Making Ubers Offensive Teams

[mtr]

For the purposes of this thread, "Offense" is defined as any team that isn't a Stall Team or a Screen Pass team (though the latter don't exist anymore now that everyone has Dragon Tail).

Making a stall team is pretty formulaic, and hasn't changed much since Gen IV except you see less Blisseys and Chanseys now. But making offense teams has a lot of room for variation, and I think it could be helpful to discuss the similarities and contrasts between various approaches to offense.

I don't know too much about making beast offensive teams, so I welcome anybody's advice. But I'll do my best to start this thread off on the right foot.



1) The Stealth Rocker
Stealth Rock is still a very powerful move. Regardless, without it it's much harder to check threats like Ho-oh, Reshiram, Kyurem-B/W, as anyone who's played our CCAT knows. There are a few options for this.

Deoxys-S: The best choice if you don't mind starting the game 5-6 in exchange for SR+Taunted Enemy or SR+Spikes. You should pair this up with Giratina-O or Ghost Arceus.

Dialga: One of the best SR setup Pokemon, with its amazing typing, solid defenses, and powerful Draco Meteor.

Groudon: Good on Sun Teams, but it often invites strong, faster special attackers who threaten it out and blast your team. Thunder Wave can turn this into an advantage though...

Forretress: For those who want to condense Stealth Rock and Spikes (and Rapid Spin) onto one Pokemon that doesn't have paper defenses. Some players use this, just remember to use Volt Switch to get in a sweeper after you've set the hazards you want. Red Card as an item is also viable as a failsafe against a sweeper, if its a bit gimmicky.

Support Arceus: You can also shove Stealth Rock onto an Arceus form to get the hazard up while patching up a hole in your team.




The Strategy:
Offensive Teams have a variety of different strategies they can use to sweep through teams. These can be based around weather, or just synergistic offensive combinations designed to weaken counters and sweep.

Rain Abuse:
Kyogre is obviously a requirement for these teams. For the main sweeper, you have the option of Palkia, Manaphy, Waterceus, or a Swift Swimmer. These teams tend to have issues with Lati Twins and Ferrothorn. Grassceus, Chansey/Blissey, and rival weather changers are also concerns depending on the chosen sweepers. A Rain Team should use its remaining Pokemon to deal with these threats, while avoiding accumulating weaknesses to other common sweepers.

Sun Abuse:
Groudon is required for these, of course. Other than that, a Sun Abuser can be Ho-oh, Reshiram, Blaziken, Fire Arceus, or a Chlorophyller (though most of those suck). These teams tend to be vulnerable to residual damage, and those without Reshiram suffer against Giratina/Giratina-O. Additionally, those without Ho-oh can be slow and vulnerable to strong special assaults from Darkrai, Mewtwo, and various Arceus formes. Many of these teams favor Terrakion as a check against against the latter, and Latias (or Wobbuffet) against the former.

Sand Abuse:
These teams frequently feature Tyranitar (though Hippowdon also sees some usage) as their weather Pokemon. For their sweeper, Garchomp, Excadrill, and Rockceus are favored choices, and Gliscor and Ferrothorn are useful support/defensive Pokemon they use. These teams don't have the sheer power of Rain or Sun teams, but Sand's residual damage hits a lot of people in Ubers, and Sand's sweepers are strong in their own right.

Offensive Combinations:
The idea here is to either use a particular strategy to destroy walls/scarfers/crap so other dudes can sweep. For example, RPDon and EK Normceus double up and kill Giratina so one of them can sweep. MixRay serves as a Groudon lure so Poison (or Steel/Water/Whatever) Arceus can CM up and sweep. These can be related to weather too.




Checking Threats:
An offensive team should be able to have decent matchups against both stall and offensive teams. If the offensive team is using Pokemon that can't get past stall (eg: IceCeus, SpecsOgre, etc) it should use wallbreakers like Darkrai or Giratina-O.

Calm Mind is well distributed throughout Ubers, and often after a Calm Mind it's difficult to revenge enemy Pokemon on the special side. So right now, a lot of the popular scarfers are physical ones like Terrakion, Zekrom, and Garchomp. Other way to check Pokemon include weather-boosted revenge killers like Kingdra, Excadrill, or Blaziken.

The amount of threats you need to check also depends on what you let setup. For example, if your team doesn't let Rayquaza get stat boosts, you don't need to have a DDRay Check.



Addendum:
I dunno, I had an example team posted here, but usually it takes several playtest games for me to make a good offensive team (Sand doesn't count, its easy to make those). What do you think?

[locoghoul]

My first advice would be the way of playing an offensive team. Momentum has to be on your side. If you play an offensive team then you have to be aggressive since turn 1. Double switching should be bread and butter when playing offense. Also, a good read on the opposite's team defense. If your main sweeper Reshiram is useless against certain team (Rockceus, Chansey or Ho-Oh) then try to lure them and weaken them. Another tip is that even on offensive teams, Tspikes are great. All the weather starters are weak to Tspikes. You can win the weather war if you keep pressure with Tspikes on the field.

Originally Posted by Fat mtr

For the purposes of this thread, "Offense" is defined as any team that isn't a Stall Team or a Screen Pass team (though the latter don't exist anymore now that everyone has Dragon Tail).

Smash passing is very popular on PO server. By this I'm not saying is the best strat nor that is the noobish strat ever. Smeargle with Spore, Ingrain, Shell Smash and Baton Pass is not easy to deal with.

[Jerp]

I've never faced a screen pass team, but smash passers are actually fairly common. I'd say 1/50 teams I've faced was a smash passing team... on PO anyway.

"Smeargle with Spore, Ingrain, Shell Smash and Baton Pass is not easy to deal with."

If rocks are up, it's even worse. There be only one reliable counter to smash pass:

Mewtwo @ Choice Scarf
Timid
Standard Ev's
-Aura Sphere
-Ice Beam
-Shadow Ball
-Psystrike

Outspeeds and OHKO's nearly every smash pass recipient that isn't scarfed.

[Blim]

Originally Posted by Fat locoghoul

Smash passing is very popular on PO server. By this I'm not saying is the best strat nor that is the noobish strat ever. Smeargle with Spore, Ingrain, Shell Smash and Baton Pass is not easy to deal with.

Good to know that am not the only one annoyed by that ridiculous, cheap, no skill, focus sash shell smashing smeragle with either ingrain / taunt / or magic coat as the 4th move. It's difficult to stop if it has proper team support, like lead deoxys-s. From my experience of facing it, I honestly think it's completely broken and uncompetitive in ubers.

But back on the subject of offense in ubers, I'd like to bring up barry4ever's guide: http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=84947

Definitively one of the best guides I've read on smogon, the metagame has changed a bit with the bw2 stuff being released of course, but the guide is still really good. Toxic Forretress can be a pretty decent sd arceus check, which is very important as offensive teams tend to be sd arceus weak unless they're running skarmory. It also provides that much needed rapid spin support [yeah, it's harder to spin in ubers, deal with it.] Darkrai, Mewtwo, Rayquaza, and Ghost Arceus are also the most threatening offensive pokemon in my opinion.

[Myzozoa]

Im going to post what I consider to be the most affective ubers offensive core. This core maximizes skilled play and long-term planning as opposed to prediction. It is extremely reliable, and it can basically ignore team match-up.

The Core is:

Darkrai@Leftovers, Timid Max Spa, Max Speed
Sub
Nasty Plot
Dark Pulse
Dark Void


Mewtwo@ Life Orb, Timid Max speed, Max special attack
Psystrike
Calm Mind/Thunder
Ice Beam
Fire Blast

Arceus Fighting, Timid, max speed, max special attack
Judgement
Ice Beam
Calm Mind
Recover

This core is operates by sleeping one of their important checks to mewtwo or arceus and then sweeping. Darkrai comes out late game after they revenge kill one of your other offensive threats. If you're against stall you agressively substitute with Darkrai forcing them to let you sleep an important pokemon without relying on risky predictions. I usually support this core with a weather inducer, a stealth rocker, and a ghost for a really basic offensive team that doesn't worry about team match-ups because Darkrai throws any advantages they have out the window.

[Jerp]

"This core is operates by sleeping one of their important checks to mewtwo or arceus and then sweeping. Darkrai comes out late game after they revenge kill one of your other offensive threats. If you're against stall you agressively substitute with Darkrai forcing them to let you sleep an important pokemon without relying on risky predictions. I usually support this core with a weather inducer, a stealth rocker, and a ghost for a really basic offensive team that doesn't worry about team match-ups because Darkrai throws any advantages they have out the window."

Interesting core. But just out of curiosity, what should happen if your own darkrai is put to sleep by an opposing darkrai/ flinched to death by shaymin/ ko'd by mewtwo?

[Poppy]

3 man offensive check core

terrakion - extremekiller

darkrai - cm arceus

palkia / latias - kyogre

support with dialga / forretress

cm or sd arceus forme

wobbuffet or rayquaza

[locoghoul]

Originally Posted by Fat Myzozoa

Im going to post what I consider to be the most affective ubers offensive core. This core maximizes skilled play and long-term planning as opposed to prediction. It is extremely reliable, and it can basically ignore team match-up.

The Core is:

Darkrai@Leftovers, Timid Max Spa, Max Speed
Sub
Nasty Plot
Dark Pulse
Dark Void


Mewtwo@ Life Orb, Timid Max speed, Max special attack
Psystrike
Calm Mind/Thunder
Ice Beam
Fire Blast

Arceus Fighting, Timid, max speed, max special attack
Judgement
Ice Beam
Calm Mind
Recover

This core is operates by sleeping one of their important checks to mewtwo or arceus and then sweeping. Darkrai comes out late game after they revenge kill one of your other offensive threats. If you're against stall you agressively substitute with Darkrai forcing them to let you sleep an important pokemon without relying on risky predictions. I usually support this core with a weather inducer, a stealth rocker, and a ghost for a really basic offensive team that doesn't worry about team match-ups because Darkrai throws any advantages they have out the window.

I had a surprisingly successful team with Deoxys-A, Mewtwo and Darkrai as offensive core plus Blissey, Wallceus and some SRer. I was quite surprised how hard was to wall these pokes as they can deal with most special defense walls. I think Wobba would have worked great with them trapping scarf revenge killers.

[Jibaku*]

There be only one reliable counter to smash pass:

And his name is Ditto. Unless your opponent somehow got Sub + Smash + Pass which is highly unlike considering that Smeargle usually ends up having his Sash activated, and Gorebyss doesnt have Spore to shut down your phazing, Ditto should be able to batter apart the enemy's team by transforming into the recipient. You may need to wear out the screens, though.

Smashpass is a cheesy strat but it does have several flaws and really breaks apart if you ever deny Smeargle the pass / counter the recipient. Lum Tyranitar and Lum Extremekiller can deny the pass, and Adamant max speed Excadrill outruns +2 Smeargle in the sand, for instance.

[Gates]

Can we please stop talking about Pass teams? This thread is supposed to be about offensive teams.

Originally Posted by Fat Myzozoa

Im going to post what I consider to be the most affective ubers offensive core. This core maximizes skilled play and long-term planning as opposed to prediction. It is extremely reliable, and it can basically ignore team match-up.

The Core is:

Darkrai@Leftovers, Timid Max Spa, Max Speed
Sub
Nasty Plot
Dark Pulse
Dark Void


Mewtwo@ Life Orb, Timid Max speed, Max special attack
Psystrike
Calm Mind/Thunder
Ice Beam
Fire Blast

Arceus Fighting, Timid, max speed, max special attack
Judgement
Ice Beam
Calm Mind
Recover

This core is operates by sleeping one of their important checks to mewtwo or arceus and then sweeping. Darkrai comes out late game after they revenge kill one of your other offensive threats. If you're against stall you agressively substitute with Darkrai forcing them to let you sleep an important pokemon without relying on risky predictions. I usually support this core with a weather inducer, a stealth rocker, and a ghost for a really basic offensive team that doesn't worry about team match-ups because Darkrai throws any advantages they have out the window.

I really like this. I think Darkrai is a massively underrated pokemon in this format. People seem to think that because of his frail defenses and the fact that Mewtwo outspeeds him make him not viable when in reality he's the Breloom of Ubers. The coverage between these three is almost perfect too. I think generally the underlying concept that Myzozoa was getting at is that for a hyper-offensive team you want an aggressive core that basically ignores everything that your opponent could do and turn pokemon into a single-player game.

For Bulky Aggro teams, though, I usually use Support Groudon, SpecsOgre, and Ferrothorn as a core (I'm not gonna waste your time by posting the sets other than saying I still like Roar over Dragon Tail since some of the best sets in the format run Sub). It has a nice entry hazard suite and allows you to dictate the weather conditions at all times, which I would argue is more important to bulky aggro than completely ignoring your opponent. Between Groudon and Ferro, most threats can be switched into and either phazed, seeded, or statused and very rarely they can be outright killed. Kyogre is a great secondary weather user and SpecsOgre in particular can change momentum in a match since your opponent often has to stop what they're doing to deal with it. It has a lot of problems but it's a solid enough start that I recommend it to people new to Ubers just so that they can learn how the format functions (and also because top5+Ferrothorn is viable in every format and Groudon and Kyogre are both consistently in the top 5).

For reference, I'm defining "bulky aggro" as any team that has more tanks than boosting sweepers or choiced pokemon. It doesn't rely on entry hazards to the extent of stall but it doesn't place as much emphasis on getting set up for a sweep as hyper-offensive teams do.

[mtr]

Heh, Brksocsc's team is pretty interesting, and definitely shows how fast special attackers will never go out of style in Ubers.

[Pokémon Trainer R]

Originally Posted by Fat Jibaku

And his name is Ditto. Unless your opponent somehow got Sub + Smash + Pass which is highly unlike considering that Smeargle usually ends up having his Sash activated, and Gorebyss doesnt have Spore to shut down your phazing, Ditto should be able to batter apart the enemy's team by transforming into the recipient. You may need to wear out the screens, though.

Smashpass is a cheesy strat but it does have several flaws and really breaks apart if you ever deny Smeargle the pass / counter the recipient. Lum Tyranitar and Lum Extremekiller can deny the pass, and Adamant max speed Excadrill outruns +2 Smeargle in the sand, for instance.

Actually, there are two reliable counters to the Shell Smash + Baton Pass strategy, and Ditto is not one of them, as that is a revenge-killer, not a counter (though Ditto will still undeniably be the Pokémon responsible for the death of Shell Smash + Baton Pass in Wifi Ubers, just like how it has already happened in DW/No Preview Ubers). The two reliable counters to Shell Smash + Baton Pass are:

1. Haze Xatu
2. Yawn Espeon (even this could actually fail if Smeargle uses Substitute instead of Baton Pass on the turn when Espeon Yawns... but it's reliable enough)

Anyway, when I think of offense in Übers, the first thing that comes to my mind is the Swords Dance Rayquaza + Extreme Killer Arceus offensive duo.

[locoghoul]

^ I've seen Dialgas with Lum Berry instead of LO so Yawn is not a full stop

[TrollFreak]

You know, you could add a team or two in the OP to show how offensive teams are built.

Anywho, speaking of BP, Xatu does make a nice check, I tried it aganist BP teams thanks to PTR, but who wants to use Xatu on a team just for BP. Thats whats makes it so hard, random Pokemon that can beat BP, but don't do much else.

[mtr]

Yeah I'm working on making 2 teams. For one, I had Deoxys-S / Giratina-O / RP Lum Don / EK Normceus / Latias / Terrakion (Poppy helped me with this one).

For another, I wanted to do a Rain Abuse team, so I had something like ScarfOgre / Qwilfish / Giratina-O / Support Dialga / Mewtwo / Palkia, but that one needs work.

[firecape]

Kabutops is really underrated for rain teams and in general. Many people forget it has Rapid Spin, which is just such a valuable move that not many offensive Pokemon can use effectively. (Credit goes to Jibaku for Kabutops !_!).

I have been trying for a while to make effective offensive teams (edit: and made mixed success) and the main thing you need is without a doubt an effective wallbreaker. I've been using Mamoswine and it's just amazing. It can literally 2HKO basically everything thats not Skarmory or Bronzong, and these aren't that common. The most common leads for semi-stallish team (Dialga/Groudon, I didn't check usage stats so this is probably wrong, but whatever >_>) are just demolished by it. Dialga has a decent chance to be OHKOed (too lazy to run calc atm...) and get absolutely nothing, and Groudon will always be 2HKOed by Icicle Crash, and has a 30% chance of being flinched and get nothing as well. It also does well against Deoxys-S: Earthquake first, then you can either Ice Shard for the KO, which means at max they will get one hazard (sometimes none because they try to Taunt), or get a free Substitute up. Its incredibly easy to get Mamoswine behind a sub and just destroy things from there. So many people try to go to Ferrothorn expecting some easy spikes, then see Earthquake 2HKOes and I get a free sub on the switch out/Leech Seed/Protect. If you wanna see the set im using its the on site one basically but with a slight tweak to the EVs. It 2HKOs Giratina/SpD Ferro/Lugia/Groudon and many more with little prediction and some help from SR. Its Ice Shard off Adamant LO with max attack also does massive damage to basically all Dragons that would like nothing better to spam Draco Meteor against a frail offensive team. Also, when I make an offensive team, I don't allow myself to have more than like 2 Pokemon who cannot deal with Ferrothorn in some way (which in turn means they can handle Forretress and Skarmory in most cases). It sounds a bit excessive and is easier said than done, but if you do this you basically shut down what makes uber stall/semi-stall/balance so effective: hazards. You could say "just predict the Ferro and double switch" but you can't get those double switches right every time. Another alternative is just make a team not that weak to hazards, but I find the first option is usually easier. Rapid Spinning is also an option but it just kills any momentum you had unless its either like Excadrill/Cloyster/Kabutops. 2/3 have to be in a specific weather to pose enough threat to maintain momentum and pull off a spin, and 1 doesn't really fit on many teams easily (not that the other 2 do either really). Just my 2 cents, sorry if its mostly rambling...

[Mr.lol]

1. Haze Xatu
2. Yawn Espeon (even this could actually fail if Smeargle uses Substitute instead of Baton Pass on the turn when Espeon Yawns... but it's reliable enough)

Anyway, when I think of offense in Übers, the first thing that comes to my mind is the Swords Dance Rayquaza + Extreme Killer Arceus offensive duo.

And Gorybess remains forgotten for raping the above with a +2 Surf / Hydro Pump........ oh well.

Kabutops is really underrated for rain teams and in general. Many people forget it has Rapid Spin, which is just such a valuable move that not many offensive Pokemon can use effectively. (Credit goes to Jibaku for Kabutops !_!).

Kabutops spinning is boss, although I hate how you have to give up one coverage move or something for it. It can't either SD, use STAB, or it has to give up the treasure low kick :(.

[Pokémon Trainer R]

Originally Posted by Fat TrollFreak

You know, you could add a team or two in the OP to show how offensive teams are built.

Anywho, speaking of BP, Xatu does make a nice check, I tried it aganist BP teams thanks to PTR, but who wants to use Xatu on a team just for BP. Thats whats makes it so hard, random Pokemon that can beat BP, but don't do much else.

The main purpose of Xatu isn't even to counter Baton Pass teams. It's to reflect entry hazards and status effects, and counter Ferrothorn, Lugia, and defensive Groudon. Countering Baton Pass is only Xatu's secondary purpose.

Originally Posted by Fat Mr.lol

And Gorybess remains forgotten for raping the above with a +2 Surf / Hydro Pump........ oh well.

Since Gorebyss does not learn a sleep-inducing move, then it can be simply countered by a Dialga/Lugia with Dragon Tail/Whirlwind.

[Mr.lol]

Since Gorebyss does not learn a sleep-inducing move, then it can be simply countered by a Dialga/Lugia with Dragon Tail/Whirlwind.

It appears who's theorymoning is a tad bit obvious
Standard Gorebyss @1 Shell Smash Rain Boosted Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 80 SpDef Lugia -> (118.51% - 139.90%) Guranteed OHKO

Standard Gorebyss @ 1 Shell Smash Rain Boosted Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP Dialga ->(94.31% - 111.14%)

Standard Gorebyss @ 1 Shell Smash Rain Boosted Hydro Pump vs 252 HP / 200 SpDef (Support Dialga) Dialga -> (75.72% - 89.18%) potential OHKO with 2 layers of spikes and rocks

Phazing infront of Gorebyss is near impossible, also all these calcs assumed Life Orb because Life Orb Gorebyss is too strongth, and it might as well hold something beneficial if Smeargle gets to hold focus sash O_o (go away white herb I like my KOes).

Ok so I went against one of the more ancient screen pass teams yesterday and I must say its a forgotten strategy that seems to work successfully in the new meta. The rise of balance means that these teams can plow right through them with a strong sweeper (ex: Double Dance Groudon / DD quaza).

Also to the OP Syrim and I tested weatherless offense at one time, it wasn't as bad as others think it may be.

[mtr]

Originally Posted by Fat Jerp

"This core is operates by sleeping one of their important checks to mewtwo or arceus and then sweeping. Darkrai comes out late game after they revenge kill one of your other offensive threats. If you're against stall you agressively substitute with Darkrai forcing them to let you sleep an important pokemon without relying on risky predictions. I usually support this core with a weather inducer, a stealth rocker, and a ghost for a really basic offensive team that doesn't worry about team match-ups because Darkrai throws any advantages they have out the window."

Interesting core. But just out of curiosity, what should happen if your own darkrai is put to sleep by an opposing darkrai/ flinched to death by shaymin/ ko'd by mewtwo?

Well, I assume that's what the Scarfer is for.

I've been experimenting with such a team, and I usually have a fairly reactionary way of playing Darkrai against offensive teams. Usually the purpose of Rai there is to check Lati Twins and CM Arceus formes.

One of the teams I made had:

Mewtwo
Fightceus
Darkrai
Dialga (support, check ScarfOgre)
Giratina-O (spinblock, limit Deo-S to one layer, provide resists)
Kyogre (Scarfer)

[bygbyrd]

I think a great addition to this thread would be some logs of offensive teams being played properly. Offence is all about momentum and planning, and some examples of that would be excellent for the thread.

[lousy918]

Actually, there are a lot more checks to SmashPass, such as:
- Jumpluff in the sun (or Whimsicott, but Jumpluff has Sleep Powder and ground immunity)
- Scarfed Darkrai (comes in on Shell Smash, then Dark Void, but 80% accuracy)
- Thundurus (slightly like Whimsicott with Priority Taunt, but offensive presence)

Can't think of others. Sashers are not viable as Deoxys-S is a common partner, but Lum Berry phazers are viable for Smeargle. Also, all above counters are mostly for Smeargle, as Thundurus/Whimsicott/Jumpluff is OHKOed by +2 Ice Beam from Gorebyss, while Darkrai fails to outspeed.