Scol and 'Cross Bones, a Baton Pass Team for Pirates

[HedgeKnight]

X and Y gave two great gifts to baton pass teams, two great gifts that may make them finally viable, to the dismay of every sane person on showdown. The first is scolipede. Scolipede got the gift of speed boost this generation, which makes it a slower but bulkier ninjask. The other gift is Mega Heracross. mega Heracross has 185 base attack, but only 75 base speed. The easiest way to remedy this? Scolipede! These two pokemon form the heart and soul of this team.

Scolipede @ Black Sludge
Ability: Speed Boost
EVs: 252 Spd / 248 HP / 8 SDef
Timid Nature
- Protect
- Substitute
- Baton Pass
- Swords Dance

This is my lead. I lead with it every game, no matter what my opponents team is, and go from there. I usually start by scouting with protect, but against some leads like forretress, I will set up a sub first thing. If I can start my turn with a sub up, I can get a swords dance off. Otherwise, just the speed boosts are immensely helpful. The main treat to this lead is taunt, obviously, so If I suspect a taunt, I will protect to scout for it, then pass my one speed boost to a sweeper who can counter the opposing lead. Another big threat is trick, though black sludge is decent insurance against this. Latios specifically can be switched to to bite a trick, as it makes good use of cjoice specs or scarves.

Heracross @ Heracronite
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Adamant Nature
- Close Combat
- Pin Missile
- Rock Blast
- Swords Dance

With higher attack than deoxys-a, mega heracross makes for an ideal baton pass receiver. Two high powered STAB moves and Rock Blast for coverage let it sweep easily with some speed boosts. On a safe switch in, I can get a swords dance boost, which always helps.

Smeargle @ Focus Sash
Ability: Own Tempo
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Timid Nature
- Spore
- Shell Smash
- Baton Pass
- Foul Play

A long time veteran of baton pass teams, smeargle is indispensible on this team. Spore gives it a free shell smash, which it can then pass to any of the sweepers on this team to deal a lot of damage. Foul play keeps me from being total taunt bait.

Thundurus @ Life Orb
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 252 Spd / 4 Atk / 252 SAtk
Naive Nature
- Thunder Wave
- Taunt
- Thunderbolt
- U-turn

Thundurus Gives me an out to priority taunters like sableye, liepard, and klefki. Investment in speed means my priority taunts go first, and priotity thunder wave is a very good thing. Thunderbolt gives me a powerful attack, and U-turn can deal loads of damage if thundurus gets an attack boost.

Aegislash @ Life Orb
Ability: Stance Change
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Iron Head
- Sacred Sword
- Shadow Sneak

Aegislash is the backup sweeper on this team, and it's excellent. Its bulk lets it more easily switch into attacks. Swords dance lets it boost up without switching forms. Iron head gives it a powerful STAB move, and shadow sneak gives it an excellent priority attack. Sacred sword gives it perfect coverage, and is a good attack besides. Aegislash is its own worst enemy due to life orb, which adds up.

Latios (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
- Dragon Pulse
- Psychic
- Defog
- Roost

The final member of my team is latios. It acts as a special sweeper in addition to being a passable revenge killer. Dragon Pulse punches a big dent in anything non-fairy, and psychic gives it a good STAB move. Defog gives me a way to remove hazards.

 

[Higsby]

May I recommend giving heracross both pin missile and rock blast over megahorn and stone edge respectively? Mega heracross gets skill link, this paired with pin missile means it has similar power to mega horn with 100% accuracy. Using rock blast will give you 125 base power with 100% accuracy over stone edges 100 base power and 80% accuracy. The extra benefit of multi hit moves is that they will break subs as well. :)

 

[Conspirator]

I very much like the concept of multiple baton passers, but a flaw I see is against sableye. With priority taunt, it can prevent your scolipede from actually doing anything, and can also quickly burn Heracross. In addition, Mew is unable to touch it, while Aegislash is wrecked by foul play, unless you can take it out in essentially one move. Sableye alone manages to take out everyone except Latios, and they're not going to let you take it out. You mentioned that you were inclined to remove Mew, so you can pick a good special attacker fire type, which makes the worst Sableye tame. If you want to keep Mew, as an alternative you can run Guts on Heracross base form. You don't need to mega evolve on turn one, and normal Heracross is still a perfectly competent attacker, and still works for sweeping.

Aegislash is, bizarrely enough, as close as you'll ever see to a glass cannon the way it is. Without being able to switch back into Shield Forme, it has the offensive presence of Deoxys-N... with 60 base speed. Granted, it has a much better defensive typing, but with 60/50/50 defenses after the first attack it doesn't end up turning out well for our shield friend. Normally people end up not running Iron Head, but here it works best partnered with Heracross due to the fairy weakness of Latios and Heracross, and the latter's difficulty hitting fairies. With Heracross' insane Close Combat, you should ditch sacred sword and go for King's Shield.

This is just my personal opinion, but overall it's a decent baton pass team, albeit with a sableye problem.

 

[John the Aussie]

other then what ^they^ said
1. give aegislash kings sheild over iron head allowing it to transform out and kill other aegislashes easier
2. give aegislash 252 atk/ 252 Hp/ 4 spd, to allow it to outspeed other base 0 aegislashes and to reatain its defensive form before going for the sacred sword ie kill bulky tanks
3. give aegislash weakness policy over life orb, aegislash is very hard to ohko and has only 2 moves that are normally effective against it ie your either going to take neigh no damage whatsoever or you going to take a fair amount of damage and then sweep
4. give smeargle dark void over spore so that he can hit pesky grass types especially treverent
5. replace taunt with something offensive so as not to be taunt bait for leads, try mud slap as stupid as it sounds it has 100% accuracy and always lowers accuracy which can really anoy your opponents, or sticky web to help your pokes sweep without aid if need be
6. give smeargle a jolly nature if you dont intend on giveing it an offensive move, struggle is a base 40 power Phisical move meaning that if you must be taunt bait you can do a tiny bit more damage
7. give scolipede a starf berry or a liechi berry (always activate after 3 subs) to allow you to pass better and maby stronger
8. your main baton passsing core of heracross and scolpede have no defensive synergy meaning that when you switch between the opponent doesnt have to guess they can just always stone edge try something like kengaskhan or choice banded kyurem black
9. give latios ?haze? the new move that removes all entry hazards as you team takes a major butt hurting to them with all you bug pokes
10. replace mew its its setup and taunt and everything else bait your better off with a ninjask or a deoxys d

hope i helped, see you round.

 

[Hopkinc1]

The Beautiful thing about Skill Link is that it makes moves such as Pin Missile and Rock Blast hit every time it can, and whats even better is that this is Heracross' ability. What is even BETTER is that Heracross gets Bullet Seed, Arm Thrust, and Pin Missile from the get-go, and that Rock Blast is an Egg Move.

Thanks to Skill Link, Pin Missile becomes more powerful and reliable than Megahorn, and Rock Blast becomes more powerful and a bit more reliable than Stone Edge. Close Combat beats out Arm Thrust with Power, but with a Tanky Pokemon like Mega Heracross I'd personally rather not have a defense and Special Defense boost, so that may be a better option than Close Combat, but CC is the better move. It also looks like you have a Baton Passing team here, in which case, you wouldn't need to use Swords Dance, just use Bullet Seed or another Coverage Move. Here is the set I would use for Mega Heracross:

Heracross @ Heracronite | Moxie/Skill Link
Adamant Nature | 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spd
Pin Missile | Close Combat/Arm Thrust | Rock Blast | Bullet Seed

This set abuses Skill Link, and although none of the moves have 100% accuracy (if I remember correctly), they all have higher BP after Skill Link (with the exception of Arm Thrust). A lot of them are also a lot more reliable.

Now that we get that out of the way, Heracross is still not a fast Pokemon. You seem to have a pretty reliable baton passers with Scoliopede and Mew, and absolutely ZERO entry Hazards. We need to change that, and we can with Smeargle. There isn't anything wrong with Smeargle (except you wanna keep that set, change taunt out with something else like Ingrain or Magic Coat), but Smeargle can be utilized better if you have a hazard setter. Here is the set I use:

Smeargle @ Focus Sash | Own Tempo
Timid Nature | 252 HP / 252 Spd / 4 Def
Spore | Stealth Rock | Sticky Web | Magic Coat

This set uses the best Entry Hazards along with magic coat, which can catch taunt users and other Smeargles off guard. Spore is standard. Stealth Rock is perhaps the most useful Entry Hazard there is out there, and Sticky Web The Second. Unless you're up against a Talonflame, Heracross will be able to outspeed most flying types after the speed boosts, and get off a Rock Blast, and anything else will be slowed down if you don't pass him speed. Magic Coat was a little more useful when we had Gen V sleep Mechanics, but they can still be annoying.Hope any of that helps!

 

[HedgeKnight]

I'm testing a Thundurus set with taunt, Thunder wave, thunderbolt, and u-turn instead of mew. So far it's working. I swapped out stone edge and megahorn for rock blast and pin missile, don't know how I screwed that up. Smeargle has foul play right now, but I may try sticky web on him. Latios now has defog.

Does anyone know how to make spoilers?

 

[Yeah Galo Sengan]

Make Aegislash mixed with spooky plate.

Quiet, 96 atk/252 sp.atk/156 HP

shadow ball
iron head/ HP ice
sacred sword
shadow sneak

Being able to deal a solid 70%+ to physical walls that switch in is huge.

 

[Shurtugal]

Personally, I think you should try Weakness Policy on Aegislash since it lures out and KOs more things with Shadow Ball. Invest in maximum HP as well; the bulk is really importante with Shadow Sneak over IH.

Scolipede should run Mental Herb (or was it White herb?) to cure Taunt status, which would really ruin your chances of Baton Passing ASAP.

I'd give heracross enough speed to outpace 530 when passed +2 speed (play around with EV settings) so Scarf Latios and below can't Revenge kill you.

Other than that, this team is kinda niche. In a good way. Like it'd be entertaining to play with, despite being standard SmashPass.

Good Job!

 

[tab]

Read the rules, your descriptions aren't good enough. PM me with improved ones and I'll unlock this.

ps those images are obnoxious af