Another Rain Team but Without Keldeo and Thundy and such (INSERT HIGH PEAK HERE)

[Vemane]

^thought that was a nice picture albeit slightly awkwardly proportioned

So yeah, here's another rain team that I would like some assistance with/you can steal I guess idk. I don't really know what it has "peaked" at due to the fact that I don't use alts (including for team testing/gimmicking/etc. because i don't care) so I'm just sitting on my main with a billion battles gaining glicko2 a point at a time. so peaking isn't happening. Despite that, I can say that I have played around 45 battles with the team, altering when needed, and have only lost 4 (one due to two freezes on two different pokemon that never got unfrozen...). So, yeah. Without further ado...

Team Building Process if you care:

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So I was just sitting there on the ladder when suddenly I came upon a tornadus based team. And I was like, um... meh. Then it started spamming specs hurricane and I was like... oh. I mean, starmie just came in and thunder'd it, but regardless. All I could think was, "What the hell deals with tornadus?" Then I realized that, in practice, nothing common. So then I decided to make a team with him! Obviously the toad followed suit.

So then I was like... okay spinner I guess. But more than that, I wanted to use starmie. I had used the set on my last team, but it was weatherless so it really couldn't reach its full potential, but was still the mvp. So I was extremely excited to try it in rain while also supporting tornadus.

Then I was dissapointed with the realization that jirachi and zapdos and such do indeed wall tornadus (lolrotom-w). So what better way to make sure that doesn't happen then to add a shitton of hazards?! Jirachi and co are already close to being 2hkod-ish, and 3 layers of spikes just make tornadus's job that much easier! So yeah, ferro. Defensive backbone of rain teams and a complete bitch to everyone else while doing everything I could possibly want it to (like take electric attacks which my team was growing extremely weak to... fuck thundurus-t)

So now I needed to spinblock and such so jellicent because ferrocent and such and it also was a great check/counterish to lando (spdef obvs!). Could tank hits from lots of stuff (including se nonstab electric attacks) and recover off like a boss. Also dealth with starmie who thought they could kill me, only to be hit with a shadow ball. Owell.

Okay, I lied somewhere because I'm fairly certain lando was not last. My thought process was something along those^ lines though. Idk... In any case, lando is a fun sr setter and counter to rakion/dragons/etc. Not much to say besides 252/252+ hpice or go home.

This was a very recent change because I really felt my lack of priority of any kind and thundy-t was a BIG problem, as was subcm rachi who mamo handles only marginally better than jellicent. I don't know how it's working out atm because it was literally a 3 battle ago change but I hope I don't miss the spinblocking/etc. utility. Mamo handles lando as well, if not better, but my team loses a bit of bulk. It was very difficult finding out where to put a breloom/scizor/mamo because every member was so vital, so I'm open to suggestion for this last slot/others.

Politoed @ Choice Specs
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Ice Beam
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Focus Blast

Forget this setup bait, easy to switch into bulky toad that I and everyone have been using incessantly, specstoad is where its at. Things just can't switch into it really. It serves as a very nice way to wear down walls so that tornadus can sweep. Also kills sun teams because ninetales can't switch in because it comes close to dying, which means something has to take a rain boosted hpump (hint: they can't). Moves and such quite self explanatory. Normally just smash hpump.

Starmie @ Expert Belt
Trait: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
IVs: 30 Atk / 30 Def
- Thunder
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Rapid Spin

This is my wonderful favorite amazing little starmie. <3 Expert belt maybe bluffs a choice item? Idk, that was never my intention. The fact of the matter is that this starmie can deal with most of the meta by itself, 1hkoing a huge amount of things with dat coverage. Life orb sucks because then starmie dies. With ebelt there is usually a no risk situation where I can just spam thunder, regardless of a ferro/mamo/whatever switchin becuase a) I outspeed 95% of the time and b) I don't take damage. Wonderful. also provides much-needed spin support.

Tornadus (M) @ Choice Specs
Trait: Prankster
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naive Nature
- Hurricane
- Focus Blast
- Rain Dance
- U-turn

Here's tornadus. Idk... he's pretty strong and such. Nothing really walls it... they have to use a starmie/kazam/scarfer to do anything tbh. Basically click hurricane and then you win! That 3rd slot is really ambiguous and i dont' know what to put there. I'd love to do a fun non-revengable by scarfers tailwind+hurricane combo, but then I can't use specs :( Otherwise tailwind+rd+hpice (hurricane kos anyway...) are all good options. Suggest something, idk. rain dance is fun for those late game sun teams because venu can't do anything and water attacks hurt. But tailwind means that anyone can just go outspeed anyway :(

Landorus-Therian (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Def
Relaxed Nature
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- U-turn
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake

Patches some lovely holes (like fighting and scizor and such) and brings such fun utility with intimidate. Also I won a game one time (like 20 minutes ago) because I had tornadus and lando left and the opp had an rp lando. so he was like "oh lando I'll just rp so I don't have to play around with a hurricane miss (it was sandy)," thinking it was safe. Then I hpiced and won because fuck yeah hp ice (thanks alexwolf!). Also kills dragons and such. U-turn and rocks are fun too!

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SDef
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Leech Seed
- Spikes
- Bulldoze
- Gyro Ball

Ok, so ferro+rain=obvs. But some explaination is due. Ferro serves as my primary special wall (which is problematic for focus blasters but....) thus the heavy investment. Leech seed for damage+healing (allows it to wall some crazy things), spikes for spikes, bulldoze because magnezone sucks among other reasons: my team is kind of slow so it is inherently problematic when something like toxicroak comes in because my only poke who can wall it+ko it is 4x weak to ice punch. so, I can bulldoze on the switch/setup, go to lando-t (while lowering attack) and outspeed and ko with earthquake. Gyro ball because it hits things surprisingly hard and such.

Mamoswine @ Life Orb
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Ice Shard
- Icicle Crash
- Earthquake
- Superpower

RIP Jellicent :( I really needed to deal with thundy-t because I was clean swept by fb variants (the good one) And some priority in general never hurt so mamo resists ice+electric, both problematic while providing this along with a general offensive presense.






Subcm Jirachi is a BIG threat. However, it can be played around (surprisingly I haven't lost to one yet despite my glaring weakness)

Kingdra is a HUGE threat. However, if someone is using kingdra specifically to counter rain (ie. the specs variant/lo which are the ones I have issue with) then it is probably deadweight normally so their ratings can't be that good so I guess they can have one win. idk

 

[Penguiin]

Hi there!
Quick rate right here as I need to hit the hay for morning practice but I noticed you said you are weak to sub cm rachi. It also looks like you might be weak to a few set up special attackers as well and I know how annoying they can be. An easyway to do this without changing any Pokemon is putting perish song on politoed! They obviously wont want to loser their sweeper and will obviously switch out before dying. This means you'll probably have to change his choice specs set however. But that's okay since he was kind of acting as a slower version of starmie which you already have. I'd reccomend a bulky attacker politoed! Bold nature with scald, ice beam, perish song and either toxic, hypnosis, or another coverage move like focus blast. Evs would be 252 hp, 252 spec, and 4 def. anyways, I hope I helped, cool team btw! :)

 

[dcae]

Hi there!
Quick rate right here as I need to hit the hay for morning practice but I noticed you said you are weak to sub cm rachi. It also looks like you might be weak to a few set up special attackers as well and I know how annoying they can be. An easyway to do this without changing any Pokemon is putting destiny bond on politoed! They obviously wont want to loser their sweeper and will obviously switch out before dying. This means you'll probably have to change his choice specs set however. But that's okay since he was kind of acting as a slower version of starmie which you already have. I'd reccomend a bulky attacker politoed! Bold nature with scald, ice beam, perish song and either toxic, hypnosis, or another coverage move like focus blast. Evs would be 252 hp, 252 spec, and 4 def. anyways, I hope I helped, cool team btw! :)

I think you mean Perish Song, not Destiny Bond. Just wanted to edit that.

Onto the team. I don't have time right now, so I'll add more later. However, this is a nice team that employs the underrated monster Specs Tornados. I noticed you mentioned SubCM Rachi as a problem. Honestly, considering the team you are running, Rachi can only set up on Tornados stuck into Hurricane, which hurts, or on Starmie or Ferrothorn. To prevent Ferro from being bait, and since you already run Bulldoze, a simple 168 Attack EVs allow it to break Rachi's Sub, which forces it to constantly Sub to avoid the speed drop. I'll add more to the rate later once I have time and I rake a more in depth look of the team.

 

[MrChar]

Hello, vemane, I'm watching your team and some of things jump out at me.
I'll start by saying that I look a little weak to combo + Thundurus Keldeo, and this problem is quite solvable, you could start by giving the rock stealt> Leech Seed to Ferrothorn (or give them to Mamoswine), and so change Landorus with a Latios, which paired with Ferrothorn is really good.
Going to the rest of the team, Perish Song would be a better choice of Hidden Power of Politoed, you can always come in handy.
A Starmie changes the Expert Belt with Life orb that is definitely best to Starmie (just 1 in a million that you're going to believe because you know that choinche Tornadus needs the spinner).
Tornadus can go well, but if you see the need to stop Breloom (actually some quirks that could give) you could also put Sleep Talk (and it's cool to throw hurricanes priority).
Landorus as I told you it would replace with latios, do you place the set below (also because I think it slows you down a lot).
Ferrothorn could put Stealt Rock> Leach Seed and maybe some evs in def.
Mamoswine can decide to leave it that way (if you put Stealt rock Ferrothorn) or give him stealth rock and focus sash as iteam (so you have the spinner).

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Latios (M) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Draco Meteor
- Psyshock
- Trick
- Surf

Mamoswine (M) @ Focus Sash
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Ice Shard
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Endeavor

Ferrothorn (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SDef
Sassy Nature (+SDef, -Spd)
- Stealth Rock
- Spikes
- Bulldoze
- Gyro Ball

Tornadus (M) @ Choice Specs
Trait: Prankster
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naive Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Hurricane
- Focus Blast
- Rain Dance / Sleep Talk
- U-turn

Starmie @ Life Orb
Trait: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Thunder
- Hydro Pump
- Ice Beam
- Rapid Spin

Politoed (M) @ Choice Specs
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Hydro Pump
- Ice Beam
- Perish Song
- Focus Blast

Obviously currency such as set stealt use if you use rock to Ferrothorn can also leave a Life Orb Mamoswine.
So you're a little weaker at check in jirachi but if you can play it well you should have no problems.

 

[ShootingStarmie]

Hi there. This looks like a B/W rain offense team with Lando I to lay SR and take on physical attackers, so it seems to be pretty solid so far. However, the first weakness I see is Rotom-W, specifically the Chesto Resto set, which I keep seeing rised usage on the ladder. It can switch into Torn-T, Starmie, Politoed, and Mamoswine. It can then proceed to to Burn Ferrothorn, Mamoswine, or Landorus-T trying to switch into Volt switch, and it can hit everything bar Ferrothorn for super effective damage.

Now, here's my suggestion. Replace Landorus-T with Celebi. Celebi can still lay SR, gain momentum with U turn (or Baton Pass), and still takes on Fighting types like Terrakion and Keldeo pretty well. You will be slightly weaker to Scizor, but the combination of Starmie and Ferrothorn check it.

Celebi@ Leftovers
Trait: Nature Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 224 SpDef / 32 Spe
Calm Nature
-Giga Drain / Stealth Rock
-Psychic
-Recover
-Baton Pass

Celebi can switch into a tonne of threats in todays metagame, including Rotom-W, Landorus-I, Keldeo, Breloom and more. 32 speed is used to outspeed most Scizor and Tyranitar, and Baton Pass will allow you to escape their Pursuit. Stealth Rock has been slashed as Giga Drain is a very good move, and you could use SR on Mamoswine, but that's up to you.

I hope this suggestion helps you, and congrats on a cool team man.

 

[Electrolyte]

Hey there, nice team

Tornadus-I is a cool sweeper to center a team around, but it does require some team support, so I think there are ways you can patch up the team a bit more. First of all, you need to be able to handle its checks and counters- and one that stands out to me as a pokemon your team can't quite handle very well is Rotom-W- who walls almost all of your team and can KO them all with Water / Electric type coverage. Faster pokemon with powerful coverage such as LO / Sash Alakazam or LO Offensive Starmie can also bring this team a lot of trouble since they can outspeed your Tornadus and constantly keep in it check, as well as use their coverage moves to hit most of your team for quite a lot of damage. Although they're a much lesser threat, Choice Scarfed pokemon such as Keldeo or Latios can also deal a lot of damage to this team because Ferrothorn can be muscled past with SE coverage, and they can later counter Tornadus by outspeeding it and OHKOing. Many of Tornadus-I's offensive checks / counters can be handled relatively easily with a few set / spread changes to your defensive pokemon, however. On Ferrothorn, I would try Power Whip instead of Gyro Ball and Thunder Wave instead of Bulldoze. There are a few reasons for this. Power Whip lets Ferrothorn smack Rotom-W for a lot of damage, hitting it for a 2HKO or an OHKO after some prior damage. It also smacks other water types such as Starmie for massive amounts of damage too. Since Ferrothorn is your main answer to those above pokemon, it needs to have a way to hit them for a lot of damage so you're not stuck in a hit-and-run strategy, and you can pick them off ASAP so Tornadus-I can sweep. Thunder Wave, on the other hand, helps the team manage faster opponents, which is crucial since Scarfers and naturally speedy powerhouses can also tear this team apart when given the opportunity. Thunder Wave cripples these pokemon and makes them easy to take down later- since many of them lack the amount of bulk needed to take hits from your attackers. It may seem as if Gyro Ball is better at countering faster opponents, but Thunder Wave lets other teammates contribute to the cause, so Ferrothorn isn't shouldering everything by itself. With this change, minimal speed is no longer necessary, so I'd try Careful with 31 Spe ivs so you can outspeed Paralyzed Reuniclus.

To help you handle set up threats with a bit more reliability, I would probably try Perish Song on Politoed instead of probably HP Grass (which is now covered by Ferrothorn.) Perish Song lets you force Jirachi and other set up sweepers out once they get going, and it's a nice way to check them and try to nail them for a bit more damage later if things truly get out of hand.

In order for you to reliably counter Scarfed / Specs Keldeo, I think you should try Life Orb instead of Expert Belt on Starmie. This gives you the power boost you need to OHKO Keldeo in Rain about 60-70% of the time- much preferred over the ~30% chance of EBelt Thunder. If the hazards damage / LO recoil annoys you, you can try Recover instead of Ice Beam, as this lets Starmie survive a bit longer at the cost of coverage that is pretty much handled by Toed and Mamoswine already. Recover also makes Starmie last longer so it can come in more often in order to spin away hazards that this team hates.

There are a few other optional changes that you could try that might help this team, but I'll leave it up to you to decide. One thing that you can try is LO Latias instead of Mamoswine. Your team is still a little bit weak to fast special attackers that can hit hard, especially Thundy-T and Keldeo, since they can defeat Starmie through the use of power / SE coverage. Latias easily walls them both, and can OHKO with the appropriate STAB move. She also grants extra insurance against Sun teams, whilst also giving you a pokemon that can hit with Dragon type coverage. However, she does lack the physical prowess and ability to revenge kill Dragon types that Mamo does, so to make up for it, you could try Stone Edge instead of HP Ice and a spread of 200 HP / 64 Atk / 244 Def Adamant on Landorus-T. The subtraction of Mamoswine means that you'll have to rely on Landorus to check Dragon Dancers, so it needs a bit more power and Stone Edge in order to be able to do so reliably. 64 Atk Adamant lets you OHKO Dragonite after SR with Stone Edge, whilst still giving you enough bulk to take 2 CB Terrak Stone Edge's after Intimidate. HP Ice is relatively useless on it since Latias easily handles RP Lando now.

Nice team!

 

[Vemane]

Hi there!
Quick rate right here as I need to hit the hay for morning practice but I noticed you said you are weak to sub cm rachi. It also looks like you might be weak to a few set up special attackers as well and I know how annoying they can be. An easyway to do this without changing any Pokemon is putting perish song on politoed! They obviously wont want to loser their sweeper and will obviously switch out before dying. This means you'll probably have to change his choice specs set however. But that's okay since he was kind of acting as a slower version of starmie which you already have. I'd reccomend a bulky attacker politoed! Bold nature with scald, ice beam, perish song and either toxic, hypnosis, or another coverage move like focus blast. Evs would be 252 hp, 252 spec, and 4 def. anyways, I hope I helped, cool team btw! :)

Hi! Thanks for the suggestion! I don't feel comfortable with switching out toad's crazy strong specs set due to how well it deals with the likes of sun teams (and pretty much anything tbh!) Putting perish song over ice beam, though, will allow me to gain the same utility while also being quite unexpected and will hopefully alleviate some of the cm'ers pressure :)

Onto the team. I don't have time right now, so I'll add more later. However, this is a nice team that employs the underrated monster Specs Tornados. I noticed you mentioned SubCM Rachi as a problem. Honestly, considering the team you are running, Rachi can only set up on Tornados stuck into Hurricane, which hurts, or on Starmie or Ferrothorn. To prevent Ferro from being bait, and since you already run Bulldoze, a simple 168 Attack EVs allow it to break Rachi's Sub, which forces it to constantly Sub to avoid the speed drop. I'll add more to the rate later once I have time and I rake a more in depth look of the team.

However, once rachi comes in on one of these pokes, it could then easily sub and proceed to calm mind as I send in something else. Once I know its coverage, it becomes much easier to handle but it is difficult to switch in lando if he happens to have water pulse or toad if it has thunder, etc. The problem mainly comes in when it has a cm simply due to the fact that it is really hard for me to break its sub since I don't have any fast physical attackers, not so much that it straight up sweeps me :) I had considered the 168 evs, but that really cuts back on his spdef investment and without jellicent to assist with the special tanking, that investment is greatly needed :(

Hello, vemane, I'm watching your team and some of things jump out at me.
I'll start by saying that I look a little weak to combo + Thundurus Keldeo, and this problem is quite solvable, you could start by giving the rock stealt> Leech Seed to Ferrothorn (or give them to Mamoswine), and so change Landorus with a Latios, which paired with Ferrothorn is really good.
Going to the rest of the team, Perish Song would be a better choice of Hidden Power of Politoed, you can always come in handy.
A Starmie changes the Expert Belt with Life orb that is definitely best to Starmie (just 1 in a million that you're going to believe because you know that choinche Tornadus needs the spinner).
Tornadus can go well, but if you see the need to stop Breloom (actually some quirks that could give) you could also put Sleep Talk (and it's cool to throw hurricanes priority).
Landorus as I told you it would replace with latios, do you place the set below (also because I think it slows you down a lot).
Ferrothorn could put Stealt Rock> Leach Seed and maybe some evs in def.
Mamoswine can decide to leave it that way (if you put Stealt rock Ferrothorn) or give him stealth rock and focus sash as iteam (so you have the spinner).

Stealth rocks does not prevent agili-tus from sweeping my team though :P (pre-mamo). I still have absolutely nothing to do to it. Plus if ferro is the one with the rocks, then thundy has already come in and, so, won't take damage at that point. Lando is generally able to find ample opprotunity to come in and set up rocks early game, so that isn't too much of a problem :) Keldeo on the other hand was previously handled very well by jellicent, but now starmie is my best option, and he can do so quite well (though if choiced my safe switch ins become much higher with a bit of prediction).

I simply can't do lo on starmie :( Although the power is nice, it can't handle the life orb recoil and makes attacking with it in many cases somewhat risky due to the ease of being warn down.

Sleep talk is fun! :)

If I replace lando with latios, though, I lose my ability to comfortably deal wtih the likes of terrakion and co as well as hazard utility, but one of the latis may be a good idea over mamo (as it can deal with sun and thundy, but it certainly doesn't help with jirachi :P)

Now, here's my suggestion. Replace Landorus-T with Celebi. Celebi can still lay SR, gain momentum with U turn (or Baton Pass), and still takes on Fighting types like Terrakion and Keldeo pretty well. You will be slightly weaker to Scizor, but the combination of Starmie and Ferrothorn check it.

Celebi@ Leftovers
Trait: Nature Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 224 SpDef / 32 Spe
Calm Nature
-Giga Drain / Stealth Rock
-Psychic
-Recover
-Baton Pass

Will try it out :) My only concern then though is that I don't have the utility of free lando switches into u-turns and the like, plus I am even more threatened by jirachi :P

Tornadus-I is a cool sweeper to center a team around, but it does require some team support, so I think there are ways you can patch up the team a bit more. First of all, you need to be able to handle its checks and counters- and one that stands out to me as a pokemon your team can't quite handle very well is Rotom-W- who walls almost all of your team and can KO them all with Water / Electric type coverage. Faster pokemon with powerful coverage such as LO / Sash Alakazam or LO Offensive Starmie can also bring this team a lot of trouble since they can outspeed your Tornadus and constantly keep in it check, as well as use their coverage moves to hit most of your team for quite a lot of damage. Although they're a much lesser threat, Choice Scarfed pokemon such as Keldeo or Latios can also deal a lot of damage to this team because Ferrothorn can be muscled past with SE coverage, and they can later counter Tornadus by outspeeding it and OHKOing. Many of Tornadus-I's offensive checks / counters can be handled relatively easily with a few set / spread changes to your defensive pokemon, however. On Ferrothorn, I would try Power Whip instead of Gyro Ball and Thunder Wave instead of Bulldoze. There are a few reasons for this. Power Whip lets Ferrothorn smack Rotom-W for a lot of damage, hitting it for a 2HKO or an OHKO after some prior damage. It also smacks other water types such as Starmie for massive amounts of damage too. Since Ferrothorn is your main answer to those above pokemon, it needs to have a way to hit them for a lot of damage so you're not stuck in a hit-and-run strategy, and you can pick them off ASAP so Tornadus-I can sweep. Thunder Wave, on the other hand, helps the team manage faster opponents, which is crucial since Scarfers and naturally speedy powerhouses can also tear this team apart when given the opportunity. Thunder Wave cripples these pokemon and makes them easy to take down later- since many of them lack the amount of bulk needed to take hits from your attackers. It may seem as if Gyro Ball is better at countering faster opponents, but Thunder Wave lets other teammates contribute to the cause, so Ferrothorn isn't shouldering everything by itself. With this change, minimal speed is no longer necessary, so I'd try Careful with 31 Spe ivs so you can outspeed Paralyzed Reuniclus.

Rotom-w has actually been extremely easy to handle for me :o It usually tries to switch into toad so it is then forced to take 30% from hpump or nearly 60% (and then gets kod the next turn) from hp grass, and that's assuming it is full spdef. Even if it switches from the hpump, that now puts tornadus in a position to 2hko. For the offensive variants, a quick switch to ferro normally shut them down and allowed me to spike or leech seed as they did nothing in return.

Alakazam is a big problem (for all my teams T_T) and usually requires a bit of sacking (or a switch to (RIP) jellicent). Starmie on the other hand is also shut down by ferrothorn (or jellicent T_T) and a few other members if it is running the far-too-common bulky ice beam+surf set. I quite like twave+power whip on ferro, but I'd miss the ability to hit the latis and other dragons, though I will definitely try it out to help alleviate some of the pressure from faster threats.

As mentioned above, I simply can't do life orb on starmie :(

I quite like the lati suggestion and will def try it over mamo :o (i needs those fighting+water+elect resistances back :P)

Thanks!