Trying to climb to Master Rank in Pokemon Unite is a much more cumbersome task than you might assume, especially if you're unfamiliar with the concept of climbing the rankings in a MOBA or dealing with the constant new character additions. You can bash your head against the wall that is Master Rank all you want, but it's entirely up to luck if you'll make it. Sure, having a lot of skill can increase your chances slightly, and that's why we've come up with some tips.
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This is all we can offer to help lessen the workload just a bit of cleaning up after your AFK allies and solo-carrying your team, so let’s go over some of them now.
Call Your Lane & Expect It To Be Ignored
In Ranked, you’ll (sadly) have to constantly deal with teammates who try and steal jungle Pokemon from the central laner, ignore bottom so that three people can go top lane, or a wide variety of other ill-advised choices. So, one of the biggest tips we can give you for solo-queuing is to have adaptability, versatility, and patience.
Call your lane on the character select screen, and even use the Quick Chat option to re-call your lane a few times too. But, even with all that, you should still be ready to adjust on the fly if your teammates just decide to ignore your call.
Increase Your Playable Character Pool
Speaking of adaptability, that also applies to the characters you play. If you’re someone who’s trying to get to the higher tiers of Pokemon Unite’s ranking system, but you only play one character, you're standing in your own way. You need to be able to adjust your character picks based on what the rest of your team is like. Unite has 5 roles to pick from, and you should at least be able to play 1-2 characters in each role. A decent pool of playable roles should look like this:
- 2 Playable Attackers: A basic attack heavy one and a move-based one
- 1 Reliable Defender: Snorlax preferably, but any of them work.
- 1 to 2 All-Rounder's: Any work, but save Charizard and Garchomp for teams you can trust to babysit you until your final evolution.
- 1 Speedster: Absol and Gengar are the safest options but any of them work. This is not a "required" role for a well-built team but it's still very useful.
- 1 to 2 Supporters: One is fine, but if you can play both a healing-based one like Eldegoss/Blissey and a CC one like Wigglytuff/Mr. Mime, you're a hero.
You don't have to play them all as well as your main, but if you're not able to fill as a solo-queuer, you're going to have a real rough time. If Unite ever implements a League of Legends-style ARAM mode, this could easily fix a lot of player's low pool of playable characters.
Let Your Support Get Early Farm
Now, this next tip isn’t always necessary depending on how useful your lane partner is, but level 4 for Supporters is a big milestone. This is the level where Eldegoss can start really healing teammates (Blissey can at level 3), where Mr. Mime can use its absurdly powerful Confusion + Barrier combo, and where Jigglypuff/Wigglytuff starts using Sign or Roll Out to lock opponents down. Meanwhile, most carry characters don’t get their first real move until around level 5-8 (though some do get it at 4).
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So, your support is going to (more often than not) let you get the first couple of Aipom to get to level 3 quickly, and then it's up to you to make sure they get the last hit on at least 1 or 2 of the Audino to set yourself up for a well-built early game.
Always Score Points When Possible
Once you start getting to the higher ranks (Veteran and higher), you might start noticing that the opponents are sneaking small goals often rather than waiting until the lane is cleared to score 20 or more at once. Well, there are a couple of reasons for this that might convince you to start doing it too, such as:
- You heal and gain EXP from scoring.
- It's almost impossible to stop someone from scoring five points or less, and this is even more true if they're using Score Shield.
- You're invincible during the entire scoring animation.
Basically, the recommendation is that you try and score whenever possible instead of saving up, as there's really no downside to it until the last two minutes of the game.
Sadly, You'll Need To Leave Some Players Behind
This next tip might sound heartless, but it’s something you'll have to come to terms with pretty early on in Unite's Ranking system. Pokemon Unite is a MOBA, sure, but it has the Pokemon IP tied to it, meaning most of the playerbase is made up of children who love Pokemon but don't have a full grasp of MOBAs or MOBA fanatics who have 5+ years of experience with the genre.
So, there's going to be a lot of games where you'll get a 12-year old playing Pikachu who keeps diving the enemy team 1v3, and this will only become more prevalent once the game comes out on mobile in September. What we're trying to say is that there will be times where you just have to leave them to their fate of getting KO'd over and over to focus on your own farming. It might sound evil or too "tryhard," but it's sort of mandatory in Ranked games.
Always Rotate For Drednaw
The first Drednaw spawn in a standard Unite Match matters almost as much as Zapdos does. It's at least the only other Jungle spawn that even comes close. That’s why, if possible, teams should always rotate for Drednaw to make sure they get the first one.
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Why does this matter so much? Well, when defeated, Dreadnaw gives the entire team some points, some EXP, and a big shield. These rewards propel the team who killed it above their opponents, creating a gap between the two teams in terms of power. This gap can be closed, but it takes a lot of work from the team who didn't get Drednaw, so that's why we always recommend rotating for it.
Watch The Minimap & Help Your Jungler
If there’s one thing we keep seeing people unintentionally doing, it’s accidentally ruining their jungler's gank without realizing it by pushing the enemies back before the jungler even reaches their lane. That same logic applies to junglers as well. We see so many junglers just "walk into lane" for a gank like the enemy isn’t going to back up or anything, which they always do. So, the best strategy is, understandably, two-part:
- For Laners: always set up the gank for your approaching jungler as much as you can, let the enemies chase you a bit and overextend, etc…
- For Junglers: make sure you actually come in to gank if you enter top or bottom lane, don't just go there to steal an Audino/Aipom.
Always Go For Performance Points
Ranked in Pokemon Unite can be crushing, but it does have a bit of cushion in the form of Performance Points or "PP." Each Rank (outside of Master Rank, surprisingly) in Unite has a certain amount of PP that, once obtained, gives you one of those diamond-shaped pips toward the next rank for free.
This free pip has saved players from de-ranking or let them rank up early many times already, making it a very valuable resource. Each rank has a minimum number of points required to obtain this free diamond pip, ranging from 80 to 400, but, how exactly do you earn these Performance Points? Well, in a Ranked Unite Match you'll obtain them from:
- Scoring a total of 50-99 Aeos Energy Points = 5 PP
- 100-199 Aeos Energy Points = 10 PP
- 200+ Aeos Energy Points = 15 PP
- Keeping a “Win-Streak Bonus" going = 10 PP
- Getting the Sportsmanship Medal = 10 PP
- Participating in the game (That is, not AFK'ing) = 10 PP
So, taking all of these methods into account, if you know you’re likely going to lose a game, don’t give up! Instead, spend the rest of the game trying to score or keep your teammates happy and earn the Sportsmanship Medal so at the very least you might hit your PP amount for your Rank and nullify the loss with a free pip.
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