[TEAM REPORT] Penguin the Emperor! VGC 15

[Pokeventurer]

Hi guys I am back from a really long break I took, hopefully u guys sticked around my blog to read more from me, now today I am presenting a new team that I built in between the days of my exams (literally) I didn’t had a really solid team to decided to build one, I had some ideas which I threw together to build up this team, you’ll learn soon let’s get to the construction of this team and then head into what it had with each individual member:

Team building process:
So I was just bored and really at first out of ideas, the day before I started to build this team I once and just once thought about this core synergy b/w landorus and empoleon, funny enough it looked completely worthless but after all I decided to give it a try anyways to make a failed team again, I putted them on and I saw what they countered well. Just to get a sufficient lead combination the duo of volcanion and weavile was added, the way this lead combination was pre planned to work changed over the format shift between spooky cup and BSD/VGC (not that it’s composition mattered over these two so using a /, I do realize they are not entirely identical). Next came mega gardevoir, mega gardevoir is a pokemon that I knew and thought that had good synergy w/ the duo core of empoleon and landorus in terms of switch ins, I also had used it before once so I was fine to go with it this time as well. Last up on this team came rotom-m as I saw on paper that I needed some things to yet be countered and a pokemon with certain criteria that you will run into.

The Team:


Landorus-Therian @ Choice Scarf  
Ability: Intimidate  
Level: 50  
EVs: 52 HP / 220 Atk / 52 Def / 4 SpD / 180 Spe  
Adamant Nature  
- Rock Slide  
- Earthquake  
- U-turn  
- Superpower

First off I’ll start by landorus/ I’ll go by the order the team was made. Landorus came at hand w/ the empoleon duo core and hax factor for sure, seriously it helps. Now we have a landorus at our hands what to do? There were quiet some options though at first I was limited cuz I was running a choice scarf volcanion and weavile w/ a special/unusual on the team. After I changed choice scarf over something the team demanded from volcanion in the VGC format. I didn’t wanted to replace a move *no spoilers* on my weavile, which went away with the volcanion’s variant change.i thought that scarf lando is a thing and didn’t wasted my weavile’s surprise so let’s scarf that, I had a cool spread from early this season and had used it before, so why not go w/ it again?
As expected this variant soon became the MVP of the team in different ways than offense, let’s just call it utility. Rock slide flinch hax is real, intimidate is never a waste on this team especially with the presence of a mega gardevoir. As I completed the team, I did realized how landorus check marked some really big threats to the overall team. Believe me and most of you already know there is nothing significant about this mon’s moveset, the EV spread is simple to take one +1 orb bisharp’s sucker punch, thought unlikely in the very current meta, still a safe check than 252/252/4 where you auto-loose to a bisharp when defiant activates. Super power, rock slide, EQ are all very important to contribute to this team’s victory. Lanodrus is one of those safer lead options against my opponents teams to put me in a sudden advantage often on.


Empoleon @ Assault Vest  
Ability: Defiant  
Level: 50  
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 52 Def / 148 SpA / 52 SpD  
Quiet Nature  
- Aqua Jet  
- Scald  
- Ice Beam  
- Flash Cannon

Empoleon can be called the MVP of this team in many matches, many teams didn’t had a well enough answer for it and then it smashed then from start to finish. Empoleon also made it to many matches. Many people doubted my decision for bringing this mon into my team and here’s why  choose it over suicune even when desperately needing tailwind: empoleon is an absolute tank, it can take many and many hits. empoleon is also good for an offensive coverage set and spread. It resists rock slides (a threat to this team). Empoleon takes hit super effective on gardevoir by being immune to poison and resisting steel 4x, want more reasoning? Well there is no more but I had some and shared them.
It’s roles are my favorite thing about this mon on this slot on the team here, it’s complex EV spread makes it survive tons of stuff and so will I explain the choice of assault vest on it. The EV spread I designed here is to survive an adamant landorus’ earthquake 100% of the time and some of u might not believe as I tell that it can survive stuff up to like 252+ heatran’s earth power which actually 3HKO’es it. Now let’s get to the move set. Scald and flash cannon are some good stab attacks, ice beam is really a wynaut question in a format filled w/ some of the most popular mons being weak or 4x weak to ice. The choice of aqua jet is quite interesting, you will notice things like quiet nature on this mon instead of adamant/modest, the reasoning to that is: in my terms torrent isn’t a worth ability, defiant puts bits and pieces of pressure on intimidate users like landorus mostly, aqua jet also synergizes w/ this weird weavile you’ll learn about and does about 1/3 after the defiant boost to nowaday’s landorus. The quiet nature makes it quite slow but empoleon is already bulky as it get’s and survives many attacks so I can handle the speed loss from it, aqua jet also adds to a bit of priority on it in this lac of speed and works in the moments when your opponent hangs off with like slivers of health.


Volcarona @ Lum Berry  
Ability: Flame Body  
Level: 50  
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe  
Timid Nature  
- Flamethrower  
- Bug Buzz  
- Protect  
- Tailwind

Next up on this team comes another duo, yes you read right, another duo. This duo came to give me the combination of scarf volcarona and assurance weavile*I’ll just reveal it* so first up on the combination was scarf volcarona and why it changed is here: as I completed the team, I needed a speed control option either could be my rotom w/ thunder wave however I saw that not working even on paper, next option was to try a variant of a weird speed control volcarona, you mostly see that on supportive volcarona; overall don’t use this volcarona, it is not a viable option for any team, this one fills an important thingy the team needed. As I decided to remove the scarf it was passed on to landorus and completed that role their as landorus + assurance weavile. Moveset is pretty weird and standard mesh-up f what a volc should keep :P flamethrower over heat wave ‘cuz of three words: accuracy, power, heatran/flash fire. Bug buzz is not impotant though good against m-gardevoir. Tailwind the usual (yet unexpected) speed control method and the staple protect that you should keep. You probably wondering where’s the cool spread? Well I am lazy to make one right now, and this one works just fine. I changed my item choice a lot as it rocked back and forth b/w two items. At first scarf was replaced for life orb for monstrous power. However soon after facing many amoonguss switch ins and smeargles I thought of replacing it for lum berry which also helps in paralysis situation.


Weavile @ Focus Sash  
Ability: Pressure  
Level: 50  
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe  
Timid Nature  
- Fake Out  
- Assurance  
- Icicle Crash  
- Protect

The part 2 of this duo is bounded w/ weavile which synergized well with all the ones mentioned above. Whether it is empoleon’s aqua jet or a rock slide from landorus assurance after crocking it’s boost lands terribly strong amounts of damage and many times turns around a match in a single unexpected turn. It sounds weird to use assurance on one of the most faster most I this format but works really well in it’s place and spot. Apart from this assurance monstrosity, weavile is also good for filling in some gaps that the team might have trouble with, first of let’s talk chalk cores, not them as a whole but the kangaskhan and landorus part. Weavile’s fake out outspeeds kangs’ and as most landorus’ are *** vest you can OHKO them even before they land a single move, even if they are scarfed they are not going anyway as my sash activates at full health. I did plan on using things like low kick and life orb for more fighting coverage and power respectively, however that idea dropped as I needed to protect sometimes to conserve the sash, and talking the choice of sash is that I’ll always mess up my orb weavile and then lose; simply that I find hard to play it. That was it for this pokemon.


Gardevoir-Mega @ Gardevoirite  
Ability: Telepathy  
Level: 50  
EVs: 252 HP / 92 Def / 116 SpA / 28 SpD / 20 Spe  
Timid Nature  
- Hyper Voice  
- Psyshock  
- Hidden Power [Ground]  
- Protect

Where da mega at? Four mons chosen and I haven’t FTW gardevoir came into this team as it’s fifth member of the team, w/ the above mons listed and what’ll they support well together with all of their roles combined. Let’s get to the theory of mega gardevoir’s choice here: I had experience using it in the past, which was an awesome team. My team had intimidate support and more importantly empoleon to back up all the weaknesses. More to it is that gardevoir 4x resists fighting type who 2 of my mons are super weak to and handle them well too. Now let’s get to the interesting EV’ing and the moveset of it. First for the moveset: Hyper voice shouldn’t be explained, as for psyshock, my investment wasn’t surely enough to knock out things like amoongus and it gave me a slightly better option against rain modes and especially conkeldurr who s fond of carrying an Assault vest often on. HP ground is rather another unusual/rare move that most of the mega gardevoirs have trick room or imprison etc. my EV’ing is specific to outspeed max speed brelooms, with a special attack stat of 200, rest went into bulk.


Rotom-Mow @ Life Orb  
Ability: Levitate  
Level: 50  
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA  
Modest Nature  
- Thunderbolt  
- Leaf Storm  
- Protect  
- Will-O-Wisp

Finally the last member is again a weird mon for this format you do really expect rotom’s wash and heat forms but this is a mow rotom for better over those two. So here is why this became the last slot on this team; as I looked over the meta check list I saw that I didn’t had any counters for bulky waters which were a threat as they can kill volc and landorus, scald had a chance to burn weavile too, what do I pick? I made some statements that could patch up this team, came up with a pokemon immune to ground, a pokemon w/ electric or grass coverage, however adding thundurus seemed the best but that thingie with rock slides is a major issue already for this team. Rotom-m seemed like the best pick for this team which had all the criteria required. I tried faster spreads but this one, which seems like a lazy one gave me stuff I needed especially w/ a life orb for more damage. Rotom-m also gave me little treats like a spore immunity and being baus against the growing use of azumoongus lead combination which looked scary, it also made me ignore powder and land moves where intended. Rotom by far is the least used member of this team however it is good when it should be. And yes this was it for the team.

Conclusion:
In the end hope you guys enjoyed this team and liked the idea of it, however I have to take another break for about two weeks and can’t promise my content to come out consistent as usual because I’ll be super tangled in study stuff again very soon, so yeah… anyways leave feedback cuz who doesn’t loves it! Bye for now!

[Podfighterninja123]

Not to hate, but max hp and spatk on Rotom Mow? I know you never see it, but weird set...

[GiMYz]

Original team composition, i think it can be tweaked a bit. For example: have you thought about Amoonguss instead of Rotom-M? You can add Trick Room on M-Gardevoir (which should be Modest nature then) to run a slow mode Garde/Amoonguss/Empoleon and a fast mode with Tailwind Volcarona and Weavile (> that should be Jolly but i think you simply made a mistake on Showdown, while i don't understand the reason for Assurance since its effect applies only after something else hit that target first, but you only have Scarf Lando faster than your Weavile)

[Delta]

Well this is certainly an interesting team. Assurance Weavile doesn't quite work unless it is paired with Landorus, which could work, but I would advise against it. Also, your Landorus is heavily inferior to my Landorus because my Landorus has Life Orb and Protect. LIFE ORB LANDORUS IS GOD!

[iflytoohigh]

Wow, this is a very interesting team! I must tell you that I love viewing creative drafts like this. I don't often see Empoleon, which makes me sad, because (s)he is probably my second favorite starter Pokémon evolution (after Venusaur).  

I am sadly not too good at battling, so I can't provide any useful suggestions... but, I did just want to say that I like the creativity! :D

xx