RBY Ubers / 1P Mewtwo [GP Ready]

Mewtwo
mewtwo.png

Type: Psychic
Stats: 106 | 110 | 90 | 154 | 130


Introduction

Mewtwo is the best Pokemon in RBY 1P, it's really quite that simple. The meta revolves around getting into a position for your own Mewtwo to do work, while at the same time stopping your opponent from getting their own Mewtwo going. There aren't really any Mewtwo "counters", your best bet is either crippling it via status, winning a Mewtwo freeze war, using FlashTwo, or forcing it out with Explosion threats.

Sets

Standard

Mewtwo
- Amnesia
- Recover
- Ice Beam
- Psychic

Set Details

This is the classic Mewtwo set, and the one you should prepare for in general. Ice Beam helps in the Mewtwo ditto, and leaves the loser of the freeze war basically unusable for the rest of the game. Psychic is Mewtwo's STAB and it KO's most Pokémon at 999 Special (which it reaches after 2 Amnesias!)which aren't Psychic-resistant, with the notable exception of completely healthy Snorlax. The loser of the freeze war in a good portion of games, will end up losing the game simply because Mewtwo is the most powerful piece on either side. Psychic also lets Mewtwo attempt to break some of its checks such as paralyzed Light Screen Chansey via Special drops, and turns on which Chansey gets fully paralyzed. Thunderbolt is also a valid option that lets it beat Slowbro which can otherwise go toe to toe with it, although there is opportunity cost both in dropping Psychic and in dropping Ice Beam from your set. If you were to drop Ice Beam, then that prevents you from engaging in a freeze war with other Mewtwo's which is a huge downside - but if you can let a partner, such as Light Screen Chansey, take the freeze, then this set has very few downsides - except, Exeggutor can now consistently force out Mewtwo via the threat of Explosion as it takes little from its attacks. If you were to drop Psychic, then you lose out on being able to beat Light Screen Chansey, and a relatively healthy Snorlax(as opposed to a full health Snorlax when Psychic is run) can now check Mewtwo quite nicely. Thunderbolt and Ice Beam run together, is a sort of compromise, that allows you to beat Slowbro, and Exeggutor while also being able to engage in Freeze wars with Mewtwo, but has the downsides as listed, making it generally weaker and slightly less capable as a cleaner.

Asd Assassin

Mewtwo
- Self-Destruct
- Amnesia
- Psychic
- Thunder Wave

Set Details

This set opts to not use Mewtwo as a win condition, instead it bluffs the standard Amnesia Mewtwo, seeking to paralyze and chip at the opposing Mewtwo before using a surprise Self-Destruct. Mewtwo's Selfdestruct does damage in the range of about 50 to 60%, so you should aim to have weakened the opposing Mewtwo to a point where Self-Destruct, if not KOing the opposing Mewtwo, at least leaves it sufficiently weakened that it's ineffective for the remainder of the match. A few things can do the job of chipping Mewtwo, such as Seismic Toss Chansey, Tauros,Snorlax,Exeggutor, Mew, and Zapdos - some of which can also paralyze Mewtwo with Thunder Wave, Stun Spore, or Body Slam, as well as possibly scaring it with Self-Destruct. By doing this you can avoid engaging in a game-deciding freeze war, and can instead look to set up the game for something else on your team(Surf Slowbro is a particularly good option) by trading Mewtwo on both sides.

Psychic is the main recommended attack because it provides a reliable STAB, as well as helping to bluff the standard set. It is generally superior to Ice Beam since it does not aim to engage in a freeze war, due to its lack of recovery, and Self-Destruct; the ability to get Special falls with Psychic is also far more useful than having a neutral attack when versus a paralyzed Mewtwo. If you can reliably paralyze Mewtwo in another way(for example with the assistance of Pokémon such as Chansey, Slowbro or Exeggutor), then dropping Thunder Wave to run Recover becomes a good option.It helps tohide the presence of Self-Destruct on Mewtwo's set, making it a more effective lure so long as the opposing Mewtwo is pre-paralyzed. The set is named after marcoasd.

HM Slave (Flashtwo / DisasterTwo)

Mewtwo
- Flash
- Amnesia
- Recover
- Psychic

Set Details

This Mewtwo should be held back until opposing Mewtwo is revealed because it specifically is meant as a primary Mewtwo answer, and has a huge advantage in a mirror match. Flashtwo can boost alongside, and then can utilise flash to make it difficult to hit, and hence even more difficult to freeze. It beats standard Mewtwo on PP, and that leaves you with a fully boosted Mewtwo with Psychic that can clean up the opposing team or at least do some damage, whilst negating the effectiveness of the opponent's Mewtwo. This set however still struggles with Slowbro, just like the standard Mewtwo set, so you should have some plan in place for dealing with Slowbro safely without using Mewtwo. Another noteworthy counter is Lutrew, which can consistently take FlashTwo on in a mirror match, if it's not forced to take on something else early on. Exeggutor also becomes a bit more of a pain, because it can just stay in and seek to cripple you with Stun Spore without too much risk, due to the absence of Ice Beam on this Mewtwo'sset, which can put Mewtwo into risky situations where it can be pressured with Pokemon such as Snorlax. This set is sometimes known as DisasterTwo since it was originally thought of by Disaster Area.

Other Options

Seismic Toss could be run over Psychic on the Asd Assassin set; 2 Seismic Tosses plus Self-Destruct KOs Mewtwo, which with the support of paralysis could work effectively, however using it gives away the surprise of the set making it an inferior option. It could also be run over Thunder Wave instead, allowing you to abuse the guarantee'd KO only if you require it, with the set still more heavily focussed on keeping Self-Destruct as a surprise. Barrier is a poorbut notable option; Barrier has more PP than than Ice Beam, so a paralyzed Barrier Mewtwo beats an opposing standard Mewtwo on PP. It also helps protect against being broken by Asd Assassin Mewtwos, Mews, Zapdos, Snorlax, and others. Submission is also another option seen at times, to help get past Chansey, but is generally an inferior option to Psychic which, when boosted by Amnesia can be used to break past Chansey, albeit at a cost of PP, whilst being useful for a number of other reasons. Finally, Counter is noteworthy because of its flexibility, but it's not particularly useful on Mewtwo compared to its other options, however it definitely has validity and a strategy could be built around it.

Checks and Counters

There's a number of ways to take on Mewtwo, some of which are more effective than others. To some extent it depends on what set Mewtwo is running as to what's an effective answer: for example, if Mewtwo isn't running Thunderbolt then Slowbro makes a great answer, alongside your own Mewtwo, but if it it's running Thunderbolt then it's probably not running Psychic and so Light Screen Chansey makes a good answer. You can try and take on Mewtwo with your own Mewtwo first and try to win a freeze war, if you're running standard Mewtwo, and then use something else such as your own Chansey or Slowbro to take it on should you lose it. However there's a number of other means to taking it on; alternative Mewtwo sets such as the Asd Assassin and FlashTwo can be used to either lure and explode on or PP stall Standard Mewtwo, for example. You can endeavor to paralyze it, for example with Mew, Zapdos, or Chansey, and then proceed to pressure it through the use of strong physical attackers such as Snorlax and GGMew, and through the threat of Explosion such as from Exeggutor. Lutrew can be used to effectively have a second Mewtwo, if it is in a fit state to take it on by the time Mewtwo comes out.

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Co-authored with Disaster Area.
 

Ortheore

Emeritus
2 1 3 3 3 1 2 2
Huh, I'd already written a Mewtwo analysis =[

Psychic/Ice Beam is very far from being the best coverage combination imo. I'd actually argue it's one of the weaker options, due to being bad at PP stalling and that your opponent should never ever play out the Mewtwo ditto if they're liable to get frozen. On that note, PsyBolt and BoltBeam should not be buried in set details. PsyBolt is great because it means Mewtwo is literally the only thing capable of walling your Mewtwo, and if you gain some sort of advantage like being paralysed suddenly there's nothing that's able to stall out Mewtwo. BoltBeam is similar, but you get walled by Chansey (not as bad as Bro!) and get to freeze things in exchange. I'd consider both of these options better than PsyBeam

Boom Mewtwo and Barrier seriously need to be swapped. Barrier is one of Mewtwo's best options, giving you a massive advantage in PP stall and shutting down all forms of physical offense. Literally the only things that can stop this strategy are Slowbro, a freeze (but you want to take para anyway) or a healthy Softboiled Mew in conjunction with Mewtwo. By contrast, Boom Mewtwo literally does not gain any advantage, the best it can hope for is a trade, and that's far from guaranteed, so in terms of risk/reward it's a shitty plan. Also TWave is a dead giveaway, that needs to be replaced with Recover.

I think FlashTwo needs to distinguish itself from Barrier Mewtwo, since the sets function very similarly. Maybe mention how Flash is better if a freeze is possible and that Flash also allows other teammates to potentially stall Mewtwo rather than putting everything on your own M2
 
Is Psychic really the best option with Flash? Psychic only does 11-13% to the opposing Mewtwo which can easily recover off and use amnesia to relieve the specfalls. I'd use Flash to assist with a freeze.

And Self Destruct Mewtwo needs a much more artful way of paralysing Mewtwo, Thunder Wave on Mewtwo should immediately set off alarm bells in any player. Maybe you paralyse something else then try to bait the opposing Mewtwo to switch in to T-Wave so they think you've accidentally paralysed their Mewtwo or something.

I don't know if these really constitute separate sets in an analysis, but I think they'd good for an article in Mew's Magazine about offbeat/underrated Mewtwo options with Barrier, Submission etc...
 
first i wanna say that I don't actually play the meta, I've just seen discussion with marco / sunny / lutra / ggyara and it's really interesting but weird seeing these polar opposite viewpoints.

well you beat opposing mewtwo 1v1 on PP with flash (or with barrier) and nothing really wants to switch into a 999 special psychic so you force it to stay in really. I mean its main advantage over barriertwo is that in a 1v1 versus standard mewtwo, there's a much lower chance that you get frozen, so you don't require anything to take freeze beforehand to make it work. It has 16 more PP than standard mewtwo [8 if they use tbolt instead of one of ice beam / psychic] so you should have a few attacking PP left over after it goes down [honestly though once you've PP stalled it you'd probably rather then just switch your mewtwo out and boost it up later since you don't want to waste the PP you will have left just trying to KO the PP-less opponent's mewtwo, thinking about it more... especially since flash means it would be missing its struggles too]

maybe about with the self-destruct mewtwo, recover could have a slash over twave, or even be the first slash. I understand sunny tested it and liked it; you can easily get something else to paralyze mewtwo (I think?) and recover helps you bluff being the standard set for longer.

also I'd like to note that sunny and others have had a lot of success with self-destruct mewtwo, i.e. it works from (their) experience. (I understand his main noob-beating team uses it too)

If you can get your own mewtwo paralyzed then yes stuff like barrier / some of the different standard variants become a whole lot more effective, though I think that all the listed sets work better under the assumption that mewtwo isn't paralyzed. Not to say one or the other is right or wrong, but it's worth noting that that's a clear fundamental difference in assumption that affects how the sets are weighted. It does sound like tbolt versions of the standard two and barriertwo deserve their own slashes [in the former case] / sets [in the latter case] b/c of their unique draws. Also I'd like to note psychic/tbolt mewtwo is walled by exeggutor on paper, and I guess that in practice you can just run light screen chansey + use an egg as well as your other psychic types to relieve specfalls with. Also in a pure mewtwo vs mewtwo 1v1 vs the most common mewtwo sets you're at a huge disadvantage: you HAVE to get it parlayzed really for it to be effective, or otherwise disable their mewtwo. Obviously both are possible but just be clear that when you're using it that should be in your gameplan.
 

Ortheore

Emeritus
2 1 3 3 3 1 2 2
If you can get your own mewtwo paralyzed then yes stuff like barrier / some of the different standard variants become a whole lot more effective, though I think that all the listed sets work better under the assumption that mewtwo isn't paralyzed. Not to say one or the other is right or wrong, but it's worth noting that that's a clear fundamental difference in assumption that affects how the sets are weighted. It does sound like tbolt versions of the standard two and barriertwo deserve their own slashes [in the former case] / sets [in the latter case] b/c of their unique draws. Also I'd like to note psychic/tbolt mewtwo is walled by exeggutor on paper, and I guess that in practice you can just run light screen chansey + use an egg as well as your other psychic types to relieve specfalls with. Also in a pure mewtwo vs mewtwo 1v1 vs the most common mewtwo sets you're at a huge disadvantage: you HAVE to get it parlayzed really for it to be effective, or otherwise disable their mewtwo. Obviously both are possible but just be clear that when you're using it that should be in your gameplan.
I mean generally it's nice to not be paralysed, but the advantages in the Mewtwo ditto are obvious and I think that ditto is of huge importance given how often Mewtwo dittos play out, so overall I consider getting paralysed to be more useful than not taking para, especially since M2 has the bulk to go along with it. I agree that PsyBolt M2 is probably weakest set against opposing M2 due to losing the ability to freeze in exchange for a mere 8 extra PP, but tbh I think freezing is overrated since your opponent should normally have measures to avoid it. Also Egg doesn't wall M2, it has no recovery except Rest and +3 Psychic is a 3HKO.


It's worth noting that there I think there's a clear dichotomy in strategies in ubers, I prefer to focus on winning the M2 stall-war, someone like Marco uses Explosion aggressively, it's basically defense vs offense
 
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Yes. Both are listed in the index and viability rankings, listing them clearly in order of publication on forums, noting the author.

Duplicates of analyses are fine although we prioritise having analyses of pokemon without analyses over new analyses for pokemon that already possess analyses.
 
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