Week 2 vs pdt - I'm going to try to go over this live in pia, 9 PM GMT-4 on
my twitch. I've got a couple more vods there as well, including an analysis of highways and pdt from last week I did with
pinorska
Usual disclaimers - I will do this win or lose, I mean no disrespect to my opponent, I do this for the educational value
Replay
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8uu-648260
Match up and Lead
In my
week 1 post, I went quite in depth on defining what a match up advantage was (whoever would win if neither side predicts = MU advantage), and ways to identify it (identify which win cons are strongest or identify if you have counters to opponents threats, not mutually exclusive).
Actually, we get pretty close to a mirror match up, which I think is self explanatory but happens when both teams are very similar. We have four Pokemon exactly the same (Mence, Diggersby, Primarina, and Cobalion) and one mon very similar (Amoong vs Tangrowth), with the major only difference being Reuniclus for Nihilego. This is a pretty easy short cut to see who has the MU advantage - while Amoong does own Tangrowth pretty badly, CM Reuniclus is basically unstoppable in this case without significant hax. I pretty obviously have the MU advantage. However - one thing isn't too clear, that is, his Primarina set. If it's Choice Specs, my lack of Fairy resists means it will get a KO every time it comes in for free which is no bueno. I'll still be able to force it out and then set up with Reuniclus on something but it's not necessarily clear I have a MU advantage if his Primarina is specs (it's not!).
I end up leading with Cobalion, thinking my Tangrowth lead is pretty darn obvious and he can just lead Amoonguss. I want SR up and even if he does Defog with Mence, that gives Reuniclus pretty free entry (not completely free as lowering the evasion actually makes Hurricane more effective). A few reasons I regret this, not just in hindsight. First, it is true that my Tangrowth lead is pretty predictable, but Tangrowth alone can't really make progress vs an Amoonguss team, and he can immediately make more significant progress by (Stun) Sporing something potentially. All I can do is get rid of Amoong's item which rarely ends up mattering. The other thing is that Diggersby is a perfectly acceptable lead for my opponent too, and I'm probably not going to risk Cobalion. Note that he probably doesn't have to scout for Shuca, since I run Tangrowth and Mence, I'm extremely unlikely to be Shuca Cobalion (and I reveal Helmet later). Lastly, I kind of flub a very basic concept in mons - when you're ahead, play it safe. I was definitely ahead on match up alone, no reason not to play it safe with the Scarf U-Turn Diggersby lead.
Momentum PDT - Why did I vote to not suspect test Primarina, turns 1-5
So my regrettable lead choice aside, I decide to go straight to Tangrowth to try and counter my opponents lead Primarina. I could have stayed in to damage Primarina or set up SR, but Cobalion was helpful here for many reasons and my Tangrowth set could potentially not get 2HKO by Specs Moonblast anyways. On turn 1, it reveals it is not Choice Specs to my relief - it's likely an offensive 3 or 4 attack set though. Protect has been very common as a last move but I figure Knock off is going to make a bit of progress vs Primarina or Amoonguss no matter what, so I feel fine going for it. Of course I forget that Substitute Ice Beam is a very real set, which is the only way that I not only do NOT make progress, but I also end up potentially losing a mon quite early on.
PDT smartly Substitutes on turn 2 just to scout for the Knock Off, which he gets and is further rewarded with a Freeze on Tangrowth and a special attack drop on turn 4. The significance of this is that I end up having to lose a Pokemon basically early on - he didn't actually need the freeze or drop for this, just the correct Knock off prediction.
Which brings us to the first really important choice of the game - did I have to go Primarina on turn 4? Even without the special attack drop, my own Primarina wasn't going to come out of this exchange without someone else or itself dying. Even if I outspeed it and break the sub, there is no way I am going to be able to OHKO their Primarina and I'm not CM either. The point is, breaking the Substitute on Primarina isn't important - Reuniclus sets up on her even if she has a Substitute up.
So turn 5, I basically concede turn 4 was a mistake and just end up giving up my cold noodles anyways. So I lost health on Primarina for no reason on turn 4, but at least I didn't take two Moonblasts for no reason.
This is a key skill strong players are able to apply - admitting their mistakes and not committing to bad lines just because they started it. Yes, the turn 4 was probably pretty bad from me but I didn't have to commit and obviously the game was early enough + Reuniclus was good enough to recover later.
Setting up the counter attack - turns 6-14
Okay so I'm down a mon by turn 6, but Reuniclus is so strong that the position isn't really that bad still + I am now seizing the initiative since MY threat is coming in for free now. PDT is worried enough to just switch out and lose his Substitute, which is probably correct since if I got two Calm Minds (one on Prim, one on the switch out), I will OHKO the Amoonguss, losing the ability to Spore me will take away a big part of his potential Reuniclus counterplay.
I immediately try to scout for a Spore on turn 8 but my opponent gets a correct double switch instead so we end up trading a lot of health on each other's Primarinas and I learn his is slower than mines. Turn 11 is a bit interesting, I've talked about it on streams before, but psychologically speaking people are often loathe to give up Pokemon that just did a lot of work - clearly Prim did a lot of work for my opponent early on, so I predict they don't want to lose it now and take the opportunity to set up SR. This is basically what I wanted turn one, setting up Rocks early on to get Mence in so Reuniclus comes in for nearly free vs Mence.
To my surprise, my opponent opts for damage on Reuniclus instead of Defogging, potentially putting my Reuniclus in 2HKO range of more moves and also letting his Primarina stay in Torrent range more easily. Nevertheless, I get an opportunity to set up Reuniclus again and my opponent finally bites and uses the Spore on turn 14, which I correctly scout for and thus disable one more piece of counterplay he had for Reuniclus because of Sleep Clause and Ramolost does not own Smogtours. To be clear, my opponent cannot really be faulted for not predicting the scout - he already did it once and there was a decent chance I'd stay in with Reuniclus on Amoonguss - I could either rely on an overprediction by my opponent or a 1 turn sleep or a Psyshock Crit, all in all, odds were not that low that I stay in.
A bit more set up - turn 16-21
Okay, basically all that is happening here is 1) me not wanting to set up on Body Slam para chance + 2) wanting to use Rocky Helmet to put Diggersby in +0 Focus Blast range or +1 Psyshock range. Focus Blast was certainly an option turn 19 (and 18, but 19 I knew he was locked in), but I ruled against it in light of Primarina forcing me out with Torrent Scald afterwards.
Arguably turn 21 was pretty poor from me, risking Cobalion waking up and giving Amoonguss the ability to spore again, except now my team is even more tattered with Primarina gone and Cobalion heavily chipped. But I was getting pretty excited about the opportunity for Cobalion to make some progress on it's own, giving me an extra chance to win apart from Reuniclus, and I was getting ready to try and punish a hard Amoonguss switch in to Reuniclus later to spore me by just Psyshocking instead of CM - might have worked. Regardless, none of these lines play out since I stay asleep anyways.
The Jelly from Helly - rest of the game
Everything is set into place - I have SR not that it matters much, my Reuniclus is at high health, Spore is wasted, and Diggersby is in range of Psyshock so no Focus Blast necessary. Obviously I would love more (Prim being dead to get rid of Ice Beam freeze, Cobalion being in range of Psyshock for example, but I don't think I'm getting more chances. Apart from Amoong, Mence is what I want to set up on so I take it. Diggersby risks para chance and I still don't know if his Nihilego is Meteor Beam or SR/if his Cobalion has Megahorn.
Anyways, I tactically get out of Primarina's Torrent range by healing and letting Primarina heal with Leftovers which sets up a chance for Calm Mind to sweep. I couldn't tell based on PS rounding on turn 25 if he was in Torrent range but I would have healed anyways. I thought healing on turn 28 was a pretty nice move by me to stay out of range of any move on turn 29 if he crit on turn 28 and indeed he does get hax on turn 28 and 29, but not the optimal hax that he needs to win.
My idea is this - get Reuniclus boosted enough so after I break the sub, I can KO Prim. That should force him to sub into torrent range, which still gives him a chance for a torrent crit but only 1 shot. However, he's going for the Ice Beam freezes instead, which have an 8% chance to freeze for at least 1 turn, as opposed to Scalds roughly 4.2% critical hit chance. Anyways, I think Ice Beam is right because it can still do good damage with crits, but I end up winning this exchange.
His next hope is getting Diggersby para hax - I don't want to be in range of U-Turn + Earthquake so I scout on turn 34 with Recover, but this gives PDT an extra body slam paralysis chance which comes perfectly in handy for him - he gets the paralysis on turn 35.
Turn 36 is pretty important as we both have decisions to make - do I heal or attack, does he boost or attack? I basically have to hope he isn't Megahorn at this point or he is heavily favored, he can kind of spam it and likely wait for a full para, and then Nihilego revenge kills me.
The Iron Head seems correct for my opponent - basically, they have two chances to win with Cobalion 1) if they get Iron head/full para two turns in a row, then Cobalion just kills Reuniclus/Reuniclus is kept at 10% and Para and useless or 2) if they get 1 or 0 Iron Head/full para, then then can set up a SD after I recover and hope for Focus Blast Miss/full para (47.5%) PLUS the next turn focus blast miss/full para/iron head flinch ( 63.25%).
He had about a 22.6% chance of getting 1) and 30.0% chance of getting 2). I'm not factoring in his crit chance as well so maybe he had a bit more than this, but overall, it seems like his Cobalion alone had about a 45.8% chance to win. Primarina and Salamence had chances as well, so all in all, he did seem favored to bring down Reuniclus BUT THIS WAS BECAUSE HE GOT THE PARA - which he was of course not guaranteed to do. It's a bit more complicated, but I'm confident in saying that the opponent was slightly favored to win if he got a Body Slam paralysis, which he did. But I'm not sure he was favored to win before getting the paralysis.
Anyways, he doesn't get literally anything, so Cobalion dies AND reuniclus is healthy, which sets me up to win in a very high probability.
The Calm Mind on turn 39 is because I calced his Salamence is probably very defensive and +1 Psyshock won't do more than 50%, so I need to boost again to hurt it.
Quite surprised at his turn 45 that he didn't go for hax, in addition, if he loses Nihilego I don't need Reuniclus to win, my Salamence can also have a high probability to win. I think this was a mistake but he was already in a very bad spot. not much to say for the rest of the game, my opponent had a chance but much less than 1%, and he ends up not getting it.
Basically, apart from some finessing to try and set up the Reuniclus sweep (some nice mechanics knowledge by me like getting out of Torrent range, getting Spore activated, and getting chip on Diggersby via Helmet), it was a complete odds game on Reuniclus and I got the odds I needed to win.
That brings me to my second victory in this tournament and gives my team a chance to win this week as well fortunately. Again, it's very nice winning against someone higher seeded although, as I'm sure anyone who's ever competed seriously knows, you don't really care about your seeding when you play the match. I've always had trouble vs PDT, losing two UUPL games to him and he was one of the tougher ladder players for me as well so getting this win is really critical for my confidence. I was a lot calmer this game than my last one and I expect that will continue. It's still very early on in the tournament so I'm only cautiously happy.
TLDR - IF THERE IS ONE EDUCATIONAL NUGGET YOU CAN GET OUT OF THIS - maybe one obvious lesson is this - you do NOT need to commit to bad lines that you start, if you make a mistake, you can recover from it - I'm referring to my turn 4/5 here, where going Prim was bad vs the opponent's Prim.
