All right, folks, I've been having a lot of fun with this team for the last little bit. I peaked at ~1670 with it and have had no trouble staying in the 1500s to low 1600s despite being a very streaky player and running a couple of pretty non-standard selections (which is why I'm posting it here and not in Sample Teams). Figured I'd share the full team so other folks can give it a shot and tell me if I'm just crazy or if these things actually work. I bring you Specs Treads VoltTurn Offense
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The team is built around a VoltTurn core of Specs Treads, Helmet 'Mola, Boots Lokix, and Spikes Ogerpon. You'll spend a lot of the game pivoting between those four, wearing down opposing 'mons and looking for openings for Braviary-H to nab KOs or Iron Hands to sweep, with Hands also fulfilling its role as a Trade Machine that would make Sachin Gupta envious. Here's a more detailed breakdown:
Specs Treads wasn't what this team was built around, but it has slotted in perfectly since I started mucking with it. I
posted about this set in the metagame thread a few days ago, and it's surprisingly not just a meme. The selling points here are 1) A Volt Switch that's actually worth a damn and 2) Throwing off expectations and traditional counterplay.
252 SpA + Specs brings your effective special attack up to 364, i.e. ~12% higher than 252 Atk Treads' physical attack, offsetting the slightly lower BP of Earth Power vs EQ. What this means is that Specs Treads hits almost identically as hard as standard Treads while dealing a lot more damage with Volt Switch and not having to fear Wisp as your tradeoffs for getting locked into your move selection. More often than not, that's been a worthwhile exchange for me.
Tera Dragon turns your Fire and Water weaknesses into resists while removing weaknesses to Ground and Fighting and retaining an Electric resistance. This reduces the amount of prediction you need to make around Heatran, for instance, and also lets you blast your way through rain teams.
Spin is just a nice bit of added utility that takes advantage of Treads' defensive typing to find opportunities to clear hazards for its teammates.
There's nothing revolutionary about Helmet 'Mola, but it's absolutely the straw that stirs the drink for this team. You'll spend a lot of time pivoting into it and back out to the appropriate threat, spreading Helmet chip on the way. Whirlpool is there to add some guaranteed damage (especially in tandem with Protect) and to help secure the advantage by controlling what you're pivoting into. Tera Grass is here to remove weaknesses to Water and Grass and add a Ground resist to the team, but, honestly, this probably could/should be Tera Dragon, too, now that Garchomp isn't in the tier anymore. SpDef EVs are to survive 252 SpA Sandy Shocks Thunderbolt in case you ever need to.
Knock was such a boon for Lokix. STAB Tinted Lens KnockTurn is just an amazing way to make progress even when it's not in position to pick something off with its priority. Tera Dark over Tera Bug to remove the Rocks weakness in the case that Boots get knocked off and because Adaptability Knock + Sucker is more reliably useful than Adaptability First Impression (waaaay more 4x Bug Resists running around than 4x Dark Resists).
Ogerpon offers a lot of role compression to this team: It's your best answer to
and
. Encore mucks with setup sweepers and/or creates opportunities to get Spikes up or force a switch that you can u-turn on for momentum. Embodied Aspect offers the option of speed control when Lokix isn't an option without committing to a Scarfer.
Depending on the MU, Iron Hands is on the team to either trade with an offensive threat you're out of position to manage in a better way or to set up and make holes. Hands is at its best when it can generate a free turn to get in an SD so it can use neutral +2 Drain Punches to keep itself going. Lum is this set's way of gaining that advantage without committing to tera. Drain Punch + Ice Punch + EQ is my preferred move combo because it just hits so many things, and as long as you can get to +2, there aren't a lot of cases where you miss Electric STAB. Tera Ground has no overlapping weaknesses with your base typing, which is often enough to keep Iron Hands in business, while maintaining a rocks resistance and giving EQ some serious oomph.
Hisuian Braviary might be a niche pick, but it's a niche pick that puts in work, pretty much soloing certain types of fat teams. I've
posted about it a
couple of times, but in short, it only needs Psychic and Air Slash to 2HKO pretty much anything not named Heatran, Jirachi, or Tinkaton. Bring it in on Amoonguss, Clodsire, Chesnaught, GWeezing, or plenty of other slower threats and pop behind a sub and there's a good chance the other team will be down a `mon in short order. Even if there's not an easy `mon to come in on, Braviary has juuust enough bulk to stare down pretty much any one hit that isn't SE STAB -- a max-attack Quaquaval Knock Off (or +1 Aqua Step) or Scarf Gapdos Brave Bird, for instance -- and take down the threat, possibly coming back to haunt more dreams with Wish support from 'mola. Tera Flying because it's a better defensive type than Psychic and nothing is immune to Flying, making it safer to spam.
Threats:
DDers in general, and Salamence in particular: If you don't get the pivot into Ogerpon right, and/or if Ogerpon doesn't have the option to Tera into Encore, DD Salamence/Haxorus and even Gyarados and Tyranitar can quickly get overwhelming. Other fast `mons can be handled by chipping them down with `Mola/Hands/Treads and picking them off with Lokix, but that stops being an option when you just die without picking up the chip >_<.
Breloom: Possibly the best remaining reason for me to keep Tera Grass on `mola, since there isn't any great switch-in on the team. Iron Hands just gets Spored before it can do anything. Ogerpon doesn't want to eat an attack on a predicted Spore, and everything else is weak to some combination of Mach Punch, Bullet Seed, and Rock Tomb. I've also run into a couple of Poison Heal SubPunch sets that were surprisingly hard to play around.
Lilligant-H: Similarly to Breloom, it hits too hard and/or carries coverage for everything on the team. Similarly to the DDers, the boosted attack and speed help it avoid any chipping strategies with the added pain that it's also boosting its defense at the same time. If it can get a Victory Dance off unimpeded, you're basically just praying for a Hustle miss so you have two shots at it with Lokix.
Replays:
Classic example of the VoltTurn core controlling tempo. Hands is used to scout the opposing Ogerpon, Tera Dragon Treads manages Band Ogerpon, Crawdaunt, Mamoswine, and Heatran
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9uu-1972864090
Playing defense through 'mola and offense through Brav. Two bad misplays on this one: Going Treads instead of Ogerpon on turn 30 and then clicking Earth Power instead of Volt Switch on a potential tera on turn 31. 'Mola's bulk, Encore Ogerpon, and Brav's fire power combine to squeak out a win I probably didn't deserve. Also, if I just say "$#%* it, we ball" and click Tera Flying on Turn 13, it probably would have been game:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9uu-1972080743
Brav tearing through fat:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9uu-1972322809
Lum Hands gives me the (over)-confidence to set up in Sinistcha's face. VoltTurn goes brrrr.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9uu-1972986032
Ogerpon's Speed Control absolutely saves my bacon against multiple speed boosting threats:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9uu-1972300357-1jxabkg8i02nofqkmqe6ddx59dp1h71pw
A rematch demonstrates how weak I am to fast threats that can break `Mola and don't fear Ogerpon when booster Jugulis leads me to overcommit my tera on Iron Hands, letting Lilligant-H sweep:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9uu-1972311853-ryqthin0xfbmtvu8yetpddbt1259tk7pw