Sun Team: Advice wanted please

[Nathaniel Br]

I'll be quick I'm moderately new to this and somewhat inexperienced but here's my team, so tell me where I can improve

Ninetales (Usual lead)
Nature: Timid
EVs:
Speed 252
Special Attack 252
HP 4
Item: Leftovers
Ability: Drought
Moves:
Sunny Day
Fire Blast
Toxic
Substitute

This is my usual lead as the title suggests. The exception falls of course to when I am competing against opposing weathers. The aim of this is too hit with the force of any Pokémon that should if not for its ability be NU can, while managing to outlast Politoad and Tyranitar when I engage in the weather wars that follow. Fire Blast offers something resembling force. The aim is simple- Switch during the rain/Sand/hail and then toxic their weather user that is bound to switch in the term, stall them if I can in the form of Substitute while Toxic puts them on a timer (If they switch I get a free substitute and can then use Sunny Day to put my weather back up). When not opposing weather teams his viability is strictly limited.

Venusaur (Sweeper)
Nature: Rash
EVs:
Special Attack 252
Speed 252
Attack 4
Item: Focus Sash
Ability: Chlorophyll
Moves:
Giga Drain
Growth
Earthquake
Hidden Power Ice

This work idea that Venusaur while slightly frail, only needs one boast to reek havoc. Giga Drain takes back the damage it took meaning it isn't reliant on one HP, Earthquake is to take advantage of the Attack Boost while hitting Heatran hard. Growth is for boosting and hidden power is to hit dragons that might threaten it even with the boost with force.


Dragonite (Phyical Attacker)
Nature: Jolly
EVs:
Attack 252
Speed 252
HP 4
Item: Lum Berry
Ability: Multiscale
Moves:
Dragon Claw
Dragon Dance
Earthquake
ExtremeSpeed

Sacrificing the raw power of Salamence for a more reliable method of setting up in the form of Multiscale coupled with Dragon Dance. I choose Extremespeed over the various other alternatives such as firepunch as it brings much needed priority to the team.


Volcorona (Sun Abuser)
Nature: Timid
EVs:
252 Special Attack
252 Attack
4 Special Defence
Item: Life Orb
Ability: Flamebody
Moves:
Bug Buzz
Fiery Dance
Giga Drain
Quiver Dance

Despite the 4x Stealth Rock weakness, Volcorona is a welcome addition to the team. Hitting hard, recovery with Giga Drain, the best boosting move available, decent dual stab. Nothing much more to say other than what is apparent too all.

Starmie (Utility)
Nature: Timid
EVs:
252 Special Attack
252 Speed
Item: Life Orb
Ability: Natural Cure
Moves:
Rapid Spin
Thunderbolt
Ice Beam
Psyshock

Covering the huge Stealth Rock weakness my team has is- Starmie! Hitting fairly hard, removing all entry hazards, losing all status conditions upon switching out it's easy to see why its been in OU for five generations. Ice Beam hits the ever present Salamence, Dragonite and Garchomp. Thunderbolt deals with rain teams and Psyshock deals with Blissey.

Cloyster???
Nature: Jolly
EVs:
252 Speed
252 Attack
Item: Focus Sash
Ability: Skill Link
Moves:
Rock Blast
Icicle Spear
Ice Shard
Shell Smash

Bringing some well needed Ice Priority too the team, he is more than capable of Sweeping most teams that don't include Steel Types. I'm slightly dubious about his postion on the team but all I can think of too replace him with is Mamoswine which doesn't work quite as well.

Problems I can identify.
No stealth Rock on my team
No fighting type moves.
No taking as much advantage of the Sun as I potentially could. Let me know your thoughts.

 

[dice]

Hello Nathaniel Br. This is a pretty cool sun team, but there are a few problems regarding redundancy issues, item and moveslot choices, and threats to the team which I want to help minimize. For starters, your team is 4x weak to Rock-type moves with no resistances. Not only does this make you incredibly weak to Stealth Rock, but you are also weak to a top dog (lol) of the metagame in Terrakion. Although your Stealth Rock weakness can be alleviated by a Rapid Spinner, Terrakion can freely spam Stone Edge versus your team and then you're going to have a rough time! Not only this, but some opposing dragons can be quite problematic as well. For example, Band Dragonite can break through Cloyster on the switch with either Outrage or Superpower. After that happens, you cannot break it easily. If Stealth Rock is up, you can't even switch into DD Dragonite. Lati@s is more of a problem due to the fact that it gets a free switch on a quite a few members of your team and then harrasses you. SubCM Latias in particular can 6-0 with Stealth Rock up. Opposing Special Landorus give your team the bird due to the fact that Cloyster fails to OHKO with Ice Shard and then the rest of your team is just pummeled. If it pulls a Rock Polish, your only hope is the preemptive gg curse giving you an ExtremeSpeed crit. Another big problem with your team is that it doesn't have Stealth Rock. I cannot exaggerate how crucial Stealth Rock is. You, yourself should know how troublesome it should be since your team is quite weak to it. Due to these problems, I have a few Pokemon suggestions.

First of all, try out Donphan instead of Starmie. Starmie on your team in particular is unnecessary. Starmie's use in sun teams is simple: to give them a secondary Water-resistance and a switch-in to Politoed. Your team currently has two water resists in Dragonite and Venusaur, so Starmie's slot is not providing much for your team at all except for helping with your already good Rain matchup. Donphan gives your team quit a few things it currently lacks which is why I recommend him. First of all, he gives you the all-important Rock-resistance and has a good defensive stat to check Terrakion which you need desperately. Secondly, it gives you Stealth Rock setter. Stealth Rock is one of the most important moves in the game as I mentioned previously (repeating because VERY important), so you have that covered as well. Donphan also serves as a good Dragon-type switch-in since my next change can't really switch into Dragon-type Pokemon directly and it can't revenge a +1 Dragonite like Donphan. Lastly, Donphan isn't a free Heatran switch-in like every other spinner since even Starmie is walled. Since your team is a Dugtrio-less sun team, giving Heatran minimal switch-ins is important. Although you cannot directly switch-in to Heatran at all, prevent it from coming in is good enough. The set is optional, but I would recommend an offensive one with Stealth Rock / Earthquake / Ice Shard / Rapid Spin and maximum HP and Atk investment. You can try Head Smash > Ice Shard to nail Gengar if you feel as though it's redundant with my next suggestion. Even trying a speed varient could work as well to outspeed Jellicent trying to block you.

My second recommendation to you is to try out a Weavile instead of Cloyster. A change of Ice Types may seem like a minimal one, but you do get a couple of things in return. Weavile's primary niche is Pursuit. Although Pursuit in Sun seems rather lame, it does cover a few things in particular that you're weak to: Lati@s and Starmie. As I mentioned earlier, Lati@s just decimates your team currently. Starmie may seem bad against a Sun team, but you lack a reliable switch-in to it. Venusaur is weary of Psyshock while Dragonite is OHKO'd by Ice Beam after Stealth Rock. Cloyster is scared of any move (lol) and the rest of your team is scared of its Water-type STAB. Starmie can be be pretty frightening. Weavile still maintains a solid Ice Shard'r while helping against these threats, so I feel as though the change is beneficial. A set of Ice Shard / Night Slash or Ice Punch (I prefer the former typically) / Low Kick / Pursuit and max Atk and Spe EV's should work out fine.

Now, I do have a few other nitpicks on your team. The first is your Ninetales set. Offensive Ninetales is just bad. Substitute on Ninetales is even worse. Ninetales needs Specially Defensive investment to switch into random Scald's and Specs Surf from Politoed occasionally. It wants the survivablity, not the power. Substitute is bad because stripping 25% of Ninetales' health when it is already weak to Stealth Rock is simply a bad idea. A more effective set in my opinion is Will-o-Wisp / Flamethrower / Pain Split / Sunny Day. This set allows you to status common switch-ins like Tyranitar and Hippowdon who despise Burn more than Poision and then lets you Sunny Day in their face. Pain Split let's you stay around longer, but you can try out Roar or another Status move instead if Pain Split doesn't work out. 248 HP / 148 SpD / 112 Spe with a Timid Nature allows you to outspeed the neutral-natured Kyurem-formes and other extraneous things like Jolly Mamoswine and Dragonite to outspeed them if need be. Another oddity on your team is Focus Sash on Venusaur. Definitely just make it Life Orb. Life Orb with Giga Drain allows you to break Thunder Wave-less and Flamethrower-less pink blobs, and the power boost is more useful in general. I'd probably go with Hidden Power Fire instead of Ice since you have Donphan and Weavile to cover Dragons now, but that's just me. Finally, Giga Drain Volcarona in sun basically gives you the same coverage and survivability as Venusaur. Using Roost over Giga Drain with a bulky spread of 252 HP / 240 Def / 16 Spe and a Timid Nature is more ideal in sun from experience. Roost works more than Giga Drain in Sun since you can now tank Water-attacks easily which you can't outside of sun. Giga Drain nails those Water-type attackers. However, you can set-up on them now with Roost in Sun and it serves the same purpose as Giga Drain. The rest of your team looks pretty solid.

I hope I helped! Good luck.

 

[Nathaniel Br]

Thanks the helps really appreciated. And all the changes you've recommended have been useful and made a lot of sense. Once again thanks :D