Tipping The Balance (Balanced Team)

[mattpla440]

INTRODUCTION:

I've been experimenting with teams for awhile, most recently testing rain, sand, and double dragon teams or even combinations of them that I have found success with previously. I had not been able to find much success recently and decided to scrap the whole weather fad. So far after a couple of test rounds with this team I have found it to be very solid and I have been happy with the results.

TEAM AT A GLANCE:

TEAM BUILDING:

Hide

I wanted a strong physical sweeper with boosting capabilities and good coverage. The first pokemon that came to mind was Terrakion.

Next I needed a pokemon to help cover some of Terrakion's weaknesses as well as support it with status. Celebi fit that bill.

Another good defensive/support pokemon was then added in the form of Rotom-W. The washing-machine has great synergy with the other two members of the team.

Next after looking at my team I deemed that I needed some counters for Lati@s and otherwise good fits in the team. Scizor helps check alot of threats to this team, while Starmie spins and helps keep other pokemon at bay.

To provide hazard support and some more defense I chose Bronzong to fill that role. I would use him as a lead-type on this team.

I found that Bronzong did not provide as much help as I thought and my team struggled against boosting teams or baton pass teams. To help fix this I chose Skarmory to help cover similar threats as Bronzong, but provide more valuable stalling and utility.

THE TEAM:

Skarmory (M) @ Leftovers Trait: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 48 Def / 184 SDef / 24 Spd
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Drill Peck
- Stealth Rock
- Roost
- Whirlwind
THE SKINNY:
Skarmory fills the role of a balanced wall and hazard setup on this team. He is most exclusively used in a leading position to set up rocks early, however if there are threats he can be subbed out. Skarmory's typing allows him to take hits that most of his teammates cannot and they thank him for that by absorbing fire and electric type damage for him. Choosing Drill Peck over Brave Bird was mostly based on the recoil, while drill peck still allows it to take out some common threats such as Vizeron. Roost and Stealth rock are self explanatory for this set, while whirlwind provides valuable phazing when going up against stat boosters and subseaders. All in all, Skarm provides a valuable defensive and supporting role for this team.

Terrakion @ Air Balloon
Trait: Justified
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Close Combat
- Stone Edge
- Swords Dance
- Rock Polish
THE SKINNY:
The top dog of this team. With powerful boosting movies including Rock Polish and Swords dance, Terrakion can come in on a non-threatening pokemon and set up based on necessity. Close Combat and Stone Edge provide powerful STAB and great coverage to hit most pokemon hard. Terrakion loves the burns that Rotom puts on Fighting types, the thunder waves that Celebi spreads to faster opponents, and the stealth rocks to get those OHKOs. Most of his weaknesses are covered by his teammates, but I usually wait until his threats are eliminated or weakened and he can pull a sweep. Terrakion is definately a powerhouse that can guarantee some heavy damage to opponents. It also helps to switch in on a Dark attack aimed at Celebi or Starmie and get an attack boost.

Celebi @ Leftovers
Trait: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 220 Def / 36 Spd
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Grass Knot
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Thunder Wave
- Recover
THE SKINNY:
Defensive Celebi helps to spread Terrakion's favorite friend, paralysis, to help increase his sweeping ability. Other than that, Celebi provides some invaluable resistances to help out its teammates including a nice fighting resistance. Recovery helps add to the longevity of Celebi and helps to stall. Grass Knot and HP Fire round out this set to help clear out common typed pokemon such as water, ground, steel, and grass. Natural Cure is a great ability allowing Celebi to absorb status without worry.

Rotom-W @ Leftovers
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 112 HP / 252 SAtk / 144 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Thunderbolt
- Hydro Pump
- Will-O-Wisp
- Pain Split
THE SKINNY:
Rotom-W was added to this team as a good defensive and utility pokemon to help balance out weaknesses. Combined with Terrakion and Celebi, Rotom forms a perfect resistance balance as well as providing good synergy. Thunderbolt and Hydro Pump are there for powerful STAB attacks that can hit hard with this build. Will-o-wisp helps me check physical sweepers and fighting types that will further increase the effectiveness of my team. Pain Split with Rotom's low HP stat help to eat away at the opponents health while healing itself. Levitate helps avoid the ever common earthquake, spikes, and toxic spikes that may plague the field. All in all, Rotom fills the role of a threatening special attacker with good bulk and utility.

Scizor (M) @ Choice Band
Trait: Technician
EVs: 212 HP / 200 Atk / 88 SDef / 8 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Bullet Punch
- U-turn
- Pursuit
- Superpower
THE SKINNY:
Scizor, a regular at the OU level fills the role of revenge killer and scout. I chose to run a bulkier variation, rather than the all out attacking version, for added survivability against powerful special sweepers. Bullet punch is self-explanatory hitting with STAB and Technician to easily polish off weak pokemon. U-turn helps get in clean switches while helping to scout the enemy team. Pursuit traps threatening pokemon such as Lati@s, Reunculis, and spin-blocking ghosts among others. Superpower is there for heavy hitting against steel, rock, and normal types. Scizor shines in the role that made him one of the biggest threats in Gen 4 to help this team.

Starmie @ Leftovers
Trait: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam
- Surf
- Rapid Spin
THE SKINNY:
This team doesn't really appreciate enemy hazards, so thats where Starmie comes in. A highly offensive variation of the rapid spinning Starmie sets, omits Recovery for Ice Beam. Ice Beam is critical in handling dragon, grass, and ground types that hurt this team. Thunderbolt finishes the BoltBeam combo that fits well with Starmies special attacking prowess. Surf actually replaced Recover because after testing, this team offered no fast counter with water type moves to hit Ninetails, Infernape, and Heatran that broke this team before. BoltBeam and Surf help allow Starmie pull off a late game sweep providing its counters and walls are removed, and some enemies have been softened up. Natural cure again helps Starmie serve as a status absorber, which you can never have enough of.

CONCLUSION:
When playing with this team, I've found myself beginning with a stall approach until the opponent's team has been softened up and then from there the offense goes fast. The only threats I've encountered so far have been the fast fire types, which I've adjusted to by adding Surf to Starmie. The other threat was baton pass and stat boosting teams, which I swapped Bronzong for Skarmory to help phaze using whirlwind. Overall I've been quite pleased with this team. Thanks for your time.

 

[silentshadow7]

I love terrakion, but i've always found he doesn't have amazing defenses. Without good defenses it is usually harder to set up. Because of this I would recommend that you remove a setup move from him and pick another attack for coverage (earthquake, x-scisor). If you really want to decrease the setup you can give terrakion a choice item. Also, if you run a rock polish set or a choice scarf he will be out speeding almost everything, so I would choose rock slide over stone edge for some flinch-hax. Also the increased accuracy doesn't hurt. If celebi is gonna be paralyzing people, go for rock slide.
Hope I helped :)

 

[afterburn]

Hey, cool team. It seems Sun teams are problematic for you with no weather changer of your own; Growth Venusaur under the sun can force out Rotom-W (not minding the burn) and can set-up on Scizor's Superpower or Pursuit and sweep you clean from there. Taunt W-o-W Mew is also annoying, again coming into Scizor locked into the wrong move, being able to cripple your members with W-o-W and then outstalling you with Taunt / Recover. None of your attackers can get in a clean KO on it. Starmie is also threatening with Rain support, as you have to risk a tie with your own Starmie, which if you lose, it can sweep you clean.

Specially Defensive Heatran over Starmie solves the first two issues. Starmie is unneeded on this team, you have a solid Water- type in Rotom-W, and you have the threats Starmie checks, such as Infernape, Heatran and Gliscor covered, so it kind of overlaps its role with the other members. Heatran is able to wall Growth Venusaur and cripple Volcarona with Toxic, two premier sun sweepers (along with helping you vs sun in general), while being able to defeat Mew, not giving a damn about W-o-W. It also forms the Celetran core with Celebi and allows you to check lots of threats between the two, most Steel- types and Bulky Water- types (also Rain and Sun teams initially). Furthermore, Heatran abuses the hazards set-up by Skarmory by forcing switches with Toxic / Roar and Lava Plume burns (you also cover the Physical and Special attacks with Skarm / Tran).

Without Starmie you do lose a way to revenge Thundurus, which is why you should try Choice Scarf Rotom-W over your current set. With this, you will be able to revenge a wide range of threats such as Thundurus, Infernape, Starmie, etc. You said Rotom helped check Physical threats, but Skarmory covers pretty much all of them. Rotom will also be able to work as a stop to CM'ers and similar boosters with Trick and make up for the lost speed with the removal of Starmie, while stilll hitting hard enough and maintaining its bulk with the listed spread. It gives you a second revenge killer along with Scizor, so it takes off a bit of pressure of Scizor, while making a solid scouting duo with Scizor thanks to Volt Switch (both resisting each other's weaknesses and handling each other's checks). It has better overall bulk than your current set, while enough speed to outpace Scarftar, which is all you really need.

With Heatran taking Draco Meteor and similar Special Attacks, you can turn Skarmory into the standard 252 HP / 244 Def / 16 Spe, seeing as you need the bulk for Physical threats such as SD Landorus. But feel free to stick with your current spread if CM Virizion is too annoying (though Celebi can take a hit and cripple it, while Scizor can take a hit and do a ton with U-turn). You can run Stealth Rock on Heatran now, and Spikes over Stealth Rock on Skarmory, since that is what Skarmory should be doing, checking threats, and setting up hazards for the team, and to weaken Physically bulky walls (i.e. Hippowdon) for Terrakion, whom I assume is you late game cleaner.

Movesets:

SDefensive Heatran / Scarf Rotom-W

Heatran (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SAtk / 252 SDef
Calm nature (+Sdef, -Atk)
- Flamethrower / Lava Plume
- Toxic / Roar
- Earth Power
- Stealth Rock
---

Rotom-W @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 216 HP / 144 SAtk / 148 Spe
Modest nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Hydro Pump
- Volt Switch
- Hidden Power Fire / Hidden Power Ice
- Trick
---

GL

 

[AB2]

Hey, this is a pretty nice team. Your weakness to sun teams has been covered pretty well so there is not really a huge need to explain it. Faster special attackers such as choice specs Latios and Starmie can outrun and do major damage to this entire team. Against Starmie, it seems like the only way that you will win is if you win the speed tie with your own Starmie. Obviously, this makes this a pretty shaky check as most of the time Starmie will do major damage to this team regardless. Scarf Tyrantiar would work perfectly on this team over Scizor. Not only does it essentially solve your weakness to sun teams, but it also gives you a decent stop to faster special attackers such as Starmie, Gengar, Thundurus, and the lati twins. Tyranitar also gives you a weather changer, and although you do not really have any true abusers of sandstorm, it will give you the ability to more easily fight off other weathers. Tyranitar should be running a set of crunch / pursuit / superpower / stone edge, choice scarf, jolly, and maximum speed and attack.

If Scizor is removed, Virizion can be a huge problem to this team. It has the ability to set up a calm mind versus a few members of this team and pretty much sweep you clean. Calm mind Latias would fit on this team very well over Starmie. Although Latias does a pretty nice job in switching into and sponging attacks from Virizion, it also gives you the ability to abuse the hazards that Skarmory has laid down for this team. Latias also allows you to keep the water and fighting resist and giving you an extra electric resistance and a sure fire way of dealing with Gliscor, which can be a pretty big problem for Terrakion to deal with. Maximum speed and hp, leftovers, timid nature, and a set of calm mind / dragon pulse / recover / roar will work on this team very well. Substitute is an option over roar as well if you want to have a very nice way of dealing with taunt + wow Mew as you will be able to set up all over it. Substitute can also scout out for incoming Scizor and Tyranitar as well as blocking out random paralysis or toxic which can really cripple Latias.

Skarmory should really have a set of spikes / roost / brave bird / whirlwind as opposed to the one that you're running now. Spikes really helps Terrakion, Latias, and Rotom-W who can all force switches rack up plenty of hazard damage. Also, a spread of 252 HP / 216 Def / 40 Spe will work well in outrunning choice band Tyranitar that do not run a ton of speed as well as giving you a better switch in to sandstorm sweepers. If you decide to run spikes on Skarmory, I would try running stealth rock on Celebi. This way, Celebi can provide you with stealth rock as well as checking threats such as Rotom-W, Jellicent, and drizzle. Celebi should really run leaf storm / hidden power [fire] / stealth rock / recover, leftovers, modest nature as well as a spread of 228 HP / 240 SpA / 40 Spe so that you can out space stallbreaker Mew with Celebi as well. Rotom-W would work really well with volt switch over thunderbolt. With Tyranitar, Rotom-W can lure in Latias and volt switch as it comes in allowing you to trap and ko it with Tyranitar. This also helps you abuse the hazards that Skarmory and Celebi provide by putting immediate offensive pressure on your opponent.

This is a pretty solid team that you have here. Good Luck.