SS OU Garchomp + Melmetal BO [1757 Elo, 85% GXE]

GARCHOMP + MELMETAL Bulky Offense
SS OU


Built by SLDR, played by Veritas95


- OVERVIEW AND IMPORTABLE -

:garchomp: :melmetal: :tapu lele: :tornadus-therian: :ferrothorn: :rotom-wash:

- LADDER RESULTS -
Immagine.png

- INTRODUCTION -
I built this team for Veritas95 a while back (you can see the date of the ladder screenshot for a reference; he made the account around the time I built the team) because he needed it for the seasonal OU tournament he was participating in. He ended up winning that round with the team and went on to try and rank as high as possible with it. Unfortunately, the laddering process ended up being two mornings of games because our schedules were absolutely incompatible (mainly because of me and my job - sorry my friend), but, even though we could have ranked a bit higher with more time on our hands, I think we still ended up with pretty respectable Elo and GXE. The team was built slightly ahead of the Blacephalon and Assault Vest Tornadus-T hype, which means it's also in a Kyurem metagame. Kyurem was never threatening to destroy the team since the offensive core paired well against it, but it definitely was a Pokémon that required extreme caution, so its removal from the tier arguably only benefitted the team's viability.

- TEAM BUILDING PROCESS -
As hinted by the title, the team is built around the offensive core of :garchomp: + :melmetal:

swords dance garchomp and protective pads melmetal share devastating offensive synergy, softening up each other checks (mainly melmetal for garchomp), such as slowbro, landorus-t and corviknight, but also the rarer tangrowth, buzzwole and skarmory. They also work well around each other’s weaknesses, with melmetal having great matchup against garchomp’s #1 enemy weavile and also hail and fairy types like clefable and tapu lele, while garchomp takes advantage of melmetal’s weakness to heatran and magnezone for setup opportunities.

Starting from this core, I knew I had to add a powerful choice scarf cleaner for several reasons: the core is pretty slow despite garchomp’s decent speed tier and thus vulnerable to the usain bolts of ou (specs pult, weavile, tapu koko, blacephalon, kartana,...). Furthermore, these two are phenomenal breakers and they share checks and victims amongst the wide array of steel types in ss ou, meaning they can effectively threaten and remove them. Lastly, garchomp itself utilizes fire fang to destroy weakened corviknight and is critically vulnerable to two important priorities to respect in ss ou which pray on scale shot’s defense drop: weavile’s ice shard and rillaboom’s grassy glide.

For these reasons, the only logical entry for the cleaner role is choice scarf :tapu lele:: flawlessly revengekills dragapult, weavile, kartana, tapu koko, zeraora, blace. Basically every offensive powerhouse or speedster gets popped by the sheer power of tapu lele, which is remarkable even without a power-boosting item.

the offense of the team seemed pretty much sorted for me: three very capable and powerful attackers, two can break and two can clean up the rubbles in different ways. Now it was time to give the team some backbone. :tornadus-therian: was the first one that got added: its sheer versatility as an utility pokèmon is unmatched in ss ou thanks to its amazing speed tier and the coveted uturn + regenerator combo. Defog was an option but I didn’t want to pidgeonhole myself into making it a defogger, so I just kept the option open. I mainly wanted it due to its synergy with melmetal and tapu lele: check to fighting types, ground immunity, rillaboom check, knock off + uturn combination to annoy everything, in particular heatran and other steel types for tapu lele.

The next member needed to sport entry hazard but also help out against opposing electric types, due to the offensive nature of garchomp. Also, having melmetal as the only steel type was worrysome to me because of its offensive role in the team. It’s meant to be used as a breaker, not a tank. :Ferrothorn: was the natural solution, despite being forced to drop spikes it makes for a reliable stealth rock setter and check to an infinite amount of pokèmon. Leech seed, body press and power whip allow ferro to check dangerous threats such as weavile, tapu fini, rain in general, tapu koko and annoy the crap out of stall teams. Ferrothorn is the true anchor of the team.

The last slot needed to provide insane role compression: heatran check, water and fire resist, lando switch-in, volturn proponent, potentially defogger to free up a slot for tornadus to run both hurricane and heat wave. Fortunately, :rotom-wash: exists and ticks all of those boxes. It also helps tremendously vs opposing tornadus-t and is arguably the best user of volt switch you could possibly ask for. It sports great synergy with both tornadus and ferrothorn defensively and helps cover up other threats such as dragonite as well.

:garchomp: :melmetal: :tapu lele: :tornadus-therian: :ferrothorn: :rotom-wash:

At this point I sent the team to veritas, who promptly reminded me that we didn’t have a dragapult check at all. It was really hard to find a worthy replacement for any one pokèmon here, so I had a very simple idea: torn-t was running 4 attacks already, so just whack an assault vest and we are good to go (this was done before blacephalon and the av torn-t hype exploded). With this small change, the team just took off. I played it myself for a couple of games and I found it really enjoyable and reliable, but for a more thorough and also valid showing, other than me saying “oh yeah, it totally works folks, trust”, I will provide replays acquired by veritas. For now, let’s get an in depth look into the team.

- TEAM IN DEPTH -

:leftovers:
GARCHOMP.png
:leftovers:
Garchomp @ Leftovers
Ability: Rough Skin
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe

Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance

- Scale Shot
- Earthquake

- Fire Fang

Swords Dance Garchomp acts as a mid-game wallbreaker and a late-game cleaner, depending on the situation. It also acts as the Electric immunity of the team and as a secondary Heatran and Volcarona check. It forms a powerful offensive synergy with Melmetal breaking through eachother’s checks, such as Slowbro, Tangrowth, Buzzwole and Corviknight, while Melmetal takes care of Fairy-types such as Clefable and Tapu Fini, Garchomp destroys the aforementioned Fire-types that trouble Melmetal.
EVs: pretty standard stuff for an offensive powerhouse.
Moveset: Again, very common move choice for Swords Dance Garchomp. Fire Fang is the preferred move for the 4th slot for its ability to deal big damage to Steel types that are immune or neutral to Earthquake, such as Ferrothorn and Corviknight.
Item: Yache Berry wasn’t needed due to the presence of Tapu Lele and Roseli Berry was too situational; I opted for Leftovers for reliability and longevity.

:protective pads:
melmetal.png
:protective pads:
Melmetal @ Protective Pads
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 40 HP / 252 Atk / 216 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Double Iron Bash
- Thunder Punch
- Superpower / Earthquake

- Toxic


Protective Pads Melmetal acts as a wallbreaker and lure early-to-mid game in order to open up for a Garchomp or Tapu Lele sweep. Its sheer bulk and immense power lets it check numerous threats such as Swords Dance Weavile, Tapu Lele, Tapu Fini and Calm Mind Clefable and acts as a back-up Steel type to relieve some pressure off of Ferrothorn’s shoulders.
EVs: This iteration of Protective Pads Melmetal has a lot of speed due to the team being susceptible to Calm Mind Clefable, especially when carrying a Fire type move. We lost a couple games to it when testing and decided to switch to a speedier set.
Moveset: the only noteworthy move is Toxic, which is here to thwart Slowbro, Gastrodon and Zapdos+Clefable structures, which ended up being very annoying for Garchomp and Melmetal to break through consistently and reliably. Toxic Melmetal lures and cripples Zapdos very efficiently and lets it break through the core a lot more easily.
Item: Protective Pads is very useful in avoiding disadvantageous contact effects held by opposing Pokémon, such as Zapdos’ Static and Ferrothorn’s Iron Barbs. This set is actually very tough for a common core of Garchomp + Zapdos + Ferrothorn to deal with, which is very helpful for my own Swords Dance Garchomp who has an awkward matchup against it.

:choice scarf:
lele.png
:choice scarf:
Tapu Lele @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature

IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic

- Moonblast
- Future Sight

- Aromatherapy


Tapu Lele acts as a revenge killer, speed control and late game cleaner, when equipped with a Choice Scarf. It appreciates our physically offensive core breaking through specially bulky Pokémon and especially Steel types. This lets it clean through faster teams a lot more easily. Tapu Lele is actually the most common win condition alongside Garchomp, because with them you usually need to weaken/remove just one or two Pokémon so let them run riot.
EVs: standard spread once again.
Moveset: Psychic and Moonblast are the two most powerful STABs for late game cleaning purposes. Future Sight and Aromatherapy are there not to play 5v6 against stall/bulkier teams. The first is a very underrated tool, being A LOT stronger than the usual Future Sight ran by any of the Slowtwins and – most of all – unexpected on Tapu Lele. Aromatherapy is another obscure move that gets a lot of utility when facing teams that run Toxic on every other Pokémon and lets you play more aggressively with your backbone when making progress. We’ve never needed Psyshock to revengekill Volcarona, because Garchomp, Toxic Melmetal, Rotom-Wash and Tornadus-Therian already do a very good job at manouvering around it.


:assault vest:
tt.png
:assault vest:
Tornadus-Therian (M) @ Assault Vest
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 224 HP / 64 Def / 52 SpD / 168 Spe
Timid Nature
- Hurricane
- Heat Wave
- Knock Off

- U-turn

This Pokèmon is a cheat code. As a reminder, this was chosen in this spot WAY before Assault Vest became popular for Tornadus-T, at around when Blacephalon was being discovered. For this reason we didn’t know how well it would perform and, oh boy, this thing is without question the most important member of this team. It blanket checks a stupid amount of special attackers while still fulfilling its primary role of Grass type check very comfortably. It also acts as a progress tool in pretty much every stage of the game.
EVs: these are the most sophisticated EVs on the team. The speed creeps opposing utility Tornadus-T by one point. HP and SpD makes sure you take two Shadow Ball from Choice Specs Dragapult after Stealth Rock, and the Def EVs maximize the chance of surviving LO +2 Grassy Glide from Rillaboom (which is rare af but you need to be aware of this calc when using this).
Moveset: pretty standard, Hurricane is the main STAB, Knock Off + U-turn is always a broken combination and Heat Wave helps pressuring Steel types very effectively.
Item: Assault Vest on Tornadus-T is what makes this team work as well as it does.


:chople berry:
ferro.png
:chople berry:
Ferrothorn @ Chople Berry
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 248 HP / 172 Def / 88 SpD

Impish Nature
- Stealth Rock

- Leech Seed
- Body Press

- Power Whip

Ferrothorn is the primary Steel type, Tapu Lele check and Rain countermeasure. Everyone knows its defensive profile and how deep its support capabilities are. Here it anchors the team by providing useful resistances and chip damage between its ability and moveset.
EVs: I honestly do not remember why I chose these specific EVs, but I tried to keep Ferrothorn outside of dangerous thresholds against Tapu Lele while also being able to deter Weavile and Urshifu-R with Chople Berry. If you have suggestions, absolutely let me know.
Moveset: Stealth Rock over Spikes because as a solo entry hazard it is vastly superior, especially against Corviknight. Leech Seed pressures every switchin to Ferrothorn and, once again, it creates an easy cycle to force chip damage on Corviknight and keep it low. Power Whip + Body Press allow Ferrothorn to cover what it needs the most for the team. Speedy Melmetal defeats the purpose of running Iron Head for Clefable.
Item: Chople Berry acts as a backup against Urshifu-R, which is quite tricky to manouver against. Ferrothorn can lure it out of the game with health to spare and this task is aided by the presence of a Fighting resist in Tornadus-T and a Water resist in Rotom-Wash. It also helps with opposing Protective Pads Melmetal, Kartana and Tapu Lele’s Focus Blast.

:leftovers:
tomtom.png
:leftovers:

Rotom-Wash @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 116 SpD / 140 Spe
Calm Nature

IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch

- Hydro Pump
- Defog

- Will-O-Wisp

Rotom-Wash rounds out the team by providing a secondary form of safe momentum, hazard control, primary check to Heatran, Volcarona and Tornadus-T. Its support is noticeable as it is a Volt Switch user that scares out Ground types due to the threat of Hydro Pump; the only one it doesn’t scare out is Storm Drain Gastrodon, which we have Toxic Melmetal for. This great asset makes it a reliable partner to Tornadus-T in helping the offensive positioning of the two main breakers.
EVs: Speed is enough to creep the 240 speed tier by a couple of points. This is especially relevant because, when testing, me and Veritas ran into multiple people trying to click U-turn with their specially defensive Landorus-T only to get clipped by an Hydro Pump which puts it in range of +1 Scale Shot and -1 Double Iron Bash.
Moveset: pretty self-explanatory, with Defog being mandatory to sustain Assault Vest Tornadus-T and for protecting the team from being eaten alive by Spikes.
Item: obviously Leftovers is the go-to item for Rotom-Wash.

- REPLAYS -
vs Trick Room
:porygon2: :melmetal: :marowak-alola: :cresselia: :hatterene: :crawdaunt:

vs Gastrodon + Clefable + Zapdos (tough core to crack)
:melmetal: :urshifu: :gastrodon: :zapdos: :kartana: :clefable:

vs Shedinja Stall
:blissey: :toxapex: :shedinja: :corviknight: :clefable: :ditto:

vs Beat Up Weavile (big threat)
:kartana: :dragapult: :crawdaunt: :weavile: :melmetal: :landorus-therian:

vs HO
:mew: :rillaboom: :bisharp: :dragapult: :garchomp: :zapdos-galar:

- THREATLIST -
:weavile: (:choice band: with Beat Up): Weavile can be positioned to scare out Garchomp and Tornadus-T, so it poses a threat. With Ferrothorn and Rotom-Wash you can always manage it, especially with Choice Scarf Tapu Lele lurking in the back. However, if the opposing Weavile runs Beat Up, it becomes very difficult to check. Ferrothorn can barely avoid a 2HKO and it took us a wrong play in the loss showcased in the replay section to realise.

:urshifu-rapid strike: Usually we lure it with Ferrothorn, but you need to play very carefully or it will do a lot of damage.

SUN :torkoal:: we never faced Sun teams, but I assume they would be pretty tough matchups since our Fire resists are either specially defensive or too precious to be used defensively against Sun.

:regieleki: + :zapdos-Galar: this team was built prior to the insurgence of the core so we never faced it, but it would definitely be a tough matchup even though Garchomp is quite threatening against the usual team composition behind these two.

- CREDITS -
Small section to thank Veritas95 for sticking with my stupid schedule and performing well on the ladder. Building and testing the team around your playstyle was a very enjoyable experience. If anyone else is interested in having team built for them to test, please contact me. I enjoy building a lot more than playing so I'm happy to work alongside someone who's more dedicated than me.

- CLOSING THOUGHTS -
Honestly, this RMT took way too long because of me having a sh*t ton of stuff to do IRL, so I'm happy to be able to FINALLY make it. It's a bit rushed, unfortunately, so feel free to correct some inconsistencies I may have left in the script. The team itself is quite enjoyable to play, which is the most important thing for me, and has a couple of small techs that may not work in other team, which makes it also very unique and appealing to me. Hopefully you will enjoy it too, if you decide to give it a try. Feel free to critique this team as much as you want, I'm happy to receive insight from the community.

Thanks for reading!
SLDR
 
Last edited:
Ok people I tried to somehow get a shareable link to the replay, but I think I made the irreversible mistake of just downloading the replay and not getting the link to share it, so I can't give you easy-to-look replays. Big L on my part. What I did is using Pastebin to at least get you the written replay of the game, that's honestly the best I could do.
 
Nice team!

I'm a big fan of Aromatherapy on Lele, but one thing you might want to try is Psyshock instead of Psychic for Blissey and other special walls.
 

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