SS UU Words That Never Reached You

Estarossa

moo?
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It's been a while since I've done a current gen RMT, so I wanted to celebrate the end of the generation by showcasing one of my favourite teams from UU Swiss, which went 4-0 in the tour. Semi Stall teams have been of a particular interest to me throughout this generation in UU, they've traditionally been able to maintain strong matchups versus a lot of the tier thanks to fantastic defensive options such as Umbreon and Slowking that are able to maintain offensive presence well in combination with fantastic win conditions such as Calm Mind Slowking, Calm Mind Slowbro-Galar, SubTox Aegislash, and Swords Dance Doublade in the various metagames, giving plenty of room to outplay less than perfect matchups compared to a more full out Stall team.

Shortly before UU Swiss I had been particularly interested in building a Semi Stall team around Lanturn, on paper it offers a lot of useful traits as a defensive glue for such a team as a Rotom-H and Rotom-W counter and Volt Blocker, strong Thundurus-T check, and Heal Bell support, while offering a pivot into Pokemon like Toxic Celesteela and maintaining momentum with Volt Switch. In practice this worked as a really nice way of supporting Calm Mind Slowking as a win-con and enabling superior movesets for Umbreon and Chansey.

After this teams strong performance in Swiss I decided this would be the ideal choice to RMT for the end of the generation, showcasing a really interesting unique option that a few other people have also decided to explore in Lanturn.

The Team

:bw/umbreon:

noah (Umbreon) @ Leftovers
Ability: Inner Focus
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Foul Play
- Toxic
- Wish
- Protect

Umbreon is the face of stall teams for a reason in UU; its combination of insane defensive utility + wish support alongside its lack of passivity due to the threat level of Foul Play + Toxic making it hard to switch into outside of defensive Pokemon who allow for free wish passes. It answers a lot of boosting threats thanks to its amazing mixed bulk and Foul play such as Dragon Dance Gyarados that would otherwise be very threatening, and provides strong answers to a lot of threats such as Zygarde-10%, Excadrill, and Azelf to take pressure off its teammates.

Maximum physical defence even gives it the ability to check Swords Dance + Knock Off Scizor very well in a pinch, while Inner Focus is huge to let it counter Pokemon like Gyarados, Nasty Plot + coverage (eg. Flamethrower) Togekiss, and Jirachi. Synchronise would also be undesirable for a Toxic set, as Umbreon would rather avoid activating it on a Scald Burn against key Toxic targets such as Slowking.

:bw/lanturn:

mio (Lanturn) @ Leftovers
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 HP / 168 SpD / 88 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Volt Switch / Thunderbolt
- Scald
- Heal Bell
- Toxic

Lanturn provides a counter to the Rotom-formes and a strong Thundurus-T answer, which the special defensive investment helps to improve, making "vortexing" through Volt Switch particularly dificult to accomplish versus this team. It also provides Heal Bell support, while Toxic lets it threaten Thundurus-T and Rotom's alongside other some switch-ins such as Tangrowth. Volt Switch support helps maintain momentum and ease prediction, Thunderbolt is an option if you particularly care about the Nasty Plot + Heal Bell Togekiss matchup however as it allows Lanturn to stay in and continue to pressure it out of its PP. Speed investment lets it outspeed some Pokemon such as slower Skarmory's.

:bw/slowking:

eunie (Slowking) @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Scald
- Psyshock
- Slack Off

Slowking is the main win condition of the team with its Calm Mind set. It acts as a generic check to a range of Pokemon such as Mamoswine, Keldeo, and Cobalion with its strong typing + physical defense and Regenerator, while the application of Calm Mind lets it deal with Pokemon such as Calm Mind Slowbro-Galar and Calm Mind + Rest Primarina, while being able to mutually wear out the PP of stallbreakers in Calm Mind Reuniclus and Hatterene if necessary at the cost of its own Slack Off PP.

Lanturn's synergy is particularly useful to Slowking, as it has a tendancy to pick up Sludge Bomb Poison's from Slowbro-Galar and Amoonguss, or Toxic's from Pokemon like Salamence and Hippowdon, helping it waste less Slack Off PP. Colbur Berry is particularly useful to let it threaten and avoid being threatened so easily by Knock Off Scizor, while giving it the option to safely threaten or recover against Hydreigon. Tanga Berry is an option if finding the team hard to pilot against Swords Dance + Megahorn Cobalion, giving one free chance to threaten it, but the team has room to otherwise deal with this through Salamence and Skarmory, especially as its main entry point is a Wish user.

:bw/chansey:

taion (Chansey) (F) @ Eviolite
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Seismic Toss
- Toxic
- Soft-Boiled
- Stealth Rock

Chansey provides the mandatory special wall of the team, countering threats like Primarina, Nihilego, and Hydreigon, while providing Stealth Rock support and making use of its strong matchup versus Defoggers due to its bulk + Toxic. It also covers for sets such as Meteor Beam Celesteela for Lanturn and Slowking, and maintains the not passive nature of the defensive core of the team through the combination of Seismic Toss + Toxic. Not much else to say about Chansey since it's a pretty standard obvious Pokemon here.

:bw/salamence:

lanz (Salamence) @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 160 Def / 96 Spe
Impish Nature
- Toxic
- Earthquake
- Roost
- Defog

Salamence provides one of the Defoggers of the team, as well as another strong defensive wall to cover for Pokemon like Cobalion and Conkeldurr. Toxic helps it pressure Hippowdon which otherwise safely 1v1s it with its own Toxic at no cost. Earthquake over Flamethrower is an unusual choice, as Flamethrower would usually be desirable to pressure Skarmory and Scizor, but its of key use on this team as it prevents Nihilego from switching into it to reset Stealth Rock freely, while maintaining coverage for Cobalion, 2HKOing it nearly always after a single round of Stealth Rock. Its defensive value is of great value versus a range of other Pokemon such as Zarude, Diggersby, and Darmanitan too, and it can easily make use of this to take pressure off their primary checks such as Skarmory and Slowking.

:bw/skarmory:

sena (Skarmory) @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 160 Def / 96 Spe
Impish Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Iron Defense
- Body Press
- Roost
- Defog

Skarmory acts as the other Defogger of the team, ensuring there is enough Defog PP to out-PP any single Stealth Rock setter. It acts as the Primary one a lot of the time, as it is completely unthreatened by choices such as Chansey and Hippowdon due to its immunity to Toxic, and can also be used to threaten opposing Skarmory through its Iron Defense + Body Press combination to help keep Spikes off the field. Skarmory acts as the primary check to a range of threats like Scizor, Zarude, Azumarill, Cobalion, and Excadrill with its typing + rocky helmet and Iron Defense + Body Press combination, with its speed letting it outspeed Azumarill.

Threat List
:hatterene: :reuniclus: - Naturally for a stall team Calm Mind Hatterene and Reuniclus are dangerous threats due to their power level and Toxic immunity. Magic Bounce + Draining Kiss is particularly annoying for Hatterene to deny Stealth Rock from Chansey and maintain its HP. Calm Mind Slowking can deal with either of these two Pokemon if necessary as long as it has enough PP, being able to simultaneously boost up and trade its Slack Off PP for their Psyshock (or Stored Power for Reuniclus) PP, allowing Chansey to deal with them after, but this can open up room for other Pokemon to become dangerous to the team while removing the option of using it as a win condition later. Trying to force them to waste PP before this can help so that Slowking can maintain some PP to still have some use.

:conkeldurr: - A natural threat to Stall teams, but Conkeldurr has multiple checks on this team to make it quite manageable in practice. Physically defensive Salamence provides a strong switch in to it throughout a match, while Colbur Berry Slowking offers an easy switch in to pivot options such as Teleport Slowking to stop Conkeldurr getting in safely and can force it out with a free switch in, and Iron Defense Skarmory can attempt to 1v1 it and waste its HP with Rocky Helmet too. Conkeldurr also struggles to get switch ins versus this team easily, as the main entry targets for it in Umbreon and Chansey can both force it to take a worse status in Toxic, and do not insignificant amounts of damage with Foul Play and Seismic Toss respectively.

:crawdaunt: - Swords Dance Crawdaunt is one of the biggest threats for this team due to the lack of true counters to it, Salamence can somewhat deal with Choice Band sets although losing its Heavy-Duty Boots can be an issue, but Swords Dance sets can very easily claim kills and force delicate counterplay from Salamence and Sturdy Body Press Skarmory to deal with it.

:togekiss: Togekiss's Nasty Plot + Heal Bell set can be very challenging for this team to beat, as is the case for most non Nihilego stall teams. Umbreon is able to force it to waste around 4-5 Heal Bells in a single 1v1 thanks to Inner Focus, but eventually loses due to the power of a +6 Togekiss. With decent play this can be enough sometimes, as Lanturn is also able to threaten it to a degree with its special bulk + Toxic and ability to force Roosts to stack up more Toxic damage with Volt Switch, while Chansey can simultaneously threaten it at low boosts with Toxic + Seismic Toss, and it is therefore possible to potentially get it through all its Heal Bell PP with stacking up the Toxic damage while it is forced to attack, boost, or recover, but this is a challenging matchup nonetheless that can be very difficult. As discussed previously, Thunderbolt is an option on Lanturn to improve this matchup as it can now stay in and constantly threaten it with 35-40% damage and force Roost's without having to switch out after.


Replays

Below are the replays of the four UU Swiss games featuring this team, in particular showcasing the matchups versus threats like Double Dance Registeel + Calm Mind Slowbro-Galar, or Conkeldurr. Replays are found by clicking on the opposing teams!




Closing Comments

I always suck at doing shoutouts and end up forgetting people so I'm not going to do any long shoutouts this time. I just wanted to say thank you to some of my closest friends on this site for making the time I spend on here as enjoyable as it is, so ty Band Jade Lily Chloe Mystras Leoxses avarice Accel lydian Magnum Celebiii ausma and anyone else I forgot (sorry!), and to the whole of the UU community who make it a great place to be :) I'm looking forward to gen9 moving onwards and seeing how stuff goes.
 
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