Rain, Rain watching all my trouble away. (Peak 53- 1409)

AfroThunderRule

AfroThunderRule

*yawn* ez
is a Tiering Contributor Alumnus

Frog (Politoed) (F) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Drizzle
EVs: 16 HP / 252 SAtk / 240 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Ice Beam
- Surf
- Focus Blast
- Hypnosis

Rain inducer and primary revenge killer. 240 Spd EV let Frog sit at 354 Speed out speeding to threats like the genies/Lati@s/Garchomp/the horse(?) trio/Excadrill and deal sufficient damage to each one of those Pokemon. Hypnosis is to shut down threats that might be problematic for my team like Rotom or Ferro. EVs, the 252 SAtk EVs and Modest nature is to hit as hard as possible, while I explained what the 240 Spd EVs were for, the rest into HP for some survivability.


Fish (Swampert) (M) @ Choice Band
Trait: Torrent
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Stealth Rock
- Waterfall
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge

Fish is pretty amazing, no one expects (Well from what I've seen) CBPert, most expect a more defensive Swampert, it how I end up getting things like Reuniclus/Conkeldurr/Skarmory switching on me expecting to set hazards/power up with ease and then getting 2HKO'd on the progress. Fish also can *sometimes* 2HKO Ferrothorn, another pest for this team. I'm currently debating if I should use Superpower over Stone Edge, help Smogon? Fish is also my main Ttar/Thundurus counter, and as you can see he is also my SR user. 252 HP Evs are for survivability, while the 252 Atk EV/Adamant are to hit as hard as possible and the rest I put to speed to outrun other Swampert.


Horse (Virizion) @ Leftovers
Trait: Justified
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Calm Mind
- Giga Drain
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Focus Blast

Wall breaker, dealing with opposing TTar/Ferro/Jelli/Gliscor/Rotom that love to annoy this team, Horse can switch into all of those aforementioned Pokemon and threaten to set up a Calm Mind or hurt a predicted switch-in or the aforementioned Pokemon. Gives this team a much needed Water/Electric resist and my primary Rotom-W counter, Horse is also the team go to sweeper. After a couple of Calm Minds Horse is ready to sweep teams and recover its health with Giga Drain. The standard 252/252/6 to go as fast/hit as hard as possible with Timid to outrun certain important threats like Garchomp. Though I feel like I can optimize this guy EVs, any help with Horse's EV spread guys?


Toilet (Rotom-W) @ Leftovers
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 124 HP / 232 SAtk / 152 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Thunder Wave
- Hydro Pump
- Thunderbolt
- Pain Split

Toilet, the Washing machine. I love the new change GameFreak gave this little guy, most teams can't handle switching into this guy under the rain with the combination of Hydro Pump/Thunderbolt unless they have a Grass/Dragon Pokemon in those cases most Dragon/Grass Pokemon get crippled by Thunder Wave like Latios/Virizion who could do some damage if they mange to out predict me. There isn't much to say about Toilet, his good typing allows Toilet to switch in number of threats and start raking havoc. Pain Split also is a form of recover that Toilet appreciate with his low base HP. EVs: 152 Spd EVs let Toilet sit at 246 Speed enough to outspeed those threats dedicated to outrun TTar, while the 124 HP EVs is for some bulk, and 232 SAtk and Modest to hit as hard as possible.


Wishing Well (Jirachi) @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 216 SDef / 40 Spd
Careful Nature (+SDef, -SAtk)
- Body Slam
- Iron Head
- Wish
- Protect

Wishing Well is so cute. <3 OMFG how can anyone hurt it?! Erm.. I shamelessly stole Wishing Well from Mr. Kevin Garrett anyways Wishing Well is my main Special Defensive Pokemon, countering Latios, most Dragonites, Garchomp locked into Outrage. You must be wondering why Body Slam instead of Thunder if I'm using a rain team? Well that's it, most expect Thunder instead of Body Slam in this situation which has netted me a couple of switch-ins from Garchomp/Gliscor/Exadrill(sp?) and other grounds expecting a free Sword Dance or something and got paralyzed on the progress. <3 Wishing Well is also responsible keeping Frog and the others healthy, though that doesn't always work out. Protect is amazing, it allows me to check what other Choice users will do and lock them at that move, gives me 6% of recovery. The EVs are pretty simple, the 40 Spd EVs also nets Wishing Well that 246 bench mark, the rest into SDef/HP to take Special attacks even better.


Bat (Gliscor) (M) @ Toxic Orb
Trait: Poison Heal
EVs: 252 HP / 176 Def / 80 Spd
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Taunt
- Earthquake
- Ice Fang
- Swords Dance

Last but not least on this team it's Bat. Pretty much my main Physically defensive Pokemon, help counter most TTar/Garchomp/Haxorus(sp?)/Exadrill/Scizor/Terrakion heck most in the top ten. Taunt lets it set up on Ferro/Skarm and start raising hell with Sword Dance and with Taunt it also prevents them some setting up some Spikes/SR that threaten this team with wear and tear. With Toxic Orb I won't have to worry too much about status or recovery on Bat and it allows let Bat to switch on Will-o-Wisp/Sleep Powder/etc and start Sword Dancing. The EVs, one again, are very simple. 80 Spd EVs allow him to sit on that 246 that I happen to love so much, while the rest of the EVs are into maximizing my Physical defense.
 
Any reason why? I just find Tbolt more reliable and my team gains more from para, well I think so. If you're able to convince me that W-o-W will help my team in the long run be my guest, anything to improve the team.
 
The reasoning for running Thunder over Tbolt is that in the rain Thunder has infinite accuracy. Obviously there could be problems with enemy TTars or Ninetails but other than that it should be a much better choice. WoW and Twave both cripple sweepers but it's a trade off, Twave offers 100% percent accuracy and hurts all sweepers, whereas WoW will render physical sweepers COMPLETELY useless but is less accurate and doesn't help against specials, it's up to you. Also if you want Gliscor to be a defensive poke, usually you should run a defensive set, if it's meant to be an offensive set than don't say it's your main physically defensive poke but disregard this next suggestion. Here's an example of a defensive set:

move 1: Earthquake
move 2: Toxic
move 3: Taunt / Protect
move 4: Ice Fang / Facade
item: Toxic Orb
ability: Poison Heal
nature: Impish
evs: 252 HP / 184 Def / 72 Spe

Also Swampert: Swampert is part of a dying era he's not seeing much play anymore and for good reason with so many good new Grass types, but use him if you like. Superpower over Stone Edge is something I'm really conflicted about here, my gut feeling says Stone Edge as I was raised with the Ground/Rock coverage duo, but with the omnipresent Ferrothorn Superpower is definetely a good option especially as the only SE hit you have on Nat is the unreliable Focus Blast. For the reason, I think I've made up my mind, run Superpower bra, that way you don't get fucked by 70% accuracy.
 
I'm torn on Thunder/Thunderbolt, yea Thunder on the rain has perfect accuracy but what if rain isn't present? My Frog/Politoed isn't the bulkiest thing out there and I'm already banking on moves that have 70%acc/60%of working. It's too luck base for my taste.

Also yea Grass pokes can be a pain now, Jirachi can deal with some of them while Gliscor can deal with Breloom. But, ironically, it's Drought teams that are a pain in the ass to me. Those Chlorophyll users can pretty much set up on most of my Pokes and start breaking me down. Though that might be my fault due to inexperience. Swampert doesn't SR fast enough and Ninetales can bring out the sun as much as he want. :|

But outside of Sun grass pokes aren't much of a prob, under the rain Virizion takes over 50% from Waterfall. x_x
 
Experiment with Thunder, it's definitely worth the risk, as long as you protect Politoad. Plus, if you're using Pokemon Online, most of the servers tell you the opponent's team anyways, so you can tell if Politoad needs to be saved or not
 
This team is really cool because it handles sand much better than sun, which is very rare for a rain team. Anyways, it's actually probably better to be weaker to sun than sand due to the prevalence of Tyranitar and Hippowdon, but there are still a few things you can do to help against those pesky Ninetales. I would suggest you try out Choice Band Azumarill over your Swampert for its ability to check a multitude of sun sweepers that you currently can't keep up with. Unfortunately, Swampert can't take Ninetales's Energy Balls or Volcarona's Bug Buzzes, whereas Azumarill can just bypass their Speed and hit them with a powerful Aqua Jet. As long as it's raining, which is easy seeing as you can switch Politoed into Ninetales with little to fear most of the time, Azumarill will help you a ton against sun sweepers that will otherwise destroy your team, like Infernape and Volcarona.

Azumarill @ Choice Band
Ability: Huge Power
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spe
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Aqua Jet
- Waterfall
- Ice Punch
- Superpower

If you end up replacing Swampert, you can make Jirachi your Stealth Rock user by replacing Protect. Protect is nice for scouting and the extra recovery, but as long as you Wish slightly more often, you probably won't miss it too much. Another small change I would go for would be Leftovers over Life Orb on Virizion. You definitely need Virizion to stay alive longer if you want it to break down the likes of Tyranitar and Jellicent. I would also try out Will-O-Wisp over Thunder Wave on Rotom-W simply because Ferrothorn walls a pretty hefty portion of your team, and getting it burned will help you a lot in the long run.

Although it's mostly a preference thing, you might want to consider a bulky Politoed over your Scarf variant. It obviously isn't necessary and it doesn't change your team all that much, but my reasoning is that it will help you a lot more when switching into Ninetales. Scarf and Specs Politoed are great for deterring Tyranitar from switching in throughout the match and is more suited for offensive teams. Since your team has a ton of ways of beating sand, a specially defensive Politoed might be useful in breaking down teams with Toxic and will generally stay alive longer. Regardless, you should still consider Perish Song over Hypnosis seeing as Gorebyss Pass teams will sweep you outright if they pass to something like Garchomp.
 
Thanks for the comment Iconic, I switched Life Orb to Leftover on Virizion like you said and I noticed much better team synergy. It lived long much more longer which helped eliminate threats like Ttar/Ferro/Jelli that can be bothersome. And yea this team hate facing sun. >_< Those grass pokes even without the Sun can outrun most of my Pokes and deal damage.

But I'm not to keen on the Azumarill thing, I don't see how it could deal with those Grass Pokemon and things like Volcarona/Infernape aren't so threatening on the rain. I could try it again and see how well it goes this time. :o

Thanks again for the suggestions.

And as for Thunder, I tried it and had mix reactions towards it. The extra power and chance of paralysis is nice but with Sandstorm everywhere it sometimes felt like a wasted move. Poiltoed isn't bulky enough to switch-in on TTars/Hippo. :(

Also I just learned about the Hypnosis change, most players now are too smart and now I'm running a ScarfToed so they stay in and I'm forced to switch, and they just wake up too quick. Any move replacement?

Forgot something, while I'm also testing Azumarill (over Swampert) in the meanwhile I'm also going to test Swampert (Ice Punch>SR) and Jirachi (SR>Protect). I'll let you guys know how well it's working for me.
 
I was going to rate, but Iconic suggested it all. I would just add to Gliscor's spread. A more efficient spread would be 244 HP / 192 Def / 72 Speed, since, with it, you get a poison heal number and you still get more defense. Anyways, nice team!
 
replace Gliscor with Subseed Parasect with Spore/Substitute/Leech Seed/X-Scissor, once it gets a sub up it is practically unstoppable.
 
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