New to Smogon!!

[zepovinho]

Hello people from the forums!! ZePovinho here bringing you a team for you to go through and tell me what you think. Be as harsh as you can, I'm a man and I can take it xD. So... Let's start.

Introduction

First off, I must say i'm kind of new to this thing that is competitive battling.
My former team had a bad problem with fighting type pokemon so I tried switching some pokes here and there but I couldn't make it work.
As I was becoming a bit fed up with the fact I kept losing, I decided to build a team from scratch.
I decided to bring a pokemon that nowadays doesn't see much action but that I really like and that I thought it would be valuable mainly to counter some of the pokemon that are some major pain to most teams.
Having all this in mind, I chose Swampert to be the center piece / team captain of this team.
With the first pokemon chosen, it was a matter of time until my team got to it's final stage, with no pokemon benched until now.
It now assumes this shape:

The Team:

Swampert (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Torrent
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Earthquake
- Stealth Rock
- Roar
- Waterfall

After Swampert was chosen, and considering that I like a team that is balanced, I needed to fill some of the slots with walls. I chose a pokemon that could bring some more hazards, phaze some more and be my overall physical wall. So I brought this guy:

Skarmory (M) @ Shed Shell
Trait: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 Spd
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Spikes
- Whirlwind
- Brave Bird
- Roost

With rocks and spikes up, my sweepers now have an easier time sweeping. Shed Shell allows it not only switch in on W-O-W but it helps getting rid of the other undesireable status. It's EVs focus in defense and it has great synergy with swampert.

After these two I had to find another defensive pokemon to balance my team and then I remembered a pokemon i've been seeing a lot these days.

Ferrothorn (M) @ Rocky Helmet
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 6 Def / 252 SDef
Relaxed Nature (+Def, -Spd)
- Thunder Wave
- Leech Seed
- Gyro Ball
- Power Whip

I guess this is a standard ferrothorn set. It focus on Special Defense and brings a relly annoying status. I'm thinking of replacing this one with an eviolite chansey, a special defensive dusknoir or a blissey so that both my walls aren't weak to fire.

Now I needed something that would take care of the of the fire types that threatened my skarm and ferro and the choice was the pokemon that follows.

Chandelure (M) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Flash Fire
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Fire Blast
- Shadow Ball
- Energy Ball
- Psychic

This one is the main special sweeper on my team. It usually switches in on the predicted fire attack directed towards ferro or skarm and proceeds to hurt or sweep the opposing pokemon. Choice Scarf to boost it's speed and becoming a revenge killer, although I thought about running Air Baloon to have a safer switch in on heatran.

Now I needed to take care of the problem ghosts are for my chandelure. It was (and still is) an unsettled decision between eviolite chansey, who can wishpass to my team and this guy, who packs the punch my team needs against those pesky dragon types.

Porygon2 @ Eviolite
Trait: Trace
EVs: 252 HP / 184 Def / 72 SDef
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Ice Beam
- Thunderbolt
- Toxic
- Recover

This set focus on bulk so that it can make a safe switch in on almost any pokemon. The BoltBeam provides almost perfect coverage and toxic helps me deal with opposing walls that want to stall me, unless they're steel types...

Now my team is almost complete and I noticed a certain fire type starter who recently got an ability that makes him a big threat to a lot of teams *cough* SB Blaziken *cough*, could still be a threat to my team. So I also brought a good counter to it and here he is.

Dragonite (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Multiscale
EVs: 252 HP / 46 Atk / 212 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Dragon Claw
- Dragon Dance
- Waterfall
- Fire Punch

Dragonite has resistance to both blaziken's STAB's and can still be of great value to my team. After two dragon dances he is ready to sweep.
He comes as my main physical sweeper and his moves provide pretty good coverage while, if that's not possible, Dragon Claw cleans it up.
i'm considering changing LO for lefties so that he lasts longer.

As I said at the beginning, be harsh on the criticism because I really need all the opinions so I can get better.

This team is to be used in PO so, if you think I should replace all, or almost all pokemon, say so. I'm also looking for someone who can mentor me in competitive battling.

P.S.: Pardon my english because I'm portuguese and, therefore, not a native english speaker.

P.P.S.: I also use this team in some places where blaziken isn't banned.​

 

[franky]

3. Have some actual words in your post beyond your six Pokemon and their moves. Not following this makes your post quite boring to read and rate. All Pokemon should have a good reason for being in your team anyway, so why not post that reason? If you are having trouble with this one, start by giving an explanation for each team member. Why are they there? What role do they serve? How do you get them in? Then, give an explanation of how you would open with the team and how you would go about using it. All of these things help people rate your team and allow us to offer more helpful advice.

This thread is locked under Rule 3; please apply the changes and then VM/PM me your changes so I can re-open your thread, thanks

EDIT: re-opened, please apply the changes and thank you

 

[zepovinho]

bump.

 

[New World Order]

Hi and welcome to Smogon. First, why would you run Thunder Wave and Gyro Ball on the same set? All Thunder Wave does is make Gyro Ball weaker. I suggest replacing one of the two with Stealth Rock.

This means Swampert is no longer needed for SR, and it is now completely outclassed by Gastrodon, who counters Thundurus, Rotom-W, Starmie, and various other threats thanks to immunity to both water and electric. Its also one of the best special sponges in the game.

Gastrodon @ Leftovers
Storm Drain
Calm
252 Hp/ 252 SpD/ 4 SpA
Scald/ Ice Beam
Earth Power/ Ice Beam
Toxic
Recover

I also suggest running Discharge over Thunderbolt on Porygon2. This gives him the ability to "double status", while the lack of power wont be very significant, since P2 doesn't hit that hard and electric moves are aimed at Pokes it hard counters anyways like Gyara and Vaporeon.

Finally I suggest running another item over Life Orb for sure. Multi Scale is 5th gen's gift to Dragonite. Otherwise, its completely outclassed by Salamence. Who has intimidate which actually makes it more bulky than non Multi Scale Dragonite, you want to abuse Multi Scale as much as possible. Not lose it by just attacking. Therefore I suggest Roost over either Fire Punch or Waterfall. Second, Dragonite's worst enemy is Toxic. It effectively renders Multi Scale useless and you'd essentially have a crappy fatmence on your hands. I suggest running a Lum Berry to fix that problem.

 

[Shadowlucario64]

Hi and welcome to Smogon. First, why would you run Thunder Wave and Gyro Ball on the same set? All Thunder Wave does is make Gyro Ball weaker. I suggest replacing one of the two with Stealth Rock.

This means Swampert is no longer needed for SR, and it is now completely outclassed by Gastrodon, who counters Thundurus, Rotom-W, Starmie, and various other threats thanks to immunity to both water and electric.

I would recommend spikes rather than stealth rock (unless you need a counter to the pokemon mentioned above) since there are so many great pokemon that learn stealth rock and so few good pokemon that learn spikes.