2 BUGS ARE BETTER THAN 1 - AN OU RMT (PEAKED #33)

[malefic]

-INTRODUCTION-
(couldn't think of a better name >_>)
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hello smogon. being bored, i decided to share a team of mine that i cobbled together for the ongoing keldeo suspect and that got me reqs with relative ease (owing partly to the abundance of terrible players on the ladder). the playstyle of this team is hyper offence as with the majority of my teams; i prefer having my pokemon dish out rather than sponge damage (crits and more importantly BURNS are the downfall of too many otherwise well-played & well-constructed stall teams which is just stupid imo). anyway, i shall proceed to outline my teambuilding process.

Proof of peak:​

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-AT A GLANCE-

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-TEAMBUILDING PROCESS-​

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gaining momentum early-game is crucial to hyper offence. powerful priority moves are another must-have for HO, and so i settled on this little guy, who is a personal fave anyway. i sashed him, because sashloom is great at giving me leverage early game which i can capitalise on to keep the offensive pressure consistently heavy.

i needed another user of priority as well as a win condition and settled on scizor (at this point i wasn't actually giving it much thought). i use a bulky SDZor as it gives me a more viable win condition than Bandzor would. zor also helps me with mons like latios and gengar that are general threats to HO. zor isn't #1 in usage for nothing.

latios stood out as a mon that would help me against sun and rain teams. the main pokemon that discourages me from using latios in my teams would definitely be ttar, which loom and zor easily subdue. i used CM dragon gem latios with dpulse, hpfire and thunder, and it won me many a good game. this latios excelled at setting up on bulky waters and was a huge success in a rain-dominated meta especially on the (current) ladder where rain water spam was heavily employed.

dragonite is an excellent pokemon on weatherless teams. at this point i wanted many things: another sun and rain check, another reliable source of priority, a volcarona check (badly) etc etc and nite was all that rolled into one. dual dragon offence also looked like a good way to go.

dual fight spam AND dual dragon spam, why the hell not? SDluc seemed like an obvious choice (although in retrospect i would concede that i chose it on impulse). ANOTHER source of priority, and also a good mon against sand teams in general. besides, i chose this along with the last pokemon of the team, CustapSkarm - and luc and skarm complemented each other as espeed nets some notable kos with SR + 1 spikes.

this team got me to 3000++ glicko2 on the hyperinflated ladder before i started facing some actually good players >_> which marked a turning point beyond which i found my team manhandled by well-played lando-t and some rachi sets. custapskarm was becoming exceedingly overused, and i didn't like essentially losing certain HOvsHO matches from the get-go because of losing a speed tie with opposing custapskarm. i also felt that luc was underperforming & wasnt killing anything that the rest of my team couldnt handle; it would usually kill a ferro or something before being threatened by scarfrachi/scarf lando/terrak which would force me to relinquish my offensive momentum. i decided to backtrack a little and remove both of them from the team.

without luc, spikes weren't an absolute necessity. SR definitely was though, and i needed a reliable setter of it. lando-t was still a huge threat, and i also needed another source of priority if possible, and therefore my answer lay in mamo. sashed it too, as sash mamo has the potential to rack up ridiculous early-game momentum + clean up endgame.

SR stood out as a major pain to the team, fucking up both my sashmons and breaking nite's multiscale. magic bounce stood out as the best way to keep rocks at bay in a HO team as it is a passive ability, as opposed to spinning, which takes up one crucial turn (not to mention the possibility of spinblock). xatu was then made the final team member, and boy, did it not let me down.

this next and last decision would be one i was loath to make. the team was doing fine, except that i had an issue with latios's typing, which left it vulnerable to common priority from the likes of opposing scizor and mamo. scarfrachi was also still a big threat to the team and i felt like i needed another check to it. with some reluctance i chose volcarona, which checks zor and scarfrachi brilliantly (flame body hax is always welcome too) and otherwise fulfills much the same roles as latios (with the same unfortunate weaknesses to ttar and heatran, lol). i missed out on the added insurance against rain teams though, and gave the team a greater weakness to dragonite. overall though, volc over latios has felt like a net gain, and this is the incarnation of the team i've been running with.

-TEAM ANALYSIS-

Xatu @ Rocky Helmet​

Trait: Magic Bounce
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SDef
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 16 Spd
- Heat Wave
- Roost
- U-turn
- Toxic​

• xatu's primary role is to keep rocks off the field duh​
• rocky helmet punishes scizor, breloom, scarfrachi. it also breaks multiscale and random sashes​
• ivs and nature are so i move last against heatran that try to set up SR the turn i uturn​
• toxic to cripple walls, but many times i feel i can make better use of this moveslot​
  

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Breloom @ Focus Sash
Trait: Technician
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Bullet Seed
- Low Sweep
- Spore
- Mach Punch​

• adamant to maximise damage output​
• my team's main answer to jellicent, (most) rotom-w and well bulky waters in general. a secondary answer to tran, kyub and terrak​
• sash because sash is a great item and sashloom a great mon. barring non-ou mons, if the opponent's team lacks celebi, i bring this out first turn to spore something and throw some damage about​
• low sweep is great for catching stuff off guard and gaining me some useful momentum oh a 90 bp stab move is nothing to scoff at either​
  

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Scizor @ Lum Berry
Trait: Technician
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 SDef
Adamant Nature
- Bullet Punch
- Swords Dance
- Superpower
- U-turn​

• the main answer to terrak and kyub, gets in a hit against lati@s, nite, chomp making them easier to handle
• the team's mandatory steel type​
• a bulky spread (hp instead of speed investment) helps me play around lati@s better, take dragon and water attacks more comfortably and basically extend zor's lifespan​
• lum to cushion me from scald burns which is infinitely important since scald burns 100% of the time, this allows me to get past rotom-w in a pinch - very cool as rotom-w threatens this team significantly​
• uturn for momentum and under some early-game circumstances feign a choiced set​
  

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Volcarona (M) @ Passho Berry
Trait: Flame Body
EVs: 56 Def / 252 SAtk / 200 Spd
Modest Nature
- Fiery Dance
- Bug Buzz/Psychic
- Giga Drain
- Quiver Dance​

• the steel killer of the team. this volc acts as a midgame breaker more than an endgame cleaner/sweeper​
• giga drain + passho allows volc to get past jelli, rotom-w and toed​
• fiery dance is mandatory stab, the SpA boost has proven useful on occasion. should i choose fire blast though?​
• psychic is something i've been testing primarily because it works out against tenta which is one of the biggest threats to the team. missing out on bug stab definitely isn't nice although it isnt as bad as one might think, ultimately i'm only losing the ability to hit lati@s, who wouldnt be too keen to come in against volc anyway (starmie is killed by +1 giga drain)​
• modest to maximise damage output, speed isn't really needed on this volc, even with max speed i don't outspeed scarfdeo, scarfti@s, scarfrak, scarfchomp... i get a useless speed tie with scarfmence and as it is i only really need to outspeed positive-natured base 80s​
  

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Dragonite @ Normal Gem
Trait: Multiscale
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Naughty Nature
- Dragon Claw
- ExtremeSpeed
- Ice Beam
- Earthquake​

• ddnite's time is over. seriously ddnite is horrible, it is outspeeding nothing it really wants to at +1. cbnite is powerful but overly restrictive so i opted for a 4-attack nite​
• normal gem to dish out that band espeed when needed. this has proven very useful against the likes of lati@s and starmie​
• dragon claw over outrage for the mandatory dragon stab, this nite doesn't like being locked into a move, 80bp stab off 400 attack hits what it needs to hard enough anyway​
• ice beam is somewhat of an answer to lando-t and puts a full stop to gliscor; please don't dismiss it as a gimmick, if lando-t uses hp ice nite can use ice beam​
  

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Mamoswine @ Focus Sash
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Ice Shard
- Icicle Spear
- Earthquake
- Stealth Rock​

• the team's SR setter and provider of ice priority that snipes dragons, thundy + lando-t. stab eq is great for breaking tran, ttar and eq + ice stab makes mamo hard to switch into in general​
• icicle spear to break subs and get past yachechomp (in conjunction w sash)​
• sash ensures sr goes up when i need it to, many times it has proven invaluable lategame as well as i can often ensure it isnt broken with xatu around early-game​

-THREATLIST-
(red = primary | orange = secondary)

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• a top threat to the team which only mamo can really handle but not really. nothing can switch into it without risking a scald burn. sciz carries lum but can't hurt it significantly. this is the main reason why psychic is considered on volc.

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• intimidate just cripples a team with 4/5 of its attackers being physically-based. it doesn't help that both these users of the ability are otherwise rather threatening to the team too​
• defensive pivot lando requires me to play very carefully around it to prevent rocks from going up​
• scarf lando screws over alot of shit on the team​
• gyara, especially those carrying intimidate, sets up on more than half of the team and is almost guaranteed to net at least 1 kill​

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• not a big issue if i play carefully, but the fact that it stops my 2 bugs in their tracks earns it a spot in this threatlist

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• again not a big threat with careful play but it does manhandle xatu+mamo, my hazard setting + prevention duo, and it does carry the hated WoW

-CONCLUSION-
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i have had plenty of fun and success with this team. having 4 sources of solid priority, a good team synergy and possessing a certain level of skill as a player has enabled me to finish most matches swiftly and decisively. however as much as i am proud of the team i don't think it is perfect, and neither am i the best teambuilder. for example, the team generally matches up poorly against rain stall teams, and there are certain mons (as listed in the threatlist) that are consistently major impediments to my victory whenever i encounter them... so tl;dr im just looking for as much constructive criticism as possible ^_^

 

[Brawlfest]

Hello! Congratulations on the peak. The team looks quite well made, only with a few needed tweaks.

Firstly, I find that having low sweep and Mach Punch is a tad redundant. Under Technician, Mach Punch works fine, and I would suggest changing Breloom's Low Sweep to Swords Dance. With your Sash, you can most certainly get off a spore, which garuntees at least a Swords Dance, of which you can follow with either BulletSeed or MachPunch.

I feel that both Dragonite and Volcarona's items are also inefficient. On Volcarona, your main threat isnt water moves, its in fact Rock moves. For that reason, if you MUST have a berry, use Charti, with all the Stone Edges in the Tier. However, a much better option might just be Leftovers, Lum, or Life Orb.

As for Dragonite, normal gem seems a bit akward. Banded Dragonite gets much better results, and Leftovers will help you keep Multiscale intact, both of which are superior. It also is not appreciating the Lowered Special Defense from it's nature. If you don't want to be locked into a move, may I suggest just using leftovers, and having Dragon Claw | Extremespeed | Fire Pwnch | Roost, to get coverage, and maintain your monstrous multiscale?

Interesting team though, love it.

 

[Jukain]

Hi @Parapaxis -- got your rate request! This is a neat team you've got here, and I actually see very few performance issues. Let me just suggest a few little changes that could optimize your team.

First off, @Brawlfest, Passho is extremely good. You can set up on Scalds and even take a non-Specs/LO Surf from Keldeo. These benefits make the choice to run Passho a great one, and thus I wholeheartedly disagree with your assertion. However, I strongly suggest running some more bulk to aid in setting up. Run 108 Spd / 108 HP / 252 SAtk / 40 SDef, which gives you a good amount of bulk to take Hydro Pumps, particularly helping against Keldeo, which you can with this spread survive a Hydro Pump from comfortably. You have just enough Speed to outrun Breloom and a lot of Pokemon at +1, as well as max Special Attack to get the most possible damage off. This spread will help you immensely.

Well, I actually am going to suggest a Pokemon change. Xatu doesn't seem quite fit for this team. It's unreliable in blocking hazards, shares weaknesses with the rest of your team, and takes up a precious teamslot. I highly recommend slotting in a bulky Starmie over it. You very much need an out to Fighting-type attacks on this team -- one not wrecked by Terrakion as well. Starmie can do this. You are also extremely Fire weak, so having a strong resist is essential. Just Dragonite is not enough. Starmie helps in that department. It's actually quite bulky with max HP, and is fast enough to almost guarantee a spin in many cases. You have hazard issues even with Xatu, and Starmie fixes that and other issues right up.

Finally, your Dragonite set. You'd better off if you just used a Choice Band. Normal Gem, while all cool for that lure and strong priority aspect, is disappointing in every way. With all your other moves unboosted, face it -- you're just a weak Dragon, and you don't even have Leftovers or Roost! I highly recommend going Outrage / Dragon Claw / ExtremeSpeed / Superpower. Superpower covers all your bases, nailing the blobs without resorting to Outrage, OHKOing Tyranitar, and OHKOing Heatran. Heatran is a huge pain for this team, and Superpower provides a good way to hit it hard without resorting to the weak and exploitable Earthquake. CB Nite is a hit-and-run attacker/revenger anyway, so the stat drops aren't /too/ big an issue.

Finally, that Scizor. That is one messed up Scizor, haha. Run Flying Gem + Acrobatics / Superpower / Bullet Punch / Swords Dance + 252 Atk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd Adamant. Acrobatics keeps you from being walled by Landorus-T/Gyarados, two threats you listed. Acrobatics also nails Tentacruel and Jellicent, which I see as annoying to break for this team in conjunction with a Latias or Celebi. This Scizor will lure in these threats and kill them, which is extremely important. All in all, your Scizor is inferior, and this change will fix it. Screw U-turn. You're running a boosting set.

With these changes, I can say that this team should perform well in the metagame.

tl;dr

- 108 Spd / 108 HP / 252 SAtk / 40 SDef > your current spread on Volcarona

- Bulky Starmie > Xatu

- Choice Band > Normal Gem and Outrage / Superpower > Earthquake / Ice Beam on Dragonite

starmie

Starmie @ Leftovers
Trait: Natural Cure
EVs: 248 HP / 32 Def / 4 SAtk / 224 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Rapid Spin
- Scald
- Psyshock
- Recover

Notes on the EV spread: 248 HP / 32 Def lets Starmie always survive the OHKO from CB Terrakion's Stone Edge and standard Ferrothorn's Power Whip. 4 SAtk provides enough power to always OHKO 4 HP Gengar. 224 Spd Timid is enough to outrun Tornadus (base 111) and below.

 

[Reymedy]

Wanted to do a rate, as you requested, but instead I'll bounce on Jukain's one.
So first, ye, definitely Starmie over Xatu, that's the first thing I thought when I saw the team.

However, I don't really like the AcroZor in this very situation. I feel like your team has enough weapons to deal with Bulky Waters (Passho, Breloom, now Starmie, and Mamoswine pressuring them really hard). On top of that, your Scizor has a lot of work to do so you better make sure he doesn't go to waste in an attempt to be overly aggressive.
Instead, you could go for the SD/U-Turn/Roost/BPunch set... or you can try Jirachi Scarf in this spot, with HealingWishorTrick/IcePunch/IronHead/U-Turn. Now, you have a better switch-in to what you mentioned in your comment, and another Rock resistance would be REALLY appreciated when your only one is Breloom (who won't last 3 turns). Jirachi makes sure that your opponent can't lock his pokemon in a Rock move "for free". For instance, let's say he has a Scarf/CB Terrak, you just have to switch to Jirachi... and if he did predict correctly and went for the CC, then your Nite/Volc are ready to hit back HARD.
You can just go for the Bulky spread, Healing Wish would be the best option in my opinion, to bring back Nite Multiscale once SR are off the field, bring a weakened Volcarona back to life, or restore Breloom's Sash.

Starmie should help you against Gyara, if you go for a difference set than Jukain mentionned. In my opinion, you can keep the "bulkyness" and go for a 200/84/224 Timid spread, with Tbolt/HPump/Recover/RapidSpin. You could try to put Ice Beam somewhere, but I don't feel like Grass types are annoying for your team, they offer many set-up possibilites.
With that spread you live +1 Bounce for Gyara and can kill him after SR, even the bulkier versions, 100% of the time.

I think the CB Nite is a fine suggestion, but I'd really rather go for FirePunch/Outrage/ESpeed/Earthquake because I really dislike Superpower on Nite (especially when you get locked)... but well, it's up to you.
Finally, you could try Superpower>IcycleSpear, usually, you don't regret this choice to hit Rotom-W/Ferro harder.

Was just a quick opinion sustaining Jukain's rate since you already mentionned your weaknesses etc, I hope I helped.

 

[X5Dragon]

Nice team :)

There a couple of ways to solve your threat list problem. You can either use Volca's HP Ground to get past Tentacruel and Heatran (Rotom-W and Politoed are never gonna enjoy Bug Buzz's anyway) or use SD Acrobatics Scizor to get rid of Tentacruel and got the edge over most defensive Heatrans.

 

[malefic]

thanks for the rates and suggestions guys! i'm currently testing them out; in the meantime all are welcome to view comment and rate :)

 

[chimpact]

Hey there, sorry for the late reply haha.

I think you should try out endeavor on Mamoswine over Icicle Spear. It allows you to get past a lot of pokemon that mamoswine can't beat and it can open up some sweeps for your other pokemon.

Additionally, I'm not really sold on Ice Beam on Dragonite. Yea it can get a surprise kill on lando I, but the scarfed lando set is more problematic for your team so I don't think its the best idea for this particular team.

I would also just replace xatu and breloom. breloom is great, and is a great answer to a lot of pokemon, but it doesnt really support the team. breloom doesnt cover the main problems that your team has. Bulky waters are handled by breloom, but they're going to remain relatively healthy

I'll add more explanations later on.