[Overview]
<p>Golurk is unique in many ways; it is the only Pokemon that
offers a Ghost and Ground dual-type has the Ghost / Ground dual typing,
giving which gives it unique key resistances. With its respectable
124 Base base 124 Attack stat—which is
a lot high for
a Ghost-type
s—decent defenses
, and a nice number of new toys
courtsey courtesy of BW2
—including Stealth Rock and all of the elemental punches
—it found a very interesting niche in the OU metagame. The ability to lay
out hazards while acting as a spinblocker is
really useful, even though Golurk struggles with two common spinners, namely Starmie and Tentacruel. Still, Golurk makes
up for this
up by being immune to sandstorm and the
really rare ability to reliably counter Terrakion
, something only
very few Pokemon can do.
</p>
<p>Even with Despite the release of No Guard being released, Golurk can't take as much advantage of it as Machamp
does can,
making which makes Iron Fist
the clearly
the better option for it. The list of downsides for Golurk is sadly quite long; with
5 five very common weaknesses, Golurk will have a hard time against many Pokemon. Water, Ice, and Grass attacks severely hurt it and are seen on literally every team. Due to its Ghost typing, it also can't deal well with Dark and Ghost attacks, most notably Pursuit
. and if this isn't enough yet Furthermore, Golurk's base 55 Speed is just horrible, making its only setup move—Rock Polish—an obviously bad choice
with which to attempt a sweep. Instead, Golurk should focus on its supportive movepool and defensive capabilities to make full use of its potential.</p>
(remove space)
[SET]
name: Support
move 1: Stealth Rock
move 2: Earthquake
move 3: Ice Punch
move 4: Fire Punch / Shadow Punch
item: Leftovers
ability: Iron Fist
nature: Impish
evs: 252 HP / 80 Atk / 176 Def
[SET COMMENTS]
<p>With this set, Golurk
best fulfills its unique niche to set up Stealth Rock while blocking Rapid Spin at the same time
the best. Earthquake is its most powerful attack
move,
which and severely dents everything weak to it. An Iron Fi
rst-boosted Ice Punch is an invaluable new option for Golurk
, making that makes Gliscor way easier to handle, and also grants near perfect coverage along with Earthquake. In the last slot, Golurk can choose between Fire Punch and Shadow Punch, which both gain a power boost
via from Iron Fist. While Fire Punch opens up a way for Golurk to break through walls and tanks
like such as Forretress, Ferrothorn, Scizor, and even Skarmory to some extent, Shadow Punch is still an option, as
its it is Golurk's best way to handle Starmie, Gengar, and Alakazam
, all of which are OHKOed by it
, whereas Reuniclus can be 3HKOed and also 3HKO Reuniclus.</p>
[ADDITIONAL COMMENTS]
<p>Golurk's unique typing gives it three immunities in Normal, Fighting, and Electric attacks,
while it resists and resistances to Rock, Bug, and Poison attacks. This gives Golurk a number of potential switch
-(hyphen)ins,
like such as into a Choice
-locked Volt Switch,
with the needed time to gaining time to (is this what you meant?) set up Stealth Rock as fast as possible. Golurk's biggest selling point (The biggest selling point of Golurk's typing? optional change) is that it is a solid Terrakion counter, thanks to its typing.
Golurk is Being immune to Close Combat and
resists resistant to Stone Edge,
it only
fearing fears the rarely seen Earthquake. With the given EVs, Golurk can survive
an Adamant
Terrakion's (life orb?) +2 Stone Edge comfortably,
while offering and possesses enough power to OHKO Terrakion
back with Earthquake.</p>
<p>
Many neutral hits can be sponged with this set. This set can sponge many neutral hits. Most
interestingly significantly,
Life Orb Tornadus-T cannot manage to OHKO with Hurricane and +1 Salamence is not able to OHKO with Outrage Life Orb Tornadus-T and +1 Salamence cannot OHKO with Hurricane and Outrage respectively. Even Jirachi struggles against Golurk as it can't paralyze
it Golurk at all, while Ice Punch
is, its only usable damaging move,
dealing deals 32.46% - 38.21%. Golurk
can also
can sponge common priority attacks in OU, namely Mach Punch and ExtremeSpeed, that are aimed at its teammates,
while being somewhat able to handle Dragonite with Ice Punch and Ice Punch variants are somewhat able to handle Dragonite (otherwise sort of misleading). Breloom and Conkeldurr
, however, can simply pick their next effective move
, hitting and hit Golurk
quite hard with Bullet Seed and Payback or Ice Punch, respectively. Golurk can even take an Ice Shard from Adamant Life Orb Mamoswine
, but
will definitely not
be able to take a second one two.</p>
<p>A more offensive EV spread of 172 HP / 252 Atk / 96 Spe
can be combined with an Adamant nature
can be used to hit way harder. This spread gives Golurk the jump on
0 Spe EV Scizor to make it a decent check, uninvested Scizor, which it can check well by simply OHKOing
it with Fire Punch. However,
a Life Orb-boosted Adamant an Adamant Life Orb +2 Bullet Punch has a 56% chance to OHKO
the this offensive
spread Golurk,
while it clearly fails to achieve this against the defensive spread but not the defensive one. Because of its crappy base Speed, there's absolutely no point in investing any more into this stat, so the rest
goes should go into HP to make Golurk as bulky as possible.</p>
<p>Bulky Water-types are a sheer nightmare for Golurk, as it has nothing to handle them with
, Golurk is in need of and thus needs proper team support to
bypass these problems. Both Rotom-W and Rotom-C are ideal partners for this job,
being able to take as they can patch up two of Golurk's
three weaknesses
caused by its Ground typing, while sporting powerful STAB moves in Volt Switch, Discharge, Thunderbolt, and
the latter one also Leaf Strom Leaf Storm for the latter,
dealing which deal well with most Water-types. Gastrodon's
ability Storm Drain and Jellicent's Water Absorb
abilities will give your team a handy Water-type immunity
; and they also have access to Toxic to stall out extremely bulky Water-types. Gastrodon even stops most opposing Rotom-W cold as it is immune to most of the attacking moves Rotom-W tend to carry.
Vaporeon can be used as well, having Vaporeon too has access to two great abilities
, helping that help out against most Water-types, while rain teams will
clearly have problems
to take taking on Hydration variants. With both Toxic and Wish at its disposal, Vaporeon makes a great
team player for supporter to Golurk. Grass-types, such as Breloom, Celebi, and Virizion, also help
out dealing with against most Water-types thanks to their STAB moves. Jirachi is yet another good partner for Golurk; a Calm Mind set with Thunderbolt and Psyshock can
be used to handle threats
like such as Tentacruel and Calm Mind Keldeo.</p>
[Other Options]
<p>Golurk sports a good number of alternat
ive moves. Hammer Arm gets an Iron Fist boost and
is available to deal
s with Blissey, Chansey, and Rotom-W, which
its Golurk's other moves can't touch at all. Drain Punch
is also boosted by also gets an Iron Fist
boost; however, it is significantly weaker than Hammer Arm. Nonetheless,
it's able to recover Golurk's HP a bit it provides HP recovery as well. Toxic
can be used to cripple cripples bulky Water-types, rendering them useless in the long run.</p>
<p>A Choice Band is Golurk's only way to pump its Attack stat
, giving and gives it a nice power boost; however,
it is still Golurk is too slow to take advantage of it. Rock Polish is its only real setup move, but Golurk's base Speed is so pathetic that it barely outspeeds all non-
Choice Scarf Pokemon in OU, which makes it easy for the opponent to
counter eliminate it with their
next best Choice Scarf user.</p>
<p>A SubPunch set with Iron Fist can be used to get some free attacks off, but it generally lacks
the Speed and coverage to pull off a sweep. Golurk's Dream World ability
, No Guard
is finally released,
which can be used to make can grant it perfectly accurate DynamicPunch
es and Stone Edge
s perfectly accurate. However, there's not much more at Golurk's disposal that profits from it
, and despite the fact that DynamicPunch is a great move when accurate, Golurk should leave this job to Machamp
, At least Machamp who gets STAB on it and doesn't mind that much about
many opposing moves that get perfect accuracy,
like such as Hydro Pump.</p>
<p>ThunderPunch helps Golurk
deal better
deal with Water
-(hyphen)types
, but
doesn't offer the coverage it gets by its other elemental punches isn't as good coverage-wise as the other elemental punches are. Rock Slide can be used over Stone Edge, trading power for accuracy. Bulldoze and Low Sweep can help Golurk bypass its
Speed issues, but it only really helps against switch
-(hyphen)ins and only if they are already quite slow. Low Kick is another usable Fighting-type move for coverage, but
doesn't receive any boost by any of its abilities in contrast to Hammer Arm unlike Hammer Arm, doesn't receive an Iron Fist boost. Magic Coat can surprise many opponents
, throwing by reflecting back entry hazards and
any status move
like s, such as Toxic and Spore. Gravity is an interesting
add on for Golurk, as it gives DynamicPunch usable accuracy along with an Iron Fist boost option that gives (a potentially Iron Fist-boosted) DynamicPunch usable accuracy and allows Earthquake to hit everything, most notably Rotom-W, but Golurk's
Speed issues are again
a dererrent from an obstacle to using this move successfully.</p>
[Checks and Counters]
<p>Even though Golurk's unique typing gives it nice resistances and immunities, it sadly got a lot
of weakness
es too. Water-types are the main problem
, and
to make matters worse, they are extremely common. They don't mind taking Fire Punch and Ice Punch at all
; Starmie and Tentacruel
specifically can come into almost any move
, forcing and force Golurk out with their STAB moves. Rotom-W and Gyarados don't even take any damage from Earthquake,
making which makes them extremely hard
to handle for Golurk for Golurk to handle. Grass-types, such as Virizion, Venusaur, and Breloom
, can come in on Stealth Rock or Earthquake easily and hit real hard with their appropriate STAB moves. Breloom even beats Substitute sets easily thanks to Bullet Seed. However, Grass-types need to be careful against Fire Punch and Ice Punch. Ice-types
, such as Mamoswine, Kyurem, Abomasnow, and Weavile
, will be hurt by Stealth Rock
, but they are all faster than Golurk,
giving them an easy time to KO and thus have an easy time KOing it with any of their STAB moves. Mamoswine and Kyurem
can both
can even handle Fire Punch thanks to their ability and secondary typing, respectively.</p>
<p>Pokemon that are part Flying-type or have the ability Levitate will come in easily on Earthquake. Gengar can take any move bar Shadow Punch, while Shadow Ball will OHKO Golurk easily. Hydreigon has to watch out for Ice Punch and Hammer Arm but else has no problems switching into Golurk and OHKOing with Draco Meteor. Latias, Latios, and all Therians and Incarnate
forms formes of Landorus, Thundurus, and Tornadus have to watch out for Ice Punch. Unboosted
Timid 252 SpA Latias can't even manage to OHKO with Draco Meteor, whereas Life Orb
Timid 252 SpA Latios can OHKO with both Draco Meteor and Surf. The
genies all safely 2HKO Golurk with an appropriate move. However, Landorus-T has slightly more problems. A Naive Life Orb
252 Atk Landorus's Earthquake does 48.69 - 57.32%, which has a 46% chance to 2HKO, factoring in Leftovers, while Golurk easily 2HKOes with Ice Punch, even factoring in Intimidate.</p>
<p>Offensive powerhouses also deal with Golurk with ease. Offensive Trick Room Pokemon
like such as Reuniclus can come in, set up, and start sweeping. All Ninetales, Volcarona, and Air Balloon Heatran will outspeed Golurk with ease and have a high chance to OHKO with their STAB Fire-type moves. Choice Band Haxorus and Dragonite don't have any problems either. It might sound absurd, but apart from Terrakion, Jirachi, and in some way also Mienshao, pretty much anything in OU at least makes a decent check to Golurk.</p>
