Hello all,
Until recently, I had only played OU, but I have started to play UU and really enjoyed it as a metagame. The first thing I noticed was that UU seemed to have a more balanced flavor than OU, with not quite as much offensive bludgeoning (though still plenty of powerhouses). Thus, UU seemed like an appropriate environment to try out a stall team, something I have never built successfully before. So, here is my attempt at a stall(ish) team. It's done decently, but has too many glaring weaknesses, especially to extremely offensive teams -- it has done well against most other stall/balanced teams.
This team is called Lux Aurumque because it is a beautiful song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7o7BrlbaDs&noredirect=1) that I listened to/sang often while laddering with this team.
Team-Building Process:
I found obi's process in his stall team (http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=47785) to be very instructive, so I started by deciding what moves I wanted on the team. The list was similar to obi's: Stealth Rock, Spikes, Toxic Spikes/absorption, Wish, Aromatherapy/Heal Bell, Rapid Spin, a stat boost remover, and perhaps Leech Seed. Toxic could also prove useful, but that is easy to find a slot for. With some tinkering, I ended up with this starting lineup:
These fulfilled every role that I had thought of, and also had a bit of offensive power with Togekiss (NP, Air Slash, Heal Bell, Wish) and Shaymin (subseed). Unfortunately, the lineup wasn't actually that good at walling things. I was reading about Snorlax and how good it was in the UU Viability ranking thread, and realized that it would really help my team out. I replaced Togekiss with a CurseLax, which was much better offensively and defensively, but didn't support its team as well. I also found Froslass to be quite weak, and Toxic Spikes to be less useful than I had thought (that is, I could put spikes on Qwilfish). I changed Froslass to Cofagrigus. So I ended up with:
This version of the team did alright, but I found that Leech Seed really wasn't too useful, and also wanted to have wish support. Thus I got the current team:
At this point, I got a decent team. As I said, this team still has some big weaknesses, which I am hoping to ameliorate, and will specify at the end of the RMT. So far I have thought a lot about potential reworks and replacements and haven't come up with anything good. Besides replacements, the EV spreads could use some changes. Now I will expound on the sets.
Bronzong @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
0 Spe IVs
Nature: Relaxed (+Def, -Spe)
-Stealth Rock
-Earthquake
-Gyro Ball
-Toxic
Bronzong is a great tank and team supporter. Stealth rock and toxic are excellent support moves, while Gyro Ball seriously hurts leads (Crobat, Azelf, Froslass) that think they can get away with Taunting me. Earthquake is there for good neutral coverage on other things, though it doesn't see nearly as much use as the other moves. HP is obviously maximized. I maximized defense because Bronzong seemed best physically defensively, though this team is special-weak, so changing the spread could work.
Possible Changes:
If anything, Earthquake might be changed, perhaps to Light Screen to bolster Bronzong's special capabilities, though it's nice to have another attacking move. As mentioned, the EV spread could use some work.
Roserade @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP/4 Def/252 SpD
Nature: Calm(+SpD, -Atk)
-Aromatherapy
-Giga Drain/Sludge Bomb
-Spikes
-Synthesis
Roserade is here as a cleric and spikes supporter. It can also absorb Toxic Spikes, but I haven't actually played anyone with Toxic Spikes in about 100 ladder games, so this is minor. Aromatherapy might actually be its most-used move, because a) it is forced out too often to spike up much and b) it really helps support my team, especially Snorlax. When I can, setting up Spikes is pretty handy. Synthesis is useful to heal Roserade. Rest is another option, performing better against weather teams, but I find that, in battles, healing is most important against opponents that I don't want to switch out against, and Rest essentially forces my switch. Giga Drain is my stab move of choice, putting the hurt on bulky waters and ground types. The EVs are fully specially defensive. Originally, I tried more balanced defenses as in Smogon's Roserade Article, but this team is very solid against physical threats already, while weaker to special attackers. Being frail already, Roserade needed all the SpD it could get.
Possible Changes:
Sludge Bomb over Giga Drain is the easiest change to make on this set. I'm not sure which move is better.
Cofagrigus @ Leftovers
Ability: Mummy
EVs: 252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
Nature: Bold (+Def, -Atk)
-Pain Split/Rest
-Will-o-wisp
-Shadow Ball
-Haze
Cofagrigus works well as a spinblocker and sports useful resistances. The moveset is pretty standard. Pain Split provides recovery, albeit unreliably. Will-o-wisp cripples physical attackers that Cofagrigus loves to switch into even more (watch out for Hera!), and Haze, while not used too often, gets me out of tons of tight spots when it is. Shadow Ball gives me a way to deal some damage. The EV spread is standard fully defensive, but this could be changed.
Possible Changes:
Rest provides much more reliable recovery than Pain Split, which is useful on such a defensive beast. The EVs could be tinkered with, but the other three moves seem set in stone.
Snorlax @ Leftovers
Ability: Thick Fat
EVs: 188 HP/104 Def/216 SpD
Nature: Careful (+SpD, -SpA)
-Curse
-Return
-Crunch
-Rest
An absolute monster that carries the team in its overflowing fat. With a few Curses under it's belt, Snorlax can sponge all but the most absurdly powerful hits from both sides of the spectrum, and retaliate with a powerful Return. Curse/Rest are the standard moves that make this Snorlax so good. Crunch is a great move to hurt the ghosts in this tier that Snorlax likes to switch in on, and works much better than any alternatives. The extra damage from Return helps a lot more than the paralysis chance from Body Slam would, I think. The EV spread was just ripped from the analysis, and I have it as that passively, but I don't know what it should be.
Early game, Snorlax switches in on special attacks and tries to put on some hurt. With Rest and Aromatherapy support, it does this pretty effectively. Mid to late game (or early game if they let me set up), it curses and sweeps.
Possible Changes:
Everything is set in stone but the EVs, like on all of my pokes, are very much up in the air.
Alomomola @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
Nature: Bold (+Def, -Atk)
-Wish
-Protect
-Toxic
-Scald/Waterfall
A great poke and very reliable Wish-passer. My whole team really appreciates wish support, and Alomomola can tank unboosted physical attacks and most attacks from bulky waters for days. It can then either stay in and toxic stall them, or go out into something that needs healing. Wish, Protect and Toxic are standard, and the EVs maximize overall and physical bulk, which is also straight forward. Scald is the most questionable option. Though it provides a 30% burn chance, it also does very little, and I already have WoW on Cofagrigus and Toxic on this guy. Waterfall is an option to deal a bit more damage, but it's not doing much more. Any other suggestions?
Possible Changes:
As stated, Scald is the main question mark.
Hitmontop @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP/252 Def/4 Spe
Nature: Impish (+Def, -SpA)
-Rapid Spin
-Close Combat
-Sucker Punch
-Aerial Ace
A very useful poke for checking offensive threats with the invaluable Intimidate and good defenses. Also the obligatory spinner. Close Combat is a useful powerful STAB attack. Though the drawback is quite unfortunate, the power is pretty important. Sucker Punch is there for ghosts, though I find it to be pretty underwhelming, because a lot of ghosts just sub up. Aerial Ace lets me hurt Heracross, but that's close to it.
Possible Changes:
Both of the last moves are questionable. Sucker Punch almost never does as I want it to, which is frustrating. It could be changed. Aerial Ace doesn't cover that much, especially since this team already does OK against Heracross. I find Toxic to be even less useful than these moves, because I already have plenty of status effects among the rest of my team.
So that's the team. Now for the main weaknesses:
Kingdra is quite hard for my team to deal with by virtue of its unpredictability. Even when I have pinned down the set, special sets still hurt Snorlax/Roserade quite a lot, and DDers still give Alomomola/Hitmontop/Cofagrigus problems.
Togekiss is another special attacker that is hard for Snorlax/Roserade to deal with, especially once it gets an NP boost, which isn't hard against this team.
Snorlax can handily take on most Zapdos, but the Specs set can break huge holes in any part of the team, and with smart play and good support by other team members, can rip the team to shreds.
Bisharp is a threat mainly because it completely trolls Hitmontop with Defiant, and annihilates Cofagrigus. Alomomola can't toxic it either, while it hides behind subs to avoid Scald burns. Bronzong is the best answer to it, but still gets hurt by powerful attacks.
Like Zapdos, most Victini are not hard for this team to deal with, but the right mixed set can run through my team. V-Create is also an annoying attack because most of my pokes can't take advantage of the speed drop.
Outside of a lucky burn, this bird is immune to residual damage, and only takes a potent amount of damage from Snorlax's Crunch. If the Xatu player is smart and doesn't give Snorlax a chance to set up, the totem pole can really hinder my team.
I'm fortunate that almost no one uses Golurk, because it is very harmful to this team for one reason: DynamicPunch. Machamp would be here, but Cofagrigus reliably beats it, usually even with Payback. Golurk has Shadow Punch to do a good chunk even to Cofagrigus.
Since I have a slow team full of utility moves, none of my members wants to be crippled with a choice item, and it's unfortunate that Snorlax, my most reliable switch-in to pokes with Trick, often desperately needs to stay uncrippled to sweep late game.
So that's the team. Hope it was a good read, and rate away! Please don't pull any punches; I realize this team has shortcomings and am not afraid of harsh criticism and (not TOO) substantial suggested changes.
Until recently, I had only played OU, but I have started to play UU and really enjoyed it as a metagame. The first thing I noticed was that UU seemed to have a more balanced flavor than OU, with not quite as much offensive bludgeoning (though still plenty of powerhouses). Thus, UU seemed like an appropriate environment to try out a stall team, something I have never built successfully before. So, here is my attempt at a stall(ish) team. It's done decently, but has too many glaring weaknesses, especially to extremely offensive teams -- it has done well against most other stall/balanced teams.
This team is called Lux Aurumque because it is a beautiful song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7o7BrlbaDs&noredirect=1) that I listened to/sang often while laddering with this team.
Team-Building Process:
I found obi's process in his stall team (http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=47785) to be very instructive, so I started by deciding what moves I wanted on the team. The list was similar to obi's: Stealth Rock, Spikes, Toxic Spikes/absorption, Wish, Aromatherapy/Heal Bell, Rapid Spin, a stat boost remover, and perhaps Leech Seed. Toxic could also prove useful, but that is easy to find a slot for. With some tinkering, I ended up with this starting lineup:
These fulfilled every role that I had thought of, and also had a bit of offensive power with Togekiss (NP, Air Slash, Heal Bell, Wish) and Shaymin (subseed). Unfortunately, the lineup wasn't actually that good at walling things. I was reading about Snorlax and how good it was in the UU Viability ranking thread, and realized that it would really help my team out. I replaced Togekiss with a CurseLax, which was much better offensively and defensively, but didn't support its team as well. I also found Froslass to be quite weak, and Toxic Spikes to be less useful than I had thought (that is, I could put spikes on Qwilfish). I changed Froslass to Cofagrigus. So I ended up with:
This version of the team did alright, but I found that Leech Seed really wasn't too useful, and also wanted to have wish support. Thus I got the current team:
At this point, I got a decent team. As I said, this team still has some big weaknesses, which I am hoping to ameliorate, and will specify at the end of the RMT. So far I have thought a lot about potential reworks and replacements and haven't come up with anything good. Besides replacements, the EV spreads could use some changes. Now I will expound on the sets.
Bronzong @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
0 Spe IVs
Nature: Relaxed (+Def, -Spe)
-Stealth Rock
-Earthquake
-Gyro Ball
-Toxic
Bronzong is a great tank and team supporter. Stealth rock and toxic are excellent support moves, while Gyro Ball seriously hurts leads (Crobat, Azelf, Froslass) that think they can get away with Taunting me. Earthquake is there for good neutral coverage on other things, though it doesn't see nearly as much use as the other moves. HP is obviously maximized. I maximized defense because Bronzong seemed best physically defensively, though this team is special-weak, so changing the spread could work.
Possible Changes:
If anything, Earthquake might be changed, perhaps to Light Screen to bolster Bronzong's special capabilities, though it's nice to have another attacking move. As mentioned, the EV spread could use some work.
Roserade @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP/4 Def/252 SpD
Nature: Calm(+SpD, -Atk)
-Aromatherapy
-Giga Drain/Sludge Bomb
-Spikes
-Synthesis
Roserade is here as a cleric and spikes supporter. It can also absorb Toxic Spikes, but I haven't actually played anyone with Toxic Spikes in about 100 ladder games, so this is minor. Aromatherapy might actually be its most-used move, because a) it is forced out too often to spike up much and b) it really helps support my team, especially Snorlax. When I can, setting up Spikes is pretty handy. Synthesis is useful to heal Roserade. Rest is another option, performing better against weather teams, but I find that, in battles, healing is most important against opponents that I don't want to switch out against, and Rest essentially forces my switch. Giga Drain is my stab move of choice, putting the hurt on bulky waters and ground types. The EVs are fully specially defensive. Originally, I tried more balanced defenses as in Smogon's Roserade Article, but this team is very solid against physical threats already, while weaker to special attackers. Being frail already, Roserade needed all the SpD it could get.
Possible Changes:
Sludge Bomb over Giga Drain is the easiest change to make on this set. I'm not sure which move is better.
Cofagrigus @ Leftovers
Ability: Mummy
EVs: 252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
Nature: Bold (+Def, -Atk)
-Pain Split/Rest
-Will-o-wisp
-Shadow Ball
-Haze
Cofagrigus works well as a spinblocker and sports useful resistances. The moveset is pretty standard. Pain Split provides recovery, albeit unreliably. Will-o-wisp cripples physical attackers that Cofagrigus loves to switch into even more (watch out for Hera!), and Haze, while not used too often, gets me out of tons of tight spots when it is. Shadow Ball gives me a way to deal some damage. The EV spread is standard fully defensive, but this could be changed.
Possible Changes:
Rest provides much more reliable recovery than Pain Split, which is useful on such a defensive beast. The EVs could be tinkered with, but the other three moves seem set in stone.
Snorlax @ Leftovers
Ability: Thick Fat
EVs: 188 HP/104 Def/216 SpD
Nature: Careful (+SpD, -SpA)
-Curse
-Return
-Crunch
-Rest
An absolute monster that carries the team in its overflowing fat. With a few Curses under it's belt, Snorlax can sponge all but the most absurdly powerful hits from both sides of the spectrum, and retaliate with a powerful Return. Curse/Rest are the standard moves that make this Snorlax so good. Crunch is a great move to hurt the ghosts in this tier that Snorlax likes to switch in on, and works much better than any alternatives. The extra damage from Return helps a lot more than the paralysis chance from Body Slam would, I think. The EV spread was just ripped from the analysis, and I have it as that passively, but I don't know what it should be.
Early game, Snorlax switches in on special attacks and tries to put on some hurt. With Rest and Aromatherapy support, it does this pretty effectively. Mid to late game (or early game if they let me set up), it curses and sweeps.
Possible Changes:
Everything is set in stone but the EVs, like on all of my pokes, are very much up in the air.
Alomomola @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
Nature: Bold (+Def, -Atk)
-Wish
-Protect
-Toxic
-Scald/Waterfall
A great poke and very reliable Wish-passer. My whole team really appreciates wish support, and Alomomola can tank unboosted physical attacks and most attacks from bulky waters for days. It can then either stay in and toxic stall them, or go out into something that needs healing. Wish, Protect and Toxic are standard, and the EVs maximize overall and physical bulk, which is also straight forward. Scald is the most questionable option. Though it provides a 30% burn chance, it also does very little, and I already have WoW on Cofagrigus and Toxic on this guy. Waterfall is an option to deal a bit more damage, but it's not doing much more. Any other suggestions?
Possible Changes:
As stated, Scald is the main question mark.
Hitmontop @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP/252 Def/4 Spe
Nature: Impish (+Def, -SpA)
-Rapid Spin
-Close Combat
-Sucker Punch
-Aerial Ace
A very useful poke for checking offensive threats with the invaluable Intimidate and good defenses. Also the obligatory spinner. Close Combat is a useful powerful STAB attack. Though the drawback is quite unfortunate, the power is pretty important. Sucker Punch is there for ghosts, though I find it to be pretty underwhelming, because a lot of ghosts just sub up. Aerial Ace lets me hurt Heracross, but that's close to it.
Possible Changes:
Both of the last moves are questionable. Sucker Punch almost never does as I want it to, which is frustrating. It could be changed. Aerial Ace doesn't cover that much, especially since this team already does OK against Heracross. I find Toxic to be even less useful than these moves, because I already have plenty of status effects among the rest of my team.
So that's the team. Now for the main weaknesses:
So that's the team. Hope it was a good read, and rate away! Please don't pull any punches; I realize this team has shortcomings and am not afraid of harsh criticism and (not TOO) substantial suggested changes.
