With tournament season in full swing, Pokémon UNITE is continuing to see changes in the meta. Last week Aegislash’s player base collapsed, but with patch 1.4.1.4 fixing some bugs will the phantom sword see a rebound in play rates?
Main picks of top 100 players in the current Pokémon UNITE meta
Other placements include:
C Tier:
- Blissey – 3.5% (+2)
- Gardevoir – 2.88% (-0.62)
- Machamp – 2.5% (+2)
D Tier:
- Garchomp – 2% (+1)
- Mime – 1.5% (+0.5)
- Blastoise – 1.5% (+0.5)
- Mamoswine – 1.5% (+1.5)
- Greninja – 1% (-3)
- Snorlax – 1% (+/-)
- Absol – 1% (+/-)
- Crustle – 1% (+1)
Aegislash, Charizard, Cramorant, Decidueye, Gengar, Ninetails, Sylveon (-1), Trevenant, Tsareena, Zeraora all saw no consistent play among the top 100 players.
Crustle’s comeback
This is the first time Crustle has seen play among the top 100 since Dec. 10, the longest drought of any current character in the game except for Gengar. Crustle had seen most of its play in late October and early November, back during the release of Greedent. This is because the two played similar roles in the meta, serving as speedy and frequent scorers. Unfortunately for Crustle, even after Greedent faced significant nerfs, it was still unable to contend with the squirrel.
The score-based Pokémon UNITE meta
Crustle isn’t the only Pokémon with prominence in the score-based meta that is seeing an increase in play; Talonflame and Wigglytuff also saw notable increases in play. Talonflame is a common jungler in that meta, known for its high mobility. Wigglytuff, with a move that provides a shield and a Unite move that shields all allies, is also great for allowing entire teams to score at the end of a match.
Hoopa’s (almost) here
With a standard-only release at the moment, Hoopa will be showing up in ranked matches in only a couple of days. With its ability to allow teams to quickly travel around the map and summoning allies to team fights through its unite move, there are a lot of ways Hoopa can be used. Based on how the meta is currently changing, players could be preparing with the score-based meta to counteract Hoopa. It sounds obvious but ultimately the best way to limit Hoopa is to start winning the game early, particularly breaking goals quickly to limit the opposing team’s mobility.
