Zen

We need more /d's with the leaders! --- /d had a conversation with Shade. /d got checkmated by Radomus.

Those damned kids are getting dumber and more insolent as time goes by, I swear. It hasn't even been five years since I graduated from high school, and already the changes are glaringly obvious. It's one thing to be a smart asshole, but another thing completely to be an ignorant idiot.

Well, it IS proof that non-weather can still beat weather Then there were others, like Savage getting walled by Shade's shedinja for goodness-knows how many times... Elias being that horrible, horrible troll when he felt like it... I'm sure you remember those

Well... Owen did suffer Bennett's yanmega despite running a Sun team... Really, weather in the game is seasonal, just like actual weather - it comes and goes with varying team trends. Eventually, the weather-users would probably get bored of it, too.

Looks like we've just de-evolved again, this time from a doduo to an egg. It used to be that we had boxes of pokemon by type and battle format (e.g. Bug/Singles), which we had them stored in like files. So if we wanted to make a bug singles OU team, we'd go to the right box and then take the right bugs out. So some boxes would be filled halfway with several different types of forretress, for example. Anyway, given that it seems we never actually saved a specific team and instead used the boxes like a warehouse, all our existing pokemon and/or team concepts are down. So... this is farewell for a short - possibly long, who knows - while, since we'll be slowly rebuilding the thirty boxes' worth of pokemon we lost. And this time saving them as teams, since the update apparently nukes box warehouses.

I liked it, frankly. Without saying anything to spoil the show... it wasn't GREAT, but it wasn't BAD, either. It had this... balance between the light-hearted moments and some pretty grim undertones, so I'm quite impressed. As some others here have mentioned, well... I like the new Spiderman Andrew Garfield's got the physicality for the role as opposed to Tobey Maguire (Tobey was fine, but Andrew's got more muscles on him to fit the original depictions), and he also did the emotional bits with that light/dark balance I mentioned. Definitely one for the DVD collection, and if the sequel is consistent with this one's quality, sign me up for tickets.

As far as typing goes... I've found that rotom-W sort of works the best due to its 4x steel resistance. It's really there to serve as a scizor killer, mainly - saves me from bringing out chandelure. Unusually enough, I've also found rotom-C to be occasionally useful - resists opposing rotom-W's.

Haha, I don't blame you for thinking along those lines XD It's done reasonably well, actually - on the server it so far holds about a 75% winning record. Probably because no one knows what garbodor does LOL

Been a while since I've seen this one being run. Most opt for Acid Armour on chandelure.

Mainly because my luck is horrible, lol I don't think I've had Hydro Pump hit more than ten times out of perhaps fifty attempts. Other than that, for some reason people tend to try for that SD + Bug Bite with a scizor against my rotom... so HP Fire ends that.

So... somehow I ended up putting together a team that somewhat reflects urban society (at least how I see it). For singles in OU. Why am I not studying? --- Trash (Garbodor) (M) @ Focus Sash Trait: Aftermath EVs: 60 HP / 196 Atk / 252 Spd Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk) - Gunk Shot - Rock Blast - Spikes - Toxic Spikes --- Bug (Forretress) (F) @ Occa Berry Trait: Sturdy EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 SDef Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk) - Earthquake - Volt Switch - Rapid Spin - Stealth Rock --- Shadow (Spiritomb) (M) @ Leftovers Trait: Pressure EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 SDef Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk) - Dark Pulse - Icy Wind - Sleep Talk - Rest --- Light (Chandelure) (M) @ Focus Sash Trait: Shadow Tag EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk) - Flamethrower - Shadow Ball - SolarBeam - Sunny Day --- Electricity (Rotom-W) @ Leftovers Trait: Levitate EVs: 40 Def / 220 SAtk / 40 SDef / 208 Spd Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk) - Thunderbolt - Hidden Power [Fire] - Will-O-Wisp - Pain Split --- Pollution (Muk) (M) @ BrightPowder Trait: Sticky Hold EVs: 252 Atk / 196 Def / 56 SDef Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk) - Gunk Shot - Shadow Sneak - Brick Break - Minimize --- So... basically a rather random team, that manages to do reasonably well. Muk/garbodor cover for rotom's grass weakness, while chandelure/spiritomb/rotom cover for muk/garbodor's ground/psychic weakness. Forretress clears hazards, as it always does. Fast fire-types may be a threat here, as are Swift Swimmers. And why garbodor? Because.

You are definitely a noob if you think I'll believe you when you claim to be a girl. Or if you assume I'd go easy on you for being female to begin with. EDIT - The 314th post! Fen is so going to rage later that I got the value of pi XD

Heather would be happy with this one... but Elias was the only one who used Skill Swap.

As some of you may recall, the three of us have a fetish fondness for Skill Swap. And of course, we monotype all the time. So, here's the core of a doubles team, made for the flying monotype --- Butterfree (M) @ Focus Sash Trait: Compoundeyes EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk) - Giga Drain - Sleep Powder - Skill Swap - Quiver Dance --- Archeops (F) @ Focus Sash Trait: Defeatist EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk) - Aerial Ace - Rock Slide/Stone Edge - Earthquake - Crunch/Dragon Claw/Filler --- Gyarados (M) @ Lum Berry Trait: Intimidate EVs: 32 Atk / 172 Def / 96 SDef / 208 Spd Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk) - Waterfall - Earthquake - Ice Fang/Stone Edge - Dragon Dance --- So, it should be pretty obvious what's going down here. Butterfree can liberate archeops of Defeatist, which makes it dangerous to an extent (aerodactyl imitator, anyone?). What's more, CompoundEyes can ensure that Rock Slide/Stone Edge hit nearly all the time. Gyarados is a backup in case archeops goes down - both Ice Fang and Stone Edge could also benefit from CompoundEyes. Intimidate may also ensure the survival of both pokemon until the trick kicks in. Another possibly fun option would be to Swap out Defeatist using a Xatu. Magic Bounce could prevent whimsicott/sableye/volbeat/liepard/riolu from trolling it, after all.

Oh, that's just a random thing. Scald's just as usable. Hmm, Blake's old cloyster was a hazardous one And mixed cloysters for hazards don't really work since the hazard cloysters need defense. Giving the cloyster that amount of defense lowers its base speed, which makes even Shell Smash kind of sub-average

... What is this sorcery?

Well, drowning isn't the fastest of deaths... and somehow I decided to make a water monotype for stalling. At least, it's reasonably handy for stalling, and yet isn't a pure stall team. So I decided to flip through MS' textbook of eye diseases and name the team after eye diseases XD For singles in OU. --- Concretion (Cloyster) (M) @ Focus Sash Trait: Skill Link EVs: 236 Atk / 16 Def / 252 SDef Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk) - Ice Shard - Toxic Spikes - Spikes - Rapid Spin --- Epiphora (Politoed) (F) @ Leftovers Trait: Drizzle EVs: 176 Def / 252 SAtk / 76 SDef Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk) - Surf - Ice Beam - Perish Song - Protect --- KP (Seismitoad) (M) @ Rindo Berry Trait: Swift Swim EVs: 252 Atk / 56 Def / 32 SDef / 164 Spd Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk) - Earthquake - Rock Slide - Poison Jab - Brick Break --- Pterygium (Sharpedo) (F) @ Life Orb Trait: Speed Boost EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk) - Aqua Jet - Crunch - Ice Fang - Earthquake --- Buphthalmos (Jellicent) (M) @ Leftovers Trait: Cursed Body EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 SDef Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk) - Hex - Will-O-Wisp - Taunt - Recover --- Trichiasis (Tentacruel) (M) @ Air Balloon Trait: Liquid Ooze EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 Spd Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk) - Scald - Acid Spray - Rapid Spin - Toxic --- Hazards via cloyster, and dual Spinners in case of opposing hazards. Jellicent's the usual staller, as is tentacruel, to an extent. Sharpedo and seismitoad are the sweepers, but as always, ferrothorn/skarmory are a pain. However, I usually rely on jellicent or politoed to handle those two. Not top-notch competitive, but it's something different from the usual rain teams.

Since the three - well, now two - of us rarely say anything after a tournament match, and this may have contributed to the discussion at hand... I feel the need to bring up a point. Of late, there's been quite a few new players on the server. And of course, not all of them bother to READ the rules and check out the tiers prior to battling. So out comes a garchomp/chandelure/blaziken/etc., and there comes the ragequit. Now, sometimes they don't ragequit, but deliver a nice cluster-F bomb or perhaps a few choice insults before closing the battle window. We USED TO offer a 'Good match' after ALL matches, regardless of whether we won or lost. And it was always typed, not set as a default - we believed that the personal touch was worth it. But then, it just grew old after a while of the incident above happening. And of course, you can't say anything to an opponent who closes the window immediately after a match ends. Believe me, we're all for spirit, camaraderie, and so on. But if the server is becoming more and more filled with strangers who start the problem by not doing some background work to begin with... No point offering flowers to monkeys, as a local idiom goes. Am not going to comment on the tiers, since it's our belief that Reborn's tiers accurately reflect how a league match would go if the game cartridges could think like a human would. More game-based tiers? We'd go for that, even if there will be days when our teams get butchered.

So, looks like our - this is questionable - happily insane trio has been downgraded to a duo for the foreseeable future. Due to some issues with his thesis, parents, and some other stuff he refuses to talk about, Fen won't be online for some time. If he owes anyone here anything, do let us know - things go on, whether or not he wants to be a hermit. As for anyone who might have somehow gotten in direct correspondence with him, he isn't even checking his emails as of today, so good luck if you're going to try reaching him for whatever reason. And moral of the story? Perhaps the loud ones aren't always the saner ones.

So this is what happens in the Ivy League? (wait, is Harvard even one of those? I forget) XD Ah, well - everyone needs to unwind!

Unreasonable, you say? So it's not reasonable for someone to be unhappy because they're forced into something that they have the full right to say no to? Fuck this, those idiots are little better than rapists, if that's their logic. Is it so impossible to accept that what has already been done, is done? And that you can never possibly undo it? Unless of course, they don't even remember what's been done. The other two might be around after this, but I'll be gone for some time.

Haha, those were just taken from the common boxes between the three of us. So you could alter them to taste.

With the recent discussion on monotypes by Valkyria, I decided to run observation on how weather teams are typically run on the PO and Reborn servers. As expected, most players seemed to start weather right off the bat. However, a couple did go for the alternative route, and ran delayed weather. So I decided to dig deeper into this particular tactic, which is arguably very handy for running monotypes. Delayed weather offers the option of possibly taking out opposing weather with greater ease (especially if they also run immediate weather), and also for setting up on the opposition. Reason being, the usual run of immediate weather players seem to either attempt setting up with their weather-maker (ninetales, politoed, hippowdon, tyranitar, abomasnow), or to switch it out immediately once the battle starts. I think you can see where I'm going with this; a decent prediction usually dents immediate weather players at this point. So, the following are a list of some leads for the various types of weather, off the top of my head. There is also the possibility of manual weather on a delayed weather lead, to handle opponents that enjoy switching their pokemon about. As far as items go, the Focus Sash and Lum Berry are probably the two most useful in this area, for obvious reasons. The Custap berry is handy in sand teams, as the sand pieces tend to have Sturdy. Finally, always carry a Rapid Spin pokemon if using delayed weather, as a standard precaution. --- SUN --- RAIN --- SAND --- HAIL

If I ever do run into you online, then, some experimentation would be in order And what's this about the ground monotype lacking special attackers? Nidoking, nidoqueen, claydol, torterra, gastrodon, or even stunfisk would beg to disagree with you. And if it's a question of reliable special attackers, those mentioned above usually do reasonably well, with the possible exception of stunfisk.