View attachment 295855
Volcanion @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Water Absorb
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Steam Eruption
- Flamethrower
- Sludge Wave
- Defog
With considerable natural bulk and Water Absorb,
would try and put Water absorb into the bit about it being an Azu/Prim check since it doesn't really fit with this first point about boots/defogging as much. Volcanion can make quality use of Heavy Duty Boots and be a more consistent Defogger compared to the last generation. It tends to fit best on bulky offense teams.
Its definitely good on balance too fwiw. In general i don't think this statement is really necessary though at that point cause it fits on a p decent range of stuff. Volcanion easily pressures Azumarill and Primarina and can threaten bulky pokemon like defensive Celesteela and Amoonguss. Sludge Wave provides coverage for the pokemon that its STABs would miss, such as Latias and Kommo-o.
I would make sure to comment on how its massive spA along with its STAB combination + sludge wave makes it a fearsome wallbreaker at the same time, very few Pokemon reliably switch into it except Latias , defensive/mixed kommo-o, rotom-w etc. Make sure to comment on how it pressures really popular Pokemon like Celesteela, Amoonguss, Tapu Bulu etc here too to get a lot of opportunities. If hazard removal is not needed, Volcanion can run Toxic over Defog to further pester these Dragon-types
mention Washtom somewhere between these two points imo. Switch-ins to these Dragon-types such as Diancie and Celesteela are appreciated. Volcanion is also able to check slower breakers such as Bisharp and adamant Mamoswine for them.
+2 252+ Atk Black Glasses Bisharp Sucker Punch vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Volcanion: 250-295 (83 - 98%) -- guaranteed 2HKO , you definitely aren't switching Volcanion into either of them either but you barely even offensive check Bisharp either. You could definitely instead mention checking some stuff like Primarina and Choiced Victini for them instead? Victini is slightly dodgy with Psychic and Bolt Strike easily 2hkoing but if you specify choiced here your celesteela can just happily scout it. Kommo-o and Terrakion work as Knock Off absorbers so Volcanion can keep its Heavy Duty Boots and can provide Stealth Rock.
Thinking about the most common knock users in the tier - Tangrowth, Krookodile, Scizor, Azumarill, Incineroar etc, Terrakion is honestly not a good switch in to a lot of these while Volcanion checks them pretty reliably itself and is only forced out by Krook. I think the Kommo-o point is fine but I don't really like the focus you put onto it here. As an example of something you could instead focus on with it - being a rocks setter that can threaten volcs checks like Rotom-W / Chansey and appreciates Volc checking Prim for it. Amoonguss makes for a reliable partner as it can pivot into Electric-type attacks from Zeraora or Thunderus-Therian
Thundurus mention is ok but NP + Psychic is pretty common over sludge wave to reliably deal with amoonguss/kommo-o. Incarnate is honestly better than Therian too atm cause the speed tier putting it over things like Terrakion and Keldeo is massive a lot of the time. Imo if you are gonna mention Thundurus i'd warn about Psychic coverage here. Also consider mentioning both Amoong and tangrowth instead of just amoong, and mentioning how tang also checks terrak/lycanroc for volc. Rotom-Wash is definitely something worth mentioning having a pivot into too since pain split sets are one of the better switch ins to volcanion. and get off a Spore.
