Hello!

Ive yet to write up in any detail on the No Holds Barred Competition, but frankly seeing as this write-up is going to be a lot simpler and shorter I’m going to start here.

The competition for September is called “Mega Melee”. This Single Battle competition allows for you to use only Pokémon that are capable of Mega Evolution. To be clear, despite a team of 3-6 being added, only 1 Pokémon will be used during each match.

So I’ve thought about who I’m going to take and write a short post on each one. I’m going to discuss their usage, their weakness, and make use of Pokémon Showdown and their Damage Calculator.

Mega Slowbro

Slowbro @ Slowbronite Ability: Regenerator EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD Bold Nature

• Toxic
• Slack Off
• Scald
• Iron Defense

Usage

OK, let’s get the elephant out of the room, and touch briefly about that shell. Just look at that poor guy will you?! It’s not actually SlowBro but Shellder who has Mega Evolved. That’s the face of sadness right there.

Despite the design, it’s a serious competitor in this game, as it can wall physical opponents and wear them down thanks to poison/burn damage. This will put pressure on the opponent to hit hard. Against a physical attacker, burn will reduce their chance of getting the win even less likely.

It’s ability in Shell Armour basically removes the opponent from being lucky and turning a guaranteed 2HKO into a OHKO, which comes in useful when you need to use Slack Off.

You will need to lose a turn and setup Iron Defense, however Slack Off can be used to recover after the fact. For example, against M-Tyranitar you’ll lose out one on one:

Mega Salamence is another physical attacker that M-SlowBro will wall. The below calc is with Adamant nature

+2 252+ Atk Salamence Double-Edge vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Slowbro-Mega: 139-164 (35.2 - 41.6%) – guaranteed 3HKO

Fact of the matter is Slowbro could match the boosts like-for like with Iron Defense. And on the offence, M-Slowbro can recover easily with Slack Off and hit with Scald + Toxic, or maybe even hold out for a burn from Scald. Andwhilst Ice Beam would OHKO M-Salamence, there’s more merit going with Scald.

Base 130 Special Attack and STAB on Scald means that it’s offence is not bad and will more than contribute to wearing down teams. It also helps from being blocked by Steel types: contrast Scald vs Ice Beam against M-Steelix:

0 SpA Slowbro-Mega Scald vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Charizard-Mega-X: 243-286 (158.8 - 186.9%) – guaranteed OHKO

Weaknesses

Basically any Special Attacker  is a threat. With it’s Special Defence at 80 it’s susceptible to being 2HKO. For example, mixed attacker Abomasnow has an outside chance to 2HKO:

68 Atk Abomasnow-Mega Wood Hammer vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Slowbro-Mega: 164-194 (41.6 - 49.2%) – 19.1% chance to 2HKO after hail damage

Even Mega Houndoom has a guaranteed 2HKO:

As we have seen form the numbers, offensively M-Slowbro can cope with a decent range of opponents with Scald, thanks to it’s decent Special Attack and STAB boost. Central to this is taking a hit setting up Iron Defense and using Slack Off to wear down those more resilient opponents. But M-Slowbro is going to suffer against any opponent with a better than average Special Attack.