SS OU M3tamorphosis

[su1p]

Introduction

Name of this thread is a song from Whole Lotta Red, I've really liked the album since it dropped. I have been enjoying Crown Tundra a lot and I'm pretty sure I've got like 3000 games since it came out. Some of you may have seen me post on SwSh OU Bazaar, and I really like sharing my builds on Smogon. This is my best team in the Spectrier meta. I've had great success with the team. The inspiration behind building the team was preparing for OST. It's a fairly standard team. Originally I was going to keep it secret, but I got round 3'd by the one and only Gefährlicher Random. I didn't use this team against him, but I spammed it on the ladder as well as twice vs. my round 2 opponent (replays at the end). I know this team isn't going to age well, at least this version, but its still usable until Spectrier gets banned. I might be posting the updated version in the replies when Spectrier gets banned. Highlights of the team are two overlooked sets for Melmetal and Spectrier respectively. Melmetal is Protective Pads + Substitute, which I've fell in love with recently. Spectrier is actually Disable + SubCM. I have found Disable to be more effective than Will-O-Wisp in my personal opinion, this actually has a big part in one of the replays which I will link at the end.

Team Analysis

Landorus-Therian (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Impish Nature
IVs: 30 Spe
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Toxic

Physically defensive Landorus-Therian is an incredibly good check to a lot of threats in the metagame right now. It can for example, come in on Cinderace, Excadrill, Scale Shot Garchomp and Regieleki. Leftovers > anything on defensive Landorus as it has better longetivity than Rocky Helmet. The set is pretty standard, though this one does have max defense, because I want it to tank the most amount of hits as possible. Obviously it's the teams Stealth Rocker. 30 Speed IVs for it to have a slower U-Turn than every other Tank Landorus. Toxic is just very good chip damage on many pokemon.

Melmetal @ Protective Pads
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Double Iron Bash
- Thunder Punch
- Earthquake / Superpower
- Substitute

There are not many things that are scarier than Melmetal behind a Substitute. The way I've been able to get behind a sub is vs. pokemon like Toxapex, Clefable and Corviknight. It's easy especially against Corviknight, as they haven't been running Body Press recently so you can beat it 1v1 always. They sometimes Roost or just U-Turn away and you can claim a kill behind sub without really predicting. Thunder Punch does hefty damage to Corviknight. Double Iron Bash is very powerful and good neutral move against pretty much everything. Earthquake / Superpower tossup is preference, Superpower means you can probably beat a Ferrothorn 1v1 better.

Carti (Spectrier) @ Leftovers
Ability: Grim Neigh
EVs: 64 HP / 252 Def / 192 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shadow Ball
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
- Disable

Behold the broken horse. Pretty sure I copied the EV spread from talah who used it against xray in an SPL game. I don't know what it exactly does, but it has been great. As I mentioned in the introduction, I absolutely love this moveset. Great way to use disable at the start of the battle is to sub and then disable Lead Landorus' Earthquake, as they only run Explosion after that. Calm Mind is also my choice of setup. After 1 Calm Mind, Specs Dragapult can't revenge kill you at high health, doing only 73.9 - 87.3% damage. There are a few mons you can setup on with Calm Mind, where as you couldn't with Nasty Plot. This can also beat that Defog Hydreigon with CM + Disable. Overall overpowered pokemon and should abuse it while you still can.

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 248 HP / 176 Def / 84 SpD
Impish Nature
- Spikes
- Knock Off
- Leech Seed
- Power Whip / Gyro Ball

Ferrothorn is the team's utility mon and switch-in into Rillaboom and can beat Dragonite, which has been gaining popularity recently. Spikes means that we might now be able to get up both Rocks and Spikes on the opponents field and deal a lot of residual damage to their team. Gyro Ball is for you if you are scared of Dragonite a lot. It also removes a bit of weight off Landorus shoulders. Ferrothorn is our kind of switch-in into Barraskewda and other water-types. Overall Ferrothorn is very good at the moment in my opinion.

Hydreigon @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 164 HP / 92 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Defog
- Dark Pulse
- Earth Power
- Roost

Honestly don't like this pokemon, but it's necessary so I don't straight up lose to Spectrier. CM+Disable Spectrier eats this pokemon tho, but at least Nasty Plot + Disable variants can't get up a sub as Earth Power does well over 25% against a Spectrier. Defogger for the team if hazards get too uncomfortable. Life Orb variant doesn't deal with Spectrier as well, so can't run that. This mon avoids Future Sights. Not much to say about this mon apart from that.

Slowking-Galar @ Assault Vest
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 208 HP / 172 SpA / 128 SpD
Sassy Nature
- Future Sight
- Sludge Bomb
- Flamethrower
- Earthquake
/ Psyshock

Galar Slowking is phenomenal. I has been praised a lot already, so gonna keep it simple. This one has a little more bulk than normal ones, mainly because it can actually beat a Heatran 1v1 at close to full HP thanks to Earthquake. It 2HKOs Heatran with Earthquake, it's a cool tech. Sassy nature because I want the most out of earthquake and it's not like this thing outspeeds anything with neutral nature anyway. I vouch for Psyshock, as it beats other Galarian Slowkings. Almost always my answer to opposing Magearna, Weakness Policy Stored Power is hell though. Can absorb Draco Meteors from Dragapults if they come in to kill our Hydreigon. Slowking's Future Sight is incredibly powerful. Sometimes you can hard switch into Melmetal after using Future Sight, and proceed to claim a kill if their Melmetal check is Landorus or Toxapex.

Threatlist

Importable

team

Landorus-Therian (M) @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Impish Nature
IVs: 30 Spe
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Toxic

Melmetal @ Protective Pads
Ability: Iron Fist
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Double Iron Bash
- Thunder Punch
- Earthquake
- Substitute

Carti (Spectrier) @ Leftovers
Ability: Grim Neigh
EVs: 64 HP / 252 Def / 192 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shadow Ball
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
- Disable

Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 248 HP / 176 Def / 84 SpD
Impish Nature
- Spikes
- Knock Off
- Leech Seed
- Power Whip

Hydreigon @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 164 HP / 92 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Defog
- Dark Pulse
- Earth Power
- Roost

Slowking-Galar @ Assault Vest
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 208 HP / 172 SpA / 128 SpD
Sassy Nature
- Future Sight
- Sludge Bomb
- Flamethrower
- Earthquake

Replays

OST

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1271959075-6cqevl9clzsrj8smgnyz21bxm4rvmh6pw vs. rain
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1271972830-d8xmroq7b7uhh3rrgxytbeh5y8gilqvpw vs. popular hyper offense (here disable going crazy)

 

[Ironcondria]

Spectrier speed evs is to outspeed max speed tornadus t by 1 point

 

[Smashburn]

Great team construction, plus the song is catchy lol.

Glowking does extremely well in the Glowking - Hydreigon - Ferrothorn core, being as no one likes to switch in to those nasty combos, even as defensive mons. The resists cover well too, several members of the team having issues with Fire-types so the coverages work, and to add to this, Glowking and Hydreigon are solid mons to the common Specs Magearna and Spectrier sets. The Melmetal set is very unique, I love the idea of hiding behind a fakemon of shame to beat out stalls meant to deal with melmetal and its partners, being as this is also very good for situations when you know the opponent cannot deal with it, very unexpected. To add to this, there is an amazing amount of substitutions for this team that make it so competitively viable, where even if the niche of some of the mons is gone this team can thrive.

Going back to the core issue of the threat list, it is a bit unfortunate to struggle against Dragapult, as it checks this team pretty hard between its extremely high Spe and decent SpA, as will as its move coverage with Ghost, Fire, and Dragon-Type moves, and even momentum with U-Turn. There really isn't much you can do against it, other than carefully play around Dragapult. As for Cinderace, its situation it similar to Dragapult's. Cinderace has high Atk and Spe with a variety of clicks and momentum which threatens the team due to its own lack of momentum. Hawlucha is on an entirely different plane of existence for this team, being as it can quickly cause a 6-0 VS those HO which also feature Cinderace (which are common).

If I could add anything to this threat list, it would be rain teams. From playing one myself I know that they can even be extremely threatening to Ferrothorn, which is the floodgate to rain entirely obliterating your team. Ferrothorn- although resisting many mons- has trouble keeping up with recovery after Knock Off, and in the meantime as rain forces a wedge in your team, you have to sacrifice the HP of your supports to try and knock out their threats. To add to this, once in the 30-40% HP range, Barraskewda- who is always in rain teams- can OHKO Ferrothorn with a rain Liquidation and go on an unholstered rampage after, and being as Melmetal has plenty of checks in rain, it soon after suffers the same fate. Fortunately with smart playing you can avoid this, but it is hard to do so with a lack of speed against the typical rain ream. To slightly patch this, I would recommend always running Power Whip on Ferro, this also aids against powerful Ground-Types like Hippowdon, Landorus-T Suicide-Lead / Landorus-T Scarf, and Excadrill, which could switch in on it, planning to take advantage of a possible Knock Off Gyro Ball set.

[EDIT]:

I would also add:

Nidoking-
Urshifu-RS-

While being more a minor threat, Nidoking's Sheer Force LO + move variety can cause a lot of damage to your supports, being as no mons can 100% resist it in this team during the entirety of a match. Nidoking can cause a huge split for the team, at times opening it up for members such as Dragapult that can be paired with Nido in teams that need the speed and typing. Although Hydreigon does outspeed it, it cannot OHKO Nidoking, and after some wearing down on Hydreigon will be knocked out, and allow Nido to sweep your team. Again, careful playing allows you to dance round this threat with Glowking and Hydreigon, but be aware that a miss-step can cause you to lose a member of your team since Hydreigon cannot take more than 1 Sludge Wave on switch, and Glowking cannot take more than 1 Earth Power on switch. Granted your team has Landorus, which can serve as a check to Nidoking.

Urshifu RS is a bit lesser of a threat, but a threat none the less (especially in rain). It causes very 50/50 plays for your team that can be difficult to deal with, being as it cannot be switched into properly outside of Ferrothorn, and even then common partners of Urshifu-RS can deal with Ferrothorn, again taking advantage of it (the reason I suggested Power Whip > Gyro Ball always).

Notable Calcs:
Urshifu-RS-

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu-Rapid-Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 208 HP / 0 Def Slowking-Galar on a critical hit: 333-396 (86.9 - 103.3%) -- approx. 6.3% chance to OHKO

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu-Rapid-Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 164 HP / 0 Def Hydreigon on a critical hit: 153-180 (41.8 - 49.1%) -- approx. 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu-Rapid-Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Melmetal on a critical hit: 201-243 (48.9 - 59.1%) -- approx. 99.6% chance to 2HKO

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu-Rapid-Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 64 HP / 252 Def Spectrier on a critical hit: 300-354 (84 - 99.1%) -- approx. 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu-Rapid-Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 208 HP / 0 Def Slowking-Galar in Rain on a critical hit: 504-594 (131.5 - 155%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu-Rapid-Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 164 HP / 0 Def Hydreigon in Rain on a critical hit: 228-270 (62.2 - 73.7%) -- approx. 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu-Rapid-Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Melmetal in Rain on a critical hit: 306-363 (74.4 - 88.3%) -- approx. 2HKO

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu-Rapid-Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 64 HP / 252 Def Spectrier in Rain on a critical hit: 450-531 (126 - 148.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Notable Calcs:
Nidoking-

252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Nidoking Earth Power vs. 208 HP / 128+ SpD Assault Vest Slowking-Galar: 187-221 (48.8 - 57.7%) -- 94.9% chance to 2HKO

252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Nidoking Sludge Wave vs. 164 HP / 0 SpD Hydreigon: 216-255 (59 - 69.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Nidoking Earth Power vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Melmetal: 530-627 (128.9 - 152.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Nidoking Earth Power vs. 64 HP / 0 SpD Spectrier: 224-265 (62.7 - 74.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Nidoking Flamethrower vs. 248 HP / 8 SpD Landorus-Therian: 148-175 (38.8 - 45.9%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

 

[adem]

Rlly love this team, but having trouble finding what to replace spec with atm, currently using gengar

 

[JackPilotF2]

Love the Spec