RAIN TEAM

[gaddster03]

Well to start i am just going to say this is my first self built team in competitive battling. I am extremely new to this type of battles and after using "test" teams and extensive reading of analysis and basic guides on smogon.


So without further ado...

Politoed @ Choice Specs
Trait: Drizzle
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 SAtk / 252 Spd / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Ice Beam
- Focus Blast
- Hidden Power [Grass]

The rain maker. He hits hard with rain +specs boosted hydro pump. The other moves offer some nice coverage agaisnt gastrodon and water in general and dragon's

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 208 SDef / 48 Def / 252 HP
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spd
- Spikes
- Thunder Wave
- Gyro Ball
- Stealth Rock

Really annoying wall, hits sweepers on the switch with t wave, standard hazard setter. Gyro ball does some really nice damage to fast users who can't break through it's defences.
Compliments politoad really well as they sponge each others weaknesses quite well, whilst offering a swithc from defense to offense.
Latios (M) @ Choice Specs
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 SAtk / 4 HP
Timid Nature
- Surf
- Draco Meteor
- Psyshock
- Thunder

A secondary special sweeper. Thunder offers nice paralysis rate and some extra coverage for water types (looking at you jellicent, i have hp grass for gastrodon). Psyshock is a really nice stab on specal walls that think they can force a swtich. Draco meteor is jsut for huge damage. Surf has a really high base power in rain for nice damage too.

Blissey @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 SDef
Calm Nature
- Wish
- Heal Bell
- Flamethrower
- Toxic

The special wall. This absorbs statuses and special attacks (mainly electric) all day every day, every year. It heals my team with huge wishes. Hurts foes with toxic. Flamthrower is because i hate when people think they can set up with scizor/ fortress on me, plus i really hate ferrothorn

Terrakion @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Justified
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Jolly Nature
- Close Combat
- Stone Edge
- X-Scissor
- Earthquake

This is my main revenge killer with great coverage. Earthquake is my only move that hits electric types :(, and X-Scissor is my only move for psychics. The other two moves is for STAB.

Kyurem-Black @ Choice Band
Trait: Teravolt
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 Atk / 4 HP
Hasty Nature
IVs: 30 Atk / 30 Def
- Ice Beam
- Fusion Bolt
- Stone Edge
- Outrage

Well this is a pokemon i stumbled across looking for a good physical sweeper and i saw the huge base attack, outrage can OHKO so much and the speed is not to bad, i may try using scarf instead with an atk boosting nature which still offers a huge 483 attack. Ice beam is the only ice type move i can competitively use :(, really was hoping for ice shard/spear but oh well. This really wrecks a lot of stuff, and is great late game sweeper 317 speed isn't too bad but not amazing.

 

[Mosquiton]

Hi there! Nice rain team!

I'll give you some quick fix :)
First thing I would advice you to use Cloyster Mixed with Hydropump> Razor Shell to make a direct OHKO to Skarmory, change the nature in naive and use this ev spread 248 Atk / 16 SAtk / 244 Spd for peak the breakpoint in SpA and outspeed however ScarfTerrakion.
I see in your team a weakness to electric types so you should to put this spread EVs to Ferrothorn: 252 HP / 48 Def / 208 SDef and Power Whip > Leech Seed.
Personally i don't like Shed Shell on Ferrothorn, i prefer Leftovers but if you have afraid of Magnezone it's ok.
I use Cruel Timid only for outspeed adamant Mamoswine and for make this you must give 4 evs in speed for peak 260 points.
Honestly I don't like your Jirachi, under rain HP Fire have a ridiculous power and i think that the classic subCMind is more appropriate, with a coverage Electric Psychic has excellent wallbreaking capacity: timid max speed and max hp to make 101 HP substitutes for fuck Chansey and blissey!

Set:

Hide

> 252 HP / 252 def / 4 speed @ Timid Cruel

Cloyster (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Skill Link
EVs: 248 Atk / 16 SAtk / 244 Spd
Naive Nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Hydro Pump
- Shell Smash
- Icicle Spear
- Rock Blast

Ferrothorn (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 48 Def / 168 SDef
Sassy Nature (+SDef, -Spd)
- Power Whip
- Stealth Rock
- Spikes
- Gyro Ball

Jirachi @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Thunder
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
- Psyshock

 

[ganj4lF]

Well...okay, your team has a number of problems. First of all, your EV spreads on walls are bad, not maxing HP is a recipe for disaster, usually. I'd suggest 252 HP / 88 Def / 168 SpD Relaxed, on Ferrothorn, which is rpetty much the standard, and 252 HP / 236 Def / 20 Spe Bold on Tentacruel. To better understand why my EV spreads work better than yours, let's look at some calcs on, for example, Ferrothorn, against some random pokes chosen as examples:

252 Atk Tyranitar Superpower vs. 4 HP / 252 Def Ferrothorn: 176-208 (60.68 - 71.72%)
252 Atk Tyranitar Superpower vs. 252 HP / 88+ Def Ferrothorn: 180-214 (51.13 - 60.79%)

252 SpA Choice Specs Latios Draco Meteor vs. 4 HP / 252+ SpD Ferrothorn: 111-131 (38.27 - 45.17%)
252 SpA Choice Specs Latios Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 168 SpD Ferrothorn: 131-154 (37.21 - 43.75%)

As you can see, the proposed Ferrothorn is much bulkier on the physical side, and marginally more on the special one. The same is probably true even for Tenta, although I didn't run calcs here. The key point to understand is that HP investment raises both defenses, so unless you're not called Blissey it's almost always wise to maximize HP investment on walls.

Now, moving on the team. You have a quite troublesome weakness to threats such as RP Landorus, Agility Thundurus-T, and Fighting types, to a lesser extent (if the enemy team manages to take down Tentacruel, you don't have any back up resistance). To patch up these holes, I suggest the following changes into your team:

Expert Belt Jirachi -> Wish + CM Jirachi
Ferrothorn -> Specially Defensive Celebi

Sets

Celebi @ Leftovers | Natural Cure
Calm | 252 HP / 224 SpD / 32 Spe
- Giga Drain
- U-Turn / Thunder Wave / Baton Pass (the last if you're afraid of Pursuit)
- Stealth Rock
- Recover

Jirachi @ Leftovers | Serene Grace
Bold | 252 HP / 224 Def / 32 Spe
- Wish
- Calm Mind
- Thunder
- Water Pulse

Let me explain. Celebi is a way to handle all those mentioned threats, it doesn't care about weak LO HP Ices, and can Thunder Wave things to uselessness, or just Recover stall them (this actually depends on you, since you need to run SR on Celebi with my suggested changes, T-Wave and U-Turn / BPass are alternatives, while Perish Song is not recommended since you already run it on Toed). It provides key resistances to Fighting (so you now have a back-up if Tentacruel dies), Water, Grass, and Ground, that should put you into safety against Lando and many Fighting types like Keldeo or Terrakion (unless you come in into X-Scissor, and Tenta is better to deal with Terrakion anyway, however a back-up plan is always useful). Ferrothorn's resistance to Water seems less necessary with this change, however you still can't handle properly LO Hurricanes from Tornadus. While a SpD Jirachi would be the obvious choice, it would be quite redundant with Celebi and you would lack firepower somehow; Wish + CM Jirachi, instead, has the ability not only to heal itself, but to be threatening against pretty much everything after even one single CM, since taking it down will be a hard task. Its innate physical tankiness is welcome since it gives you a nice way to absorb Outrages (which was gone away after Ferrothorn's demise) and similar attacks. Wish is obviously very useful, and Calm Mind gives it the opportunity to sweep after its supportish role has been absolved. While you may be concerned about taking down Ferrothorn, your precedent Jirachi wouldn't help much anyway under the Rain (and Ferro usually is in a Rain team), and your best bet is to rely on Terrakion or Scald burns anyway to bring it down to ~70%, then Cloyster can safely destroy with +2 LO Icicle Spear. It's not the best game plan, but still better than your previous one, I guess. Not even taking into account the possibility of haxing it to death while healing Leech Seed damage via Wish with Jirachi.

Another little change: run Hydro Pump over Razor Shell on Cloyster. Hydro Pump allows you to break down Skarmory, Forretress, and physically defensive Steels in general, while Razor Shell doesn't achieve much. You didn't list the nature, but you should run a Naive one, to avoid gimping Hydro Pump while retaining max speed. Cloyster won't tank any special attack anyway.

Okay, this should be all, I hope this is useful in some way. Good luck.

 

[King of Blades]

Hello, and welcome to the world of poke... err.. smogon!

Well, the first thing I see with this team is that you have made the mistake of leaving your team weak to other weathers. If you lose the weather war, you're in for a world of hurt. Stuff like venusaur and sawsbuck outspeeds and kills your entire team. Also, keldeo can take advantage of the rain and nuke you with repeated boosted hydro pumps. Anything that resists it can be hit with secret sword. I think you can solve your keldeo weakness by replacing tentacruel with jellicent. You can also beat other weather by replacing jirachi with latias. Latias provides a great answer to sun teams, your main problem, as well as being able to beat terrakion, a key sandstorm sweeper. Just play carefully, as it gets mauled by tyranitar, the more common of the sandstorm setters.

Here are the sets.

Jellicent @Leftovers
EVs: 252 HP, 36 Def, 220 Sp. Def | Calm | Water Absorb
~Scald
~Toxic
~Substitute / Taunt / Protect / Shadow Ball / Night Shade / Energy Ball
~Recover

Alright, so here's specially defensive jellicent. It does tentacruel's job, only better. It's clear you weren't using rapid spin much just based on the looks of your team. Scald is for STAB and it gets a chance of burning key physical sweepers such as scizor. Toxic is good for breaking walls and tanks, especially on stall teams. The third slot is massively contested. Substitute and protect are both good with toxic. Taunt shuts down support pokemon and walls. Shadow Ball hits starmie, the prime spinner. Night Shade gives consistent damage on stuff. Energy Ball hits water types. Recover is there for hp.

Latias @Life Orb
EVs: 252 Speed, 252 Sp. Atk, 4 HP | Timid | Levitate
~Draco Meteor / Dragon Pulse
~Psyshock
~Thunderbolt / Surf / Hidden Power Fire
~Recover

Alright, so this is the offensive set of latias. It still tanks a lot despite no defensive investment. Draco Meteor is for STAB, and hits like a truck. Dragon Pulse is always a viable alternative if you hate the sp. atk drop. Psyshock hits keldeo, blissey, and a bunch of other crap as well as being a good secondary STAB. Thunderbolt hits other rain teams. Surf can be used instead to hit heatran, tyranitar, and landorus. Hidden Power Fire can be used instead to hit scizor, forretress, ferrothorn, and a lot of steel types.

Jellicent and latias will do a lot to help your team. Jellicent provides a stalwart defensive combination with ferrothorn and keeps those hazards safe. Latias fixes your weakness to rock polish landorus, thundurus-t, terrakion, and other weathers.

Alright, now that you have a specially defensive pokemon (jellicent), why not move ferrothorn's sp. def evs to hp? Sure, they provide him decent special bulk, but he'll survive even more on the physical side and be a great buddy with jellicent. Make sure you change the nature to relaxed too. Also, I would recommend changing ferrothorn's item to leftovers. I have no idea why shell bell is on a ferrothorn.

Summary of changes

Tentacruel >>>>>> Jellicent
Jirachi >>>>>> Latias

Ferrothorn
new ev spread: 252 HP, 252 Def, 4 Sp. Def
new nature: relaxed
new item: leftovers


Hope this helps, and good luck with the team!
~KoB

 

[Joeyboy]

Cool team man!

So I definitely agree with Ganj4lf on the Ferrothorn spread he recommended. That'll allow Ferrothorn to have even more longevity. I also want to suggest runningThunder Wave over Leech Seed. Thunder Wave deters many of Ferrothorn's most common switchins, such as Terrakion or Keldeo. Leftovers is also preferred, especially if you've got Thunder Wave over Leech Seed, as Ferrothorn needs all the passive recovery it can get.

Also the standard Tentacruel spread will probably serve you better: 252 HP / 236 Def / 20 Spe Bold Nature

Finally I recommend you switch Jirachi to the Specially Defensive Set. Tornadus-T is a huge threat, and while you do have Jirachi now, its lack of solid Special bulk plus only semi-reliable recovery(Wish with no Protect) could lead to some dilemmas if your opponent is smart. The set I recommend is:

Hide

Jirachi @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SDef / 4 SAtk
Careful Nature
- Protect
- Wish
- Thunder
- Iron Head

Good Luck!

 

[Harsha]

This is a pretty cool rain build, but I think you can touch the team up a bit to cover more threats and run more efficiently. What stands out to me right now is that your Jirachi is really not doing anything for the team. First off, Hidden Power Fire is basically useless in the rain, and it'll be piss weak against even targets it hits for super effective damage. Additionally, your team really doesn't need Wish support, especially with Tentacruel there to get rid of entry hazards. I'd probably swap out your Jirachi set for another one that you can use to still tank Tornadus-T Hurricanes, but can carry a bit more relevance for your team. I suggest a SubCM Jirachi to take advantage of Ferrothorn's hazards while your opponent inevitably switches to Hippowdon, or whatever his counter to SubCM Jirachi is (keep in mind that a lot of the time, your opponent may not even be able to cope with SubCM Jirachi). The set consists of a spread of 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe, Leftovers, a Timid nature, and a moveset of Substitute / Calm Mind / Thunder / Psyshock. While Psyshock isn't absolutely necessary, I think the STAB is nifty. If you want to be able to hit Landorus or Landorus-T on the switch, though, you can go with Water Pulse instead.

On Tentacruel, I would just drop Toxic Spikes entirely. They're far from my favorite hazard, and with all the opposing Tentacruel, Poison-types, floating Pokemon, and spinners present in this metagame, they're not going to do you much good in the long run. The best move you can fit in this slot is Toxic, as it allows you to hit the Tentacruel switch-in on the switch. Your opponent will be wary, and likely won't send out a Steel-type to take the Toxic because most Steel-types are crippled by Scald burns. Toxic Spikes won't last all game, and they don't do most teams much good in this fast-paced metagame. However, Toxic can cripple key Pokemon like Rotom-W, Ninetales, or other common switch-ins that aim to take advantage of Tentacruel. You can also hit daring Hippowdon or Tyranitar if they aim to KO Tentacruel, though obviously you'll generally want to hit them with Scald instead. Toxic is a good move on Tentacruel though because of all the major Pokemon that you can take out of commission, and Tentacruel lures out some key Pokemon. You do already have Scald, and if you'd rather be burning those Pokemon, you can always just run Sludge Bomb to hit Breloom and Celebi with a super effective STAB move. I also second Joeyboy's EVs because you want to sponge as many hits as possible.

Definitely take the other suggestions above mine regarding Ferrothorn into account. Shell Bell provides no reliable recovery, and if you use Spikes or Stealth Rock you won't heal any HP. Just go with Leftovers to keep it alive as long as possible, as Ferrothorn is the team's defensive backbone. On Politoed, I think you should try Focus Blast over Perish Song. You have no defensive investment so Perish Song will often never even be used unless you face a stray Reuniclus, while Focus Blast provides insurance against Ferrothorn, something rain teams will always appreciate. You could alternatively go with a spread of 248 HP / 252 SpA / 8 Spe (to outcreep other 4 Spe base 70 Speed Pokemon and defensive Politoed) and keep Perish Song so that it would be usable after tanking a hit.

Finally, you can always try a Life Orb Tornadus-T over your Cloyster, as I've used this same team with Tornadus-T and it seemed to work, but that's completely up to you. If Cloyster is working well, then by all means keep it. Do note that there's a rather large Electric weakness on your team that Thundurus-T can exploit, and your only means of beating it lie in Choice Scarf Terrakion, which can be setup bait for another Pokemon. That's pretty much all I have to say. Good luck, I hope I helped.

 

[Nova]

Hi gaddster03

First off, welcome to Smogon! Always nice to see new users here especially those posting in the RMT section looking to have their team critiqued. The rain team you have built here is quite solid and I like your use of an underrated set in Mixed Jirachi. Now looking at your team, I can see it being threatened by opposing Sun teams. Chlorophyll Venusaur is a huge threat to your team. After a Growth boost and if sunlight is up, he can outspeed your entire team if he is running Timid Nature and can rampage through it with its standard coverage moves of Giga Drain and Hidden Power [Fire]. The only member on your team who is hit for super effective damage by either of these moves is Tentacruel, who albeit being Specially Defensive, won't be able to do much of anything back. For this reason, I suggest replacing Jirachi with a Calm Mind Latias with a moveset of Calm Mind / Dragon Pulse / Recover / Psyshock. Latias is one of the best checks to Sun teams with her resistance to both Fire and Grass type attacks as well as her massive 130 Base Special Defense. Latias can easily take Giga Drains and HP Fires and finish off the grass frog with a powerful STAB Psyshock. Psyshock also nails powerful threats such as Terrakion and Keldeo and prevents you from being completely walled by special walls such as Blissey and Chansey. Adding Calm Mind Latias to your team provides you with a deadly sweeper especially late game as she can boost up and heal off damage with Recover and if she's your last Pokemon she obviously cannot be phazed out. Losing Jirachi does come at the cost of Wish support but the Pokemon you want to be surviving and walling your opponent (Ferrothorn, Tentacruel) already have solid forms of recovery (Leech Seed and Rain Dish respectively).

Now for some smaller changes. On Ferrothorn, I suggest replacing Shell Bell with Leftovers. Shell Bell is an item that heals HP based on the amount of damage the holder deals out that is best used on offensive Pokemon if you were to use it at all. Due to Ferrothorn being a wall, he won't be dealing out much damage anyways and very much appreciates the steady recovery of Leftovers that increases survivability. I also recommend changing Ferrothorn's EV spread to 252 HP / 88 Def / 168 SDef with a Relaxed nature. This spread allows Ferrothorn to survive longer and wall attacks from both sides of the spectrum. Lastly I would replace your current Tentacruel set wiht a SubToxic set with a moveset of Scald / Toxic / Substitute / Rapid Spin and an EV spread of 252 HP / 240 Def / 16 Spd with a Timid nature. Tentacruel's speed allows the squid to get off a fast Substitute to block opposing status. He can then stall out opponents with residual damage from Scald burns or Toxic and great recovery from Black Sludge+Rain Dish.

Hope I helped and good luck with your team!


Sets:

Hide

Latias @ Leftovers
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
-Calm Mind
-Dragon Pulse
-Recover
-Psyshock


Tentacruel (M) @ Black Sludge
Trait: Rain Dish
EVs: 252 HP / 240 Def / 16 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
-Scald
-Toxic
-Substitute
-Rapid Spin

tl;dr

Hide

Mixed Jirachi ----> Calm Mind Latias
Shell Bell on Ferrothorn ----> Leftovers
Ferrothorn's EV Spread ----> 252 HP / 88 Def / 168 SDef with Relaxed Nature
Tentacruel ----> SubToxic Tentacruel

 

[gaddster03]

BUMP

 

[gaddster03]

i have found that ferrothorn can really bother this team if i lose terrakion, also physcial attackers with scarf's/are just really speedy have proven to be annoying. So i feel i need a more reliable way to burn other then 20% from blissey flamethrower. Maybe scald on politoed but i think that would make a really strong attack into a mdeocore or good attack at best if i replace hydro pump.
Thoughts???