Hello! I'm NotlPrimRose, if you havent heard of me, i dont blame you, but i'm a teambuilder and a slightly above average player and i decided to share this team that i've been using for a really long time that i think is actually really good in this meta. The main reason i'm writing this is my team bazaar post is very outdated and i want to write an updated "guide" to this team now that i'm more experienced and understand how the team works and how to navigate certain matchups.
Teambuilding Process:
This is a really good core rn. Calm mind fini is a really good wincon, especially right now where a lot of teams being used have subpar fini matchups, incineroar provides intimidate and fake out along with resisting grass and hitting rillaboom really hard and rillaboom gives fini passive healing beyond what leftovers can do for it and provides more fake out along with resisting electric and helping in the fini mirror. This core makes for a very well supported fini, but this core is overall very slow and lacks immediate offensive presence. It also can't sufficiently deal with things like volcanion and sub dragon dance zygarde due to its lack of offensive coverage
When it comes to fast offensive coverage, no other pokemon does this better than genesect. Scarf genesect is very potent on compositions like this as it gives you the immediate offensive presence this team needs when paired with zygarde which covers it's weaknesses quite nicely. zygarde also appreciates the several ice resists this team has and incineroar's intimidate and fake out let it not worry about kyube as much and allow it to do zygarde things. fini benefits from genesect switching into rillaboom quite well and zygarde being immune to electrics as well. Genesect zygarde works for this team not only offensively but defensively as well. This team still has problems, like opposing fake out being a huge problem for this team and the crippling weakness to kyurem black, but we still have one slot left
Dragapult is another pokemon i think is really good rn. It's immune to fake out and has very few switchins due to ghost being such a spammable type in this meta. Draco meteor hits through sub which helps a lot with the dd zygarde + coaching matchup and hits kyube super hard if not outright kills it. U turn also allows it to work as a pivot, so anything you cant kill you can just u turn on into something that can. This is probably the most replacable pokemon on this team, naganadel would also work in this slot if you really want speed control but dragapult is just super fun and the immunity to fake out + hitting through sub is just too good to pass up imo
Meet The Squad:
Dragapult @ Choice Specs
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Shadow Ball
- Flamethrower
- U-turn
This pokemon is genuinely one of the most fun things to use rn. Draco hits kyube which this team struggles with, shadow ball is just hard to switch into, flamethrower is for genesect because the shift gear variant can end up causing problems if incin goes down and u turn is just for general pivoting. Hydro pump is an option, u turn is just personal preference tbh. The immunity to fake out is super nice on this team because double fake out teams can be annoying to deal with at times and going through sub is great for reasons i already explained. The evs aren't anything special, just 252/252/4, there's not much else you could run on this thing. In terms of how you should use it, you either want to lead it to pick up kos early game or use it late game to clean up. I'll show replays which showcase how powerful dragapult can be in a real game at the end, so dont worry about this one too much
Tapu Fini @ Leftovers
Ability: Misty Surge
EVs: 252 HP / 112 Def / 144 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Moonblast
- Muddy Water
- Calm Mind
- Protect
Fini is pretty standard. The entire team is built with the purpose of supporting it. The evs allow it to kill urshifu unboosted with moonblast and give fini an arbitrary amount of bulk. Moonblast and Muddy Water for stabs, Calm Mind for boosting and protect because theres nothing else you can really run in this slot and the team lacks protect overall. This is the only real wincon on this team, so try to avoid letting it take unnecessary damage. The evs do let it take stuff like a fusion bolt from kyube, a plasma fists from zeraora and a grassy glide from rilla, but they're still not hits you want to take, so use your fake out users and fast pivots to pressure your opponent and preserve fini.
Genesect @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Download
EVs: 100 Atk / 156 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Iron Head
- Ice Beam
- Thunderbolt
- U-turn
Genesect provides a lot of coverage on this team. Iron head hits diancie (flash cannon is a better option if you're only worried about diancie but iron head is better for kyube) Stab u turn hits like a truck, especially if it gets download boosted, Ice beam hits zygarde and rillaboom and tbolt is for urshifu and fini. The evs allow you to hit hard on both the physical and special side with the physical side not needing as much investment due to stab. Genesect is almost always a lead with zygarde and can switch in and out throughout the game to apply pressure due to its good defensive typing. Make sure to pay attention to which download boost you get because that can skew calcs by a lot
Zygarde @ Choice Band
Ability: Aura Break
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Thousand Arrows
- Thousand Waves
- Superpower
- Extreme Speed
No, that jolly nature is not a mistake. Zygarde is here due to its synergy with fini and genesect. Tarrows is mandatory, twaves limits switching which can allow for free setup or knockouts, superpower and espeed are more or less filler. I know you dont need the speed from jolly, but im running jolly BECAUSE I don't need it. You see, all the base 95 pokemon in dou have a very interesting dynamic with each other. None of them run max speed jolly/timid, at least not on most sets (cough cough specs/scarf lele cough cough). Why? Because none of the other pokemon in their speed tier run max speed, so they don't need to waste evs or a nature on being max speed, they just need to run enough speed for the other base 95 pokemon because they're all doing the same thing, or at least thats how i understand it. So by running jolly, i'm less likely to tie with the other base 95 pokemon, which is good because zygarde loses to both of them. Zygarde is usually lead with genesect and can use its good natural bulk to its advantage which allows it to switch in and out throughout the game to fire off thousand waves and trap things.
Incineroar @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 244 HP / 136 Atk / 32 Def / 96 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Knock Off
- Fake Out
- Parting Shot
I haven't seen anyone else using this incin spread so im just gonna say its my signature spread. Enough atk for amoonguss with flare blitz and an arbitrary amount of bulk (this incin is still a reliable switchin into everything you need it to be able to take and i don't see the steam eruption benchmark as something incin needs to be able to take) knock off ohkos pult and just has general utility, fake out for obvious reasons and parting shot helps our matchup vs setup sweepers like kyube and zygarde. You're gonna be using incin as a defensive switchin and as a way to weaken things like kyube and rillaboom to make them less threatening to fini. You also can do respectable damage with this incin which a lot of people won't expect so keep that in mind.
Rillaboom @ Assault Vest
Ability: Grassy Surge
EVs: 248 HP / 124 Atk / 36 Def / 100 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Grassy Glide
- Fake Out
- U-turn
- Wood Hammer
Last but not least, you can't forget rillaboom. This rillaboom is very standard. the atk investment is effectively max atk without needing to invest 252 evs and an arbitrary amount of bulk. You don't really need speed, everything you would want to outspeed is either out of your range or stuff we already have covered with the other members, plus the bulk can come in handy a lot of the time. Rillaboom is usually gonna be paired with fini for the passive recovery and fake out support. Knowing when you do and dont need misty terrain is important though, so keep that in mind. Wood hammer is good because it lets rillaboom kill things it can't with grassy glide, like fini and diancie.
Replays: I dont have many replays for this team, i thought i had more because ive been using this team for a long time, but i'll just post the ones i do have
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8doublesou-1401042236-drffad6wzmtm42ah1wle3gpb6ogz2jypw
This replay shows the power of pult. Pult's ability to ignore fake out and sub make it a great fast pivot that can break down the opposing team until fini can win (if you even need to use fini, which i didn't in this replay)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8doublesou-1412974778-93agnmyna3ay5i7tpae2dx3mmcirp9kpw
Despite the fact that i misplayed by not protecting fini (i was trying to read the protect but they just said fuck it and clicked fusion bolt, that was my bad, i shoud've conditioned them by clicking fake out once and then reading the second time) This replay shows how powerful thousand waves trapping can be (i could've killed the amoong with flare blitz but chose not to for some reason? i made a few weird plays in this one actually) along with why the attack investment on incin is important and how jolly zygarde comes in handy a lot more than you would think (i.e i was able to kill the heatran before kyube could move which won me the game)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8doublesou-1406635709
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8doublesou-1426963716
These replays just show how powerful fini can be once it gets set up (again, i didn't play perfectly in these games, but im more of a teambuilder than a player, these are just to show off how the team works)
Bad Matchups/Weaknesses:
Priority Blocks: This is more of a mild annoyance than a mad matchup, but psyspam and/or tsareena can be pretty annoying to deal with, but with double terrain and several power whip switch-ins, you should be fine
Speed Control: This team has no speed control, mostly because the way i play i just don't find myself needing it a lot of the time, even when my opponent is using tailwind. If this bothers you, you could replace pult for naganadel and the team would function more or less the same, i just prefer pult as it's immune to fake out, ignores sub and is just straight up more fun to use.
Fake out: This team has almost no protects and no priority blocks, so fake out can be annoying at times, but pult being immune to fake out and your own fake out users helps with that.
Kyurem-Black + Redirection: This team has no fairy spread, so once incin goes down the opponent can kinda just win with kyube + redirection (which is how i lost r1 of ssnls... no i dont want to talk about it ;-;) My solution? Don't let incin die
I can't think of any other bad matchups at the time of writing, i might edit this later if i think of something (if that's allowed, i didnt see anything about editing in the rules)
Strengths:
This team is pretty consistent and easy to use, and due to a lot of teams being unprepared for a well supported calm mind fini, this team does quite well in the current "meta" if you can call it that, people are still trying to figure out what works and what doesn't, including me
The Paste:
Importable: https://pokepast.es/09b576ac84742c2e
Conclusion:
I think this team is pretty solid rn. Some of the decisions i made were simply personal preference and things to make the team easier for me to use which you can definitely change to make the team more suited to just general use by other people and i tried to point those out as best i could. If i missed anything, let me know, hopefully i touched on everything. Also I believe my peak with this team is #5 on the ladder if that counts for anything. I'm not saying that makes the team good, i just thought it was worth mentioning. Ok bye!
Teambuilding Process:
This is a really good core rn. Calm mind fini is a really good wincon, especially right now where a lot of teams being used have subpar fini matchups, incineroar provides intimidate and fake out along with resisting grass and hitting rillaboom really hard and rillaboom gives fini passive healing beyond what leftovers can do for it and provides more fake out along with resisting electric and helping in the fini mirror. This core makes for a very well supported fini, but this core is overall very slow and lacks immediate offensive presence. It also can't sufficiently deal with things like volcanion and sub dragon dance zygarde due to its lack of offensive coverage
When it comes to fast offensive coverage, no other pokemon does this better than genesect. Scarf genesect is very potent on compositions like this as it gives you the immediate offensive presence this team needs when paired with zygarde which covers it's weaknesses quite nicely. zygarde also appreciates the several ice resists this team has and incineroar's intimidate and fake out let it not worry about kyube as much and allow it to do zygarde things. fini benefits from genesect switching into rillaboom quite well and zygarde being immune to electrics as well. Genesect zygarde works for this team not only offensively but defensively as well. This team still has problems, like opposing fake out being a huge problem for this team and the crippling weakness to kyurem black, but we still have one slot left
Dragapult is another pokemon i think is really good rn. It's immune to fake out and has very few switchins due to ghost being such a spammable type in this meta. Draco meteor hits through sub which helps a lot with the dd zygarde + coaching matchup and hits kyube super hard if not outright kills it. U turn also allows it to work as a pivot, so anything you cant kill you can just u turn on into something that can. This is probably the most replacable pokemon on this team, naganadel would also work in this slot if you really want speed control but dragapult is just super fun and the immunity to fake out + hitting through sub is just too good to pass up imo
Meet The Squad:
Dragapult @ Choice Specs
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Shadow Ball
- Flamethrower
- U-turn
This pokemon is genuinely one of the most fun things to use rn. Draco hits kyube which this team struggles with, shadow ball is just hard to switch into, flamethrower is for genesect because the shift gear variant can end up causing problems if incin goes down and u turn is just for general pivoting. Hydro pump is an option, u turn is just personal preference tbh. The immunity to fake out is super nice on this team because double fake out teams can be annoying to deal with at times and going through sub is great for reasons i already explained. The evs aren't anything special, just 252/252/4, there's not much else you could run on this thing. In terms of how you should use it, you either want to lead it to pick up kos early game or use it late game to clean up. I'll show replays which showcase how powerful dragapult can be in a real game at the end, so dont worry about this one too much
Tapu Fini @ Leftovers
Ability: Misty Surge
EVs: 252 HP / 112 Def / 144 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Moonblast
- Muddy Water
- Calm Mind
- Protect
Fini is pretty standard. The entire team is built with the purpose of supporting it. The evs allow it to kill urshifu unboosted with moonblast and give fini an arbitrary amount of bulk. Moonblast and Muddy Water for stabs, Calm Mind for boosting and protect because theres nothing else you can really run in this slot and the team lacks protect overall. This is the only real wincon on this team, so try to avoid letting it take unnecessary damage. The evs do let it take stuff like a fusion bolt from kyube, a plasma fists from zeraora and a grassy glide from rilla, but they're still not hits you want to take, so use your fake out users and fast pivots to pressure your opponent and preserve fini.
Genesect @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Download
EVs: 100 Atk / 156 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Iron Head
- Ice Beam
- Thunderbolt
- U-turn
Genesect provides a lot of coverage on this team. Iron head hits diancie (flash cannon is a better option if you're only worried about diancie but iron head is better for kyube) Stab u turn hits like a truck, especially if it gets download boosted, Ice beam hits zygarde and rillaboom and tbolt is for urshifu and fini. The evs allow you to hit hard on both the physical and special side with the physical side not needing as much investment due to stab. Genesect is almost always a lead with zygarde and can switch in and out throughout the game to apply pressure due to its good defensive typing. Make sure to pay attention to which download boost you get because that can skew calcs by a lot
Zygarde @ Choice Band
Ability: Aura Break
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Thousand Arrows
- Thousand Waves
- Superpower
- Extreme Speed
No, that jolly nature is not a mistake. Zygarde is here due to its synergy with fini and genesect. Tarrows is mandatory, twaves limits switching which can allow for free setup or knockouts, superpower and espeed are more or less filler. I know you dont need the speed from jolly, but im running jolly BECAUSE I don't need it. You see, all the base 95 pokemon in dou have a very interesting dynamic with each other. None of them run max speed jolly/timid, at least not on most sets (cough cough specs/scarf lele cough cough). Why? Because none of the other pokemon in their speed tier run max speed, so they don't need to waste evs or a nature on being max speed, they just need to run enough speed for the other base 95 pokemon because they're all doing the same thing, or at least thats how i understand it. So by running jolly, i'm less likely to tie with the other base 95 pokemon, which is good because zygarde loses to both of them. Zygarde is usually lead with genesect and can use its good natural bulk to its advantage which allows it to switch in and out throughout the game to fire off thousand waves and trap things.
Incineroar @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 244 HP / 136 Atk / 32 Def / 96 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Knock Off
- Fake Out
- Parting Shot
I haven't seen anyone else using this incin spread so im just gonna say its my signature spread. Enough atk for amoonguss with flare blitz and an arbitrary amount of bulk (this incin is still a reliable switchin into everything you need it to be able to take and i don't see the steam eruption benchmark as something incin needs to be able to take) knock off ohkos pult and just has general utility, fake out for obvious reasons and parting shot helps our matchup vs setup sweepers like kyube and zygarde. You're gonna be using incin as a defensive switchin and as a way to weaken things like kyube and rillaboom to make them less threatening to fini. You also can do respectable damage with this incin which a lot of people won't expect so keep that in mind.
Rillaboom @ Assault Vest
Ability: Grassy Surge
EVs: 248 HP / 124 Atk / 36 Def / 100 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Grassy Glide
- Fake Out
- U-turn
- Wood Hammer
Last but not least, you can't forget rillaboom. This rillaboom is very standard. the atk investment is effectively max atk without needing to invest 252 evs and an arbitrary amount of bulk. You don't really need speed, everything you would want to outspeed is either out of your range or stuff we already have covered with the other members, plus the bulk can come in handy a lot of the time. Rillaboom is usually gonna be paired with fini for the passive recovery and fake out support. Knowing when you do and dont need misty terrain is important though, so keep that in mind. Wood hammer is good because it lets rillaboom kill things it can't with grassy glide, like fini and diancie.
Replays: I dont have many replays for this team, i thought i had more because ive been using this team for a long time, but i'll just post the ones i do have
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8doublesou-1401042236-drffad6wzmtm42ah1wle3gpb6ogz2jypw
This replay shows the power of pult. Pult's ability to ignore fake out and sub make it a great fast pivot that can break down the opposing team until fini can win (if you even need to use fini, which i didn't in this replay)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8doublesou-1412974778-93agnmyna3ay5i7tpae2dx3mmcirp9kpw
Despite the fact that i misplayed by not protecting fini (i was trying to read the protect but they just said fuck it and clicked fusion bolt, that was my bad, i shoud've conditioned them by clicking fake out once and then reading the second time) This replay shows how powerful thousand waves trapping can be (i could've killed the amoong with flare blitz but chose not to for some reason? i made a few weird plays in this one actually) along with why the attack investment on incin is important and how jolly zygarde comes in handy a lot more than you would think (i.e i was able to kill the heatran before kyube could move which won me the game)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8doublesou-1406635709
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8doublesou-1426963716
These replays just show how powerful fini can be once it gets set up (again, i didn't play perfectly in these games, but im more of a teambuilder than a player, these are just to show off how the team works)
Bad Matchups/Weaknesses:
Priority Blocks: This is more of a mild annoyance than a mad matchup, but psyspam and/or tsareena can be pretty annoying to deal with, but with double terrain and several power whip switch-ins, you should be fine
Speed Control: This team has no speed control, mostly because the way i play i just don't find myself needing it a lot of the time, even when my opponent is using tailwind. If this bothers you, you could replace pult for naganadel and the team would function more or less the same, i just prefer pult as it's immune to fake out, ignores sub and is just straight up more fun to use.
Fake out: This team has almost no protects and no priority blocks, so fake out can be annoying at times, but pult being immune to fake out and your own fake out users helps with that.
Kyurem-Black + Redirection: This team has no fairy spread, so once incin goes down the opponent can kinda just win with kyube + redirection (which is how i lost r1 of ssnls... no i dont want to talk about it ;-;) My solution? Don't let incin die
I can't think of any other bad matchups at the time of writing, i might edit this later if i think of something (if that's allowed, i didnt see anything about editing in the rules)
Strengths:
This team is pretty consistent and easy to use, and due to a lot of teams being unprepared for a well supported calm mind fini, this team does quite well in the current "meta" if you can call it that, people are still trying to figure out what works and what doesn't, including me
The Paste:
Importable: https://pokepast.es/09b576ac84742c2e
Conclusion:
I think this team is pretty solid rn. Some of the decisions i made were simply personal preference and things to make the team easier for me to use which you can definitely change to make the team more suited to just general use by other people and i tried to point those out as best i could. If i missed anything, let me know, hopefully i touched on everything. Also I believe my peak with this team is #5 on the ladder if that counts for anything. I'm not saying that makes the team good, i just thought it was worth mentioning. Ok bye!
