CBU
Banned deucer.
pdt's contributionn are in red
Usually these days I restrain myself from doing RMTs. Most probably because I’ve come to terms with the fact that when it comes down to building my train of thought bounces between difficult to explain and non existent. That’s why I decided to present a team I made, not only from my point of view, but also from pdt’s, who had a good amount of success using it.
To be honest when CBU first passed me this team in the middle of the 3rd week of the ULT cycle, I was pretty skeptical at first glance. I saw a pretty huge Breloom weakness, a weird Primarina set, and a substandard Terrakion set with the techs in Fightinium Z and Toxic. However, while it is weak to many things on paper, in practice it completely transforms. The momentum and pressure that is able to be generated by every single Pokemon on the team, couple with the longevity of Scizor and Primarina as a psuedo-backbone on an offensive team flowed ridiculously well for such a random team. Even with no real Scizor check besides our own Scizor and M-Manectric to revenge, It still was able to function insanely well on ladder, able to apply pressure between the breakers and the momentum generators. Balance, which was running rampant with the Empoleon / Hippowdon / Latias / M-Aerodactyl cores at the time, and Z-Fight Terrakion worked exactly how CBU intended it to, nuking Hippo and allowing M-Mane to go rampant. Choice picks like Nidoking as a ground type also murdered this type of Balance through just a couple Ice Beam predicts. I started to play this team, but learning the specific function of some Pokemon that have been seemingly over role compressed was tough to figure out. I started to play around 1500 flat in ULT Cycle 4 , and I maybe lost 3-4 games until I peaked at 1763 at #4 on the ladder, qualifying for ULT. Along with that I was able to get multiple accounts up into low-mid 1700s, consistently winning games against higher level players. To go a little more in depth into the match-ups for this team, against Offense is one of the better match-ups. While it can struggle with VoltTurn because of Nidoking as a shaky Electric Immunity, it also has very good speed control in M-Manectric, Scarf Hydreigon, and Scizor w/ priority. Scizor and Primarina act as fantastic sponges, able to check opposing threats long enough to tear holes in the opponents team. Bulky Scizor is also a fantastic win condition against offense, because it is much harder to revenge than Offensive or even Band variants. Bulky Offense is obviously a bit tougher but both Terrakion and Nidoking are able to come in and cripple things / get kills against most variants of BO, while Manectric has a very fun time being able to pivot around once the Ground is significantly weakened / lured. Fat Ground usually also give Scizor a hard time, so the continued pressure of both Manectric and Scizor is really able to punch holes in the opponent's team. Balance is easily the best match-up for this team, because not only does it usually not have the tools to quickly dismantle the backbone of this team but also Terrakion and Nidoking absolutely smash it, even the Bronzong / Sylveon / fat Ground balances that have seen a bit of popularity recently are extremely threatened by Terrakion and many teams will just straight up lose after losing their Ground type. Stall is also a fantastic match-up for this team, but Terrakion will lose or win you the game in this scenario. If they know the team, you've pretty much lost because it becomes extremely hard to kill Quagsire or Alomomola with Terrakion and open up the way for Scizor. At +2 Z-Fight kills the standard Alo variant, and regular Close Combat into Z-Fight will pick up the KO on Quagsire. Certain stall teams are also very threatened by Nidoking, especially the popular Hikari stall, where Nidoking pressures both of the Defoggers and allows easy doubles on Blissey into Terrakion which can easily pressure both M-Altaria and Moltres.
Team Overview
In Depth Building Analysis
i was yours (Manectric-Mega) @ Manectite
Ability: Lightning Rod
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Flamethrower
The basic idea behind this team was to make mega manectric work in this meta. Mane is probably the weirdest pokemon in this tier. On paper it tears down entire teams, either by spamming its great movepool(typewise) or by clicking volt switch to gain momentum on fatter mons that it cannot 2hko. All that until it runs on a bulky ground type, that isn’t weak to its hp of choice x4. Until that goes down, mane is borderline useless.Hence, a lure is needed. A pokemon that will keep in the ground type by force and either ohko it or damage it to the point where mane can bypass it and go ballistic on the opposing team.In Depth Building Analysis
i was yours (Manectric-Mega) @ Manectite
Ability: Lightning Rod
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Flamethrower
bring you tears (Terrakion) @ Fightinium Z
Ability: Justified
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Stone Edge
- Close Combat
- Toxic
i hate you (Hydreigon) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Draco Meteor
- U-turn
- Dark Pulse
- Defog
With the initial core of mega mane+terrak, what was needed asap was a ground resistance/immunity. Given the fact that terrakion can act as a breaker in certain matchups, I thought it would be a good idea to form a volt-turn core around it. Hydreigon is a mon that can play that part as good as any other in the tier, by simultaneously providing volt-turn capabilities, ground immunity, speed and hazard control. At the same time its natural resistance to prevalent types like water and grass provides some added defensive synergy to the team.
forever yours (Nidoking) @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Earth Power
- Ice Beam
- Sludge Wave
Next thing in line was hazards of my own plus a fairy killer. I chose nidoking, which honestly is my go-to pick for such roles. Excellent coverage, hard hitter and notorious balance breaker, being able to switch into every fairy attack
heal wounds on me (Primarina) @ Leftovers
Ability: Torrent
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD / 4 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Moonblast
- Scald
- Rest
- Sleep Talk
shame on you baby (Scizor) @ Leftovers
Ability: Technician
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- U-turn
- Roost
- Bullet Punch
Using this team actually forced me to become better as a player, it really relied on identifying win conditions and keeping certain Pokemon healthy/alive to win games. It also gave the really underrated fat Primarina set a lot more exposure as a viable set, able to win games by itself by just sitting there and spamming its STABs. All in all this team was a stroke of genius by CBU and using it has really guided me to better teambuilding and playing.
Threat List
LOL it is a CBU team, just put the entire tier in
Why? Well, especially the life orb set is capable to sweep this team with relative ease if it is given the opportunity to set up a swords dance.
How do I beat it? That depends 100% on the set. Under every circumstance, nidoking will survive a mach punch even at +4 and revenge kill. Having said that, you cannot switch nidoking hard in because there is always teh chance a bullet seed is coming. First order of business is sacing the most useless mon to a potential spore. Every mon on this team is capable of doing huge amounts of damage to breloom so it wont settup 2 sds no matter what. If you get spored, you hard scizor and u-turn into nidoking. If it hard attacks and you die, nidoking is free and breloom is either dead or forced out.
Why? Yes it is garbage, yes it belongs in RU, yes I never prep for it and it 6-0s me. Aside from personal bias,however, DD Cobalion is a huge threat to this team especially if it packing the z-iron head for primarina.
How do I beat it? You do not allow both SD and RP to go up. AT ALL COST. if sd is up u have mane to kill or force it out, if rp goes up primarina hard walls and can scald/moonblast for huge amounts of damage. The go-to response should be primarina either way, which means it is vital to keep it healthy.
Why: Its ability to spam volt switch and chip down the team at will is only partially stopped by an electric immunity that switches in from 0 to 1 times.
How do I beat it? There is no clear cut way to do so. To damage manectric you need to force it to not switch out. what that means is that u need to put in a position to click its coverage and go hard hydreigon to chew a hit. At that point the opponent is a difficult situation bc if you u-turn, which you should, they lose momentum and potentially a mon to your breakers and if they stay in manectric gets destroyed by a dark pulse. That, coupled with rocks chip, safely bringing in nidoking and eventually scizor's bullet punch should be enough. Not the best obviously, but offense as an archetype gets run over by manectric anyway.
Why? Offense does not have a way to deal with ghost+poison+fighting coverage with one mon.
How do I beat it? It is vital to not lose momentum against gengar teams. you cannot switch into it, but neither can gengar switch into you. Outside of scarf, it gets forced out by hydreigon and manectric and with rocks it is very easy to bring it into scizor's bullet punch range. Just try to allow it minimal switchins.
Proof of ladder: https://gyazo.com/9eaa07c5ec8b348c9644128620ac4665
Importable: http://pokepast.es/e2d06356070f77c4
Replays:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7uu-750022960 (vs pif stall)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7uu-742959178 (vs fat+ mane)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7uu-749865224 (vs manectric food, outside of fat ground)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen7uu-372157 (vs the GOAT)
S/O:
- My friends over at #theyneverlisten.Youthberry, Low Ladder Heroes, BlubirD, Finding True Love, Renny, Lord Iroh, BRS, Island Spices, Sun, Sparrow, Zben. As much I wanted to quit this game, I could not find it in me to quit you. I love you all so much and you are very special to me, despite all the bullshit I put you through daily. You all are the only thing in this community worth spending time on.
- People I haven't been talking to lately because of my decision to distance myself from the community. Itsjustdrew, Euphonos, SilvioGuacamole and others I probably forget. Try making a change in this community and don't let it change you instead.
- My internet son PDT for helping my lazy ass do this RMT. You are amazing!
- The dude that made this fire artwork, which probably will be found in art museums all over the world in a few weeks.
- you guys have gotten me through some stressful times irl, love you all:
- vivalospride Juuno Miraklez altariaoffense chloe kris mengy nui rekeri sageofthe6 yeezyknows stihiihuio gl volkner eyan cloudynatu and everyone else in secret rooms :)
- shoutout to lobby staff y'all are goats
- theyneverlisten
- Finally, to anybody that wasted enough of your time to read this, thanks for your time and I really hope you will enjoy both using and reading about this team.
