My (Hopefully Not Generic) Rain Team

WhinoTheRhino

WhinoTheRhino

Hi guys, this is my first RMT post. I've read the guidelines and a few other posts to get a feel of how to post myself, so here goes. If I make a mistake of formatting or something related to posting, please point it out to me.

Before I start, let me point out two weaknesses I have noticed on my team. My first weakness is an absence of physical attackers. The only physical attacks on my team are from my supporting pokemon. If someone could suggest a good physical attacker to replace one of my special attackers that would be great. The second weakness I have noticed is my lack of priority. I only have a single priority move on my team and I feel that I need more. Once again, if anyone could suggest a good pokemon that can utilize priority to replace one of my other pokemon that would be great.

Now, on to the actual team:

Politoed @ Leftovers
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 252 Def / 252 HP / 4 Spd
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Ice Beam
- Perish Song
- Hypnosis
The good old froggy rain-maker. Defensive Politoed can surprisingly take quite a few hits. Scald is the standard attack. Hypnosis and Perish Song work surprisingly well together. After putting a potential counter to sleep, I can use Perish Song after. This either 1) if the target decides not to switch out, Perish Song will force them to, resetting the sleep counter or 2) if the target does switch out, Perish Song will hit the switch, forcing the new pokemon to switch after a couple turns. 0 Atk IVs for the rare confusion because y not.

Volcarona @ Leftovers
Trait: Flame Body
EVs: 252 SAtk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Modest Nature
- Quiver Dance
- Bug Buzz
- Hurricane
- Hidden Power [Water]
Volcarona, a fantastic pokemon in any weather. Volcarona is my setup sweeper. Quiver Dance, 100% accuracy hurricane and boosted HP Water in the rain. Not much else to say.

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 48 Def / 208 SDef
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Spikes
- Thunder Wave
- Power Whip
- Gyro Ball
Ferrothorn is a very useful wall. T Wave over Leech Seed because it cripples opposing sweepers better. Gyro Ball may seem redundant with T Wave but I find Gyro Ball is still useful if I want to just go for the attack instead of using T Wave.

Tornadus (M) @ Expert Belt
Trait: Prankster
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 SAtk / 4 Def
Timid Nature
- Hurricane
- Focus Blast
- Sleep Talk
- Tailwind
STAB 100% accuracy Hurricane is great, focus blast for added coverage however the accuracy is a let-down. If anyone has an alternative to Focus Blast that would be welcome as I haven't had too much of a chance to use it anyways. Prankster Sleep Talk is my counter to Breloom, and Prankster Tailwind is great for a late-game sweep. Oh yeah, and I use Expert Belt to fake a Choice item.

Latios @ Life Orb
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Surf
- Psyshock
- Thunder
Latios is my speedy all-out attacker. I've been thinking of using Expert Belt to fake a Choice item but am not sure. Input welcome. Simple 4 attacks, with Surf getting a rain boost, Thunder getting 100% accuracy, and the others getting STAB. Once again 0 Atk IVs.

Donphan @ Leftovers
Trait: Sturdy
EVs: 252 Def / 252 Atk / 4 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Earthquake
- Stealth Rock
- Ice Shard
Rapid Spinner, Stealth Rock setter, and priority Ice Shard revenge-killer. 252 EVs in Atk to take advantage of Donphans 120 base Atk through Ice Shard and Earthquake. I have been debating whether to put the 252 Def EVs into HP or keep them in Def. Input welcome.


Well, that's my team! I hope you like my first RMT post! Also I have no fancy pictures like other RMT posts cause I'm just lame I guess. Thanks for reading.
 
Hey there, nice team but i do have some suggestons.

But first to answer your question about physical attackers. In the rain i have 2 favorites beeing Toxicroak and Lucario, both have a very strong swords dance set. Croak benefits from the rain trough his dry skin ability wich will make you heal up the dammage you take from life orb. Lucario benefits because fire attacks will not hurt quite as much. Croak obviously benefits more but he is slightly slower so thats for you to choose. I would personally change donphan, he is awesome for sunteams but not directly the best pick for rain teams. You can get stealth rocks on your ferrothorn.

As for the rest: I see you have 2 Hurricane spammers, wich in my experience is a bit redundant. I would replace one of them with Thundurus-T with a scarf.
Wich brings me to the next point: You have no scarf, you count on tailwind to outspeed opposing scarfs, but it may allready be too late after getting tailwind up. Also tailwind increases speed by one stage, this means a fast scarfer may still outspeed your pokemons. Therefor Thundurus-T will come in handy.

So to sum up what i would change:
Donphan -> Toxicroak/Lucario SD set
Ferrothorn: Stealth rocks over powerwhip and maybe get leech seed for some healing as ferro is your only wall.
Volcarona/Tornadus -> Thundurus-T (Personally i'd get rid of volcarona because he was the reason you got a spinner i'm assuming)

Lucario @ Life Orb
Trait: Justified
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Jolly Nature
- ExtremeSpeed/Bullet Punch
- Crunch/Ice punch
- Swords Dance
- Close Combat

Extremespeed is a stronger priority then bullet punch, even with STAB but it is resisted by a whole lot of pokemons... then again so is bullet punch, up to you.
Crunch makes you able to kill jellicent wich would otherwise wall you with ease, but ice punch lets you kill dragonite because you can outspeed and at +2 its a OHKO trough multiscale.
SD and CC are standard.

Toxicroak @ Life Orb
Trait: Dry Skin
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Sucker Punch
- Ice Punch
- Drain Punch/Cross Chop

Sucker punch is awesome and terrible at the same time. Only 8 PP and it does nothig if the oponent doesnt attack. Toxicroak is easily walled by a jellicent and doesnt really have an answer to it.
Ice punch again to outspeed dragonite since you outspeed.
Drain punch or cross chop, for you to decide, they both have their advantages but lately i always use drain punch because 100% accurate and allows you to sweep in other weathers aswell.

Thundurus-Therian (M) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 SAtk / 4 Atk
Timid/Naive Nature
- Focus Blast
- Thunder
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- U-turn/Volt Switch

U-turn allows you to scout without having to fear for groundtype switch ins wich would absorb volt switch. If using u turn , use naive nature.
Since this set uses thunder over thunderbolt (rain..) you might like volt switch in case you lose the weather wars. If you use volt switch -> use timid nature.

Hope i helped. Good luck and have fun testing.
 
Thanks for the suggestions! I'm really liking Lucario as his ExtremeSpeed would also help my priority problem. I think I will also add scarfed Thundurus-T as I do need a scarf.
 
I actually like the flow of this team. It's relatively solid and Volcarona is actually used properly. With a few changes, this could be a pretty consistent group. The biggest thing that jumps out at me though is the lack of two important things that you will probably need to succeed. First of all, you lack a Choice Scarfer. I always think having a Choice Scarfer in balance or HO is very important; the metagame is so offensive and past-faced which makes not having a Scarfer in said archetypes a bad idea since something with Dragon Dance or a fast, powerful Pokémon like Specs Keldeo can just shove a footlong turkey sammich made by Jared from Subway up your rump. A Choice Scarfer will remedy quite a few holes in your team. The second major problem is the lack of a stallbreaker. Your team isn't weak to too many indivudal defensive threats, but I honestly do not see how you break sand stall. HP Water is doing a pittance to SpDef Heatran in sand, and even if you do somehow break it, partners like KyuremB will eventually kill you with Life Orb recoil taking its toll. Defensive cores just practically give you little to no room for error, and it requires almost perfect play. I don't like your odds. Latios isn't really considered a stallbreaker since it's easily walled by common staples Jirachi and Tyranitar among other things. Besides the weaknesses listed above, you do seem pretty weak to a few Pokemon. Opposing Volcarona, especially Substitute varients, really bone you. It sets up on Donphan, -2 Latios, and Ferrothorn (if Lum or Sub), and then proceeds to Quiver past your whole team with its STABs. Terrakion seems like a pretty big threat in general since Donphan is your only real "safe switch in". With Donphan out of the picture, who is 2HKO'd by Close Combat with the current EV's, Terrakion gets a free kill on practically every switch in. In a similar vein, Mamoswine can revenge kill and OHKO several of your Pokemon and you lack a reliable check. Lastly, you are pretty weak to opposing Scizor as your only "counter" is Volcarona whom is Stealth Rock weak, so it'd be nice to have another check.

With this in mind, I'd like to recommend a few changes. The first would be converting Politoed to a Choice Scarf set. With a Choice Scarf and Timid nature, Politoed can outspeed several Pokemon it couldn't previously like DD Dragonite, Lati@s, SD Terrakion, etc. and it supplies your team with a reliable Revenge Killer and general "fastmon" which can spam Rain boosted Hydro Pumps. What's not to love? Of course you lose survivability, but your matchup vs other weathers is already pretty decent, so I think it's worth the risk. A set of Hydro Pump / Ice Beam / Scald | Hypnosis / Encore with Max Spa / Spe and a Timid Nature is the best set. I like Hypnosis, but it's a pretty inaccurate move to miss with on a Scarfed Pokemon, so be wise with it. My second change will be to change Tornadus to a Feraligatr. Tornadus doesn't really provide much to your team since it already has sufficient Breloom checks and two decent Fighting resists. Feraligatr on the other hand provides you with a few valuable things, the primary one being a Stallbreaker. Feraligatr with Crunch can pretty much decimate most defensive cores and makes it a pain in the ass for Sand Stall. Feraligatr gives you a solid Terrakion / Scizor / Volcarona check with priority Rain Boosted Aqua Jets, and it's a rad sweeper with Torrent since it's surprisingly bulky enough to live hits while setting up and get into range. Swords Dance / Waterfall / Crunch / Aqua Jet with EV's of 184 HP / 252 Atk / 72 Spe @ Mystic Water and an Adamant Nature give you sufficient bulk and the ability to outspeed slow Rotom-W. You can adjust the EV's to how you see fit, however. I feel like these changes solve most of your problems, but there are a few other nitpicks I'd like to make. I really do not like Thunder Wave on Ferrothorn at all. Ferrothorn is usually better off attacking or setting hazards or Leeching. Leech Seed > Thunder Wave gives you more utility and survivability which lets you set more Spikes. Latios's survivability is a problem since you need it to kill Keldeo, so trying Roost instead of Thunder let's you have a decent Keldeo check thoughout the game. If Latios still doesn't manage to do well, changing it to Latias with the same set and EV's gives you a more solid Keldeo check. Lastly, you lack a Pokemon to lead against Breloom, so trying out Substitute on Volcarona over HP Water is cool. If you try this, use Leftovers on Volcarona so it gains more survivability as well (Sub + LO = death).

Good luck.
 
hey there, nice team!! the only thing i don't understand is why use Donphan on a rain team as your spinner? Lots of water types have high special attack which is further boosted by rain and Donphan has really low special defense! On my rain team for my spinner i use..

Tentacruel Leftovers
Ability- Rain Dish
EV's: 248 HP / 244 Defense / 16 Spd
Timid Nature
-Scald
-Rapid Spin
-Protect
-Toxic Spikes

I've had a lot of success with Tentacruel using this set. In the rain with leftovers or black sludge he gets back almost 13% of his health each turn. Protect is there to get free HP. Scald can cripple Physical Sweepers and with Tentacruel it's very easy to stay in long enough to burn one or two opponents pokemon. Other then that your team looks solid! You should check my team out i just did a RMT in the OU forum too!! I would love to battle sometime too to see whos got the better rain team!!
 
Wow, I feel bad for not replying to your suggestions here. I never bothered checking the thread again after smogon went down for about a day right after I posted this RMT. You guys probably won't see this but thanks for your suggestions! Even though it's been like 3 weeks lol... To be honest I made this team back when I was more noobish, thus my lack of a scarfer (I didn't really know much about scarfs back then which is why I thought I needed more priority moves instead of a scarf lol)
 
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