Baton Pass Chain
Introduction
The move Baton Pass has been around in Pokémon since the release of GSC, but really increased in usefulness in Advance for several reasons. More Pokémon learn it, more Pokémon learn stat-upper moves and more handy goodies have been handed to several Pokémon to decrease the difficulty of getting a boost in and getting out alive.
What Baton Pass is, how it works and you can dominate opponents with it will be analyzed in this guide.
The mechanics
Baton Pass is essentially a move that makes you switch out while keeping the effects the user has activated in play. Unlike switching, whether you go before or after your opponent is determined by speed, like with every other move. The possibilities of passing effects are nearly endless.
* Any regular stat upper move: Swords Dance, Agility, Calm Mind, Bulk Up, etc, but also stat changing side effects like Steel Wing increasing Defense, or Ancientpower boosting all stats.
* Substitute
Note: the passed Substitute will have the same HP as the Substitute / Baton Pass user, namely 1/4 of its max HP. When an attack lands on the Substitute, it uses the defenses of the Pokémon it's aimed at. So if Vaporeon creates a Substitute of 404 HP and Celebi uses Psychic on it, it will use Vaporeon's (for example) 240 Special Defense. However, when Vaporeon Baton Passes this 101 HP Substitute to Blissey, the attack will use Blissey's astronomical 360 Special Defense, while still using the same 101 HP Substitute to subtract the damage from.
* Negative stat changers like Intimidate and Screech
If Salamence switches in and Intimidates Celebi, and Celebi uses Calm Mind, followed by a Baton Pass, the receiver will have a boost in Special Attack and Special Defense due to Calm Mind, but a reduction in Attack due to Intimidate. The recipient having Clear Body, White Smoke, Hyper Cutter or such abilities does not help. The reductions of the use of Superpower (Attack and Defense drop), Overheat and Psycho Boost (both sharp Special Attack drop) as well as taking a lucky Shadow Ball or Crunch (Special Defense drop) are passed on as well.
* Invisible stat changes like confusion, attraction, Leech Seed and Ghost Curse.
If Lapras uses Swagger on Scizor for some reason, and Scizor then uses Baton Pass, the receiver will not only keep the sharp Attack boost, but also the Confusion status, unless this receiver has Own Tempo. Attract, however, will not pass on, even if the receiver and the Attractor have the same genders, or if the receiver has Oblivious. Visible status like Burn and Paralysis are not passed on in any way. The only exception to this rule is a glitch on NetBattle 9.6. If a Pokémon has been afflicted by the Toxic status, they keep their Toxic counter. So if Vaporeon is in for 4 turns while Toxiced, Baton Passes to another Pokémon, and then comes back in later from the same Baton Pass chain, it will take 5/16 damage, rather than 1/16. Leech Seed is passed on, even if the receiver is Grass-typed. In a similar way, Perish Count from Perish Song continues if you Baton Pass, even if the receiver has Soundproof.
* Ingrain
Baton Pass is the only way for a Pokémon in Advance to switch out if it has been Ingrained. The receiver will have the same curses and blessings as the Baton Passer: he will not be able to switch out without using Baton Pass by himself, however he will be immune to Roar / Whirlwind (not to Haze though) and he will regain 1/16 of his max HP at the end of every turn.
The effects of Charge are not passed. Trait changes via Trace, Skill Swap or Role Play are voided when you use Baton Pass. If you Baton Pass out while you are Choice Banded, the receiver does not have the effect of a Choice Band unless he has a Choice Band himself, and he won't be forced to use Baton Pass even if he has it. Reflect, Light Screen, Mist and Safeguard are passed automatically, even if you switch out or are Roared / Whirlwinded.
The strategic part
So, how is Baton Passing going to help you? The prime use is using one Pokémon to set up another on your team. The most common use for Baton Pass is to build a chain of Pokémon to Baton Pass to each other. The boosts are cumulative, everything can be passed on forever as long as nothing breaks the chain by dying or switching out without the aid of Baton Pass.
The following set-up is a standard one. If you're looking for a team that's very easy to use (after a few practice matches) and gets a big amount of wins and if you don't mind being yelled at, go ahead and steal it. Nearly every regular player has used this at least once.
1. Ninjask
2. Vaporeon
3. Scizor
4. Smeargle
5. Celebi
6. recipient
I will now analyze each of the 5 Baton Passers separately and list their standard moves, as well as discuss alternatives, and then give you some information on what to use as a recipient. However, you shouldn't really see it as a team in a certain order but as a chain, where every Pokémon contributes something. Like a circle of the first five, with the last Pokémon in the middle. First, the five Baton Passers will be analyzed.
When putting an alternative, you'll always want to keep Baton Pass (obviously), and keeping Substitute in there is strongly recommended to keep status in check, as well as removing the biggest threat in the game to Baton Pass teams: Critical Hits.
Ninjask
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Swords Dance
~ Hidden Power Flying
@ Leftovers
Ninjask is the starter of this chain nearly all the time. He passes on Speed extremely easily, simply by using Substitute about two or three times until everyone on your team is faster than your opponents. Everything with 264 Speed takes one Speed boost to beat everything standard, 198 takes two Speed boosts and 158 takes three. Swords Dance is for later, when the rest of the team has set up some defenses and Ingrain for Ninjask so he can start to tank and make Substitutes that take two hits to break. When that time has come you can alternate Substitute and Swords Dance to your heart's content. Ninjask's standard attacking move is Hidden Power Flying, this is your best bet to take on Heracross and Medicham. Because of your lack of attacking moves, these two with Focus Punch can be big nuisances that totally destroy your team. Despite his 4x resistance, Ninjask is not very keen on taking those hits and should get rid of these two as soon as possible. Hidden Power Flying should also shut down any opposing Ninjasks, which is why giving it max Speed and Attack is not a bad idea.
Alternatives: Protect makes it easier to get in Speed Boosts and stalls for more Leftovers / Ingrain recovery. Sand-Attacking your opponent can win you time. You either force them to switch out, or if they don't want to or cannot, they have a chance of missing every time you put up a Substitute, which everyone of your team can take advantage of. Hidden Power Rock gets rid of opposing Ninjask guaranteed as well as Charizard. You never see a Charizard, but when you see one, your team gets destroyed unless you can get in Vaporeon in time and Surf it, and this is providing you still have a nearly max health Surfing Vaporeon. Silver Wind or Hidden Power Bug is helpful for STAB and mostly for Celebi and Tyranitar. The latter is extremely annoying to deal with early on. Either you face a Dragon Dancing set with Substitute or Taunt, preventing you from statusing it, or you are battling Tyraniboah, who hits super-effective on every Baton Passer on your team, except Scizor. If your recipient cannot deal with Tyranitar well, this is a good option. Swords Dance is a replaceable move, as you can always have that on Scizor (or Belly Drum on Smeargle, or even Swords Dance on a Celebi / Mawile), but so is Hidden Power Flying.
EVs: If you want to beat other Ninjask to the punch, max Speed and Attack with Jolly to ensure the KO with Hidden Power Flying. Hidden Power Rock KOs too, but that lowers your Speed DV. If you want to play it safe just switch (not Baton Pass) out of them to Vaporeon and play from there. If you do that you may as well max HP for more powerful substitutes, or empower defenses so they break less easily (bringing a HP and a defense closer to each other means you take less damage in percentages, making your Substitutes more sturdy, however putting EVs into HP empowers both defenses evenly). 397 Speed is the absolute minimum, if you're paranoid about Electrode use 420 or so, this will outspeed no-Speed-EVs Kingdra after Rain Dance (that's 412).
A good midway between above options is 88 HP / 252 Def / 108 Spd with Jolly nature, with Hidden Power Rock in the set. This ensures you will beat every enemy leading Ninjask that doesn't switch out. This spread allows you to survive any Hidden Power Flying from Jolly Ninjask, while you will outspeed any Adamant ones. Hidden Power Rock allows you to OHKO them. You have 60 leftover EVs in this spread to put wherever you want.
Smeargle
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Ingrain
~ Spore
@ Lum Berry / Salac Berry / Leftovers
Smeargle is the ONLY thing in the game that can Baton Pass Ingrain, and trust me when I say Ingrain is a godsend. It makes your Pokémon immune to Whirlwind and Roar, eliminating the need for something like Magneton for Skarmory or overspecific Suicune / Weezing counters. In addition, it gives you 1/16 of your max health back after every turn: a secondary Leftovers. This helps a lot against Sandstream, or Burn / Poison status if you ever get them. Ingrain is essential for the success of your chain. To get in Smeargle, pass a Substitute to him that won't break against a slow Pokémon or on a switch by your opponent. Watch out for Dugtrio and enemies with Substitute; always play it safe if your opponent has these. All Smeargle should be relied upon for is Ingraining and getting the hell out. Spore can help in giving you a free turn, it will usually give even two if you Spore a slower Pokémon while you have a Substitute up.
Alternatives: Spider Web is the best one (as it has more PP than Block and Mean Look), but the only slot you may free up for it is Spore, or Substitute if you feel like being risky. If you remove Substitute and you do manage to pull off Spore + Spider Web, you're in the money. You can set up everything you want while the opponent is asleep as long as you are behind a Substitute, and if he wakes up just pass the Substitute to Smeargle and sleep him again. Smeargle can pass everything the other Pokémon can too, but he has too few moveslots already and everyone is a better Baton Passer than Smeargle when going by typing and stats. The only exception is Belly Drum, which nothing else can pass. It is a very risky bet sometimes, but also the quick way to win. Just pass Belly Drum to Salamence or Medicham and you have won. You don't really need a Baton Pass chain around Belly Drum Smeargle, though.
EVs: The obvious move would be max Speed and HP, as Smeargle doesn't even use his attacking stats and rarely should rely on his defenses. However, with 128 HP and 152 Special Defense EVs, you will always live through a Modest max Special Attack Zapdos Thunderbolt, which is the most powerful common unboosted Special Attack in the standard metagame. This knowledge will help you against other things like Starmie as well. You will still have 267 Speed with Jolly and the rest of your EVs in Speed, so you'll outspeed Aerodactyl and Jolteon after one Speed Boost or Salac Berry. This is merely an alternative spread, nothing is wrong with max HP and Speed. You can optionally stick to 56 Speed EVs and rely on two Speed Boosts as well, though Smeargle is so fragile this may not be the best idea.
Vaporeon
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Acid Armor
~ Wish
@ Leftovers
If you're not using Scizor but something like Umbreon, you will need this thing a lot, as she's your main bet against physical attackers and Fire-types. Generally, if you are met up with a Snorlax, Salamence or something on your Ninjask, get three Speed Boosts to make sure Vaporeon is faster than anything, and get either Scizor or Vaporeon in to outpace their physical stat boosting with your additional Defense. If you smell status or your opponent is doing less than 25% damage, always use Substitute before doing anything else � this prevents you from getting screwed up by a Critical Hit. This goes for every single of your Pokémon. Use Vaporeon to keep the other Pokémon's health high with Wish, but of course her own health has to stay high as well.
Alternatives: Charm and Acid Armor together shut down physical opponents 100%. Charm makes opponents switch, which means free turns for you. It's really handy against Curselax. Protect works with Wish, but is rather overkill with Substitute. Surf is a 2HKO on Tyranitar, OHKO if you're pumped with Calm Minds. Sand-Attack helps, but you're better off relying on tanking than on dodging. Roar works against other Baton Passing chains (though you will be annoyed by Mr. Mime and Ingrain Smeargle once they catch on), but of course it's not a good idea to Roar away Pokémon that you have trapped using Smeargle or Umbreon. Roar also stops Curselax from setting up on you as well as Charm does. Ice Beam is for Salamence and Flygon which can be very annoying to take care of, whether they have Choice Band or not. Vaporeon needs all the moves suggested, though: Substitute and Baton Pass are obligatory. Wish is extremely useful if you're not using another Wisher (and the best one is Umbreon, which is not in the standard line-up). Acid Armor would be the most replaceable one since Scizor can have Iron Defense, but still you'll miss that when you don't have it, or something like Choice Band or Dragon Dance Salamence with Flamethrower with murder you.
EVs: Max Defense with Bold makes it very easy to set up Acid Armor in combination with the high HP. Maxing HP isn't a bad idea as that gives you really big Substitutes to pass around in the team. You need 128 Speed EVs to outspeed Aerodactyl and Jolteon after two Speed Boosts, which isn't worth it as you can just go for three. If you insist you should add 4 more EVs, as this gives you the ability to outspeed 100 base Speed Pokémon after one Speed Boost (300 Speed after the pass). You will find Special Attack EVs mostly useless. Tyranitar will always be 2HKOed by Surf from Vaporeon's minimum of 256 Special Attack, unless Tyranitar has nearly max HP and Special Defense, which means it doesn't hurt you. For a guaranteed OHKO on Tyranitar (max HP, no Special Defense EVs) with Surf you'll need 463 Special Attack. To get that after one Calm Mind, you'll need to start with 308 Special Attack, which you need 208 Special Attack EVs for (no need for Modest). Surf after two Calm Minds will always OHKO Tyranitar. If you use Ice Beam, putting 80 Special Attack EVs to make 276 isn't a bad idea as this is a guaranteed OHKO on 369 HP, no Special Defense Salamence.
Scizor
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Iron Defense
~ Hidden Power Bug
@ Leftovers
Without Scizor, you wouldn't stand a chance against a leading Tauros or Dodrio. It's the only Normal-resisting Baton Passer besides Mawile, and takes other physical hits quite well too. Together with Vaporeon they should protect you against Snorlax and Salamence (beware Fire Blast!) and several other dangerous Pokémon. Scizor can also take care of Tyranitar to an extent with Hidden Power Bug � an OHKO when he gets in Swarm range or when you have a Swords Dance under your belt, a 2HKO otherwise.
Alternatives: Swords Dance is an obvious choice, Scizor is easier to set up than Ninjask when you don't have all your defenses set up, and he can use it himself too. He gets Agility as well, but that's something Ninjask already provides. Light Screen can protect your Special Defense if you don't have Calm Minds but isn't really worth using a moveslot for. Steel Wing and Silver Wind are alternative attacks � less power than Hidden Power Bug (or even Steel), but the side-effect may save you someday. If you have to rely on it, however, you have made an error somewhere. When replacing something, obviously take out Hidden Power Bug when putting a new Attacking move. Vaporeon's Acid Armor may seem you to urge you to take out Iron Defense, but this is the only thing between you and a Tauros sweep, unless you can kill Tauros.
EVs: Max out HP, and put 128 or 132 EVs in Speed depending on whether you have a Hidden Power that requires a 30 Speed DV or not, to hit 198. This means you outspeed Jolteon and Aerodactyl after 2 Speed Boosts or one Agility. However, you may choose to use 136 or 140 to hit 200, so you outspeed 100 base Pokémon without a +Speed nature after one Speed Boost. Stack your Defense with the rest, and use Impish. Alternately, you can absolutely no Speed EVs whatsoever, as with 3 boosts, you are faster than everything, much like with Vaporeon. This allows you to max HP, and boost your defenses more.
Celebi
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Calm Mind
~ Recover
@ Leftovers
Celebi contributes Calm Mind as well as pretty high HP Substitutes. Calm Mind should be here, even if you have a physical recipient, because the Special Defense boost keeps your Substitutes (or actually your Pokémon) from being broken by Special attackers like Raikou and Zapdos. There really isn't much else to add to it. Celebi is an extremely good Baton Passer thanks to sturdy defenses, Natural Cure and Recover, which makes it less reliant on Wish and Substitute, giving Vaporeon some breathing room.
Alternatives: Celebi is pretty flexible. You can of course put Psychic or a Grass move like Giga Drain or Hidden Power Grass on it to make use of Calm Mind. Psychic would help against Heracross and other Fighters (Focus Punching ones really hurt) as well as Taunt Gyarados to an extent, and a Grass move protects against Tyranitar and also Dugtrio to an extent. Psychic will especially help against Weezing, who if not Spored, will be extremely difficult to beat otherwise, considering it carries Haze and a STAB Sludge Bomb that will be Celebi's bane when the Acid Armors / Iron Defenses are Hazed away. Besides Celebi's / Mr. Mime's Psychic and / or a premature reliance upon your recipient's attacks, Vaporeon's Surf is the only actual attack on a Baton Pass team that threatens Weezing, who laughs at Scizor's Hidden Power Bug and Ninjask's Hidden Power Flying. Celebi can also Baton Pass Swords Dance, but since you have Ninjask and Scizor for that you won't really need that, plus Celebi is much more limited to physical attacking options. You can use Heal Bell in case one of your other Pokémon gets statused or Reflect / Light Screen to throw up a temporary barrier before you get enough Acid Armors / Iron Defenses / Calm Minds in, but Substitute and smart play are much better ways to get around these problems.
EVs: Max out HP for the best Substitutes, and put 264 Speed (112 EVs). You can also just neglect Speed and get 2 Speed Boosts beforehand to outspeed anything (Celebi's minimum 236 Speed is more than enough for that). Build up either Special Defense or Defense with what you have left, preferably Special Defense to tank better with Calm Mind.
Your recipient
There's a couple of good recipients in the game, but the following are considered the best of the best. Your best bet is something that can kill everything in the game with high accuracy, preferably in one hit. Lum Berry on them isn't a bad idea so you can switch them in on a Thunder Wave or something, but Leftovers saves them against Sand Stream. You should have Ingrain and Substitute up though, but these are just-in-case scenarios. The best candidate for this is Medicham.
Medicham
~ Baton Pass / Substitute
~ Brick Break
~ Shadow Ball
~ Return
@ Lum Berry / Leftovers
Absolutely nothing can take on this Medicham with +6 Attack and +1 Speed, except maybe a series of Quick Attack Pokémon, which is what Defense boosts are for. Medicham doesn't need to be Calm Minded to the max, and he can be brought in on Tyranitar (if you're faster and have a Substitute up and he doesn't have one, of course) to kill it before Baton Passing out again. This is more useful when Tyranitar is trapped, but sometimes you have no choice. Every single of his attacking moves are 100% accuracy and they hit everything in the game. Even Skarmory is OHKOed by Brick Break. The only thing that survives both Brick Break and Shadow Ball in standard play is Weezing (well, and Muk sometimes), who is OHKOed by Return. Besides his fragility, Medicham is the best recipient you can wish. Baton Pass is generally the most useful move, as it allows Medicham to come in on problem Pokémon (Tyranitar) before you are through boosting, and scare them off / kill them before they destroy your team, and then Baton Pass out to finish boosting up.
EVs: Max Attack and Speed with Jolly, no questions asked.
Zapdos
~ Thunderbolt
~ Hidden Power Grass
~ Baton Pass
~ Drill Peck / Roar / Substitute
@ Lum Berry / Leftovers
Zapdos isn't bad either. Like Medicham he can Baton Pass out so you don't have to save him for the end. Zapdos can take a few Tyraniboah hits unlike most BP chain Pokémon, and he takes on Gyarados with ease, a huge plus. Drill Peck needs some Attack EVs to guarantee an OHKO on Blissey, Snorlax and Regice (think of a stat between 250 and 300), which may or may not be worth it - Thunderbolt from +6 Special Attack is going to 2HKO them anyway, so go ahead and use another filler. Roar can beat other stat-uppers and Substitute protects you from status (like Snorlax Body Slam or Blissey Thunder Wave). Zapdos isn't as fragile as Medicham, but doesn't have as much instant power, and does give you another nasty Rock weakness.
EVs: You need 290 Attack (192 EVs + nature) to OHKO 500 HP/200 Defense Snorlax 100% of the time (with 6 Attack boosts obviously), which is a little too much. I'd settle with 270 Attack at max (216 EVs without nature) to guarantee the OHKO on max HP max Defense Blissey, but less is acceptable. 264 Speed makes you outspeed everything even if you only have one Speed Boost, if you don't put any EVs you'll need 2 Speed Boosts, even if you use a -Speed nature. 297 is an option for outspeeding Heracross but it costs a lot of EVs. Stack Special Attack with your leftover EVs, or work on HP and defenses to take on threats such as Tyranitar better. If you're not working on defenses, use a -Defense or -Special Defense nature. If you're not stacking Speed to 264, use a -Speed one.
Salamence
~ Flamethrower
~ Dragon Claw
~ Hidden Power (Flying)
~ Earthquake / Roar / Substitute
@ Lum Berry / Leftovers
You will probably get the most mileage out of Earthquake in the last slot, even if Pokémon like Aggron, Muk and Arcanine aren't exactly huge metagame threats. Otherwise, nothing survives the first three offered attacking moves once fully powered up, and Intimidate can be very handy. Like Zapdos, Salamence can Roar out enemy Baton Passers, gives a Rock weakness, and needs to rely on mixed attacking. The lack of Baton Pass is really what kills him for the best recipient award, but he's a solid choice, and helps the Fighting weakness.
EVs: For Speed, same as with Zapdos: use 264, 297, or just don't put any EVs at all and use -Speed. Max out Special Attack and put the rest in Attack.
In theory you can use almost anything, even Nidoking or freaking Aipom to sweep your opponents with, because fully boosted Pokémon are nearly impossible to stop. However, when fighting for a tournament and you must use a Baton Pass team, might as well use the best of the best.
Alternative Baton Passers
Now, the above chain isn't the only Baton Passing chain. There are a LOT of other possibilities; I'll list some of the best.
Zapdos
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Agility
~ Thunderbolt
@ Leftovers
If Zapdos isn't your recipient, it can be your Baton Passer. Ninjask is a very frail Pokémon, and Zapdos can at least take care of Weezing, Skarmory and Suicune, so this is an acceptable solution. Very easy to set up and pass with, but you'll have to put an Attack booster somewhere else.
Alternatives: Hidden Power Grass or Ice can mess up Grounds, Thunder Wave helps the set-up but blocks your own Spore Smeargle, and Drill Peck kills Heracross. Then again you don't really have room for anything.
EVs: Doesn't necessarily need any Speed EVs, but 244 Speed can be nice to beat all Tyranitar. Max out HP for Substitute, and put the rest in your defenses. Thunderbolt should hurt the phazers decently enough.
Mawile
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Iron Defense / Swords Dance
~ Taunt
@ Leftovers
Scizor's little sister, she trades a lot of good stats and attacking potential for a Flying resistance, Taunt (!) and Intimidate. Not bad per se, but much more vulnerable than Scizor, thanks to the lower Special Defense and weakness to Earthquake. Pick which stat booster you need. Like with Scizor, Iron Defense helps a lot against Normal-types, but Swords Dance is good if you don't have a Swords Dancing Ninjask or something else that boosts Attack.
Alternatives: Substitute AND Taunt may seem a little overkill, so you may want both Iron Defense and Swords Dance. You can attack with a random physical Hidden Power, like STAB Hidden Power Steel for Tyranitar. Sing can win you a turn but is unreliable, and you won't need it with Spore on Smeargle. Tickle can be fun to toy with, and it goes through Substitute, which can be handy against something like Tyraniboah.
EVs: Max HP always. Mawile can reach 198 Speed, but you need 248 Speed EVs for it. To realize her tanking potential, you can stick with 158 Speed, which is more than enough as you can just get 3 Speed Boosts and outspeed Aerodactyl and Jolteon that way. Put what you have left in Defense and go for Impish.
Umbreon
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Wish
~ Mean Look
@ Leftovers
This thing used to be standard on Baton Pass chains. Very good defenses allow it to sop up some hits, and it can do a lot of things Vaporeon can do too, like Wish and Charm. The main selling point is Mean Look. The only other Trappassers are Ariados and Smeargle, where the former blows and the latter has other things to do. A trapped opponent is much more predictable and easier to stall out. Umbreon isn't a bad choice if you have a leftover slot.
Alternatives: As said Umbreon is a bit like Vaporeon, but it doesn't get Acid Armor, Roar, Ice Beam or Surf. Don't bother attacking with it, stick with Charm, Sand-Attack or Taunt. Taunt stops stat-uppers and Substitute to an extent if you're faster, as well as status and Ingrain, but you may find it overkill with Substitute and Ingrain at your disposal. Wish is expendable if you already have it on Vaporeon.
EVs: Max HP, as you might have guessed. Put the defenses how you like it, you won't need any Speed (going to 198 with 128 EVs is optional but not worth it). 252/128/128 HP/Defense/Special Defense isn't a bad idea really. Calm / Careful boosts Umbreon's higher defense stat.
Jolteon
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Agility
~ Thunderbolt
@ Leftovers
Basically this is Zapdos without the awesome typing and great stat balance, more Speed, Volt Absorb and some cool other options. It counters other Electrics to an extent which is always nice.
Alternatives: Like Zapdos it can Roar out other Baton Pass chains, and like the other Eeveelutions it can Charm, Sand-Attack and Wish. The defensive Eevees are better at those though.
EVs: 374 Speed minimum for beating Alakazam, Sceptile and Dugtrio, 384 if you fear Swellow. Max out HP and put the rest in Special Defense for taking Hidden Powers better; you won't need Special Attack.
Mr. Mime
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Encore
~ Calm Mind
@ Leftovers
Like Umbreon, Mr. Mime used to be a bog standard on Baton Pass chains. Mr. Mime has some wonderful abilities but extremely lame HP and Defense, unlike Celebi, who can take a load of hits and Recover them off. Mr. Mime's Soundproof allows it to come in on Suicune Roar, perhaps Encore it and Calm Mind up in its face. Try to get Ingrain up sooner or later though because your other Pokémon are not Soundproof. Soundproof also helps against Perish Singers, but if they Perish Song against another Pokémon and you Baton Pass to Mr. Mime it won't go away. If you're Ingrained and someone Perish Songs on you, you will lose a Pokémon no matter what. Encore is a great tool, especially if you trap the opponent. It's one of the few things Baton Pass chains can do against Raikou.
Alternatives: Mr. Mime gets a LOT of handy stuff. Barrier is there for obvious reasons, Taunt helps against Whirlwinders, Thunderbolt and Psychic make use of Calm Mind and can hurt phazers and Fighters respectively. Trick + Choice Band is a long-term but much riskier Encore. If you trap something and Trickband it into a not-too-dangerous move it's game over for them. Really helps against Haze Weezing. Hypnosis puts something to Sleep, but like with Sing Mawile, why would you when you have Spore Smeargle? You can contribute with Meditate but you have 3 better Swords Dancers at your disposal. There are of course the screens, but I outlined at Celebi's section why they are somewhat redundant.
EVs: Max out his horrible HP to gain more overall coverage. 264 Speed and the rest in Special Defense with Calm is probably your best bet.
Gorebyss / Huntail
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Iron Defense
~ Amnesia
@ Leftovers
Basically a mini-Vaporeon with the possibility to pass Agility or Amnesia. They aren't to good as Pokémon themselves, but if you have a physical recipient you may as well use Amnesia, though Calm Mind Mr. Mime and Celebi do a better job at standing up to Electrics. Their low HP and Special Defense really keeps them from being on Baton Pass teams.
Alternatives: As said, these two can use Agility, and of course you can use Surf / Ice Beam (use Gorebyss if you're doing so, she's got better Special Attack). Huntail can also go physical if you must, but there's no good options available aside of generic Hidden Power or Return.
EVs: Like with about anything, max HP. To spare EVs you can use the 158 Speed stat, but that means you won't outspeed everything after Agility or 2 Speed Boosts, which is crucial for Pokémon with Agility. It takes nearly the maximum to get them to the 198 threshold. Put your leftover EVs in Defense, and use Bold (or Impish if you're using Huntail with physical attacks).
Espeon
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Calm Mind
~ Psychic
@ Leftovers
Known as EspyJump. The fastest Calm Mind passer, if you ever need one. Sadly Espeon doesn't outspeed max Speed Raikou, which would be the main reason to use her over Celebi or Mr. Mime (besides the 130 Special Attack). Not a bad Special tank, but usually you're better off with Celebi or Mr. Mime, given she has neither that Earthquake / Surf / Thunderbolt resistance with Recover and Natural Cure, nor Soundproof and an impressive movepool.
Alternatives: Sand-Attack, like on Jolteon and Ninjask, can be used in combination with Substitute to scout for a miss. Charm is better on Vaporeon / Umbreon, but it's there. Same for Wish. The screens deserve a mention, but not more than that. These would go over Psychic if anything, but sadly you'll be wasting 130 Special Attack.
EVs: Max HP and a lot of Special Defense should do the trick. About 301 or 332 Speed is plenty, especially considering you'll be Speed boosting. Calm nature.
Every other Pokémon with Baton Pass is UU and nearly unusable, except Medicham which is just too good as a recipient to pass up, sorry for the pun. Pick your team accordingly, with the goal to get all boosts you need and covering the problems.
The question is, which problems? What beats a well-played Baton Pass team?
Counters
Baton Pass teams are nearly unbeatable. You need insane luck, overspecific counters, or an error by your opponent. Some things that have a shot:
phazers
These are on nearly every team, and can make it a little harder to get the chain going. However, after Ingrain is in these are worthless. The most dangerous phazer is one that actually OHKOs Smeargle. A good example would be Roar Aggron. It can Focus Punch Smeargle, and Substitute to block Spore, and Roar out everything else. You'll never see it, but when I did, I did have a really difficult time. Remember that Mr. Mime can block Roar, but he is really fragile on the physical side as well. Raikou or Zapdos with Roar can be very annoying as well, Encore Mr. Mime should help but he takes surprisingly few predicted Thunderbolts to bring down.
Exploders
Substitute protects your Pokémon from dying against these, but they are wonderful for escaping a trap, and really threatening if you don't have a Substitute. In combination with Spikes, status and / or Sand Stream, Explosion can force Wish Vaporeon or maybe Umbreon to get on low HP, making it really difficult to keep everything healthy. Scizor can make their life difficult.
Perish Song
As mentioned before, they force you to switch out or die. If you're Ingrained, you cannot escape Perish Song death without Baton Passing to Mr. Mime BEFORE it's used.
Belly Drum
An instant killer move from Charizard or Linoone can spell death. Surf Vaporeon can handle both to an extent, but sometimes you will have to sacrifice. Really deadly, but also really rare.
Psych Up
Regice, for example, hits really hard if it steals your boosts. Medicham as a recipient can kill it off, but is 2HKOed by Ice Beam. Mr. Mime with Trickband or Encore can halt this, as long as you BP straight to Mr. Mime when Regice comes out, so you can Encore the Psych Up. Tricking Thunderbolt still spells doom, lots of Baton Passers are weak to Thunderbolt.
Other Baton Passers
Things like Ninjask passing to Marowak that are built to hit hard really quickly as opposed to the usual Baton Pass chains which slowly work towards the recipient's invulnerability. Those are big threats and good reasons to max Ninjask's Speed or to put Surf on Vaporeon.
Choice Banded Fighters
Against a lot of Baton Passers, you are free to Focus Punch at will as they cannot attack you. Without defense boosts even the 4x resistant Ninjask falls for it eventually, though Hidden Power Flying will scare Heracross and Medicham to death. Acid Armor / Charm Vaporeon cannot stand up to this.
Smeargle Death
Smeargle is the most vulnerable Pokémon in a Baton Pass chain. If he doesn't have that precious Speed Boost he can be trapped by Dugtrio, and OHKOed if he doesn't have defense boosts yet. Substitutes can surprise him and block Spore, and if he Ingrains at the wrong time he is up for a lot of pain. Mach Punch, Extremespeed, Fake Out and Quick Attack spell his doom as well sometimes. You should be really careful when using Smeargle.
Tauros / Dodrio lead
Without Scizor or Mawile, a Choice Banded Return / Double-Edge is going to hurt badly, even on Vaporeon and Umbreon.
If anything in the Baton Pass chain dies, you should take your chances and sweep your opponent before he renews his set-up. The longer you take, the more boosts the chain gathers. If you don't give them a chance to put up a Substitute, you can repeatedly hit them until you get a Critical Hit.
Trick Band
Trick works its magic through Substitute ("thanks GameFreak"), so if Alakazam or Mr. Mime manage to Trick a Choice Band onto anything your opponent 100% needs for success, most notably Ninjask or Smeargle, you will have rendered the chain effectively useless. Even if you Trick Band something like Umbreon or Scizor, it is remarkably easy for your opponent to forget that one of his Pokémon has been Trick Banded after a few turns have passed. It is an automatic loss if they don't Baton Pass right away if they Baton Pass it in again to take a hit (or if they've forgotten it is holding a Choice Band and not Leftovers). If your opponent has a Trick Mime of his own and is smart, however, he can see this strategy coming a mile away and nullify it the first time, though he will eventually have to have something permanently take the Choice Band, especially if he needs his Mime's services for the success of his chain.
Final Words
Baton Pass teams are dangerous. They can pop up anywhere and really make your life sour, because a 100% counter to them doesn't exist, not even the above "counters". Contrary to popular belief, Haze, Roar, Perish Song and Whirlwind are not enough to scare them. However, the advantage against Baton Pass teams is that they have no offense early on, and that one surprise at the right time can totally mess them up. If someone is building up +6 across the board, you may as well forfeit though. On the plus side, if you see a team on Netbattle in the 50-60% Team Power range in a serious battle, you can almost guarantee it's going to be a Baton Pass team.
Introduction
The move Baton Pass has been around in Pokémon since the release of GSC, but really increased in usefulness in Advance for several reasons. More Pokémon learn it, more Pokémon learn stat-upper moves and more handy goodies have been handed to several Pokémon to decrease the difficulty of getting a boost in and getting out alive.
What Baton Pass is, how it works and you can dominate opponents with it will be analyzed in this guide.
The mechanics
Baton Pass is essentially a move that makes you switch out while keeping the effects the user has activated in play. Unlike switching, whether you go before or after your opponent is determined by speed, like with every other move. The possibilities of passing effects are nearly endless.
* Any regular stat upper move: Swords Dance, Agility, Calm Mind, Bulk Up, etc, but also stat changing side effects like Steel Wing increasing Defense, or Ancientpower boosting all stats.
* Substitute
Note: the passed Substitute will have the same HP as the Substitute / Baton Pass user, namely 1/4 of its max HP. When an attack lands on the Substitute, it uses the defenses of the Pokémon it's aimed at. So if Vaporeon creates a Substitute of 404 HP and Celebi uses Psychic on it, it will use Vaporeon's (for example) 240 Special Defense. However, when Vaporeon Baton Passes this 101 HP Substitute to Blissey, the attack will use Blissey's astronomical 360 Special Defense, while still using the same 101 HP Substitute to subtract the damage from.
* Negative stat changers like Intimidate and Screech
If Salamence switches in and Intimidates Celebi, and Celebi uses Calm Mind, followed by a Baton Pass, the receiver will have a boost in Special Attack and Special Defense due to Calm Mind, but a reduction in Attack due to Intimidate. The recipient having Clear Body, White Smoke, Hyper Cutter or such abilities does not help. The reductions of the use of Superpower (Attack and Defense drop), Overheat and Psycho Boost (both sharp Special Attack drop) as well as taking a lucky Shadow Ball or Crunch (Special Defense drop) are passed on as well.
* Invisible stat changes like confusion, attraction, Leech Seed and Ghost Curse.
If Lapras uses Swagger on Scizor for some reason, and Scizor then uses Baton Pass, the receiver will not only keep the sharp Attack boost, but also the Confusion status, unless this receiver has Own Tempo. Attract, however, will not pass on, even if the receiver and the Attractor have the same genders, or if the receiver has Oblivious. Visible status like Burn and Paralysis are not passed on in any way. The only exception to this rule is a glitch on NetBattle 9.6. If a Pokémon has been afflicted by the Toxic status, they keep their Toxic counter. So if Vaporeon is in for 4 turns while Toxiced, Baton Passes to another Pokémon, and then comes back in later from the same Baton Pass chain, it will take 5/16 damage, rather than 1/16. Leech Seed is passed on, even if the receiver is Grass-typed. In a similar way, Perish Count from Perish Song continues if you Baton Pass, even if the receiver has Soundproof.
* Ingrain
Baton Pass is the only way for a Pokémon in Advance to switch out if it has been Ingrained. The receiver will have the same curses and blessings as the Baton Passer: he will not be able to switch out without using Baton Pass by himself, however he will be immune to Roar / Whirlwind (not to Haze though) and he will regain 1/16 of his max HP at the end of every turn.
The effects of Charge are not passed. Trait changes via Trace, Skill Swap or Role Play are voided when you use Baton Pass. If you Baton Pass out while you are Choice Banded, the receiver does not have the effect of a Choice Band unless he has a Choice Band himself, and he won't be forced to use Baton Pass even if he has it. Reflect, Light Screen, Mist and Safeguard are passed automatically, even if you switch out or are Roared / Whirlwinded.
The strategic part
So, how is Baton Passing going to help you? The prime use is using one Pokémon to set up another on your team. The most common use for Baton Pass is to build a chain of Pokémon to Baton Pass to each other. The boosts are cumulative, everything can be passed on forever as long as nothing breaks the chain by dying or switching out without the aid of Baton Pass.
The following set-up is a standard one. If you're looking for a team that's very easy to use (after a few practice matches) and gets a big amount of wins and if you don't mind being yelled at, go ahead and steal it. Nearly every regular player has used this at least once.
1. Ninjask
2. Vaporeon
3. Scizor
4. Smeargle
5. Celebi
6. recipient
I will now analyze each of the 5 Baton Passers separately and list their standard moves, as well as discuss alternatives, and then give you some information on what to use as a recipient. However, you shouldn't really see it as a team in a certain order but as a chain, where every Pokémon contributes something. Like a circle of the first five, with the last Pokémon in the middle. First, the five Baton Passers will be analyzed.
When putting an alternative, you'll always want to keep Baton Pass (obviously), and keeping Substitute in there is strongly recommended to keep status in check, as well as removing the biggest threat in the game to Baton Pass teams: Critical Hits.
Ninjask
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Swords Dance
~ Hidden Power Flying
@ Leftovers
Ninjask is the starter of this chain nearly all the time. He passes on Speed extremely easily, simply by using Substitute about two or three times until everyone on your team is faster than your opponents. Everything with 264 Speed takes one Speed boost to beat everything standard, 198 takes two Speed boosts and 158 takes three. Swords Dance is for later, when the rest of the team has set up some defenses and Ingrain for Ninjask so he can start to tank and make Substitutes that take two hits to break. When that time has come you can alternate Substitute and Swords Dance to your heart's content. Ninjask's standard attacking move is Hidden Power Flying, this is your best bet to take on Heracross and Medicham. Because of your lack of attacking moves, these two with Focus Punch can be big nuisances that totally destroy your team. Despite his 4x resistance, Ninjask is not very keen on taking those hits and should get rid of these two as soon as possible. Hidden Power Flying should also shut down any opposing Ninjasks, which is why giving it max Speed and Attack is not a bad idea.
Alternatives: Protect makes it easier to get in Speed Boosts and stalls for more Leftovers / Ingrain recovery. Sand-Attacking your opponent can win you time. You either force them to switch out, or if they don't want to or cannot, they have a chance of missing every time you put up a Substitute, which everyone of your team can take advantage of. Hidden Power Rock gets rid of opposing Ninjask guaranteed as well as Charizard. You never see a Charizard, but when you see one, your team gets destroyed unless you can get in Vaporeon in time and Surf it, and this is providing you still have a nearly max health Surfing Vaporeon. Silver Wind or Hidden Power Bug is helpful for STAB and mostly for Celebi and Tyranitar. The latter is extremely annoying to deal with early on. Either you face a Dragon Dancing set with Substitute or Taunt, preventing you from statusing it, or you are battling Tyraniboah, who hits super-effective on every Baton Passer on your team, except Scizor. If your recipient cannot deal with Tyranitar well, this is a good option. Swords Dance is a replaceable move, as you can always have that on Scizor (or Belly Drum on Smeargle, or even Swords Dance on a Celebi / Mawile), but so is Hidden Power Flying.
EVs: If you want to beat other Ninjask to the punch, max Speed and Attack with Jolly to ensure the KO with Hidden Power Flying. Hidden Power Rock KOs too, but that lowers your Speed DV. If you want to play it safe just switch (not Baton Pass) out of them to Vaporeon and play from there. If you do that you may as well max HP for more powerful substitutes, or empower defenses so they break less easily (bringing a HP and a defense closer to each other means you take less damage in percentages, making your Substitutes more sturdy, however putting EVs into HP empowers both defenses evenly). 397 Speed is the absolute minimum, if you're paranoid about Electrode use 420 or so, this will outspeed no-Speed-EVs Kingdra after Rain Dance (that's 412).
A good midway between above options is 88 HP / 252 Def / 108 Spd with Jolly nature, with Hidden Power Rock in the set. This ensures you will beat every enemy leading Ninjask that doesn't switch out. This spread allows you to survive any Hidden Power Flying from Jolly Ninjask, while you will outspeed any Adamant ones. Hidden Power Rock allows you to OHKO them. You have 60 leftover EVs in this spread to put wherever you want.
Smeargle
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Ingrain
~ Spore
@ Lum Berry / Salac Berry / Leftovers
Smeargle is the ONLY thing in the game that can Baton Pass Ingrain, and trust me when I say Ingrain is a godsend. It makes your Pokémon immune to Whirlwind and Roar, eliminating the need for something like Magneton for Skarmory or overspecific Suicune / Weezing counters. In addition, it gives you 1/16 of your max health back after every turn: a secondary Leftovers. This helps a lot against Sandstream, or Burn / Poison status if you ever get them. Ingrain is essential for the success of your chain. To get in Smeargle, pass a Substitute to him that won't break against a slow Pokémon or on a switch by your opponent. Watch out for Dugtrio and enemies with Substitute; always play it safe if your opponent has these. All Smeargle should be relied upon for is Ingraining and getting the hell out. Spore can help in giving you a free turn, it will usually give even two if you Spore a slower Pokémon while you have a Substitute up.
Alternatives: Spider Web is the best one (as it has more PP than Block and Mean Look), but the only slot you may free up for it is Spore, or Substitute if you feel like being risky. If you remove Substitute and you do manage to pull off Spore + Spider Web, you're in the money. You can set up everything you want while the opponent is asleep as long as you are behind a Substitute, and if he wakes up just pass the Substitute to Smeargle and sleep him again. Smeargle can pass everything the other Pokémon can too, but he has too few moveslots already and everyone is a better Baton Passer than Smeargle when going by typing and stats. The only exception is Belly Drum, which nothing else can pass. It is a very risky bet sometimes, but also the quick way to win. Just pass Belly Drum to Salamence or Medicham and you have won. You don't really need a Baton Pass chain around Belly Drum Smeargle, though.
EVs: The obvious move would be max Speed and HP, as Smeargle doesn't even use his attacking stats and rarely should rely on his defenses. However, with 128 HP and 152 Special Defense EVs, you will always live through a Modest max Special Attack Zapdos Thunderbolt, which is the most powerful common unboosted Special Attack in the standard metagame. This knowledge will help you against other things like Starmie as well. You will still have 267 Speed with Jolly and the rest of your EVs in Speed, so you'll outspeed Aerodactyl and Jolteon after one Speed Boost or Salac Berry. This is merely an alternative spread, nothing is wrong with max HP and Speed. You can optionally stick to 56 Speed EVs and rely on two Speed Boosts as well, though Smeargle is so fragile this may not be the best idea.
Vaporeon
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Acid Armor
~ Wish
@ Leftovers
If you're not using Scizor but something like Umbreon, you will need this thing a lot, as she's your main bet against physical attackers and Fire-types. Generally, if you are met up with a Snorlax, Salamence or something on your Ninjask, get three Speed Boosts to make sure Vaporeon is faster than anything, and get either Scizor or Vaporeon in to outpace their physical stat boosting with your additional Defense. If you smell status or your opponent is doing less than 25% damage, always use Substitute before doing anything else � this prevents you from getting screwed up by a Critical Hit. This goes for every single of your Pokémon. Use Vaporeon to keep the other Pokémon's health high with Wish, but of course her own health has to stay high as well.
Alternatives: Charm and Acid Armor together shut down physical opponents 100%. Charm makes opponents switch, which means free turns for you. It's really handy against Curselax. Protect works with Wish, but is rather overkill with Substitute. Surf is a 2HKO on Tyranitar, OHKO if you're pumped with Calm Minds. Sand-Attack helps, but you're better off relying on tanking than on dodging. Roar works against other Baton Passing chains (though you will be annoyed by Mr. Mime and Ingrain Smeargle once they catch on), but of course it's not a good idea to Roar away Pokémon that you have trapped using Smeargle or Umbreon. Roar also stops Curselax from setting up on you as well as Charm does. Ice Beam is for Salamence and Flygon which can be very annoying to take care of, whether they have Choice Band or not. Vaporeon needs all the moves suggested, though: Substitute and Baton Pass are obligatory. Wish is extremely useful if you're not using another Wisher (and the best one is Umbreon, which is not in the standard line-up). Acid Armor would be the most replaceable one since Scizor can have Iron Defense, but still you'll miss that when you don't have it, or something like Choice Band or Dragon Dance Salamence with Flamethrower with murder you.
EVs: Max Defense with Bold makes it very easy to set up Acid Armor in combination with the high HP. Maxing HP isn't a bad idea as that gives you really big Substitutes to pass around in the team. You need 128 Speed EVs to outspeed Aerodactyl and Jolteon after two Speed Boosts, which isn't worth it as you can just go for three. If you insist you should add 4 more EVs, as this gives you the ability to outspeed 100 base Speed Pokémon after one Speed Boost (300 Speed after the pass). You will find Special Attack EVs mostly useless. Tyranitar will always be 2HKOed by Surf from Vaporeon's minimum of 256 Special Attack, unless Tyranitar has nearly max HP and Special Defense, which means it doesn't hurt you. For a guaranteed OHKO on Tyranitar (max HP, no Special Defense EVs) with Surf you'll need 463 Special Attack. To get that after one Calm Mind, you'll need to start with 308 Special Attack, which you need 208 Special Attack EVs for (no need for Modest). Surf after two Calm Minds will always OHKO Tyranitar. If you use Ice Beam, putting 80 Special Attack EVs to make 276 isn't a bad idea as this is a guaranteed OHKO on 369 HP, no Special Defense Salamence.
Scizor
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Iron Defense
~ Hidden Power Bug
@ Leftovers
Without Scizor, you wouldn't stand a chance against a leading Tauros or Dodrio. It's the only Normal-resisting Baton Passer besides Mawile, and takes other physical hits quite well too. Together with Vaporeon they should protect you against Snorlax and Salamence (beware Fire Blast!) and several other dangerous Pokémon. Scizor can also take care of Tyranitar to an extent with Hidden Power Bug � an OHKO when he gets in Swarm range or when you have a Swords Dance under your belt, a 2HKO otherwise.
Alternatives: Swords Dance is an obvious choice, Scizor is easier to set up than Ninjask when you don't have all your defenses set up, and he can use it himself too. He gets Agility as well, but that's something Ninjask already provides. Light Screen can protect your Special Defense if you don't have Calm Minds but isn't really worth using a moveslot for. Steel Wing and Silver Wind are alternative attacks � less power than Hidden Power Bug (or even Steel), but the side-effect may save you someday. If you have to rely on it, however, you have made an error somewhere. When replacing something, obviously take out Hidden Power Bug when putting a new Attacking move. Vaporeon's Acid Armor may seem you to urge you to take out Iron Defense, but this is the only thing between you and a Tauros sweep, unless you can kill Tauros.
EVs: Max out HP, and put 128 or 132 EVs in Speed depending on whether you have a Hidden Power that requires a 30 Speed DV or not, to hit 198. This means you outspeed Jolteon and Aerodactyl after 2 Speed Boosts or one Agility. However, you may choose to use 136 or 140 to hit 200, so you outspeed 100 base Pokémon without a +Speed nature after one Speed Boost. Stack your Defense with the rest, and use Impish. Alternately, you can absolutely no Speed EVs whatsoever, as with 3 boosts, you are faster than everything, much like with Vaporeon. This allows you to max HP, and boost your defenses more.
Celebi
~ Baton Pass
~ Substitute
~ Calm Mind
~ Recover
@ Leftovers
Celebi contributes Calm Mind as well as pretty high HP Substitutes. Calm Mind should be here, even if you have a physical recipient, because the Special Defense boost keeps your Substitutes (or actually your Pokémon) from being broken by Special attackers like Raikou and Zapdos. There really isn't much else to add to it. Celebi is an extremely good Baton Passer thanks to sturdy defenses, Natural Cure and Recover, which makes it less reliant on Wish and Substitute, giving Vaporeon some breathing room.
Alternatives: Celebi is pretty flexible. You can of course put Psychic or a Grass move like Giga Drain or Hidden Power Grass on it to make use of Calm Mind. Psychic would help against Heracross and other Fighters (Focus Punching ones really hurt) as well as Taunt Gyarados to an extent, and a Grass move protects against Tyranitar and also Dugtrio to an extent. Psychic will especially help against Weezing, who if not Spored, will be extremely difficult to beat otherwise, considering it carries Haze and a STAB Sludge Bomb that will be Celebi's bane when the Acid Armors / Iron Defenses are Hazed away. Besides Celebi's / Mr. Mime's Psychic and / or a premature reliance upon your recipient's attacks, Vaporeon's Surf is the only actual attack on a Baton Pass team that threatens Weezing, who laughs at Scizor's Hidden Power Bug and Ninjask's Hidden Power Flying. Celebi can also Baton Pass Swords Dance, but since you have Ninjask and Scizor for that you won't really need that, plus Celebi is much more limited to physical attacking options. You can use Heal Bell in case one of your other Pokémon gets statused or Reflect / Light Screen to throw up a temporary barrier before you get enough Acid Armors / Iron Defenses / Calm Minds in, but Substitute and smart play are much better ways to get around these problems.
EVs: Max out HP for the best Substitutes, and put 264 Speed (112 EVs). You can also just neglect Speed and get 2 Speed Boosts beforehand to outspeed anything (Celebi's minimum 236 Speed is more than enough for that). Build up either Special Defense or Defense with what you have left, preferably Special Defense to tank better with Calm Mind.
Your recipient
There's a couple of good recipients in the game, but the following are considered the best of the best. Your best bet is something that can kill everything in the game with high accuracy, preferably in one hit. Lum Berry on them isn't a bad idea so you can switch them in on a Thunder Wave or something, but Leftovers saves them against Sand Stream. You should have Ingrain and Substitute up though, but these are just-in-case scenarios. The best candidate for this is Medicham.
Medicham
~ Baton Pass / Substitute
~ Brick Break
~ Shadow Ball
~ Return
@ Lum Berry / Leftovers
Absolutely nothing can take on this Medicham with +6 Attack and +1 Speed, except maybe a series of Quick Attack Pokémon, which is what Defense boosts are for. Medicham doesn't need to be Calm Minded to the max, and he can be brought in on Tyranitar (if you're faster and have a Substitute up and he doesn't have one, of course) to kill it before Baton Passing out again. This is more useful when Tyranitar is trapped, but sometimes you have no choice. Every single of his attacking moves are 100% accuracy and they hit everything in the game. Even Skarmory is OHKOed by Brick Break. The only thing that survives both Brick Break and Shadow Ball in standard play is Weezing (well, and Muk sometimes), who is OHKOed by Return. Besides his fragility, Medicham is the best recipient you can wish. Baton Pass is generally the most useful move, as it allows Medicham to come in on problem Pokémon (Tyranitar) before you are through boosting, and scare them off / kill them before they destroy your team, and then Baton Pass out to finish boosting up.
EVs: Max Attack and Speed with Jolly, no questions asked.
Zapdos
~ Thunderbolt
~ Hidden Power Grass
~ Baton Pass
~ Drill Peck / Roar / Substitute
@ Lum Berry / Leftovers
Zapdos isn't bad either. Like Medicham he can Baton Pass out so you don't have to save him for the end. Zapdos can take a few Tyraniboah hits unlike most BP chain Pokémon, and he takes on Gyarados with ease, a huge plus. Drill Peck needs some Attack EVs to guarantee an OHKO on Blissey, Snorlax and Regice (think of a stat between 250 and 300), which may or may not be worth it - Thunderbolt from +6 Special Attack is going to 2HKO them anyway, so go ahead and use another filler. Roar can beat other stat-uppers and Substitute protects you from status (like Snorlax Body Slam or Blissey Thunder Wave). Zapdos isn't as fragile as Medicham, but doesn't have as much instant power, and does give you another nasty Rock weakness.
EVs: You need 290 Attack (192 EVs + nature) to OHKO 500 HP/200 Defense Snorlax 100% of the time (with 6 Attack boosts obviously), which is a little too much. I'd settle with 270 Attack at max (216 EVs without nature) to guarantee the OHKO on max HP max Defense Blissey, but less is acceptable. 264 Speed makes you outspeed everything even if you only have one Speed Boost, if you don't put any EVs you'll need 2 Speed Boosts, even if you use a -Speed nature. 297 is an option for outspeeding Heracross but it costs a lot of EVs. Stack Special Attack with your leftover EVs, or work on HP and defenses to take on threats such as Tyranitar better. If you're not working on defenses, use a -Defense or -Special Defense nature. If you're not stacking Speed to 264, use a -Speed one.
Salamence
~ Flamethrower
~ Dragon Claw
~ Hidden Power (Flying)
~ Earthquake / Roar / Substitute
@ Lum Berry / Leftovers
You will probably get the most mileage out of Earthquake in the last slot, even if Pokémon like Aggron, Muk and Arcanine aren't exactly huge metagame threats. Otherwise, nothing survives the first three offered attacking moves once fully powered up, and Intimidate can be very handy. Like Zapdos, Salamence can Roar out enemy Baton Passers, gives a Rock weakness, and needs to rely on mixed attacking. The lack of Baton Pass is really what kills him for the best recipient award, but he's a solid choice, and helps the Fighting weakness.
EVs: For Speed, same as with Zapdos: use 264, 297, or just don't put any EVs at all and use -Speed. Max out Special Attack and put the rest in Attack.
In theory you can use almost anything, even Nidoking or freaking Aipom to sweep your opponents with, because fully boosted Pokémon are nearly impossible to stop. However, when fighting for a tournament and you must use a Baton Pass team, might as well use the best of the best.
Alternative Baton Passers
Now, the above chain isn't the only Baton Passing chain. There are a LOT of other possibilities; I'll list some of the best.
Zapdos
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Agility
~ Thunderbolt
@ Leftovers
If Zapdos isn't your recipient, it can be your Baton Passer. Ninjask is a very frail Pokémon, and Zapdos can at least take care of Weezing, Skarmory and Suicune, so this is an acceptable solution. Very easy to set up and pass with, but you'll have to put an Attack booster somewhere else.
Alternatives: Hidden Power Grass or Ice can mess up Grounds, Thunder Wave helps the set-up but blocks your own Spore Smeargle, and Drill Peck kills Heracross. Then again you don't really have room for anything.
EVs: Doesn't necessarily need any Speed EVs, but 244 Speed can be nice to beat all Tyranitar. Max out HP for Substitute, and put the rest in your defenses. Thunderbolt should hurt the phazers decently enough.
Mawile
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Iron Defense / Swords Dance
~ Taunt
@ Leftovers
Scizor's little sister, she trades a lot of good stats and attacking potential for a Flying resistance, Taunt (!) and Intimidate. Not bad per se, but much more vulnerable than Scizor, thanks to the lower Special Defense and weakness to Earthquake. Pick which stat booster you need. Like with Scizor, Iron Defense helps a lot against Normal-types, but Swords Dance is good if you don't have a Swords Dancing Ninjask or something else that boosts Attack.
Alternatives: Substitute AND Taunt may seem a little overkill, so you may want both Iron Defense and Swords Dance. You can attack with a random physical Hidden Power, like STAB Hidden Power Steel for Tyranitar. Sing can win you a turn but is unreliable, and you won't need it with Spore on Smeargle. Tickle can be fun to toy with, and it goes through Substitute, which can be handy against something like Tyraniboah.
EVs: Max HP always. Mawile can reach 198 Speed, but you need 248 Speed EVs for it. To realize her tanking potential, you can stick with 158 Speed, which is more than enough as you can just get 3 Speed Boosts and outspeed Aerodactyl and Jolteon that way. Put what you have left in Defense and go for Impish.
Umbreon
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Wish
~ Mean Look
@ Leftovers
This thing used to be standard on Baton Pass chains. Very good defenses allow it to sop up some hits, and it can do a lot of things Vaporeon can do too, like Wish and Charm. The main selling point is Mean Look. The only other Trappassers are Ariados and Smeargle, where the former blows and the latter has other things to do. A trapped opponent is much more predictable and easier to stall out. Umbreon isn't a bad choice if you have a leftover slot.
Alternatives: As said Umbreon is a bit like Vaporeon, but it doesn't get Acid Armor, Roar, Ice Beam or Surf. Don't bother attacking with it, stick with Charm, Sand-Attack or Taunt. Taunt stops stat-uppers and Substitute to an extent if you're faster, as well as status and Ingrain, but you may find it overkill with Substitute and Ingrain at your disposal. Wish is expendable if you already have it on Vaporeon.
EVs: Max HP, as you might have guessed. Put the defenses how you like it, you won't need any Speed (going to 198 with 128 EVs is optional but not worth it). 252/128/128 HP/Defense/Special Defense isn't a bad idea really. Calm / Careful boosts Umbreon's higher defense stat.
Jolteon
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Agility
~ Thunderbolt
@ Leftovers
Basically this is Zapdos without the awesome typing and great stat balance, more Speed, Volt Absorb and some cool other options. It counters other Electrics to an extent which is always nice.
Alternatives: Like Zapdos it can Roar out other Baton Pass chains, and like the other Eeveelutions it can Charm, Sand-Attack and Wish. The defensive Eevees are better at those though.
EVs: 374 Speed minimum for beating Alakazam, Sceptile and Dugtrio, 384 if you fear Swellow. Max out HP and put the rest in Special Defense for taking Hidden Powers better; you won't need Special Attack.
Mr. Mime
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Encore
~ Calm Mind
@ Leftovers
Like Umbreon, Mr. Mime used to be a bog standard on Baton Pass chains. Mr. Mime has some wonderful abilities but extremely lame HP and Defense, unlike Celebi, who can take a load of hits and Recover them off. Mr. Mime's Soundproof allows it to come in on Suicune Roar, perhaps Encore it and Calm Mind up in its face. Try to get Ingrain up sooner or later though because your other Pokémon are not Soundproof. Soundproof also helps against Perish Singers, but if they Perish Song against another Pokémon and you Baton Pass to Mr. Mime it won't go away. If you're Ingrained and someone Perish Songs on you, you will lose a Pokémon no matter what. Encore is a great tool, especially if you trap the opponent. It's one of the few things Baton Pass chains can do against Raikou.
Alternatives: Mr. Mime gets a LOT of handy stuff. Barrier is there for obvious reasons, Taunt helps against Whirlwinders, Thunderbolt and Psychic make use of Calm Mind and can hurt phazers and Fighters respectively. Trick + Choice Band is a long-term but much riskier Encore. If you trap something and Trickband it into a not-too-dangerous move it's game over for them. Really helps against Haze Weezing. Hypnosis puts something to Sleep, but like with Sing Mawile, why would you when you have Spore Smeargle? You can contribute with Meditate but you have 3 better Swords Dancers at your disposal. There are of course the screens, but I outlined at Celebi's section why they are somewhat redundant.
EVs: Max out his horrible HP to gain more overall coverage. 264 Speed and the rest in Special Defense with Calm is probably your best bet.
Gorebyss / Huntail
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Iron Defense
~ Amnesia
@ Leftovers
Basically a mini-Vaporeon with the possibility to pass Agility or Amnesia. They aren't to good as Pokémon themselves, but if you have a physical recipient you may as well use Amnesia, though Calm Mind Mr. Mime and Celebi do a better job at standing up to Electrics. Their low HP and Special Defense really keeps them from being on Baton Pass teams.
Alternatives: As said, these two can use Agility, and of course you can use Surf / Ice Beam (use Gorebyss if you're doing so, she's got better Special Attack). Huntail can also go physical if you must, but there's no good options available aside of generic Hidden Power or Return.
EVs: Like with about anything, max HP. To spare EVs you can use the 158 Speed stat, but that means you won't outspeed everything after Agility or 2 Speed Boosts, which is crucial for Pokémon with Agility. It takes nearly the maximum to get them to the 198 threshold. Put your leftover EVs in Defense, and use Bold (or Impish if you're using Huntail with physical attacks).
Espeon
~ Substitute
~ Baton Pass
~ Calm Mind
~ Psychic
@ Leftovers
Known as EspyJump. The fastest Calm Mind passer, if you ever need one. Sadly Espeon doesn't outspeed max Speed Raikou, which would be the main reason to use her over Celebi or Mr. Mime (besides the 130 Special Attack). Not a bad Special tank, but usually you're better off with Celebi or Mr. Mime, given she has neither that Earthquake / Surf / Thunderbolt resistance with Recover and Natural Cure, nor Soundproof and an impressive movepool.
Alternatives: Sand-Attack, like on Jolteon and Ninjask, can be used in combination with Substitute to scout for a miss. Charm is better on Vaporeon / Umbreon, but it's there. Same for Wish. The screens deserve a mention, but not more than that. These would go over Psychic if anything, but sadly you'll be wasting 130 Special Attack.
EVs: Max HP and a lot of Special Defense should do the trick. About 301 or 332 Speed is plenty, especially considering you'll be Speed boosting. Calm nature.
Every other Pokémon with Baton Pass is UU and nearly unusable, except Medicham which is just too good as a recipient to pass up, sorry for the pun. Pick your team accordingly, with the goal to get all boosts you need and covering the problems.
The question is, which problems? What beats a well-played Baton Pass team?
Counters
Baton Pass teams are nearly unbeatable. You need insane luck, overspecific counters, or an error by your opponent. Some things that have a shot:
phazers
These are on nearly every team, and can make it a little harder to get the chain going. However, after Ingrain is in these are worthless. The most dangerous phazer is one that actually OHKOs Smeargle. A good example would be Roar Aggron. It can Focus Punch Smeargle, and Substitute to block Spore, and Roar out everything else. You'll never see it, but when I did, I did have a really difficult time. Remember that Mr. Mime can block Roar, but he is really fragile on the physical side as well. Raikou or Zapdos with Roar can be very annoying as well, Encore Mr. Mime should help but he takes surprisingly few predicted Thunderbolts to bring down.
Exploders
Substitute protects your Pokémon from dying against these, but they are wonderful for escaping a trap, and really threatening if you don't have a Substitute. In combination with Spikes, status and / or Sand Stream, Explosion can force Wish Vaporeon or maybe Umbreon to get on low HP, making it really difficult to keep everything healthy. Scizor can make their life difficult.
Perish Song
As mentioned before, they force you to switch out or die. If you're Ingrained, you cannot escape Perish Song death without Baton Passing to Mr. Mime BEFORE it's used.
Belly Drum
An instant killer move from Charizard or Linoone can spell death. Surf Vaporeon can handle both to an extent, but sometimes you will have to sacrifice. Really deadly, but also really rare.
Psych Up
Regice, for example, hits really hard if it steals your boosts. Medicham as a recipient can kill it off, but is 2HKOed by Ice Beam. Mr. Mime with Trickband or Encore can halt this, as long as you BP straight to Mr. Mime when Regice comes out, so you can Encore the Psych Up. Tricking Thunderbolt still spells doom, lots of Baton Passers are weak to Thunderbolt.
Other Baton Passers
Things like Ninjask passing to Marowak that are built to hit hard really quickly as opposed to the usual Baton Pass chains which slowly work towards the recipient's invulnerability. Those are big threats and good reasons to max Ninjask's Speed or to put Surf on Vaporeon.
Choice Banded Fighters
Against a lot of Baton Passers, you are free to Focus Punch at will as they cannot attack you. Without defense boosts even the 4x resistant Ninjask falls for it eventually, though Hidden Power Flying will scare Heracross and Medicham to death. Acid Armor / Charm Vaporeon cannot stand up to this.
Smeargle Death
Smeargle is the most vulnerable Pokémon in a Baton Pass chain. If he doesn't have that precious Speed Boost he can be trapped by Dugtrio, and OHKOed if he doesn't have defense boosts yet. Substitutes can surprise him and block Spore, and if he Ingrains at the wrong time he is up for a lot of pain. Mach Punch, Extremespeed, Fake Out and Quick Attack spell his doom as well sometimes. You should be really careful when using Smeargle.
Tauros / Dodrio lead
Without Scizor or Mawile, a Choice Banded Return / Double-Edge is going to hurt badly, even on Vaporeon and Umbreon.
If anything in the Baton Pass chain dies, you should take your chances and sweep your opponent before he renews his set-up. The longer you take, the more boosts the chain gathers. If you don't give them a chance to put up a Substitute, you can repeatedly hit them until you get a Critical Hit.
Trick Band
Trick works its magic through Substitute ("thanks GameFreak"), so if Alakazam or Mr. Mime manage to Trick a Choice Band onto anything your opponent 100% needs for success, most notably Ninjask or Smeargle, you will have rendered the chain effectively useless. Even if you Trick Band something like Umbreon or Scizor, it is remarkably easy for your opponent to forget that one of his Pokémon has been Trick Banded after a few turns have passed. It is an automatic loss if they don't Baton Pass right away if they Baton Pass it in again to take a hit (or if they've forgotten it is holding a Choice Band and not Leftovers). If your opponent has a Trick Mime of his own and is smart, however, he can see this strategy coming a mile away and nullify it the first time, though he will eventually have to have something permanently take the Choice Band, especially if he needs his Mime's services for the success of his chain.
Final Words
Baton Pass teams are dangerous. They can pop up anywhere and really make your life sour, because a 100% counter to them doesn't exist, not even the above "counters". Contrary to popular belief, Haze, Roar, Perish Song and Whirlwind are not enough to scare them. However, the advantage against Baton Pass teams is that they have no offense early on, and that one surprise at the right time can totally mess them up. If someone is building up +6 across the board, you may as well forfeit though. On the plus side, if you see a team on Netbattle in the 50-60% Team Power range in a serious battle, you can almost guarantee it's going to be a Baton Pass team.
