First RMT, please take a look

PizzaDelivery

Hi everyone. I've been battling competitively for a few months, and this is my first RMT. I've played pretty much only OU so far, currently hovering around 1450 on the ladder. This team seems to be performing better than my others at this point, and is also the most aggressive one. The idea is mainly to set up stealth rock then just hit as hard as possible with strong attacks and setup sweepers. Pretty crude, no rapid spinners or phasers or anything, but it's work decently enough. Hopefully this RMT can improve it.

The team

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Azelf @ Focus Sash
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 6 HP/252 Spd/252 SAtk
Timid nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Stealth Rock
- Explosion
- Flamethrower
- Psychic

I've switched this lead around a few times, since I'm mainly just looking for an offensive lead that can lay down a stealth rock. Psychic is for STAB, Flamethrower for coverage, and Explosion I've found useful. I'm still not that tied to it, and would be open to changing it. As a sidenote, this guy is one of the few on my team that can do something to both Skarm and Bliss, assuming he survives the lead spot.
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Snorlax (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Thick Fat
EVs: 252 HP/6 Atk/252 Def
Adamant nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Crunch
- Earthquake
- Body Slam
- Ice Punch

This guy is my fallback. I can switch him safely into alot of things, and hit reasonably hard with good coverage. Ghosts, Heatran, Jolteon, Starmie to name a few. It's also revenge killed alot of dragons. Something feels odd about EVing him like this as a tank rather than special wall, so I'd be open to suggestions. I've considered a few replacements, but none of them could switch in on nearly as many things.
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Scizor (M) @ Muscle Band
Ability: Technician
EVs: 252 HP/252 Atk/6 Spd
Adamant nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Bullet Punch
- Quick Attack
- Swords Dance
- Roost

Before every using a Scizor it struck me as overrated. Not anymore. This thing cleans up incredibly well in the lategame, and is a useful revenge killer to weakened sweepers. It previously had superpower instead of roost to do more damage to Skarmory, but I found it got worn down pretty quickly, hence the roost. Quick attack gives coverage against those water and electric types often sent out against Scizor, and even fire types if they're low enough to be picked off by it. There were about 4 or 5 other items I considered for the item slot, and I'm wondering if life orb could work better than muscle band.
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Kingdra (M) @ Chesto Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 252 HP/114 Atk/144 Spd
Adamant nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Rest
- Dragon Dance
- Waterfall
- Outrage

A build up attacker with only one weakness. I previously had it carrying a lum berry and with speed and attack maxed out, but I saw something about Chesto Berry Kingdra and decided to try it out. The speed EV was probably designed to outrun something, but i can't remember what atm. The HP gives it the bulk to make use of the Rest+Chesto combination.
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Gengar (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 6 HP/252 Spd/252 SAtk
Timid nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Shadow Ball
- Thunderbolt
- Focus Blast
- Hidden Power [Fire]

I won't go on about this one too much, since it's pretty much the exact same as the Life Orb set discussed on the strategy pokedex. Heavy damage and plenty of coverage, though focus blast is a really annoying move to have to run. In view of what I think is a weakness to skarmbliss in my team, I'm wondering if pain split should find it's way on there. Explosion seems as though it would be too weak to take down Blissey.
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Dragonite (M) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 6 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
Adamant nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Extremespeed
- Outrage
- Earthquake
- Dragon Dance

Dragon dancer number two. I usually put this in after Kingdra to give me time to scout the opponent's team and possible Ice/priority moves. Lum Berry stops one bout of confusion from outrage, or else gives me an extra turn to dance if the other player tries to paralyse. This guy is insanely powerful, but runs into a dead end against Skarmory. I'm considering Fire Punch over Earthquake. I don't want to give up Earthquake, but I want to keep extremespeed even more - you can never have too much priority.
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As for threats, the main thing that worries me at the moment is a well played stall team with a strong special and physical wall (especially SkarmBliss). I've not run into it too many so times so far, but when I have I've either lost or had to predict extremely well (or extremely luckily) to win. The changes I'm considering on my existing pokemon to better handle that are fire punch on Dragonite, pain split on Gengar. I'm open to changing pokemon as well, but preferably not half the team.

Other than that, I'm not sure what threats stand out. I previously had a few bad fights against high offence Jolteons, but that was before Dragonite had Extremespeed and now I can usually pick them off. Snorlax works against Jolteon too, but it won't stay in to take an Earthquake.

That's it, thanks for reading, please give it a rate! Cheers.
 
Minor nitpick. Why not change Azelf's nature to hasty or naive since you have a minus attack nature which will heavily reduce explosions damage. I dont have time to rate now so reserving this post for later.
 
Notable Threats
Lead Machamp
Lack of a revenge killer
Lack of Rock type resist
Skarmbliss core (and to a greater extent, stall)
Dragon Dance Gyarados

How they're threats
Yeah, so Machamp can take out Azelf with Payback+Bullet Punch, so your Azelf has to decide between doing damage or getting Stealth Rock up. None of your Pokemon after that enjoy a Dynamic Punch to the face, and those that don't mind it too much are handled by Payback/Ice Punch. There's nothing here to take Choice band/Scarf Tyranitar's Stone Edge, sure you revenge with Scizor, but he will make holes in your team with boosted Stone Edge. Skarmory+Blissey combo walls you to no end, if they have hazards down, they'll make you switch around by constantly walling your team (Skarmory takes on Snorlax/Scizor/Dragonite/can PHaze Kingdra, while Blissey handles Gengar). Dragon Dance Gyarados (especially life orb variants) will make you cry, by setting up all over Scizor, while you do up to 23% after Intimidate.

Solutions
Change Azelf to a Colbur Berry variant, with the following spread: 8 HP|140 Atk|144 Sdef|216 Speed, Jolly nature, and a moveset of: Stealth Rock/Taunt/Explosion/U-turn. With this, you always survive Machamp's Payback+Bullet Punch, set-up Stealth Rock as it Paybacks, and Explode on its face as it Bullet Punches. i think Choice scarf Jirachi works wonders over Scizor, giving you a rock resist, something to stop Dragon Dance/ Choice band Tyranitar, and a very nice Lucario and Gyarados check, and can check Dragon Dance Dragonite (something Scizor kind of did), all in one! Try a set of Iron Head|Fire Punch|Thunder Punch|Ice Punch and a spread of 252 Atk|4Def|252 Spe and Jolly nature. To handle Skarm+Bliss, try SubSplit Gengar over your current one, with the same spread as your current one, but Pain Split and Substitute, over ThunderBolt and Hidden power Fire. Skarmory can't do much but pHaze you, while you Focus Blast it for a hefty amount of damage. Blissey loses to Pain Split+Focus Blast+Substitute. It either focuses on keeping its health up to live through Foucs blast assaults, where you Pain Split, or tries to attack Gengar, while slowly dying to Focus Blast. Seismic toss doesn't affect gengar, which is the most common move on Blissey, so it won't be doing too much to Gengar, while risking getting KOed by FocusBlast/Substitute/PainSplit.

If you want a more specific meaning if the above wasn't satisfying:
"The combination of Substitute and Pain Split allows Gengar to take out Pokémon it normally would not be able to, most notably Blissey. After Substitute and two Pain Splits (or one if sandstorm is in effect), Blissey's health will low enough so that Focus Blast is a 2HKO. This means that Blissey will be forced to constantly heal herself or risk being KOed. Pain Split has 32 PP, while Wish and Softboiled have 16, meaning that Gengar can easily stall Blissey out. If Blissey does not use a healing move to conserve PP, then she is at huge risk of being 2HKOed by Focus Blast."
Click to expand...

thats all i got, nice team, GL!
 
@Somalia, good point. I think that may have been left over from when it didn't have Explosion, but right now doing more damage with it is more important than one of the defence stats, which are paper thin anyway.

I think I've battled with you on the ladder and lost, though I can't remember if it was with this team. Heh.

@The LegendKiller, thanks for the rate. My normal play against lead Machamp is to hit it with Psychic, then switch in Scizor to take the bullet punch and knock it out with it's own bullet punch. That leaves Azelf at 1 HP or close to it, but with some chance to sneak back in since my opponent hasn't put up a stealth rock. The Colbur Berry change sounds interesting, but does it set me back against other leads? Heatran might be knocking me out with a fire blast. Without a focus sash, are there any leads I'll need to switch out of instantly?

You're right about Scarfed Stone Edge, I actually faced one today with my Scizor down, and was lucky to win (it missed twice against one of my pokemon). I haven't had so many problems with dragon dancing Gyrados, though. After Stealth Rock damage, Scizor usually seemed to end up winning, assuming decent health. At the very least it puts it in range of extremespeed. Atm I'm tempted by the Azelf change but not so much on replacing Scizor.

Is it worth fire punch over earthquake on Dragonite? Then it's walled by Heatran but does alot more to Skarmory, and Heatran doesn't bother me much anyway.

With Gengar, does it beat Blissey carrying thunder wave? I've fought that battle from the other side of the fence, and found that by thunder waving on the predicted pain split, I could paralyse the Gengar and make it near useless. Ice beam/bolt/flamethrower breaks the subs. Also, does it handle Skarmory with focus blast alone instead of thunderbolt? If the new model of Gengar beats both Skarm and Bliss then I'll definitely test it out.
 
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