A small favor to ask the community-at-large.
There was a point last weekend where, between Maison and Tree, I noticed that every Stealth Rock user would set rocks down first and foremost, no matter what. I figured that this would could be a future rule of thumb I could apply in general for facilities. The following weekend,
none of these users did so, either going for super-effective hits on my team, or in the case of phazers, going for the phaze straightaway (although I also found instances of Aggron1 going for Metal Burst first). Now, I'm not sure what to think regarding the AI's usage of this move.
This was originally going to be an affirmation of the general guideline, "if you're going to use a Sash, it
has to lead", and I will still do so. But, it has gotten me curious as to how the AI treats entry hazards in terms of importance. So, I was going to ask everyone here, if they have a moment while they're on their Tree runs, to note if any Stealth Rock users they encounter go for that first. I myself will start recording instances of this between Subway/Maison/Tree, as I'm holding small streaks in all of these right now. I'm relatively certain folks in past facility threads have gone over this, but I wouldn't remember what they said (although I will be fixing this shortly). I want to limit this to SR data since this is the most commonly encountered entry hazard post-Legend and the most relevant for those here (despite their inherent problems, Fire/Flying and Volcarona are things people here want to try out at least semi-consistently).
Thx in advance for any data collected.
EDIT: As an example of what I'm up against, I'm using this team for Subway right now:
Team #2 (Codename: Sand)
Chople Berry, Brave Nature, Sand Stream
252 HP, 252 Atk, 4 Def
Rock Slide, Crunch, Ice Punch, Protect
Life Orb, Timid Nature, Intimidate
8 HP, 244 SpA, 252 Spe
Dragon Pulse, HP Flying, Flamethrower, Protect
Focus Sash, Adamant Nature, Sand Rush
76 HP, 252 Atk, 4 Def, 4 SpD, 172 Spe
Earthquake, Rock Slide, Iron Head, Protect
Sitrus Berry, Calm Nature, Levitate
248 HP, 20 SpA, 20 SpD, 220 Spe
Thunderbolt, Hydro Pump, HP Ice, Protect
In the course of this run, I've encountered Stealth Rock users four times: twice against Tyranitar1, once against Cradily1, and once against Mamoswine1. In the first case of Tyranitar1, it Thunder Waved the leads, Rock Slide once, Thunder Wave (into a Excadrill switch-in), then was eliminated by Excadrill. In the second instance, it Thunder Waved the leads, Flung its Iron Ball (into a Rotom-W switch-in), Rock Slide, set rocks, Thunder Waved Rotom-W, then was eliminated by Excadrill. Against faster threats, status seems to be the priority for this set, followed by super-effective hits on Salamence. The instance against Cradily1 was me concentrating my Ice attacks against it (since its ally Bastiodon1 was spamming Wide Guard and -2 Iron Head), so it got one Stockpile, one Swallow, one more Stockpile, and then gone. As the Subway article has noted:
CPU tends to only use recovery moves when they are below half health. They sometimes, however, seem to "predict" when they will go below half health when their Pokemon is slower than yours.
Certainly was the case here.
Mamoswine1 went for the Ice Shard on Salamence, got it down to 45 or 46 HP, then was double-targeted and taken down. Here, going for the super-effective hit (with priority, coincidentally) was the clear priority.
A very small sample size, but one can tell that general AI tendencies prevail in the Subway, mostly those predicted by those in the tracks at that time.