Haxorus's access to the coveted mold breaker is enough of an advantage over other dragons as it lets it bypass unaware clefable which can stop physical dragons not called charizard x and it ignores levitate so you can hit rotom-w without resorting to outrage. It also unlike the mega dragon dancers does not take up a mega slot and unlike dragonite it lacks a rock weakness which both of these advantages are pretty damn relevant. It's speed is also much better sitting at 97 compared to 80. Hopefully won't get shot down for this but I find taunt on haxorus really overrated and overhyped as while it can bypass mega Sableye's magic bounce courtesy to mold breaker this is a risky play as most sableye's often run foul play which rips it to shreds. Sure you can troll hippo chesnaught and skarm with it but you miss out on poison jab which is a lot more important as it lets you bop mega Altaria and for clefable which are much more threatening to haxorus then hippo is and giving mega altaria a free turn is much worse then letting hippo chesnaught and skarmory get a free turn.
I'm not shooting you down or anything, but I disagree with the fact that Taunt is overrated. This is especially pertinent to the current Landorus-I suspect test going on because some people are saying that Stall and Balance would become too difficult to deal with if Landorus leaves OU. Taunt SD Haxorus is a great counterargument to that statement as it can singlehandedly beat slower, defensive teams all on its own with minimal support--especially thanks to Mold Breaker muscling its way past Unaware Quagsire and Clefable. Here's a set that I actually used a bit in the suspect test ladder:
Haxorus @ Lum Berry
Ability: Mold Breaker
EVs: 120 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def / 132 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Taunt
- Outrage
- Superpower
I don't recommend running that EV spread on just any team since it's pretty slow, but one of the teams I was using struggled with Balance and Stall, so I decided it was only necessary to outspeed Jolly Bisharp. Superpower was my coverage move of choice as it can deal with Ferrothorn, Heatran, and Skarmory in just one move. Lum Berry was nice for setting up on weak Scalds from stuff like Slowbro, Quagsire, and Alomomola. Plus, Haxorus is strong enough to really make Lum Berry useful:
+2 252+ Atk Mold Breaker Haxorus Outrage vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Slowbro: 318-375 (80.7 - 95.1%) -- 56.3% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
+4 252+ Atk Mold Breaker Haxorus Superpower vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Skarmory: 268-316 (80.2 - 94.6%) -- 50% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252+ Atk Mold Breaker Haxorus Outrage vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Quagsire: 378-445 (95.9 - 112.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
That's also why I decided on Outrage over Dragon Claw. If my opponent had a Fairy type in the first place, I wasn't going to set up anyway. About +4 on Skarmory--what usually happened was Stall tended to switch into Skarmory as I set up an SD and then proceeded to Whirlwind which is when you Taunt. Then, as they Brave Bird, you can set up to +4 and then OHKO Skarm.
One last thing: Haxorus excels on Sticky Web teams, which I think was a discussion point on the viability rankings thread. Sticky Web allows Haxorus to run SD vs more offensive teams as it's like going for Dragon Dance, but having its attack boosted by 2 stages (only against opposing grounded Pokemon ofc). In that case, I'd run enough speed to outspeed -1 Timid Mega Sceptile as well as Poison Jab over Taunt to hit Fairies. I think Dragon / Poison / Fighting is perfect coverage, so an unprepared opponent can easily lose half their team to this extremely powerful monster. Plus, one of the most common Choice Scarf Pokemon in the tier, Landorus-T, is outsped by a Jolly Haxorus at +1, so there is some merit to its Dragon Dance set.
Haxorus does not come without its faults, though. Mono Dragon typing leaves it with a pretty mediocre typing for a set-up sweeper, resisting only Water, Grass, and Fire (edit: thank you
pika pal, it also resists Electric which is nice for Rotom-W and non HP Ice Zapdos). Grass type moves, espcially in ORAS OU, tend to be pretty weak in the first place while the most popular Water move has a 30% chance to Burn. Resisting Fire is nice, but Fire types are pretty barren in OU and most of them have other moves that can hit Haxorus excruciatingly hard, such as Talonflame's Brave Bird. Unlike Dragonite, Haxorus's ability doesn't grant it an easy Dragon Dance. Unlike M-Altaria, Haxorus has no immunities and has less-than-decent bulk, weighing in at 76/90/70 as opposed to M-Altaria's 75/110/105. It's obvious that Haxorus faces competition from the other notorious Dragons in OU and can really only play an offensive role, whereas the others have quite a few other sets up their sleeves. Zard-X can be bulky wisp, Dragonite can use bulky DD, special, or the parashuffler set, Altaria can be bulky DD or special, Garchomp can be a Tank, SR Lead, SD, or Mixed Mega, and Lati@s has access to Defog. However, Haxorus has something over them, and that is Taunt.
