INTRO
Tapu Lele is one of the scariest special attackers in the tier, boasting immense power and a speed tier good enough to pose a threat to bulkier builds and a handful of powerful attackers like Rillaboom and Nidoking. I experimented with randomly built teams with Tapu Lele and I realised that to win games with it you kinda just have to get one Psyshock or Focus Blast off onto the right Pokémon before claiming a kill everytime it gets in. With is good special bulk and some useful resistances/immunities, Tapu Lele isn't useless on the defensive end, too. In a pinch it can stomach quite a few powerful special attacks like specs kyurem's ice beam and can gets itself relatively free switches against some metagame staples like mandibuzz and the lati twins. it's a very rewarding pokèmon if utilized correctly with proper prediction and game plan and i found myself very comfortable when playing specs lele, so i decided to build a more thought out team around it.
I don't usually play with fully standard meta teams, but this time I decided to build one with the best and most cohesive available options for each role I needed. I think this team is decent
TEAMBUILDING PROCESS
As I said the team is built around Tapu Lele, the specs set. I think it's by far its best, most effective set. very standard, very powerful.
To support it i wanted a speedier offensive pivot and luckily this is exactly what cinderace is. It creates opportunities for lele to come in and click buttons by u-turning on slowbro, toxapex and lando-t mainly. it also complements lele well because between fire and fighting coverage, it demolishes every steel type in ou. again, this is nothing innovative, but it's very effective. lele + ace is a tried and trusted offensive core.
Now it's time to think about the defensive backbone of the team. Balance has become my favourite playstile because of how solid and versatile it is in its matchups.
However, 3-mon defensive backbones always leave something to be desired so I knew i had to put in 4 pokèmon with defensive utility. At the same time, speed was an issue because cinderace is still slower than many relevant mons and i dont want to always be on the back foot. so i looked at weather speed abusers, because i wasnt satisfied by what koko, pult and zeraora brought to the table and i dont want to use spectrier when it's about to get banned. Excadrill made the most sense due to its coveted ground typing, which coupled with its steel typing allows it many switchin opportunities, mainly against electric types like koko and non-heat wave zapdos. Tyranitar was my sand setter of choice due to necessity for kyurem counterplay (it would have no reason not to click freeze dry if i went hippo) and ghost resist (pult, gengar, choiced aegislash,...)
with how much ground weakness i was stacking, i knew my last two pokèmon would have to bring good matchup against the more prevalent ground types in the tier. slowbro was a no brainer pick because i also needed counterplay for cinderace, urshifu-rapid, garchomp and excadrill. with teleport, it helps generate momentum for my team, in particular for lele and ace. also regen is broken
finally, the mandatory ground immunity. i went for zap because g-zap and hawlucha would overwhelm slowbro and i cant just rely on slowbro to handle all of this nonsense, especially when they are in the same types of team that garchomp is in. also zap is my back up for physical grass monsters like rillaboom, kartana and the less common tapu bulu. it also helps with spreading paralysis around with static and discharge, expanding the scope of lele's threat to mons faster than it, which usually dont have the bulk necessary to survive a hit.
TEAM IN DEPTH
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Moonblast
- Focus Blast
- Psyshock
I already described Lele in the intro segment, but I gotta reach 3 lines. Sometimes I think this Mon is broken for how much damage it does and how little easily you can make progress with it. I can't stop imagining how broken Lele would be if it actually got expanding force. Those 4 moves are pretty standard I would say. Psychic and Moonblast are the moves you want to click. Psyshock and Focus Blast are the moves you probably need to hit once in order to make progress.
Ability: Libero
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Pyro Ball
- U-turn
- Gunk Shot
- High Jump Kick
Broken bunny is here to leverage its good speed tier and stab coverage to generate momentum and assist Lele in breaking teams apart. This set is very standard, with coverage to hit pretty much everything it needs to hit in order to assist Lele. I was thinking about using zen headbutt, taking advantage of psychic terrain to hit pex and nidoking, but I like having gunk shot for opposing Lele, Clefable and fini. Uturn, fire and fighting coverage are a must. No sucker punch because of psychic terrain.
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Iron Head
- Swords Dance
- Toxic
Excadrill serves three roles. Electric immunity, Magearna check, speed control under sand. This is pretty standard as well, although I want to mention toxic as a mean to wear down bulky grounds and bulky waters, which give trouble to both drill and ace. I'm still undecided about 2nd and 3rd slot. Rock slide give me a way to hit flying types (although I have toxic for the birds). Rapid spin would free Zapdos from defog and gives me a better chance at cleaning even without sand. Eq slide SD spin is another potential set, but I like having toxic for slowbros, landot and birds. also, i could potentially also run a bulkier spread, which would allow me to better deal with koko and broken magearna in the long term. this way drill would work even more as a speed control with defensive utility.
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 240 HP / 16 Atk / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Crunch
- Rock Blast
- Fire Blast
Tyranitar works as the sand setter, stealth rocker, ghost resist and special attacking sponge. It provides all of this without being passive, thanks to its power and coverage moves. Crunch hits the slowbrothers and all of the ghost types, fire blast baits in and deals good damage to metal birds and ferrothorns. Rock blast hits birds and kyurem but eq might be better for Nido and tran. i want to highlight the utility of fire blast in conjunction with tapu lele: smacking ferrothorns and corviknights allows lele not to predict with focus blast and just pick them off with one or two psychics.
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpA
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Teleport
- Slack Off
- Ice Beam
- Psychic
Slowbro works as a defensive pivot and as a safety net against a number of physical attackers like Garchomp, excadrill and Urshifu rapid. Ice beam + psychic are chosen to deal with the former and the latter. Especially Garchomp is really threatening to this team if I don't run ice beam on Slowbro. Psychic immediately hits Urshifu rapid because if I run into bulk up tpunch I might just lose immediately if I don't get the burn w scald or is lum berry. Also I don't have rocky helmet to chip it because I need it to be healthy to take on Garchomp. I would love to fit scald and future sight on this set but I feel like I can't afford it defensively.
Ability: Static
EVs: 248 HP / 124 Def / 136 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Discharge
- Hurricane
- Roost
- Defog
This is my true ground immunity, it helps Slowbro dealing w hawlucha and galarian zap and provides a switchin to the grass type demons. If I fit rapid spin into drill, a slightly speedier spread + heat wave > defog might be beneficial for excadrills since Slowbro doesn't run scald. With this spread I reach 270, which is 1 point faster than Rillaboom. Discharge is for paralysis support for Lele and ace + reliable hit vs pex, but volt switch is a valid option as well.
CONCLUSIONS
I think this team is pretty solid overall. I like the sinergy between toxic drill + ace and fire blast ttar + Lele. Unfortunately no future sight is sad because with broken cinderace you could get a lot of mileage out of it. Not many Pokémon can switch into pyro ball + future sight and afford to stay in another turn. No scald either is risky for drills mostly.
Some sets and spread can probably be changed to be more efficient, so I'm open to any suggestions.
THREATLIST
this is a giant threat. I can't let it set up and if it's band i need to be very careful. Ace must be kept at full health and drill needs sand. I can't safely switch into it especially if it runs low kick.
the swords dance variant is a certified demon. I HAVE to run ice beam + hdb on Slowbro to be somewhat safe and I need some sr chip before I can ko it with either that or drill under sand. Garchomp is scary.
I do only have ttar and a timely focus blast destroys it. Kyurem always breaks balance apart if they don't have g slowking. Again, you gotta be very careful. Thankfully, it can only be brought in safely through double switches, as I can either ko it with ttar Lele ace and drill, or get momentum w teleport or volt switch if I decide to run it.
under sand w SD Eq and rock slide it can be devastating, you gotta be careful about it especially because this team sets sand up as well. If it's against ttar you might just want to fire blast it or eq if it's run over rock blast.
good luck switching into this thing. fortunately, lele and drill are faster ohkos while ace is faster and deals good damage (again maybe zen>gunk?)
under rain, i dont really have a special water sponge. i can handle barraskewda and urshifu rapid w slowbro, but those are scary. try to keep sand up and check them offensively
Tapu Lele is one of the scariest special attackers in the tier, boasting immense power and a speed tier good enough to pose a threat to bulkier builds and a handful of powerful attackers like Rillaboom and Nidoking. I experimented with randomly built teams with Tapu Lele and I realised that to win games with it you kinda just have to get one Psyshock or Focus Blast off onto the right Pokémon before claiming a kill everytime it gets in. With is good special bulk and some useful resistances/immunities, Tapu Lele isn't useless on the defensive end, too. In a pinch it can stomach quite a few powerful special attacks like specs kyurem's ice beam and can gets itself relatively free switches against some metagame staples like mandibuzz and the lati twins. it's a very rewarding pokèmon if utilized correctly with proper prediction and game plan and i found myself very comfortable when playing specs lele, so i decided to build a more thought out team around it.
I don't usually play with fully standard meta teams, but this time I decided to build one with the best and most cohesive available options for each role I needed. I think this team is decent
TEAMBUILDING PROCESS
As I said the team is built around Tapu Lele, the specs set. I think it's by far its best, most effective set. very standard, very powerful.
To support it i wanted a speedier offensive pivot and luckily this is exactly what cinderace is. It creates opportunities for lele to come in and click buttons by u-turning on slowbro, toxapex and lando-t mainly. it also complements lele well because between fire and fighting coverage, it demolishes every steel type in ou. again, this is nothing innovative, but it's very effective. lele + ace is a tried and trusted offensive core.
Now it's time to think about the defensive backbone of the team. Balance has become my favourite playstile because of how solid and versatile it is in its matchups.
However, 3-mon defensive backbones always leave something to be desired so I knew i had to put in 4 pokèmon with defensive utility. At the same time, speed was an issue because cinderace is still slower than many relevant mons and i dont want to always be on the back foot. so i looked at weather speed abusers, because i wasnt satisfied by what koko, pult and zeraora brought to the table and i dont want to use spectrier when it's about to get banned. Excadrill made the most sense due to its coveted ground typing, which coupled with its steel typing allows it many switchin opportunities, mainly against electric types like koko and non-heat wave zapdos. Tyranitar was my sand setter of choice due to necessity for kyurem counterplay (it would have no reason not to click freeze dry if i went hippo) and ghost resist (pult, gengar, choiced aegislash,...)
with how much ground weakness i was stacking, i knew my last two pokèmon would have to bring good matchup against the more prevalent ground types in the tier. slowbro was a no brainer pick because i also needed counterplay for cinderace, urshifu-rapid, garchomp and excadrill. with teleport, it helps generate momentum for my team, in particular for lele and ace. also regen is broken
finally, the mandatory ground immunity. i went for zap because g-zap and hawlucha would overwhelm slowbro and i cant just rely on slowbro to handle all of this nonsense, especially when they are in the same types of team that garchomp is in. also zap is my back up for physical grass monsters like rillaboom, kartana and the less common tapu bulu. it also helps with spreading paralysis around with static and discharge, expanding the scope of lele's threat to mons faster than it, which usually dont have the bulk necessary to survive a hit.
TEAM IN DEPTH
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Moonblast
- Focus Blast
- Psyshock
I already described Lele in the intro segment, but I gotta reach 3 lines. Sometimes I think this Mon is broken for how much damage it does and how little easily you can make progress with it. I can't stop imagining how broken Lele would be if it actually got expanding force. Those 4 moves are pretty standard I would say. Psychic and Moonblast are the moves you want to click. Psyshock and Focus Blast are the moves you probably need to hit once in order to make progress.
Ability: Libero
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Pyro Ball
- U-turn
- Gunk Shot
- High Jump Kick
Broken bunny is here to leverage its good speed tier and stab coverage to generate momentum and assist Lele in breaking teams apart. This set is very standard, with coverage to hit pretty much everything it needs to hit in order to assist Lele. I was thinking about using zen headbutt, taking advantage of psychic terrain to hit pex and nidoking, but I like having gunk shot for opposing Lele, Clefable and fini. Uturn, fire and fighting coverage are a must. No sucker punch because of psychic terrain.
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Iron Head
- Swords Dance
- Toxic
Excadrill serves three roles. Electric immunity, Magearna check, speed control under sand. This is pretty standard as well, although I want to mention toxic as a mean to wear down bulky grounds and bulky waters, which give trouble to both drill and ace. I'm still undecided about 2nd and 3rd slot. Rock slide give me a way to hit flying types (although I have toxic for the birds). Rapid spin would free Zapdos from defog and gives me a better chance at cleaning even without sand. Eq slide SD spin is another potential set, but I like having toxic for slowbros, landot and birds. also, i could potentially also run a bulkier spread, which would allow me to better deal with koko and broken magearna in the long term. this way drill would work even more as a speed control with defensive utility.
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 240 HP / 16 Atk / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Crunch
- Rock Blast
- Fire Blast
Tyranitar works as the sand setter, stealth rocker, ghost resist and special attacking sponge. It provides all of this without being passive, thanks to its power and coverage moves. Crunch hits the slowbrothers and all of the ghost types, fire blast baits in and deals good damage to metal birds and ferrothorns. Rock blast hits birds and kyurem but eq might be better for Nido and tran. i want to highlight the utility of fire blast in conjunction with tapu lele: smacking ferrothorns and corviknights allows lele not to predict with focus blast and just pick them off with one or two psychics.
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpA
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Teleport
- Slack Off
- Ice Beam
- Psychic
Slowbro works as a defensive pivot and as a safety net against a number of physical attackers like Garchomp, excadrill and Urshifu rapid. Ice beam + psychic are chosen to deal with the former and the latter. Especially Garchomp is really threatening to this team if I don't run ice beam on Slowbro. Psychic immediately hits Urshifu rapid because if I run into bulk up tpunch I might just lose immediately if I don't get the burn w scald or is lum berry. Also I don't have rocky helmet to chip it because I need it to be healthy to take on Garchomp. I would love to fit scald and future sight on this set but I feel like I can't afford it defensively.
Ability: Static
EVs: 248 HP / 124 Def / 136 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Discharge
- Hurricane
- Roost
- Defog
This is my true ground immunity, it helps Slowbro dealing w hawlucha and galarian zap and provides a switchin to the grass type demons. If I fit rapid spin into drill, a slightly speedier spread + heat wave > defog might be beneficial for excadrills since Slowbro doesn't run scald. With this spread I reach 270, which is 1 point faster than Rillaboom. Discharge is for paralysis support for Lele and ace + reliable hit vs pex, but volt switch is a valid option as well.
CONCLUSIONS
I think this team is pretty solid overall. I like the sinergy between toxic drill + ace and fire blast ttar + Lele. Unfortunately no future sight is sad because with broken cinderace you could get a lot of mileage out of it. Not many Pokémon can switch into pyro ball + future sight and afford to stay in another turn. No scald either is risky for drills mostly.
Some sets and spread can probably be changed to be more efficient, so I'm open to any suggestions.
THREATLIST
this is a giant threat. I can't let it set up and if it's band i need to be very careful. Ace must be kept at full health and drill needs sand. I can't safely switch into it especially if it runs low kick.
the swords dance variant is a certified demon. I HAVE to run ice beam + hdb on Slowbro to be somewhat safe and I need some sr chip before I can ko it with either that or drill under sand. Garchomp is scary.
I do only have ttar and a timely focus blast destroys it. Kyurem always breaks balance apart if they don't have g slowking. Again, you gotta be very careful. Thankfully, it can only be brought in safely through double switches, as I can either ko it with ttar Lele ace and drill, or get momentum w teleport or volt switch if I decide to run it.
under sand w SD Eq and rock slide it can be devastating, you gotta be careful about it especially because this team sets sand up as well. If it's against ttar you might just want to fire blast it or eq if it's run over rock blast.
good luck switching into this thing. fortunately, lele and drill are faster ohkos while ace is faster and deals good damage (again maybe zen>gunk?)
under rain, i dont really have a special water sponge. i can handle barraskewda and urshifu rapid w slowbro, but those are scary. try to keep sand up and check them offensively