I) Team sharing
Well, even though not being really active here anymore and even on Smogon and PS, I played a fair amount of games in the post-home metagame. A few month ago I had some time so I decided to enter the AAA SSNL to get the chance to play some friends. It was not so great cuz I lost a coinflip R1 making me play so many games (perhaps twice the game Career Ended played?) that was annoying because I didn't have any time for this with summer job and my new job starting at the end of August. I think people realized I had no time for this and did the least in terms of prep so it was perhaps not fun to see me bring the same teams again and again... I apologize for viewers but this is not my will.
I still did my very best in my game against Atha because I respect it as a player and a friend (even though he's washed and says non sense smh) but the ending was not what I was looking for. Already talked about this to him but I should also kind of apologize to Career Ended for our final I didn't really prep for and play kinda hastily. Unfortunately I had no time for this and could have just dropped out especially considering Kris wasn't particularly understanding about our issues to get the game done considering our irl priorities while trying. But by respect for Career who deserved to play this final and for who winning by forfeit would def not have the same flavor, I still really tried to get the game done and we made it.
Congratulations again to Career Ended for winning the AAA SSNL! Sorry it couldn't be better because I just wanted this tour to end and go to sleep lol.
Anw, now that this is said, something I'm still proud about and from which I do not deviate is using only my teams. And here we go:
THE Gzap Tspikes support BO
One of my first build post-home and perhaps one of my best team. You all know about this team now. The idea is to put a tremendous pressure on Corv with Gzap, Tbolt Melo, Chien-Pao and Flamethrower Chomp so it ends up being overwhelmed. This team is quite solid and really cool to play because you have a way to deal with pretty much anything (Fluffy Zap became quite popular recently and I recognize it's annoying). You're often quite in control because you get a lot of momentum and Tdebris Garchomp acts as a momentum controller preventing the opponent to enter anything after a U-Turn due to the Tspikes. Really cool team to play even though it aged a bit. I spammed it during the SSNL until SammyCe123 beat it with a CT making me stop recycling.
THE Gsurge Muk-A Volt-turn spam BO
The second team I played the most during the tour. We will come back on that later on but yeah, I always believed there was something to do with Gsurge. I had this funny idea of trying it with Muk-A because it doesn't really mind losing a moveslot for Protect (but it minds not getting the bulk of Regenvest). The basic idea was to use Gsurge Muk-A as a SpD mon to free the Regenslot for something that could abuse it differently, Mew. It's a mon that dissapeared a bit this gen because of the SAC and because it lost many tools anw but I believe it could still do the job with the Scarf utility set. I put H-trode which is really good with Gsurge support being able to 2HKO max SpD Chomp or OHKO Treads for instance. Treads likes quite a lot Gterrain recovery and is the Fire and Elec immunity I needed while getting all the stuff you want with Knock and Spin. No Vswitch kinda sucks but I wanted SR... Not sure what's the best tbh. Slither pairs well with Htrode and I love this bug. Then Intimidate Moltres might feel weird but I didn't want to add Corv making the Fire MU really solely handled by Treads which is not great. I also wanted some real Ground and Fighting resist that also don't instantly lose to Chien-Pao... Not like I have many options lol.
Overall the team is cool but the Water MU really sucks and especially Volcanion or offensive Quaquaval one (I don't mind Intel cuz Hoodra made this mon not so great and dropped in usage). This easiest way to fix that it to go Dland Moltres but then you alsmost outright lose to Chien-Pao considering Intimi Moltres is already not so good. Ironically I played several Quaqua with this team but my opponents never managed to make it work correctly.
Some standard Sticky HO
Everything is in the name really lol. Ceru Dland prevents Quaqua from spinning and forces 50/50 against Treads to keep the Sticky (Treads is slower and dies to pretty much any mon so it can't really spin). Quaqua is really good in Sticky and offers Rapid Spin support. I chose Encore over SD at a point where people still spammed Unaware Stail without thinking but SD would prob be better (even though Encore can save you from difficult situation and is generally unexpected). The dog because dog. MB Chomp is something I took from Osake but SoR might be better especially with the fall of Stail recently. ThunduT is the only but necessary special sweeper of the team.
vs Pociekmociek
Volcanion BO
First team I built after I decided to stop spamming the same 2,5 ones. Just wanted to try Volcanion myself cuz it's so heat. I remember I wanted to diversify the mon I was used to use for not getting a chance to be counter-teamed. I chose Fluffy Zap that just started to become popular because I found myself quite weak to ZapG usually and because the mon looked fine with Volcanion. Iron Treads because I need the utility it provides and I didn't want to play either Corv or Quaqua there. Still no Vswitch but rocks which is something I don't like but I hate even more going with no hazard especially with a team that will end up being weak to Chien-Pao. At least Corv trying to Defog is an open door for Volcanion and this is good. Goodra over Hoodra because I didn't want to stack Steel and because getting this Fire resist is good (not losing to Volcanion). Enam made sense a lot to me being a Fairy preventing Specs Hydrei to just click DM and pick against my team and kinda alleviate some pressure on Zapdos thanks to its bulk and resists. Because I didn't see any Stail in my opponent teams I decided to go double dance and was pretty sure this mon will autowin (it autowon after a single play). This is another tool to not autolose against Chien-Pao and I remember having many internal conflict about choosing LO to OHKO Pao for sure or going Lefto in game I encountered a Chien-Pao and didn't get that roll so EnamT died and Pao not. I still managed to win because I had SR. Hydreigon is the last, not particularly good but I just remembered wanting a "real" speed control that provides momentum. Other things would have worked ig and perhaps I had a true reason to go Hydrei but forgot it.
vs SammyCe123
HK9 BO
We stay on the same line: diversify my teams and become quite unpredictable so I can maybe try to recycle again but my opponent will not be able to know which team I'm gonna bring and get a good MU. I wanted to try HK9 at some point and when I saw Sammy play quite a lot Corv or Fluffy Zap without too many Chomper, I decided it was time. The LandoT Fluffy + Hoodra core looked quite nice because LandoT U-Turn on some stuff HK9 like to switch into (Corv and Fluffy Zap). Finally decided to fix my recent Chien-Pao weaknes by going Intimi Quaqua. EnamT provided again some speed control and a great wincon while still providing some defensive utility. Scarf Rotom-W Hadron is the last because I wanted another way to burn Chomp or just to lure in RegenVester for HK9 to enter the field. Cool team tbh but HK9 is hard to put in work without the right MU tbh. The ascent of Intimi Quaqua doesn't help it. In-game Sammy brought both Corv and Fluffy Zap so that was just perfect lol.
Gaming vs atha
The insane HO
I remembered Career Ended beating our ass with a Beat Up Techni Sash Weavile lead a while ago and decided to bring the tech myself. Aerial Ace felt so fun to lure Quaqua (it doesn't kill Intimidate one at +1 rip) and make it unable to check Drednaw anymore. Quaqua was MGLO initially but I wanted MG more on Drednaw so I changed it to Psea Mystical Water double Dance that I believe could still works and perhaps even better. EnamT my beloved and dog stapples sh*t on offensive playstyle. Then another hot tech with Protosynthesis (s/o Osake) Lando-I that I think could be an emergency revenge killer and surprise atha. In-game it was really tense but every tech managed to put in work and I got it.
Roaring Moon Band BO-Offense
It's been a long time since I played Strong Jaw Band Roaring Moon so just decided to go with it. Treads is the perfect partner being able to remove Corv's RH and chip it with Vswitch to put it in range of 2 Crunch of Roaring. Meloetta because I really wanted a dynamic team. Lando-I is perhaps better than LandoT thanks to mixed coverage. Then Htrode cuz Volt-turn speed control yk now. And finally Quaqua even though I already have a spinner because Chien-Pao and I'm fine with double removal. Full pivot team that prob loses to any sort of setup HO but really good against some balanced-like playstyle.
In-game I got a so called "perfect MU" where Atha couldn't do anything even though he tried his best to outplay. It was a disappointing win but so is AAA sometimes.
Stail Regen Screens HO
Double immu Balanced
Teams I had for g3. The first is a variant of what Career brought against him last round with Taunt Rock Slide Jolly Ches in case of no speed Fluffy Zap or Fluffy ID Corv.
Last is a bulkier team based on WA Garganacl + EE Skel I thought could be fun and surprising.
Gsurge Volt-Turn BO
I thought to a core that might be cool to try, Gsurge Rotom-Wash and Tinkaton. Both are mon I like a lot and because Rotom-Wash runs Protect anw, Gsurge seemed fine especially to stay on Ground users without needing Regen to stay alive. Slither is another mon I love and it pairs just extremely well with Rotom-Wash luring things like RegenVest Hoodra/Melo. Then I added the Mesprit tech of the new star of SV AAA, ojr the goat. It's some really basic Fsight + Fighting which is a difficult combination to switch into. Then Corv because Corv lol (Fluffy because I thought it was fine with both Rotom-Wash and Tink somehow dealing with Pao... haha). And finally again Htrode to abuse Gterrain and provide the team some great speed control outside from Slither not-so-reliable priority.
In-game I was up against Skel that wasn't great and I regretted a lot to not be Scrappy Slither that was just autowinning the game (everytime I play Adapt Slither I'm up against Skel and when I try Scrappy ofc I run into Fluffy Zap lol). Still I managed but got hasty entering Htrode that was a really nice wincon there on Garg and dying from Ice Punch (could have been Body Press and still kill tbh). Then I made something that can be viewed as another mistake by assuming Career will not risk to lose Chien-Pao against Rotom-Wash and decided to double on Mesprit to catch a switch on Chomp or Skel. Unfortunately Career's Chien-Pao was Adamant and got a roll to kill Rotom-Wash and he decided to try getting it. I lost Mesprit that was my last chance to win. Should have just Protected and switch next turn prob but I didn't realize it was Adamant so I didn't want to let him get the momentum by clicking Protect.
g2 I recycled the HK9 team and got caught off guard by the double Scarf while being in a good position after Career made a really bad play staying with Hoodra against Quaquaval earlier on.
Enjoy to perhaps get some inspiration for your next team post DLC!
II) Thoughts on the metagame
I didn't like home meta at the beginning but unlike some people that were left with this first impression, I tried again and started to really enjoyed it. Meta felt diversified and dynamic allowing BO to work quite well and that's what I like. Builder didn't feel to constrained even though I was really annoyed sometimes to see a fine team was just losing to Chien-Pao and sometimes to fishy shield dog. Unlike pre-home I think it's almost impossible to say that we lack defensive options now with the rise of new Regenvesters (Hoodra, Meloetta, Muk-A and even Garchomp coming back), new Fluffy user (Zapdos and Landorus mainly), new Intimidate user (defensive Quaqua really rised to the top) and immunity users.
All of these led me to think we did a great tiering by removing a lot of fishy uncompetitive elements like Dragonite, Hariyama or Ursaluna freeing the builder from the pink ball that was just not fun to use. Overall it's still a complete utopia to believe you can cover everything defensively which is true in any metagame but especially in AAA with all this diversity. However it feels we can take into account most of the metagame with a large panel of available options and still manage to deal with others with offensive means.
So to conclude, the post home meta felt good, diversified and competitive and I liked it. I know some found it redundant with the Regenvest + Intimidate + Fluffy + speed control + breaker + filler structure that was quite popular but in any metagame things become redundant at some point where the metagame is well developped. Even though such structure is good and popular, you still have diversity within by changing mons and cores. That's also definitely not the only structure available able to work consistently. So yeah I don't really know why but people seem to get quickly bored whenever the metagame "stagnates". Personally I enjoyed still trying to find new things, playing new cores I didn't try, etc all in a competitive and balanced atmosphere.
Speaking of a thing I tried, it deserves a special mention:
Grassy Surge
This is ofc the main innovation I tried to put in work in AAA. I always believed Gsurge might be viable but kinda hard to use because it doesn't provide sheer bulk we often need to handle insane breakers we have in AAA. However the Grassy Terrain is more than just 12% recovery (including Lefto) per turn. What makes it decent is the ability to support other mons meaning it's an ability "shared" by your mons (but also by the opponent's ones). The idea is then to build a structure that benefits a lot from Gterrain support either by the healing it provides either by both healing and halving of EQ damages. Many mon can benefit a lot from Gterrain while not being the user like Tinkaton, Rotom-Wash, Hoodra, Volcanion, Ceruledge (no longer die to any EQ), Muk-A, Dland Skel or Heatran. Even offensively it's interesting to boost Chloroblast from Htrode and Flower Trick from Meowscarada.
Perhaps I convinced some people to try it like you guys might have seen during AAAPL. Ofc, not saying Gsurge is great and should absolutely by played but I think the ability def have a niche even though it's not easy to build around and has drawacks.
III) Incoming changes
Isaiah said:
Hi guys, it's been a while
The council has been voting (and debating with gnashing of teeth) on what to unban with DLC 1 next week (September 13th).
Here's the list of candidates so far:Great Tusk
Thoughts? I won't show the votes yet since voting won't be over until probably sometime this weekend, but personally I'm voting to unban everything because I'm interested in trying out a new slate (even if it's only temporarily with DLC 2 coming 2-3 months after) and trying to balance from scratch--especially with all of the changes we'll have gotten from Home and DLC combined.
Great Tusk
Zacian-Crowned (it can only have intrepid sword)
Enamorus
Sneasler
Gholdengo
Walking Wake
Poison Heal
Zoroark-H
Gengar
Dragonite
ZamazentaI don't know why people are so "free/unban happy" and question months of development that easily even though we ended up doing things right by achieving a balanced and competitive metagame with a great degree of diversity. Is the metagame so bad we have to question every choices that have been made, often, by the community itself through voting? I understand DLC I is going to be an important change but doesn't look bigger than home tbh and we didn't question every actions that have been taken till the begin with home release. It made the tiering easier and allowed to reach a great state earlier.
Now about my thoughts:
Zacian-Crowned, Enam-I, Sneasler should absolutely stay banned. Those mons are extremely restrictive and just broken really. And ofc I'm not interested in living in a metagame where Fluffy is absolutely necessary otherwise you lose to some stupid dog under screens. Poison Heal should also stay banned cuz we still don't have the tools to make it fine-ish (everyday we remember how strong PH were by watching SM and ORAS AAA games lol). The idea to get PH free will be to try freeing Ngas but apparently it "breaks the concept of the metagame" so :shrug:
There is some new counterplay to Dragonite but the mon itself will not really by more healthy tbh. It's a deadly threat for any offensively oriented teams while doing nothing against the right combination of wall. This is just an unbalanced mon in the sense it's extremely polarised between doing too much or doing almost nothing. This is never healthy to have something like that in the metagame cuz you have to take into account otherwise you may just lose (restrictive) but at the same time might be forgotten cuz not necessarily good generally speaking.
And just look back, was the metagame better with Dnite or without?
I leave it to everyone to answer but overall I firmly disagree again with the mind set of "banning things only and only if they are really broken and we can't do something else". This is detrimental for the health of the metagame by letting many borderline elements in the metagame constraining the builder and leading to an exacerbated uncompetitiveness and centralisation.
pannu said:
Dnite should've never been banned, it wasn't broken whatsoever without access to shed tail support. Free him.
This is how democracy works buddy. "shouldn't have been banned" is only what you think but more people estimated the contrary. Between you and Greybaum (below) it's surprising to see how people think to be right and have something to say about a suspect test that didn't end the way the wanted. Just learn to respect the outcome of a suspect test (and that's not some ND-tera like situation lol). No one's the wiser.
Walking Wake was completely dumb when released because our Regenvesters were all Dragons (bar Tinkaton maybe) and some other tools we had specially defensively speaking were Iron Moth (dies to BoR DM for sure) and SS Garga (dies from Water move + is bad nowadays). Now we have new Regenvesters that deal better with this sh*t and perhaps new counterplay with redacted Empoleon returning. Is that enough to unban it? I don't know. I don't like the idea to let such thing forcing even more some RegenVest freed in nature. Also let's remind unlike many other insane special breakers, this one is really fast and had one of the best coverage in game.
About Gengar and H-Zoro now. Let's quote a funny phrase first.
Greybaum said:
i disagreed with both of these being banned in the first place, and we've only had more checks like meloetta drop since then. free them both.
Yeah... Meloetta the famous SI to H-Zoro. I just learnt Meloetta don't mind taking Knock + U-Turn from MGLO or Body Slam from SFLO one. Funny to see how people talk without knowing anything tbh.
Anw, considering the counterplay we got with home, I can see Gengar being freed, the big 3 RegenVest gang (Hoodra Melo Muk-A) is a relevant counterplay to Gengar that give much more options that what we had previously. Also RegenVest Chomp and Lando works decently.
However H-Zoro is not on the same boat this time. This had insane diversity and just got better now people really rely a lot on RegenVesters by its ability to knock the AV. SFLO Body Slam breaks both Muk-A and Melo as I said unless you run a lot of def which is ofc restricting.
About Zamazenta, why not. Not saying it's fine or anything but unlike others, we never gave it a chance. That's why I'm open to see and then ban it if we realize it's indeed too much for the metagame.
Great Tusk is a tricky question but yeah, might be fine? If we assume Regen set will be much harder to use cuz you want your Regenslot for something else that's much better? idk. It just means people are going to run more offensive sets that are not particularly healthy. Anw Tusk will again be a corner stone if it comes back. Don't really like that it terms of diversity cuz Tusk just kills so many things that had a niche because Tusk didn't exist but, at the same time, it's prob not a reason for it to be banned either right? The point will be to know how centralizing it's gonna be and if setup sets combined to Band ones will be too annoying to deal with (I'm not hearing every argument based on FluFFy CorV IrON DefEnSe and FlUfFY ZaPdOS because finding something that beat a mon shouldn't be a reason for it to stay). You can reastically find a counter to pretty much everything so it's not what matters. What matters is how many ways we have to deal with this (diversity of counterplay), what's the cost of running them (restrictiveness) and how competitive is it (competitiveness).
Finally, Gholdengo. This one is probably the trickiest one. On one hand it provides some great defensive utility with a lot of compression but on the other it centralizes the metagame a lot around a unhealthy guessing game. Overall, we can do without Gholdengo, we don't "need it". Tiering and balancing is about banning stuff the metagame can't handle correctly or unhealthy for it, not unbanning unhealthy/brokens things to deal with some other ones. If the only reason for some things to stay is Ghold which is itself really borderline, then they should prob both go.
Hera said:
ghold has a hard counter now in sball melo
I keep learning things here lol. First Melo checks Ghold only and only if it runs Shadow Ball which is already restrictive considering the move is somehow useful only against Ghold making Melo worst against anything else that testifies to a strong impact on the meta restricting what's viable or not. And then:
+2 252 SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Meloetta: 243-289 (60.1 - 71.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+2 252 SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Meloetta: 289-342 (71.5 - 84.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Adaptability Gholdengo Make It Rain over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Meloetta: 270-320 (66.8 - 79.2%) -- not a KO
Not really what I call a hard counter tbh. Note that Sball might not 2HKO so some TW Gholdengo can try some yellow magic moment without much to lose to break through Meloetta. And let's say Bulletproof Ghold doesn't exist anymore... right?
So yeah I don't think Gholdengo should come back and still constitutes a unhealthy presence because even the "new counterplay" fails to answer this or that set making Ghold MU playing a big role.
About those 2, I think the metagame became much more interesting when we stopped spamming CorvGholdTusk with insane usage and then adding fillers. It was much more healthy and fun to not play guessing game or randomly lose to some offensive Tusk and opened the builder way more by allowing many things to shine and stuff to get banned.
Oh btw can we finally ban BD now that we get 2 new DrumTriage abusers (Kommo-O Poliwrath)? Yeah yeah banning Triage is the way I know... this way we could try Proto Booster BD, Surge Surfer BD or new ones to continue the fish forever! Triage is usually fine in any situation but BD but yeah this is what's going to be targeted even though it's more harmful for the metagame... at least we can keep using BD Marill let's goooo!!
Quoting some random bad AAA player you may know:
One direction is "the rules are the rules because they are the rules", the other is "the rules have a purpose and when they don't fulfill the purpose we change them"
I hope this is really one of my last post in this thread and perhaps the last one because I don't have time to play anymore. Will still try to support a bit Charizzards for AAAPL even though they absolutely don't need my help cuz they're so broken lmao. See you in another life or in a Camomons maybe
Cheers 
