Saint's Ridiculous Team.

[DarksaintJP]

Well I'm new to battling somewhat. I started about a month after X/Y came out. And this is what I've come up with. Criticism is appreciated and I'd like any good suggestions. :D

Ferrothorn - Iron Barbs - Calm -Leftovers - EV's 252 HP / 48 Def / 208 SpD -
Moves -
Power Whip
Leech Seed
Stealth Rock
Protect

This is mostly a standard Ferrothorn set. He is my Stealth Rocks guy mainly because he performs so well outside of using rocks. He walls everything that doesn't have Fire type move or a Strong Fighting type move. Leech seed is great for forcing switches and with correct predictions can support my other teammates. Power whip hits a lot of things hard without a resistance or strong defenses. And protect is for stalling for health or scouting moves.

Talonflame - Gale Wings - Adamant - Life Orb - EV's 64 HP / 252 Atk / 192 Spe
Moves -
Brave Bird
Flare Blitz
Roost
Tailwind

Woo Talonflame because 6th gen made cool things. Alright this guy is here because Medicham and Breloom must die. Brave Bird is here because there is no turning down a 120 Base Damage Priority move.
Flare Blitz because I really believe Fire must be on every team in some way. Roost in case I get an opportunity to heal (rare but helpful). And most importantly Tailwind. Speed up an entire team for 5 Turns with hardly anything to prevent it because of priority. Extremely useful for supporting my team.

Tentacruel - Liquid Ooze - Calm - Black sludge - EV's 248 HP / 238 Def / 4 SpD / 16 Spe
Moves -
Toxic
Rapid Spin
Scald
Protect

His main use is obvious, I have a Talonflame so I need a spinner, but what I like is Tentacruel's usefulness outside of spinning. He can stall a lot of Ferrothorn counters. He resists Fighting and Fire Moves, the defensive EV's help take hits physical and Special hits. He takes Physical hits well as long as they aren't Electric, Psychic, or Ground. Toxic cripples most Pokemon and helps my team stall out the poisoned Pokemon till they are knocked out. Scald is good for crippling physical hitters that try to set up and is a good STAB move too. And Protect is good for stalling for health or damage from poison or burn. And also to scout for moves.

Gliscor - Poison Heal - Impish - Toxic Orb - EV's 244 HP / (edit) 14 Def / 252 SpD
Moves -
Earthquake
Knock Off
Toxic
Protect

This guy completes what I call a Circle of Stalling. It completes the circle between Ferrothorn and Tentacruel by being immune to ground and resisting fighting. He mainly gives me more options to switch into and he plays as kind of a mirror to Tentacruel since this Gliscor can take both physical and special hits but not as good at taking special. Also since Gliscor is always poisoned he is a good switch into will-o-wisps or T-waves. And he's a good switch into knock off since Toxic orb is no longer needed after the initial poison. Earthquake is for a powerful STAB move, Knock off is so when if a switch is forced I can break an item. Also against other tanks, losing an item can cripple the tank. Toxic is so Gliscor can poison someone if Tentacruel can't. Like against Ground or Electric types. And again Protect is for stalling or scouting.

Alakazam - Magic Guard - Timid - Focus Sash - EV's 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Moves -
Psychic
Shadow Ball
Focus Blast
Dazzling Gleam

The Premier Focus Sash User. Psychic is for stab, Shadow Ball for Ghosts, Focus Blast for Tyranitar, and Dazzling gleam because People think that switching into Mandibuzz isn't obvious. His main use is for taking down priority users like Talonflame, Aegislash, or even Mega Mawile (after it's weakened) or Mega Medicham. But I've also found him to be a great late game sweeper, or even someone to take out a some key Pokemon on the opposing team. Also with his power and wide range of moves, it makes it dangerous to switch into this Alakazam.

Garchomp - Rough Skin (Sand Force) - Adamant - Garchompite - EV's 190 HP / 252 Atk / (edit) 68 Spe
Moves -
Dual Chop
Earthquake
(edit) Stone Edge
Swords Dance

Oh Dear Lord the power of this thing. Okay so this guy is the powerhouse of my team. His ridiculous power breaks everything. I made him bulky because of his reduced speed. the 4 defense Ev's help him live one Ice Shard from mega Abomasnow or Mamoswine. The main point of him is the combination of Mega Bulky Garchomp and Talonflame. At almost any point I am able to use Priority Tailwind from Talonflame as I sack him (God help the man who kills it with Tyranitar (because Sand Force)), then safely switch into this monstrosity and wreck as much as possible for 5 turns. Dual Chop is seriously for dealing with focus sash users since it's the same power as Dragon Claw and I don't like being locked into Outrage. Earthquake because the 5 year old in me commands me to use it to kill everything (the Precious STAB too). Stone Edge is for dealing with some certain walls like Togekiss. And Swords Dance is because if i have the opportunity to use it, That's worth a turn of speed gone.









Well guys this is my team and I am open to any good suggestions you may have. I have run out of ideas to improve this team so maybe you guys can help. Thanks guys!! :D
-DarksaintJP

 

[Oranos]

Ferrothorn: I would use thunder wave over protect. Although protect can give you a bit of extra healing from leftovers/leech seed, ferrothorn is one of those "all or nothing" types of pokemon; he's either taking a fire blast to the face and dying or he's tanking an outrage and taking nothing, his role is to set up your sweeper, and thunder wave will help infinitely more than protect will. Also the EV's need to be max defense, no exception to this really. I think it's a common misconception that EV's and natures should be used to cover a defensive mon's "weaker set." There are instances where this is true, but in general you want to have a physical wall (a la ferrothorn) and a special wall. Basically, you very rarely want ferrothorn to be in against special attackers (exceptions would be something like rotom that he can X4 super effective vs), but you DO want to be able to switch into him against any non-super effective physical threat and take very little damage. This forces your opponent to switch and you get off a thunder wave/leech seed/whatever with the free turn. So go max defense to make him as physically bulky as possible!

Talonflame: It's not that tailwind can't be useful on the right team, but there's a reason the vast majority use sword dance. Tailwind doesn't give you a whole lot here; alakazam is faster than most of the non-scarfed metagame, talonflame certainly doesn't need the speed, garchomp...well I'll get to that, ferrothorn and tentacruel don't care much about speed in general. It IS pretty useful for gliscor, but I hardly think talonflame should waste a moveslot (or a turn) to set up for gliscor. Sword dance lets you sweep entire teams right then and there (provided you get a chance to pull it off), and is generally the much better option.

Tentacruel: looks about right, I was never a big fan of toxic/scald together. I think you might have more success giving him a poison stab to deal with fairies that can disrupt garchomp or talonflame (azumarill), especially since gliscor already has toxic. Otherwise it looks like a solid build.

Gliscor: Substitute is absolutely essential to gliscor because of the following; when you switch into gliscor (ostensibly against something he walls), your opponent will immediately switch into some sort of wall breaker (who usually don't care about toxic, they're much more afraid of burns and paralysis), it is essential that you set up a substitute on the first turn (when they are switching) so that you are guaranteed to get off a toxic/earthquake before you have to switch him out. I think the most effective would be substitute/toxic/earthquake/roost (or knock off). Knock off vs roost depends on what you're trying to accomplish; you have a lot of toxic/stall type tactic so you might want to go with roost in order to keep him alive. Knock off, however, would be beneficial to your sweepers by getting rid of things like choice items, life orb, etc... I would go with roost in order to keep your defensive core alive as long as possible, but I could see either move being useful.

Alakazam: You need psyshock instead of psychic, so you can get through special walls like blissey (and no, he can't wall break her with focus blast), otherwise looks like a normal build

Garchomp: Ahhh this is an interesting conundrum. I almost never see mega chomp in the 1400 range (I can't speak to anything above/below, maybe he is more common at the top levels in the 1500's but I don't think so), so I'm not overly familiar with him. I do love garchomp; I have choice scarf garchomp on just about every team I build, and it is phenomenally good at so many things. In your case alakazam fills a very similar role (although even he isn't as fast a scarf-chomp), so I wouldn't advise it here. The question is whether or not mega garchomp is the most effective use of the mega slot for this group. If you want a revenge killer you have alakazam, if you want a sweeper you have the priority of talonflame to do so. My complaint is that you're using talonflame as a sacrificial lamb (albeit after he's done some damage) to give garchomp 5 turns of extra speed, when it seems like the team should be gearing up to help talonflame be the final sweeper. No amount of tailwind is better than talonflame's natural priority brave birds, and to kill a much faster pokemon (who also does quite respectable damage), to give a temporary speed boost to garchomp seems a bit counter intuitive. You could run sword dance on talonflame and instead devote this slot to something like Mega-medicham, which does cataclysmic damage without any sword dance setup and can eliminate talonflame checks/walls. The ideal situation would be for talonflame to be the last pokemon alive, looking at a group of weakened pokemon it can 1HKO with priority.

There should be more on garchomp, like I said I'm not super familiar with his mega form. I will try to think of mega pokemon that have better synergy with talonflame (if there are any) and get back to this later.

 

[BenTheDemon]

Replace Tentacruel with this:

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Scald
- Psyshock
- Recover

Trust me. You'll never miss Tentacruel. ;)

 

[DarksaintJP]

Replace Tentacruel with this:

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Scald
- Psyshock
- Recover

Trust me. You'll never miss Tentacruel. ;)

I would but i like that fairy resist. I did put a lot of thought into starmie when making the team though.

 

[BenTheDemon]

I would but i like that fairy resist. I did put a lot of thought into starmie when making the team though.

Ferrothorn already walls Fairies to hell and back. Starmie would add a lot more utility than Tentacruel.

 

[DarksaintJP]

Ferrothorn: I would use thunder wave over protect. Although protect can give you a bit of extra healing from leftovers/leech seed, ferrothorn is one of those "all or nothing" types of pokemon; he's either taking a fire blast to the face and dying or he's tanking an outrage and taking nothing, his role is to set up your sweeper, and thunder wave will help infinitely more than protect will. Also the EV's need to be max defense, no exception to this really. I think it's a common misconception that EV's and natures should be used to cover a defensive mon's "weaker set." There are instances where this is true, but in general you want to have a physical wall (a la ferrothorn) and a special wall. Basically, you very rarely want ferrothorn to be in against special attackers (exceptions would be something like rotom that he can X4 super effective vs), but you DO want to be able to switch into him against any non-super effective physical threat and take very little damage. This forces your opponent to switch and you get off a thunder wave/leech seed/whatever with the free turn. So go max defense to make him as physically bulky as possible!

Talonflame: It's not that tailwind can't be useful on the right team, but there's a reason the vast majority use sword dance. Tailwind doesn't give you a whole lot here; alakazam is faster than most of the non-scarfed metagame, talonflame certainly doesn't need the speed, garchomp...well I'll get to that, ferrothorn and tentacruel don't care much about speed in general. It IS pretty useful for gliscor, but I hardly think talonflame should waste a moveslot (or a turn) to set up for gliscor. Sword dance lets you sweep entire teams right then and there (provided you get a chance to pull it off), and is generally the much better option.

Tentacruel: looks about right, I was never a big fan of toxic/scald together. I think you might have more success giving him a poison stab to deal with fairies that can disrupt garchomp or talonflame (azumarill), especially since gliscor already has toxic. Otherwise it looks like a solid build.

Gliscor: Substitute is absolutely essential to gliscor because of the following; when you switch into gliscor (ostensibly against something he walls), your opponent will immediately switch into some sort of wall breaker (who usually don't care about toxic, they're much more afraid of burns and paralysis), it is essential that you set up a substitute on the first turn (when they are switching) so that you are guaranteed to get off a toxic/earthquake before you have to switch him out. I think the most effective would be substitute/toxic/earthquake/roost (or knock off). Knock off vs roost depends on what you're trying to accomplish; you have a lot of toxic/stall type tactic so you might want to go with roost in order to keep him alive. Knock off, however, would be beneficial to your sweepers by getting rid of things like choice items, life orb, etc... I would go with roost in order to keep your defensive core alive as long as possible, but I could see either move being useful.

Alakazam: You need psyshock instead of psychic, so you can get through special walls like blissey (and no, he can't wall break her with focus blast), otherwise looks like a normal build

Garchomp: Ahhh this is an interesting conundrum. I almost never see mega chomp in the 1400 range (I can't speak to anything above/below, maybe he is more common at the top levels in the 1500's but I don't think so), so I'm not overly familiar with him. I do love garchomp; I have choice scarf garchomp on just about every team I build, and it is phenomenally good at so many things. In your case alakazam fills a very similar role (although even he isn't as fast a scarf-chomp), so I wouldn't advise it here. The question is whether or not mega garchomp is the most effective use of the mega slot for this group. If you want a revenge killer you have alakazam, if you want a sweeper you have the priority of talonflame to do so. My complaint is that you're using talonflame as a sacrificial lamb (albeit after he's done some damage) to give garchomp 5 turns of extra speed, when it seems like the team should be gearing up to help talonflame be the final sweeper. No amount of tailwind is better than talonflame's natural priority brave birds, and to kill a much faster pokemon (who also does quite respectable damage), to give a temporary speed boost to garchomp seems a bit counter intuitive. You could run sword dance on talonflame and instead devote this slot to something like Mega-medicham, which does cataclysmic damage without any sword dance setup and can eliminate talonflame checks/walls. The ideal situation would be for talonflame to be the last pokemon alive, looking at a group of weakened pokemon it can 1HKO with priority.

There should be more on garchomp, like I said I'm not super familiar with his mega form. I will try to think of mega pokemon that have better synergy with talonflame (if there are any) and get back to this later.

Ferrothorn: I really like this ferrothorn, he still takes hardly any damage from outrages, and because of the special investment, he tanks just about every unboosted hit that isn't super effective. I will consider the T-wave, it seems like it could cripple a lot of mon's that like their speed.
Talonflame: The tailwind is mainly used against Pokemon i don't have a good switch into or when i don't see a way of healing the recoil off of talonflame during the rest of the match (AKA when talonflame is screwed). this helps against strong pokemon that alakazam can't revenge kill. I really never wanted to use talonflame as a set up sweeper since there are so few situation i find myself in where that option is available.

Gliscor: I would like to keep knock off since it cripples so many Pokemon who rely on their items. And I am not sure about your substitute argument, if someone was gonna switch into a wall breaker, wouldn't they do that for ferrothorn and tentacruel too? I will consider it over protect though. I'll try it out.

Alakazam: Classic problem between psyshock and psychic.

Garchomp: I like it because its a bulky garchomp, and It takes hits well while breaking most things in its path.
Thanks for the feed back though :D

 

[CyclicCompound]

Ferrothorn already walls Fairies to hell and back. Starmie would add a lot more utility than Tentacruel.

There are several issues with putting Starmie in place of Tentacruel.

The first is that it carries little strategic synergy with the rest of the team. If you look at the team's composition, there are two cores—Talonflame/Alakazam/Garchomp being the offensive core, and Ferrothorn/Tentacruel/Gliscor being the defensive core. Already, we can see that replacing Tentacruel with Starmie creates an imbalance in these cores, as Starmie is significantly less bulky and can't switch into as many attacks. Furthermore, inspect the defensive core more. It's entirely based upon residual damage, with two Pokemon knowing Toxic, one knowing Leech Seed, and all three utilizing Protect. Starmie breaks that pattern, and makes it harder for the defensive core to accomplish its goal, which is to make it easier for the offensive core to sweep.

The second is that Starmie's defensive synergy is rather inappropriate in relation to the rest of its team. Aegislash is encouraged to switch in and fire off STAB Shadow Ball, which none of the members of this team really want to take. Tentacruel, on the other hand, can tank it comfortably. Tentacruel's weaknesses to Ground-, Electric-, and Psychic-type moves can all easily be handled by Ferrothorn or Gliscor. In comparison, Starmie has two weaknesses to Ghost- and Dark-type moves that none of the Pokemon on this team resist. Finally, Tentacruel is a better Fighting-type check than Starmie (discounting Gliscor here since most Fighting-types carry Ice Punch), as most common Fighting-type Pokemon like Conkeldurr and Mega Lucario will beat defensive Starmie 1-on-1 (Starmie cannot 2HKO MegaLuc, and Conkeldurr will win through Knock Off + Mach Punch), whereas Tentacruel can do much better.

Finally, Rapid Spin is COMPLETELY NECESSARY due to the fact that Talonflame is a key Pokemon on this team. Tentacruel's overall better bulk and synergy means that it can be a much more reliable spinner than Starmie.

So yeah. That's my two cents on Starmie vs. Tentacruel. I'm not saying that Starmie is bad, it has its uses, but defensive Starmie on this team is IMO a big no.

Now, for some things that can be changed...

Switch Poison Jab on Garchomp for Stone Edge. Poison Jab does admittedly get a strong hit on most Fairies, but think of it this way:

STAB Earthquake: 150 power
Super Effective Poison Jab: 160 power

Earthquake is basically just as strong. The two exceptions to this are Togekiss and Whimsicott. Whimsicott is almost never seen and doesn't really pose too much of a threat, and Togekiss is hit harder by Stone Edge anyway. Plus, with Stone Edge, you gain the ability to...

• Get a much more powerful hit on Air Balloon Heatran, Gyarados, and Mandibuzz.
  
• Get a guaranteed OHKO on Talonflame, Mega Charizard Y, both of whom cannot be OHKOd with Dual Chop.
  
• Beat SubDisable Gengar.

Give Garchomp 68 Speed EVs. I personally consider this the minimum for Mega Garchomp. 68 speed EVs allows it to outspeed fully invested Adamant Mamoswine and Dragonite. Mamoswine should be outsped because Ice Shard cannot beat Garchomp, but Icicle Crash can. Dragonite for obvious reasons.

Give Gliscor 244 HP EVs. This gives you the maximum recovery possible from Poison Heal and only requires sacrificing 2 points of HP. Well worth it.

Hope these suggestions helped.

 

[DarksaintJP]

There are several issues with putting Starmie in place of Tentacruel.

The first is that it carries little strategic synergy with the rest of the team. If you look at the team's composition, there are two cores—Talonflame/Alakazam/Garchomp being the offensive core, and Ferrothorn/Tentacruel/Gliscor being the defensive core. Already, we can see that replacing Tentacruel with Starmie creates an imbalance in these cores, as Starmie is significantly less bulky and can't switch into as many attacks. Furthermore, inspect the defensive core more. It's entirely based upon residual damage, with two Pokemon knowing Toxic, one knowing Leech Seed, and all three utilizing Protect. Starmie breaks that pattern, and makes it harder for the defensive core to accomplish its goal, which is to make it easier for the offensive core to sweep.

The second is that Starmie's defensive synergy is rather inappropriate in relation to the rest of its team. Aegislash is encouraged to switch in and fire off STAB Shadow Ball, which none of the members of this team really want to take. Tentacruel, on the other hand, can tank it comfortably. Tentacruel's weaknesses to Ground-, Electric-, and Psychic-type moves can all easily be handled by Ferrothorn or Gliscor. In comparison, Starmie has two weaknesses to Ghost- and Dark-type moves that none of the Pokemon on this team resist. Finally, Tentacruel is a better Fighting-type check than Starmie (discounting Gliscor here since most Fighting-types carry Ice Punch), as most common Fighting-type Pokemon like Conkeldurr and Mega Lucario will beat defensive Starmie 1-on-1 (Starmie cannot 2HKO MegaLuc, and Conkeldurr will win through Knock Off + Mach Punch), whereas Tentacruel can do much better.

Finally, Rapid Spin is COMPLETELY NECESSARY due to the fact that Talonflame is a key Pokemon on this team. Tentacruel's overall better bulk and synergy means that it can be a much more reliable spinner than Starmie.

So yeah. That's my two cents on Starmie vs. Tentacruel. I'm not saying that Starmie is bad, it has its uses, but defensive Starmie on this team is IMO a big no.

Now, for some things that can be changed...

Switch Poison Jab on Garchomp for Stone Edge. Poison Jab does admittedly get a strong hit on most Fairies, but think of it this way:

STAB Earthquake: 150 power
Super Effective Poison Jab: 160 power

Earthquake is basically just as strong. The two exceptions to this are Togekiss and Whimsicott. Whimsicott is almost never seen and doesn't really pose too much of a threat, and Togekiss is hit harder by Stone Edge anyway. Plus, with Stone Edge, you gain the ability to...

• Get a much more powerful hit on Air Balloon Heatran, Gyarados, and Mandibuzz.
  
• Get a guaranteed OHKO on Talonflame, Mega Charizard Y, both of whom cannot be OHKOd with Dual Chop.
  
• Beat SubDisable Gengar.

Give Garchomp 68 Speed EVs. I personally consider this the minimum for Mega Garchomp. 68 speed EVs allows it to outspeed fully invested Adamant Mamoswine and Dragonite. Mamoswine should be outsped because Ice Shard cannot beat Garchomp, but Icicle Crash can. Dragonite for obvious reasons.

Give Gliscor 244 HP EVs. This gives you the maximum recovery possible from Poison Heal and only requires sacrificing 2 points of HP. Well worth it.

Hope these suggestions helped.

wow i checked your changes to Garchomp and id still live a ice shard easily. If i could I'd give you a cookie i would. Awesome suggestions, im probably gonna use all of them.

 

[DarksaintJP]

Using my bump now because i feel like there might be some more improvements to my team, If anyone thinks they have a suggestion then kindly share it. I read all the comments.