OK so, what are we doing here? Are we just using a garbo-mon just for the sake of using it? The question when using any unconventional mon, is "why am I using this mon, instead of counterparts that may be better than it?" In OU, there are 2 groups of mons that I can easily compare Nidoking to, in terms of what it offers to a team. The first is the most obvious: comparing it to the other relevent ground types in the tier. By using Nidoking over Rhydon, you're missing out on some incredibly useful factors, such as the invaluable normal resist, the sky high defense stat, and the ability to cleanly 2hko Chansey among other things. But Nidoking is not directly outclassed in every way, at least not in the same way that it would be if you wanted to use Rhyhorn in OU, for example. Most notably, Nidoking has a fairly respectable speed stat, letting it outpace mons that Rhydon and even Sandslash can't without para support, mons like Exeggutor, Chansey, Lapras, Cloyster and Victrebell. It also has a fairly good special stat, letting it take ice beam/blizzard far better. And with that special stat Nidoking also has an incredible movepool, and while its offences struggle to match Rhydons edge-quake coverage, Nidoking can match the damage of rock slide vs Cloyster with thunderbolt, and notably can outdamage Rhydon against Exeggutor and opposing Rhydons. The second group that we're considering as potential mons to outclass Nidoking, is from fast attackers that either serve to soften up the enemy teams defenses for Tauros to finish up late game, or to allow Tauros to be played more aggressively so that they themselves can clean up. Mons like Persian can come to mind for example, or maybe Kangaskhaan. And while not nearly as fast as Persian, Nidoking still offers significant offensive potential to weaken stuff like Chansey, and the big thing Nidoking has over the 2 mentioned mons is a thunder wave immunity, preserving its speed tier in the face of threatening paralysis.
Team: https://pokepast.es/92eb08b1306367e0
Replays:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen1ou-1853017977 (Getting Nidoking value in the Starmie matchup)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen1ou-1851653068 (Whenever Chansey goes to sleep, Lapras will always go crazy)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen1ou-1845174675 (When you put yourself in a winning position, but they crit and you die from 100%. Still a fun game)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen1ou-1843189601 (stomp is a funny move)
Weebs Bane (Starmie)
Ability: No Ability
- Thunder Wave
- Psychic
- Thunderbolt
- Recover
Starmie is the chosen lead for the team, here so spread paralysis and absorb sleep against common stuff like Gengar Jynx and Exeggutor. Starmie is also our safest option versus Cloyster and can let us pivot between itself and Chansey to purge special drops, offering utility to the team even while asleep. Psycic+thunderbolt means we can't threaten Exeggutor outside of special drops, but hitting Gengar and Snorlax hard is imperative for the team, as well as hitting opposing Starmie and Slowbro. I think I'm ok with not hitting Eggy but I guess there's an argument to be made that blizzard might fit in here over Psychic. Most games if you thunder wave the Chansey switch in turn 1 you're losing a ton of momentum, but our sleeper is fairly unreliable, and our attackers honestly appreciate a paralyzed Chansey. Nidoking lacks the ability to 2hko Chansey without a crit, but spamming earthquake will force softboileds until you eventually get a full para or crit. Keep in mind anytime I mention Starmie filling a role for the team, that Starmie is almost always the sleep absorber, so stuff like threatening Snorlax won't always be a possibility throughout the entire game.
Hail to the king (Nidoking) (M)
Ability: No Ability
- Earthquake
- Blizzard
- Thunderbolt
- Surf
Nidoking defensively does one thing and one thing only: it switches into thunderbolt and thunder wave. So the idea of the team is to bait those moves as much as possible in order to fully take advantage of that. This means we have easy switch in opportunities if played correctly vs the likes of Chansey, Zapdos, Jolteon and even potentially a paralyzed Starmie. Starmie is often forced to recover spam vs you if it wants to be able to continually switch into EQ, so you've got a few opportunities to fish for a paralysis or crit with thunderbolt as that happens. If your ground type can't beat Zapdos 1v1, then the meme isn't even worth using, and I'm happy to report that blizzard just BARELY ekes out enough damage over drill peck that you come out on top barring crits. Spreading paralysis and chip damage can be extremely vital for Nidoking to not be dead weight, the biggest things standing in its way is being outsped by Starmie and Alakazam, and struggling to 2hko Snorlax, Exeggutor, Cloyster or Chansey without prior damage (primarily Snorlax, the other 3 can be muscled past throughout the course of the game by Nidoking with proper play). However meeting these 2 conditions really turns Nidoking into a threatening offensive presence, expecially with how strong EQ+its coverage moves are. Interestingly enough, while poison is a terrible secondary typing defensively, we gain a little bit of utility with it for switching into Victrebells razor leaf (which will never 2hko) or Gengar mega drain. It's also worth noting that the team can struggle against Victrebell, so preserving the mons that outspeed it is very important in that matchup.
Kings Water Steed (Lapras)
Ability: No Ability
- Blizzard
- Thunderbolt
- Sing
- Rest
As mentioned, Lapras supports Nidoking in several ways. It baits thunderbolts, it eats Exeggutor, it threatens physical Snorlax (particularly reflect lax which can sit on Nidoking), and it can sleep Starmie or Chansey. Nidoking also excels at trading into Chansey, which in turn makes Lapras far more threatening. It kind of sucks using Lapras as my sleeper with how unreliable it can be, and in games where the opposing Chansey gets parad Lapras can instantly turn into dead weight. But with the impressive bulk Lapras offers you've got many opportunities to spam sing, and as long as Chansey isn't parad it always has to respect the sleep. I'm running rest as my final move over body slam/hyper beam as I really appreciate the longevity. There aren't a ton of opportunities to use it but you can rest alongside Lax in some circumstances and it lets you sit on Ice beam+reflect Chansey which is a set that's proved annoying to the team. There's other decent opportunities too, burning sleep turns on paras isn't too uncommon and theres some mons that can't touch you like parad Cloyster.
Gen 1 Moment (Snorlax)
Ability: No Ability
- Body Slam
- Reflect
- Self-Destruct
- Rest
The Snorlax set I settled on was mainly tailored against reflect Chansey, with self destruct providing the necessary damage onto a Chansey that's feeling relatively safe behind a reflect. The other major boom targets are Eggy and Starmie, luring any one of these 3 mons can really give a ton of opportunity to the rest of the team. Some lesser targets but still valid are Alakazam, as well as being a safety check against Slowbro. This set retains all the practicality as just a regular reflect lax in terms of soft checking opposing lax, Rhydon or Tauros to a degree, while potentially luring a major threat for a quick elimination. Completely walled by Gengar, but we have Starmie to outspeed with Psychic, and thunderbolt Gengar can't touch Nidoking, and non thunderbolt Gengar struggles to damage Lapras. Plus as our second attack is self destruct, a lot of people will fear the EQ on their Gengar, giving us a bit of wiggle room to bluff it. I've also considered just an all out attacking Snorlax set, but I find it hard to pull the trigger and forgo reflect/rest as the utility gained from longevity is hard to understate, and forcing other Snorlax to rest is one of the better opportunities to take advantage of it with Lapras or Starmie.
Balanced Breakfast (Chansey) (F)
Ability: No Ability
- Ice Beam
- Thunderbolt
- Thunder Wave
- Soft-Boiled
The Chansey set I'm using is probably the most vanilla Chansey set you'll see out there, being just standard bolt-beam. It's important because it gives me a good matchup into primarily Starmie, with ice beam punishing mons like Exeggutor and Rhydon harshly, while also chipping Snorlax and threatening a freeze. It's also able to play the fish for freeze war vs opposing Chansey, although as I mentioned before it's not the end of the world if opposing Chansey gets parad. The team can really struggle against alakazam, even with the ability to pivot between Chansey and Starmie to flush out special drops. I've been really considering dropping something for seismic toss, literally just to help vs Alakazam, but I can't drop thunderbolt as I need it to beat Starmie, and dropping ice beam just seems like a ludicrous idea since hitting Rhydon and Eggy is huge, and going toe to toe in a freeze race against opposing Chansey is absolutely necessary.
Obligatory Bull (Tauros) (M)
Ability: No Ability
- Body Slam
- Earthquake
- Stomp
- Hyper Beam
The Tauros set I'm using is very likely suboptimal. If we're realistically trying to improve the team, we'd just run the standard with blizzard over stomp (which would also improve our Rhydon martchup). The idea of stomp was essentially with Lapras as our only sleeper, this team is far more focused on spreading paralysis than most teams, and given Starmie/Lapras/Nidoking all threaten Rhydon offensively stomp felt like a cheesy little tech to muscle past paralysed stuff like Chansey or Slowbro as a last ditch effort. It can also situationally have massive benefit in the Tauros mirror if I've taken damage and they haven't.
Team weaknesses:
Rhydon - While almost every mon on the team can threaten it in some way, switching into Rhydon can be difficult. This issue can be further compounded as Nidoking surf is a fairly low roll to ohko from full. It's worth mentioning Rhydon EQ will never ohko you back without a crit, but preserving hp on NIdoking is often very important for checking Zapdos and Chansey as we often need to take hits from them to beat them 1v1.
Alakazam - It might just be how I'm playing around it, but I find Zam lead to be a really annoying mon to deal with. It's excellent at harassing stuff like Chansey through paras with special drops and crits. But if it wants to stay in to harass Chansey, it's going to be eating a thunder wave which ultimately helps Nidoking/Tauros in the endgame.
Victrebell - For some reason I've had a lot of difficulty against this mon. From outspeeding Lapras, to paralyzing Nidoking, this mon finds its way in muscling past my teams would be checks to it throughout the game. Starmie helps in the matchup in theory, but I'll usually realize I'm facing a Victrebell matchup after Starmie has already eaten a sleep. So really this leaves only Tauros and Nidoking to potentially threaten it, and a Victrebell trading blizzard damage for a stun spore/sleep powder onto either one of these 2 mons is disastrous.
Chansey - Reflect Chansey can be a struggle to deal with, but even just standard bolt-beam can invalidate a lot of the team if it gets paralyzed. I guess prioritizing not getting it parad could help, but it's really difficult to not thunder wave a Jynx lead. I typically need to trade Nidoking to weaken it so Tauros can finish it off, but this becomes concerning when facing matchups where Nidoking is required to be healthy, like in the Zapdos/Jolteon matchup for instance.
Zapdos - Ironically enough, the team can struggle vs Zapdos. The Zapdos v Nidoking matchup will be decided by whoever crits like 6 games out of 10, and that's not even counting the games I get impatient and use Nidoking to soften up Chansey, as any bit of chip damage turns the matchup from in favor of Nido into that of Zapdos