So, you’ve successfully played the laning phase to your advantage, bullying the enemy laners off neutral Pokémon and giving yourself a level advantage.

Now what do you do with it?

 

Two minutes and thirty seconds into the game, the countdown for two different spawns begins. For top lane, Rotom will spawn, giving you 20 points and instant scoring if you are able to capture and then push it into the enemy goal. While this neutral objective can be a big help, it can also be stopped by the enemy team even after you manage to successfully capture it. For bottom lane, Drednaw will spawn, giving teamwide experience points, and 20 points for the teammate who deals the final blow for them to score. 

These spawns dictate a harsh change in the game state, pushing teams to fight over one of the objectives and begin the team fighting portion of the game.

 

Which objective is more important?

While both neutral objectives give you and your team helpful bonuses, Drednaw is the objective to get. With teamwide experience and points to score, Drednaw is a powerful boon to push your team ahead in the game. When the countdown begins for Drednaw and Rotom, top laners should reset and head bot lane to assist in the team fight around Drednaw. Giving up your top lane goal isn’t usually ideal, but with Drednaw as the trade off it is very much worth it. Here, at three minutes into the game, the first teamfight begins.

 

What is my role in a teamfight?

A good team composition in Pokémon Unite is generally made up of one Pokémon of each role. A Defender, an Attacker, a Speedster, an All-Rounder, and a Support. Each Pokémon has a different role to serve in a teamfight, and it’s critical for success that they accomplish it.

 

Defenders: Defenders have tools to control the flow of the fight. Snorlax’s heavy slam + block combo is a powerful example. You have the highest HP and defenses in the game to tank the most damage. Before a fight breaks out, assess the enemy team comp, and compare it to yours. Does the enemy composition have multiple speedsters to dive your backline? Do they have multiple attackers that need to be hindered? The most important thing is identifying the enemy teams win condition and using your powerful crowd control abilities to prevent it. Do they have a fed Zeraora? Save your Crowd Control to stop them from diving on your attackers. Do they have a stronger backline? Use your CC to get on top of them and enable your Speedsters to eliminate them.

Attackers: Attackers have tools to deal damage at range, and to deal a lot of it. An attacker’s main priority is to survive for as long as possible in a fight to deal continuous damage to the best target that is in range. It’s important you keep your distance to prevent yourself from getting CC’d and bursted down by the enemy team, to enable yourself to deal as much damage as possible. Secondly, around neutral objectives, it is on you to land the final blow and claim it for your team.

Speedsters: Speedsters have mobility and high burst damage to eliminate the enemy Attacker Carries. Save your cooldowns and position yourself close to the enemy backline in bushes to close the distance and eliminate the enemy teams biggest threat before they can get much damage into the teamfight.

All-Rounder: All-Rounders are late game powerhouses that have tools to live longer and deal damage. As a shorter ranged counterpart to the attackers, you have to get into the thick of things to deal damage. Try to eliminate weaker targets first, but don’t overextend for it and lose your life. 

Support: Supports are enablers. While Defenders often will be disabling the enemy teams win condition, it’s the Supports job to identify and enable your win condition. This varies Pokémon to Pokémon, with Eldegoss using healing and shields to enable their carry to commit, while a Pokémon like Wiggly uses Crowd Control and damage to set up their carry to clean up the fight.

 

While most Pokémon won’t have their Unite Moves available on the first Drednaw fight, it’s important to time your Unite Moves and save them for the neutral objective teamfights. Always keep an eye on the clock to know if your Unite Move will get value towards claiming a neutral objective!

 

So I’ve helped my team secure Drednaw. What’s next?

After securing Drednaw, your team can easily push their newfound level advantage and shields to clean up the team fight and eliminate the rest of the enemy team. Score your points in the bot lane goal to destroy it and reset. It’s important that you keep your advantage by clearing out the jungle and spawns. This will secure your level lead and refuse catchup experience to the enemy team. It’s important you do not greed and try to score more points in the Tier 2 goal in the bot lane. This will almost certainly result in losing your life to the fast respawns of the enemy team, meaning you can’t accrue more experience from neutral Pokémon, and you’ve given over experience to the enemy team for free. 

 

What about Rotom?

Rotom is a somewhat unimportant neutral objective, but it’s still necessary to address it here. After the first Drednaw of the game, clear out the neutral Pokémon on the map before attempting to take Rotom. If you try to take Rotom right away after the first Drednaw, the enemy team will have respawned to recontest it, and overall you’ll be losing experience per minute. If the enemy team starts Rotom, you can rotate up while clearing neutral Pokémon with abilities and contest Rotom before the enemy team lands the final blow. An important detail to note is that Rotom keeps its damage permanently, and unlike both Zapdos and Drednaw will not reset its healthbar. Last hitting is less critical with Rotom, as the teamfight itself will yield more experience and points than Rotom, and you can clear it even after the enemy team has claimed it.

 

What’s after the first Drednaw?

Reset, clear neutral Pokémon for more experience, help your team in fights if they occur and defend your tier one bot goal to give yourself an advantage in the next Drednaw fight. Drednaw respawns every two minutes (120 seconds), so watch the clock to be ready at full hp for the next Drednaw fight!

 

Zapdos just spawned and my team is winning!

Zapdos is the most important neutral objective in the game. It gives your team a load of points, and lets your team score instantly. In combination with double points, Zapdos lets teams turn a crushing defeat into an astounding victory. Zapdos spawns at two minutes remaining and removes the other neutral objectives from the game. The teamfight here is the same as the Drednaw fight, with last hitting Zapdos being the most crucial objective. If your team is in the lead, posture around Zapdos, but DO NOT ATTACK ZAPDOS. Zapdos deals high amounts of damage to your team while they are fighting it, and with how short the spawns are, unless you’ve won the fight around the pit directly before attacking Zapdos, the enemy team can always respawn and contest for a steal. Because your team is ahead, it’s best to defend your goals and keep an eye on Zapdos to make sure the enemy team doesn’t start attacking it. You can see Zapdos’ health bar no matter where you are on the map, even while it’s in the fog of war, so you’ll always know if the enemy team attacks it. 

 

My team is losing, and Zapdos spawned! What do I do?

Attempting to take Zapdos is a dangerous task, but because you are losing there is less risk involved. Poke at goals first to see if you can score some points, but if they’re defended, you’ll have to back off and attempt to take Zapdos to turn the game in your favour. Unlike Drednaw, every Pokémon on the team should keep an eye on Zapdos and try to secure that final blow. It’s that important. The enemy team will contest you when you begin to attack it. Use your saved Unite Moves to try to win the teamfight and secure Zapdos for the victory!

 

I got the final blow on Zapdos! My team can now instantly score, but the enemy team is still alive!

If you secure Zapdos and the enemy team is still around and kicking, you have two options. The first is to try to take advantage of the teamwide AOE damage Zapdos will deal to the enemy team to clean up the fight and eliminate them all. This is recommended if they are low and you have the resources to do so, as it will let you score without any hiccups. If the enemy team however would have a chance of eliminating a few of you, use your movement abilities (even going so far as to Eject Button away from them) and just head right to the goals to score. For some Pokémon, such as Gardevoir this is a bit more difficult, but certainly still worth it. It’s likely that you and each of your teammates will have fifty points each, which during double points equates to five-hundred points if everybody scores.

 

Our team lost Zapdos and wants to surrender!

While Zapdos is a huge benefit to whichever team secures it, the game is not over there and then. If your team was ahead and has number advantage, you can work on eliminating any opponents before they can score. Or, if there are enough opponents on their respawn clock, your team can occasionally nullify the Zapdos bonus by making big scores of your own! It's an uphill battle for sure, but there are ways to still win.

 

I’ve won the game!

Congratulations! You’ve successfully won your first game of Pokémon Unite. Continue to climb through the trials and tribulations of ladder to become a Pokémon Unite Master!

-Wicca