Kangaskhan

http://pokemon.wikia.com/wiki/Xerneas

This Team is Mediocre but it got me to Worlds: A T128 US Nationals Team Report

Hello Hat Lovers!

I played in US Nationals last weekend. I needed to make top 128 in order to get my worlds invite so top 128 was all I cared about. I’ve been burnt out from the 2016 format lately and wouldn’t mind if I never played it again but I also didn’t want to miss worlds (especially with San Fransisco being such a convenient trip compared to Indiana, Boston and Columbus). A week before Nationals I decided to play Xerneas/Groudon. I tested Bronzong, Smeargle and a couple other Pokemon in the non-restricted slots but ended up using Thundurus and Cresselia as they were what I felt most comfortable with.

(more…)

Early VGC 2016 Metagame Primer

Hello Hat Lovers!

Before we officially start the 2016 format I’m going to look at some of the top Pokemon in the early VGC 2016 metagame. This is meant to be a guide for anyone unfamiliar with the format to help bring them up to speed with the most common threats in the metagame.

Restricted Pokemon:

The biggest part about figuring out the format so far is understanding how the restricted Pokemon interact with it. We only get two restricted Pokemon per team so a big aspect of team-building will be figuring out what combinations of restricted Pokemon are good.

I think almost all of the restricted Pokemon are usable, but since we only get to use two per team the most powerful ones will make it harder to justify using the rest. Here are the four restricted Pokemon that are currently the most used and will likely stay at the top throughout the season:

(more…)