Gen 3 Lavender Hearts

[Zerkas]

Introduction
Hello - Have this cool team I wanted to share built around a zapdug core
shoutouts vapicuno & jhonx for helping me refine
​

Set explanation​

Zapdos @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 Def
- Thunderbolt
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Substitute
- Baton Pass

Nothing special here, just a basic offensive zap w/ sub + bp
Ice > Grass here because I'm not too bad into pert regardless and I like being able to pressure celebi into dug range + flygon actually is quite threatening to me on the spikes builds it fits on


Dugtrio @ Choice Band
Ability: Arena Trap
EVs: 236 Atk / 48 SpD / 224 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Hidden Power [Bug]
- Aerial Ace
- Beat Up

It's dugtrio. This is a zapdug core. Need I say more?


Suicune @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 240 HP / 252 SpA / 16 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Rest

Cune here gives me a lot of my defensive backbone, especially into the entire physical side of the spectrum - mence and ttar, as well as being a psuedocheck to gengar
So this is a modest crocune set but I did ice > sleep talk because I needed that extra security into ddmence as I have no intimidater and jirachi is not ice, and losing stalk doesn't really matter as much as I'm not bliss weak or other cmer weak.


Jirachi @ Leftovers
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 136 Atk / 236 SpA / 136 Spe
Mild Nature
- Dynamic Punch
- Psychic
- Fire Punch
- Hidden Power [Grass]

Alright, this is the fire. Standard mixrachi EVs, but I did psychic over the traditional last of body slam as modest psychics really sting the molt and zard & aero, as well as not needing to click grass every time if I want to catch dugtrio - jirachi here pairs extremely well with dugtrio forcing out bulky ttar and blissey into dug range, as well as forcing a bunch of switches as I reveal coverage move after coverage move to put things into dug range. Rachi also takes advantage of zap's sub heavily on stuff like metagross mmash or various rock slides, forcing big damage on everything coming in.


Snorlax @ Leftovers
Ability: Immunity
EVs: 92 HP / 116 Atk / 144 Def / 144 SpD / 12 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Self-Destruct
- Body Slam
- Shadow Ball
- Earthquake

I have lax here to cover the cmers and various special threats while spamming paralysis for the fairly slow jirachi to abuse. Lax also allows me to blow things up in a pinch, because it lives one from almost everything. It also means I don't autolose into offmie, which is nice.



Metagross @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 HP / 176 Atk / 80 Def
Adamant Nature
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Protect
- Explosion

Metagross here is my aero/dder pivot, allowing me to come into rock slides early into the game and scout damage, and force repeated mashes to wear down skarm and pert. Standard bulkygross shit

Threat list:


My best switchins are cune/rachi, if it's fire grass wisp it threatens a lot of my team and mandates cune be at full



Nothing likes to switch into a swampert at full health, but cune overload and zap not being grass really hurt me here



dugtrio destroys my offense if it gets me on a few key turns, and I have to be very careful when clicking moves with jirachi or else my main breaker will get nowhere and I will have to force offense with boom



I beatdown skarm most of the time, and it's free entry for rachi, but spikes going up hurts me as I have only one spikes immune and skarm can roar around a lot.

 

[watermess]

hey awesome team, I considered a few ways you might Improve some of your more difficult matchups. The team is a great 6 and looks like it works pretty well so ill just give you a few ideas that i might try to tweak the team. I ordered the ideas by how useful I think they would be to consider.

Im going to give some ideas i think might help with gengar, skarm, pert and dug since u mentioned them.



Jirachi @ Lum Berry
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 136 Atk / 236 SpA / 136 Spe
Mild Nature
- Dynamic Punch
- Psychic
- Fire Punch / Thunderbolt or Thunder
- Hidden Power [Grass]

consider trying lum > leftovers here, it helps you fish dynamic punch on bliss without as much fear of a twave and it gives you that one time freebee on gengars wisp that offense teams can sometimes find really gives them room to breath. You might find leftovers are the play, and that's totally fine, i just throught it might be nice here to try out lum!

Also consider trying an electric move here, Theyre a little stronger vs skarmory and while they do invite dugtrio, it must be said this set usually is pretty easy for dug to remove regardless. I figure as you have ice zap to hit celebi, and dug to remove him you can maybe afford to drop grass beating coverage here in place of something that might compliment your team more offensively. The main big advantage i see from this change is that you can bluff ice punch coverage and lure swampert who you said you were struggling with in for a hp grass and put yourself in a good position vs him later on.



Metagross @ Leftovers
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 204 HP / 216 Atk / 88 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Agility
- Meteor Mash
- Earthquake
- Explosion

Consider dropping protect on metagross in favour of agility. The team currently is very suicune sweep centric, and suicune is not particularly fast, making it prone to being finished off by zaps, gengars, dugs, aeros, etc etc. You also talked about your problem with skarm and dug, and agilitygross can definitely be considered a threat to both as games draw on! With a bit more attack you can hurt skarm a tiny bit more with mashes, and you can still live ddtar, but crucially you'll be able to beat aero and dug by boosting to be faster than them and sweeping clean through them. A convenient byproduct of being the player with the fastest pokemon is that spikes threaten you a little less, as a lot of pokemon that normally finish metagross off from 50-60% are now being outspeeded and OHKOed. I like the synergy between this and any form of swampert lure on your team it could certainly make a splash if the tbolt grass coverage combo on jirachi manages to lure pert!



Snorlax @ leftovers
Ability: Immunity
EVs: 16 HP / 252 Atk / 120 Def / 120 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Self-Destruct
- Double-Edge / Return
- Shadow Ball
- Focus Punch

Lets talk about snorlax. So when your having trouble with skarm, its the combination of this chap and dugtrio that is forming the crux of your issue. when lax's strongest move to hit skarm is body slam, usually the team features a magneton to deal with skarm, thus preventing later walling, phasing and capping skarms layers in most games long before that devastating third layer. However since your team lacks rapid spin or magneton to help you out with that problem, its best to make sure your snorlax can pull his own weight vs the steel bird. By investing more heavily in attack and running focus punch you now have the tools to take a nice chunk out of skarm on switch in and get the ball rolling, it comes at the cost of EQ which is reliable damage on tar and meta, but focus has its benefits and I'm sure you'll find those intruging if you indeed give these suggestions a try! I also took the liberty to give your snorlax double edge over body slam. Paralysis is useful for suicune in outspending teammates but when we consider the most common pokemon paralysed by lax slam are metagross skarm and tar who are all already slower, and now you have metagross outspeeding aero removing that singular use, I figure we may as well go for a power move in this slot also, as it will help you to take chunks out of skarm and water types such as suicune, milo and swampert should they make the mistake of taking the hit. Return can also be used for a no recoil option to make you a little safer vs zapdos.

The other option i consider on a team like this is something a little more sweep focused who can perform the same zap/starmie/suicune/milo checking role. A good example of this and a pokemon i think could be a good fit for this team that is a little less skarm weak could be super CM celebi, but be aware it comes with added weakness to dugtrio and has less synergy with metagross for cleaning up, but this set can really excel vs "skarmory blissey tar pert gar" teams once dugtrio has beaten up the blissey and taken it out of the game. If i was going to use this set id maybe reconsider metagross being agility in favour of a move that is effective vs common celebi sweep stoppers such as moltres and zard - rock slide can be used to try and ohko them or a safer easier to click double edge can be effective to hit fires into range without blanking into swampert.

celebi

Celebi @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
Hidden Power: Fire
EVs: 76 HP / 252 SpA / 180 Spe
Timid Nature
- Calm Mind
- Giga Drain
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Psychic

As I said at the start of the RMT tho, its a nice looking team and probably functions really well as it is! Still, I'm hoping some of these ideas help! I think my edits will make you a little weaker vs metagross (something you are quite safe vs with suiucne, zap and dug) while improving your skarm, dug and gar matchups primarily.

Please feel free to chop and change! Tweaking teams is a subtle art and very challenging so don't take my word for gospel and give some ideas a try for yourself, see if you like any - these ideas can be seen individually or together so definitely tune the team how you like.

Finally, great job always nice to see more skillful builders posting on the forums. I hope everyone reading has a wonderful week!