Somewhat sand team

[Ukkoclap]

Hi there, I'm pretty new to battling competetively, but I'm looking what I can possibly improve my team for more wins. Currently i've come to the point getting 50/50 wins, but I feel my team is lacking something that keeps me from winning more battles. Anyways this is my team right now.

Tyranitar @ Choice Band
Trait: Sand Stream
EVs: 180 HP / 252 Atk / 76 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Crunch
- Stone Edge
- Stealth Rock
- Pursuit

Nice things about T-tar is during the sandstorm his sdef is increased by 50% that makes him bulky against water moves, but having 4x weakness against Fighting is still a problem. Good physical sweeper with Choice Band and good to swap in against physical pokemon and using pursuit on them if they're tyring to run away.

Garchomp @ Yache Berry
Trait: Rough Skin
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Outrage
- Swords Dance
- Fire Fang
- Earthquake

Garchomp is a nice physical sweeper. What I like from Garchomp vs other Dragon pokemon it has Earth and Dragon as STAB. I do have noticed that garchomp can't really take many special hits. Good against Fire/steels with Earthquake and Fire Fang for Pokemon like Scizor or other weak to fire types. Outrage makes also a good combination when fighting non-steel types and dragons that are slower than Garchomp also OHKOs Dragonite when not at full HP. Sword Dance boosting attack when I get the chance.

Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Trait: Poison Heal
EVs: 252 HP / 6 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature
- Earthquake
- Substitute
- Toxic
- Protect

From what I've read Gliscor can be used either as a stall or Baton Passer. I've chosen for the stall tactic, because I don't have many other defensive or bulky Pokemon as long I don't encounter pokemon using strong Ice attacks Gliscor can pretty much wall many physical attacks and wear out the oponent with Toxic and I can protect myself with Substitute and Protect also can thrown in earthquakes aslong they aren't immune to it or flying.

Scizor @ Life Orb
Trait: Technician
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 6 SDef
Adamant Nature
- Bullet Punch
- Swords Dance
- Roost
- Bug Bite

Scizor is another great sweeper if I can get 1 sword dance off Bullet Punch is a killer or Bug Bite versus physics. Roost can keep Scizor healthy only danger is fire moves which pretty much can OHKO Scizor. I chose HP EV over Speed for a more bulky Scizor since you'd mostly use Bullet Punch which is a priority move and if I'm gonna Sword dance 1 round it wouldn't matter if I go first or not.

Gothitelle @ Leftovers
Trait: Shadow Tag
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 6 SAtk
Bold Nature
IVs: 30 Atk / 30 Def
- Calm Mind
- Substitute
- Psyshock
- Tickle

Gothitelle is kind of trapper if its convinient. With Shadow Tag the oponent can't escape I can tickle the oponent and set up Calm Mind enough to OHKO with psyshock. Only weak thing with semi-wall Gothitelle is there's no reliable recovery, since she doesn't get Recover.

Latias (F) @ Choice Specs
Trait: Levitate
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Psyshock
- Thunderbolt
- Draco Meteor

Great special sweeper would find it hard to swap this one out. Any physical walls I come a cross I can take care with Latias. usually can OHKO Ferrothorns with HP unless they have SDef EVs. Latias is also usually faster than other dragons so it can pretty much OHKO any dragons with Draco Meteor. Psyshock versus special walls like Blissey, and Thunderbolt against flying/water types I can't hurt enough with STAB moves. Latias has good Speed stat and SDef too only con it's rather frail against physical attacks and pursuit pretty much OHKOs Latias.


I usually start off with Gothitelle to trap the enemy or T-tar and stealthrock. If there's a good physical to wall I can swap in with Gliscor and toxic them to either keep walling them or have them force to switch to another pokemon. Fromt here pretty much keep sweeping untill I win.

Threaths
- I usually still feel trapped against certain combinations also my team really isn't fond of Water/Ice oponents.
- Also my team is in great danger if my oponent can get off dragon dances or 2 then having greater speed than any other of my Pokemon and kills them off left and right since most pokemon are rather frail.
- Spike teams are also pretty annoying.
- Jirachi - pretty annoying overall usually takes 3 tries to kill it. Also strong when i'm either stuck in Outrage or when my oponent anticipates my move knowing I'm gonna Draco Meteor.
- anything crippling my pokemone with para/burn.
- Not sure what else.

I feel I still kinda lack something on the support department or should I also be considering swapping some sweepers for something else with not the same weakness?

Any tips/feedback would be much appreciated.

 

[Nemusus]

Try and have more description for each Pokemon- it's hard to understand why you chose each Pokemon, what threats you intend for them to take out, etc.

Now, first off, with that Latias set, you should run a life orb, as there is no point to running recover on a Choice set- you get locked in to recover, and your Latias isn't a bulky variant, so that's not a great strategy. You could either replace Recover with Dragon Pulse/Hidden Power Fire or replace the Coice Specs for Life Orb. However, Latios' higher Sp.A makes him a better candidate for a Choice Specs user, so I'd recommend him over Latias if you want Specs. Otherwise, use Life Orb Latias.

Umm... Gyarados beats Tyranitar most of the time, unless they switch Gyarados into Tyranitar. Otherwise, they Dragon Dance when Tyranitar switches in, and then they have a 75% chance of beating you with Waterfall. Also, Stone Edge straight up OHKOs 252HP/0Def Gyarados, and 2HKOs all variants with defence investment, so there's not much point to running it. You don't beat Politoed either. I'd recommend running Pursuit over Thunder punch, as you can then beat the Lati twins, Espeon, and other fragile psychics.

Scizor has pretty terrible speed, so I'd recommend a 252 Atk, 252 HP, 4 Speed Ev spread. It gives you more bulk, while still maximising attack. Also, Bullet Punch gives you priority, so there is no point to 252 Speed.

 

[Elite 4 John]

Hey man,nice team

I though did notice a few drawbacks on u team but still its a cool team

1.Scizor is slow so it doesnt really need 2 outrun things and it gets bullet punch so i would suggest u max the hp ev's and keep max attack and 4 in speed.That way u take hits,deal massive damage with ur attacks and heal up with roost.Also u may wanna consider lefties as an option 4 your scizor.

2.I dont see the point of recover on a specs latias.Would suggest u change it to a life orb since it doesnt lock u into using the same move.If u wanna stick 2 specs u may wanna test T-Bolt or HP Fire so ferro doesnt completely wall your latias.

3.I think ur better of replacing stealth rocks on ferro and put leech seed otherwise u will lack the recovery 4 your ferro.And also u may wanna put lefties on your ferro 2 add up the recovery from leech seed.

4.You can replace thunder punch on T-Tar and put in rocks.Since stone edge ohkoes gyarados after rocks.Also u may wanna consider runnin lefties or expert belt.Up 2 personal preference

So those are my suggestions.Hope i helped!!!!!

 

[John the Aussie]

make sure you read the how to make an RMT thread ie you should have at least 3 lines of description for each poke
you team is prity good and covers most of its threats well but hear are the outstanding issues.
1. the sprite you chose to represent your tyranitar is very humorous :D but on a more serious note you may wish to give him stealth rock over your ferrothorn as more often you will lead with your weather inducer and as so you will want stealth rocks up for longer so as to rack up more damage against switches and you really dont need thunderpunch. you might want to consider the edgequake combo on ttar as well. if your really set on giveing him a band then at least replace thunder punch w ice punch for the more common dragon grass flying and ground types.
2. support your weather. what i mean is your team mainly relies upon the weather for its damaging effects and to get rid of other weathers so you may wish to try a hippowdon on your team as well as ttar but on top of scizor this also gets rid of one of your weaknesses to fire.
3. consider a rapid spinner. my suggestion would be sandslash who offers a certainty of getting rid of entry hazards as well as a great sweeping potential.

 

[Ukkoclap]

Bump.

 

[Prinz]

Hi

The first thing I notice when I looked at your team is your weakness to Rain teams in general. Keldeo can just spam Surf and damage hard your whole team, only Latias can switch into it but she hasn't a recovery move so she can't tank strong Water-types attacks like Keldeo's Surf and Choice Specs Politoed's Hydro Pump (another annoying Pokemon to face for your team) all the battle. To solve your weakness to Rain teams without changing any Pokemon of your team I'd use a different set on your Latias -- a Calm Mind one with a standard EV spread of 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe with a moveset of Dragon Pulse, Recover, Calm Mind and with Psyshock / Hidden Power Fire / Substitute (choose the move you prefer here, if you want a preference of mine I usually prefer Substitute to avoid annoying status like badly poison and paralysis and to setup more easily at the same time), with a Timid nature and with Leftovers should work fine on your team. If you want to use something different because you don't like Calm Mind Latias so much for some reasons, a more offensive set with an EV spread of 72 HP / 184 SAtk / 252 Spd, with a moveset of Surf, Psyshock, Draco Meteor and Recover, with a Timid nature and with Life Orb should work too. Just try both of them and see which is the best on your team.

Now I'd give a look on your Tyranitar, you're using Stealth Rock with a Choice item and it's generally not good at all because you have to switch out whenever you use Stealth Rock and this way you allow a free turn at your opponent which can do anything he wants. For this reason, you may try to use Stealth Rock on your Garchomp changing its set accordingly. I'd use the Stealth Rock one from this page which can setup Stealth Rock easily and which can hit hard at the same. I personally prefer Focus Sash to setup SR more easily and I prefer Fire Blast instead Sword Dance too, it allows to hit Steel-types such as Forretress, Ferrothorn and Skarmory which can give some problem to Garchomp otherwise. However, there are just preference of mine so feel free to use Life Orb and Sword Dance if you prefer them.

Then, you can change Stealth Rock on your Tyranitar to something more useful. Superpower is the move you need -- it allows to hit hard Steel-types which resist the other moves and to punish the switch in of Terrakion, Keldeo and Breloom at the same time. You also should try to use a faster Tyranitar, 104 EVs on Speed are enough to outspeed some fast version of Jellicent which can otherwise burn your Tyranitar before it Pursuits / Crunches them. 104 EVs on Speed allows to outspeed Skarmory too and to 2HKO it with Stone Edge, Skarmory is a big problem to both your Gliscor and Scizor so if you kill it, Gliscor and Scizor can do their job better of course.

As last thing, I don't see the point to use Gothitelle with Calm Mind and Tickle, it's for sure a creative set but in my opinion you may also try something different. I'd personally use a Choice Scarf one since your team lacks a revenge-killer and a fast Pokemon in general. Try the Choice Scarf one from this page and see how it works on your team.

Good luck!

 

[Ukkoclap]

Thanks for the useful information, got one question do you think it would be good to swap something out for a pokemon that can clear status effect in the party like with Healing Bell and that can stall/wall a little with self heal?

 

[BlackOnyx]

Your team seems really weak to Mienshao; almost all your team is weak to fighting or ice, and you can't trap it with Gothitelle; it'd U-Turn out. I suggest running a Cleric Jirachi over Gothitelle; it's still bulky, and can help inflict status on the opposing team, downgrading the annoying fast threats that take down your team. With wish and Heal Bell, and U-Turn, it could really provide your team some survivability, letting you focus more on offense with your other Pokemon.

 

[Ukkoclap]

Ok, I'll look into Jirachi also am I missing something or Jirachi doesn't learn Heal Bell?

 

[Arcticblast]

Mienshao is rarely seen in OU, and it definitely isn't getting away from Garchomp or Scizor with much health left (if it gets away at all).

I'd like to suggest using a Life Orb Latias over your current Specs version (unless you're testing CM and prefer that). It has similar power to Specs Latias and has the freedom to change moves, and can even pack Roost on top of that.

Latias (F) @ Life Orb
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Psyshock / Thunderbolt / Surf
- Draco Meteor
- Roost

Good luck with the team!