Research Group #7: Scraggy, Masquerain, Beheeyem and Ampharos

skylight

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Introduction
NU is a tier where many Pokemon are usable, and there are a ton of different options. Research Group aids in helping explore the tier. Who knows, maybe in future tier changes one of these Pokemon can be incredibly useful, potentially being able to check the new threats well. Maybe one of these Pokemon may find uses in other tiers and is not just a simple throw-away Pokemon, unlike some unfortunate Pokemon in NU.

Some rules
  • Be open-minded. Don't just say something is terrible and walk away; at least look into them and see what options they may be able to utilize.
  • Feel free to theorymon, but make it clear that you are theorymonning. At the end of the group, however, I want discussion to move towards how useful the Pokemon actually are in NU, and what sets are effective on them.
  • Just because an analysis has been done for a Pokemon doesn't mean there isn't more to explore; it's quite possible that something might have gone unnoticed or is missing.
  • Do not post in this thread complaining about the Pokemon I choose and/or suggesting ones we should do for future weeks. I want discussion to stay on topic about the 4 Pokemon we are "researching". If you want to suggest something, send a forum Private Message to me. Also, Pokemon from past research weeks will be used again simply because the metagame has obviously changed since this project was last brought about.
The four Pokemon for this group (23/09/13):


Questions to consider when posting here

How useful are these Pokemon in NU? What sets can they run effectively? What gives them trouble? What advantages do they have over other Pokemon? How well do they work in the metagame? If you have anything to say about any of these Pokemon, please post about them! It doesn't matter if you've used them or have just faced them in battle, anything is fine (but please, do try them). Just be sure to back up your posts with good competitive reasoning. Remember, discussion is not limited to this topic, you are encouraged to talk about these Pokemon in #neverused as well!

The Research Group Challenge
  • Users will use any number of the research group mons on their team
  • Users will attempt to reach as high as possible on the ladder with the Pokemon. Breaking past the 2000 mark on the ladder with your registered alt will earn you a spot on the Hall of Fame: Gold Class. Crossing the 1850 mark will secure you a Silver Class spot while a 1700 rating will earn you a Bronze Class spot. Post a screen-shot of your peak in order to achieve this, and a pastebin of your team. Note: this is for Glicko2. You must also have a deviation of 85.
  • Users will be expected to post their experiences with the Pokemon they use, the teams they used, the problems they encountered while trying to make the said Pokemon work.
  • If a user does not participate in the discussion, he will be passed over.
  • In order to participate in the challenge, simply post here with a brand new alt. Post battle logs, experiences with your team on the ladder, and generally how a Pokemon has worked out for you: past or present.
  • The Hall of Fame will be on the NU hub soon!
Please include more substance in your posts than just "in" and what Pokemon you're using. What sets are you planning on using? What interests you about whatever Pokemon you're using? Remember: people who contribute a lot to Research Group will be listed on the hub page as an outstanding contributor for this Research Group (yes, I'm aware I'm c/ping this but I'm actually going to actively update the hub, so!)

Every few days during the group I'll post questions which I expect you guys to be involved in. If you have any questions about this project, feel free to send me a PM, otherwise just compete in the challenge, and actively post here too discussing the sets throughout the group. Remember that the NU mods keep an eye over everything even when they're asleep and you could get one step closer to earning CC if you actively post here and keep up discussion. n_n
 
These are all pretty cool mons- I'll probably try them all out at one time or another. Particularly interested in Scraggy and Beheeyem. Scraggy because I have a soft sport for stuff that sets up on walls, and Beheeyem because I also like stuff that breaks them.
 

Shuckleking87

"Assault vest makes everything better" AV Seaking, BT
is a Tiering Contributor Alumnus
Well my team for the last research group had both a poke from last week and beheeyem, so i already have the gold class... Beheeyem is very very strong, as it essentially kills anything with choice specs analytic psychic if it gets a free switch in, and has enough bulk to take a hit or 2.

Ampharos I've always thought of as meh, i'd rather use eelektross for a slow volt switcher, while musharna is a better cleric.
Scraggy is awesome, but with primeape and sawk being everywhere, it is difficult for this poke to work, though it might be interesting to try the DD set (i usually use bulk up).
Masquerain is an interesting poke as there are so many pokes that would appreciate a QD boost (jynx and ludicolo first come to mind). I will probably use masquerain
 

Enguarde

I only play ADV UU
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Ampharos is really great! I like the sub agility set with thunderbolt and focus blast the best since its decent bulk allows it set up subs as well as be threatening at the same time. Its also fun to pass calm minds to from musharna, which also makes in monstrous offensively but also allows it to have an easy time setting up subs on even more things.

I'm sure by now everyone knows how powerful an analytic boost is, and how it activates on switching pokemon, since a common strategy with offensive trick roomers is usually to stall out the trick room turns by switching around to take predicting attacks, beeheeyem can take good advantage of that thanks its ability!
 
interesting research week: not gonna go in depth on the last three because i don't like them much at all: masquerain is far too slow to sweep by itself, and that Sr weakness combined with low offensive presence makes me shy away from it, although quiverpassing is always a cool strategy. if you can get it to work consistently, kudos to you. people like to hype analytic beheeyem, but it doesn't benefit from the boost when under trick room, ad its slow as balls speed and eh typing make it easy enough to dispose of. i'd rather just use musharna. ampharos is a groovy pokemon, and is stronger, bulkier and faster than eelektross, but the latters wider far better movepool and levitate would make me pick it over ampharos almost all the time, although enguardes subagility set sounds amusing.

scraggy however is a pokemon that i have a LOT of experience with. i typically use the dragon dance set, as at +1 it just outruns a bunch of targets that it can happily ohko, like haunter, jynx, sawsbuck, primeape etc (the 95s). it can also set up on walls, thanks to shed skin and drain punch, and is one of the tiers best offensive answers to liepard, again thanks to shed skin, but also the 4x dark resist and the abiltiy to ohko it once it gets a free turn in. it can be quite cool to pair scraggy up with a shadow tag mon: either gothorita or wynaut can take out opposing scarfers that lock themselves into a fighting-type move. ive not used shed skin as much, but again, this potentially benefits even more from something like gothorita, which can also eliminate the band close combat users such as sawk. once gothorita has done her job, she's often at the mercy of dark types, which scraggy just takes a dump on.

i might try some tanky kind of ampharos with a sassy nature, as this is a pretty cool calc:
20 Atk Ampharos Fire Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Dry Skin Jynx: 244-288 (90.03 - 106.27%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO

compared to, say:
4 SpA Ampharos Thunderbolt vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Jynx: 120-142 (44.28 - 52.39%) -- 21.48% chance to 2HKO
 
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I have been using Ampharos as a pivot/cleric and it's working well for the most part. Having a cleric with some offensive presence is pretty nice to have, even though Amphy's movepool is so damn shallow. Focus Blast is okay, and since with Volt Switch/TBolt/Heal Bell you only have one moveslot left, not much else could work on Ampharos as well as it. Even then, lack of coverage leaves Ampharos with very few options, in some of which he is outclassed. I like him as a cleric because I find it easy to find a spot to Heall Bell because of his solid offensive typing.
 

Punchshroom

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Time for moar insight!

Scraggy - This thing is cool beans. For an NFE, you wouldn't expect it to hold up so well against almost every wall available in NU with little defensive investment, then stand up to even the offensive threats after a couple of Dragon Dances. Its STAB combo is also amazing, so it's basically just "boost, Rest, wake up quick with Shed Skin, sweep with unresisted STAB combo". Shed Skin is a fairly huge factor on what makes Scraggy good: it doesn't care about Thunder Wave, Will-o-Wisp, Toxic, Lovely Kiss and also its own Rest. Granted it's only a 1/3 success rate, but that's also a 1/3 chance the opponent gave Scraggy a free boost. After 1 Dragon Dance it can outrun base 95s and its Hi Jump Kick can pack a serious wallop. Keep your bulky dudes away from this thing, it's derpy look doesn't suggest that it's a slouch at all.

Masquerain - Bug/Flying-types have always had it rough: Masquerain is no different. It's slow and not too bulky, and the SR weakness heavily reduces its ability to setup or even survive. Masquerain does have a niche in Quiver Passing, which is occupied by Venomoth before it. Masquerain doesn't have a sleep move or even good offensive stats, but it does have Intimidate and effective Bug+Water coverage in Bug Buzz and Hydro Pump (meaning it's not actually that easy to wall), or can make use of Roost for more boosts and forgoing coverage. Unfortunately, like Ninjask, Masquerain rarely gets to pass more than one or two boosts at a time, or even pass more than once throughout the entire match. Its weaknesses also makes deciding recipients somewhat tricky. However, many special sweepers such as Samurott, Jynx and Charizard love the boost which they cannot attain themselves, so if you can make Masquerain work for them even just one time it could still be worth it.

Beheeyem - This alien is pretty much the first thing that comes to mind when someone mentions Trick Room in NU, and heralded as its most offensive user. Beheeyem's movepool is really not bad at all, having access to Thunderbolt to hit Mandibuzz, Nasty Plot to perform a "NastyRoom" sweep of sorts, and Signal Beam or Hidden Power Ground to cover other threats. Beheeyem doesn't even need Trick Room to function, as Analytic takes advantage of Beheeyem's sluggishness to bolster its power, smashing faster threats or switch-ins alike with crazy damage. However, Beheeyem isn't very bulky for something so slow, but it would almost always pack a solid wallop, sweeping with Trick Room or wallbreaking with Specs/Life Orb or even Nasty Plot.

Ampharos - Ampharos finds itself struggling to stand out amongst the pool of Electric-types, Eelektross giving it the most competition due to it putting its Fighting coverage to greater use and has more coverage to boot. It should be noted that Ampharos has the strongest Thunderbolt in the tier. Ampharos's best hopes of standing out would be either an offensive set/a defensive set with Heal Bell (the former to bust through bulky walls unhindered and the latter for team support), a Dual Screens set with Volt Switch to make life easy for almost any setup sweeper, and an Agility set. Mind you, Ampharos is mainly outclassed because other Electrics wallbreak/sweep better, while its defensive typing resists little, but Ampharos can still definitely work.
 
Alright, I've played ~20 matches with each of Beheeyem and Scraggy- here are my thoughts on each.

Beheeyem has probably been the more successful of the two. With Analytic and a Life Orb, it's obscenely powerful and has fairly good coverage between Psychic, TBolt, HP Ground and Signal Beam. I briefly tried replacing Signal Beam with Substitute to take advantage of the number of switches it can force, but Beheeyem already has decent enough bulk to take most hits and retaliate anyways, and being able to hit Shiftry and Exeggutor has come in handy at least once. Unfortunately, it does not have decent enough bulk to take a hit on the switch in, take another hit and then retaliate, which greatly limits its usability in my eyes. Even mons without much offensive presence can hit it with a toxic or something and cut down its longevity by a huge amount.

Incidentally, Beheeyem is awesome at luring in and taking out Skuntank and Mandibuzz with its coverage moves, as well as steel types like Metang or Bastiodon. I might try pairing it with something like Exeggutor (could even try using TR for the playstyle thread too), but that's just theorymon at this point.

Scraggy, while cool as hell, almost never came through for me. While it can nab a free boost on Alomomola and co, it neither hits hard enough nor takes hits well enough to deal with the inevitable switch into something with more offensive presence. The fact that I encountered Sawk on nearly half of the teams that I fought may be a contributing factor, but Scraggy's reliance on grabbing multiple boosts to pose a threat makes him extremely difficult to use until the late game regardless. Until then, you're playing 6-5. If I want a boosting fighting type that doesn't mind Status, I'll use Gurdurr. If I want a dark type to set up on walls, I'll use Shiftry.

I am still interested in the DD set, though, since it seems to get around most of the problems that I've listed- +1 252 Atk Scraggy Hi Jump Kick vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Sawk: 280-330 (95.89 - 113.01%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock.

No HoF reqs yet, since neither of these two mons have been working out very well for me, but that'll hopefully change soon.
 
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watashi

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i used dd scraggy and it was still weak as shit and had lackluster bulk which made it hard to set up on walls that had decent power such as regirock or seismitoad. reliance on drain punch for healing limit how well it can perform against stall and it gets completely wrecked by offense. shed skin is extremely overrated and can give you a false sense of security as you try to set up on something like alomomola
 
did you not have rest? I'd imagine it would be pretty useful, with a good chance to wake up earlier than the standard 2 turns. I'd probably use dd/drain punch/crunch/rest if I was using it tbh

what did you use over rest, HJK? Does that achieve any useful KOs, and is it worth using over rest?
 

Punchshroom

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I imagine Scraggy having DD, Crunch, and either Drain Punch, Rest or Hi Jump Kick in the last two slots. +1 Hi Jump Kick also somewhat makes up for any lack of power.
 

Bluwing

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did you not have rest? I'd imagine it would be pretty useful, with a good chance to wake up earlier than the standard 2 turns. I'd probably use dd/drain punch/crunch/rest if I was using it tbh

what did you use over rest, HJK? Does that achieve any useful KOs, and is it worth using over rest?
I would rater go dd/hjk/crunch/rest as when you already have rest + shed skin to heal the need off drain punch isn't that needed, especially not with the imense power off hjk which is much more usefull against bulky walls than drain punch, and more usefull in any other way (except when you miss lol).
 

scorpdestroyer

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If I use that set, it would be on BU Scraggy, which actually has decent bulk and can tank weak hits when asleep unlike the DD set. It can switch in on Psychic and Ghost types or anything without a super effective move and start setting up (and iirc Jynx can only 2HKO it with LO Focus Blast after SR with 2 high rolls so it's quite a safe Jynx check too)

Idk why there's hate on DD Scraggy because it's really good, destroys stall and has HJK if you really wanted the power. With Drain Punch + Shed Skin setting up on Alomomola really isn't a problem unless you're super unlucky with Shed Skin
 

watashi

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without hjk the dd set will have a lot of troubles getting any koes unless it was against a frail pokemon with a weakness to one of it's attacks. going back to one of othesemo's calcs: +1 252 Atk Scraggy Hi Jump Kick vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Sawk: 280-330 (95.89 - 113.01%) — as you can see it can't even get a guaranteed kill with hjk of one of your typical offensive pokemon who is hit neutrally.
 
Ampharos is going to be the one I'm testing this time, under alt Enxai. As Punchshroom said, it was kinda difficult finding a niche that wasn't utterly outclassed by Eel. Finally decided on abusing both Amp's pretty decent survivability (non-weakness to all forms of priority is great) plus Agility, and so I'm passing it Tail glows from Volbeat. So far, it's been working out pretty fine, with Encore giving me plenty of tries to set up.

Masquerain is... Interesting. Its main problem is its abysmal base 60 speed, meaning any scarfer can simply walk in as Masquerain QD's and promptly kill it. My usual remedy for that was to Sash it and get a second QD before passing, but that requires a lack of rocks, which isn't so easy to achieve in NU. When your support 'mon needs support... Usually kinda meh. However, The Simi trio and special 'rott make a pretty good match with Masquerain, since they can each carry Taunt and kill the SR setters, while appreciating the speed and SpA boost that Masquerain gives in response.

Haven't tried the rest yet, so can't say.
 
I like DD Scraggy, I used in LC too. I find very good its abilities (Shed Skin, Moxie and Intimidate) each one with interesting implementations. My preference is for Shed Skin which makes ineffective Toxic, ThunderWawe, Sleep Power and so on. To have a better coverage, I use always it with Zen Headbutt over Hi Jump Kick (taking Crunch and Drain Punch).
 
i would definally like to try TR beheeyem because of its sheer power
i think a bulk up evolite scraggy would be a good partner with is bulk and it can also abuse TR if only for a turn or 2

My alt is GangstaScraggy :D
 

Shuckleking87

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Yeah I suck, I know. DD scraggy is like one of the best checks to the omnipresent Mightyenas running around the tier. But speed was needed to ensure it would outspeed base 95's after one boost, the extra power with adament would have been great. THat is why I chose moxie over intimidate (mainly because tauros already had it) or shed skin (because most people don't try and status scraggy anyways). Probably outclassed by stuff like combusken who gets automatic speed boosts, or pinsir because of its way higher attack. Also great to switch into musharna and set up dd's. It doesnt hit scolipede hard, which is really annoying. Overall, an ok poke, but I'd rather use pinsir for power or primeape for speed (but not by much though).
 

skylight

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Masquerain is... Interesting. Its main problem is its abysmal base 60 speed, meaning any scarfer can simply walk in as Masquerain QD's and promptly kill it. My usual remedy for that was to Sash it and get a second QD before passing, but that requires a lack of rocks, which isn't so easy to achieve in NU. When your support 'mon needs support... Usually kinda meh. However, The Simi trio and special 'rott make a pretty good match with Masquerain, since they can each carry Taunt and kill the SR setters, while appreciating the speed and SpA boost that Masquerain gives in response.
Sawk would also be good too, as it can kill SR users, and when something like Mushy comes in, Sawk can switch to Masquerain and baton pass to Jynx or something when it gets a chance. Since really, Masquerain has a pretty good matchup against most things that fuck Sawk over, and Sawk can destroy things that fuck Jynx over. The original idea I had with Masquerain was with specs Regice. It didn't really do much but it was mentioned about using Specs Regice a while back, so I tried to think of a way to get it to be faster. Turns out Masquerain was the best option for that reason. Plus it resists one of Regice's weaknesses at least.
 

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