Alright everyone, it's my turn. I've been looking at a set that I find that's great for the meta-game. Keep in mind, however, that this set is only specialized to work best in Hail, and that this set is based upon a Pokemon that I feel that is vastly underrated at this point of the meta-game. With having approximately as much bulk as Serperior, having a solid Special Attacking stat of 110, and having a granted access to STAB Blizzard and Ice Body, take our eyes here for Vanilluxe, a Pokemon that I may possibly suspect to become quite phenomenal within the set here.
Vanilluxe @ Life Orb
Trait: Ice Body
EVs: 112 HP / 252 SAtk / 144 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Autotomize
- Blizzard
- Hidden Power [Fighting] / Hidden Power [Ground]
- Protect / Flash Cannon
Now, some of you may have either forgotten that Vanilluxe existed, or just never cared to utilize it due to it becoming notably quite a notch much more inferior to other Ice-types, such as Regice and Articuno, some of you guys may be wondering why you'd imagine something like this. Also, with the welcome viable additions to other Hail-based threats that have gained quite a bunch of light with their powerful sets, such as SubProtect Offensive Glaceon and SubSplit Rotom-F, you may wonder what advantages will this particular set would carry on over the two. The answer is Autotomize; with Autotomize, a notable advantage is the ability to boost its Speed to outstanding levels, allowing it to have an exceptional chance of sweeping significantly more-so than the two and prevents it from becoming revenge killed by two of their most dangerous offensive threats, Sawk and Cincinno, and thanks to its great bulk and Ice Body, it will gain an absurd amount of opportunities to set-up an Autotomize, especially on various Ice and Grass types, some Choice Pokemon, and some common walls such as Snover and Garbodor. Blizzard is its main STAB move that, especially factoring in a Modest nature and Life Orb, will blast through anything that doesn't resist it. For example, Standard Gurdurr is OHKO'd with a combination of Protect (for Hail damage) and Stealth Rock damage. It is also interesting to note that it 2HKO's a number of resists as well, such as Rotom-F, Emboar, and Samurott. Hidden Power Fighting has nice coverage that OHKO's or 2HKO's a vast variety of Ice types, such as Rotom-F, Glaceon, and Piloswine, while also being quite useful for Pokemon like Thick Fat Miltank, Carracosta, and Probopass. Hidden Power Ground covers mainly Emboar and Carracosta, but is generally less useful of a coverage move outside of that ability. Protect has an immense amount of utility on this set. It can be used to scout for certain move of such, and provide utility of Ice Body and passive damage. The former being especially useful for healing some Life Orb damage and potentially getting yourself out of the KO range of Priority moves (252 Atk Life Orb Absol (+Atk) Sucker Punch vs 112 HP/0 Def Vanilluxe: 68.81% - 81.35% (2 hits to KO)
, 252 Atk Skuntank (+Atk) Sucker Punch vs 112 HP/0 Def Vanilluxe: 42.44% - 50.16% (2-3 hits to KO)
, for example), and the latter being useful for wearing down the opposing and possibly putting it in range of being taken out by Blizzard or a coverage move. Flash Cannon can be useful for covering for the Ice-types if you wish to choose HP Ground over HP Fighting.
The EV's give it enough speed to outspeed Scarf Timid Rotom-A after an Autotomize boost with an odd hp number, while outspeeding neutral-natured max Speed 65 Pokemon such as Emboar and Glaceon and outpacing Gorebyss before the boost. The rest are dumped into a nice investment of bulk with an odd HP number and Max SpA with Modest.
Snover is obviously its strongest team player Pokemon of this set's succession, as its ability Snow Warning allows it to activate an 100% accuracy and utility within Ice Body and Hail damage from their opponents. Otherwise, ironically, even with coverage moves, Standard RestTalk Regice is the best counter to this set, as it just barely sits out of 2HKO range of Flash Cannon after Stealth Rock damage. With that being said, Fighting types, especially Sawk, are by far and away the strongest teammates of this set, being able to easily smash through it and other possible rare switch-ins, such as Flareon. Duosion is also a great partner, as it does well against common Fighting types and takes most of its checks as setup fodder.