Teambuilding Tip of the Week submissions!

Here's where everyone can post their teambuilding tips to share with all of the battlers of the leagues! As OL's primary focus is to provide a fun community for trainers from all around to become the best they can, it's tons helpful for newer members to get help with their strategies!
The format of this doesn't need to be fancy, just put the name of what you're covering, and the strategy that follows. Also feel free to post tips that other members post (as long as you add tips, not change or remove).

Have fun!

One of the biggest flaws that I've seen in others' teams is the lack of coverage. First off, make sure none of your Pokemon have two moves of the same type (excluding Calm Mind with Psychic and such). You also have to ensure that your team has balance in the typing. Don't forget secondary typings! For example. Say you have a Ferrothorn. Ferrothorn has a 4x Fire weakness and a 2x fighting weakness. You can give it an Occa Berry to reduce the damage, but that's only once. Why not switch it into something that resists Fire and Fighting? You can go with Dragonite. It's a great physical attacker to tag along with Ferrothorn, the physical wall. But now Dragonite has a 4x Ice weakness. What resists Ice? Fire. So how about we go with... Rotom-H. Now what are your weaknesses? Water. Which is covered by Ferrothorn. That's not a full team, but it already has its synergy! Good luck building your teams!

So Ben posted as the "tip of the week": Type coverage and synergy for team building, which is pretty cool actually, and a clever idea in my opinion. So why don't we post our strategies (Not voltturn and cores or baton pass, but team building tips and UNDERRATED strategies!) here? I think we should, so they might become the "tip of the week"!.

Just to start off, I'm gonna continue on Ben's coverage tip:

Lets pretend like his team is somewhat like this:

Dragonite (M) @ Lum Berry
Trait: Multiscale
EVs: 40 HP / 252 Atk / 216 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Dragon Dance
- Outrage
- Earthquake
- Rest

Ferrothorn (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 88 Def / 168 SDef
Relaxed Nature (+Def, -Spd)
- Gyro Ball
- Spikes
- Leech Seed
- Power Whip

Rotom-H @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Overheat
- Volt Switch
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Trick


(0 spd IVs on Ferrothorn). As you can see, it's pretty standard, and does have great type coverage. But you also has to think about which type of moves are normally combined, and which pokemons are the most used! Scizor and Terrakion are 2 of the most used pokemons, aswell as Dragonite. Dragonite is not a problem, seeing that you can bait an outrage on your own Dnite, then go into ferrothorn to sponge the hits. Iron barbs damage will do alot, while gyro ball does (0 Atk relaxed(0 spd IVs) Ferrothorn Gyro Ball vs 54 HP/0 Def/204spd(+1) Dragonite: 47,62% - 56,25% (2-3 hits to KO)) Which basically means while outrage is in charge, it's a guaranteed 2hko! Terrakion is a huge problem tho, since even a adamant scarfed one will oustpeed both +2 Dnite and rotom, hitting them with stone edge, and then using close combat on ferrothorn: 252 Atk Terrakion (+Atk) Close Combat vs 252 HP/88 Def Ferrothorn (+Def) : 81,82% - 97,16% (2 hits to KO) which means that it's got a chance to OHKO ferro with rocks up! so being able to counter him is important, which means that we have to add a pokemon. Golurk actually is a good counter, since its immune to its main STAB Fighting, and resists rock. It can also counter with STAB EQ or a Drain punch for recovery! Scizor is not a problem tho, unless it's banded with superpower (252 Atk Choice Band Scizor (+Atk) Superpower vs 252 HP/88 Def Ferrothorn (+Def) : 82,39% - 97,16% (2 hits to KO). but then you can revenge kill it with rotom-h! Genesect is a problem now though, being that only Rotom can take the common moves, while it can hit the rest for super effective damage (Dont need any calcs vs either golurk, dragonite or ferro, being the probable +1 sp.atk and ice beam/Fthrower). And since Rotom-h is weak to rocks, a spinner would be smart to have. Which spinner you choose doesn't matter, just DONT USE IT AS ONE OF YOUR MAIN WALLS! If its Ebelt genesect, switching into Dnite, it won't get the sp.atk boost, and you will have a chance to survive an ice beam if at full hp ( 252 SpAtk Expert Belt Genesect Ice Beam vs 42 HP/0 SpDef Multiscale Dragonite: 70,57% - 83,48% (2 hits to KO)), so you can DD then retaliate with a move (Go for Fire punch). This would be beneficial for a team, making one of the biggest threats in the metagame a set up fodder!

Thinking about it, Gengar is a big threat, and will do alot to ur team. When Dragonite and rotom is weakened, a shadow ball will KO, and it will do some serious damage to Golurk (252 SpAtk Life Orb Gengar Shadow Ball vs 42 HP/0 SpDef Dragonite: 51,35% - 60,66% (2 hits to KO, with SR damage), 252 SpAtk Life Orb Gengar Shadow Ball vs 0 HP/4 SpDef Rotom-H: 67,22% - 78,84% (37,5% chance to OHKO with SR damage), 252 SpAtk Life Orb Gengar Shadow Ball vs 212 HP/0 SpDef Golurk: 111,29% - 130,65% (Guaranteed OHKO), 252 SpAtk Life Orb Gengar Hidden Power Fire vs 252 HP/168 SpDef Ferrothorn: 87,5% - 103,41% (25% chance to OHKO) This basically means that Gengar sweeps your team. But why add a pokemon to counter it, when you can do some changes to ferrothorn?: 252 SpAtk Life Orb Gengar Hidden Power Fire vs 248 HP/208 SpDef Ferrothorn (+SpDef) : 76,35% - 90,03% (2 hits to KO), then OHKO back with 20 atk evs: 20 Atk Ferrothorn Gyro Ball vs 0 HP/4 Def Gengar: 90,04% - 106,13% (37,5% chance to OHKO) I would say this is your best option.


Heres what your team should look like now:
Dragonite (M) @ Lum Berry
Trait: Multiscale
EVs: 40 HP / 252 Atk / 216 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Dragon Dance
- Outrage
- Earthquake
- Fire Punch

Ferrothorn (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Barbs
EVs: 248 HP / 20 Atk / 32 Def / 208 SDef
Sassy Nature (+SDef, -Spd)
- Gyro Ball
- Spikes
- Leech Seed
- Power Whip

Rotom-H @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 252 SAtk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Overheat
- Volt Switch
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Trick

Golurk @ Leftovers
Trait: Iron Fist
EVs: 212 HP / 252 Atk / 44 Def
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Drain Punch
- Earthquake
- Shadow Punch
- Stealth Rock


Feel free to test this "core", tho its somewhat big for a core. Test in battles, and try using threats as set up fodders. Hope this helped, Fille out.

(Sorry for posting your submission as my own, Fille. I wanted to move the topic over to my moderation).

BenZyreck wrote:

Spoiler:

No problem, its better that u do it like this, and give me credit, than me having to make this shit over again O.O''
Ofc, adding colour to the importable and the calcs would be beneficial, as it would be easier to read and skip the facts that u dont want to read

Certain pokemons are more used and are more annoying in the different tiers than others. I'll go UU now, since thats my passion and so on. Pokemons like ScarfHeracross and Gligar are really common. So when your making a team, this is obviously something to watch out for. I'll take Gligar as an example now, since I hate it with all the passion I got left.


Annoying bitch (Gligar) (M) @ Eviolite
Trait: Immunity
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 Spd
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Stealth Rock
- Toxic
- Roost
- Earthquake

This is the most standard set, and the one that we have to watch out for. Gligar is 4x weak to Ice, and 2x weak to Water. Hmm. Lets put in a Zapdos!


My saviour (Zapdos) @ Life Orb
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 252 SAtk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Substitute
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Thunderbolt
- Heat Wave

Gligar can't do shit to this guy right? EQ won't hit it, Sub up on the toxic then HP Ice the crap out of Gligar But nope, this doesnt work. Ofc, some people are stupid enough to stay in, but we're not talking about noobs in this tip. If you want to counter Gligar, you have to be able to counter it's most common partners too! They're a part of Gligar, and he's useless without them!



Oh noes (Umbreon) (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Synchronize
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SDef
Calm Nature (+SDef, -Atk)
- Heal Bell
- Wish
- Protect
- Foul Play


Daaamn ._. (Snorlax) (F) @ Leftovers
Trait: Thick Fat
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 SDef
Careful Nature (+SDef, -SAtk)
- Rest
- Sleep Talk
- Body Slam
- Whirlwind

Hmmm. What am I supposed to do now?? Zapdos can't do shit to these 2. Hmm. Well, they both got 1 weakness in common: Fighting! Physical fighting types will hit them really hard. But gligar can take on fighting types with eaze. Hmm. Lets combine Ice moves and fighting moves! If only Infernape was legal in UU.... We could try something else though!:

Solution! (Weavile) (M) @ Expert Belt
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 252 Atk / 40 SDef / 216 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Substitute
- Ice Punch
- Beat Up
- Brick Break

Here you got it! Weavile! Ice punch them Gligars, while Brick breakin' the Snorlax and Umbreons! The good thing about Ebelt is that it gives a decent boost to the moves, while there is no recoil, so there is room for playing safely, going straight for Ice punch on Gligars, and Straight for Brick break on Lax/Umbreon!! If you expect a switch, but are not entirely sure, you could always just Sub up and see what happens :] Hope I helped ya out.