Stealth Rockless (OU)

[Bogmire]

I wanted to make a team without stealth rock just for the hell of it and the result has been surprisingly successful. please don't suggest SR anywhere as it would ruin the whole theme.

OVERVIEW

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Heatran@Choice Specs
Modest
Flash Fire
EVs: 252 sp atk/252 spe/6 hp
-Overheat
-Earth Power
-HP grass
-Flamethrower

This is by far my favorite lead I have ever used. I don't waste time setting up SR and instead opt to kill stuff right off the bat. It's so easy for opposing teams to lose a key team member in the blink of an eye because they don't expect specs overheat to KO their hippowdon and metagross (with occa), or they don't expect HP grass from a leadtran. It's quite common for the opposition to never get stealth rock up at all. If I use earth power this will usually come out on top against Porygon2 if I get a sp def drop, and even if I don't predict HP grass bulky water types still take around 50% from overheat. Specstran's sheer power makes up for the lack of SR damage.

Moveset Explanation
Overheat: Mainly here to OHKO occa berry gross leads, which fire blast cannot do reliably. Anything else switching into overheat will either leave dead or extremely hurt.

Earth Power: For other Heatran, Tentacruel, and Tyranitar (max HP variants are 2HKOed). Also my best attack besides flash cannon (which has crappy coverage otherwise) against porygon2.

HP grass: Used to OHKO swampert leads and 2HKO other bulky waters like vaporeon and suicune.

Flamethrower: A reliable 100% acc STAB for late game sweeping that can 2HKO blissey below 50% health. Good against azelf leads because fire blast always misses. It's high PP makes it annoying for wishbliss that carry flamethrower and toxic.

EVs and Nature
Modest is used for maximum power and because Timid doesn't outrun anything significant and is generally a crappy nature for specstran.

Heatran vs the top 15 leads
Metagross: Overheat for the OHKO
Azelf: 2HKO with flamethrower. unfortunately they usually get SR up.
Jirachi: They usually u-turn out to a counter which gets smacked with overheat. then I switch. like gross, overheat KOs right through any occa variants.
Swampert: HP grass always kills. I've only had one case where a swampert used protect the first turn
Aerodactyl: unfortunately I lose to this. I usually go to Vaporeon and surf it.
Infernape: A problem. Either salamence or dusknoir can switch into the and come out on top.
Hippowdon: Overheat always OHKOs. I've never had hippo switch out of a tran lead, and starting off 6-5 against a stall team is great.
Bronzong: Overheat, even with heatproof it can sometimes OHKO depending on the EV spread.
Ninjask: lol
Tyranitar: annoying, it isn't worth risking EQ to 2HKO with earth power. usually I go to salamence to intimidate it while they usually EQ or set up SR. brick break usually kills it.
Heatran: I have to switch to vaporeon which can scout for explosion. sadly it will usually get SR up.
Roserade: Vaporeon absorbs the sleep powder (so it doesn't get poisoned by TS later) then back to Heatran.
Smeargle: Vaporeon absorbs spore, then I go to specsjolt because often times bp teams have no real answer to it (not saying a smeargle lead always indicates a bp team but sometimes it does)
Abomasnow: OHKO. Specstran isn't so kind to hail teams in general.
Mamoswine: Go to salamence to take EQ and intimidate. now its set up fodder for dusknoir (so many teams are unprepared for it)

Vaporeon@Leftovers
Bold
Water Absorb
EVs: 252 HP/252 def/6 spe
-Surf
-HP electric
-Wish
-Protect

Ol' reliable Vaporeon. the glue of this team so to speak, keeping dangerous threats like gyarados, empoleon, and infernape at bay. Draws electric attacks for jolteon to give free switch ins and supports the rest of my team with wish. I don't know what else there is to say about this.

Moveset Explanation
Surf: Obligatory STAB for infernape and mamoswine

HP Electric: Good for gyarados and empoleon. What surprises me is when gyarados stay in to taunt me, for whatever reason lol.

Wish: Standard

Protect: to scout and heal from wish

EVs and Nature
Bold and max HP and def for maximum durability. I never really found the speed EVs from the analysis too helpful, the extra defense can help taking Close combat from Infernape who invest more attack EVs. Sp atk EVs don't do anything significant so yeah I don't use 'em.

Salamence@Life Orb
Rash
Intimidate
EVs: 80 atk/252 sp atk/176 spe
-Draco Meteor
-Fire Blast
-Brick Break
-Roost

Classic mixmence. my team's main stall breaker. I use this over new mixmence because locking yourself into outrage against a stall team isn't such a great idea and roost helps a lot with extending mence's survivability. Salamence gives me a good lucario check and a ground immunity to fall back on. Intimidate is awesome for making Mamoswine leads useless against dusknoir, and electivire useless too (they usually come in on jolteon then use eq)

Moveset Explanation
Draco Meteor: Powerful STAB to obliterate anything that's not a steel type or named blissey.

Fire Blast: Used to hit steels

Brick Break: 2HKOs blissey and OHKOs tyranitar.

Roost: Roost is a great move to foil anybody who tries to use fancy switching to stall out mence with recoil damage.

EVs and nature
The EVs are taken from the analysis. 252 sp atk to make draco meteor as strong as it can be, 176 speed to outrun adamant lucario, and 80 atk to power up brick break. A lot of people are opting to use +speed natures on their salamence's now, but believe me that 10% power boost from rash really does make a difference.

Dusknoir@Leftovers
Adamant
Pressure
252 HP/252 Atk/6 speed
-Substitute
-Focus Punch
-Shadow Sneak
-Will-O-Wisp

If there's one thing Dusknoir does better than Rotom it's abusing it's physical movepool. Dusknoir is a real prick for the opposing team, setting up substitute then focus punching their heatran and tyranitar into oblivion. shadow sneak pisses off frail sweepers like infernape after they survive a focus punch and think they have me in the KO range for their next attack. Anyone who switches Gyarados or Salamence in thinking they can wall me and set up with impunity will be sorely disappointed not expecting will-o-wisp on a subpunch set. Another thing dusknoir is good for is screwing around with noobjask leads and burning whatever their bp receiver may be (usually metagross).

I used to have a LO gengar with shadow ball/tbolt/focus blast/hp fire in this spot but really wanted to try subpunching dusknoir and ended up being very impressed with the results. Both have their strong points, Dusknoir has unpredictability and priority on it's side plus its more bulky, while Gengar has a toxic spikes immunity, more speed, and ground immunity going for it.

Moveset Explanation
Substitute: For focus punch, obviously. Dusknoir's natural bulk and 2 immunities makes it relatively easy to set up.

Focus Punch: Used to take out would-be Dusknoir "counters" like Tyranitar and Heatran while hitting blissey and frail sweepers extremely hard.

Shadow Sneak: Priority is great for picking off anything who has weathered a focus punch already and 2HKOs stuff immune/resistant to FP like latias, gengar and 4 hp scarf rotom. Ghost+Fighting have perfect coverage.

Will-O-Wisp: Adds to the annoying factor of this set. Now, anything who can easily take both my attacking moves will be crippled with a burn.

EVs and Nature
The EVs are very simple. Max HP for survivability when setting up, and max atk and adamant because base 100 atk is decent but not amazing. the other 6 into speed to beat other dusknoir.

Scizor@Choice Band
Adamant
Technician
EVs: 248 HP/252 atk/8 SpD
-Bullet Punch
-U-Turn
-Superpower
-Pursuit

Bog standard CB scizor. Makes a great latias check and revenge killer among other stuff. You all know how this works.

Moveset Explanation
Bullet Punch: revenge kill

U-Turn: scout

Superpower: steel types

Pursuit: trap and kill

EVs and nature
The EVs are standard. 252 atk obviously, 248 HP for bulk and the resulting HP isn't divisible by 8 thus reducing SR damage. 8 sp def for more bulk. No speed EVs because when two CB scizor's are against each other the slower one has the advantage. I also use a couple less speed IVs to ensure that I'm slower.

Jolteon@Choice Specs
Timid
Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 sp atk/252 spe/6 def
-Thunderbolt
-Shadow Ball
-HP grass
-Baton Pass

Specsjolt is another special sweeper of my team. Heatran sometimes find itself stopped cold by Porygon2 so I'll send this in to absorb the twave (and twave in general) then 2HKO with tbolt. Any team without a proper electric resist or blissey is generally torn to shreds by this. Heatran goes some way in supporting Jolteon by taking out Hippowdon and Swampert leads who don't usually expect to be OHKOed making spamming tbolt a lot less risky.

Moveset Explanation
Thunderbolt: Obligatory STAB

Shadow Ball: For those pesky Rotoms and Celebi.

HP grass: For swampert and rhyperior, mainly

Baton Pass: If I predict a switch to a counter I can use this to keep the momentum going. Jolteon has a piss poor movepool so there's not really anything else viable to put here.

EVs and nature
Timid is necessary to outspeed Starmie, Azelf, Adamant Gyara after 1 DD, and CB dugtrio. Max sp atk and speed obviously.

Team building process
I'm going to be honest here I just through together a bunch of hard hitters and hoped for the best. I noticed an infernape, gyarados, and empoleon weakness so I added Vaporeon who covers them all.

Final thoughts

The lack of a rock resist is devastating for this team, but luckily the only commonly seen pokemon who gets STAB on them is tyranitar and aero (who's weak enough to be walled by vappy). It's still an issue though, because nothing will switch into ttar CB stone edge without dying. Any suggestions? I was thinking maybe machamp or flygon but I just don't know.

One might look and see that I got a whopping 4 pokemon with abilities for Porygon2 to trace, but it really isn't an issue, if it traces heatran's flash fire for example jolteon can just come in and kill it or vice versa. I've yet to lose against a team that utilizes porygon2.

 

[henryhychoi]

I advice you to switch the 8 spe EV's in your Scizor to something else

Because: If it is a Scizor VS. Scizor, the faster one will use U-Turn first allowing the opponent to swith into what you U-Turn in.

Also, if both Scizors use Superpower against each other, the second one has a distinct advantage as it gets to exploit the Def. stat decrease.

But one may view attacking first as an advantage if the Scizor is already weakend etc.

A choice of preference really, but if you don't really care about the Spe EV's I would invest them somewhere else

 

[Bogmire]

thanks, the 8 EVs have been moved to special defense.

 

[Bogmire]

bump

 

[FalconPunch]

I suggest that you swap MixMence out for MixKnight. MixKnight outclasses the classic Mixmence because Dragonite has access to superpower which lets him OHKO Blissey, a feat that can not be preformed by Salamence. Here is the set:

Dragonite @ Life Orb | Inner Focus
Rash ( +Sp.Atk -Sp.Def )
112 Atk / 200 Sp.Atk / 196 Spd
•Draco Meteor
•Superpower
•Fire Blast
•Roost

MixKnight, a great stall breaker. Dragonite gives you a good lucario counter and a ground immunity to fall back on. Draco Meteor is for a Super Powerful STAB that will crush anything that is not made of steel or is named blissey. Fire Blast Crushes those Steels while Superpower will OWN Blissey. And Roost is to recover off life orb damage.

 

[Xephyr]

Whenever I make a team without Stealth Rocks, I like to make my lead Yanmega because it's such a sexy killer lead with protect, air slash, bug buzz, hp ground and whatnot.

Anyhow, your team is just flowing with ridiculous immunities. You're sporting total immunities to fire, ground, electric, water, normal, fighting, and poison (lol) attacks in some fashion on this team. That's kinda cool, honestly, lol. I think Spiritomb would be a better addition than Dusknoir. While it doesn't Focus Punch, it can Sucker Punch or Calm Mind for a sweep and is better overall at Wil-O-Wisping things, and it loses the Pursuit weakness. And I'm not just saying that because it nets you another immunity in psychic, lol.


You might want to try Explosion on your Tran and a different nature just because. It can always help, and I don't really see any situations where Flamethrower is more useful than Overheat =/

 

[Riverside]

@Falcon Punch

I think this EVs are better for that:

Dragonite (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Inner Focus
EVs: 60 Atk / 196 Spd / 252 SAtk
Naughty Nature (+Atk, -SDef)

By the way, what are you supposed to outspeed with 245 speed?

 

[FalconPunch]

what are you supposed to outspeed with 245 speed?

the given Attack EVs are necessary to OHKO Bold Blissey, Tyranitar, and Heatran. 196 Speed EVs place Dragonite at 245 Speed, enough to outrun Jolly Tyranitar and just about any defensive Celebi and Zapdos, and the remaining EVs are placed in Special Attack.

 

[Riverside]

Ok I get it, then:

Dragonite (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Inner Focus
EVs: 64 Atk / 192 Spd / 252 SAtk
Naughty Nature (+Atk, -SDef)

With those EVs you got 352 Attack and not just 332 while your Spc atk it's 299 instead or 314

So you won 20 points in attack losing 15 on special attack.

Dusknoir@Leftovers
Adamant
Pressure
252 HP/252 Atk/6 speed
-Substitute
-Focus Punch
-Shadow Sneak
-Will-O-Wisp

You could try Pain Split instead of Wow. and Life Orb as item, to guarantee some OHKOs.

Scizor@Choice Band
Adamant
Technician
EVs: 248 HP/252 atk/8 SpD
-Bullet Punch
-U-Turn
-Superpower
-Pursuit

EVs and nature
The EVs are standard. 252 atk obviously, 248 HP for bulk and the resulting HP isn't divisible by 8 thus reducing SR damage. 8 sp def for more bulk. No speed EVs because when two CB scizor's are against each other the slower one has the advantage.

Then take away 1 or 2 IVs from speed to being slower than others scizor with 0 Evs @ speed.

 

[Bogmire]

thanks for the rates everybody.

I tried using yanmega and I don't really like it, like I said the biggest problem with this team is the fact CB tar stone edge basically always gets a free kill on something, another 4x rock weakness definitely isn't something good for my team. yanmega also lacked the sheer power of specstran to destroy other leads.

I'm going to test mixnite, though I'm a bit skeptical because the lack of intimidate makes it less of a team player and its slower than lucario (and dies to ES after an SD and SR because of no intimidate)

life orb on dusknoir definitely is not a good idea, it'll just die waaaay to fast. I'm going to test pain split though.

I'll test explosion on tran, but tbh there's never been a time when I wished I had it. flamethrower has helped me a lot with cleaning up weakened stall teams in particular.

 

[FerrariCUBU]

This is a really great team. I like the idea of a lead meant to kill. However, I see two things that could become a problem. 4/6 of your Pokemon have a big problem with Porygon2. Just be very wary of it. Also, half of your team is Choiced. If you are good at predictions this is fine. Otherwise it might hinder you a little bit. Overall great team.

 

[MetaNite]

Actually, this is usually the optimal MixNite Ev spread: 56 Atk / 252 SpA / 200 Spe. With only 196 spe evs you only tie with defensive Celebi, Zapdos, Jirachi, some Heracross, and other Pokemon that Ev just to oustpeed Jolly Tyranitar.

If you wish to OHKO bold Blissey, then 112 Atk EVs should do it although more Blissey are calm now adays.

Hello Bogmire. I remember facing a team with Hidden Power Grass Tran as a lead, I wonder if it was you? I believe they also had a SubPunch Dusknoir (not something you forget) but it could have been another battle.

Blissey seems to wall a fair majority of this team. Blissey with Flamethrower, Ice Beam, and Toxic will surely be a hazard. It can easily come in on SpecJolt or Heatran (It'll do a lot of damage with Overheat, but not nearly enough to even 2HKO, especially without residual damage).

Dusknoir dreads Toxic, and its not likely Blissey will try and stall it out anywho. Scizor is your only truly reliable switch in, but Flamethrower will still be its demise. Unfortunately, Salamence can't OHKO Blissey while Blissey can OHKO.

You'll probably have to replace a Pokemon to fix this. Jolteon is one of the Pokemon walled by Blissey, who you could replace with say Electivire if you still need an eletric immunity. The standard mixed attacker should work fine, and help break stall even more.

The offensive Pokemon this team seems to have trouble with is Lucario. Salamence is your only true check, as Crunch should KO Dusknoir since it has no Defense EVs. Salamence will be worn down by Stealth Rock and surely Life Orb damage. The way I see it, you need to sacrifice a Pokemon at least to have a hope of bringing it down.

Hmm... again, you will probably have to replace a Pokemon to deal with Lucario better unless you want to make Salamence Naive and possibly replace Life Orb. No doubt you know what deals with Lucario so I won't go into that. As to who you should replace, I'd say Dusknoir or Scizor. Scizor doesn't really give you much synergy, while I don't see a problem with Tyranitar, Gengar (2 Pokemon Dusknoir and Scizor for that matter, can handle fairly well).

EDIT @Overcast: Every team and every Pokemon can take advantage of Stealth Rock. How can you not take advantage of a move that constantly wears down the foe's Pokemon? If you want a specific example, just look at Salamence. It would certainly enjoy Stealth Rock to get some extra kills.

EDIT @Ferrari: I was responding to Overcast's post, saying how he has no Pokemon who rely on Stealth Rock and that he should take advantage of not being able to take advantage, or something like that is what I think he's saying. I understand the concept, however, a Pokemon such as Aerodactyl can lay down Stealth Rock while also OHKOing his Heatran. Not only sets up, but taking momentum as Bogmire wants his lead to do. Similarly to Metagross, set up, kill a Pokemon with Explosion.

 

[Overcast2020]

Nice lead.

Many teams actually do not need stealth rock if they are built properly, because some pokemon rely on it. You team has no pokemon who rely on Stealth Rock so you take advantage of that with your cool heatran lead.

I also think pain split is a good idea on Dusknoir because sub takes health faster than you ussually predict.

I like the vaporeon-Jolteon synergy. good job

thats bout all

 

[FerrariCUBU]

Every team and every Pokemon can take advantage of Stealth Rock. How can you not take advantage of a move that constantly wears down the foe's Pokemon? If you want a specific example, just look at Salamence. It would certainly enjoy Stealth Rock to get some extra kills.

I believe the point of not having SR is to get a jump on the opponent by getting in an easy kill. Also, many leads are just that, leads. They can't do much during the middle and end of the battle. A SpecsTran can do a lot.