UNOVA Rate My Team
Hello everyone, i've recently decided to pick up 5th gen OU and i've had some small success with a new team today, but it still needs your input to make it the best it can be :)
ps: not sure where to post this so correct me if i'm wrong... also this is my first RMT!
Okay, with that out of the way let’s start~
Team At A Glance:
Now with moving sprites, enjoy! The premise of the team is still the same, based on sandstorm and setting up for a doryuzu sweep.
Team Building Process:
Okay, so we've already got doryuzu, now we need sand, and there's only two viable pokemon for the job. I chose tyranitar mainly because of its offensive presence and at the same time can trap ghosts like burungeru and other pokemon like starmie and lati@s which can give this team problems.
Next, i needed team-mates that can take advantage of sand and help doryuzu sweep. This leads me to garchomp, which acts as a powerful revenge killer and makes a great partner with salamence by wearing down each other’s counters, namely skarmory.
We now turn to salamence, one of my favorite pokemon, who makes a great wallbreaker, firing off powerful base 140 draco meteors and intimidating physical threats. It makes a great switch in to most physical threats, though being stealth rock weak is a big setback. Although not one that it can't overcome;) with <strike>the right support</strike> rapid spin.
Scizor adds an extra layer of offensive and defensive prowess to this team, being able to gain momentum through U-Turn and providing an important dragon resist to the team. However, it is much less effective at what it does since scouting is no longer as important this gen and due to the abundance of new pokemon resistant to steel, spamming bullet punch is no longer an option?:\
The final slot goes to jolteon, who is mostly the weakest link in the chain, its frailty and lack of coverage moves are a big drawback but it allows me to deal damage on both sides of the spectrum and can fend off bulky waters.
Type Weaknesses And Resistance:
Tyranitar (XStream)
Ability: Sand Stream
Jolly @ Choice Scarf
4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Tyranitar is my lead of choice (no pun intended) to set up a sandbox for doryuzu to play. It acts as a suicide lead and lets me quickly set up rocks. Although I might save it for later depending on the opponent’s team. It can negate sashes with its omnipresent ability and has great utility mid-game. The next two moves take advantage of its STAB and the last move is rarely used. The ev’s are also standard, with max attack and speed and the remaining point in HP to increase longevity.
Doryuzu (XHeart)
Ability: Sand Throw
Jolly @Balloon
4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Doryuzu is the main force of the team. Although I usually send it out end-game once its counters have been removed, I won’t hesitate to bring it out early if necessary. With just two moves it can destroy most of OU after a swords dance boost. Although it needs its balloon intact in order to have a chance against other doryuzu. Rapid spin lets me take advantage of stall, and helps clear the field of spikes, since skarmory and nattorei often like switching in. Max speed is recommended to at least speed tie with other doryuzu and the rest is used to maximize attack.
Garchomp (XBlade)
Ability: Sand Veil
Jolly @ Choice Scarf
4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Not the friendliest pokemon you will ever meet, but definitely one of the most reliable. Scarfchomp makes a great revenge killer and late game sweeper once the enemy is weakened enough. While it may seem weird to run two scarfed pokemon, it actually lets me handle the vast amount of threats this gen slightly better. Scarttar and scarfchomp form a great duo being able to lure in and trap key threats to this team, such as burungeru. The set is pretty much a smogon rip, but fire blast is chosen because of its importance in taking out skarmory and so you don’t become fodder for nattorei.
Salamence (XWings)
Ability: Intimidate
Naïve @ Life Orb
4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Good old ‘New Mixmence’, makes a great addition to the team, providing key resistances to fighting and ground types moves which plague tyranitar. It pairs up well with garchomp and together they are often enough to form a victory condition. It helps break down dedicated walls like hippowdon and skarmory via draco meteor and fire blast respectively. Outrage completely destroys blissey and earthquake is to remove troublesome steels after a DM. The evs maximize the damage output of draco meteor and guarantee the KO on skarmory.
Scizor (XRose)
Ability: Technician
Adamant @Choice Band
248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 Spe
Not as common as it once was, but still a threat to most teams. Scizor helps weaken the opposing core and acts as a pivot, by using one of the best moves in the game, U-Turn. It gives you an immediate advantage no matter what the opponent switches-in. Bullet Punch rounds off the set by giving it a powerful priority option to work with. The other moves are very situational and are generally bad moves to lock-into. Overall, Scizor hasn’t changed much this generation, it’s still one of my favorites, easy to use etc.
Rankurusu <3
Ability: Magic Guard
Bold @ Life Orb
252 HP / 4 Def / 252 Sp.A
Poor rankurusu, it's such an underrated pokemon. After a few battles with it, i think it's a great pokemon.
One of it's main draws is its ability: magic guard. This means it takes no damage from the likes of spikes, stealth rock, burn, toxic, leech seed and sand. Making it a great pokemon against stall teams that rely on passive damage. As a bonus, it takes no damage from life orb and has a high base 125 sp.atk stat to work with, this makes it a surprising sweeper under the right conditions, i.e. trick room.
...But this is a RMT afterall, so i have to talk about how it helps the team :)
Rankurusu helps remedy the teams main weakness to powerful fighting types and other weather based teams; a sandstorm teams worst nightmare is the rain, and this team is no exception. With trick room however, it can change the tides in a single move, and from there onwards its smooth sailing.
The moves are a mix between offense and defense. Psychic is the primary option with Focus Blast provided for coverage, Trick Room lets it go first with base 30 speed and strike hard with STAB psychic whilst recover helps keep it alive. The ev's reflect this, max hp gives it the necessary bulk and the rest is put in sp.atk so it can make the most of life orb. no ev's are invested in speed because it's meant to work in trick room and also it loses out to roopushin - who has higher base speed - in terms of speed. The advantage is that roopushin is forced to go first with a weaker payback. Rankurusu can take a +1 roopushin's payback and KO with psychic.
Well, that concludes the team; I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did typing it up. Feel free to make comments and suggestions.
edit: added in the abilities
edit2: i'm quite happy with the team right now, thanks to everyone who made suggestions :)
edit3: added new type chart
edit4: layout changes + move change for dory
