Moveset Help & Other Questions

No Chance Without Zekrom said:

A mixed Arceus is a rare sight. It depends on what form/type/plate your Arceus is. So what's its form?

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IDK really, I just got a cool 6IV naive one, any plate will do haha

I've been away from the Pokemon world since Gold and Silver, with the exception of a brief dip into Platinum. I've beaten Y, I have X and have not touched it at all. I'm at the victory mountain (or w/e) on Pokemon white and that's as far as my pokemon experience goes.


I really want to get into competitive pokemon battles, the only problem is I have no idea what I'm doing, AND I don't have any event pokemon at all, no Jirachi, no Celebi, nothing like that. Would I still be viable in a competitive battle? My plan was to beat pokemon White and get those legendaries under lock and key b4 PokeBank launched in NA, but I failed at that miserably.

With PokeBank out now and everyone's ungodly RNG pokemon now in X and Y, will I stand a chance if I attempt to get "in the game" or should I just stick to casually battling randoms here and there?

Please note that I have 0 experience with competitive battling, so it's not just the fact that I lack all these Uber pokemon, I lack the experience as well.

Managrimm said:

Are there any Ghost types that make good special tanks besides Jellicent or is he my best bet?

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Besides specially defensive Aegislash (which occasionally sees use due to the surprise factor), you'll have to make do with Jellicent. Here's specially defensive Aegislash if you're curious:
-Shadow Ball
-Pursuit
-Toxic
-King's Shield
Nature: Sassy
EVs: 252 HP/4 Def/252 SDef
Item: Leftovers

Corrosive said:

I've been away from the Pokemon world since Gold and Silver, with the exception of a brief dip into Platinum. I've beaten Y, I have X and have not touched it at all. I'm at the victory mountain (or w/e) on Pokemon white and that's as far as my pokemon experience goes.


I really want to get into competitive pokemon battles, the only problem is I have no idea what I'm doing, AND I don't have any event pokemon at all, no Jirachi, no Celebi, nothing like that. Would I still be viable in a competitive battle? My plan was to beat pokemon White and get those legendaries under lock and key b4 PokeBank launched in NA, but I failed at that miserably.

With PokeBank out now and everyone's ungodly RNG pokemon now in X and Y, will I stand a chance if I attempt to get "in the game" or should I just stick to casually battling randoms here and there?

Please note that I have 0 experience with competitive battling, so it's not just the fact that I lack all these Uber pokemon, I lack the experience as well.

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You can still battle competitively even without event Pokemon. Most people have successfully battled without them. I think you should practice against some randoms before you decide.

Which eevee evolution?

Hi,
I have caught an eevee and i have a water stone, fire stone and a thunderstone. I can't decide which to use on eevee. I am thinking of using a thunderstone because i don't have any electric types but i'm not 100% sure. what to you think i should use?

I think you should use the thunderstone. Jolteon is arguably the strongest eevelution and one of the best electricity type pokemons. If you already have a fire and water type pokemons the answer should be obvious.

dontstay96 said:

IDK really, I just got a cool 6IV naive one, any plate will do haha

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Ok. What makes for a good mixed Arceus.....


The only ones I can think of are Rock Arceus, Ground Arceus, and Ghost Arceus. Because Judgment is specially based and is the same type as the plate it holds, Rock and Ground Arceus can pack a special based Rock and Ground attack, which is pretty rare (those types are often physically based). So for them, you could try something like this:


-Arceus w/Stone Plate
Nature: Naive
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Sp.Attack
Moves: Judgment, Earthquake, Calm Mind, Recover/Refresh/Extreme Speed


-Arceus w/Earth Plate
Nature: Naive
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Sp.Attack
Moves: Judgment, Stone Edge, Calm Mind, Recover/Refresh/Extreme Speed


These 2 basically act the same, just with the Ground and Rock attacks physical/special being swapped. The nice thing about these is that it gives Arceus good mixed offenses since it has the Attack EVs but can boost its Sp.Attack with Calm Mind, which also gives it more resistance to the Water and Grass attacks they don't like, while posing as a common Calm Mind Arceus which may trick your opponent into switching in a special wall that will get promptly killed by the physical attack. Ground and Rock also get fantastic (netural) coverage together.


Oh these sound so good, I wanna try them out on Showdown....


Ghost gets good coverage by itself since Game Freak thought it was a good idea to remove Steel's resistance to Ghost, so try this for Ghost Arceus:


-Arceus w/Spooky Plate
Nature: Naïve
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Sp.Attack
Moves: Shadow Force/Shadow Claw, Judgment, Brick Break/Focus Blast, Calm Mind


or


-Arceus w/Spooky Plate
Nature: Naïve
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Sp.Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Attack
Moves: Shadow Force/Shadow Claw, Judgment, Brick Break/Focus Blast, Swords Dance


Like the sets for Rock and Ground Arceus, you can probably trick your opponent into thinking that Arceus is just physical or just special based (because 99.9% of all Arceus's are like that) when really its mixed. Set up and blast away!


Whatcha all think of that?

Hi all, I've been Masuda Method breeding for a shiny Shinx for my friend, since Luxray is his favorite pokemon. However I also want to make sure it's viable in competitive battling, so through some work I've got a Japanese male Absol with perfect IVs in everything but special attack (holding destiny knot), and an English female Shinx with the same IVs, and I've made sure the Shinx is Jolly (holding everstone) and has Guts so I've been passing all that down too (hoping for either guts or intimidate!). However in looking up movesets for a good Luxray, everything seems to include Ice Fang... I definitely don't have a 5IV male foreign pokemon with Ice Fang lol, so I can't pass it down, ]: Is Ice Fang actually needed?

And good moveset suggestions for Jolly Luxray would be highly appreciated [:

Shhmew said:

Hi all, I've been Masuda Method breeding for a shiny Shinx for my friend, since Luxray is his favorite pokemon. However I also want to make sure it's viable in competitive battling, so through some work I've got a Japanese male Absol with perfect IVs in everything but special attack (holding destiny knot), and an English female Shinx with the same IVs, and I've made sure the Shinx is Jolly (holding everstone) and has Guts so I've been passing all that down too (hoping for either guts or intimidate!). However in looking up movesets for a good Luxray, everything seems to include Ice Fang... I definitely don't have a 5IV male foreign pokemon with Ice Fang lol, so I can't pass it down, ]: Is Ice Fang actually needed?

And good moveset suggestions for Jolly Luxray would be highly appreciated [:

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Ice Fang isn't that necessary. However, you'll need Black 2/White 2 for this set, as Superpower is one of Luxray's staple moves:
-Wild Charge
-Facade
-Superpower
-Crunch
Nature: Jolly
EVs: 4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spe
Item: Toxic Orb/Flame Orb
Ability: Guts

PlatinumDude said:

Ice Fang isn't that necessary. However, you'll need Black 2/White 2 for this set, as Superpower is one of Luxray's staple moves:
-Wild Charge
-Facade
-Superpower
-Crunch
Nature: Jolly
EVs: 4 HP/252 Atk/252 Spe
Item: Toxic Orb/Flame Orb
Ability: Guts

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Well dang... I literally have nothing on older games to breed with, so I guess I can't get Superpower. ;-; Hopefully whatever the next game is has a Superpower tutor?

Also, with Luxray burned by the Flame Orb, does the attack raise take place instead of the attack drop that Burn normally gives, because of Guts? And what would be a good item if the shiny happens to have Intimidate (or Rivalry, god forbid)?

Either way, I guess it's not gonna be that great ; -;

I usually like to raise multiples of the same pokemon with different sets, both to surprise friends and just to enjoy different strategies with my favorite pokemon. With that in mind, I have access to 3 Celebi. Two from the HGSS event (with Nasty Plot) which have access to 4th/5th gen tutors, and the one from Pokebank. The first two are Bold (IVs average at 24) and Careful (might not use this one if there's nothing unique I could do with it); the one from Pokebank is Quiet with 31/31/x/x/31/31.

What are the best movesets/spreads for each? Are there certain roles I could allocate to them differently, such as a Baton Passer, Cleric, Stealth Rocker, Perish Songer, etc? Or am I better off just running the same set on some of them?

Shhmew said:

Well dang... I literally have nothing on older games to breed with, so I guess I can't get Superpower. ;-; Hopefully whatever the next game is has a Superpower tutor?

Also, with Luxray burned by the Flame Orb, does the attack raise take place instead of the attack drop that Burn normally gives, because of Guts? And what would be a good item if the shiny happens to have Intimidate (or Rivalry, god forbid)?

Either way, I guess it's not gonna be that great ; -;

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Guts ignores the Attack drop from burn.

Shrew said:

I usually like to raise multiples of the same pokemon with different sets, both to surprise friends and just to enjoy different strategies with my favorite pokemon. With that in mind, I have access to 3 Celebi. Two from the HGSS event (with Nasty Plot) which have access to 4th/5th gen tutors, and the one from Pokebank. The first two are Bold (IVs average at 24) and Careful (might not use this one if there's nothing unique I could do with it); the one from Pokebank is Quiet with 31/31/x/x/31/31.

What are the best movesets/spreads for each? Are there certain roles I could allocate to them differently, such as a Baton Passer, Cleric, Stealth Rocker, Perish Songer, etc? Or am I better off just running the same set on some of them?

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Quiet wastes away Celebi's good Speed. Careful is pointless as well, since Celebi learns more special moves than physical ones. The Bold Celebi is your best bet:
-Giga Drain/Psychic
-Recover
-Baton Pass/U-turn
-Perish Song/Thunder Wave/Stealth Rock
Nature: Bold
EVs: 248 HP/240 SDef/20 Spe
Item: Leftovers

What do you guys think of this Kingdra build?

Kingdra @ Leftovers

Nature: Timid
Ability: Sniper
EVs: 252 SpAtk/252 Spe/4 HP

~ Surf
~ Dragon Pulse
~ Flash Cannon
~ Agility

Or for a physical build (though I like the Special one a little more):

Kingdra @ Weakness Policy

Ability: Sniper/Swift Swim
Nature: Adamant/Jolly
EVs: 252 Atk/176 Spe/72 HP/8 SpD

~ Outrage
~ Dragon Dance
~ Waterfall
~ Return/Giga Impact

Ars Arcanum said:

What do you guys think of this Kingdra build?

Kingdra @ Leftovers

Nature: Timid
EVs: 252 SpAtk/252 Spe/4 HP

~ Surf
~ Dragon Pulse
~ Flash Cannon
~ Agility

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Kingdra isn't that strong, tbh. It's best used as an abuser of critical hits or rain:
-Focus Energy
-Hydro Pump/Surf
-Draco Meteor
-Agility
Nature: Modest
EVs: 252 SAtk/4 SDef/252 Spe
Item: Scope Lens
Ability: Sniper

or
-Hydro Pump
-Draco Meteor
-Rain Dance/Outrage
-Waterfall/Surf/Ice Beam
Nature: Rash/Modest
EVs: 76 Atk/4 Def/252 SAtk/176 Spe
Item: Life Orb
Ability: Swift Swim

No Chance Without Zekrom said:

Ok. What makes for a good mixed Arceus.....


The only ones I can think of are Rock Arceus, Ground Arceus, and Ghost Arceus. Because Judgment is specially based and is the same type as the plate it holds, Rock and Ground Arceus can pack a special based Rock and Ground attack, which is pretty rare (those types are often physically based). So for them, you could try something like this:


-Arceus w/Stone Plate
Nature: Naive
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Sp.Attack
Moves: Judgment, Earthquake, Calm Mind, Recover/Refresh/Extreme Speed


-Arceus w/Earth Plate
Nature: Naive
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Sp.Attack
Moves: Judgment, Stone Edge, Calm Mind, Recover/Refresh/Extreme Speed


These 2 basically act the same, just with the Ground and Rock attacks physical/special being swapped. The nice thing about these is that it gives Arceus good mixed offenses since it has the Attack EVs but can boost its Sp.Attack with Calm Mind, which also gives it more resistance to the Water and Grass attacks they don't like, while posing as a common Calm Mind Arceus which may trick your opponent into switching in a special wall that will get promptly killed by the physical attack. Ground and Rock also get fantastic (netural) coverage together.


Oh these sound so good, I wanna try them out on Showdown....


Ghost gets good coverage by itself since Game Freak thought it was a good idea to remove Steel's resistance to Ghost, so try this for Ghost Arceus:


-Arceus w/Spooky Plate
Nature: Naïve
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Sp.Attack
Moves: Shadow Force/Shadow Claw, Judgment, Brick Break/Focus Blast, Calm Mind


or


-Arceus w/Spooky Plate
Nature: Naïve
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Sp.Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Attack
Moves: Shadow Force/Shadow Claw, Judgment, Brick Break/Focus Blast, Swords Dance


Like the sets for Rock and Ground Arceus, you can probably trick your opponent into thinking that Arceus is just physical or just special based (because 99.9% of all Arceus's are like that) when really its mixed. Set up and blast away!


Whatcha all think of that?

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Oh man the rock and ground sets look sooo awesome!!!!

Which nature is better for a Choice Band Rampardos: Jolly or Adamant?

No Chance Without Zekrom said:

Which nature is better for a Choice Band Rampardos: Jolly or Adamant?

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Adamant is the best way to go for the sheer power.

fire fang, iron head or stonde edge on a garchomp?

dontstay96 said:

fire fang, iron head or stonde edge on a garchomp?

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Your pick between Fire Fang or Stone Edge. If you struggle with Ferrothorn, Forretress, Scizor and Skarmory, use Thunder Fang. If you don't like having Garchomp unable to do much to Togekiss, use Stone Edge.

I'm curious as to the viability of a Belly Drum Charizard X. I fell in love with Y when it was announced but I've decided to check out X finally. I'm thinking this set with the following helper.

Charizard @ Charizardite X
Blaze -> Tough Claws
6 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Speed
Jolly / Adamant? Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Dragon Claw
- Belly Drum
- Roost

Two strong STAB attacks with the obvious boosting skill and Roost to heal away damage. I'm thinking Defog support is best.

Mandibuzz @ Leftovers
Overcoat
252 HP / (Mixed/Physical/Special???)
Nature to go with above EV set up
- Defog
- Tailwind
- Roost / Toxic
- Knock Off / Foul Play

I really only know I want Defog and Tailwind, the other skills have their uses but not sure what to decide. Defog is mandatory for removing hazards for Charizard to come in. Tailwind could be used to assist Charizard in the Speed department for help setting up. Does Mandibuzz learn U-Turn? That would help the transition. I'll look into that.

I was also thinking maybe a Duel Screener could help. Something durable for multiple switch ins if need be, hazards are pointless with Defog. Screens would help Charizard take minimal damage while boosting. This, no hazards and Roost on Charizard are important due to Belly Drums life cost.

In short, Duel Screens to take minimal damage, Defog to remove SR, Tailwind to boost Speed, Charizard comes in, boosts, heals, smashes.

I'm curious as to the viability of a Belly Drum Charizard X. I fell in love with Y when it was announced but I've decided to check out X finally. I'm thinking this set with the following helper.

Charizard @ Charizardite X
Blaze -> Tough Claws
6 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Species
Jolly / Adamant? Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Dragon Claw
- Belly Drum
- Roost

Two strong STAB attacks with the obvious boosting skill and Roost to heal away damage. I'm thinking Defog support is best.

Mandibuzz @ Leftovers
Overcoat
252 HP / (Mixed/Physical/Special???)
Nature to go with above EV set up
- Defog
- Tailwind
- Roost / Toxic
- Knock Off / Foul Play

I really only know I want Defog and Tailwind, the other skills have their uses but not sure what to decide. Defog is mandatory for removing hazards for Charizard to come in. Tailwind could be used to assist Charizard in the Speed department for help setting up. Does Mandibuzz learn U-Turn? That would help the transition. I'll look into that.

I was also thinking maybe a Duel Screener could help. Something durable for multiple switch ins if need be, hazards are pointless with Defog. Screens would help Charizard take minimal damage while boosting. This, no hazards and Roost on Charizard are important due to Belly Drums life cost.

In short, Duel Screens to take minimal damage, Defog to remove SR, Tailwind to boost Speed, Charizard comes in, boosts, heals, smashes.