Building a Battle Tower Team!

[Calisto]

Introduction

100 wins at the Battle Tower is arguably the toughest requirement to get the 5 stars on your trainer card. Most of us could do without the frustration that tackling the Battle Tower leads to! In a desperate attempt to get 100 wins, some people end up using successful teams made by other people. Yet it would be much more gratifying to do so with an original team you came up with yourself. If you want to create your own solid team but are unsure where to start, keep reading. The aim of this guide will be to familiarise you with some of the common (and less common) Battle Tower strategies and what makes them effective. After that there will be an example of how you would go about creating a team. Hopefully by the time you reach the end, you will be equiped to design your very own innovative and unconventional team to take on the Battle Tower!

The AI

If you are reading this guide you are probably an avid Pokemon player and will know that your best shot at winning a battle is knowing as much as you can about your opponent and his team. Although the Battle Tower AI has a horde of teams at its disposal, it does have certain "tendencies" when it is playing. Being aware of these "tendencies" will make battling much more predictable. Furthermore, the AI's playstyle will have a significant impact on what kind of team you should make and how to design it. So before going into any strategy, let us go through some of those 'tendencies' because it plays quite different to playing real people. Here is an overview of the AI's playing style:

Strengths:

• The AI knows your team and will adapt its own teams accordingly to some extent.
• The AI has significantly more luck than the normal game mechanics suggest

Weaknesses:

• Very predictable
• Limited number of Pokemon and movesets for trainers
• Very rarely switches

What is my Strategy?

Now that you are aware of the AI's playing style you are ready to learn about some of the strategies designed to exploit its weaknesses. The two weaknesses they tend to capitalise on are: predictability and no switching. Not being able to switch is a massive handicap as it allows you to cripple the AI's lead and set up your sweepers!


Selecting a team for the Battle Tower is about choosing Pokemon that work well together in order to execute a specific strategy effectively. There is no single Pokemon that is "the best" for the Battle Tower because it depends on the context it is used in. Bearing that in mind, here are some viable strategies you could go for:

1) All-Out-Offense

If stat-reducing moves and status inflictions are not your cup of tea, this might be what you are looking for. This is a pretty straightforward strategy and has the advantage of disposing of enemies quickly so you can get through more trainers faster. Unfortunately, even the best of these teams will succumb to a streak of bad luck at some stage and you shouldn't expect to get far beyond 100 wins with this kind of team.

In order to get the most out of your sweepers consider using moves like Destiny Bond when you have a Pokemon advantage. Using Choice items to get that extra Speed, Attack, or Special Attack may also be crucial. Obviously you want to go for Pokemon with a lot of Speed and Special Attack/ Attack.

Motto: If the enemy does a lot of damage, we'll just have to do more!
Strengths: Speed and power!
Weaknesses: Focus Sash, Focus Band, Quick Claw, Counter, Metal Burst, Mirror Coat and general frailty!
Overall: ***

Example:

Gengar @ Focus Sash
Nature: Timid / Modest
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA 252 Spe

• Sludge Bomb / Shadow Ball
• Counter
• Destiny Bond
• HP Fire

This would be a good example for a Pokemon in a BT team focusing solely on offense. With a staggering 130 base Special Attack and a high Speed stat Gengar can put a dent in almost anything! The goal is to kill off as many opponents as you can, then use Destiny Bond when you are about to die. Counter is for physical attackers you can't take out with your attacks and Pokemon that outspeed you.

2) Trickster

The Trick-team is undoubtedly the most popular strategy currently being used by people at the Battle Tower. The idea is to Trick an enemy a Choice item and then proceed to set up a sweeper while they are stuck using one move!

Trick teams generally consist of one Pokemon that can use Trick and two sweepers that cover all the type weaknesses so that setting up is easier. Common moves to set up a sweeper are: Dragon Dance, Swords Dance, Curse, Nasty Plot, and Acupressure.

Ideally ,Trick leads will also have some additional moves that can reduce the enemy's offensive potential to set up your sweepers more efficiently. In order to be able to reduce your enemy's offense as much as possible, Trick leads usually have high defensive stats too. Some common ones are:



Motto: Why play 4 v. 4 when 4 v. 1 is so much easier!
Strengths: Quite reliable, very effective if executed properly!
Weaknesses: Sticky Hold, Fling, U-turn, Choice items
Overall: *****

Example:

Spiritomb @ Choice Scarf
Nature: Bold
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 HP / 124 Def / 132 SpD

• Trick
• Grudge
• Protect
• Taunt

The strategy is simply to Trick your opponent into only using their first move. One option now is to use Grudge next until Spiritomb dies, forcing your opponent to Struggle whilst you set up a sweeper with Swords Dance or Nasty Plot. Protect can be useful to stall the PP of OHKO moves for instance. Taunt is for the chance that the enemy is locked into a status move like Thunder Wave or Will-O-Wisp and you don't want to risk a status infliction on the switch. If you're bored of reading already and want to see some battles, click here to see Spiritomb in action (I recommend turning your sound off).

3) Mementors

Memento is a move that has phenomenal potential and is not used nearly as much as it could be. Sacrificing a Pokémon that may be dying anyway in return for reducing the enemy's offenses is a great trade-off if they won't be switching! A further advantage of Memento is that it can act as a free switch. We have all been in a situation where we really don't want to keep the current Pokémon in but fear that a switch could also be dangerous.

Despite its huge potential, it is a strategy that has drawbacks too. First and foremost is obviously that the Pokemon using Memento faint and no further use during the battle. Critical hits are also a problem as thet can hit right through the reduced Attack! You also need to take care of Pokemon with abilites that ignore stat reductions like Hyper Cutter and Clear Body. Some of the ways you could work around these drawbacks is to use the moves: Substitute, Lucky Chant, Skills Swap and Destiny Bond, as well as the abilities Battle Armour and Sturdy.

If you are considering this kind of team, some useful Pokémon you could look into are:



Motto: Ha Ha, he's hitting like a lvl 5 baby!
Strengths: Needs less type coverage, so more versatility in a designing team.
Weaknesses: Clear Body, Psych Up, Hyper Cutter, OHKO moves, and critical hits.
Overall: ****

Example:

Drapion @ Black Sludge
Nature: Adamant
Ability: Battle Armour
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Att / 4 SpD

• Acupressure
• Substitute
• Crunch
• Rest

Once you have reduced the enemy's offense to shreds using Memento, you send in Drapion. With the wonderful Battle Armour ability, critical hits will be a thing of the past. Acupressure away while the enemy barely scratches Drapion and proceed to finish them off with Crunch!

4) Tormentor

The Tormentor is another strategy that hasn't really been attempted thus far. In case you're unfamiliar with the move, Torment forces your opponent to alternate between attacks! Due to the fact that the AI is fairly predictable, combining this with a move like Protect can make a solid combination. If the enemy's second move doesn't do too much damage, you can more or less do as you please every second turn!

In order to pull off this strategy effectively you need to use Pokémon with a lot of resistances. If your opponent can simply alternate between a 100 Base Power and 90 Base Power move with both neutral damage you haven't gained much. Good candidates for a Torment team would be Dragon- and Steel-type Pokemon because they resist so many types. Since this is mostly a defense-oriented strategy use Pokémon that are built to take a hit!


Some of the Pokémon that can learn Torment include:

Bastiodon Dusknoir Heatran Mismagius Tyranitar Umbreon

Motto: Prediction is key to secure a victory!
Strengths: Very reliable and allows you to switch around.
Weaknesses: 4x and super effective moves and heavy hitters.
Overall: ***


Example:

Tyranitar @ Leftovers
Nature: Impish
Ability: Sandstream
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD

• Dragon Dance
• Substitute
• Protect
• Crunch

Although Tyranitar does not have a whole bunch of resistances, its huge base stats make Torment extremely useful to it. After using Torment Tyranitar just switch between Protect, Substitute, and Dragon Dance until Tyranitar has sufficient boosts to sweep. If you can get your Torment lead to add in a Thunder Wave and some Flashes this will be even easier!

5) Sleeper

Another possibility is to try and put your opponents to sleep. They may not be asleep for very long so you will need to act quick, relying on moves like Swords Dance and Nasty plot to set up fast!

Unfortunately, the best Sleep inducing move is Spore and only 3 Pokemon can learn it: Breloom, Parasect, and Smeargle. None of these have particularly good speed or defensive stats. The only reliable alternative is Yawn, which has the drawback that it needs 2 turns to kick in.

Nonetheless, some promising ones you could look into are:

HippowdonSmeargle SnorlaxUmbreonUxie

Motto: Sweat dreams, suckers!
Strengths: Renders enemy completely harmless for 2-3 turns!
Weaknesses: Lum Berry, Chesto Berry, Early Bird, Insomnia, and need to act fast.
Overall: **

Example:

Umbreon @ Leftovers
Nature: Bold
Ability: Synchronise
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 6 SpD

• Torment
• Protect
• Flash
• Yawn

Yawn is used because it is reliable in getting your opponent to sleep. Protect has quite a few uses here: HP recovery, Yawn stall, OHKO move PP stall, and scouting for moves. Flash is there in case you want to dick around with enemy's accuracy. After Yawn kicks in, switch and set up!

Strategies summary

This was an overview of some of the various strategies you could use in the Battle Tower. The more of these you can combine into one team, the more you spread the risk and the more effective your team can be. The latter Umbreon was a good example of this. The Sleeper Umbreon combined both the Sleeper and Tormentor strategies!


Designing an actual team!

Now that we have gone through some of the theory behind designing a team, it is time to design one from scratch! Trick and All-Out-Offense teams have been done ad infinitum, so let's not go for one of those. Other people have done Yawn teams, so here goes the first ever attempt at a Memento chain team!


Strategy: Memento + Memento to cripple enemy offense and set up deadly sweeper.
Potential problems: Clear Body, Critical Hits, Hyper Cutter, Psych Up, & OHKO moves.


Clear Body/Hyper Cutter: This is going to be one of the biggest threats to this team so let us address it first. Skill Swap seems like the best way to go about this, as it will let us use Memento afterwards! Since it will get awkward to start switching around when we already have a problem we will want to have Skill Swap on our lead Pokemon. The Pokemon we could consider that learn both Memento and Skill Swap are:


DrifblimGalladeGardevoirMismagiusUxie

It is better not waste an entire Pokemon on Skill Swapping, getting a Pokémon with good defenses could be good here. Alternatively, a fast Pokémon with Focus Sash could also be able to pull of Skill Swap + Memento. Yet the latter is more vulnerable to hail / sandstorm, Quick Claw, high speed opponents, and priority moves. A further advantage of a high defense Pokemon is that we could also do some pesky weakening moves to our opponent if they have poor offense! For this reason, let's go for the bulkiest on the list: Uxie!

Uxie @ Leftovers

• Skills Swap
• Memento
• Filler
• Filler

Further problems? Memento does a great job at cutting offensive stats. However, it does not guard your sweeper from critical hits or OHKO moves while setting up. Failing to do so would be a disaster after having already sacrificed two Pokemon with Memento. Although Subtitute can act as an excellent damage cushion for such attacks, it does mean you need to move before your opponent.


Solution: As long as we can ensure we have a Speed advantage over our opponents, Substitute can take care of this problem! Uxie's two filler moves can be Thunder Wave and Knock Off, that way we take care of opponents with high speed or Quick Claw! Now all we need is a sweeper with good Speed and Substitute. We also really need one that can completely ravage opponents once set up so lets go for Garchomp! What we have so far is:

Uxie @ Leftovers

• Skills Swap
• Memento
• Thunder Wave
• Knock Off

Garchomp @ Lum Berry

• Swords Dance
• Substitute
• Outrage
• Earthquake

Earthquake and Outrage provide good coverage for sweeping while Substitute offers some Protection. Lum Berry takes care of Outrage confusion but also Effect Spore, Static and Flame Body. In order to complete the Memento chain we will need one more Pokemon with Memento.

There are a couple of Pokemon to choose from and we'd like to get one that covers any weaknesses our current duo may have. So far one potential problem arises when the opponents use high critical hit rate moves on Garchomp. Air Cutter and Night Slash are two fairly common examples. Although Substitute will mediate the critical hit problem to a certain extent, it would be even better to get rid of them altogether. Lucky Chant would be a good move for our last Pokemon as it blocks critical hits.

The Pokemon that can learn both Memento and Lucky Chant are: Gallade, Mismagius, and Gardevoir. None of the above have good defences so we are probably best off using Focus Sash on them to make sure we can use both Memento and Lucky Chant before they die. Since Mismagius has the most Speed, she will probably be the most reliable, so let's go for her!



Mismagius @ Focus Sash

• Lucky Chant
• Memento
• Thief
• Taunt

In addition to Lucky Chant and Memento, Mismagius has two move slots left. Thief can be useful to use on Pokemon that have a Quick Claw if you didn't have enough time to remove it with Uxie (eg. Metagross). Taunt can help you deal with annoying moves that Garchomp hates: Taunt, Destiny Bond or Perish Song.

So this is our final Memento Chain Team:

Uxie @ Leftovers
Nature: Bold
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4SpD

- Skill Swap
- Thunder Wave
- Knock Off
- Memento


Mismagius @ Focus Sash
Nature: Jolly
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 Sp 252 Def

- Thief
- Taunt
- Lucky Chant
- Memento



Garchomp @ Lum Berry
Nature: Jolly
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Att / 252 Spe

- Swords Dance
- Substitute
- Earthquake
- Outrage


10 Closing Tips:

1) Use Substitute on your sweepers to guard against items and moves like: Focus Sash, Quick Claw, priority moves, Brightpowder, and more from ruining your strategy! It is usually more important to have a Substitute up than get your 6th Dragon Dance or 3rd Swords Dance!

2) Choose Pokemon with the highest base stats unless you have a specific purpose in mind.

3) Select types with a lot of resistances to give you room to switch around and cover weaknesses. Good example types are Steel- and Dragon-type Pokémon.

4) If possible, combine as many strategies as possible so that if one fails, you have a back-up plan!

5) Do NOT leave anything to chance! Even if you can kill 99% of all Pokémon that can come next with 5/6 Dragon Dances, get the last Dragon Dance as long as you have a Substitute up and it is safe to do so!

6) Play it safe and make sure you can handle a critical hit at any time. Don't hope that you won't get one at a specific time if you have an alternative because critical hits WILL happen when they are most inconvenient!

7) Try to avoid moves on your Pokemon that do not have 100% accuracy, chances are you would regret it very soon!

8) Choose your natures and EV spreads carefully, taking into account specific threats on the list of Pokémon at the Battle Tower!

9) Make use of this search tool to look for the Pokemon you can find at the Battle Tower (Diamond/Pearl/Platinum/HG/SS only)

10) It can be useful to find out what Pokemon each trainer you face can have. Check out this Pokémon trainer list and all the Pokemon they have!


Have Fun and Good luck!

[coolking49]

3) Mementors

This will probably be a new strategy to most of you as I haven't seen people use it yet.

among other places. Don't use the word I. Rephrase this into something like "This is a rarer strategy not seen as often". Also, in your sleepers, Breloom and smeagle deserve mention, breloom for its ability to not waste a turn switching, instead stat upping with sword dance and abusing mach punch, and smeargle for the abilty to sleep then lower their stats in anyway, or just use flash.
Lastly,

10) It can be useful to find out what Pokémon each trainer you face can have. Check out this Pokémon trainer tool at Serebii! Can't find the link atm but will update when I do!

Smogon has one too, i think you should link to that, I'll edit it in here in my post.

edit: here it is: http://www.smogon.com/forums/showpos...&postcount=330, and point 9 can also be found in the stark mountain thread battle tower records.

[Bucky]

I really like this!! I gave up on legally getting 100 wins at the BT a long time ago, but I think I'll give it a go now :D

Also, you have a few typos:

One option now is to use Grudge next until Spiritomb dies...
The Tormentor is another strategy I haven't seen used so far.
Once you have reduced the enemy's offense to shreds...
Use Substitute on your sweepers...priority moves, Brightpowder and others!

There's a few other grammatical things, but I'll leave it at that.

[Calisto]

Thanks for the feedback and suggestions!

I have added the list of trainers coolking49 linked to and fixed the errors that you guys spotted. The Serebii Pokémon trainer search tool was a little faster though because you just had to select a trainer name and it would give you a complete list of all the possible Pokémon, their movesets, items and natures. This works too though, just not as user friendly.

The only thing I haven't changed is the Snapper Search Tool link because it is easier to use than the long list in the Battle Frontier Records Thread. The Snapper Tool also displays the stats of each Pokémon and has some search functions that may come in handy. It is linked to in the Battle Tower Records thread anyway so I guess it would be okay to link to it?

EDIT: I've tried using a Breloom with Spore before and it didn't work as well as I had hoped. This was back in Emerald though, in which he was significantly weaker because there was no Focus Sash yet. Not sure how effective a sweeper he will be with only one offense move, assuming he'll have Spore, Sub and SD. The lack of Speed might also be a major weakness (don't think you want Mach Punch as your only move).

Smeargle has definitely got to be one of those Pokémon you can find the ultimate moveset for but nobody got round to it yet, so I'll add him to the list of ones to check out!

[BinarySolo]

Originally Posted by Fat Calisto

Introduction

The 100 wins at the Battle Tower is one of the toughest requirements to satisfy in order to get the 5 stars on your trainer card. The frustration that most of us inevitably feel when tackling this facility is something many of us could do without! Maybe get rid of that exclamation mark, it doesn't really fit the sentence. In the end, some end up using successful teams made by other people in order to get past 100 wins. The aim of this guide will be to familiarise you with some of the common and effective Battle Tower strategies so that you can design your own original team and get over 100 wins with it!


The AI

If you are reading this guide you are probably an avid Pokémon player and will know that your best shot at winning a battle is knowing as much as you can about your opponent and his team. Although the Battle Tower AI has a horde of teams at its disposal, it does have certain 'tendencies' when it is playing. Being aware of these tendencies will make battling much easier. In addition, how the AI plays will have a significant impact on what kind of team you should make and how to design it. So before going into any strategy, let us go through some of those 'tendencies' because it plays quite differently to real people. Here is an overview of the AI's playing style:


Strengths:

• AI knows your team and will adapt its own teams accordingly to some extent
• AI has significantly more 'luck' than the normal game mechanics suggest

Weaknesses:

• Very predictable
• Limited number of Pokémon and movesets for trainers
• Very rarely switches

What is my Strategy?


Now that you are aware of the AI's playing style you are ready to learn about some of the strategies designed to exploit its weaknesses. The two weaknesses they tend to capitalise on are: predictability and no switching. Not being able to switch is a massive handicap as it allows you to cripple the AI's lead and set up your sweepers!

Selecting a team for the Battle Tower is about choosing Pokémon that work well together to execute a certain strategy effectively. There is no single Pokémon that is 'the best' for the Battle Tower because it depends on the context it is used in. Bearing that in mind, here are some viable strategies you could go for:


1) All-Out-Offense

If stat-reducing moves and status hax are not your cup of tea, this might be what you are looking for. This is a pretty straightforward strategy and has the advantage of disposing of enemies quickly so you can get through more trainers faster. Unfortunately even the best of these teams will succumb to hax at some stage and you shouldn't expect to get far beyond 100 wins with this kind of team.

In order to get the most out of your sweepers consider using moves like Destiny Bond when you have a Pokémon advantage. Using Choice items to get that extra Speed, Attack or Special Attack may also be crucial. Obviously you want to go for Pokémon with a lot of Speed and Sp. Att./Att!

Motto: If the enemy does a lot of damage, we'll just have to do more!
Strengths: Speed and power.
Weaknesses: Focus Sash, Focus Band, Quick Claw, Counter, Metal Burst, Mirrot Coat and general frailty.
Overall: ***



Gengar @ Focus Sash
Nature: Timid/Modest
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 252 Att, 252 Sp, 6 HP (sorry for being anal :/)

• Sludge Bomb/ Shadow Ball
• Counter
• Destiny Bond
• HP Fire

This would be a good example for a Pokémon in a BT team focusing solely on offense. With a staggering 130 Base Sp. Att and a high Speed stat Gengar can put a dent in almost anything! The goal is to kill off as many opponents as you can and take an enemy with you using Destiny Bond when you are going to die anyway. Counter is for physical attackers you can't take out with special attacks and Pokémon that outspeed you.


2) Trickster

The Trick-team is undoubtedly the most popular strategy currently being used by people at the Battle Tower. The idea is to Trick an enemy into a Choice item and then proceed to set up a sweeper while they are stuck using one move!

Trick teams generally consist of one Pokémon that can use Trick and two sweepers that cover all the type weaknesses so that setting up is easier. Common moves to set up a sweeper are: Dragon Dance, Swords Dance, Curse, Nasty Plot and Acupressure.

Ideally Trick-leads will also have some additionaly moves that can reduce the enemy's offensive potential to set up your sweepers more efficiently. In order to be able to diminish your enemy's offense for as long as possible, these Trick-leads usually have high defensive stats too. Some common ones are:


CresseliaaaaaLatiasaaSpiritombaaaUxie

Motto: Why play 4v4 when 4v1 is so much easier?
Strengths: Quite reliable, very effective if executed properly.
Weaknesses: Sticky Hold, U-Turn, Choice items, High Recoil Damage & Low PP moves.
Overall: *****

Example:

Spiritomb @ Choice Scarf
Nature: Bold
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 252 HP, 124 Def, 132 Sp. Def

• Trick
• Grudge
• Protect
• Taunt

The strategy is simply to Trick your opponent into only using their first move. One option now is to use Grudge next until Spiritomb dies, forcing your opponent to Struggle whilst you set up a sweeper with Swords Dance or Nasty Plot. Protect can be useful to stall the PP of OHKO moves, for instance. Taunt is for in case the enemy is locked into a status move like Thunder Wave or Will-o-Wisp and you don't want to risk a status infliction on the switch.


3) Mementors

This will probably be a new strategy to most as it hasn't really been used much yet. Memento is a move that has phenomenal potential and is not used nearly as much as it could be. Sacrificing a Pokémon that may be dying anyway in return for reducing the enemy's offenses is a great trade-off! A further advantage of Memento is that it can act as a free switch. We have all been in a situation where we really don't want to keep the current Pokémon in but fear that a switch could also be dangerous.

Despite its huge potential, gain it is a strategy that has drawbacks too. The first one is critical hits, which can hit right through the reduced Attack and ruin your strategy. You also need to take care of abilities ignoring stat reduction like Hyper Cutter and Clear Body. Some of the ways you could work around these drawbacks is to use the moves Substitute, Lucky Chant, Skills Swap, Destiny Bond and the abilities Sturdy and Battle Armour.

If you are considering this kind of team some useful Pokémon you could look into are:


aDusknoiraaaLatiosaaMismagiusaSpiritombaaUxie

Motto: You do damage like lvl 5 pokémanz!
Strengths: Needs less type coverage, so more versatility in designing a team.
Weaknesses: Clear Body, Psych Up, Hyper Cutter, OHKO moves and Critical Hits.
Overall: ****

Example:

Drapion @ Black Sludge
Nature: Adamant
Trait: Battle Armour
EVs: 252 Att, Sp. Def and HP (Fix up EV spread, your choice for the spread)

• Acupressure
• Substitute
• Crunch
• Rest

Once you have reduced the enemy's offenses to shreds using Memento once or twice you send in Drapion. With the wonderful Battle Armour ability, Critical Hits will be a thing of the past. Acupressure away while the enemy barely scratches Drapion and finish them off with Crunch!


4) Tormentor

The Tormentor is another strategy that hasn't really been attempted thus far. Torment forces your opponent to alternate between attacks. Due to the fact that the AI is fairly predictable, combining this with a move like Protect can make a solid combination. If the enemy's secondary move doesn't do too much damage you can more or less do as you please every second turn!

In order to pull off this strategy effectively you need to use Pokémon with a lot of resistances. If your opponent can simply alternate between a 100 Power and 90 Power move with both neutral damage you haven't gained much. Good types for this sort of thing would be Dragon- and Steel-type Pokémon. Since this is mostly a defence-oriented strategy use Pokémon that are built to take a hit!

Some of the Pokémon that can learn Torment include:

BastiodonaaDusknoiraaHeatranaaMismagiusaTyranitaraaUmbreon

Motto: Prediction is key to secure a victory!
Strengths: Very reliable and allows you to switch around.
Weaknesses: 4X and super effective moves and heavy hitters.
Overall: ***

Example:

Tyranitar @ Leftovers
Nature: Impish
Trait: Sandstream
EVs: 252 HP, 252 Def

• Dragon Dance
• Substitute
• Protect
• Crunch

Although Tyranitar does not have a whole bunch of resistances, the its raw stats makes Torment extremely useful for him! After using Torment Tyranitar just switches around between Protect, Substitute and Dragon Dance until he has sufficient boosts to attempt a sweep. If you can get your Torment lead to add in a T-Wave and some Flashes this will be even easier!


5) Sleeper

Another possibility is to try and get your opponents to sleep. They may not be asleep for very long so you will need to act quick, relying on moves like Swords Dance and Nasty plot to set up fast!

Unfortunately the best Sleep-move is Spore and only 3 Pokémon can learn it: Breloom, Parasect and Smeargle. None of these have particularly good speed or defensive stats. The only reliable alternative is Yawn, which has the drawback that it needs 2 turns to kick in.

Nonetheless, some promising ones you could look into are:

HippowdonaSmeargle aSnorlaxaaaUmbreonaaaUxie

Motto: Sweat dreams, suckers!
Strengths: Renders enemy completely harmless for 2-3 turns!
Weaknesses: Lum Berry, Chesto Berry, Early Bird, Insomnia & need to act fast!
Overall: **

Example:

Umbreon @ Leftovers
Trait: Synchronise
Nature: Bold
EVs: 252 Hp, 252 Def, 6 Sp. Def

• Torment
• Protect
• Flash
• Yawn

Yawn is used because it is reliable in getting your opponent to sleep. Protect has quite a few uses here: HP recovery, Trick+Torment, Yawn stall, OHKO move PP stall and scouting for moves. Flash is there in case you want to dick around with enemy accuracy. After Yawn kicks in, switch and set up!


Strategies summary

This was an overview of some of the various strategies you could use in the Battle Tower. The more of these you can combine into one team, the more you dilute the risk and the more effective your team can be. The latter Umbreon was a good example of this. The Sleeper Umbreon combined both the Sleeper and Tormentor strategies!



Designing an actual team!

Now that we have gone through some of the theory behind designing a team, it is time to design one from scratch! Trick and All-Out-Offense teams have been done ad infinitum so lets not go for one of those. Other people have done Yawn teams, so here goes the first ever attempt at a Memento chain team!

Strategy: Memento + Memento to cripple enemy offense and set up deadly sweeper
Potential problems: Clear Body, Critical Hits, Hyper Cutter, Psych Up, & OHKO moves!

Clear Body/Hyper Cutter: This is going to be one of the biggest threats to this team so let us address it first. Skills Swap seems like the best way to go about this, as it lets us use Memento afterwards. Since it will get awkward to start switching around when we actually already have a problem we will want to have Skill Swap on our lead Pokémon. The Pokémon we could consider that learn both Memento and Skill Swap are:


DrifblimaaaaGalladeaaGardevoiraMismagiusaaaUxie

Since we would rather not waste an entire Pokémon on Skill Swapping, getting a Pokémon with good defences could be good here. Alternatively a fast Pokémon with Focus Sash could also be able to pull of Skill Swap + Memento. Yet the latter is more vulnerable to Hail/Sandstorm, Quick Claw, high speed and priority moves. A further advantage of a Pokémon with high defences is that we could also do some pesky weakening moves to our opponent if they have lacklustre offences. For this reason, lets go for the bulkiest on the list: Uxie!


Uxie @ Leftovers

• Skills Swap
• Memento
• Filler
• Filler

Further problems? You have used Memento with your first two Pokémon and you face an opponent that can outspeed your final sweeper with pure Speed or Quick Claw. All you need to lose now is a OHKO move or an untimely Critical Hit!

Solution: As long as we can ensure we have a Speed advantage over our opponents, Substitute can take care of this problem! Uxie's two filler moves can be Thunder Wave and Knock off, that way we take care of opponents with high speed and Quick Claw. Now all we need is a sweeper with good speed and Substitute. We also really need one that can completely ravage opponents once set up so lets go for Garchomp! What we have so far is:


Uxie @ Leftovers

• Skills Swap
• Memento
• Thunder Wave
• Knock Off

Garchomp @ Lum Berry

• Swords Dance
• Substitute
• Outrage
• Earthquake

In order to complete the Memento chain we will need one more Pokémon with Memento. There are a couple of Pokémon to choose from and we'd like to get one that covers any weaknesses our current duo may have. So far one really annoying thing I can think of is if the enemy is using a move with a high critical hit rate and lands a couple of them on Garchomp! Since we don't want to leave anything to chance in the Battle Tower, Lucky Chant would be a good move for our last Pokémon. The Pokémon that can learn both Memento and Lucky Chant are: Gallade, Mismagius and Gardevoir. None of these have good defences so we are probably best off using Focus Sash on them to make sure we can use both Memento and Lucky Chant before they die! Since Mismagius has the most speed, he will be the most reliable so lets go for him!



Mismagius @ Focus Sash

• Lucky Chant
• Memento
• Thief
• Taunt

In addition to Lucky Chant and Memento, Mismagius has two move slots left! Thief can be useful to use on Pokémon that have a Quick Claw if you didn't have enough time to remove it with Uxie (eg. Metagross or Gliscor). Taunt can help you deal with annoying moves like Taunt or Perish Song which Garchomp doesn't like.

So this is our final Memento Chain Team:
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Uxie @ Leftovers aaaaaaaaMismagius @ Focus Sashaaaaaaaa Garchomp @ Lum Berry
Trait: Levitate aaaaaaaaaaaTrait: Levitate aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaTrait: Sand Veil
Nature: Bold aaaaaaaaaaaaNature: Jolly aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaNature: Jolly
EVs: 252 HP 252 DefaaaaaaEVs: 252 Sp 252 Def aaaaaaaaaaaaaEVs: 252 Hp 252 Sp
- Skill Swap aaaaaaaaaaaaa- Thief aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa- Swords Dance
- Thunder Wave aaaaaaaaa- Taunt aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa- Substitute
- Knock Off aaaaaaaaaaaaa- Lucky Chant aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa- Earthquake
- Memento aaaaaaaaaaaaa- Memento aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa- Outrage





10 Closing Tips:

1) Use Substitute on your sweepers to guard against items and moves like Focus Sash, Quick Claw, priority moves, Brightpowder and such ruining your strategy. It is usually more important to have a Sub up than get your 6th Dragon Dance or 3rd Swords Dance!

2) Choose Pokémon with the highest base stats unless you have a specific purpose in mind.

3) Select types with a lot of resistances to give you room to switch around and cover weaknesses. Good example types are Steel- and Dragon-type Pokémon.

4) If possible, combine as many strategies as possible so that if one fails, you have a back-up plan.

5) Do NOT leave anything to chance! Even if you can kill 99% of all Pokémon that can come next with 5/6 Dragon Dances, get the last Dragon Dance as long as you have a Substitute up and it's safe to do so.

6) Play it safe and make sure you can handle a Critical Hit at any time. Don't hope that you won't get one at a specific time if you have an alternative because Critical Hits WILL happen when they are most inconvenient!

7) Try to avoid moves on your Pokémon that do not have 100% accuracy, chances are you would regret it very soon!

8) Choose your natures and EV spreads carefully, taking into account specific threats on the list of Pokémon at the Battle Tower.

9) Make use of this search tool to look for the Pokemon you can find at the Battle Tower (Diamond/Pearl/Platinum/HG/SS only)

10) It can be useful to find out what Pokémon each trainer you face can have. Check out this Pokémon trainer list and all the Pokémon they have!

Have Fun and Good Luck!

EDIT: This spacing stuff is weird, not sure why its being all funky!

Red stuff needs to be left out, bolded stuff has been altered and italics are just comments.

Consider replacing instances of 'hax' with more precise terms, such as Brightpowder or low-accuracy moves. I didn't put those in my edit because it comes down to preference but think about it I guess. I also italicized 'ad infinitum' just because it's Latin. Also try to keep consistent when you're capitalising or abbreviating words; it just flows better. Overall nice guide, just a little lacking in grammar and spelling. Good luck!

[UPPERDECKER]

Can someone explain Skill Swap on Uxie? I don't get the strategy behind it.

[Calisto]

Thanks for all the corrections BinarySolo, I've changed everything you mentioned. Can't believe I had Bold Nature on Gengar lol...


Omoplata: If you are using moves to reduce your enemy's Attack then your strategy will fail miserably if you are facing enemies with the abilities:
Hyper Cutter: Prevents Attack loss
Clear Body: Prevents stat reduction

Some examples would be: Pinsir, Metagross, Regice, Gliscor, Regirock and Registeel.

Skill Swap switches abilities between your own Pokémon and your opponent. So if you use Skill Swap on Pokémon with Hyper Cutter and Clear Body, you give them Uxie's Levitate instead. They now ARE vulnerable to moves that reduce their stats because they no longer have their original ability!

[UPPERDECKER]

Okay, now I get it, thanks. The Chain Memento strategy looks very interesting.

[Phantom_IV]

Lucky chant is a horrid idea. It only blocks critical hits for 5 turns, not nearly enough for most things to setup reliably.

Additionally, Garchomp @ Lum isn't anywhere near enough to sweep the battle tower, even if it can get to +6 attack. There are many pokemon with Ice/Dragon moves that will outspeed you, and Sub can only save you once. Not to mention Ice priority wrecks you.

[Calisto]

Well, I kind of disagree on the point you make about Lucky Chant being useless. It is enough for Pokémon with Nasty Plot or Swords Dance to set up but also very beneficial for others, for example a Registeel with Amnesia/Curse would benefit a LOT from a few turns with no Critical Hits, reducing your risk significantly. Those turns might be all you need to get your defences high enough so you can recover HP + Sub faster than they can take it down.

This team was only meant as an original example team for getting 100 wins, not an invincible one, so it is obviously not perfect. Having said that, a +6 Garchomp is pretty brutal in the Tower and can kill of most things with Outrage or Earthquake. Only Glalie 390 and Lapras 356 have Ice Shard after battle #49, so I doubt Ice priority will 'wreck' this team. The only Pokémon with more speed and good Dragon moves are Sceptile 765 and Aerodactyl 851. Of the 2 Pokémon outspeeding Garchomp holding a Focus Sash, two are Electrics with no SE moves. The remaining Pokémon outspeeding Garchomp are Electrics or spread out fairly evenly over which trainers use them. This means it is less likely you're going to face 2 threats in a row than if say all your threats were Ice Pokémon and any Ice trainer has a good chances of having two major threats. At some stage you will obviously get screwed by something like Brightpowder misses but that is something that happens to most teams. Yet overall I still think this team would be adequate to do what it was designed for, getting 100 wins.

[Eo Ut Mortus]

Moved to Articles since it's more appropriate there.

[coolking49]

bit of a bump, since I was BTing tody and thought of a couple things that may came in here.

First off, under trickster, fling users are another weakness, because If they use fling after you trick, you cant have that free set up.

Also, under momento, double team/ toxic strategies screw you over pretty bad, since you cant hit them and they just wear you down.

[Frank Ripley]

Originally Posted by Fat Calisto

1) All-Out-Offense

If stat-reducing moves and status inflictions are not your cup of tea, this might be what you are looking for. This is a pretty straightforward strategy and has the advantage of disposing of enemies quickly so you can get through more trainers faster. Unfortunately even the best of these teams will succumb to a streak of bad luck at some stage and you shouldn't expect to get far beyond 100 wins with this kind of team.

In order to get the most out of your sweepers consider using moves like Destiny Bond when you have a Pokémon advantage. Using Choice items to get that extra Speed, Attack or Special Attack may also be crucial. Obviously you want to go for Pokémon with a lot of Speed and Sp. Att./Att!

Motto: If the enemy does a lot of damage, we'll just have to do more!
Strengths: Speed and power!
Weaknesses: Focus Sash, Focus Band, Quick Claw, Counter, Metal Burst, Mirrot Coat & general frailty!
Overall: ***

Just a little error I found.

[EonADS]

Calisto, you'll want to change the Spread on Drapion. Either Adamant with Max SpD, or 252Hp / 32 Def / 220 SpD / 4 Spe with a Careful nature. Belive me, as somebody who has taken Battle Tower streaks as far as 237 (my 264 streak has yet to be updated), offense matters very little if you're going the Psuedo-invincible route, but you need the best defenses you can get. On every P-I team, you do need a backup sweeper with strong offense though, so you might want to add that in as a side note.

One other strategy you're missing is the Offensive Trickers. Pokemon like Latios, Gengar, Metagross, and Starmie that carry three offensive moves to sweep weaker teams and Trick to incapacitate the correct Pokemon so that the next you use can set up a sweep. Here's an example:

Latios @ Choice Specs
Timid
EVs: 4 Hp / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Ability: Levitate
-Dragon Pluse
-Thunderbolt
-Surf
-Trick

Yes, I know it looks like copypasta from somewhere, but it's actually a very nice compromise between TrickScarf and a Speed Team. Tricking the Specs and locking a physical attacker up before switching to a setup sweeper is actually a viable strategy if you're not into the whole TrickCrippleSwitch thing. It works great with Pokemon like Gyarados and Scizor.

[Calisto]

Thanks for the comments! I have fixed the Mirror Coat typo and added Fling to the Trick team threats.

Toxic + Double Team: There are 14 Pokémon that have both Toxic and Double Team and none seem to have any proper offense capabilities. With the example team in the OP I think Thunder Wave and Taunt coupled with Memento should be sufficient to kill such opponents effectively. After a Substitute from Garchomp you have some time to use Swords Dance and then strike. With their poor Attack stats and moves they won't be too dangerous in the meantime. Except for maybe Skarmory I don't think any of these can survive a hit from a +6 Garchomp.

Drapion: The best spread on Drapion probably depends on what you are using him for. In the Memento strategy section where Drapion was mentioned there is no room for another sweeper on your team so it is important to maximise Drapion's Attack stats so you don't need another back-up sweeper. If you can OHKO the second enemy Pokémon and prevent it from using Counter, that may just save you from the last Pokémon chucking a Quick Claw OHKO combo in your face. Although Defence on Drapion is useful, I doubt it will give you that much of an edge if your enemy's Attack is already reduced to 1/4 and possibly paralysed. On a Trick team that Attack stat is usually not crippled so much, making Defensive EVs way more important than on a Memento team.

Offensive Trickster: I considered mentioning hybrids of the overall strategies but it seemed easier to follow if I just divided the sections into distinct strategies. Perhaps I could add a separate section on which strategies mesh well with another if people feel it might be useful. I definitely agree with your sentiments that these Offensive Tricksters should not be underestimated.

[scarloc]

great work. but.... what if you want to use set up sweepers without trick e.g. SD lucario. is that good idea?

[EonADS]

Actually, without high/max SpD, Accupressure Drapion can't take neutral Special Attacks like Signal Beam or Ice Beam at all. That's why both people in the Top 10 with Drapion (Jumpman and me) use so much Special Defense. Take a look at the team dynamics of both teams and at Jumpman's previous 190 win streak team if you want to understand a bit more. They're all in the Battle Frontier Records list.

[Calisto]

@ Scarloc: Sure, but it usually tends to be harder without Trick.

@ EonADS: Memento and Trick are two completely different strategies so you can't compare EVs spreads of one strategy with the other and expect all arguments for one to hold true for the other. With Memento and Battle Armour you really don't care about neutral moves if their Attack is divided by 4. If you can take on Signal Beams and Ice Beams with EV investment in Sp. Def on your Trick team, imagine what it would be like if ALL of those only did 1/4 damage. If you are not convinced yet maybe the following calculations will clear it up:

Let us say for Signal Beam I take one of the most powerful Signal Beams out there, from Yanmega. After two Mementos (which is what I have mentioned this spread was for twice) your Signal Beam is going to do 25-30 damage out of Drapion's 177 Hp (252 HP 6 Sp. Def). The most powerful Ice Beam in the game from Glaceon will do a bit more but it is not a disaster either: 35-47 damage. Considering he recovers about 11 Hp per turn with Black Sludge and also runs Rest, claiming he can't take those Attacks is a bit extreme. If anything it would be the opposite of what you say as you should be much more worried about physical STAB Earthquakes rather than Special moves. After all if you don't run Trick you can't get around those by Tricking with a Levitator.

[NightShadow]

You lack 4/6 EVs on Tyranitar. Every stat points counts ;)

[Jason 137]

Okay, noob question, I know, but exactly what are these "hax" I'm always hearing about? And how exactly do they work against you?

Also, can't you abuse Encore as well? I know I'm probably going to be attacked by a gazillion more advanced Battle Tower-ers than me, telling me that's a horrible idea (that's what happens every time, lol), but I just wanted to throw that out there.

[Calisto]

@ Nightshadow: Perhaps we could make an exception for something as badass as Tyranitar? =)

@ Jason 137: They refer to effects that have a given probability of happening but occur more often than they should. In the Battle Tower these frequencies tend to be biased in favour of the enemy team.

Examples:
- Critical hits have a 1/16 chance of happening, the AI this triggers more often (whereas you do not).
- Quick Claw is an item that has a 20% chance of making your Pokémon attack first, the AIs activation is higher than that.
- Brightpowder is an item that can cause your opponent to miss attacks, same story.
- OHKO moves have a 30% chance of hitting, the AI hits them at least half of the time.


As for Encore, it seems like a valid strategy to abuse but unfortunately it only lasts for a couple of turns. This makes it harder to base a team around it than a Trick team, though I suspect it could work.

[spheal]

this article helped me a lot with my team thank you.
i made a trick/memento team consisting of Latios and Scizor and Metagross :)

[macle]

Please tell me if this article is finished or not

[Lady Salamence]

No mention of CounterCoat?

Something with Taunt/Protect/Mirror Coat/Counter worked amazingly for me.

I start off with Protect. If they use a status move, Taunt. if they attack, use the move that counters it. It really works, due to predictability of the AI.

[Darthenos]

This was extremely useful. I am going to try to use the torment strategy when I get my DS and game back from my friend.