Reports

Published on May 22nd, 2013 | by lucariojr

8

The Prince and the Politoed: Regional 10th Place and April International Team Analysis

Hello everyone, my name is Joseph Brummett, perhaps better known as lucariojr. I started battling competitively in ’09 when I got into top cut by sheer luck (because of the lottery and quality of my opponents; I remember one using Skill Swap+Regigigas) before losing to OmegaDonut. This event inspired me to build better teams and improved myself as a player. I didn’t take another top cut until Nationals 2012 where I lost to ryuzaki. So here we are today, and I choked out of another top cut in my round 8 match versus Dim by deviating from my game plan. Despite being a terrible Pokémon trainer, I think this team is the best thing I’ve used in a long time and fits in perfectly with my play-style: a semi-Trick Room team capable of turning on its heels and coming at the opponent from a completely different angle.

I can’t take all the credit for building this team, though. Lamitite11 helped me teambuild a little and was especially helpful by testing all the changes and offering his input. Of course I tested as well, but he tested on Pokémon Showdown, which I tend to avoid because I find myself playing differently there.  He used it later in the 2013 April International Challenge and finished in the top 50, barely bubbling out of top 16, with it while I got disqualified for having too many disconnects. I’m pleased to note that this team doesn’t just work for me and brought success to someone else.

I know it may sound cheesy, but I’d like to thank all of Team Magma for being nice to me and offering their opinions on crazy stuff that I theorymon. They’re a great bunch of people and great battlers too, so definitely check them out if you haven’t already.

The Team

Politoed (RANA) @ Choice Specs
Drizzle, Modest
252 HP / 176 SpA / 76 SpD / 4 Spe
– Hydro Pump
– Ice Beam
– Hidden Power Grass
– Scald

I don’t think I need to explain why Politoed is on a RainRoom team. What I probably do need to explain however, is Choice Specs. Why Specs instead of Water Gem? The answer is simple: Choice Specs allows for multiple incredibly powerful Hydro Pumps that often 3HKOs or 2HKOs Cresselia and OHKOs pretty much anything less bulky than that in rain, provided I’m hitting at least neutrally. In fact, I’ve been relying more on Politoed for my firepower than Kingdra or even Thundurus-T just because of how powerful its Hydro Pumps are. The coverage moves are there for obvious things and of course hit hard if they’re dealing Super Effective damage, but often fall short on KOing anything bulkier than 4 HP Tornadus or Thundurus-T. I used to have Focus Blast in the last slot for Ferrothorn, but after I got PP stalled out of it twice because it missed every other turn, Scald quickly took its place. I’d say I miss having the coverage (pun intended), but Scald has proven to be very handy cleaning up weakened Tyranitar and other slowpokes without having to worry.

The EVs were lifted from Mrbopper’s team, but the idea for Choice Specs was mostly influenced by Dubulous’s use of Politoed in Trick Room. At first, I had a slightly different EV spread with 4 Defense instead of 4 Speed and a Politoed with 27 Speed IVs to underspeed Metagross and other Politoed, but Lamitie and I quickly remembered that this is only a partial Trick Room team, and thus the 4 Speed and 31 Speed IVs were more useful for outspeeding and OHKOing Metagross and the occasional Hitmontop that run 252 HP spreads.

Kingdra (Shiihorse) @ Lum Berry/Dragon Gem
Swift Swim, Modest
108 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpA / 144 Spe
– Draco Meteor
– Muddy Water
– Substitute
– Protect

Politoed+Kingdra is pretty overdone, but I don’t think you need me to tell you that, or give you reasons why Kingdra+Politoed works; just go read Bopper’s or Biosci’s team analyses, because I’d just be parroting what they already wrote. I’d go as far as to say a rain team isn’t complete without Kingdra, and when I see Politoed without a Kingdra (or without Trick Room support), I tend to underestimate my opponent. It’s that common. However, I will elaborate on my choices for this Kingdra, named after the very cute Smogon Wi-Fi mod, Shii.

One thing I hated to do in Kingdra vs. Kingdra was gamble on the Speed tie and trust my opponent wasn’t running Timid (or Jolly Outrage… yeah I don’t know either), and more often than not, better players would attempt to Icy Wind or paralyze my Kingdra to avoid the Speed tie. I also got tired of being OHKO’d by Hitmontop’s Close Combat, so naturally this led me to make Shii fatter. This new and improved EV spread allowed her to live Close Combat about 70% of the time, as well as allowing her to live hits that I’m sure she wouldn’t have been able to otherwise and outspeed max Speed Modest Ludicolo. Obviously a more defensive spread called for a more defensive item because Life Orb’s recoil would kind of cancel out any advantage I had using my new bulky spread. For the longest time, I used Lum Berry since I heard nothing but good things from Zach and a few others about it saving them from paralysis, but after the Georgia regional I realized it didn’t come in handy for me all that often. Dragon Gem provided the boost I solely missed while allowing me to retain my relative bulk. I don’t find myself using Draco Meteor more than once per battle anyway, bar keeping Kingdra in for chip damage when it outlives its usefulness.

Thundurus-T (Hotwire) @ Life Orb
Volt Absorb, Timid
6 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
– Thunderbolt
– Hidden Power Ice
– Grass Knot
– Protect

Thundurus-T wasn’t my first option. I first considered Zapdos to spam Thunders as well as keep rain up with Rain Dance, but then I realized the usefulness of Volt Absorb. With it, I can play Thundurus-T defensively despite minimal defensive investment as it resists key moves such as Thunderbolt and Acrobatics that my team has trouble with otherwise. Of course, I do have trouble keeping it healthy like this, especially with Life Orb recoil, but access to Protect (something Choice variants lack) mitigates this somewhat and Hotwire can usually last until endgame provided I don’t get surprised by Scarfed Pokemon with Rock Slide or Stone Edge like Scarf Bisharp which is apparently a thing on GBU.

I chose Timid over Modest because of other Thundurus-T. Modest is the most common nature and some people use 30 speed IV spreads for Hidden Power. Granted, my Hidden Power Ice only OHKO’s about 25% of the time, but that leaves the enemy Thundurus in kill range for Feint, Muddy Water and sometimes Giga Drain. I would like to use Modest since it would improve Thundurus’s performance in Trick Room, give me a better chance of OHKOing Tyranitar with Grass Knot in rain, and I’m sure there’s some KO’s I’m missing out on with Thunderbolt. However Timid has been far too useful in Thundurus versus Thundurus matches.

I had trouble with my third move, believe it or not. I tried Thunder, Volt Switch, Dark Pulse, Flash Cannon, Taunt and some other stuff, but eventually settled on Grass Knot. In fact, I accidentally went in to regionals with Thunder AND Thunderbolt even after I realized how dumb having two electric attacks on the same ‘mon was, but once again I found myself hardly ever using the third slot. I’m still reconsidering the third slot since I hardly ever use Grass Knot, but it has been useful when Thundurus gets left alone with Gastrodon. The other two major candidates for the third slot were Dark Pulse and Taunt. Taunt was extremely useful in stopping Amoonguss, Cresselia, Chansey and Liepard since Therian Thundurus rarely carries it; though in Cresselia’s case I usually just got Ice Beamed. Dark Pulse doesn’t really hit anything special except for Shedinja, which I’ll assume you notice I have nothing to hit it with. Luckily for me, and I’m sure for other Rain users, Shedinja is an incredibly rare sight nowadays with the omnipresent Tyranitar.

Amoonguss (OGLETHORPE) @ Leftovers
Regenerator, Sassy
212 HP / 108 Def / 190 SpD
– Spore
– Rage Powder
– Giga Drain
– Protect

I’m sure you’re all well acquainted with Amoonguss for better or worse. I chose Amoonguss for one reason really: Trick Room support. Without some kind of support, my full Trick Room mode would quickly fall apart because Gallade can’t bear to take more than two special attacks or more than one physical. Under Trick Room, it becomes a huge threat, outspeeding everything and Sporing it before it can even move, and sometimes Gallade helps it out with Feint to put something important to sleep. Sometimes I don’t even have to use Rage Powder; a lot of people instantly go into AMOONGUSS SMITE MODE and unload all their heavy artillery like Psychic Gem Zen Headbutt, Draco Meteors, Specs Hidden Power Flying and Fire Punch… right into a Protect. Obviously, I have to be careful with this because some people have the gumption to double target Gallade just in case I don’t Protect with Gallade and don’t use Rage Powder. Rage Powder also makes Ferrothorn useless as long as it doesn’t have Iron Head and/or Thunder Wave since Power Whip is doubly resisted and Amoonguss is immune to Leech Seed. Giga Drain is also surprisingly helpful for chip damage as it can break opposing Kingdra’s Substitutes, KO weakened Thundurus-T and some Thundurus-I, and of course it 2HKO’s Gastrodon and is my main check for it — though the rest of my team is capable of handling it.

The EV spread was lifted from Biosci’s team in the middle of the night when I was sure he was asleep. Luckily, he hasn’t noticed that this ingenious spread that can live Metagross’s Zen Headbutt and Latios’s Psychic has been missing, so I’ve been free to sully it with my presence. I used Black Sludge for a while, but I realized that I absolutely despise Sableye and Trick Rotom-W, so I didn’t want to give them any ideas about messing with the rest of my team’s items, especially Politoed’s Specs, so I switched to Leftovers, which does the same thing, except with a longer healing animation. Sitrus Berry and Mental Herb are also some items I like to use from time to time. Sitrus Berry is faster than Leftovers, which helps me sponge hits better with Rage Powder and Mental Herb is great for Taunt Thundurus-I since it’s hilarious to Spore them after they Taunt me. However, Leftovers is the most useful because Amoonguss is usually OHKO’d or OHKO’d after chip damage if it’s KO’d at all, so Leftovers+Regenerator help me avoid the latter scenario.

Escavalier (T.R.Knight) @ Bug Gem
Swarm, Brave
– 252 HP / 132 Atk / 124 SpD
– Megahorn
– Iron Head
– Substitute
– Protect

If you play on rated GBU, Escavalier isn’t exactly uncommon. The main reasons the Japanese use Escavalier are that it’s very bulky and OHKO’s Cresselia with Megahorn — I think you know how great that is considering stuff like Dark Gem Tyranitar and Helping Hand-boosted Bug Gem Bug Buzz from Volcarona fail at doing that. Its bulk is one of the main reason I chose it. I wanted a Steel-type that could take Draco Meteors and actually stand up to Thunderbolts and rain-weakened Flamethrowers while still packing a punch under Trick Room. Scizor was my first option, but it fell too quickly to Rotom, couldn’t take Gem-boosted Draco Meteors, and its Bug Bite was too weak.

The EVs are of Lamitie11’s design. They allow Escavalier to survive any Fire attack less powerful than Life Orb Hydreigon’s Flamethrower in rain, and tank a lot more special hits while still being able to OHKO Gastrodon and Cresselia with Bug Gem Megahorn. Thanks to its bulk, Escavalier doesn’t need Trick Room to be effective since it can switch in, take a few hits and KO something with Megahorn — especially when Swarm activates in the process, in which case it even OHKOs things like bulky Thundurus-I. It punishes opposing Trick Room teams by outspeeding most if not all of their Pokémon under its effects bar speed tying with Ferrothorn and losing out on Level 1 Aron. Substitute is key to Escavalier’s success, bringing itself down to Swarm range safely or just taking advantage of a double Protect when Gallade isn’t out — which gives me the opportunity to fire off more Megahorns even when Trick Room ends. I tried Swords Dance for a few battles, but it definitely wasn’t as effective as Swords Dance Scizor because once Trick Room ended it was often a sitting duck, especially if it took damage, along with being more vulnerable to burns from Sableye and some Rotom.

Gallade (Rodrick) @ Focus Sash
Justified, Adamant
252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
– Close Combat
– Zen Headbutt
– Trick Room
– Feint

I knew I wanted a Trick Room Pokémon that would actually deal damage and not just spam support moves (Cresselia), so my first choice was Reuniclus. The problem quickly became 1) Reuniclus can’t take a hit, especially from Tyranitar, 2) Reuniclus pretty much needed Life Orb to deal desirable damage, and 3) it relied on Focus Blast or a weak, non-STAB Energy Ball for coverage. If I used Energy Ball, it was walled by Ferrothorn, and I needed to be able to handle it, so I started using Focus Blast, but obviously 70% accuracy with no way to boost that is not going to cut it. Just when I was digging at the bottom of the barrel and seriously considering Flame Orb+Trick, I discovered Gallade while browsing a list of Pokémon that can learn Trick Room. Gallade did everything I could only dream of Reuniclus doing, except for being vulnerable to Intimidate and being faster, but even that was a blessing in disguise because it meant I could use it outside of Trick Room. It dented Ferrothorn, Amoonguss, Hitmontop after Intimidate, OHKO’d Chople Tyranitar (!) and just did a lot of damage to everything whenever it was on the field. I ended up changing very little about this Gallade, besides changing Fighting Gem to Focus Sash to help set up Trick Room more reliably, tinkering with the EV spread, and toying with the fourth move with moves like Shadow Sneak, Disable, Ice Punch, Magic Coat and Destiny Bond before settling on Feint.

Adamant with no investment in Speed allowed me to outspeed the multitude of Pokemon hitting 106 – 107 Speed to outspeed Cresselia and occasionally bluff having Brave with 0 IVs which was useful against some Tyranitar that would actually do me a favor and stall out Trick Room so I could outspeed and OHKO. Other EV spreads I’ve tested were mostly like 204 HP / 252 Atk / 52 Speed, hitting 107 Speed, outspeeding neutral 0 Speed Rotom-W, which was occasionally useful, but I found I preferred simply outspeeding Rotom under Trick Room because a lot of my checks to it are slower as well. I think I might’ve tried a bulkier set with Drain Punch, but that flopped because Gallade isn’t all that bulky physically and it generally just played like a poor man’s Scrafty. Justified was chosen over Steadfast because I don’t want a speed boost obviously, but I had high hopes of getting some Attack boosts off stuff like Tyranitar and Hydreigon. Unfortunately, I haven’t gotten a single one yet because they’re all much more interested in using Draco Meteor or Rock Slide (though this may be a good thing because Tyranitar’s Crunch does 73% to poor Gallade).

<Lamitie11> o/
<lucariojr> \o
<CDXCIV> Lamitie11 o/\o lucariojr
<CDXCIV> http://i.imgur.com/B219e.jpg

Teammates!

Politoed + Kingdra

This is basically only used for winning matches quickly against the kind people who use their in-game team or people who flat-out don’t prepare for Kingdra/Politoed. If I do use Kingdra/Politoed against someone who knows what’s up, it’s to give the impression that I’m just another beginner running around with a Rain team and lure out Pokémon like Gastrodon for a free knockout. My version of the combo isn’t as powerful as the regular copy since I lack a Helping Hand + Dragon Gem boosted Draco Meteor to destroy my opponents with, but playing offensively with Politoed and defensively with Kingdra is sometimes enough to throw my opponent off.

Amoonguss + Gallade

This is a standard way to set up Trick Room, but isn’t all that obvious on a team with Politoed and Kingdra. Amoonguss keeps Gallade from taking more than one hit (spread special attacks like Blizzard usually don’t 2HKO Gallade anyway) and once Trick Room is up it sets to work Sporing everything while Gallade knocks heads with its STAB moves. Amoonguss can also switch out to activate Regenerator and allow Escavalier and Politoed to fire powerful attacks. Protecting doesn’t help the opponent either because of Feint, allowing me to maximize my damage output in the four turns of Trick Room.

Thundurus + Gallade

This is my other big bruiser combo that aims to just spam powerful attacks and grab surprise KO’s with Feint. With Thundurus’ relative frailty and status as a powerful legendary Pokémon that absolutely must die, I can set up Trick Room when I think its time is up and continue my roll with either Politoed or Escavalier. Shifting gears mid-game can be a huge advantage for me when everything falls into place, and it’s allowed me to pull out of some tough scrapes (see: my match with NidoRich). It can be pretty tough to do this sometimes if Gallade is targeted instead of Thundurus, but otherwise it pulls the rug from under the opponent and I win by quickly nabbing one KO after another while the opponent’s anti-Trick Room Pokémon (and by this I mean Trick Room Cresselia) are OHKO’d by Escavalier.

Threats:

Shedinja

You might’ve noticed by now, but I have nothing to hit Shedinja with. It was actually the deciding factor on choosing Leftovers on Amoonguss so I could possibly timer stall it out, which is far from desirable. However, I don’t have much choice besides switching Substitute for Toxic on Kingdra (which may not be a terrible idea, actually) or Dark Pulse over Grass Knot on Thundurus. I’m kind of surprised I haven’t seen any yet, but I suppose it’s justified because every team nowadays has something to hit it with. If you ask me though, Shedinja is one of the best anti-rain Pokemon you can find.

Sableye

Sableye is really only a threat if I leave it to its own designs. Kingdra’s Draco Meteor can OHKO Sableye at about the same rate as Focus Blast hits, Politoed and Thundurus’ Scald/Thunderbolt can 2HKO, but the rest of the team absolutely despises it. If Sableye makes it out of turn 3 without at least taking a beating, the game tilts painfully in my opponent’s favor unless Escavalier can keep its Substitute up. Luckily it’s almost exclusively used as a lead, so dealing with it is usually not that big of a deal.

Thundurus

On paper this team looks Thundurus weak, but I’m amending my threat list with this before finalizing the conclusion because I just remembered it. Thundurus is a lot like Sableye in that I prioritize it pretty heavily. Unlike Sableye however, it lacks the element of surprise because Incarnate Thundurus are usually bulky, don’t carry Protect, can’t deal enough damage and paralysis can be used to my advantage with Volt Absorb and Trick Room while Therian Thundurus are very short-lived since most of them don’t carry Protect either and lack the bulk to withstand Draco Meteor, Hidden Power and other stuff.

Ninetales

I don’t think I’ve said this yet, but Rain is mainly used to cover my Pokemon’s Fire weaknesses. In fact, for a Rain team, I’m pretty vulnerable to Fire-types — Chandelure in particular. With this in mind, it should be obvious how Drought Ninetales is a huge threat; it takes away my Fire neutrality, makes my Water moves useless (which is my main method of dealing with Fire-types) and makes me play predictably when Ninetales comes out with my Politoed active. My Trick Room mode fares fairly well here though, and it gives me an opportunity to use Kingdra in Trick Room to fire off superpowered Draco Meteors while at the same time having Politoed in my lineup. Feint helps here especially to help pick off Ninetales, which makes the match that much easier. That said though, a well-played Ninetales and a team to compliment that is an absolute nightmare for me to face.

Ferrothorn, Gastrodon and Ludicolo

These three are what most teams use just to check Rain — the exception being Ludicolo — though it’s not used in rain as often as it once was. Ferrothorn is perhaps the most troublesome of the three because half of my team can’t do anything to it besides pray for a Scald burn, but the other half checks it nicely with Megahorn and Close Combat denting or KOing it under Rage Powder support. Ice Beam Ludicolo is the most dangerous set for me, but in general Ludicolo lacks the power to become a real nuisance. Gastrodon is problematic if, and only if, I try to go into autopilot mode or forget to look over Team Preview. Otherwise, a Gastrodon on team preview means that the person is GOING to use it, which makes my job a little easier because everything on my team can handle Gastrodon bar consecutive Scald burns. If I don’t see it in the leads, I can assume that it’s going to switch in first turn if I have Politoed and/or Kingdra out.

Manual Sun

Manual sun is used like the three Pokemon I just mentioned: just to check Rain. The problem with a lot of manual sun Pokémon is that the rest of the team usually doesn’t take advantage of Sunny Day. Another problem with manual sun is that most of the Pokemon using Sunny Day are Pokemon like Cresselia and Sableye that don’t use Protect, allowing me to successfully gang up on them, switch out Politoed, and continue on my merry way. When used sparingly however, it can be pretty devastating, especially if they have a Chandelure to take advantage of Sun.

Chandelure

I’ve mentioned it a couple of times, but let me just say that I’m actually pretty scared of Chandelure. Half of my team is weak to its STAB moves, it can reverse or prevent Trick Room from going up and Trick Chandelure (and to a lesser extent Flame Body Chandelure) instantly cripples half of my team, so it can be a threat even in rain. Politoed and Kingdra do a pretty good job of getting rid of it and Thundurus can at least mortally wound it, but people who bring Chandelure against a rain team can play around them or force me to make some hard decisions. On top of all this, Chandelure is one of my favorite Pokemon, so that makes it all the more difficult to hurt it.

Rotom-W

Rotom-W falls in the same category as Thundurus since they’re both decently bulky and have moves that can wreck my team like Electric Gem Thunderbolt and rain-boosted Hydro Pump but fails to do so unless I leave it to its own designs. The main thing that sets it apart from Thundurus is that it’s more likely to have Protect and Escavalier and Amoonguss can deal with it more easily than they can Thundurus.

Georgia Regional

I’m pretty proud of my performance in this regional, sans the first and last matches. I actually ate and got a good night’s sleep, unlike a lot of my regionals where I don’t feel like eating and only get 3 or so hours of actual sleep. I did pretty well with my predictions and thinking things through except for the last match which was truly embarrassing.

Probably the best battle of the day was against Shiloh. She leads with Mesprit and Rotom-H while I lead with Amoonguss and Gallade in preparation of full Trick Room mode with Politoed and Escavalier in the back. Rotom Overheats Gallade, bringing it down to about 16 HP while Amoonguss Protects against Mesprit and Gallade gets Trick Room off but dies the next turn. Escavalier gets a sub off a predicted Protect while Amoonguss Spores an incoming Garchomp and Escavalier continually misses Megahorn. Trick Room runs out and Garchomp breaks my Substitute before getting Spored again. At this point I’m getting tired of Escavalier missing Garchomp (I kind of want it dead anyway before Mesprit comes out) so I send in Politoed to get rid of Sand Veil, but when Shiloh sees Politoed, she slams her fist on the table as her Tyranitar’s Fire Punch fails to KO Escavalier before it KOs Garchomp. The next turn things wrap up as Politoed OHKOs Mesprit and Tyranitar.

Other cool things I got to do was abuse opponents’ Trick Room and walk over anti-rain Pokémon (see my match with BSTS where Trick Room comes in handy against Tailwind Latios) and all my opponents were very social except for my other loss to some guy with a Rain team. I’m pleased to say that my only other loss in the tournament was because of a Megahorn miss, but such things are beyond my control. Hopefully I can continue this trend at Nationals!

April International

This is where my worst nightmares came to life. Escavalier was complete dead weight against Japanese players; I believe I lost every match against a Japanese player when I brought Escavalier. At the very least they didn’t use Shedinja, but if you look at my threat list, pretty much every game had something on that list. They made me think and punished me for playing like an autopilot team, which in retrospect I kind of needed because I was relying heavily on Kingdra when playing online. Otherwise, Politoed and Gallade were definite MVPs because I could KO so much with Feint and superpowered Hydro Pumps. Feint also came in handy for the F.E.A.R. users, though only one of them actually finished a match with me.

I think I’ve already said this, but I got disqualified for having too many disconnects. Some of them were on my end (since apparently I can’t get good reception even when I’m sitting right next to my router), but most of them were from people who are disgusted at being beaten so readily by Politoed + Kingdra. My final score was something like 1649, and I peaked 1700 before getting a long string of bad luck, bad matchups, and disconnects. I’m not complaining though since the CP doesn’t really affect me after missing two regionals, but hopefully next year I can get serious about CP and maybe get a worlds invite or bye (a guy can dream, right?).

Lamitie11’s Thoughts on the Team

I’ve really enjoyed playing with this team and it was pretty fun to make too. I remember while building we had to come up with a way to beat Ferrothorn and some of our ideas were pretty funny and cool, ranging from Focus Miss Poltioed to Flame Orb Trick Reuniclus. I had never built a rain team before with pretty much anyone (though I had used other rain teams people had created) so it was a good learning experience to get an insight to the thought that goes into making them.

As for my thoughts on the team in general and as a whole, it’s probably one of the best teams I’ve worked on and played with in a while. It got the most usage from me during the April International Challenge, where I bubbled at 17th in the US (top 128 globally). I know lucariojr tends to like playing the Trick Room mode, but I play it a lot differently using Rain as my main mode. Politoed and Amoonguss was a favorite lead of mine. Poltioed hits really hard and Amoonguss does a nice job supporting. Kingdra and Thundurus saw a lot of usage, usually either paired with Poltioed or stored in the back to come in and clean up the mess. Speaking of Kingdra, go home you’re drunk. Muddy Water is a great move when it actually hits, but 85% accuracy is questionable. Escavalier was a man when he got used, because Megahorn hits dare I say, like a truck, but a lot of teams meant to counter Scizor aren’t safe for him. Also, the Japanese have been there and done that; so many knew how to dispose of it fairly quickly. Thundurus was a pretty big issue, at least for me, so Terrakion might have fit somewhere to remedy that, but it’s hard to say. Cresselia could be bothersome if I lost Politoed and/or Escavalier.

All in all, I think it’s a great team and it’s fun to use. It definitely gave me a lot of information for moving on. Building and playing a rain team extensively was a great experience for me because you become very familiar with what it can and can’t do. This makes playing against rain so much easier and more comfortable. It’s a little sad to see it retired but it had a great run and needs a vacation.

Conclusion

This was my first teambuild with another person. My teams usually end up goodstuff-esque or have convoluted counters or game plans that don’t work out in practice, but having another person to offer input and help test is definitely faster and more productive. Seeing as both of us were having problems with rain teams apart from the autopilot variety, the team gave us insight of how they work. At the same time I enjoyed the team because it catered to my playstyle and love for Trick Room while also using some uncommon Pokemon, which were Gallade and Escavalier who formed the bone-crushing combo that shall henceforth be known as Double Knight. In all honesty, I like the team so much that I was debating on even sharing it with you and taking it to Nationals, but I ultimately decided that using the same team for such a long time would only make me rusty. I hope you’ll try it out for yourself and perhaps be inspired to use rain in more creative ways other than just spamming powerful Helping Hand boosted water moves and Draco Meteors.

Article image created by Alex Leon for Nugget Bridge. View more of her artwork on her portfolio or Behance.

About the Author

lucariojr

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