SM OU Dark Blue - Peaked #5

[jpw234]

Hi all, welcome to my first SM OU RMT, Dark Blue. This is a team I built around Ash-Greninja and Mega Sharpedo. I enjoy building teams with the goal of pressuring and overwhelming shared counters. Mega Sharpedo and Ash-Greninja are a good pair for this, with shared offensive typing and the ability to hit on both sides of the offensive spectrum. This team is built to break down 'mons that counter both of these threats like Tapu Fini and Mega-Gyarados. Once those Pokemon are gone or weakened, we can identify which of our threats is best suited to clean up our opponent's team and maneuver from there.

I'm enjoying the use of this team early in the SM OU meta (for future reference, we're currently post-Gene ban) because it relies on some under-utilized sets and Pokemon. People are still feeling out the meta and relying on some central, very powerful Pokemon, and we're hitting from a bit of a different angle that can exploit some typical teambuilding ideas. I managed to peak with this team at #5 on the OU ladder, which I'm pretty happy with. However this team certainly does have some issues, so I'm happy to hear any advice that could improve it.

Teambuilding Process​

I started off by wanting to build with Ash-Greninja, and decided to take the approach of pairing it with a similarly-typed threat that could help break down overlapping counters. I initially used Crawdaunt, but eventually decided Mega-Sharpedo was better suited for the role. These two Pokemon are cool in that they can both clean a weakened offensive team, but they're also both strong enough to smash holes in balance and even stall. We do have a couple of Pokemon that are going to give both of them trouble, most notably Tapu Fini and Mega-Gyarados, but also to a lesser extent Ferrothorn, Tangrowth, and Mega-Venusaur. We'll need team support to weaken these Pokemon so that we can sweep.

The next Pokemon added was AV Magearna, who was a natural choice. Our two heavy hitters break down Fire and Ground types that threaten her, and Magearna can tank hits from stuff like Tapu Lele and electric types that threaten us. Magearna also chips down Fini via Volt Switch -> another threat and gives us one of our natural sources of momentum.

At this point I decided that if one of our most important tasks was going to be to chip down the most common Defogger in the tier, incorporating Spikes into our team would be very valuable. Laying Spikes forces Fini in more often, and taking out Fini makes Spikes a serious pain for any team. However we're out the best offensive Spiker because we're using Ash-Greninja, and Ferrothorn really doesn't fit this style of team. As such I have been using the VR-blacklisted Pokemon Golisopod, and it's been surprisingly good for me. It's definitely not a great Pokemon, but it has a suite of unique and interesting capabilities that give it an important role in our team.

Defog is out because we're going Spikestack, but we also need hazard clear because Toxic Spikes in particular are really bad for us. Scarf Excadrill provides Rapid Spin, some speed, and a good amount of coverage that can keep opposing threats in check.

Finally we've got a great Lando-T set that fills in a bunch of holes: it sets SR, gives us a Z-move, an EQ immunity, breaks down those Grass types and also seriously pressures Fini.

Under the Microscope

Greninja @ Choice Specs
Ability: Battle Bond
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Water Shuriken
- Hydro Pump
- Dark Pulse
- U-turn​

This is the standard Ash-Greninja and it's quite good. Dual STABs punch holes in anything that doesn't resist them, Water Shuriken lets you clean with a reasonably strong priority move, and U-Turn is just momentum. There's not much to using this Pokemon once it's in - it's far more about using the team around it to ensure that Greninja can just come in and break things.

Sharpedo @ Sharpedonite
Ability: Speed Boost
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Protect
- Psychic Fangs
- Crunch
- Poison Jab​

Mega-Sharpedo is an underrated hard-hitter that is, in my opinion, pretty well positioned in the current metagame. It's pretty easy to get to +2 where you aren't outsped by anything common but Scarf Pheromosa, and Sharpedo's Crunch hits surprisingly hard. The other moves here provide us some useful coverage. Psychic Fangs hits Buzzwole, Venu and Keldeo who think they're blocking our sweep. Poison Jab is primarily for Tapu Bulu, but also does reasonable damage to Fini and Clefable. I'm not shy about bringing Sharpedo in before the end of the game to rack up some damage on a defensive Lando-T, potentially PJab a Fini that comes in, or just make a play with a double. If you're patient with mega-evolving this you can often wear down counters enough to completely clean up a team later.

On this set, a notable alternative option would be to use Hydro Pump (with a Naughty nature) instead of Poison Jab. I ended up on PJab because it helps break down Fini and because Bulu is otherwise a reasonably big problem for this team, but Hydro, for example, gives you a lot more game against Skarmory and Landorus-T. The ability to KO Skarmory between Crunch and Hydro Pump is particularly useful as Skarm is typically our biggest barrier to beating stall.

Magearna @ Assault Vest
Ability: Soul-Heart
EVs: 248 HP / 252 SpA / 8 SpD
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch
- Aura Sphere
- Flash Cannon
- Fleur Cannon​

AV Magearna is close to a necessity to check powerful special attackers like Ash-Greninja, Lele, and Kingdra. This mon has a lot of bulk and coverage for days, so she's frequently pivoting in and out to give us momentum and rack up damage against offense. Additionally, the rest of our team covers her few weaknesses (like Marowak-A and Mega Venusaur) pretty well. Getting a good read on your opponent's team is very important in using Magearna correctly. While you don't want to just throw her away, sometimes it's very worth it to use her to get some chip damage on a Ferrothorn or Fini even when they have Greninja if you're confident you can set up a Sharpedo sweep or something.

HP Fire is better against Scizor, but Aura Sphere is imo much better overall for its ability to hit Magnezone, Heatran and Excadrill much harder while still 3HKOing Ferrothorn. If Scizor becomes more prominent, HP Fire might become more reasonable. Other items like Air Balloon or Shuca seem tempting but we rely pretty heavily on Magearna to blanket check a lot of special attackers so the general boost to SpD is just better.

Golisopod @ Leftovers
Ability: Emergency Exit
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Spikes
- First Impression
- Liquidation
- Leech Life​

I've certainly gotten some looks for this guy but he's performed surprisingly well for me. First things first we've got Spikes. This is undoubtedly the biggest reason he's here. Spikes aren't common in the current meta and there are a lot of teams that really fold to decent play when there's a layer or two down as their Pokemon quickly get in range of our priority or a Sharpedo clean. They also force Fini in to Defog, helping our theme of chipping her down. But aside from just laying Spikes, Golisopod does some other quite useful things. First of all, First Impression is a very powerful priority move from an uncommon offensive type that can be very useful. This means Golisopod serves as a stop to Mega-Gyarados, Ash-Greninja, Mega-Zam, Hoopa, etc. It can also pick off even some resists from low health which makes playing against things like DD Salamence, DD Lando-T and etc. much more forgiving, as we only have to get them down to 40%-ish where they can be finished off between First Impression and Water Shuriken. Do recall that First Impression has +2 priority like Extremespeed, so it will beat typical priority moves from faster mons. Next off, Golisopod is actually surprisingly sturdy and his unique typing means he checks some useful Pokemon. Stuff like Mamoswine, non-Bloom Doom Heatran, defensive Lando-T, non-Bounce Gyarados and non-Thunderpunch Metagross really have a hard time doing damage to Golisopod which gives us opportunities to either set Spikes or wear them down with Leech Life/Liquidation. Finally, Emergency Exit is often bad, but also often useful. We can frequently use it to get in one of our frail attackers safely. Exit triggering also blocks our opponent's U-Turn/Volt Switch from switching them out so we can deny momentum or get a favorable matchup there.

Set-wise, some recommend AV but that's a nonstarter since we're relying on this guy for Spikes. The only move that I think is replaceable is Leech Life, which I honestly almost never click. I'll confess to not really having tested other options. Poison Jab, Bulk Up and Rock Slide all look reasonably interesting. Too bad he's too slow to Taunt even Chansey :\

Excadrill @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Mold Breaker
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Rock Slide
- Earthquake
- Iron Head
- Rapid Spin​

Scarf Excadrill is really the perfect Pokemon for the team at this point. We naturally pressure a lot of the common flying-types and ground resists like Landorus-T and Salamence, which means cleaning up via EQ is actually quite common. Rapid Spin is not always necessary but is definitely good to have. Otherwise having some speed lets us beat stuff like DD Dragonite and Mega-Pinsir.
Excadrill is by no means a tank, but his reasonable bulk and good typing actually gives this team a bunch more play against offense. You can eat stuff like Continental Crush and Supersonic Skystrike as well as Lele's Moonblast and more and grab momentum with a double switch.

There's not really much else possible for this set. Scarf is mandatory for speed so we can't really pull off SD or Air Balloon.

Landorus-Therian @ Flyinium Z / Rockium Z
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Swords Dance
- Fly / Stone Edge​

Landorus-T rounds this team out very nicely. We have Rocks, obviously, while additionally having a great source of immediate offensive pressure against a lot of key mons. This set seriously pressures and often KOs Tapu Fini, opposing Lando-T, Venu, Tangrowth, Ferrothorn, Garchomp, Bulu and Scizor, all of which can pose problems for the rest of our team. SD/Z-Move also is our best source of offensive power against the bulkier and stall builds in the meta.

This is the one place I put a slash in the main set because I honestly don't know which option is better. I'm more commonly running Z-Fly for the additional neutral power from STAB and the ability to kill grass types. However there are serious advantages to Z-Rock, most notably against stall. This team primarily struggles against Zapdos and Skarmory on stall and Z-Rock will often cleanly lure and dispatch these Pokemon while still seriously chunking Lando-T, Fini, Venu and etc. If you take this team I recommend trying both options.

Threatlist​

- I think this team looks weaker to Zard than it ends up being, but it's still a problem. Taking hits from either form is very difficult. However if played correctly Zard-X should have a really tough time setting up a DD and both forms can be revenge killed or forced out by our faster threats.

- Again it's not as bad as it may seem as we have some play against Kingdra and can make it seriously hard for Pelipper to set up rain more than once but in the end Kingdra does do serious work against us.

- I don't see this Pokemon too often but Leech Seed sets are tough to wear down and offensive sets can hit pretty hard. I often end up saccing a Pokemon to get this sufficiently low.

- We can power through it but we just have to be really careful to not give it free turns to set up or it will get too bulky.

/

- Whichever one of these stall is running is the key to the stall matchup. Once we can kill the defogger we can pressure Sableye and get some spikes up which makes the matchup easy but both of these mons are very difficult to kill. This is the best reason to run Z-Rock Landorus-T.

Wrapup + Importable​

Thanks for reading! I hope you like the team, and I particularly hope that you try it out and let me know how you do with it. I encourage any suggestions, even theorymonning, as we're very early in SM and exploring new ideas can often have good results. This team has been a lot of fun on the ladder and I'll probably continue to use and tweak it so I'll update back if any big changes get made.

Importable

Greninja @ Choice Specs
Ability: Battle Bond
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Water Shuriken
- Hydro Pump
- Dark Pulse
- U-turn

Sharpedo @ Sharpedonite
Ability: Speed Boost
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Protect
- Psychic Fangs
- Crunch
- Poison Jab

Magearna @ Assault Vest
Ability: Soul-Heart
EVs: 248 HP / 252 SpA / 8 SpD
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch
- Aura Sphere
- Flash Cannon
- Fleur Cannon

Golisopod @ Leftovers
Ability: Emergency Exit
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Spikes
- First Impression
- Liquidation
- Leech Life

Excadrill @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Mold Breaker
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Rock Slide
- Earthquake
- Iron Head
- Rapid Spin

Landorus-Therian @ Flyinium Z
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Swords Dance
- Fly

 

[Smogon Genie]

Standard greninja is timid. The reduced damage is negligeable (u-turn isn't really used for damage) but you want the bulk to eat certain hits (ie metagross meteormash).

Also consider ice beam (can help with Tapu Bulu)

I prefer waterfall/crunch/poison jab sharpedo. Psychic coverage doesn't hit much other than keldeo which is not super common.

Psychic fangs hits Mega-Saur which is (under most circumstances) a pretty common switch in to ash gren, Pre-form change or not. The two are meant to cover for each other offensively and psychic fangs really helps with that.

(I assume this is the reason OP uses P-Fangs )

 

[Edward3th]

I've been playing and doing very well until Pheromosa appeared. I realized in general, if not because Landorus, how do you take fighting type attacks? Maybe a well played Keldeo, Pheromosa as i said, or even Kartana could bring some problems with these.

 

[jpw234]

Psychic fangs hits Mega-Saur which is (under most circumstances) a pretty common switch in to ash gren, Pre-form change or not. The two are meant to cover for each other offensively and psychic fangs really helps with that.

(I assume this is the reason OP uses P-Fangs )

@ league's post, Ninja's nature will be fixed. IMO Psychic Fangs is necessary but Water > PJab is reasonable. I also recommend Hydro Pump/Naughty over Waterfall for utility in hitting most water weaks and Skarmory. Skarm, Lando-T, Hippowdon etc are all hit harder by Hydro Pump, the only notable thing Waterfall is hitting is maybe Tyranitar who is easy to wear down.

I've been playing and doing very well until Pheromosa appeared. I realized in general, if not because Landorus, how do you take fighting type attacks? Maybe a well played Keldeo, Pheromosa as i said, or even Kartana could bring some problems with these.

Golisopod hard-checks every non-specs Pheromosa. Specs can be played around between resistances to all of its attacks and your priority. Use First Impression and hazards to wear it down. QD is the only set I've found really threatening but between Magearna living comfortably from +1 and OHKOing with Fleur and First Impression/Water Shuriken killing I don't have too much trouble. If you need more ways of chipping it RHelm on Golisopod could be a possibility?
Scarf Keldeo is mildly annoying but again Golisopod hard checks it and sets up Spikes which wears it down, and Magearna also checks it.