SS OU The Poison Jungle (Nidoking + Grass Spam)

[PikaSpark]

Introduction
Hello! This is my first time here at the forums, and I am here to seek advice, criticism etc on my first attempt at a Gen 8 OU Team. It probably has a lot of flaws I haven't encountered yet :'( This is not a high elo team, just around 1500 give or take.
Anyways, I have only been playing this format for about 2 months, and I have been only playing with Sample Teams so far, climbing to 1400 or so on the ladder. But recently, I finally decided to try and build my own team. Thank you in advance, I hope this was detailed enough to let you know what I was thinking as I built this team.

I give to you the Poison Jungle, named in honor of the Nidoking + Rillaboom

https://pokepast.es/62b4546b42ee02b6 here's ur paste :)

My Teambuilding Thought Process

I wanted to start off with Nidoking, a great wallbreaker in my opinion :)




This slot was actually very random, but it worked out. I just thought of what Nidoking was weak to, and Ground type attacks popped up first in my mind. Because usually the ground moves in this format is Earthquake, I wanted to add a grassy surge mon. A priority Grassy Glide is also amazing.




I decided to twist this team into some sort of Grass Spam to make good use of my Grassy Terrain, so I slapped on a Kartana.




One of the most effective counters to Grass Spam is Tornadus-T. Zapdos could help deal with it, as well as potentially cripple it with Static when it attempts a U-turn. The reliable recovery in Roost also felt very nice. Defog also helps :)




I realized I had three weaknesses to Ice, so I added Heatran. It also benefits off Grassy terrain, with the terrain slightly weakening Earthquake's power.




I panicked on what mon I should put here, so I frantically tried to form a Fire-Water-Grass typing synergy cuz I didn't know what else to do. I went to Teambuilder, typed Water, and I just considered what could counter opposing Nidoking. Urshifu-R used to take this spot at first, but eventually I realized all my water resists were physical; which means Scald is extremely dangerous. Keldeo was added as a substitute+calm mind user, seeing I didn't have any set up users on my team o_o

Da Team


Nidoking (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Earth Power
- Sludge Wave
- Ice Beam
- Stealth Rock

Description

Slightly standard set. As for the Item, Life Orb + Sheer Force was just too good to pass up, as Sheer Force ignores the HP loss of Life Orb. Evs are very straightforward, all fully invested into SpA and Spe to let it hit as hard as possible. I don't really know if I should use Modest, but Timid felt safer in case there was anything important to outspeed. Sludge Wave and Earth Power is Nido's strongest STAB moves, while Ice Beam kills Landorus-T and other flying types. For the last move I considered going Flamethrower, but I noticed a lack of Stealth Rock and changed it at the last minute.
Edit: SRocks back to Flamethrower, Heatrans got the rocks :)

Rillaboom @ Choice Band
Ability: Grassy Surge
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Grassy Glide
- Superpower
- Wood Hammer
- U-turn

Description

Choice Band powers Rillaboom up amazingly, I really wanted to use it.
Since I'll usually be clicking priority Grassy Glide, speed didn't really matter to me, instead the extra power in Adamant felt better. Evs are very easy to figure out.
Grassy glide is absolutely a must, one-shotting mons like Weavile. And Superpower catches those Ferrothorn, Heatran switches and deals huge damage to them. Also does a fair bit to Corviknight as well. Wood Hammer picks up some KOs that Grassy Glide can't, and U-turn provides momentum. I might run Knock Off but overall the other moves were more valuable.

Edit: Running Swords Dance set now :)

Kartana @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Leaf Blade
- Knock Off
- Sacred Sword
- Smart Strike

Description

I really, really love Scarf Kartana. Its my favorite set to use, as it revenge kills a lot of stuff, and acts as an amazing cleaner.
I don't think I have to explain the evs :P
Leaf Blade powered up by Grassy Terrain is great, and when all the annoying resistances are gone, or severely chipped its the usual cleaning move to click. Knock Off is important for killing Dragapult, Blacephalon, and overall removing the item of switch-ins. Sacred Sword hits Steels such as Ferrothorn and Heatran, Smart Strike is another STAB that does 2HKO Tornadus-T with 252 HP/0 Def.

Zapdos @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Static
EVs: 248 HP / 220 Def / 40 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Discharge
- Hurricane
- Roost
- Defog

Description

Zapdos was necessary to counter Tornadus-T, and has proved very useful. I was not very creative so i went for the Smogon Utility set, they will tell you that 40 Spe Evs with Timid lets it outspeed Rillaboom. Discharge lets Zappy spread paralysis, while Hurricane deals decent damage against Grounds such as Landorus-T. Roost and Defog are all good utility :D Sometimes games are just won off keeping it healthy. Never risk Zapdos getting Toxic-ed unless its late game where Zap is just a sack ;-;

Heatran @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 232 SpD / 24 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Magma Storm
- Earth Power
- Taunt
- Toxic

Description

Heatran is an amazing wall to Volcarona and a lot of other stuff. This is the most famous moveset by far, Magma storm deals a decent chunk to a lot of pokemon, such as Landorus-T, taking away about 50% of Landorus-T's health with the trapping damage. Earth Power hits mirror matchups and Toxapex. Taunt stops healing and teleport from Blissey and Toxapex, also Clefable. Toxic is used to wear down Volcarona, and is just great utility. I'm not sure about the 24 Evs in Speed, Smogon didn't mention it and I just follow smogon movesets :P

Edit: Changed to Lava Plume / Stealth rock / Toxic / Protect

Keldeo-Resolute @ Leftovers
Ability: Justified
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
- Scald
- Secret Sword

Description

The reason I opted to run Keldeo instead of its brother-in-typing Urshifu-Rapid-Strike was because it had a few things going for it. Keldeo is best known by its ability to strike down Blissey even though it is special, through its signature move called Secret Sword. And I wanted something that could fill the role of a set-up user, seeing the lack of it on my team. This Keldeo can try to Substitue then find chances to Calm Mind, and its used to blow big holes in the enemy team.
Substitute is to avoid Leech seed or Status conditions, while Calm Mind is to boost you up. Scald+Secret Sword are its best reliable STAB moves, and Scald was used over the extra power of surf because the 30% burn cheesed me out of difficult situations often. Secret sword is famous for being able to break past Blissey, also hits steels such as ferro.

Problems I've Been Having
The most annoying thing is probably the Tapu Lele + Tornadus or some other flying. None of my pokemon can afford to switch into a Psychic except for Heatran, but that switch is just so read easily by Focus Blast. The best I can hope for is to hope for Psyshock into Kartana, or maybe even sack something to bring in a revenge killer safely. But Nidoking is too slow, while Kartana and Rillaboom are checked by Lele's partner, usually a flying type. I can try to stall out Psychic Terrain by spamming Roost on Zapdos, but Lele is ALSO usually accompanied by a ground type such as Landorus-T, who will Toxic my Zappy at first sight.
Also, Birds in general is kinda hard. I usually try to look for a toxic onto them with Heatran, or get off an Ice beam with Nidoking with a good prediction.
Outro
I've had a couple of different versions of this, sometimes using Urshifu, Tapu Fini, Rotom-W, Tornadus, Landorus etc.
This one was my most recent, and I felt like it was on the more stable side than the others. More often than not, I felt like I was working for the team, when it really should be the other way around.
Anyways I'd appreciate your input to improving this team. Thank you <3

 

[Gummybean999]

Dam, the team looks great. Only thing you could change would be giving heatran flash cannon over toxic, just so that you can beat lele

 

[Mathology0]

Dam, the team looks great. Only thing you could change would be giving heatran flash cannon over toxic, just so that you can beat lele

Heavy slam would do more damage and potentially ohko

 

[Fancy1]

Air balloon is also commonly run on heatran

you could also run life orb on Kartana and replace smart strike with swords and dance, if you get a revenge kill with Kartana it can easily snowball into a sweep

 

[PikaSpark]

Thanks a lot for the suggestions, gonna test them out and see how it goes :)
I do worry though, that without choice scarf Kartana will be too slow ;-;

 

[Fancy1]

max speed should be around 342 it should be able to outspeed a lot of stuff but if you want higher speed scarf sets are commonly run too :)

 

[ElStefano]

Very nice team indeed. Few suggestions to test, not sure if everything is an improvement, but still worth testing:

- Keldeo should rund taunt over substitute to beat haze toxapex.
- I'd try banded Kartana and SD Rillaboom to break even better. U loose the ability to u-turn into nido, but its well worth it imo.
- If you want to keep banded Rilla, have you ever tried timid Kartana with 0 attk EVs, 18 IVs if i remember correctly, and swords dance? Bit of a mene, but unexpected win con (Speed boosting after a kill).
- If you want to keep scarf Kart, try banded Bulu over Rilla. With Stone edge it can actually OHKO Torn on switch in, it stays around longer thanks to horn leech.
- Maybe switch Stealth Rocks from Nidoking to tran to run flamethrower on Nido. Heatran's trapper set is not needed in this team, since nothing capitalizes on the removal of Pex or Blissey. You could even opt for protect to get more recovery out of the terrain.

Maybe some of this helps =) Love the team!

 

[PikaSpark]

Very nice team indeed. Few suggestions to test, not sure if everything is an improvement, but still worth testing:

- Keldeo should rund taunt over substitute to beat haze toxapex.
- I'd try banded Kartana and SD Rillaboom to break even better. U loose the ability to u-turn into nido, but its well worth it imo.
- If you want to keep banded Rilla, have you ever tried timid Kartana with 0 attk EVs, 18 IVs if i remember correctly, and swords dance? Bit of a mene, but unexpected win con (Speed boosting after a kill).
- If you want to keep scarf Kart, try banded Bulu over Rilla. With Stone edge it can actually OHKO Torn on switch in, it stays around longer thanks to horn leech.
- Maybe switch Stealth Rocks from Nidoking to tran to run flamethrower on Nido. Heatran's trapper set is not needed in this team, since nothing capitalizes on the removal of Pex or Blissey. You could even opt for protect to get more recovery out of the terrain.

Maybe some of this helps =) Love the team!

Thanks so much! I'll try running every version you suggested of Rilla + Kart, and yeah rocks on heatran sounds so much better :) Maybe I could run Rocks, Lava Plume, Toxic and Protect, I guess?

 

[RaikouLover]

Cool team. However, you have serious bird (Zapdos / Dragonite / Tornadus) problems. You can’t break any of those mons and if they are offensive you more than likely just lose. I suggest restructuring the team a bit.