approved by Haunter
XY Version by doughboy
Lures are pokemon that are specifically designed to draw in their usual checks and counters, and then cripple or KO them in order to benefit another sweeper on your team. While lures are not particularly common on the ladder, due to the fact you can face an opponent multiple times in a short period of time, they are very common in tournament matches. Oftentimes in tournaments you only face an opponent once. So the effectiveness of the lure is not compromised in reaching your end goal (i.e. one win, vs multiple, consistent wins on the ladder). This isn't to say that lures aren't effective on the ladder, as the lures you should be using should still be consistent enough to win multiple games (more on this latter).
What discourages most people from using lures is how they are the most difficult sets to play with in pokemon. Using a lure obligates you to play a certain way during a match. In addition, it is hard to judge when to break from that playstyle or when to strike against the pokemon you are luring in. Lures are also difficult sets to design. First, you have to make sure the lure will play similar enough to draw your target pokemon. Second, you have to make sure the lure will play consistently enough that if the target Pokemon is not on your opponent's team, your lure will still be able to pull its own weight. Here you can find some effective lures in OU, effective partners to those lures, and an ideas to help you design your own lure in the future.
While lures can be hard to use, they are some of the most fun sets to use if you can pull them effectively. So let's get started!
What makes a bad lure?
A bad lure is one that is either overly specialized and / or lessens the amount of targets it can hit effectively in exchange for hitting a single target effectively. If you specialize your lure too much, it becomes a non threat to a larger amount of pokemon and only to the pokemon you are targeting. It will only be effective if the pokemon you are targeting is in the match, which is less likely to happen when you consider you might be going into a single battle for a tournament. Here is an example of a bad lure:
Gyarados (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naughty Nature (+Atk, -SDef)
- Dragon Dance
- Waterfall
- Stone Edge
- Fire Blast
Gyarados with Fire Blast sounds pretty swell, since it now has the ability to 2HKO Skarmory and Ferrothorn, two of its biggest counters. On closer inspection, however, you can see that Fire Blast Gyarados has severe problems. First, just about any Water-type in OU can easily check or counter Gyarados without a more reliable STAB in Bounce or a more consistent Earthquke. The same situation occurs with grass-types that are not overtly weak to Fire Blast (ex. Trevnant, Celebi) or Dragons not weak to Stone Edge (Latios, Latias, Hydreigon). Second, you can achieve a 2HKO on Ferrothorn with Bounce with some prior damage and Skarmory with Waterfall with some prior damage at +1.
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Gyarados Waterfall vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Skarmory: 153-183 (45.8 - 54.79%) -- 98.05% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Gyarados Bounce vs. 252 HP / 48+ Def Ferrothorn: 200-238 (56.81 - 67.61%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
*needs Spikes for Ferrothorn accounting for Lefties on two turns attack but you get the point
The only way to OHKO either with Fire Blast with SR is to have max special attack with a positive nature. But at that point, you compromised the effectiveness of your physical moves to sweep with DD way too much. Overall your "power output" for Fire Blast of your physical moves will be too small.
Here, you sacrificed too much overall effectiveness for the sake of hitting two targets while specialized. In addition, your "lure" could have worn down the same counters just as well without a luring move in Fire Blast. You also lost some bulk in the process by choosing to go with a nature that decreases sp. def in order to preserve Fire Blast's power. To sum up, you just have a less effective Pokemon.
Here is an example that is fairly well known:
Freeze-Dry Mamoswine
Mamoswine (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 240 Atk / 16 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naive Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Ice Shard
- Icicle Crash
- Earthquake
- Freeze-Dry
Mamoswine this gen seemingly is countered by Rotom-W. Freeze-Dry Mamoswine can actually just get by physically defensive Rotom-W with a small amount of investment in special attack. Since Freeze-Dry is super-effective against Water-types, Rotom-W is hit harder than any other move in Mamoswine's movepool. Freeze-Dry is a 2HKO on Rotom-W after SR. Since you are only using a small amount of special attack investment, you don't detract away much from Mamoswine's overall power output. This Mamoswine really gets through teams that rely on the Rotom-W + Landorus-T combo to act as pivots.
Partners: Talonflame, Mega Pinsir, Landorus-T
If you have a lure that'd you'd like to share, post it here and if there is enough reasoning behind it; and it isnt too gimmicky, it will be added to the archive below n_n
Also, it is very helpful to post some calcs to back up a lure, but dont post too many or at least use hide tags.
Natural Gift Gyarados
Power Herb Solarbeam Heatran
Mixed Victini
HP Fire Starmie
Expert Belt Celebi
Earthquake Latios
Will-O-Wisp Talonflame
Fire Punch Diggersby
Aerial Ace Bisharp
Whirlpool Latias
SD Natural Gift Talonflame
Sheer Force Conkeldurr
HP Flying / Bug Keldeo
Toxic Landorus-T
Focus Blast Clefable
Mixed Dragon Dance Mega Charizard Y
Knock Off Mega Pinsir
Aerial Ace Scizor
Natural Gift Jirachi
Thunder Wave Clefable
Expert Belt Rotom-W
Gravity Landorus-T
Knock Off Mega Alakazam
Crunch Hippowdon
XY Version by doughboy
Lures are pokemon that are specifically designed to draw in their usual checks and counters, and then cripple or KO them in order to benefit another sweeper on your team. While lures are not particularly common on the ladder, due to the fact you can face an opponent multiple times in a short period of time, they are very common in tournament matches. Oftentimes in tournaments you only face an opponent once. So the effectiveness of the lure is not compromised in reaching your end goal (i.e. one win, vs multiple, consistent wins on the ladder). This isn't to say that lures aren't effective on the ladder, as the lures you should be using should still be consistent enough to win multiple games (more on this latter).
What discourages most people from using lures is how they are the most difficult sets to play with in pokemon. Using a lure obligates you to play a certain way during a match. In addition, it is hard to judge when to break from that playstyle or when to strike against the pokemon you are luring in. Lures are also difficult sets to design. First, you have to make sure the lure will play similar enough to draw your target pokemon. Second, you have to make sure the lure will play consistently enough that if the target Pokemon is not on your opponent's team, your lure will still be able to pull its own weight. Here you can find some effective lures in OU, effective partners to those lures, and an ideas to help you design your own lure in the future.
While lures can be hard to use, they are some of the most fun sets to use if you can pull them effectively. So let's get started!
What makes a bad lure?
A bad lure is one that is either overly specialized and / or lessens the amount of targets it can hit effectively in exchange for hitting a single target effectively. If you specialize your lure too much, it becomes a non threat to a larger amount of pokemon and only to the pokemon you are targeting. It will only be effective if the pokemon you are targeting is in the match, which is less likely to happen when you consider you might be going into a single battle for a tournament. Here is an example of a bad lure:
Gyarados (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naughty Nature (+Atk, -SDef)
- Dragon Dance
- Waterfall
- Stone Edge
- Fire Blast
Gyarados with Fire Blast sounds pretty swell, since it now has the ability to 2HKO Skarmory and Ferrothorn, two of its biggest counters. On closer inspection, however, you can see that Fire Blast Gyarados has severe problems. First, just about any Water-type in OU can easily check or counter Gyarados without a more reliable STAB in Bounce or a more consistent Earthquke. The same situation occurs with grass-types that are not overtly weak to Fire Blast (ex. Trevnant, Celebi) or Dragons not weak to Stone Edge (Latios, Latias, Hydreigon). Second, you can achieve a 2HKO on Ferrothorn with Bounce with some prior damage and Skarmory with Waterfall with some prior damage at +1.
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Gyarados Waterfall vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Skarmory: 153-183 (45.8 - 54.79%) -- 98.05% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Gyarados Bounce vs. 252 HP / 48+ Def Ferrothorn: 200-238 (56.81 - 67.61%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
*needs Spikes for Ferrothorn accounting for Lefties on two turns attack but you get the point
The only way to OHKO either with Fire Blast with SR is to have max special attack with a positive nature. But at that point, you compromised the effectiveness of your physical moves to sweep with DD way too much. Overall your "power output" for Fire Blast of your physical moves will be too small.
Here, you sacrificed too much overall effectiveness for the sake of hitting two targets while specialized. In addition, your "lure" could have worn down the same counters just as well without a luring move in Fire Blast. You also lost some bulk in the process by choosing to go with a nature that decreases sp. def in order to preserve Fire Blast's power. To sum up, you just have a less effective Pokemon.
Here is an example that is fairly well known:
Freeze-Dry Mamoswine
Mamoswine (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 240 Atk / 16 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naive Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Ice Shard
- Icicle Crash
- Earthquake
- Freeze-Dry
Mamoswine this gen seemingly is countered by Rotom-W. Freeze-Dry Mamoswine can actually just get by physically defensive Rotom-W with a small amount of investment in special attack. Since Freeze-Dry is super-effective against Water-types, Rotom-W is hit harder than any other move in Mamoswine's movepool. Freeze-Dry is a 2HKO on Rotom-W after SR. Since you are only using a small amount of special attack investment, you don't detract away much from Mamoswine's overall power output. This Mamoswine really gets through teams that rely on the Rotom-W + Landorus-T combo to act as pivots.
Partners: Talonflame, Mega Pinsir, Landorus-T
If you have a lure that'd you'd like to share, post it here and if there is enough reasoning behind it; and it isnt too gimmicky, it will be added to the archive below n_n
Also, it is very helpful to post some calcs to back up a lure, but dont post too many or at least use hide tags.
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