At A Glance:
Even with the decent amount of time I've been in the serious metagame (since Plat), I'm a terrible, TERRIBLE team builder. The last team I tried was Trick Room, which was a favorite strategy of mine in 4th gen, and that recent team just got 5-0ed 15 minutes ago by CMRachi, of all things. So that's why I'm here; I type a bunch of stuff with pretty pictures (please tell me those things come through), and you guys write big long paragraphs on why I'm retarded.
AGGRON: THE LEAD
Item: Custap Berry
Ability: Sturdy
Adamant (+Atk, -SpA) nature, 252 HP/252 Atk/4 Spe
Endeavor
Metal Burst
Stealth Rock
Stone Edge/Earthquake
Should be fairly obvious what this guy's up to in looking at the moveset. Tempt an attack from the opposing lead, then Metal Burst it back. Next turn, eat my complimentary Custap Berry and either see if I can't pick off the opposing lead with my direct attacking move or just be safe and set up some Sneaky Pebbles. Endeavor is the least often used move on the set, only really being useful if I actually KO the opposing lead with Metal Burst (i.e. they don't have a Focus Sash or Sturdy) and can use my Custap Berry to bring the NEXT guy down to 1 HP, making him easy pickings for someone else on the team.
Flaws with this lead are also blaringly obvious. Fake Out leads, especially Infernape, eat it for breakfast, as does any lead with priority (which is a lot of them these days). Flat-out misprediction will handily screw me over, like picking between whether that Hippowdon will use Stealth Rock or EQ and getting it wrong. Burn-inducers, the most common being Scald Politoed, will also take a dump all over my picnic. And I'm sure there's a few things I'm not thinking of.
Basically, this lead is a gimmick that often works, but in the end is just a placeholder. As much as I love him, he really only belongs in lower tiers. I want to build a team, not show off fancy movesets I stole from YouTube.
CONKELDURR: THE REALLY OBVIOUS ONE
Item: Lefties
Ability: Guts
Careful (-SpA, +SpD) nature, 252 HP/4 Atk/252 SpD
Bulk Up
Drain Punch
Payback
Mach Punch
Oh for- we all know what Conkeldurr's Bulk Up set looks like, what it does, blah blah blah. It's really just more glue for the team, and it picks off weakened sweepers and takes some Dark-type hits that Cofagrigus wouldn't be able to without getting some boosts beforehand.
COFAGRIGUS: THE ONE WITH BIG DEFENSE
Item: Lefties
Ability: WONDER GUARD. Except it's not Wonder Guard, it's Mummy.
Bold (-Atk, +Def) nature, 252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
Calm Mind
Hidden Power [Figthing]
Shadow Ball
Rest
My particular intention here is to rather readily switch him into resistant or immune attacks and get the opponent thinking it's a straight-up wall. Then, of course, find an opportunity to CM up and sweep some pants. interestingly enough (to me), Cofagrigus usually ends up being my end-game sweeper, where my back is against a wall 1-X and their main counter to him is weak or gone. From there, it's often a bit easy to spam boosts until I need to Rest, then wake up and get cracking without suffering too much damage to keep sweeping. A notable exception is particularly powerful Specs/Band users with good supereffectives, like, uh... CB Scrafty? (implying everyone uses CB Scrafty)
Problems are the same as with any slow, not-particularly-powerful-without-some-boosts sweeping tank. Banded or Specs powerhouses can just clean it out with one shot sometimes, regardless of one or two Calm Minds. Quagsire can be a somewhat hilarious pain in the ass. The biggest screw-you-Cofagrigus is T-tar, who can shrug off HP Ftg and kill that which is already dead with a Banded Crunch, or just a couple of normal ones.
I've been seriously considering confining Cofagrigus to UU and replacing him with Ferrothorn, but being a horrible hipster about tiers I've been procrastinating about using the metagame's No. 1 wall. I'd also likely be replacing Aggron because of duplicate Stealth Rock (unless I ran Spikes), so I've been a holding off because of that as well. If you've got recommendations for a large-scale team overhaul, consider what changes a Ferrothron would make.
VOLCARONA: THE ONE THAT GOT OVERHYPED
Item: Life Orb/Lefties
Abiltiy: Flame Body
Timid (-Atk, +Spe) nature, 252 SpA/4 SpD/252 Spe
Fiery Dance
Butterfly Dance
Bug Buzz
Hidden Power [Rock]
Pretty typical stuff here as well. Volcarona rarely DOESN'T set up BD, so I might as well go with something I know. Fiery Dance and Bug Buzz are STAB, and HP Rock is coverage on Salamence and Dragonite. I've been struggling with Life Orb versus Leftovers, though, and with perhaps dropping HP Rock for Morning Sun. Any advice on pros/cons of each would be greatly appreciated.
KYUREM: THE WEIRDO
Item: Choice Scarf
Ability: Pressure
Timid (-Atk, +Spe) nature, 88 HP/252 SpA/178 Spe
Draco Meteor
Dragon Pulse
Ice Beam
Hidden Power [Fire]
Let me guess what your first thought is: "WTF is up with that EV spread?" My twisted logic here revolves around that Speed stat. As shown, this Kyurem outspeeds neutral-natured 252-EV +1 Charizard and Flygon by one point, and ties with +1 Salamence, something I will soon remedy by adding one more point (gotta love those EV berries), and it can OHKO each of these three with one of its moves. Addtionally, I took one look at those nice base (90 defenses and the good HP and thought "Bulky Scarfer? Why the heck not!"
Let's just say I was mad when they moved Kyurem to BL. This build was perfect for UU, taking some surprising hits with those extra HP EVs and still being fast and powerful enough to get the job done. It's slow for a Scarfer, though, especially for OU, and that's why I'm thinking of retiring or repurposing it. Unfortunately, I'm stuck with the IVs and Timid nature; I got this from a 4chan RNG distribution, and I have neither PokeSav nor an acekard or whatever they're called, so this is the only usable Kyurem I'll ever have. I can alter EVs freely with the EV berries and retrain them, since I do have an AR, but Kyurem is stuck on Timid, which is why this wasn't a mixed set. And yeah, pokegts can make me one, but it would never pass a hack check in a million years.
LANDORUS: COULDN'T THINK OF ANYTHING BETTER
Item: Life Orb
Ability: Sand Force
Naive (-SpD, +Spe) nature, 252 Atk/4 SpA/252 Spe
Earthquake
Stone Edge
U-Turn
Hidden Power [Ice]
This guy was really pretty much just tacked on the end, and I wanted more than just one Ice move on the team to deal with Gliscor and the Dragons. General Life Orb sweeping to be done, and decent scouting with U-Turn. I chose Life Orb over Leftovers because even though Stealth Rock will be doing it no favors in combination with Life Orb recoil, I really prefer the extra power.
Looking at it with more of the big picture in mind, Landorus gets a lot of free switches with its two immunities, but really suffers from not having anybody to switch to in the face of an Ice-type attack. No one on the team resists Ice except Aggron, and he's not exactly built to last.
And I'm done. Be brutally honest in your critiquing; if I'm being a Class 5 Dumb Butt, call me on it, and tell me why. If you hold back in criticizing the team, I won't take you as seriously, and will be less likely to improve it that way.
Even with the decent amount of time I've been in the serious metagame (since Plat), I'm a terrible, TERRIBLE team builder. The last team I tried was Trick Room, which was a favorite strategy of mine in 4th gen, and that recent team just got 5-0ed 15 minutes ago by CMRachi, of all things. So that's why I'm here; I type a bunch of stuff with pretty pictures (please tell me those things come through), and you guys write big long paragraphs on why I'm retarded.
AGGRON: THE LEAD
Item: Custap Berry
Ability: Sturdy
Adamant (+Atk, -SpA) nature, 252 HP/252 Atk/4 Spe
Endeavor
Metal Burst
Stealth Rock
Stone Edge/Earthquake
Should be fairly obvious what this guy's up to in looking at the moveset. Tempt an attack from the opposing lead, then Metal Burst it back. Next turn, eat my complimentary Custap Berry and either see if I can't pick off the opposing lead with my direct attacking move or just be safe and set up some Sneaky Pebbles. Endeavor is the least often used move on the set, only really being useful if I actually KO the opposing lead with Metal Burst (i.e. they don't have a Focus Sash or Sturdy) and can use my Custap Berry to bring the NEXT guy down to 1 HP, making him easy pickings for someone else on the team.
Flaws with this lead are also blaringly obvious. Fake Out leads, especially Infernape, eat it for breakfast, as does any lead with priority (which is a lot of them these days). Flat-out misprediction will handily screw me over, like picking between whether that Hippowdon will use Stealth Rock or EQ and getting it wrong. Burn-inducers, the most common being Scald Politoed, will also take a dump all over my picnic. And I'm sure there's a few things I'm not thinking of.
Basically, this lead is a gimmick that often works, but in the end is just a placeholder. As much as I love him, he really only belongs in lower tiers. I want to build a team, not show off fancy movesets I stole from YouTube.
CONKELDURR: THE REALLY OBVIOUS ONE
Item: Lefties
Ability: Guts
Careful (-SpA, +SpD) nature, 252 HP/4 Atk/252 SpD
Bulk Up
Drain Punch
Payback
Mach Punch
Oh for- we all know what Conkeldurr's Bulk Up set looks like, what it does, blah blah blah. It's really just more glue for the team, and it picks off weakened sweepers and takes some Dark-type hits that Cofagrigus wouldn't be able to without getting some boosts beforehand.
COFAGRIGUS: THE ONE WITH BIG DEFENSE
Item: Lefties
Ability: WONDER GUARD. Except it's not Wonder Guard, it's Mummy.
Bold (-Atk, +Def) nature, 252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
Calm Mind
Hidden Power [Figthing]
Shadow Ball
Rest
My particular intention here is to rather readily switch him into resistant or immune attacks and get the opponent thinking it's a straight-up wall. Then, of course, find an opportunity to CM up and sweep some pants. interestingly enough (to me), Cofagrigus usually ends up being my end-game sweeper, where my back is against a wall 1-X and their main counter to him is weak or gone. From there, it's often a bit easy to spam boosts until I need to Rest, then wake up and get cracking without suffering too much damage to keep sweeping. A notable exception is particularly powerful Specs/Band users with good supereffectives, like, uh... CB Scrafty? (implying everyone uses CB Scrafty)
Problems are the same as with any slow, not-particularly-powerful-without-some-boosts sweeping tank. Banded or Specs powerhouses can just clean it out with one shot sometimes, regardless of one or two Calm Minds. Quagsire can be a somewhat hilarious pain in the ass. The biggest screw-you-Cofagrigus is T-tar, who can shrug off HP Ftg and kill that which is already dead with a Banded Crunch, or just a couple of normal ones.
I've been seriously considering confining Cofagrigus to UU and replacing him with Ferrothorn, but being a horrible hipster about tiers I've been procrastinating about using the metagame's No. 1 wall. I'd also likely be replacing Aggron because of duplicate Stealth Rock (unless I ran Spikes), so I've been a holding off because of that as well. If you've got recommendations for a large-scale team overhaul, consider what changes a Ferrothron would make.
VOLCARONA: THE ONE THAT GOT OVERHYPED
Item: Life Orb/Lefties
Abiltiy: Flame Body
Timid (-Atk, +Spe) nature, 252 SpA/4 SpD/252 Spe
Fiery Dance
Butterfly Dance
Bug Buzz
Hidden Power [Rock]
Pretty typical stuff here as well. Volcarona rarely DOESN'T set up BD, so I might as well go with something I know. Fiery Dance and Bug Buzz are STAB, and HP Rock is coverage on Salamence and Dragonite. I've been struggling with Life Orb versus Leftovers, though, and with perhaps dropping HP Rock for Morning Sun. Any advice on pros/cons of each would be greatly appreciated.
KYUREM: THE WEIRDO
Item: Choice Scarf
Ability: Pressure
Timid (-Atk, +Spe) nature, 88 HP/252 SpA/178 Spe
Draco Meteor
Dragon Pulse
Ice Beam
Hidden Power [Fire]
Let me guess what your first thought is: "WTF is up with that EV spread?" My twisted logic here revolves around that Speed stat. As shown, this Kyurem outspeeds neutral-natured 252-EV +1 Charizard and Flygon by one point, and ties with +1 Salamence, something I will soon remedy by adding one more point (gotta love those EV berries), and it can OHKO each of these three with one of its moves. Addtionally, I took one look at those nice base (90 defenses and the good HP and thought "Bulky Scarfer? Why the heck not!"
Let's just say I was mad when they moved Kyurem to BL. This build was perfect for UU, taking some surprising hits with those extra HP EVs and still being fast and powerful enough to get the job done. It's slow for a Scarfer, though, especially for OU, and that's why I'm thinking of retiring or repurposing it. Unfortunately, I'm stuck with the IVs and Timid nature; I got this from a 4chan RNG distribution, and I have neither PokeSav nor an acekard or whatever they're called, so this is the only usable Kyurem I'll ever have. I can alter EVs freely with the EV berries and retrain them, since I do have an AR, but Kyurem is stuck on Timid, which is why this wasn't a mixed set. And yeah, pokegts can make me one, but it would never pass a hack check in a million years.
LANDORUS: COULDN'T THINK OF ANYTHING BETTER
Item: Life Orb
Ability: Sand Force
Naive (-SpD, +Spe) nature, 252 Atk/4 SpA/252 Spe
Earthquake
Stone Edge
U-Turn
Hidden Power [Ice]
This guy was really pretty much just tacked on the end, and I wanted more than just one Ice move on the team to deal with Gliscor and the Dragons. General Life Orb sweeping to be done, and decent scouting with U-Turn. I chose Life Orb over Leftovers because even though Stealth Rock will be doing it no favors in combination with Life Orb recoil, I really prefer the extra power.
Looking at it with more of the big picture in mind, Landorus gets a lot of free switches with its two immunities, but really suffers from not having anybody to switch to in the face of an Ice-type attack. No one on the team resists Ice except Aggron, and he's not exactly built to last.
And I'm done. Be brutally honest in your critiquing; if I'm being a Class 5 Dumb Butt, call me on it, and tell me why. If you hold back in criticizing the team, I won't take you as seriously, and will be less likely to improve it that way.