ORAS OU demons

[p2]

• introduction

hello. i haven't made an rmt in a while, but i might as well do it now since i've hit 2000 posts because that's what all the cool people do and its not like i've got any better ideas.

so basically, most people on this site know me as p2 or fleggumfl, and i'm just one of those guys that post in the ou forum as well as being a ladder idiot and builder. other than that i don't do much, pretty boring background if you ask me.

so basically, this team is my latest favourite one i've built recently and one of the more effective ones i've built and used. i wanted to play around with some nice balance instead of the generic goon offenses i've been using, i like this team in particular because it utilises some underrated threats like subsalac garchomp and cm slowking as well as the recently noticed physically defensive tangrowth which is really great in the meta right now. so onto to the team itself.

• teambuilding process

i initially based the team around these two, because it's a really solid core and i wanted to use physically defensive tangrowth after noticing after all the hype it picked up over the course of spl. i've never believed this set was particularly bad but seeing pif ladder with it encouraged me to use it because i've never seen anything so absurd. basically, tangrowth can live any single hit in the meta that isn't adamant zard x's flare blitz or mega hera's pin missile which is pretty incredible, which gives it plenty of opportunities to shut down threatening stuff, usually coming off unscathed because people think it's gonna be forced out.

if you're running tangrowth, some extra regen mons never hurt because the continuous recovery lets you be really cheeky against stuff like terrakion because they rarely die and end up stalling it out of stone edges which is pretty hot. cm slowking is a particularly underrated set, capable of taking on the typical goons like clefable and tornadus-t, usually using them as setup bait outside of the occasional taunt. cm slowking is a pretty solid wincon and also helps the team handle stuff like keldeo and mega lopunny more effectively and it's natural physical bulk is really solid too in living crucial hits like band weav's pursuit and scarf ttars crunch, which usually makes it really safe compared to stuff like latios or latias.

so yeah on a nice balance squad like this, you're gonna need countermeasures for latis, hoopa, electrics and other things, so that's where tyranitar comes in. it's slow, but it's enough - trapping stuff like gengar, hoopa, and cm latios nicely. it also makes for a nice revenge killer against terrakion because i've recently noticed that mon is a huge pain in the ass to face. the team doesn't exactly mind its sand either so it's having very little negative effect on the synergy of the team. it's a necessary addition though because of how easily it can stop many threats to the team.

things get a little funky here. of course tyranitar alone isn't enough for speed, but garchomp helps out this a little in giving the team more breathing space around faster wallbreakers like mega gardevoir and zard y. it also functions as a very unprepared sweeper a lot of the time due to the fact that subsalac garchomp has dropped off the earth completely. sub is very nice on chomper because it takes advantage of stuff like landorus-t which just try to intimidate you to death and lets you captilise on rotom-w's trying to wisp or ones that miss hydro. great set though.

final addition to the team was mega sableye. seems like an odd choice considering that the team would have liked something more offensive, but mega sableye does sableye things and shits on all these upcoming ladder trends like mega medicham and these common spike stack teams. it fills a pretty crucial role on this team in checking zam, which would be very problematic otherwise. it also gives some buffer against weavile but that's kinda thrown out the window given that weavile just flinches sableye and everything else to death anyway. band weavile is just frustrating for this team to face, but you can play around it a little better since it can't switch between knock off and icicle crash.

• the team

meatran (heatran) @

| flash fire
timid | 104 hp / 152 spa / 252 spe
stealth rock / toxic / taunt / lava plume

so part of the starting point to the team was heatran. heatran's one of my favourite mons to use right now just because it's so good, it can be tailored to doing anything on a team, but fast heatran is without a doubt it's best set right now, since it can outspeed and take out stuff like mega scizor and mega heracross that spdef heatran misses out on, and then proceeds to go ahead and get blown up by superpower and close combat, respectively. taunt toxic is a very potent combination on heatran because it lets you set annoying water types like keldeo and slowbro on a timer and taunt prevents any healing from slowbro as well as shutting down slower hazard setters like skarmory and ferrothorn. the hp investment avoids the ohko from mega gardevoir which can try pick off tran turn 1. this gives you an opportunity to plume it or set rocks, depending on how lucky you're feeling, which puts it in range for tyranitar to force out or garchomp to ohko. simple stuff, and this usually acts as a main countermeasure for stuff like mega sableye and clefable.

tangy tom (tangrowth) @

| regenerator
bold | 252 hp / 200 def / 56 spd
sleep powder / giga drain / hidden power fire / leech seed

it goes without saying that physically defensive tang is a monster of sorts in ou right now ebcause its physical bulk is insane, checking a ton of fast hard hitters that a lot of teams can struggle with like sd excadrill, breloom, mega lopunny, terrakion, azumarill, landorus-t, sd chomper. the list goes on and on but tangrowth is pretty incredible right now. i've seen this thing live a +3 outrage from dnite, so if that doesn't mean something, then i don't know what does. even though its spdef is really poor, it can check some stuff like starmie and keldeo to an extent, however it still does a great job of switching into weak scalds and absorbing burns from the likes of rotom-w when needed. the given investment is a ben gay spread and avoids the ohko from lo starmie's ice beam which is pretty nice, it also lives 2 specs keldeo scalds assuming neither of them burn, so it's a nice last resort against these mons if anything. sleep powder is the main reason why phys def tangrowth is so good, it isn't locked like av it and is free to spread status around, crippling stuff like heatran and tornadus-t, and giving a way to reduce its passivity. hp fire is for hitting ferrothorn and mega scizor, tangrowth usually takes hits well from the latter so yeah, it's a check of sorts. leech seed just lets tangrowth annoy everything and helps bypass the lack of leftovers which can sting sometimes, but i feel rocky helmet is more useful overall.

slow bro (slowking) @

| regenerator
bold | 252 hp / 252 def / 4 spd
scald / psyshock / calm mind / slack off

slowking is a nice choice too, being able to check a bunch of threats like talonflame, clefable, some tornadus-t variants, heatran, keldeo, starmie, and a bunch of other things that tangrowth struggles with. it also creates a nice n annoying regen core with tangrowth which can be very annoying to take down because that's a difficult task in itself. again, calm mind is a very underrated set, because people mostly assume people run that garbage assault vest set or something with nasty plot or thunder wave. calm mind + psyshock is just the best ever and lets slowking consistently switch into clefable and set up against it, eventually breaking through it if clefable doesn't crit with moonblast first. it's best to try get burned by scald or wisp before attempting to beat clefable because if you get twaved, your chances are severely reduced because of twaves nice habit of full paraing when you need it the absolute least. the investment on slowking is also very neat because it somewhat acts as a diancie check as well as switching into mega lopunny which can also be a pain at times, the former is really annoying to deal with however.

stocky rocky (tyranitar) @

| sand stream
jolly | 252 atk / 4 spd / 252 spe
crunch / pursuit / stone edge / superpower

so yeah scarftar, there really isn't a lot to say about this mon because everybody and their moms know exactly what this mon does. tyranitar checks a bunch of dangerous threats to the team, stuff like cm latios, hoopa-u, and gengar while also providing a very hard check to stuff like mega pinsir and talonflame, beating the former is very important because holy shit mega pinsir is so annoying for balance builds to face without a steel that can handle close combat fairly well. problems that can crop up with relying on tyranitar to handle so many threats would be completely overloading it, but it puts in a solid amount of work in many, if not all, matchups in trapping key threats because the team is very pressed to check some threats as it is.

chompy chomp (garchomp) @

| rough skin
jolly | 12 hp / 244 atk / 252 spe
swords dance / substitute / earthquake / dragon claw

this garchomp set is possibly my favourite thing about this team, it's a very underprepared for set that completely throws off stuff like rotom-w and landorus-t since you can avoid wisp and bait for hydro pump misses, as well as blocking out intimidating, making switching loops ineffective at stopping chomp, so it stomps a ton of builds like that very easily. the extra speed from salac makes chomp so potent though since it just ohkos anything faster than it when its at +2, and forces a bunch of teams to have skarmory or togekiss to beat it and fast teams need reliable priority to take it on once chomp has been brought down to its salac berry since it just blows apart stuff like torn-t, manectric, keldeo, terrakion, raikou, and starmie, the list goes on. point is this set is a monster and punishes so many builds its insane. i've considered the idea of toying around with endure over sub to get the upper hand on stuff like zard x, latios, and scarf rachi, but i like being able to avoid status with sub or bait for misses if I need to.

mostly ghostly (sableye) @

| prankster
careful | 252 hp / 112 def / 144 spd
fake out / foul play / will-o-wisp / recover

so mega sableye rounds off the team. i initially added it because i needed an alakazam check, because almost no other mega evos do that. this opened potential for a more offensive build with mega slowbro over slowking but i decided not to go down that path and just went with this annoying piece of shit which i still strongly feel should be banned. it also checks gengar should tyranitar be unable to switch in. it also makes up for the passive nature of the team in that its pretty vulnerable to common spikers like skarmory and ferrothorn, so i feel that it's a very effective glue holding the team together. its presence also helps deter mega medicham from going anywhere against this build because the megacham trend has taken over the ladder again, so it's very important to watch out for that since it rips apart balance builds very easily. so yeah, i like fake out on this build because you get chip damage and help slowly weaken annoying stuff like mega gardevoir, but it can also force mindgames against it, because giving heatran free rocks or a free plume off hurts the gardevoir user’s momentum pretty badly. overall, i'm glad i used sab because it rounds off the team very well.
​

• threatlist

manaphy is very threatening to the team as the team has no way to reliably beat it when it's at +3 as tangrowth gets blown back by scald since it’s not av. the best way to handle it is to revenge with both garchomp and tyranitar. another plan that can work is setting up with slowking which it can actually do as long as manaphy lacks energy ball. the same deal with cm manaphy, set up against it with slowking.

zard x with eq is so annoying to face, ohkos heatran and screws over ttar big time, there is really no possible counterplay to this thing at +1, the team absolutely must not allow it to set up otherwise you might as well forfeit.

serperior is a total menace too, leaf storming everything and it just blows back tangrowth. at least heatran handles it if its hp fire, but if its hp ground, it's nearly impossible to win since you can't revenge it with ttar + chomp since it outspeeds chomp.

band terrakion is a total pain to face, it’s one of the few physical attackers that can overwhelm and break through tangrowth and slowking without any super effective hits. pivot around this very carefully and for the love of god don't foul play it with sableye.

weavile is also annoying purely because icicle crash can and will bullshit sableye, tangrowth and tyranitar. banded versions aren't as annoying to face sometimes because it needs to be able to switch moves to really hurt this team, but still holy hell.

games also get very messy against volcarona if it has hp ground and bug buzz, but luckily it isn't that common due to its being very hit or miss in oras.

victini's mixed set is annoying, but it can be trapped by tyranitar, just don't get it focus blasted. this mon isn't exactly common though so it's not too problematic.

• importable

Hide

meatran (Heatran) @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 104 HP / 152 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Toxic
- Taunt
- Lava Plume

tangy tom (Tangrowth) (M) @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 200 Def / 56 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 SpA / 30 Spe
- Sleep Powder
- Giga Drain
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Leech Seed

slow bro (Slowking) @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Slack Off
- Calm Mind
- Psyshock

stocky rocky (Tyranitar) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Crunch
- Pursuit
- Stone Edge
- Superpower

chompy chomp (Garchomp) @ Salac Berry
Ability: Rough Skin
EVs: 12 HP / 244 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Substitute
- Earthquake
- Dragon Claw

mostly ghostly (Sableye-Mega) @ Sablenite
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 252 HP / 112 Def / 144 SpD
Careful Nature
- Fake Out
- Foul Play
- Will-O-Wisp
- Recover

• shoutouts

im not gonna write an essay or tag a billion people in this but there's been groups of people that have made my time on this site enjoyable and the main reason i'm still around so yeah

ou workshop builders - all cool guys giving ideas for builds, suggesting stuff and helping iron out issues a bunch of my builds run into

ou qc team - same thing, cool guys, fun discussions at times and all that

kis - gone but not forgotten, one of the best groups of people i've known

rmt guys - same stuff, cool dudes, cool ideas and conversations

suu - :D

oh - oh.

love Ice Tea

 

[MANNAT]

no shoutout for the guy that talked with you basically all spring break :[

I'm just gonna point out a few things that you should prolly add to the threatlist along with some quick fixes that might help vs them, but I can do a more in-depth rate later if u want

SD Glisc: Slowking is the only mon that can really pressure this, and sab's foul play doesn't even ohko physdef spreads at +4 iirc. After a boost or two, a physically bulky set basically bodies the whole team and the combination of knock off and earthquake can and will body you. HP Ice>fire on tang could be a hot fix for this, but I feel like a more reliable solution could be added.

Lum SD Chomper: Ironically this sets up vs sab, clicks +2 eq/dclaw to body the team and your only mon that does remotely well vs this is tang who sleep powders after lum berry has already been used up. Once again hp ice>fire on tang is nice here, but it's not too common so you don't really need to worry about it.

LO Mie: Specifically hydro+boltbeam sets destroy you since tang and slowking are both physdef, hydro blows through the rest of the team, and sab soft checks it, but it cant switch into hydro at all, but ttar can pursuit trap it so it isn't gonna get more than one, maybe 2 kills per game. If you really wanna fix this issue, you might wanna change king to AV, but losing the cool wincon and recovery aside from regen really hurts.

Mega Heracross: Sub sets can sub up on the majority of the team then proceed to get a kill vs whatever mon they want to. You should try to keep sab regular to get priority wisp vs it i guess until you burn hera, but that's all I can think of lol.

...there's prolly a few more I'm not mentioning, but that's all I can think of at the moment

 

[bludz]

littlelucario he is running fast Tran already ...

p2 you know I think this team is hot especially because you have defensive tang. I have a couple small changes that I think may help.

First thing is I don't really think you need HP Fire on Tangrowth. Between Heatran and Mega Sableye you have Scizor and Ferrothorn covered pretty well. U-turn Scizor is annoying I guess but isn't really beating you anyway. I think you could try Knock Off since it will help you to wear down the other team more, esp since you don't carry it on Sableye. Also helps with LO breakers if you can reduce their power and ability to break through stuff.

Next I think I would run Earthquake on Tyranitar over Superpower. I feel like the main targets of Superpower (Chansey, other Ttars, Ferro) aren't exactly huge threats to your team. I think EQ gives you a more reliable option to revenge Diancie, Heatran and stuff like weakened Zard X if you don't wanna miss. Most EQ resists / immunities are handled fairly well by the squad so providing that opportunity is less devastating than being locked into Superpower which keeps dropping your attack.

Last suggestion is to use a different Slowking spread. As mentioned before and I think is missing a bit from the threat list is Mega Diancie. Your current spread can beat it if Rocks don't go up but if they do, it can become a huge issue. I would recommend a spread of 252 HP / 220 Def / 36 SpD with a Calm Nature as this lets you switch into SpA Diancie even if Stealth Rock is up. Losing the defense hurts a little against Lop and Talon, although you still beat them with Rocks off and have other checks to them. The other thing this helps with slightly is Manaphy. If it comes in after you have CMd one time, you can CM one more and survive a 2HKO from +3 Energy Ball almost all the time, allowing you to chip it more and revenge it. Kinda situational, but some people may need Manaphy just to break Slowking anyway. Honestly the other thing is that max Def Slowking is actually a bit outclassed by Slowbro with a SpD spread since you can achieve either the exact same spread or have 3 more defense and 2 fewer special defense points.

Anyway I hope any of these suggestions are helpful!

 

[rocknrolljesus42]

If you're going to run max def cm slowking doesn't it make more sense to run slowbro? You'd have better defence and still works as a great cm sweeper/stall

 

[Ramses]

Hey little late to the party, but if you want to reduce your threatlist by a ton you could run Stun Spore > HP Fire on Tangrowth. It's a pretty great extra perk that gives you some kind of way to screw over your threats. It's inaccurate, but you can catch Terrakion, Weavile, Volcarona, and Zard X with paralysis if it hits when they think you're helpless after Sleep Powder and since you pretty much survive a hit from all of them bar Volcarona it shouldn't be too hard and Volcarona pretty much assumes it can setup in your face. Like bludz said you shouldn't miss HP Fire too much. Knock Off is certainly fine, but overall I think Stun Spore would take you further and help by bs'ing out of bad matchups.

Only suggestion, but hot squad and #tangytom forever