XY NU Basic team,needs help!

[Sir_Bagel]

I've been really into NU battling recently and after trying my hand at many teams I have gotten some decent success with a fairly basic team i will list below. I know the team has many flaws and therefore all help would be appreciated.

Steelix @ Leftovers
Ability: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earth Power
- Iron Head
- Explosion

Steelix is my main lead unless the opponents lead is fairly obvious and counters steelix. With his great bulk and sturdy Steelix can always get a stealth rock on the field without a doubt. Earth power provides good coverage and can hit specially defensive and regularly defensive pokemon. Explosion is for when things are looking bad and the massive explosion damage is the only way out.

Rotom @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Shadow Ball
- Trick
- Thunderbolt
- Volt Switch

Rotom makes both a great revenge killer and a straight up attacker. Not many pokemon can out speed scarfed rotom and with big threats like mismagius a strong ghost type is nice. Rotom also has many immunities so even with its less than great bulk ir has a fairly easy time switching in. It also works well with typhlosion and zangoose hitting things hard and fast with no set up.

Feraligatr @ Life Orb
Ability: Torrent
EVs: 28 HP / 252 Atk / 228 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Waterfall
- Earthquake
- Ice Punch
- Dragon Dance

This Feraligator set is the standard sweeper gator. It can switch in to many pokemon and with just one dragon dance hits mostly every pokemon in NU extremely hard. Feraligator also easily sets up on things like torkoal and bulky waters, Feraligator is not easy to stop when it gets going.

Zangoose @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Toxic Boost
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Knock Off
- Quick Attack
- Facade
- Protect

Zangoose is a third the reason this team works well with rotom and typhlosion. After toxic boost is activated zangooses attack shoots through the roof with no real set up risk. Zangoose also ant be crippled by nasty status ailments. It works with rotom and typhlosions to hit things extremely hard before the opponent can react. Knock off also really helps with ghost types switching in and eviolite users.

Vileplume @ Black Sludge
Ability: Effect Spore
- Giga Drain
- Sludge Bomb
- Sleep Powder
- Moonlight

When things look bad for my all out attackers i always rely on vileplume to take some hits. Vilplumes typing and move set work perfectly for keeping it alive for as long as possible and sleep powder gives me an easy free switch to one of my other pokemon. It also takes out most grass types and fairy pokemon.

Typhlosion @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Eruption
- Fire Blast
- Focus Blast
- Hidden Power [Rock]

Typhlosion caps things off by hitting extremely fast with choice scarf and almost always getting off the full powered eruption. Even resisted a full eruption is never something you want to switch in on. Also for rock types that think they can take a hit are majorly hurt by focus blast when predicted. If threats are removed before typhlosion comes in it can easily sweep teams with no prior set up.

 

[ium]

the choices in pokemon themselves seem like they can work fine as a team, but you can optimize your sets a bit. most of them aren't good

steelix should use earthquake over earth power because its special attack is terrible, and roar over explosion because steelix is something you want to save throughout a match to check many physical threats while being able force out any setup attempts. it also doesn't need max defense, so you can run careful and max special defense which helps make its typing and bulk useful against things like mismagius, mesprit, cryogonal, some dragalge, and so on

feraligatr can stick with a swords dance set since it's better suited working in tandem with zangoose to break down some bulky pokemon. with that in mind, lum berry over life orb helps it gain setup opportunities against those pokemon and aqua jet over earthquake grants a good opportunity to clean late-game against more offensive teams. adamant, 144 hp / 252 atk / 112 spe is enough and gives you usable bulk while letting you outspeed things like pawniard

zangoose shouldn't be giving up coverage, so use close combat over protect so you can actually break steel- and rock-types. you double switch or pick off weakened pokemon with zangoose to activate your orb

sleep isn't really that devastating for the opponent in this generation, so vileplume is better suited using hidden power fire over sleep powder so you can break through ferroseed. you also don't have a spread on vileplume; i'm assuming you have max hp and defense with a bold nature, but if you don't then that spread should work on your team since you need to handle feraligatr and fighting-types a little bit better

finally, you don't need two choice scarf pokemon so typhlosion can just stick with choice specs. also focus blast and hidden power rock don't really hit anything significant and you never really explained why you chose those moves. instead you can use extrasensory for dragalge and hidden power grass for things like seismitoad and rhydon

unless you point out some specific flaws or weaknesses in your team, these changes should be good enough and will help your team fulfill its functions better. you should also refer to the on-site dex or the c&c forum to look at what sets work best for each pokemon considering how some of the choices for movesets weren't good