ORAS UU Puppet strings (M-Banette/TR team)

[LeonesdgoGt]

+ ~Puppet strings~ +

Intro:

After weeks of playing mono ghost teams with no succes at all... I started to see that mega banette its really underated and i started to like playing it a lot, so i made this trick room team to cover all i could to make him the biggest killer in my team.

The team:

+~Puppeteer~+

/Puppet#1/ /puppet#3/

/Puppet#4/

/Puppet#2/ /puppet#5/



The set up:

Puppet#1 (Aromatisse) @ Leftovers
Ability: Aroma Veil
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 156 Def / 196 SpA / 100 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Trick Room
- Aromatherapy
- Psychic
- Moonblast

Puppet#1 is my lead pokemon to set trick room and is a great wall against special sweeper and fightning/dark pokemon. With aroma veil im sure i will set trick room and will start to sweep. Psychic is to counter poison pokemon and make good damage to fightning walls like machamp and others. Moonblast is a great STAB and a dark type killer. Im not sure if run aromatherapy or wish because i tested both and both helps in dofferent battles so i need to decide with that moveslot. At the end if aromatisse is alive Banette have nothing to fear.

Puppet#2 (Porygon2) @ Eviolite
Ability: Analytic
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 248 HP / 252 SpA / 8 SpD
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 SpA
- Trick Room
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Thunderbolt
- Shadow Ball

If theres a lot of poison type in the opposite team i start with puppet#2. His my offensive TR setter but i choose porygon2 with eviolite because porygonZ was to fragile and puppet#2 its more bulky and my water type killer that works great against mega swampert with HP grass. I used to have recover and works good but Doublade was giving me a lot of problems for his massive def so this helps to kill him fast and works really good as a surprice move when my opponent is hidding theyre ghost pokemons of M-banette. With Thunderbolts is great vs M- aerodactil and other offensive fly pokemon.

Puppet#3 (Gligar) @ Eviolite
Ability: Immunity
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 100 Atk / 156 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Toxic
- Earthquake
- Roost
- Stone Edge

Puppet#3 is my physical wall and have great synergy with aromatisse and empoleon with his electric immunity and poison/fire ressistant. Stone edge can kill really fast fly pokemon and have roost to last longer. Toxic is great against walls and tanks.

Puppet#4 (Empoleon) @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Torrent
EVs: 156 Def / 196 SpA / 100 SpD
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Ice Beam
- Scald
- Flash Cannon
- Defog

Puppet#4 is my second sp sweeper and is my fairy/dragón killer. Also is my hazard remover and defends from poison aromatisse.

Puppet#5 (Druddigon) @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Rough Skin
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 SpD
Adamant Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Outrage
- Iron Head
- Superpower
- Dragon Tail

Puppet#5 is one of my physical sweeper. He can 1,2 or 3HKO a lot of things also have dragón tail for things that cant kill and for boosted foes. Iron head is great to give a surprice to fairy types. Súper power works great against normal types like blessey ( if its not just support) rough skin and Rocky helmet gives a nice punch to any pysichal sweeper that hits me. He supports Banette when he is against normal type foes.

Puppeteer (Banette-Mega) @ Banettite
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Destiny Bond
- Sucker Punch
- Phantom Force
- Pain Split


Now my puppeteer. He is my late Game sweeper he hit like a truck and can recover hp with pain split the idea is to switch in Banette in the trick room when i have 2 turns left, use phantom forcé and then trick room banish so my opponent gonna move first and then phantom forcé hit hard on my foe usually theyre left with 1/4 hp and with sucker punch i garantee to kill my opponent. If an opponent hit puppeteer i can switch out and wait and repeat the steps again. (TR, 2turns left, switch in, PF or SP) if the opponent switch to a pokemon with full HP i recover mine with pain split and when im against a foe that i cant kill i trick them to kill me and use destiny bond.

Strategy:

My strategy is to keep alive aromatisse because its the shield of banette. Duddrigon kills normal types and dark types with aromatisse, also fightning types and other foes that usually have knock off/crunch/sucker punch.

Gligar, empoleon and porygon2 can handle other stuff well. My pokemon have good resistance and immunity to fightning types but porygon2 and empoleon are really weak to them so usually i have to play a lot with my switch ins but i manage to make it work. After normal types and dark types are out. Banette can handle almost everything and if theres something i can handle i just kamikaze and fight with the rest of my team.


Treaths:

Blissey

If its a blissey with to much def and with aromatherapy and soft boiled im not gonna be eable to kill it and makes the Match súper bored and with no end.

Eveeolutions

Again a team with only eveeolutions usually have wish/protect/moonlight/morning sun and walls that make really hard to kill them because they spam the cures and usually have really good def and spdef. (Biggest treaths are bulcky vaporeon, wish sylveon and bulcky/wish umbreon)

Lucario

Lucario its súper annoying to my team. can kill really fast my both trick room setters and can destroy my strategy. I can get rid of him with banette and duddrigon.

Exxegutor

A wall Harvest exxegutor with Leech seed can become a big problem not like blissey but if i dont have banette or or empoleon its a no end Match against gligar.

Suicune

A def suicune with calm mind is a big threath but if i mange to trick him i can get rid with banette with destiny bond.




I hope you like my team and if someone can make Changes in move sets or even changing pokemon (not mega banette) to make it a better team i will gladly will listen.

 

[Fireflame]

So this seems like a pretty cool trick room team, but I feel that it could use a decent amount of work to make it more effective. My changes will be in bold and the sets will be at the end.

First off, for Aromatisse, your EV spread is sub-optimal. Aromatisse is a support and doesn't benefit from SpA investment whatsoever. It needs more bulk in order to be a functional wall and support. Thus, a spread of 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD is optimal so you can be much bulkier and check several UU threats. Furthermore, Psychic is useless. You said that Psychic hits fighting type Pokemon, but Moonblast hits those Pokemon much harder anyway. Therefore, Protect > Psychic. Protect allows you to scout what the opponent is going to do so you can safely set up Trick Room if you predict a switch. Wish > Aromatherapy since your team doesn't really care about status too much (Gligar absorbs poison and paralysis and Empoleon absorbs poison). Wish allows you to constantly heal your Pokemon and is better for your team considering it is Trick Room.

Your Porygon2 lacks a functional moveset, especially since it has no STAB. We're going to need to fix this immediately. Tri Attack > Hidden Power Grass gives you a powerful STAB attack that hits anything that doesn't resist it for a lot of damage. It also allows you to potentially spread status. You don't need to have HP Grass to kill Mega-Swampert considering the fact that you should never stay in due to Superpower. Furthermore, Shadow Ball doesn't do anything at all. Ice Beam > Shadow Ball gives Porygon2 near perfect coverage along with Thunderbolt (BoltBeam) and it allows you to still target water types. Thunderbolt still kills 2HKOs Doublade, and Doublade best attack is a 3HKO, so you shouldn't be having any problems with Doublade anyway. You don't need Recover since you have Aromatisse with Wish.

Your Gligar set is very sub-par. Stone Edge is useless and shouldn't even be considered since Gligar is a support and it has a bad attack stat. Your team also needs a hazard setter because once you activate trick room, the opponent will start switching-out to checks. Therefore, Stealth Rock > Stone Edge. Stealth Rocks gives your team much needed hazards that do nice chip damage which allows Druddigon or Mega-Banette to "sweep" more effectively. Furthermore, the attack EVs are useless since Gligar is a wall/support. A spread of 248 HP / 16 Def / 244 SpD is MUCH more effective and it gives your team much needed special bulk which allows you to take hits from Hydreigon better.

Sadly, due to the amount of special attackers in UU that are viable in a trick room team, Empoleon isn't as good as other options. The only thing you're getting out of using Empoleon is Defog, which isn't necessary as nothing on your team is weak to any hazards bar Empoleon, who has a weakness to Spikes himself. Aromatisse's wish support also alleviates any damage you take from hazards. Therefore, Magneton > Empoleon. Not only does Magneton give your team more status immunity and 11 resistances plus 1 immunity, Magneton does much more damage than Empoleon and it benefits much more from Trick Room. Magneton gives you momentum in Volt Switch, a way to deal with Fairy types, and Analytic. Magneton is going to force a lot of switches, and an Analytic boosted attack with seriously dent anything. Analytic also allows you to do more damage when Trick Room isn't up.

You have an offensive Druddigon set but the wrong item and ability. Sheer Force > Rough Skin gives your moves much more power, and Life Orb > Rocky Helmet allows you to do more damage without taking recoil due to Sheer Force. Change Druddigon's nature to a Brave Nature since this lowers your speed which makes you faster in trick room. Now for the actual moves: I personally don't like Outrage since you can't change up moves. Dragon Claw > Outrage still provides you with power and allows you to switch up moves. Furthermore, Fire Punch > Superpower because Dragon Claw hits normal types hard anyway, and Fire Punch provides necessary coverage against steel and grass types. Since you're using an offensive set, Dragon Tail in unneccessary. Gunk Shot > Dragon Tail allows you to deal with fairy types and specifically allows you to 2HKO Blissey, who you labelled as a threat.

Calcs

252+ Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Druddigon Gunk Shot vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Blissey: 415-489 (58.1 - 68.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

Lastly, Mega-Banette. First off, I must tell you that Phantom Force is a bad move. It lasts for two turns, which means the opponent can switch into any normal type or any resist. Shadow Claw > Phantom Force gives you a reliable attack compensated by Mega-Banette's immense power. Additionally, Will-O-Wisp > Pain Split. Mega-Banette doesn't really need recovery, and you have wish from Aromatisse anyway. Will-O-Wisp provides you with a first turn cripple on a sweeper, even under trick room.

Before I end my rate, I strongly urge you to consider Pangoro as a physical wallbreaker for your team. Pangoro has a high attack stat and low speed, making it really good for trick room teams. Furthermore, it gets access to Hammer Arm, which is ridiculous since it decreases your speed stat, which will make you even faster under trick room. It gives your team a super strong Knock Off, a reliable way to deal with Blissey, and along with Magneton, gives your team a nice momentum core. It has more team synergy than Druddigon, but I don't know how you feel about switching out Pokemon.

Otherwise, that's the end of my rate. Hopefully I helped and good luck!

TL;DR:

Aromatherapy -> Wish; Psychic -> Protect; changed EVs

Hidden Power Grass -> Tri Attack; Shadow Ball -> Ice Beam

Stone Edge -> Stealth Rock; changed EVs

->

Rough Skin -> Sheer Force; Rocky Helmet -> Life Orb; Adamant -> Brave; Outrage -> Dragon Claw; Superpower -> Fire Punch; Dragon Tail -> Gunk Shot

Phantom Force -> Shadow Claw; Pain Split -> Will-O-Wisp
Consider

Sets

Aromatisse @ Leftovers
Ability: Aroma Veil
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Trick Room
- Wish
- Protect
- Moonblast

Porygon2 @ Eviolite
Ability: Analytic
EVs: 248 HP / 252 SpA / 8 SpD
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Trick Room
- Tri Attack
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam

Gligar @ Eviolite
Ability: Immunity
EVs: 248 HP / 16 Def / 244 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Toxic
- Earthquake
- Roost
- Stealth Rock

Druddigon @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Dragon Claw
- Iron Head
- Fire Punch
- Gunk Shot

Banette-Mega @ Banettite
Ability: Cursed Body
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Destiny Bond
- Sucker Punch
- Shadow Claw
- Will-O-Wisp

-------------------------------------

Magneton @ Choice Specs
Ability: Analytic
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Quiet Nature
- Volt Switch
- Thunderbolt
- Flash Cannon
- Hidden Power [Grass]/Hidden Power [Ice]
(IVs will be set based on the Hidden Power you choose)

Pangoro set

Pangoro @ Choice Band/Life Orb
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 HP / 4 Def
Brave Nature
- Hammer Arm
- Knock Off
- Gunk Shot/Poison Jab
- Parting Shot/Ice Punch

 

[Punxsutawney Phil]

Hello there! Trick Room is my favorite playstyle, and it's always fun to see it in RMTs.

As you've pointed out, this team struggles with many Pokemon, Blissey and Suicune most notably (Exeggutor and Eevelution teams tend to vanish once you leave low ladder). I'll propose some changes that can help you with that problem.

Change #1: Replace Aromatisse with the following Sylveon set:

Sylveon @ Life Orb
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Hyper Voice
- Psyshock
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Shadow Ball

This hardly has the defensive presence that Aromatisse has, but on a Trick Room team, defensive presence on a sweeper is unnecessary. What's important is that this set packs way, way more of a punch than Aromatisse. It also provides a superior offensive movepool, with the Life Orb ensuring that Hyper Voice and all the coverage moves hit hard, something crucial as Trick Room turns tick away. This set does not have Trick Room setup (Sylveon can't learn it), but with the additional changes I'm proposing, Trick Room on Sylveon will not be needed.

I also noticed your team has no means of setting up rocks. Rocks are crucial in this meta to the point where any team that doesn't have a means of setting them up is sub-optimal. Your team also needs another Trick Room setter, given that I have eliminated Aromatisse. With that in mind, I suggest you replace your Gligar with the following set.

Bronzong @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Trick Room
- Stealth Rock
- Gyro Ball
- Explosion

This set preserves the crucial Ground immunity that your Gligar has, while also bringing more utility. Bronzong cannot Toxic stall other Pokemon, but on a Trick Room team Toxic stalling merely wastes precious Trick Room turns. What's important about this set is that it can set up rocks and set up Trick Room. Once Trick Room is up, Bronzong can deal heavy damage with its Gyro Ball attack, which is capable of completely OHKOing or 2HKOing may fast or non-resistant 'mons. If you cannot do good damage with Gyro Ball, you can save Bronzong to set up Trick Room again by switching into a sweeper, or Explode to gain momentum (this is useful if your opponent tries to Rapid Spin or Defog). Colbur Berry is so Bronzong doesn't get OHKOed by powerful Knock Offs.

Perusing your team some more, I noticed your Porygon2 set does not take advantage of Trick Room. With that in mind, I suggest changing it to the following set:

Porygon2 @ Eviolite
Ability: Download
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Ice Beam
- Thunderbolt
- Trick Room
- Recover

Download is the ability preferred over Analytic, since under Trick Room Porygon2 ends up going first most of the time and Download helps with Suicune (provided you get in before a Calm Mind is up). I also elected to replace Hidden Power Fire with Recover, since BoltBeam coverage hits a great deal of the UU meta neutrally or super effectively already, and Recover gives your Porygon2 needed longevity that lets it set up Trick Room again and again. You are going to be weaker to Swampert, but there are other ways of dealing with Swampert that I can introduce to your team.

Now, this is the change that will really help your team against Suicune and Blissey. I suggest you replace your Druddigon with the following set:

Machamp @ Assault Vest
Ability: No Guard
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Dynamic Punch
- Knock Off
- Heavy Slam
- Stone Edge

Druddigon is not very viable in UU, or on your team. It doesn't really have much raw power, and it's movepool is only average. It is Machamp that excels under Trick Room, since even resisted hits are hindered by confusion due to Dynamic Punch. Machamp's coverage is also excellent, 100% accurate Stone Edge being the cherry on the cake. This 'mon obviously destroys Blissey, and Suicune never appreciates a confusion either. In short, this is a great Trick Room abuser, and under Trick Room it has the potential to be unstoppable. Machamp is also great at annoying leads like Swampert or Donphan.

Lastly, I'd like to make a change to your Banette set. Phantom Force wastes a Trick Room turn. I suggest you replace it with Shadow Claw. Secondly, Pain Split also mostly wastes Trick Room turns, so I suggest you replace it with Gunk Shot, which can really hit Fairies hard.

I hope these suggestions are helpful.

 

[LeonesdgoGt]

Thanks to you're answers guys i tested everything you said and made Changes in my team. Now this is my Puppet Strings and its working a lot better!

Puppet#1 (Porygon2) @ Eviolite
Ability: Trace
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 0 Spe
- Recover
- Trick Room
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam

Puppet#2 (Bronzong) @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Levitate
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
- Trick Room
- Earthquake
- Stealth Rock
- Explosion

Puppeteer (Banette-Mega) @ Banettite
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
- Shadow Claw
- Sucker Punch
- Destiny Bond
- Gunk Shot

Puppet#4 (Sylveon) @ Life Orb
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 SpA / 30 Spe
- Hyper Voice
- Psyshock
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Wish

Puppet#3 (Machamp) @ Assault Vest
Ability: No Guard
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Brave Nature
- Dynamic Punch
- Knock Off
- Stone Edge
- Heavy Slam

Puppet#5 (Suicune) @ Wacan Berry
Ability: Pressure
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpA
Quiet Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Ice Beam
- Scald
- Shadow Ball
- Roar


I tested my old team with magneton and personally i felt that magneton made the team more squishy. Duddrigon with life orb and sheer forcé is great, but i had to much ice weakness so i tested Phill Changes also and was a lot more my style of offensive play.

I Changed empoleon with suicune because entei was destroying me in every Match i find it. My second change was to put shadow ball in suicune, so i could get wish on sylveon because those toxics and WoW plus hazards are giving me a hard time in super deffensive teams and Changed HP ice to fire to counter steel and its a good surprice for ice and grass mons. Changed gyro ball with earthquake to have a counter to fire moves, Changed also Tri attack for recover on porygon2 too and last i Changed pain split for gunk shot on banette and works great vs fairy.

Blissey its still a big threath but less than before my most biggest threath is súper deffensive teams with status, hazards and cures becomes to hard for me to kill all. I hope with practice i can predict and kill those teams.

 

[Punxsutawney Phil]

If you're having trouble with Entei and stall, I suggest including the following set on your team:

Crawdaunt @ Life Orb
Ability: Adaptability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Crabhammer
- Aqua Jet
- Knock Off
- Swords Dance

This set straight up kills Entei with Aqua Jet after rocks. It also has immense power and can plow through teams under Trick Room. Seriously, this thing can be unstoppable with a few Trick Room turns behind it. Stall fears this mon, since after one or two Swords Dances, it can obliterate so much. I also suggest you can put an Occa Berry on Bronzong to halve super-effective Fire damage, since you already have a Dark resist with Sylveon. This ensures Bronzong can get a Trick Room up even as Entei launches a Sacred Fire at it.