Heavy Offense

[YoshiX]

It seems that all the heavy offense discussed in this thread has been physical. Is it possible for a heavy stall team to go special? And if so, should it include something like a np/flamethrower/psychic/explosion to lure out blissey and kill it?

 

[EspyJoel]

yes it is possible to go all special. Stathakis' archived team is special HO. You obviously have a few strong special sweepers who most can take out Blissey whether it be Explosion, Nasty Plot, etc.

 

[chenman333]

All special is much harder to pull off now thanks to Latias however.

Primarily physical is probably the way to go right now.

 

[Class]

I'm using a HO team since reading this. It's gotten me up to 1550s-70s, bouncing around there (on my alt Free Class). I'm not using any screens or even SR though.. Is it for better or for worse you guys think? It does let me beat other HO teams surprisingly easier since they seem hell bent on getting screens/SR up at the start.

I'm having a huge problem with things like Gengar, Latias, or Salamence + Scizor though, which are all real common...

 

[Game Freak201]

I'm using a HO team since reading this. It's gotten me up to 1550s-70s, bouncing around there (on my alt Free Class). I'm not using any screens or even SR though.. Is it for better or for worse you guys think? It does let me beat other HO teams surprisingly easier since they seem hell bent on getting screens/SR up at the start.

I'm having a huge problem with things like Gengar, Latias, or Salamence + Scizor though, which are all real common...

With HO teams you need to have a plan. For example, I run a specially based Rain Dance team. The My only problem pokemon would be Blissey, Latias, Suicune, and Vaporeon. To deal with this, I have placed three exploders(Azelf, Qwilfish, and Bronzong) on my team so I can tear apart the problem pokemon that are in the way of my sweep.

For your problem with Gengar, Just don't give it a chance to set that sub up or else you'll be struggling big time. Latias is huge Pursuit bait, especially the Choice Scarf variants. Although the LO attacker with Roost might pose more of a challenge. Tyranitar can Revenge kill both variants with either Crunch or Pursuit(Sand Stream recoil might put you off though), but if he won't fit on your team, you would probably have to use Scizor and/or fast Exploders and other means of revenge killing to deal with it. If you want to deal with Salamence and Scizor, the first thing to do is to set up SR. This would cut a quarter of our Dragon's health and hamper Scizor's scouting. You would never let Salamence have the chance to DD or you might end up losing if your Salamence check is dead or too crippled to handle it. As for Scizor, you would need pokemon that take a few hits of its common moves. Pokemon with the ability Intimidate such as Gyrarados(though SR weak) can take take BP, Super Power, and U-Turn without dying on the first hit. Heatran is also useful for taking BPs(be careful of Super Power) and can make Scizor flee instantly.

 

[august]

Just point out that Azelf isn't the only way to start off on Hyper Offense. Infernape lead is also a great way to start off, as it can get down Stealth Rock fast etc, but the real use of it is Encore. Encore allows you to get free Dragon Dances early game with Gyara / Mence / Tar or Agilities with Metagross etc.

Also HO is pretty fun to play on ladder, i got to 1600 with Infernape / Tyranitar / Gyarados / Lucario / Metagross / Salamence which is p cool. I have since went to Taunt / Reflect / SR / Explosion Azelf over Infernape cause i hated Hippo leads, but the premise is the same.

As for last member etc, i always liked Tyranitar just because it can switch in and force out shit like Scarf Rotom / Starmie (biggest bitch to HO ever) and because Scizor is constantly coming in to eat a DD'd Fire Punch, which allows Mence to sweep easier and also weakens Hippo a signifigant amount to allow Lucario to OHKO later on in the game.

 

[franky]

I like to start Hyper Offense with a bang, SR then Explosion is probably the best tactic as most leads today lean towards bulk and a severely injured lead pressures the opponent from switching out or staying in and taking the hit from someone like Salamence or Gyarados.

Personally I like to pack something that bypasses walls, something like CB Salamence or CB Gyarados has got me up the leaderboard quite easily. Softening up things is the key component to hyper offense imo, again, it builds pressure for the opponent to switch out or stay in to take the hit. CB Salamence is the best tool for this as it blows open bulky teams, especially ones who rely on Scizor taking the Outrage. An Adamant CB Outrage is a 2HKO with SR down most of the time, and it practically makes life easier for Gengar to come in and sweep.

 

[Stathakis]

I like to start Hyper Offense with a bang, SR then Explosion is probably the best tactic as most leads today lean towards bulk and a severely injured lead pressures the opponent from switching out or staying in and taking the hit from someone like Salamence or Gyarados.

thing about explosion is it then causes blind switches so unless you really think blissey is a bitch i dont think its worth it. taunting bulky leads to stop them from sring your fliers and roaring/statusing you while you set up is good enough for me. it also allows you to stop ddtar who would otherwise just come in on azelf, get the dd, and sweep you (or at least smash all your shit to a huge degree, allowing the other 5 mons to make quick work of you). so yeah, unless i need explosion, I think it's best to avoid one because of the extra prediction (and it's early enough for you to usually know nothing, so it is 100% guesswork) and besides, taunt is so good on leads anyways.

Personally I like to pack something that bypasses walls, something like CB Salamence or CB Gyarados has got me up the leaderboard quite easily. Softening up things is the key component to hyper offense imo, again, it builds pressure for the opponent to switch out or stay in to take the hit. CB Salamence is the best tool for this as it blows open bulky teams, especially ones who rely on Scizor taking the Outrage. An Adamant CB Outrage is a 2HKO with SR down most of the time, and it practically makes life easier for Gengar to come in and sweep.

yes, softening things up is key. no, you don't need a cber to do it. name something that can take a 405 attack lo outrage comfortably and ill give you a cookie. thing is, when choosing cbmence or cbgyara or something like that, ask yourself why you wouldnt want just the ddlo version. the ddlo version usually 2hkos the same stuff, and if it doesnt, then the offensive synergy should take care of the rest. going ddlo, however, allows you many things. first and foremost, the choice item goes away, meaning less prediction, which is the point of this whole idea anyways. secondly, removing the choice item means you can't lose to ddgyara setting up on choiced salamence fire blasts or something. when you're not revenge killing, you can't be letting things set up. thirdly (and perhaps most importantly), by going ddlo you keep your options open. guy has a celebi and defensive starmie on the team? no problem, you have ddlo mence. guy has a mamoswine on the team? no problem, you have ddlo gyarados. if you had the cb versions, you would have less sweeping options, and less options means less possible pleans which means more scenarios where the winning plan doesn't exist. more win conditions is better, and the ddlo versions soften up the walls just as well without getting set up on afterwards anyways.

 

[chenman333]

If there is one pokemon that I have been enjoying a lot on heavy offense, it is Jolteon. When the dust is settling, Jolteon can come in with its blistering speed and have just enough pop to KO everything in sight.

Bit of dead weight against stall, even if you use LO and have Baton Pass. But boy, it can shred opposing offensive teams to pieces.

 

[Class]

Meh, I've decided to remake my team since I've reached a rut since my high point. It was

Lead Dragonite, LO, Extremespeed, DD, Outrage, EQ
Kingdra, LO, DD, Waterfall, Outrage, Substitute
Tyranitar, Babiri Berry, DD, Crunch, Stone Edge, Fire Punch
Metagross, Occa Berry, Agility, Meteor Mash, Ice Punch, EQ
Salamence, LO, DD, Outrage, EQ, Fire Blast
Lucario, LO, SD, Crunch, CC, ES

Going to try a screen lead and probably Gyarados on the new one.

About the lead: It took out 2 pokes on average up until the 1500s. Nothing stopped it except Aero and Hippo, the latter which I only ran into once. Swampert either killed me with Ice Beam and lived with 10%, no SR, or died but got SR up. Standard Azelf died to ES x2, Screen Azelf died to an ES, +DD, +ES, then hit their next poke hard. Metagross and Heatran both died to a +1 EQ and Infernape couldn't kill me. For Roserade and Smeargle, I took the spore after an ES(does 90%ish), spammed DD until I woke up, then wrecked until I died. People loved to switch Gyarados in, only to do 80% with their Stone Edge and have me suicide kill them with Outrage.

 

[akarias]

Special is better than physical because special attacks in general have much higher base damage, and plus the fact that rotom walls physical teams 5000x harder than latias walls special. And intimidate doesn't make special useless. And bolt-beam+1 filler hits more things super-effectively than physical can hope to manage.

 

[Amitoz]

Prediction leaves too much up to chance rather than skill, since the less skilled can beat the more skilled. So we, the more skilled, prefer to remove it from the game whenever possible. Heavy offense is a way to do that.




​

prediction is a skill.. its not for idiots, and good players like prediction... this statement of yours is false!

 

[mtr]

But the thing about prediction is that it introduces inconsistency into the picture, and at many points prediction becomes little more than guesswork. This is why so many players either play Stall or play Heavy Offense, especially in tournaments.

 

[Stathakis]

prediction is a skill.. its not for idiots, and good players like prediction... this statement of yours is false!

never did I say prediction was for idiots. but only an idiot would want to win if the opponent does x but lose if they do y (as opposed to winning no matter what), so the less you need to predict to win, the better.

 

[franky]

yes, softening things up is key. no, you don't need a cber to do it. name something that can take a 405 attack lo outrage comfortably and ill give you a cookie.

My style of play is much different, this is the way i soften up things. Its an instant x1.5 boost. Suppose you start DD'ing, and 252 / 252 Def Swampert comes, it can take Outrage pretty well, as suppose to my game plan where it involves Outrage on the spot, and will 2HKO Swampert on the spot as well. My style of play is usually wrecking something, and let the next one wreck it, and not give them time to heal or do whatever. Choice users are key to this, and they provide instant power to overwhelm the opponent.

thing is, when choosing cbmence or cbgyara or something like that, ask yourself why you wouldnt want just the ddlo version. the ddlo version usually 2hkos the same stuff, and if it doesnt, then the offensive synergy should take care of the rest.

Again, my style is a bit different. Its hit until I die, let the next one come. Scarfers are the problem today for HO, and take it from DD Gyarados, I get the boost and I'm forced to switch out from Rotom, which isn't my libedo. I like games that require minimum prediction and more hurting. CB Gyarados can OHKO Scarf Rotom on the spot / switch, which opens up Lucario sweeps, you get the point, while DD would require a boost and switch

first and foremost, the choice item goes away, meaning less prediction, which is the point of this whole idea anyways. secondly, removing the choice item means you can't lose to ddgyara setting up on choiced salamence fire blasts or something.

Sometimes it doesnt always have to be prediction. Just outright muscling moves through walls is enogu for me. The magic of choiced iems is the instant boost. with SR down, even a resisted Outrage is enough to 2HKO Scizor, something Life Orb can't. I used Choice to muscle through things and hurt it as much as possible. Afterall that is what offensive is about (imo). Choiced Fire Blast is extremely situational, which is something I will never do. The only time I would resort to that, is identifying the entire team. But taking it from an entire communitie's perspective, I guess most would use Fire Blast, but most players know that you have to use it after analysing the team.

and the ddlo versions soften up the walls just as well without getting set up on afterwards anyways.

That could be viewed in another positive manner but from a cb user pespective: "cb versions can ohko checks / walls on the spot in exchange of getting set up afterwards". Meaning I get a kill (accomplishment) but I get set up on. But this is extremely situational, I will always pack checks to what set ups on me. And sometimes choice users overwhelm, the opposition. I try to avoid from choiced attacks with bad coverage, I always lean for Dragon-types. to hit every possibly set-up starters possible. In conclusion, CB is another route to soften up tings. good luck with yo swine flu

 

[Anachronism]

Franky: Using choice items is exactly what gives them free turn to heal. people usually don't let you 2hko them with cb mence. If I see an outrage (and am not playing HO) I immediately go to a steel. You are now forced to switch out and you may give them 2 free turns to set up as you do so (if you don't switch out they still get free turns). With Gyara I would be able to get free turns to reheal my Celebi if you spam waterfall too much, etc. )

The point is that you get to hit me hard once, and then I force you out with my switch. You will never get the chance to 2hko something that way. A LO doesn't give them this option. The only way a choice item works on HO is if it is last pokemon stuff similar to SpecsJolt on Greek RMT. Once the rest of your team has eliminated the ground types, Jolt comes in to wreak havoc.

 

[gingbino11]

Personaly, I prefer to play Special Hyper Offence to Physical. Simply because I dislike the bog-standard-ness of the teams there. Special HO can be very brutaly effective, blasting down walls. It runs through Stall and Bulky Offence with ease. My team is:

Azelf: Light Screen/Reflect/Stealth Rock/Explosion.
Gengar: Shadow Ball/Focus Blast/HP Fire/Explosion.
Infernape: Nasty Plot/Focus Blast/Flamethrower/Vacuum Wave.
Suicune: Calm Mind/Surf/HP Electric/Ice Beam.
Latias: Calm Mind/ Dragon Pulse/HP Fire/Surf.
Empoleon: Agility/Substitute/Surf/Ice beam.

I find the Special varient to be a lot better. Gengar, Infernape and Suicune are experts at ripping holes in the opponents team, while Latias and Empoleon can easily finish off the opponents team.

 

[JLei2k]

Personaly, I prefer to play Special Hyper Offence to Physical. Simply because I dislike the bog-standard-ness of the teams there. Special HO can be very brutaly effective, blasting down walls. It runs through Stall and Bulky Offence with ease. My team is:

Azelf: Light Screen/Reflect/Stealth Rock/Explosion.
Gengar: Shadow Ball/Focus Blast/HP Fire/Explosion.
Infernape: Nasty Plot/Focus Blast/Flamethrower/Vacuum Wave.
Suicune: Calm Mind/Surf/HP Electric/Ice Beam.
Latias: Calm Mind/ Dragon Pulse/HP Fire/Surf.
Empoleon: Agility/Substitute/Surf/Ice beam.

I find the Special varient to be a lot better. Gengar, Infernape and Suicune are experts at ripping holes in the opponents team, while Latias and Empoleon can easily finish off the opponents team.

Yay get shit on by any Latias. Outspeeds and sets up on all cept Azelf who will boom and Latias. Your own Latias can't KO after a CM. Special HO has to worry about Latias and it is a big problem since it shuts down most of a special HO team. Trying to overwhelm something that can CM and has recover and can hit back very hard is very tough. It's not just Blissey you have to deal with nowadays. It's why Stat never brought that suspect team over to OU.

 

[Scofield]

CBmence is a great pokemon for heavy offense. It is the one CB pokemon which doesn't have to predict. Dragon claw first turn to lure steels, every time after that I outrage. Even luke can't set up on a cb outrage. Earthquake only if the last pokemon is ttar or gross, fire blast only if the last pokemon is luke scizor. Pretty simple really. I'd rather attack twice with cb outrage than once with ddlo outrage.

 

[13blue101]

I like the Rain/HO style that was mentioned earlier in this thread. Ive been running:

Azelf @ Damp Rock: SR, Explosion, Psychic, RD
Ludi @ LO: SD, Ice Punch, Waterfall, Seed Bomb
Kingdra @ LO: DD, Surf, Outrage, Waterfall
Bronzong @ Damp Rock: LS, Reflect, Explosion, RD
Gyara @ Leftys: Waterfall, SE, Taunt, DD
Scizor @ LO: SD, BP, QA, SP/Bug Bite

Explosion, imo, is ok here with blind switches as one of the rain abusers can immediately threaten most things. Gyara gets the nod over another Swift Swimmer since I wanted something to be able to do damage outside the rain and to handle Lucario a bit better. Taunt lets me beat Skarm which is a bit of a pain for the team. Kingdra's set is the main problem for me. Surf was there to 2hko Skarm since Waterfall has missed it sometimes for me.

 

[Stathakis]

CBmence is a great pokemon for heavy offense. It is the one CB pokemon which doesn't have to predict. Dragon claw first turn to lure steels, every time after that I outrage. Even luke can't set up on a cb outrage. Earthquake only if the last pokemon is ttar or gross, fire blast only if the last pokemon is luke scizor. Pretty simple really. I'd rather attack twice with cb outrage than once with ddlo outrage.

mence should only be switching in once anyways and doing the damage he needs to do. switching him out and back in means you use a turn to let the opponent hurt one of your sweepers (whoever you switch into an attack), meaning you'll have a harder time setting up, and you've also had to give up a free turn to the opponent in which they can do all sorts of nasty shit. so all of this "come in next time and outrage" really isn't worth it when you can do just as much damage without switching out.

oh and stuff outspeeds +0 mence, btw. a lot of the time you only get to attack once with cb outrage. if you do stay in long enough to be confused, it's much better to have that extra attack and speed in order to, you know, stop shit from setting up on you (while confused you can often hit yourself once while they set up then outspeed them and kill). if you don't stay in long enough to be confused, it means you died, meaning you didnt get off the extra attacks that make mence worth it. either way I don't see how he's so good. sure, you get to 2hko a few things if they stay in, but you do 80%+ to anything you'd want to 2hko with cbmence which i would hope you guys think qualifies as "softening up" (considering you ko them with a little bit of residual damage) and personally I think the extra versatility, ability to be harder to set up on, and slack in prediction (which is what the whole idea is about anyways) is much more worth it.

 

[Eraddd]

Special is better than physical because special attacks in general have much higher base damage, and plus the fact that rotom walls physical teams 5000x harder than latias walls special. And intimidate doesn't make special useless. And bolt-beam+1 filler hits more things super-effectively than physical can hope to manage.

I think you forgot Blissey. Unless you're willing to explode on the pink blob. And even skilled players can predict an explosion coming their way.

 

[Erazor]

I think you forgot Blissey. Unless you're willing to explode on the pink blob. And even skilled players can predict an explosion coming their way.

All special offense doesn't really mind Blissey. Blissey is usually the team's only check for special attackers. If you go all special, then Blissey has no time to recover, as you should keep hitting her, let your sweeper die, then pummel her some more. If Blissey doesn't come to "stop" them, then they've already lost.

 

[Sparko]

a big weakness I've noticed with heavy offence is with pokemon that are able to deal status/recover or both, like for example cresselia, yes its 2hko'd by lucario or tyranitar, but it can t-wave them, making them unuseable for the rest of the match while healing off the damage taken via moonlight... this also applies to celebi, which is even more used than the former and can recover more consistently...

things like hippowdon/skarmory/gliscor are also really hard to taken down as the take around 40% from unboosted attacks, except for gyara/kingdra's waterfall of course, and can heal off/roar you away, which is really annoying, so I'd really like some help on what to do in such situations please...

I also just realised that scarf rotom, despite the fact it can be set up on, can really rape the whole team if its conserved by the opponent, picture this:

I switch in gyara to kill off the lead, then rotom comes in, I notice its scarfed either by letting gyara die, or by seeing no lefties recovering, if gyara is killed by scarf rotom I switch in tyra (what do I switch if I don't use tyra?) dd on the switch and the opponent sends in something else to counter tyra, if this something is machamp, I'm really screwed as tyra fails to 2hko machamp with any of its attacks even after a dd, meaning I lost my rotom counter already, and this scarfed rotom can then take out salamence in 2 hits, trick its scarf onto something so I attack and give chance to the opponent to set up, or just 2hko the rest of the team :/ yeah I've been in this similar situation for quite too many times for my liking and I still can't find ways to prevent it from happening, so my questions are:

how does HO deal with trick-scarfers?
how is rotom taken care of if tyranitar is down?
can HO be successful if the azelf lead is somehow shut down by haxrachi/trick scarfers?
also, what is used to take lead metagross down after azelf dies?

I know they're annoying questions to answer but they can offer helps to anyone out there who's having my same problems :) thanks!

 

[Quaily]

Something like lum/sub kingdra can deal with status.
rotom usually comes out against my empoleon, who hits it for a clean OHKO with hydro pump
vs meta leads you should have no problem getting reflect up, which makes it pretty easy to set up on