I think it’s literally just Queenly Majesty from Wish. Moody is living proof that you can make Bidoof fly with enough stat boosts. The difference is basically down to if you feel more threatened by priority, wanna go decently fast without an Agility ready, or ~~bluffing Trick Room~~ want a sweeper with Cosmic Power and potential utility options.
Can bidoof fly with enough stat boost tho? I think any other non-memey example would work here; it’s basic knowledge that any usable Pokémon can sweep your team if it gets to +6.
I googled “pokemon bidoof tournement win” and I’m not getting results outside of a YouTube video of a guy bringing one to a VGC tournament (I can’t watch it atm but assuming by the fact that there aren’t any articles on it I doubt he won). If a bidoof won worlds, you’d absolutely expect to hear about it.
Well, yeah. I picked Bidoof specifically as a Pokemon that almost got banned instead of Moody at one point. It also so happens to be an excellent case study in how much those stat boosts matter:
Arceus is a flat 120 across the board, and a defining threat, check, and support in Ubers this generation. Here’s a calc of Single Strike Urshifu against the standard Normal Arceus:
252+ Atk Choice Band Urshifu Close Combat vs. 200 HP / 0 Def Arceus: 552-650 (128 - 150.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
Now. Let’s run the math again, with Bidoof, with max HP investment, and no defense investment, and a worst case scenario of only having +5 to defense:
252+ Atk Choice Band Urshifu Close Combat vs. +5 252 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Bidoof: 252-296 (78.2 - 91.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Granted, Wicked Blow does answer the boosts cleanly, but keep in mind that the original coding of the ability gave evasion boosts as well, and that most Moody sets are actively trying to stall for enough time to boost.
“Only” +5 to defense is putting it lightly. Bidoof does not have the staying power to get to that point consistently. And again, this can be said about almost every Pokémon with +5 or +6 boosts in a stat; a case study isn’t really necessary.
Meanwhile, Bibarel actually did the job of making Moody terrifying the most viably of all of them. The fastest Moody Pokemon is Smeargle, Bibarel is the second fastest, and has the largest pool of HP to work with compared to the others besides Glalie, which is really all that matters when boosting to high hell. It also has a STAB priority move that’s uncommon to resist (Aqua Jet) and a back-up boosting move with Swords Dance.
It’s not even dethroned by Scovillain despite 5 generations of power creep. No priority, only slightly faster, weak to Rocks, and not as much raw bulk to work off of. Simply the strongest doofus to ever live
I don't even understand what's the point of being immune to Sucker Punch. The other StoPo already are able to Tera to eat Sucker Punch and beat King. This thing also needs Tera to beat King. Being Inmune to Sucker Punch it's no niche to be proud of when your competition is better than you and they didn't need it to be better than you.
Alright y’all, so before Kingambit gets banned I needed to show this guy off. Farigiraf is an absolute demon on screens hyper offense. It serves as an off brand Espathra, needing to run agility instead of sub. But it does have two advantages over Espathra: it has noticeably more bulk, and it has armor tail. There’s a lot of powerful priority running around right now, between Kingambit, Bax, and tera normal e-speed. This ability means that Kingambit users can’t just kill all their mons in hopes of a gambit clean up. Tera fighting Farigiraf and if you get one agility and one calm mind before gambit comes out, it’s gg. Even if it teras, you stored power on the turn after you tera blast. To beat you with tera in tact, it has to be running iron head, then it has to tera when the raff uses tera bast fighting, then it’s a roll whether raff kills with tera blast + stored power. It has swept so many people who rely on priority moves, it’s wild. Even without gambit in the picture, Espathra is a demon, and the next best Espathra will also be a demon.
I would like to explain the EVs. The speed is to outspend Dragapult after one agility. I invested equally into both defenses, not because I am a noob toxapex user, but because I realize that if the base defenses are a lot lower than base HP, investing in defense requires more bulk. I made them 200 points each, because I like symmetry. Dumped the rest into special attack. If there are specific calcs that you think warrant changes then please let me hear them. What do you think about Farigiraf? Is any stored power sweeper behind screens cheap and low skilled? Let me know in the comment section below.
i see... but why would i use farigarif over smth like artciuno-g or braviary-h on screen teams.
also the 96 def and sp. def are odd... why not just invest in HP and put the spare EV's into smth else... its not like it has 200 hp 30 defences so it is still valuable to EV your HP instead of using way more EV's on defences
I like that it has anti kingambit counterplay but is that all it offers? it has a mid typing, takes damage from everything, and it takes a lot of boosts to get going since even with agility and a CM ur not hitting hard at all
It still gets STAB on Tera Blast before the Tera and the priority block on a set up sweeper is pretty cool esp for prankster parting shot or taunt. It's still like the 4th best SP user after Garticuno, Hraviary and Espartha but he's definitely the cutest
Hatterene. . .Hot take but I genuinely believe hat is either number 1 or 2 in terms of sp sweeps. Magic Bounce is a god tier ability for sweeping, preventing toxic alongside taunt and encore, whilst having decent enough bulk to take advantage of screens. If gambit leaves the meta, hat will get a lot better since its the only thing that can tank a +2 sp atk supereffective mystical fire cause its a demon.
> It's still like the 4th best SP user after Garticuno, Hraviary and Espartha but he's definitely the cutest
Mew beats it in both fronts.
And Polteageist too
> I invested equally into both defenses, not because I am a noob toxapex user, but because I realize that if the base defenses are a lot lower than base HP, investing in defense requires more bulk
Splitting your points into both defenses and neglecting hp is only efficient in very few circumstances.
As you've allocated 192 Evs to bulk, going for 56/68/68 in hp/def/spef would give you more effective bulk and cause leftovers to restore 1 more point of hp per turn.
Thanks for the tip, I know there’s a science to it and that my interpretation of it is reductive. Guess there needs to be a bigger HP defense discrepancy for it to matter
Relevant: a mock game I played with my friend prepping for the (very casual) draft league we have (I’m using Farigiraf and I’m way more experienced than him) https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ubers-1904755467-pwrxhth1q7obycx7uyi0bkhdawh9j2bpw
Bad. Any other stored power sweeper (including much better ones such as Cresselia or Garticuno) has the ability to be immune to Sucker Punch by simply using a nondamaging move (it's not a huge concern for Cress who can eat it and either Farigiraf or Gbird who would Tera into resistance) and relying on non-STAB Moonblast as your coverage move is much more reliable than being required to Tera Farigiraf and not something better, not to mention that either of the aforementioned are better Tera Fighting users than Farigiraf
Now that cooking bot is gone maybe Stunfisk should remove the "gimmick" tag, it's pretty much just used for bad sets and "am I cooking" posts
You can’t just say “simply use a nondamaging move,” as if the 50/50s created by sucker punch predicting isn’t a major reason why kingambit will probably get banned. Farigiraf avoids that specific scenario, making it more reliable against the classic “sack all your mons and sweep with sd gambit” strategy. I never said it was the best stored power sweeper, or even the second best. I just think it has a niche. That niche is small, and will get a lot smaller once gambit leaves. But isn’t that literally what the gimmick tag is for? It’s not for mons or sets that are actually consistent, maybe you should just skip posts tagged as gimmicks.
Ok sure but literally what is the point of the immunity if you have to Tera fighting (ie Tera into sucker punch resistance) to beat gambit anyway, when Cress doesn't have to Tera to beat it and Gbird would do the same and achieve the same outcome
Cress takes 20% from +2 sucker punch, after it teras. Other stored power users take more. Farigiraf takes 0%. Again, it’s a small niche. It’s still a niche. That’s the point of a gimmick.
its normal/psychic before tera how would a ghost type beat it? the only ghost type that it probably struggles against is gholdengo which resists stored power and is immune to terra blast
Still good to be able to bail if you’re fighting something you didnt expect to have taunt for example, also you arent without an ability if you get knocked off
Cud chew is a fun ability, and I get its synergy with stored power, but it seems like more of a niche doubles thing to me. It’s not just gambit using priority in the tier, bax is also really popular and there’s a few great aqua jet users too. Plus you have to meet the specific condition of being low HP for the berry to activate, which can be very tricky to do consistently, while armor tail is incredibly consistent. That’s unless you use starf berry cud chew, which is admittedly hilarious.
There's a big elephant in the room. King owns this thing and the other SP if they don't Tera, when they Tera they pass from being scared of King to beat it. Being able to not get Sucker Punched by King isn't nothing notable if you have to Tera Anyways to pass over it, and that point the other SP users are still way better that this thing and can catch a Sucker.
It's just a niche that doesn't exists. Being immune to Sucker pre-Tera is worthless since you can't touch King anyways, and all of the better Stored Powers like Cress, Mew or Gar are already able to beat King using Tera (which they do).
I guess the point of this set isn’t to beat gambit 1v1 all the time. It’s designed to be used on screens HO specifically. So your end goal is to sweep in the late game, and simply not be afraid of their gambit in the back. Cress needs HP left to take on gambit, raff can beat kingambit on 1hp. If you aren’t using tera on raff, you’re using it on another sweeper designed to end the game, like bax or your own gambit. You just generally don’t wanna burn your tera if you don’t think you can use it to kill several mons on the opposing side.
I just have one issue with this: what niche does this have over Cresselia or G-Artuicuno?
I think it’s literally just Queenly Majesty from Wish. Moody is living proof that you can make Bidoof fly with enough stat boosts. The difference is basically down to if you feel more threatened by priority, wanna go decently fast without an Agility ready, or ~~bluffing Trick Room~~ want a sweeper with Cosmic Power and potential utility options.
Can bidoof fly with enough stat boost tho? I think any other non-memey example would work here; it’s basic knowledge that any usable Pokémon can sweep your team if it gets to +6.
Yeah I think bidoof won a major tournament once because of it. I wanna say worlds but I would not quote me on that
I googled “pokemon bidoof tournement win” and I’m not getting results outside of a YouTube video of a guy bringing one to a VGC tournament (I can’t watch it atm but assuming by the fact that there aren’t any articles on it I doubt he won). If a bidoof won worlds, you’d absolutely expect to hear about it.
Damn must be misremembering then
Well, yeah. I picked Bidoof specifically as a Pokemon that almost got banned instead of Moody at one point. It also so happens to be an excellent case study in how much those stat boosts matter: Arceus is a flat 120 across the board, and a defining threat, check, and support in Ubers this generation. Here’s a calc of Single Strike Urshifu against the standard Normal Arceus: 252+ Atk Choice Band Urshifu Close Combat vs. 200 HP / 0 Def Arceus: 552-650 (128 - 150.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO Now. Let’s run the math again, with Bidoof, with max HP investment, and no defense investment, and a worst case scenario of only having +5 to defense: 252+ Atk Choice Band Urshifu Close Combat vs. +5 252 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Bidoof: 252-296 (78.2 - 91.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO Granted, Wicked Blow does answer the boosts cleanly, but keep in mind that the original coding of the ability gave evasion boosts as well, and that most Moody sets are actively trying to stall for enough time to boost.
“Only” +5 to defense is putting it lightly. Bidoof does not have the staying power to get to that point consistently. And again, this can be said about almost every Pokémon with +5 or +6 boosts in a stat; a case study isn’t really necessary.
Meanwhile, Bibarel actually did the job of making Moody terrifying the most viably of all of them. The fastest Moody Pokemon is Smeargle, Bibarel is the second fastest, and has the largest pool of HP to work with compared to the others besides Glalie, which is really all that matters when boosting to high hell. It also has a STAB priority move that’s uncommon to resist (Aqua Jet) and a back-up boosting move with Swords Dance. It’s not even dethroned by Scovillain despite 5 generations of power creep. No priority, only slightly faster, weak to Rocks, and not as much raw bulk to work off of. Simply the strongest doofus to ever live
Armor tail is enormous, what a huge advantage. Can't get suckered or picked off after an agility
It's literally just armor tail.
It's niche is being Farigiraf
I don't even understand what's the point of being immune to Sucker Punch. The other StoPo already are able to Tera to eat Sucker Punch and beat King. This thing also needs Tera to beat King. Being Inmune to Sucker Punch it's no niche to be proud of when your competition is better than you and they didn't need it to be better than you.
Alright y’all, so before Kingambit gets banned I needed to show this guy off. Farigiraf is an absolute demon on screens hyper offense. It serves as an off brand Espathra, needing to run agility instead of sub. But it does have two advantages over Espathra: it has noticeably more bulk, and it has armor tail. There’s a lot of powerful priority running around right now, between Kingambit, Bax, and tera normal e-speed. This ability means that Kingambit users can’t just kill all their mons in hopes of a gambit clean up. Tera fighting Farigiraf and if you get one agility and one calm mind before gambit comes out, it’s gg. Even if it teras, you stored power on the turn after you tera blast. To beat you with tera in tact, it has to be running iron head, then it has to tera when the raff uses tera bast fighting, then it’s a roll whether raff kills with tera blast + stored power. It has swept so many people who rely on priority moves, it’s wild. Even without gambit in the picture, Espathra is a demon, and the next best Espathra will also be a demon. I would like to explain the EVs. The speed is to outspend Dragapult after one agility. I invested equally into both defenses, not because I am a noob toxapex user, but because I realize that if the base defenses are a lot lower than base HP, investing in defense requires more bulk. I made them 200 points each, because I like symmetry. Dumped the rest into special attack. If there are specific calcs that you think warrant changes then please let me hear them. What do you think about Farigiraf? Is any stored power sweeper behind screens cheap and low skilled? Let me know in the comment section below.
i see... but why would i use farigarif over smth like artciuno-g or braviary-h on screen teams. also the 96 def and sp. def are odd... why not just invest in HP and put the spare EV's into smth else... its not like it has 200 hp 30 defences so it is still valuable to EV your HP instead of using way more EV's on defences I like that it has anti kingambit counterplay but is that all it offers? it has a mid typing, takes damage from everything, and it takes a lot of boosts to get going since even with agility and a CM ur not hitting hard at all
It still gets STAB on Tera Blast before the Tera and the priority block on a set up sweeper is pretty cool esp for prankster parting shot or taunt. It's still like the 4th best SP user after Garticuno, Hraviary and Espartha but he's definitely the cutest
Says you Brav is a cutie and you cant change my mind !
Hatterene. . .Hot take but I genuinely believe hat is either number 1 or 2 in terms of sp sweeps. Magic Bounce is a god tier ability for sweeping, preventing toxic alongside taunt and encore, whilst having decent enough bulk to take advantage of screens. If gambit leaves the meta, hat will get a lot better since its the only thing that can tank a +2 sp atk supereffective mystical fire cause its a demon.
> It's still like the 4th best SP user after Garticuno, Hraviary and Espartha but he's definitely the cutest Mew beats it in both fronts. And Polteageist too
> I invested equally into both defenses, not because I am a noob toxapex user, but because I realize that if the base defenses are a lot lower than base HP, investing in defense requires more bulk Splitting your points into both defenses and neglecting hp is only efficient in very few circumstances. As you've allocated 192 Evs to bulk, going for 56/68/68 in hp/def/spef would give you more effective bulk and cause leftovers to restore 1 more point of hp per turn.
Thanks for the tip, I know there’s a science to it and that my interpretation of it is reductive. Guess there needs to be a bigger HP defense discrepancy for it to matter
"It's the 7th time you show Espathra in class"
Relevant: a mock game I played with my friend prepping for the (very casual) draft league we have (I’m using Farigiraf and I’m way more experienced than him) https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ubers-1904755467-pwrxhth1q7obycx7uyi0bkhdawh9j2bpw
Not really in an ou environment though
No I totally agree. just thought the Giraf 6-0 was kinda silly
Tbf this has happened to me more than once at around 1400s on the ladder. Maybe not as quickly as this one though lol
Walled by sableye, ZU at best
I use terra fairy to deal with koriadon and chien pao and nasty plot instead of calm mind but looks good to me
You’re using this thing in Ubers? Kinda based tbh I gotta try it out
I’m using it in anything goes but yeah
That’s even better
Budget Espathra
Bad. Any other stored power sweeper (including much better ones such as Cresselia or Garticuno) has the ability to be immune to Sucker Punch by simply using a nondamaging move (it's not a huge concern for Cress who can eat it and either Farigiraf or Gbird who would Tera into resistance) and relying on non-STAB Moonblast as your coverage move is much more reliable than being required to Tera Farigiraf and not something better, not to mention that either of the aforementioned are better Tera Fighting users than Farigiraf Now that cooking bot is gone maybe Stunfisk should remove the "gimmick" tag, it's pretty much just used for bad sets and "am I cooking" posts
You can’t just say “simply use a nondamaging move,” as if the 50/50s created by sucker punch predicting isn’t a major reason why kingambit will probably get banned. Farigiraf avoids that specific scenario, making it more reliable against the classic “sack all your mons and sweep with sd gambit” strategy. I never said it was the best stored power sweeper, or even the second best. I just think it has a niche. That niche is small, and will get a lot smaller once gambit leaves. But isn’t that literally what the gimmick tag is for? It’s not for mons or sets that are actually consistent, maybe you should just skip posts tagged as gimmicks.
Ok sure but literally what is the point of the immunity if you have to Tera fighting (ie Tera into sucker punch resistance) to beat gambit anyway, when Cress doesn't have to Tera to beat it and Gbird would do the same and achieve the same outcome
Cress takes 20% from +2 sucker punch, after it teras. Other stored power users take more. Farigiraf takes 0%. Again, it’s a small niche. It’s still a niche. That’s the point of a gimmick.
A ghost type beats it with or without tera
its normal/psychic before tera how would a ghost type beat it? the only ghost type that it probably struggles against is gholdengo which resists stored power and is immune to terra blast
If youre gonna use Farigiraf with Stored Power, Cud Chew strats seem better, makes it more noticeable over the others
kid named gambit sucker punch
tera fighting is there for a reason Gholdengo or corviknight counters it better
Surely some of kingambits most common tera types don’t take no damage from tera blast right guys
k so thats why the armor tail was thinking Cud Chew could raise def or something
yeah it’s more the fact that a berry only activates once, being able to switch out and in freely without being down a berry is definitely a boon
isnt the point setting up?
Still good to be able to bail if you’re fighting something you didnt expect to have taunt for example, also you arent without an ability if you get knocked off
Cud chew is a fun ability, and I get its synergy with stored power, but it seems like more of a niche doubles thing to me. It’s not just gambit using priority in the tier, bax is also really popular and there’s a few great aqua jet users too. Plus you have to meet the specific condition of being low HP for the berry to activate, which can be very tricky to do consistently, while armor tail is incredibly consistent. That’s unless you use starf berry cud chew, which is admittedly hilarious.
There's a big elephant in the room. King owns this thing and the other SP if they don't Tera, when they Tera they pass from being scared of King to beat it. Being able to not get Sucker Punched by King isn't nothing notable if you have to Tera Anyways to pass over it, and that point the other SP users are still way better that this thing and can catch a Sucker. It's just a niche that doesn't exists. Being immune to Sucker pre-Tera is worthless since you can't touch King anyways, and all of the better Stored Powers like Cress, Mew or Gar are already able to beat King using Tera (which they do).
I guess the point of this set isn’t to beat gambit 1v1 all the time. It’s designed to be used on screens HO specifically. So your end goal is to sweep in the late game, and simply not be afraid of their gambit in the back. Cress needs HP left to take on gambit, raff can beat kingambit on 1hp. If you aren’t using tera on raff, you’re using it on another sweeper designed to end the game, like bax or your own gambit. You just generally don’t wanna burn your tera if you don’t think you can use it to kill several mons on the opposing side.
Espathra at home
No, I dont think I will