For those not so sure how to build the best team, I'll go through the basics of team selection and building.
In this thread, I'll use the Valley View Victinis and the Perrysburg Persians as examples. See rosters here.
IDENTIFYING THE BEST POKEMON
Looking at the Perrysburg Persians, we can see 4 Poison weaknesses and only 3 resistances. Let's exploit that.
Poison resistances: Forretress, Zygarde-10%, Froslass
2 of these 3 Pokemon are weak to Fire, and the other is 4x weak to Ice.
Let's find a Pokemon on the Valley View Victinis to cover all of these...
Tornadus has coverage moves for all of these Pokemon, but there's a problem... 2 Pokemon are faster than it (Tapu Koko & Mega Sceptile). So what are the options?
1) Give Tornadus a Choice Scarf so it's faster than them. You'll be locked into the selected move so your opponent can counter this.
2) Have a defensive switch-in to Tapu Koko and Mega Sceptile. Use a damage calculator to see who can take hits.
You don't have to counter every Pokemon on a team with just 1 of yours. Find the best balance of attacking power and coverage as well as defensive switch-ins.
SELECTING THE RIGHT MOVES AND SPREADS
Let's use Zygarde-10% as an example.
You can see it has good physical attack "Attack" but pitiful special attack "Sp. Atk". Only physical type attacking moves should be use on this Pokemon.
For example, use Earthquake and not Earth Power. See these damage calcs...
0 Atk Zygarde-10% Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Victini: 218-258 (63.9 - 75.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Zygarde-10% Earth Power vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Victini: 182-216 (53.3 - 63.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Even with maximum special attack EVs, the physical type Earthquake still does more because the base stat is that much higher. You can identify physical and special type attacks by these icons:
Physical
Special
Here's an example of a good Zygarde-10% build
Lum Berry to remove a status condition like burn (which halves attack)
Thousand Arrows & Outrage for STAB attacks
Extreme Speed to finish off faster Pokemon which have low health
Dragon Dance to increase attack and speed for more power
252+ Attack and 252 Speed EVs to maximize damage output and guarantee being faster than Pokemon with slightly lower base speed. Zygarde-10% is not meant to be defensive, investing EVs in defense or special defense is a waste of time.
This is just 1 example, check the Smogon page for more suggestions.
More to come....
In this thread, I'll use the Valley View Victinis and the Perrysburg Persians as examples. See rosters here.
IDENTIFYING THE BEST POKEMON
Looking at the Perrysburg Persians, we can see 4 Poison weaknesses and only 3 resistances. Let's exploit that.
Poison resistances: Forretress, Zygarde-10%, Froslass
2 of these 3 Pokemon are weak to Fire, and the other is 4x weak to Ice.
Let's find a Pokemon on the Valley View Victinis to cover all of these...
Tornadus has coverage moves for all of these Pokemon, but there's a problem... 2 Pokemon are faster than it (Tapu Koko & Mega Sceptile). So what are the options?
1) Give Tornadus a Choice Scarf so it's faster than them. You'll be locked into the selected move so your opponent can counter this.
2) Have a defensive switch-in to Tapu Koko and Mega Sceptile. Use a damage calculator to see who can take hits.
You don't have to counter every Pokemon on a team with just 1 of yours. Find the best balance of attacking power and coverage as well as defensive switch-ins.
SELECTING THE RIGHT MOVES AND SPREADS
Let's use Zygarde-10% as an example.
You can see it has good physical attack "Attack" but pitiful special attack "Sp. Atk". Only physical type attacking moves should be use on this Pokemon.
For example, use Earthquake and not Earth Power. See these damage calcs...
0 Atk Zygarde-10% Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Victini: 218-258 (63.9 - 75.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Zygarde-10% Earth Power vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Victini: 182-216 (53.3 - 63.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Even with maximum special attack EVs, the physical type Earthquake still does more because the base stat is that much higher. You can identify physical and special type attacks by these icons:
Here's an example of a good Zygarde-10% build
Lum Berry to remove a status condition like burn (which halves attack)
Thousand Arrows & Outrage for STAB attacks
Extreme Speed to finish off faster Pokemon which have low health
Dragon Dance to increase attack and speed for more power
252+ Attack and 252 Speed EVs to maximize damage output and guarantee being faster than Pokemon with slightly lower base speed. Zygarde-10% is not meant to be defensive, investing EVs in defense or special defense is a waste of time.
This is just 1 example, check the Smogon page for more suggestions.
More to come....
