Base Stats: 80 HP / 70 Atk / 65 Def / 80 SpA / 120 SpD / 100 Spe (515 Total)
Abilities: Clear Body | Liquid Ooze | Rain Dish
Notable Moves:
- Rapid Spin
- Toxic Spikes
- Sludge Bomb
- Knock Off
- Surf
- Flip Turn
- Toxic
- Sludge Wave
- Haze
- Ice Beam
- Acid Spray
Pros:
- Tentacruel's typing and special bulk let it be a viable pivot into certain specially offensive threats, like Gholdengo, Iron Moth, Volcarona, Iron Valiant, and Walking Wake.
- It can provide some team support with Rapid Spin for hazard control, Flip Turn to pivot out, and Knock Off and Poison Jab or Sludge Bomb to debilitate foes.
- It's the only Rapid Spinner that absorbs Toxic Spikes on entry.
Cons:
- Tentacruel lacks recovery and can be vulnerable to hazards, and it really isn't super bulky. It can usually only pivot in a few times at most.
- With low attacking stats and weak STAB options it struggles to fit, as well as no access to Scald, Tentacruel is very passive.
- As a hazard remover, Tentacruel can't fight most hazard setters head-on due to being weak to their moves.
Terastallize Potential:
- Tentacruel can utilize Tera defensively to get into more favourable type matchups.
- Tera Grass is an option that lets it change its Ground and Electric weaknesses into resistances.
- Tera Dark is an interesting option that can flip the script on a very boosted Darkrai or Gholdengo, as well as Psychic-types like Latios or Deoxys-S.
Potential Sets:
Special Defensive
Tentacruel @ Leftovers
Ability: Rain Dish / Liquid Ooze
Tera Type: Grass
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpD / 4 Spe
Careful Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Poison Jab / Sludge Bomb
- Knock Off
- Flip Turn / Haze / Toxic Spikes
Tentacruel is great to pivot in on threats, then provide some sort of support. Rapid Spin is your means of removing hazards. It's good at using it in the face of more passive or special hazard setters, like Ribombee, Clefable, or Greninja. Poison Jab lets you deal damage and spread poison to wear down threats, and it does a lot to the Fairy-types Tentacruel is good at checking. Sludge Bomb is a option over Poison Jab, but it leads to confusion over the optimal nature to run and isn't much stronger than Poison Jab. It does do more to targets with higher physical Defense like Iron Valiant, but less to boosting threats with CM or Quiver Dance like Volcarona. Knock Off is your main means of wearing down foes that resist Poison like Gholdengo and limiting recovery even further. Flip Turn lets you pivot out while taking a chunk out of mons like Iron Moth, Iron Boulder, Great Tusk, Heatran, and others. Haze can let you dissuade setup mons, and Toxic Spikes is an option to pressure teams. A Water STAB like Surf or Liquidation is usable to pose more of a threat to Ground types, but Tentacruel usually doesn't want to stay in on them anyways. Running Surf or Ice Beam does make you more solid against Gliscor which is a problem for this set otherwise. You can use Heavy-Duty Boots or Air Balloon to mitigate the effects of Spikes, and Air Balloon even makes you able to pivot in on a Ground move once. All of Tentacruel's abilities are pretty incidental, so you can choose if taking advantage of rain or drain is your priority.
AV (I Swear It's Good Please Don't Laugh At Me)
Tentacruel @ Assault Vest
Ability: Rain Dish / Liquid Ooze
Tera Type: Grass
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpD / 4 Spe
Careful Nature
- Rapid Spin
- Poison Jab / Sludge Bomb
- Knock Off
- Flip Turn
Don't laugh bro. I'm serious, don't laugh at me. With Flip Turn, Tentacruel will be pivoting out of battle a lot, and therefore gets comparatively little value from running Leftovers, so why not run AV? This set has huge special bulk and plenty of utility with its attacks. It has the bulk to withstand strong special attacks and can debilitate special attackers before pivoting out to a revenge killer. A lot of the same considerations apply to this set, it can run Sludge Bomb and Surf or Ice Beam if checking specific threats are needed.
Other Options:
- Sets can run Sassy and reduced Speed IVs to outslow Gholdengo or Heatran and get a slow Flip Turn out, but it comes at the cost of being outsped by more mid-speed threats. Being able to outspeed Great Tusk and Gliscor might be more relevant for your team.
- Running more speed to creep specific threats is always an option, as Tentacruel has pretty solid speed for a defensive mon.
- Swords Dance Tentacruel is a respectable meme sweeper with an SD and Rapid Spin boost, and it has some strong physical STAB options in Gunk Shot and Liquidation.
- Whirlpool can be used to trap a foe and wear it down even quicker.
- Acid Spray is an option to break through CM mons and bulky spinblockers that aren't Gholdengo.
Overall:
Tentacruel is one of the mons of all time. I doubt it will find long-term OU viability, but its access to hazard control is a lot more uncontested this gen, and the addition of Flip Turn makes it a lot more versatile. On the flip-side, it is really hurt by the loss of Scald which made it a lot more passive, and its stats really aren't that excellent. I think it could find a niche as a bulky spinner that checks some key threats for some teams. What do you think of Tentacruel?
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