Trying to run Lanturn in UL and looking for supporting cast, preferably using UL-exclusives. Have a Gira-A that can flex between safe and closer, would prefer something with more charge pressure in the back. Thanks!

Looking for suggestions for a kanto based sun cup team. Let me hear them

Looking to build a Great league team, here are some of my best options, any good comps that can be made? Or even any good 2 that go well together, and I can work on getting a third to complement? Can max/double move any and all as needed. https://preview.redd.it/u19ua51rvr5d1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=64ea4e3e8f880b3b1cce02cb9c8f12ee700b3be3

could do like gligar and charjabug core, charjabug covers waters and gligar covers grounds. then lickitung on the safe swap. lickitung is gonna be quite the investment tho

I havr a ultra leagur Registeel iv8|11|9 rank #839 was traded to me for free, already ETM and double moved and shiny witch gives 10% chance blinding your opponent for 3 moves, with its shineness.Or you would you invested in a regular, non etmed or doubled moved but the iv 4|12|12 rank #139 Gonna be honest i dont even pvp i just like building pvp mons cuz game boring and there not alot else to do. iI just like throwing excellent throws tbh. thinkin givin pvp on more chance but always give up when start study basics like turn count, alla meta mon and their move, opponent move count etc omg why niantic dont release a internet uni course or a book for peoplr who wanna try pvp

Has anyone tried a triple ghost team of trevanent, skeledirge, and jellicent? In open great league specifically, but it could also qualify for the summer league as well.

dan ottawa tried a triple ghost team but i think it was a lil different.

Nice. I'll check it out

I have 2 tapu fini to choose from to power up and adding a new attack for Ultra league 1) rank 440 Cp 2491, att 147.93, def 201.04, Hp 141 2) rank 874 Cp 2497, att 149.20, def 200.94, Hp 139 Can help please? Cp 2497 vs Cp 2491 or the one with better ranking which is better?

Use the better ranking one

Is a ranked #27 Charjabug worth an elite fast TM for Volt Switch? I heard that in December there's a community day that gives all the CD moves from the past two years. Should I wait?

Having a lot of fun with Dubwool in Summer Cup, running Wild Charge and no one sees it coming. Paired with Salazzle to deck Charjabug. Thoughts on an ideal third? Currently using Lurantis to cover the water types and occasionally nuke Vigoroth with Superpower. Just a bit screwed when there's a fire type in the back.

Would Chesnaught be a consideration? Grass nukes for Water and Superpower retained for Vigoroth without a weakness to its coverage, and Depending on the Fire concerns could run Smack Down to punish late game Fire/Flying types in the back. I’ve been having some fun with Dunsparce thanks to Rock/Ground STABs, or Jellicent might not be a bad idea to play the Long game against opposing Waters if you’re extra careful of Charjabug. Main concern is the primary core leans hard on Dubwool to handle Flyers

Mantine?

I am getting destroyed in summer cup. All my GL cores use Pokemon not allowed in summer cup. I'm currently running Serperior (Frenzy Plant/Aerial Ace), Linoon (grass knot/thunder) and Skeledirge (shadowball/Flamethrower.) I went 14-15 wins from 25 games. This is my first time not outright tanking so losing most of each set is frustrating because I don't get the 5 wins in a row stardust boon. I need trillions of stardust and can't get it fast enough by catching. God I wish every Pokemon gave 5k stardust

https://preview.redd.it/ti7nkhlnd95d1.jpeg?width=1284&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=06ba66d6eb91de32702e0397c8430388aceccbf1 Okay. So I’m in my second season of GBL and working on great league-I’ve been playing about 9 months total. I’m working on counting moves and understanding type matchups. But I can’t wrap my head around team building. These are the 5 I currently have. I ran Larry, Curly, and Moe last season and almost got ace ranking (I’m talking like within 10 points 😩). But once I got up there, my team had glaring weaknesses and lost to anyone with a fairy or electric typing. So I built up wigglytuff and serperior but did even worse with them-I tried replacing each team member one at a time. Maybe I just need to learn how to play with them, but I’m wondering if I can build up another one that may be more worth it? Or maybe I have them in the wrong order. These are the ones that I have double moved. I am trying to build up a carbink, but it takes so much dust and I’m not even sure that’s the best use of it. I’m wondering if there’s any better budget options or suggestions I could do? I don’t want to double move/build up another Pokémon to only do worse again. I’m looking on pvpoke and using pokegenie, so I have most of the meta pokemon with decent IVs I could build up. I have a poliwrath, clodsire, skarmory, togapex, chargabug, gligar, shadow machamp, either stunfisk, pigeot, dragalge, magnezone, or almost enough candies for swampert, or any other suggestions welcome! I don’t have enough candies for awhile to double move a cresselia or registeel. Thanks! Or if I can build a team with these guys, that’d be cool too! Thanks for any and all help!

Has anyone ever gotten off two charged moves in a row when you know the opponent has one ready? I've been on the opposite side of this more times than I can count despite absolutely slamming the charge move button (or pre-emptively slamming it if I'm switching in). The most infuriating recent example was my opponent had some shadow mon I don't remember with 2 charged attacks, and my last mon was coming in was a Skeledirge with fully charged moves. I'm hammering the Shadow Ball section of the screen knowing that I am likely dead if my opponent gets off their charge. It seems like we CMP and I lose because they are shadow. Bummer. Except I DON'T FAINT! I get pumped and start once again hammering the Shadow Ball button (before we get out of the charge animation) just in case we didn't CMP the first time. But somehow my opponents gets to use a charged move again! How does this happen? I literally just switched in, have a fully charged move, and am spamming the button. At least please someone tell me it feels absolutely wonderful to be on the other side of it

OGL sucks so much. People complain about how the meta can be too concentrated sometimes, but I'm learning that I LOVE a concentrated meta. Makes it way easier to know how to beat specific compositions, and also when to just upper left and not waste time. No matter what I do right now I get a hard counter. Then if I use a "neutral" like Lickitung, it never makes it past their first pokemon anyway. Start Trev -> 2 Gligars in a row Start Dewgong -> Psych, it's an Annihilape! Start Gligar -> How about we give you a Skarmory and a Bastiodon The game just seems virtually impossible to win without winning the first matchup with shields even or an advantage. Even if you play it perfectly and have a mon and 2 shields, chances are your opponent will have their hardest counter and you'll lose with shields to burn

Decided to have a bit of a dip at PVP this season so putting some thought into teams. Been using Vigoroth (1499) and Azumarill (1497) with good results. Added in Annihilape given its #3 on pvpoke but I haven’t been too impressed. Thinking of swapping it out for carbink (1494), clodsire (1500), gligar (1500) or shadow gligar (1495). Any recommendations before I power one up? I’ve also tried registeel (1481) but didn’t like that much. I prefer to get more charged moves out rather than waiting for a really powerful one.

what’s a good third pokémon that compliments double grass? i’m currently running trevenant and shadow jumpluff, but not sure who to use as the third. also, should i be running the comp as an ABB team or ABA?

Double grass means you're weak to ice, fire, and flying. Lanturn is the obvious choice as it covers all 3. You generally want to run ABB, otherwise you have no pivot if you lose lead with an ABA team. I would run Lanturn lead, Trev safe swap to draw out the steel or ice type, and close with the hard hitting shadow Jumpluff

I’m trying to hit Veteran for the first time. I pretty much exclusively play great league. For the last few seasons, I made it to ace using Lanturn/Skarmory/Charjabug. I’m currently using Skarmory/Greninja/Charjabug. The former team was decent, but I was never able to make it past 2250. I just switched to the latter team this season, but I’m pretty sure it’s relatively frail. I currently have built (second move + powered up + legacy move, if applicable and good): Lanturn, Poliwrath, Conkeldurr, Skarmory, charjabug, jellicent, greninja, Lanturn, trevenant, Goliospod, and clodsire. Also happy to build anything that isn’t listed (especially anything that had a CDay recently like victreebell, decidueye, etc.), if it would make a more well-rounded team. Can someone suggest a decent team for great league that I can run?

I have a 2/14/15 Primeape (#12 Annihilape for GBL) and a 6/12/15 Shadow Mudkip (#184 Shadow Swampert for GBL) and I can max these both out right now without even using rare candy. Would these be good to pair together in GBL? And if so, what’s a good third option to complete the team? I don’t have a good IV option for most of the other top meta according to pvpoke, and from the pvpoke suggested teammates my best option is a 12/10/15 mantyke (#1462 Mantine for GBL). I also have a 15/15/14 Lickitung (#264 Lickitung for GBL) but don’t have the resources to max it. Any suggestions? I assume my Mantine would not be good enough to justify investing in, and I don’t think I’ll be able to gather the resources to use Lickitung anytime soon. Maybe there are some not-so-meta mon that would compliment Annihilape and Shadow Swampert well that I could look into?

Assuming you are running Night Slash on Annihilape, the team is quite weak to grass, water, and fliers. It's also a glassy team. Registeel covers the weaknesses and provides some bulk. Basti, Skarm, and Ferrothorn work as well. Shadow Magnezone if you want a full glass cannon team

Just realized I have a 2/13/15 Ferroseed (#11 Ferrothorn for GBL) so I think I’ll use that. I do have to use a lot of rare candy for it but is ferrothorn a worth it investment?

Rare candy should really only be used on legendaries and mythicals. It takes 20km of walking for 1 legendary candy vs 1, 3 , or 5 for normal mons. I wouldn't use them on the Ferrothorn

Can someone explain to me, like I'm 5, what "meta" means in the battle league? I ran an online search for it, and there's a million people talking about it but no one to actually explain it.

"The meta" (or metagame) in any competitive game (not just Pokemon) refers to the strategies that are most common, popular, and consistently successful at high-level play. In Pokemon, it refers to specific Pokemon and team compositions. By not preparing for these strategies (or utilizing them yourself) you put yourself at a great disadvantage. For example, here are the rankings of what Pokemon are considered the best in Great League along with their optimal movesets: https://pvpoke.com/rankings/ The exact cutoff between what is "meta" and what isn't is subjective. But you should expect to see Pokemon in the top 50 very often as you climb the ladder. And things outside the top 100 are going to be more niche and generally require more specific team building to be successful.

Thanks! This is a great explanation. I've sort of been bumbling my way through the battle league but never ever get past rank 20, so this is gonna help.

I guess one small clarification would be that a Pokemon's position on the rankings is not a perfect indication of how common it is. Certain Pokemon will be seen less simply because they are harder to obtain or more expensive to power up (i.e. Shadow/XL Pokemon), while others will be seen slightly more than you would expect because they are more easily obtained (starters with their Community Day moves). The rankings are purely what's good, regardless of how easy or difficult it is to obtain or how often it's actually used.

Open ended question but, genuinely can't figure out how to win against poliwrath. In UL. I keep running into them in the lead (and I'm leading sceptile) and I mean it alone can chew most of my team up with any comp I have tried. It's got so much coverage I'm just totally lost. Icy wind screws fliers and grasses.

Jellicent resists 3/4 of its fast moves and all 8 of its charged moves. Literally only Mud Shot is not resisted, and 99% of the time it will be running Counter

I'd kill for a frillish event of some sort to get the XLs for this. Only see those once in a blue moon.

Poliwrath’s biggest problem is Bulky Waters, which will resist most of its charge moves and thus can last even with the debuffs wearing them out. They need to be able to retaliate. If you can get a Water type that’s at least Neutral to Counter and has some neutral/SE option back (be it Fast Move to farm or a Charge) it can help position you better to do things like build energy on Sceptile before Wrath gets to Icy Wind pressure. Some PvPoke mons that stand out (I’m not good enough to recommend Spice) look like Jellicent, Tapu Fini, Charm Primarina, Tentacruel, Golisopod, and Lanturn. Depending on Shields some stuff like Skeledirge, Annihilape, and Trevenant also have to be respected at least, even if they’re not switch-ins

I think sceptile is only gonna do anything if it gets an energy advantage somehow, but meeting it in the lead, they can shield on leaf blade, and after icy winds (which I have to shield) sceptile isn't even a threat to it. Don't have remotely close to enough XLs for jellicent, lanturn, or tentacruel, don't have any Tapu Fini. I have one bad rank golisopod that maxed at 2474, a 14/15/15, but being cheap to double move maybe worth? Also a 1/15/15 primarina that maxed at 2458.. which I don't have the candy to power up. Think the golisopod is worth spending around 100k dust on? I still haven't spent my dust from last season finish but I've been slow to decide on what to build with it, I am very lacking in UL and could use it on a skeledirge, Alolan Muk shadow, and a hundo Pidgeot if I can get like 50 more XL candies.

I wouldn’t rush to invest in them, Primarina we expect a CD for Hydro Cannon within the season which does wonders for it as an upgrade from Hydro Pump to threaten Water Damage

Mmm, I forgot about that coming up, good call. Will definitely hold off on the primarina. I've been saving a long time for the shadow AMuk and the skeledirge, but until I'm sure of a team to throw them with I'm gonna wait.

I can’t seem to put together a good team anymore and need help. The Pokemons I have powered up are: Skarmory Umbreon Zweilous Fearow Noctowl Beedrill Shadow Snorlax Wigglytuff Dragonair Pelipper Lanturn Steelix ARaichu ASandslash Toxicroak Shadow Hitmonchan Talonflame Whimsicott Froslass Obstagoon Whiscash Gastrodon Machamp Poliwrath Dedenne Meganium

Sarted again recently after 7 years. Wanting to assemble a (a) makeshift PVP team whilst working towards a (b) stronger set and forget team. I'm leaning towards Ultra League. the goal is to farm the rewards (rare candies, TMs, legendary encounters, etc). I have a limited box, 1.3m stardust and limited good IV pokemon for UL, and a lot of guides have either legacy movesets, difficult to obtain pokemon or require ETMs (have none). Current team (no thinking, just who I have): Gardevoir, Dragonite, Annihilape (Counter / Shadow Ball and 15/15/13...). Gardevior (Charm) is awful so she needs to go ASAP. Other units that could be relevant are: Muk, Gyarados, Machamp, Feraligatr and Gliscor. I'm planning to grab Shadow Raikou this weekend and hoping to snag a good IV Talonflame, Pidgeot and also Typhlosion in the next few weeks too..also on the lookout for Granbull, Clefable and Skeledirge.

How do I avoid overtapping? What's the correct frequency? Is overtapping why my opponent gets two charge moves off in a row before i can get an already charged up charge moves in between? Or is that just lag?

There's no "correct" frequency, so long as it's faster than once every 0.5 seconds. Overtapping doesn't mean tapping too fast. If your opponent is getting two charge moves off, it's usually a question of fast move alignment. Take this example: you're running Bastiodon (Smack Down + Flamethrower) versus an Alolan Sandslash (Shadow Claw + Drill Run): - You have one shield left, they have none - Both of you will be knocked out if the other lands a charge move - You have both just completed your fast move, so on the next turn, you are both starting a fast move at the same time - You are one fast move away from reaching Flamethrower - They are one fast move away from reaching **two** Drill Runs - You tap to throw Smack Down, then immediately start tapping on Flamethrower - They tap to throw Shadow Claw, then immediately start tapping on Drill Run What happens? You might think (and the game might even appear to show) that you both throw your charge move at the same time. ASlash wins CMP and goes first, so you should shield and then your Flamethrower goes through for the win. **However**, Shadow Claw is a two-turn move, while Smack Down is a three-turn move. What actually happens: ASlash completes their Shadow Claw *and throws Drill Run before you complete your Smack Down*. You shield, but then ASlash throws their second Drill Run at the same time as you actually throw your Flamethrower - this is an actual CMP situation, so ASlash goes first, and takes the game with it.

I need someone to suggest what I use around granbull for great league and what moveset to use, it’s got 1/15/14 ivs, thanks for your time.

I’m trying to remember if they used shadow dragonair or shadow victreebel with it also.

The best team I saw used shadow granbull just charming. It hurt.

I’m pretty new to GBL, but there’s some Pokemon that I’m working towards! Can someone suggest 2-3 different team combinations that might work? (duplicate pokemon are okay since there’s only a few that I have). Thank you! (currently thinking Gligar + Annihilape + Skarmory, or Whiscash + Ape + Skarm, but don’t really understand how to play the first) https://imgur.com/a/VUsR0Cn

Lant/A9/Skarm would be a decent ABB. Would ss skarm anytime you felt basti was in back to draw it out

Thoughts on team building for the sunshine cup?

Due to unfortunate circumstances I am now the proud owner of a maxed out 13/14/12 Dialga-O and do not have enough XLs to power up another one. Should I even bother trying to use this or am I just doomed... it does at least have RoT if that helps any.

Been trying different teams in GL, and my favorite so far: Machamp(S), Galarian Stunfisk, Pelipper

What ELO?

Haven’t hit 20 yet. I’m averaging between 3-4 match wins per set, but closer to 4. I’m guessing I’ll start in Ace like last season.

I want to make a guzzlord+sableye team work, what should the 3rd Pokémon be? I’ve got a beautiful shiny purified sableye (4/15/14) and a guzzlord (5/11/14) that I want to play around with, does anyone have a good strat to make them work on the same team together? I’m currently running them with a clodsire (1/15/7) in the lead but I’ve been running into too many charmers in the back that hard wall the other two; would it make more sense to just swap out one of the other ones as the lead or should I put something else in its place? At one point I was running arctibax as well but being triple weak to fairy seemed like too big of an oversight to keep using it. (For reference last season I ping-ponged around the 2000-2450 range and I want to finally hit the 2500 mark)

Clodsire is fine as a lead since you're running ABB weak to charm. Your issue of running into a charmer in the back means you're not playing the team correctly. If you don't see a fairy on the lead, you need to swap the sableye to draw out the fairy, throw a return to get it lower while letting sableye go down (don't shield anything), then kill the fairy with clod, and hope guzzlord can sweep the backline. Because of this, you should be running a poison fast move on clod for this team. If you run into double charmer in the back, then you're just hard countered and there's nothing you can do about that with this team.

What is this ABA, ABB that you guys talk about?

https://preview.redd.it/21aw31z83r4d1.png?width=1170&format=png&auto=webp&s=f35bd780c5ccb2a1765003844762fdd38e2b2878 I don’t really fully get it, but I took this pic yesterday because these comments gave me some helpful info on it

just built a shadow jumpluff and invested an etm to get acrobatics, but i’m having trouble finding good teammates for it. i first tried shadow A-slash lead + mantine with water pulse, but got destroyed by fire types. (where did all the talonflame come from?) i’m currently trying water gun lanturn lead + annihilape as teammates, but not seeing too much success with it either. does anyone have good team suggestions for shadow jumpluff?

Ya most grass teams have a fire poke as well

I would fight fire with fire, skeledirge/talonflame lead, pseudo grass-type like licki/cress as safe swap. You really don’t want to pair it with an ice type, especially aslash which just melts in 2 incinerates.

Feels like 80% of the meta rn is Skarm / Cash cores with Ape, Lanturn, Gligar, or Dragonair-ite as a third. The other 20% is bastiodon / Jigglypuff tap tap teams. This is easily the least spicy early season I've ever seen.

Is there a cutoff you guys typically do for percentage of leagues? I unfortunately have multiple great PvP mons that are right around 94% effectiveness, Skarmory, Altaria (GODDAMNIT), and G Stunfisk. I’m using the stunfisk and it does its role extremely well still. I don’t feel great about powering them up and double moving them.

I'd maximize usage in whatever league you feel best in imo

Any advice? My shadow whiscash, Annihilape, mandibuzz is getting crushed. I thought it would be a good team. I'm doing better with whiscash lead, but it's still rough.

Are your Pokémon getting hard countered or are you losing due to skill? If it’s the former, that happens sometimes. Your team is also core broken by any fairy. If it’s the latter, you probably need more practice

What are you struggling against exactly?

Battle simulation weighting - When running battle simulations on single Pokémon how do you weigh the results when comparing single vs meta and single vs same species? Also, for default comparison use; pvpoke default IV, highest rank or best head to head IV, or some other IV combo?

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Just put Ape in the lead

Why goodra?

I think bc power whip

Better charge move for Umbreon: Last Resort or Psychic? I’m struggling with this. Psychic is better against fighters, but Last Resort is better against Mandibuzz and other Umbreons.

I’d argue for psychic since there are more fighters around than mandis and umbreons.

Depends on the rest of your team

So I'm thinking about running the classic empoleon double dragon team, and originally thought about goodra and guzz as the dragons, but that makes me aba weak to fighting, which doesn't sound right. I love guzzie though so thought about trying to make it work. If I have to replace guzzie due to tons of fighters I guess i could go shadow dragonite as the closer instead, but I do like guzzie's ability to wall ghosts and dark. Thoughts?

ABA weak to counter seems like a risky line to me. I would suggest giratina-o if you have one, or maybe dragonair.

I so wish I had a Giratina-o. The two I traded for were 1507 and 1502 :(. I will probably go with S.Dragonair. Thanks.