Tyranitar [Ubers] (WIP)

Inspirited

There is usually higher ground.
is a Contributor Alumnus
Tyranitar is characterized by the its ability to create nasty trade scenarios and capitalize on them by damaging key targets with its amazing STAB typing and well rounded coverage moves. It can also deal damage in a more roundabout way by setting up Stealth Rock some of the time. It has the versatility to fit on many team-styles ranging from aggressively focused teams to those that deal there damage slowly. The gift of physical Dark-type STAB and a decent Attack stat help to set it apart from other trade-focused Pokemon such as Dialga.

Tyranitar tends to be more specialized than its usual competition by specifically targeting Pokemon weak to its Dark-type STAB moves. Giratina-O, Latias, and Latios are the most common of these targets due to their inability to reliably KO Tyranitar without proactive play. Within these three common examples, Tyranitar has the tools to heavily damage if not KO one of the three reliably thanks to Pursuit. However, Tyranitar does need to be in decent health to damage almost any Pokemon in Ubers because of its low Speed stat.

Tyranitar also has the right combination of stats, typing, item freedom, and movepool to function as an effective lead. Sand Stream, Rock- and Dark-type STAB moves, and Fighting-type coverage allow it to KO many opposing lead Pokemon such as Deoxys-S, Darkrai, Rayquaza, Deoxys-A, and Froslass. Each item Tyranitar can viably hold has different counterplay to minimize how much damage it does, but Tyranitar's opponent will likely have to guess what that item is, or somehow see the item without taking unwanted damage.


[SET]
name: Choice Band
move 1: Payback / Crunch
move 2: Pursuit
move 3: Superpower
move 4: Stone Edge
item: Choice Band
ability: Sand Stream
nature: Adamant / Brave
evs: 252 HP / 112 Atk / 144 SpD

[SET COMMENTS]

This set aims to maximize Tyranitar's trade value by giving it the bulk it needs to live the more dangerous attacks Latios can use against it and the Attack it needs to threaten Giratina-O and Lugia. More specifically, max HP, 144 Special Defense EVs, and the sandstorm boost allow Tyranitar to live +1 Draco Meteor from Soul Dew Latios after an entry hazard's worth of damage and +1 Grass Knot should Latios carry it. The Attack investment and nature boost makes sure all common Giratina-O are OHKOed by Payback and that Pursuit leaves the more dangerous variants in KO range of Stealth Rock or sandstorm damage should it switch. Pursuit will also leave almost all Lugia in KO range of Stealth Rock should it switch out of Tyranitar while Lugia that use Reflect will eventually end up KOed by Payback should they stay in. An Adamant nature gives Tyranitar a better shot at winning a potential speed tie with other Tyranitar while a Brave nature is used to give Tyranitar a 100 base power Payback against neutral Speed Blissey. Crunch can also be used on a Adamant natured Choice Band Tyranitar to allow it to hit Blissey hard with a Dark-type STAB attack. When compared to Payback, Crunch will noticeably do less damage to a Groudon, Kyogre, or any other Pokemon that takes neutral damage from Dark-type attacks that commonly switch into Tyranitar.

Superpower is only used to threaten Dialga with a near OHKO and other Tyranitar with an OHKO. It is used over Low Kick because of the latter's worse damage output against secondary targets such as Jirachi, Forretress, Blissey, and Skarmory. Stone Edge 2HKOs most Forretress and still deals Payback-level damage to most Pokemon outside of Groudon, Garchomp, and every Steel-type seen in Ubers. Fire Punch can be run in place of Stone Edge as a much more reliable way of KOing Forretress and Skarmory. However, the move combined with the Choice Band's locking side-effect also give a large portion of the most dangerous Pokemon in Ubers a very easy switch-in with Kyogre, Giratina-O, Palkia, Latias, and Latios being the usual suspects.

[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]

While the EV spread covers many common scenarios Tyranitar finds itself in against its common targets, no EV spread will keep it safe from certain moves when it switches into them. Latios's Grass Knot and Giratina-O's Earthquake or Outrage will almost always 2HKO Tyranitar if it wants to have enough Attack to threaten Giratina-O with Pursuit as well as Payback. Entry hazards, such as Spikes and Toxic Spikes, amplify Tyranitar's Speed problem as it will be unable to recover any damage dealt to it and needs its health in order to make use of its attacks. Careful planning and overall good play are the only real solutions to these problems.

Choice Band Tyranitar will be more useful on an offensive or more balance team than a team that wants to create long games. If Tyranitar does manage to KO or heavily damage a Giratina-O, there are many dangerous partners it can utilize to take advantage of this with Groudon, Latias, Latios, offensive Mewtwo, and Lucario being just a few of them. Groudon, its weather rival Kyogre, Palkia, and Garchomp also benefit from the successful removal of an opposing Latias or Latios. Kyogre, Palkia, Mewtwo, Rayquaza, and many other dangerous Pokemon will also benefit from Choice Band Tyranitar's tendency to bring in Skarmory and Forretress with Skarmory in particular being a massive problem for Tyranitar.

[SET]
name: Utility
move 1: Payback / Crunch
move 2: Stealth Rock
move 3: Superpower
move 4: Pursuit
item: Chople Berry / Lum Berry
ability: Sand Stream
nature: Adamant / Brave
evs: 252 HP / 112 Atk / 144 SpD

[SET COMMENTS]

Support Tyranitar exchanges the large amount of trade power provided by a Choice Band for the option of setting up Stealth Rock. It also has the item freedom to hold a Chople Berry in the hopes of trading more effectively with Pokemon that carry weaker Fighting-type moves such as Life Orb Mewtwo, certain Dialga, and Darkrai that have already activated Sleep Clause. Chople Berry will not save it from stronger Fighting-type attacks such as Close Combat from Lucario or Superpower an opposing Choice Band Tyranitar. Leftovers can also be used to reduce Tyranitar's weakness to entry hazards and improves its staying power for use on stall teams, even if it is only by a little bit.

Maximum HP and 144 Special Defense EVs still make it so Latios can never KO Tyranitar with any one attack at +1 while 112 Attack EVs and a boosting nature allow Tyranitar to OHKO most Giratina-O with Payback and sandstorm after a little prior damage. The ability to effectively use Stealth Rock gives Tyranitar another way of dealing near guaranteed damage in a less specialized way when compared to the powerful Pursuit of its Choice Band set.

Superpower provides Tyranitar with a way to threaten most Dialga with a 3HKO at worst with the exception being Bulk Up Dialga. It is also used to threaten Blissey and opposing Tyranitar should they be slower. Pursuit is a smaller utility move on this set as it still damages Giratina-O, but its use has a notable amount of risk associated with it due to Giratina-O's Earthquake and Outrage 2HKOing Tyranitar. Should it stay in, Pursuit only takes away one third of Giratina-O's health at best; a low amount given how valuable Tyranitar's own health is. Latios will also be able to KO Tyranitar should it stay in on Pursuit unless it lacks the coverage to hit Tyranitar super effectively. Pursuit is still rather easy to use against Latias due to its inability to 2HKO a full health Tyranitar without two entry hazards on the field.

A specialized lead set with Lum Berry and 252 HP / 80 Atk / 176 SpD EV spread is used to KO common lead Darkrai sets. Tyranitar is too slow to prevent hazard leads from setting up at least one hazard before being KOed. The extra Special Defense EVs also help Tyranitar deal with Latias, Latios, and Mewtwo at the cost of doing less damage to Giratina-O.

[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]

Due to Tyranitar's Speed issue, it will usually only have one or two turns to do anything; especially against aggressive teams. Because of this, there will be quite a few games where Tyranitar should opt to attack dangerous Pokemon for its team and won't be able to set up Stealth Rock as a result. Because it has a hard time dealing crippling damage to Tyranitar, an opposing Latias will give Tyranitar its chance to set up Stealth Rock while retaining enough health to still be threatening depending on what your opponent will switch into Tyranitar. The decision to set up Stealth Rock almost anywhere else is hard to make correctly with value factors like expected game length, dangerous Flying-types, potential damage done by Payback, an opponent's expected decision etc being variable throughout common scenarios.

The specialized lead variant can also use Fire Blast to stop Forretress from setting up its own entry hazards with 80 SpA ensuring that Fire Blast KOs Forretress. It doesn't have much utility outside of this case and is competing for moveset space with Pursuit, Superpower, and Stealth Rock, all of which have their own less-specialized utility.



[SET]
name: Focus Sash Lead
move 1: Crunch
move 2: Fire Blast
move 3: Superpower / Low Kick
move 4: Stealth Rock / Stone Edge
item: Focus Sash
ability: Sand Stream
nature: Hasty
evs: 176 Atk / 80 SpA / 252 Spe

[SET COMMENTS]

[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]
 
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80 spa beats forretress

superpower is better vs darkrai leads and should be the 'first' as that was one of the main points to ttar.

and why do you want max speed? for other ttars? seems excessive,,,,,,even the cloysters are faster than you and thats like the slowest lead.

oh, and CB is the best set. or any ttar that is mid game. pursuiting for spin and just getting rid of gira for lucario / groudon is insane. it can even twave crap for stuff like...Togekiss!!

scarf blows. yeah it beats the 110s but you need extra insurance against darkrai, and since scarf ttar is a balance mon, you struggle to double up on darkrai insurance. too risky, and not enough profit.

ho ho i tried
 
dd ttar is still good too. but dd taunt–over stone edge–is probs the only good one. and i would check that ttar ev stuff. im not a huge fan of non adamant band ttar nor payback. cause hittin slower things like blissy and quag and ludicolo makes it actually worth it. like ur tankin stuff ttar will never put himself in and the evs are for a mon ttar doesn't realll ycare about. we want evs tailored towards like 100 def gira, def latias, lugias, etc. cause we don't care if we trade 1v1 with the target, it is all accordin to our evil plan.
 

Inspirited

There is usually higher ground.
is a Contributor Alumnus
I'll work with the suggested DD tar for a little while just to make sure I get the speed right (it looks like it doesn't need max).

I agree with Iris on CB tar and put up the spread I personally use that lives +1 Latios meteor after one hazard and has never had power problems against a Giratina-O or a Lugia. I don't think there is a way to live life orb blast from Darkrai without power issues but I also haven't looked into that in awhile; I will at some point.

As for the Focus Sash set, I have been struggling to figure out why my own spread turned out the way it did:
Tyranitar @ Focus Sash
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 80 HP / 116 Atk / 112 SpA / 200 Spe
Naive Nature
- Superpower
- Crunch
- Stone Edge
- Fire Blast
The Special Attack was increased to set up Groudon for a KO from something else and should be reduced to 80, but other than that I am unsure what the HP and only have a vague clue as to why there is so much Speed (I would face many fast Tyranitar at the time). The attack looks like the leftover EVs, but I don't like how low it ended up looking at it, even if it never caused me any massive complications as far as I can remember. Some Speed and Special Attack can definitely be transferred into Attack to fix this, but until I know what the purpose of the HP, I am hesitant to move away from the 176 / 80 / 252 (at least we can pass the speed off as aimed to tie with other sash Tyranitar).

I am still looking for a name for that more support oriented set. It's more of a mix breed of several Tyranitar than just a "Chople Tar" or a "Support Tar".
 

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