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Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
Welcome to Break This Team: USUM AG Edition! This project follows a simple layout, with the submission and voting stages taking place on a week by week basis. Most metagame defining teams may seem perfect on the surface, but they all have their undeniable flaws, and this project aims to help point out those weak links. Each week, I'll post a team that was built by someone invested in the metagame, and the participants will then try to break this team with a core made of just two Pokémon.
As stated earlier, the project will have two phases each week: the submission phase and the voting phase. The submission phase will have a duration of five days and participants are allowed to post a core with two Pokémon within that time. Then the voting phase will last two days and people can vote for their two favorite cores (this number is subject to change, depending on the number of submitted cores). Lastly, if you win a week, you will be placed in the Hall of Fame, and if you happen to win three weeks, you'll be able to PM me with your own team and it will be submitted in this thread for that other people try to break it!
RULES:
Please attempt to not post one-liners. This includes extremely short descriptions. You don't need to write an elaborate essay, but try to at least provide a satisfactory description of the core. Don't post "these Pokémon work well together and I think that it will break this team ", try to elaborate on a good post with an explanation of how the core performs against the team.
This is not a counterteaming competition. This is an attempt to get the community to find viable, functional cores that work generally well in the meta which the team of the week is weak to.
By extension, try not to post gimmicky sets. Using Shadow Ball MMY to take advantage of a Lunala is NOT a viable choice.
Again, participants are only allowed to post one core with only two Pokémon.
Please don't vote on your own core, or I'll delete your post.
Please make your votes clear. You can shorten out the names of the people you vote for, but if you do, at least spell the shortened version how it is. I shouldn't have to wonder if you're voting for users.
Don't rally people to vote for your own core. This is not fair at all to the other participants, and if you're caught doing this then you won’t be allowed to post or even offer any ideas in this thread.
A small explanation would be appreciated when voting.
Participants are allowed to do reservations, but if they don't post the sets with the explanation within 48 hours, other participants are allowed to take it.
In order to encourage creativity and originality between submissions, the same Pokemon can only be used two times maximum per submissions round.
So Skarpherim's team is obviously solid, one weakness I noticed is that a lot of his offensive presence is shut down by Fairyceus, but his team gets around that well enough by luring it with Toxic Zygarde. I thought a good way to take advantage of this would be to run Calm Mind + Refresh Fairyceus, it's a more niche set but it's definitely workable in the current metagame. This allows Fairyceus to check Marshadow and Scarf Rayquaza without being annoyed by Zygarde's Toxics. While that set takes on most of the team's offensive Pokemon, Mega Gengar helps out by removing the two Pokemon that can stop Fairyceus from sweeping: Poisonceus and Ferrothorn. Once those two Pokemon have been removed, Fairyceus is quite free to get through the remainder of the team.
First thing I noticed with this team is the only thing stopping ghosts from doing anything is in the form of speed control with Marshadow or Rayquaza, so I decided to start with Lunala. I chose CM Roost rather than Sub CM as it allows it to continuously setup on Ferrothorn and Arceus-Poison without fear of Toxic, and Arceus-Water and Zygarde can’t come in on a +1 Lunala to Toxic. However, if the situation came that Lunala feared Toxic, or Rayquaza or Marshadow were in, I decided to go with Refresh Arceus-Fairy as it covers all of these threats very well. Arceus-Fairy is able to hard check Marshadow, Scarf Rayquaza and Toxic Zygarde all in one slot, while laughing in Arceus-Water’s face as a bonus. Overall this core is a great choice for breaking this team, but it was a tough team to crack for sure.
I noticed looking at the team that it struggles to switchin to Life Orb Mewtwo. The common coverage ran on Mewtwo and its great speed tier means that against Skarpherims team you don't have to predict too hard to get good results from playing aggressive with Mewtwo. adding alongside this Arceus Water with will-o wisp to check Marshadow and Mega Rayquaza as they both revenge kill Mewtwo means that with good supporting teammates I think you can easily aim to take out threats with Mewtwo while checking and forcing out the revenge killers with Arceus.
A cleric would probably be a beneficial option for another teammate.
Please read the rules before you post; the guidelines specifically say the same Pokemon can only be used twice per submission round. I’ll let it slip this time, but I don’t want to see another Arceus-Fairy!
The team doesn't have any answer to the astounding power of Mega Rayquaza as shown in the following calcs:
252 Atk Choice Band Rayquaza-Mega Dragon Ascent vs. 24 HP / 0 Def Zygarde-Complete: 319-376 (55 - 64.9%) - guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 Atk Choice Band Rayquaza-Mega Dragon Ascent vs. 248 HP / 244+ Def Arceus-Water: 240-283 (54.1 - 63.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Life Orb Marshadow Spectral Thief vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Clefable: 165-195 (41.8 - 49.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
The best this team does against Rayquaza is getting 2hkoed, nothing can switch in, which means if you can lead it into ferrothorn/zygarde and have a sack+revenkiller for marshadow+scarf rayquaza you just win, Clefable's existence is based around stopping Marshadow therefore she just uses wish+cleric support, Moonblast would be useless because Marshadow will just die out of recoil while the rest of the team just takes 10% max.
Calm Mind Arceus Dragon is a giant threat to this team. With no Fairy type, Dragceus has no worry about clicking judgement throughout the game. With the normal Calm Mind Refresh set, the passive Arceus Water cannot deal with this set efficiently. The main concerns stopping Dragceus from sweeping are Marshadow, Poisonceus, and Ferrothorn. That's where Celesteela comes in. The common set of max defense sub/seed flame charge allows Celesteela to potentially sweep in its own right, but more importantly check the three ways of dealing with dragceus.
The fact that Zygarde is dd toxic benefits this core because Dragceus is always a switch in that threatens Zygarde on the chance it comes in against Celesteela. Mega Ray is not an issue for this core, the main concern would be perish song. However, with only 8 PP and no other ways to truly break this core, as soon as there are no more perish songs the game is over.
This core looks pretty meme-ish but it used to be a very hot core in early gen7. Zekrom is an amazing wallbreaker but its low speed can be an issue which smeargle's sticky web fixes. Since his only defogger is waterceus, Zekrom makes sure that sticky webs are not removed from the field.
I used the standard lead smeargle set but with whirlwind over rapid spin so that his zygarde does not set up for free. Zekrom can ohko or force 4/6 pokemons to switch out (waterceus, ray, marsh, zygarde) and it can set up on Ferrothorn for free. Only thing that can slightly bother Zekrom is poisonceus, which gets ko'd by z move bolt strike at +1 or unboosted z move after dragon claw chip.
poisonceus:
252+ Atk Teravolt Zekrom Dragon Claw vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Arceus-Poison: 136-162 (30.6 - 36.4%) -- 58.2% chance to 3HKO
252+ Atk Teravolt Zekrom Gigavolt Havoc (195 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Arceus-Poison: 331-391 (74.5 - 88%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
ferrothorn:
cannot do much at +0, but ferrothorn cannot check this because i have sub and ferro cant break the sub with bullet seeds. i can boost as much as i want and ko it with bolt strike/dragon claw
marshadow:
252+ Atk Teravolt Zekrom Bolt Strike vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Marshadow: 310-366 (96.5 - 114%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO
rayquaza:
252+ Atk Teravolt Zekrom Dragon Claw vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Rayquaza-Mega: 320-378 (91.1 - 107.6%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO
As evident, Zekrom is a huge threat for skarph's team and with sticky web support it is almost impossible for him to win this matchup. We might not be able to 6-0 him with Zekrom, but we can definitely heavily weaken his team and make way for other pokemons like xerneas/rayquaza or w/e we're running to sweep the rest of the team.
Necrozma-Dusk Mane @ Solganium Z
Ability: Prism Armor
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Rock Polish
- Swords Dance
- Sunsteel Strike
- Earthquake
Rayquaza @ Life Orb
Ability: Air Lock
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Soe
Naive Nature
- Dragon Ascent
- Draco Meteor
- V-Create
- Extreme Speed
Mix-Mega Rayquaza can come in on Ferrothorn and Zygarde-C (but not as easily) and proceed to wreck house, with it being faster than both Arc formes and with it's coverage OHKOing Zygarde and Ferrothorn and it's ability to beat both Arceus formes on the switchin.
252 Atk Life Orb Rayquaza-Mega Dragon Ascent vs. 248 HP / 8 Def Arceus-Poison: 277-328 (62.5 - 74%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
4 SpA Life Orb Rayquaza-Mega Draco Meteor vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Arceus-Water: 263-309 (59.3 - 69.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
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252 Atk Life Orb Rayquaza-Mega Dragon Ascent vs. 248 HP / 244+ Def Arceus-Water: 208-247 (46.9 - 55.7%) -- 77% chance to 2HKO
Jolly Necrozma Dusk Mane hits 556 Speed after a RP, resulting in it being faster than even Scarf-Ray. After 2+ in both attack and speed (It can come in on Arceus-Water pretty well and begin setup) it is very powerful against this team and can punch holes through it. It can only sweep if Ferrothorn is chipped a little and if it is healthy enough to take a marsh sneak and if it can come in safetly, so mid to late game this is a huge threat.
+2 252 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Arceus-Poison: 428-504 (96.3 - 113.5%) -- 75% chance to OHKO
(Searing Sunraze Smash OHKOes)
Xerneas @ Power Herb
Ability: Fairy Aura
EVs: 212 HP / 252 SpA / 44 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Geomancy
- Moonblast
- Psyshock
- Focus Blast
Uxie @ Psychium Z
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Grass Knot
- Stealth Rock
- Memento
uxie is rly fat so you eat a hit and do a good bit of dmg to smth w z psychic and psyshock geoxern basically wins if the poisonceus took like 15% so n_n
due to its typing, the defensive core can’t touch heatran, and the combination of taunt + toxic beats waterceus and poisonceus. I went with magma storm > lava plume on it as if you burn waterceus it can be annoying, while the last slot is free, either rocks or earth power work fine. defensive groundceus is to wall the offensive core, mray and marsh can’t 2hko it (unless they crit) and zyg can’t beat ice beam + refresh. the evs on groundceus are a bit weird, but they’re to live two surfs from ray after rocks and outspeed zyg pre complete, and you don’t lose much by sacrificing defense.
Specs Kyogre 2HKO's everything on the team with Spout, being able to remove key walls such as waterceus and ferrothorn. Origin Pulse can be used alternatively if kyogre gets low. Thunder can be used for the direct OHKO on waterceus, and ice beam can be used to deter mray from switching into Spout. The main problem with this pokemon is that it is outsped by pokemon that offensively threaten it, marshadow and mray. I added Waterceus because it adequately checks these two mons, as well as being able to wisp Poisonceus to prevent its Z move from eliminating Kyogre.
Also Bacon has a core with the best pokemon in AG, you bet I'm voting for that.
Groudon-Primal @ Red Orb
Jolly Nature
Ability: Desolate Land
EVs: 156 Atk / 100 SpD / 252 Spe
- Stealth Rock
- Swords Dance
- Precipice Blades
- Stone Edge
Aside from revenge killing with a mega evolved Rayquaza (and when boosted, Marshadow), this team is not able to do much to prevent this Primal Groudon from wreaking havoc on the team. It has a free entry point in Poisonceus and effectively sets up Stealth Rock for free due to Waterceus' passivity against this set.
Calm Mind Ultra Necrozma really shines against this team. It can surprise OHKO Ferro with Heat Wave, Zygarde with Dragon Pulse, and Poisonceus with LTBTS or Photon after a Stealth Rock. Before Ultra Bursting, it forces a swap out on Waterceus, allowing for a Calm Mind or prediction OHKO. The primary two threats to Ultra Necro/Necro DM are Shadow Sneak Marsh and Scarf Mray. That is why I have chosen Bulky Xerneas to accompany Ultra Necro. While not as tanky or able to withstand as many hits as Fairyceus, Bulky Xern still accomplishes its job of being a swap in to Mray and Marsh. In addition, Xern can be used as a bait in order to bring out Poisonceus/Ferro in order to swap in Ultra Necro and potentially get a KO.
Magearna @ Leftovers
Ability: Soul-Heart
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 1 Atk
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Fleur Cannon
- Volt Switch
- Calm Mind
Groudon-Primal @ Red Orb
Ability: Desolate Land
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Rest
- Sleep Talk
- Dragon Tail
- Precipice Blades
Calm mind magearna is very strong against this team. Perish trapping is avoided with the addition of volt switching into groudon. Fleur cannon is powerful enough even without special attack investment to 0hko megaray and deal a heavy chunk to zygarde (4+ SpA Magearna Fleur Cannon vs. 24 HP / 0 SpD Zygarde-Complete: 404-476 (69.7 - 82.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery).
Meanwhile, rest/sleep talk primal groudon is a force to be reckoned with. It can't be status'd, a well predicted dragon tail will cripple a ray switch-in, and not even ferro can wear groudon down if it keeps getting d-tailed out.
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