Wolfey's Famed hail! Peaked with 1571 points!

[Wolfey]

Hi, my name is superwolfe and I am a fairly active player on PO. I started fooling around with hail the other day, and discovered that not only do I love using it, its also very, very good. I found a problem with my team and I need some help, as well as thoughts from the community so im posting it here. Please rate it id really appreciate it, and leave any suggestions here. This team peaked at 1571 points, #7 on the OU ladder.

At A Glance:

heres my basic hail team, ive tried it with many variations but so far ive found this works the best. The pokemon that is currently heatran is normally the one that gets switched around, and the other pokemon stay reasonably the same.

A Closer Look
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Mamoswine @ Focus Sash Jolly
252 Speed/252 Atk/4 Def
-Earthquake
-Ice Shard
-Stealth Rocks
-Endeavor

Mamoswine, apart from being one of my favorite pokemon of all time, is a great pokemon to have on this team and fulfills his role very well. He can either attack a pokemon that could be a threat, such as machamp, metagross, etc. Or he can set up stealth rocks. The main reason why mamoswine is so good however is because of endeavor. Endeavor works great against pokemon slower then you, such as a gyrados before a DD. If they use waterfall, you can set up SR first then next turn bring them down to 1 hp thanks to your sash. If theyre faster then you it takes a little prediction, such as against scizzor. You need to make the decision if theyre going to BP or U turn. If you think theryre going to BP, then endeavor then ice shard next turn. If you think they are going to U turn you can hit them with earthquake. Mamoswine can also come back in late game if hes been brought down to the sash earlier he can come in on an electric move and endeavor, or ice shard a dragon locked into outrage. His ability snow cloak helps him late game, especially if he hasnt been brought down to the sash.

Abomasnow @ leftovers Timid
252 HP/252 Spe/4 Sp A
-Substitute
-Leech Seed
-Blizzard
-Protect

Ah, abomasnow, the hail starter. Abomasnow is important on this team for several reasons. The first is rather obvious, to set up hail of course! Next is protect. Abomasnow can scout out choice users (such as heatran and scizzor) and allow me to switch in appropriately. Abomasnow is also great for leech seed. If I bring abomasnow in on a pokemon I know is going to switch out, then I can use substitute to see what they will bring in. If they bring in a heatran or t-tar, or something along those lines then I can use leech seed, protect, and then switch out. I can also attack with blizzard, although thats not the focus of the set, which is why more EV's are in HP then in SP A. Abomasnow is also my bulky water check. suicune, vaporeon, starmie, swampert, none of them can touch me. Odds are since everyone except walrein is weak to surf or immune to toxic, they wont be using toxic on the switch. I can then bring in abomasnow on the switch, use sub to take the toxic in some cases, or leech seed if its a boosting type, and stall them to death.

Tentacruel @ black sludge
Calm/Clear body
252 HP/120 Def/136 Sp D
-Toxic Spikes
-Rapid Spin
-Surf
-HP Electric

Tentacruel is essential to the team for several reasons. For one thing, he can switch in and absorb toxic spikes, as well as whisking away entry hazards which is good because ice is weak to SR. He can also set up toxic spikes of his own, which is tremendously useful. His typing is also good, being weak to electric and ground isnt a big deal on this team, and he also has another important role. This team has a big infernape weakness, or it would if not for tentacruel. Tentacruel is my infernape counter, as well as having stupendous synergy with gliscor. Hes my special wall, and is not meant to take physical attacks, or even attack for that matter. This team does have a big DD gyrados weakness, which is why I use HP electric over sludge bomb.
Clear body is used over liquid ooze because of gengar. Tentacruel can 2hko gengar after rocks, but gengar has more of a problem with tentacruel. It stinks to loose your tentacruel because of a poorly timed Sp Defence drop

Gliscor @ Leftover's
Jolly/Sand Veil
252 Speed/252 HP/4 Def
-Earthquake
-Toxic
-Taunt
-Roost

Gliscor is my wallbreaker, among other things. Taunt stops rotom, scarm, and forrey from setting up or it can stop status, as the odds are that he will be faster. Gliscor has great synergy with tentacruel, and I wouldnt use him without the other. The main thing that gliscor does, however, is stop t-tar. There are alot of sandstorm teams out there nowadays, which is why I use sand veil. Theres nothing more professional then haxing with sand veil gliscor on a hail team. Gliscor can handle most variants of t-tar, as well as stop heatran and taunt breloom, both of which can be a problem to this team. Earthquake is pretty self explanatory, as is roost. Toxic is in case I dont set up toxic spikes, or if I just need to hit a pokemon with levitate or a flying type.

Walrein @ Leftovers
Bold/Ice Body
220 HP/252 Def /36 SpD
-Protect
-Roar
-Subsitute
-Surf

Ah walrein, the essential to all hail teams. Walrein is one of the best pokemon on the team. With Ice body walrein recovers twice as much HP as he normally would, meaning he can heal off the damage 100 percent from a sub after a protect and a normal turn. So, if your opponent is poisoned, he can stall them to death without losing any HP and potentially maintaining a sub. Roar is for shuffling pokemon trying to set up, such as kingdra or D-night. Im considering switching it for Ice beam/HP Electric, but for now I prefer roar. Walrein is extremely bulky with the given EV's and nature and under hail he is nearly impossible to KO. His weakness's are not a problem for the team, with 2 ground types and a grass resisting electric, flying and poison resisting fighting, everyone but mamo being nuetral or resistant to grass, he is well covered.

Heatran @ choice Scarf
Naive/Flash Fire
252 Sp A 252 Spe 4 Atk
-Fire Blast
-HP Grass
-Explosion
-Earth Power

Heatran ties up the lose ends on the team. He fixes some weakness'ss that would be a problem, he absorbs fire moves, he is scarfed so he outspeed's pokemon that others on the team couldnt, as well as providing good offense for what otherwise would be a defensive team. The moves are fairly self explanitory, fire blast for strong STAB, Earth power for other heatran/anything weakened that I dont want to risk missing with fire blast, HP grass is used for swampert or hippowdon if they try and switch in, and explosion is for that final bang.



Conclusion
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The team is working very well for me, except for 2 things. I have a massive weakness to gyrados. I tried switching the pokemon in the slot of heatran, but then I had a huge lead azelf weakness. I need a some suggestions on how to fix this please, and thank you for reading.
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[Nosferalto]

Hi. Decent Hail team. You basically have all of the essential components of a succesful Hail team except for one very important part: a Spin-blocker. Toxic Spikes is such an important of a team like this one so you really want to add a Ghost type to prevent opposing Rapid Spinners from ruining all of your hard work. Since DD Gyarados is also a bit of an issue, Rotom-A seems like the best choice for this job. By virtue of it's Ghost typing, it provides a sturdy Rapid Spinner and can effectively check DD Gyarados. Mamoswine is probably the most replaceable member, not playing a significant role in the team other than setting up SR. So moving Gliscor to the lead position and replacing Mamoswine with a Rotom-A with Thunderbolt / Reflect / Rest / Sleep Talk, Bold nature, Leftovers and 252 HP / 120 Def / 136 SpD. With this change, you get a decent Gyarados check, a Spin-blocker and a handy status absorber. As for Gliscor, simply replace Toxic with Stealth Rock and use him in the lead slot. Gliscor struggles against lead Machamp but Rotom-A can deal with this threat thanks to its Fighting immunity and Reflect (since Machamp leads tend to carry Lum Berry).

As for minor changes, definitely use Dragon Pulse over HP Grass on Heatran. Without Dragon Pulse, Heatran is unable to hit DD Dragonite versions are diff and Kingdra for significant damage. HP Grass is mainly for Swampert but the rest of the team handles Pert quite well.

As I already said, this team is really solid and hopefully this will improve it even more!

 

[Wolfey]

But if I do that, gliscor loses toxic and only 2 of my pokemon resist hail, which defeats the purpose...

 

[Ya gary oak]

hi nice team i always like seeing hail teams and it seems you've made a rather nice one at that but it seems to be a bit confused as to wether it wants to be more offensive or defensive. If your looking for a more stallish team i would suggest losing mamo for a snow cloak abuser froslass@leftovers timid
248 hp/228 def/32 spe

~ Substitute
~ Thunder Wave
~ Spikes
~ Blizzard
not only does it spread status and spikes but it also covers rapid spin blocking which your team desperately needs. I recomend leftovers over brightpowder because the enemy never seems to miss and froslass is rather frail.

I also would recomend moltres over heatran as it adds some decent fire power yet has some stalling ability by using sub roost and fares better in general on a hail team than heatran.


Moltres@leftover bold
248atk/200def/60 spe
~ Flamethrower
~ Substitute
~ Roost
~ Toxic / Roar

just keep in mind moltres gets wrecked by stealth rock so keeping tentacruel alive will greatly extend moltres life.

oh almost forgot you should try leading with aboma for the hail right off the bat as its hard to switch in aboma with all his weakness and the sooner you have hail the better.

 

[Nosferalto]

But if I do that, gliscor loses toxic and only 2 of my pokemon resist hail, which defeats the purpose...

Ok I don't usually post twice in the same RMT but I feel like you really need some guidance here. Firstly, losing Toxic on Gliscor is not an issue at all because you already have Toxic Spikes on the team which makes Toxic useless most of the time.

As for the second part, you don't really defeat the purpose of your team. Hail teams are not supposed to be centered around Ice types that are immune hail. They do not take advantage of Hail in any way other than being immune to it and actually compound shared weaknesses. Your lead Mamoswine is a suicide lead, meaning it is more offensively oriented not really suited on a defensive team like this one. As it appears, your goal is to set-up Toxic Spikes and along with Hail damage, Leech Seed and SR, gradually wear down your opponent's team. The changes I suggested give you a DD Gyarados check which you really need, and a spin-blocker since Rapid Spinners can potentially ruin your whole strategy.

 

[Wolfey]

Ive been testing the team with your changes, but I feel like I want to keep toxic on gliscor for zapdos mainly, since nothing else can touch him once heatrans gone. I dont feel like using gliscor as a lead is working so well for me, im not entirely sure why, maybe because I use him so much late game. Ive considered moving abomasnow to the lead spot, keeping gliscor, and replacing rotom with froslass with the hail spiker set, as well as giving rocks to heatran and making him more bulky but im not sure how well that would work...

 

[george182]

Congrats on getting so high with a hail team, as it can be quite tough to do.

Firstly is your DD gyrados weakness. It is quite a bad weakness as taunt gyrados can set up on Heatran, Gliscor, Walrein and Abomansnow. Then proceed to destroy your team with a combination of Waterfall and Stone edge.

A quick fix is to put HP electric on heatran over hp Grass. You miss out on the damage on swampert, but as gyrados is a bigger threat I would say it's worth it. You still have the problem with Jolly gyarados though. Now this is clearly a stall team, so it would be more succesful if all the members contributed to stalling, you may think you want lots of ice types. However the ice type has 1 resistance (to itself) and I think 3 weaknesses (Fire/Fighting/Rock), it's also weak to stealth rocks, so you actually don't want too many ice types.

So I suggest changing lead mamoswine to a lead Forretress:
Forretress @ Leftovers/Lum berry/Shed Shell
252 hp/4 def/252 sp.def
Careful/Impish
- Stealth rock
- Toxic Spikes/Spikes
- Rapid Spin
- Payback

This fills a nice support role in your team, as well as giving you a solid answer to threats like sub-spilt gengar, who can be a pain for stall teams.

With that, I would change Tentacruel to a Starmie. Starmie acts a solid check to Gyarados and fills the roles Tentacruel did before. It also gives you 2 spinners, which could be really useful as abomasnow and walrein take a ton of damage from the hail.

Starmie @ Leftovers
Timid
252 hp/252 speed
- Surf
- Thunderbolt
- Rapid spin
- Recover

Now for walrein, roar is an alright move, but I would consider using Super fang over it. This halves the health of the oponents HP and is a great way for destroying set up sweepers, it also works when taunted. You then can use Brine in the last slot over surf because Brine doubles in power when the oponent is bellow 50%, so Superfang + Brine = awesome and Sub + Protect = awesome.

So to summaries I suggest:
- Hp electric on Heatran
- Starmie over Tentacruel and Forretress over Mamoswine
- Try out Superfang + Brine combo (sounds good on paper)

 

[Delko]

Hello

Cool Hail team but I think there is room for improvement.

Like others have already mentioned a spin blocker is needed for this team to keep your source of residual damage, Toxic Spikes on the field. But unfortunately Rotom-a cannot be used on pokemon online. Therefor I suggest you use Dusknoir as your spin blocker. As a Ghost type he will protect you from Rapin Spin but he will also act as your counter to a variety of threats for Hail teams such Machamp (because Dusknoir is slower), Breloom and Heatran, Gyarados, etc.
I suggest a the simple spinblocker set with an EV's spread of 252 HP / 28 Atk / 228 Def with an Impish nature, holding Leftovers. And a moveset of Ice Punch / Thunder Punch / Pain Split / Earthquake. Pressure is also a useful ability at the right time.

On Tentacruel I suggest you'd use Leftovers instead of Black Sludge because Trick users can Trick it to another teammember, screwing them over. I also suggest useing the Liquid Ooze ability. This allows Tentacruel to swicht in Leech Seed with more ease and Clear Body doesn't have much use anyway in competitive play.

Like Nosferalto has said, replace Toxic on Gliscor with Stealth Rock because you if take my previous suggestion (Dusknoir instead of Mamosine) you won't have a Stealth Rock user anymore.

You could try a more bulkier spread on Abomasnow, since your trying to play stall with this team. A spread of 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 SpD always works for me. You might also want to try Focus Punch instead of Protect to get a little SubPunch strategy going, this is especially nice on the likes of incomming Heatran.

Hope this helped and good luck with the team.

 

[george182]

Hello

Cool Hail team but I think there is room for improvement.

Like others have already mentioned a spin blocker is needed for this team to keep your source of residual damage, Toxic Spikes on the field. But unfortunately Rotom-a cannot be used on pokemon online. Therefor I suggest you use Dusknoir as your spin blocker. As a Ghost type he will protect you from Rapin Spin but he will also act as your counter to a variety of threats for Hail teams such Machamp (because Dusknoir is slower), Breloom and Heatran, Gyarados, etc.
I suggest a the simple spinblocker set with an EV's spread of 252 HP / 28 Atk / 228 Def with an Impish nature, holding Leftovers. And a moveset of Ice Punch / Thunder Punch / Pain Split / Earthquake. Pressure is also a useful ability at the right time.

On Tentacruel I suggest you'd use Leftovers instead of Black Sludge because Trick users can Trick it to another teammember, screwing them over. I also suggest useing the Liquid Ooze ability. This allows Tentacruel to swicht in Leech Seed with more ease and Clear Body doesn't have much use anyway in competitive play.

Like Nosferalto has said, replace Toxic on Gliscor with Stealth Rock because you if take my previous suggestion (Dusknoir instead of Mamosine) you won't have a Stealth Rock user anymore.

You could try a more bulkier spread on Abomasnow, since your trying to play stall with this team. A spread of 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 SpD always works for me. You might also want to try Focus Punch instead of Protect to get a little SubPunch strategy going, this is especially nice on the likes of incomming Heatran.

Hope this helped and good luck with the team.

Rotom forms are allowed on Pokemon online.

 

[Wolfey]

@ george: Thank you for posting! I especially find one of your comments useful, the HP grass over electric thing is very useful to me. however, if I change mamo to forry then I have a massive mixape weakness, as ice is weak to fire and fighting, and heatran is weak to close combat. I have actually tried starmie over tentacruel, but then I lose a special wall, which is invaluable on this team. I have tried super fang brine, it was actually my original set on the walrein, but then I lose to zapdos with Roost/Thunderbolt/Heat wave/toxic that are specially defensive, or after heatran is weakened. I am considering (and currently testing) switching abomasnow to the lead position, giving rocks and a shuca berry to heatran, and replacing the empty spot with a snow cloak abusing frosslass. It seems to be working well so far, as then I get T wave support, hail from the start, spikes, and a spin blocker


@ Delkou: I like the idea of dusknoir, however I think frosslass is better in this situation for several reasons. Froslass can para, use STAB unmissable blizzard, is immune to rapid spin and fighting moves, and most importantly can set up spikes. If you look at the responce above it says what ive been testing in my team. The reason I use clear body over liquid ooze is that most leech seeders fear abomasnow. Since most of them are grass type, leech seed wont affect aboma and they will need to run from his STAB blizzard. Clear body makes sure gengar cant beat tenta with shadow ball. Black sludge is more useful especially against rotom appliances. With walrein and aboma using protect, along with hail damage black sludge will do a good amount to anything unfortunate to hold it. If they try to trick it back to me I can bring in tentacruel, or heatran as then theyll be choiced again and black sludge doesnt affect heatran. I need toxic on gliscor for zapdos, as I said above. Ive tried F punch on aboma, but in the long run protect is better, as it can scout choiced users and get more out of leech seed.