ok so now that Anchor9 had his attempt and I finished school Imma give this team a shot.
I'll put it out there that AG doesn't have a lot of resources, since people usually play Ubers. Therefore, there may be some weaknesses in this team due to meta developments that I am not aware of. With that being said, I'm still going to try my best and fix this team.
Ting-Lu: Fortunately, Ting-Lu is superb in AG. Unfortunately, Your Ting-Lu is less than superb. Ting-Lu is known for being a bulky hazard setter, and while AV does give it a lot of SpDef to deal with special threats such as Caly-Shadow, I do not think that this much SpDef invest is necessary if one Payback ends the Shadow Rider. With that being said:
Ting-Lu @ Leftovers
Ability: Vessel of Ruin
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD
Tera Type: Poison
Careful Nature
- Spikes
- Ruination
- Payback
- Whirlwind
This set maintains maximizes special bulk while possessing the maximum utility that Ting-Lu can offer. Spikes is a great tool in Ting-Lu's movepool, as there are little relevent Pokemon unaffected by Spikes (only Lando and Giratina-O). With Ting-Lu's massive bulk, it is able to come in multiple times a game and set these back up should they get removed. Ruination is a great way to exert chip damage on otherwise bulky mons, such as opposing Ting-Lu, Toxapex, and Lando-T. Payback is the main method for Ting-Lu to deal damage, as its mediocre 50 BP gets doubled if it moves last, more than enough for a defensive/support mon. Finally, Whirlwind deals with the many, MANY threats in AG who boost up and threaten to win the game, such as Extreme Killer, Calm Mind Miraidon, and DD Arceus-Ground. Tera Poison is an emergancy check to a either finish off a weakened Koraidon or, in the case of SD, phase it out.
Flutter Mane: The fact is, without prominent Dark types such as Yveltal roaming around, Calyrex Shadow is going to be better than Mane 99% of the time. It's faster, notably outrunning the Gen 9 legends and Zacian, while also packing Nasty Plot to threaten a sweep. Despite Mane's Moonblast being effective against Ting-Lu, the premier Dark, Ting-Lu's Tera Poison would render it useless. Also Specs Moonblast doesn't OHKO, while Payback does after 3 layers of spikes.
Calyrex-Shadow @ Choice Specs
Ability: As One (Spectrier)
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Astral Barrage
- Grass Knot
- Psychic
- Trick
Calyrex-Shadow's STABs are extremely dangerous, especially under the boost of Specs, where it can be launched to stratospheric levels. Psychic is used over Psyshock due to power being the main factor of this set. Grass Knot is for the heavy, Grass weak mons such as Groudon, Kyogre, and Ting-Lu. Trick can be used to cripple an opposing defensive mon, such as the aforementioned Ting-Lu, Lando-T, or Skeledirge. Tera Ghost is used to boost Astral Barrage's power even more. This is a mid-game Pokemon; although strong, it doesn't pack the setup required to sweep teams. However, if you manage to remove crucial Dark type mons such as Ting-Lu and Kingambit, you can very easily preserve Calyrex-Shadow and sweep a weakened team late game.
Annihilape: Lets be honest, if you have played OU during the Ape meta you would know the optimal set, which is not the one you're using. Not that it matters, since Ape is not good in AG due to, well, everything (Caly Shadow, Power Creep, Zacian, Arceus Fairy, Ogre, need I say more?). This is starting to become more of a hyper offense team, so why not use the most threatening sweeper in the game?
Arceus @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Multitype
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Extreme Speed
- Shadow Claw
- Recover
That's right, it's E-Killer. Tera Ghost for Fighting types, Shadow Claw to hit Ghosts, Recover to heal on passive blobs that can't do much back. There is no speed investment due to the sole reliance on Extreme Speed to sweep. It may be difficult to use at first, but all you have to do is to remove Ghosts, switch in on a defensive mon, SD, and sweep.
Calyrex-Shadow: Well this is awkward I just gave you a Caly set up above. Oh well I'll just give you another threat, this time being Zacian. I do notice that you have a lack of Fairy resists and counters, which is why I opted to run Zacian. Despite being nerfed this generation, Zacian is still naturally fast enough to threaten something out, set up SD, then sweep the opponent. Obviously having to spend a turn and a moveslot for setup isn't ideal, but Zacian has such a high threat level that most people don't care. Here's the set:
Zacian-Crowned @ Rusted Sword
Ability: Intrepid Sword
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Tera Type: Fire
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Play Rough
- Behemoth Blade
- Crunch
Standard SD set, provides midgame versatility as well as a counter to Arceus-Fairy, all while being threatening should the opponent not respect it. Tera Fire is used to provide an immunity to Wisp and resistance to Korai's Flare Blitz, should that be necessary to win the game. Crunch is used in the last slot to do decent damage against Dirge. It is important to preserve Zacian if there is Arceus-Fairy and, less importantly, opposing Zacian on the other team. Bulky Arceus Fairy can take on all your attackers except for Zacian, which can muscle through with SD and Behemoth Blade. Meanwhile, opposing Zacian that drop Behemoth Blade for CC will have a hard time KOing your Zacian (3 Spikes and Blade has a high chance of OHKOing Zacian, while CC does a big chunk but not all).
Infernape: Like Hallu mentioned, Infernape is hella unviable due to Koraidon outclassing it fully. Despite only sharing the Fighting type, Koraidon's Sun boosted Flare Blitzes provided a deadlier nuke button than whatever Infernape can do. Your support set is a valiant effort to making it work, but support mons like Ting-Lu and Giratina-O just do this job much better. The only logical move is to replace it with Koraidon.
Koraidon @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Orichalcum Pulse
Tera Type: Fire
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- U-turn
- Close Combat
- Dragon Claw
- Flare Blitz
One of Koraidon's problems is its inability to outspeed threats like Calyrex-Shadow, Zacian, and DD Arceus Forms after a boost. With scarf, all the problems are gone. Close Combat is the preferred STAB due to its extra 20 BP being more valuable than Collision Course's secondary effect, which rarely activates in a meta so desolate of Fighting-weak mons. Plus, mons like Ting-Lu still crumple to a Orichalcum Pulse boosted CC. U-Turn is to provide pivoting for the team, Dragon Claw is secondary STAB to hit mons like Eternatus, which would otherwise wall it. Flare Blitz complements will with Close Combat, hitting mons like Arceus-Fairy and Lando which would otherwise resist it. It being sun boosted as well as potentially Tera boosted helps it a lot as well. Tera Fire also procs against the stray Flutter Mane or Quark Drive Bundle trying to pick it off with super effective STABs.
Amoonguss: While Amoonguss is viable in OU, this is AG. Therefore, it is totally unviable. This is mainly due to the more hostile metagame, along with a slew of super effective moves aimed at it. As mentioned before, this team has a problem with Fairy types, and it is more apparent now considering Ting-Lu and pre-Tera Koraidon being weak to Fairy, not to mention that E-Killer and Caly can't do much to defensive Arceus-Fairy. Toxic Spikes can also be a hinderance to everything, since as mentioned before, not a lot of mons are able to dodge Spikes, and only Zacian is immune to the Toxic variant. Therefore...
Toxapex @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Regenerator
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Haze
- Recover
- Toxic
- Infestation
A physically defensive Toxapex to deal with SD Zacian and Arceus-Fairy in a pinch. The reason Pex is viable, and Guss is not, is due to its support movepool. Haze clears boosts, Toxic is able to cripple opposing Pokemon, and Infestation traps something in with Toxapex, like Skeledirge, then finishes it off with Toxic. Pex also matches up better against the metagame, walling non-Thunder Kyogre (a lot), Koraidon, non-Wild Charge/Tera Ground Zacian. Pex also has overall better bulk than Guss, resulting in it being better at taking hits. This is the mon that I am the most hesitant about, since it kind of disturbs the momentum of the offensive team we are trying to build. So instead, if you are more focused on offense, you could use this:
Arceus-Ground @ Earth Plate
Ability: Multitype
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Calm Mind
- Judgment
- Ice Beam
- Recover / Substitute
Calm Mind Arceus-Ground is one of the most potent Arceus forms out there. Ground and Ice form superb coverage against the AG metagame, hitting the many Grounds and Dragons of the tier. Tera Water is used to tank Kyogre's attacks, barring Thunder, which is quite rare anyways due to Koraidon's sun. Recover can be used to snag crucial recovery on forced switches, however Substitute is a more offensive option to give more opportunities to set up against defensive mons.
And that's it! I hope you have fun in AG, and am able to improve it even further based your knowledge of the metagame. I am by no means a professional, but this team should be enough to get you to the 1400s, maybe 1500s (depending on how many newbies are crowding the lower tier lol). Have fun laddering!
