I wish this team had a cool name

[aquason]

Introduction

I'm just some weird player you've probably never heard or seen before. This started as my first team when I first started playing (sometime during this year) and gradually turned into what it is today. I was inspired to start playing by Black Light Attack's videos and the first inklings of this team by this video in particular: warning contains some foul language.

Nogood (Wartortle) (F) @ Eviolite
Trait: Torrent
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SDef
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Rapid Spin
- Scald
- Yawn
- Seismic Toss

First up is Wartortle as my Spinner and defensive kind of pivot wall thing. A lot of this is obvious, Rapid Spin for Stealth Rocks and other Entry Hazards, Scald as a Water STAB to be used against ground and rock types also deters any physical attacker from switching in or staying in. Yawn to force switches and Seismic Toss when scald does less damage. It's also the first part of my 3-part defensive core consisting of Masquerain, Bastille, and itself. Resisting rock, ice and generally threatening out physical attackers.

Twa (Gardevoir) (M) @ Lum Berry
Trait: Trace
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature
- Stored Power
- Substitute
- Hidden Power [Ground]
- Signal Beam

Part of my "instant win condition" Gardevoir is designed to kill everything as quickly as possible and if Masquerain dies before hand to be at least somewhat useful at taking down other Pokemon with her non-STABs. At +2 Speed, Special Attack and Special Defence outspeeds the entire Tier and can OHKO some of the tier's biggest special walls:

+2 252+ SpA Gardevoir Stored Power (140 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Lickilicky: 364-429 (85.84 - 101.17%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO 87.5% after Stealth Rocks

+2 252+ SpA Gardevoir Stored Power (140 BP) vs. 248 HP / 8 SpD Regice: 262-310 (72.17 - 85.39%) -- guaranteed 2HKO -- 81.25% to OHKO after Stealth Rocks

+2 252+ SpA Gardevoir Stored Power (140 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Munchlax: 261-307 (55.06 - 64.76%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

If you manage to get a third quiver dance even Munchlax is guaranteed to die if stealth rocks are up. The only Pokemon that really counter this are Shedinja and Unaware Bibarel. Sub protects from priority and especially sucker punch, while Signal Beam and Hidden Power Ground are for Coverage and when Gardevoir has no boosts.

Lum Berry is used because if there is one thing that Gardevoir hates it's status effects.

Anglais (Masquerain) (F) @ Leftovers
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 Spd
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Quiver Dance
- Baton Pass
- Roost
- Air Slash

My physical pivot, and after a few quiver dances it can usually find itself surviving many Special Attacks long enough to pass on the boosts. Intimidate plus 4x resist to Fighting and Immunity to ground covers 2/3 of the Bastiodon's weaknesses, and it's two other resistances are also okay (grass and bug). Quiver Dance and Baton Pass are the crux of the set, roost allowing me to tank a few more hits if I need to, and Air Slash over Bug Buzz as I find most people don't switch in or keep something in that is weak to bug anyway. Air Slash lets me hit Fighting types that might switch in to try to get off a stone edge, and isn't resisted by 6 different types (3 instead).

Gesundite (Mightyena) (F) @ Dread Plate
Trait: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Sucker Punch
- Crunch
- Ice Fang
- Thunder Fang

Mightyena is my revenge killer/overall momentum grabber/sweeper. Once something on my team dies late in the game Mightyena can start rolling with priority and crunch as Moxie increasingly makes Mightyena deadlier and deadlier. While the coverage is disappointing, and the last two moves are filler designed to hit those 4x super effectives, Mightyena does its job well. I use Dread Plate over Life Orb as I find the damage difference negligible and I rarely use my two last moves. I also find that Mightyena can usually survive one neutral hit maybe, so not losing 10% health every attack helps.

Bastille (Bastiodon) (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Sturdy
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SDef
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spd
- Stealth Rock
- Roar
- Magic Coat
- Metal Burst

Bastiodon is the third pillar in my defensive trio, providing amazing resistances and immunities to 10 different types. Magic Coat is a generally helpful move to reflect status and other moves, Stealth Rocks to help all sweeps, Roar to stop set up, and Metal Burst gives the possibility of doing one sacrificial play to take something out. It's type resistances include Normal and Flying (Swellow), Ice and Psychic (Jinx) which are a very good help for this team.

Xernea's Cousin (Sawsbuck) (F) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Sap Sipper
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Horn Leech
- Nature Power
- Double-Edge
- Megahorn

Finally is Sawsbuck, which is my main revenge killer. The electric resist is nice, but what I really chose Sawsbuck for originally was Nature Power which bypasses Sucker Punch and hit Skuntank really hard. It also absorbs grass type attacks, grass induced sleep and leach seed for me.

Notable Threats

Non choice Locked Fighting Types with Rock-type moves. Thankfully as of now most of them are choice locked, but if they become more popular I will need to consider my options much more carefully and play much more cautiously.

Armaldo: Can pretty much kill my entire team bar Wartortle who can dent him with Scald and hopefully burns if Armaldo is carrying earthquake.

Munchlax: I still hardly dent Munchlax without any fighting moves, and Whirlwind ruins any plans I may have of Baton Passing quiver dances.

Extreme Pro-activeness: Once a person knows my quiver dance/moxie boost tricks, they know to immediately put a stop to it before it becomes too powerful. By themselves Mightyena, Gardevoir and Masquerain aren't that effective.

Conclusion

Well that that. My second post and probably not one of my most coherent. I hope when I wake up I don't realize I did something stupid and idiotic.

 

[Moose V]

I'll add a couple of suggestions per pokemon

Wartortle
-Doesn't need seismic toss when it has scald, I'd change it to either haze, toxic or forseight.

Gardevoir
-I would highly highly highly recommend replacing stored power with psychic on Gardevoir as it has no stat-boosting moves on its own and therefore almost 100% relies on getting a +2 baton pass from masqurain which is quite optimistic team building. In reality, almost no good player would ever let you get two quiver dances off AND a baton pass. Psychic will be a stronger move any time its has less than two quiver dances, so I would definitely recommend psychic over stored power.
-Focus blast is probably better than hp ground but I can understand that you don't wanna miss.


Masquerain
-Not a lot to say here, seems like a perfectly fine set.


Mightyena
-Life orb is probably gonna be more beneficial just because mightyena isn't designed to take hits anyway and the life orb boost is the difference between being able to OHKO something like cacturne with ice fang or getting your sweep cuz short by the same cacturn's drain punch.

Bastiodon
-You're gonna want some sort of attacking move or at least status lest you become set-up fodder and get sweep by a sweeper carrying taunt

Sawsbuck
-Not a bad set and a scarfed sawsbuck probably gives you a nice surprise factor.


Your team seems to have some nice synergy, but I'd like to see how your team works, got any replays?

 

[aquason]

Thank you for the suggestions. I've tinkered with this team for a while so here are some of my responses.

Wartortle
-Doesn't need seismic toss when it has scald, I'd change it to either haze, toxic or forseight.

I've run haze before and the only time I used it was against a sub bulk up Braviary which Baastiodon can usually handle because of his 4x resist to bird and normal which Sub Bulk Up Braviary Usually carries. Foresight seems like an interesting idea, but normally with ghost types I either a) scare them out with Scald (Golurk, Lampent), b) don't want to stay in or c) would prefer starting to set up against it with Masquerain. Toxic is definitely an option though, although I would have a hard time to use it because I generally use Yawn as my de-facto phaze for Wartortle, Toxic definitely could be useful though.

Gardevoir
-I would highly highly highly recommend replacing stored power with psychic on Gardevoir as it has no stat-boosting moves on its own and therefore almost 100% relies on getting a +2 baton pass from masqurain which is quite optimistic team building. In reality, almost no good player would ever let you get two quiver dances off AND a baton pass. Psychic will be a stronger move any time its has less than two quiver dances, so I would definitely recommend psychic over stored power.
-Focus blast is probably better than hp ground but I can understand that you don't wanna miss.

Stored Power vs Psychic is definitely a worthy consideration, but it's definitely been part of my team as one of the driving themes. I'll definitely try swapping it out, but I do feel that I often get +2 quiver dances. Spot on with the HP Ground over focus miss, I really hate the 70% accuracy. With HP Ground and Signal Beam I get good coverage on most things.

Mightyena
-Life orb is probably gonna be more beneficial just because mightyena isn't designed to take hits anyway and the life orb boost is the difference between being able to OHKO something like cacturne with ice fang or getting your sweep cuz short by the same cacturn's drain punch.

In your specific Cacturne example, I would generally cut my losses during something like that and switch over to Masquerain as I can threaten out with the (percieved) Bug Buzz and nothing could be really done to me. At no boosts Ice Fanghas a 6.25% chance to OHKO Cacturne with Life Orb boost. At +1 it's a definite OHKO, but with dread plate and +1 it's still a 81.25% chance to OHKO. Often Mightyena survives neutral hits with the barest scraps of HP and Life Orb would mean those sweeps would be cut short.

Bastiodon
-You're gonna want some sort of attacking move or at least status lest you become set-up fodder and get sweep by a sweeper carrying taunt

Normally I just Magic Coat the taunt back to the target.

Your team seems to have some nice synergy, but I'd like to see how your team works, got any replays?

I don't keep many replays but here are my 3 latest matches in replay form:

http://www.pokemonshowdown.com/replay/nu-18741484

http://www.pokemonshowdown.com/replay/nu-18740818

http://www.pokemonshowdown.com/replay/nu-18668893

 

[WhiteDMist]

I agree with moose V on his Gardevoir suggestion, and also feel that Seismic Toss and Scald do enough on their own to prevent Wartortle from being set up fodder (and it does annoy Ghosts regardless). Since you never use these last two moves regardless, you might as well replace the fangs on Mightyena with Fire Fang and Return or Toxic. Fire Fang is simply for the few Steel-types that you may face, the most common of which is Metang. Return is mostly for hitting Skuntank and Fighting-types on the switch in, while Toxic lets you surprise physical and special walls that may switch in.

For Bastiodon, I suggest trying out Protect and Toxic over Magic Coat and Metal Burst. Metal Burst is a nice move if your opponent isn't expecting it, but usually people use chip damage to break Sturdy before using a powerful move to KO it. Magic Coat is a great move on Bastiodon, but it is a bit situational unless you are facing the rare Taunt leads. Protect lets you scout these leads out regardless, and lets you scout Choiced Pokemon that can easily tear your team apart if you mispredict (especially CB Sawk). Toxic lets you weaken walls and prevent your opponent from keeping in Pokemon for long periods of time. Of course, you can still run either Magic Coat or Metal Burst over Toxic, but I feel that Protect is very important. Test it out with your team and see what works best for you.