Hurricane ☂!

Nova

snitches get stitches
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Hurricane ☂!



Hello, Smogon. This is Novaray presenting my favorite team from BW2. This team takes the classic BW2 Rain team and is modified with some changes that suit my style and i believe helps it perform better. One of the main changes was the Breloom+Mamoswine offensive core that I thought would be good in the current metagame and it has certainly proved to be very effective. This team got me voting reqs for the 9th round of suspect testing and has gotten pretty high up on the ladder with various alts. I thought I'd post this team now as Keldeo and Tornadus-T are soon being voted on and their days in OU may be limited. This team is extremely solid and each member can help cover another's weaknesses. It does have some weaknesses which I am aware of, especially to Sub+CM Keldeo and Jirachi but they are not very common and whenever I have tweaked to try to account for these weaknesses, it opens new ones to bigger, more common threats. I eagerly present to you: Hurricane! So sit back, enjoy, and grab an umbrella ☂!


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~




Politoed @ Leftovers
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 Spd
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Scald
- Toxic
- Protect
- Perish Song

Defensive Politoed was the best set to use on this team as the team relies heavily on Rain being up and he has the best survivability of any Politoed set. His great bulk especially on the physical side allows him to take a number of hits. Scald is the only attacking move on this set but it is enough, dealing moderate damage with a boost in the Rain and having the nifty 30% chance to burn the opponent, severely crippling physical attackers. Toxic helps to wear down walls with residual damage and is especially useful against other weather starters Tyranitar, Ninetales, Hippowdon, and Abomasnow as it it crucial to get damage on these Pokemon so Politoed can win the weather war. Protect is nice to get an extra turn of Leftovers recovery, inflict an extra turn of Burn/Poison damage on the opponent if they are statused, and to also scout Choice Pokemon. Finally, Perish Song is a life saver in the last slot. Without it, set up sweepers such as Sub+Calm Mind Latias would be able to set up all day in front of Politoed. It is also my best bet against the aforementioned Sub+CM Keldeo and Jirachi, to force them out after 3 turns. The EV spread is standard and I chose to run 4 Speed EVs just to outrun opposing Defensive Politoeds that do not invest in any Speed.




Breloom @ Life Orb
Trait: Technician
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Spore
- Mach Punch
- Low Sweep
- Bullet Seed​

Breloom is a great Pokemon for nearly any team with its access to a 100% accurate sleep move in Spore and ability to hit extremely hard with base 130 Attack and Technician. Mach Punch is standard on the set and has incredible power, equivalent to that of Scizor’s Bullet Punch but with much better coverage. The move is important to take out threats such as Terrakion that could otherwise prove troublesome for my team. Bullet Seed is also very powerful with a Technician boost and annihilates opposing bulky Water types. I chose Low Sweep in order to beat many of the counters that switch into the standard Swords Dance Breloom, expecting to be able to beat it. With this move, Breloom can 2HKO the likes of bulky Pokemon such as Latias as the first Low Sweep drops Latias’ Speed, allowing Breloom to outspeed and go for the kill with the second Low Sweep or Bullet Seed. Low Sweep is also a great move to use when you expect the opponent to switch out and sacrifice something as sleep fodder, expecting to take a Spore. Breloom also makes a great offensive partner with the following Pokemon, Mamoswine, as the mushroom guy can beat things like Terrakion, Scizor with some prior damage, and bulky waters, which the mammoth struggles with.




Mamoswine @ Life Orb
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Ice Shard
- Icicle Crash
- Earthquake
- Superpower​

Mamoswine is a great Pokemon in the current metagame where a lot of the top threats are weak to Ice type attacks. His priority Ice Shard helps check things like Tornadus-T, Thundurus-T, Garchomp, Salamence, etc. Without Mamoswine, Dragon Dance Salamence and Dragonite can easily 6-0 my team after setting up a single DD. It’s also great against Chlorophyll Venusaur in the sunlight as it can now outspeed my Tornadus-T. Icicle Crash is Mamoswine’s strongest Ice-type move and it has a 30% flinch chance which is helpful occasionally as it can flinch and beat Skarmory. Earthquake is a very powerful move and destroys things that Rain teams commonly struggle with these days such as Toxicroak, Tentacruel, and Specially Defensive Jirachi. Superpower in the last slow is mainly just to do damage against Rotom-W as most Rotom-W’s are Specially Defensive and Mamoswine can outspeed them and do a nice 50%~ to them. I use a Jolly nature as the extra damage from Adamant is not usually required and Jolly allows him to outspeed Jolly Breloom, so Ice Shard outspeeds Mach Punch. Mamoswine forms the other half of the offensive core with Breloom, taking out things like Landorus, Latios, Latias, and Gliscor that give Breloom trouble.




Tornadus-Therian @ Choice Specs
Trait: Regenerator
EVs: 252 SAtk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Hurricane
- Focus Blast
- Air Slash
- U-turn​

Big Bird. This guy is the real deal and in my eyes, the most threatening Pokemon in OU. In the rain, this guy throws 180 Base Power Hurricanes at will, easily OHKO’ing frailer Pokemon and even 2HKO some Pokemon that resist the move. Hurricane is just such an easily spammed move with its amazing coverage, damage output, and confusion chance that beats would-be counters. I usually lead with this guy to get off a quick U-turn to immediately gain switch advantage and put pressure on my opponent. And “quick” is right as Tornadus-T’s base 121 Speed allows it to outspeed Pokemon that had previously been considered top tier in Speed including Latios, Latias, Starmie, and Alakazam. Another reason Tornadus-T is so deadly is because of its Regenerator ability, healing 33% of its HP every time it switches out. This means that Tornadus-T cannot be worn down by Stealth Rock and U-turn essentially becomes a move that deals damage, gains momentum, and provides recovery all in one, making it all the more spammable. Focus Blast provides coverage to things that resist Focus Blast such as Heatran and Rotom-W, easily 2HKO’in them provided that it hits. I chose to use Air Slash over the more commonly used Sleep Talk as Air Slash is still a very powerful Flying type attack that can be used outside of Rain when I don’t want to mess around with a 70% Hurricane. It’s also a nifty surprise to beat Ninetales and win the weather war early as most Ninetales would just expect you to U-turn out, not willing to chance a 50% Hurricane, but gets promptly 2HKO’ed by Air Slash. In desperation, the flinch chance from Air Slash can also help hax the way to victory. I chose Choice Specs as I wanted the extra power over Life Orb and despite Regenarator, I still do not want Tornadus-T to take LO recoil as some prior damage opens the door for Scizor to revenge kill with Choice Band Bullet Punch. Tornadus-T doesn’t mind being locked into a move also because it’s usually just U-turning out or spamming Hurricane. A Timid nature is required to maximize its Speed and to maintain bulk which is more important than increasing damage from U-turn.




Tentacruel @ Black Sludge
Trait: Rain Dish
EVs: 252 HP / 240 Def / 16 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Scald
- Toxic
- Rapid Spin
- Substitute

Tentacruel is one of the best Rapid Spinners for a Rain team as well as one of the best walls. I chose the Sub+Toxic set over the standard Toxic Spikes set to more easily beat things such as Ferrothorn and other Tentacruel which the Toxic Spikes set struggles with. Toxic Spikes is also not very viable in the current metagame due to the prevalence of Tentacruels and Venusaurs that can come in and absorb them and the multitude of Steel, Flying, and Levitate Pokemon that are immune to Toxic Spikes. As previously mentioned, Scald is a great attack with the Rain boost and burn chance while Toxic helps wear down walls and cripple Special attackers that do not mind burn. Substitute is essential on this set as it protects Tentacruel from status moves and also Scald burns. With Rain Dish+Black Sludge, Tentacruel acts similarly to Toxic Stall Gliscor, being able to heal most of the lost HP from Substitute every turn while withering away at the opponent’s HP with burn or poison. Rapid Spin is just to clear away the entry hazards and possibly free Tentacruel from Leech Seed. The Speed investment is so that Tentacruel can outspeed Sub+DD Gyarados and Adamant Dragonite, being able to hit both with Toxic and limiting their survivability.




Jirachi @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 216 SDef / 40 Spd
Careful Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Wish
- Body Slam
- Iron Head​

With the prevalence of Tornadus-T and Keldeo and the threat they pose, almost every team needs a solid Special wall and my choice is Specially Defensive Jirachi.. Jirachi can take attacks from these threats as well as from things such as Latios and Hydreigon and proceed to paralyze them with Body Slam and then Iron Head them to death with paraflinch. The paralysis support that Jirachi provides is also extremely helpful for Breloom and Mamoswine as they can now outspeed and take out things they normally would not be able to. Jirachi is also my Stealth Rock setter which is essential on almost every team as well to check things such as Salamence, Dragonite, and Volcarona. Wish helps regain lost HP and to also help heal up her teammates. It’s a great move to restore Politoed’s HP and help me win the weather war. With the start of SPL, a lot of players have been using Healing Wish on Jirachi and I have experimented with the move which sacrifices Jirachi to give another Pokemon essentially a Full Restore, healing back all lost HP and removing status. This makes it so opponent’s will basically have to beat Tornadus-T or Breloom or Mamoswine twice, which is very difficult for a team to do. However, I have stuck with Wish for the time being as it provides more consistent recovery throughout the course of a battle.



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Closing Comments

I would like to thank Benelux for giving me support in all my Pokemon endeavors. You guys are some of the nicest people I know and it has really been a pleasure to know you guys. McMeghan, Vinc2612, and Hugendugen are always wet dudes. I must thank Delko for being a great tutor when I first started on Smogon and taught me a lot of what I know about battling and teambuilding and also being a good person in general. I must also give a big thank you to my bro badabing for helping me maximize the potential of this team. You’re a great person and always willing to help me or talk about whatever I want. Also I want to thank some of the RMT people: Sayonara, Jirachi, Jimbon, Superpowerdude, harsha, Trinitrotoluene, tab, Shining_Latios, and undisputed. You guys are all great people and team raters and have fueled my love for team rating and team building.

As I mentioned, this team is my favorite BW2 and is the team I am most confident in using. I will soon be retiring it as the days of Tornadus-T in OU may be limited and I would like to share it with everyone.


Importable:
Politoed @ Leftovers
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 Spd
Bold Nature
- Scald
- Toxic
- Protect
- Perish Song

Breloom @ Life Orb
Trait: Technician
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Spore
- Mach Punch
- Low Sweep
- Bullet Seed

Mamoswine @ Life Orb
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Ice Shard
- Icicle Crash
- Earthquake
- Superpower

Tentacruel @ Black Sludge
Trait: Rain Dish
EVs: 252 HP / 240 Def / 16 Spd
Timid Nature
- Scald
- Toxic
- Rapid Spin
- Substitute

Tornadus-Therian (M) @ Choice Specs
Trait: Regenerator
EVs: 252 SAtk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
- Hurricane
- Focus Blast
- Air Slash
- U-turn

Jirachi @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 216 SDef / 40 Spd
Careful Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Wish
- Body Slam
- Iron Head
 
honestly this team is very good. I think I might be able to help with your two problems. I recomend forretress over tentacruel. The set I recomend is

Forretress @ Leftovers/ Shed Shell
Trait: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 80 SDef / 176 Def
Relaxed Nature
- Stealth Rock/ HIdden Power (ICE)
- Rapid Spin
- Earth Quake
- Volt Switch/ Hidden Power (ICE)

Forretress can help with jirachi with earth quake while jirachi cant do to much back and can also volt switch on in comming keldeo. if you give him stealth rock you can change jirachi to a calm mind which will help with keldeo or scarf variant of your own to revenge kill. If you keep stealth rock on Jirachi than hp Ice helps with gliscor landorus and all the dragons out therewhile still being able to rapid spin like tentacruel.

The last thing I recomend is sleep talk over air slash on tornadus. That way you have a member that can take sleep and having two flying moves on tornadus is alittle redundant. I think the changes will help you out alot. Good luck on your team
 
Hi Nice Team there I see a slight weakness to Breloom so I would recommend Sleep Talk>Air slash on your Tornadus-T as nothing really appreciates a spore from breloom and then it will get at least one kill. So, that is all Great Team and Luvdisc'd
 

Trinitrotoluene

young ☆nd foolish
is a Top Team Rater Alumnusis a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
I love you, and I love this team, but get my name right, please. Anyways, this team is solid, bearing some similarities to my own Deep Sea of Mare, and its weaknesses, while somewhat significant, are also uncommon, so you don't need to worry about them as much, and when I take a look at your team, it's evident that you've tried your best to overcome these weaknesses without compromising. So, first change that I would recommend is to change Air Slash to Sleep Talk on your Tornadus-T. This small change gives your team effective sleep fodder and an amazing counter to Breloom and Amoonguss, both of which provide small problems for your team to deal with, especially since your main counters to the both of them are Tornadus-T and Mamoswine. Also, I'm taking this a verbatim from your OP: "[Air Slash is] a nifty surprise to beat Ninetales and win the weather war early as most Ninetales would just expect you to U-turn out, not willing to chance a 50% Hurricane, but gets promptly 2HKO’ed by Air Slash." You already have very reliable methods for besting Ninetales (see: defensive Politoed, Mamoswine [for slower variants], SubToxic Tentacruel), and you don't really need Air Slash as another countermeasure for Ninetales.

The changes suggested in this paragraph are entirely optional, and are not mandated in any way, shape, and / or form. Something that you could also try out (even though you will probably object to this) is offensive Starmie over Tentacruel. This change gives your team a more solid answer to SubCM Keldeo, thanks to Psyshock and a greater Speed stat, as well as opposing Mamoswine, which can really tear your team a new one once Politoed is weakened. Starmie also works well with Breloom since it is massive Pursuit bait, giving Breloom many more opportunities to switch in and wreak havoc with its powerful attacks; much of the same can be applied to Jirachi, since Starmie appreciates Wish support, and Jirachi appreciates having hazards off the field. In addition, if you opt to use Thunder over Recover on the Starmie set listed below, Starmie can be used as an alternative answer to bulky waters that Breloom doesn't like taking on. A summarized list of changes can be found below.

Set:

Starmie @ Life Orb | Natural Cure
Timid | 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe | 0 Atk
Surf | Psyshock | Recover | Rapid Spin


Nitpicks:
    • Air Slash ----> Sleep Talk
  • ---->
    *

Anyways, this is an cute and excellent team made by an even cuter and more excellent user. I love it, even though you got my name wrong on your shout-out list. Also, before I forget, Luvdisc'd!
 
An alternative to alleviating your Mamoswine weakness somewhat would be to change Tentacruel's EV spread to 204 HP / 208 Def / 96 Spd. You'll lose some bulk, but with this spread you can outspeed Jolly Mamoswine and KO it with Scald before it can use Earthquake.
 

Neliel

Sacred Sword
yo, you have good team here so ill definetely try to improve it :3

First, i see this team having some problem with Mamoswine. Its priority move can nearly ko breloom and tornadus, and nothing else in your team likes taking earthquake that much. A quick fix would be to put a different spread on Tentacruel, so that you can outspeed mamoswine getting a surprise kill. Something like this EVs: 244 HP / 168 Def / 96 Spd with a timid nature should work, you lose some bulk but i think its fine since this team is offensive.

Now i think you can put stealth rock on Mamoswine, instead of Superpower probably (you can even try icicle spear if you think that rotom-w or ferrothorn are that problematic) to use U-turn on jirachi. U-turn is really good on Special defensive jirachi, it lets you maintan momentum that your team needs, so that you dont have trouble with things that often switch in on you, like ferrothorn for example. If you use u-turn while ferrothorn switchs in you can send out Breloom mantaing momentum for your team. Also, with + u-turn is really good to wish pass to your teammates strong wishes, so you can recover your team easier. Mamoswine also gives a lot of pressure under the opponent so you will be able to set up them easily. The other thing i would change is body slam; i've never liked that much on rain team, because i think thunder is a way better to hit water types and skarmory for grater damages, which is always welcomed. All you miss with thunder is Thundurus-t and Landorus, but you have Mamoswine to check them anyway so i dont it matters that much. If you do this change put a sassy nature and all the other evs in special defense.

An another thing i would try is focus punch over low sweep. It may seems strange, but it allow you to do way more damage to everything that normally checks breloom, so for example after you spore the first breloom check of your opponent you can press the focus punch button and see how many damage it does to things like tornadus, dragonite, thundurus and stuff like that. I think that koing them is better than relying on the speed drop to 2ko them because they can switch out, if you use focus punch they are just dead.

Now the last thing i would say is, try life orb Tornadus. Honestly, i've never felt like life orb tornadus is missing some ko. The only reason i think specs should be used is to avoid being fucked by the recoil + stealth rock when you dont have a spinner (25+10 is more than 33) but rather than that life orb is just better. Life orb lets you hit heatran and tyranitar whitout having to predict, and what is most important with life orb you can use something usefull in the filler slot. Obviously if you do this change put superpower and a naive nature. Here since i made you a little weak to ferrothorn cause i removed superpower on mamoswine, taunt can be appreciated to deal better with it, so it cant leech seed you / paralize you / stealth rock on you. For sure gyro ball does some damage, but regenerator lets you recover easily. Taunt also helps against deo-d teams, cause gengar often has moves to get ride of spinners (like, destiny bond, w-o-w, disable) so its better to prevent them rather than spin. If you feel like taunt is not needed for whatever reason, still consider rain dance. Nothing in the common sun team can stop rain dance tornadus, and that move is really good to help you countering ninetales and winning the weather war. Lets say that nowadays politoed is a bad switch in on ninetales, because they are probably going to status you the first switch in (which your politoed wont like) and then sunny day so you wont have rain back. Rain dance tornadus is able to fix this easily.



Your current spread--> 244 HP / 168 Def / 96 Spd with a timid nature

Superpower / Icicle spear --> Stealth rock

Choice specs--> life orb
Focus blast--> Superpower
Timid--> Naive
Air slash--> Taunt / Rain dance

Stealth rock--> U-turn
Your current spread--> 252 Hp / 4 Def / 252 Spd with sassy nature
Body slam--> Thunder
Low sweep--> Focus punch
 
Hi, nice team!

Unknown glaring weaknesses but I have a little 'changes to say. First, I propose to change the Evs spread Politoed giving 44 evs in speed to outrun Choice Band Scizor and when it is being KO Scald kill him with increased power from the rain, then use this spread Evs 252 HP / 212 Def / 44 Spd. In this way you avoid that maybe he'll kill you using Pursuit Politoed and then taking place after the Sandstorm from Tyranitar or Hippowdon, or maybe you use U-Turn and you have to change Pokemon turns giving the opponent. Now I want to change a little 'things between Mamoswine and Jirachi to make them more functional, I'd give Stealth Rock to Mamoswine instead of Icicle Crash, Adamant> Jolly and Focus Sash> Life Orb, so then I would give Protect> Stealth Rock Jirachi. All of this for several reasons, Jirachi with Protect becomes a completely different Pokemon, no doubt more resistant and more difficult to send KO, and Mamoswine is perfectly capable of placing the Stealth Rock, Whereas it is supported by a Rapid Spinner and Focus Sash , that make him a powerful Revenge - Killer as well as placing the Stealth Rock, Adamant nature, obviously for more offensive power at the end Dragonite even if it exceeds in speed kill him anyway with Ice Shard more Adamant nature.
Tentacruel to say that you can safely replace the Timid nature with the Bold, as to outrun Rotom-W (which is the purpose of the 16 Evs in speed Cruel Sub), you want to get the 16 Evs in speed, Timid nature not required, in return, the Bold will increase the defense.
At this point last thing council Tornadus-T with Life Orb. With Life Orb if you make the change you need to do Naive> Timid and Superpower> Focus Blast and also Taunt / Rain Dance> Air Slash.
The advantages are that for example if you get stuck on Hurricane against Tyranitar, it will only use you Pursuit making you out Tornadus-T, while Life Orb, you can hit it with Superpower putting KO With Taunt instead you can easily stop Ferrothorn by placing hazards or use you Leech Seed, and in general, you can prevent the Setup any Wall as Tornadus-T will always be faster.
With Rain Dance instead, you solve a weakness to Sunny Day Team, which would be completely destroyed by what you would do as the entrance of Ninetales Rain Dance, then using a Hurricane free, which will make him very badly. Rain Dance would help you to win more easily the Weather War. That is all.
Good luck, with your team!

Sets
Bold > Timid (for Tentacruel)

Politoed (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 252 HP / 212 Def / 44 Spd
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Scald
- Protect
- Toxic
- Perish Song

Mamoswine (M) @ Focus Sash
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spd / 4 SDef
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Ice Shard
- Earthquake
- Superpower
- Stealth Rock

Jirachi @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SDef / 4 Atk
Sassy Nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Protect
- Iron Head
- Wish
- Body Slam

Tornadus-T (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Regenerator
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naive Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Hurricane
- Superpower
- U-turn
- Taunt / Rain Dance
 

Nova

snitches get stitches
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Team Rater Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
honestly this team is very good. I think I might be able to help with your two problems. I recomend forretress over tentacruel. The set I recomend is

Forretress @ Leftovers/ Shed Shell
Trait: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 80 SDef / 176 Def
Relaxed Nature
- Stealth Rock/ HIdden Power (ICE)
- Rapid Spin
- Earth Quake
- Volt Switch/ Hidden Power (ICE)

Forretress can help with jirachi with earth quake while jirachi cant do to much back and can also volt switch on in comming keldeo. if you give him stealth rock you can change jirachi to a calm mind which will help with keldeo or scarf variant of your own to revenge kill. If you keep stealth rock on Jirachi than hp Ice helps with gliscor landorus and all the dragons out therewhile still being able to rapid spin like tentacruel.

The last thing I recomend is sleep talk over air slash on tornadus. That way you have a member that can take sleep and having two flying moves on tornadus is alittle redundant. I think the changes will help you out alot. Good luck on your team
Thanks man! I'll definitely try out Sleep Talk over Air Slash on Tornadus-T again as this has been a common recommendation. As for the Forretress suggestion, the main reason I did not choose to use him is because he is dead weight in a lot of games. Tentacruel helps me beat some things like Jellicent and Scizor that could trouble my team.


Hi Nice Team there I see a slight weakness to Breloom so I would recommend Sleep Talk>Air slash on your Tornadus-T as nothing really appreciates a spore from breloom and then it will get at least one kill. So, that is all Great Team and Luvdisc'd
Thank you! Ya, I will definitely be testing out Sleep Talk again as it seems to be a common suggestion.


I love you, and I love this team, but get my name right, please. Anyways, this team is solid, bearing some similarities to my own Deep Sea of Mare, and its weaknesses, while somewhat significant, are also uncommon, so you don't need to worry about them as much, and when I take a look at your team, it's evident that you've tried your best to overcome these weaknesses without compromising. So, first change that I would recommend is to change Air Slash to Sleep Talk on your Tornadus-T. This small change gives your team effective sleep fodder and an amazing counter to Breloom and Amoonguss, both of which provide small problems for your team to deal with, especially since your main counters to the both of them are Tornadus-T and Mamoswine. Also, I'm taking this a verbatim from your OP: "[Air Slash is] a nifty surprise to beat Ninetales and win the weather war early as most Ninetales would just expect you to U-turn out, not willing to chance a 50% Hurricane, but gets promptly 2HKO’ed by Air Slash." You already have very reliable methods for besting Ninetales (see: defensive Politoed, Mamoswine [for slower variants], SubToxic Tentacruel), and you don't really need Air Slash as another countermeasure for Ninetales.

The changes suggested in this paragraph are entirely optional, and are not mandated in any way, shape, and / or form. Something that you could also try out (even though you will probably object to this) is offensive Starmie over Tentacruel. This change gives your team a more solid answer to SubCM Keldeo, thanks to Psyshock and a greater Speed stat, as well as opposing Mamoswine, which can really tear your team a new one once Politoed is weakened. Starmie also works well with Breloom since it is massive Pursuit bait, giving Breloom many more opportunities to switch in and wreak havoc with its powerful attacks; much of the same can be applied to Jirachi, since Starmie appreciates Wish support, and Jirachi appreciates having hazards off the field. In addition, if you opt to use Thunder over Recover on the Starmie set listed below, Starmie can be used as an alternative answer to bulky waters that Breloom doesn't like taking on. A summarized list of changes can be found below.

Set:

Starmie @ Life Orb | Natural Cure
Timid | 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe | 0 Atk
Surf | Psyshock | Recover | Rapid Spin


Nitpicks:
    • Air Slash ----> Sleep Talk
  • ---->
    *


Anyways, this is an cute and excellent team made by an even cuter and more excellent user. I love it, even though you got my name wrong on your shout-out list. Also, before I forget, Luvdisc'd!
Thanks TNT! Ya that Starmie idea is actually a great suggestion so I will definitely test it. The one thing I will miss is that Sub+Toxic Tentacruel can actually beat Jellicent which is a spinblocker that can give some trouble to my team. But the ability to beat Gengar more easily is certainly move the tradeoff and will be extremely helpful for Sub+CMers.



An alternative to alleviating your Mamoswine weakness somewhat would be to change Tentacruel's EV spread to 204 HP / 208 Def / 96 Spd. You'll lose some bulk, but with this spread you can outspeed Jolly Mamoswine and KO it with Scald before it can use Earthquake.
Thank you for the suggestion! I didn't face many Mamoswine while using this team and the ones I did were usually the Sash Lead variant so I wasn't really aware of my weakness to it. I'll definitely give your spread a whirl!
 

alamaster

hello
is a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Past SPL Champion
Hey man, cool Rain team, pretty standard but it obviously works!

  • Definitely going with what everyone else said with Sleep Talk over Air Slash, most of the time you'll only be using Hurricane anyway. 70% acc isn't that bad outside of Rain, I use it all the time lol.
  • Only other change I'd make, seeing as your team is pretty weak to Toxicroak is changing Protect on Politoed to Psychic. I use it on my Rain team and I've never looked back. It also hits Keldeo hard who can be a pain for you as well, since it resists SR, can come in on a number of your pokemon, and with most of your Pokemon physically defense oriented, even resisted Surfs/Hydro Pumps will hurt.

Well that's about it, congrats on making a really solid team! Best of luck in the future.
 
Hey Novaray,

Very cool team, I use(d) an almost-identical team in my day, and the Jirachi-Tentacruel-Breloom core gives Tornadus-T great support to sweep with. My only suggestion would be to give Breloom a Jolly nature. You may be feeling like this is a little excessive considering it already outspeeds Lati@s after the speed drop. Unfortunately, it comes one point shy of outspeeding Starmie, and a touch slower than -1 Tornadus-T, which can come back to bite you in the ass. However, with a Jolly nature, you outspeed everything up to Jolteon after a Low Sweep, which can come in handy. Just a suggestion to consider, great team though!
 
I used a team with the exact same lineup with ferrothorn > breloom in week 1 of SPL. Different movesets though.

Just saying, you're very kingdra weak lol. It basically literally 6-0s with no support except maybe rocks. Not that kingdra is very common at all, but it really does destroy rain offense without ferro.

Yeah, definitely want to make breloom jolly--one of low sweep's main draws is beating torny after a drop. SDloom is better as adamant. Mamo should be adamant IMO, loom isn't a huge problem and jolly ice shard doesn't come close to OHKOing anyway. The extra power is nice though.

I personally like icicle spear on mamo to break subs and stuff, especially if you run into subpunch loom or something. crash is cool though too i guess, miss chance sucks though.

I notice that mamo is a big problem for this team (as it was for mine). one thing you do to help with the problem is to give either tenta or rachi enough speed to outspeed it (iirc 96 EVs, which isn't a huge jump from your current on rachi). Otherwise, every time mamo comes in it gets a KO essentially, and fastrachi or tenta is a great lure. Fastrachi also helps a bit vs croak, since you outspeed adamant (which is like all) and can beat it with wish/spunch mindgames, or leave it paralyzed at the very worst.

Also, maybe change rachi's HP Evs to 236 for a lefties number while you lose literally 4 HP lol.

Gl with the team and congrats on getting reqs with it!
 

Trinitrotoluene

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Oh, just a quick addition for my rate. Starmie would be an even better idea since you have Breloom and Tornadus-T to take out Jellicent.
 

Shurtugal

The Enterpriser.
is a Tiering Contributor
Hey,

I believe sword dance over your current move, low sleep, would be superior because you would have a better wall breaker. Icicle spear over icicle crash because SubToxic Gliscor or SubSD looks like a big threat to this team if it manages to set up a substitute.

Sleep talk is superior to air slash because it has more utility in beating Breloom, whereas Air slash is kinda redundant in most cases. I support the move Psychic on Politoed as well.

Good luck!
 

Nova

snitches get stitches
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yo, you have good team here so ill definetely try to improve it :3

First, i see this team having some problem with Mamoswine. Its priority move can nearly ko breloom and tornadus, and nothing else in your team likes taking earthquake that much. A quick fix would be to put a different spread on Tentacruel, so that you can outspeed mamoswine getting a surprise kill. Something like this EVs: 244 HP / 168 Def / 96 Spd with a timid nature should work, you lose some bulk but i think its fine since this team is offensive.

Now i think you can put stealth rock on Mamoswine, instead of Superpower probably (you can even try icicle spear if you think that rotom-w or ferrothorn are that problematic) to use U-turn on jirachi. U-turn is really good on Special defensive jirachi, it lets you maintan momentum that your team needs, so that you dont have trouble with things that often switch in on you, like ferrothorn for example. If you use u-turn while ferrothorn switchs in you can send out Breloom mantaing momentum for your team. Also, with + u-turn is really good to wish pass to your teammates strong wishes, so you can recover your team easier. Mamoswine also gives a lot of pressure under the opponent so you will be able to set up them easily. The other thing i would change is body slam; i've never liked that much on rain team, because i think thunder is a way better to hit water types and skarmory for grater damages, which is always welcomed. All you miss with thunder is Thundurus-t and Landorus, but you have Mamoswine to check them anyway so i dont it matters that much. If you do this change put a sassy nature and all the other evs in special defense.

An another thing i would try is focus punch over low sweep. It may seems strange, but it allow you to do way more damage to everything that normally checks breloom, so for example after you spore the first breloom check of your opponent you can press the focus punch button and see how many damage it does to things like tornadus, dragonite, thundurus and stuff like that. I think that koing them is better than relying on the speed drop to 2ko them because they can switch out, if you use focus punch they are just dead.

Now the last thing i would say is, try life orb Tornadus. Honestly, i've never felt like life orb tornadus is missing some ko. The only reason i think specs should be used is to avoid being fucked by the recoil + stealth rock when you dont have a spinner (25+10 is more than 33) but rather than that life orb is just better. Life orb lets you hit heatran and tyranitar whitout having to predict, and what is most important with life orb you can use something usefull in the filler slot. Obviously if you do this change put superpower and a naive nature. Here since i made you a little weak to ferrothorn cause i removed superpower on mamoswine, taunt can be appreciated to deal better with it, so it cant leech seed you / paralize you / stealth rock on you. For sure gyro ball does some damage, but regenerator lets you recover easily. Taunt also helps against deo-d teams, cause gengar often has moves to get ride of spinners (like, destiny bond, w-o-w, disable) so its better to prevent them rather than spin. If you feel like taunt is not needed for whatever reason, still consider rain dance. Nothing in the common sun team can stop rain dance tornadus, and that move is really good to help you countering ninetales and winning the weather war. Lets say that nowadays politoed is a bad switch in on ninetales, because they are probably going to status you the first switch in (which your politoed wont like) and then sunny day so you wont have rain back. Rain dance tornadus is able to fix this easily.



Your current spread--> 244 HP / 168 Def / 96 Spd with a timid nature

Superpower / Icicle spear --> Stealth rock

Choice specs--> life orb
Focus blast--> Superpower
Timid--> Naive
Air slash--> Taunt / Rain dance

Stealth rock--> U-turn
Your current spread--> 252 Hp / 4 Def / 252 Spd with sassy nature
Body slam--> Thunder
Low sweep--> Focus punch
Thanks for the rate! I will definitely be changing Tentacruel's EV spread as the weakness to Mamoswine is quite apparent and the change will definitely help it. The thing about giving Stealth Rock to Mamoswine is the fact that he is much less bulkier than Jirachi so he may not be able to get them and also serve to check the things he needs to check. Jirachi has a lot of bulk so she can easily get them up and still do her job. I will try it though. And the Focus Punch suggestion and Life Orb are things I will try out for sure.


Hi, nice team!

Unknown glaring weaknesses but I have a little 'changes to say. First, I propose to change the Evs spread Politoed giving 44 evs in speed to outrun Choice Band Scizor and when it is being KO Scald kill him with increased power from the rain, then use this spread Evs 252 HP / 212 Def / 44 Spd. In this way you avoid that maybe he'll kill you using Pursuit Politoed and then taking place after the Sandstorm from Tyranitar or Hippowdon, or maybe you use U-Turn and you have to change Pokemon turns giving the opponent. Now I want to change a little 'things between Mamoswine and Jirachi to make them more functional, I'd give Stealth Rock to Mamoswine instead of Icicle Crash, Adamant> Jolly and Focus Sash> Life Orb, so then I would give Protect> Stealth Rock Jirachi. All of this for several reasons, Jirachi with Protect becomes a completely different Pokemon, no doubt more resistant and more difficult to send KO, and Mamoswine is perfectly capable of placing the Stealth Rock, Whereas it is supported by a Rapid Spinner and Focus Sash , that make him a powerful Revenge - Killer as well as placing the Stealth Rock, Adamant nature, obviously for more offensive power at the end Dragonite even if it exceeds in speed kill him anyway with Ice Shard more Adamant nature.
Tentacruel to say that you can safely replace the Timid nature with the Bold, as to outrun Rotom-W (which is the purpose of the 16 Evs in speed Cruel Sub), you want to get the 16 Evs in speed, Timid nature not required, in return, the Bold will increase the defense.
At this point last thing council Tornadus-T with Life Orb. With Life Orb if you make the change you need to do Naive> Timid and Superpower> Focus Blast and also Taunt / Rain Dance> Air Slash.
The advantages are that for example if you get stuck on Hurricane against Tyranitar, it will only use you Pursuit making you out Tornadus-T, while Life Orb, you can hit it with Superpower putting KO With Taunt instead you can easily stop Ferrothorn by placing hazards or use you Leech Seed, and in general, you can prevent the Setup any Wall as Tornadus-T will always be faster.
With Rain Dance instead, you solve a weakness to Sunny Day Team, which would be completely destroyed by what you would do as the entrance of Ninetales Rain Dance, then using a Hurricane free, which will make him very badly. Rain Dance would help you to win more easily the Weather War. That is all.
Good luck, with your team!

Sets
Bold > Timid (for Tentacruel)

Politoed (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 252 HP / 212 Def / 44 Spd
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Scald
- Protect
- Toxic
- Perish Song

Mamoswine (M) @ Focus Sash
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spd / 4 SDef
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Ice Shard
- Earthquake
- Superpower
- Stealth Rock

Jirachi @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SDef / 4 Atk
Sassy Nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Protect
- Iron Head
- Wish
- Body Slam

Tornadus-T (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Regenerator
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naive Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Hurricane
- Superpower
- U-turn
- Taunt / Rain Dance
Thanks for the rate! I will definitely try the faster Politoed spread. The thing with Tentacruel is that I like the speed to be able to outspeed other Tentacruel's and set up a Substitute so that their Scald doesn't burn me and then cripple me by taking away my recovery. I may try the Stealth Rock on Mamoswine but again, Mamoswine is frail and I need him to be a Dragon/therian formes check first and foremost. And I will try out the LO and moveset changes on Tornadus-T!


Hey man, cool Rain team, pretty standard but it obviously works!

  • Definitely going with what everyone else said with Sleep Talk over Air Slash, most of the time you'll only be using Hurricane anyway. 70% acc isn't that bad outside of Rain, I use it all the time lol.
  • Only other change I'd make, seeing as your team is pretty weak to Toxicroak is changing Protect on Politoed to Psychic. I use it on my Rain team and I've never looked back. It also hits Keldeo hard who can be a pain for you as well, since it resists SR, can come in on a number of your pokemon, and with most of your Pokemon physically defense oriented, even resisted Surfs/Hydro Pumps will hurt.

Well that's about it, congrats on making a really solid team! Best of luck in the future.
Thanks a lot my bro ala! ;) Ya I will definitely try out Sleep Talk on Tornadus-T and Psychic seems like a cool thing to use on Politoed and it will also help a little for my Keldeo weakness


Thanks a lot for the help guys!
 
you definitely want 28 speed on politoed to toxic jellicent, so yeah. You could try taunt bulk up toxicroak over tentacruel and maybe donphan over mamoswine to help deal with keldeo and starmie who rape you right now. You have a much less powerful ice shard but bulky donphan can take outrages for days. You are also quite weak to rotom-w, which is not an easy weakness to fix but if you put on toxicroak you could use a latios or seomthing over breloom. Mamoswine is also a huge pain, bronzong/skarmory over jirachi would be nice but their special bulk and lack of wish are less than impressive.
Donphan>Mamoswine
Latios>Breloom
Toxicroak>Tentacruel
 

Jirachee

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This thread wins the RMT of the week! Congratulations! Everyone who rates this team or has already rated it will get points towards RMT of the Week rewards.

Furthermore, this team will be the RMT of the Week until the next one is chosen

ps donphan sucks
 

Nova

snitches get stitches
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Hey Novaray,

Very cool team, I use(d) an almost-identical team in my day, and the Jirachi-Tentacruel-Breloom core gives Tornadus-T great support to sweep with. My only suggestion would be to give Breloom a Jolly nature. You may be feeling like this is a little excessive considering it already outspeeds Lati@s after the speed drop. Unfortunately, it comes one point shy of outspeeding Starmie, and a touch slower than -1 Tornadus-T, which can come back to bite you in the ass. However, with a Jolly nature, you outspeed everything up to Jolteon after a Low Sweep, which can come in handy. Just a suggestion to consider, great team though!
I'll definitely try Jolly Nature on Breloom, Thanks!


I used a team with the exact same lineup with ferrothorn > breloom in week 1 of SPL. Different movesets though.

Just saying, you're very kingdra weak lol. It basically literally 6-0s with no support except maybe rocks. Not that kingdra is very common at all, but it really does destroy rain offense without ferro.

Yeah, definitely want to make breloom jolly--one of low sweep's main draws is beating torny after a drop. SDloom is better as adamant. Mamo should be adamant IMO, loom isn't a huge problem and jolly ice shard doesn't come close to OHKOing anyway. The extra power is nice though.

I personally like icicle spear on mamo to break subs and stuff, especially if you run into subpunch loom or something. crash is cool though too i guess, miss chance sucks though.

I notice that mamo is a big problem for this team (as it was for mine). one thing you do to help with the problem is to give either tenta or rachi enough speed to outspeed it (iirc 96 EVs, which isn't a huge jump from your current on rachi). Otherwise, every time mamo comes in it gets a KO essentially, and fastrachi or tenta is a great lure. Fastrachi also helps a bit vs croak, since you outspeed adamant (which is like all) and can beat it with wish/spunch mindgames, or leave it paralyzed at the very worst.

Also, maybe change rachi's HP Evs to 236 for a lefties number while you lose literally 4 HP lol.

Gl with the team and congrats on getting reqs with it!
Thanks my bro Kidogo!! Ya I made Tentacruel faster to outspeed Mamo, will try Jolly Nature on Breloom and Icicle Spear on Mamoswine. Also ya I'll make the change on Jirachi


Oh, just a quick addition for my rate. Starmie would be an even better idea since you have Breloom and Tornadus-T to take out Jellicent.
Thanks TNT! I'll give it a try


Hey,

I believe sword dance over your current move, low sleep, would be superior because you would have a better wall breaker. Icicle spear over icicle crash because SubToxic Gliscor or SubSD looks like a big threat to this team if it manages to set up a substitute.

Sleep talk is superior to air slash because it has more utility in beating Breloom, whereas Air slash is kinda redundant in most cases. I support the move Psychic on Politoed as well.

Good luck!
Thanks! I'll test SD again, also ya i'll look into Sleep Talk


you definitely want 28 speed on politoed to toxic jellicent, so yeah. You could try taunt bulk up toxicroak over tentacruel and maybe donphan over mamoswine to help deal with keldeo and starmie who rape you right now. You have a much less powerful ice shard but bulky donphan can take outrages for days. You are also quite weak to rotom-w, which is not an easy weakness to fix but if you put on toxicroak you could use a latios or seomthing over breloom. Mamoswine is also a huge pain, bronzong/skarmory over jirachi would be nice but their special bulk and lack of wish are less than impressive.
Donphan>Mamoswine
Latios>Breloom
Toxicroak>Tentacruel
Thanks for the rate! I'll make Toed faster, but I need Tentacruel to spin and spread status while Donphan doesn't hit Dragon types hard enough. Also Breloom beats Rotom-W these days as most are specially defensive.

This thread wins the RMT of the week! Congratulations! Everyone who rates this team or has already rated it will get points towards RMT of the Week rewards.

Furthermore, this team will be the RMT of the Week until the next one is chosen

ps donphan sucks
Thanks Jirachi! Sadly Tornadus-T is now banned so I will try this team with Tornadus-i in place of him but I fear it will definitely not be as good.
 

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