichu, milotic<kyogre and whimsicott<salamence), so that the team has a better matchup against common threats, such as opposing yveltal+thundurus leads, as well as double primal and big 6 teams. He also adds some crucial speed control to the team, giving nuzzle to raichu, tailwind to salamence and icy wind to kyogre, whilst keeping aegislash as a suitable trick room check.
Finally, he optimises the sets of the remaining pokemon to suit the kyogre/palkia archetype better, which altogether gives the team a fantastic structure that can hopefully be used to great success.

Thanks to his detailed and well presented rate, GradeAGarchomp has earned a spot in the Hall of Fame.
Congratulations!