Scofield
Ooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhh hhhhhhhhhhh, Kate.......
Welcome to Fabletown
A Team of Fables aka Team Phoenix Rising aka The Team I Used in Smogon Tournament # 5
(As usual skip all of the introduction stuff if you’re impatient.)
Objective: After signing up for the 5th Annual Smogon Tournament, I realized that my last team had become outdated. I was already in the process of making a new team, but soon realized that that team wasn’t going to get me where I wanted to go. So I decided to scrap the team in progress and wanted to make a team that would give me the best chance to win any one given battle, given all battle conditions and styles. And that is how this team came to be.
Play Style: I started out playing bulky offense. After a bit, I started playing hyper offensive, trying to win as quickly as possible. With this team, I wanted to return to my original style, as I felt it was the most effective. Without realizing it, most players do play the “bulky offense” or “balanced” style. The idea is for each Pokémon to carry its own weight, and not using walls for the sake of walling threats, but rather just being able to beat, either by countering or checking, all dangerous threats. You want to play smartly, sacrificing Pokémon as needed, but not letting any one die needlessly. Any Pokémon is viable to be used in this play style, even if just by using its typing to its advantage to get switch into the game. Of course, it only makes sense to limit the number of “fragile” Pokémon on this team. I also like to use Pokémon that I am familiar with, although sometimes in new roles, ie Heatran as a Stealth Rocker as opposed to the Life Orb or Scarfer version.
Theme: I love nicknaming my Pokémon cutesy/funny/ironic names. While making this team, I was reading the Fables series, and was quite into it, so of course they all ended up named after Characters from fairy tales or fables. I’ll explain the nicknames as people sometimes are curious about them, but I’ll try not to clutter the thread with it. For those who are unfamiliar with the series I am speaking of: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fables_(Vertigo)
Effectiveness: No, I’m not trying to brag, I’m just trying to show that this team can be effective. Obviously, I developed this team for ST5, and it got me to the second round before losing in a game that could had gone either way. Besides that, I used this team on the ladder, and it got me to 1600 and the top 20 on two accounts. If my life depended on winning one Pokémon match, this is the team I would use.
Rose Red (Roserade) (F) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 6 HP/252 Spd/252 SAtk
Timid nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Sleep Powder
- Leaf Storm
- Sludge Bomb
- Hidden Power [Ice]
Namesake: Ah, a rose by any other name…Although, admittedly Roserade should be by the name of Briar Rose aka Sleeping Beauty. I just liked Rose Red’s character more and it still fits.
EV’s/Item/Nature: A pretty standard max/max sweeper spread. I do have one question though. On the Roserade analysis, the focus sash set has the extra 6 ev’s thrown into hp, but on the scarf set, it is dumped into special defense. Which is better? As for the choice scarf, it allows Roserade to hit a speed of 459.
Move Set: Sleep Power is the key to the set, allowing me to get off a quick sleep at the beginning of the match. Leafstorm allows me to always have a move to check those pesky curse Swamperts (ohko under all circumstances), +1 Calm Mind Suicunes, and to hit hard in general, doing a great deal of damage to dragon dance Gyarados (about 56%) and Kingdras (about 85%). Sludge bomb allows a nice stab move to pick off Infernape or Azelf trying to switch into a light grass knot. It also allows me to do a great deal of super-effective damage to Celebi. Lastly, HP Ice is to check +1 dragon dance Salamences.
Team Role: About 99/100 times I just sleep at the beginning of the match. The only time I think I ever don’t is if the lead is a Flygon, which are usually scarfed and try to use U-turn, in which case I just HP Ice it. Lum Berry leads are very rare now, teams hardly carry sleep absorbers any more and the only times Roserade has ever gotten me into trouble as a lead is when Sleep Powder misses. I am able to shut down all suicide leads, hopefully preventing them from getting Stealth Rocks up. I’m not afraid of revealing the “scarf surprise” early in the match, but it is nice when I can occasionally conceal it for a late game surprise knock out. I was going to list the top 10 leads and how Roserade stacks up against them superiorly, but really, it would just be a waste of time as I could (and do) just sleep them all. Roserade has a few very important roles on my team. Besides the fast leading sleep and previously mentioned swampert check, she offers me a toxic spikes absorber, revenge killer without fear of magnezone or status due to natural cure, and a soft celebi counter, being immune to leech seed, not caring about twave, resisting grass knot and being able to take HP Fire well. Roserade is surprisingly bulky on the special side, as not even an unboosted max special attack neural natured Infernape’s Flamethrower is a guaranteed OHKO, which is helpful against suicide lead Infernapes who opt for accuracy. Her grass typingand decent special defense also allows me to switch in on some electric attacks, like Jolteon and Zapdos and hit back hard.
Opinion: The choice scarf makes Roserade the ultimate anti-lead. Remember 6 months ago when Scarf Gengar was everywhere? Then all of a sudden everyone started carrying lum berry leads until the hypnosis of accuracy fell. Then all of a sudden everyone forgot about starting out with a fast sleep, meaning that it is once again anti-meta. And Roserade does have the fastest reliable sleep (for the sake of argument I’ll define “reliable sleep” as a sleep move with over 70% accuracy.) Besides sleep, Roserade is utterly walled by Heatran and most steels, fearing scizor switch-ins even more, but it isn’t too much of a bother for the rest of my team. The rest of my team can handle Heatran and other steels, and Scizor would be reluctant to switch in anyways if they think I’m the regular sashed toxic spikes Roserade with HP Fire. Roserade is invaluable to the team as the lead and fills a niche in my team that only she can. I’ve always like Roserade but have never been able to effectively use it on a team until now. Not that I think anyone will, but I don’t want anyone to look down on Roserade just because she is considered UU. The reason most UU don’t have a place on an OU team is because there is an OU Pokémon that outclasses the UU Pokémon and does their role better. But there is not one OU Pokémon that can do Roserade’s job on this team. The thing about being choiced is that if your opponent knows what’s coming, you still have to find a way to be effective, and there are not a lot of things that can stop a fast sleep.
Teambuilding Process: When building this team, the first thing I thought of was the lead, which is unusual for me. I wanted a lead that would immediately get me the advantage at the start of the match. I thought about taunt leads before realizing Scarf Roserade was the perfect anti-lead, spinning out of my old Scarf Gengar days. This gave me a soft counter to Celebi, a guaranteed check against Swampert, and a toxic spikes absorber, giving me free reign to pick a bulky water of my choosing. But then I thought about how I could take advantage of the fast sleep to continue keeping my opponent on his back foot, leading to the selection of my next Pokémon.
Jack Horner (Heatran) (F) @ Shuca Berry
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 6 Atk/252 Spd/252 SAtk
Naive nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Explosion
- Earth Power
- Fire Blast
- Stealth Rock
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Namesake: Jack Horner, ever since he was tricked into buying those magic beans, he’s been trying to swindle others into his own tricks, much like my Heatran.
EV’s/Item/Nature: EV spread is rather simple once again, with the extra EV’s pumped into its attack for a stronger explosion. Originally I used Life Orb until I was convinced to use Shuca Berry to beat other Heatran’s guaranteed to further conceal Heatran’s tricks. The only time I really miss life orb is when exploding against intimidate users and Blissey and 2hkoing Tentacruel with Earth Power. I use max speed so I don’t waste the shuca berry if I don’t have to. And I lowered special defense as opposed to defense so that I can take earthquakes and still survive, while still surviving earth powers and maintaining a strong explosion.
Move Set: Ah blufftran, basically the old set I used to always run, but with Stealth Rocks over HP Ice since I needed to fit Stealth Rocks somewhere on this team. I usually don’t hesitate too much to explode on anything that can cause me troubles. Earth Power mostly for other Heatrans. And the extra power by Fire Blast allows me to do cute things like 2hko Hippowdon, surviving an earthquake with the shuca berry.
Team Role: Heatran gives me something to switch into fire attacks, gives me a great user of Stealth Rocks, a secondary counter to Celebi, always helpful steel typing and can always pull its own weight as long as it has explosion. This thing is a nightmare for stall teams, as it can hit everything hard, and Blissey is afraid of explosion. For example, I can fire blast Hippowdon, survive earthquake due to Shuca Berry, and then explode on the switch to Blissey. Or if I’m out against Blissey, I can Fire Blast on the switch to Rotom or Skarmory who expect an explosion. Sometimes against Blissey I just Fire Blast a few times to see what my opponent is going to do and just play mind games all day.
Opinion: I always loved leadtran, but felt he was too predictable as a lead. Now that I’m using leadtran not as a lead, people expect it even less. Heatran is a Pokémon that I have used often and different versions of it. Overall it is just a favorite, filling in many roles, always carries its own weight and fun to use.
Teambuilding Process: Okay, last we left off we had Roserade sleeping a Pokémon and a likely cold double switch up ahead. After I’ve slept a Pokémon, I always go straight to Heatran. If they don’t realize that I am scarfed, they will likely switch in something to wall Roserade, so let’s take a look at common Roserade switch-ins:
-Blissey
-Scizor
-Zapdos
-Bronzong
-Skarmory
-Jirachi
Q: What do all of these Pokémon have in common? A: They are all beaten by Heatran. The most common switch-in to Roserade is either a special wall like Blissey whom Heatran can just set up rocks on before Blissey is afraid of explosion, playing mind games or sturdy steel types to resist Roserade’s grass attacks and weak HP Fire. The most important thing is that no one will switch in a bulky water in on Roserade for fear of its Grass Knot (although oddly enough quite a few people switch in Gyarados on a potential 120 bp grass knot for some weird reason.) Even if the opponent doesn’t switch, I can set up rocks against a sleeping opponent, and if it is Azelf, Bronzong, or Metagross, they can’t do much to me and switch fearing a Fire Blast. After I set up rocks, I assess the situation and then either explode or switch again. So, now a realistic outcome of the match thus far is this: I have slept a Pokémon, set up Stealth Rocks, and say exploded on something with Heatran. This means that I’ve seen the opponents lead, stopped their opening gambit, seen another Pokémon, and killed one other Pokémon. So, I now know half of the opponent’s team, with one Pokémon being asleep, and another one being dead. Meanwhile, the opponent has only seen two of my Pokémon, one of them is already dead, and if I’m lucky they still don’t know that Roserade is scarfed. Sounds like an advantage to me.
Boy Blue (Vaporeon) (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Water Absorb
EVs: 188 HP/252 Def/70 Spd
Bold nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Wish
- Protect
- Surf
- Hidden Power [Electric]
Namesake: Boy Blue’s character grew on me, so he replaces Bluebeard. Still fits because of the blue and all. A lot of people ask me why Boy Blue is a female, but that is just something that I do from a competitive standpoint. This is in case somebody tries to use attract on my Pokémon, I figure the majority of Pokémon are males (the default). It’s just like how I lower my attack IV’s to 0 on Pokémon that only use special attacks to prevent higher confusion damage.
EV’s/Item/nature: Max defense with bold, and a good HP number. I have moved the extra 70 EV’s from special attack to speed, as suggested in the Vaporeon analysis. This has been more helpful than I’ve anticipated. It allows me to outspeed and pick off weakened Tyranitar, Magnezone, Metragross, and Scizor who don’t invest in too much speed. Lefties to feed the hunger in her heart.
Move Set: Wish support is really helpful, and is usually supplied to the decently bulky Roserade and Heatran coming in on grass or electric attacks aimed at Vappy. Protect is a great scouting move and saves me from Heatran’s explosions. Surf is a great stab attack against neutral threats and super effectively beating Heatrans and Infernapes and HP Electric for Gyarados. I would love to fit Ice Beam on this set, but there just isn’t room for it, meaning I have to rely on my scarfers to check Salamence. Hopefully Salamence will just fear Ice Beam so I can keep it at bay.
Team Role: Wish support and counters Gyarados and fire types. In case either attempt to switch into my Roserade while I go to Heatran, I can fall back to Vappy without worries. Water Absorb is invaluable against Rain Dance teams and water attacks aimed at Heatran. Is usually my first switch against Swampert, as she can handle any common non curse versions.
Opinion: I love Vappy. I’ve used it a lot, but it has never really had a sticking role in any of my better teams. Last time I had her on a team I ended up replacing her with offensive Suicune for a hyper offensive flow. Well, this time she most definitely stuck. Worse part is that it gives Zapdos, who can be a pain if played right, a chance to switch in.
Teambuilding Process: Remember earlier when I said Roserade’s removal of toxic spikes gave me free reign over my choice of bulky waters? Well I chose Vappy, as she is a personal favorite. Vappy especially supports Heatran and Fire/Water/Grass is a great type trinity in general. I usually can’t make a team without a bulky water, so I chose Vappy and her ability to beat Gyarados and fire types who might try to switch into Heatran after I’ve slept their lead with Roserade. Vappy is the only Pokémon that can be considered a true “wall” on this team, but she is needed to effectively stop some of the most dangerous threats in the game. She still doesn’t slow the team down.
Prince Charming (Jirachi) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 82 HP/252 Atk/176 Spd
Jolly nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Ice Punch
- Fire Punch
- Iron Head
- Trick
Namesake: can’t really explain this one, but it just seems fitting. After all, doesn’t Jirachi just seem charming to you?
EV’s/Item/Nature: My second choice scarfer for speed purposes. The Nature and EV spread aims to hit 308 speed before factoring in the scarf, so I can take on most +1 dragon dance Salamence’s. Also revenges dragon dance Tyranitar. I used to run a slightly bulkier spread with only 300 speed but it burned me a handful of times so I upped it. I’m still thinking about upping the speed all the way to at least tie with jolly dragon dance Salamence.
Move Set: Ice punch is to revenge kill Flygon and Salamence. Fire Punch is to check Lucario (even though it only does about 71%) and Scizor. Iron Head is an amazing move. I’ve won many games on some flinch hax. It has stab and a 60% chance of flinch allowing me to beat things I can’t quite ohko like Gengar, Machamp, and Tyranitar. Trick is to get rid of the scarf against stall (I’ll outspeed most stall teams) or if I’m paralyzed, since he doesn’t have Natural Cure like Roserade. I miss not having thunder punch to cover Gyarados, but that is what Vaporeon is for.
Team Role: Amazing revenge killer as long as I’m initially careful of Magnezone (although, some don’t like trick, all don’t like fire punch, and I’ve flinched many to death with iron head.) I usually hang onto the scarf as long as I can, but I don’t hesitate todump it if I think it can help the team. Can still be effective if the opponent knows I’m choiced since it has a nice stab iron head and trick to dump the scarf. Even after dumping the scarf, I can still check Scizor, Lucario, Tyranitar, and unboosted Salamence. Jirachi gives me another helpful steel type in addition to Heatran, who usually booms earlier. Even if I get stuck in, say, fire punch against Tyranitar or Salamence, I have no problem switching out, as when I get back in, I should still be faster than them.
Opinion: Jirachi fits perfectly into this team due to its natural bulk and nice typing. Of course, I absolutely love trick. Trick allows me to support the team if I can get Zapdos stuck in heat wave or Swampert stuck in earthquake. I hate it when my opponent has a max jolly dragon dance Salamence, in which case I have to sacrifice Roserade to find out Salamence’s speed, trick it into outraging and maybe losing another Pokémon to this, before bringing in Jirachi to take one outrage and then ice punch. When I started using this Jirachi, it was still quite a surprise, allowing me to get many surprise kills, as most people opted for the sub-calm mind set, which is once again the most popular.
Teambuilding Process: Jirachi was a tricky selection (pardon the pun). My previous team that I scrapped was built around Celebi/Jirachi/Heatran/Bulky Water/2 Fire resists. The idea behind that team was to have two fire weaknesses and have the rest of the team immune to or resist fire. I basically replaced Celebi with Roserade and already had Heatran and a bulky water, so I figured that Jirachi would once again work well, and I did really like Jirachi. Besides, Jirachi covered up a lot of holes on the team, checking some important threats, giving me a physical hitter, and trick to further screw with stall.
Snow White (Kingdra) (F) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 6 HP/252 Atk/252 Spd
Adamant nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Outrage
- Waterfall
- Dragon Dance
- Substitute
Namesake: Well, she’s just beautiful.
EV’s/Item/Nature: I thought about going with a bulky spread but the extra power was just too tempting. Max speed since I want to beat other Kingdras who don’t max, especially in rain. Kingdra gives me a good check against rain dance teams, as many of them are weak to opposing Kingdra's, and I can beat their Kingdra since I max speed. This is why I use Swift Swim over Sniper, so I don't have to resort to stalling out rain with Vappy. Lum Berry to help against status and if anything, it cures the confusion from outrage, acting as a nice safety.
Move Set: Dragon/water has great coverage, and both are amazing attacking physical types. Dragon Dance is obvious as I wanted a stat-upper in this slot. Substitute, since it works well with Lum Berry to block status, and I got the idea from TAY. I can switch into status, sub, and dragon dance against slower threats like Blissey. Or I can dragon dance and then sub to protect myself from trick or will-o-wisp from Rotoms switching in. I never really cared for using hydro pump.
Team Role: Either tears a hole in the opponents’ team leaving enough of an opening for the rest of my team to take it, or ends the game herself. My stat up sweeper, which I love to have at least one of on my teams. Also resists fire attacks aimed at Roserade and Jirachi. I don’t have a set time to release her to wreck havoc, but she usually comes out middle to late game.
Opinion: I’ve used dragon dance Kingdra before, but it was always just “good” for me. Then I tried it out with lum berry and substitute, which fixes her main weakness: status. Amazing typing always lets her set up. She is seriously amazing, not much walls her. Even Celebi is 2hko’ed and Skarmory can fall if I get a lucky flinch. Her only weakness is to reflect and things that get lucky when stalling out outrage.
Teambuilding Process: This is where things get really interesting. These last two team slots were decided on at around the same time. At the present I had a solid core of Roserade/heatran/Vaporeon/Jirachi. It was time to start thinking about late game sweepers. I needed something that was physical to beat BLissey. I also wanted something that resisted fire, immune to electric attacks, with a little speed and could stat up and sweep. It was then that I realized Garchomp was the perfect Pokémon for this team. After remembering, that Chomp was banned, I decided on Kingdra. While I wanted a ground type or electric immunity, any ground type was too slow and left me quite a bit susceptible to Starmie. Kingdra, meanwhile, could set up on Starmie. Kingdra can still do well against Zapdos one on one, and the lum berry fixed her ability to switch in on thunder wave to an extent.
Bigby Wolf (Salamence) (F) @ Life Orb
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 82 Atk/176 Spd/252 SAtk
Naive nature (+Spd, -SDef)
- Draco Meteor
- Outrage
- Earthquake
- Flamethrower
Namesake: My favorite character, The Big Bad Wolf. He could only be Salamence and the name fits perfectly.
EV’s/Item/Nature: This was Raikou Lover’s original spread and move set. Eventually he dumped the attack to max speed, but I really liked having the extra oomph on outrage. The speed is to hit 308, to outspeed any ice punch Lucario who try to get cute. Life Orb to truly destroy walls. I chose naïve over hasty because I wanted to be able to survive some Scizor bullet punches and Lucario extreme speeds, although I wish I didn’t have to lower either stat.
Move Set: Nothing can safely switch in on this. draco meteor + outrage kills Blissey, as does earthquake + outrage. Flamethrower beats steels, still hitting hard after the special attack drop from draco meteor. I usually just start off with a draco meteor no matter what, nab a ko. Then they might expect me to be special and switch in non scarf Heatran, whom I’ll earthquake.
Team Role: I usually don’t switch him in on attacks; rather I switch him in after something has already died. He always gets his share of attacking done, and absolutely destroys stall. Much like Kingdra, he usually comes out middle to late game to wreck havoc, either opening a hole for the rest of the team or sealing the win himself. If I can stop stealth rocks early with sleep, unlimited switch ins really helps this guy. If I trick a scarf onto an earthquake user aiming at Jirachi, I can bring him in to wreck havoc on the switch.
Opinion: Salamence also became a favorite of mine, especially after it got outrage. I started out by using choice band Salamence before dabbling in special bulky and dragon dance versions. However, I found that too often with the dragon dance version, if I didn’t get the sweep, I would lose. So, I decided to try out MixMence instead, as I needed something that can break down walls. When I first started using this Salamence, MixMence wasn’t as popular as it is now, and no one really expected it. Some people still don’t.
Teambuilding Process: I wanted another fire resist, a wall breaker, something to take advantage of no stealth rocks , to switch in on earthquakes, and to work well with (or replacing) Kingdra. In these last two slots I thought of a lot of combinations, Tyranitar/Salamence, Kingdra/Tyranitar, etc. Eventually I decided that two dragon dancers wouldn’t work and Tyranitar’s sand stream, while not absolutely hated by the team, didn’t go perfectly with it, as MixMence losing 16% each turn was a tad much. Eventually I settled on an old favorite, who fit everything perfectly, rounding off the team.
Reason for making this: With my elimination from the tournament, I am thrown into a metagame of Latias. And yes, one Pokémon really does wreck this team. Latias likes to come out to play in the middle to late game, after scouting for Scizors and Tyranitars. My Pokémon that like to come out and play middle to late game are also dragons, and just happen to be outsped. Besides that, I had reliable ways to check Salamence, but those methods do not apply to Latias. Latias laughs at Roserade’s weak HP Ice, Jirachi’s ice punch is not even a 2hko, Vappy is set up bait, Heatran dies to surf, and neither Kingdra nor Salamence can get off an attack. Is this team beyond salvaging in a metagame with Latias? Should I just build another team? Or maybe I’ll just take a bit of a vacation from Pokémon ~_~