Grass Arceus (Analysis)

Grass Arceus

==================================
Status: Writing up.
QC Approval: 2/2 [firecape][Fireburn]
QC Rejection: 0/2 [NONE][NONE]
Grammar/Prose Check: 0/2 [NONE][NONE]
==================================
[Overview]

• Resists Water, Electric, Grass, and Ground which are all very common attacking types.
• Bulky with 120/120/120 Defenses
• Resist both Kyogre and Groudon's STABs, while dealing super effective damage with its own STAB.

[SET]
name: Calm Mind
move 1: Calm Mind
move 2: Recover
move 3: Grass Knot / Judgment
move 4: Ice Beam / Earth Power
nature: Timid
item: Meadow Plate
evs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe

[Set Comments]

• While Grass does hit some very important Pokemon hard with its STAB, it is fairly hard to find a good coverage move due to Grass being resisted by a variety of types.

[Additional Comments]

• One of the biggest questions when using Grass Arceus is whether to use Grass Knot or Judgment. After a Pokemon reaches 100.1 Kg, Grass Knot becomes the better choice because of PP and potential for higher damage. Notable Pokemon with lower GK BP: Celebi (20), Jirachi (20), Manaphy (20), Mew (20), Blissey (60), Chansey (60), Doryuuzu (60) Latias (60), Wobbuffet (60), Cresselia (80), Darkrai (80), Deoxys (80), Garchomp (80), Lucario (80), Randorosu (80). Pokemon that take more damage from Grass Knot (all 120): Arceus, Dialga, Giratina, Groudon, Kyogre, Kyurem, Lugia, Metagross, Palkia, Rayquaza, Reshiram, Tyranitar, Zekrom.
• Ice Beam allows Arceus to deal with Salamence, Rayquaza, Latias, Latios, Zekrom, and Giratina-O. However it leaves you vunerable Fire- and Steel-types, majors being Ho-Oh, Reshiram, and Dialga who can take the nuetral hits pretty well.
• Earth Power allows Arceus to deal with Heatran, Dialga, Reshiram, Zekrom, as well as non-Levitating Steel-types. However it leaves you vulnerable to Ho-Oh, Lugia, Latias, Latios, Salamence, Rayquaza, Giratina-O, and Grass-type Pokemon.
• Water-types make excellent teammates as the cover each others weaknesses well. Probably the best examples are Kyogre, who weakens Fire-type attacks, and Palkia, who is doubly resistant to fire.
• Biggest counter is Ho-Oh, so setting up Stealth Rock is very important. A good SR user who also does well with Arceus is Heatran, powering up from Arceus's weakness. However, note that if you are also using Kyogre that Heatran will be weakened as well.

[SET]
name: Support
move 1: Recover
move 2: Grass Knot / Judgment
move 3: Ice Beam / Earth Power
move 4: Thunder Wave / Stealth Rock / Magic Coat
nature: Modest
item: Meadow Plate
evs: 252 HP / 132 SpA / 124 Spe

[Set Comments]

• 124 Spe allows Arceus to outrun all Max speed base 90s and below.
• 252 HP allows Arceus to take hit slightly better than the bulky 100/100/100 defensive spread it is forced to use in Gen 4, while still leaving room for better investment in Spe and SpA. It also makes Ditto switch-ins less effective, as Ditto won't be able to get Arceus's massive 444 HP.
• While Grass does hit some very important Pokemon hard with its STAB, it is fairly hard to find a good coverage move due to Grass being resisted by a variety of types.
• Great use as a lead.

[Additional Comments]

• One of the biggest questions when using Grass Arceus is whether to use Grass Knot or Judgment. After a Pokemon reaches 100.1 Kg, Grass Knot becomes the better choice because of PP and potential for higher damage. Notable Pokemon with lower GK BP: Celebi (20), Jirachi (20), Manaphy (20), Mew (20), Blissey (60), Chansey (60), Doryuuzu (60) Latias (60), Wobbuffet (60), Cresselia (80), Darkrai (80), Deoxys (80), Garchomp (80), Lucario (80), Randorosu (80). Pokemon that take more damage from Grass Knot (all 120): Arceus, Dialga, Giratina, Groudon, Kyogre, Kyurem, Lugia, Metagross, Palkia, Rayquaza, Reshiram, Tyranitar, Zekrom.
• Ice Beam allows Arceus to deal with Salamence, Rayquaza, Latias, Latios, Zekrom, and Giratina-O. However it leaves you vunerable Fire- and Steel-types, majors being Ho-Oh, Reshiram, and Dialga who can take the nuetral hits pretty well.
• Earth Power allows Arceus to deal with Heatran, Dialga, Reshiram, Zekrom, as well as non-Levitating Steel-types. However it leaves you vulnerable to Ho-Oh, Lugia, Latias, Latios, Salamence, Rayquaza, Giratina-O, and Grass-type Pokemon.
• When using as a lead, it is often recommended to use Magic Coat to bounce back Taunt, entry hazards, or Dark Voids.
• Water-types make very teammates, especially Palkia and Kyogre.
• Biggest counter is Ho-Oh, so setting up Stealth Rock is very important. A good SR user who also does well with Arceus is Heatran.
• A Calm Nature Grass Arceus can actually be used for the support set as it allows Grass Arceus not to be 2HKOed by Kyogre's unboosted Ice Beam.

[Team Options]

• Kyogre can make a great teammate, being able to switch into Fire- or Ice-type attacks. Rain also weakens the huge Fire weakness that Arceus has.
• Heatran makes another great teammate as Heatran and Arceus cover each other's weaknesses very well. Heatran also can get powered up from the Fire-type attacks aimed at Arceus.
• Palkia can take a good number of hits that are aimed towards Arceus and deal heavy damage to the attackers.

[Optional Changes]

• Both Ice Beam and Earth Power can be used along side Grass STAB without Recover for a more offensive Calm Mind Arceus, however due to its Grass-typing it is better as a more defensive Pokemon.
• Will-o-Wisp can be used for the last slot on the Support set, but is generally not as effective as Arceus's main counters are immune to it.
• Roar can be used on the last slot on the Support set if you already have a Pokemon to setup Stealth Rock and do not care about the paralysis.

[Counters]

• One of the best counters to Arceus is Ho-Oh, being able to take any attack that Arceus uses and hitting back with a powerful Sacred Fire.
• When using Ice Beam, Fire Arceus, Reshiram, as well as Steel-type Pokemon are all able to resist you.
• When using Earth Power, Ho-Oh, Lugia, Latias, Latios, Salamence, Rayquaza, Giratina-O, Bug Arceus, and Grass-type Pokemon.

[Dream World]

• Arceus has no Dream World ability.

Okay so apparently this was done, but never bumped, so I totally missed it. Fixed some formatting, marked as done.

Thunder Wave should be the primary slash on the support set - Grass Arceus is one of the best users of it 'cause it makes Grounds run.



QC approved 1/2

I think the Calm Mind set should have Max HP instead of Max Special Attack. I tested both and found Max HP to be much better to allow Arceus to take more hits from things Like Groudon, Zekrom, and Palkia while setting up. Max HP also makes Arceus a decent check to Specs Kyogre. (Water Spout after SR from Modestogre only manages 50.7% - 59.7% provided I did my calc correctly.)

And I second firecape's fixes.

With the support set being, well, support-oriented, is there any particular need for all of that special attack? A stronger Grass Knot still doesn't guarantee the OHKO on Max / Min Kyogre, and 276 SpA is still sufficient to OHKO Max/Min Groudon.

Personally, I've been using a spread of Timid 252 HP / 108 Def / 32 SpD / 112 Spe.

You can drop the speed if you want, but I like being able to outrun Jolly Garchomp and Palkia (since this particular version actually makes a good check to the latter). Here's what the spread accomplishes:

-Always suvives Adamant DDRay's +1 LO Outrage without Rocks (Jolly +1 LO Ray has a mere 2.76 chance to OHKO with rocks), and OHKOs back with Ice Beam. It also survives MixQuaza's LO Fire Blast + LO Extremespeed, as well as DDRay's LO Overheat, meaning that it checks essentially every type of Rayquaza out there and makes a great initial switch. Current spread cannot do this.
-Never OHKOd by Timid Specs Palkia / Specs Dialga's Draco Meteor, and can thus Recover stall, and has a higher chance to survive Modest SpecsMeteor.
-Lower chance of being OHKOd by +1 Timid Mewtwo's LO Fire Blast in rain.
-Never OHKOd by Max Attack Adamant +2 LO Extremespeed from Extremekiller accounting for Spikes and SR, while onsite is.

You get the picture. It isn't too much, but considering that you could potentially Ice Beam Ray after surviving its attack or paralyze Arceus with Thunder Wave to drastically cut its effectiveness, I think it deserves a mention.

In fact, I've used this spread to great success on several Arceus forms that I rely on for support. Ground Arceus, for example, can also survive Adamant Ho-oh's CB Sunboosted Sacred Fire AND a subsequent burn, and will survive any Modest Specs Draco Meteor at full health thanks to its ground typing. Obviously GrassCeus won't be doing this but each type has its own advantages. I'm saying that the spread is a great place to start, and then you can tweak it based on resistances or anything specific you want to survive.

"Landlos" is official romanization of

Nitpicking again! "vunerable" should be "vulnerable", and "nuetral" should be "neutral" in the first set's additional comments' 3rd bullet point, and in the 5th bullet point, "very teammates" should be "very [whatever adjective you want to put, like "good"] teammates". In the optional changes' 1st bullet point, "along side" is one word, so "alongside", and there should be a semicolon instead of comma after "Calm Mind Arceus"; in the 3rd bullet point "setup" should be 2 words, so "set up". Finally, in the counters' 3rd bullet point, the sentence needs to be finished at the end even though I know what you're saying already lmao... ^_^

A Calm Nature Grass Arceus can actually be used for the support set as it allows Grass Arceus not to be 2HKOed by Kyogre's unboosted Ice Beam.

Flamethrower allows Grass Arceus to OHKO Scizor, Forretress and Nattorei easily in the sun.

This needs to be updated. Most of the English names are not used and stuff like Ditto(225) and Latias(79) are referred to which are practically non existent in Ubers.

EDIT: Also both Victini and Blaziken can both check Grass Arceus unless Grass Arceus is running Earth Power. Even when running Earth Power, Blaziken can still protect, to boost its Speed and do 92.3% - 109.5% to Grass Arceus, (100 % OHKO with SR)

barry4ever is taking this over. Locking.