SM OU Super Scizor Squad!

[Chubby Gardevoir]

My first post on the forums and my first RMT! I've had a ton of fun with this team, and despite essentially being volt-turn spam I still feel that he's a unique little snowflake!
So, yes, team

Scizor-Mega (M) @ Scizorite
Ability: Light Metal
EVs: 248 HP / 16 Def / 108 SpD / 136 Spe
Impish Nature
- Swords Dance
- Bullet Punch
- Roost
- U-turn / Superpower

The squad's daddy, Scizor provides a very strong spine for the team, being able to set up, heal up, pivot out of or outright defeat a good chunk of OU (provided they don't run scizor's hardest counter: hidden power fire) like non-Z Landorus, Tangrowth, Venusaur, Magearna, Kartana, Tapu Bulu, Tapu Lele, Clefable, Diancie, Alakazam, and the Lati twins. The EV spread enables Scizor to tank a single specs Ash Greninja hydro pump (43% chance to live after rocks in a pinch), with enough speed for modest magnezone and an Impish nature+a little defense for things like Kartana's sacred sword and Diancie's diamond storm. U-turn can be swapped out for Superpower if you feel like smacking heatran and magnezone hard on the switch is more valuable than pivoting out, which sometimes I do. If running Superpower, it may be prudent to not bother with the physdef investment but I'm far too lazy to change it every time I swap moves. A major downside with Scizor, however, is its mediocre bulk before it mega evolves, making switching into some heavy hitters like specs Lele or Diancie difficult if you haven't mega'd yet.

Heatran @ Firium Z
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Magma Storm
- Earth Power
- Taunt
- Stealth Rock

The team's rocker and likely the most obvious pairing with Mega Scizor, Heatran forces most fire attacks directed at Scizor to become a mind game, knowing that powering up your flash fire may just give you a free KO. Removing Toxapex is also always a blessing for Sciz.

Rotom-Wash @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch
- Hydro Pump
- Defog
- Thunder Wave

Physdef Rotom is the team's defogger, and also has a nice synergy with Heatran and Scizor. While wil-o is the most common status option, I feel like most of the Pokémon that I would normally like to burn with Rotom like Tapu Bulu have a very poor matchup vs this team anyway. While this was originally specially defensive for greninja, this team lacked a good answer to Hawlucha and I figured it more worth it to sacrifice my defensive Gren answer because I can still check it offensively with my own Gren.

Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 244 HP / 152 SpD / 112 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Knock Off
- U-turn
- Earthquake
- Roost

Gliscor is yet another synergistic pivot, and one that should be sticking around for a while what with the team's natural resistance to ice and it's natural sustainability. While usually Gliscor likes to run more utilitarian support options, rotom taking up much of that role enables you to to diversify with the slightly more niche option of u-turn, enabling more pivot spam. Knock off is a great option to remove scarfs from the likes of Lando and Kart, assault vests from things like Tangrowth, Chansey's eviolite, and various leftovers. The EV spread enables you to outspeed timid Heatran while enabling you to take hits from said Heatran as best as you can.

Tapu Lele @ Choice Specs
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Focus Blast / Hidden Power Fire
- Psyshock
- Moonblast

This is the Pokémon that you want to be pivoting INTO when using this team. I think you all now how obscenely powerful modest specs Lele is, 2HKOing ridiculous things like offensive heatran with psychic, ruining Magearna with Psyshock, and coming darn close to OHKOing max spdef ferrothorn with focus blast. While focus blast is definitely the preferred option, sometimes that accuracy leads to depression so hidden power fire is a thing. It should also be noted that your own terrain will block Scizor's bullet punch, so keep that in mind when sending in Lele.

Greninja (M) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Protean
EVs: 176 Atk / 80 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Ice Beam
- U-turn
- Grass Knot
- Rock Slide

Protean Gren is the team's speedy boy, and can often 1v1 hyper offense teams on its own with a decent matchup. Having the STAB coverage of U-turn and ice beam without having a stealth rock weakness is an amazing blessing. 80 EVs in spatk are preferred when running grass knot to ensure the OHKO on mega Swampert. Rock slide is there for Volcarona and ZardyY, while also having a nice chance to flinch if Rotom thunder wave's a more bulky threat.

POOR MATCHUPS:
-Sun
While I haven't run into much sun, it's pretty obvious that sun teams diddle me kind of hard, putting tons of pressure on my Rotom and Heatran to basically carry the rest of the team.
-Ash Greninja
I rely on revenge killing Ash or making risky doubles on it, unfortunately, as I had to sacrifice my main answer in spdef Rotom to better check Hawlucha
-Bulky Volcarona
While I do have scarf rock slide gren, if something happens to my froggy boi or if Volc manages to get 2 quiver dances before gren comes in, I am basically screwed as heatran usually won't beat it 1v1.
-there was another major one that is currently slipping my mind, will update this as soon as it comes to me


So, in short, if it wasn't already apparent, the team is built around getting in Tapu Lele, Heatran, and Greninja safely using the synergy of its pivots. Mega Scizor is a really underrated pick in my mind, and just the fact alone that it counters the majority of Magearna sets would be enough for me to consider using it. I've been developing this team for the past few days, so let me know what you guys think! If anything I'd think rotom and Lele the most flexible mons to be changed around, but what do I know huh I just got here???

 

[RufflesPro]

Hi Chubby Gardevoir,

I like your team, seems pretty cool!

Here's a couple of things I would fix mainly some EV spreads:

Mega Scizor: You can go with a 248 HP / 16 Def / 108 SpD / 136 Spe. This way you still outspeed modest zone like you want to, but max HP and more SpD allow you to take on Tapu Lele and Mega Zam. Mega Scizor doesn't really need more than 16 Def EVs with Impish.

Gliscor: Go with 244 HP / 152 SpD / 112 Spe with a Timid Nature. First, 244 HP maximizes the number of poison heal recovery, you can read more about that in the Smogon's page about Gliscor. Running a Timid nature with 112 Spe and 152 Spd is better than running 48 SpD with a careful nature and 212 Spe on Gliscor. Why? Because natures are a 10% boost. And since Gliscor's nature's speed stat is higher than its special defense, it makes more sense to be Timid as you will gain more points. Gliscor with 152 EVs in SpD gets 224 points total. Gliscor with 48 SpD and a careful nature only goes up to 217 points. Also, I don't recommend having Taunt + U-turn on Gliscor, neither are really that important for your team, and definitely not both. I would recommend putting Toxic or Knock Off over one of them, or maybe instead of both. Another thing you can do is run Swords Dance / Facade / EQ / Roost.

Other than that, I recommend going for the 176 Atk / 80 SpA on Gren, and going for Grass Knot + Rock Slide, as you are pretty weak to both Mega Swampert and Volcarona.

Finally, I wanna let you know that your team is pretty weak to Hawlucha. You can't really do much about that without changing something major about your team. You can Scarf Koko over Greninja, run physically defensive rotom-w and something like ferrothorn (for waters) over heatran, run lando-t over heatran, etc. etc.

 

[Chubby Gardevoir]

Hi Chubby Gardevoir,

I like your team, seems pretty cool!

Here's a couple of things I would fix mainly some EV spreads:

Mega Scizor: You can go with a 248 HP / 16 Def / 108 SpD / 136 Spe. This way you still outspeed modest zone like you want to, but max HP and more SpD allow you to take on Tapu Lele and Mega Zam. Mega Scizor doesn't really need more than 16 Def EVs with Impish.

Gliscor: Go with 244 HP / 152 SpD / 112 Spe with a Timid Nature. First, 244 HP maximizes the number of poison heal recovery, you can read more about that in the Smogon's page about Gliscor. Running a Timid nature with 112 Spe and 152 Spd is better than running 48 SpD with a careful nature and 212 Spe on Gliscor. Why? Because natures are a 10% boost. And since Gliscor's nature's speed stat is higher than its special defense, it makes more sense to be Timid as you will gain more points. Gliscor with 152 EVs in SpD gets 224 points total. Gliscor with 48 SpD and a careful nature only goes up to 217 points. Also, I don't recommend having Taunt + U-turn on Gliscor, neither are really that important for your team, and definitely not both. I would recommend putting Toxic or Knock Off over one of them, or maybe instead of both. Another thing you can do is run Swords Dance / Facade / EQ / Roost.

Other than that, I recommend going for the 176 Atk / 80 SpA on Gren, and going for Grass Knot + Rock Slide, as you are pretty weak to both Mega Swampert and Volcarona.

Finally, I wanna let you know that your team is pretty weak to Hawlucha. You can't really do much about that without changing something major about your team. You can Scarf Koko over Greninja, run physically defensive rotom-w and something like ferrothorn (for waters) over heatran, run lando-t over heatran, etc. etc.

Ayy I appreciate the optimized EV spreads. I knew somewhere in the back of my head about optimizing poison heal but I was just thinking about having its HP be an odd number so it takes less from stealth rock. I may just go with physdef rotom instead because I can check Ash Gren offensively, but doing the same to Lucha is a near impossibility and adding a defensive answer is extremely restricting when I'm already running mons like Tran, Lele, and Gliscor. I also considered Zapdos at some point but I remember there being a good reason why I didn't pick Zap, even if I can't remember it ATM.
I did try replacing scarf gren with scarf Koko but I felt rather helpless in the face of any ground type that isnt in range to by killed by HP ice! I'd think it would work but would require a lot more editing to the team overall.
And I did take your advice in swapping taunt for knock as well, but U-turn on Gliscor has been putting in a decent amount of work for me.
Thanks for your feedback! Should I edit the team in the OP accordingly if I adopt suggested changes or just leave it to play out in the replies when that kind of thing happens?

 

[RufflesPro]

Ayy I appreciate the optimized EV spreads. I knew somewhere in the back of my head about optimizing poison heal but I was just thinking about having its HP be an odd number so it takes less from stealth rock. I may just go with physdef rotom instead because I can check Ash Gren offensively, but doing the same to Lucha is a near impossibility and adding a defensive answer is extremely restricting when I'm already running mons like Tran, Lele, and Gliscor. I also considered Zapdos at some point but I remember there being a good reason why I didn't pick Zap, even if I can't remember it ATM.
I did try replacing scarf gren with scarf Koko but I felt rather helpless in the face of any ground type that isnt in range to by killed by HP ice! I'd think it would work but would require a lot more editing to the team overall.
And I did take your advice in swapping taunt for knock as well, but U-turn on Gliscor has been putting in a decent amount of work for me.
Thanks for your feedback! Should I edit the team in the OP accordingly if I adopt suggested changes or just leave it to play out in the replies when that kind of thing happens?

Keep Testing and post any final changes you made (whatever you liked the best or settled on). Going Physically defensive rotom-w doesn't sound like a bad idea, but it would make you really weak to greninja so just keep that in mind. Yeah U-turn + Knock Off on Gliscor doesn't sound bad either, keep testing and see how you feel

 

[SaveMeJebus]

What is the counterplay against Reuniclus? It seems this team can easily get 6-0ed by it

 

[DrPumpkinz]

What is the counterplay against Reuniclus? It seems this team can easily get 6-0ed by it

Both Gliscor and Heatran have Taunt, which puts a stop to Reuniclus's boosting and recovering. Gliscor can slowly wear down Reuniclus thanks to Roost and Poison Heal, and unless it's at +1 and has Psychic, Reuniclus isn't dealing too much damage in return. Heatran, on the other hand, doesn't care much about either Psychic or Psyshock thanks to its Steel typing, and does over half to even a +1 Reuniclus with Inferno Overdrive. The only thing Heatran has to fear is Focus Blast variants. Also keep in mind that most things on this team have VoltTurn, so Reuniclus is taking potentially super effective chip as you pivot out to either Gliscor or Heatran.

 

[Chubby Gardevoir]

What is the counterplay against Reuniclus? It seems this team can easily get 6-0ed by it

Does Reun run HP fire? I thought the only coverage it generally ran was focus blast because, I mean, my Mega-Scizor is right there lol.

Both Gliscor and Heatran have Taunt, which puts a stop to Reuniclus's boosting and recovering. Gliscor can slowly wear down Reuniclus thanks to Roost and Poison Heal, and unless it's at +1 and has Psychic, Reuniclus isn't dealing too much damage in return. Heatran, on the other hand, doesn't care much about either Psychic or Psyshock thanks to its Steel typing, and does over half to even a +1 Reuniclus with Inferno Overdrive. The only thing Heatran has to fear is Focus Blast variants. Also keep in mind that most things on this team have VoltTurn, so Reuniclus is taking potentially super effective chip as you pivot out to either Gliscor or Heatran.

I did end up changing the team so Gliscor has knock over Taunt, but yeah Heatran should be able to handle a Reun that IS running HP fire.

 

[SaveMeJebus]

I didn't run the calcs. I was just wondering how you do against the double dance set since non leftovers tran can get worn down pretty quickly and this specific Scizor is not really designed to handle Reuniclus 1v1

 

[Chubby Gardevoir]

I didn't run the calcs. I was just wondering how you do against the double dance set since non leftovers tran can get worn down pretty quickly and this specific Scizor is not really designed to handle Reuniclus 1v1

I mean, I honestly haven't run into Reun with this team, but I could always just go scizor as soon as it comes in and U-turn right into Taunt heatran on the potential HP fire/iron defense. According to the calc, double dance Reun doesn't even run HP fire but even if he HP fires into my scizor on the switch it only does like 60%, and if he doesn't have HP fire at all I can Swords Dance up with scizor easily.

 

[SaveMeJebus]

Two of your mons are taking 12.5% damage every time you do that but Taunt does a good job of shutting down Reuniclus so I guess the strat could work if you or the opponent don't prolong the match up

 

[Chubby Gardevoir]

Two of your mons are taking 12.5% damage every time you do that but Taunt does a good job of shutting down Reuniclus so I guess the strat could work if you or the opponent don't prolong the match up

That's true but my opponent is gonna be holding more than that between U-turn and Magma storm/inferno. There are bad matchups but I really don't think Reuniclus is one of them.
Edit: Ran into my first Reuniclus, can confirm that Reuniclus is pretty helpless vs this team, actually, it didn't even get a chance to do much of anything. Would be more threatened by the rare specs regenerator set tbh if my opponent made God reads.

 

[SaveMeJebus]

That's true but my opponent is gonna be holding more than that between U-turn and Magma storm/inferno. There are bad matchups but I really don't think Reuniclus is one of them.
Edit: Ran into my first Reuniclus, can confirm that Reuniclus is pretty helpless vs this team, actually, it didn't even get a chance to do much of anything. Would be more threatened by the rare specs regenerator set tbh if my opponent made God reads.

That depends on wether or not you're running U Turn on Scizor, though. I could easily see it wearing Heatran down since it lacks lefties and although it won't like Para Hax, gets plenty of set up opportunities against Rotom or Gren, Lele locked onto certain moves and Scizor lacking U Turn. Also, most Reuniclus teams run spikes and toxic spikes which makes it tough for volt turn teams. But if you say you don't have a problem with Reuniclus, then that's great

 

[Chubby Gardevoir]

That depends on wether or not you're running U Turn on Scizor, though. I could easily see it wearing Heatran down since it lacks lefties and although it won't like Para Hax, gets plenty of set up opportunities against Rotom or Gren, Lele locked onto certain moves and Scizor lacking U Turn. Also, most Reuniclus teams run spikes and toxic spikes which makes it tough for volt turn teams. But if you say you don't have a problem with Reuniclus, then that's great

Perhaps my opponent didn't play it very well? You seem pretty sure that Reun should give me a hard time so I'm assuming it's a Pokémon you are familiar with using and know what it can do best. Unfortunately it's still a rare pick so it's hard to get proper experience in fighting it.

 

[SaveMeJebus]

Perhaps my opponent didn't play it very well? You seem pretty sure that Reun should give me a hard time so I'm assuming it's a Pokémon you are familiar with using and know what it can do best. Unfortunately it's still a rare pick so it's hard to get proper experience in fighting it.

It's not something you should be too worried about is it's not too common. I was just wondering the counterplay with this team.