by Doc – Owner, Founder, Wonders if Gyarados Crunch Could Stifle Mewtwo
Mewtwo was just released in Pokémon Legends Z-A and its Mega Evolutions came with it. As to whether its Mega Evolutions are viable… I don’t know yet, and the meta will have to figure it out in the upcoming Ubers “230” tournament on Saturday where all base game Pokemon including legendaries are legal, and the Mega Dimensions DLC has not released but Diancie and Mewtwo are out. It is that upcoming tournament’s ruleset which is the source of this post.
You can join the Legends: Z-A Competitive 1v1 server here.
It has seemed to me as the Legends Z-A meta has developed that there are fundamentally a few archetypes to plan around. The first one was the Infestation archetype, which has thankfully been banned, and the second one being the stall archetype, which is heavily assisted by the courageous and clever fighting game trope of “run away, nerd”. The third archetype is the BoltBeam user, whose purpose is to pack a moveset of such a wide variety of types that it can hit nearly any opponent super effectively. Clefable, Gallade, and many, many other Pokémon fit into this mold, especially Gyarados with his access to Ice Fang and the extremely potent Crunch.
(And for purposes of this Ubers tournament, there is a fourth archetype – the legendaries, who will most likely play a very significant role, especially Zygarde, who uniquely annihilates Skarmory with Thousand Arrows, rendering the bird practically untenable should the opponent have a Zygarde. But I digress.)
Of course, many Pokémon don’t fit into an archetype, such as Skarmory, Garchomp, Ampharos, and Chandelure. These Pokémon are the centralizing archetype, around which the rest of the meta has developed, and so around which the other archetypes are created. They don’t really fit into anything else besides that they’re all good Pokemon.
Mewtwo is, weirdly enough, both a legendary and a likely BoltBeam user. His stats are phenomenal, and maybe a contender for the most useful stats in the meta. His moveset is what I once heard referred to as “four move slot syndrome”, where he has any number of useful toys that he would like to run but simply can’t run them all. Mewtwo is super effective against, well, everything. He’s even super effective against himself, thanks to packing Shadow Ball.
So although there likely will not be another Ubers 230 tournament ever again, I consider it likely that for the one that will occur this weekend, Mewtwo will be chief of the BoltBeam archetype.
If one does not wish to pack Mega Mewtwo, that’s not surprising – a 50% boost to his special attack through something like Assault Vest, paired with a Calm Mind, renders him practically unkillable on the special side. One would need a physical Dark, Ghost or Bug type attack to take him down a peg or face the consequences. Gyarados Crunch comes to mind as a solution to this.
Alternatively, failing the usefulness of Assault Vest, it’s conceivable to see that a Shell Bell Mewtwo could have similar snowball ability. While Shell Bell does not restore a ton of HP, it is certainly helpful when, after one Calm Mind, you can likely take out an opponent’s entire HP bar in one shot. Given the presence of legendaries, Mewtwo packing:
- Calm Mind
- Ice Beam
- Shadow Ball (for the other Mewtwo)
- Psychic
…could threaten basically everyone else on the field who is a legendary. Yes, Xerneas and Diancie are not threatened in typing by this moveset, but they will still be threatened by superior power.
The exact optimal moveset will of course need to be tinkered with and figured out in future Ubers 230 tournaments, should they ever occur, but the point stands: Mewtwo is most likely the best BoltBeam user in the current state of things. He’s just got it all, if he wants it.
That’s not to say that he doesn’t have counter options. He can’t hit Skarmory for super effective damage given this moveset, and no moveset can plan for everyone, especially given the new addition of the existing legendaries into the game. Still, type effectiveness matters less when extreme raw power is available.
Amiibo Doctor 