=Finding your Threat=

[Pyphoria]

*****FINDING YOUR THREAT*****

I typed pretty much all this as I was trying to figure out my Scizor's EV spread, this is just a neater version
of it. This is basically a way to find out which commonly used Pokemon pose a threat to you, aside
from the obvious weaknesses. For example, a Pokemon with 125 base attack using a STABd'
physical move with 90 base power against my Scizor with 344 HP and 237 defense will do roughly
171 damage and leave me with 173 HP left, this is coming from a move that does normal damage to me,
no resistance and not super effective. Doing the following 5 steps will give you a better chance at
survival during battles.

(Skip to step 1 now if you really don't care about why and how I created this)

I found the link to the Defense tool thing at Smogon in Google while about giving up trying to figure out
what is better to put EVs into on my Scizor....special defense or hp? And if it actually made a difference.
I'm the kind of person who cannot use someone else's ideas for my own, so I do not use movesets or
anything off Smogon, I just visit to find out a Pokemon's counter Pokemon. Until now I didn't compete
with anything other than UU really, I've trained one OU and that is because it was my favorite Pokemon,
Starmie ( until now my nostolgia goggles have shadowed all Pokemon other than the original 151, I still
dislike a good amount of them, and I don't really absolutly love any of the ones after 151 but at least
I don't hate them due to the fact that they're new, another big part is when your older and have outgrown
something and they keep making newer versions of it, you still kind of like the original.....but having
outgrown it you frown upon all the newer ones). Anyways..............back to making your Pokemon better
....as I said follow these steps and it'll make you better off ( In my opinion ).


Step 1:
Find out which types you do not resist are

______________
Ex.
Scizor:

Fighting
Flying
Ground
Rock
Water
Electric

( I ignored fire as it pretty much owns Scizor in all instances of a Pokemon using it in OU,
aside from minimal attack Blissey using a fire punch....but yeah you see that alot don't you? )

_______________________________________________________________________________


Step 2:
Find out for each type the most commonly used method of attack (Physical / Special )
Bulbapedia is an easy way of doing this.

_______________________________________________________________________________

Step 3: *This steps is pointless, you can ignore it*
Get the ratio for which provides the greater threat out of all of them

__________
Ex.

Scizor

4:6 Physical



So technically 67% of unresisted attacks SHOULD come from physical attacks.

_______________________________________________________________________________


Step 4:
Check the % of Pokemon that use physical moves in the OU tier, I did not account for tanks/walls
(I counted Blissey is as a special attacker) and I used the OU tier because I figured they would be
the most common Pokemon played.

30/50 so, 60% (as of May 17 2010, 12:00 AM)

Then for special;

26/50, so 52%

Then for the ones that can do either (Pokemon that have decent base stats in Atk and Sp.A,
Ex. Salamence, I however went down to 85 base in a stat)

15/50, so 30%


_______________________________________________________________________________

Step 5:
Find the % that can gain a STAB on moves that you don't resist (In the OU category)....
It would probably help to write them down, for use in the next few lines.

Then the % of them that use physical attacks (with a high base stat in them),
Next find the special attackers....
and then finally ones that can use both with succsess...
(P is for Physical and S is for Special, B, both)

_________
Ex.
Scizor:

STAB 27/50 54%
P. STAB 10/26 38%
S. STAB 5/26 19%
B. STAB 11/26 42%



Now split the percentage you got from the 'B. STAB' and add the halfed number to
P. and S. STABs.

_________
Ex.
42 / 2 = 21
P. STAB 38 + 21 = 59
S. STAB 19 + 21 = 40


So this came out to be 59 to 40, we'll go ahead and round 59 to 60
(during the rounding it set it off by one number here, I think the number
came out to be like .375------ something so I rounded to 38).

And put your threat into:

http://users.smogon.com/X-Act/defense.html

To find out what your remaining EV spread should be.

_______________________________________________________________________________

I'm sure this can be improved alot, so feel free to email me (email at bottom) and I'll modify my original post
(provided this gets big or sticky'd) along with credit to you and your wording in a different colored text.
If I don't get around to modifying within a week then feel free to post your own but please give credit
where credit is due.


-Maybe add a % for super-effective types and figure a way to factor those in.

- A better way to split up the % that use both physical and special attacks (maybe some extreme
calculating into what % of people atcually use special attacks on Pokemon more suited for
physical attacks)



Credit to Pokemon.Marriland.com for the awesome ease-of-use pokedex
(sad that it was down a couple days)
Credit to Smogon.com for their awesome calculator
Credit to Serebii.net for explaning game mechanics as they do
Credit to Veekun.com for their Pokemon search engine
(which has filters like Marriland)
Credit to Bulbapedia.Bulbaguarden.net for their extremely useful help on types
(especially their listing of damaging moves in that type)
Credit to Psypokes.com for their fast nature guide, and their damage calculator
(which I constantly use cause I keep forgetting the natures I hardly use)

In hopes of this being looked at and greatly improved, I've just copied and pasted
on some of the other site's forums, excuse my 'kind of' spamming.

Email: [email protected]


-Excuse typos its 1:57 and this was typed in notepad, copied and pasted-

 

[Falconwing]

Um, okay. Does this belong here?

 

[Pyphoria]

Geez I hope so...seemed like the right place to me, there isn't anything about in-depth stuff I saw. Um if a moderator comes could you please move it and not just close it?

 

[Azure Butterfly]

Yeah, I'm sure a mod will move it to the Battle Center (or wherever they deem fit), no worries. I can tell you thought a lot about this, and I can understand the gist of it. One thing though - does this assume that the Pokemon has perfect IVs? If so, maybe you could work that in somehow.

 

[Pyphoria]

Yeah, I'm sure a mod will move it to the Battle Center (or wherever they deem fit), no worries. I can tell you thought a lot about this, and I can understand the gist of it. One thing though - does this assume that the Pokemon has perfect IVs? If so, maybe you could work that in somehow.

That is a good observation, I was using it on Pokemon with max IVs in the stats they needed....no clue right now as to how I would go about doing that.

Hmmm....that means natures could factor as well....I guess it all comes down to percents though.

 

[DCM]

good thread! but i want it in battle strategy subforum

 

[coolking503]

For ivs just add 4 evs on to the stat. Obviously you need more evs that way, but thats your fault if you can max the ivs. Really good job, though most pokemon dont need this if they are frail sweepers. But I will certainly try this on my next team, looks awesome.

edit: weird, I made pretty much the same post below on when you posted it on Smogon.

 

[Cheesus Is Lord]

The problem with this is that it over-simplifies things too much. What's important is not what Pokemon can STAB, but rather what they can switch into, what they can take, and what total coverage they have. For example, according to this, Starmie is a real threat to Scizor because it can hit on Scizor's special defense with a powerful neutral attack. However, Starmie is unimportant because no Starmie would ever come in on Scizor. It risks getting destroyed by U-Turn or Bug Bite on the switch. Additionally, something like, I dunno, say Weezing, should not be very threatening because it only STABs poison moves. But Weezing resists Scizor's U-Turn and Superpower and has enough raw defense to deal with Bullet Punch. Plus, it can dish out Flamethrowers.

In addition to this, doing it this way wastes EVs. Let's say there are a few weak special attacks you can take, but you simply can't stand up to any others. On average, this method would make you put a lot into SpDef because that's where you're weak. But most of that is wasted, since even with that investment, you can't take the hits. It's better to put in just enough to take the weaker hits, and get out of there if you see something stronger. Then you can put the rest towards something else.

The real way to do EVs is to see what you have left over, think about what threats you might need to take a hit from in order to beat and EV just enough to hit a good number (avoid OHKO, 2HKO, etc.). Then put the rest somewhere where you think they'll be more useful.

If all of OU on average hit you at once, your method would be good. But only one thing can hit at once, and you can control whether it does by switching. So tailor your EVs to specific threats rather than just averaging everything out.