ORAS OU Not Just A Rain Team

[Czarz]

Hey everyone,
This is my first time posting a team, I typically play monotype with my dragons, but thought I'd give OU a try. This team peaks out around 1500, (1488, for those who care). I've seen the destruction rain teams can cause so I made one myself. It's pretty standard rain, but functions fairly well without the rain, with M swampert being the only real sufferer.

The team requires a lot of switching, so rocks and hazards are a pain, but the team usually hits hard enough that the battle doesn't last for them to be a really big issue. Even with the switching, its just bad predicts that kill, not the rocks.

Politoed @ Damp Rock
Ability: Drizzle
EVs: 248 HP / 60 Def / 144 SpD / 56 Spe
Calm Nature
- Ice Beam
- Scald
- Rest
- Toxic

Rain setter. A staple on any rain team, he can come in, set the rain, toxic and run. Or, if the opponent is something that needs hit to break a sash he can do some damage too. Reliably sturdy, and once he's about to die he can rest and run to be used to set rain again. Lives most unboosted attacks and can hit salamence, dragonite or garchomp hard.

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
IVs: 0 Spe
Relaxed Nature
- Leech Seed
- Stealth Rock
- Gyro Ball
- Toxic

Rock setter. In the rain gives him obvious help, typically rocks and runs to thundy or back to politoed or swapert for fire hits anyway though. Toxic to help break stalls , along with leech seed, gyro ball for fairy coverage and a damaging move to not be taunt bait.

Swampert @ Swampertite
Ability: Damp
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Waterfall
- Earthquake
- Ice Punch
- Protect

The sweep. Typically comes in after main threats eliminated or if politoed dies and its his last chance for a rain sweep. Protect to make sure the speed boost gets there. Waterfall and earthquake are its hardest hitting moves and ice punch for coverage if i need to take out a grass type in a pinch.

Thundurus-Therian @ Assault Vest
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 192 SpA / 64 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Volt Switch
- Focus Blast
- Grass Knot
- Thunder

Thundy. Survives a surprising amount of hits with assvest. Loves to switch in after politoed or tornadus for volt absorb. Volt switch for the volt turn combo with tornadus, focus blast for steel types, and with thunder and grass knot, he stops opponents rain teams in their tracks.

Tornadus-Therian @ Life Orb
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 76 Atk / 216 SpA / 216 Spe
Naive Nature
- Hurricane
- Superpower
- Knock Off
- U-turn

He usually hits and runs to take advantage of regen, rocks are a real issue for that strategy though, but with superpower and stab hurricane he takes care of most rock setters with a ohko if they dony set up at the start.

Lickilicky @ Choice Specs
Ability: Cloud Nine
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Def / 252 SpA
Modest Nature
- Fire Blast
- Shadow Ball
- Wring Out
- Ice Beam

The anitweather. He is pretty must just for opposing steel or grass types in the rain. Bulky enough to switch in and take any nonsuper effective hit and get off fire blast. Other moves are pretty much filler, ice beam comes in handy with so many dragons roaming. Most people laugh when they see lickilicky, but with specs and full investment he kills most things with a supereffective move after rocks damage.

 

[Mega Slutbunny]

Hello there, and welcome to the Smogon forums!

This looks like a solid team, and it implements the ever wonderful Tornadus/Thundurus core to great effect. It looks like an interesting team, overall.

Now, on to the actual team.

I noticed that you mentioned that you had issues with M-Swampert, mainly being that it is fully dependant on Politoed to function well. Because of this, I recommend running Rain Dance over Protect.

Swampert Changes

Swampert @ Swampertite
Ability: Damp
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Waterfall
- Earthquake
- Ice Punch
- Protect ----> Rain Dance

While I understand the idea of Protect to help you mega-evolve safely and abuse swift swim, I feel as though M-Swampert would be more than capable of taking any neutral hits. Running rain dance would benefit M-Swampert more greatly, since it allows him to sweep in the late game, even with Politoed gone.

Aside that, you also mentioned that the team also has some issues dealing with hazards. Because of this, you may want to try running Forretress over Ferrothorn

Forretress Changes

Forretress @ Leftovers
Ability: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
IVs: 0 Spe
Relaxed Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Stealth Rock
- Volt Switch/Toxic
- Gyro Ball

Forretress more or less has a similar role your Ferrothorn has, with the additional ability to also spin away rocks

Otherwise, your team looks pretty great, and it looks like you've performed relatively well with it too. Good luck!

 

[Albacore]

Your team probably needs a wallbreaker, Rain usually struggles against stall teams and you don't have too much to threaten them bar Torn-T. At the same time, I don't think Lickilicky is a good chocie on yoru team, since it's forced to get locked into a move and is therefore super exploitable,and 80 base SpA doesn't give it enough power to really be threatening especially given that it's outsped by almost the entire metagame. I would suggest Toxic Orb Heracross over Lickilicky, not only does it wallbreak very well, but it also gives you a very good answer to Grass- and Steel-types which you mentioned using Lickilicky for.

You mention a hazards weakness which is true. However, it's quite hard to fit a hazard remover on your team : I guess you can use Foretress as suggested above, but you lose a lot of utility as well as an additional Water resist. I thik a better way of dealing with your SR weakness woudl be replacing Thundurus-T with a Pokemon that isn't weak to Stealth Rocks (Torn-T is SR-weak too, but Regenerator makes that weakness lessof a problem). I would suggest Raikou over Thundurus-T, not only is it not SR weak, but it gives you a much better check to Keldeo which seems like a huge thretat o your team, and it's a much better AV user thanks to its higher special bulk. It also has significantly higher speed which makes it a better Volt Switch user and enables it to check offensive threats much more easily. You do lose out on pwoer and Grass Knot, but I don't think your team needs Grass Knot on Thundurus-T that much anyway, sincey you already have a Grass-type to deal with Water/Ground types, and if you follow my Heracross reccomendation, you gain anotehr good check to those as well.

Speaking of which, I would run Power Whip over Toxic on Ferrothorn, this lets you deal with stuff like Sub MGyarados and Water and Ground-types in general more easily.

sets

Heracross @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Guts
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature / Jolly Nature
- Close Combat
- Megahorn
- Facade
- Swords Dance

Raikou @ Assault Vest
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Volt Switch
- Thunder
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Shadow Ball / Extrasensory

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
IVs: 0 Spe
Relaxed Nature
- Leech Seed
- Stealth Rock
- Gyro Ball
- Power Whip