Project SV RU Secret Santa 2025

[Elec-ant1234]

Ho ho ho and welcome to RU's Secret Santa!​

If you don't know what a "Secret Santa" is, it's a group event where you get the name of a random someone in a group and have to get them a gift to be given to them anonymously, keeping the gifter's name a "secret" until the reveal of the gift. For a Smogonized version, the "gifts" in question are teams!

Everyone who joins the RU Secret Santa will be asked to PM me, Elec-ant1234 a Pokemon or core that they would like a team to be built around, with more abstract concepts also being allowed (I.E. "gimmie a team built around Psychic Terrain!"), after which they'll be given someone else's team request (and you'll know who it's for). When you finish your team, post it in this thread to give the recipient their gift!

General Rules:

1. Post "in" or "Merry Christmas!" to join the Secret Santa!
2. If you know what you want already, set up a Smogon DM so you don't forget when it's time to send your request.
3. I ask that you only join if you're absolutely sure you can make a genuine attempt to finish the team before the team deadline! I'll try my best to complete any unfinished gifts, but it's not really allat fun for everyone involved if you join up and forget about it.
4. It's called "Secret Santa", so keep please your gift and whose gift you got to yourself! This helps preserve the surprise of the reveal and keeps the spirit of the event intact, so don't go asking around about it! I will find out.

Submission Rules:

1. These teams will be for SV RU ONLY
2. Each request should be sent via Smogon DMs to Elec-ant1234
3. Please submit your request BEFORE the submission deadline, if you haven't submitted anything 1-2 days before I'll track you down and remind ya (don't make me do that though... you won't like me when i'm angry... grrr....)
4. Try to keep your requests simple, you can make suggestions about what sets or playstyle your request should have / follow, but try not to bog down your gifter with 10 different limitations. Additionally, people will be allowed to deviate a little if said deviation helps make the team work properly.
5. You can change your request before the submission deadline.
6. After the submission deadline closes, I'll DM each person who joined to tell them whose request they're getting! (as well as the request itself of course)
7. When you finish your team, post it in this thread and tag the person (done by typing @ and the name of the person, I.E. @ feen without the space) so that they can see your cool gift!
8. Nicknames are allowed, but if it wasn't obvious please keep it clean, even if you're best buds with the person you're gifting the team to.

So TLDR: sign up before the 26th and DM me your request before the 26th as well, on the 26th you will receive a request from someone else, and you'll hafta make a team based around that request before the 5th of January; and when you do finish the team, you post it in this thread, tagging the recipient!

With all that said, don't feel stressed or pressured to make the "best team" or something like that. The whole point of this event is to have fun and give gifts, so if you want to do something funny instead that's fine too!

The dates for each major deadline are listed below, although they're tentative at the moment and can change if necessary.

Submission Deadline: Saturday , December 27th
Team Deadline: Tuesday, January 6th

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!​

 

[Canard]

Merry Christmas

 

[Rarelyme]

Rummikub in

 

[Tubular]

In (it's been about 3 months since I last played, but idc)

 

[Winterbub]

thank you elecant i am so in

 

[Sulfura28]

in for the christmas spirit !

 

[Flabeauf]

merry christmas

 

[Togyeeee]

merry christmas!!

 

[Akotelette]

Merry Christmas! (to anyone but Flabeauf <3)

 

[Heatranator]

merry christmas

 

[colorednaem]

merry christmas

 

[Hoops]

merry christmas

 

[milliongatejumpguy]

In your merry christmas ^^

 

[Elec-ant1234]

As a few people still haven't gotten back to me and I don't wanna hound people on christmas, I'm moving the submission deadline forward a day. The new Submission Deadline is now Saturday 27, and the team deadline has been extended as well

 

[fluff!!]

can I still get in :3

 

[Elec-ant1234]

The submission deadline has closed! I will be DMing everybody their requests, and thank you all for participating!

 

[Heatranator]

Flabeauf
You requested a pivot incineroar team. Unfortunately I wasn't able to quite make an offense team with it work so here's a balance team with it.



the requested mon, I decided to get a bit funny with this team. While the standard set is wisp+p-shot, I went in a different direction. U-turn isn't too out of this world, but what is unusual is taunt. Taunt incin is actually a pretty effective stallbreaker, as the few things that can take it's stabs (grounds, some waters and umbreon), absolutely despise getting taunted, which makes Pokemon such as Umbreon unable to damage incin effectively. This is pretty amazing against bulkier teams, as incin can pretty easily spread knock off. Blaze makes sure incin doesn't proc defiant or competitive, though intim is prob fine as well. Speed is to outspeed base 65's though more could be used to outspeed base 70's.

very good mon that covers most of the mons that incin can't, we have slowbro. This is just a pretty standard set, IDT there is much to explain.

final mon for the FWG core, breloom can be pretty devestating late game. Pretty standard set, bullet seed is to help against mmq and sash leads, while tera steel helps the mu into garde.

Defogger and fastmon on the team, this is a pretty standard set for it. Flame hits steels like regi and jirachi while Draco gives it a good burst of damage.

Krookodile is our scarfer for the team, and it's pretty standard set apart from the last move and tera. Tblast grass is something that I've been experimenting more on krook, which allows it to break through quag, gastro and to a lesser extent hippo. But it's primarily for the stall mu, as if krooks scarf is knocked in any way (a-muk is the prime one, but ches can also do it if you are careful), then it can be pretty deadly if ches is chipped at all. This can make breloom and incin way more threatening, as they are a lot more difficult to deal with for the stall team. If you don't like that option though, tera poison and stone edge/cc are also good options.

finally, our steel and rocker, jirachi can be a nice glue mon for the team. Pretty standard set, encore can stop setup sweepers while wish can keep itself and teammates healthy for longer games.

And if you truly desire it, here's one of my unsuccessful attempts at an incin offense team: https://pokepast.es/ce7e268cbb7277ba

 

[Flabeauf]

Hello milliongatejumpguy
You requested a non-sand weather team featuring OTR Diancie and here it is:



I went with the most classic OTR set. I chose Tera Water because the Basculegion-F matchup is annoying, and it also gives a useful Steel resistance. Tera Dragon can also be a decent option, mainly for the Grass resistance.


It’s a very good partner for Diancie because Super Fang + Taunt can weaken almost every threatening Pokémon, especially Steel types and big special walls. The 96 SpA EVs allow Noivern to 2HKO Armarouge. Tera Fairy is a nice option as well, since Dragon Pokémon can be annoying in the endgame, and the Dark resistance is very valuable.


It’s a strong breaker with really good resistances like Ghost and Dark, plus an Electric immunity. Close Combat is useful for the Krookodile mirror and extra breaking power.


It’s a great glue mon with Stealth Rock, pivoting, and Encore. The item is Rocky Helmet because it helps a lot against Maushold and provides nice chip damage. Tera Normal gives a Ghost immunity, which is very useful against Mimikyu.


Tentacruel is a solid spinner and pivot. I like it here for its ability to pivot and remove items with Knock Off. Tera Flying is nice for the Ground immunity while keeping the Fighting resistance. The Speed allows it to outspeed Basculegion-F and Gardevoir while staying slower than Suicune, so it can knock off its Leftovers easily.


Finally, I needed a better Krookodile matchup and a scarfer, so I chose Flamigo. Upper Hand helps a lot against Mimikyu and Bisharp.

 

[Rarelyme]

hi Tubular, I got you your bulky Feraligatr team:

I went for HO because Feraligatr works pretty well in those and the shifts are here which means the meta is quite uncertain, however in the case HO, it's easy to predict how effective it still is so hopefully you can easily find success with this team on ladder.

Feraligatr is going full Gyarados mode with that ChestoRest set which works surprisingly well from the few testing I was able to do. You have just enough Speed to outspeed Gengar at +1, and at +2 you outspeed everything except for Scarf Gengar. For the bulk, I decided to go max HP and the rest in SpD to prevent fast special Pokemon from threatening you like Gardevoir, Gengar and Noivern which now can't 2HKO you. The set is very cheesy but works because of the surprise factor most of the time. Be wary not to reveal it too early to maximize the snowball effect.

The rest of the team is rather standard for HO; Lycanroc and Maushold to win the hazard wars, Armarouge and Tornadus to threaten special walls and Torterra to support Feraligatr by either breaking before it or cleaning after. I feel like I had to give Tornadus a slot in this team even though I hate this set but it allows you to weaken some Pokemon that are pretty annoying for Feraligatr, namely Registeel and Umbreon (which also gets weakened by Armarouge). I gave it the Wide Lens so you don't hate using it so much and Tailwind to have more options against weather teams which are otherwise quite difficult to deal with for standard HO. I expect Rain teams to be more present in this new meta so I tried to cover the matchup as much as I could.

Merry Pokemon Christmas to you, I hope you have fun using the team.​

 

[Daharan]

In as sub

 

[Winterbub]

Merry Late Christmas! (Or early depending on how you look at it)
Hoops

Here is your request - SD Talonflame!
It’s a shame that Hippo rose to UU because I was actually almost done with that build, but I’d much rather start over and make you something you could actually use.
https://pokepast.es/ad5c96015bab0879

Intro:
I haven’t been tapped into RU since we lost Gapdos, Volcanion, and Gyarados, so I apologize if any parts of my build feel outdated. However, I feel like the team came out pretty good.

Building:
When you gave me the request you suggested moves like taunt, roost, and Tera blast ground. I think those are all great directions I could have gone, but I actually ended up opting for Tera blast grass. I really liked the idea of just being able to immediately handle any bulky waters that want to switch in on SD Talon like Quag, Slowbro, Gastro, and Suicune. However this does leave us with no recovery and a glaring weakness to Hisuian Goodra.
For my second mon I decided to solve the no recovery problem with Jirachi. Scarf HWish jirachi allows Talonflame to come in once and nuke some stuff and then heal all the way back up after. Ideally you want to get the wish off after crippling one of their defensive mons with trick, but it won’t always work out that way.
Next I solved the Hoodra problem with Magnet Pull Magnezone on a balloon. This probably won’t always beat Hoodra, but hopefully it can handle it most of the time. I know I wanted iron press, but I opted to not have volt switch. I felt the value of flash cannon and thunderbolt was more important than the ability to pivot.
The last three mons I just filled in some gaps with the team adding removal and hazards. Suicune is also just a really nice win condition.

Here’s a replay of me using the team. Suicune almost immediately stole the game but fortunately my opponent had a pretty cool cress set that saved them and I got to put in work with talon later.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ru-2511134393-odjpvu9aceiukotx1r7ut35s738dkgqpw

 

[Togyeeee]

Merry Late Christmas! (Also Happy New Year)
Rarelyme

Here is your request: Swords Dance - https://pokepast.es/fc476ea1d35ac829

Well, first of all, I’d like to explain the team’s base.
This is mainly an offensive hazard stack team, applying strong pressure thanks to Mimikyu, Feraligatr, and Armarouge.

SD Meganium needs good Grass-type removal, which is where and come in. They fit very well together: Feraligatr can weaken checks like Chesnaught and Wo-Chien with Ice Punch, while Armarouge can switch into Chesnaught to gain a Weak Armor boost (you can run Weakness Policy or Power Herb, depending on preference).

fits perfectly into this kind of structure and can easily clean late-game thanks to the pressure the team applies throughout the match.

is our Stealth Rock setter and speed control. Tera Normal allows it to bait Ghost-types like Gengar and especially opposing Mimikyu.

is our Spikes setter and slow pivot / Knock Off user. It applies great pressure thanks to its utility and is probably one of the stars of the team.

Now, I’ll explain the STAR of the team.
Meganium with Covert Cloak can safely trade against Suicune (RestTalk / SubProtect variants) and PsyNoise Slowbro, while also taking Scald without worrying about burns. It functions as a solid special wall thanks to the investment, and can safely switch into offensive Empoleon and Scarf Basculegion-F. The Speed investment allows Meganium to outspeed Modest Basculegion-F and Adamant Feraligatr. The remaining EVs are just there to help Meganium deal some damage (good luck with that, LMAO).

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ru-2507977486

^ Just beating a popular snow team :)

I almost forgot to post calcs lol

148+ SpA Empoleon Ice Beam vs. 144 HP / 112+ SpD Meganium: 146-172 (43.3 - 51%) -- 3.9% chance to 2HKO (Offensive Empo)

0 SpA Empoleon Ice Beam vs. 144 HP / 112+ SpD Meganium: 116-138 (34.4 - 40.9%) -- guaranteed 3HKO (Defensive Empo)

252 SpA Basculegion-F Ice Beam vs. 144 HP / 112+ SpD Meganium: 134-158 (39.7 - 46.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO (Timid Basc)


252+ SpA Basculegion-F Ice Beam vs. 144 HP / 112+ SpD Meganium: 146-174 (43.3 - 51.6%) -- 8.2% chance to 2HKO (Modest Basc)

 

[Tubular]

Rest Talk Chien + Terrak Balance for Heatranator

​

- I've already built chien as a part of a tenta meme team, but rest talk is appealing to me. Rest fixes its problem of unrealiable recovery, so it can be more annoying as hell and wear down mons for terrak. Also helps that it checks krook (be careful of Gunk Shot, though).

- Helps chien by covering its weaknesses and having will-o for chip damage and crippling physical mons. Taunt is to improve the webs and hazstack mu.

- Scarfer that deals with steel offensively and mein, as mein's Stone Edge and cc is problematic for tflame and chien.

- I needed a wish passer and a garde check, so rachi has miminal speed investment to safely heal the wallbreakers and krook. It is also physically bulky to better scout for mien's ice or rock move. You can replace Protect for ihead to be less passive against garde and mmq.

- Since the team lacks hazard removal, specs herscu has the firepower to 2HKO or OHKO spikers like Gligar and gastro. It also checks Magic Guard reun, a mon that otherwise steamrolls this team.

- Rounds out the team by resisting ghost and electric. Sr and knock provides more sweeping and breaking opportunities for terrak.

 

[fluff!!]

Iron Thorns Offense for Winterbub

(click the sprites for paste!)​

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

The team's general gameplan is to set hazards early, have Terrakion punch some holes for Iron Thorns to exploit, make the opposing hazard remover have the worst day of its life, then clean up with Iron Thorns or Basculegion-F.


Iron Thorns @ Booster Energy
Ability: Quark Drive
Tera Type: Flying
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Taunt
- Tera Blast
- Earthquake
The choice for which set to use was quite simple: I think all the loaded dice shenaniganery is butt cheeks so I went with the classic DD Taunt TBlast Flying. Tera Blast Flying + EQ is already near perfect coverage so it opens up a slot for Taunt which is insanely good, as you will see in the Replays section. The only mons who can handle this combination of moves are usually prone to getting severely weakened by the other team members, like for example, Terrakion CCing a Bronzong for big damage or Mew spamming Psynoise and Body Press. Not that Bronzong is that common, but it's clear other Stealth Rock options will be in high demand after Hippowdon left us. You don't need to use Iron Thorns as a cleaner, using it to get 2 KOs and weakening something else in the mid game is perfectly fair game when we still have a Basc-F ready to wreak havoc in the back line.


Mew @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Synchronize
Tera Type: Fighting
EVs: 240 HP / 252 Def / 16 Spe
Bold Nature
- Spikes
- Body Press
- Psychic Noise
- Volt Switch
I started working on my hazard stacking core right away and never used this Mew set before so I figured it would be the perfect occasion to see what it brings to the table; and I was very happy with the result. I'm not going to cite Mew's smogdex analysis here, but you may read it to see what Mew does best.


Terrakion @ Chople Berry
Ability: Justified
Tera Type: Fighting
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Rock Blast
- Close Combat
- Swords Dance
I wanted an offensive Stealth Rock setter who could also bait and damage Iron Thorns's answers while being at least decent at anti-leading, and also having a Knock Off switchin if possible. Terrakion checks all these boxes. It's a great lead against Kleavor and Lycanroc leads thanks to Rock Blast bypassing Kleavor's Focus Sash, and Chople Berry allows it to tank ladder's Lead Scarf Kleavor Close Combat with ease. Chople Berry is also great for tanking a Close Combat from Mienshao, a Mach Punch from Breloom, or any other strong Fighting move you can think of, and KOing back with your own Close Combat. tl;dr trading is good. Swords Dance helps pressuring the teams of defensive mons unable to OHKO like Muk-A much more.


Basculegion-F @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Adaptability
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 52 Def / 236 SpA / 24 SpD / 196 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Agility
- Shadow Ball
- Surf
- Ice Beam
Basculegion-F checks a lot of boxes: Big Special attacker, can threaten a sweep, great at blocking Rapid Spin, helpful against both Sun and Rain, and brings a bit of bulk to trade vs OTR Diancie or stuff idk. It's great at cleaning up after an Iron Thorns rampage, or at punching holes for Iron Thorns. Don't forget that Basculegion is especially threatening after setting 3 layers of Spikes, or Rocks + Spikes, since most of its checks like Muk-A and Hoodra are very susceptible to them. The more hazards up the merrier. It's also a solid switch in to Sacred Fire, which is always nice to have.


At that point I knew I wasn't gonna cover the HO matchup naturally with no priority or speed control to speak of 4 mons into the builder. Luckily, Ditto happens to be great in RU nowadays thanks to the popularity of HO and Stall. It prevents almost all of the tier's most dangerous setup sweepers like P-Z and Torterra from running over you without thought. Some will call running Ditto a proof of bad teambuilding, I call it Ditto 80% WR in RUCL.


Tsareena @ Assault Vest
Ability: Queenly Majesty
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 32 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 220 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Power Whip
- Knock Off
- Triple Axel
I wasn't sure whether to try and look for an offensive spinner (because Cyclizar ain't gonna cut it in this team) or to just accept my fate and run something with boots that hits big buttons. So, as all great builders do, filtering Rapid Spin users in the hope of finding anything, I saw Tsareena and said "fk it we ball". AV Cyc is cringe anyway, so I bring you AV Tsareena. She was actually much more useful that I thought she would be, being great at deterring Ghosts from coming in to block Spin since the combination of Power Whip and Knock Off threaten all of them for often an outright OHKO. Being a Grass type also means being able to tank a Rain boosted hit once which is always welcome. You could also hope the opponent forgets about Queenly Majesty. although it's still a decent ability in general. The EV spread could use some labbing. As of right now, you have enough Speed to outspeed Talonflame after a Rapid Spin, 4 SpDef EVs for Download, 252 Atk because hurr durr and the rest into HP. Feel free to tinker in the calc with HP investments as I don't even know what benchmarks 252 Atk reaches. You could consider running HJK to threaten Bisharp directly as it is a very popular mon but all 4 moves are too important to pass up on. But it is true that if Terrakion were to be weakened too much, Bish can become an issue. Tera Type can also be tinkered with. I actually did all my test games with Tera Grass because I forgot about it, but all of Tera Water, Steel and Fairy are worthy of consideration.


Replay zone
tw: fresh account laddering
Went 7-0 in piss ladder but won against Rain and HO and that's better proof of a good team than those flimsy tournaments I keep hearing about.
Tsareena solo wins against Webs because Basc ain't switching into that
Taunt allows Iron Thorns to bulldoze half a team
Ditto proceeds to reverse sweep an opponent who doesn't know what their own moves do
Basc-F cleans up against a team with no hazard removal and no boots lol thanks ladder
This is where I would put the replay against Rain if I saved it

EDIT: forgot the paste lol

 

[fluff!!]

Basculegion-F @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Adaptability
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 52 Def / 236 SpA / 24 SpD / 196 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Agility
- Shadow Ball
- Surf
- Ice Beam
Basculegion-F checks a lot of boxes: Big Special attacker, can threaten a sweep, great at blocking Rapid Spin, helpful against both Sun and Rain, and brings a bit of bulk to trade vs OTR Diancie or stuff idk. It's great at cleaning up after an Iron Thorns rampage, or at punching holes for Iron Thorns. Don't forget that Basculegion is especially threatening after setting 3 layers of Spikes, or Rocks + Spikes, since most of its checks like Muk-A and Hoodra are very susceptible to them. The more hazards up the merrier. It's also a solid switch in to Sacred Fire, which is always nice to have.

After thinking about it, you could consider running Colbur Berry over WP to Surf on Krook (and Bish too ig?) for "free" since WP only really works if there's a Cyc in the enemy team who's willing to give your WP for free, WP is much better in Screens/Veil. Also the team doesn't have a real Krook switch in, and even though usually Krook can't actually do much in-game it still feels good to have a real way to bait it and OHKO it even if Thorns kinda already does it