Project Mono-Type: Psychic

I think a way we should really look is Trick Room.
Many great users. I have used this team to moderate success on the PO server.
Xatu (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Magic Bounce
EVs: 252 HP / 160 Def / 96 SDef
Sassy Nature (+SDef, -Spd)
- Roost
- Reflect
- Haze
- U-turn

Slowking (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 56 Def / 200 SDef
Sassy Nature (+SDef, -Spd)
- Trick Room
- Psychic
- Scald
- Flamethrower

Slowbro (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 200 Def / 56 SDef
Relaxed Nature (+Def, -Spd)
- Trick Room
- Ice Beam
- Surf
- Focus Blast

Gallade (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Justified
EVs: 120 HP / 252 Atk / 136 Def
Brave Nature (+Atk, -Spd)
- Close Combat
- Psycho Cut
- Earthquake
- Shadow Sneak

Metagross @ Life Orb
Trait: Clear Body
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Brave Nature (+Atk, -Spd)
- Zen Headbutt
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Hammer Arm

Reuniclus (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Magic Guard
EVs: 176 HP / 80 Def / 252 SAtk
Quiet Nature (+SAtk, -Spd)
- Trick Room
- Psychic
- Shadow Ball
- Focus Blast


My evspreads are shit so yeah.
I just threw this team together and it worked well.
I have never EVER used a Trick Room team before so I think with some work TR can be a viable strategy.
 
Let's avoid posting full teams for the time being... I still want to focus on specific pokemon and the type as a whole.
 
Victini with heavy Sp. Def investiment is probably the best counter to Volcarona I can think of.
V-Create should be doing plenty of damage since Volcarona is neutral to fire and has a terrible defense stat and as Victini is a fire type himself he doesn't have to worry about Flame Body.
Victini also gets priority in the form of Quick Attack. While weak it can be used to bypass V-Create's speed and defenses drops to finish Volcarona off.
Can someone run a few calculations to back this up?
 
252 Atk., +Sp.Def. Victini V-Create @Life Orb vs. 224 HP/252 Def., +Def. Volcarona: 81,7% - 96,5%
And then Quick Attack: 12,3% - 14,7%

The same bulky Volcarona (at +1 Sp. Atk., 0 EVs) w/ Bug Buzz to a 4 HP/252 Sp.Def. Victini: 39,5% - 43,8%
 
TM13IceBeam said:
Darmanitan should not be considered. Goddamnit. I don't care if it has Zen Mode or whatever, but the fact that it cannot be Psychic type throughout and starts off as a pure Fire means that it shouldn't be legal at all.
Click to expand...

That's why I said "I guess Victini will take Darmanitan's place anyway :p". That was just a copy and paste from one of my older posts.
 
So if we run Victini, then Volcaron, with prediction, becomes less of a threat.

I like the idea of Mew baton passing. Mew can baton pass an boost in the game, so we could get +2 in Speed (Rock Polish) and +2 in (Sp.)Atk, (Nasty Plot/Swords Dance). Substitute can be passed, as well has preventing Tyranitar from using Pursuit.

Another question to ask is, are we leading with Deoxys-S. Doing so can ensure an
early-game advantage, but it's frail and probably can't come in later in the game.
 
Alakazam@Life Orb
Timid l 252 spA/252 spe/4 HP
Substitute/Hidden power fire/psychic/focus blast


Zam is going to be an important link due to ttar and scizor's prevalence. Sub lets you take a hit and ohko respective attacker.

We could also opt for fire punch wish rachi which still beats both but meh

Oh and

Celebi@leftovers
Bold/careful/whatever is suitable l 252 hp/240 def/16 spe
Sub/ baton pass/ giga drain/ calm mind

Sub when volca switches in, baton pass to []
 
iamdanielcruces said:
252 Atk., +Sp.Def. Victini V-Create @Life Orb vs. 224 HP/252 Def., +Def. Volcarona: 81,7% - 96,5%
And then Quick Attack: 12,3% - 14,7%

The same bulky Volcarona (at +1 Sp. Atk., 0 EVs) w/ Bug Buzz to a 4 HP/252 Sp.Def. Victini: 39,5% - 43,8%
Click to expand...

Thanks for the calculations.
Looks like Victini is a solid check to Volcarona even without entry hazard support.
I would consider it a must have in a mono-psychic team.
 
@ ElectivireRocks
You're welcome :)

It's either Victini, Gallade, or a Rain Dancing Psychic/Steel. I was a bit worried about the team "weatherlessness", and thought that something like a Rain Dance Bronzong might be a good idea. It should be brought along Starmie, Surf Lati@s, Slowbro, and any other mon that would benefit from rain. But its main function would be to screw with the opponent's team weather.

(Perhaps I'm just worrying too much about this...)
 
Gallade's Dream World Ability, Justified, has been released. With this in, I think Gallade will be the Tyranitar counter for our team, more so than Medicham. Gallade will receive a +1 attack boost should Tyranitar decide to Pursuit or Crunch on it. With Wish support from Jirachi, he could do this multiple times throughout the match. Tyranitar will be on his toes against our teams.

The only problem is that Justified is illegal with Drain Punch :( So Gallade going to have to run an all out sweeping set with TR or SD. The Bulk Up set could be good but you have to get up to +3 since Gallade won't have buddies to really take those u-turns and crunches well as opposed to if he was on a normal team. The last thing really cool thing Gallade can do is run Mean Look with Bulk Up. This would make getting up to +3 and beyond infinitely easier.
 
It's not really that hard to get to +2 as there are PLENTY of tough psychic types like jirachi who can help weaken the team so gallade can get in and set up. SD imo is mostly a waste of time as gallade is just too slow to make use of it. Also without a fair amount of investment (or bulk ups) he is kinda frail on the physical side. But with some investment like this gallade...

PE-EL (Gallade) (M) @ Leftovers Trait: Steadfast
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Bulk Up
- Drain Punch
- Shadow Sneak
- Leaf Blade


you may find that he can come in far more often as this set can take some abuse. I've even sent it in to set up against T-tar after it killed something!
 
Vix said:
It's not really that hard to get to +2 as there are PLENTY of tough psychic types like jirachi who can help weaken the team so gallade can get in and set up. SD imo is mostly a waste of time as gallade is just too slow to make use of it. Also without a fair amount of investment (or bulk ups) he is kinda frail on the physical side. But with some investment like this gallade...

PE-EL (Gallade) (M) @ Leftovers Trait: Steadfast
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Bulk Up
- Drain Punch
- Shadow Sneak
- Leaf Blade


you may find that he can come in far more often as this set can take some abuse. I've even sent it in to set up against T-tar after it killed something!
Click to expand...


Why not use Ice Punch over Leaf Blade? Ice Punch hits Gliscor hard but is there a specific threat Leaf Blade hits?

Also, a really worthwile pair I can see on our Mono-Psychic teams are Metagross and Medicham. I can't test it right now, but on paper it looks good. Metagross I beleive the only Psychic who has access to Pursuit. This means it is exceptional at trapping Ghost types. The Ghost types that would otherwise switch-in on HJK are now gone. Both also learn trick so they can easily cripple the others or their own counter. They look like they can make decent offensive pair who would make way for TR Reuniclus or another standalone sweeper to sweep.

I think we should note the support moves Trick and Burning moves as well. Trick is going to make breaking defensive cores a whole lot easier, and it really helps that almost all of our attackers learn it. The most notable burners as of now are Mew and Sigilyph. Tyranitar and Scizor, the most prominent threats, supereffective moves are physical. The only other burners are Victini and Reuniclus with Flame Orb. They both have more important and better things to do and I think Trick-Flame Orb Reuni is garbage.
 
^I gotta agree that Mew is really exceptional on a Psychic team. If we're going balance, we want that Stallbreaking Taunt+WOW set; if we want hyper offense / gimmick strategies in terms of baton pass or trick room, Mew can do that too.

I might be teeny bit off topic, but where is the other mono-water thread? Idk if it even made a team that the whole thread agreed on, and yet another project...
 
Well assuming we're not limited to just released Pokemon since it seems we're only discussing a type once, I'd like to add mention of Meloetta.

On a Mono-Psychic team, she has plenty of unique perks, the biggest of which are; Being one of 2 Psychics with a Ghost immunity and being able to switch it's typing on the fly to a Pokemon that is immune to Ghost and resists Dark & Bug.

Aria forme Meloetta is far & away the best Pokemon Mono-Psychic teams can run for dealing with Ghosts. Base 100 HP & base 128 Special Defense solidify that fact while a base 128 Special Attack makes her a big offensive threat. It only has a weakness to Dark & Bug, neither of which any Ghosts, bar Spiritomb, would even carry. Neutrality to Focus Blast means that nothing Ghosts carry will ever threaten her too much.

Pirouette forme adds even more appeal to Meloetta as it can now sweep with a blistering base 128 Speed and an absolutely brutal 128 Attack as well as getting trading her Dark & Bug weakness for a Dark & Bug resistance. That's just how crazy it's ability to switch types really is.

This set is called "Duet". It's a set I made for my own Meloetta a long while back.

Meloetta @ Life Orb
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 204 Atk / 112 SAtk / 192 Spd
Naive Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Relic Song
- Psychic
- Close Combat
- Stone Edge


This set takes full advantage of both formes allowing both Aria & Pirouette to sweep together. Relic Song of course switches her formes making it more of just a move to pick off weakened opponents rather than a coverage move. Psychic is Aria's main form a offense, hitting only a difference of 8 Sp.Attack weaker than a Base 100 STAB Psychic with the EVs I've given her. Relic Song has 75 Base Power with 20% chance to put the opponent to Sleep making it the farthest thing from dead weight. Pirouette is EV'd to just out-speed Alakazam & Dugtrio without wasting any EVs to just hit uncommon Pokemon like Swellow & Weavile. Close Combat & Stone Edge give it near perfect coverage only being resisted by...a few bad ideas. (Looking at you, Trollurk) Her EVs also give her 343 Attack makes both of her moves hit like trains with Life Orb.

Aria is the 2nd strongest Normal-type Special Attacker while Pirouette has the 3rd strongest Close Combat in the entire game with only Machamp & Terrakion in front of her by 1 Base Point so don't take her lightly in either forme.
 
@ThePillsburyDoughBoy: I think he's got Leaf Blade on there to power through Quagsire, who otherwise walls BU Gallade to high heavens with Unaware and Recover.

@Katakiri: I'd be psyched if Meloetta was released. But I seriously doubt we're going to consider it for the team since it isn't.
 
There are quite a few OU viable pokemon that haven't been brought up yet.

Azelf
Sigliyph
Cresselia
Xatu (Questionable)

Psychic's biggest benefit is it's diversity. Cresselia, Slowbro, and Brongzong allow a team access to very potent walls, Medicham and Azelf lead the way to H.O., Gallade, Latias, Reniculus and Metagross work great as bulky offenders, Starmie and Latios can function as Choice abusers, Deoxys-S is just about guaranteed to get hazards up, and Xatu/Espeon can handle the hazards your opponent brings.


However, all is not well for Psychic. Of the Pokemon listed above, very few can take on Tyranitar, and sans Bronzong, none of them can switch in. Gallade may seem like a good counter in practice, but you have to remember that against a mono-Psychic team, Tyranitar will be throwing around Pursuit much more commonly than Crunch. When teambuilding, we will need to be extremely careful of Tyranitar.
 
252 HP/252 Atk Metagross can swith in Tar, is not 3HKOed by Crunch an can take a Fire Blast an OHKOes with Meteor Mash, he also OHKOes Gengar (and most week ghosts) with BP

I fail to see the lack of physical psyquics, when you have Psyshock an Gross, Victini and Gallade you hardly need any more, TRictini is another amazing sweeper that sinergies mith Metagross an Reuniclus really well, and Gallade can run a ver effective Bulk Up set

Slowbro is imo the best pokemon vs bug teams hitting SE everything important, he hardly cares about steel/bugs thanks to Fire Blast/Flamethrower and in TR at -Spe, nothing common beats him (and most escavaliers don't run -spe so you can even underspeed them), oesn't give a crap about BP, hits Vulcanoa SE, an after rocks O-2HKOes evevery bug poke, and if low on health just switch out!

If you want to go offensive, Dual Screens it an amazing way to go, Cresselia, Uxie an Mew are all amazing an have ways to annoy you opponent so you can set up (lunar dance, memento, U-turn) a sweep or a pass (Nasty plot, CM and SD or agility, it's Mew! do whatever you want) an they can't erase the boosts thanks to Espeon (i've manage to do a very nice BP chain that only required espeon, mew, celebi an Mr. mime with tho extras to eliminate specific treaths) try to defeat Starmie at +2, you rally can't

PS: Oh yeah, Rocks are even more important in mono since really, just Volcanora and Dragonite are enough of a reason, hitting every bug for at least 6.25% damage is always nice
 
I'm thinking Starmie's a must here. With all the D-S offense teams popping up, a spinner is extremely important.

Tyranitar isn't really that big of a threat; I don't think we need to delve into RU to find a good counter. Especially when you consider that both those Psychic/Fighters have absolutely pitiful Base Defenses. I think we should just look to the much better Psychic/Steels like Jirachi, Metagross, and Bronzong. Especially Jirachi. She's way better than the other two. Plus all of them can set up Stealth Rock.

I think with the vital Starmie, along with Latios and Deoxys-S, full Trick Room doesn't seem like the best option. Too many of the most viable OU Psychic options don't fit, and we end up with a motley crew of NUs. Trick Room on it's own is extremely difficult to pull off, but mono-Psychic Trick Room? Yikes. I think Reuniclus on its own might be a great idea to utilize Trick Room to take a shit on offensive teams, but really I don't think we should make it the whole show.

Anyways, on Volcarona, I think Stealth Rock + Scarfer/Wobbuffett should be enough to take care of her.

Drifloon said:
Alakazam@Life Orb
Timid l 252 spA/252 spe/4 HP
Substitute/Hidden power fire/psychic/focus blast
Click to expand...
Love Zam, but you can't live without Shadow Ball hitting all the new Psychics of OU, especially Lati@s. So you either have to suck up the Scizor weakness and get rid of HP Fire, or get rid of Substitute (probably the best option).
 
leaf blade because I lack a grass type move on my team for 1. and 2. I sorta forgot that it got rock slide and stone edge. >_>
 
Starmie. Only Psychic that is not necessarily a Psychic due to Camoflage. But STAB from HP Ground sounds unfortunate. Makes me think Stunfisk...

EDIT: Oh yeah, Reflect Type Lati... bet its nastier when is type changes...
 
you can't really get rid of sub on zam because it allows you to beat Scizor (sub up while opponent switches to Scizor, click HP fire to win), and we know how Scizor can smash up psychics quite badly.

considering the amount of psychics that get shadow ball (i'm sure there's like a fuckton of them) you can skip it on Zam
 
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