by This post comes in response to a comment that Frikismikis made to me in the Garchomp Strategy post and the truth is that it seemed like a very interesting topic to deal with, so let’s go with it.
People who are used to playing Competitive Pokémon often use specific terms to refer to certain roles that Pokémon are geared towards . Yes Physical Sweeper, yes Stall, yes Revenge Killer… and of course, I fully understand that someone who is just starting out comes across terms like this and doesn’t understand anything.
I must clarify that these are words that the English community has defined and that I often translate a little unconsciously. In this post I will explain what each of these terms means and how I usually translate them. Let’s go there!
SWEEPER
The translation of Sweeper is broom and that is why I sometimes call them “The Sweepers”, when you see their role you will understand why they have this name.
They are usually Pokémon that hit very hard and at the same time are fast and for this reason they are often equipped with the Choice Scarf or use Dragon Dance, since Speed is the most decisive factor to be a good Sweeper.
These Pokémon take advantage of their power and high Speed to literally sweep teams because thanks to their great speed and power it is very easy to annihilate many Pokémon if the rival does not have something against us like a Pokémon that resists us very well or another that is faster (hence the importance of Life).
The fact is that it is highly recommended to use these Pokémon for when the battle is already well advanced, since at that time the opponent’s Pokémon will be more weakened and if you have eliminated possible threats already described (defensive ones that hold you or faster Pokémon), Well, literally no one will be able to stop your Pokémon and you will “sweep” your team.
Priority attacks will also be very useful for this type of Pokémon since one never knows what can be found and we could run into faster Pokémon or that also have these types of attacks.
To finish, it should be clarified that the terms “Physical” or “Special” are often added to refer to what type of damage they are more oriented towards: Physical Sweeper, Special Sweeper or Hybrid Sweeper (or you can say it in English, as you see ).
Examples of Pokémon that can be good Sweepers would be Garchomp or Cinderace .
WALL
The Wall or as I usually say, Walls, are very resistant Pokémon (usually slow) and are usually used to stop Pokémon that cause a lot of damage. Normally they don’t deal much damage, but be careful because there are exceptions such as Tyranitar , which is an incredible Special Wall and also hits really hard (what it doesn’t have is Speed).
The ideal is to use it to protect ourselves. Imagine that you are using Charizard and you have a Gyarados in front of you; most likely he will throw a Water attack at us and send us to the graveyard; For this reason, we must change to a Pokémon that can resist that blow well, such as a Toxapex , which is a brutal wall and that attack will tickle it (more if it is a Water attack on top).
After this the rival will be forced to change because it is practically impossible for him to kill you and in the meantime you can take the opportunity to annoy him with Toxic or other attacks. If he doesn’t want to change his Pokémon, that’s his problem, because sooner or later, even if it costs you, you’ll kill him; however he will not be able to.
But… a little unintentionally I have mentioned the following role, which is usually closely related to the Walls; let’s go with him.
STALL (“THOSE WHO DISGUST”)
I don’t have a translation for Stall , it could be “Passive damage Pokémon” or something like that, but I usually refer to them as “disgusting” or “how heavy they are” and I’m telling you, those qualifiers they come from fear They’re great Pokémon when used by you (I use them, forgive me), but horrible when used against you.
They are usually Walls that have movements that damage over time and since they resist so much they usually kill you slowly while you can do little (also they usually heal either with movements or with Leftovers). These movements are usually Toxic, Draining, Wisp… etc. They start to put things like these in you to lower your life and since you don’t have any Pokémon capable of killing them, you’re lost.
Toxapex is again a clear example: Absurdly resistant, it has toxic, it can be cured… it is a horror to face him. But I can’t forget to mention the god of Stall in my opinion: Ferrothorn .
Ferrothorn is almost unkillable unless you are attacked with Fire (weakness x4) since it throws Drains at you to damage you as it heals, with Scraps it heals even more, it can put Rock Trap on the field and you can also use Protection to win an extra turn (one in two) in which it will heal with Scraps and Drains (in addition to the damage you will deal with them). He is horrible… I love him with all my heart, but the disgust he gives is incredible.
REVENGE KILLER
A Revenge Killer or Avenger is a Pokémon that is usually taken out just when a Pokémon has been killed, the fact is that they are Pokémon that usually also perform well in the role of Sweeper.
Once again we are facing powerful and fast Pokémon (or with priority attacks) that usually take advantage of the “safe” turn in which they kill a Pokémon in order to enter the field and take revenge for the death of our partner. They are usually Pokémon that are very weak (defensively) and therefore putting them in a normal turn is too dangerous since they could easily die.
Weavile would be a prime example of a Pokémon that can be a very good Revenge Killer. Very fast, hits hard, has priority attacks and is also quite paper; so it is more appropriate to put the field when we kill a Pokémon.
WALLBREAKER
The Wallbreakers or Rompemuros are characters that, as you can imagine, are specialized in destroying very resistant Pokémon (the Walls). They are usually Pokémon that hit very hard, often with the ability to boost their damage, and they don’t have to be fast… in fact, they usually aren’t very fast.
This happens because the walls as such are not usually very fast as such and therefore we will not need as much Speed to pass them. However, it would be good for us to have some stamina since they are still defensive Pokémon and could take a hit and therefore hit us, and if our Pokémon is made of paper, it will not be able to perform the role well.
Conkeldurr would be a good example of this because he has impressive offensive power and is not made of paper (he can also heal himself with Drain Punch). Their issue is speed, but that’s not as much of an issue against Walls, plus we’ll offset it a bit with EV (and Walls don’t usually go Speed EV because they want to hold as long as possible).
Another good example would be Arcanine , this one is quite fast.
LEAD (THE FIRST YOU TAKE OUT)
A Lead is a Pokémon that works very well as the first Pokémon to leave the field. They are usually Pokémon that go with Rock Trap to start already in the first turn with that disadvantage in the opponent’s field, or powerful and fast Pokémon that can easily intimidate (I’m not referring to the Ability, but it is also very good to have it) easily to the opponent and that this is forced to change in the first turn (and that you take with you). A lot of them have moves like To and Back in case they need to switch, so you at least give a little hit when doing so.
A Ferrothorn would be a good Lead to set Rock Trap and because it’s so resistant it would be rare that you can’t set it (the opponent would have to start with a Fire Pokémon or something like that). But, the best example of Lead I can give you is Landorus-Therian:
- Has Rock Trap.
- It is fast and very powerful.
- As between the attack lowers the rival.
- It has very few weaknesses.
- And on top of that, there is Round Trip.
It’s a very broken Pokémon, I didn’t put it in the Top 1 of the Best Ground Pokémon for nothing (and if I make the Top Flying Pokémon, don’t be surprised that it’s also there hahaha) and as Lead it’s absurdly good.
OTHER ROLES
And to finish we have roles that refer to some particularity of said Pokémon, that there is a bit of everything, but luckily they are the ones that are most easily understood.
- Salamence Dragon Dance: A Salamence that would be geared towards boosting with Dragon Dance.
- Cinderace Scarf: Scarf is a bandana. It would be a Cinderace wearing the Choice Scarf.
- Rain Sweeper: A specialized rain sweeper, like Barraskewda or Kingdra .
- Terms such as offensive, defensive… etc. can also be used. A Tyranitar for example you could orient it more to offensive or more to Defensive.
And I suppose that with this you get the idea a bit, thousands of combinations can come out… but I think that after reading this you will have everything much clearer and you will even be able to use these terms yourself.
