[Guide] [Competitive] Astronite

[Lord Windos]

Astronite is an interesting mon, since it has two subsets of way to have perfect coverage: Ghost/Fight/Psychic and Rock/Ground/Fire with any of its abilities (Technician works best, though). Based on that, one has to decide which coverage set is more optimal for it, their team, and what threats they need to face.

Rock/Ground/Fire deals with the vast majority of weakness that the living meteorite, and all the moves are phenomenal against the vast majority of the current metagame. Earth Power, the most spammable move on this triangle of types, is strong enough to deal with just about anything. It doesn't have the same strength as STAB Ancient Power does, but that move has less PP and is therefore not that optimal for frequent usage. HP Fire is just HP Fire, but it benefits from Sunny Day like all other Fire type moves, so it has some synergy on those team!

Ghost/Fight/Psychic, meanwhile, provides both ample Offensive and Defensive coverage for Astronite as well, but not to the same extant as R/G/F . However, its main STAB, Psyshock, has both STAB and the ability to go straight through Bulky Special Walls, which combos well with HP Fighting to clear out the Steel and Dark types that try to come in to block it. Ominous Wind works well taking care of other Ghost types not named Chainite, and hits just about everything else neutrally that Fight/Psychic can't. Its PP is still worrisome, but since its not it main STAB on this set and only rounds out coverage/provide the rare stat boosts, the users doesn't have to be so conservative with its usage.

This 'mon has a surprising amount of nuance to it, now that I think about it!