Garbodor
[Overview]
<p>Garbodor, despite its appearance, is not complete trash. It is actually a great Pokemon in the NU tier, and is the best Pokemon that can use both Spikes and Toxic Spikes available. Garbodor also has a good defensive typing to go with its supporting role. Poison typing gives it useful resistances to Fighting-, Grass-, and Poison-type moves, and allows Garbodor to actually absorb the opponent's Toxic Spikes as well. Garbodor has respectable bulk as well, boasting 80 / 82 / 82 defensive stats allowing it to be either physically or specially defensive depending on its team's needs. Garbodor has good Attack and Speed stats for such a defensivly oriented Pokemon, allowing it to hit hard with its powerful STAB Gunk Shot, while outspeeding many other defensive Pokemon. However, everything is not good for Garbodor. Its movepool is really shallow, and is basically limited to Gunk Shot, Clear Smog, and Rock Blast. Garbodor has no recovery outside of Rest, and that makes it difficult to keep Garbodor alive, especially because it is weak to the common Ground- and Psychic-type moves; it has to avoid Pokemon such as Golem, Musharna, and Gardevoir on a daily basis. However, Garbodor makes great use of what little it has available, and no Pokemon can match it when it comes to its main task.</p>
[SET]
name: Spikes
move 1: Spikes
move 2: Toxic Spikes
move 3: Gunk Shot
move 4: Clear Smog / Rock Blast
item: Leftovers
ability: Stench
nature: Impish
evs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
[SET COMMENTS]
<p>As the most reliable user of both Spikes and Toxic Spikes in the tier, this set is a given. With great bulk and defensive typing, Garbodor has no trouble getting several layers of each entry hazard up. Gunk Shot is Garbodor's best STAB move at disposal, as its bad Special Attack makes it unable to use Sludge Bomb effectively. Despite its low accuracy, Gunk Shot's high Base Power more than makes up for it, being able to KO big threats such as Exeggutor and Ludicolo. Clear Smog, while being rather weak and redundant with Gunk Shot, serves a useful purpose: to remove any stat boosts the opponent might have acquired. However, Rock Blast is useful, as it allows Garbodor to break through the opponent's troublesome Substitutes which is extremely helpful against Pokemon such as Haunter. Rock Blast is also Garbodor's most reliable answer to Cryogonal.</p>
[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]
<p>In Garbodor's shallow movepool lies a few other useful moves. Body Slam is the most prominent one, as the chance of paralyzing a foe is always helpful. Protect is also good for Garbodor, especially if it is used on a stall team, as it allows Garbodor to recover health with Leftovers while stalling the opponent with poison damage. In a similar vein, Toxic can also work over Toxic Spikes for inflicting immediate Toxic status to the opponent, and is especially useful if you only want to set up Spikes. A physically defensive spread is chosen to make it easier for Garbodor to switch in on moves such as Close Combat from Sawk, but a specially defensive EV spread is perfectly viable as well. Even though Garbodor is weak to Psychic-type moves, which are more often special, it's also weak to Ground-type moves which are more often physical, so neither EV spread is better than the other. A specially defensive spread makes it easier for Garbodor to switch in on Grass-type moves that are also often specially oriented, as well as the rather common Sludge Bomb from the likes of Vileplume and Amoonguss. Focus Blast becomes easier to tank as well. A more offensive spread can also be used to make Garbodor hit harder with Gunk Shot. While it won't be able to take hits as well when doing so, Garbodor is now able to hit Pokemon such as Exeggutor and Gorebyss much harder.</p>
<p>Garbodor pairs well with Absol—Absol can easily take on every Psychic-type in the tier with its STAB Dark-type moves, while Garbodor resists Fighting-type moves directed at Absol and its Spikes and Toxic Spikes help Absol break down bulkier opponents. Skuntank is also good option, filling the same role as Absol, but shares a Ground-type weakness with Garbodor. Cacturne is also a good replacement as it also resists Ground-type moves. Exeggutor also appreciates the entry hazards Garbodor sets up, while it resists both Psychic- and Ground-type moves. Cleric and Wish support is crucial if you want Garbodor to be able to set up its entry hazards more than once during a match. Miltank and Lickilicky are both good options, with Lickilicky being able to pass Wishes as well while both benefit from Garbodor's Fighting-type resistance. Leafeon is another great option. While its Wishes aren't as huge as Lickilicky's, Leafeon has a useful resistance to Ground-type moves. A Ghost-type Pokemon, most notably Misdreavus, is almost a must for Garbodor, as it helps keeping Spikes and Toxic Spikes on the opponent's side of the field by blocking Rapid Spin. Misdreavus has access to Heal Bell as well, while it is immune to Ground-type moves and hits Psychic-types hard with its super effective Shadow Ball. Most other sweepers besides the aforementioned Absol, such as Magmortar, Samurott, and Charizard, benefit greatly from the support Garbodor provides as it helps in bringing down bulkier Pokemon. This is especially useful for Pokemon such as Magmortar and Charizard as they usually don't carry moves to boost their stats. Garbodor is also a great staple for most stall oriented teams, as Spikes and Toxic Spikes are great for wearing down the opponent in the stalling process.</p>
[Other Options]
<p>Garbodor can utilize a faster Spikes set with the use of Weak Armor to raise its Speed, acting more as a suicide lead than a defensive support planning to sticking around for long. Garbodor can also use Rest in combination with Chesto Berry to recover its health to keep setting up entry hazards, but it's generally an inferior strategy. Unlike Clear Smog, Haze hits through Substitute, allowing for a more reliable way to remove the opponent's potential stat boosts; however, Haze can only be used with Toxic Spikes as it's illegal with Spikes. Curse, Amnesia, and Stockpile can all be used to boost Garbodor's defense stats further, which can be useful. However, Garbodor's horrible physical movepool makes a Curse set a bad way to go with Garbodor. In a similar vein, Rock Polish will boost Garbdor's decent Speed to high levels, but again its physical movepool lets it down. Explosion is also an option, although it's best left until late in the battle. Garbodor's movepool consists of a few powerful special moves such as Sludge Bomb, Focus Blast, Thunderbolt, Psychic, and SolarBeam. However, Garbodor's low base 60 Special Attack stat makes it a bad user of these moves. Air Balloon can be used to avoid Garbodor being hit by Ground-type moves. While it's decent, Air Balloon is a one-use item and the recovery from Leftovers can be crucial most times and is often the preferred choice.</p>
[Checks and Counters]
<p>Most hard-hitting Pokemon will be able to break Garbodor either in one or two hits. Exeggutor, Musharna, and Gardevoir can hit Garbodor with their powerful Psychic. While Musharna can take repeated Gunk Shots and recover the damage, both Exeggutor and Gardevoir need to avoid being hit by Gunk Shot. Gardevoir has a really low Defense stat, while Exeggutor is weak to Gunk Shot and can has a slight chance to be OHKOed with prior Stealth Rock damage. Golem and Sawk have really powerful Earthquakes to take Garbdor down with, while Camerupt can aim at Garbodor's more often lower Special Defense stat with a powerful Earth Power. Misdreavus is another major threat to Garbodor as it can wear down Garbodor with Will-O-Wisp and Pain Split, while it resists Gunk Shot. Misdreavus can also stop any of Garbodor's attempts at setting up Spikes and Toxic Spikes with Taunt. Other faster Taunt users are a huge problem as well. Golbat, for example, is really bulky, resists Gunk Shot, and can successfully break Garbodor down with Super Fang and Brave Bird. Pokemon with respectable physical bulk, such as Gorebyss and Samurott, can set up on Garbodor lacking Clear Smog and blast away powerful STAB moves at it.</p>
[Unreleased]
<p>Garbodor receives Aftermath as its Dream World ability. Aftermath is much more useful than Stench on defensive versions of the Spikes set, as the only offensive moves Garbodor use, bar Body Slam, don't make physical contact and the potential extra damage is always useful.</p>
