First RMT - OU

[ImMrCow]

-----------------First 4th Gen Team------------------

Intro
I used to play a lot of 3rd gen, and I knew most of the strategies and pokemon, but now with DPPT, I'm forced to learn the new pokemon and movesets. Here is my first attempt at a DPPT team.
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Azelf

Item: Focus Sash
Ability: Levitate
EV's: 56 Atk / 252 Spe / 200 SpA
Nature: Naive(+Spe, -SpD)
-Fire Blast
-Psychic
-Taunt
-Stealth Rock

Good lead for now, Taunts Swampert and can setup SR. OHKOs Infernape and Fire Blast for Yanmega, but other than that, just a SR setup starter that usually gets suicided. Thinking of replacing it with Aerodactyl, but it might get OHKO'd by Swampert. Need some input.

Rhyperior

Item: Life Orb
Ability: Solid Rock
EV's: 252 Atk / 252 Spe / 4 SpD
Nature: Jolly(+Spe, -SpA)
-Rock Polish
-Stone Edge
-Earthquake
-Substitute

Rock Polish Rhyperior is amazing. Scary physical sweeper, and with max speed EV's and a Rock polish, it's speed rises to 392, and it becomes a deadly force. Substitute can help keep it alive longer, but it's really just meant to sweep with the help of STAB.

Infernape

Item: Life Orb
Ability: Blaze
EV's: 64 Atk / 192 Spe / 252 SpA
Nature: Naive(+Spe, -SpD)
-Close Combat
-Hidden Power Ice
-Grass Knot
-Flamethrower

Mixed Sweeper. Covers tons of types, and can be used to catch opponents off guard with moves that they dont know I have. Based mostly on Special Attack.

Empoleon

Item: Petaya Berry
Ability: Torrent
EV's: 12 HP/ 232 Spe / 232 SpA / 12 SpD
Nature: Modest(+SpA, -Atk)
-Agility
-Substitute
-Surf
-Grass Knot

Set up with Agility on one of the 12 types it resists, then SubPetaya away. 4x resist to Bullet Punch, which is great thanks to it's frequent use. Grass knot can be used against water types, and I can Surf everything else. I think Ice Beam would be a much better choice because it can cover more types, but I need to be able to kill water well, because I don't have anything else that can.

Heatran

Item: Choice Scarf
Ability: Flash Fire
EV's: 4 HP / 252 Spe / 252 SpA
Nature: Naive(+Spe, -SpD)
-Earth Power
-Flamethrower
-Explosion
-HP Grass

Flamethrower is for STAB and keeps grass and steel types at bay. Earth Power is needed for a Heatran counter, but Earthquake is statiscally better than Earth Power, should I switch to quake? Explosion is for when Heatran is spent and HP Grass is for water type counters.

Staraptor

Item: Choice Band
Ability: Intimidate
EV's: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Nature: Adamant(+Atk, -SpA)
-Brave Bird
-Close Combat
-Return
-U-turn

Can switch onto grass types, scizor and on a faint. Then scout counters with U-turn or just use Close Combat for rock types, and Return electric types. Can also sweep well.


That's the team, give me your input. I'm willing to make changes, like adding in Electivire or Magnezone as my electric type. I'm also wondering about putting Scizor in. Pokemon changes, Item changes, nature, moveset or any others are welcome. I really want to add in an electric type, because I realized I don't have any electric attacks. I'm thinking either Zapdos or Jolteon, which one is better? Thanks for reading.

 

[Bloo]

You have quite a significant Ground weakness, with four of your Pokemon weak to Earthquake and two immunities, and you are quite vulnerable to Water as well. A common user of Earthquake + Water is Gyarados. Gyarados is a big threat to your team. It can easily pull of a Dragon Dance on a locked Close Combat from your Staraptor, or a locked Flamethrower or Earth Power from Heatran. Gyarados can also set up on Infernape as well. Gyarados will then proceed to sweep with Earthquake/Stone Edge/Waterfall/ A Pokemon that can help against Gyarados while providing a Water/Ground/Fighting resist will be very beficial to your team. The best you can do is Explode on it with Heatran; this puts your revenge-killer out of work, and if said Gyarados is used in conjuction with Swords Dance Lucario, you probably lose most of the time. So I will suggest a Pokemon to help with these problems.

The perfect Pokemon for this role is Celebi. Celebi will provide you with a Ground/Water/Fighting resist as stated above. It will also give you an excellent counter to Gyarados and most Bulky Water-types such as Vaporeon, Suicune, and Swampert, other Pokemon that give your team a hard time. Celebi also pairs up with Heatran nicely as they cover each others weaknesses perfectly. You can use Celebi over Starpator or Empoleon. Empoleon adds an additional Fighting and Ground weakness to your team and replacing it with Celebi, will remedy this weakness. Celebi is much more effective at taking down Water-types than Empoleon. If you decide to use it over Staraptor, you lose an extra Ground immunity and a Fighting resist, in addition to a very useful Intimidate. However, if you decide to use Celebi over Empoleon, you can use Gyarados over Staraptor. Gyarados provides you with an Intimidate user in addition to the Fighting resist and Ground immunity that Staraptor provided. Gyarados also teams up well with your Heatran and Celebi if you decide to use it as they have great synergy together. Gyarados can also give you an additional Lucario counter instead of having to rely on Heatran revenge-killing it. Gyarados also helps against Scizor, Infernape, and Heatran. You can use a set of Dragon Dance/Waterfall/Earthquake/Ice Fang, 4 HP/252 Attack/252 Speed, Adamant, Life Orb. Gyarados has amazing coverage with that set and is a scary sweeper due to its ability to raise its already impressive Attack and decent Speed with Dragon Dance. Overall, Gyarados is more durable than Staraptor and can sweep more effectively due to Gyarados' ability to Dragon Dance, instead of being locked into Choice Band like Staraptor.

With Grass Knot and possibly Thunder Wave, Gyarados is not beating Celebi very easily. If add HP Fire, Celebi can get the surprise kill on Scizor. However, Scizor with Special Defense EV's will not be OHKOed by Hidden Power Fire at full health. However, after a few turns of Stealth Rock damage, you get the KO in return. The set I suggest is Grass Knot / HP Fire / Thunderwave / Recover, with an EV spread of 252 HP / 220 Def / 36 Spe and a Bold nature. The EVs give Celebi overall good walling capabilities while still outrunning Jolly Tyranitar, allowing you to Grass Knot it before it hurts you with Crunch. Grass Knot is there for STAB and to hit various other Bulky Waters that hurt your team quite a bit. Hidden Power Fire gives Celebi the opportunity to hit Steel-types such as Forretress, Scizor, and Metagross reasonably hard. Recover is there to heal off any damage you take and Thunder Wave is there to slow down threats such as Infernape and Heatran, both of which like switching into Celebi. You can Thunder Wave them, making it eaier for your Pokemon to set up or handle certain threats more effectively.

If you use Celebi, the need for Hidden Power Grass on Heatran is lessened. Celebi will be able to take Water types with ease, meaning Heatran can now use another move over Hidden Power Grass. I suggest using Dragon Pulse. With Dragon Pulse, you can now revenge kill a Salamence locked onto Outrage. Now you do not have to Explode on it. Dragon Pulse also allows you to hit Latias, Flygon, Dragonite, and Kingdra as well for super effective damage! On Azelf, I suggest using Explosion over Taunt. Only one Pokemon on your team has to really worry about Stealth Rock and that is Staraptor, and Gyarados if you decide to use him over Staraptor. Explosion will allow Azelf to get rid of a Pokemon that is troubling you. Explosion also hits everything in OU for huge amounts of damage, even the Steel types such as Bronzong that resist Explosion!

Item: Choice Scarf
Ability: Flash Fire
EV's: 4 HP / 252 Spe / 252 SpA
Nature: Naive (+Spe, -SpD)
-Earth Power
-Flamethrower
-Explosion
-HP Grass

Flamethrower is for STAB and keeps grass and steel types at bay. Earth Power is needed for a Heatran counter, but Earthquake is statistically better than Earth Power, should I switch to quake? Explosion is for when Heatran is spent and HP Grass is for water type counters.

No, do not use Earthquake on Heatran. Heatran has a poor Attack stat, making Earthquake a weak move on Heatran. Earthquake will not even hit things like Blissey hard. Heatran is a Pokemon that utilizes Special Attacks, and since Earth Power is a special attack, I suggest keeping it.