----------
Good day Smogon. I have been playing the gen 5 metagame since it began, and I have not met nearly as much success as I would like. I am tyring to improve, but it seems everyday there's new fun mysteries to unlock on that smogon PO server. As always when teambuilding, I pick a favorite poke and build around it accounting for the popular presences in the current meta. This is one of my earlier teams- i have tested many since- but it has been my most successful peaking at a mere 1253. I know this is awful and I sincerely desire to improve, so I am turning to the most elite competitive pokemon community around for help. I appreciate any suggestions anybody has. To give you some insight on my thinking process, here are my chronological idea as I put this team together.How I did it:
----------
I wanted to start this team with the graceful grassland pokemon. It just sparked my interest because of its speed and variety of applications. I also wanted to include a grass type so as not to be stunned by leech seeders. It's speed allows it to outspeed base 100s, 101s (landorus), 102s (garchomp), and usually it has the moves and power to strike fiercly. It's problem is accuracy and surprisingly bulkier pokemon. Jirachi, for instance, is a great check to my virizion. Just a litte sidenote... what is this noob jirachi everyone is using? It's too haxy and "shows no skill", stop it.
I really like this new gen, and the reason is speed. Landorus was given an ironic 101 base speed which lets it outspeed salamence, volcarona, shaymin, tentacruel, jirachi... the list goes on and on. Also it's attack is above average and I wouldn't say its frail by any means. It is neutral to SR and immune to spikes; it truly has alot going for it. With a scarf it can come in an surprise a mence or volcarona while still being bulky enough to deal with gliscor or excadrill. It is a great "scout" (a role which has been diminished by this team preview), and it has enough power to just deal some hole blowing neutral damage. Looking at these two, I realized I have an ice weakness, the next two pokemon will make up for that.
Another great new poke with some great new typing. Normal, Fighting, and Water type attacks all do nothing to Jellicent. Having three complete immunities on one poke is astounding, not to mention the various resistences this typing combo grants, namely ice. Synergy wise, jellicent is weak to grass, dark, ghost, electric which can easily be handled by virizion and landorus. Jellicent carries some crippling moves like scald and Will-O-wisp, as well as the ability to recover its own health. It could also stop the opponent from setting up or carry move attacks for great coverage. Of course being big and bulky, its not too fast but that's not too big of an issue.
Adding another ice resistance is the 4th gen. lava monster that is heatran. I chose his boiling behemoth for its typing and its great special attack stat. It can set up rocks and deal some explosion shots for great neutral damage. Its blatant weakness is ground, which is taken care of to an extent by this new air balloon item. With that in mind, it is weak to water and fighting, which can be sent to jellicent and landorus. Its speed can be adjusted to compete with some fearsome threats such as breloom, scizor, dragonite varients, and toxicroak. Heatran also provides some great coverage along with virizion, but also attracts specially bulky pokes like members of the dredded chansey family. Words cannot express my disdain for stall. With these special attackers, I was sure to get confronted by one of the pink blimps.
Horray for a new Machamp from Unova. Conkeldurr would surely scare away chansey and blissey with its large broken pillars of justice. Not only does conkeldurr provide some physical attacking gumption, but also it packs a STAB priority move. Annnd it gets a move to increse its attack, and it is inherently bulky. It has such a great movepool, I had touble - and am still testing- picking what i thought to be the most effective moveset. Another pokemon that conkeldurr handles nicely is ferrthorn. Everyone has a ferrothorn and for some reason, i struggle to get them down. See people run them on rain teams, so it somewhat nullifies the fire weakness so heatran is not much help. Many times I have to rely on this powerful clown to take down Forretress's cousin, which is difficult because I use conkeldurr perhaps too prematurely in the battle. Even though conkeldurr can take down blissey, ferrothorn, and even skarmory sometimes, it always lures in gliscor. Which it could handle on its own (gliscor's usually SD while I bulky up, then we EQ/payback till death), or switch to jellicent.
The last spot on my team goes to my favorite poke from Hoenn. Carrying another STAB priority is the steel force of Metagross. There really is no rhyme or reason to its moveset, no tricks, no gimmicks, nothing too creative. When this thing is given max speed in the gen 5 metagame, look out. If you are not skarmory or ferrothorn, Metagross will probably put a dent in you. It has such great coverage and is faster than many of the new threats like heatrans, brelooms, magnezone, tyranitar, jirachi and can crack them each with a super effective move. It shares a ground weakness with heatran, but landorus is there for that. Its fire weakness is absorbed by heatran. Also, things it cant kill- ferrothron, skarmory- should be taken down by none other than heatran. When metagross gets lucky enough for meteor mash to raise its attack, its power becomes even more super but those bulky steels are still an issue.
----------
I wanted to start this team with the graceful grassland pokemon. It just sparked my interest because of its speed and variety of applications. I also wanted to include a grass type so as not to be stunned by leech seeders. It's speed allows it to outspeed base 100s, 101s (landorus), 102s (garchomp), and usually it has the moves and power to strike fiercly. It's problem is accuracy and surprisingly bulkier pokemon. Jirachi, for instance, is a great check to my virizion. Just a litte sidenote... what is this noob jirachi everyone is using? It's too haxy and "shows no skill", stop it.
I really like this new gen, and the reason is speed. Landorus was given an ironic 101 base speed which lets it outspeed salamence, volcarona, shaymin, tentacruel, jirachi... the list goes on and on. Also it's attack is above average and I wouldn't say its frail by any means. It is neutral to SR and immune to spikes; it truly has alot going for it. With a scarf it can come in an surprise a mence or volcarona while still being bulky enough to deal with gliscor or excadrill. It is a great "scout" (a role which has been diminished by this team preview), and it has enough power to just deal some hole blowing neutral damage. Looking at these two, I realized I have an ice weakness, the next two pokemon will make up for that.
Another great new poke with some great new typing. Normal, Fighting, and Water type attacks all do nothing to Jellicent. Having three complete immunities on one poke is astounding, not to mention the various resistences this typing combo grants, namely ice. Synergy wise, jellicent is weak to grass, dark, ghost, electric which can easily be handled by virizion and landorus. Jellicent carries some crippling moves like scald and Will-O-wisp, as well as the ability to recover its own health. It could also stop the opponent from setting up or carry move attacks for great coverage. Of course being big and bulky, its not too fast but that's not too big of an issue.
Adding another ice resistance is the 4th gen. lava monster that is heatran. I chose his boiling behemoth for its typing and its great special attack stat. It can set up rocks and deal some explosion shots for great neutral damage. Its blatant weakness is ground, which is taken care of to an extent by this new air balloon item. With that in mind, it is weak to water and fighting, which can be sent to jellicent and landorus. Its speed can be adjusted to compete with some fearsome threats such as breloom, scizor, dragonite varients, and toxicroak. Heatran also provides some great coverage along with virizion, but also attracts specially bulky pokes like members of the dredded chansey family. Words cannot express my disdain for stall. With these special attackers, I was sure to get confronted by one of the pink blimps.
Horray for a new Machamp from Unova. Conkeldurr would surely scare away chansey and blissey with its large broken pillars of justice. Not only does conkeldurr provide some physical attacking gumption, but also it packs a STAB priority move. Annnd it gets a move to increse its attack, and it is inherently bulky. It has such a great movepool, I had touble - and am still testing- picking what i thought to be the most effective moveset. Another pokemon that conkeldurr handles nicely is ferrthorn. Everyone has a ferrothorn and for some reason, i struggle to get them down. See people run them on rain teams, so it somewhat nullifies the fire weakness so heatran is not much help. Many times I have to rely on this powerful clown to take down Forretress's cousin, which is difficult because I use conkeldurr perhaps too prematurely in the battle. Even though conkeldurr can take down blissey, ferrothorn, and even skarmory sometimes, it always lures in gliscor. Which it could handle on its own (gliscor's usually SD while I bulky up, then we EQ/payback till death), or switch to jellicent.
The last spot on my team goes to my favorite poke from Hoenn. Carrying another STAB priority is the steel force of Metagross. There really is no rhyme or reason to its moveset, no tricks, no gimmicks, nothing too creative. When this thing is given max speed in the gen 5 metagame, look out. If you are not skarmory or ferrothorn, Metagross will probably put a dent in you. It has such great coverage and is faster than many of the new threats like heatrans, brelooms, magnezone, tyranitar, jirachi and can crack them each with a super effective move. It shares a ground weakness with heatran, but landorus is there for that. Its fire weakness is absorbed by heatran. Also, things it cant kill- ferrothron, skarmory- should be taken down by none other than heatran. When metagross gets lucky enough for meteor mash to raise its attack, its power becomes even more super but those bulky steels are still an issue.
----------
Here are my favorite gnarly pounders of gen 5 so far. They share some common weaknesses but usually get the job done. Since they cannot always complete said job, I need help from you guys for their improvement.
----------
In-Depth Analysis
Virizion @ Lum berry
Justified - Timid
252 speed | 252 spA | 4 HP
~ calm mind
~ Hidden Power Ice
~ Focus Blast
~ Giga Drain
Here are my favorite gnarly pounders of gen 5 so far. They share some common weaknesses but usually get the job done. Since they cannot always complete said job, I need help from you guys for their improvement.
----------
In-Depth Analysis
Virizion @ Lum berry
Justified - Timid
252 speed | 252 spA | 4 HP
~ calm mind
~ Hidden Power Ice
~ Focus Blast
~ Giga Drain
I have quickly grown fond of this forest majesty. I am well aware of the variety of EV spread and movesets it can entertain, but I like this one the best. It hits 346 speed which is just incredible and only starmie, lati@s, thundurus outrun in this current metagame. If everything goes according to plan, virizion can really sweep through many teams. Unfortuneately focus blast's accuracy fails me many times. I opted for lum berry over leftovers because many times, jirachi will body slam or something will toxic me, and I would have the 2HKO anyway, but with a status condition. With all of my pokes, I am open to suggestions on what to change and so forth. HP ice takes care of gliscors and garchomps that everyone has, giga drain now damages rotom quite a bit also quagsires, focus blast knocks out heatran and ferrothorn. I have found that lum berry virizion is a great switch in to ferrothorn. its immune to leech seed, and at +1 Im pretty sure focus blast is OHKO, or at least close to it. The only reason I didn't make virizion physical is the coverage granted by HP ice. I would love close combat and leaf blade for their accuracy and increased power, respectively, but fainting a dragonite, gliscor, garchomp, haxorus, salamence, or landorus early is just too valuable to my team.
Landorus @ Choice Scarf
Sand Force - Naive
252 attk | 252 speed | 4 HP
~ Earthquake
~ U-turn
~ Stone edge
~ Hidden Power Ice
I usually lead with this ground genie, just because of the scarf U-turn. Team preview effectively nullified the traditional "lead" position, but Landorus assumes it pretty well in 5th gen. When faced with a lead tyranitar or jirachi I am very often tempted to just earthquake away, but I know that wont end well and I should be more careful so early in the battle. Stone edge allows landorus to come in on salamence or volcaronas that are setting up on my switch only to be slammed down by landorus. Hidden power ice was a suggestion from a random person on PO, and it has been doing okay. It does OHKO anything, but it does like ~80% to gliscors and garchomps which is usually enough in the late game. I am thankful for landorus' natual bulk so I know it can survive some devastating neutral hits like returns and power whips. Overall, landorus is a very solid member and holds his own nicely. I just wish earthquake would hit jirachi a little harder.
Jellicent @ Leftovers
Water Absorb - Calm
252 HP | 252 spD | 4 speed
~ Will-o-Wisp
~ Recover
~ Shadow ball
~ Scald
Here is where mostly any special attack ends up. It can even tank a nonSTAB tbolt or grass knot from things like starmie, latios, and espeon. I like that it even though its specially defensive minded, it can still stop physical attackers by burning them. Usually, jellicent can take an earthquake, outrage, stone edge, brave bird and hopefully hit the WoW and recover from there. I had taunt over shadowball, but then starmie ran through my team. I mentioned that jellicent can take a starmie's tbolt, and that's great but without shadow ball, it doesnt help much. I ran a rain team for a while, and my toxicroak always got PP stalled out by these jellicents with taunt, but I looked into it and those jellicents had to be pretty fast to use taunt before I substituted. Anyway, my point here is that Ive seen jellicent be used to counter toxicroak but mine cant. Another great point about its bulk, it can take a draco meteor from an LO latios for like ~50%.
Heatran @ Air Balloon
Flash Fire - Modest
252 spA | 160 speed | 96 HP
~ Earth Power
~ Stealth Rock
~ Hidden Power Ice
~ Overheat
Max special attack heatran is a beast. And with an air balloon, its biggest weakness is eliminated for a little while. Overheat hits anything hard, but as I've stated, theres a bunch of rain teams that just make this move virtually useless. My dilemma with this set is that I want to get rocks up early, but at the same time I dont want to risk my balloon. It's quite the conundrum really. Since it does help so much when coming in on a gliscor or off a kill switch into a garchomp. HP ice is here again to combat those dragons and ground types I mentioned before. Earth Power is usefull for the dreaded toxicroak and tyranitar when it has been previously weakened. The EV's are a bit original, at least I haven't seen them posted anywhere. They are unique in that they allow heatran to reach 230 speed, putting him above today's average scizor, breloom, gliscor, tyranitar, and other heatran. I also like heatran for its typing which lets it completely wall shandera and volcarona, barring some strange hidden powers.
Conkeldurr @ leftovers
Guts - Adamant
252 attk | 120 HP | 136 spD
~ Bulk up
~ drain punch
~ mach punch
~ payback
Here is just the fundamental roobushin. It can be so effective when its biggest threats are taken care of - isn't that true for everything. Like I said, I love the boosted stab priority allowing me to put a damper on cloyster especially. I like that drain punch gives it energy back and that it is no big deal if he gets burnt or poisoned. payback of course deals with ghosts, but i cant help but think that something else could be used here that would show more coverage. Since payback is a well known move here, not many ghosts switch into conkeldurr unless they are definitely faster and can KO before they get hit. Another great mention is that this thing is now a great rotom killer =]. hydropump does enough to not KO and then drain punch allows me to regain enough HP to not get 2HKO'd, usually. Problems with this set are reunicles somehow not being damaged enough by payback to care about it, and gliscor is similar.
Metagross @ Lum Berry
Clear Body - Jolly
252 attk | 252 speed | 4 HP
~ Earthquake
~ Zen headbutt
~ Meteor Mash
~ Bullet punch
I have been running this set for years now; it's the same one I used in gen 4. It's usefulness has certain not declined with the new generation, infact it found a new group of pokes to retire. Giving it the extra speed is apparently really surprising to some people as I have managed to outspeed even some gengar. I started using this to mess with brelooms when i would switch in on the sleep, lum berry, then either outspeed or at the very least speed tie and OHKO with zen headbutt. Zen headbutt, by the way, is also a great way to deal with conkeldurr who will try to bulk up think I will meteor mash i guess. Also, this is faster than most heatrans so usually i just take my chances and EQ provided there is no balloon. Also people think bringing in magnezone on this is a good idea, well thats good for me. It's strong priority is great for tapping down weakened sweepers like latios, gengar, haxorus, and garchomp. But as usual, skarmory and ferrothron give me trouble.
----------
----------
Closing Statements:
I am very devoted to this game, spending 12-15 hours a day on it now. I really want to become good at it, I am in a club and a League at my school where I strive to be a top player. As you can tell from my descriptions, I am tied to each of these pokemon, but honestly they are not attaining the scores I need. I am open to any and all suggestions, please dont hesistate to be harsh. I have not been too active in the smogon community- which could be why I did not get into the recent battling 101 program- but I intend to drastically increase my activity here and just absorb all the knowledge I can. I have been active on other sites, but obviously this is where it's at. There are some weaknesses with my team I know, and I really could use some advice in these particular areas...
----------
----------
Closing Statements:
I am very devoted to this game, spending 12-15 hours a day on it now. I really want to become good at it, I am in a club and a League at my school where I strive to be a top player. As you can tell from my descriptions, I am tied to each of these pokemon, but honestly they are not attaining the scores I need. I am open to any and all suggestions, please dont hesistate to be harsh. I have not been too active in the smogon community- which could be why I did not get into the recent battling 101 program- but I intend to drastically increase my activity here and just absorb all the knowledge I can. I have been active on other sites, but obviously this is where it's at. There are some weaknesses with my team I know, and I really could use some advice in these particular areas...
Specific Areas of Interest:
- Ferrothorn and Skarmory in the rain are big issues. Heatran really cant be used. For Ferrothorn, I have to rely on focus blast and not getting leech seeded on Conkeldur. I do not have an electric attack, so skarm in the rain is a huge probelm.
- I also don't have a spinner, so if one of those bulky guys starts setting up in a rainstorm, I'll be taking some serious entry hazard damage and theres little i can do to stop it.
- I do not have anything with roar/whirlwind/haze or even taunt. So baton pass teams coud techinically rip me apart, but with team preview I've learned to hit the baton pass-ee hard and take it from there.
- Reunicles is also a threat. My only plan is to bring in metagross and just meteor mash for my life. It's so bulky that my moves are not 2HKO's so it can recover then CM and its just a big mess. CM/roar latias is similar, but i can deal with that easier thanks to spamming u-turn.
----------
----------
Thanks for Reading. Please offer any advice you can.
----------
Thanks for Reading. Please offer any advice you can.
