Dual Suns - Double Battle Team

[Benlisted]

This is really my first foray into double battling, as my router does not support DS wifi, so I cannot practice it at all. And with a local doubles tournament coming up, there is nowhere I can really look to for sound advice other than smogon, despite not being very doubles focused, before I actually train this team. As such I am unsure about a fair few aspects, but this is my best shot at a RMT.

The rules, put simply, are item clause, a banlist of many legendaries and rotom (see below), and using 4 out of your 6 pokemon after seeing your opponent’s whole team. Items can be moved around between pokemon after each battle, however.

I decided to go with Sun as a theme for the team having used it to great effect in UU and the doubles format opening up even more possibilities for it. So without further ado, here is my rough plan for the team:


Leads:

Infernape @ Focus Sash

Ability: Blaze

Nature: Naive

EVs: 64Atk/252SpAtk/192Spe

Fake Out

Heatwave

Close Combat

Vacuum Wave



Crobat @ Lum Berry

Ability: Inner Focus

Nature: Jolly

EVs: 252Hp/20Def/20SpDef/216Spe

Sunny Day

Taunt

Protect

Super Fang



The aim of my two leads is to get Sun up as soon as possible and begin breaking down the opponent’s team, while going some way to prevent other strategies.

Fake Out is there to prevent a Dark Void, Trick Room, or other potential threats from doing their thing first turn, and is the main reason I chose Infernape as a lead. Heatwave, when boosted by sun, becomes almost as powerful as a fire blast on each opposing pokemon. Close Combat is a Powerful STAB with good coverage, and can be used once without affecting my other moves. A priority move is to allow Infernape to do a little more damage once his sash has been activated, or take out a weakened foe. I chose vacuum wave due to fear of double intimidate.

Crobat was chosen for his ability, and my paranoia of being fake-outed. I opted for a sleep berry to ward off any occasional scarfed sleepers while being able to get sun up, although I am debating a Heat Rock, but due to my inability to test, I have no idea if 5 turns of Sun in doubles is a lot or not. Super Fang is mostly to bring many opponents into KO range for the rest of my team. Protect is to allow survival of an impending explosion, and taunt helps Infernape counter dual setup. Fakeout protects Crobat from fast attacks that would KO it.
​

Switchins:

Tangrowth @ Life Orb

Ability: Chlorophyll

Nature: Adamant

EVs: 252Atk/252Spe/4HP

Protect

Earthquake

Rock Slide

Power Whip



Powerful spread attacks and huge speed in Sun is my reason for choosing Tangrowth. He is bulky enough to take a physical attack while he swords dances, but preferably he will be partnered with Togekiss to follow me targeted special attacks while he hits things hard. The attacks speak for themselves, and Power Whip is obligatory STAB. Protect is for exploding things, and possible Heatwave users while Togekiss hits them. Wide Lens is a possible swap for Tangrowth for added accuracy.



Togekiss @ Sitrus Berry

Ability: Serene Grace

Nature: Modest

EVs: 252HP/64SpAtk/192Spe

Follow Me

Heatwave

Air Slash

Sunny Day



Primarily her purpose is to allow Tangrowth to sweep, and reset sun, leading to the somewhat filler moves. Heatwave is for coverage on the Grass-types which wall Tangrowth somewhat, and as a second attack STAB Air Slash, with a nice chance to flinch. Follow me is to draw some SpAtk fire from Tangrowth, or any attacks from Typhlosion. Supporting a weakened Infernape with this is also an option.
​

Spare slots:

Shiftry @ Expert Belt

Ability: Chlorophyll

Nature: Modest

EVs: 252SpAtk/212Spe/44Atk

Leaf Storm

Dark Pulse

Icy Wind

Explosion



Shifty is an alternative Chlorophyll abuser, for if I feel the need to swap for a more specially offensive sweeper if the enemy packs a physically tough team, or some nasty psychic or dragon pokemon. The given EVs allow me to outspeed dragon dance boosted max speed Garchomp, as well as the Lati@s twins.

Dark Pulse does 65%+ to the most specially defensive Latias set, without Soul Dew, as it is banned in my tourney. Icy wind serves a dual purpose - to get the jump on nasty dragons, and though it does not do too much damage, to slow them down to help the rest of my team deal with them. It does 45-75% on Salamence, depending on the EV spread, but only 25% to Latias/os.

Icy Wind's other purpose is to combine with Typhlosion when the enemy looks like they have a team that can be easily decimated by Eruption. On their first turn out, he protects while Shiftry slows down the opponent, allowing for a powerful Eruption to go off at least once, while Shiftry covers with other attacks. Once it is nearly dead, Explosion and Protect can then be used for yet more damage, as well as otherwise being a panic button for anything getting out of hand.




Typhlosion @ Charcoal

Ability: Blaze

Nature: Timid

EVs: 252SpAtk/252Spe/4Def

Eruption

Heatwave

Solarbeam

Protect



A high risk Pokemon, this would come out only if I saw a team lacking flash fire pokemon and able to be abused by STAB Eruptions from Typhlosion. Thanks to the Masked Nitpicker's advice, I now have two possible combos to abuse it with. Shiftry and Typhlosion can do their Protect + Icy Wind combo, or if I see few spread abusers, Togekiss and Typhlosion can abuse Eruption and Follow Me.

My concerns are as follows. With Shiftry and Typhlosion, I really need them out at the same time to be able to pull off the combo. If they lead, then I lose Sun, and the KO on a few specially defensive and resisting pokemon. If they go in second, then I either have to time my Infernape and Crobat's deaths with focus sash and protect (and luck), or try to make sure they die on the same turn by friendly firing, which is clearly not a great idea. I am considering Protect somewhere on Shiftry for to allow it to come in a turn earlier than Typh and the combo to still work.

Overall, I should be able to overcome these issues by only using him if I can see him working, however.

Former Members:

​

Exeggutor @ Wide Lens

Ability: Chlorophyll

Nature: Rash

EVs: 252SpAtk/252Spe/4Atk

Sleep Powder

Explosion

Psychic

Leaf Storm

REPLACED BY SHIFTRY

A sweeper of sorts, Exeggutor is perhaps a specially based replacement for Tangrowth. The obvious Sleep Powder in the first slot is able to subdue a number of unsuspecting threats due to chlorophyll. Psychic and Leaf Storm are its primary attacks, with it being able to explode when its job is done. My team will have to protect or die, though this could be a good way to clear the field for a combo I need to get in all at once.

Also, few people know exactly how fast Exeggutor is under sun, able to reach 458 Speed - outspeeding many scarfers and boosters. This allows his Explosion to function as an unexpected panic button should I face scarfers, as my spread gives him 218 speed.


​

Banlist:
Mewtwo
Mew
Lugia
Ho-Oh
Celebi
Kyogre
Groudon
Rayquaza
Jirachi
Deoxys
Rotom
Dialga
Palkia
Giratina
Phione
Manaphy
Darkrai
Shaymin
Arceus

To anyone brave enough to read all this and rate, thankyou in advance.

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

Generally speaking, you won't get a lot of power out of Infernape's Earthquakes. I'd probably replace it with Close Combat. Even if you fear double Intimidate, Earthquake would be just as nerfed by it.

Your Crobat's moveset looks good. Very utilitarian. Any reason you're not maxing out Speed? You plan to switch out against opposing Aerodactyl and Jolteon I take it? If you really want to have Explosion on your Exeggutor, you'd better give your Crobat Protect, although I'd probably trade out U-turn instead of Taunt.

Your Tangrowth is a magnet for special attacks. If your opponent uses Heat Wave, Togekiss won't be able to save it. You're already giving it Life Orb, maximum Attack EVs, and an Adamant nature. Swords Dance may be asking a bit much. My advice is that you either Shift most of those Attack EVs into SpDef or give it Protect or some other move over Swords Dance. I'd go with Power Whip for your last slot, especially with an Adamant nature.

Togekiss should be a good secondary Sunny Day user. Air Slash over ExtremeSpeed. It's very handy to have priority moves in order to deal with opponents' Focus Sash holders, but a solid STAB attack will do you more good on average, I'll wager. After all, if you weren't interested in dealing damage with your Togekiss, you wouldn't be giving it a Modest nature.

Togekiss can't save your Typhlosion from Rock Slide or Earthquake. This last is extremely important, since Garchomp is allowed in your tournament and outspeeds Typhlosion with its ridiculous 102 base Speed. If you insist on running Eruption, Choice Scarf is usually preferred. I'd take SolarBeam and Focus Blast in your other two slots.

Exeggutor looks pretty good. I'd run Leaf Storm and Sleep Powder. If you have Explosion, you don't have to worry as much about the SpAtk drops. You might want to consider Wide Lens in order to boost the accuracy of Sleep Powder as well.

General Comments: The reason I recommend your Grass-types against having SolarBeam is that your opponent could switch in Hippowdon, Tyranitar, or Abomasnow, which makes you lose a turn and halves SolarBeam's power. If you want to have one of your Grass-types with Solarbeam, make it Exeggutor and don't use it if your opponent's team includes one of these weather-changers.

One potential problem I see is that the tournament allows the pseudo-legendary Dragon-types: Dragonite, Salamence, and Garchomp. None of your Pokémon can learn any Ice-type attack, and since you don't have any Pokémon with Hidden Power on your team currently, I'm going to infer that you're not in the habit using it. (I fully endorse not using Hidden Power, for what it's worth.)

To remedy this, consider replacing Exeggutor with Shiftry. It learns Explosion, SolarBeam, and Leaf Storm, but it also learns a slew of other moves such as Icy Wind, Sucker Punch, and Fake Out. It doesn't get Sleep Powder, though, and its stats are lower overall compared to Exeggutor.

Anyhow, it's a shame that you can't practice this team over Wi-Fi. The best way to determine its effectiveness is to test it. If you get access to a DS-compatible access point anytime in the near future, let me know via Private Message and I'll test a few of my teams against yours.

 

[Benlisted]

Generally speaking, you won't get a lot of power out of Infernape's Earthquakes. I'd probably replace it with Close Combat. Even if you fear double Intimidate, Earthquake would be just as nerfed by it.

That's fair enough. I have a feeling I may have become slightly obsessed with spread moves while making this team, and in all honesty I hadn't considered Close Combat too much. I'll put it on the moveset.

Your Crobat's moveset looks good. Very utilitarian. Any reason you're not maxing out Speed? You plan to switch out against opposing Aerodactyl and Jolteon I take it? If you really want to have Explosion on your Exeggutor, you'd better give your Crobat Protect, although I'd probably trade out U-turn instead of Taunt.

Well, my plan against opposing and outspeeding pokemon that look like theyre going to do horrible things to Crobat was to Fake Out them with Infernape, at least buying a turn for Sun to go up. I can always adjust the EV spread once my team is slightly more... polished, and I'll bear that threat in mind. A fast U-Turn does put the switch-in at risk, actually, so Taunt and Protect it is.

Your Tangrowth is a magnet for special attacks. If your opponent uses Heat Wave, Togekiss won't be able to save it. You're already giving it Life Orb, maximum Attack EVs, and an Adamant nature. Swords Dance may be asking a bit much. My advice is that you either Shift most of those Attack EVs into SpDef or give it Protect or some other move over Swords Dance. I'd go with Power Whip for your last slot, especially with an Adamant nature.

Very true. I have no clue about EVing in doubles battles other than your Double Battle Primer article's advice to put some into defences, and have been using this set in UU a lot lately, so I probably should alter it. Aside from protect the most feasible options seem to be another Sleep Powder, Brick Break (negligible coverage due to low BP) and Poison Jab for Grass types.

I'll try Protect however, as I would like to keep the attack EVs and I do need a few more protect users to ease my paranoia of things exploding. At some point I'll run some calcs with SpDef EVs to see how what would be a good investment, though.

Togekiss should be a good secondary Sunny Day user. Air Slash over ExtremeSpeed. It's very handy to have priority moves in order to deal with opponents' Focus Sash holders, but a solid STAB attack will do you more good on average, I'll wager. After all, if you weren't interested in dealing damage with your Togekiss, you wouldn't be giving it a Modest nature.

True enough, you know my intentions better than I do! That'll ease EV investment and give me a nice flinch chance anyway, so Air Slash it is. Would you advise me still to use Follow Me if I remove Swords Dance from Tangrowth? I am very uncertain of its usefulness.

Togekiss can't save your Typhlosion from Rock Slide or Earthquake. This last is extremely important, since Garchomp is allowed in your tournament and outspeeds Typhlosion with its ridiculous 102 base Speed. If you insist on running Eruption, Choice Scarf is usually preferred. I'd take SolarBeam and Focus Blast in your other two slots.

Indeed, that was the main reason I was looking for a way for it to survive one turn at full HP to be able to get those 2HKOs with eruption. My lack of OU and Ubers knowledge appears to have screwed me over here with Garchomp's annoying base speed... I guess I'll replace Typhlosion, as I really wanted to use Eruption for the cool points but it just doesn't quite seem able to work effectively enough to not be a deadweight.

Exeggutor looks pretty good. I'd run Leaf Storm and Sleep Powder. If you have Explosion, you don't have to worry as much about the SpAtk drops. You might want to consider Wide Lens in order to boost the accuracy of Sleep Powder as well.

Cheers, I'll take your advice about Leaf Storm. Wide Lens is a damn good idea actually, especially seeing as (I believe i forgot to mention this in the OP) we are allowed to change items around within the team between matches. Can always swap it with Life Orb on Tangrowth if I feel one needs better accuracy or power. It's also more likely that I pick one of the two grass sweepers depending on whether the opponent's team looks like it'll be easier broken down by physical/special rather than both, so this should be okay.

General Comments: The reason I recommend your Grass-types against having SolarBeam is that your opponent could switch in Hippowdon, Tyranitar, or Abomasnow, which makes you loses a turn and halves SolarBeam's power. If you want to have one of your Grass-types with Solarbeam, make it Exeggutor and don't use it if your opponent's team includes on of these weather-changers.

Didn't think of this, and again good advice. I'll go with Leaf Storm first off though, I think.

One potential problem I see is that the tournament allows the pseudo-legendary Dragon-types: Dragonite, Salamence, and Garchomp. None of your Pokémon can learn any Ice-type attack, and since you don't have any Pokémon with Hidden Power on your team currently, I'm going to infer that you're not in the habit using it. (I fully endorse not using Hidden Power, for what it's worth.)

To remedy this, consider replacing Exeggutor with Shiftry. It learns Explosion, SolarBeam, and Leaf Storm, but it also learns a slew of other moves such as Icy Wind, Sucker Punch, and Fake Out. It doesn't get Sleep Powder, though, and its stats are lower overall compared to Exeggutor.

Yeah, I didn't use HP on Eggy purely because I am not confident with its use in the DS game. I'll take a look at Shiftry, especially as Icy Wind is very useful to slow things as well, and Fake Out/Sucker Punch are also invaluable. I can always move Sleep Powder to Tangrowth if I feel I need it somewhere.

However, with me likely removing Typhlosion, would you advise perhaps using both Shiftry and Eggy as reserves, or tailoring my last slot to be a counter for those 4x Ice Weak dragons? Perhaps a Mamoswine with Ice Shard, Metagross with Ice Punch, or Swampert with Ice Beam?

Anyhow, it's a shame that you can't practice this team over Wi-Fi. The best way to determine its effectiveness is to test it. If you get access to a DS-compatible access point anytime in the near future, let me know via Private Message and I'll test a few of my teams against yours.

I'm going to take every opportunity to test the team against my friends (albiet this will not be too useful as they are not competitive), to hopefully get somewhat of a feel for the team, and I'll continue to pray for a Shoddy2 release miracle. But if I do manage to find a new router then I'll be sure to give you a shout, and thankyou very much for the wall of advice, I'm incredibly grateful for it :).

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

I'd definitely keep Follow Me on your Togekiss. Even if it doesn't always help, it's still a very effective move in many situations. Also, when you practice with it, see if it survives more than four turns on average. If not, replace Leftovers with Sitrus Berry since one Sitrus Berry = four turns of Leftovers.

I can definitely support keeping your Tangrowth's EVs in Attack. Since you're getting rid of Swords Dance, you'll need those EVs to deal damage, especially with Earthquake and Rock Slide.

You don't have to get rid of your Typhlosion altogether if you don't want to. There are a lot of options. One of the more brutal ones I've seen is to use Protect on the Typhlosion while its partner uses Icy Wind. After that, Typhlosion should be faster than most everything and can use Eruption unhindered. You'd probably want to pack Charcoal, since Life Orb is taken by another Pokémon on your team. If you choose to use this strategy, you can look at your opponent's team before the match and decide which is safer, using Typhlosion with Togekiss, using it with the Icy Wind user, or not using it at all. The big caveat with the Icy Wind strategy is that you have to make sure your Typhlosion and Icy Wind user are out at the same time, which means you'll usually send them out first. So, no Sunny Day.

Anyhow, if you decide you do want to get rid of your Typhlosion, I probably wouldn't put a third Grass-type on the team. That could really limit your defensive versatility. If it were me, I'd probably avoid putting another Fire-type weakness on your team at all, what with Sunny Day. So that eliminates Mamoswine and Metagross. Personally, I like putting a Rock-type on a Sunny Day team because it can take Fire-type damage and threaten Fire-type opponents. But that's just me. You could also replace Typhlosion with another Fire-type, or if you're not comfortable with Eruption, you could just leave it off and keep using Typhlosion. Typhlosion's a solid Fire-type in general.

 

[Benlisted]

I'd definitely keep Follow Me on your Togekiss. Even if it doesn't always help, it's still a very effective move in many situations. Also, when you practice with it, see if it survives more than four turns on average. If not, replace Leftovers with Sitrus Berry since one Sitrus Berry = four turns of Leftovers.

Okay, I'll do that, never have thought of it otherwise tbh.

I can definitely support keeping your Tangrowth's EVs in Attack. Since you're getting rid of Swords Dance, you'll need those EVs to deal damage, especially with Earthquake and Rock Slide.

Again, will do. Unless I remove Eggy and put a Sleep powder over protect, but that is unlikely, I'd probably just forgo the sleep altogether.

You don't have to get rid of your Typhlosion altogether if you don't want to. There are a lot of options. One of the more brutal ones I've seen is to use Protect on the Typhlosion while its partner uses Icy Wind. After that, Typhlosion should be faster than most everything and can use Eruption unhindered. You'd probably want to pack Charcoal, since Life Orb is taken by another Pokémon on your team. If you choose to use this strategy, you can look at your opponent's team before the match and decide which is safer, using Typhlosion with Togekiss, using it with the Icy Wind user, or not using it at all. The big caveat with the Icy Wind strategy is that you have to make sure your Typhlosion and Icy Wind user are out at the same time, which means you'll usually send them out first. So, no Sunny Day.

I do rather like the strategy of Icy Wind and Eruption, but without Sun up the power of Eruption drastically falls, missing out on a fair few specially defensive pokemon's 2HKOs, which is my main issue with it. I'd much rather use it as a second two strategy, but whether it would be viable for me to try and time the deaths of both my leads to get them in is another matter, as is whether Sun would get more than 2 turns of use by Typhlosion with this idea. It is feasible I guess to put protect on Shiftry and switch him in first on the death of my first lead - then protect, then assuming my second dies the next turn, to send in Typhlosion and go from there. Either has risks I guess, and I can always mix up those three ideas.

I do also like the idea of being able to tailor Typhlosion's use to whether it looks like the enemy will have fast pokemon, spread attacks, or it'd be better to use my Grass Types. I'll try out a charcoal Typhlosion with a speed EV to outspeed most -1 things, rather than get rid of him. Shiftry in that case I guess is also a must, so I'll swap Eggy for it too.

My worry is still Dragons, however. I guess slowing them whilst hitting them with ice is damn useful, but I can see a team with 2+ dragons on giving mine hell. And Shiftry does really need sun up to be able to outspeed them, bar Dragonite.

Anyhow, if you decide you do want to get rid of your Typhlosion, I probably wouldn't put a third Grass-type on the team. That could really limit your defensive versatility. If it were me, I'd probably avoid putting another Fire-type weakness on your team at all, what with Sunny Day. So that eliminates Mamoswine and Metagross. Personally, I like putting a Rock-type on a Sunny Day team because it can take Fire-type damage and threaten Fire-type opponents. But that's just me. You could also replace Typhlosion with another Fire-type, or if you're not comfortable with Eruption, you could just leave it off and keep using Typhlosion. Typhlosion's a solid Fire-type in general.

I didn't really consider the possibility of a Dragon mincing my team with Fire Blast while I Ice Sharded and Rock Slided it with Tangrowth and Mamoswine, which I'd been running calcs on. I did find out that Eggy's Psychic and Mamo's Ice Shard will deal with even Yache Berry Dragons, however, and Tangrowth's Rock Slide can replace Psychic for the flying ones. However, you have sold Typhlosion to me, so I shall attempt that at least for the meantime, and see if my friend's dragons pose any trouble defensively without a dedicated counter.

I've tried Rock types on my Sun teams before in UU but have been underwhelmed. I've had a look through the list of Rock types, and of the ones not neutral to fire and able to take a hit there remains Regirock and Rhyperior as options, both of which pose a problem with an Earthquake weakness, and especially because Tangrowth and likely they will run EQ as well, and I only have two ground immunities. Their speed also puts me off to be honest, but if Typhlosion/Shiftry proves underwhelming I'll probably switch back to Eggy and try a Rhyperior in the final slot.

Thanks again for the epic rate.

Edit: Will alter OP once I decide on EV spreads for Shiftry and alterations to Typhlosion.

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

No problem. I really like your team and I'm happy to help with it. Good luck in the tournament!

Just one more piece of advice: do not, if you can possibly help it, let your opponent set up Rain Dance. Once they do, most of your Pokémon are in a very bad spot. Both of your Fire-types will succumb quickly to Water attacks (Infernape gets a short reprieve with Focus Sash) and neither of your Grass-types can take a powerful Ice Beam. If preventing Rain Dance means leading with both your Crobat and Togekiss and using some combination of Taunt/Sunny Day or Follow Me/Sunny Day, then so be it.

Also, watch out for Dark Void Smeargle. Apparently the UK tournament (the one I'm assuming this team is for) doesn't have Sleep Clause, despite the fact that they're using PBR. Good thing you have a Taunt Crobat with Lum Berry and Protect on a few allies.

 

[Benlisted]

No problem. I really like your team and I'm happy to help with it. Good luck in the tournament!

Just one more piece of advice: do not, if you can possibly help it, let your opponent set up Rain Dance. Once they do, most of your Pokémon are in a very bad spot. Both of your Fire-types will succumb quickly to Water attacks (Infernape gets a short reprieve with Focus Sash) and neither of your Grass-types can take a powerful Ice Beam. If preventing Rain Dance means leading with both your Crobat and Togekiss and using some combination of Taunt/Sunny Day or Follow Me/Sunny Day, then so be it.

Also, watch out for Dark Void Smeargle. Apparently the UK tournament (the one I'm assuming this team is for) doesn't have Sleep Clause, despite the fact that they're using PBR. Good thing you have a Taunt Crobat with Lum Berry and Protect on a few allies.

Thanks a lot, and yeah, hopefully with my experience using Sun in UU I'll be able to prevent rain getting up effectively in doubles as well. And if I can get sun up then Grass attacks simply tear rain dance teams apart. Smart switching may be needed to dodge ice attacks, but I'll see how it goes. One of my friends may be using a rain team so I can always test against that.

Sleep Clause is indeed absent, so I may be running a spare Chesto Berry somewhere on my team for that, possibly Shiftry. But in general lead Smeargle should be nicely dealt with by Infernape's Fake Out, then Vacuum Wave, while Crobat sets up Sun, or taunts it. The Berry on Crobat is to ward off surprise sleep or for if there is a more threatening pokemon out for Infernape to take. Protect and preemptive and chlorophyll boosted Sleep Powder and Explosions should also help me counter this.

The clauses are somewhat odd, I do wish the Lati@s twins were banned and that there were a sleep clause, but what can you do. Hopefully I will fare okay anyway :)

 

[Benlisted]

(Roughly) 24 hour bump, just to see if I can get anyone else's input.

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

Hey, sorry if I've talked your ear off already, but I wanted to weigh in on Typhlosion's new moveset. The way I see it, Focus Blast is the best candidate to be replaced by Protect. For one thing, its accuracy is just terrible. But even apart from that, let's look at your other moves. Eruption is a keeper because it's central to your strategy. Heat Wave is a very necessary STAB move for when your HP is low and Eruption won't be doing much damage. Furthermore, once your HP is below 1/3, Blaze will activate and make it as powerful as a full-HP Eruption. SolarBeam is your go-to move for two of the four types that resist your Fire-type attacks. It has the danger of auto-weather switch-ins like I mentioned previously, but its synergy with Fire-type attacks is too good to pass up on Typhlosion.

So what does Focus Blast get you? Neutral damage against Dragon and Fire-types. Half the Dragon-types are part-Flying anyway, though, and a full-power Eruption or Blaze-activated Heat Wave in the sun is going to do about as much damage as Focus Blast to most Fire and Dragon-types AND hit their partner AND have a much higher accuracy.

So the biggest thing you lose by dropping Focus Blast, really, is the ability to do any sort of damage at all to a Pokémon with Flash Fire (especially Heatran). But I'd say the benefits of Protect outweigh that. If you see that your opponent has a Pokémon that probably has Flash Fire, maybe don't bring Typhlosion into that match.

OK, that's my 2¢.

 

[Benlisted]

Haha don't worry, I appreciate the input, and I have a feeling my own talking has put anyone else off giving this a rate!

I downloaded Netbattle as it supports doubles, and had been using FB over Solarbeam there, however I do see your logic in using Solarbeam for coverage over Focus Blast. Heatran would definitely dissuade me from using Typh in the first place, and hopefully Tangrowth will be able to EQ flash fire users I spot to death. As for Dragons - Icy Wind does a decent amount of damage to them all, the fliers I have Rock Slide for too, and the Latis Dark Pulse. Chomp and Flygon are more fragile as well, so I'm hoping I can cope with them fairly well.

Anyway, NB has shown me a few things. If I have both Sun Setters I can easily keep Sun of for 4 KOs (NB seems to have to do 6v6), my only worry about it is with a lead combo with Ape and Crobat into Shiftry and Typhlosion, mostly due to protect's use by me. (Shiftry's speed is the issue here more than Typh's power.) Also, that Kiss needs your recommended Sitrus Berry, as especially with Follow Me it rarely survives over 3 turns. Finally, since the only game I lost, albeit closely, was to a team featuring a Mewtwo and Palkia, that this team does indeed work. The standard of battling on NB may not be too great, but even still, its a confidence booster :).

EDIT: TMN, if you do happen to look at this again, I've realised from reading your comments in another thread that several of my EV spreads are designed to outspeed something by 1 point at Lv100. Should I invest 4 more in each in order to make sure I can outrun the same spreads at Lv50, which I again think I neglected to mention this tournament is at?

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

I'm glad your team is testing so well! It's a shame that you can't practice on Wi-Fi. Maybe I'll sign up for NetBattle.

TMN, if you do happen to look at this again, I've realised from reading your comments in another thread that several of my EV spreads are designed to outspeed something by 1 point at Lv100. Should I invest 4 more in each in order to make sure I can outrun the same spreads at Lv50, which I again think I neglected to mention this tournament is at?

Yeah, sorry I didn't mention that before. Your EV spreads looked good at a glance (and they are good), so I didn't catch that you were EVing for Lv100. Basically, EVing at Lv50 is the same, but any fractional points get rounded off. So your Infernape will need 4 more Speed EVs, for example. You can take those 4 out of Attack without penalty since they're currently being rounded off anyway. This is all assuming you have a perfect 31 (or at least an odd number) in all the relevant stats.

EDIT: Hey, I just realized that we both have a Sunny Day team, but none of our Pokémon overlap (now that you've removed Exeggutor from your team). That's pretty cool.

 

[Benlisted]

Well, since I'm not RNGing and am simply going to be mass breeding in any case (with an AR's help) I'll most likely have to modify the spread of anything without quite perfect Speed IVs in any case.

But thanks, I had a feeling the game would simply cut in half stats, but I wasn't sure which way it would round. I'll do the math and note down some Lv50 EVs, but may as well leave the Lv100 ones up here for ease of reading. Nice to know that in a few cases I can easily take them out of other stats though!

And haha wow, not only do we both have a reasonably rare team (though there is a sudden influx of them at least in the RMT section), but entirely different pokemon? I'd put money on Jumpluff, Moltres and maybe a Heatran perhaps being in yours? Not much idea what the rest may be though, aside from a Rock of some form :P.

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

I'd put money on Jumpluff, Moltres and maybe a Heatran perhaps being in yours? Not much idea what the rest may be though, aside from a Rock of some form :P.

Sorry, but you'd lose that money! I don't use legends, so Moltres and Heatran are out, and I don't happen to have a Jumpluff on the team.

My team, for the record, is Cherrim, Arcanine, Aerodactyl, Torkoal, Exeggutor, and Hariyama.

 

[Benlisted]

Haha, a man after my own heart, I also dislike using legends. Also, wow, that team is pretty awesome, kudos on the Torkoal in particular!

At least I got a rock type right, but I'd never have guessed Aero.