Axew
[Overview]
<p>Say hello to Axew, the pokemon with the highest attack and speed stats of any dragon type in LC. When first looking at Axew, you’ll most probably be drawn in by the sight of his ludicrous attack stat and decent speed, and things only get better when you learn he gets dragon dance. So maybe you’re wondering why anyone would ever use any dragon type other than this little cutie. The answer is simple. Axew’s movepool is about as barren as a desert. With no decent coverage moves and not even a very useable special attack stat, Axew will need rather more support than his dragon brethren, especially when you see his defenses are less than stellar too. As such, Axew is not something you can just slap on to a team and expect results, but if you can give him the support, read on.</p>
[SET]
name: Sub-Dancer
move 1: Dragon Dance
move 2: Dual Chop/Dragon Claw
move 3: Outrage
move 4: Substitute
item: Eviolite
ability: Mold Breaker
nature: Adamant
evs: 68 HP/220 Atk/220 Spe
[SET COMMENTS]
<p>This is probably Axew’s most dangerous set. Axew is notorious for being a dangerous dragon dancer and this set puts it to best effect. Dragon Dance is clearly the crux of the set, boosting Axew’s attack to very dangerous levels and his speed so he outspeeds everything un-boosted and even a lot of choice scarf users, such as snover and shellder. Dual Chop or Dragon Claw function as the main STAB. Dual Chop is a little less accurate than Dragon Claw, but has the added bonus of hitting through substitutes and focus sashes (it should be noted that Mold Breaker already bypasses sturdy) which can be potentially game-changing if you face another substitute user. However, if you’re paranoid about accuracy or just prefer completely consistent damage, than Dragon Claw would be the better option.
Outrage should only be used if you really require the KO which Dual Chop can’t achieve. This is mostly because Axew is fairly difficult to set up and outrage leaves you very vulnerable to opposing choice scarfers and some bad luck with confusion can cut your sweep short. Substitute is a useful move that allows Axew to beat down a lot of faster scarfers anticipating a dragon dance, such as chinchou, which is important as it allows him to set up safely later on. The Evs and adamant nature ensure that axew still outspeeds choice scarfed foes sitting on 14 speed while still having as much attacking power as possible, having jolly is inferior adamant generally as the 15 speed tier is rather small and doesn’t allow him to out-speed anything noteworthy except scraggy at +1 who shouldn’t be confronted with Axew anyway. More importantly, an adamant nature grants KOs Axew would otherwise miss out on at +1 with a jolly nature, most notably eviolite misdreavus after stealth rock damage. It is strongly reccomended that you give this set magnemite support as Axew is unable to break through steel types easily. </p>
[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]
<p>Axew is generally quite difficult to set up, as though he has a good typing with some useful resistances, these are very frequently targetting axew’s not very impressive special defense. Therefore, any assistance that can be given to help Axew set up would be very useful. Noteable things include dual screens bronzor (who coincidentally synergises excellently with axew) or anything that can baton pass substitutes, such as mienfoo. Again I stress magnemite support is essential to get the most out of this set as axew has no way to get through steel types. Magnemite also synergies fairly well with Axew, resisting both his weaknesses and it is easy to find other team members who would also benefit from this support, such as drifloon or dwebble.</p>
move 4: Draco Meteor/Reversal
item: Choice Scarf
ability: Mold Breaker
nature: Naughty/Naive
evs: 68 Sp. Atk/220 Atk/220 Spe
[SET COMMENTS]
<p>Due to Axew’s great attack and good speed, he is able to run a solid choice scarf set. The main aim of the set is to revenge kill things quickly and effectively, a point to note, however, is that axew will not be able to OHKO as much as you would like, due to the good bulk that eviolite grants everything so prior damage is still usually needed to effectively KO things.
Outrage is the most important attack on this set as while it does make him vulnerable to faster choice scarfers and priority like on the dragon dance set, the power is very much needed as Axew has no way of boosting his attack on this set. Dual Chop is generally preffered over dragon claw on this set as being able to break through substitutes is invaluable to a scarfer and often something it will need to do often. X-Scissor is about as far as Axew’s viable coverage goes. X-Scissor is quite useful for finishing of defensive steel types as the most common are ferroseed and bronzor who both take neutral damage from X-Scissor which only deals a little less than a non-effective Outrage with no downsides. Reversal can also do this but has a much less consistent damage. Draco Meteor is really just a filler, and while it only comes of a measly 10 special attack, it’s insane base power coupled with STAB still let it hit hard and is useful for beating physically bulky pokemon who would usually expect to live an outrage, such as shellder.</p>
[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]
<p>Magnemite support is not as important on this set as this is primarily supposed to revenge kill but if you don’t take the magnet, be careful of getting locked into outrage. Jolly is given as an option as axew may find itself having to revenge kill scraggy so the jolly nature allows him to outspeed the lizard at +1 but be very wary when doing so as scraggy doesn’t take that much from outrage when equipped with an eviolite and will OHKO back with a +1 drain punch.</p>
[Other Options]
<p>Due to Axew’s terrible move-pool, there aren’t really many other options that it can make use of. Axew does have swords dance at its disposale, but is generally out-classed by gligar in this field. Dig may look like a viable option to deal with bronzor, but due to its one turn charge, it is very easy to avoid and creating a free switch to the opponent’s gligar is never good. Item-wise, life orb is an option which lets axew hit insanely hard after a boost, but also makes setting up insanely difficult and revenge-killing him easier too.</p>
[Checks and Counters]
<p>Axew is pretty straight forward to check due to his lack of coverage moves so virtually any steel type can wall him easily. However, if your steel type is gone (probably courtesy of magnemite), stopping axew suddenly becomes a lot more difficult. Very physcially bulky pokemon such as timburr, shellder or gligar can survive a boosted outrage and dish some serious hurt on him with earthquake and drain punch or icicle spear (which is possibly the best move to deal with his sub-dancing set) respectively, but must be kept rather healthy to do this. Fortunately, checking him is rather a lot easier. Fast scarfers such as chinchou, misdreavus and mienfoo are able to revenge kill him so long as he doesn’t get to +2 and snover will be able to kill him with ice shard with a bit of prior damage regardless of the boosts, however none of these can safely switch in on him and must watch out for substitute.</p>
[Unreleased]
<p>Axew gets Unnerve as its dream world ability. While this would be a fantastic ability in 4th generation, in B/W, eviolite is much more popular and effective so Axew will have little use for this ability.</p>
Notes:
apologies if I don't reply as this will be the last time I'll be using smogon for about a month or so.
First analysis I've done so sorry if it's not quite up to standards. Corrections/improvements would be appreciated.
[Overview]
<p>Say hello to Axew, the pokemon with the highest attack and speed stats of any dragon type in LC. When first looking at Axew, you’ll most probably be drawn in by the sight of his ludicrous attack stat and decent speed, and things only get better when you learn he gets dragon dance. So maybe you’re wondering why anyone would ever use any dragon type other than this little cutie. The answer is simple. Axew’s movepool is about as barren as a desert. With no decent coverage moves and not even a very useable special attack stat, Axew will need rather more support than his dragon brethren, especially when you see his defenses are less than stellar too. As such, Axew is not something you can just slap on to a team and expect results, but if you can give him the support, read on.</p>
[SET]
name: Sub-Dancer
move 1: Dragon Dance
move 2: Dual Chop/Dragon Claw
move 3: Outrage
move 4: Substitute
item: Eviolite
ability: Mold Breaker
nature: Adamant
evs: 68 HP/220 Atk/220 Spe
[SET COMMENTS]
<p>This is probably Axew’s most dangerous set. Axew is notorious for being a dangerous dragon dancer and this set puts it to best effect. Dragon Dance is clearly the crux of the set, boosting Axew’s attack to very dangerous levels and his speed so he outspeeds everything un-boosted and even a lot of choice scarf users, such as snover and shellder. Dual Chop or Dragon Claw function as the main STAB. Dual Chop is a little less accurate than Dragon Claw, but has the added bonus of hitting through substitutes and focus sashes (it should be noted that Mold Breaker already bypasses sturdy) which can be potentially game-changing if you face another substitute user. However, if you’re paranoid about accuracy or just prefer completely consistent damage, than Dragon Claw would be the better option.
Outrage should only be used if you really require the KO which Dual Chop can’t achieve. This is mostly because Axew is fairly difficult to set up and outrage leaves you very vulnerable to opposing choice scarfers and some bad luck with confusion can cut your sweep short. Substitute is a useful move that allows Axew to beat down a lot of faster scarfers anticipating a dragon dance, such as chinchou, which is important as it allows him to set up safely later on. The Evs and adamant nature ensure that axew still outspeeds choice scarfed foes sitting on 14 speed while still having as much attacking power as possible, having jolly is inferior adamant generally as the 15 speed tier is rather small and doesn’t allow him to out-speed anything noteworthy except scraggy at +1 who shouldn’t be confronted with Axew anyway. More importantly, an adamant nature grants KOs Axew would otherwise miss out on at +1 with a jolly nature, most notably eviolite misdreavus after stealth rock damage. It is strongly reccomended that you give this set magnemite support as Axew is unable to break through steel types easily. </p>
[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]
<p>Axew is generally quite difficult to set up, as though he has a good typing with some useful resistances, these are very frequently targetting axew’s not very impressive special defense. Therefore, any assistance that can be given to help Axew set up would be very useful. Noteable things include dual screens bronzor (who coincidentally synergises excellently with axew) or anything that can baton pass substitutes, such as mienfoo. Again I stress magnemite support is essential to get the most out of this set as axew has no way to get through steel types. Magnemite also synergies fairly well with Axew, resisting both his weaknesses and it is easy to find other team members who would also benefit from this support, such as drifloon or dwebble.</p>
[SET]
name: Choice Scarf
move 1: Outrage
move 2: Dual Chop
move 3: X-Scissor/Reversalname: Choice Scarf
move 1: Outrage
move 2: Dual Chop
move 4: Draco Meteor/Reversal
item: Choice Scarf
ability: Mold Breaker
nature: Naughty/Naive
evs: 68 Sp. Atk/220 Atk/220 Spe
[SET COMMENTS]
<p>Due to Axew’s great attack and good speed, he is able to run a solid choice scarf set. The main aim of the set is to revenge kill things quickly and effectively, a point to note, however, is that axew will not be able to OHKO as much as you would like, due to the good bulk that eviolite grants everything so prior damage is still usually needed to effectively KO things.
Outrage is the most important attack on this set as while it does make him vulnerable to faster choice scarfers and priority like on the dragon dance set, the power is very much needed as Axew has no way of boosting his attack on this set. Dual Chop is generally preffered over dragon claw on this set as being able to break through substitutes is invaluable to a scarfer and often something it will need to do often. X-Scissor is about as far as Axew’s viable coverage goes. X-Scissor is quite useful for finishing of defensive steel types as the most common are ferroseed and bronzor who both take neutral damage from X-Scissor which only deals a little less than a non-effective Outrage with no downsides. Reversal can also do this but has a much less consistent damage. Draco Meteor is really just a filler, and while it only comes of a measly 10 special attack, it’s insane base power coupled with STAB still let it hit hard and is useful for beating physically bulky pokemon who would usually expect to live an outrage, such as shellder.</p>
[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]
<p>Magnemite support is not as important on this set as this is primarily supposed to revenge kill but if you don’t take the magnet, be careful of getting locked into outrage. Jolly is given as an option as axew may find itself having to revenge kill scraggy so the jolly nature allows him to outspeed the lizard at +1 but be very wary when doing so as scraggy doesn’t take that much from outrage when equipped with an eviolite and will OHKO back with a +1 drain punch.</p>
[Other Options]
<p>Due to Axew’s terrible move-pool, there aren’t really many other options that it can make use of. Axew does have swords dance at its disposale, but is generally out-classed by gligar in this field. Dig may look like a viable option to deal with bronzor, but due to its one turn charge, it is very easy to avoid and creating a free switch to the opponent’s gligar is never good. Item-wise, life orb is an option which lets axew hit insanely hard after a boost, but also makes setting up insanely difficult and revenge-killing him easier too.</p>
[Checks and Counters]
<p>Axew is pretty straight forward to check due to his lack of coverage moves so virtually any steel type can wall him easily. However, if your steel type is gone (probably courtesy of magnemite), stopping axew suddenly becomes a lot more difficult. Very physcially bulky pokemon such as timburr, shellder or gligar can survive a boosted outrage and dish some serious hurt on him with earthquake and drain punch or icicle spear (which is possibly the best move to deal with his sub-dancing set) respectively, but must be kept rather healthy to do this. Fortunately, checking him is rather a lot easier. Fast scarfers such as chinchou, misdreavus and mienfoo are able to revenge kill him so long as he doesn’t get to +2 and snover will be able to kill him with ice shard with a bit of prior damage regardless of the boosts, however none of these can safely switch in on him and must watch out for substitute.</p>
[Unreleased]
<p>Axew gets Unnerve as its dream world ability. While this would be a fantastic ability in 4th generation, in B/W, eviolite is much more popular and effective so Axew will have little use for this ability.</p>
Notes:
apologies if I don't reply as this will be the last time I'll be using smogon for about a month or so.
First analysis I've done so sorry if it's not quite up to standards. Corrections/improvements would be appreciated.
