My 4th gen OU Team

Alright guys, this is my 4th gen OU competitive battling team. I've watched many videos online on competitive battling and I was dying to try it out and now I have constructed a team. So feel free to point out any counters or major errors I made. Thanks.



Metagross @ Lum Berry
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 HP/ 252 Atk/ 6 Spe
Nature: Adamant [+Atk, -Sp.Atk]
- Stealth Rock
- Meteor Mash
- Bullet Punch
- Explosion

This is my lead Metagross. The main purpose of this Metagross is to get Stealth Rocks up and knock out other pokemon in the opponents team with it's massive attack stat. Since Metagross also has massive defense, it can take a few hits. I put Meteor Mash on this set as a powerful STAB move coming off of Metagross' Attack stat. And since Meteor Mash has a chance of boosting Metagross' attack even higher! Bullet Punch is to do good damage a pokemon that's faster, or to revenge kill a pokemon after Metagross switches back in. And then we've got Explosion, when there is a threat to my team that I just can't take out.




Tentacruel @ Leftovers
Ability: Liquid Ooze
EVs: 252 HP/ 120 Def/ 136 Sp.Def
Nature: Calm [+Sp.Def, -Atk]
- Toxic Spikes
- Rapid Spin
- Surf
- Sludge Bomb

This is my support Tentacruel, it plays many roles for my team, first it plays as a Specially Defensive Wall and for switching in if there is a fire type pokemon that is bothering my Metagross or Skarm. It's main purpose though is to Spin away Entry Hazards that will bother my team, so that I can sweep with my Togekiss without losing 25 % of health. It's next role is to set up two layers of Toxic Spikes so that I have two entry hazards up.



Skarmory @ Leftovers
Ability: Keen Eye
EVs: 252 HP/ 252 Def/ 6 Sp.Def
Nature: Impish [+Def, -Sp.Atk]
- Spikes
- Whirlwind
- Roost
- Bravebird

My Skarm plays as my defensive wall, quite obviously and also to set up Spikes. After that it Whirlwinds so that the opponent's pokemon are taking damage and it reveals their team so I can choose which of my pokemon I can use to counter it. And ofcourse it roosts up when it's health is down. It's last move is just for damage or if somehow I get locked in to taunt.


Electivire @ Expert Belt
Ability: Motor Drive
EVs: 6 HP/ 252 Atk/ 252 Spe
Nature: Adamant [+Atk, -Sp.Atk]
- Thunderpunch
- Ice Punch
- Cross Chop
- Earthquake

Since I have two pokemon that are weak to Electric type moves I think that Electivire is an amazing pokemon on my team. After getting it's boost, it can outspeed anything in the OU tier that's not scarfed except for Ninjask ofcourse. From there it proceeds to do huge amounts of damage to the opponents pokemon. Since this set covers 13/17 of the pokemon types for super effective damage, I decided that Expert Belt would be a better Item than Life Orb.



Togekiss @ Leftovers
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP/ 36 Sp.Atk/ 220 Spe
Nature: Modest [+Sp.Atk, - Atk]
- Nasty Plot
- Air Slash
- Aura Sphere
- Roost

Now I have watched alot of videos online of OU battling and haven't seen Togekisses that often so I thought I'd like to try it. This is my defensive nasty plot Togekiss. It's got max HP and with it's defenses it can set up very well. After one nasty plot it takes it's 313 Special Attack all the way up to 616. From their it proceeds to use it's two attacks and roost up any damage with leftovers to help it to recover.


Breloom @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 12 HP/ 252 Atk/ 244 Spe
Nature: Adamant
- Substitute
- Focus Punch
- Spore
- Seed Bomb

This is my SubPunching Breloom. It's a real pain in the behind when I get to set up. I start of by using spore so that the opposition is asleep, however I have trouble using it with faster pokemon since I can't predict when they will wake up. After that I Substitute, and the poison heal ability heals 1/8th of it's health since it's poisoned so I can sub many times. From there I either use Focus Punch since the pokemon is asleep and even if it woke up it couldn't touch me behind my sub, or Seed Bomb depending on the typing of the opposition pokemon.


So that's my team, feel free to post any suggestions or any mistakes that I made here.

IMO, you are wasting too much time on hazards. This metagame is too offensively oriented for Toxic Spikes to be a viable strategy, unless you happen to be playing some kind of stall, which you aren't.

Also, Electivire is just bad. Period. It has no moves to even touch Rotom-A. I'd replace it with a more reliable Electric-type like Jolteon or Raikou.

Jolteon @ Choice Specs
Trait: Volt Absorb
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spe
Timid Nature (+Spe, -Atk)
- Thunderbolt
- Shadow Ball
- Hidden Power Grass / Hidden Power Ice
- Baton Pass

Raikou @ Life Orb
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spe
Timid Nature (+Spe, -Atk)
- Calm Mind
- Thunderbolt
- Shadow Ball
- Hidden Power Grass

Both of these can actually hurt Rotom-A.

You have nothing to handle Lucario, and Skarmory is an unreliable way of handling it because it has a chance to be OHKOed by a +2 Close Combat after Stealth Rocks. I know this from experience with my own Lucario. You don't really need Spikes support, so I'd replace Skarmory with a Choice Scarf Jirachi.

Jirachi @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature (+Spe, -SAtk)
- Iron Head
- Fire Punch
- Ice Punch
- U-turn

Outspeeds any Lucario, even Scarf. Resists both ExtremeSpeed and Bullet Punch. This will give you time to nail it with a Fire Punch before it sweeps you. I personally prefer using U-turn, since that prevents Jirachi from being complete Magnezone bait. ThunderPunch is not needed as Breloom already resists every move Gyarados commonly carries and can scout for Bounce by using Substitute on the first turn then using Spore when Gyarados hits the Sub.

You also do not need Toxic Spikes support, so I think you could make great use of a SubSplit Gengar over Tentacruel to wear down walls.

Gengar @ Life Orb
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spe
Timid Nature (+Spe, -Atk)
- Substitute
- Pain Split
- Shadow Ball
- Focus Blast

Has pretty good synergy with your team. Breloom resists Dark, Togekiss is immune to Ghost, and Metagross and Jirachi 4x resist Psychic. On the other end, Gengar is immune to Earthquake which a few of your members are pretty weak to.

Hope this helped.

Woooah, so many things I wasn't paying attention too thanks alot!

So Lead Metagross
Specs jolteon/ Calm Mind Raikou
Scarfed Jirachi
Subsplit Gengar
Defensive Nasty Plot Togekiss
and SubPunch Breloom.

I would actually say that SubSplit Gengar is a safe SD Lucario check and that Spikes are very useful for this style of team. Scarfed Jirachi is often too weak and Skarmory's hazards are more effective.

I agree that Jolteon would be better than Electivire but it is easily played around by dedicated Special walls/tanks (read: Blissey), and I would recommend SubPass Jolteon instead. This allows for Jolteon to scout for status, have a pseudo-scouting move, and pass Substitute to others in the team, particularly Togekiss. With this set, Jolteon can also beat Flygon, who usually switches into Jolteon with impunity.

Lucarioark, it simply isn't true to say that Toxic Spikes and other hazards aren't effective in this metagame. Kevin Garrett's main laddering team when he made it to number 1 on the PO ladder a few weeks back was a stall team, the current number 1 and number 2 both used Spikes regularly to get there, and when I made it to number 2 not long ago I was using Toxic Spikes as well. If anything, they're more effective than ever.

Back to the rate. Okay, the first thing I notice is that you seem to be a bit confused about the type of team you're trying to make. You have Toxic Spikes, Spikes, but no Rapid Spin blocker - also, these team members, and especially Tentacruel which has a lot of difficulty in the current metagame without extensive Wish support, don't synergise that well together. I'm going to assume that you want a balanced sort of team with some entry hazard abuse for the purposes of this rate.

There are a lot of threats that your team will have difficulty beating with the team in its current state. Special attackers of all sorts don't have too much difficulty beating everything you can switch in to them - this includes threats such as Heatran, LO Jolteon, LO Starmie, and some physical threats such as SD Lucario, Breloom, and bulky Taunt Gyarados.

The first suggestion I want to make is to replace your Electivire with a Choice Scarf Rotom-W. Electivire really is a bad pokemon as others have said, getting walled by one of the most common pokemon in the meta, while most of the things it can hit supereffectively can survive easily and OHKO back. What Rotom-W gives you is first of all a spinblocker, and a reliable defensive pokemon checking Starmie, Gyarados, Lucario, boosting Infernape, and so on.

Next, try using a Blissey instead of Metagross. Metagross doesn't offer much to the team defensively when you have Skarmory; Blissey is the best multi-purpose check to most of your remaining threats. It can also Stealth Rock, though not in the lead position, and support the team with Wish which is incredibly helpful for Tentacruel as I mentioned earlier (Tentacruel resists the STAB attacks of a lot of common pokemon which switch into Blissey, mainly Fighting types, meaning it can reliably survive the oncoming attack and heal back up).

Finally, the team is still a bit weak to Gyarados and Fighting types (unless you replace Tentacruel with Starmie, but I don't want to change too much more on your team and the Toxic Spikes are very helpful for the core I have in mind). For this reason I'd suggest using a SubRoost Zapdos (Substitute, Thunderbolt, Roost, Roar / Toxic) over your Togekiss. It synergises almost perfectly with Breloom (Breloom loses to Celebi, Venusaur, Gyarados, all of which Zapdos can switch into and set up a Sub; Breloom switches safely into the things Zapdos can't beat such as Blissey and Tyranitar). Zapdos also makes a pretty good lead, 2HKOing or setting up a Sub on most of them and able to Toxic leads like Swampert or Hippowdon which can take its attacks.

Breloom should be changed to a bulky SubSeed set imo on a team like this, it makes it much easier for it to switch in multiple times, and SubSeed abuses the entry hazards more effectively anyway.

Just to cap off; if you like my suggestions your team would look like this:

-SubRoost Zapdos
-Skarmory (use a specially defensive spread with an Impish nature, it lets it set up against the greatest number of pokemon)
-Tentacruel (use Knock Off, HP Electric etc instead of Sludge Bomb)
-Choice Scarf Rotom-W
-Blissey (Stealth Rock, Wish, Protect, Seismic Toss)
-Breloom (SubSeed)

Hope you like those suggestions. I can guarantee that the team works well and is a LOT of fun to use. Good luck :)

Mikel said:

I would actually say that SubSplit Gengar is a safe SD Lucario check and that Spikes are very useful for this style of team. Scarfed Jirachi is often too weak and Skarmory's hazards are more effective.

I agree that Jolteon would be better than Electivire but it is easily played around by dedicated Special walls/tanks (read: Blissey), and I would recommend SubPass Jolteon instead. This allows for Jolteon to scout for status, have a pseudo-scouting move, and pass Substitute to others in the team, particularly Togekiss. With this set, Jolteon can also beat Flygon, who usually switches into Jolteon with impunity.

Jolteon

Jolteon (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 Spd/252 SpAtk/4 SpDef
Timid nature (+Spd,-Atk)
- Baton Pass
- Hidden Power
- Substitute
- Thunderbolt

Click to expand...

SubSplit Gengar is not a safe Lucario check because it will die to a +2 Bullet Punch after SR.

Flygon and Jirachi have the same base Attack. Flygon often uses a Choice Scarf. Both make excellent users of Choice Scarf. Choice Scarf users are used for revenge killing, not for being stronger than everything.

Anyway, the problem I'd have with not using a Choice Scarf user of some sort is that without one, you will easily get swept by the likes of Dragonite, whereas Jirachi will outspeed and OHKO that Dragonite with Ice Punch. ScarfRachi also gives him some nice momentum to work with, as does Specs Jolteon since it can dry pass out as something like Blissey comes in.

@bubbly: Bulky Tauntrados cannot beat Breloom unless it has Bounce, which is incredibly rare. Offensive DD Gyarados is also much more common, who can barely even beat Breloom even if it has Bounce. Also, that isn't a balanced team you made him, it's semi-stall. I saw him looking for battles on the battle finder thread earlier today, so I'm assuming he's using this team on Wifi, where stall is just a bad idea due to how slow Wifi is.

Anyway, now that I think about it a little more, I think Shuca Berry Heatran would be a more effective lead than Metagross on this team. Here's the set:

Heatran @ Shuca Berry
Trait: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature (+Spe, - Atk)
- Stealth Rock
- Fire Blast
- Earth Power
- Hidden Power Grass

HP Grass is on the set solely to prevent lead Swampert from blocking out the set entirely. Also fucks up lead Azelf, due to resisting Psychic and being immune to Fire Blast. Lead Aerodactyl could be a problem, but it cannot OHKO you with Earthquake because of the Shuca Berry, which allows you to set up your rocks if it does not Taunt you. Plus, all lead Aero can do to your Breloom is Taunt it, since Breloom resists both halves of the EdgeQuake combo. If you choose to use this, I recommend running the Specs Jolteon set I gave you with HP Ice, as this will give you a way of hitting Flygon on the switch, who you could seriously struggle with otherwise.

That's all I have for now. Hope this helped.