Cacnea [QC 0/3]

[Shaymin :D]

READY FOR QC

Overview
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· Amazing Attacking Stats allows it to go physical or special.

· 5 Weaknesses prevent it from taking hits well.

· The lack of Offensive Grass types (outside of Chlorophyll abusers) gives it little competition as a Offensive Grass type.

· Fairly Strong Priority in Sucker Punch (Sadly Not STAB).

· Immunity to powder moves is nice.

· Extremely low speed makes it rely on Sucker Punch a little too much, and can be easily played around.

Swords Dance
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name: Swords Dance
move 1: Swords Dance
move 2: Bullet Seed
move 3: Drain Punch
move 4: Sucker Punch
ability:Water Absorb
item: Eviolite
evs: 36 HP / 156 Att / 196 Def / 116 SpDef
nature: Impish

Moves
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· Swords Dance lets Cacnea reach a huge attack stat of 34 with EV’s and Nature

· Bullet Seed lets Cacnea beat Tirtouga through Sturdy and is its main STAB

· Drain Punch is good coverage, and lets Cacnea beat Steel types, especially Pawniard.

· Sucker Punch, though not STAB, is Cacnea’s only priority and is a must with its pitiful speed.


Set Details
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EViolite gives Cacnea good bulk to set up a Swords Dance. The EV’s help Cacnea reach 21 Def and 34 Attack after a Swords Dance. Water Absorb lets Cacnea get switch-in opportunities, get health back, and use most Water types as Swords Dance bait.

Usage Tips
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· Bring Cacnea in on something that can’t touch it, such as Slowpoke.

· Swords Dance up.

· Bullet Seed lets Cacnea beat Tirtouga through Sturdy and is STAB.

· Drain Punch hits Steel types, especially Pawniard, much harder and gives Cacnea a form of recovery.

· Sucker Punch is to be used as priority, helping Cacnea beat faster threats and alleviates its low speed. It also has good coverage with Drain Punch.

Team Options
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· Abra is an amazing offensive partner with Cacnea, immune to sandstorm thanks to Magic Guard and the ability to beat both Croagunk and Koffing, 2 pokemon that hard wall Cacnea, while Cacnea beats Lileep and most Dark types with Drain Punch.

· Hippo also get a mention for setting the Rocks that let Cacnea get more KOs, getting up the sandstorm that activates Sand Veil, and taking hits for Cacnea as well.

· Hippo + Lileep create a sandstorm core that can weaken most teams with hazards, walling abilities, and powerful attacks that let Cacnea sweeps much more easily

· Sand Rush Drilbur is another good offensive sandstorm partner, either Cacnea beating most Water and Grass types opens up a Drilbur sweep, while Drilbur's ability to hit every one of Cacnea's weaknesses SE with QuakeSlide opens up a Cacnea sweep.

· Chinchou is a good teammate, taking most Flying, Ice, and Firre Attacks for Cacnea while Cacnea resists both of its weaknesses. A rather slow Volt Switch also brings Cacnea in unharmed.

· Steel types such as Pawniard and Magnemite are good teammates and each have their advantages, such as Knocking Off Eviolites and slow Volt Switch, respectively. Cacnea also resists Ground, but the Fire weakness is compounded.

· Fire types such as Ponyta can take Fire, Ice, and Bug attacks, absorb burns and hand them out, and hit things hard with Flare Blitz. Cacnea also resists the Ground and Water weakness.

· Finally, since Cacnea appreciates Wish support and a cleric for burns or paralysis, Spritzee is a decent teammate as well.

Other Options
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· Cacnea learns Nasty Plot, but with no priority is easily revenge killed.

· Seed Bomb is a more reliable STAB, but gets out damaged by Bullet Seed with 3-5 hits and loses to Sturdy Tirtouga.

· Cacnea also learns Switcheroo, letting it do Choice sets decently. It can also get Disable, making Switcheroo + Disable an annoying combination.

· Substitute can help Cacnea eventually get a Sand Veil miss, but it ultimately just wastes sand turns.

· Cacnea also gets access to the new move Fell Stinger, giving it a free Swords Dance when it KOs a pokemon, but Fell Stinger is much too weak to KO most pokemon and, again, Cacnea is too slow to pull it off.

· Cacnea also gets GrassWhistle, putting a counter easily out of commission.... if it had better accuracy.

· Cacnea can actually take advantage of its low speed with Payback, dealing good damage to many things. However, now its bulk prevents it from using it effectively.

· Finally, Growth gives Cacnea powered Sucker Punch, along with STAB recovery in Giga Drain, but Sun is required.

Checks & Counters
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· Poison types wall its STAB and Drain Punch, making them effective counters. Especially Croagunk resist all the moves on the set and Koffing can Will-O-Wisp to make Cacnea useless.

· Cacnea has no way of beating Foongus, which just KOs with Sludge Bomb.

· Pokemon that can outspeed and take a Sucker Punch do well against Cacnea, including Mienfoo, Scraggy, and Pawniard.

· Flying types that can take a Sucker Punch, such as Vullaby, wall Cacnea and kill it easily, despite the fact its suppose to be based off of a Scarecrow.

· Cottonee encores Swords Dance or Sucker Punch and takes all hits easily.

· Fire types are known as the bane of Grass types, and Cacnea's no different. Larvesta, Ponyta, and Growlithe all deal with Cacnea with bulk, Will-O-Wisp, U-Turn, Intimidate, or combinations.

· Misdreavus easily Will-O-Wisp's Cacnea and takes little damage. It is even more threatening when it carries Substitute.

 

[Shaymin :D]

Ok, completely QC ready.

 

[Shaymin :D]

A few questions:

· Should I slash SubPunch into the main set, make it its own set, or keep it in OO?
· Bulky Cacnea is actually decent, tanking things such as Bulky Staryu's Ice Beam and Meditite's Ice Punch.
196 SpA Staryu Ice Beam vs. 196 HP / 0 SpD Eviolite Cacnea: 14-18 (58.3 - 75%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
196+ Atk Pure Power Meditite Ice Punch vs. 196 HP / 228 Def Eviolite Cacnea: 16-20 (66.6 - 83.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
And the ability to respond back.
84+ Atk Cacnea Bullet Seed (3 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Staryu: 18-24 (94.7 - 126.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
84+ Atk Cacnea Bullet Seed (4 hits) vs. 0 HP / 76 Def Eviolite Meditite: 12-16 (63.1 - 84.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
84+ Atk Cacnea Sucker Punch vs. 0 HP / 76 Def Eviolite Meditite: 5-7 (26.3 - 36.8%) -- 84.5% chance to 3HKO after Stealth Rock
(Staryu is OHKO'd by 3 Hit Bullet Seed, while Meditite has a high chance to be KO'd by 4 Hit Bullet Seed and Sucker Punch.)
I don't know whether that's enough to merit a set, but it should definitely be mentioned in OO. What do you guys think?
· Any other thoughts about good teammates/C&C? I have Hone Claws Rufflet off the top of my head right now.

 

[Darkamber8828]

let me preface this by saying i've never used cacnea and the last time i saw one was in gen 4

subpunch seems much worse this gen, it was good last gen because of sand veil, but now that it's not infinite it's hard to abuse

also mention nasty plot and growth, they're both bad because weak sucker punch but STAB giga drain is nice

152 SpA Chinchou Ice Beam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Cacnea: 20-24 (95.2 - 114.2%) -- 56.3% chance to OHKO
152 SpA Chinchou Ice Beam vs. 236 HP / 0 SpD Eviolite Cacnea: 12-16 (50 - 66.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

beating able to 1v1 chinchou and win is cool and pretty important as a grass-type so probably put bulky set in set details (you do lose a TON of OHKOs with Sucker Punch), the speed doesn't matter too much

speaking of chinchou it's a neat teammate, fire, ice, and flying resists and has volt switch to bring cacnea in, and lures ground-types (although you can't really touch gligar), cacnea resists ground and grass for it

lileep seems a little redundant as a teammate, especially since hippo already sets SR

pawniard resists poison, flying, and ice and lures in things that resist sucker punch and knocks off their whatevers (also it has SR), cacnea resists ground for it

magnemite resists poison, flying, bug, and ice and has volt switch, cacnea resists ground for it

ponyta resists fire, ice, and bug and is good for absorbing / giving burns, cacnea resists ground and water for it

spritzee kills dark and fighting-types that resist sucker punch, and wish + aromatherapy is cool

hone claws rufflet isn't worth mentioning because nobody uses rufflet and bulk up rufflet is better anyway

also cottonee walls everything you have and encores swords dance

bulky fire-types like ponyta, larvesta, and growlithe can all burn you through sucker punch or squish you with flare blitz (larv has u-turn and resists drain punch, growlithe has intimidate)

 

[Shaymin :D]

Updated, also, Hone Claws Rufflet is actually OK, with the release of Hustle thanks to Ability Capsule. +1 Return hurts everything that doesn't resist it. I suppose I should supply calcs to justify myself.

+1 252 Atk Hustle Rufflet Return vs. 36 HP / 236+ Def Eviolite Koffing: 15-18 (71.4 - 85.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252 Atk Hustle Rufflet Return vs. 0 HP / 212+ Def Eviolite Hippopotas: 16-21 (69.5 - 91.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252 Atk Hustle Rufflet Rock Slide vs. 116 HP / 76+ Def Eviolite Vullaby: 20-24 (80 - 96%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252 Atk Hustle Rufflet Return vs. 196 HP / 156+ Def Eviolite Slowpoke: 18-22 (64.2 - 78.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252 Atk Hustle Rufflet Return vs. 228 HP / 0 Def Bronzor: 14-17 (56 - 68%) --
guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252 Atk Hustle Rufflet Return vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Gligar: 25-31 (108.6 - 134.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+1 252 Atk Hustle Rufflet Return vs. 0 HP / 236 Def Eviolite Gligar: 15-18 (65.2 - 78.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO


Some of the most dominate physical walls in the game, all 2HKO'd by +1 Return (Without LO people.....)

Yet again, I do agree that Rufflet is never used, but it is one of the strongest Dark Horses in LC.

 

[Darkamber8828]

shitty bunnelby with pluck

EDIT: oh wait it has hustle i guess hone claws is good

still not a good mon though, 16 speed is too slow and it's still outclassed by bunnelby as an offensive normal type outside of pluck and a ground immunity

 

[Bagon]

Bump up.
Remove murkrow mentions and swirlix. This is kind of outdated and should be updated to the current meta :)

 

[Shaymin :D]

Alright, Done :)

 

[Goddess Briyella]

• The set should be changed to 36 HP / 156 Atk / 196 Def / 116 SpD with Eviolite and an Impish nature, and here's why: Having maxed Attack is a lot less important if you already have Swords Dance to boost it, and this is especially true since Cacnea doesn't have the best bulk or Speed to work with anyway, so it could use some investment there. Its Speed only hits 14 with a Jolly nature, but that's not an ideal threshold to meet when it can't boost its Speed to 21 without using a Choice Scarf, and Cacnea's available options render it a less than ideal user of this item. Life Orb is overkill as well when you have Swords Dance and is suicide when you're Grass-type with low Speed in the first place. Eviolite with my given spread provides 21 Defense and 34 Attack after one Swords Dance boost, which is enough to punch holes in anything while not being a sitting duck to the rest of the metagame. Sucker Punch helps alleviate the lack of Speed, and Drain Punch helps alleviate the lack of recovery; these two moves sport excellent coverage together. The order of moves should be listed in order of importance as per the set, which would be as follows: Swords Dance, Bullet Seed, Drain Punch, Sucker Punch.

• Water Absorb should be the definitive and only ability on the set; it's ideal over Sand Veil even if used with Hippopotas as a teammate, to make Cacnea able to switch into Water-type attacks aimed at Hippopotas's Ground weakness and also get some health back in the process. Sand Veil shouldn't even be mentioned in Other Options, as it is simply outclassed by Water Absorb, which does not require sand support to be effective, and is entirely hax-reliant even with sand in play.

• The statements Sucker Punch is to be used most of the time, as Cacnea is very slow, making it hard to use any other move and Bullet Seed lets Cacnea beat most Fighting types and Dark types are untrue and misleading. Bullet Seed is the main attack, Drain Punch is good for hitting Steel-types that wall Bullet Seed (especially Pawniard), and Sucker Punch is generally there to help Cacnea override its Speed problem while also having solid coverage alongside Drain Punch. The reasoning for Bullet Seed over Seed Bomb needs to be clear: it gets around Focus Sash and Sturdy, which is especially crucial in Tirtouga's case.

• In Checks & Counters, Foongus deserves more emphasis as something that beats Cacnea entirely. Misdreavus is also a major threat that can bypass Sucker Punch and burn Cacnea with Will-O-Wisp, thereby effectively neutering its offensive presence; Misdreavus is even more problematic if it carries Substitute.

• In Checks & Counters, you list Cottonee as a counter that can use U-turn against Cacnea. Cottonee cannot learn U-turn.

QC 1/3

 

[Shaymin :D]

I think I got everything, and to be honest, I don't have enough time to be able to write this up eventually. Someone who does can take over if they want.

 

[Goddess Briyella]

I think I got everything, and to be honest, I don't have enough time to be able to write this up eventually. Someone who does can take over if they want.

Okay then, if you're sure, I'll reassign it.