Originally, I wasn't planning on giving this team out at all to anyone but with my recent elimination in OLT playoffs I figured there's no real reason to keep this team a secret anymore. This team was originally made by my good friend Spencer back in 2019 but he gave me permission to RMT it for the end of the generation as I popularized it near the end of the gen and found major success with it. There are quite a few different variations of this team but I'll be posting the one I use because I think is most consistent. This team is designed to break with bandtar so that excadrill or dragapult can clean up late game. The other three mons are there to support the team with hazards, status, momentum, and item removal. This team has very few bad matchups and with the proper positioning and predictions you can win almost any game.
Tyranitar @ Choice Band
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Stone Edge
- Crunch
- Superpower
- Heavy Slam
Heavy slam on ttar is solely for clef but pays off because of how annoying clef otherwise is for this team, killing it frees up ferrothorn to leech, rotomw to toxic and volt switch, dragapult to draco, and your own clef becomes even more annoying. Plus ttar itself removed what is often the only dark resist for next time it comes in. Superpower on ttar is extremely helpful as a catch all for ferrothorn/heatran/ttar/kartana/magnezone/hydreigon surprising them when crunch would not otherwise kill. it also works great vs things like blissey/chansey who often stay in to scout what move you're going to lock into, which works really well if you had already weakened a member of their team prior. The stall matchup becomes extremely easy once you can get rid of chansey/clef as with these 2 moves as you can often just spam crunch/shadowball from pult after those are gone and get up hazards and win pretty easily. Stone edge and crunch are spammable STABs and are extremely under prepared for lacking many really solid resists.
Excadrill @ Leftovers
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Earthquake
- Iron Head
- Rapid Spin
- Swords Dance
Everything about this excadrill is standard and it does its usual shit. Spin is oftentimes very important when playing opposing spikestack as dragapult/ttar do not like switching into those a lot and excadrill is also often a great late game cleaner after ttar+pult have made holes in the opposing teams defence. It's pretty essential to keep drill vs HO as it outspeeds and kills almost everything and can also spin away the hazards that may have been setup.
Clefable @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 HP / 248 Def / 8 Spe
Bold Nature
- Moonblast
- Knock Off
- Stealth Rock
- Soft-Boiled
Clefable is also pretty standard, I elected to go with this spread instead of mixdef because I have ttar for dragapult shadow ball and I would rather be able to use clef to reliably switch into zeraora which is potentially extremely threatening to this team. Knock off is its best move as knocking shit like pexs boots, clefs leftovers/helmet, and getting it in on defoggers to knock their item like torn/landot/corv becomes extremely beneficial. It gives you an alternative to beating scarf lele too as you can just knock it and revenge kill with pult if it really comes down to that. Rocks clef is cool because it baits in those defoggers and since not a lot of shit can ohko clef you can almost always get rocks up if needed.
Dragapult @ Choice Specs
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Shadow Ball
- Flamethrower
- U-turn
Modest specs dragapult has become one of my favourite pokemon to use after spamming it on ladder and for good reason. Shadow ball is extremely spammable and its coverage moves help a lot vs most of the shit in the meta. U-turn works perfectly on this team paired with band ttar as a lot of the shit that likes to come in on pult (chansey, mandibuzz, clef, tornt, pex) all get completely trucked by ttar.
Rotom-Wash @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Hydro Pump
- Volt Switch
- Toxic
- Pain Split
Toxic on rotomw is solely for gastrodon though it has some other helpful moments like vs spdef bro or slowkings who sponge u turn. the ev spread is to outspeed nidoking to catch it off surprise but it works really well in situations where im low and i need to get a split off vs shit like heatran/volcanion. Outspeeding modest specs lele has its merits to and has came in clutch many times.
Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 244 Def / 12 Spe
Impish Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Body Press
- Iron Defense
- Leech Seed
- Spikes
This ferrothorn set lets it beat magnezone so I don't lose vs kartzone and it can also annoy offensive teams without a ghost and pressures defog corviknight nicely which excadrill appreciates. Spikes is really what makes this team work as getting up all your hazards and getting knocks with clef make pult and ttar so hard to beat for most teams, having no leftovers makes scarf lele a bit more annoying but i'd rather have helmet on him too to be able to punish uturns on shit like landot to get it in range of shit like +1 iron head from drill, shadow ball etc.
Threats
The main threats to this team are rillaboom, volcarona, and blaziken. For rillaboom u wanna keep ferro+pult+clef healthy as ferro can ID up beside it which makes clef a viable switchin as it can punish drain punchs/superpowers/uturns and keeping pult above +2 ada glide range means rillaboom cant really sweep. For volc what you wanna do is keep ttar/rotomw healthy as rotomw can toxic it so you can pivot around and weaken it for drill, or if ttar is healthy you can live a +1 buzz and revenge kill. blaziken is pretty easy to deal with compared to the other 2 as it can only really setup on ferrothorn for free but having a healthy ferro is often enough as you can bait out flare blitz by going into dragapult and then going ferrothorn which kills after body press damage and recoil. (38+17+13)
Replays:
Vs stall
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1643768509-0ous5okbqdd5b66bhfmjmthog3jhvxhpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1641503834-m2q9n6w99v95udi5mgdlwkxnc91mb5bpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1640749915-wgfv8r3q14kxc5aqk727ewjq0tfynudpw
vs bulky offence
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1650715544-1kznjbaf2fr2tmqw056rk111i10dvkfpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1644053835-6uvzfd8f3qcwsad3nggs1zf24ftitz5pw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1639990117
i don't really have any replays vs rain but it completely fucks on that too as dragapult kills everything, ferro/clef punishes skewdas moves, rotomw volts out and u have ur own weather that also kills everything else.
https://pokepast.es/85d2f1edf9c68d4a this is the import
special shoutouts to spencer for actually making the team and shoutout to him, Hiye bbeeaa Storm Zone and bdhb for helping me get better not only with the team but at the game in general.
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