Gen 1 My RBY Team

Hi everybody. I've just finished building my RBY team for the Gen 1 OU tier. It's my first time trying competitive, so I may have made some horrible mistake Hahaha I tried it a couple of times on Showdown and it was decent, but I definitely need more practice and data to properly evaluate it. Here are the details. Any opinion?

While building this team I focused on type coverage.

Almost every Pokemon has a STAB move for at least one of its types and I managed to get STABs against 13 types out of 15. The only one missing is Ghost, but since the Gengar line is the only one with this type and all of them are also Poison, I preferred to use super effective moves to Poison against them. About Psychic types I only have Jolteon's Pin Missile, that is quite weak, but I couldn't figure out a better solution.

Defensively, I have a good coverage too, with 14 resistances out of 15. The only one here is Dragon, but also in this case I don't care really much since Dragon moves are super effective only against other Dragons and I don't have any.

Gengar (Lead)
- Psychic
- Mega Drain
- Hypnosis
- Thunderbolt

Gengar does not have STABs, but it can use its high speed to put at sleep the opponent pretty quickly with Hypnosis. With Thunderbolt there's also the chance to paralyze and with Mega Drain he can recover its HPs a little when necessary.

Poliwrath
- Submission
- Surf
- Rest
- Amnesia

Poliwrath is one of the main attackers. Two STABs, Amnesia to rise its quite low Special and Rest to be a little annoying.

Rhydon
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Strength
- Toxic

Rhydon also has two STABs and Toxic to poison the opponent if needed. Strenght is a filler move, but it can be useful when any other try has failed.

Jolteon
- Pin Missile
- Thunderbolt
- Thunder Wave
- Sand Attack

As I said before, Jolteon's Pin Missile is my only hope against Psychic types. I definitely need advice on this. Then there are the STAB, Thander Wave to paralize and Sand Attack to annoy.

Jynx
- Ice Beam
- Psychic
- Lovely Kiss
- Mimic

Jynx also has two STABs, Lovely Kiss for sleep and Mimic to use if needed.

Dodrio
- Drill Peck
- Tri Attack
- Rest
- Toxic

Dodrio has the last two STABs, a Toxic like Rhydon and a Rest to recover.
 
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Ah,someone who wishes to break the norm. After me own heart, as I'm the kind of guy who likes occasionally using Red's Team(starters + Chu+Lax+Lapras.) Anyway RBY is much more strict meta in flexibility then later gens so I will lay out the 3 big things here:

-Psychic,Normal and Ice are the best types. Fighting, Poison and Bug are probably the worst.

The Big 5 of gen 1 outside the Mew family are Tauros,Chansey,Exeggcutor,Alakazam and Snorlax. Every competitive team will be running at least 3 of them.

-The only status heavily used are paralysis, sleep and freeze.

I'll add my 2 cents for your team here after my next break.

...And I'm Back. now then, with RBY OU it is less about Coverage and more around building a team that disrupts your opponent's flow so you can set up with a killer. Usually the process goes that the lead starts disruption, support carries it on when their work i done, and when the team is scouted you set up with your main killer(usually Tauros.) I'm still sort of an RBY scrub but I believe I can give a basic skeleton here of what you want:

Lead/Cores/Tech/Sweeper.

now overlooking your team:

Gengar and Jynx are actually both commonly(read: almost solely) used as leads, so you really only need one of them to use. for what it sounds like you want, I'd say Jynx is your best bet, as while not quite as fast as Gengar and lacking a reliable escape method in boom it does have the advantage of sporting Psychic typing, a slightly more accurate Sleep Move and a reliable move for hurting Exeggcutor(one of the most commonPokemon you will encounter.)

Poliwrath is sort of high risk, high reward from what I've read. Amnesia helps it's Psychic immunity a bit but only a bit. Going by the guide at least this is considered a guy who should only be used if you can guarantee no Starmie or Alakazams, so funnily enough a safer replacement is Starmie, probably with a set of Psychic/Recover/Blizzard/Thunder Wave. Wrath probably still could be used though as he may actually be the best thing to take down a Golem or Rhydon. Speaking of....

Rhydon is cool. shuts down Zapdos in it's tracks and does decent against the Oh so annoying Chansey(a poke that would give your team a Bad Time otherwise). however refer to what I meantioned earlier that Sleep/Para/Freeze is all that it used-that is because Toxic apparently has a glitch where the Badly Poisoned effect is removed upon switch. Rhydon should be more Power focused, and one of the 2 most used Normal type moves in the game is Body Slam, a move that does nearly as much damage as Strength and also has a bonus of possibly paralyzing another poke(except other Normal Types funny enough.) another Potential option to consider is Golem: Does the same general job as Rhydon, but in exchange for less power and HP has more Defense and can learn Explosion.

For Dodrio and Jolteon, I would Suggest a Pokemon that takes both of their best traits and combines them: Zapdos. This dude does both their jobs combined-Thunderbolt for Heavy Special STAB on targets like Starmie or Slowbro. Drill Peck for heavily hurting Exeggutor and doing great damage against Chansey or Zam. Also it learns Agility, which thanks to another neat bug can negate paralysis when used(still have the random full paralyze chance though), allowing you to continue your massacre. Only major things that stop it are Rhydon and Golems....which can easily be taken down by your Water Type.

Now last but certainly not least, the Cores. I wanted to respect you being a bit more out of the box, ergo why I didn't go for the standard 3-4 core team. but there are 2 main cores that are practically essential, and they are:

Tauros: No questions here. Stupidly good, but is best used for ending games. Zapdos should do sweeping duties first to bait out Twavers and then when it's safe have the Mad Cow finish them off.

Chansey: one of the best Special walls period. yes, the bold was intentional that's how important it is.

Alright, so this is my basic Idea I see for your team:

1.Jynx(Lead)
Lovely Kiss
Psychic
Blizzard/Ice Beam
Mimic

2.Rhydon(Tank/Wall)
Earthquake
Rock Slide
Body Slam
Substitute

OR

2.Golem(Tank/Wall)
Earthquake
Rock Slide
Body Slam
Explosion


3.
Your Poliwrath set I agree with(Amnesia/Submission/Surf/Rest.) If you consider the other option though...

3. Starmie(Support)
Recover
Psychic/Thunderbolt
Blizzard
Thunder Wave

4.Zapdos(Sweeper/Tech)
Thunder Wave
Thunderbolt
Drill Peck
Agility

5.Tauros(Core/Sweeper)
Earthquake
Body Slam
Hyper Beam
Blizzard

6.Chansey(Core/Support)
Softboiled
Thunder Wave
Ice Beam
Thunderbolt/Counter
 
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Hmm, type coverage might be a useful rule of thumb in newer gens, but it just doesn't work in RBY because the meta is so heavily warped around some types while others are totally irrelevant.

If you're new to RBY, I strongly recommend sticking to a standard big 4 build while you learn the meta (that's Egg/Chansey/Lax/Tauros). The reason is it has no glaring weaknesses and supports a variety of different playstyles, whereas a more unconventional build may dictate a certain style of play and have other weird quirks. The aforementioned pokemon leave you free to choose a lead (Zam and Jynx are the two best imo), and then there's a fifth slot available where you can pick any pokemon you think would be good.

Fawful's suggested team looks nice, but has one glaring omission; lack of a backup sleeper. I strongly suggest slotting an Exeggutor on the team somewhere, possibly in place of Starmie or Zapdos.

Regarding Psychic types, they all have weaknesses but Bug is the wrong way to target them. All of the Psychic types have limitations, both offensively and defensively. Exeggutor is weak to ice attacks and has no recovery. Alakazam and Jynx are weak to physical attackers. Slowbro and Starmie are weak to Electric attacks. Offensively, they all have limited coverage and/or lack the raw power to break through walls. Chansey can take on literally any special attacker in OU. Alakazam can sponge attacks, although it often has trouble doing anything in return. Starmie can also take on a lot of other psychic types, thanks to its coverage and recovery.

Onto the original team!

Firstly, Gengar could really use Explosion as a general purpose wallbreaking tool (it's one of the biggest reasons it's good!). I also recommend running Night Shade somewhere on the set, due to its consistent damage output, most notably against Exeggutor. Easily the most expendable move is Psychic, since it is really only effective against opposing Gengar... which you seldom actually get to take on, since normally one of them gets slept and promptly switches out. Mega Drain is the next most likely move to be dropped since it's only really useful if GolDon try to enter play, which is a lot less common than Exeggutor coming in.

Poliwrath sadly just isn't viable in RBY OU. Its typing is just too big a hindrance to be effective. I strongly suggest replacing it with a Recover user (Starmie/Chansey/Alakazam). Note that this also depends on what the rest of your team looks like, as you may need something that can check physical attackers. I personally like Starmie here, but it's not the greatest when paralysed, so Chansey is also an option

Rhydon's set should be changed to have Body Slam and Substitute in place of Strength/Toxic. Body Slam is better than Strength in every way and can potentially spread paralysis, which is invaluable if your opponent keeps sending Starmie out. Toxic just isn't effective in RBY, while Substitute is great for exploiting paralysed opponents.

Jolteon should be running Double Kick>Sand Attack, which gives it a good shot at breaking Chansey as well as chipping things like GolDon. Sand Attack just isn't reliable enough to be worthwhile.

I highly recommend Jynx be replaced with Exeggutor (Sleep/Stun/Psychic/Explosion). Jynx is a really awkward fit outside the lead position, as its poor physical bulk can be an issue. Exeggutor is a great check to opposing physical attackers, and also fills the role of backup sleeper well.

Dodrio ought to be replaced with Tauros (BSlam/HBeam/EQ/Blizz). Tauros is better in almost every way, better speed and bulk and better coverage. It's really fucking good.
 
Thank you both for the quick reply.

As I said, I'm new to competitive, at all, and without knowing which Pokemon and types were the most used in this meta, I opted for a team that (on paper) could counter almost everything, without being excellent against anything, and then build on this when I learned more about it.

And with your replies on one side and more battles on Showdown on the others (battles that I lost slightly more often than I won), I've learned a lot.

From my testing battles, my first impression is that a "strange" team has the advantage of surprise effect. I've seen Chanseys and Snorlaxes being taken down easily just because of that, so I'll probably continue on the path of a slightly more surprising team.

On the other hand, however, I understand that deliberately not using the best ones only for the sake of surprise is just stupid, so I'll consider the idea of including at least one of the Big 5, as Fawful called them.

For the leading spot, I'll probably go with Jynx, with the same moveset it has now, as suggested by Fawful. In my testing battles I found myself using it more often than Gengar, so I agree on that.

Side-note: my Gengar experience, however, hasn't been completely negative. I must say that it came quite useful in emergency situations with its Mega Drain and Thunderbolt when other Pokemon were down, like when Poliwrath was fainted and it took down a Golem that was causing a little too much problems, especially to my Jolteon... I think that I'll combine this experience with the surprise effect I was talking about earlier, maybe renouncing some stat moves in favor of some different moves that can both surprise the opponent and come handy in emergency.

The second spot goes to Poliwrath, with the same moves it has now. I understand the risks, but I prefer having a Fighting STAB to take down quickly the so, so annoying Snorlax, Chansey and Tauros rather than deal with them in other ways.

The third spot goes to Jolteon, with Double Kick/Thunderbolt/Thunder Wave/Sand Attack, partially accepting Ortheore's suggestion. I never used Pin Missile. Even against a Psychic type I relied more on Thunderbolt. I understand Ortheore's issues with Sand Attack, but in my test battles it came useful quite often in combination with Jolteon's high speed to make the opponent miss the attack at the first turn before switching to something better. Also, Double Kick is another good fighting move, to be used if Poliwrath goes down or when predicting that a Golem or Rhydon is coming in.

Speaking of Rhydon, I accept the suggestion that both of you gave me. It will get the fourth spot on the team with the moveset Earthquake/Rock Slide/Body Slam/Substitute. Not much to say here. You both already said everything, and my testing battles agree too.

The fifth and sixth spots are the ones that I'm going to change. About Gengar I talked about earlier and Dodrio just couldn't stand a chance in my battles. I'll pick Exeggutor (Sleep Powder/Psychic/Mega Drain/Stun Spore; I don't like the idea of my Pokemon exploding in front of the opponent. Poor Exeggutor...) and Tauros (standard Body Slam/Hyper Beam/Earthquake/Blizzard).

So, summing up, my next proposal is the following:

Jynx (lead)
- Ice Beam
- Psychic
- Lovely Kiss
- Mimic

Poliwrath
- Submission
- Surf
- Rest
- Amnesia

Jolteon
- Double Kick
- Thunderbolt
- Thunder Wave
- Sand Attack

Rhydon
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Body Slam
- Substitute

Exeggutor
- Sleep Powder
- Psychic
- Mega Drain
- Stun Spore

Tauros
- Body Slam
- Hyper Beam
- Earthquake
- Blizzard
 

Jorgen

World's Strongest Fairy
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Use Blizzard on Jynx. 90% accurate, hits like a truck.

Slowbro is better for what you're trying to do with Poliwrath; too many Psychics flying around. If you're dead set on Poli though, swap out Rest for a "surprise" move: Counter, Hypnosis, or Blizzard for Egg coverage. Poliwrath is a bit of a gimmick like that.

Jolt often runs pin missile for Egg coverage. I prefer that over Sand-Attack; if you're gonna pray for hax with Jolt, you go for the crit.

Egg should use Explosion over mega drain or stun spore.

This is going to be a super fast-paced team that is not going to feel safe at all. Which is fun, but isn't so good in RBY anymore because the dominant pokes are just so good (I say "anymore" because they were decent when you didn't need Twaves to paralyze Chansey). Chansey is going to sit in your face and paralyze half your team; Alakazam and Starmie too. Lax you can check, but your own lax would often be even better as Normal types cannot be paralyzed by Body Slam.
 
Jynx (lead)
- Ice Beam
- Psychic
- Lovely Kiss
- Mimic

Poliwrath
- Submission
- Surf
- Rest
- Amnesia

Jolteon
- Double Kick
- Thunderbolt
- Thunder Wave
- Sand Attack

Rhydon
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Body Slam
- Substitute

Exeggutor
- Sleep Powder
- Psychic
- Mega Drain
- Stun Spore

Tauros
- Body Slam
- Hyper Beam
- Earthquake
- Blizzard
I told IronBullet I would come back to rating if there was RBY + ADV teams so here goes:

The team in its current form isn't terribly usable. You have 3 mons that outright lose to opposing Eggys (god rest his soul, what the f is that new form) and it's also a check to Tauros (though not a very sturdy one). Considering your best way of beating it is Jynx, which will end up Paralyzed or Asleep turn 1 in 99% of games.. you're basically starting off REALLY far behind. Now, I'm not saying you need an Articuno or anything, but you DO need more ways to generally play around it considering it is one of the four best mons in the tier.

Poliwrath has to go. You don't have the slot to screw around with in this tier basically (even if slot 6 is generally considered "whatever you want", in a good team it will realistically be one of lapras/zapdos/golem/rhydon/wrapper like 99% of times and then more esoteric shit like Cuno or Persian or whatever). Point being, while this is a fuck around slot basically and you can have a competitive team with many different things there, you can't have Poliwrath. It does basically nothing in this generation and is switchin fodder for too many common mons. I can bring a para'd Alakazam in on it fearlessly, for example.

Jynx needs Blizzard and Mimic is a funny gimmick but almost never useful, just in my experience. Make it Rest, or if you want to be hipster go with Counter and pray you don't get para'd the turn you take that Snorlax Body Slam or whatever.

Sand Attack is way to "pray for the best" with Jolteon. Old gens like RBY are more lenient w/ that shit but like, just run Pin Missile so you aren't hard walled by Eggy. Also, I don't think you need Jolteon and Rhydon on the same team. One of the super cool advantages to both of those mons is checking Zapdos which is a nightmare of a mon (the VR description of it as "S-Rank if the opponent doesn't have GolDon" is actually kinda accurate). But doubling up on checks to it isn't super necessary when you can get more use out of say, Snorlax or Chansey.

Both Stun Spore and Mega Drain are "fourth moves" on Eggy, so it's hard to get away with running both. Eggy DOES have a little bit of customization to it outside that fourth move (there's a cool rest set actually, and that leech seed one too) but generally it's best to stick to the best 3 moves and then style based on what your team needs. I kept Stun Spore as its generally more useful, Mega Drain is only helpful in one scenario.

Here's how I'd do your team:

Jynx
- Blizzard
- Psychic
- Lovely Kiss
- Rest

Rhydon
- Earthquake
- Rock Slide
- Body Slam
- Substitute

Exeggutor
- Sleep Powder
- Psychic
- Explosion
- Stun Spore

Tauros
- Body Slam
- Hyper Beam
- Earthquake
- Blizzard

Snorlax
- Body Slam
- Hyper Beam
- Earthquake
- Self-Destruct

Chansey
- Reflect
- Seismic Toss
- Thunder Wave
- Soft-Boiled


It's standard, but you're new so it's probably best to stick to standard stuff for now. You can start fucking around w/ Moltres and Hypno a little while later, no need to jump the gun. I've played on the RBY ladder before - it's wrap infested (so a rock is fine, Gengar's cool too) and generally very... bad. There are a few good players that ladder regularly and you'll want to be able to have a team that keeps pace with them. I would use this team for some time and get used to it and then branch out then. Reflect Chansey isn't the "go-to" set but it's really common now, I think it's cool to have on this team because you have Rhydon to check Zapdos and this lets you soft check a lot of other stuff like Snorlax, Tauros (to get the Twave off) and if you get Para'd you PP stall other Chanseys.
 
You can take for word most of what Teal said. RBY is a very limited metagame in which surprises don't work since they're usually bad in themselves but also because the game has been around for 20 years, so players had time to figure out what works and what doesn't, for example Poliwrath doesn't.

The reasons why the teams you offered weren't good were covered, but I actually disagree with Teal on some things he said:

The team teal offered is like decent, but I would 100% run Golem over Rhydon especially with only two mons that have a paralysing move. Rhydon needs a lot of para support to be efficient, and is tougher to use for a beginner (Explosion is easier obv click a button ftw). Also with only two paralysing mons (which I don't agree with I think 3 is the minimum) if you have a bad start like losing a Jynx ditto first turn and then getting your Chansey frozen, you're just gonna lose. To make a comeback you'll need to paralyse and get lucky, and your only mon to do so will be Egg (note that in those situations having boom is better than higher stats for your rock). So I'd either change the 6th to something like Jolteon (with Pin Missile and not Sand Attack) who can deal with Zapdos and be a third paralyser, or you could just change the lead to either Starmie/Alakazam. Jolt also deals with Waters, who are annoying to the team. It's a more offensive approach with which you can be in the driver's seat way more often. But tbh a lot of 6ths could work. Also even if Reflect Chansey is fine, you might want the BeamBolt set with Jynx + Rock to handle waters better + to get even more freeze shots. When you use Jynx you can't really avoid para on Chansey like you can if you have like a Zam lead, so you won't make an amazing use of Reflect, it'll probably never be good against Tauros, and Zapdos is already covered. And if you're paralysed and the opposite Chansey isn't, well you just spam ice beam like a retard and go to your lax if he goes to his. I'm thinking Counter could be smth though but then you're weak to Waters again.

As for the ladder well I haven't laddered against low ranks for a while so I don't know if it's Wrap Infested but if it is then a rock is just terrible: Cloyster is a horrible match-up and just destroys the team, Victreebel is very annoying to against since your only faster pokemon is Tauros and Jynx will usually be para'd/sleeping/dead. Teams that have Vic might not have Egg which means they don't have "the check" to GolDon but a rock isn't really a tough thing to handle. Dragonite absolutely loves Rocks since it usually can switch-in eq, go up against them to set up, OHKO with Surf etc... so if you really want to fuck up Wrap you should basically have a fast 6th like Zam which can twave and recover, Starmie is the best Cloyster check and is better vs Dragonite thanks to its bulk but can be in tricky situations against Victreebel at times. Gengar is obviously a way too but you have to be careful not being punished too much by your opponent just going to Tauros after he wrapped you etc... The best team to just say "lolno" to wrap while being good vs non wrap teams would probably be something like Gengar/Big 4/Starmie.
 

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