Analysis
Stoutland, with its amazing 115 attack and good 85/90/90 bulk, makes it a great attacker in 35 Pokes. Stoutland has access to great abilities too! Stoutland’s main STAB would be Return, and when combined with Scrappy, Choice Band Stoutland becomes very hard to switch into. With Crunch to hit the Ghosts type for super effective damage, and Superpower for hitting the Normal-resists, Stoutland can be a task to switch into. It’s last slot can be Retaliate, making it a great revenge killer, or Facade, just in case you let your Stoutland be burned by accident.
While Sand is niche in this metagame, if you wanted to run Sand, Stoutland should be an auto-include since it has Sand Rush. While it’s Choice Band set works on Sand, you can also use a Life Orb set. One big difference the Life Orb set has is Substitute, which allows it to scout for Sucker Punch from Bisharp as well as block pesky status moves. It uses its standard Normal-Fighting-Dark offensive core. While it does hit less hard, the freedom to block status moves and switch moves can sometimes be worth it.
Finally, it has its Utility set. While this set is worse then it’s offensive sets, Intimidate can be a great tool. Access to tools like TWave, Toxic, Roar and Yawn make Stoutland a surprising good defensive Pokémon. Superpower or Crunch can be used depending if you want to hit Bisharp or Ghost types like Houndstone.
Stoutland has it’s flaws though. Stoutland can struggle to break through Sandaconda (252+ Atk Choice Band Stoutland Return vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Sandaconda: 151-178 (43.3 - 51.1%) -- 5.1% chance to 2HKO) and Fluffy Houndstone. (252+ Atk Choice Band Stoutland Crunch vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Fluffy Houndstone: 92-109 (26.4 - 31.3%) -- 18.6% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery).Stoutland also occasionally struggle to switch into the field. It’s Utility set is also not that great, as there are better Utility mons like Sylveon. Still, Stoutland can be really good for your team if used properly, and you will find it to be a good breaker/ occasional utility mon.
Written by OceanicGamer