SCIZOR, "Can It Be Competitive?"

[Scizor83]

SCYTHER was my favorite R/B/Y PM, but SCIZOR became my favorite past G/S/C. I'm trying to figure how I would go about adding SCIZOR to me team, but none of SCIZORS moves are really that good. SCIZORS limmited move selection puts it at a dissadvantage in terms of strategy or suprize and it's and low Speed and Special Defence combined with it's 4X weakness to fire attacks make it easilly cut down. However, in it's defence, it's physically sturdy with great HP, Defence, and a nasty Attack power. Back during Pokemon Stadium 2, SCIZOR was my dominating opener PM who could generally take out several on his own, but there's quite a bit of difference between battling a computer and battling a player.
I'm looking forward to the WII game coming out that allows for incredible 3D and multiplayer online gaming, so I'm trying to put together a good team that doesn't rely on legendaries asside from Suicune. So, anybody have sudgestions on what to do with a SCIZOR? It's not that difficult to figure a place for him during team battles, combineding him with a strong water type, but I'm looking to make him a viable stand-allone force.

Here's my plan so far...
While I was originally planning on adding Double Team to his move set, it just seems like that strategy would just take too long to build up facing the wrong oponent. To deal with his lack of speed, I added the Quick Claw for the chance to at least get the first strike. Instead of useing Double Team, oddly enough SCIZOR is capable of learning Rain Dance and cutting down fire damage all together. Thanks to what I learned about EV training I can better choose stats in his defence, though I plan on sacraficing his worthless Special Attack for beefing up his defences.

Personality: Careful (+Special Defence, - Special Attack)
EV Training: HP, Attack, Special Defence and/or Speed (Can't decide...)

Moves:
Return
Steel Wing / Sleep Talk
Rain Dance
Rest


Agility is the only real powerup move SCIZOR learns, but it's not really that useful in the long run. How is it SCIZOR can learn Rain Dance anyway? Seems like the only addition this move would have is to increase it's resistance to the only attack that is effective against it. As for personality, the original plan was to go with Adamant and beef up his attack to excede 400 with EV Training.

For referance, I have a level 99 Adamant SCIZOR that has not undergone EV training yet, His stats are...

HP
266

Attack
321

Defence
233

Special Attack
107

Special Defence
169

Speed
135​

 

[jc_rcw]

lol wtf carefull, no you want adamant with something like
- Silverwind
- Batonpass
- swords dance/agility
- substitute

 

[Scizor83]

lol wtf carefull, no you want adamant with something like
- Silverwind
- Batonpass
- swords dance/agility
- substitute

I can understand Batonpass, Swords Dance and possibly Substitute, but Silverwind is just terrible in my openion. Return has a great power, 102 MAX I think, and Steel Wing would work on oponents like Rock types that generally have a high Defence. The move set you listed above seems like more of a tactic to beef up your other team members at the expence of the SCIZOR.


I'd really like to rely on a hold item other than Leftovers. Leftovers just seems too overused and I'd rather use it only on 1 or 2 members of my team. With Substitute, I'd really require the use of Leftovers.

 

[jc_rcw]

Silverwind is the second strongest bug move, plus it gets stab, doing more damage than return.

 

[shanecdavis]

The move set you listed above seems like more of a tactic to beef up your other team members at the expence of the SCIZOR.

Unfortunately, that is what Scizor is best at.

 

[Scizor83]

Looks like I've got some stratagizing here. I could sacrafice Scizors Attack and raise Speed and Special Defence while still retaining an attack power of around 300, give or take. Beefing up Speed and Special Defence would actually make Scizor a fairly well ballanced PM, with the exception of Special Attack. The reason why I do not vouch for Silverwind is because it is weak against Fire and Scizor needs all it can get to fend off a Fire attack, which is also why I had not opted to add Steel Wing.
Given the right atributes Scizor might be able to hold his own. As I stated, Rain Dance is a viable defence against Fire, though there's not many level 100 popular Fires with speed lower than 135 and would probubly defeat Scizor with even the Rain Dance defence as a second attack and Rest is simply not an option in this situation. I might be able to pull off a victory against a Flareon with the above Scizor, but it's not something I can expect to take down a Charizard with.


I'm kinda picky though. Substitute may be good if I beefed up Scizors HP more, but I already have a good Sub on my team and it'd just be too tacky to have a second. :\

 

[n3croart]

Scizor @ Leftovers / Lum Berry
Timid Nature
-Agility
-Swords Dance
-Silver Wind
-Baton Pass

Hope this helps.

 

[Alter Ego]

Dude, you're just not listening, are you? -.-

1. Scizor's Sp.Defense and HP are both average, it does, however, hava a double weak against Fire, so even with the rain reducing to a single weak Scizor would still be OHKOed by most STAB fire moves unless you put an insane amount of EVs into Sp.Defense and HP, which is lol since that way Scizor won't be able to accomplish anything even remotely useful. Besides, a Rain Dance is just inviting swift swimmers like Ludicolo (Since you don't even have a bug move to hit it with on the switch) or even Kingdra to jump in and sweep past your Scizor with STAB water moves, or, optionally, bulky waters which will just sit there, take your pathetic Return, and Surf the crap out of you. There's a bulky water on practically every pokémon team, so Rain Dance Scizor is very, VERY poor strategy.

2. Normal moves on non-normal pokémon (Excluding Quick Attack, Extremespeed, self-destruction moves and, in certain cases, Double-Edge) are a waste. The strongest move a Scizor can get is a fully powered Hidden Power [Bug] (base power 70 with STAB = 70 x 1.5 = 105, add Swarm and a bug weak to that and you get some pretty good damage), but most people prefer Silver Wind for the chance of a passable stat boost it provides.

3.

Scizor needs all it can get to fend off a Fire attack

Excuse me, I've got to go and express my internal mirth over this statement...*Rushes off into a corner and laughs hysterically for fifteen minutes* Right, that's better. If you seriously think that Scizor can stand up against any half-decent fire pokémon then you're way off. Double Weak with less than godly Sp.Defense and HP means that you're dead meat against a STAB move of that type. Even if Rain Dance might save you from one non-STAB hit, you'll still have wasted one of Scizor's turns in performing the Rain Dance and thus have gained nothing.

4.

Beefing up Speed and Special Defence would actually make Scizor a fairly well ballanced PM, with the exception of Special Attack.

Why do N00Bs always mess up their pokémon's EVs so that they don't excel at anything and then call it balanced? Scizor doesn't need any Speed EVs, that's why Agility is there for for cripe's sake! >_< As for Sp.Defense, the only special attacks Scizor will see are the ones that either OHKO or 2-hit KO it anyway, so those are wasted EVs. However, in adding to Sp.Defense you're neglecting the two stats that let Scizor shine: Attack and Defense, which means that it will now be vulnerable to sweeping by both physical and special attackers (As opposed to just special attackers) and will be even worse at striking back even when it gets the chance. Way to make Scizzy more competitive. -.-

I'm kinda picky though. Substitute may be good if I beefed up Scizors HP more, but I already have a good Sub on my team and it'd just be too tacky to have a second. :\

If this and that god-awful Porygon 2 build you posted earlier are your ideas of good builds then I have my doubts about your subber, but odds are you won't bother with anyone who actually wishes to correct your horrible misconceptions so I won't bother. <.<

Oh, and Lugialord, wtf is the point with giving Scizor a Timid (-Atk, +Spd) nature? It doesn't need the speed since it's got Agility, and Timid cuts down Silver Wind's power. Impish or Adamant are what you need.

 

[Scizor83]

I'm not too concerned about facing a Fire PM with a Scizor. If a Fire PM comes out I'd attempt a switch, plain and simple. The reason I'm looking for a defence against fire moves is because of the 'unexpected'. Scizor may be strong against Psychic types like Alakazam, but that doesn't mean Alakazam might not know a non-psychic attack. I'm more concerned about surviving the Fire Blast from a Nidoking than a Charizard. :D
After doing some more digging I found that Scizor can learn Light Screen through egg moves. This seems like a better option that Rain Dance.

New possible moves...

Hidden Power (bug)
Agility
Light Screen
Rest

Breed for a more durable Adamant Scyther with Light Screen, hopefully a 31 stat or two, and use Agility and Light Screen when I can afford to.

If this and that god-awful Porygon 2 build you posted earlier are your ideas of good builds then I have my doubts about your subber, but odds are you won't bother with anyone who actually wishes to correct your horrible misconceptions so I won't bother. <.<

Live and learn, at least I'm not trying to sound self important about it. Your agressive attitude sounds like a person who indeed knows allot about Pokemon, but very little about life above the screen. I'm sure a few of the forum members know someone like this in person and know what I'm talking about.


Deep breaths, no need to burst a vein O Puba of Pok'e. :P

 

[Alter Ego]

Live and learn, at least I'm not trying to sound self important about it. Your agressive attitude sounds like a person who indeed knows allot about Pokemon, but very little about life above the screen. I'm sure a few of the forum members know someone like this in person and know what I'm talking about.

Okay, point taken about the tone (Although if you'd have seen some of the raters who used to be active around here you'd know that I'm far from the worst), but please refrain from insulting side-remarks about my personal life (Of which you know nothing whatsoever <.<). They have absolutely nothing to do with the topic and border on flaming. The reason I'm being "aggressive", as you put it, is because you're spending a bit too much time on arguing why the flaws in your strategy aren't flaws and a bit too little on learning from the experienced raters. Now if the rest of the people in this section were experienced it wouldn't be a problem, but fact is that most of them are clueless about the game and start taking up and passing on faulty information, which leads to all the more frustrated hair-pulling for the raters who have to correct the same misconception over and over again. Anyway, let's just stick to the topic from here on, m'kay?

I'm not too concerned about facing a Fire PM with a Scizor. If a Fire PM comes out I'd attempt a switch, plain and simple. The reason I'm looking for a defence against fire moves is because of the 'unexpected'. Scizor may be strong against Psychic types like Alakazam, but that doesn't mean Alakazam might not know a non-psychic attack. I'm more concerned about surviving the Fire Blast from a Nidoking than a Charizard. :D

This, I notice, is handily contradicting your earlier comments about Flareon etc. How about saying what you're going for right at the start? It would help matters a lot.

After doing some more digging I found that Scizor can learn Light Screen through egg moves. This seems like a better option that Rain Dance.

New possible moves...

Hidden Power (bug)
Agility
Light Screen
Rest

Breed for a more durable Adamant Scyther with Light Screen, hopefully a 31 stat or two, and use Agility and Light Screen when I can afford to.

Nyah, Light Screen Scizor is kind of lol. Also, if it's ingame then Silver Wind > Hidden Power [Bug] since Hidden Power's base power is always a toss up, and the chances of getting a strong one of the right type are very slim. (Hidden Power is really only for NetBattle) If Silver Wind's PP is too small for you then I suppose even Steel Wing works, but STAB is the way to go. Also, Rest won't do you much good since a sleeping Scizor is just asking for a water or fire type switch in. Baton Pass, on the other hand, works nicely with Agility (Which lets you outspeed the most) as it can be passed on to other team members. I'd still suggest Swords Dance over Light Screen, though, since a proper sweeper with a couple of passed-in SDances and Agilities is practically unstopable.

 

[aragornbird]

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Fire Punch is Alakazam's second best attack. You should automatically assume any Alakazam will have one. Learn about standard sets and not many things will be unexpected. Even Weezing and Snorlax with Fire Blast won't be a surprise since they are viable options from their list of moves.

Good luck getting an HP Bug above 60 power. =p

Other options besides BP include Reversal Scizor and CB Scizor. They're all better than a Scizor with Light Screen, lol.

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