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Theorymon Discussion and Viability Ranking

alexwolf said:
Gary2344 Beat Up is almost always superior to Bite and Faint Attack on Technician Weavile. Each hit of Beat Up does 17 damage, which is powered up to 25 by Technician. This means that with six alive and non-statused Pokemon Beat Up has 150 BP, with five 125, with four 100, with three 75, with two 50, and with one 25.
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Hmm I never got around to testing Beat Up. I completely forgot about that move TBH. I do like the fact that Faint Attack / Bite are consistently powerful throughout the entire duration of the battle, but I can definitely see where you're coming from. I really want to test that out now. That sounds amazing.
 
Gary2346 said:
After a few battles, I've come to a conclusion that Technician Weavile would be an absolute monster. Here's one of the better battles I had. I was using an old hail team that I turned into a standard team by replacing Specs Kyurem with Specs Latios and Abomasnow with Weavile itself. The team functioned like a usual T-Tar + Keldeo core but instead of T-Tar I used Weavile to better handle Jellicent and for revenge killing the Lati Twins.

http://pokemonshowdown.com/replay/customgame-45057987

I was using this set:

461.gif

Weavile @ Life Orb
Trait: Technician
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spd / 4 HP
Jolly Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Ice Shard
- Pursuit
- Bite / (Testing Beat Up)
- Low Kick

If Technician Weavile existed, this would probably be the best anti-metagame set it could run. Because Ice Shard is so damn powerful when boosted by Technician, there's no reason to ever run both Ice Shard and Ice Punch on the same set, allowing you to fit both Pursuit and another Dark-STAB for different situations. Weavile has access to two 60 base Dark-type moves; Bite or Faint Attack. Although Bite has a chance to flinch, I chose Faint Attack just for the lols, but in most cases Bite would probably be superior for that flinch chance. Unlike Night Slash, Bite is capable of actually KOing physically defensive Jellicent after SR, and Celebi as well. That's huge, because before now, Jellicent could easily live a Night Slash and potentially burn Weavile, leaving it crippled and worthless. Going back to Ice Shard, it is important to note that Weavile can now always KO Latios after SR and sometimes Latias after SR and a tiny bit of residual damage. Although 99% of the time Weavile can just spam Bite or Pursuit on the Lati twins, the fact that Scarf Latios can no longer live an Ice Shard and then revenge kill Weavile, is very impressive and quite important. Pursuit KOs Celebi, Latias, Latios, and does a huge chunk to physically defensive Jellicent when they switch out, which makes Weavile the best Pursuit trapper in OU, even better than T-Tar. Low Kick is for Heatran, Blissey, Ferrothorn, and Tyranitar mostly. All in all, this thing is absolutely amazing, and it would make Weavile one of the deadliest assassins in the OU metagame, capable of ripping DragMag and offensive teams to shreds.

Overall, I think Technician Weavile would be an easy A- Rank Pokemon. It still has to worry about being weak to Mach Punch, Bullet Punch, and SR, along with its ass defenses and huge amount of weaknesses, but Weavile would be so useful in this metagame that the goods would outweigh the bads by a long shot. It would easily be a top tier threat.

461.png
Technician Weavile = A- Rank
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Definitely definitely use beat up

That was the big thing with tech weavile... It like 2hkos forry or something
 
http://pokemonshowdown.com/replay/customgame-45234310
http://pokemonshowdown.com/replay/customgame-45236856

Had a few battles. Haven't been able to get a real opinion on Flygon yet, but Zapdos and Escavalier are both pretty damn baller under rain.

Right now I'm using Modest offensive Zapdos and it hits like a TANK. So damn hard, all teams have trouble switching in. Only trouble is it's too slow, and now quite tough enough to take a lot of hits. I'm going to have to test defensive Zapdos later, as well as offensive Zapdos + Tornadus (tailwind support + dual hurricane). Still, Zapdos just so intimidating-- and those 30% hax on both STABs is not fun for people to deal with.

Escavalier, as expected, has its issues-- but it also does exactly what it's supposed to do: trap and kill Keldeo checks under rain. Starmie, Latios, Latias-- even Celebi and Jellicent to some extent. They have no answer to Escavalier; and Rain + Leftovers makes it just so damn durable. In the second log, you'll see Escavalier switch into Gengar while there's SR + Spikes on the field, Protect, then be at practically full health and being like "whatever." If I hadn't gotten special defense fall, I would have trapped and killed Gengar without even thinking about it.

Escavalier takes down Alakazam and Gengar effortlessly too (if they lack HP Fire). Check the first log to see Escavalier do exactly this: kill starmie effortlessly and enable Scarf Keldeo to sweep almost an entire (admittedly fairly poorly made) team. Escavalier also makes it way easier for Zapdos to sweep by killing fast threats like Gengar, Lati@s, Starmie, etc. I imagine it would enable Thundurus-T and Garchomp to a lesser extent as well.

When it comes just to trapping under rain and enabling a Keldeo sweep, Escavalier is way better than Scizor.

Only trouble is that its coverage is so poor, and it lets a lot of things set up. It's also torn in choosing between defensive ability and power-- since you want special bulk to make you REALLY bulky; but with little investment you're just not hitting hard enough. I might test Specially bulky + Life Orb + Protect.


My thoughts so far (will keep playing):

Zapdos (Hurricane + Lightningrod): A

Escavalier (Dry Skin + Drill Run): B+

Escavalier + Keldeo + Rain: Broke as fuck
 
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What if there was an ability like smeargles sketch? where if you send that pokemon out into battle it copy's the other pokemons ability permanently
 
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I asked that two pages back Cschollen1, we had a pretty good conversation about it. Prankster/Shadow Tag/Weather/Simple/Speed Boost would probably be Uber, and several more would be suspected.
 
What if spider Pokemon got a bug type Magma Storm?

Attack: Silk Shot
Type: Bug
Attack Type: Special
Power: 120
Accuracy: 75
Effect: Traps and damages the target over 4-5 turns.

Pokemon to learn this attack (so far):
-Galvantula
-Ariados

and their pre-evs.

Would Galvantula see any use with something like:

@Choice Specs
-Thunder
-Silk Shot
-Hidden Power Ice
-Volt Switch

BTW, the only OU Pokemon who resist both of its STABs are Landorus-T, Gliscor, and Magnezone. Outside OU, you could add Nidoqueen and Nidoking.
 
So Hail obviously is the worst out of all weathers because there aren't many real abusers of it. The only Pokemon who don't mind hail to begin with are merely ice-types, who tend to be the only exploiters of hail too, for they sometimes have hail-based abilities and can spam STAB base 120 attacks with perfect accuracy in hail, but in the end you can't really profit from it, especially because it doesn't give ice-types any defensive boosts and ice-types can't fully exploit abilities like Ice Body because their typing is terrible on the defensive side. Now people have been speculating on defensive boosts for ice-types in hail, much like rock-types get a boost in their special defense in sand, but I'd rather take a more offensive approach, since that's what ice-types are good at:

What if there would be an ability that doubles a Pokemon's speed in Hail (and makes the wielder immune to Hail damage)?

It's quite obvious why this would be a thing. For one, it balances the viability of hail as a playstyle to some degree, and secondly, it just makes a lot of sense that such an ability would be around, seeing as all other weathers have such an ability (Swift Swim, Chlorophyll, Sand Rush). Let's call this ability Snowshoe for lack of a better name. One Pokemon who would gain a huge improvement from such an ability would be Glaceon, who already has access to two Hail-based abilities. With access to this Snowshoe ability, she'd be able to run Choice Specs and max speed investment, which would let her outpace the entire unboosted tier and a lot of the boosted tier and punch huge holes with Specs-boosted Blizzard coming off a base 130 SpA, meaning only weather starters and a couple of dedicated special walls could come in on her without taking a ton of damage. However, there'd be more Pokemon who would profit from this ability. To name another example, Mamoswine would need to run only 192+ speed to outrun every important scarfer in OU in hail, which would mean that he would be impossible to revenge kill without taking at least a huge chunk of damage unless your name is Scizor. If this ability would come into existence and would have a decent distribution (with abusers that aren't ice-typed too) there might be a chance that Hail would finally move away from total obscurity in OU.
 
The last thing Hail needs is another Pokémon it feel obligated to use that is weak to Rock and Fighting. Between Abomasnow, Kyurem, Mamoswine, Heatran, Cloyster, and others, hail teams find themselves extremely weak to those two moves. No, if hail wanted to get a powerful sweeper, it would have to be something that at least resists Stealth Rock. Now if you gave that ability to something like Sawk, I could definitely see it being a force to be reckoned with. It would resist Stealth Rock, could revenge kill Terrakion easily (and between Tentacruel and Sawk, you'd have his STABs covered), and has pretty decent stats for a Speed-boosting ability. A set with Close Combat / Ice Punch / Stone Edge / Earthquake holding Life orb would be a great addition to a hail team's roster. None of the weather starters could switch into it. It naturally outspeeds all of them except Ninetales, and Ninetales never runs enough speed to be faster than a base 85 'mon. Politoed and Tyranitar are easily dealt with by Close Combat, even Hippowdon would have to watch out if there was even just one layer of Spikes on the field (now hail team would have an actual reason to run Overcoat Forretress!). Ninetales dies to Stone Edge / Earthquake after Rocks. Yeah I could definitely see Sawk being a powerful addition to hail teams.

For those questioning the flavor of Sawk getting something that makes him faster in hail, I think it makes perfect sense. There are all sorts of stories about powerful martial arts masters training in harsh conditions like on the tops of mountains and whatnot. I chose Sawk just because his stats are remarkably similar to other weather-related speed-boosters like Victreebel, Venusaur, Kabutops, etc.
 
I like this Hail Theorymon! However, I think the ability should be called Snow Slide, and I know exactly which Pokemon should get it:

395.gif


In terms of Pokemon who are not Ice-types, Empoleon would be the best candidate to get the ability. In fact, it seems perfectly built for it.

Flavor wise: It's a penguin, so an ability that benefits it under hail makes perfect sense. I could see Empoleon using this ability to slide over snow like real penguins, boosting its Speed to insane heights.

Typing / Stats: Empoleon's got a perfect blend of typing and stats to really abuse this ability. First, it's not an Ice type so it can bring greater typing diversity to its team. Steel/Water is a great defensive typing, and Empoleon has the bulk to make this work-- and just enough Speed as well! Also, keep in mind that Empoleon's typing gives it a resistances to ExtremeSpeed, Aqua Jet, (Shadow Sneak, Sucker Punch,) and four times resistances to Ice Shard and Bullet Punch-- it only fears Mach Punch. Of course, that 111 Special Attack that ranks amongst the best of all Water-types is clinche for a 2x Speed booster. Especially with Empoleon's move pool!

Move Pool: Empoleon gets Blizzard. That alone is a blessing when we're talking about a Hail sweeper. Blizzard is so damn powerful and so damn devastating that 100% acc Blizzards by themselves are a pretty attractive reason to use Hail. Of course, Water/Ice coverage is great, and Empoleon gets Grass Knot too!

Strategically: Empoleon was OU last gen based ONLY on the fact that it could absolutely devastate teams at +2 Speed. Petaya Empoleon hit like a truck with that 111 Special Attack, and after an Agility, there was little that could stop it-- so we KNOW a +2 Speed Empoleon is a big threat. Agility Empoleon's big problems are having to take that turn to boost, and also finding room for coverage moves because of the need to use Agility + Substitute. With only 2 attacks, there's only so much damage it can do.

BUT with Hail boosting its Speed to +2, there's no need to set up at all! Empoleon can just come in and wreck! In fact, it can run FOUR attacks and Life Orb, and be DEVASTATING.

395.gif

Snow Slide
@Life Orb / Choice Specs
-Surf / Hydro Pump
-Blizzard
-Grass Knot
-Hidden Power Fire

With this set, Empoleon can take down anything not named Chansey / Blissey / Rotom-W. With Timid, it reaches 480 Speed! Unfortunately, it does get pretty easily outsped by Scarf Terrakion, so you'd probably be using Modest (which still reaches 438 Speed). It hits like a tank, has incredible bulk for such a fast Pokemon, resists almost all the types in the game-- including the vast majority of Priority. It is also immune to Toxic Spikes and resists SR. It also benefits from rain and doesn't take damage from Sand. This Pokemon would be a monster, and a tremendous asset to Hail I think.
 
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I posted that hail theorymon in RU months ago, except it was Snow Cloak doubling speed in hail.
I felt that Pokemon such as Glaceon and Frosslass could become great in lower tiers, where the other weathers don't exist.

Since I don't want to double post, here's another one for hail:
What if there was a Hydration for Hail?
 
@Halycon of Light: well yea that's true, like I said, some non-ice types with the ability would be nice, although Sawk is a bit of a far-fetch'd example cos he's not really related to snow or ice in any way as far as I'm concerned.

@Chou Toshio: Now that there is a good contender! Empoleon would be amazing in Hail, with practically no downsides; typing works well both offensively and defensively, speed in hail and SpA are great as well, access to Blizzard - nice find overall. Empoleon would definitely make hail a lot more viable. The only annoying thing about Empoleon is that he does share a fighting type weakness with ice type, but that'd be easy to work around.
 
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^This guy here would also be a worthy contender. As a seal/otter thing, I see it making sense flavor wise.

Samurott: 95 / 100 / 85 / 108 / 70 / 70
Empoleon: 84 / 86 / 88 / 111 / 101 / 60

So Empoleon has significantly more Special Bulk. It hits a little harder, but the difference is pretty slight (3 base points). The real difference is in typing, where Empoleon has a LOT more resistances going for it, but it DOES have that iffy Fighting weakness.

Samurott may not resist Extreme Speed or Stone Edge, but it lacks a fighting weakness, has somewhat better physical bulk, and most importantly-- it outspeeds Choice Scarf Terrakion, Keldeo and Infernape. It does unfortunately miss out on outspeeding Scarf Lati@s by 1 point, but nothing's perfect (same boat as Venusaur there).

Samurott also has all the same attacks Empoleon has on the special side.

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Timid / Modest
Snow Slide
@Life Orb / Choice Specs
-Surf / Hydro Pump
-Blizzard
-Grass Knot
-Hidden Power Fire


The other nice thing Samurott has going for it is a potentially very good Swords Dance set. Yes, Empoleon gets Swords Dance as well, and some cool physical options such as Earthquake and Rock Slide-- but the gap between 86 and 100 base ATK is pretty significant, and Samurott's access to Megahorn and Night Slash (for Jellicent) is pretty cool.

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Jolly / Adamant
Snow Slide
@Leftovers
-Water Fall
-Megahorn / Return / Night Slash
-Swords Dance
-Substitute / Aqua Jet / Night Slash
 
I made a big ass post bout hail...and it somehow got deleted :p. So I'll just say that snow slide on empoleon or glaceon sounds amazing. They r powerful pokemon held back by their poor speed.
Also while we're on the topic of my fav mons:
What if Garchomp got intimidate?
Its big, its powerful and its a shark, intimidate makes perfect sense on Chomp. That 106/95/85 bulk is boosted a lot which lets it take hits to SD more easily as well as act as a hazard setter(although rough skin is just as good for this)
 
EJ190 said:
I made a big ass post bout hail...and it somehow got deleted :p. So I'll just say that snow slide on empoleon or glaceon sounds amazing. They r powerful pokemon held back by their poor speed.
Also while we're on the topic of my fav mons:
What if Garchomp got intimidate?
Its big, its powerful and its a shark, intimidate makes perfect sense on Chomp. That 106/95/85 bulk is boosted a lot which lets it take hits to SD more easily as well as act as a hazard setter(although rough skin is just as good for this)
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It'd be better than Rough Skin for sure, he'd be able to scare some physical attackers ut that can't get the 2HKO on him at -1, which would give him more opportunity to set SD/SR up.
 
Nice article! Yeah, there was one or two things I thought didn't make that much sense, like not mentioning new entry hazards, Beat Up Weavile, and Scarf Magnezone, but it was a very solid article. Jesus, does Archeops really hit harder than Kyurem-B?

In other news, I'm gonna be testing out Drought Arcanine. Look for BatSol on PS! if you want to play.
 
On the topic of Snow Slide, another Pokemon that could profit from it is one of OU's most outclassed Pokemon, one that might as well be UU as of now. Therefor, here's what I present to you:

What if Donphan would have Snow Slide + Swords Dance?
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Now flavor-wise, it might be a bit of a far stretch to give him Snow Slide, but keep in mind that he does learn Ice Shard, which might hint to some relation to icy habitats. idk. Swords Dance does make sense, as these giant tusks are just begging for Swords Dance and you know it. With these two traits, Donphan would no longer be outclassed by his fellow spinning brothers, for he can fix his dreadful speed in hail and put the opponent in a tight situation. Here's why: Donphan, with his solid natural physical bulk, can switch into something that doesn't really threaten him (Forretress comes to mind), then threaten with either a spin or a SD. This means that the opponent has to take a huge gamble: Either switch to Jellicent or Gengar to block a spin and pray that he doesn't set up SD instead to put huge dents in them (at +2 with max attack and LO, Donphan OHKO's Jellicent), or switch to something that can threaten Donphan with an OHKO and hope that he doesn't spin. This makes Donphan a lot more threatening and actually somewhat viable, it would at least give him a niche over his fellow spinners.

Oh and by the way, if I'm on the subject of tusks + SD anyways: Mamoswine might as well get Swords Dance because why the hell not.
 
So, he acts as a sort of answer to Sandslash and Excadrill (potentially) for hail? He's still dreadfully slow, and any quick special Scarfer crushes him, but it would, again, give Hail a much-needed buff.
 
Lord of Bays said:
So, he acts as a sort of answer to Sandslash and Excadrill (potentially) for hail? He's still dreadfully slow, and any quick special Scarfer crushes him, but it would, again, give Hail a much-needed buff.
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Well yes, he'd still be able to get revenge killed, but don't understimate him; even with Adamant nature, he can still outspeed every non-boosted threat in OU. This is a set he could run:

232.png

Donphan @ Life Orb
Trait: Snow Slide
EVs: 252 Atk/252 Spe/4 Def (I suppose you could make it a tad more defensive or something, idk I'm not good with EV spreads)
Adamant nature

-Rapid Spin
-Swords Dance
-Earthquake
-Stone Edge

Because he can outspeed every unboosted OU mon in hail, he can forgo Ice Shard for EdgeQuake coverage. With LO boost added, he can crush all forms of Gengar and Jellicent with one hit. For example:

+2 252+ Atk Life Orb Donphan Earthquake vs. 248 HP / 216+ Def Jellicent: 411-485 (101.98 - 120.34%) -- guaranteed OHKO

The Adamant nature allows him to OHKO whether there are any hazards up on the opponent's side or not. Jolly nature isn't necessary because he doesn't outspeed anything major other than +1 Dragonite in Hail (so that he could come in and possibly revenge kill) or Gyarados at +1 in Hail(also revengeable, but DD Gyarados tends to be behind Sub and can OHKO you regardless so trying to revenge kill him with Donphan is probably a terrible idea). I see this set giving Donphan a definable niche, although he wouldn't be a very durable spinner due to LO recoil and having no investment in bulk, so some Wish support wouldn't hurt him. He'd be far from perfect, but hey, every niche is a niche. Also, he doesn't share weaknesses with ice types.
 
I guess I have an interesting thought - what if Staraptor got Swords Dance + ExtremeSpeed ?


398.gif

Staraptor @ Life Orb
Adamant
252 Atk/252 Spe/4 HP
Reckless
- SD
- ESpeed
- Brave Bird
- Close Combat

I don't really know what in all of OU can go toe-to-toe with this thing once its at +2. ESpeed means that Terrakion is the only common Scarfer that can revenge Staraptor, and even then it's taking 59-70% from ESpeed. On the defensive side, only the bulkiest of Steels (read: Skarmory) can live a hit, anything else like Lando-T etc. get utterly wrecked by Brave Bird.
This might not be totally game-breaking, because Staraptor will still have problems getting that SD, but it would introduce an extremely potent threat to the meta. Thoughts?
 
This is essentially arceus without bulk. Tbh even though it would be hard to setup, once it did there wouldnt be much preventing a sweep. Terrakion and skarm are really the only things i can think of that could check it. Maybe cb lando t with superpower too. This would definitely be a top tier threat bit im really glad it doesnt exist because it seems a little to overpowered.
 
Not terrakion:
+2 252 Atk Life Orb Staraptor ExtremeSpeed vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Terrakion: 175-207 (54.01 - 63.88%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

So Terrakion can't actually switch in on Staraptor once it is at +2

What if Absol got Unburden?
Absol is actually a monster with base 130 attack and high power attacks, but is limited by speed. But what if Absol got Unburden? With Unburden Absol would undoubtably be a threat in OU with a Dark-Gem boosted Sucker Punch hitting anything faster for massive damage and post unburden it outspeeds all scarfers until and inclusive of base 110. With a decent movepool, Unburden Absol could be a real threat
 
Any mon with good atk always appreciates espeed, especially if it gets stab on it. Cband Staraptor w/espeed could seriously revenge kill methinks.
WHAT IF AZELF GOT SHEER FORCE?
Its the willpower mon so makes sense flavour-wise.
Sheerforce lifeorb azelf would be crazy strong thanks to 125/125/115 stats. Psychic, tbolt, flamethrower, elemental punches, zen headbutt, shadowball all get massive boosts.
Azelf can work in sun(fireblast) or rain(thunder) and can be a physical or special attacker.Broken?
 
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