#573 Cinccino
Normal
75/95/60/65/60/115
Cute Charm: pokemon of the opposite gender have a 30% chance of being infatuated when attacking with physical moves.
Technician: moves 60 base power and below are boosted by 1.5
Skill Link: multi-hit moves will always strike 5 times
Level Up moves: Pound, Growl, Helping Hand, Tickle, Doubleslap, Encore, Swift, Sing, Tail slap, Charm, Wake-Up Slap, Echoed Voice, Slam, Captivate, Hyper Voice, Last Resort, You First, Bullet Seed, Rock Blast
Egg moves: Iron Tail,Tail Whip, Aqua Tail, Mud-Slap, Knock Off, Fake Tears, Sleep Talk, Endure, Flail
Learnable TMs: , TM04 - Calm Mind, TM06 - Toxic, TM10 - Hidden Power, TM11 - Sunny Day, TM15 - Hyper Beam, TM16 - Light Screen, TM17 - Protect, TM18 - Rain Dance, TM20 - Safeguard, TM21 - Frustration, TM24 - Thunderbolt, TM25 - Thunder, TM27 - Return, TM28 - Dig, TM32 - Double Team, TM42 - Facade, TM44 - Rest, TM45 - Attract, TM48 - Round, TM49 - Echoed Voice, TM52 - Focus Blast, TM56 - Fling, TM67 - Retalliate, TM68 - Giga Impact, TM73 - Thunder Wave, TM83 - Work Up, TM86 - Grass Knot, TM87 - Swagger, TM89 - U-Turn, TM90 - Substitute
Cinccino is a pokemon with surprisingly good stats given that it evolves from the cute rodent mascot of this generation. 115 base speed and 95 base attack allow it to naturally outrun a lot of pokemon and hit with some passable power. Like a lot of normal types it has access to a fairly large move pool of both attacking and supportive moves. However Cinccino is a little special in that it seems to be built for the sole purpose of abusing multi-hit moves, which make it a specialist at breaking substitutes.
This pokemon gets technician and skill link (from the dream world), the latter of which allows multi-hit moves to strike the maximum number of times. It also learns Rock Blast, Bullet seed and Tail Slap, giving it sub-breaking attacks to deal with pokemon weak to rock or grass, as well as a STAB option for damage against neutral targets.
It doesn't end there. Cinccino gets even more type coverage with Aqua tail, Wake-Up Slap and Iron Tail, and it also has access to Thunder wave, Encore, U-turn, Sing, Tickle and Light Screen for supportive reasons. It has several powerful STAB normal attacks it can call on, including the standard Return, the new Retalliate for an attempt at a possible revenge kill, STAB Last Resort, Flail and also Tail Slap. But the only move it can use to boost it's own physical attack is Work Up, which boosts it's special attack as well.
Cinccino may have a puny base 65 special attack, but it does learn some decent special attacks, so a mixed set would not be impossible at lower tiers if it could get in an Encore to force a switch.
Like a lot of interesting gen 5 pokemon, Cinccino doesn't have any way to boost it's own speed, so outside of Thunder Wave it has to worry about faster pokemon and priority attacks. It's not like this pokemon is going to sweep teams on it's own, but with the wide range of options available to it, it's sure to be able to do something useful before it's low defenses spell it's untimely doom. Also, it doesn't get taunt either, so there's not much it can do to stop bulky opponents setting up when it's out other than sing or thunder wave to cripple them before they become a problem...well so long as they aren't trying to use substitutes. Then again it can always just U-turn to make an exit if it needs to.
When it comes to abilities, Technician and Skill link both seem to have their ups and downs. Technician will allow weaker moves (including the trademark multi-hitting attacks) to be boosted in power, but skill link causes the attacks to hit 5 times, making them more reliable for breaking substitutes and causing damage. Technician also has the benefit of boosting other moves, though there aren't too many others below 60 base power that this Pokemon will want to use.
In terms of items, Cinccino would probably benefit best from a Focus Sash (watch out for entry hazards) Salacc Berry, Wide Lens, (those multi hit moves don't have 100% accuracy) Metronome or Life Orb.
--[MOVESETS]---
Giga Sub Breaker:
Cinccino @ life orb
Jolly nature
Skill Link
Ev's into Attack and Speed
Bullet Seed/Tail Slap
Rock Blast/Tail Slap
U-turn/Work up
Return/Thunder Wave/Encore/U-turn
Cinccino has so many moves that would help it, so it's kind of hard to make a moveset. This is a primary set designed for breaking substitutes and getting a little bit of damage in. Basically bullet seed or Rock blast are interchangable with Tail Slap if you must have a STAB sub breaker, though it seems unecessary. U-turn is a must if you plan to stay safe, but Cheer-up allows Cinccino to boost it's attack a little after forcing a switch with Encore or Thunder Wave. Return is a possibility if you want to hit most pokemon a bit harder, but Tail Slap will do more damage with skill link.
Obligitory Choice set:
Cinccino @ choicewhatever
Adamant/Jolly
Technician
EV's into speed and attack
Aqua Tail
Wake-up-Slap
U-turn
Return/Tail Slap/Retalliate
STAB get even could be pretty good for revenge kills, and the other moves give him type coverage over rock, steel, psychic, dark, grass, ground, fire, ice and normal. I guess U-turn could be replaced for Rock Blast too.
Annoying Vermin w/ Pretty Tail:
Cinccino @ focus sash/lum berry
Jolly
Skill Link/Technician
EV's into speed and attack (maybe HP...)
Thunder Wave
Encore/charm
Knock off/Wake-up slap
U-turn
Silly Annoyer set. Watch out for ghost types of course, but if you play your cards right you could hopefully cripple some threats.
Last Resort
Cinccino @ Life Orb
technician
Adamant/Jolly
Ev's into attack and speed
Encore
Work up
Sing/Thunder wave
Last Resort
Lots of problems with this set. but STAB last resort after a Work Up coming off a respectable base 95 attack is going to hurt something when it hits. You can't do anything to ghosts or ground types, but you'll at least be able to paralyze a pokemon and slam another if you get lucky. Make sure that you use Encore, Thunder Wave/Sing, Work Up in this order.
Max coverage:
Cinccino @ Life Orb/expert belt/choice band
technician
Adamant/Jolly
Ev's into attack and speed
Bullet Seed
Rock Blast
U-Turn
Wake-up Slap
The idea here is check as many different types as possible. This set lacks in supportive options, but allows super effective coverage of Water, Rock, Ground, Fire, Bug, Flying, Dark, Grass, Psychic, Normal, Steel and Ice Pokemon. Everything else is hit for neutral.
Multi-battle Supportive:
Cinccino @ whatever
technician/skill link
Jolly
Ev's into HP and speed, but mostly speed
Helping Hand
You First
encore/t-wave/knock off
protect/sunny day/rain dance/round
nothing but multi battle support. With both helping hand and you first, it can either power up another pokemon or make it attack faster. Encore and thunder wave to try to cripple/annoy when you're not supporting. Protect to keep safe from explosions and earthquakes and to bait out fighting type attacks (since Cinoccino is an easy target and may make a good distraction) rain dance/sunny day to remove on-field weather from weather starters. And finally, if you're making a gimmick round team, it can learn that too.
Wet Fur:
Cinccino @ Life Orb/damp rock
technician
Mild/Lonely/Hasty
*no idea for ev spread. help me out here
Calm Mind/Work-Up/Rain Dance
Aqua Tail
Thunder
work-up/wake-up-slap/u-turn
Weird rain mode Cinoccino that might be good for something. Imagine the look of surprise and amusement on your opponent's face when you set up rain dance with Cinoccino and then halfheartedly try to go mixed? At least they won't be expecting it, and with bullet seed you get super effective hits against every other auto-weather starter in the game except for Abomasnow. You won't be KOing any of them, but at least it's something. If you're not using rain dance, then this set can also make use of perma-rain if you just must have a Cinoccino on your rain team. After a work-up or calm mind it hits surprisingly hard with boosted aqua tail and decently hard with perfect accuracy thunder. Wake-up-slap lets you do some damage to (usually steel) pokemon who resist the Aqua tail/thunder combination and U-turn is there for escaping them.
I Am Just Pulling Stuff Out Of My Ass Now:
Cinccino @ light clay/life orb
technician
Adamant/Jolly
Ev's into attack and speed
light screen
charm/fake tears
thunder wave
U-turn
It gets charm and light screen so whether the opponent is physical or special it can at least make them do less damage, paralyze them, then U-turn to a counter to force switches. I don't know if anyone would actually want to do this though, as there's probably other pokemon who do the same thing much more effectively.
