Monotype Mono Fire, my first team in the format.

[Morgoth]

I have never tried to climb in the Monotype ladder before and this team is my first try. I chose fire type because it has a lot of good matchups but the main problem that I had while building was the lack of good bulky fire types, so I had to stick with Heatran as a bulky support.

Heatran @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Earth Power
- Toxic
- Magma Storm
Heatran is my usual lead. I built this one as a fast support, with the maximum investment in speed it reaches 278 what is pretty nice, outspeeding Pokémon with 80 base speed without the max. The moveset is pretty standard, with rocks, magma storm and earth power and i had to choose between Toxic and Taunt and i chose Toxic because it cripples walls that doesn't have Rest or anything like it. Leftovers is here just to provide sustain, since I doesn't need ballon because I have 2 ground immunities.

View attachment 137281
Charizard-Mega-Y @ Charizardite Y
Ability: Drought
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Air Slash
- Solar Beam
- Fire Blast
- Roost
I can say that the whole team works around Zard, especially against Water teams. He is the one that I try at max to keep alive during the battles and can also function as a "sponge" against special attacks. There's no much reliable switch-ins against him with an almost no resisted coverage.

Rotom-Heat @ Aguav Berry
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Serious Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Will-O-Wisp
- Defog
- Overheat
- Volt Switch
Rotom provides the hazard control to keep my team and obviously Zard safe. I put max SpA to keep any mon that doesn't resist Overheat very low, Wisp is to cripple physical attackers, those that are a problem to my team, since most of my mons are physically frail and Volt Switch to gain momentum.

Incineroar @ Incinium Z
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Darkest Lariat
- Flare Blitz
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
Since the physical attackers are a problem to my team, a Intimidate user is welcome. I can find breaches to use Swords Dance, mainly when a mon with lowered attack is switched out and then strike with a +2 Malicious Moonsault.

Chandelure @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Energy Ball
- Shadow Ball
- Fire Blast
- Trick
The special side wallbreaker. With a ridiculously high Special Attack, it's a 2HKO against almost any mon that doesn't resist and Trick is there to disable walls but sacrificing the speed boost of Scarf.

Infernape @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Flare Blitz
- U-turn
- Close Combat
- Stone Edge
The speed control that my team needs. Unresisted coverage and U-Turn to gain momentum. The main problem with him is his frailty, he is unable to take too much damage and is very vulnerable to priority, but Infernape can delete any other sweeper without priority that is slower than him.

I have hard times dealing with setuper sweepers with moves like Dragon Dance and is very easy to snowball against my team. Any advice to improve would be helpful.

 

[Eien]

Hi there! I'm glad to hear you tried out Monotype and like it enough to want to improve your team. I got a few suggestions to offer that should hopefully give you more success on the ladder.

First, the major ones are changing out Chandelure and Incineroar for better options. Chandelure, while once good, is now sadly almost entirely outclassed by Blacephalon. Blacephalon is both stronger and faster, making it very difficult to ever truly use Chandelure. Since I mentioned we'd like to change Incineroar, we do have your Z-Move slot open. I'd like to use it here to let you still have a fast Pokemon in this slot. Blacephalon can use Z-Trick as a pseudo-Agility, giving it +2 Speed. This combines with its Beast Boost ability granting Special Attack on KO to make it a very threatening sweeper. You should find that Blacephalon is much more reliable and useful than Chandelure ever was.

Incineroar is sadly rather mediocre as a physical attacker due to its below average stat line. I would suggest using Alolan Marowak instead. While its stat line is actually worse, it brings a very important Electric immunity to the team with its Lightning Rod ability. Your Mega Charizard Y absolutely loves Alolan Marowak, since it beats Electric-types like Tapu Koko very easily. Alolan Marowak is still quite capable of wallbreaking the way Incineroar did, thanks to Swords Dance boosting its already high Attack from Thick Club. Where Incineroar relied on its unique Z-Move to have enough power, Alolan Marowak can just power right through without taking your team's Z-Move, which we had gladly put on Blacephalon. Alolan Marowak also fulfills another niche in being able to run Stealth Rock, allowing us to give Heatran a new move.

Because we are able to run Stealth Rock on Alolan Marowak, Heatran's set needs a quick change too. Instead of the old Stealth Rock, we definitely want to have Flash Cannon. Flash Cannon lets Heatran actually beat Mega Diancie, since Earth Power doesn't have enough damage output. Mega Diancie is such a big threat to Fire, thanks to its ability to spam Diamond Storm with little to no fear, so we're more than okay with running a move just to beat it. It's especially nice on your Heatran set, since Leftovers and bulk lets it switch into attacks more safely, notably not being 2HKOed by Mega Diancie's Diamond Storm.

For Mega Charizard Y, it used to be a very scary wallbreaker, but Mantine and Toxapex are both able to wall it. As a result, I think you should replace Air Slash with Hidden Power Electric. This lets you 2HKO both of them. Importantly, with that capability, you can now actually rip right through Water teams even though you're using Fire! Solar Beam + Hidden Power Electric coverage is essentially unstoppable, and that should seriously improve your matchup there. It also gives you a huge edge against Flying, which heavily relies on Mantine to stop Mega Charizard Y, and even Poison, which relies on Toxapex. These three matchups, Water, Flying, and Poison, were probably really hard for you before, so I think this is an important change.

We no longer have Incineroar to take physical attackers, but luckily, Rotom-H is a very good option for a physically defensive tank. By switching its EV spread to 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD along with a Bold nature, we can sort of compensate for the loss of Incineroar. Rotom-H is unlikely to be strong enough to really threaten much offensively, and we now have Hidden Power Electric on Mega Charizard Y, so even the strong Volt Switch for Water-types is less necessary.

Finally, on Infernape, we would prefer to have Earthquake instead of Stone Edge. Simply, Earthquake's coverage is essential for hitting both Mega Diancie and Nihilego. As two very fast Rock-types that can tank a Close Combat and completely sweep Fire teams with Diamond Storm and Power Gem respectively, having Infernape able to outspeed and KO them with Earthquake is an absolute must.

I hope that helped and good luck with the team!

importable

Heatran @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Flash Cannon
- Earth Power
- Toxic
- Magma Storm

Charizard-Mega-Y @ Charizardite Y
Ability: Drought
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Hidden Power [Electric]
- Solar Beam
- Fire Blast
- Roost

Rotom-Heat @ Aguav Berry
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Will-O-Wisp
- Defog
- Overheat
- Volt Switch

Infernape @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Flare Blitz
- U-turn
- Close Combat
- Earthquake

Blacephalon @ Psychium Z
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Trick
- Shadow Ball
- Fire Blast
- Hidden Power [Ice]

Marowak-Alola @ Thick Club
Ability: Lightning Rod
EVs: 52 HP / 252 Atk / 204 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Shadow Bone
- Swords Dance
- Flare Blitz

 

[Morgoth]

Well, I just chose Chandelure over blacephalon because he have a reliable grass type move and a slightly better bulk and Incineroar was basically just for intimidate.

I really liked the suggestions of a defensive Rotom and HP elec on zard.

Also, I was thinking of Band Victini or Arcanine as physical wallbreakers in the place of Incineroar.

 

[Lu]

Quote

Well, I just chose Chandelure over blacephalon because he have a reliable grass type move and a slightly better bulk and Incineroar was basically just for intimidate.

I really liked the suggestions of a defensive Rotom and HP elec on zard.

Also, I was thinking of Band Victini or Arcanine as physical wallbreakers in the place of Incineroar.

Well, since having more bulk isn't something really useful for the role they play I find it useless, also it doesn't have enough bulk to survive EQ's from scarf Exca.

252 Atk Mold Breaker Excadrill Earthquake vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Chandelure: 368-434 (140.4 - 165.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Meanwhile you can flamethrower ohko Excadrill with Blacephalon and then sweep if you've already got Heatran off your way v. steel. While v. ground I guess you can pretty much sweep after Gastrodon is gone if it's special wall.

252 SpA Blacephalon Flamethrower vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Excadrill: 468-552 (129.2 - 152.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Gastrodon calcs

Special Gastrodon

252 SpA Blacephalon Shadow Ball vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Gastrodon: 120-142 (28.2 - 33.4%) -- 94% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery

+1 252 SpA Blacephalon Shadow Ball vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Gastrodon: 178-211 (41.8 - 49.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery


Physical Gastrodon

252 SpA Blacephalon Shadow Ball vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Gastrodon: 172-204 (40.3 - 47.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

+1 252 SpA Blacephalon Shadow Ball vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Gastrodon: 256-303 (60 - 71.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

And for your physical wallbreaker I'd rather use Victini since it has a lot of damage with V-Create boosted by band + stab and maybe sun.

252 Atk Choice Band Victini V-create vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Gastrodon in Sun: 252-297 (59.1 - 69.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

-1 252 Atk Choice Band Victini V-create vs. 252 HP / 240+ Def Landorus-Therian in Sun: 286-337 (74.8 - 88.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery.