Empoleon: The Beastly Penguin within!

rokman

rokman

Empoleon: The Beastly Penguin within!
#395 Empoleon
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When I looked at the three starters of the latest Pokemon Expansion, I noticed something peculiar, Empoleon is far superior to the other two starters! Why was he this way you ask? Notably, his massive amount of resistances. So he is weak to three popular types: Ground, Fighting and Electric, but every pokemon needs something negative about it to make the game balanced, doesn’t it?

Now, I haven’t ever been in favor of starter pokemon, especially after the trash that came out in Johto, but Empoleon changed me. It showed me the way saying, “Hey! We starters are usable. And you know what? We can dish out as much as the next guy!” I have to agree, because Empoleon truly is the Emperor of pokemon.

The Set of all Sets
Empoleon “Bonaparte”
Item: Shed Shell (Always allows holder to switch out)
Nature: Calm (+ Special Defense – Attack)
EVs: 208 HP / 56 SAtt / 240 SDef
- Stealth Rock
- Grass Rope
- Ice Beam
- Yawn

What is Empoleon used for? It is used for two primary missions.
1. Defeat Choice Specs Salamence.
2. Wall anything it can.

I was doubtful when I first looked at the pokemon. But I noticed something special, it learns Stealth Rock. What does this do for this pokemon, you ask? It makes it far more viable than just a silly counter to SpecsMence. Here is a scenario, SpecsMence just OHKO’d one of your star pokemon, it’s time for some revenge, don’t you think? You send in Empoleon, slap SpecsMence with Ice Beam and be done with it? No, what if they switch out? What if they knew your strategy all along? Stealth Rock FTW! Yes.

What else does Stealth Rock set up? Why, Yawn of course! You can Yawn some hefty beast, and allow your opponent to choose, Switch out and take a Stealth Rock or Stay in and sleep?

The thing is, Empoleon isn’t only an amazing pokemon, but when used properly and with good prediction, it clashes with some of the top tier pokemon. Stats aside, it is amazing, it can counter so many things, it can wall aplenty, and it looks so cool! It’s a mix between sheer sleekness and class!
 
Well, that's nice and all, but starters like Infernape are a lot more versatile than Empoleon, and stronger overall. Hell, even Torterra can make Empoleon cry.
 
You have a list of what it counters, cause I'm pretty sure it can't counter most physical sweepers, and the only special sweeper I can think of right now is Azelf.
 
SolarHavok said:
Well, that's nice and all, but starters like Infernape are a lot more versatile than Empoleon, and stronger overall. Hell, even Torterra can make Empoleon cry.
Click to expand...

What Torterra would switch in on Empoleon, who is faster and OHKOs with Ice Beam?

Unless you provide examples, OP, I'm gonna run some numbers later on those EVs. They look promising; I love Empoleon, he's Cools McAwesome in my book.
 
That's neat, but I think it could also make a good special tank. Base 111 Sp. Atk and 101 Sp. Def are pretty nice.
Still, it seems this could be its primary use. Well done. :)
 
i'd recommend Protect and Yawn. helps stop it's too main counters (Duggy and Magnezone) assuming they try and switch in (though who switches in Duggy on Empoleon?)

Beautful Skin is also possible over leftovers if you're feeling paranoid.

This guy compliments TSS teams very well being 4x resistant to Ice Beam and countering Specsmence. He's going on my TSS team.
 
THE rokman? lol
dude I swear I thought of this set a while ago cause I wana use Empoleon so bad with so many resistances, I can't stand using Blissey. I was still debating myself over Protect or Stealth Rock.
 
PabloMeza said:
THE rokman? lol
dude I swear I thought of this set a while ago cause I wana use Empoleon so bad with so many resistances, I can't stand using Blissey. I was still debating myself over Protect or Stealth Rock.
Click to expand...
THE Pablo?!
Yeah well, Stealth Rock >>> Protect.
 
Would earthquake be viable on him? 86 Attack isnt that bad.
Say you come in on mence and you predict the switch to some electric (magnezone or electivire probably). You hit them right away with eq. It would be a nice little surprise.
 
EDIT: Apparently Brine works when the FOE is below 50%. I apologize, essentially everything that comes after this edit is crap.

While studying for my Trademark final for the past 12 hrs, I have been obsessing over thinking about using Empoleon as a starting point for a team I'm planning. A lot of this is based on my assumptions on calculations for moves and abilities that I'm not super familiar with:

Empoleon
Item: Focus Sash
Ability: Torrent (Boosting water moves 1.5x when under a certain HP_
Nature: +SpA -Def (or +Speed -Def)
EVs: Max SpA and Speed
Moves:
--Agility
--Brine
--Aqua Ring
--Protect

OR

--Agility
--Brine
--Ice Beam
--Aqua Ring

Now hear me out for a minute. I wanted to use Empoleon because of it's SICK resistances, but the ever-present Earthquakes, TBolts, and various fighting moves made me a little sad. So I thought, "Empoleon BEGS for these moves to be used against him since anything else will be resisted... what if I used that to my advantage?"

The premise of this the nature/EV combo I came up with is to make the
the Earthquakes and Close Combats, etc. STING. That's where Focus Sash would come into play and keep Empoleon alive with 1HP, and Sandstream wouldn't cause a problem because of the resistance due to steel. This is how I imagine it all playing out:

First Turn:
Faster Enemy with the Earthquake or Fighting move knock me down to 1HP.
Empoleon uses Agility!

Second Turn:
Empoleon used Brine! (130BP x 1.5 from Torrent x 1.5 STAB)
Enemy is KOed!

......
Alternatively:

First turn:
Foe switches out to a Pokemon with necessary move to take out Empoleon.
Empoleon uses Agility

Second turn:
Empoleon uses Aqua Ring!
Foe uses move that brings Empoleon to 1HP.
Empoleon recovers a negligible amount of HP from Aqua Ring that still lets Torrent and Brine work their magic.

Third Turn:
Empoleon KOs foe with Brine.
.................

The second moveset is there to provide Empoleon with more options than just Brine. Protect in the first moveset it there to allow some more recovery from Aqua Ring? Would Aqua Ring recovery happen before a leech seed drain?

Yeah Blissey gives both movesets huge problems. Maybe Brine + Waterfall?

I apologize if this whole moveset is super noobish but the mind wanders while studying.
 
Great example of overhyping. Empoleon is good for switching into Choice Glasses Salamence, yeah, and it has a nice list of resistances. Great.

It also gets trapped instantly by BOTH Magnezone and Dugtrio. Sentences like

So he is weak to three popular types: Ground, Fighting and Electric, but every pokemon needs something negative about it to make the game balanced, doesn’t it?
Click to expand...

just plain irk me to death. I wish you good luck thinking of ANY popular Pokemon that doesn't have a move of any of these types in its movepool that would like to use it sometimes.

The set I would use is Surf/Ice Beam/Grass Knot/Stealth Rock by the way. Grass Knot helps against other Waters, especially Swampert who might come in once in a while.

Also claiming Infernape is worse than Empoleon is really foolish. It's pretty clear to me which one is being used more, and which one is sweeping more teams.
 
I think the effectiveness of the Yamn/Spikes combo is being overblown. All they have to do is just let some poke take it (preferably something that wouldn't mind it, like a Sleep Talker, Natural Heal, or having a healer on their), then switch out. And then that's it, they won't be doing any more switches, because of the "only one sleep" rule. They're only gonna let you get away with it once. It's better to force switches than hope they play along, because they're not going to.
 
Let me add something there: Empoleon isn't going to sit there, lay Stealth Rock and use Yawn all day long until the entire opposing team dies of Stealth Rock damage. It's going to take hits every other turn or even more often.

Not to mention Stealth Rock damage is so little compared to what you could have done in those turns...
 
When I saw Empoleon, the first thing I thought was, "Cool, part steel, makes an interesting alternative to a bulky waters counter in TSS teams." Since for the rather long time I've been on Netbattle RSE before this there hasn't been a real viable option for that one slot. (What, Cacturne? lollerskates. Magneton prolly does a better job.) So, sweet.

Then I remembered it gets trapped by two common trappers. Ouch. At least it gets some pretty high defences and special attack, so you can boost its survivability some.

It's by no means a terribly bad pokemon, but yeah, overhyping. It will probably find some use in TSS teams, and I'm definitely gonna test it in mine (Once I finish breeding my main pokemons), but outside of that there's that "Why should I run this over this that etc etc etc?" question that will pop up far more often.

Although, even Mekkah was being pretty nice to Empoleon as far as I'm concerned. Several of my friends already dismissed it as the Meganium of the DS generation starters.
 
Empoleon

I've had some chances to test out a team on the chinese version of DP Netbattle and Empoleon is my favorite pokemon to date. Not only is it a penguin...but it's a steel penguin. This is just full of badassery. Now, I don't know how to link you to a picture or whatever...but I'll put out the EVs and the moveset then explain what it is used for.

Now this is the Empoleon that I use on my team and it's under the assumption that item clause is in effect (which, imo, it should be).

Modest Empoleon (Courage) @ Shell Bell

HP - 372
Atk - 187
Def - 250
SpAtk - 283
SpDef - 260
Spd - 160

EVs
HP - 252
Def - 152
SpDef - 90
Spd - 16

Moveset
- Hydro Pump
- Ice Beam
- (Filler) Grass Knot/Stealth Rock/Toxic/Sleep Talk
- Rest

Now, the biggest threats one can immediately think of to this pokemon would be Magnezone and Dugtrio. At least, you would think so. But, since most of these pokemon are used to try and get in as soon as possible with the thought of a OHKO or whatever, in mind, neither of them can beat Empoleon one on one at full health (as a torrented hydro pump kills Magnezone if it takes a hit on the switch and a non-torrented hydro-pump, ice beam, flash cannon or grass knot kill dugtrio) and only Magnezone can really switch in on it predicting an ice beam over a hydro pump it's not like it really has to be that afraid of either of those pokemon, more cautious than anything. This depends a lot on the player and their ability to effectively use a pokemon.

That said, lets look at what it is good for. A normal resist, which is always good to have. A rock resist. Your classic bulky water with resistances to many new types such as poison, psychic, flying, bug, neutral against grass and fire so no more need to fear Venusaur. Fighting, Earthquake and Thunderbolt kind of put it back a bit, so predicting the wrong move can really hurt, but, again, that depends on the player not on the pokemon.

Now lets look at why I have his special attack so high. First, it's good to deal damage. The more damage the better especially paired with shell bell. This is also partly to deter its counters (at least in magnezone and dugtrio) most people don't like taking a stab hydro pump (assuming it doesn't miss) on something it is neutral against even. The shell bell is used as something of a makeshift leftovers because of item clause but I think, if used properly, it can heal more than leftovers, even.

Lets look at what resists water: grass, water, ice, dragon
And what resists ice: water, ice, steel, fire.
And grass: steel, poison, fire, grass, bug, dragon

Water is super effective against: ground, rock, fire.
Ice is super effective against: ground, rock, flying, dragon.
Grass is super effective against: water, ground, rock.

The only point to using Grass Knot or Flash Cannon would be to avoid being walled by other waters or ice pokemon. I would personally choose grass knot since it isn't resisted by ice and is super effective on waters. That said, each of the attacks covers the others resisted types. So nothing can really "safely" switch in to avoid damage from one move so they probably want to move to something neutral. Either way, if they chance it and get bitten you gain more life than normal, if not and you hit something that isn't snorlax/blissey/somethingwithabnormalspdef you are getting at least as much as leftovers while super effective hits give much more (that's a given).

These are some of the most common typings in the current metagame and could be in the future...that said, shell bell could be put to good use on this pokemon (rest is always there, too).

So this is how I would use Empoleon. I've sort of made a version of my DP team on the regular netbattle (with swampert replacing empoleon and skarm over the physical wall I chose) and it's pretty successful. But we'll see what happens. Tell me what you think.

This was moved over from the other topic because it has to be discussed here, I guess.

Also, I think that counting on TTS being an option once the metagame is established isn't that great since Tyranitar is likely to be moved up a tier.
 
No Dice Needed said:
Also, I think that counting on TTS being an option once the metagame is established isn't that great since Tyranitar is likely to be moved up a tier.
Click to expand...

Why is Tyranitar likely to be moved up a tier? Just because it has better special defence? This "moving T-tar to the Uber level" thing is overdone, and the current physical-based metagame just shows that pretty much everything out there has some sort of physical move to take T-tar out. Everyone's favourite CB Meteor Mash, Megahorn, a reportoire of Earthquakes, an aforementioned Brick Break, and of course, Close Combat and what have you. All the SDef boost gives is a better bulky waters resist, and switching in waters on T-tar is never a wise strategy anyway. If it switches in, that just means you got more damage in. Plus, if anything, Rhyperior is as hard, if not harder, to take out during a sandstorm, even with that 4x grass/water weak.
 
I think the best set for Empoleon is a Choice Specs set. It comes in rather easily, it just can't stay in. Ergo, it makes a pretty decent hit-and-run Pokemon with Choice Specs and 111 base special attack. Surf/Ice Beam/Grass Knot hurts most anything, for fillers you can use Hydro Pump for added oomph maybe (don't even bother with Luster Cannon, it gives you no advantages except against Regice or something).
 
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