Welcome to ZU Sample Teams! Here you will find a collection of solid, successful teams intended to help new players get acclimated to the metagame and different playstyles found within the tier. Everyone is welcome to submit a team, but in order to maintain a good quality archive, your team will be subject to approval from the council before its addition. You may use any team in this archive as you see fit. Teams are updated in the OP.
An Importable of the team is required.
A brief explanation of how the team works and what each member does. You may also include any success the team had on ladder or in tournament play, and if you want, some replays.
Teams must be tested and fine tuned as much as possible. If your team has glaring flaws and has to be touched up, it likely will not be added.
A submitted team will be added if deemed up to par.
In the same vein, teams should utilize Pokemon mostly from S to B+ to better reflect the metagame. Teams may showcase lower-ranked Pokemon, so just be mindful that the goal of this thread is to show newer players what's most common and effective in ZU. Also, we encourage you to submit teams you've build on your own.
No memes
(optional but helpful) mini sprites
A brief explanation of how the team works and what each member does. You may also include any success the team had on ladder or in tournament play, and if you want, some replays.
Teams must be tested and fine tuned as much as possible. If your team has glaring flaws and has to be touched up, it likely will not be added.
A submitted team will be added if deemed up to par.
In the same vein, teams should utilize Pokemon mostly from S to B+ to better reflect the metagame. Teams may showcase lower-ranked Pokemon, so just be mindful that the goal of this thread is to show newer players what's most common and effective in ZU. Also, we encourage you to submit teams you've build on your own.
No memes
(optional but helpful) mini sprites
After you’ve submitted your team, the council will look it over and either add it or post here explaining why we will not.
Sample Teams:
(click on sprites for the Pokepaste)
TangDash Balance 2.0 by Corthius
Sableye Semistall by 5Dots
CB Klinklang + DoubleDance Alcremie by Tuthur
Sun HO by Tuthur + Corthius
Stall 3.0 by kay
(click on sprites for the Pokepaste)
TangDash Balance 2.0 by Corthius
Sableye Semistall by 5Dots
CB Klinklang + DoubleDance Alcremie by Tuthur
Sun HO by Tuthur + Corthius
Stall 3.0 by kay
NP Skuntank+Hex Rotom Offense by hiss
Thievul VoltTurn by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
(Poison)
TangDash Balance by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
KangaSpikes 2.0 by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
Stall 2.0 by kay
ThwackTank by czim
NP Frostom BO by Tuthur
(Poison)
Future Sight VoltTurn by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
(Ground)
Kanga Haz Stack by czim
Rain by kay
Frosmoth VoltTurn by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
(Ground)
Mawile Stall by kay
Ninetales Balance by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
Skuntank's stallbreaking capabilities with Corrosive Gas, Nasty Plot, and a fantastic dual STAB, make it a top tier threat. While it typically runs Taunt, Corrosive Gas is a fantastic way to cripple defensive switch-ins like Rhydon and Stunfisk. Although it has some notable checks and counters, major assistance is provided to Skuntank via its teammates. Rotom is an offensive pivot that lures in Ground-types like Rhydon and Piloswine, just to cripple them with Wisp and Hex. Thwackey not only revenge kills faster opponents, but Grassy Terrain provides recovery alongside a weakening of Earthquake for Skuntank. Rhydon blocks Volt Switch and sets up hazards, and has the bulk & firepower to check otherwise troublesome Pokémon like Altaria, Stunfisk, and Rapidash. Wishiwashi is a defensive teammate that soft checks a lot of threats, and its slow U-Turn lets Skuntank or another Pokémon come in safely. Rapidash is also a generally good check to many Pokémon, and its easily-spammed Toxic allows Skuntank's checks to be worn down.
(Poison)Thievul is a great special wallbreaker on VoltTurn because it gets in on slower, vulnerable targets to punish them or switch-ins with Stakeout-Choice Specs boosted attacks. Thwackey, Silvally-Poison, and Uxie, and Wishiwashi all help get Thievul in and form the defensive backbone of the team. Rotom is the revenge killer and completes the team as all 6 Pokemon are able to pivot and get eachother in. Use Thwackey as a Volt Switch check, and even though Thwackey won't stop pivoting, there's enough support on the team to regain that momentum later. Also, watch out for
TangDash Balance by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
Tangela + Rapidash is a well known defensive core capable of checking virtually every physical attacker with the combination of resistances, recovery, and multiple status options. For example, even wallbreakers like Centiskorch and Choice Band Sawk cannot break this core on their own thanks to Toxic, Sleep Powder, and Knock Off making it too hard for them to consistently wallbreak. On the specially defensive side of things, there's Rhydon and Articuno. They handle both setting and removing entry hazards, and Swords Dance Rhydon is especially notable for stallbreaking and blocking Volt Switch. Nasty Plot Rotom is the better stallbreaker, though, and is a viable wincon versus defensive teams. Against offensive teams, there's arguably the best Choice Scarfer for the matchup in Cinccino, which also is utilized as a Ghost switch-in. Watch pout for Knock Off; while Tangela often makes a good switch-in, it loses its Eviolite in the process and jeopardizes some of its sizable bulk. More so, it's the only teammate that can afford Knock Off usually, unless you pressure the opposing entry hazard setters well enough-Freeze-Dry Articuno somewhat does this well vs Qwilfish, at least.
Kangaskhan is always a great offensive threat to pair with Spikes. Fake Out + Spikes chip damage adds up so that Kangaskhan take out more walls with Double-Edge or revenge kill offensive threats by following with Sucker Punch. Qwilfish provides Spikes, and Alolan Sandslash is a great defensive partner that also adds Stealth Rock. For both removal and for a Ground-type switch-in, there's Eldegoss. Throh completes the defensive core as a much needed special wall with recovery, and its Knock Off + Circle Throw combo is also awesome here. Rotom finally is a spinblocker and it uses its extra speed as a Choice Scarf user to clean.
NA
ThwackTank by czim
NA
NP Frostom BO by Tuthur
(Poison)NA
(Ground)VoltTurn is a dominate playstyle in the current metagame. The simple strategy of 2 defensive pivoting cores, 2 offensive pivoting cores, and 2 revenge killers goes a long way for a good mix of offensive and defensive pressure. The defensive core of Uxie + Wishiwashi handles most threats together with their huge bulk. Silvally-Ground and Rotom-S are the offensive examples, with again more pivoting and complementing eachother with decent Speed tiers and nailing eachother's checks. Lastly, Choice Scarf Sawk and Kangaskhan are the revenge killers, which use the constant pivoting to get in safely and offensively check a ton of threats. As the name of the team implies, Future Sight is ran on Uxie, and it's a great compliment for the offensive teammates. For example, Sawk's Close Combat is hard to check if the opposing Garbodor or Qwilfish can't afford to take a Future Sight, as well as Silvally-Ground's Multi-Attack to specially frail walls like Tangela and Gurdurr. So wall the VoltTurn lacks a traditional Choice Specs / Choice Band wallbreaker, Uxie's support goes a long way to make up for the missing damage output.
Kanga Haz Stack by czim
This team aims to wear the opponent down with residual damage from hazards and the contact chip from Ferroseed and Qwilfish while paving the way for a Kangaskhan sweep. Centiskorch and Kangaskhan complement each other well with Kangaskhan pressuring common Centiskorch checks like Qwilfish and Garbodor while Centi pressures other physical blanket checks like Tangela and Palossand for Kang, while also removing boots from Pokemon like Altaria and Rotom-fan, helping to keep hazards up. Rotom is a spinblocker and revenge killer and helps Kang revenge faster threats and helps stallbreak with Trick.
Rain by kay
Rain is a pretty straightforward play style so the team ends up being very straight forward. Uxie and Liepard are the best rain setters in the tier because of the speed at which they're able to set rain on top of their added utility such as rocks and u-turn in Uxie's case or priority rain/encore in Liepards. Ludicolo is the teams go to breaker and win condition for when rains up because its stab + coverage can break almost any cores and its speed tier in unmatched in rain. Qwilfish was chosen next for its ability to win the stall match ups that might otherwise wall out the team which gives you a much better overall match up spread into the meta. Kabutops was chosen as the last rain abuser as it can lure in things like Feroseed and nail them with a super power to clear the way for Ludicolo to sweep later as well as just being a general menace. Garbodor was picked up for the last glue slot as its able to punish priority users like Kangaskan that might otherwise try to pick off your rain sweepers. Spikes are also a huge benefit to rain and greatly increases your ability to clean sweep teams.
Frosmoth VoltTurn by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
(Ground)Another perk of VoltTurn that was missing in the previous team but present here is bringing in setup sweepers. Frosmoth needs a safe opportunity to Quiver Dance and Substitute, so pivots can be a great way to facilitate setup opportunities for it. More so, the constant pivoting and residual damage this team offers is a great way for Frosmoth's checks to be worn down so that it is much more likely to pull off a sweep. Alolan Persian and Clefairy are a good defensive core wearing down targets. Clefairy is the main special wall but has 96 Defense EVs to avoid a 2HKO from Choice Band Sawk's Close Combat. Choice Specs Basculin is the wallbreaker + another offensive pivot, and Choice Scarf Cinccino is a perfect revenge killer, especially against playstyles like rain and HO. Silvally-Ground is again a great offensive pivot, although its sweeping potential is forfeited for Defog; half of the team is already immune to entry hazards, but a Defogger + Electric immunity is still warranted on VoltTurn. The main goal of the team is to sweep with Frosmoth, so take trades when appropriate. Clefairy and Alolan Persian can take attacks from Centiskorch and Magneton if it means they by Toxic or Knock Off, respectively, in the process.
Mawile Stall by kay
Audino and Pyukumuku make up the classic stall cores you see on most stall teams. Audino providing a special pivot, wish, and heal bell helps keep your team from being broken down. Pyukumuku offers the role of blanket set up sweeper answer with unaware and Spite to drain out the PP of sub set up sweepers. Tangela combos well with Audino to make up a regen core as well as giving your team a blanket answer to most physical threats. Altaria is the team status sponge, defogger, and answer to Centiskorch and Rapidash who can otherwise break the rest of the team. Spiritomb offers the role of main fighting resist and Cofa answer while also being the teams main win condition be it through pressure stalling or just by CM sweeping. Mawile ends up rounding out the team by offering rocks as well as answers back a few key stall breakers such as Shiftry, draco Flapple, taunt NP skuntank, and Appletun
Ninetales Balance by S1nn0hC0nfirm3d
Ninetales is the star sweeper of this Fire-Water-Grass balance. It's decently fast with good good coverage to offensively pressure checks + wallbreak / clean after the rest of the balance wears down checks or gets Ninetales in safely. Tangela + Wishiwashi work great together as a physical-special wall core. Tangela sponges attacks and spreads Knock Off + status, while Wishiwashi may absorb status thanks to rest and use its U-turn helps proc Tangela's Regenerator. Rhydon completes the defensive core as a Normal resistance and Electric immunity while also providing Stealth Rock. Rotom-S is a needed Fighting resistance and Defogger, and Choice Scarf Sawk is a great revenge killer in this meta. The team revolves heavily around spreading status and wearing down opposing teams for Ninetales and / or Sawk to clean, but it's also entirely possible that the reverse is true and the offensive support breaks down teams so it's easier for Tangela + Wishiwashi to outstall.
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G-Stunfisk provides an important electric immunity to halt Voltturn momentum, while also fufilling the role of a SR setter with excellent SlideQuake coverage.
can be used in place of 
The speed on this set is basically to creep any opposing sun shiftry with +speed for whatever reason, but if you aren't worried about that(which you should be) then just take it to 260 and outspeed +atk shiftry, rest in hp too. As I mentioned earlier, I have been using some or the other version of these team for months, I have also experimented a lot with this Mon in particular. The last move slot is very flexible. The options for it are x scissor/leaf blade/knock off/weather ball/sunny day. Now, I don't really see the point of leaf blade unless other weather's become super popular or heat rock gets banned so eliminated. X scissor hits opposing grass but tbf de deals with them unless it's ferro or tang or leaf, mons that are supposed to be taken care of by the remaining team members so scissor eliminated. As for knock its basically only for ferro and tang which are better off being dealt by shiftry and mar. Weather ball is same case as knock. So considering the above points and no uxie a pinch setter is what I found to be best.
So this particular slot has seen a lot of experimentation as well. It has had ivy and couple sets of bellosom and well I replaced ivy because at times it was outstanding and at times not strong enough. This inconsistency was kinda bugging me so I went ith Bello hoping it's sleep powder would help but meh it was worse. Also it reduced a ferro answer. So finally I decided to gamble and use my fav sun sweeper from last year august or something aka maractus the sunlight! Actually I also had rapidash for a very long time on this slot but ngl it was underwhelming. So mar speed is to creep scarf rotom because you don't outspeed scarf basc and above even with Max speed and scarf jynx goes down to sucker. Well sucker is there especially for jynx that it ohkos and for basc mane that at +2 takes 64.7-76.1 which is good enough Imo. +2 solar beam and weather ball nuke most of the tier which is really nice. +2 lo weather ball all guaranteed 2hko alt whose only counter answer to mar is a 50% acc hurricane. Besides its an end game cleaner and filler so don't pressure my dear cactus to sweep right from start OwO
Theres not much to tell here right? Ig I will just tell about reasons for it's moveset. It mostly just spams solar beam and psychic move is for grass resist. So I aimed to hit audino and cuno with psyshock. Is a nuke at +1 and giga is recovery + out of sun boom.
Hmm so yeah I have dug a ur bad and meme mon over uxie one of the best utility mons. Why ? Well it's not about what the mon is like in general but about what mon serves my purpose best. What dug offers is forcing mons like skun to keep away while it is on field. Did you notice that all my abusers are setup and most are frail? Well that isn't an issue because memento greatly weakens the mon in front which means either that mon will do low damage or switch. I both the cases you get the 1 turn of setup after which leafeon and shiftry ohko near about anything and everything.
. Pawniard serves as a knocker and an SD sweeper, but most importantly as Defog deterrent. Mons like Articuno who try to Defog the Spikes away will be in for a brutal awakening, giving Pawniard a +2 right off the bat. Pawn's definitely the most unconventional pick for this team because it's currently unranked, but there isn't a better Defiant mon who staves off Defog in the tier. Pawn's running Adamant instead of Jolly so it can dish out more damage, which is all that matters for this mon anyway. SD+Knock is gonna pack a punch against any mon, and Sucker for priority against any mon who would outspeed and revenge it, because SD+Sucker is a combo straight from the depths of the netherworld. Underrated mon, hopefully this team encourages more people to use it.
is my NP sweeper and spinblocker. Opps might often try to Defog the hazards away, which Pawn covers, but in order to deal with Rapid Spin, I had to recruit Gourgeist-Small. I could've gone for any of the Gourgeist forms, but the quality about Small it has that appealed to me was its speed tier. Ghost typing+NP+base 99 speed is amazing, outspeeding Rotom and the Silvally forms is the best form of speed control I could've asked for in a ghost type. NP is for setting up spat, Sball is the ghost stab, Giga Drain's the grass stab, and Focus Blast is for hitting Audino and the steels who would otherwise love switching into it.
is another SD sweeper who functions as an Alcremie and fighting check. During the initial stages of testing this team, I actually had Thievul on this team, and it wasn't working out. The team was severely weak to Alcremie, and that's where Poisonvally comes in. Being able to hit it super effectively on the physical end with reliable poison stab is life saving, and having Uturn to pivot and Flame Charge to hit steels are much appreciated added bonuses (Flame Charge gets you to +1, which means Poisonvally outspeeds the rest of the meta!). Poisonvally's another form of speed control, outspeeding Band Sawk and Rotom while also checking other fighting mons such as Gurdurr. You could also opt for Ice Fang > Uturn if you really wanna hit Rhydon harder.
is ANOTHER SD sweeper who functions as a priority abuser, knocker, pivot, and passive healing support for the team. Because of the lack of flying mons, Thwackey with Eviolite helps alleviate stress from ground mons, most notably Rhydon, being able to tank repeated EQs thanks to Eviolite, grass typing, and grassterrain. You could argue Thwackey is more utility and support than it is offensive, with 2 utility moves and grassterrain being extremely helpful at healing Alolaslash and Poisonvally, both of whom appreciate the support. I'd say it's a sweeper with perks that naturally synergize with the rest of the team. The grassterrain also boosts the power of Smallgeist's Giga Drain, which can make it even more threatening on top of the NP+LO damage.
is the final mon on the team. Arguably the scariest mon on the team, Alcremie can decide games through whether or not the opp's team is too passive to break through repeated CMs. Full physdef investment allows it to check fighting mons like Sawk and Gurdurr, and covers for the on e side of the spectrum Alcremie's lacking in; CM covers its special bulk. Its naturally great special bulk allows for it to safely switch into mons like Scarf Rotom and Cramorant, both of whom would love this team if it weren't for her. I opted for Recover > Rest because it's much more reliable as a form of recovery, and Aromatherapy is how it covers for status conditions the team may become inflicted with. One thing Alcremie may struggle with is steel types, but luckily steels don't exactly like this team either, with Smallgeist's Focus Blast being able to blow past them and Alolaslash being able to setup in their face.
