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Hello Here a The First Guide SOLS Team of Npc-Match Call for Win some Money Only u can win Extra Money with Pay-day i suggest a Meowth lvl100 R104 Rich Boy Winston 840$+90$ R115 Battle Girl Cyndy 648$+150$ 117 Anna and Meg 612$+150$ Petalburg Woods BUG Catcher James 550$+150$ R118 Aroma Lady Rose 1.250$+570$ R121 Gentleman Walter 3480$+600$ R111 Cooltrainer Wilton 1836$+510$ MT,Pyre 5TH Flood Hex Valerie 1728$+520$ MT-Chimmeny Expert Shelby 1890$+530$ MT-Chimmeny Hiker Sawyer 1820-450$ R120 Bird Keeper 2080$+590$ Hiker Trent 1530$+540$ R114 PokeManiac Steve 2565$+420$ Tuber Ricky 117$-570$ R115 Black Belt Nob 1368$+590$ Meteor Falls Old Couple John&Jay 3150$+390$ Meteor Falls Dragon Tammer 3998$+580$ R103 PokeFan Miguel 1800$+600$ R117 Triathlete Maria 1530$+540$ R112 Hiker Trent 1530$+500$ R121 Beatuy Jessica 3890$+590$ R120 Bug Maniac Jeffrey 3645$+580$ R119 Pokemon Ranger Jackson 2916$+570$ R110 Collector Edwin 1190$+250$ MT-Pyre Pokemon Breeder 2340$+520$ Jagger Pass Camper Ethan 720$+200$ R106 Fisherman Elliot 900$+540$ R117 Triathlete Dylan 1530$+500$ R111 Ruin Maniac Dusty 3015$+590$ Jagger Pass Picker Diana 684$+190$ R121 Cooltrainer Cristin 3132$+590$ R104 Lady Cindy 840$+70$ R119 Poke Ranger Chaterine 2208$+520$ R102 Youngser Calvin 180$+50$ R110 Triathlete Benjamin 1140$+510$ R111 CoolTrainer Brook 1836$+530$ R114 Kindler Bernie 1296$+600$ R103 Twins Amy & Liv 405$+150$ R110 Triathlete Abigail 1440$+600$ Total Rewards 104.979

[first Guide] (credits to myself for the 'banner') Hello PokeMMO players.~ This is a guide about how use the a new system made in the last update called the 'Mail System'. _____________________________________________________________________________________ You can use this system in the upstairs of any pokemon centers in the two regions. You must talk to the NPC with a green costume and a Wingull: You'll automatically be on a page in the tab 'Read Mail'. This tab is for read all received mails in your Box: P.S.: When you have a Mail in your box you'll have a notification in the top left corner of your In Game screen. Then, click on the second tab 'Send Mail'. This tab is for send your mails. Form: Recipient: [In Game Name] Subject: [Title for the mail]. Body: [The message]. Attached Money: [Money to send]. Attached POKéMON: [Pokemon to send]. Mailing Fee: $1 000 / $1K (you can't change it, you MUST pay 1K to send your mail). You click on "Send Mail" and your mail is sent. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Bug (with how solve it): https://forums.pokemmo.eu/index.php?/topic/58685-guide-how-use-the-mail-system/#entry1166929 _____________________________________________________________________________________ Tell me if you can see any mistakes and if I forget some informations.~ Then, click "Like" if my guide is ok or leave a comment if no.

Given bl0nde's guide, I thought it might be fun to take her up on the offensive player's guide. Since I'm an NU player, I'll use examples from NU to give you a crash course on Hyper Offense: THE ART OF HYPER OFFENSE - WIN FAST, LOSE FAST With the recently implemented Physical/Special split, Hyper Offense just became a possibility. Be forewarned, this playstyle can be a big challenge and you'll frequently find yourself saying "Where are my walls?!?!" when you're faced with a scary sweeper. Prologue: Hyper Offense? All teams fall somewhere on the spectrum between defensive and offensive play; Hyper Offensive teams are usually composed of few supporters and lots of powerful sweepers. The general set up is 5+ sweepers or tanks that can dish heavy damage, break stall and work together with a high degree of synergy to beat enemy teams. In 3rd gen this is tricky as we don't have some of the staples of offense in later gens: Choice Specs, Life Orb, or superpowered sweepers with insanely high attack stats. Part 1: Archetypes There are a couple of Archetypes for offensive teams: Choice Band - with access to moves of all types, physical sweepers are more viable than ever to hold Choice Band and reap its benefits. However, this playstyle requires prediction and you can quickly be worn down by stall tactics like Spikes and Status. Since many sweepers benefit from setting up a little before attacking, Choice Band teams might be a thing of the past. But they can also make short work of your opponent's switches if you're good at predicting. Special Assault - this playstyle is generally bad with the move options that PokeMMO has. Wait until we get Porygon-Z and then we'll talk. Bulky Offense - these teams are more defensive and tend to focus more on slower heavy hitters to break walls. With the split, this playstyle is more effective than ever. Part 2: Offensive Options and Core Building under construction Individual pokemon [spoiler] descriptions coming soon Ariados Electabuzz Lapras Poliwrath Sneasel Victreebell Walrein Xatu [/spoiler] Offensive Cores [spoiler] Electabuzz+Sneasel A common core that relies on the popularity of Psychic types as special walls. Electabuzz, with Magnet attached, deals hits everything without special defense investment like a truck and with HP Ice, Psychic and Signal beam has the coverage to take down almost everything other sweeper in the tier. With Sneasel as a teammate, Electabuzz can easily predict the switch to a special wall and let Sneasel hit hard with Pursuit/Bite. While this core isn't foolproof, with the right teammates it can prove deadly: both Sneasel and Electabuzz's high use is evidence. More generally: in other metagames, cores like this one are also common. In ORAS OU, for instance, Tyranitar, Bisharp, Metagross or Scizor often pair with Mega Charizard Y, Manectric, or Keldeo, or other strong special sweepers to lure in special walls and provide the same type of Pursuit support that Sneasel provides to Electabuzz in NU. Aerodactyl is an example of this in OU, though its pursuit is not strong enough to cause Chansey any real problems. Stantler+Zangoose This core relies on a common concept in offensive teambuilding: spamming one type of move so much that the enemy can't possibly handle it. Stantler's access to Megahorn and Iron Tail lets it take out Rock types like Armaldo and wear down bulky Psychics for other teammates to get an opening. Intimidate gives it opportunities against weaker attackers, improve its modest bulk, and force switches to get a predict kill. Zangoose is there to revenge kill opposing sweepers and boost swords dance to prevent faster sweepers like Sneasel and to clean up weakened walls once Stantler has done its job. If one of these pokemon is not revealed until later in the match, this strategy is even more effective, since the opponent rarely expects to see two normal spam sweepers on one team and will sacrifice their walls and sponges just to keep one from tearing through their team. Once the second is revealed, it's often too late. More generally: building teams that rely on the relative dominance of one type against most of the metagame is a great way to get easy wins. In XY OU, for instance, a popular team was Talonflame+Pinsir (nickenamed Birdspam), which relied on both pokemon's access to strong STAB flying moves and coverage that could break through or weaken common checks like Tyranitar, Rotom-W and Steel types, who respectively fell to Close Combat/U-turn, Close Combat, and Flare Blitz. While teams like this aren't common in Pokemmo OU, similar tactics can be used with strong sweepers like Ursaring+Tauros/Aerodactyl, relying on Ursa's ability to break walls, and the faster sweepers' ability to clean up weakened opponents. Jumpluff + Magmar Jumpluff's access to memento is a blessing in a tier filled with offense. When the time is right, this move allows Jumpluff to sacrifice itself and halve the opponent's Atk/SpAtk, giving Magmar an opportunity to Belly Drum and sweep. While some pokemon thwart this plan, like Whishcash, Hitmontop, or Scyther, the key to this core is adequately scouting the opponent enough to know when the plan will work. If the opponent reveals their team too early, the Jumpluff user can plan their onslaught well and execute the plan - or they can go Rambo style and just try busting the plot out from turn one. This core also appreciates bulky Psychics, Waters and other walls who can stall the opponent and get chip damage. If an opponent choice locks themself into Pursuit, for instance, Magmar can easily boost Belly Drum and sweep, given the right conditions. More generally: Memento is a powerful move for offense against other offensive teams, and since offense is common in NU, the tier is well-suited to it. Similar combos like OU Memento Gardevoir + Belly Drum Linoone use a similar plan to execute their strategy. Xatu+Hitmontop/Poliwrath This core is more defensive than others listed, but the synergy between these two pokemon and their respective versatility is a great illustration of core-building. Xatu's resistance to Psychic, along with its bulky CM build and perfect coverage through Psychic/Psybeam allow it to abuse attacks common Psychic attacks launched at Hitmontop/Poliwrath and sweep slower, more defensive teams that rely on tactics like Toxic stall. Hitmontop, on the other hand, abuses Dark/Rock/Ice type attacks aimed at Xatu and can itself boost with Bulk Up to become a hard to stop tank. With Theif/Mach Punch it acheives perfect offensive coverage, while EQ/Rock Slide gives it stronger attacks that still hit a variety of threats for good damage. More generally: teams that rely on boosting are different from the more straightforward "Rambo" offensive teams that rely on hard hitting combos or type spam. Cores like Xatu+Hitmontop are a good example of "bulky offense" meaning that switching is allowed and even beneficial. These teams are more effective against slower stall teams rather than offensive ones, since these teams often lack the firepower to break bulky sweepers after they've accumulated a few boosts. Another tactic that you see in later generations is "Dual Dancers" - two pokemon (Gyarados/Dragonite or Haxorus/Salamence) that rely on weakening walls with one setup sweeper so that the other can do its job. Since both Hitmontop and Xatu don't like Psychics generally, eliminating a Psychic wall can make sweeping easier for the other, similar to how Gyarados can Taunt and kill Skarmory/Forretress, allowing Dragonite to rip through the opponent with Outrage later. Scyther+Poliwrath+Camerupt This core isn't very common lately, but with such amazing synergy it's not fair to leave it out. Scyther's speed and resistance to Fighting/Ground/Grass attacks gives it a number of points of entry in the metagame, while Poliwrath's resistance to Ice, Fire, Rock and Water attacks allows it to mitigate Scyther's weak points. Enemies who think they've got Poliwrath cornered can have the tables turn when Scyther comes in on a 4x resisted Giga Drain and threatens them out of play with Wing Attack. Camerupt is a slower yet diverse attacker whose access to STAB EQ, STAB Fire Blast, Rock Slide and Hidden Power and numerous resistances allow it to soak up attacks from Electabuzz, who otherwise disintegrates the remaining core. Other special walls like Grumpig generally lack this firepower, but can build themselves to have better coverage and prevent unwanted Special Sweeper problems. More generally: type synergy is important, even on offensive teams. While other cores listed are used to accomplish a specific goal, this core allows for more defensive play while still enlisting slower, harder hitters instead of walls to chip away at the opponent. These teams are less effective against stall, but when you predict correctly they can provide a healthy mix of damage output and type-based defense to wear down opponents enough for other partners to sweep. Keep in mind that there's no need to limit your cores: these 3 pokemon pair well with lots of other sweepers that allow you to provide even more damage output and defense without sacrificing synergy. Got cores? Post them so I can list them here! [/spoiler] Part 3: Mind games The real key to playing offensively is in the mindset! Prediction is the key ingredient to success here. But how do I predict? That's not an easy question, and it takes a certain level of reading your opponent, scouting their team and inferring their win condition in order to maintain control while still dishing out heavy damage. While some Hyper-Offense teams can afford to lose a member early, others might not fare so well if their opponent is packing lots of surprises of their own. Steps to a fast win: [spoiler] 1. Start with a great lead that has few sturdy counters or effectively baits a wall that you can eliminate. Spikes leads like Glalie are awesome in NU for punishing switch-heavy wall teams and faster leads like Crobat can Taunt, Super Fang or Sludge Bomb spam your opponent into an awkward start. 2. Scout your opponent immediately. Force switches as much as possible to see what they have and more importantly how they play. Extremely cautious players can fall victim to set ups, tricks and traps that a more aggresive player would balk at. Similarly, don't be Rambo and assume your opponent will over/under predict you and make a costly error early on. Offense requires you to be more bold in attacking, but the costliest mistake you can make is throwing away a needed teammate too early and then falling victim to an opposing sweep. 3. Set up your win condition effectively. After scouting your enemy's team a bit, you should have some idea for how you can start to dismantle some walls and get a sweeper in to clean up. Sometimes at this stage you will realize that you're screwed, due ot either losing a pokemon, letting an opponent set up, or losing a pokemon to a surprise from your opponent. Other times, you'll realize you haven't scouted them enough, and need to go back to step 2 before setting up your win condition. Remember that offensive teams have a timer on them- you can't really afford to play defense so a lot of the time you just have to run with what you have. Double switches can be huge momentum grabbers, however, so when you know exactly what your opponent is going to do, put the pedal to the floor and cut them off with a counter before they can get a move in otherwise. 4. Sweep! After you've eliminated the things you need to kill in order to win, start chipping away at their sweepers and walls. Keep as many of your fast sweepers alive to take out theirs, and only sack something when you know its job is done. In some cases, like CB teams, you can just start with this step, as these teams require far less set up (and far more prediction) than "Trap" offensive teams. [/spoiler] What you should note while reading the "Steps" is that prediction is important at every level of the game. Unlike defensive teams, offense requires that you're actively pursuing a goal at every step of the game, not merely reacting to your opponents moves. The mind game is balancing your team's objective against the probability that your opponent will swap to something you just can't handle. Moves like Substitute can be instrumental in meeting this balance - Sub punch, Sub status and Sub Disable can all turn your sweepers into nightmares for weak-minded opponents to play around while still providing damage output. At the same time, Subs block would be KO's from the Rambos of the world and ease problems that Choice Banders can cause. Part 4: Epilogue That covers most of what you need to know in order to beat those hated "wall fgts" and look like a total alpha male while doing so. Remember that pokemon is an "art" in that how you play expresses who you are: hyper-offensive players have to be okay with losing because they simply weren't prepared for a gimmick set or because they lost a speed tie. If you're the hyper-offense type you shoot first and ask questions later, love surprising your opponent and like to come up with new ways of sweeping harder and faster than your opponents walls can handle. Feel free to add to (and comment on) this as you wish! I'm not the "authority" on anything pokemon related so I can always stand to learn a lesson or two. TODO: Ugh fix everything because of the special/physical split

The Art of Swift EV Training :The Devil's Guide to EVing "How many threads like this are there? Isn't this redundant?" A random embodied fellow proclaims. Under the request of our fellow feline-loving GM that governs the Guide Tavern, the Devil presents to you the secrets and easiest ways with the new introduction of Hoenn to EV Train like never before. [spoiler] As most or none of you may I know, I am a notorious, conscientious and experienced EV Trainer, having the cheapest service in the MMO and with the update and ease of breeding, even cheaper -- everything in this guide is, at the end of the day, opinionated. [/spoiler] Things to point out: This guide is under process. Currently, this guide will include the easiest spots in every region to EV Train in one specific stat. Things to come include: The Art of Swift EV Training The Art of NPC EV Training EV Training in multiple stats at once (inefficient, but I may add depending on my business) Any remarks of mistakes and critiques in the process of my construction of this guide is thoroughly appreciated. Please do not post in this thread until I have provided my required reserves. Thank you for your cooperation.

Disclaimer: Everything here is my opinion _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ How you design your pokemon team and play in duels depends on what kind of balance you prefer to have between risk and reward. Use the graph below for a visual aid. Different team designs represent different points on the graph. As you play more offensively (risky), your potential reward goes up in the form of the amount of damage you are able to deal to your opponent. A very offensive team is represented by point "C". In contrast, a defensive team is represented by point "A". How you choose to play in the end simply comes down to personal preference. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ When you start up any game there are various elements like equipment, levels, and abilities. In our game there are many elements we deal with: -IV’s –Natures -Base Points of Pokemon -Critical Hits –Dueling Skills/Experience The first thing you learn as a serious duelist is you want your IV’s to be as close to 31 and you want your correct nature for each pokemon. Why is this? We do this because we do not want these elements to be contributing factors to a loss. We try to stop these from being on our list of factors that influence our duels. In any game, you want to ideally cross out all elements except skills. The goal is to have an even playing field or one where you have the advantage so your skills and experience can guide you to victory. In a game full of “RNG” and unpredictability like PokeMMO, there is only so much you can do to control elements like critical hits, flinches, and missed attacks. All you can do is try to create a consistent playing field for yourself that is as fair as possible. The most ideal way of doing this is by playing defensively. A defensive style does not limit critical hits and other RNG you sustain, but it makes them a much less contributing element to your wins/loses. The reason being with more bulk, recovery options, etc. you have more chances to show that you know how to outplay the opponent. It lets your experience, dueling skills, and personal decisions have a greater impact on whether you win or lose. -IV’s –Natures -Base Points of Pokemon -Critical Hits –“Dueling Skills/Experience” __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ We start with building a team of course! Building a beautiful team of any sort from scratch is never fast or perfect the first time. It may look cheap and easy, but building an extremely successful defensive team can be very difficult and time consuming in our metagame as well. This statement is even more true with the addition of the choice band creating powerful "wall breakers". There are multiple reasons for an exceptionally designed defensive team to not be easy to create : A defensive team depends on the ability to consistently and repeatedly predict and absorb various types of damage. If you start losing the ability to absorb damage, you start to lose your chances of winning – it's that simple. From this thought, you can see that it takes a lot of preparation and a lot of thought. You need to be prepared for literally anything in the game that comes your way. In a game with as many different creatures and attack combinations as ours, I will be the first to tell you this: it’s impossible to be ready for everything. There is no “perfect” team against everything. So, what can you do? In the end, your team design should come down to a little bit of exploration through trial and error and a balance between ideas. For a defensive play style you want to balance between these ideas when building your team: What are my primary threats in this game? Go watch other people play and be a spectator. Go to the Tierlist of your choice and read about the possible things you will be facing. Write down what you feel your biggest threats are and what common attack combinations they use. Watch what people tend to do and how they play. Plan out how to deal with these things. Basically you want to figure out what your threats are and what you need to prioritize being able to defend against. Synergy, Synergy and more Synergy. Synergy means individual members of your team with different roles complement one another and work well together to make one solid unbreakable team. I'll provide an example using my most recent dueling team. These are two team mates that I designed to work together. Their main purpose is to be the primary physical "defensive core" of my team. Weezing Resistists the many pokemon which carry the ghost/fighting attack combination. This is one of the most common physical attacking threats in the game Levitates. Instant Recovery. Special Attacker. Solrock Resists ground/normal/flying attacks. It also resists fire which is the traditionally the most common special attack type on a mixed physical sweeper. Levitates. Instant Recovery. Physical Attacker. As you can see these two have great physical defensive synergy. When solrock is weak to bug and ghost, weezing is there. When weezing is overwhelmed by double edges and strong normal stabs, solrock can sometimes step in. I never said it was a perfect core. Anyone can name something that will break it when only looking at these two. Nevertheless, this is a great example of synergy and this pair covers a large portion of the physical threats in the metagame. Remember, it's impossible to defend against everything. That's not what I'm trying to convince you that you can do. The only thing to take from this is the idea that the more synergy you can get between your team members, the tighter you team will be and the harder it will be to break. As you build your team keep synergy in mind. What is the goal of my team. As much as you want to consider your threats, at the same time you need to have a strategy yourself which should have the end goal of allowing you to inflict more damage than you take. In some ways, it doesn’t matter if you deal a lot of damage or not much on a "play by play" level. The main thing is that overall you want to consistently push out more damage than you absorb. As you build you team keep your strategy in mind. A worthwhile tip to mention while team building is that since defensive teams do not pack as much punch as offensive teams, supporting your team members through indirect damage can often win you literally half the battle. Whether or not you need indirect damage depends on your team design. It’s not always necessary but it is a great option. Indirect damage: Spikes, status effects (Will-o-Wisp, toxic), Knock Off(loss of all items, especially recovery items), etc. If you have enough room on your team to start stacking indirect damage, it just gets NASTY. Knock off a vaporeons leftovers while you have your spikes out. You will watch the vaporeon spam wish over and over while your opponent will most likely be "acknowledging" the nice design of your team. Do the Calculations. Know what you are fighting against and let your team be prepared. The idea is to dish out more damage than you take right? Well, playing defensively isn't always about just creating the most slow and bulky creature possible. You only should use what you need. Overkill in bulk is simply overkill and a loss of efficiency. Pay attention to your EV Spreads, Natures, and Stats of your pokemon. What do I mean? The best way to explain this is by an example. On my team I use a cloyster which is my terrain control (spiker). In this situation most people run a bold cloyster and they just want it to be as bulky as possible, which is not wrong if that's what you want. Bold Cloyster's stats can look like this: -Hit Points: 156 252 Ev's -Attack: X -Defense: 218 -Spe Attck: 121 129 Ev's -Spe Def: 80 129 Ev's -Speed: 86 Watch what happens if I change the nature to timid and adjust the spread: -Hit Points: 156 252 Ev's -Attack: X -Defense: 200 -Spe Attck: 121 129 Ev's -Spe Def: 73 64 Ev's -Speed: 107 64 Ev's What happens is I've lost about 10% of my physical defense. So if a snorlax hits me with a body slam and was doing 50 HP on the Bold cloyster it will do 55 to 60 now. To me, this is not significant. I know my math may not be precise, but I hope you can understand the point here. The point is to do your calculations and try to be prepared - don't be caught off guard because knowing how much damage you can take is key to playing defensively. In this example, I've given up 10% of my defense, to gain 21 points in speed which allows me to out run a pokemon that can be a potential threat to any team: Marowak. To me, it is worth it because cloyster's purpose on my team is just just mainly my influence on the terrain (spikes/rapid spin). If something like this is worth it to you or not will depend on the way your team is set up. You may not have expected to read this in this guide from me, but is speed the best defense sometimes? The answer is most definitely yes. To conclude this bullet point: consider what you want your team members to do. It's not about just throwing bulk everywhere as much as possible as some haters will claim. Doing that won't win you those tough games. Consider what roles and expectations you have for your team members and optimize them as much as possible for performance. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Keep your mind open when you start to duel with your new defensive team and take your time as you are clicking your moves. Think clear, don't rush. Being a defensive player takes a certain mindset. It’s a somewhat different mindset than offensive players use. What mindset do I mean? Well there's just different things to keep more focus on. Basically when you play you have to continually remind yourself what you team is built for and what you are trying to do. Let that thought influence your decisions as you play. Remember, you built your team to do certain things. Remember your strategy you planned. If your opponent lends you a “free turn” remember to always try to set conditions in your favor. This could mean setting up indirect damage to help out your struggling team members. It could also mean healing up your 2 main work horses that dish out the hurt. Don’t play your opponents game by trying to reciprocate their damage punch for punch. Don’t try to follow them. You won’t win because your opponents team is better designed for their game. Play your game and play your strategy. Do what your team was designed for. Another tip for the mindset: one thing I do as I duel is once I have scouted to some degree, I pretend I am the opponent that I am fighting. I ask myself "what would I do against that pokemon in this situation". There are never any guarentees, but if you keep a cool head and keep your opponent's perspective in mind, you will often find them making a logical decision in which case you will have successfully predicted it. Also remember that as a defensive player with a defensive team, you aren’t necessarily trying to sweep or beat down things fast. One of your goals is efficiency. So, don’t get too hungry when you are in a situation where you think you can “smell the blood” in the water because that could just be the opponent baiting you. Remember what we said: walls are far from invincible - when you lose the ability to absorb damage you start to lose. If you "smell the blood" and the opponent's pokemon is no threat to you, why worry or rush? You can always come back and finish them later on. So, if you are not threatened by any move on the opposing pokemon, scout first! You should worry more about the things you don’t see. If the case is that you are in fact being baited, the predictable move is the obvious choice - that's when you think can smell the blood. You can surprise people by not being that person that picks the predictable move by instead scouting for unseen threats. If the opponent has not revealed his pokemon and you are in a position where you are not threatened, scout for threats by pick a move that doesn’t make sense. Afterwords, when you are more aware of your opponents strategy and the hidden surprises are gone, you can then start following through with your normal game plan by using your optimum defender (efficiency) for each individual encounter and etc. A good example of the last bullet point above is what I personally perceive as the rising popularity of the houndoom lately. Pokemon that are weak to fire (scizor, forretress) are used as bait to activate flash fire on the houndoom and then it can pursuit trap or fire off powered up fire attacks which can be potentially hard to absorb. So for me, when I have my dusclops out (which is houndoom bait), I am already clicking my focus punch anytime #1 dusclops is not threatened and #2. I do not yet know what the opponent has on his team. I know people see the dusclops and think: "Will-o-Wisp". That is when I will pick focus punch or something different - I turn a potentially predictable situation into an unpredictable situation. Then again, after you have fully scouted, you can then start trying to punch back in the holes you find with your normal strategy. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Thank you for reading my guide. I hope that you got some ideas and maybe learned something. I could have condensed this and I could have also expanded some sections of it. I suppose the best teacher is experience and sometimes words just arn't enough. I wrote this because I like to create open minds around me in my life. I like to see people who are willing to learn and grow. I would also like for someone who duels a lot and has been around a long time to write out a deep offensive guide that somewhat reciprocates this defensive one. I am very interested in learning to play different styles and I don't feel like I would be very good in this moment as some of you. I've poured pretty much everything I know and how I create my teams in this guide. The rest is up to you. Fun is the thing we often forget and I hope you have fun and do well in your games. Good luck!

This guide shows location of best payout for vs skeeker battles in kanto. (is necessary to use payday with amulet coin) > ROUTE 12 < List Pokemon: Tentacruel - Seaking - Kingdra - Poliwrath - Claustro - Nidoran (M) - Nidoran (F) - Electrodo - Fearow - Raticate - Primeape - Arcanine - Sandslash - Magikarp -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- Fisherman / Money: 1.782 $ + 600 $ (payday) Fisherman / Money: 1944 + 600 $ (payday) Fisherman / Money: 2.187 $ + 590 $ (payday) Fisherman / Money: 1.701 $ + 600 $ (payday) Young Couple / Money: 1512 $ + 240 $ (payday) Rocker / Money: 1.566 $ + 580 $ (payday) Camper / Money: 1.305 $ + 600 $ (payday) Fisherman / Money: 1.944 $ + 220 $ (payday) -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- TOTAL MONEY: $ 17.971 > ROUTE 13 < List Pokemon: Tentacruel - Seaking - Kingdra - Poliwrath - Pidgeot - Dewgong - Dodrio - Fearow - Noctowl - Clefable - Parasect - Persa - Nidorina - Raichu - Raticate - Victreebel - Clefairy - Vileplume - Wigglytuff - Muk - Weezing - Electrodo - Arbok -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- Picnicker / Money: 1.260 $ + 600 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1566 $ + 550 $ (payday) Picnicker / Money: 1.080 $ + 570 $ (payday) Beauty / Money: 3.132 $ + 580 $ (payday) Beauty / Money: 2.916 $ + 590 $ (payday) Picnicker / Money: 1.350 $ + 600 $ (payday) Picnicker / Money: 810 $ + 600 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 936 $ + 600 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 900 $ + 600 $ (payday) Biker / Money: 840 $ + 600 $ (payday) -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- TOTAL MONEY: $ 20.680 > ROUTE 14 < List Pokemon: Pidgeot - Dodrio - Fearow - Noctowl - Clefable - Wigglytuff - Raichu - Muk - Weezing - Electrodo - Arbok -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- Bird keeper / Money: 1512 $ + 590 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1404 $ + 600 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1566 $ + 560 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1512 $ + 600 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1782 $ + 590 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1566 $ + 600 $ (payday) Biker / Money: 780 $ + 570 $ (payday) Biker / Money: 840 $ + 600 $ (payday) Biker / Money: 870 $ + 570 $ (payday) Biker / Money: 870 $ + 600 $ (payday) Twins / Money: 522 $ + 550 $ (payday) -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- TOTAL MONEY: $ 19.654 > ONE ISLAND < NORTH AND SOUTH List Pokemon: Vileplume - Raticate - Clefable - Pidgeot - Parasect - Nidorina - Sandslash - Golem - Fearow - Nidoking - Rapidash - Machamp - Primeape - Hitmonchan - Hariyama - Hitmonlee - Hitmontop - Wartortle - Kingler - Claustro - Poliwrath - Seaking - Kingler - Tentacruel - Seadra - Starmie - Golduck - Lanturn -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- Picnicker / Money: 1.575 $ + 600 $ (payday) Camper / Money: 1.620 $ + 600 $ (payday) Battle girl / Money: 2.052 $ + 590 $ (payday) Swimmer / Money: 342 $ + 600 $ (payday) Crush Kin / Money: 2.106 $ + 600 $ (payday) Black Belt / Money: 1998 $ + 590 $ (payday) Black Belt / Money: 2025 $ + 600 $ (payday) Battle girl / Money: 1.998 $ + 590 $ (payday) Swimmer / Money: 342 $ + 600 $ (payday) Swimmer / Money: 333 $ + 550 $ (payday) Fisherman / Money: 2.835 $ + 600 $ (payday) -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- TOTAL MONEY: $ 23.746 > THREE ISLAND < NORTH List Pokemon: Raichu - Wiggytuff - Clefable - Sunflora - Breloom - Venusaur - Bellossom - Weepinbell - Kingler - Poliwrath - Seaking - Seadra - Poliwhirl - Dewgong - Starmie - Roselia -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- Twins / Money: 999 $ + 590 $ (payday) Miss scent / Money: 2268 $ + 600 $ (payday) Beach / Money: 306 $ + 560 $ (payday) Beach / Money: 315 $ + 590 $ (payday) Miss scent / Money: 2331 $ + 600 $ (payday) -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- TOTAL MONEY: 9.159 $ > FIVE ISLAND < NORTH AND SOUTH List Pokemon: Azumarill - Raichu - Clefable - Smeargle - Ampharos - Qwilfish - Seaking - Skiploom - Blissey - Persa - Primeape - Slowbro - Nidoking - Crobat - Golbat - Noctowl - Dodrio - Fearow - Pidgeot -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- Breeder / Money: 3.024 $ + 570 $ (payday) Painter / Money: 1.800 $ + 560 $ (payday) Lady / Money: 6.000 $ + 570 $ (payday) Lady / Money: 5.880 $ + 560 $ (payday) Painter / Money: 1.800 $ + 550 $ (payday) Painter / Money: 1.800 $ + 580 $ (payday) Youngster / Money: 1.728 $ + 600 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1764 $ + 560 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1764 $ + 600 $ (payday) Bird keeper / Money: 1764 $ + 600 $ (payday) -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- TOTAL MONEY: $ 33.074 > SIX ISLAND < NORTH AND SOUTH List Pokemon: Hypno - Forretress - Electrodo - Mr. Mime - Machamp - Golem - Sandslash - Steelix - Onix - Dugtrio - Rhyhorn - Kangaskhan - Marowak - Claydol - Golduck - Poliwrath - Tentacruel - Seadra - Claustro - Seaking - Starmie - Dewgong - Lanturn - Wigglytuff - Raichu - Clefable - Roselia - Sunflora - Bellossom - Weepinbell - Breloom -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- Juggler / Money: 4.320 $ + 600 $ (payday) Mountainerr / Money: 3.969 $ + 580 $ (payday) Mountainerr / Money: 4.050 $ + 600 $ (payday) Pokemaniac / Money: 2.352 $ + 490 $ (payday) Ruinmaniac / Money: 3.456 $ + 600 $ (payday) Ruinmaniac / Money: 3.600 $ + 580 $ (payday) Ruinmaniac / Money: 3.528 $ + 600 $ (payday) Swimmer / Money: 294 $ + 600 $ (payday) Swimmer / Money: 300 $ + 600 $ (payday) Double / Money: 1.350 $ + 600 $ (payday) Miss / Money: 2.058 $ + 540 $ (payday) -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- TOTAL MONEY: $ 35.667 > SEVEN ISLAND < NORTH AND SOUTH List Pokemon: Kadabra - Girafarig - Xatu - Hypno - Mr. Mime - Slowbro - Sunflora - Bellossom - Venusaur - Roselia - Weepinbell - Breloom - Forretress - Electrodo - Exeggcute - Cacturne - Jumpluff - Vileplume - Victreebel - Tangela - Golduck - Tauros - Dewgong - Kangaskhan - Ursaring - Nidoqueen - Lickitung - Sandslash - Persa - Arbok - Hariyama - Machamp - Hitmonlee - Hitmontop - Rhyhorn - Ninetales - Rapidash - Marowak - Claydol - Steelix - onix - Raichu - Arcanine -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- Psychic / Money: 1560 $ + 580 $ (payday) Psychic / Money: 1500 $ + 590 $ (payday) Canyon Entrance: Aroma Lady / Money: 2.100 $ + 600 $ (payday) Juggler / Money: 2.820 $ + 590 $ (payday) Pokémon Ranger / Money: 2.754 $ + 600 $ (payday) Pokémon Ranger / Money: 2.754 $ + 590 $ (payday) Young Couple / Money: 2100 $ + 600 $ (payday) Sevault Canyon: Cool Couple / Money: 1872 $ + 570 $ (payday) Tamer / Money: 2.940 $ + 560 $ (payday) Pokémon Ranger / Money: 2.646 $ + 600 $ (payday) Pokémon Ranger / Money: 2.808 $ + 590 $ (payday) Battle Girl / Money: 1.728 $ + 600 $ (payday) Cool Trainer / Money: 2.700 $ + 600 $ (payday) Cool Trainer / Money: 2.700 $ + 600 $ (payday) Tanoby Chambers: Ruin Maniac / Money: 3456 $ + 580 $ (payday) Monsieur / Money: 3.528 $ + 590 $ (payday) Ruin Maniac / Money: 3600 $ + 590 $ (payday) -------------------------------------------------- ------ ---------------------------------- --------- TOTAL MONEY: $ 53.596

Welcome to the PokeMMO forums! If this is your first time participating on a forum read through this to see what is understood to be 'common courtesy'. Even if you're an old hat at forums it never hurts to refresh your memory... These guidelines will help you have the best possible forum experience, and make other forum users much happier with you. Always read the forum rules - both the overall rules and the subforum1 specific rules (they aren't always the same) Look at the pinned topics2 in the subforum - they may contain important information that is relevant to what you need. Post in the right section! Each subforum is meant for a specific thing, and has a description of what belongs in that subforum. Use meaningful thread titles and topic tags - they make it easier for people to see if what you're talking about is relevant to what they're looking for Use proper spelling and grammar. Many users do not have English as a native language, but using the best English you can will make it easier for others to understand and converse with you. Try to avoid TYPING IN ALL CAPS, Typing In CamelCase or using excessive 1337 spk. Dis is hurd 2 understnd 4 sum ppl. SO IS THIS, And So Is This Not To Mention It Is Extremely Obnoxious If English isn't your native language, feel free to include a translation in your native tongue. If you're lucky someone will be able to understand you and help you that way Be civil. Don't get off topic or start attacking/arguing with someone in the middle of someone else's thread. If you have a disagreement take it to PMs. If a question has already been answered, don't answer it again just to get your post count up. Adding additional information or clarifying is fine, but don't post for the sake of posting Don't hijack someone's thread, especially in the Support subforum. In some cases (all cases in the Support subforum) it is more appropriate to start your own thread than to interrupt someone else's. That being said, don't create unnecessary duplicate threads. The search bar is a very useful tool. Many questions/suggestions/bugs/problems have been found before, and taking the time to search will help keep the forums tidy. If you need help with searching the forums (it can be a mess) check out this excellent guide by ProfessorElderberry. Don't bump3 ancient threads (usually). This means that if you're asking a question in General Discussion its probably better to first search for an answer, and if the older threads don't answer it for you then make a new one. That being said, if you're making a suggestion in the Suggestion Box then its better to search for an identical/similar suggestion and bump it, explaining your support, than to create an unnecessary additional post. Read the OP4 in its entirety before you post, and at least skim through the rest of the thread. This helps prevent repeating what someone else says and making sure that your post is relevant to the thread. Don't respond to spammers - it just makes a bigger mess for moderators to clean up Don't double post - use the edit button (found on the bottom right hand corner of your post). Double posting is only acceptable under special circumstances (see the Trade Corner rules) Don't cross post (post the same message on several threads). This counts as spamming Don't spam. Its just obnoxious and will likely be removed anyway. When replying to a post, only quote what you need to (especially if they wrote an entire novel) Don't have an overly obnoxious signature - there is no text limit on them, but that doesn't mean you can write your life story there. Also avoid using epilepsy inducing gifs. Don't post information that you want to remain private (username/passwords, birthdays, home address, email/phone/skype, etc etc). Don't be too mean to newbies who don't know what they're doing (unless they totally deserve it, then its ok) [spoiler] not srs[spoiler]ok maybe a little[/spoiler][/spoiler] Don't be afraid to PM a moderator and ask questions. They'll all be happy to help you. Its going to be easiest if you PM one of the moderators in charge of the subforum (found on the bottom right hand corner of the subforum), or a global moderator. These people will either be able to help you or point you in the right direction That being said, don't bother high level staff members unless its important. Administrators especially, and arguably Senior Game Masters, probably have better things to do. Ask a lower level staff member first, and they'll direct you to contact one of those individuals if necessary. PokeMMO specific Etiquette Don't create unnecessary test5 posts - just PM a friend or make a valid post somewhere else. Glossary Subforum - the subsection of the forum that is designated for a certain topic or range of topics Pinned topics - threads that have been 'pinned' to the top of the subforum. Normally threads will be displayed in order of most recent activity, however pinned threads will always be displayed above those. These are usually the 'more important' threads in a subforum. Bump - often seen as an acronym for 'bring up my post' it is the phrase used to describe a thread being 'bumped' from wherever it was on the subforum to the top of the subforum. This is only appropriate in some situations OP - original post, the first post of a thread. Always read it before posting. test post - These are posts used to check the forum time vs your computer's time (relevant to tournaments) Credits - thanks to all the random authors of other forum etiquette threads I borrowed from. If you have any questions/comments/feedback let me know!

Table of Contents: Introduction 1. Understanding the meta-game 2. Pre-battle 3. Mentality and approach to battling 4. Advanced techniques Conclusion Introduction: I’m Barrage, a competitive duelist who has been playing since December. Some of you might know me from dueling in Viridian where I have played hundreds of duels under the name “Ombre” as well as Barrage since March (for those of you who didn’t know that was me, I was just tired of being referred to as a Mexican man in teamspeak and on stream). I also participate in tournaments and have consistently placed well in the 6v6 tournament scene as well as 4v4 more recently, showing repeated quarter/semi/finals appearances in both environments as well as several official tourney wins including the Master's Invitational Brawl. I consider myself to be a strong duelist with a tournament match win-rate of over 70% in OU for the month of May. I decided to create this guide in order to try to help intermediate to advanced duelists become aware of certain more abstract or complex concepts of dueling. This guide takes for granted that you have good understanding of the fundamentals of battling such as the role of every Pokemon and the type effectiveness chart. I will divide this guide into multiple sections and possibly accompany them with video demonstrations as I progress. This guide is most likely to be a perpetual work in progress as I add more to the guide over time and as the meta-game shifts. It is a long read, but please don’t be intimidated. My goal is to make a very comprehensive guide and pour almost all of my knowledge into it so that others can benefit. I want to do what I can so that we have a more experienced and knowledgeable dueling community in order to create a more interesting competitive scene. I hope the audience for this guide is there. 1. Understanding the PokeMMO meta The first thing to consider when battling in PokeMMO is that the meta-game is vastly different from that of the generation 3 official series. PokeMMO is only in development and lacks many of the mechanics that exist in generation 3. Most notably, we do not have access to many held items, perhaps the most important one being the choice band which greatly affects the way we interact with physically offensive Pokemon in the meta. We currently do not have access to breeding moves either which has a large impact on the strength of certain Pokemon. In addition to this, certain abilities and attacks are not fully functional. As a result, keeping the metagame in mind when teambuilding and determining the strengths and weaknesses of every Pokemon is important in PokeMMO. A big mistake I often see with many competitive players in PokeMMO is using smogon as a completely reliable source of information for an analysis of the strength of a certain Pokemon. Many people don’t take into account the PokeMMO meta when coming up with builds and movesets for their Pokemon and go with a cookie-cutter build. This is not necessarily the most effective way to proceed due to the unique nature of PokeMMO’s metagame. I strongly advocate the use of damage calculators and careful thought to come up with builds that fill specific purposes within our meta. A Pokemon should always be built with multiple objectives and have it be able to adapt and perform well under the most situations. That’s why when considering what Pokemon are strong, one should always think about how each Pokemon deals with the common threats of the meta. More innovative players will even think of extremely creative ways to deal with said threats. If you would like more information on this, please visit ThinkNice’s advanced guide to EVing. 2. Pre-battle knowledge a] Knowing damage In many players’ case, I believe some of the greatest blunders arise from a lack of knowledge of damage. I often hear people say “oh wow, I didn’t expect that to do so much damage” and similar things. Through experience and using damage calculators (smogon.com/calc/), a strong competitive battler will have an extremely good idea of how much damage a Pokemon will take from different attacks originating from many aggressors. This is extremely important in battling in order to predict how the duel will go in multiple scenarios. Knowing damage will affect how you approach the duel in every case and give a better grasp of good decision making. When every Pokemon is revealed and especially with the last handful of Pokemon remaining, it should be known to you how you should proceed in order to close the duel. This, of course, will not be static every turn and may vary as your opponent adapts to this as well in the case of two good players battling each other. In that case, it should also be known to you in which scenarios you could lose and to avoid those scenarios by assuming that your opponent is aware of them and is taking the same steps as you are to win. All of this begins with knowing damage to a tee. b] Knowing every Pokemon stat-wise In order to have good expectations of damage, you should know the stats of every Pokemon and how they physically and specially strong or weak, both offensively and defensively. There are certain standard builds in PokeMMO that you can expect to see. You should know how each Pokemon’s unique build interacts with another Pokemon’s build damage-wise. Scouting a moveset will often give you a good idea of what sort of damage you can expect. A moveset will often reveal a Pokemon’s build to you and you should adapt using this knowledge. c] Knowing damage part 2 – predicting damage using knowledge of stats Even in the case that you don’t specifically know how much damage a Pokemon will do with a particular move, using knowledge of STAB, type effectiveness and understanding of base stats, it is possible to deduce the strength of an attack on a given Pokemon. For example, you are in a duel vs. a Machamp. You have already scouted that he carries focus punch and he sent out his Machamp after you defeated one of his Pokemon with Snorlax. Your Snorlax is now threatened and your best switch option is Starmie, as it resists Machamps cross chop and threatens it out. Nothing else can take a hit from Machamp on your team at this time. However, you have scouted that he carries focus punch, but you do not want to risk the cross chop. You want to know how much damage a focus punch will do to Starmie in the event that he predicts your switch, but have never been in this scenario before. Using math, we can determine how much this will do using relative knowledge of other moves against Starmie. Let’s say you have seen Ursaring’s earthquake damage against Starmie and know exactly how much damage it does. Ursaring has the same base attack as Machamp (130). Since you know that every Machamp and Ursaring are likely to invest 252 attack EVs, you are looking at a similar final attack stat, a max of 200 at level 50. Knowing this, the next step is to do math to determine the end base power of the focus punch by calculating type resistances and stab. Focus punch has a base power of 150. Machamp gets STAB from fighting moves, so this power is multiplied by 1.5x, putting our number at 225. Lastly, we factor in Starmie’s resistance to fighting moves as a psychic type, and that will reduce our number to half the value, 112.5, or 113 rounded up. That means focus punch will do slightly more than Ursaring’s earthquake to Starmie. This same process can be applied to determine the damage of Pokemon across different base stats even though in this example we used two Pokemon with the same base attack. It is important to know how much a base stat represents at level 50 with and without different EV investment and to understand what that represents in terms of damage to different targets using various base powers. d] Building highly versatile teams and Pokemon As I mentioned earlier in the guide, it is important to build Pokemon to deal with a large number of situations with movesets that are conscientious of the meta’s biggest threats. People often complain about walls and how they are overpowering. While this is true due to a lack of choice band and the implementation of certain Pokemon as well as moves like substitute, many players are not doing what they can to cope with the popular use of these walls, especially in condensed environments like 4v4. I personally believe mixed attackers are currently the name of the game in PokeMMO. With accurate predictions, it is possible to bring down walls using combinations of special and physical attacks within the same moveset. Examples are Charizard, Salamence, Nidoking, Arcanine, Kabutops (to a lesser extent), and others. Starmie, for example, while a special powerhouse, will easily get walled by the likes of Blissey and Snorlax. While Starmie is certainly a great addition to many teams, one must ensure to pair it with wall-breakers and adequate protection in order to deal with special walls so that it can do its job as a late-game sweeper with excellent coverage. Furthermore, there are certain Pokemon that are nigh-unwallable in our metagame, such as Marowak. A focus punch will take out most Skarmory in two hits, arguably the Pokemon that most effectively walls it. Another good example is Machamp, who does around 70% of Skarmory’s health with one focus punch and can often finish it off with a cross chop. When considering how you build your team, you should always carry effective ways to break down walls. Alternatives are special attackers with explosion such as Electrode and Gengar, who, with accurate predictions, toy with your opponent and force them to take free damage or lose a big part of their defensive core. I feel like this is something people often overlook. Many don’t have the insight, skill, or confidence in battle to use wall breakers effectively and as a result, don’t see their strength. In the hands of a good player, however, wall breakers are currently the best way to deal with wall stacking in PokeMMO. 3. Mentality and effective thought process in battle a] Adapting to your opponent I consider this skill to be quintessential. This is what makes the biggest difference between a mediocre and a good competitive player. While Pokemon is a game with a relatively low skill ceiling compared to Starcraft or something like that, accurately adapting to your opponents is how you can learn to consistently beat players who are just as knowledgeable and good as you. I have been told by a few players that Pokemon is a game of rock paper scissors and that at the highest level, the game comes down to Pokemon match-ups. While this statement often proves to be true in the 4v4 format, I think it is not so applicable to 6v6. In 6v6 there is much more room for switching and you will often have teams that are better prepared for a variety of threats – not the case in 4v4. With more tools available to you, it is possible to outplay your opponent by understanding their thought process. This goes back to what I mentioned earlier regarding understanding the steps to winning the duel for both you and your opponent and predicting outcomes many turns ahead. Adapting to your opponent involves analyzing their play and gauging their skill level. Based on their actions, what knowledge does your opponent appear to have? Are they adapting correctly to your play? What would you do in their situation – are they doing the same? It is possible to put yourself in your opponent’s shoes in order to predict what the most likely play would be for them. You should always adapt your play style based on the assumptions your opponent appears to be making. b] Avoiding ‘overprediction’ I often hear players throw around the term ‘overpredict’. Sometimes, the anticipation of a certain play isn’t necessarily an overprediction – it may have been a good and reasonable prediction but the opponent did not realize the danger of the situation they were putting themselves in and didn’t react accordingly. That’s why gauging skill level is so crucial. I define overprediction as predicting your opponent to make a move that might appear to be optimal but was not in fact necessary for them to win the duel. I will explain with a case scenario. In a duel, player A has Charizard out versus a Venusaur in the first turn. The Charizard player goes for focus punch, predicting a switch to something that can absorb the anticipated flamethrower. Two common special walls are Snorlax and Blissey, both with which focus punch deals quite well. As predicted, Snorlax comes out and the Charizard player proceeds to take it out with a brick break – a good prediction given the circumstances. Player B did not know whether player A was good enough to anticipate the blind (blind because player A has never seen Snorlax, he just assumed) switch to a special wall and did not want to risk crippling his Venusaur early on. However, consider this next scenario: In a different duel, player A is down to his last Pokemon, a full hp Charizard equipped with a lum berry. His opponent’s remaining Pokemon are a full health Venusaur, which is out, and an 80% health Snorlax, meaning player A has already seen it. Unlike in the first scenario, it would be foolish for the Charizard to go for a focus punch here even though player B is in a technically unfavorable matchup. Player B can simply win by attacking the Charizard with Venusaur, since he knows it isn’t carrying overheat and physical Charizard cannot one-shot hp invested Venusaur with a flamethrower. Venusaur will go for a sludge bomb and the next turn Snorlax will finish the job with a body slam. Even though in a previously similar case, focus punch would have been a good call, these circumstances do not warrant focus punch. I consider this type of play an overprediction because player A predicted a move that his opponent did not need to make – it did not take into account the optimal play for player B. Granted, player A was probably screwed here unless he got a critical brick break on Snorlax after killing Venusaur. If the Venusaur player was inexperienced, it was also possible that he tried to go for a sleep powder, activating lum, and letting Charizard two-shot the Venusaur with flamethrower and escape without damage. This puts Charizard out of kill range for Snorlax, enabling him to get 2 brick breaks off to kill the Snorlax. Always keep in mind how your opponent will try to win the duel and what you need to do to win in order to adapt your level of prediction. c] Multi-level prediction This leads into my next point about what I call multi-level prediction, for lack of a better term. It has been noted that most people strategize only predicting 1 step, or level, ahead of their opponent (for more information on this and an interesting watch, check out this video). For example, if a player has Marowak out versus Snorlax, the obvious play for Marowak is to press earthquake against Snorlax. The Snorlax player would then think level ahead of the Marowak, predict the earthquake, and send a flying type or a Pokemon with levitate. Predicting a step further ahead, Marowak would instead go for the focus punch, double-edge, swords dance maybe, or make a switch into another Pokemon to deal with the incoming Pokemon. If the Snorlax player predicts that the Marowak player will make a double-switch, he might switch into a Pokemon himself to deal with the anticipated oncoming switch-in or stay in on Snorlax and go for an attack. There are many ways to accurately determine on which level of thought you should be playing for most of the duel, which mostly involves analyzing your opponent’s typical level of play and adapting to that. However, in duels versus equally matched excellent players, it can be difficult to anticipate one another. You can often base your prediction on how the opponent previously responded to your plays. If a player reacts a certain way once, it is likely that he won’t react the same way in a repeated situation – this occurs often in 6v6. It is easy to take advantage of that. A really good player might react the same way twice though, knowing that you will anticipate the opposite. However, it is always important to determine the likelihood of your opponent making a risky play given the situation. Sometimes even if your opponent knows what’s coming, they will bite the bullet because it isn’t worth the risk to them. It is important to understand this yourself. Know what is important to your opponent and act accordingly. 4. Advanced battling techniques While these may seem obvious, I often only see the strongest players dare to pull of these moves. It seems most players are afraid to take risks, or don’t correctly evaluate the importance of making certain plays. I hinted at these two techniques in the previous sections, but I will explain in somewhat more detail here, though they are quite self-explanatory. a] Double-switching A double-switch is a switch you make anticipating your opponent’s switch. Both players are switching out, hence the term “double” switch. For example, low hp Machamp vs. 100 hp Snorlax, Snorlax might go into full health Gengar. Predicting this, the Machamp player switches into his own low hp Starmie. This would seal the duel for the Starmie player if these are the last four remaining Pokemon. Had he stayed in with Machamp and went for a cross chop or rock slide, Gengar would have come out and put the Starmie player in a bad situation. Gengar would press t-bolt and kill Machamp. Starmie would come out for the revenge kill, but Snorlax is out of range of a single attack and it will kill the Starmie in a body slam or shadow ball. However, in the example where the double-switch occurs, Starmie can now kill Gengar, fall to the Snorlax, and Machamp can finish off Snorlax. Even if the Gengar switches back into Snorlax, it will take too much damage from psychic to survive a second one. b] Pressure baiting This uses the concept of pressure to bait your opponent into making a certain move. Obviously, having pressure is when you have the advantage and your opponent must make a defensive manoeuver or is put in a position where their play is extremely readable. Often, it will be advantageous for you to come into match-ups in a certain order for you to win the duel. Sometimes you can manipulate which match-ups you get by baiting your opponent into attacking a certain way or pressuring them out of a match-up and double-switching to something else to give yourself a more favorable position. For example, my opponent has a Starmie out vs. my low health Snorlax but I don’t want to lose it quite yet. Let’s say in this scenario, my best option is to bring out Kingdra and set up rain. However, I don’t want my Kingdra to get withered. I’m not sure if he will go for surf or psychic against my Snorlax, so I can’t necessarily switch in Kingdra safely. I switch into my Umbreon which can safely come in on either attack. I know that he doesn’t want to risk losing his Starmie or have it get chunked by pursuit, and he is probably carrying a lum berry to prevent status. The obvious play for him is to scout for the pursuit and go for a surf. If he isn’t wary of pursuit and switches out to something else, that’s fine too, given that we have already established that getting Kingdra out safely is all I need to do given the imaginary circumstances of this duel. Regardless of the situation, I have baited my opponent into making a move that plays into my hands – coming into a 4x resisted surf or coming in for free. c] Blind prediction One of the things I most rarely see is players making blind predictions – that is, making a prediction of an incoming switch without seeing the Pokemon prior to. In OU, this is especially easy to abuse due to the very common Pokemon used in that environment. The scenario involving Venusaur and Charizard exemplifies this perfectly. Without seeing the Snorlax, I can assume that the opponent is afraid of taking a flamethrower and will run to a special wall or something that will absorb the fire – a water type. Thus, focus punching, as mentioned, is a good measure to take in the case I mentioned. People often don’t take this risk, but most people play in a very standard way when they have not gauged the skill of their opponent or scouted their team. I strongly suggest doing this if you want to refine your prediction skills and take more people by surprise. Pushing your advantage is really important. You need to do everything you can to maintain your momentum – you want to keep the pressure on your side. That’s why I consider wall breakers to be so powerful. Conclusion Thank you for reading my guide. If you have made it this far, I salute you. I hope this guide helped give insight for players who are good competitive battlers but aren’t quite great. While the examples I listed are simple and pretty obvious to seasoned players, they are applicable on a much larger scale than a few turns. And while obvious, even ignoring the simplicity of one double switch, I have seen people lose finals rounds that they easily could have won if they just kept these things in mind or manned up enough to make a somewhat risky move. I know the competitive community has potential to grow but there is somewhat of a lack of information. If my guide aids people at all in developing better battling skills and creating a more competitive dueling scene, I will be content. If you have any questions, feel free to message me. Also, I would like feedback about whether or not my dueling scenarios are too confusing to follow. If they are, I may take screenshots or make short videos portraying the situations. Cheers!

As you know, keyboard playing Pokemon is both annoying and hard on the hands. We can't get back the old feelgood of GBA handheld, so we have to go with the next best thing. In this guide, I will show you the cheaper alternative for those who don't have a PS3 remote or Bluetooth gamepad, but instead have an old PS2 remote laying around. The first piece of equipment you are going to need is this ; [url="http://www.amazon.com/Playstation-Controller-Adapter-Lifetime-Warranty-2/dp/B000F6BGXY"]http://www.amazon.co...2/dp/B000F6BGXY[/url] I got mine about 3 years ago and it still works, however the 2nd joypad slot on mine didn't. I typically use this device in conjunction with a program called x360ce. This emulates the remote into an XBOX 360 remote, and it works really well! However, for this guide, we are going to be using [url="http://www.electracode.com/4/joy2key/JoyToKey%20English%20Version.htm"]JoytoKey[/url]. This will allow you to be able to hook up your PS2 Gamepad, and designate the keys you want to use for the task. Once the download is complete, extract it anywhere, and run JoyToKey.exe as administrator (Just to be safe) The rest is fairly simple, the image I will use as reference was pulled from the site as well ; [img]http://www.electracode.com/4/joy2key/JoyToKey%20English%20Version_files/jtk33en1.gif[/img] You can double-click a key setting, and choose what keyboard key and joystick button to use it with. The annoying part will be determining what key "Button 1 or 2" is on your gamepad... so what I will do instead is upload a .rar with a saved configuration for you to load into it and make it a load easier. JoyToKey coniguration file - Place this with the .exe http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?dc72x14q5n4u39z LINKS - [url="http://www.electracode.com/4/joy2key/JoyToKey%20English%20Version.htm"]JoyToKey[/url] [url="http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?dc72x14q5n4u39z"]Configuration File[/url]

Recently, I've been seeing a lot of questions in game asking what the best nature is on a pokemon. The problem with this is that this is all dependent on what you want that pokemon to do. So not every pokemon can just get a straight answer, thus why no one bothers to respond. So I decided to make a quick little guide to show people a ROUGH way of how I narrow down the choices of natures for pokemon. 1. Picking the Pokemon you want to train. Starmie I'm using Starmie for this guide because it's pretty easy to determine which nature and EVs you should train for it. 2. What's the best nature? The first thing you want to look at when determining the best nature is what Starmie's best and worst base stats are. Usually, you want to take advantage of their best stats, don't try and make up for what they lack, it's not worth it. You see that Starmie's best stats are Sp. Attack[100] and Speed[115]. So that means you'll want to take advantage of either it's high speed or high Sp. Attack. I would use either a Timid[+Speed -Attack] or Modest[+Sp. Attack -Attack]. Why? Starmie's Moves List With that high Sp. Attack, you'll want to use mostly if not all special moves. So having a nature that is -Attack doesn't do harm at all. Plus, using physical attacks with Starmie is pointless because a base 75 attack is bad. Also, you shouldn't sacrifice Defense or Sp Defense if you don't have to. So that eliminates Mild[+Sp Attack - Defense] Rash[+Sp Attack - Sp Defense] Hasty[+Speed - Defense] and Naive[+Speed - Sp. Defense]. That leaves Timid, Modest, Jolly[+Speed -Sp. Attack] and Quiet[+Sp. Attack -Speed]. The problem with Jolly and Quiet is, they both are minus in Starmie's important stats. You never want to have a Nature that hinders their greatest stats. So the optimal natures are Timid and Modest. So which one?!?!!!111 That depends on the person and how much time they are willing spend trying to find the perfect Starmie. Personally I think the ideal Starmie is Timid, simply because speed is it's highest base stat. Some will catch Starmies until they find a Timid one. The problem though, is the troll IVs. You can catch a Timid Starmie, which is great, but then you Check its IVs,and it can have very low speed IVs. On the other hand, you can find a Modest Starmie, check it's IVs, and it can have very high, if not perfect speed IVs. It all just depends on how much time you're willing to spend finding that perfect pokemon. If I spend 5 hours searching for a Timid Starmie with good IVs, and at the end of the 5th hour the best I got was a Modest with great IVs and a bunch of Timids with low IVs, I would train the Modest, because it takes advantage of a high stat, and can still be viable because of the high IVs. 3. Go EV Train Now that you have the pokemon you want, go EV train it. As, for what EVs to train, I usually just max it's 2 best stats. So 252 in Speed & 252 in Sp Attack. But that's always up for debate. TL;DR 1) Pick you Pokemon 2) Look at it's base stats 3) Pick a nature that takes advantage of said stats 4) \( ▀ ͜͞ʖ▀)/ 5)