Metagame Fallen Friends

[lost heros]

Approved by The Immortal and Chloe

[A Banner]

Fallen Friends​

Rules:

Mechanic: After a pokemon faints, its teammates get +1 boost in the fainted pokemon's highest stat on switch-in
Clauses: OU Clauses
Bans: OU Banlist

Strategy:


Fallen Friends is a metagame that allows for pokemon to benefit off their teammates fainting to become devestating sweepers. As such many teams will be designed to get as much value possible from their pokemon when it's both alive and fainted.

Pyukumuku gets a noticeable buff, being able to use Memento and Innards Out to cripple its opponent as well as give a defensive buff to its teammate.

Azelf is able to set rocks and use explosions to be a great suicide lead and give its partner a boosted attack, special attack, or speed.

Quagsire and other Unaware Pokemon can very easily stop what could've been a dangerous sweeper dead in its tracks.

Krookodile can benefit from all Stat Boosts with a strong Power Trip and can also use Moxie to keep pushing past any defensive boosts the opposing team might accumulate.

Q&A


Q: What if HP is my highest stat?
A: Only your highest stat from Attack, Defense, Special Attack, Special Defense, and Speed is considered similar to Beast Boost.

Q: What happens if two of my pokemon faint and they had the same highest stat?
A: The stats are cumulative so if you have multiple pokemon with the same highest stat faint, then your remaining pokemon would get a +2 boost in that stat?

Q: When do stat boosts trigger?
A: Stat boosts trigger immediately upon switch-in

Q: How do Contrary and Simple affect these boosts?
A: Contrary and Simple would not affect these boosts.

Q: How does Intimidate affect these boosts?
A: Intimidate as well as any other way your stats are affected occur normally. So if your pokemon is at +2 attack, an intimidate user would bring your attack back down to +1.

Q: How long do the stat boosts last?
A: The stat boosts will occur at every switch-in for the remainder of the match.

Resources
None as of yet!

 

[lost heros]

Reserved + you may now post

 

[drampa's grandpa]

Approved by The Immortal and Chloe

[A Banner]

Fallen Friends​

Rules:

Mechanic: After a pokemon faints, its teammates get +1 boost in the fainted pokemon's highest stat on switch-in
Clauses: OU Clauses
Bans: OU Banlist

Strategy:


Fallen Friends is a metagame that allows for pokemon to benefit off their teammates fainting to become devestating sweepers. As such many teams will be designed to get as much value possible from their pokemon when it's both alive and fainted.

Pyukumuku gets a noticeable buff, being able to use Memento and Innards Out to cripple its opponent as well as give a defensive buff to its teammate.

Azelf is able to set rocks and use explosions to be a great suicide lead and give its partner a boosted attack, special attack, or speed.

Quagsire and other Unaware Pokemon can very easily stop what could've been a dangerous sweeper dead in its tracks.

Krookodile can benefit from all Stat Boosts with a strong Power Trip and can also use Moxie to keep pushing past any defensive boosts the opposing team might accumulate.

Q&A


Q: What if HP is my highest stat?
A: Only your highest stat from Attack, Defense, Special Attack, Special Defense, and Speed is considered similar to Beast Boost.

Q: What happens if two of my pokemon faint and they had the same highest stat?
A: The stats are cumulative so if you have multiple pokemon with the same highest stat faint, then your remaining pokemon would get a +2 boost in that stat?

Q: When do stat boosts trigger?
A: Stat boosts trigger immediately upon switch-in

Q: How does Contrary affect these boosts?
A: Contrary would not affect these boosts.

Q: How does Intimidate affect these boosts?
A: Intimidate as well as any other way your stats are affected occur normally. So if your pokemon is at +2 attack, an intimidate user would bring your attack back down to +1.

Q: How long do the stat boosts last?
A: The stat boosts will occur at every switch-in for the remainder of the match.

Resources
None as of yet!

If I have 2 stats that are my highest do I get two boosts or one, and if one, how does it pick?

 

[MattL]

https://pokepast.es/b43b7f9da4d73f28

This for sure isn't the best variation of this team, but I feel that this type of team archetype is definitely effective in this metagame. The goal is to not kill your opponent (hence no attacking moves aside from Bold, 0 Atk IV Self-Destruct [not Explosion] Ferrothorn) so they don't accumulate any stat boosts, while using Taunt to prevent setup or similar counterplay while stacking as many hazards as possible. Skill Swap, Worry Seed, Glare, and Twave are there similarly to not kill your opponent, but just neuter them so it's easier to stack on them (and not get shut down by Magic Bounce). After the other 5 die, Espeon will come in with +1 Def, +1 SpA, +1 SpD, and +2 Spe. In general, you don't want to kill your opponent until it's too late for them to recover so they aren't able to swing the momentum back with their stat boosts. Haze on Greninja seems counterproductive but that's more of an emergency button.

Although I have to admit, even though this team might end up being effective, it would make the meta pretty... undesirable.

 

[lost heros]

If I have 2 stats that are my highest do I get two boosts or one, and if one, how does it pick?

Depending on what's easier to code, either the stat boosted will be randomly determined between the highest stats on the first switch and be the same stat every switch, or it will be randomly determined every switch.

The real question is why would you do that.

https://pokepast.es/b43b7f9da4d73f28

This for sure isn't the best variation of this team, but I feel that this type of team archetype is definitely effective in this metagame. The goal is to not kill your opponent (hence no attacking moves aside from Bold, 0 Atk IV Self-Destruct [not Explosion] Ferrothorn) so they don't accumulate any stat boosts, while using Taunt to prevent setup or similar counterplay while stacking as many hazards as possible. Skill Swap, Worry Seed, Glare, and Twave are there similarly to not kill your opponent, but just neuter them so it's easier to stack on them (and not get shut down by Magic Bounce). After the other 5 die, Espeon will come in with +1 Def, +1 SpA, +1 SpD, and +2 Spe. In general, you don't want to kill your opponent until it's too late for them to recover so they aren't able to swing the momentum back with their stat boosts. Haze on Greninja seems counterproductive but that's more of an emergency button.

Although I have to admit, even though this team might end up being effective, it would make the meta pretty... undesirable.

While on paper that seems good, the problem is still that you do have to eventually KO the opposing team, and if you're relying on one single Pokémon to KO their whole team in one go their opposing team could potentially revenge KO you with a priority move and a couple attack boosts, wall you with a resisted mon and a couple of defensive boosts, or even just straight up use their super sweeper to beat yours after all the other teammates are fainted.

 

[DrPumpkinz]

Depending on what's easier to code, either the stat boosted will be randomly determined between the highest stats on the first switch and be the same stat every switch, or it will be randomly determined every switch.

It should work like Beast Boost, with the order of priority being Attack -> Defense -> Sp. Attack -> Sp. Defense -> Speed.

 

[Mr Spaz]

Question: Is the boost affected by Simple?

 

[lost heros]

Question: Is the boost affected by Simple?

No, abilities like Simple and Contrary don't affect the boosts.

Besides I don't think people would like to play Swoobat the meta.

 

[Yahooboo]

No, abilities like Simple and Contrary don't affect the boosts.

Besides I don't think people would like to play Swoobat the meta.

i would play that

 

[DrPumpkinz]

Here are some sets I've come up with / think might be good in this meta (most are pretty standard).

Weavile

Weavile @ Choice Band / Choice Scarf
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Punishment
- Icicle Crash
- Ice Shard
- Knock Off / Low Kick / Poison Jab

Due to the abundance of stat boosts in this meta, Punishment is much stronger and acts like a pseudo-Moxie. Weavile can thus use Punishment to sweep in the late game. Choice Scarf is if you're worried about the opponent outspeeding via speed boosts or their own scarf.

CritDra

Kingdra @ Scope Lens
Ability: Sniper
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Focus Energy
- Draco Meteor
- Hydro Pump / Surf
- Ice Beam / Agility

CritDra utilizes its fallen teammate's boosts to make up for the speed and immediate power of Swift Swim. More importantly, because it will be critting 100% of the time, it gives zero f***s about any Sp. Def boosts the opponent may have accumulated.

Chansey

Chansey (F) @ Eviolite
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Soft-Boiled
- Stealth Rock
- Seismic Toss
- Toxic

I'm not very experienced with Stall, but I do know that the biggest thing holding Chansey back is its less-than-stellar Defense. If Skarmory, Clefable, or Phys. Def Toxapex have already fallen, Chansey's one weakness will be patched up.

Amoonguss

Amoonguss @ Black Sludge
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 184 Def / 72 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Spore
- Clear Smog
- Giga Drain
- Hidden Power [Fire]

Amoonguss brings two important tools to the table in this meta. The first is Spore, which incapacitates a foe without knocking it out and boosting its team. The second is Clear Smog, which cripples a foe by removing its boosts, forcing your opponent to switch if they want their boosts back.

Malamar

Malamar @ Leftovers
Ability: Contrary
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD
Careful Nature
- Superpower
- Topsy-Turvy
- Knock Off
- Psycho Cut

Like Amoongus, Malamar can use the constant boosts to its advantage in crippling a foe. In this case, instead of just removing the opponent's boosts, Malamar uses Topsy-Turvy to reverse them. Malamar can make good use of the switch forced by the negative boosts because it buys it time to boost with Superpower.

Greninja

Greninja
Ability: Protean
- Spikes
- Filler
- Filler
- Filler

Speaking of forcing switches, Spikes Greninja helps maximize the punishment of every switch you force. Additionally, because Greninja commonly runs mixed attacking sets, it benefits from all three offensive stat boosts.

 

[readytolose]

This meta is interesting in that it totally redefines speed control. Against faster paced offensive teams the idea of revenge killing becomes pretty obscure after a few boosts. Hyper offensive teams with a suicide lead basically start the game with +1 Speed on everything, meaning that opponents need to either "keep up" with speed boosts by sacking their own Azelfs/whatever, revenge kill with priority exclusively, of simply check everything with bulky threats. This results in Choice Scarf users not being super splashable in this meta, as they can't revenge kill consistently unless on a team that can grab speed boosts early. Sticky Web is somewhat obsolete too, as it is often better to simply let a fast mon die rather than dedicate something to setting up the hazard. Although this could suggest that this meta could end up very hyperbolic, there are in fact a few speed control options available to a variety of teams. Here's a few ways to turn the tables on faster teams.

Ditto is in incredibly valuable revenge killer, capable of turning the tables on mons with speed boosts by simply copying them. This lets Ditto function as a splashable Choice Scarfer that doesn't require allied speed boosts to revenge kill effectively. Although in standard play Ditto can be lessened in effectiveness by simply not setting up, in Fallen Friends Ditto punishes opponents for letting mons die. Against offensive teams, Ditto can engage in reverse sweeps extremely easily. It should be noted that any boosts pre-transformation are lost upon transforming into the opponent, so Ditto cannot benefit from it's own team's boosts. Regardless, Ditto holds a niche as perhaps the only scarfer that can consistently revenge an opponent in this metagame, regardless of either player's team composition.

Trick Room seems pretty damn threatening, as usual. Since it doesn't need to use speed boosts to "keep up" with opponents, in fact punishing opponents for boosting their speed, it can funnel all of its stat boosts into making its sweepers bulkier and stronger. At this point I'd like to introduce the idea of mono-physical and mono-special teams. By running an entire team that attacks only physically or specially, that means that every teammate can take advantage of the boosts to Attack or Special Attack. While running a mix of physical and special attackers allows for more versatility, mono-physical or mono-special teams aim to overwhelm by acquiring lots of boosts to their respective attacking stat. Mono-special seems like perhaps one of the best ways to run Trick Room, as many of the best Trick Room attackers are special, such as Magearna, Tapu Lele (mono-special means no priority on team, and Lele serves to counter priority spam), Mega Camerupt, and Porygon2. Of course you'd need something for Chansey be it something with Psyshock or an oddball physical mon or even Dugtrio.

I could imagine mono-physical priority spam being pretty powerful. The idea here is to stack 6 mons with Attack as their highest stat, so that they can setup their own late-game sweeps simply by dying. The necessary support would be a hazard setter, a pursuit trapper for Tapu Lele, and something to deal with Unaware. The idea of setting up a last-mon Belly Drum Azumarill without needing to actually Belly Drum is quite terrifying. The sheer power of priority will crush faster teams, and more defensive teams will be hard pressed to withstand powerful attacks. Applying the same concept of "keeping up", even the most defensive teams will not be able to accumulate enough Defense boosts to match this team's attack boosts. Running 6 Pokemon with defense as their highest stat is quite impractical and cripplingly overspecialized, so I can't see anyone doing it, especially when keystone members of stall Chansey and Dugtrio don't give it. On paper this is perhaps the scariest thing I can think of. EDIT: Speaking of paper, shout out to Kartana, who not only crushes all Unaware users by virtue of typing but has Sacred Sword to ignore defensive boosts.

 

[Isa Simple]

Came here today ready to make a super hefty post, but most of what I was going to say was swept up by readytolose who I believe is definitely onto it.

Mono Physical/Special teams are definitely the way to go offensively. With Trick Room Special Spam, and Priority Physical Spam being the best archetypes imo. A random mon with a couple defence boosts here and there is still going to get overwhelmed by a mon at +5 Atk or Spa. Running speed sacking mons is largely unrewarding as there are better ways to play the speed game without sacrificing power. If you're sacking speed mons against a team with TR or Priority, those boosts become redundant whilst you're opponent straight up out scales you.

So with that I think there will be 3 main builds in this tier:
Trick Room Special Spam, Priority Physical Spam, and STALL.

TRSS

The face of these builds will definitely be Magearna, being an awesome stand alone Trick Room sweeper that is actually able to do massive work early game in this meta with Soul Heart preventing it from being out scaled and forced out. There's literally no reason to not run a Magearna on these builds.
Tapu Lele will be another that is pretty much essential, boasting a super powerful Psyshock and the godsend that is Psychic Terrain.
I find it easy to imagine that TRSS will be one of the most dominant builds as there is very little counter play. You have priority to ignore Trick Room? Psychic Terrain. You have strong Special walls or SpD boosts? Terrain boosted Psyshock. You have Taunt or Roar to prevent TR from being set up? Aromatisse, Focus Sash Espeon, Mental Herb Mimikyu, opposing Taunt. Unaware? Powerful Z-Moves or Super Effective hits. There's just such solid options available to play around the few weaknesses. The biggest problem I see is that you'll struggle to make a build that earns you +5 SpA by the end, as you'll need at least one hyper bulky setter or a Mimikyu who won't be able to viably EV their SpA to the top, so you run the risk of being out scaled by Stall unless you run at least 1 manual booster. Also if I'm correct in that this'll be popular, there's gonna be a lot of awkward Trick Room vs Trick Room battles lol.

PPS

With physical priority spam, I believe that however it'll be less clear cut to identify and patch your weaknesses, you'll have a lot more freedom and flexibility with building than TRSS builds. This is because TRSS has a lot more pokemon and roles that are essential to fill, and is limited in boosting their desired stat, where as it is super easy to make a variety of unique builds that'll give you +5 Atk and a shit tonne of priority no matter what you sack. You do have a lot of check boxes you need to patch however, such as a Lele Trapper, Hazard Setter, Stall Breaker, Wall Breaker, and you also need to remember Unaware and Ditto. There's multiple different ways to fill these roles though so I wouldn't say there's any specific pokemon you'd be stupid not to run, but here are a couple really cool ones. Weavile is awesome on these builds as it can threaten Lele with Pursuit, keep up against dying teams with Punishment's in combat scaling, and still clean late game with Ice Shard. Gotta run Adamant though for that Atk boost. Bibarel is another really cool mon to consider although niche. I am aware that Simple doesn't double the boosts, but Bibarel is great as an Offensive Unaware user, ignoring defensive boosts to finish off Stall builds late game. Most physical attackers would struggle to KO something like a +3 Def Mega Slowbro, even at +5 Atk, but an Unaware Bibarel does not. Plus +5 Aqua Jet still cleans offensive teams, and you can always sack it early if you're not against Stall or an AJ weak team.

STALL

Now here's where I actually bring up something new. Stall has been very overlooked thus far and in practise I believe it will be very hard to deal with, and require multiple dedicated answers to beat. An even spread of Def and SpD boosters, or perhaps more Def boosters, against a strong CM late game cleaner, is going to be super hard to break. Unaware by itself crushes most teams, so you need to be able to deal with Quagsire, Pyukumuku and Clefable quickly. But how are you going to deal with a CM Unaware Clefable with +3 Def and +2 SpD to begin with? Or a Mega CroBro with the same boosts? Perhaps even a CM Chansey with +4 Def? Or a Mega Sableye with a CM Foul Play set? Just Foul Play in general?
These are dedicated walls, designed to be able to take hits even after a Swords Dance or Nasty Plot, they don't need to match your +5 Atk or SpA perfectly.
Also consider this, Walls are going to kill your mons very slowly, so if you KO too many of them too quickly, they'll have the easiest time possible boosting to +6.
TRSS and PPS will no doubt be threatening, but if they don't heavily prepare for Stall and play against it correctly, it'll quickly become unbreakable.

I might try build an effective team for each of these archetypes and share them later, but I'm very busy at the moment so they'll be a long time coming.

 

[Phat Albert]

PPS

You do have a lot of check boxes you need to patch however, and you also need to remember Unaware.

Nice post, though one thing I would like to mention is my boi Kartana. With its massive attack stat it would really love physical attack boosts, and thanks to its typing it obliterates every viable Unaware user with SE hits. I'm not super sure, but if stall looks anything like it does in OU I'm pretty sure an attack boosted Kartana does quite a number on several of the mons on that playstyle, with Fightinium Z Sacred Sword busting through Skarmory. It doesn't really have any priority however, but Kartana is naturally faster than Lele and so can easily force it out (unless Lele is Scarf of course). Anyways, this meta seems pretty interesting and I'd like to see how it develops.

 

[skies]

Lost heroes – How does Lunar Dance / Healing Wish work? Say you have a +1 Atk, +1 Def, +2 Spe Latias or whatever, and its highest stat is SpA. You bring back a fainted Pokemon, let's say Unfezant. The Unfezant would have just a +1 SpA, or would it have all of the previous boosts as well?

 

[SadisticMystic]

Lunar Dance and Healing Wish can't be used to revive anyone, the point is to use them to bring in someone who's almost (but not quite) dead and restore them back to full health (and in the case of Lunar Dance, also full PP), at the cost of the user's life. You will now have one more fainted Pokemon than you had before, and the switch-in will get all the boosts that the team had, plus the new boost from the Healing Wish user's stat.

 

[urkerab]

Depending on what's easier to code, either the stat boosted will be randomly determined between the highest stats on the first switch and be the same stat every switch, or it will be randomly determined every switch.

It should work like Beast Boost, with the order of priority being Attack -> Defense -> Sp. Attack -> Sp. Defense -> Speed.

I've gone for Beast Boost in my attempt to code this for ROM as that was easiest to code. (Anyone want to test?)

 

[Cenamazing]

I like how pepole are already boxing in the "only 3 viable strategies in the metagame" before we can even play it.

 

[lost heros]

Great discussion so far, however I do think we've been underestimating some non-Trick Room Special Teams. Special Pokemon still have access to Quiver Dance and Tail Glow. While setting up manually may seem counter-intuitive, the benefit of having both high Speed, Special Attack, and Bulk boosts can give Balance a place in the metagame.

Here are a couple cores of my own.

Azelf+Whimsi+Xurkitree

Xurkitree @ Life Orb
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Tail Glow
- Thunderbolt
- Energy Ball
- filler/Substitute/HP Ice/Something to hit Clefable/Z-Hypnosis if your ballsy

Azelf @ Focus Sash
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Taunt
- Stealth Rock
- Explosion
- Flamethrower

Whimsicott @ Focus Sash
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Memento
- Taunt
- Protect
- Tailwind

This is pretty simple to understand. Azelf sets rocks and explodes to give a useful speed boost, Whimsi comes in to set up tailwind before killing itself with Memento, Xurkitree then comes in on the mon that just got a nasty -2/-2 in its offenses and uses that to set up Tail Glow. Now it has +2 Speed, +3 Special Attack, and a Tailwind as well as a way to rip through Unaware Quagsire anyways. Pair this with a Terrain Extended Tapu Lele (If it dies more SpAtk) and make sure the opposing Clefable is out of your way and off you go!

 

[PrincessGardevoir]

"With great power comes some other random fucker that will ruin the fun of it all for the hell of it."

- probably some guy in the OU room

Manaphy @ Leftovers
Ability: Hydration
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Heart Swap
- Rain Dance
- Rest


Here's a possibility that I don't think some people probably are thinking of as this is still sort of in a 'alpha stage.' Manaphy can come in during the early-game, if you have leads that can successfully take out one or two Pokemon, preferrably something that provides a great boost such as Speed or Special Attack, and steal the boosts from whatever it is while passing on, say, Defense or an Offensive stat they don't really want. While a scenario like this isn't too possible, Manaphy still exists as a way to swap around stats. Manaphy also isn't a slouch by itself as just a natural abuser of this meta's stat passing - Allowing Manaphy to easily gain defensive boosts in order to just outstall competition with Rain Dance Rest and Scald burns + power-up through Special Attack.

Oh and here have a team

Hide

Manaphy @ Leftovers
Ability: Hydration
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Heart Swap
- Rain Dance
- Rest

Tapu Koko @ Life Orb
Ability: Electric Surge
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 30 Atk
- Thunderbolt
- Dazzling Gleam
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- U-turn

Xurkitree @ Focus Sash
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Dazzling Gleam
- Tail Glow

Clefable @ Leftovers
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Moonblast
- Stored Power
- Calm Mind
- Soft-Boiled

Greninja @ Focus Sash
Ability: Battle Bond
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Water Shuriken
- Dark Pulse
- Ice Beam

Krookodile @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Power Trip
- Earthquake
- Fire Fang
- Superpower

 

[The Immortal]

It's been a couple of months and suffice to say this OM lacks any interest. As such, we have decided to close it.