Pokémon Crobat

[CassiusYT]

This is the set Ive been running (Credit goes to Tokyo Tom)

Crobat @ Black Sludge
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 232 HP / 8 Atk / 68 Def / 200 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Taunt
- Roost / Defog
- Brave Bird
- U-turn / Defog


The HP gives a Leftovers number, 8 atk evs ensures Brave Bird kills 0/4 Scolipede, enough speed to outpace Timid Greninja. There is no reason to use max speed, you don't outspeed anything notable. The rest goes into physical bulk to take hits better.

 

[L0calLEGEND]

The HP gives a Leftovers number, 8 atk evs ensures Brave Bird kills 0/4 Scolipede, enough speed to outpace Timid Greninja. There is no reason to use max speed, you don't outspeed anything notable. The rest goes into physical bulk to take hits better.

Don't you mean Timid Noivern? I was going to reply by saying, if you are going to outspeed greninja you might as well outspeed noivern too. But I ran some calcs and found out 200 evs w/ jolly outspeeds noivern by one point. Sorry, I guess there were mishaps on both of our parts.

 

[Dr. Eyepatch]

This is the set Ive been running (Credit goes to Tokyo Tom)

Crobat @ Black Sludge
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 228 HP / 8 Atk / 72 Def / 200 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Taunt
- Roost / Defog
- Brave Bird
- U-turn / Defog


The HP gives a Leftovers number, 8 atk evs ensures Brave Bird kills 0/4 Scolipede, enough speed to outpace Timid Greninja. There is no reason to use max speed, you don't outspeed anything notable. The rest goes into physical bulk to take hits better.

I wanted to second the effectiveness of this set. I needed a somewhat bulky 'mon with Taunt and the pivotal U-Turn to round out my team, and Crobat has been doing wonders for me. Since I already have a Defog user on my team, I have been using the other four moves mentioned.

Crobat, with full HP investment, can survive a fair number of things and dishes out a surprising amount of damage. It functions well as a switch-in to a lot of Bug, Flying, Ground, and Flying types whilst threatening them out or a KO. The EV spread I use is 248 HP / 252 Speed / 8 Attack, but I feel it could be optimized, particularly with the Speed.

 

[L0calLEGEND]

The EV spread I use is 252 HP / 252 Speed / 4 Attack, but I feel it could be optimized, particularly with the Speed.

Is there anything in particular or anything noticeable that jolly 252 speed outspeeds? What I recommend is jolly 200 speed evs to outspeed noivern and anything past that, a scarfed poke could do the job better. Unless you want to out speed a certain scarfer maybe?

 

[Dr. Eyepatch]

Is there anything in particular or anything noticeable that jolly 252 speed outspeeds? What I recommend is jolly 200 speed evs to outspeed noivern and anything past that, a scarfed poke could do the job better. Unless you want to out speed a certain scarfer maybe?

Not necessarily. Aside from speed tying with other base 130 pokemon, I really had no reason in mind to run 252 speed. The truth is, I am not very good at optimizing EV spreads at all; I knew 252 speed was too much, only I was not sure what the cutoff point should be. As long as it still outspeeds Noivern and Greninja, 200 speed EVs should be just fine.

 

[L0calLEGEND]

200 evs are the way to go. If I was you, I would dump the other useless 52 speed evs into attack to give brave bird slightly more power. And if you really want to take advantage of it, give crobat 248 hp evs to give to get 5 straight switch ins into stealth rock instead of 4.
I'm glad to help. :)

 

[Dr. Eyepatch]

200 evs are the way to go. If I was you, I would dump the other useless 52 speed evs into attack to give brave bird slightly more power. And if you really want to take advantage of it, give crobat 248 hp evs to give to get 5 straight switch ins into stealth rock instead of 4.
I'm glad to help. :)

Oh, I forgot that I actually gave it 248 HP for just that reason. I will edit my previous post to reflect that. Otherwise, I like the idea of putting the rest into Attack. I just love how versatile Crobat is, especially since a lot of people tend to underestimate what it can do. Thanks again for the input.

 

[bluegrass]

Crobat is tied for favorite Pokemon, so I decided to build a team around his Special Sweeping set.

Crobat @ Black Sludge
Ability: Infiltrator
Timid Nature
252 SpAtk / 252 Spe / 4 HP
-Nasty Plot
-Sludge Bomb
-Heat Wave
-Giga Drain

Heat Wave is mandatory to hit Steel types that think it's a safe switch in, while Giga Drain provides decent recovery while also hitting water and rock types (not named Tyranitar) for pretty good damage. I chose Sludge Bomb over Air Slash because the two move's coverage is pretty redundant, while Sludge Bomb has a higher base power and hits Fairys super effectively, while also hitting Electric types for neutral damage. Conkledurr and Dugtrio both pair pretty well with this set, as they both take care of Heatran (who stops this set cold). Crobat needs the Nasty Plot boost to actually be able to do decent damage, as base 70 SpAtk, even when invested, is pathetically weak.

Tbh, I think the standard stall breaker set is his best set and most OU viable, but this set is fun to use and catches opponents off guard, even if it is pretty much hit or miss in most battles. Funny enough, even this set suffers from 4MSS to an extant. HP Ground would be great for Heatran, while having Air Slash helps immensely with fighting types, namely Assault Vest Conk. Roost as a recovery move is also nice to have

 

[EpicNikolai]

Crobat gained amazing buffs this gen. Crobat already had a great defensive typing, and with STAB Cross Poison being SE to new fairies such as Clefable, it is really viable. The resistance to Fairy-type moves can come in handy as well. Infiltrator is a solid ability and could be beneficial to deal with stallers and other Pokémon behind Subs. A Banded STAB Brave Bird will hit harder than a Talonflame. Despite not having the +1 Brave Bird as Talonflame gets from its Gale Wings-ability, it still pumps out more damage than it with base 90 attack. It should dash out a good amount of damage to anything that doesn’t resist it, and it could work really well late-game for instance, with weakened Pokémon.

Crobat also has an outstanding base 130 speed, so hitting first isn’t its main problem. In addition to this, Crobat also has a niche with access to Defog to get rid of hazards that come in the way, further increasing Crobats usefulness to OU teams. U-turn is there to deal some damage before switching out. All in all Crobat is a really underrated Pokemon that you should give a try in the OU meta. It can do massive damage to teams there, and it definitely isn’t easy to deal with in the right players hands. Here is a solid sample set of what you could run on Crobat:

Crobat @ Choice Band
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Brave Bird
- U-turn
- Cross Poison
- Defog

 

[CassiusYT]

Crobat @ Choice Band
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Brave Bird
- U-turn
- Cross Poison
- Defog

Banded Defog is pretty horrible and kills all your momentum, try Sleep talk instead if you wanna run CB. If you need a Defogger on your team than dont run CB, they just don't work well together.

 

[EpicNikolai]

Banded Defog is pretty horrible and kills all your momentum, try Sleep talk instead if you wanna run CB. If you need a Defogger on your team than dont run CB, they just don't work well together.

It isn't particularily useful. But the thing is that Crobat doesnt realy have anything else worth using. Sleep Talk is viable, yes. Just in case it gets put to sleep obviously. But Defog could work as well. You Defog and then switch again. Simple as that.

 

[Karxrida]

It isn't particularily useful. But the thing is that Crobat doesnt realy have anything else worth using. Sleep Talk is viable, yes. Just in case it gets put to sleep obviously. But Defog could work as well. You Defog and then switch again. Simple as that.

Being forced to switch out kills your momentum even more when a non-Choiced Crobat could have at least used U-turn. There's also the issue of Crobat being bad Defogger; it can't really deal with Bisharp (Heat Wave's too weak to OHKO it and if you mispredict you're screwed over by Knock Off + Sucker Punch; even if you KO it your opponent still kept their Rocks up and you're probably weakened enough to get killed by a Scarfer or Priority), lose to most Hazards setters (for example you can't guarantee a 2HKO on Ferrothorn without significant Special Attack investment), and Crobat is not very offensively threatening overall.

 

[Yamborski]

Keep Defog. It's fine to use and will no doubt find use. Sometimes Crobat will just have a bad team matchup and killing momentum might be worth a quick Defog. Its like how Scarf Excadrill can run Rapid Spin. Its too good of a move not to use especially on something with such a limited movepool.

 

[EpicNikolai]

Keep Defog. It's fine to use and will no doubt find use. Sometimes Crobat will just have a bad team matchup and killing momentum might be worth a quick Defog. Its like how Scarf Excadrill can run Rapid Spin. Its too good of a move not to use especially on something with such a limited movepool.

I support this. This is my point. You have nothing to lose basically. Just great to have the option to be able to get the Defog off if its neccesary.

 

[Karxrida]

I support this. This is my point. You have nothing to lose basically. Just great to have the option to be able to get the Defog off if its neccesary.

If you really need a fast Defogger, use Latias or Latios. They are significantly stronger, can lure out Ferrothorn/Bisharp and KO them consistently, and Latias can even provide Healing Wish support. Crobat will usually be dead weight outside of Defog while Latios and Latias provide great offensive pressure.

 

[Yamborski]

If you really need a fast Defogger, use Latias or Latios. They are significantly stronger, can lure out Ferrothorn/Bisharp and KO them consistently, and Latias can even provide Healing Wish support. Crobat will usually be dead weight outside of Defog while Latios and Latias provide great offensive pressure.

Crobat isn't to be used as a fast defogger primarily, it is a fast banded brave birding... bird. Defog is just a filler utility move that can not be relied upon to control hazards but one which can clutch a win in certain situations. It's better than Cross Poison lol.

I wonder if a 3 attack LO Defog set could work? BB / heat wave / hp ground / defog. Lures in ferro / skarm and leaves the field clear for fellow birds like talon or pinsir. It can even defog rocks for itself lol.

 

[EpicNikolai]

Crobat isn't to be used as a fast defogger primarily, it is a fast banded brave birding... bird. Defog is just a filler utility move that can not be relied upon to control hazards but one which can clutch a win in certain situations. It's better than Cross Poison lol.

I wonder if a 3 attack LO Defog set could work? BB / heat wave / hp ground / defog. Lures in ferro / skarm and leaves the field clear for fellow birds like talon or pinsir. It can even defog rocks for itself lol.

It could work, but the problem is that you wear down HP too much with BB + Life Orb. Roost would be pretty much a neccesity if you ran a set like that, unlesss you want to faint and get outpredicted on switches all the time.

 

[alexwolf]

How did this thread stay open so long?