My VGC 2013 team

Stijn

This is my team:

Metagross @ Iron Plate Trait: Clear Body
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Bullet Punch
- Earthquake
- Meteor Mash
- Protect


Bullet Punch is a fast steel type move. You can use it for some extra damage before it faints, or to knock out a Pokemon quickly. Meteor Mash is a strong stab move. Earthquake is just a good move to have. The iron plate is for boosting the steel type moves a little. It uses the item by lack of a better item for him that came to my mind.

For further details, see Abomasnow.



Abomasnow (M) @ Ice Gem
Trait: Snow Warning
EVs: 160 HP / 252 SAtk / 96 SDef
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Blizzard
- Giga Drain
- Ice Beam
- Protect


These were named as good partners on the Smogon page of some of my other four pokemon, so that is why i chose Metagross and Abomasnow. Blizzard hits instantly because of the hail summoned by his ability. Besides that is it boosted by the hail, is it a stab move, it has a great base power and in combination with the ice gem very dangerous (yes i know that is only one time but it still is a strong move after the gem). Giga Drain is the best draining special attack and a stab move. Ice beam if Blizzard is not necessary or i use it when i have to save the ice gem. Protect is standard.



Latios (M) @ Dragon Gem
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Protect
- Psychic
- Draco Meteor
- Surf


Latios a good special attacker and he can learn good moves. Surf is a good water type move with a large spread, i don't know any reasons besides that why this one. Draco Meteor stab move boosted with the gem creates an extreme attack. Psychic is better then his signature move. Protect is standard.



Zapdos @ Sitrus Berry
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 125 HP / 124 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Thunder
- Detect
- Heat Wave
- Roost


Zapdos was after Tyrannitar the second pokemon i chose. I remembered that some of the participants were using it and they were fantastic, plus it was a good cover for Tyrannitars water weakness. Detect instead of protect because detect is rarer then protect so it has a high chance of not being blocked. Roost and the berry and the evs for HP make it a great bulker. Thunder in combination with politoeds rain and the high damage and being a stab move for Zapdos makes it a great move. Heat wave is just a nice fire type move to have.



Tyranitar (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Rock Slide
- Earthquake
- Fire Blast
- Protect


Tyrannitar was the first pokemon i chose for this team. He can underspeed other weather abilities. He has also great stats. Rock slide is a multiple hit rock move with a chance of flinching. Earthquake shoul be clear. Protect is just a handy move. And i don't know why i chose fire blast.




Politoed (F) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 116 HP / 252 SAtk / 140 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Hydro Pump
- Protect
- Psychic
- Ice Beam


I chose Politoed because of his/her ability making it a great partner with Zapdos and because of Hydro Pump rain boosted stab move in combination with the speed boost of the scarf. You know about Protect, and I don't know any more about the other moves.


I personally think i miss something, that i did something wrong with the choises i have made or that it isn't a good team after all? Could you answer my question while rating?

Well, i hope i provided you enough information this time.
 
Have you tested this team much? It'd be helpful to know how successful it is and what sort of things you have trouble with. Just looking at it, I'd say having three different weather starters on one team is a really bad idea, they have absolutely no synergy with each other. I'd suggest choosing one of them and then building around that. Also, Choice Scarf+Protect on Politoed makes absolutely no sense.

Alternately, you may want to consider looking at VGC Battling 101. You just missed the latest round, but there will be another starting September 27, so keep an eye out if you think that interests you.
 
Yeah, i missed it because i live in europe and here it was almost middle of the night and there was still no topic so i went to sleep (plus the fact that i have a very small chance to get chosen because of the time zone i live in). But enough off topic!
The point is that i will lose a very good "icer". I could keep the others and change tyrannitars ability. How about the move sets? Any hints for this team? (you should say it if i ask too much)
 
Stijn said:
The point is that i will lose a very good "icer". I could keep the others and change tyrannitars ability. How about the move sets? Any hints for this team? (you should say it if i ask too much)
Click to expand...
I'm not really sure what you mean by "icer."
If you keep Abomasnow, get rid of Ice Beam, you should basically never be using it. HP Fire and Ice Shard are better options. Politoed needs to lose either Protect or the Scarf, otherwise the movesets look pretty solid.
Golden Piloswine said:
Could you please expand on the descriptions? I can't tell why Metagross is using a horrible item such as Iron Plate.
Click to expand...
Actually, I've found that the plates really aren't all that bad (and makes Item Clause easier to deal with), especially on something that is mostly using one attack type.
 
I mean by icer a good ice type attack user, especially Blizzard. The biggest obstacle for blizzard is the accuracy, and blizzard will hit in hail but i am using rain.
 
I will try to help here to maybe guide you to building a stronger team, or at least what you should be thinking when building a team and making a RMT...

First, you mentioned that Tyranitar is the first pokemon you chose for the team. Was there a particular reason why? It is ok to say maybe your first thought was that you just like that pokemon or something like that, but after that, there really should be a specific competitive reason why you chose that pokemon as your starting point.

So, assuming that you chose Tyranitar because it's just a really hard attacker and has decent defenses, and now you wanted something that has good synergy with it, and you then chose Zapdos, which is fine, since Zapdos can cover somewhat for Tyranitar's fighting, ground, electric, grass, bug and water weakness either defensively or offensively.

After that though, it is not very clear what you are trying to do with the rest of your team. Both Zapdos and Tyranitar have fire moves, but Politoed's rain weakens those moves, so it would seem like Politoed might not be a very good choice here, and yet you say that your team is primarily taking advantage of rain - which your team does, but in that case, maybe you should not use Tyranitar then.

Then the other weather changer came up... Abomasnow. You are primarily using rain, so why are you even using Abomasnow at all? I.e. what does Abomasnow provide for the team? There are plenty of other pokemon that can learn ice beam. Actually, I should probably mention Blizzard.

Your statement is slightly self-contradicting... You wanted a good ice type attack user, especially Blizzard, but you know that Blizzard is not very accurate, so you can use hail, but instead you are using rain. Basically, this means nothing will ever fulfill what you want to do unless you are using a gravity team, because Blizzard will almost never be 100% accurate otherwise when it is raining.

Just a note, a multi-target Blizzard is not even as strong as Ice Beam. Basically, just use Ice Beam unless you are using hail or unless you like your moves missing at crucial times. Don't use Abomasnow if you are using rain. Assuming no other changes to your team (except maybe replacing Tyranitar with something else), Ludicolo might be a good replacement for Abomasnow, being able to take advantage of the rain with swift swim, and can take further advantage of the rain with a water attack while still having Giga Drain and can also Ice Beam. You can use either Fake Out or Protect as the last move.

Just a note, Ice typing is not a very good defensive typing, as it is weak to many types while being resistant to only ice. It is, however, a good offensive typing. This leads to many of the the best ice beam users to be water types, because water is a much better defensive type.

There are a few options you have for Politoed's last move (don't use protect). 1) Hypnosis, 2) Perish Song, 3) Surf, 4) Focus Blast, 5) Hidden Power Grass / Electric.

Hidden Power Grass/Electric's purpose is obvious - to cover water types that Politoed otherwise could not hurt very much. Grass is usually the preferred Hidden Power because of its ability to hurt Gastrodon which immune to Electric and (to a lesser degree) Rotom-W which is neutral to electric. Focus Blast is for covering Ferrothorn and potentially other pokemon weak to fighting (like Abomasnow), but the accuracy makes it not a very reliable option. On the topic of unreliable options, if you are thinking of using Focus Blast which probably doesn't OHKO anything, you then might think that you might as well use Hypnosis which at least prevents the opponent from attacking for hopefully a few turns. Perish Song's main purpose in Double is to end a battle quickly while you are ahead in battle. I.e. if your opponent only has two pokemon left while you have more than two, you may be able to win by simply using that move and stall for a few turns. It can also force switches if your opponent has more than 2 pokemon left. I can really only recommend surf if you are using Ludicolo @ Absorb Bulb and probably something immune / resistant to water to replace Tyranitar. Of course, with something like that, your team would be a lot more rain focused. That is not to say it will be a bad team, but more so that... it will be a fairly standard rain team that people are very used to seeing and battling. If you do not want that, then Hidden Power is probably the ideal choice.

One other ironic thing I should mention about your current team as I just noticed it when I was re-reading... You mention choosing Tyranitar as your first pokemon and then commenting that it can underspeed other weather abilities... ... ... meaning, you will likely get that sand going. Yay! ... ... except, you are using rain. So yeah, sorry if my comments are a bit harsh, but you have to make a choice here... are you going to use sand, or are you going to use rain? My suggestions here, as you can tell, have been made under the assumption that you are wanting your team to be primarily rain-oriented.

It is very possible to create a competitive hybrid weather team with both sand and rain, but it is neither easy to make, nor easy to use. Given your lack of experience in team building (and thus probably battling), I would not recommend you to try using something like that. It would be better to use a team that is easier to use first.

Hope that helps a bit.

O yeah, I think Metagross is fine. I did not really pay much attention to your EV spreads, but that's also because you did not really explain much about them. Some are obvious, and some looked fairly arbitrary, but without any explanation, it's hard to suggest what to change.
 
Stijn said:
I mean by icer a good ice type attack user, especially Blizzard. The biggest obstacle for blizzard is the accuracy, and blizzard will hit in hail but i am using rain.
Click to expand...

So don't use rain.

Ice teams are uncommon, and as long as you have a means to deal with fire and fighting guys, use ice.
 
@ Chinese Dood But if i choose Ludicolo as replacement for Abomasnow, wouldn't i be even more weak to bug types then i am now? Plus you are saying that my team is very common/standard, is there a good alternative for Tyrannitar which has access to rock slide but is also a good unexpected cover for my weaknesses?
 
Replacing Abomasnow with Ludicolo isn't any more or less weak to bug than your current team is, since both of them are 2x weak to bug. You can even argue it is less weak to bug now than before because a rain boosted scald / hydro pump / surf will hit Scizor (the most common bug in the metagame) for more damage than anything Abomasnow can do.
EDIT: And same for Volcarona (probably the 2nd most common bug in the metagame).

Something resisting bug to replace Tyranitar does sound like a good alternative. Toxicroak was the first thing that came to mind (it can learn Rock Slide), but yeah, that will make the team a pretty standard rain team. Nothing bad about it (in fact it's probably good) other than not being very original. If you want other choices... well, Flying, Fighting, Ghost and Steel types resist bug. There aren't really any viable Ghost types that learn Rock Slide. Flying will most likely share ice weakness with Latios and Zapdos. That leaves Steel and Fighting. There are a number of fighting types to choose from. Toxicroak benefits from rain, but if you do not want a standard rain team, Terrakion is a fairly good replacement for Tyranitar, with similar offensive strength but much faster. Excadrill is also a fine replacement with immense power.
 
Ok. I have this team and i have it tested. It is bad. Is it me or my team? Can anyone test it for me who has experience so i know if it is my team or me?
 
Stijn, I'd like to echo what Voodoo Pimp has already said. From what I glanced at your team from earlier in this thread, it looks like you through 6 half decent Pokemon together with poor synergy with each other. If you're new to VGC, posting a rate my team of six Pokemon is far from a good way to start learning. I would recommend reading up on a few of Smogon's and Nugget Bridge's introductory VGC guides and analysis to get a feel for like the environment's like. Additionally, consider enrolling in Battling 101 for some one on one tutoring to help you get a deeper understanding of VGC.
 
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