Rate my first gen 8 ou team

Question

So Garchomp is out and I wanted to have a little fun with it's new toy, scale shot, so I've given it a try. I'm still only at 1100 elo because I rage quit a lot especially if the game drags on for very long. I only wanna get to like 1300 or 1400 because I get tilted if all me and my opponents do is go in circles as we wait for the other to make the first move, which is usually what happens when you're around 1500. It's almost like that situation where you and your crush like each other but neither of you wants to admit. Oh, and the rng seems to be a lot worse than it is when compared to wifi battles. There's nothing more annoying in this game than you losing a battle because of the bloody rng. So, here's the team

Garchomp @ Life Orb
Ability: Rough Skin
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Fire Fang
- Scale Shot
- Earthquake
- Swords Dance

I just chose fire fang over stone edge because that dumb move cost me three battles when it refused to hit. Swords dance and scale shot are its boosting options with life orb in the event dancing up is not an option so it's attacks still hit hard Basically just how Garchomp played in gen six except it has scale shot over dragon claw

Zapdos-Galar @ Choice Band
Ability: Defiant
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- U-turn
- Blaze Kick
- Brave Bird
- Close Combat

I have no idea how to use this thing to be honest so I just decided to go with an all out attacker. It's also really fun to use because it feels like a better version of Staraptor although maybe scarf would be better

Dragapult @ Life Orb
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- U-turn
- Thunderbolt
- Draco Meteor
- Shadow Ball

I like creepy stuff and this guy looks creepy so I used it. I don't wanna specs it because getting locked into a move is annoying especially since I use it a lot

Ferrothorn @ Iapapa Berry
Ability: Iron Barbs
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 60 Def / 196 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Spikes
- Leech Seed
- Power Whip
- Stealth Rock

Good old Ferrothorn, always a reliable pokemon. Not sure of the ev spread since I literally just started gen 8 ou yesterday and I just based it on it's gen 7 version

Tornadus-Therian (M) @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Defog
- U-turn
- Hurricane
- Knock Off

Another one of my most reliable pokemon. Heavy duty boots seems to be an item made specifically for it and it's uses as a scout is a lot more useful and without z moves or mega stones, knock off is so pesky. The only thing I don't like about it is the hurricane never hitting whenever I need it to hit

Slowbro @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Regenerator
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 176 Def / 80 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Toxic
- Scald
- Teleport
- Slack Off

My only ice resist and since teleport is reworked, I figured, why not. It's been a reliable physical wall since regenerator came out so I just used it

Replace anyone but Garchomp since that guy's the only reason I even play gen 8. I wanted to see how it's new toy fares

Comments

"I like creepy stuff and this guy looks creepy so I used it."
Lol
And from what I've seen, scarf zapdos is better, as it has a middling base speed, and literally everything has a scarf. Band works too tho.
(I find scarf zapdos better because of the likely-to-be-banned-but-still-here-pheramosa, and it outspeeds it with a scarf)

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xD

I did say I just started yesterday and I did use a bunch of other mons but this is the one I prefer. I agree altho I don't have a problem against Pheromosa yet since I play Garchomp aggressively and after a single scale shot Chomp outspeeds Mosa

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Ah ok makes sense. Forgot about that. I'd also reccomend throat chop so you can threaten ghost types including the threatening spectrier

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Throat chop? On which pokemon? And that ghost horse is so fragile on the defensive side that any strong neutral hit just outright kills it

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might want something for spectrier. scarf + grim neigh can easily snowball against a team with no ghost resist or sucker punch/other priority. even non scarf with webs support could do the same thing since its faster than torn-t. if you want to do a speed boosting garchomp set then i think sub salac berry would probably be better honestly. ill admit scale shot is more fun though. the zapdos set is perfect, wouldnt change a thing. same with tornadus. dragapult set is fine, but i would change the item. taking life orb damage every time you u-turn will wear you down pretty quickly, especially if hazards are up on your side. i'd recommend scarf to help with spectrier, or heavy-duty-boots to prevent hazard damage as well as not having to worry about sticky webs. im not sure why you are using iapapa berry on ferrothorn, especially after it got nerfed. leftovers seems way better or rocky helmet at least. i would try max defense + body press instead of power whip as well. those special defense evs on slowbro kind of seem like a waste. nothing wrong with toxic, but thunder wave is always another option

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Oh yeah I forgot that it no longer restores half hp. No wonder it didn't heal as much as it did when it triggered. I don't really like subsalac because priority. A single priority and all that effort to trigger the berry would be wasted and I could also be forced out. That's true. Garchomp even gets lots of chance to get scale shot speed because of the new electric regi that literally has almost zero ways to deal with ground types. I'll try that since I did get destroyed once by that ghost horse so I guess Dragapult would be the scarfer. As much as I wanna scarf Zapdos, one shotting things is just way too much fun. Wouldn't having both my walls being physical leave me vulnerable on the special side?

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but scale shot lowers defense every time you use it, so you would be screwed by priority either way, right? i suppose you could go specially defensively with ferrothorn, but you lose out on having a really strong body press which is by far the best new move it got in this gen. i just find it best checking a lot of physical attackers due to its ability and typing but it has a workable special defense stat anyways. as for slowbro, its special defense is a lot worse than its defense. putting a small bit of evs into it wont help much with that. its usually better to put it all into one stat instead of spreading yourself thin unless there is a specific damage roll you can avoid with a little extra evs. but even besides all that, slowking is basically the exact same pokemon but just with flipped defenses. you are better off using it instead if you wanted to take special hits better.

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That's true. Whenever I see a priority user I just get out. Either that or I dedicate all efforts to killing it and let Garchomp deal with the rest. Even without swords dance, its life orb boosted attacks still hurt unless intimidated, which for some reason is very rare down here. Honestly, my biggest enemy in this game is the rng. I just hate it when the scale shot misses for some reason. I was also thinking about using white herb instead but if I do that then using swords dance first becomes a must

That's true. I still haven't played gen 8 that much so I guess I'll try max def Ferrothorn with Slowking instead, or maybe a specially defensive Toxapex. Thanks

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oh wow i didnt even know scale shot only had 90% accuracy. thats pretty lame. but anyways those sound like good additions. and in any case it will be a lot easier to use this team when things like naganadel and genesect inevitably get banned from the tier