SM OU Mega-Venusaur Team

[Zann31]

Introduction​

**This is a team I’ve been playing with for a couple months now. It looked a little different at first, but this is where I’ve landed. I really like playing with this team, but it’s gotten a little stale, and it’s admittedly only so-so competitively (about 60-65%). While I built this team around Mega-Venusaur and Heatran, I’m willing to replace anything on the team (even those two “founders”) so any and all suggestions are welcome.**

Venusaur @ Venusaurite

Ability: Chlorophyll

Nature: Bold

EVs: 232 HP / 180 Def / 80 SpD / 16 Spe

Moves: Giga Drain | Leech Seed | Synthesis | Hidden Power [Fire]​

**This is the pokemon that the rest of the team is built around. It functions in a pretty standard Mega-Venusaur way, walling and stalling. It originally had Sludge Bomb, but I found myself using it to stall more often than not, so I replaced it with Leech Seed. The biggest issue I have is against things like Latios, since I don’t have anything that walls Psychic (my best option for that being Azumarill). I’ve tried different things to fix that problem but haven’t come up with much on my own besides just playing and predicting smarter.**

Heatran @ Grassium Z

Ability: Flash Fire

Nature: Timid

EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe

IVs: 0 Atk

Moves: Magma Storm | Earth Power | Solar Beam | Toxic​

**Heatran makes up the second part of the Mega-Venusaur/Heatran core that this team is built around. Heatran does it’s thing as a Special Sweeper. The only change this ‘mon has seen is that it started with Stealth Rock instead of Toxic. Stealth Rock on Heatran ended up being redundant and almost never used since I was always using it with Landorus-T, so Toxic has been a very helpful substitute.**

Zapdos @ Leftovers

Ability: Pressure

Nature: Bold

EVs: 248 HP / 244 Def / 16 Spe

Moves: Discharge | Roost | Heat Wave | Defog​

**Zapdos is here first and foremost for Defog. It fits in with the tankier playstyle of the team, and discharge is a much needed coverage move. I went with Heat Wave over HP Ice because I found the burn chance very helpful and the type coverage was better, particularly with Kyurem-B and Landorus-T (HP Ice) taking care of Ice coverage.**

Landorus-Therian @ Rocky Helmet

Ability: Intimidate

Nature: Impish

EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe

Moves: Earthquake | Stealth Rock | Hidden Power [Ice] | Stone Edge​

**Landorus-T is here because it has to be on every team, right? But seriously, Landorus-T got this spot first for Stealth Rock, and (as a close second) for Earthquake. It started out with U-Turn instead of Stone Edge because I wasn’t using U-Turn very much, and I was having trouble with Pheromosa and MegaZard-Y. Now that Pheromosa’s out of OU (yay!) and Kyurem-B is my MegaZard-Y counter (more on that later) there may be reason enough to give U-Turn a second chance. I’m also think about moving some EV’s around to put more in Special Attack since I find I use HP Ice a lot - so suggestions on what to do there are especially wlecome.**

Kyurem-Black @ Choice Scarf

Ability: Teravolt

Nature: Naive

EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe

Moves: Ice Beam | Fusion Bolt | Iron Head | Outrage​

**At this point in development, this team was severely lacking in true power. Enter Kyurem-B. It filled in a lot of gaps for type coverage, and it’s an awesome wall breaker, which I felt I needed. Originally, it started with a Choice Band, but after I kept losing to MegaZard-Y’s (really, I was losing out to a lot of faster threats, but it felt like it was always a MegaZard-Y) I decided to try doubling down on speed and going with Naive AND Scarf. I’ve loved it so far. It catches most by surprise and (though not perfect) can often turn the tide for me.**

Azumarill @ Assault Vest

Ability: Huge Power

Nature: Adamant

EVs: 240 HP / 252 Atk / 16 SpD

Moves: Play Rough | Waterfall | Aqua Jet | Knock Off​

**This ‘mon got the spot because it just kind of fit what I was missing. Defensively, it filled some big holes both with typing (particularly Fairy) and the Assault Vest boosted stats. Knock off was a must have, something I learned early with great difficulty against Chanseys. As I mentioned before, this team is not particularly fast, so the priority from Aqua Jet is helpful - except when Psychic Terrain is up, which brings us back to the aforementioned difficulty with Psychic types.**

Conclusion​

**I think one of the issues with this team is that it's perhaps a little too "all-around." It does a lot of things pretty well, and covers a lot of the bases, but it doesn't seem to do any one thing really well. Thanks in advance for the help. Fun fact: this is not only my first RMT post, it is, in fact, my first ever post on any of the forums. Thanks again!**

Importable

Venusaur @ Venusaurite

Ability: Chlorophyll

EVs: 232 HP / 180 Def / 80 SpD / 16 Spe

Bold Nature

- Giga Drain

- Leech Seed

- Synthesis

- Hidden Power [Fire]


Heatran @ Grassium Z

Ability: Flash Fire

Shiny: Yes

EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe

Timid Nature

IVs: 0 Atk

- Magma Storm

- Earth Power

- Solar Beam

- Toxic


Zapdos @ Leftovers

Ability: Pressure

EVs: 248 HP / 244 Def / 16 Spe

Bold Nature

- Discharge

- Roost

- Heat Wave

- Defog


Landorus-Therian @ Rocky Helmet

Ability: Intimidate

Shiny: Yes

EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe

Impish Nature

- Earthquake

- Stealth Rock

- Hidden Power [Ice]

- Stone Edge


Kyurem-Black @ Choice Scarf

Ability: Teravolt

Shiny: Yes

EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe

Naive Nature

- Ice Beam

- Fusion Bolt

- Iron Head

- Outrage


Azumarill @ Assault Vest

Ability: Huge Power

EVs: 240 HP / 252 Atk / 16 SpD

Adamant Nature

- Play Rough

- Waterfall

- Aqua Jet

- Knock Off

 

[ThirdXavier]

Your defensive core is kinda weak. Mega Venusaur and Zapdos are both good mons, however defensively they don't have perfect synergy together, because although Zapdos beats the Flying-type attackers Venusaur loses to, it doesn't beat the Psychic type attackers Venusaur loses to. Overall you don't really have options to deal with Psychic type attackers in general because Heatran can just get OHKOed by Focus Blasts and isn't invested defensively. To help mitigate this problem, I recommend you replace Zapdos with specially defensive Celesteela, who beats both types of attackers that Venusaur loses to as well as retaining the very useful ground immunity.

That will leave you missing Defog, so I also recommend you replace Azumarill with Calm Mind Tapu Fini with a set of CM/Scald/Moonblast/Defog, who sports the same typing but has much better natural bulk and can be much more offensively threatening since it'll give you a Pokemon that can set up, giving you a win condition that your team really needs. If you still feel like you need Knock Off, you could make room for it on Landorus-T by replacing Stone Edge or HP Ice.

Finally, running Toxic on Heatran with Magma Storm feels pretty redundant. You could run Taunt instead because that will do an even better job of helping to shut down mons that you need to stall than Toxic will, but if Toxic is helping other members of your team stall people out more than you think Taunt would then go for it.