I think investing in defense rather than HP is very inefficient. Unless you want to be able to take certain specific physical attacks better but even then, some HP investment would surely optimal. Also, Calm is the optimal nature because you get much more of a benefit adding 10% to base 140 Special defense than to base 70 defense
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Pokémon Goodra [REVAMP]
- Thread starter TaBuu
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I've been running this set with Acid Armor and Substitute to make it that much bulkier. Most damage is from hazards and the point is to just weaken everything by a fair margin for an easy sweep which it accomplishes very well. Biggest problem I've had so far is Crawdaunt with those knock offs.
Goodra @ Leftovers
Ability: Gooey
EVs: 248 HP / 24 Def / 236 SDef
Impish Nature
- Acid Armor
- Body Slam
- Dragon Tail
- Substitute
This spread puts both defenses right at or around 400 after an acid armor.
I'm running a rain dance hydration set. Primarily to provide support for my team in terms of fire resistance. It's poor defense is also mitigated by a reflect from my lead Klefki.
Nature: Calm
Item: Damp rock
Ability: Hydration
Dragon Pulse
Thunder
Rain dance
Rest
Great bulk and eats moon blast fully invested from Sylveon easy (-50%) dmg
Rain also allows for my team to benefit offensively and defensive helping Kabutops (swift swim) and Mega Mawile (fire is weakened) respectively.
Runs well on my trick room team too, murdering Garchomps daily.
Nature: Calm
Item: Damp rock
Ability: Hydration
Dragon Pulse
Thunder
Rain dance
Rest
Great bulk and eats moon blast fully invested from Sylveon easy (-50%) dmg
Rain also allows for my team to benefit offensively and defensive helping Kabutops (swift swim) and Mega Mawile (fire is weakened) respectively.
Runs well on my trick room team too, murdering Garchomps daily.
What would be considered the standard Goodra set? There seems to be so many viable options.
Depends on your teams needs. Assault vest with gooey ability is quite popular if you opt for full offense.
Assault Vest with Gooey isn't that good, IMO. Goodra wants its Leftovers, and the Grass immunity is more useful than Gooey, which requires a contact hit; Goodra can't really take physical hits all day to try and activate it.
I'd say that the standard is this:
Goodra @ Leftovers
252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 SpDef
Careful (I think it's careful. + SpDef, - Atk)
Sap Sipper
Dragon Pulse
Thunderbolt
Flamethrower
Toxic
I think some people run max SpA instead of SpDef, but this set is what I'm currently using. It's a great specially bulky pivot, and can hit back quite hard.
November Blue you goob, that's Calm you want, Careful cuts Special Attack.
Yeah I use a set almost identical to this, except with max Sp.Atk, Modest, and Draco Meteor > Pulse + Fire Blast > Flamethrower. I also have Gooey since I already have a Grass-type on my team, and pivot switching or even saccing Goodra to contact moves is pretty nifty if I do say so myself, though either of Goodra's abilities do not help it tremendously in the first place.
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No no no, you see, I actually wrote Careful on purpose! It was to uh... make sure that the rest of you were paying attention!
TBH, I'm still not sold on an ability for our good dragon. Sure, Gooey can be a great emergency stop to physical attackers, but the Grass immunity is... good, I guess? I haven't really found either to be useful. I guess Sap Sipper + Earthquake will be good for Heatran, but...
Is there something I'm missing?
Right...
Naw, that's probably the most mileage I'd think I'd see out of Sap Sipper too (maybe Power Whip for Rotom-W? But it now has to be wary of burns). Focus Blast hits Heatran nicely already though. Both of Goodra's usable abilities are pretty situational at best, and Sap Sipper sets that use entirely physical movepools might, if not will regret not using a stronger physical Dragon if they don't get the boost, which would be a lot of the time.
What's nice about Sap Sipper is that it gives Goodra immunity to Spore, Leech Seed, and the powder series of moves. I'm not really sold on the attack boost portion of it, since it gets a really nice special move-pool and suffers from four move slot syndrome. Adding physical attacks to that makes FMSS much more prominent.
I know a lot of people have recommended Dragon Tail sets, but you have to get any Faries out of the way otherwise they come in for free and threaten you out. However, it is important to note that most, if not all offensive Fairy types in OU are naturally slower than Goodra --- Mawile, Sylveon, Klefki (Prankster gives priority to non-offensive moves), Azumarill. The only exception is Togekiss, but unless you have something amazing like a boosted Sludge Bomb, you're not hitting it very hard as it has 115 base SDef, and most Togekiss are bulky nowadays. The main problem with Goodra is faster fellow dragon types, like Garchomp, Salamence, Haxorus, etc. Sure, you could room Gooey to slow them down, but I don't think the average player would let you revenge kill their slowed dragon so easily.
So, yes, I agree Goodra's ability is highly situation and dependent on team composition --- Hydration if you have enough rain support, Gooey if your team can take advantage of the slow, and Sap Sipper if you need grass immunity (which, honestly, seems the most practical to me as Goodra's typing is more beneficial than most common grass types out there).
I know a lot of people have recommended Dragon Tail sets, but you have to get any Faries out of the way otherwise they come in for free and threaten you out. However, it is important to note that most, if not all offensive Fairy types in OU are naturally slower than Goodra --- Mawile, Sylveon, Klefki (Prankster gives priority to non-offensive moves), Azumarill. The only exception is Togekiss, but unless you have something amazing like a boosted Sludge Bomb, you're not hitting it very hard as it has 115 base SDef, and most Togekiss are bulky nowadays. The main problem with Goodra is faster fellow dragon types, like Garchomp, Salamence, Haxorus, etc. Sure, you could room Gooey to slow them down, but I don't think the average player would let you revenge kill their slowed dragon so easily.
So, yes, I agree Goodra's ability is highly situation and dependent on team composition --- Hydration if you have enough rain support, Gooey if your team can take advantage of the slow, and Sap Sipper if you need grass immunity (which, honestly, seems the most practical to me as Goodra's typing is more beneficial than most common grass types out there).
Sap Sipper is good for a Mixed Goodra which i think can do okay overall.
Sap Sipper w/Leftovers
-insert proper nature- 240hp 16att 252spatt
Outrage
Earthquake
IceBeam
Thunderbolt/Flamethrower
With that being said Ive used this set on showdown and love it!
Gooey w/ Leftovers
Bold 252hp 240def 16spdef
Toxic
Infestation
DragonPulse
Sludgebomb/Flamethrower
Sure you get Toxic'd and you are screwed but with your defenses you can lock in something that cant hurt you much with Infestation, go for the Toxic, and just watch it die slowly. Ive done it to things like Confagrigus which can do nothing but try to set up in vain
Sap Sipper w/Leftovers
-insert proper nature- 240hp 16att 252spatt
Outrage
Earthquake
IceBeam
Thunderbolt/Flamethrower
With that being said Ive used this set on showdown and love it!
Gooey w/ Leftovers
Bold 252hp 240def 16spdef
Toxic
Infestation
DragonPulse
Sludgebomb/Flamethrower
Sure you get Toxic'd and you are screwed but with your defenses you can lock in something that cant hurt you much with Infestation, go for the Toxic, and just watch it die slowly. Ive done it to things like Confagrigus which can do nothing but try to set up in vain
People are focusing too much on the attack boost when it comes to discussing Sap Sipper. Storm Drain Gastrodon was awesome last gen because it made it immune to water, not because of the stat boost. Stat boosting abilities that activate when hit by a certain move but don't weaken the move are generally useless (sporadically useful maybe but not reliable) so you should ignore the Atk boost and focus on the immunity.
Yes, the immunity is the best part of the ability, but you might as well carry some physical moves to utilize the stat boost because unless you're running modest (and there's no point in doing that), his atk is higher than his SpA after a boost. I agree its not totally reliable, but that's why I like his mixed sets.
Yes and all Gastrodon users should make their Seaslugs fully physical support sets and ignore the Spatt boost from StormDrain too.
If you have the immunity....and in addition it boosts your stat....why not capitalize on that even a little!? Mixed Goodra could use Sap Sipper the best followed by a defensive set (in which maybe only EQ is your physical move lets say) so please cut the crap with a bad analogy. Sure some Gastros run EQ....but dont fool yourself into thinking the boost to Scald, Icebeam, or EarthPower arent appreciated
I've been thinking about switching my Goodra set up to
Goodra @ Leftovers
Ability: Hydration
EVs: 252 HP / 20 Def / 236 SDef
Impish Nature
- Acid Armor
- Rain Dance
- Aqua Tail
- Dragon Tail
Over Sub and Body Slam. Been having issues with damage output and being able to boost damage and still not have to worry about status with one moveslot seems like the answer. Of course it makes Azumaril public enemy #1 though.
I think you should capitalize on special attack and HP bulk because physical moves won't be optimimal like with sap sipper.
Mine set up is just an example but it's great because not only are you immune to spore and powder like with sap sipper but u also have good recovery. Damp rock helps a lot because I already have rest as recovery
I have a question for the people using acid armor ... isn't curse much more viable? It boosts defense and attack, making goodra's attack stronger. I mean ... it is basically a gooey version of curselax 
Congratulations on completely missing the point.
Of course the boost is appreciated on Gastrodon because you don't have to change his moves at all to accommodate it. He was running all special moves (except maybe Earthquake) and he didn't need to split EVs to go mixed because he invested fully in defenses anyway.
You should NOT change Goodra's moves and EVs to take advantage of a boost that will almost never happen. If the set has physical moves anyway, great, but don't change it to accommodate the ability because frankly the moves are much more important than the choice of ability when it comes to Goodra.
You missed the point...Mixed Goodra means mixed offensive where clearly you would have benefits from Sap Sipper. And if you are running a defensive set im not telling you to take 16evs off hp to but into attack...im saying having the occassional EQ on a defensive set could help if you receive the +1. Nor am i saying make his entire moveset physical to use up the boost but taking advantage of the boost is not bad either.
Sorry if this ruins your oh so perfect Goodra set. The point is Sap Sipper had great use on a mixed Goodra and can have more than one use on a defensive Goodra
What are you trying to prove by these posts exactly? That Sap Sipper gives a +1 attack boost? That a +1 attack boost is useful if you have physical moves? Everyone knows that.
What I'm saying is, some people are making posts along the lines of 'Sap Sipper is only good on a Goodra with physical moves' or 'you need to use physical moves if you're using Sap Sipper' which is obviously not true, the immunity is much more important than the attack boost. That's all.
I have a question for the people using acid armor ... isn't curse much more viable? It boosts defense and attack, making goodra's attack stronger. I mean ... it is basically a gooey version of curselax
Depends on what your strategy is. Curse means you will be a lot slower and Goodra already has decent speed. It also means you won't be able to wall Physical moves as quickly and give them more time to set up. In 2 turns Acid Armor would give you +4 def while 2 turns of Curse would drop your speed by 2 and give you +2 atk/def. If you are doing a stall set and want to force switches or slowly kill with poison, Acid Armor is faster. If you want to be a physical attacker then go with curse and a physical moveset.
BTW Curselax isn't really the best strategy and pretty easy to stop.
Personally I don't like having to mix EVs and natures. I like to play off Goodras strengths which is walling special moves and switching into grass moves/pokes. Its either try to be a Jack of all trades, master of none, Or try to be a master of one.
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