[Overview]
<p> You may be surprised to find that the strongest user of Outrage is not a fearsome land shark, or a flying dragon with earth shattering power; but in fact a small, dual-headed dragon, badly in need of a haircut. That's right, thanks to Hustle, Zweilous has the equivalent of a base Attack stat greater than 150, beating Uber behemoths like Rayquaza and Zekrom. He even has access to perfect neutral coverage in RU with Fire Fang and a very nice dual STAB with Crunch. Putting Zweilous in a tier with so few Steels to resist Outrage must be crazy, right? Wrong. Combine his terrible speed and below average bulk with the popularity of Fighting and Bug-type moves in the tier and Zweilous becomes incredibly easy to revenge kill. Outside of coverage, Zweilous doesn’t get any useful moves like Pursuit or Dragon Claw to avoid locking himself into Outrage, as well as few viable stat boosting moves, meaning Pursuit-users like Honchkrow and boosting Dragon-types like Fraxure often compete with him for a spot in a team. Even if Zweilous can overcome these downfalls he still has to deal with all his normally 100% accurate moves being cut down to a measly 80% accuracy and a miss could easily spell doom for Zweilous due to his frailty. Despite this, Zweilous can still break holes in the opponent's team for a comrade to sweep, and definitely has its niches if played correctly.</p>
[SET]
name: Wallbreaker
move 1: Outrage
move 2: Crunch
move 3: Fire Fang
move 4: Dragon Tail / Substitute
item: Choice Band / Eviolite
ability: Hustle
nature: Adamant
EVs: 236 HP / 252 Atk / 20 Spe
[SET COMMENTS]
<p>This set is designed to abuse the ridiculous power that Outrage has in order to break holes in the opponent's team. With Choice Band and Hustle, Zweilous receives a boost larger than Swords Dance while Eviolite assures that an Outrage miss isn’t as deadly and that he can take the opponent’s hit and strike back next turn. Normally, investing Speed EVs into a naturally slow Pokemon is pointless but with 20 Speed EVs he can outspeed uninvested base 60's like Clefable and Weezing before they cripple him with status or KO him. This allows him to strike the foe with one of his STAB moves or, if the foe resists those two moves like Ferroseed or Magneton, Zweilous can hit them with a super-effective Fire Fang. With the great coverage Zweilous has, the 4th move slot is mainly filler, although if Eviolite is chosen Zweilous can make great use of Substitute when he is not certain of a KO and fears status from the likes of Weezing and Tangrowth.</p>
[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]
<p>The choice between Eviolite and Choice Band is a tough one, and greatly impacts the way Zweilous is played. With Eviolite, Zweilous can use his unique typing and resistances to switch in to many threats more effectively before firing off a powerful Outrage. The fact that he is not locked into a move also means he can use his great coverage more efficiently, as well as the opponent will not be doing as much damage if Zweilous should happen to miss due to Hustle. However, Choice Band guarantees many 2 and 3HKO's on common physical walls such as Tangrowth, who needs to have taken damage from Stealth Rock and 1 layer of Spikes to be 2HKO'd 100% of the time without Choice Band, or even Weezing, who has a 50% chance of surviving 2 un-boosted Outrages.</p>
<p>Stealth Rock support and at least one layer of Spikes are very effective in turning 3HKO’s into 2HKO’s, especially when running Eviolite. The Choice Band set can also phaze a threat out with Dragon Tail, racking up even more hazard damage. Roselia and Qwilfish both have pretty good synergy with Zweilous and can set up Spikes while Claydol can set up Stealth Rocks for him. Claydol can also spin away hazards for Zweilous, a very useful ability considering how often Zweilous switches. However, a Wish user is a viable alternative to recover entry hazard damage, especially after losing 25% of your health when using Substitute.</p>
<p>If the damage from Substitute is offputting, Taunt can be used as a replacement, as Taunt also stops status, but Substitute takes advantage of the switches Zweilous causes and as such is generally superior. Thunder Wave is another effective move for the 4th slot as it means Zweilous can outspeed the foe, and means that a miss with Hustle wouldn’t always give your opponent a free turn due to the chance of a full paralysis, but Zweilous generally doesn’t have the time to use status moves, so it is even more effective with paralysis support from a team mate.</p>
<p>Despite the few steel-types in the tier, almost every one of them can wall Zweilous without a problem, hit him with a powerful move or cripple him with status. This makes Magneton a good partner as he can trap opposing steel-types in order to take them out with an HP fire while protecting himself from status with a Substitute. Once the steel-types are out of the way, Zweilous can then proceed to take out (or severely damage) many common walls such as Clefable, Munchlax, and Tangrowth, allowing a sweeper normally walled by these threats to clean up. A great example of this would be Druddigon as they form a very powerful dual-dragon core and benefit from similar support.</p>
[Other Options]
<p>Zweilous has a severe lack of options in its movepool limiting any diversity from the move set, but there are a few moves worth a mention. Ice Fang is perhaps the most notable, as it can beat Gligar without locking Zweilous into Outrage but is situational at best, especially considering the move's 76% accuracy. Other physical options include Head Smash, Thunder Fang, Return, and Body Slam, but offer no additional coverage to his moveset. The only boosting move Zweilous has access to is Work Up, which although could be viable on a mixed set with Earth Power and Dragon Pulse, Zweilous generally doesn’t have the speed or bulk to set up, even with Eviolite. Choice Scarf is an option as with a Jolly nature, he can outspeed Pokemon with 110 base Speed and max Speed EVs, but is generally better left to a Pokemon with better movepool options such as Honchkrow.</p>
[Checks and Counters]
<p>Countering a Pokemon with more physical attack than Rayquaza can seem tough, but Steel-types do a great job at it as long as they are careful of Fire Fang. Aggron and Steelix are great candidates thanks to their gargantuan defence, resistance to Outrage, and to add to this, both of them have powerful STAB attacks that can severely maim Zweilous. Checking Zweilous is a much easier prospect however, as a number of fast and strong Fighting types can come in to take out Zweilous with a quick Close Combat or Hi-Jump Kick, although most cannot take an Outrage. Many Ice- and Bug- types are in a similar boat as well. Zweilous is very vulnerable to status, especially burn, so anything with above base 60 Speed and Will-O-Wisp such as Rotom, and his RU-legal appliance forms can easily cripple Zweilous for the rest of the match.</p>