What Are Some Of Your Favorite Strategies? (5th Gen Revival)

Now that the 5th gen has been among us for a while now, I thought I would recreate this thread, and see what people choose to post. Here's a copy/paste of the thread rules from its previous incarnation.

foxyumbreon wrote:I got the idea for this thread after seeing the "What do you say is the best Pokemon" thread posted by voreloverman. Put simply, it'll just be a thread for posting some of your favorite strategies you've either come up with yourself, or have seen, for individual Pokemon. Please try to at least include the Pokemon, its ability, its item, and its move-set. Other details are welcome as well, but not necessary. You can also explain how the strategy is used if you like. And they can be ones you like for any reason, be them being good, or you just have fun using them, or whatever reason you have. Here's a few of my favorites I've made.

Here's one additional rule. If you're going to post a pokemon with its hidden ability, please only do so if the hidden ability is actually presently available.

So, here we go again. Keep in mind that just because this is revived for the 5th gen, that doesn't mean you can only post 5th gen pokemon, or strategies that require the 5th gen moves or items in order to accomplish. I just thought it would be fun to give the thread another try now that there are fresh, new ideas for people to utilize. As before, I'll start with a few of my own that I have in my White Version.

Pokemon: Carracosta
Nature: Either Impish or Careful. I went with Careful.
Ability: Solid Rock
Item: White Herb
Moveset: Stone Edge, Curse, Aqua Tail, Shell Smash

Pokemon: Electrode
Nature: Modest
Ability: Static (The ability isn't very relevant. I just hate Soundproof because it's far too circumstantial)
Item: Choice Specs
Moveset: Electro Ball, Hidden Power (Ice), Volt Switch, Thunder Wave (because I couldn't decide on anything better I wanted due to Electrode's quite limited move options)

Pokemon: Ninetales
Nature: Timid
Ability: Drought
Item: Petaya Berry
Moveset: Fire Blast, Substitute, SolarBeam, Disable

Pokemon: Butterfree
Nature: Bold
Ability: Compoundeyes
Item: Leftovers
Moveset: Bug Buzz, Sleep Powder, Supersonic, Quiver Dance

Escavalier is one of my favourite of the new pokemon. At level 40 he sweeped the entire elite 4 before also taking on Ghengis' team and defeating 3 of them effortlessly at under level 50.
Pike - Escavalier
Metal Head
Iron Defense
Megahorn
Reversal/Screetch/Pursuit
With leftovers he's just overkill. I didn't even use him in the battle against N because I realised I hadn't used any of my other pokemon for hours and they were getting exp starved.

One thing I've noticed is that Gen V has added a lot of moves that are really good if you've got some support from other party members. That being said, I'm gonna put up a couple of my favorite support-abuse sets, and a support that helps both of them.

Gengar
Nature: Modest
Ability: Levitate
Moves:
Shadow Ball
Venoshock
Thunderbolt
Energy Ball
Held Item: Whatever, really.

Yes, Poison is a pretty lackluster attacking type. But a STAB Venoshock on a poisoned target is nothing to laugh at, especially with Gengar's obscene attack power. The rest of the moveset is mostly just there to cover things that Venoshock isn't as good on. Feel free to switch Shadow Ball for Hex, since your targets are hopefully suffering from status problems in the first place. Or put Destiny Bond on there somewhere. I dunno, Gengar has lots of fun move options.

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Galvantula
Nature: Modest/Timid
Ability: Compoundeyes
Moves:
Electro Ball
Bug Buzz
Energy Ball
Thunder Wave

Electro Ball hits a maximum of 150 power, if the user is 4 times as fast as the target. That's mildly insane. When you add in the fact that this does indeed include the speed penalty from paralysis... any paralyzed target that would've been slower in the first place takes an Electric-type Hyper Beam, basically. Thunder Wave is just there due to Galvantula's fairly lacking movepool; if your team has other paralysis support, you can swap it for something else.

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Klingklang
Nature: The speed+ sp.att- one. I forget which that is.
Ability: Whatever its ability is. Meh.
Moves:
Toxic/Thunder Wave
Gear Shift
Gear Grind
Trick Room/Sandstorm/Screech/Metal Sound/...Double Team?/Rest/Return/Giga Impact/Volt Switch...

Okay, not gonna lie. That last slot I'm just picking moves at random. Klingklang is pretty amazing, and I really like its little gimmick about how you can still see its pre-evolved forms "in" the sprite of the stronger ones. Its attack isn't great, but it's decently bulky and surprisingly fast, which means... decent support set! Actually, it's got a solid 100 attack stat, but not much to use it with other than Gear Grind, Return and Giga Impact. And Vicegrip, but why bother? Basically, you have a Steel move and two Normal moves for offense. Just keep Gear Grind so you aren't Taunt fodder, mmkay? The important stuff: You use Toxic or Thunder Wave, whichever your team likes more. Then you use Gear Shift to raise your Speed severely, and make your decent Attack genuinely threatening. At this point, do whatever you want. Go for a sweep with semi-reliable Gear Grinds, force switches and spread status by using Screech or Metal Sound (or, god forbid, Double Team), stall around with Rest, or set stuff up for the rest of your team with Trick Room or Sandstorm. Probably Trick Room, but some backup Sandstorm Support is never a bad idea. Volt Switch lets you deal the status, then get KLINGKLANG out of there, which is nice if you just used Toxic, then switched over to a legit wall.

The best part about that Klingklang is that you can literally just swap it back and forth between poison-based and paralysis-based teams with one switch of a move. And with everlasting TMs... yeah! Do that!

You know how some people blatantly hack by giving a Sableye or a Spiritomb the Wonder Guard ability? This is one I made to work around it:

Kangaskhan
Jolly
Scrappy
Focus Sash

Return
Double Hit
Brick Break
Crunch

And if that doesn't work, I have a Smeargle that knows Transform. It's not a hack if you acquire it legitimately, right?

Terastas wrote:You know how some people blatantly hack by giving a Sableye or a Spiritomb the Wonder Guard ability? This is one I made to work around it:

Kangaskhan
Jolly
Scrappy
Focus Sash

Return
Double Hit
Brick Break
Crunch

And if that doesn't work, I have a Smeargle that knows Transform. It's not a hack if you acquire it legitimately, right?

Speaking of which, I once tried to make a double battle team that utilized passing Wonder Guard to Spiritomb by using Skill Swap. It didn't work because Skill Swap was unable to snag Wonder Guard.

And since I'm posting, I think I'll throw in a few more pokemon just for the heck of it. Keep in mind that some of these are setups I haven't yet had the chance to try (never have anybody to play, and hate the rule limitations in random matches), so I can't guarantee how effective some of them actually may be.

Pokemon: Bronzong
Nature: Brave
Ability: Heatproof
Item: Iron Ball
Moveset: Trick Room, Gyro Ball, Confuse Ray, Psych Up

Pokemon: Sableye
Nature: I went with Sassy, but anything that boosts one of its defense stats while not lowering the other would work fine. Those and its HP are the only stats it uses.
Ability: Prankster
Item: Sitrus Berry
Moveset: Recover, Toxic, Confuse Ray, Attract

Pokemon: Alakazam
Nature: Timid
Ability: Magic Guard
Item: Life Orb
Moveset: Encore, Psychic, Substitute, Disable

Pokemon: Pidgeot
Nature: Adamant
Ability: Tangled Feet (doesn't really matter)
Item: Flying Gem
Moveset: Thief, Brave Bird, Return, Mirror Move

Pokemon: Blaziken
Nature: Adamant
Ability: Speed Boost
Item: Muscle Band
Moveset: Endure, Reversal, Flare Blitz, Swords Dance