Standard Sand? First RMT here

[Dragonicwari]

Introduction

Hi guys, welcome to my first RMT on Smogon. So lately everyone and their moms have been telling me what holds me back is in the competetive environment is my team building ability. So I decided to try and make a fairly standard team but this team so far is only doing slightly better than most of my teams (this one peaked a little under 1800, I'm use to seeing myself get to around 1725-50ish). So I decided I would go ahead and post this team and get some help. I am willing to listen to just about any suggestion as long as you explain WHY I should make the change and HOW it will benefit me. AKA I will not listen to the guy who posts: "LOL, your team doesn't have Scizor, drop any of your members because Scizor is better than all of them." That being said, I don't mind people being harsh on me, as long as they have a solid argument.

Team Building Process

So I was browsing the RMT threads and eventually found myself on the archives. I stumbled upon an old balanced sandstorm team using Hippowdon and I realized I never used Hippowdon even though I really like how it looks on paper.

Now I was going through the mons of Ou looking for something that resisted ice, water, and grass attacks... I'm sure you all realize I did not get very far. Eventually I decided on the psuedo FerroCent core: CruelThorn.

Next I needed some offense, so I just took the 2 most common sweepers in sandstorm (and made myself fairly rain weak, it's fun to play like this trust me) and added Terrakion and Landorus.

So I decided I wanted a bulky mon and added CM Reuniclus.... And then I wanted a late game sweeper so I changed it to Trick Room Reuniclus. I put in so much effort into my team building >.>

Hippowdon @ Leftovers
Trait: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 HP / 16 Def / 240 SDef
Sassy Nature
- Earthquake
- Ice Fang
- Slack Off
- Whirlwind

So I found this set on the thread "The Great Southern Trendkill" and honestly I really like it. It's bulky on both ends of the spectrum and is often my go to wall and phaser. Slack off gives me reliable recovery (which I would not mind on more members of my team to be honest) and I honestly feel like this makes Hippowdon the easiest pokemon to win a weather war with in ou. That being said I normally keep the Hippo held back until I have fully abused my opponents weather. Earthquake by the way is my stab move of choice while ice fang gives me some nice coverage, specifically against Landorus and Dragons. Hippowdon tends to act as my mixed wall and he normally does quite well at it, being able to take hits from both sides really well.

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

Since I already had a mixed wall I decided I did not need another. Instead I decided to go with a physically defensive Ferrothorn. Now you might be thinking: "This guy has no spikes, he's such a nooby noob biscuit." To which I respond: "I don't have a spin blocker, so why would I run spikes?" That aside, Ferro is my only user of entry hazards in the form of stealth rocks. Leech seed gives me some much needed recovery on my team and works really well with sandstorm. Power whip and Gyro Ball are my stab moves and they both have their utility. Power whip allows me to take on water types that my team absolutely despise while gyro ball lets me hit fast targets such as dragons that try to set up on me or one of the Muskateer's for example. Ferrothorn also is one of my main rain counters, walling many pokemon on rain teams.

Tentacruel @ Leftovers
Trait: Rain Dish
EVs: 144 SDef / 112 Spd / 252 HP
Calm Nature
- Giga Drain
- Ice Beam
- Rapid Spin
- Scald

Now y'all are probably wondering why I have speed investment. It's in here specifically for Breloom so I can either ice beam or scald it since NOBODY expects speed investment in Tentacruel. Now I run sp def Ev's because sp def Tentacruel tanks hits for days. Now that we have that out of the way, Tentacruel is here to be my main rain counter as well as my only spinner, which is useful when my opponent runs lots of hazards. Giga drain lets me hit the common water types of the tier while ice beam nails any dragon that thinks I am set up fodder. Scald is useful for burns and stab shenanigans. Oh, by the way, this set easily takes volt switches from Rotom, and if they T-bolt I will heal back enough to take another via giga drain iirc as long as they aren't randomly max investment specs or some crazy stuff like that.

Terrakion @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Justified
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spd / 4 SDef
Jolly Nature
- Close Combat
- Stone Edge
- Earthquake
- X-Scissor

This is Scarf Terrakion with a bit of a twist. Most people don't run earthquake but because I'm sooooo flipping hipster I decided it would be good coverage against things like Jirachi and Tentacruel. Unfortunately it deals like 60% max to both but it can ease prediction depending on my opponents team and is often an unpleasant surprise for them. Other than that this is a really standard Terrakion in my opinion, Close Combat and Stone Edge are my stab options, while X scissor nails psychic types hard. Next I have maxed out speed and full investment in attack with 4 Ev's in sp def for the sand boost. Terrakion is my revenge killer (no way man) and I normally switch it into set up sweepers that use dragon/quiver dance on turn one of them being out so that they have no chance of getting the second dance and outspeeding me.

Reuniclus @ Life Orb
Trait: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 SAtk / 192 HP / 64 Def
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Focus Blast
- Psyshock
- Shadow Ball
- Trick Room

Trick room Reuniclus, nuff said. Wait, you wanted more? Alright: this guy will come in and do some crazy things to your pokemon man, suddenly they all think Reuniclus is faster than them. While your pokemon are in this very odd state Reuniclus then proceeds to kill off every one of your members. His attacks give him solid coverage and by the time he normally comes out he can 1 shot every member that is left on your team. Thus he acts as my main late game sweeper, often saving me from losing. He has maxed out sp atk and considerable bulk, plus life orb lets him finish off most pokemon at 60% or less.

Landorus (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Sand Force
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 Atk / 4 SAtk
Naive Nature
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Rock Polish

Have you ever played never have I ever? Let me start: Never have I ever used rock polish with this team. I'm considering switching it to work up or something. Anyways, here is the old physical Lando with hp ice. Honestly I would switch him to the sheer force variant if Jellicent didn't hard wall my team by changing that. Seriously guys, my way of taking out Jellicent (when Ferro is dead) is: Send out Landorus. Landorus uses EQ. Landorus dies. I send out Terrakion. Terrakion uses EQ, Jellicent dies. Which is annoying because Landorus is an otherwise solid wall breaker. Anyways he has max speed and attack with a slight investment in sp atk to kill stuff. I have ran life orb ever since I found out my Landorus was emo and dealt more damage whenever he was on pain.

Replays

http://www.pokemonshowdown.com/replay/ou-15371376 Hippowdon is a monster

http://www.pokemonshowdown.com/replay/ou-15494697 Really close game that almost pushes me into the 1800's

http://www.pokemonshowdown.com/replay/ou-15500557 First loss, 5-0, Celebi hurts

http://www.pokemonshowdown.com/replay/ou-16086416 I really hate hax, especially when it's obvious you should have won

ThreatList

Jellicent can wall me pretty well depending on what I have left

Defensive Celebi walls me if it is in a good core

If my opponent has good prediction Toxicroak can be an issue


Testing

Sub Toxic Tentacruel (suggested by Chimpakt)
U-turn Landorus (suggested by Chimpakt and Viktor)
E-belt Landorus (suggested by Chimpakt)
Black Sludge on Tentacruel (suggested by Tendrake, this is a definite change once I have the opportunity to change it)
Latios + Mamoswine > Landorus I + Reuniclus (Suggested by Tendrake)
​

 

[chimpact]

Hey there, you say you have difficulty handling Jellicent and I completely agree with you. Altough Jellicent doesn't really have a lot of opportunities to switch in to your team, it isn't really 2hko'd by anything. Every one of your pokemon hit it decently hard enough, but Tentacruel is a great bait for taking it out. Tenta doesn't do enough damage to 2hko Jellicent with Giga Drain, but a variant of Sub / Toxic / Scald / Rapid Spin can handle your jellicent problem much more efficiently. It gives you a great answer to rain teams as you can substitute up on opposing water types trying to scald burn you, you can try to get ferrothorn to miss power whips to try to scald burn it later on, and it just overall takes hits very well. An EV spread of 252 HP / 144 Def / 112 Spd will allow you to outspeed all Adamant Base 95s (Kyurem-B/ Gliscor) and Jolly Base 80s (Dragonite, Mamoswine, Chandelure) so you can potentially sub toxic stall them or take them out if they're weakened enough.

Additionally, just make your Landorus an Ebelt one with U-turn over rock Polish. There's absolutely no reason to use rock polish on a physical lando. there are so many pokemon that can take the edgequake combo and it's too reliant on sand to be effective. You should either just turn it into the sheer force lando (EP/ Focus Blast / HP Ice / RP) or just give it ebelt with u-turn.

Lastly, I think you should test out Spikes over Leech Seed on ferrothorn. you may not have a spin blocker, but not every team carries a spinner. Ferrothorn handles most spinners well anyway and it will allow your landorus and terrakion to really get some crucial 2hko/ohko's they otherwise wouldn't be able to get. Trick Room Reuniclus works really well with multiple hazards as people try to switch out a lot to take advantage of the limited amount of Trick Room turns. you could also try to replace whirlwind or Ice Fang with stealth rock (on hippo) and put spikes over stealth rock on ferrothorn, but you would make yourself extremely vulnerable to DDnite and other set up sweepers.


TL;DR

- Change to Substitute / Toxic / Scald / Rapid Spin with 252 HP / 144 Def / 112 Spd @ Timid Nature

- U-turn > Rock Polish and Life Orb > E-belt or just make it a special attacking Sheer force lando with a bulkier spread of 72 HP / 252 SAtk / 184 Spd @ Modest Nature.

Try to fit spikes in his moveset

Good luck and I hope I helped!

 

[Viktor24]

If rock polish isn't your thing, you can try either swords dance (for sweeping and wall breaking) or U-turn.

 

[Dragonicwari]

Big thank you to both of you, while spikes are really nice (I've abused them before) I think I'm not going to try fitting them on because it would cause to much moveset manipulation. I will try sub toxic Tentacruel and u-turn on Lando as well as the expert belt.

Any more rates would be much appreciated :)

 

[Tendrake]

Hey, I like your team! However looking through, I feel that Reuniclus just doesn't seem to fit into the team due to anti-synergy between your fast mons and Trick Room, as well as the fact that you have to waste a turn to set up TR. Because of this, I'd suggest some kind of Specs L@tias set, which would not only maintain a powerful lategame sweep and strong revenge killing with Base 110 speed, but would also grant you resists to Grass/Water/Fire, which would help against common mons in Sun and Rain teams. If you're not a fan of Specs, you could run either EBelt, Life Orb, Leftovers or Scarf, pick your poison.

The other suggestion is a very minor one, and that's to replace Leftovers on Tentacruel with Black Sludge. It gives exactly the same recovery, but it will poison any Trick user that tries to remove it from you. The amount of times this will happen is probably negligible, but it's nice to have the ability to do so in a pinch.

Also I'm not entirely sure how well this would work, but looking at your team I think that replacing Lando with CB Mamoswine might be extremely effective at wallbreaking and give you the biggest threat against Dragons. L@tias's levitate and typing would prevent Ground/Fighting type moves from wrecking Mamoswine, and together they'd have amazing synergistic coverage. Possibility to think about.

 

[Dragonicwari]

Thanks for the compliment, I'm going to break this down into a few sections

About trickroom: If you look at my team, only two members outspeed base 100's with max speed investment and the 4 mons that don't are pretty bulky. Thy normally eat up the trick room turns like it's their job because... It kind of is.

About Tentacruel: I normally run black sludge on Tentacruel, not sure why I'm not now.

About Latios+ Mamoswine: If you left it at just Latios I probably would have ignored that part since I would have become fairly ice weak (Hippo+Lando+Latios) however I think I'll use Life Orb Latios with recover and probably life orb Mamoswine. Thanks for the rate :)