Special-Scarfed Blaziken

CK1

Blaziken has been knocked down a peg due to Infernape, but using Infernape it just has no staying power and it lacks elite speed or elite attack. Blaziken has just enough speed, and a higher base attack in both areas to make it a more viable option.

Looking at the analysis for Blaziken, I was sort of surprised that there was nothing in there about using Blaziken's 110 special attack, besides a line about Fire Blast 2HKO'ing Donphan (always). That would be without EV investment. While it has a limited special move pool, there's enough to get by. You can use a few different sets. It's a good candidate as either a purely special sweeper with the right support, or a mixed sweeper.

Blaziken
-Fire Blast
-HP Ice
-Sky Uppercut
-T-Punch/Solar Beam/Blaze Kick//Earthquake
Item: Choice Scarf
Nature: Naive/Mild
Evs: 252 SP ATT, 252 speed, 6 ATT

Ok, the fourth slot is in the up in the air. It really just depends on how you want it to fit with your team. There's a lot you can do there. You can go for stab. You can add in another physical move. I include Solar Beam because I originally intended to use it with sunny day.

The nature depends on whether you want to outrun everything but Deoxy's/Ninjask un-scarfed or get more power. I'm leaning towards Naive to outrun scarfed Heracross.

Fire Blast does some hefty damage. The set above is.
Bronzong - Damage: 49 - 57 (max SP DEF/postive nature)
Bronzong/w Mild nature - 75 - 88
Donphan - 69 - 81 (max HP)
Donphan/w mild - 76 - 89
Hippowdon - 55-65

Blaze changes things up a bit in the end. Hippowdown can just be OHKO with blaze and mild nature (90-106). Donphan is OHKO with blaze. HP Ice does roughly the same damage to those two.

It could 2HKO a Rhyperior if blaze were activated and it were mild. Dusknoir would be a 3HKO.

HP Ice:
Garchomp - 89 - 104
Garchomp/mild - 97 - 114
Salamence - 100 - 118

Sky Uppercut:
Blissey - 55 - 65
Tyranitar - 99.75 -117 (max HP)

Solar Beam, which is what I was going for originally:
Donphan - 92 - 108
Donpahn/mild - 101 - 118
Hippowdon/mild - 80 - 104
Swampert - 99 - 116
Swampert/mild - 108 - 127

Solar Beam doesn't have much of an advantage, unless you're looking to kill Swampert.

Thunderpunch:
Starmie - 48 - 57 (172 HP EV's)

Gyarados is a 2HKO one way or another.

Cresselia walls it entirely. Dusknoir, as well, unless you have blaze kicking in and a mild nature.

Not quite gimmicky. Doesn't rely entirely on surprise. Screws up most of the common switches.
 
Very interesting. I'd discard Solar Beam, as it won't really work without Sunny Day. Thunderpunch seems the best choice.
 
Um, since your using Scarf, wouldn't Overheat be better then Fire Blast because Overheat gives you that "hit and run" Stratagey and you don't really waste that lose of Sp.Att?

And Solar Beam is really usless without Sunny Day so no point in using it. I'm leaning towards T-Punch as well.
 
I'll sum this up in a few words that Blaziken has been forced to live with since D/P came along.

Infernape does it better.

I'm leaning towards Naive to outrun scarfed Heracross.
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Okay, so if you were to use 252/252/6 as you proposed you would end up with this.

Attack: 277
Special Attack: 319
Speed: 284

Now over to Infernape. He could use Mild nature and attain the following stats:

Attack: 275 (124 EVs)
Special Attack: 337 (252 EVs)
Speed: 285 (132 EVs)

So, as you can see, the lil fire monkey can have much more special attack, more speed, and only lose out in the physical attacking area by a measly 2 stat points. However, when you factor in that Blaziken will be using Sky Uppercut, whereas Infernape will be using Close Combat, you will see that Infernape will hit a shit load harder, both physically and specially.

And lets not forget Infernape's drastically bigger movepool. I can't think of a single reason to use a Scarfed Blaziken over a Scarfed Infernape.
 
You're only using Blaziken over Infernape for two things: Reversal and BP, and the BP version usually doesn't work that well (trust me, I've tried).
 
Well, Blaziken may be outclassed, but he isn't completely useless. He's a slightly weaker Infernape, but he helps avoid the species clause if you want two Infernapes on your team.
 
If you want to scarf it, you are probably better off using the Physical side as that is where it actually outdoes Infernape and with the said scarf will also be fast enough to get some hits in. The lost flexibility of changing moves sucks, but its not weak to SR and resists Pursuit which helps.

Sure Infernape gets CC to make its STAB stronger than Blaziken's, but with Flare Blitz and Brave Bird you already have some good hard hitting options. That said when putting together a Blaziken MS its pretty hard to not make it a shitty Infernape.
 
Forsety said:
Speaking of BP did anyone ever confirm whether they were actually giving out BP Chimchar's at NYPC?
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That was a hoax. We have an announcement on it.

Blaziken is a better Scarfer than Infernape. The reason I say this is because Infernape is a better Bander/Mixed sweeper. If your aim is to outspeed Scarfcross, stick with 270 speed, anything extra is only detracting from your defenses or SA.

If, however, you're only interested in outspeeding say, Adamant Weavile, go with 242 Speed. That will beat any other non-scarfed non-natured opponent, any 115 Base speed pokemon (Starmie, Azelf), and you can boost Blaziken's much higher base attack. The only move Infernape has over Blaziken is Close Combat > Sky Uppercut. You can sort of fix it by using Focus Punch instead, but Sky Uppercut is still an easy 2HKO on 252/252 Bold Blissey. Infernape would have the edge since it can occaisionally OHKO, but it is a miniscule chance on 252/252 Bold Blss, and 50/50 on sets with less HP.

If you really need to, 249 outspeeds natured 120s (Sceptile, Alakazam, Duggy) and 256 outspeeds natured 125s (Swellow, Darkrai only). So unless you REALLY need Blaziken to outspeed natured Jolteon/Aero/Crobat/Mewtwo, raise its attack instead of speed.

Other than your Fighting move, Blaziken outpowers Infernape on a Scarf set, assuming you boost its attack instead of speed. My strong recommendation with a speed boosting set is to only focus on either physical or special. I tried mixed 270 speed Blaziken and it was a nightmare to EV. If you took out of SA, HP Ice didn't finish what it should. If you took out of attack, you didn't have enough power on Flare Blitz/Sky Uppercut. Ultimately I learned the cardinal rule of using Scarf Blaziken is to have Stealth Rock support.
 
Blaziken is a better Scarfer than Infernape. The reason I say this is because Infernape is a better Bander/Mixed sweeper.
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Um...okay, that's terrible logic. Alakazam is a better Choice Specs user than Salamence. The reason I say this is because Salamence is a better Bander/Dragon Dancer. Sounds stupid, doesn't it?

Just because Infernape can do other jobs better, doesn't mean that he can't scarf better than Blaziken too. Blaziken's higher attack stats are deceptive in this regard, because after he has pumped all those neccesary speed EV's, he will have little left with which to bolster his attacking stats. As I already showed, Infernape will hit harder than Blaziken.

Forcing him to go either physical or special as Deck Knight said, is foolish. Wasting a potential 120/110 attacking stat is like using Weezing as a special wall.

And yes, I'm a MASSIVE Blaziken fan and have used him in every match for as long as I can remember so don't think that I'm just trying to shit on Blaziken. The fact is Infernape has the better stat distribution and movepool for this job.
 
Lee said:
Um...okay, that's terrible logic. Alakazam is a better Choice Specs user than Salamence. The reason I say this is because Salamence is a better Bander/Dragon Dancer. Sounds stupid, doesn't it?
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Alakazam and Salamence have nothing in common. Blaziken and Infernape have nearly everything in common, right on down to typing and offensive movepool. The difference is that Blaziken is midling speed with better attack stats and thus benefits more from Choice Scarf, where Infernape has better speed and lower attack stats, and gets superior benefits from Choice Band or Choice Specs. Unless your aim is to outspeed Scarfcross, Blaziken does better than Infernape as a Choice Scarfer because it doesn't have redundant speed and its higher base attack stats mean that it will outdamage Infernape in nearly every situation.

Just because Infernape can do other jobs better, doesn't mean that he can't scarf better than Blaziken too. Blaziken's higher attack stats are deceptive in this regard, because after he has pumped all those neccesary speed EV's, he will have little left with which to bolster his attacking stats. As I already showed, Infernape will hit harder than Blaziken.
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You assumed Blaziken had a plus speed nature, my caveat was that Blaziken should have a +Attack nature. Therefore, Infernape's supposed damage benefits are negated. Blaziken already has more attack than Infernape will ever have, nature or otherwise. +Attack leaves more stat points open for special attack, after you've EV'd the speed you want.

Forcing him to go either physical or special as Deck Knight said, is foolish. Wasting a potential 120/110 attacking stat is like using Weezing as a special wall.
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I was stating my experience with Blaziken, having used him as a Scarfer. I said it was a nightmare to EV, and it is. My set was Flare Blitz/Sky Uppercut/HP Ice/Thunderpunch. Maybe the set was flawed, but essentially I was using it as a revenge killer. Eventually I went all physical because HP Ice wasn't worth the EV investment. Maybe if I exchanged Flare Blitz for Fire Blast it would have been different, but that's the experience I had.

And yes, I'm a MASSIVE Blaziken fan and have used him in every match for as long as I can remember so don't think that I'm just trying to shit on Blaziken. The fact is Infernape has the better stat distribution and movepool for this job.
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Infernape is superior if your purpose is to beat Scarfcross. If you don't need a 260+ initial speed and can live with outspeeding say Dugtrio, Blaziken hits harder than Infernape. it comes down to the purpose you're using them for. Blaziken is better for some purposes and Infernape for others. If your team already has an answer to Scarfcross and the Base 130 contingent, Blaziken makes for a better Scarfer.
 
Why not give Brave Bird a try in that last slot? Fighting and Flying provides great coverage. Also, I agree with whoever said Overheat is better than Fire Blast, because, it has better accuracy, better base power and you'll be switching in and out a lot with Choice Scarf, so the sp.atk drop doesn't hurt that much.
 
Bologo said:
Why not give Brave Bird a try in that last slot? Fighting and Flying provides great coverage. Also, I agree with whoever said Overheat is better than Fire Blast, because, it has better accuracy, better base power and you'll be switching in and out a lot with Choice Scarf, so the sp.atk drop doesn't hurt that much.
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would also like to suggest Stone edge or night slah in the last slot for more type coverage, both dark/fighting and rock/fightinng get good coverage.
 
People have already mentioned that infernape outclasses blaziken. I also want to mention that with a 109? base sp. att, base 100 speed, and eruption, cs typhlosion completely outclasses blaziken's special side, unless you're going mixed.
 
Volarion said:
People have already mentioned that infernape outclasses blazikan. I also want to mention that with a 109? base sp. att, base 100 speed, and eruption, cs typhlosion completely outclasses blazican's special side, unless you're going mixed.
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If you're going to post in a topic about Blaziken, have enough sense to spell it right.
 
TBH, I always thought the Physical Blaziken would work best. You seem to nab my attention.

You know however, Blaziken DOES have some selling points compared to Infernape. One would be Sky Uppercut. Now, before you go on, remember, Sky Uppercut has no drawbacks really, and isn't demolishing his defenses like Infernape (but note: either way, they're both going to go down on non-STAB moves a bit). The other, which was mentioned before, was the ever-cool Brave Bird, which makes sense. Blaziken is a "rooster" of sorts, so that makes him a bird, thus Brave Bird = Blaziken. Since he can hit Steels anyways with Blaze Kick (or I guess Flamethrower / Fire Blast), Brave Bird is a nice mention to counter Heracross... or even, his somewhat-near cousing, (dun dun dun...) Infernape.

I also realized that Flare Blitz, Night Slash, and (if you felt more Special-like): Focus Blast as well. Focus Punch could possibly work over Sky Uppercut to counter people that switch. If you don't want to breed for Night Slash, Shadow Claw is an option. Thunderpunch works too, but it really only bashes Gyarados. However, it might be wanted, so you could replace HP Ice for Thunderpunch, seeing as Blaziken won't even KO Garchomp with HP Ice anyways about 50% of the time

It's a damn shame Blaziken couldn't learn Ice Punch, because that would be something to use that would outshadow Infernape a bit. However, he lacks it anyways, so ignore it.

Yeah, and TBH, Overheat > Fire Blast. Below:

Overheat on Max HP Hippowdon: 63.81% - 75.24%
So, 2HKO almost, since the cut would be 32.14% - 37.86%

I ran the rest of the calcs, and some would fall on a 3HKO (Brave Bird doing around ~40% to Garchomp), TTar would come to a KO with + Attack Nature Sky Uppercut, Blissey gets 76.45% - 89.97% with Sky Uppercut. Focus Punch anyone?). So, it seems like if Blaziken is loved as a Scarf-user, he would best be used as a Revenge Killer. A good one, but maybe not the best.

I forgot BulkyGyara, but Thunderpunch does 64.05% - 75.53% to something, say, a Choice Band Gyara. This factors Intimidate, so really, Blaziken could cause something to him even. However, Slowbro gets 32.49% - 38.32% with Max HP + Def + Bold, so yeah, not a good idea to face this thing.

I like your idea, however, it needs some tweaking. So in other words, maybe put in Brave Bird as an option. Not being able to KO Garchomp will cost you with EQ. And even not KO'ing Tyranitar with max HP will cost as well.
 
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