Getting some theorymon down on Cloyster/Gliscor/Greninja. I finished breeding and training the team:
Cloyster @ Focus Sash
Ability: Skill Link
Nature: Naughty
EVs: 252 Atk, 244 Spe, 12 SAtk
-Icicle Spear
-Rock Blast
-Surf
-Shell Smash
I prefer Naughty with Surf to Razor Shell for two reasons, even with the base power nerf in XY and Greninja's presence on the team:
- Accuracy - 95% is never worth the risk if there is a 100% accurate alternative.
- Making contact - Fire types (the primary target for a Water STAB) now have more Flame Body in the Maison, so disposing of them with a non-contact move is very important.
This Cloyster is a random shiny that hatched while I was breeding for a 6IV Shellder. It has an imperfect SDef IV of 16; I bred for a long time, longer than I did for previous 6IVs/HP Waters - luck was not on my side here, and then a shiny hatched with just SDef missing, which was enough incentive for me to call it off and settle for an imperfect-SDef Cloyster. Hopefully, it won't cost me.
Cutting Speed by a grand total of 1 was the most I could do, as Volcarona sits right at 120 and can't be counted out with Rock Blast's inaccuracy and Hurricane confusion hax.
Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
Nature: Jolly
EVs: 212 HP, 220 Spe, 76 SDef
-Earthquake
-Toxic
-Substitute
-Protect
Speed cut to 157, as tying with 161 is actively bad and prevents you from stalling them reliably, and the things in 160-158 are food for Greninja and doesn't have anything threatening in it. 177 HP; the rest are dumped into SDef, as it will often want to switch into Special attacks aimed at Cloyster to stall out some PP to allow Cloyster guaranteed set-up to +6.
Looking at 160-158 again, the exact things there are Pyroar4 (Hyper Voice) which Gliscor has no business being out against or switching into, and Krookodile, which has so much attacking PP that it is not possible to stall out of it. Accordingly, nothing of value is lost with the cut.
Greninja @ Life Orb
Ability: Protean
Nature: Timid
EVs: 252 SAtk, 252 Spe, 4 HP
-Ice Beam
-Grass Knot
-Dark Pulse
-Scald
This Greninja is not speed cut like the previous Singles one, since on that team the 185-188 Pokémon were set-up fodder for Aegislash/Dragonite; this is not the case here, so max Speed is preferred. The Doubles 1-speed cut is possible, but I didn't have any spare Greninja on hand with that spread and it was already taken by the Triples team, so an uncut one will have to do.
The instant comparison point is Peterko's Cloyster/Garchomp/Suicune Subway team, the most succesful Cloyster team to date.
What Gliscor can do here in the Suicune position is stall out attacking moves on a lot of things it can safely switch on - then after they've been stalled out, Cloyster can be switched in to get to +6 with an intact Focus Sash. This should be the first strategy to consider, and used whenever applicable for a nearly guaranteed win - when it works, it's even stronger than Cloyster set up by Durant, since this Cloyster can use Surf.
What Gliscor can't do is handle Water types, especially Greninja/Starmie and the like, which is why Greninja is in the Garchomp position. Assorted theorymon for miscallenous speculative threats follows:
- Starmie4: the plan is to switch in Gliscor on Thunderbolt, and then switch Greninja on Ice Beam and KO it with Dark Pulse. If there's a freeze, that's bad - but even if it happens, you still get Scald damage on Starmie, which will put it in KO range for +2 Icicle Spear, and there's still a chance to Shell Smash on it afterwards - barring paralysis/flinch on top of a freeze, of course. So Starmie will need two instances of hax on its side to guarantee a loss, which is not great, but it should be manageable.
- Greninja4: Greninja can switch in and KO with LO Grass Knot.
- Volcarona4: Rock Blast is an OHKO. If it fails due to missing or Hurricane confusion, hoping it Quiver Dances on Gliscor instead of going for a kill is a possible get-out-of-jail-free card.
- Vaporeon: Vaporeon4 is food for Gliscor after it switches in on Shadow Ball, but Vaporeon1 (Quick Claw) can be a menace. It should be possible to tell the set apart with Protect after switching in Gliscor (other Vaporeon sets will use an Ice attack while Vaporeon1 will use Surf), but you must keep an eye for it.
- Fake Out users: Gliscor should be able to switch in on all of them. Greninja will need to come in afterwards for Jynx, risking a freeze.
- Taunt users: Gliscor and Greninja both destroy Crobat. Cloyster assumes Taunt and uses Rock Blast to KO before smashing - even if it misses, Greninja needs fifty turns to kill it. Toxicroak is Gliscor bait. Tornadus4 is KO'd by Icicle Spear if it happens to use Taunt.
- Confuse Ray: my impression is that Gliscor should do pretty well against most of the users, but I'm not sure.
- Will-O-Wisp: Greninja beats all of its users.
- Thunder Wave & Electric attacks: Gliscor should handle them, stall them out, and then allow Cloyster the honor.
- Trick Room: Everything bar Slowking/Slowbro is Gliscor bait; Greninja OHKOs Slowbro (though TR will probably go up), Icicle Spear on Turn 1 + Dark Pulse after switch has a high chance to KO Slowking but, TR will still stay up. If both of them show up at once or an Aromatisse/Druddigon situatuon occurs, it might get rough, but if Greninja falls, Protect and switches should be enough to stall TR out to allow Gliscor to begin stalling.
- Anything slower than Gliscor/Electric attackers: AI, meet Substitute-Protect; run out of attacking PP; get Cloyster to +6 with an intact Sash if possible.
I'm feeling pretty good about this one, and will start playing soon, but I'm especially interested in whether my impressions of Gliscor are on the mark. It'd be a shame to lose because of trying to get too greedy with stalling PP, which I will want to do often, so if there's anything you guys can think of, I'm all ears. Especially
VaporeonIce, since you had that crazy 500+ win streak with Gliscor in Singles (which you should submit for the leaderboard even though it doesn't beat your existing records, because it is seriously amazing.)
What I'm not clear on is what moves you're planning to set Cloyster up against. Here's a subset of Pokemon (starting from #800 on the list):
Altaria 4: Can set up on Cotton Guard (assuming it doesn't spam that instead of Sing; I don't think it will use Dream Eater on a non-sleeping Pokemon)
Toxicroak 4: Taunt, can't set up
Gothitelle 4: Substitute/Psych Up? Again, only works if it runs out of Flatter PP first.
Reuniclus 4 (Magic Guard): Recover, but only if it uses up Trick PP first (which I doubt it will, but it might)
Bisharp 4: Taunt, can't set up
Abomasnow 4: Set up on Ice Shard/Protect once it uses up the PP of its other moves (but it may not use Focus Blast on Gliscor)
Nidoqueen 4: Has four attacking moves
Nidoking 4: Has Protect, but it will use that up before its attacking PP
Cradily 4: You can definitely set up on this, because it's laughably bad and is set-up bait for everything.
Armaldo 4: Choice Band Struggle? I wouldn't try it; with Choice Band + Defense drops, it could take Cloyster out
Rampardos 4: Nope
Bastiodon 4: I don't think this will use its attacking PP very quickly; it likes Metal Burst a lot
Floatzel 4: Aqua Jet, I guess
Mismagius 4: Nope
Carracosta 4: Will use up Water PP on Gliscor, so you can't set up on it.
Escavalier 4: Nope; Swagger messes you up
Accelgor 4: Encore and Protect. I guess you can stall out ALL of its PP for Struggle, but with Bug Buzz SpDef drops, it probably won't work
Zebstrika 4: Switches out of Gliscor
Drifblim 4: Will save its Hypnosis and T-Bolt PP
Seismitoad 4: It will save its Dig PP; you can set up, but you'll take heavy damage.
Poliwrath 4: Four attacking moves, and Circle Throw you out.
Rapidash 4: Will use Protect PP before running out of attacking PP
Muk 4: Boom!
Obviously, setting up Cloyster wouldn't be your strategy against all of these Pokemon. My point is, most Pokemon don't have a handful of attacking moves, plus a fourth move that says "do nothing." If you're lucky, they'll have Rest+Sleep Talk, which lets you set up (the first thing that came to mind is Walrein, but you don't want to actually risk switching Gliscor in against it), and Curse+Rest is another easy target. But those are few and far between; generally, the non-attacking moves will be status moves or something else that can mess you up. And for Pokemon with more than one non-attacking move, they usually won't waste the PP of the one you want them to (such as Gothitelle's Flatter) against Gliscor for a free Cloyster set-up.
Gliscor is awesome at stalling, but it only has 32 PP to do so. Against most Pokemon (like the aforementioned T-Wave users), that isn't anywhere near enough; you'll be forced to Toxic or start attacking (though you can stall Flying/Levitate Pokemon some more with EQ, assuming they're not breaking your Sub). Your best case scenario for a Cloyster set up will usually be setting up on a Pokemon that's locked into Struggle, but very few Pokemon have 32 PP or less, so you'll usually be stuck doing that against opponents with Choice items. I would focus on having Gliscor kill things, which it's actually quite good at. There's usually only one move it REALLY needs to stall out (sometimes there are two), and after that, it can get off a free Toxic for a (gradual) KO. Watch out for stuff like Yanmega (especially Speed Boost), who I think will randomly use Air Slash against Cloyster sometimes and can mess you up a bit with Bug Buzz SpDef drops.
Speaking of Choice item users, watch out for Trick. Alakazam is particularly tough, since it might use Trick and it might use Focus Blast. Gliscor likes Focus Blast, but hates Trick; Greninja doesn't mind Trick, but hates Focus Blast.
Froslass can be a problem, since Focus Sash Destiny Bond can kind of put Greninja in a "checkmate" position (switch to Gliscor and risk a random Ice move? Or stay in, attack, and die?), while a first turn Destiny Bond can KO Cloyster (and you risk a Rock Blast miss if you attack).
Good luck! I think this team can do well, but you'll need to do a lot of testing to find out the best strategy against a variety of different leads.
I'll post the Dragonite/Aegislash/Gliscor streak soon; I probably would have posted it earlier, but your own Singles streak discouraged me from doing so (after all, you used a different third Pokemon for Dragonite/Aegislash, and it clearly worked better than my choice). Nevertheless, I'm sure people will like to see Gliscor being
a hilarious bastard successful!
