Rotation Battles: Unexplored and potentially awesome

[ss118]

Hey this will be SWF's official discussion thread for gen V's new battling style available to the mass; Rotation battles.

For people who don't know how it works, it acts like a 1v1 and 3v3 in a mixed fashion. Let's say my team was;

Charizard [Starter]
Squirtle
Ivysaur
Pikachu
Lucario
Jigglypuff

Now ignoring the obvious reference, the way the match would begin with Charizard, Squirtle, and Ivysaur coming out and Charizard would be what I like to call the "point" pokemon. Ivysaur and Squirtle will be the "side" pokemon, I guess. I suck at making up terminology.

Point pokemon - The one of the three pokemon out that will be affected by the attacks of the opponent's point pokemon.
Side pokemon -The two of the three pokemon out that will not be affected by the attacks of the opponent's point pokemon.

So what are your options available to you? Well you have Charizard's usual moveset of Flamethrower, Rock Smash, Fly, and Substitute. You can switch in Jigglypuff, Pikachu, or Lucario. You also have the ability to "rotate" in either Squirtle or Ivysaur and put them on point.

Rotate - The swapping of your point pokemon with one of your available side pokemon.

What's the difference between rotating and switching in a pokemon, then? A pokemon rotated in gets to attack in the same turn.

So to be honest, the fact that Charizard is on point means nothing until the turn starts. Rotating has more priority over everything, including switching and pursuit. A pokemon that rotates in also isn't affected by Spikes, SR, or Toxic Spikes. The only importance in starting is if your pokemon that has an ability that is activated upon switching in, IE Salamence's Intimidate or Tyranitar's Sand Stream. If they are "side" pokemon, their abilities won't activate, even once rotated in.

So we can assess that a pokemon kept in the side position or rotated out is safe at all times. Another interesting thing is how "stacks" work in terms of rotation.

Stacks - Anything related to a pokemon in terms of counters or effects, including but not limited to stat ups, leech seed, toxic damage counter, substitute, etc.

So if you Sub with Charizard and keep it then rotate out to Squirtle, the next time Charizard is rotated in you keep the substitute. At the same time, if a pokemon is confused upon rotated out, if it comes back in it will remain confused. I don't know exactly how attract works; I'd assume it works if the same pokemon(the attract-er and attract-ee) are both on point, but doesn't have an effect elsewhere.

Another thing to abuse about stacks is Protect and Wish. Since Wish works the turn afterwards regardless of what pokemon is out the next turn, you can have a team like Blissey + two bulky-offensive pokemon and do something like.

Gyarados (On Point)@ Life Orb
Intimidate: Adamant
252 Attack, 4 Defense, 252 Speed
Aqua Tail
Stone Edge
Dragon Dance
Protect

Blissey @ Leftovers
Serene Grace/ Natural Cure: Bold
252 HP, 252 Defense, 4 Sp. Attack
Ice Beam/ Flamethrower/ Thunderbolt/ Seismic Toss
Wish
Protect
Toxic/ Anything that can be abused w/ Serene Grace

Blaziken(probably still uber) @ Life Orb
Speed Boost: Adamant
252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Sp. Defense
Flare Blitz
Hi Jump Kick
Swords Dance
Protect

With Gyarados on point you get a free intimidate on something. Special attacks are pretty much a guess against this team; Blissey nullifies them completely, so mis-predicting her rotating in and using Wish will cause either Gyarados or Blaziken to get a free 357 HP back, and potentially a free Swords Dance/ Dragon Dance if you aren't careful.

Further, if Blissey uses Toxic on the other person's last pokemon, you can stall three turns by using all three Protects in conjunction. This is possible because all of the protect counters work off of each of the individual pokemon's stacks.

So feel free to discuss anything about this kind of battle here. I personally want to use a defensive-team with Gyarados(point), Blissey, and Ferrothorn. They have to constantly predict between the three walls while I throw out SR, Leech Seed, Spikes, Roar, Wish, Protect, Taunt... that's a lot to look out for. And I have always been a very predicting intense player, so this kind of "screw up once and you lose" style doesn't bother me too much because I feel if played perfectly it can beat any combination.

 

[Wave⁂]

I really enjoy watching Rotation Battles, it's a giant mess of prediction. Playing it, on the other hand... I don't think I have the team-building or yomi to be good at Rotation.

 

[Pink Reaper]

Wait, protect works off separate counters? That seems absurdly broken.

 

[ss118]

I don't see how. As far as I know Substitute is a very common move, and spending a turn doing nothing while your opponent has 12 moves available(more than one of which is likely able to take advantage of Protect) can be costly.

Also, Toxic stalling doesn't work that well unless it is 1 v 3. In which case you likely win, anyway.

 

[Wave⁂]

Yeah, Protect isn't very advantageous most of the time. If you're switching WishBliss into a Thunderbro, why Protect when you can Wish?

 

[UltiMario]

Because they'll predict you coming in and switch out to something with a physical attack.

 

[Smasher89]

Rotation battles are alot of fun. Having priority and also the threat of a belly drummer always on the field makes the predictioning very interesting for example.

Here is a pokemon that alone can turn around matches sometimes:

Whimsicott/Erufuun
@Leftovers
Taunt
Swagger (forces switches, which gets harder and riskier since the switching pokemon has to be in the middle)
Substitute (predict a opponent hitting themselves, or just spam till it happens
Leech seed

 

[Wave⁂]

Because they'll predict you coming in and switch out to something with a physical attack.

But... if you do Protect, you've got a Blissey against a Thunderbro that'll switch out to a Conk.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't, I guess

 

[ss118]

I think Shedinja might potentially be abusable in this style of play.

The usual issue with it is weather + entry hazards, the later of which is nullified by rotating in Shedinja over switching him in. Weather is also decently easy to handle since just having Rain Dance on 1 or two pokemon isn't too hard.

I think it also creates a lot of opportunities for a team as it can find time to get in an SD relatively easily. Once it does, your opponent has to predict twice to kill it(once to rid of the sash I'd assume). Forcing them to react to you gives you opportunities to do crazy stuff like get an easy DD with Tyranitar(Type synergy is AMAZING and don't make it your point pokemon if you don't want SS going. Or use the dream world ability).

Just thought I'd ask here if people think this might make Shedinja amazing? Also I don't want this thread to just die with the little discussion.

 

[mood4food77]

Sheddy's only problem is that wonder guard doesn't act like a beefed up magic guard which would help him greatly

I'm not 100% sure of how rotation battles work but do weather abilities activate on the turns in which the pokemon IS rotated in

Cause if they do, then carrying a politoed and some rain abuse like ferrothorn could be really helpful

 

[ss118]

No. Your weather-ability pokemon has to be on point or be switched-in.