SS OU Ghost Sweeper Team

Noctis2510

Hello, this is one of my first SS teams for the OU category. I have played quite a bit of competitive Sun and Moon, and recently have been researching teams for this game. This is my first Team (and therefore probably lacks synergy - Also because its my first team I don't really understand the gigantamax/dynamax features, so they aren't referened. plz help lol.), based around Aegislash, and revolving around setting up for my other Ghost Sweepers for various checks. However, I doubt this is a very good team, and am open to any criticisms. Also, most team members use smogon movesets, because I feel they are decent enough.

Aegislash @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Stance Change
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Shadow Sneak
- Iron Head
- Close Combat

This is the first mon on this team and I based the research for this team on this mon. Aegislash will be brought out late in the game in order to sweep teams after using U-Turn to switch it in. Swords dance is used immediately, and the final three moves are used as sweeping moves, especially shadow sneak, which makes up for the lack of speed with priority. Finally, I use weakness policy to further boost my sweeping capabilities off of the switch-in.

Terrakion @ Focus Sash
Ability: Justified
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Taunt
- Close Combat
- Rock Tomb

Terrakiona provides a good lead, while also having nice offense and speed. I don't know about the Focus Sash, since it's already super bulky and fast. Stealth rock is our lead move, providing us with a lot of value for our aegislash later on.

Togekiss @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Air Slash
- Trick
- Roost
- Nasty Plot

Togekiss was the pokemon I was most unsure about. After seing numerous Clefables, I decided to not run with the pack and use this trick Togekiss. However, it is in a slot that should be providing clearance to get rid of spikes and rocks, and while everybody is raving about the fairy type being a must-have, I don't see its use here.

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Impish Nature
- Spikes
- Body Press
- Knock Off
- Leech Seed

Ferrothorn provides similar value as Terrakion, only I don't lead with it (due to its terrible speed) and used it during the midgame to launch more hazards at the enemy and use knock off to (oh wow) knock off choice items and other annoying held items to provide room for my aegislash.

Dragapult @ Spell Tag
Ability: Infiltrator
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Hex
- Will-O-Wisp
- Draco Meteor
- U-turn

Here we go. The final two team members. These are mostly other possible ghost sweepers who are used to support our aegislash before his very grand reveal. Dragapult provides Will-O-Wisp, to get some early burns, before U-Turning the F out of there into Aegislash.

Gengar @ Black Sludge
Ability: Cursed Body
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Substitute
- Shadow Ball
- Sludge Wave
- Nasty Plot

I didn't know what to put in this last slot, but I was pretty sure I wanted another ghost sweeper in case our Aegislash stops breathing (Wait - that's not right). It uses substitute first to scope out possible checks, before nasty plot and shadow ball/sludge wave.

Please leave any and all feedback in the comments of this thread. As I said, being fairly new to SS, I'm trying to figure out my playstyle and what the meta is still.
 
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Welcome to Smogon! First of all, Dynamax has been banned from Overused, so no need to worry about it. This team has some promising elements, but some changes need to be made to make it viable. Right off the bat, I see that your team doesn't really know what it wants to be. You have a suicide lead Terrakion and a Ferrothorn. Suicide leads are almost excusively used on hyper-offense, a style where Ferrothorn will just be a dead-weight momentum sink. The next thing I see is that your Aegislash set doesn't make a lot of sense. On weakness policy, you want to run Autotomize over Swords Dance with max speed Jolly. This maximizes your sweeping capabilities. However, I don't think Policy Aegi fits well on this team. If you're running two Ghost types, you want them to wallbreak for each other, and physical Aegislash and Gengar do not share checks that they can break for each other. I didn't want to turn your team into a balance, though, because I liked how offensive it is. I kept your core of 2 ghosts + Terrakion and changed the rest.
With those things in mind:

The changed team can be found in this importable: https://pokepast.es/682f24ca71bfc698
Major Changes:
  • Togekiss -> Mandibuzz
    • You need a ghost resist. This team has 2 ghost types (3 if you keep Dragapult, for the record a bad idea) and no switch-in to a shadow ball. You also need something to take Earthquake. You also need something that can check Bisharp, because Terrakion can't always do that. Mandibuzz satisfies the three criteria. It's one of the best Ghost resists in the metagame, it can check Bisharp and Excadrill with Foul Play, and it is a flying type to take ground type attacks.
  • Dragapult -> Zeraora
    • You don't need a third ghost type. Your core works with just 2.
    • I changed Dragapult for Zeraora because Zeraora provides the speed Dragapult offers, while providing you more offensive utility. With the set I gave, it can break Toxapex, something that can be problematic for this team to deal with. Specially defensive Toxapex walls specs Aegislash barring drops, so you want something that can break it.
    • It can also function as a revenge killer with its massive speed stat. I opted for Plasma/CC/Knock/Play Rough, because this team has 3 special breakers, it doesn't need grass knot for Hippowdon.
  • Ferrothorn -> Clefable
    • Ferrothorn is not providing you a lot of utility here. On a team this offensive, you want to pressure your opponents by generating momentum. You win by forcing switches and breaking a hole in their team that they can't recover from. Ferrothorn is not helping you do that. Everytime you switch it in, it starts to sap the offensive momentum you generated. It isn't the worst momentum sink ever, but it is too passive for this team.
    • Clefable provides stealth rock. The set I gave can beat common defoggers like Mandibuzz and Corviknight. This is a somewhat unconventional set, so feel free to mess around with the EV spread. I went 252/4/252 Modest for simplicity, but I think 120/252/140 Modest could work as well.
Minor(-ish) Changes:
  • Aegislash: I changed the set from Weakness Policy to Choice Specs. The point of running a team like this is to exploit the opponent's ghost resist: overwhelm it so that it faints and then your powerful ghosts can sweep their team. However, physical Aegislash does not share checks with the other ghosts on your team, so I changed it to Specs, which is in my opinion the best set in the current metagame. For future reference, weakness policy Aegislash wants to run Autotomize max speed over Swords Dance max HP.
  • Gengar: I changed the set from substitute to Nasty Plot Life Orb. I don't think sub Gengar is very good. It isn't bulky enough to sub in front of things, so it has to rely on forcing switches. If their Dragapult is still alive, your sub doesn't matter anyway. I think that Nasty Plot on the switch is better than sub, because it gives you immediate breaking power. There are very few things that can take a hit from +2 Gengar.
  • Terrakion: I changed the set from sash lead to Choice Band. You want this thing to help kill particularly nasty dark types like Mandibuzz and Hydreigon that your ghost types might otherwise have a hard time beating. Sash lead is just too inconsistent for this team.
I tested this team on the 1600 ladder and it seemed to work well enough. Let me know what you think.
 
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