[SMOGON] Starmie Moveset - Special Attacker/Support

[Marcusube]

Stats: 60 HP, 75 Atk, 85 Def, 100 SAtk, 85 SDef, 115 Spd
Ability: Natural Cure (This Pokemon has its status cured when it switches out.)

Build

Starmie @ Life Orb
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 0 HP / 0 Def / 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Thunder Wave
- Recover
- Scald
- Psychic

Offensive Calculations

252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Gengar: 213-252 (157.7 - 186.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Scald vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Talonflame: 203-242 (132.6 - 158.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Defensive Calculations

252+ Atk Life Orb Talonflame Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Starmie: 122-146 (90.3 - 108.1%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO
252 SpA Alakazam Shadow Ball vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Starmie: 108-128 (80 - 94.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
0 SpA Rotom-W Volt Switch vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Starmie: 96-114 (71.1 - 84.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Summary

This Pokemon, as you can see by the calculations above, can dish out very powerful hits while taking a reasonable amount of damage from the most common threats in the meta-game. Starmie is a very good support in the fact that, not only can it dish out powerful hits but it has good support in crippling the opponents. This move set is geared towards taking out mainly lead Pokemon such as Gengar and Alakazam who are mostly ran with a focus sash. As you can see from the calculations, Starmie will be taking a lot of hits that push it down to less than three-quarters of its max HP, hence why recover was chosen in this set. Scald and Psychic are for STAB and if you get lucky, a possible burn or special defense stat drop which makes it easier for your other Pokemon to come in and finish the job if Starmie proved inefficient. Lastly, Thunder Wave is ran to cripple fast sweepers such as Greninja, Gengar, Infernape and the list goes on. In conclusion, Starmie, even though it is fragile, can prove to be a real game changer when battling 6v6 Smogon.

[Justin]

[beastmoose]

I like this, because people would't expect it to be able to take an electric attack, but it can actually stay in there long enough to attack back. Great build!

[GingerxPug]

Not a bad set. Good job!

[Hero]

I actually might consider using this. Its not bad at all.

[MagnusHexem]

I have no idea why I haven't seen any Starmies used in VGC. It's FANTASTIC is singles, and there's really nothing that brings it down transitioning to Doubles besides not having the greatest abilities... (Illuminate, Natural Cure, and Analytic.)

[Black117]

Starmie is definitely gonna get usages once frogger gets the boot to ubers.

Anyways I think you should definitely sash in hydro pump, psyshock, thunderbolt, ice beam, grass knot, hp fire, and rapid spin as potential options to run. This literally give starmie the coverage it needs to get the jump on wouldbe checks.

Edit: Something to consider as well is a reflect type set as it allows starmie to semi check the likes of bisharp, scizor, t-tar, ferrothorn, etc while doing its job to spread burns/spin hazards.

Starmie @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 248 HP / 16 SpD / 244 Spe
Timid Nature
- Reflect Type
- Scald
- Rapid Spin
- Recover

[Rodrim]

Add in an option to opt rapid spin over Twave. Rapid spin is such great utility in the game, and spike stackers coming to be more common, its a great helpful. If you have a defogger, rapid spin is useless.

[elmo_loves_cake]

This seems awesome nice work!