Proof of Ranking
Hey guys, as a newcomer to the gen 8 format, I'd like to start off with describing one of my first teams that I built upon the crown tundra's expansion release. As the metagame began to shift, I decide to start off with a more defensive structure to my team, since I enjoy stall based teams. With that in mind, lets get started.
First mon on the team!
Toxapex @ Black Sludge
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 16 Spe
- Scald
- Recover
- Haze
- Knock Off
Toxapex is my knock off mon. As toxapex has a broken ass ability (regenerator) It is able to force progress against other things by knocking off leftovers from a clefable. Thanks to toxapexs blessed typing it makes it so god damn hard to wear down. Like what mon wants to switch in to a knock off or a potential scald burn. With toxapexs god moveset it’s able to prevent setup from broken shit like calm mind shift gear mag while checking banded mosa, and zen ace.
Scald- scald is to force progress and can burn basically anything
Knock off- knock off makes it easier to wear things down by knocking off leftovers
Haze- haze prevents setup from mons like magearna, and has a lot of pp.
Recover- recover is pretty mandatory on every toxapex. Which makes it even harder to wear down. I can’t stress on how hard it is to wear down toxapex because of recover+regenerator.
252 Atk Libero Cinderace Zen Headbutt vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Toxapex: 132-156 (43.4 - 51.3%) -- 3.1% chance to 2HKO
252 Atk Life Orb Pheromosa Drill Run vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Toxapex: 127-151 (41.7 - 49.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
Blissey (F) @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
Blissey is fat. Blissey is probably the best special wall in the game right now. Able to check things like Quiver Dance Volcarona, Specs Pult, Scarf spectrier etc.
With blissey having natural cure it makes it even harder to wear down since it can come in on a potential status move and get up rocks right in front of it.
- Stealth Rock I figured this team wouldn’t need any momentum so I decided rocks>teleport would be better
- Seismic Toss Blissey can’t really use anything else besides Seismic Toss. You can actually stall out a pex by spamming toss on it so it’s a good way to force progress
- Soft-Boiled soft boiled is mandatory on blissey. It gives it longevity and allows it to check volc
- Toxic Toxic allows it to stall mons like hydreigon unaware clef etc
Clefable @ Leftovers
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Aromatherapy
- Moonblast
- Wish
- Protect
Clefable. The mon that has basically defined generation 8 (or at least, in my opinion). This thing has NEVER not been a key part of the metagame, and I'm using my own iteration of clef on this team as a cleric with wish passing capabilities. With unaware, it is annoying for most mons to deal with this thing, as setup that checks MG clefable does not work against this variant. Wish is a very great move that allows for the chance to heal up other mons (We don't use wishport though, that's for noobs), and on a bulky mon like clef, it gets a decent amount of chances to set it up. The key aspect of this set, though, is aromatherapy. Every single mon on this team does have access to good, instant recovery, so it's not exactly the most necessary thing to be wish passing all the time. What this team DOES lack is being able to remove hazards. Burns on Pex, toxic on Hydreigon, Quagsire, Corviknight, and itself can all be eliminated with a single click. Admittedly, this mon does have a weakness in hazards and status in itself. However, those can be taken care of with defog support and good plays. These flaws can therefore, be forgiven in some aspect due to the amount of support it can offer to the team, and thus, clef will always play a huge role in this squad.
The evs on clefable is max physdef and max hp to guard against Urshifu and Hawlucha
Hydreigon @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 168 SpD / 88 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Dark Pulse
- Earth Power
- Roost
- Defog
Hydreigon is my 2nd defogger on the team, as it puts a less pressure on corviknight from defogging Hydreigon holds the team together by checking crawdaunt, heatran, and spectrier which can potentially 6-0 my team. Hydreigon can also force progress by spamming dark pulse which hits p hard even without the 252 spatk.
Hydreigon can also play around future sight+shifu teams, because for some reason people click wicked blow under future sight instead of cc to hit the darks.
Speed is for max speed heatran that is modest, and max hp and rest in spdef to guard against spectrier.
Quagsire @ Leftovers
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Haze
- Recover
- Toxic
Quagsire is unaware of your boosts. Quagsire can check things like shift gear calm stored power magearna (if pex is weakened),swords dance chomp,dragon dance dragonite (If clefable is weakened), And bisharp (Which this team struggles with). It is able to stop volt turn cores because of its ground typing Volt turn cores and destroy stall by gaining momentum and chipping you down slowly, And grounds are mandatory on all teams just because of regileki being able to tear through them.
Scald - Scald can be a way for force progress against steel types, e.x Magearna,Corv, basically any mon that likes to switch in on a toxic
Haze - Haze is to stop shift gear stored power magearna from getting out of hand, As shift gear mag can sweep this team if pex is weakened
Recover - Recover is a mandatory move on Quag. As it allows you to stall out mons like bisharp,melmental etc
Toxic - Toxic is used to put a timer on mons like Garchomp, Dragonite, etc (which i mentioned above)
Corviknight @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 5 Spe
- Spite
- Roost
- Body Press
- Defog
Now last but not least, Corviknight. Corviknight is able to wall toxic swords dance drill (which is not to common), stall ferrothorn with spite+pressure, and plays the long matchup against other fat teams. I originally had Moltres>Corviknight on the team. but i knock ferrothorn+a different stealth rocker would be a problem, as moltres would take 4x damage from rocks. Corviknight also forces a melmental to click thunder punch instead of its stab and you can go hard quagsire.
The evs for Corviknight is max physdef which allows it to take on swords dance drill, odd hp so it takes less from rocks and rest in spdef.
5 speed ivs on Corviknight is to be slower then hippowdown, and get a slow roost off.
- Spite Spite is able to stall out mons like ferrothorn, and basically any thing that wants to 1v1 it.
- Roost Roost is mandatory as it gives me longevity for mons like drill
- Body Press Body press is for mons like, Tyranitar, and Drill
- Defog Double defog is good against spike+stealth rock teams which can pressure stall pretty hard.
Replays: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1229102107-e63stpj6klpvs3b8uago7dfz5cqtpjupw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1229115495-g4h4d406oq9wmuyo729ao0lxidcrp6opw
Team: https://pokepast.es/7acc2547d748578f
Hey guys, as a newcomer to the gen 8 format, I'd like to start off with describing one of my first teams that I built upon the crown tundra's expansion release. As the metagame began to shift, I decide to start off with a more defensive structure to my team, since I enjoy stall based teams. With that in mind, lets get started.
First mon on the team!
Toxapex @ Black Sludge
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 16 Spe
- Scald
- Recover
- Haze
- Knock Off
Toxapex is my knock off mon. As toxapex has a broken ass ability (regenerator) It is able to force progress against other things by knocking off leftovers from a clefable. Thanks to toxapexs blessed typing it makes it so god damn hard to wear down. Like what mon wants to switch in to a knock off or a potential scald burn. With toxapexs god moveset it’s able to prevent setup from broken shit like calm mind shift gear mag while checking banded mosa, and zen ace.
Scald- scald is to force progress and can burn basically anything
Knock off- knock off makes it easier to wear things down by knocking off leftovers
Haze- haze prevents setup from mons like magearna, and has a lot of pp.
Recover- recover is pretty mandatory on every toxapex. Which makes it even harder to wear down. I can’t stress on how hard it is to wear down toxapex because of recover+regenerator.
252 Atk Libero Cinderace Zen Headbutt vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Toxapex: 132-156 (43.4 - 51.3%) -- 3.1% chance to 2HKO
252 Atk Life Orb Pheromosa Drill Run vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Toxapex: 127-151 (41.7 - 49.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
Blissey (F) @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
Blissey is fat. Blissey is probably the best special wall in the game right now. Able to check things like Quiver Dance Volcarona, Specs Pult, Scarf spectrier etc.
With blissey having natural cure it makes it even harder to wear down since it can come in on a potential status move and get up rocks right in front of it.
- Stealth Rock I figured this team wouldn’t need any momentum so I decided rocks>teleport would be better
- Seismic Toss Blissey can’t really use anything else besides Seismic Toss. You can actually stall out a pex by spamming toss on it so it’s a good way to force progress
- Soft-Boiled soft boiled is mandatory on blissey. It gives it longevity and allows it to check volc
- Toxic Toxic allows it to stall mons like hydreigon unaware clef etc
Clefable @ Leftovers
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Aromatherapy
- Moonblast
- Wish
- Protect
Clefable. The mon that has basically defined generation 8 (or at least, in my opinion). This thing has NEVER not been a key part of the metagame, and I'm using my own iteration of clef on this team as a cleric with wish passing capabilities. With unaware, it is annoying for most mons to deal with this thing, as setup that checks MG clefable does not work against this variant. Wish is a very great move that allows for the chance to heal up other mons (We don't use wishport though, that's for noobs), and on a bulky mon like clef, it gets a decent amount of chances to set it up. The key aspect of this set, though, is aromatherapy. Every single mon on this team does have access to good, instant recovery, so it's not exactly the most necessary thing to be wish passing all the time. What this team DOES lack is being able to remove hazards. Burns on Pex, toxic on Hydreigon, Quagsire, Corviknight, and itself can all be eliminated with a single click. Admittedly, this mon does have a weakness in hazards and status in itself. However, those can be taken care of with defog support and good plays. These flaws can therefore, be forgiven in some aspect due to the amount of support it can offer to the team, and thus, clef will always play a huge role in this squad.
The evs on clefable is max physdef and max hp to guard against Urshifu and Hawlucha
Hydreigon @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 168 SpD / 88 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Dark Pulse
- Earth Power
- Roost
- Defog
Hydreigon is my 2nd defogger on the team, as it puts a less pressure on corviknight from defogging Hydreigon holds the team together by checking crawdaunt, heatran, and spectrier which can potentially 6-0 my team. Hydreigon can also force progress by spamming dark pulse which hits p hard even without the 252 spatk.
Hydreigon can also play around future sight+shifu teams, because for some reason people click wicked blow under future sight instead of cc to hit the darks.
Speed is for max speed heatran that is modest, and max hp and rest in spdef to guard against spectrier.
Quagsire @ Leftovers
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Haze
- Recover
- Toxic
Quagsire is unaware of your boosts. Quagsire can check things like shift gear calm stored power magearna (if pex is weakened),swords dance chomp,dragon dance dragonite (If clefable is weakened), And bisharp (Which this team struggles with). It is able to stop volt turn cores because of its ground typing Volt turn cores and destroy stall by gaining momentum and chipping you down slowly, And grounds are mandatory on all teams just because of regileki being able to tear through them.
Scald - Scald can be a way for force progress against steel types, e.x Magearna,Corv, basically any mon that likes to switch in on a toxic
Haze - Haze is to stop shift gear stored power magearna from getting out of hand, As shift gear mag can sweep this team if pex is weakened
Recover - Recover is a mandatory move on Quag. As it allows you to stall out mons like bisharp,melmental etc
Toxic - Toxic is used to put a timer on mons like Garchomp, Dragonite, etc (which i mentioned above)
Corviknight @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 5 Spe
- Spite
- Roost
- Body Press
- Defog
Now last but not least, Corviknight. Corviknight is able to wall toxic swords dance drill (which is not to common), stall ferrothorn with spite+pressure, and plays the long matchup against other fat teams. I originally had Moltres>Corviknight on the team. but i knock ferrothorn+a different stealth rocker would be a problem, as moltres would take 4x damage from rocks. Corviknight also forces a melmental to click thunder punch instead of its stab and you can go hard quagsire.
The evs for Corviknight is max physdef which allows it to take on swords dance drill, odd hp so it takes less from rocks and rest in spdef.
5 speed ivs on Corviknight is to be slower then hippowdown, and get a slow roost off.
- Spite Spite is able to stall out mons like ferrothorn, and basically any thing that wants to 1v1 it.
- Roost Roost is mandatory as it gives me longevity for mons like drill
- Body Press Body press is for mons like, Tyranitar, and Drill
- Defog Double defog is good against spike+stealth rock teams which can pressure stall pretty hard.
Replays: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1229102107-e63stpj6klpvs3b8uago7dfz5cqtpjupw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1229115495-g4h4d406oq9wmuyo729ao0lxidcrp6opw
Team: https://pokepast.es/7acc2547d748578f
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