I'm working on getting those right now.
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Battle Spot - Simple Questions and Answers
- Thread starter Age of Kings
- Start date
hmm. I don't find ev training to boring tbh, but there's some stuff you can do to make it go a little faster. Assuming you're ORAS, poke vitamins are half price in Slateport city on Mondays. You always want lots of those to cut how much you gotta train. They're also pretty chea in the Battle Maison(xy too on this.)
When you're breeding mons and are biking all over waiting to hatch, ALWAYS have the Super Training screen open and be hitting the default bag to get other ags, and toss the bad ones to make room. Then when you got a mon you wanna train you bike around while hitting the correct bag with it, i.e. Defense Bag L. That saves a lot of time and costs nothing really.
Lastly, and this one I often forget, if you're just training one mon for something it's easier to just do ST, but if it's multiple for the same IV give them all Power items(i.e Bracer,) and go battle the appropriate horde. Then you get them all done at once. Also, even if you're gonna go train atk off a horde encounter, you can still hold a power item foir a diff. stats evs and then when you're done training lower atk unless the mon wants that too.
Hope that helps and lemm kno if you need me to clarify anything:)
If you need a PKRS mon then you're welcome to post on my profile and I'll infect something and send it via GTS. Or alternatively you could try asking on Wifi's SQSA thread.
Hi All,
I was wondering if there were any important differences between the BSS metagames on the actual games and the BSS Ladder on Showdown?
I've been using the same team on cart that I used to peak in the top 100 on the ladder, somewhere ~1560 if I recall, but haven't managed to do better than a 50/50 win:lose ratio, and am struggling to stay above 1500.
Do the metagames differ at all? Any extra threats I should be aware of? Or is the cart ladder just harder? Or do I just suck?
Thanks in advance for any advice you can give me!
I was wondering if there were any important differences between the BSS metagames on the actual games and the BSS Ladder on Showdown?
I've been using the same team on cart that I used to peak in the top 100 on the ladder, somewhere ~1560 if I recall, but haven't managed to do better than a 50/50 win:lose ratio, and am struggling to stay above 1500.
Do the metagames differ at all? Any extra threats I should be aware of? Or is the cart ladder just harder? Or do I just suck?
Thanks in advance for any advice you can give me!
I find that the main difference between cart and sim, in terms of influence on winning and losing, is that cart matches take a lot longer to complete than sim matches do, with longer waiting times between turns and before and after the match. This means that tilt happens a lot more easily; when you're on the sim and you suffer from game-deciding hax or you run into Glalie, or Tacticat, or Minimize on the sim, you're two or three clicks away from immediately finding another match. These longer matches mean that individual wins and losses carry a lot more weight, which means that forfeiting will almost always have a significant impact on your ranking, which almost always translates into tilt. That's my take on it anyway - cart takes more time, therefore losing on cart is worse than losing on sim in terms of ladder ranking and tilt. My rule is that if you lose two matches in a row on the cart ladder, you should immediately take a break before going back, or you'll be in the 1300s before you know. I hope this was helpful :)
e: the other factor that I forgot to mention is how time-consuming it can be to assemble a team on cart. When you've spent countless hours breeding and training your squad only for them to fold to Thunder Wave or sleep turns or flinches, you're going to feel robbed of your time, and that also translates directly to tilt.
e: the other factor that I forgot to mention is how time-consuming it can be to assemble a team on cart. When you've spent countless hours breeding and training your squad only for them to fold to Thunder Wave or sleep turns or flinches, you're going to feel robbed of your time, and that also translates directly to tilt.
ethan06 That's a very perceptive opinion, and I have to say, I hadn't really thought about tilt, though it's true that long periods of battling on cart do tend to wear you down. That said, for that very reason, I tend not to play more than 5 or so matches in one sitting. The "two losses" rule is a good one as well, and one that I probably follow without realising, due to getting annoyed from multiple losses. Again, for this reason, I do tend to stop when I lose, unless it's my first match of that sitting.
That said, it's not encountering annoying tactics or hax that I'm worried about (as frustrating as these things can be), it's just that, for whatever reason, I can't translate my wins on simulator into wins on cart, even with the same team. And it's nothing to do with tilt. If I were to go on Battle Spot now and look for a game, there's about a 50/50 chance I'd win it, and that's at the start of the ladder. However, if I were to make a new account on PS and do a battle, the chances of me winning it will be much, much higher.
And it's not that I feel it's a waste of time because my Pokemon get haxed out of a victory, more that it's a waste of time having bred a Pokemon that worked brilliantly on simulator but seems to underperform on cart. Still, that's not the end of the world as most of the Pokemon I use are decent in the Maison, or in other formats and they're always there and can be transferred to Sun and Moon come November where they may be useful and save me a lot of breeding time. And it's not as if I dislike breeding either. I stick a sitcom on whilst doing it and I'm happy as Larry. No, what seems a waste of time to me is all those hours of practice on Showdown which don't seem to have equipped me as well as I thought for playing on cart.
I understand the two laddering systems are different, but I'm wondering if there's any extra metagame threats to prepare for on cart, or any Pokemon that work really well against these "unusual" threats. Most of the teams I see on PS revolve around the same 10 or so Pokemon, whereas I see all sorts on cart. I seem to be prepared for the common threats on PS, but woefully unequipped to deal with some of the stuff I see on cart. I got messed up by a Gourgeist the other day, and I don't think I'll have seen more than a couple of those in ~200 battles on simulator. Perhaps it's just a question of experience on cart, but I'd like to know if there's anything I can do to speed up that up.
That said, it's not encountering annoying tactics or hax that I'm worried about (as frustrating as these things can be), it's just that, for whatever reason, I can't translate my wins on simulator into wins on cart, even with the same team. And it's nothing to do with tilt. If I were to go on Battle Spot now and look for a game, there's about a 50/50 chance I'd win it, and that's at the start of the ladder. However, if I were to make a new account on PS and do a battle, the chances of me winning it will be much, much higher.
And it's not that I feel it's a waste of time because my Pokemon get haxed out of a victory, more that it's a waste of time having bred a Pokemon that worked brilliantly on simulator but seems to underperform on cart. Still, that's not the end of the world as most of the Pokemon I use are decent in the Maison, or in other formats and they're always there and can be transferred to Sun and Moon come November where they may be useful and save me a lot of breeding time. And it's not as if I dislike breeding either. I stick a sitcom on whilst doing it and I'm happy as Larry. No, what seems a waste of time to me is all those hours of practice on Showdown which don't seem to have equipped me as well as I thought for playing on cart.
I understand the two laddering systems are different, but I'm wondering if there's any extra metagame threats to prepare for on cart, or any Pokemon that work really well against these "unusual" threats. Most of the teams I see on PS revolve around the same 10 or so Pokemon, whereas I see all sorts on cart. I seem to be prepared for the common threats on PS, but woefully unequipped to deal with some of the stuff I see on cart. I got messed up by a Gourgeist the other day, and I don't think I'll have seen more than a couple of those in ~200 battles on simulator. Perhaps it's just a question of experience on cart, but I'd like to know if there's anything I can do to speed up that up.
Well, I kno there are a ton of Japanese people on cart but not so many on PS. Idk if i'd say they're just plainly bettr than the majority of us here that ain't Japanese(tho that might be fair. The top people in any seasoin tend to be Japs as far as I kno,) but they use unorthodox sets that are hard to prepare for, since if you go all out on having counters to something rare it's likely you're vulnerable to something more common.
From what I've seen from Jap teams people have posted they often use standard enough mons but unexpected sets, unlike the cookie cutter sets that many like to run here.
Tl;dr, basically cart is harder cuz takes longer and there are just more good players and strategies.
I stop playing when I lose to some guy with a Scarfed Rain Dance Politoed (never attacked - only used Rain Dance) because he got a two-turn Ice Beam freeze on Turn 1 with a non-LO, non-Choice Ludicolo, followed by THREE consecutive Hydro Pumps a few turns later in the match, finishing my full-HP, +2/+2 Cress with Knock Off + Crit Hydro Pump.
That's when I stop. Bastard broke my 9-0 :P
BS ladder seems to have a lot of dank trolls and pollution too, I run Safeguard Whimiscott for the sole and single purpose of countering stupid shit like Scarf Sleep Powder Vivillion, Gravity Meowstic + Hypnosis Mega Gengar, Trick Room Gardevoir + Amoonguss, Thundurus, etc.
Once you're outside of the cesspool (~1610 or so) you can switch over to things that are actually good and remove the cheese knives. Personally I'm waiting for Prankster Lucky Chant to exist. I'd be top of the ladder in a month. Can't actually remember the last loss I had that didn't involve a crucial crit (trash like crit Snarl on Garchomp doesn't count imo).
So yeah, try some anti-cheese like Whimsicott, Klefki, Meowstic, or Lum + Safeguard Terrakion.
Cart battles also take pretty long per turn so you'll run into more... idk, patient people with more time to think. PS matches never seem to think more than 10 seconds and are in a rush to either win or forfeit and move on to the next match without really giving a shit from the couple battles I've done.
A few reasons:
- Literally what Demantoid said. Starting at 1000 on PS is way different to 1500 on cart. You won't face a bad team on cart until you drop to 1450 or lower, whereas you probably won't face a good team on PS until about 1250 (at least). This means you're much more prone to losing when you start out on cart than on the PS ladder.
- The cart is also the "real" metagame, which means the "real" players are there. I'm not trying to say the PS ladder is bad, but there are way more people testing / trying stuff out there, compared to the cart ladder where people are bringing their A-game all the time. And yeah, we can't deny that the Japanese players are the innovators, and there are way more of them trying new tech out to catch us off guard than the PS ladder.
- The PS ladder is somewhat prone to being infested with the same Pokemon / teams, probably because a lot of people are learning the meta / trying sample teams before making their own. This limits your practice, so when you jump onto the cart ladder you're guaranteed to run into something that you aren't familiar with and won't know your gameplan against it. The only solution is to play on cart more!
Omastar68 I did think about the "Japanese Factor" but didn't think I'd encounter that problem unless I got into the higher ranks.
Demantoid Yeah both good points there
ProjectTitan313 I wouldn't say that "troll"/"annoying" teams are what's causing me to lose. I use Mega Sableye who is pretty effective at shutting most of such teams down and most of the losses I've incurred thus far have been to "normal teams". And although it IS true that simulator battles are much quicker, I don't think that necessarily translates into an easier ladder. True, people are more inclined to forfeit when a lucky crit may bring them back into the game, but I'm just as likely to be that guy who goes for the forfeit when things seem bleak, which means the ladder shouldn't be any harder as a result.
cant say Yeah, good point again. I guess I hadn't considered how far down both ladders go (how far do they go down?), but I guess you are thrown into the deep end a bit more on cart. And yeah, the "bringing the A game on cart" is a good point, I guess I do need to just get more cart experience in!
Demantoid Yeah both good points there
ProjectTitan313 I wouldn't say that "troll"/"annoying" teams are what's causing me to lose. I use Mega Sableye who is pretty effective at shutting most of such teams down and most of the losses I've incurred thus far have been to "normal teams". And although it IS true that simulator battles are much quicker, I don't think that necessarily translates into an easier ladder. True, people are more inclined to forfeit when a lucky crit may bring them back into the game, but I'm just as likely to be that guy who goes for the forfeit when things seem bleak, which means the ladder shouldn't be any harder as a result.
cant say Yeah, good point again. I guess I hadn't considered how far down both ladders go (how far do they go down?), but I guess you are thrown into the deep end a bit more on cart. And yeah, the "bringing the A game on cart" is a good point, I guess I do need to just get more cart experience in!
Gatr: favorite pokemon
Doubles: best meta ever
YOU FOUND THE RIGHT PERSON, congrats :P
To put it bluntly, 'Gatr isn't the greatest, but could be fun. It is absolutely dependent on setup, as its natural Speed is simply inadequate to outspeed a vast portion of the meta.
Damage output is fucking sexy though:
252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Conkeldurr: 114-136 (53.7 - 64.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (Drain Punch recovery just needs a chip to break)
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Conkeldurr: 172-203 (81.1 - 95.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (So close lol. Aqua Jet / chip? :P)
252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Crunch vs. 220 HP / 172 Def Cresselia: 109-130 (48.8 - 58.2%) -- 98% chance to 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 220 HP / 172 Def Cresselia: 121-144 (54.2 - 64.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 220 HP / 172 Def Cresselia in Rain: 183-216 (82 - 96.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
She's more or less free setup too.
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Mega Kangaskhan: 165-195 (91.1 - 107.7%) -- 50% chance to OHKO
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Feraligatr Low Kick (100 BP) vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Mega Kangaskhan: 211-250 (116.5 - 138.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Parental Bond Mega Kangaskhan Return vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Feraligatr: 141-168 (87.5 - 104.3%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Parental Bond Mega Kangaskhan Sucker Punch vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Feraligatr: 74-88 (45.9 - 54.6%) -- 54.1% chance to 2HKO
^ A bit of bulk investment helps here so you don't have to sac your redirector
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Ice Punch vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Zapdos: 234-278 (118.7 - 141.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
Thunderbolt completely murders you, unboosted with no investment, so don't get ballsy lol.
Thundy, being frailer, obviously dies too, but having the same typing and Sp. Atk means you also die to T-bolt with no debate.
-1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Ice Punch vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Landorus-T: 203-239 (123 - 144.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Conkeldurr: 172-203 (81.1 - 95.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (So close lol. Aqua Jet / chip? :P)
252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Crunch vs. 220 HP / 172 Def Cresselia: 109-130 (48.8 - 58.2%) -- 98% chance to 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 220 HP / 172 Def Cresselia: 121-144 (54.2 - 64.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 220 HP / 172 Def Cresselia in Rain: 183-216 (82 - 96.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
She's more or less free setup too.
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Waterfall vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Mega Kangaskhan: 165-195 (91.1 - 107.7%) -- 50% chance to OHKO
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Feraligatr Low Kick (100 BP) vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Mega Kangaskhan: 211-250 (116.5 - 138.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Parental Bond Mega Kangaskhan Return vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Feraligatr: 141-168 (87.5 - 104.3%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Parental Bond Mega Kangaskhan Sucker Punch vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Feraligatr: 74-88 (45.9 - 54.6%) -- 54.1% chance to 2HKO
^ A bit of bulk investment helps here so you don't have to sac your redirector
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Ice Punch vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Zapdos: 234-278 (118.7 - 141.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
Thunderbolt completely murders you, unboosted with no investment, so don't get ballsy lol.
Thundy, being frailer, obviously dies too, but having the same typing and Sp. Atk means you also die to T-bolt with no debate.
-1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Ice Punch vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Landorus-T: 203-239 (123 - 144.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
Bulk is ok on the physical side, but can't stomach a strong or super effective Special hit. Hydreigon, Thundurus, Zapdos, Char-Y, and even Amoonguss do severe damage:
252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Ice Punch vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Amoonguss: 125-148 (56.5 - 66.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Feraligatr Ice Punch vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Amoonguss: 187-221 (84.6 - 100%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
SpA Amoonguss Giga Drain vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Feraligatr: 86-104 (53.7 - 65%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Even at max Atk after a DD, Sheer Force, and LO, its generally struggling to OHKO, though it can outrun everything up to Weavile after a single DD.
Clefable would allow a DD setup in most cases, since most spread moves hardly even dent Gatr, and double genie is very much afraid of that buffed Ice Punch even at -1. Amoonguss works as well, but opposing Breloom / Virizion / Venusaur / Amoonguss / Saftey Goggles will wreck you.
Problem with much of this, though, is that Gyarados/Mega Gyarados/Mega Mence are significantly better at the job. Gyara/Mence have Intimidate for extra setup insurance, and Moxie is optional if Milotic is an issue. Gatr has Fighting coverage (Low Kick / superpower) that's unboosted by SF but after a boost can hit Ferrothorn/Khan really hard. It's also very vulnerable to WoW and Thundurus, since it simply cannot afford to run anything but a Life Orb.
tl;dr Mence/Gyara are bulkier and generally better. 'Gatr's advantage is not setting off Competitive, good Ice/Fighting coverage, Aqua Jet for priority, and no 4x weakness. imo you'd need Rain and a redirector to make it work, and that's a tad questionable. None of them break Suicune or other bulky waters. Only imaginable justification I have is "Mega slot was taken, Gyarados' Rock weakness was bad, and I needed an extra Ferrothorn check".
edit: Oh and Azumarill is really good at the "Slow, fat Water mon with great physical damage output" thing and doesn't need setup, at all, to kick your ass. Also has Fairy STAB and Fighting coverage. So that's also in the competition neighborhood.
edit2: fixed calcs, calc was set to "torrent" by default. wtf.
Last edited:
You forgot to put Sheer Force in your calcs :p
wait what. Why the fuck was that not enabled by default.
Gimme a sec I'll fix it, I'm in the middle of reworking a team so damage calcs are flying anyway :P
You're a salvation as always,mate
Lf
Hippowdon
Ability: Sand stream
Relaxed Nature
- Slack Off
- Yawn
If anyone can help me out with these egg moves
Cheers
Hippowdon
Ability: Sand stream
Relaxed Nature
- Slack Off
- Yawn
If anyone can help me out with these egg moves
Cheers
Try asking in the wifi forum, in the simple requests thread. You're more likely to get a response there.
Hey if I were to get into battle spot singles, where's the best place to learn? I'm pretty proficient at smogon OU but I know this a whole different game. Any pages/ forums/ YouTube channels you guys could recommend?
Our StrategyDex Hub is probably the best place to start, then you can come hang out in our chatroom on Pokemon Showdown (Battle Spot). Other than that, there's our own damage calculator (https://cantsay.github.io) and stats site (battlespotstats.com) to use, and you can check out GroudonEmpire's and DragonWhale's YouTube channels.
https://m.youtube.com/user/GroudonEmpire?
https://m.youtube.com/user/Ryu1alex?
Thank you so much!
It's a 25% reduction in damage.