Team GET SOME

Ok so I took an originally sun-based team of Groudon, Reshiram, Mewtwo, EK Arceus, Ferrothorn, and Ho-oh, and eventually whittled it down to this. It counters single/dual weather teams quite well, and though it seems slightly counter-intuitive, the combo of Groudon and Kyogre works quite well. After certain checks, for example opposing Kyogre or Palkia are taken out, scarf Reshiram/scarf Kyogre can quickly take down a team with their deadly STAB moves.

Team at a glance:






Groudon @ Leftovers
Trait: Drought
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Fire Punch
- Stone Edge

Groudon sets up Stealth Rock rather reliably, and readily takes on common leads such as Forretress and Deoxys-S with Fire Punch and Earthquake, respectively. Max Atk is run to cripple opposing leads, and max Spe is run to suprise the slower dragons such as Dialga. The coverage moves are really there to nail Ho-oh and Ferrothorn, who can cause some of my sweepers a lot of trouble. Nota Bene, if Deoxys-S comes in, I always use Earthquake, because 9 out of 10 times, it always Taunts. Why is that???


Reshiram @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Turboblaze
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Blue Flare
- Draco Meteor
- Dragon Pulse
- Flamethrower

The epitome of offense under the sun- really just click Blue Flare or Draco Meteor as the situation demands. The given nature and EVs are the standard for a scarf pokemon. It's an excellent revenge killer, and given that sun is up and my opponent doesn't have Kyogre, which isn't too hard to acheive with some help from Ferrothron, Reshiram can really smash holes into the opposing team. Dragon Pulse and Flamethrower are really just there for consistancy in case you need to take down threatening Pokes at low HP. I'm tempted to run a mix set with Outrage just to deal with Soul Dew Latias. Would that be appropriate?


Kyogre @ Leftovers
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SDef
Calm Nature (+SDef, -Atk)
- Scald
- Roar
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

To absorb status and tank neutral hits, I found that Kyogre works AMAZINGLY well. Scald is for STAB and Roar is an excellent phazing move to abuse Stealth Rock and Spikes set by Groudon and Ferrothorn. Works well as a counter to lead Darkrai too.


Palkia @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Hasty Nature (+Spd, -Def)
- Draco Meteor
- Outrage
- Fire Blast
- Surf

Now something to abuse Kyogre's rain! Palkia has the obligitory STAB Draco Meteor and also has Surf, which is easily spammable after some dragons are out of the way. Outrage is to deal with Latias, but is a little on the weak side, and is easily exploited by opposing Ferrothorn due to high defense, Iron Barbs, and access to Leech Seed and Thunder Wave, so it comes down to Outrage vs. Thunder. Fire Blast to use under the sun to deal with Ferrothorn/Forretress.

Arceus (Arceus-Ghost) @ Spooky Plate
Trait: Multitype
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Judgment
- Flamethrower
- Recover
- Will-O-Wisp

Powerful attackers with priority such as Extreme Killer Arceus and Rayquaza would be a threat, but they get fucked by Will-O-Wisp, effectively neutering them for the rest of the match. Sayonara. Judgment is the obviously STAB move, while Flamethrower pegs Ferrothorn and Forretress, and is deceptively strong under the sun. Max HP EVs and Recover make him survive a lot longer, and Max Spe is given to outpace the obvious Shadow Claw coming from Extreme Killer Arcues, who never ever ever invests in full Spe.


Ferrothorn (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 SDef
Careful Nature (+SDef, -SAtk)
- Spikes
- Power Whip
- Leech Seed
- Thunder Wave

This defensive monster is pretty much a hard counter to Kyogre, Luiga, etc. that used to give me such a hard fucking time when I played with just a pure sun team. However, it takes hits like a champ, and takes a good chunk of HP from Kyogre, and seeing how it only takes around 45% from full power CS Kyogre, can easily cripple the bloated whale with Power Whip to destroy it's effectiveness and regain the HP lost through Leech Seed and Leftovers. Toxic destroys stall-based Pokemon like some Arceus and Lugia, while Thunder Wave cripples speedy threats like Palkia and Mewtwo. It also can be used as sleep fodder if Darkrai is used as a lead against my Groudon. After Ferrothorn is asleep, switch in CS Reshiram and Darkrai can eat shit.

Threats: teams that also exploit the Groudon/Kyogre combo really give me hell, and without Taunt Mewtwo, Lugia/Latias really give this team hell, as they can simply recover back entry hazard damage and procede to set up/sweep.

THANKS FOR READING :) I really appreciate any help you can give me with this team!

Fast lead Groudon / Scarfed Reshiram / Scarfed Kyogre / Standard LO mewtwo / Support Ghostceus / Standard Ferrathorn

This team is weak in order of importance to:

Scarfed Kyurem-W: Nothing on your team can outspeed it and since nothing has any SpD investment save Ferra gets ohko'd by Draco meteor. Or in ferra's case ohko'd by ice beam.

DD ray: It can setup against ferra and then proceed to ohko ferra with fire blast in sun and ohko the majority of your team with outrage.

Extreme Killer Arceus: It can easily setup against ferra/groudon and then ohko your team with the respective coverage move once ghostceus goes down. So losing ghostceus means extreme killer will proceed to destroy you

Scarfed Kyogre: No your own kyogre doesn't counter it since relying on a speed tie is often a huge mistake and could cost you the battle.

Sash darkrai lead: Nothing can take the sleep and it'll get a nasty plot/t-wave in and at least kill one mon and cripple groudon which I'm assuming you lead with.

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To alleviate issues with Kyurem, Extreme Killer I would suggest using Calm mind Steelceus over the Ghostceus you're using now since it doesn't provide you any key resistances.

For groudon I would suggest using a lum berry instead of leftovers to take the sleep and in turn revenge kill darkrai leads. I would also shift the ev's you put into speed for groudon for defense instead to better tank physical hits from zekrom/kyurem-b/ray and the likes. Secondly having more speed on groudon means you will always lose the weather war unless your opponent leads with a scarfed kyogre in which case it will proceed to ohko groudon with a full power water spout in sun. Or if you switch you really have nothing to take the hit.

Also is there a specific reason you're running toxic and t-wave on ferrathorn? I can understand that you might want to cripple something but dual status isn't the way to go. Instead I would replace one of the two with protect so you can stall so the enemy will slowly die.

Also you seem to have a massive hazard weakness since all your pokes are grounded and you lack a spinblocker so to remedy this I would suggest replacing ferrathorn with forretress so it can spin away opposing hazards while setting up your own.

Along with the forretress change I would also advise replacing reshiram with ho oh since your whole team save groudon is more special based.
...

tl;dr
Ferrathron => forretress
or t-wave/toxic => protect
Reshiram => ho oh
Ghostceus => Steelceus
leftovers and 252spd evs => lum berry and 252 def evs for groudon

Thanks for your advice! :) The steelceus is working out okay, and can tank a lot of moves. Really has benefits for my team, but I've found that Kyurem-W isn't actually all that commonly used..., while ghost arceus counters giratina and mewtwo fairly well, so I'm debating which one to use- requires more testing. Bulky Ho-oh just doesn't hit hard enough, and recoil + Stealth Rock really messes with it's longetivity, despite Regenerator, so I'm testing a Scarf Ho-oh, but it really requires that Forretress keeps rocks off the field. THANK YOU!

You can't label smash pass smeary or as a threat and not consider kyurem-w a threat.... It's not really about how common it is but more of the fact that kyurem-w out speeds and ohko's your whole team after hazards.

Your team is also incredibly hazard weak like I stated.

Hey, this is an interesting team, but it could use some moveset optimisations. Groudon should use Earth Plate over Leftovers guaranteeing the OHKO on 252 HP Dialga with Earthquake, which it cannot do without. While Toxic on Ferrothorn is cool to check CM Arceus Formes it overlaps with Thunder Wave, and more importantly ignores one of the best qualities of Ferrothorn; use Spikes over Toxic on Ferrothorn. Ferrothorn also doesn't really need the attack EVs or the Sassy nature without making use of Gyro Ball, it can actually outspeed some things with a neutral nature after a Thunder Wave; change Ferrothorn's nature to Careful and move all Atk EVs into Special Defense (you can leave 4 in Attack).

I've noticed this team would appreciate a secondary CM Arceus check, in addition to a Darkrai one - Specially Defensive Kyogre is a prime choice, giving you all of the above and a phazer.

Kyogre

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move 1: Scald
move 2: Roar
move 3: Rest
move 4: Sleep Talk
item: Leftovers
ability: Drizzle
nature: Calm
evs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD

Moreover, this teams Choice Scarf user suffers from not being able to outspeed Rayquaza and being weather reliant on a team with conflicting weathers. I recommend a change to a Choice Scarf Palkia.

Palkia

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move 1: Draco Meteor
move 2: Thunder
move 3: Fire Blast
move 4: Outrage / Surf
item: Choice Scarf
ability: Pressure
nature: Hasty / Timid
evs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe

Outrage is mainly for Lati@s, but with Ferrothorn it isn't too big of an issue, you can use Surf if you so choose, but make sure to use Timid if so.

Good luck.

OMG This is amazing. Thank you so much, Poppy. I replaced Scarf Kyogre with Specially Defensive Kyogre, and it works so well, especially once Stealth Rocks and three layers of Spikes are down. Also currently testing Scarf Palkia, which also works pretty well. And thanks for pointing out the incorrect EV spread for Ferrothorn I had before. A question: what's a reliable counter for Giratina-A?

to deal with it with your team lay spikes in front of it with ferrothorn (if you deem it worth it to get burned) and then phaze it around repeatedly or set arceus ghost and mewtwo on it. a taunt'd giratina doesn't really do much and judgment is a 2hko on phys.def variants, 3hko on sp.def.

Changes: Scarf Kyogre for Rest Talk Kyogre and Scarf Palkia over Mewtwo. Some EVs on Ferrothorn and it's nature too :). But now Lugia, Latias, and to an extent, Ho-oh, really give my team hell. Also, still a little scared of EK Arceus and my team is still a little entry hazard weak, though I really don't like Forretress as it's easy set-up bait. Would a Scarf Zekrom fit on my team somehow, as to deal with the HGSS legendaries? And are there any other glaring weaknesses?