SS OU Need some help fixing my first team!

[Rouko]

Hi everyone! I just got back into pokemon and I'm new to OU, so I need a bit of help finding some replacements and polishing the ev builds on my team!

Togekiss @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Air Slash
- Aura Sphere
- Flamethrower
- Dazzling Gleam

Togekiss is my favorite pokemon and I wanted to make a team around it. I am interested in the tank togekiss build as well but just stuck with the choice scarf air slash one until I could get some advice on whether changing it would be a good idea.

Zeraora @ Expert Belt
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
- Plasma Fists
- Close Combat
- Grass Knot
- Volt Switch

I wanted Zeraora here as a possible switch-in option with togekiss in case they wanted to use electric moves on me, and vice versa with a ground-type move being used on zeraora, I could switch into togekiss.

Urshifu-Rapid-Strike @ Choice Band
Ability: Unseen Fist
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Surging Strikes
- Close Combat
- Aqua Jet
- U-turn

I needed a water type and found this one which does a lot of damage, so I went with it!

Ferrothorn @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 168 HP / 92 Atk / 92 Def / 156 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Leech Seed
- Protect
- Gyro Ball
- Power Whip

Ferrothorn is my special defensive tank and usually what I use to counter fairy types.

Slurpuff @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Belly Drum
- Play Rough
- Drain Punch
- Substitute

Another one of my favorite pokemon, although really situational, I love how easy it is to set up with belly drum and unburden, which could just be a win condition for me. I am open to switching him for a fire type as currently, my only fire type move is flamethrower on a choice scarf togekiss.

Snorlax @ Figy Berry
Ability: Gluttony
EVs: 68 HP / 196 Atk / 244 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Body Slam
- High Horsepower
- Curse
- Recycle

I wanted this to be my defensive tank as well as my ground-type attacker with high horsepower, but again I am open to switching him for better options.


I am open to any suggestions regarding changing my EVS and replacing any of the pokemon with better options, so please let me know what you guys think would work better!

Thanks.

 

[ironwater]

Hey Rouko, welcome to Smogon. I’m here to rate your team and suggest changes to improve it.

Togekiss is probably not the most optimal choice in OU, but as you’re trying to build a team based on it, I will keep it in my suggestions. However, you can’t add too many non-OU Pokemon if you want to end up with something viable in the tier. Thus, Slurpuff and Snorlax who are both pretty bad in OU are not good choices here. I think that the best way to use Togekiss in OU would be to play it in a Balance team, and thus, you should replace these two by some defensive Pokemon, as your team lacks of switch-ins to the most common metagame threats like Urshifu-R , Kartana , Garchomp … Ferrothorn can work in this kind of team, but you should really use Stealth Rock or Spikes on this Pokemon as its main role is to set up hazards in order to help your breakers and here, you lack of hazards control, being unable to set them up or to remove them. As for your offensive, I think that both Zeraora and Urshifu-R are fine here and they are threatening when played together, with Zeraora bringing Speed control while Urshifu-R is able to wallbreak through a lot of teams. They also form a good VoltTurn core.

Overall, you will struggle with this team against a lot of matchups where the opponent has a breaker that forces a kill at each entry, and most of the time Slurpuff and Snorlax won’t help much as they have a hard time finding an opportunity to setup and are not interesting in a defensive role. I’ll thus mainly try to rework a bit the defensive options of the team in order to have a more solid defensive backbone. Let’s dive into the suggestions!


Major Changes

-> : The three changes I made here are basically replacing Pokemon that won’t be useful most of the time by a solid defensive core that I’ve used a lot of time and have shown to be pretty hard to break. The first member of this core is Landorus-T , a staple in the tier that can setup Stealth Rock, Intimidate opposing breakers and slow pivot on them with U-turn to keep the momentum. Here is the standard set for defensive Landorus-T:

Landorus-Therian (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 164 Def / 92 Spe
Impish Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Toxic


-> : The second member of this core is Toxapex with a mixed spread in order to deal with threats like Urshifu-R and Dragapult . The spread could be optimized, and Scald and Toxic Spikes are too different options you can try in the last moveslot. Rocky Helmet is a nice item to annoy breakers like Urshifu-R and punish the use of U-turn. However, you can try to use Shed Shell to avoid being trapped by Heatran and Tapu Fini . Here is the set:

Toxapex @ Rocky Helmet / Shed Shell
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 100 Def / 156 SpD
Careful / Sassy Nature
- Knock Off
- Recover
- Haze
- Toxic Spikes / Scald


-> : Corviknight is a good way to keep in check threats like Landorus-T , Kartana , Melmetal and even Tapu Lele without Thunderbolt (with some SpD investment). This will also bring a Defogger in the team to avoid being overwhelm by Stealth Rocks and mainly by Spikes. Here is the classic Defogger set:

Corviknight @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 HP / 168 Def / 88 SpD
Impish Nature
- Body Press
- U-turn
- Defog
- Roost


Overall, this defensive basis is solid. However you may struggle against some annoying breakers like Heatran . Togekiss can Thunder Wave it and Urshifu-R and Landorus-T are able to come two or three times, but you may get overwhelmed and will have to play carefully against Heatran. One way to ease the Heatran matchup could be to replace Togekiss by Hydreigon which is a solid Heatran check and can also act as a Ghost resist once you’ve scout the move chosen by Specs Blacephalon/Dragapult with Toxapex. I decided to keep Togekiss, as your team is based on this Pokemon, but you can keep this suggestion in mind.


Minor Changes

: Choice Scarf Togekiss could work but I think that Zeroara gives enough Speed Control in this kind of team and that you rather have a Nasty Plot variant of Togekiss with Thunder Wave to annoy fast threats and increase your change of beating your checks in one vs one. If you want to stick to a Choice Scarf set, keep in mind that Togekiss can learn Trick and thus get read of its Choice Scarf to annoy a defensive answer if needed. Anyway, for a non-Scarf Togekiss, you can use the set just below with enough defensive investment to deal with Choice Specs Dragapult (without a SpD drop from Shadow Ball). This set could be a nice win condition against more passive teams and can be annoying to deal with for more offensive builds because of Thunder Wave and Togekiss great bulk.

Togekiss @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 120 SpD / 136 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Air Slash
- Roost
- Thunder Wave


: Zeraora’s main role in a balance kind of team is to act as a pivot with Volt Switch and potentially a late game cleaner thanks to its very high Speed. Thus, you really want to use Heavy Duty Boots as an item because you will have to come on the field a lot of time and you don’t want to get consistently chipped by hazards. As for the moveset, I’m not a big fan of Grass Knot as the most prominent Ground types are Landorus-T and Garchomp and Grass Knot doesn’t help much against these. Knock Off is a more reliable option which may help overwhelming the aforementioned Ground types by removing their Leftovers and thus their only way of recovering health. Here is the set I would use (you really need a Speed bosting nature by the way to outspeed foes like Dragapult):

Zeraora @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Plasma Fists
- Volt Switch
- Knock Off
- Close Combat


Urshifu-R’s set is fine, and you can keep it, without changing anything.


And that’s all for the suggestions, here the modified version of the team with all these changes, don’t hesitate to try it out:

The past

Togekiss @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 120 SpD / 136 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Air Slash
- Roost
- Thunder Wave

Zeraora @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Plasma Fists
- Volt Switch
- Knock Off
- Close Combat

Urshifu-Rapid-Strike @ Choice Band
Ability: Unseen Fist
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Surging Strikes
- Close Combat
- Aqua Jet
- U-turn

Corviknight @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 HP / 168 Def / 88 SpD
Impish Nature
- Body Press
- U-turn
- Defog
- Roost

Toxapex @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 100 Def / 156 SpD
Careful Nature
- Knock Off
- Recover
- Haze
- Toxic Spikes

Landorus-Therian (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 164 Def / 92 Spe
Impish Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Toxic

I did some battles with the new team to test it. It was around 1500 on the ladder so it’s not top-quality matches, but if you’re trying to learn the tier, it can give you a great insight on how the tier works and how to play this kind of team.

Against another balance team:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1383218076-oxackj6c3a9uepecc19nyskiuaas0dypw

Against a weird Rain team/Electric Spam team:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1383220871-eylux9z0jd134wfrsshnwj6pg4c92tqpw

Against a very classic build:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1383222619-j015ac2h6k3u2m23c7jh1i9btmt20atpw


Hope this was helpful, have a nice day!

 

[Rouko]

Hey Rouko, welcome to Smogon. I’m here to rate your team and suggest changes to improve it.

Togekiss is probably not the most optimal choice in OU, but as you’re trying to build a team based on it, I will keep it in my suggestions. However, you can’t add too many non-OU Pokemon if you want to end up with something viable in the tier. Thus, Slurpuff and Snorlax who are both pretty bad in OU are not good choices here. I think that the best way to use Togekiss in OU would be to play it in a Balance team, and thus, you should replace these two by some defensive Pokemon, as your team lacks of switch-ins to the most common metagame threats like Urshifu-R , Kartana , Garchomp … Ferrothorn can work in this kind of team, but you should really use Stealth Rock or Spikes on this Pokemon as its main role is to set up hazards in order to help your breakers and here, you lack of hazards control, being unable to set them up or to remove them. As for your offensive, I think that both Zeraora and Urshifu-R are fine here and they are threatening when played together, with Zeraora bringing Speed control while Urshifu-R is able to wallbreak through a lot of teams. They also form a good VoltTurn core.

Overall, you will struggle with this team against a lot of matchups where the opponent has a breaker that forces a kill at each entry, and most of the time Slurpuff and Snorlax won’t help much as they have a hard time finding an opportunity to setup and are not interesting in a defensive role. I’ll thus mainly try to rework a bit the defensive options of the team in order to have a more solid defensive backbone. Let’s dive into the suggestions!


Major Changes

-> : The three changes I made here are basically replacing Pokemon that won’t be useful most of the time by a solid defensive core that I’ve used a lot of time and have shown to be pretty hard to break. The first member of this core is Landorus-T , a staple in the tier that can setup Stealth Rock, Intimidate opposing breakers and slow pivot on them with U-turn to keep the momentum. Here is the standard set for defensive Landorus-T:

View attachment 360682
Landorus-Therian (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 164 Def / 92 Spe
Impish Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Toxic


-> : The second member of this core is Toxapex with a mixed spread in order to deal with threats like Urshifu-R and Dragapult . The spread could be optimized, and Scald and Toxic Spikes are too different options you can try in the last moveslot. Rocky Helmet is a nice item to annoy breakers like Urshifu-R and punish the use of U-turn. However, you can try to use Shed Shell to avoid being trapped by Heatran and Tapu Fini . Here is the set:

View attachment 360683
Toxapex @ Rocky Helmet / Shed Shell
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 100 Def / 156 SpD
Careful / Sassy Nature
- Knock Off
- Recover
- Haze
- Toxic Spikes / Scald


-> : Corviknight is a good way to keep in check threats like Landorus-T , Kartana , Melmetal and even Tapu Lele without Thunderbolt (with some SpD investment). This will also bring a Defogger in the team to avoid being overwhelm by Stealth Rocks and mainly by Spikes. Here is the classic Defogger set:
View attachment 360684
Corviknight @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 HP / 168 Def / 88 SpD
Impish Nature
- Body Press
- U-turn
- Defog
- Roost


Overall, this defensive basis is solid. However you may struggle against some annoying breakers like Heatran . Togekiss can Thunder Wave it and Urshifu-R and Landorus-T are able to come two or three times, but you may get overwhelmed and will have to play carefully against Heatran. One way to ease the Heatran matchup could be to replace Togekiss by Hydreigon which is a solid Heatran check and can also act as a Ghost resist once you’ve scout the move chosen by Specs Blacephalon/Dragapult with Toxapex. I decided to keep Togekiss, as your team is based on this Pokemon, but you can keep this suggestion in mind.


Minor Changes

: Choice Scarf Togekiss could work but I think that Zeroara gives enough Speed Control in this kind of team and that you rather have a Nasty Plot variant of Togekiss with Thunder Wave to annoy fast threats and increase your change of beating your checks in one vs one. If you want to stick to a Choice Scarf set, keep in mind that Togekiss can learn Trick and thus get read of its Choice Scarf to annoy a defensive answer if needed. Anyway, for a non-Scarf Togekiss, you can use the set just below with enough defensive investment to deal with Choice Specs Dragapult (without a SpD drop from Shadow Ball). This set could be a nice win condition against more passive teams and can be annoying to deal with for more offensive builds because of Thunder Wave and Togekiss great bulk.

View attachment 360686
Togekiss @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 120 SpD / 136 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Air Slash
- Roost
- Thunder Wave


: Zeraora’s main role in a balance kind of team is to act as a pivot with Volt Switch and potentially a late game cleaner thanks to its very high Speed. Thus, you really want to use Heavy Duty Boots as an item because you will have to come on the field a lot of time and you don’t want to get consistently chipped by hazards. As for the moveset, I’m not a big fan of Grass Knot as the most prominent Ground types are Landorus-T and Garchomp and Grass Knot doesn’t help much against these. Knock Off is a more reliable option which may help overwhelming the aforementioned Ground types by removing their Leftovers and thus their only way of recovering health. Here is the set I would use (you really need a Speed bosting nature by the way to outspeed foes like Dragapult):

View attachment 360685
Zeraora @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Plasma Fists
- Volt Switch
- Knock Off
- Close Combat


Urshifu-R’s set is fine, and you can keep it, without changing anything.


And that’s all for the suggestions, here the modified version of the team with all these changes, don’t hesitate to try it out:

The past

Togekiss @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 120 SpD / 136 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Air Slash
- Roost
- Thunder Wave

Zeraora @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Plasma Fists
- Volt Switch
- Knock Off
- Close Combat

Urshifu-Rapid-Strike @ Choice Band
Ability: Unseen Fist
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Surging Strikes
- Close Combat
- Aqua Jet
- U-turn

Corviknight @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 HP / 168 Def / 88 SpD
Impish Nature
- Body Press
- U-turn
- Defog
- Roost

Toxapex @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 100 Def / 156 SpD
Careful Nature
- Knock Off
- Recover
- Haze
- Toxic Spikes

Landorus-Therian (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 164 Def / 92 Spe
Impish Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Toxic

I did some battles with the new team to test it. It was around 1500 on the ladder so it’s not top-quality matches, but if you’re trying to learn the tier, it can give you a great insight on how the tier works and how to play this kind of team.

Against another balance team:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1383218076-oxackj6c3a9uepecc19nyskiuaas0dypw

Against a weird Rain team/Electric Spam team:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1383220871-eylux9z0jd134wfrsshnwj6pg4c92tqpw

Against a very classic build:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1383222619-j015ac2h6k3u2m23c7jh1i9btmt20atpw


Hope this was helpful, have a nice day!

I can't thank you enough! The team really does look amazing and I can't wait to try it out in showdown for myself. Have a great day too!