[SET]
name: Life Orb Attacker
move 1: Earth Power
move 2: Sludge Bomb
move 3: Substitute / Stone Edge / Rock Slide
move 4: Protect
item: Life Orb
ability: Sheer Force
nature: Timid
evs: 4 HP / 252 Special Attack / 252 Speed
[SET COMMENTS]
Although often left behind in the shadow of the infamous Therian forme, the unique aspects of the Series 10 metagame allow Landorus-Incarnate to take center stage. we dont really have the room for these funny openers like the days of old sadly The lack of Dynamax, along with the prominence of Pokemon like Regieleki and Incineroar who take super-effective damage from Landorus' main attacks, has caused Landorus to emerge as one of the foremost offensive threats in the metagame. this line overlaps with your line below on earth power targets The crux of Landorus' strength relies in the interaction between Sheer Force and Life Orb. Individually, Sheer Force boosts the power of moves with secondary effects (effects that have a percentage chance to happen when you use an attack, such as Earth Power's 10% chance to drop Special Defense) by 30%, with the minimal downside of nullifying the secondary effect, while Life Orb boosts the damage of all moves by 30% with the downside being that a Pokemon holding Life Orb will lose 10% of its health after each attack. However, when a Pokemon with Sheer Force holds a Life Orb, a unique interaction occurs wherein the Pokemon gets the effect of both the item and the ability, compounding damage output to be increased by a very nice 69% modifier, without the downside of losing HP because of Life Orb. This allows a frail attacker like Landorus to have more staying power, as it doesn't lose HP from attacking.
this is pretty much all dex info. reciting mechanics is typically frowned upon In order to maximize the damage output that this combination provides, most Landorus opt to run a simple EV spread that maximizes Special Attack and Speed, and a timid nature is usually used in order to ensure that Landorus outspeeds important Pokemon that are only slightly slower than it like Urshifu and Xerneas.
Earth Power and Sludge Bomb are the bread and butter of Landorus' attacking moves. Earth Power is important not only because of the damage increase from STAB, but also because it hits several important Pokemon in the metagame for super effective damage: Incineroar, Zacian, Entei, and Regieleki, just to name a few.
Besides this, the boosts from Sheer Force and Life Orb turn those super effective attacks into almost guaranteed KOs, as you almost always OHKO most Pokemon weak to Ground. For instance, no common Zacian sets are capable of surviving an Earth Power, and even the most specially defensive Incineroars have a less than 50% chance to survive. Additionally, a neutral Earth Power is a 2HKO on almost everything in the format besides the bulkiest of bulky Pokemon, allowing Landorus to tear through teams that can't knock it out quickly. Sludge Bomb is a very complimentary move to Earth Power, and has two distinct advantages. The first is that it enables Landorus to hit pure Grass types that resist Earth Power for super effective damage, causing metagame staples like Rillaboom and Tsareena, which could otherwise comfortably tank Earth Power, to lose a large chunk of their health -- or even get OHKO'd if they choose not to carry an Assault Vest. The second reason is that Sludge Bomb hits Xerneas, one of the most common restricted Pokemon in the metagame, for super effective damage. While it doesn't have a chance to OHKO, Sludge Bomb will take out the majority of an unboosted Xerneas' health, finishing off an already damaged Xerneas or leaving it in range for another Pokemon to land a final blow.
Protect tends to be the go-to third move for most Landorus, while the final move slot has a bit more optionality.
Protect tends to be a strong move on most Pokemon in VGC, given the freedom it provides Pokemon in avoiding targets while a partner Pokemon can handle threats, but it's extra relevant on a strong but frail offensive threat like Landorus that will frequently draw the ire of opponents. In terms of the final move, Substitute
is the most common option. It follows a similar logic as Protect, which is that it gives Landorus the ability to avoid damag
e, and the main value of Substitute is on teams that pair Landorus with Fake Out users pairs extremely well with the metagame's many Fake Out users. Additionally, Many opponents will double Protect when going against a Landorus and a Fake Out user to avoid taking a large amount of damage and doing little back, so Substitute takes advantage of
those sorts of defensive plays and switches by punishing an opponent's passivity. Other options in that slot are Stone Edge and Rock Slide. Both of those move options are focused around doing heavy damage to problem Pokemon like Volcarona and Ho-Oh. Even with a hindering nature and no Attack investment, Stone Edge gets the OHKO on maximum defense investment Volcarona
, although it's important to note that Stone Edge's crit chance is not effected by Sheer Force, so Landorus only gets a Life Orb boost from the move and takes Life Orb damage. While Rock Slide doesn't quite get the KO on Volcarona, it is effected by Sheer Force (increasing damage and having no Life Orb recoil, but eliminating flinch chance) and hits both opposing Pokemon, allowing it to be especially strong if paired with other fast partners.
Landorus typically runs some sort of version of the above set, but some other options do exist. Some Landorus that run Stone Edge or Rock Slide will opt to run a Naive or Hasty nature in order to increase the damage output of those moves, but given that the nature change doesn't directly influence any damage calculations, it has more fringe use. Choice Scarf is another option that has seen some play on Landorus, as that allows Landorus to outspeed some faster Pokemon that do big damage. This set specifically targets Zacian, and can outspeed and threaten an OHKO on
it the Sword Dog.
However, Choice Scarf haas a couple issues that prevent it from seeing significant usage. Besides the inherent problem of a Choice set not being able to Protect or switch moves, Choice Scarf can miss out on some important OHKOs and 2HKOs. Most common is Incineroar, which will usually survive an Earth Power, and against some Zacian Non-Life Orb Earth Power is a roll, and some bulky Zacian may even be EV'd to always survive it. A timid nature is still important for Choice Scarf in order to outspeed max Speed Calyrex-Shadow Rider and Zacian, and Choice Scarf sets will opt to run another coverage move like Grass Knot over Protect. pretty in depth for an offhand mention
everything that I left alive in these paragraphs can be used to form the first paragraph, see my comments on the outline below
Part of the reason Landorus is so strong in Series 10 is that it naturally pairs quite effectively with some of the strongest Pokemon in the format. Incineroar, Rillaboom and Mienshao can all make for strong partners, due to their ability to apply Fake Out pressure and each having other ways to support Landorus: damage reduction by Incineroar, coverage against Water types by Rillaboom, and Feint and Wide Guard by Mienshao. Landorus also appreciates some sort of speed control, such as Electroweb from Regieleki or Tailwind from Tornadus, in order to allow it outspeed a Zacian and OHKO without needing to take a Behemoth Blade.
Lastly, Landorus appreciates being paired with other strong, fast Pokemon that can double up and finish off an opposing Pokemon by double targeting or getting chip damage in. just gonna cut this because its vague and we need to save space
Common checks to Landorus come in three forms. The first is direct answers that can tank Landorus' attacks and retaliate with OHKOs, such as bulky Waters like Kyogre and Suicune. The second is Pokemon that are Immune to Earth Power and take neutral damage from Sludge Bomb like Yveltal, leaving Landorus with minimal ways to deal high amounts of damage (sets running Rock moves mitigate this somewhat, but it's far from an ideal solution).
Lastly, the most broad category is simply Pokemon that damage trade with Landorus, where Landorus can threaten big damage on them but they can also threaten damage on Landorus. This includes some common Pokemon like Zacian, which can outspeed and OHKO Landorus with Behemoth Blade if it has no Attack or Speed reductions, Rillaboom, which can survive a Sludge Bomb if it holds an Assault Vest and can 2HKO Landorus with priority Grassy Glide, Urshifu-Rapid-Strike, which gets taken down to Focus Sash by Earth Power but can retaliate with an OHKO by using Surging Strikes, and Xerneas, which can survive a Sludge Bomb and use Geomancy to threaten an OHKO on the next turn. Consequently, it's very important to pair Landorus with Pokemon that can mitigate those threats through board control, which can allow Landorus to thrive. this is like, true for a lot of Pokemon and at the same time I think the specific examples form a list too long for this brief of an analysis
these last two paragraphs can make up the second paragraph. i would only highlight landorus's best partners and scariest checks, I did some coloring to guide you but i'm down to discuss it if you wanna swap this around
[CREDITS]
- Written by: [[Namuko Pro, 426995]]
- Quality checked by: [[username1, userid1]]
- Grammar checked by: [[username1, userid1]]
