So I hate stalling, and I kinda hate setting up and just being forced to switch out against a good check.
I was tooling around the ubers archives and I ran across Shadows and Dust - Deep Thought's UBER ladder team, and thought to myself "huh that seems awesome, I think I'll try that concept in OU"
the process -
Lead - I'm going to be switching a lot, and I really don't like the idea of having a stealth rock hurting me every time, so the goal was to use a taunt lead (pretty much a straight rip off of a mew lead... Azelf
Step 2; Late game sweeper - I went over a ton ideas on this one. Gengar (too squishy), SD luke (ended up sharing EQ weakness), empoleon (see Luke), infernape (too squishy and see luke) I eventually decided that I needed both fire and EQ resistance to set-up, CM latias got the job.
Step 3 was the easiest - the plan was to run hard to kill, hard hitting choice users. CB-Scizor, IMO the best pokemon in OU. He's on so many successful teams, and is basically an auto include in anything offensive.
step 4; Special powerhouse - this also saw a list of options, nearly all of whom feared getting prioritized out of the game, which isn't really good for a momentum team - PorygonZ is still in my mind for this slot, as adaptibility + specs + tri-atk is a scary amount of power, but I needed a Scizor/skarmory answer and an all around heavy hitter. specs heatran joins the party.
Step 5; 2nd band user - Tyranitar. I needed a cleaner for flyers/psychics, and with 2 steel types already on the team sandstream gives the bombard with powerful attacks plan a little extra push.
step 6; Originally this was a specsMence, but after the help from people here I have moved to Scarf flygon, I really needed some speed on the team, a revenge killer was most important. Many suggested making heatran into a scarfer, which I don't hate, but I like the surprise power that comes from specs boosted attacks on heatran.
Here's a better look at what we have at the end of the tunnel
Azelf@focus sash - Jolly
4 HP / 252 ATK / 252 SPE
Taunt
SR
u-turn
explosion
Azelf is a very common lead, and for pretty obvious reasons. Varying leads require different answers, the absolute goal is to prevent their stealth rock, whilst getting yours up. with this team its generally preferable to prevent their SR than it is to get yours up if you are forced to make the choice. Often you'll be u-turning to scizor for a priority move, and hoping to get SR up with azelf later on in the match.
Latias@leftovers - Timid
4 HP / 252 SPA / 252 SPE
Dragon Pulse
Calm mind
thunderbolt
surf
I chose a slightly different set than usual, going with tbolt over some other options, this is mainly gyarados's fault, blame him and suicune. The advantages of using latias as the late game sweeper are mostly it's typing, levitate, and bulk - excellent leftovers holder, and is very likely to tear through most teams once they have been weakend by the bombardment of choice boosted attacks.
Tyranitar@choice band - Adamant
160 HP / 252 Atk / 96 Spe
Crunch
stone edge
Aqua Tail
Earthquake
This a pure powerhouse set, it sets-up sandstorm, hit's massively hard with 2 high power boosted stab moves, that combine for excellent coverage. no pursuit because people will be expecting it, and I plan to just EQ/aqua tail the switch. EQ is the primary as I'll be expecting pokemon that set-up on pursuit to switch in (like SD luke or empoleon)
Heatran@specs - modest
40 HP / 252 SpA / 216 Spe
FlameThrower
Earth Power
Dragon Pulse
Overheat
oh heatran. Scizor does such a good job of baiting flamethrowers that flashfire might actually activate, but even if it doesn't, with his massive SPA and overheat, not even gyarados will like switching in, especially with SR/sandstorm running. Dragon pulse, flame thrower, and earth power can all sweep in the late game, depending on the team i'm facing. if they manage to stop latias.
Scizor @ choice band - Adamant
248 HP / 252 ATK / 8 SPE
Pursuit
u-turn
bullet punch
superpower
explaining this pokemon is pretty unnecessary. it's CB Scizor. trapping, priority, scouting, dragon resistance, it slices, dices and comes back for more. Primary purpose is being a steel type to switch in against half the game. Functions as a revenge killer with one of the best priority attacks in the game (technician boosted bullet punch) and as a scout using u-turn on the switches he is likely to force. Pursuit is less important for this team, but sometimes trapping annoying scarf users (like opposing latias/genger) is just more important than severely hurting the pokemon that is about to switch in.
Flygon @ Choice Scarf - Jolly
4 hp / 252 atk / 252 spe
Earthquake
Outrage
Stone Edge
U-Turn
Revenge killer, and surprisingly effective late game sweeper, scarf outrage is fast and painful. This slot provides a lot of utility that salamence just didn't, Lightning immunity, while maintaining ground immunity. the ability to work as a secondary scout (with scizor) which is very helpful in weakening their pokemon without the drawback of giving a free strike/turn to set-up. He also holds a very useful ground type for good stab and immunity to the sandstream.
The other options mentioned / considered were: Spec's Empoleon, ScarfTran and CB swampert. So I'll briefly explain my thoughts on them, as they are all excellent suggestions, and perhaps there is something I'm missing.
Spec's Empoleon - I like this guy a lot. My only issue with him is the lack of pure power that heartan brings to the table - but this will certainly be tested as the spec's user on the team (he in the slot, but heatran's monsters 130 base SPA and similar resistances stole the slot)
Scarf heatran - If I moved heatran to a scarf user, I would want to replace his spec's role with empoleon, which is fine but starts compounding the EQ weakness, which isn't really a path I want to walk, being swept by ScarfGon is a sad day. If I replaced his spec's slot with salamence, I'm looking a little better by maintaining ground immunity, and covering some of the fighting weakness, but overall there is just a power gap there, and mence is taking heat from sandstorm.
CB Swampert - honestly I like this guy, but not as much as Scizor or Ttar. I really can't say there is a reason for benching him other than the 2x item clause.
Ultimately I like the typing of flygon, and the ability to use u-turn more than I like the raw power of spec's mence + ScarfTran. U-Turn is probably the primary difference here, as "free" damage+switches is pretty amazing for this team.
there's my RMT - I'm looking for suggestions, and threats that I may have overlooked.
I was tooling around the ubers archives and I ran across Shadows and Dust - Deep Thought's UBER ladder team, and thought to myself "huh that seems awesome, I think I'll try that concept in OU"
the process -
Lead - I'm going to be switching a lot, and I really don't like the idea of having a stealth rock hurting me every time, so the goal was to use a taunt lead (pretty much a straight rip off of a mew lead... Azelf
Step 2; Late game sweeper - I went over a ton ideas on this one. Gengar (too squishy), SD luke (ended up sharing EQ weakness), empoleon (see Luke), infernape (too squishy and see luke) I eventually decided that I needed both fire and EQ resistance to set-up, CM latias got the job.
Step 3 was the easiest - the plan was to run hard to kill, hard hitting choice users. CB-Scizor, IMO the best pokemon in OU. He's on so many successful teams, and is basically an auto include in anything offensive.
step 4; Special powerhouse - this also saw a list of options, nearly all of whom feared getting prioritized out of the game, which isn't really good for a momentum team - PorygonZ is still in my mind for this slot, as adaptibility + specs + tri-atk is a scary amount of power, but I needed a Scizor/skarmory answer and an all around heavy hitter. specs heatran joins the party.
Step 5; 2nd band user - Tyranitar. I needed a cleaner for flyers/psychics, and with 2 steel types already on the team sandstream gives the bombard with powerful attacks plan a little extra push.
step 6; Originally this was a specsMence, but after the help from people here I have moved to Scarf flygon, I really needed some speed on the team, a revenge killer was most important. Many suggested making heatran into a scarfer, which I don't hate, but I like the surprise power that comes from specs boosted attacks on heatran.
Here's a better look at what we have at the end of the tunnel
Azelf@focus sash - Jolly
4 HP / 252 ATK / 252 SPE
Taunt
SR
u-turn
explosion
Azelf is a very common lead, and for pretty obvious reasons. Varying leads require different answers, the absolute goal is to prevent their stealth rock, whilst getting yours up. with this team its generally preferable to prevent their SR than it is to get yours up if you are forced to make the choice. Often you'll be u-turning to scizor for a priority move, and hoping to get SR up with azelf later on in the match.
Latias@leftovers - Timid
4 HP / 252 SPA / 252 SPE
Dragon Pulse
Calm mind
thunderbolt
surf
I chose a slightly different set than usual, going with tbolt over some other options, this is mainly gyarados's fault, blame him and suicune. The advantages of using latias as the late game sweeper are mostly it's typing, levitate, and bulk - excellent leftovers holder, and is very likely to tear through most teams once they have been weakend by the bombardment of choice boosted attacks.
Tyranitar@choice band - Adamant
160 HP / 252 Atk / 96 Spe
Crunch
stone edge
Aqua Tail
Earthquake
This a pure powerhouse set, it sets-up sandstorm, hit's massively hard with 2 high power boosted stab moves, that combine for excellent coverage. no pursuit because people will be expecting it, and I plan to just EQ/aqua tail the switch. EQ is the primary as I'll be expecting pokemon that set-up on pursuit to switch in (like SD luke or empoleon)
Heatran@specs - modest
40 HP / 252 SpA / 216 Spe
FlameThrower
Earth Power
Dragon Pulse
Overheat
oh heatran. Scizor does such a good job of baiting flamethrowers that flashfire might actually activate, but even if it doesn't, with his massive SPA and overheat, not even gyarados will like switching in, especially with SR/sandstorm running. Dragon pulse, flame thrower, and earth power can all sweep in the late game, depending on the team i'm facing. if they manage to stop latias.
Scizor @ choice band - Adamant
248 HP / 252 ATK / 8 SPE
Pursuit
u-turn
bullet punch
superpower
explaining this pokemon is pretty unnecessary. it's CB Scizor. trapping, priority, scouting, dragon resistance, it slices, dices and comes back for more. Primary purpose is being a steel type to switch in against half the game. Functions as a revenge killer with one of the best priority attacks in the game (technician boosted bullet punch) and as a scout using u-turn on the switches he is likely to force. Pursuit is less important for this team, but sometimes trapping annoying scarf users (like opposing latias/genger) is just more important than severely hurting the pokemon that is about to switch in.
Flygon @ Choice Scarf - Jolly
4 hp / 252 atk / 252 spe
Earthquake
Outrage
Stone Edge
U-Turn
Revenge killer, and surprisingly effective late game sweeper, scarf outrage is fast and painful. This slot provides a lot of utility that salamence just didn't, Lightning immunity, while maintaining ground immunity. the ability to work as a secondary scout (with scizor) which is very helpful in weakening their pokemon without the drawback of giving a free strike/turn to set-up. He also holds a very useful ground type for good stab and immunity to the sandstream.
The other options mentioned / considered were: Spec's Empoleon, ScarfTran and CB swampert. So I'll briefly explain my thoughts on them, as they are all excellent suggestions, and perhaps there is something I'm missing.
Spec's Empoleon - I like this guy a lot. My only issue with him is the lack of pure power that heartan brings to the table - but this will certainly be tested as the spec's user on the team (he in the slot, but heatran's monsters 130 base SPA and similar resistances stole the slot)
Scarf heatran - If I moved heatran to a scarf user, I would want to replace his spec's role with empoleon, which is fine but starts compounding the EQ weakness, which isn't really a path I want to walk, being swept by ScarfGon is a sad day. If I replaced his spec's slot with salamence, I'm looking a little better by maintaining ground immunity, and covering some of the fighting weakness, but overall there is just a power gap there, and mence is taking heat from sandstorm.
CB Swampert - honestly I like this guy, but not as much as Scizor or Ttar. I really can't say there is a reason for benching him other than the 2x item clause.
Ultimately I like the typing of flygon, and the ability to use u-turn more than I like the raw power of spec's mence + ScarfTran. U-Turn is probably the primary difference here, as "free" damage+switches is pretty amazing for this team.
there's my RMT - I'm looking for suggestions, and threats that I may have overlooked.
