[OVERVIEW]
Lickitung has many desirable traits among OU Swords Dance users that make it stand out from the crowd. These include STAB Body Slam, Hyper Beam, and Wrap, all the physical and special coverage it could ever want, and bulk roughly on par with Tauros. Unfortunately, its wide movepool and STAB Hyper Beam are let down by its abysmal base 55 Attack, making its STAB moves no more powerful than any other Swords Dance user's non-STAB attacks, and its awful base 30 Speed ties it for the slowest fully evolved Pokemon in the entire game. Lickitung is very easy to play around once paralyzed, making it extremely risky to stay in on anything that can paralyze it.
Nearly every unique trait Lickitung has is eclipsed by another Pokemon. Its role as a Swords Dance user with Wrap is taken by Victreebel, its Water-type coverage is done better by Kabutops and Kingler, and its ability to hit Gengar with Earthquake is outclassed by Sandslash's STAB Earthquake. Its only redeeming traits are its STAB Hyper Beam and that, unlike other Swords Dance users, it has no blatant defensive weaknesses thanks to its decent bulk and strong Normal typing, which has no common weaknesses and allows it to avoid Body Slam paralysis. Although Lickitung has many positive traits as an OU Swords Dance user, its positives are heavily outweighed by its negatives, making it extremely impractical and difficult to use.
[Set]
name: Swords Dance Sweeper
move 1: Swords Dance
move 2: Hyper Beam
move 3: Earthquake / Wrap
move 4: Earthquake / Bubble Beam / Surf / Body Slam
[SET COMMENTS]
Set Description
=========
STAB Hyper Beam, Wrap, and Lickitung's good defensive qualities are the only reasons to consider it over better Swords Dance users, such as Kingler or Sandslash. +6 Hyper Beam reaches such immense power that it even OHKOes Cloyster 82.1% of the time, though +4 Hyper Beam still packs enough power to almost always OHKO threats with more moderate bulk, such as Zapdos and Tauros. Earthquake is essential coverage, as it is Lickitung's only option to hit Gengar for super effective damage, and it deals decent damage to Rock types at +2; +2 Earthquake has a 7.7% chance to OHKO Gengar and a 6.6% chance to 2HKO Rhydon. Wrap is a useful utility move that can be used to pivot out of bad matchups and chip paralyzed foes into Hyper Beam range while keeping Lickitung safe from paralysis. Water-type coverage can be considered; Bubble Beam 2HKOes Rhydon and Golem and has a 33% chance to drop their Speed, which allows Lickitung to outspeed and KO them on the next turn, whereas Surf deals enough damage to prevent Rhydon from using Substitute later. Body Slam is Lickitung's best option for dealing consistent damage, 2HKOing Chansey and having a 95.5% chance to 3HKO Snorlax at +2.
Lickitung's only way to find success is by putting it on a team with heavy paralysis support and statusing nearly the entire enemy team before bringing it out. The best opportunity it has to set up is to switch in when a paralyzed Snorlax uses Rest and boost to +2 while Snorlax switches out. It can then try to choke the paralyzed enemy team with boosted Wrap and Hyper Beam.
[CREDITS]
Written by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/notverycake.625260/
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/enigami.233818/
Quality checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/amaranth.265630/
Grammar checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/sabelette.583793/
Lickitung has many desirable traits among OU Swords Dance users that make it stand out from the crowd. These include STAB Body Slam, Hyper Beam, and Wrap, all the physical and special coverage it could ever want, and bulk roughly on par with Tauros. Unfortunately, its wide movepool and STAB Hyper Beam are let down by its abysmal base 55 Attack, making its STAB moves no more powerful than any other Swords Dance user's non-STAB attacks, and its awful base 30 Speed ties it for the slowest fully evolved Pokemon in the entire game. Lickitung is very easy to play around once paralyzed, making it extremely risky to stay in on anything that can paralyze it.
Nearly every unique trait Lickitung has is eclipsed by another Pokemon. Its role as a Swords Dance user with Wrap is taken by Victreebel, its Water-type coverage is done better by Kabutops and Kingler, and its ability to hit Gengar with Earthquake is outclassed by Sandslash's STAB Earthquake. Its only redeeming traits are its STAB Hyper Beam and that, unlike other Swords Dance users, it has no blatant defensive weaknesses thanks to its decent bulk and strong Normal typing, which has no common weaknesses and allows it to avoid Body Slam paralysis. Although Lickitung has many positive traits as an OU Swords Dance user, its positives are heavily outweighed by its negatives, making it extremely impractical and difficult to use.
[Set]
name: Swords Dance Sweeper
move 1: Swords Dance
move 2: Hyper Beam
move 3: Earthquake / Wrap
move 4: Earthquake / Bubble Beam / Surf / Body Slam
[SET COMMENTS]
Set Description
=========
STAB Hyper Beam, Wrap, and Lickitung's good defensive qualities are the only reasons to consider it over better Swords Dance users, such as Kingler or Sandslash. +6 Hyper Beam reaches such immense power that it even OHKOes Cloyster 82.1% of the time, though +4 Hyper Beam still packs enough power to almost always OHKO threats with more moderate bulk, such as Zapdos and Tauros. Earthquake is essential coverage, as it is Lickitung's only option to hit Gengar for super effective damage, and it deals decent damage to Rock types at +2; +2 Earthquake has a 7.7% chance to OHKO Gengar and a 6.6% chance to 2HKO Rhydon. Wrap is a useful utility move that can be used to pivot out of bad matchups and chip paralyzed foes into Hyper Beam range while keeping Lickitung safe from paralysis. Water-type coverage can be considered; Bubble Beam 2HKOes Rhydon and Golem and has a 33% chance to drop their Speed, which allows Lickitung to outspeed and KO them on the next turn, whereas Surf deals enough damage to prevent Rhydon from using Substitute later. Body Slam is Lickitung's best option for dealing consistent damage, 2HKOing Chansey and having a 95.5% chance to 3HKO Snorlax at +2.
Lickitung's only way to find success is by putting it on a team with heavy paralysis support and statusing nearly the entire enemy team before bringing it out. The best opportunity it has to set up is to switch in when a paralyzed Snorlax uses Rest and boost to +2 while Snorlax switches out. It can then try to choke the paralyzed enemy team with boosted Wrap and Hyper Beam.
[CREDITS]
Written by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/notverycake.625260/
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/enigami.233818/
Quality checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/amaranth.265630/
Grammar checked by:
https://www.smogon.com/forums/members/sabelette.583793/
Last edited: