Trick Room team! Suggestions to improve?

SumRndmDde

SumRndmDde

Alright, so here is a trick room team I've created.
Please give me advice for what I should switch for the best team ever!
All IVs are assumed zero in speed and full in everything else. Hidden Power is made with 31/30 combinations.

**Also if there's a move (or item) in parentheses next to another move/item, that means that the move in parentheses was the original move and the one outside is what I changed it to after using this team in a few battles. I just also wish to know if the switch was good enough, if I shouldn't have done it. This is just because I'm still a little new, and I want to see if my choices are correct view the eyes of those with more experience.

Reuniclus (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 SAtk / 252 HP / 4 Def
Quiet Nature
- Focus Blast
- Psyshock
- Shadow Ball
- Trick Room

Nice and bulky Reuniclus can set booth sweep and set up Trick Room in the middle of a sweep. The first three moves are for powerful coverage. Trick Room is for setting up when necessary. Reuniclus's job on the team is to simply be powerful against anything and always be an option to switch into, whether things are getting tough or no other options. He's the team's prime special sweeper.

Porygon2 @ Eviolite
Ability: Trace
EVs: 52 SDef / 252 HP / 4 SAtk / 200 Def
Sassy Nature
- Trick Room
- Ice Beam
- Hidden Power [Fire] (Recover)
- Recover (Discharge)*

Porygon2 is here to set up Trick Room, and smack the opposing pokemon hard with one of its moves. The moveset has the same reasoning as Reuniclus: coverage and setting up Trick Room. This thing stays in for a while and is always good for setting up Trick Room. It is essentially plays like Reuniclus, only it's a safer choice to set up with during the earlier parts of the game; loosing it is better than losing Reuniclus. As for the switch from Recover to Hidden Fire, Recover was great, but Scizor, Bisharp, and Ferrothorn, were all very common and destructive to this team. Hence, Hidden Fire took over the less useful Recover. This guy is secondary special sweeper.

Magnezone @ Leftovers
Ability: Magnet Pull
EVs: 252 SAtk / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
- Flash Cannon
- Volt Switch
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Fire] (Hidden Power [Ice])*

The last special sweeper of the team. All his moves are for coverage, except for Volt Switch which just makes switching easier when Trick Room needs to be put back up. Magnezone is used when Porygon2 and Reuniclus are unable to come out, or I need to have something that can handle, or be sacrificed, to different situations. Magnet Pull is just a tiny gimmick, but sometimes I wish I had sturdy; should I switch it? Essentially, Magnezone is the alternative special sweeper.

Malamar (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Contrary
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SDef
Brave Nature
- Trick Room
- Destiny Bond (Flamethrower)* (Topsy Turvy)
- Superpower
- Night Slash (Psycho Cut)*

Malamar, he's thrown out there when the opportunity for physical sweeping has occurred. Same reasoning for moveset as Reuniclus: coverage and setting up Trick Room. Topsy Turvy was switched for same reason as Porgon2 along with: bug-types happening and the opponent's weren't having stat boosts as common as they were having Scizor. Also, his strategy pretty much sums up to: use Superpower as much as possible for boosts, use Psycho Cut for Ghosts and other situations that would be better. This guy is the primary physical sweeper.

!Bronzong @ Focus Sash (Life Orb)! <Slowbro>
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Brave Nature
- Trick Room
- Stealth Rock
- Payback (Earthquake)
- Explosion

Bronzong is the first to go out 90% of the time. He attempts to set up Stealth Rock and Trick Room if possible. Then he explodes. Payback/Earthquake is there due to it sometimes being a better alternative than to just explode. I prefer Payback since it seemed that pokemon that used Taunt tended to be Psychic-type most of the time. Also, he once had Life Orb to help with the power of explosion, but he kept getting OHKOed to often. This guy just sets up and does the best he can do for initial damage.

Conkeldurr (M) @ Flame Orb
Ability: Guts
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Brave Nature
- Drain Punch
- Facade (Ice Punch)*
- Mach Punch
- Knock Off

Then finally, Conkeldurr. Flame Orb + Guts is used against status users and gives a nice boost of power.
All the moves are coverage along with special little gimmicks.
Drain Punch = STAB + Heal
Mach Punch = STAB + priority (when Trick Room can't be put up conveniently)
Knock Off = Good coverage, and hits off very good items sometimes
Conkeldurr's used for same reason as Magnezone, can take hits nicely, and physical.
He's the alternative physical sweeper.
*Also I was wondering if Conkeldurr is better to be switched with U-turn Technician Scizor?

Well, that's my team.
Please don't hesitate to give advice.

*Moves with this star next to them means they were changed due to advice given after this was posted.

!Pokemon surrounded with explanation points were removed and replaced with the pokemon in <> brackets!
 
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I'd use Thunderbolt over Discharge on Porygon2 for the added power, or go all the way for paralysis with Thunder Wave. Paralysis isn't all that useful for Trick Room anyway, what with the opponent's Speed drop.
 
I saw a Trick Room team, and I run one of my one, so I just had to rate it.

First off, you run porygon2, reuniclus, and conkeldurr, all staples for TR, cool. The porygon spread seems a little weird tho. Regardless of how threatening the metal bugs are for your team, hp fire is not worth it on porygon 2, especially when you only have 4 evs in special attack. It seems very counter productive to me to invest in bulk and then not run recover while running 3 attacks with no investment. You should change that to be more efficient.

As for conkeldurr, you should run toxic orb because its less damage in 2 turns, and you shouldn't be staying in for much longer than that. Also, you should run facade over ice punch so that you can actually hurt azumarill, who otherwise can set up a belly drum on the switch and basically sweep your entire team. (If sash on bronzong is broken, which is also easy because you have no way of stopping or removing hazards.)

I question the use of malamar on this team a lot. Malamar isn't too bulky, doesn't hit strong immediately, and overall a weak pokemon that doesn't bring too much to this team. What I would replace this with is a mega mawile. This guy is perfect for TR, he oozes power and bulk while TR can fix his only problem. He even has sucker punch for powerful priority, mach punch from conk isn't that much unfortunately.

For magnezone, I wouldn't recommend going leftovers on him, a life orb would be better cuz you neeeed immediate power for TR above anything else. Magnezone just doesn't cut it with leftovers. I would overall advise against him, but I have no idea what to replace him with :( bottom line you shouldn't have leftovers.

Lastly, bronzong is really bad for TR this gen because his resistances got heavily nerfed. I would instead recommend running a Slowbro. He is much more durable, provides you with a decent check to talonflame (which this team currently lacks (never a good thing)) and gives you a way to deal with powerful ground types which your team is weak to.

This is a cool TR team, though most TR teams are pretty copy paste you atleast attempted to use something different. Unfortunately, TR is a tough style to play and you have to use the BEST pokemon to succeed, which is why a lot of these pokemon are currently just weighing you down.

I hope I was able to help you with this team, good luck!

Bro :) (Slowbro) @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SAtk
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spd
- Trick Room
- Surf
- Fire Blast
- Yawn

Mawile @ Mawilite
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 HP / 4 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Play Rough
- Fire Fang
- Brick Break
- Sucker Punch
 
Srn9130 said:
I saw a Trick Room team, and I run one of my one, so I just had to rate it.

First off, you run porygon2, reuniclus, and conkeldurr, all staples for TR, cool. The porygon spread seems a little weird tho. Regardless of how threatening the metal bugs are for your team, hp fire is not worth it on porygon 2, especially when you only have 4 evs in special attack. It seems very counter productive to me to invest in bulk and then not run recover while running 3 attacks with no investment. You should change that to be more efficient.

As for conkeldurr, you should run toxic orb because its less damage in 2 turns, and you shouldn't be staying in for much longer than that. Also, you should run facade over ice punch so that you can actually hurt azumarill, who otherwise can set up a belly drum on the switch and basically sweep your entire team. (If sash on bronzong is broken, which is also easy because you have no way of stopping or removing hazards.)

I question the use of malamar on this team a lot. Malamar isn't too bulky, doesn't hit strong immediately, and overall a weak pokemon that doesn't bring too much to this team. What I would replace this with is a mega mawile. This guy is perfect for TR, he oozes power and bulk while TR can fix his only problem. He even has sucker punch for powerful priority, mach punch from conk isn't that much unfortunately.

For magnezone, I wouldn't recommend going leftovers on him, a life orb would be better cuz you neeeed immediate power for TR above anything else. Magnezone just doesn't cut it with leftovers. I would overall advise against him, but I have no idea what to replace him with :( bottom line you shouldn't have leftovers.

Lastly, bronzong is really bad for TR this gen because his resistances got heavily nerfed. I would instead recommend running a Slowbro. He is much more durable, provides you with a decent check to talonflame (which this team currently lacks (never a good thing)) and gives you a way to deal with powerful ground types which your team is weak to.

This is a cool TR team, though most TR teams are pretty copy paste you atleast attempted to use something different. Unfortunately, TR is a tough style to play and you have to use the BEST pokemon to succeed, which is why a lot of these pokemon are currently just weighing you down.

I hope I was able to help you with this team, good luck!

Bro :) (Slowbro) @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SAtk
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spd
- Trick Room
- Surf
- Fire Blast
- Yawn

Mawile @ Mawilite
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 HP / 4 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Play Rough
- Fire Fang
- Brick Break
- Sucker Punch
Click to expand...


Thanks for the info!
However, could you expand on why to use Slowbro over Slowking?
Also, is it really okay to take off Stealth Rock?
As for Mawile, I guess it's okay to replace Malamar, especially due to his supreme weakness to bugs.
Once again, thanks!
 
SumRndmDde said:
Thanks for the info!
However, could you expand on why to use Slowbro over Slowking?
Also, is it really okay to take off Stealth Rock?
As for Mawile, I guess it's okay to replace Malamar, especially due to his supreme weakness to bugs.
Once again, thanks!
Click to expand...

Slowbro over Slowking because you have nothing for talonflame or strong users of earthquake. Taking off stealth rock is more ok because hazards are so easy to remove nowadays.
 
Hey I saw your post and I think you have a solid good team. I run a competitive Trick Room Team myself. I have a Malamar on my team as well. This is my Malamar right here.

Malamar @ Leftovers
Ability: Contrary
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Trick Room
- Superpower
- Night Slash
- Destiny Bond

He is a underrated pokemon that shines the best in a trick room team setting. Keep the 252 HP because he will need it against an attack from your opponent. Use 252 in Atk because he will need to be a Physical Sweeper. Then I would do 4 Def because I notice that most Fairy attacks and Bug attacks are physical i.e U Turn and Play Rough. Keep your trick room on your Malamar as this is a must move to have on him. So he can set up a crushing defeat for your opponents. Set Superpower as his second move. This way he can pull off 120 damage against your opponent and with a 1.5x + in ATK and DEF added to his stats (contrary ability) after the damage. He'll be taken more seriously as a foe from your opponent. Set Night Slash as your third slot move. I tried with Psycho Cut but Night Slash just tops Psycho Cut on many bases to my opinion. Then lastly I would go with Destiny Bond over Flame Thrower. I know that Malamar is 4x Super effected by Bug. But I have two good reasons why to switch Flame Thrower to Destiny Bond.
1. Malamar wasn't designed to be a mixed sweeper. Point Blank! He works best as a physical attacker. He is a new favorite of mine but I will speak the truth about his greatness and also his faults.
2. When you use Trick Room. You will most likely take a real hit blow from your opponent. So using destiny bond right after Trick Room. You will be taking out your opponent who may be a serious threat to the rest of your team. Then on top of that you have 4 turns to use Trick Room with other sweeping pokemon. For example. I will add a video replay to prove my point. Click onto Turn 7 and you will see what I mean about having Destiny Bond over Flame Thrower.
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/pokebankoubeta-71531919

I hope that this helps. I honestly think Trick Room Teams will be seen more. I am still working on my final product of my team and will post later tonight. If you have any more questions. I wouldn't mind teaming up with some ideas over skype or email. I have some great ideas for a trick room team and you may have some ideas for my team.
 
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CAPRICORN 1986 said:
Hey I saw your post and I think you have a solid good team. I run a competitive Trick Room Team myself. I have a Malamar on my team as well. This is my Malamar right here.

Malamar @ Leftovers
Ability: Contrary
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Trick Room
- Superpower
- Night Slash
- Destiny Bond

He is a underrated pokemon that shines the best in a trick room team setting. Keep the 252 HP because he will need it against an attack from your opponent. Use 252 in Atk because he will need to be a Physical Sweeper. Then I would do 4 Def because I notice that most Fairy attacks and Bug attacks are physical i.e U Turn and Play Rough. Keep your trick room on your Malamar as this is a must move to have on him. So he can set up a crushing defeat for your opponents. Set Superpower as his second move. This way he can pull off 120 damage against your opponent and with a 1.5x + in ATK and DEF added to his stats (contrary ability) after the damage. He'll be taken more seriously as a foe from your opponent. Set Night Slash as your third slot move. I tried with Psycho Cut but Night Slash just tops Psycho Cut on many bases to my opinion. Then lastly I would go with Destiny Bond over Flame Thrower. I know that Malamar is 4x Super effected by Bug. But I have two good reasons why to switch Flame Thrower to Destiny Bond.
1. Malamar wasn't designed to be a mixed sweeper. Point Blank! He works best as a physical attacker. He is a new favorite of mine but I will speak the truth about his greatness and also his faults.
2. When you use Trick Room. You will most likely take a real hit blow from your opponent. So using destiny bond right after Trick Room. You will be taking out your opponent who may be a serious threat to the rest of your team. Then on top of that you have 4 turns to use Trick Room with other sweeping pokemon. For example. I will add a video replay to prove my point. Click onto Turn 7 and you will see what I mean about having Destiny Bond over Flame Thrower.
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/pokebankoubeta-71531919

I hope that this helps. I honestly think Trick Room Teams will be seen more. I am still working on my final product of my team and will post later tonight. If you have any more questions. I wouldn't mind teaming up with some ideas over skype or email. I have some great ideas for a trick room team and you may have some ideas for my team.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice!

I look forward to seeing your team.
I am very interested in Trick Room teams due to their ability to be extremely offensive and defensive at the cost of loosing an occasional turn.
As for teaming up, I would be very glad to do so. I'm probably not as experienced as you think though, so I may not be able to contribute a lot.

You can get me through my email:
SumRndmDde@gmail.com
we can communicate through email or determine another method.

Also, once again thanks for the proposition! and I look forward to speaking with you!

P.S: I'll be sure to take your advice with Destiny Bond. It never occurred to me; it seems very deadly to taking care of the few Trick Room blocking pokemon.
 
SumRndmDde said:
Thanks for the advice!

I look forward to seeing your team.
I am very interested in Trick Room teams due to their ability to be extremely offensive and defensive at the cost of loosing an occasional turn.
As for teaming up, I would be very glad to do so. I'm probably not as experienced as you think though, so I may not be able to contribute a lot.

You can get me through my email:
SumRndmDde@gmail.com
we can communicate through email or determine another method.

Also, once again thanks for the proposition! and I look forward to speaking with you!

P.S: I'll be sure to take your advice with Destiny Bond. It never occurred to me; it seems very deadly to taking care of the few Trick Room blocking pokemon.
Click to expand...


You got it bro. I just emailed you and just email back.
 
This is a nice team, much more solid than the one I used to run (using only two TR setters, Trevenant and Chandelure).

Just curious though, if you would tailor this team for VGC 2014, what would be a good substitute for Porygon2?

Also, I'm thinking Magnet Pull would not be too useful on the Magnezone, given that the notable Steel pokes I see (at least in doubles where I usually play) are usually those that wouldn't fear much about not being able to switch out. Maybe Sturdy would be better, but have you also given thought to Analytic (HA)? Since both abilities take into account the possibility of your opponent going first, it might be a good idea to have additional damage in such a case? Would have to test either case out in Showdown, though.

Lastly, and this is addressed to all TR experts, what is the recommended Speed IV for a TR team? Does it always have to be all 0 Speed IVs? Or should at least one poke be bred for 31 Speed, in case Trick Room can't be put up?
 
Hello first of congrats to you, you are the first person I have seen running a trick room team this gen, (claim your prize at the front desk on your way out) I think that trick room is really viable this gen since it got a few new toys to play play with. Now on to the rate.


First off your reunculis set looks pretty good, One thing that I would consider doing however would be to switch focus blast, for recover. The reason I would do this is because generally you are going to have to scrap a turn to set up trick room, and in that turn you are going to take damage. The key to teams that rely on field effects such as trick room, rain, sand , sun and whatnot is keeping the setters alive, and without leftovers reunculis has no recovery on the current set. Recover allows for super fast healing after trick room is set, allowing you to stall if you need to. It also allows for reunculis to have longer sustainability and possibly come back in and set up trick room again. Focus blast is in general an unreliable move, and depending on it is something that can cost you games, at least with recover what you see is what you get.


Now on to porygon2, I really like that space ducky, its tanky for a tiny little thing. The only recommendation I have for you here is to replace hidden power fire, with hidden power rock. The reason I do this is simple. Talonflame. Gale wings overrides trick room and allows it to slam your team hard. Hidden power rock should do great damage and limit that pheonix’s life


Now on to bronzing and Malamar (the other two fit the team nicely so I won’t touch them) I think that these 2 pokemon can be taken out of the team for 2 others that I think can fit your team better. First off I think that ferrothorn is amazing on trick room teams. Once trick room is activated ferrothorn gets blazing speed and gyroball is amazing. It can also lay down rocks.

In the place of MalamarI would recommend something that will surely pull you out of sticky situations. Mega banette. With the new mega bannette we get all the prankster goodness we had before, but now we have a viable attack stat to go with it. It can set up trick room with priority and allow for you to go ahead and sweep. It can use destiny bond with priority as well making it a great sweep stopper.

Sets: Ferrothorn@ leftovers

252 atk 252 hp 4 spdef. +atk –speed

-Curse

-stealth rock

-gyro ball

-power whip


Bannette @ banneteite

252 atk 252 hp 4 spdef +atk –spatk

-trick room

-destiny bond

-shadow claw

-(your choice of coverage)
 
ninjawhitetiger said:
Hello first of congrats to you, you are the first person I have seen running a trick room team this gen, (claim your prize at the front desk on your way out) I think that trick room is really viable this gen since it got a few new toys to play play with. Now on to the rate.


First off your reunculis set looks pretty good, One thing that I would consider doing however would be to switch focus blast, for recover. The reason I would do this is because generally you are going to have to scrap a turn to set up trick room, and in that turn you are going to take damage. The key to teams that rely on field effects such as trick room, rain, sand , sun and whatnot is keeping the setters alive, and without leftovers reunculis has no recovery on the current set. Recover allows for super fast healing after trick room is set, allowing you to stall if you need to. It also allows for reunculis to have longer sustainability and possibly come back in and set up trick room again. Focus blast is in general an unreliable move, and depending on it is something that can cost you games, at least with recover what you see is what you get.


Now on to porygon2, I really like that space ducky, its tanky for a tiny little thing. The only recommendation I have for you here is to replace hidden power fire, with hidden power rock. The reason I do this is simple. Talonflame. Gale wings overrides trick room and allows it to slam your team hard. Hidden power rock should do great damage and limit that pheonix’s life


Now on to bronzing and Malamar (the other two fit the team nicely so I won’t touch them) I think that these 2 pokemon can be taken out of the team for 2 others that I think can fit your team better. First off I think that ferrothorn is amazing on trick room teams. Once trick room is activated ferrothorn gets blazing speed and gyroball is amazing. It can also lay down rocks.

In the place of MalamarI would recommend something that will surely pull you out of sticky situations. Mega banette. With the new mega bannette we get all the prankster goodness we had before, but now we have a viable attack stat to go with it. It can set up trick room with priority and allow for you to go ahead and sweep. It can use destiny bond with priority as well making it a great sweep stopper.

Sets: Ferrothorn@ leftovers

252 atk 252 hp 4 spdef. +atk –speed

-Curse

-stealth rock

-gyro ball

-power whip


Bannette @ banneteite

252 atk 252 hp 4 spdef +atk –spatk

-trick room

-destiny bond

-shadow claw

-(your choice of coverage)
Click to expand...

Trick Room is has a priority of -7, not 0, so with prankster it only becomes -6. No priority TR :(
 
Srn9130 said:
Trick Room is has a priority of -7, not 0, so with prankster it only becomes -6. No priority TR :(
Click to expand...
Oh god I knew it was too good to be true, well the priority destiny bond is still nice J yea I had a brain fart there mate, my other advice is sound, sorry about that
 
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