[DISCUSSION] Kris' Pokemon Champions Weekly Discussion Blog - Printable Version +- Pokemon Forever (http://pokemonforever.com) +-- Forum: POKéMON (http://pokemonforever.com/Forum-POK%C3%A9MON) +--- Forum: Competitive Pokemon Discussion (http://pokemonforever.com/Forum-Competitive-Pokemon-Discussion) +--- Thread: [DISCUSSION] Kris' Pokemon Champions Weekly Discussion Blog (/Thread-DISCUSSION-Kris-Pokemon-Champions-Weekly-Discussion-Blog)

Kris' Pokemon Champions Weekly Discussion Blog - Kris - Apr 11, 2026 Hello all! I've decided to work on a bit of a weekly writing project discussing current meta changes, my thoughts, and overall any topic I think of for Pokemon Champions! The game launched earlier this week and we have already seen some clear meta directions as the player base eases their way towards the Master Ball tier for this season. I haven't had the chance to get therre just yet as I'm still theorycrafting the team I want to run, so I think that's going to be what I'll discuss in this week's inagural blog post, my dream team for Champions! These blogs are kinda just for me to keep a record of progress, but if you're reading as a guest and wanna jump in on the discussion, then feel free to join the forum and say hi! Meta Snapshot - Week 1 First, let's go over to the ever-trusty Pikalytics website to see what the current top picks seem to be for Champions so far. Numbers are subject to change of course and this might not be a 100% accurate reading due to the default teams, but still let's take a look. To absolutely nobody's surprise, Incineroar is the number one threat currently. Incineroar was practically made for VGC, and its moveset of choice remains as the unshaken mountain it has been since day dot; Fake Out, Parting Shot, Flare Blitz, and any needed Dark-type move like Snarl or Darkest Lariat. Incineroar's Ability Intimidate always puts it in a great advantage from the word go about 90% of the time, so you will be expecting to see it. Shuca or Sitrus Berry are great items for it in this format. Coming in just behind it is the equally unsurprising Sneasler. When it was first introduced in Legends: Arceus, Sneasler did not seem all that promising to a lot of people, but once it came over to Scarlet & Violet, VGC players quickly learned of it's incredible potential for greatness. With its wicked Dire Claw move and the Ability Unburden, Sneasler is making waves in Champions with a standard all-out physical moveset including Close Combat and Fake Out, while running Coaching for support. In this game's limited selection for items, White Herb or Focus Sash are its preferred choices. If we're talking about VGC, we need to mention the support sets keeping Pokemon like Sneasler and Garchomp running, and right now the best supporter appears to be Sinistcha. Effectively, this Pokemon is filling the slot that Amoonguss normally would but with enough tools that make it feel like more than a carbon copy. Sinistcha runs Matcha Gotcha for quick healing, Rage Powder for redirection of attacks, and other support moves depending on the team, mostly Protect and either Trick Room or Taunt. It's item choice safely sits at Leftovers or Sitrus Berry to complement its own healing and its Ability is almost always Hospitality to heal allies on switch in. Whimsicott is unsurprisingly a top choice for a support Pokemon, and I honestly think Pikalytics is underselling its usage. With Prankster giving priority to any of its status moves, Whimsicott will be running Tailwind and Encore almost all the time. You might see some variety with Taunt, Protect, Helping Hand, and some Whimsicott might be running Moonblast. AustinJohnPlays and THATSAplusONE recently collaborated on a video showcasing Endeavor Whimsicott which utilizes the held item Focus Sash, so we might see some rise in usage of that move too. Weather teams built around Rain and Sun are very common as well, the best one of the bunch appears to be cores utilizing Archaludon's Electro Shot move, which is essentially a variant of Solarbeam that is utilized in the Rain. Achaludon's bulk makes it harder to take out than you'd think and it has a decent defensive typing. Commonly you can pair it with Pelipper to help set Rain and to fish for Earthquakes from Garchomp or Excadrill. First Impressions It's a game that's very rough around the edges. I don't really care about the smaller roster or the item pool, in fact that's what makes it enticing for me is that we have hard limitations to need to work around, although common competitive items being omitted is really grinding my gears in some cases, like no Life Orb, Assault Vest, BlackSludge, Choice Band and Specs, a lot of these would be a great addition and help a lot of sets out immensely, I do miss AV Tyranitar for example. Like with the items, I just find some of the Pokemon ommissions to be very confusing. No Amoonguss is especially odd, but some key pre-evolutions being missing also feels odd. But then we get Pokemon that feel completely weird to even mention like... Watchog? Who is using Watchog in VGC and for what reason - I'd like to chat. I think the selection of battle music is awful, and locking Legends: Z-A's tracks behind a paywall is just bad. Adding insult to injury, its not even any of the premiere tracks of that game, so it kind of feels lackluster even with that option. Pokemon has a phenomonal selection of music, and the most we get to choose from is just Trainer Battle themes from the main series games. There is a Randomize option on each game's album which tells me that more music will be added over time, but I really would have just liked a wider selection. At the very least, Vs. Wild Pokemon, Vs. Trainer, and Vs. Gym Leader for each game selection should have been there by default in my opinion. I don't mind the paid choices being a thing, Champions is a free-to-play game after all, but make the free options better. I don't care how good DPPt or BW's Vs. Trainer tracks are, nobody wants to hear it a thousand times. The default Pokemon movesets are not good 90% of the time and the Auto-Team Build function doesn't really help new players out. Auto-Team Build seems to just randomly assign Pokemon and Items to the team witchout real thought, like I used it once and got Quick Claw on my Sneasler instead of on my Tyranitar who would have prefered an item that counters its low speed tier. I think ATB needs some work because new players will likely see this option and think it has made good sets for them. As for the default sets, the absolute worst one I've spotted is Sylveon with Quick Attack and Yawn but I know more exist. This is Pokemon Stadium levels of bad, like Alakazam running Kinesis and Psywave bad. These need a lot more work especially as more Pokemon eventually get added. Kris' Team Of Choice Okay, now let's talk about the team I'm going to run and test out on the ladder. With Weather being everywhere, of course I want in on the action too, but instead of Mega Charizard Y's sun team or the usual Pelipper rain teams, I want to use an archetype I've never run before being Snow. Snow replaced Hail in Legends: Arceus, and instead of dealing chip damage it now provides a defense boost to Ice type Pokemon. This is of particular interest to me for certain Pokemon like Mega Abomasnow who was never quite a good Pokemon historically. I don't think Snow is going to make it into a premiere threat, but that's not going to stop me from trying. While I figure out the full team of six, the main Pokemon I'm definitely bringing are Sinistcha for its incredible support and the ability to set Trick Room for Mega Abomasnow, Ninetales-Alola for obvious support with Aurora Veil, Primarina as an answer to Mega Charizard Y, and Mega Froslass as an alternative sweeper to Mega Abomasnow. I think the last slot might go to either Milotic or Corviknight. These Pokemon aren't particularly hard to get, the reason it has taken me a bit to build the team is just because I wanted to have shiny versions of most of them, gotta flex after all. Abomasnow is my first target, and my game of choice is Legends: Z-A, as I can very easily reset for an Alpha Abomasnow to be shiny. In that same area I can also be lucky enough to get a shiny Snorunt that I might be able to evolve into a Froslass, and those wild spawns each have a chance to become an Alpha variant each reset too. A shiny Machop also spawned in while I was catching Hestia, but I let that one go as I already have a shiny Machamp. Abomasnow came very quickly for me, literally while I typed that last sentence it showed up! I named her Hestia as I'll be naming all my team after Greek myths. That's one down, and I reckon I will just hang around in that zone until I get a preferred shiny Snorunt too. For Primarina, I think the only game I can shiny hunt it in is Scarlet & Violet and I will do so via Eggs, only because my eyes do not appreciate the small Popplio models in the overworld! I am very grateful to Legends: Z-A for having the shiny sparkle play in the overworld like its predecessor Legends game. Scarlet & Violet will have to be the game of choice for Ninetales-Alola as well, I think, which will be another Egg hunt. I really don't like the changes to Eggs in Scarlet & Violet, but I think it is the only way I can get it currently unless I'm missing something. I'm not going to bother with shiny hunting for a Sinistcha because Poltchageist has a small overworld model and my only other option would be Eggs in Scarlet & Violet, something I do not mind skipping out on, lol. I'll run with this team and see how it goes on the ladder and see if it can even get me to Master Ball tier, which of course means that next week I will have a status report to analyze the team's performance as well as my own gameplay. Stick around for next week's blog post where I will talk about any changes to the metagame and what updates Champions itself may have underwent since this week. I'm going to try update this consistently each week, saw some eyes on my Starting Guide from earlier this week which tells me at least a few lurkers are particularly interested in the game, well I'll have you covered no problem. Thanks for reaing my odd little posts, lurkers!