Help me build my first team?

Hi, can anyone be kind enough to help me put together a team I can make in Alpha Sapphire that I can use for competitive online play. I would appreciate it if you also could recommend the moves I should learn the Pokémon, and tell me some basic tactics. (Who to start with and what moves to do first)
I have played though the entire game, and therfore I have lots of attractive Pokémon I can trade with so feel free to recommend Pokémon that might be exclusive to Omega Ruby.

(I originally posted this thread in the wrong section, this is a repost)

The first thing we need to know is if you're gonna do singles or doubles. The two play differently and what works in singles usually doesn't work in doubles and vice versa.

Looking at some resources like the Global Link statistics, Smogon's Strategy Dex pages, and Nugget Bride, as well as BTB's resources will also be helpful to learn what Pokemon are commonly used and what they commonly run, since the common things are a major part of what you need to prepare for.

Now, we could just drop you a whole team and be like "use this", but that's not going to be fun or helpful to you (right now anyway). What Pokemon do you wanna use? What kind of playstyle do you think would suit you best?

Give us a little to work with and we can help you more

I would like a single battles team

When it comes to playstyle I like playing attacking agressive, while trying to predict switches all the time. (Almost over predicting)

I want a team that can counter Greninja and Talonflame (with good coverage overall). I want it to be a bit of a "hipster" team where I use some unusual Pokemons. Can any of you help me with this? :D

Sandertn said:

I would like a single battles team

When it comes to playstyle I like playing attacking agressive, while trying to predict switches all the time. (Almost over predicting)

I want a team that can counter Greninja and Talonflame (with good coverage overall). I want it to be a bit of a "hipster" team where I use some unusual Pokemons. Can any of you help me with this? :D

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Forgot to mention that I have a Metagroos I want to use ;)

A hyper offense team is probably what you're looking for. And (Mega) Metagross is a good place to start since it's a pretty good poke. If you're in need of a set for it, there's this:

Metagross @ Metagrossite
EVs: 252 Atk/252 Spe/4 HP
Ability: Clear Body----->Tough Claws
Jolly Nature
-Meteor Mash/Iron Head
-Zen Headbutt
-Hammer Arm/Earthquake
-Ice Punch/Grass Knot/Thunder Punch/Bullet Punch

The last slot can vary depending on the rest of the team, since those moves are meant for more specific Pokemon. You cna also use an Agility set to threaten more hyper offensive teams at the cost of a coverage move.

Mega Metagross hates getting statused though, so you need an offensive Pokemon to absorb that kind of stuff. First things that come to mind are AV Guts Conkeldurr and Poison Heal Gliscor. The former becomes rather dangerous when statused, while the latter is immune to paralysis and wants to get poisoned (be careful around burns/sleep though, it needs to already be poisoned to absorb those without crippling itself). Conk handles Dark types better than Metagross does (especially if you forgo Hammer Arm), while Gliscor is immune to its Ground weakness.

Conkeldurr @ Assault Vest
EVs: 252 Atk/232 SpD/ 20 Def
Ability: Guts
Adamant Nature
-Drain Punch
-Mach Punch
-Knock Off
-Ice Punch/Poison Jab/Stone Edge

Mega Metagross also wrecks most Fairy and Psychic types, stuff Conkeldurr hates.

Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 244 HP/92 SpD/72 Spe
Careful Nature
-Swords Dance
-Earthquake
-Knock Off
-Roost

This is a pretty nice Gliscor set, combines bulk and power and isn't too slow, and tends to threaten more balanced teams iirc.

Pick one of the two pokes though, not both Gliscor and Conkeldurr.

I've also heard that Keldeo also works together nicely with Mega Metagross.

As for Talonflame and Greninja, we'll start with Talonflame since it's easier to deal with. Basically any not frail Rock type that doesn't have a secondary type that's Flying or Fire weak will give Talonflame a hard time. So if you wanna be a little more....."hipster", there's always like Rhyperior, Tyrantrum, Gigalith, Barbaracle, Omastar, Golem, Carracosta, etc, take your pick. Having a Rock type also means you'll have access to Stealth Rock, which is needed in 6v6 but not 3v3.

Greninja is much harder to deal with since it's very fast, hits kinda hard thanks to Protean, and has plenty of coverage options and the only move all Greninjas have in common is Ice Beam so you kinda have to play a guessing game on what it's carrying. Not sure what to do about that one.

So where do you wanna go from here?

Would you rather run popular Pokemon with unconventional sets (Special Landorus-Therian as an example), one or two wild cards supported by goodstuffs, or an entire team of obscure stuff?

Will porygon2 work against grenina? I like 6vs6 matches the best so I want to go towards that. Also can you recommend one of the stone Pokémon you mentioned? One that can work against several Pokémon?

(I think I'm going for gliscor)

Sandertn said:

Will porygon2 work against grenina? I like 6vs6 matches the best so I want to go towards that. Also can you recommend one of the stone Pokémon you mentioned? One that can work against several Pokémon?

(I think I'm going for gliscor)

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Porygon2 is one of the very few Greninja counters iirc. Idk if it quite works in a hyper offense playstyle but you might as well try it:

Porygon2 @ Eviolite
Ability: Trace
EVs: 248 HP/204 Def/56 SpD
Calm Nature
-Ice Beam
-Thunderbolt
-Recover
-Toxic/Thunder Wave

As for the Rock type....you pick. It's your team after all. You can learn stuff from us telling you things, but you'll also learn by doing some things yourself. Let's see what you come up with.

skyburial said:

Would you rather run popular Pokemon with unconventional sets (Special Landorus-Therian as an example), one or two wild cards supported by goodstuffs, or an entire team of obscure stuff?

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It would be interesting to have popular pokemons woth unusual abilities and movesets, I saw a guy who wiped out an entire team just by using an uncovential moveset on a Mega Alakasam.

skyburial said:

Would you rather run popular Pokemon with unconventional sets (Special Landorus-Therian as an example), one or two wild cards supported by goodstuffs, or an entire team of obscure stuff?

Click to expand...

Sandertn said:

It would be interesting to have popular pokemons woth unusual abilities and movesets, I saw a guy who wiped out an entire team just by using an uncovential moveset on a Mega Alakasam.

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Just to let you know, there's a fine line between gimmick and surprise factor. Gimmicks are things like using physical moves on specially offensive Pokemon (with some exceptions; this especially applies to Pokemon with a significant difference between Attack and Special Attack) and vice-versa, using more support moves than offensive moves on offensive Pokemon, etc.

An example of a surprise factor set is stall breaker Heatran:
-Magma Storm
-Earth Power
-Solar Beam/Toxic
-Taunt
Nature: Timid
EVs: 4 Def/252 SAtk/252 Spe
Item: Power Herb/Leftovers/Air Balloon

As Heatran is weak to Water Pokemon, it can lure them in and attempt to trap them with Magma Storm. Once that's done (it doesn't really matter if Heatran outspeeds the bulky Water in question), Heatran can go for a Solar Beam. It also lures in special walls and beats them with the combination of Taunt and Toxic to stop them from recovering/setting up and wearing them down.

Would this work for a stone pokemon?
Rhyperior @ Weakness Policy
Trait: Rock Head
EVs: 200 HP / 56 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Earthquake
- stone edge
- Hammer Arm/Megahorn
- Avalanche

PlatinumDude said:

Just to let you know, there's a fine line between gimmick and surprise factor. Gimmicks are things like using physical moves on specially offensive Pokemon (with some exceptions; this especially applies to Pokemon with a significant difference between Attack and Special Attack) and vice-versa, using more support moves than offensive moves on offensive Pokemon, etc.

An example of a surprise factor set is stall breaker Heatran:
-Magma Storm
-Earth Power
-Solar Beam/Toxic
-Taunt
Nature: Timid
EVs: 4 Def/252 SAtk/252 Spe
Item: Power Herb/Leftovers/Air Balloon

As Heatran is weak to Water Pokemon, it can lure them in and attempt to trap them with Magma Storm. Once that's done (it doesn't really matter if Heatran outspeeds the bulky Water in question), Heatran can go for a Solar Beam. It also lures in special walls and beats them with the combination of Taunt and Toxic to stop them from recovering/setting up and wearing them down.

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I`ll try to be careful with that ;)

I have tried to put the team into a team builder:
http://www.teammagma.net/teambuilder/?376m|472|464|233

Do you have any recommendations to cover the weaknesses I have? Something good against grass and dark pokemons?

Sandertn said:

Would this work for a stone pokemon?
Rhyperior @ Weakness Policy
Trait: Rock Head
EVs: 200 HP / 56 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Earthquake
- stone edge
- Hammer Arm/Megahorn
- Avalanche

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To be really honest with you, no. Rhyperior isn't fast enough to take advantage of the Weakness Policy boost, plus it would need Rock Polish to really do that, and even that is situational:
-Stealth Rock
-Earthquake
-Stone Edge/Rock Blast
-Toxic/Ice Punch
Nature: Adamant
EVs: 212 HP/44 Atk/252 Def
Item: Leftovers
Ability: Solid Rock

Remember that when a Rock Head Rhydon evolves into Rhyperior, it loses Rock Head in favor of Solid Rock. Rhyperior's main use is checking/countering physical attackers like Talonflame.

I hope this dosent come up as rude, but I regrett going for a hyper offencive team after watching some youtubers (who claim they are good) using tactics where they slowly make it impossible to kill your pokemoms, and then they go into attacking mode, and I would like to try that myself.

Is it possible to build a fast team that can cover up this sableyes weeknesses? (Forget the "hipster" thing)

Sableye (M) @leftovers
Calm mind
Recover
Dark pulse
Wil o wisp

In the video I saw, they guy used wil o wisp to widdle down most of the oponents. He used recover when nessesary, and calm mind when he had the oportunity, resulting in dark pulse being able to take out several opponents.

If that's what you wanna do.....

Mega Sableye's most obvious weakness is Fairy types, since they are the one type that's super effective against it and Dark Pulse ain't doing much to them. So partners that beat Fairies are something you'll need. Steel types in general will force them out, but you'll also want something to lure them in so you can actually kill them. The AV Conkeldurr I suggested above can do that when you run it with Poison Jab. Dragon Dance Haxorus with Poison Jab is a faster alternative. There's probably other things that could lure Fairies in too but I can't remember. So pick a Steel type and a Fairy lure.

Besides Fairies, Mega Sableye also struggles with special walls since they can just heal off the burn damage and/or remove the burn, and even at +6 your STAB move may not do enough damage to break them. Chansey and Blissey in particular are bad for Mega Sableye. So a wallbreaker/stallbreaker is good to have too.

Mega Sableye's also not terribly fond of powerful special attackers since burn doesn't effect their damage output and it needs time to set up enough Calm Minds to comfortably tank special hits.

Basically once you've removed those 3 things from the opponent's team, you can begin to set up and sweep with Mega Sableye.

Nah said:

If that's what you wanna do.....

Mega Sableye's most obvious weakness is Fairy types, since they are the one type that's super effective against it and Dark Pulse ain't doing much to them. So partners that beat Fairies are something you'll need. Steel types in general will force them out, but you'll also want something to lure them in so you can actually kill them. The AV Conkeldurr I suggested above can do that when you run it with Poison Jab. Dragon Dance Haxorus with Poison Jab is a faster alternative. There's probably other things that could lure Fairies in too but I can't remember. So pick a Steel type and a Fairy lure.

Besides Fairies, Mega Sableye also struggles with special walls since they can just heal off the burn damage and/or remove the burn, and even at +6 your STAB move may not do enough damage to break them. Chansey and Blissey in particular are bad for Mega Sableye. So a wallbreaker/stallbreaker is good to have too.

Mega Sableye's also not terribly fond of powerful special attackers since burn doesn't effect their damage output and it needs time to set up enough Calm Minds to comfortably tank special hits.

Basically once you've removed those 3 things from the opponent's team, you can begin to set up and sweep with Mega Sableye.

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Mega Sableye can easily PP stall out Chansey, so it isn't much of a problem for it. It can also burn it to wear it down faster, despite Chansey's Natural Cure access. Still, weakening special attackers is a bit of a help for it:

+6 4 SpA Mega Sableye Dark Pulse vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Eviolite Chansey: 154-183 (23.9 - 28.5%) -- 94.1% chance to 3HKO after burn damage

This one is directed at the OP: regular Sableye is overshadowed by its Mega counterpart because of the latter's better overall bulk.

Nah said:

If that's what you wanna do.....

Mega Sableye's most obvious weakness is Fairy types, since they are the one type that's super effective against it and Dark Pulse ain't doing much to them. So partners that beat Fairies are something you'll need. Steel types in general will force them out, but you'll also want something to lure them in so you can actually kill them. The AV Conkeldurr I suggested above can do that when you run it with Poison Jab. Dragon Dance Haxorus with Poison Jab is a faster alternative. There's probably other things that could lure Fairies in too but I can't remember. So pick a Steel type and a Fairy lure.

Besides Fairies, Mega Sableye also struggles with special walls since they can just heal off the burn damage and/or remove the burn, and even at +6 your STAB move may not do enough damage to break them. Chansey and Blissey in particular are bad for Mega Sableye. So a wallbreaker/stallbreaker is good to have too.

Mega Sableye's also not terribly fond of powerful special attackers since burn doesn't effect their damage output and it needs time to set up enough Calm Minds to comfortably tank special hits.

Basically once you've removed those 3 things from the opponent's team, you can begin to set up and sweep with Mega Sableye.

Click to expand...

So you mean that I should have a conkeldurr that is weak to fairies to lure out a fairy, and then attack it with the poison attack the fairy is week to?

Sandertn said:

So you mean that I should have a conkeldurr that is weak to fairies to lure out a fairy, and then attack it with the poison attack the fairy is week to?

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Yeah. Most people love to throw their Fairies at Fighting types, so if you predict that switch-in you can nail it with Poison Jab as it comes in and eliminate the opposing Fairy.

So I've found a list of Pokémons I need to counter to be successful with sableye. Can you help with that?

Talonflame
Heracross
Gardevoir
Sableye (Apparently)
Absol

I've already planned that sableye is going to be mega so I can't have any more megas :)