[QC Approved 1/3] Delphox



[Pros]

<ul>
<li>Great offensive coverage between its Fire / Psychic typing.</li>
<li>A pretty fun and interesting ability in Magician, allowing for unexpected gameplay and for messing up the opponent's strategy.</li>
<li>Very good Sp. Attack combined with a nice Speed stat.</li>
</ul>

[Cons]

<ul>
<li>Weakness to Stealth Rock.</li>
<li>Weakness to Water, Ghost, Dark and Ground, all very common in OU.</li>
<li>Weak to several priority attacks such as Aqua jet, Shadow Sneak and Sucker Punch.</li>
</ul>

[Set Recommendations]

Offensive Calm Mind
Delphox @ Life Orb / Leftovers
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Fire Blast / Flamethrower
- Grass Knot
- Psychic / Psyshock

  • Calm Mind is what can really set apart Delphox from other fire types. After a Calm Mind it can take a hit from either Timid Starmie or Modest Rotom-W and hit them back hard.
  • Fire Blast as STAB move for the extra power or Flamethrower to land every hit.
  • Psyshock to cover the physical side with STAB or Psychic if that isn't a concern.
  • Life Orb to ensure OHKO's instead of Leftovers passive healing, since it is too frail to make a good use of it.
  • Grass Knot as the prefered coverage move to handle Starmie and Tyranitar among others, although Solarbeam can be an option if used on a Sun team.
  • +1 252 SpAtk (Timid) Delphox w/Life Orb Psychic vs. 248 HP / 8 SpDef (Bold) Rotom-W: (81.1 - 95.7%) - 56.3% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
  • +1 252 SpAtk (Timid) Delphox w/Life Orb Psyshock vs. 232 HP / 0 SpDef (Modest) Rotom-W w/Assault Vest: (73.5 - 86.6%) - Guaranteed 2HKO
  • +1 252 SpAtk (Timid) Delphox Grass Knot vs. 4 HP / 0 SpDef Starmie: 272-322 (103.8 - 122.9%) (Guaranteed OHKO) (without Life Orb)
Choice Witch
Delphox @ Choice Scarf / Choice Specs
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest / Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Switcheroo
- Fire Blast / Flamethrower
- Grass Knot
- Psychic / Psyshock

  • Fire Blast as STAB move for the extra power or Flamethrower to land every hit.
  • Psyshock to cover the physical side with STAB or Psychic if that isn't a concern.
  • Modest Nature since she can outspeed base 130s with Choice Scarf without a positive nature in speed.
  • Switcheroo to mess-up common mons that set up Spikes or SR and are not susceptible to Delphox's STAB moves, such as Shuckle.
  • 0 Atk IV's for the now more common Foul Play.
[Checks and Counters]

  • Starmie, Greninja and Gengar are all faster mons that can OHKO Delphox depending on their set, and if not they leave this witch with less than 10% health without the +1 that Calm Mind brings to her Special Defense.
  • Weakness to common priority moves like Sucker Punch, Aqua Jet and Shadow Sneak (meaning MegaKangaskhan, Azumarill and Aegislash among others).
  • With the buff to Knock-Off, being it super-effective against Delphox, it's probable it'll be used against her. It's worth to consider Magician as the ability on any set because of this.
  • Hydreigon resists all of its usable moves.
  • Azumarill is a great partner due to coverage and physical bulkness.
  • Special walls such as Blissey and Goodra are good counters since the only thing they could fear is Psyshock, which Tyranitar is immune to.
 
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Mega Kangaskhan is actually something Delphox should not try to fight imo as Delphox is OHKOed by Sucker Punch/EQ, so I'm not sure if it's something you put into consideration when choosing Flamethrower or Fireblast.
I really like the idea of Solar Beam to hit Rotom, but that moveslot going to be useless after Power Herb if you don't run something else with Sunny Day or Drought.
Also, iirc you need to write it in skeleton form until you get 2 QC.
 

Shroomisaur

Smogon's fantastical fun-guy.
Power Herb... SolarBeam? Hitting Rotom-W is nice but it's a waste of both a moveslot and itemslot after that single use. Delphox gets Grass Knot anyway. A Calm Minder should have Lefties / LO, and Delphox is probably best off as a Choice user anyway to fix its mediocre stats and cripple walls with Switcheroo.
 
Power Herb... SolarBeam? Hitting Rotom-W is nice but it's a waste of both a moveslot and itemslot after that single use. Delphox gets Grass Knot anyway. A Calm Minder should have Lefties / LO, and Delphox is probably best off as a Choice user anyway to fix its mediocre stats and cripple walls with Switcheroo.
grass knot hits rotom-w for 20 base power, and with magician delphox can proceed to steal its opponents item after attacking it. solarbeam is mainly only going to be used once anyway, although i agree, leftovers or life orb with blaze are probably the better items
 
Yeah that set is made to kill one of its counters while stealing at the same time the item, which in most cases of Rotom-W for example is Leftovers.

Oh btw, I haven't been able to try out magician properly in pokemon showdown. It doesn't seem to work in any scenario.
 
Power Herb + Solarbeam + Magician is more or less a gimmick. There are just too many factors that make such a set unreliable. Using Power Herb essentially means you have no real item before you actually use Solarbeam. This means no power boost from Life Orb/Choice Specs, no passive recovery from Leftovers, and no speed boost from Choice Scarf. All you're getting in return is a one time use of a 120 BP coverage move, and even then it doesn't actually beat all of the stuff you might think it would. For example, Tyranitar with no bulk investment whatsoever is taking 23.46 - 28.15% from Solarbeam since besides the SpD boost, Sandstream also drops Solarbeam's power to just 60 (unless this has changed as of XY). Much of the other things Solarbeam actually hits are hit hard enough by Grass Knot, and the only notable Pokemon I can think of that doesn't mind Grass Knot at all is Rotom-W. Being able to steal an opponent's item sound great and all, but its effectivness is heavily dependent on what item you steal. Life Orb is honestly the best one you could get due to the general power increase. Leftovers doesn't do that much good since Delphox really wants the extra power, and its not going to be taking many hits even with Leftovers. Choice Scarf and Choice Specs are somewhat useful, but they ruin the chance of a Calm Mind sweep and essentially turn Delphox into a Choice user with only two good moveslots. Stealing a Choice Band completely cripples Delphox altogether, etc.

Overall, the set is just too risky and unreliable. I'd much rather just run Life Orb with Grass Knot instead of Solarbeam. It might make a good Other Options mention if these previews had that section, but I just recommend you go with the offensive Calm Mind and Choice sets that were already established in the previous thread.
 
I'm personally not so sure about the S
Mega Kangaskhan is actually something Delphox should not try to fight imo as Delphox is OHKOed by Sucker Punch/EQ, so I'm not sure if it's something you put into consideration when choosing Flamethrower or Fireblast.
This gives me an idea: Will-o-wisp.
I really like the idea of Solar Beam to hit Rotom, but that moveslot going to be useless after Power Herb if you don't run something else with Sunny Day or Drought.
I totally agree with this.
 
v-mon

-Add more checks and counters.

-This Pokemon is not a wall...change that in the cons.

-Remove your power herb set and make the only two sets the one which I asked you to add (Choice and CM).

Once that is done let me know and I will approve this.
 
Not removing the cons stuff, added more checks and counters, added a description to the Power Herb set regarding sunny day teams.
 
Not removing the cons stuff, added more checks and counters, added a description to the Power Herb set regarding sunny day teams.
Does that Solar Beam damage on Mega Tyranitar account for the fact that Solar Beam is reduced to half during Sandstorm, unless Power Herb causes it to bypass this check?

+1 252 SpA Delphox Flare Blitz vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Starmie: 272-322 (103.8 - 122.9%) (Guaranteed OHKO)
^ What's that?
 
Oh, there was a problem in the calculator with Grass Knot so I chose a random move and input the base power, grass and special thingys haha
 
I don't think your calculation on Tyranitar is even right.
+1 252 SpA Delphox Solar Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Tyranitar in Sand: 114-136 (28.2 - 33.6%)


Solar Beam + Power Herb I think is only useful for is Rotom-W, and I'm not sure it's a good idea to dedicate a move slot AND item slot for a single pokemon.
Sure Rotom-W is a very popular pokemon, but it's not like it's hard to check with other more reliable pokemon.
 
Not removing the cons stuff, added more checks and counters, added a description to the Power Herb set regarding sunny day teams.
-This is your first preview on a Pokemon, you obviously are bound to make mistakes so instead of brushing aside what a QC member suggests to you, you should be courteous enough to oblige or at least explain why you feel differently.

-This thing is not a wall so remove that point or this is not going to get stamped.

-Make the first set the CM variant followed by Choice. Solarbeam + power Herb is redundant and as others mentioned, is only useful for one hit which isn't even guaranteed to hit the right target. Furthermore you hurt Rotom-W who invests in its physical defense pretty hard with STAB Psychic so yeah...

-Remove your set. The two sets i mentioned are sufficient.

-DO NOT include Solarbeam...its redundant and the sets which i told you to add did not include that move. You can make mention of Solarbeam if you feel strongly about it in AC.

When you make the changes I asked, then we can make progress on this.
 

dragonuser

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Ok this is just getting out of hand. After talking with other QC members, we have decided that v-mon has 24 hours to fully implement somalia's changes, fix coding, and revert this to bullet point format, otherwise this will be assigned to someone else.
 
-Looks good, just make Psychic the main option for both sets, my fault for making it the other way round since you are going to be doing more damage to Garchomp and Rotom-W that way. Slash Leftovers with Life Orb on set one, this thing can get worn down easily and at +1 it can take Special attacks rather well (for instance it can 2hko Rotom-W with +1 Psychic and can tank the Hydro rather well, however Life Orb will make it lose an additional 20% in the process which sucks for a fragile Pokemon like Delphox so Leftovers is also viable).
-Checks and Counters: Alot of information which you'll need for the write-up, but for now just get maybe 5-8 points from it and list in them bullet points. no need to delete all the hard work you done for that section, just perhaps copy paste it to a word document or place it in hide tags until you reach the write-up phase.

Once you do that...

QC APPROVED 1/3

Good work
 

Sunday

God Bless Nintys Incompetence :*)
is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a CAP Contributor Alumnus
It seems remiss to describe Delphox as having "a great movepool to work with" when every set is:
- Calm Mind / Switcheroo
- Fire STAB
- Grass Knot
- Psychic STAB

It's movepool isn't great at all, in fact it's entirely predictable from the team preview screen.
 
Mention Special defense Pokemon such as Blissey (who only fears boosted Psyshock), Goodra and Tyranitar as counters as well. Looks good otherwise.
 
  • Calm Mind is what can really set apart Delphox from other fire types. After a Calm Mind it can take a hit from either Modest Starmie or Calm Rotom-W and hit them back hard.
  • +1 252 SpA Delphox Psyshock vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Rotom-W: 169-199 (55.7 - 65.6%) (Guaranteed 2HKO)
  • +1 252 SpA Delphox Grass Knot vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Starmie: 272-322 (103.8 - 122.9%) (Guaranteed OHKO)
I don't understand - how common are these two things, exactly? Not only does the Starmie Analysis recommend Timid on all of its sets, there is no Calm Rotom-W listed on what is soon to be the on site analysis, and you are far more likely to run into Physically Defensive Rotom-W over Specially Defensive versions anyways because of how good the Physically Defensive spread is at checking prominent, metagame threats, like Talonflame and Azumarill.

Second, the calculations don't use Life Orb - but it's the first item listed, so shouldn't all damage calculations for this set use Life Orb?

These are the only calculations you should be using, I think:

+1 252 SATK (Timid) Delphox w/Life Orb Psychic vs. 248 HP / 8 SDEF (Bold) Rotom-W: (81.1 - 95.7%) - 56.3% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock.
+1 252 SATK (Timid) Delphox w/Life Orb Psyshock vs. 232 HP / 0 SDEF (Modest) Rotom-W w/Assault Vest: (73.5 - 86.6%) - Guaranteed 2HKO.

I recommend removing the Starmie damage calculation because no Starmie is going to be switching into Delphox anyways, and will always Starmie outrun him.
 
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