So as most of you may or may not know, I (True Syzygy on Shoddy) have spent the last few weeks trying to make myself into a Trick Room master mind. I've tested for the best sweepers, I've tested for the best core, I've tested for the best lead; everything one would need for a "successful" Trick Room team. I realize that, no matter how solid your team itself is, in a "gimmicky" environment like Trick Room it definately takes some experience and skill to play the team successfully, and I've been working on that too. In this team I simply try to keep Trick Room as much as possible, abusing it with my Sweeping Abusers, and when I see an opening for the sweep I clean them with my lategame.
@Lum Berry
252 HP/128 Def/130 SpD
Relaxed
Levitate
~Gyro Ball
~Explosion
~Trick Room
~Stealth Rock
- I Stealth Rock as he does, and then Trick Room while he usually does A) switches out B) attacks with something I resists. Then I switch to the appropriate pokemon.
- Although it's tough for me, I usually end up Gyro Balling, watching the Taunt. If he does Taunt, I have an easy 2HKO; if he doesn't taunt, I usually have to switch out to Slowbro, since i just ate a Fireblast and another one is coming my way.
-I simply Stealth Rock as he does, and then Trick Room the next turn. He really doesn't bother me very much.
- Silly antileads. I Stealth Rock the first turn, even though it often leads to being tricked into his scarf. If I get flinched by Iron Head the first turn, I start trying to use Trick Room, because I'd rather used the one hole I might get offered in the Flinch Hax to become faster than him, and THEN put in Rocks.
- Not much I can do here. I Gyroball for the 2HKO as he Taunts me and puts up rocks.
- I use Trick Room first turn here, as he usually won't OHKO me, and if Trick Room goes off I can put up Rocks before he kills me the second turn.
- I Stealth Rock as it does and then Trick Room and switch out.
- I Stealth Rock as he protects, Gyro Ball as he subs, then Trick Room on the second protect and Gyroball before he uses his next sub.
- I hate going face to face with these things. I Stealth Rock as they do, then Trick Room as they usually put up stupid screens that I usually have to wait out.
- I Stealth Rock as it (usually) does. Then I Trick Room unless he Dragon Danced, in which case I Gyroball him, if he didn't I usually switch out.
@Leftovers
252 HP/120 SpD/138 SpA
Quiet
Trace
~Thunderbolt
~Ice Beam
~Trick Room
~Recover
@Life Orb
252 SpA/252 SpD/6 HP
Quiet
Torrent
~Hydro Pump
~Ice Beam
~Grass Knot
~Roar
This here penguin is the first of my abusers. Abusers are a very important aspect of Trick Room teams, and I found no one better than Empoleon. Empoleon, with his 111 base attack, can be decently scary when he's faster than you. On top of that, his mass of resistances backs up the core with the very important bug and dark resists. His excellent Special Defense is important, since no one likes one of their main sweepers being KOd on the switch in, before it gets a chance to do any damage. I chose to go with Roar over HP Fire because it's a 100% to OHKO Scizor with Hydro Pump anyways. Grass knot is VERY important, since a Swampert can absolutely demolish this team without it (moreso in the earlier versions than now, but he's still scary.) I'm not sure what the coverage chart on Water-Grass-Ice is, but I'm sure it's not too impressive. I love this set anyways, and can't find anything that would make it better.
@Thick Club
252 Atk/252 Def/6 HP
Brave
Rock Head
~Earthquake
~Fire Punch
~Stone Edge
~Substitute
Here's my second, and potentially more devastating, abuser. I decided to change the moveset up a bit, and use Substitute over both Thunder Punch and Double Edge. If Marowak has a Sub up at the end of Trick Room, it doesn't give the other person a free turn of setup as it would without a sub. Also, if Gyarados tries to come in to revenge kill, his Intimidate doesn't affect me and he gets easily OHKOd by Stone Edge. Also, Sub allows Marowak to no longer fear the bastardly WoW from Dusknoir, and 2HKO him with Earthquake. These, along with like five hundred other advantages of Sub, with few drawbacks, led me to put it on the moveset. His attack is, of course, maxxed, allowing him to reach 568, a gargantuan number for Ubers. My only complaint is that I never get to use Earthquake, it seems no one sticks in for a base 100 power STAB attack coming from 568 attack...
@Life Orb
252 SpA/252 Spe/6 HP
Timid
Levitate
~Shadowball
~Thunderbolt
~Focus Blast
~Explosion
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252 HP/128 Def/130 SpD
Relaxed
Levitate
~Gyro Ball
~Explosion
~Trick Room
~Stealth Rock
So Bronzong is my lead, as he is, and should be, on many other Trick Room teams. His bulk and his plethora of resists allows him to come in time after time through the battle, and is about as far from a suicide lead as you can get (except for the whole exploding thing, but I'll get to that later). There's a breakdown of what I do against the common leads below. Since I also use Bronzong alot lategame, I'll include some of that. The main thing is that damned Breloom. He always causes me problems unelss Trick Room is up when he switches in. In the case of a rampant Breloom, I have to do this. First-let something get put to sleep Second- Switch in Bronzong on the Sub Third- Use Trick Room while eating a Focus punch Finally- Explode on the stupid Sub. Then I have 1 turn to KO Breloom, and 2 more turns to dominate under Trick Room. Other than that, he just comes in to renew Trick Room or Explode on a different nuisance. So to recap that, Bronzong puts up rocks, serves as a last chance against unstoppable sweeps, and is a bulky TR users.
252 HP/120 SpD/138 SpA
Quiet
Trace
~Thunderbolt
~Ice Beam
~Trick Room
~Recover
Ah, Porygon-2, my Beloved. He counters his usual counters (IE Dugtrio, Salamence, Gyarados, aswell as checking ScarfTran on Fire and Magnezone). That's not his sole purpose though. He's got a highly useful Ghost immunity and sets up Trick Room. He's one of my two recovering-special attacking-Trick Room-setter-uppers, and the two work together as good as I could hope for, coming from the limited selection of Trick Room users. Slowbro resists Porygon's Fighting weak, and Porygon really takes pretty much anything thrown at Slowbro that isn't STAB. Slowbro is much more physically bulky, so I decided to throw a few of Porygon's EVs into Special Defense. I tested a porygon with 252 HP and 252 SpA, and he took hits fine, so I'm not worried at the lack of EVs on the physical side. Porygon 2's ability can trace a Levitate for the free switch, or the flash fire for the free switch, allowing him to get Trick Room up with minimal damage, which is VERY nice. His Special Attack allows him to deal with a few very important threats, namely Gyarados.
@Leftovers
252 SpA/252 Def/6 HP
Quiet
Own Tempo
~Surf
~Psychic
~Trick Room
~Slack Off
252 SpA/252 Def/6 HP
Quiet
Own Tempo
~Surf
~Psychic
~Trick Room
~Slack Off
That brings us to the second recovering-special attacking-Trick Room-setter-upper. This one is more defensive on the Physical side, and eats Scizor's Bullet Punch for breakfast (as does Empoleon). He's the last of my three man Trick Room core, and fills it out the best I know. I'm not entirely sure what to put the two attacks as, so I just went with STAB-STAB. Trick Room is for setting up 3 turns of destruction for Marowak or Empoleon, but his base 100 SpA and his powerful STABs let him do some damage if they are out of the picture. Slack Off makes his bulk even scarier, and allows him to laugh in the face of many physical attacks. His ability and typing is perfect, as Machamp's Dynamic Punch absolutely shuts out Porygon 2, and it does laughable damage to Slowbro, as well as not confusing him.
252 SpA/252 SpD/6 HP
Quiet
Torrent
~Hydro Pump
~Ice Beam
~Grass Knot
~Roar
This here penguin is the first of my abusers. Abusers are a very important aspect of Trick Room teams, and I found no one better than Empoleon. Empoleon, with his 111 base attack, can be decently scary when he's faster than you. On top of that, his mass of resistances backs up the core with the very important bug and dark resists. His excellent Special Defense is important, since no one likes one of their main sweepers being KOd on the switch in, before it gets a chance to do any damage. I chose to go with Roar over HP Fire because it's a 100% to OHKO Scizor with Hydro Pump anyways. Grass knot is VERY important, since a Swampert can absolutely demolish this team without it (moreso in the earlier versions than now, but he's still scary.) I'm not sure what the coverage chart on Water-Grass-Ice is, but I'm sure it's not too impressive. I love this set anyways, and can't find anything that would make it better.
252 Atk/252 Def/6 HP
Brave
Rock Head
~Earthquake
~Fire Punch
~Stone Edge
~Substitute
Here's my second, and potentially more devastating, abuser. I decided to change the moveset up a bit, and use Substitute over both Thunder Punch and Double Edge. If Marowak has a Sub up at the end of Trick Room, it doesn't give the other person a free turn of setup as it would without a sub. Also, if Gyarados tries to come in to revenge kill, his Intimidate doesn't affect me and he gets easily OHKOd by Stone Edge. Also, Sub allows Marowak to no longer fear the bastardly WoW from Dusknoir, and 2HKO him with Earthquake. These, along with like five hundred other advantages of Sub, with few drawbacks, led me to put it on the moveset. His attack is, of course, maxxed, allowing him to reach 568, a gargantuan number for Ubers. My only complaint is that I never get to use Earthquake, it seems no one sticks in for a base 100 power STAB attack coming from 568 attack...
252 SpA/252 Spe/6 HP
Timid
Levitate
~Shadowball
~Thunderbolt
~Focus Blast
~Explosion
This is the one pokemon on my team I'm not so sure about. I need the best non-setup lategame sweeper I can find, and I think Gengar is the best I've come across thus far. With the huge dominance of Special Attack on this team, Gengar can also come in on the ending turn of Trick Room and Explode on something giving the rest of the team trouble, assuming I haven't already seen an opening for him to come in and sweep the rest of their team's beaten remains. I guess I don't really have much to say about Gengar, except that I wish Focus Blast had more than 70% accuracy, as it's my only answer to a Tyranitar that isn't under Trick Room.
Building Process
So I knew that if I wanted to make a Trick Room team, I most definately wanted to use one of my favorite pokemon, a Marowak. No where else had I been able to use his awesomness, until the Trick Room teams started being made.
I then knew that if I was going to make a Trick Room team, I needed Trick Room users (duh). I started with Porygon 2, as I couldn't resist his awesomeness and his amazing versatility. I knew I would need 3 users, and he fit perfectly, so as to not bend the scales towards a weakness as many of the psychic pokemon would.
I seen that I still needed a Stealth Rock user, as well as two more Trick Room users, so I headed over to Marriland. I searched pokemon that can use Trick Room and Stealth Rock, and Bronzong was easily the best choice. I was slightly worried about his attacking abilities, but I've learned to work around having a setup pokemon (I'm usually an offensive player).
I looked for my last Trick Room user, and found him shortly after. I chose Slowbro for his Fighting Resist, Fire resist, and overall Bulk. I liked him more than Slowking because the current swing of the Metagame points to physical attacking, so I chose a physically defensive pokemon over the specially bulky one.
I then had my core secure, and, as every Trick Room team does, didn't have a resist for a few types, such as Dark and Bug. I was hoping to find, but not really expecting to, find something as awesome as Empoleon. His 111 base Special Attack, overall bulk, and low speed were perfect my team, and I added him very quickly after finding him. His Grass attack was an added bonus, as I needed something to deal with the bulky waters and Swampert that would challenge the rest of the team.
Then I had just one slot left, the clean up position. I dropped a speed search and didn't find anything that really fit what I wanted. I eventually settled with Gengar for his great special attack and ability to Explode.
Building Process
So I knew that if I wanted to make a Trick Room team, I most definately wanted to use one of my favorite pokemon, a Marowak. No where else had I been able to use his awesomness, until the Trick Room teams started being made.
I then knew that if I was going to make a Trick Room team, I needed Trick Room users (duh). I started with Porygon 2, as I couldn't resist his awesomeness and his amazing versatility. I knew I would need 3 users, and he fit perfectly, so as to not bend the scales towards a weakness as many of the psychic pokemon would.
I seen that I still needed a Stealth Rock user, as well as two more Trick Room users, so I headed over to Marriland. I searched pokemon that can use Trick Room and Stealth Rock, and Bronzong was easily the best choice. I was slightly worried about his attacking abilities, but I've learned to work around having a setup pokemon (I'm usually an offensive player).
I looked for my last Trick Room user, and found him shortly after. I chose Slowbro for his Fighting Resist, Fire resist, and overall Bulk. I liked him more than Slowking because the current swing of the Metagame points to physical attacking, so I chose a physically defensive pokemon over the specially bulky one.
I then had my core secure, and, as every Trick Room team does, didn't have a resist for a few types, such as Dark and Bug. I was hoping to find, but not really expecting to, find something as awesome as Empoleon. His 111 base Special Attack, overall bulk, and low speed were perfect my team, and I added him very quickly after finding him. His Grass attack was an added bonus, as I needed something to deal with the bulky waters and Swampert that would challenge the rest of the team.
Then I had just one slot left, the clean up position. I dropped a speed search and didn't find anything that really fit what I wanted. I eventually settled with Gengar for his great special attack and ability to Explode.
