BW OU (Baton) Passport to Victory (Peaked #2)

[Kidogo]

Thanks again everyone! I actually managed to keep the post under 4,000,000 words this time, so I won't bother with hide tags:
@conduit, NPbi is totally a beast set but for this team nastypassbi definitely fits better, i really appreciate the longevity provided by recover and the defensive EVs and its ability to set up NPs on so much. Starmie would defintely be nice here (I've tried it > thundy in the past) but I've found that aggressive playing early-game and liberal use of terra's taunt usually limit the amount of hazards that go up enough (and having 3 SR resists is super cool actually). Thanks for the comment!

@hayden I've tested these two sets a lot and I have to say I really am preferring the original LO agility set--CTC's EV spread is nice for the added survivability, but I jsut find the immediate power LO too nice to pass up given that quite often thundy just needs to attack attack attack right off the bat. And yep, like conduit said, agility is soften really useful for that reason.

@shurtugal--oh thats funny, great midns think alike what can i say? I love the bone-crushing power of modest too much on specstoed to go for timid, and I already have what is close to the best adamant loom-counter in existence in celebi. And yep, I'm using CTC's thundy spread fsure, with a slight adjustment for LO > lefties.
And yes, I could not agree more--that is the whole fun of the team :D

@GOthee--thanks, it's really fun to use!
As before, I really appreciate all the feedback and suggestions guys, the team has never felt more consistent to me!

 

[Meru]

I've played this team quite a few times on the ladder and I gotta say, I'm a little disappointed that you've taken sand stall so little into account. I think a wallbreaker would do you good here, as Hippowdon + Latias can take your whole team, and with no spinner, hazards do a harsh number on here. So where to start? I gotta say, I think Terrakion really does so little for this team. Speed already seems pretty covered throughout your team, so I'm going to go a little off the radar and recommend changing Terrakion to Nidoqueen. You'll get Toxic Spikes absorption, good Stealth Rock setter, and you'll be able to give a plethora of trouble to teams of all kinds.

Although Nidoqueen IS Nidoqueen. Since typically, you're never able to spread her stats as far as you want to, so it might not be a good idea in the end. Still, my assertion holds that I think that Terrakion is the weakest link of the team.

 

[Shurtugal]

He could use Normal Gem Explosion Azelf, but (since I've kinda retired) I'm not sure how common Mental Herb leads are so ~

Nidoqueen < Psyshock Latias. Not all Latias on sand stall are going to be your CM variant, and the CM variant likes to set up on it anyway. If he's going to replace it, Azelf would be best. SR / Taunt / Explosion / U-turn or Ice Beam, so he can beat Latias and Hippowdown.

@kidogo

Fun teams are fun right? :P

 

[Delinquents]

First off, I have to say that I love this team. It's very interesting, and specifically I'm a huge fan of the Celebi set, which I actually added to my own rain team. Sashed Terrakion makes a great lead, and getting rocks down and getting a kill sometimes is awesome. It does exactly what a lead should do. I prefer a scarf on Politoed, and my 'toed is always carrying ice beam, however I can understand why you use grass. The keldeo set is fairly standard, and I like the addition of HP ghost a lot. As for your Thundurus, I don't really like Life Orb on it, nor do I like the agility set. I don't like these because I consider myself bad at setting up. If you can set up with such a fragile pokemon, then by all means continue using it. I'll recommend this set, however.

Thundurus-Therian (M) @ Expert Belt
Trait: Volt Absorb
EVs: 8 HP / 252 SAtk / 248 Spd
Modest Nature
- Thunder
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Focus Blast
- Grass Knot

This Thundurus is slow without agility, but if you eliminate the things that outspeed it and threaten it too much, the extra coverage it provides is wonderful. I really like to get into a situation when I can spam thunder (either after passing a nasty plot or two) and then lure in something and destroy it with something it's weak to. The opponent's reaction is always priceless. Grass knot really puts the hurt on gastrodon, and my opponents are always so eager to switch their gastrodons in once they see Thundurus hit the field. being able to fake a choiced item is great, and I've always liked the lure/trapping playstyle.

As for Jirachi, I like the set. I personally use a more stall-based set with thunder, iron head, wish, and protect. I consider myself really good at winning the weather war, so thunder > body slam for paralysis is better for me. It also gives me an element of surprise, and I can sometimes catch a water type who isn't suspecting a thunder and hurt it pretty badly. My set it also slower, but has more special defense for taking fire hits in stride.

Jirachi @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 236 SDef / 20 Spd
Careful Nature
- Iron Head
- Thunder (body slam if you find yourself not winning weather wars as much as you should)
- Wish
- Protect

I can't count how many times I've clutched a game with just Jirachi. It's a pokemon that definitely can win the grind game. My logic behind going with a slower Jirachi is that once it paralyzes something, it tends to outspeed or resist most things that I encounter. The speed I lose is also replaced with special defense, so aside from earthquake (which is easy enough to predict in most cases) my Jirachi isn't dying to much.

I really wouldn't change much about this team, if anything. It's a killing machine, and the defensive core can take a freight train if it has to. Your biggest weakness, like you said yourself, is lack of a spinner, but assuming that you don't let the opponent get rocks and three layers of spikes down, you aren't in too much trouble. Thundurus is so fragile with the presence of stealth rocks, which is why I dislike life orb. Even with this team's weaknesses, it's still extremely solid, every member is here for a reason, and the sets here are awesome, especially the Celebi set.

 

[ABfloww]

There is absolutely no way of denying how good this team is, and i witnessed the great synergy and great combination of pokemon when i used this team with a few battles. But during one of my battles, i found out a certain flaw in the team, probably one of the few it has. And that is its ability or should i say lack of ability to take down a Sub CM latias after its behind a sub, or after a CM or two. This led to half my team being swept, and i ended up loosing the battle. This isnt a "major" problem as if you play well around it you should be fine, and also Sub CM Latias isnt too common that it should cause a change in the team. Anyway i thought i'd just point out this problem, it basically can be overcome by good play or changing a couple of movesets.

 

[Kidogo]

Hmm yet more really good comments. I've done a lot of testing with a couple different variations of the team and am making a small change to the team. Responding to posts below:

@meru (although I still think of you as ninety hehe)

It is true that stall (and possibly, sand stall in particular) is annoying for this team to face since I have no RSer. However, I usually am able to fare fairly well vs stall by virtue of the sheer power of some of the attacks--not many mons want to take a specstoed hpump, for example. Of course, it gets problematic when the opponent has both a hippo / skarm / hazards core and something really irritating like jellicent--I really need to force a lot of double switches and try to accrue damage by playing aggressively, and thundurus becomes invaluable for the fact that pretty much nothing can switch into it with absolute security. Given this, one of my absolute top priorities vs stall is to prevent hazards being set up. Nidoqueen would sorta help with this by absorbing tspikes, but terrakion has a couple really important things > nido, taunt being a major one. Oftentimes if I lead with it I can get SR down, prevent the foe from doing so, and deal some nice damage to the opp's lead before going down. Then my goal is to play as offensively as possible to prevent them getting hazards up--a difficult task, but generally possible. terrakion is aso by far the team's biggest asset vs sun, so I think even if i did exchange it for something like nido, I would open up a bigger hole to that. Lastly, I'm actually not totally sure how I'm weak to hippo + latias--jirachi hard-counters latias and I'll mostly jsut spam uturn with it early game in case of a hippo switch-in, in which case 4/5 remaining members threaten it out. Snd stall is definitely a difficult match-up (and all too popular thanks to you :P), but I think it's probably something to consider more in how to play the team than an alteration in the lineup, since that might jsut open up a bigger hole. Thanks for the comment and the suggestion though!

@shurtugal

Hehe i personally like terra more but if i ever want to try something out i might just have to go for azelf :D

delinquents

Thanks for the rate, I'm glad you like the team! Believe it or not, I've been testing out ebelt on thundurus lately and actually greatly prefer it to LO, so I'll be updating the OP with that change (I'm still using the agility set though--most of set-up opportunities will come from forcing a switch (send out vs a jellicent or smth, agility as they switch). Thanks for the input though, I've been thinking the exact same thing regarding the item.
I prefer bslam for a couple of reasons: even if I do win the weather war, it works before I've brought in toed or before I've won it. It also paralyzes ground types, which is really nice, since i've caught a lot of landorus that way when they try to set up a RP on rachi. Uturn is also really valuable for a lot of reasons (one big one is escaping from zone), and I've generally found that with paraflinch protect isnt so necessary. I run the speed almost solely for mamoswine which I always find annoying, I have considered dropping it though since aside from that it's generally not super useful. It's always nice to have another check for mamo though, so I'll probably keep the speed as is. Thanks for the rate and especially the ebelt suggestion on thundy, that's right on. Glad you like the team!

@ABfloww

Thanks haha, it's taken a lot of work and help from all you guys to get it here. What I find with subCM latias is that, if I still have jirachi, it's a complete non-issue, but that if I don't, it can be really problematic. Additionally, CM + refresh latias literally 6-0s if rachi gets paralyzed, which I found out the hard way. You're right though, subCM sweepers can be annoying since the team is so specially based, jirachi being by far the worst since celebi can't simply set up alongside it since it 4x resists psychic. Usually you can get past these with careful playing though as you said. Thanks for the comments, glad you like the team :D

OK, so thundurus's item LO --> ebelt, thanks for everyone who's complained about its survivability hehe, I really like this change.

 

[Neliel]

Congratulations to Kidogo for winning Team of the week :)