The Double Battle Metagame (GBU)

It looks like a lot of 4th Gen move tutor moves will be available this gen. What do you think? I'm looking forward to some of the status moves that weren't legally available to Prankster Pokemon, like Gravity with Sableye.

Also, there is (apparently) a stricter rule on disconnection.
 
It's a good idea in theory to prevent someone who disconnects from battling for a short while, hopefully it will work in practise.

I'm glad they have introduced these move tutors to this generation too. I breed all my Pokémon properly, so it means I can finally do a few that I never bothered to do on the generation 4 games (like Gastrodon with Earth Power...)
 
hmm wonder how hard getting the shards will be? Nothing really cool for me in the move tutor stuff, I have to wonder what will even get Drill Run. Dual Chop is an interesting proposal, so Dragons can choose between it and Dragon Claw. I have a feeling most aside from Dratini and Dragonair will get it. The disconnect rule sounds like it could be very good if it works like it should!
 
Hydreigon will be able to have both Dark Pulse and Earth Power... Dragonite will be able to have Multiscale and Superpower... Salamence with Moxie and Dragon Dance and Outrage (more interesting for singles...) maybe some of the fifth generation Pokémon will be able to learn some new moves too... (Conkeldurr with the elemental punches?)

They will certainly make things a little more interesting.
 
Yea, I just mean nothing too much on my personal faves AKA Trick Roomy stuff mainly. Hydreigon is a notable one i hadn't considered in awhile, it will give him pretty great coverage, but I think there will be a slot on most of his movesets that is Flamethrower/Fire Blast/Earth Power, because of sorta similar coverage. Wonder if Mienshao will get the elemental punches, I don't really think it would make him that much stronger but it would be an interesting and viable option
 
I came across my first Skill Link Cinccino and Prankster Liepard today. The Liepard was very annoying - Foul Play / Swagger / Thunder Wave / Substitute - obviously Foul Play and Swagger work together quite well.
 
So after getting fed up of the majority of simple battles in Free Mode, I dived into Rated for the first time on Black 2. First game; someone called ZACH I think from the USA with 1630. I win, he disconnects as the ratings go through...

Shame it's still happening even with the new games.
 
Intimidate Scrafty will be released on the 21st of November, according to Serebii.

I'm sure we'll see a fair few of these. I imagine Hitmontop will still be first choice though.
 
Wow, this thread (and subforum) is a virtual ghost town.

I just started playing random wifi doubles recently and I've been shying away from rated play due to all the stories of D/Cs. But in my limited experience in free mode, the competition has been lackluster to say the least. Does my only chance of facing strong players in random wifi lie in braving the potential D/C-fest of rated play? Or have I just been unlucky in playing really weak players in free play?
 
That's exactly how it was back in BW1 (unchallenging free mode vs. disconnect-friendly rated mode) and though I had heard D/Cing had more consequences in BW2, it sounds from your account like the changes in BW2 either didn't work or never really happened. I don't know how many D/Cs you have had in free mode, but the D/C count in my sig is 100% from free mode; so it could just as well be that the D/Cing in rated mode, while bad, is only really a little worse than free mode, than that D/Cing in rated mode is far worse even than in rated mode. If you've seen a thread about a Wifi tournament and disconnections within it, that's probably the best way to parse how bad rated mode is going to be short of playing in it for a while.
 

JRank

Jonny
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I can probably count on one hand the amount of times I've been DCed on in rated, if anything there have probably been more DCs in free mode! (roughly the same amount of games played in both) Overall it's much less of a problem than in BW1, and contrary to what was thought in the beginning of BW2 *coughbirchcough*, only the person who disconnects is kicked off for an hour.
 
That's exactly how it was back in BW1 (unchallenging free mode vs. disconnect-friendly rated mode) and though I had heard D/Cing had more consequences in BW2, it sounds from your account like the changes in BW2 either didn't work or never really happened. I don't know how many D/Cs you have had in free mode, but the D/C count in my sig is 100% from free mode; so it could just as well be that the D/Cing in rated mode, while bad, is only really a little worse than free mode, than that D/Cing in rated mode is far worse even than in rated mode. If you've seen a thread about a Wifi tournament and disconnections within it, that's probably the best way to parse how bad rated mode is going to be short of playing in it for a while.
Well, I haven't actually delved into rated mode yet. I'm just basing it on the comments I've read on here and just human nature when a pretty rating is involved. But if the D/C rate in free mode is similar to that of rated mode, I might as well play the more challenging one.

I can probably count on one hand the amount of times I've been DCed on in rated, if anything there have probably been more DCs in free mode! (roughly the same amount of games played in both) Overall it's much less of a problem than in BW1, and contrary to what was thought in the beginning of BW2 *coughbirchcough*, only the person who disconnects is kicked off for an hour.
Hmmm. Guess I'll give rated mode a fair shake then.

Thanks guys!
 
Well, I'm going to start playing again, and rather than play singles, I'm going to be playing doubles. It seems to me that it's a much more strategic form of gameplay. I could be wrong, though.


For reference, though, what are we seeing to be useful at this moment?
 
In doubles you're going to see a metric shitload of rain teams with equal amounts of goodstuff and Trick Room, in actual face to face competitions most teams are sand or goodstuff, with the occasional Trick Roomer.

If you're asking in terms of what kinds of pokemon you regularly see in doubles the big ones who you absolutely can not ignore because they're so common are Cresselia, Tyranitar, Hitmontop, Thundurus, Metagross, Hydreigon, Gastrodon, Garchomp, Lati@s, Politoed, Ludicolo. Those are the kings of VGC format who make up almost every team out there in some form. Out of those the absolutely most dangerous are Hitmontop & Thundurus, they make up one of the most dangerous lead pairs in the entire game.

Other Pokemon who are also extremely common and game changing you'll see are the likes of Scrafty, Whimsicott, Heatran, Chandelure, Excadrill, Abomasnow, Amoonguss, Togekiss, Terrakion, Breloom, Conkeldurr, Ferrothorn, Sableye, Gyarados, Jellicent and the Therians. Though in the case of the Therian's they're only uncommon because of the difficulty in getting them, in practice they'd have a lot more impact if they were easier to get.
 
Coming into doubles for the first time ever, been doing only singles the entirety of the pokemon game existence. So far it seems the only thing in common is everyone rage quits. Starting out with a rain team as it seems the easiest to test the format with. I've also noticed a lot of things run protect that normally wouldn't in singles. Now for the move "Helping hand" if my pokemon dies that used it does the other still get an attack boost? How much is the attack boost? Is it better to just have two things attack the same mon rather than helping hand? I'm actually not minding the lack of sleep clause in doubles. Priority attacks like Scizor bullet punch also don't seem to be as important either, but that might just be me.
 

Celever

i am town
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Coming into doubles for the first time ever, been doing only singles the entirety of the pokemon game existence. So far it seems the only thing in common is everyone rage quits. Starting out with a rain team as it seems the easiest to test the format with. I've also noticed a lot of things run protect that normally wouldn't in singles. Now for the move "Helping hand" if my pokemon dies that used it does the other still get an attack boost? How much is the attack boost? Is it better to just have two things attack the same mon rather than helping hand? I'm actually not minding the lack of sleep clause in doubles. Priority attacks like Scizor bullet punch also don't seem to be as important either, but that might just be me.
Protect is amazing in doubles and should be run on a lot of your pokemon. Since doubles is a fight for control of the match I'm not surprised at the rage quits either. Trick Room is the easiest team to start with by the way. iirc the helping hand boost is 1.5x and it will still work if the user of the move dies on that turn. Anyway yeah...
 
correction: disconnects will happen because people are cowards that can't admit defeat. also, priority is more important than you'd think, especially with all the speed control that's common in higher level play.
 
I've been so used to revenge killing something with bullet punch but what's been happening is the mon will, far as I've had experience with, randomly have protect and I get bopped by the second guy. Just taking some getting used to.
 
Priority is pretty important and standard IMO. Stuff like Scizor, Conk, Fake Out Users, etc. all use priority and are standard in this meta.
 
Is it better to just have two things attack the same mon rather than helping hand?
Depends on typing and stats. Helping Hand is more useful on things with lower (Sp)Atk than those that would rather attack themselves but sometimes boosting a partner's attack with better coverage is a better bet. Things that tend to drop their offensive stats like Latios can also use Helping Hand well as it gives them a way to contribute after the debuff without having to switch out.
 

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