CAP 20 CAP 20 - Part 2 - Typing Discussion

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aim

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Water/Steel seems like excellent typing for CAP 20 to set up on Revenge Killers. When i think of revenge killers i think of Talonflame, Latios (-2 after Draco), Choice Scarf Tyranitar and the list goes on. Water/Steel takes advantage of that and provides an easily spam-able move in scald, assuming we go down the set of CM as opposed to DD or SD. The ability to beat some of the best set up mons stoppers (horribly worded bare with me) in the game i.e. unaware clefable and set up on fat mons themselves is invaluable to Cap 20 prolonging its sweep. Agreeing with srk1214
 

tehy

Banned deucer.
i'm also rather liking Water / Steel ; I think we almost need Steel-typing, since if Clefable beats us it's pretty bad, and Steel beats that hands down. It does have the downside of disliking Scarf Lando-T, but so do half the typing suggested anyhow. (plus, i guess Levitate is an option). It is kind of rekt by Keldeo though, a problem for the CM set especially.

Water / Poison also has a lot of this locked down, but i'm not a big fan of losing to Psyshock. Better than Keldeo, maybe.

Water / Steel is a better overall typing but Water / Poison is a bit better since Psyshock lati@s can be worn down by its STAB a lot easier and won't like DD sets, plus gunk shot is a nice strong STAB.

idk man this is hard, not a huge fan of elec / fairy because it just gets toxxed and can't brake clefairy, sucks against ferrothorn too.
 
I would go with the water-steel combo, but, looking at type coverage, bulky waters just destroy us regardless of the set we use. Slowbro can easily out stall us, and defeat us. I too like the electric/fairy option, however, I feel for CM, this isn't the best. Electric fairy is nice, but then it is hindered by EQ users, and they are abundant. Also, as a dragon dancer, it has to rely on play rough, with isn't the best. For me, fairy isn't the way to go for mixed threats. And I agree with NumberCruncher, priority is important for it to stop revenge killers.

Looking at the types, I see these as having reliable and good special and physical STABs. This would be it's main STAB IMO.

Ground: EQ and earth power
Electric: Thunderbolt and fusion bolt (As it seems to be allowed)
Water: Surf/Scald and waterfall <- Gets Aqua Jet
Steel: flash cannon and iron head
Dragon: Dragon pulse and Dragon claw/outrage
Fighting: Aura sphere (Is it allowed?) and close combat <-Gets a physical and special
Grass: Giga drain/energy ball and leaf blade/seed bomb
Dark: Dark pulse and knock off <- gets sucker punch
Poison: sludge bomb/wave and poison jab
Normal: Tri Attack (Inc nature power)/hyper voice and Return <- gets extreme speed.
Bug: Bug buzz and x-scissor

Ghost: Shadow ball and Shadow claw/phantom force <- gets shadow sneak

Ghost gets a weaker physical selection, but, it gets coverage similar to dragon (Resisted by one, immune against one), and with its 2 immunities, it would be a good starting base for us. Also, it is immune to gothitelle's shadow tag, letting us escape if it wants to try trap us and trick us on a choiced item or something.

If it gets refridgerate/pixilate/aerialate, these get the good STABs of normal.

We really want both the sets to be viable, and I feel that the CM set is too big on both the electric/fairy and water/steel sets. And yes it can set up, but Water steel dual STABs are really bad IMO.

I'd have a look more towards Dragon/Steel. While this is walled by pretty much most OU steel types, it does actually take them on fairly well. However, it would probably need some coverage limitations to successfully work. Adding in strong fire/ground coverage gives the CAP a very large amount of coverage. It is also kept in check by pokemon like bisharp and metagross.

CM: The main ones you would see are sub-CM/CM+3 attacks/CroCAP-20 and may get a recovery move for 2 attacks and recovery. For this, it can cause a stalemate with the likes of ferrothorn and friends.

DD: Gets strong STABs with outrage/dragon claw and Iron head, and could even wield meteor mash, and possibly get bullet punch. With a strong STAB of dragon, it can tear a lot down, but leaves it hindered by the fairies and steels, and its steel typing gives fairies a hard time setting up on.

Notable STABs: Outrage, dragon claw, dragon pulse, draco meteor, meteor mash, iron head, bullet punch, flash cannon.

I would have liked to do something with normal types, but then there is little to go well with it.

Well, there is my opinion
 
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Korski

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Okay I made these charts for my own benefit but I think they are helpful so I’ll post them before I launch into my post.

Since mono-attacking and potential coverage has come up, I’ve broken down each STAB’s coverage individually for assessing said coverage necessities. All three typings absolutely need both STABs on the set, imo, although in the case of Electric / Fairy, it can get away with only Fairy / Fire if for some reason I can’t imagine it chooses to forego Electric attacks.

Electric / Fairy

2x: Ground, Poison
1x: Fairy, Fire, Ghost, Grass, Ice, Normal, Psychic, Steel, Rock, Water
1/2x: Bug, Dark, Electric, Fighting, Flying
0x: Dragon

Weak to STABs (22*):
  • Electric (8): Azumarill, Charizard-Y, Gyarados, Manaphy, Skarmory, Slowbro(-M), Starmie, Talonflame
  • Fairy (12): Altaria-M, Breloom, Conkeldurr, Dragonite, Gallade-M, Garchomp, Kyurem-B, Latias, Latios, Lopunny-M, Sableye-M, Tyranitar(-M)
  • Both (3): Gyarados-M, Keldeo, Mandibuzz

Resistant to STABs:
  • Both (4): Excadrill, Ferrothorn, Magnezone, Venusaur-M
  • Mono-Fairy (9): Excadrill, Ferrothorn, Gengar, Heatran, Jirachi, Magnezone, Metagross-M, Scizor(-M), Venusaur-M
  • STABs + Fire (0): None
  • Fairy + Fire (1): Heatran

Water / Poison

2x: Electric, Ground, Psychic
1x: Dark, Dragon, Flying, Ghost, Grass, Normal, Rock
1/2x: Bug, Fairy, Fighting, Fire, Ice, Poison, Steel, Water

Weak to STABs (17):
  • Water (9): Charizard-Y**, Diancie-M, Excadrill, Gliscor, Heatran, Landorus-I, Landorus-T, Mamoswine, Talonflame
  • Poison (7): Altaria-M, Azumarill, Breloom, Celebi, Clefable, Gardevoir-M, Sylveon
  • Both (1): Tyranitar

Resistant to STABs:
  • Both (1): Ferrothorn
  • Mono-Water (16): Altaria-M, Azumarill, Breloom, CAP20, Celebi, Dragonite, Ferrothorn, Gyarados(-M), Keldeo, Kyurem-B, Latias, Latios, Manaphy, Slowbro(-M), Starmie, Venusaur-M
  • STABs + Fire/Fighting (0): None

Water / Steel

2x: Electric, Fighting, Ground
1x: Dark, Fire, Ghost, Grass
1/2x: Bug, Dragon, Fairy, Flying, Normal, Psychic, Rock, Water
1/4x: Ice, Steel
0x: Poison

Weak to STABs (15):
  • Water (7): Charizard-Y**, Excadrill, Gliscor, Heatran, Landorus-I, Landorus-T, Talonflame
  • Steel (5): Altaria-M, Clefable, Gardevoir-M, Kyurem-B, Sylveon
  • Both (3): Diancie-M, Mamoswine, Tyranitar

Resistant to STABs:
  • Both (8): Ferrothorn, Gyarados(-M), Keldeo, Manaphy, Rotom-W, Slowbro, Slowbro-M, Starmie
  • Mono-Water (16): Altaria-M, Azumarill, Breloom, CAP20, Celebi, Dragonite, Ferrothorn, Gyarados(-M), Keldeo, Kyurem-B, Latias, Latios, Manaphy, Slowbro(-M), Starmie, Venusaur-M
  • STABs + Grass (1): Ferrothorn

*Gyarados and Mega Gyarados are listed separately but tallied as one Pokemon
**Drought tho

Remember that this Poke is going to be more of a surgeon than a butcher; the stats cannot be specialized towards either set, meaning the DD set will be underwhelming compared to Charizard-X/Dragonite/Gyarados-M and the CM set will not have the staying power we’ve come to expect from Pokemon like Slowbro-M and Sableye-M. This is a rare instance in CAP where SE coverage is going to be more important to the successful outcome of the project than neutral coverage, or else the power just won’t be there and players will simply be better off using the aforementioned boosters instead, which is why I am partial to Electric / Fairy. In all likelihood, as all three typings are weak to Ground and Electric/Fighting/Poison/Psychic (all quite common, save for Poison), our CAP will get at most two turns before facing OU’s brutally strong attackers (simply having a Water STAB will not prevent the CAP from getting Earthquaked). Surprise value will only get us half of the way to where we want to go, and unless we go bonkers on stats or movepool, then I do fear that this CAP with Water / Steel will fail to gain any traction in the metagame, as it threatens the fewest amount of Pokemon amongst these three types and has the weakest STAB options. It could still work, although I think Water / Poison might be the better way to go for this concept now (Water / Steel is, of course, one of the best typings in the game, just not for this concept, imo).

I do have a significant worry about the Water typings in general, that absent SE coverage (as in the mono- or dual-STAB CM sets), they are actually set up on by a majority of other boosting sweepers in the tier, notably Gyarados(-M), Keldeo, Manaphy, Slowbro-M, and potentially Breloom, Dragonite, Garchomp, Latias, Latios, Sableye-M, and Thundurus. This is less of an issue for Water / Poison as it is for Water / Steel, but it is still an issue for both and is hardly an issue for Electric / Fairy (Clefable and Scizor(-M) would be legitimate concerns). We like to joke about Scald’s seemingly 100% Burn rate, but in reality it is not a reliable check to opposing setup sweepers, so I think these Pokemon are going to end up raining on our parade unless we take strong measures to address them.

And to address status: Toxic immunity is certainly a nice thing to have but as it stands a grand total of zero Calm Mind users in OU are actually immune to the status (Sableye is the exception only if it has MEvo’d already), so I wouldn’t say at all that this particular immunity is a required prerequisite for bulky sweeping. A similar argument goes for Paralysis (in favor of Electric / Fairy); the CAP doesn’t need to be immune to this status, but it would be advantageous for both boosting sets to not have to run Substitute or Taunt or something to avoid catching it. I would argue that Paralysis cripples the CM set more than Toxic cripples the DD set, making it the more threatening status of the two, but I will not try and force that opinion on others.
 
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I do not think Water / Steel is the best typing for this CAP. While it is good defensively, Water / Steel is a horrible STAB combination offensively, and bulky Water and Grass types will just stop this thing cold. There really is not much of a spammable STAB except for Scald, and Slowbro, Ferrothorn, and Keldeo are very common in OU, all of which can be problematic for an offensive Water / Steel CAP.

Poison is not necessarily a bad STAB to have if the Pokemon can use it well, but Water / Poison is not exactly for the concept of this CAP. It is not necessarily the Ground weakness, but the Psychic weakness, which leaves this CAP vulnerable to Mega Slowbro, which appears to hard counter the CAP if it possessed a Water / Poison Typing.

Electric / Fairy is an interesting typing to have, but it seems too easy of an opportunity for bulky Ground types that are not Garchomp to come in. You could say this about Poison typing too, but at least Poison-type attacks can mess with a Hippowdon / Lando-T / Garchomp with the threat of a Poison chance. Regardless, it still looks like an interesting option to pursue due to how many Pokemon in OU are threatened by either STAB.

Ununhexium I would like to challenge your stated con of Poison as a questionable STAB. As a Dark Type, having a neutral hit on common Fighting and Dark-Types like Keldeo, Mega Lopunny, and Mega Gyarados, as well as a Super Effective hit on common Fairy Types like Clefable, Mega Altaria, and Azumarill is exceptionally handy. You mention being able to threaten Landorus, presumably Therian, as important, but Landorus-T is one of the easier Pokemon in OU to lure out due to how many Pokemon it checks and its 4x weakness to Ice-type attacks, so being vulnerable to Landorus-T is not necessarily that much of a flaw, especially since we can cover that issue when we discuss movepool.
 
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Ignus

Copying deli meat to hard drive
Haven't been around much since this thread started, and unfortunately, that meant I couldn't get this tool posted quickly in the discussion. It should be a helpful reference for this discussion with direct relation to OU.

http://spo.ink/ignuschart1

This spreadsheet, to put it simply, talks directly about CAP's STABs and the STABs of Pokemon in OU. All you have to do is copy the sheet, put a typing in the yellow box on the main sheet, and it will show you if the type 'checks' or 'counters' each Pokemon. While the reference isn't perfect (it's not a damage calculator) it does give a decent basis to jump off of for your arguments for or against a typing. The exact definition of what a Check and Counter mean in this situation is better defined in the Reference sheet within the spreadsheet. Feel free to message me if you run in to any bugs (for example: resists being wrong for a certain type), issues, or typos in the spreadsheet, and I'll fix it ASAP.
 

DetroitLolcat

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srk1214's argument for Water/Steel was very convincing, and I believe it and Water/Poison are by far the best options for this CAP. It'w a great defensive typing for a Calm Mind user because it's only weak to two common Special attacking types: Electric and Ground. However, it's not particularly hard to sponge non-STAB Earth Powers so the only Ground special attacker we'd have to worry about is Landorus-I. Furthermore, it still gets to use the most spammable offensive move in the game: Scald.

Water/Steel doesn't necessarily make for a great Dragon Dancer, but it's not bad either. Water is a great Physical attacking type, and although Steel doesn't complement it great offensively it does a great job defensively by providing a Brave Bird resistance. We'd probably need some sort of coverage so Ferrothorn and bulky Waters don't destroy us, but that's within reason. The bottom line is that Water/Steel works, and I support both Water/Steel and Water/Poison fully.
 
Now, this is the first time I've contributed to anything other than flavor for a CAP, but here goes nothing.

I'm fully in support of Water/Steel for CAP 20's typing. Not only does it get access to STAB Bullet Punch and Scald, it can set up on Talonflame. I think one 'mon that we have to take into consideration is Conkeldurr, however. It shrugs off Scald burns thanks to Guts, and unless CAP 20 has Mega Slowbro-level Physical Defense, it's going down to a few Drain Punches.

In addition, as has been previously said, Ferrothorn and bulky Waters (Slowbro stood out the most to me) wall the living heck out of this CAP, so we're going to need to give it Fire or Fighting coverage, possibly in addition to Knock Off. We're also going to have to watch for stray Focus Blasts on non-CM variants. Landorus-T is also a big problem to DD variants, as it can drop their attack with Intimidate and proceed to threaten it with an EQ.
 
So looking over the information we have again, I'm highly surprised our line-up has nearly no answers to Landorus-Therian. I would have thought the Choice Scarfed Intimidater would have been the very first consideration given that we only plan to need one Dragon Dance, and Landorus is built to invalidate one Dragon Dance. Water/Poison and Water/Steel can Aqua Jet it, but they're never going to have the +1 boost on it, so there's no way on earth it's going to hit for enough. Then it dies to Earthquake because that hits for way to much and is super effective. Electric/Fairy and Poison/Dark are in an even worse state of affairs because they can't even land a super effective hit, or in Electirc/Fairy's case a hit at all. Dragon Dance sets won't get past it, and Calm Mind sets get trounced by it.

In fact, at this point I would argue any set that can't get past Landorus-Therian isn't viable for a Dragon Dance set. When you take into account that Lando-T is the singular most common pokemon in OU right now, getting hard countered by that is unacceptable.

For this reason, I'm going to shove my weight behind Ghost/Fairy again. Somebody else is going to put up the Water/Poison set. Simply put, a slight weakness to priority doesn't outweigh an inability to beat the most common pokemon in the game.
 

Deck Knight

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Lando-T can be handled a couple of ways, and typing isn't really one of them if we want either paralysis or toxic immunity (Sub-flying makes our sweeper SR weak and Lando uses Stone Edge). For example, if CAP is faster than Lando-T (92+ Base Spe), then DD + Icicle Crash/Ice Punch will suffice as long as +0 Ice Coverage can OHKO. Regardless of typing or ability, CAP could also have a viable Air-Balloon set that would allow CAP to come in on a predicted Earthquake and then set up and be too far gone the next time Lando-T comes in. In fact I almost wager we would want Scarf Lando-T to be an answer to Calm Mind, but not to Dragon Dance. When one of our major concerns has a significant weakness to a typing that synergizes offensively with most of our discussed main STABS (Ice to both Electric and Water), the real issue is making sure it doesn't get the drop on CAP at +1. That can be done because of Lando-T's odd speed tier, where CAP can be faster than it without being so overwhelming as a sweeper that it forgoes a booster.

So yes, Lando-T is a concern, but its glaring Ice weakness plus odd speed tier are two elements our CAP process can handle adequately.
 
I think NumberCruncher makes a good point, but the way you suggest the watercap v Lando matchup plays out (it aqua jets, doesn't KO, is KOed by EQ) is quite narrow. It assumes Lando switches in on the DD and isn't hit on the switchin, and it depends on cap having less than Lando's mediocre base 91 speed (if it's faster than Lando when they're both at +1spe it will just go for the waterfall, boom, roasted. And incidentally, supposing that it does happen to be faster than LandoT, CM sets aren't trounced outright - by scarf they are, but they beat the physically defensive variant better than DD does.) Another hypothetical solution to Lando T would be something like Hyper Cutter or any better variant. And so on and so forth. At the end of the day Lando doesn't have the raw bulk to be considered a 'hard counter' to anything that packs supereffective stab against it. Its presence is, in my view, an argument in favour of water/steel, not against. The counter I am more concerned about dealing with is Ferrothorn, which is a hard stop to almost every typing we're considering. But Ferrothorn is easily handled by Fire/Fighting coverage or maybe Taunt, which means we get to choose which of the two sets, if either, beats it - a definite plus for the 'double boosting' concept in my view, so Ferro walling both stabs is not all bad in my book.

As what I just said suggests, I like Water/Steel for this cap, for reasons that have been better explained above than I could attempt to myself. The brief obvious ones: spamming CM scald is a winning strategy, and having some common priority resistances makes DDing that much more viable.
 
For example, if CAP is faster than Lando-T (92+ Base Spe), then DD + Icicle Crash/Ice Punch will suffice as long as +0 Ice Coverage can OHKO.
Let's assume that this is a Choice Banded or Life Orb Landorus, since that's the only type that will actually be outsped by those stats(Namely the Choice Scarf Variant) while also not tanking by said Ice Punch and OHKOing anyway (The Defensive set). It's usual Choice Band build is 200 HP/252 ATK/52 DEF and an Adamant nature, which means we can't OHKO that without either 100 base ATK and a Life Orb or 130 base ATK and an Adamant Nature. That's what it takes to beat a variant that is neither Choice Scarfed nor defensive. To beat a Choice Scarf variant, you can't have any item except Air Ballon. You lose otherwise. This limits us to Adamant Nature, 130 ATK, and an Air Balloon. This is how the Dragon Dance variant has to be built in order to not lose to Landorus in any form.

At that point, calculations look like this:
252+ Atk Tentacruel Ice Punch vs. 200 HP / 52 Def Landorus-T: 372-440 (100.8 - 119.2%) -- guaranteed OHKO
(Went with Tentacruel since I was already doing calcs with the Water Poison set. A similar calc for anything without STAB on Ice)

The issue there is that the logic behind giving a Pokemon with at least 130 Base Attack and only around the range of 92-99 Base Speed (remember, this isn't supposed to be viable as a non-booster) an Attack boosting nature instead of a Speed Boosting nature is completely unreasonable. Furthermore, now any Priority move is good enough to kill CAP by virtue of breaking the Air Balloon. That means no matter how much resistance we have to priority moves, it almost doesn't matter. Heck, a good number of Pokemon will still outspeed us because we don't have a Speed boosting nature, so we'll need at least two Dragon Dances to get by. One more issue with this is that the Calm Mind set would usually gain more from having a recovery item, so we might end up having our item give away our set, reducing or eliminating the surprise factor.
 
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Korski

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NumberCruncher Let’s not get melodramatic about Landorus-T just yet. Yes, there is a good chance it can check the physical set because, well, checking physical attackers is what Lando-T does, and it’s good at it, hence its high usage. But Lando-T is not perfect: it has no recovery beyond Leftovers; offensive sets are substantially less bulky than the defensive pivot set; it is vulnerable to repeated hits on the numerous occasions it switches in, especially from the Special side (which the CAP itself will be capable of); it has a highly predictable moveset; and it has a 4x weakness to Ice that would prevent it from freely switching in if CAP even has access to it in the movepool (CAP will have HP-Ice for sure). Overcoming OU’s premier physical check, on the first occasion it enters battle and when it is at full health is, as you’ve shown in your latest post, an enormous stretch and essentially either a huge distraction from the concept due to the measures it would take to outright defeat it 1-on-1, or a very slippery slope to overpowering our CAP.

Even still, we would have to abandon a host of typing advantages in the metagame in order to cater to defeating Lando-T by typing alone, which imo Ghost/Flying Fairy (sorry to misread) doesn’t even do (Stone Edge, Knock Off). I honestly don’t see how Ghost/Flying fairs any better than any other typing, and its negatives vastly outnumber its positives in every other area. In regards to the currently-under-consideration typings, Lando-T doesn’t resist Dark, Fairy, or Steel, and it is weak to Water, so they are not as helpless as you are making them out to be. As has been mentioned, there are numerous avenues outside of typing with which to handle just about anything. In Lando-T’s case, there are Ice attacks, Water attacks, Levitate, Defiant, Competitive, Magnet Rise, Air Balloon, 92 Spe, or simply just common gameplay strategy that people already use to wear Lando-T down. CAP gets to have five teammates, remember.

It’s certainly too early to call the CAP a failure if it is not overwhelmingly obvious that it can beat a single, particular Pokemon. The typing decision is a broad brushstroke; it’s about the bigger picture and keeping our direction clear but our options open. The sky is not falling, don’t worry.
 
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Even still, we would have to abandon a host of typing advantages in the metagame in order to cater to defeating Lando-T by typing alone, which imo Ghost/Flying doesn’t even do (Stone Edge, Knock Off).
Fairy, not flying. It's on here for the same reason Fairy is on Electric/Fairy, except with Ghost it has better coverage and no weakness to Ground.

But lets even ignore Landorus-T. That doesn't change the fat that Ground in general is the most common coverage types in the game and a plethora of fast Pokemon have access to it that aren't necessarily weak to priority. Ignoring Landorus-T, we have Garchomp, Lando that isn't Therian, Diancie, and Kyurem-B, not to mention others that can still outspeed us unless we use priority, and Landorus-I is the only one who can reasonably die to priority Aqua Jet. And these aren't slouch pokemon either, Garchomp being 7th in usage as of February. Furthermore, adding answers to these pokemon specifically takes away from the coverage we can have against Ferrothorn, which everybody struggles with. This means we have to answer it in abilities, and that requires us to dedicate ourselves to an ability way earlier than we would like.
 
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I remain really unconvinced by Water/Steel. While it's a nice defensive typing it just falls short offensively.
The coverage is redundant. Steel only hits fairies super-effectively where water cannot (and ice too, but Kyu-B is the only thing worth running steel for STAB for). It's a nice niche to have, but this typing is completely anti-fairy anyway. Water would pretty much be the only usable STAB, on the DD set at least. It's very undesirable for this CAP to have to rely on only one STAB when it's likely its stats will end up being quite average across board due to the nature of the concept.

I understand toxic immunity is nice to have, but it's unnecessary to address as much as we can at this stage of the process. Status issues can be easily solved at both abilities and movepool and I would argue its better off being solved elsewhere. Basically it's not worth compromising typing over, especially when the DD set really needs two synergistic STABs with in order to do its job of cleaning teams up as soon as it can.

Every legitimate typing combination thus far has an issue with ground types, even the Water suggestions. This will remain the same even in light of access to Aqua Jet. In this concept the DD set is supposed to start cleaning up after a single boost. With that in mind if lando-t comes in and neutralises the boost then Aqua Jet will not actually do that much to it. (It's so much more feasible for Lando-T to switch in on the set up than not by the way.) Even on the completely bulk uninvested Choice Scarf sets, we're still looking at just about 50% damage from Aqua Jet off a 125 base attack. So water/steel and water/poison will still be outright threatened by Lando-I anyway.

In a bit of a rush so couldn't cover everything I wanted to in this post.
 
I am unsure why everybody says we need to be able to remotely deal with Landorus-T and prevent it from ever being a problem. Numerous Pokemon in OU are all capable of doing work despite being weak to Landorus-T. Handling Landorus-T is a component that you work into teambuilding, and as long as our CAP is still capable of doing SOMETHING to Landorus-T that can wear it down (Knock Off, Ice coverage, status, etc.), then being weak to Landorus-T should not be that much of an issue.
 
Even after reading Ununhexium's advantages/disadvantages list, I still stand by Electric/Water. Both STABs being resisted by Dragon types only really applies to the Latis and Altaria-M, as the other Dragons (Charizard-X, Dragonite, Garchomp) all have a dual type that makes them at least neutral to one STAB, and aside from that it's very similar to Water/Poison, with one status immunity that helps one of the sets more than the other (although I'll agree toxic immunity is a little more important) and a Ground weakness. Electric has more important priority resists (although generally less) and a more reliable physical STAB seeing as Fusion Bolt is allowed, but Poison has a Fairy resistance (which in turn means can beat Clefable) and can use Black Sludge, so it's pretty fair.

Now, I'll give my thoughts on some of the other types. Specifically, about the two most supported (Water/Steel and Electric/Fairy), I'm alright with these, but generally prefer the two listed above. Although Water/Steel is very similar to Water/Poison (Toxic immune, spams Scald, resists Fairy), it's easier to wall over Water/Poison and Water/Electric, as Water types give it crap unlike the other two and it also has an unfortunate Electric (which Water/Poison also has however) and Fighting weakness, so it doesn't seem as tempting. As for Electric/Fairy, it seems really easily stopped by most Steels, despite the neutrality (keep in mind several of 'em have Electric resistances and even an immunity with Excadrill) and to nail it in, it's can't even hit Lando-T on the switch-in, which while isn't necessarily crucial, it's a good quality for the previous 3. On the side, I think Steel/Fairy can work, but suffers from the same things Electric/Fairy does but has a little more defense to it.

TL;DR: Supporting in order Electric/Water > Water/Poison > Water/Steel > Steel/Fairy > Electric/Fairy
 
Although water/steel is good, How many dual type calm mind users regularly have a coverage move? Ususally, it is some form of recovery/support. Sub/roost/recover/slack off, there are a ton. Even then, the mono-type ones have 1 form of coverage. Also, this pokemon then is unable to do much damage to bulky water types like rotom-w. And there it is: rotom-w. WoW shuts off our DD set, and Thunderbolt hits us very hard. The CM set gets worn down by Will-o-wisp, and with thunderbolts and crits, it is unlikely it will survive. Also it completely gets shut down by ferrothorn, and with it's leech seed, it isn't going anywhere.

Electric/fairy, as I said before, wouldn't be balanced on sets unless it got pixilate, as play rough is a terrible physical STAB. Although I see it as an amazing duo, the lando-t problem is still around. I would say it is one of the best so far. Something possible is that there is the possibility that the CAP gets levitate as an ability, however, it is a little too much than I think we could handle. We also get the chance to use air balloons. I feel that this type combination leans a lot on a CM set rather than mixed options.

Water/poison does still have the lando-t problem, has an option to take it on with water STAB, and deals with the fairy menace with poison. It does get a good balance on reliable STABs. Also, a major problem is gothitelle. This thing can switch in and wreck strategies. Dugtrio, although rarer, is a pain here too, especially if hazards aren't up.


I really want to try put forward a normal type pokemon, so here is Electric/Normal.
2x: Ground, Fighting
1x: Normal, Fire, Grass, Water, Dark, Fairy, Ice, Poison, Psychic, Rock, Dragon, Bug
1/2x: Electric, Flying, Steel
0x: Ghost

Weak to STABs:

Electric (8): Azumarill, Charizard-Y, Gyarados, Manaphy, Skarmory, Slowbro(-M), Starmie, Talonflame

Resistant to STABs:
  • Both (3): Excadrill, Ferrothorn, Magnezone
  • Mono-Normal (Many): Any ghost/rock/steel pokemon
See below about coverage.

Normal has a very large neutral coverage, and that is useful as a bulky pokemon. With access to hyper voice and nature power/tri attack, we have some powerful move options for CM user, especially VS sub users, and moves like return, double edge and thrash, with the possibility of extreme speed and quick attack for priority. It can also get parabolic charge for a tad of recovery. While it has a lot of checks to these STABs, it has very little in the way of counters, with there really being excadrill and ferrothorn. Add in fighting coverage, and it isn't resisted. As an electric type, it can't be paralyzed, so that is a plus for the electric typing, and Normal typing gives us really strong in neutral coverage. With coverage, it can gain a wide variety of move types. Most move types give the CAP some form of additional SE coverage, with the normal typing patching up resistances with neutral coverage, adding to the the unpredictability to this pokemon. As it doesn't have the best resistances, it still has enough to take hits as a CM user, and can be deadly as a DDer but still has weaknesses that stop it from S-tier.
 

Imanalt

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So the more i talk with people on irc and read through the thread, the more i hear "water/steel isn't good for dd." People seem to have this notion that we need to run both stab moves or we aren't good. A lot of the most threatening attacking pokemon in the tier do not run both of their stabs, some by choice and some by not having two good stab attacks. But I don't think anyone is saying landorus doesn't have enough offensive presence because it doesn't run flying stab (although hurricane would be insanely strong on it). Hell, one of the mons I see ending up with a very similar dd set to us, m-altaria, usually foregoes its dragon stab to run roost one stab and a coverage move on dd. The advantages steel offers the typing in terms of aided set up, and being harder to revenge are more valuable than having a secondary stab that is also good offensively.

Also on the somehow popular electric/fairy type. Its a great type. Its a bad type for what we're trying to accomplish. Cm sets have little to no option other than to run both stab moves, heatran is a huge problem for those running monofairy (as well as being outclassed by clefable, whose magic guard makes it likely better as a pure cmer than we will be), and there are a multitude of common ground mons to beat monoelectric. I don't like restricting our cm sets to being unable to run taunt or sub or whatever else ends up being helpful to cm. Electric/fairy is relatively good for the dd set, I'll give it that. In terms of physical stabs, Play rough is fine, and wild charge is meh, but functional, but both also easily set up options for good coverage options. But a type that only works for one of our set up moves not the other is not good, especially when that option is dd. This isn't because people who like water/steel are biased against dd, which I've heard implied, its because dd will be primarily dependent on stats and the effectiveness of our coverage moves. Very few types can run just their stabs with no coverage and be good, and very few types with the correct two coverage moves don't end up hitting everything they need to hit.
 

DougJustDoug

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MODERATOR ANNOUNCEMENT

Fusion Bolt is NOT on the table for CAP 20 at this time.
There was apparently some confusion amongst the TLT and the mods as to what exactly is allowable or not at this time -- and the earlier post about Fusion Bolt was a mistake. Event Moves and Signature Legendary Moves are disallowed for use in CAP movepools, and that applies to Fusion Bolt as well.

We'll talk a lot more about moves later in this CAP project, and too much discussion of specific moves in this thread is considered poll-jumping. If access to Fusion Bolt is a make-or-break factor for you in supporting Electric, then consider it a "break". Otherwise, consider CAP 20 within the framework of regular moves (e.g. Wild Charge) and movepool rules, as outlined in the CAP Process Guide and recent Policy Reviews.
 

reachzero

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I think one of the most important things to keep in mind about this concept is that we want the two boosting sets to have very different counters. In other words, we should choose a typing combination that won't automatically require movepool and base stat wizardry to beat the most common defensive Pokemon in OU. In other words, if both sets are going to lose to things like Ferrothorn, SpD Heatran, Skarmory or Landorus-t, we should pick a different type. Of course, we COULD solve any of these problems individually at other stages (Electric/Fairy walled by Ferrothorn? I guess Reckless High Jump Kick, whatever) but it is silly to leave ourselves open to that at this stage when it would be far easier to pick a typing that can actually handle these reasonably well.

In other words, typing is not useful or bad in a vacuum, it is useful or bad in the context of a metagame. A 4x weakness to Psychic might sound bad, for instance, because we don't like 4x weaknesses, but realistically there aren't enough good Pokemon in OU that use Psychic moves to care.

For this reason, I think that Electric typing, and specifically Electric/Fairy isn't a good choice for this CAP. Landorus-t is everywhere in this metagame, and it has the resources to Intimidate and destroy a Dragon Dance Electric/Fairy while tanking an unboosted Fairy hit from a defensively minded Calm Mind Electric Fairy. In other words, I think the potential for Landorus-t to destroy both sets is very high with Electric typing, assuming the secondary typing isn't supereffective against Landorus-t.

Given this reasoning, I feel that Water/Steel has a lot going for it--Water type gives us of options regarding what will and wont' counter each set based on what coverage moves we choose to give it, and Water/Steel has the extra benefit or giving us STAB Steel against Clefable, which is a major issue for all kinds of boosting sets. This combination doesn't have an easy time breaking Ferrothorn either, but as least it isn't weak to it, and Water STAB will clearly deter Landorus-t, Heatran etc. from switching in freely.
 
Normal/Ghost
Weakness: Dark(2x)
Resists: Normal(0x), Ghost(0x), Poison(.5x), Bug(.5x)
STABs Super Effective Against: Psychic, Ghost
STABs Resisted Both By: No Single Type, Dark/Steel, Dark/Rock

Normal Moves (Physical): Extreme Speed, Double-Edge, Return, Body Slam, Chip Away, Double Hit, Explosion
Normal Moves (Special): Boomburst, Uproar, Hyper Voice
Ghost Moves (Physical): Shadow Claw
Ghost Moves (Special): Shadow Ball

Continuing with the theme of only one weakness to exploit, Normal/Ghost would be another good choice for the CAP. Although this typing only provides two resists, it does have two immunities, and only two Pokemon, Bisharp and Tyranitar, resist both STABs. The other benefit of this typing combination are a STAB Boomburst and STAB Extreme Speed.

STAB Boomburst is very spammable and has great PP and hits hard; even Pokemon that resist it will be taking good damage from it. This is incredibly important for a boosting Pokemon and can not be stressed enough: using a boosting move takes a moveslot away from another move that could have been used as a coverage move. A Normal Typing would grant access to STAB Boomburst, which really takes pressure off not being able to hit every Pokemon Super Effectively. A neutral STAB Boomburst hits harder than a Super Effective Base 100 move, and almost as hard as a Super Effective Thunder, Blizzard, or Fire Blast. A Normal Typing really brings out the potential of the CAP as a versatile offensive threat by freeing up the rest of the movepool for specific threats.

Extreme Speed also allows the CAP to hit other priority users first, and hit them hard. It can help to force switches on Pokemon that have already been damaged or are frail in general, which would provide the opportunity to use a set up move. Extreme Speed also helps to mitigate the speed loss of being paralyzed. Return and Double-Edge as STAB moves are also a solid, and although they won't be hitting anything for Super Effective Damage, they will hit many neutral targets hard. The Ghost type attacks hit other Ghost types that would be immune to Normal moves for Super Effective Damage. Chip Away is another interesting STAB move, as it ignores the Stat Boosts of other Pokemon, although it probably will not see much usage. Explosion is an odd choice on a boosting Pokemon, but the threat of being hit with a STAB Explosion will always be on the opponent's mind.

Normal/Ghost provides the CAP with a typing that severely limits how the opponent will deal heavy damage to the CAP, while providing STAB for several versatile moves. Being able to switch into two types of moves for no damage and only having one weakness helps the CAP to stay alive and set up, being able to make opponents switch out a frail or already weakened Pokemon for fear of being taken out with a STAB Extreme Speed.
And in case you already forgot, STAB Boomburst
 
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Normal/Ghost
Weakness: Dark(2x)
Resists: Normal(0x), Ghost(0x), Poison(.5x), Bug(.5x)
STABs Super Effective Against: Psychic, Ghost
STABs Resisted Both By: No Single Type, Dark/Steel, Dark/Rock

Normal Moves (Physical): Extreme Speed, Double-Edge, Return, Body Slam, Chip Away, Double Hit, Explosion
Normal Moves (Special): Boomburst, Uproar, Hyper Voice
Ghost Moves (Physical): Shadow Claw
Ghost Moves (Special): Shadow Ball

Continuing with the theme of only one weakness to exploit, Normal/Ghost would be another good choice for the CAP. Although this typing only provides two resists, it does have two immunities, and only two Pokemon, Bisharp and Tyranitar, resist both STABs. The other benefit of this typing combination are a STAB Boomburst and STAB Extreme Speed.

STAB Boomburst is very spammable and has great PP and hits hard; even Pokemon that resist it will be taking good damage from it. This is incredibly important for a boosting Pokemon and can not be stressed enough: using a boosting move takes a moveslot away from another move that could have been used as a coverage move. A Normal Typing would grant access to STAB Boomburst, which really takes pressure off not being able to hit every Pokemon Super Effectively. A neutral STAB Boomburst hits harder than a Super Effective Base 100 move, and almost as hard as a Super Effective Thunder, Blizzard, or Fire Blast. A Normal Typing really brings out the potential of the CAP as a versatile offensive threat by freeing up the rest of the movepool for specific threats.

Extreme Speed also allows the CAP to hit other priority users first, and hit them hard. Extreme Speed also helps to mitigate the speed loss of being paralyzed. Return and Double-Edge as STAB moves are also a solid, and although they won't be hitting anything for Super Effective Damage, they will hit many neutral targets hard. The Ghost type attacks hit other Ghost types that would be immune to Normal moves for Super Effective Damage. Chip Away is another interesting STAB move, as it ignores the Stat Boosts of other Pokemon, although it probably will not see much usage. Explosion is an odd choice on a boosting Pokemon, but the threat of being hit with a STAB Explosion will always be on the opponent's mind.

Normal/Ghost provides the CAP with a typing that severely limits how the opponent will deal heavy damage to the CAP, while providing STAB for several versatile moves.
And in case you already forgot, STAB Boomburst
I will say that I had a look at that duo, but you need both a defensive and offensive duo. While it has a good offensive typing, it lacks many resistances to common types, which will hinder it in it's CM route a lot.
 
But lets even ignore Landorus-T. That doesn't change the fat that Ground in general is the most common coverage types in the game and a plethora of fast Pokemon have access to it that aren't necessarily weak to priority. Ignoring Landorus-T, we have Garchomp, Lando that isn't Therian, Diancie, and Kyurem-B, not to mention others that can still outspeed us unless we use priority, and Landorus-I is the only one who can reasonably die to priority Aqua Jet. And these aren't slouch pokemon either, Garchomp being 7th in usage as of February. Furthermore, adding answers to these pokemon specifically takes away from the coverage we can have against Ferrothorn, which everybody struggles with. This means we have to answer it in abilities, and that requires us to dedicate ourselves to an ability way earlier than we would like.
As this argument regards water/steel - Chomp, Lando-I, Diancie and Kyube are all staples on offense and are all basically boned if they switch in as cap DDs. In that situation it will most likely outspeed and hit everything but chomp with SE stab. Scarfchomp and scarfKyube are definitely potential exceptions here. But are those two dealbreakers, and are they difficult to work around at later stages (the point about Lando-T's mediocre speed applies to Kyube as well for example)? Personally I don't think so.
Given that offense is exactly what we want DD to beat, I think this is an okay situation. Suppose they switch in expecting the more stallbreaker-oriented CM set, which they legitimately beat, but are unpleasantly surprised with the DD. Isn't this exactly what we want? The ground weakness is trouble for CM but not, I think, for DD.
 
Ok so from speaking to people on IRC and stepping back and looking at the two most popular typings Water/Steel and Electric/Fairy, there are strengths and weaknesses with both these typings.

Electric/Fairy and Steel/Water are both weak to ground. This is a fact. Even if Water/Steel can hit ground supereffectively. Lando-T is a prominent scarfer as everyone knows, and scarfers are typically revenge killers. If we don't want to lose to the odd Landog then both these typings are awful choices. Even if water/steel gets aqua jet an unboosted Aqua jet off a 125 base attack is 50%ish to an bulk uninvested Lando as I stated earlier. I say unboosted to factor in intimidate and the criteria that DD should be operating off a single boost.

Electric/Fairy is not great for the CM set since by the criteria given for this set it should operate off a single STAB. Electric is completely walled by ground types and fairy is walled by steel types unless it miraculously gets to +6, in which case it should power through steel types anyway. I will concede that water/steel is a far more stellar typing for the CM set, since scald is by and large the most spammable move on any stacking CM set. Burn chance does greatly bolster physical defense which is part of the reason why suicune and m-slowbro have such a successful CM set. Plus the toxic immunity is nice.

However, Water/Steel is also not that great for the DD set. Water and Steel STABs do not compliment themselves well, sharing a lot of the same targets. I strongly believe the DD set needs two STABs to do well, as our attack stat cannot be bloated. Each stat is going to end up being fairly average due to the nature of the concept. Whereas electric/fairy offers a good neutral coverage. Plus the paralysis immunity is nice.

Note, I haven't mentioned anything on coverage moves at this point because that can help alleviate a lot of these issues but there's no point really discussing that at this stage imo.

So both these typing combos fall short on one side of the concept while being quite exemplary in the other. With that in mind I'm going to propose something radical.
Say bye bye to Brave Bird resist and bye bye to some form of status immunity.

And say hello to Water/Fairy.

Water/Fairy attempts to combine the positives of both these heavily discussed typings. Water and fairy STABs have amazing neutral coverage (Ferrothorn, Venusaur, Tentacruel, Amoonguss and Empoleon are the only OU viable pokemon to resist both STABs). This is important for the DD set as we can easily choose what we want it to be beaten by.
Water/Fairy is also less threatened by the ever present Lando-T as it has no ground weakness, and resists every other commonly run Landog move bar Stone Edge.

For the CM set, water/fairy gives a number of nice typing resistances allowing it to set up quite easily. Water, or more to the point, Scald is the most spammable move a CM set can use as previously stated. This is pretty much the reasoning why water has been so heavily suggested in my opinion.
But yes the issues with Water/Fairy typing are that it doesn't resist Talonflame's Bravebird and it has zero status immunity. The latter can be resolved thanks to having a super spammable move like scald allowing CAP to forgo coverage in favor of a move to prevent/block/heal status moves. Or if necessary it can be addressed during the abilities stage. To address Talonflame's Brave bird we can either choose to lose to it outright or ensure we don't during the stat stage.

So it seems like Water/Fairy is a solid option for both DD and CM alike. It does not naturally gravitate to one set or the other like the two typing combos discussed at the start of this post do.

EDIT: thanks to NumberCruncher for doing this leg work that I neglected to do

Weaknesses: Grass, Electric, Poison
Resistances: Bug, Dark, Fighting, Fire, Ice.
Immunities: Dragon

Weak to STABs: Altaria-M, Breloom, Charizard-Y (To a degree), Conkeldurr, Diancie-M, Dragonite, Excadrill,Gallade-M, Garchomp, Gliscor, Gyarados-M, Heatran, Keldeo, Kyurem-B, Latias, Latios, Lopunny-M, Landorus-I, Landorus-T, Mamoswine, Mandibuzz, Sableye-M, Talonflame, Tyranitar, Tyranitar-M

Neutral to STABs: Azumarill, Bisharp, CAP itself, Celebi, Chansey, Charizard-X, Clefable, Gardevoir-M, Gengar, Gothitelle, Gyarados, Hippowdon, Jirachi, Magnezone, Manaphy, Manectric-M, Metagross-M, Mew, Raikou, Rotom-W, Scizor, Scizor-M, Skarmory, Slowbro, Slowbro-M, Starmie, Sylveon, Thundurus, Zapdos

Resistant to STABs: Amoongus, Empoleon, Ferrothorn, Tentacruel, Venusaur-M

Relevant STAB moves: Aqua Jet, Waterfall, Water Shuriken, Scald, Razor Shell, Hydro Pump, Draining Kiss, Play Rough, Moonblast
 
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