Welcome to my first RMT, the team links to the paste
Proof of peak -
Breakdown:
Light Brand (Kartana) @ Protective Pads
Ability: Beast Boost
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 19 Atk
- Swords Dance
- Leaf Blade
- Knock Off
- Sacred Sword
The first member of my team is a very specific kartana. Timid kartana has always been one of my favorite pokemon to use. With this set of 252+ timid, with 19 IVs in attack, kartana will beast boost speed after knocking out a pokemon. This makes it very difficult to revenge kill, and it can very easily run over offensive or balance teams after only one or two specific pokemon are chipped/KO'ed. The use of 252 special defense is something that I have considered for a while. Although many timid kartanas invest heavily if not solely in hp, I believe that heavy if not full special defense is more optimal in most situations. Consider the following calcs -
0 SpA Tornadus-Therian Hurricane vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Kartana: 187-222 (71.9 - 85.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
0 SpA Zapdos Hurricane vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Kartana: 211-249 (81.1 - 95.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Tapu Koko Thunderbolt vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Kartana in Electric Terrain: 113-133 (43.4 - 51.1%) -- 5.9% chance to 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Tapu Lele Psychic vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Kartana in Psychic Terrain: 210-247 (80.7 - 95%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
With this much special defense investment, kartana can survive and attack non-heat wave defensive tornadus, survive and even set up on defensive non-heat wave zapdos, 95% of the time set and attack tapu koko 1v1, and even set up on a psychic locked choice specs tapu lele. Protective pads were chosen as the item on this team. As the team is focused on chipping everything into range for kartana to sweep, kartana doesn't need the extra power of life orb. Pads were chosen over leftovers due to the spread often leaving kartana in range of rocky helmet/contact abilities after taking a big attack, and because of the high usage of static zapdos.
Judgement (Thundurus) @ Life Orb
Ability: Prankster
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Taunt
- Thunder Wave
- Thunderbolt
- Grass Knot
Thundurus-Incarnate, the second inspiration for this team. I wanted to use this pokemon for a while, but until now I struggled to find a real place for it. It originally caught my eye when discussing the UUBL mons, because it was and still is easily one of the most overlooked. Additionally, the few uses that I had seen were focused on it being a defiant user, which is mostly outdone by zapdos-galar. I looked back at the history of this mon, and was reminded why it was originally good - a great speed tier with good special attack, and prankster thunder wave. Thundurus on this team does quite a few things. Because I have a hazard lead (mew), taunt is very useful to keep up those hazards. Unlike the defiant users that are generally used on this kind of team, this pokemon threatens every defogger in the tier without risking death to their attacks. Although this cannot switch directly into defog to punish it, that isn't known unless thundurus was already sent out and the team is generally hard to defog against considering the danger of the setup mons. Taunt stops the aforementioned defog, stops pokemon like clefable and blissey from healing out of range for offensive teammates, and stops status from pokemon like landorus, at which point landorus is walled by thundurus. Thunder wave means that (barring miss) no scarfer, snowballing sweeper, or weather speed booster can countersweep. This also stops opposing hazards to keep offensive teammates healthier. Thunderbolt is chosen for reliable stab, and grass knot is chosen to chunk landorus and garchomp, while dealing massive damage to the rare gastrodon and swampert, as well as remove seismitoad as a potential switchin. Chipping these grounds with 2 grass knots puts them in range of kartana after a boost and rocks, setting up nicely for lategame kart cleaning.
Bingus (Mew) @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Synchronize
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Spikes
- Taunt
- Thunder Wave
Next up is some support in the form of suicide lead mew. This is my personal favorite suicide lead for hyper offense as of writing this. Stealth rocks and spikes are self-explanatory, chip damage helps greatly in attempting to sweep. Taunt is a requirement to stop opposing defog and is nice to deter status and stop setup. Thunder wave is what I have chosen for the often varied fourth slot on mew. With thunder wave, mew beats non-taunt torn by paralyzing and taunting it. Dragapult never kills max hp mew in one hit with specs shadow ball and can be thunder waved for a teammate, at which point mew still gets at least one hazard. Similarly, colbur berry allows mew to always live any weavile knock off, even after a defensive landorus u-turn, although it must watch out for banded beat up. This can also be done against any greedy scarfers attempting to 2hko mew before it can set up 2 layers of hazards, making them useless for later in the game.
Reaper (Garchomp) @ Yache Berry
Ability: Rough Skin
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Fire Fang
- Scale Shot
Next up, garchomp. This is one of my personal favorite hyper offense picks. It offers a ground type, a check to the heatran that can eliminate most pokemon on this team, and can break for kartana if not sweep on its own. The set is fairly standard outside of item choice. Swords dance to threaten defensive pokemon, earthquake for reliable STAB, scale shot for speed boost, and fire fang for hitting steel types and buzzwole. Speaking of buzzwole, this is one of the situations where yache berry shines. Three of the biggest stops to garchomp sweeping in any given match requiring killing garchomp with ice moves. Buzzwole lives a +2 fire fang and can ohko in return with ice punch, some slowbro run ice beam and can live any attack, and weavile can kill unboosted chomp with triple axle or ice shard a +1 speed chomp in revenge. Yache berry reverses most of these situations -
252+ Atk Buzzwole Ice Punch vs. -1 0 HP / 0 Def Yache Berry Garchomp: 296-350 (82.9 - 98%) -- guaranteed 2HKO - Even the most offensive buzzwole cannot kill even -1 garchomp
252 Atk Choice Band Weavile Ice Shard vs. -1 0 HP / 0 Def Yache Berry Garchomp: 290-344 (81.2 - 96.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO - Weavile must be adamant choice band to even have a roll to kill. Even then chomp is favored to live.
0 SpA Slowbro Ice Beam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Yache Berry Garchomp: 148-176 (41.4 - 49.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
Garchomp will rarely be revenge killed from full by weavile, can earthquake freely on ice beam slowbro assuming chomp grabbed a swords dance already, and can opt to 2hko buzzwole with +2 fire fang or swords dance again and kill it with +4 after rough skin. This enables chomp to often sweep or heavily damage common teams that rely on boots weavile to revenge kill garchomp. All of this helps greatly to enable kartana lategame.
Bazelgeuse (Dragapult) @ Life Orb
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Lonely Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Dragon Darts
- Phantom Force
- Fire Blast
Next up, a mon that I used to hate for most of the generation - Dragapult. Although normally used as a (boring) specs attacks, dragapult does have access to a dangerous dragon dance set. Max attack and a lonely nature allow it to hit as hard as possible on both sides. Dragon dance and the STAB moves are obvious, but the 4th move here is fire blast. With life orb, fire blast is able to do considerable damage to steels, especially buzzwole and potentially corviknight on the switch. This pokemon helps out especially against weather and opposing offense. Defensive cores that rely on pokemon like spdef lando-t and buzzwole can easily lose to this set, and it can often break a large hole, if not sweep outright.
Melly (Melmetal) @ Shuca Berry
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 76 HP / 252 Atk / 168 SpD / 12 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Double Iron Bash
- Earthquake
- Ice Punch
- Thunder Punch
Rounding out the team is a shuca berry 4 attacks melmetal. This pokemon fits in perfectly with the other 5 members of this team. It can abuse slow paralyzed pokemon from thundurus and mew with double iron bash flinches, revenge kill +1 speed garchomp which otherwise instantly crushes this team, chunk zapdos and keep it low with 252+ attack ice punch and EQ, and switch into weavile on forced ice shards against the boosted dragons on the team. Ice punch was chosen for zapdos and garchomp, earthquake for toxapex, greedy heatran, and to punish zapdos for roosting, thunder punch for corviknight, pelipper, and slowbro, and double iron bash for generally knocking out anything that doesn't resist it. The large pool of coverage and max attack investment keeps the mon from being a momentum sink, and stops defoggers from freely removing mew's hazards.
The Gameplan:
The team aims to win with one of the dragons or kartana. Dragons generally win against slower teams and kartana against more offensive ones. Mew is always the lead, unless the opponent is likely to lead beat up weavile or a blacephalon, something that threatens to outspeed and ohko mew. In those cases, counterlead with melmetal or garchomp, and then find a time to double to mew. Once hazards are up, start making progress. Thundurus is normally best midgame, when it can force chip on ground types / spdef walls and spread status/taunt. It can often be sacked to thunder wave a faster mon, which is very often worth the trade. The dragons are normally next in line to break, with melmetal as a defensive backbone to pivot into and either double out of or to predict an incoming mon with a strong coverage move. As soon as the possible kartana answers are low, immediately start looking for an opening for kartana to set up. Non twave-ferrothorn is one of the best, as well as anything that kartana threatens out. It can also be bluffed as scarf if needed. Kartana's window to win normally won't be long, so don't be afraid to play very aggressively and even sack pokemon if needed to get it in position. Doubling is very good with this team, because it generally dissuades or taunts defog users and can quickly force hazard chip on annoying checks to the wincons on this team. So far, I have gotten this team up to 1902. I will update this rmt if I can make it higher.
