======================================= Pokemon Diamond/Pearl/Platinum Version ======================================= Strategies and Counter Strategies FAQ By Sui89 Version 3.0 Started on 8/5/07 Last modified on 10/23/08 The latest version can always be found at GameFAQs. ===================== I. Table of Contents ===================== I. Table of Contents II. Version Information III. Introduction A. Introduction B. Purpose Statement (updated!) C. E-mail Policy IV. Frequently Asked Questions (updated!) V. Before You Start Your Team A. Important Terms B. Strategy Explanations C. Natures D. EVs and IVs E. Clauses F. Official Rules and Classifications (updated!) VI. Status Conditions and Move Specifics A. Primary Ailments (updated!) B. Secondary Ailments C. Weather Conditions D. The Trapping Moves E. Spikes F. Hidden Power (updated!) VII. Things to Keep in Mind... (updated!) VIII. Move Prediction In Battle (NEW!) A. Why do I need to switch to be successful? B) How do I know when it's advantageous to switch? C) General Suggestions for Prediction Success IX. Team Synergy (NEW!) A) What is Team Synergy? B) Why do I need Team Synergy to have a good team? C) General Suggestions for Team Synergy X. Team Building - Overused Metagame (NEW!) A. Picking Your Team B. Assigning Your EVs and Natures C. Picking Your Abilities D. Picking Your Move Sets E. Picking Your Hold Items F. Breeding and EV Training G. Leveling and Finalizing H. Strategy Explanation (NEW!) XI. Team Building - Underused Metagame (NEW!) A. Picking Your Team B. Assigning Your EVs and Natures C. Picking Your Abilities D. Picking Your Move Sets E. Picking Your Hold Items F. Breeding and EV Training G. Leveling and Finalizing H. Strategy Explanation (NEW!) XII. Suggestions for Specific Strategies A. Physical Sweeping B. Special Sweeping C. Physical Wall D. Special Wall E. Mixed Sweeping F. Mixed Wall G. Specialized Team H. Baton Passing I. Choice Teams J. Annoyer XIII. Counter Strategies A. Countering Physical Sweepers B. Countering Special Sweepers C. Countering Physical Walls D. Countering Special Walls E. Countering Mixed Sweepers F. Countering Mixed Walls G. Countering Specialized Teams H. Countering Baton Passers I. Countering Choice Teams J. Countering Annoyers XIV. Building a Baton Pass Team A. Type Selection B. Pokemon Selection C. Move Selection (updated!) D. Order Selection E. Final Touches XV. Completed Examples of EV Spreads and Move Sets XVI. Additional Resources XVII. Acknowledgments (updated!) XVIII. Contact Information XIX. Copyright (updated!) ======================== II. Version Information ======================== Version 3.0 - More lots of stuff was added! I added the entire UU team building section as well as adding a team strategy explanation to the end of both the OU and the UU sections, since I realized I never explained the strategy to use for each of the example teams. In addition, I also added a prediction/switching section, since that was suggested to me in an e-mail and I thought this was a really good idea since it explained a lot about why I choose the moves and Pokemon I do for the examples. I also fixed a mistake about Gliscor in the Baton Passing section. Other random mistakes I noticed were fixed. And I updated the credits again. Version 2.5 - Holy crap did I do a lot for this update. Let's see. First off, I rehashed pretty much the entire thing. I decided to redo the main section of the FAQ completely, splitting it into OU and UU sections for team building. OU section was completed. The UU section will be added with the next update (hopefully tomorrow). Baton Passing section was kind of redone, after some things I realized I did stupidly thanks to some e-mails. I also added in the tier lists since Smogon just redid those a couple of weeks ago (adding Garchomp to the ubers, being the main thing). I took out the "Specific Pokemon Counters" section since that was really outdated and was causing problems and was relatively little use (the rise of bulky waters and the fall of Skarmory, for example, made the section on Skarmory a little excessive while there was nothing on bulky waters). I fixed a couple errors here and there, added or removed a couple paragraphs here and there to more accurately state things. Hopefully the FAQ should feel more up to date now instead of being so horribly out of date. I also redid my purpose statement to more accurately reflect my thoughts of how you should battle (changing my initial statement of using want you want to using what you want, while sticking within the tier that you're building for). Also updated the list of allowed sites and the acknowledgements! Version 2.0 - Added a section especially for Baton Passing! Exciting. Hopefully people will find it informative, since the strategy is my personal favorite. Also, I've been told that I should add a section on weather teams. I might research this some and add something on this in future updates. Oh, also I took out some of the specific Pokemon counters I was never going to add. Version 1.76 - Been a while again. Sorry. I've got some more e-mail fixes I thought I should probably get in. Along with some potentially updated movesets for my examples and some typos. I've got a little time coming up, so maybe I'll have time to get in some new relevant content. Version 1.75 - Been a while since the last update. Unfortunately, this one is just minor. I got some suggestions via e-mail I thought were relevant, so I added them. Also removed the tier list I had since it was not only not official, but also outdated now. I've posted the link to Smogon's tier list now. Also added two secondary ailments and corrected something in the poison ailment section. In addition, I've changed some movesets I'm not happy with. If I didn't post anything different, I'm still thinking about them and will add my decisions to the next update. Added a couple questions to the FAQ too. Version 1.72 - Updated the list of specific strategies to be added. Updated information on Blissey's counter. Fixed an error involving Stealth Rock. Added some alternate strategies provided by Surging_Chaos via e-mail to me. Updated the FAQ section. Version 1.71 - Updated e-mail policy. Added more specific strategies. Added more stuff to EV training section. Version 1.7 - Added the "Trapping Moves" and "Spikes" sections. Reformatted to make status ailments a seperate section entirely and added move specifics to the category for additions planned on later updates. Added a couple of specific Pokemon counters. Version 1.61 - Fixed another few dumb errors. Added a couple paragraphs to the counter strategies section. Version 1.6 - Added quite a few status ailments to the list, along with a couple different additional ways to counter certain strategies. Fixed a ton of typos and little stupid mistakes. Also added a weather conditions and resource section. Version 1.5 - Added a counter strategy section and specific Pokemon counters section. Version 1.1 - Added the "Suggestions for Specific Strategies" section in order to try to accomodate people who wanted more to learn by than the specific example I showed in the team building section of this FAQ. Version 1.01 - Corrected some typos and errors in information certain people pointed out to me while I was having this proofed. Added several more "things to keep in mind" and subdivided things a little more. Version 1.0 - Finished all major sections of the FAQ. Currently proofing for typos, missing information, and just generally improving upon the whole thing before submitted for posting. Upon finishing, will be ready for submission. Version 0.X - Just starting this FAQ. Getting formating set up, as well as deciding on things to put in. Not yet ready for public viewing. ================== III. Introduction ================== A. Introduction ================ Hey all! If you're reading this, you're probably looking for information on team building in either Pokemon Diamond, Pearl, or Platinum for the Nintendo DS. My name is David, but I'm known everywhere online as Sui, or some variation of that name. As far as guides go, I've written a couple before, although I mainly specialize in rating characters in certain RPGs, so this particular type of guide is fairly new to me. Hopefully I do a good enough job that you'll all want to come back here to get more helpful tips. ^_^ B. Purpose Statement ===================== The purpose of this guide is to provide suggestions for you to make a CREATIVE competitive battling team. Too many times people only copy movesets or use only the most powerful combinations of Pokemon or the like with their teams. I say no to that, and decide to use other Pokemon, maybe less used, with better strategy. This guide is here to provide you with suggestions for using the Pokemon that you LIKE in your competitive team, and not just the "most powerful" like everyone else. This guide will attempt to teach via example (which is the best way I could think of). If you're not getting the drift of what I'm saying, and would like some help with your struggles, please feel free to e-mail me about it (see below). In addition to simply making your team, the purpose of this FAQ is to provide many explanations of different strategies in order to properly USE your team, and to counter other teams you might be having trouble with. However, just because you should use what you like does not mean that you should battle unrealistically. You should always try to stick within the tier you're building your team for. C. E-mail Policy ================= If you see anything wrong or missing in my guide, please feel free to e-mail about it. I also love to hear from people just about what they thought about my guide. So if you find something helpful, or feel that you could give me some constructive criticism, please e-mail me about it. So to sum it up: I WILL answer e-mails concerning: Questions that involve something not mentioned in the guide Something I missed in my guide Suggestions on how to make my guide better Arguments about opinions (as long as they're in an intelligent manner) Letting me know what you thought of my guide Other things you may just want to talk about (opinions, etc.) I WILL NOT answer e-mails concerning: Flaming of any sort Questions that have already been answered in the guide Anything that's stated in a disrespectful manor Anything else of the above sort Something that can EASILY be found on Serebii or another site if you put out the effort to do it And there you have it. That's what I will and will not answer. As a main rule, I'll usually answer anything that's stated politely, and will give a kind reply to e-mails as such. If not, you'll likely not receive a reply. Also, if you do send an e-mail to me, make the title something along the lines of "Pokemon FAQ" so I know which of my FAQs you're talking about and I don't ignore your message thinking it's spam. UPDATE TO POLICY Do NOT e-mail questions like "Where do you find Pokemon?" Or "Is move a TM?" Or pretty much ANY piece of technical information that you could really easily find on Serebii. It's annoying, and I'll be ignoring anyone who sends me these types of questions from now on. UPDATE FOR 1.75 TO POLICY If you do not tell me SPECIFICALLY what you have on your team at the VERY least, I probably will not even reply. So at the very least, I have to know what Pokemon you're thinking of. Do not just tell me types and jobs the types will do. This is not enough, it's not especially relevant, and I will no longer reply to e-mails if you only give me that much information. =============================== IV. Frequently Asked Questions =============================== Q: Where do I look to find a Pokemon's move pool? A: I use http://www.serebii.net. If you don't like it, google it. I'm sure you'll find something. Q. Where do I look to find a Pokemon's base stats and stat line? A: Serebii. Q. Where do I look to find a... A. Serebii. I've seriously never found any piece of technical information about this game that I couldn't find at that site. Check there first. Chances are they'll have what you're looking for. Q. Why don't you like those Pokemon? I think they're TEHZOMG RAWK!!!111!!! A. I dislike how people don't have the mind to make an effective special wall that isn't Blissey, and I hate how overused things like that get and how boring it makes the battles. Being creative and just using what you like makes things tons more fun. And we all know that more fun = win. Q. In your FAQ, you said that should use . I think that he's better off doing . A. The strategy you're talking about may be equally effective as the one I mentioned using in here. I'd have to test it out. However, the teams that I make are designed to work TOGETHER, and thus, each and every move (most of the time) serves a purpose in being there. Q. Rate my team! A. No. I'll help you determine things, I won't rate it for you. Q. Make me a team! A. No. I'll help you determine things, I won't make anything for you. Q. Why is Wobbuffet considered an uber? Everyone else on that list is a legendary! A. I've decided to redo my answer on this, since it wasn't completely accurate before. Encore and Shadow Tag make sure that if a Pokemon, for some reason, uses an attacking move on Wobbuffet, you will know how to counter. However, if a non-attacking move is used, Wobbuffet can simply switch out and switch back in after the opponent switches to an appropriate counter. Thus, Wobbuffet is just nearly impossible to counter and was banned from standard play. Q. Can I trade/battle with you? What's your friend code? A. My Wifi sucks, so sorry, but no. I've got about 30 Pokemon left to finish my Dex, and that's all I'll be using my Wifi for, since it's a pain to set up everytime. Q. What's your favorite Pokemon? A. Umbreon. Thanks for asking. ^_^ Q. Where do you get Pokemon? A. Look it up on Serebii and DONT EMAIL ME ABOUT IT. If you're lazy enough to not look up such a simple piece of information, I don't see why I can't be lazy enough to not answer your question. Q. Can you make me a suggestion about who to use on my team? A. See "Make me a team!" Because ITS THE SAME QUESTION. Up until now, I've been pretty good about replying nicely to e-mails like this. But I'm no longer going to give people a reply if they send me stupid questoins like that. I'll only provide help if you give me an IDEA of who want to use, or if you're looking for a last slot type of thing, or something alone those lines. Q. I've got of Pokemon that are sweepers/walls on my team! Can you give me suggestions on what else to put on? A. No. If you do not tell me SPECIFICALLY what you have on your team at the VERY least, I probably will not even reply. So at the very least, I have to know what Pokemon you're thinking of. Q. Why is Garchomp uber now? I loved using him on my team! A. First of all, I hate you for using Garchomp. Secondly, Garchomp was banned for similar reasons to Wobbuffet, in that he was just incredibly difficult to find a counter for. About the only thing that could kill it was Ice Beam. But no one is dumb enough to not switch out when they see something that probably has Ice Beam. Everything else takes many hits to kill it. Meanwhile, Garchomp builds with Swords Dance, and then sweeps the rest of your time. And this is assuming Garchomp DIDNT have a Yache Berry, which is a very common item for it to have. Needless to say, Garchomp was deemed too powerful for regular competitive play and banned. Q. Why did you take out the old team you used for this FAQ and rewrite pretty much the entire thing? A. I redid it because it was outdated, and people were nagging me about my FAQ being outdated. So I redid the main section to stick to the tiers while using what I want, in order to more accurately show how you should build teams for competitive purposes. Don't expect a rehash like this too often though. I can't keep up with Smogon's constant updates of the tier lists or anything. I just wanted to at least be kind of up to date with the release of Platinum and such. Q. I loved your FAQ/saw something wrong/just wanted to comment! A. Great! E-mail me, and I'll be happy to talk to you about whatever you're sending me a message about. See my contact information for my address and be sure to follow my e-mail policy! Q. I sent you a correction/suggestion you said you'd add, but you didn't! A. If you sent me a correction or something in the seven or so months I did not update the FAQ, I'm sorry, but I've since forgotten what exactly you said. I know there were a couple things, but I don't have the time to search through my e-mail to find all of them right now. So feel free to send them again if you want, and I'll make sure I actually add them now since I'm feeling more up to updating this thing now than I have been. More frequently asked questions may be added at a further date if I receive a bunch of the same questions via e-mail. ============================== V. Before You Start Your Team ============================== A. Important Terms =================== In order to fully understand my guide, there are a couple of terms you'll need to know beforehand. These may include: EVs - Effort Values (explained later) IVs - Individual Values (explained later) Clauses - The "rules" for the battle, so to speak. They often place restrictions on movesets, hold items, or the like. Natures - Listed on the Pokemon's status page, these affect different stat gains and caps for the Pokemon, depending on the nature. Egg Moves - These are moves that the Pokemon can only acquire through breeding. These are never learned through level up, and cannot be learned via TMs. Sweeper - A Pokemon that is meant to deal out damage fast and hard. Wall - A Pokemon that's meant to be able to soak up damage for long periods of time in a battle. Lead - The Pokemon you first throw out in a battle. These are meant to take out the enemy's lead before you get KO'd yourself. Tier/Tier List - The list from Nintendo stating which Pokemon are in which "category" of competitive play. Diamond and Pearl do not yet have one of these. STAB - Stands for SAME TYPE ATTACK BONUS. It's when a Pokemon uses a move that is the same type as it. It receives a x1.5 power boost when it's used. HP - Stands for "Hit Points" or "Hidden Power" More terms may be added at a later date if deemed necessary. B. Strategy Explanations ========================= Before building your team, you'll need to have a basic understanding for what exactly you want your team to DO. Most teams are hybrids of what's below, so mix and match as you deem necessary. A "standard" team is usually consisting of two physical sweepers, two special sweepers, a physical wall, and a special wall. Physical Sweeping - A physical sweeper is a Pokemon that has good to excellent attack, meaning that it will deal more damage if the enemy has lower defense. Examples of physical sweepers include Electivire, Scizor, etc etc. Special Sweeping - A special sweeper is a Pokemon that has good to excellent special attack, meaning that it will deal more damage if the enemy has lower special defense. Examples of special sweepers include Porygon Z, Alakazam, etc etc. Physical Wall - A physical wall is a Pokemon that has good to excellent defense, meaning that it will soak up more damage if the enemy has lower attack. Physical walls include Steelix, Golem, Miltank, etc etc. Special Wall - A special wall is a Pokemon that has good to excellent special defense, meaning that it will soak up more damage if the enemy has lower special attack. Special walls include Blissey, Cresselia, etc etc. Mixed Sweeping - A mixed sweeper is a Pokemon that has good to excellent stats in both the attack and special attack areas, meaning that it can deal a good amount of damage no matter what type the attack may be, be it physical or special. An example of a mixed sweeper is Lucario. Mixed Wall - A mixed wall is a Pokemon that has good to excellent stats in both the defense and special defense areas, meaning that it can soak up damage, no matter what attack the opponent uses. There are very few of these. An example of a mixed wall is Umbreon. Specialized Team - A specialized team is a team that has a common theme to it, whether it be type, region, "cute", "cool", a certain move, a certain status condition it causes, etc etc. A simple example of a specialized team by the water type would be Starmie, Blastoise, Cloyster, Lanturn, Lapras, and Vaporeon. Baton Passing - Baton Passing is a very specific strategy that revolves around the move "Baton Pass". Only a very select number of Pokemon can learn the move, so using the strategy requires very careful planning. What Baton Pass does is it "passes" the current conditions of the battle on to your next Pokemon without resetting the conditions like normally would happen. A common reason for doing this is for using moves such as Iron Defense, Aqua Ring, or Swords Dance with one Pokemon, and then passing them on to your next Pokemon to sweep with especially good results due to boosted stats. Choice Team - There are certain items known as the "choice" items. These items make it so that you can use only one move (the first one you use) until you withdraw that Pokemon. However, they give you a x1.5 bonus on attack, speed, or special attack, depending on which of the items you're using. In certain situations, this can be a very effective strategy to use. Annoyer - In an Annoyer team, your main focus is using whatever status ailment/stat boosting move you need to tick off your foe. My personal annoyer strategy is the confusion strategy. But you could also do paralysis, attraction, and the like. More strategies may be added later upon consideration or popular request. C. Natures =========== The nature of your Pokemon affects, to a certain extent, what your Pokemon will be good at, and what it will lack in. Typically, you want physical sweepers to have an attack boosting natures and physical walls to have a defense boosting nature, and so on. There are exceptions, and only you can tell what is best to boost for your strategy. The following are all the natures in the game and what each boosts and declines. Hardy - Nothing raised or lowered. Lonely - Attack raised. Defense lowered. Brave - Attack raised. Speed lowered. Adamant - Attack raised. Special attack lowered. Naughty - Attack raised. Special defense lowered. Bold - Defense raised. Attack lowered. Docile - Nothing raised or lowered. Relaxed - Defense raised. Speed lowered. Impish - Defense raised. Special attack lowered. Lax - Defense raised. Special defense lowered. Timid - Speed raised. Attack lowered. Hasty - Speed raised. Defense lowered. Serious - Nothing raised or lowered. Jolly - Speed raised. Special attack lowered. Naive - Speed raised. Special defense lowered. Modest - Special attack raised. Attack lowered. Mild - Special attack raised. Defense lowered. Quiet - Special attack raised. Speed lowered. Bashful - Nothing raised or lowered. Rash - Special attack raised. Special defense lowered. Calm - Special defense raised. Attack lowered. Gentle - Special defense raised. Defense lowered Sassy - Special defense raised. Speed lowered. Careful - Special defense raised. Special attack lowered. Quirky - Nothing raised or lowered. HP is the one stat that you can neither raise nor lower via the Pokemon's nature no matter what, since no nature affecting this stat exists. Of note to natures and BREEDING is the fact that natures are passed on more assuredly through an Everstone. If you give a parent an Everstone, the child will have a 50% chance of inheriting the nature of that parent. Breeding for a specific nature is quite a bit more manageable thanks to this trick! Certain strategies usually carry certain natures for the Pokemon in them. They are as follows: Physical Sweeper: Adamant or Jolly Special Sweeper: Modest or Timid Physical Wall: Bold, Impish, or Relaxed Special Wall: Calm, Careful, or Sassy Mixed Wall: Bold, Impish, Relaxed, Calm, Careful, or Sassy Mixed Sweepers: Depends on the Pokemon and situation Needless to say, the specific nature you should have often depends on the Pokemon you're using, and the above suggestions should be taken with a grain of salt. D. EVs and IVs =============== EVs, short for "effort values", and IVs, short for "individual values" greatly affect your Pokemon's final stats at level 100. I'll start with EVs. EVs are what make trainer Pokemon better than Pokemon in the wild. Each Pokemon you kill increases a Pokemon's EVs by a certain amount in a certain stat. When you get four EVs of one stat, that will equal one point of the actual stat when the Pokemon is at level 100. You can have a total of 510 EVs total, with the max in a specific stat being 255. 255, however, is not divisible by four. Thus, most EV trained Pokemon have 252 EVs in two stats, and 6 in another. Two of the six points of the last stat will go unused no matter what, since six is also not divisible by four. 252 EVs in a stat means at level 100, your Pokemon will have 63 more points of a certain stat than if you had not EV trained it. You will accumulate EVs naturally throughout the game. However, these will be random, and it's highly recommended you do not use your in game team for your post-game uses because of this. Instead, EV train your Pokemon against certain things in the wild fresh after you've beaten the game. Good sources for EV training are: HP - Wooper (1 point) and Quagsire (2 points) - Route 212 Attack - South of Solaceon Town - Bibarel (2 points); Right of Celestic Town - Machop (1 point), Machoke (2 points), Bibarel (2 points), Kricketune (2 points) Defense - Iron Island - Onix (1 point), Steelix (2 Points), Graveler(2 points) Special Attack - Old Chateau - Ghastly (1 point) - Haunter and Gengar (2 and 3 points respectively) will appear if you have a GBA Pokemon game inserted in your DS (room with picture with glowing eyes only), Golduck (2 points) - Resort Area (Surf) Special Defense - Route 223 (Surf) - Mantyke (1 point), Tentacruel (2 points) Speed - Poliwag (1 point) and Poliwhirl (2 points) - Route 228 (Surf) Also of note is in Solaceon Town's Ruins. Unown give 1 point of attack and 1 point of special attack, which makes them good to train mixed sweepers against. In addition to defeating Pokemon in order to gain EVs, you can also use vitamins in order to raise your EVs. Vitamins can be used to gain 100 EVs in a stat, up to 51 vitamins (which will put you at the EV limit), at 10 EVs gained per vitamin taken. However, these 100 EVs must be the FIRST 100 EVs added. In other words, the game will let you give a Pokemon vitamins until a Pokemon has a TOTAL of 100 EVs in that stat. The vitamins that increase each EV are as follows: HP Up: Hit Points Protein: Attack Iron: Defense Calcium: Special Attack Zinc: Special Defense Carbos: Speed In addition to raising EVs, you can also REDUCE your EVs if you accidentally gave a Pokemon some EVs you didn't want them to have, or something like that. You do this via special berries (the one's that say "Raise happiness, but lower X base stat"). The first berry you give them will lower their EV total down to 100 (no matter where it was at before that), assuming it was above that total. Each additional one after that will reduce the EV by 10, until you don't have anything left to take off. The berries that reduce each stat are as follows: Hit Point EVs: Pomeg Berry Attack EVs: Kelpsy Berry Defense EVs: Qualot Berry Special Attack EVs: Hondew berry Special Defense EVs: Grepa berry Speed EVs: Tamato Berry IVs, unlike EVs, are predetermined from the time you hatch or catch a Pokemon. Like EVs, they add to stats at level 100. The number can be anything from 0 to 31, and that number is the raw number that is added on to the stat at level 100. To determine what your IVs are exactly, have someone do a Wifi battle with you, record their stats, and then shut the power off. Then use a site like Serebii (or Google "Pokemon IV calculator" if you need to) use an IV calculator to calculate what the IVs are. The reason for the level 100 battle is so that you get a more accurate reading. If you breed instead of catching, IVs are inherited from the parents. Although there isn't a way of determining which IV will be passed down from each parent. Generally, getting good IVs takes a lot of random luck, so getting good ones isn't something that I necessarily recommend doing unless you have a lot of time to kill. E. Clauses =========== Clauses are essentially the "rules" of a specific battle. If you know that you'll be facing people who will likely implement a certain clause for your battle, it's a good idea to make your team abide by certain clauses. Common clauses include the sleep clause, which limits the number of Pokemon on each side that can be asleep at a time to one (excludes sleep induced by Rest), evasion clause, which prohibits the use of moves like Double Team, and the like. I won't be providing a complete list of clauses, since that is far too many to provide, but just check with people you might battle with to see if they put any clauses in effect for their battles. F. Official Rules and Classifications ====================================== AKA the tier lists. At Nintendo events, Pokemon are divided up into different "tiers". What your team is made up of determines which events you can classify for, and tiers determine what your team splits into. The different tiers are the "Ubers", who are considered too good for any competitive play except against other ubers, the "Overused", who are considered the best of best when it comes to legal Pokemon to use, the "Borderline", who are just below the overused, the "Moderately used", who are below borderline, the "Underused", who are below the moderately used, and the "Never used", who are below that. Generally, the higher up you are, the more powerful you are. However, do NOT get the idea that because you're against someone who has something lower on the list than you that you will win. Strategy is key to everything, and if you do not know how to USE the Pokemon on your team with proper strategy, it's completely possible for something like a moderately used or underused Pokemon to beat an uber. I've done it myself before. However, for all intensive purposes, the tiers that exist now are ubers, overused, borderline, and underused (and the NFE, which stands for not fully evolved, but hardly anyone plays this metagame). There are typically three types of battles. Uber battles, "standard" battles (which are Pokemon in the OU tier), and BL/UU battles, which is everything below the OU tier. Since the tier list was JUST updated, I'll list the tier list here again. However, It's updated a quite often every year, so if you haven't seen an update on this FAQ in a while, check this site to see the current tiers: http://www.smogon.com/dp/tiers/ UBERS Arceus Darkrai Deoxys Deoxys - A Deoxys - D Dialga Garchomp Giratina Groudon Ho-oh Kyogre Latias Latios Lugia Manaphy Mew Mewtwo Palkia Rayquaza Wobbuffet OVERUSED Aerodactyl Alakazam Azelf Blissey Breloom Bronzong Celebi Cresselia Deoxys - S Donphan Dragonite Dugtrio Dusknoir Electivire Forretress Gallade Gengar Gyarados Heatran Heracross Hippowdon Infernape Jirachi Jolteon Lucario Machamp Magnezone Mamoswine Metagross Milotic Ninjask Porygon-Z Roserade Salamence Scizor Skarmory Snorlax Spiritomb Starmie Suicune Swampert Tentacruel Togekiss Tyranitar Vaporeon Weavile Yanmega Zapdos BORDERLINE Abomasnow Ambipom Arcanine Azumarill Blaziken Charizard Crobat Empoleon Entei Espeon Exeggutor Feraligatr Floatzel Flygon Gardevoir Hariyama Honchkrow Houndoom Lickilicky Ludicolo Magmortar Marowak Medicham Mesprit Mismagius Moltres Pinsir Porygon2 Raikou Rampardos Regice Regigigas Regirock Registeel Rhyperior Sceptile Shaymin Slaking Smeargle Staraptor Tangrowth Tauros Torterra Typhlosion Umbreon Ursaring Uxie Zangoose UNDERUSED Absol Aggron Altaria Ampharos Arbok Ariados Armaldo Articuno Banette Bastiodon Beautifly Beedrill Bellossom Bibarel Blastoise Butterfree Cacturne Camerupt Carnivine Castform Chatot Cherrim Chimecho Clamperl Claydol Clefable Cloyster Corsola Cradily Crawdaunt Delcatty Delibird Dewgong Ditto Dodrio Drapion Drifblim Dunsparce Dustox Electrode Exploud Farfetch'd Fearow Flareon Froslass Furret Gastrodon Girafarig Glaceon Glalie Golduck Golem Gorebyss Granbull Grumpig Hitmonchan Hitmonlee Hitmontop Huntail Hypno Illumise Jumpluff Jynx Kabutops Kangaskhan Kecleon Kingler Kricketune Lanturn Lapras Leafeon Ledian Linoone Lopunny Lumineon Lunatone Luvdisc Luxray Magcargo Menectric Mantine Masquerain Mawile Meganium Mightyena Miltank Minum Mothim Mr. Mime Muk Nidoking Nidiqueen Ninetales Noctowl Octillery Omastar Pachirisu Parasect Pellipper Persian Phione Pidgeot Pikachu Plusle Politoed Poliwrath Primeape Probopass Purugly Quagsire Quilfish Raichu Rapidash Raticate Relicanth Rotom Sableye Sandslash Scyther Seaking Seviper Sharpedo Shedinja Shiftry Shuckle Skuntank Solrock Spinda Stantler Steelix Sudowoodo Sunflora Swalot Swellow Torkoal Toxicroak Trapinch Tropius Unown Venomoth Venusaur Vespiquen Victreebel Vigoroth Vileplume Volbeat Wailord Walrein Weezing Whiscash Wigglytuff Wormadam Wormadam - G Wormadam - S Xatu ========================================= VI. Status Conditions and Move Specifics ========================================= A. Primary Ailments ==================== In the game of Pokemon, there are certain moves you can use in order to inflict certain status ailments on the opponent. However, these do more than simply cause damage, immobility, or the like. They also cut certain stats. So I'll take a moment to explain the ailments and what each one does. What I classify as a "primary" ailment are the status ailments that are actually LABELED in the status. There are five of them: burn, sleep, freeze, poison, and paralysis. Two primary ailments cannot exist at the same time, nor can they replace each other. In addition, the condition remains even if they are switched out of battle. This type of ailment is tied to the Pokemon that it was inflicted on and cannot be Baton Passed to another Pokemon. The one exception to this rule is if a Pokemon uses Rest. If Rest is used, sleep will replace any ailment the Pokemon previously had. Burn - A burn is obviously caused by some type of fire move. Each turn, 1/8th of the Pokemon's HP is reduced from the Pokemon that's burned. In addition, the attack stat of the Pokemon burned is cut in half. You can cause a burn with certain fire type moves, however, Will-o-Wisp is the most reliable, since it's a move simply for that purpose, and not an attack with a small burn side chance. Paralysis - If you're paralyzed, you have a 25% chance of not being able to move. Paralysis is caused by certain electric moves, along with other moves such as Body Slam. In addition to sometimes not being able to move, the speed stat is cut in half. A common misconception of this ailment is that ground Pokemon cannot be paralyzed. This is untrue. While electric paralysis moves don't affect them (Thunder Wave, etc), Body Slam can still cause the ailment. Poison/Heavy Poison - Poison is obviously caused by poison type moves. When you're poisoned, a small amount of your HP is reduced every turn. However, if the poison is heavy (caused by moves such as Toxic), the damage will increase by 1/16th more every turn (previously I had said it doubles every turn, which is untrue). If a Pokemon switches out of battle, the damage done is "reset" and will start at 1/16th damage again. Steel types and poison types cannot normally be poisoned (see below). Update for 1.75 - Someone pointed out quite a while ago in an e-mail that Steel and Poison types CAN be poisoned, but only by one move - Twineedle. This move is so not common that's it's just not even really an issue. Freeze - If you're frozen, you cannot move at all until you thaw out. Freeze is obviously caused by ice type moves. Unlike all of the other status ailments, freeze is the only one that cannot be caused with an almost certain chance of being affected. There is no move that specifically causes the ailment, and instead randomly happens with moves like Ice Beam (10% chance). It should be noted that if a fire move is used on a frozen Pokemon, they are instantly cured of the ailment. Sleep - If you're asleep, you cannot move at all until you wake up. The exception being if you know a move like Snore or Sleep Talk which enable you to move while you're asleep. Sleep is not connected to a certain type of move but instead is caused by a variety of moves such as Spore, Sleep Powder, and Hypnosis. Having the sleep ailment opens you up to the moves Dream Eater, Nightmare, and Darkrai's Bad Dreams ability. It should almost be noted that the sleep status is often limited in battles with the sleep clause, so planning a team solely devoted to it is often difficult to do legally. B. Secondary Ailments ====================== What I consider a "secondary" ailment is a status ailment that is NOT labeled in the status. And, unlike primary ailments, you can stack these with each other, along with ONE primary ailment and infect the foe with as many of these as you want at the same time. However, secondary ailments are cured the instant you withdraw the Pokemon infected from the battle. Unlike primary ailments, if you use Baton Pass, these conditions WILL be passed on to the Pokemon you Baton Pass to (with the exception of Attract). Confusion - If you're confused, you have a chance to attack yourself for minor damage instead of the opponent. Confusion is not a labeled status ailment, which means you can be confused at the same time you have another one of the status ailments. It is also caused by a variety of types of moves, such as Supersonic, Confuse Ray, and Swagger. The damage inflicted by confusion is determined by the attack/defense ratio, which means the higher your attack is in comparison to your defense, the higher the damage will be. Attraction - Attraction (or infatuation, as it's sometimes referred to), is only caused by the move "attract". In addition, it's caused by the "Cute Charm ability". If you're attracted, you'll fail to attack 50% of the time. It's similar to confusion in that sometimes you will get through and sometimes you won't, only attraction does not have damage if you fail to attack. This ailment is only caused if the other Pokemon is the opposite gender, with genderless Pokemon being immune to this status. Also, in addition to the status being cured if your Pokemon leaves the battle, it's also cured if the OPPONENT'S Pokemon leaves the battle. Curse - Curse is a condition that's caused only when a GHOST Pokemon uses the move Curse against you. It cuts its own HP by half of its total HP and places the ailment on you. If you have the status ailment, your HP will be reduced by 1/4 of your total HP for every turn that goes by. However, this doesn't mean you will necessarily die in four turns. If your HP doesn't divide by 4, the ailment may take five turns to take you down. Leech Seed - This ailment is only caused by the move "leech seed". If you're seeded, a small amount of HP will be drained from you to the foe every turn that you're still infected for. Grass Pokemon cannot be hit with this move. In addition, even if the Pokemon that used leech seed is switched out, the new Pokemon still receives HP back. This status can be removed using the move "rapid spin". Nightmare - The nightmare status is obviously caused by the move "Nightmare". However, this move can only be used on Pokemon that are asleep. Similar to the curse status, the nightmare status removes 1/4th of your total HP every turn, until the status is cured when the sleeper wakes up. Flinch - Flinching is a condition that causes a Pokemon to lose its turn. The status only lasts for one turn, and can only be used by a Pokemon that goes first in a battle. Certain items can be used in order to increase the chance of flinching. Taunt - Taunt is caused by the move "taunt" and lasts from two to four turns. The taunt status disables any move that doesn't cause damage, such as Confuse Ray, Baton Pass, etc. If taunt is used first in a battle, and the opponent has a non-damage move set, it will cause that move to fail. Encore - Encore is caused by the move "encore" and lasts from two to six turns. When inflicted with the status, you can only use the move you used last when you had the move used on you. Torment - Torment is caused by the move "torment" and lasts until you switch the infected Pokemon out. Torment disables the use of the same move twice in a row. If the tormented Pokemon only has one usable move, the Pokemon will alternate between that move and Struggle. Substitute - While not an "ailment", per se, it's still a different status than normal. In order to create a substitute, you use the move Substitute and forfeit 1/4th of your total HP. Once created, the substitute will protect the user from enemy attacks. While behind a substitute, you cannot be inflicted with status ailments from your enemy, and the move can indeed be Baton Passed to someone else. Embargo - Embargo is a move that disables the foe from using their held item. It's not usually that useful in most situations. It's more annoying and sometimes problematic than it is usually worth your time to put this on your team. Heal Block - Heal Block is a move that disables the opponent healing for five turns. This can be effective in combination with something like Mean Look against a wall. Walls like to use self-recovery moves, which offen negate burn and poison damage. This move helps counter that. C. Weather Conditions ====================== If a weather effect is caused by the moves Sunny Day, Rain Dance, Sandstorm, or Hail, the condition will last for five turns. If the user of the weather move is holding the correct corresponding rock (Damp Rock, Heat Rock, Smooth Rock, Icy Rock), the weather effect will last eight turns instead of five. Weather effects can be erased by replacing them with another weather condition. However, you cannot "renew" a current weather effect by using the move again before it expires. If the weather effect is caused by the abilities Drizzle, Drought, Sand Stream, or Snow Warning, the weather effect will NEVER expire until a new weather condition is put into play. Rain's effects: 1) Make's water moves 50% stronger. 2) Makes fire moves 50% weaker. 3) Cuts the power of Solarbeam in half. 4) Makes Synthesis/Moonlight/Morning Sun heal 1/4 of your HP instead of 1/2. 5) Increases Thunder's accurary to 100%. 6) Changes Weather Ball's power to 100 and type to water. 7) Activates the abilities Swift Swin, Rain Dish, Dry Skin, Hydration, and Forecast. Harsh sunlight's effects: 1) Makes fire moves 50% stronger. 2) Makes water moves 50% weaker. 3) Allows you to use Solarbeam without a charging turn. 4) Makes Synthesis/Moonlight/Morning Sun heal 2/3 of your HP instead of 1/2. 5) Reduces Thunder's accuracy to 50%. 6) Changes Weather Ball's power to 100 and type to fire. 7) Activates the abilities Chlorophyll, Dry Skin, Flower Gift, Solar Power, Leaf Guard, and Forecast. Sandstorm's effects: 1) Hurts all non-ground/rock/steel/Sand Veil Pokemon between turns. 2) Rock types get a 50% special defense boost. 3) Cuts the power of Solarbeam in half. 4) Makes Synthesis/Moonlight/Morning Sun heal 1/4 of your HP instead of 1/2. 5) Changes Weather Ball's power to 100 and type to rock. 6) Activates the Sand Veil and Forecast abilities. Hail's effects: 1) Hurts all non-Ice Pokemon between turns. 2) Increases Blizzard's accuracy to 100%. 3) Cuts the power of Solarbeam in half. 4) Makes Synthesis/Moonlight/Morning Sun heal 1/4 of your HP instead of 1/2. 5) Changes Weather Ball's power to 100 and type to Ice. 6) Activates the abilities Snow Cloak, Ice Body, and Forecast. D. The Trapping Moves ====================== There are certain moves which you can use in order to trap your opponent in the battle, preventing switching out so they could gain an advantage against you. Using these moves is oftentimes excellent strategy if you have a certain move, such as Destiny Bond, that you know they'd smart enough to switch out against otherwise. There are two "categories" of these moves, so to speak. The first is the moves that simply prevent switching, but don't do damage, and last as long as that Pokemon is in the battle. The second is the moves that DO do damage, but only last a certain number of turns. The moves that will last as long as the Pokemon that used them is in battle are: Block Mean Look Spider Web Thanks to Tombola Man for pointing out Spider Web to me, though Spider Web can only be learned by Spinarak and Ariados. The damage inflicting moves with limited turns are: Bind Clamp Fire Spin Whirlpool Wrap In addition to these, you can also SELF INDUCE yourself into not being able to switch out with these moves: Ingrain The Pokemon that can learn each of these moves are as follows: Block - Snorlax, Sudowoodo, Nosepass, Bastiodon, Bronzong, Bonsly, Tangrowth, Probopass, Geodude, Graveler, Golem, Slowpoke, Slowbro, Onix, Slowking, Steelix, Snorunt, Glalie, Froslass Mean Look - Zubat, Golbat, Ghastly, Haunter, Gengar, Jynx, Crobat, Umbreon, Murkrow, Misdreavous, Smoochum, Sableye, Duskull, Dusclops, Dusknoir, Grimer, Muk, Ralts, Kirlia, Gardevoir, Absol, Gallade Spider Web - Spinarak, Ariados Bind - Onix, Tangella, Pinsir, Steelix, Kecleon, Dusclops, Carnivine, Tangrowth, Dusknoir Clamp - Shelder, Clamperl Fire Spin - Charmander, Charmeleon, Charizard, Vulpix, Ponyta, Rapidash, Magmar, Flareon, Moltres, Magby, Entei, Torchic, Torkoal, Solrock, Chimchar, Monferno, Infernape, Magmortar, Heatran, Growlithe, Arcanine, Houndour, Houndoom Whirlpool - Shelder, Mudkip, Wailmer, Wailord, Clamperl, Huntail, Gorebyss, Piplup, Prinplup, Empoleon, Buizel, Floatzel, Finneon, Lumineon, Phione, Manaphy, Lapras, Chinchou, Lanturn, Marshtomp, Swampert, Barboach, Whiscash Ingrain - Tangela, Sunkern, Sunflora, Roselia, Cacnea, Cacturne, Lileep, Cradily, Carnivine, Snover, Abomasnow, Tangrowth, Bulbasaur, Ivysaur, Venusaur, Oddish, Gloom, Vileploom, Bellsprout, Weepinbell, Victreebel, Exeggcute, Exeggutor, Chikorita, Bayleef, Meganium, Bellossom, Corsola In addition to MOVES having this effect, there are also certain Pokemon that have an ABILITY that has the same effect. These abilities are: Arena Trap Magnet Pull* Shadow Tag * Magnet Pull only traps Pokemon of the STEEL type. The Pokemon that have each of these abilities are: Arena Trap - Diglett, Dugtrio, Trapinch Magnet Pull - Magnemite, Magneton, Nosepass, Magnezone, Probopass Shadow Tag - Wobbuffet, Wynaut E. Spikes ========== The game also has certain moves that will damage the opponent upon switching their Pokemon out. I've named this the "Spikes" category, for lack of something better to call it. There are only three moves in this category, and they are: Spikes Toxic Spikes Stealth Rock Spikes and Toxic Spikes can both be "stacked," meaning you can use them up to three times for a better effect. Stealth Rock cannot be stacked, and has full effect after just one use. (Thanks to Tombola Man for this). Spikes deals damage the Pokemon switching in for the opponent unless that Pokemon is of the flying type or has the Levitate ability. Toxic Spikes poisons the Pokemon switching in unless the Pokemon is of the flying, poison, or steel types or has the Levitate ability. Stealth Rock has nothing that is immune to it. Each one of these moves will be super/not very effective if a Pokemon that switches in to them is resistant/weak to their types. Oftentimes the opponent is reluctant to switch after these moves are used on them, so these moves are often paired with moves like Roar and Whirlwind in order to force the switch. F. Hidden Power ================ Hidden Power (HP) is a special move that doesn't have a specific type or power connected to the move itself. Instead, it's power and type is dependent solely on the specific Pokemon you have. There isn't a way of knowing what your type or power is unless you either test it versus in game enemies to determine its type, or using an IV calculator to also determine your HP type. Often times, this move can be used to cover weaknesses that otherwise could not be covered. However, since getting the right type of this move is as random and time consuming as getting the good IVs you want, I won't be recommending the use of this move in actual movesets unless you have a lot of time to spare for getting it. Update - I've reconsidered my stance on Hidden Power. It is very useful for covering blatant weaknesses, so I will possibly recommend it as an option, but I will never recommend it without also giving an alternative. =============================== VII. Things to Keep in Mind... =============================== Before I get started on the actual team building part, I figured I should give some general guidelines to consider while building, and some tips to help you along the way. 1) Use who you like. However, you should try to play within the tier you're building for. Just because you like something in the UU tier doesn't mean you should use it in an OU team. My initial statement of "you can take down anyone with proper strategy" is a little outdated now. While I still maintain that your teams should try to be original, you should try to stay within your tier to keep your odds of winning realistic. 2) Make sure your wanted moveset is possible before you finalize your selection. If your Pokemon is in the "ground" egg breeding group, then you can get any egg moves you want. However, for someone like Crobat, who is only in the "flying" egg group, and does not have a common crossover to the ground group (the only one being Farfetch'd), not all egg moves are possible at the same time. You can get them all one at a time, but it cannot learn more than one of them at a given time in a lot of situations. 3) Females pass on the species. Males pass on TMs and egg moves. To get egg moves, you're going to need a female of the species you want, with a male that knows the move you want it to know. Don't forget this. If you have both a male AND a female of the same species who BOTH know the same level up move, this move can also be passed on to the child if the two parents breed while both knowing this move. 4) When breeding for natures, it's helpful to use Dittos. Sure, catching Dittos of every nature can be a little time consuming, but depending on how many Pokemon you want, it may be worth the time. I have Dittos of every nature, and it took around 90 minutes to catch them all. Once you have the Ditto you want with the right nature, simply give it an Everstone when you go to breed and it will have a 50% chance of passing on the nature to the child. This negates the time it would have taken to get that nature randomly. 5) Consider the Pokemon you have access to. Granted, rarity should not be the highest on the list for consideration, but say you want something that's not easy to come by, and the gender you want is rare even within the species. If you're not willing to spend time on it, use something else. 6) Consider the rareness/availability of your moves/items. Certain moves will only be available via TM, and certain hold items take a long time to get in the battle tower. If you don't think you have access to them, or aren't willing to spend the time to get them, make sure you can trade for them via the GameFAQs trade boards before you set your heart on having that moveset. 7) Make sure the move set you choose is not self conflicting. What I mean by that is things like having both Toxic and Will-o-Wisp on the same Pokemon. You cannot cause two primary status ailments at the same time, so giving a Pokemon two primary status ailment causing moves is a waste of a slot. Another example is giving a Pokemon Will-o-Wisp and Confuse Ray. Burn cuts attack, which reduces the damage the confusion smack will do. Self-conflicting. Always make sure your team is free of this. However, I should note that in rare cases, you want a Pokemon to have two of these types of moves, but it doesn't happen too often. 8) Double and triple check your team and strategy. After you form what you want, go back over it and make sure everything works well together and you didn't make any stupid mistakes. Ask a friend to review it for you. Ask someone on the GameFAQs forums. Just make sure you have it right before you go and put your plan into action. 9) Use STAB to your advantage. Your Pokemon has type(s). Use that x1.5 bonus you get from STAB to your advantage. There's no sense in letting a bonus like that go unused. Exceptions to this obviously apply if you're not going to be attacking with the Pokemon or if other moves grant you better coverage. 10) Try not to double up on types. If you have one fire Pokemon on your team already, then don't choose another Pokemon that has the fire typing. Using more types of Pokemon on your team helps ensure that you cover as many of your weak points as possible. 11) If your Pokemon has more than one ability possible, make sure the one you breed has the one that's more beneficial to your strategy. Certain Pokemon have more than one ability possible in Pokemon DPP. You can't have them both, so decide which one you want for maximum performance. 12) Just because I labeled a Pokemon as a "physical wall" or a "special sweeper" or the like, doesn't mean that that's the ONLY thing they can be. Certain Pokemon are good at many different things and can often serve many purposes. Only you know what you're going for in a particular strategy. Things can also be artificially made to be things they're not via stat boosting moves as well. Moves like Curse can make a typical special wall into both a physical sweeper and a physical wall. Just remember that what something is often depends entirely on what you want it to be. 13) There is no "ultimate moveset" for any one Pokemon ever. One moveset may work well for one strategy, while a totally different one could work better for a different strategy. If someone questions a certain move you have on your team, tell them the reason it's there as opposed to something else. If a moveset that might *technically* be superior is suggested, but you have very specific reasons for using the moves you're using instead, stick with whatever makes your strategy work better. 14) Make sure you know whether your Pokemon is good in the physical or special area, and that the moves you're using correspond to that. Weavile, for example has great attack, but poor special attack. So using an attack like Ice Beam, which is special based, on a Weavile doesn't make sense. Instead, aim for a move that utilizes your Pokemon's stregths. Ice Punch, still an ice move, is a physically based move, and thus makes much more sense for the situation. ================================ VIII. Move Prediction In Battle ================================ Move Prediction is an essential part of the Pokemon metagame. In order to battle well, you need to learn how to predict what your opponent will use. Battles are often decided by who is the better predicted. Sometimes you can over predict, and your opponent won't do something because he thought that you thought he was going to do it, so he didn't do it and it messed you up. Things like this are one of the more complicated parts of competitive battling. A. Why do I need to switch to be successful? ============================================= An essential part of the Pokemon metagame is knowing when to keep your current Pokemon in battle and when to withdraw and switch to something else. Obviously every Pokemon has their weaknesses, and not everyone can survive in any situation. So knowing when to switch is essential to every battle. For example, Earthquake is one of the more common moves in the game. Lots of things are weak to ground. If you've got an Electivire out and your opponent has a Rhyperior, why would you stay in while you're at an obvious type disadvantage? Switching to an appropriate counter here will save your Electivire from certain death, and is most certainly a smart thing to do. Some situations aren't as obvious, and you must simply remember that that Pokemon you're against can learn a certain move and will probably have it in order to provide coverage. Maybe you don't know that Starmie can learn Thunderbolt, so you think you're safe when you're versing Starmie with another Water type. If you don't know that Starmie can learn Thunderbolt, you're in a pretty deep hole. Switching is obviously good to do in situations like this too. No matter what the situation, however, switching Pokemon in battle when you think you'll lose the round is almost always an advantage for you. B) How do I know when it's advantageous to switch? =================================================== In competitive battling, switches happen pretty often, so how do you know when you need to do it and when you should stay in? Well, initially, the battle starts out without you knowing exactly what your opponent has on his or her team. People tend to battle more cautiously then since it's unknown what exactly will be used against you. Generally speaking though, if you start with an initial disadvantage with your lead, switching is a good idea. Some things are obvious. An electric type is out against something that pretty obviously knows Earthquake. This is when you need to switch to something that can fly. Ground is nullified, and death was avoided due to the switch. Here's where things get complicated though. After you've done that switch once, your opponent knows that should you throw out that electric Pokemon again, you will probably try to switch to your flier again if Earthquake is a threat. If you think they're going to use Earthquake again, you'll switch to the flier again, thinking that you'll avoid the attack and all will be great for you. However, your opponent thinks that you'll switch to the flier, and instead of using Earthquake, he uses Stone Edge, which is super effective against your flier, OHKO-ing it. This was an advantageous prediction for your opponent in which you made a miscalculation. Obviously the same thing can apply for you though, thinking the opponent will switch to something, and instead using something that will be effective against the SWITCH IN, rather than the Pokemon out now. Another situation it's advantageous to switch in is to absorb certain status ailments. Say you've got someone on your team who is poisoned. However, your current Pokemon isn't poison. The opponent switches to the Pokemon you know can inflict the ailment on you. You suspect that they might try to poison you again, since they were having a tough time getting rid of that particular Pokemon. Suspecting this, you could switch to your other Pokemon who is ALREADY poisoned, wasting their turn. This also works if you're asleep or paralyzed. If you have an ailment, you can use that Pokemon to absorb the attack of another Pokemon who tries to inflict an ailment on another Pokemon. Aside from type disadvantage and status ailment absorbment, it's also a good idea to switch if you think you'll SOON have a disadvantage in the battle. Let's say your opponent has an electric type out again and you've got someone with Earthquake (however, you don't know Stone Edge). You think that he will probably switch out, thinking you will use Earthquake. So instead, you switch out to an electric type in preparation for the flying type you expect your opponent to throw out. This saves you a turn and often throws your opponent off since they weren't expecting to also be at a disadvantage after the switch. C) General Suggestions for Prediction Success ============================================== Something that is really useful in getting to predict well is getting to know what kind of player your opponent is. If you know roughly how they play, you can better predict what they will do. There are basically four types of players: offensive players, defensive players, balanced players, and gimmick players. If a player is offensive, he is less likely to switch out and more likely to try to rush you with all out offense. They like taking risks and try to predict you (sometimes overpridicting in hopes that you predict wrong). Defensive players play more conservatively and hope that their opponent's make a mistake. Walls are more common for them, and they'll be less likely to take you down with a quick, fast and hard hitting sweeper. Balanced players are somewhere between the two, while gimmick players tend to use Pokemon with obscure movesets (IE, sets that aren't typically used, therefore, you are less likely to predict what the Pokemon knows). If you see your opponent switching a lot in order to predict you, you know the other player is offensive, and know that they are more likely to make a mistake in overpredicting. Don't try to think too hard against these players. Think about your past actions in the battle and, based on those, decide what you think THEY think you will do, and then don't do that. It seems counter-intuitive sometimes, but it often works. Taking advantage of types and abilities is essential to be successful at switching well. I've already mentioned the obvious switch in for flying types and things with Levitate against Earthquake, but there are other abilities (mainly Flash Fire and Water Absorb) that nullify other types of attacks. Water Absorb is particularly useful to switch in for since not only is the attack nullified, but you also regain HP when a water attack hits you. Using these to your advantage, if you ever think that another member of your team is going to get hit by something that can absorb types of attacks like that, you should switch to them. Taking risks is often a part of successful prediction and switching. For example, sometimes you KNOW that a Pokemon has a certain move, and that if they use it against what you currently have out, it WILL kill you and it will be very bad for you. However, you've already switched out against the same Pokemon once before in the battle. Knowing this, you think your opponent won't expect you to do the same thing twice, so they won't use the move that could kill you in prediction of this. It's a risky chance, since you don't know that you won't die, but it's often advantageous if you guess correctly. Ultimately, the best advice I can give you is to just learn what Pokemon typically learn what moves. Once you know what typically has what, you can make your switches based on what you know can probably kill you. You never want to not-switch when you know something can kill you. However, you have to always remember what you've done previously IN THE SAME BATTLE. If you've done it once before, don't expect the same switch to necessarily work twice. The opponent might have guessed what you were going to do and made preparations to counter what he thinks you're going to do. In conclusion, you need to switch in order to be successful at this, but you don't want to try to overpredict your opponent. Just remember what you've done previously in the battle and make your moves and switches accordingly. ================= IX. Team Synergy ================= A) What is Team Synergy? ========================= Basically, Team Synergy is your team's ability to work well together as a team, rather than just well individually. This is mainly why one move set is never ultimately the best moveset a Pokemon can have. On different teams, a Pokemon may need to do different job, depending on what else you have on your team. A part of Team Synergy is making sure you can cover as many of your team's weaknesses as possible. It's obviously quite impossible to be able to counter everything with a single Pokemon. Similarly, there aren't any Pokemon that can't be beaten by something else. Team Synergy is all about making sure your team can cover the other member's weaknesses, as well as their ability to work well together. B) Why do I need Team Synergy to have a good team? =================================================== So what do I mean by their ability to work well together? Using my UU example team as an example here, I'll explain. The team is basically set up to allow Swellow to have success. First we have to ask ourselves what Swellow is walled by. Steel is basically the only thing that walls it, which could be a problem. So we selected another Pokemon in order to be backup. Probopass, aside from being an excellent damage absorber, is on the team in order to destroy the steels - the only thing that walls Swellow. If a steel Pokemon comes out, Probopass switches in, thus trapping the steel type, and then destroys them. As you can see, without Probopass, Swellow is walled by steels, and they will probably be able to kill Swellow, and you're down a member of your team pretty easily. This is one part of Team Synergy. You need to make sure that if you are walled by something, you have an adequate Pokemon to compensate for the weakness. But obviously, just making sure that you have types of Pokemon to counter others isn't enough. Having adequate switches for things is also fairly essential. A Synergetic team should be able to avoid quite a bit of damage simply by switching to a counter at the proper time. If something is weak to ground, having something immune to ground is pretty nice to have. It's similar with other weaknesses. Obviously sweepers aren't usually going to be good at switching in to avoid damage, so it's important to consider how those are going to get in too. Some of your walls (or maybe just someone else who has an easier time switching in due to immunities) might need to have some moves (like Substitute + Baton Pass) in order to give some of your sweepers an easier time switching in. Ultimately, if your team cannot work well together, regardless of whether or not the individual movesets are good, it will probably fail. You won't be able to compensate for individual weaknesses, you won't be able to set up one Pokemon for success, and you'll basically just have a bunch of Pokemon with movesets that work well until you're walled by something, and then you will die because you don't have something to cover for your weakness. C) General Suggestions for Team Synergy ======================================== Generally speaking, in order to have good Team Synergy, you should run scenarios through your head constantly while you're making your teams. You have to think "what will this Pokemon have problems with, and how can I choose my other Pokemon in order to compensate?" After you plan a team, you should check it and make sure that multiple bases are covered. Can you effectively switch from one Pokemon to another without taking too much damage most of the time? You should be able to a lot of the time if your team has good Synergy. Things that are generally good for Team Synergy are planning things that can fly if you've got an Earthquake weakness, planning things with Water Absorb if you've got a big fire weakness, and so on. Making sure you can not take damage when possible is always good. Another thing that really helps with synergy is making sure that should one of your Pokemon be walled by something (Swellow is easily walled by Steel, for example), that you have something else on your team to take care of that (in my UU team's case, Probopass is there to take care of the things that wall Swellow). Things that are bad for Team Synergy include having six sweepers, each of them having mainly attacking moves, with nothing to support the other members of your team. Similarly, having all walls will not work. You have you have a good balance of Pokemon that will do the work and Pokemon that will support the others. This, combined with having adequate switches for the Pokemon your team are the most important things to keep in mind for Team Synergy. ===================================== X. Team Building - Overused Metagame ===================================== Since I recently decided to split the FAQ into two sections - one for OU and one for UU, there is no longer a need for a step to decide your tier. Read this section if you're playing the standard (OU) metagame, and skip down the page if you're playing the UU metagame. A. Picking Your Team ===================== With my original FAQ team going down the drain with this update, we can really focus in on who exactly we want to use on this OU team. I'm not going to retype the tier list in this section again, so refer to earlier in the FAQ for the full list of Pokemon in the OU tier. While building in the OU tier, we need to keep a couple of things in mind. Unlike the UU tier, the OU tier is less about setting up a specific Pokemon for success, and more about ensuring that you have appropriate switch ins, counters, and ability to quickly sweep things. With this in mind, I know I'll have to have a decide selection of walls, things with Levitate or the flying type, and sweepers. So I'll select my favorite Pokemon in the OU and start the process of elimination. Of the 51 Pokemon in the tier, these are my favorite (or something I think would work well as a switch in): Breloom, Bronzong, Dusknoir, Electivire, Gallade, Gengar, Gliscor, Heatran, Heracross, Infernape, Jolteon, Lucario, Machamp, Milotic, Ninjask, Roserade, Scizor, Starmie, Suicune, Vaporeon, Yanmega, Zapdos As you can see, there's still quite a bit to choose from. But the important part is that now I have somewhat of an idea of who I'd like to use. So now I'll separate them into categories. Sweepers: Breloom, Donphan, Electivire, Gallade, Gengar, Gliscor, Heatran, Heracross, Infernape, Jolteon, Lucario, Machamp, Roserade, Scizor, Starmie, Suicune, Yanmega, Zapdos Walls: Bronzong, Donphan, Dusknoir, Gliscor, Heatran, Milotic, Scizor, Suicune, Vaporeon Support: Gliscor, Heatran, Jolteon, Milotic, Ninjask, Roserade, Scizor, Suicune, Vaporeon Obviously, a Pokemon could do more than one thing - not at once - but in different things, they can do different things. Now's the time we have to make more of a selection. Here's where we have to take into account things like not overlapping in typing and having a decent balance of walls for switches, supports, and a decent ability to sweep. First I'll consider my walls, since their ability to take hits on a switch in is more important than anything else on your team (minimizing damage is extremely important). Of my choices available, I want to make sure they not only can switch in and survive, but then proceed to force a switch and do things once they're in. Bulky waters are good for this, as are things with steel typings and/or massive amounts of defense. In this case, I want a flying type to grant myself immunity to Earthquake. So I'll be selecting Gliscor as one of the slots. Secondly, Suicune has a base of 115 in both defense and special defense, making it a great choice to soak up some damage. Plus I've always wanted to use a Suicune and have never had the chance to in a competitive team. Now seems like as good of a time as any. Next we need to consider what we want to be doing the majority of the damage for our team. On these Pokemon, we want a variety of attacks for good coverage. Getting walled by things is bad, so we want to try to avoid this. Secondly, we may want to consider Choice Items to pack a punch for some of these Pokemon. Or perhaps moves like Swords Dance to boost stats. And most importantly, we want to make sure we have both physical and special attackers - or mixed attackers if applicable. It also helps when sweepers are fast. We want to move first, especially if the said Pokemon is fragile. If they're fragile and don't move first, they may die before they get to use all that power they have. So with this in mind, I'll make my selections. Fighting types are extremely important to have, due to the abundance of Blissey, so this must be considered first. Fire is also an important type to have simply because getting walled by things that resist fire is a major pain. With this in mind, Infernape seems like the best choice for a good sweeper here. Another physical sweeper must be considered though. Scizor seems like a good choice, considering his steel typing, excellent move pool, and so on, so we'll stick with him for now. There are two slots left and there are still things to consider. Namely, we need some special sweepers, but there are other things as well. A lack of a Pokemon to use Stealth Rock or Spikes puts you in a tough spot these days, what with every team having one of those these days. It makes the opponent think twice about switching because of the damage they'll receive on the switch in. Another move to consider is Rapid Spin, because of said prevalence of Stealth Rock and Spikes. An ability to remove these is also important. Luckily, two of the Pokemon I've selected are already good at said abilities (which I knew, but was saving to say until now). Gliscor can Stealth Rock and so can Infernape. However, we're left without a Rapid Spinner. While this is unfortunate (and possibly unwise), fitting one in would be more detrimental due to coverage being sacrificed. Normally, someone should be considered to do the Rapid Spinning for teams. Special sweepers need to be considered now. There are several typings I don't have covered yet that are fairly important: electric and ghost. I must cover all of these with my last two selections somehow. Gengar is a quick, powerful sweeper with high KO'ing potential. He can also learn Thunderbolt in addition to Shadow Ball, covering two types we need pretty badly. In addition to that, he has immunity to three different types, making it relatively easy to switch in on things (mainly predicted Earthquakes). As for the last slot, I am fond of Yanmega, and Yanmega generally uses a strategy that is very effective, so I'll be selecting him as my last slot. According to what I've just said, my team selection is: Suicune, Gliscor, Infernape, Scizor, Gengar, Yanmega Gliscor, Gengar, and Yanmega are all immune to ground. Gliscor and Yanmega are weak to ice. Scizor is weak to fire. Suicune provides a good switch in for Gliscor, Yanmega, and Scizor, being resistant to both ice and fire. We've got two types being double covered (Gliscor and Yanmega are both flying and Yanmega and Scizor are both bug), but if everything is played out and switched correctly, this shouldn't be too much of a problem. ************************************************************************ * Team selection: Suicune, Gliscor, Infernape, Scizor, Gengar, Yanmega * ************************************************************************ B. Assigning Your EVs and Natures ================================== Okay! Now you've got the Pokemon you want on your team decided. The hardest part of the decision making is over! The very next thing you have to do is decide what natures you should give each of them, along with the EVs to train each of them in in order to best bring out their qualities. In order to do this, you'll want to look at the stat lines for each of the Pokemon you picked. Sometimes it's beneficial to assign EVs to their two best stats, then the remaining 6 to HP. However, sometimes, if their stats are good enough, overkilling them with EVs is unnecessary, so it's more beneficial to assign the EVs to something else. The same thing applies for natures. However, if you know a Pokemon is going to be walling, a useful tool for figuring out specifically how many EVs should go where is on this page: http://users.smogon.com/X-Act/defense.html We'll start with Suicune. He's a mixed wall for me, and will mainly be used to soak up some damage. With this in mind, a Bold nature is selected for him. Using the above site, the EVs can be calculated to be most beneficial at 252 HP, 252 defense, 6 special attack. Gliscor is in a similar situation as Suicune. Since we plan on using him primarily as a wall, we don't have to worry about dedicating any EVs to speed like we would otherwise. He should be assigned an Impish nature and have 252 HP, 6 attack, and 252 defense. Infernape's EVs and nature will depend entirely on what we want him to do. I had originally intended for him to be a physical attacker with his fighting type. However, both of his attacks are quite high, and he has a nice move pool to use both of them well. This said, I'm going to take advantage of both of his stats and make him a mixed sweeper. Thus, he will be a Naive nature with 48 attack, 252 special attack, and 208 speed. This is in order to boost both his attacks and ensure he goes first. Scizor is both strong and durable, making him ideal for tanking. However, depending on what we want to do, we want to assign him different EVs. He is fairly good at Baton Passing, which is good to note, meaning that it is possible to sacrifice bug coverage (covered by Yanmega) in order to make room for some Baton Passing moves. With this in mind, we'll assign him EVs for this. Impish nature. 184 HP, 176 defense, 148 speed. Gengar is a fast sweeper who hits hard, so we'll want to take advantage of those selling points. That said, there's not a lot else we would WANT to put his EVs in other than speed and special attack. So this is what we shall do. Timid nature. 6 HP, 252 special attack, 252 speed. Yanmega is the last on the list, and has a similar spread as Gengar. The only difference is here we want a Modest nature (Speed Boost takes care of the extra speed), and 6 EVs in defense instead of attack. *********************************************************** * Suicune: Bold, 252 HP, 252 defense, 6 SA * * Gliscor: Impish, 252 HP, 6 attack, 252 defense * * Infernape: Naive, 48 attack, 252 SA, 208 speed * * Scizor: Impish, 184 HP, 176 defense, 148 speed * * Gengar: Timid, 6 HP, 252 SA, 252 speed * * Yanmega: Modest, 6 defense, 252 SA, 252 speed * *********************************************************** C. Picking Your Abilities ========================== Certain Pokemon have more than one ability possible, while others have only one possible. Before you start to breed, you want to decide which ones you want your Pokemon to have. These abilities should be the ones that benefit your team the most. In my case, Gliscor, Scizor, and Yanmega all have two different abilities. However, neither of these abilities actually matter for Gliscor or Scizor for the strategies I'm planning on using. However, for Gliscor, since I am not using Sandstorm at all, Hyper Cutter is a better ability. For Scizor, since my moves won't be below a certain power, Swarm is slightly better. Yanmega is the one it is important I choose the right ability for. The strategy for Yanmega depends on Speed Boost boosting his speed in order for him to go first, so Speed Boost is the necessary nature here. ************************* * Gliscor: Hyper Cutter * * Scizor: Swarm * * Yanmega: Speed Boost * ************************* D. Picking Your Movesets ========================= This is a critical stage in the team building process. This is the time you decide the approach and style you're taking to your battle. Will you go on an all out offense? Will your moves be dedicated to stat boosting? Or perhaps you want to annoy your enemy to death? You can do multiple things with one Pokemon, but not really at the same time. This is mainly why there are several movesets that could work equally well for any Pokemon at any given time. So let's get get started on what we want to do. Suicune -------- As previously stated, Suicune is planned to be one of my walls, so its moves need to reflect its ability to wall. There's a couple of things we could do here. First, Calm mind is excellent for Suicune due to its ability to actually stay alive and use it. Stealth Rock should already be out by the time Suicune takes the field, so Roar is a good move in order to force the opponent to take damage (it's also good at forcing your opponent to show you what else they have on their team). Surf and Ice Beam are obvious options for coverage for the team and also to use once Calm Mind has boosted you. Rest is an option for staying alive longer and, in conjunction with that, Sleep Talk. Substitute is another option for building up Calm Minds behind. This is about the extent of viable options for a defensive Suicune. So my purposes, Roaring away to annoy and reveal things on my opponents team seems like it will work really well in conjunction with Calm Mind and my ability to absorb attacks. And to support Calm Mind, Surf for STAB and Ice Beam for dragon coverage. ********************************************* * Decision: Surf, Roar, Calm Mind, Ice Beam * ********************************************* Gliscor -------- Gliscor is going to be a physical wall, so our moves need to reflect this. We could place Stealth Rock on Gliscor, but this move seems better suited for our planned lead, Infernape. Roost is good for recovery (though you lose your flying type temporarily, so be careful), so that would work well. Earthquake is an obvious attack move, especially since there isn't really another place on your team to put it. Ice Fang could be useful in taking down dragons, but it doesn't seem to be quite as useful as Aerial Ace would, what with STAB and being an excellent counter to Heracross. Baton Pass could be an option if this were a Baton Passing Gliscor (he's pretty good at it), but this isn't, so those moves shouldn't be considered. As for the last move, Knock Off typically screws walls with their hold items, and definitely helps against things with Choice items. Taunt prevents things like Skarmory using Spikes or Stealth Rock or walls using Toxic, Will-o-Wisp, or Thunder Wave. Both of these are useful ability to have. However, in this case, I'm going to opt for Knock Off. ****************************************************** * Decision: Earthquake, Roost, Aerial Ace, Knock Off * ****************************************************** Infernape ---------- Infernape has a couple of possibilities for its moveset. I said earlier that I was planning on making it a mixed sweeper. However, I also plan on making it my lead, which is notable. Mixed apes have some possibilities for their moves. Flamethrower/Fire Blast is good for a high power fire move. So is Flare Blitz. Close Combat has really good destructive power, especially on walls like Blissey. Grass Knot is good at countering water types. HP Ice is good for dragons and the like. Nasty Plot or Swords Dance are obviously options, however, due to Infernape's frailty, those probably aren't the best options. Thunderpunch is another counter for waters. Fake Out is a priority move and is an incredibly important move for a leading Infernape. And, as I stated earlier, Stealth Rock needs to be fit on here since I'm not using it on Gliscor. So Stealth Rock and Fake Out need to be on. The last two moves should ideally be devoted to STAB. Fire Blast and Close Combat have the most destructive power of the choices. ************************************************************** * Decision: Fake Out, Stealth Rock, Fire Blast, Close Combat * ************************************************************** Scizor ------- Scizor has some amazing Baton Pass abilities being able to use Swords Dance, Agility, AND Rock Polish. However, we can't use all of these, and even using two of these for a non-Baton Passing team isn't all that wise. Thus, we'll have to chose between one of them. Upon further consideration, I've decided that since the rest of my party members are for the most part pretty quick, Agility is also a little excessive here. Thus, Swords Dance is optimal since not only can Scizor use the boost himself, but he can also pass them off to Infernape or Gliscor. As for the last two moves, we're going to want to put in a recovery move since Scizor is serving partly as a wall, so Roost works well here. The last move will be used for attacking just so that we have the option to attack if we really need to. There are two STAB moves to consider here - X-Scissor or Iron Head. In this case, I'm going to use Iron Head just because Yanmega already has coverage for bugs but we don't have any steel type attacks on the team anywhere yet. ******************************************************** * Decision: Swords Dance, Baton Pass, Iron Head, Roost * ******************************************************** Gengar ------- Gengar is super fast and hits hard. His moveset is fairly standard because of this. As previously stated, we need Shadow Ball for STAB and Thunderbolt for coverage. Focus Blast helps with normal types and also helps you against rocks and steels. Hypnosis is a good sleep inducing move to help you sweep after you put them to sleep. The set is pretty standard, but it works pretty well, so there's no sense in not using this. ************************************************************* * Decision: Shadow Ball, Thunderbolt, Hypnosis, Focus Blast * ************************************************************* Yanmega -------- This Yanmega is going to use the same strategy as the Yanmega in the last FAQ example I had, before I removed it. The strategy works really well. The idea is that you need Speed Boost to activate in order to ensure going first, so you use Protect. Secondly, you have Hypnosis to sweep behind (although be careful with sleep clause, since Gengar also has Hypnosis). Alternatives to Hypnosis are HP Ice or HP Ground. Ice to take out dragons and also hit Zapdos (who resists both of your other moves), and Ground prevents rocks and steels from walling you. That said, I'm using Hypnosis since I hate breeding for HP types. The last moves are Air Slash and Bug Buzz for STAB. Air Slash has an extra effect of a chance of flinch, which is really useful. King's Rock would be use to use. Unfortunately, it's an illegal item, so using it isn't viable. Yanmega can also serve as a secondary lead, should I not want to use Infernape as my lead, since Protect scouts for moves, and Hypnosis can put common Stealth Rockers to sleep before they can set up. **************************************************** * Decision: Protect, Bug Buzz, Air Slash, Hypnosis * **************************************************** E. Picking Your Hold Items =========================== Now you've FINALLY decided all of your movesets for your team. Don't worry, that's the longest process in the entire thing. Now comes a somewhat easier, yet still important part. Hold items. Hold items will aid your Pokemon in whatever way that they wouldn't receive otherwise. With hold items, it's best to assign them in a way that will help cover weaknesses, or boost your power over the top. You should evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of each of your Pokemon when assigning these items. Suicune - Suicune is a wall and as such, gets a pretty common wall hold item. Leftovers. Gliscor - Leftovers also work really well here. Infernape - Assuming Infernape is the lead, there is really only one option for a hold item - Focus Sash. Focus Sash prevents things from killing it right away, ensuring you have time to set up your Stealth Rocks. Scizor - Leftovers are good again. Gengar - Gengar really has two options open to him. Wide Lens helps the accuracy on Hypnosis, which is only 70. Life Orb boosts his attack over the top. Personally, I prefer the Life Orb, so that's what I'm going with. Yanmega - As I said earlier, King's Rock isn't an option. Focus Sash would be better for Yanmega if I didn't already have Protect. Expert Belt is a good option though since it helps Bug Buzz and Air Slash do more damage where they're super effective. ************************** * Suicune - Leftovers * * Gliscor - Leftovers * * Infernape - Focus Sash * * Scizor - Leftovers * * Gengar - Life Orb * * Yanmega - Expert Belt * ************************** F. Breeding and EV Training ============================ Phew! Now the actual planning part is done, although you want to confirm that your strategy for your entire team will work and is effective before continuing on to this step. Ask for help with that as much as you can. Show a friend. Ask on this site. E-mail someone. Make sure it's good before wasting your time making a bum team. Once you're sure you're satisfied with all your hard planning, you can continue onto this step. The first thing you'll need to do is catch the base form of the Pokemon you want, should you not have it already. If you can't get it in your game, go on Wifi and see if anyone here at the GameFAQs trading boards has what you want. After you have it, what you need to do is breed for any egg moves you need, if any. If you have egg moves on your Pokemon, the Pokemon you have will need to be FEMALE. And then you'll need to find a Pokemon in the same egg group as it that learns the move you want and catch a MALE of that. When the male with the move you want and the female of your species breed together, the will create a Pokemon that's the species you want, and has the move you need too. However, you're not done breeding yet. It's helpful if that product you just got with the egg move is male, since then you can use Dittos in order to get the nature you want. Assuming it is male, give a Ditto with the nature you want an Everstone and breed it with the Pokemon you just got with your desired egg move. You now have a 50% chance of getting the nature you want! Much better than going randomly until you hit a small chance of hatching the nature you wanted. Also at this time, you should be noticing your abilities. If your Pokemon has BOTH the nature you wanted AND the ability you wanted (assuming it had more than one), then that's good. If not, keep breeding and hatching eggs until you get one that is exactly the way you want it. It could be perhaps time consuming, but not so much that it's unbearable. After you have the finished product with nature and egg moves, you can begin your EV training. Depending on what your Pokemon is, you will train in different places, which are listed for you earlier in this guide. If you're in doubt about which Pokemon give what EV and how many of them, simply look the information up on Serebii to find it. However, I don't recommend simply sitting down and EV training without any enhancement. There are certain things that boost the number of EVs you get. PokeRus doubles the EVs you gain. It can be acquired randomly through a small chance in a wild Pokemon encounter. More likely, you can trade for it on the trading boards on GameFAQs. There are also the "power" items, which you can get from the battle tower. They boost EVs of a CERTAIN TYPE, by 4. The Power Lens, for example, boosts special attack EVs by 4. There is a power item for every stat, so getting them all could take a long time. I recommend getting whichever ones you think you'll use the most and use the other item, the Macho Brace, for the rest of the training. You can get the Macho Brace by showing the Burmy fan in Pastoria City the three different types of Burmy. If you have BOTH the PokeRus AND the corresponding power item, a battle that normally gave you 1 EV of the stat will now give you a whopping TEN. EV training goes by much faster under these conditions. Also of note is the use of Exp Share. EVs are gained by gaining experience, so anyone who receives experience in the battle, even with Exp Share receives EVs from it. However, these EVs won't be boosted unless the Pokemon in question also has PokeRus, in which case they'll receive double of what the BASE EV was, and not the heavily boosted power item bonus was. Repeat the breeding and EV training process for your entire team until all of them are completed. G. Leveling and Finalizing =========================== The final stage of the team making process is FINALLY to level up your Pokemon and teach them whatever moves you assigned them to have. If you're extremely lucky, you may even not have to do this if your Pokemon was assigned all egg moves and TM/HM moves. Simply level them up with Exp Share and run through the Elite Four until they know everything necessary. And obtain the TM you seek by any means necessary. Teach them what they need to know and enjoy your newly completed team! Update for 1.76 - Apparently it is confusing what I mean here? I will clarify. Do NOT level or do anything until you're done EV training. Anything that gains experience in battle will gain EVs. So if you run through the Elite Four and you haven't EV trained yet, that Pokemon will have unwanted EVs on it. So EV train first, then level. H. Strategy Explanation ======================== The strategy for this team is fairly straightforward. Infernape is the lead here, and he starts by using Fake Out. Fake Out always makes the other Pokemon flinch, so this is basically a free hit. After this, you are free to set up Stealth Rock, since Focus Sash will keep you alive regardless of what they use on you (however, if it activates, you'll be in a tough spot if you switch out and need to switch back in with him). After the initial setup, you'll want to either continue sweeping with Infernape, if it's feasible, or switch to a proper counter, most likely Suicune, but perhaps Gengar (depending on if it looks like Surf or Earthquake is going to be used). Suicune should be switched to whenever it looks like Surf or Ice Beam is likely, which Gengar can switch in and attempt a sweep anytime Earthquake or a normal/fighting move is likely to be used. It's not terribly difficult to switch in with Gengar thanks to his three immunities. Similarly, Yanmega can also be used to avoid Earthquakes. After switching in, Protect the first turn for Speed Boost to activate, then Hypnosis, then sweep as necessary. Should you need to switch out (fire or Ice Beam are probably the most common threats, though flying is also a problem), Suicune is probably what you want to switch to, since he resists both ice and fire. Basically, Suicune is used to absorb water, ice, and fire moves, though he certainly can survive more. Gengar, Yanmega, and Gliscor can all switch in to Earthquake. Gengar and Yanmega if you want to sweep, or Gliscor if you need a wall or Earthquake of perhaps you just want to draw out a likely Ice Beam or force a switch or something. Scizor is used either for walling a little bit, drawing out a fire move, or Swords Dance Passes to other members. Infernape, if you can use him after starting, will be good for getting rid of things like Blissey and Snorlax with Close Combat, so try to make sure he survives if at all humanly possible. Basically, this team is going to be successful if you can switch to absorb damage with Suicune or one of the other members with immunities. Switching is the key, and most of your bases should be covered if you remember to switch out properly. ======================================= XI. Team Building - Underused Metagame ======================================= Many thanks to Anonymous1 from Saint Elimine's Sanctuary for the team I'm using as an example for this section. I'd planned out another team for it, but then realized that half of the team was the same as his, and the other half served nearly the same purpose. He volunteered for this team to be used, so I'm using the original example of this team, since I've seen it work wonders in battle. The Underused (UU) metagame is not the standard metagame in Pokemon. Pokemon in this tier are considered to be not as capable at battle as opposed to someone in the OU tier given their base stats and move pools when used by someone of equal skill. Thus, they are used less often, and have been given the name "underused". It should be noted that anything less than OU can be used in this metagame, so borderline (BL) Pokemon can be selected to be on these teams too, should you choose. A. Picking Your Team ===================== The UU metagame is much different than the OU metagame in that the UU metagame is much more about setting up than the OU tier is. Strategy in the UU tier should be about your Pokemon setting up one Pokemon on your team for success. Thus, you need to have adequate switches and such in order to make sure that you can ensure the star of your team for success. The first step in making a team for the UU tier is, again, separating who you like and don't like (keeping in mind not to eliminate too many, and especially keeping in mind things that won't take much damage and will be good for switches). So I'll do that now (note that I won't be including the BL tier for this FAQ example, but normally you can make teams with BL Pokemon on it if you want): Absol, Arcticuno, Banette, Blastoise, Chatot, Claydol, Clefable, Dewgong, Drifblim, Electrode, Flareon, Froslass, Girafarig, Glaceon, Golduck, Golem, Gorebyss, Hitmonchan, Hitmonlee, Hitmontop, Jumpluff, Jynx, Kabutops, Lanturn, Lapras, Leafeon, Luxray, Manectric, Mantine, Meganium, Mightyena, Miltank, Mr. Mime, Ninetales, Persian, Poliwrath, Probopass, Raichu, Rapidash, Sandslash, Shuckle, Swellow, Venusaur, Vespiquen, Vileplume The UU tier is huge, so I've got more Pokemon to narrow down than I did with the OU team. So I'll again separate them into categories: Sweepers: Absol, Chatot, Clafable, Dewgong, Drifblim, Electrode, Flareon, Froslass, Girafarig, Glaceon, Golduck, Gorebyss, Hitmonchan, Hitmonlee, Hitmontop, Jynx, Kabutops, Lapras, Leafeon, Luxray, Manectric, Mightyena, Mr. Mime, Ninetales, Persian, Poliwrath, Raichu, Rapidash, Sandslash, Swellow, Venusaur, Vespiquen Walls: Arcticuno, Blastoise, Claydol, Clefable, Dewgong, Drifblim, Golduck, Golem, Lanturn, Lapras, Mantine, Miltank, Poliwrath, Probopass, Sandslash, Shuckle Utility: Banette, Blastoise, Claydol, Electrode, Flareon, Froslass, Girafarig, Gorebyss, Jumpluff, Meganium, Mr. Mime, Vileplume There's still quite a bit to choose from in terms of sweepers, but at least now we can see who our choices are for walls. We need to keep in mind that walls are what are ideally going to be taking damage a lot of the time for our team, so it needs to not get hurt very much and be able to take quite a bit of abuse. Since reducing damage by switching is so important in the UU tier, the walls are what we should choose first. Looking at our choices, it's looking like Claydol and Probopass will be the best options for walls in regards to minimizing damage done. Claydol also has Levitate, granting it immunity to ground type moves. Considering that Probopass is x4 weak to Ground moves, should we choose to have them both on the team, this will make an excellent switching sequence. Probopass is mainly appealing since even though it has a nasty x4 weakness to ground, as long as you switch on essentially anything BESIDES a ground attack, damage done will be minimal. His moveset is really less important than him just being there, since often Probopass will be switched to take the oncoming attack, and then you will switch to something else as needed. Claydol is appealing because of his immunity to Spikes and Toxic Spikes, in addition to his resistance to Stealth Rock. Meaning that he can switch in without damage from those, Rapid Spin them away, or set up his own. Both of these can learn and be effective with Stealth Rock, but we probably won't want them both doing that, but we can still plan them both as walls for now regardless, and decide later which one of them we want doing Stealth Rock. Next we'll decide what we want to be sweeping. Keeping in mind that these are what we want to set up for success, we can make our selections. From personal experience, I can say that Swellow works really well in the UU environment due to the strategy it uses (which we'll get to later). If we don't choose it as the lead, or if it switches out, we can switch back easily due to the ground immunity. This said, we need something that is going to draw out Earthquakes, since if you can't easily predict an Earthquake (which usually is because you're weak to it), you can't really predict on when to switch on one. Keeping this in mind, there's a couple of things we need for the team. First, priority moves are HUGE in UU. It is very important that you have them since sometimes something with very little HP left will be thrown out, and you won't be able to outspeed it to kill it. So priority moves. Bulky waters are also nice too, and at the very least, we should try to fit in an ice move somewhere for dealing with the many things that are weak to ice. Unfortunately, there's not exactly room on the team to have all of these on the team and still get the rest of what we should have on. So we'll need to make some choices. First of all, note that both Claydol, should they be attacking, will use special attacks. Meaning that if we pick two more special attackers here, we'll be in a vast shortage in terms of physical attacks. So we'll try to pick out a physical attacker here. Keeping in mind that I'm also trying to fit a bulky water in here, it seems that Poliwrath can make a good choice that fits both of these descriptions. Poliwrath also has Water Absorb, which acts as a bonus for switches a lot of the time. With that covered, we've got two Pokemon left to select for the team. We don't have an outright special sweeper on the team yet, so now is time to consider one of these. Ice Beam is preferable to be fit somewhere on this Pokemon to hit everything that is weak to it. I also want something with outright destructive power since my only other real dedicated sweeper is Swellow. So we'll need something else to help with the power issue. Glaceon is notable here since 130 base in special attack is pretty useful. And with a Choice Scarf in effect, the special attack on it will be very impressive indeed. As for the last spot, it's generally useful in UU to have a Pokemon that acts as kind of the nurse Pokemon, healing other Pokemon up when you need it. There are several things they can do: heal, remove statuses, disable the opponent. Generally things like this. Grass Pokemon are nice for this since they can learn a lot of supporting moves like this. While looking through the list, Vileploom sparks the eye since Aromatheropy is good for status heals, and it can also double as a special sweeper. So this will work well here. This final selection makes my team: ************************************************************** * Swellow, Claydol, Probopass, Poliwrath, Glaceon, Vileploom * ************************************************************** To doublecheck: Claydol and Swellow are both immune to Earthquake, while Probopass is x4 weak to it. Probopass can take damage pretty well for things that aren't ground typed. Poliwrath can absorb water attacks walk away from ice attacks without much trouble. Vileploom heals. Everything else supports Swellow for success. We should be okay here, so we can proceed. B. Assigning Your EVs and Natures ================================== Okay! Now you've got the Pokemon you want on your team decided. The hardest part of the decision making is over! The very next thing you have to do is decide what natures you should give each of them, along with the EVs to train each of them in in order to best bring out their qualities. In order to do this, you'll want to look at the stat lines for each of the Pokemon you picked. Sometimes it's beneficial to assign EVs to their two best stats, then the remaining 6 to HP. However, sometimes, if their stats are good enough, overkilling them with EVs is unnecessary, so it's more beneficial to assign the EVs to something else. The same thing applies for natures. However, if you know a Pokemon is going to be walling, a useful tool for figuring out specifically how many EVs should go where is on this page: http://users.smogon.com/X-Act/defense.html We'll start with Swellow. Swellow is ideally going to be my lead, since he has really good speed and a nice move pool for leading. This said, Swellow's EVs and nature need to reflect this. There's not really a lot else we need to do with stats, so we can do the general attacking spread of 252 attack, 252 speed. The remaining 6 should go to special defense since that's the place most lacking defense-wise. Jolly is most beneficial to the strategy here. Not Next, Claydol. Claydol is primarily serving as a wall to take damage for things on switches. So we want EVs and a nature to help it minimize damage. However, it's move set isn't going to be devoted solely to defensive moves, so we're going to power up its special attack a little bit too. 252 EVs should be placed in HP since its HP only has a base of 60. The rest of the EVs should be split between defense and special attack. 144 defense, 114 special attack. Bold nature is best here. Probopass has some of the highest defense stats in the game, so it's not like he actually needs a whole lot of help with not taking any damage. Its HP base is also 60 though, meaning it needs help here. Since Claydol also makes a good Spinner, Stealth Rock is probably more beneficial for this team on Claydol. Thus Probopass will be doing other things (mainly taking take of the steels that will wall Swellow). So we need to plan EVs keeping in mind that even though we'll still be absorbing attacks with him, taking care of steel types is another purpose. 168 EVs in HP, 252 in special attack, and 90 in speed with a Modest nature are best for this particular nature. Poliwrath is going to serve as a sweeper and also as a bulky water, meaning that his EVs should reflect both of these things. In order to help him bulk up, so to speak, HP EVs are a good idea here, and attacking EVs help with the damage he should be doing, with the rest going to speed. 252 HP, 252 attack, 6 speed. Adamant nature to help boost the attacks. Glaceon is a pretty standard example of a special sweeper, so there's not really a lot of variation we need to do with its set. However, since it isn't exactly the fastest to begin with (plus its defenses are pretty good) we should focus some EVs in HP to make it survive longer. 252 HP, 252 special attack, 6 speed. Timid nature. Vileploom is going to serve primarily as support, but will also double as a special attacker. So we'll need to devote some EVs both to defenses and to special attack (with the EVs very spread out, in this case). 252 HP, 50 defense, 148 special attack, 60 defense. Modest nature helps the attacking do a little more damage. *********************************************************** * Swellow: Jolly, 252 attack, 252 speed, 6 SD * * Claydol: Bold, 252 HP, 144 defense, 114 SA * * Probopass: Modest, 168 HP, 252 SA, 90 Speed * * Poliwrath: Adamant, 252 HP, 252 attack, 6 Speed * * Glaceon: Timid, 252 HP, 252 SA, 6 Speed * * Vileploom: Modest, 252 HP, 50 Defense, 148 SA, 60 Speed * *********************************************************** C. Picking Your Abilities ========================== Abilities are important to certain strategies, so it's important that, if a Pokemon can have more than one, you get the right one for your strategy. In my case, Swellow, Claydol, Glaceon, and Vileploom can only learn one ability, so this isn't a problem for them. But I have to decide what abilities I want for the other two. Probopass can have either Sturdy or Magnet Pull. Sturdy is a fairly useless ability since not only are OHKO moves not really reliable, thus no one uses them anyway, but they're also outlawed most of the time. So Magnet Pull is an obvious choice here. Poliwrath can have either Damp or Water Absorb. It's not really a question about which one we want here since Water Absorb is infinitely more useful than Damp in pretty much all situations. *************************** * Probopass: Magnet Pull * * Poliwrath: Water Absorb * *************************** D. Picking Your Move Sets ========================== This is a critical stage in the team building process. This is the time you decide the approach and style you're taking to your battle. Will you go on an all out offense? Will your moves be dedicated to stat boosting? Or perhaps you want to annoy your enemy to death? You can do multiple things with one Pokemon, but not really at the same time. This is mainly why there are several movesets that could work equally well for any Pokemon at any given time. So let's get get started on what we want to do. Swellow -------- All right. I'm planning Swellow for my lead due to his extremely high base speed and nice move pool for it. It's pretty obvious what should be done with Swellow given his skill: Guts, but I'll explain anyway. Guts increases the attack of a Pokemon 50% if they're statused. Swellow is also a normal type. These things mean that Swellow can use a +50% attack STAB'd Facade. Facade is already a 140 base power move when statused. Combine that with a 50% attack boost from Swellow and STAB, and that is a lot of power in one move. So the majority of this moveset is going to revolve around using this move. In order to get Guts to activate, Swellow needs to have a status ailment. We can't just wait for this to randomly happen in order to be effective, so we're going to self-induce either poison or burn by giving Swellow a Poison/Flame Orb (for this FAQ, I'll be using Poison Orb, but either works). We want this to activate without Swellow taking damage, so Protect gives us a free turn to do that, with the added benefit of scouting for moves. Then we have to look for another good STAB move for Swellow, taking care of the Flying type. Brave Bird offers just that, so it's a good choice for a second attacking move. As for the last move, should Swellow come up against something that you know you can't beat (or will get killed on their attack), you will want a quick hit and run move - U-Turn. U-Turn offers a way to get in a quick attack before you call it back and switch to an appropriate counter. ************************************************* * Decision: Facade, Protect, Brave Bird, U-Turn * ************************************************* Claydol -------- Remember how I said that Claydol was really good for a utility unit since he is immune to both Spikes and Toxic Spikes and resistant to Stealth Rock? Well, Claydol's moveset is going to reflect this. Since it can switch in so easily against these moves, it is an excellent candidate to be using Rapid Spin in order to blow those away. And on a similar note, he can also lay down your own Stealth Rock while he's at it. The last two moves will be going to help you attack a little bit, should you have the need. Since Claydol's attack and special attacks are the same, and the options for special are better, this is what we're going to be using. Luckily, Earth Power is a ground move that is special based (they're pretty rare, and Claydol can learn the move naturally). As for the last move, Shadow Ball is optimal since it could be switching in to block your Rapid Spin, but Toxic is also an option since it can help take out other walls that are common switch ins to Claydol. I'll be going with Shadow Ball in this case. **************************************************************** * Decision: Rapid Spin, Stealth Rock, Earth Power, Shadow Ball * **************************************************************** Probopass ---------- Probapass' set is going to be tricky since he is also a fine candidate for Stealth Rock. But we've already assigned that move to Claydol. So should we assign it to Probopass too and have two options for Stealth Rockers? That's certainly an option, but let's put Stealth Rock on hold for now and deal with the other moves first for now. Probopass' primary purpose here is to serve as a wall and to to give support to the rest of the team - and more specifically, to serve as the steel counter for Swellow, since steels are the one thing that walls it. With this in mind, we need to make sure we get rid Probopass' ground weakness since, if we're to be facing steel types, which could possibly have Earthquake, we need to take care of the possibility that they could KO us. Thus, Magnet Rise is the first move here. The next two moves provide a way to attack in order to both take care of steel types and other things you might encounter. Earth Power is nice for getting rid of the Steel types, while Flash Cannon is a nice STAB move for you to have for other things. As for the last move, we want to consider that since Probopass is a wall, and thus hard to destroy (Earthquake aside), an option for taking him down is via status ailments (mainly Will-o-wisp, since he is immune to Toxic). Thus, Taunt is a good option here since it forces them to attack you, which means that you can't be statused to death, which is great for someone with defenses as high as Probopass. Plus Taunt is just a great move to have on a team in general since additionally, it can stop things such as Baton Passers from doing their job. *********************************************************** * Decision: Earth Power, Flash Cannon, Magnet Rise, Taunt * *********************************************************** Poliwrath ---------- Poliwrath is a bulky water serving as one of our physical attackers. Thus we are going to want some attacks, but before we assign some, there are some things to note. Poliwrath can learn Hypnosis and can also learn Focus Punch. A commonly used tactic people use with Focus Punch is hiding behind a Substitute and then using it, since it prevents you from getting hit so the move is successful. Hypnosis puts your opponent to sleep, meaning that if they don't switch, you get free turns behind a Substitute. If they do switch, it gives you a free turn to set up your Substitute for Focus Punch. Breloom commonly uses a very similar set (with Spore instead of Hypnosis in the OU tier. It's a very good tactic and is pretty effective if you use it right. As for the last move, Poliwrath should be able to take care of things like dragons without needing to switch to Glaceon to take care of them with an Ice Beam, so Ice Punch seems like it would be a good choice for the last slot. Plus Ice Punch covers bases that Focus Punch does not and provides a more secure way to attack, should you not want to take the turns in order to set up for Focus Punch. ********************************************************** * Decision: Focus Punch, Substitute, Hypnosis, Ice Punch * ********************************************************** Glaceon --------- Like I said before, Glaceon was selected in order to have another solid candidate that can deal a lot of damage. Thus, we're planning Glaceon with Choice Specs, which will make its special attack absolutely devastating. Unfortunately, Glaceon's moveset is pretty limited as to what you can put in it. Ice Beam is an obvious move for STAB, but really the only other move that's viable is Shadow Ball, which it should also have. Thus, we're left with two more slots to fill and not much to choose from. This is when we look to Hidden Power for help. HP Fighting is most preferable here since, in combination with Ice Beam, there isn't a Pokemon in the game that resists this combination. The last move is mainly filler but does have some reason for its selection. Sleep Talk makes Glaceon a good Hypnosis or other sleep move absorber. If you see something that commonly uses the move, you can switch to Glaceon, who will then have the ability to attack while asleep, meaning that you won't be down a Pokemon until they wake up. It's a decent tactic to be using anyway. ************************************************************ * Decision: Ice Beam, Shadow Ball, HP Fighting, Sleep Talk * ************************************************************ Vileplume ---------- Vileplume is going to serve mainly as Aromatheropy support since the ability to use this move is extremely useful as a status healer for your entire team, but it obviously has to do other things too. A status move is good to have for a second move to keep your opponent on their toes. They will probably assume upon seeing a Vileplume that they have a one of these moves, but they probably won't know which one. Sleep Powder and Stun Spore are both viable options normally, but Poliwrath already has Hypnosis, and since Sleep Clause is quite common, not planning too many Pokemon with sleep inducing moves is important as to stick to the rules, so in this case we'll be using Stun Spore. As for the last two moves, we'll be taking advantage of Vileplume's decent special attack. There are two types of STAB to take advantage of, but there are really only one move of each that are viable options. Sludge Bomb is good poison STAB, and either Energy Ball or Grass Knot (depending, since Energy Ball is more consistent, but Grass Knot is better for heavier things since damage is dealt proportional to weight) is good for grass STAB. I personally prefer Energy Ball for more consistency, so that's what I'll be going with here. **************************************************************** * Decision: Stun Spore, Aromatheropy, Sludge Bomb, Energy Ball * **************************************************************** E. Picking Your Hold Items =========================== Now you've FINALLY decided all of your movesets for your team. Don't worry, that's the longest process in the entire thing. Now comes a somewhat easier, yet still important part. Hold items. Hold items will aid your Pokemon in whatever way that they wouldn't receive otherwise. With hold items, it's best to assign them in a way that will help cover weaknesses, or boost your power over the top. You should evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of each of your Pokemon when assigning these items. Swellow - As I've already stated, Swellow's entire strategy is based on it having a Toxic Orb for Guts/Facade activation, so Toxic Orb is pretty much just what we have to give it here. Claydol - Being a wall, Leftovers are generally good. Leftovers are good for so many things, which makes them such a good hold item just in general. Probopass - Leftovers again. Same reasons as Claydol. They're nice on walls. Poliwrath - Leftovers. Mostly filler. Leftovers are never not useful. Glaceon - As with Swellow, our strategy was based around us giving Glaceon a Choice Specs, so that's what it gets. Vileplume - More Leftovers. F. Breeding and EV Training ============================ Phew! Now the actual planning part is done, although you want to confirm that your strategy for your entire team will work and is effective before continuing on to this step. Ask for help with that as much as you can. Show a friend. Ask on this site. E-mail someone. Make sure it's good before wasting your time making a bum team. Once you're sure you're satisfied with all your hard planning, you can continue onto this step. The first thing you'll need to do is catch the base form of the Pokemon you want, should you not have it already. If you can't get it in your game, go on Wifi and see if anyone here at the GameFAQs trading boards has what you want. After you have it, what you need to do is breed for any egg moves you need, if any. If you have egg moves on your Pokemon, the Pokemon you have will need to be FEMALE. And then you'll need to find a Pokemon in the same egg group as it that learns the move you want and catch a MALE of that. When the male with the move you want and the female of your species breed together, the will create a Pokemon that's the species you want, and has the move you need too. However, you're not done breeding yet. It's helpful if that product you just got with the egg move is male, since then you can use Dittos in order to get the nature you want. Assuming it is male, give a Ditto with the nature you want an Everstone and breed it with the Pokemon you just got with your desired egg move. You now have a 50% chance of getting the nature you want! Much better than going randomly until you hit a small chance of hatching the nature you wanted. Also at this time, you should be noticing your abilities. If your Pokemon has BOTH the nature you wanted AND the ability you wanted (assuming it had more than one), then that's good. If not, keep breeding and hatching eggs until you get one that is exactly the way you want it. It could be perhaps time consuming, but not so much that it's unbearable. After you have the finished product with nature and egg moves, you can begin your EV training. Depending on what your Pokemon is, you will train in different places, which are listed for you earlier in this guide. If you're in doubt about which Pokemon give what EV and how many of them, simply look the information up on Serebii to find it. However, I don't recommend simply sitting down and EV training without any enhancement. There are certain things that boost the number of EVs you get. PokeRus doubles the EVs you gain. It can be acquired randomly through a small chance in a wild Pokemon encounter. More likely, you can trade for it on the trading boards on GameFAQs. There are also the "power" items, which you can get from the battle tower. They boost EVs of a CERTAIN TYPE, by 4. The Power Lens, for example, boosts special attack EVs by 4. There is a power item for every stat, so getting them all could take a long time. I recommend getting whichever ones you think you'll use the most and use the other item, the Macho Brace, for the rest of the training. You can get the Macho Brace by showing the Burmy fan in Pastoria City the three different types of Burmy. If you have BOTH the PokeRus AND the corresponding power item, a battle that normally gave you 1 EV of the stat will now give you a whopping TEN. EV training goes by much faster under these conditions. Also of note is the use of Exp Share. EVs are gained by gaining experience, so anyone who receives experience in the battle, even with Exp Share receives EVs from it. However, these EVs won't be boosted unless the Pokemon in question also has PokeRus, in which case they'll receive double of what the BASE EV was, and not the heavily boosted power item bonus was. Repeat the breeding and EV training process for your entire team until all of them are completed. G. Leveling and Finalizing =========================== The final stage of the team making process is FINALLY to level up your Pokemon and teach them whatever moves you assigned them to have. If you're extremely lucky, you may even not have to do this if your Pokemon was assigned all egg moves and TM/HM moves. Simply level them up with Exp Share and run through the Elite Four until they know everything necessary. And obtain the TM you seek by any means necessary. Teach them what they need to know and enjoy your newly completed team! Update for 1.76 - Apparently it is confusing what I mean here? I will clarify. Do NOT level or do anything until you're done EV training. Anything that gains experience in battle will gain EVs. So if you run through the Elite Four and you haven't EV trained yet, that Pokemon will have unwanted EVs on it. So EV train first, then level. H. Strategy Explanation ======================== All right! So I've shown you how to build this team in the UU tier. Now you'll need to know how to use it. As I stated before, UU is much more about setting up a single Pokemon for success than the OU tier is. Thus, this team is all about one Pokemon while the others give it support. Swellow is obviously the Pokemon we're focusing on here. Swellow is also the lead here. Basically what you want to do right away is use Protect in order to have the Toxic Orb activate in order to poison you. On the next turns you can either switch or attack with Facade/Brave Bird. If you need to switch, it is preferable to use U-Turn since you can usually outspeed things and you can get some quick extra damage beforehand if you do. Eventually, you will probably need to switch though, since Swellow can't survive forever in there, especially given the poison. This is where the others come in. Claydol is there in order to easily switch into spikes and Stealth Rock, upon which he can spin away and then lay his own. He resists a lot of things, so doing this shouldn't be a problem. Probopass is there mainly for countering the steel types that wall Swellow. With Magnet Pull, the steels are trapped, and you will be free to sweep them with Earth Power as desired. However, in addition to this, Probopass also serves as a wall for soaking up damage. With his rock and steel typings, he can soak up quite a few attacks, assuming they aren't ground attacks, so a good use for Probopass is switching into something to absorb the damage, and then immediately switching out AGAIN to something else. He can take quite a bit before he dies, but just make sure your opponent doesn't catch on to your strategy and make you switch Probopass into an Earthquake, thus killing him. If ever you think one might be coming, Probopass needs to switch back to Claydol or Swellow. Poliwrath serves mainly as a second physical sweeper, but also gives some bulky water support, and can survive pretty well himself, having Water Absorb to switch in on (ideally) and also Substitute, meaning he should be able to survive a couple attacks himself. Glaceon also serves as a sweeper, though is admittedly not as useful as the others. Its sweeping ability, while great, isn't as useful due to it not having as many good opportunities to switch in on. Hypnosis absorptions are one good use, but if you can get Glaceon out when you might need it, it's always a good idea. Vileplume is used mainly for status healing support, but also for Stun Spore to support Swellow. The remaining attacks are used if you don't need to switch out after taking care of status. Basically, the idea is to start with Swellow, sweep as much as you can, and then switch when you need to, preferably to Claydol so he can set up some Stealth Rocks for you. From there, you switch in accordance with what happens in the battle, negating as much damage as you can with switches. Things are there to support Swellow, so eventually you should be able to throw Swellow out again and continue sweeping. Should Swellow die, both Poliwrath and Glaceon are there as backup sweepers, and hopefully you should still be fine. Ideally though, Swellow is the main attraction of this team. ========================================= XII. Suggestions for Specific Strategies ========================================= So I've run you through one specific example of how to build a team. But what if you still aren't sure how to start for what you specifically are going for? Well, in this section, I'll try to give you some things to go on for each specific strategy that I've listed above. A. Physical Sweeping ===================== To be a physical sweeper, you need to have a good base for attack. Or, at the very least, attack should be one of the stats you're better in. Speed is also a pretty important stat for physical sweepers. The point of physical sweepers is to hit hard and fast against the opponent's defense. Thus, you're going to want something with fairly high attack power, and enough speed to go first at least in a good portion of situations. A good place to start for determining who you want to be a physical sweeper is Serebii's Pokedex, viewing highest to lowest in base attack, which you can view at the following address: http://www.serebii.net/pokedex-dp/stat/attack.shtml It should be noted that your lead should definitely have a lot of speed, in addition to being fairly powerful. So to confirm that your lead will go first in a lot of situations, a good place to start to determine this is Serebii's Pokedex, viewing highest to lowest in base speed: http://www.serebii.net/pokedex-dp/stat/speed.shtml It should be noted that your lead can be either a physical sweeper OR a special sweeper. Which one it is is entirely up to your personal preference. As far as strategy itself goes for physical sweeping, typically physical sweepers don't know a lot of supporting moves since their defenses tend to be not so great. So you'll probably want to stick to three physically based moves, along with something else that could possibly get you out of a sticky situation. You should always take advantage of STAB for the types of your Pokemon (both of them if necessary, although certain Pokemon don't know good moves for both of their types: IE Lucario and steel), and then things that cover your Pokemon's or TEAM's weaknesses the best. Let's take Flygon, for example. Flygon has a x4 weakness to ice. So a good choice for a move for Flygon is something that can cover an ice weakness. Ice is weak to fire, rock, and fighting moves. Since in this situation, Flygon is a physical sweeper, Stone Edge is a good choice, since