Hi everyone. This is my emerald team that I am using against the elite four and I was wondering if you could rate my team and give me comments on what I should do.
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Aggron
Lvl: 47
Holding: EXP.Share Leftovers/Choice Band
Moves:
Thunderbolt Rock Slide
Blizzard Substitute/Thunder Wave/Counter/Focus Punch/Brick Break
Iron Tail/Focus Punch
Dig Earthquake
Point one; Aggron's Sp.Attack royally sucks. Trust me, no special attack move is ever worthwhile on it despite that tomfoolery that Steven is up to. xP Solid physical attacks are the way to go, Earthquake and Rock Slide are solid, reliable moves. Earthquake being strong and far superior to Dig (Because you seriously don't want to end up in the way of your opponent's Earthquake with Aggron's double weakness against Ground, even moreso if your underground (Double damage in case you didn't know) <.<) To make it a bit more than just power mashing, I'd suggest giving it Substitute (Good if your opponent is too weak to break it with one, serves as a cover for Focus Punch), Thunder Wave (To cut down the opponent's speed and make it harder to attack, also serves as a (Slightly unreliable) cover for Focus Punch) or Counter (Your Aggron probably won't be in much condition to fight after that, but odds are that it will at least have taken your opponent's Earthquaker/Brick Breaker along with it). As a possible substitutionary move for Iron Tail, Focus Punch can deal some truly impressive damage, even to tough opponents. However, it will need the cover of a move like Thunder Wave or Substitute to function. For an item, Exp.Share is worthless in battle, replace that with Leftovers. Optionally, you can just go for brute strength (All of them physical moves, mind you) and add a Choice Band to power up. At any rate, Dig, Thunderbolt, and Blizzard make Aggron cry. Ditch them. =P
Sharpedo
Item: Choice Band
Lvl: 52
Moves:
Surf/Hydro Pump
Waterfall Return/Double Edge
Dive Hidden Power [Flying]/Ice Beam
Earthquake
No...just, no...don't ever put three damaging moves of the same type on a pokémon. Don't ever. First of all, Dive sucks, majorly...it's like a weakened Water-type edition of the already pathetic Dig and should never be on a moveset. If you need it for exploration purposes then stick it on a HM slave, because that's the only place where it belongs. You should aim for as many hard-hitting physical moves as possible, as Sharpedo is both fast and strong (On the physical side) but can't really take a hit. Return and Double Edge both deal quite nice damage to a wide variety of types while Earthquake is great both because of its high power and because it grants an edge against troublesome electric types. To replace Waterfall (A move which is completely inferior to Surf and also belongs exclusively to HM slaves) Hidden Power [Flying] can do some major damage against three of Sharpedo's weaknesses; Grass, Bug, and Fighting. But if your Sharpedo doesn't happen to have that power then Ice Beam is passable, and it does grant you an edge against Salamence and the like. A hard-hitting Water move isn't too bad for Sharpedo really, as it helps you to plow through physical walls that block your way, although you might want to consider going for Hydro Pump instead to get that extra boost. Finally, a Sharpedo without a Choice Band is a joke in my opinion. It already has a great Attack stat, so why not make the best of it?
Grovyle
Item: Leftovers
Lvl: 29
Moves:
Dynamic Punch Thunderpunch
Cut Dragon Claw/Crunch/Leech Seed (Crunch and Leech Seed require breeding)
Leaf Blade
Quick Attack Substitute/Attract/Protect
A piece of general advice; look at your pokémons' statlines before choosing their moves. First of all, I can't understand how your starter can still be this weak when you're facing the Elite Four. It should have already become a Sceptile a long time ago. Secondly, nothing with an Accuracy of 50% or less is worth having, Dynamicpunch is flimsy and unreliable, and to top it all, Grovyle doesn't have the Attack stat to make any physical move worthwhile. And Cut...is another worthless move which is only fit for HM slaves, no serious moveset should contain it. Sceptile is a fast Sp.Attacker with low defenses, so you should concentrate on hitting your opponent hard with special attacks. Thunderpunch is great for this because it grants you an edge against Flying types, and Dragon Claw serves to deal decent damage to a wide variety of types. Crunch is better though, because it has an advantage against more types and may drop the target's Sp.Defense, and Leech Seed is also a formidable option when used in combination with a protection move. But both of those moves require breeding so Dragon Claw will suffice. For the final move, you need something to keep your Grovyle alive a bit longer. Protect can be used to check what your opponent is trying to do, as well as grant you additional turns of free healing if you have put a Leech Seed on your opponent, Attract makes it very difficult for pokémon of the opposite gender to attack, and Substitute grants you protection against status attacks and can be used to buy an additional turn of attacking if your opponent starts to buff. Substitute is also especially effective in combination with Leech Seed because the HP recovery granted will always leave you with enough HP to create a new Substitute, forcing your opponent to either Switch out or find some other means of getting rid of the seeds.
Vulpix
Item: Leftovers
Lvl:40
Moves:
Flamethrower
Fire Blast Faint Attack/Hidden Power [Grass/Electric]/Sunny Day
Overheat Will-O-Wisp/Hypnosis
Imprison Confuse Ray/Attract
Now what did we say about putting moves of the same type on a pokémon? First of all, Overheat is a very poor choice for a Special Attacker like Vulpix because it cuts down the power of all other attacks you use, quickly, whereas Fire Blast is inaccurate with low PP and the extra damage is kind of pointless because Vulpix gets both STAB and, in some cases, Flash Fire bonus for Fire attacks and should be quite capable of handling things with Flamethrower. What Vulpix really needs is variety in moves. Ingame, Faint Attack is the most reliable move available, but it too requires breeding. Failing that, you can once again check if you happen to have a suitable Hidden Power (Grass and Electric are the best types, although almost any special Hidden Power with even decent damage helps), for the remaining moves, you should focus on status inflicting moves (Because Imprison is just plain pointless with a set like this). Hypnosis is a good way to incapacitate foes, but it requires breeding as well, so Will-O-Wisp is there for substition. It's also useful not only because of the extra damage but also because it will halve the target's Attack stat, which is a great help for Vulpix. For the other status move, I'd suggest one which stacks with the first. Confuse Ray is always fun, if rather unreliable, whereas Attract is a nice way to stall out opponents, even though it leaves you high and dry against unfavourable genders.
Xatu
Lvl: 36
Item: Leftovers
Moves:
Flash Faint Attack/Giga Drain/Calm Mind
Fly Substitute/Protect/Calm Mind
Psychic
Teleport Wish
Don't ever create scary stuff like this. First of all, Teleport is a joke, on any moveset, and does absolutely nothing in a trainer battle, not to mention that it's inferior to Fly as well, although neither of those two really has a place on a Xatu. With a Xatu, the best approach is to buff up and then try to sweep as much as you can. Wish is a precious and wonderful recovery move and it's a downright outrage not to use it. Secondly, I'd heavily reccomend sticking Calm Mind on there. If you're okay with not being able to damage Dark types then you can also add Protect or Substitute to make it harder for you opponent to finish the job while you're waiting for your Wish, but if you want a slightly wider attacking potential then Faint Attack (Provided that you breed it in) or even *Shudders* Giga Drain can be used for that purpose. If you get lucky with the Hidden Power you can try that for a second attack as well.
Swalot
Item: Leftovers
Lvl: 52
Moves:
Sludge Bomb
Body Slam Shadow Ball/Fire Punch
Shock Wave Yawn/Toxic/Amnesia/Acid Armor/Fire Punch
Giga Drain Rest
Swalot is cute...but you're doing terrible things to it. First of all, although Swalot is equally good with special and physical attacks, you should be more choosy about what attacks you put on it. Body Slam, although a decent enough move, is kind of bland and doesn't really do that much damage without STAB, so I'd suggest replacing that with either Shadow Ball (To beat ghost types) or Fire Punch (To give it an edge against Steel types). In a similar vein, Shock Wave is a wasted move really, and you'd be better off with either adding Yawn or Toxic for a status inflicting move (to either grant you more time to work or to add some additional damage to the opponet), Acid Armor or Amnesia to grant it some protection from attacks (Acid Armor needs breeding), or a third damaging move (In which case you could keep Sludge Bomb, Shadow Ball, and Fire Punch all at once). Finally, Rest lets you keep your Swalot in the game longer, and since it's ingame you can cheat the system and only suffer one turn of sleep thanks to the Blue Flute.
Please comment on these and give me any tips on what moves, and ways I can beat the elite four.
Thank you
~Shylocke~
