Hey guys. This is my first RMT, so if some formatting stuff is off I apologize. I've been playing pokemon since gen 1, PO for the past year or so and PS for the past two months. I've tried tons of teams and feel this one has potential. As the title states, it's not your typical sand team-with only half of them benefitting/being immune to the sand damage. However, it's prowess is not to be underestimated as it has very good synergy between teammates. I keep hitting a wall, however and think there's just something not right with it. Anyway here it is:
Team Building Process
All right, nice. You've seen the building process. Here's what they do on the team:
Hippowdon @ Leftovers
Trait: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SDef
Impish Nature
- Roar
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Slack Off
Anyone who says hippowdon is outclassed by tyranitar as a weather starter is nuts. I use hippowdon as my physical wall on the team as well as (duh) getting sand up. Most of the time I lead with it against other weather starters and get rocks up early if its a sand starter. Once rocks and sand are up, I use hippodwon to tank physical hits coming my way and slack off the damage. If the opponent sends in a set-up sweeper, I try to get hippowdon in before too many boosts and roar it away. I really love this thing; I have taken +2 bullet punches from scissors and laughed while recovering the damage. True with earthquake as my only STAB and attacking move, I am limited against flying, levitators or resisted pokes, but Hippowdon's 112 attack is, um, pretty damn good for it's sole coverage. The ev's are as recommended on Smogon's analysis for a physical tank with the remaining 4 in SDef. Hippowdon and it's set aren't really a huge problem for me, but I needed good teammates to absorb huge special hits like draco's from hydregion or STABBED water/grass hits. When coming in against politoed or ninetails i switch to ferrothorn or heatran to avoid water attacks or will-o-wisps. Not sure how much more evidence I need for it's position on the team but I'll just say a Close Combat from band terrakion is doing 49-58%. Yes. Exactly. Can't think of many other power houses on the physical spectrum for hard evidence there.
Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 88 Def / 168 SDef
Relaxed Nature
- Thunder Wave
- Leech Seed
- Protect
- Power Whip
Ferrothorn serves two purposes: To tank water attacks and to cripple fast sweepers with thunder wave and slowly drain their health with leech seed. It has an added bonus of taking out most water types that try to switch into hippowdon and heatran (namely politoed, starmie and tentacruel), though most people won't risk the power whip killing their weather starter/sweeper. I can't count how many times I was frustrated trying to kill an opposing ferrothorn in the rain and trying to set up a sweep only to be crippled by t-wave and stalled out with leech seed. It's ev's are taylored to give it max staying power in HP and take boosted water attacks from rain teams. It isn't running gyro ball due to the thunder wave. I didn't give it any entry hazards, since stealth rocks are fine for this team with the sand damage. Protect is on it to rack up more sand/leech seed damage and scout opponent's moves.
Heatran @ Air Balloon
Trait: Flash Fire
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature
- Flamethrower
- Earth Power
- Dragon Pulse
- Hidden Power [Grass]
With Breloom and ferrothorn on the team, there was a huge weakness to fire attacks (salamence isn't taking too many fire blasts or flare blitzes in the sand). I already have a stealth rocker and bulky walls (ferro and hippo) so I opted for an offensive variant. I choose modest because I usually switch it in on a predicted ground or fire move and hit back hard while most likely being untouchable for opposing pokes (choice-locked darmanitan in fire attack, hydregion in earth power, etc). If I predict another heatran coming in, I can hit it with another attack to pop any balloon it may be carrying and KO with earth power before it can pop my balloon (a pseudo-focus sash). There have been times where I wish I had timid for opposing heatrans, but the extra power is nice to bring them down far enough to a range where with rocks and sand the poke rendered death fodder. With the balloon, heatran also serves to dodge and mold-breaking dragons (looking at you haxorus) or dug trio trying to arena trap. Flamethrower is on over lava plume due to sheer damage output and over fire blast due to increased accuracy. I use HP grass for gastro/quagsire, hitting politoed hard on switch (2HKO defensive politoed after rocks), and other bulky waters.
Salamence @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naughty Nature
- Earthquake
- Fire Blast
- Outrage
- Dragon Claw
The main sweeper on my team. I didn't truly understand how powerful this thing was until time and again my teams came up against it with NO ANSWER. As my scarfer and revenge killer, it is capable of coming in on a poke, OHKOing it with outrage, and sweeping teams if any bothersome steels are removed. EQ and fire blast are for those such steels, predicting their switch-in and destroying them. The EVs and nature are tailored for maximum physical damage, speed and the rest to increase fire blast's damage. It's flying type is great for being able to dodge ground attacks aimed at a popped-balloon heatran. Since I don't have much invested in bulk, it's not made to take too many hits, even resisted ones. I sometimes lead with it, or bring it in to dragon claw something if there is an opposing steel type left.
Tentacruel @ Black Sludge
Trait: Liquid Ooze
EVs: 252 HP / 24 Def / 232 SDef
Bold Nature
- Knock Off
- Rapid Spin
- Magic Coat
- Scald
Possibly the most interesting addition to my team. With salamence coming in and out to revenge kill things, stealth rocks are a huge deal to its viability. I tried and tried to make this team work without using a slot for a spinner, but decided its need was too great. I've used tentacruel in the past and was amazed at its bulk, being able to take Life Orb thunders from starmie (~55%), or psychics from latios (~55%) and do it's job of spinning hazards away. Unfortunately, the jellyfish's movepool is somewhat shallow (pun in tended). I opted for knock off to remove non steel/rock/ground type's leftovers for increased residual damage in the sand and the only recovery form for certain steel pokes like heatran or ferrothorn (without leech seed). Magic coat is on there to catch certain taunt-ers and status-ers by surprise. It's really hilarious to bounce back a taunt to a deoxys-D while you switch to another threat or stay in, knock off its leftovers and possibly burn it with scald. Magic coat also works well against opposing ferrothorns, which is why the ev's are slightly different than typical sets. A ferrothorn thinking it is going to set up against tentacruel is going to have its spikes or thunder wave bounced back. In the case of the former, it may be on the receiving end of a scald-burn next turn, rendering it helpless. It's not going to leech seed any damage due to liquid ooze (also hilarious when a +3 conkeldurr drain punches) and its going to lose its lefties after a knock off. As mentioned, the ev's and bold nature are tailored to take a power whip at under half damage to do it's job of spinning etc, as well as take special hits from starmie, latios and even some electric attacks (thundurus-t volt switch from modest 252 spA is 62-74%). Finally, it's typing makes it an excellent sand team partner taking on water, grass and ice hits with ease (and fighting for heatran!)
Breloom @ Life Orb
Trait: Technician
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Mach Punch
- Low Sweep
- Spore
- Bullet Seed
Here it is: The crown jewel of BW2. One of the most anticipated pokes of this "new" generation. I always like to have a fighting type on my team for raw power and filled most of my teams in BW with conkeldurr (who is still a beast btw). I kept hearing all the hype over "techniloom this" and "techniloom that." Appearances certainly are deceiving, as this little mushroom packs as much "punch" as scizor and mamoswine and one point MORE THAN TERRAKION! I run adamant for maximum power rather than trying to outspeed with its mediocre base speed. Most of the time I can catch something on the switch and spore it or, even better, low sweep it to lower the speed then finish with a bullet seed or another low sweep (eg Espeon, Latios, gliscor, landorus). True, the sandstorm and life orb don't help with it's mediocre hp, but I use it in this team as a lead to polities/ttars to minimize residual damage or after a poke has fainted to start the spore/low sweep mindgames. It's excellent for shutting down ferrothorns and it's unique STABs are resisted only by a few of the meta's best pokes (latias, tornados, thundurus, dnite, salamence...are the few that come to mind).
Threatlist
So there's the team guys. I've been playtesting it for the past week or so on PS and it's doing fairly well with the addition of breloom and salamence. Unfortunately, I feel like it's offensive power is somewhat hampered (or I'm not playing it correctly). Maybe I should introduce spikes on ferrothorn for more residual damage? Try to make it more stall-ish with hippowdon and change heatran to defensive build? Also, due to alakazam and celebi weakness, was thinking of maybe Sabeleye (a taunt variant instead of tentacruel to stop hazards). Let me know what you think! I appreciate the comments. I will try to update the threat list as they come up in online play.
Team Building Process
Since there is an inundation of weather in the current meta, I decided that I would make my own weather team. While I really prefer weatherless, it is so difficult (for me anyway) to take out certain threats in certain weathers (DAMN RAIN FERROTHORN lol). In deciding between weathers I looked not to the weather itself, but the corresponding started. I knew hail and sun were out, since their starters don't have spectacular staying power (rocks, spikes, mediocre recovery IMO). It was down to politoed's rain or ttar/hippo's sand. I never had any great luck with rain, and have always found hippo to be a fantastic wall so I went with that. Hippowdon is an extremely underrated pokemon with fantastic support moves and reliable recovery. It's huge HP and great def makes for a great wall; thus it was my obvious first pick.
So next I knew I wanted another strong support poke. With the presence of rain almost everywhere and the weakness that many sand teams have to water ferrothorn was next on the team. It has great defenses/resistances, and if properly equipped, can help to cripple the opposing team.
With ferrothorn (and as we'll see later breloom), there was the glaring 4x weakness to fire. I wanted something that could take those fire attacks for it and not be completely crippled in the sand (i.e a typical fire type). Since I had a wall and a stealth rocker in hipppowdon, specially offensive heat ran fell right into place. It has great coverage and really likes taking a flash fire boost from an incoming attack on ferrothorn.
Next up was a solid sweeper. I have used a majority of the best sweeper sets on many pokes over the past years. Lately, I came up against something that struck me as incredibly powerful and really difficult to deal with on my end: Scarf MixMoxieMence. This thing is truly a force of nature. It's coverage, power and speed are befitting of a monsterous dragon. Once bothersome steels were down (even by it's own doing), it could wreck havok on the opposing team with its Outrage or DClaw. Little bagon and shelgon dared to dream big. And their wish was granted:
As the team stood, hazards weren't quite a big deal. Ferro, hippo, and heatran didn't care that much about stealth rocks (with the balloon, heat ran didn't care about spikes either) and two of the aformentioned didn't care about any kind of spikes. Salamence also soared over any spikes, but with sandstorm and any stealth rocks up, it's longevity and ability to switch in and out were severely hampered. I wanted sand, but I wanted mence. Thus, I clearly needed a spinner. I mentally ran through the list of spinners available and brought it down to donphan, starmie and tentacruel. I have used all three in the past and had varying levels of success with each. When PS first went live I had a stall-ish rain team with a bulky tentacruel. On a sand team I figured water may again be a problem, so it was down to starmie and tentacruel. Starmie is an amazing offensive spinner and can even run defensive sets. However, I tested it briefly and found that the added offensive power coming off life orb hits was not enough to negate its ok defenses. True, I could run a bulky starmie with recover (have and it worked well on other teams, but I wanted more bulk). I went with tentacruel with its great SpD and support movepool. It didn't have natural cure, but it had some pretty cool moves to back up a bulky spinner. I taylored the eve (seen later) to combat some more prominent OU threats.
Lastly, with all the defensive pokes on my team, salamence was having some trouble keeping up the pressure (ok it doesn't get pressure fine be picky lol). I tried a few prominent offensive threats: Landorus (a solid sand powerhouse since BW's inception) and Haxorus (a poke with such raw power that it had skarmory shaking in it's steel feathers). Expert belt landorus was pretty solid for mind-games against people but I felt it just didn't have the "oomph" I needed for this team (yea sand force makes it a monster but just on edge/quake). Then haxorus tore its way in landorus's place. However, the added ice/dragon weakness coupled with sand damage made it's staying power difficult, particularly after being locked into outrage and facing ferrothorn's spiky butt. I turned to one of BW2's most amazing new toys: Techniloom. Yes, I just said i was weak to ice. Yes I just said that sand was troublesome. But a boosted low sweep or mach punch from that 130 base attack!?! It's really nuts. Go try it. Seriously. This thread will still be here....See told you! And it's access to spore let's me shut down a ton of threats and low sweep on switches. Also, it's fantastic for dealing with damn ferrothorns that I've been having problems with lately. Boom.
So next I knew I wanted another strong support poke. With the presence of rain almost everywhere and the weakness that many sand teams have to water ferrothorn was next on the team. It has great defenses/resistances, and if properly equipped, can help to cripple the opposing team.
With ferrothorn (and as we'll see later breloom), there was the glaring 4x weakness to fire. I wanted something that could take those fire attacks for it and not be completely crippled in the sand (i.e a typical fire type). Since I had a wall and a stealth rocker in hipppowdon, specially offensive heat ran fell right into place. It has great coverage and really likes taking a flash fire boost from an incoming attack on ferrothorn.
Next up was a solid sweeper. I have used a majority of the best sweeper sets on many pokes over the past years. Lately, I came up against something that struck me as incredibly powerful and really difficult to deal with on my end: Scarf MixMoxieMence. This thing is truly a force of nature. It's coverage, power and speed are befitting of a monsterous dragon. Once bothersome steels were down (even by it's own doing), it could wreck havok on the opposing team with its Outrage or DClaw. Little bagon and shelgon dared to dream big. And their wish was granted:
As the team stood, hazards weren't quite a big deal. Ferro, hippo, and heatran didn't care that much about stealth rocks (with the balloon, heat ran didn't care about spikes either) and two of the aformentioned didn't care about any kind of spikes. Salamence also soared over any spikes, but with sandstorm and any stealth rocks up, it's longevity and ability to switch in and out were severely hampered. I wanted sand, but I wanted mence. Thus, I clearly needed a spinner. I mentally ran through the list of spinners available and brought it down to donphan, starmie and tentacruel. I have used all three in the past and had varying levels of success with each. When PS first went live I had a stall-ish rain team with a bulky tentacruel. On a sand team I figured water may again be a problem, so it was down to starmie and tentacruel. Starmie is an amazing offensive spinner and can even run defensive sets. However, I tested it briefly and found that the added offensive power coming off life orb hits was not enough to negate its ok defenses. True, I could run a bulky starmie with recover (have and it worked well on other teams, but I wanted more bulk). I went with tentacruel with its great SpD and support movepool. It didn't have natural cure, but it had some pretty cool moves to back up a bulky spinner. I taylored the eve (seen later) to combat some more prominent OU threats.
Lastly, with all the defensive pokes on my team, salamence was having some trouble keeping up the pressure (ok it doesn't get pressure fine be picky lol). I tried a few prominent offensive threats: Landorus (a solid sand powerhouse since BW's inception) and Haxorus (a poke with such raw power that it had skarmory shaking in it's steel feathers). Expert belt landorus was pretty solid for mind-games against people but I felt it just didn't have the "oomph" I needed for this team (yea sand force makes it a monster but just on edge/quake). Then haxorus tore its way in landorus's place. However, the added ice/dragon weakness coupled with sand damage made it's staying power difficult, particularly after being locked into outrage and facing ferrothorn's spiky butt. I turned to one of BW2's most amazing new toys: Techniloom. Yes, I just said i was weak to ice. Yes I just said that sand was troublesome. But a boosted low sweep or mach punch from that 130 base attack!?! It's really nuts. Go try it. Seriously. This thread will still be here....See told you! And it's access to spore let's me shut down a ton of threats and low sweep on switches. Also, it's fantastic for dealing with damn ferrothorns that I've been having problems with lately. Boom.
All right, nice. You've seen the building process. Here's what they do on the team:
Hippowdon @ Leftovers
Trait: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SDef
Impish Nature
- Roar
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Slack Off
Anyone who says hippowdon is outclassed by tyranitar as a weather starter is nuts. I use hippowdon as my physical wall on the team as well as (duh) getting sand up. Most of the time I lead with it against other weather starters and get rocks up early if its a sand starter. Once rocks and sand are up, I use hippodwon to tank physical hits coming my way and slack off the damage. If the opponent sends in a set-up sweeper, I try to get hippowdon in before too many boosts and roar it away. I really love this thing; I have taken +2 bullet punches from scissors and laughed while recovering the damage. True with earthquake as my only STAB and attacking move, I am limited against flying, levitators or resisted pokes, but Hippowdon's 112 attack is, um, pretty damn good for it's sole coverage. The ev's are as recommended on Smogon's analysis for a physical tank with the remaining 4 in SDef. Hippowdon and it's set aren't really a huge problem for me, but I needed good teammates to absorb huge special hits like draco's from hydregion or STABBED water/grass hits. When coming in against politoed or ninetails i switch to ferrothorn or heatran to avoid water attacks or will-o-wisps. Not sure how much more evidence I need for it's position on the team but I'll just say a Close Combat from band terrakion is doing 49-58%. Yes. Exactly. Can't think of many other power houses on the physical spectrum for hard evidence there.
Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 88 Def / 168 SDef
Relaxed Nature
- Thunder Wave
- Leech Seed
- Protect
- Power Whip
Ferrothorn serves two purposes: To tank water attacks and to cripple fast sweepers with thunder wave and slowly drain their health with leech seed. It has an added bonus of taking out most water types that try to switch into hippowdon and heatran (namely politoed, starmie and tentacruel), though most people won't risk the power whip killing their weather starter/sweeper. I can't count how many times I was frustrated trying to kill an opposing ferrothorn in the rain and trying to set up a sweep only to be crippled by t-wave and stalled out with leech seed. It's ev's are taylored to give it max staying power in HP and take boosted water attacks from rain teams. It isn't running gyro ball due to the thunder wave. I didn't give it any entry hazards, since stealth rocks are fine for this team with the sand damage. Protect is on it to rack up more sand/leech seed damage and scout opponent's moves.
Heatran @ Air Balloon
Trait: Flash Fire
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature
- Flamethrower
- Earth Power
- Dragon Pulse
- Hidden Power [Grass]
With Breloom and ferrothorn on the team, there was a huge weakness to fire attacks (salamence isn't taking too many fire blasts or flare blitzes in the sand). I already have a stealth rocker and bulky walls (ferro and hippo) so I opted for an offensive variant. I choose modest because I usually switch it in on a predicted ground or fire move and hit back hard while most likely being untouchable for opposing pokes (choice-locked darmanitan in fire attack, hydregion in earth power, etc). If I predict another heatran coming in, I can hit it with another attack to pop any balloon it may be carrying and KO with earth power before it can pop my balloon (a pseudo-focus sash). There have been times where I wish I had timid for opposing heatrans, but the extra power is nice to bring them down far enough to a range where with rocks and sand the poke rendered death fodder. With the balloon, heatran also serves to dodge and mold-breaking dragons (looking at you haxorus) or dug trio trying to arena trap. Flamethrower is on over lava plume due to sheer damage output and over fire blast due to increased accuracy. I use HP grass for gastro/quagsire, hitting politoed hard on switch (2HKO defensive politoed after rocks), and other bulky waters.
Salamence @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naughty Nature
- Earthquake
- Fire Blast
- Outrage
- Dragon Claw
The main sweeper on my team. I didn't truly understand how powerful this thing was until time and again my teams came up against it with NO ANSWER. As my scarfer and revenge killer, it is capable of coming in on a poke, OHKOing it with outrage, and sweeping teams if any bothersome steels are removed. EQ and fire blast are for those such steels, predicting their switch-in and destroying them. The EVs and nature are tailored for maximum physical damage, speed and the rest to increase fire blast's damage. It's flying type is great for being able to dodge ground attacks aimed at a popped-balloon heatran. Since I don't have much invested in bulk, it's not made to take too many hits, even resisted ones. I sometimes lead with it, or bring it in to dragon claw something if there is an opposing steel type left.
Tentacruel @ Black Sludge
Trait: Liquid Ooze
EVs: 252 HP / 24 Def / 232 SDef
Bold Nature
- Knock Off
- Rapid Spin
- Magic Coat
- Scald
Possibly the most interesting addition to my team. With salamence coming in and out to revenge kill things, stealth rocks are a huge deal to its viability. I tried and tried to make this team work without using a slot for a spinner, but decided its need was too great. I've used tentacruel in the past and was amazed at its bulk, being able to take Life Orb thunders from starmie (~55%), or psychics from latios (~55%) and do it's job of spinning hazards away. Unfortunately, the jellyfish's movepool is somewhat shallow (pun in tended). I opted for knock off to remove non steel/rock/ground type's leftovers for increased residual damage in the sand and the only recovery form for certain steel pokes like heatran or ferrothorn (without leech seed). Magic coat is on there to catch certain taunt-ers and status-ers by surprise. It's really hilarious to bounce back a taunt to a deoxys-D while you switch to another threat or stay in, knock off its leftovers and possibly burn it with scald. Magic coat also works well against opposing ferrothorns, which is why the ev's are slightly different than typical sets. A ferrothorn thinking it is going to set up against tentacruel is going to have its spikes or thunder wave bounced back. In the case of the former, it may be on the receiving end of a scald-burn next turn, rendering it helpless. It's not going to leech seed any damage due to liquid ooze (also hilarious when a +3 conkeldurr drain punches) and its going to lose its lefties after a knock off. As mentioned, the ev's and bold nature are tailored to take a power whip at under half damage to do it's job of spinning etc, as well as take special hits from starmie, latios and even some electric attacks (thundurus-t volt switch from modest 252 spA is 62-74%). Finally, it's typing makes it an excellent sand team partner taking on water, grass and ice hits with ease (and fighting for heatran!)
Breloom @ Life Orb
Trait: Technician
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Mach Punch
- Low Sweep
- Spore
- Bullet Seed
Here it is: The crown jewel of BW2. One of the most anticipated pokes of this "new" generation. I always like to have a fighting type on my team for raw power and filled most of my teams in BW with conkeldurr (who is still a beast btw). I kept hearing all the hype over "techniloom this" and "techniloom that." Appearances certainly are deceiving, as this little mushroom packs as much "punch" as scizor and mamoswine and one point MORE THAN TERRAKION! I run adamant for maximum power rather than trying to outspeed with its mediocre base speed. Most of the time I can catch something on the switch and spore it or, even better, low sweep it to lower the speed then finish with a bullet seed or another low sweep (eg Espeon, Latios, gliscor, landorus). True, the sandstorm and life orb don't help with it's mediocre hp, but I use it in this team as a lead to polities/ttars to minimize residual damage or after a poke has fainted to start the spore/low sweep mindgames. It's excellent for shutting down ferrothorns and it's unique STABs are resisted only by a few of the meta's best pokes (latias, tornados, thundurus, dnite, salamence...are the few that come to mind).
Threatlist
This is far from a comprehensive list. It highlights the main pokes that I've had difficulty with:
Keldeo: I try to handle it before it starts setting up. Salamence can take it out if it's unboosted. Ferrothorn can take a timid secret sword without a boost and twave it and/or leech seed it before it boosts. Tentacruel can also check it for a while, but cannot do much back. I don't have a flat counter, unfortunately, so I have to stop it before it sets up or my team is toast.
Tornadus-T: There's not much on the team that wants to take a life-orb hurricane from this beast. Ferrothorn takes one at just over half (~58%) but can't switch in and risks a follow-up superpower. Tentacruel takes a little under half but cannot do very much back to it, except knock off its life orb or try to scald (burn) it. Salamence can't switch in on it, but is able to out-speed and OHKO with outrage or boosted dragon claw.
Thundurus-T: Does ~75% non-Life Orb (LO) to Hippowdon, so it can only switch in to a predicted thunder and roar it away hopefully when rocks are up. Ferrothorn can only leech seed it, but takes ~65% from a non LO focus blast and ~25% from non LO thunder so it can BARELY switch in. Scarfed variants can outrun my salamence as well.
Jirachi: I really hate this thing. I can handle it straight up with heatran or hippowdon, but it's the damn statuses that I can't take. Paraflinch variants ruin my team if hax is bad and sub cm sets can also hurt me if I get paralyzed. I guess statuses are more of a problem than jirachi itself...but then again, isn't that what serene grace is all about?
Tyranitar: Not much trouble with this. Hippowdon can tank any physical variants and if ttar is special, can survive an ice beam and switch to tentacruel to scare out with a scald or knock off the lefties. Lead with breloom to threaten with spore or mach punch
Rotom-W: A slight pain. People usually lead with this, so I lead with ferrothorn to see if it's a trick/will-o-wisp or offensive variant. Ferrothorn can handle offensive variants and salamence can outspeed. Switch in heatran to take any will-o-wisps and switch out to ferrothorn to take the water-have to mind game it. Trick variants I can switch into mence and threaten out/kill with outrage. If I have a free switch, breloom can beat it one-on-one.
Scizor: I wouldn't feel right not including this on the threatlist. However, my team can handle it well. Hippowdon TANKS its hits (+2 Bulletpunch from adamant 252 attack is ~33% LOL) and can roar it out or alternate eq and slack off to kill it. Heatran...Um hard counter? Even ferrothorn can take a superpower from full health and tentacruel resists its steel stab nicely.
Dragonite: Ferrothorn walls variants without fire punch and heatran walls variants without earthquake. The former can twave and leech seed it dry and the latter can KO after multiscale is broken with dragon pulse. Dnite also does pitiful damage to hippowdon (~37 %) with outrage (adamant 252 attack).
Salamence: Scarfed variants are handled by hippowdon (if I don't see intimidate, it's usually scarf moxie mence). It can also roar away intimidate-dragon dancers and hopefully get stealth rock damage on it. Ferrothorn can take any hits not called fire blast or flamethrower. Heatran on a balloon also walls it and can KO with dragon pulse before the balloon is popped and is earthquaked.
Alakazam: Ok this guy I have trouble with. Due to the amazing coverage, speed and sheer power, there are not many things I can do to it before it kills me. Scarfmence can outrun it, but can't switch in...and if it has a sash then mence is going down. Ferrothorn can maybe take a focus blast at full health and twave it for other pokes. Luckily it is frail and if breloom is in, i can low sweep in on the switch and mach punch or bullet seed it.
Mamoswine: Also a big pain in the ass. Ice moves crush hippowdon trying to tank the hits. I can leech seed/protect and power whip with ferrothorn, but if it's banded it cannot switch in and take two hits. Breloom can finish off them with mach punches but its shaky due to lower speed. Salamence is-lol-killed. Heatran can come in on a predicted eq and hurt it with fire moves, but the sash can create problems since mamoswine can outspeed it.
Latias: Sub-cm sets are problematic since ferrothorn does jack to it and it gets at least +1 before I can get hippo in to roar it out. It hard counters breloom and will survive even a low sweep and 3 hit bullet seed. Mence can outspeed it can KO luckily, but not if its behind a sub.
Starmie: Ferrothorn can handle pretty well. Breloom destroys on switch in with low sweep (followup), spore or bullet seed. Tentacruel can take at least one Life orb hit and knock off the item and switch.
Celebi: Heatran hard counters if balloon is intact. Salamence can outspeed and KO with fire blast or outrage. Still somewhat problematic however. May need help with this one as well.
Terrakion: Hippowdon tanks the hell out of even choice-banded hits. And terrakion is not staying in on an earthquake, especially after close combat lowers its defense.
Gyarados: Ferrothorn can handle it pretty well. Taunt variants are problematic, since I can only power-whip them. Salamence may be able to outspeed and KO, but its usually situational, depending on prior rocks damage and sandstorm.
So there's the team guys. I've been playtesting it for the past week or so on PS and it's doing fairly well with the addition of breloom and salamence. Unfortunately, I feel like it's offensive power is somewhat hampered (or I'm not playing it correctly). Maybe I should introduce spikes on ferrothorn for more residual damage? Try to make it more stall-ish with hippowdon and change heatran to defensive build? Also, due to alakazam and celebi weakness, was thinking of maybe Sabeleye (a taunt variant instead of tentacruel to stop hazards). Let me know what you think! I appreciate the comments. I will try to update the threat list as they come up in online play.
