If you want to watch a couple of really good games, @SeasidePokemon played a pretty sweaty set of games with me. I was able to sneak in a 2-0 win, but only by the skin of my teeth.
Team report to follow!
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Never thought I’d see lead Vaporeon here. Great games and plays on both ends! Congrats on making Top 8 winners side!
@silversnorlax204 you’re now up against @cosrob, who has Top 3’d both of our previous tournaments!
In losers side, we have @SeasidePokemon vs @wisewailmer for another Top 8 qualifier. That’s sure to be another nail biter!
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Team report time!
My biggest regret with this team, is the fact I forgot to give them all nicknames before I went live for @SeasidePokemon match against me. I’ll include them in this post. I give you: TEAM PUPPERS
Vaporeon (Water Puppy) @ Salac Berry
Ability: Water Absorb
EVs: 16 HP / 228 SpA / 12 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Hydro Pump
- Ice Beam
- Substitute
- Baton Pass
Originally, I scrapped my entire team from the first round of this tournament. The hope was to find something new that I could play with but after a good 200+ points lost on ladder I figured maybe back to basics for me, so took my original team winner from last round and started to tinker with it.
As I played, I found that the lead metagame to be insanely important for my play style. But my playstyle is just weird… so maybe a weird lead to fit? How about lead offensive Vaporeon?
What does that offer compared to other standard leads? I’ll tell you:
Vs T-tar:
228 SpA Vaporeon Hydro Pump vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD 30 IVs Tyranitar: 346-408 (101.1 - 119.2%) – guaranteed OHKO
Vs Zap:
228 SpA Vaporeon Ice Beam vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Zapdos: 198-234 (61.4 - 72.6%) – guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
*note, assuming on turn one zap brings you down to salac range (it usually does if it’s offensive), you out run and KO zap back turn two. In the event you don’t get into salac range, you find out the zap is bulky and this changes the playstyle going forward. Win-win
Vs Mence:
228 SpA Vaporeon Ice Beam vs. 116 HP 30 IVs / 0 SpD 30 IVs Salamence: 442-520 (123.1 - 144.8%) – guaranteed OHKO
Vs Skarm:
228 SpA Vaporeon Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Skarmory: 155-183 (46.4 - 54.7%) – 10.9% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
*note, if skarm does not have a phasing move, this is a free sub and baton pass into something to counter.
Additionally, with the speed invested in Vaporeon, I’m out running to get my sub up before I can take a toxic.
Vs Metagross:
228 SpA Vaporeon Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Metagross: 188-222 (51.6 - 60.9%) – 94.5% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
*note, this is a calc for VERY bulky metagross, it’s still a 2HKO
Here’s a defensive calc too: 252+ Atk Choice Band Metagross Earthquake vs. 16 HP / 0 Def Vaporeon: 278-328 (68.6 - 80.9%) – guaranteed 2HKO. Gross can’t 2HKO as vaporeon runs more speed to out run Metagross.
Vs Suicune:
Horrible match up typically, but Vaporeon does have water absorption for solo water suicune’s. Making it completely immune to most of what it can throw at it. 9/10 times it’s best to baton pass turn one to A) figure out how fast suicune is and B) get better board position.
So, what does Vaporeon bring to the team? Immediate offensive pressure to the rest of the lead meta. And when it can’t do that, it offers a great way to sub and baton pass for more team information. It always gets me SOMETHING so it’s a sleeper pick for me.
Claydol (Spinning Puppy) @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 216 Atk / 32 SpA / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Earthquake
- Psychic
- Explosion
This was a slot I really struggled with, it easily saw over half a dozen changes. I played with Claydol for a total of one games before I brought it to the match with Seaside. I’m really happy I did as most of my team just plain sucks against electric pokemon (I found this out game one, turn four by the way).
Being able to rapid spin out hazards to be pretty key with this team as phasers usually do a number to my offensive teams. While Claydol slows things down a lot, he provides a really helpful immunity and the ability to explode to help me gain momentum back in my favor. The EV spread and moves are just a direct standard rip, and I was crushed to not bring ice beam on this mon, but found ultimately that what was put together was just right.
Raikou (Electric Puppy) @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 32 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 216 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 SpA
- Calm Mind
- Substitute
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Grass]
Staple of team WOMBO COMBO, back for another round! This team still struggles some with pert, but a correctly positioned Raikou fixes this problem. That, and I found the powerful thunderbolts after a single boost to be really strong for this team. If it does not KO out right it usually chips enough to get me into good position to finish off.
Breloom (Mushroom Puppy) @ Leftovers
Ability: Effect Spore
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Spore
- Substitute
- Focus Punch
- Hidden Power [Ghost]
My number one salac boosted baton pass recipient! While I used Breloom in my last match as a lead, here I took it back to a more passive early to late game role.
Breloom is great, except for his speed stat, it’s easily out run and OHKO’ed by a lot of things in the current meta. By getting a speed boost I can play some serious mind games. Sub offers a lot of board control and scouting and spore is such a clear threat that most people will play based on the spore play vs the sub play. Since I was using a (theoretical) speed boosted ‘loom I found that mach punch from my previous team to be pointless so changed the last move slot to HP Ghost as this mon is completely walled by Gengar and other ghosts.
Salamence (Scary Puppy) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 116 HP / 252 Atk / 140 Spe
Naive Nature
- Fire Blast
- Double-Edge
- Earthquake
- Dragon Dance
Standard DD mence with a little twist, fire blast! I noticed the same playstyle against Mence over and over on the ladder. Typically, you show fire blast and it brings skarm down to about 50%. In almost every match I played, the following turn skarm would protect for leftovers recovery. In order to punish the protect, I would DD.
Again, we get into a mind game, do I blast away skarm? Or do I hit as hard as I can into something else? I like Double Edge here as the neutral damage game usually makes for a good trade. EQ is for coverage. Biggest issue with this set is Gengar just eats me alive.
Aerodactyl (Bird Puppy) @ Choice Band
Ability: Rock Head
EVs: 224 Atk / 32 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Double-Edge
- Earthquake
- Hidden Power [Bug]
- Rock Slide
Another bread and butter pick from team WOMBO COMBO. Aero still cleans up really well, but it needs chip damage against a lot of things in order to be really successful at what it needs to do. EV’s and move set are again standard, with HP bug > flying to better coverage.
And that’s the team! I’ll have to tinker more as my next match up is against @cosrob ! Guess we’ll figure out if I’m ready to hang with the big boys on E4!
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Great write up! Lead Vaporeon is something I humored using but it needs a more aggressive playstyle to really get the full benefit. I do agree it’s super good in the right circumstance.
Interesting position to be in now. Top 8 and usually i stick to my tried and trusted team but with the new rules of changing pokemon between teams makes it a lot easier to counter the same team.
With Silversnorlax mixing it up he’s already got the advantage over consistency.
We’ll see in the next match what i do in terms of trusting the team or mixing it up to throw off any prepared plans.
Yep, running the same team against two different opponents is a huge risk.
To clarify, you can swap entire teams between opponents. But against the same opponent throughout all three games, all Pokemon, held items, moves, IVs/EVs must remain the same. Only the lead Pokemon can be changed between games in a set.
Looking forward to seeing your set. Already know it’s gonna be a close one!
I found “sticking to what I know” was actually way easier for me, you’ll notice about half my team is the same from round one to round two. Sure I can play a prediction game with other folks, but it now comes down to: Do i play what is comfortable? Or try to throw off my opponent?
Also I build my teams based off of what I see on ladder (see water puppy calcs) as I never really know what I’m going to see.
played 2 great games with @Dyl, and won 2-0, hope to play again!
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Good ol’ random battle chaos!
@mossdeep you’re up against @Will now. One of you will move on to Top 8!
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Mossdeep has proven to be the RNG god. Won in randoms and then got an opponent who DQ’d.
Can anyone truly stop him?
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Only the Dank Demon King
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Had a quick match with @vic ending in 0-2, my loss. Had no idea how to counter his Suicune to start the match, kinda forgot that Suicune wasnt Ice type.
Here the replays, thanks for the match.
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Hi everyone, the first two stages of bracket have concluded and we are close to having our final set of competitors. Many have fought valiantly but only a select few can move on to challenge the crown.
Rounds 3 - Rounds 5 will take place from June 3, 2024 - July 2, 2024
Winners Side Matches
@dylan vs @ddk
@cosrob vs @silversnorlax204
Losers Side Matches
@yamahap45 vs @vic
@mrtz vs @caughtatpoint
@SeasidePokemon vs @wisewailmer
@Will vs @mossdeep
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@ddk you were right these battles were super close
2-0 wailmer by the narrowest of margins
Thank you for the great games @SeasidePokemon
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Literally the definition of “2-0 but close”. Congrats on qualifying for Top 8! Your Hoenn Hoes would be proud of the crazy losers run!
@SeasidePokemon Tough draw but you had some good opponents and kept it competitive! Looking forward to seeing you again in Gen 4!
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lol it reminded me of my tragic rock slide miss on @yamahap45 in the first round.
the rage of that miss fueled me
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@wisewailmer crazy lower bracket run buddy! It reminds me of a famous DOTA player saying this:
Cheers!
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He only needs to win 6 more rounds to win the entire tournament. 
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Those were really great games! Super close match up!
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