6v6 Tuesday: Pokemon Killing Power, Part 1

Today, I decided I'd talk about users of moves that hit multiple Pokemon. I went over them briefly last time, but this time, I'll be going into detail of the potentially good users of them. In a doubles/multi Pokemon battle, any move that hits 2 or more Pokemon has its base power reduced to 75%. This means that Earthquake drops to a BP of 75, although STAB will still increase it to 112.5, over its original BP. That means I'd try not to run multi-hitting moves that aren't Explosion and such without STAB, as the base power drop is too much. Earthquake, however, still remains respectable, but not as powerful as on its STAB users. Starting off with users of EQ:



You should also be familiar with this guy, as well. It should come as no real surprise that Garchomp, probably Scarfed or given a Yache and hoping you get one SD off so you can destroy their soul, would be the best user of Earthquake. There are only two Pokemon with higher Attack and STAB EQ, and those are Groudon and Rhyperior. Groudon would still remain Uber in this format, and Rhyperior is mostly worse than Garchomp in every way on this team. With Sandstorm support, Rhyperior is possible due to his great physical walling ability, but Surf and Water Spout will most likely spell his doom. Not Garchomp's, though.



Assuming Garchomp gets banned, Rhyperior is an acceptable option for EQ IF you have Tyranitar. With Surf being multi-hitting, Rhyperior's low speed and Special Defence make it a liability, likely to get destroyed by a Vaporeon or Milotic's Surf. However, the Sandstorm boost could let it survive long enough to get one CB Earthquake in, and at its attack, plus Band boost, one hit is all you'll need. Lightningrod is also a useful ability, allowing you to protect pokemon weak to Electric, such as Gyarados, from faster electric users like Jolteon. Lightningrod gives Rhyperior his own niche ability from Garchomp, but with Sand Veil letting Garchomp dance around enemy attackers, it probably benefits less from Sandstorm. If you feel like running a Gyarados, though, Rhyperior is an acceptable Bander.



The last of the EQ users I'd consider for Theorymon is Mamoswine. He benefits from a different weather to the previous two, and Snow Veil combined with Abomasnow could let him survive long enough. In addition, the major weakness of Abomasnow, Fire, only gets three multi-hitting moves, and none of the three are learnt by many Pokemon, with only Heatran really using them. Thus, Mamoswine is a fine choice, and his typing lets him take on Dragons, like the above Garchomp, with the powerful Ice Shard, letting him get around his relatively slow speed.



My favourite user of Water Spout (excluding Kyogre, of course), as it can survive enough to still have a reasonably powerful Water Spout, unlike Wailord (due to his low defences) and Octillery (due to both low health and defences). His Special Attack is pretty much the same as Wailord's, though lower than Octillery's. Water Spout is unreliable in 6v6, though, as all the users of it (again, bar Kyogre) are fairly slow, and you can't afford to lose much health before using Water Spout. Torrent helps this, though, as if Blastoise it at 33% health, Water Spout has the same power it would at 50%. However, Surf, the other multi-hitting water move, hits your teammates as well, so if you're running, say, Tyranitar, Surf can be dangerous to use. However, on the other hand, Surf hits Vaporeon and Quagsire as a nice psuedo-Wish.



If you're looking for Surf as a healing move, Starmie is probably your best non-uber bet. At a pretty amazing base speed of 115, the only Pokemon in current OU that outrun you are Ninjask (unviable in this format due to Baton Pass not working), Aerodactyl (possibly viable, due to EQ immunity, which is useful, and high speed, though fragile), Jolteon (most likely too fragile, will get hit awfully hard by EQ users) and Weavile (entirely possible due to nice Ice moves and speed). Reasonable Special Attack also means Starmie hits your enemy fairly hard, too. Just be wary of enemy Vaporeons or Quagsires.



However, if you plan on running a Rain Dance team, there's no one faster than Floatzel. Although the auto-rainer, Kyogre, will always be Uber, auto-weather isn't as powerful in this format due to the inability to switch the user back in. For instance, even if TTar starts Sandstorm off on turn 1, as soon as someone uses Rain Dance, he can't set it back up. Although Floatzel is fragile, he will outrun everything that isn't Scarf Deoxys-S. Although Surf is less than decent on him due to his sub-optimal SAttack, Waterfall doesn't hit multiple pokemon, making Surf a possible consideration.



Now we come back to Mamoswine. Blizzard hits all the enemy Pokemon, giving him two moves hitting everything, both STAB, both 100% accuracy (assuming you're running Abomasnow). Admittadly, its off his sub-optimal 70 Special Attack, but Blizzard's ability to hit everything and add versatility to Mamoswine makes up for it, I think. Mamoswine really does deserve two entries on this list, just because of how potentially powerful Mamoswine is. Blizzard, Earthquake, Ice Shard, Superpower, Rock Slide (hits all enemies, and has 100% accuracy, unlike Stone Edge), plus Snow Cloak and immunity to Electricity makes for an amazing Pokemon. I may even give it a third entry in the list sometime later.



Froslass is also a good abuser of Hail. Blizzard, again, but off a slightly better Special Attack and much better speed. I'd run Brightpowder to make up for Frosslass' worse defences, and with that, Frosslass makes great support. TWave and Confusion to slow the enemy's sweeepers and lets you hit before them. Whether or not Substitute is useful in this format, I don't know though.



Typhlosion's Eruption becomes alot more useful now that it hits multiple Pokemon, and he has the highest Special Attack and speed combination of all the Pokemon that learn it. He also learns Blaze, and like Blastoise's Torrent, it buffs Eruption when Typhlosion becomes too low of health to use it properly. Typhlosion also learns Lava Plume, a parallel to Surf in this case, as it lets Typhlosion still hit alot of Pokemon late game.



Heatran learns both Heat Wave and Lava Plume, of which Lava Plume is more reliable but more dangerous to your own team, especially if it burns your one of physical sweepers. Lava Plume could be used by one of your other Pokemon to trigger Flash Fire, but as all of the Pokemon that learn Lava Plume are grounded Fire Pokemon, its not the most reliable of strategies. Heatran's absurd Special Attack lets him use either of them for massive damage, though, so its really up to you.



The mighty Rotom-A is best represented by Fridge, since it gets Blizzard as well, but any will do. Discharge hits all Pokemon, and it is rather dangerous as it can potentially paralyze your own Pokemon, but if supported by some ground Pokemon, the chance of paralyzing your own drops enough to make it worthwhile. Rotom-C and Rotom-H are probably the best for coverage still, but Rotom-F is brilliantly powerful if supported by Abomasnow.

And that's it for part 1. Look forward to Part 2 next Tuesday.