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Published on June 30th, 2014 | by Scott

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VGC 2014 Metagame Overview

While we’re pretty far along in the VGC 2014 format, with US Nationals upcoming I would imagine a lot of players are dusting off their 3DSs and getting reacquainted with Pokémon VGC. For some players, it may even be their first VGC tournament. Whether you are a new player, new to the format, or just looking for a little refresher, this article will serve as an overview to the most common Pokémon in the 2014 VGC format. While every Pokémon that is viable won’t be included here, you can expect that once you move beyond the very bottom tables, 85-90% of the Pokémon you run into will probably be on this list. Consider the Pokémon here to be the minimum of what you should be familiar with in the VGC 2014 format in order to be successful.

The information listed with each Pokémon is pulled from the Pokémon Global Link’s data about the May International Challenge Wi-Fi Tournament. This isn’t intended to an opinion piece: while you will get some of my thoughts on each Pokémon, the point here is to give an idea of what each Pokémon is likely to do based on data from previous tournaments, not necessarily what I think they should do. On the other hand, I will note cases where I think the statistics may be misleading and where a particularly high concentration of newer players may have slanted the data away from what I think is likely to occur in real life. I may update the stats referenced in the article for the June Wi-Fi International Challenge after US Nationals, but the data here is currently all based on May. The Pokémon selected and the order they are presented in are based largely on the usage data from Pokémon Showdown! rather than the Wi-Fi tournaments because I can’t get a full list from the Global Link, though I added and excluded a few Pokémon toward the end based on perceived relevance and in some cases because of strange mechanics that would trouble an uneducated player.

Consider everything in this resource to be listed in rough order of importance. The Pokémon are listed largely in descending order of their popularity. Within each section, the most common moves and builds of the Pokémon in question will be listed first. Pokémon that are almost guaranteed to Mega Evolve will be listed with their Mega picture only, Pokémon that are almost always guaranteed not to Mega Evolve to will only be shown in their normal form, and both pictures will be shown when Pokémon are commonly seen both with and without their Mega Stones.

This article is probably not something you want to read in completion in one sitting. Think of it more as a reference sheet for reviewing the most common VGC Pokémon.

The following Pokémon will be included in this article:

• Kangaskhan
• Aegislash
• Garchomp
• Heat Rotom
• Wash Rotom
• Mawile
• Amoonguss
• Talonflame
• Salamence
• Tyranitar
• Gardevoir
• Charizard
• Azumarill
• Venusaur
• Gengar
• Manectric
• Hydreigon
• Aerodactyl
• Gyarados
• Meowstic
• Ferrothorn
• Bisharp
• Scrafty
• Mamoswine
• Smeargle
• Politoed
• Ludicolo
• Kingdra
• Greninja
• Lucario
• Chandelure
• Mienshao
• Goodra
• Gothitelle
• Pyroar
• Zapdos
• Raichu
• Sableye
• Klefki
• Liepard
• Blastoise
• Scizor
• Weavile
• Noivern
• Conkeldurr
• Staraptor
• Gourgeist
• Trevenant
• Wigglytuff

Kangaskhan

Base stats: 105 HP / 95->125 Atk / 80-> 100 Def / 40->60 SAtk / 80->100 SDef / 90->100 Spd

Probability of Mega Evolving: 100%. Kangaskhan would still be in the Safari Zone without mega stones.

Typing: Normal/Normal

By far the strongest Pokémon VGC has seen since Kyogre in 2010, VGC 2014 is Kangaskhan’s metagame. Its unique Ability upon Mega Evolving, Parental Bond, basically gives it a Choice Band that allows it to switch moves. The fact it actually hits twice instead of just doing x1.5 damage like Choice Band allows it to break Substitutes and Focus Sashes at the cost of being more vulnerable to Rough Skin, Iron Barbs, Rocky Helmet, and Sitrus Berry. The main benefit of the double hit is that it allows Kangaskhan to be the sole effective user of one of the new moves in XY, Power-Up Punch, which lets it gain one level of Attack on each of the two hits while doing some chip damage. Kangaskhan boasts the best defenses of any offensive Pokémon in the format, with fairly outrageous 105/100/100 defenses after Mega Evolving, and at 100 Speed, it’s at least tied with most of the fastest Pokémon that have meaningful positive qualities beyond being fast. The combination of power, speed, and bulk on Kangaskhan is pretty overwhelming, and the metagame has centralized significantly around it as a result. Even Kangaskhan’s original ability, Scrappy, is somewhat useful, allowing it to damage Ghost-types with its Normal-type attacks prior to Mega Evolving. While Kangaskhan dominates most neutral match ups, it does struggle a little with faster threats like Garchomp and some Choice Scarfed Pokémon, who still need to be wary of Sucker Punch, Will-O-Wisp and Intimidate, which can be partially or completely negated by Power-Up Punch, knocking itself out along with its opponent because of Rocky Helmet, and the few usable Ghost-types like Aegislash and Gengar. Kangaskhan helps form most of VGC 2014’s “cheese” duos, combining especially with Talonflame, Amoonguss, and Smeargle to wreck havoc without too much finesse required from its trainer.

Key Moves: Sucker Punch, Power-Up Punch, Fake Out, Return, Double Edge, Protect, Hammer Arm

Typical Builds: Kangaskhan has a handful of interesting build options. While its item is eaten up by the Kangaskhanite, both Jolly and Adamant are popular natures. Jolly helps Kangaskhan deal with other Pokémon around base 100 Speed like Charizard, the slightly slower Hydreigon, and perhaps most importantly, ensures at least a Speed tie with other Kangaskhan. Adamant is also popular on Kangaskhan, which adds enough damage to get a few extra KOs and helps the Kangaskhan player’s decision-making a little as the temptation to try to coinflip speed ties with other Kangaskhan is removed. Adamant spreads range from maximizing Attack and Speed to slowing down Kangaskhan to around the point where it is a point or two faster than positively natured Smeargle, while Jolly almost always runs maximum Attack and Speed. Bulkier Brave Natured versions on Trick Room teams featuring Hammer Arm are also not unheard of. Regardless of its nature and EVs, Kangaskhan also has to make some interesting decisions between Fake Out and Protect as well as Return and Double Edge depending on how conservative or aggressive the Kangaskhan is to be.

Aegislash

Base stats: Shield Forme: 60 HP / 50 Atk / 150 Def / 50 SAtk / 150 SDef / 60 Spd
Blade Forme: 60 HP / 150 Atk /50 Def / 150 SAtk / 50 SDef / 60 Spd

Typing: Ghost/Steel

Another XY addition that is among the very strongest Pokémon in the format because of a unique Ability, Aegislash is probably the most important non-Mega Pokémon in the format. Aegislash’s trick is its ability Stance Change, which allows it to swap its attacking and defending stats when it attacks, and then switch back to its powerful defensive forme by using Aegislash’s unique version of Protect, King’s Shield. King’s Shield lowers the Attack stat of physical attackers who target Aegislash while it is shielding it from damage moves at the expense of King’s Shield not blocking status moves like Protect does. Stance Change allows Aegislash to take most of its hits with powerful base 150 defenses if played wisely, while always attacking with its base 150 attacks in Blade forme. Substitute is extremely common on Aegislash because it can usually get Substitute up safely in Shield forme and then use it to take a hit in Blade forme or to avoid being instantly mauled by Sucker Punch. Aegislash is a huge problem for Kangaskhan, who typically can’t hit it on turns when it isn’t attacking due to Aegislash’s Ghost-typing. Aegislash’s ability to stall is greatly hampered by Will-O-Wisp and Taunt prevents it from stance dancing with King’s Shield, but if played well it tends to be extremely obnoxious to most other opponents who aren’t carrying STAB-boosted Fire-, Ground-, Ghost-, or Dark-type attacks.

Key Moves: King’s Shield, Shadow Ball, Substitute, Flash Cannon, Sacred Sword, Wide Guard, Shadow Sneak

Typical Builds: Normally seen from competitive players with Shadow Ball, a second attack, Substitute, King’s Shield, and Leftovers. Aegislash is one of the few Pokémon that makes good use of Leftovers, as it gets many turns of healing because it spends so long on the field maneuvering with Substitute and King’s Shield. Speed can be variable depending on player preference in the mirror. Minimum Speed is definitely the most common way to run Aegislash, though speeds all the way up to absolute maximum (to outspeed neutral-natured Bisharp) have been used in official events. While Flash Cannon was considered the best second attack for a long time, Sacred Sword is being seen more frequently on all sets recently, as even while Intimidated Aegislash only needs a neutral nature and 100 EVs to always KO uninvested Bisharp, a Pokémon that the Korean players especially have used to put fear in the hearts of many players. Wide Guard is less common, but given that Aegislash is weak to both Earthquake and Heat Wave it is both a useful move to support a team and to save Aegislash itself from being knocked out.  Most players dump most of Aegislash’s EVs into Special Attack and HP. Less common on Aegislash is the Weakness Policy gimmick set(28.6% usage in the May Wi-Fi International), which activates fairly reliably thanks to Shield forme, but tends to be too unreliable to be considered by more serious players at this point in the format. The Weakness Policy variant is much more likely to run Shadow Sneak, which typically allows it to almost-but-not-quite get a quick KO and then be immediately smeared while stuck in Blade forme for the rest of the turn.

Garchomp

Base stats: 108 HP / 130 Atk / 95 Def / 80 SAtk / 85 SDef / 102 Spd

Typing: Dragon/Ground

Probability of Mega Evolving: Less than zero.

After a season of being largely replaced by Landorus-Therian in 2013, Garchomp is both the best Ground-type available in 2014 and one of the safest and most generally effective Pokémon in the entire format. The addition of Mega Kangaskhan has made Garchomp’s once underwhelming hidden ability, Rough Skin, one of the best abilities in the game. Rough Skin causes Mega Kangaskhan to take 1/4 of its HP in damage every time it attacks Garchomp instead of the usual 1/8 because of Parental Bond causing it to hit twice, causing potential devastation if Garchomp cleverly switches into a Fake Out. Garchomp also has the advantage of base 102 Speed, an excellent quality in a metagame where several premier Pokémon are slightly slower than it is at base 100, such as Mega Kangaskhan, Salamence, and Mega Charizard. While Garchomp’s movepool is a little shallow and predictable, the combination of its Speed and having the right coverage moves allows it to become an annoying hurdle for Mega Kangaskhan, to fire off Rock-type attacks against Mega Charizard-Y, Earthquake Mega Mawile, and do serious damage to its fellow Dragons, the best of which are slightly slower than it is. Garchomp has to be a little wary of Choice Scarves, especially from other Dragons, and some enemy Fairy-types like Azumarill switching in for free into Dragon Claws, but otherwise Garchomp is pretty difficult to safely knock out once it gets on the field without at least letting it get some damage off.

Key Moves: Earthquake, Dragon Claw, Rock Slide, Protect

Typical Builds: Nearly always Jolly and close to 252 Attack and Speed to help it counter Kangaskhan, Charizard, and the other dragons. Typically holds Lum Berry, both to stop Will-O-Wisp and because Garchomp is one of the few higher-end Pokémon who can easily function as natural counters to Kangaskhan+Smeargle leads looking to Dark Void. Occasionally seen using the somewhat outdated Rocky Helmet to do extra damage to Mega Kangaskhan and friends, or the even more outdated Yache Berry or Focus Sash to survive super effective attacks that would normally knock it out in a single blow.

Heat Rotom

Base stats: 50 HP / 65 Atk / 107 Def / 105 SAtk / 107 SDef / 86 Spd

Typing: Electric/Fire

While Heat Rotom has traditionally been overshadowed by the generally superior typing of its watery cousin, the lack of playable Fire-types that can actually take hits in the VGC 2014 format combined with a large amount of Pokémon Fire-type Pokémon are really helpful against like Mawile, Amoonguss, and Aegislash has led to Heat Rotom becoming the more common Rotom forme. While Heat Rotom’s obnoxious weakness to Rock-types leads to it becoming Rock Slide flinch bait a little more frequently than many players would prefer, it is the premier defensive Fire-type in the format. Will-O-Wisp’s accuracy being up to 85% in XY almost guarantees you won’t miss four times in a row, which is an extremely valuable move in a metagame dominated by a handful of powerful physical attackers. Heat Rotom’s previously polarizing defensive typing is now much stronger in general in XY, walling Mega Charizard-Y and Talonflame effectively while offering a resistance to Fairy-types. Overheating recklessly can lead to Rotom ceasing to be a threat in a hurry, but it offers great offensive presence against most Pokémon even from defensive builds.

Key Moves: Overheat, Thunderbolt,Will-O-Wisp, Protect, Hidden Power, Volt Switch

Typical Builds: Heat Rotom almost always uses a Modest nature, but there is some serious deviation after that point. The most common setup is similar to the Wash Rotom of old with maximum or nearly maximum HP, some defensive investment to avoid getting smeared by Kangaskhan, and a bit of Special Attack along with the safe Sitrus Berry or Safety Goggles to play around enemy Amoonguss. Heat Rotom can also run something closer to what it would have during generation five with Choice Specs (replacing Fire Gem) or Choice Scarf and a more offensive EV spread, typically with all four of the attacking moves listed above, though it does so less frequently in VGC 2014 given the lack of other Pokémon available that can fill the defensive role it normally does.

Wash Rotom

Base stats: 50 HP / 65 Atk / 107 Def / 105 SAtk / 107 SDef / 86 Spd

Typing: Electric/Water

Wash Rotom has been one of VGC’s defensive mainstays since it was reintroduced in the 2012 format with Electric/Water typing, rather than the Electric/Ghost typing it had at its inception toward the end of generation four. The combination of Water/Electric typing and Levitate leaves Wash Rotom with only a single weakness and several useful resistances, which makes it a very safe Pokémon to play with. In conjunction with its solid Defense and Special Defense, Rotom’s typing allows it to spread Will-O-Wisp and stall out many opponents efficiently with enough HP EV investment to overcome its pitiful base 50 HP. While Grass-type attacks actually existing this year thanks to Venusaur and Ludicolo becoming relevant and Amoonguss being more popular as the most reliable form of redirection in the format isn’t favorable for Wash Rotom, 2014 is still a pretty good format for it. Azumarill and Megas Kangaskhan, Tyranitar, and Mawile really don’t want to be hit by the recently buffed Will-O-Wisp, Rotom-Heat and Talonflame are usually easy wins, and Levitate is valuable in a format with so much Garchomp, which is now a hard ability to come by with Cresselia out of the format. Some of the metagame’s biggest hits like Choice Specs Draco Meteor and Power-Up Punch-boosted Kangaskhan attacks can swat Rotom pretty easily, but in general it is a reliable, bulky option that spreads Will-O-Wisp better than any other Pokémon in the format.

Key Moves: Hydro Pump, Thunderbolt, Will-O-Wisp, Protect, Volt Switch

Typical Builds: In spite of Choice Specs Wash Rotom having a World Championship under its belt, Wash Rotom is even more likely to be built defensively than Heat Rotom is. While Modest nature is the most common for Wash Rotom as well, Bold and Calm are both seen much more frequently than for Heat Rotom, the defensive natures helping Wash Rotom wall special or physical attackers while spreading burn with Will-O-Wisp. Sitrus Berry is the only really common item on Wash Rotom, with offensive items almost disappearing at this point in the season. Typically all Wash Rotom maximize HP, then focus on surviving specific hits. Choice Specs Draco Meteor isn’t targeted as frequently as it used to be with the removal of Dragon Gem providing the same boost, so typically on the special end Wash Rotom has tried to survive Mega Charizard-Y Solar Beams for most of the year. Recently, fewer players seem to be finding this worth EVing against, and more physically defensive spreads have gotten more popular again, especially in regard to taking as many hits from Kangaskhan and Mawile as possible in order to get burns out. The fastest Wash Rotom is likely to go is quick enough to outrun neutral-natured Tyranitar, though with Life Orb Tyranitar getting less common over the course of the season, Wash Rotom now frequently only uses a point or two of Speed investment.

Mawile

Base stats: 50 HP / 85 -> 105 Atk / 85->125 Def / 55 SAtk / 55->95 SDef / 50 Spd

Probability of Mega Evolving: I don’t think most people even knew Mawile was a real Pokémon until it got a Mega.

Typing: Steel/Fairy

Like Kangaskhan, Mawile is a Pokémon that has had a shocking rise to stardom. Receiving both the beneficial addition of Fairy-typing and a Mega Evolution with the attack-doubling Huge Power in XY, Mawile is surprisingly pretty cleanly the second best Mega Evolution in the format. Regular Mawile’s Intimidate is actually pretty useful and sometimes makes it worth delaying Mega Evolving for a while, giving it some supportive ability before trying to sweep later in the game (as long as its trainer takes care not to waste too much HP through normal Mawile’s much weaker defenses). Like Kangaskhan, Mawile has Sucker Punch to finish off faster threats, though unlike Kangaskhan, most of the Pokémon in the format are quicker than Mawile is, so it is more likely to have to fall back on Sucker Punch and the threat it provides. The lack of Speed makes Mawile the strongest Mega Evolution for most Trick Room teams, though it is much more frequently seen on more standard teams as a Mega Evolution that has a very positive matchup with Kangaskhan due to its typing and Intimidate. Thanks to Huge Power doubling Mega Mawile’s attack, it can 2HKO most of the format and OHKO basically everything that is either frail or weak to one of its attacks, causing it to trade efficiently and be one of the format’s most punishing Pokémon when given free turns. In spite of its typing, Mawile has to look out for Garchomp Earthquakes and Fire-type attacks from the special Dragons, though Mawile will survive any of these attacks to KO back unless the Dragon-types are using offensive items to finish it off first. Mawile also struggles a bit with both Rotom formes, Amoonguss, Ferrothorn, and Charizard, though Mawile can rip through basically any team in a hurry if its teammates help create room for it to attack uninhibited. The biggest problem for Mawile is that it essentially automatically loses to Substitute Aegislash.

Key Moves: Play Rough, Sucker Punch, Protect, Iron Head, Rock Slide, Fire Fang

Typical Builds: While the first impression for most players was just to make Mawile Adamant on a standard team or Brave in Trick Room with close to maximum HP and Attack, bulkier spreads have sprung up during the season. Ray Rizzo won the first XY Regional with a Careful Mawile that had almost maximum HP and Special Defense in order to survive all unboosted Fire-type attacks safely, and similar spreads have stayed popular throughout the year. While Mawile’s EVs tend to stay near either of those extremes and its item is restricted by needing to Mega Evolve, it does have some interesting move choices. Play Rough, Protect, and Sucker Punch are on nearly every Mawile set, but Iron Head has fallen in popularity some in the last slot, since it doesn’t add much coverage beyond Gardevoir, Aromatisse, Venusaur, other Mawile, and being a STAB-boosted attack that can’t miss.  Rock Slide has gotten more popular recently to help Mawile remove some of the Pokémon that normally counter it like Charizard and Talonflame, especially on teams supporting Mawile with a form of speed control. Fire Fang also sees use on about 1/4 of all Mawile, though it is pretty limited and doesn’t really help with anything but other Steel-types.

Amoonguss

Base stats: 114 HP / 85 Atk / 70 Def / 85 SAtk / 80 SDef / 30 Spd

Typing: Grass/Poison

A solid supportive Pokémon in every VGC format since it was introduced in 2011, Amoonguss is enjoying what is probably its best year since it helped dominate the last highly centralized regionaldex VGC metagame. Amoonguss’s main two functions are using Spore to put enemy threats to sleep and Rage Powder to redirect attacks from its teammates who are actually capable of inflicting damage. One strange change for Amoonguss is that in XY, neither of those moves work on Grass-type Pokémon anymore, so the Amoonguss mirror tends to end up with both partners Spored and the players flipping coins patiently trying to wake up first rather than the Amoonguss trying to speed creep each other and be the first to Spore the mirror like in the BW formats. Amoonguss is really excellent alongside almost all powerful offensive Pokémon in order to help them get more free attacks off, such as the special Dragon-types, Kangaskhan, Mawile, and Gardevoir. As has been the case for years, Amoonguss’ main weaknesses are Taunt and the few Pokémon that can hit it with a STAB-boosted super effective attack, which from a practical perspective is basically limited to Gardevoir, Talonflame, Heat Rotom, and Mamoswine in this format.

Key Moves: Spore, Rage Powder, Giga Drain, Protect, Sludge Bomb

Typical Builds: Amoonguss is probably more likely than any other Pokémon on this list to be using exactly the first four moves listed. It’s also almost equally likely to use any defensive nature depending on what its team needs: Calm, Relaxed, Bold, and Sassy all see pretty similar usage, with the Speed-lowering natures being a little more popular because of their ability to fluster Trick Room teams. As the natures would indicate, Amoonguss tends to use all or almost all of its EVs on its defensive stats in order to absorb as much damage as possible for its teammates. Interestingly, Effect Spore came back into relevance this year when Sejun Park introduce the world to the hilariously annoying Rage Powder + Effect Spore + Rocky Helmet Amoonguss early in the year. Most teams are less aggressive than his and tend to prefer Regenerator Amoonguss, but Rocky Helmet has stayed popular throughout the year and is one of the more reliable ways to choke Kangaskhan teams out. Black Sludge and Sitrus Berry are seen more rarely as alternative items.

Talonflame

Base stats: 78 HP / 81 Atk / 71 Def / 74 SAtk / 69 SDef / 126 Spd

Typing: Fire/Flying

Another new Pokémon that is playable mostly on the strength of an outrageous new ability, in this case Gale Wings, which adds +1 priority to all of Talonflame’s Flying-type moves. Talonflame is pretty much the god of what a lot of us would have called “badstuffs” last generation: it has terrible defenses, almost no ability to switch into attacks safely, and its most common build focuses around the all-out offense favored by newer players. In Talonflame’s case, we may finally have gotten a Pokémon that can perform that niche well enough that it is at least worth considering at all levels of competition, since even off of a pretty mediocre 81 base Attack, attacks with 120 base power and boosted priority are pretty painful to deal with. It has had some excellent finishes at the Regional and National tournaments so far this year, and it has managed to maintain popularity even in the typically much more defensively-oriented Japanese metagame. Talonflame’s existence has forced a lot of other frail Pokémon out of the metagame, since a quick Brave Bird will typically knock them out before they can move.  While Talonflame has serious issues with getting walled by Pokémon like Rotom and Tyranitar and being quickly defeated by almost anything that can survive an attack from it, it certainly has an almost unmatched ability to dish out damage… both to the enemy and to itself, with two recoil moves in Brave Bird and Flare Blitz as its main attacks and Life Orb as its most common item. Talonflame also has the advantage of being one of the few really common Pokémon that can find room in its moveset for Taunt, an excellent move for stopping Smeargle, Trick Room users, and Aegislash.

Key Moves: Brave Bird, Flare Blitz, Tailwind, U-Turn, Protect, Quick Guard, Taunt

Typical Builds: Talonflame’s ability to help uninitiated VGC players overperform is perhaps best identified by the fact even in the rating-influenced May International Wi-Fi Tournament Global Link stats, Talonflame’s most common two items, Life Orb (38.4%) and Choice Band (26.5%) only accounted for about 2/3 of Talonflame’s total item options, leaving the other third for a bunch of bizarre item options that clocked in under 10% each, including Sky Plate(…?) at 9.8%. Typically, the standard Talonflame uses Choice Band or Life Orb, maximizes Attack, and then either maximizes HP or Speed depending on if it cares more about surviving slightly longer or outrunning/speed tying other Talonflame. The two STAB attacks are basically mandatory. Life Orb can choose between some combination of the other five moves in its last two slots, usually including Taunt or Tailwind and Protect or Quick Guard, while Choice Band is forced to pick up U-turn and something it really doesn’t want to be Choice-locked into.

Salamence

Base stats: 95 HP / 135 Atk / 80 Def / 110 SAtk / 80 SDef / 100 Spd

Typing: Dragon/Flying

Always a strange Pokémon in Doubles play because of its inability to use its higher Attack stat effectively, Salamence is a Pokémon that is basically only used over the more powerful Hydreigon for its slightly higher Speed and for the incredibly valuable Intimidate. Thanks to Kangaskhan and Mawile dominating the metagame, Salamence is by far the most popular it has ever been in a VGC format, seeing much more use than its three-headed counterpart. Salamence has been used almost exclusively with a bulkless Choice Scarf set, and in spite of attempts by some players to innovate with more defensive sets, Choice Scarf remains the norm. Salamence applies Intimidate very efficiently and pressures out other Dragons, but Salamence really has to be careful about what move it locks into because unboosted, neutral, non-STAB attacks off of 110 base Special Attack or its nature-reduced 0 EV Attack create very little pressure. The most common targets to exploit this are Fairy-types, the most dangerous of which being Azumarill, who can easily use Salamence as bait to set up a Belly Drum. One of the bright spots for Salamence is that it speed ties Charizard and can knock it out fairly easily with Stone Edge, and with Intimidate slowing down Kangaskhan, Mawile, and Tyranitar, it can do something useful against most of the common Megas. Salamence tends to need to switch out immediately a lot to avoid giving up huge shifts of momentum, but it is the easiest Intimidate user to fit on most teams and a quick Draco Meteor can finish off many weakened targets, so it remains popular.

Key Moves: Draco Meteor, Fire Blast, Dragon Pulse, Hydro Pump, Stone Edge, Rock Slide, Flamethrower, Sleep Talk

Typical Builds: Nearly always uses Choice Scarf — even now, 71% of Salamence in the May Wi-Fi International were Scarfed. On top of that, Timid was the most popular nature by far, which is starting to seem almost mandatory because of the high probability of running into Scarf Salamence mirrors. Salamence is perhaps the Pokémon in the metagame that has been used with the least amount of variety, and nearly always carries Choice Scarf, maximum Special Attack and Speed, Draco Meteor, Fire Blast or Flamethrower, Stone Edge or Rock Slide, and one of Hydro Pump, Dragon Pulse, and Sleep Talk. There isn’t much consensus among other Salamence builds, but if it isn’t Choice Scarfed, it is typically running Life Orb or Choice Specs with the same general setup, or Haban Berry or Rocky Helmet and a defensive spread, often with Roost.

Tyranitar

Base stats: 100 HP / 134->164 Atk / 110->150 Def / 95 SAtk / 100 ->120 SDef / 61->71 Spd

Probability of Mega Evolving: About 1 in 3.

Typing: Rock/Dark

Tyranitar’s VGC 2014 adventure has been an interesting showcase of how the game’s most powerful Pokémon can adapt to unfavorable situations and stay useful. For most of this season, Tyranitar’s most common moveset has consistent primarily or exclusive of special attacks, even though Tyranitar has a much higher Attack stat and has traditionally only very rarely used even a single special attack. With this metagame so focused on countering physical attackers because of Mawile and Kangaskhan, physical Tyranitar wasn’t doing well with all of the Intimidate and Will-O-Wisp present, so players adjusted and started using special Tyranitar, typically with Life Orb, often still carrying Rock Slide. Recently, Mega Tyranitar has started getting more popular, making Tyranitar almost the only Pokémon in VGC that can genuinely be effective in or out of mega form. While the Mega version typically uses Dragon Dance, taking advantage of the base 164 Attack and the minor Speed boost allowing Tyranitar to actually outspeed things after a single Dragon Dance without 252 Speed EVs and a Jolly nature, it can still fight fairly effectively without Mega Evolving on teams featuring two Mega Pokémon.

Both Tyranitar formes bring a lot of value with their Sandstream ability, giving Tyranitar and other Rock-type Pokémon a boost to Special Defense and breaking Focus Sashes, which are more popular this year than in the past due to the format being more offensive and Tyranitar being less common. Sandstream makes Tyranitar an excellent choice for teams that need a little help with Mega Charizard-Y teams, especially in the case of Mega Tyranitar, as Mega Evolving on the same turn as Charizard and instantly changing its Drought back to Sandstream is often nearly an instant win. Tyranitar is one of those Pokémon that seems to either counter (Heat Rotom, Talonflame, Salamence, Charizard, Meowstic, Manectric, Chandelure) or be countered by (Kangaskhan, Wash Rotom, Garchomp, Scrafty, Politoed) most of the metagame, on top of having some awkward trades with Pokémon like Mawile, Gardevoir, Ferrothorn, Bisharp, and Aegislash where often both sides can do huge damage to the other and the winner is decided more on board position. Tyranitar takes a lot more care to play this year than it did in the past couple of years, but it is still very capable of contributing to high level teams when it is brought out in the right situations.

Key Moves: Rock Slide, Protect, Crunch, Dark Pulse, Ice Beam, Fire Blast, Dragon Dance, Earthquake

Typical Builds: Tyranitar is an odd case in the sense that the way Mega Tyranitar is played and the way normal Tyranitar is played are like two completely different Pokémon. The normal version is more common, which typically carries two of the special attacks, Rock Slide, and Protect. Modest and Timid are relatively similar in popularity, with most Tyranitar trending toward maximum Special Attack and Speed in either case. It is not unheard of for Jolly or Adamant normal Tyranitar to create a similar build with Crunch and a special coverage move, though it is much less common. The item tends to vary, with Life Orb being the most popular and Assault Vest, the always unreliable Weakness Policy, and Choice Scarf rounding out the common items. Mega Tyranitar can be either Jolly or Adamant, though Jolly is almost required to be useful out of Mega forme at all with Dragon Dance, and Jolly is still important for getting over some of the faster Pokémon in the metagame after Dragon Dance even for Mega Tyranitar. Dragon Dance is used almost without exception on Mega Tyranitar. Rock Slide is the other definite option, with moves like Crunch, Earthquake, Protect, Fire Blast, and even Brick Break rounding out the set depending on team needs.

Gardevoir

Base stats: 68 HP / 65->85 Atk / 65->65 Def / 125->165 SAtk / 115->135 SDef / 80->100 Spd

Probability of Mega Evolving: Almost zero from experienced players, decent chance otherwise.

Typing: Psychic/Fairy

Gardevoir is a somewhat tricky Pokémon to combat because its two most common movesets are very similar but are best countered by slightly different Pokémon. Choice Specs and Choice Scarf are Gardevoir’s two most popular items on the power of its XY-introduced partial Fairy-typing, but there’s a pretty wide range of Pokémon outrun by Choice Scarf but not by Choice Specs that really don’t want to take a free Moonblast, like Garchomp and Hydreigon. Choice Scarf is pretty effective at picking off or forcing out enemy Dragon types, but the damage the Choice Scarf set puts out is feeble enough that its popularity has waned as teams have gotten bulkier and players have become less apt to use multiple Dragon types. Choice Specs has largely replaced it, which compared to Choice Scarf trades being more likely to be knocked out without getting an attack off for doing much more damage when it does attack, especially to neutral targets.  Luckily for Gardevoir, there are very few solid Steel-type Pokémon in this year’s metagame to wall it, and one of them, Bisharp, isn’t resistant to Fairy-type attacks.

Mawile and Aegislash are among the few Pokémon that can switch in with relatively reckless abandon, and even then Aegislash is weak to common coverage move Shadow Ball. Gardevoir’s bigger issue in this metagame is neutral physical attacks: there are a lot of really powerful physical attackers that can outrun it and knock it out in a strong hit or two because of its terrible 68 base HP and 65 base Defense. Gardevoir maintains popularity because being able to OHKO Dragon-type Pokémon, most Tyranitar builds, and do pretty meaningful neutral damage to most of the metagame makes it a hard Pokémon to switch into if it can get into a safe attacking position.

Key Moves: Psychic, Dazzling Gleam, Moonblast, Shadow Ball, Protect, Thunderbolt, Trick Room, Taunt

Typical Builds: As mentioned previously, Gardevoir’s most common set runs Choice Specs, which typically uses the first four moves listed above. While Choice Scarf is basically forced to go maximum Speed and Special Attack to actually inflict damage and go first, as is sort of the point of the item, Choice Specs can afford to go a little slower and bulkier and still dish out big hits. It is common for it to use 252 HP, often with enough Defense to survive Choice Band Talonflame’s Brave Bird and/or enough Special Defense to survive maximum Special Attack Aegislash’s Shadow Ball. Thunderbolt is sometimes used on the Choice sets, but non-STAB Thunderbolt is a sketchy move to lock into and the damage increase isn’t worth it against almost anything, even when super effective. The defensive build leaves relatively little room for Special Attack and Speed investment, so some players do choose to go much frailer on their Choice Specs sets than what was described. Gardevoir’s final common item is Sitrus Berry, which is typically used with more defensive sets involving setting Trick Room up for its teammates or using some of its niche support options like Taunt and Will-O-Wisp.

Charizard

Base stats: Base stats: Mega Charizard Y: 78 HP / 84->104 Atk / 78 Def / 109-159 SAtk / 85->115 SDef / 100 Spd
Mega Charizard X: 78 HP / 84->130 Atk / 78->111 Def / 109->130 SAtk / 85 SDef / 100 Spdd

Typing: Fire/Flying (Charizard, Mega Charizard Y), Fire/Dragon (Mega Charizard X)

Probability of Mega Evolving: It sure better. Mega Charizard Y is much more common than Mega Charizard X, but it isn’t unreasonable to see X as a rogue choice from stronger players or as a “creative” pick from newer players.

Perhaps the strangest of all Pokémon in its jump in relevance, franchise icon Charizard is somehow actually a very competitive choice this year in two different formes. Mega Charizard Y burned out of the gates, originally seen as one of the game’s three best Mega Pokémon along with Kangaskhan and Mawile. While most players seem to agree its relative power was exaggerated early in the format and that it weaker now that the metagame is more developed, the special-based Charizard is still a Pokémon I’d expect to see extensively in this format’s remaining events. Mega Charizard Y’s Drought ability allows Charizard to pull some Chlorophyll Pokémon up to join it on its rise out of obscurity, which amusingly is a role best served by fellow Kanto starter Venusaur in this format. The Mega Charizard Y + Chlorophyll Venusaur + Fighting type + Ground type + Rotom + filler core was one of the more popular ways to play the game in its opening months. Charizard has had to find a little more robust ways to make appearances on teams recently, with its original core not being as metagame-appropriate as it once was, but Charizard still packs the strongest reliable special attacks of any Mega Pokémon with its Drought-boosted Fire-type attacks. The prevalence of Garchomp, Heat Rotom, Manectric, Tyranitar, Aerodactyl, and priority later in the format’s life have been hard on it, but Charizard’s more commonly seen Mega is still a respectable option.

Mega Charizard X is a little more rogue. It’s been rare this year almost to the point it could be considering nonviable, but opponents committing too hard to Charizard picking its other Mega Evolution and facing down Mega Charizard X instead can win Charizard games pretty easily. Most commonly seen with a Dragon Dance set, Mega Charizard X was something I think shouldn’t have been overlooked as long as it was, and it finally got a high enough finish in a CP event that it should have people’s attention thanks to DaFlo’s adventures. It’s still not something I expect to see a lot of and is a Pokémon that needs some serious team support to get going, but it’s a capable threat in its own right. Mega Charizard X has the advantage of causing some counters like Garchomp to misplay against it and to deal much better with some Pokémon Mega Charizard Y struggles with like Rotom and Talonflame, at the expense helping its teammates less with Tough Claws not being team-oriented and being a somewhat set-up reliant Pokémon.

Key Moves: Protect, Solar Beam, Heat Wave, Overheat, Air Slash, Flare Blitz, Dragon Claw, Dragon Dance

Typical Builds: Charizard typically has very little moveset variety in either of its forms. Charizard-Y normally runs Solar Beam, Heat Wave, Overheat, and Protect, though some players inexplicably run Air Slash. Mega Charizard Y is typically either Timid or Modest, usually with enough bulk to survive Garchomp’s Rock Slide and then either maximum Speed and Timid with the remaining EVs  in Special Attack, or enough Speed to outrun Timid Smeargle, Modest nature, and the rest in Special Attack. While more defensive sets with Roost and/or Will-O-Wisp are sometimes used, Mega Charizard X almost always features Dragon Claw, Flare Blitz, Dragon Dance, and Protect. Adamant is a bit more popular than Jolly for the Dragon Dance variant.

Azumarill

Base stats: 100 HP /50 Atk /80 Def /60 SAtk /80 SDef /50 Spd

Typing: Water/Fairy

Another Pokémon that was almost useless for a decade, Azumarill gaining partial Fairy-typing in generation 6 was enough to finally make it not only a relevant Pokémon, but one of the better Pokémon in this year”s format. Azumarill can switch into Salamence, Hydreigon, Kingdra and most Noivern with reckless abandon, which is a really handy trait considering how powerful Dragon-types normally are.  The point about Kingdra is especially important, as Azumarill’s existence is a big part of why many Rain teams have chosen to switch to Ludicolo, as players still using the Politoed+Kingdra duo will find themselves almost completely unable to inflict damage on Azumarill. Azumarill is one of the only Pokémon VGC has ever seen that can run Belly Drum reliably, as in spite of its pretty terrible Speed it can fire off powerful +6 Aqua Jets to KO many Pokémon in a single shot, with Play Rough to handle predicted switches and other Water types. Due to its attachment to Belly Drum, Azumarill tends to hog its team’s Sitrus Berry, but it can actually use a handful of other items effectively as well after dropping the Drum thanks to the power its ability Huge Power gives it, most notably Assault Vest and Choice Band. Choice Band Azumarill’s Superpower can actually OHKO Ferrothorn without very much trouble, so Azumarill’s power is something that definitely shouldn’t be underestimated!

Azumarill’s weaknesses involve it losing a lot of power if it is burned or Intimidated, having a hard time dealing meaningful damage to Steel types because of Aqua Jet being it’s only Water-type attack most of the time, and struggling a lot with Wash Rotom and enemy Pokémon who are faster than it or who have priority due to its low Speed.

Key Moves: Play Rough, Aqua Jet, Protect, Belly Drum, Superpower, Waterfall, Helping Hand, Perish Song

Typical Builds: The standard Azumarill set is definitely Play Rough, Aqua Jet, Protect, and Belly Drum with a Sitrus Berry. Almost exclusively Adamant nature, though there is a bit of variance from there. Running basically zero Speed is certainly the most common approach, with players preferring instead to invest in Attack and some bulk to help survive Belly Drumming. Occasionally, slightly faster sets are used, especially to creep against Pokémon with similar Speeds. Azumarill is also capable of using Choice Band and Assault Vest effectively, adding Superpower and Waterfall as the additional attacks and running a little more Speed to compensate for the weaker Aqua Jet when ending up at +6 isn’t a possibility. Azumarill is also an integral part of Perish Song teams, but it is run a little differently there with Sap Sipper instead of Huge Power, EVs and nature invested exclusively into bulk, and usually using both of Perish Song and the rarely seen Helping Hand.

Venusaur

Base stats: 80 HP / 82 -> 100 Atk / 83->123 Def / 100->122 SAtk 100->120 SDef / 80 Spd

Typing: Grass/Poison

Probability of Mega Evolving: Almost guaranteed when Charizard isn’t present, about 50/50 if it is.

Another Pokémon that got a ton of help this generation, Venusaur can actually be used effectively in two completely different context now, either as support for Mega Charizard Y in Drought-based teams or as a standalone Mega that is one of the format’s best defensive behemoths and an extremely hard stop to almost everything on Rain. With Charizard, Venusaur tends to carry Sleep Powder to have a 75% chance of disabling threats that Charizard can’t deal with, along with Sludge Bomb and Giga Drain. The option also exists for sun to use more offensive, Life Orb-wielding Venusaur, who can instead just try to knock out threats to Charizard, more effective in a world where Garchomp normally has Lum Berry and Sleep Powder tends to miss when needed, anyway.

Mega Venusaur runs similar moves and is often seen with its Mega Stone even alongside Charizard, though especially Synthesis and sometimes Leech Seed is more common when Mega Venusaur is the focus, as it typically wants to choke out longer win. Where normal Venusaur mostly just focuses on creating holes for Mega Charizard Y, Mega Venusaur is one of the stronger late game finishers in the format itself, as in many cases an opponent left with only support Pokémon and special attackers won’t be able to break through Mega Venusaur’s healing. Both Venusaur really struggle with Talonflame, though Mega Venusaur can EV to survive a single Choice Band-boosted Brave Bird, and the advent of Choice Specs Gardevoir has also not been favorable for Venusaur. The biggest problem for Venusaur may actually be Mega Kangaskhan: Venusaur just can’t trade efficiently with it given how weak its offense is, as Kangaskhan can easily knock it out in two turns. Mega Mawile is even worse, so Venusaur tends to need some help dealing with the enemy Mega Pokémon in order to win.

Key Moves: Sludge Bomb, Giga Drain, Sleep Powder, Protect, Synthesis, Leech Seed, Hidden Power

Typical Builds: Overwhelmingly Modest, but Bold and Calm are also common choices. About 2/3 of Venusaur hold Venusaurite, and strangely, the second most common item in May was Black Sludge… an item I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen a Venusaur use. Life Orb, the third most common item, is certainly what I’d expect to see it use on a Sun team that didn’t want Mega Venusaur, though Wide Lens to help the extremely unreliable Sleep Powder is also an option. All builds tend to use Sludge Bomb and Giga Drain, with Mega Venusaur choosing any of the remaining moves that suits its fancy, as all of them are viable options depending on how offensively or defensively Venusaur wants to play, with the Hidden Power option tending to be Fire. The Sun non-Mega version can use both Life Orb-boosted Hidden Power Ice (to remove Garchomp) or the more defensive Sleep Powder effectively, so it is a bit of a challenging value decision to decide which move to drop between those two, the STABs, and Protect and whether or not to run an offensive item.

Gengar

Base stats: 60 HP / 65 Atk / 60->80 Def / 130->170 SAtk / 75->95 SDef / 110-> 130 Spd

Typing: Ghost/Poison

Probability of Mega Evolving: High if one or more Liepard, Raichu, Gothitelle, or Politoed are present, otherwise low unless player is inexperienced.

Gengar is one of VGC 2014’s quirkier Pokémon. In spite of its best stat being Special Attack, it’s much more interested in disrupting its opponents than actually knocking them out directly. Normal Gengar tends to be used primarily to shut down Pokémon like Kangaskhan and Amoonguss, who can’t do much (literally nothing in Kangaskhan’s case most of the time) to Gengar, but who are greatly inhibited by Will-O-Wisp and Taunt, respectively. Gengar’s Taunt can also be used to protect its teammates from being burned, as it easily outruns other common Will-O-Wisp users, most notably Rotom. Gengar still has that beefy Special Attack, of course, and can use it to bonk Pokémon like Gardevoir and  Aegislash (who also really doesn’t want to be Taunted) for pretty significant chunks of damage. Taunt is an extremely powerful move in the present metagame, so Gengar is pretty popular in spite of being very frail, to the point that it basically always needs Focus Sash.

Mega Gengar is a different animal. It tends to function on one of two types of teams, both of which are focused on its ability, Shadow Tag, which traps its non-Ghost type opponents. Mega Gengar either focuses on using Disable with a teammate’s Encore and trapping Struggling foes as they slowly knock themselves out, or by using the combination of Perish Song and Shadow Tag to trap its foes and knock them out more directly that way. Both of Mega Gengar’s common strategies rely on it being both fast and bulky, so again, the Special Attack tends to be wasted a little bit. Mega Gengar is still frail and a little weak to Taunt, as well as to Aegislash switching out on it and allowing a more appropriate solution to switch in, but Mega Gengar creates a challenging battle for its opponents. It is one of those Pokémon where you absolutely must understand how it works and what your best plays against it are or you will find yourself losing almost automatically.

Key Moves: Shadow Ball, Protect, Sludge Bomb, Will-O-Wisp, Taunt, Dazzling Gleam, Destiny Bond Perish Song, Disable, Substitute

Typical Builds: The more common regular Gengar almost always runs Shadow Ball, Protect, and two of Sludge Bomb, Will-O-Wisp, and Taunt while holding a Focus Sash. In spite of really being more of a support Pokémon, it tends to go with maximum Speed, Special Attack, and a Timid nature because it is so frail that the minimal bulk that could be gained after reaching the necessary Speed would accomplish almost nothing. Mega Gengar still has to go very fast Timid to get Substitutes and/or Disables off, but typically doesn’t invest in Special Attack much because the point is to use Shadow Tag to make Perish Song or Disable work, not to get quick KOs. Mega Gengar typically runs Protect, one of the two attacks, and  some combination of Perish Song, Disable, Taunt, Will-O-Wisp, and Substitute. I felt obligated to include Dazzling Gleam (24%) and Destiny Bond (16.8%) in the previous section based on their relatively high May usage rates, but I wouldn’t expect to see many of these with positive records at the remaining VGC 2014 tournaments.

Manectric

Base stats: 70 HP / 75 Atk / 60->80 Def / 105->135 SAtk / 60->80 SDef / 105->135 Spd

Typing: Electric

Probability of Mega Evolving: Nearly guaranteed, though it often delays its Mega Evolving.

Another Pokémon useful almost exclusively because of its Mega Evolution, Mega Manectric has created a fun niche for itself that hadn’t really existed in a VGC format before it. In its normal form it has the Lightningrod ability, which redirects Electric-type attacks and increases its Special Attack by one stage. Unlike some other Mega Pokémon, Manectric often waits a few turns to Mega Evolve, using the threat of Lightningrod to deter enemy Electric-type Pokémon and defend teammates like Azumarill and Talonflame. Upon Mega Evolving, Manectric can further support its team with the Intimidate ability, which it often spreads by repeatedly switching in and Volt Switching out, in a similar way to how some Landorus Therians did in last year’s format. Manectric also has some important coverage attacks that most Electric types do not in the Fire-type attacks Flamethrower and Overheat, which allow Manectric to have surprisingly versatile coverage when combined with Hidden Power Ice and an Electric-type attack. Most Manectric these days are running Timid natures, which has the most visible influence in the matchup with Garchomp. Timid ensures Manectric outruns Garchomp on the turn it Mega Evolves instead of having to Protect first to start a turn with Mega Manectric’s higher speed, but it comes at the cost of losing the ability to reliably KO even 4 HP Garchomp with Hidden Power Ice, as Timid Mega Manectric has a maximum of a 43.8% chance to OHKO compared to the 87.5% from Modest.

While Manectric’s moves and Abilities are truly fantastic, its weakness is its mediocre stats, even after Mega Evolution. Manectric is extremely frail for a Mega Pokémon, so it can often be knocked out in a single blow if it carelessly Volt Switches into a Protect or a switch to a Ground-type Pokémon. Additionally, without an item to boost its damage, base 135 Special Attack isn’t impressive for a Pokémon that invests so much into offense, so bulkier Pokémon that it can’t hit super effectively can usually take hits from it fairly easily and tend to cause a lot of problems for it, most notably Mega Venusaur and its Thick Fat.

Key Moves: Protect, Hidden Power, Volt Switch, Thunderbolt, Overheat, Flamethrower, Thunder

Typical Builds: Manectric is overwhelmingly seen with a Timid nature, to the tune of about 87% in the May Wi-Fi International. This reduces Manectric’s damage, but allows it to immediately outrun both Garchomp and enemy base 100 Pokémon. Manectric almost always carries Protect and Hidden Power Ice, with the decisions coming in when deciding which of the two Fire-type attacks and which Electric-type attack(s) to pick. Volt Switch is great for spreading Intimidate, but is causes Manectric to be weak on offense if it is the only Electric-type attack on its moveset. Thunderbolt is used for reliability, and Thunder is a popular and risky option for teams using Politoed. Overheat and Flamethrower is basically a decision between immediate power that comes with the penalty of needing to Volt Switch out to reset Manectric’s Special Attack afterward, and especially on Rain are sometimes skipped completely for more versatile Electric-type attacking options. Manectric tends to be trained exclusively with very close to absolute maximum Special Attack and Speed.

Hydreigon

Base stats: 92 HP / 105 Atk / 90 Def / 125 SAtk / 90 SDef / 98 Spd

Typing: Dragon/Dark

A Masters World Champion during two of the three years of its existence, Hydreigon has shown its power through its unique defensive and offensive typing and an excellent Special Attack stat. While having Dark-type STAB isn’t as amazing as it was in the Cresselia-dominated metagames of the past two years, Aegislash is just as common and irritating as Cresselia was, so Hydreigon has again shown up in force late in a VGC format to prove it was really the best Dragon all along. The trouble of playing against Hydreigon is that the way the Pokémon is built can vary extensively. Based on the May Wi-Fi tournament, there’s about a 60% chance of Hydreigon holding a Choice item, with Choice Specs being more common than Choice Scarf, but assuming it is choice-locked can lead to blasting into a Life Orb Hydreigon’s Protect or having your Dragon quickly removed by a Draco Meteor coming back your direction because Hydreigon survived your own Draco Meteor with its Haban Berry.With the metagame no longer EVed almost across the board to survive Dragon Gem-boosted Draco Meteor with Dragon Gem not being available, Life Orb and Choice Specs Hydreigon can pick up many more easy KOs than it was able to last year in a format that respected it more.

Hydreigon’s weaknesses must start with, as during 2012 and 2013, being the slowest of the Dragons, leading to its brethren preying on it fairly effectively, and also a new 4x weakness to Fairy-types, which has certainly led to Hydreigon’s reduced popularity this season. Hydreigon is almost as easy of set-up bait for Azumarill as Salamence is if it the Hydreigon isn’t prepared adequately, and even Dazzling Gleams tend to knock Hydreigon out easily. Worse yet, Hydreigon is also weak to Mega Kangaskhan’s Power-Up Punch, which allows it to be further set-up bait when weakened, though Mega Kangaskhan has to be a little more careful as unboosted Power-Up Punch does not OHKO and Hydreigon can do huge amounts of damage back with an offensive item.

Key Moves: Dark Pulse, Draco Meteor, Fire Blast, Flamethrower, Dragon Pulse, Protect

Typical Builds: A Pokémon used largely for its power instead of its Speed, 84% of Hydreigon are Modest, with almost all of the most of the remaining Hydreigon choosing Timid natures. Choice Specs (35.9%), Choice Scarf (24.3%), Life Orb (17.9%) amd Haban Berry (12.4%) are Hydreigon’s relevant items, which tend to be EVed similarly. All the Hydreigon builds can afford to add a bit of bulk because they’re have a bit of breathing room just below them on the speed tiers, with Haban tending to carry the most bulk and all Hydreigon tending to favor near-maximum Special Attack. Dark Pulse is mandatory, with Draco Meteor or Dragon Pulse, Flamethrower or Fire Blast, and Protect or the second Dragon move being the most common options depending on both Hydreigon’s item and how risk-averse its trainer is.

Aerodactyl

Base stats: 80 HP / 105 Atk / 65 Def / 60 SAtk  / 75 SDef / 130 Spd

Typing: Rock/Flying

Probability of Mega Evolving: Not Mega Garchomp-tier irrelevant, but still extremely unlikely — about 1/4 of all Aerodactyl Mega Evolve, probably fewer in a live tournament.

A Pokémon that has risen to surprising relevance in VGC 2014 after being somewhere between gimmicky and irrelevant the past several years, Aerodactyl’s rise is largely do to being a beneficiary of a number of format and game mechanics changes. Aerodactyl’s weaknesses certainly haven’t been mitigated much in XY: it is extremely frail and does little enough damage on its own that it isn’t very viable as the aggressive attacking Pokémon its stats would indicate it was originally envisioned as. Instead, Aerodactyl has found its niche as a very unique, aggressive support Pokémon. Aerodactyl is probably the best user of the previously mediocre Tailwind, which is now more valuable due to so few good Pokémon in this year’s format getting Thunder Wave and Trick Room to counter it, as well as Pokémon in general tending to take fewer hits before they go down in this format. Tailwind’s tutor is also no longer available, a big win for the few Pokémon who can learn it naturally like Aerodactyl.

Aerodactyl also got a big boost from Sky Drop finally being allowed after it was banned during all of Generation 5 due to a game-breaking glitch. Sky Drop gives Aerodactyl’s team some unique options for ways to deal with enemy threats, as the turn of an enemy not being able to attack can free up Aerodactyl’s partner for a big hit if the Sky Dropped target was a counter, or even to use a move like Swords Dance or Dragon Dance to get sweeping. Aerodactyl’s old tricks, like supporting its team with potential flinches from an extremely fast, STAB-boosted Rock Slide and Unnerve preventing berries from being eaten round Aerodactyl out as a comparable frail support Pokémon that offers more offensive presence than most similar Pokémon. One last necessary mention from Aerodactyl is its ability to combine with Bisharp, an innovation of reigning South Korean National Champion Sejun Park, putting damage on both foes so Bisharp can blow one up with the newly buffed Assurance.

Key Moves: Rock Slide, Protect, Sky Drop, Tailwind, Wide Guard, Taunt, Ice Fang

Typical Builds: About 62% of Aerodactyl hold Focus Sash, which is really the only viable item for normal Aerodactyl due to its frailty. Aerodactylite is about 26% of what’s left, though again, I think that’s probably a misleading statistic as far as what players are likely to see in live events, with most of the remainder split between a variety of items that probably shouldn’t have been selected. Aerodactyl tends to build very offensively because of its Focus Sash, maximizing both Attack and Speed and almost exclusively choosing a Jolly nature. Rock Slide, Protect, and Sky Drop are almost mandatory, with Tailwind, Wide Guard, and Taunt competing for the last slot (sometimes over Protect or Sky Drop), and Mega Aerodactyl sometimes adding Ice Fang into the mix.

Gyarados

Base stats: 95 HP / 125 Atk -> 155 Atk / 79->109 Def / 60->70 SAtk / 100 -> 130 SDef / 81 Spd

Typing: Water/Flying->Water/Dark

Probability of Mega Evolving: 4 in 10, according to the May Wi-Fi tournament.

A Pokémon that bares the shame of its only decent Generation 5 Masters World Championships finish being Huy’s bizarre 90’s-inspired Choice Specs Special Attacking Gyarados finishing 9th in 2012, Gyarados may finally be destined to use its stats optimally in a major VGC tournament this year. While Gyarados in its normal form was most frequently seen with a Choice Band last year, it has evolved to become more of a support Pokémon with Intimidate and access to one of the format’s few viable Taunts and even rarer viable Thunder Waves.

Mega Gyarados tends to be a Dragon Dancer almost exclusively, and it has fairly solid defensive typing to take advantage of as it sets up. Mega Gyarados’ lack of Crunch means it fails to break from the Gyarados tradition of not actually having a usable secondary STAB, though Waterfall, Earthquake, and Protect or Ice Fang tend to offer good enough coverage. Normal Gyarados Dragon Dancing with a Lum Berry isn’t unheard of, either. In spite of being one of the few viable Intimidate users in VGC 2014, Gyarados hasn’t been very popular this year outside of its Mega form, perhaps because it struggles to inflict much damage on so many of the common Pokémon. Mega Gyarados has achieved reasonable popularity, but it has almost exclusively been through people using one of Sejun Park’s teams verbatim, so it will be interesting to see if players find enough uses for Mega Gyarados over the rest of the year for it to stay relevant.

Key Moves: Waterfall, Protect, Earthquake, Ice Fang, Dragon Dance, Taunt, Thunder Wave

Typical Builds: Adamant 59% of the time and Jolly 25% of the time. Otherwise, typically a defensive nature for a support-oriented set with Thunder Wave and Taunt, which would also EV more defensively. Defensive Gyarados seems to get thrown whatever item its team has leftover, which tends to be Rocky Helmet, Wacan Berry, or Rocky Helmet. While the Dragon Dance version could afford to run a little bulk, it tends to be EVed surprisingly aggressively with nearly maximum Attack and often just as much Speed. With Dragon Dance, Gyaradosite is expected, though Lum Berry is also an option if another Mega is present or the ability to smash Wash Rotom is unneeded.

Meowstic

Base stats: 74 HP / 48 Atk / 76 Def / 83 SAtk / 81 SDef / 104 Spd

Typing: Psychic

Every format now, apparently, needs some obnoxious Prankster Swagger user, and this year Meowstic is that Pokémon. Meowstic’s lack of offense presence is a much bigger issue for Meowstic than it was for its predecessor, Thundurus, during its reign from 2011 until 2013, and for the most part it isn’t considered a strong pick the way Thundurus was as a result. After Smeargle and Kangaskhan, Meowstic probably drives the most “cheese” strategies in the format, particularly using the combination of Prankster Swagger and Safeguard to power Pokémon like Mega Gyarados, Mega Tyranitar, Mega Kangaskhan, and Bisharp. The other big reason people use Meowstic is Thunder Wave, as it is the best replacement for Thundurus’s Prankster-boosted speed control in that regard.

Each Prankster Pokémon has a slightly different bag of primary tricks, and along with Safeguard, Meowstic’s other big one is a move it shares with Liepard, Charm, which reduces Attack by two levels and generally Meowstic has quite a large bag of other marginally useful tricks like Quick Guard, Helping Hand, Trick Room, Light Screen, and Reflect. Meowstic is a Pokémon that similarly to Sableye doesn’t do quite enough offensively to be a true top-tier threat, but can be very disruptive to common Pokémon and sometimes allow its more powerful teammates to win games they otherwise wouldn’t be able to. Still, Charm is one move that Kangaskhan has no real counterplay for beyond wasting all of its turns Power-Up Punching to try to even things out, which is a good Pokémon to fluster.

Key Moves: Safeguard, Swagger, Quick Guard, Charm, Fake Out, Reflect, Light Screen, Psychic

Typical Builds: Sometimes dumps a bunch of EVs in Speed to try to outrun Kangaskhan with Fake Out and other Prankster Pokémon with Safeguard, but more typically runs a defensive EV spread with Bold, Timid, or Calm natures. Sitrus Berry, Leftovers, and Mental Herb are used about 1/5 of the time each, with Light Clay being the last item that is used a noteworthy amount of the time.

Ferrothorn

Base stats: 74 HP / 94 Atk / 131 Def / 54 Satk / 116 SDef / 20 Spd

Typing: Grass/Steel

Ferrothorn is a Pokémon that has had a strange spot in the VGC world since being introduced. While it is a Pokémon that was immediately very powerful in singles metagames because of its strong defensive typing and stats, with entry hazards being so much better in singles than other Pokémon formats, in VGC Ferrothorn often runs into the issue that it sometimes just doesn’t seem to accomplish anything. Ferrothorn tends to rely a lot on winning longer games where its teammates have eliminated the enemy Pokémon with Fire- and Fighting-type attacks for it, which is a little risky, as this trait combined with Ferrothorn’s sketchy offense leads to a lot of its games being won or lost on time instead of by one side getting four KOs. In spite of its offensive shortcomings, it is a fairly safe switch in to pretty much all physical attackers that aren’t Fighting-type, of which VGC 2014 has basically zero relevant options. Ferrothorn also easily beats the format’s Water types, which is an extremely useful quality.

Unfortunately for Ferrothorn, there are many more Fire-type attacks in this format than in previous years due to the importance of checking Mawile and Aegislash, so it is much less likely to find teams that are totally unprepared for it than in the past. It also lost resistances to Dark and Ghost this generation, so it is a little less powerful as an all-purpose wall than it used to be. Ferrothorn is a Pokémon that is highly annoying for most teams to deal with and one that almost forces opponents to bring their Fire-types, but to win, the Ferrothorn player tends to have to work pretty hard to find ways to make it more than just annoying.

Key Moves: Power Whip, Leech Seed, Protect, Gyro Ball, Iron Head, Thunder Wave

Typical Builds: With most of its otherwise useful support moves not being very good in doubles formats, Ferrothorn is a Pokémon with very predictable moves, almost always including all of Gyro Ball, Power Whip, Leech Seed, and Protect. In spite of the simplicity of its moveset, it has builds that can go two directions. The most common is the Ray Rizzo Winter Regionals-inspired version, which is EVed more offensively and Brave natured to allow Ferrothorn to deal massive chunks of damage to Pokémon like Wash Rotom and Scarf Salamence, and typically holds a Lum Berry to keep damage up when hit by a Will-O-Wisp. The alternative route is to be a little bulkier and more support-oriented, with more defensive investment to work with Leech Seed stalling. More defensive builds are much more likely not to use both attacks in favor of a support move like Thunder Wave, since they’re a little underwhelming without investment, to say the least. The more defensive spreads are also likely to use an item like Leftovers or Occa Berry to stay on the field longer, or Rocky Helmet to try to cheese physical attackers a little.

Bisharp

Base stats: 65 HP / 125 Atk /100 Def / 60 SAtk / 70 SDef / 70 Spd

Typing: Dark/Steel

Bisharp tends to fit best among players who favor playing more read-oriented, aggressive styles, as Bisharp has a lot of tools to restrict opponents. Bisharp is used mainly because of its ability, Defiant, which raises its Attack two levels every time its stats are lowered by the enemy team. This makes Intimidate give Bisharp a level of Attack instead of taking one, and Bisharp also gets to be immune to the King’s Shield effect due to Defiant negating it, making it a great solution to standard Aegislash. Bisharp is placed on teams because it makes it much less safe for opponents to lead Intimidate, and even to bring it to battles, which helps physical attacking teammates like Mega Kangaskhan, Aerodactyl, Mega Mawile, Talonflame, and Mega Gyarados. Ironically, the aforementioned Kangaskhan is also one of Bisharp’s biggest predators, as enemy Kangaskhan being able to swat Bisharp with Power-Up Punch for an easy KO and stat boost is one of Bisharp’s biggest drawbacks.

Bisharp got one really fantastic new trick this generation, which was Assurance’s base power being increased to 60 from 50. Assurance’s damage doubles when the target has taken damage earlier in the turn from any source, and with Bisharp’s naturally high Attack stat often boosted by Defiant or Life Orb, double-power Assurance can KO most targets in the game that don’t resist it. Bisharp’s Sucker Punch makes attacking it or its teammates extremely dangerous when it has a Defiant boost, further limiting the options playing against it and opening opportunities to use Assurance instead, but Bisharp’s fairly terrible defenses are easy to expose if it predicts incorrectly and allows the opponent to target it uninhibited. Bisharp’s final common attack, Iron Head, is also better this generation because of being super effective against the newly introduced Fairy type. Bisharp is a Pokémon that helps drive offensive teams by limiting the options of their opponents and allowing its trainer to make easier reads, and it is the best in the game at what it does in spite of its frailty and middling Speed.

Key Moves: Sucker Punch, Iron Head, Protect, Assurance, Night Slash

Typical Builds: Bisharp has a simple job and its EVs normally reflect that, with it tending to be very close to either maximum Attack and Speed with a Jolly or more frequently Adamant nature, or maximum Attack and HP with an Adamant nature. Bisharp is a pretty common Pokémon to try to speed creep, so divesting too much Speed can cause some major problems for Bisharp, especially against Pokémon like Rotom that it would really like to flatten with Assurance before Will-O-Wisp or Overheat is used. The most common item for Bisharp is Life Orb, which gives it a strong mix of offensive power and flexibility while leaving it exposed a little defensively. Focus Sash is also common to allow it to at least survive one big attack, though the drop in damage output from Life Orb is very noticeable and prevents some important KOs. Lum Berry is sometimes seen to counter Will-O-Wisp and Dark Void, though few players have chosen to try to overcome being both weaker on offense and capable of being knocked out it in a single blow.

Scrafty

Base stats: 65 HP / 90 Atk / 115 Def / 45 SAtk / 115 SDef / 58 Spd

Typing: Dark/Fighting

Similarly to 2011, Hitmontop not being available in 2014’s format has led to Scrafty rising to a relevant level of use. Unlike in 2012 and 2013, there are few reasons why Scrafty would be used on its own merit were Hitmontop available in this format, as Scrafty’s Dark-typing, which once protected it from Cresselia Psychics, now just causes it to get completely annihilated by even weak Fairy-type attacks, which are a big problem considering their relevance to the format. Scrafty is still a somewhat popular, if momentum-killing, member of Trick Room teams, helping to set Trick Room up with its Fake Out and then supporting the team with Intimidate. Scrafty still has a pretty interesting kit, but the metagame isn’t super favorable for it. It’s Dark-typing would be more useful if there were more targets for it, but with Cresselia gone the Pokémon you want a Dark-type to counter is Aegislash, who Scrafty doesn’t deal with very well because of its trouble with getting through the King’s Shield + Substitute combination. One of Scrafty’s old strengths was its ability to deal with Tyranitar, but Tyranitar isn’t nearly as popular as it used to be, and Intimidate doesn’t bother it nearly as much as it used to. Scrafty does have a cool new trick in the ability to still be supportive with Fake Out while holding Assault Vest, and it has access to Quick Guard… which it is largely too slow to use optimally. Still, Intimidate and Fake Out are both valuable traits, so Scrafty has some place in this format… just not a large one.

Key Moves: Fake Out, Drain Punch, Crunch, Quick Guard, Ice Punch, Detect

Typical Builds: Like the rest of Scrafty’s qualities, the way it is built is in a sort of awkward spot between being good enough offensively and defensively. Adamant is the most common nature, though Careful is also popular on more defensive sets, and Brave is sometimes used for Trick Room. Since it tends to be used as a lead, Lum Berry is the most common item to protect from Rotom Will-O-Wisps and Smeargle Dark Voids, though Assault Vest is also used about 23% of the time. Leftovers is the only other item used more than 10% of the time, perhaps indicating by the remaining third that nobody else is really sure what Scrafty is supposed to be doing, either. Scrafty needs a decent bit of Attack investment to do respectable damage, and with an iffy base HP it usually needs some investment there in order to actually survive to start draining.

Mamoswine

Base stats: 110 HP / 130 Atk / 80 Def / 70 SAtk / 70 SDef / 80 Spd

Typing: Ice/Ground

One of the game’s very few Pokémon who can use STAB Ice-type attacks effectively, Mamoswine broke out in a big way as the kingpin of Mean’s 2013 World Championinship winning team. With all of the Intimidate and Will-O-Wisp (especially from Rotom) in the format, Mamoswine is likely going to have a hard time repeating, but it’s still very capable of dealing out massive chunks of damage if openings can be created for it to attack uninhibited. Mamoswine has pretty excellent offensive coverage, since most of the types that resist one of its STABs are hit super effectively by the other. The flaws for Mamoswine are its middling Speed and weak Special Defense, which is amplified a bit by its need to invest offensively. Mamoswine can use Ice Shard or Choice Scarf to try to circumvent the Speed issues some, but it’s hard to carry as much bulk as Mean did in 2013 and still be able to deal enough damage for Mamoswine to be worth using. There are just not quite enough Pokémon that Mamoswine can OHKO in the metagame for it to feel like a top tier threat on most teams, but both Choice Scarf and Life Orb are extremely powerful on teams that can support Mamoswine well enough for it to stay on the field long enough to do its job, and Focus Sash is a viable alternative if it can surprise the opposition by surviving and net a return KO. Mamoswine’s greatest contribution in this format is probably the ease with which it can remove Salamence and injured Garchomp from the field (uninjured with Choice Scarf), opening up holes in enemy teams for its teammates.

Key Moves: Earthquake, Ice Shard, Icicle Crash, Rock Slide, Protect, Icicle Spear

Typical Builds: Predominantly Adamant, but sometimes seen with a Jolly Nature when holding Life Orb or Focus Sash. EVs tend to be extremely offensive: it just needs that extra damage to get KOs in this metagame because it will take so much damage in return for failing to finish its targets off in this metagame. Earthquake is on every set, with Icicle Shard being nearly as common. Icicle Crash is more common than Icicle Spear, but both are viable options as the primary Ice-type STAB. Choiced Mamoswine tend to use Rock Slide as the final attack, while Life Orb and Focus Sash use Protect.

Smeargle

Base stats: 55 HP / 20 Atk / 35 Def / 20 SAtk / 45 SDef / 75 Spd

Typing: Normal

In spite of its incredibly fearsome 250 base stat total (less than half of many of the best Pokémon), Smeargle is still one of the metgame’s most feared and hated threats for its ability to learn every move. Specifically, because every move actually means every move this year, which gives Smeargle access to the previously banned Dark Void. Game Freak and TPCi evidently felt that there was enough counterplay in the format that Dark Void would be fine to allow in the format — I think most players, even those who don’t think it is an especially powerful tactic, would disagree with the sentiment the format is better for having Dark Void. Smeargle also brings the community hated Moody ability, which is weaker in Doubles than Singles, but still totally capable of changing games with a timely RNG boost of two levels of Speed or evasion.

Regardless, it has what it has this year. While Smeargle threatens Dark Void, it can also fire off a variety of other vaguely useful support moves to help its teammates when its opponents try to prepare for Dark Void, such as Fake Out, Follow Me, and Tailwind. Smeargle’s horrific stats almost require it to use Focus Sash, which lets it take two hits from anything but Kangaskhan and Mamoswine in practice, ensuring it gets at least one turn to move next to something that can cover it a little like Kangaskhan. While Smeargle is extremely frail and weak to Taunt and teams of fast Pokémon, it has single-handedly forced most players to carry a Lum Berry. When on team preview, Smeargle greatly restricts what its opponents can lead safely, causing it to be a deadly teammate even when it isn’t one of the four Pokémon selected. Smeargle has helped force the popularity of Lum Berry on Garchomp and many Pokémon would run slower spreads if it wasn’t for the impact of the threat of Smeargle’s Dark Void.

Key Moves: Dark Void, Transform, King’s Shield, Fake Out, Tailwind, Spiky Shield, Follow Me

Typical Builds: Smeargle’s EV spreads are pretty simple. 4/5 of Smeargle use Focus Sash, which is really the only competitive item choice for it. It defaults to Timid nature, but will go Jolly with Fake Out for slightly more (but still mostly irrelevant) chip damage. It requires absolute maximum Speed, and the rest of the EVs go toward making Smeargle as bulky as something as frail as Smeargle can become with 256 EVs. Strangely, Own Tempo is actually used quite a bit more frequently than Moody, though this seems to mostly be a regional preference, with Asia using the safer Own Tempo and the West going ham with Moody. Dark Void is always used. Transform is sometimes used beside Kangaskhan, which offers Smeargle some offensive potential in exchange for removing the consistent utility of a move like Fake Out, Follow Me, or Tailwind. Typically, all Smeargle use one of King’s Shield or Spiky Shield, with King’s Shield’s higher popularity being a little confusing given that it doesn’t block Taunt or Will-O-Wisp, which make Smeargle completely useless and break its Focus Sash, respectively.

Politoed

Base stats: 90 HP / 75 Atk / 75 Def / 90 SAtk / 100 SDef / 70 Spd

Typing: Water

A Pokémon that received a huge surge of relevance in BW due to its new ability Drizzle, Politoed has fallen of a bit in XY due to some new holes in the Rain archetype and the losses of Water Gem and Helping Hand. Still, Rain has had a few good events in each age division this year and it remains something strong enough that teams that don’t try to check it risk an almost unavoidable loss. Traditionally in 2014, Politoed teams up with Ludicolo instead of Kingdra, one of Kangaskhan, Mawile, and Manectric, often Talonflame, and a couple other player’s choice Pokémon, though the most famous Rain team this year is probably Keewan’s Politoed/Kingdra/Talonflame/Manectric/Bisharp/Amoonguss team, so a variety of options still exist. The lack of a non-Mega Electric-type that matches up with the metagame well seems to be one spot holding Politoed teams down a little bit, as Zapdos just hasn’t shown it is what Thundurus-Therian was.

The existence of Mega Charizard Y and Mega Tyranitar are extremely unfavorable for Politoed’s attempts at actually keep Rain up on the field, which is perhaps part of why Eject Button has become one of its more common items. Unlike the Megas, it also has the option of using Damp Rock for longer Rain. Mega Venusaur’s existence is also very unfavorable for Rain, as it fairly easily defeats Politoed and both of its primary Swift Swim buddies, which is part of why Rain so frequently deploys Talonflame. Azumarill shutting down the Politoed/Kingdra duo so easily has also changed the archetype a lot. Times are pretty tough for Rain, but Politoed is keeping it relevent.

Politoed has one other trick in Perish Song, which can function both as a surprise late game finisher when the opponent only has two Pokémon remaining and allow Politoed to be a partner to Pokémon like Mega Gengar on Perish Trap teams, should Gengar prefer not to team up with Azumarill instead.

Key Moves: Ice Beam, Scald, Protect, Surf, Hydro Pump, Perish Song, Encore, Rain Dance

Typical Builds: The most common nature on Politoed is Modest, but only 35% of Politoed used it in May, indicating that Politoed is one of those Pokémon that can be used in a variety of ways right now without any super dominant builds. Calm, Timid, and Bold all finished around 20% usage, with the defensive sets making a little more sense for a primarily support-oriented Pokémon. Politoed’s most common item is Choice Scarf, perhaps because of its appearance on R Justice’s Rain team, with Sitrus Berry next and then Eject Button third, courtesy of Keewan. Damp Rock is the last common item, which helps a lot in matches without an enemy weather changer. The Scarf set EVs very offensively, but most of the other sets focus on increasing Politoed’s bulk, as the key is to keep Politoed alive and able to repeatedly switch in to keep Rain up, increasing the speed and power of Kingdra or Ludicolo and removing the Fire-type weakness of some other teammates.

Ludicolo

Base stats: 80 HP / 70 Atk / 70 Def / 90 SAtk / 100 SDef / 70 Spd

Typing: Water/Grass

Once the premier Swift Swim user in 2006 and 2010, Ludicolo sort of took a backseat to Kingdra in 2013 and sort of in 2012, but it has certainly become the more common Politoed partner in 2014, at least in the West, thanks largely to Azumarill. While Ludicolo isn’t without its own problems, particularly the Swift Swim-ignoring Talonflame, being able to beat Azumarill and its Fairy friends, as well as having better type coverage in general, have made Ludicolo Rain’s most effective sweeper.

Ludicolo also functions surprisingly well out of Rain this year. I think the idea of Ludicolo as more of a support Pokémon was a pretty strange concept prior to kingofmars winning US Nationals with one last year, but Assault Vest is now Ludicolo’s most common item, and out of Rain it tends to function very similarly to how his did last year. Ludicolo deals with common Pokémon like Garchomp, Azumarill, and Salamence pretty effectively, which is a nice trait for a non-Mega Pokémon, since they tend to excel at causing problems for enemy Megas.

Ludicolo’s biggest problems in this format stem from its relatively weak physical defense. Talonflame absolutely eats it alive, and Mega Kangaskhan can also pick up free KOs on it without too much trouble (though if Kangaskhan has to eat a Hydro Pump in the Rain first to remove Ludicolo, it’s actually not that bad of a trade for a non-Mega). Ludicolo excels when it is either in the Rain and being supported by teammates or against special attackers out of the Rain. In either use, it is quite powerful when kept away from bad situations in this format.

Key Moves: Ice Beam, Fake Out, Giga Drain, Hydro Pump, Scald, Protect

Typical Builds: Ludicolo is almost always Modest, as base 90 Special Attack is low enough for something that is as aggressive as it is that it needs the extra oomph behind its attacks. Assault Vest is the most common item, and combined with its excellent Special Defense it is quite difficult to actually knock out with Special Attacks when using the item and a bunch of HP investment. Life Orb is sometimes used on Rain to give Ludicolo more damage with a much more offensive EV spread, and Absorb Bulb is used by some players who are lost and trying to find the Junior division.

Kingdra

Base stats: 75 HP / 95 Atk / 95 Def / 95 SAtk / 95 SDef / 85 Spd

Typing: Dragon/Water

Still the more popular choice with Politoed by volume, Kingdra has still seemed to be the Swift Swim user of choice in Korea and Japan. Kingdra trades being almost useless against Azumarill for being quicker than Ludicolo and able to inflict meaningful damage on Mega Venusaur. Unlike Ludicolo, Kingdra really can’t function outside of Rain at all, which vastly limits its effectiveness in games where the Rain mode has a poor matchup. Kingdra’s big advantage comes in the always unreliable Muddy Water, which allows Kingdra to do spread damage to both opponents without damaging its partners, which is a lot more valuable in a world where its teammates tend to be Talonflame and Manectric instead of Metagross and Cresselia and where its opponents have become similarly more frail.

With either Life Orb or Choice Specs Kingdra is capable of dealing big chunks of damage in the Rain, but it is very much a one trick pony. Much of Kingdra’s effectiveness is tied to how prepared for it its opponents are.

Key Moves: Muddy Water, Draco Meteor, Protect, Hydro Pump, Dragon Pulse, Ice Beam

Typical Builds: Almost always runs Modest Nature. EVs tend to be equally offensive, tending to be very close to or exactly 252 Special Attack and Speed. Life Orb is about twice as common as Choice Specs, with Life Orb having the option to use Protect instead of a filler attack like Hydro Pump, Dragon Pulse, or Ice Beam. Interestingly Substitute, which was once on basically every Kingdra’s moveset, isn’t even one of its 10 most common moves in XY.

Greninja

Base stats: 72 HP / 95 Atk / 67 Def / 103 SAtk / 71 SDef / 122 Spd

Typing: Water/Dark

The idea of a fast and frail starter Pokémon begs for Greninja to be placed in the “popular among casual players but useless competitively” bin, but its ability, Protean, is so good that it creates a much higher sense of danger than most similar Pokémon are able to. Protean changes Greninja’s type to match that of whatever attack it uses, which means it gets a STAB boost for each of its attacks and can change its typing before it is hit, perhaps actually surviving an attack because of the resistance. While Protean tends to be risky, it helps make Greninja one of the game’s most fun and interesting Pokémon.

Greninja tends to be a little too frail to be considered for most top players’ teams, but Greninja is actually very dangerous even in the hands of newer players compared to what they might have been using in the past. Greninja gets excellent type coverage, which combined with Protean, its Speed, and sometimes Life Orb, makes it plenty capable of taking KOs on a bunch of “stronger” Pokémon if it is given room. It also has a trademark move in Mat Block that can be used for some gimmickry, as Mat Block blocks all damage attacks that move after it, allowing its teammate to get in a free attack or stat boost. Mat Block lacks priority, which often tends to it whiffing like those people trying to use it as Greninja’s final smash during the E3 Smash 4 demos, but it is one of those moves players have to respect because misplaying into it can create large problems quickly.

Key Moves: Ice Beam, Dark Pulse, Scald, Grass Knot, Mat Block, Hydro Pump, Extrasensory, Protect

Typical Builds: Almost always Timid to capitalize on that excellent Speed, but sometimes Modest for more power, and sometimes even Hasty or Naive to allow for a mixed set using a move like Rock Slide. Life Orb is the most common item, though Expert Belt is sometimes used to a similar effect, and Focus Sash is an option for Greninja who are confident they don’t need the damage boost and would like to survive more than one turn. All sets tend to be EVed with basically maximum Special Attack and Speed. The moveset is sort of a toss-up — it actually doesn’t even need a traditional STAB move, since everything is a STAB move. Ice Beam annihilates Dragons, Dark Pulse blasts Aegislash, and the Water-type attacks are usually safe neutral damage while helping with Heat Rotom and Tyranitar.

Lucario

Base stats: 70 HP / 110->145 Atk / 70->88 Def / 115->140 SAtk / 70 SDef / 90->112 Spd

Typing: Steel/Fighting

Probability of Mega Evolving: Surprisingly, actually almost as likely to Mega Evolve as the Pokémon used exclusively for their Mega Evolutions.

In a world where even the crazily aggressive Talonflame seems like a good option to a lot of players, Lucario has been surprisingly unpopular in this format in spite of being one of the few available Fighting-types and perhaps the Mega with the most raw power. While Lucario can be used in or out of its Mega forme, the Mega is probably the most interesting and common, with about 4/5 of Lucario holding Lucarionite. Mega Lucario features the Adaptability ability, which increases the boost from STAB to x2 instead of x1.5. Unfortunately for Mega Lucario, it struggles taking advantage of this a little as it doesn’t really have two excellent STAB moves when going either physical or special, but it does allow Lucario to absolutely destroy even neutral targets that lack bulk. Combined with its strong attack stats and a Speed stat just high enough to help it outrun basically everything unboosted that matters, it’s a little surprising Mega Lucario hasn’t been more common given that it isn’t much frailer than the other Pokémon the metagame features right now.

Normal Lucario tens to use Focus Sash, though Choice Scarf, Choice Specs, and Life Orb all let it dish out some pretty serious damage. It’s biggest contribution is probably the abilities it supplies Mega Lucario with, most notably Inner Focus and Steadfast. Both abilities are pretty impractical given the inherent risk on such a frail Pokemon, though Inner Focus tends to trade better. Normal Lucario can actually OHKO offensive Kangaskhan with an offensive item pretty easily if given the opportunity itself, though, so it shouldn’t be underestimated.

Lucario’s biggest problem in this format is probably how badly it deals with Aegislash, as Aegislash is immune to one STAB and resists the other. Redirection from Amoonguss, priority moves, and the format’s limited Speed control also trouble Lucario, as it is certainly a glass cannon and really needs to be careful not to take unnecessary damage.

Key Moves: Detect, Close Combat, Flash Cannon, Aura Sphere, Bullet Punch, Extreme Speed, Vacuum Wave, Rock Slide, Nasty Plot

Typical Builds: Lucario is one of those Pokémon I’m not sure the optimal spread has been found on yet. It is most often seen with a 252/252 spread and Jolly or Timid, though Adamant receives notable usage, which allows for some extra KOs. Physical sets tend to use Close Combat, Bullet Punch, and Extreme Speed or Rock Slide, while special sets veer toward Flash Cannon, Aura Sphere, and Vacuum Wave or Nasty Plot. Lucario is one of those Pokémon that probably remains a little underexplored at this point in the format.

Chandelure

Base stats: 60 HP / 55 Atk / 90 Def / 145 SAtk / 90 SDef / 80 Spd

Typing: Ghost/Fire

Chandelure is a Pokémon that for most of this season has maintained a shockingly high rate of use. It was hanging right around the top 10 mark for the first months of the season, and while I don’t know that it ever caught in North America or Europe the way it did in Japan, it has maintained surprisingly popular in spite of not having as clearly defined of a niche as most Pokémon with similar usage. Chandelure received very few changes in XY — only gaining the ability to hit through Substitutes and screens with Infiltrator, which is only used about a third of the time over Flash Fire. However, the game has changed some around it.

Perhaps no Pokémon benefits more from the increased importance of Fire-types in a metagame concerned about removing Steel-types for Fairies and Dragons. Not only is Chandelure a Fire-type itself, but it can exploit other Fire-type with its Flash Fire, almost always outtrading and getting a boost to start wiping out the rest of the enemy team with. If Chandelure chooses not to focus on enemy Fire-types, it can instead knock out weakened Aegislash through its Substitute, which vastly reduces the power of another dominant Pokémon and can help Chandelure’s Mega Evolved teammates if paired with a teammate like Mawile or Kanaskhan. Chandelure also has base 145 Special Attack, which is easily the highest constant of a non-Mega Pokémon in the format, leading to it dishing out huge chunks of damage when it gets free.

Chandelure doesn’t enjoy the extensive use of Sucker Punch in the metagame, which has made Choice sets a lot less popular than they might have otherwise been. Tyranitar, Politoed, Garchomp cause some problems for Chandelure, and Azumarill and Talonflame can finish it efficiently when it is weakened.

Key Moves: Shadow Ball, Heat Wave, Protect, Energy Ball, Trick Room, Will-O-Wisp, Flamethrower, Overheat

Typical Builds: Modest is the most common nature for Chandelure, representing over half of all Chandelure. Quiet is second most common at 28%, which is a little interesting given that Trick Room is much more common at 43%. Trick Room Chandelure is much more likely to use Focus Sash, which is the most common item at 35%. I would imagine nearly all of the Chandelure using the second most common item, Chocie Scarf, are running Modest. There’s room for some bulk on both sets, but the Chandelure EV spreads have been as random as the remaining items so far this season. Seven items clock in between 7% and 4% usage, including Safety Goggles, Life Orb, Leftovers, Air Balloon (?), Lum Berry, Choice Specs, and Sitrus Berry.

Mienshao

Base stats: 65 HP / 125 Atk / 60 Def / 95 SAtk / 60 SDef / 105 Spd

Typing: Fighting

Traditionally one of those Pokémon that was a little too frail for its Speed and power to compensate for, the sudden emphasis on the Speed points near base 100 Speed in this format have made Mienshao a much better option that it used to be. Able to move before Kangaskhan and Fake Out for or block the enemy Fake Out with Quick Guard, as well as to simply smash Kangaskhan with Hi Jump Kick, Mienshao is pretty obnoxious to deal with for many common teams. As in the past, relying on Hi Jump Kick presents the danger of accidentally targetting a Protect or an Aegislash switch-in and doing massive damage to itself instead of the enemy, but powerful Fighting-type attacks are rare and valuable in this format.

Mienshao is still incredibly frail and vulnerable to Intimidate and bulky Pokémon in general, as it needs to at least 2HKO its target to trade well most of the time. The addition of the Fairy type and the Fighting type resistance that came with it has also not been advantageous for Mienshao, as it doesn’t get to fire off many attacks most of the time, so any missed opportunities can be game losing.

Key Moves: Fake Out, Hi Jump Kick, Rock Slide, Quick Guard, Wide Guard, Drain Punch, Low Kick, Knock Off, Feint

Typical Builds: Mienshao is almost exclusively Jolly, as the whole point of using it is to outrun Kangaskhan. EVs tend to be pretty close to maximum Attack and Speed, which is part of why it almost always carries Focus Sash. Life Orb and Wide Lens are the most common items when Focus Sash isn’t available, and Life Orb Reckless actually lets Mienshao put out pretty outrageous damage as an alternative to focusing more on control. Typically, Mienshao runs Fake Out, Hi Jump Kick, Rock Slide, and one of the Guards, though Feint and Knock Off are alternatives to the last two moves and sometimes players try a different fighting move to get away from the risks of Hi Jump Kick.

Goodra

Base stats: 90 HP / 100 Atk / 70 Def / 110 SAtk / 150 SDef / 80 Spd

Typing: Dragon

Perhaps the strangest psuedo-legendary Pokémon in the game, Goodra enjoys long walks letting its body slowly seep into the beach and causing special attacks to do negligible amounts of damage. The best word to describe Goodra is bizarre. It has a bizarre movepool even for a Dragon, having some interesting non-STAB moves like Thunderbolt, Ice Beam, Sludge Bomb, Muddy Water, Power Whip, and Feint. It has a variety of bizarre abilities — perhaps the strangest of which being its unique Gooey, which lowers the Speed of attackers that make contact with it, though it also gets the rare and excellent Sap Sipper. It has a bizarre stat spread, with one of the highest Special Defenses in the game. It’s even bizarre that it isn’t a dual-type Pokémon like its predecessors.

Goodra’s strength lies in its ability to trade incredibly efficiently with basically every special attacker in the game because of a combination of its outrageous 150 base Special Defense and its excellent coverage. Its weaknesses are that it doesn’t do huge amount of damage, it isn’t particularly fast, and that it only has mediocre physical defense, which causes it to struggle with Pokémon like Azumarill, Mawile, Kangaskhan, and Garchomp. Goodra functions sort of uniquely where even though it’s heavy slant toward Special Defense would indicate it should be one of those Pokémon that closes a game instead of opening, it’s more flexible. It doesn’t close games when its counters are removed quite as efficiently as something like Ferrothorn, but it is much, much more useful early in the game than most similar closers are.

Key Moves: Dragon Pulse, Thunderbolt, Fire Blast, Flamethrower, Ice Beam, Draco Meteor, Sludge Bomb, Muddy Water, Power Whip, Feint

Typical Builds: Goodra is typically Modest, which helps bring up it’s respectable Special Attack to more dangerous levels. Assault Vest is by far Goodra’s most common item, as well as its only common item. Assault Vest takes Goodra’s Special Defense to truly outrageous levels, allowing it to take even some Choice Specs-boosted Draco Meteors and making it almost immune to resisted and neutral special attacks. Goodra tends to want near maximum HP to increase the value of its hefty Special Defense, with a mixture of Special Attack, Defense, Special Defense, and Speed in the remaining slots that depends on how it’s trainer wants it to function. Other than Dragon Pulse, the move choices are really up to the player — they’re all excellent, though Feint is probably worth a particular mention because it allows Goodra to provide utility in spite of its Assault Vest, which is a more common choice among stronger players even though it is less popular overall. Beyond Modest and Assault Vest, Goodra is incredibly flexible.

Gothitelle

Base stats: 70 HP / 55 Atk / 95 Def / 95 SAtk / 110 SDef / 65 Spd

Typing: Psychic

While even Shadow Tag wasn’t enough to make Gothitelle relevant outside of Perish Trap in BW2 thanks to how overshadowed it was by Cresselia, Gothitelle is now a Pokémon fully capable of some big finishes in XY. It has fairly respectable defensive stats, which combined with Shadow Tag make it a good enough Trick Room user to try to build around given the lack of quality competition for that role. Shadow Tag is genuinely very useful in this format, especially combined with one of Gothitelle’s quirkier moves, Charm. Unfortunately, Charm takes the place of Helping Hand on most other defensive Trick Roomers, as Gothitelle lost access to it thanks to the Kalos Native rule. This causes Gothitelle to really all-in the Shadow Tag thing, and its usefulness is largely determined by how well its teammates can remove trapped threats. Gothitelle really needs to trap the right targets to do well, especially physical attackers, because it just doesn’t have the supportive movepool or offensive coverage to be used the way something like Cresselia was before. Gothitelle is also used to help support Perish Trap teams, as Mega Gengar can switch out to Gothitelle to maintain the trap, and Gothitelle can use Trick Room to change the order Perish Song knocks out targets in if it ends up in a 2v2 situation.

Gothitelle is extremely weak to Taunt and to Aegislash, who both ignores Shadow Tag and is capable of doing giant chunks of damage to Gothitelle. Gothitelle also really wants to avoid Hydreigon. The thing with Gothitelle, though, is that the game becomes much less about what Gothitelle itself is weak to and more about what combinations of Gothitelle and its teammates can create situations where opposing Pokémon are easily trapped and defeated.

Key Moves: Protect, Trick Room, Psychic, Reflect, Charm, Psyshock, Psybeam, Heal Pulse, Taunt, Light Screen

Typical Builds: Gothitelle’s horrific movepool is probably best shown in the fact that three of its seven most common moves in May were Psychic-type attacks. Outside of crazyville, Gothitelle should probably be using only one Psychic attack, Protect, and two choices out of Trick Room, Charm, the screens, Taunt, and Heal Pulse. While some players will still drop it, 3/4 of Gothitelle run Protect even on the Trick Room set because preserving Gothitelle after setting up Trick Room is more important than it is with other Trick Roomers because of Shadow Tag. Gothitelle’s offense is almost irrelevant, so players tend to go Sassy, Bold, Relaxed, or Calm, with EVs invested in HP and then the defenses.

Pyroar

Base stats: 86 HP / 68 Atk / 72 Def / 109 SAtk / 66 SDef / 106 Spd

Typing: Fire/Normal

A Pokémon with nice Speed, decent Special Attack, and not much else, Pyroar is a Pokémon I would wager almost everyone in VGC expected to stay irrelevant all year. Strangely, thanks to a combination of being faster than Garchomp and Kangaskhan and Fire-type Pokémon in the VGC 2014 format being very limited, Pyroar has become a respectable niche choice pioneered by the influential Japanese player See. Extremely offensive, Pyroar typically grabs a Life Orb and gets to work trying to knock things out before it is horrifically slaughtered by attacks the strength of gusts of wind from Pidgey. It actually does this surprisingly well, as Overheat OHKOs everything weak to Fire and some frail neutral targets, Hidden Power Ice takes out the Dragons who are 4x weak to Ice, and Hyper Voice punishes even bulky teams extremely hard if Pyroar is given free turns where it can’t pick up a free KO with one of its other moves. Pyroar is a Pokémon all about getting sent out in safe position and finding ways to fire enough attacks off where it is actually a net gain for its team from there, since it is fairly easy to knock out in a single blow, especially after Life Orb recoil.

Pokémon that particularly trouble Pyroar include Azumarill, Kangaskhan, and Talonflame because of their priority, Wash Rotom, Tyranitar, Greninja, and basically anything with a Choice Scarf or a Substitute. Pyroar is one of the format’s few frail Pokémon who can’t really use Focus Sash effectively, which comes at a price.

Key Moves: Hyper Voice, Hidden Power, Protect, Overheat, Flamethrower, Fire Blast, Will-O-Wisp

Typical Builds: Literally every Pyroar that made the stats in May was Timid, which isn’t very surprising when you consider there really isn’t any reason to use a Pyroar that is slower than Garchomp. Life Orb was used about 3/4 of the time, and it again is really only the reasonable choice for Pyroar given its niche. Hyper Voice, Hidden Power Ice, Protect, and a choice of the Fire moves make up Pyroar’s only really viable moveset, typically with maximum Special Attack and Speed.

Zapdos

Base stats: 90 HP / 90 Atk / 85 Def / 125 SAtk / 90 SDef / 100 Spd

Typing: Electric/Flying

In spite of being the only member of its trio to see respectable usage in XY, Zapdos has been conspicuously absent from VGC 2014… at least prior to making both Senior and Masters finals in Japan. Hidden Power’s nerf really hurt it, as Hidden Power Flying only being 60 Base Power makes it not very worth carrying just for the STAB option, so Zapdos has acquired Gyarados syndrome without a real STAB option for one of its types. In spite of that, Zapdos still brings a balanced combination of Speed, good power, and decent bulk, so it’s a little surprising it hasn’t seen more play. Outside of some occasional use on Rain, Zapdos has dropped its more offensive sets of the past and begun to use more defensive sets more frequently, perhaps because the offensive variants don’t trade very well with the heavyhitters in XY like Kangaskhan, Mawile, and Hydreigon.

Zapdos is one of those Pokémon that is pretty good at hanging around for long periods of time, but never seems to come up when you think of Pokémon who are good counters to almost anything. It fries Talonflame nicely, but otherwise it tends to just use Roost to trade positively with Pokémon who don’t resist Electric. It’s good at stalling on more defensive teams, but it isn’t the best Pokémon for many problems a team might have in XY. It is one of those Pokémon that will probably stay lower in usage until someone finds a core that it completes.

Key Moves: Hidden Power, Thunderbolt, Roost, Detect, Discharge, Thunder Wave, Volt Switch, AGILITY?????

Typical Builds: I think Zapdos is the first Pokémon I’ve ever seen with Hidden Power as the most common move, which says something about how bleak this movepool is. The most common Zapdos item is Safety Goggles at 22%, with a bunch of other items over 9%, including Choice Scarf, Sitrus Berry, Life Orb, Leftovers, and Rocky Helmet. Most Zapdos are Modest, which shouldn’t be too surprising given that Zapdos’s highest base stat is Special Attack by far. Timid is seen the next most frequently, presumably to at least keep a Speed tie with Kangaskhan and Charizard, and the very few remaining Zapdos choose defensive natures to increase their bulk beyond what EVs can do on their own. Timid Zapdos still needs maximum Speed, but other Zapdos tend to only run enough Speed to get over Timid Smeargle, preferring instead to give themselves a bit of power and then to bulk up so Roost actually does something. Discharge is pretty nonviable at high levels, Thunder Wave is an interesting option on defensive sets, and Volt Switch goes along with Discharge or Thunder as filler on Choice sets.

Raichu

Base stats: 60 HP / 90 Atk / 55 Def / 90 SAtk / 80 SDef / 110 Spd

Typing: Electric

One of those original Pokémon with horribly sub-optimal stat spreads (Raichu, why do you think you need 90 Attack?), Raichu is surprisingly useful in this format in spite of being relegated to helping better Pokémon set up. Raichu has one of those valuable faster-than-Kangaskhan Fake Outs, Lightningrod, and Encore, which is just enough to let it help other Pokémon succeed. Like Liepard, it has the Fake Out + Encore combination, punishing players who just double Protect every time they see a Fake Out user. Raichu is a really risky support Pokémon — it is incredibly obnoxious to play against and provides a little more support and power than, say, something like Liepard tends to, but it does so at the expense of being even easier to remove and having an easier attack type to stop. Raichu also has a handful of other tricks it can work in, such as Fling and Feint.

Raichu’s weakness is everything that isn’t weak to Electric. It’s going to go down hard if it actually gets attacked, but the point of Raichu is to put Raichu in situations where your opponent has to pay a large opportunity cost for targeting Raichu instead of its partner as it sets up or takes a KO.

Key Moves: Fake Out, Encore, Thunderbolt, Protect, Hidden Power, Volt Switch, Feint, Fling

Typical Builds: Raichu is almost exclusively Timid, as moving first is vital for Encore to actually work correctly. Focus Sash is Raichu’s most common item, with the second most common in May being Air Balloon, an item that nothing should ever use in any situation. Raichu’s third most common item, King’s Rock, is used for a second guaranteed flinch after Fake Out is used with Fling, which is one of Raichu’s only reasonable moveset deviations. Otherwise, Fake Out, Encore, Thunderbolt or Volt Switch, and Protect or Hidden Power are pretty much the only options, other than maybe using Feint on really aggressive teams. Raichu needs maximum Speed, but the rest of the EVs normally go into bulk rather than Special Attack, unlike on many similarly frail Pokémon.

Sableye

Base stats: 50 HP / 75 Atk / 75 Def / 65 SAtk / 65 SDef / 50 Spd

Typing: Dark/Ghost

Each of the viable Pranksters other than Meowstic have to find ways to make themselves useful by doing things Meowstic can’t do. In Sableye’s case, it has Will-O-Wisp, excellent defensive typing, and Recover. These moves allow it to become a pretty serious nuisance for Kangaskhan, Mega Tyranitar, and Mega Gyarados, and at least survive Play Rough from Mawile in exchange for burning it, a pretty serious niche in a metagame dominated by physical Megas. Sableye also has access to Foul Play, a move that makes it easier for Sableye to get away with not running any offensive investment and helping it further devastate physical attackers.

Like all Prankster users, Sableye really doesn’t want to be Taunted, and it has some pretty sketchy defenses. The bigger threat with Sableye is the worry of getting caught out on the field without really being able to do much and being a momentum sink with its team, because if it is caught out with something it can’t do much to with Foul Play and that doesn’t care much about Burn, Sableye just doesn’t do very much.

Key Moves: Will-O-Wisp, Recover, Taunt, Foul Play, Fake Out, Knock Off, Swagger

Typical Builds: Sableye desperately needs to invest in its HP, as 50 base HP + Recover is pretty pathetic without maximum investment. Sableye uses the defensive natures that don’t lower Speed pretty evenly, though it has a slight preference for the Special Defense-raising natures over their Defense-raising equivalents. Sableye’s most common item is Leftovers, which helps with the whole burn-targets-and-spam-Recover thing, though it also likes Sitrus Berry when it is available and sometimes falls back on Mental Herb if it is afraid of Taunt. Roseli Berry has also recently become a bigger thing, which lets Sableye go back to the days of it not having any targetable weaknesses for at least a turn.

Klefki

Base stats: 57 HP / 80 Atk / 91 Def / 80 SAtk / 87 SDef / 75 Spd

Typing: Steel/Fairy

The keys! Klefki offers very interesting typing, slightly better defenses, and similarly terrible base HP when compared to the other Prankster users. Klefki is definitely XY’s most dedicated Thunder Wave bot, as unlike Sableye, it doesn’t have much to differentiate itself from Meowstic other than its typing, so it winds up using similar moves. Perhaps that lack of differentiation has led to Klefki being much less popular than its fellow Prankster newbie Meowstic, but Klefki’s typing may make it better for some teams. The only real difference is Foul Play, which it shares with Liepard and Sableye, though it lacks the STAB the other two have.

As with all Prankster users, Klefki suffers from Taunt and momentum issues. Unlike most other Prankster users, its typing is actually relevant in most of the games it plays. It is extremely annoying for the special-based Dragons to deal with, as Light Screen makes incoming Fire-type damage controllable and being paralyzed is very, very bad for all of them. It also does better against Kangaskhan than most of the other Prankster users thanks to its Normal-type resistance, though Klefki isn’t likely to knock Kangaskhan out very quickly with Thunder Wave and non-STAB Foul Play, either. Klefki does need to be careful for Ground- and Fire-type enemies, because the added weaknesses make it a little easier to remove for most teams than some of its Prankster cousins.

Key Moves: Thunder Wave, Foul Play, Reflect, Light Screen, Swagger, Safeguard, Dazzling Gleam, Draining Kiss

Typical Builds: Leftovers is Klefki’s most common item, which makes sense given that its only other form of potential recovery is Draining Kiss and that it prefers longer battles and sustained healing over the burst healing of a Sitrus Berry. Light Clay is the second most common item, which tend to be better for Klefki aiming to get both screens up quickly and then faint for the team instead of wasting momentum rather than those in it for the long haul. Klefki’s most common nature by far is Bold, with 50% of Klefki showing that they’d really rather not just instantly get smeared by Garchomp and Talonflame. Calm and Impish are the next most common, at 17% and 12%, respectively. All Klefki tend to build focusing on bulk, with 252 HP being important because of the low base HP. Klefki nearly always has Thunder Wave, but any of Foul Play, Reflect, Light Screen, Swagger, and Safeguard are equally likely in the remaining slots.

Liepard

Base stats: 64 HP / 88 Atk / 50 Def / 88 SAtk / 50 SDef / 106 Spd

Typing: Dark

In spite of having pretty much the worst distributed base stat total for a Prankster user I can possibly imagine, Liepard is an interesting option. The pioneer of the Fake Out + Encore gimmick has been upstaged by the non-Prankster-but-fast-enough-it-doesn’t-matter Raichu, but Liepard does have a few tricks to differentiate itself from Raichu and the other Prankster users. Like Klefki and Sableye, it has Foul Play to deal some damage. Like Raichu, it has Fake Out and Encore. Like Meowstic, it has Charm. Its unique trick is Fake Tears, an option that isn’t seen very frequently, but can be extremely devastating as a result, surprising foes playing for Encore. Liepard also shares Thunder Wave with all of the aforementioned Pokémon but Sableye, which is still an awfully good move. Liepard’s variety as a disruptive Prankster user is unmatched, though it lacks supportive moves like screens or Safeguard.

Liepard doesn’t tend to create the same momentum issues other Prankster Pokémon do thanks to Encore, but it does still want to avoid Taunt… which it can often do by using its own speedy Taunt. Liepard may somehow be the frailest Prankster user, but at least its HP went in the right direction from the last two Pranksters on this list. Liepard is enjoying the lack of Mach Punch in the metagame, though it probably wouldn’t have minded if the whole Fairy type thing hadn’t happened.

Key Moves: Fake Out, Encore, Foul Play, Taunt, Thunder Wave, Fake Tears, Swagger, Charm

Typical Builds: Bizarrely, Liepard only used Encore 63% of the time in May in spite of Fake Out + Encore being basically the entire point of the Pokémon in VGC, making you wonder what the other 37% of players were doing. Foul Play and Taunt are both used about half the time, with Thunder Wave about a third and the rest clocking in at about a fifth. Fake Out and Encore are almost mandatory, with the others depending on team needs. Liepard used a positive Speed nature 95% of the time, which requires enough Speed to outrun Kangaskhan and get the faster Fake Out. The rest of the EVs go into bulk. In spite of that, Focus Sash is the most common item by far at 70%, with a bunch of other items receiving negligible usage after that.

Blastoise

Base stats: 79 HP / 83->103 Atk / 100->120 Def / 85->135 SAtk / 105->115 SDef / 78 Spd

Typing: Water

Probability of Mega Evolving: Fighting with Non-Mega Blastoise is like fighting with a non-Mutant Teenage Ninja Turtle.

Unlike the other two members of its trio, Blastoise hasn’t quite been able to make it to true relevance yet. Blastoise has one of the game’s strongest attacks in Water Spout off of base 135 Special Attack, and boasts pretty respectable bulk in spite of its mediocre base HP. Unfortunately, its middling Speed requires it to need a greater degree of support to be successful than most other Mega Pokémon do, and it hasn’t been able to crack that elite class of Pokémon as a result. The most noteworthy use in North America has been Randy Kwa’s team, which pairs it with Smeargle. Perhaps Blastoise will do better in later formats with more redirection.

For now, Blastoise is a bulky sweeper with amazing field-clearing power when uninhibited, but that is a little too easy to inhib to fit onto most teams. Rotom-W, Azumarill, Mega Manectric, and Rain in general are noteworthy counters, but what really gives Blastoise trouble are faster Pokémon that are capable of lowering its health enough to make Water Spout’s damage more controllable… a description many common Pokémon fit.

Key Moves: Aura Sphere, Protect, Water Spout, Ice Beam, Dragon Pulse, Water Pulse, Dark Pulse, Fake Out

Typical Builds: Blastoise is Modest 70.5% of the time and Quiet 16.1% more. Blastoise’s Speed investment depends a lot on the team it is on, as the presence of Tailwind or Trick Room changes what it may want to try to outrun, though outrunning neutral Tyranitar is popular for Modest Blastoise. It tends to invest heavily in Special Attack after Speed, with the remaining EVs going to help its bulk. Blastoise has a lot of interesting move options, though Aura Sphere seems to be the only constant, given how important it is to deal with Kangaskhan. Water Spout is the most common Water-type attack and by far Blastoise’s best sweeping option, though it requires a great deal of support. Ice Beam and Dragon Pulse both do the same job, with Ice Beam doing more to Salamence, Noivern, and Garchomp, but Dragon Pulse doing better neutral damage and doing more to Hydreigon. Water Pulse is an alternative STAB option, and Dark Pulse Blastoise just wants to see Aegislash burn.

Scizor

Base stats: 70 HP / 130 Atk / 100 Def / 55 SAtk / 80 SDef / 65 Spd

Typing: Bug/Steel

Probability of Mega Evolving: About 1/5 of the time.

Previously one of the premier Steel-types in the 2012 and 2013 formats along with Metagross and Heatran, Scizor makes up for having not being physically removed from the format in 2014 like the other two by having been practically removed from the metagame. Losing both Steel Gem and Bug Bite from its old standard set and gaining a Mega Evolution that isn’t really enough of a boost to be worth using over the competition, Scizor is sort of in an awkward spot in XY. Scizor still has its STAB and Technician-boosted Bullet Punch, which is its saving grace in a format full of frail Pokémon and the one thing that keeps it relevant. While Scizor can still run the Swords Dance set it was known for during generation 5, it is now almost as likely to run something like Life Orb or Choice Band to work with U-turn a little bit better, which tend to be the better sets in XY.

Scizor doesn’t deal especially well with all of the Intimidate, Will-O-Wisp, Aegislash, or the increased presence of Fire-types in this metagame, especially considering many of the Fairy-types available aren’t actually weak to Steel. It still finishes low health Pokémon effectively, but Scizor just isn’t what it used to be, especially considering the surprisingly large hit of no longer being resistant to Sucker Punch in XY.

Key Moves: Bullet Punch, Swords Dance, Protect, X-Scissor, U-Turn, Aerial Ace, Feint, Pursuit

Typical Builds: Scizor’s most common item is Lum Berry, which the Swords Dance set has little choice but to fall back on now. After its mostly ineffective Mega Stone, Life Orb and Choice Band are its next most common items, which seem to be the way most of the serious players using Scizor are going. Scizor is almost exclusively Adamant with maximum attack, with the remaining EVs going into either Speed or HP depending on what its trainer wants to focus on. Bullet Punch is mandatory on every set, with Swords Dance being used about half of the time. X-Scissor is better with Swords Dance than U-turn to avoid switching out of the boost, but Choice Band and Life Orb seem to prefer U-turn. Strangely, only about half of Scizor use Protect in spite of Choice Band only being used about 1/8 of the time. Scizor does have a variety of useful filler attacks, but I’d certainly have expected more players to be running Bullet Punch/Bug move/Swords Dance or filler move/Protect unless Choiced. Mega Scizor, if being used for some reason, tends to be built the same way as normal Scizor since it’s pretty much just a stronger version of the same thing, though Swords Dance is preferred a little more strongly.

Weavile

Base stats: 70 HP / 120 Atk / 65 Def / 45 SAtk / 85 SDef / 125 Spd

Typing: Dark/Ice

Secretly the last of this format’s viable supports, Weavile’s respectable Attack and Speed allow it to function better as a frail attacker than most other Fake Out users to make up for Weavile not really being that supportive outside of Fake Out. Weavile combines a handful of useful qualities like being faster than Kangaskhan and Garchomp, having Fake Out, having the rare Ice-type STAB, and having access to a couple cool utility moves like Fling and Taunt and then mucks it up by being another one of those Pokémon with paper-thin defenses. Weavile can create a lot of pressure with Fake Out and threatening a lot more damage than most of the other Fake Out users, but similarly to Mienshao, it does so at the expense of being very easy to blow up. Mienshao is really the Pokémon Weavile could be considered a substitute for: they run very similar movesets, with Weavile changing its typing and dropping access to the Guards. Many experienced players may consider Weavile one of those Pokémon that are kind of a trap for newer players, but it can get enough done in this format offensively to be worth considering on more offensive teams, though Weavile lacks the typing advantages on popular Megas that keep Mienshao more common than it.

The amount of priority in the game definitely creates a lot of problems for Weavile, as it is likely to be OHKOd by almost all priority moves without a Focus Sash and priority gets around its Speed. Some of the metagame’s bulkier sweepers that are not weak to Ice also cause a bunch of trouble for it, most notably Kangaskhan, Mawile, Gyarados, and Azumarill. The metagame’s focus on neutering physical attackers bothers Weavile more than most Pokémon picked primarily for a move like Fake Out, since Weavile’s lack of other support moves means it actually needs to do some damage after the Fake Out to be worth using.

Key Moves: Fake Out, Night Slash, Icicle Crash, Ice Shard, Brick Break, Ice Punch, Protect, Taunt, Fling

Typical Builds: Weavile almost always uses Focus Sash, Jolly, and maximum Attack and Speed, though Adamant Weavile is still much faster than Jolly Kangaskhan and Garchomp and should probably be considered more often. Fake Out and Night Slash are sort of obvious, with Icicle Crash seeming like the obvious STAB option so as to avoid falling back on only the weaker priority move Ice Shard. Choice Scarf Salamence and enemy priority users make Ice Shard more tempting than it would otherwise be, and running both Ice-type attacks is an option. Brick Break, Protect, and Taunt are all viable as 4th moves if the Weavile player doesn’t want both Ice-type attacks, with Ice Punch being something that probably shouldn’t be used. After Focus Sash, the next most common item is Life Orb, which is much, much riskier, but gives Weavile more opportunity to make some big plays against unprepared teams. The last sort-of-common item is King’s Rock, which combines with Fling for a second flinch in a similar strategy to what some Raichu employ.

Noivern

Base stats: 85 HP / 70 Atk / 80 Def / 97 SAtk / 80 SDef / 123 Spd

Typing: Dragon/Flying

Featuring a lower BST than most fellow Dragon-type Pokémon, Noivern focuses more on being tricky instead of focusing on raw power. As is normally the case, raw power tends to be a lot better, and Noivern is much less popular than Garchomp, Hydreigon, and Salamence. However, Noivern has a boatload of cool tricks that keep it worth using for players who are trying to win more on finesse, though Noivern is one of those Pokémon that don’t do nearly as well against opponents who understand what it is likely to do.

Noivern’s tricks start from its abilities. Most commonly it uses Frisk, which gets some good information early in a battle to help make its trainer make higher percentage decisions. Noivern tends to be led with Frisk, and it helps make Noivern a nice game one Pokémon in best-of-threes to ensure the information game is being won. Noivern’s value in game ones is furthered by the variety of attacks it has access to, including some excellent support moves in Tailwind, Super Fang, and Taunt. Tailwind does little for Noivern itself, but helps its team significantly, and Super Fang early in a match is guaranteed to do a big chunk of damage to anything but Ghost-types, negating the idea of a safe switch. Taunts is extremely valuable in this metagame and Noivern has two helpful qualities that synergize with it: Noivern is much quicker than Rotom to Taunt its Will-O-Wisp and Noivern is not weak to any of Aegislash’s attacks. Noivern has one final viable trick in one of its alternate abilities, Infiltrator, which allows it to attack through Substitutes and screens. This would help a little bit more if Noivern could actually do enough damage to knock out Aegislash through its Substitute while in Shield forme, but there’s always the chance of catching unsuspecting foes. While it isn’t boosted by STAB, Noivern is also one of the few users of Boomburst, which is really only seen by newer players trying to cheese with spread moves and immunities. Less common is Switcheroo, which is potentially devastating from the Choice Specs set.

Noivern’s weaknesses are basically that the other Dragons are very popular, causing their counters saturate the metagame, and that it simply doesn’t do very much damage. Base 97 Special Attack isn’t awful, but it is pretty weak compared to something like Hydreigon, and it makes it difficult for Noivern to be competitive when it is competing for the same spot on teams. Noivern takes an extra hit for the frequency it uses Hurricane, as it is right on the edge of being too inaccurate to be viable at 70%.

Key Moves: Draco Meteor, Flamethrower, Hurricane, Tailwind, Protect, Boomburst, Air Slash, Super Fang, Dragon Pulse, Taunt

Typical Builds: Like most faster, frailer Pokémon, Noivern’s move usage data is a little wonky due to being infected more than normal by less competitive players. Noivern’s competitive options are basically Draco Meteor, Flamethrower, and Hurricane for attacks, with Dragon Pulse sometimes being used on Choice sets and Protect being common otherwise. Super Fang, Taunt and Tailwind are all awesome utility options and at least one should be used on pretty much all non-Choice Noivern. Noivern’s most common item is actually Choice Specs, an attempt to add some power to its natural Speed. Focus Sash is the next most common item, which gives Noivern a lot more room to use one of its support moves and then get an attack off even when threatened. Life Orb is the next most common item, which kind of creates a happy medium between having more respectable offensive power and having access to some of the quirkier support moves. Noivern is almost always Timid to take advantage of its natural Speed, though it doesn’t need to go maximum Speed to outrun most of the viable nearby threats and really needs big chunks of Special Attack investment to be a threat.

Conkeldurr

Base stats: 105 HP / 140 Atk / 95 Def / 55 SAtk / 65 SDef / 45 Spd

Typing: Fighting

After jumping from relatively underplayed to one of the most important Pokémon in the format last year around the time of Japan and US Nationals in 2013 thanks to Iron Fist, Conkeldurr has found itself a lot relevant in VGC 2014. Conkeldurr has a pretty optimal stat spread for a Fighting type Pokémon, with the trademark high Attack, decent defense, and a huge pool of HP to draw from. Its low Speed was an asset during generation five, but with Trick Room being so uncommon in XY and Meowstic and friends being a big drop off from Thundurus, it is a much harder obstacle to get around this year with the terrible speed control options available. However, Conkeldurr was a World Champion as a rookie in 2011, won Japanese Nationals in 2012 and 2013, and appearing on both finalists teams in 2013 Worlds, so it should be clear that it is just one of those well-designed Pokémon that seem to be able to claw their way into any format. One way players have tried to make that happen in this format is Assault Vest, as one of Conkeldurr’s natural weaknesses is its low Special Defense, though it doesn’t have the movepool to make really great use of Assault Vest this year without access to its tutor moves.

The Pokémon available and common in this format just aren’t very advantageous for Conkeldurr. Few targets are weak enough to simply pick off with a Mach Punch, and after losing Ice Punch, Conkeldurr’s sweeping power has been greatly reduced. There are a variety of Ghost-, Flying-, and Fairy-type Pokémon in the metagame, all of which tend to be extremely difficult for Conkeldurr to remove. While it has a typing advantage against the most powerful Pokémon in the format, Kangaskhan, Conkeldurr’s ability to actually exploit that with Fighting not resisting Normal tends to be a little bit more limited. It really only takes one strong neutral special attack to get Conkeldurr low enough that Kangaskhan can finish it off with Return. So many Intimidate users in the metagame have further created problems for Conkeldurr, though it does have the advantage of having the option to use Guts to mitigate Will-O-Wisp. Conkeldurr brings a lot of power, but finding space to use it in this format is pretty challenging.

Key Moves: Mach Punch, Drain Punch, Rock Slide, Detect, Payback, Poison Jab, Earthquake, Wide Guard

Typical Builds: While Iron Fist was the stronger ability with Ice Punch available, most Conkeldurr have gone back to Guts with Conkeldurr’s newly gimped movepool. The Kalos native rule forces Conkeldurr to resort to Mach Punch, Drain Punch, Rock Slide, and Detect or Wide Guard except on Assault Vest sets, which must resort to Payback or Poison Jab in the final slot. About 3/4 of Conkeldurr are Adamant, with almost all of the remaining being Brave and likely appearing on Trick Room teams, which makes sense given how much higher Conkeldurr’s base Attack is than its other stats. Conkeldurr’s most common item is the sketchy Flame Orb, which spends its item slot to get the power from the Guts boost as opposed to trying to switch in to Will-O-Wisp and using an item that won’t slowly knock Conkeldurr out. Assault Vest is the second most common and best choice, with a variety of mostly unplayed options after that. Conkeldurr gets very little value from investing in Speed, so players can either focus on targeting both its HP and Special Defense or just cranking up and further increasing its fantastic Attack. Given all the Flame Orbs, I feel comfortable assuming most players have been doing the latter…

Staraptor

Base stats: 85 HP / 120 Atk / 70 Def / 50 SAtk / 60 SDef / 100 Spd

Typing: Normal/Flying

Somehow the second relevant route 1 bird in this format, Staraptor is one of the game’s better designed competitive Pokémon. While certainly not a Pokémon anyone would accuse of being overpowered — perhaps it is a touch underpowered — it has exactly the tools it needs to in order to fit a small niche it performs better than any other Pokémon and nothing more. Staraptor gets to be competitively relevant almost exclusively because of Final Gambit and its Speed and HP stats, which allow it to assassinate targets with lower or equal max HP to it as long as it doesn’t take damage first by attacking into a Protect or being hit by a priority move. Staraptor has some other useful moves like Brave Bird, Close Combat, and U-turn, which do decent chunks of damage even from an uninvested base 120 Attack. Intimidate also helps Staraptor provide some utility in games it can’t get the Final Gambit off, though it is certainly a weaker option than other Intimidate Pokémon when Final Gambit is taken out of the equation.

Staraptor is an extremely high risk, high reward Pokémon. If it takes a Pokémon out that is more valuable than it is with Final Gambit, it can be game winning. Even just trading 1-for-1 with a Pokémon of equal value can be a big deal for teams that can exploit playing 3v3 instead of 4v4. However, even a slight misplay with Staraptor can prevent it from taking a KO as it goes down, which can easily be game losing. Priority, Protect, and Ghost-types switching in are Staraptor’s bane, but it can make huge plays when it predicts correctly for such a humble-looking Pokémon.

Key Moves: Brave Bird, Close Combat, U-turn, Final Gambit, Double Edge

Typical Builds: The stats are infected with some garbage, so I’m going to be blunt with this one: you shouldn’t care that only 65% of Staraptor used Choice Scarf and only 43.3% of Staraptor used Final Gambit. The viable competitive Staraptor set has Choice Scarf, Final Gambit, 252 HP, and then the player has some decisions to make regarding whether they value a little more power when Staraptor isn’t Final Gambiting or more Speed to creep against other Choice Scarf users like Salamence. U-turn is pretty important and Brave Bird is Staraptor’s offensive fallback without Final Gambit, but the other attacks are a bit of a toss-up in the final slot since they don’t tend to get used very much.

Gourgeist

Base stats: 85 HP / 100 Atk / 122 Def / 58 SAtk / 75 SDef / 54 Spd (Super-sized for optimal stats)

65 HP / 90 Atk / 122 Def / 58 SAtk / 75 SDef / 84 Spd (Medium-sized for Insomnia)

Typing: Grass/Ghost

While it hasn’t seen much recent use Gourgeist is certainly viable enough to be worth a mention here. It typically functions as an extremely physically bulky supportive Pokémon in its Super size forme, with access to moves like Will-O-Wisp, Leech Seed, Trick Room, and Safeguard to support its teammates and the scouting ability Frisk. While the Medium size is a lot less viable, it is the only forme that has access to Insomnia, an Ability that slows down Smeargle at the expense of not doing much else, since Gourgeist was already immune to Spore and Sleep Powder as a Grass-type Pokémon to begin with. Gourgeist is like a version of Ferrothorn with less direct offense but higher utility, as it is capable of winning games on its own by stalling out primarily physical targets with the combination of Leech Seed, Will-O-Wisp, and sometimes Phantom Force.

Due to problems with Taunt and some common Pokémon like Tyranitar, Hydreigon, Charizard,and Talonflame, Gourgeist’s usage has stayed pretty low. It remains a Pokémon worth respecting, as evidenced by it winning one Regional and taking second place in another.

Key Moves: Leech Seed, Will-O-Wisp, Phantom Force, Protect, Trick Room, Seed Bomb

Typical Builds: Gourgeist typically maximizes HP and Defense in order to stall against physical attackers as efficiently as possible, though builds focusing more on Special Defense to make it a more balanced tank have been used, with Defense-increasing natures in the former case and Special Defense-increasing natures in the latter case. Leftovers is the most intuitive item, though Sitrus and Occa Berries have also been used. Gourgeist usually needs the first three moves on this list to do its job, so Trick Room tends to replace Protect if it is used, with Seed Bomb checking in only when Gourgeist’s trainer has a particular aversion to the strange strategy of Phantom Force.

Trevenant

Base stats: 85 HP / 110 Atk / 76 Def / 65 SAtk / 82 SDef / 56 Spd

Typing: Grass/Ghost

Featuring a much better ability than Gourgeist but much less optimal stats, the other Grass/Ghost Pokémon, Trevenant, is starting to become a little less obscure than Gourgeist, partially thanks to Lajo’s German Nationals team. It actually has a pretty respectable amount of usage now, though I think it is debatable whether or not it is actually better than Gourgeist. Trevanant’s ability to hold out defensively comes down to hitting rolls with Harvest a lot more than any natural bulk it has, which leads to it being a little riskier than Gourgeist with higher potential reward. Using Harvest, it can recycle Sitrus Berries, allowing it to stall very effectively with Will-O-Wisp and Leech Seed as long as it doesn’t hit a cold streak of Sitrus Berry not respawning.

Trevenant functions very similarly to Gourgiest, so it has similar weaknesses, which are again to Taunt, Tyranitar, Hydreigon, Charizard, and Talonflame, among some others. The difference is that Trevenant trades being able to take less burst damage for having more sustained healing… as long as Harvest decides to work.

Key Moves: Will-O-Wisp, Protect, Horn Leech, Leech Seed, Trick Room, Shadow Claw, Wood Hammer, Phantom Force

Typical Builds: Harvest and Sitrus Berry are mandatory for Trevenant to be Trevenant. Careful and Impish are Trevenant’s most popular natures depending on which defense its trainer wants to prioritize, though unlike Gourgeist it doesn’t have such a large disparity between the two stats naturally. HP tends to be brought near maximum first, with the remaining EVs again going into Special Defense and Defense depending on player preference. Will-O-Wisp and Leech Seed are pretty mandatory, with Protect or Trick Room fighting for the third slot and an attack taking care of the other. Unlike Gourgiest, Trevenant has a more solid competitor for Phantom Force due to the healing synergy from Horn Leech, though Shadow Claw is actually surprisingly popular to try to deal with Aegislash.

Wigglytuff

Base stats: 140 HP / 70 Atk / 45 Def / 85 SAtk / 50 SDef / 45 Spd

Typing: Normal/Fairy

Wigglytuff of all Pokémon is now a decent choice in VGC 2014 thanks to its new partial Fairy-typing and somehow being the best of a very mediocre group of Pokémon available with the new Competitive ability. While Wigglytuff is probably just keeping the spot warm until Milotic is legal, Wigglytuff plays a role for teams who want to be able to deter or exploit Intimidate without using Bisharp, as Intimidate and all other stat drops give Wigglytuff a cool two levels of Special Attack, allowing Wigglytuf to make its enemies’ health bars move a little bit.

While its Defense and Special Defense are truly awful, Wigglytuff is actually a pretty interesting tech for some teams. Defiant has very limited distribution, which is basically just Bisharp in this format. For teams looking to use a different Steel-type like Mawile or Aegislash, Wigglytuff can help support a team full of physical attackers by exploiting enemy Intimidate use. It is typically paired with Assault Vest, allowing it to at least survive a couple of attacks thanks to its amazing base HP and natural immunity to Draco Meteor, which is actually a step up on its usual upgrade Bisharp.

Wigglytuff is not worth bringing against opponents who lack Intimidate 99.9% of the time and struggles against teams full of strong physical attackers, but it is a viable roleplayer to help out teams that need its unique traits.

Key Moves: Dazzling Gleam, Fire Blast, Thunderbolt, Hyper Beam, Hyper Voice, Ice Beam

Typical Builds: Wigglytuff needs quite a large amount of Special Attack investment and a Modest nature to actually do damage at +0 and to get OHKOs at +2, which spreads it a little thin. Increasing Special Defense would definitely improve the value of Assault Vest, but not increasing Defense makes Wigglytuff extremely easy to knock out with physical attacks in spite of its excellent HP, so players have to make a tough value decision that normally ends up with EVs in Defense. Assault Vest is basically mandatory for Wigglytuff to at least be able to take one type of attack, so four attacks must be selected, with the first four listed above being the most common by far.

About the Author

Scott started playing VGC in 2011. He finished 17th at US Nationals, then lost in the final round of 2011 Worlds LCQ. He finished 10th in the 2012 World Championships and qualified for Worlds again in 2013 after going into US Nationals second in CP. Instead of playing, he commentated at US Nationals and the World Championships in 2013 and 2014. Follow him on Twitter @NBNostrom!

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