Hackmon Groudon

by Lynjabear Mon Jul 23, 2012 12:49 pm

Hi everyone! In Pokemon Showdown, there is a new, interesting tier known as "Hackmons." The rules are -

Nothing. There are no rules.

Essentially, you can hack to your heart's content. Enter a world where No Guard Sheer Cold Mewtwo are commonplace, and Pure Power Slaking spam Extremespeed like there is no tomorrow. Wonder guard is abused to a scary level. The game changes immensely when Adaptability Reshiram starts using Eruption or Latios sweeps with contrary Draco Meteor.

Because of the general mayhem caused by pure hacking, some things have been banned in a second tier, called "Balanced Hackmons." Essentially, the most metagame-centralizing things have been banned, such as No Guard and 0hko, Pure Power, and Wonderguard. It's still an awesome tier, but it's less crazy.

This is one of my favorite sets that I use in "Balanced Hackmons"

Hackmon Groudon 383

Groudon @ Lum Berry
Trait: Prankster
EVs - 252 everything but SpA
Careful Nature (+SpD, -SpA) / Adamant Nature (+Attack, -SpA)
- Belly Drum
- Nature Power
- Spore / Substitute / Will-o-wisp / Imprison
- Baton Pass / Imprison

In Balanced Hackmons, (BH) you have the ability to stack 252 EVs in every stat, meaning that even with a defensively neutral nature, Groudon is extraordinary bulky thanks to its naturally sturdy 100/140/90 base defenses. Put in OU terms, Groudon has 4/3 the physically defensive bulk of Skarmory. As a result, it can usually get a belly drum and manage not to become KO'd, even at half health if you manage not to hit your opponent with spore on turn one, which should hopefully not occur because of your priority on sleep moves thanks to prankster.

Nature Power in buildings becomes earthquake, and is used over its more commonly seen OU counterpart because it gets Prankster priority. You can imagine that a pokemon at +6 with a priority 150 move is very scary to face in battle. However, sweeps don’t work as well in a tier where everything is OP, and to stop Imposter Blissey from trolling the daylights out of you, Imprison can be used to stop her in her hideous tracks. It may seem odd that there is no coverage move other than nature power, but this is a second stop to blissey by baton passing to a flier. I use Magic Guard Ho-Oh as my personal baton pass recipient. Of course, blissey can’t copy jack if you are behind a substitute, and will-o-wisp is listed as an option to defeat sturdy sheddy.