VGC 13 RMT: Team "garchomp"- Help needed :)

[ryancyy]

Greetings people! My purpose today is to post a team that i had came up with. I have no idea how to progress further and improve with this team. I will greatly appreciate any constructive feedback with regards to this team!

Also, i'm a new member to this community. So, please forgive me if i offend anyone or use the wrong format in this forum post.

Team Building Process:
I want to create a team that centers around garchomp ( preferably, sand veil).
Garchomp has respectable stats and its my favourite pokemon.
Since garchomp is a physical attacker, i need a pokemon which can discourage the use of intimidate pokemon. Hence, defiant tornadus comes into the picture. It also allows garchomp to use earthquake freely.
Next, tyranitar will come into the picture as sandstorm allows garchomp to abuse sand veil
In almost every vgc team, one should include a steel type to take dragon attacks, especially draco meteors. Hence, i decided to use heatran. Virizion also synergises well with heatran.
Rotom-w is added so as to take care of rain teams along with virizion and offer some speed control in the form of thunder wave.
Team moveset:

Garchomp @ dragon gem
Ability : Sand veil
EVs: 252 Attack, 252 speed, 4 hp
Nature: Jolly
-Dragon claw
-Earthquake
-Protect
-Substitute

EVs are made to make garchomp hit as fast and hard as possible. Dragon gem just to increase dragon claw's damage output since dragon claw is not really that strong. Dragon claw and earthquake are just compulsory STAB moves. Substitute is for when i predict the opponent is going to use status moves, protect or switch out. No one will want to face a sand veil garchomp behind sub in a sandstorm.

Tornadus @ flying gem
Ability : Defiant
EVs : 252 Attack, 252 speed, 4 hp
Nature : jolly
-Acrobatics
-Heat wave
-Crunch
-Protect

Evs are made to be able to OHKO latios with acrobatics+ flying gem. Latios is a huge threat to garchomp. The speed evs are maxed out so i can outspeed latios. Since this is a defiant tornadus, i will want it to be a physical attacker. Crunch is just a filler move to deal with cresselia. Heat wave deals with steel types such as scizor and metagross. With my current evs, a heat wave can OHKO 252Hp/ 0 sp def scizor and 2-3HKO 252hp/0 sp def metagross.

Tyranitar @ chople berry
Ability: Sand stream
EVs : 252 HP ,124 Atk ,36 Def ,96 SpDef
Nature : Careful
-Crunch
-Rock slide
-Low kick
-Protect
36 def evs allows it to survive unboosted meteor mash from metagross. The sp def evs + Careful nature allows it to survive Thunderbolt from Modest, 252 sp atk Thundurus-T, making it a 3HKO.
Rock slide and crunch are STABs. Low kick for opposing tyranitar. My tyranitar sort of acts as a counter for thundurus and volcarona.

Heatran @ shuca berry
Ability : Flash fire
Evs : 252 hp, 252 sp attack, 4 def
Nature: Modest
-Heat wave
-Earth power
-Hidden power [Ice]
-Protect
I have no idea what to do with the evs so i just max hp and sp atk. :(
Heat wave is a compulsory STAB and earth power is just for coverage. HP Ice to hit opposing dragons when i switch it in to take dragon-type moves. Shuca berry is to allow heatran to survive earthquake.

Virizion @ grass gem
Ability: Justified
Evs: 44 Hp, 212 atk, 252 speed
Nature: Jolly
-Leaf blade
-Sacred sword
-Helping hand
-Protect
As i said, virizion has excellent synergy with heatran.

The EV Spread allows Grass Gem Leaf Blade to OHKO a multitude of common Pokemon, such as Tyranitar, Terrakion, Rindo Gastrodon, Rotom-W and Politoed. It acts as an anti-weather Pokemon, killing off other weather starters. Sacred sword was used as i will not want virizion to suffer def and sp def drops. Helping hand is to provide some form of support when virizion could'nt do anything to threaten the opposing pokemon.

Rotom-W @ stritus berry
Ability : Levitate
Evs : 252 hp, 252 sp atk, 4 def ( I have no idea what specific evs to go for :( )
Nature: Modest
-Thunderbolt/ discharge
-thunder wave
-Protect
-Hidden power [flying]

I chose rotom-w as my rain counter and a way form of speed control through thunder wave. Hidden power flying take cares of fighting types as i only have tornadus to take care of fighting types. I could not decide between thunderbolt and discharge as discharge may hurt my pokemon when i am not pairing with garchomp.

Problems and Threats:
No way to counter trick room teams.

Also no way to counter status such as burns or sleep ( none of my pokemon carry safeguard ; which makes me wonder is safeguard compulsory to prevent status and to deal with status-inducing teams?)

I also face some problems with conkeldurr as it normally carries ice punch and i have only rotom-w left to deal with it.

I will greatly appreciate constructive feedback on how to improve on my team as i really feel that my team is not complete and there are alot of loopholes around in terms of synergy and evs. Alternatives to these pokemon in my team are also possible but i will prefer them to be able to center around garchomp as this team revolves around garchomp.

Thanks so much for taking the time to read and giving me feedback. :)

 

[Osharlock]

May I suggest replacing either Protect or Substitute for Dragon Dance for Garchomp? If you are good at predicting you could essentially get up a free Dragon Dance, or with the Sand Veil ability + Sand Stream you could get lucky. Also, in that sense, it may be good to give Garchomp a focus sash instead of a dragon gem. This is because after dragon dance Garchomp outspeeds most things, and the power will be immense.

 

[M. Rock]

Hold on I literally just saw this team on Nugget Bridge.

Not going into a huge rate, but if I were you I'd keep the Garchomp set and use Yache Berry. He needs it really badly, resist berries in this tier are awesome. Thus, since he has no power boosting item or ability, he shouldn't be your primary form of offense, but more like a powerful back up.

 

[tlyee61]

If you wanted another Latios counter, try Haban on chomp. Also, did you find that spread for Virizion on the San Jose Seniors 2nd place article? If so, thanks for using that spread of mine! It looks like you have a solid FWG core on your hands. Since the main intimidate user in VGC is Hitmontop, I would suggest a cresselia to avoid intimidate. Tornados doesn't really have good synergy with the rest of your team.. Cress can 2HKO top easily and will make others think twice about sending it out. It also pairs nicely with ttar, heatran and even virizion. Use a spread of 252 HP / 52 Def / 28 SpArk / 176 SpDef to 2hko top, virizion and terrakion with Psyshock/2hko the genies with ice beam and live Volcarona bug gem bug buzz / ttar crunch. I would suggest either HP Fire or Ice on rotom depending on if you use ice beam on cress or not

 

[ryancyy]

Osharlock- Alright im going to consider that. Thank you for your feedback :)

M. Rock- Yes i posted this team on both smogon and nuggetbridge forums to have more feedbacks on improvement. Sorry if i did the wrong thing or break the rules. :/
I see. Thank you for your feedback! :)

tlyee61- Yup i got the virizion set from you RMT, San Jose Seniors 2nd place article. I apologise for not giving credits to you. :(

I see. May i ask why tornadus do not have good synergy with my team? Is it possible if u reply here or pm me? :) Thanks for your cresselia spread!!! :)

 

[tlyee61]

tlyee61- Yup i got the virizion set from you RMT, San Jose Seniors 2nd place article. I apologise for not giving credits to you. :(

I see. May i ask why tornadus do not have good synergy with my team? Is it possible if u reply here or pm me? :) Thanks for your cresselia spread!!! :)

no problem man, it was just fun to see someone using my EV spread :) Tornadus shares a few with some of your team members.

Chomp & Virizion: Ice

EDIT: Actually now that I think about it, tornadus isn't really the problem here. it's TTar I think. none of your Pokemon really benefit from SS except for Chomp. If you replaced TTar with cress, you could have a good support mon that synergizes with your team better than ttar.

 

[M. Rock]

If you wanted another Latios counter, try Haban on chomp. Also, did you find that spread for Virizion on the San Jose Seniors 2nd place article? If so, thanks for using that spread of mine! It looks like you have a solid FWG core on your hands. Since the main intimidate user in VGC is Hitmontop, I would suggest a cresselia to avoid intimidate. Tornados doesn't really have good synergy with the rest of your team.. Cress can 2HKO top easily and will make others think twice about sending it out. It also pairs nicely with ttar, heatran and even virizion. Use a spread of 252 HP / 52 Def / 28 SpArk / 176 SpDef to 2hko top, virizion and terrakion with Psyshock/2hko the genies with ice beam and live Volcarona bug gem bug buzz / ttar crunch. I would suggest either HP Fire or Ice on rotom depending on if you use ice beam on cress or not

I guess great minds think alike, because I was almost about to say the same thing. But, as per request, I'll add a little insight.
In a later post, Tylee mentions that Ttar is unecessary, rather than Tornadus. Either way, you will need to replace one of them with Cresselia; both are nice teammates for Garchomp to have, but neither is a necessity. I would use the Cresselia set Tylee recommended. The EV Spread is good, I would use a Calm nature with it, and have it hold a Sitrus Berry. Two of the moves have to be Psyshock (it hits Hitmontop harder than Psychic) and Trick Room (which will eliminate your trouble with TR teams because you can shut them down automatically). The last two moves depend on who you will replace with Cress.
Personally, I would replace Tornadus. This is for two reasons: he doesn't really have a concrete goal on your team (other than to punish intimidators, which is a situational), and having him means that half of your team is weak to Ice Beam and Blizzard. I don't know about you, but that would certainly be irksome to me. In this situation you can round out the rest of your moveset with Ice Beam, Thunder Wave, Light Screen/Reflect, Safeguard, Helping Hand, etc. Cresselia's last two moves are up to you. Thunder Wave and Trick Room together give you a lot of versatility for speed control; paralyze their whole team, unless their entire team is faster than most of yours, in which case you can gain an advantage with TR. Not necessary, but just some food for thought.

If you replace Tyranitar, then you lose a way to get rid of the field effects that make weather teams so dangerous. But the rest of your team is so tight with each other that you can't really add in a different auto-weather Pokemon. In this case I would actually give Cresselia Sunny Day. That may sound weird, but here's the way I see it: very few teams that abuse weather benefit from sun, so it's an okay effect to use as a "counter" to weather. Cress has the bulk to be able to set it up, and Heatran and Tornadus can benefit from it. Rotom will be okay if you decide not to run Hydro Pump......which is kinda stupid given it's great coverage along with Tbolt....so yeah there will be some kind of ripple effect for getting rid of Ttar. In my mind it would mean replacing Rotom-W, because I see no point in using him if one is to ignore Hydro Pump.



As for the rest of your team:
- Listen to Tylee and go Haban on Chomp. He was right, I was wrong. In practice, you'll realize that Chomp attracts more dragon attacks than he does Ice attacks.

- I, personally, would want to have Close Combat on my Virizion for more power, although I do understand why you did not choose it. You can experiment with three options: Keep as is, use CC over Sacred Sword, or keep as is and give it a Lum Berry and have Cresselia use Swagger on Virizion (this will make up for the lack of power in SS, and you'll have no stat drops).

- Use Thunderbolt over Discharge on Rotom-W, otherwise its offensive options are limited when Garchomp is not in play.

- Rotom will need Hidden Power Fire if you run Ice Beam on Cresselia, and Hidden Power Ice if you do not. Also, some of his IVs will be 30 for him to have the right Hidden Power. In the case of Fire, use 248 SpA EVs and have 4 in each defense, b/c after 248 the EVs will cease to work in SpA. Also, I commend your set. I can say from experience that Max HP Rotom is best Rotom =D

- Don't worry too much about status, many teams are not terribly prepared for it. And there are no status clauses. This means you can weild moves like Spore and Thunder Wave as powerful weapons.

- As a last thought, why is there no Hydro Pump on Rotom-W? Part of why he's sooooo good is that unbeatable type coverage his STABs have. Do one or the other with Hidden Power and Thunder Wave, he does not need both. Also, Cresselia needs recovery more than Rotom does, so I'd give the berry to Cress and maybe give a power-boosting gem to Rotom. Or if you decide to forgo Twave, you can slap a Choice Specs on Rotom-W to make a seriously bad ass hole-puncher.

So, as you can see, you have quite a few options to tinker and experiment with. This is because there are quite a few (albeit subtle) variations that can work for this team, you just need to test and see which ideas work best. This is a very good start for a team, and I hope you found our advice useful

 

[BlankZero]

May I suggest replacing either Protect or Substitute for Dragon Dance for Garchomp? If you are good at predicting you could essentially get up a free Dragon Dance, or with the Sand Veil ability + Sand Stream you could get lucky. Also, in that sense, it may be good to give Garchomp a focus sash instead of a dragon gem. This is because after dragon dance Garchomp outspeeds most things, and the power will be immense.

That would work, except Chomp doesn't get DDance :/

 

[tlyee61]

I guess great minds think alike, because I was almost about to say the same thing. But, as per request, I'll add a little insight.The EV Spread is good, I would use a Calm nature with it, and have it hold a Sitrus Berry. Two of the moves have to be Psyshock (it hits Hitmontop harder than Psychic) and Trick Room (which will eliminate your trouble with TR teams because you can shut them down automatically). The last two moves depend on who you will replace with Cress.
Personally, I would replace Tornadus. This is for two reasons: he doesn't really have a concrete goal on your team (other than to punish intimidators, which is a situational), and having him means that half of your team is weak to Ice Beam and Blizzard. I don't know about you, but that would certainly be irksome to me. In this situation you can round out the rest of your moveset with Ice Beam, Thunder Wave, Light Screen/Reflect, Safeguard, Helping Hand, etc. Cresselia's last two moves are up to you. Thunder Wave and Trick Room together give you a lot of versatility for speed control; paralyze their whole team, unless their entire team is faster than most of yours, in which case you can gain an advantage with TR. Not necessary, but just some food for thought.

If you replace Tyranitar, then you lose a way to get rid of the field effects that make weather teams so dangerous. But the rest of your team is so tight with each other that you can't really add in a different auto-weather Pokemon. In this case I would actually give Cresselia Sunny Day. That may sound weird, but here's the way I see it: very few teams that abuse weather benefit from sun, so it's an okay effect to use as a "counter" to weather. Cress has the bulk to be able to set it up, and Heatran and Tornadus can benefit from it. Rotom will be okay if you decide not to run Hydro Pump......which is kinda stupid given it's great coverage along with Tbolt....so yeah there will be some kind of ripple effect for getting rid of Ttar. In my mind it would mean replacing Rotom-W, because I see no point in using him if one is to ignore Hydro Pump.



As for the rest of your team:
- Listen to Tylee and go Haban on Chomp. He was right, I was wrong. In practice, you'll realize that Chomp attracts more dragon attacks than he does Ice attacks.

- Use Thunderbolt over Discharge on Rotom-W, otherwise its offensive options are limited when Garchomp is not in play.

- Rotom will need Hidden Power Fire if you run Ice Beam on Cresselia, and Hidden Power Ice if you do not. Also, some of his IVs will be 30 for him to have the right Hidden Power. In the case of Fire, use 248 SpA EVs and have 4 in each defense, b/c after 248 the EVs will cease to work in SpA. Also, I commend your set. I can say from experience that Max HP Rotom is best Rotom

- As a last thought, why is there no Hydro Pump on Rotom-W? Part of why he's sooooo good is that unbeatable type coverage his STABs have. Do one or the other with Hidden Power and Thunder Wave, he does not need both. Also, Cresselia needs recovery more than Rotom does, so I'd give the berry to Cress and maybe give a power-boosting gem to Rotom. Or if you decide to forgo Twave, you can slap a Choice Specs on Rotom-W to make a seriously bad ass hole-puncher.

Thanks! I agree with the bolded statements. The only reason to include Ice beam on cress is that I calced it so that 28 SpAtk EVs lets it 2HKO Tornadus/Thudurus (although most are bulky these days...) i don't agree with Sunny day on Cress since it actually hinders Rotom. His team doesn't look like it has a serious porblem with weather to me. Virizion/Rotom for rain, heatran for sun and hail, virizion/rotom-w for sand, chomp for sand. Run Hydro Pump over HP Flying for Rotom-W.

 

[ryancyy]

M. Rock- Yes it is very helpful!! :) Yup i will run a few experiments to see which fits my play style better! Thanks so much for fulfilling my request and giving me such an in-depth analysis!!! I appreciate it greatly! :)

tlyee61-Thanks again for commenting on this thread to give me more advice!! I really appreciate it :)