Tournaments Smogon Premier League: ADV OU Discussion

Bedschibaer

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The Smogon Premier League is one of the biggest stages of competition on this website and a good opportunity to showcase quality matches of metagames that do not get alot of exposure otherwise. Every past generation will have 5 matches each week that we can discuss here. I will update this thread with the matchups and the replays/logs of every week. This thread should be a place for constructive discussion about things like team choices, matchups, plays but also tendencies in the metagame and so on. Trashtalking players is not allowed. Players commenting on their teams or on certain key turns and answering questions is encouraged.​

coming soon














Will the meta drastically change because of Sleep Talk mechanics? :v4:
 
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I've said this elsewhere but the sleep talk change is so overrated......only thing that gets really affected is ResTalk Zapdos (stuff like Mag/Regice with ResTalk is pretty rare while CroCune is just bad......I think now people will stop running it on offense at long last), and even Zapdos itself will stay relevant because BKC/McM/MDrag discovered that it could do a pretty good job offensively last SPL. The mechanics do hurt and the loss of a solid Special Wall/Phazer/Damage dealer will hurt but overall it shouldn't have that much impact.

As for week 1, uh, Triangles beat panamaxis, as for the other four:
dekzeh beats undisputed: Dek is probably the better player and undisputed almost always brings stall/bulky balance which is easy to counterstyle.
Fakes beats Floppy: Fakes is a pretty underrated quantity in ADV: he went 3-1 last WCOP in a fairly stacked pool, and also performed well back around ST16/SPL 5, and his bulky-offensive teams are probably gonna do pretty nicely, Floppy on the other hand is probably gonna bring something goofy and lose.
Golden Sun beats Jabba: Idk, Jabba's just kind of dated and his style is similar to undisputed's in that it's fairly predictable, while last season Golden Sun showed a fair bit of versatility from Rain to CMPass teams along with his standard offensive teams, I could be wrong though.
McMeghan beats Veteran In Love: McMeghan is easily the strongest player in this pool, he loves the tier, plays a ton and is more than willing to innovate, and in terms of play is a monster, that said though VIL does have a decent chance, especially if he's commited and playing at his level. Highlight match imo.
Edit: Channeled my inner psychopathic New-England BM loving ADV fanatic to produce this prediction: both players going in lacking confidence and decide to use SDPass to cover up their weakness, both players lose their passers early on, McMeghan's Magneton sacs itself to paralyse VIL's DDTar before it can get its sub up allowing Metagross to annihilate it, but that gets killed in turn by Aero. McMeghan then proceeds to set-up his own SubSalac Aero and sweeps too VIL's last, but VIL's Aero then dodges two Rock Slides in a row to break the Sub and sweep. VI temporarily rejoices only to realise that McMeghan's last is Tyranitar, which shrugs off Aero's Rock Slide and fires away its own, netting its master the win.

Overall predictions: McMeghan tops again, Golden Sun, Fakes, dekzeh go positive from 9-10 games, VIL and Triangles do nicely too, Ojama crashes and burns again, and BKC spends week 3-4 on Amazon trying to buy a new ADVer (lol).
 
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Has VIL said what his last was in the battle with McMeghan? I'm curious what it was that he never wanted to go out to once in a fairly long match.
 

Triangles

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McMeghan beats Veteran In Love: McMeghan is easily the strongest player in this pool, he loves the tier, plays a ton and is more than willing to innovate, and in terms of play is a monster, that said though VIL does have a decent chance, especially if he's commited and playing at his level. Highlight match imo.
Edit: Channeled my inner psychopathic New-England BM loving ADV fanatic to produce this prediction: both players going in lacking confidence and decide to use SDPass to cover up their weakness, both players lose their passers early on, McMeghan's Magneton sacs itself to paralyse VIL's DDTar before it can get its sub up allowing Metagross to annihilate it, but that gets killed in turn by Aero. McMeghan then proceeds to set-up his own SubSalac Aero and sweeps too VIL's last, but VIL's Aero then dodges two Rock Slides in a row to break the Sub and sweep. VI temporarily rejoices only to realise that McMeghan's last is Tyranitar, which shrugs off Aero's Rock Slide and fires away its own, netting its master the win.
This literally couldn't have been further off lol
 

McMeghan

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Quick thoughts on games from Week 1:


Team wise, undisputed used a tried and true Physical Offense featuring SubSailak Cross while dekzeh went for something quite unconventionnal between Moltres and the Umbreon/Perish Song Celebi combo. Moltres immediately reveals to be quite the clutch choice as it's a pain to deal with for Physical Offenses (as showcasted in the last WCoP in the CyberOdin - reyscarface game). The combination of Stab Fire Blast, HP Grass coverage and WoW puts everything undisputed has at risk.

undisputed plays well with his Heracross to punch some holes in dekzeh's defense mid-game by doubling on dekzeh's Tyranitar. Much like Moltres, Heracross has a field day against dekzeh's team, threatening everything with his Bug/Rock coverage. In the end game situation, undisputed's playing with sand damages to bring Heracross in Sailak range and hopefully clean with it and Salamence, but dekzeh reveals his trump card: Agility Moltres. The game seemed won at this point but Fire Blast didn't connect and Magneton disposed of the phoenix. dekzeh probably could have recovered on Salamence on turn 24, forcing Heracross to Megahorn the turn after, which would have given him a chance to win if it missed.


Fakes is using here a pretty old offensive team revolving around a core of DDers and Magneton/Endeavor Pert to remove their checks. Floppy on the other hand has a tendency for unusual builds and it shows here with the usage of Umbreon in an otherwise offensive team. If I had to guess, I'd say that the goal is to clean with Starmie backed up by Spikes while you can abuse special sponges with Lax and Metagross. Umbreon pursuits Gengar to help Forretress in its spinning task.

The game is pretty straightforward. Fakes goes for the blind read early game and weaken Metagross to the point of putting him in Magneton's range. Floppy has nothing to safely handle SubPert (his Umbreon could but Fakes is clearly going for the freeze, which would pretty much give him the win if he got it). This forces Floppy to get his Snorlax weakened to the point of no return. With Snorlax and Metagross out of the way, nothing can deal with CurseLax which has free set-ups on Forretress and Umbreon. As demonstrated here, Counter Forretress is not a good Snorlax answer since +6 Shadow Ball is denting it without Counter doing enough back.


Something I like about Triangles is his proficiency in going off the beaten track in his builds. His take on Special Spam here is quite unique: no Dug, no Porygon2, a lot of Boomers (with Regice and Gengar to bait Blissey/Lax), and even brought some Spikes to the party in the form of Cloyster. There is a great synergy in the team: the Special Sweepers attract Blissey which in turn allow Regice and Gengar to punch holes due to the threat of Boom and Spikes. On the other hand, all the Booms bring in the Physical walls that Suicune/Jirachi loves to abuse (such as Pert or Skarmory). My favorite team of this first week without any doubt.

panamaxis's team is more standard but it does showcase Hariyama as a mixed sponge that can take on Gengar to help Blissey while removing some Leftovers with Knock Off, an interesting option for his Stall team.

Triangles plays the game very well by Booming at the right times, which is extremely important in that match-up. He catches Hariyama and Blissey early allowing him to pressure panamaxis with the special armada of Rachi/Gar/Cune. He puts himself in a good position where Suicune is likely going to win, which is cemented when Claydol disposes of Starmie.


There were some doubts whether or not Jabba would shake the rust off for Week 1 and this game shows he still has work to do regarding teambuilding. The team was awfully weak to the combination of Skarmory/Gengar, especially when backed up by Blissey.

There isn't really much to say here: GS gets his spikes up, spinblocks Forretress for days with Gengar putting more and more pressure on Jabba's team as the game goes on since Jabba has no pursuiter/Magneton and a bunch of Pokemons that hate Spikes damages. SkarmBliss pretty much walls all options at Jabba's disposal and GS reveals his final asset in the form of Offensive Starmie to clean.

I think Jabba should have gone for the Lax/Cune finish as soon as possible (keeping one of them at 100% and awoken) but even then, GS had BoomGar + Starmie/Ttar to play around these threats (CurseLax could have still been an issue if Gengar had to boom when it was at +1 since Tyranitar revealed to not be DD or Band).

---

I'm particulary glad to see all the "innovations" this year. We're only in the second week and we already got 5 BLs used (Donphan/Umbreon*2/Moltres/Cloyster/Hariyama) and this time, it's coming from the majority of players. I'm looking forward the next games :toast:
 

dekzeh

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[RUIN] dekzeh vs. undisputed [WOLF]

Team wise, undisputed used a tried and true Physical Offense featuring SubSailak Cross while dekzeh went for something quite unconventionnal between Moltres and the Umbreon/Perish Song Celebi combo. Moltres immediately reveals to be quite the clutch choice as it's a pain to deal with for Physical Offenses (as showcasted in the last WCoP in the CyberOdin - reyscarface game). The combination of Stab Fire Blast, HP Grass coverage and WoW puts everything undisputed has at risk.

undisputed plays well with his Heracross to punch some holes in dekzeh's defense mid-game by doubling on dekzeh's Tyranitar. Much like Moltres, Heracross has a field day against dekzeh's team, threatening everything with his Bug/Rock coverage. In the end game situation, undisputed's playing with sand damages to bring Heracross in Sailak range and hopefully clean with it and Salamence, but dekzeh reveals his trump card: Agility Moltres. The game seemed won at this point but Fire Blast didn't connect and Magneton disposed of the phoenix. dekzeh probably could have recovered on Salamence on turn 24, forcing Heracross to Megahorn the turn after, which would have given him a chance to win if it missed.
Just adding to this that alongside the Fire Blast miss, the CH on Donphan was very unfortunate too, as it would force Hera out due to Perish Song, and give me something in the late game that could tank a Heracross Megahorn and Protect to stall for sand damage. I thought the team I used was pretty cool, a revamp on classic Umbreon pass, trying to make it a little bit less matchup based while still auto-winning vs stall.

[CONG] panamaxis vs. Triangles [FLCN]

Something I like about Triangles is his proficiency in going off the beaten track in his builds. His take on Special Spam here is quite unique: no Dug, no Porygon2, a lot of Boomers (with Regice and Gengar to bait Blissey/Lax), and even brought some Spikes to the party in the form of Cloyster. There is a great synergy in the team: the Special Sweepers attract Blissey which in turn allow Regice and Gengar to punch holes due to the threat of Boom and Spikes. On the other hand, all the Booms bring in the Physical walls that Suicune/Jirachi loves to abuse (such as Pert or Skarmory). My favorite team of this first week without any doubt.

panamaxis's team is more standard but it does showcase Hariyama as a mixed sponge that can take on Gengar to help Blissey while removing some Leftovers with Knock Off, an interesting option for his Stall team.

Triangles plays the game very well by Booming at the right times, which is extremely important in that match-up. He catches Hariyama and Blissey early allowing him to pressure panamaxis with the special armada of Rachi/Gar/Cune. He puts himself in a good position where Suicune is likely going to win, which is cemented when Claydol disposes of Starmie.
I was really liking the looks of Triangles' team, till the point he revealed Claydol in the slot of what I assumed was a Dugtrio. Without Dugtrio the only way he could really kill Blissey was the way he did it, by CH'ing it. Even with huge atk investment, Gengar and Regice just don't do enough to stop Blissey from recovering on other things, especially since there was no sand which mean at most with 2 turns of Leftovers on doubles/after something dies, it'd be out of range of everything but Claydol.

That said Triangles did play the game well, like McM said, by exploding at the perfect times early game and criticals are just another part of the game we love. Pana's squad was very interesting too, especially the Hariyama which aliviates pressure on Swampert vs any TTar variant while also checking a few other threats.


I'm particulary glad to see all the "innovations" this year. We're only in the second week and we already got 5 BLs used (Donphan/Umbreon*2/Moltres/Cloyster/Hariyama) and this time, it's coming from the majority of players. I'm looking forward the next games :toast:
Majority huh, pls, I used half of those :3
 

JabbaTheGriffin

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[SHRK] Golden Sun vs. JabbaTheGriffin [TGRS]

There were some doubts whether or not Jabba would shake the rust off for Week 1 and this game shows he still has work to do regarding teambuilding. The team was awfully weak to the combination of Skarmory/Gengar, especially when backed up by Blissey.

There isn't really much to say here: GS gets his spikes up, spinblocks Forretress for days with Gengar putting more and more pressure on Jabba's team as the game goes on since Jabba has no pursuiter/Magneton and a bunch of Pokemons that hate Spikes damages. SkarmBliss pretty much walls all options at Jabba's disposal and GS reveals his final asset in the form of Offensive Starmie to clean.

I think Jabba should have gone for the Lax/Cune finish as soon as possible (keeping one of them at 100% and awoken) but even then, GS had BoomGar + Starmie/Ttar to play around these threats (CurseLax could have still been an issue if Gengar had to boom when it was at +1 since Tyranitar revealed to not be DD or Band).
Because this is probably the last time I mons I thought maybe I'll drop some insight on my battles. I definitely lost this one at the teambuilding stage. I made a couple executive decisions that were meant to better tailor the team towards what I expected based on what GS usually brings. One of the biggest changes was lax > pursuit ttar. As anyone with eyes can see that really left me wide open. Being unable to pursuit Gengar placed a ton of pressure on me all match that I couldn't come back from. This was really a classic case of preparing for what you think your opponent will bring rather than just playing to your own style. It's a trap I think we all fall into on occasion.

As for how I should have played it: Lax wasn't curse so that option is out the window. Cune was probably my best chance but I never saw an opening (either in the moment or down the road) to make it happen. I think I did the best with what I had but there was really no coming back from the matchup outside the couple shots I had for a crit win with Kou in the middle there.
 
[SHRK] Smurf. vs. Veteran In Love [RAID]



Thought I might share some insight into the team I used vs VIL in week 2. I definitely wanted to control the pace of the match early, and after checking out some of his teams I realised Heracross was a good choice. The set I used was Megahorn / Focus Punch / Rock Slide / HP Ghost @ Chesto berry. Credits to McMeghan who I saw use this initially, cool set dude. I also noted VIL liked hypnosis Gengar, and Heracross would lure it out and kill it, which really helps the other dudes on my team, especially Lax, Gyara and Cune. Heracross is also useful at forcing the opponent to reveal his Mence, because that is definitely one poke you do not want revealed at the 11th hour as it DD's in your face. The team is built on the power of dual water sweepers. Cune is S rank for a reason, and I really like the bulky modest CM set. +1 Ice beam rocks Zapdos and Celebi, which means Cune has amazing synergy with HP Rock Gyarados (who really does need a fair amount of support to shine). Gyarados is a pretty underrated threat, and with a jolly nature you can lure out pesky things like Jolteon and Aerodactyl that can make life hard for Cune. Jolteon was an obvious teammate given its ability and the team's two water types. I opted for a Baton Pass + Toxic set, as against stall you can reliably beat last mon Blissey by landing toxic with Jolt and then subbing down with 101hp subs with Cune as toxic and stall's own sand works against it. Baton pass is a great move and allows me to hold momentum which is pretty crucial when using a team like this. I really like utility bombs to help break balance and stall teams down, so Snorlax and my signature CB Houdini were obvious choices to round out my squad. They provide both nice defensive and offensive presence, with is something I really look for in pokes when constructing a team.

Shoutouts to M Dragon for building the team with me, and Golden Sun for being relentlessly victimised by it! :toast:


Last but not least,
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SHARK ATTACK!!!_________
 
EXTRA EXTRA READ ALL ABOUT IT! ADV GAMES BROKEN DOWN TO THE BASICS, SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE!

Fakes vs undisputed:
So the battle starts off very much on Fakkesi's terms, with his Tyranitar facing down undisputed's Jolteon, forcing undisputed to BP out of the match-up to preserve the electric mon, going back to Skarm to take a Rock Slide from TTar. Unfortunately, undisputed chose this moment to get greedy and go into Dugtrio, trying to trap TTar, just as TTar let loose with a Focus Punch, meaning it was probably a variant of the rare Boah. With his trapper lost, undisputed goes into Starmie to force TTar out, but Fakes goes to Blissey to sponge the Hydro Pump, leaving him up one.

So these first 4-5 turns were probably the ones that decided the game: firstly because they showed that undisputed was indeed running a Specially Offensive team, and secondly because he lost Dugtrio, which would be his main method of removing Blissey (aside from Explosion Gar but Fakes would be on guard for that now), meaning that so long as Fakes played smart and preserved his Blissey, he would have a guaranteed win.

What follows the first two turns is a barrage of switching, with undisputed trying to Spike up with Skarm, only to be hammered by Fakes' bulky Starmie and MixMence. undisputed then reveals his own Tyranitar, and HP Grasses the Swampert switch-in, killing it and opening up the possibility of a TTar sweep. Another volley of switching ends in TTar vs TTar, and Fakes decides here to switch out: surprisingly, because both HP Grass and the team suggest it's a Mixed variant, which fails to OHKO opposing TTar due to its lack of Focus Punch or Earthquake. In any case this wasn't the best decision as Fakes' Mence took heavy damage from a Rock Slide, though it bit back with a Dragon Claw on Starmie. Fakes managed to get TTar in on Jolteon, which given the condition of undisputed's team forced him to sac something: he threw away Skarmory, which was on low health and not accomplishing much vs Fakes' team. Another train of switching as well as a forced Recover+Softboiled on Fakes' end ended with undisputed's ideal scenario, TTar vs Bliss. Fakes switches out to Starmie and undisputed gets the breakthrough, critting with Rock Slide to get the kill (that wouldn't have happened otherwise). Now Fakes, with no real switch-ins to Tyranitar, would be in the same position as undisputed: picking what to sacrifice every other turn.

Fakes, seeming pretty broken up about it from the chat, goes back to Salamence and lands another Dragon Claw on Starmie, putting it on the verge of death, and as it shows Psychic the next turn, it's an edge Starmie's not coming back from. Fakes forces out Starmie with Blissey and manages to Toxic Tyranitar, but the next turn his own TTar falls to another Rock Slide (crit). Whatever I said about how after the first 5 turns matchup dictated that Fakes won, undisputed had a chance that his magic MixTar would carry him through. Mence came back in, and here undisputed again had to pick what to sac: he chose correctly, as Starmie had no chance of living a hit from anything, and it allowed him to bring in Gengar: with the ideal scenario being exploding on Blissey and cleaning up with his Jolt.

Throughout the game, I'd been speculating on Fakes' last: I figured it'd probably be a Jirachi, as it could support his team with Wish as well as threatening to sweep and providing another Rock resist, however, with his back to the wall here, Fakes pulls out his Aero (also a solid choice), threatening to countersweep undisputed, however it promptly gets burned by Gengar. Though technically useless, Aerodactyl manages to kill Jolteon with a Rock Slide before getting slaughtered by TTar, and undisputed went right back to Gengar to blow up Blissey, finishing the game. And then it happened. All game, Fakes had had the odds against him, but now the hax was on his side, as an Ice Beam froze Gengar, essentially cutting down undisputed's chances. Fakes proceeded to Solftboiled up and kill Gengar, before using Softboiled to stall out the already poisoned Tyranitar, netting the win.

In conclusion, the game was a pretty good example of a match-up between two balanced teams that are forced into the offensive, as well as proving that dangerous threats can be held in check by simply sending in something faster to force them out. Overall though it was haxy towards the end it was pretty well played on both sides (aside from undisputed's early gamble with Dugtrio), and even so it could have turned out very differently.


McMeghan vs Golden Sun (Coming soon)
 

Bughouse

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necro bumping this thread because I was on the CMS merging dex edits and I found one from BKC that wanted to change Starmie's Offensive ADV set from Surf / Hydro Pump to just Hydro Pump.

http://www.smogon.com/dex/rs/pokemon/starmie/

Note that this is NOT about surf vs hydro on Recover+Rapid Spin starmie. This is for 3 attacks.

This SPL Starmie was only used 13 times I think from usage stats, but (un)surprisingly Starmie did not reveal even close to its full set most of the time, so I didn't want to draw any conclusions myself.

Tagging some other ADV players for thoughts before I make edit to an important mon on an old gen no one else will look at for a while.
JabbaTheGriffin UD Astamatitos Ojama Triangles Danilo Golden Sun dekzeh


The edit is as follows:

[SET]
name: Offensive Star
move 1: Surf / Hydro Pump
move 1: Hydro Pump
move 2: Thunderbolt
move 3: Ice Beam
move 4: Recover

[SET COMMENTS]
Starmie functions well as a special sweeper, with its combined blessings
of a great offensive movepool and a usable Special Attack stat. Surf is
Starmie's main STAB move, useful for whittling away at the HP of Snorlax
and Regice while dealing hefty damage to Swampert, Flygon, and
Heracross. Hydro Pump is an option if you're using Starmie on more
offensive teams. Thunderbolt prevents Starmie from being walled by
Pokemon such as Milotic, opposing Starmie, Gyarados, and other common
Water-types. Ice Beam is Starmie's best option against Celebi and
Zapdos, forming the famous coverage combination of BoltBeam with
...



Starmie functions well as a special sweeper, with its combined blessings
of a great offensive movepool and a usable Special Attack stat. Hydro Pump is
Starmie's main STAB move, useful for whittling away at the HP of Snorlax
and Regice while dealing hefty damage to Swampert, Flygon, and
Heracross. Hydro Pump's accuracy is a necessary tradeoff, as its power difference
compared to Surf is too great against important targets such as Tyranitar,
Swampert and Jirachi. Thunderbolt prevents Starmie from being walled by
Pokemon such as Milotic, opposing Starmie, Gyarados, and other common
Water-types. Ice Beam is Starmie's best option against Celebi and
Zapdos, forming the famous coverage combination of BoltBeam with
...
 
u can replace psychic with tbolt depending on the squad. u still get great neutral coverage but now u get to ohko gar. i think rapid spin should be the last move
 

UD

BeerLover
I half agree with Danilo. I think Thunderbolt is just about mandatory on offensive Starmie, whereas Psychic should be slashed in the last slot. I also think Rapid Spin over Recover is better on offensive Star, but this is basically pure preference. Also, while it is a niche option, HP Grass isn't bad for late game sweeping so you don't need to click Hydro twice vs. an opposing Swampert. I've used it a few times and been pleasantly surprised with the results.
 

dekzeh

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Hydro Pump, Thunderbolt/Psychic, Ice Beam, Rapid Spin/Psychic

I personally find Recover useless, and wouldnt go without Thunderbolt. Stuff like HP Grass has merits but its specific and gimmicky enough to not be analysis worthy.
 

Triangles

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Agreeing with all of the above that Rapid Spin can be used over Recover and is generally better. A 3 attacking Star EV spread is 252/252 or something relatively similar. As such 3 Atk Star doesn't play very much of a defensive role, and either won't get opportunities to Recover much or will be a big momentum loser, therefore Spin is better as a utility option. Stars which have Recover also have Spin and bulk investment, and that's kind of a separate thing - tbh not sure how good that set really is in the current meta either, definitely not as good as offensive. Anyway, here's what the analysis set should look like imo.

name: Offensive Star
move 1: Hydro Pump
move 2: Ice Beam
move 3: Thunderbolt/Psychic
move 4: Rapid Spin

HPump is much better as a STAB choice because it can oneshot Ttars after a Spikes (and some Ttar sets without that too), and also is better for pressuring guys like Lax and Ice.
Tbolt and Psy are interchangeable - Bolt is best to hurt guys like Cune and Skarm hard, and also important in the Star mirror. Psy is good to oneshot Gars and as a good neutral hit on shit (that's accurate and doesn't have 8 PP), and also to catch Hera. Bolt is marginally better though but of course it's team dependent.
 
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Bughouse

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OK so it sounds like the consensus is:

1) Definitely Hydro Pump
2) Rapid Spin over Recover
3) Maybe even Psychic or HP Grass over Rapid Spin, making it 4 attacks

Any further thoughts on point 3 above? Would you realistically use starmie without rapid spin? Or would you say it has 3-5 good offensive moves, and you pick HPump+Ice Beam+Attack+spin depending on team?

Once I have the set down, I can write the updated set with your comments here as my "QC checks" of sorts.
 
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UD

BeerLover
I'm not fully aware of the current Dex philosophy regarding niche sets, but if what Dekzeh said is accurate then I probably would not slash HP Grass in the actual set. Perhaps just list it as a footnote at the bottom. Otherwise I would agree on slashing Psychic and Rapid Spin in the last slot.

I would realistically use offensive Star without Rapid Spin (four attacks then, not Recover), but I think generally Rapid Spin is the best move for that slot. I'm having a hard time thinking of a team that really needs Psychic > Thunderbolt on offensive Starmie, but I suppose it is possible. I mean Psychic is only a 1/8 chance to OHKO bulkless Heracross anyway (I know sand is always out), and Ice Beam / T-bolt + Hydro Pump will kill Gengar. But I suppose Psychic is a little more spammable than the other moves.
 

Typhlito

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The only thing Id really like to add to this is how if starmie is using rapid spin, it probably should be using psychic along with it since its able to ohko gengar while none of its other attacks can do the same. I mean sure you could try to hit it on the switch if your opponent thinks you might spin but having psychic when you also possess rapid spin makes things easier prediction wise.

All out starmie is pretty good as well if it ran hydro pump, ice beam, thunder bolt, psychic/hp grass. Hits almost everything with at least neutral damage with this set.
 

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