Gen 3 Nidoking Special Offense (?)

[Gul Macet]

This team is an attempt to, for some godforsaken reason, use the example set of Nidoking on the thread "ADV OU Creative Sets, Synergistic Cores, and Concepts"

Nidoking is by far my favorite pokemon, and seeing him listed as the example set in the creative sets thread certainly perked my eyes. I do not think this team enables him well, and this post will be a deconstruction of my likely faulty teambuilding process in attempting to do so. Here is the set.

TSS Breaker Nidoking
Nidoking (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Poison Point
EVs: 244 Atk / 76 SpA / 188 Spe
Lonely Nature
- Fire Blast
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Focus Punch
- Sludge Bomb

I'll be frank and say I have no idea what this speed stat is for. It lets you outspeed plus nature base 65s (Scizor and Roselia?) and neutral nature base 76s (Nidoqueen and Hitmonchan???). Vapicuno authored the thread, and they know infinitely more about pokemon than I do, but I'd probably change this to 224 Spe to outspeed neutral Gyarados (base 81 and below) or 152 Spe for Tar. In the linked thread, Vapicuno mentions using the King as a Skarm, non-ice Zap, and non-Ice Bliss check, and I do agree with that, but I don't agree that he forces switches. Focus Punch on Nidoking's "acceptable" 92 Atk stat is easily switched into by resists and Gengar, who threaten the shit out of him. To be honest, Skarm can pretty easily get two spikes up and survive, and Zap and Bliss will murder him with HP Ice and Ice Beam respectively.

My recommended set for a Nidoking fulfilling this purpose is:

Nidoking (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Poison Point
EVs: 104 Atk / 252 SpA / 152 Spe
Rash Nature
- Fire Blast
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Taunt
- Sludge Bomb

Because if we are going to dunk on Skarm, we're doing it right. This set forgoes the illusion that the King will be dealing with anything other than Skarm. This Fire Blast two hits Skarm after protect, and the boost to HP Grass helps with Pert and Tar. I might even drop the Atk for speed just to hit 263 and outspeed max Metagross. But outside of Skarm, the King should mostly be used to scout status, since he's immune to both Toxic and TWave.

We'll continue with the lead mon, Tar:

Tyranitar @ Lum Berry
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Fire Blast
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Ice Beam
- Brick Break

Standard mixed Tar. I think Mixed Tar is the statistically best lead outside of Zapdos. He's just my go-to lead outside of Band Dodrio.

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Thunderbolt
- Rapid Spin
- Ice Beam
- Psychic

I always run Psychic on my offensive Starmie for Gengar. This Starmie offers a bit of cleanup support and a rapid spin. It hits decently hard, but isn't anything that special.

Celebi @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 224 SpD / 32 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 SpA
- Calm Mind
- Leech Seed
- Baton Pass
- Giga Drain

Makes Mixed Tar, Mixed King and Offensive Starmie "that special." Celebi's leech seed really eats Blissey's lunch, and having Starmie as a second natural cure, and the King as an immunity to 2 of the 4 common statuses lets you use Celebi as a bulky special pivot quite effectively. CM Pass wins games, and special wall Celebi is underrated IMO

Aerodactyl @ Choice Band
Ability: Rock Head
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Rock Slide
- Double-Edge
- Earthquake
- Hidden Power [Flying]

Regular Aero. I experimented with Duggie but Band Areo applies a lot more pressure. I find with this sort of team Dug is just setup fodder, and you really can't add Swampert as defensive backbone, because for some fucking reason, I ran into several DD HP Grass TTars and Mences. Band Areo can go nuts if Nidoking works well, but that is a big if.

Milotic @ Leftovers
Ability: Marvel Scale
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
- Surf
- Recover
- Toxic
- Refresh

The midground between Pert and Suicune. I'm not confident in Milotic's placement on the team, but she did better than Pert.


Personally, I like this team, and in terms of ladder results I think its about 1400 worthy, and defintely matchup fish a tournament game hint hint. Really, it was more an exploration of Vapicuno's Nidoking set than an attempt at creating a truly cohesive team. I think the King would be better served as a bulky status pivot rather than a Skarm check, but if you want to use him as a Skarm check, this is what I think is the best way to do it.

I think if you want an unconventional mixed mon that hates Skarm to force switches for spikes damage, Blaziken is probably better suited for the role. Regardless, this is what I got.

https://pokepast.es/903e333ea9e85681

 

[watermess]

Hi friend!

First off thanks for posting a gen 3 RMT! I do really enjoy seeing what people are building and I think trying out creative sets should be encouraged for players at all levels of play, whether it's to use our favourite pokemon, explore the wealth of diversity in competitive ADV, or even gain a competitive edge, each is an as valid reason as the next.

Anyway, lets take a look a the team!

First lets review the 6
tyranitar, nidoking, celebi, starmie, milotic, aerodactyl

I think you've actually got a reasonable balance of resistances here, if we consider some of the most important roles for a team to fill in adv to be defensively successful, you have a rock resist, something fast to revenge threats, rapid spin, a good zapdos/gengar/suicune switch in and a solid physical sponge for metagross and dd users in milotic. The team also has impressive status absorption, certainly skarm bliss will be wasting a few turns if they plan to try and status you, and I do like that for teams using a niche pick.

offensively you have a interesting selection of individual threats, including 2 pokemon that are a threat on the offense (tar, nido), 2 pokemon that are a threat on the defense (milo, celebi), and 2 pokemon that are a threat to revenge KO and clean up (starmie, aero). This is not a bad balance, there is a rough gameplan between tar, nido breaking for aero, and cm pass celebi helping tar, nido and starmie find the power they need to break without spikes.

But what places do I think the team could be improved?
Well there were a few things that jumped out at me as being challenging for this team. ill quickly list them off, and then see if we can come up with some solutions.


1. Celebi's only reliable form of offense is base 60 power grass move or leech seed. this means if your opponent has any steel types or flying types or a gengar or a celebi of their own, the best you'll be able to do to it is going to be capped out at 12%. In a vacume this is not an issue, celebi is here to preventing some of those pokemon from running through you, and easily recovers off zapdos tbolt. However now consider what happens when zapdos or gengar finds out you cant really hurt them back hard. they can make use of threatening moves such as gars ice punch to pressure you extra hard as you leech seed, and force celebi to be even more passive than it might have appeared on paper, since the only response is recovery moves or switching. same goes for a zapdos with rest or drill peck or hidden power ice which are all viable sets. A good dedicated special tank should be able to deal with these threats in a slightly more dynamic way, put simply, its tough to be a safe defense, when there's no punishment for an over aggressive opponent.


2. milotic and nidoking are wobbly as a rock resistance core. Milotic takes around 50% from a CB tar rock slide and its not uncommon for tar to be faster either, so while it might be a solid countermeasure to slower weaker rock moves, such as max hp, max attack leftovers tyranitar, its a risk to over rely on it, as you could easily find yourself losing your whole milotic to a CB tar/aero or ddtar for 0 damage with as little as one flinch. additionally I think we should recognise that often rock types come paired with metagross, who is a phenomenal defensive piece and threat due to its ability to tank hits and lure in and remove rock type checks, milotic being a perfect example of a pokemon often boomed by metagross. If you face metagross + max hp ddtar, you could be in a tricky spot, first milotic is KOed by boom, and then ttar boosts once on choice locked aero and a second time as it survives any one hit from full from all of your remaining 5 slots, it then cleans house by outspeeding and ohkoing all remaining members.


3. last point, sorry for ripping into your team a bit, I promise I actually really like it, and ill get into my suggestions in a sec! right so my final point is an evaluation of the "pace" of difference components on your team, what I mean by this is, how fast does each pokemon ideally plan on winning a game on its own. I think you have two slightly differing paces here, let me explain further. Nidoking, tar, starmie and aero all have 0 defensive investment and hold 0 recovery moves, meanwhile milotic and celebi both hold two recovery moves each! I reckon if you looked back at some replays, you'd find there are quite a few games where one or two offensive mons are almost entirely spent before milotic or celebi have managed to A) make much progress in terms of damage, B) come anywhere close to being used to their full defensive potential. This is because they are better suited to a longer game than their teammates and might be slightly better suited to another set of teammates who want to play the same longer game as they do.

Ok so onto some suggestions!

suggested set (s)

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 40 SpA / 216 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Rapid Spin
- Recover
- Surf
- Thunder Wave

I actually really like what your trying here, nidoking and starmie have really cool synergy vs skarm being quite effective at taking it on, preventing it from easily having multiple layers and using it as a chance to poke damage onto not just skarm but also the backline since skarm often lacks the tools to do much damage to them. This combined with tar makes a pretty ffective set of teammates for a sweeping aero. Id like to take this synergy to the next level though by making the starmie bulkier. let me explain. skarmory has room for four moves, it always has spikes, almost always has roar, usually has protect, and then will fill in the remaining slots with one or both of drill peck or toxic. most skarmory will have the 3 defensive moves and then one of the two attacking moves. Nidoking is immune to toxic, but drill peck will actually hurt him due to his low defense, and this can make it difficult to use taunt to deny spikes with perfect accuracy. Recover starmie has the opposite problem, he can prevent drill peck skarm from ever setting a layer by recovering off the damage, but if toxiced, starmie must switch to obtain natural cure, and this gives skarmory a chance to spike. by combining the two, you are able to have an efficient response to both skarmory sets and really frustrate teams that are focused on spikes to make their damage stick.

suggested set (s)

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

Now we have two recover waters, and they both have exactly the same set of problems, so lets change that. I propose you keep the starmie chance you just made and allow starmie to fulfil milotics usual role in checking pokemon such as mixed salamence, mixed tyanitar and fire types. And in milotics place try using metagross. Metagross is a useful defensive pokemon as it can survive a+1max attack earthquake from tyranitar/salamence making it a premier physical defender that doesn't sacrifice on offense! This will solve your rock resistance problem and help to give you more power to break your opponents to clean up with aero thanks to metagrosses boom being able to KO 90% of the metagame from full with ease. He also has great synergy with starmie who can check fire types that scare metagross, and help to sponge unboosted Eq that are trying to chip metagross on switch in, easily recovering those off and threatening many users such as dd salamence with a thunder wave that will neuter it for the remainder of the game.

suggested set (s)

If you are still determined to CM pass to teammates try this, its walled by tar and can struggle with waters but it will be better at passing boosts vs skarmorys and hurting gengar/zapdos

Celebi @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
Hidden Power: Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 76 SpA / 180 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 SpA
- Calm Mind
- Psychic
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Baton Pass

OR

For some all out power this set can sweep late game vs teams that don't have blissey or a suitable equivalent, while still providing a check to pokemon like zapdos gengar and suicune.

Celebi @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
Hidden Power: Fire
EVs: 76 HP / 252 SpA / 180 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 SpA
- Calm Mind
- Giga Drain
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Psychic

OR

For a combination of some defensive bulk and recovery, with power to pack a punch vs all the pokemon in ADV try this set, its able to leech bulky recover users in longer games forcing them to switch and allowing it to go toe to toe with blissey. But it also has modest stabs and fire coverage to sock it to not just gengar zap and waters, but also to skarm, metagross and tyrantiar as well! This is the set I think I would recommend to use here, but just know it might take some getting used to not having recover anymore.

Celebi @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 192 HP / 8 Def / 252 SpA / 56 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 SpA
- Psychic
- Leech Seed
- Giga Drain
- Hidden Power [Fire]

Finally we have celebi, who has a really cool set for enabling your special attackers but still is giving out too many free openings in my opinion, we need to make him pack more of a punch so your opponents won't try and take advantage of your weaker slot. Theres a lot of sets you could try here as celebi is a pretty versatile pokemon. Ill give you a few options you can test out and you can pick your favourite, because I couldn't tell you which would be best without some ladder testing. celebi still doesn't take a lot from a zapdos tbolt and should be able to check most specials and waters once or twice if you use him carefully even with a more offensive set. its useful to also remember that in a pinch if celebi goes down you have two big tools at your disposal to stop a special attacker sweeping you! aerodactyl is faster than every special attacker unboosted, and can KO most of them with little to no chip required, this should help you stay in the game even if celebi falls early to a crit or good predicts. Also you now have metagross who is so bulky, no pokemon without the fire typing can KO him from full, and remember he has explosion to KO back! fire types meanwhile can be easily checked by starmie aero or even tar!

Lets put it all together.

Heres what I've got: https://pokepast.es/4c6abe96d8af7136
I hope you like what I've done with it, I've tried not to change too much and keep your main ideas unadulterated. maybe take it for a spin on ladder, try some of those difference celebi sets and let us know how it gets on!

Hope everyone reading this has a pleasant rest of their week and weekend xx

 

[Gul Macet]

I love what you did with the idea. I'll respond to your changes in a bit but first I'll 'justify' some of the choices I made on the OG team.

Milotic: I very rarely use Milo, and had actually considered switching it for a Skarm.

I really hate getting trapped with Mag tho.

It was certainly a thoughtless inclusion, but since pert kept getting killed by DD HPgrass I figured why not. Its a bulky water so it did its job well enough, anyway.

Fast Starmie. I've been using scarf Starmie in DPP, and really love it there. I considered using Claydol to spin but Psychic starmie destroys Gar. It combos in a fun way with CM pass, but you probably want +2 before it gets scary, which can be hard to hit.

Celebi. I love Celebi both for leech and CM pass, and I like to attempt to do both even though its probably more of a potential liability.

And lastly King I did switch to a minus SpDef from minus Def nature for Skarm DP. A minor change but certainly something I considered.

For your recommendations, I really like Metagross over Milotic. He can much better take advantage of all of the pressure put on skarm and certainly isn't as passive.

For Celebi, I'll need to do some testing on which set I prefer. My set was made to primarily exploit Blissey, and I think Meta deals with Bliss pretty well generally. I might also switch Celebi to a Bliss or something dumb like wish Mence, but we'll see.

Thanks for the recommendations.