I like playing Monotype Normal simply because it’s fun to use a type that it’s considered boring and win teams like 6 dragons just with a Porygon2 (and a Bunny with strong legs in National Dex)
Normal is my favorite type and this is one of the reasons. People see the normal type and think "Boring, weak, nothing that sticks out", but you can trick them with the fact that there are a lot of REALLY good normal types. There's a good reason why every Normal type gym has been consistently the most difficult in each game!
Monotype Poison is great because it has three pokemon with Regenerator that go on every team no matter what and Sheer Force Life Orb Nidoking just shreds half the tier with a correct prediction
Water and Flying are versatile Ghost is threatening Ice is deadly Poison is toxic And Bug is ....... surprisingly potent. Yeah Bug doesn't fit how most people anticipate it to be
@@simple45679 Bug has been one of the top HO types for a few gens now and it gets a TON of potent offensive threats whilst having a pretty solid defensive backbone (Buzzwole + Araquanid + HDB Volcarona + Scizor gives Bug both some good offensive presence as well as a really good defensive core that can offset a lot of bad match ups ....... and that also bodies Ice teams like nobody's business. Like seriously, Bug is probably the worst match up for Ice teams due to these bad boys that are in like every single bug team and all are able to handle almost the entire team by themselves)
I'm gonna be honest, I strongly disagree with mono-Water not being #1, let alone top 5. As a mono-dragon user I absolutely think Water is a better type than it is. No other type has that perfect balance of weather abuse, bulk, strong STABs, good typing, great walls, and great wallbreakers/sweepers. The only bad matchup it truly has is vs Rillaboom, everything else it can outplay with the right setup. It's obviously not unwinnable, but mono-water doesn't have to overstretch itself to patch offensive/defensive holes like others do.
As a mono dragon player in Nat dex (different format, but this will only strengthen my argument), Scarf Kyurem (in gen 8) single handedly invalidates mono water. Every time it switches in it gets a kill. And this is in a format where water has access to mega swampert. Like, give kyurem any support in speed and mono water has nothing for it
My favourite aspect of Monotype is when it leads to the usage of usually untiered Pokemon, for example in Gen VII Alolan Golem was on almost every Electric team just because it happens to be the only Electric type with Stealth Rock and on every Rock team because Magnet Pull helps in the Steel type matchup
Monotype bug is a relatively niche choice. With access to offensive threats like Quiver Dance Volcarona, Swords Dance Guts Heracross, etc., Bug types, with their common poison dual typing, can counter Fairy, Psychic, and Dark.
Don't forget the main thing that makes MonoBug unique, Sticky Web. A lot of teams don't have reliable hazard removal and Sticky Webs can be pretty overpowered
In previous gens it was even better. Losing things like Mega Beedrill, Pinsir, and Heracross really hurt bug mono. Another crucial bug type was surprisingly Volbeat, with tail glow and prankster thunder wave you could really get stuff done! I haven’t played gen 8 mono much but Volcarona, Shuckle, and Centiskorch seem pretty crucial, along with staples like Scizor and Araquanid
Surprised mono water didn't make the list, from my surface level point of view it seems like it has ways to deal with it's weaknesses both defensively and offensively
I played a fair bit of monotype a year ago and really liked this one dark team. Beating fairy and bug teams was so fun and rewarding. Fighting teams hardly ever came up but the few that I fought annihilated me
I'm a big fan of ground as a monotype. So many strong attackers while also having a defensive backbone with mons like, Garchomp and Landerous-Therian. You have some interesting ways to deal with some of your weaknesses like water absorb Gastrodon for water types, Thick Fat Mamoswine for ice, Nidoking for grass and so on.
Really hope you continue this series! monotype was always one of my favourite metagames back before I actually started to gain some game sense and learned how to get better (at least, a little better) at competitive pokemon. Water type teams were always my go to, and I vaguely remember and electric and flying team as well. I'd been thinking about getting back into it, might give it a shot because of this video! time to bring back my anti-water lapras and see what it can do in the modern meta
Is it just me or is NathanlikesChicken getting recommended to everyone now, and monotype is starting to get really popular? Guy is popping off and deserves it for his efforts in the monotype scene.
As an player of this tier for almost an decade Grass and Rock are always bottom tier, Bug used to be mid tier but since powercreep of the types it’s now low tier
I've been sick and haven't slept for a week, so I had to watch this video twice to follow along properly, but I REALLY enjoyed learning more about the monotype format and I hope you do make more videos about it! Thank you for treating us to so many fascinating commentaries!
I doubt it's the best, but certainly the one I've had the most fun and success with has been mono Poison. It's not just the triple Regenerator core with Amoonguss, Toxapex and my precious boy AV Slowking, but also Nidoking's sheer power (pun intended), Galarian Weezing's ability to counter a lot of different mons and setters like the tapus, and other useful fillers, such as Tentacruel for hazard removal, Scald burns and Toxic Spikes for a very useful free moveslot on Weezing or Pex, Drapion for a Psychic immunity with a good chance to launch a Sniper-boosted critical stab or Eq on a switch-in, or Scarf/Banded Crobat for a speed control to spam U-Turns (once used a Defog Boots one in a non-Tspikes team, but didn't really work out) and other offensive moves. I just don't know why, but it's more fun than it has any right to be having my opponents playing around status constantly as I go quite more offensively than I should lol
I would infer that Normal would be pretty solid for some sort of team. Lots of normal types have great natural bulk, and their key contribution throughout the games has been amazing movepools. You can even use something like Scrappy Miltank with Body Slam and a Lum Berry for covering Ghost Not to mention the absolute offensive monsters you have access to, two of which being Guts users which provides you two status immune sweepers…probably my favorite type ever and I just think it’s so slept on
Normal is biding its time until Hisuian Zoroark is finally released in the mainline games, so they can have a perpetual CC switch-in, before they take over as the Kings of Monotype.
It's decent in natdex because of amazing mons like staraptor and mega lopunny, but the removal of return was what made normal okay at best in gen 8. Although normal still has good mons like blissey, p2, ditto, bewear, obstagoon, and diggersby that still make it a decent type. It's nowhere near the top 5 though.
Electric, particularly in natdex mono is a super interesting type. There’s always going to be a core of 3 Pokémon that define the team ;Zapdos, Koko, A-Raichu), a second tier of 2-3 Pokémon that have moderate/high usage (Zeraora, Rotom-W, Magnezone, Regileki) and some teams will run a fringe option such as Dracozolt, Rotom-H, Galvantula or even something less viable such as Togedemaru or A-Golem. Within those three core Pokémon (Zap, Koko, A-Raichu), there’s a bevy of different sets, physical pivot Koko, dual screen Koko, special Koko. Specs Raichu, EB Raichu. Specs Zapdos, scarf Zapdos, defensive Zapdos, Flyinium Z Zapdos etc.
I currently run a psychic type team at around medium ELO. Indeedee is really good for covering the ghost types. And with so many strong psychics also having the fairy type, dark isn't too scary either. Mono bug is actually the biggest problem but it's still doable with victini taking care of them. I typically also run a Physical attack Mew as well since it's a little tough to find a good physical psychic type Team is: Mew, Slowbro, Victini, Tapu Lele, Alakazam, and Indeedee
Thanks for covering Monotype! Monotype has always been one of my favorite ladders because of how you build a type to both play to its strengths and to counter its weaknesses. Also, I saw my own mono flying team (same pokes, probably different and better moves) on here which both makes me feel skilled and generic, haha.
This format reminds me of a Pokemon League of sorts where we kind of played mono type teams againat challengers (Like a Pokemon League), did have an "Elite 4" tournament, I actually ended up winning as Mono Fairy vs Mono Steel back in X/Y.. Those days were really fun
i really only know competitive pokémon because i used to play randoms with my now-ex (he once said he quit because mega sableye was a pain in the ass, which i find funny, because sableye is my favourite mon and i literally have a half sleeve tattoo of him) but when i heard of monotype i made a ghost team because most of my favourites are ghost (sableye, froslass, mimikyu, dragapult , mismagius and phantump are all some of my favourites). i think the team i made all of those but instead of phantump it was frillish. i only played it once and the guy i played against was super nice and gave me so many tips on how to play a monotype ghost team. i miss that person. i hope they know that i think they were very kind and i appreciated them being gentle with me , as i’m really just a pokémon fan for The Littel Guys
although my favourite monotype experience was when i did a random and got normal and swept a bunch of rocks with cotton guard/body press dubwool. dude was so mad it was hilarious
This was such a wonderful video to stumble upon. Playing monotype has become my favorite and pretty much primary way I play competitive Pokemon on showdown. I first found out about it because I generally really like a lot of poison mons that are generally not super viable in most competitive formats except the more stall based mons and this was a way to kind of fufill the gym leader fantasy ever kid has. I also found that team building can have a very different mindset behind it which is also super interesting. While you can still build a very balanced team with you standard support and sweapers I have also found that supprisingly having teams of very niche sweepers that work well with a couple of coverage options works very well also. Also just in general Mons that wouldn't see much if any usage suddely have niches on teams and its just a lot of fun all around that doesn't get talked about enough. I honestly am a little bit sad that there isnt a doubles monotype available on showdown but hopefully one day.
Before the video started my guesses for top 5 were Water, Fairy, Steel, Dragon and Ghost. I got 3 right and water was the honorable mention. Not bad considering I never play this tier I guess Lol. Cool video I liked the concept.
Ghost is actually a very bad monotype due to their lack of reliable bulk and knock off being everywhere. Ground is much better yet the others are quite good.
I didn't play competitive Pokemon for like a year but a few weeks ago I got the itch to play monotype. It's a really fun format, I personally love using mono-Electric. Currently at the time of writing I'm #6 on the Showdown ladder but admittedly that's probably a fluke, I typically float around between 1600 and 1700. One type that I think is really strong that you didn't mention is Ghost. Dragapult, Spectrier, and Aegislash have a few different movesets that they can run, and if you guess wrong which one they're running and you give them a free turn as a result you can get in serious trouble. And of course if you're dependent on physical attackers, it can be really hard to break past G-Corsola (luckily Electric doesn't have that particular problem).
Ice is an amazing type despite all it's weaknesses you got everything you really want but at the end of the day are at the mercy of your own skill vs the opponents despite this you still have mons like Weavile/G-Darm/Kryurem for offensive pressure and more defensive mons like Eviolite Piloswine for rocks / HDB Avalugg for spinning/phasing Kyurem can also stall a fair bit with it's sub roost set
Def agree. In the meta I play in, not only do you have buffed mons like filter avalugg and mega glaile’s access to refrigerate fake out and quick attack, but you also have new mons such as sevii Zebstrika, which has electric/ice and either lightning rod for an electric pivot or a buffed illuminate for more accurate thunders and blizzards, and (while not really a new Mon) dewgong, who now has wields ice scales and a frost breath that is now the equivalent to an ice type version of scald that ignores spedef boosts and cripple special attackers rather than physical attackers. Doesn’t usually need the frostbite at times since even unhindered something like zard y, which would normally scare mono ice to death, gets completely stone walled by gong, and gong can viably run rest talk since for this team style it only really needs frost breath and flip turn.
With my group friends we do a monotype tournament every 4 months. The gimmick of the first half was Free for all. Next week is the finals and I am there. Wish me luck!
I remember rocking with a Mono Ground team when I played monotype, and I actually liked the flying matchup on the low ladder because it always crumbled whenever Gravity was set up.
Even knowing nothing about the monotype meta I was sure flying would be a great monotype just because bird spam has been so effective in the past. If you can practically make a monotype team and have success in OU that type is surely going to do well in monotype.
I played a lot of Mono Bug back in Gen 6. It wasn't amazing, but I found it to be a really fun hyper offense strategy. It seems to be pretty bad these days though. No good new Bug types means it still loses to its worst matchups but even harder now. Add to that, it used to not have the worst matchup against Fighting and Dragon, but it kinda feels like Bug insta-loses to Kommo-o. I'm surprised to hear Electric being so good these days. It used to be just horrible, but I guess Tapu Koko and Zeraora really brought a lot to the table.
I love how this was a sneaky list of reasons you should play them too- the "if you like X playstyle" on a couple of those explanations is a good hook to try and get people to try out monotype ladder :P
Me and a friend used to do competitions in monotype on Showdown. It functioned in that we go up to gen 8, a randomizer selecting the types we get each gen with no repeats (if you get ghost in gen 1, you can't get it in 2-8). Additionally, our opponent doesn't know what types the other has. Other rules being no mythicals or major legendaries, basically box art mons or equivalent but you can use lesser legends like the legendary birds, beasts, and swords of justice or mythical Pokemon. Also it's usually a coin flip whether we allow generational gimmicks. AKA: no megas, no z crystal, no dynamax. Also because gen 1 and 2 lacks some type in quantity, we only allow for 3 mons. An optional rule we did differently each time was gen 3 onward, we play doubles instead of singles. As 1 and 2 lack double battles. For every gen we do 2/3, winner gets a point. Whoever has most points wins, we never tied but the system I suggested is that a randomizer picks a random gen but we get to select our types. (Other person obviously not knowing beforehand.) We had a ton of cool battles. Like the time we both got gen 3 fighting and had near exact teams except 1 Mon. Even setups were near exact. Was very close, coming down to who's medicham beat the others. I luckily had the foresight to preserve mine, whilst he focused on his Heracross. (Thankfully my near death one won the speed tie and 1hk'd it with HP Flying, but went down right after from his Hariama.)
Please make a video about the fighting type! It was very looked down on in generation 7, but I played it a TON and got good results with it. I'd love to see a video about what you think about it in gen 7
First thanks for covering that format👍 My favorite this Gen would be mono Fire. Nothing like Drought plus V-Create or Flare Blitz spam. Addtionally it helps a lot that Pursuit is removed. Thus Victini and Blacephalon are really good now. Not to mentioned Cinderace is like cheat code with Libero.
Ngl, I didn't know that existed and it actually sounds fun, and is likely the thing that might actually get me to try anything competitive pokemon out, even thought I probably will lose as i'm not very competitive or good at in depth type stuff. As far as pokemon goes that is.
Youve made a video about my passion this time, Ive made Monotype teams Of every type made to counter each other type + a Mono team for General usage. 19 teams of each type, 18 types, 342 teams for Natdex Monotype alone
I used to be addicted to monotype on smogon back in the gen 7 days, and I started to get frustrated with it after a while from trying way too hard to be competitive and wasting hours and hours teambulding "the perfect team(s)" just to still face failure. Eventually i dropped the sweaty try-hard mentality and just kicked back and did what i thought was fun. Instead of copy and pasting meta strats and picking "s tier types" (that most people were already running) i just played my favorite types with my favorite mons. Ironically, the strategy of fun eventually led me to my highest ladder ranking ever on smogon which was either just shy of 1400 or right at 1400 cant remember. Got that high MOSTLY due to a fighting type team that was close to my heart, with help from a tapu koko focused electric team secondary
this was really cool to learn about a tier I've never thought much about but now i desperately want you to explain how bug and ice do in this tier to me
bug is trash unless you abuse the rare few op ones that get used in ou like volcarona (ive tried without its not fun) and i use the ice type exclusively its fun but being the worst defensive type in the game makes balanced playstyles incredibly difficult so you either need to use hyper offense or do what i do and have some bulk on the team (i use thick fat walrein with full bulk evs as a mixed attacking wall), ninetales alola with aurora veil and try to set up slush rush pokemon like arctozolt and sandlash, weavile is a requirement for any ice team as playing without it or losing it early is a guaranteed loss. generally speaking 95% of ice types are worse than they would be as a mono type w their other typing because ice removes a lot of resistances, turns a lot of weaknesses to 4x and doesnt provide much more offense, and you're basically playing it to feel good about using a gimmick which is why i use it
I'd like to see you do a top 5 worse types too - I'm only a few minutes into yhe video but I'd like to hear you elaborate why Fighting fell off so hard over the past few generations (largely assuming Fairy is part of this)
I once was in a FB group where they decided to host a Pokémon league dynamic. They chose a gym leader for each type and the goal was to challenge and beat at least 10 of the leaders so that you could go into the elite 4. I was in charge of the flying gym and it was one of the hardest earned medals. I had stuff like scarf + retaliate Staraptor for revenge killing, Landorus for the electric immunity, Multiscale + WP Dragonite, Thundurus, Skarmory and I think it was Gliscor. The only thing that made my blood boil was people challenging with mono ice or rock teams, but it was fun as hell. If I ever go back into showdown, I'll definitely consider going into monotype with a kickass flying mono.
In the past i climbed up the ladder with mono rock: Sandstorm is great and can set up sana rush lycanrock to outspeed a lot of mons. I user storm drain cradily and diamond storm body press diancie. Was very fun and effective i personally suggest to try that.
As i was watching your previous video i thought "id love to see a monotype video from him" and then i saw this. And Then i saw a non-evolved nuzlocke which is another thing ive wanted to see! How was i not already watching your vids
It's worth mentioning the air balloon for electric, and how common ice is on water pokemon. The former is a very useful item and the latter is a very useful offensive type. At least that's my armchair understanding.
I play every once in a while with Electric and run Magnezone with Air Balloon. It sounds weird, but it's deceptively useful. (that or people suck in low elo but i did beat a ground team almost perfectly)
I would have put Ghost as an Honorable mention simply because it's really good at neutral matchups, sure the type struggles quite a bit against Dark and Normal (but it DOMINATES Psychic and Fighting like nobody's business lmao. Using Fighting and seeing a Ghost team facing you is one of the worst feeling in the tier, roughly as bad as say using an Ice team against a Bug team), but it's damn consistent against most neutral match ups simply because Ghost resists are in short supply and Ghost teams have a premiere offensive line up and some more than decent defensive backbone with Corsola, Mimikyu and Aegislash (and Dragapult which has a good defensive type and can take a strong neutral hit in a pinch). Ghost is definitely a pretty solid type
I played a good bit of monotype and groun is REALLY fun as long as you dont get a grass team, then rillaboom sweeps. My team is landorus, hippowdon, excadrill, mamoswine, nidoking and seismitoad. The reason i use seismitoad over gastrodon is because its less passive since it has power whip for water types. The whole team hits like a truck especially banded mamoswine (with thick fat to resist ice) its only issue is its lacking speed without sand rush excadrill.
Hey man, love your content! Started playing showdown recently and have been learning a lot of cool stuff from ur vids, even started doing some LC games after watching ur teambuilding guide
I actually run trick room on my mono dragon teams to counter slush rush, and faster dragon type teams. Additionally I run 30 speed IVs to ensure I out speed opposing dragons in trick room.
When I was involved in showdown I ran mono Normal and distinctly recall a match with a Mono Ghost user where their Gengar ended up Struggling against my Blissey for the win
I used to play a really fun mono poison team on showdown in gen 6, though I haven't really played much pokemon since then tbh. Looking into it, mono poison still looks love it has tons of good options which looks pretty fun
I love monotype, it's a great mix of serious teambuilding in a casual atmosphere. To me, it's the best "use what you want and figure it out" gameplay. Oh, and I play Nat Dex, of course. Seems to me that there's not enough choice to make varied teams with just gen 8.
This video got me trying out Monotype and it’s very fun and less intense on my brain for building a team. I wouldn’t mind more monotype top 5s or Monotype why Blaziken was banned
Great vid! What we REALLY need to know though… what’s the best secondary typing for monotype? As in, what type do you see most often that isn’t the type shared for all 6 mons? For example, I think flying would definitely be up there again since it has such a high dual type percent and creates a ground immunity (which 5 monotypes are weak to) and there are just good flying types in general… electric is another easy answer simply because the rotom forms are so good lolol (is this question relevant to anything? No… but I think it’s kinda fun and interesting 😊)
Flying is probably the most common secondary type. Ground is very common as coverage, so you're pretty much always going to see a Flying/X mon on every single team.
Yeah, I do agree that flying is really good, but in all honesty I think the best secondary typing is Steel, lots of resistances, immunity to t-spikes, poison moves, and resistance to rocks (unless primary type is weak, in that case it's a neutrality), plus tons of good mons get the type, off the top of my head I can think of Scizor, Heatran, Excadrill, Ferrothorn, Celestela+friends (skarmory, and Corviknigth), Klefki, and Duralodon. I'd still say that flying is the second best overall secondary type tough, ground immunity is nothing to scoff at.
Haven’t played in a while but mono water with Swift Swim banded Barraskewda was fun, funny enough I had more trouble with mono poison with that team rather than grass
I got recently into Monotype, because I thought this mode was actually really fun to play Got into 1500 elo today with just an Electric team! Seeing Electric as top 3 types in Gen 8 Monotype makes complete sense tbh xD Btw, here is the team, Im so proud of this little boys :') -Tapu Koko -Magnezone -Alolan Raichu -Rotom Frost -Regieleki -Galvantula Hope everyone enjoys Monotype as much as I do!
I like playing Monotype Normal simply because it’s fun to use a type that it’s considered boring and win teams like 6 dragons just with a Porygon2 (and a Bunny with strong legs in National Dex)
Helio + pory can outplay flying and water by themselves, which are arguably 2 of the most common mono teams you see
Normal is my favorite type and this is one of the reasons. People see the normal type and think "Boring, weak, nothing that sticks out", but you can trick them with the fact that there are a lot of REALLY good normal types. There's a good reason why every Normal type gym has been consistently the most difficult in each game!
I play Mono Normal because I like throwing scarf Ditto to steal the opponent's sweep lol
@@neog8029 I run mono-dragon with DD Pult as my sweeper, and seeing Ditto on the opposing team puts the fear of god into me
In Old Gens phys def Intimidate Staraptor was so good convined with chancey
Monotype Poison is great because it has three pokemon with Regenerator that go on every team no matter what
and Sheer Force Life Orb Nidoking just shreds half the tier with a correct prediction
The only issue is that toxic spikes destroy mono poison😏
The 3 are toxapex, galarian slowbro and who am I forgetting?
@@xavierlehew6746 Amoongus
Amoongus
Regenerator is a fun ability that supports smart plays and knowing when to switch in and out 🙃
Mono ghost is pretty nice now that they added poltergeist and dragapult, at least compared to previous gens
Did dragapult get unbanned?
I guess the lack of pursuit helps as well
Polteageist is an auto win button against electric teams
@@andreaseverin1346 shell smash is always appreciated yeah
@@andreaseverin1346 That's when you pull out the sucker punch pincurchin
I love how each type's playstyle fits their type. Dragon is powerful, Electric strikes fast, Steel is steady, etc.
Water and Flying are versatile
Ghost is threatening
Ice is deadly
Poison is toxic
And Bug is ....... surprisingly potent. Yeah Bug doesn't fit how most people anticipate it to be
And I fricking love it! Also electric gets mentioned WOOO
@@sephikong8323 bug gets squashed
@@simple45679 Bug has been one of the top HO types for a few gens now and it gets a TON of potent offensive threats whilst having a pretty solid defensive backbone (Buzzwole + Araquanid + HDB Volcarona + Scizor gives Bug both some good offensive presence as well as a really good defensive core that can offset a lot of bad match ups ....... and that also bodies Ice teams like nobody's business. Like seriously, Bug is probably the worst match up for Ice teams due to these bad boys that are in like every single bug team and all are able to handle almost the entire team by themselves)
@@sephikong8323 it's just a joke chill
I'm gonna be honest, I strongly disagree with mono-Water not being #1, let alone top 5. As a mono-dragon user I absolutely think Water is a better type than it is. No other type has that perfect balance of weather abuse, bulk, strong STABs, good typing, great walls, and great wallbreakers/sweepers. The only bad matchup it truly has is vs Rillaboom, everything else it can outplay with the right setup. It's obviously not unwinnable, but mono-water doesn't have to overstretch itself to patch offensive/defensive holes like others do.
I agree
Well that will be very annoying for my plans to scorch the earth with sun boosted fire moves
As a mono dragon player in Nat dex (different format, but this will only strengthen my argument), Scarf Kyurem (in gen 8) single handedly invalidates mono water. Every time it switches in it gets a kill. And this is in a format where water has access to mega swampert.
Like, give kyurem any support in speed and mono water has nothing for it
Mono water especially HO Rain teams,
get evicerated by ice.
Ive had mono bug to #1 on the ladder multiple times, but damn water is strong, water should be #1 for sure
Recently got into monotype and I love it it's a breath of fresh air
Me too, its amazing
Mono dragon or mono flying
It's a really fun tier ngl. Criminally underrated in gen 8, people who don't like how slow and stally OU is should really play it
Ah I’m glad when my community gets an shoutout by Freezai.
Mono is fun and quite tricky to plan around but you usually don’t get in stall fests
@@Shnoz591 Mono dragon sounds kind of scary to run because of all the people using mono fairy, no?
My favourite aspect of Monotype is when it leads to the usage of usually untiered Pokemon, for example in Gen VII Alolan Golem was on almost every Electric team just because it happens to be the only Electric type with Stealth Rock and on every Rock team because Magnet Pull helps in the Steel type matchup
Ah yes, i too was a fellow alolan golem user back in gen 7 thanks to stealth rock for my electric team
The funny thing its that with flying you can even use a Rain Offense. Pelipper, Zapdos/Thundurus, Swift Swim Mantine, and others... so nice lol
Swift Swim Mantine is something to be scared of
Ice is notable for being the most volatile team type, one player is always going to lose very hard and it's not always clear which.
Yeah, you either get an Arctozolt sweep or funny random poke kills all your icies effortlessly
I may not play gen 8 monotype, but I do play gen 9, and it still feels that way, Ice has some good set up sweepers, but can easily be countered.
Monotype bug is a relatively niche choice. With access to offensive threats like Quiver Dance Volcarona, Swords Dance Guts Heracross, etc., Bug types, with their common poison dual typing, can counter Fairy, Psychic, and Dark.
and since bug is an uncommon type, you can cause problems for players that haven't built their teams to deal with bugs
Sadly this gen Bug is absolutely horrible in monotype, cause they online lost value with gen 8 while not getting a new busted pokemon like other types
Don't forget the main thing that makes MonoBug unique, Sticky Web. A lot of teams don't have reliable hazard removal and Sticky Webs can be pretty overpowered
In previous gens it was even better. Losing things like Mega Beedrill, Pinsir, and Heracross really hurt bug mono. Another crucial bug type was surprisingly Volbeat, with tail glow and prankster thunder wave you could really get stuff done! I haven’t played gen 8 mono much but Volcarona, Shuckle, and Centiskorch seem pretty crucial, along with staples like Scizor and Araquanid
@@Error403HRD try max physical defense investment with substitute and flame body. You'll find a lot more opportunities to set up than you'd expect.
Monotype is really fun, it's interesting to see how people decide to build their teams
i always take rain team to mono water even if damp rock is banned. there isn't rly a grass check tho except sap sipper azumarill.
And every time I play I only see boring sample teams💀
@@vahahadziev I beat up most of the sample teams since they basically doesn't have too much of a surprise factor and is a great way to practice
Surprised mono water didn't make the list, from my surface level point of view it seems like it has ways to deal with it's weaknesses both defensively and offensively
Man the whole vid I was like "ok surely water is next" lmao
The problem is the top 5 all end up beating water. Also water teams are always stall, and that's just impolite
@@AdmiralStormy Mono waters are moslty Rains HOs not stall, but this is not more morally acceptable tbf
@@AdmiralStormy Pelipper + Swift swim is the most common water archetype, if that's considered stall wtf is offense?
@@AdmiralStormy i haven’t seen rain stall since like gen 5 bro what are u on about. Pelipper + Rain HO straight up wins most games.
Loving the Hoenn-themed song choices for each time! :D
Oldale/Lavaridge, Zinnia, Gym, Steven, and Fortree
I played a fair bit of monotype a year ago and really liked this one dark team. Beating fairy and bug teams was so fun and rewarding. Fighting teams hardly ever came up but the few that I fought annihilated me
I'm a big fan of ground as a monotype. So many strong attackers while also having a defensive backbone with mons like, Garchomp and Landerous-Therian. You have some interesting ways to deal with some of your weaknesses like water absorb Gastrodon for water types, Thick Fat Mamoswine for ice, Nidoking for grass and so on.
11:12 I can't believe Freezai forgot rookidee, and corvisquire, those are HUGE threats who are pure flying type
"It's not immediately obvious why Mono Flying is so good."
My dude Landorus is RIGHT there 😅
Landoooooo
Genie of healthy meta
What an interesting format! I love the idea of building teams like a gym leader. I'd love to see more videos about it
I love NathanLoveChicken's monotype content so it's super cool to see you get into the tier too!
NathanLikesChicken the monotype YT Goat
@@twobadour facts
Hearing about why blaziken and kartana got banned would be really cool!
Really hope you continue this series! monotype was always one of my favourite metagames back before I actually started to gain some game sense and learned how to get better (at least, a little better) at competitive pokemon. Water type teams were always my go to, and I vaguely remember and electric and flying team as well. I'd been thinking about getting back into it, might give it a shot because of this video! time to bring back my anti-water lapras and see what it can do in the modern meta
Is it just me or is NathanlikesChicken getting recommended to everyone now, and monotype is starting to get really popular? Guy is popping off and deserves it for his efforts in the monotype scene.
Yeah he's the reason why I play that tier sometimes
I'd love to see a video like this for all the mono-type teams. Really informative video!
As an player of this tier for almost an decade Grass and Rock are always bottom tier, Bug used to be mid tier but since powercreep of the types it’s now low tier
@@rontheauraknight9606 Please comment here your tiering on types!! I would love to know it from an experient player
I've been sick and haven't slept for a week, so I had to watch this video twice to follow along properly, but I REALLY enjoyed learning more about the monotype format and I hope you do make more videos about it! Thank you for treating us to so many fascinating commentaries!
Longtime player of Monotype and National Dex Monotype. Been loving my Poison stall team.
I doubt it's the best, but certainly the one I've had the most fun and success with has been mono Poison. It's not just the triple Regenerator core with Amoonguss, Toxapex and my precious boy AV Slowking, but also Nidoking's sheer power (pun intended), Galarian Weezing's ability to counter a lot of different mons and setters like the tapus, and other useful fillers, such as Tentacruel for hazard removal, Scald burns and Toxic Spikes for a very useful free moveslot on Weezing or Pex, Drapion for a Psychic immunity with a good chance to launch a Sniper-boosted critical stab or Eq on a switch-in, or Scarf/Banded Crobat for a speed control to spam U-Turns (once used a Defog Boots one in a non-Tspikes team, but didn't really work out) and other offensive moves. I just don't know why, but it's more fun than it has any right to be having my opponents playing around status constantly as I go quite more offensively than I should lol
I would infer that Normal would be pretty solid for some sort of team. Lots of normal types have great natural bulk, and their key contribution throughout the games has been amazing movepools. You can even use something like Scrappy Miltank with Body Slam and a Lum Berry for covering Ghost
Not to mention the absolute offensive monsters you have access to, two of which being Guts users which provides you two status immune sweepers…probably my favorite type ever and I just think it’s so slept on
Normal is biding its time until Hisuian Zoroark is finally released in the mainline games, so they can have a perpetual CC switch-in, before they take over as the Kings of Monotype.
It's decent in natdex because of amazing mons like staraptor and mega lopunny, but the removal of return was what made normal okay at best in gen 8. Although normal still has good mons like blissey, p2, ditto, bewear, obstagoon, and diggersby that still make it a decent type. It's nowhere near the top 5 though.
I love monotype, I get to relive my childhood dream of becoming a gym leader!!
Electric, particularly in natdex mono is a super interesting type. There’s always going to be a core of 3 Pokémon that define the team ;Zapdos, Koko, A-Raichu), a second tier of 2-3 Pokémon that have moderate/high usage (Zeraora, Rotom-W, Magnezone, Regileki) and some teams will run a fringe option such as Dracozolt, Rotom-H, Galvantula or even something less viable such as Togedemaru or A-Golem.
Within those three core Pokémon (Zap, Koko, A-Raichu), there’s a bevy of different sets, physical pivot Koko, dual screen Koko, special Koko. Specs Raichu, EB Raichu. Specs Zapdos, scarf Zapdos, defensive Zapdos, Flyinium Z Zapdos etc.
I currently run a psychic type team at around medium ELO. Indeedee is really good for covering the ghost types. And with so many strong psychics also having the fairy type, dark isn't too scary either. Mono bug is actually the biggest problem but it's still doable with victini taking care of them. I typically also run a Physical attack Mew as well since it's a little tough to find a good physical psychic type
Team is: Mew, Slowbro, Victini, Tapu Lele, Alakazam, and Indeedee
Yeah psychic is awesome
"it's a little tough to find a good physical psychic type"
It's called psyshock lol
@@asepsisaficionado7376 sure but coverage is key in monotypes. The mew runs earthquake lol
Monotype is one of my favorite tiers. I'd love to see more videos about it.
Thanks for covering Monotype! Monotype has always been one of my favorite ladders because of how you build a type to both play to its strengths and to counter its weaknesses.
Also, I saw my own mono flying team (same pokes, probably different and better moves) on here which both makes me feel skilled and generic, haha.
Mono Dark is another great type due to how many great pokemon they have in their line-up
This format reminds me of a Pokemon League of sorts where we kind of played mono type teams againat challengers (Like a Pokemon League), did have an "Elite 4" tournament, I actually ended up winning as Mono Fairy vs Mono Steel back in X/Y.. Those days were really fun
This is will always be my favourite metagame on pokemon showdown though I haven't played in a while
Mono Flying has always been my preferred option thanks to the multitude of good options around
Really looking forward to your two next videos in the format, they sound very interesting !
i really only know competitive pokémon because i used to play randoms with my now-ex (he once said he quit because mega sableye was a pain in the ass, which i find funny, because sableye is my favourite mon and i literally have a half sleeve tattoo of him) but when i heard of monotype i made a ghost team because most of my favourites are ghost (sableye, froslass, mimikyu, dragapult , mismagius and phantump are all some of my favourites). i think the team i made all of those but instead of phantump it was frillish. i only played it once and the guy i played against was super nice and gave me so many tips on how to play a monotype ghost team. i miss that person. i hope they know that i think they were very kind and i appreciated them being gentle with me , as i’m really just a pokémon fan for The Littel Guys
although my favourite monotype experience was when i did a random and got normal and swept a bunch of rocks with cotton guard/body press dubwool. dude was so mad it was hilarious
I remember I one took part in a Gym Leader tournament on PS and ended up with Jasmine. Has been my avatar ever since!
mono ice is so fun. slush rush plus darm is fantastic and no one respects your type until you brutalize them.
This is my favourite Freezai video in a long time. I hope it does well so we get more videos like this.
This was such a wonderful video to stumble upon. Playing monotype has become my favorite and pretty much primary way I play competitive Pokemon on showdown. I first found out about it because I generally really like a lot of poison mons that are generally not super viable in most competitive formats except the more stall based mons and this was a way to kind of fufill the gym leader fantasy ever kid has. I also found that team building can have a very different mindset behind it which is also super interesting. While you can still build a very balanced team with you standard support and sweapers I have also found that supprisingly having teams of very niche sweepers that work well with a couple of coverage options works very well also. Also just in general Mons that wouldn't see much if any usage suddely have niches on teams and its just a lot of fun all around that doesn't get talked about enough. I honestly am a little bit sad that there isnt a doubles monotype available on showdown but hopefully one day.
The sad thing though, is since it would be top 5 and bottom 5 types, we would be missing 8 types for a tier list
Before the video started my guesses for top 5 were Water, Fairy, Steel, Dragon and Ghost. I got 3 right and water was the honorable mention. Not bad considering I never play this tier I guess Lol. Cool video I liked the concept.
Ghost is actually a very bad monotype due to their lack of reliable bulk and knock off being everywhere. Ground is much better yet the others are quite good.
I didn't play competitive Pokemon for like a year but a few weeks ago I got the itch to play monotype. It's a really fun format, I personally love using mono-Electric. Currently at the time of writing I'm #6 on the Showdown ladder but admittedly that's probably a fluke, I typically float around between 1600 and 1700.
One type that I think is really strong that you didn't mention is Ghost. Dragapult, Spectrier, and Aegislash have a few different movesets that they can run, and if you guess wrong which one they're running and you give them a free turn as a result you can get in serious trouble. And of course if you're dependent on physical attackers, it can be really hard to break past G-Corsola (luckily Electric doesn't have that particular problem).
Ice is an amazing type despite all it's weaknesses you got everything you really want but at the end of the day are at the mercy of your own skill vs the opponents despite this you still have mons like Weavile/G-Darm/Kryurem for offensive pressure and more defensive mons like Eviolite Piloswine for rocks / HDB Avalugg for spinning/phasing Kyurem can also stall a fair bit with it's sub roost set
Def agree. In the meta I play in, not only do you have buffed mons like filter avalugg and mega glaile’s access to refrigerate fake out and quick attack, but you also have new mons such as sevii Zebstrika, which has electric/ice and either lightning rod for an electric pivot or a buffed illuminate for more accurate thunders and blizzards, and (while not really a new Mon) dewgong, who now has wields ice scales and a frost breath that is now the equivalent to an ice type version of scald that ignores spedef boosts and cripple special attackers rather than physical attackers. Doesn’t usually need the frostbite at times since even unhindered something like zard y, which would normally scare mono ice to death, gets completely stone walled by gong, and gong can viably run rest talk since for this team style it only really needs frost breath and flip turn.
Honestly I love learning about competitive Pokémon even though I don’t play it
With my group friends we do a monotype tournament every 4 months. The gimmick of the first half was Free for all. Next week is the finals and I am there. Wish me luck!
That's awesome, good luck!
I remember rocking with a Mono Ground team when I played monotype, and I actually liked the flying matchup on the low ladder because it always crumbled whenever Gravity was set up.
Even knowing nothing about the monotype meta I was sure flying would be a great monotype just because bird spam has been so effective in the past. If you can practically make a monotype team and have success in OU that type is surely going to do well in monotype.
I've found that Mono Dark's STAB Sucker Punch hits incredibly hard. (Also Water should definitely be #1 imo)
I played a lot of Mono Bug back in Gen 6. It wasn't amazing, but I found it to be a really fun hyper offense strategy. It seems to be pretty bad these days though. No good new Bug types means it still loses to its worst matchups but even harder now. Add to that, it used to not have the worst matchup against Fighting and Dragon, but it kinda feels like Bug insta-loses to Kommo-o.
I'm surprised to hear Electric being so good these days. It used to be just horrible, but I guess Tapu Koko and Zeraora really brought a lot to the table.
If Golisopod had a better ability then bug would be a far better type.
Yes! ive been waiting for monotype videos, ty so much
I love how this was a sneaky list of reasons you should play them too- the "if you like X playstyle" on a couple of those explanations is a good hook to try and get people to try out monotype ladder :P
5:20 why’d you have to include this replay bro I got my ass beat 😂 love the vids
Me and a friend used to do competitions in monotype on Showdown. It functioned in that we go up to gen 8, a randomizer selecting the types we get each gen with no repeats (if you get ghost in gen 1, you can't get it in 2-8). Additionally, our opponent doesn't know what types the other has.
Other rules being no mythicals or major legendaries, basically box art mons or equivalent but you can use lesser legends like the legendary birds, beasts, and swords of justice or mythical Pokemon.
Also it's usually a coin flip whether we allow generational gimmicks. AKA: no megas, no z crystal, no dynamax.
Also because gen 1 and 2 lacks some type in quantity, we only allow for 3 mons.
An optional rule we did differently each time was gen 3 onward, we play doubles instead of singles. As 1 and 2 lack double battles.
For every gen we do 2/3, winner gets a point. Whoever has most points wins, we never tied but the system I suggested is that a randomizer picks a random gen but we get to select our types. (Other person obviously not knowing beforehand.)
We had a ton of cool battles. Like the time we both got gen 3 fighting and had near exact teams except 1 Mon. Even setups were near exact. Was very close, coming down to who's medicham beat the others. I luckily had the foresight to preserve mine, whilst he focused on his Heracross. (Thankfully my near death one won the speed tie and 1hk'd it with HP Flying, but went down right after from his Hariama.)
Please make a video about the fighting type! It was very looked down on in generation 7, but I played it a TON and got good results with it. I'd love to see a video about what you think about it in gen 7
I've been like six years playing only bug monotype and I love it, even in VGC format where the lack of legendaries knocks me out
was surprised to see mono electric here, might try this mode out seems like fun
First thanks for covering that format👍
My favorite this Gen would be mono Fire. Nothing like Drought plus V-Create or Flare Blitz spam. Addtionally it helps a lot that Pursuit is removed. Thus Victini and Blacephalon are really good now. Not to mentioned Cinderace is like cheat code with Libero.
Ngl, I didn't know that existed and it actually sounds fun, and is likely the thing that might actually get me to try anything competitive pokemon out, even thought I probably will lose as i'm not very competitive or good at in depth type stuff. As far as pokemon goes that is.
I got to #1 in this format twice. Once with Fairy and once with Ghost.
Youve made a video about my passion this time, Ive made Monotype teams Of every type made to counter each other type + a Mono team for General usage. 19 teams of each type, 18 types, 342 teams for Natdex Monotype alone
mono normal with z conversion porygon z is so much fun
Send em over plz I would love to try them!
@@SamGBSR me too
I used to be addicted to monotype on smogon back in the gen 7 days, and I started to get frustrated with it after a while from trying way too hard to be competitive and wasting hours and hours teambulding "the perfect team(s)" just to still face failure.
Eventually i dropped the sweaty try-hard mentality and just kicked back and did what i thought was fun. Instead of copy and pasting meta strats and picking "s tier types" (that most people were already running) i just played my favorite types with my favorite mons. Ironically, the strategy of fun eventually led me to my highest ladder ranking ever on smogon which was either just shy of 1400 or right at 1400 cant remember. Got that high MOSTLY due to a fighting type team that was close to my heart, with help from a tapu koko focused electric team secondary
this was really cool to learn about a tier I've never thought much about but now i desperately want you to explain how bug and ice do in this tier to me
bug is trash unless you abuse the rare few op ones that get used in ou like volcarona (ive tried without its not fun) and i use the ice type exclusively its fun but being the worst defensive type in the game makes balanced playstyles incredibly difficult so you either need to use hyper offense or do what i do and have some bulk on the team (i use thick fat walrein with full bulk evs as a mixed attacking wall), ninetales alola with aurora veil and try to set up slush rush pokemon like arctozolt and sandlash, weavile is a requirement for any ice team as playing without it or losing it early is a guaranteed loss. generally speaking 95% of ice types are worse than they would be as a mono type w their other typing because ice removes a lot of resistances, turns a lot of weaknesses to 4x and doesnt provide much more offense, and you're basically playing it to feel good about using a gimmick which is why i use it
Hail in national dex monotype with mega abomasnow and alolan ninetails supporting arctovish, arctzolt and alolan sandslash is a lot of fun to use
I'd like to see you do a top 5 worse types too - I'm only a few minutes into yhe video but I'd like to hear you elaborate why Fighting fell off so hard over the past few generations (largely assuming Fairy is part of this)
Urshifu dark good banned before that fighting was strong
YOO THAT SEISMITOAD AT 3:09 ROCKS LOVE MF DOOM
I once was in a FB group where they decided to host a Pokémon league dynamic. They chose a gym leader for each type and the goal was to challenge and beat at least 10 of the leaders so that you could go into the elite 4.
I was in charge of the flying gym and it was one of the hardest earned medals. I had stuff like scarf + retaliate Staraptor for revenge killing, Landorus for the electric immunity, Multiscale + WP Dragonite, Thundurus, Skarmory and I think it was Gliscor. The only thing that made my blood boil was people challenging with mono ice or rock teams, but it was fun as hell.
If I ever go back into showdown, I'll definitely consider going into monotype with a kickass flying mono.
In the past i climbed up the ladder with mono rock: Sandstorm is great and can set up sana rush lycanrock to outspeed a lot of mons. I user storm drain cradily and diamond storm body press diancie. Was very fun and effective i personally suggest to try that.
As i was watching your previous video i thought "id love to see a monotype video from him" and then i saw this. And Then i saw a non-evolved nuzlocke which is another thing ive wanted to see! How was i not already watching your vids
Really, I'm just happy that two of my favorite types, Electric and Dragon, are here.
It's worth mentioning the air balloon for electric, and how common ice is on water pokemon. The former is a very useful item and the latter is a very useful offensive type. At least that's my armchair understanding.
I play every once in a while with Electric and run Magnezone with Air Balloon. It sounds weird, but it's deceptively useful. (that or people suck in low elo but i did beat a ground team almost perfectly)
@@penitente3337 I guess if anything's gonna get it it's the one that's 4x weak
I would have put Ghost as an Honorable mention simply because it's really good at neutral matchups, sure the type struggles quite a bit against Dark and Normal (but it DOMINATES Psychic and Fighting like nobody's business lmao. Using Fighting and seeing a Ghost team facing you is one of the worst feeling in the tier, roughly as bad as say using an Ice team against a Bug team), but it's damn consistent against most neutral match ups simply because Ghost resists are in short supply and Ghost teams have a premiere offensive line up and some more than decent defensive backbone with Corsola, Mimikyu and Aegislash (and Dragapult which has a good defensive type and can take a strong neutral hit in a pinch). Ghost is definitely a pretty solid type
You could probably make a whole video on all the banned monotype Pokémon
Got into monotype because of this video. I've somehow been doing really well with mono fighting national dex.
Would be super cool to see a gen 9 update to this 👀
I played a good bit of monotype and groun is REALLY fun as long as you dont get a grass team, then rillaboom sweeps.
My team is landorus, hippowdon, excadrill, mamoswine, nidoking and seismitoad. The reason i use seismitoad over gastrodon is because its less passive since it has power whip for water types. The whole team hits like a truck especially banded mamoswine (with thick fat to resist ice) its only issue is its lacking speed without sand rush excadrill.
Hey man, love your content! Started playing showdown recently and have been learning a lot of cool stuff from ur vids, even started doing some LC games after watching ur teambuilding guide
As the person who played some Fairy to write the Klefki analysis, I can confirm that Fairy is an insane type.
"All monotypes are good and valid"
Except for rock because rock is..
Now I want to see the top 5 worst types in competitive monotype Pokémon.
As a long-time Flying-type enjoyer, this puts a smile on my face.
I actually run trick room on my mono dragon teams to counter slush rush, and faster dragon type teams. Additionally I run 30 speed IVs to ensure I out speed opposing dragons in trick room.
when both of your favourite pokemon's types and your favourite eeveelution's type makes it in the video:GGs
Bug is underrated but so fun in monotype
When I was involved in showdown I ran mono Normal and distinctly recall a match with a Mono Ghost user where their Gengar ended up Struggling against my Blissey for the win
literally never played monotype in my life ngl
Flying is great. I love bringing rain with lots of hurricane and thunder users.
I used to play a really fun mono poison team on showdown in gen 6, though I haven't really played much pokemon since then tbh. Looking into it, mono poison still looks love it has tons of good options which looks pretty fun
Nathan: *tickles the algorithm*
Freezai: “this is my funnel”
I love monotype, it's a great mix of serious teambuilding in a casual atmosphere. To me, it's the best "use what you want and figure it out" gameplay. Oh, and I play Nat Dex, of course. Seems to me that there's not enough choice to make varied teams with just gen 8.
This video got me trying out Monotype and it’s very fun and less intense on my brain for building a team.
I wouldn’t mind more monotype top 5s or Monotype why Blaziken was banned
Finally, a format I am familiar with
3:00
i’m here to see seismitoad
Great vid! What we REALLY need to know though… what’s the best secondary typing for monotype? As in, what type do you see most often that isn’t the type shared for all 6 mons?
For example, I think flying would definitely be up there again since it has such a high dual type percent and creates a ground immunity (which 5 monotypes are weak to) and there are just good flying types in general… electric is another easy answer simply because the rotom forms are so good lolol (is this question relevant to anything? No… but I think it’s kinda fun and interesting 😊)
Flying is probably the most common secondary type. Ground is very common as coverage, so you're pretty much always going to see a Flying/X mon on every single team.
Yeah, I do agree that flying is really good, but in all honesty I think the best secondary typing is Steel, lots of resistances, immunity to t-spikes, poison moves, and resistance to rocks (unless primary type is weak, in that case it's a neutrality), plus tons of good mons get the type, off the top of my head I can think of Scizor, Heatran, Excadrill, Ferrothorn, Celestela+friends (skarmory, and Corviknigth), Klefki, and Duralodon.
I'd still say that flying is the second best overall secondary type tough, ground immunity is nothing to scoff at.
I’ve made a couple teams where every mon is the same dual type. it’s a challenge for sure, but a fun one.
Monotype has been my favourite OM for years, there's nothing like beating water with fire, not to mention stall practically doesn't exist:)
Haven’t played in a while but mono water with Swift Swim banded Barraskewda was fun, funny enough I had more trouble with mono poison with that team rather than grass
I got recently into Monotype, because I thought this mode was actually really fun to play
Got into 1500 elo today with just an Electric team!
Seeing Electric as top 3 types in Gen 8 Monotype makes complete sense tbh xD
Btw, here is the team, Im so proud of this little boys :')
-Tapu Koko
-Magnezone
-Alolan Raichu
-Rotom Frost
-Regieleki
-Galvantula
Hope everyone enjoys Monotype as much as I do!
Congratulations
I really love how Alolan Raichu just goes completely ham in Monotype.