ORAS Ubers M-Diancie+Ho-oh offense

[hublo]

What is up everyone, hope you like the original title of this thread. Diancie+fire-mon-with-quad-rox-weakness is a cool concept that I tried to make work with volcarona in OU, but I didn't have much success, so I moved to ubers where rainbow bird is a top threat and not a "go big or go home" kind of pokemon like volcarona. The teambulding was not straightforward indeed I kept shuffling around the last two teamslots and some sets until I was confortable with the team.

teambuilding

To my offensive core I added groudon, which checks kyogre and provides rocks support; next teamslot was a toss-up between the lati twins, I eventually opted for latias for her better bulk, which allows her to check some threats more reliably than latios, but sometimes I miss the power. I asked in the ubers chatroom what I should have put in the last teamslot and someone suggested to put defensive yveltal and arceus-water, so I did. The team performed well but sometimes it felt really passive. Then I used klefki+E-killer; the only issue I was facing is that opposing groudons were consistenly getting rocks up, so I searched for a mon with taunt in the uber tier and mewtwo seemed a good fit, revenge killing some threats that klefki used to check, like mence, latis and darkrai.

Team description
​

Diancie @ Diancite
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 76 Atk / 252 SpA / 180 Spe
Timid Nature
- Moonblast
- Diamond Storm
- Earth Power
- Protect

Diancie is the first mon added to the team and so far it has pulled its weight in every match. It sports really good coverage in the form of diamond storm, moonblast and earth power, which is useful to deal some serious damage to primal groudon and klefki.
Evs are standard and quoting the smogondex "176 Speed EVs with a Timid nature allow Mega Diancie to outspeed base 100 Speed Pokemon. A Timid nature is used because the Attack drop does not significantly impact any targets of Diamond Storm [...]. Significant Special Attack investment keeps this set offensive and allows it to OHKO threats such as Rayquaza and Mega Salamence. The remaining EVs go into Attack to make Diamond Storm hit slightly harder."

Ho-Oh @ Choice Band
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 248 HP / 188 Atk / 52 SpD / 20 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Brave Bird
- Sacred Fire
- Earthquake
- Sleep Talk

Ho-oh is the special tank of the team. Dual STABs are mandatory for every set as brave bird has good coverage in the tier and the secondary effect of sacred fire is really good. The last two moveslots depend on the set you want to run and can be either recover+twave or eq+sleep talk. I can't really decide which set I should run. Twave is useful to cripple salamence on the switchin, while thanks to sleep talk I have sleep fodder for darkrai (I can't really bank on diancie to check it for the whole match).
EVs are just enough to survive thunder from a boosted geoxern, 20 speed EVs for speed creeping standard Ho-oh (winnig a potential mirror 1v1 could help a lot considering that I don't have good switchins), the rest goes into attack.

Groudon @ Red Orb
Ability: Drought
EVs: 252 HP / 56 Def / 200 SpD
Relaxed Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Lava Plume
- Thunder Wave

Groudon is the team supporter that checks a lot of stuff. Earthquake is chosen because I prefer accuracy over power. Lava plume is another good STAB with a nice secondary effect. Sometimes I wish I had stone edge for opposing ho-oh and salamence but lava plume has its merits. Thunder wave is what I'm running for neutralizing mega mence on the switchin.
The EVs are standard for a defensive set, but I suppose that a sassy nature might be viable to take better ice beam from kyogre and some hits from geoxern.

Latias @ Soul Dew
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 212 HP / 120 SpA / 176 Spe
Timid Nature
- Defog
- Roost
- Draco Meteor
- Grass Knot

Latias is yet another team supporter and it's really good at switching in on the primals and arceus ground and consistently getting a defog off. The only issue I have with latias is it is usually setup bait for E-killer after the SpA drop from draco meteor (which you are going to use quite often given that is the only powerful STAB on her set).
EVs are straght from the latias analysis and allow her to outspeed base 100s. 120 SpAtk were used to 2HKO kyogre with psyshock and the rest went into bulk. Even if I don't carry psyshock I didn't know which benchmarks I should have used for this set so I left everything as it was.

Mewtwo @ Life Orb
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Psystrike
- Focus Blast
- Ice Beam
- Taunt

Mewtwo is the new entry and let me say just one thing about it: it is so good. Psyshock deals heavy damage to pretty much everything in the tier. Focus blast is chosen for coverage against steel types and dark types, ice beam smacks the dragon types in the tier and yveltal, taunt is crucial for preventing rocks. Of course dropping fire blast sucks for stuff like klefki, scizor and aegislash, but I feel safe with two fire types on my team.
EVs maximise offensive potential.

Arceus @ Life Orb
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Extreme Speed
- Shadow Claw
- Earthquake

E-killer is yet another broken pokemon that mauls stuff yada yada you know how it works. Extreme speed is very useful for revenge killing stuff and shadow claw hit hard the ghosts that threaten latias and mewtwo. Earthquake is standard coverage for groudon, dialga and diancie. SD and life orb allow arceus to wallbreak effectively.
EVs maximise damage output.

Threats:​

latios: I don't have a good switchin. It's usually a guessing game between psyshock and draco meteor and I have to think twice before sending out either diancie or mewtwo.

salamence: without a twave on either Ho-oh or groudon earthquake sets literally 6-0 this team.

E-killer: not much to say it has some setup opportunities and it's just really difficult to stop once it gets going.

giratina: not a threat by itself, it needs some team support, but a well played giratina can screw up latias, groudon, mewtwo and arceus, especially if it's a hex set.

gengar: really annoying, It's really scary if it carries protect to mega evolve safely.

groudon: dual dance variants are the evil.

Thanks for your attention.
​

importable

Diancie @ Diancite
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 76 Atk / 252 SpA / 180 Spe
Timid Nature
- Moonblast
- Diamond Storm
- Earth Power
- Protect

Ho-Oh @ Choice Band
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 248 HP / 188 Atk / 52 SpD / 20 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Brave Bird
- Sacred Fire
- Earthquake
- Sleep Talk

Groudon @ Red Orb
Ability: Drought
EVs: 252 HP / 56 Def / 200 SpD
Relaxed Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Lava Plume
- Thunder Wave

Latias @ Soul Dew
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 212 HP / 120 SpA / 176 Spe
Timid Nature
- Defog
- Roost
- Draco Meteor
- Grass Knot

Mewtwo @ Life Orb
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Psystrike
- Focus Blast
- Ice Beam
- Taunt

Arceus @ Life Orb
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Extreme Speed
- Shadow Claw
- Earthquake

 

[oversway]

Hey, nice team, Mega Diancie with Ho-oh is one of my favorite cores in the current meta. However, I have a few suggestions, especially as many of the mons in your threatlist are S or A rank mons.

• Yveltal over Mewtwo. While being a hard hitting attacker, I don't see it synergizes defensively or offensively with the rest of your team, and is vulnerable to priority and the threats you listed above. Defensive Yveltal allows you to check mega mence, ekiller, and most offensive Primal Groudon variants, while providing a way to counter Giratina and deal decent damage to wisp Gengar. Rocky Helmet is an option to further punish physical attackers, while Charti Berry allows you to live a +2 Stone Edge PDon and ekiller. As you struggle to switch in to Latios (Psyshock is a 2hko on Diancie and Ho-oh) this change also forces some predictions on your opponent's part. Yveltal additionally has decent defensive synergy with the rest of your team, as it's weaknesses, save for the uncommon ice, are covered well.
• Stone Edge over Shadow Claw on ekiller. With Yveltal you no longer have to worry about ghostceus, and OHKOing Ho-oh after a boost is more important imo. It also hits Lugia and Yveltal harder; while Diancie deals with those as well it can get worn down quickly, after which common stall cores such as Lugia+MSab become a problem.
• This isn't necessary, but running more speed on Ho-oh is an option to creep other Ho-ohs. While you creep most dex sets people generally run more speed in the current meta, so running 100 speed will creep most other dons and ho-ohs.
• Diancie spam is a problem to this team, so running defog Groundceus is an option. This allows you to counter Diancie while retaining a moveslot for a hazard remover. You could then run 4 attacks Latios in order to make up for the loss of offensive pressure. While this removes your late game sweeper, I don't feel one is necessary on this build, since you already have a plethora of hard hitters that can break threats for each other.

sets

Yveltal @ Charti Berry
Ability: Dark Aura
EVs: 232 HP / 252 Def / 24 Spe
Impish Nature
- Foul Play
- Sucker Punch
- Taunt
- Roost

Arceus @ Life Orb
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Extreme Speed
- Stone Edge
- Earthquake

Ho-Oh @ Choice Band
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 168 HP / 188 Atk / 52 SpD / 100 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Brave Bird
- Sacred Fire
- Earthquake
- Sleep Talk

Arceus-Ground @ Earth Plate
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 248 HP / 200 Def / 60 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Judgment
- Toxic
- Recover
- Defog

Latios @ Soul Dew
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Psyshock
- Grass Knot
- Hidden Power [Fire]

Hope this works out!

 

[hublo]

Hey Dominato, sorry for late response but I didn't get to play pokemon since I posted this RMT so I was not able to play the team with the changes; however I agree with the stuff that you mentioned and you seem to be more experienced with this tier than me so I'll swap mewtwo for yveltal.
I'm not really fond of ground supportceus because e-killer is just so good and I think It would make the team kyogre-weak, but I'll give it a try. Thanks for the suggestions!

 

[Cynara]

Hey Dominato, sorry for late response but I didn't get to play pokemon since I posted this RMT so I was not able to play the team with the changes; however I agree with the stuff that you mentioned and you seem to be more experienced with this tier than me so I'll swap mewtwo for yveltal.
I'm not really fond of ground supportceus because e-killer is just so good and I think It would make the team kyogre-weak, but I'll give it a try. Thanks for the suggestions!

Yeah Im not a huge fan of the Support groundceus suggestion on this team, though the yveltal change is optimal, running support groundceus, basically casues redundancy in latias, forcing you to change it to 4 attacks latios, which weakens the build by using an inferior defog user. imo the optimal change is to run SD groundceus over E killer with Recover if you decide to go with Groundceus to improve your Primal groudon, Diancie and klefki matchup (like the mentioned supportceus change, but allows you to keep latias for kyogre, making don + latias plenty), these kind of builds dont really need the E speed priority, +2 Earthquake hits much harder and deals with much more relevant threats, giving more much offensive presence in general, leads to a bulky offense archtype which looks like this team is geared towards to originally, Stone edge can be used for perfect coverage, hits hooh lugia yveltal etc. you have yveltal to handle E killer and ghostceus

though the aformentioned changes, make it a standard team that already exists, Its the strongest configuration by changing one mon and changing one set/item on an existing pokemon and without restructuring the team.

 

[oversway]

at least groundceus beats all common hazard setters 1v1 (excluding bronzong)
Groundceus doesn't really make the team Kyogre weak, since you can play around it with Ho-Oh/Primal Groudon (especially since it's spdef) and it's checked by either of the lati twins.

 

[Aberforth]

Did you actually suggest support groundceus? Urgh.

Support Groundceus is really bad in this meta and you're right by not feeling it is a good fit. What is a good fit is Swords Dance Arceus-Ground with Recover, which will quite easily beat most Diancie Offenses, and also doesn't get rid of your main win con for a poor defogger that gives too many free turns to too many good things.

Another small change I feel you can make is running Dragon Tail over Lava Plume on Groudon. This limits the setup opportunities for many of the threats you identified and hits Latios a tonne stronger than anything you currently have with your Groudon.

Minor thing that can help vs Non-Stone Edge Ekillers, run 4defense on Ho-oh from attack. It means it will always live a +2 jolly extremespeed, whereas there is a chance of it dying with your spread (albeit low). Adamant would require 92 evs, so its not really worth it.

Finally, I would replace Mewtwo with a Choice Scarf Yveltal rather than a Defensive one. I find the defensive set doesn't synergise well with your team, you lack the defensive backbone to truly support it, wheras a choice scarf Yveltal with 96 defense, 236 spa, 176 speed outspeeds Mewtwo-Y and can live an Extremespeed from full and OHKO back with foul play.

sets

Arceus-Ground @ Earth Plate
Ability: Multitype
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge
- Recover

Groudon-Primal @ Red Orb
Ability: Desolate Land
EVs: 252 HP / 56 Def / 200 SpD
Relaxed Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Dragon Tail
- Lava Plume
- Precipice Blades

Yveltal @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Dark Aura
EVs: 96 Def / 236 SpA / 176 Spe
Modest Nature
- Foul Play
- Dark Pulse
- Oblivion Wing
- Heat Wave

 

[hublo]

Thanks everyone for your suggestion. It took me some time to try every set but eventually I pinned down the last two members for my team. I chose charti berry yveltal because a healthy e-killer, given a free switchin into diancie, could easily setup and wreck house, scarf was good but not as consistent in a 1v1 and the loss of taunt relly hurt my team. I also put sucker punch on it because once lati is gone mewtwo could deal some serious damage to everything. Next I implemented SD groundceus which helped a lot in the matchup vs opposing diancie and CM rockceus (not common but still threatening). In some matchups e-killer is more useful but overall groundceus performs a little better (it doesn't fear LO recoil, it's less susceptible to SR damage and recover it's a useful tool in the mid game). In the end the team it's kinda weak to kyurem-w but you can't really cover everything and ho-oh+diancie should be enough.

PoMMan you mentioned Dtail over lava plume but in the [/hide] thing you put it over Twave and so I did, but twave it's really crucial for neutralizing both xerneas and salamence.

When I run the calc for the ho-oh vs arceus scenario I get this: +2 252 Atk Life Orb Arceus Extreme Speed vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Ho-Oh: 351-413 (84.5 - 99.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO. I use the calculator that is linked when you type /calc on ps, if it's inaccurate let me know.

 

[Aberforth]

Hide was a mistake by me getting lazy and importing something from my teams that already had dtail and I didn't pay attention to the lack of twave. Twave is really useful.