A new take on Red Steel (Scizor Discussion)

[-Nitro-]

Last topic was in December, so I thought I would make a newer one.

(Yay for Microsoft paint. >_>)
http://www.serebii.net/pokedex-dp/212.shtml

Stats
HP: 70
Attack: 130
Defense: 100
Sp. Atk: 55
Sp. Def: 80
Speed: 65

Traits:
Swarm: Increases power of Bug moves when his HP runs low
Technician: Any move of 60 BP or less is powered up by 1.5.

General
Scizor is still a little slow, but Choice scarf can help with that. His typing grants him a fair amount of resistances, and only one weakness. Unfortunately, that's a 4x weakness, to fire. However, he does have an interesting trait available in technician, which makes previously weaker moves more viable, such as Rock smash. New moves in U-turn, X-Scissor, and Iron head provide him with Stab that isn't Silver wind / Steel wing as he had in advance.

Notable Physical movepool
Underline indicates new move, **indicates moves affected by techincian, Bold indicates Stab.

Quick Attack**
Pursuit**
X-Scissor
Night Slash
Double Hit**
Iron Head
Return
Brick Break
Aerial Ace**
Facade
U-Turn
Rock Smash**
Reversal
Counter

Not bad.

I'm leaving Special movepool out, as you can't do much with 55 Base Sp Atk.

Notable Support Movepool
Underline indicates new moves.

Agility
Iron Defense
Swords Dance
Toxic
Sunny Day
Protect
Rain Dance
Roost
Endure
Sandstorm
Rest
Substitute
Safeguard
Light Screen
Baton pass

Pretty Impressive, actually.

Moveset Ideas

Choice Scarf
Jolly @ Choice Scarf
Technician
~X-Scissor
~Iron Head
~Aerial Ace
~Rock Smash / Brick Break / Night Slash

He has great attack, and Chocie scarf helps his speed. X-Scissor and Iron head for Stab, Aerial ace is nice with 90 bp, and can deal with fighters, Heracross, Grass, and other bugs. Rock smash isn't that bad with Scizor, because of the technician boost, and a 50% chance of a defense drop. Brick break is there if you prefer more static attack instead of the 50% defense drop. Night slash is recommended only if you really need something to hurt ghosts... Other than that it's not that great.

Baton Pass
Jolly @ Leftover / Shed Shell
Swarm
~Iron Defense / Swords Dance / Agility
~Iron Defense / Swords Dance / Agility
~Baton Pass
~X-Scissor

Shed shell if you're worried about Magnezone ruining your fun. He has decent defenses, and great stat up moves. Most often you'll be running Swords Dance and Agility and passing to a physical sweeper, I'm guessing, but Iron Defense is there if you really need it. X-Scissor can do some damage after a Swords dance, especially with Swarm.

Endrev
Jolly @ Salac Berry
Swarm
~Endure
~Reversal
~Swords Dance
~U-Turn / X-Scissor / Iron Head

He's immune to Sandstorm, so endure the hit, activate Salac, and Reversal. If you get a Swords dance off before hand, you can get extra boost with Reversal. U-turn if you ever plan on salvaging him, you can use it after to switch out with STAB, Swarm, potentially Swords Danced U-turn. X-Scissor or Iron head for filler.

Life Orb
Jolly @ Life Orb
Technician / Swarm (Depends on moveset)
~X-Scissor
~Roost / Iron Head
~Agility
~Aerial Ace / Brick Break / Rock Smash / Night Slash / Double Hit

Agility then sweep. Roost is there if you feel pressured by the constant recoil of Life Orb. Last slot is filler, and I'd choose what your team needs. If you do go with Aerial Ace, Rock Smash or Double hit, then Technician may be worth it. If you go with Night Slash or Brick Break, then stick to Swarm.

 

[pooch]

I like your style. I'd use Scizor as a Baton Passer, but that attack is too good to ignore. So my set would combine his ability as a physical sweeper with Passing utility.

~ X-Scissor
~ Iron Head
~ Agility
~ Baton Pass

After an Agility, he's quite the threat. And while "blah blah so is anything," Scizor can get off an agility by exploiting its resistances, forcing a switch. Do you think X Scissor and Iron Head are the best moves here? Obviously they both use STAB, and they would appear to cover most types.

 

[Forsety]

About the Reversal set I ran another variation which I found was alot more effective overall.

Scizor @Liechi berry
-Agility
-Substitute
-Reversal
-(Filler)

Less likely to get WoW or Paralyzed.

Either way Iron Head + Agility was a massive boost to Scizor's movepool and is also high on my list of considerations.

 

[Jibaku]

What about CB
- Brick Break/Rock Smash
- U-Turn
- Pursuit
- Double Hit/Quick Attack/Aerial Ace

 

[SNX7]

Yay, a Scizor disscusion. If only my (good) Scizor had Technician instead of stupid Swarm, but whatever.

I really like the life orb set, except I go with Adamant. 394 Attack+450ish Speed is awsome. Roost is an awsome addition, and gives Scizor more durability. I really like X-Scissor/Roost/Agility/Iron Head. 2 STAB moves, and the only thing you can't hit is Fire, which you SHOULD be switching out against anyways.

I may think about putting a Leichi berry/Baton pass in place of Roost though. A massive power boosted X-Scissor is pretty damn strong, and when the going gets to tough, Baton Pass Agility+Leichi boosts to my Gallade or Heracross.

 

[Andarel]

Are there any thoughts on a potential Trick Room usage for Scizor? I'm thinking of making one, and assuming Slowbro is used over Bronzong (who is a fire magnet) then Scizor could be great, what with neutral to everything 'Bro is weak to, and a good def/medium sdef/medium HP. SD once and proceed to sweep 3 turns until Trick Room runs out, and even then you might still be able to own if they can't kill you.

I'd probably go with Leftovers, maybe...hm

Scizor@Lefties
Technician
(-Spd; +atk/def/sdef depending on preference. I'd go +atk, his defenses are good enough imo, if EV'd right)
*need to check EV's. +Atk is a given, probably +HP as well, and maybe a touch of SDef if needed. Def is already good.*
- X-Scissor/U-Turn/Night Slash (The first if you want more power, the second for a good retreat option to bring out the Trick Roomer when time's about to run out, the third for...idk. High crit rate maybe? I think X-Scissor is more reliable.)
-Swords Dance
-Aerial Ace (for fighting who resist Night Slash/X-Scissor)
-Iron Head/Double Hit (for Rock, chance at stat iirc; or second for Sub-breaking, or killing FEAR if they're crazy I guess? *EDIT* - As I just reread the thread, ShadowNinja pointed out that Iron Head + X-Scissor/U-Turn hits everything neutral except fire. Which nobody would use Scizor against anyway, unless they're...in Trick room and guaranteed to outspeed and still probably not kill I guess? With SD, Scizor is fearsome. Without, he's still scary but nowhere near as much. I'd probably go with X-Scissor/AA/SD/Iron Head, but there are other options. Double can swap for AA if you're really scared of subbers or Focus Sash?)

Set up Trick Room, come in with this guy (hopefully on someone who'll run), SD once if possible, and proceed to sweep for 3 turns of Trick Room. 2 SD's might work too, but that gives you less time of going first. His speed isn't terrible, unfortunately, so you'd need -Spd nature and 0 spd EV's (and 0-1 IV's if possible). No agility for obvious reasons, though you could run it instead of swords dance, along with Baton Pass, to speed up the slow peeps if your Trick Roomers die.

I think it might work, I'm really interested in a viable Trick Room team...and Scizor is just cool. So yeah.

 

[SDShamshel]

Scizor has the strongest U-Turn in the game and it takes neutral damage from Stealth Rock, so it's not exactly a bad idea.

 

[Suikama]

Yay, a Scizor disscusion. If only my (good) Scizor had Technician instead of stupid Swarm, but whatever.

I really like the life orb set, except I go with Adamant. 394 Attack+450ish Speed is awsome. Roost is an awsome addition, and gives Scizor more durability. I really like X-Scissor/Roost/Agility/Iron Head. 2 STAB moves, and the only thing you can't hit is Fire, which you SHOULD be switching out against anyways.

I may think about putting a Leichi berry/Baton pass in place of Roost though. A massive power boosted X-Scissor is pretty damn strong, and when the going gets to tough, Baton Pass Agility+Leichi boosts to my Gallade or Heracross.

You forgot Steel types. Most notably, Skarmory.

 

[Yoshi King]

What about using an Occa berry on the Life Orb set instead of a Life Orb? It'll reduce the X4 weakness to X2, which allows for a much more comfortable use of Roost. Maybe replace Agility with Swords Dance for a slow tank sweep, maybe? (This kind of depends if the Occa berry works more than once on a fire-type attack)

 

[Andarel]

Scizor learns Brick Break to take care of some steels, but is pretty much walled by Skarm. Any good Skarm (e.g. one with Whirlwind) should be able to handle things pretty well...

However, that makes for some fun under Trick Room. The standard Skarmory switchouts - Gyarados, Electivire, maybe Swampert - all are scared of tank-esque monstrosities that speed up as they slow down. A Trick Room Rhyperior enjoys OHKO'ing Gyara with STAB Stone Edge. And Electivire...Motor Drive makes it even slower, and its defenses are onmly average.

Still, Scizor's worst problem is Skarm. For steels especially, I think X-Scissor/U-Turn | BB | SD | Iron Head might be the way to go. However, U-Turn kinda nulls the purpose of this set and Bronzong laughs at it due to Hypnosis and being even slower...I'll need a Bronzong counter for sure. Though that's so hard to do...

-Yoshi-
Berries are one-use, unfortunately.

 

[sarunibi]

Here is another Scizor set:

Scizor @ Focus Sash
Reversal
Agility
X-Scissor
Baton Pass/Iron Head

 

[Deck Knight]

Scizor also has the second strongest Pursuit, after Tyranitar.

Technician opens up entire new worlds for Scizor.
105 BP Double Hit
60-120 BP Pursuit
90 BP Wing Attack/Aerial Ace

Those, in addition to Somersault, are not bad additions at all.

 

[Big Bayou]

Why no U-Turn on the choice scarf set?

 

[-Nitro-]

You forgot Steel types. Most notably, Skarmory.

Gyarados walls Scizor pretty hard as well with only STAB moves.

Why no U-Turn on the choice scarf set?

I'll put it up as an option on there with X-Scissor. I think it relies a lot on predicting your counter switching in, though, because it's a choice item.

As with most slow sweepers, get ninjask to baton pass him 2 Speed boosts (If possible) and a swords dance and he can really hurt things.

60-120 BP Pursuit

Does pursuit still receive the technician boost when the foe switches out? (Is it 80 or 120 BP?)

EDIT: On a side note, I thought I'd add a link to the actual analysis in the first post.

 

[MrBubbles]

I don't like the idea of having Scizor use Agility/Sword Dance, too risky since Scizor doesn't cover a lot of types and will probably get walled or forced to switch by a fire type.

Setting Scizor up is fun times, however.

 

[Big Bayou]

Another cool thing about Scizor is that the fire types that counter it the hardest are all finished by a BP or U-turn to Dugtrio.

 

[SNX7]

You forgot Steel types. Most notably, Skarmory.

Ah yes, I forgot about Steel types for some reason. Put in BB, and the only thing you can't hit is Skarm+Fire types, all of which counter Scizor, so it'd be stupid to keep him in against them.

 

[Suikama]

Another cool thing about Scizor is that the fire types that counter it the hardest are all finished by a BP or U-turn to Dugtrio.

Except Charizard.

 

[SNX7]

Yea, but Charizard easily get's owned by just about anything with Stealth Rock or Stone Edge. At least one Pokemon on every team has one of those attacks now.

 

[Pitcher]

I like using Scizor's 4x weakness as an advantage. A lot of times you'll be able to predict when a Fire attack is coming so you can always BP, U-Turn, or just switch to a pokemon with Flash Fire such as Heatran.

 

[Cliftor]

I used to think of his weakness as an advantage too, because I used to use the EndReving set last gen. The set had plenty of problems and I see that now.

I don't think U-Turn on the EndRevver is a good idea... I mean, yeah, you got him out, but what's the point? You wouldn't be able to switch him back in on anything, and even if you could, what is he gonna do? He's too slow to keep using Reversal without the speed boosts.

 

[Alienjesus]

maybe you could have a heal wish sacrifice that could bring him back end game to annoy stuff all over again.

 

[Sephka Blight]

I love Scizor. I'm probably going to use
Scizor@ Life Orb
X-Scissor
Agility
Roost
Brick Break

Maybe take out roost for another attacking move for more coverage?

 

[OldSchoolNub]

Scizor LOLs at a Skarm on the switch. Predict the switch, U-Turn to Magnezone, gg Skarm. He also laughs at Tyranitar leads and Pursuit will hit Gengar hard regardless of whether or not he switches. I've been using him against standards, and while he's not good enough for the OU tier, he can surprise people who underestimate him.

 

[Suikama]

Scizor LOLs at a Skarm on the switch. Predict the switch, U-Turn to Magnezone, gg Skarm. He also laughs at Tyranitar leads and Pursuit will hit Gengar hard regardless of whether or not he switches. I've been using him against standards, and while he's not good enough for the OU tier, he can surprise people who underestimate him.

You don't even have to predict the switch since you get to see if they switched or not before you choose who to U-turn too.