Makin' it Rain: UU Rain discussion

[mite b cool]

Why is everyone talking about rain dance now, currently when i log on the ladder about 1/3 of teams i face are rain, whereas a few months ago and heck even in the Gallade/ Honc era i only ever would come up against rain about 1/10 matches. Are people just starting to realize its potential now?

The two things I used to rely on to beat it (and i never really had a solid strategy and my team was never build around countering rain dance) was Technitop + random Priority + lots of switching. Technitop can easily slow down rain dance, with a turn wasted from fake out followed by mach punch on something like Kabutops or Omastar.

Then there was the constant switching, for example sending Poliwrath in on a surf, then going to Registeel on an Grass Knot, than back to Registeel on a Ice beam and go from there. I'm expecting that this is a what of players do to handle rain dance, switching constantly and trying to outpredict the opponent, while keeping a sweeper like CM raikou in the wings until the initial surge was over.

So i'm just thinking: What is the prospect of pairing up spikes with rain dance? setting up spikes early in the match with something like Qwilfish, because when they see a Qwilfish lead the opponent will think you are either setting up RD or spikes, so once you choose one they wont suspect the other, then Setting up rain, going boom and you get a sweeper in for free. Now Gorebyss have a much easier time handling walls like Registeel and specially defensive Venusaur. Just a thought, might test it yet

 

[shrang]

You can't use something that doesn't have a -2 Defense drop?? Let's just look at some of the common UU leads against Qwilfish:

Let's just look at top leads:
Froslass: Taunts Qwilfish, possibly setting up its own Spikes and then Destiny Bonding Qwilfish for the KO (Suicide lead), or just lazily setting up heaps of entry hazards if it's the bulky set, Pain Splitting Qwilfish whenever she needs to. Likely outcome, no Spikes, no Rain.
Uxie: Probably the one that Qwilfish can set up on, so long as it's not TrickScarf.
Ambipom: Fakes Out and Returns Qwilfish to death, likely outcome, no Spikes, no Rain.
Moltres: Leads are usually Scarfed, and would probably only let Qwilfish set up one thing, rain or one layer of Spikes.
Alakazam: Just Psychics Qwilfish to death, if you switch out to a Rain Dancer, Taunt will stop setting up even the first time.

This goes on and on, but seriously, we are going off-topic. We're not here to discuss FlareBlitz's team, but to discuss Rain in general. As I have said before, a good Rain team in the hands of a good player will ALWAYS be deadly. A good any-style team in the hands of a good player will ALWAYS be deadly. I reckon, IF rain is broken, it needs to be something that the average player can abuse and beat decent players with, and obviously, that's not really what's happening.

 

[mite b cool]

Well it doesn't have to be Qwilfish you can set it up with Frosslass and then set up rain later

 

[shrang]

This again begs the question of whether you can afford the time to set up Spikes AND Rain, because if you lose the momentum, it's really hard to get back, especially for a Rain team. Rain is all about momentum. Also, this also raises the question of whether it is Damp Rock (Rain) or Spikes (Froslass) that is making these rain sweepers broken, as clearly, without Spikes, Specs Gorebyss or something like that will never get past Chansey. So, does Spikes or Damp Rock fit the Support Characteristic?? It's a bit of both, but we cannot blame it on Damp Rock alone. Stuff like Cresselia setting up rain doesn't help either. I really think we should see how Rain fares without Cresselia or Froslass or even Raikou, if they are banned.

 

[capefeather]

There's one main problem I have with banning Damp Rock. The thing is that here we are talking about severely nerfing an entire team style. So why are we comparing it to single sweepers? A lot of what's been said can certainly be used to deem a single sweeper broken. Gyarados devastates your team, but you beat it? OK, here are the other five opponents you have to beat. Rain devastates your team, but you beat it? gg.

Maybe FlareBlitz's team is broken. But is banning Damp Rock really the answer? I think you guys might be severely underestimating the effect that a sweeper has on a Rain team just by being there. I've had games where the very existence of Kabutops on the opponent's belt meant gg. But what happens when you ban, say, Kabutops? The other sweepers have no Kabutops to soften the opponent up in the early game, and no Kabutops to clean up in the endgame if the other sweepers go in first. A more "relaxed" Rain team like FlareBlitz's probably just lost a third of their sweeping power. We keep talking about keeping Kabutops outside rain, but what about Rain teams without Kabutops? Just because it doesn't viably exist now, that doesn't mean that it has less of a right to exist than Kabutops does.

 

[Vrolok]

What makes you think Rain will be unusable without Damp Rock? Not every sweeper that can double their Spe and STAB with 1 turn of setup. I certainly wouldn't mind testing it.

 

[Smurf.]

The best UU team > best Rain team, does not equate to an argument that damp rock is UU. I could use yanmega and fail to beat you stallion, would that make it any less BL? Also note that your current team is stall based balance, one of the only playstyles i outlined earlier that could be able to beat rain. I myself did it as well, but i still think it is broken.

 

[FlareBlitz]

Lots of discussion! That's what I like to see.

I'm not here to discuss my team; as Shrang said, that's not really relevant. But I will say that, out of Shrang's list, Qwilfish only ever loses to Froslass, which is arguably broken itself.

I already covered why we ban Damp Rock over rain sweepers. For one, rain sweepers have legitimate uses outside of rain teams; Kabutops makes a great lead, Ludicolo makes a good seeder/annoyer, Omastar is an excellent support Pokemon, etc. If Damp Rock is what makes all these Pokemon broken, then we'd rather ban Damp Rock, not three or four Pokemon. This is the same argument for banning Soul Dew rather than Latias itself.
Your counterargument regarding Gyarados misses the point. Gyarados is only one sweeper, yes, but then, if you stall out 7 turns of rain, you only stalled out ONE rain period. I can easily set up rain 3-4 times in a match, and have done so on numerous occassions. That is why I believe my analogy is applicable.

But honestly, if you guys don't think rain is broken, that's fine. I respect that, and I'd be okay with you voting accordingly. I just want to make sure everyone here understands the experiences and viewpoints of those who do think it's broken.

 

[Synre]

While Rain tends to reward limited prediction making by the Rain team, what it does better than probably any strategy I've ever seen is punish the shit out of people who are making bad predictions, specifically people who are making the most obvious fucking move every turn. Anyone who has ever seen psycho play against a Rain team probably knows what I'm talking about here, but while that example is really extreme, I think a lot of the problem I have with the arguments here is that people really aren't giving countering rain a shot. I'm not sure if people have just sold themselves on failure already and aren't really trying to counter it anymore, both when making the teams or playing the games or what, but it sure sounds like people think Rain is a team full of ubers which is getting pretty ridiculous.

I think it's very telling that with maybe one exception the people complaining about this one aren't the people I consider really skilled players. I don't mean that in a condescending way, but I think a lot of people really need to re-think how they're playing against rain (especially from the team creation stage). I think there's a reasonable argument that it is simply too difficult to play around, but it is a very different argument than "I could play around DD LO Gyarados" like it was made it out to be. Gyarados isn't going to magically lose half its speed and attacking power if it is on the field too long, nor will its switch in be telegraphed by rain set-up. Playing against a rain team, you know pretty much exactly when Kabutops or Ludicolo or whoever is switching in based on the stage of the battle and what is on your side of the field.

Rain teams strategically have a bunch of weaknesses. It is absolutely terrible with the Rain isn't up. Team formation is extremely predictable, to the point you basically know 3-4 members of the team from turn 2. There's exceptions like Flare's team (which, incidentally, has been way under .500 in matches I've watched it in, though I only watch games against other good players). Information is a huge part of Pokemon - when you know a Pokemon's moveset the moment it is sent out, and for the most part your opponents remaining pokemon (so you know what Pokemon you need to keep alive to avoid auto-losing) it is much easier to predict against. Rain also has some big weaknesses in that you know exactly the tempo it is going to try to play by - the lead will basically invariably be a rain set-up, followed by one of the water based sweepers. This is something you can and need to take advantage of. Almost everyone is running an anti-rain set-up lead right now which is a good start, though I think unless you're being super clever you're going to have to face an early game rain. As such, a lot of how people should be playing it is sending something out that punishes the inevitable switch. Having a sub out before rain sweeper 1 helps, but even just killing or greatly weakening the first sweeper on the switch helps a ton. There's really not much your opponent can do to stop this unless they're leading stupid Electrode (who is probably the worst Rain Dancer IMO, since by design he isn't going to be around to Dance a second time), and if they try to keep their set-up mon out to fight whatever you have in protection of their sweepers, they are wasting precious rain turns. Maybe the biggest weakness of rain is the fact its essentially choosing to play down 6-4 at best (sometimes worse for the heavy set-up teams), since those set-up Pokemon aren't going to do anything terrible threatening (Raikou being somewhat of an exception, though it has to neuter itself pretty good to play its role on these teams). Particularly in the middle of the game it is not nearly as impossible to apply offensive pressure as people like to think it is, especially if you can get the rain team to anticipate a switch. It is really difficult (read: impossible, since you have no useful resistances) to play on the defensive with a Rain team - it's basically an instant loss if it ever loses momentum.

Not the least of these weaknesses, by the way, is the fact that everyone mentions Rain sweepers getting a Swords Dance turn one. My experience from my Rain testing has been pretty much right - yes, my opponent usually does something stupid the first turn I have Ludicolo or Kabutops out so I can SD up.

Why the hell do people do that?

Is there anything you can imagine that would possibly make my job easier than basically ensuring I can OHKO anything on your team if I guess right? Rain sweepers are frail across the board. They can't carry sash since SR is almost guaranteed to be up and they need the LO power, and they all have weaknesses to pretty common types. Why the hell would you just let me stat-up? Especially when you had that RD turn to tell you what I'm about to do? If you don't have something that's going to threaten Kabutops/etc. enough that it can't Rain Dance out (especially if it can't OHKO either, obviously) the turn after the Rain Dance (preferably the turn of to hit whoever comes in on the switch), you're doing something horribly wrong

Heh I did beat Flare with his rain team the one time we've played, and seriously guys you don't need Dual Screens or whatever to beat Rain. It's actually not that bad if played correctly, you just need to make smart switches the whole time. I think with my current team I haven't lost to a single rain team AND I've managed to be successful on ladder (top 5 peak, still top 10 I think or close to). Rain is very good, but you're all making it sound like you need to go to extreme lengths to beat it >.<

Just quoting this to agree with it.

If you lead with DD Gatr, you probably run an all out offensive team with one, maybe two (semi) defensive pivots.

Turn 1: You DD as Quilfish sets up Rain.
Turn 2: You DD again while it explodes in your face.

Quoting this (even though it was in response to an equally flawed post) for one reason in particular: Oh look, the Feraligatr user got outplayed! Haven't seen this before in an anti-rain post...

BTW what you outlined is not immediate offensive pressure, I'm referring to e.g Scarf Saur leaf storm/sleep powder. then again Quilfish carries lum, so your only choice is to ohko with leaf storm, take the -2 drop, and watch helplessly as rain is set up.

Kind of ironic on that since on most teams (basically everyone except evidently one specific team) that set-up mon is carrying a rock for the extra three turns... I guess you'd see this more if you win the vote?

I think Smurf. is overstating it when he says you automatically lose. I certainly feel I had a chance to beat FlareBlitz. It's just that, at least with the tactics I used, it's very hard - and I had a lot of rain defense. Perhaps next time I'll give up on early screens to stop his early Spikes, which hopefully would let Venusaur and Milotic switch in more often.

I lost the name on this quote which makes me very sad but I really like the line of logic here.

This is pretty much exactly what I wish I was seeing more of. "Well, I didn't win, but if I had [played better] I could have won."

If Rain really does end up being broken, we'll find out after players are losing consistently to rain even after playing a much better game - the problem comes in when the player who plays the worse game wins. This post pretty much sums up my entire point here - people are playing with teams that are underprepared for rain and/or misplaying their opponents, and then complaining that it is Rain's fault they lost. Rain is certainly a tough strategy to make a comeback against, but I think more than anything it is sometimes a strategy where the first 8 turns decide who wins, one way or another. If people are letting 3 layers of spikes or whatever get set up, rain up, and all of the sweepers are undamaged, then OF COURSE you're going to lose! You just fucked up!

Synre, Heysup, I've beaten most of the people in the top 20 on the leaderboard with my rain team. The same rain team, mind. Multiple times.

I don't want this to sound like a call out post but I would love to know who some of these players are, and logs are nice. These are the type of games that would be relevant to this type of topic (especially if you're actually beating them in rematches when what seems like an awfully gimmicky rain team no longer has the element of surprise) - I really couldn't care less about most of the logs people have posted because a majority of the time one of the players was never in the game.

 

[shrang]

The best UU team > best Rain team, does not equate to an argument that damp rock is UU.

The best Rain team > A lot of other UU teams doesn't equate to it being broken either. As I said before, a good team being used by a good player =/= broken, because it's obvious it's going to be good. What your really need to see is if the average Rain team > the average UU team, and that, is still something we need to find out.

Not the least of these weaknesses, by the way, is the fact that everyone mentions Rain sweepers getting a Swords Dance turn one. My experience from my Rain testing has been pretty much right - yes, my opponent usually does something stupid the first turn I have Ludicolo or Kabutops out so I can SD up.

Just like to expand on this, SD is never going to guarranteed, meaning most of the time, if your opponent is smart, Kabutops will stay 361 Attack. Say you send in Kabutops on my Chansey. Do you: i) Set up SD predicting a switch, only to get Thunder Waved or ii) Predict that I'll stay in and Waterfall Chansey to death, but keeping Kabutops at 361 and then have something like Hitmontop come in and Intimidate you??

 

[FlareBlitz]

Syrne, I don't save logs, but you can ask Mawile, Shut Up Bitch (I have no idea who this is), BL Abuser (same here), Bluewind, Silent Verse, and Psycho. I have consistently beaten all of those players, and they have all been/currently are top 10 on the ladder. And don't worry, I didn't take it as a call-out post. I do take issue with you calling my rain team "gimmicky", although you doing so supports my point more than yours. If a "gimmicky" rain team like mine can get to 1640 CRE, how well would a non-gimmicky team do, I wonder?

Anyway, I've already the addressed the "well just switch around" argument before. See my analogy to Gyarados.

 

[Heysup]

What makes you think Rain will be unusable without Damp Rock? Not every sweeper that can double their Spe and STAB with 1 turn of setup. I certainly wouldn't mind testing it.

So you are saying it is going to be "usable"? If it isn't going to make "that much" of a difference why would we ban it as a way to dampen (pun intended) the power of Rain Dance?

Seriously, I have not heard one valid argument for this.

As for Rain in general: I actually think rain is pretty meh when compared to a well-built offensive team. It's basically a one dimensional, albeit powerful, heavy offensive team.

Rain is just unbelievably predictable. This is one of the most important aspects of a battle when considering a good battler vs another good battler. "Oh he is using Rain, now all I need to do is X/Y/Z until rain is over and sweep him after". You can't really "outplay" anyone with Rain since it is so one dimensional. "Oh he is using Ludicolo now I have a chance to send in Absol or Scarf Venusaur and OHKO one of his Pokmeon and he can't do anything about it". The only actual advantage when considering Rain Dance vs reg offense is that you basically remove the team building aspect from it. However, that's a subjective argument at best.

@ FlareBlitz: Gimmicky doesn't mean "bad". It means "it will surprise you once, and if you lose to it again then -_-"

 

[SJCrew]

but it doesn't work like that when Flareblitz has spikes up and specs gorebyss rapes Chansey

Where's your Rapid Spinner? How'd he get all three layers of Spikes and rain up without you doing anything about it?

Oh, and the damage calc shows me that specs Gorebyss doesn't 2HKO with Hydro Pump even after three layers of Spikes due to Leftovers recovery. She's only one point of sp. att behind Omastar, the strongest special sweeper there is in rain, so that means any rain sweeper relying on special attack gets walled by Chansey. She gets a free T-wave, recovers and you just waste turns of rain.

 

[Ekanselttar]

Oh, and the damage calc shows me that specs Gorebyss doesn't 2HKO with Hydro Pump even after three layers of Spikes due to Leftovers recovery.

Turn on the rain.

@Heysup, you're saying my post (which mentions Kabutops specifically but also applies more genreally) is completely invalid? :S

 

[FlareBlitz]

Heysup, your post is funny. "I haven't seen one argument supporting this! *ignores the last 2 pages*". Really good stuff. Multiple people, including myself, have posted arguments comparing the difference between rain with Damp Rock and rain without it, and why banning Damp Rock is ideal over banning Kabutops, Ludicolo, Qwilfish, etc. You'd have to have tried pretty hard to ignore all that.

SJCrew, your calcs are off. 0/252 Calm Chansey is 2hko by Hydro Pump 100% of the time with a layer of spikes, and 252/252 Calm Chansey is 2hko'd 100% of the time if it lacks protect. With 3 layers of spikes, even Surf 2hkos. Additionally, spinning against a rain team is, 9/10 times, monumentally stupid. You're either giving a sweeper a free turn to set up, or a free switch, or a free opportunity to set up 8 more turns of rain. The sheer offensive pressure of a rain dance team is what makes hazard-stacking so effective.

 

[Heysup]

Heysup, your post is funny. "I haven't seen one argument supporting this! *ignores the last 2 pages*". Really good stuff. Multiple people, including myself, have posted arguments comparing the difference between rain with Damp Rock and rain without it, and why banning Damp Rock is ideal over banning Kabutops, Ludicolo, Qwilfish, etc. You'd have to have tried pretty hard to ignore all that.

Seriously, I have not heard one valid argument for this.

Why is it that whenever someone has something like "lol" or "funny" in their post about a semi-serious topic it is always bad?

Anyway, simply saying "look 3 extra turns is good so omg it is the culprit" is not a valid argument, which is all I've read so far.

EDIT: I think this is amusing, especially since I don't think there happens to be a way to legitimately come up with evidence to back up your claims. This would mean we are nominating Damp Rock on a hunch. Cool.

 

[FlareBlitz]

Oh, right, it's totally not valid, as you made clear in your thorough rebuttal.
Oh. Wait. There was no rebuttal. No mention of my comparisons between damp rock and no damp rock and 2x SR weak pokes and 4x SR weak pokes (and how that limits their sweeping time and, thus, their potential). No mention of the point that rain sweepers can no longer set up (because then they'll have only 1-2 turns to attack), which makes them substantially less threatening.
I also think it's odd that you mention "3 extra turns" in such a derogatory fashion. 3 turns is HUGE. Matches are won and lost on the basis of just one turn, and you think three whole extra turns of double STAB and double speed is insignificant. Right.
Until such time as you see fit to grace us with your thoughts on why the arguments presented thus far as "not valid", I don't see why I should take your opinion seriously.

 

[Synre]

With what he quoted I assume what he meant was "what makes you think rain isn't going to be worthless if we ban damp rock," which no one has really made a case for because it will, in fact, be worthless.

 

[Golden Sun]

With what he quoted I assume what he meant was "what makes you think rain isn't going to be worthless if we ban damp rock," which no one has really made a case for because it will, in fact, be worthless.

If damp Rock does get banned Rain Dnace won't be anywhere near as succesful. Those 3 turns are what makes rain hard to beat but with 5 turns it just isn't good enough

 

[Ekanselttar]

My interpretation is that he's saying we can't prove that five turns of rain won't curbstomp all our teams, despite the fact that we're trying very hard to make the argument that eight turns does. Which is something I and others have addressed.

 

[Stagnant]

We only suspect that Damp Rock is the culprit. Why do I believe so? Simply because I would like to assume that an item 'breaks' rain teams. I would rather ban an item than a Pokemon.

 

[RBG]

What I have yet to see in this topic is something equating to why Damp Rock is broken over Multiple Pokemon that make it instead broken. If banning 3-5 Pokemon suddenly makes rain not as threatening with Damp Rock still legal, then why shouldn't we do that? Please don't try to feed me the "Less bans is better" argument, because the amount of bans should not matter so much, as long as we can reach a "balanced" metagame with the most possible playstyles viable. I have yet to see any of the Damp Rock suspect arguments address this point, something that I would imagine would be a crucial focal point to the argument

 

[franky]

I'll try to join in this discussion, and for your informations, I support this Damp Rock banning. A couple of questions people constantly ask:

Is banning Damp Rock the answer as supposed to banning the sweepers?

Yes it is. Banning the rain dance sweepers, which in my opinion is everyone, would not be the solution. Most of these sweepers are mediocre/good at what they do outside of rain sweeping, and banning them would be unfair. For instance, Kabutops makes a great sweeper, albeit not a broken sweeper. Omastar makes a great Spikes support, albeit not a broken supporter. Banning these potential suspects based on their rain dance performance would be unfair. Just because they are powerful at rain, doesn't mean we should remove them entirely from the tier when they are mediocre/good at best outside their rain dance sweeping role. On the other hand, I've been saying this for a long time now, banning Damp Rock would be a "no harm done" decision. In a sense, Damp Rock full-fills the support characteristic by adding more turns for the sweepers, therefore helping them sweep sufficiently easier. We don't need to remove the sweepers, but instead we weaken or "nerf" Rain Dance. This raises the next question.

Why would banning Damp Rock make it less broken?

Sometimes actions speak louder than words. Tell a friend to whip out a team without Damp Rock and you'll see how much easier it is to handle a Rain Dance team. With five turns on the ticker now, it is much easier to weather the hits with only a few amount of turns (three less is a lot). This means that you'll accumulate less damage in total compared to eight turns. In my opinion, Rain Dance is just a timed offensive team, and without their Speed, most of these sweepers are slow. With five turns on the timer, this makes it more manageable and its only a matter of turns until the sweepers get slower. The need to set up Rain Dance will be more frequent now, therefore it will make it more manageable to stop the set up Pokemon since they will pop up more often now. With Damp Rock, the set up mons often make an appearance only once or twice in a match, making it difficult for the opponent to take down the set up mons.

Why is eight turns of rain so broken?

We all know Rain Dance teams hit hard. Duplicate Speed threatens a portion of the fast sweepers, while the added Water boost applies pressure on the defense Pokemon. Why is this relevant to the question? An average Rain Dance team set up more than once in a game. Assuming Damp Rock is in play, we are talking about 16 turns of Rain on the field (2 times of set up). 16 turns of incredible pressure, taking hits from x1.5 Water-boosted hits, while you can't threaten it back with a fast Pokemon unless you are running a fast Scarfer or using priority to beat it. Basically you are almost forced to run a defensive Pokemon to truly weather the hits for 16 turns. 16 turns is ultimately too much and you will most likely accumulate too much damage from the constant bombarding from the rain sweepers. On the other hand, without Damp Rock, two-set ups is only a "measly" 10 turns. This is six turns sliced down, therefore making it more manageable.

 

[Heysup]

I disagree with your last point Franky, simply because any good battler will do everything he can to STOP Rain from setting up once, never mind twice.

Anyway, thanks for actually outlining why, in your opinion, Damp Rock is the culprit and Pokemon aren't.

I still think it would make more sense to ban the "Broken Pokemon", but as I don't even think Rain is broken itself that would be tough to do.

I think someone should make two teams:

One team with Damp Rock and team without. Then see the difference.

And then they should make two more teams:

One team with Kabutops / other "possibly broken sweeper" and one team without (with Damp Rock on both).

And post logs.

This would really be the only way to understand the true culprit because it isn't obvious. This is where the "suspectless" metagame would help, actually.

 

[SJCrew]

SJCrew, your calcs are off. 0/252 Calm Chansey is 2hko by Hydro Pump 100% of the time with a layer of spikes, and 252/252 Calm Chansey is 2hko'd 100% of the time if it lacks protect.

No, nothing on my end is off, I double checked.

31.8% - 37.6%

On average, you deal about 34%.

I come in on Spikes: 100-25% = 75%
Hit me with specs Hydro Pump in Rain: 75-34% = 41%
Leftovers recovery: 41+6% = 47%

No chance to KO next turn.

If we assumed max every hit: 75-37% = 38%
Leftovers recovery: 38+6% = 44%

No chance to KO next turn.

Here's a screenshot with the calcs.

As far as I can tell, I didn't do anything wrong and my math isn't off. Chansey really does counter every special-based rain sweeper and can either cripple them or the switch-in with Twave.

Additionally, spinning against a rain team is, 9/10 times, monumentally stupid. You're either giving a sweeper a free turn to set up, or a free switch, or a free opportunity to set up 8 more turns of rain. The sheer offensive pressure of a rain dance team is what makes hazard-stacking so effective.

um what

- Froslass dies with one or two layers of Spikes.
- You switch in rain setup.
- I switch in Blastoise while you Rain Dance.
- Rapid Spin while your sweeper comes in.

or

My lead tricks Froslass a Scarf while it's still setting up, switch in Blastoise, and get a free spin.

No spikes. You can't just assume spikes will be up all the time to strengthen your argument, you have to come up with a feasible and applicable instance which you would have them. If you have a spin blocker besides Froslass, you're just wasting another slot and rain momentup making sure your spikes stay up. I can get the spikes out at the beginning of the match without wasting momentum, making it easier to deal with your sweepers.