Hit The Ground Running

[lars]

Hello Everyone,

I started playing RU about 1 year ago (more or less about a month after the start of the tier) and it's been my favorite ever since.

I've seen friends come (Aerodactyl/Nidoqueen) and go (Sharpedo/Honchkrow).

Around mid summer other things came up in my life and distracted me away from the community.

5 days ago, in a rush of nostalgia, I came back to see how things were.
4 days ago I made a team, and 3 days ago I decided to make it competitive.

Presenting my very first RMT! (Idk, I just never got around to it before)



Hit The Ground Running!

There was really no original overall goal when I started making this team. Basically I wanted to get on the ladder and win. That said, I usually at least need something to start with. As typical of the average RU team, I went offensive. A good 75% of my teams were balance with an offensive bias so after 3 months of letting my team building skills collect cobwebs, I figured I should stick with my basics.



One of those basics being...

Manectric

2.998x10^8 (Manectric) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Lightningrod
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 SAtk / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
- Overheat
- Switcheroo
- Volt Switch
- Hidden Power [Grass]

I really don't have enough good things to say about this guy. If I make a team without him, I miss him. The utility, the power, the speed, the safety net. All good things to start off a team with. Pretty standard set here (other than modest over timid) and it works like a charm. I prefer modest because I rarely trick the scarf off prematurely and when skirting 463 speed, that extra 10% power has secured more KOs than my lower speed has lost me. STAB and Overheat destroy a good portion of the RU metagame and HP [grass] hits those Quagsire. Switcheroo is my CroTomb and Cosmic Power shut down and cripples Lanturn who think they counter me. This is Manectric! As if!

Unfortunately the nature of this set means I'll be switching around and probably taking a lot of hazard damage...


So the obvious choice is...

Kabrotops (Kabutops) @ Leftovers
Trait: Weak Armor Battle Armor
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 HP / 4 SDef 32 HP / 224 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Aqua Jet
- Stone Edge
- Rapid Spin
- Waterfall

One of my top 5 faves in RU. I used this guy before people realized he was good. Best spinner in the tier. Excellent offensive typing, and enough bulk to take the hits he needs to. Comes well equipped with priority to pick off scarfers and sweepers as well. Weak Armor was working ok, but I'm going to see if immunity to crits works out better in the long run. Running speed now to beat Modest Nidoqueen. Slightly worried about taking 30% from CB Entei Flare Blitz though.

Now I tend to think about typing synergy, just by my typical picks my teams tend to be weak to Bug or Ground.


So when you have the best spinner you might as well use the Pokemon that hates rocks the most...

Hates rocks (Moltres) @ Leftovers
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 8 Def / 248 HP / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
- Flamethrower
- Substitute
- Toxic
- Roost


Honestly I don't really like Moltres. I respect the power, I respect the (decent) versatility, and I respect the fact that rocks tear him a new one. I'm more of a Typhlosion guy, but starting off with 3 ground weaknesses is never a good start so I made the leap. Since I'm using Moltres almost purely for typing reasons, I went with a set that will allow me to abuse his resistances the longest. Sub Roost Toxic really is an excellent set and it is especially excellent at wearing down the opponent's team so a sweeper can wreck them.


I present the sweeper!

Twiggy (Sceptile) @ Flying Gem
Trait: Unburden
EVs: 252 Atk / 224 SAtk / 32 Spd
Naive Nature
- Leaf Storm
- Acrobatics
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Rock Slide

Here for obligatory WGF core and another ground resist. Sceptile can do many things and I figured he would be a great mid game sweeper or late game cleaner. This set isn't the one usually seen, mostly because I don't like Acrobatics. It doesn't make sense to forgo the potential for better super effective coverage. Rock gem is almost purely because it's always Fire types that switch into Sceptile. In principle this set works well. However, if I had to change something first, it would be this. It lacks a little power for my tastes and honestly I find I rarely even need to use it. Sceptile, no offense, you are my "go to" death fodder. I'll try the mixed set for awhile

Dumb Muscle (Bouffalant) @ Leftovers
Trait: Sap Sipper
EVs: 132 HP / 252 Atk / 124 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Head Charge
- Megahorn
- Earthquake
- Swords Dance

Takes hard hits and hits back harder. This shores up my Lilligant and Amoonguss weakness. If the opponent has a grass type on their team, I can typically look forward to a +3 Afro Bull at some point in the game. +3 Bouffalant hits so stupidly hard. The other major reason for using this is to beat the defensive Tangrowth core (even though it is slightly falling out of favor I hear). I'm open to suggestions on the EVs. I just tend to find that if you can't outspeed it, you might as well tank it. I've used 252 Spd on other teams, I haven't really noticed any drop in performance. Actually I noticed that Sandslash could outspeed me which was annoying so per Zebraiken's suggestion I increased the speed.

Now I need a special tank almost specifically for Magmortar and Accelgor. I also find that I've neglected to fit in hazards thus far.

Need good resistances? Dragon typing works. Need some more priority, access to SR, and consistent damage?

That's right! It's Druddigon!

Damage Soak (Druddigon) @ Leftovers
Trait: Rough Skin
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 HP / 252 SDef
Careful Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Sucker Punch
- Dragon Claw
- Fire Punch

I can't entirely say he was the last addition, he was mostly in the back of my mind the whole time because he is an excellent defensive pivot for laying SR. With max Sp. Def, this thing can sponge a whole lot of damage. Ice beams and Draco Meteors are about all I need to worry about. Rough Skin helps wear down LO sweepers and Fire Punch helps beat some other hazard layers who might want to set them up with me. Dragon Claw just for STAB. Considering Dragon Tail, but I haven't really missed it and I'm not abusing hazards or status enough to really scream for the ability to phaze.

Currently have about a 8:1 win:loss ratio and hit top 20 top 10 now on the PS ladder in about 30 battles.

If I get around to it I might make a list of weaknesses here
Certain forms of stall (very rare) would probably give me trouble.
Heavy phazing teams especially with D-tail as it does good damage to Druddigon can be issues.


There you have it. Open to most suggestions although Manectric, Kabutops and Bouffalant are likely to stay no matter what anyone says about them.

Very open to EV tweaks and thoughts for a new late game cleaner that still has good type synergy.

Thanks! Hope you enjoyed the team!

 

[ss234]

This team looks very solid, however I think that there are quite a few errors in the movesets and items.

Manectric should really be running Timid.This allows it to outspeed +2 Omastar, which is one of the main reasons to use Manectric over other scarf users. On Kabutops, you should be running LO over Leftovers and Swords Dance over Waterfall. This allows it to beat Sprirtomb quite easily, and the LO gives him some more punch to help revenge kill threats like Galvantula(you can 1HKO after rocks at +2). On Sceptile, Rock Gem is a terrible idea IMO. I much prefer Acrobatics over Brick Break, as it allows you to hit very hard, harder than a super-effective Brick Break straight off the bat, and you're not going to be KOing Steelix with Brick Break anyway. On Moltres, Hurricane over Toxic is what you should be using, as Hurricane allows Moltres to smash past Slowking. Toxic doesn't do this, it just makes Moltres set-up bait for the likes of Kabutops, and Entei can now beat you with Toxic.

GL though and I hope I helped.

 

[lars]

This team looks very solid, however I think that there are quite a few errors in the movesets and items.

Manectric should really be running Timid.This allows it to outspeed +2 Omastar, which is one of the main reasons to use Manectric over other scarf users. On Kabutops, you should be running LO over Leftovers and Swords Dance over Waterfall. This allows it to beat Sprirtomb quite easily, and the LO gives him some more punch to help revenge kill threats like Galvantula(you can 1HKO after rocks at +2). On Sceptile, Rock Gem is a terrible idea IMO. I much prefer Acrobatics over Brick Break, as it allows you to hit very hard, harder than a super-effective Brick Break straight off the bat, and you're not going to be KOing Steelix with Brick Break anyway. On Moltres, Hurricane over Toxic is what you should be using, as Hurricane allows Moltres to smash past Slowking. Toxic doesn't do this, it just makes Moltres set-up bait for the likes of Kabutops, and Entei can now beat you with Toxic.

GL though and I hope I helped.

Thanks for the comments.

Modest Manectric actually still outspeeds +2 timid omastar so no worries there.

I've used Swords Dance sets on Kabutops before, but I'm not really trying to get another set up sweeper. I'm actually considering changing weak armor to battle armor because I hate crits and the Def drop has made me nervous.

The current team really has no issues with Slowking, so I don't know why Moltres would need to beat him 1v1. Considering I'm using Moltres as a wall, it's not so important that it can beat other walls.

I've used the standard SD sceptile set on other teams. I'll probably test it here a bit just to see how things are go, but as a whole I've found I don't really like the Physical Sceptile sets.

If I replace sceptile with something that doesn't need boosts I'll probably test the team with the SD Kabutops.

--Some changes made

 

[jake]

hey lars,

neat team. i do have a few nitpicks, though -- if you're really adamant about not running an offensive boosting kabutops, you should still be packing a lot more speed to help it check nidoqueen, who currently has next to no issues running through your team. 224 speed evs lets you outrun modest nidoqueen by one point and ohko 90% of the time with waterfall after sr. you only get the ohko with a boosting item of some kind, though, so keep that in mind if nidoqueen becomes more of an issue. i've experimented a lot with afrobull's ev spreads before and the one that i really liked the most was 40 hp / 252 atk / 216 spe because it ensured that you'd always outspeed adamant aggron. if that's not enough bulk for your tastes or you aren't worried about aggron, you can also go with 124 speed and the rest in hp - this lets you outrun min spe poliwrath, lanturn, roselia, and sandslash as well as the standard spreads for aggron and tangrowth. you should really try to avoid going lower than that though, because you start missing a lot of threats that afrobull really doesn't need to take extra hits from.

moltres should also be using 248 hp, as that allows tres to switch into sr twice without dying. lastly, for your sceptile set, i really recommend that you try out august's mixed set (described in his rmt here, i'll also provide the set in the summary below). it seems to fulfill the exact role that you're looking for and has impressed me much more than any of the physical acrobatics sceptile sets on-site. i think you'll be impressed by it, too.

summary

- adjust kabutops's EV spread to outrun modest nidoqueen (32 hp / 252 atk / 224 spe)
- adjust afrobull's EV spread (either 40 hp / 252 atk / 216 spe or 132 hp / 252 atk / 124 spe)
- adjust moltres's EV spread (248 hp / 8 def / 252 spe)
- test august's mixed sceptile > your current set

sceptile @ flying gem | unburden
naive nature (+spe, -spD) | 252 atk / 224 spa / 32 spe
leaf storm / hidden power [fire] / acrobatics / rock slide​

hope i helped a bit and gl with your team in the future

 

[lars]

hey lars,

neat team. i do have a few nitpicks, though -- if you're really adamant about not running an offensive boosting kabutops, you should still be packing a lot more speed to help it check nidoqueen, who currently has next to no issues running through your team. 224 speed evs lets you outrun modest nidoqueen by one point and ohko 90% of the time with waterfall after sr. you only get the ohko with a boosting item of some kind, though, so keep that in mind if nidoqueen becomes more of an issue. i've experimented a lot with afrobull's ev spreads before and the one that i really liked the most was 40 hp / 252 atk / 216 spe because it ensured that you'd always outspeed adamant aggron. if that's not enough bulk for your tastes or you aren't worried about aggron, you can also go with 124 speed and the rest in hp - this lets you outrun min spe poliwrath, lanturn, roselia, and sandslash as well as the standard spreads for aggron and tangrowth. you should really try to avoid going lower than that though, because you start missing a lot of threats that afrobull really doesn't need to take extra hits from.

moltres should also be using 248 hp, as that allows tres to switch into sr twice without dying. lastly, for your sceptile set, i really recommend that you try out august's mixed set (described in his rmt here, i'll also provide the set in the summary below). it seems to fulfill the exact role that you're looking for and has impressed me much more than any of the physical acrobatics sceptile sets on-site. i think you'll be impressed by it, too.

summary

- adjust kabutops's EV spread to outrun modest nidoqueen (32 hp / 252 atk / 224 spe)
- adjust afrobull's EV spread (either 40 hp / 252 atk / 216 spe or 132 hp / 252 atk / 124 spe)
- adjust moltres's EV spread (248 hp / 8 def / 252 spe)
- test august's mixed sceptile > your current set

sceptile @ flying gem | unburden
naive nature (+spe, -spD) | 252 atk / 224 spa / 32 spe
leaf storm / hidden power [fire] / acrobatics / rock slide​

hope i helped a bit and gl with your team in the future

Thanks for the suggestions!

I think I'll go with 124 speed on Bouffalant. You're right. I was noticing how it was annoying that Sandslash could outspeed me.

I'll probably try the extra speed on Kabutops too. Although I'm slightly worried that I won't have anything to tank CB Entei E Speed and Flare Blitz very well

with only 32 hp he could take over 30% with Flare Blitz (about 25% with 252 hp)

Moltres has lefties so I'm able to switch in twice regardless of the 248 (does not work to come in after a faint and have to switch right away), but going 248 hp and 8 def actually gives one more theoretical point in his physical bulk so it looks good to me... (just in case I switch into a Spiritomb embargo or something! haha)

Thanks for the Sceptile set suggestion. I'll probably play with it for a while. (you're right, the standard set is doing my team no favors still)

Actually considering an offensive mespirit or uxie for his spot.

--Updating the team