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The Beginner's Team; Would like tips on how to make better...
Topic Started: Mar 13 2009, 03:58 PM (1,846 Views)
Colloquy
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i miss addie ;_;

I was thinking about ways I could tutor Blue Kirby in Little Cup, on the spot. I was panicking, because I didn't really expect that I would have to tutor him, so I just told him the basics, and about the metagame. We then built this team together. It's incredibly easy to use, it's almost the most basic team out there, but it's standard, and it's good. So, here you go, and team for new players.

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When we were building this team, I said LC leads had to be disruptive, and gave him four choices, Meowth, Voltorb, Ponyta, and Gastly, and explained the pros and cons of each. Blue Kirby picked Meowth, as he liked the fact it could break Focus Sash and revenge-kill. So, our lead was Meowth.

We talked about what commonly switches into Meowth, and how to handle that. Using the standard lead Meowth set, with U-turn, will let us escape a counter, and go to one of our own. Bronzor is the most common switch to Meowth, so using Houndour as an option to go to after the U-turn is a good idea. A Choice Scarf set seemed good, to add some Speed.

Blue Kirby noticed a Fighting-type weakness forming. We don't want this, as Machop and Mankey are good enough without picking on weaknesses. Misdreavus with Substitute and Calm Mind seemed like a good choice, as it could come in on an immunity and set up, giving us a good chance to take on a few of the opponent's Pokemon.

Now, this team lacks a good stall-breaker. Misdreavus can't touch Munchlax, so it can't really break stall. Elekid with a coverage set seemed solid, as it outpaces nearly everything and can do serious damage to everything in the metagame. We were missing two important things from our offensive team, Stealth Rock and priority.

The first thing we added here was Stealth Rock. A good offensive Pokemon to set it up is Gligar, who also could tank a lot of hits for our team with its good defenses, which Diglett, another Pokemon competing for the spot, didn't have. With Roost, it can heal itself, and we added two coverage moves. Gligar would be our Pokemon to fall back on. It also takes care of Diglett, after it kills something.

The last thing we needed was a good priority sweeper, incredibly important in LC. I also noticed we had a bit of a Croagunk weakness. Now, what counters Croagunk? MixPlotGunk seemed like it would work well here, taking down opposing Croagunk, and having double priority to rape with.

So, this was our team-building process, and I think it worked quite nicely.

---

Team:

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Meowth @ Focus Sash
Ability: Technician
EVs: 76 HP / 236 Atk / 196 Spe
Nature: Jolly (+Spe, -SpA)
- Fake Out
- U-turn
- Bite
- Hypnosis

Description: Meowth leads off the team with power. Fake Out provides powerful priority, taking away around 60% from most Pokemon. U-turn lets me switch to a counter for something, and Bite handles Ghost-type switch ins. Hypnosis is filler, but it gives status, which is always helpful.

EVs: Max Speed with a Jolly nature hits the 19 Speed mark, which is incredibly helpful in outpacing other leads. Max Attack is for harder hits, and 76 HP gets an extra stat point.

Team Work: Meowth sets up the team. It can also status, and U-turn gets helpful switches. It is also a potent revenge-killer with Fake Out.

Here is how you handle the most common leads with Meowth.

How to handle common leads with Meowth!
 

Meowth: It's a Speed tie, but Fake Out first. Then, switch to something, as they will use U-turn.
Gastly: Bite. Even if it's Choice Scarfed, you have a Focus Sash.
Stunky: Fake Out, then U-turn to Croagunk unless you expect Explosion.
Voltorb: Fake Out, then switch to Misdreavus, as it will commonly Explode.
Snover: Fake Out, then U-turn to Houndour.
Anorith: Switch to Gligar.


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Houndour @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 200 SpA / 40 SpD / 240 Spe
Nature: Timid (+Spe, -Atk)
- Overheat
- Dark Pulse
- Hidden Power Ground
- Flamethrower

Description: My team needed a way to take out Bronzor, and here it is. With the threat of Houndour around, Bronzor must be careful. Houndour is also a great late-gamer. The last three moves give good coverage, and Overheat is used for hitting switch ins.

EVs: With Timid and max Speed, Houndour gets to 25 Speed, outpacing a bunch of Pokemon. Max Special Attack is obvious, and the 40 SpD EVs get an extra point.

Team Work: Houndour takes Fire-type attacks, and is a great late-game sweeper as well as revenge-killer. It takes care of Steel-types that stop this team well.

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Misdreavus @ Salac Berry
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 240 SpA / 240 Spe
Nature: Timid (+Spe, -Atk)
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
- Shadow Ball
- Hidden Power Fighting

Description: Misdreavus is a great tank. Switch into a Ground, Fighting, or Normal-type attack, and set up a Substitute on the switch. Then, Calm Mind up, and sweep. The moves provided get great coverage, and with a Salac boost, barely anything outpaces me. The immunity to commonm priority moves helps, too.

EVs: Maxed out Speed gets to 19 Speed, and with a Salac, it's getting really fast. Maxed out Special Attack for hardest hits possible.

Team Work: General sweeper, good for luring out special walls like Munchlax and taking them down. It can also take a few hits itself, especially after a Calm Mind.

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Elekid @ Life Orb
Ability: Static
EVs: 252 Atk / 36 Def / 232 Spe
Nature: Jolly (+Spe, -Atk)
- ThunderPunch
- Ice Punch
- Cross Chop
- Quick Attack

Description: Elekid is one of the best sweepers LC has. 20 Speed is incredibly helpful. Anyway, the moves provided have great coverage, and let Elekid hit nearly everything. Quick Attack is good for back-up priority.

EVs: Max Attack for the most possible power, and max Speed for 20 Speed. 36 Def gets an extra Defense point.

Team Work: Elekid breaks stall. Stall teams, when used well, handle this team pretty well. Elekid's great coverage and Speed let it take on offensive teams as well.

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Gligar @ Oran Berry
Ability: Hyper Cutter
EVs: 76 HP / 252 Atk / 156 Def
Nature: Impish
- Roost
- Stealth Rock
- Aqua Tail
- Earthquake

Description: Gligar is the go-to guy for the team, supplying Stealth Rock as well as taking hits for my sweepers when they need to switch. Roost is useful for healing. The last two moves provide coverage, hitting nearly everything neutral.

EVs: Max Attack may seem odd, but it's worth it to do as much damage as possible. The rest of the EVs focus on Defense.

Team Work: Gligar sets up Stealth Rock and is also my only defensive Pokemon on the team. It's the receiver for the most attacks.

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Croagunk @ Life Orb
Ability: Dry Skin
EVs: 188 Atk / 188 SpA / 116 Spe
Nature: Hasty (+Spe, -Def)
- Nasty Plot
- Vacuum Wave
- Sucker Punch
- Earthquake

Description: Priority is absolutely needed in LC. MixPlotGunk is really good, as it provides dual spectrum priority, and a way to handle common Croagunk revenge-killers. For example, say I kill a weakened Meowth with Vacuum Wave, and Diglett comes in, and promptly dies to Sucker Punch. Earthquake works incredibly well on this set, to handle other Croagunk.

EVs: The Speed EVs outpace other Croagunk, meaning I can OHKO with Earthquake after. Then, the most Attack and Special Attack were needed.

Team Work: Croagunk provides an extremely powerful priority sweeper that can take down nearly anything with a Sucker Punch, getting rid of revenge-killers.
----

If you guys don't like this format, I'll change it. It's hard to do...
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Edited by Colloquy, May 3 2009, 12:58 AM.
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Colloquy
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i miss addie ;_;

Okay, so we all know that Threat Lists don't really bode well with the offensive nature of Little Cup, but I'll just post what you should generally do when stuff comes in.

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Offensive Threat List:

Staryu: You'll generally want to switch to Croagunk at the first sight of Staryu, as it will probably use
Surf, meaning you will get in for free. Then, Sucker Punch if you think it will stay in. Otherwise, Nasty Plot up.

Dratini: When Dratini comes in, it's probably an Agility variant. It's probably best to revenge-kill this with a Sucker Punch from Croagunk, or a Fake Out. Croagunk has a fairly safe switch into it if you think it's Agility or Dragon Dance Dratini.

Elekid: Easily revenge-killed by Croagunk or Meowth. You can't really counter it on this team.

Gligar: Switching in your own Gligar will normally do the trick, as it resists Stone Edge and is immune to Earthquake. Aqua Tail can handle it, or you can set up Stealth Rock.

Abra: Houndour can switch in on Psychic and outpace non Choice Scarfed variants. Meowth or Croagunk can revenge.

Gastly: Houndour can barely take a Shadow Ball, but that's not advised. Croagunk can revenge, or Meowth or Elekid can handle non Scarfed ones.

Cranidos: Gligar can take it most of the time if it's Scarfed, as it won't use Ice Beam. Don't think you're safe switching in Misdreavus on Earthquake, though. Croagunk can revenge, but don't expect Vacuum Wave to OHKO.

Misdreavus: A big threat to this team. The only way to get around it after a Substitute is sacrifice and then revenge-killing.

Magby: Easily outsped by anything but Gligar on this team and OHKOed with Stealth Rock.

Teddiursa: Revenge-killed by priority or Houndour.

Croagunk: Our Croagunk can switch in on Vacuum Wave, Sludge Bomb, and most other attacks and outspeed and OHKO with Earthquake.

Houndour: Nothing on this team is really safe from Houndour. It's a big threat, especially with Sucker Punch, but priority can hurt it.

Kabuto: Without Rain Dance up, it's easily outsped and OHKOed by a lot of stuff. In Rain, Croagunk is a fairly safe switch, as it won't get hurt by the Water-type move, and can hurt it badly with Vacuum Wave or Sucker Punch.

Rhyhorn: Gligar walls and OHKOes with Aqua Tail. Also, easily revenged by Vacuum Wave.

Mankey: Easily revenge-killed by Fake Out or Croagunk's moves.

Carvanha: Easily taken out by Croagunk, who can take Water-type moves and OHKO with Vacuum Wave.

Diglett: Complicated. It can be revenge-killed, but it will often switch. It's mainly a prediction battle.

---

Will be adding defensive threat lists as well.
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HeYsUp
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Hey, what's up?

Well this is a really good team, as it uses the same immunities (and four of the same pokemon actually) as Vader's Immunity based team.

I cant do a full rate right now, but i would consider these changes:

Taunt over Hypnosis on Meowth. Hypnosis is too unreliable, and SR is easy to set up against Meowth otherwise.

Charge Beam on Missy to Hit the common Taillow switch ins for more than HP fighting, while increasing Missy's SAtk which makes it more deadly with Salac.

and Max Speed EVs on Croagunk, to outspeed other Croagunk.

A beginner team should definately include Diglett in some way too....

I'll edit more when i get out of Classes.

EDIT:

Ok, Meowth lead is fine. But the change i suggested should be considered.

ScarfDour is good as well, great synergy with Croagunk and Missy. Consider Fire Blast + Sucker Punch over Overheat+Flamethrower, with a Hasty nature, so that you can revenge kill many threats easier, as you depend on "Revenge killing" alot in your threat list, yet have only a couple Pokemon who can revenge kill effectively. Magby could easily go over this though.

Elekid is good as usual, incredibly overused but thats the point right. I COULD see diglett working here.

Gligar works fine too, but consider Maxing speed instead of Defenses, as it really helps against alot of Pokemon to be faster than them, such as Doduo. Could even use Diglett here..

Missy is fine, but Sub+Charge Beam is probably better for LC then Calm Mind for reasons i stated before.

Croagunk is always good, but consider my suggestion of Maxing Speed. Consider HP Psychic over EQ, that will help your Missy problem too. It still OHKOs other Croagunk.

Thats about it, Good team!

Edited by HeYsUp, Mar 13 2009, 04:45 PM.
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Thanks to Legacy Raider for this sig :D. Thanks to bugmaniacbob for my avatar :D.

Visit my Little Cup blog.
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Colloquy
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i miss addie ;_;

Firstly, thanks for the comment!

Hypnosis on Meowth may seem unreliable, but not many leads aim to set up Stealth Rock, and it doesn't hurt my team at all, as I only have one SR weak. Taunt will be taken into consideration, though.

Overheat + Flamethrower is better than Fire Blast + Sucker Punch, at least in my opinion. Overheat provides a great hit-and-run tactic, which I personally like for revenge-killing, or I'll just Dark Pulse. Flamethrower is also better for late-game sweeping than Fire Blast. Sucker Punch seems not needed.

I happen to like Calm Mind over Charge Beam because it turns Misdreavus into a tank while also boosting at the rate Charge Beam would. Taillow isn't too common a switch in, and it can't do much while I'm behind a Substitute. I'll consider it, though.

I actually avoided Diglett because it's incredibly frail, and only useful when Focus Sashed or Choice Scarfed. I needed something bulky to set up Stealth Rock as soon as possible.

Hidden Power Psychic will probably go over Earthquake as soon as I test it. Thanks!
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HeYsUp
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Hey, what's up?

Well if you dont want to use taunt, then i would suggest Return over Hypnosis. 60% accuracy is just too low, especially for a beginner friendly team. IMO at least.

Flamethrower and Fire Blast are about equal for late game sweeping, many opponents can not be 2HKOd or OHKOd by Flamethrower, albeit the accuracy is appealing. But this only a minor thing.

With most of my teams with a Flying/Normal Pokemon (Taillow and Doduo), i always switch them in first because the worst case scenario is that they are sitting at 30% while Missy's sub is broken, and with Taillow the speed tie isnt usally worth risking.

Taillow happens to also plow through this team once Elekid as at ~60-70% (Quick Attack). Taillow probably wont last long enough though, so meh.

At least add it to the "threat list" imo.


I guess Gligar is much more user friendly, so Point taken on Diglett.

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eric the espeon
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Agree with keeping Hypno on Meowth. Very useful against many opponents.

Charge Beam has failed to 1KO Taillow for me, and both its boosts and acc are unreliable. Its nice against some things but.. you can always go to Gligar against flyers.

One major threat you seem to be weak to is Gligar with Aqua Tail, particularly RP+Roost variants. Meowth, Croagunk and Elekid can only scratch it with their priority moves and with one boost it outspeeds and 1KOs most of your team. Missey helps to an extent, but if its lost some HP its not going to take a ATail well. If you bring in your own Gligar they will usually win unless you get in on an EQ.

Other than that, I think its a solid team. Not much has a large advantage over it (maybe rain teams would be hard to beat, but not impossible) but it does not have much in the way of advanced tactics to push a win through. I suppose that's the idea though, more easy to use that way. Nice team.
Edited by eric the espeon, Mar 15 2009, 02:27 PM.
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Beefy
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Troll on Dougs and be trolled
I can't do a full rate now but one thing you should try is Aipom over Meowth unless you really like sleep support. Aipom' fake is weaker but its so much more power. It has decent defenses and with Return, Shadow Claw, Brick Break it 2hko's everything minus Bronzor. You should atleast try it.
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eric the espeon
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Moving to archive and attaching team file.
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ModestRaikou
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i've a team with the same pokèmon's set, but with return on mewoth's bite, ice punch on croag's eq, and pursuit + fire blast and crunch on hp ground on houndour (with a different ev spread)(my "famous" houndy)... lol o.O

btw nice work

edit: oh, in my team missy is charge beamer.

these are mine suggest anyway
Edited by ModestRaikou, Jun 16 2009, 06:23 AM.
aka DarkSector the haxed

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thanks to plus for the signature :*
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