Aka Curse Dragapult's Big Adventure.
So for the big 3,000th post I wanted to do my typical RMT milestone thing, partially because I like documenting history and partially because I like talking about myself. I knew for a while that this post was coming, but I never expected it would be in OU of all things; I've been a lower tier player ever since the beginning, and breaking into the OU scene was not something I felt interested in nor skilled enough to do. To be here now writing about not only an OU team that I and others had much success with, but one that even created a metagame staple set is something I never really could've imagined, and tbh it still feels kinda surreal as nerdy as that is to say.
I've always been sort of a crafty builder and I tend to put my own spin on things whenever possible; I'm far from the Eeveeto or crying level of heat connoisseur, but I do think I'm at least a little bit off the wall. This was the first SV OU team I put a ton of effort into, because it was the team I brought to my first (and third) ever SPL game - these were games my team very much needed to win to have any playoff odds, so the pressure was pretty high, and I wanted to make something I knew I could pilot well and be comfortable with. My go-to when "solving" a new meta tends to be some sort of hyper offense, since it allows for quick games and lets me get a grasp on basic sequences much quicker than a typical balance squad would. After a week of countless iterations, this is the version of the team I came up with. I've named it after a bunch of my favourite songs from a certain duo - they're very underrated and I highly recommend it. Without further ado, let's get into the RMT.
Teambuilding Process
Despite Dragapult being the first Pokemon in the team's order, the first Pokemon I put on the team was Meowscarada since I knew I wanted to make a Lead Meowscarada Hyper Offense team.
Volcarona was chosen as the obligatory "click setup move and watch things die" Pokemon. It was the first thing I added to my team as I felt it was pretty good at taking advantage of a number of the things that would theoretically be used to deal with Meow like Booster Valiant, Hydreigon, those kinds of guys.
Kingambit was and probably is mandatory for these kinds of offenses because of how much defensive utility it provides while also being the biggest offensive threat in the tier. There isn't much more to it than that, enormous bulk + Sucker Punch = good.
Very typical Kingambit partner because between Kingambit and Iron Valiant you could check most of the offensive metagame if played correctly. Iron Valiant ended up being one of the most common endgame sweepers on the team, too, mostly because of how fast it is.
So far I was great against opposing offense but I fel like I needed something that could muscle through balance teams easily enough. Baxcalibur seemed like the perfect fit with its enormous power and good bulk and ability. It shreds most non-Dozo fat with ease and makes for a great breaker to aid the sweepers in their sweeping duties.
Originally I wanted DD Dragapult as my Ghost-type since I knew I wanted one of those, but it kinda stunk.
Next I tried Gholdengo but it was a bit too slow and sacked a fair bit of momentum.
Don't use this guy.
Or this one.
Honestly wasn't bad, broken a lot of non-Ting Lu teams very well. Far from the worst thing I've used and at least it was good at spinblocking Tusk.
Right about here is when I decided to go back to the Dragapult drawing board.
I gave up on DD but realised that Dragapult had an endless movepool, so I tried to see what I could do with it. Screens is what I came up with in the end, with the nasty surprise of Ghost-type Curse, a move that was pretty much unseen until right about now.
In-Depth Look
Glass Spiders (Dragapult) @ Light Clay
Ability: Cursed Body
Tera Type: Dragon
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Darts
- Reflect
- Light Screen
- Curse
Despite Dragapult being the first Pokemon in the team's order, the first Pokemon I put on the team was Meowscarada since I knew I wanted to make a Lead Meowscarada Hyper Offense team.
Volcarona was chosen as the obligatory "click setup move and watch things die" Pokemon. It was the first thing I added to my team as I felt it was pretty good at taking advantage of a number of the things that would theoretically be used to deal with Meow like Booster Valiant, Hydreigon, those kinds of guys.
Kingambit was and probably is mandatory for these kinds of offenses because of how much defensive utility it provides while also being the biggest offensive threat in the tier. There isn't much more to it than that, enormous bulk + Sucker Punch = good.
Very typical Kingambit partner because between Kingambit and Iron Valiant you could check most of the offensive metagame if played correctly. Iron Valiant ended up being one of the most common endgame sweepers on the team, too, mostly because of how fast it is.
So far I was great against opposing offense but I fel like I needed something that could muscle through balance teams easily enough. Baxcalibur seemed like the perfect fit with its enormous power and good bulk and ability. It shreds most non-Dozo fat with ease and makes for a great breaker to aid the sweepers in their sweeping duties.
Originally I wanted DD Dragapult as my Ghost-type since I knew I wanted one of those, but it kinda stunk.
Next I tried Gholdengo but it was a bit too slow and sacked a fair bit of momentum.
Don't use this guy.
Or this one.
Honestly wasn't bad, broken a lot of non-Ting Lu teams very well. Far from the worst thing I've used and at least it was good at spinblocking Tusk.
Right about here is when I decided to go back to the Dragapult drawing board.
I gave up on DD but realised that Dragapult had an endless movepool, so I tried to see what I could do with it. Screens is what I came up with in the end, with the nasty surprise of Ghost-type Curse, a move that was pretty much unseen until right about now.
In-Depth Look
Glass Spiders (Dragapult) @ Light Clay
Ability: Cursed Body
Tera Type: Dragon
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Darts
- Reflect
- Light Screen
- Curse
A lot went into the planning for this slot. I go into it above, but there was a lot of nuance and thought here. Eventually I came to realise that the main thing I wanted from this slot was positioning, so I thought about my options. Enter Curse Dragapult.
This was important for a lot of reasons. First, Dragapult's raw Speed was great for keeping things in check - think Hydreigon, opposing Meowscarada, Cinderace, other stuff like that. Second, dual screens + setup spam is a tried and true strategy; not one this team needed to function, but it was certainly enhanced by it. Third, Curse was immensely helpful for two things. Preventing stuff like Kingambit / Garganacl from using you for free setup is obviously pretty huge, but so is KOIng yourself to get an appropriate sweeper on the field in extremely favourable conditions; the opponent will have to deal with a setup monster behind screens while taking 25% every single turn, and you create extremely easy snowball effects that way. Tera Dragon is just for boosted Darts damage, but you should probably never find yourself clicking it.
Since then, it's been widely agreed upon that Dragapult is easily the best screens setter, which I find very humbling. It feels weird to see my contribution to a metagame like that.
Horror Show (Meowscarada) @ Life Orb
Ability: Overgrow
Tera Type: Steel
EVs: 180 Atk / 76 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Spikes
- Leaf Storm
- Sucker Punch
- Taunt
So then we have lead Meow, but not the normal one. You can use the standard Sash variant if you want, but after testing and messing around I decided this was a very fun way to punish some typical lines. With this investment, you can still OHKO Great Tusk with Leaf Storm and thus keep your Spikes up, but with Sucker Punch you can also OHKO Dragapult. That's huge, since a common way to deal with lead Meow was to U-turn with Dragapult into something else to KO, or just DDarts with CB Dragapult. Good way to flip that matchup on its head.
Beyond that, Meow was just the best lead. Glimm sucked and always did, it was too easily prepared for and was just a huge bait mon. Meow keeps em up against just about everything other than like, SpDef Iron Treads?? Idk. Tera Steel is just to block Mortal Spin, since Glimmora is kind of annoying, but you really shouldn't need to Tera - just 2HKO it with Leaf Storm in that matchup.
California's Burning (Volcarona) @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
Tera Type: Ground
EVs: 100 Def / 156 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Quiver Dance
- Flamethrower
- Giga Drain
- Tera Blast
Broken #1. Tera Ground Volcarona was a monstrous breaker when it was legal and there really weren't all that many good stops; the most common ways to beat Volcarona were with Skeledirge, Ting-Lu and Tera Fire Kingambit. Ting-Lu admittedly still worked p well but the other two got owned, and so did Toxapex and co. That said, I tried to avoid Teraing Volcarona unless it had a really good opportunity to do so, because Volcarona's very limited amount of responses meant I could use it to get some good damage and then position another Pokemon that's more capable of sweeping like Baxcalibur or Iron Valiant.
Also, the Def EVs let you live CB Tera Dragon Glaive Rush from Baxcalibur behind Reflect. Pretty handy.
Awful Ever After (Kingambit) @ Leftovers
Ability: Supreme Overlord
Tera Type: Fire
EVs: 212 HP / 252 Atk / 44 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Kowtow Cleave
- Iron Head
- Sucker Punch
Broken #2. Kingambit swept basically every Tuskless team and had a tendency to sweep Tusk teams too. However, unlike most teams where Kingambit is the sweeper, this one relies more on its defensive presence; Kingambit can sweep, yes, and if the opportunity arose I would definitely go for it, but most often it would end up trading with a big threat like Baxcalibur or CM Iron Valiant for the benefit of the rest of the squad. Near max HP investment makes it basically impossible to OHKO without a Fighting move, and most of the frail things that threatened it could be OHKOd back, so it was usually a great trade to take them and it'd frequently create checkmate positions (lol).
Tera Fire was mostly to avoid Will-O-Wisp and make sure Volcarona didn't get out of hand, but there was probably experimentation to be done. Lum Berry would let you milk other Teras like Water maybe. Hard to say tbh, especially since the meta this was born in is gone now.
Wide Awake (Baxcalibur) @ Loaded Dice
Ability: Thermal Exchange
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 68 HP / 252 Atk / 188 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Icicle Spear
- Glaive Rush
- Earthquake
Loaded Dice Baxcalibur was a very fun innovation that hadn't been used in (high level?) OU yet at the time of my debut. It was a thing in VGC for sure, but I guess nobody thought to port it over. My manager shiloh recommended it as a sweeper when I mentioned I was hating Icicle Crash; tried it once and never looked back, this thing is amazing.
With Thermal Exchange, Bax was able to punish some very popular mons like defensive Volcarona and Rotom-W. From there once it gets a DD it's usually claiming at least one unless you're unfortunate enough to run into a Scizor; I don't believe anyone was using Tera Fairy atp but I wanted it to ease the Pult MU mostly. You could DD again in its face and that'd usually be game over. The EVs here outspeed Dragapult at +1; non max Speed might seem greedy but I found that the HP invest went a really long way against stuff like Gholdengo and Great Tusk, esp behind screens.
Split Personality (Iron Valiant) @ Booster Energy
Ability: Quark Drive
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Moonblast
- Shadow Ball
- Taunt
Iron Valiant was a necessity on offense at this time because of the sheer value brought by a mon with an immediate Speed stat above 500. I went with a CM Taunt set to make the balance matchup easier; you could set up on Toxapex, prevent Corviknight from Defogging, and even sometimes beat Volcarona. The coverage choice was really just down to finding the best 2 move coverage I could; Fairy + Ghost hits every Pokemon in the game for neutral damage except for Pyroar, Grafaiai, and some weird Garganacl Teras, so I was fine with that.
I think Valiant was the 2nd most commonly used sweeper on the team behind Baxcalibur just because everything else broke so well for it; Volcarona or Bax would send Garg/Ghold packing and then you'd go to town with this thing after a CM. Being able to outspeed stuff like Meow and Cinderace was so clutch too, and of course Dragapult. It was a very easy mon to clean up games with.
Replays
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9ou-675342 vs elodin, SPL Week 5 - Old version, but same principle.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9ou-678213 vs Hyogafodex, SPL Week 7 - The version you know and love now.
Closing Words
Normally I love being sappy here and writing a billion shoutouts but this time I'm gonna keep it to just a few. Thanks to shiloh and z0mOG for drafting me and giving me a chance, and to my Tigers friends TheFranklin, TPP, erz, Fc, Finchinator, c0mp, crucify, BluBirD and mael for helping me with prep and test games. Would not have gotten near where I am now if not for you guys. Huge s/o to Team Europe too, and to ppl like TDK, august and Sage for convincing me I could actually get somewhere in the first place when I was at a mental low w/ the game.https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9ou-675342 vs elodin, SPL Week 5 - Old version, but same principle.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9ou-678213 vs Hyogafodex, SPL Week 7 - The version you know and love now.
Closing Words
Ancient team, not even legal anymore, but I wanted to gush a bit and this felt like the right way to do it. Here's the importable. Happy 3k to me!