Resource VGC Creative & Niche Pokemon Thread

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Pyritie

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:scopelens:


Kartana @ Scope Lens
Ability: Beast Boost
Level: 50
EVs: 52 HP / 124 Atk / 4 Def / 76 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Leaf Blade
- Sacred Sword
- Substitute
- Detect

So this is a set that has caught on rather recently and deserves mention here. Scope Lens Kartana was piloted on Enosh's 3rd/4th place ONOG team and Nail's Top 8 Melbourne Internationals team. The premise here is that Kartana is able to bypass Intimidates with both Substitute and a 50% chance to crit your opponent. Critical Hit Leaf Blades do an absurd amount of damage to even Pokemon that normally resist and it only snowballs further if you can get attack boosts. This set is also very good at shutting down Snorlax as crit Leaf Blade and Sacred Sword bypass Snorlax's Curse boosts and deal tremendous damage while Snorlax struggles to do anything back. Definitely a fun set and worth trying [:
What do the defensive EVs on this set do?
 

Pyritie

TAMAGO
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sash nihilego power gem 3HKO and LO koko tbolt in electric terrain 2HKO
oh nice

I've been using 84 HP / 84 Atk / 4 Def / 84 SpD / 252 Spe myself -- it survives a modest lele psychic in terrain and a jolly chomp fire fang
 
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I thought I'd post about something I've been having a lot of fun testing recently. By no means am I saying this isn't being used or that it is original, but I do think in general Aerodactyl isn't seeing as much usage as I believe it deserves.


Aerodactyl @ Focus Sash
Ability: Pressure
Level: 50
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Rock Slide
- Wide Guard/Taunt/Roar
- Tailwind
- Sky Drop

Being one of the only truly viable tailwind setters in the format besides Pelipper and at a bit of a stretch Whimsicott, as well as the few viable rock types besides Gigalith and at a stretch Nihilego, I feel Aerodactyl has some massive draws as a utility lead. The first and most straightforward of which is a fast Rock Slide. In previous formats Rock Slide was often said to be the best move in the game due to its great flinch chance when factoring in both targets. While it is less common this year, it is still just as useful as ever for breaking sashes, fishing for flinches and picking off heavily weakened Pokemon. Wide Guard allows Aerodactyl to protect its partner from the plethora of spread moves in this format, such as Discharge, Dazzling Gleam, EQ, Blizzard and Eruption/Heat Wave, while also protecting itself ensuring that you at least survive from your Focus sash if your opponent expects the spread damage to finish you off. Taunt is predominantly used to prevent Trick Room being set up by P2, as well as preventing their recovery/toxic stall. It is also useful in preventing sub+seed Celesteela from stalling you out. On the other hand, Roar can be used to guarantee that you prevent Trick Room from Mental Herb Oranguru, as well as being useful versus set up mons such as Z-stockpile Gastrodon/Araquanid or Sub+Calm Mind Tapu Fini. Tailwind is here obviously for speed control, though granted it isn't used all that much. Often times I have found that the threat of Tailwind was better than actually using the move. Still, with so little speed control in the format tailwind can be huge in setting up a win condition. And finally Sky Drop, my favourite part of the moveset. The fact that Sky Drop can just cock block a Pokemon for a turn is huge, but the fact that they can't Protect or switch the next turn is huge. I love pairing it with some kind of nuke option, such as Z moves or terrain/choice item boosted STAB moves. Considering how fast Aerodactyl is, I often have my say on what I want gone for the turn, allowing my partner to focus on its target and then have a pretty much guaranteed KO the next turn.

The spread is straight forward enough, though max speed really does take advantage of the fact that seemingly very few Tapu Koko are max speed nowadays, making it pretty much faster than the entire unboosted metagame. Something that hasn't come in to play yet and I'm not sure about the mechanics of but what I imagine should work in theory is that its ability Pressure coupled with its fast speed should allow you to check whether or not an opposing Tapu Lele is scarfed depending on if their terrain goes off before your Pressure, but I'm not sure if terrains go off before other abilities so I'd like confirmation on that.

I've personally been testing this set with a bulky specs Tapu Lele, in my opinion the epitome of a nuke and one that really appreciates the speed control. It is slow enough to deny opposing Tapu Koko leads the terrain advantage and just puts a dent into anything unresisted. It can just delete opposing Tapus, or at the very least 2HKO Bulu outside of psychic terrain, as well as things like Arcanine, Gastrodon, Milotic (especially after a Sky Drop) and clean 2HKO any P2 in psychic terrain. But enough about that, really it can work with all sorts of things that love getting off guaranteed damage, value speed control and appreciate Wide Guard support, which tbh seems pretty damn broad to me.
Has anyone ever considered running Flyingium-Z on Aerodactyl? It's something I've been meaning to test out for a while but I just haven't gotten around to building a team for it. I figured you would run more or less the standard set but Flyingium Z would allow for Aero to push out some immediate damage with its flying STAB if it needed to or set up a Tailwind through Taunt/Encore. Z-Tailwind also boost the critical hit chance, which could be potentially useful considering that a majority of the intimidate pokemon in this format are weak to Aerodactyl's Rock STAB.
 

Arcanine @ Choice Band
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpDef / 252 Spe
Nature: Adamant
Ability: Intimidate
- Flare Blitz
- Wild Charge
- Extremespeed
- Close Combat

Choice Band Arcanine has been gaining popularity recently and it's now the most common item in-game. With the boost, Arcanine can now OHKO even the most defensive Celesteela with Flare Blitz and has a 50% chance to OHKO max HP Araquanid with Wild Charge. Extremespeed will deal over 50% to most Pokemon and has an 81.3% chance to OHKO Pheromosa, assuming it doesn't have a Focus Sash. Close Combat is Arcanine's strongest coverage move in terms of base power. With Choice Band, it will do a minimum of 71.2% to standard Porygon2, 83.3% to max HP Gigalith, and OHKO max HP Snorlax.

Max Atk and Spe are just to let Arcanine hit as hard and fast as possible. The 4 SpDef is just to give Porygon2 an Attack boost from Download.
 
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Max Atk and Spe are just to let Arcanine hit as hard and fast as possible. The 4 SpDef is just to give Porygon2 an Attack boost from Download.
FYI: Download doesn't work like Trace. It takes the average of both Pokemon and then picks the weaker stat instead of randomly picking one opponent's stats. That 4 SpDef might still make a difference now and then, but not as often as you'd think.
 
FYI: Download doesn't work like Trace. It takes the average of both Pokemon and then picks the weaker stat instead of randomly picking one opponent's stats. That 4 SpDef might still make a difference now and then, but not as often as you'd think.
Well that explains why Porygon2 always gets a SpAtk boost while Kartana's out. Probably won't help much, then.
 

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Well that explains why Porygon2 always gets a SpAtk boost while Kartana's out. Probably won't help much, then.
It helps when paired with another Pokemon that has the same Def/SpD stat, but otherwise it shouldn't make a difference

With Choice Band, it will do a minimum of 83.3% to max HP Gigalith, and OHKO max HP Snorlax.
Gigalith and Snorlax often run Def EVs and so often have more physical bulk than a standard 252 / 0 set. Snorlax in particular may carry many Def EVs, and I wouldn't count on OHKOing it. For example against a 60 HP / 252 Atk / 196 Def:
252+ Atk Choice Band Arcanine Close Combat vs. 60 HP / 196 Def Snorlax: 220-260 (90.5 - 106.9%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO

Against Markus' Snorlax (EVs: 100 HP / 28 Atk / 244 Def / 132 SpD):
252+ Atk Choice Band Arcanine Close Combat vs. 100 HP / 244 Def Snorlax: 208-246 (83.8 - 99.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
 
It helps when paired with another Pokemon that has the same Def/SpD stat, but otherwise it shouldn't make a difference



Gigalith and Snorlax often run Def EVs and so often have more physical bulk than a standard 252 / 0 set. Snorlax in particular may carry many Def EVs, and I wouldn't count on OHKOing it. For example against a 60 HP / 252 Atk / 196 Def:
252+ Atk Choice Band Arcanine Close Combat vs. 60 HP / 196 Def Snorlax: 220-260 (90.5 - 106.9%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO

Against Markus' Snorlax (EVs: 100 HP / 28 Atk / 244 Def / 132 SpD):
252+ Atk Choice Band Arcanine Close Combat vs. 100 HP / 244 Def Snorlax: 208-246 (83.8 - 99.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Yeah I really had no idea what the best sets for Gigalith and Snorlax were. Some chip damage from Rock Slide or Dazzling Gleam can pretty much guarantee the kill, though.
 
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