5th Gen RMT : Uhh.. please?

[Eagle]

I'm new to the competitive pokemon side and would like help with my team. I've been reading up a lot of the details but have little experience in competitive OU battling. I know in the rules to making a RMT thread you should test the team out.. but I'm having trouble with all the breeding and what not and it's taking awhile. I just really don't want to finish the team and it turns out its horribly flawed. Still, I hope you guys can help me anyway!

Cloyster @ Focus Sash
Ability: Skill Link
EVs: 252 Atk, 252 Spd, 6 HP
Nature: Adamant (+Atk, -S.Atk)

- Icicle Spear
- Shell Smash
- Rock Blast
- Ice Shard

After trying Closer as my lead I am pretty satisfied. One time I managed to sweep an entire team with 2 Shell Smashes followed up by Icicle Spear / Rock Smash. But that was like, 1 in 30 battles.. Still, I'm pretty happy with the result.

Ferrothorn @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP, 128 Atk, 128 Def
Nature: Brave (+Def, -Spd)

- Protect
- Seed Bomb
- Stealth Rock
- Leech Seed

Ferrothorn is a little tricky. Do I use Leech Seed first, or Stealth Rock? Protect is helping me stall which allows a free turn of Toxic Poison + Leech Seed, but Seed Bomb isn't offering much help. I've been screwed by substituting Dragonite and Breloom. Are there any alternatives? Seed Bomb has been able to shine a couple of times, but I think the slot could be put to better use. Perhaps.

Conkeldurr @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Fist / Guts
EVs: 116 HP, 252 Atk, 140 Def
Nature: Adamant (+Atk, -S,Atk)

- Bulk Up
- Mach Punch
- Drain Punch
- Stone Edge

I love Conkerdurr. I chose to use Iron Fists over Guts because of Drain/Mach Punch. But now that I have played a bit of games on Pokemon Online I am seeing a lot of status effects, so I should probably switch to Guts.

Tentacruel @ Black Sludge
Ability: Liquid Ooze
EVs: 252 HP, 60 Def, 176 S.Def, 20 Spd
Nature: Calm (+S. Def, -Atk)

- Toxic Spikes
- Rapid Spin
- Scald
- Hex

I'm really liking the tanky Tentacruel with effect Toxic Spikes. If an opponent is under a status effect and normally resists Water and Ghost, should I use Scaled or Hex? Hex just doesn't seem to do much, even with the opponent under a status effect. Is there any alternative?

Garchomp @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 252 Atk, 252 Spd, 6 HP
Nature: Jolly (+Spd, -S.Atk)

- Earthquake
- Stone Edge
- Outrage
- Firefang

Really liking the Garchomp. But Outrage, if I were to switch to Dragon Claw would it have a dramatic impact on my gameplay? Also, Firefang.. Eh.

Reuniclus @ Life Orb
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 HP, 252 Def, 6 Spd
Nature: Bold (-Atk, +Def)

- Recover
- Psyshock
- Focus Blast
- Calm Mind

I like Reuniclus but it's certainly no MVP. Also it's been OHKO sometimes by normal resisted physical moves and he's a bit slow.



Thank you for taking the time to read my RMT and possibly taking the team to help me.

 

[Gates]

For starters, Mean Look can no longer be Baton Passed in Gen V.

Second, you have 4 pokemon on your team that are weak to fighting, which is a huge problem since if you lose Claydol (who honestly isn't that bulky anyway) you won't be able to stop fighting-type sweepers like Conkeldurr and Lucario from setting up and destroying your whole team. I can see that you try to remedy this with Chople Berry Umbreon and Focus Sash Cloyster, but Umbreon can't do anything to threaten back and Cloyster loses to the priority moves of both these pokemon, being unable to kill Conkeldurr after it gets a Bulk Up and losing in priority to Lucario's Extremespeed.

Water/Ice is also really terrible type coverage since you get walled by pretty much every water type. This means that you're setup bait for Gyarados, Feraligatr, Suicune, Cloyster, Kingdra, etc. I'd suggest either running Surf (or Scald) and Dragon Pulse or Ice Beam and HP Electric. The first is probably going to be easier to do since all you need to do is breed a Feebas with a dragon instead of going through all that IV breeding crap.

Zoroark's addition is questionable at best because frankly he's just not that good. You say your strategy is just to kill something with Zoroark and then stall, but in a metagame where one of the most used pokemon has STAB Mach Punch, you really need to come up with a better plan than just using that and Cloyster to sweep. You also say that you try to disguise him as Claydol, but I don't think Claydol gets any of those moves so your opponent will know you have a Zoroark as soon as you use one of them. Taking 12% damage as you come in on Stealth Rock instead of 6% will also be a tipoff. Even if you try to mindgame them into switching to a dark, ghost, or steel type to deal with Claydol, Zoroark is so physically weak that if your opponent's pokemon can do anything to Claydol, Zoroark will take a ton of damage from it too.

Speaking of your Claydol, RestoChesto isn't a commonly used set on it for a reason, because it's just not very good. Even if it were good though, Ground/Psychic is pretty bad as far as type coverage goes. You're better off running Earth Power and Ice Beam or Ancientpower. Psychic just isn't a good attack type to run, but if you really want two STAB moves on it you should use Psyshock so that you can deal with Chansey and Blissey more easily.

Frankly your team just needs a total overhaul. Aside from Ferrothorn and Cloyster, you don't really have anything good here and you get destroyed by a lot of big threats in the metagame (Conkeldurr kills most of your team singlehandedly and you can't really do anything about sandstorm either).

Since it seems the only point of including Umbreon is to pass Mean Look, which doesn't work, and Wish, which he doesn't need Baton Pass to do, you should probably just take him out entirely. Zoroark should also go because he's just really gimmicky and not very useful. Claydol isn't doing much for your team and there are much better Calm Mind sweepers available so you should probably get rid of him as well. There are much better supporting water type pokemon out there than Milotic, in fact there's a lot better supporting pokemon in general, so you should drop her.

Try this team:

Spoiler

Cloyster @ Focus Sash
Ability: Skill Link
EVs: 6 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
Nature: Adamant
- Icicle Spear
- Shell Smash
- Rock Blast
- Ice Shard

Same as what you have now. It's not designed to function as a lead, but it definitely can if your opponent doesn't have anything with Taunt.

Ferrothorn @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 56 HP/196 Def/252 SpD
Nature: Relaxed/Sassy
- Protect
- Seed Bomb
- Stealth Rock
- Leech Seed

More defensive version of what you have now. Because of Leech Seed, I am of the opinion that Ferrothorn doesn't need to run much HP. I also think that Protect will help you out more in the long run than Gyro Ball.

Conkeldurr @ Leftovers
Guts
120 HP/252 Atk/136 SpD
Adamant
- Bulk Up
- Mach Punch
- Drain Punch
- Stone Edge/Payback

A phenomenal revenge killer that can also function well as a sweeper.

Tentacruel @ Black Sludge
Liquid Ooze
252 HP/60 Def/176 SpD/20 Spe
Calm
- Toxic Spikes
- Rapid Spin
- Surf/Scald
- Hex

A great supporter. Being able to spin is very important, as is being able to set up toxic spikes of your own.

Garchomp @ Choice Scarf
Sand Veil
6 HP/252 Atk/252 Spe
Jolly
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge/Dragon Claw
- Outrage
- Fire Fang

A phenomenal revenge killer and anti-weather pokemon.

Reuniclus @ Life Orb
Magic Guard
252 HP/252 Def/4 SpD
Bold
- Calm Mind
- Recover
- Psyshock
- Focus Blast

Reuniclus' ability makes it immune to several status effects and recoil from Life Orb, making it a great sweeper.

Since this is in-game I tried to avoid using legendaries and since you appear to be playing with Item Clause I tried to avoid using the same item multiple times.

 

[Eagle]

Thanks so much for your help, Gates! Much appreciated.

I'm glad you didn't find too much wrong with Cloyster and Ferrothorn, they were two of my favorites when working out a build.

Also, am I able to get a Black Sludge item in-game for Gen V?

I would play on Shoddy Battle, but I don't think they're up to date with Gen V Pokemon yet.

And I don't suppose you can provide suggestion(s) for Garchomp's position? I appreciate the filling of the weather-counter but I really.. don't like.. Garchomp. Any more help would be much appreciated too.

 

[kirbyraeg]

There is a shoddy battle server that has Generation V Pokémon and movesets up, Gary Oak's Battle Frontier? (something like that anyway)

You can also download Pokémon Online, which has a complete gen V client.

As for the team...

1: Move zoroark to the lead spot, give it a focus sash, and move ferrothorn to the last spot. Simple gimmick, but it can be effective. Give this a shot:

Zoroark @ Focus Sash
252 SpAtk/4 Atk/252 Spe
Naive / Illusion

Dark Pulse/Night Daze
Fire Blast/Flamethrower
Focus Blast
Counter/Extrasensory/Sucker Punch

Dark+Fighting gives great coverage, and Fire covers most everything else. Counter will give you the chance to surprise most fighting-type switch ins. Sucker Punch will let you get the one-up on more offensive leads who can often be 2hko'ed by your Dark stab and Sucker Punch immediately afterwards.

Ditch Umbreon since he can't mean look pass anymore (we'll get into his replacement later), and try replacing Claydol with a Reuniclus in its place to help you deal with your heavy fighting weakness:

Reuniclus @ Leftovers
252 HP/252 Def/4 SpAtk (low Spe IV)
Relaxed / Magic Guard

Recover
Calm Mind
Psychic
Focus Blast

It's the kind of bulky sweeper you're looking for, and it is a hard stop to most fighting-types. A 19 Spe ensures that you won't ever be hit by a 100-BP Payback (I ran into a conkeldurr once that purposely ran 0 spe brave just to be slower than standard Reuniclus), so just make sure that if you catch a Reuniclus that it doesn't have a perfect speed IV, and you should be OK :3

Ferrothorn is ok as-is, though it really can use leftovers and have a bulkier EV spread (like 252 HP/64 Def/192 SpDef relaxed nature). Just my opinion though.

Cloyster is good too, though I think Focus Sash is a bad idea to rely on since a lot of teams use entry hazards/sandstorm/etc. I think you should replace Ice Shard with Razor Shell and run Life Orb instead of Focus Sash, but use your setup to scout for switch-ins.

Scarfchomp is a good revenge-killer, lol. I hate it, but it does a good job, so you should replace Umbreon with it.

Milotic wants Scald, and I'd recommend putting Dragon Tail in the last spot (even though I think you'll have to breed it onto the Milotic you want). Otherwise, I think Ferrothorn will do a good job dealing with most Waters and that Ice Beam is a good move to have to net a quick 1hko on most Dragons.

edit: Lol I didn't see Gates posted an entire team.

 

[Eagle]

Thank you for your input too.

I didn't know about Pokemon Online. Great, thanks!

 

[Gates]

And I don't suppose you can provide suggestion(s) for Garchomp's position? I appreciate the filling of the weather-counter but I really.. don't like.. Garchomp. Any more help would be much appreciated too.

Well Garchomp is by far your best thing to use in that slot, but there are other options I suppose. The most obvious replacement is Flygon, who is the exact same type as Garchomp and has a similar movepool. The advantages of Flygon are that he is immune to spikes and toxic spikes and has access to U-Turn. The disadvantage is that he's worse in pretty much every other way. He's worse in every stat besides SpA and has no evasion ability like Garchomp does with Sand Veil. He's worse overall, but in terms of getting type resistances down for your team he does exactly as well as Garchomp and in terms of revenge killing he's not too bad.

I have no idea if Black Sludge is available in Gen V, and if it is then I wouldn't know where. If it's not in Gen 5 you can put Macho Brace on Conkeldurr and Leftovers on Tentacruel I guess.

Gimmicky Zoroark set.

Oh man, that reminds me of the lead Lucario I used in that BOTW against PinkU-Turn. Good times.

 

[Eagle]

I have changed my team. With a couple of small changes. Would appreciate your opinions. Also, Earthquake.. I swear it just.. eats me. But it's usually pretty predictable. Are there any Pokemon I could swap out that are Flying / Levitate because I find myself in situations where I know I can stop an Earthquake, but can't counter to somethin' like Ferro because of his super vulnerability to fire from Infernape's or whatever.

Really like the team though. Thanks again.

Also, I'm getting owned by Grass pokemon. Namely Bulbasaur and Venasaur. And when I can predict Earthquake with Ferroseed it's followed up by some stupid fire move that knocks him out.

Forget what I said. Well, don't actually, because they're true. But BRELOOM. Gah Damn. He will Spore me and I will fall asleep. He is faster than me. The only situation where I will be faster than him is to Garchomp. BUT! I don't know he has Breloom. So he will pull out Breloom and it will be too late to bring out Garchomp. Now that I'm asleep he will make a substitute (Healing with toxic orb and poison heal or whatever). If I wake up, he just spores and substitutes. Then whacks me with Focus punch.

Also I wouldn't mind incorporating Breloom to my team.

EDIT: Seriously. Getting my *** kicked by Breloom here.

 

[E123-omega]

I would use acid spray over hex on Tentacruel, -2 sp. Def really soften up opponents and lets you hit harder with scald, just beware of steel types swicthing in (It's not like hex would do anything significant to steels anyway )

 

[Moozle]

I think putting Nattorei's attack EVs into sp.def and giving it gyro ball (or at least power whip) over seed bomb would help a lot. Power whip could work well since I can see this team getting run through pretty easily by a Specs Rotom-W.

 

[Gates]

I would use acid spray over hex on Tentacruel, -2 sp. Def really soften up opponents and lets you hit harder with scald, just beware of steel types swicthing in (It's not like would do anything significant to steels anyway )

No, that allows Jellicent to set up on you for free. It also has 40 base power, which is just downright sad. You need something to threaten spinblockers and Hex can do that. If you replace it with anything it should be Hidden Power Electric, which I didn't suggest because this is in-game and IV breeding would be a nightmare. That move can at the very least take care of Jellicent and Gyarados with ease. Giga Drain could also work if you have any way of transferring Tentacruel back to a Gen IV game and access to the TM. Keep in mind that all these moves only threaten Jellicent though, so you'll need other ways of dealing with spinblockers like, say, Spiritomb or Dusclops. If all else fails I guess you could just run Toxic for redundancy.

I think putting Nattorei's attack EVs into sp.def and giving it gyro ball (or at least power whip) over seed bomb would help a lot. Power whip could work well since I can see this team getting run through pretty easily by a Specs Rotom-W.

I didn't realize he was still running Atk EVs. Don't do that. Run 252 HP/128 Def/132 SpD.

Seed Bomb is fine as is. It's better to be able to 2HKO Rotom-W all the time than to OHKO it sometimes because of Power Whip's horrible accuracy. Gyro Ball is also pretty bad because it has low PP and is resisted by a ton of things. And I really don't see what Rotom-W can do to Ferrothorn anyway outside of Tricking it, which you can't prepare for, or using HP Fire, which will obviously hurt it but a lot of Rotom-W's are on rain teams anyway so there would be no point to them learning it due to the reduced power it would have. Shadow Ball is kind of a joke too since Nattorei resists it and Rotom-W doesn't need to cover itself against other ghosts anymore.

Conkeldurr should be EV'd in SpD, not Def.

 

[Eagle]

This is no longer in-game because I'm now playing Pokemon Online.

Thanks again for the help.

Oh, he was EV'd correctly (Not Ferrothorn though, thanks for pointing that out.) I just wrote it out wrong.