Old Strategy, New Generation

[Blastburner]

Hi all,

This morning I decided to check out the new era of pokémon battling. After searching some information, I downloaded PO and wasted no time building a team. With the limited knowledge I had about the new battling strategies I thought it was best to start off from my usual way of team building, not trying anything too fancy. The team you're about to see will be typical for me. I'm a very, very offensive battler. I use a lot of choice items as I used to do in gen 4 and as a result my immediate firepower will be way higher than 99% of the teams. All the Pokémon in this team will have an base atk or sp. atk stat of at least 130.

The first thing I do is take a look at the metagame I play in and see what are the most devastating beasts. With the limited amount of pokémon banned to the uber tier, it became apparent to me that there are many powerful dragons. The other immediately noticeable thing were the weather sweepers.

The idea: In the previous gen I learned that the general strategy is more important then being able to counter everything. With every new added pokémon this becomes more and more important IMO. So...

I went for the dragons and decided to use the dragon-steel core. I came up with the idea to use 2 dragons. If 1 dragon can't break through the defences, it should at least weaken them enough for the 2nd to finish it off. This means I'll use 2 steel types as well. Next thing I wanted is a trapper to destroy steel types that resist dragon moves. The last thing I needed was some revenge killing. This is especially important because I don't know all the possibilities of the new gen yet. And everything x2...

Team building process:

The first dragon I picked was Ononokusu. When I found this new pseudo-legend I fell in love with it. 147 base attack. Awesome. Not to mention this is the the coolest looking dragon IMO.

Next I picked a steel type. Magnezone was my favourite trapper previous gen so it was a no brainer to use it.

For the second dragon I decided to use something specially based. The ability to use Latios was just too good not to use.

So now I wanted another steel type to finish my double dragon-steel combo. I picked scizor for its ability to deal some nice damage and the ability to revenge kill with priority.

The new fire/ghost trapper sounded amazing because of shadow tag. I threw him into the team.

To finish the team I had to look a little bit longer around. Eventually, Breloom seemed pretty good for this team. It got some nice new additions. I put him in the lead slot since I often ran Breloom in the lead slot in gen 4.

So nothing new. To sum it up:
-2 dragons
-2 steel types
-2 trappers
-2 priority users

In depth:

Breloom @ life orb
Adamant / Technician
252 atk / 252 speed / 4hp

-spore
-mach punch
-bullet seed
-stone edge
Comments: Technician allows Breloom to be a strong revenge killer with mach punch, especially with the sand mole around. Spore is obvious. I can't spam it around anymore with espeon deflecting it back and porygon2 somehow doing it too. Bullet seed is the new seed bomb and stone edge increases my coverage andgives me a chance against slow fireghosts that like to trap me. Adamant nature for more power.

magnezone @ choice scarf
timid / magnet pull
252 sp. atk / 252 speed 4 hp

-thunderbolt
-volt change
-hidden power fire
-flash cannon
Commebts: Thunderbolt is the most poweful move. Volt change is useful for switching purposes, especially in a choice item infested team. This new little toy is really fun ^^. With the many new grass/steel types magnet pull + hidden power fire is a good thing to have. Flash cannon grants me secondary STAB and is useful is some cases.

Shandera @ choice scarf
modest / shadow tag
252 sp. atk / 252 speed / 4 hp

-flamethrower
-energy ball
-shadow ball
-overheat
Comments: Shandera is with its 135 sp. atk. and 80 speed, combined with a superior ability arguably a better trapper then magnezone. Its typing isn't too bad either. Magnezone still deserves its place because its a completely different type with completely different moves and functions extremely well in removing steel types, the main idea of the team. Using both is beneficial. they help each other well. Flamethrower gives damage, overheat gives higher damage at the cost of a lowered sp. atk. Shadow ball is secondary STAB and energy ball is useful for bulky waters that don't die easily in 1 hit, which is important for my strategy.

Latios @ choice specs
Timid / Levitate
252 sp. atk / 252 speed / 4 hp

-draco meteor
-psycho shock
-grass knot
-trick
Comments: Latios is pretty amazing. Draco meteor destroys, psycho shock is very useful, especially against blissey and grass knot helps me take down bulky waters; Trick is to fuck up random stuff, especially tanks.

Ononokusu @ choice scarf
Adamant / Mold breaker
252 atk / 252 speed / 4hp

-outrage
-dragon claw
-earthquake
-shadow claw
Comments: The MVP of the team. Outrage destroys everything. Dragon claw gives me the ability to keep in control of the battle. EQ and shadow claw are for coverage. Shadow claw isn't so useful. I only used it once to KO a gengar. 97 base speed with a scarf = surprise kill.

Scizor @ metal coat
Adamant / technician
252 atk / 248 hp / 8 speed

-U-turn
-bullet punch
-super power
-quick attack
Comments: Scizor is still great. Everyone knows it, so no explanation needed about the moves. I did pick metal coat over choice band because I already have so many choice items. Scizor is the only pokemon that also has some extra EV's for defence. this is of course because of the priority.

Conclusion
The team is okay, nothing special. I'm still happy with the result after 1 day. My rating on PO is about 1220-1240. I might be able to push it a little higher, but that's it. I don't feel the team can get much higher without some serious changes. The biggest problems are doryuuzu in sandstorms and kingdra in the rain. Porygon2 is also a bitch to take down.

It's a fun team with a fun theme behind it IMO. Lots of choice items, which make me stronger 1 on 1. That's the reason I prefer to give my trappers choice items. The 3 scarfs are often a surprise to the opponent, especially on ononokusu. Being able to switch attacks on scizor is also a surprise to most opponents. Surprises win battles.

4 choice items might seem like a tad too much, but it works because of the moves. I can choose between flamethrower and overheat on shandera, thunderbolt and volt change on magnezone and dragon claw and outrage on ononokusu. Volt change and U-turn keep the momentum at my side. No new strategy for me, only a new gen.

 

[Tortferngatr]

...Is this OU or Dream World?

Shandera can only have Shadow Tag in DW meta, which doesn't exist yet and is based on all the data we have in the games.

 

[Jaroda]

With two trappers relieving the opponent of their Steels you have no need to run Scarf on Ono. Once you wipe out their Skarmory, Nattorei, etc. you are free to Dragon Dance or even Sword Dance for an unresisted Outrage sweep. Take advantage of what your team has to offer. So many things are capable of revenging as is don't limit Ono's potential. Psycho Shock and Grass Knot are horrible on Latios. Use Surf and either Psychic for Roopushin or a Hidden Power or even just Dragon Pulse. Shandera doesn't need Flamethrower. Overheat is fine since it's meant to revenge and it wants HP Ice for Dragons. Need a Steel to resist Doryuzuu? Skarmory walls it and can use Spikes as well as Whirlwind, but it can't kill it. Gliscor is an amazing Doryuzuu counter.

 

[y4f]

With two trappers relieving the opponent of their Steels you have no need to run Scarf on Ono. Once you wipe out their Skarmory, Nattorei, etc. you are free to Dragon Dance or even Sword Dance for an unresisted Outrage sweep. Take advantage of what your team has to offer. So many things are capable of revenging as is don't limit Ono's potential. Psycho Shock and Grass Knot are horrible on Latios. Use Surf and either Psychic for Roopushin or a Hidden Power or even just Dragon Pulse. Shandera doesn't need Flamethrower. Overheat is fine since it's meant to revenge and it wants HP Ice for Dragons. Need a Steel to resist Doryuzuu? Skarmory walls it and can use Spikes as well as Whirlwind, but it can't kill it. Gliscor is an amazing Doryuzuu counter.

Jaroda has very good advice here. I'm going to add to what he said with some more specifics about the changes.

Firstly, Magnezone. I would suggest running Leftovers over Scarf and running a Substitute / Thunderbolt / HP Grass or Fire / Magnet Rise or Explosion. Then switch the EVs to 40 Atk or HP / 252 SAtk / 216 Spd. This allows you to outspeed most pokemon you're trying to trap, sub up, prevent them from breaking the sub (stuff like jirachi without fire punch, skarmory, forretress, etc won't be able to break sub), and kill them off with a combination of HP Fire and Thunderbolt depending on the situation. This allows you to come off the encounter -hopefully- with a sub still up, and hit at least 1 other member of their team moderately hard before being forced to switch out.

Keep your Scarf on Shanderaa - it's a great scarfer, cause the stuff Shanderaa tries to trap / kill tends to be faster than the bulky slow steels Magnezone deals with. Also, drop Energy Ball for HP Ground. HP Ground allows you to hit Heatran, something that gives Magnezone, Breloom, and Scizor quite a bit of trouble. Basically, you can break the balloon of heatran's coming in on any of the above 3 pokemon with any attack, switch shandera in on the inevitable fire attack, resist it, and KO with HP Ground. Energy Ball won't be hitting most specially bulky waters hard at all - generally it'll be a 3KO, and you can get OHKOd back.
Little nitpick - Shandy actually has base 145 not 135 SAtk.

I would personally switch Latios for Latias as it's a lot bulkier, and drop Psycho Shock and Grass Knot for Surf / HP Fire and Thunderbolt - much better moves, as they have better overall SE and neutral coverage, as well as letting Latios hit stuff like Hippo, Gliscor, Skarmory, bulky waters without Ice Beam, and a lot of other stuff hard. For Scizor and Ono, I'd suggest running set-up sweeper sets in order to wreak havoc late game when their counters have been removed. For scizor, run leftovers or life orb, then run Swords Dance over Quick Attack and X-Scissor over U-turn. Ono, I'd run Dragon Dance over Dragon Claw and then Taunt over Shadow Claw to stop yourself from being phased. Shadow Claw could also be kept for neutral coverage / Ranku / Ghost switchins.


Good luck with the team!

 

[Blastburner]

@ tortferngatr: Yea, this is dream world. I have no idea how to put it in the title.

@ jorada: Wow! Great rate. I'm definitely going to try some of these. I'm definitely changing Ononokusu. I'l change some of the moves on Latios too.

@ y4f: Some great additional ideas. Magnezone should not try to set up a substitute on skarmory in my opinion because skarmory can just whirlwind away or drop spikes. Shandera has 145 base sp. atk? Nice. Changing scizor seems like a good idea too.

Thnx for rating.

 

[Hirako Shinji]

If youre changing scizor, you should use Bug Bite, not X-Scissor. With Technichian, it hits 90 base power, 20 more then X-Scissor, despite the chance to you get a random berry.