(Let's ignore the title)
This is one of my most sucessful teams to date, I've played 5 wi-fi battles and 15 or so shoddy battles using this team and currently i've lost one wi-fi battle and 2 shoddy battles.
One of the most annoying times in a pokemon battle is when you let your opponent set up a dangerous amount of sword dances/dragon dances and other boosting moves, leaving you almost completely helpless against their sweep, which means that a potential victory goes down the drain along with a few peices of slag meat from your once proud blissey. Because this is something I let happen far to often in a battle, I designed this team (accidentally) to minimise the chances of my opponent pulling off a sucessful sweep like this while dealing alot of damage in return. Let's take a look at the team.
Weakness/Resistance
As you can see, this team has no outstanding weaknesses and resists alot of common move types fairly well.
But how did I build this team to begin with?
Latias was always one of my favorite pokemon ever since I knew it existed (When i first got my Ruby cart I always thought rayquaza was gen III's mew/celebi and the Lati's were some wacky event pokemon) and I try to include it in as many teams as possible because of it's bulkiness coupled with a good attack stat, speed, and resistances.
Latias is easily taken down by powerful bug/dark/ghost/dragon/ice moves, and I also wanted something that could threaten opposing latias, scizor fell into place because of it's physical bulkiness as well as it being a good counter to said opposing latias.
Now that I had no outstanding weaknesses, I needed to think about a suitable lead, I chose machamp because of it's bulkiness, and access to both encore and substitute, coupled with dynamicpunch for that extra punch in the crotch i enjoy so much. machamp can also handle azelf leads with ease should they stealth rock me before attacking (machamp can't be OHKO'd by any unboosted psychic and payback is an ohko on azelf).
Bulky waters are some of my favorite pokemon, especially restalk or stalling sets, but my team wasn't looking for stalling potential or status absorption, what it needed was something that could put pokemon out of comission, I picked milotic for hypnosis and recover, filling the criteria of being able to shut down a sweeper and having instant recovery, it also helped me deal with gyarados.
Gyarados isn't a pokemon I regularly use, back when I first started competitive battling I made it a rule never to use OU tier pokemon for fear of being unoriginal, Later on I realised I was an idiot and began balancing OU and UU tier pokemon in my team, again, this was stupid and I decided that I could be original and still use OU tier pokemon to the best of their ability, but i still had a mental block on TTar/Hippo/Gyarados/Gengar/ and other pokemon similar, and it's been an annoying quirk ever since. anyway, I chose bulky Gyarados because it helped me take on opposing scisor and heatran who can do alot of damage if left unchecked while I could do little back, and Gyarados's intimidate only complimented my teams physical bulkiness, taunt also helped me keep my opponent from setting up and has saved me from getting swept many times.
It took me a while to decide what my last pokemon should be, and i suddenly realised that while scizor was relatively bulky, It still succumbed to repeated outrages and such, I chose steelix because it is the best outrage resistor in the game without a single defense EV, It also provides with with stealth rock support and roar, which can help me stop pokemon setting up and allow me to stack up residual damage.
I decided to replace Milotic with Vaporeon to provide the team with some wish support, I found that steelix was able to survive most physical attacks but alot of the time he was within an inch of his life, Vaporeon came to the rescue and gave me a nice water immunity.
Now, without further ado, the team itself;
Captain Steroid Abuse
Machamp@Leftovers
Adamant
No Guard
252 HP/160 Att/96 SpD
-Dynamicpunch
-Encore
-Substitute
-Payback
Lead machamp is a bad omen for any lead that decides to set up rocks or trick instead of attacking machamp, encore forces these pokemon to switch and provides machamp with a free turn to set up substitute and total whoever switches in, if anyone. It has a speed IV of 19 so that bronzong can't break a sub in 1 hit with gyro ball. Payback OHKO's gengar and azelf.
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Crockadilicus
Scizor@Choice Band
Adamant
Technician
248 Hp/252 Att/8 Spe
-U-turn
-Pursuit
-Bullet punch
-Superpower
Scizor is a great revenge killer and my answer to latias, who has to make the decision of staying in and risk a 210 power U-turn or switching out and risking a 160 power pursuit, superpower deals with tyranitar and bullet punch is for eating faster, frailer pokemon.
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King Midas Snake
Steelix@Leftovers
Relaxed
Rock Head
252 Hp/120 Att/136 SpD
-Gyro Ball
-Stealth Rock
-Roar
-Earthquake
Steelix is my absolute favorite steel type pokemon, It's defense is so high that an unboosted Close combat from a life orb lucario is a 2HKO, while steelix in turn decimates it with a STAB earthquake. Stealth rock helps me rack up damage when coupled with roar, allowing latias and scizor to sweep late game, and because steelix has the slowest STAB gyro ball in the game, I put it on for obvious reasons. My answer to any dragon locked into outrage, as even a +6 life orb salamence won't OHKO even with stealth rock support.
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Candycane Airlines
Latias@Choice Specs
Timid
Levitate
252 SpA/252 Spe/6 HP
-Draco Meteor
-Surf
-Thunderbolt
-Trick
I love Latias, and I was ecstatic when I found out it was becoming OU, still, I found the calm mind sets lacked immediate power and I never found a good time to use them, so I opted for the all purpose specs latias, Draco meteor devistates anything that doesn't resist it or boast alot of SpD, surf is there to deal with heatrans and ground types, thunderbolt for gyarados and bulky waters, grass knot deals with swampert and 2hko's tyranitar without any EV investment.
I opted against dragon pulse because I felt that having two dragon attacks was rendundant since you can sweep just fine with draco meteor. Added Trick over Grass Knot to help me against stall, and to give me more defense against stat boosters.
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The Screaming Hyperdeath
Gyarados@Leftovers
Adamant
Intimidate
156 HP/108 Atk/100 Def/144 Spe
-Dragon Dance
-Waterfall
-Stone Edge
-Taunt
Originally, this was a gliscor, but before I even begun a battle I realised that the only thing gliscor was doing was dealing with lucario, I found that bulkygyara did a good job of this also, and boasted a much better sweeping potential (Plus, let's face it, who actually LIKES Gliscor?). Taunt stops just about every physical wall crippling me, stone edge knocks zapdos and fliers out of the sky and waterfall gives me some solid STAB coupled with Flinch.
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Operation Seacats
Vaporeon@Leftovers
Bold
Water Absorb
188 HP/252 Def/68 Spe
-Protect
-Wish
-Surf
-Hidden Power (Electric)
Vaporeon is my replacement for Milotic and my answer to heatran, gyarados and other bulky waters, Since I now have trick to shut down scarier pokemon, I feel it's safe to ditch yawn on vaporeon for wish, which lets steelix and latias stay alive long enough to get rid of big scary dragons, Surf is for solid STAB and HP electric takes out those bulky waters, namely gyarados.
Threats
Bolded threats are very troublesome
Italised threats are easy to take down
Normal threats aren't much trouble, but can still be a pain
Abomasnow: Scizor and gyarados have no trouble with Abomasnow, and OHKO it with stone edge/bullet punch/u-turn.
Azelf: Steelix and scizor handle it relatively well, machamp survives psychic from unboosted azelfs and OHKO's with payback.
Breloom: Latias resists both STAB attacks, and gyarados can threaten it with taunt, breloom can't take repeated +1 waterfalls.
Celebi: Scizor handles him easily, either OHKOing with u-turn or doing massive damage with pursuit.
Dugtrio: Scizor doesn't care much about getting hit by dugtrio, and OHKO's with bullet punch.
Dragonite: Steelix catches those locked into outrage, while latias outspeeds unboosted ones and OHKOs with draco meteor.
Electivire: Machamp and scizor don't care much about physical variants, and special variants packing flamethrower can be taken down by latias.
Empoleon: Vaporeon isn't worried about grass knot, and can shut it down with hypnosis or damage it with HP electric.
Flygon: Steelix takes on outragers, Vaporeon otherwise, latias can get a revenge kill on Choice banded ones.
Gengar: Scizor laughs at gengar while OHKOing it with bullet punch or pursuit.
Gliscor: Gyarados, Latias and Vapreon have no trouble with gliscor.
Gyarados: Vaporeon can deal with Gyarados easily, taking little damage and hitting back with HP electric.
Heatran: Vaporeon and Gyarados can stop Heatran in it's tracks, latias can revenge kill with surf.
Heracross: Gyarados is my only real answer to this, but it's not very troublesome.
Infernape: Latias and gyarados have no trouble with mixape, Vaporeon has to be careful of boosted grass knots but comes in easily otherwise.
Jirachi: I hate this thing, it does no real damage to my team but flinchhaxes its way to victory. Vaporeon and steelix don't have much to worry about, though.
Kingdra: Vaporeon and steelix, same as any dragon..
Latias: Scizor isn't scared of latias, and steelix can come in easily on any set without surf, grass knot or HP fire.
Lucario: Gyarados can deal with most lucario with little problems.
Machamp: I'm not sure, really. It doesn't cause too much trouble to anyone and I suppose Gyarados can take it on if it lacks stone edge.
Magnezone: Latias laughs at magnezone, and steelix is 2hko'd by HP fire, while it ohko's magnezone with earthquake.
Mamoswine: Scizor and Vaporeon rid me of Mamoswine easily. Never any trouble here.
Metagross: Vaporeon can take on most metagross and come out the victor, steelix absorbs explosions and takes on any set without earthquake.
Ninjask: Steelix uses ninjask as it's plaything, and once SR is up steelix can just shuffle ninjask to hell.
Porygon-Z: Scizor can OHKO with superpower and fears only the very rare Hp fire.
Rhyperior: Scizor isn't afraid of rhyperior, but rhyperior usually comes out the victor. Latias and latias OHKO it with surf unless sandstorm is up.
Roserade: Latias isn't fearing much from roserade and can OHKO with draco meteor.
Rotom-A: Steelix can deal with all rotoms but Overheat and Hydro pump variants, which might give me trouble
Salamence: Steelix can take on all outraging salamences, but specsmence can be a big problem for my team, although latias revenge kills it.
Scizor: Gyarados handles scizor with no problem, and steelix is 3hko'd by repeated superpowers, while roaring it away.
Snorlax: Machamp has no trouble here.
Starmie: Latias can maul it with tbolt/draco meteor, scizor can survive most hits and u-turn/pursuit it to death. Vapreon handles any without Tbolt.
Togekiss: Can be a real headache if it gets set up properly, my only check for it is gyarados who can be flinched to death.
Tyranitar: Machamp has no trouble here.
Weavile: Vaporeon, Scizor, machamp, steelix all laugh at weavile.
Yanmega: Steelix is taking on all sets and mauling it with it's own immense speed.
Zapdos: Latias doesn't have much trouble now that vaporeon can pass it wish.
And that's my team, what do you think?
This is one of my most sucessful teams to date, I've played 5 wi-fi battles and 15 or so shoddy battles using this team and currently i've lost one wi-fi battle and 2 shoddy battles.
One of the most annoying times in a pokemon battle is when you let your opponent set up a dangerous amount of sword dances/dragon dances and other boosting moves, leaving you almost completely helpless against their sweep, which means that a potential victory goes down the drain along with a few peices of slag meat from your once proud blissey. Because this is something I let happen far to often in a battle, I designed this team (accidentally) to minimise the chances of my opponent pulling off a sucessful sweep like this while dealing alot of damage in return. Let's take a look at the team.
Weakness/Resistance
As you can see, this team has no outstanding weaknesses and resists alot of common move types fairly well.
But how did I build this team to begin with?
Latias was always one of my favorite pokemon ever since I knew it existed (When i first got my Ruby cart I always thought rayquaza was gen III's mew/celebi and the Lati's were some wacky event pokemon) and I try to include it in as many teams as possible because of it's bulkiness coupled with a good attack stat, speed, and resistances.
Latias is easily taken down by powerful bug/dark/ghost/dragon/ice moves, and I also wanted something that could threaten opposing latias, scizor fell into place because of it's physical bulkiness as well as it being a good counter to said opposing latias.
Now that I had no outstanding weaknesses, I needed to think about a suitable lead, I chose machamp because of it's bulkiness, and access to both encore and substitute, coupled with dynamicpunch for that extra punch in the crotch i enjoy so much. machamp can also handle azelf leads with ease should they stealth rock me before attacking (machamp can't be OHKO'd by any unboosted psychic and payback is an ohko on azelf).
Bulky waters are some of my favorite pokemon, especially restalk or stalling sets, but my team wasn't looking for stalling potential or status absorption, what it needed was something that could put pokemon out of comission, I picked milotic for hypnosis and recover, filling the criteria of being able to shut down a sweeper and having instant recovery, it also helped me deal with gyarados.
Gyarados isn't a pokemon I regularly use, back when I first started competitive battling I made it a rule never to use OU tier pokemon for fear of being unoriginal, Later on I realised I was an idiot and began balancing OU and UU tier pokemon in my team, again, this was stupid and I decided that I could be original and still use OU tier pokemon to the best of their ability, but i still had a mental block on TTar/Hippo/Gyarados/Gengar/ and other pokemon similar, and it's been an annoying quirk ever since. anyway, I chose bulky Gyarados because it helped me take on opposing scisor and heatran who can do alot of damage if left unchecked while I could do little back, and Gyarados's intimidate only complimented my teams physical bulkiness, taunt also helped me keep my opponent from setting up and has saved me from getting swept many times.
It took me a while to decide what my last pokemon should be, and i suddenly realised that while scizor was relatively bulky, It still succumbed to repeated outrages and such, I chose steelix because it is the best outrage resistor in the game without a single defense EV, It also provides with with stealth rock support and roar, which can help me stop pokemon setting up and allow me to stack up residual damage.
I decided to replace Milotic with Vaporeon to provide the team with some wish support, I found that steelix was able to survive most physical attacks but alot of the time he was within an inch of his life, Vaporeon came to the rescue and gave me a nice water immunity.
Now, without further ado, the team itself;
Captain Steroid Abuse
Machamp@Leftovers
Adamant
No Guard
252 HP/160 Att/96 SpD
-Dynamicpunch
-Encore
-Substitute
-Payback
Lead machamp is a bad omen for any lead that decides to set up rocks or trick instead of attacking machamp, encore forces these pokemon to switch and provides machamp with a free turn to set up substitute and total whoever switches in, if anyone. It has a speed IV of 19 so that bronzong can't break a sub in 1 hit with gyro ball. Payback OHKO's gengar and azelf.
___________________________________________________
Crockadilicus
Scizor@Choice Band
Adamant
Technician
248 Hp/252 Att/8 Spe
-U-turn
-Pursuit
-Bullet punch
-Superpower
Scizor is a great revenge killer and my answer to latias, who has to make the decision of staying in and risk a 210 power U-turn or switching out and risking a 160 power pursuit, superpower deals with tyranitar and bullet punch is for eating faster, frailer pokemon.
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King Midas Snake
Steelix@Leftovers
Relaxed
Rock Head
252 Hp/120 Att/136 SpD
-Gyro Ball
-Stealth Rock
-Roar
-Earthquake
Steelix is my absolute favorite steel type pokemon, It's defense is so high that an unboosted Close combat from a life orb lucario is a 2HKO, while steelix in turn decimates it with a STAB earthquake. Stealth rock helps me rack up damage when coupled with roar, allowing latias and scizor to sweep late game, and because steelix has the slowest STAB gyro ball in the game, I put it on for obvious reasons. My answer to any dragon locked into outrage, as even a +6 life orb salamence won't OHKO even with stealth rock support.
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Candycane Airlines
Latias@Choice Specs
Timid
Levitate
252 SpA/252 Spe/6 HP
-Draco Meteor
-Surf
-Thunderbolt
-Trick
I love Latias, and I was ecstatic when I found out it was becoming OU, still, I found the calm mind sets lacked immediate power and I never found a good time to use them, so I opted for the all purpose specs latias, Draco meteor devistates anything that doesn't resist it or boast alot of SpD, surf is there to deal with heatrans and ground types, thunderbolt for gyarados and bulky waters, grass knot deals with swampert and 2hko's tyranitar without any EV investment.
I opted against dragon pulse because I felt that having two dragon attacks was rendundant since you can sweep just fine with draco meteor. Added Trick over Grass Knot to help me against stall, and to give me more defense against stat boosters.
_______________________________________________
The Screaming Hyperdeath
Gyarados@Leftovers
Adamant
Intimidate
156 HP/108 Atk/100 Def/144 Spe
-Dragon Dance
-Waterfall
-Stone Edge
-Taunt
Originally, this was a gliscor, but before I even begun a battle I realised that the only thing gliscor was doing was dealing with lucario, I found that bulkygyara did a good job of this also, and boasted a much better sweeping potential (Plus, let's face it, who actually LIKES Gliscor?). Taunt stops just about every physical wall crippling me, stone edge knocks zapdos and fliers out of the sky and waterfall gives me some solid STAB coupled with Flinch.
_______________________________________________
Operation Seacats
Vaporeon@Leftovers
Bold
Water Absorb
188 HP/252 Def/68 Spe
-Protect
-Wish
-Surf
-Hidden Power (Electric)
Vaporeon is my replacement for Milotic and my answer to heatran, gyarados and other bulky waters, Since I now have trick to shut down scarier pokemon, I feel it's safe to ditch yawn on vaporeon for wish, which lets steelix and latias stay alive long enough to get rid of big scary dragons, Surf is for solid STAB and HP electric takes out those bulky waters, namely gyarados.
Threats
Bolded threats are very troublesome
Italised threats are easy to take down
Normal threats aren't much trouble, but can still be a pain
Abomasnow: Scizor and gyarados have no trouble with Abomasnow, and OHKO it with stone edge/bullet punch/u-turn.
Azelf: Steelix and scizor handle it relatively well, machamp survives psychic from unboosted azelfs and OHKO's with payback.
Breloom: Latias resists both STAB attacks, and gyarados can threaten it with taunt, breloom can't take repeated +1 waterfalls.
Celebi: Scizor handles him easily, either OHKOing with u-turn or doing massive damage with pursuit.
Dugtrio: Scizor doesn't care much about getting hit by dugtrio, and OHKO's with bullet punch.
Dragonite: Steelix catches those locked into outrage, while latias outspeeds unboosted ones and OHKOs with draco meteor.
Electivire: Machamp and scizor don't care much about physical variants, and special variants packing flamethrower can be taken down by latias.
Empoleon: Vaporeon isn't worried about grass knot, and can shut it down with hypnosis or damage it with HP electric.
Flygon: Steelix takes on outragers, Vaporeon otherwise, latias can get a revenge kill on Choice banded ones.
Gengar: Scizor laughs at gengar while OHKOing it with bullet punch or pursuit.
Gliscor: Gyarados, Latias and Vapreon have no trouble with gliscor.
Gyarados: Vaporeon can deal with Gyarados easily, taking little damage and hitting back with HP electric.
Heatran: Vaporeon and Gyarados can stop Heatran in it's tracks, latias can revenge kill with surf.
Heracross: Gyarados is my only real answer to this, but it's not very troublesome.
Infernape: Latias and gyarados have no trouble with mixape, Vaporeon has to be careful of boosted grass knots but comes in easily otherwise.
Jirachi: I hate this thing, it does no real damage to my team but flinchhaxes its way to victory. Vaporeon and steelix don't have much to worry about, though.
Kingdra: Vaporeon and steelix, same as any dragon..
Latias: Scizor isn't scared of latias, and steelix can come in easily on any set without surf, grass knot or HP fire.
Lucario: Gyarados can deal with most lucario with little problems.
Machamp: I'm not sure, really. It doesn't cause too much trouble to anyone and I suppose Gyarados can take it on if it lacks stone edge.
Magnezone: Latias laughs at magnezone, and steelix is 2hko'd by HP fire, while it ohko's magnezone with earthquake.
Mamoswine: Scizor and Vaporeon rid me of Mamoswine easily. Never any trouble here.
Metagross: Vaporeon can take on most metagross and come out the victor, steelix absorbs explosions and takes on any set without earthquake.
Ninjask: Steelix uses ninjask as it's plaything, and once SR is up steelix can just shuffle ninjask to hell.
Porygon-Z: Scizor can OHKO with superpower and fears only the very rare Hp fire.
Rhyperior: Scizor isn't afraid of rhyperior, but rhyperior usually comes out the victor. Latias and latias OHKO it with surf unless sandstorm is up.
Roserade: Latias isn't fearing much from roserade and can OHKO with draco meteor.
Rotom-A: Steelix can deal with all rotoms but Overheat and Hydro pump variants, which might give me trouble
Salamence: Steelix can take on all outraging salamences, but specsmence can be a big problem for my team, although latias revenge kills it.
Scizor: Gyarados handles scizor with no problem, and steelix is 3hko'd by repeated superpowers, while roaring it away.
Snorlax: Machamp has no trouble here.
Starmie: Latias can maul it with tbolt/draco meteor, scizor can survive most hits and u-turn/pursuit it to death. Vapreon handles any without Tbolt.
Togekiss: Can be a real headache if it gets set up properly, my only check for it is gyarados who can be flinched to death.
Tyranitar: Machamp has no trouble here.
Weavile: Vaporeon, Scizor, machamp, steelix all laugh at weavile.
Yanmega: Steelix is taking on all sets and mauling it with it's own immense speed.
Zapdos: Latias doesn't have much trouble now that vaporeon can pass it wish.
And that's my team, what do you think?
