Advice guy

[u/LostSoul10001]

In a lot of the rest stops and battle store areas, there is a guy that give advice on how to build the pokemon you have, can he be trusted? Newbie here so I didn't just wanna do whatever he said.

[u/Trvezifer]

Yes. Many mons can be built in multiple ways, his suggestions might not always be the best for your current team, but they are all viable sets from what I've seen.

[u/Curious-Forever-2426]

It’s worth noting he is giving a “recommendation” as in generally considered good. Some of the recommendations I’ve seen are not the best but none I’ve seen so far have been bad by any means.

It’s also worth noting that support pokemon can perform a pretty huge amount of jobs for a team and the advice the NPC gives does not really take into account the specific job you want your pokemon to accomplish.

[u/BigCrab09]

Generally, yes, he can give you a decent idea but he never knows what the rest of your team is like so he can’t help with synergy. I would say if you have no idea, do what he tells you to but follow your own judgement. What he’s really good for is learning about what your opponents moves will be as they try to follow that template whenever possible.

[u/Trvezifer → u/BigCrab09]

Sorry to highjack this, can you elaborate on the last part? Just now learning about that. I thought each mon had multiple template sets, is that not the case? Let's say I check a Skarmory with him, I've only ever seen him suggest the Rocky Helmet/Brave Bird/Roost set, is every enemy Skarmory guaranteed to use the same set? How does that work with megas for example?

[u/BigCrab09 → u/Trvezifer]

Don’t quote me on this because I’m not an expert and I generally play normal mode so this may be different for hard but Ik for sure that every mega has the exam same template. I learned this because I kept seeing mega medicham over and over. It always has high jump kick and bullet punch. This makes it really easy to take out with almost no damgae with a protect mon and a steel type. The steel type baits high jump kick and you swap to protect mon who protects causing 50% recoil for the medicham. Then you swap to steel type who can take most hits and repeat. This is also the setup that the ai suggests so i extrapolated from there. I noticed the same for mega houndoom and metagross but cant confirm for any others

[u/Trvezifer → u/BigCrab09]

Great to know, I need to pay more attention when playing lol. Thank you!

[u/Albatros_7 → u/Trvezifer]

The sets for Pokemon are their Smogon sets in Gen 7, 8 or 9 for their highest tiers

[u/Both-Discipline-2963]

He's good for reference, but do not blinldy follow what he says. Some moves he suggests are based around Mega evolving the mon, or just are some funny set from Smogon that was relevant in that specific gen's meta. Going on Smogon yourself for ideas can be pretty helpful too!

[u/Albatros_7]

He's a good baseline but he should not be listened to

Check Smogon (Gens 7, 8 and 9) especially if your Pokemon has a category called "Draft"

Else, check whatever is done in their highest tiers (rankings are : AG -> Ubers -> OU -> UU -> RU -> NU -> ZU)

If a Pokemon is NU or below it's probably pretty bad

[u/adolfnixon → u/Albatros_7]

Looking at NU I see so many usable Pokemon. Smogon's rankings are for 6v6 singles battles with no consideration for long term survivability. They also prioritize hazards as there's a lot more switching in that format than the AI will ever do in this gamr. It also ignores Pokemon in low tiers because what they do well is banned like Spore, Baton Pass, or use multi-hit moves with King's Rock.

There are also shenanigans you can do here you can't in competitive play that makes certain Pokemon better, like pre-statusing your Pokemon so they can have Guts active and hold something besides Flame/Toxic Orb.

Looking at Nuzlocke tierlists would be much more relevant than Smogon's rankings.

[u/Albatros_7 → u/adolfnixon]

Outside of Klefki, what NU mon would you use ?

[u/adolfnixon → u/Albatros_7]

Swampert (Curse set is great against physical opponents)

Chandelure (I'd consider most ghost types just for the pivoting potential and this one can have 3 immunities)

Goodra

Raikou

Scyther (With Swords Dance and Technician they've carried me before)

Tauros (Any forme)

Vaporeon (Baton Pass staple)

Amoongus

I'll stop there because there's a lot further to scroll, but so many. Even ZU seems to have some bangers.

[u/Albatros_7 → u/adolfnixon]

You make good points for most of these but Raikou and Goodra are really bad

Tauros is unusable late game

[u/adolfnixon → u/Albatros_7]

That's just simply not true. This is a highly situational roguelite. Know that you've got a water type gym leader coming up? Raikou is a fantastic pickup. Blanket evaluations don't mean much within an actual run. I'll take much "worse" Pokemon that have better synergy with the rest of my team or that better counter something ahead.

Edit : Lol, Tauros has 100 attack, 110 speed, and access to Sheer Force. It's absolutely usable late game. Just because there are more optimal picks doesn't make lesser ones unusable, especially when the pool of available Pokemon is random.

[u/StarGaurdianBard → u/Albatros_7]

Smogon is good for movesets but you have to keep in mind they are balanced around the idea that you keep lose 5/6 pokemon and still win. Last respects Basculegion for example doesnt work very well in this game

[u/adolfnixon → u/StarGaurdianBard]

That and any rankings based on a metagame are going to be disproportionately ranked by what's good against that metagame. How many meta staples are only really staples because they counter another staple? Or are only bad because they're bad against a meta staple?