OU Tips for my offense team?

[nocatnocradle]

Hi all! Here's a team that I've been tinkering with for awhile, getting as high as mid-1500s on the ladder with it on occasion. It's partly built around my preferences over optimization, but I'd still like to see how it can be improved. This team uses Aero as its anchor and main win condition. This is also my main team, so I've used it quite a lot!

The team:
Tyranitar @ Lum Berry
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Rock Slide
- Earthquake
- Brick Break

What seems like a fairly typical T-tar lead. For awhile I was running the HP grass dance set to build early momentum on the common swampert switch-in, but I've found that earthquake is preferable for dealing with Metagross and Jirachi, plus it'll still decently chip swampert. DD + rock slide also serves as a backup win condition for if Aero is out of commission.
Swampert @ Leftovers
Ability: Torrent
EVs: 248 HP / 212 Def / 44 SpD / 4 Spe
Quiet Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Earthquake
- Ice Beam
- Roar

Swampert is absolutely essential for this team, as it's currently my primary means of dealing with physicall offensive threats like DD salamence, metagross, and all of the other threats that swampert is so good against. The main issue, really, is that I rely on him too much for my liking; once swampert is dead i really don't have anything that can deal with DD Salamence or agility Metagross, and my margins for soaking up hits become a lot thinner. Roar is important most commonly as a means of dealing with calm mind + rest suicune, which is the only set that Registeel can't really deal with without exploding. I used to run HP grass on this as well, but I've found that in the swamp vs. swamp matchup I can't really afford to waste HP getting earthquaked/pumped- or, worse, toxiced, although that doesn't seem super common.
Registeel @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 SpD
Careful Nature
- Seismic Toss
- Thunder Wave
- Toxic
- Explosion

I've found Registeel to be a fantastic special wall for this team and a very reliable pivot against special offense and more passive pokemon like Blissey or Celebi. Regi's absolute best matchup, though, is against Suicune: he totally walls out almost every suicune set and can toxic in return, making him hard for suicune to get around even if it's boosted. He also does very well into magneton, usually taking some damage in the 1v1 but often winning outright and getting the kill with enough HP to use explosion on something later. He does poorly into gengar and EQ users, but even with those he can often get a paralysis against them that will make them much easier for the rest of my team to deal with. He also suffers against Dugtrio, but I find that unless my opponent made it a point to chip him into oneshot range with EQ he will usually be able to explode and take dug down with him.

Magneton @ Salac Berry
Ability: Magnet Pull
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 SpA
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Endure
- Thunder Wave

Mag is here to do mag stuff, really. I've used the salac + endure set for a long time now and I'm becoming less happy with its results; while it's alright for getting a suprise threat against Dug it hurts to not have HP grass be a guaranteed kill, and the opponent can neutralise the threat by just switching to something like Blissey or Celebi. This build also means Skarm usually gets a layer or two up- I find that spikes being up isn't TOO bad against my very fast-paced gameplan, but it's definitely not ideal. Mag still does well into non-agil metagross, is a good check against swampert, and tends to be good for getting a t-wave off against anything that doesn't kill it right away- often other electrics like zap or especially jolteon. This is especially the case with endure + salac, which can basically guarantee a paralysis going out before mag dies.

Charizard @ Leftovers
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 24 Atk / 240 SpA / 244 Spe
Rash Nature
- Substitute
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Fire Blast
- Focus Punch

This is the most recent addition to the team (previously a goofy phys gengar set), and one I'm still not totally sure about. My team really likes having the fire STAB to pose a big threat against Meta, Celebi, and Jirachi, plus it's a good user of HP grass for swampert and sometimes starmie/vaporeon. Substitute is useful because zard is so good at baiting switch-outs, and focus punch is nice for getting big hits on common switch-ins like blissey, tar, and houndoom and chunking anything else that might come in unexpectedly. Starmie is usually not a huge issue thanks in part to registeel but salamence is a problem, as is aero. Zard is also my main answer to lead Medicham, which often gives me a lot of trouble.

Go! Go! GO! GO! (Aerodactyl) @ Choice Band
Ability: Rock Head
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Rock Slide
- Double-Edge
- Earthquake
- Hidden Power [Flying]


The heart and soul of the team and really a pretty simple role-filler. Aero's here to go crazy once his checks are gone and in the meantime chunk whatever it can with reads and high damage. I love this set, to be honest, and one of my favorite parts of this team is setting up big CB aero predictions that get an unexpected kill and signal the beginning of the end. No big notes here, all works as you'd expect- rock sliding into victory most of the time.

 

[nocatnocradle]

Notes:

By far the biggest issue for this team is DD salamence, especially with HP grass. One DD is up, ifmy swampert isn't healthy enough to KO with ice beam I don't have another good response. A runner-up to biggest problem is Agility metagross: while meta will have a much harder time getting the agil off against this team, if it does and swampert can't handle it I'm very likely to get swept. Blissey is the most effective mon at slowing my momentum and Claydol and Celebi can be difficult to deal with as well; a cagey opponent playing with those very defensive mons can just become very difficult to make progress against. Milotic /can/ be a huge issue in this way, but I find that teams that use milotic tend to give me chances to chunk it down over time and eventually remove it, especially since it can't really make progress against Registeel. Bulky fighting types can also be an issue, ESPECIALLY lead medicham (who I don't have a good switch-in for) and thick fat Hariyama (who can soak up anything but aero HP fly and can probably kill aero if it tries to switch in).

I know a spikes setter or a blissey would probably improve this team, but honestly I don't think that's a playstyle that I would enjoy all that much and I really don't want to use Blissey. I did experiment with Cloyster as a lead instead of zard for spikes, but wasn't impressed with its output. I think I'd be happy with this team if I could find a way of consistently dealing with boosting salamence/meta, as those two are the things that are regularly making me lose games- the other stuff being difficult is alright by me, as I know a team like this is going to have those kinds of pain points.

 

[Finchely]

Use dedge over brick on ddtar, you slam all the slide/quake checks really hard.

Roar is useable on Swampert but Protect is far more ideal, and should help a lot with your troubles with the big physical mons. You mention that you have trouble with needing to boom on suicune but tbh that's kind of what Registeel is good for. It's not really meant to be sticking around for too long and I think you're getting quite good value out of it if you can boom on cune to bring it down to a range such that it won't be able to make a comeback for the rest of the game.

Magneton just doesn't work well on this team imo. Replace it with Skarmory. Aero + DDtar is already capable of breaking through a lot of physical checks, especially repeated use of Aero. Part of what makes Aero good though is spikes, because many of Aero's checks are grounded. It can remove a certain amount of prediction necessary, since rock sliding into a metagross can come out still in your favor if you're making progress with spikes. Even physically defensive spikes-immune pokemon oft take far too much from rock slide or double-edge.

Zard is a bit incoherent here. It's best on more special-leaning offenses for its ability to come in on Celebi and break open special checks, not something you're really looking for here. You may want to consider using something like BP Zapdos in Zard's place, for its ability to act as a check to water types that doesns't need to boom itself, a second interim special check, and particularly a swampert switchin that can properly threaten it out.

 

[nocatnocradle]

Use dedge over brick on ddtar, you slam all the slide/quake checks really hard.

Roar is useable on Swampert but Protect is far more ideal, and should help a lot with your troubles with the big physical mons. You mention that you have trouble with needing to boom on suicune but tbh that's kind of what Registeel is good for. It's not really meant to be sticking around for too long and I think you're getting quite good value out of it if you can boom on cune to bring it down to a range such that it won't be able to make a comeback for the rest of the game.

Magneton just doesn't work well on this team imo. Replace it with Skarmory. Aero + DDtar is already capable of breaking through a lot of physical checks, especially repeated use of Aero. Part of what makes Aero good though is spikes, because many of Aero's checks are grounded. It can remove a certain amount of prediction necessary, since rock sliding into a metagross can come out still in your favor if you're making progress with spikes. Even physically defensive spikes-immune pokemon oft take far too much from rock slide or double-edge.

Zard is a bit incoherent here. It's best on more special-leaning offenses for its ability to come in on Celebi and break open special checks, not something you're really looking for here. You may want to consider using something like BP Zapdos in Zard's place, for its ability to act as a check to water types that doesns't need to boom itself, a second interim special check, and particularly a swampert switchin that can properly threaten it out.

Hey! Sorry to take so long to reply here, I wanted to respond after I'd played some games with the changes and haven't had a ton of free time. You're spot on about mag, I've replaced it with skarm and found that there's not much lost for the difference and a lot gained. Having a good roar user so I can have protect on swampert is a Huge improvement to the team, giving it some sustainability that was very much needed and helps into the team's bad matchups! Up to this point I've kept Charizard on the team. While you're certainly right that it's not exactly the best fit, I find the Stab fire blast so effective at dealing with some things that would otherwise be major checks that it's hard to give up, and to be honest I just like having it around. At some point I'll likely give Zapdos a go, but with the previous changes I've become pretty happy with how the team is performing and am having a lot of fun with it. I will say that I miss having brick break on tar for blissey and snorlax, but the difference isn't so huge that it outbalances the benefits of dedge.

Thanks so much for the tips! : )