The number one thing I like about Talonflame is priority Roost. I can see that uppin’ its survivability a lot with the right reads. It also counteracts all that recoil damage before that neutral OHKO or forced SR damage can take you out.
Ninja Edit: If this thing got priority Featherdance in its breeding movepool that would be too good!
Gengar craps all over Mega Kangaskhan, since Kangaskhan’s coverage is pretty much limited to Normal, Fighting, Ground, and Dark/Ghost. It doesn’t have Scrappy in Mega form and it’s not going to run Sucker Punch and Shadow Claw/Crunch on the same set, so just Sub up, disable, and kill it with Focus Blast.
Anyone messing around with weakness policy?
Cause I’m wondering if Carracosta could be pretty derpy with it.
Cause it has sturdy and shell smash…
the only counter i’ve seen to megakanga is a set-up ghost, something with substitute and toxic/will-o-wisp
seriously, fake out, sucker punch, and PuP are really good on this thing
if kangha doesn’t have a coverage move for aegislash it’s just PP stallin out sucker punch. if he does and it’s crunch it’s just king’s shielding it. if it’s EQ then there’s a little more hope for kanga. it’s not a counter but it can let aegislash setup and sweep and aegis is a pretty common pokemon so i’m not too worried about kanga running rampant too much.
yeah it’s absolutely devastating in the right places. There’s a lot of pokemon that are held back by being slightly too slow, and a lot of pokemon that are only good because they are just fast enough. I’ve been using it on a team with arcanine and Hydreigon, both are pretty terrifying when you don’t out speed them(specially if you get hydreigon in on an immunity and get a sub up). I tore up the Showdown ladder pretty hard with the same team.
It does have a slight weakness in that I’ve fought a reasonable amount of teams where their fast threats are flying/levitating(taloflame, gengar, most of the dragons etc…) or don’t REALLY care about speed. Luckily Galvantula nearly 100% accurate thunders and good speed is still a solid addition to the team, and a lot of those teams are pretty weak to stealth rocks.
Doublade is also really good against mega kengis kahn, I’m not sure if a +0 sword kills him in one shot, if he does he’s a real counter, if not you have to predict. He definitely survives 2 earthquakes though, and is immune to power up punch and fake out, so if you switch him in on either immunity you get a free swords dance and you one shot him after surviving sucker punch or earth quake or whatever.
edit:
also while I do thing talon flame is super solid, I think most people are overrating him. That low base attack and quad rock weakness REALLY hurt him, anything reasonably bulky that isn’t weak to fighting or flying can come in and force him out, and being forced out reasonably easy is pretty bad news when you have a 4 times rock weakness.
Here you go:
[details=Spoiler]http://youtu.be/F2mo4X2KOFg
http://youtu.be/yjnJHvRMYUc
http://youtu.be/B3dkcW9VWhM
http://youtu.be/vzevkLKjgU0[/details]
And here are a couple of guides…
[details=Spoiler]Basic Team Building:
http://youtu.be/USTY697_3oU
Flawless IV Breeding:
http://youtu.be/gTuSvjYOlfE[/details]
Even with that low base attack, his Sharp Beak Brave Bird is 16.5% stronger than Band Scizor’s Bullet Punch, itemless acrobatics is only 11% weaker, and the first hit of gem acrobatics is a whopping 33.5% stronger. And unlike Band Scizor, Talonflame has the freedom to switch moves and boost. Most things neutral to flying take like 80% or more after a Swords Dance boost, so with just a little prior damage will ruin a lot of Talonflame’s would-be checks.
With sharp beak on it it’s really easy to wall with anything that resists flying, no item flare blitz’s off mediocre attack stats don’t hat that hard on anything that’s actually defensive, even on stuff that’s weak(no defense invested doublade is 3 shot after rocks), and forcing it to hit hard flare blitz’s after rocks damage is pretty hard on it’s hp. I personally have not had any problems at all, even without rocks, with rocks I’ve found it pretty underwhelming. Could be I need to mess around with more teams though, may just be that my team doesn’t care about it.
after playing on pokemon showdon in both prebank OU and pokebank OU i can say this:
blaziken is fucking retarded and i even run a team that gives blaziken the giant middle finger, seriously, please do not allow this thing to be used in the tournament, it’s so oppressive, you need a team with at least 4 checks to just have hope which opens you up to so many other things, that it’s not even worth it. i want it to die in a fucking swirling water tornado, fuck this thing to Poseidon’s lair and back
megakangaskahn is very, very, very good with the only counters being set-up ghost pokemon, PuP is bonkers on this guy while having access to two types of priority, leaving his 4th move to be either return or earthquake, he forces you to run a ghost type, not saying broken but i really hate facing this thing, it’s super bulky and after 1 PuP, it can deal 70%+ to a bulky scizor set which is absurd (and i mean 252/252 bold)
megalucario is very good, it’s very similar to blaziken in terms of straight up raping your team, but since my team handles blaziken well, it handles megaluc just as well. he’s really stupid and has been causing a lot of headaches
thunderus-I should be banned, it’s way too versatile in one set, bulky water/ground types are the only things stopping it right now and outside of swampert, they suck (and even swampert isn’t that good), thankfully he’s not released yet or you would hear many salty tears
excadrill is a top 5 poke, it’s the best spinner out there, especially with sand rush but he really suffers from move slot syndrome, the loss of permasand really makes him balanced and a very solid poke
landorus-T is going to be awesome this time around, due to the lack of permaweather, his utility in u-turn intimidate is so much better, it also doesn’t help that physical attackers are so far way more common this gen it seems, he’s a great defensive pivot pokemon with great offensive presence. to add to that, he looks like he’s going to be the best user of SR this gen
genesect is still really dumb, u-turn download is broken on a poke with those offensive stats and moves, his typing is awesome, he’s just too much for most pokes to handle, especially when it seems like he learns every god damn move in the game
azumarill is awesome, his best set currently is choice band but that’s because of all the stupid shit running around, once those things go away, we could see other sets like belly drum or chestorest even
talonflame is a poke i seriously underrated, it’s awesome, especially a bulky swords dance set, it 2HKOs most of the game after +2 with brave bird, it’s very good, but not in a stupid way, if it’s ATK was any higher than 80, it’s be way too good but if it was lower, then it’d be terrible
aegislash is good but most people use it wrong, SD sets aren’t that good and are basically stopped by anything remotely bulky with a move that’s SE against it, mixed sets are way deadlier
sylveon is way better than i anticipated, i had one survive a +5 252 adamant gyarados waterfall with like 30% left, it runs a wish set better than I could have imagined
the dragon steel core is no longer OP, it’s still really good but it’s not going to dominate like it did the past 2 gens (especially dragmag), a lot of this has to do with azumarill being the tits
Yeah, mixed aegis slash is pretty rough. All physical aegis slash is pretty much hard countered by doublade, and if you predict the kings shields can be beaten by most anything, especially things that have a set up move to out play kings shield.
Mega Kengis Kahn is really good if you don’t have a set up ghost, but he falls over pretty hard if you do.
Heh, first match against a Blaziken. This dude’s ranking is pretty darn high too.
Deoxys formes, and Genesect being unbanned is annoying as hell by the way.
http://pokemonshowdown.com/replay/pokebankoubeta-60428221
Suggestions for improving my team are appreciated. I’m not really feeling Doublade atm and Togekiss feels really situational as well.
My Team
Team
Blastoise @ Blastoisinite
Ability: Rain Dish
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SAtk / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
Celebi @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 HP / 220 SDef / 36 Spd
Gentle Nature
Heatran @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SAtk / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
Talonflame @ Flying Gem
Ability: Gale Wings
EVs: 48 HP / 252 Atk / 208 Spd
Adamant Nature
Doublade @ Leftovers
Ability: No Guard
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 SDef
Careful Nature
Togekiss @ Leftovers
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SAtk / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
^Why isn’t Doublade running Eviolite? With all those attacks, I don’t think he needs reliable recovery all that much, he should be like a tank or something.
Try an eviolite set with 252 Attack 252 HP, he has no reliable recovery options so he can tank but through so many hits.
Idk if I feel that Togekiss, in OU, I’d swap for something else.
I knew something was wrong with my doublade lol. Thanks for pointing that out for me
I think that team could do with some more support- Togekiss could probably be re-purposed into a Bulky variant with T-Wave*(I’m sure Blastoise, Heatran and Doublade would appreciate paralysis support)*, and I’d almost suggest replacing Blastoise with Greninja, but that’s probably my preference for blazing offense showing.
you can use hydro pump over water pulse on blastoise, it’s still stronger, or even scald (while not as strong, burn is a very good status to spread)
ancient power is a terrible move, i wouldn’t use that on heatran at all, flash cannon is better (a resisted flash cannon is as strong as a neutral ancient power)
your team could use garchomp over talonflame, your fwg core is really good and dragon/steel/fairy is another good core, straight up yache berry SD chomp, it lessens your weakness to SR, your team doesn’t seem to need a revenge killer but does lack anything to punch holes in the opponent, chomp gives you this something like:
Garchomp @ Yache Berry
Jolly / Rough Skin
252 Atk / 252 Spe / 6 SpD
Swords Dance
Outrage
Earthquake
Fire Fang / Stone Edge
but do be warned, this new scizor set going around will give your team troubles once heatran goes down, you don’t wanna get bopped
What is the new Scizor set?
@Mood4Food77: Ancient Power is mainly for enemy Talonflame, which can and will set up on Heatran without Ancient Power.
just offensive SR heatran has quite a bit more synergy with your team, running fire blast which 2HKOs talonflame makes him more versatile
you could also run roar over ancient power, which has more versatility
seriously, ancient power is terrible
so far I think the hardest pokemon to deal with is malamar… super power with stabbed dark moves backing it up is terrefying, especially since steel doesn’t resist dark anymore. I’ve lost a LOT of games to him.