Old timer coming back, looking for insight

Hey all,

I've been playing Pokemon White fairly casually, and while I knew there was some degree of depth I have not been given a real reason until recently to look into it. Long story short, some younger family and some old friends have been bringing me back into it, what hooked me was when someone was bringing up the comparison to many fighting/RTS games I play, and sure enough I was finding that level of depth as I continued reading.

That being said, it's pretty hard to keep up with the nieces and nephews time-tables (Darn you real life getting in the way!), and after jumping into a couple of online games I came to realize just how sorely out of my depth I really am.

As it stands I am currently re-beating white (Used up alot of Items I started realizing I really should have saved), with a very basic (and I'd say inept) stall-team build I started working on just to get the feel for stall, the type of group I am looking to build.

The team I currently am trying to level/evolve/etc. while going through the game is Petilil, Trubbish, Roggenrola, Yamask, Tympole (Hope to replace with a Cloyster for Spikes and Defense), Sigilyph. I am aware if this team is even remotely close to Stall, it's still probably terrible due to being the wrong natures, I still have no idea what I am doing as far as EVs and IVs (Still reading and trying to understand them), and probably a boatload of other reasons I am ignorant to.

Yup, I R n00blet.

So as I browse the forums, I start wondering how do you even get started in making a team that is competitive? Any advice for the grind in general? I know I'll probably go back and pick up the pokemon for this team again, looking at natures and keeping the lowest leveled one just for those tiny bonuses, but how long does it typically take for you guys to develop a team once you have an 'idea' you want to try?

Are there things I can do while I am going through the game (again) to make it easier on myself when I start trying to play online? Would it be to my benefit to stay to the NU/RU/UU format to start earlier? Personally I'd rather not be playing with legendary-focused teams, but that's what I kept running into in my few ventures into online, so is the other leagues something organized on the side?

Cant remember where I read it, but apparently it is also bad-form to use stuff like Sand-Attack and whatever else reduces accuracy. Is this adhered to online or is this more of a gentleman's agreement?

Truthfully, I'm probably reading the guides posted right now, but it's alot of information to take in, and alot of it seems really long-term since I gotta finish my new play-through, but I'd like any feedback, thoughts, suggestions, etc.

Anyway, there is alot more but I'll end this before this page evolves into a true wall of text.

Take care,

-MD

Hi there.

I think the first point I'm going to make here is that the games and the competitive environment are not as similar as people often make them out to be. Competitive pokemon is primarily played on simulators [though wifi works too] and honestly, bears a lot more resemblance to chess than the Pokemon games, at times. The Pokemon you use are often different from the ones you raised in games [especially since you used up all your EV points on them]; the ones on simulators are all there for you to use, and people often use "legal hacks" on wifi [use an AR to generate a competitive-apt Pokemon, but not illegal, aka 900 in all stats, or get EV-trained ones from traders/breeders.

The second point I'm gonna make here is one a lot of people miss, and that is that not every Pokemon is viable/usable/good, even in the lower metagames. The Pokemon you listed are all pretty bad by OU's standards, and with the exception of Lilligant, Sigilyph and Yamask/Cofagrigus, NU's standards, NU being the lowest tier. An example of an OU stall team might look something like:

Skarmory/Celebi/Heatran/Latias/Hippowdon/Starmie

Not sure if that's a great build, but most stall teams in OU are built from the cores of a few Pokemon and the best stall teams often don't diverge much from each other [although there are some separate builds of stall, such as Sand Stall which utilizes Sand Stream]. A stall team also has Pokemon doing certain things, Skarmory is responsible for putting down Spikes, which do damage to Pokemon switching in [lots of switching in the metagame; this is how stall handles strong offensive teams and keeps their opponents at bay]. That's just a small portion of what there is about the metagame and stall, I reccomend reading articles on smogon.com to learn more, more specifically their introduction to competitive Pokemon http://www.smogon.com/dp/articles/intro_comp_pokemon

For tiers, I reccomend starting with OU, just because it's what everyone plays, and the Pokemon are fun and easy to use; plus you can use pretty much anything [except the Ubers, which is a different and harder-to-learn metagame] so you can experiment a lot. I wouldn't worry about having to use legends, a lot of them are just small contributors that are useful more because of their balanced offensive/defensive capabilities [Jirachi, Heatran, etc] than being overpowered; not every legend is good in the meta.

On the subject of sand attack, it is considered bad form to some people, since you're basically luck-fishing, but it's also a bad idea. Sand attack doesn't always work [neither do some other luck based moves or strategies], and when it doesn't; you're essentially wasting a turn, that your opponent could use to set up a swords dance or a substitute, putting you in a dire situation; make every turn count and go towards some way of beating your opponent. Also, evasion boosters like double team are banned anyways; though the accuracy lowering ones aren't.

Good luck in your pursuit of competitive pocket monsters!

Thanks for the replies!

Yea, I am currently about to finish my loooong weekend and am just beating the Elite Four (Currently level grinding). The more I read, the more I am disappointed that the Pokemon I am actually excited to use are basically Roll-tier (Pardon, MvC pun). I guess I need to hold off on working on a Stall team and just focus on a very basic coverage team. Kinda bites not being able to use them but them's the breaks when looking at this game compeditivly, and I am just now getting my eyes oppened to a whole new method of play.

Now, to keep this from being flooded as another 'rate my team' thread and keeping it on rails to a more beginner oriented theme, I am currently wondering what would be my best bet after beating the Elite Four. I know I gotta go hunting to fill out the pokemon I do have avalible to start playing with as teams, but as I am told, the idea goes something like this:

Grab the pokemon female you need for your team
Mate with a compatible male who may pass on a needed move (Spikes are the big one I am told)
Keep making eggs until you get a pokemon with a complimentery nature that's level 1
Use XP Share to level it up/Evolve it
Once it's at a level where it can EV train effectivly, start EV training
Once it is EV trained and evolved, throw it in the pokemon daycare to finish leveling it to 100 while you are repeating the process with another lvl1.

That about sum it up?