SM OU Zam+PsychUp (out-of-season) Halloween Special OU

[AlexTheGreat VA]

Alakazam's Trick-or-Treat Halloween Special OU​

Alakazam @ Focus Sash
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psych Up
- Psyshock
- Focus Blast
- Shadow Ball

Banette-Mega @ Banettite
Ability: Frisk
EVs: 160 HP / 252 Atk / 96 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Destiny Bond
- Will-O-Wisp
- Shadow Sneak
- Shadow Claw

Tyranitar @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Stone Edge
- Crunch
- Earthquake
- Ice Punch

Clefable @ Leftovers
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 240 HP / 220 Def / 32 SpD / 16 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Protect
- Wish
- Toxic
- Moonblast

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 16 Def / 240 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Protect
- Leech Seed
- Stealth Rock
- Gyro Ball

Celesteela @ Flyinium Z
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 72 HP / 252 SpA / 184 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Autotomize
- Flash Cannon
- Air Slash
- Fire Blast​

How to Effectively Utilize the Team!

1) Alakazam is the star player on the team. With magic guard and focus sash he can come in at any time and always take a hit. His purpose is to come in on any setup mon, use PsychUp to steel their boosts and proceed to reverse sweep. Volcarona, Magerna, Togekiss, Celesteela are great examples. Its best to remove all priority users first as well... Or add Lele to the team. But that's a discussion for later.

2) Mega-Bannette is one of my favorite newly released megas. With the auto attack increase and access to prankster, this mon is a huge threat. His primary purpose is similar to Alakazam... eliminate opposing setup mons. Destiny bond and a slow shadow claw allows you to trap your opponent in a cycle of switching to avoid being killied by destiny bond or a massive shadow claw. shadow sneak is added for a form of sneaky coverage. Try to avoid being toxic or seeded.

3) Tyranitar is absolutely amazing in this meta! The choice scarf allows you to counter mons like MCharizard-Y, Heatran, Volcarona and MPinsir as well as other fire types. They will never see it coming! DO NOT let ttar die while those four mons are on the field or you will have a really tough time.

4) Clefable is a staple of the team! Defensive unaware lets you switch in on any physical dragon type in the game! Pretty much any physical type in the game that isn't steel... or MPinsir. Please be careful about MPinsir.

5) Ferrothorn is here for rocks and as a special wall. Protect/seeds is very annoying and can be used to stall out terrain, weather, trick-room and tailwind if necessary. Gyro ball hits ice types very hard which can otherwise cause some issues.

6) Celesteela has the z-move on this team... and oh boy does it pair well with autotomize and beast boost! After one turn of setup Celesteela goes to work. Its coverage and z-move allow for an early kill and once you are at +1 SpAtt, it'll be hard to stop you. Watch out for Heatran or scarf fire/electric types. Anything over 136 base speed will out speed celesteela at +2 speed. The only mons applicable are MAlakazam and MAerodactyl which can't do much to you anyway and aren't that common.


Possible Team Changes!

1) Add Tapu Lele to the team to better increase the effectiveness of Alakazam and boosted Celesteela. Not sure who I would replace though... I'll leave you to decide that one.

2) Give Ferrothorn power whip if you are having trouble with water types, and sometimes you will. Spikes may be nice over protect if you like your hazards.

3) Tyranitar can use pursuit over ice punch for trapping if you like the idea of trapping... It does fit well with the Halloween theme. I like ice punch with scarf because it allows you to kill lando and zygarde after a little bit of prior damage.

4) Bannette can run Gunk shot over shadow sneak if you prefer a way to hit grass/fairy types. Although, without any other form of priority, I do prefer shadow sneak. AV Tangrowth does wall the team pretty well and gunk shot would certainty change that.

5) Its hard to pick three moves on Alakazam. I tried dazzling gleam, HP fire, HP ice, signal beam... but ultimately I settled on the current move pool. Feel free to change it up though.

6) Replace Clefable with Defensive mew to counter psychic/fighting types.

Team Testing and Difficulty!

The team has been used about 20-25 battles in the OU tier to reach the low 1400's, as with all of my teams before they are posted. The Idea behind this team is to utilize fun gimmicks, trickery and overall bulk to beat your opponent. With all of my teams I have included the overall Team Difficulty Rating.

1) Predictions: Moderate
2) Switches: Moderate-High
3) Mental awareness: High
4) Mental Capacity: Moderate
5) Overall: Moderate-High Team Difficulty

Rating Scale - (1)Minimal (2)Low (3)Moderate (4)High (5)Maximal

 

[IronBullet]

Hi, welcome to Smogon! I'm locking your RMT for the time being as the forum rules require that you provide in-depth descriptions for each Pokemon to explain their roles. Please read the rules carefully and take a look at Team Showcase to see the level of detail we require. PM me with updated descriptions and I'll be happy to unlock this.

Edit: Reopened

 

[AlexTheGreat VA]

I hope everybody likes the team so far! I just wanted to post a neat replay I had yesterday to show you guys how this team can beat weather. I know I mentioned weather as a weakness, well yesterday I faced a dual weather, ttar/drill and Zard-Y/Venusaur with a fini and duggy. To be honest, I feel my opponent didn't play to the best of his/her ability, but he certainly had a better match up with the dual weather. I saw a chance to sweep with Celesteela and I took it. Instead of taking the easy 2HKO on Fini, I switched to Celesteela and setup for the end game. I needed to get +4 speed to out speed his sand rush and chlorophyll mons. Celesteela is such a monster! Every match up there is usually only 1 or maybe 2 threats that need to be eliminated before its time for a Celesteela sweep. I hope the replay helps :) I plan to push the team into the 1500's and post some replay's for you guys to see how it does higher up the ladder. I'm currently making/testing a new team so my AlexTheGreat VA account is bouncing around in the 1300's.

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7ou-606627480

I also have multiple sweeps against web teams. This team has an excellent match up against all the web teams I've faced. Unfortunately the two replays I saved, my opponents were not very good... But they did have cool teams so check it out :)

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7ou-606238064
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7ou-606266595

 

[AlexTheGreat VA]

Bump

 

[AlexTheGreat VA]

bump

 

[Trueblade]

Hi! My name is Trueblade. I like this team. I like this concept, but there are somethings we need to discuss.

Theme: The only thing "Haloween" about this team is Mega Banette. Not being mean, just saying. I think this would be more of a "Dark Wall" Team, if you ask me. Just saying.

Alakazam: Yeah, we need to talk. Mostly because Pshych up is a pretty useless move most of the time. Replace that with Dazziling Gleam. You also need to replace Shadow Ball with Grass knot, as it gives more type coverage. Also, replace the Focus Band with Choice Specs/Leftovers.

Banette: You remind me of me when I first started. I can tell because of the team layout. Destiny bond isn't the best thing to put on a mega, especially this one. Replace it with Knock Off, that way it becomes a wall breaker. Also, get rid of the 180 EV health, and replace it for full speed and 4 def.

Tyranitar: ...Yeah, this thing isn't fast. You need to replace the speed EV for HP, as it is much more useful on tyranitar. Also, replace Ice Punch for Avalanche, and you will thank me later.

Clefable is almost perfect! But you need to move the 16 speed over to SpD. Also, Tapu Fini in my opinion does a much better Job walling than Clefable in my opinion, so contact me if you need to add it to your team.

I have nothing to say about Ferrothorn. It's perfect.

Celestellia: I see you said "screw it", and went to Smogon for help here. But Another Mon that does the Z-move well is Salamence, and also contact me if you need to add it to your team.

Overall: I'd say that this is a very well-balanced and equal team. Just make the adjustments, and you're all set.

Edit: I'm in an enviornment where I can't make "quality" work, and I accidentally hit send before I was done. This evening, however, I'm open.

 

[AlexTheGreat VA]

Trueblade I see your adjustments and while yes, they are viable options, they completely change the play style of the team. This team has been built to be played a very specific way. Your changes completely remove the original design of the team, which is to counter setup & sweep teams. Your changes remove that aspect. Focus Sash with PsychUp steals the boosts, unaware ignores their boosts and destiny bond with prankster kills boosted Pokemon. Scarf Ttar is designed to eliminate Zard-Y, which otherwise 6-0 this team. The smogen Celesteela fits very well here. No need to fix what isn't broken. Every aspect of this team has been designed very carefully to utilize fun tricks and gimmicks. I am sorry if you did not understand the purpose of this team at first glance. You can try to read the descriptions I have provided and you may better understand.

When you consider Halloween, its not just the appearance, its the mood and activities you must consider was well. Bannette, Alakazam and Tyranitar are dark, ominous Pokemon, which fit well with Halloween having a dark, ominous theme. Halloween is also known for the many pranks and tricks, which is the hallmark of this team.

Thank you for your comments. I love to have open discussion where anybody can voice their opinion!