Intro
Hey there! I'm Coral. SwSh OU has been by far my most-played generation of OU despite having been playing for like 6 or 7 years now. In my spare time I've been going through almost every low-tier mon in the game and at least trying to build around them, and Arctovish stood out to me. Dracovish got banned pretty early into the meta and he was really fun to use, and now there's a mon with the same broken move, the same attack stat, and a speed-boosting ability in weather? Seems pretty cool, right? Only disadvantage was its Ice typing and its issues hitting bulky Waters... or so i thought :P
Freeze Dry hits every Fishious resist for neutral or super-effective damage, besides Walrein and Shedinja. Plus, it has access to 100% accurate Blizzards to chip down Ferros and Buzzwoles. This team was supposed to be just for fun, but it ended up being my favourite team I've built this gen, and it got me, a bad player, to top 200 and could easily be taken higher by a top player.
The Team
️️ Luna ️️ (Ninetales-Alola) (F) @ Icy Rock Ability: Snow Warning Shiny: Yes EVs: 248 HP / 8 Def / 252 Spe Timid Nature IVs: 0 Atk - Moonblast - Aurora Veil - Toxic - Encore | Just the hail setter. Toxic is to hit Ttars, Volcaronas, Hippos, Unaware Clefs, etc especially on the switch. Odd HP to survive 4 rounds of rocks. Pretty standard otherwise as far as I know. She is sometimes needed to fill slight holes in my defensive core, because for example, Corviknight is often not enough to deal with Weavile on its own, and a Dragon immunity is nice for predicting moves from Chomp or Pult. Her name is Luna and she is canonically trans. |
Steve (Arctozolt) @ Heavy-Duty Boots Ability: Slush Rush EVs: 80 Atk / 176 SpA / 252 Spe Naive Nature - Bolt Beak - Blizzard - Freeze-Dry - Stomping Tantrum | Higher spatk than standard to ensure maximum Blizzard damage to Ferro/Buzzwole. Enough attack to OHKO Weavile and to 2HKO standard Clef. Stomping Tantrum is its strongest option against Heatran and Magnezone, and can also surprise Zeraoras that Volt Absorb Bolt Beak. His name is Steve and he works in HR. |
Bob (Arctovish) @ Life Orb Ability: Slush Rush EVs: 32 Atk / 224 SpA / 252 Spe Naughty Nature IVs: 29 HP - Fishious Rend - Freeze-Dry - Blizzard - Hail | The icelord himself, Vish 2HKOs pretty much the entire tier, but the main guys you gotta worry about are Ferrothorn, Volcanion and Spdef Pex (physdef is 2hkoed :)). Worst-case Arctovish gets big damage on the opposing Ferro or Pex which opens up Arctozolt and Latias. Volcanion is the closest thing to a counter but Latias kinda walls it and Swampert usually like wins the 1v1 if you play well. 29 HP IVs means you take 1 less % of Life Orb damage. No one really stays in with Pult on this so you don't miss the <420 speed stat that much. Usually the first thing I do when loading up this team is look at the opponent's Arctovish switchins. It's rarely the win condition itself but it's like one of the best wallbreakers in the game imo, and destroys almost all stall teams near-singlehandedly. His name is Bob and he is a pretty chill guy. |
Emily (Latias) @ Weakness Policy Ability: Levitate EVs: 200 HP / 252 Def / 56 Spe Timid Nature IVs: 0 Atk - Stored Power - Aura Sphere - Calm Mind - Roost | Secondary wincon to the hail guys, Latias just has a really nice profile of resistances for Hail. Switching in to Water, Fighting, Fire, Grass, Electric, Psychic and Ground moves allows Latias to setup on or wall mons like Urshifu, Kartana, Blaziken, Heatran, Victini, Zapdos and Rotom-Wash. Many of those are problems for the hail abusers/my defensive pivots. I've tried Magnezone and Kommo-o in this slot, but I've had the most success with Latias. Psyshock can be better in some cases, and more speed would help against Garchomp, Taunt Mew, and Specs Blacephalon, but I found myself adding more and more physical defense over time to be able to setup on more things, so its speed had to suffer a little. Her name is Emily and she girlbosses all over the tier. |
Jaiden (Swampert) (F) @ Assault Vest Ability: Torrent Shiny: Yes EVs: 252 HP / 24 Def / 232 SpD Sassy Nature IVs: 0 Spe - Flip Turn - Earthquake - Mirror Coat - Stone Edge | AV Pert is super underrated, imo. The EVs just maximise Spdef and hit an aestically pleasing 222 defense, whilst minimising speed for slow pivots. When using Leftovers or Helmet sets I found that 90% of the time I'm clicking Flip Turn and switching in on special moves, so why not just make it AV and give up on rocks? This set means I don't auto-lose to Scarf Blacephalon, and it allows me to come in on annoying mons like Slowking-Galar, Zapdos, Dragapult, Volcanion and especially Heatran, and more often than not gain momentum. Mirror Coat allows me to lure a kill on Lele/Volcanion, and Stone Edge is specifically for the Volcarona matchup because I found I was super weak to it and never used Scald anyway. Her name is Jaiden and her unqiue colour is a result of eating all of the cupcakes. |
Darren (Corviknight) (M) @ Rocky Helmet Ability: Pressure EVs: 248 HP / 196 Def / 64 SpD Relaxed Nature IVs: 0 Spe - Body Press - U-turn - Defog - Roost | The corresponding physdef slow pivot to go with Swampert, this is pretty standard for a Corv, it's a defogger, steel type, ground immune and slow pivot all in one. Its defensive profile complements Pert extremely well (Pert switches into most Elec/Fire attacks, Corv switches into most physical and grass attacks). His name is Darren and he is a gigachad. |
Pokepaste
https://pokepast.es/391f6e2b188cbde8
Alternate versions
These versions are pretty good too, but Zone -> Latias was ultimately the key to this team's success. I still think defensive Defog Zapdos is a fine substitution for Corv, but the team would then lack a steel type so really I'd have to also do something like Latias->Melmetal. If anyone wants to branch off the Zone route, I'd recommend Chople Magnet Rise since it's good for both Ferrothorn and Melmetal.
You can also try spdef lando over spdef pert, but you become weaker to mons like Blaceph and Heatran over time.
Matchups
- This team destroys all stall except for Safety Goggles Shedinja + Spdef Hippo stall which is pretty much impossible unless you catch the Shed off guard with Edge Pert or Toxic Alolatales. Luckily this is extremely rare.
- This team generally wins against balance teams, with the most annoying mons being Ferro, Spdef Pex, and Volcanion, though like you have 6 mons and the breakers here are broken. Like, generally balance teams will have like one or two answers for each Hail abuser but the fact they often overlap just means you have to sack one to beat the other.
- This team destroys Rain, thanks to its huge vulnerability to Freeze Dry. Ferro is the only threat on there and once it takes a couple Ice moves it's pretty close to dead. Latias also does great vs Rain.
- This team hard loses to Sun, as well as Trick Room, unless your opponent is bad & you're a prediction god. Again, luckily, these team archetypes are very rare.
- This team struggles against Sand, since it becomes a war of whose setter dies first (or if you get the vital freezes within the first few ice moves). It's by no means unwinnable but teams with Ttar often do well against this team.
- This team generally wins vs opposing hail, since you have two hail abusers.
- Volcarona offense wins automatically vs you if they crit Giga Drain or dodge Stone Edge.
- This team has a 50/50 matchup against spikestack, since Spikes aren't that bad and you outspeed a lot of their guys but Rocks and Weavile are annoying.
- This team generally wins vs HO, though Blaziken in particular is tough if it has Knock for Latias, or if their team forces damage on Latias early on.
In an overview of the sample teams, only the two Sand teams are really difficult from preview and otherwise you can outplay most teams there without too much effort, and Stall and Rain in particular are made super easy if you don't throw. Obviously the real range of teams is a lot more broad and varied in practice but hopefully that's useful as a rough guide to help you plan out your games.
Replays
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1710403235 Band Pult BO
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1709053177 6-0ing minimax AI lol
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1707580210 Destroying stall
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1708823287 Destroying stall again
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1710285515-n0llsex7a13l9fbu3capsmd1l1hvyx9pw Weavile + Lele BO
Conclusion
This team is pretty easy to win with vs standard, non-sand teams, it's just 2 wallbreakers, a hail setter, 2 bulky pivots, and a CM setup wincon. If you're tired of getting stalled this team gets games over with quickly and doesn't require that much skill. You just click buttons and win. Looking forward to Gen 9 but this team will stay with me as my favourite team of the generation <3