Team Building Guide

Yeah OK i'm not the best battler and stuff but this guide might help some of the inexperienced players and give the experienced ones something to do.


Well the 4th generation has brought us the greatest gift of all time: Online, wifi, competative play. With it, hundreds of forums and websites have sprung up, sporting lots of different skilled trainers ranging from the new guys to the national tournament winners. However, because of this you can’t just be content to beat your next door neightbour anymore: You have to have a good, well build, EV trained team to cope with the competetive metagame. Read on!


Let’s go through the terms used to describe pokemon first:


Wall – A pokemon that has high defence (good ones have at least 400), and can take hits. It usually counters physical sweepers. They have usually a recovery move, an attacking move, a status move and one other depending on the pokemon. Examples are Skarmory, Weezing, Regirock.

Special Wall - A pokemon that has high special defence (good ones have at least 400), and can take hits. It usually counters special sweepers. They have (usually) a recovery move, an attacking move, a status move and one other depending on the pokemon. Examples are Blissey, Regice and Snorlax. These are also called "Sponges" occasionally

Mix Wall – A pokemon that has good defence and special defence. They can counter both special and physical sweepers, and have the same kind of moveset as walls. However, these can be more inclined to set up with moves such as curse. Examples are Probopass, Shuckle and Umbreon.

Sweeper – An attacking pokemon that uses physical moves. They generally have some kind of set-up as well to either boost their speed or attack. Good attack and speed are needed, as the idea is to faint the opponent in one or two hits. Examples are Garchomp, Lucario and Tyranitar

Special Sweeper – An attacking pokemon that uses special moves. These aren’t as commonly used with set-ups as physical sweepers as there aren’t many good special attack boosting moves out there. Calm mind and nasty plot are two of the best. Common examples are Porygon-Z, Azelf and Starmie. Spec sweepers are occasionally called “Snipers” as well.

Mix Sweeper – As you may have guessed, this is a sweeper that uses both physical and special moves. When used correctly this can lay waste to the common SkarmBliss combo with 2 hits. 2 of each kind of move is normal. However this kind of sweeper tends not to have as high of either attack as its mono counterparts as you have to put EVs into both stats, as well as speed. Examples are Salamence, Infernape and Electivire.

Tank/Special Tank – This is almost like a sweeper/special sweeper, except that the speed is sacraficed for more of one type of defence. This allows it to take hits and set-up with moves or just to straight attack. They generally have more attack than a sweeper. Examples of this are Swampert, Milotic and the occasional Gyrados.

Fragile Cannon – The extreme version of a sweeper – the speed and attacking freak. It has ridiculously low defence, but ridiculously high atk/sp atk and speed. It generally carries a focus sash and no set-up moves – it doesn’t need them and will die if it does. Take extreme care against choice band/speced versions of these too – they will destroy you. Examples of these are Gengar, Alakazam and Weavile.

Baton Passer – Quite simply, it BPs stat changes to another pokemon, generally a kind of sweeper. A swords dance or agility is common. Speed boost Ninjask is the most common of these, as one protect can BP a level of speed, and a protect and substitute can basically do an agility. Examples are Gliscor, Eeveelutions and Ninjask.



OK, now that we have that out of the way, let’s get on to the real nitty-gritty – Actually MAKING the team.


Two general formulas for teams are:

The defensive side


Phys sweeper

Spec sweeper

Wall

Spec Wall

Mix wall

Mix sweeper/Fragile Cannon


OR the more attacking side


Fragile cannon (to lead)

Mix sweeper

Mix wall

Phys Sweeper

Spec sweeper

Tank/ Spec tank


Of course there are many, many other types of teams you can build. For example, my own team consists of:

Physical Sweeper

Mix Sweeper

Spec Sweeper

Spec Wall BPer

Physical Tank

Special Tank



Now let’s put these formulae actually into practice. Take the first one:



Phys sweeper - Electivire

Spec sweeper - Starmie

Wall - Weezing

Spec Wall - Blissey

Mix wall - Umbreon

Mix sweeper – Infernape


There we have a respectable team that would win battles. Any base will work as long as it does not have half its team on the same type – i.e. Not more than 3 special sweepers or physical walls. As long as it has balance, it should do fine. However be careful of having too much balance, as you may not be aggressive enough to seize the victory. Also, make sure you have good coverage in your team - both offensively and defensively. There is no point having 6 fire moves on your team, but no water ones, for example, Similarly your walls will be rendered useless if they are all the steel type or whatever


What to watch out for

What else could be first except the dreaded SkarmBliss. The best wall/spec walls in the game on the same team rendering any sweeper/spec sweeper/ fragile cannon utterly useless. However, it is ridiculously easy to counter when done correctly. Any mixed pokemon that COULD be a phys/spec sweeper stands a great chance of destroying this combo. For example, a mix mence could be send out against skarmory. They switch out to Blissey (as they think you are a special mence) and you hit them with brick break. Then Skarmory can be dismantled by flamethrower or fire blast. That’s just one example – any mixed sweeper stands a good chance against this combo.

Another thing to watch out for are hazers/whirlwinders. These come out against your nicely set up sweepers and destroy those stat moves you spent so long creating! Before going for a super-setup make sure any weezings, skarmories etc are out of the way.



So yeah, that’s basically all the help I can give you on team making. Make sure your team includes walls, sweepers and a mix sweeper and you’ll be on your way. The best way to make a good team is not to read this guide, but to actually get out there and experiment! Good luck!

I did NOT make this guide.I am giving the person from another site credit for it.To be fair this was taken from Poke Legion.