speeds the name...

well, i was scrolling through pokemon, when i saw marowak. it had great attack and defense, and looked like a good sweeper, but then i saw its horrid speed. then i saw ninjask not too long after, and a combination was born.

so i had the outline of my team. i needed something to cover marowaks weaknesses but could still hit hard. Scizor immediately came to mind. it has a strong priority move in bullet punch and, upon further searching, i realized it had baton pass. i figured i could use it as an intermediate between ninjask and marowak if i felt the switch was not safe.

at this point i realized not only am i really weak to fire, but i also am using all physical attackers. so, to balence this out, i chose to use mixmence

at this point, i figured i might want a special baton passer, so i opted for togekiss. she is well balanced, able to cause paralysis and can also use paraflinch. it is the best nasty plot passer, so why not?

finally, i needed a lead. my first thought was swampert, since it is so reliable, but after some thought, i realized my team needed a rapid spinner lead. i didn't feel like having another fire weakness in forretress so i opted for starmie and gave up rocks.

after some testing, i realized i'm too weak to ice so i chose to replace salamence with infernape for better type coverage on the whole.


so now for the in depth amalysis

Starmie
timid/life orb
natural cure/136HP/156DEF/216SPE
ice beam
thunderbolt
rapid spin
hydro pump

my anti lead. it can 1 or 2HKO every lead in the game except some bronzong. i had grass knot before for swampert, but i found hydro pump could 2HKO it, so i got thunderbolt and hydropump over grass knot and surf. rapid spin is for stealthrocks.

togekiss
calm/leftovers
serenes grace/252HP/64SPD/192 SPE
Nasty plot
air slash
baton pass
substitute

togekiss passes nasty plot to infernape and starmie if the latters allive and also allows an easier switch for ninjask with substitute. air slash with serenes grace stops slower sweepers. its ev spread is to make it double as a special wall, which my team really needs.

infernape
naive/life orb
blaze/64ATK/252SPA/192SPE
hidden power (ice)
grass knot
flamethrower
close combat

this thing is great. it has special attacks with a great speed, making it a powerful revenge killer and a great recipient for nasty plot and speed boost. its type coverage makes it overall threat, especially to newer players who probably wont predict grass knot or hp ice on infernape.

Scizor
adamant/life orb
technician/252ATK/252SPD/4SPE
bullet punch
pursuit
brick break
baton pass

scizor serves a very interesting function on my team. i guess you could call it an intermediate. it takes baton passes from ninjask and togekiss and holds onto them to provide a safe holding area for them against dangerous say an ice or rock type for ninjask and togekiss. it can counter both types of threats, and if it has speed boost/sword dance, it can use it to sweep. once the enemy switches to an unfavorable enemy, scizor can baton pass its boosts to a suitable partner. its attack spread is similar to the choicebanders, though u turn was replaced with baton pass and superpower with brick break. life orb makes it a more potent sweeper and allows it to OHKO almost anything with a pass from ninjask.

ninjask
leftovers/adamant
speed boost/176HP/252ATK/80SPE
protect
baton pass
sword dance
x-scissor

my sspeed passer. i generally send him in after togekiss passes a sub or something dies. one turn, i use sword danceto up my attack and the next i protect. this gives me+2 ATK and +2 SPE. with this set, my only real concern are priority attackers, so if i see one, i generally just protect and pass speed.

Marowak
thick club/jolly
rock head/4HP/252ATK/252SPE
double edge
earthquake
fire punch
stone edge

a signiture pokemon of my team. it goes great with ninjask. even with only a one speed boost pass, it has enough speed to make a good sweeper. it has great type coverage(no pokemon can resist every attack) and double edge+rock head makes for a lethal combination. it can take down almost every pokemon in the game with two speed boosts and sword dance bareing maybe empoleon (aqua jet). furthermore, against trick room teams it can hold its own and crush the faster trick roomers with ease. overall, ifeel marowaks insane attack when coupled with speed boost makes for a lethal combination, and that is why its on this team.

before you rate my team, i'd like to first say thank you. with that, i will also add that though my team is based on ninjask and marowak, i'm perfectly willing to remove them from my team in exchange for as better pokemon. however, i'm not sure what pokemon can fill ninjask's job on this team.

Superpower and Baton Pass don't work well in conjunction; replace it with Brick Break. The extra power isn't really missed, especially with its Life Orb and the chance it has been BP'd a Swords Dance.

Plus breaking screens is nice :D

yh i agree with cadorea. baton passing a loss in attack and defense isn't too good. also you need stealth rock. without it, infernape and scizor have a hard time functioning as mid-late game sweepers. also with rocks, fire types have a harder time switching in against your scizor. remember scizor is the crux, if it goes, your baton pass goes.

btw good job with ninjask and marowak

thanks. i made the change. anything else i missed

welcome. i think thats it. but why the 8 speed EV's in scizor?

woops, that was suppose to be for Special defense, but now that i think about it, it would be smarter to keep 4 in speed and max HP

well, im trying to find a good SR pokemon, but either i'll need one that knows rapid spin or can stop enemy rocks altogether any ideas?

well, i looked through possible SR pokemon, and aerodactyl, swampert, smeargle and forretress all stuck out. aerodactyl has insane speed and can taunt before setting up, swampert has roar going for it and is a decent late game sweeper, smeargle can put slower enemies to sleep, while forretress can spin. which one should i choose

o would drop subsitite on ninjask for maybe something like x-szizzor but that is just me. DONT MAX HP ON SZIZOR it cause him to take more stealth rock damage.

Also could i test the team as that would allow me to see if there are more problems?

by all means, test the team, more advice the better. i don't have substitute on ninjask, so i am ok there. i think i'll put the HP EV's in special defense for more resistance to special attacks.

if someone could give an in depth all around review, that would be great with any pokemon that could cause me trouble. in all honesty, i haven't found any that stump my team, so i can't really lead you in the right direction sorry.

Hello, got your PM.

As much I like keeping the center pokemon that people like to build around, I feel that Ninjask and Marowak are too easily exploitable through Skarmory. Skarmory can easily come in and whirlwind you out, at that point one of your pokemon is dead weight while the other lacks speed to do anything, and can potentially get walled by something like Rotom-h and Skarmory as well, even with Fire Punch. With entry hazards up, your team is that much harder to use, as you have to worry about getting everything in safely which is really hard to do considering you are using relatively frail pokemon as recipients. Nothing is going to take down DD Gyarados very well, and set up sweepers in particular can be very detrimental to your team.

Baton Passing is a relatively risky sort of thing you'd want to be doing in OU, if you're going to attempt a version of it I'd at least suggest you try BP Gliscor and Metagross over Ninjask and Marowak, the former combo being perhaps the most efficient BP duo in OU. Gliscor can Taunt away numerous threats and has great bulk to go along with it, and also can boost both attack and speed. Metagross can tear apart nearly anything with a +2 in its arsenal, and has great coverage like Marowak. Additionally, it has better defenses to work off of.

As I looked at your team building process I was pretty eh on Togekiss. You do not necessarily need a Nasty Plot passer in this team, and considering the changes I made to your team, you would definitely love to have a dual screener with some rocks in a slot. You can choose to keep Starmie in your lead slot, however I would recommend Dual Screen Uxie with SR to help support your team in its attempts to BP, this is really important for pokemon like Gliscor who play a huge roll in allowing your team to sweep. Providing more support to BP teams is key to its success -- one of the key things you should focus on is circling in on specific things you want rather than a hodgepodge of BPers passing to different component's of your team, as it is really hard to make varied choices when battling, and you'd get way too predictable.

With Togekiss out of the way, consider making Infernape one of your other BP recipients by making Infernape purely Physical, so it can sweep similarly to its swords dance set. This way, Infernape can benefit greatly from Gliscor and and can work in conjunction with Metagross. One plus side about Infernape is that it can sweep potentially even without the BP boosts. Should Metagross fall victim to something, Infernape makes a great late game cleaner for this team. Change your ape spread to simply 252 atk / 252 spe / 4 def with Blaze Kick / Close Combat / Stone Edge / Mach Punch if you'd want to try this out.

I apologize for the massive changes, but I think they will really help boost the effectiveness of your team.

Uxie @ Light Clay
Impish 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Reflect / Light Screen / Yawn / Stealth Rock

Gliscor @ Yache Berry
Jolly 252 HP / 196 SpD / 60 Spe
Rock Polish / Swords Dance / Taunt / Baton Pass

Metagross @ Lum Berry
Jolly 12 HP / 252 Atk / 244 Spe
Meteor Mash / Zen Headbutt / ThunderPunch / Earthquake

You can potentially opt to lead with Uxie if you choose to do so, however i think starmie is fine enough in that slot as it functions better as an anti lead compared to uxie. Uxie may want to use Memento over Yawn, however Yawn works nicely to sleep things for a later time so you get more turns to BP up. Also, Yawn works in the same vein as Memento as it pressures opponents to switch out. However, should you want Memento in the slot instead for say, an exploder, then that's fine as well. Metagross has enough speed to outspeed Scarf Infernape after one rock polish, though it is impossible to beat Scarf Latias or Gengar even if you ran max speed. Zen Headbutt is preferred to hit Swampert and Rotom-a for maximum power, while you can still kill off things like Mence and Latias with +2 Meteor Mash.

As far as weaknesses go, still watch out for Gyarados. Without Screens up, LO waterfall is killing off Gliscor. If anything, be sure to always be on the lookout for that, and make sure it doesn't get a BP off.

Good luck with your team.

thank you your rate was helpful and i changed my team accordingly but then i realized that i don't have any special attackers outside of starmie, and once thats down, salemence comes in and completely dominates my team. i considered reverting infernape back to a mixed special, but i want a second opinion first. is there a better special attacker i should use? if so, who needs to go?

forestflamerunner said:

thank you your rate was helpful and i changed my team accordingly but then i realized that i don't have any special attackers outside of starmie, and once thats down, salemence comes in and completely dominates my team. i considered reverting infernape back to a mixed special, but i want a second opinion first. is there a better special attacker i should use? if so, who needs to go?

Click to expand...

A special attacker isn't a set in stone role that is supposed to be in every team. If you want a special attacker, you already have starmie. With Infernape, Stone Edge kills off Salamence with rocks up, you have Scizor for bullet punch, and you have starmie to ice beam. If all three of them go down, then yes, you will lose. However with your team you should not be letting this happen. Whether it's a special sweeper or physical, it really doesn't matter so long as you beat Salamence. Because Scizor and Ape help you beat mence down and you have starmie leading, this really shouldn't be too problematic.

ok thanks. i am abandoning this thread and will shortly start a new one as this team has been given a complete makeover (only pokemon that was kept the same throughout was starmie)

I'd suggest you stick to one attack type for your end sweepers.

That way you will be able to focus on the whole team instead of a random;
Togekiss = Infernape
Ninjask=Scizor=Everythingesle

Make Scizor more bulky with leftovers and EVs (since you do not pass any stats other then attacking ones) To pull off more reliably. Lefties is must.

I suggest Gliscor to pass Speed and Maybe Scizor to pass SD (simply because Gliscor can roost and set up Agility again and again) Ninjask is largely impractle, but if you insist I suggest you use it as the lead. Just be aware that there are better options then ninjask.