Introduction:
Hello! This is my very first gen 5 rmt and i'm really excited about it. I really like the new metagame and I kinda got used to it in those 2 and half months since it was released on pokemon online. I mean it's hard to imagine going back to gen 4 metagame after you get used to gen 5. However gen 5 is far from balanced at the moment and even though some top threats were already banned it's still a long way until this metagame will be as balanced as the previous one.
Team building process:
Team at glance:
Indepth look:
Tyraitar @ Leftovers
Ability: Sandstream
EVs: 252 HP / 88 Atk / 168 SDef
Nature: Brave (+Atk, -Spd)
- Stone Edge
- Crunch
- Flamethrower
- Pursuit
Well here it is the all important sandstorm inducer. That is of course his primary role in any sandstorm team. However he has other uses as well. On of them is dispatching of ever so annoying ghosts. He of course is not a perfect counter to all of them. Well he counters Shandera perfectly and that is very important as Shandera is the most used ghost right now. He can have problems against Gengars Focus Blast and against Will-O-Wisp. But overall he does his job and counters other stuff like Lati twins too. So why leading with him? Well thats a good question. The first reason is the immediate sandstorm that he brings to the table. He has good amount of bulk and can badly damage quite some leads right at the beginning. I don't ALWAYS use him in the lead spot. As you know you can change your leads in wifi (standard) tier around after seeing opponents team so I will of course do that if i don't have a good matchup. I play both dream world and wifi so that isn't always a possibility. Sometimes I will lead with Gliscor as he works great in that spot too. Evs are placed in a way that gives my Tyranitar a nice amount of both physical and special bulk but at the same time retains the ability to hit the opponent hard thanks to Brave nature. For the moves I have Stone Edge because it hits flyers hard and is a great STAB to have. Crunch is another STAB that might seem unnecessary but since this guy is meant to counter bulky ghosts and psychics too it's great to have as it relly does nice damage to guys like Rankurusu. Flamethrower is chosen over Fire Blast for accuracy and over Fire Punch for it's ability to hit from the special side of the attacking spectrum. It provides great coverage and makes Nattorei think twice before switching in. Pursuit is my favourite move on this set and it really does shine. Trapping those Shanderas and Lati twins provides free kills and is just too good to pass up. Leftovers are giving for longelivity.
Espeon @ Light Clay
Ability: Magic Mirror
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Nature: Timid (+Spd, -Atk)
- Reflect
- Light Screen
- Psychic
- Wish
Well yes it's an Espeon. You've probably seen quite a few running around since gen 5 start. I myself really didn't want too use this guy at first and reason for that was his movepool. What are you going to run on him I mean there are very few options. I tried some offensive sets at first with Calm Mind and Choice Specs. But then I knew he was on my teams to support it with his ability in the first place so why not support my team even more. Then I thought of Dual Screens and I almost completly forgot about them. I mean they aren't used that much but they are still great and a large chunk of top sweepers really hate them. They also make set ups with Garchomp and Doryuuzu much much easier. Psychic does nice amount of damage even without any investment thanks to Espeons great SAtk stat. Wish is more of a filler than anything else and it works decently even though Espeons Hp isn't that great. I could probably replace it for some coverage move but I'm not sure because recovery is always nice. Another reason why I use Espeon is the huge usage of Breloom at the moment and it's nice to have a counter. EV's make Espeon just a bit bulkier than normal and I retain max speed with Timid nature which is helpful for using those support moves before opponent attacks me. Espeon holds Light Clay over Leftovers as 8 turns of screens is more helpful to me than extra recovery.
Gligar @ Evolution Stone
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SDef
Nature: Careful (+SDef, -SAtk)
- Stealth Rock
- Toxic
- Earthquake
- Roost
Oh well all I can say about Gligar is that I was really suprised about his walling capabilities. I mean I've met so much teams that just didn't pack an answer for this baby. With my EV spread and Careful nature he reaches 247 Def and 251 SDef. Now add Evolution Stone and Sand Veil and this guy becomes really hard too take down. I mean he can take most non-STABed water and ice attacks very well. He can set up Stealth Rock which is nice as you can't always rely on Espeon to bounce it back. Toxic was always one of my favourite moves and since Gligar doesn't have the best attack it's better for him too slowly wear opponents down. Earthquake is a nice STAB move too have and it helps me to check Doryuuzu (I have to break his Ballon first though) and Blaziken. Recovery is essential on any good wall and Gliscor has a reliable method of recovery in form of Roost. I sometimes lead with Gligar as i can get my rocks up straight away. Overall I would say Gligar really helps to balance this team defensivly along with screen support.
Donphan @ Shell Bell
Ability: Sturdy
0HP IV
Lv. 1
- Endeavor
- Ice Shard
- Toxic
- Sandstorm
Well this is the STAR of this team I would say. However even though I have a lot of support for him I'm not really relying o him to do all the job. So first of all I know there are still a lot of you out there that don't know what F.E.A.R. is. Well basically it's about abusing level 1 pokemon that can hang on to sash to use endeavor to get your opponent to one HP and then let sandstorm (or hail) finish him off. However this strategy got too a whole new dimension in this gen. It all begins with the sturdy change , which now acts as a built in Focus Sash so you don't need to carry one. That frees space for a very special item called Shell Bell. What Shell Bell does is that it heals you at the end of the turn for 1/8 of the amount of damage you dealt to your opponent that turn. So at level 1 Donphan with HP IVs has 12 HP (instead of 13 with normal HP), which basically means you are going to get all the way back to full health after you attack with endeavor as long as you do at least 88HP (8x11HP you need to recover) of damage to opponent. That effectivly means that Donphan is going to have infinite sash as long as he deals damage every turn. Most people that have faced F.E.A.R. consider it cheap. I won't deny that but I'll say it's not all that easy to play with it and it does require support to deal with counters. Most notable are hazards, ghosts and status as well as sandstorm immune pokemon with Leftovers. For the moves you know what Endeavor does, Ice Shard finishes off sandstorm resists at 1 HP, Sandstorm is for backup in case both mine and opponent's weather inducers are dead it can really change the tide of the battle and Toxic is mainly a filler that doesn't really do much so any suggestions are welcome. There is obviously no need to EV a level 1 pokemon, that's why there are none.
Garchomp @ Yache Berry
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Nature: Jolly (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Swords Dance
- Outrage
- Earthquake
- Fire Fang
So yeah it's Garchomp. The very same dragon that was too broken too be in OU in gen 4. It's hard too say where he will end this time but one thing is for sure. He is a top threat. After using him for awhile now I can say that he brought me a lot of victories and is in my opinion even more dangerous than Doryuuzu. Well why? First thing that a lot of people overlook on Garchomp is his bulk. He can take almost all priority moves bar Ice Shard which is much less comon than Mach Punch and maybe Aqua Jet that Doryuuzu fears. I would say that he is just in general hard too stop at some points of the game thanks too not only his underrated bulk but Sand Veil also. Sand Veil is just SO GOOD on Garchomp I mean seriously every otherwise reliable attack is now Stone Edge. I also run Yache Berry to help with those Ice Beams/Shards and it's working out great. Garchomp loves Dual Screen support provided by Espeon as well. I have standard EV spread with maxed out attack and speed with Jolly nature just because Garchomp needs all the speed he can get. Swords Dance is there to boost it's already nice attack an hopefully sweep. Outrage is my most powerful STAB by I try not to get locked into it too early. Dragon Claw would be a possible alternative but I find the extra power necessary. Earthquake is STABed and therefore my main move for hitting those steels and when I don't want to get locked. Fire Fang helps with ever so common Nattorei and it can at least touch Skarmory as well as break Ballons.
Doryuuzu @ Ballon
Ability: Sand Throw
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Nature: Jolly (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Rapid Spin
You all know him I mean he is a signature Pokemon of gen 5 and this set isn't very creative either. The only diffrence from the standard one is that I run Rapid Spin over X-Scissor. The reason for this is mainly to help out Donphan should my opponent get any hazards up. But you know Rapid Spin is always nice even more so against stall teams. This guy is probably one of the best spinners and the best offensive spinner at the moment. What's even better is that most opponents won't even expect it to spin. Other than that it's fairly standard. It has Swords Dance pretty much for the same reason as Garchomp to boost it's attack and try to sweep. This guy has a good number of checks but it's deadly in the endgame regardless. Earthquake is my main STAB move and Rock Slide provides decent coverage along with it hitting flyers as wel as having that 30% flinch ratio. He is EVd in attack and speed having a Jolly nature just too speed tie with other Doryuuzus. While I have considered to run Adamant for extra power I just think that opposing Doryuuzus are way too common. Ballon is not a suprise at all but it works giving me much more chances to set up.
Hello! This is my very first gen 5 rmt and i'm really excited about it. I really like the new metagame and I kinda got used to it in those 2 and half months since it was released on pokemon online. I mean it's hard to imagine going back to gen 4 metagame after you get used to gen 5. However gen 5 is far from balanced at the moment and even though some top threats were already banned it's still a long way until this metagame will be as balanced as the previous one.
Team building process:
Well it took me quite some time to come up with this team. First of all I would like to say I tested a lot of diffrent both old and new pokemon in this new meta. Because of my testing most teams were just a few random pokemon. I have however created some teams that I did put some thought into. I first tried rain which a played a lot in the old gen. It seemed great as rain really got a huge buff. But I quickly got bored of it, I mean to me rain was much more fun too play in gen 4 even though it was much harder to pull off. Then I tried a team that wasn't relying on any form of weather and was actually quite solid. But in time I realised it was way to hard for me too deal with other weather teams. Everyone was using weather teams and I realised that the only way for a team to be sucessful is to be able to counter those. I had 2 options either my own weather team or a trick room team. I tried trick room first but somehow it just wasnt working that great even though it was and still is a very nice anti-meta style(trick room Rankurusu rapes weather teams in my experience). So then I decided to play sandstorm. I just found out that those kind of teams are kinda reliable and work great at the moment. But I didn't want to just run a completly obvious SS team I wanted to add at least a few suprises in it:
So yeah around that time I found out about the new and improved F.E.A.R. Aron or FEARon and I was really stunned by how broken it was. I decided to build a team around him as I knew he was going to need A LOT of support to work properly.
I was kinda thinking wouldnt it be great if Aron had some sort of priority to finish off weakened pokemon at 1HP that sandstorm can't kill. I looked up the pokemon that can learn endeavor and have strurdy ability. The only two were Aron and Donphan. But donphan also had acess to ice shard. I thought running a F.E.A.R. set on him isn't possible because it could be level 25 at best. But for some reason pokemon online DOES ALLOW you to build a level 1 Donphan. So I proceeded to do that and replaced Aron.
I needed someone who could set up sandstorm. There were of course 2 options: Hippowdon and Tyranitar. I decided to use Tyraitar because it could provide a counter for ghosts as well which is crucial to support F.E.A.R.
What I wanted was too keep any form of hazards out of play as they ruin F.E.A.R. immediatly. One great counter to those was Espeon thanks to it's new incredible ability Magic Mirror.
Well I am running a sanstorm team right? Well I think yes so I needed some abusers. Perhaps the best abuser at the moment is Garchomp. I mean it has decent bulk combined with one of the deadliest abilities ever and a very good attack and speed.
I realised that doryuuzu would work great on this team. Well it does great on every sandstorm team but on this team it could function as a rapid spinner aswell. It wouldnt be wise to rely only on Espeon to block all the hazards and this is my answer if opponents does get the hazards up. So the best offensive spinner in the game that can also abuse sandstorm? I think I'll take that.
So last I wanted something that could help increase my defensive capabilities. I also wanted someone who could set up rocks of my own as they are always helpful. I thought of using Hippo but I wanted a ground immunity as well so in the end I decided to give Gligar a shot as I wanted to to test the new Evolution stone out as well.
So yeah around that time I found out about the new and improved F.E.A.R. Aron or FEARon and I was really stunned by how broken it was. I decided to build a team around him as I knew he was going to need A LOT of support to work properly.
I was kinda thinking wouldnt it be great if Aron had some sort of priority to finish off weakened pokemon at 1HP that sandstorm can't kill. I looked up the pokemon that can learn endeavor and have strurdy ability. The only two were Aron and Donphan. But donphan also had acess to ice shard. I thought running a F.E.A.R. set on him isn't possible because it could be level 25 at best. But for some reason pokemon online DOES ALLOW you to build a level 1 Donphan. So I proceeded to do that and replaced Aron.
I needed someone who could set up sandstorm. There were of course 2 options: Hippowdon and Tyranitar. I decided to use Tyraitar because it could provide a counter for ghosts as well which is crucial to support F.E.A.R.
What I wanted was too keep any form of hazards out of play as they ruin F.E.A.R. immediatly. One great counter to those was Espeon thanks to it's new incredible ability Magic Mirror.
Well I am running a sanstorm team right? Well I think yes so I needed some abusers. Perhaps the best abuser at the moment is Garchomp. I mean it has decent bulk combined with one of the deadliest abilities ever and a very good attack and speed.
I realised that doryuuzu would work great on this team. Well it does great on every sandstorm team but on this team it could function as a rapid spinner aswell. It wouldnt be wise to rely only on Espeon to block all the hazards and this is my answer if opponents does get the hazards up. So the best offensive spinner in the game that can also abuse sandstorm? I think I'll take that.
So last I wanted something that could help increase my defensive capabilities. I also wanted someone who could set up rocks of my own as they are always helpful. I thought of using Hippo but I wanted a ground immunity as well so in the end I decided to give Gligar a shot as I wanted to to test the new Evolution stone out as well.
Team at glance:
Indepth look:
Tyraitar @ Leftovers
Ability: Sandstream
EVs: 252 HP / 88 Atk / 168 SDef
Nature: Brave (+Atk, -Spd)
- Stone Edge
- Crunch
- Flamethrower
- Pursuit
Well here it is the all important sandstorm inducer. That is of course his primary role in any sandstorm team. However he has other uses as well. On of them is dispatching of ever so annoying ghosts. He of course is not a perfect counter to all of them. Well he counters Shandera perfectly and that is very important as Shandera is the most used ghost right now. He can have problems against Gengars Focus Blast and against Will-O-Wisp. But overall he does his job and counters other stuff like Lati twins too. So why leading with him? Well thats a good question. The first reason is the immediate sandstorm that he brings to the table. He has good amount of bulk and can badly damage quite some leads right at the beginning. I don't ALWAYS use him in the lead spot. As you know you can change your leads in wifi (standard) tier around after seeing opponents team so I will of course do that if i don't have a good matchup. I play both dream world and wifi so that isn't always a possibility. Sometimes I will lead with Gliscor as he works great in that spot too. Evs are placed in a way that gives my Tyranitar a nice amount of both physical and special bulk but at the same time retains the ability to hit the opponent hard thanks to Brave nature. For the moves I have Stone Edge because it hits flyers hard and is a great STAB to have. Crunch is another STAB that might seem unnecessary but since this guy is meant to counter bulky ghosts and psychics too it's great to have as it relly does nice damage to guys like Rankurusu. Flamethrower is chosen over Fire Blast for accuracy and over Fire Punch for it's ability to hit from the special side of the attacking spectrum. It provides great coverage and makes Nattorei think twice before switching in. Pursuit is my favourite move on this set and it really does shine. Trapping those Shanderas and Lati twins provides free kills and is just too good to pass up. Leftovers are giving for longelivity.
Espeon @ Light Clay
Ability: Magic Mirror
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Nature: Timid (+Spd, -Atk)
- Reflect
- Light Screen
- Psychic
- Wish
Well yes it's an Espeon. You've probably seen quite a few running around since gen 5 start. I myself really didn't want too use this guy at first and reason for that was his movepool. What are you going to run on him I mean there are very few options. I tried some offensive sets at first with Calm Mind and Choice Specs. But then I knew he was on my teams to support it with his ability in the first place so why not support my team even more. Then I thought of Dual Screens and I almost completly forgot about them. I mean they aren't used that much but they are still great and a large chunk of top sweepers really hate them. They also make set ups with Garchomp and Doryuuzu much much easier. Psychic does nice amount of damage even without any investment thanks to Espeons great SAtk stat. Wish is more of a filler than anything else and it works decently even though Espeons Hp isn't that great. I could probably replace it for some coverage move but I'm not sure because recovery is always nice. Another reason why I use Espeon is the huge usage of Breloom at the moment and it's nice to have a counter. EV's make Espeon just a bit bulkier than normal and I retain max speed with Timid nature which is helpful for using those support moves before opponent attacks me. Espeon holds Light Clay over Leftovers as 8 turns of screens is more helpful to me than extra recovery.
Gligar @ Evolution Stone
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SDef
Nature: Careful (+SDef, -SAtk)
- Stealth Rock
- Toxic
- Earthquake
- Roost
Oh well all I can say about Gligar is that I was really suprised about his walling capabilities. I mean I've met so much teams that just didn't pack an answer for this baby. With my EV spread and Careful nature he reaches 247 Def and 251 SDef. Now add Evolution Stone and Sand Veil and this guy becomes really hard too take down. I mean he can take most non-STABed water and ice attacks very well. He can set up Stealth Rock which is nice as you can't always rely on Espeon to bounce it back. Toxic was always one of my favourite moves and since Gligar doesn't have the best attack it's better for him too slowly wear opponents down. Earthquake is a nice STAB move too have and it helps me to check Doryuuzu (I have to break his Ballon first though) and Blaziken. Recovery is essential on any good wall and Gliscor has a reliable method of recovery in form of Roost. I sometimes lead with Gligar as i can get my rocks up straight away. Overall I would say Gligar really helps to balance this team defensivly along with screen support.
Donphan @ Shell Bell
Ability: Sturdy
0HP IV
Lv. 1
- Endeavor
- Ice Shard
- Toxic
- Sandstorm
Well this is the STAR of this team I would say. However even though I have a lot of support for him I'm not really relying o him to do all the job. So first of all I know there are still a lot of you out there that don't know what F.E.A.R. is. Well basically it's about abusing level 1 pokemon that can hang on to sash to use endeavor to get your opponent to one HP and then let sandstorm (or hail) finish him off. However this strategy got too a whole new dimension in this gen. It all begins with the sturdy change , which now acts as a built in Focus Sash so you don't need to carry one. That frees space for a very special item called Shell Bell. What Shell Bell does is that it heals you at the end of the turn for 1/8 of the amount of damage you dealt to your opponent that turn. So at level 1 Donphan with HP IVs has 12 HP (instead of 13 with normal HP), which basically means you are going to get all the way back to full health after you attack with endeavor as long as you do at least 88HP (8x11HP you need to recover) of damage to opponent. That effectivly means that Donphan is going to have infinite sash as long as he deals damage every turn. Most people that have faced F.E.A.R. consider it cheap. I won't deny that but I'll say it's not all that easy to play with it and it does require support to deal with counters. Most notable are hazards, ghosts and status as well as sandstorm immune pokemon with Leftovers. For the moves you know what Endeavor does, Ice Shard finishes off sandstorm resists at 1 HP, Sandstorm is for backup in case both mine and opponent's weather inducers are dead it can really change the tide of the battle and Toxic is mainly a filler that doesn't really do much so any suggestions are welcome. There is obviously no need to EV a level 1 pokemon, that's why there are none.
Garchomp @ Yache Berry
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Nature: Jolly (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Swords Dance
- Outrage
- Earthquake
- Fire Fang
So yeah it's Garchomp. The very same dragon that was too broken too be in OU in gen 4. It's hard too say where he will end this time but one thing is for sure. He is a top threat. After using him for awhile now I can say that he brought me a lot of victories and is in my opinion even more dangerous than Doryuuzu. Well why? First thing that a lot of people overlook on Garchomp is his bulk. He can take almost all priority moves bar Ice Shard which is much less comon than Mach Punch and maybe Aqua Jet that Doryuuzu fears. I would say that he is just in general hard too stop at some points of the game thanks too not only his underrated bulk but Sand Veil also. Sand Veil is just SO GOOD on Garchomp I mean seriously every otherwise reliable attack is now Stone Edge. I also run Yache Berry to help with those Ice Beams/Shards and it's working out great. Garchomp loves Dual Screen support provided by Espeon as well. I have standard EV spread with maxed out attack and speed with Jolly nature just because Garchomp needs all the speed he can get. Swords Dance is there to boost it's already nice attack an hopefully sweep. Outrage is my most powerful STAB by I try not to get locked into it too early. Dragon Claw would be a possible alternative but I find the extra power necessary. Earthquake is STABed and therefore my main move for hitting those steels and when I don't want to get locked. Fire Fang helps with ever so common Nattorei and it can at least touch Skarmory as well as break Ballons.
Doryuuzu @ Ballon
Ability: Sand Throw
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Nature: Jolly (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Rapid Spin
You all know him I mean he is a signature Pokemon of gen 5 and this set isn't very creative either. The only diffrence from the standard one is that I run Rapid Spin over X-Scissor. The reason for this is mainly to help out Donphan should my opponent get any hazards up. But you know Rapid Spin is always nice even more so against stall teams. This guy is probably one of the best spinners and the best offensive spinner at the moment. What's even better is that most opponents won't even expect it to spin. Other than that it's fairly standard. It has Swords Dance pretty much for the same reason as Garchomp to boost it's attack and try to sweep. This guy has a good number of checks but it's deadly in the endgame regardless. Earthquake is my main STAB move and Rock Slide provides decent coverage along with it hitting flyers as wel as having that 30% flinch ratio. He is EVd in attack and speed having a Jolly nature just too speed tie with other Doryuuzus. While I have considered to run Adamant for extra power I just think that opposing Doryuuzus are way too common. Ballon is not a suprise at all but it works giving me much more chances to set up.
Closing Comments:
I think this team is quite decent at the moment and I've been doing quite well with it. But you can still help because I know it can still get much better so I would like to say thanks for reading and encourage you to rate my team!
I think this team is quite decent at the moment and I've been doing quite well with it. But you can still help because I know it can still get much better so I would like to say thanks for reading and encourage you to rate my team!
