Icy Room

[By-Tor!]

I used to play a lot of battles on Shoddy during Gen 4, but I became too busy and mostly fell out of competitive battling during Gen 5. I've wanted to come back though, and after doing VGC and OU battles for the past month or so, I'm doing pretty well.

This is a hail + trick room VGC team I created recently that's done well (winning about 75% of the time), but still could do a lot better.

Abomasnow @ Ice Gem
Trait: Snow Warning
EVs: 252 Def / 4 Sp Def / 252 SAtk
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Blizzard
- Leech Seed
- Giga Drain
- Protect

Abomasnow exists mainly to setup hail, but it also can pick off a lot of threats that counter trick room, especially Amoonguss. Ice Gem + Blizzard causes huge damage, even to Pokemon that resist Ice. Leech Seed gets up an early advantage against tanky threats. Giga Drain counters unexpecting Rain Teams, so that Politoed can be eliminated relatively quickly. It also counters Gastrodon and is a quick healing move.

Jellicent @ Sitrus Berry
Trait: Water Absorb
EVs: 60 Def / 252 HP / 196 SDef
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Protect
- Trick Room
- Will-O-Wisp
- Water Spout

Jellicent is the other Pokemon I always pick. It works amazingly well with Abomasnow thanks to its immunity to fighting and resistance to fire. It stalls, and does so quite well in the hail. Will-O-Wisp doubles as both an effective way to stop tanky pokemon, and a way to stop physical attackers. Water Spout is a great STAB move that uses rain teams to its advantage. Trick room is the main move here, though. Once Amoonguss is eliminated, Jellicent is free to set up trick room, and hail room takes off.

Musharna @ Leftovers
Trait: Synchronize
EVs: 132 SAtk / 252 HP / 124 Def
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Psychic
- Helping Hand
- Light Screen
- Protect

Musharna is a very bulky attacker, mostly here to eliminate fighting threats. With this EV spread, Psychic can easily OHKO flame orb Conkeldurr with hail, and have a good chance at doing so for non-flame orb Conkeldurr. The rest of the moves are support, making Musharna an excellent partner for Scrafty or Glaceon (and I almost always have one of the two). I opted for Musharna over Reuniclus because of better defenses (which is worth the attack trade off, since I still can easily beat fighting types) and Synchronize, which can catch many Thunder Wave, Toxic, or Spore users off guard.

Scrafty @ Chople Berry
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Drain Punch
- Crunch
- Detect
- Fake Out

It's just a basic Scrafty set, but I find it really effective. 252 HP EV's, combined with Drain Punch, makes it pretty hard to kill, and Drain Punch and Crunch have great coverage. Detect stops threats, and Fake Out can allow an almost dead pokemon to get one more move out- especially useful when that pokemon is Jellicent setting up one last trick room.

Cradily @ Lum Berry
Trait: Storm Drain
EVs: 252 Def / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Rock Slide
- Confuse Ray
- Toxic
- Giga Drain

I originally had Gastrodon here, but I've found that Cradily works much better. Confuse Ray + Toxic is a great combo here. With the added damage of hail, a confused and poisoned pokemon faints very quickly, and thanks to Cradily's bulky stats, it can easily poison and confuse both of the opponent's pokemon, and then Giga Drain back to full health. Storm Drain counters water types and rain teams, and brings Cradily some benefit with the Giga Drain boost. Lum Berry prevents status, and since many opponents try to combat Cradily with poison or burns, this effectively wastes a turn and saves Cradily.

Glaceon @ BrightPowder
Trait: Snow Cloak
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SAtk / 4 SDef
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Blizzard
- Protect
- Shadow Ball
- Fake Tears

Glaceon is a pokemon that works pretty well, but only in some circumstances. Once all of its threats have been eliminated, though, it can sweep quite easily. Snow Cloak, combined with Bright Powder, makes it hard to hit Glaceon. With a huge 130 base special attack, combined with 100 accuracy blizzard, Glaceon can quickly kill almost anything. Fake Tears takes care of bulky Pokemon, but also allows for a great partnership with Abomasnow near the end of a match, since Glaceon can Fake Tears, and then Abomasnow can Blizzard that same turn.

I've really enjoyed perfecting this team, and I hope you like it.

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!

 

[By-Tor!]

Ok I think you might all ready know this but isn't snow cloak rule breaking and this is pretty much why no one is posting but I'm bored that's why I'm posting so change glaceon ability

This is a VGC team, so Snow Cloak and Bright Powder are both allowed.

 

[Eyedol]

I used to play a lot of battles on Shoddy during Gen 4, but I became too busy and mostly fell out of competitive battling during Gen 5. I've wanted to come back though, and after doing VGC and OU battles for the past month or so, I'm doing pretty well.

This is a hail + trick room VGC team I created recently that's done well (winning about 75% of the time), but still could do a lot better.

Abomasnow @ Ice Gem
Trait: Snow Warning
EVs: 252 Def / 4 Sp Def / 252 SAtk
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Blizzard
- Leech Seed
- Giga Drain
- Protect

Abomasnow exists mainly to setup hail, but it also can pick off a lot of threats that counter trick room, especially Amoonguss. Ice Gem + Blizzard causes huge damage, even to Pokemon that resist Ice. Leech Seed gets up an early advantage against tanky threats. Giga Drain counters unexpecting Rain Teams, so that Politoed can be eliminated relatively quickly. It also counters Gastrodon and is a quick healing move.

Jellicent @ Sitrus Berry
Trait: Water Absorb
EVs: 60 Def / 252 HP / 196 SDef
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Protect
- Trick Room
- Will-O-Wisp
- Water Spout

Jellicent is the other Pokemon I always pick. It works amazingly well with Abomasnow thanks to its immunity to fighting and resistance to fire. It stalls, and does so quite well in the hail. Will-O-Wisp doubles as both an effective way to stop tanky pokemon, and a way to stop physical attackers. Water Spout is a great STAB move that uses rain teams to its advantage. Trick room is the main move here, though. Once Amoonguss is eliminated, Jellicent is free to set up trick room, and hail room takes off.

Musharna @ Leftovers
Trait: Synchronize
EVs: 132 SAtk / 252 HP / 124 Def
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Psychic
- Helping Hand
- Light Screen
- Protect

Musharna is a very bulky attacker, mostly here to eliminate fighting threats. With this EV spread, Psychic can easily OHKO flame orb Conkeldurr with hail, and have a good chance at doing so for non-flame orb Conkeldurr. The rest of the moves are support, making Musharna an excellent partner for Scrafty or Glaceon (and I almost always have one of the two). I opted for Musharna over Reuniclus because of better defenses (which is worth the attack trade off, since I still can easily beat fighting types) and Synchronize, which can catch many Thunder Wave, Toxic, or Spore users off guard.

Scrafty @ Chople Berry
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Drain Punch
- Crunch
- Detect
- Fake Out

It's just a basic Scrafty set, but I find it really effective. 252 HP EV's, combined with Drain Punch, makes it pretty hard to kill, and Drain Punch and Crunch have great coverage. Detect stops threats, and Fake Out can allow an almost dead pokemon to get one more move out- especially useful when that pokemon is Jellicent setting up one last trick room.

Cradily @ Lum Berry
Trait: Storm Drain
EVs: 252 Def / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Rock Slide
- Confuse Ray
- Toxic
- Giga Drain

I originally had Gastrodon here, but I've found that Cradily works much better. Confuse Ray + Toxic is a great combo here. With the added damage of hail, a confused and poisoned pokemon faints very quickly, and thanks to Cradily's bulky stats, it can easily poison and confuse both of the opponent's pokemon, and then Giga Drain back to full health. Storm Drain counters water types and rain teams, and brings Cradily some benefit with the Giga Drain boost. Lum Berry prevents status, and since many opponents try to combat Cradily with poison or burns, this effectively wastes a turn and saves Cradily.

Glaceon @ BrightPowder
Trait: Snow Cloak
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SAtk / 4 SDef
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Blizzard
- Protect
- Shadow Ball
- Fake Tears

Glaceon is a pokemon that works pretty well, but only in some circumstances. Once all of its threats have been eliminated, though, it can sweep quite easily. Snow Cloak, combined with Bright Powder, makes it hard to hit Glaceon. With a huge 130 base special attack, combined with 100 accuracy blizzard, Glaceon can quickly kill almost anything. Fake Tears takes care of bulky Pokemon, but also allows for a great partnership with Abomasnow near the end of a match, since Glaceon can Fake Tears, and then Abomasnow can Blizzard that same turn.

I've really enjoyed perfecting this team, and I hope you like it.

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!

A few things I noticed when viewing your team:

1) People can tell at first glance your team is obviously a Trick Room team

⦁ With every pokemon an obvious choice for a Trick Room team, your opponents will know what to expect before you even start and select their best anti-Trick Room team
⦁ That could pose problems when you face players that can prevent your Trick Room with Taunt, Encore, a Trick Room of their own, or a really powerful attack
⦁ Considering you only have one Trick Room user and they know what to expect going in, it seems like a real possibility that opponents could cripple the team strategy from the start
⦁ Some options that might help are: switching Jellicent's item to a Mental Herb to improve your odds of using Trick Room - and possibly changing Protect or Will-O-Wisp to Recover to compensate for no Sitrus Berry, adding Trick Room to Musharna as a backup, or switching some slower pokemon to faster ones that make the team more flexible and harder to predict

2) Sun teams

⦁ Hail teams like yours can have lots of trouble with Sun teams because of all the Ice types that are weak to Fire; the only pokemon you have that resists fire moves, Jellicent, is weak to the Grass types that are also common on Sun teams
⦁ Switching Abomasnow's item to a Focus Sash could allow you to switch in to a Fire attack and set up Hail one extra time
⦁ You could add some resistance without changing the team concept too much by including a Chandelure (who could also set up Trick Room), Heatran, or Dragon Type (Salamence for Scrafty keeps an Intimidator, Druddigon works well with Trick Room)

3) Fighting Types

⦁ You have four weaknesses to fighting, one resistance, and one immunity; that gives opponents a pretty high likelihood of doing serious damage with Fighting attacks and also a pretty easy chance to predict when they can catch you with one. On top of that, Mach Punch is really common and Hammer Arm lowers speed, each negating your priority advantage with Trick Room.
⦁ As constructed the team could have some serious trouble with Breloom, Heracross, Toxicroak, or any number of others
⦁ Metagross would be a good option to counter fight types and would still fit well with a Trick Room team. I recommend spending some EVs in defense to help offset the higher attack stats of Fighting types and also for the inevitable opponent Metagross that a Hail team will face. I recommend you stick with Earthquake over Hammer Arm in the moveset specifically to face opposing Metagross. A Lum Berry could be a good item choice to counter Breloom's Spore.

In general this looks like a fairly solid team. I think your biggest challenge is the team's reliance on Trick Room is so obvious that opponents will have an easier time making good choices against you. That challenge is probably amplified by so many weaknesses to Fighting Types and Jellicent as the only Trick Room user. A few modifications to give you more flexibilty might go a long way.

I hope this helps you somewhat, and good luck with your team. ^_^

 

[tlyee61]

Hi, if you could explain your EV spreads on Musharna and Jellicent, that would help myself and other rate your team better. As for your Fighting weakness, Eyedol already covered it. I think most Glaceon and Cradily are somewhat gimmicky and I'd like to help you replace them with more consistent mons. I think Glaceon is good, but a moveset of Blizzard / Protect / Helping Hand / HP Fire could be cool. As for a replacement for Cradily, I'd suggest Eruption Heatran. Even though he's still weak to fighting, he has some nice synergy with Abomasnow and Jellicent.

 

[By-Tor!]

Thanks to both of you for looking at my team!
Eyedol, that outlined my problems really well, and I'll try your suggestions as soon as possible (especially Mental Herb on Jellicent and switching Scrafty for Salamence). Thanks!

Tlyee, Jellicent's EV spread lets it survive hits from common physical attackers, like a fling from Scizor, making up for its poor defense stat while still protecting it from electrics and ghosts, who are a bigger threat. Specifically with this spread, I can take a Gengar's shadow ball and Tyranitar's rock slide in the same turn and not really even be in danger. Musharna's balance attack and defense, giving just enough Sp Attack to beat a Conkeldurr with Flame Orb in one hit (one of the most common sets I had trouble against before I had Musharna). After one move in hail, Musharna still can get a gauranteed 1HKO on a Conkeldurr that doesn't have flame orb. Since Musharna has light screen, I didn't focus on Special Defense, and instead put 252 in HP and then the remainder in defense. Heatran could replace Cradily, but then I'd lose a major rain dance counter. I'll try running it a few games though and see how it goes, but if he doesn't work in Cradily's slot, he'll probably work in another slot to help counter sun teams. The Glaceon moveset looks good, so I'll try that as well. Thanks for the rate!


Edit: These suggestions are working wonders for the team. I switched Cradily and Scrafty for Metagross and Salamence, changed Glaceon and Jellicent, and now my team is doing a lot better. Thanks!

 

[tlyee61]

Edit: These suggestions are working wonders for the team. I switched Cradily and Scrafty for Metagross and Salamence, changed Glaceon and Jellicent, and now my team is doing a lot better. Thanks!

Thank you so much for the EV explanations! I'm glad the team is working out for you! :D