Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
Welcome to the latest edition of the Team Rater Competition! The tier this time around will be OU. For each round we'll post a team, and participants will have one week to complete a rate of said team. When the round is over, the participants who submitted the best rates will move onto the next round. If you're currently involved in or are looking to start rating OU teams, I highly encourage you to participate as this promises to be a great learning experience. Here's to a fun and competitive tournament!
Important notes:
The rates in the final two rounds will count towards the Team Rater
The winner will be awarded voice status in the RMT room on PS if they have shown an interest in getting involved (If you are currently an active voice and win, you may be promoted to driver).
Each round will last one week. Failure to rate the team within the one week time period will result in disqualification unless you're able to give us a valid reason. Please only sign up if you can commit to rating one team every week for the next month.
If you are eliminated and would like some feedback on your rate and how you can improve going forward, feel free to ask us.
Participants please PM your rate to Team Pokepals and celticpride. You have until 23:59 EST on Saturday, 17 September to submit your rate.
The general idea of the team is to stack hazards and then clean with Terrakion, DD Altaria or sweep with Cm Reuni. So the hazard core is Starmie/Lando/Ferro and then I tried an offensive core made up of Terrak/Altaria/Reuni.
Terrakion provides good offensive synergy for my team, checking common Dark-types like Bisharp and Weavile using its Choice Scarf. Stone Edge and Close Combat are effective STAB, and Facade can help counteract a burn. Toxic can whittle bulky Pokemon like Garchomp. An Adamant Nature gives me more power, but I could consider using Jolly.
Reuniclus @ Leftovers
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 HP / 200 Def / 56 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psyshock
- Shadow Ball
- Recover
- Calm Mind
Reuniclus is my team’s primary win condition. I think it’s really effective in the current metagame because it can take on Mega Medicham, Mega Lopunny, and Mega Diancie really effectively. Psyshock and Shadow Ball let it sweep once Weavile and Dark-types have been eliminated. Calm Mind lets me boost up to astronomical levels, and Recover lets me stay healthy.
Starmie gives the team a good switch in for Keldeo and spins for the rest of the team. Colbur Berry was added to help reduce Pursuit damage from trappers like Tyranitar and Weavile. A bulky Starmie was chosen to help deal with Keldeo throughout the game, as an offensive one would get worn down extremely quickly. Natural Cure + Recover helps Starmie recover, even from Scald Burns and Psyshock helps Starmie quickly defeat Keldeo, especially Sub Calm Mind variants.
Landorus-Therian @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 248 HP / 244 Def / 8 SpD / 8 Spe
Impish Nature
- Earthquake
- Stealth Rock
- U-turn
- Stone Edge
Lando covers many physical attackers including Excadrill and Mega Lopunny, and is able to wear down physical attackers with it's Rocky Helmet. It also acts as the Stealth Rock user for the team and is able to provide momentum via U-turn. Stone Edge enables Lando-T to defeat Mega Pinsir and Talonflame, and 8 SpD EV's allow it to avoid the 1HKO from Mega Manectric.
Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 88 Def / 168 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Power Whip
- Leech Seed
- Spikes
- Gyro Ball
Ferrothorn provides the team with a switch in for Fairy and Dragon types such as Clefable and Latios lacking fire coverage. It can also switch into Kyurem-Black and Weavile. It completes the hazard stack duo with it being the Spikes user and is also able to get chip damage in through Iron Barbs or Leech Seed. Power Whip enables Ferrothorn to do major damage against water types like Rotom-Wash and Keldeo if they try to switch in, and Gyro Ball is run to deal a good amount of damage to Fairy types like Clefable, Ice types including Kyurem-Black and Weavile, and finally faster threats like Tornadus-Therian and Latios.
Cotton Guard defense boosts let it tank powerful hits from Steel-type moves, which can let it easily clean once opposing Steel-types have been removed or weakened by Ferrothorn’s Spikes support. I chose not to use Refresh because Reuniclus can handle opposing status moves with its Magic Guard. Return is great STAB that hits hard, and Roost lets me regain HP.
The winning rate for Round 1 was by -Lone! He had a strong rate that drastically improved the team against prominent metagame threats.
-Lone began his rate by analyzing big threats to the team, such as Keldeo. By showing that the team had no sturdy Fighting-resist, -Lone proved that the team would easily fall under extended pressure from Fighting-types like the aforementioned Keldeo as well as Mega Lopunny. He then replaced Garchomp with Landorus-T, providing the team with a better check to Mega Lopunny without Ice Punch while also providing a Ground immunity. He also showed how Landorus’ U-Turn could also provide free switches and opportunities for Kyurem-B to hit hard, since Landorus-T often forces switches into physical walls that Kyurem-B can easily KO.
He then replaced Tangrowth with Amoonguss, reasoning that it was a secondary Fighting-resist that could help Landorus-T against Ice Punch Mega Lopunny and Keldeo. -Lone also showed that it was able to switch in much more easily against non-Belly Drum Azumarill than Tangrowth was, avoiding the 2HKO from all common attacks. Then, he pointed out that Amoonguss can handle Thunder Wave Clefable with the combination of Clear Smog and its typing, which was a huge threat to the team.
Finally, -Lone pointed out that the changes he had made up to that point still left the team quite weak against Weavile. Although it would require changing a third Pokemon, -Lone opted to replace Rotom-W with Keldeo to handle Weavile as well as Bisharp. He showed that the coverage Rotom-W offered was mostly redundant, as the team now had Landorus-T to handle Talonflame and Excadrill.
Although rates aren’t usually encouraged to change more than two members of a team to avoid completely shifting its identity, the TR team felt that -Lone’s changes were justifiable given the otherwise huge weaknesses that the team had against common threats. Thus, -Lone has the best rate for this round! Congratulations!
Thanks for submitting all your rates ! If you want to know why you weren't able to make it last round, feel free to PM us, we are more than happy to provide feedback on the rate you sent along with suggestions on how to improve.
Here is a summary of all the things that stood out and we liked:
Littlelucario: Suggested Band Kyurem-B as he spotted the team’s inability to break stall. Iron Head works really well with Mega Lopunny to lure Clefable and keep it at low HP, because Clefable often uses both Kyurem and Lopunny as an opportunity to switch in. Kyurem and Lopunny can potentially break or sweep teams with Clefable weakened.
-Lone : Replaced Tangrowth with Amoonguss and Landorus with Garchomp to have a more solid defensive backbone. He also improved the offensive capabilities of the team, since specs Keldeo > Rotom adds more speed and breaking power to the team. It can act as a revenge killer to some threats such as Kyurem-Black.
Eutychios : Added Latios in place of Tangrowth gives the team more breaking power and also gives Defog support for Kyurem-Black. He also suggested running Iron Head on Kyurem-Black to lure out Clefable to deal some major damage and prevent it from easily switching in again.
Panther5001: Healing Wish Lopunny is a cool idea that can work well with a Lando-T set that breaks defensive cores for Lopunny.
ez: Suggested Power Herb Solar Beam Heatran, which helps out Mega Lopunny as it is able to immediately get rid of bulky waters that would switch into Mega Lopunny, or at least deal significant damage to them to put them in range for Mega Lopunny to KO.
False.: Noticed that Amoonguss works better in place of Tangrowth, which improves the team's matchup against Clefable, who can potentially cripple Heatran through a coverage move like Thunder Wave. Using Bisharp as a breaker also works well with Mega Lopunny, as it can easily break through or wear down some of Lopunny's switch ins including Clefable and Slowbro.
By the way, we now have two official team raters in the team competition: False. and Eutychios. Having the badge doesn't automatically mean that you have no chance against them. It’s impressive that some of you can go head to head with our official team raters. They have to give everything they have to stay in this tour too!
If any participants want more feedback on their rate, they can PM us and we can then give private feedback about their respective positives and negatives. Our suggestions for improvement might give you an advantage over other raters, so feel free to use this opportunity.
In this round you’ll have to go all out to proceed, good luck!
