ADV MixPert with a few new variations. The advantage of this set over a purely physical set is more powerful Water and Ice attacks. Surf does more damage than Waterfall to the majority of his fellow Ground-types as they usually possess high Defense and poor Special Defense. Hydro Pump is slightly less accurate than Surf, but can score a 2HKO on the likes of Skarmory and Weezing, and is worth considering for that reason alone. Like with the physical set, you have your choice of support / utility options in the last slot. Hippowdon, Donphan, Skarmory, Weezing, and several others take more damage from Surf than they do from Waterfall, despite Swampert's higher Attack stat, so this set usually outdamages the pure physical set.
A strong and reliable physical attacker and tank. Earthquake and Avalanche form the Ground / Ice attacking combination which is only resisted by Bronzong and Surskit. In the third slot, Stone Edge provides coverage against Gyarados, and hits most other Flying-types harder than Avalanche. Waterfall provides a more powerful attack than Earthquake against Rhyperior, and does some decent damage to Levitating Pokémon such as Gengar and Azelf. The final slot is for utility / support. Swampert's all around sturdiness makes it a good choice for setting up Stealth Rock, or phazing physical attackers such as Dragon Dance Tyranitar (as you can't OHKO with Earthquake). Protect helps provide some self-healing with Leftovers, scout attacks from Choice item users, and helps to avoid getting Swampert hit with a random Hidden Power Grass. Stone Edge / Waterfall can also be replaced for one of these support options.
Although this set has the potential to hit a lot harder, it's not quite as effective as the previous two. It's a fairly simple strategy—boost Swampert's physical stats with Curse, and attack accordingly. The final slot provides type coverage with Waterfall, or healing with Rest. Be wary of using Rest as Swampert will still be vulnerable to powerful special attacks—especially Energy Ball and Grass Knot—while it's sleeping. This set suffers from being unable to do any serious damage to common phazers such as Skarmory, Suicune, and Weezing.
Swampert is a very sturdy Rest Talker, and as long as you keep him away from STAB or boosted Grass attacks, you can expect him to survive a long time with this set. Once again, the Ground / Ice combination is preferred due to its superior type coverage, but Stone Edge can be used in place of Avalanche to cover Gyarados. Life Orb is an option over Leftovers if you want to give Swampert a little extra power.
A combination of the two previous sets. This plays like a physical version of "Crocune". Although limited to only a single attack, this can be incredibly difficult to take down once you have eliminated anything that sports a Grass attack.
Although dropping some defensive EVs and Leftovers means this Swampert can't take hits as well as other sets, you have the element of surprise on your side here. Few people will expect Swampert to hit this hard, and with a potential Attack stat of 525 with Choice Band, coupled with its impressive physical movepool, you can make quite a dent in your opponent's team. Ice Punch is preferred to Avalanche as it provides more power against incoming Pokémon. Focus Punch or Hammer Arm can be used in either of the last two slots for a more powerful option against Blissey, although only Focus Punch will guarantee a OHKO. However, they are both lesser options, as Earthquake will always 2HKO, and Waterfall has a good shot at the 2HKO too, doing 49–58% to a max HP / Defense, Bold Blissey (assuming max Attack on Swampert).
Somewhat of a novelty set, but like the Choice Bander, this can surprise your opponent and help you get the upper hand in a battle. Use Substitute to get Swampert down to 1 HP and activate Salac Berry. Endeavor will drain your opponent's HP, allowing you to finish them off with Waterfall or Earthquake. Waterfall also receives a boost from Torrent at low HP, and you're actually fast enough to get some luck with the 20% flinch rate. Make sure you've killed or Paralyzed anything with Speed in excess of 360—Swampert's max Speed after a Salac boost—before attempting this strategy. Other OptionsHidden Power Electric can 2HKO Gyarados, but doesn't really hurt most other Water-types, like Milotic or Suicune. Hidden Power Bug can catch Celebi and Ludicolo off guard, but won't OHKO either of them. Counter or Mirror Coat can grab a surprise KO on certain attackers that Swampert would otherwise have problems hurting. Swampert can Focus Punch from behind 101 Substitutes to block Blissey's Seismic Toss and hurt her badly, but sapping the HP of Swampert when it's usually relied upon to take hits is counter productive. Hydro Cannon gets a mention simply to say this—do not use it. The extra power over Hydro Pump isn't worth the second turn recharge and inability to switch. EVsMixPert can be Relaxed with 240 HP / 216 Def / 52 SpA. The Special Attack EVs allow Swampert to reach a stat of 219, which is sufficient to score a likely OHKO on Salamence with Ice Beam (94–100%, against a minimum HP Salamence). To guarantee a OHKO on the same Salamence, 235 Special Attack (116 EVs) is required. 219 also allows for a likely 2HKO on Weezing and Skarmory with Hydro Pump, with both taking 48–57% (assuming max HP/0 Special Defense). The Physical set should have an Impish nature. You'll want a minimum of 240 HP EVs and 216 Defense EVs to take hits from Tyranitar effectively, although Max HP and Defense is fine here as the extra 52 Attack EVs aren't required to KO anything of any consequence. Dumping 20 EVs into Speed allows Swampert to outrun Weezing (although you're not doing much damage to him), and also Tyraniboah. The Curse set should max out HP first, and use a Careful nature with 180 Defense EVs and 88 Special Defense EVs to give Swampert 261 in both defensive stats. You can invest more Special Defense EVs if you wish, but some initial Defense helps to take hits before you set up with Curse. The Sleep Talker can follow the same EV spread as the Physical set, although you can invest some EVs in Special Defense to help take Surfs from Starmie and the like. The Choice Bander should max out HP (so that Swampert can take hits), max out Attack, and go with an Adamant nature. Some investment can be made in Speed at the expense of HP, with 207 (204 EVs) to beat minimum Speed Suicune. If you max out Speed and use a Jolly nature, you can outspeed and OHKO Adamant Breloom with Ice Punch. The Endeavor set requires a Jolly nature, and max Speed and Attack—throw the remaining 6 EVs anywhere but HP. Adding them to HP will make Swampert's HP divisible by four, so you can only use Substitute three times instead of four. OpinionIn ADV, Swampert fell into the category of "Bulky Water" alongside the likes of Suicune and Milotic. Swampert's Rock resistance, Sandstorm immunity, and Electric immunity gave it a nice advantage over those two back then, and it's of even greater importance in DP. This is due to the addition of a new Sand Stream Pokémon in Hippowdon, a more powerful Rock attack in Stone Edge, and the introduction of Stealth Rock. Donphan, Hippowdon, and Rhyperior are stiff competition for Swampert for the position of Ground-type on a team. Swampert's advantages over those three include its neutrality to Water and Ice attacks, higher Special Defense, and usable Special Attack stat. It's worth noting that it will almost always beat those three, one on one. While its movepool upgrades from the previous generation are slight, they are both significant and welcome nonetheless. Physical Water and Ice attacks are a nice bonus, as is its ability to provide support with Stealth Rock. Stone Edge is also a useful new addition, giving Swampert the opportunity to take on Gyarados with some degree of success. His ability to counter heavy hitters such as Tyranitar, Metagross, and Salamence has taken a hit from the previous generation, as all three now have 80 base power STAB attacks to hit it for neutral damage. In the case of Metagross, Grass Knot can easily 2HKO Swampert, and Salamence's Draco Meteor can OHKO it on a Choice Specs set. The new Grass attacks such as Energy Ball and Grass Knot pose an obvious threat to Swampert, but are fairly predictable. Overall, Swampert is an solid choice on any team, and will rarely let you down. CountersLudicolo is an excellent counter—Ground and Water resists, neutral to Ice and Rock attacks, and a STAB Grass attack to batter Swampert with. Almost any other Grass-type that can take at least one Ice attack should finish it with ease. The best candidates for this include Celebi, Venusaur, Leafeon, Tangrowth, Exeggutor, Meganium, and Shaymin. Both Dusknoir and Spiritomb shrug off Swampert's attacks, can hit it with a Burn, and can leech off its HP with Pain Split. Cresselia, Uxie, and Mesprit are immune to its STAB Earthquake and possess sufficient defenses to take hits from its other attacks. All three can hit back with Energy Ball or Grass Knot. Azelf works in a similar way, but its lower defenses mean it can't take quite as much a repeated beating from Swampert's Water attacks. Gengar doesn't enjoy taking hits from Swampert's STAB Water attacks, but will usually survive them and can either cripple Swampert with Hypnosis or Will-O-Wisp, or simply throw powerful Energy Balls at it. Mismagius works in much the same way, but her high Special Defense means she can sponge Surfs and Hydro Pumps more effectively than Gengar. Zapdos can survive a Stone Edge and any of Swampert's Ice attacks, and take it down with Hidden Power Grass. It can also use Light Screen to sponge hits from Ice Beam. Heracross resists Earthquake and 2HKOs Swampert with a Choice Banded Megahorn or Close Combat. Waterfall is a possible 2HKO on the bug, but requires more Attack EVs than most Swampert usually carry (280 for a possible 2HKO, 320 for guaranteed 2HKO on a minimum HP Heracross). Milotic can Recover off Swampert's Earthquakes, and wear it down with Surf. Vaporeon can fill a similar role by alternating between Wish and Protect to stall out Swampert while hitting him with Surf. Suicune does the same job with its incredible Defense. All three can Haze / Roar the Cursing set. Weezing shuts down the entirely physical sets with Will-O-Wisp, but has to be careful around the mixed sets because Hydro Pump can 2HKO. |
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