Row Row Fight the Power: 2013 Autumn VGC Team Report

Do the Impossible
See the Invisible
Row Row Fight the Power

Hey there everyone, this is Arbin T. (Cypher). If you don’t know me, well, I’m an admin on the Skarmbliss PO2 server, and I have no other notable qualifications. Despite my lack of achievements, I still believe myself to be a great team maker as well as a great battler.

The team was inspiried by the anime, Toppen Tegann Gurren Lagann. It’s one of my favorite animes, and I wanted to dedicate the VGC team to it. Thus, I used Pokémon that resembled the main characters, which are Excadrill, Krookodile, Scizor and Zapdos. Then, I added a Tyranitar to boost Excadrill’s speed as well as counter any other weather. Last, I added Cresselia, who played the role of speed control through the use of Icy Wind and Trick Room. My friends Bisty, MrFox, TalkingLion and more helped me with this team: they showed me how to handle certain Pokémon, what Pokémon to watch out for, what moves I should use and what EVs I should use.

In addition, this is the team I used at the Philadelphia VGC 2013 regionals, where it went 4-4. Although 4-4 is not an impressive record, there are various factors why this team lost that are useful to examine. This team has three different ways it can be played: Hyper-Offensive, Bulky Offensive, or Defensive. Throughout the battle, it can switch between the three modes. This goal of this team is to either perform an Excadrill sweep, rip through the opponent’s team through double targeting, or use the Safeguard and Swagger combo.

Team Dai-Gurren

Simon (Excadrill) (F) @ Leftovers
Trait: Sand Rush
EVs: 4 HP / 132 Atk / 60 Def / 188 SDef / 124 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
– Earthquake
– Rock Slide
– Substitute
– Protect

As I mentioned before, one of the purpose of this team is to perform an Excadrill Sweep. Excadrill is a pretty cool Pokémon; it’s strong, surprisingly bulky, fast under Sand, good in Trick Room out of Sand, resistant to Dragon-type moves and immune to Thunder Wave. Overall, it’s a great sweeper.

Instead of using the typical hyper-offensive Excadrill, I used a Bulky version instead, with Substitute and Leftovers. Although a strange concept, it does work. There are hardly any HP Evs at all on Excadrill due to its already high base HP. The Special Defense EVs on Excadrill allow Excadrill to switch into Special attacks, most notably Latios’ Dragon Gem Draco Meteor. In addition, at full health, Excadrill can survive a Max Special Attack Heatran’s Heat Wave. The Speed EVs are so Excadrill hits 124 Speed, outspeeding Base Speed 70s outside of Sand, as well as hitting 248 Speed in Sand. Furthermore, 124 was used for Trick Room, so with no Sand, I can underspeed Base Speed 80s, such as Max Speed Chandelure. The 132 EVs were placed in Attack in order to hit the magic number where it gains an extra stat point. The Defense EVs are leftover EVs to increase its bulk, as well as make sure that Scizor’s Bullet Punch won’t break its Substitutes.

Earthquake, Rock Slide and Protect are common moves for Excadrill, but Substitute is not. Because I wanted Excadrill’s to sweep in Sandstorm, I used Substitute to protect Excadrill. Substitute was used often, especially in conjunction with Protect because by using the two moves in succession, Excadrill could stall out its opponent and cause them to get hit by Sandstorm damage. Furthermore, Excadrill will be able to heal itself through Leftovers, making it able to create more Substitutes later on. This defensive technique would prove useful in my Round 1 match at Philadelphia, where Excadrill was able to Substitute stall in order for my opponent’s Hitmontop to be KO’d by sand. This left his Salamence as his last remaining Pokémon, which Excadrill KO’d with Rock Slide.

Excadrill was commonly used with Tyranitar, due to Tyranitar bringing out Sandstorm for Excadrill’s Sand Rush. However, there were times I did not use Tyranitar alongside Excadrill because I predicted my opponent would bring out Sandstorm for me or I needed Excadrill to underspeed something inside of Trick Room. Cresselia was a good partner for Excadrill because Excadrill can set up a Substitute or attack, while Cresselia can Trick Room and is immune to Earthquake.

Excadrill is named after the main character Simon, Gurren Lagann’s protagonist, who’s iconic item is a drill. Due to Excadrill’s resemblence to a drill, I chose it to represent Simon.

Kamina (Krookodile) (F) @ Life Orb
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
IVs: 30 HP
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
– Earthquake
– Crunch
– Low Sweep
– Protect

One might think, why use Krookodile when Garchomp exists. Well, there are certain qualities that Krookodile has that Garchomp does not. Krookodile has Intimidate instead of Sand Veil, which is not as luck-based and helps support the team overall by lowering the opponent’s Attack stat. In addition, Krookodile has Crunch to hit the ever-present Cresselia for super effective damage, which Garchomp cannot do as effectively.

Krookdile is one of the Hyper-Offensive members of this team. It plays pretty straight-forwardly, destroying the opponent’s team with its vicious Attack and Speed. Jolly 252 Speed was so Krookodile can outspeed Neutral Base Speed 100s and 102s (and Ray’s Hydreigon too!). Although not Adamant, with Life Orb and 252 Attack, Krookodile still did major damage. The 4 Special Defense EVs were to counter Download Pokémon, such as Porygon2, and have them raise their Attack stat instead of the more useful Special Attack. Instead of having a Krookodile with 31 HP IVs, I used 30 HP IVs instead because this makes Krookodile’s HP stat 169 instead of 170. This was on purpose because this would cause Life Orb’s recoil to be 16 HP instead of 17 HP, which means I can use Life Orb 11 times without fainting instead of 10.

Earthquake and Crunch are standard STAB moves, ravaging through even the bulkiest of Pokémon. Low Sweep was chosen to hit Hydreigon, which this team is weak against, and Heatran. I wanted to make sure that my team was ready against Hydreigon and against Levitate Heatran (due to Skill Swap). In addition, Low Sweep can be used if I have to hit a Pokémon such as Tyranitar but cannot use Earthquake due to having my own Tyranitar on the field. Lastly, if there was a Pokémon, such as Garchomp, on the field and it was faster than Krookodile, I would use Low Sweep in order to lower its Speed and strike it first on the next turn.

Krookodile was mostly paired up with Zapdos. Together, they would use the divide and conquer strategy, where they double teamed on one of the opponent’s Pokémon. This was used because it was usually predictable when one Pokémon was going to Protect and the other Pokémon was going to use a move such as Trick Room or Tailwind. Thunderbolt and Crunch were mainly used to annihilate many Pokémon. Even Cresselia couldn’t stand up to it. Thunderbolt would hits it first, then Crunch KOes Cresselia because Sitrus would not have activated yet due to Thunderbolt hitting for less than half its HP.

Krookodile is named after Kamina, the hot-headed Deuteragonist of the show. Due to his trademark shades and Krookodile’s eyes looking like Kamina’s shades, I chose it to represent Kamina.

scizor
Yoko (Scizor) (F) @ Lum Berry
Trait: Technician
EVs: 196 HP / 156 Atk / 4 Def / 124 SDef / 28 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
– Bullet Punch
– Bug Bite
– Safeguard
– Protect

Scizor is a pretty nifty Pokémon. With a great ability, priority and strong moves, Scizor is a strong choice for this team. It gave this team a Grass-resist, an Ice-resist and another Dragon-resist. In addition, with Bullet Punch, it helped clean up my opponent’s Pokémon.

Scizor’s spread is unusual, but it does make sense. With 196 HP EVs and 124 Special Defense EVs, Scizor has a 66.6% of surviving Max Special Attack Expert Belt Cresselia’s Hidden Power Fire, which means that the odds are in my favor. 28 Speed EVs hit 89 Speed, which allowed Scizor to function under Trick Room by underspeeding Base Speed 70s. In addition, if my opponent gets hit by Icy Wind, Scizor can outspeed them if they are neutral base speed 80 or lower. If hit by another Icy Wind, Scizor can outspeed Positive Base Speed 108s, such as Terrakion. In addition, outside of Trick Room, this allowed Scizor to outspeed slow Cresselia and Metagross. The rest were dumped into Attack, which also hit the magic number which allowed for an extra stat point. Lum Berry was used for the Swagger-Lum combo between Cresselia and Scizor, as well as countering status.

Bullet Punch, Bug Bite and Protect are staples on Scizor. However, an odd choice for Scizor was Safeguard. Since Cresselia suffers from Four Moveslot Syndrome, I had to use Safeguard on another Pokémon, which soon became Scizor. Safeguard was used to protect my team from status, such as Thunder Waves and Spores. It was useful to counter teams that relied on Amoonguss to incapicitate their opponents. Lum Berry was used to make sure that Scizor could get a Safeguard up before being statused. Furthermore, due to Cresselia having Swagger, I would abuse the Safeguard Swagger combo between the two, boosting Scizor’s Attack and sweeping with either STAB moves. In addition, I could switch Scizor out for another Physical Sweeper, either Excadrill, Krookodile or Tyranitar, and sweep with them.

Scizor was mainly paired with Cresselia for the Defensive mode of my team, as well as the Bulky-Offensive mode too. Cresselia and Scizor would help control the opponent by using Icy Wind, Trick Room, Safeguard and Bullet Punch. Furthermore, I would spam Swagger to abuse Safeguard and gain Attack boosts to pummel the opponent with.

Scizor is named after Yoko, the female red-headed sniper. Due to Yoko’s recognizable red hair color and her weapon of choice being a sniper rifle, and Scizor’s red color and Scizor’s “signature” move is named after a bullet, I chose Scizor to represent Yoko.

Dai-Gurren (Tyranitar) (F) @ Chople Berry
Trait: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 HP / 52 Atk / 28 Def / 116 SDef / 60 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
– Crunch
– Rock Slide
– Low Kick
– Protect

Due to the inclusion of Excadrill in this team, I needed a Sand Stream Pokémon, and I didn’t want three Ground-Types on this team, so I chose Tyranitar, who I like better. Tyranitar is the glue to this team due to how well it brings the team together through Sandstorm. It beats Focus Sashes, kills off super low HP Pokémon, tanks Dragon-types and other neutral damaging types like a boss — no wonder Tyranitar is a commonly used Pokémon.

Tyranitar has another unusual spread. 252 HP and 28 Defense EVs are used to make sure that Metagross’ non-boosted Meteor Mash is not a OHKO on Tyranitar at max health. The Special Defense EVs are so Tyranitar’s Special Defense is higher than its Defense, to counter Download Pokémon. In addition, it allows Tyranitar to take Special Attacks, such as Hydro Pump, better. Like Scizor, 60 Speed EVs hits 89 Speed, which allows Tyranitar to underspeed base speed 70s, most notably Politoed. This is important because this allows me to know if Politoed is a slow variant or a normal/fast variant through the order of the weather. In addition, after one Icy Wind, Tyranitar can outspeed base speed 80s, most notably Chandelure, and after two Icy Winds, can outspeed base speed 108s, most notably Terrakion. The leftover EVs are placed in Attack, where Tyranitar gains an extra stat point.

Tyranitar runs the typical Tyranitar moveset, complete with the Chople Berry. Chople Berry was used to prevent KOs from Fighting-Types, especially from -1 Attack Pokémon due to Krookodile’s Intimidate. A Dark or Rock Gem could have been used instead, but Chople Berry was still more useful in my opinion. Its moves are standard because its moves were important to the team. Crunch hits many Pokémon for neutral damage, Rock Slide is a strong STAB option, taking out threatening Thundurus and Volcarona, and Low Kick hits the annoying Dark- and Steel-Types, such as Hydreigon or Heatran. Aqua Tail was an option over Low Kick or Crunch in order to hit Pokémon such as Rhyperior for high damage, but Low Kick and Crunch proved more useful and less situtational for me.

Tyranitar was usually paried up with Excadrill, in order to bring out the Sandstorm for its Sand Rush. In addition, Tyranitar could be partnered up with Scizor, Zapdos and Cresselia too, due to their good synergy together.

Tyranitar was named after Dai-Gurren, the team name of the main cast of Gurren Lagann. Since this is a Sand team and Tyranitar represents Sand as a whole, and Dai-Gurren is the name of the team, I chose Tyranitar to represent the team.

zapdos
Kittan (Zapdos) @ Choice Specs
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 4 HP / 176 SAtk / 76 SDef / 252 Spd
IVs: 30 Atk / 30 SAtk
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
– Thunderbolt
– Air Cutter
– Heat Wave
– Hidden Power [Grass]

After having two Ground-weak Pokémon and two Earthquake users, I desperately needed a Ground-resist. Thus, I chose Zapdos for its useful Flying-type, as well as great Electric-type. It is pretty useful for this team since I did not have clear way to beat Water-types otherwise.

The EVs are fairly simple. Timid 252 Speed is to hit max speed, outspeeding neutral base 100s and 102s, such as Salamence and Garchomp. 4 HP and 76 Special Defense EVs are used in order to survive a max Special Attack Life Orb Kingdra’s Draco Meteor. The rest of the EVs were dumped into Special Attack for strength. At first, I did not mind the weaker Special Attack, due to using Choice Specs, however, now, if I could, I would have used an even simpler spread of 4 HP / 248 Satk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd. This is because at Regionals, I did not battle any Rain teams, and Kingdra was not used that often. Furthermore, during my Round 3 battle, my normal combo of Thunderbolt + Crunch failed to KO a Cresselia, leaving it left with only 4 HP. If my Zapdos was stronger, that would have ensured the KO and ensured that Trick Room was never set up.

Thunderbolt and Heat Wave are common moves, hitting Pokémon such as Politoed and Metagross. However, Hidden Power Grass and Air Cutter are underused moves. I needed a way to hit Pokémon such as Gastrodon hard, so I chose Hidden Power Grass. But for Air Cutter? That’s for Fighting-types such as Hitmontop and Virizion. I originally used Hidden Power Flying, but I needed Grass attack in order to deal with Gastrodon better. Since I had four attacking moves with nothing else, I decided to use Choice Specs in order to increase the damage output of its moves. Although there were sometimes I wished I could have switched moves, the increased damage output was very useful to counteract that.

Zapdos was mainly paired up with Krookodile for the Hyper-Offensive mode of my team. As explained before, I would use the Divide and Conquer strategy to shock my opponents. However, Zapdos was pretty versatile with my team, being able to pair up with any other Pokémon.

Zapdos is named after Kittan, the fierce rival and friend of Kamina. Due to Kittan’s spiky yellow hair and Zapdos’s spiky yellow body, I chose Zapdos to represent Kittan.

Nia (Cresselia) (F) @ Sitrus Berry
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 100 SDef / 156 Spd
Calm Nature (+SDef, -Atk)
– Psychic
– Icy Wind
– Swagger
– Trick Room

Cresselia was much needed on this team, which was weak to Fighting-types and needed some Ground resists. Cresselia was the perfect fix, especially with its fantastic bulk. In addition, with the ability to control Speed, it would prove to be a useful member on my team.

At first glance, this Cresselia may seem normal, but it really isn’t. This Cresselia is absurdly fast! I ran 156 Speed in order to hit 125 Speed, faster than the average Cress. I ran that number for various reasons. First, after one Icy Wind, Cresselia can outspeed Max Speed Base Speed 115s, which outspeed Latios and Thundurus. This allows Cresselia to outspeed them again, and cause them to have -2 Speed. This will cause some of my other Pokémon to outspeed them and strike them. Also, at 125 Speed, Cresselia outspeeds Excadrill outside of Sand, which allows me to use the Swagger-Safeguard Combo on it. Then, I can switch Cresselia out for Tyranitar, bring out the Sandstorm, and Excadrill will be both super fast and super strong. The 252 HP and 100 Special Defense were added to add bulk to Cresselia, especially Special Defense to survive hits from Hydreigon.

Cresselia runs a common moveset of Psychic, Icy Wind, Swagger and Trick Room. Icy Wind and Trick Room are for Speed control. Swagger is to abuse the Swagger-Lum combo with Scizor, as well as abuse the Swagger-Safeguard combo. In addition, as a last resort, Swagger was used to disrupt the opponent’s strategy through the use of hax. Lastly, Cresselia has Psychic instead of Psyshock. I chose Psychic due to the amount of physical attackers on this team, which meant I hit most Pokémon’s Defense instead of their Special Defense. I lacked ways to hit a Pokémon on its Special side, so I chose Psychic instead of Psyshock to fulfill that need. In addition, the 10% chance for a Special Defense drop is a good bonus.

Cresselia could pair up with any other member of the team — even Excadrill without Sandstorm up. But, I usually paired it with Scizor. The Swagger Lum Safeguard combo worked out pretty well, despite not using it much at Regionals. Also, Speed control was useful, controlling the tide of some matches.

Cresselia is named after Nia, the sweet and caring princess. Due to Nia’s positive attitude and Cresselia’s kindness, I chose Cresselia to represent Nia.

Conclusion

Although this team has a lot of flaws, such as the 3x weak to Water, Fighting and Bug, it still managed to play well. However, there is still room to improve, such as switching some of the Pokémon, EV spreads, moves, items, etc. In addition, there were some plays I could have done better, but oh well. I really enjoyed playing with this team, and it has become one of my favorites. Although it had had an unlucky run at Philadelphia, it still won in my heart.

Touch the Untouchable
Break the Unbreakable
Row Row Fight the Power