Introduction
Hey Smogoners, this team is based around abilities that involve trapping Pokemon, so that I can pick them off one by one where ever possible, while also being able to weaken the others with a series of U-Turns, Stealth Rock and Sandstorm. I've been having some success with this team, however I don't feel like this team has reached its potential. If possible, I'd like to keep Magnezone and Dugtrio to maintain the trapping theme, while also having as many U-Turners as possible to utilize the trappers as best as I can, but if you feel that in doing so is preventing this team from becoming better, than that's fine.
Changes in RED.
At a glance.
This team has gone through quite a lot of changes, but those were only movesets and EV's, but I have considered changing Tyranitar to Hippowdon, or even a giving up Sandstorm, but in the end I've gone back to Tyranitar.
Indepth.
@ Focus Sash
Ability: Sandstream
Nature: Rash
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpAtk / 252 Spe
Moveset:
~ Stealth Rock
~ Dark Pulse
~ Fire Blast
~ Superpower
I'm really not quite sure why I use this guy over Hippowdon, maybe it's just because I rather play offensively. I wanted a sandstreamer to cause as much residual damage as I could. He does work quite well some of the time though. He can kill sash leads easily with the respective move and Sandstorm killing them off, so they usually only get stealth rock up, or just taunt. Stealth Rock is important to my team since I want to cause as many switches as I can, so the SR damage racks up. The set is discussed in detail here http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=58149 thanks to Gen. Empoleon.
@ Leftovers
Ability: Sand Veil
Nature: Jolly
EVs: 244 HP / 48 Def / 216 Spe
Moveset:
~ Earthquake
~ Roost
~ Taunt
~ U-Turn
Gliscor's the first of my two U-Turners and I must say I really like him. His taunt stops Skarmory from spiking, Blissey from healing, Celebi from seeding, and the list goes on. Earthquake is STAB and OHKO's Lucario, making Gliscor my best Lucario counter, outspeeding him and taking only about 50% (iirc) from Extremespeed. Roost to heal and U-Turn to utilize my trappers or rack up stealth rock damage. 244 HP EVs is a life orb number, speed to outrun Max speed base 90's, and rest in defence. Sand Veil also works well in conjunction with sandstorm.
@ Life Orb
Ability: Technician
Nature: Adamant
EVs: 232 HP / 252 Atk / 24 Spe
Moveset:
~ U-Turn
~ Swords Dance
~ Bullet Punch
~ Superpower
My second U-Turner, which everyone should know about by now. The set is somewhat made up by myself and I've found it works fairly well. I am able to U-Turn out of counters early to mid game and still set up late game for a Bullet Punch sweep after my opponents Pokemon have been weakened via sandstorm, U-Turns and stealth rock. HP EVs allow 339 HP for life orb, Max attack for.. max attack... and rest goes in speed to outspeed other scizor, but I've found sometimes being the slower scizor helps, since Superpower is usually the attack of choice, mine will do more damage since their defence has dropped from their superpower.
@ Leftovers
Ability: Water Absorb
Nature: Bold
EVs: 188 HP / 252 Def / 68 SpDef
Moveset:
~ Surf
~ Hidden Power [Electric]
~ Wish
~ Toxic/Protect
Vaporeon's always been one of my favorite Pokemon, and I also wanted a wisher in my team to keep my Pokes healthy. Moveset is rather self explanatory but Surf is STAB, HP Electric for Gyarados, Wish to heal and support, Toxic for bulky stuff that I can't really hurt. EV's allow leftovers number, max defense and rest in SpDef rather than Spe since Magnezone can trap Skarmory anyway. Vaporeon also helps my rather big Water/Ice weaknesses, but for some reason I feel that Vaporeon helps my team the least, I rarely get the chance to actually Toxic, so I may try Protect over that.
@ Choice Scarf
Ability: Magnet Pull
Nature: Naive
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpAtk / 252 Spe
Moveset:
~ Thunderbolt
~ Hidden Power [Fire]
~ Flash Cannon
~ Explosion
The first trapper of the team. The ability to trap and know that you are able to kill a Pokemon just seemed like such a great concept to me that I had to make a team around it. I tried the scarf set before, but I've found that it wasn't necessary since most scizor don't run many Speed EVs. The Max SpAtk with modest and life orb allows OHKO on almost all scizors with HP Fire before they can hit me with Superpower. The Life orb also allows me to change moves if necessary. Substitute is primarily for Skarmorys with Shed Shell. If i know they have a Shed Shell, I substitute anticipating a switch, so that I can select the correct move without much prediction.
Magnezone was changed to Scarf Variant so I can outspeed and kill slightly weakened Lucarios while also being able to outrun all scizor. This helps me to kill off opponents Pokemon one at a time more easily.
@ Choice Scarf
Ability: Arena Trap
Nature: Adamant
EVs: 40 HP / 252 Atk / 216 Spe
Moveset:
~ Earthquake
~ Stone Edge
~ Night Slash
~ Aerial Ace
The last member of my team and second trapper. It's pretty self explanatory but I chose Life Orb instead of Choice band to prevent things like Salamence and Gyarados to have a free set up with i'm stuck on earthquake. Jolly and max speed to outrun as much as I could, I think running 40 HP EVs will be useless since life orb will kill the ability to survive the Extremespeed from Lucario anyway, so that's why those EV's were moved to speed. Earthquake for STAB, Stone Edge for fliers, Night Slash for Ghosts and Sucker Punch was chosen over Air Slash because.. well, I never used Air Slash. Sucker Punch on the other hand has helped me KO those low HP salamence with dragon dances.
Dugtrio was also changed to Scarf Variant so I can revenge kill any scarf heatran with STAB Earthquake. I can also outspeed +1 Salamence if the need to ever comes. The scarf also makes Sucker Punch rather pointless so Aerial Ace has replaced it to counter Breloom easily, unless it has a sub.
Currently Testing
Flygon @ Choice Band
Ability: Levitate
Nature: Hasty
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpAtk / 252 Spe
Moveset:
~ U-Turn
~ Outrage
~ Earthquake
~ Fireblast
I'm testing this as a replacement over Gliscor and so far it's been working well but I'm afraid that my team will have too many choice users (4 with the edits). Anyway Flygon keeps the theme of a powerful U-Turn and strong STABs in Outrage and Earthquake. Fireblast 2HKO's 252/0 neutral Skarmory with no EV investment with SR 100% of the time.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Well, that's it. Thanks for reading my team, now if you would rate it I would be really appreciative =]. Any constructive criticism is greatly appreciated.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hey Smogoners, this team is based around abilities that involve trapping Pokemon, so that I can pick them off one by one where ever possible, while also being able to weaken the others with a series of U-Turns, Stealth Rock and Sandstorm. I've been having some success with this team, however I don't feel like this team has reached its potential. If possible, I'd like to keep Magnezone and Dugtrio to maintain the trapping theme, while also having as many U-Turners as possible to utilize the trappers as best as I can, but if you feel that in doing so is preventing this team from becoming better, than that's fine.
Changes in RED.
At a glance.
This team has gone through quite a lot of changes, but those were only movesets and EV's, but I have considered changing Tyranitar to Hippowdon, or even a giving up Sandstorm, but in the end I've gone back to Tyranitar.
Indepth.
Ability: Sandstream
Nature: Rash
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpAtk / 252 Spe
Moveset:
~ Stealth Rock
~ Dark Pulse
~ Fire Blast
~ Superpower
I'm really not quite sure why I use this guy over Hippowdon, maybe it's just because I rather play offensively. I wanted a sandstreamer to cause as much residual damage as I could. He does work quite well some of the time though. He can kill sash leads easily with the respective move and Sandstorm killing them off, so they usually only get stealth rock up, or just taunt. Stealth Rock is important to my team since I want to cause as many switches as I can, so the SR damage racks up. The set is discussed in detail here http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=58149 thanks to Gen. Empoleon.
Ability: Sand Veil
Nature: Jolly
EVs: 244 HP / 48 Def / 216 Spe
Moveset:
~ Earthquake
~ Roost
~ Taunt
~ U-Turn
Gliscor's the first of my two U-Turners and I must say I really like him. His taunt stops Skarmory from spiking, Blissey from healing, Celebi from seeding, and the list goes on. Earthquake is STAB and OHKO's Lucario, making Gliscor my best Lucario counter, outspeeding him and taking only about 50% (iirc) from Extremespeed. Roost to heal and U-Turn to utilize my trappers or rack up stealth rock damage. 244 HP EVs is a life orb number, speed to outrun Max speed base 90's, and rest in defence. Sand Veil also works well in conjunction with sandstorm.
Ability: Technician
Nature: Adamant
EVs: 232 HP / 252 Atk / 24 Spe
Moveset:
~ U-Turn
~ Swords Dance
~ Bullet Punch
~ Superpower
My second U-Turner, which everyone should know about by now. The set is somewhat made up by myself and I've found it works fairly well. I am able to U-Turn out of counters early to mid game and still set up late game for a Bullet Punch sweep after my opponents Pokemon have been weakened via sandstorm, U-Turns and stealth rock. HP EVs allow 339 HP for life orb, Max attack for.. max attack... and rest goes in speed to outspeed other scizor, but I've found sometimes being the slower scizor helps, since Superpower is usually the attack of choice, mine will do more damage since their defence has dropped from their superpower.
Ability: Water Absorb
Nature: Bold
EVs: 188 HP / 252 Def / 68 SpDef
Moveset:
~ Surf
~ Hidden Power [Electric]
~ Wish
~ Toxic/Protect
Vaporeon's always been one of my favorite Pokemon, and I also wanted a wisher in my team to keep my Pokes healthy. Moveset is rather self explanatory but Surf is STAB, HP Electric for Gyarados, Wish to heal and support, Toxic for bulky stuff that I can't really hurt. EV's allow leftovers number, max defense and rest in SpDef rather than Spe since Magnezone can trap Skarmory anyway. Vaporeon also helps my rather big Water/Ice weaknesses, but for some reason I feel that Vaporeon helps my team the least, I rarely get the chance to actually Toxic, so I may try Protect over that.
Ability: Magnet Pull
Nature: Naive
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpAtk / 252 Spe
Moveset:
~ Thunderbolt
~ Hidden Power [Fire]
~ Flash Cannon
~ Explosion
The first trapper of the team. The ability to trap and know that you are able to kill a Pokemon just seemed like such a great concept to me that I had to make a team around it. I tried the scarf set before, but I've found that it wasn't necessary since most scizor don't run many Speed EVs. The Max SpAtk with modest and life orb allows OHKO on almost all scizors with HP Fire before they can hit me with Superpower. The Life orb also allows me to change moves if necessary. Substitute is primarily for Skarmorys with Shed Shell. If i know they have a Shed Shell, I substitute anticipating a switch, so that I can select the correct move without much prediction.
Magnezone was changed to Scarf Variant so I can outspeed and kill slightly weakened Lucarios while also being able to outrun all scizor. This helps me to kill off opponents Pokemon one at a time more easily.
Ability: Arena Trap
Nature: Adamant
EVs: 40 HP / 252 Atk / 216 Spe
Moveset:
~ Earthquake
~ Stone Edge
~ Night Slash
~ Aerial Ace
The last member of my team and second trapper. It's pretty self explanatory but I chose Life Orb instead of Choice band to prevent things like Salamence and Gyarados to have a free set up with i'm stuck on earthquake. Jolly and max speed to outrun as much as I could, I think running 40 HP EVs will be useless since life orb will kill the ability to survive the Extremespeed from Lucario anyway, so that's why those EV's were moved to speed. Earthquake for STAB, Stone Edge for fliers, Night Slash for Ghosts and Sucker Punch was chosen over Air Slash because.. well, I never used Air Slash. Sucker Punch on the other hand has helped me KO those low HP salamence with dragon dances.
Dugtrio was also changed to Scarf Variant so I can revenge kill any scarf heatran with STAB Earthquake. I can also outspeed +1 Salamence if the need to ever comes. The scarf also makes Sucker Punch rather pointless so Aerial Ace has replaced it to counter Breloom easily, unless it has a sub.
Currently Testing
Flygon @ Choice Band
Ability: Levitate
Nature: Hasty
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpAtk / 252 Spe
Moveset:
~ U-Turn
~ Outrage
~ Earthquake
~ Fireblast
I'm testing this as a replacement over Gliscor and so far it's been working well but I'm afraid that my team will have too many choice users (4 with the edits). Anyway Flygon keeps the theme of a powerful U-Turn and strong STABs in Outrage and Earthquake. Fireblast 2HKO's 252/0 neutral Skarmory with no EV investment with SR 100% of the time.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Well, that's it. Thanks for reading my team, now if you would rate it I would be really appreciative =]. Any constructive criticism is greatly appreciated.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
