RMT Sun/Moon VGC

[Vradek]

So I've been trying to create a doubles competitive team and after much research and discussion back and forth, I think I've found a viable team that I would like to be judged by the smogon community.

Torkoal @ Charcoal
Ability: Drought
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Quiet Nature
0 Spe IV
- Eruption
- Flamethrower
- Heat Wave
- Protect

So this my weather setter, pretty obvious and self explanatory moveset I think. Charcoal is great to increase eruption and flamethrower, leaving the Z-item for Krookodile.

Liligant @ Wide Lens
Ability: Chorophyll
EVs: 112 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 140 Spe
Modest Nature
- Leaf Storm
- Sleep Powder
- After You
- Protect

This is to gain speed control in sunny weather. I chose wide lens so sleep powder is more reliable, neutralizing threats temporarily and forcing switches. The speed EV investment can outspeed scarf nihiligo, the SpD investment was so Lilligant wouldn't get OKO by a Download P2. SpA is maxed and the rest of the points were distributed in HP, which is a modification of KyleCole's EV spread and a suggestion made by Mystical.

Oranguru @ Mental Herb
Ability: Telepathy
EVs: 252 HP / 164 Def / 92 SpD
Sassy Nature
0 Spe IV
- Psychic
- Instruct
- Trick Room
- Protect

One of the best TR setter to my understanding. Again, fairly common moveset. Instruct with Eruption Torkoal synergizes well. The EV spread to have a good chance to live 2 tapu koko wild charges, survive a flare blitz from A-Marowak as well as a krookodile knock off.

Tapu Lele @ Life Orb
Ability: Psychic Terrain
EVs: 92 HP / 252 SpA / 164 Spe
Modest Nature
- Dazzling Gleam
- Psychic
- Energy Ball
- Protect

Lele allows me to get in on terrain wars and with its ability, opponents can't fake out oranguru, allowing it to set up TR. The speed on the spread set allows it to outspeed adamant max speed Scizor and Sandslash out of hail and modest Pelipper. Thunderbolt will OKO a Celesteela that is damaged even a little bit and since I have grass moves on Lilligant and Torkoal, I thought it would be more balanced to use thunderbolt instead of energy ball.

Muk @ Figy Berry
Ability: Gluttony
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Att / 4 SpD
Brave Nature
0 Spe IV
- Poison Jab
- Knock Off
- Taunt
- Protect

To take care of Tapus and any other fairies, and its slow speed works well in TR to give me more options.

Krookodile @ Groundium-Z
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge
- Snarl
- Protect

Intimidate and snarl give Krook more utility while stone edge gives me a high chances to break celesteela's sub. Stone edge also hits the Flying-types that are immune to Earthquake and has great coverage against other types. It has good synergy with Lele and Torkoal if I need to switch it in. I put Groundium-Z because it was pointed out the EQ doesn't synergize well with Lele, who was choice spec-ed and thus didn't have protect. Groundium-Z now give me a single target ground move, which helps the team moreso.

It's definitely the best team I've put together so far (with A LOT of help, thanks RebornFX) and I would love any opinions, comments, criticism and advice on this team. Thanks in advance.

 

[Pyritie]

What are some things that this team struggles against? What are you specifically looking to get help with? This will help us figure out how to improve your team better.

 

[blarajan]

I think you did a much better job here than on your last team! I like Wide Lens Lilligant honestly, but one of the strongest things it does is free up your Focus Sash on a more offensively inclined team. Solarbeam / Instruct fails in tandem if that influences your decision. I honestly tend to think the best third move is just another Fire move lol. I don't know how useful Firium-Z is when Eruption in and of itself is so strong; I would kind of rather Charcoal almost all the time. If you take Firium-Z off Torkoal, you might consider Psychium-Z on Tapu Lele, so you can use Protect too (which makes it easier next to Krookodile). Pursuit on Muk is garbage. Use anything else. You might also consider Groundium-Z Krookodile so you have a single target Ground move (so it conflicts with your team a little less).

 

[mew-2Chainz]

I would consider running mental herb on Oranguru, since personally I'd make sure a taunt user can shut him down if I saw he was on your team.

If you want ideas for what to replace Pursuit with on Alolan Muk, I love running Disable, since it allows me stop my opponent from doing moves on my partner as he protects. Snarl, Toxic, and Curse are pretty cool too if you don't like Disable.

 

[Vradek]

Okay, so I took some of your ideas and edited the team.

I put poison gas on Muk because I thought it was a better option than toxic for doubles teams since it hits both. What about Clear Smog, is that useful in doubles? I definitely added mental herb on Oranguru because of the point made by mew-2Chainz.

I understand solarbeam doesn't synergize with instruct, but its stronger than HP Ice and I don't see the need of a third fire move, lol.

Does Firium-Z really not OKO anything that Eruption doesn't OKO already? If that's true, I think it'd either Psychium-Z and add protect on Lele as blarajan suggested.

Excuse my ignorance, but why is pursuit bad on Muk?

 

[C.ViperIsBestWaifu]

on Torkoal solarbeam isn't my favorite move i would recommend you use heat wave over solar beam because in doubles you have a partner and lilligant has leaf storm to take care of whatever you are using solar beam to attack.
Lilligant with Wide Lens is not my favorite item for it because it may boost the accuracy of sleep powder but lilligant isn't used because it can put pokemon to sleep and now with Tapu Fini and Tapu Koko sleep is easy to beat and with how Dark Void smeargle was in 2016 i would not be surprised if once pokemon like lilligant or any other pokemon who can put you to sleep become popular that Tapu Fini will gain more use and Tapu Koko will stay consistent

Oranguru would be better if given the minimum EVs needed to survive a Tapu Bulu Wood Hammer


Tapu Lele with Choice Specs is another item choice i don't like because if Tapu Lele is one of your last 2 pokemon you cant even switch out and change moves so it just isn't anything i like

Muk i feel would be better with Gunk Shot over poison gas but all of this is just my preference but gunk shot should be better as a way to do more damage


Krookodile with Life Orb an snarl are not my personal favorite choices because snarl is never going to do a lot of damage when used by any pokemon but it just doesn't look like it helps krook because to me krook wants to attack and if it has life orb it wants to attack but with snarl i would make it bulky and do something as different to every other krook it would be
these are just my opinions but it looks like you have a good team and i don't think any of my complaints are anything new or useful but it is just how i feel and while i may not be good i do really like sun teams and sun-room is my favorite between torkoal lilligant this year and groudon in vgc 2016

 

[Vradek]

I don't see why I'd use heat wave to hit doubles when I have eruption.

I understand what you're saying about tapu fini, but to my understanding, she's not as popular because koko and bulu can OKO her and although they can use terrains to prevent sleep, I do have Tapu Lele, to change terrains to my advantage if need be.

I just checked the calcs, I would have to change to a relaxed nature and invested completely in def to prevent a OKO from a Bulu Wood Hammer. This would leave Oranguru open to special attack threats. What I can do is change the EV spread to have a good chance to live 2 tapu koko wild charges, survive a flare blitz from A-Marowak as well as a krookodile knock off. Thanks for making me think about Oranguru's EV spread a bit more.

I suppose your right about Choice Specs, but is that a reason to not use the item? It's a very common item, I just have to play appropriately.

I was initially thinking gunk shot too, but I wasn't a fan of the accuracy and was told poison jab was enough to do the job. What is your opinion on Clear Smog instead to remove stat increases?

This is probably the biggest flaw you pointed out, which I just realized. I like snarl for utility, not the damage, but it doesn't make sense if I'm losing HP and not hitting as hard as possible, especially with no recovery moves. I'll change around the items on my team. Thanks!

 

[C.ViperIsBestWaifu]

i use torkoal with eruption and heatwave because once you get to low HP eruption will have less Power than heatwave

 

[Rakom]

Regarding the moveset on Muk, I think that you should definitely stick with poison jab/knock off/protect, having consistent STAB damage is very nice. I wouldn't use Poison Gas as the final move, because it's pretty much inferior to toxic. Toxic will never miss when used by Muk where Poison Gas has only 90% accuracy, but more importantly: normal poison is not that powerful of a status. The major selling point of toxic is its ability to wear down bulky mons like Porygon2 or Gastrodon. Because bad poison continues to increase in damage each turn, it eventually reaches a point where it's impossible to recover off. Normal poison doesn't do this, so it can more easily be dealt with through recovery moves or grassy terrain/leftovers. That said, I'm actually not sure that a poisoning move is your best bet on Muk to begin with, since your team doesn't have a ton of ways to stall turns and would probably prefer some other utility move. I would encourage you to test Taunt - this lets you stop opposing Porygon2 from reversing your Trick Room or walling you out with Recover, as well as stopping random Wide Guards, Substitutes, etc. Muk does have a lot of other interesting options for that slot like Disable, Snarl, Shadow Sneak, Clear Smog, etc so definitely try them out if you aren't finding taunt that useful.

Like C. Viper said above, Heat Wave is used on Torkoal so that you still have strong spread damage after Torkoal goes below 2/3 HP. It's also used because the other options are pretty underwhelming - sun + STAB + Charcoal just makes your fire moves so strong that most of the time you don't need anything else. Being unable to instruct Solar Beam kinda hurts, but if you want that extra way to hit Gastrodon it can be worthwhile.

The Krookodile set looks solid to me, although you could experiment with rock slide > stone edge, and Crunch or Taunt > Snarl. The spread damage, flinch chance, and accuracy of rock slide are all quite nice, but stone edge does hit a single target much harder so it can definitely be worth it.

I would probably run a faster spread on Life Orb Lele - 92 HP/252 SpA/164 Spe Modest keeps maximum power, creeps the usual Gyarados spread (and other random stuff in that area), and can still live a Garchomp Poison Jab or a -1 Kartana Smart Strike. I'd also consider replacing either Dazzling Gleam or Thunderbolt with Moonblast but that's really a matter of preference.

 

[Mystical]

I'll try to give some new suggestions here.

I would run 108 HP / 4 Def / 244 SpA / 12 SpD / 140 Spe on Lilligant to give Download P2 an attack boost instead of a SpA boost. Quiet P2 with a little SpA investment can OHKO your Lilligant, but only with the SpA boost.

Your Oranguru can actually take a Tapu Bulu Wood Hammer most of the time. 252+ Atk Tapu Bulu Wood Hammer vs. 252 HP / 164 Def Oranguru in Grassy Terrain: 169-199 (85.7 - 101%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
And Tapu Bulu is really a non-issue for the team since you have two hard checks for it. Side note: Knock Off was only a tutor move for Krookodile, so it's illegal on Krook in this year's VGC.

Personally, I would replace Thunderbolt on your Tapu Lele. Psychic does more damage to everything bar Gyarados and Pelipper, but even then they're still KOd by Psychic in Psychic Terrain most of the time. Moonblast, Energy Ball, and Taunt are good options for Garchomp, Gastrodon, and P2, respectively.

 

[Vradek]

Okay, I'll definitely give taunt a try on Muk, thanks! You're right, I forgot poison gas wasn't a badly poison.

Okay, I kind of understand heat wave, but I do have flamethrower, which I know isn't a spread attack. Would it be recommended to switch flamethrower for heat wave? In this way I can keep solarbeam for checks.

That calculation doesn't include miracle seed or life orb, which I thought were popular choices on Bulu.

I modified the EV spread you suggested Mystical. You make a good point, but since Lilligant is so frail to begin with, I didn't want to take EVs from SpA, so I removed the Def EVs and put them in HP and SpD. Thanks!

I like thunderbolt because I can almost OKO a Celesteela, which is very popular. I know Lele gets OKO by Celesteela's heavy slam but as long as I've weakened Celesteela a bit with another mon, its a guaranteed OKO if I can switch it in safely. I also like thunderbolt because I already have Lilligant and Torkoal with grass moves.