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Improve your Battling: Replay Critique

Anti

Anti

return of the king
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Much of the content in the forum recently has centered around team-building, with the threat list, building competition, building workshop, etc.

Of course, in-battle execution is also very important. It is the reason that you can copy a number one ladder team and barely scratch the top 500 or "steal a team" for a tournament and find yourself 4-0ed. The goal of this thread is to help you improve your execution.

The way it works is simple. Post a replay of yours where you feel like you could have played better. Maybe you had a big lead and let it slip away, or maybe you won but have no idea how you managed to pull it out after nearly choking. It could have been that your opponent just completely destroyed you. These are just a few examples. If you feel like you could use some critique on a battle of yours no matter the circumstances, then post the replay and we can give advice.

And...that's all! Post away!
 
Yoshikko

Yoshikko

the princess has awoken while the prince sleeps on
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da quick to diminish the seriousness of any battling related thread and willingness of ppl to actually post in this forum yet again
 
Dark Azelf

Dark Azelf

☽𖤐☾𓃶𐕣
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Yoshikko said:
da quick to diminish the seriousness of any battling related thread and willingness of ppl to actually post in this forum yet again
Click to expand...

My goal is ironically the opposite young shrew. ;)
 
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Anti

Anti

return of the king
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I'll go through this. Hope it's helpful etc.

Team Preview

Just to preface what I'll say, breaking down the match-up in preview will give you an idea of some underlying assumptions I'll be operating under.

Your team versus his: You have a pretty good match-up, enough that I'd say you had the advantage. Latios is the easiest thing that pops out at you - his team doesn't have a switch-in to Draco Meteor. Also, he has nothing faster than Latias except Victini or Kyurem-B (one of who is presumably Scarfed). Latias Speed tie is bad news for him more than you. Don't sleep on Scizor here either, as Garchomp and Victini both do not have recovery and are easily worn down, and the rest of the team gets shredded up. Also, Scizor walls his entire team except the Victini and Garchomp if it has Fire Blast, so keeping it alive is paramount. Thus, Latios and Scizor-Mega are both suitable win conditions. Weavile can also put in work.

Conversely, Keldeo is walled by half of his team. This is definitely a good candidate as a sacrificial mon should you need it, especially to sponge the first Victini switch-in of his. Your own Victini hates Garchomp and Slowbro, so this would also be a sacrificial candidate, though it has nice utility pressuring Amoonguss and potentially Kyurem-B should Scizor be killed.

His team versus yours: His biggest threat to you is Slowbro-Mega (though Latias could be mega as well but you handle that much more easily with Scizor and Weavile). His other mons are, quite frankly, not very threatening to you; Scizor in particular walls or at least hinders a large portion of his team, as mentioned before. Victini is threatening but you have your own Garchomp to help wear it down and your own Keldeo to...sack, probably. His Garchomp, if it is defensive with Fire Blast (as it would turn out to be), could potentially cause problems for some of your Pokemon but also struggles with Keldeo, Latios, and Weavile. As long as you don't let the Slowbro get rolling, you can apply most of the pressure.

Overall Strategy: First, his team is either SR weak or relies on Regenerator, so getting SR down early is a good way to start. Besides that, force him to make sacrifices early with Latios so long as you can hold off the Slowbro. (Forcing it to M-evo is also good as it curbs Regenerator and will make it easier to wear down, though this is easier said than done.) Wear down the Victini/Chomp and sweep with Scizor.

Lastly, I know this is easier to do in hindsight than when the game is happening, but a quick survey of you team and what he struggles with isn't difficult or time-consuming. Also, the more you use certain teams or even Pokemon, the more intuitive it becomes.

Anyway, onto the battle:

Turn 1

I didn't get this play since the Slowbro is likely to be Mega, and Latios is actually fodder for Mega Slowbro. If you have SD or Toxic on the Chomp, it's actually not a bad opening play even though the risk of a Scald burn is high. At the very least, it puts offensive pressure on him, especially since he...doesn't have a Dragon switch-in aaaaa. I'm assuming you sent in Latios to absorb Scald, and it ended up working since you forced the Slowbro out, but you ended up sacrificing Garchomp (who would have been nice vs. Victini) to do it. That's a tough lead match-up: I might have led off with Weavile since it pressures all of his Pokemon, though Garchomp was a perfectly defensible choice as well.

Turn 6

Very nice forcing him to sack, though it does create an opening for Slowbro. I like the play regardless as Slowbro can be forced out by Victini + Weavile if necessary and getting a free kill is always nice.

Turn 7

You alluded to this play in your post, and yeah, I can't say I agree with it. With your rocks up, that's a play you can make the next time Victini comes in, but you have to know the limitations of Lati's strength here. While defensible as this play would contribute to your overall strategy of wearing Victini down for Scizor, it's a bit premature when you can save a key contributor and let Keldeo sponge a U-turn or V-Create. Since Keldeo isn't helping you much, something like a Bolt Strike is not a catastrophe, and is indeed giving Latios a free switch back in with full SAtk. U-turn was the obvious play on your opponent's part and I think just letting Keldeo take it would have been better. Yeah, he could go into Latias, Amoonguss, or Slowbro, but with Victini/Weavile/Scizor all still intact, Slowbro is hard-pressed to set up all that well and risks a Scald burn or a Specs coverage move. It's a tough position for you to be in, but it's not unworkable. The advantage of your play was that it kept momentum on your side, but at the cost of a key player.

Turn 8

This needs to be a U-turn since he has no reason to risk the Amoonguss when he has Chomp and Slowbro both in. V-Create creates Slowbro fodder/Garchomp recoil. If he does stay in, it's Sporing, and Keldeo is a great candidate to take it for you. Then you can send Victini right back in.

Turn 9

This is risky business with your remaining win-con. You know Garchomp is his SRer since nothing else learns it, so he's probably looking to get that up first, but really, you have to switch Scizor out to scout for Fire Blast. (The miss was very fortunate.) You might as well toss Keldeo in there right away to force it out, and then you can pull a double into Weavile. This whole sequence was rather sloppy.

Turn 13

With Spore being fairly obvious, I would have let Victini take it or even predict the Spore and keep Keldeo in, though the latter play is somewhat dubious. Weavile pressures his whole team and it fell asleep. Victini is much less useful with Garchomp and Slowbro still in the way. I thought this play really hurt you.

Turn 16

This sequence with the Garchomp also caught my attention heading into the next turn as well. I actually would have Roosted here. At this point, he has to switch his Amoonguss out if he wants to keep it alive. If he stays in, no harm done. But since he'll probably switch out, he has a few options. The first is a Victini sack to get his Garchomp in without taking damage. The second is a direct switch to Garchomp. The key point is that either way, you won't quite kill the Garchomp and you'll have to switch out or kill your Scizor in the process of killing the Garchomp. You cannot lose Scizor or your last win condition is gone. You need to recognize Scizor's importance and not let it die. With that in mind, Roost is a conservative but solid play, as you can live to fight another day and bring in Keldeo to hold off Garchomp. (This is where having Weavile awake would help as well, just as added offensive pressure for when Keldeo is inevitably forced out.)

Once you killed off Scizor, the game was over.

Retrospective

I think the biggest thing to emphasize is just that you have to identify key players, sacrificial lambs, and then play accordingly. Keldeo is an especially good example in this battle because not only is it walled, but it actively cedes momentum to major threats on the opposing team like Latias and Slowbro, so its usage has to be strategic.

A lot of times people say that HO is abut making plays, making the right switches, and sacrificing the right Pokemon. Definitely be mindful of the key players you have so you don't put yourself at a disadvantage. You were reacting more than forcing the action on him, and it showed.

It was just a few minor errors to clean up. Some of the plays I suggested are by no means fool-proof and come with their own problems. (For example, switching Keldeo into the Victini could give you a major issue with Slowbro again.) I just got the impression that some of them were made rather carelessly, so I would take my advice not so much as absolute but rather as just something to mull over to that you are more deliberate next time in weighing long-term goals and relating that to short-term risk/reward. We all make lazy plays sometimes, but being really active as a thinker helps to minimize how often they happen.

So yeah, hope that was helpful. I hope it wasn't too discouraging as I've seen you make plenty of good plays before! It's just about being more consistent.
 
Anti

Anti

return of the king
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The crit mattered:

+1 252+ Atk Altaria Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Roserade: 170-200 (65.1 - 76.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Altaria Return vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Roserade: 173-204 (66.2 - 78.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

damage calc

There isn't much about the last two battles...

As for the first one, lots of comments:

- Don't panic against the Lopunny. You get half of your team damaged before you decide what to do against it. Send in Amoonguss and force it out and try to keep it out with offensive pressure. Also, this is a nitpick, but there's no reason to Scald it. This is a needless risk and you're very lucky that it burned. Secret Sword it and ensure the KO.

- Gliscor is a far better Excadrill switch-in than Keldeo (see turn 15). No need to risk your Pokemon to it waking up, and you were fortunate that it SRed (probably assuming Gliscor would come in or that it would leave Amoonguss after setting rocks).

- The Altaria play was okay but it would have been better to toss Heatran in there since you really didn't need it except for Umbreon, who Altaria handles better. You noted worrying about Superpower, but think about the long game. If he OHKOes Heatran with Superpower, what do you do? Remember that you have Keldeo still who can come in and fire off a Secret Sword, which will 2HKO Umbreon or Rotom-W and will OHKO a -1 Def Scizor. That's why I wouldn't have sacked Altaria. Try to think a few turns ahead and weight risk/reward. In that case, risking Heatran is only a short-term risk but not really a long-term one.

- On that same note, there was no reason to just sack the Keldeo to CB Bullet Punch. I don't have anything deep to say except "don't do that." Know if your Pokemon are healthy.

I could write an essay about your opponent's misplays, but you managed pretty well overall.
 
Anti

Anti

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Nolafus said:
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/ou-220030780

Yeah, I won, but I feel like my beginning game was really sloppy. I don't think I should have sacked two of my most potent sweepers that early on, so any tips?
Click to expand...

sorry this will be truncated, if you have any follow-up questions etc. i can go in-depth more.

the biggest thing i saw from that battle playing out is that you each had pseudo-wincons that were walls, him heatran and you hippowdon. really, glancing at team preview, the only thing that he has that really uses hippowdon as fodder to deal serious damage to you is clefable. landorus-t can annoy it but if it's scarf (turned out not to be) then it's possible to wear it down. np thund is upset alert a bit what what can you do lol, and you averted the crisis.

this was a pretty tough match-up for you as you really don't have a good heatran switch-in at all. i might have tried to get lati in earlier to trick it or clefable which would have improved your odds tremendously, though of course it did come in handy against the thundurus.

you got pretty fortunate that he needless risked his clefable to your scizor twice (resulting in its death) when you didn't really have good answers for it. normally i try to play aggressively against stuff i'm weak to and pull off some double switches to try to keep momentum, but as i have been talking with you i do know that you're still picking up ou and that's probably something to tackle once you are more used to the metagame.

this might sound like annoying/cheeky advice, but i might just try to cover heatran more in your teambuilding as luring with cb superpower from scizor is tricky business. then again, can't cover everything in oras. heatran is pretty common though, so i might look at eq over hp fire on the lati since trick already cripples ferrothorn plenty? it's a bit burn weak but what can you do eh?

anyway, solid effort.
 
Polar Spectrum

Polar Spectrum

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This, is a great concept for a thread, imo there's a huge lack of emphasis on actual battling in the Battling and Team Building section. And how the hell can you deny that it's an integral part.


Anywho to contribute what little I can;

srinator said:
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/pokecommunity-ou-151615
Click to expand...

First, who was your answer for rocks? Charizard has to come in sadly before he can only be 2x weak instead of 4. And what are Shaymin's other two moves? Was switching Landorus out on the obvious leaf storm an option? Does your Char X run Dragon Dance btw? Taking the tailwind to KO serperior was obvious better than dying to dragon pulse, just curious.
 

srinator

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Polar Spectrum said:
First, who was your answer for rocks? Charizard has to come in sadly before he can only be 2x weak instead of 4. And what are Shaymin's other two moves? Was switching Landorus out on the obvious leaf storm an option? Does your Char X run Dragon Dance btw? Taking the tailwind to KO serperior was obvious better than dying to dragon pulse, just curious.
Click to expand...

i did not have one for that battle.
seed flare and earthpower none of which could ko serp and i did not die to dragon pulse. well technically.
yes its a dd char x.
 
Anti

Anti

return of the king
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AmourPearlShipper said:
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/ou-222875387

I won, but I think I screwed up in the early-game.
Click to expand...

honestly not a whole lot to say about this match, but i'll toss in some observations.

first, this isn't on your play, but running a team with no ground resists or immunes is asking for trouble. i might consider a tornadus-t over goodra who i don't like on rain despite hydration as it is a momentum killer more than anything. can't say it was surprising to see it as the easiest sac candidate. sometimes a legitimate conclusion from a replay is "i need to change this team" and i'd take that opportunity here; in the turn 8/9 range your opponent opted to send his thund in when garchomp was basically going to get a free kill for the remainder of the match, and the major ground weakness was the main contributing factor to that. (and if that chomp had sd, omg lol.)

anyway, turn 1 was the only early game play i found worthy of much critique. i'm not sure if you have a secondary rain setter, but if not, that was a needlessly reckless play and i think a goodra sack made much more sense there when you can let that poke die and then have the same RK sequence with seismitoad that you had. of course, this is predicated on my steadfast belief that goodra is p bad and surprise surprise gets manhandled by like all of the opp's team bar thundurus lol.

turn 10 was weird to me. i don't know your amph evs, but this calc is not promising:

252 SpA Life Orb Thundurus Focus Blast vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Mega Ampharos: 153-181 (47.5 - 56.2%) -- 81.6% chance to 2HKO

even this isn't really as it's still a roll:

252 SpA Life Orb Thundurus Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Mega Ampharos: 153-181 (39.8 - 47.1%)

i'd have to see the evs but sub was kind of asking for disaster, and i didn't really see why you'd do that? dragon pulse is going to hit everything hard so there's no need to risk it/kill off a quarter of your health. also curious about sub m amph when that seems like it's just going to kill the tempo on a team archetype that wants to use its rain turns as preciously as possible etc. agility there would pretty much win the game...

that's about it on my end. the kabu sac was a nice play recognizing the importance of scizor.
 
skyburial

skyburial

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Would we be able to open this up to cartridge players as well? I'm training for VGC Spring Regionals and don't want to spoil my team for my soon-to-be opponents over at Nugget Bridge.
 
Nah

Nah

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Archer99 said:
Ok, I want to know what went wrong here. It was pretty much a clean battle.

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/pokecommunity-ou-154779
Click to expand...
Someone else can probably offer more advice but there were 2 errors that I think you made. First was that you let Talonflame die too soon. Yours isn't one of the bulky ones so it ain't taking hits worth a shit, especially after BB recoil, and Mega Anti's Bird has enough power to shred frailer pokes. Should've swapped out for Diancie since it pretty much walls it. Talonflame was your only answer to Bronzong, which he screwed you with later in the match. The other thing is that you should've set up Stealth Rock earlier. Anti's team lacks any sort of hazard removal, and SR would've made things harder for him and his bird.
 
Polar Spectrum

Polar Spectrum

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skyburial said:
Would we be able to open this up to cartridge players as well? I'm training for VGC Spring Regionals and don't want to spoil my team for my soon-to-be opponents over at Nugget Bridge.
Click to expand...

I don't know who else has the capabilities to do so; but I can at least watch your replays and critique. And I'm not on Nugget Bridge spreadn' yer team builds around so heh.
 
Anti

Anti

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skyburial said:
Would we be able to open this up to cartridge players as well? I'm training for VGC Spring Regionals and don't want to spoil my team for my soon-to-be opponents over at Nugget Bridge.
Click to expand...

You're free to, but I know absolutely nothing about VGCs and won't be able to help much.

Archer99 said:
Ok, I want to know what went wrong here. It was pretty much a clean battle.

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/pokecommunity-ou-154779
Click to expand...

I'll run down what stood out to me.

Turn 3: Zekrom is absolutely right about this. Swampert is my only SD Talonflame check besides recoil, and it gets a free set-up on Shaymin. This is definitely a potential win-con, and even if it's not, its revenge killing capacity against most of my team makes it something to keep alive.

This needed to be a BP into Keldeo. I do not have a Fighting resist, and you have Specs Secret Sword. You're faster than Pidgeot before its M-evo, but I instead got a free shot at your Talonflame, which I knew I needed to kill, even if it meant severely wounding Pidgeot. Keldeo keeps the pressure on me and forces me to RK with Shaymin, which is very favorable for you since you can use Celebi or Talon to easily grab momentum back from it. Diancie would have been acceptable as well, as Zekrom said, as it forces me to go into my Bronzong, who is very passive and exploitable, as Turn 15 gives an idea of.

Turn 7: No reason not to BP here. Since you really don't have any switch-ins to Pidgeot (Diancie is extreme shaky, especially if it gets confused, and can only come in once), you are taking a big risk trying to NastyPass. Even if the reward is high (and I would actually dispute that), you needless ceded momentum here. You never really got it back, as the U-turn/double switch/U-turn/Hurricane sequence over the next few turns demonstrates. This play might have had a bigger impact than you realize.

Turn 12: This is the proper sac. Of course, you want to minimize these, but it's inevitable with an aggressive team like yours and making the right play in those situations is very important. At this point in the game, you have to wear down the Bronzong for a Diancie sweep.

Turn 17: Not play critique really, but I want to point out what happened in the sequence leading up to this turn. Here, you retake some momentum and force me to sac my lesser Pokemon to keep Bronzong alive. With Swampert and Feraligatr dead, I am able to get my Pidgeot in safely and force you to do the same, but it's actually pretty important to keep forcing sacrifices, even if I will eventually force you to do the same.

Turn 18: I'm not sure I agree with this sac. I might have foddered Landorus here. Keldeo gets a free kill every switch-in while Landorus does not. While Landorus has defensive value against Hurricane and can lay SR, but I think I might have killed it off. The reason lies in the situation at that time:

Anti's Team
Pidgeot (in): 27%
Bronzong: 48%
Hydreigon: 100%
Shaymin: 100%

Archer's Team
Keldeo (in): 26%
Diancie: 84%
Landorus: 100%
Celebi: 90%

Keldeo gets a free kill still and can come in on Bronzong or Hydreigon on an RK. I'm not sure my alternative is the right play (I can't quite decide), but I'll just lay out the alternative. Take it with a grain of salt though.

Turn 21: I didn't agree with this play. If you haven't gotten your Rocks up by the time late game rolls around (and this is late game), then it might be worth considering going for more immediate damage. On my end, I was hoping for a Focus Blast to miss, and with a 51% chance for that to happen, I didn't mind those odds. There wasn't really anything you could have done to stop Healing Wish, but Bronzong has no recovery and Landorus could have removed it. If both Focus Blasts connect, Diancie wins unless I get a Hurricane confusion. At the very least, I Focus Blast here and see what happens. If it misses, then laying SR and trying to wear it out with Celebi (with the threat of a Giga Drain killing Pidgeot on the switch-in being the impetus for laying Rocks) becomes a reasonable play. If not, then you absolutely take that 70% chance to win the game on the next turn. It sucks when games come down to praying something hits, but sometimes it really is the best play, and I think it was here.

Endgame: All I want to point out here is that Magic Bounce bounces back Hypnosis. That said, this was mostly just a guessing game though where I just had to get Pidgeot in safely on Celebi with Bronzong healthy enough to tank Moonblast (after SR) to win. You seemed to recognize this Giga Draining, and I was definitely afraid of you doubling into Diancie after I initially put Celebi to sleep. Nothing to really critique here as this is all just guessing really.


Concluding thoughts: Going to echo Zekrom here: I didn't point this out as I skipped doing a team preview analysis, but I actually think this game was pretty simple and I'd take this paragraph more seriously than the others. I think you lost the game by not getting up SR earlier and taxing my switches into no recovery Bronzong and SR weak Pidgeot. As these were the thorns in your side, the SR "switch tax" would have been enormously helpful for you and would have made my execution much trickier. Zekrom is absolutely 100% right, and translating that to specific game circumstances, Turn 7 could have been a BP right into Landorus (albeit sacking it to Pidgeot to lay SR, but that's a long term play) or even Turn 3. I think recognizing the importance of this would have won you the match, as my team has quite a few holes which I shield by the momentum Pidgeot provides.
 
skyburial

skyburial

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What could I have done better in this battle?

VP2W-WWWW-WWXR-56TW

- I was concerned about hard switching into any of my Pokemon
- The lead matchup was less than ideal.
- I left Mega Altaria on the bench because of Mega Beedrill and Gardevoir, and Support Lucario because of Landorus-T and Mega Beedrill. Although in hindsight, I could have resisted all of Beedrill's STABs, so Follow Me! + Rock Slide might have netted the beast.

Edit: More on this

252 Atk Adaptability Mega Beedrill U-turn vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Lucario: 30-35 (16.9 - 19.7%) -- guaranteed 6HKO

252 Atk Mega Beedrill Drill Run vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Lucario: 136-162 (76.8 - 91.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252 SpA Choice Specs Gardevoir Draining Kiss vs. 252 HP / 228+ SpD Lucario: 58-69 (32.7 - 38.9%) -- 98.9% chance to 3HKO

(I assume it was Specs because of Draining Kiss's damage output)

- I thought Lando-T was for sure going to be Choice Scarf. Is this not typical of Volt Turn cores?

Other than that, everything on my team answered at least 2 things that he brought.

My wins are not as close as they were last week and my losses have been brutal 3-0's an 4-0's.

Set Details:
- Focus Sash Terrakion w/Quick Guard as the 4th move
- Confuse Ray/Recover/Giga Drain/Ancient Power on Cradily, standard Physically Defensive VGC spread
- Assault Vest Entei
- Angel Miranda's Expert Belt Swampert
- 252 HP/252 Def Impish Mega Altaria with Wonder Room, Tailwind, Return and Roost
- Chople Berry 252 HP/28 SpA/228 SpD Calm Lucario with Vacuum Wave, Follow Me!, Protect, and Helping Hand

Thanks, guys.
 
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