Anti-Mawile / Sub Gyara / Swampert Suicide Tank
Skarmory @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Sturdy
Shiny: YES
EVs: 236 HP / 176 Def / 96 Spe
Bold Nature
Vs: 0 Atk
- Counter
-
Iron Defense
- Roost
- Defog / Whirlwind
I made this Skarmory set several months back during the Nagandel meta, when I was looking to counter
Paycard 's Mawile/Naga high ladder team at the time. Barring Hax,
this Skarmory cannot be KO'd by any Mawile set if played correctly. Additionally , this set and spread also counters Sub Mega Gyara, another popular stall breaker set.
96 EVS are to ensure that you outpace max speed adamant mawile, while realistically most mawile will never run max speed, Skarmory's role as an anti-mawile tank is too necessary to afford losing to weird speed spreads.
236HP / 176 Def spread is very specific to avoid getting 2hko'd by consecutive fire, or thunder punches.
You CANT adjust the HP/Def ratio without the chance of getting 2hko'd barring Hax.
This Skarmory functions as a Mawile suicide tank by luring in hits, and thus, tricking the opponent into thinking that racking up massive rocky helmet recoil is in his or her best interest. How you play this set is very specific to whether they have fire punch or not (this can be read mostly from team preview) -- yet even without this knowledge, you can play around it through its other tech.
To explain how to use this set, I'll guide through several scenarios of playing against mawile with Skarmory.
Mawile non Knock Off Tpunch
====================
Turn 2: Skarmory Switches In, Mawile takes 16% recoil damage
252+ Atk Huge Power Mawile-Mega Thunder Punch vs. 236 HP / 176+ Def Skarmory: 184-218 (55.7 - 66%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Now the opponent thinks that they've trapped skarmory into an unwinnable position
Turn 3: Skarmory outspeeds and roosts (thus eliminating its electric weakness that turn), mawile attacks again now having racked up 32% recoil damage total.
252+ Atk Huge Power Mawile-Mega Thunder Punch vs. 236 HP / 176+ Def Skarmory: 92-109 (27.8 - 33%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
Factoring in averages, Skarmory should be at about 60% health after turn 3, while Mawile has suicided much of its own. At these damage ranges, not even switching Skarmory into Stealth Rock hampers this strategy at all.
At this point, the opponent will either SD up, switch out, or foolishly attack again into a spiked wall. My recommendation is to roost up to full health (and regain Sturdy). If they boost up with SD, you can outboost with Iron Defense (this tech also helps with other sub phys sweepers) and KO it back either through residual damage, or with Counter.
Mawile Fire Punch
============
Fire punch has the exact same BP as t-punch, so the only difference is that after tanking 1 hit, you will instead Iron Defense up, thus surviving the second hit, and therefore safe to roost up.
Knock off Mawile
===========
Knock off mawile is more annoying to play around, but with Iron Defense/Roost outspeeds and KO'ing back with Counter it isn't too much a problem. This is where you can consider Whirlwind over Defog to deal with annoying PP Stalling issues with mawile or gyarados too, but this comes at the cost of role compression.
Shoutout to
Mindnight for the last minute help :3
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7ou-704103882
(only have a quick test replay since I hid this set for months now, tho I did misclick on counter turn 10 instead of iron defensing)
EDIT: I have a replay now of using it in a practical, real battle:
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7ou-707591984
The key for Stall to dealing with Mawile is to have a defensive counter threat that outspeeds (firium clef, firium zapdos, life orb flamethrower clef). The opponent usually won't think straight if their mawile is outsped by shit like clefable or skarmory LOL. You don't need to run anything close to max speed on defensive answers to mawile either.
I should add that this Skarmory set is stiill a 3hko from Rain Swampert, tho gets easily annoyed and killed by waterfall flinches...
I have many other surprising gimmicks, but since i'm going into tour play I can't give away all my goodies ;w;