[OVERVIEW]
Roserade is one of the best Spikes and Toxic Spikes setters in the metagame and the only one with a significant offensive presence. With access to Sleep Powder, Leaf Storm, and a high base 125 Special Attack stat, Roserade can set Toxic Spikes on the many Water- and Ground-types of the tier such as Swampert, Suicune, Hippowdon, Starmie, and Quagsire. Toxic Spikes are useful in dealing with grounded threats such as Tyranitar, Swampert, Machamp, Suicune, Infernape, and Blissey. Roserade is also the most common grounded Poison-type, allowing it to remove opposing Toxic Spikes for these Pokemon upon entry. Despite its offensive leaning stats, with investment, Roserade is also a solid defensive Spikes setter and can answer Breloom by virtue of resisting its most common attacks. Crucially, Roserade is the only common Spikes setter that isn’t trapped by Magnezone. These qualities and its resistances make it unique as a Spiker compared to Skarmory, the other most common Spiker in the metagame. As a lead, Roserade is a decent disabler with a Choice Scarf, as it outspeeds all common unboosted leads and either puts them to sleep should they lack a Lum Berry or offensively threatens them with powerful coverage.
Unfortunately, Roserade has critical movepool issues, faces heavy competition from Skarmory, and is really easy to wear down. Sadly, Roserade has to choose between using Spikes or the combination of Sleep Powder and Leaf Storm, as they are illegal all together. This forces offensive Roserade sets to either forgo its best offensive tools for Stun Spore and Grass Knot or set Toxic Spikes instead. While Toxic Spikes are very effective against certain Pokemon such as Tyranitar, common team structures are built to mitigate their impact. Due to the rise of Clefable, some stall teams are entirely immune to Toxic Spikes, while many offensive teams stack Steel-types, Lum Berry, and non-grounded Pokemon. As a Grass-type, Roserade doesn’t have many options to hit Steel- and Dragon-types; often, it is forced to pick between Hidden Power Ice and Hidden Power Fire, both of which leave it walled by Heatran unless it uses Hidden Power Ground. As a Spiker, Skarmory is often more effective than Roserade due to its defensive typing, much better Defense stat, and access to recovery in Roost. Roserade’s own defensive typing, low Defense, lack of reliable recovery, and vulnerability to Spikes and sand make it really easy to wear down. It often cannot fulfill defensive roles long-term, even with full investment. Because of this, balanced teams built around Roserade can have significant defensive holes that are difficult to cover with the options available.
[STRATEGY COMMENTS]
Other Options
=============
Like many Grass-types, Roserade has a few options not especially effective in the modern DPP OU metagame, such as Leech Seed, Life Orb, and Choice Specs. Leech Seed sets are invalidated by Clefable and the general pace of the offensive teams that would OHKO Roserade before it could take advantage of it. Life Orb exacerbates Roserade’s weakness to residual damage, and Choice Specs often locks Roserade into an attack with heavy drawbacks or poor coverage. Roserade has a wealth of coverage moves to hit specific targets such as Shadow Ball for Rotom-A, Extrasensory for Breloom, Machamp, and Gengar, and Weather Ball for Zapdos and Dragonite in sand, but these often don't provide enough value for the moveslot. Roserade can always use Rest and switch with Natural Cure to heal itself to help against residual damage but struggles to fit it and loses a lot of momentum. Roserade also gets Worry Seed to remove Clefable’s Magic Guard, Aromatherapy to heal teammates' status conditions, Sunny Day or Rain Dance to clear the weather, and Growth to potentially sweep, but Roserade is often too frail to take advantage of these, and they use up a valuable moveslot.
Checks and Counters
===================
**Offensive Pokemon with Lum Berry**: If Roserade can't sleep or OHKO the foe, it is probably going to threaten Roserade. While Machamp, Dragonite, Gyarados, and Metagross can take a lot of damage from Roserade's coverage options, they heavily damage offensive variants back and punish Roserade hard if it uses Sleep Powder on them. More defensive Roserade variants often can't hurt these Pokemon very hard outside of status. Lum Berry Stealth Rock users such as Azelf and Heatran are unimpeded by Roserade trying to disable them. Lum Berry Pokemon are especially dangerous if they are faster than Roserade's average Speed, as it is has a very low Defense stat and is really frail without investment.
**Steel-types**: If it lacks Hidden Power Fire or Ground, Roserade can't touch most Steel-types. Scizor OHKOes offensive Roserade with Bullet Punch, Skarmory and Forretress set up unimpeded, Heatran roasts it with Fire-types moves, Jirachi 2HKOes with Iron Head, and Metagross 2HKOes it at worst with Meteor Mash. However, they do not enjoy being statused.
**Dragon-types**: On the other hand, if Roserade lacks Hidden Power Ice or Sludge Bomb, Dragon-types completely wall Roserade. Dragonite is especially dangerous, as its +1 Extreme Speed OHKOes it after Stealth Rock. Latias doesn't take a lot of damage from either of those options and OHKOes with Choice Specs Draco Meteor. Flygon and Kingdra threaten it similarly. Again, none of these Pokemon enjoy being statused.
**Poison-types**: Roserade struggles to hit other Poison-types such as Gengar and Tentacruel very hard without Extrasensory. Gengar easily 2HKOes most Roserade while grounded Poison-types such as Tentacruel, Nidoqueen, and other Roserade critically absorb Toxic Spikes, rendering the offensive variant's sacrifice in vain should it faint before they are revealed.
**Flying-types**: Roserade doesn't have very good coverage options to hit Flying-types such as Zapdos, Dragonite, and Skarmory. Should it lack the correct Hidden Power, Roserade often cannot do anything to them but status them, especially because they're immune to Spikes and Toxic Spikes.
**Residual damage**: Roserade is grounded, weak to sand, frail, and commonly can't heal itself. Roserade often wants to switch into attacks such as Breloom's Superpower and Swampert's Waterfall, but residual damage often makes this impossible to do more than once. Roserade often gets worn down very easily from even weaker attacks such as Rotom-A's Shadow Ball and defensive's Latias's Ice Beam, meaning it often has only a few turns to make an impact.
**Special Walls*: Clefable, Blissey, Latias, and Heatran are often unbeatable foes for Roserade unless it has the exact move it needs such as Hidden Power Ground for Heatran or Sleep Powder. Clefable especially invalidates options such as Leech Seed or Toxic Spikes. However, other than Heatran, these options are quite passive and let Roserade set up entry hazards before it faints.
**Priority**: Roserade is extremely physically frail and doesn't resist most priority. Dragonite, Lucario, Scizor, Mamoswine, and Weavile all hit Roserade very hard, potentially OHKOing offensive variants.
**Substitute**: Substitute attackers such as Jirachi, Empoleon, Dragonite, and Gengar are especially devastating to Roserade, as they easily can KO or set up on it and if Roserade lacks the correct coverage move, it might fail to break the Substitute.
[CREDITS]
Written by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/johnnyg2.57904/
Quality checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/oiponabys.435540/
Grammar checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/ken.594478/
Roserade is one of the best Spikes and Toxic Spikes setters in the metagame and the only one with a significant offensive presence. With access to Sleep Powder, Leaf Storm, and a high base 125 Special Attack stat, Roserade can set Toxic Spikes on the many Water- and Ground-types of the tier such as Swampert, Suicune, Hippowdon, Starmie, and Quagsire. Toxic Spikes are useful in dealing with grounded threats such as Tyranitar, Swampert, Machamp, Suicune, Infernape, and Blissey. Roserade is also the most common grounded Poison-type, allowing it to remove opposing Toxic Spikes for these Pokemon upon entry. Despite its offensive leaning stats, with investment, Roserade is also a solid defensive Spikes setter and can answer Breloom by virtue of resisting its most common attacks. Crucially, Roserade is the only common Spikes setter that isn’t trapped by Magnezone. These qualities and its resistances make it unique as a Spiker compared to Skarmory, the other most common Spiker in the metagame. As a lead, Roserade is a decent disabler with a Choice Scarf, as it outspeeds all common unboosted leads and either puts them to sleep should they lack a Lum Berry or offensively threatens them with powerful coverage.
Unfortunately, Roserade has critical movepool issues, faces heavy competition from Skarmory, and is really easy to wear down. Sadly, Roserade has to choose between using Spikes or the combination of Sleep Powder and Leaf Storm, as they are illegal all together. This forces offensive Roserade sets to either forgo its best offensive tools for Stun Spore and Grass Knot or set Toxic Spikes instead. While Toxic Spikes are very effective against certain Pokemon such as Tyranitar, common team structures are built to mitigate their impact. Due to the rise of Clefable, some stall teams are entirely immune to Toxic Spikes, while many offensive teams stack Steel-types, Lum Berry, and non-grounded Pokemon. As a Grass-type, Roserade doesn’t have many options to hit Steel- and Dragon-types; often, it is forced to pick between Hidden Power Ice and Hidden Power Fire, both of which leave it walled by Heatran unless it uses Hidden Power Ground. As a Spiker, Skarmory is often more effective than Roserade due to its defensive typing, much better Defense stat, and access to recovery in Roost. Roserade’s own defensive typing, low Defense, lack of reliable recovery, and vulnerability to Spikes and sand make it really easy to wear down. It often cannot fulfill defensive roles long-term, even with full investment. Because of this, balanced teams built around Roserade can have significant defensive holes that are difficult to cover with the options available.
[STRATEGY COMMENTS]
Other Options
=============
Like many Grass-types, Roserade has a few options not especially effective in the modern DPP OU metagame, such as Leech Seed, Life Orb, and Choice Specs. Leech Seed sets are invalidated by Clefable and the general pace of the offensive teams that would OHKO Roserade before it could take advantage of it. Life Orb exacerbates Roserade’s weakness to residual damage, and Choice Specs often locks Roserade into an attack with heavy drawbacks or poor coverage. Roserade has a wealth of coverage moves to hit specific targets such as Shadow Ball for Rotom-A, Extrasensory for Breloom, Machamp, and Gengar, and Weather Ball for Zapdos and Dragonite in sand, but these often don't provide enough value for the moveslot. Roserade can always use Rest and switch with Natural Cure to heal itself to help against residual damage but struggles to fit it and loses a lot of momentum. Roserade also gets Worry Seed to remove Clefable’s Magic Guard, Aromatherapy to heal teammates' status conditions, Sunny Day or Rain Dance to clear the weather, and Growth to potentially sweep, but Roserade is often too frail to take advantage of these, and they use up a valuable moveslot.
Checks and Counters
===================
**Offensive Pokemon with Lum Berry**: If Roserade can't sleep or OHKO the foe, it is probably going to threaten Roserade. While Machamp, Dragonite, Gyarados, and Metagross can take a lot of damage from Roserade's coverage options, they heavily damage offensive variants back and punish Roserade hard if it uses Sleep Powder on them. More defensive Roserade variants often can't hurt these Pokemon very hard outside of status. Lum Berry Stealth Rock users such as Azelf and Heatran are unimpeded by Roserade trying to disable them. Lum Berry Pokemon are especially dangerous if they are faster than Roserade's average Speed, as it is has a very low Defense stat and is really frail without investment.
**Steel-types**: If it lacks Hidden Power Fire or Ground, Roserade can't touch most Steel-types. Scizor OHKOes offensive Roserade with Bullet Punch, Skarmory and Forretress set up unimpeded, Heatran roasts it with Fire-types moves, Jirachi 2HKOes with Iron Head, and Metagross 2HKOes it at worst with Meteor Mash. However, they do not enjoy being statused.
**Dragon-types**: On the other hand, if Roserade lacks Hidden Power Ice or Sludge Bomb, Dragon-types completely wall Roserade. Dragonite is especially dangerous, as its +1 Extreme Speed OHKOes it after Stealth Rock. Latias doesn't take a lot of damage from either of those options and OHKOes with Choice Specs Draco Meteor. Flygon and Kingdra threaten it similarly. Again, none of these Pokemon enjoy being statused.
**Poison-types**: Roserade struggles to hit other Poison-types such as Gengar and Tentacruel very hard without Extrasensory. Gengar easily 2HKOes most Roserade while grounded Poison-types such as Tentacruel, Nidoqueen, and other Roserade critically absorb Toxic Spikes, rendering the offensive variant's sacrifice in vain should it faint before they are revealed.
**Flying-types**: Roserade doesn't have very good coverage options to hit Flying-types such as Zapdos, Dragonite, and Skarmory. Should it lack the correct Hidden Power, Roserade often cannot do anything to them but status them, especially because they're immune to Spikes and Toxic Spikes.
**Residual damage**: Roserade is grounded, weak to sand, frail, and commonly can't heal itself. Roserade often wants to switch into attacks such as Breloom's Superpower and Swampert's Waterfall, but residual damage often makes this impossible to do more than once. Roserade often gets worn down very easily from even weaker attacks such as Rotom-A's Shadow Ball and defensive's Latias's Ice Beam, meaning it often has only a few turns to make an impact.
**Special Walls*: Clefable, Blissey, Latias, and Heatran are often unbeatable foes for Roserade unless it has the exact move it needs such as Hidden Power Ground for Heatran or Sleep Powder. Clefable especially invalidates options such as Leech Seed or Toxic Spikes. However, other than Heatran, these options are quite passive and let Roserade set up entry hazards before it faints.
**Priority**: Roserade is extremely physically frail and doesn't resist most priority. Dragonite, Lucario, Scizor, Mamoswine, and Weavile all hit Roserade very hard, potentially OHKOing offensive variants.
**Substitute**: Substitute attackers such as Jirachi, Empoleon, Dragonite, and Gengar are especially devastating to Roserade, as they easily can KO or set up on it and if Roserade lacks the correct coverage move, it might fail to break the Substitute.
[CREDITS]
Written by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/johnnyg2.57904/
Quality checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/oiponabys.435540/
Grammar checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/ken.594478/
Last edited:
