Rain Offense (1800+)

[Holpolo]

Hi all. I'm relatively new to gen 6 battling and want to improve my attempt at a rain team. I have a decent amount of battling experience but this is my first attempt in a long time at building my own team. Any rates or comments are appreciated. So without further ado,



Holpolo's Rain Offense

At a glance:

Politoed

Politoed @ Choice Specs
Ability: Drizzle
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SAtk / 4 Spd
Modest Nature
- Scald
- Hydro Pump
- Ice Beam
- Focus Blast

Politoed is the heart and soul of any rain team. In addition to summoning rain, Poli's combination of special bulk and disgusting offensive power make it a fearsome pokemon. Even mons that resist water will take more than 50% from specs hydro pump. I chose to put the extra points into HP because poli doesn't outspeed anything important anyway, and the bulk allows it to stay in on rotom-w if it's healthy.

Keeping poli alive is vital to the team's success, as it is the only mon that can set rain without losing momentum. To this end, I frequently switch to zapdos and ferrothorn if there is even the threat of losing it in the mid-game. In the endgame, I usually sacrifice it just to get rain up for the final sweep.​

Conkeldurr

Conkeldurr @ Assault Vest
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 252 Atk / 12 Def / 244 SDef
Adamant Nature
- Drain Punch
- Mach Punch
- Knock Off
- Ice Punch​

Conkeldurr is a powerful tank and a vital member of the team. With assault vest, it can scare off any number of miscellaneous special sweepers, including Heatran, Starmie, and Genesect. It also has the valuable ability to switch into genesect and scizor's u-turns, which I would otherwise need Zapdos for. The moves themselves are fairly self-explanatory: drain punch for tanking, mach punch for revenge-killing, ice punch for gliscor and knock off for aegislash.

Keeping conk healthy is very important and very difficult. Special genesect causes my team major problems, and conk is my only switch-in for it if I don't know what move it's using.​

Kingdra​

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Kingdra @ Life Orb
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 80 Atk / 252 SAtk / 176 Spd
Mild Nature
- Surf
- Waterfall
- Draco Meteor
- Outrage

My primary rain abuser, Kingdra. Sweeping with Kingdra is this teams win condition. It outspeeds just about everything except Talonflame in the rain and deals at least 80% to everything that isn't water type. Even most water types, like rotom-w, take more than 50%. It also functions as a revenge killer as long as rain is up. Rain dance is a filler move more than anything, but occasionally I have the chance to set it up. I'm open to suggestions for replacing it.

I got this EV spread from a friend, so I'm not sure what its exact purpose is, but I trust it.



Ferrothorn​

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Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SDef
Careful Nature
- Leech Seed
- Stealth Rock
- Power Whip
- Toxic

Ferrothorn is one of the most pivotal members of my team. Taking on the likes of manaphy and rotom-w, which dominate the rest of my team, make Ferrothorn nearly irreplaceable. I chose specially defensive ferro because it is better at taking on water and electric attacks, and because it takes less than 50% from heatran's lava plumes in the rain. Ferro, Politoed and Zapdos make up the "core" of the team. Ferro takes attacks aimed at poli, poli takes the fire attacks aimed at ferro, and zapdos takes the fighting attacks aimed at ferro as well as fast physical attackers that scare poli.​

Zapdos​

Zapdos @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 Spd
Bold Nature
- Thunder
- Roost
- Defog
- Rain Dance

Physically defensive Zapdos makes up the third part of my core. Zapdos is a great switch-in for scizor, although there is a huge risk of losing momentum. It can also switch in on a predicted brave bird from talonflame if rocks aren't up. Keeping rocks off the field is important, as it zapdos as my mid-game rain re-setter. Politoed and ferro take the ice type attacks that Zapdos fears. If Zapdos goes down, my team is in serious trouble from certain obscure pokemon like Togekiss.

Thunder is the attacking move of choice, roost allows it to heal, and toxic lets it stall out bulky mons that love to switch in on it like porygon-2 and assault vest conkeldurr.
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Tornadus-T​

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Tornadus-Therian (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Hasty Nature
- Hurricane
- U-turn
- Superpower
- Knock Off

Tornadus is my secondary rain abuser, and an invaluable member. Its blazing speed allows it to revenge-kill numerous threats that can destroy my team otherwise, like mega-lucario and Starmie. Hurricane is the primary move on this set, and it threatens everything that doesn't resist it. U-turn is for momentum, though it doesn't see much use due to the higher utility of other moves in the set. Superpower is for weakened steel types and Chansey and knock off is for switch-ins that I can't predict.


Threat list to come later. Will work on it as I improve the team. Any comments and criticism are helpful, but remember, my goal is to build a viable rain team. Thanks in advance.​

 

[aPandaCub]

Some Comments.

• Choice Specs Toad is probably the best Toad set currently in the meta. Your toad, judging by its moveset, is geared more toward an offensive Specs Toad. I don't really think you need a Damp Rock, you already have two other rain starters, with Thundurus even having priority. Alternatively, if you don't want to use a specs toad, you should still try putting leftovers over Damp Rock, to keep him alive. At the very least, putting more support moves such as Encore, Perish Song, etc, can help you gain momentum for your team better than going 3 Offensive moves+Toxic
• Your team lacks spinners. You can solve this by putting Taunt on Thundurus, this prevents anyone from setting up hazards. Offensive LO Starmie could work as well, Hydro Pump in the rain will absolutely slaughter anything. You could maybe try replacing Dragonite with Starmie, that D-Nite set seems a bit counterproductive. You could also try the Rain Mixed Attacker set, found here http://www.smogon.com/bw/pokemon/dragonite

 

[S0L1D G0LD]

I would recommend switching dragonite to either the choice band or dragon dance set, as I feel it works much better with your current team; you already have a rain abuser in kingdra, and a special sweeper with thundurus.

 

[Holpolo]

The advice is appreciated. I've changed Politoed to modest choice specs with hydro pump, scald, ice beam and focus blast. I've replaced dnite with tornadus-t and thundurus with bulky rotom-w. I'll update the OP when I get a chance to play some more.

 

[PkMn Gravija]

Critdra in rain works a lot better imo, critical draco meteors and hydro pumps in the rain just destroy so much, I use it personally myself and I'm very impressed by the damage it can do (like ohko aegislash-shield)

 

[S0L1D G0LD]

Critdra in rain works a lot better imo, critical draco meteors and hydro pumps in the rain just destroy so much, I use it personally myself and I'm very impressed by the damage it can do (like ohko aegislash-shield)

But then you give up swift swim, which is like, the main reason to use him in rain.

 

[PkMn Gravija]

With the meta being filled with quite a lot of pokemon in the -100 speed tier side, swift swim isn't necessary in gen 6 tbh and the rain boosted hydro pumps was the bigger reason to use him in rain anyway further abusing this with sniper crits is just godlike damage, not sure if my calcs are right but it's like 3.375x damage with your hydro pumps (assuming the calc is 2.25x + 1.5x for the rain boost).

or even, for example.

252+ SpA Life Orb Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Eviolite Chansey in Rain: 199-235 (28.2 - 33.3%) -- 0% chance to 3HKO

252+ SpA Sniper Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Eviolite Chansey in Rain on a critical hit: 343-406 (48.7 - 57.6%) -- 96.1% chance to 2HKO


Also, I think you're gonna want your politoed to have perish song so gliscor causes you less problems, aswell as clefable etc late game.

 

[poke n00b]

I think Conkeldurr @ assault vest might be better and replace bulk-up with ice punch, not only it boosts iron fist effectiveness but it rlly good to check some drags and landorus T.

 

[Holpolo]

Conkeldurr has been changed to the assault vest set. Tornadus is working out pretty well, rotom-w is kind of a mixed bag but maybe I'm using the wrong set.

Keeping rain up for Kingdra is really important but sometimes I have to sac Politoed to get a safe switch. What are some good rain-setters for the mid-game other than Politoed?

 

[Holpolo]

Bumping because the thread was locked and the team was changed.

Still need some feedback on the team. Would it help if I posted some replays of the team in action?

Specifically, I need a way to keep rocks off the field without sacrificing offensive presence or my defensive core. I've tried Starmie and it hasn't worked out, being redundant offensively with Kingdra.

 

[over9000chainz]

Bumping because the thread was locked and the team was changed.

Still need some feedback on the team. Would it help if I posted some replays of the team in action?

Specifically, I need a way to keep rocks off the field without sacrificing offensive presence or my defensive core. I've tried Starmie and it hasn't worked out, being redundant offensively with Kingdra.

I'm looking to build this team in X/Y. What would be a good replacement for Zapdos, and what would be a good move set for Conkeldurr? Zapdos is far too much work to hunt down with good IVs and Ice Punch/Iron Fist are not available for Conkeldurr.

 

[Holpolo]

Use guts and any move you want to replace ice punch on Conk. Replace Zapdos with another physically defensive mon that resists fighting.

 

[Twin_Scimitar]

Hello. Unsure of whether or not you're still looking for rates, but I have a lot of experience with Kingdra rain teams so I thought I'd give it a go.

I have some small changes in mind that I'd like to suggest. Let me know if you're not a fan, because I do have a few other ideas if you're willing to change some team members around.

Special Kingdra to Mixed Kingdra, Toxic to Defog on Zapdos

I've found Mixdra to be an improvement on Special Kingdra. The main thought process is outlined in post #7 here: http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/kingdra.3498212/. You can read the part just above the bolded list and the tldr part to get a general idea of what I'm trying to say. Anyway I'd suggest this:

Kingdra @ Life Orb
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 80 Atk / 252 SAtk / 176 Spd
Mild/Rash Nature
- Surf / Hydro Pump
- Waterfall
- Draco Meteor
- Outrage / Ice Beam

Outrage is generally better (as long as you are smart about using it) and I like surf for the accuracy, but that's just me. The speed EVs allow you to reach 500 speed in rain, outspeeding choice scarf Garchomp. With Politoed, and Zapdos I think it's probably a waste of coverage to carry Rain Dance on Kingdra, and I've found the turn you are using to Rain Dance would be better used hitting the opponent with a Draco Meteor if you do find yourself out of rain and unable to switch.

Toxic to Defog on Zapdos is so you have a way to get rid of entry hazards. With two SR weaks you really need this (yes you have Regenerator on one, but it's such an amazing ability if you heal 33% on each switch as opposed to 8%). I could see how losing Toxic on Zapdos could really hurt, but you really do need to keep SR off of your side of the field. If you definitely want to keep the ability to toxic certain threats somewhere on your team you could switch thunder-wave on Ferrothorn to toxic.

Hope this helps! Good team by the way.

 

[Holpolo]

Thanks for the mixdra suggestion, it's been working better than my original set. Defog on Zapdos I'm a little iffy about. It almost caused me to lose a stall war against Sylveon, but it will probably help more as I get higher on the ladder.

Any more suggestions would be appreciated! In particular I don't feel like Zapdos is pulling its weight.

 

[BTzz]

Hi. So a big problem with gen 6 rain is the amount switching you have to do. Politoed has to switch in multiple times to get rain up, and then you have to switch to a sweeper. This combined with all of your forced switches will make hazards a real pain. To remedy this I suggest putting Defog on Zapdos over Toxic.

Another problem I think this team has is its weakness to the Talonflame/Pinsir Flying STAB combo. SpD Zapdos will get worn down quickly by both of them so I suggest using a Physically Defensive spread. The spread change isn't much of a loss as Ferro + Conk can handle a good portion of special attackers. Also, Talonflame and Pinsir aren't mons you want to be playing around with so I suggest using Thunderbolt over Thunder on Zapdos so you an reliably deal with these threats. While Zapdos does have Rain dance and Defog to boost Thunder's accuracy, sometimes you don't have time to set them up.

After an SD, Aegislash is another significant threat to this team. To limit its switch-in opportunity I suggest using 252 Atk EVs on Conk as opposed to SpD. Conk can take special hits just fine with AV 252 HP and with Atk EVs you ensure the 2HKO on Aegislash with Knock Off.

 

[Holpolo]

Didn't notice that zapdos was listed as specially defensive in the op. It has always been physical to deal with exactly what you suggested. I've changed it to reflect what my team actually is now.

I also noticed that the title of this thread is no longer accurate. It came from when everyone's ratings were super-inflated.

 

[Seven Lions]

always mega blastoise who can fire off powerful hydro pumps in rain while maintaining bulk. you should also run HP Grass over Scald for Gastrodon.

 

[Holpolo]

always mega blastoise who can fire off powerful hydro pumps in rain while maintaining bulk. you should also run HP Grass over Scald for Gastrodon.

Who should I replace? Kingdra?

 

[Seven Lions]

meant like there's always megablastoise, not you always need to run one. anyways you could just swap zapdos with Kabutops for swift swim rapid spin. not the best defenses but itll get a spin off and live a neutral hit.