BW2 OU Rain Team RMT

[SpiritWinterWulf]

Hello, my name is Spirit, and today I have a team I'd like to show you. It's been doing pretty well on PS! It's a very different style of team than I've seen alot of people use or post. It sort of centers around Espeon's ability to baton pass lots of CMs after any physical threats are out of the way, and also sweep with stored power if need be. So, let's begin, shall we? (My apologies for the lack of pictures, my computer sucks.)

Politoed (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Drizzle
Bold Nature (+Def/-Atk)
EVs: 252 HP/160 Def/ 96 SpD
Hydro Pump
Ice Beam
Hypnosis
Encore

Politoed is obviously my rain inducer, but the point of her set is to catch people off guard, seeing as almost no one I've battled was expecting Hypnosis. Hydro Pump is a strong offensive move for her, while Ice Beam helps to check opposing ground types and that damn hippo. Encore lets me piss off set up sweepers that already have a status ailment or can't fall asleep.


Thundurus-Therian Forme (M) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Volt Absorb
Modest Nature: (+SpA/-Atk)
EVs: 252 SpA/4 SpD/252 Spe
Thunder
Nasty Plot
Hidden Power Ice
Agility

First, let's just clear this out of the way, Thundurus T is a BEAST. With the choice specs, his already insane Special attack stat skyrockets to 641. His STAB Thunder hits for 100% accuracy in the rain, and Focus Blast just nails everything else, except for what Dark Pulse does. Thundurus is really my only counter to Jirachi and Metagross, seeing as Thunder hits for around 90% and 70% respectively.


Toxicroak (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Dry Skin
Adamant Nature (+Atk/-SpA)
EVs: 136 HP/252 Atk/120 Spe
Drain Punch
Bulk Up
Ice Punch
Sucker Punch

Toxicroak, Toxicroak, Toxicroak... oh man, where do I even begin? This thing has caused more rage quits than anything I've ever seen. In the rain with a couple Bulk Ups, she is an unstoppable physical force, ripping and tearing through almost everything she sees. Cross Chop mauls anything that isn't Deoxys-D and Ice Punch kills off those annoying dragons. And Sucker Punch picks off those pesky psychic types trying to ruin her fun.


Donphan (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Sturdy
Impish Nature (+Def/-SpA)
EVs: 252 HP/80 Atk/176 Def
Stealth Rock
Rapid Spin
Ice Shard
Earthquake

Donphan is my physical defender, and an awesome check to the dragon types that like to snack on my team. I've noticed that not alot of people expect him to run ice Shard, so i gain an advantage there when people predict EQ and get Ice shard. (Here's lookin' at you, Dragonite...)

Blissey (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
Calm Nature (+SpD/-Atk)
EVs: 252 Hp/252 Def/4 SpD
Toxic
Protect
Seismic Toss
Wish

Blissey is a superb special wall. She can wall almost any special threat you throw at her, heck, even Hydreigon Draco Meteor fails to 2HKO. Ice Beam is for dragons and the Serene Grace freeze chance increase, other than that, she can stall her way through almost anything but something with Psyshock, a physical attacker, or a steel type.


Espeon (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Magic Bounce
Timid Nature (+Spe/-Atk)
EVs: 252 HP/120 SpA/136 Spe
Baton Pass
Calm Mind
Stored Power
Substitute

Ahhh, here she is, Espeon, one of the greatest things about this team. Once physical threats are gone or Politoed has hypnotised something, she can come in, CM as much as possible, and then either sweep with stored power, or baton pass the boosts and a sub. She has been the tiebreaker in alot of games.

Thank you for looking at my team and rating it, I'm looking forward to all of your constructive criticism, and can't wait to read what you have to say! :)

 

[Nova]

Hi SpiritWinterWulf

Solid rain team you've built here, I admire your use of an underrated set that is Baton Pass Espeon. I do have some suggestions I'd like to propose in order to help improve your team. Tornadus-T is one of the major powerhouses in the Black and White 2 metagame and is a threat to your team. He can outspeed every member and fire off powerful Hurricanes which none of your Pokemon take very well and use Superpower to hit Blissey. Another threat to your team is offensive Dragon Dance users such as Dragonite, Salamence, and Haxorus. After a DD boost, these threats will be able to outspeed and potentially sweep your team as you carry no Dragon resist. For these threats, I suggest replacing Jellicent with a standard Defensive Donphan with a moveset of Stealth Rock / Rapid / Earthquake / Ice Shard. Donphan has access to Ice Shard, giving him a priority attack to hit Dragon types and the new therians for super effective damage. As you mentioned, you said that Jellicent was the most replaceable member of your team and you were in search of a physical wall. Donphan fits the bill with his great base 90 HP and 120 Defense, allowing him to shrug off Outrages and check Dragon tupes. Donphan provides you with Rapid Spin support which is very useful for allowing Thundurus-T to get more switch ins and can also set up Stealth Rock which is a crucial move to check the likes of Dragonite, Thundurus-T, and Volcarona who are some of the top threats in OU. Although it may seem counterintuitive to place Donphan on a rain team as his water weakness will be amplified, most Special Water type attacks will OHKO him regardless outside of rain (2HKO with Sturdy) and he actually is a great help in winning the weather war. He makes a great check to common Sand teams threats such as Tyranitar, Terrakion, and Landorus with his great physical bulk and eliminates Ninetales with Earthquake. I recommend using an EV spread of 252 HP / 80 Atk / 176 Def with an Impish nature. The attack investment makes for a stronger Earthquake as well as getting the 2HKO on Landorus with Ice Shard without sacrificing much bulk.

Next, some changes on Thundurus-T. First, I would change his nature from Modest to Timid. Timid nature allows you to abuse his unique 101 base Speed which outspeeds the likes of Jirachi, Mew, and Celebi as well as speed tie with non-Scarf Landorus and opposing Thundurus-T. This does cause a drop in power but it is usually more beneficial on a offensive Pokemon to use a speed increasing nature so he can hit opponents before they can hit him. Next, I suggest replacing Dark Pulse with Hidden Power Ice. Neutral STAB Thunder already deals more damage than a Super Effective Dark Pulse so Dark Pulse is really not needed. HP Ice gives you additional coverage against Dragon types such as Lati@s, Hydreigon, and Dragonite and also on Venusaur. Lastly, place the 4 HP EVs on Thundurus-T into Special Defense in order to maximize the number of times he can switch into Stealth Rock. Thundurus-T without HP EVs has an odd HP stat of 299 and can survive 4 Stealth Rock switch ins while Thundurus-T with 4 HP EVs has an even HP stat of 300 and can only survive 3.

Now for some smaller changes. I suggest replacing Cross Chop on Toxicroak with Drain Punch. Drain Punch provides a great recovery move, healing you more HP with additional Bulk Ups. This coupled with the recovery from Leftovers and Dry Skin will make Toxicroak very difficult to bring down. Finally, Natural Cure is more useful than Serene Grace on Blissey. Serene Grace is only benefiting one move on Blissey's set and still only offers a meager 20% freeze chance on Ice Beam. Natural Cure is a better ability on a defensive Pokemon such as Blissey as it prevents her from being worn down with poison or burn as she can just switch out when inflicted with one, making her a much more effective wall.

Hope I helped and good luck with your team!

Sets

Hide

Donphan (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 80 Atk / 176 Def
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
-Stealth Rock
-Rapid Spin
-Earthquake
-Ice Shard

Thundurus-T @ Choice Specs
Trait: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 SAtk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
-Thunder
-Focus Blast
-Hidden Power [Ice]
-Volt Switch

tl;dr

Hide

Jellicent ----> Standard Defensive Donphan
Modest Nature on Thundurus-T ----> Timid Nature
Dark Pulse on Thundurus-T ----> Hidden Power [Ice]
4 HP EVs on Thundurus-T ----> 4 Special Defense EVs
Cross Chop on Toxicroak ----> Drain Punch
Serene Grace on Blissey ----> Natural Cure

 

[SpiritWinterWulf]

Thanks for your suggestions, I espescially like the Donphan set. I'll try them out today and get back to you on wether or not they work well. Thanks! :)

 

[Jirachee]

Hi

This is a cool team however there are a couple of things that you need to fix for it to become better because I think there are some pretty big holes in it. First of all, any physical Dragon completely annihilate your team as you have no Dragon resist at all, and nothing really bulky enough to tank Outrages, meaning that stuff like Choice Scarf Moxie Salamence and DD Dragonite are going to be clean sweeps pretty much every game. Life Orb Latios can also be troublesome for your team as Psyshock will destroy your current Blissey, it can even 2HKO max HP max Def Blissey, and seeing you run no Defense investment at all and even a -Def nature you're in for trouble. Latios can pretty much beat everything on your team on 1 on 1 and that isn't a good situation. The last thing your team lacks is entry hazard support. It's always important to have entry hazard on the enemy's side of the field because they weaken their Pokemon making them easier to KO, and they put a lot of pressure on their side and punish switching, which is really what you want. Threats like Dragonite and Volcarona are extremely difficult to deal with without Stealth Rock support, and hazards makes it so much easier to win weather wars. Honestly, you don't want to give your opponent the edge in that regard. I think that you'd greatly benefit of dropping your Jellicent for a Ferrothorn. Since you don't really like Jellicent anyway I don't know why you'd keep it, and Ferrothorn does a number of things for you. First of all, it resists Dragon typed attacks making it much more difficult for Dragon types to mow down your team as it is able to take most Outrages quite nicely. Ferrothorn also switches in pretty much everything Latios has to offer pretty well, thanks to Drizzle support from Politoed. Lastly, Ferrothorn can throw in Stealth Rock support which is always important if you want to win weather wars and deal with Dragonite better.

Honestly, your Blissey set needs to be changed because at the moment it will die to really weak physical attacks and it can actually take some physical attacks pretty well with investment. I really don't get why you are using a Gentle nature given that you don't use Blissey's pathetic Attack stat, while its Defense can actually come in handy sometimes when you need to tank weaker attackers. Using a Calm nature with maximum HP and Defense investment instead would be a better idea. With max HP and Defense Blissey will take physical attacks much better and since its Special Defense is already high the nature boost will be fine, as Blissey already takes Special Attacks nicely. This will allow Blissey to survive much longer and hopefully let it tank much more attacks and serve your team better.

Here are the sets you should use:

Ferrothorn and Blissey

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Iron Barbs
Sassy
EVs: 252 HP / 92 Def / 164 SpD
~Gyro Ball
~Stealth Rock
~Leech Seed
~Spikes

Blissey @ Leftovers
Natural Cure
Calm
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 Spe
~Wish
~Seismic Toss
~Toxic
~Protect

Good luck!

 

[SpiritWinterWulf]

Thanks for your help. I'm running Novaray's Donphan for my physical defender now, but I really like your Blissey suggestion.

 

[destinyunknown]

Hey Spirit,

You have a cool rain team, but it has some flaws that need to be covered. First off, I would like to say that Jirachi's hitted the nail on the head on his rate, and I completely support all the changes he has suggested, as Ferrothorn would be a great addition for your team since you absolutely needed a Dragon-type resistance, which you were lacking before. However, even with this change, you're still very weak to Substitute + Dragon Dance Gyarados, which can easily set up on Ferrothorn (as it can't break Gyarados's substitutes with Gyro Ball), Politoed and Espeon when unboosted. This can be easily fixed by using Power Whip instead of Spikes on Ferrothorn, as your team isn't especially benefited by Spikes, and they can be removed easily by any Rapid Spin user (Starmie and Tentacruel find a lot of opportunities to switch in against your team, for example).

Another thing I would like to recommend is using a different set on Thundurus-T. While Choice Specs Thundurus-T is a very powerful pokemon, it heavily relies on prediction, and it can't take down the main special wall, Blissey. Foremost, since the purpose of your team is passing CM boosts to your special sweepers (Thundurus-T is the only one besides Espeon itself), your current Thundurus-T set doesn't fit the team strategy very well, as Choice item users aren't good Baton Pass receivers because they will be forced out easily. For this reason, I suggest running a Nasty Plot + Agility set instead. With this set, Thundurus-T will be able to both destroy defensive teams via Nasty Plot, or just use Agility when dealing with more offensive teams. Agility can also be useful to boost Thundurus-T's speed after obtaining Calm Mind boosts. Here's the set:

Thundurus-T@Lum Berry | Volt Absorb
Timid Nature | 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Nasty Plot / Thunder / Hidden Power Ice / Agility

Good luck!

 

[SpiritWinterWulf]

Thanks to all of you for the help and suggestions!