OU SM OU - Teambuilding Competition : October 2023 Revival (Week 1: Seismitoad on post #290)

[Xirkitreez]

mega lopunny balance

https://pokepast.es/e9f7bb46de6d3e8b

sd mono attack gliscor can beat pokemon that lopunny struggles to break and in return mega lop handles fast pokemon and ice types that can threaten gliscor, magnezone is used to trap steels such as skarm and ferro. chansey and skarm for a good defensive backbone of the team, both setting up hazards. and tapu fini to prevent status and serves as a defogger

sorry for grammar

 

[DIYUSI]

Balance Choice Band Kartana + Z-Thunderbolt Magnezone


​

Hi everyone, time to add another Balance in the pile. So, this time, I build around the well-known core of Kartana and Magnezone. Indeed, Kartana is one the best wallbreaker in the tier (the most common answer to it is, in general, Scarf Magnezone or better speed control with Tornadus-Therian/Latias-Mega). With Choice Band, Kartana can likely 2HKO almost everything (except some annoying steel like Skarmory). This is why we run alongside a Magnezone in order to trap these steels and letting Kartana click Leaf Blade as much as it wants. To complete this core, I feel that a good old reliable core of Latias-Mega + Ferrothorn + Toxapex + Gliscor fits well with this offensive core, especially Gliscor that can bring a slow u-turn and put safely Kartana on the field. Let's look in detail the sets!

With Band, Kartana hits really hard. For the coverage, Leaf Blade for the obvious stab, Knock Off is a really great to use in earlier game to weaken the opposing team (and also a better midground most of the time), Sacred Sword to hit steels like Heatran/Ferrothorn and, finally, we have Frustration to hit other grass-resist like Zapdos/Tornadus-Therian/Volcarona/Charizard-Mega-Y.

The usual z-move set. Thunderbolt and Flash Cannon for stab, HP Fire obviously and Subtitute because Magnezone can easily click it on what it traps (mainly Ferrothorn). For the spread, we put enough Speed for Mawile-mega and the rest in Defense to ease the 1v1 against the like of Kartana (you can increase the speed to 211 if Heatran Spedef is an issue).

The most versatile pokemon in Balance. Here, we will use a Calm Mind variant with Bolt Beam coverage. The reason is to cover in the same time offensive ground (like Garchomp, Landorus-Therian and SD Gliscor), Manaphy in Rain and Scam other Calm Mind users with the chance to paralyze them with Thunder (Stored Power is also a good option to easily break Chansey).

Yep, third time you see that pokemon in my team. The defog support + slow pivoting is really useful with a "frail" breaker like Kartana. For the spread, we go for the common careful gliscor (really good to ease the MUs against Alakazam-Mega and Diancie-Mega).

The usual Toxapex. Toxic + Haze is really important to not auto-lose against most Volcarona's sets (subswarm is not real). For the spread, we put enough spedef to avoid the 2HKO from HP Ground from offensive Volcarona at +1, while the bold nature helps to ease the MUs against Lopunny-Mega and Charizard-Mega-X.

the usual bulky Steel. Gyro Ball to better handle Serperior without HP Fire and Protect because Choice Specs Lele and Medicham-Mega are too scary for my taste here.

Conclusion: Thanks for your time. Hope you will like the team. Feel free to contact me if you have questions about the team or want to share feedback on it.

 

[Rae]

time to vote! thank you for the submissions :O!!

by KaiserKaiba!
by Xirkitreez!
by Ske!

2 days to vote, gl!

 

[D5405]

T1

 

[Proftreez]

t3

 

[euph181215]

T2 by Xirkitreez

 

[A Welcome Guest]

T1

 

[Amir]

T3

 

[Captain Funk]

T1

 

[Rae]

Kaiser wins again! onto round 15!

Round 15 - UUBL



For this round, you are tasked with making a team that specifically highlights any Pokemon from UUBL! This is a free choice round, so go crazy! You have 7 days to submit a team, good luck!​

 

[Cdijk16]

DiaVolcSerp Hyper Offense
​

Importable: https://pokepast.es/1f409229b5a545f0
This is a hyper offense team built around Mega Diancie. Mega Diancie can reflect hazards, which is huge for hazard weak sweepers like Volcarona and Dragonite.
Diancie: Diancie provides Hazard control and is a decent stealth rock setter. It can check Tornadus and help overwhelm Heatran and Toxapex. Endeavor can be used over Earth Power to threaten Chnasey. Volcarona in turn checks problematic steel types like Scizor-Mega and Celesteela.
Volcarona: Volcarona benefits greatly from Magic Bounce. Iapapa Berry is used as the Z-Slot is taken up. HP Ground lets it smack heatran.
Serperior: Defog serperior provides backup hazard control. It also has excellent synergy with Volcarona(Volc melts steels and Serp beats waters). Taunt helps break down specially defensive walls like Toxapex. Glare can be used to to generate setup opportunities for other sweepers.
Dragonite: The other members of the team are good at keeping rocks at bay, and this allows Multiscale Dragonite to set up on very large swathe of the metagame. It also improves the rain matchup, which the team is otherwise quite weak to.
Kommo-o: Kommo-O provides important defensive utility against Ash-Greninja. It does an excellent job setting up on pokemon that it threatens out such as Ferrothorn.
Magearna: Provides defensive utility against Tapu Lele. It's also an excellent cleaner with Shift Gear.

 

[DIYUSI]

Heracross-Mega Para-Spam


​

Hi everyone, I really like the theme of this week (hope we can continue in this direction for other weeks). So, for this week, I wanted to explore an old relic of SM OU during zygarde era: glare-spam. The idea of glare spam was more or less Slow Breaker (Mawile-Mega for example) + Serperior + Zygarde + Chansey. Due to the ban of Zygarde, we can't reproduce this playstyle but we can, at least, make a modern version with other available options. Thanks to this week, I finally have a valid reason to build on one of my favorite mega: Heracross-Mega. The idea of this team is really simple: try to slow down as much as possible the opposing team in order to compensate the bad speed of Heracross-Mega. Let's look in detail the sets!

The star of this week. Heracross-Mega is a really powerful wallbreaker that can easily destroy a lot of fattish defensive core. So, the combination of Close Combat + Rock Blast, coupled with Swords Dance, makes Heracross-Mega near uncheckable in a defensive way. For the last move, Substitute (with enough speed for Careful Gliscor) helps a lot Heracross-Mega to set-up on key defensive pokemons like Toxapex or Gliscor.

One of the piece of our strategy, Serperior can easily slow down a lot of fast grass-resists like Tornadus-Therian or Latias-Mega with Glare. For the rest, I choose the usual Sub variant with HP Fire to easily blow Scizor-Mega/Ferrothorn.

Victini is my favorite scarfer at the moment. Not only he can bait Toxapex/Heatran with Final Gambit, Victini still holds a lot of firepower with its insane stab V-create while keeping a lot of bulk (very useful for Alakazam-Mega in particular).

The bulky steel I use the most recently and also a part of our strategy, Ferrothorn will be able to slow down a lot of fast fire-types like Volcarona, Victini, Charizard-Mega-X and Y or Heatran. For the rest, I give it the classic Power Whip + Spikes + Protect.

The last piece of this para-spam, Zapdos will be able slow down a lot of physical offensive pokemons like Kartana, Medicham or Lopunny-Mega with its ability Static. However, here, because we already have some soft grass and fight-resists, I decided to put a more offensive set with Modest Nature + Z-Thunderbolt. With 20 spA and Modest nature, Zapdos is able to OHKO careful Toxapex with Z-Thunderbolt + 2HKO Gliscor Careful with HP Ice. I put enough speed for Tyranitar-Mega full speed and give it as much bulk as possible to better handle Lopunny-Mega and Medicham-Mega.

Acting as our mandatory ground and better fire-resist, Garchomp completes and paired well with the rest of the team with Roar + Stealth Rock.

Conclusion: Pretty cool team in my opinion. Unfortunatly, some huge flaws exist here and there (Alakazam-Mega!!!), but, overall, I think this build is still solid enough considering this idea of Heracross-Mega + Para-Spam. Hope you will like the team and feel free to contact me if you have questions or want to share feedback on it.

 

[Glimmer]

GALLADE LELE + Z KOMO-O OFFENSE
Hello everyone! The theme this week seemed interesting so I decided to submit! For this week, I decided to base my team around Mega Gallade, pairing him up with early game weakeners, Tapu Lele and Komo-o, to make its late game cleaning way easier.

Gallade- He is our win condition here. It easily makes use of Tapu Lele forcing switches and weakening the opponent's team. With decent speed very good attack and access to Swords Dance it can easily rip open a team.

Tapu Lele- One of my favourite special breakers to use, easily weakening resists and opening holes for Gallade to finish the game.

Celesteela- Celesteela is a good partner for Komo-o and Gallade, as both of them are pretty vulnerable to opposing psychic and fairy types (Namely opposing Lele) and it also can leech seed the opponent to give the breakers a bit more health.

Toxapex- Old reliable Toxapex. Toxapex works well with Celesteela and acts as a secondary fairy resist, while having more longevity.

Komo-o- Stealth Rock and Z-move for breaking are always appreciated by Gallade. Komo-o also has decent firepower itself, acting as a secondary win condition.

Landorus Therian- The missing piece in the puzzle, acting as both speed control and defog to keep Toxapex and Celesteela healthier. It also is a secondary Heatran check so Gallade and Komo-o don't need to get damaged to break it.

 

[agslash23]

Mega Latios + Weavile Drag Mag Offense



https://pokepast.es/5c3ed684d88afd41

I have not built an USUM OU team for a long-time but seeing this competition got my creative juices flowing.

+

Since we were asked to build around a UUBL Pokemon, I decided to go for not one but 2 BL mons in Mega-Latios and Weavile, who actually aren't as bad as the usage suggests (In VR, Mega-Latios is A and Weavile is B+) and have good offensive synergy - Weavile Pursuit traps lot of Latios checks like Chansey as well as Bulky Psychic types like Mega Latias and Reuniclus, while Latios beats Weavile checks like Toxapex, Heatran, Kartana. They also attempt to overload shared checks such as Fairy types like Clefable, Magearna, etc.



The biggest problem that the UUBL core faces is breaking past Steel types like Mega-Scizor, Ferrothorn, Celesteela. This is where Magnezone comes in to eliminate their best checks and enable them to wallbreak efficiently. It also smashes Fairy types and brings them in safely using Volt Switch to further ease Latios and Weavile's life.



Next, we go for a Stealth Rocker and a Ground-type to block opponent Volt Switches. In this slot, we go for a Garchomp over Landorus-T as I wanted to go for a more offensive route (and DragMag is cool, so why not) and it synergises well with all 3 prior Pokemon - Latios beats Tapu Bulu, Weavile traps Mega Latias and chips Chansey, Magnezone eliminates Skarmory, Celesteela. We go for Dragonium-Z here to beat defoggers like Zapdos, Rotom-W, Lando-T, Torn-T, and to overwhelm checks like Slowbro and Tangrowth; however, Rockium-Z is more than viable to beat Tapu Bulu.



We now need a hazard remover and a check to Ash-Greninja, as it shreds offensive teams such as this. On offensive teams, Tapu Fini is the only one to compress all these roles. It provides another check to Heatran, soft-checks Mega Charizard-X, and shuts down defensive Pokemon using Taunt.



We are now in dire need of speed control, since stuff like Tapu Koko, Mega-Lopunny and Mega Alakazam can go out of hand on the rest of the team. We also need checks to Tapu Lele and Magearna, who otherwise can spam Fairy STABs all day long (no, Magnezone is not a check to them). Jirachi fits the bill here. Iron Head is deadly in late-game after our breakers chip down fatter stuff, and it also provides additional pivoting to bring in our breakers. Additionally, Trick cripples stall hard, and Healing Wish provides one of our breakers with a second chance.​

 

[Maktyum]

Salamence Grass Spam

(click me)​

This week I chose Salamence as my UUBL (not entirely true, tried first with Mega Gardevoir, this mon is turbo bad here is the result if you want). Salamence is quite interesting as a sweeper. Even if Dragonite gives him competition, Salamence is much better at pressuring fat and balance and has a much better snowballing effect with moxie and 100 in speed.

: Sub dd Z fly will always be a threat. It pairs well with Bulu and Diancie since it can remove bulky grass types for them early game or clean the opposition in end game after all the damages Bulu has done. Once Salamence starts boosting it is hard to stop for sure.

: Diancie is a great partner for Salamence to keep hazards out of the field. Moreover, Diancie removes zapdos quite easily for Salamence while setting rocks for the team. Grassy terrain pairs well with Diancie, letting it survive one earthquake from offensive Landorus therian.

: choice Band Tapu Bulu is the other breaker of the team. Wood Hammer and Horn leech are its stabs, drilling holes in the opposing team. Superpower is great to catch heatran and ferrothorn while stone edge removes flying types. 184 EVs in HP allow Bulu to survive a hurricane from pivot Tornadus therian without rocks and improve the probability of surviving two ash-greninja hydro pump (you are fine vs non-transform greninja). 100 in speed makes Bulu faster than ada Crawdaunt and most spedef Heatran.

: Heatran is the mandatory steel type of the team. It acts as a fire and psychic resistance for the team. Heatran removes steel types from the field, improving the mu of Diancie and Bulu. Heatran uses the Grassy Terrain as well to get recovery and survive earthquake. Protect is useful vs Lopunny and gives heatran another turn of leftovers+grassy terrain.

: defensive iapapa landorus therian with defog (I needed one sooo) and hidden power fire to dispatch kartana and Mega Scizor (2HKO with rocks).

: Finally Kartana completes the team as speed control with the choice scarf and last abuser from the grassy terrain.

Hope you will enjoy this team.

 

[Rae]

Glad to see so many submissions this week!! I'll remember to do more themed weeks from now :D
Here are the submissions!

by Cdijk16!
by KaiserKaiba!
by glimmerrdust!
by agslash23!
by Maktyum!

2 days to vote, good luck!!

 

[Proftreez]

team 2

 

[Captain Funk]

Team 5

 

[Verdas]

team 4

 

[Alpha1013]

Team 5

 

[Rae]

Maktyum wins! Time for round 16!

Round 16 - Tapu Fini


​

Tapu Fini's strong niche is the fact that it is a Defog user that beats the two arguably best entry hazard setters in the tier in Heatran and Ash-Greninja while still having a decent matchup against other Stealth Rock users like Landorus-T, Mega Tyranitar, Gliscor, and Mega Diancie. Tapu Fini also acts as a decent check to the likes of Hawlucha and Keldeo. Misty Terrain is also incredibly helpful, keeping teammates safe from status, with some notable examples being keeping Mega Mawile protected from Will-O-Wisp and bulky Volcarona safe from Toxic. Taunt is also a wonderful move to have, enabling Tapu Fini to shut down the likes of Toxapex and Reuniclus. However, the lack of reliable recovery is still very crippling to Tapu Fini, meaning it's prone to getting worn down over the course of a match, especially if it has to check more than one Pokemon on the opposing team.

You have a week to make a Tapu Fini team, good luck!

​

 

[DIYUSI]

SAILING!
Choice Specs Tapu Fini + Diancie-Mega + Magnezone Bulky Offense
(click on the pokemons to get the pokepast)


​

The idea of this team is to use Tapu Fini with Choice Specs to get some unexpected OHKO (on Gliscor Careful for example) and bait a lot of pokemons with Trick + Knock Off. Diancie-Mega is a good fit because it will greatly appreciate the lure support from Tapu Fini. Magnezone will patch are huge weakness to Ferrothorn and Mawile-Mega and support a lot, in general, Diancie-Mega. Gliscor, Tangrowth and Jirachi will form the backbone of this team. Hope you will appreciate this fun team.

 

[Alpha1013]

Excadrill is our rocker , fini here is our defooger and sp def is invested in it .Mega lopunny is our speed support and Volcarona helps in checking mons like Ferro . DD dragonite with z fly is always a threat to watch out for.
Hope u like the team
https://pokepast.es/9a8267be1ee34704

 

[Proftreez]

BONEDUST:
Calm Mind Zeraora + Mega Charizard X Offense
(click on mons for paste s/o to kaiba for the format lel)



Intro:​

Welp, i've finally crumpled to my animalistic desires as a memer and have posted a hot steamy pile of garbage in the teambuilding comp. Jokes aside, i've been pleasantly surprised by the effectiveness of this squad. The premise behind the team was the core of cm zera and dd zardx. Cm zera could effectively lure in and weaken the numerous grounds that would hinder zardx's sweeping attempts, while in turn zardx could effectively abuse the bulky grasses that would otherwise neutralize zera. After some deliberation with zeraora enthusiast KaiserKaiba, the rest of the team from there on flowed together pretty naturally, leading to whatever the hell this is. And so, wiithout further ado, I present to you: BONEDUST.

Team:​

A relic of the earlier days of ss ou and the first part of my sweeping duo, as mentioned prior, calm mind zeraora enables zardx through its ability to lure and break down the numerous bulky grounds that might impede its ability to sweep. Although at a glance outclassed by cm koko, which carries the same coverage and a much desired boost in power with terrain, zeraora contains a unique set of traits. First, zeraora's speed tier is among the best in the tier, and with the majority of mzams favoring bulk over speed, zera is often the fastest mon bar scarfers in a game. This allows zera to snowball more effectively compared to koko which is often forced out by offensive mons such as mega lopunny or ash gren. Second, zeraora is bulkier than koko. This is a particularly important trait when concerning zeras role in removing the bulky grounds of the tier. While koko risks getting ohkoed by a gliscors earthquake, zeraora can stomach the hit relatively comfortably at full, giving it the possibility to snowball and sweep a bludgeoned opposition without cutting into its damage output. And finally, zera has the ability volt absorb. While a bit more of a personal philosophy, in my opinion momentum is the most important aspect of any match. With the combination of calm mind, zera is able to comfortably create chokepoints against the opposition by abusing bulky pivots such as rotom wash, zapdos, magnezone, and even weakened magearna as set up fodder, something that becomes very apparent when you account for surprise factor. The evs on zeraora maximize its damage output while allowing you to outspeed mzams that creep for lopunny, with the rest being placed into bulk. The combination of grass knot and hp ice allows to demolish the majority of grounds, with grass knot having the added bonus of creaming a pert who thinks they have a safe switchin. Expert belt is the preferred item as it improves rolls against gliscor, garchomp and landot.

furry smesh (calcs)

252 SpA Expert Belt Zeraora Hidden Power Ice vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Garchomp: 302-360 (84.5 - 100.8%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
+1 252 SpA Expert Belt Zeraora Hidden Power Ice vs. 244 HP / 252+ SpD Gliscor: 346-408 (98.2 - 115.9%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO
+1 252 SpA Expert Belt Zeraora Grass Knot (60 BP) vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Gastrodon: 326-389 (76.7 - 91.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO and Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Expert Belt Zeraora Hidden Power Ice vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Landorus-Therian: 322-379 (84.2 - 99.2%) -- 75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
+1 252 SpA Expert Belt Zeraora Grass Knot (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 144 SpD Hippowdon: 434-511 (103.3 - 121.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 SpA Expert Belt Zeraora Grass Knot (100 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Swampert-Mega: 408-485 (119.6 - 142.2%) -- guaranteed OHKO

The second part of my sweeping duo, dd zard x is one of the most threatening megas in the current mega, shredding a large portion of the metagame if left unchecked. Zardx demolishes the bulky grasses that otherwise wall zeraora, while acting as an important check to the likes of kartana, bulu, zard y, msciz and volcarona. Thanks to zeras breaking, zardx is able to afford eq as opposed to dragon claw allowing it to 2hko pex while keeping misty terrain, as well as exploding tran. The evs allow you to outspeed positive base 95s while the rest are allocated in attack and hp.

A classic partner to zardx and the subject of this weeks teambuilding comp, fini acts as my obligatory heatran and ash gren answer, as well as my first defogger. Fini provides the all important misty terrain giving my sweepers an immunity to status and giving leeway for kart and a-muk to harass the defensive components of the opposition. Taunt was chosen to prevent walls such as clef or pex from getting away with their shenanigans. When it hits, hydro pump dents spdef variants of heatran, slams gliscor and guarantees a 2hko on mega swampert after rocks, easing the rain matchup. The evs allow fini to survive a +2 continental crush from garchomp at full, guarantee an ohko vs standard lucha after rocks, and creeps the crowded speed tier of shit creeping for max speed ttar, with the rest dumped in spdef.

Yet another shoutout to kaiba for bringing up pursuit into the discussion in order to remove nuisances such as mlati@s. However, in contrast to his more offensive recommendation in the form of weavile, I decided on using a-muk for a few key reasons. A-muk shits on psyspam, netting either a ko or heavy chip on both or either lele or mzam. Additionally, a-muk's inclusion allowed me to utilize a physically defensive fini by acting as a check to the likes of greninja. Finally with fire punch, a-muk acts as a reliable check to set up variants of magearna which otherwise threaten a sweep. The evs guarantee an ohko on lele, lets you avoid the 2hko from jolly band hoopa-u, and creeps chansey. The rest of the set is self explanatory.

The glue of the team, landot acts as my blanket check to the bevy of threatening physical attackers, my obligatory stealth rocker, and acts as the teams wall breaker. An sd variant was chosen in order to assist both zeraora and zardx in their breaking. Rockium was chosen over flyinium in order to remove nuisances such as celesteela or rotom-w as opposed to a slightly better hawlucha mu. The evs allow you to live a neutral zardx flare blitz after rocks as well as outspeed neutral nature lele and kyub. Sd landot be broke landot lol.

The physical embodiment of a paper cut, utility kartana rounds out the team. Kart compliments the capabilities of fini beautifully, preventing hazards from being set freely by ferro, while assisting against grounds such chomp, landot and gliscor. Shed shell is an odd choice compared to the more commonly used grassium z or meadow plate. However, the ability to escape magnezone creates a unique dynamic, with zera, zardx and landot being immune to or resisting the common moves run by zone creating free setup opportunities, an immensely useful attribute against the common balance and semistall structure zone often finds itself on. The evs allow you to better check fini, while the rest are allocated to speed and attack.

Closing:
I have no life lol. 4th and final shoutout to kaiba lol.

On a more serious note its a nice feeling returning to smogon after taking a few months off. ts been a long time since ive enjoyed building, and its a shame the sm forums been kinda dead so ill prolly stop lurking and start posting more lol. Anyhow hope yall enjoy the team. Peace.​

 

[Rae]

Sorry about the delay, got a little busy with stuff but it's voting time!

by KaiserKaiba!
by Alpha1013!
by Proftreez!

2 days to vote, good luck!