Mega-Altaria Analysis:
![[Image: Mega_Altaria.png]](http://www.pokemonrubysapphire.com/_ui/img/_en/august/art/Mega_Altaria.png)
Too many Options….
Typing: Dragon/Fairy
Imune: Dragon
Resists: Electric, Dark, Fire, Grass, Water, Bug, Fighting
Weak: Ice, Steel, Poison, Fairy
Altaria somewhat managed to get very little out of its new typing losing its ground imunity and rock weakness to pick up resistances to electric and dark, immunity to dragon and weaknesses to poison and steel. It also halved its ice weakness but it’s still a glaring issue for the flying fluffball. With both steel and poison types getting potentially more usage in ORAS with mega beedrill, mega metagross and mega steelix. However mega altaria now enjoys obliterating its fellow dragons with its immunity to dragon type attacks and access to a pixilated hyper voice.
Stats:
HP – 75
Attack - 110
Defence - 110
Special Attack - 110
Special Defence - 105
Speed - 80
Somewhat underwhelming for a mega on the stats front not enough speed to become a significant threat without dragon dance/agility. That said none of the stats are bad and this means Altaria does get options. The result, your unpredictable prior to using the set up move the stats will force you to carry or leave at risk of making you average. This means altaria can catch people off guard as they won't know its role on your team unless you team select makes it obvious.
Move Pool:
Agility: inferior version of dragon dance
Cotton Guard: a +3 def boost, the first of mega Altarias set up moves setting up for a scary strong physical wall.
Dazzling Gleam: Multi target fairy move, vastly inferior to pixilated hyper voice.
Draco meteor: 1 of the strongest nukes in the game you just lack the special attack to make full use of its 1 shot mechanics still could surprise a physical wall etc if the rest of your set is physical.
Dragon Claw: Reliable dragon type physical stab not much more to say here.
Dragon dance: the next set up move boosting speed and attack it turn altaria into a very fast and very deadly physical attacker.
Dragon pulse: reliable dragon type special stab.
Earthquake: yes the flying fluffball can cause earthquakes no idea how XD But excellent at scaring off steel types, as well as giving poison types and electric types issues a great move to pull on the counter people will bring in.
Facade: fairy type stab damage due to pixilate not affected by burn and even benefits from it. Coupled with fairies good coverage and it’s a very powerful option.
Fire blast: Fire type coverage nice for scaring off steel types, hitting grass/poison and ice types hard as well. Powerful but inaccurate
Flamethrower: Fire type coverage nice for scaring off steel types, hitting grass/poison and ice types hard as well. Less power more accuracy.
Return/frustration: Same move just depends in you like happy or unhappy Altarias but making your Altaria want to kill you is a bad idea so I recommend return and making your altaria love you. Fairy type physical stab thanks to pixilate very strong options if you don't fear burns reducing your power.
Haze: Stat reset for all pokemon since you want to boost your stats running this is a bad idea for several Mega Altaria sets.
Heal bell: for party support or for healing your own status.
Heat Wave: Fire type coverage nice for scaring off steel types, hitting grass/poison and ice types hard as well, your fire move of choice for doubles. :D
Hyper voice: 90 base power boosted 30% by pixilate then you get your fairy stab for another 50% extra power it’s a fairy type aoe hyper beam that you don't need to recharge. In other words it’s awesome.
Ice beam: Bit irrelevant when you have access to stab fairy type moves but still a solid option.
Moonblast: your strongest single target fairy type move other than pixilated hyper beam. Not really worth taking over hyper voice only + side is it’s not dependent on the ability which could be negated by simple beam etc.
Outrage: Strong but locks you into a move that can do no damage to fairies.
Protect: its protect....
Refresh: cures your status conditions if you want to be selfish and want more pp than heal bell can give you.
Roar: Forces the foe out nice on hazards teams.
Roost: sustain with decent pp and few downsides.
Substitute: protects from status and gives you a protected turn to set up.
Tailwind: doubles speed of your team for 5 turns its nice for a support build.
Round: used after your teammate this could be insanely deadly with pixilate boost but otherwise worse than hyper voice.
Safeguard: protects party from status useful on support builds can be paired up with swagger but not recommended.
Swagger: +2 att boost for target but confuses them can be used on a safeguarded teammates to still get the + 2 att boost but not take the confusion.
Wonder Room: could turn altaria's monster boosted def into a crazy spec def but limited use and not really worth a move slot.
Builds:
Dragon Dance:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Return/ Facade
- Dragon Claw/ Outrage/ Protect
- Earthquake/ Protect/ Roost
The Dragon dance set, not much to say on this set really get set up start sweeping might be good but I just end up seeing this set up as an inferior version of what mega salamance can do will have to wait to see exactly how well they both will do who knows the reduction in ice weakness may mean that Altaria does better solely due to all the ice spam to stop mence. I’m just doubtful this set will be worth the mega slot however it should be viable it’s just surpassed by others in my opinion. Still probably the strongest set up fairy type sweeper except maybe Mega mawille (situational since mawilles so slow).
Cotton wall:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD
Calm/Careful Nature
- Cotton Guard
- Return/ Facade/ Hyper Voice
- Dragon Claw/ Dragon Pulse/ Protect / Heat Wave/ Earthquake
- Roost/ Protect
My personal favourite build cotton guard means that after 1 turn your defence is now sky high in addition this this you can go for either a physical set or a special set keeping you a bit unpredictable. With either a pixilate boosted return/facade or a pixilate boosted hyper voice for fairy type stab it’s no pushover on the offensive front either. Coupled with a 2nd move of the trainer’s choice, I like to go with the dragon stab but heat wave deserves a mention in doubles as well as earthquake. Finally Roost and/or protect give sustain to Altaria allowing for some scary staying power and hopefully mean you’ll be around long after your opponent bites the dust. You can even turn this set over to be mixed by sacrificing speed with your nature. Defiantly a set to be aware of even if you don’t want to run it yourself as there are not many pokemon that are popular with cotton guard so a drastic def raise may catch people off guard when they were expecting a dragon dancer etc.
Party Support:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 160 Def / 96 SpD
Bold Nature
- Tailwind
- Hyper Voice
- Heal Bell
- Roost/ Protect
After looking through altaria’s move pool this build just jumped at me the stats are more your choice with this build I prefer tankier but you could equally go more offensive. Tailwind is really the only essential move on this set for the huge speed boost to the team the other moves can be entirely your preference ranging from physical attacking sets with return and earthquake to full team support sets like my above set can even run. Heal bell cleanses team members status but safeguard could be used to protect from status as well. Round has potential on this set as well to team up in double/triple battles for scary damage with the pixilate boost. Overall I like this set a lot but has to compete with mega audino for team support but with the tailwind I think Altaria hold her place as a great offensive support option to your other team members.
The next 2 builds are almost identical and are really just run of the mill tanky sweeper sets so I’ll cover them both together after them.
Bulky Special:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
- Hyper Voice
- Heat Wave
- Dragon Pulse
- Roost/ Protect
Bulky Physical:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Return/ Facade
- Dragon Claw/ Outrage
- Earthquake
- Roost/ Protect
Cookie cutter builds at their finest take 3 offensive moves a huge boost to your chosen attack style and hp in evs and nature and start causing problems. The attacks depend on your team and format you’re playing in but in general your looking to cover as many bases as possible and use your natural bulk coupled with roost/protect to mitigate damage. Simple but effective and the existence of these sets are what’s likely to give other sets more surprize factor.
Team options:
Ermm a lot… like simply put as long as you bring a team that suits your altaria build and covers its weaknesses well altaria’s one of those megas that will work well in almost any team.
Overall:
Mega Altaria on paper looks a bit weak compared to other mega’s however its strength literally comes from its options no two mega Atarias will be the same and this makes trying to plan against one very hard I mean look at greninja and how much people struggle planning how to counter him in the end bringing several counters. Altaria won’t draw the attention as much so you might get several surprises on people. I doubles the tailwind set will create the possibility for a team to simply win with the wind on their backs with ease as speed is so powerful in deciding battles. Either way while most will see her as the ultimate dragon slayer with a pixilate boosted hypervoice/return and immunity to dragon type moves I urge you to see altaria as one of the most varied megas to date who will be a dragon slayer on any of her sets. Just watch out for super effective hits especially from greninja who can carry both ice and poison now (really game freak who thought giving him gunk shot was a good idea...). In the end i just wish mega Altaria had access to calm mind as this would turn Altaria from an average mega into something very very scary as it suits both defense and offense and altaria can be good at both ohh well i can hope it comes in ORAS but i doubt it.
Either way enjoy the first dragon fairy type and i hope mega Altaria gets plenty of play.
If you guys want calculations please state what matchups you want to see and for what builds seeing how there were so many options i avoided doing calcs this time but i'm prepared to add them if people want them.
Check out my other analysis threads if you liked this one: Mega Gallade Analysis, Mega Pidgeot Analysis, Mega Lopunny Analysis
Too many Options….
Typing: Dragon/Fairy
Imune: Dragon
Resists: Electric, Dark, Fire, Grass, Water, Bug, Fighting
Weak: Ice, Steel, Poison, Fairy
Altaria somewhat managed to get very little out of its new typing losing its ground imunity and rock weakness to pick up resistances to electric and dark, immunity to dragon and weaknesses to poison and steel. It also halved its ice weakness but it’s still a glaring issue for the flying fluffball. With both steel and poison types getting potentially more usage in ORAS with mega beedrill, mega metagross and mega steelix. However mega altaria now enjoys obliterating its fellow dragons with its immunity to dragon type attacks and access to a pixilated hyper voice.
Stats:
HP – 75
Attack - 110
Defence - 110
Special Attack - 110
Special Defence - 105
Speed - 80
Somewhat underwhelming for a mega on the stats front not enough speed to become a significant threat without dragon dance/agility. That said none of the stats are bad and this means Altaria does get options. The result, your unpredictable prior to using the set up move the stats will force you to carry or leave at risk of making you average. This means altaria can catch people off guard as they won't know its role on your team unless you team select makes it obvious.
Move Pool:
Agility: inferior version of dragon dance
Cotton Guard: a +3 def boost, the first of mega Altarias set up moves setting up for a scary strong physical wall.
Dazzling Gleam: Multi target fairy move, vastly inferior to pixilated hyper voice.
Draco meteor: 1 of the strongest nukes in the game you just lack the special attack to make full use of its 1 shot mechanics still could surprise a physical wall etc if the rest of your set is physical.
Dragon Claw: Reliable dragon type physical stab not much more to say here.
Dragon dance: the next set up move boosting speed and attack it turn altaria into a very fast and very deadly physical attacker.
Dragon pulse: reliable dragon type special stab.
Earthquake: yes the flying fluffball can cause earthquakes no idea how XD But excellent at scaring off steel types, as well as giving poison types and electric types issues a great move to pull on the counter people will bring in.
Facade: fairy type stab damage due to pixilate not affected by burn and even benefits from it. Coupled with fairies good coverage and it’s a very powerful option.
Fire blast: Fire type coverage nice for scaring off steel types, hitting grass/poison and ice types hard as well. Powerful but inaccurate
Flamethrower: Fire type coverage nice for scaring off steel types, hitting grass/poison and ice types hard as well. Less power more accuracy.
Return/frustration: Same move just depends in you like happy or unhappy Altarias but making your Altaria want to kill you is a bad idea so I recommend return and making your altaria love you. Fairy type physical stab thanks to pixilate very strong options if you don't fear burns reducing your power.
Haze: Stat reset for all pokemon since you want to boost your stats running this is a bad idea for several Mega Altaria sets.
Heal bell: for party support or for healing your own status.
Heat Wave: Fire type coverage nice for scaring off steel types, hitting grass/poison and ice types hard as well, your fire move of choice for doubles. :D
Hyper voice: 90 base power boosted 30% by pixilate then you get your fairy stab for another 50% extra power it’s a fairy type aoe hyper beam that you don't need to recharge. In other words it’s awesome.
Ice beam: Bit irrelevant when you have access to stab fairy type moves but still a solid option.
Moonblast: your strongest single target fairy type move other than pixilated hyper beam. Not really worth taking over hyper voice only + side is it’s not dependent on the ability which could be negated by simple beam etc.
Outrage: Strong but locks you into a move that can do no damage to fairies.
Protect: its protect....
Refresh: cures your status conditions if you want to be selfish and want more pp than heal bell can give you.
Roar: Forces the foe out nice on hazards teams.
Roost: sustain with decent pp and few downsides.
Substitute: protects from status and gives you a protected turn to set up.
Tailwind: doubles speed of your team for 5 turns its nice for a support build.
Round: used after your teammate this could be insanely deadly with pixilate boost but otherwise worse than hyper voice.
Safeguard: protects party from status useful on support builds can be paired up with swagger but not recommended.
Swagger: +2 att boost for target but confuses them can be used on a safeguarded teammates to still get the + 2 att boost but not take the confusion.
Wonder Room: could turn altaria's monster boosted def into a crazy spec def but limited use and not really worth a move slot.
Builds:
Dragon Dance:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Return/ Facade
- Dragon Claw/ Outrage/ Protect
- Earthquake/ Protect/ Roost
The Dragon dance set, not much to say on this set really get set up start sweeping might be good but I just end up seeing this set up as an inferior version of what mega salamance can do will have to wait to see exactly how well they both will do who knows the reduction in ice weakness may mean that Altaria does better solely due to all the ice spam to stop mence. I’m just doubtful this set will be worth the mega slot however it should be viable it’s just surpassed by others in my opinion. Still probably the strongest set up fairy type sweeper except maybe Mega mawille (situational since mawilles so slow).
Cotton wall:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD
Calm/Careful Nature
- Cotton Guard
- Return/ Facade/ Hyper Voice
- Dragon Claw/ Dragon Pulse/ Protect / Heat Wave/ Earthquake
- Roost/ Protect
My personal favourite build cotton guard means that after 1 turn your defence is now sky high in addition this this you can go for either a physical set or a special set keeping you a bit unpredictable. With either a pixilate boosted return/facade or a pixilate boosted hyper voice for fairy type stab it’s no pushover on the offensive front either. Coupled with a 2nd move of the trainer’s choice, I like to go with the dragon stab but heat wave deserves a mention in doubles as well as earthquake. Finally Roost and/or protect give sustain to Altaria allowing for some scary staying power and hopefully mean you’ll be around long after your opponent bites the dust. You can even turn this set over to be mixed by sacrificing speed with your nature. Defiantly a set to be aware of even if you don’t want to run it yourself as there are not many pokemon that are popular with cotton guard so a drastic def raise may catch people off guard when they were expecting a dragon dancer etc.
Party Support:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 160 Def / 96 SpD
Bold Nature
- Tailwind
- Hyper Voice
- Heal Bell
- Roost/ Protect
After looking through altaria’s move pool this build just jumped at me the stats are more your choice with this build I prefer tankier but you could equally go more offensive. Tailwind is really the only essential move on this set for the huge speed boost to the team the other moves can be entirely your preference ranging from physical attacking sets with return and earthquake to full team support sets like my above set can even run. Heal bell cleanses team members status but safeguard could be used to protect from status as well. Round has potential on this set as well to team up in double/triple battles for scary damage with the pixilate boost. Overall I like this set a lot but has to compete with mega audino for team support but with the tailwind I think Altaria hold her place as a great offensive support option to your other team members.
The next 2 builds are almost identical and are really just run of the mill tanky sweeper sets so I’ll cover them both together after them.
Bulky Special:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
- Hyper Voice
- Heat Wave
- Dragon Pulse
- Roost/ Protect
Bulky Physical:
Altaria-Mega @ Altarite
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Return/ Facade
- Dragon Claw/ Outrage
- Earthquake
- Roost/ Protect
Cookie cutter builds at their finest take 3 offensive moves a huge boost to your chosen attack style and hp in evs and nature and start causing problems. The attacks depend on your team and format you’re playing in but in general your looking to cover as many bases as possible and use your natural bulk coupled with roost/protect to mitigate damage. Simple but effective and the existence of these sets are what’s likely to give other sets more surprize factor.
Team options:
Ermm a lot… like simply put as long as you bring a team that suits your altaria build and covers its weaknesses well altaria’s one of those megas that will work well in almost any team.
Overall:
Mega Altaria on paper looks a bit weak compared to other mega’s however its strength literally comes from its options no two mega Atarias will be the same and this makes trying to plan against one very hard I mean look at greninja and how much people struggle planning how to counter him in the end bringing several counters. Altaria won’t draw the attention as much so you might get several surprises on people. I doubles the tailwind set will create the possibility for a team to simply win with the wind on their backs with ease as speed is so powerful in deciding battles. Either way while most will see her as the ultimate dragon slayer with a pixilate boosted hypervoice/return and immunity to dragon type moves I urge you to see altaria as one of the most varied megas to date who will be a dragon slayer on any of her sets. Just watch out for super effective hits especially from greninja who can carry both ice and poison now (really game freak who thought giving him gunk shot was a good idea...). In the end i just wish mega Altaria had access to calm mind as this would turn Altaria from an average mega into something very very scary as it suits both defense and offense and altaria can be good at both ohh well i can hope it comes in ORAS but i doubt it.
Either way enjoy the first dragon fairy type and i hope mega Altaria gets plenty of play.
If you guys want calculations please state what matchups you want to see and for what builds seeing how there were so many options i avoided doing calcs this time but i'm prepared to add them if people want them.
Check out my other analysis threads if you liked this one: Mega Gallade Analysis, Mega Pidgeot Analysis, Mega Lopunny Analysis
