Chlorophyll Sweepers

[Jaetheho]

The Huge Overview Paragraph

Sun is starting to die out with the rising popularity of voltturn and rain and sand offense, and will later be more impacted with the release of keldeo. This thread is dedicated to the discussion of sun sweepers, and mainly grass types with chlorophyll. Sun has been the worst of the three OU weathers for a long time (hail doesnt count) And there are valid reasons why. First of all, Rain teams have the rain equivalent of chlorophyll in the form of swift swim. The true advantage of rain over sun, however, is that, almost all swift swimmers are Water type (hello beartic and armaldo) and they are blessed with a double STAB to their water attacks in the rain. This was one of the reasons why rain+swiftswim was banned, but not sun+chlorophyll. Another reason is that the water types commonly seen with swiftswim resist the attacks that are amplified by their appropriate weather. This is not the case for chlrorophyll sweepers. To this day, there are no non-grass types that get chlorophyll. All chlorophyll pokemon are grass, and share the x3 (in sun) weakness to fire. This is a huge hindrance for the sweepers, as unlike the swift swimmers, they have harder time switching into weather-boosted attacks in the sun. However, there are defeintely many advantages to chlorophyll sweepers. The first advantage is the new mechanics of the move "growth." The new mechanics allow growth to effectively serve as a nasty plot + a swords dance and makes these grass types FEARSOME mixed sweepers. Another advantage for the chlorophyll sweepers is that, instead of the double-STAB boost that rain sweepers get for their water attacks, they get a pseudo-STAB on fire type moves. Many of the chlorophyll sweepers run hp fire, and in the sun, it is effectively a 105 BP move. However, there are still disadvantages that chlorphyll users face. There are no super-hard-hitting pokemon with great set-up moves. Venusaur, arguably the most popular chlorophyll pokemon, albeit bulky, does not have the sheer force to run through the whole OU. This is contrasting to sweepers of other weathers such as kingdra or omanyte or excadrill. They have either, STRONG stabs, high sp. attack or high attack (dragon/water, 115, and 135 respectively) These other-weather sweepers also have great boosting moves like dragon dance, shell smash, and swords dance. Another disadvantage of chlorphyll sweepers is that they are neutral to the most popular priority, bullet punch. These are some of the disadvantages of chlorphyll sweepers, but nonetheless, they are very powerful when played right.

The bottom portion will not be text heavy, as i want a THOROUGH DISCUSSION from YOU GUYS.

The Pokemon

Venusaur (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Chlorophyll
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Growth
- Energy Ball
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Sludge Bomb

Venusaur is the original Grass pokemon.
Venusaur got the vest thing it could have wished for from the 5th gen dream world, and that was Chlorophyll. With the introduction of Droughtales, Venusaur had gained its ticket to OU. Venusaur has many traits that make its a great sweeper, and should be the first offensive chlorophyll sweeper to consider when making a team.

Pros:
Great Bulk
Good Typing
Access to sleep powder and growth
Able to get through normal counters by running a full-physical or a mixed set (i.e. return/eq for latias and heatran respectively)

Cons:
Lacks some power
Has conflicts with DW move compatibility (like power whip and giga drain)

Other sets: Subseed, physical, mixed

Victreebel (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Chlorophyll
EVs: 172 Atk / 140 SAtk / 196 Spd
Rash Nature (+SAtk, -SDef)
- Growth
- Leaf Blade
- Weather Ball
- Sludge Bomb

While Victreebel might look like a specialized venusaur.... wait it is. It is much more hard hitting, can fully reach the potential for a mixed set, and looks awesome.

Pros:
Very hard hitting
Acces to Growth, and WEATHERBALL and powerwhip/leafblade
Good typing

Cons:
Very frail
cant get past heatran

Other sets: Fully special (probably REALLY GOOD)

Calculations:

Hide

172 +2 Atk Life Orb Victreebel Leaf Blade vs 252 HP/252 Def Blissey: 78.29% - 92.16%
Entry hazards damage: 178
After entry hazards: 737 - 836 (103.22% - 117.09%)
100% chance to OHKO

140 +2 SpAtk Life Orb Victreebel Weather Ball vs 252 HP/252 SpDef Ferrothorn: 259.09% - 305.68%
100% chance to OHKO

140 +2 SpAtk Life Orb Victreebel Sludge Bomb vs 0 HP/0 SpDef Latias: 84.72% - 99.67%
Entry hazards damage: 37
After entry hazards: 292 - 337 (97.01% - 111.96%)
81.25% chance to OHKO

Detailed Result:
140 +2 SpAtk Life Orb Victreebel Sludge Bomb vs 252 HP/0 SpDef Latias: 63.46% - 75%
Entry hazards damage: 45
After entry hazards: 276 - 318 (75.82% - 87.36%)
2 hits to KO (DARN)

140 +2 SpAtk Life Orb Victreebel Sludge Bomb vs 0 HP/0 SpDef Dragonite: 98.45% - 115.48%
87.5% chance to OHKO

172 +2 Atk Life Orb Victreebel Leaf Blade vs 252 HP/64 Def Tentacruel: 109.89% - 129.4%
100% chance to OHKO

140 +2 SpAtk Life Orb Victreebel Sludge Bomb vs 252 HP/252 SpDef Celebi: 113.61% - 133.66%
100% chance to OHKO

IDK what to put else...

Sawsbuck (F) @ Life Orb
Trait: Chlorophyll
EVs: 120 HP / 252 Atk / 136 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Swords Dance
- Horn Leech
- Nature Power/ Jump kick
- Return

Sawsbuck is a gen 5 pokemon that has much potential. It has a signature move--a physical giga drain--that allows it to shine. It hits hard on the physical side.

Pros:
Good physical attack
Good movepool, can beat Heatran (even balloon ones)
Good STABs (normal is useful for dragons)

Cons:
Cannot beat certain physical walls
Weak to mach punch

Other sets: None

Tangrowth (F) @ Life Orb
Trait: Chlorophyll
EVs: 248 Atk / 8 SAtk / 252 Spd
Naughty Nature (+Atk, -SDef)
- Growth
- Power Whip
- Earthquake
- Hidden Power [Fire]

This is mostly for Birkal. lol. Tangrowth has the best mixed attacking stats of all of the chlorophyll sweepers, but has shitty speed.

Pros:
Good mixed attacking stats
Great physical bulky
Good physical moveset (hellya powerwhip)

Cons:
Shitty Speed

Other sets: Fully physical, fully specail, physical wall (LOL which should run regenerator)

Lilligant (F) @ Life Orb
Trait: Chlorophyll
EVs: 252 SAtk / 64 SDef / 192 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Leaf Storm
- Hidden Power [Rock]
- Sleep Powder
- Healing Wish

Liligant is the weird one of the family. First of all, she has access to quiver dance when she wants to sweep, and she can support the team with healing wish, essential a free lifeline for a teammate.

Pros:
Quiver Dance
Healing wish
Hard hitting
Sleep Powder

Cons:
Shitty movepool

Other Sets: Quiver Dance

Shiftry (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Chlorophyll
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Swords Dance
- Faint Attack/ Sucker Punch
- Seed Bomb
- Low Kick

Shiftry is Underused and is awesome. this set allows you to beat other weather starters as well, and is able to defeat sun enemies like LATIAS (GOGO FAINT ATTACK)

Pros:
Perfect coverage, great stabs
Growth
Access to STAB priority
Beats weather setters

Cons:
Weak to Mach punch
slightly fragile and weak

Other sets: Mixed, fully special

Honorable mentions

(Seeds)

(Specs)

(Spikes)

(Swords)

DISCUSS!

 

[Ilios]

I usually run the Venusaur set you have posted but with Leftovers over Life Orb, since he can take advantage of his bulk over other Chlorophyll users that way. There's no way to get past Heatran with that set though, so I think he works much better as a late-game sweeper. Once he gets a sun-boosted Growth he can also put a huge dent on the dragons that sun teams have so much trouble with.

Sawsbuck is another favorite of mine, but Mach Punch really hurts him, and he doesn't have the same staying power something like Venusaur has. I like to use Horn Leech/Return/Jump Kick/Nature Power with a Life Orb. Nature Power to hit unsuspecting Heatrans (they love to come out whenever there's a Chlorophyll sweeper around) and Jump Kick in case they have an Air Balloon.

 

[nyttyn]

Personally I think own tempo is better on Lilligant. Sleep powder the imminent swap in, throw up one quiver dance, proceed to sweep at least one or two pokemon.

Also, with a team that grass intense, I would suggest running someone like, say, arcanine. Something that can take care of enemy bulky grass and steel types (especially ferrothron screw ferrothron). He gets bonus from sunny day too in the form of a reliable recovery move. I'd advise standard life orb sweeper.


Item: Life Orb
Ability: Intimidate
Nature: Adamant / Jolly
Moveset
~ Flare Blitz
~ ExtremeSpeed
~ Wild Charge / Close Combat
~ Morning Sun
EVs
72 HP / 252 Atk / 184 Spe

 

[jds24]

While everything you said about weather boosts was correct and made sense, you forgot to mention something. In contrast to swift swimmers and rain in general, the weather purely focuses on spamming water attacks, while sun allows for chlorophyll sweepers to use their grass attacks to eliminate bulky waters and other things that resist fire, opening a door for boosted fire attack spam. Just some food for thought... Honestly if sun had a stronger selection of sweepers (like rain teams had before the ban) they would theoretically be equal to, if not better than, rain teams on paper.

 

[doughboy]

Exeggutor is a pretty good chlorophyll abuser seeing as his movepool is a bit more expanded than other sweepers and he is physically bulky. Sleep Powder is the icing on the cake for a 3 attacks set which Eggy excels at. However, don't forget Eggy has that 100% abuse sable Harvest in the sun! In the sun, Harvest Eggy can act as a catch-all status absorber for the team and a bulky attacker with Rest+Lum Berry. That is one of the more obvious options, but Eggy has some pretty interesting options such as using the type resist berries for a pseudo-neutrality or pseudo-moody with a starf berry. Had it not been for the Explosion nerf, he could have possibly been the defining Chlorophyll sweeper in OU (imagine CS Heatran's Explosion in 4th gen but slightly more powerful!)

TBH, chlorophyll sweepers are underwhelming in OU. While powerful, depnding on the moveset some Poke's can be a complete stop to a sweep. For example, Venausaur without EQ can't touch Heatran, but without Sludge bomb it can't touch Dragons.

 

[FSLAR]

Chlorophyll really does complement Venusaur for the reasons you mentioned, as it combines the best aspects of other Chlorophyll users. It has solid bulk, like Tangrowth and Exeguttor, good speed to beat most scarfers like shiftry and victrbeel, and respectable special attack. It's a lot easier to set up than most of the others as well, and I would say with all of this it might be the best purely special chlorophyll user.

 

[AJC]

i tend to stick on my chloro abusers something for t-tar like low kick on Eggy (and giving it enough speed to outpace it without scarf) so that t-tar just can't waltz in and put up sand without a fuck.

 

[iamQmai]

I think these are as "bad" (broken) as the Swift Swimmers, just we dont get them as much.

I literally have no counters to a HP ice Venasaur and it really pisses me off at times. I'm not going to lie, i think Drought and Chlorophyll should be banned like Drizzle & Swift Swim.

 

[Ithilanor]

I think these are as "bad" (broken) as the Swift Swimmers, just we dont get them as much.

I literally have no counters to a HP ice Venasaur and it really pisses me off at times. I'm not going to lie, i think Drought and Chlorophyll should be banned like Drizzle & Swift Swim.

Well, whose fault is that? I mean, even accounting for the rarity of Venusaur using HP Ice, without HP Fire pretty much any steel type can wall it.

On the main topic, I rather like Lilligant; Quiver Dance gives her something to do even w/o sun, and Healing Wish is rather nice with the frail 'mons that Sun teams usually have.

 

[alphatron]

If using chlorophyll Lilligant, I find quiver dance to be useless due to the lack of coverage. Setting up when you get forced out so easily is very annoying. Growthsuar and Growthbell both only have 2 and 1 counters respectively. Lilligant? She's countered by a ton of stuff.

I find sword's dance exeguttor to be more effective than special variants. Wood hammer is reliable power, and that's what chlorophyll sweepers need. The power behind wood hammer allows you to avoid having to run hp ice or something-Latios takes 90-106% damage from a +2 wood hammer with a life orb and a boosting nature, which is an ohko with SR down. Los kick and nature power can be used to dispose of heatran and friends.

 

[iamQmai]

Well, whose fault is that? I mean, even accounting for the rarity of Venusaur using HP Ice, without HP Fire pretty much any steel type can wall it.

On the main topic, I rather like Lilligant; Quiver Dance gives her something to do even w/o sun, and Healing Wish is rather nice with the frail 'mons that Sun teams usually have.

I do have checks for it but what i mean is that i cant come in on it without losing atleast 50% health to atleast one poke. Lets say it predicts my switch into my Magnezone. It uses Growth (for a +2) then energy ball's me. Magnezone has at most 40%. Its faster than my scarf due to chlorophyll, and it pretty much OHKO's all my pokes bar Maggy and Dragonite. (if its HP fire, if its HP ice it does 112% - 132% damage, with Multiscale.)

 

[Acritter]

I have no idea if this is still viable, but a long time ago I used to run what I called "semi-weather teams". The idea behind them was that they had weather as a theme, but kept it strictly secondary to general play. Most of those teams were just assortments of Pokemon that kinda liked having whatever weather was relevant up, but one of them was a fairly normal team with Specs Ninetales and LO Growth Venusaur. It would use the other Pokemon on the team to slowly wear my opponent down, and once I'd gotten complete weather control, I'd switch in Ninetales, blast away at a Pokemon or two, and then set up Venusaur for a sweep. I'm gonna have to rebuild that team sometime. I remember that a key player was Wobbuffet, because of its unique ability to step in and eliminate Pokemon that would threaten Venusaur's sweep, but not much else. Hope that helps someone out, or gives them inspiration for a new team.

Oh, and I forgot to mention. It's not relevant to the Chlorophyll sweepers, but my OTHER semi-sun team treated Ninetales as nothing more than a mini-Specs Kyogre (Fire Blast hits for a ridiculous amount) and had Morning Sun Volcarona in place of Venusaur. That was a fun team.

 

[Nachos]

Venusaur and Lilligant are the best I reckon, I'd be even willing to say that Venusaur is a 'need' for every offensive sun team due to it absorbing Toxic Spikes, not to mention it's somewhat bulky and has a varied movepool. Most other sun sweepers die if you blow on them. I prefer 3 Attacks + Synthesis with LO personally, I'd rather just hit hard from the get go than having to waste a move on Growth while they go to Tyranitar or whatever. The physical set is weak without a boost too...

Lilligant is very dangerous after a Quiver Dance and doesn't need Sun to be good. However, it is easy to get 2 QD's in Sun, one when they switch out to send in their counter, the other after you sleep powder it. If your opponent doesn't react quickly or if they let the wrong thing sleep, then Lilligant has the best chance out of all of Chlorophyll sweepers to sweep a team. I urge others to give it a go, I probably would have never tried Lilligant if it wasn't for Stone/Alice's team, it's really underrated.

 

[andysensei]

I like to run Sawsbuck on my sun team.

I feel like it is best with a back up sweeper, who is good in the sun, but doesn't rely on it, like DD Dragonite. Basically one acts as an early game attacker, and the other cleans up.

My sun team generally looks like
Ninetales/Sawsbuck/Dragonite/Spinner/Heatran/revenger

Also, I prefer to distribute the evs in Saws' set a bit differently, basically I run enough speed to outrun scarf Terrakion under the sun (forgot the numbers off the top of my head), and leave the remaining in HP.

But, as already mentioned, to actually make the sweep with Saws, you need to eliminate basically anything that may carry a priority attack, as well as Skarmory, and at the very least you need to put a hefty dent in their Gliscor if they have one.. but you should probably try to ensure that it's dead.

edit: if you're running jump kick on it, it can actually act as a really good 'weather war' decider. If you can get it in safely, it becomes very dangerous to switch in the opposing weather summoner, as jump kick downs T-Tar easily, and horn leech will do a number on Toed.

 

[Ilios]

edit: if you're running jump kick on it, it can actually act as a really good 'weather war' decider. If you can get it in safely, it becomes very dangerous to switch in the opposing weather summoner, as jump kick downs T-Tar easily, and horn leech will do a number on Toed.

One of the things I like best about Sawsbuck is that it's constantly underestimated. Even without sun, Sawsbuck is fast enough to be a threat to anything that doesn't have fighting priority. I often lead with it when my opponent has a weather team, since Ninetales is faster than their weather pokes and there's a good chance they'll lead with them. Many Tyranitar users, in particular, don't tend think that Sawsbuck will hit hard enough to scare them away and end up regretting it.

 

[alphatron]

I have an incomplete sun discussion thread on my computer that I never got around to posting. Chlorophyll sweepers are nice and all but sun's place lies in much more than that. Mamoswine is an excellent sun Pokemon who seldom seems to get a mention. My most recent team focuses on a volcorona set that doesn't run in fear from scarf landorus. We don't have to talk about just the grass types, especially when most of the chlorophyll Pokemon are awful anyway. I would rather use a bulky naive solar power charizard as a wall than a few of them.

Sawsbuck is awesome. Like seriously awesome. Until the terrible day where the smogon community goes insane and grating is dropped into OU, all dragons are mauled by his sword's dance sets. Three attacks + aromatherapy is fine too. The dude can also baton pass (at the cost of serious coverage) and if you hate scizor as much as I do work up sets allow you to get rid of the guy with hp fire.

...okay, so you're probably better off letting Sawsbuck lose to scizor and simply running a fire type Pokemon to back you up.

 

[czechm8]

A while back I tried an Own temp QD liligant on my sun team. I think the set was
Lilligant @LO Own Tempo
252 SpAtk 4 spdef 252 Spd
Quiver Dance
Petal Dance
HP Fire
Healing Wish/Sleep Powder
While you are still shut down by alot of stuff. curse you awful movepool! You use this a late game cleaner; Sleep Powder if you want to all but guarantee a QD and Healing Wish for team support. The raw power of petal dance after a dance or two allows it to march through a weakened team without the confusing side effect bringing the sweep to an end. Still sucks that she's walled so easily, o well maybe BW2 will give her some tutors.

 

[Acritter]

Mamoswine is an excellent sun Pokemon who seldom seems to get a mention.

Would you care to explain more about why Mamoswine is so good on Sun teams?

 

[Scrawly]

Mamoswine's a dragon slayer. Suns teams tend to be weak to dragons, cos of the whole Grass-Fire focus.

With regard to Sawsbuck, the Mach Punch weakness is kinda a let down: it discourages setting-up a Sword Dance. I prefer to use a choice band set. It's got an extra coverage move on the SD set and hits ridiculously hard and fast under the sun.

 

[alphatron]

^Pretty much that. He can also set up SR if you really want him to and the priority in ice shard is a boon at times. Plus, he kills heatran. Sun team members who kill that Pokemon are are always a good thing. The Pokemon who wall mamoswine are usually dealt with by your own sun Pokemon anyway (bulky waters by grass types and skarmory and bronzong are dealt with by your fire types).

Choice band Sawsbuck...I'll have to try it before I knock it but sawsbuck's move set seems to contain all of the moves you really don't want to be choice locked into when attacking.

 

[Razza]

Best physical chlorophyll sweeper:

Sawsbuck

Sawsbuck (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Chlorophyll
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Double-Edge
- Swords Dance
- Nature Power
- Horn Leech

Double edge ohkos dragonite and latios after sr, as dragons can wall other chloro sweepers. Nature power is earthquake and ohkos heatran, plus tyranitar wont want to switch in on this guy.

Problems? scizor walls you

Best special sweeper

Victreebell

Victreebel (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Chlorophyll
EVs: 252 SAtk / 4 SDef / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Giga Drain
- Growth
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Weather Ball

Insane coverage, ice for dragons and weather balls for steels. Timid outruns scarfedterrakion. After a growth this guy ohkos practically everything. Also victreebell owns chansey and blissey due to growth and giga drain, and the fact it is immune to being toxiced. Four attacks set is cool too with sludge bomb and solarbeam, but it cant ohko stuff like jirachi or latios who can end a sweep, also that set is walled by pink blobs which can be annoying.

 

[Acritter]

Ah, cool, thanks. I'd guess Gengar would be a pretty solid addition to Sun teams as well: can switch into Mach Punch, Earthquake, and Rapid Spin, and hits hard and fast enough to deal with most threats. 4x resist to Bug is nice too.

 

[Ilios]

Choice band Sawsbuck...I'll have to try it before I knock it but sawsbuck's move set seems to contain all of the moves you really don't want to be choice locked into when attacking.

In my experience, this is right. Choice Band kills Sawsbuck's versatility and makes it very easy to wall, he's better off holding a Life Orb.

 

[andysensei]

I have an incomplete sun discussion thread on my computer that I never got around to posting. Chlorophyll sweepers are nice and all but sun's place lies in much more than that. Mamoswine is an excellent sun Pokemon who seldom seems to get a mention. My most recent team focuses on a volcorona set that doesn't run in fear from scarf landorus. We don't have to talk about just the grass types, especially when most of the chlorophyll Pokemon are awful anyway. I would rather use a bulky naive solar power charizard as a wall than a few of them.

Sawsbuck is awesome. Like seriously awesome. Until the terrible day where the smogon community goes insane and grating is dropped into OU, all dragons are mauled by his sword's dance sets. Three attacks + aromatherapy is fine too. The dude can also baton pass (at the cost of serious coverage) and if you hate scizor as much as I do work up sets allow you to get rid of the guy with hp fire.

...okay, so you're probably better off letting Sawsbuck lose to scizor and simply running a fire type Pokemon to back you up.

well, there's already a Sun thread, iirc, and this thread is specifically aimed to discuss chlorophyll users, so talks of other uncommon beneficiaries of Sun, we could just do that in the general Sun thread, I guess?

And yeah, if I have to, I will let Saws fall to Scizor and just bring in Heatran, so long as I know my Sun will stay up.. and just take the free boosted fire blast on whatever they run too, since chances are it's going to be a heavy dent.

 

[The Truth]

I've used victreebel on some teams and it's a lot better than people give it credit for, as it can run both weather ball and hp ice to only be walled by heatran and chansey (not sure if chansey can even kill it before it hits +6 and beats it down though...) I think it's much stronger than venusaur if you're willing to sacrifice venusaurs nice bulk. Victreebel is horribly frail though :(