Monotype Poison Mono for Singles and Doubles.

[earthcrackle]

Hey! First time caller, so please take it with a grain of salt that I have not gotten to the level of doing specific IVs for specific Pokemon within the meta, but I'm very open to suggestion. This team is one I've had for fun, but have a lot of variations of. I've been playing with Spore/Toxic Spikes Roserade and also Salazzle with a variety of moves, but this has been my most well rounded team so far. I also used to LOVE Quick Draw Quick Claw Slowbro, but since quick claw got banned its not viable atm. If anyone has suggestions on readding Slowbro I'm all ears. My biggest issue is deciding who to replace.

The main weirdness of this team is that I'm making it for a tournament that will have single and doubles mixed in, so I choose some moves like surf and heat wave over Scald/Hydro Pump/Flamethrower.

Tentacruel @ Assault Vest
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Giga Drain
- Sludge Bomb
- Surf
- Ice Beam

My Spdef Wall. Obviously with assault vest I need four attacking moves. Originally I had Hex over Ice beam to pair with sludge bomb's 30% poison and to deal with the occasional psychic user. I opted for Ice beam to take care of SpAtk Dragon types, which has been fairly useful. Tentacruel is here over Toxapex because It can also hit decently hard and can outspeed more than I usually expect. Surf spam has been an okay counter for Heatran as well, which is a big threat. Again has Surf due to doubles games. Also a good pair to have out in doubles with Toxicroak if I can Gmax and get rain to use Toxicroak's Dryskin ability.

Toxicroak @ Focus Sash
Ability: Dry Skin
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Drain Punch
- Sucker Punch
- Thunder Punch

This guy has solidified their spot on my team for a few reasons. The dry skin ability is usually fairly unexpected for a clean switch in on water teams, and occasionally I get the added benefit of healing up from the water attack after taking hazard damage, which makes my FSash usable again. For most encounters I just try to get a swords dance in and then smack with some power, even if its just a sucker punch. Fantastic sweeper for ghost teams and Psychic Teams. Also good against Pelipper with Thunder Punch and Dryskin Drizzle healing.

Weezing-Galar @ Black Sludge
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Protect
- Will-O-Wisp
- Strange Steam
- Flamethrower

My Def. Wall. This is probably my last like Mon, but I havent found a good replacemet. Heatwave and Will-o-wisp have been decent, but theres better pokemon for these moves like Salazzle, however I don't know what other high Def. pokemon to use that is better. I was playing around with Amoongus, but it's defense isn't really that great and Weezing's levitate is very helpful. I just wish it wasn't weak to steel types.

Nidoking (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Thunderbolt
- Sucker Punch
- Flamethrower
- Earth Power

My SpA powerhouse. Nidoking hits hard, and a can 2hko most things. Flamethrower for steel types and thunderbolt for water types that switch in. Earth Power and Sucker punch are usually the two most used moves though and i'm considering making it a more Physical sweeper, but I'd lost the coverage and Earthquake would hit my team in double unless its Weezing, Crobat or Drapion with it's balloon still intact. Sucker Punch has really solidified itself on my team and can really take away Psychic threats easily. Having it on two pokemon might be cheap, but Drapion isn't tough enough to take care of a whole Psychic team on their own.

Drapion @ Air Balloon
Ability: Sniper
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Brick Break
- Knock Off
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake

Kind of my Swiss Army knife hitter. It's immunity to psychic is great and balloon makes it a safe switch in for most things one time. If I can get a swords dance off, its a decent attacker while being beefy enough to two hits from almost anything not boosted. I'm not in love with this set up mostly because I wish I could take Nidoking's sucker punch and put in on here. Knock off is good, but Drapion doesn't outspeed enough and isn't bulky enough to wall anything from what I've found. Very open to suggestion here.

Crobat
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Acrobatics
- Taunt
- Whirlwind
- U-turn

Finally my favorite annoying bat. I love to open with Crobat and a taunt just to throw things off, but I try to U turn out in order to save ot's Whirlwind for anything boosting it's stats. Its fast, it hits pretty hard and Acrobatics is fantastic. Most people expect each pokemon to have an item, so not having one saves a lot of knock off damage and lets Crobat hit with a 110 base power Acrobatics. I love this pokemon. It might not be the most optimized, but it has saved my ass a lot of time. It also has so many 4x resists it's hard to beat.

Thank you in advance! I look forward to hearing all your criticism. Please tear the team apart, and please feel free to ever explain, so I can really know that you're thinking.

 

[Omastar68]

Lele seems to bea problem, it shuts down Sucker Punch and even if you could use it it's neutral. Perhaps poison STAB on Nidoking, or Cross Poison on Drapion?

I'd consider a Sitrus berry or w/e on Crobat, but I don't really know if an item is worth it in that case.

I'm the only one w/ BSS RMTs anymore, so Ive taken to rating teams for metas idk. Hopefully I'm still of help.

Also to stand out I'd add the monotype tag before the title.

 

[earthcrackle]

Thank you! Yeah you're right. Lele is a definite problem seeing it has super effective or neutral stab moves on everyone.

And yeah good point. What move should I replace on Nidoking?

Yeah I mean Crobat would only hit half as hard and any item thats a consumable doesn't help enough? idk i could try it.

Tag added! Thank you.

 

[Omastar68]

Thank you! Yeah you're right. Lele is a definite problem seeing it has super effective or neutral stab moves on everyone.

And yeah good point. What move should I replace on Nidoking?

Yeah I mean Crobat would only hit half as hard and any item thats a consumable doesn't help enough? idk i could try it.

Tag added! Thank you.

Sucker Punch. Lele shuts that down and you have it on Toxicroak. Also Toxicroak is maybe odd on a mono-poison. Idk for sure, buut 4x psychic weakness is bad when you are naturally 2x weak to it on average. It would depend on how common mono-psychic is.

I'll look into Crobat, I feel you can do more w/ it than itemless but maybe that's just habit. Does Sitrus+Brave Bird do more than nothing+Acrobatics? Cause sitrus partially offsets recoil.

EDIT: Was gonna suggest Liquid Ooze on Tentacruel. Leech Seed is irritating, and youu do not fear Intimidate as a special mon. I guess you void Max Darkness SpD drops, idk how much that is worth. Also on Crobat Haze stops set up w/o going last.

looked more at Crobat, Cross Poison or Poison Fang could be your friends for Lele. Maybe over U-Turn, idk though U-Turn is good. Item-wise if Sitrus doesn't cut it, and you're not a bulky Roost set, only Jaboca berry, Rowap berry, or Eject Button/Red Card make some sense. Those are not high-end items so I guess it can't hurt much to go itemless. Unless Brave Bird really does have merit.

 

[Giyu]

->
Slowking-G is a lot better in terms of bulk and has a much wanted neutrality to Psychic-type attacks. With Regenerator, it has a way to heal off a lot more damage than Giga Drain on Tentacruel and It's able to break through bulkier opponents with it's many coverage moves. Slowking-G's Future Sight also supports your breakers and helps with things like Toxapex which can be quite hard to get past.

->
Unfortunately, Toxicroak doesn't provide nearly enough for Poison teams to be used over something like Toxapex or Amoonguss which are incredible in a Regenerator core with Slowking-G. Toxapex provides excellent physical defense and spreads status ailments around. Toxapex's ability to shutdown setup sweepers like Dragapult is extremely useful and definitely grants the team easier progression in the match.


Weezing-G appreciates recovery from Pain Split making it a lot harder to break, it only makes sense to run it over Protect as Flamethrower, Strange Steam, and Will-O-Wisp are all great.


You are really going to want Ice Beam over Sucker Punch as it provides coverage against Ground and Flying teams that Nidoking has trouble breaking past. Sucker Punch just isn't worth it as it's very difficult to win against matchups like Psychic regardless and you want all the coverage you can get for the team. Stealth Rock is also quite viable in that slot to wear down the opposing team.


Battle Armor is generally better than Sniper as it helps you setup easier. Brick Break and Earthquake shouldn't be ran at the same time as they have a similar function of dealing with Steel-types. It's really down to opinion but Brick Break allows you to break Aurora Veil on Ice teams and hits opposing Dark-types. Poison Jab or Toxic are both good over Earthquake as you can have STAB or the ability to cripple switch ins. Black Sludge provides recovery which Drapion lacks and considering you have 2 Ground immunities, you can afford losing Air Balloon.


Crobat is generally a Poison team's dedicated defogger as it has proper recovery, immunity to Ground-type attacks, and can pivot out with U-turn. Considering your set is quite offensive I think making the EV spread a litte bulkier and adding utility options to the moveset can help out the team a bunch. Infiltrator allows you to hit opponents behind Substitute with U-turn for more chip and Brave Bird does more damage to Pokemon behind screens.

Paste

 

[Omastar68]

All good points! Except that he DOES have t-bolt(unless that was just edited in I can't recall.)

I try to change sets not mons, unless it's really icky, so I'm not great at this lol:^

 

[Giyu]

All good points! Except that he DOES have t-bolt(unless that was just edited in I can't recall.)

I try to change sets not mons, unless it's really icky, so I'm not great at this lol:^

Yeah I meant Ice Beam haha

 

[earthcrackle]

Awesome breakdown! I'm going to play around with what you've suggest a bit but these are all great points.

I definitely like playing much more aggressively than a stall team, but:

Tentacruel replaced with:

Slowking-Galar @ Assault Vest
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Future Sight
- Ice Beam
- Shadow Ball
- Psychic


Toxicroak replaced with:

Toxapex @ Black Sludge
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Baneful Bunker
- Recover
- Haze

Weezing actually had Pain Split on it before, and was meant to be on that, so that was a mistake on my end. Replaced Protect with Pain Split already.

Nidoking actually had Icebeam before, but was getting beat up by a lot of ground types as is. I guess it's just as likely to be beat up by Psychic types, but the priority did help. I'll try Icebeam again and see how it goes.

I've been using Crobat as an opener with Taunt, but I'm going to try Drapion with

Drapion @ Black Sludge
Ability: Battle Armor
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Brick Break
- Knock Off
- Toxic Spikes
- Cross Poison

and edit Crobat as this:

Crobat @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Brave Bird
- Taunt
- Defog
- U-turn

Thank you for such a thorough reply!