Project SV DOU Teambuilding Competition v3: Week 1 (Ogerpon-Wellspring)

[Noelle]

The DOU Teambuilding Competition is back again again (again)! The way this project works is I post a new Pokemon, core, or anything of the sort, and you compete to see who can make the best team out of it. Each team posted must include the importable and explanation of the building process behind the team along with its strengths and weaknesses. After I post the concept to build around, you get 5 days dedicated to building the team and 2 days dedicated to voting. Whoever wins the competition for the week get placed in the Hall of Fame!

Rules:

1) Don't copy teams.
If you copy someone else's team that was already posted, you get disqualified. This is the Teambuilding Competition, you have to actually build teams

2) No voting for yourself.
Don’t vote for yourself. If you do this, your vote will not be counted at all.

3) No asking for votes.
Don't go around begging people to vote for your team or anything of the sort. It makes it so instead of who has the most creative team, the person who has the most connections win. If I catch you doing it you're getting disqualified.

4) Make sure the teams are actually functional.
It’s a bit too early to say what’s viable and what isn’t, as the metagame has been out for a week at the time of writing, but no meme teams please. Posting meme teams repeatedly will result in your post being deleted.


5) Ties
If there's a tie, I'm going to use !pick in the Smogon Doubles Room on Pokemon Showdown. This is to prevent potential bias from me, intentional or not.

Example Team

https://pokepast.es/08f3ee02345280ea

Description

Explain the strengths and weaknesses of the team here :D

HALL OF FAME

Week 1 (Ogerpon-Wellspring):

 

[Noelle]

For the first Teambuilding Competition of Scarlet/Violet, the Pokémon is Palafin!



Palafin in it’s normal state is actually quite weak. That is, until you activate it’s ability Zero to Hero by switching out, at which point it becomes Palafin-Hero. Palafin-Hero has monstrous attack, good speed, great natural bulk. Additionally, it gets access to Jet Punch, a 60 base power Water-type attack with +1 priority. This allows it to revenge kill Pokémon like Chi-Yu and Flutter Mane and remove weakened targets late game.

Building will last until December 3rd and voting on December 5th

 

[Actuarily]

First one for the new generation, I’ve been playing a ton with palafin and love how strong it’s priority move is.

Hazards + Priority

Description

This team is built around setting hazards with Glimmora to weaken Pokémon as they switch in, and then cleaning up with strong priority moves. Chien-Pao is an excellent pick for this team as it lowers the defenses of all the other active mons, making them easier to be picked off. Ice Spinner is also a required move for removing psychic terrain that would block priority moves (and Chien-Pao is super good into the other mons that block priority moves with their abilities). Dragonite’s extremespeed is one of the best priority moves in the game, and if you can also get off a dragon dance then it’s basically game over. Scizor + Palafin + Arcanine make for a great pivoting core that allows you to get back in Palafin in its hero form. Water Tera CB Palafin hits like an absolute truck, and with Jet Punches priority you’ll never get hit back. The great thing about this team is that it doesn’t need to worry about speed control in a meta that is lacking in good speed control options. Try it out!

Paste

https://pokepast.es/c2212b2d5d1b74de

A quick replay: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9doublesou-1725258769-z1k6tqhzbqtxlgf8gsk260p8j13cglupw

 

[AIRedzone]

Hazard Stack Balance with Palafin

Here's the team:

Description

I've been playing a ton of hazard stack balance, and recently have used Palafin on these teams as my priority user/wallbreaker. I mainly wanted a way to break past opposing Ting-Lu + Ttar cores and Palafin does that with ease. The idea of the team (somewhat similar to Actuarily's team above) is to set hazards (mainly with Glimmora) and sand to steadily chip at the opponents, leaving them weak enough to finish off with Palafin's priority or the other mons' spread moves. While activating Palafin's hero form can be annoying, Amoonguss serves as a great partner it can switch/Flip Turn to as it can easily eat up any supereffective attack thrown at Palafin and heal it back up with Regenerator. The Ttar + Ting Lu core disrupts sun and weakens some of the hardest-hitting threats in the game (like Chi-Yu + Flutter Mane), leaving them well within range of being KOd by Banded Jet Punch from Palafin. Tera water serves to further that immense cleaning/breaking power. Finally, Arcanine can help bring Palafin in on opposing attacks more safely with its Intimidate, Will-o-wisp, and Snarl. One thing this team struggles to deal with is Tera-grass Garganacl, so I will likely be editing this team further to beat it.

Paste

https://pokepast.es/626735d5e65c5b05

Edit: I don't have many great replays because I keep forgetting to save them, but here's the team beating opposing ESpeed Dnite and the Dondozo combo.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9doublesou-1725716372

I'll look for some more replays against a wider range of teams.

 

[yone]

Palafin Rain HO

Description

A rain hyper offense with Damp Rock Pelipper to make the rain last as long as possible and not have to worry about putting it back every time. The team's idea is to clean up with Palafin by maximizing the damage with the rain and taking advantage of Jet Punch's priority.
Tailwind is a key part of the team because here we don't have a Swift Swim user and once in place, every Pokémon here becomes monstrous in terms of speed, we put the move on Salamence which with Intimidate is good defensively and it has the Steel type Tera here in counter to Flutter Mane which will tend to Dazzling Gleam in a matchup against Salamence. Glimmora is our suicide lead and we will use Mortal Spin to remove the hazards that hurt the offensive momentum of the team and especially the toxic spikes that in the long run, make us lose and while taking advantage of the Focus Sash on Iron Bundle, which will be Tera water to maximize the damage with Hydro Pump if necessary.
For Kilowattrel, Wind Power and Volt Absorb are both playable as talents, there is not one less useful than the other, but the Pokémon is important because the damage it inflicts is consequential and access to Volt Switch AND Hurricane are paramount in a team of this pace.
Finally we have Palafin, a classic choice band that is mainly there to finish the game when the oppo lacks options.

Pokepaste

https://pokepast.es/7c2171d639895b07

Will edit in a few hours to add more things in the description, thanks for taking time to read.

 

[tob]

Bulk Up Palafin Hazard Stack


click sprites for paste

Description

I wanted to try something that wasn't just Choice Band, so I went with a Substitute + Bulk Up set, with Tera Fighting allowing Palafin to get more damage and by extension healing from Drain Punch. EVs outspeed max Speed Adamant Dragonite (plus a little bit more for some other arbitrary stuff), which I don't know if people are running but it made sense to me as a benchmark. More experimenting probably needed. Attack investment allows +1 Terastallized Palafin to 2HKO the Leftovers Ting-Lu spread from qsns's VR post, then I went with max HP and enough SpDef such that Chi-Yu doesn't break Subsistitute with Dark Pulse after you Terastallize (if I've done my calcs right).

Pairing a Bulk Up Pokémon with Ting-Lu seemed good to me, so I did that. Took the exact Leftovers set I mentioned before, opting for Stomping Tantrum because I didn't feel happy running Earthquake with only one Ground immunity. I thought about using a more defensive Tera type, but ultimately I couldn't be bothered.

Ting-Lu makes every team it's on bulky, so Glimmora made sense to me. Having hazard control in Mortal Spin is also nice, since Palafin needs to switch in at some point, and Toxic Debris is just a good ability.

Garganacl offers another win condition if the Palafin matchup is bad (which it sometimes can be because of the set I've chosen). Purifying Salt is really good, and was my first port of call for Spore immunities. I had no idea how to EV it so I just did max HP max SpDef and hoped Iron Defense could cover the rest- there's probably more optimising to be done there. Tera Steel allows you to effectively resist both of Flutter Mane's STABs, which is pretty valuable, although there may be other defensive Tera types that serve Garganacl better.

It's a good Pokémon. Spore, Rage Powder, and Pollen Puff help the team with both the set-up angle (Palafin and Garganacl) and the "stall" angle (Ting-Lu). Clear Smog helps against Dondozo, as much as I'd like to just pretend that Pokémon doesn't exist. EV Spread is again taken from qsns's post.

I'm not sure I like Salamence in general, but it seemed to fit here as a Tailwind setter (if needed), Intimidate user, and at least offers some offensive counterplay to Amoonguss, which this team otherwise lacks. Safety Goggles are an option if you need another Spore immunity, so you can run those over Heavy-Duty Boots if you so choose. I built the team without Tailwind in mind, so it may be valuable to include a little more Speed on stuff like Garganacl in order to take advantage of that, but that's up to the user.

 

[Clink143]

It seems everyone decided glimmora works well with palafin, or perhaps is just broken in general. Didn't build this specifically for this thread, but have had a lot of fun and success with this team.

Glimmora Rain

Description

In an earlier version of this team I was using banded Palafin, but while losing flip turn can make the dolphin significantly harder to develop, I have gotten way more mileage out of this set. Amoonguss is the most common answer to Palafin I've run into, but with Dondozo requiring Clear Smog and allied Ting-lu becoming a demon with Pollen Puff, many Amoonguss struggle to find space for a grass move and rely on Rage Powder + Spore. Safety Goggles counters this. I found that between the Hurricanes and Gholdengo I rarely wanted to be hitting opposing Amoonguss, so I opted for Close Combat over Zen Headbutt. The Ghost Tera is for fake outs and Dragonite, the speed EVs are to outspeed Jolly Houndstone under Rain or Tailwind and kill it with Wave Crash.


The team's rain setter and one of the Tailwind users. I decided I needed bulk more than power; the SpA EVs are to guarantee a 2HKO on most invested AV Ting-lu (if they are 252/252+ they deserve it). At 166 Speed Pelipper already outspeeds base 100s and notably Sandy Shocks under Tailwind so I didn't see much point in investing more. Because I opted for bulk, I felt a slow U-Turn would do more for me than Protect.


This mon does way too much. The best hazard setter, the best spinner, and with full SpDef it eats Flutter Mane and Chi-Yu hits like they aren't obscenely broken. As most of my team threatens opposing Glimmora, I can usually win the hazard war by leading this and hazard stacking until it dies. With 130 base SpA even uninvested power gems hit hard. Again, this mon does WAY too much.


A fairy resist that can switch into status and fire off a 120 Power 100 Acc STAB Spread move. This mon is fun to pilot, and while sometimes challenging to position, it does absurd damage, especially with Steel Tera. I chose the Specs set primarily because of Tailwind, and though its power isn't quite on the level of broken that Specs Chi-Yu can achieve, I have been impressed by it again and again. The Speed EVs are once again for Houndstone.


This mon is basically just a Hurricane bot that occasionally presses Tailwind, but STAB Hurricane in the rain has never been a bad idea. To give you an idea of the power level, it's a guaranteed OHKO on max SpDef Amoonguss after rocks. The speed is for Pawmot, though I have yet to run into one. You could go down a few more points to Chomp or Sandy Shocks, but I didn't see much of a point.


Ting-lu is just a great mon. A raid boss with an electric immunity that can phase and deal decent damage to top it off. Earthquake might be better on this team, but I found stomping tantrum to be more reliable. The attack EVS guarantee an OHKO on Chi-Yu after rocks or alongside mortal spin. Im sure the SpDef EVs do something, they were stolen from qsns.

Paste

Palafin @ Safety Goggles
Ability: Zero to Hero
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 204 HP / 252 Atk / 52 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Protect
- Jet Punch
- Wave Crash
- Close Combat

Pelipper @ Damp Rock
Ability: Drizzle
Tera Type: Grass
EVs: 252 HP / 172 Def / 84 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Tailwind
- U-turn
- Hurricane
- Hydro Pump

Glimmora @ Focus Sash
Ability: Toxic Debris
Tera Type: Flying
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpD / 4 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Spikes
- Mortal Spin
- Power Gem

Gholdengo @ Choice Specs
Ability: Good as Gold
Tera Type: Steel
EVs: 76 HP / 252 SpA / 180 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Make It Rain
- Shadow Ball
- Thunder
- Trick

Iron Jugulis @ Booster Energy
Ability: Quark Drive
Tera Type: Flying
EVs: 24 HP / 252 SpA / 232 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Protect
- Tailwind
- Dark Pulse
- Hurricane

Ting-Lu @ Leftovers
Ability: Vessel of Ruin
Tera Type: Ground
EVs: 252 HP / 48 Atk / 84 Def / 124 SpD
Impish Nature
- Stomping Tantrum
- Throat Chop
- Whirlwind
- Protect

ladder performance

I've gotten the impression that the doubles ladder doesn't mean much, but this team performed very well for me and I'm proud of it. Almost all of these games were played with different versions of this team.

 

[ratpacker]

Garchomp Rain Offense

Here's my own take on rain offense with palafin, I mostly inspired myself from the rain teams of Gen 8.



https://pokepast.es/099306d3131b7eef

Description

Booster Iron Jugulis is a very reliable way to setup Tailwind and benefits from Rain to use precise Hurricanes.
Tsareena is here to counter (almost) every Trick Room setup with Taunt unaffected by Rage Powder and counters priority move spam, while benefitting from a stronger matchup against Fire moves thanks to Rain.
Tera-Ground Garchomp always beats Chi-yu + Flutter leads on top of having very good teammates to spam Earthquakes, with rocks to weaken the enemy team. In my opinion, one of the best possible pairings with Jugulis or Pelipper. As Gyarados is an extremely obvious switch-in, Clear Amulet will cancel the effect of Intimidate. It also catches Grimmsnarl off guard if it tries Parting Shot.
Pelipper can afford to run Bulky and can occasionally even setup the second Tailwind of the game and has Helping Hand for Garchomp or Gholdengo's spread moves.
Gholdengo is there as a Steel Type, as a Spore resist and the cool fact it learns Thunder, to take advantage of weather as much as possible.
Close Combat on Palafin hits Roaring Moon mainly, otherwise Palafin's role is to close out games through Wave Crash or Jet Punch.

Replays

Tournament game vs Actuarily : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9doublesou-663359
Room tour vs Yellow Paint : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9doublesou-1717596071
Room tour vs Teambuilding Addict : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9doublesou-1719529625

 

[Mac3]

double bulk up bulky offense



idea behind this team was to abuse brokens with healing, redirection, and taunt support. the sweepers in palafin and annihilape are incredibly good, having insane bulk for their offensive profiles which means theyre able to fully take advantage of amoonguss' and indeedee's pollen puff and heal pulse, respectively. i originally had taunt on palafin but realized its unnecessary when in conjunction with goggles so went double water stab instead, steel tera allows me to counter amoonguss and take advantage of rain weakening fire moves as well. the other sweeper, annihilape, is given taunt in order to prevent me losing to shit like haze pex while i can just kill murkrow if prio-haze, annihilape was given water tera in order to resist surf from pelipper, the attack always ohkoes chiyu with drain punch. pelipper was added as i wanted weather control vs chiyu flutter sun and pelipper also provides tailwind. additionally its able to trigger annihilape's rage fist through both surf and also uturn (evs outspeed the ape). tinglu was added as well in order to help set my sweepers up through the weakening of special attacks, while also being able to trigger rage fist with bulldoze (evs outspeed -1 ape). the teams evs are in general quite unoptimized but unsure what id wanna do with them

 

[bagel]

Screens Setup Spam

https://pokepast.es/24671a8745a8ed0e

Description

The general game plan of the team is to pivot around with the defensive+support core of Grimmsnarl/Ting-Lu/Arcanine/Amoongus, chip the opposing team, and eventually provide an opening for Palafin or Baxcalibur to set up and clean up.

Bulk up + sub seems to catch people off guard, and the threat of band makes it really easy to get a sub off and start bulking up. Speed EVs are to outspeed adamant Gyrados, Dragonite, and jolly Houndstone outside of sand. Not sure how optimal this is, but felt like a decent benchmark to hit without investing too much in speed. Attack EVs 2HKO a bunch of frail stuff at +1, and I threw the rest in Special Defense to stay on the field longer. Tera water in order for jet punch to hit as hard as possible, and its just a nice defensive type. Tob's set he posted above is probably more optimal.

I originally chose Baxcalibur because it was a new shiny toy and seemed like one of the best things to nuke Amoongus and generally help free up Palafin. Max speed adamant actually has a pretty nice speed tier, outspeeding the entire unboosted metagame outside of Dragapult and Talonflame. Tera Fire to resist fairy and steel without becoming weak to fighting, and also take hits from Chi-yu better in order to optimize its ability.

Its Ting-Lu, you know what it does. This things job is to absorb damage while setting up as many hazards as possible and clicking whirlwind. If it finds itself behinds screens or aside Arcanine's damage control it feels invincible. Spread stolen from qsns's post.

Grimmsnarl is also quite simple. Set screens and Taunt annoying mons like opposing Amoongus or Glimmora. I think any combination of screens/Fake Out/Spirit Break/Taunt/Parting Shot can work, but I found taunt to be very helpful against opposing setup and Grimm was too passive without Spirit Break. Parting shot was nice for the extra pivoting capabilities. EVs could definitely be optimized better but I've found heavier Spdef investment to be more useful.

Arcanine does Arcanine things. Arc + Grimm + Ting-Lu all together do a solid job reducing opponent damage and giving Palafin and Baxcalibur chances to set up. Arcanine doesn't like to stay on the board very long, switching in for an intimidate and maybe to get off a wisp but not staying long.

Amoonguss is maybe the best mon in the tier, and it does its usual thing on this team. Spore bot + healing and redirection for the two sweepers.

Replay: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9doublesou-1728878428

 

[thethirdspoon]

Pivot Palafin with Shed Tail Support

https://pokepast.es/4a742308a0a55a90

This is an offensive team that revolves around knocking out everything with Palafin or Chien-Pao. The supporting cast provides speed control, redirection, a bit of damage, and most notably, free substitutes.

Description

Palafin is almost always your lead with this team. It's really important to get Hero-Mode going ASAP. I run Liquidation over Jet Punch or Wave Crash. Jet Punch has a lower BP and Adamant Scarfed Palafin outspeeds every Pokemon in the tier without a Scarf. And Liquidation > Wave Crash because this pokemon needs to get multiple KOs for this team to work.

Murkrow is a very fun utility mon this generation. This set focuses on counterplay. Quash can counter both Tailwind and Trickroom, as well as just being generally annoying. Rain Dance allows Murkow to interrupt weather teams and power up Palafin. Foul Play is very good for chunking threats as well. Tera-Grass to dodge Spore/powder moves.

I love this Pokemon. It's such a good support Pokemon, with (Ally Switch + Helping Hand). And it has a strong anti-priority ability. It's normal typing allows for really dirty Ally Switch games with ghost types. This is also why I run Tera-Ghost, except for normal/fighting attacks. This set is specifically built to abuse Amoonguss. Safety Goggles + Ally Switch to play with Spore. Finally, this pokemon has base 110 SpAtk. This allows it to chunk Amoongus with STAB Psychic. And finally Energy Ball for Gastrodon.

I hate this Pokemon. But I hate Dondozo more and this team needed a way to fight it (This is why it is EVd defensively). Tera-Dark to dodge prankster nonsense. Min Speed to operate under Trick Room.

Chien-Pao might be the best offensive compliment to Palafin. Its ability is stupid and speaks for itself. Ice/Dark/Fighting provides really good attacking coverage. Nukes Amoonguss and a lot of the popular dragon types going around. Tera-Fighting Sacred Sword ignores opponent stat boosts, making this a strong pokemon for chunking Dondozo or Body Press users. This guy outspeeds most of the tier while Jolly as well, making it a huge threat.

And the best for last. Cyclizar is so much fun to use and turns Chien-Pao and Palafin from threats to game-enders. Rapid Spin is a solid stab and very important for increasing the longevity of the previously mentioned threats. Knock Off and Taunt are good support options, and Tera-Dark Knock Off can do decent chip, but Tera-Dark is mainly to dodge Prankster tomfoolery. And finally, Shed Tail. Turns out a free Substitute is really good. Late game, you can force situations where your opponent can't stop a Shed Tail and that often ends the game. Passing to Palafin-Hero is really strong, as Palafin-Hero can often survive a hit with the substitute intact.

First Turn Palafin-Hero

If you lead with Palafin + Cyclizar, you can actually get a first turn Palafin-Hero behind a substitute without losing too much momentum. Scarfed Flip Turn/Switch out Palafin. Then Shed Tail Cyclizar into the new Palafin-Hero. If you need to dodge priority, you can hard switch Palafin into Farigiraf.

That being said, sometimes it's more important to start clearing threats with Chien-Pao. The entire goal of the team is pretty much to enable 1 or both of Palafin/Chien-Pao to sweep.

Replays

Low Ranked, but shows the idea of the team (will update)

Example of 1st Turn Palafin-Hero
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9doublesou-1729188297

Bullying with Farigiraf
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9doublesou-1729075899

Everything goes Wrong Comeback(Bulk Up Palafin Set -Too slow for this team IMO)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9doublesou-1728887967

 

[megacyber]

https://pokepast.es/f7c6f4077dceb71d

garganacl feels kinda dubious, maybe that should be something else, but w/e

 

[Noelle]

Actuarily

https://pokepast.es/c2212b2d5d1b74de

AIRedzone

https://pokepast.es/626735d5e65c5b05

Herv

https://pokepast.es/7c2171d639895b07

tob

https://pokepast.es/0413e52d6bcee5b9

Clink143

https://pokepast.es/1fb59d256bc127b6

ratpacker

https://pokepast.es/099306d3131b7eef

Mac3

https://pokepast.es/f942497f41a8d088

bage1

https://pokepast.es/24671a8745a8ed0e

thethirdspoon

https://pokepast.es/4a742308a0a55a90

megacyber

https://pokepast.es/f7c6f4077dceb71d

Voting ends on December 5th

 

[Meminger21]

Actuarily

 

[tob]

ratpacker

 

[GenOne]

AIRedzone

 

[Chris32156]

Actuarily

 

[xqiht]

Actuarily

 

[ratpacker]

Tob

 

[SingleThunder]

Ratpacker

 

[Yoda2798]

Ratpacker

 

[qsns]

tob

 

[Toxigen]

tob

 

[bagel]

tob

 

[Teals]

MegaCyber