Poliwrath (Analysis) [QC 0/3]

[Katakiri]

I normally don't write analysis for the intent of influencing a Pokemon's usage rather than just pointing out cool things low tier Pokémon can do; but after a long period of researching and using Poliwrath, I really like using it on my teams and I honestly believe it should be much higher in usage. It's a shame because Poliwrath is just such a great Pokemon for this metagame. It's only flaw is it's lack of power behind it's attacks, which hardly matters outside of one situation but is made entirely a non-issue with Encore, but I'll get into that later.

Why an OU analysis?:

Poliwrath is a lot like Gastrodon. It’s not an amazing Pokémon on paper (although I'll try my damnedest for this,) and was very "meh" in the tier it was originally in, but the OU metagame has shaped in a way that is very tailored for Poliwrath’s attributes. Right off the bat Poliwrath’s Water/Fighting-typing sticks out; giving it a resistance to Rock & Dark, Bug & Steel, Water & Ice, and Fire. Poliwrath not only boasts resistances to the STABs of Tyranitar, Politoed, Ninetales, and a few of their coverage moves, but it also resists Scizor’s STABs. Typing isn’t everything though. You would think Poliwrath’s stats would be like Politoed’s; but unlike Politoed, Poliwrath has base 95 Defense to compliment its impressive resistances. Water Absorb is the icing on the cake for Poliwrath’s Defensive attributes; allowing for Poliwrath to not only switch-in for free even against Specs Politoed’s powerful Hydro Pump, but it allows Poliwrath to switch-in on Scald without fear of Burn. Its immune to Scald, can easily remove status, and resists Ice Beam. Tyranitar can do maybe 20% with Stone Edge on a good day if it’s Adamant. Scizor is free should a partner be fearful of Bullet Punch as even Choice Band U-Turn does 21% max against max Def Wrath with a CB Superpower only doing 49% max.

Offensively, however, Poliwrath leave a lot to be desired with a meager base 85 Attack Stat. To pile onto that, Poliwrath’s strongest reliable STAB physical attacks are Waterfall and Brick Break. So what keeps Poliwrath from being setup fodder? A move that only 6 Pokémon have access to; Circle Throw, a Fighting-type move that forces the opponent to switch-out. It’s not a powerful move, but it makes Ghost-types the only safe switch-ins to Poliwrath as anything else will take Hazard damage then be instantly thrown out by Circle Throw. For a Pokémon like Poliwrath that is very bulky and can switch-in extremely easily due to its typing and Water Absorb and forces out most Pokémon it switches into, negating the ability to safely switch a Pokémon in on it is a huge advantage. A STAB move with 60 base power isn’t too scary, but that damage with or without hazards will add-up, considerably softening a team for a sweeper to take advantage of later on. Ice Beam prevents Dragonite and Gliscor from getting Subs up as well let Poliwrath beat Scarf Landorus and DD Dragonite 1v1. That’s on top of already beating non-Choice Band/LO Terrakion; Heatran; and, of course, Tyranitar 1v1 with Circle Throw; making Poliwrath quite the pain for Sand Teams and Rain Teams alike and the top 10 of OU in general.

Poliwrath has some cute tricks like SubPunch, Hypnosis, and Bulk Up; but I’ll only be focusing on the Utility Counter set.

I have a thread that lists off a few of the large threats that Poliwrath beats. Just note that this Poliwrath should be one tier higher than the one on the current list is as Ice Beam was not listed in any on-site set, which is what allows this set to 2HKO Dragonite. http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3464926

QC Approvals:


[Overview]

<p>Will probably just be a shortened and reworded version of what I said above.</p>

[SET]
name: Utility
move 1: Circle Throw
move 2: Scald / Ice Beam
move 3: Toxic / Encore
move 4: Substitute / Protect
item: Leftovers
ability: Water Absorb
nature: Relaxed
evs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Def

[Set Comments]

• Poliwrath’s best set for the OU metagame
• Built to handle top threats of OU with relative ease
• Resistance to Rock, Dark, Bug, Steel, Ice, and Fire with immunity to Water
• Great typing and bulk allows it to switch-in very easily
• Capable of beating Dragon Dance Dragonite, Heatran, Scarf Landorus, Unbooted Terrakion, and Tyranitar one-on-one
• Circle Throw makes Ghost-types the only safe switch-ins to Poliwrath as anything else will take Hazard damage then be instantly thrown out by Circle Throw
• Circle Throw and Hazard damage add-up due to the lack of safe switch-ins
• Scald provides a STAB attack that can potentially burn as well as do decent damage to troublesome Ground-types such as Donphan who care little for Circle Throw.
• Ice Beam prevents Dragonite and Gliscor from getting Subs up as well let Poliwrath beat Landorus and DD Dragonite 1v1
• Toxic wears down walls such as Jellicent & Gastrodon.
• Encore locks Pokémon into Substitute should they not fear Circle Throw and lets Poliwrath annoy Ghosts as well
• Using Substitute on something Poliwrath forces out will allow Poliwrath to Circle Throw Pokemon that counter him such as Thundurus-Therian, Celebi, & Rotom-Wash, building up entry hazard damage as well
• Protect lets Poliwrath recover a little health while scouting his opponent's next move
• Specific mention of phazing CM Keldeo (Up to QC)

[Additional Comments]

• Ice Beam does more damage than Ice Punch to Dragonite, Landorus, and Gliscor at the cost of losing a mere 18 Speed due to the nature; even having a chance to OHKO Landorus, so it is the better option
• It’s best to use Poliwrath alongside hazards as they will help Circle Throw break-down teams
• Poliwrath can’t break the Subs of Bulky Pokémon like Gyarados and Jirachi. And is reliant on either teammates or Encore to deal with them.
• Poliwrath can fit on most teams rather nicely due to its resistances and immunity being universally sought after and isn’t effected by Drought in the slightest.
• As long as Poliwrath has partners that can take Flying, Grass, Electric, and Psychic attacks, Poliwrath should be just fine.
• Poliwrath is ideal for Jirachi as it's Wish can heal Poliwrath and Paralysis brings foe's Speed down below Poliwrath's making him even more effective while Poliwrath resists Fire and doesn't mind taking a few Earthquakes for Jirachi.

[Other Options]

• Refresh allows Poliwrath to clear it's own status to out-last nearly any common Toxic stallers.
• SubPunch with Encore abuse
• Bulk Up set
• Access to Hypnosis
• Belly Drum + Swift Swim set

[Checks and Counters]

• Jellicent laughs at Poliwrath
• Most Ghost-types have no trouble with Poliwrath
• There’s a lot of Special Attackers that can hurt Poliwrath badly, but Circle Throw prevents them from coming in unless it drags them in itself and it’s so easy for Poliwrath to switch-in that switching it out is next to no trouble
• Poliwrath can’t break the Subs of Bulky Pokémon like Gyarados and Jirachi. Just be weary of Encore.

Note to self: Check BW2 data for new counters

Partywrath.
Everyday he’s shufflin’.

[JellyOs]

Throwing my support behind this, but I think Haze deserves a mention, especially on the utility counter set

[alexwolf]

Originally Posted by Fat The QWAZ

My main issue with poliwrath is that, aside from living hits from some very powerful threats, he doesn't exactly do much else. Countering scizor and co. is all good but what exactly can you do back, what exactly stops breloom, virizion or celebi coming in while you rest and severely damaging or one shotting you with their stab move of choice, or forcing you out.
I do think poliwrath deserves an analysis, but more of a booster like a bulk up set or a CroCune esque set.

Use Circle Throw as they come in, forcing them and the poke that gets in to take hazards damage?

[Knight of Cydonia]

@The QWAZ - Did you read the whole thing? It specifically states that is phazer, that is what Circle Throw is for. It builds up damage through hazards and the damage caused by Circle Throw no matter how little that may be. Anyway those resistances/immunity are great, I think you have forgotten to mention Pursuit support in AC.

EDIT - ninja'd to an extent.

[Saitsuofleaves]

Wow, this set looks neat. I wanna try it myself now.

[dragonuser]

This set actually seems really interesting, and I cant wait to give it a test. Its a creative and effective set that can handle some of the meta games most key players. Supporting ^^

[IbanezObsession]

Could definitely be a pretty fun set to use as it gets Water Absorb. It may have a disadvantage to Gastrodon because Rotom can Volt Switch on it, but its advantage is that it can phaze as well as Encore if you choose to run it.

[shrang]

No mention of Scald for epic Burn hax?

[howabe]

Originally Posted by Fat alexwolf

Use Circle Throw as they come in, forcing them and the poke that gets in to take hazards damage?

That's all well and good, but he specifically mentioned them coming in when you Rest, in which case you're not guaranteed to get Circle Throw with Sleep Talk.
Ice Beam will hurt the mentioned Grass types, but it's not going to OHKO them off Poliwrath's uninvested Special Attack.

[Knight of Cydonia]

@howabe - While that point is valid, the same applies to basically all RestTalk phazers, so it doesn't exactly bring anything to the discussion.

[ElCee]

Originally Posted by Fat Knight of Cydonia

@howabe - While that point is valid, the same applies to basically all RestTalk phazers, so it doesn't exactly bring anything to the discussion.

It does apply to "all resttalk phazers" and it's a huge problem that no one seems to be looking at. How many RestTalk phazers are there outside besides Gyarados who rarely does it anymore? It's a legitimate concern.

It might have its place but there's a few concerns I'd have besides its nature as a RestTalker:

-I think this is the biggest one: "lack of safe switch-ins" is kind of misleading. You talked about it in the OP but seemed to understate the issue. Hazard damage only gets you so far. Much of the time you can just take a piss weak Circle Throw(like, Blissey only takes 34% max weak), hit Poliwrath, and then hit it with whatever it brought in.
-To expand on the above, Ice Beam is unbelivably weak; it only KOs Dragonite 6.25% of the time after Stealth Rock and doesn't do a whole lot to basically any other Dragon besides Salamence. Anything that's not 4x weak is laughing at it(even Gliscor only takes 65% max).
-It doesn't really "completely" shut down Politoed; Focus Blast and HP Grass hit you pretty hard, especially if it's Specs.
-You can take Scizor's U-Turns but you're probably going to run into Rotom-W on the other end, so...
-I'm sure not switching this into Ninetales when ~70% of them have a Grass attack.
-I'm not sure how it really "beats" Scarf Terrakion when it gets 2HKOed by CC and can't even OHKO back after two CC defense drops. I understand it can beat it if it comes in on Stone Edge or after a kill(which is not a great situation anyway) but it seems like a weak selling point to me.

I'm not trying to be harsh or say "this set sucks", but it seems that no one has examined the pretty obvious flaws here, and I wouldn't be contributing anything if I just parroted what's already been said, right? It would be interesting to hear how these questions are answered.

[Katakiri]

ElCee, go back and read the OP. Looking back at your post, there's about 5 things- no...just about everything you're concerned about I've already covered or, in the case of Ninetales, didn't cover because I didn't want to draw attention to it because it's really not important. But if it bothers you, I'll change the one mention of Ninetales, that's not even in the set analysis itself mind you, to Heatran.

First off, exactly where are you getting your Gliscor calcs from?
0 SpAtk Poliwrath Ice Beam vs 252 HP/0 SpDef Gliscor: 73.45% - 87.01%
0 SpAtk Poliwrath Ice Beam vs 40 HP/0 SpDef Gliscor: 86.38% - 102.33% After entry hazards: 297 - 345 (98.67% - 114.62%) [93.75% chance to OHKO]

Secondly, and perhaps most importantly, you completely miss the point of using Poliwrath.
Poliwrath can completely disrupt any momentum the opponent has and then force them into an unfavorable situation by using Poliwrath's typing and Circle Throw. You can then take advantage of that by switching to another Pokemon or continue Circle Throwing until something forces Poliwrath out and then try to take advantage of that Pokemon.
I use Poliwrath on a Sun team in those replays to demonstrate Poliwrath's ability to grab momentum away as the entire problem with Ninetales is how easy it is to snatch momentum from her.

As for the VoltTurn comment, that applies to damn near everything. Look at Skarmory for instance. That doesn't stop him from being great. Get a VoltTurn counter. Mine's Venusaur. Just because Poliwrath can't stay in on Rotom-W (Volt Switch only does 70% but still,) doesn't mean that's an excuse to let Scizor do heavy damage to anything. Make him struggle to get a KO with Poliwrath around.

You're acting like it's exceptionally easy to get meaningful damage on Poliwrath.
Scizor: Superpower's cute for 49% max, but I can get a free Rest off Scizor if I feel like it. Sword Dance versions are just adorable.
Dragonite: Non-CB versions can only 3HKO while Poliwrath 2HKOs with Ice Beam. Roost? Circle Throw.
Tyranitar: Ha!
Heatran: Earth Power or Toxic? That's cute.
Terrakion: Unless it's Choice Band or Life Orb it can't 2HKO Poliwrath and Life Orb only has a chance to 2HKO but I specifically said "unboosted."
Politoed: Unless Choice versions can predict the switch & use HP Grass, there's nothing he can do.
Gliscor: Useless unless it has Flying Gem Acrobatics. And even with the Flying Gem boost that's a 6.25% chance to OHKO.The same as chance for Ice Beam to OHKO Dragonite after SR and you made a big deal of that. Oh and AcroBat gets OHKOed by Ice Beam after SR and has a chance to be OHKOed without.
Jirachi: Only Special or Sub Jirachi are threatening. The standard Jirachi just wastes it's PP trying to Iron Head a Sleeping Poliwrath if it hasn't been Circle Thrown out already.
Landorus: OHKOed by Ice Beam after SR.
Salamence: Same as Dragonite. Good luck without an Attack boost.
Tentacruel: See Politoed. And yes I know it can Spin and use lay T-Spikes.

A decent amount of the top Pokemon in OU can't do much to Poliwrath at all. But that's just the top Pokemon.

This is basically the cheat sheet. A list of the OU Pokemon Poliwrath can steal momentum from without too much risk as, discounting Special Attacking Jirachi, CB Scizor's Superpower does the most with 49% and Volcarona's Fire Blast does the most out of the specials with 44%:
Scizor
Dragonite*
Tyranitar
Heatran
Politoed
Gliscor*
Jirachi (Scout for Psychic/Thunder)
Landorus*
Salamence (Scout for Mixed)
Tentacruel
Forretress
Infernape
Volcarona
Donphan
Blissey
Vaporeon
Mamoswine*
Metagross
Cloyster
Gastrodon
Dugtrio
Scrafty
Chansey
* - Depends on Item choice. Scout first.

Dragonite and Salamence are shaky and I personally would avoid switching into them, but they can only 3HKO without Life Orb or Choice Band. (I carry Heatran & Scarf Metagross for a reason) The only time I'd switch in Poliwrath is to Phaze if I have nothing left to take them.

But aside from those two and Special Jirachi, which I usually scout for, I feel safe switching Poliwrath in on any of those Pokemon if he's in good health.

If you have a problem with Ice Beam, which is there to prevent key Pokemon from setting up Subs and not attempt to OHKO anything if you read more carefully, use Encore. It does the same job but leaves you open to Gliscor and Landorus while helping against Ghosts, SubJirachi, and Gyarados. Really shouldn't have to repeat the OP here.

Believe me, I've "examined" Poliwrath plenty.


@Shrang: Nope. As epic as burn hax can be, Scald 3HKOs Pokemon Ice Beam can OHKO.

Originally Posted by Fat The QWAZ

what exactly stops breloom, virizion or celebi coming in while you rest and severely damaging or one shotting you with their stab move of choice, or forcing you out.

It's crazy but just follow me on this. Because we all know that Poliwrath or any Water-type is going to stay in on a Life Orb Leaf Storm.

You guys are expecting Skarmory to take down a Heatran here. Poliwrath is not a one-mon-army.

The opponent may have their Celebi or Ferrothorn out because you Circle Threw it in, but you phazed out his Specs Politoed in the process and damaged his team a bit with Hazards and Circle Throw, so if you have the tools to take down Celebi or Ferrothorn with ease somewhere on your team, you've already put your opponent in an unfavorable situation and Poliwrath has done his job for the time being.
You've basically forcefully replaced a large threat for a smaller, more manageable one. And it's even better if you have a Pokemon that can set up on that smaller threat.


The key to Poliwrath lies in it's unique typing and play-style. It's a Water-type that resists Rock, Bug, and Dark. It's a Fighting-type that resists Fire, Ice, and Water. It's a Bulky Fighting-type with Ice Beam. But it's also a Defensive Fighting-type; the only other Defensive Fighting-type is Cobalion. It heals from Scalds. Circle Throw changes things even more. And to top it all off, it can easily clear it's status. Those traits together are entirely unheard of in OU and absolutely no team prepares for that.


When you have Gliscor, Landorus, Scizor, Heatran, Politoed, and Tyranitar at least moderately covered in one Pokemon that not only beats them, but can switch into them while phazing other threats and heals itself, that opens up a new world of team building options. Suddenly you laugh at Scizor, Politoed, and Tyranitar because of a single Pokemon. That alone would be considered fantasy. But I'm rambling at this- Well long before this point, but still.

Poliwrath is extremely solid and his only real flaw is his inability to break bulky Subs with Circle Throw. Otherwise he does exactly what he's expected to do.

[ParaChomp]

With neutral priority Circle Throw in mind, I would slash Relaxed nature with Impish (if you decide to use Encore over Ice Beam). Aside from that, this looks super interesting thus I am going to try it out myself, and hope this analysis gets approvals.

[Anthrix]

If you go with Impish, add a mention of more Speed to outrun Skarmory - they've got the same base Speed, and you need at least 24 to begin Speed creeping him. This way you have the chance to Sleep Talk Circle Throw before he sets up Spikes, and always phaze him first if they use Whirlwind.

[ShakeItUp]

Originally Posted by Fat Anthrix

If you go with Impish, add a mention of more Speed to outrun Skarmory - they've got the same base Speed, and you need at least 24 to begin Speed creeping him. This way you have the chance to Sleep Talk Circle Throw before he sets up Spikes, and always phaze him first if they use Whirlwind.

We do not speed creep on analyses. The user of the Pokemon can decide for themselves how much Speed they want to run, if any.

[jc104]

It's perfectly reasonable to mention the use of more Speed, just not to include it as the primary option for a set. People seem to have forgotten why we tried to remove Speed creep in the first place: the worry that certain analyses might repeatedly leapfrog each other.

Encouraging people to consider the amount of Speed they add to a set is only a good thing.

Also, do we really want Impish and not Bold? If we're running Impish surely Ice Punch would be the better option anyway?

[Katakiri]

Like I said, Ice Beam does more damage than Ice Punch. It is 75 vs 95 Base Power after all and his offenses are only 15 base points apart. Ice Punch would be best with Impish, but you do lose a lot of power because of the lack of Ice Beam.

As for Speed, I don't think Skarmory is exactly something we want to stay in on as there is that 66% chance that Sleep Talk will choose Rest or Ice Beam and all we'll gain is a Brave Bird to the face.
I think out-pacing Breloom could be interesting with abusing Sleep Talk with his Spore but it requires a minimum of 64 Speed EVs to beat Bulk Up Breloom's 60 Speed, which isn't worth giving up all those HP/Def EVs all for one Pokemon.

I still think Relaxed is the better choice overall.

[Asek]

With Spikes+SR up this guy in theory could spread a lot of misery around the opposing team. This should proabably have an OU mention as it seems that Poliwrath's Ability to stand up to top notch offensive threats is definitly a great draw card in the OU environment

[shrang]

Originally Posted by Fat Anthrix
If you go with Impish, add a mention of more Speed to outrun Skarmory - they've got the same base Speed, and you need at least 24 to begin Speed creeping him. This way you have the chance to Sleep Talk Circle Throw before he sets up Spikes, and always phaze him first if they use Whirlwind.


We do not speed creep on analyses. The user of the Pokemon can decide for themselves how much Speed they want to run, if any.

Just saying, giving 24 Speed EVs on Poliwrath DOES allow him to outspeed Wobbuffet, which while Wobb is rare, not getting locked into Ice Beam or something like that and getting trapped would be very helpful.

[Asek]

I fought against this guy on the ladder and I can see he Phazed a heck of a lot better than my Heatran did. I have to say that this guy deserves an OU mention. His weakness to Volt Switch his is only major flaw other than that he does his job effectively and his Upsides far outweigh his Negatives

[Seven Deadly Sins]

As the premier Poliwrath user in OU, I can say that RestTalk is awful.

Instead, you should be passing it wishes with Jirachi! Poliwrath has Water Absorb, resistance to Fire, and the bulk to take most unSTAB Earthquakes. Additionally, Jirachi doesn't really care about Electric attacks, and can shrug off Grass, Flying, and Psychic attacks.

Without Rest and Sleep Talk, you can fit on much more stuff, like...

Scald - Always awesome.
Toxic - Wears down annoying stuff, especially Gastrodon and Jellicent. Also helps win against last Pokemon situations.
Protect - Scouts and gets Leftovers recovery.
Waterfall - Maybe lets you hit stuff? idk
Substitute - Lets you scout, and Sub-PHazing can be good if you Throw in stuff that can't deal with Poliwrath well.

Also, something to emphasize is that Poliwrath switches into all 3 primary weather inducers with general ease, outside of Toxic from Politoed.

I'd have the set look more like this:

[SET]
name: Utility Counter
move 1: Circle Throw
move 2: Scald / Ice Beam
move 3: Encore / Toxic
move 4: Protect / Substitute
item: Leftovers
ability: Water Absorb
nature: Relaxed
evs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Def

Lots of utility moves. Protect is the best for the last slot, and Protect + Encore is a bitch to deal with. Honestly, Circle Throw is the only one that's really necessary- the others can be mixed and matched.

[Jimera0]

Originally Posted by Fat Seven Deadly Sins

As the premier Poliwrath user in OU, I can say that RestTalk is awful.

Instead, you should be passing it wishes with Jirachi! Poliwrath has Water Absorb, resistance to Fire, and the bulk to take most unSTAB Earthquakes. Additionally, Jirachi doesn't really care about Electric attacks, and can shrug off Grass, Flying, and Psychic attacks.

Without Rest and Sleep Talk, you can fit on much more stuff, like...

Scald - Always awesome.
Toxic - Wears down annoying stuff, especially Gastrodon and Jellicent. Also helps win against last Pokemon situations.
Protect - Scouts and gets Leftovers recovery.
Waterfall - Maybe lets you hit stuff? idk
Substitute - Lets you scout, and Sub-PHazing can be good if you Throw in stuff that can't deal with Poliwrath well.

Also, something to emphasize is that Poliwrath switches into all 3 primary weather inducers with general ease, outside of Toxic from Politoed.

I'd have the set look more like this:

[SET]
name: Utility Counter
move 1: Circle Throw
move 2: Scald / Ice Beam
move 3: Encore / Toxic
move 4: Protect / Substitute
item: Leftovers
ability: Water Absorb
nature: Relaxed
evs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Def

Lots of utility moves. Protect is the best for the last slot, and Protect + Encore is a bitch to deal with. Honestly, Circle Throw is the only one that's really necessary- the others can be mixed and matched.

Well this is a brand new Analysis. Why not just have both? While Sleep Talk does have issues due the whole new sleep mechanics thing, not everyone is going to be able to shoehorn a wish passer into their team, and one of the selling points of this set is the ability to do so much with just one Pokemon. Additionally, the status absorbing capacity of Rest-Talk cannot be ignored, and is a notable benefit. They serve the same general purpose but are different enough that having both sets shouldn't be a real problem. Besides, I find it highly unlikely we're likely to end up cluttering Poliwrath's OU page of all things. I have to admit, I almost laughed out loud when The QWAZ suggested an offensive set for OU (no offense QWAZ, you know I love you :P).

[Molk]

I have to say, Poliwrath sounds like a really cool pokemon to use mainly because it can fit on so many teams, take on so many top threats, and because normal priority phazing can become very annoying. I would really like to see Poliwrath tested on a hail team, it seems like it could excel even with the residual damage from the hail. Why?

1) Poliwrath can take on other weather inducers and help win the weather war, especially vs politoed.

2) A lot of hail teams have several forms of entry hazards from pokemon such as heatran, tentacruel, and froslass, which circle throw could take advantage of. Also take into account that hail damage wears down any mon not holding leftovers, this means that poliwrath is capable of doing more damage in the hail

3) Going back to #1 here, Poliwrath also takes on a lot of pokemon that threaten hail with relative ease, such as scizor, ttar, infernape, and scrafty.

4) In the hail Poliwrath can now utilize Blizzard, which may be capable of hurting some threats more than ice beam could.

Anyways, Poliwrath sounds like an excellent Pokemon and its definatly deserving of an OU analysis, after all checking like half the metagame has got to mean something :P

[Seven Deadly Sins]

Originally Posted by Fat Jimera0

Well this is a brand new Analysis. Why not just have both? While Sleep Talk does have issues due the whole new sleep mechanics thing, not everyone is going to be able to shoehorn a wish passer into their team, and one of the selling points of this set is the ability to do so much with just one Pokemon. Additionally, the status absorbing capacity of Rest-Talk cannot be ignored, and is a notable benefit. They serve the same general purpose but are different enough that having both sets shouldn't be a real problem. Besides, I find it highly unlikely we're likely to end up cluttering Poliwrath's OU page of all things. I have to admit, I almost laughed out loud when The QWAZ suggested an offensive set for OU (no offense QWAZ, you know I love you :P).

sleep talk suuuuuuuuuuuuucks

no, seriously

It's easier to fit in a wishpasser than a heal beller, and that's what RestTalk needs to not just get worn into oblivion while asleep and rolling the dice. I've tried both, and RestTalk just doesn't work in this meta.

Originally Posted by Fat Molk

stuff about hail

hail's bad, mmk

even if poliwrath was good on hail it wouldnt get a hail set

[Molk]

Originally Posted by Fat Seven Deadly Sins

hail's bad, mmk

even if poliwrath was good on hail it wouldnt get a hail set

I wasnt saying that Poliwrath would get a hail set that would only be used on a hail team, i meant that poliwrath (whichever of the two sets its running) could be an asset to hail teams and even gets a little bonus in the form of being able to run a stronger ice attack. Also, i wouldnt say hail is bad, in fact in my experience a well built hail team can mess up a lot of other teams with a combination of abomasnow's low speed and unique STABs that help it win the weather war (with an expert belt set and EQ it can do major damage, if not OHKO the other weather inducers, and with abomasnow's low speed you can get a head start on things like ninetales and ttar, while being fast enough to outspeed and OHKO politoed). Now my idea of using poliwrath on hail was to try and patch up a lot of common problems hail teams have, mainly with scizor and other weathers. Poliwrath completely walls scizor, and is able to come in on politoed and tyranitar easily, it has to fear an energy ball/solar beam from ninetales though. Poliwrath also takes care of heatran! and SD rock gem terrakion (not 2HKOed by unboosted close combat, while only having a 10% chance to be OHKOed by +2 close combat factoring in hail damage). I can understand why people would shy away from hail, its kind of hard to build a hail team that can effectively handle most of the threats in the tier, but it is in no way bad in my opinion.


EDIT: Im going to test SDS's set paired with wish jirachi, and im also going to give restalk a try on my new hail team, as well as a sand team and a weatherless team and bring back some logs of both sets later.