Type Control (Playable on Aqua and Pandora)

Sap Sippers

Azumarill: Its best is Bulldoze or Dig for Ground physical STAB, and really it's probably better off with Huge Power than some gimmicky no weaknesses build.
I was gonna suggest ParishTrap with Whirlpool, but then I remembered that set is illegal. :(

Venomoth: Shield Dust and Tinted Lens are both really good Abilities, Venomoth's statline is actually respectable, and it gets Quiver Dance. It's just that Bug/Poison is painfully redundant as an offensive type combination and not all that great defensively either. Here Venomoth has a chance to maybe shine! Just swapping out Bug Buzz for Energy Ball (Or Solar Beam in a sun team!) and Bug for Grass is already an overall improvement, but it also gets Psychic, Giga Drain, Ominous Wind... um... Air Cutter... honestly, Venomoth's other problem is its movepool is walled badly by Steel, and Ominous Wind is the only thing that helps at all in its entire movepool. So it's probably still not going to see use, alas. You could try Ghost/Grass, see how well it does? To be fair, Tinted Lens helps bypass the problem a bit.
Bug/Psychic+Tinted Lens gives it 100% perfect neutral coverage (unless you can make somthing Steel/Steel. Wait, could one do that? Because if so I want to see that).

Virizion: Zen Headbutt, Bounce, and Aerial Ace are literally all its non-STAB non-Normal offensive moves. Psychic/Fighting is an OK typing, and Fighting/Flying is actually pretty decent, but Virizion's real problem is having a dumb statblock and there's no major gems in its movepool to save the day,
Literally all of them except Stone Edge :P Rock/Fighting or Rock/Grass with it's High Sp. Def could help it stand out as a Sandstorm special tank with high speed. So there's something.

Sceptile: Once Mega Sceptile is a thing, keep in mind the possibility to Water/Flying for Lightningrod abuse. Moves-wise, Sceptile has Pursuit, Night Slash, X-Scissor, Dragon Claw, Earthquake, Brick Break, Acrobatics, Crunch, Rock Slide, Thunderpunch, Outrage, Dragon Pulse, Drain Punch, and Iron Tail. Keep in mind that while Sceptile's Special Attack is higher than its Attack, it's a manageable difference. While a lot of these would be a bad combination with grass-typing, producing one or more double weaknesses (Rock/Grass is the only one of these that doesn't), that's OK because you can just ignore its Grass typing (Maybe use Leaf Blade as a coverage move) and instead make it Dragon/Steel, or Ground/Steel, or Ground/Electric, or Electric/Dark, or... it has a lot of potential!
STAB Acrobatics+Unburden is always cool. It can use Fling, Solar Beam or Leaf Storm to activate Unburden.
 
Pokemon immune to Electric via Ability

Water/Flying with an Electric immunity is only vulnerable to Rock. Incidentally, Water/Flying is the only way to be doubly weak to Electric.

Motor Drives

Electivire: Unfortunately, Electivire lacks both Flying and Water moves. It doesn't even get Aerial Ace! And given it's not a wall sort of Pokemon, it probably isn't worth running this trick for just for the difficulty in being harmed. It's probably better off adding Fighting for Drain Punch, or even going Ground/Fighting outright, presumably swap out Motor Drive for Insomnia.

Zebstrika: It gets Bounce. Not that much of a wall. It can run Lightning Rod instead, which doesn't help.

Emolga: Can of course pull off the Flying part, but not the Water part. Even less of a wall than the previous two.

Volt Absorbers

Jolteon: Nothing.

Lanturn: Naturally, it can pull off the Water part, and it also gets Bounce! (Not that it's all that physically oriented...) Has some potential, given its fairly high HP, though its Defense is awful.

Raikou: Unfortunately, it's Hidden Ability has yet to be released. Even with it released, the only way it could pull it off at all would be to use Weather Ball in rain, and honestly I'd probably rather run it as Water/Electric at that point with Thunder and Weather Ball.

Pachirisu: Oh man its statline is tortuous to look at. Fast, tough except not really, and with crap offenses. Lovely. And no, it doesn't get Flying or Water moves.

Minun: Wait, why is this a more competent version of Pachirisu when Pachirisu came later? Oh, and no Flying or Water moves.

Thundurus-Therian: No Water moves, and Sky Drop and Fly are its best Flying options. It's got better things it could be doing.

Lightning Rods

Manectric: Not even slightly.

Raichu: Come on Gen VI Surfing and Flying Pikachu, hurry up and exist! Otherwise, nope.

Marowak: Nope.

Rhyperior: I already mentioned it gets Aqua Tail, but alas, no Flying moves.

Seaking: Plenty of Water moves, and it gets Peck and Bounce. It could kind of pull this off?

Plusle: Not any better than Minun.

So, in summary: no Pokemon can really pull this off to its full potential, with Seaking being the closest you get.

Bug types

Bug is a mediocre type and has a lot of pairings that are particularly awful, or at least have a crucial problem: Heracross was kind of obnoxious back in Generation II, being the first Bug type that had the hitting power to really counter Psychic types, and then it not only had a double Flying weakness but was actively vulnerable to Psychic attacks! In Type Control you'll have the potential to salvage a lot of Bugs who are either ill-suited to their Bug typing or are marred by the exact combination they have being particularly awful. Plus Bug just isn't that great of an attacking type anyway, particularly since it's got no amazing moves.

Pinsir: It's got a zillion Fighting moves, it's got Earthquake, plus Knock Off. I'm not sure what happens when you Mega Evolve a Pokemon that changes type in doing so. Will it add Flying if your second type is free? Overwrite it period? Do nothing at all if your Pokemon has a nickname defining its type? Assuming for the moment the type doesn't change, Flying/Fighting, Flying/Dark, Dark/Ground (With Aerilated moves as coverage), or Fighting/Ground (Aerilate=coverage) are all good possibilities.

Scyther: I normally ignore pre-evolutions, but the main reason Scyther never sees use is that Bug/Flying is an awful, awful type. Scizor has the same stat total, just distributed differently, but Bug/Steel is really good, while Bug/Flying is really bad. 105 Speed is enough to outrun a lot of important Pokemon, and surprisingly it's only slightly more fragile than Scizor, and only against physical attacks. It can run Fighting, Dark, and even some mediocre Steel moves. Unfortunately, it lacks priority, it lacks moves to really abuse its own Technician with, and Scizor does have a Mega Evolution to dramatically increase the stat total difference.

Scizor: Scizor can of course run everything Scyther can run, and throws in more besides. (Scyther does not get Superpower, while Scizor does, for instance) Steel/Fighting is the only alternative to Bug/Steel that really stands out as having some potential for Scizor, and honestly the double Fire weakness is probably a lot more tolerable than having all of Steel's weaknesses at once when everybody is going to plan for Steel Pokemon. It's not like Scizor has the Special Attack to really appreciate STAB on Vacuum Wave.

Volbeat: Volbeat has this problem where it is markedly more Attack-oriented than Special Attack-oriented, and yet if you want to use it it would be because Tail Glow is three stages of Special Attack. It's actually got a fantastic movepool that can pull off Electric, Psychic, Ghost, Fighting, Flying, Fairy, and Grass, but it's too awkward to be liable to get use out of.

Illumise: Actually Special-oriented! Does not get Tail Glow because REASONS! It has basically the same movepool as Volbeat, except no Tail Glow. It also has access to Tinted Lens, which is a nice Ability. But no Tail Glow. Uuuuugh. Basically, don't use Volbeat or Illumise. sigh

Butterfree: It can finally get STAB on Psychic! Or better yet Shadow Ball! Or Energy Ball and Giga Drain! Or, um, Twister?... Keeping in mind it gets Quiver Dance and Tinted Lens or Compound Eyes, plus Powder moves so it's got almost-Spore like potential on Sleep Powder. I guess it could run Ghost/Grass? It'll probably be overshadowed by Venomoth and Volcarona though.

Beautifly: All those things I just said about Butterfree? Pretend I'm saying them about Beautifly, only replace 'Tinted Lens' with 'Rivalry' and be even sadder. It actually has more Special Attack than Butterfree though?

Kricketune: I don't think type modification really can salvage it.

Forretress: Ground/Steel for Earthquake STAB and no double weakness! (Though lots of Forretress never attack or only attack with Rapid Spin anyway) Normal typing for Explosion STAB! Really though, I'd probably make it Ghost/Steel for spinblocking and general durability, maybe give it Gyro Ball.

Accelgor: Lightning fast and with access to Hydration potentially a nice Rain-Rester. It also gets Curse, which could be an interesting thing to use as a Ghost Rain-Rester. Unfortunately, it's movepool is a bit limited: what isn't Bug is Grass or Poison, barring Focus Blast. (Or Normal, but it's got nothing amazing) It actually gets Recover too. Maybe a weird, fast wall that Curses enemy walls and then Recovers the damage off? It even gets Infestation to trap the enemy.

Volcarona: Flying, Psychic, and Grass are about it for its realistic alternatives. It has a decent physical movepool, but its Special Attack is more than twice its Attack, and it has Quiver Dance. Overall I feel Fire/Grass is its best option, but Grass/Flying or some such might be good for a rain team to use Hurricane. Fire/Grass and Fire/Psychic are its only STAB-using options that don't gain double weaknesses.

Ledian: I don't get why this thing gets Iron Fist, its Attack is a bad joke and its Special Attack is still awful. Just take Early Bird, if you're going to use Ledian at all. In general, just take a more defensible type combination, stat it up, Baton Pass, or toss out Toxic, or whatever. If Type Control finds Ledian is competitive I'll be amazed.

Shuckle: If there were a doubles format for this, it would be worth discussing its sweeper potential and what types go well with that: Trick Room, Power Trick, murder everything. In singles play that's far, far too impractical. Instead, let me say that Rock and Bug are both awful defensive types that are only kind of OK together, and you're much better off with Dark/Poison or something. Steel or Poison is basically a must for Toxic immunity.

Heracross: Fighting/Rock for the Mega Evolution's use would be great. For non-Mega, Ground/Fighting with Earthquake could be quite nice, and it even gets Smack Down. It's worth noting that it gets Shadow Claw: Ghost/Fighting is a fairly solid offensive pairing. It also gets some decent Dark moves.

Masquerain: Slow, not that tough, and not that hard hitting. Not a good combo. It's actually got an excellent Special movepool, including Scald, Solar Beam, Shadow Ball, Ice Beam, Blizzard, Energy Ball, Hydro Pump, Mud Shot, and Giga Drain. Certainly, just swapping out Flying for Water, or turning it Water/Grass, or Water/Ghost, or some such, would go a long way to making it less terrible, what with reducing its vulnerability to Stealth Rock and all.

Ninjask: Second-fastest Pokemon in the game, and overall speed king with Speed Boost. Bug/Flying is obviously a terrible combination with too many problematic weaknesses and a double weakness to Rock, but what else can it do competently? Well, it gets Night Slash... um... that's really basically it. Bug/Dark isn't all that bad of a type combination. It's not great, but there's worse out there.

Shedinja: Obviously the main goal should be to be as hard as possible to hurt. Dark/Poison with Air Balloon has been covered, pure Electric with Air Balloon could also be done but it loses the immunity to Toxic so that's sub-optimal, Dark/Ghost is actually only weak to Fairy, which you can't cover up but Fairy is not widely available via moves in actual fact, Steel/Fairy is only vulnerable to Fire and Ground but that's problematic... overall Dark/Poison or Dark/Ghost are probably it's best options, given it has Sucker Punch and Shadow Sneak, and it basically needs priority to keep itself relevant.

Mothim: It's Butterfree, but slower, harder hitting, and with equally high Attack and no moves to use it on. Also, Tinted Lens is its only good Ability. Um. Pass.

Vespiquen: It's actually got an OK statline, but it's movepool doesn't really range out from 'Bug' and 'Flying', barring a few mediocre moves like Ominous Wind. So make it a Bug/Steel with Defend Order, Attack Order, Heal Order, and Toxic? I guess?

Yanmega: Psychic, Solar Beam, Shadow Ball, Giga Drain, and... er... Ancient Power? It could run as Bug/Ghost, or Grass/Ghost, fairly competently. Or Psychic/Bug is not so bad. Keep in mind it gets both Tinted Lens and Speed Boost, so it has some real potential, even with a limited movepool.

Crustle: Earthquake! Plus Smack Down! It also has Shadow Claw, Poison Jab, Night Slash, and Knock Off. Just making it Bug/Ground instead Bug/Rock would be an overall improvement, and more interestingly running it as Dark/Ground would be quite nice.

Escavalier: Poison/Steel, Dark/Steel, Poison/Dark, are about all its movepool and statline can really support other than Bug/Steel, and Poison/Dark is the only one that actually removes the double weakness.

Galvantula: Sucker Punch, Energy Ball, Poison Jab, Cross Poison, Pursuit, Giga Drain, and Bounce. Its physical Attack is lower than its Special Attack, but not by a ton. Just switching it to Electric/Grass could be a good choice, bringing powder immunity in and retaining the nice canceling out of a Flying weakness and a Ground weakness. You also switch from a Rock and Fire weakness to a Fire, Ice, and Poison weakness. OK so maybe switching to Grass/Electric is a bad idea, but Giga Drain with STAB is nice.

Durant: 109 base Speed is enough to outrun Garchomp and the Musketeers! It's got Crunch, Shadow Claw, Stone Edge, Thunder Fang, and Superpower. Bug/Dark is actually a decent type combination, and though I hesitate to recommend a double weakness to Bullet Punch/Vacuum Wave, Dark/Steel could be pretty good too.Or it could pull off Ghost/Steel for a slight loss in damage output but no double weakness, and in fact immunity to Fighting. It's fast enough, hard enough hitting, and has good enough physical durability to have some real potential. (Its Special durability is crap though)

Genesect: Fire, Electric, Grass, Ghost, Psychic, Ice, Dark, and even Poison if you want to use Gunk Shot are all viable types for Genesect to run. When considering Techno Blast, it could also run Water, and it's also a good option for Normal between Extreme Speed and no-Drive Techno Blast. Water/Electric running Water Techno Blast would be a very solid Pokemon, or a Normal/Ghost version with Shadow Claw and Extreme Speed as its core moves would be good too.

Vivillon: There are three moves that separate Vivillon from Butterfree and its other copies: Draining Kiss, Hurricane, and Powder. Powder in particular is noteworthy because it means Vivillon can run Bug/Steel and almost ignore its weakness. (Note that Pokemon with Overcoat, that are part-Grass, or that are holding Safety Goggles will not hurt themselves if you attempt to use Powder on them and they use a Fire move. Given that various Pokemon like Volcarona and Charizard have motivation to run as Grass/Fire, this isn't that reliable a defense) I suppose one could run it as Fairy/Flying in a rain team.

Armaldo: Ground, Fighting, Water, Poison, Dark, Ghost for Curse, and Steel if you're willing to run Iron Tail are all possibilities. Water is of course particularly noteworthy since it gets Swift Swim. If you're fine with a double weakness to Grass, Water/Ground is quite solid.


My intention is to cover Ice types next. Because Ice is literally the worst defensive type in the game.
 
Pokemon immune to Electric via Ability

Water/Flying with an Electric immunity is only vulnerable to Rock. Incidentally, Water/Flying is the only way to be doubly weak to Electric.

Motor Drives

Electivire: Unfortunately, Electivire lacks both Flying and Water moves. It doesn't even get Aerial Ace! And given it's not a wall sort of Pokemon, it probably isn't worth running this trick for just for the difficulty in being harmed. It's probably better off adding Fighting for Drain Punch, or even going Ground/Fighting outright, presumably swap out Motor Drive for Insomnia.

Zebstrika: It gets Bounce. Not that much of a wall. It can run Lightning Rod instead, which doesn't help.

Emolga: Can of course pull off the Flying part, but not the Water part. Even less of a wall than the previous two.

Volt Absorbers

Jolteon: Nothing.

Lanturn: Naturally, it can pull off the Water part, and it also gets Bounce! (Not that it's all that physically oriented...) Has some potential, given its fairly high HP, though its Defense is awful.

Raikou: Unfortunately, it's Hidden Ability has yet to be released. Even with it released, the only way it could pull it off at all would be to use Weather Ball in rain, and honestly I'd probably rather run it as Water/Electric at that point with Thunder and Weather Ball.

Pachirisu: Oh man its statline is tortuous to look at. Fast, tough except not really, and with crap offenses. Lovely. And no, it doesn't get Flying or Water moves.

Minun: Wait, why is this a more competent version of Pachirisu when Pachirisu came later? Oh, and no Flying or Water moves.

Thundurus-Therian: No Water moves, and Sky Drop and Fly are its best Flying options. It's got better things it could be doing.

Lightning Rods

Manectric: Not even slightly.

Raichu: Come on Gen VI Surfing and Flying Pikachu, hurry up and exist! Otherwise, nope.

Marowak: Nope.

Rhyperior: I already mentioned it gets Aqua Tail, but alas, no Flying moves.

Seaking: Plenty of Water moves, and it gets Peck and Bounce. It could kind of pull this off?

Plusle: Not any better than Minun.

So, in summary: no Pokemon can really pull this off to its full potential, with Seaking being the closest you get.

Bug types

Bug is a mediocre type and has a lot of pairings that are particularly awful, or at least have a crucial problem: Heracross was kind of obnoxious back in Generation II, being the first Bug type that had the hitting power to really counter Psychic types, and then it not only had a double Flying weakness but was actively vulnerable to Psychic attacks! In Type Control you'll have the potential to salvage a lot of Bugs who are either ill-suited to their Bug typing or are marred by the exact combination they have being particularly awful. Plus Bug just isn't that great of an attacking type anyway, particularly since it's got no amazing moves.

Pinsir: It's got a zillion Fighting moves, it's got Earthquake, plus Knock Off. I'm not sure what happens when you Mega Evolve a Pokemon that changes type in doing so. Will it add Flying if your second type is free? Overwrite it period? Do nothing at all if your Pokemon has a nickname defining its type? Assuming for the moment the type doesn't change, Flying/Fighting, Flying/Dark, Dark/Ground (With Aerilated moves as coverage), or Fighting/Ground (Aerilate=coverage) are all good possibilities.

Scyther: I normally ignore pre-evolutions, but the main reason Scyther never sees use is that Bug/Flying is an awful, awful type. Scizor has the same stat total, just distributed differently, but Bug/Steel is really good, while Bug/Flying is really bad. 105 Speed is enough to outrun a lot of important Pokemon, and surprisingly it's only slightly more fragile than Scizor, and only against physical attacks. It can run Fighting, Dark, and even some mediocre Steel moves. Unfortunately, it lacks priority, it lacks moves to really abuse its own Technician with, and Scizor does have a Mega Evolution to dramatically increase the stat total difference.

Scizor: Scizor can of course run everything Scyther can run, and throws in more besides. (Scyther does not get Superpower, while Scizor does, for instance) Steel/Fighting is the only alternative to Bug/Steel that really stands out as having some potential for Scizor, and honestly the double Fire weakness is probably a lot more tolerable than having all of Steel's weaknesses at once when everybody is going to plan for Steel Pokemon. It's not like Scizor has the Special Attack to really appreciate STAB on Vacuum Wave.

Volbeat: Volbeat has this problem where it is markedly more Attack-oriented than Special Attack-oriented, and yet if you want to use it it would be because Tail Glow is three stages of Special Attack. It's actually got a fantastic movepool that can pull off Electric, Psychic, Ghost, Fighting, Flying, Fairy, and Grass, but it's too awkward to be liable to get use out of.

Illumise: Actually Special-oriented! Does not get Tail Glow because REASONS! It has basically the same movepool as Volbeat, except no Tail Glow. It also has access to Tinted Lens, which is a nice Ability. But no Tail Glow. Uuuuugh. Basically, don't use Volbeat or Illumise. sigh

Butterfree: It can finally get STAB on Psychic! Or better yet Shadow Ball! Or Energy Ball and Giga Drain! Or, um, Twister?... Keeping in mind it gets Quiver Dance and Tinted Lens or Compound Eyes, plus Powder moves so it's got almost-Spore like potential on Sleep Powder. I guess it could run Ghost/Grass? It'll probably be overshadowed by Venomoth and Volcarona though.

Beautifly: All those things I just said about Butterfree? Pretend I'm saying them about Beautifly, only replace 'Tinted Lens' with 'Rivalry' and be even sadder. It actually has more Special Attack than Butterfree though?

Kricketune: I don't think type modification really can salvage it.

Forretress: Ground/Steel for Earthquake STAB and no double weakness! (Though lots of Forretress never attack or only attack with Rapid Spin anyway) Normal typing for Explosion STAB! Really though, I'd probably make it Ghost/Steel for spinblocking and general durability, maybe give it Gyro Ball.

Accelgor: Lightning fast and with access to Hydration potentially a nice Rain-Rester. It also gets Curse, which could be an interesting thing to use as a Ghost Rain-Rester. Unfortunately, it's movepool is a bit limited: what isn't Bug is Grass or Poison, barring Focus Blast. (Or Normal, but it's got nothing amazing) It actually gets Recover too. Maybe a weird, fast wall that Curses enemy walls and then Recovers the damage off? It even gets Infestation to trap the enemy.

Volcarona: Flying, Psychic, and Grass are about it for its realistic alternatives. It has a decent physical movepool, but its Special Attack is more than twice its Attack, and it has Quiver Dance. Overall I feel Fire/Grass is its best option, but Grass/Flying or some such might be good for a rain team to use Hurricane. Fire/Grass and Fire/Psychic are its only STAB-using options that don't gain double weaknesses.

Ledian: I don't get why this thing gets Iron Fist, its Attack is a bad joke and its Special Attack is still awful. Just take Early Bird, if you're going to use Ledian at all. In general, just take a more defensible type combination, stat it up, Baton Pass, or toss out Toxic, or whatever. If Type Control finds Ledian is competitive I'll be amazed.

Shuckle: If there were a doubles format for this, it would be worth discussing its sweeper potential and what types go well with that: Trick Room, Power Trick, murder everything. In singles play that's far, far too impractical. Instead, let me say that Rock and Bug are both awful defensive types that are only kind of OK together, and you're much better off with Dark/Poison or something. Steel or Poison is basically a must for Toxic immunity.

Heracross: Fighting/Rock for the Mega Evolution's use would be great. For non-Mega, Ground/Fighting with Earthquake could be quite nice, and it even gets Smack Down. It's worth noting that it gets Shadow Claw: Ghost/Fighting is a fairly solid offensive pairing. It also gets some decent Dark moves.

Masquerain: Slow, not that tough, and not that hard hitting. Not a good combo. It's actually got an excellent Special movepool, including Scald, Solar Beam, Shadow Ball, Ice Beam, Blizzard, Energy Ball, Hydro Pump, Mud Shot, and Giga Drain. Certainly, just swapping out Flying for Water, or turning it Water/Grass, or Water/Ghost, or some such, would go a long way to making it less terrible, what with reducing its vulnerability to Stealth Rock and all.

Ninjask: Second-fastest Pokemon in the game, and overall speed king with Speed Boost. Bug/Flying is obviously a terrible combination with too many problematic weaknesses and a double weakness to Rock, but what else can it do competently? Well, it gets Night Slash... um... that's really basically it. Bug/Dark isn't all that bad of a type combination. It's not great, but there's worse out there.

Shedinja: Obviously the main goal should be to be as hard as possible to hurt. Dark/Poison with Air Balloon has been covered, pure Electric with Air Balloon could also be done but it loses the immunity to Toxic so that's sub-optimal, Dark/Ghost is actually only weak to Fairy, which you can't cover up but Fairy is not widely available via moves in actual fact, Steel/Fairy is only vulnerable to Fire and Ground but that's problematic... overall Dark/Poison or Dark/Ghost are probably it's best options, given it has Sucker Punch and Shadow Sneak, and it basically needs priority to keep itself relevant.

Mothim: It's Butterfree, but slower, harder hitting, and with equally high Attack and no moves to use it on. Also, Tinted Lens is its only good Ability. Um. Pass.

Vespiquen: It's actually got an OK statline, but it's movepool doesn't really range out from 'Bug' and 'Flying', barring a few mediocre moves like Ominous Wind. So make it a Bug/Steel with Defend Order, Attack Order, Heal Order, and Toxic? I guess?

Yanmega: Psychic, Solar Beam, Shadow Ball, Giga Drain, and... er... Ancient Power? It could run as Bug/Ghost, or Grass/Ghost, fairly competently. Or Psychic/Bug is not so bad. Keep in mind it gets both Tinted Lens and Speed Boost, so it has some real potential, even with a limited movepool.

Crustle: Earthquake! Plus Smack Down! It also has Shadow Claw, Poison Jab, Night Slash, and Knock Off. Just making it Bug/Ground instead Bug/Rock would be an overall improvement, and more interestingly running it as Dark/Ground would be quite nice.

Escavalier: Poison/Steel, Dark/Steel, Poison/Dark, are about all its movepool and statline can really support other than Bug/Steel, and Poison/Dark is the only one that actually removes the double weakness.

Galvantula: Sucker Punch, Energy Ball, Poison Jab, Cross Poison, Pursuit, Giga Drain, and Bounce. Its physical Attack is lower than its Special Attack, but not by a ton. Just switching it to Electric/Grass could be a good choice, bringing powder immunity in and retaining the nice canceling out of a Flying weakness and a Ground weakness. You also switch from a Rock and Fire weakness to a Fire, Ice, and Poison weakness. OK so maybe switching to Grass/Electric is a bad idea, but Giga Drain with STAB is nice.

Durant: 109 base Speed is enough to outrun Garchomp and the Musketeers! It's got Crunch, Shadow Claw, Stone Edge, Thunder Fang, and Superpower. Bug/Dark is actually a decent type combination, and though I hesitate to recommend a double weakness to Bullet Punch/Vacuum Wave, Dark/Steel could be pretty good too.Or it could pull off Ghost/Steel for a slight loss in damage output but no double weakness, and in fact immunity to Fighting. It's fast enough, hard enough hitting, and has good enough physical durability to have some real potential. (Its Special durability is crap though)

Genesect: Fire, Electric, Grass, Ghost, Psychic, Ice, Dark, and even Poison if you want to use Gunk Shot are all viable types for Genesect to run. When considering Techno Blast, it could also run Water, and it's also a good option for Normal between Extreme Speed and no-Drive Techno Blast. Water/Electric running Water Techno Blast would be a very solid Pokemon, or a Normal/Ghost version with Shadow Claw and Extreme Speed as its core moves would be good too.

Vivillon: There are three moves that separate Vivillon from Butterfree and its other copies: Draining Kiss, Hurricane, and Powder. Powder in particular is noteworthy because it means Vivillon can run Bug/Steel and almost ignore its weakness. (Note that Pokemon with Overcoat, that are part-Grass, or that are holding Safety Goggles will not hurt themselves if you attempt to use Powder on them and they use a Fire move. Given that various Pokemon like Volcarona and Charizard have motivation to run as Grass/Fire, this isn't that reliable a defense) I suppose one could run it as Fairy/Flying in a rain team.

Armaldo: Ground, Fighting, Water, Poison, Dark, Ghost for Curse, and Steel if you're willing to run Iron Tail are all possibilities. Water is of course particularly noteworthy since it gets Swift Swim. If you're fine with a double weakness to Grass, Water/Ground is quite solid.


My intention is to cover Ice types next. Because Ice is literally the worst defensive type in the game.
Great analysis! Note Hidden Power for special Attackers like Volcarona, who could be Fire/Rock or something and run HP Rock.
We do have Surf Raichu now btw ;)
 
I've ignored Hidden Power because, barring Technician, 60 BP is really not enough to justify a given typing, even for a strongly special-oriented attacker. Pokemon running Hidden Power in normal play are basically always planning to pick on a double weakness, like Thundurus running Hidden Power Ice for Garchomp, Dragonite, Landorus, etc etc. In Type Control you can't count on anything having a double weakness, let alone a predictable set of top-tier threats.

Also Fire/Rock is one of the worst type combinations in the entire game that nothing should ever run without a really really good reason. Double weakness to both Water and Ground, weak to Rock and Fighting... it's awful.

But hey now Raichu can sort of kind of pull off the Water/Flying with Lightning Rod thing. Hidden Power Flying+Surf, I guess.
 
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Has anyone tried out giving Synchronoise to an Espeon, Gardevoir, Sylveon or something and making it two of Fighting, Poison, and Psychic (Psychic for STAB, other two are weaknesses)?
 
Has anyone tried out giving Synchronoise to an Espeon, Gardevoir, Sylveon or something and making it two of Fighting, Poison, and Psychic (Psychic for STAB, other two are weaknesses)?
Synchronoise isn't really worth it when you only get a 30 BP increase in exchange for barely hitting any pokemon in the meta (not to mention you can't hit poison dark types without miracle eye)
 
Ice Type

Ice is an awful, awful defensive type (You can compare it directly to Steel and Steel's only drawback is that Ice isn't vulnerable to Ground), and its offensive value doesn't necessarily justify trying to grab STAB on it via holding onto or adding Ice. In short, for a lot of Pokemon moving away from their Ice typing may represent a rather tangible improvement.

Lapras: Electric, Bulldoze, Dragon, Curse, Future Sight, Dream Eater, Zen Headbutt, Bug, Steel, and Drill Run. Its equally competent at Physical and Special, but its movepool is not so much. Even so, Steel/Ground, Steel/Dragon, Ground/Psychic... it can do some interesting things. And it gets Water Absorb, so running it as a Ground type of some kind can have fewer weaknesses than it 'should'.

Dewgong: Bug, Dark, Iron Tail, Belch, and Drill Run. Thick Fat can make Fire and Ice weaknesses more ignorable too. Water/Bug? I dunno, nothing really stands out.

Mamoswine: It has Peck for some ungodly reason. More relevantly, Steel, Dark, Rock, and Fighting-through-Superpower are all options for it. Steel/Ground or Steel/Fighting are both quite solid, and it can use Thick Fat to cover the Fire weakness either way.

Glalie: It can run Dark, Ground, Ghost, Weather Ball, Steel, Bug, sort of Water (Water Pulse), sort of Rock (Rollout), and Normal for Explosion. Not all of these play nicely together: its Ground, Normal, Rock, and Steel options are all physical, while its Ghost, Weather Ball, Bug, and Water options are all Special. (It can do both in Dark) It can even still run in a Hail team because it has Ice Body, though otherwise Inner Focus is its best (legal) Ability. Ultimately it just has a weird/bad statline, but it has some potential just because it can be something other than Ice.

Regice: Electric, Fighting, Steel, Bug, and arguably Rock with Ancient Power. (Combine with Sandstorm for a ludicrous Special Wall) It's also got a slew of physical moves, but garbage Attack to use them with. It's really too bad Ice Body hasn't been released. Nonetheless, Fighting/Steel and Fighting/Electric are both quite good options, and even Bug/Electric is actually pretty synergistic. It even has Thunder if you want to run it in rain.

Glaceon: Normal, Ghost, Bug, Stored Power for Psychic, and a surprising number of physical moves its Attack stat cannot support. What is with Ice Pokemon having crap Attack but good physical movepools? In any event, Normal/Ghost is of course a solid type combination, and it could potentially pull off Psychic/Bug with Calm Mind for Stored Power spam. Being tougher but slower than Espeon, in some respects it can pull off the effect better. No Magic Bounce though, so overall not really.

Vanilluxe: Holy crap it actually has good stats, though that's an unfortunate Speed amount. Then again, Weak Armor... in any event, Weather Ball can let it adapt to any weather team, it can pull off Steel, Bug, and sort of Water. (Water Pulse) It's not actually very flexible, but just turning it Steel and running Flash Cannon would be a solid improvement over being Ice, and Weather Ball is a fair amount of type flexibility on its own: run it as Heatran in a sun team, Empoleon in a rain team, Probopass in a Sand team, and, er, actually it probably should just stay away from being on Hail teams.

Beartic: Water is an obvious one of course, combining with Swift Swim, but it can also pull of Ghost, Fighting (Superpower, but also Brick Break), Rock, sort of Ground, Dark, Fairy, and it actually has a number of good Normal moves too, so it could run a competent Normal/Ghost. A very flexible Pokemon and a fantastic support to rain teams.

Cryogonal: Has a weird, decent physical movepool, and lacks the stats to really use it. It does get Solar Beam, Signal Beam, and Flash Cannon. Just subbing in Steel over Ice directly represents a flat improvement, barring Mold Breaker Earthquakers. (And OK you lose immunity to Freeze and Hail, but whatever) If nothing else the fact that it has Rapid Spin will stop being a cruel joke.

Avalugg: STEEL TYPE GOGOGO. But seriously, it can also run Dark, Ground, Rock I guess, and could maybe pull off using Curse to Curse people via being a Ghost. I personally would just make it Ground/Steel and call it a day. Who needs Steelix?

Articuno: Keep in mind it's only slightly worse at Physical than Special. Unfortunately, its best non-STAB moves are U-Turn, Signal Beam, and Steel Wing. I guess it could pull off Steel/Flying and be a fast Skarmory with more even defenses that can't set hazards or anything like that. (Fast Defog though)

Delibird: Doesn't have the stats to be worth bothering... but it can run Fighting, Dark, Grass, Bug, and Poison. More realistically, you can give it defensive typing and have to be a Spiker, Rapid Spinner, etc. Most realistically, you can not run it at all.

Walrein: Dark, Ground, Bug, Rock, and Steel. Keep in mind that with Thick Fat it can effectively not be vulnerable to Fire and Ice even if it strictly is weak to them. (The most relevant scenario would be making it Grass type, but I'm not sure why you'd do that with Walrein) More realistically, it could be a Steel/Flying type whose only real weakness is Electric. Or maybe a Steel/Bug with one single-tier weakness to Fire. It's got some interesting options, in short.

Froslass: Fighting, Electric, Dark (It also gets Sucker Punch!), Weather Ball, and Bug. Note that its Dark and Fighting options are Physical while its other options are Special (Including it has no physical Ghost moves) So it's slightly less diverse than it sounds, unless you specifically want a mixed attacker.

Cloyster: Poison, Payback (SHELL SMASH PAYBACK. IS GOOD IDEA), Bug, Explosion, and of course it gets Rock Blast. I hesitate to suggest it because it's such an awful type combination, but Rock/Ice would give it STAB on Icicle Spear and Rock Blast at the same time. Not much really stands out: its core functionality tends to be compromised by changing its type without really putting into a new, good niche.

Weavile: Fighting, Ghost, Bug, Poison, and it gets Metal Claw and Iron Tail if you want to give Steel a shot. Some interesting options. Dark/Poison is of course a decent type combination. Just keep in mind that Fighting/Dark is walled by and doubly weak to Fairy while Dark/Steel still has a double weakness to Fighting.

Aurorus: Electric, Steel, Dark, and Dragon Tail. Just swapping out Rock for Steel would make it the same-thing-but-better (Excepting Sandstorms and Fire moves), and more awesomely it can do Dark/Electric (With Refrigerate to turn Nature-Power-becomes-Tri-Attack into a decent coverage move) and not completely suck. I mean, its statline is still awkward, but it at least has a chance in Type Control. It really has no business running Rock, in any event. Even turning it pure Ice would probably be an improvement. Ice/Electric is also actually synergistic, since Electric covers up Ice's Steel weakness.

Kyurem (Including alternate Forme's): Fire, Electric, Psychic, Ghost, Fighting, Steel, Rock, Bug, and Ground. It's very flexible. If Kyurem-Black isn't already banned, I'll be surprised if it stays unbanned.
 
Screw it, double post time.

I'm currently trying out a sun team, but I've had... two matches with it. Nobody ladders this meta why. Main thing I've noticed thus far is that Dark/Poison Chlorophyll Leavanny is lightning fast, hard hitting, and surprisingly difficult to kill, particularly if it Synthesizes in sun. Fire/Grass Victreebel is exactly as fun as I'd hoped it would be, though I don't have a solid idea of how good it is yet, since I only used it in one of the matches and only barely.

And it's time for....

Rock Type

Rock is such a bad type. (Better than Ice defensively...) To be fair, it is the only type that by itself walls Talonflame's traditional STABs, but Electric/Dragon, Electric/Water, and Electric/Fire all do that too, and this is Type Control so any Pokemon can run those if it wants. Not only that, but Talonflame is able to and has cause to run Flying/Steel with Steel Wing, at which point it can mash your poor Rock type for STAB Super Effective damage just fine, rendering that a moot point. Similarly, the fact that it's one of five types that crushes Shedinja is irrelevant in Type Control. Really, it's only good selling point in Type Control is the fact that it gets a Special Defense boost in Sand, which can be enough to justify it on Tyranitar. (Or Hippowdon)

I was originally going to cover Onix, and then I noticed it's more than 100 BST behind Steelix. I'd been under the impression that, like Scyther>Scizor, it had the same stat total, just distributed differently. Nope.

Tyranitar: Fire, Ice, Electric, Ground, Dragon, Fighting, Ghost, Water, Steel, Curse, all for Physical and most for Special. Only Ghost and Steel are things it lacks Special moves for, in fact. Very flexible. Just keep in mind that if you want to run Sandstream/Mega Tyranitar, it needs Steel, Ground or Rock as part of its typing if you don't want to be injuring yourself. Or I suppose you could always run Safety Goggles regular Tyranitar if you want it immune to Spore anyway and aren't willing to run Grass. (Which it has no moves for)

Sudowoodo: Grass, Dark (Sucker Punch and Foul Play, specifically), Fighting, Ground, Explosion, Curse, Fire, Ice, Electric. Particularly notable is that it gets Wood Hammer and Rock Head, which is normally sort of nice but nothing amazing, but could hit quite hard with STAB. 100 Attack on a 120 BP STAB move with no disadvantage is nothing to sneeze at. It's fairly flexible in general, actually. Slow and not that tough, but flexible.

Probopass: Electric, Fairy, Ground. It also gets the elemental punches, but its offenses are bad enough before you go using its weaker offensive stat. An alternative plan is to just give it a defensive typing and focus on Status moves etc, such as Steel/Flying with Thunder Wave etc.

Regirock: Ground, Fighting, Curse, Explosion, Fire, Ice, Electric, Steel, and it also gets Gravity! Ground/Fighting works quite nicely with Smack Down or Gravity. Ground/Steel has its appeal too. Of course, AV Rock type Regirock is a classic for a reason, more than covering up its comparatively weak Special Defense, and Rock even combines decently with Fighting if you want to stick with the classic but upgrade it. (Everything else it gets a move for ends up with one or more double weaknesses when paired with Rock)

Rampardos: Psychic, Ground, Dark, Fighting, Dragon, Steel, Curse, Fire, Electric... it can get Pain Split and Endeavor, too, though its statline would have trouble pulling that off. Two main routes present themselves: Mold Breaker running Ground and Electric (Or maybe Fire) to mess up those assorted Levitators that feel safe with double weaknesses not to mention Flashfire or Electric-immune-via-Ability types that also feel safe with double weaknesses. Or, take Sheer Force and focus on moves with relevant side effects, which mostly means Iron Head, Zen Headbutt, Thunderunch, and Fire Punch. Three of these have Ground weaknesses, so probably Zen Headbutt+one of the others.

Gigalith: Explosion, Ground, Curse, Steel, Superpower, and it gets Gravity. Honestly, barring Sand Force, it reads a lot like a bad Regirock to me. It actually has several moves Regirock doesn't get, but they're all Special moves it lacks the stats to support.

Golem: Explosion, Sucker Punch, Fighting, Steel, Curse, Fire, and Electric. Golem already shows up at times using Sturdy+Weakness Policy+Sucker Punch, and now it can get STAB on it. Just being able to escape the horrifyingly bad Ground/Rock combination gives it a new lease on life, and the fact that it has some actually decent options that fit together is icing on the cake. It's just too bad it gets Rock Head and no non-Normal recoil moves.

Omastar: Ice, Ground, and an obnoxiously good physical movepool. Just switching from Rock/Water to Ground/Water and taking Earth Power is probably a big improvement, because even though it keeps the double Grass weakness, it removes all the other weaknesses, and then it can use Ice Beam as coverage against Flying Pokemon, and need only be bothered by Levitators. That's, uh, about all that can be said positive about it, unless you want to go Normal for Wring Out STAB? It is a 121 BP move on a full health target...

Kabutops: Dark, Fighting, Aerial Ace, Bug, and it has Special Grass and Ground moves if you want to run off its inferior Special Attack. Just swapping out Rock for Dark is probably a fairly straightforward improvement to its performance. It doesn't have a lot of options, but they're decent options -and more importantly probably solid improvements over its normal type combination.

Aerodacty: Steel, Dark, Fire, Ice, Electric, Dragon, Ground, and Water. It's also worth commentary that it gets Double Edge and Rock Head, so a Normal variant has some potential. Mostly it will be very glad to move away from Flying (Which it lacks any good options for) and Rock (Which it has nothing that benefits from Tough Claws for) and on to moves Mega Aerodactyl can abuse the heck out of. STAB Tough Claws Iron Head and Dragon Claw are nothing to laugh at coming off 105 Attack, and Dragon/Steel is actually a pretty great type combination with none of Dragon's weaknesses, STAB against Fairies... it's good stuff, and probably Aerodactyl's best choice overall.

Bastiodon: It has such awful offensive stats I'd probably just run it with a better walling typing, like Dark/Poison or Steel/Flying. If you're going to try though... it gets Electric, Ground, Fire, Ice, and Dragon moves. More generally worth noting is that it gets Curse: slapping Ghost typing on it gives it an offensive option that is only useless against Magic Guard Pokemon. It even gets Block to trap enemies with!

Archeops: Dark, Dragon, U-Turn, Ground, Ghost, Steel Wing/Iron Tail, Heat Wave, and Water. Honestly, I'd go for Ground/Steel for the double Stealth Rock resistance and general defensibility. Just being less fragile as a type combination would go a long way to help Archeops get around Defeatist and actually contribute, including potentially making Roosting back health to get above Defeatist range actually viable. Archeops might have a chance in this meta is what I'm saying.

Terrakion: Ground, Aerial Ace, Bug, Poison, Steel and Psychic. Overall I'd probably go Fighting/Ground or Fighting/Steel and wreck face.

Barbaracle: Dark, Fighting, Dragon, Ground, Ghost, Bug, Poison, plus an obnoxious number of Special moves it should never use. It also gets Skull Bash if you care for some reason. Very flexible: just swapping out Rock for Ground represents a fairly straightforward improvement, Water/Dragon is a classic solid typing, Fighting/Ground has problems against Flying but that's what your Rock moves are for (Including Smack Down!), and Ghost/Dark could be a great supplement to Shell Smashing: only one weakness to pick on makes it a lot harder to stop. Pretty much anything is an improvement over Rock just for the fact that it gets Tough Claws and Head Smash is the only Rock move to make contact in the game.

Tyrantrum: Dark for Crunch is of course the obvious thing to do, and it gets Fire, Ice, Electric, and a Poison Strong Jaws-benefiting move of course. Additional notables include Earthquake, Brick Break, and Curse if for some reason you think Tyrantrum has any business laying a Curse on its enemy. Mostly I'd go Dark/Ground and murder everything after a Dragon Dance, personally, but Dark/Fire is pretty solid too, providing immunity to Burn and Strong Jaws bringing Fire Fang up to just about Earthquake in strength.

Rhyperior: Bug, Poison, Fighting, Water, Ghost, Dark, Dragon Tail, Dragon, Curse, Fire, Electric, Rototiller, Steel, and a bunch of Special moves it lacks the stats to use. Basically it can do nearly anything. Wow. Keep in mind that Solid Rock means it's less important to keep its number of weaknesses down -it's still bad to have the enemy capable of picking on a weakness without needing to switch or anything, but it's less bad than it would usually be.

Magcargo: Ground, Solar Beam, Gyro Ball. Uh. Wow. You can escape its horrifying type combination, but you can't escape its awful movepool. Wow. Just... don't use it.

Corsola: Ground, Ice, Ghost, Psychic, Explosion, Curse, and Sucker Punch. It's too bad its statline is so bad.

Aggron: A rare case where it might be strongly worth holding onto the Rock typing: Head Smash+Rock Head with STAB is quite powerful. Otherwise, it can pull off Dragon, Ground, Fighting, Ghost, has Curse, Fire, Ice, Electric, Water, and it has Aerial Ace if you care. Plus a bunch of Special moves it can't really use. Rock/Ghost off the top of my head, abusing Head Smash, can be pretty good. Or you could ignore STAB on that and just go for Ground/Steel, which is solid defensively and its got STAB for both parts and Head Smash is good coverage.

Relicanth: Ground, Psychic... er... Bounce... it's another Head Smash+Rock Head user, but honestly it's only real edge over Aggron in that regard is being less easily broken by Special attacks. Or I guess if you really want a Psychic/Rock or Psychic/Ground or Psychic/Water Pokemon using Rock Head Smash, Aggron can't compete. But. Why would you care? Zen Headbutt is bad, Psychic is bad.

Carracosta: Dark, Curse, Ground, Steel, and sort of Fighting. (Super Power, Low Kick, Rock Smash) Er. Well. It's still going to have the problem that it has to combine Shell Smash with Swift Swim to be fast enough to outspeed most things, it's still going to have awful Special Defense, and it turns out it has a limited movepool with limited type options. Gosh. Um. Honestly, there's probably other Pokemon -other Shell Smashers- that are more flexible and have better statlines and just don't use Carracosta. To be fair, it gets Solid Rock and that's... um... well, Rhyperior doesn't get Shell Smash?... Rhyperior also has a lot more HP and Attack, only slightly less Defense and Special Defense, and a vastly more useful movepool. Uuugh.
 
Steel / Flying (Arcanine) @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 248 HP / 252 SpD / 8 Spe
Careful Nature
- Morning Sun
- Iron Head
- Will-O-Wisp
- Roar

Here's one set I've been liking lately. Steel / Flying leaves it with only one weakness to electric on top of its already great defensive typing. Heatran can run a similar, possibly superior set but it's slightly slower and has no reliable recovery. Intimidate is another option but I think the utility of having a fire absorber is more beneficial to my team.

I usually idle in Pandora (English room). If I'm just sitting there, do challenge me.
 
urdrakonis, it is thanks to you and you alone that I have not become the dreaded triple poster. Your heroics are appreciated, citizen!

Normal Type

Normal is odd defensively. It's a great type for a Pokemon with overwhelming advantages in other regards, since it's only got one weakness and thus is very hard to pick on, but it also has only one defensive advantage -an immunity, admittedly- so it doesn't offer much value to a Pokemon in terms of filling a niche. Furthermore, STAB on Normal moves isn't all that great, because most Normal moves are actually pretty bad, and in any event the Normal type itself is awful as an offensive type. On top of all that, most Normal types have hugely diverse movepools of non-Normal-typed moves. As such, Normal types have a fair amount of incentive to abandon their typing in favor of something else, or at least to add something to their existing type. I've already talked about how Normal/Ghost only has one weakness, gets two immunities, and throws in a couple of resistances to boot, but there's plenty of types that can be used to give more definition and utility to your Pokemon.

... just don't make them Normal/Rock, Normal/Steel, Normal/Dark, or Normal/Ice. No reason to take on a double Fighting weakness.

Raticate: Dark, U-Turn, Electric, Psychic, and weakly Fire and Fighting. It's also got way too many Special moves it shouldn't be using. Dark/Electric? Sucker Punch can let it overcome its 97 Speed against the truly fast.

Kangaskhan: Dark, Outrage, Ground, Fighting, Ghost, Fire, Electric, Ice, Water, and I guess Iron Tail. Dark/Ghost, Dark/Ground, Ghost/Ground, Water/Fighting, Water/Electric.... there's plenty of good options to choose from. Mega kangaskhan isn't legal, but regular Kangaskhan might be worth a look-see anyway.

Tauros: Psychic, Ground, Rock, Electric, Steel, and Outrage. (It's also got some Dark options, but it's stuff like Payback) Sheer Force Tauros running Psychic/Steel could be worth a look-see. If you're running STAB Earthquake, Sheer Force is less appealing, being irrelevant to Earthquake, so probably stick with Intimidate if going that route.

Persian: Dark, Fairy, Rock, Electric, Ghost, Flying, U-Turn, Poison, Grass, and Foul Play. It can pull off both Physical and Special with similar competency, and with Technician it can do stuff like run Thief over Crunch and run Flying at all. (Aerial Ace) Worth a shot? Keep in mind some of its options are exclusively Special (Power Gem for Rock) and others exclusively Physical. (Play Rough for Fairy)

Lickilicky: Only slightly better at Physical than Special, actually, and it has Cloud Nine, so if weather teams become a big deal it might be worth considering for that alone. It can run Physical Grass, Steel, Dark, Ground, Fighting, Dragon Tail, Psychic, Water, Fire, Electric, Ice, and Iron Tail. (Also, Explosion) On the Special front it can run Ice, Fire, Electric, Solar Beam, Ghost, Fighting, and Water. Worth noting that it gets Curse and Belly Drum -overall it's probably better off sticking to the physical end of things just because of those. It's too bad it doesn't get Drain Punch or anything, though. Nor priority. Very flexible and fairly strong, anyway.

Blissey: Realistically speaking, you're probably making Eviolite Chansey and slapping on a defensible typing. But if you do want to run a Blissey that can attack, its options are Ice, Fire, Electric, Ghost, Psychic, and Fairy.

Ditto: Just give it a double resistance to Stealth Rock or make it Flying/Ground or Rock or Fighting (Stealth Rock+Spikes and Toxic Spikes protection) and call it a day.

Snorlax: Dark, Ground, Fighting, Rock, Electric, (Why does Snorlax get Wild Charge??) Psychic, Self-Destruct, Ice, Fire, Electric, Steel, Poison, Grass, and Outrage. Also keep in mind it of course gets Curse. If you're going to make it part-Steel (Or Poison) remember to not give it Immunity, stick to Thick Fat.

Porygon-Z (Or 2): Already the subject of much discussion, but nonetheless... Electric, Bug, Psychic, Ghost, Ice, Solar Beam, Dark, and Foul Play and Icy Wind are also worth noting. It's actually not that flexible, but even so.

Furret: Fighting, Ghost, U-Turn, Sucker Punch, Pursuit, Knock off, Fire, Ice, Electric, Water, and Iron Tail. Also a number of Special moves it's probably best off ignoring. Unfortunately, its stats are mediocre (90 Speed is nice, but not enough) and its best Ability is Frisk, so you're probably better off ignoring it in favor of some other Pokemon that can pull off its job better.

Ambipom: Flying (Technician Aerial Ace, plus it has Acrobatics), Fighting, Ghost, Dark (Technician Payback), U-Turn, Foul Play, Fire, Poison, Grass, Fury Cutter, Ice, Electric, Iron Tail and Knock Off. It also has Skill Link, though it has nearly no use for it. It also has an enormous Special movepool it has no business using. And of course it gets Baton Pass and moves like Nasty Plot, so you can potentially run it with a defensive typing and use it chiefly to benefit the team. It's very flexible.

Dunsparce: Ground, Ice, Ghost, Electric, Fire, Gyro Ball, Poison, Rock, Curse, Water, Psychic, and Iron Tail. Probably its best option is to focus on using Coil and its Physical options, though fortunately its only Ice and Ghost it of that previous list that it gets no Physical options for. Too bad it's slow and not that great. No priority, either.

Ursaring: Fighting, Ground, Ghost, Rock, Dark, Fairy, Fire, Ice, Electric, Poison, and Grass. It's really too bad Quick Feet is only a 50% boost to Speed. It's very flexible, but way too slow. Remember you can't use a Flame Orb to activate Guts if it's part Fire nor a Toxic Orb if it's part Poison or Steel. It has 130 Attack, so it might have a niche regardless of its crappy Speed. Too bad no priority.

Stantler: Psychic, Jump Kick, Electric, Ground, Ghost, Grass, Bug, Sucker Punch, Gravity, and Bounce if you care. Remember Gravity prevents Jump Kick from working. It's got the stats to run both Physical and Special, though not all its options are equally compatible there. (It's only Ghost option is Shadow Ball while its own Bug option is Megahorn) Mostly I'd give serious consideration to a Ground/Dark edition that uses Gravity, Earthquake, and Sucker Punch, maybe with Megahorn or Wild Charge for coverage.

Smeargle: Anything you want. Normally Smeargle wants a defensible typing, such as Flying/Steel or Dark/Poison.

Miltank: Psychic, Ground, Fighting, Steel, Curse, Fire, Ice, Rock, and Electric. It's actually fairly fast, tough, and hard hitting, and with Thick Fat and Sap Sipper can flexibly cover some weaknesses. Ground/Steel with Thick Fat seems one of its best options overall.

Linoone: Fairy, Ghost, Poison, and Grass. Also, Extreme Speed. Of these, Grass is the only one that doesn't cover Normal's weakness to Fighting, so Fairy, Ghost, and Poison could all be good to combine with its innate Normal typing. Extreme Speed is really its main claim to fame, so it probably should stay part Normal.

Vigoroth/Slaking: Fighting, Ground, Ghost, Rock, Dark, Fire, Ice, Electric, Poison, and Sucker Punch. Slaking doesn't seem to add anything in particular, unless you consider it worth going for its Special Attacking options.

Exploud: Fire, Ice, Electric, Ghost, Dark, Ground, Fighting, Water, Rock, and Outrage. Realistically speaking, if you're using Exploud it's for Boomburst, and honestly at that point you're probably better off going to Noivern. To be fair, Noivern doesn't get Scrappy.

Delcatty: oh man are its stats bad. Oh uh, it gets Fire, Ice, Electric, Ghost, Psychic, Sucker Punch, and I guess Iron Tail. Uuuh. Really, just don't use it.

Spinda: Sucker punch, Psychic, Ghost, Fighting, Rock, Electric, Fire, Ice, Electric.... but you know what I'd do? Put it on a V-Create Assist team with Contrary and a Choice Scarf, and make it Fire/type that compliments Fire. Otherwise, probably don't bother.

Zangoose: Fighting, Bug, Ghost, Dark, Poison (Don't do it though), Curse, Fire, Ice, and Electric. Fire/Fighting could be a good choice, or Fire/Dark. Fire just for the immunity to being Burned, which can really mess up Toxic Boost Zangoose builds. Or really, Zangoose in general.

Castform: There's an important question as to whether nicknames overrule the Form changes or are overruled by them. If Form changes win, then just go for hazard resistance and ignore this whole thing. If dictating type overrules Forecast's type changing, then it has Water, Fire, Ice, Electric, Ghost, Grass, Future Sight, and don't forget it can finally run Rock for Sandstorm Weather Ball STAB, which might even give it a real niche! (It is really hard to pull off a Special attacker that actually fits to a Sand team) On the other hand you can always use Rock Roserade or some such, so probably not.

Kecleon: Color Change and Protean make the question pretty irrelevant in regards to STABs. Instead you should focus on the considerations of hazards and what you need Kecleon to be able to switch on -in other words, if your team has a hard time switching in on Dark types, consider making Kecleon a Dark/Fighting, Fighting/Fairy, or Dark/Fairy type so that it's doubly resistant to Dark and will laugh off incoming Dark attacks when it's switching in.

Lopunny: Until Mega Lopunny comes along, it's not that notable, but even so... Fighting, Rototiller, Fire, Ice, Electric... er... Iron Tail?... Honestly, it's a bit narrowly focused in its movepool. It's too bad its stats don't really support a defensive style, because it actually gets Cosmic Power.

Bibarel: Curse, Superpower (Terrible with Simple), Iron Tail. Er. Don't bother.

Purugly: Ghost, U-Turn, Fairy, a number of Dark moves including Sucker Punch and Foul Play, and... Iron Tail?... I dunno, Dark/Fairy is about the only thing that stands out as particularly viable to me.

Regigigas: Fire, Ice, Electric, Fighting, Steel, Fighting, Dark, Ground, Rock, Psychic, and Gravity. I want Doubles Type Control so I can Entrainment Moxie onto a Ground/Fighting Regigigas and kill everything. Imagine a single tear running dramatically down my face at the thought this will probably never happen.

Watchog: Dark, Fighting, Poison, Water, Grass, Electric, Psychic, Fire, Ice, Iron Tail and a bunch of Special moves it probably shouldn't use. Mostly it's too slow, too fragile, and not hard enough hitting, with Abilities that range from OK to useless and no unique moves to help it stand out. Changing its typing isn't going to help when you can do that with everything else too.

Stoutland: Fire, Ice, Electric, Dark, Fairy, and Steel. Also kind of Fighting via Superpower and Reversal. I dunno, I wanna see Stoutland succeed but I cant help but suspect that there are plenty of Pokemon you could replace it with. On the plus side, it has Sand Rush, which only Excadrill and Sandslash share. (And Sandslash is Excadrill minus) So in a Sand team Stoutland could be your second Excadrill? To be fair, Excadrill doesn't learn Play Rough -a Fairy Sand whatsit has its good points. But outside of Sand I'm pretty sure Stoutland has too much competition.

Audino: Gosh, realistically just run a defensive typing. And save it for Doubles because Blissey/Eviolite Chansey is probably better in Singles. But if you wanna try to hit things with it... Electric, Psychic, Ice, Solar Beam, Ghost, Fire, Fairy, Water, Bug, Fighting, Knock Off and Iron Tail. It can run Physical or Special equally (poorly), but its movepool is much better filled out on the Special end of things.

Cinccino: Grass, Rock, U-Turn, Water, Knock Off, Poison, Iron Tail... Fighting (Technician Wake Up Slap)... honestly, if you're going to run Cinccino probably just go Grass/Rock with Skill Link, Rock Blast, and Bullet Seed. It's fast, hits fairly hard, Grass/Rock is two terrible types that taste great together, and even though the result competes with Mega Heracross it has notable advantages of A: being much faster and B: not being a Mega. Worst comes to worst, if your Mega slot is committed yet you find yourself wanting Skill Link Grass/Rock goodness, break out Cincinno. And maybe Band it, because otherwise you're nowhere near Mega Heracross' damage output.

Bouffalant: Bug, Ground, Rock, Poison, Electric, Steel, Psychic, Superpower, Outrage, and Payback. (It's slow enough going Dark for STAB might actually be worthwhile) Ground is appealing given that it has Sap Sipper, maybe run it as Ground Electric for good coverage?

Diggersby: Fighting, Rock, Electric, U-Turn. Fighting/Ground is a nice combination, and it gets Smack Down, so the likes of Skarmory can't just stick in on it indefinitely. Electric/Ground is also good, though utterly walled by Ground/Flying.

Furfrou: Sucker Punch, Electric, U-turn... uuuh... some Special moves... Wow. Um. Dark/Electric I guess.

Pidgeot: Heat Wave is about it for notable non-STAB moves. Ouch. Does not combine well with its unusual access to Hurricane. Probably just skip it, there's tons of Normal/Flying Pokemon to invalidate it.

Fearow: Ground, U-turn, Dark (sort of), er, Steel Wing... some Special moves it cannot support... urm. Ground/Flying is actually difficult to combine STABs for, but Empoleon can actually one-up it by using Earthquake instead of Drill Run. Blaziken can one-up it with Earthquake and Brave Bird! To be fair Fearow is much faster than Empoleon...

Farfetch'd: Hahahahahahahaha... oh, you're serious. Well, I guess it can run Poison, Dark, Grass, Curse, U-turn, Steel Wing... aaand that's it. Yaaaay.

Dodrio: Steel Wing and Knock Off are basically it. Hooray. Skip.

Noctowl: Psychic, of course, as well as Ghost, and Fire. Eeeeh. It does get Tinted Lens...

Swellow: U-Turn, Steel Wing... er... that's... really about it. Steel/Flying is overall a pretty straight improvement, anyway.

Staraptor: FIGHTING, Steel Wing, U-Turn, and that's it. Flying/Fighting is a pretty good type combination, so that's OK.

Chatot: Remember it gets Boomburst! Otherwise, Fire. Yep. Oh and there's Synchronoise, but why bother? (And if you wanted to use Synchronoise, the smart thing would be to make it Fighting/Poison) Mostly, if you want to use Chatot run Normal/Fire, basically.

Unfezant: Dark, Steel Wing, U-Turn. Yeeeeep.

Braviary: Superpower, U-Turn, Steel Wing, Ghost. Hooray for sucking!

Pyroar: Solar Beam, Dark, and a depressing number of Physical moves it lacks the stats to use that well. sigh

Heliolisk: Dark, Water (If you're not running Sun), Focus Blast, and a number of Physical moves it lacks the stats to use.


I might cover Fighting types next. There are a lot of Fighting types that have flexible physical movepools. Other than that, I think I'm nearly done covering Pokemon by type -there's tons of others to cover of course, but "all the Dragons" just isn't as interesting a topic as "all the Ice types", since the Ice types are a lot more likely to jump up substantially in utility from being able to change type, where the Dragons are only a little better -or even actively worse when you consider how all their competition gets the chance to improve itself hugely.
 
I've played Type Control a fair amount since it was approved and of course, made a few sets. These are two that I had a good amount of success with. NOTE: These are pre-ORAS.


Steel / Dragon (Charizard) (M) @ Charizardite X
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Iron Tail
- Dragon Claw
- Flare Blitz

This is a straight forward powerful Dragon Dancer. The typing is good and with both STABs being useful while Flare Blitz provides coverage and they all make use of Tough Claws. (One little down side is that Iron Tail has a low accuracy of 75%.) Charizard can sweep mid to late game. I opted for a Jolly nature, but Adamant works to of course. As for EVs, I simply went for maximum offense.


Dark / Ground (Haxorus) (M) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Mold Breaker
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Night Slash
- Earthquake
- Poison Jab

This one is also a powerful Dragon Dancer that can do a great amount of damage. I used this for mid to late game sweeping - which it can do well with or without Stealth Rocks up. Lum Berry was chosen to help with those Will-o-Wisps which are troublesome. Mold Breaker to be able to hit trough Levitate which is useful since it's a common idea to make use the ability in TC - also hitting through Shedinja's Wonder Guard. It can nuke the blobs, as well as KO Porygon-z. The STABs hit a lot and Poison Jab works well with them to hit fairies. EVs are straight forward. Adamant or Jolly, your choice.

So that's that, I just wanted to share them. I realize that the current state of Type Control is not that great but hopefully it can get more attention with ORAS because I feel like it has a lot of potential.
 
This is a very interesting metagame. I can't believe I only happened upon it just now.

Quick primer on ORAS Mega Evolutions (note that I am unclear about MEvos that gain an extra type, e.g. Sceptile):
  • Mega Beedrill can go Dark/Ground for STAB Drill Run and Knock Off (or keep Bug for STAB U-turn). Forget Poison Jab.
  • Mega Pidgeot can go Fire/Flying for STAB (plus No Guard) Heat Wave, but that's about it.
  • I don't know about Mega Slowbro. Water/Fairy or Water/Steel for better typing with CroBro?
  • Mega Steelix...I really don't know.
  • Mega Sceptile can't really take any further advantage of its ability Lightning Rod because it has no Water moves and its only Flying-type moves are Aerial Ace and Acrobatics (both physical, the latter being worse because holding an item is literally required). It can, however, change its typing according to coverage moves like Focus Blast and Hidden Power.
  • Mega Swampert pretty much requires Water STAB because it is rain-dependent, so the only new type I see it adopting is Ice for STAB Ice Punch.
  • Mega Sableye could use its standard Calm Mind set except given Fairy-type to use Dazzling Gleam as its offensive move for better coverage.
  • Mega Sharpedo can go Dark/Ground for STAB on Earthquake and immunity to Thunder Wave. I would keep Dark because of Strong Jaw Crunch.
  • Mega Camerupt can add Steel for better defensive typing (with an added bonus of STAB Flash Cannon).
  • Physical Mega Altaria appreciates Ground/Fairy for a nice Earthquake+Return STAB combo, while special Mega Altaria appreciates Fire/Fairy for STAB Flamethrower or Fire Blast plus Hyper Voice.
  • Mega Glalie can add Ground for STAB Earthquake (plus T-wave immunity).
  • Mega Salamence...oh, wait. It's banned.
  • Mega Metagross can add Ground for STAB Earthquake (plus T-wave immunity).
  • Mega Latias and Mega Latios are pretty much like their base forms except with slightly better stats.
  • Mega Lopunny is fine the way it is. This may seem like a cop-out, but it's true.
  • Mega Gallade is basically like the regular except with better offensive stats.
  • I am not sure about Mega Audino either.
  • Mega Diancie can go Ground/Fairy for STAB Earth Power and better typing.
Also, how about Ghost/Fighting Dragalge with Adaptability Shadow Ball and Focus Blast? Sounds like a kicker.

(and don't forget Electric/Ice Belle Pikachu with STAB Volt Tackle and Icicle Crash)
 

canno

formerly The Reptile
Not home atm but it would be great if this came back.

A potential threat i can see atm is Dark/something Mega Beedrill. Ground is probably best, since most Fairies are part Steel and dont mind anywyas? Then again like with Cress they can get around it. Hell maybe it will keep Bug for STAB U-turn. idk what i think would be best for it alongside Dark. All i know is Dark is the way to go imho.
 
I edited the OP. Anyway, I personally don't think Mega Beedrill will impact the metagame, as the two most common physical walls have an incredibly easy time walling it (Steel/Fairy Cresselia and various Avalugg sets.) Also, it's about time for me to ban Porygon-Z, i've decided to ban it months ago anyway. Porygon-Z is now officially banned. If you have any objections, please PM me if/why you want to join the council.

Current Suspect:



Ghost/Normal OR Dark (Gliscor) @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 158 HP / 252 Atk / 98 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Knock Off
- Facade
- Substitute / Earthquake / Roost
- Swords Dance

With a 140 Base-Power STAB Facade, Gliscor can sweep unprepared teams. Knock Off pairs well with Facade, as very few types can wall Normal + Dark-type coverage. Gliscor has an easy time setting against various threats, so Substitute is a great option that works well together with Poison Heal. Earthquake is a decent option over Substitute, as it grants it the coverage to defeat a few dangerous threats, such as Steel-type Avalugg. Roost makes Gliscor a lot harder to kill, as Gliscor has the bulk to abuse it significantly. The EV spread allows Gliscor to outpace fully invested Adamant Mega Heracross (I highly suggest using this EV spread.)
 
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What I wanna see is a Shedinja ban, if anything. Dark/Poison Air Balloon Shedinja demands Sand, Hail, Mold Breaker, or Will O Wisp, or Leech Seed/Curse/get Stealth Rock up first -no other options work. The thing seriously restricts team-building -there's plenty of otherwise viable teams that won't have any of those, or will have only one Pokemon that can do any of them, and then Shedinja is ready to come in and kill everything. And then it can run other obnoxious options -Steel/Flying is immune to Sand, still immune to Toxic, and is only weak to Electric and Fire, and can actually hold an item- for extra pain.

I liked the idea of Shedinja having a meta it's viable in, but it's torture.

Quick primer on ORAS Mega Evolutions (note that I am unclear about MEvos that gain an extra type, e.g. Sceptile):
Nickname always overrules as far as I've seen.
 
What I wanna see is a Shedinja ban, if anything. Dark/Poison Air Balloon Shedinja demands Sand, Hail, Mold Breaker, or Will O Wisp, or Leech Seed/Curse/get Stealth Rock up first -no other options work. The thing seriously restricts team-building -there's plenty of otherwise viable teams that won't have any of those, or will have only one Pokemon that can do any of them, and then Shedinja is ready to come in and kill everything. And then it can run other obnoxious options -Steel/Flying is immune to Sand, still immune to Toxic, and is only weak to Electric and Fire, and can actually hold an item- for extra pain.

I liked the idea of Shedinja having a meta it's viable in, but it's torture.



Nickname always overrules as far as I've seen.
To be honest, your reasoning does sound a lot like standard threats. Most good teams run Mold Breakers, Leech Seed, Stealth Rock, etc anyway, as all these moves are mandatory for more relevant reasons. I do see your point though, so I guess we should all just keep an eye on it!
 
To be honest, your reasoning does sound a lot like standard threats. Most good teams run Mold Breakers, Leech Seed, Stealth Rock, etc anyway, as all these moves are mandatory for more relevant reasons. I do see your point though, so I guess we should all just keep an eye on it!
Yeah, but many teams only have one of those, and it can be a relatively simple matter to keep SR off the field and KO the setter, especially if your team is specifically built to set up a Shedinja sweep.
 

canno

formerly The Reptile
Shedinja requires way too much support in order to even be considered a threat. This isn't even mentioning the fact that Stall Teams can still beat Shedinja by simply PP stalling it.

I don't think Shedinja is broken at all.
 
Just though I would take a second to point out Shedinja electric or poison/dark with air balloon. Kind ridiculous to try to get rid of.

Other possible threats:

Normal/Water or Normal/Dragon (Dragonite) @ Leftovers
Jolly/Adamant nature
Ability: Multiscale
Moves:
-Dragon claw
-Waterfall/Aqua tail
-Extremespeed
-Dragon Dance

STAB espeed with your choice or secondary coverage STABs. Dragonite has the highest base power of any espeeder so you can be sure it will hit hard. Dragon type gives it more resistances and a more neutral STAB but also more (common) weaknesses. Pick your poison.

Steel/Fighting (Medicham) @ Life Orb/Expert Belt/Medichamite
Adamant nature
Ability: Pure Power
Moves:
-Bullet punch
-Hi jump kick/Drain punch
-Thunder Punch
-Ice Punch/Bulk up

Pure power STAB bullet punch. OUCH. Drain punch helps curb damage you take (especially if you chose life orb) while HJK kicks people in the face. Thunder punch for a bit of coverage and either ice punch for the good ol' bolt/beam coverage bulk up for more beat face and take beat power

Flying/(Type of choice) (Scizor) @ Flying gem
Adamant nature
Ability: Mold Breaker
Moves:
-Bullet punch/Quick attack
-Acrobatics
-Swords dance/Roost/Pursuit/U-turn/Coverage
-STAB/Coverage

Lets do some math: Acrobatics has base 55 power x1.5 from technician x1.5 from STAB x2 from no item and finally x1.3 if you had flying gem at the time. That comes out to 315.25 power initially and 242.5 power every use after that. With 130 base attack, you hurt. I don't list a second type because there are so many options. Normal to buff quick attack, steel to buff bullet punch, dark to buff pursuit, bug to buff u-turn or bug bite: The list keeps going.

Lastly, and spinner/defogger with steel/(type resistant to rock) just to clean the field for your shedinja.
 
I understand why there this concern over Shedinja in this metagame, but it can be taken care of very easily using the various methods that I am sure everyone is aware of. Honestly pretty much every team has Stealth Rocks be it offence or stall.

If you are using offence I would recommend using Mold Breaker mons simply because there are various sets that would make use of the ability Levitate that will be troublesome to face without being able to hit them supper effectively.

If your using stall then surly your team packs SR or Will-o-Wisp or any other method to deal with Shedinja.

Not to mention that Shedinja is really weak with it's base 90 Atk stat. And it's not like it has Endeavour either. This gives you many opportunities to take it out. At the very end Shedinja is just really something to look out for and as long as you do that it's not a problem. If Shedinja becomes to too centralized and has a big emphasis on the meta then it should be looked at as a potential suspect.
 
Just though I would take a second to point out Shedinja electric or poison/dark with air balloon. Kind ridiculous to try to get rid of.

Other possible threats:

Normal/Water or Normal/Dragon (Dragonite) @ Leftovers
Jolly/Adamant nature
Ability: Multiscale
Moves:
-Dragon claw
-Waterfall/Aqua tail
-Extremespeed
-Dragon Dance

STAB espeed with your choice or secondary coverage STABs. Dragonite has the highest base power of any espeeder so you can be sure it will hit hard. Dragon type gives it more resistances and a more neutral STAB but also more (common) weaknesses. Pick your poison.

Steel/Fighting (Medicham) @ Life Orb/Expert Belt/Medichamite
Adamant nature
Ability: Pure Power
Moves:
-Bullet punch
-Hi jump kick/Drain punch
-Thunder Punch
-Ice Punch/Bulk up

Pure power STAB bullet punch. OUCH. Drain punch helps curb damage you take (especially if you chose life orb) while HJK kicks people in the face. Thunder punch for a bit of coverage and either ice punch for the good ol' bolt/beam coverage bulk up for more beat face and take beat power

Flying/(Type of choice) (Scizor) @ Flying gem
Adamant nature
Ability: Mold Breaker
Moves:
-Bullet punch/Quick attack
-Acrobatics
-Swords dance/Roost/Pursuit/U-turn/Coverage
-STAB/Coverage

Lets do some math: Acrobatics has base 55 power x1.5 from technician x1.5 from STAB x2 from no item and finally x1.3 if you had flying gem at the time. That comes out to 315.25 power initially and 242.5 power every use after that. With 130 base attack, you hurt. I don't list a second type because there are so many options. Normal to buff quick attack, steel to buff bullet punch, dark to buff pursuit, bug to buff u-turn or bug bite: The list keeps going.

Lastly, and spinner/defogger with steel/(type resistant to rock) just to clean the field for your shedinja.
Acrobatics has 110 base power with no item, removing the Technician boost. Secondly, Flying Gem is unreleased if I recall correctly.
 
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