Official Nintendo Tournament team

[Epic Cherubi]

Trying to make it suck less.

So uhh. About that official Nintendo tournament.. I MIGHT be going. Some friends want to take a road trip soon, and I might be able to manipulate that into a trip to Pennsylvania. I don't know too much about doubles, but after the epic failure of my Trick Room Rain team I tried again with a Sunny Day team. Its been doing pretty good, having a 26-0 win record on PBR (fucking Palkia). Built for 4V4, which the Nintendo Tournament and PRB both use. Despite having some trouble with Rain Teams, it managed to beat all of them including one that started with Jolteon and Kyogre.

@ Heat Rock
Timid - Inner Focus
252 Speed / 252 Special Attack / 4 HP

Sunny Day
Taunt
Air Slash / Heat Wave
Protect

Part one of my lead combo. I needed something to set up Sunny Day while still living long enough to.. well, that was the main requirement. Inner Focus makes him immune to flinching, so asshole Fake Out users can go die. Taunt keeps me in control against Trick Room and Rain Dance teams, and can totally rape Smeargle. Air Slash is what I have been using in the third slot, but a Cherrim / Sunlight / Helping Hand boosted Heat Wave has the same destructive power as CB Metagross's Meteor Mash. I chose Air Slash in the end due to type coverage issues. God damn Heatran and other fire resisters pissed me off. Air Slash's flinch rate won me entire games as well. Protect is there to survive Shiftry's Explosion and to negate enemy attacks and buy myself time.

@ Life Orb
Naughty - Chorophyl (I can't spell!)
lol 100 HP / 100 Attack / 100 Speed / 100 Special Attack / 54 Defense / 54 Special Defense

Fake Out
Dark Pulse
Solarbeam
Explosion

I can explain the EVs! They were the result of a "I really want this pokemon but don't feel like EV training so fuck it horray vitamins" mindset. I'll figure out some real EVs later, and re-breed but bulk, speed and mixed attacking requirements means the EVs won't change much. Anyhow, Fake Out paired with Explosion wins most matchups. Occasionally Solarbeam or Dark Pulse gets a KO. Its impressive how much damage Shiftry can deal before dying. After Sun is put up Chlorophyl grants Shiftry incredible speed. Life Orb Explosion OHKOs most things, even after intimidate.

@ Yache Berry
Modest - Flower Gift
252 HP / 252 Special Attack / 4 Special Defense

Solarbeam
Protect
Sunny Day
Helping Hand

Fucking right, its Cherubi! Flower Gift gives both Cherubi and its teamate a 1.5 boost to its offenses. Helping Hand gives ANOTHER 1.5 boost. The very act of switching in can give my pokemon an offensive boost THAT very turn. This thing is impossibly bulky too. Its taken hits and shrugged them off in ways that didn't even make sense. Things like Draco Meteors, Sun Boosted Fire Blasts and even Blizzards are all survivable. Yache Berry was just a "damn you item clause" item back when I had Leftovers Bronzong to set up Sunny Day, but it has randomly worked in my favor by giving one extra turn to bring up Sunny Day, should it ever go down.

@ Choice Scarf
Modest - Blaze
252 Special Attack / 252 Speed / 4 HP

Eruption
Lava Plume
Focus Blast
Solarbeam

150 + 1.5 STAB + 1.5 Flower Gift + 1.5 Sunlight + 1.5 Helping Hand = 759. Oh shit son. Well, to be fair should it be hitting two pokemon it gets a .75 stat loss. So its only 569 some of the time! When you attack two pokemon at the same time, the faster pokemon is hit first by a 112.5 base power Eruption (not visibly, but calculated). Should it not survive, the second pokemon will be hit by the full 150 base power Eruption. Lava Plume if for the RARE times when Typhlosion takes too much damage. Focus Blast gives me SOME insurance over Heatran, but Earthquake is an option (easy OHKO with Flower Gift). SolarBeam is literally filler since Super Effective Solarbeam has 240 BP, where as STAB / Sunny / NVE Eruption manages a decent 168.

Well, thats the team. I'm also running a CB Infernape and Focus Sash Fake Out Ambipom for backups, should the opposing team reject Sun well enough.

 

[Scepticallistic]

Too bad Flower Gift only boosts Attack and Special Defense. :<

And I don't think Typhlosion should be running a Choice Scarf. I'm not too familiar with this type of battling, but with only 4 Pokemon (which means only 2 in reserve) to switch around with, I think switching with Choice Scarf will get a bit annoying. Typhlosion is decently fast and could benefit from a different item (I was thinking Life Orb, but then Eruption would get weaker with each move...).

And then thinking over it again, switching is pretty big in doubles, so *SHRUG*

More: All your attackers are special and are basically throwing around similarly typed moves. I don't have any good suggestions, but something like Tangrowth comes to mind, who can run a nice mix set and could really benefit from a Sp. Def boost from Cherrim (not to mention double speed in sun), although I don't know who to replace and how to integrate it without increasing your existing Ice and Fire weakness.

I notice you have Infernape and Ambipom as backup, so that might be enough if something "Blissey-like" shows up.

I'm so unhelpful. XD

 

[Epic Cherubi]

Oh shit you're right. Actually that explains a lot..

Edit: Typhlosion is only 100 base speed which is nice, but running Modest puts me at risk to other fast things like Zapdos and pretty much any other base 100 or better. Being trapped into Lava Plume is rarely an issue since it almost always hits harder than his other moves.

 

[viperGTS]

I have some prior Showdown experience, battling with more experienced people and all. Just so you know, kyogre cant be used in the tourney.

Your lead is well planned, but a tiny suggestion: use heat wave over air slash. The extra boost from sunny day will end up dealing more damage than air slash plus you have a chance with burn. Although, using air slash will help with dragons.

Typhlosion should(if possible) use Hidden Power [Ice] over solarbeam to deal with dragons who would otherwise wall your entire team, although shiftry's dark pulse helps, but your plan is to explode with him, so it might not have a chance with dark pulse.

 

[Epic Cherubi]

I have some prior Showdown experience, battling with more experienced people and all. Just so you know, kyogre cant be used in the tourney.

Your lead is well planned, but a tiny suggestion: use heat wave over air slash. The extra boost from sunny day will end up dealing more damage than air slash plus you have a chance with burn. Although, using air slash will help with dragons.

Typhlosion should(if possible) use Hidden Power [Ice] over solarbeam to deal with dragons who would otherwise wall your entire team, although shiftry's dark pulse helps, but your plan is to explode with him, so it might not have a chance with dark pulse.

I know Kyogre isn't allowed, I'm just testing on PBR lol.

I'll see what I can do about HP Ice. I don't do much breeding and I'm happy my Typhlosion managed to get 31 SA IVs and mid-20's in the other stats.

I'll try to get a good one from the breeders here but I have little to offer.

 

[The Lost One]

Hooray, a team that follows the rules so I can rate it!

Trying to make it suck less.

So uhh. About that official Nintendo tournament.. I MIGHT be going. Some friends want to take a road trip soon, and I might be able to manipulate that into a trip to Pennsylvania. I don't know too much about doubles, but after the epic failure of my Trick Room Rain team I tried again with a Sunny Day team. Its been doing pretty good, having a 26-0 win record on PBR (fucking Palkia). Built for 4V4, which the Nintendo Tournament and PRB both use. Despite having some trouble with Rain Teams, it managed to beat all of them including one that started with Jolteon and Kyogre.

@ Heat Rock
Timid - Inner Focus
252 Speed / 252 Special Attack / 4 HP

Sunny Day
Taunt
Air Slash / Heat Wave
Protect

Part one of my lead combo. I needed something to set up Sunny Day while still living long enough to.. well, that was the main requirement. Inner Focus makes him immune to flinching, so asshole Fake Out users can go die. Taunt keeps me in control against Trick Room and Rain Dance teams, and can totally rape Smeargle. Air Slash is what I have been using in the third slot, but a Cherrim / Sunlight / Helping Hand boosted Heat Wave has the same destructive power as CB Metagross's Meteor Mash. I chose Air Slash in the end due to type coverage issues. God damn Heatran and other fire resisters pissed me off. Air Slash's flinch rate won me entire games as well. Protect is there to survive Shiftry's Explosion and to negate enemy attacks and buy myself time.

@ Life Orb
Naughty - Chorophyl (I can't spell!)
lol 100 HP / 100 Attack / 100 Speed / 100 Special Attack / 54 Defense / 54 Special Defense

Fake Out
Dark Pulse
Solarbeam
Explosion

I can explain the EVs! They were the result of a "I really want this pokemon but don't feel like EV training so fuck it horray vitamins" mindset. I'll figure out some real EVs later, and re-breed but bulk, speed and mixed attacking requirements means the EVs won't change much. Anyhow, Fake Out paired with Explosion wins most matchups. Occasionally Solarbeam or Dark Pulse gets a KO. Its impressive how much damage Shiftry can deal before dying. After Sun is put up Chlorophyl grants Shiftry incredible speed. Life Orb Explosion OHKOs most things, even after intimidate.

As a whole, the two look like good enough leads. You will want to watch out for those priority users though, because Crobat won't be taking much from them even if he doesn't get Fake Out flinched. If they decide to gang up on him, your Sun is gone.

On Crobat, use Heat Wave. Assuming he survives long enough to attack, it'll do more damage because of the sun boost. However, you seem to be under the impression that Flower Gift raises special attack, which it does not.

On Shifty, As you said, EVs need a lot of work. You shouldn't plan on exploding as your main strategy either, since Shiftry is pretty good at damaging opponents. If you're going to be keeping Cherrim, I suggest making him Physical instead of mixed. The rest of your team is already full special, and he'll be able to take more advantage of Cherrim's boosts.

@ Yache Berry
Modest - Flower Gift
252 HP / 252 Special Attack / 4 Special Defense

Solarbeam
Protect
Sunny Day
Helping Hand

Fucking right, its Cherubi! Flower Gift gives both Cherubi and its teamate a 1.5 boost to its offenses. Helping Hand gives ANOTHER 1.5 boost. The very act of switching in can give my pokemon an offensive boost THAT very turn. This thing is impossibly bulky too. Its taken hits and shrugged them off in ways that didn't even make sense. Things like Draco Meteors, Sun Boosted Fire Blasts and even Blizzards are all survivable. Yache Berry was just a "damn you item clause" item back when I had Leftovers Bronzong to set up Sunny Day, but it has randomly worked in my favor by giving one extra turn to bring up Sunny Day, should it ever go down.

For the record, Flower Gift raises attack and special defense. So sorry, no special attack boost on...anything in your team. Also, I don't see why Cherrim needs to do anything but support - every turn, it will have something besides attacking to do. IF you want to give it a move, maybe try something to cover your current weaknesses (such as HP Ground, if you want to be really out there). Otherwise, change the EVs to be more defensive. Even if you use a move, calculate how many EVs you need in Special attack to KO certain threats with said move, and put the rest into your other defenses.

If you decide to make Cherrim support, make sure that Crobat has nice offense. You can't do with 2 support Pokemon.

@ Choice Scarf
Modest - Blaze
252 Special Attack / 252 Speed / 4 HP

Eruption
Lava Plume
Focus Blast
Solarbeam

150 + 1.5 STAB + 1.5 Flower Gift + 1.5 Sunlight + 1.5 Helping Hand = 759. Oh shit son. Well, to be fair should it be hitting two pokemon it gets a .75 stat loss. So its only 569 some of the time! When you attack two pokemon at the same time, the faster pokemon is hit first by a 112.5 base power Eruption (not visibly, but calculated). Should it not survive, the second pokemon will be hit by the full 150 base power Eruption. Lava Plume if for the RARE times when Typhlosion takes too much damage. Focus Blast gives me SOME insurance over Heatran, but Earthquake is an option (easy OHKO with Flower Gift). SolarBeam is literally filler since Super Effective Solarbeam has 240 BP, where as STAB / Sunny / NVE Eruption manages a decent 168.

Don't use Lava Plume. It'll hit your partner, and none of your Pokemon can handle it. Use Heat Wave instead.

Outside of Heatran, I don't see the use of Focus Blast. I'd replace it with HP Ice because you're going to have problems against Dragon Pokemon like Salamence and Flygon.

Solarbeam isn't really filler. It helps against ubiquitous rain teams that have 4x resistance to Eruption.

I also don't like the item or EVs. You'll want at least some defensive EVs because of Typhlosion's acceptable defenses. It could really make the difference between being KO'd in one turn or two. Also, as for the item, Choice items aren't favorable in the Doubles environment. He'd do much better with another item, such as a berry or another attack raising item. Do NOT use Life Orb because it will affect your Eruption.

Well, thats the team. I'm also running a CB Infernape and Focus Sash Fake Out Ambipom for backups, should the opposing team reject Sun well enough.

I'm not sure how the tournament works in real life, so I can't say whether or not they let you see the opponent's team beforehand. I know that's how it works in PBR, but it might work differently at the official tournament.

Overall, the team is OK. You should definitely work on some of the sets and EVs. I think it covers many things well though, so you're off to a good start.

Personally, I think you should replace Cherrim for a non-Sun dependent Pokemon to cover the rest of your weaknesses. It doesn't seem to help much with its ability, and Helping Hand isn't as useful if you can't hit your opponents with any moves anyway (Heatran, specifically). However, that is entirely up to you.

 

[Epic Cherubi]

I didn't know Cherrim didn't boost Special Attack, but the Special Defense boost does explain a lot.

Since he doesn't do much (anything, now that I know that) what should I replace him for? Togekiss, Dusknoir or even Heatran and Infernape.. I'm not sure what other pokemon are good in doubles. Weavile has "double Fake Out" (Fling Razor Claw) which could basically guarentee a KO against anything other then Heatran with Typhlosion. Uhh.. what else works..

I'm pretty good with EV at singles, but I'll work on an EV spread for Shiftry. As I said, I need to re-breed him anyway and the spread was just to "get it on the field" to test. Fastest I've ever gotten a Pokemon to 508 EVs, thats for sure.

 

[The Lost One]

Like I said, you'll probably want something independent of the sun to cover your weaknesses and act as a backup. If you plan on keeping Shiftry specially oriented, make it physical; if you make Shiftry physicall oriented, it can honestly be either.

If you add protect onto Typhlosion somewhere, you can try a bulky-ish Ground type such as Rhyperior or, for more power, Flygon. Earthquake, Dragon Claw, Rock Slide, and Sunny Day are all beneficial to this team in some way (Earthquake only if you have Protect, as I said), as well as other moves both Pokemon learn.

If you can't spare a slot for Protect, then Heatran with Heat Wave, Earth Power, Dragon Pulse, and Sunny Day (a moveset purely off the top of my head - it might need some tweaking) would work well too. Heatran might actually be better because it will make your opponent think twice about using Heat Wave in your sun, and it still covers your own Heatran and Dragon weakness well. Also, he partners well with most of your Pokemon, especially a physically-based Shiftry.

 

[Epic Cherubi]

Why Protect on Typhlosion? I run a scarf.

Do you think Infernape or Weavile would work over Cherrim? Infernape gets Fake Out, Mach Punch and Helping Hand (and 120 BP STAB moves). Weavile gets "Double Fake Out" (Fling Razor Claw) and can stall for time while Typhlosion decimates things. Brick Break would help against Heatran and Ice Punch could KO Salamence and Latios. I'm aiming for Weavile, since I like flinches.

As for Crobat Air Slash vs Heat Wave.. After a lot of testing I found more use for Air Slash. Occasional flinches and better type coverage (I already have plenty of fire) is very useful. What common pokemon are in doubles? Heat Wave's 19% chance of burn (vs two pokemon) is cool.

 

[-Broderick-]

Hm.. not much to say that hasn't been said already, but I would personally change Shiftry to an all special guy, with HP Fire. (but then you have no Physical attacker. :|) It gets a boost from the sun, and hits the Steels that wall you. (I'd say Heatran, but he can't be used in the tournament haha.) Or, if you don't want to make him all special, make him Physical. He lacks the raw stats to be an effective mixed sweeper in doubles, and Explosion is the only way he hits both opponents. Explosion would be much more powerful with max attack as well.
Cherrim looks fine.
Typhlosion though, slap a Life Orb, or maybe a Wise Glasses, or even Charcoal on him. You want to boost his fire moves even further, but you probably don't want his Eruption to get a little less powerful each turn, right? :| Wise Glasses only gives a 10% boost to all his special attacks, but Charcoal gives a 20% boost to his Fire moves only. I use a Mystic Water on my Wailord in PBR doubles with Water Spout, and I find it provides the power he needs. Wise Glasses usually doesn't cut it. But, Typhlosion has some pretty beastly special attack, so its your call.
Like The Lost One said, HP Ice would be very beneficial, allowing you to hit flying Dragons, (like Dragonite, which will be very popular) that would normally wall you.
Good luck with the tournament.

 

[The Lost One]

Why Protect on Typhlosion? I run a scarf.

Because I told you choice items aren't very good, especially when using a variable power move that relies on health (Eruption, Water Spout).

Do you think Infernape or Weavile would work over Cherrim? Infernape gets Fake Out, Mach Punch and Helping Hand (and 120 BP STAB moves). Weavile gets "Double Fake Out" (Fling Razor Claw) and can stall for time while Typhlosion decimates things. Brick Break would help against Heatran and Ice Punch could KO Salamence and Latios. I'm aiming for Weavile, since I like flinches.

Read my last post. I devoted an ENTIRE PARAGRAPH to this. Summary: Flygon, Rhyperior, or Heatran. Most likely Heatran. And Flinches are unreliable in a single elimination format if you actually want to win.

As for Crobat Air Slash vs Heat Wave.. After a lot of testing I found more use for Air Slash. Occasional flinches and better type coverage (I already have plenty of fire) is very useful. What common pokemon are in doubles? Heat Wave's 19% chance of burn (vs two pokemon) is cool.

You just said Flying offers better type coverage, which is obviously wrong. Besides, like I said in my last post, Sun makes Heat Wave more appealing. Besides, Shiftry, Crobat's most likely partner until it faints, doesn't have fire moves at all anyway.

Also, I disagree with BrodericKK. Shiftry doesn't need HP Fire, Steels don't wall you (except for Heatran, which is covered by something that you use over Cherrim), Cherrim does NOT look fine for reasons I outlined above, and Life Orb makes no sense (although I'm not sure if he was suggesting it or not). I still believe that a berry is your best bet. Also, Heatran IS allowed, with the new ban list.

 

[Epic Cherubi]

In the battles I've had Typhlosion rarely has troubles with Eruption's ase power. Without the Scarf, he's so damn slow it seems pointless to run him.

Heatran has redundant type coverage and is 4x weak to the Earthquake focused metagame. Rhyperior or Flygon maybe, but I don't see what they actually do to help (Flygon is immune to the EQ / Discharge combo but so what its attack sucks).

Air Slash hits with the same BP as Sun boosted Heat Wave hitting two pokemon. What I meant was, I already have Typhlosion so Air Slash has been nice for taking down Infernapes, or landing the killing blow on Gyarados and Salamence.

Shiftry is normally dead by the second turn, SOMETIMES third. I have never once wished for Heat Wave.