Stuff that I used/built during the most recent mnm seasonal, just gonna go chronologically ig:
<- Click on these for pokepaste links
My everything check is Banettite Zygarde. Don't glare dark types. Alakazite puts Darkrai's speed tier above Metagrossite Kartana without dropping bulk so that's cool ig. Also you get to tech by stealing Lunala's Shadow Shield sometimes. Focus Blast + Sludge Bomb over Ice beam + Thunder is worth considering as coverage here. Not much else to say here because this is old and I haven't really used it much.
S/O
Jordy and
Chazm for making this, it's actually one of my most trusted teams in the meta right now. Toxapex is like a perfect Slowbro partner as it's one of like two good Lunala checks that don't take up the Sablenite stone, also helps with Slowbro's lack of initial power by pushing things like Terrakion into KO range. The first three mons here are fairly self-explanatory, they just help blanket check everything pretty much. Noivern as the defogger helps out to stop webs builds from destroying the team and handles SD don decently, which is a requirement on Slowbro teams. It's often important to be accurate playing with this team though, make sure you figure out when you need to use your blanket checks to do things, otherwise they'll just run through your defensive core. Also getting Slowbro and often Noivern megad is a priority so work for a good opportunity to do that. All of this is generally doable because of the sheer potential of the first three in 1v1 matchups forcing a lot of switches, so just be creative in your playing once you work out what you need to win.
Subgeo xern team. Picked Pins Kart as a partner to put some hurt on balance teams with specially defensive variants of Magearna. The rest is a fairly standard way to fill out the team, went for Ice Beam on Lunala because Luc Zyg matchup is not fun, although Focus Blast is also a good option here so the team definitely has a bit of a problem there. Main thing to note is that this team is pretty slow so things can go wrong pretty quickly if you misplay or just get a particularly tough matchup. Also through a bunch of these teams you'll see that i'm taking care to have two hazard deterrents (bounce or defoggers), ideally that would be one bouncer + one defogger that synergizes well with the bouncer, in this case it's two offensive Defoggers though, so the team can have issues if a rocks setter decides to sacrifice themselves to have rocks for a bit. This team does however have a lot of breaking power as well as a cleaner for the endgame, so make sure that you're trying to make offensive progress before your opponent gets an opening to win the game. Also try not to get smashed by Lunala lul.
Fairly generic stuff with a couple tweaks like tox mandi to maintain pressure on Arceus formes. Plume don is there to burn Mandibuzz, Lunala is there to take advantage of burned Mandibuzz. I wanted Entei for something which I now do not remember but I still remember considering a Steel type in that slot because of the weakness to Lele. Not sure whether this is quite there yet but it does at least showcase some basic meta stuff like mandi+fairyceus.
I used it, you shouldn't. Heart Swap was a tech to maybe steal boosts from Aggronite Buzzwole or Altarianite Zygarde idk lol I was bored. Heal Bell would def be a better option. Max Def Lunala is passive but can pull off some impressive calcs against the meta and frees up the Arceus slot so Rockceus becomes free.
I think pogre builds are actually in an ok spot right now, without the huge spam of offensive teams that blew right through it during its last trend. It also stands out in terms of raw breaking ability and the fact that it can soften the matchup against mons like Rock Polish Pdon on offense. Manectite Genesect is something I've already mentioned on the mnm thread, basically just a blanket physical check with pivot, which also pretty much sums up how the team works - simply pivot with Genesect a few times and hit them with powerful attacks. Fairly easy team to play with until you face a Lunala at least.
Another Geoxern team, this time with its powerful partner on offensive builds in Tapu Lele. Tapu Lele tends to draw in and consistently weaken the same prep for Xerneas (Heart Swap Mage, Aggro Mew, Ndm, etc). Normally these builds run into an obstacle where there's too much to cover with the remaining slots since there's a lot of defensive redundancy with the first two, especially against the various mons that threaten offense. This can be alleviated by running the Tapu Lele set seen here, giving the team an extra valuable check to Rock Polish Pdon (spread always lives after Rocks), as well as checks to Zygs and an emergency Intimidate. Obviously the trade off is that Lele loses a lot of offensive potency but in general it will still do its job offensively in the matchups it's needed for. Rocks Taunt Dia Terrak was the easiest way to fit rocks onto this team and actually have them stay up, and Red Orb Darkrai is an interesting pick that can take advantage of stuff like Slowbro, as well as soft checking Lunala. This team is still fairly weak to Alt Zyg, so most of the time you'll want to try and reach the conditions for a xern win quite quickly, before Alt Zyg manages to break through the emergency checking here.
Another Slowbro team. As I mentioned earlier, these builds are generally struggling for Lunala checks and for this particular game I wanted to make sure I had a check to ekiller, so I ended up with a fast Metagrossite Mandibuzz of all things (at least it's a better version of Taunt Foul Play Yveltal). The Mandibuzz speed can be dropped to 323 if you're not bothered about Lunala, the spdef right now is for Lunala Moonblast but it can get 2HKOed by Modest variants, so it may appreciate more investment there over Speed. However, as this variant of Mandibuzz still doesn't enjoy Toxic from Defog variants of Lunala, I decided to change the Pdon set to Eruption + Rocks, which allows it to break through Mandibuzz and Defog Lunala if played well, keeping up pressure on teams with those mons since they're generally expected to check Pdon. Alt Zyg fits well on these types of builds naturally and NDM provides a solid wincon to abuse Pdon's ability to smash bulky things. On top of this NDM helps out Magearna, acting as a secondary steel that can take on Lele and other special Fairies more comfortably.
Cata prep 2: Mental Breakdown Boogaloo
This is just stuff that I may have ended up bringing in finals, ngl some of it got
really questionable so I'm kinda glad we didn't end up going there.
One thing i've noticed lately is that Webs as a playstyle is back to having a broad range of options. This is because Shuckle grants a pretty unique advantage against common playstyles in the meta, which is that it can pretty much always set rocks reliably vs balance builds, regardless of how good their matchup is against every other rocker. Additionally, since slower powerful breakers can now find a use on webs as opposed to on standard teams where there's a greater emphasis on covering things defensively, this balance matchup is enhanced even further. The result of all of this is that webs' strengths come with the strength of their setter in a large part right now, and as long as the mons that are filling in are decent in some way (with very different standards to standard teams' rating of these mons) then webs will still do the job where it's expected to.
HOWEVER, I'm not sure any of this reasoning justifies whatever in the goddamn this sunwebs is:
- Why is there a Groudon?
- Why is sun the play?
- Why did Geoxern just go on a webs team??
- What is the Landorus doing here?
The simple answer to all of these questions is "idfk but sunwebs lmfao". The more complex answer is that Tapu Lele can now roast steels with only a ton of support, and Groudon can OHKO a support arceus at +2 so it must be good.
Ig this was kinda a version of the same team but hey it has an ekiller yay. Also managed to avoid having regular Groudon on this one so that's a W in my book.
This one was fairly close to happening until I realised that I don't even have rocks. Idek what to say guess the basics kinda just slipped my mind there. At least it has a Defogger so that's another W in my book. Flamethrower on Scarf Ho-Oh for more reliability against Kartana and Bulk Up Buzzwole.
We just pp stall every Mage check with Substitute and Pressure right? Well kinda, but also this team is hard matchup fishing. Just don't face anything that beats it because you'll have no way to play out haha yes.
Ekiller isn't great but I felt like it fit here with its lack of breaking capability being somewhat accounted for by Pogre. The rest is pretty standard for a Pogre BO archetype, Alt Zyg would normally take a backseat to Entei on these types of teams but since i decided to not run a support Arceus I needed help against Luc Zyg. After building this team and looking back on it I think LO Yveltal with Sucker Punch would have worked well over ekiller here too. Overall this team seems okay in comparison to the others, I would have been fine with bringing it.
Other cool stuff
https://pokepast.es/a4588e45b4f2b689 - Ferrothorn isn't a good spiker even with all of this support to weaken bouncers, wouldn't recommend.
https://pokepast.es/5674bd859e77ea0a - Spikes 2
https://pokepast.es/6764089332d2947f - Pins Tran is chazm's idea, trap things and then boom. EVs are for KOing max spdef Mandibuzz with Magma Storm + One turn of trapping damage + Boom
https://pokepast.es/1913532cb9761184 - SD Ray
https://pokepast.es/f80397af3dc40c7b - Subcm Lele
https://pokepast.es/b5c3edc1a85496b8 - I barely even remember building this cause it's old but it looks kinda cool. Wisprai allows it to midground between a bunch of its switchins like non-sablenite Buzzwole, Altarianite Zygarde, Terrakion and even teching against Toxic Psywave Blissey, the last part would be more helpful if I could actually improof the rai because right now it almost slams stall except for the looming ditto countersweep. Entei spread lives a super-effective Arceus Judgment, giving it the opportunity to muscle through any Arceus forme it wants to by spamming Return and then Espeeding whenever they don't click Recover (you can do this because you're slower).
https://pokepast.es/1a1561fb437fa8a4 - Generic 1
https://pokepast.es/78fd29b555e95500 - 6 SD LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL
21 teams there, enjoy them because i probably won't be having much fun with these teams anymore.