So as the title says, this is my first attempt at making a team (basically you can call me a newbie). I made it based on a teambuilding guide stating that I should search for a Pokemon, one I like a lot, to base my team around and work for it, IE complement it with checks to it's main threats, etc. In my case, I found 2 pokes that should be part of my team simply because I like them a lot: Chesnaught: built as a physical tank Toxicroak: as my main anti-fairy I also opted for a defensive approach, which is the playstyle I prefer. Edit 1: This is the team's V2, done after some research on teams in this and other sites, plus Joyverse's recommendations. Edit 2: After some testing, plus more of Joyverse's suggestions, this is the team's V3. Chesnaught (M) @ Leftovers Ability: Bulletproof EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD Impish Nature (+Def, -SpA) - Drain Punch - Wood Hammer - Leech Seed - Spikes He's basically a physical wall/tank that can set Spikes layers very well. Drain Punch and Leech Seed make him very durable and Woodhammer is his best STAB move, so for now I prefer it over Spiky Shield Toxicroak (M) @ Life Orb Ability: Dry Skin EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe Jolly Nature (+Spe, -SpA) - Ice Punch - Drain Punch - Gunk Shot - Sucker Punch Aesthetically I find this guy to be very cool... but not just aesthetically; he also packs a punch. Ice Punch (on Joyverse's recommednation) is there to take care of Dragons (provided they arent faster and/or dont have Earthquake), Drain Punch to be his STAB move that partially heals Life Orb's recoil damage, Gunk Shot deals mostly with Fairies, neutrally hits other threats very hard and is also Toxicroak's strongest STAB. Finally, Sucker Punch is a reliable priority move used against the many other threats that outspeed him. Heatran (M) @ Air Balloon Ability: Flash Fire EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe Calm Nature (+SpD, -Atk) - Lava Plume/Magma Storm - Earth Power - Stealth Rock - Toxic He's the team's Stealth Rock setter and a great complement that covers Chesnaught's weaknesses. Air Baloon is his main asset to prevent Earthquake OTKs against Garchomp and/or Excadrill. Lava Plume is the STAB move I chose for him since I found it to be more reliable than Magma Storm, still debating on which to use, Earth Power helps with more coverage and hits stuff that's been nasty on my team, namely Tentacruel and Excadrill. Finally, Toxic deals with what resists Fire and Earth moves and has nice synergy with Magma Storm, so... still deciding between it and Lava Plume. Latias (F) @ Life Orb Ability: Levitate EVs: 72 HP / 184 SpA / 252 Spe Timid Nature (+Spe, -Atk) - Draco Meteor - Psyshock - Healing Wish - Defog Using Joyverse's suggested pokemon and set. I agree a defogger/spinner was much needed, and Latias also hits at least neutrally a lot of pokes given Draco Meteor and Psyshock. Wasn't sure on Healing Wish until it helped me win a match, but Im still thinking about trying other attacking moves like Ice Beam/Thunderbolt. Jirachi @ Choice Scarf Ability: Serene Grace EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe Jolly Nature (+Spe, -SpA) - Iron Head - Heart Stamp - Drain Punch - U-turn Im liking this guy/gal/thing a lot (thanks again for the recommendation Joyverse!). Effectively checks Fairies and hits them hard with Iron Head, Heart Stamp is its other amazing STAB move (and I didnt even know this move existed, not sure if its Jirachi's exclusive or what), Drain Punch provides some more coverage and durability. Then, there's U-turn as a much appreciated escape move that also harms stuff I've encountered (albeit rarely) like Mega Alakazam. Altaria (F) @ Altarianite Ability: Cloud Nine EVs: 252 HP / 100 Def / 156 SpD Impish Nature (+Def, -SpA) - Return - Earthquake - Heal Bell - Roost Lastly, there's Mega Altaria, also Joyverse's idea, who can check and defend a lot of things. Return hits many threats neutrally and Earthquake can take care of many thing Return cant: Steel types, Rock types and Fire Types. Heal Bell provides support mainly to the rest of the team and Roost makes her very durable. One of the few thing's I'd fear with this setup would be Gengar though, but in most cases, Toxicroak's Sucker Punch can deal with it. Below, there are some pokes I used before the major revamps, so I'll leave it in case additional info is needed. Spoiler: Past Pokes Gengar Ability: Levitate EVs: 4 HP/ 252 Sp ATK/252 SPE Nature: Timid Item: Black Sludge Will-O-Wisp Taunt Hex Sludge Wave I was tore between Gengar and Cofagrigus to be used as my spinblocker (which was something I was ignoring and was very much needed because of Spikes and Stealth Rock). In the end, I opted for the superior Gengar and chose a Hex set for him, partially due to my other team members' ability to inflict ailments. So... Will-O-Wisp and Sludge Wave are used to inflict burn and poison and Taunt to prevent my opponent pokes from nasty setups. Bisharp Ability: Defiant EVs: 160 HP/220 ATK/96 SPE Nature: Adamant Item: Assault Vest Knock Off Iron Head Sucker Punch Pursuit Added Bisharp to help with my team's coverage on another site's recommendation (dont know if its allowed to mention which site, so I'll leave it at that) and chose this set (again, taken from said site). Knock off, I think is a utility move that also hits hard, Iron Head deals with the likes of Fairies and Tyranitar, plus other rock types (cant remember which other is common in OU), Sucker Punch is a must-have given Bisharp's Subpar speed and then there's pursuit to counter Ghosts and Psychics. Latias Ability: Levitate EVs: 252 HP/4 Sp DEF/252 SPE Nature: Timid Item: Latiasite Draco Meteor Ice Beam Thunderbolt/Defog/Thunder Wave (Cant decide!!) Roost Lastly, I felt dragons were a major threat to my team... namely Charizard X and Garchomp. I thought "why not use Mega Sceptile since he is faster and can OTK both with Dragon Pulse?" but then I realized I would be left with too many things vulnerable to flying moves (Chesnaught, Toxicroak and now Sceptile) and to Talonflame (the three already mentioned plus Bisharp). So in the end, I opted for Latias. Draco Meteor is there of course to OTK my fear out of Dragon Types, Ice Beam may seem redundant (and it really may be, Im not sure :/) but I'm using it to threaten Gliscor and Landorus, alongside Toxicroak's Ice Punch, lastly, Roost makes her very durable. Im having trouble on the last slot... Defog can be used to clear hazards, but there's no point if I use it and clear my 4 turns of setup: 3 Spikes + 1 Stealth Rock. Thunder Wave could be and also has good synergy with Gengar, but so does Thunderbolt which also provides a much needed coverage against Flying types. Swampert Ability: Damp EVs: 252 ATK/4 DEF/252 SPE Item: Swampertite Waterfall Earthquake Ice Punch Superpower This is the mega i'm using. He's tough, hits relatively hard and has good coverage. Waterfall and Earthquake are his reliable STAB moves, Ice Punch deals with Dragons and Superpower with Steels. Raikou Ability: Pressure EVs: 252 Sp ATK/4 Sp DEF/252 SPE Item: Assault Vest Thunderbolt Volt Switch Hidden Power (Fire) Extrasensory Another check to the common Skarmory. He's also my main check against flying types, namely Talonflame, which harm both my must-haves. Assault Vest helps with my team's defensive approach and turns Raikou into a Special Wall. Hidden Power (Fire) and Extrasensory complement his set giving him the coverage the rest of my team may be missing Alakazam Ability: Magic Guard EVs: 4 DEF/252 Sp ATK/252 SPE Item: Life Orb Psychic Focus Blast Shadow Ball Hidden Power (Ice) Lastly, there's Alakazam who's fast enough to check some other typical threats that the rest of my team cant: Mainly Heracross-M and Venusaur-M, and Lopunny-M. btw, I also take the aesthetic factor very into account; if I dont like how a Pokemon looks then I simply wont use it because I dont see any fun in it. Let's say Fairies are super bulky, defensive, etc. but no... I dont like how any of them looks so I simply decided not to use them. There's also other typical OU/BL Pokes that I just wont ever feel like using, yeah, Im looking at you guys: Amoongoose, Chansey, Magnezone, Weavile, Hawlucha, Togekiss, Rotom-W... and some others. Well then, that's pretty much it. Any and every help is muchly needed and appreciated. Thanks a lot for the read! Spoiler: Importable Toxicroak (M) @ Life Orb Ability: Dry Skin EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe Jolly Nature (+Spe, -SpA) - Ice Punch - Drain Punch - Gunk Shot - Sucker Punch Latias (F) @ Life Orb Ability: Levitate EVs: 72 HP / 184 SpA / 252 Spe Timid Nature (+Spe, -Atk) - Draco Meteor - Psyshock - Healing Wish - Defog Heatran (M) @ Leftovers Ability: Flash Fire EVs: 120 HP / 136 SpD / 120 Spe Calm Nature (+SpD, -Atk) - Magma Storm - Earth Power - Stealth Rock - Toxic Chesnaught (M) @ Leftovers Ability: Bulletproof EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD Impish Nature (+Def, -SpA) - Drain Punch - Wood Hammer - Leech Seed - Spikes Altaria (F) @ Altarianite Ability: Cloud Nine EVs: 252 HP / 100 Def / 156 SpD Impish Nature (+Def, -SpA) - Return - Earthquake - Heal Bell - Roost Jirachi @ Choice Scarf Ability: Serene Grace EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe Jolly Nature (+Spe, -SpA) - Iron Head - Heart Stamp - Drain Punch - U-turn
Ok lemme start you up on the non team part. First of all you are a newbie as it seems to and not a noob as you referred yourself as cause they are different terms. Read this, this will clear you up: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Noobs vs. Newbs Secondly, I highly appreciate that 4 out of your 6 pokemon are UU/LU. Did you even take the viability into thought while you were ogling at their aesthetic strengths? Also when did aesthetic value rise above competitive usage? Articuno and Delphox look great so should I use them in OU? And uh, Weavile and Togekiss look great, but that's just my opinion. Third, your team isn't stall, it's more of a balanced team that looks like it's out of UU but let's handle that. And last of all, every RMT needs an importable pasted above or below. And you can simply copy paste the details off them and not have to worry about missing the natures lol. So yeah I assume you wish to keep your first two teammates in the team, that in hand lemme first see through all your mons first... Spoiler: Chesnaught Ah, ChesTran is a tried a tested core but in most cases they both run Roar to phaze out opponents. My suggestion is that is you go over a moveset if you are that keen in keeping Ches. Chesnaught @ Leftovers Ability: Bulletproof EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD Impish Nature - Leech Seed - Drain Punch - Spikes - Wood Hammer / Spiky Shield I don't get why you have Drain Punch+Synthesis with Leftovers, that's like biting off more than you chew in a way '-') Spiky Shield can be run over wood hammer as you can heal up and cause a few mons to lose damage by hitting you. But keeping wood hammer would be better as nothing really hits water types for super effective except Raikou who is going to get blocked by Quaggys and Perts and Toads alike. Spoiler: Toxicroak Toxicroak as a sweeper in OU is a very hard to pull off, and for God's sake pls do explain what your pokemon do with their moves even if most people know. That I think is just being lazy. You have Drain Punch on this mon as well so why use Black Sludge? Use Life Orb to maximize the damage to your opponents. Another suggestion can be replacing SD or Sucker Punch (Swords Dance mostly) for Ice Punch. It gets both Gliscor and Landorus-T which is a plus. You could also run a Lum Berry just in case. No good enough players gonna let you SD twice. Forget about it, even up high ladder they won't let you SD twice and have live to laugh another day. Spoiler: Heatran You haven't written it's nature down, I am assuming it's timid. Earth Power isn't STAB lol. It's mainly there to deal with Volcanion and Heatran and is good coverage, It also helps dealing with Zard X if your balloon is still intact, don't ever use it to switchin to things that aren't fire tbh, the balloon staying is going to help a long way through. Have you typed the moves and spreads yourself? Why not just copy paste from your importable? Oh, no importable. Another thing to not is since aren't going to be troubled by bulky waters anytime soon cause of Raikou and Ches you might better use taunt > toxic just to beat the hell out of things that might wanna heal/wishpass/twave you like Chansey, Blissey and Clefable and force them out.You can dump earth power for ancient power if you wanna really kill Talonflame in one go. I would prefer a bulkier set, the Specially Defensive one especially doe. Spoiler: Mega Swampert Okay, you aren't running Mega Swampert without rain support and IDK its nature cause you forgot to yet again, assuming it's either adamant or jolly it's not much far a good mega option by far. It's going to be countered by Rotom-W who'll just burn you away. Same goes to Rocky Helmet Skarm who doesn't care about superpower that much at all lol. Spoiler: Raikou Again, no nature, what the heal?! Each and every pokemon in your team seem to have a fighting move to fend off steels so why a fire move on this? The coverage choices are bad, I suggest HP Grass/Ice for extra coverage against waters/flying types and Shadow Ball. I see no reason to use Extransensory anyway. Spoiler: Alakazam You what bro? Alakazam can't check anything really. Checking is being able to switch into something and then kill it/force it out a few times after which it becomes too weak to switch and boom. Alakazam does nothing of that. Run Psyshock > Psychic as that is going to Chansey harder also instead of HP Ice you may want to use Encore to keep a leech seeding/spiking/rocking mon doing it for a while, while you whittle it down. Even Calm Mind is a good option as that will nuke up Alakazam really nice or Recover cause healing. Another option is switching out Shadow Ball > Dazzling Gleam you'll still hit that Latwins and as a plus hit Mega Sab. Jirachi for that matter can be Focus Blasted and/or Heatran and Raikou take of that. That was the member by member rating. Now for the threat lists and substitutions. Mega Sableye combined with stallbreaker BU Talonflame is going to be extremely threatening to your team especially since such teams are going to have strong sp.def walls/pivots like Jirachi, or Chansey. Quagsire is going to cockblock your Toxicroak anyday/ Mega Sab can burn everything bar Heatran who might end up getting knocked on the switch and switch before it gets trapped. Zard Y is going to have a field day as it OHKOs Croak, Ches, Heatran, Alakazam (too an extent, I remember that Modest KOs) and Swampert cause it usually has with it Focus Blast and Solar Beam and as you don't have rain to support your mega then dead mega. Then only reliable switchin is Raikou who's not appreciating a Modest Fire Blast any day and since you have no defogger/spinner to take care of hazards, let's face it even Raikou and Heatran aren't going to continuously check Banded Talonflame continuously and neither is Raikou continuously forcing out Zard Y especially after taking a fire blast. Scarf Land-T is also a relevant mon as it can U-Turn out of both Ches and that U-turn might end up breaking Tran's balloon. And then it freely KO Raikou/Heatran and if that opposing team has Talon den gg. I might suggest using Mega Altaria over Mega Swampert as it is going to check Zard Y a decent amount of times and roost up to check even more. Altaria @ Altarianite Ability: Cloud Nine EVs: 252 HP / 100 Def / 156 SpD Bold/Impish /Relaxed Nature - Roost - Hyper Voice / Return - Heal Bell - Flamethrower / Earthquake The best for you I think would be Return and Earthquake for Steel types not Skarm as Skarm seems to be handled pretty well with Tran and Raikou around, keep Altaria impish. Cloud Nine helps shutting down the Drought and then you can mega evolve and roost and force it out pretty well.. Alakazam revenge kills Mega Venusaur and Heracross but it can't into any really. And Mega Lop kills you, it's faster. A suggestion would replacing Alakazam for Scarf Jirachi, Adamant or Jolly with Iron Head/Heart Stamp/U-Turn/Drain Punch or Fire Punch or Ice Punch. You can check Megacross' Rock Blast and Bullet Seed and too an extent it's close combat/pin missile (switches in once and survives both unless hazards) and den proceed to KO or flinch to death. It can switch into all of Venu's moves bar EQ/HP Fire but it still is able to switch in and can proceed to KO with Heart Stamp. Same for Mega Lop but watch out for it's HJK. EDIT: Come to think of it, your team just gets trucked by Mega Gardevoir, Zard Y is situational really but Mega Gardevoir has 2 100% accuracy STABst hat hit like a truck and Focus Blast for Heatran, Jirachi is going to be very very helpful as Shadow Ball on Garde is very common and it is pretty much the only thing you'll have for Garde so use it. Idk where to apply a defogger/spinner into your team as you don't want to replace either of your first three mons. If you can you can replace Raikou for Latios/Latias who can defog for you. However do change Alakazam to Rachi as that way you aren't prone to being fairy bait (especially Mega Garde) Latios/Latias both check Heatran and Zard Y for you especially making the thing easier at the cost of losing a check to Talon however you still have Heatran (and Altaria) and both check wonderfully. Run LO on Latios with defog/psyshock/draco meteor/surf. Surf is for opposing Heatrans. Run Timid max spA and speed. For Latias... Latias @ Life Orb Ability: Levitate EVs: 72 HP / 184 SpA / 252 Spe Timid Nature - Draco Meteor - Psyshock - Healing Wish - Defog Standard set. The HP will help you sop some common special moves and Healing Wish is there to use for anyone of your attacking pokemon like Croak, Heatran and the like. Hope I helped. ciao!
Very very much, thanks a lot! Taking into account your recommendations and some other guides' information, I'll update my original post with some changes. I'm still deciding on which Mega to use though.. Latios, Latias or Altaria
Latios and Latias should stay normal, their megas aren't half as good. It's either this or that. If you want to use Mega Altaria+Lati@s or Mega Altaria+Raikou. You choose.
shucks :/ I just updated my first post with a major revamp including Mega Latias. Mind checking the revamp? Any new recommendations? In the end, which mega should I use? Agh... this aint easy lol... I really dont want to netdeck one of those typical OU teams; I just want to try and make a competitive Chesnaught team + other 5 pokemons I like Also regarding the importable.. do you mean the site or place from where I got each pokemon's setup? the thing is.. some of them were adapted to my liking by combining different imports like the updated Heatran and Latias and the already removed Raikou and Alakazam and in the other cases it just felt cheap to copy-paste someone else's idea, but I can do it if it's allowed Thanks a lot for your answers!
Do /importable on po with your team. Click link and copy paste the text, add it within spoilers. Remove any unused pokemon, no strikethroughs. Ice punch hits lando and glis. Dragons are something better handled by Mega Altaria lol. A single DD is enough for zard x to ruin Mega latias. Mega alt effing roosts on its face. You kinda ruined the team with the current rendition, gengar isn't the best blocker, psyshock from starmie and eq from exca just finishes it. I am kinda lost with you slapping in random mons that I haven't even mentioned lol. My suggestion is to go back to the earlier rendition, and replace Mega Alt > Mega Pert (It's neither weak to bug or dark like mega latias and resist them as well as fight, u don't wanna lose out on drag immunity.) Lati@s > Kou (not mega but either of the sets mentioned) and finally Scarf Jira > Alak (the above mentioned set) for the time being. Then tell me here how's it's functioning then we can see.
yeah well... I updated the original post with suggestions I got from other site saying that I could aim for a hazard team, so I went ahead with Chesnaught (Spikes), Heatran (Stealth Rock) and Cofagrigus (Toxic Spikes) so Chesnaught and Heatran both worked for each other's weaknesses and Cofagrigus acted as a Spinblocker. However, I found Gengar to be a little bit better as a Spinblocker than Cofagrigus, so I opted for him and sacrificed Toxic Spikes. That's more or less the thought process for the revamped team XD Now regarding your posts, just found out what you meant by importable (duh') so your suggestion would be something like this right? Spoiler: Team Toxicroak (M) @ Life Orb Ability: Dry Skin EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe Jolly Nature (+Spe, -SpA) - Ice Punch - Drain Punch - Gunk Shot - Sucker Punch Latias (F) @ Life Orb Ability: Levitate EVs: 72 HP / 184 SpA / 252 Spe Timid Nature (+Spe, -Atk) - Draco Meteor - Psyshock - Healing Wish - Defog Heatran (M) @ Air Balloon Ability: Flash Fire EVs: 252 HP / 188 SpD / 68 Spe Calm Nature (+SpD, -Atk) - Lava Plume - Earth Power - Stealth Rock - Toxic Chesnaught (M) @ Leftovers Ability: Bulletproof EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD Impish Nature (+Def, -SpA) - Drain Punch - Wood Hammer - Leech Seed - Spikes Altaria (F) @ Altarianite Ability: Cloud Nine EVs: 252 HP / 100 Def / 156 SpD Impish Nature (+Def, -SpA) - Return - Earthquake - Heal Bell - Roost Jirachi @ Choice Scarf Ability: Serene Grace EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe Jolly Nature (+Spe, -SpA) - Iron Head - Heart Stamp - Drain Punch - U-turn Im really liking this setup, thanks! I'll test it out right now. Some questions though... is Jirachi a must or can it be replaced by, say.. Bisharp? Also, just to have more choices in order to do more testing, is there any other mega worth trying in the team besides Altaria?
Not sure about anything apart from Mega Altaria. Bisharp and Jirachi play extremely different roles, while scarf rachi is a revenge killer, Bisharp is a late game sweeper plus anti-hazard control so keep Rachi. Your importable tho, remove the sprites from it, and paste in the original post. This team has probably achieved it's final stage really, I can't really make you further than this. But however I might suggest an EV spread of 252 HP/ 136 SpD/ 120 Spe on Heatran with leftovers item. The reason is firstly you have Ches to handle EQs and secondly outspeed max speed Azumarill so you can go for a burn versus that. Additionally you can go for 200 speed EVs which put at 240 speed that sacrifices bulk for outspeeding adamant Bisharp and Breloom who don't appreciate the burn from lava plume. I guess am done for now later.
A last question though. Say.. what if I wanted to change Toxicroak for another pokemon? do you have suggestions regarding the matter? I mean.. after a lot of testings, I have had really good results with the team, but Toxicroak, even if he hits really hard he is kinda fragile and not exactly fast. I guess an option would be another anti-Fairy, a fast sweeper perhaps? Scolipede maybe? or is Jirachi alone enough?
There is SD Cobalion, SD or Mixed Nape with Gunk Shot, SD Excadrill and few others that I can't get in my mind rn. However they still have a weakness Talon's STABs. However I do think the team is good as it is now (again) It's better that you start new teams and experiment on which mons are better choices instead of sticking to one team really. That's how good players are made.