Breakdown
Dustox is an extremely niche mon only fitting on a very specific type of team style of Cherrim Sun, which is niche in of itself. Dustox is stopped easily in it’s tracks by common mons and cores, and given that this is May2024, these mons are extremely common. However if you can break it’s checks and get Dustox going, it can clean games really easily.
The main reason to use dustox is because of it’s unique access to Quiver Dance, which no other mon in May2024 gets. However, Dustox is lacking in stats, only having 50 base special attack, which is less than not ideal. Because of this, you usually need multiple boosts to become threatening. Set up on the right turn, and it shouldn’t become too hard to do.
Dustox is notable for it’s ability of Shield Dust, which is essentially a built in covert cloak, making it immune to secondary effects from pokemon moves. This doesn’t play too big of an impact in it’s niche, but it’s nice that it provides an immunity to scald burn from milotic, making it slightly harder to chip down into range of some mons, and if you have 2 or more special defense boosts, you can set up on the occasional non encore Salazzle.
“Standard” Set
Dustox @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Shield Dust
EVs: 248 HP / 72 Def / 188 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Quiver Dance
- Giga Drain/Moonlight
- Bug Buzz
- Psychic
Stab Bug Buzz is very nice into Alolan-Raichu, and with the right EV spread you can even 1v1 some Raichu sets. Psychic is pretty much almost always needed to hit Salazzle, whether it’s incoming or post boosts, Salazzle is a pain in general to Sun teams. Without psychic you need to hope and pray your opponent doesn’t bring a Salazzle.
Giga Drain is your best way to hit Klawf, and is just like bug buzz and psychic, almost always mandatory. Cherrim often fails to completely deal with klawf/milotic cores despite that being it’s main job, so having Giga Drain to pick off a damaged milotic or klawf is a big help.
248 HP with 72 defense lets it survive non ATK invested Klawf’s Stone edge and 4 hits or less rock blast from full HP. . 188 Spe Timid Nature lets you outspeed Timid Araichu, and at +1 you can 2 hit KO Araichu with Bug Buzz.
Moonlight is a solid choice over Giga Drain if you have more support to break Klawf and Milotic, and is better in those cases.
Iron Defense has been slightly explored, but hasn’t really seen a lot of success, compared to Dustox’s already limited success. I don’t think it’s good, but there might be something to explore there.
Team
Just a fair warning, this team has a relatively high skill cap, and definitely conflicts with some people’s team preferences, so change it however you would prefer it to be.
Torkoal:
Rocks setter which is really good for chipping down fire types, can do good sun boosted damage with lava plume while fishing for burns, can spread burn with will o wisp, and heavy slam 2 hits bold Carbink.
Cherrim:
Clicks banded Solar blade which threatens the entire tier with rocks up. This is for all purposes, a wall breaker and not sweeper, it can kinda act like a cleaner if you knock out their fast pokemon, but usually it’s not that. Cherrim is frail and Sun doesn’t last long, so usually you won’t have many chances to click Solar blade, because of this you have to use its entry points crucially and try to maximize value. A lot of the skill cap comes from this pokemon, especially with how you have to get it in, often having to double switch it in because of the predictability of Milotic.
Dustox:
The star of the show. Pretty much does everything I’ve already covered, it’s a solid cleaner once Klawf and Salazzle are gone, and is hard for non fire type special attackers to break once it has a boost up. Though while those mons are alive, it’s very hard to get value out of it and more often than not is dead weight.
Milotic: Easily the best mixed wall in the tier, maybe even the best wall period. It’s able to check a lot of the Pokemon sun has issues with, mainly salazzle. With the given special defense investment, you’re able to 1v1 Nasty Plot Salazzle. Minimum speed is obviously to speed tie other minimum speed Milotic for the slowest flip turn pivot.
Hitmonchan:
Despite having Assault Vest, it’s not a special wall. The point of this hitmonchan set is to be able to rapid spin once or twice, without being immediately forced out by a special attacker. It’s unfortunately a bit passive, but you’ll just have to make it for it in other ways. 108 Spe Jolly Nature outspeed Araichu after a Rapid Spin, 28 Atk lets you ko it from full with a Knock Off, 38 Defense with 248 HP let’s you survive Scarf Raichu’s psyshock, and 86 SPD is left overs. I’ve also found that scarf hitmonchan is great on this team, you’ll have to do a bit of restructuring but it can work.
Shiinotic:
This is your mandatory Raichu “check”, your Volt on Grass mon if you will. 244 HP with 216 lets you take Timid Specs Psychock and threaten big damage or spore back, and the 48 speed is to outspeed no invest drampa. Theres quite a few different items you can use on shiinotic, in this case I went with Rocky helmet just cause I feel its overall the most reliable item to use, and helps with building up chip damage with rocks. Red card can help punish Volt Switch coming off from Raichu, but kind of conflicts with spore if you want to put Raichu to sleep. Eject Button is yet another way to get Cherrim in, and even hitmonchan. It’s a solid item on it, but can proct when you really don’t want it to, which can suck. Standard leftovers are also just really solid on shiinotic, and lets you invest slightly less in defense for another stat. Boots is just obviously good on this, especially with rocks messing up the psyshock calc.
Written by Essence