First RMT,

[monte.valentine]

This is my first RMT on Smogon, but I am in no way new to the game. Still, I really need some help. I've been testing and adjusting this group for weeks, and there are still some serious issues to be fixed. These include particularly fire attackers(especially Heatran), bulky waters (especially Swampert/Suicune), and entry hazards. Some of my sets are a bit unorthodox, but most of them have proven to be very effective. Still, there are definitely some big holes and I would really appreciate any help or suggestions you can give.
So, on to the team itself:

Gengar@ Wide Lens
EVs: 252 Spe, 252 SpA, 4 Hp
Timid
Focus Blast, Shadow Ball, Thunderbolt, Hypnosis

Gengar has been a very helpful lead for me for quite a while. I've only really had a problem with Metagross, Azelf and Jirachi leads. I recently tried a substitute/life orb set, but it simply didn't work as well for me. The sleep support is really nice and Focus Blast's questionable accuracy is helped by wide lens.

Weavile@ Choice Band
EVs: 252 Atk, 252 Spe, 4 HP
Jolly
Pursuit, Brick Break, Ice Shard, Aerial Ace

Weavile is great for revenge killing, particularly dragons and psychics. Often I use it to trap Azelf leads, which Gengar appreciates. Aerial Ace is usually not used, but I like the surprise ability to kill Heracross and Infernape. Night Slash is another option for the slot that I often use.

Scizor@ Lum Berry
EVs: 252 Atk, 252 Spe, 4 HP
Adamant
Bullet Punch, Superpower, x-Scissor, Swords Dance

Yes, a lum berry. You wouldn't believe how handy that becomes when opponents throw status moves at you while you swords dance (most often Blissey with Thunder Wave). Superpower takes out Snorlax and Blissey with relative ease, and bullet punch is obviously great for Gengar, Mamoswine, and the like. Still, he has trouble with Tentacruel and Skarmory, and fire types own him. Maybe better of with Choice Band?

Typhlosion@ Choice Scarf
EVs: 252 Spe, 252 SpA, 4 Hp
Timid
Eruption, Flamethrower, Hidden Power Elec, Focus Blast

This probably seems like a strange thing to use, but this Typhlosion is a superb late-game sweeper. I get a lot of KO's on fragile speedy pokes that don't expect him to be quite this fast. This one can usually revenge kill Gyarados with Hidden Power as well. Bulky waters and Blissey usually cause problems, but the biggest issue Typhlosion has is dealing with spikes, stealth rock, and toxic spikes. He really can't be used effectively unless these are cleared.

Tentacruel@ Leftovers
EVs: 252 HP, 120 Def, 136 SpD
Calm
Surf, Sludge Bomb, Rapid Spin, Toxic Spikes

I actually had Donphan as my spinner for a long time, but my problems with fire types led me to choose something with a fire resistance and better special defense. I still kind of prefer Donphan as a more solid spinner, since Tentacruel hasn't endured as well in battle while I've been testing. Toxic spikes is a nice extra that Donphan couldn't provide, however.

Swampert@ Leftovers
EVs: 252 HP, 252 Def, 4 Atk
Impish
Avalanche, Earthquake, Roar, Stealth Rock

Swampert provides Stealth Rock and phazing. I chose a physical set so I could have a little better type coverage with just those two moveslots. I actually put him in here largely as a fire counter, but lately I've seen a lot of Hp grass from Heatrans.

So, there you have it. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated! I see some weak links where changes could be made, like how Scizor with Pursuit and Choice band could probably take over Weavile's role, but I'm not sure exactly what to fill that slot with, or perhaps Weavile is the best option in the first place. Please, feel free to share your thoughts, and thank you in advance

 

[SoulRed12]

This is my first RMT on Smogon, but I am in no way new to the game. Still, I really need some help. I've been testing and adjusting this group for weeks, and there are still some serious issues to be fixed. These include particularly fire attackers(especially Heatran), bulky waters (especially Swampert/Suicune), and entry hazards. Some of my sets are a bit unorthodox, but most of them have proven to be very effective. Still, there are definitely some big holes and I would really appreciate any help or suggestions you can give.
So, on to the team itself:

Gengar@ Wide Lens
EVs: 252 Spe, 252 SpA, 4 Hp
Timid
Focus Blast, Shadow Ball, Thunderbolt, Hypnosis

I really don't like Gengar at all, much less as a lead. He's just too frail and situational. Instead, consider switching your lead to swampert (set below him) and change gengar to a bulky Zapdos.

Zapdos @ Leftovers
Evs: 252 HP / 220 Def / 36 Spe
Bold Nature
-Thunderbolt
-Heat Wave
-Roost
-Roar / HP Grass

This also provides a decent counter to gyarados, which currently eats your team for breakfast once it gets a dd under its belt, heracross, which will OHKO or seriously damage every other member of your team bar swampert with one attack or another, .

Weavile@ Choice Band
EVs: 252 Atk, 252 Spe, 4 HP
Jolly
Pursuit, Brick Break, Ice Shard, Night Slash / Ice Punch

This is fine, except for Aerial Ace. Weavile wants night slash or ice punch, especially since acing on a heracross switch in takes a lot of prediction and night slash and ice punch are important STAB moves. In addition, most heracross are scarfed which means they kill you with megahorn before you can even get the move off. Aerial Ace is just to situational in this case to be useful, and therefore you are needlessly using up a moveslot that could be used to give Weavile some much needed power.

Scizor@ Life Orb
EVs: 252 Atk, 224 Spe, 32 HP
Adamant
Bullet Punch, Superpower, x-Scissor, Swords Dance

Scizor wants Life Orb and the above evs. Lum berry is really lost on him since you can block twaves with swampert now. Also, it doesn't need max speed because the few extra evs don't allow him to outspeed any extra pokes; with 224 evs, you outspeed max speed neutral nature ttar. Life orb gives it the extra power it needs to ensure it deal that crucial amount of extra damage. You also might want to consider putting roost over x-scizzor, since bullet punch is already incredibly powerful when you take into account technician, SD, life orb, and STAB.

Typhlosion@ Choice Scarf
EVs: 252 Spe, 252 SpA, 4 Hp
Timid
Eruption, Flamethrower, Hidden Power Elec, Focus Blast

Generally you don't use pure fire types. This is why Infernape (and to a lesser extent, blaziken) is so popular; his secondary fighting type means that SR only does 12.5% instead of a whopping 25%. Typhlosion may have a few more SpA points than infernape, but infernape both outspeeds it and is neutral against stealth rocks, while also giving you access to the amazing close combat move as STAB and grass knot, for those pesky swamperts which will last pretty long against your team. Try this mixape set:

Infernape @ Life Orb
EVs: 64 Atk / 252 SpA / 192 Spe
Naive nature (+Spe, -SpD)
-Close Combat
-Fire Blast
-HP Ice
-Grass Knot

You might want to consider giving this guy a choice scarf for the revenge killing possibilities. That of course restricts him as well, so be careful.


Tentacruel@ Leftovers
EVs: 252 HP, 120 Def, 136 SpD
Calm
Surf, Sludge Bomb, Rapid Spin, Toxic Spikes

With the removal of typhlosion, you don't have an incredible need for a spinner. It could prove useful, but generally spinners are killed quickly since rapid spin essentially gives the opponent a free turn. Instead I'd personally consider investing in a much needed counter to salamence, so you don't have to sacrifice someone just to get weavile in safely for the ice shard. But even so, once you get weavile in, salamence will probably just leave. I would consider a calm cresselia here, with ice beam and twave, to sponge mence's attacks and cripple either mence or whoever the switch in is. Check out smogon's strategy dex for some good cress sets.

Swampert@ Leftovers
EVs: 252 HP, 252 Def, 4 Atk
Impish
Avalanche, Earthquake, Roar, Stealth Rock

Lead with this guy, and use this set:

Swampert @ Leftovers
240 HP / 52 Att / 216 Def
Relaxed Nature (+Def, -Spe)
-Earthquake
-Waterfall / Avalanche
-Roar
-Stealth Rock

Lets you set up stealth rock and deal a bit of damage as well. It's also useful to spam roars until you deal a bunch of residual SR damage and see most of the rest of your opponent's team.

I can see quite a few weaknesses, including non-scarfed heatran (who generally carry hp grass specifically for swampert and outspeed swampert even without a scarf before he can kill back with e/q), gyarados, salamence, and heracross. Hopefully some of the changes I suggested will help with that. ^_^

Finally, start thinking about what your central strategy is for this team. What is your overall goal? Scizor sweep? Etc.? Basically you want to use each poke for a certain job to allow you to achieve your goal. If you want a scizor sweep, you also want to keep swampert healthy to get rid of any fires and steels that will make it impossible for scizor to deal damage without being killed. Thus when you make a team, it's beneficial to go through and say, I want this pokemon because he covers these bases and helps get rid of these types of pokemon and resists this type of attack, instead of just trying to counter every threat in the game.

Hope this helped. ^_^

 

[monte.valentine]

thanks for the tips, this works a lot better. however, i'm not too thrilled with the idea of replacing half the team, much less with legends. I just personally have an issue with using them and prefer to avoid it altogether. I will definitely move Swampert to lead though, because that has worked a lot better. Of course, the other holes will still be there, so i'll probably just start from square one. thank you for the wake up call though

 

[SoulRed12]

however, i'm not too thrilled with the idea of replacing half the team, much less too legends. I just personally have an issue with using them and prefer to avoid it altogether.

Just a tip: If you're going to play pokemon competitively, that is, with people other than just playing your friends to have some fun, you should learn the tier system. That is, Uber, OverUsed, UnderUsed, and NeverUsed. Notice there's no spot there for "legends"; instead, it's ranked based on usage (which also estimates the pokemon's power).

The legends I listed in my critique, Zapdos and Cresselia, both fall under the OU category, and as such you will see many people using them. If you restrict yourself to no legends at all arbitrarily, you may find yourself losing more often because of it. Instead, restrict yourself to only OU pokemon, and not Ubers (such as Groudon, Rayquaza, Palkia, etc.) It may seem that even OU legends in general give players some unfair advantages, but they each will go down just as easily as anyone else when not used correctly.

 

[monte.valentine]

Just a tip: If you're going to play pokemon competitively, that is, with people other than just playing your friends to have some fun, you should learn the tier system.

i am well aware of the tier system, and of course i know none of these pokemon are ubers. please don't imply that i don't know what im doing. and i'm certainly not saying they're unfair or that they shouldn't be used. i just personally don't use them because i don't like them and i dont see a need for them.

 

[SoulRed12]

i am well aware of the tier system, and of course i know none of these pokemon are ubers. please don't imply that i don't know what im doing. and i'm certainly not saying they're unfair or that they shouldn't be used. i just personally don't use them because i don't like them and i dont see a need for them.

I never said nor implied that you don't know what you're doing, you came up with that yourself. But disliking legends just because they are legends usually means someone is unfamiliar with the tier system and see legends as unfair or cheap.

And personally, I can't really understand any other reason for disliking legends just because of the fact that they are legends.

 

[monte.valentine]

nothing's unfair. groudon & arceus aren't invincible either. i've always figured there's only one of each in the game for a reason. it's just a personal policy. end of discussion, this is beginning to get retarded. i can almost kind of see where people see smogon users as elitist. i'm not fully convinced, but i see where the mistake could be made.

 

[SoulRed12]

nothing's unfair. groudon & arceus aren't invincible either. i've always figured there's only one of each in the game for a reason. it's just a personal policy. end of discussion, this is beginning to get retarded. i can almost kind of see where people see smogon users as elitist. i'm not fully convinced, but i see where the mistake could be made.

Fine? I really don't understand why you keep taking my posts as insulting; they're not in the least, and they're not meant to be. I'm simply trying to help, but when you wrote that you thought I was implying you were unknowledgable I felt I should explain where I was coming from.

Maybe it's because I don't use enough emoticons, or something.

 

[Oddish On Fire]

nothing's unfair. groudon & arceus aren't invincible either. i've always figured there's only one of each in the game for a reason. it's just a personal policy. end of discussion, this is beginning to get retarded. i can almost kind of see where people see smogon users as elitist. i'm not fully convinced, but i see where the mistake could be made.

Whether you like it or not, he's right, so don't take things so offensively. Since you're a newer player he was just trying to help and you responded with complete animosity. I was planning on rating your team, but I see no reason to if you'll simply respond with anger.

Your argument was that there are only 1 in each game. So? Unless someone has a team composed of more than one of the SAME legendary, you would be correct in your argument, but species clause prevents that. Your basis is faulty and therefore irrelevant.

And considering the use of legendary pokemon as elitism is simply illogical.

 

[monte.valentine]

Whether you like it or not, he's right, so don't take things so offensively. Since you're a newer player he was just trying to help and you responded with complete animosity. I was planning on rating your team, but I see no reason to if you'll simply respond with anger.

Your argument was that there are only 1 in each game. So? Unless someone has a team composed of more than one of the SAME legendary, you would be correct in your argument, but species clause prevents that. Your basis is faulty and therefore irrelevant.

And considering the use of legendary pokemon as elitism is simply illogical.

i'm really not seeing where i responded with any animosity. that's a huge exaggeration. and I suppose my one in each game comment was vague, and im sure any further explaination would sound completely retarded on my part unless you really want to think outside the box, and this thread is obviously not the place for that kind of thinking and rightly so. in any case, all of that is entirely irrelevant.

also, the thought that using legendary pokemon is elitism is completely ridiculous. i clearly never said that it was. i was referring to the fact that it has been assumed that i am a rookie player, that im not even aware of the tier system for example. that's the only thing that i found insulting. i've seen quite a few comments on other forums labeling smogon users as elitist or snobby, which is an unfortunate generalization. i simply said that i can see where people could jump to that conclusion, but i don't believe it to be completely true.

the first reply was extremely helpful and well done, and i really appreciate the suggestions offered. you got me to realize what i had to do, which is start from scratch and rethink this team altogether. not that you said or implied that, but it's what needs to be done and i thank you for helping me see that so i can start working on it sooner. it was exactly what i needed, but i think this whole discussion should have been over with after the third post.