DS Battle 165 / Val [NU] vs. Pyrotoz & EBrailey1 / Be Prepared
Channel: Antar1011
Date: 16/10/2012

Since NU is the lowest of the "official" tiers (I've talked with the upper Smogon staff, and there is NO CHANCE of PU being officially supported EVER), it attracts a decent contingent of players who are interested in trying more "creative" teams. In OU (or especially UU), if your team is well-prepared to take on the 50-or-so Pokemon on the OU (UU) tier list, it'll be extremely rare that you find yourself in a situation where you're NOT prepared to take on a threat. In NU, it's a bit different, and not only because the NU tier list technically consists of all Pokemon that aren't Ubers, OU, UU or RU or BLx (unless you consult MY tier lists, which include PU). While the number of Pokemon used in at least 3.41% of NU battles (the NU-PU cutoff) is roughly the same as the number of Pokemon used in at least 3.41% of OU battles (57 vs. 54), the number of Pokemon used in at least ONE PERCENT of NU battles is FAR GREATER than the number used in at least 1% of OU battles (142 vs. 103 vs. 85 in UU and RU). Another way to say this is that NU is less "centralized" than the other tiers.

The takeaway message from all this is that it's REALLY HARD to have a team that deals well with all possible viable threats in NU and below. Rampardos, for example, dropped down to PU this past update cycle, so when I saw it, I wasn't really thinking of it as this great threat. Had I taken it a bit more seriously, the first battle might have gone a bit differently.

Link to my first opponent's channel: http://www.youtube.com/pyrotoz
Link to his version of the battle: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hOTMMvsYo4

Link to my second opponent's channel: http://www.youtube.com/EBrailey1

The back sprite used in this battle was done by luckygirl88 of DeviantArt: http://luckygirl88.deviantart.com/art/Pokemon-BW-Misty-Sprite-Sheet-268364830 She has a Youtube channel as well: http://www.youtube.com/user/GaarasIchibi88