RM Hax Tower Team

[shroudedwolf51]

Well... I've been doing competitive pokemon on and off for a while now, but... As y'all know (and as I found out), the hax tower is a very different environment. So far, I've gotten to 102 wins in a row, followed by my battery dying and I haven't been able to replicate that, as I always seem to die from some randomly unusual pokemon or something like that.

Could I ask the community here to provide some suggestions on my hax tower team (or perhaps suggest a better one)?

Here's what I'm running right now:

Metagross @ Lum Berry

112 HP / 252 Atk / 12 Def / 132 Spe

Adamant

-Meteor Mash

-Earthquake

-Ice Punch

-Agility

In all honesty, this is the standard agiligross set from smogon. I've tried running thunder punch over ice punch, but from personal experience, in a few situations where my team wasn't at its best, I got completely walled by some things that murdered this guy. Otherwise, I've been using him the same way as in a competitive match; Agility up and sweep.

Salamence @ Choice Specs

252 S. Atk / 252 Spe / 6 HP

Modest

-Draco Meteor

-Fire Blast

-Hydro Pump

-Dragon Pulse

Similar to a standard specs-mence (at least from the pre-platinum era) except I decided to run hydro pump over surf and fire blast over flamethrower as often, I ended up failing to 2-OHKO a pokemon and died, leaving a huge hole in my team. Easy to use. Switch in on something that 'gross doesn't like and kill it (and possibly something else).

Gengar @ Focus Sash

252 S. Atk / 252 Spe / 6 HP

Timid

-Shadow Ball

-Thunderbolt

-Hidden Power [ice]

-Destiny Bond

Originally, I ran hypnosis over destiny bond, but after hypnosis got nerfed, I replaced it, and this seems to be running much better as if come across something I can't kill, I can set off the sash and destiny bond kill it most of the time.

He was originally meant to be a revenge-killer, although on this team, he's kinda out of place. I kept on using him since I coudln't come up with anything better, but....

[randomspot555]

I'd be glad to help.

After many, many, many tries in Diamond, I got through with a hacked but legal team. I made it ti 130+ wins. I have not gotten past 100 since then. It is very much a challenge, and without doing researc on how the Battle Tower/Frontier works, it's also a lot of luck.

Remember the AI doesn't need to win every Pokemon battle, or even every match. They just have to beat you ONCe before you start over. They will use Double Team, Lax Incense, critical hits, OHKO moves, and all types of crazy stuff that is just flat out annoying.

So, before you build your team, you need to do fit in as much advantages as possible.

• You need to have a competent understanding of EVs, IVS, natures, and all the other game mechanics that affect battles (physical/special split, statuses, etc...). One can MAYBE get through the first 21 matches by only EV training their Pokemon. After match #50, the AI starts using a ridiculous number of perfect 31 IV in all stat Pokemon. The only advantage YOU have is that their nature is random, so it might hinder them, boost them, or be neutral.
  
• 100% accuracy: While not all that common, you will eventually encounter a Double Team abuser or evasion inside hail/sand. You can view all 100% accuracy moves here. I usually ended up slapping Aerial Ace on my Band/Scarf Garchomp.
  
• Status absorber: The AI will abuse stats to no end. However, status (as in poison, burn, sleep, and paralysis) can NOT be stacked. So if you had a Poison Heal Breloom with a Toxic Orb, then the AI's attempt at sleeping Breloom will fail. RestTalk sets (not a fan), or abilities that can handle status are also options. Individual Pokemon immunities will only cover so much. I like having one Pokemon absorb all status, and usually utilized Natural Cure on Starmie for that. Substitute sets are also a good enough check.
  
• OHKO absorber: Sturdy means OHKO moves will fail. Unfortunately, there's only a handful of Pokemon with the Sturdy ability, and even fewer that are actually good. Donphan has great attack and defense, but sucks everywhere else and is soo slow. Magnezone suffers from the ground and fighting dual weakness (2 most common types) but has great special attack and decent bulk on both defense and sp def. Both, however, have very limited movepools and if you're playing completely legit, Magnezone won't be bale to hurt as much without HP Ice/Fire/Fight/Ground/Grass.
  
• Substitute sets are also a poor-man's option here too, giving you time to prepare/KO something. Shedinja's Wonder Guard gives it an immunity to all OHKO attacks, but it's Shedinja, so yeah.
  
• Minimize the need to set up: Even though I used a Swords Dance-Sub Scizor (requires set up) and many people swear by Swords Dance Garchomp, I encourage to minimize that as much as possible. You want to hit hard, hit fast, and be done. This is what the Choice Items were made for. Having two on a Battle Tower team is NOT a bad idea.
  
• Cover your weaknesses.: Between your three Pokemon, when one has a weakness, another should resist or be immune to it. THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT. Switching is something you'll do often in the BT/BF and the AI won't (unless they can't hurt you at all). But too many attacks in this game, for neutral damage, can result in an easy 2HKO. So, just as an example, and without looking at the move set, here's my winning Battle Tower team:
  

Garchomp (Dragon/Ground): Weak to Dragon and Ice. Resists Fire, Rock, and Poison. Immune to Electric.

Scizor (Bug/Steel): Weak to Fire. Resists normal, grass, ice, Psychic, Bug, Ghost, Dark, Steel . Immune to Poison.

Starmie (Water/Psychic): Weak to electric, grass, ghost, dark, bug. Resists Fire, Water, Ice, Fighting, Psychic, and Steel.

Garchomp's weakness to dragon attacks is covered by Scizor. It's Ice weakness is covered by both.

Scizor's weakness to fire is covered by both (though in case of a burn, Starmie can recover while Garchomp would be stuck by having his attack cut in half).

Starmie's electric weakness is covered by an immunity from Garchomp. Scizor resists everything else that Starmie is weak against.

So wow, that's a lot to think about.

In fact, that's so much, that I'll just come back and rate your team later. Or hit me up on IRC. randomspot555 in all the project pokemon channels.