Rhydin To A Top 4 Finish – 4th In The World Team Analysis

Greetings once again fellow Nugget Bridge readers, my name is Ben Gould, better known as Ben91293, Ben912, and Ben*insert as many letters and numbers as you feel is appropriate*. As some of you may already know, I attended my first ever World Championship event this year due to my placing in the Birmingham Nationals (see here for my Nationals write up).

As a first timer to Worlds, nobody expected much from me. I’m pretty sure people expected me to bum out at 1-5; even my oldest competitive Pokémon friend (Josh) thought I’d barely scrape into the top 32… Needless to say, I made anyone who downplayed me eat their words with my final placing, making top cut with a 4-2 standing in Swiss (7th seed) and finishing the tournament in 4th place.

So, without further ado, I bring you my Semi-Finalist World Championships team!

This team has a somewhat different drive behind it than my Nationals team. The Nationals team concentrated very much on beating the newer and less experienced opponents that were likely to be attending, closing out matches as quickly as possible and countering as many threats as possible.

However, since Worlds has a best-of-three set in each round of Swiss, I felt that a team with better bulk and the ability to change tactics on the fly would suit me better.

(Below now is my process of selecting Pokémon as members and building the team in general – I hope this gives a little insight into how I approached the metagame and into how I decided upon my squad of six).

With this in mind, I opted for a Trick Room core with faster supporting Pokémon. I felt this gave the team a solid grounding; this would allow me to open with Trick Room one game, then maybe switch it up if that worked poorly and go fast mode in the next. All teams that placed highly in previous years (Ray Rizzo’s (Ray)and Wolfe Glick’s (Wolfey) as examples) had this kind of flexibility behind them, and in my opinion, it is what makes a team capable of staying fresh game after game.

Knowing I was going to opt for Trick Room, I needed a solid Trick Room setter that I could work with. I looked at Cresselia first, but in my past experience with using it I found that it gets walled too quickly and runs out of things to do. Scizor, Heatran, Volcarona and Metagross were all huge picks in the current metagame, and I wanted something that could go toe-to-toe with them much better than the Lunar Duck. I looked to the Ghosts to work with, as an immunity to Fake Out is always handy. Chandelure fit the ticket very nicely, but I didn’t like how poorly it could take hits compared to my final choice, Jellicent. With no weakness to Rock, Ground and Water like Chandelure, Jellicent provided a good platform from which to build. Its immense bulk could be added upon with careful EV placement and it walled and beat all the Pokémon I wanted to check, which I listed earlier.

The Jellicent I used ended up looking like this:

Jellicent @ Sitrus Berry
Trait: Water Absorb
EVs: 252 HP /140 SAtk / 116 SDef
Modest Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Will-O-Wisp
- Ice Beam
- Trick Room

The EVs were the best I could find for what I had planned. Its Special Defence stat allowed it to survive a Modest max Special Attack Thundurus-T Thunderbolt as well as really solidify its ability to wall Volcarona and Heatran. The Special Attack investment secured the OHKO on a non-Yache max health Landorus-T with Ice Beam, always dealing 100% damage or more (gotta love that extra than 100% damage). This was the same for most other x4 Ice weak Pokemon such as Salamence and Garchomp.

The moves I opted for are not uncommon for Jellicent, but not overly common in VGC, either. Hydro Pump was my first pick as I didn’t like the small amounts of damage Scald did in comparison, if Jellicent was going to be hitting things first, it might as well hit as hard as it can.

Will-O-Wisp was my favourite ‘obscure’ pick for it, allowing it to punish any physical attacker on the field that can’t OHKO it outright. Metagross, Scizor, Tyranitar, Bisharp, Hitmontop and Scrafty, all of these were common and many of them had access to super effective moves. The burn helped to sure up the weaker of Jellicent’s defences and really turned it into something difficult to knock out.

My second pick needed to counter the many Tyranitars that I knew I would inevitably face. I also wanted a solid answer to opposing Ghosts and Psychic types, as I didn’t have the super effective Shadow Ball on my Jellicent’s set to deal with them. Hitmontop was a good choice initially, as it had access to a variety of helpful moves and dealt with Tyranitar very well. However, it was too weak to the very common Cresselia for my liking.

I went with a staple for most Trick Room teams and put my own spin on it, Scrafty.

Scrafty @ Choice Band
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 12 Atk / 120 Def / 116 SDef / 10 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Drain Punch
- Crunch
- Stone Edge
- Ice Punch

As you can see, this was one mean Scrafty. The extreme Defence EVs meant that at -1 from Intimidate, opposing Fighting Gem Close Combat from Hitmontop would only have a 6.25% chance to OHKO. This came with the added bonus of giving me a 50% chance to survive the same move from Terrakion. The Special Defence allowed him to take always survive a Dragon Gem Draco Meteor from Latios, and even Modest Hydreigon struggles to get the guaranteed OHKO. I deemed his Special Defence as more important in this situation, as I foresaw many more Draco Meteors being present at Worlds than Fighting Gem Close Combats, but I still wanted the reassurance that I could survive both moves effectively. Due to this increased bulk over the more standard Choice Band Scrafty EV set (usually just 252 HP /252 Atk / 4 SDef), this EV spread allowed him to stick around for much longer in games and therefore put out a lot more damage. The Speed EVs were arbitrary, I used them just to give me a jump over 0 Speed EV Scrafty sets and give me the edge outside of Trick Room.

The move choices were simple, maximum coverage. Stone Edge always OHKOs Volcarona, even some Charti Berry variants pending their HP investment. Drain Punch was the go-to move, STAB with health recovery was very useful. Ice Punch nailed things like Garchomp or served as a more accurate way to knock out Flying-types if they were already damaged. Finally Crunch, secondary STAB and not something many Pokemon can switch into easily, and a very good answer to Calm Mind Cresselia, too.

For my third slot, I wanted something to deal huge Special hits under Trick Room in case Scrafty was incapacitated early on. I decided that having my own weather to disrupt opponents was a good plan, and paired this with my now-used-in-every-competitive-team-I-have-ever-made Pokèmon, Abomasnow.

Abomasnow @ Focus Sash
Trait: Snow Warning
EVs: 140 HP / 110 Atk / 252 SAtk / 6 Spd
Quiet Nature
- Blizzard
- Ice Shard
- Giga Drain
- Protect

A very classic Trick Room Abomasnow set. I altered the EVs only a slight bit from the standard, giving mine the jump over other Quiet Abomasnow outside of Trick Room and powering up the Ice Shard a fair bit with the Attack investment.

It’s a standard moveset for the reason that it works so well, nothing more to be said!

So this is where I made the team a bit more interesting. I settled upon having a second physical attacker that would cover everything that the team was missing currently (in offence). I knew I wanted Ground coverage, as Ice and Ground pair together to form a very powerful duo, especially if they are hitting first. Looking at the slower Ground types, I noted Marowak and Rhyperior. I really wanted to get Lightningrod onto the team, as this would greatly assist Jellicent and prevent the very annoying Thunder Wave spam, especially against my fast-mode pair. I liked Marowak, but found its HP stat too low for my liking and this hurt his survivability for the way I like to play. Rhyperior was the second pick, but I desperately wanted the bulk provided with Solid Rock. So I turned to his younger brother Rhydon, the perfect blend of slow and bulky with access to Lightningrod.

Rhydon @ Eviolite
Trait: Lightning Rod
EVs: 228 HP / 156 Atk /4 Def /120 SDef
Adamant Nature
- Rock Slide
- Substitute
- Drill Run
- Protect

Upon creating this set, I was skeptical myself if Substitute would even work for it. I gave him enough health to allow for 4 Substitutes from full health with 1 HP remaining, then I sured up his Special Defence to match that of a Tyranitar (with the Eviolite boost he attains 120 Special Defence, and therefore 180 Special Defence if Sand is up). With Eviolite boosting his already insane defences, this was definitely a monster on paper (hitting over 210 Defence in total). I tested and worked on the EVs and found that he didn’t require anything near max Attack to perform, so I gave him the EVs above. He doesn’t miss out on any important OHKOs or 2HKOs that I am aware of, and the extra Special Defence that I invested really made a difference in the matches.

With so many Pokemon Protecting or swapping to try and stall out Trick Room, getting up a Substitute is easier than you may think. Once it’s up, it makes Rhydon an even bigger problem for the opponent. In one match I Substituted as a Rotom-W came out at the end of Trick Room (already on low HP from earlier). Had I been without Substitute, he would have KO’d me for an easy win, relying only on Hydro Pump hitting. Due to Substitute, I had the reassurance that I could at least attempt a Rock Slide for the win, as my chance of hitting was greater than his. This decision won me that match. Another note on how easy Substitute was to implement, was that nobody really seemed to expect it… lots of situations occurred where a Pokémon would Protect whilst its ally reversed Trick Room, which would allow me a free Substitute and to still remain a huge threat.

Without Megahorn on the set, some may think it struggles against against things like Ludicolo, Amoonguss and Cresselia to some extent. While this can be true, it should be remembered that you shouldn’t allow Rhydon to be matched against the former two anyways. I didn’t wish I had Megahorn on the set once through the entire tournament, and was very happy with the role Substitute played.

So, with the Trick Room portion finished, I started to build my fast mode core. I needed two Pokemon that could happily function next to Rhydon and Scrafty, my two main picks for when I didn’t bother going full Trick Room mode. I decided I wanted to bait Thunder Waves and therefore force plays. I wanted to draw in opposing Thundurus and Raikou, and then force them into being useless for the game while Rhydon sat there. I also wanted a solid way of knocking out the very pesky Fighting types and Amoonguss’ that liked to ruin my fun.

Latios was the perfect answer to all of these goals. Initially, I looked at a set similar to my Nationals build, with Light Screen in the mix. I changed my mind after a few games, deciding that the reason Latios would be so effective for this team would be due to his huge offensive presence and ability to crush anything not specifically built to survive his attacks.

Latios @ Choice Specs
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 4 Def / 248 SAtk / 4 SDef / 248 Spd
Timid Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Psyshock
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Thunderbolt

I fell in love with this as soon as I used it. The sheer power it outputs is immense, and since there is no reliance on the Dragon Gem to pull out big Draco Meteor hits, he can switch around often and freely. The first three moves were standard, with Thunderbolt being my primary pick for move 4. It applies great pressure to things Latios can’t usually deal with such as Heatran and more specifically, it removes Gyarados from the field, something that threatened the rest of the team quite heavily if it was specially bulky and could avoid being burned.

For the final slot, I wanted to search for a good counter to Breloom and Liepard in general. This meant I was going to be likely using a Lum or Chesto Berry to stop the Spore and abusing some kind of set up. Earlier in the year, I was playing around with a Volcarona set. I edited his EVs a bit and pulled out something that looks remarkably similar to some of the Korean sets.

Volcarona @ Lum Berry
Trait: Flame Body
IVs: 0 Atk
EVs: 240 HP / 4 Def / 8 SAtk / 44 SDef / 212 Spd
Modest Nature
- Rage Powder
- Heat Wave
- Bug Buzz
- Quiver Dance

This little bug had so much power before and after grabbing boosts, that Quiver Dance just had to be on his set. The choice with Rage Powder did the obvious, allowed it to eat status for other team members, pulled moves it resisted or was immune to onto it (my favourite usage of this in the whole tournament was using Volcarona to take a Will-O-Wisp aimed at Scrafty by Aaron Zheng (Cybertron)’s Rotom-W) and protected my more frail members. I could Rage Powder to take Grass Knots or even Bullet Punches aimed at Rhydon, allowing it to attack or set up a Substitute.

Volcarona could just attack outright and dent a huge portion of the game, or I could simply set it up and attempt to sweep with its huge Special Attack and Speed. The 0 Atk IV was simply because I could, and it helped with reducing Foul Play damage a little. Nothing like being a little perfectionist I suppose…

All in all, I loved the way this team performed. I do think it is hard to use, what with having a couple of 4x weaknesses on the team and two Choiced members, but with the practice I had I really think this helped me know who to bring into battle and when. Next, I will do a little piece on the team pairs I liked to play and things that threatened the team towards the end of the article.

Pairings

First is my standard ‘Set up Trick Room and hit them hard as I can’ lead pair.

These two formed a brutally simple Trick Room lead. Lots of teams feared a Fake Out from the Scrafty and either wasted their turn in trying to prevent it, or allowed Scrafty the freedom to attack and put the Choice Band to use. I usually had Rhydon hiding away in the back, ready to jump in and eat flying type attacks for Scrafty or protect Jellicent with Lightningrod. Abomasnow in the back resisted everything that Rhydon feared and stopped Rain from being annoying, too.

These two formed my hardest hitting pair. Scrafty bulked out Latios with his Intimidate and Latios covered the Fighting types that plagued Scrafty with his Psyshock. With the two Choice items out front, if they weren’t identified quickly enough by the opposition, they could easily be two Pokémon down by turn 2.

I liked this pair for many reasons. Latios’ huge offense meant he could, more often than not, remove a Pokémon from the opposite side of the field right away. This usually gave Volcarona a fairly good chance for a successful set up and this usually spelled disaster for the opposition.

Finally the only other combination I had imagined before the event. This used Latios’ powerhouse potential to wipe out a Pokémon and give Jellicent a free Will-O-Wisp or Trick Room. Switching Latios on the next turn was a no-brainer anyways due to the -2.

Everyone + Everyone

I could list everything as a lead along with everything else and probably justify many reasons why they would work, with the exceptions being Abomasnow and Rhydon. Leading with either of these two usually lead to bad things for me, and for good reason.

Rhydon was best played hidden in the back and revealed only when stopping electricity/resisting something or when absorbing a hit like a Tyranitar Crunch was required.

Abomasnow usually only performed exceptionally well under Trick Room conditions. That said, his Focus Sash allows for a certain amount of pseudo-bulk, and Ice Shard had a nice damage output.

Well, a kind of threat list. I’m not going to detail everything in the metagame and say how I would have countered it, rather just list Pokémon or strategies that worried me or made me think hard about how to proceed.

Sun teams

Okay, so I genuinely had a feeling that Ninetales would finally take its place as threat #1 this year. With eternal sun at its disposal and the popularity of Eruption Heatran, I was sure this would be a thing… it seems not. This team doesn’t like Fire Gem Eruption in Sun much, nor does it like fast, hard-hitting Grass Special Attackers.

Set up reliant teams

Thinking about my team the night before, it occurred to me that not having Taunt could be a big issue. Teams setting up screens, boosting with Calm Minds or even doing something like Guard Splitting Shuckle could have thrown a spanner in my works. I usually had an answer to the Pokémon that implemented these tactics, but a well-designed team played correctly could have troubled me initially. Also coming under this umbrella was the ever possible Perish Trap team. I actually played this in my third match and managed to outplay it to take the first two games decisively and quickly.

Conclusion

I was going to add in a battle report section, but my notes aren’t coherent for recalling battles, as I only noted people I played and the teams they had.

My record for swiss was 4/2 –- I had the second hardest schedule according to the first opponent win %s, the hardest being an insane from 69.44% Enosh Shachar (Human), with mine coming second at 66.67%. I played Human again in the top 8 match ups and beat him to play against out eventual champion, Arash Ommati (Mean). This put me at fourth in the competition, and thus fourth in the world for the VGC 2013 season.

Many thanks to all of you who have read this far, I hope you enjoyed my team write up and I hope this gave you a good insight into the way that I think.

I want to thank everyone that I met in Vancouver this year, so cool to finally put faces to names on a screen! Shout out goes to all of team UK for our exceptional showing this year compared to years previously, and to my good friend and fellow player Josh Peat, without whom I would likely still just be playing with my Stealth Rock Cradily on Coliseum. Props to him for helping with the title, too.

Hope to see you all again in Washington DC for 2014!

The post Rhydin To A Top 4 Finish – 4th In The World Team Analysis appeared first on Nugget Bridge.