When your volatility is this low, you get bored fast

[chenman333]

Introduction
So after my team ended up looking almost exactly like 2 other posters (except I never thought of the brilliance of spike stacking), I decided to try to update it and do something different.

I prefer making teams and experimenting with them, as I get bored battling really fast. My volatility is like .3 so my rating goes up only one point for each win and I got bored when I realized I just won 40 times and only went up 40 points in my CRE...I knew I should've used a different account. Oh well.

Anyway, its a really, really standard team. However, I am using some less popular sets that few people are prepared for. Effective? Yell yeah.

Basically, this team wears down the opposing team enough so that the weaker, but faster DDMence can wipe the floor. Even though it is probably WEAKER than a max attack, LO DDMence, its speed and bulk after two DDs allow it to wipe the floor.
Attack of the Bulky Dragon (no, not the fat one)

Analysis:

Azelf @ Focus Sash
Levitate
216 Atk/252 Spe/40 SpA
Naive
-Stealth Rock
-Psychic
-Taunt
-Explosion

Leads don't get much more reliable and effective than this. I was never a big fan of Azelf and other suicide leads since I first was introduced to Shoddy, and instead opted for bulkier stuff like Metagross, Empoleon, and Jirachi. In fact, I don't even know if I even used Azelf more than a few times. I chose Azelf because I predict a spike in Smeargle leads thanks to the success of Kevin/August, just like how Panamaxis' use of Metagross led to his spike in usage. Lum berries will be everywhere, and Azelf will be top dog again.

Well Azelf is a monster of a lead. A fast SR is obviously the main point of using Azelf, and boy he does a good job at setting them up. SR is essential for wearing down stuff on my team, and it is needed for my Heatran to get the important 2hkos. Psychic is there to do a bit of damage if I need to, and 2hko Aerodactyl. Taunt for other Azelf, slow leads and stop them from getting rocks, which is always cool.

Explode is so great for my team. With the attack investment, I can absolutely destroy just about anything, and even something like Tyranitar takes 60% or more, which really eases pressure for the rest of my team. And it gets me some real momentum.

Max speed and Naive is obvious, but I opt for more Atk EVs for a bigger Explosion. 40 SpA guarantees the KO on Aero.

Heatran @ Life Orb
Flash Fire
4 HP/252 SpA/252 Spe
Timid
-Substitute
-Fire Blast
-Earth Power
-HP Grass

Again, another monster of a pokemon. This thing absolutely crushes any team without Blissey; it's unbelievable killing power really puts my opponent into a hole wondering what to do. Gimme a Flash Fire boost and anything bar Blissey is probably getting itself KOed. His main job is to lure bulky waters and proceed to wreck them with HP Grass, which makes Salamences job much easier.

Substitute is the absolute crux of this set, forcing opponents to attack, easing my prediction, and getting me cool 2hkos. Yes the damage racks up fast, but his immunity to sandstorm and his amazing number of 4x resistances means he lives a lot longer than expected. Usually he dies from kicking too much ass hehe.

Fire Blast is completely awesome with LO. 2hkos so many pokemon, even stuff that resists. Sometimes I wish flamethrower would be cool, but the power this gets with LO and a possible FF boost is amazing. Even a Latias takes a big chunk of its health when it gets hit.

Earth Power 2hkos Tentacruel and Tyranitar that think they have any business. Obviously takes care of opposing Heatran, and provides a relatively safe move for stuff like Metagross or Jirachi.

HP Grass has killed many a Swampert and other bulky waters. Most of them don't stand a chance, except for a fast Suicune. Do I wish I had DPulse here at times? Yes, very much, but Salamence needs those Bulky Waters dead and Heatran is here to do it.

Rotom-C @ Leftovers
Levitate
216 HP/220 Spe/72 SpA
Timid
-Substitute
-Thunderbolt
-HP Fighting
-Shadow Ball

Hehe, another good one. My spin blocker, but more importantly, he is a menace against teams again. Just the right stats in just the right places make him shine.

With 72 SpA, he 2hkos 248/0 Scizor with TBolt after Stealth Rock. Yeah, that is really cool, especially since it is always trying to Pursuit me. HP Fighting deals modest damage against Magnezone, Mamo, but it is the only move that can touch Tyranitar. Luckily, Azelf usually blows up on T-Tar, meaning he loses to my Rotom. Shadow Ball rounds out the coverage, deals with other Rotom, Gengar, etc.

LO Starmie can be a pain for this. It is a pain in general, but Rotom's nice defenses mean that if he is healthy, he can take that LO shot and KO right back.

His ability to lure in T-Tar and Scizor and kill them off (or at least weaken) make him a great pair with Scarf Latias, relieving any pressure.

Rotom-c makes Swampert think twice before switching in....and you know it, he looks cool.

Latias @ Choice Scarf
Levitate
4 Def/252 SpA/252 Spe
Timid
-Draco Meteor
-Surf
-Thunderbolt
-Trick

My favorite pokemon, this is why my team can succeed. It is THE ultimate, most flexible revenger. Between the 3 attacks and Trick, it can stop just about any assault my opponent throws at me. Once the Pursuiters are gone, this is an absolutely amazing pokemon that just runs wild.

The moves are totally self explanatory. Trick is a neat move for stat uppers, as well as breaking down stall by tricking it Blissey. Blissey is actually quite troublesome to my team, so I appreciate it when the trick pulls off. I actually prefer Latias without Scarf, so I generally trick it off fairly early once I know my opponent's team a little. Basically, the 4 moves allow me to handle just about any threat my opponent throws at me. Cool.

Checks a lot of stuff....likes killing Starmie hehe.

Scizor @ Choice Band
Technician
120 HP/216 Atk/4 Spe/172 SpD
Adamant
-U Turn
-Bullet Punch
-Pursuit
-Superpower

Yep...here he is again. Ridiculous this guy is right? Just so good. I don't think he needs any explaining but I will anyway.

Deals with revenge jobs. Can sweep. Scouts. Transition mon. My go to guy. Trapper. So many roles are filled by this guy, its a shame his defenses really aren't that good. I don't feel I need to write much....

Anyway the EVs are funky. I didn't bother going with max attack, instead I wanted some SpD bulk (172 is pretty good), but the 120 HP helps him take some physical stuff a bit better too. If you have a better spread, hit me up.

Salamence @ Lum Berry
Intimidate
248 HP/156 Def/104 Spe
Jolly
-Dragon Dance
-Dragon Claw
-Earthquake
-Roost

This guy is what it is all about. BulkyMence....long time no see right? Everyone think that Dragonite outclasses this...wrong. Physically bulky Salamence is where its at! Why? Scizor. I can actually not get 2hkoed by the brawling bug, which is really just fine and dandy. Oh, and I outspeed EVERYTHING after 2 DDs, Dragonite is far too fat for that. Levitating steels? No problem, they get worn down by my team anyway. Bulky waters? That is what Heatran was for.

Once it is all said and then, Salamence can go for 2 DDs, heal back up, and sweep it up. Pretty self explanatory moves in terms of what we are going for. DD is obvious, Roost to heal throughout the match, DClaw and EQ provide sick coverage.

EVs are to outspeed Jolly Gyara before a DD, and outspeed tons of other random things that try to outrun Lucario. Also a good Adamant Lucario check. Jolly ones use Ice Punch, and Rotom can handle those.

I chose Lum because I was completely tired of getting paralyzed, frozen, burned, etc. during my set up. I am considering Outrage now though, since I do run Lum. Oh and it is nice for those SubTran that run Toxic.




Yep....that is the team. I like it, I hope you do too. It does a great job at reaching its goal usually, and most importantly, it is flexible. Flexiblity is the key to a good team; no matter what I face, no matter what happens, I'm still going to be able to have a chance to win. Oh yeah and stall? 1 SR weak, Toxic Spike Immune (I always have that, this is really useful since it makes Roserade/Tentacruel waste their time when getting those spikes up), 4 immune to spikes. I still have difficulty breaking stall if Blissey is around though. I didn't play too many stall teams during my 41 matches and managed to beat most of them via Tricking scarf to blissey---->Heatran


That is the kind of team I like. I'm going to take a nice long break from shoddy for a bit and get my summer homework done haha....

 

[chenman333]

Reserved for threat list...if I ever decide to do one

 

[franky]

Problems:

Stall Team

How to fix:

This team is really good, covers alot of the major threats but when faced against a solid stall team behind a really good player, I think its safe to say you might have a hard time getting past it. Especially having 2 Sub-users, one equipped with Life orb, Blissey can force switch-outs far too easily. Now I don't want to suggest any Pokemon, because that would just break the core up. What I will suggest are tiny things you might consider to shed through Stall Teams.

Firstly, I think you should replace Hidden power Grass for Explosion. Hidden Power Grass will only hit Swampert hard, which isn't really a big concern right now. The bigger one is Blissey. The tactic is simple, Sub then scout for Blissey. Behind a Sub you could throw in one Fire Blast to scout for someone like Skarmory or Rotom when the foe predicts Explosion, but they suffer plenty of HP from Fire Blast. Once they decide to bring Blissey back, throw in Explosion, and it will take huge chunks out of it. Basically, with Explosion you can put the opposition on their toes behind a Sub and attempt to rack a Blissey kill, which this team desperately wants. Virtually speaking, if you have Grass, Sub + Life Orb recoil then Blissey switching in would really screw you over, taking plenty of HP every crutial switch-in. So go with Explosion on that one. The last thing I will suggest is Charge Beam on Rotom, which is the basic strategy of the set. It is capable of beating Blissey 1v1, so you should def. try that. gl with this team.

Edit: Let me clarify the use of Explosion. Don't get the wrong idea, I won't recommend using Explosion on Bulky waters. That's not what I want you to use Explosion for. Let me jot down the potential bulky waters that will come in:

Suicune
Swampert
Vaporeon
Starmie
Gyarados

Suicune: You can't touch it anyways with Hidden Power Grass, after it gets the CM. Especially CM + Rest versions. Latias is your best check to it, using Trick to screw it over. If you have to result to desperate measures. Explosion is not a good idea.
Swampert: Okay, only Hidden Power Grass will hit this hard like a nuke, but its not really a big threat to the team, which the team can beat anyways. It lacks recovery move.
Vaporeon: Surely, you won't use Explosion on this because you have Latias and Rotom to check it. Hidden Power Grass is also futile because it can use Wish to recover stall you, while you waste your HP with Life orb. Again, Explosion is not a good idea
Starmie: You don't even need explosion on this, Latias can be a good check to it, as well as Rotom.
Gyarados: Latias, Explosion is not needed.

Overall, if you get my drift, Explosion is a must on Heatran. Hidden Power Grass won't be as important, because of reasons above. Although, you could try which one you feel makes your team better. This is pure theorymon I'm doing, but its practically a better option just to deal with Blissey.

 

[Bad Ass]

hey chenman, this team looks pretty solid! i love bulky dragons, with the correct support they are almost impossible to take down. i am going to see if i can help you get the right support that you need. to start, we look at the goal of the team. to sweep with bulky ddmence, there are some things you need to do. first, removing stealth rocks is an absolute must. salamence can't afford to take 25% whenever he comes in, as you rely on him to take on some threats like lucario. another thing you need to do is eliminate things like skarmory or mamoswine. the latter is covered pretty well, but you don't have a spinner to remove those rocks salamence hates so much. there are a few choices when choosing a spinner.

tentacruel - sets up toxic spikes as well as spins, stab surf.
forretress - can set up spikes, toxic spikes while spinning.
starmie - can 2hko most common spin blockers, reliable healing.

we look at these, and look at your team. forretress is too defensive, he can't keep up the high pace the rest of your team sets. this leaves starmie and tentacruel. starmie, on one hand, hits harder than tentacruel, and can use recover to heal up prior damage. it's also faster, and gives a better infernape check. all in all, i'd say to use starmie, as the extra speed and 2hkoing rotom could prove useful. i have some personal evs that allow you to get the 2hko on those pesky rotom with sr up 75% of the time. i suggest placing this over scizor, as he doesnt do much as far as helping salamence goes.

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 210 HP/216 Spd/84 SAtk
Timid nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Ice Beam
- Recover
- Hydro Pump
- Rapid Spin
---

i just saw franky suggested to remove hidden power grass on heatran for explosion-DON'T DO THIS! heatran lures out bulky waters that salamence has problems with, and hits them hard, 2hkoing most of them. if you explode, you may get the kill on their water, but you don't have a heatran anymore. you should definitely keep hidden power grass, it is potentially his most dangerous move on this team. i do, however, agree with his suggestion of charge beam > thunderbolt on rotom, as it helps a lot with stall teams.

i will try to put in the rest of my rate tomorrow. hope i helped!

 

[ARandomDude]

Azelf: I personally don't like flimsy leads because of the rise of Scarfchi leads, who can U-Turn and "revenge kill" you, or can go for the 2HKO flinchhax. If you really want a super reliable lead, Scarfchi is your man(?).

Heatran: I was skeptical about the LO, but we've talked about it, and I agree that the LO gives you a huge edge. Heatran's role here is simply to take out its counters, many of whom are only 3HKOd when Heatran is carrying Leftovers. If I were to say anything about Heatran, I would say that Will-O-Wisp or Toxic could go in place of HP Grass if you don't want Heatran to start killing himself off prediction hax (See IPL vs Infernape). We have also talked about, and I have recommended, Explosion.

Rotom: The moves here are fine, my only comment would be that Will-O-Wisp can also screw over Mamoswine and Tyrannitar, as well as many other things. As it stands, your own BulkyMence would probably wall this thing =P.

Latias: My favorite Dragon+Moveset, and my favorite choicer. Nothing else to say.

Scizor: If you really want funky EVs, these *could* work: 240 HP 72Atk 192SpD 4Spe, which guarantees that 252SpA Timid Starmie w/o LO can't 2HKO you after SR with Surf. Your EVs will probably work fine though, just watch out for Maggy.

Salamence: I would rather see LO or LO (haha) here, because someone who can Twave/Toxic/Will-O-Wisp you once probably has the guts to do it twice anyways. Besides, hopefully their status inflictors will be long gone.

Final comments: This team hates status. Enter Cresselia /w Reflect and TWave, and watch as your enitre team gets outsped and Parahaxed. Even Scizor will only have a 50% change to muster 44% damage to a fleeing Cresselia. My recommendation would be to change Rotom to a RestTalker, with Will-O-Wisp and Shadow Ball for Cresselia or Thunderbolt if you want more kick.

 

[boredomisbliss]

erm yeah i told you azelf was a beast =p

im going to make the same comment about heatran as i did before, between life orb and substitute you are going to be losing hp very very fast, btw latias takes maximum a little less than 40% so that in particular can wear you down, but you have scizor for that

about rotom, i wouldnt cite him as a counter since i dont think scizor will switch in once seeing leftovers recovery, so make sure you keep heatran alive or scizor can give you lots of problems, and keep in mind that after 1 sub scizor can KO with pursuit

bulkymence outclasses dragonite in everything but special defense which is really cool, nice to see him :p

my main concern about this team is in heatran and rotom, both of them run substitute, which will wear them down pretty quickly. Especially since you cite them as your counter to lucario and the sort, be careful you dont lose them too quickly. but great team 40 in a row must be pretty good =p

 

[chenman333]

@Franky
Yeah I have definitely considered Explosion when making this team. I was thinking Fire Blast 2hkos Gyarados anyway, but the other three take a bit of damage from Earth power I suppose. Still, it was annoying when bulky waters would come in and then run away once I brought in Latias (except for Starmie, whom I would usually Thunderbolt for a kill since it doesn't think I'm scarfed). As cool as killing Blissey would be, and opening everything up for Rotom/Latias, tricking a scarf to blissey usually does the trick anyway.

@Bad Ass
Yeah I definitely have had moments thinking "damn I wish I taunted". Luckily, this doesn't happen to oftent thanks to Roost and Intimidate. I'll still try Starmie out though; it'll help with the whole bulky water thing, but I am kinda bothered by taking Scizor out. I enjoy having 2 steels as their typing is obviously just amazing. Heatran can't afford to take Draco Meteors between Sub and LO, so I'll have to see about that.

@ARD Many of the recommendations take the pace off this team. Status is a minor issue anyway, i just send in Scizor to suck just about anything up. Is Cress really going to do anything with Scizor? No...

@Boredom Salamence is my Lucario counter, though Rotom can handle it fine if it runs Ice Punch.

I've actually swapped to Leftovers again for bulkymence again. Especially when against some Ice Beamers and Scizor, the extra 6% gained can be crucial, especially if sandstorm is around.

 

[tobi10]

Hey chenman, my suggestion for your team is using my custom Salemence spread: Salamence (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 214 HP/120 Atk/176 Spd
Adamant nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Dragon Dance
- Dragon Claw
- Earthquake
- Roost
---

Good Luck, at least give him a chance.

 

[The SPrinkLer]

hey chenman, this team looks pretty solid! i love bulky dragons, with the correct support they are almost impossible to take down. i am going to see if i can help you get the right support that you need. to start, we look at the goal of the team. to sweep with bulky ddmence, there are some things you need to do. first, removing stealth rocks is an absolute must. salamence can't afford to take 25% whenever he comes in, as you rely on him to take on some threats like lucario. another thing you need to do is eliminate things like skarmory or mamoswine. the latter is covered pretty well, but you don't have a spinner to remove those rocks salamence hates so much. there are a few choices when choosing a spinner.

tentacruel - sets up toxic spikes as well as spins, stab surf.
forretress - can set up spikes, toxic spikes while spinning.
starmie - can 2hko most common spin blockers, reliable healing.

we look at these, and look at your team. forretress is too defensive, he can't keep up the high pace the rest of your team sets. this leaves starmie and tentacruel. starmie, on one hand, hits harder than tentacruel, and can use recover to heal up prior damage. it's also faster, and gives a better infernape check. all in all, i'd say to use starmie, as the extra speed and 2hkoing rotom could prove useful. i have some personal evs that allow you to get the 2hko on those pesky rotom with sr up 75% of the time. i suggest placing this over scizor, as he doesnt do much as far as helping salamence goes.

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 210 HP/216 Spd/84 SAtk
Timid nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Ice Beam
- Recover
- Hydro Pump
- Rapid Spin
---

i just saw franky suggested to remove hidden power grass on heatran for explosion-DON'T DO THIS! heatran lures out bulky waters that salamence has problems with, and hits them hard, 2hkoing most of them. if you explode, you may get the kill on their water, but you don't have a heatran anymore. you should definitely keep hidden power grass, it is potentially his most dangerous move on this team. i do, however, agree with his suggestion of charge beam > thunderbolt on rotom, as it helps a lot with stall teams.

i will try to put in the rest of my rate tomorrow. hope i helped!

I don't believe the bit about starmie is a great idea. Scizor helps wear down blissey, stall, that your team is o so weak to without him. Starmie just adds non-needed special attackness or whatever it's called. Also when Scizor is down, it opens up Tyranitar like a bitch, one wrong move by latias and you're done. DDtar is probably the biggest crux of this team. Babiri versions kill Scizor easily. Luckily I don't see ddtar too much, although I have a ddtar team. xD
I will suggest something to aid this later, as I am going down to the ocean. I'm on vacation! Good luck with your team dude.


Edit: I'm back. Had a great time! Anyway, on to the team and it's DDtar problem...

The best thing you can do is not let it set up. It doesn't set up on anything besides Latias, and that's only to an extent. If it comes down to it, BP with scizor, although that should probably be the first thing you're doing. I don't know anything to suggest without changing the concept of your team, except maybe LO Latias, but you need that for stuff like Salamence =/