What is a good moveset for Talonflame?

Question

If you have a good competitive moveset for Talonflame, post an answer below and upvote the best ones. Movesets for any of its pre-evolutions can also be shared on this thread.

Be sure to include full set details in your post, e.g. items, abilities, natures and EVs. Some detail, including the intended game mode for your set, is also appreciated. Access the full list of guidelines here.

Talonflame Pokédex and learnset for reference.

Answer 1

Lead

Talonflame @ Focus Sash
Ability: Gale wings
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Taunt
- Tailwind
- Acrobatics
- U-turn
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T-flame is very underrated as a lead to be honest. Tailwind priority combined with access to priority acrobatics has very few Pokemon ever outspeeding it. Taunt to prevent your opponent from setting up on you, and U-turn to escape if Talon can't do much else of anything right now.

Answer 2

My super cliche Talonflame set

Talonflame @ Leftovers
Ability: Gale Wings
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Brave Bird
- Roost
- Steel Wing

-Flare Blitz: good stab
-Brave Bird: good stab, GW abuse
-Roost: good recovery, GW abuse
-Steel Wing: Rock coverage

this set is clearly outdated, too bad GW got nerfed

Answer 3

It makes sense, trust me.

Talonflame @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Flame Charge
- Fly
- U-turn
- Swords Dance

Flame Charge- Physical STAB, boosts your speed to amazing levels.
Fly- Physical STAB, you don't want to use Acrobatics because you have an item, and you don't want to kill yourself with Brave Bird.
U-turn- Physical I-don't-want-to-be-here move.
Swords Dance- Boost all of your physical attacks.

The trick is, this Talonflame was meant to be hit. Whatever you do, don't use Brave Bird. As said above, you WILL kill yourself. The strategy here is to get someone to physical attack you. Then they get hurt by the Rocky Helmet and hopefully burned by Flame Body. It's happened before, you just have to trust me. Anyway, you would want to Swords Dance once or twice and pray you don't get yourself knocked out. If you are sure your fate is sealed, U-Turn right out of there. Basically, let it either wreak havoc or retreat if necessary. And at least it'll hatch some eggs for you if it does a lot of the latter.

Comments

Seems like a decent set, but I'd say that Brave Bird on a GW talonflame is rather viable, and here's why:
1. Gale Wings. GW will make sure most of your flying moves go first, especially with talon's speed, so your flying moves mainly get outsped by extremespeed and other moves of high priority. What this means, is you can get off a high damage move first, potentially being able to ohko your opponents. But more importantly, the 2nd point -
2. Roost. Roost is priority because of gale wings, healing back all the damage you might take from flare blitz or brave bird. This is a key move that makes sure you're not just sacrificing your talon for damage, if you're not using it as a glass cannon (Although that is the premise of life orb pokemon). In fact, there are some specific sets that aren't designed to last entire matches, but I digress. Roost means that Talon will be able to heal before taking damage, and if you get countered, a switch will be sufficient.
3. HP. The damage dealt to yourself is highly dependent on the damage you deal to your opponent. Brave Bird deals 1/3 of the damage back to your pokemon. Since we have a guaranteed method of HP recovery, it means that as long as the opposing pokemon doesn't have insane amounts of HP (i.e. Chansey and otherwalls), everything should be alright. According to this pokemondb post, https://pokemondb.net/pokebase/300407/what-are-the-average-each-stats-for-each-smogon-tier?show=300407, the average base HP of a pokemon rounds up to about 69, resulting in about 342 max hp. Even with no hp investment and having no HP IVs, we'll have 266 HP on our talon. If we manage to ohko their pokemon, we do 1/3 of 342 to ourselves. That is 114 damage, which leaves us at around 3/5 of our HP, in the worst case possible. After that turn, we easily recover up to full health.

TLDR: Brave Bird would actually be one of the most adequate moves on a Talon set, and coupled with a roost, some HP EVs, and definitely a defogger, Brave Bird Talon could do rather well.

Answer 4

Gen 7

Talonflame @ Normal Gem
Ability: Flame Body / Gale Wings
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant / Jolly Nature
- Return
- Flare Blitz
- Acrobatics
- U-Turn / Steel Wing / Bulk Up / Will-O-Wisp / Swords Dance

Return, activate Normal Gem, then spam Acrobatics. Flare Blitz is STAB. U-Turn to pivot out of unfavorable matchups and to do super-effective damage against Tyranitar, the most common Rock type in the metagame. Steel Wing to cover rock types that wall this set otherwise, and a small chance to get a passive defense boost is nice. Bulk Up to be bulkier and stronger, but Swords Dance is recommended over it most of the time. Will-O- Wisp to spread burns.

Talonflame @ Choice Band
Ability: Gale Wings
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant / Jolly Nature
- Brave Bird
- Flare Blitz
- U-turn
- Steel Wing

Brave Bird is STAB, and works well with Gale Wings, Flare Blitz is STAB, U-Turn for pivoting, Steel Wing for coverage. Would be better if it got a bigger movepool.

Answer 5

Fast Physical Sweeper

Talonflame @ Leftovers
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Brave Bird
- U-turn
- Steel Wing

So, this is a sweeper as it says. I gave this Talonflame Leftovers because you might take some recoil from Flare Blitz and Brave Bird. I gave it 252 Attack for more damage output with all its Physical moves. It has Flame Body because I wanted to be a bit different from the other answers and it's not a bad ability because if your opponent gets burned, they will take a bit of damage every turn and will get halved attack which lets your Talonflame stay in longer and sweep. It has Adamant because it boosts your attack even more and lows your Sp. Attack, but you don't have any Special moves anyway. 4 Sp. Def is to just throw in there to be a bit better while the 252 Speed is to outspeed even faster mons than Talonflame.

Flare Blitz is your STAB Fire move and with its great power, it will KO many things. Brave Bird is your sweeping STAB Flying move. It has just as much power as Flare Blitz and will also do a ton of damage. Steel Wing is for coverage and helps with its 4x weakness from Rock. U-turn is for pivoting and doing damage at the same time.

Answer 6

Gen 8 NU

Talonflame @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Flare Blitz / Brave Bird
- Toxic / Will-o-Wisp
- Roost
- U-turn

Choose either Flare Blitz or Brave Bird for a STAB move. Toxic and Will-o-Wisp is to spread status, but the one you use depends on which STAB move you chose. If you chose Flare Blitz, you would run Toxic. If you run Brave Bird, you would run Will-o-Wisp. Roost is for healing. U-Turn is for pivoting.

Comments

Singles?

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Yes, it's for Singles... NU is a singles format

Answer 7

Gen 6
Role: Fast Physical Sweeper

Talonflame (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Gale Wings
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Brave Bird
- Roost
- Steel Wing

Flare Blitz and Brave Bird damage the user so we need Roost to heal, and these 2 moves are STAB. Steel Wing may raise Defense.

Comments

Choice Band with Roost? Why not use Life Orb? Gale Wings always has priority in Gen 6, and it would allow you to use Roost.

Answer 8

Taunt + Swords Dance
Gen 8 NU

Talonflame @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Brave Bird
- Taunt
- Swords Dance
- Roost

Swords Dance Talonflame with Taunt. The ability is Flame Body over Gale Wings so you can be able to punish Pokemon who make contact with a burn, and ever since the nerf of Gale Wings, Gale Wings is rather... unreliable. Taunt shuts down Pokemon who use status moves, and especially shuts down Heatproof Bronzong. Swords Dance boosts your attack. Brave Bird is strong flying STAB and can be used on rock and steel types when they're weakened because since the rock and steel types in the tier don't have access to recovery, barring Roost Aerodactyl. Roost is for healing and can heal off recoil damage from Brave Bird. This set is for use late game, but can be used to setup on Heatproof Bronzong.

Answer 9

Taunt + Toxic
Gen 8 NU

Talonflame @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 248 HP / 52 Def / 208 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Flare Blitz / Brave Bird
- Taunt
- Toxic / Will-o-Wisp
- Roost

Brave Bird is STAB that allows you to super effective damage to fighting types. Flare Blitz can be used instead so you can deal super effective damage to steel types not named Heatproof Bronzong. Taunt prevents opposing Pokemon from setting up / using moves like Stealth Rock. Toxic is to poison opposing Pokemon that are not steel and poison types upon them switching in. Will-O-Wisp is to burn opposing Pokémon and allows you to cripple the steel types in NU if you choose Brave Bird as your STAB. Roost is for healing so you can stay in longer.

Comments

so where is your fire type move

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don't you think you could have flare blitz

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and you can foret toxic and give it to other members

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I added Flare Blitz as an option for STAB. This is more of a utility set, so Flare Blitz works for this set to hit stuff like Copperajah and Escavalier.

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Flare Blitz is a far better option because it counters steel types, Brave Bird isn't viable IMO steel types have a resistance against Flying type and they're immune to Toxic.

Answer 10

Gen 7 Game:

Talonflame @ Flynium Z
Ability: Gale Wings
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Bulk up
- Flare Blitz
- Brave Bird
- Roost

Bulk up is for boosting attack and defense since Talonflame is not bulky, Brave Bird and Flare Blitz gets stab but with recoil, not to worry there is roost to heal the recoil damage.
Source: Call me joey

Comments

This set is OK, but there are a couple of things you should know:

First, you can only invest a maximum of 252 EVs in each of a Pokemon's stats and a grand total of 510 EVs altogether. Your set's EVs should instead look like this:

EVs: 252 Atk/ 4 Def / 252 Spe

Second, you should definitely run Bulk Up instead of Hone Claws. Hone Claws does boost accuracy, but all of your Talonflame's moves are already 100% accurate; therefore the accuracy boosts don't really help you. Bulk Up raises your Attack AND Defense by one stage, and while Talonflame is not bulky in any way, it could at least help it survive one or two physical hits from pokemon with poor physical attack stats.

Answer 11

Gen 8

Talonflame @ Charcoal
Ability: Flame body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Sunny Day
- Flame Charge
- Brave Bird
- Solar Beam

Start with Sunny Day so that it boosts the power of your Fire type moves as well as lets Solar Beam to attack without absorbing light, thus it lets you KO Rock and Water types. You can use Flame Charge the rest of the way which is boosted by Sunny Day + Flame Plate + STAB, which may also boost your attack, and thus, it increases the power of Flame Charge and Brave Bird. Now this even stronger Brave Bird is able to One Hit KO a Mega Sceptile or Mega Abomasnow.

Comments

Mega Sceptile and Mega Abomasnow don't exist in Gen 8.

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Well, forget about the Mega Pokemon I just mentioned, I was just giving an example. As I love Mega Pokemon, I totally forgot that they don't exist in Gen 8 games.

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Fire Plate also isn't in Gen 8. It's available for Talonflame to use in Gens 6 and 7.

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You can substitute Fire Plate with Charcoal

Answer 12

Gen 8 NU

Talonflame @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Taunt
- Bulk Up
- Brave Bird
- Roost

A Taunt + Bulk Up set. Taunt shuts down defensive Pokemon from using moves such as Toxic, Heal Bell, etc. and can stop setup sweepers from setting up. Bulk Up boosts your attack and defense, making you be more offensive while gaining defense boosts. You can become physically bulky with Bulk Up combined with Bulk Up. Brave Bird is for flying STAB. Roost allows you to stay in longer.

Answer 13

Well, seeing as how many people liked my last Gen 8 NU set, I'll go ahead and post another one.

Talonflame @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe OR 252 Def / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Flare Blitz
- U-turn
- Dual Wingbeat / Brave Bird
- Roost

Brave Bird and Flare Blitz are your STAB moves, which you can swap out Brave Bird for Dual Wingbeat if you don't want to take recoil damage. U-Turn will allow you to pivot from any Rock or Water types that'll give this set any problems. Roost will allow you to recover, which will allow Talonflame to stay in much longer. Flame Body is for the 30% chance of burn, and Heavy-Duty Boots will allow Talonflame to not take 50% of its health from Stealth Rocks.

Comments

https://www.smogon.com/stats/2022-01/moveset/gen8nu-1760.txt
Flame Body is better than Gale Wings most of the time because of its defensive value. Why do you need +1 Defog when it's the fastest Pokemon in NU apart from Aerodactly and Choice Scarfers, and the EVs are not the best for Defogging (just go max HP some bulk and rest in Spe). Also, most of the Talonflame run Jolly Nature over Adamant probably for outspeeding Spe positive natured Starmie, Salazzle, etc. I don't play NU much so feel free to prove me wrong, but I used stats as my source.

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Gale Wings can be used on Talonflame, but only on Swords Dance sets on HO teams. Also, thought I'd mention since I play Gen 8 NU, you should probably replace Defog. Talonflame isn't a good Defogger since Talonflame isn't able to beat Diancie, Mudsdale, and Rhydon, all of them being Stealth Rock setters that can easily setup Rocks vs Talonflame as they all can force Talonflame to switch out.

Answer 14

ProTox Talonflame
Gen 8 NU

Talonflame @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 248 HP / 132 SpD / 128 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Toxic
- Protect
- Roost

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Toxic + Protect Talonflame has been seeing use in NU recently. Toxic is used to poison Pokemon like Vaporeon, Mudsdale, and opposing Pokemon. Protect allows you to scout and get a free turn of poisoned Pokemon taking damage from Toxic poison. Roost is used for healing so you can stay healthy. Flare Blitz is used for fire STAB to allow you to hit Copperajah and Escavalier, both of them being immune to Toxic.

248 HP EVs gives Talonflame some bulk. Jolly Nature is used to help cut down on Speed EVs, as on ProTox Talonflame doesn't need a lot of Speed EVs. 128 Speed EVs allows you to outspeed base 110 Pokemon. You don't need Speed EVs for Salazzle for this set, as you only have Flare Blitz to actually damage Salazzle. You also end up losing to Starmie anyways, so the extra Speed EVs aren't needed. The rest of the EVs are dumped into Special Defense to help you live hits, such as being able to avoid a 2HKO from Choice Specs Hyper Voice Sylveon.

Answer 15

Format: VGC 2022 (doubles)

Talonflame @ Focus Sash
Ability: Gale Wings
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Tailwind
- Dual Wingbeat
- Flare Blitz
- Defog / Quick Guard / Protect

This is a standard doubles Tailwind lead into Flare Blitz kamikaze, with the exception of Dual Wingbeat instead of Brave Bird.

Dual Wingbeat is intended to be used instead of Tailwind on the first turn if you encounter a Whimsicott -- you will go before Whimsicott's Prankster Tailwind due to your Gale Wings and can KO Whimsicott through its Focus Sash since Dual Wingbeat hits twice (and is super effective).

The final move slot is your choice but should depend upon what the rest of your team needs more.

• Defog will have priority due to Gale Wings if you are still at full health, and is useful not only for clearing screens (which are more common than hazards in doubles) but also for lowering the target's Evasion if your doubles partner has a powerful-but-inaccurate move like Precipice Blades, Stone Edge, Focus Blast, Blizzard, etc.

• Quick Guard defends both you and your doubles ally against things like Fake Out, Sucker Punch, and Prankster status moves (e.g. Thunderwave, Eerie Impulse, Will-O-Wisp, etc.). It allows you to move with priority even if your Gale Wings is disabled due to taking damage.

• Protect lets you stall out turns, hopefully drawing your opponent's aim away from your doubles partner.

Answer 16

Talonflame @ Life Orb
Ability: Gale Wings
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Adamant Nature
- Brave Bird
- Flare Blitz
- Tailwind
- Roost

This thing is a huge thread when you give it bulk instead of speed. The idea is to set up tailwind if possible, then sweep and heal. Even if you can't set tailwind, Talonflame's based speed is still pretty good plus Gale Wings guarantees you'll get at least one priority Brave Bird, which can get you an early advantage assuming you don't get faked out or something.

I often start off with this Talonflame in doubles and it's great at catching people by surprise, making them focus on Talonflame and making room for other Pokemon to make their play.