Overview Entei has always been a formidable Physical Attacker, boasting 115 Attack and access to powerful attacks such as Flare Blitz and the coveted Extreme Speed. The 6th generation also introduced a new toy for him to abuse, Sacred Fire. Sacred Fire allows Entei to inflict many of his previous Counters with a nasty Burn status 50% of the time, making many of them think twice before switching in. Entei also boasts great 115/85/75 defences, allowing it to soak up a lot of damage and making it a great user of Assault Vest. Entei is not just limited to Physical attacks however, it has 90 Special Attack and access to Calm Mind, making it unpredictable and a threat from both sides of the spectrum. It's not all roses for Entei however, its typing leaves it susceptible to all forms of entry hazards, and its lack of coverage options means it can find itself completely shut down by Water and Rock types. Despite this Entei is one pokemon every LU team-builder needs to prepare for, and one which will rarely let you down. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Sacred Entei @ Choice Band/Assault Vest Trait: Pressure EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk) - Extreme Speed - Stone Edge - Sacred Fire - Flare Blitz This is Entei's bread and butter Physical set from last gen with a few notable additions. First is the introduction of Sacred Fire, this is an attack Entei can spam early game to spread Burn status around the enemy team, whittling them down and crippling Physical attackers. Flare Blitz is Entei's strongest STAB option, and though it comes with recoil, is especially useful for picking up reliable OHKO's and 2HKO's pokemon such as Nidoqueen and Cresselia respectively. Stone Edge is there primarily for coverage on Fire types, particularly Flash Fire pokemon such as Houndoom. Extreme Speed is probably the best priority move in the game, and Entei puts it to fantastic use with his big attack stat, being able to revenge threatening sweepers such as Sharpedo, Hitmonlee and Azelf. The other new addition is the Assault Vest, with this equipped Entei becomes a fantastic Check to some of the biggest threats in the tier such as Mega Houndoom, Mega Abomasnow and Sun teams. A Choice Band is also a great option, turning Entei in to one of the tiers best Wall Breakers and Revenge Killers in one set. Spoiler A Life Orb can be used to give your moves a lot of power whilst retaining the ability to switch Attacks, however combined with Flare Blitz recoil and Hazard damage, it can leave Entei weakened very quickly. Sleep Talk is also an option on the Choice Band set to be used over Flare Blitz, this allows you to switch in to more recklessly switch in to Grass types and the odd Jynx or Venomoth. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Calm Mind Entei @ Leftovers Trait: Pressure EVs: 136 HP / 180 SAtk / 192 Spd Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk) - Substitute - Calm Mind - Hidden Power [Grass] - Lava Plume/Fire Blast This Entei set takes advantage of the threatening nature of the Physical set, finding many opportunities to start setting up as people switch to their Physically Defensive Counters. Calm Mind is the crux of this set, boosting Entei's decent Special Attack to threatening levels and making it difficult to break by Special Attackers. Substitute helps to avoid being revenge killed, eases prediction, blocks status, and can help Entei to set up if it takes more than 1 hit to be broken. The choice between Fire STAB's is a difficult one, Fire Blast is much stronger initially and will pick up a lot more kills at +0 - +2, however a Lava Plume Burn can allow Entei to set up on a lot more pokemon. Hidden Power Grass goes in the final slot to land super effective hits on Water and Rock types that attempt to wall you, though do note that it is rather weak before any CM boosts. The EV spread may look complex, but its reasoning is simple. 136 HP EV's allows Entei to create 101 HP Substitutes, preventing them from being broken by Seismic Toss or Night Shade, the 192 Speed EV's allow Entei to out-speed Jolly Krookodile, and the rest of the EV's are thrown in to Special Attack to maximise the damage output. Spoiler You can change Hidden Power Grass to Rock or Ice to hit specific Checks such as Houndoom and Goodra, but generally Grass is the most useful. You can also bump the Speed EV's to 216 to beat Timid Kyurem and other base 95's. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Other Options Sunny day is a great option to make your Fire STAB's stronger, remove your Water weakness, and give you access to Solar Beam to nail Water and Rock types. Flame Charge can be used to boost your Speed so you are less reliant on Extreme Speed to move first. Toxic can be useful for crippling things like Cresselia and Alomomola which aren't hindered much by a Burn. Howl is an option to boost your Attack, however it doesn't in any way help Entei get around its hard Counters and you would usually be better off fishing for Sacred Fire Burns on the switch. Finally Natural Gift can be used alongside a Liechi Berry to give you a one time use, 100bp Physical Grass attack, which can be used to nab some surprise KO's on Entei's usual Counters; However note that this is mostly a gimmick since it is only useful once and it means you can't run a more useful item. Note that many of these options are only viable on Life Orb sets. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Checks/Counters Entei does have its fair share of Checks and Counters, however many of them are severely crippled by a Burn, and only a few can take on both Physical and Special sets. Physically Defensive Vaporeon, Slowking and Politoed are Entei's best Counters. All are able to easily sponge Entei's STAB attacks, are relatively unhindered by a Burn, can Check the Special sets due to their naturally high Special Defence and have access to recovery in the form of Wish, Slack Off/Regenerator and Rest respectively. Alomomola, Qwilfish, Swampert, Quagsire and Seismitoad are very effective Counters to the more common Physical set, however they are more crippled by Burns and will struggle to beat the Special set. Tyrantrum, Carracosta, Omastar, Kabutops and Barbaracle all 4x resist Fire, however only Omastar and some Carracosta sets can remain effective whilst Burned, and all but Tyrantrum have to be very wary of HP Grass coming off the Special set. Flash Fire pokemon like Houndoom and the somewhat rare Flareon are great Checks to Entei, shutting down the Special sets and stopping the CB set from freely spamming Sacred Fire, however they still need to be wary of Stone Edge. Snorlax and the more obscure Miltank are good Counters to Entei as they both have access to Thick Fat to easily Sponge Fire type attacks and ways to cure their Burn status with Rest and Heal Bell respectively. Dragon types such as Druddigon, Goodra and Mega Ampharos can all easily take on the Special sets, however will need to be running Defensive spreads to beat Choice Band sets, and Druddigon needs to be wary of Sacred Fire Burns.
hi the sacred: looks ok could add flame plate as another item option in set comments, allowing it to bluff band, can also go in oo i guess oo: looks good flame charge + lo could be added c&c: add slowking too as a bulky water, only phys def can reliably check it as spdef/ass vest phys def drudd can be listed as well, but sacred fire can cripple it snorlax is ok, ass vest will generally lose, otherwise it is almost always 3hko by flare blitz with 252 hp / 0 def, and it can rest off damage seismitoad is kinda rare, but it is rarely 3hko by flare blitz, and can 2hko in return
I'll mention Flame Plate in OO, as I don't think it's as good as Vest or Band, ill add the stuff in OO, and ill mention Slowking and non AV Lax as decent counters, and Seismitoad/Drudd as fairly good Counters are crippled by burn and struggle to take repeated hits as well as other counters.
You've got Drill Run and Bulldoze confused in the analysis. There's also a typo or two, but that's unimportant right now. Can't think of anything you haven't covered, aside from maybe LO getting a backslash on the main set? I've used it with decent success in the past, and it really lets him clean up teams well. :3
Will fix Drill Run, and ill sort typos at a later date, and I've put Flame Plate and Life Orb in set comments, however if enough people agree I'm not opposed to adding Life Orb as a backslash
Think you mean 20 more BP here. You've got most bases covered already in this analysis. I don't think Bulldoze or wOw deserve the OO mention, as they are almost entirely redundant. I'm iffy on Iron Head / Tail as well for the reasons you mentioned, but I suppose they can stay(the only set I could see them used on is Howl). Apart from that my only criticism would be that the OO section is a bit too long. To sort that out I'd suggest that you cut down on the descriptions for the special sets.
Personally I'd give SubCM its own set rather than just mention it in OO. It's a great bulky sweeper, and also catches many of Entei's usual checks like Rhyperior and Quagsire off guard. I don't think Crotei deserves a mention, since SubCM is superior. Other than that, looks solid good job.
Yh I'll cut down OO, I'll keep Iron Head/Tail mentions since they are somewhat useful for hitting Rock types but I'll make it clear there are better options, and after STAB Flare Blitz is 30bp higher, I'm defo not opposed to removing Will o or Bulldoze either. Final thing I want an opinion on is whether Life Orb should be a backslash on the main set, or just a set comments mention. If there is enough support for Sub CM to be its own set then I will add it in, I will still give Crotei a much briefer mention in OO.
STAB and BP aren't related. Yes, it's effectively 30 BP more, but the way it's phrased is misleading. Flare Blitz's BP is 120 and Sacred Fire's is 100; the difference is 20. If you want to state facts, say that FB is 20% stronger than SF. I can definitely get behind SubCM getting it's own set. Don't forget to edit the C&C section accordingly if you add it. As for LO being slashed in, I wouldn't mind, but don't think it's necessary. It's usually not an ideal item and doesn't provide for any surprise factor, so the Set Comments mention covers it for me.
For the Crotei/SubCM Entei thing, I suppose you can combine them both? Entei @ Leftovers Ability: Pressure EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SDef Bold nature -Lava Plume -Calm Mind -Rest / Substitute -Sleep Talk / Hidden Power Grass. It's not too cluttered, and covers both sets? *shrugs*
The standard SubCM Entei EVs are 136 HP /120 SAtk / 252+ Spd. The HP's for hitting 101 HP subs and the speed is so you can outpace things. The EVs you listed work for Crotei, but I don't think it's getting a main set.
alright ill make sub cm its own set, will leave Life Orb in set comments, and ill likely mention crotei in sub cm set comments. and ill just say flare blitz is a stronger option and wont mention bp
I'll also mention a bulkier Sub/CM set in the set comments, is there anything Entei would like to creep on?
140 Spd lets you beat out standard SubRoost Kyurem, Modest Nidoking(to beat Timid you're not gaining any bulk apart from like 16 EVs and a +Def nature) and Adamant Kabutops. That's about as low as I'd go if I were to still invest in Speed and not go full bulk. Otherwise stick like 30 EVs there to beat speed creeping Tentacruel.
I feel like Jolly Krookodile is all it needs to hit, and that a bulkier spread isn't necessary, since it needs the Sp Atk investment
Alright I've: Added Sub CM set Shortened and tidied OO Edited C+C to consider Special set too anything else that needs to be done?
I thought the speed creeping you meant was for the bulky set. For the normal one, Jolly Krook's a good benchmark. The only things of note you miss out on are tying with Jolly non-scarf Fygon / Timid Shaymin, and outspeeding non-scarf Timid/Jolly Kyurem. Unless you plan on setting up on Shaymin and Kyurem, that shouldn't be an issue. I don't see anything else left to do. Unless mr. eeps has any more suggestions, I believe this should be.
Yeah that is what I initially asked for, but realised that a bulky spread just wasn't very viable. And Entei is never really beating Flygon 1 on 1, and will usually beat Shaymin even if it's slower, I might mention that it can buff the speed EV's to 216 to beat Kyuremin set comments
Alright if the qc lads could give this a final look over and tell me what to change/approve would be much appreciated!
maybe in c&c also mention that some fire-types like houndoom, other entei, mega amphy, etc can shut down the cm set otherwise it's good approved