Pokemon: Personal Preferences or The Best

Which do you prefer to battle/use? Pokemon you like for whatever reason, or pokemon
other people say are better/best?

I personally go for what I like, even if it does have weaknesses that many people tend to exploit. I think that if I train right, and develop good strategies, I can make any pokemon into a Winner. I understand though, that there are vast differences in base stats, but if I EV train enough, it shouldn't be too bad right?

Many people feel that they need to tell me how to make a team or that I should throw away "this" pokemon because it's junk. D: that makes me feel bad, because I like that pokemon and usually have some sort of bond with it.

Yes, a young adult who has feelings for animated pixels xP.

I choose my team on a mix of both. I will only use pokes i like, but i will not pick crap ones because there would no point of playing if i was going to lose.

I find out which types I want on my team, then pick pokemon I'm fond of matching those types. The only reason I'll choose.... Ninetales over Charizard is because it's better looking. :3

Maybe I should have picked mixed....Because I wouldn't just send out a caterpie xD

I like things like Seviper and Ariados, but people always go "EW TERRIBLE CHOICES YOU NOOB!" ANd while I acknowledge their wide range of weaknesses, I try to form strategies to compensate.

Well, I mainly use both. I try building up a well-balanced team from early to mid-game just because of the lack of my favorite Pokemon. Once I unlocked the GTS, I started transferring.

Glaceon_ said:

I wouldn't call mine a mixed selection, because its pretty random at what I choose to use in a team. All of the ones I use currently, I pretty much use because I like them, which is why I've not started training a Garchomp, yet. XD

However, I think it will turn mixed, because I'm looking at expanding on my team selection, and to do that, I'll need to start picking Pokemon that I likely don't entirely like. But at current, I'm still in the area of "use what I like". I think it'll be a while, before I start going towards efficiency, and mixing my teams with different types of Pokemon, such as Physical attackers, and walls, and stuff like that. (a lot of my Pokemon are more attackers, than shields)

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Pretty much the same as me, then. I want to get a Garchomp, but I just can't be bothered -_-

But I did recently train a Sceptile, only to find out that it doesn't actually outrun my friend's Deoxys (which I thought it would). And I have two different Lickilickys and Cradilys trained, for some reason. Probably because I think they're pretty awesome, though they're not that good in battle.

My team is stocked full of my favorites. It just so happens that my favorites are also battle efficient.:)

My personal preferences are strong Pokemon. Pokemon that serve me well in battle become my favorites. :D

I always pick my favorites, like Sceptile, Lucario, Persian, Froslass, etc.

Go with the favorites. If you use only "Powerhouses" it's not personal. A friend of mine only uses Lv. 100 Legendaries because he desperately needs to win. Everytime I battle him it feels impersonal. I feel that battling with my favorites gives my opponents a chance to battle ME as well as my Pokes. I dont even use an HM Slave while traversing the map, I just find a way to take my HM moves and turn them into sound battle strategies. If you use your favorites, I've come to realize, you tend to get better at strategy and training as opposed to a powerhouse team.

sirboulevard said:

Go with the favorites. If you use only "Powerhouses" it's not personal. A friend of mine only uses Lv. 100 Legendaries because he desperately needs to win. Everytime I battle him it feels impersonal. I feel that battling with my favorites gives my opponents a chance to battle ME as well as my Pokes. I dont even use an HM Slave while traversing the map, I just find a way to take my HM moves and turn them into sound battle strategies. If you use your favorites, I've come to realize, you tend to get better at strategy and training as opposed to a powerhouse team.

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That's exactly how I feel about my pokemon. It feels like they're another part of me in the battle, and they represent all my work.

This topic has been brought up so many times, I think I'll give it another go.

I like things like Seviper and Ariados, but people always go "EW TERRIBLE CHOICES YOU NOOB!" ANd while I acknowledge their wide range of weaknesses, I try to form strategies to compensate.

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Just because we use a more competitive and strategic form of battling does not degrade us to snobs. ;/

sirboulevard said:

Go with the favorites. If you use only "Powerhouses" it's not personal. A friend of mine only uses Lv. 100 Legendaries because he desperately needs to win. Everytime I battle him it feels impersonal. I feel that battling with my favorites gives my opponents a chance to battle ME as well as my Pokes. I dont even use an HM Slave while traversing the map, I just find a way to take my HM moves and turn them into sound battle strategies. If you use your favorites, I've come to realize, you tend to get better at strategy and training as opposed to a powerhouse team.

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I disagree in this case. Things can always be personal in a battle, no matter the type of team. It's the people, that spend hours upon hours making these competitive Pocket Monsters that actually bond more. Whether you shred with overused Pocket Monsters or play around with your favorites, you can always have fun or be 'personal'. The strategies you can impose competitively & friendly are endless, but by far, in a competitive environment, you have to satisfy a... mmm how do I put this. Favorites wise, you can have a lot of strategies that work due to all the versatility. However, competitively, your strategies you come up with that work, are much much more efficient seeing as you're in a tougher environment.

I for one, don't use overused Pocket Monsters simply to win, I use a team so I can have fun! I once told a good friend of mine, I'm not going to battle if I'm not having a blast. I also select Pocket Monsters based on my play style. Which is all-out offense. Selecting one of my favorites, Rotom, would not satisfy my play style. I need to at least satisfy my hunger of my mindset for sheer overwhelming destruction and offensive play style. It's not something that can shred a competitive player in half. So, I'd rather select my Gyarados, who is also a favorite of mine.

So what's my preference...
Pocket Monsters that both satisfy my hunger for offense, that I also like. :D

So, yeah, some people can call me a "OU drone." That's fine, at least I'm having a lot more fun then you guys ever will. ^^

Horyo said:

I like things like Seviper and Ariados, but people always go "EW TERRIBLE CHOICES YOU NOOB!" ANd while I acknowledge their wide range of weaknesses, I try to form strategies to compensate.

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And what if the other side forms strategies just as well? I mean, yeah, sure, even some of the lesser-used Pokemon have usable niches, but there's an extent to how well you can pull things like that off. Many of the OU Pokemon are simply better in certain roles, and will be EV-trained with just as much care. You can play well, but in a matchup of similar skill, it's not entirely likely you're going to win. I guess there's a surprise value in people playing against Pokemon they really haven't fought before, but that's really as much as you've got.

Playing competitively usually needs to go in there with a mindset for winning. I've seen various teams built on exemplifying various underrated Pokemon (such as Ursaring), but these kind of teams rarely go high up in the rankings. Ultimately, if you want your name up in lights up there, you're going to want to use the best you've got. It doesn't mean you're forced into the same strategies everybody else is using, since there are still many viable options for making a team (even using an underused Pokemon or two, even if going into OU with a team full of them isn't really advisable).

Also, I rarely think raters are that condescending, and if they are they usually don't rank in among the top raters. I generally think people won't have a problem with it unless you'll really have a better chance of winning with another option - the point of rating teams anyhow.

That's just my rant on the subject.

Frankly, most of my favorites (with the general exception of Magmortar, which I mainly care for only because of it's awesome design) are OU most of the time anyhow, so I get the best of both worlds. =D

sirboulevard said:

If you use only "Powerhouses" it's not personal.

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I have to disagree with this. My Pokemon are strong as all hell, but they were bred and raised with love. After all, it's the bond between Trainer and Pokemon that determine victory. ;_;

airconditioning said:

I have to disagree with this. My Pokemon are strong as all hell, but they were bred and raised with love. After all, it's the bond between Trainer and Pokemon that determine victory. ;_;

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That's different though. When I meant Powerhouses I meant people who use Legendaries solely. I don't consider all pokemon that are powerful to be powerhouses. I've previously used a Dragonite, Charizard and Metagross team for the Battle Tower. Those 3 are powerful, but not Powerhouses. You've raised your species from eggs up. That's not using a powerhouse, that's being a good trainer. Your right it is the bond between trainer and their teammates that determine victory. What I was saying is that the reliance on a species that has overpowering stats normally (and sometimes then EV trained) is not personal.

I'm sorry, but just because Hippowdon is the best physical wall in the game (IMO) doesn't mean I didn't love the game Hungry Hungry Hippos when I was younger >:0

Seriously though, I use the most powerful pokemon. However, I try to stay away from stuff I hate, but I like most pokemon so I rarely face that obstacle.

I agree that pokemon can get dull if you use the same powerful stuff over and over, but that's what joke teams and favorites teams are for. Actually, one of my favorites teams went 16-2 on shoddy, and if you knew half the pokemon on that team, you'd know that's a good record :P

Also, a lot of my favorites happen to be good OU competitors. I love all the legendary trios besides the elf one, and most of those pokemon (LOL ENTEI) are perfectly usable. I also love me some Snorlax. SNORLAX.

sirboulevard said:

When I meant Powerhouses I meant people who use Legendaries solely.

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Uhh... nobody uses Legendaries solely. The amount of Legendaries allowed into OU is small, and it would be difficult to make a balanced team from that small pool. Unless you're referring to Ubers. Of course, those are illegal, so anyone who uses Ubers in standard battles is cheating. :/

Being a competitive player, sometimes I'm forced to use just UU Pokemon to stand a chance against my buddies (who spend twice as much time playing Pokemans, so it's hard for me to keep up), especially when we are doing 3v3 LV100.

I also lived in Hong Kong until 3 months ago, and the Pokemon they use here are different, so I'm still learning what builds are popular and such.
Plus, Double Battles seem to be all the rage now. I gotto go get DB Pokemon, seriously.

However when doing a 6v6 LV50, things are much more relaxed, so I can go in with my cute Swalot or simply use my beloved mono-Poison team.

BeachBoy said:

Just because we use a more competitive and strategic form of battling does not degrade us to snobs. ;/

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Well, I mean that more in the way when they actually insult you. I'm sure you can say your strategy/pokemon beat mine, but some people are just plain rude about it.

I don't mind suggestions though.