Perfecting relicanth

[billyjoseph]

Hey guys, so I am determined to use relicanth successfully on my team. Life orbed while using head smash with the ability rock head once set up with a rock polish can sweep but relicanth is countered by bulky fighting and grass types. Once i get relicanth set up as a lead or mid battle i find that i am countered specifically by conkeldurr, serperior, and breloom (i can still 1HKO vileplume, roserade, and fighters like hitmonlee) because these can withstand a head smash and retaliate with a grass or fighting move and take me out. The relicanth i am using is Jolly with investments in speed and attack so stats are HP 341/Attack 306/Defense 297/Sp. Atk 113/sp. Def 166/Speed 209 with moves Head smash, Earthquake, Blizzard, and Rock polish. I was thinking of switching out blizzard for bounce but i fly up for the first turn of the move so to avoid them taking a flying move I would most likely force them to switch out any pokemon that counters relicanth, but im not sure if a life orbed bounce will knock my threats out in 1 hit with a 306 attack stat, but if anyone can recommend better IV placements besides in Speed please let me know. If i max my Sp. attack will it power Head smash more?

 

[Nah]

Investing in Sp.Attack will just make Head Smash weaker, since it's a physical move. Also with that stat spread your Relicanth is Adamant, not Jolly, though you want it that way anyway. At +2 Speed, your Relicanth will hit 418 Speed, allowing it to outspeed max speed base 135 Pokemon like Mega Lopunny and Mega Manectric, so it's plenty fast. It needs more punch when it's only got base 90 Attack.

When making your team, you'll want to put in things that check or counter the things Relicanth loses to, like the bulky Grass and Fighting types you mentioned, and/or things to lure them in and snipe them down. Talonflame does a pretty good job at checking the 3 Pokemon you mentioned, and Grass and Fighting types in general, though you have to be wary of switching into a Rock attack from Conk and Breloom (HP Rock is very rare on Serp) as well as Spore from Breloom. You may also want cleric support, since LO recoil will start to take its toll on Relicanth, and if it gets burned or paralyzed it's basically useless for the rest of the match.

Unfortunately Relicanth doesn't have the movepool to adequately handle Grass types, so in place of Blizzard you'll want Waterfall/Aqua Tail for Water STAB, so it doesn't lose to Ground types (which resist Head Smash) or Zen Headbutt, which won't really help against Conkeldurr, but gives you a safer option against less bulky Fighting types as well as letting you conserve Head Smash's PP. Bounce only works in my experience on a Gyarados SubDragon Dance set.

 

[Nolafus]

This is perfect because I LOVE using Relicanth in OU, haha.

Honestly, I find a Rock Polish set and sweeping to be really unreliable and not worth using this high up. In the lower tiers, it can wreck unsuspecting teams, but in OU, priority is everywhere and Relicanth really struggles to last until late game, let alone clean up. You can keep Relicanth in your party, and never switch it out, but then you'll basically be fighting 5v6, and you'll most likely never get that perfect switch in to set up and sweep. And I'm not even mention the shaky 85% accuracy on Head Smash, making the sweeping Relicanth set a high-risk, medium-reward strategy.

The set I use in OU revolves around Relicanth's strength, instead of patching its weaknesses. This is the set I always use:
Relicanth @ Choice Band
Ability: Rock Head
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Adamant Nature
- Head Smash
- Waterfall
- Earthquake
- Double-Edge

I'm going for a bulky-physical wall that can pack a punch, which Relicanth actually does a decent job at. Luckily, there are a few threats that Relicanth can wall with ease, most notably being Talonflame. The strategy revolving around Relicanth is to switch it into physical attackers that don't carry a grass move. With the HP investment, Relicanth can tank quite a few physical attacks before going down. Click Head Smash, and watch the carnage on the switch in. With any luck, they'll switch in something that doesn't resist your main move, and you'll either nab a OHKO, or get them very low. You'll want a Choice Band, as Head Smash is the only move you'll ever need, and the Life Orb recoil is going to be very damaging over time with the lack of recovery options.

With Relicanth's low speed, you won't be able to keep it in for long periods of time. It's all about switching in and out to wear down the enemy team with those lethal Head Smashes, so you'll need partners that can do those switches without worry. Pokemon with Regenerate work well, so try out a few of those like Amoonguss, who can lure out those pesky Talonflames. You'll also need a clean up sweeper to take care of late game, and some that cover up the general weaknesses. I must admit that it's been a little while since I was heavily battling, so I don't want to name any bad pokemon, so I'll just let you figure it out by testing various strategies.

Like I said before, I love using this fish in OU, and although it's probably not the best idea to be using it, it's fun either way.

 

[LexAnarchy]

Oh dear, there are a lot of options for Relicanth. If you go with the Rockhead ability, I would agree with Nolafus, Choice Banded Head Smash is really powerful and you can even take a few hits with max HP. This is probably the most valuable set in most situations.

However, who says that you have to run Rockhead?

You can also go with a crazy swift swim set to patch it's speed and hit with a powerful Waterfall, with Waterfall now being your main attack instead of the shaky Headsmash. You'll need a Rain setter though, preferably with Damp Rock. You'll want go adamant max attack and put 252 in speed. You can now run Choice Band for an even more powerful Waterfall or LO for versatility. It's not as strong as Rockhead choice banded Head Smash, but once you have the rain up, you still dish out heavy damage and you have a guaranteed hit every time and a chance of flinching the opponent, plus you can outspeed timid 140 base speed Pokes (e.g. Mega Mewtwo-Y). Beside Waterfall, you can go with Stone Edge for Crit chances against set-up walls or Head Smash, which is probably the second choice here because of the recoil. Your 3rd move would be Earthquake and your last one would be Zen-Headbutt for fighting types or maybe even Facade in case you get burned or something. Note that this set is very situational though, but it can work really well and is very unsuspecting.

Another option could be sturdy & Weakness policy, which allows you to stay in for super effective moves, get a Rock Polish off, outspeed and start sweeping with Waterfall, Stone Edge and EQ. This one is also very situational but it has worked perfectly for me a couple of times.

Heck, you could even make a sturdy suicide lead Relicanth with custap berry. You know, getting stealth rocks off and get a powerful priority attack like Head Smash (to which you will go down due to recoil though), Stone Edge or even Giga Impact (lol) before you go down, to put a bit dent into their leading Poke.

If you didn't notice yet, I'm not a fan of conventional sets, so I'm trying to come up with something really different. Different doesn't mean bad however, I got a couple of nice kills with Relicanth, mainly because nobody ever sees it coming. I suggest you trying out different sets on some of your Pokes too, it's much more fun compared to the normal sets that everybody uses.