Cohosted with Scizorphobic
What is this?:
The Next Best Thing is a project where the community comes together to really dive into a given Pokemon's movepool and find underexplored sets that show off the Pokemon's potential. I'm very happy to take over this project as it's somewhere I think players can share their creativity and insight on the metagame. Not every set will become a metagame staple, and that's ok! We're all here to discover what each Pokemon can do, whether it's a very limited lure set or something that becomes ubiquitous like Sub CM Chandelure or Pursuit Mega Aerodactyl. We're doing this both for research and for fun! So don't be afraid to give it a shot and take a stab at your most creative ideas, even if you're scared.
The Process:
Each week, I will choose a different Pokemon, one I deem worthy of a deep movepool and or options with regards to potential sets, and participants will try to personally create a new set for that is not already on-site or in the process of being put on-site. Participants will be given 5 days to create their set, with discussion about the particular sets being promoted throughout, and on the 6th and 7th day of the week, a vote will be held to choose which user's set represented the most creative and simultaneously competitively viable set to utilize in the current UU metagame. Once the votes are tallied and a winner is crowned, the set will be archived in the OP and the process will start all over again for the next Pokemon specimen.
What are we looking for?:
Specifically, I want to stress the importance of the balance between creativity and viability when picking a set to post for the Pokemon in question. There's a very fine line between a "creative" set and a "gimmick", and this project is not meant to produce gimmicks, rather emphasize the ability to think outside the box when using a specific Pokemon in order to maximize it's potential. Having said that, I would also like to deviate from simple one move / item changes. For example, using Focus Sash over Life Orb on Crawdaunt does nothing to show any untapped potential Crawdaunt has because we already have a basic understanding of what Crawdaunt does, it just sacrifices power in order to potentially get a free set-up or hit off. The same goes for using X-Scissor over Stone Edge on SD Cobalion (To be fair, this would have been fine last gen, but Celebi is not nearly as relevant this gen), it doesn't yield productive discussion or results for the project. I am looking for sets that test what we think we know about checks or counters, so-called standards, and what it means to be viable. Maybe a particular option for a Pokemon looks inferior at first glance for that particular Pokemon, but dig deeper and try and find what it might mean in the big picture, for the entire team.
IMPORTANT RULES:
- Feel free to be as creative as you want, just make sure that you can prove that your set stands apart from the standard sets, especially if yours does not appear much different from the standard ones. If you do not know which sets are standard, I will edit a link in to the analyses. I hold the power to bet sets if I believe they are either too gimmicky/situational or not deviating far enough from standard sets.
- Feel free to post replays of your set in action; this will only help everyone (including yourself) understand whether/how your set can be game changing in some particular situations.
- Do not change your set after voting phase has started.
- I will also be participating in the voting process. I will count as one single vote, like everyone else.
- During voting stage, please don't vote for your own set; if you think your own set is the best, just abstain from the vote.
- This should be common sense, but please do not tell people to vote for you. This is cheating and will be treated as such.
On that note, the Pokemon selected will always be on the thread title. Happy Building!
Nominations will usually end on Friday
Voting phase will usually end on Sunday
Nominations will usually end on Friday
Voting phase will usually end on Sunday
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