Double Suicide Lead Psychic Terrain HO
(click the sprites for the importable)
So, as we all know, UU is fucking chaotic right now. Hyper Offense is running everywhere and threats just keep shwowing up. Every game has at least four incredibly strong offensive threats. Since HO is a pretty easy playstyle, I thought I'd give it a try as well, so I came up with this team.
Azelf
Azelf @ Focus Sash
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Taunt
- Magic Coat
- Explosion
Your standard suicide lead. I lead Azelf basically 99% of the time. It comes, either sets up rocks, taunts slower entry hazard setters, magic coats things like webs and spikes or explodes on the face of mons like Grimmsnarl, which can Taunt you and make you lose momentum by giving it the chance of setting up a Reflect/Light Screen. I originally ran U-Turn, but there's little to no point on using it anyways, so I replaced it with Drain Punch for steels, but that still made it useless against Aegi and other ghosts, so I opted for Magic Coat. Being able to reflect Sticky Web and Spikes is extremely nice.
Tapu Lele
Tapu Lele @ Terrain Extender
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Moonblast
- Focus Blast
- Thunderbolt
I didn't get to use very much of terrain teams back in gen 7 since I didn't play OU, so I never got to experience the sheer absurdity that is Psychic Terrain until now. Immunity to priority moves? Are you kidding me? Easily the best terrain. I knew I wanted to use Lele as soon as it dropped, so I fit it into the team. I gave it the Terrain Extender for two reasos: duh, more terrain turns; second, since Lele is the team's other suicide lead, I want it to faint as quickly as possible, which means that being choice-locked wasn't an option, as the enemy can just switch to an immunity/resist while I lose terrain turns (sadly, Lele doesn't learn Misty Explosion). Dual STABs + Focus Blast for steels like Cobalion, Magnezone, Scizor and Stakataka + Thunderbolt for Skarmory and Celesteela. I usually bring it in after Azelf has exploded itself into a billion pieces, and just start spamming the moves best suited for the opponent until Lele faints. And then the fun begins.
Blacephalon
Blacephalon @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Flamethrower
- Expanding Force
- Shadow Ball
- Trick
Blacephalon is fucking bonkers. If you don't have a healthy Ghost resist or an immunity, this clown can very easily steamroll your team. Not being afraind of Aqua Jet, Accelerock and Sucker Punch is amazing, as it lets Blac just pick weakened teams off like they're nothing after the priority users have been removed. Literally the only move I have ever clicked on this thing is Shadow Ball. Flamethrower is there to scare Celesteela and Skarmory, though after a few boosts, Shadow Ball can easily destroy them. I put Expanding Force because why not and Trick hasn't been very useful yet, but I know it'll save my ass sometime.
Gyarados
Gyarados @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Waterfall
- Bounce
- Power Whip
I've seen some talk on Discord about how good Gyara is and I was pretty skeptical at first, but it really is a great mon. Especially when Dual STABs + Power Whip is only resisted by Dracozolt. Being able to hit every mon in the tier for at least neutral damage is amazing and helps the rest of the team on cleaning up in the late-game. Jolly is ran instead of Adamant to outspeed Zeraora after one DD. At first I was having some trouble trying to find opportunities to set up with Gyara but it soon found its place in the team. Much like Blacephalon, when Gyara starts getting kills and Moxie boosts, it can snowball out of control very quickly for the opposing team.
Alakazam
Alakazam @ Focus Sash
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Expanding Force
- Dazzling Gleam
- Shadow Ball
Zam is the team's famous "emergency check". Magic Guard + Sash lets you revenge kill basically anything if something goes wrong (like an unexpected flinch from Galarian Moltres
).A NP + Psychic Terrain boosted Exp Force will basically OHKO or at least 2HKO a lot of the stuff in the tier, though you don't get that many opportunities to setup due to Zam's bad bulk. Which is honestly fine, because a lot of weakened teams get picked off by Zam even without a Psychic Terrain boost. I've been switching back and forth between Focus Blast and Shadow Ball, because the first one lets me check Steels and Darks that can take DGleam, while Shadow Ball helps me deal with Mew, Jirachi and Victini. I'm leaning more towards SBall now, but idk.
Hawlucha
Hawlucha @ Psychic Seed
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 Atk / 28 SpD / 228 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Acrobatics
- Close Combat
- Taunt
Hawlucha is the team's big star. I'm surprised at how many things it can OHKO after an SD, honestly. Unburden boosts your speed to astronomical levels, so you don't even need to run max Speed. This also means you can afford to run Adamant instead of Jolly. I run just enough to outspeed non-scarf base 100s like Mew and Jirachi without the Unburden boost. The rest of the EVs go towards SpDef, trying to open up more opportunities for setup against things like Nidoking. Taunt is extremely useful against Hippowdon, Skarmory and Galarian Weezing, preventing the former two from phazing you or the latter from burning you. It's specially helpful in the Hippowdon matchup, rendering utterly useless against you, giving you a free turn of setup.
Threatlist
Celesteela: Celesteela's great defensive typing, resisting Psychic, Fairy, Grass, Flying, and being neutral to Water and Fighting makes the team hate facing it. Annoying recovery method (Leech Seed + Protect) which can stall out terrain turns, powerful STAB in Heavy Slam and overall bulk make also make it a very hard threat for this team to deal with. I usually try to weaken it as much as possible with Zam and Lele for Lucha to come in after, set an SD up and Close Combat it to death. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Even offensive Autotomize sets can be problematic.(click the sprites for the importable)
So, as we all know, UU is fucking chaotic right now. Hyper Offense is running everywhere and threats just keep shwowing up. Every game has at least four incredibly strong offensive threats. Since HO is a pretty easy playstyle, I thought I'd give it a try as well, so I came up with this team.
Azelf @ Focus Sash
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Taunt
- Magic Coat
- Explosion
Your standard suicide lead. I lead Azelf basically 99% of the time. It comes, either sets up rocks, taunts slower entry hazard setters, magic coats things like webs and spikes or explodes on the face of mons like Grimmsnarl, which can Taunt you and make you lose momentum by giving it the chance of setting up a Reflect/Light Screen. I originally ran U-Turn, but there's little to no point on using it anyways, so I replaced it with Drain Punch for steels, but that still made it useless against Aegi and other ghosts, so I opted for Magic Coat. Being able to reflect Sticky Web and Spikes is extremely nice.
Tapu Lele @ Terrain Extender
Ability: Psychic Surge
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psychic
- Moonblast
- Focus Blast
- Thunderbolt
I didn't get to use very much of terrain teams back in gen 7 since I didn't play OU, so I never got to experience the sheer absurdity that is Psychic Terrain until now. Immunity to priority moves? Are you kidding me? Easily the best terrain. I knew I wanted to use Lele as soon as it dropped, so I fit it into the team. I gave it the Terrain Extender for two reasos: duh, more terrain turns; second, since Lele is the team's other suicide lead, I want it to faint as quickly as possible, which means that being choice-locked wasn't an option, as the enemy can just switch to an immunity/resist while I lose terrain turns (sadly, Lele doesn't learn Misty Explosion). Dual STABs + Focus Blast for steels like Cobalion, Magnezone, Scizor and Stakataka + Thunderbolt for Skarmory and Celesteela. I usually bring it in after Azelf has exploded itself into a billion pieces, and just start spamming the moves best suited for the opponent until Lele faints. And then the fun begins.
Blacephalon @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Flamethrower
- Expanding Force
- Shadow Ball
- Trick
Blacephalon is fucking bonkers. If you don't have a healthy Ghost resist or an immunity, this clown can very easily steamroll your team. Not being afraind of Aqua Jet, Accelerock and Sucker Punch is amazing, as it lets Blac just pick weakened teams off like they're nothing after the priority users have been removed. Literally the only move I have ever clicked on this thing is Shadow Ball. Flamethrower is there to scare Celesteela and Skarmory, though after a few boosts, Shadow Ball can easily destroy them. I put Expanding Force because why not and Trick hasn't been very useful yet, but I know it'll save my ass sometime.
Gyarados @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Waterfall
- Bounce
- Power Whip
I've seen some talk on Discord about how good Gyara is and I was pretty skeptical at first, but it really is a great mon. Especially when Dual STABs + Power Whip is only resisted by Dracozolt. Being able to hit every mon in the tier for at least neutral damage is amazing and helps the rest of the team on cleaning up in the late-game. Jolly is ran instead of Adamant to outspeed Zeraora after one DD. At first I was having some trouble trying to find opportunities to set up with Gyara but it soon found its place in the team. Much like Blacephalon, when Gyara starts getting kills and Moxie boosts, it can snowball out of control very quickly for the opposing team.
Alakazam @ Focus Sash
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Expanding Force
- Dazzling Gleam
- Shadow Ball
Zam is the team's famous "emergency check". Magic Guard + Sash lets you revenge kill basically anything if something goes wrong (like an unexpected flinch from Galarian Moltres
).A NP + Psychic Terrain boosted Exp Force will basically OHKO or at least 2HKO a lot of the stuff in the tier, though you don't get that many opportunities to setup due to Zam's bad bulk. Which is honestly fine, because a lot of weakened teams get picked off by Zam even without a Psychic Terrain boost. I've been switching back and forth between Focus Blast and Shadow Ball, because the first one lets me check Steels and Darks that can take DGleam, while Shadow Ball helps me deal with Mew, Jirachi and Victini. I'm leaning more towards SBall now, but idk.
Hawlucha @ Psychic Seed
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 Atk / 28 SpD / 228 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Acrobatics
- Close Combat
- Taunt
Hawlucha is the team's big star. I'm surprised at how many things it can OHKO after an SD, honestly. Unburden boosts your speed to astronomical levels, so you don't even need to run max Speed. This also means you can afford to run Adamant instead of Jolly. I run just enough to outspeed non-scarf base 100s like Mew and Jirachi without the Unburden boost. The rest of the EVs go towards SpDef, trying to open up more opportunities for setup against things like Nidoking. Taunt is extremely useful against Hippowdon, Skarmory and Galarian Weezing, preventing the former two from phazing you or the latter from burning you. It's specially helpful in the Hippowdon matchup, rendering utterly useless against you, giving you a free turn of setup.
Threatlist
Zeraora: Outside from scarfers, Zeraora is the fastest mon in the tier, meaning it can outspeed everything in my team with the exception of unburden-boosted Lucha. Between Knock Off and Plasma Fists, Zeraora has answers for every mon on my team and can outspeed all of them.
Mew, Jirachi, Victini: These three are not as bad, but they are pretty bulky and can take a few hits. Jirachi and Victini are specially scary for their offensive potential, specially scarf ones.
