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.
You're free to, but I know absolutely nothing about VGCs and won't be able to help much.
Ok, I want to know what went wrong here. It was pretty much a clean battle.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/pokecommunity-ou-154779
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.