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Community POTW #127

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It is better to say it if my puns and jokes are bad, Serebii. It annoys me when others think something about me and don't tell me. The same with movesets. Well, I'm here for that Arcanine...
Arcanine got a great improvement in Gen V: Wild Charge, which has relatively low recoil and is stronger than Thunder Fang. It got Flame Charge as well. And Close Combat. And Outrage!
Flash Fire: Great for a switch-in, isn't it? Intimidate: Well, you can take a physical hit, I guess, but don't expect to take an Earthquake.

The Legendary Pokémon? That's not true!
-Flare Blitz (Pre-evo)
-Wild Charge (TM)
-Extremespeed/Close Combat (Egg)/ Iron Head or Tail(Tutor)/Outrage (Tutor)/Crunch (Pre-evo)
-Extremespeed/Close Combat (Egg)/ Iron Head or Tail (Tutor)/Outrage (Tutor)/Crunch (Pre-evo)
252 Atk 252 Spd 4 HP
Adamant or Jolly
Muscle or Choice Band/Choice Scarf/Leftovers/Shell Bell/Lum Berry
Flash Fire or Intimidate
Seriously, it isn't even a pseudo-legendary. Well, Flare Blitz for STAB. Wild Charge for Water-Types and maybe something else... Extremespeed is a great priority move. But Close Combat hits Rock types. Iromn Head can do the same with a flinch probability and no Defenses lowered, but with less power and coverage. Iron Tail does as well, with great power but with less accuracy. And Outrage hits Dragons and gives Choice Band/Scarf a good use. And Crunch can hit something and lower the opponent's Defense. Well, items. Choice is good, but... Muscle Band boosts all your moves without locking you. Leftovers or Shell Bell if you want to slightly recover from recoil. Lum Berry can remove confusion after Outrage, or make you opponent's Thunder Wave a wasted turn.

Sunset... Errrrrrr... Sun Set
-Fire Blast (TM)/Flamethrower (Pre-evo or TM)/Heat Wave (Tutor)
-Solarbeam (TM)
-Dragon Pulse (Tutor)
-Sunny Day (TM)/Overheat(TM)
252 SAtk 252 Spd 4 HP
Modest or Timid
Help me with item please
Flash Fire
Choose your STAB. Power, PP, Accuracy, consider everything. I would go with Heat Wave, but... Solarbeam covers all weaknesses. Dragon Pulse hits Dragons. Sunny Day because Arcanine literally has no more options, and you may need to set sun again. Or Overheat, but it forces you to switch. Flash Fire if the opponent tries to monopolize; Let's say it will try to set Fire on a Grass-Type who was busing Solarbeam, but you switch and Arcanine takes the Flamethrower or whatever and boosts its STAB move.

ArcaNINE options for your third and fourth slots
-Agility (Pre-evo)/Flame Charge (TM)
-Flare Blitz/Flamethrower/Heat Wave/Fire Blast
-Wild Charge/Iron Head or Tail/Extremespeed/Outrage/Dragon Pulse/Close Combat/Overheat/Crunch
-Wild Charge/Iron Head or Tail/Extremespeed/Outrage/Dragon Pulse/Close Combat/Overheat/Crunch
252 Atk 252 SAtk 4Spd
Help me with item please
Naughty, Lonely, Mild, Rash, Naive or Hasty
So wide mixed movepool. Choose your Speed boosting move, the choose you STAB. Then choose other two moves out of... NINE! ArcaNINE! Serebii may like this one. I guess you could run Flare Blitz and Wild Charge with Overheat so that your Sp. Atk. being lowered isn't so crippling.
 

HeyI'mChubby

and (kind of) proud!

Arcanine @ Life Orb
Trait: Flash Fire
EVs: 32 HP / 252 Atk / 8 SpD / 216 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Flare Blitz
- ExtremeSpeed
- Wild Charge
- Close Combat

This set maximizes Arcanine's ability as a quick killer. Not much likes to be nailed in the butt by a STAB Flare Blitz from this guy. One makes Arcanine just so much better is the move ExtremeSpeed. Wild Charge and Close Combat are great coverage moves as well. Other moves such as Crunch and Morning Sun can be used as well.

The given EV spread allows Arcanine to hurt anything, outspeed common Pokemon like Herracross, (non-scarfed of course) Nidoking, Suicune, and Kingdra (as long as their speed is neutral). It also gives it the promise of outpacing Roserade. With HP and SpD invested, Porygon won't get the exact boost it wanted.


Growlithe @ Choice Band
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 76 HP /196 Atk / 36 SpD / 196 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Wild Charge
- Close Combat
- Toxic

If you want to beat the sh!it out of a wall, add Growlithe to your LC team. If KOs Houndour and Scraggy and Munchlax as long as SR is up. It can 2HKO Slowpoke. Toxic is there for some way to deal with Chinchou, but that could be replaced with Crunch if you put Ferroseed in to deal with non-HP Fire variants and Dratini beats upon Chinchou without Ice Beam.​
 

Rayofquazar

Well-Known Member
Arcanine is one of the pokemon that makes me nostalgic... It gets me thinking about the first time I was introduced to pokemon... Gen I was and still the best generation for me for that simple fact. Other generations are good, and the game is improving and ever changing but the first generation has it's place in my heart as well, I think, to the most people that had 6 to 10 YO when it first came out! But let me say that loud and clear... First generation was the kindest generation to fire type pokemon, it introduced charizard, ninetales, arcanine, rapidash, magmar, moltres, flareon and their respective families. While, most of them are not that good in the higher tiers in this metagame, they were all a success in design and overall appeal! No other generation was that great in the fire types that it introduced and 4th generation gave birth to the dreaded stealth rock that messed up every flying, ice, bug and fire types in the game!

Arcanine however still shines as one of the better fire types in UU and that's due to great stats both offesive and defensive... 5th generation was kind to fire types in general, maybe the second best generation of fire types pokemon as well as introducing new fire type moves that has a beneficial side like flame charge. Arcanine has a set of good abilities consiting in intimidate, flash fire and justified with each one have it's own justified reasons to use!

Arcanine's movepool is good enough! It has decent physical attacks as well as good special ones. Most of it's physical moves have negative effects but their power is enough reason to use them. A set consisting of Flame charge, Overheat, Wild charge and Close combat with intimidate as an ability and a defense lowering, speed raising nature. This set allows you to raise arcanine speed wich is essential for it to be more threatening. Flame charge will raise your speed as well as playing the role of your physical fire stab. Wild charge will take care of water types, close combat will take care of rock types and when the opportunity presents itself, overheat is the stronger fire type attack on this set taking care of somewhat strong ground type pokemon that have taken some prior damage. Item wise, you can give it expert belt or life orb but for me leftovers is the better item here!
 

2406Blackbird

CasualMediocre Gamer
I've always used nicknames on this Dawg like SWATT K9 , RK9 or Arcane9.

Since movesets have been covered, just note that if you run Arcanine's Intimidate that you risk boosting attack of others who use Defiant. Also it is nice power up on those nice fire attacks upon switching in.
 
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Cosmic Potato

Sexy Trainer
It's important to remember that darmanitan can outclass arcanine in many roles, so make sure your sets aren't outclassed. I like to use flare blitz/toxic/extremespeed/morning sun with intimidate and max defense. It can take massive hits easily, sponging even heavy fighting attacks.

Main counters are swampert and rhyperior, but they will fall to sunny day sets. HP grass could be used to hit them hard, but then you have to run wild charge to hit blastoise and such hard so it isn't really worth it. Will-o-wisp and crunch (for chandelure) could work over toxic and extremespeed on above set.


edit: lol my userbarhthingamajig just updated to one with arcanine
 
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sbktdreed

Veteran Trainer
Physical Set
Intimidate w/ Muscle Band/Life Orb/Leftovers
Adamant w/ 252 Attack, 252 Speed, 6 HP
Flare Blitz/Flame Charge
Wild Charge
Close Combat
Outrage/Crunch

Countering
High Defense pokemon with Water/Ground/Rock-type moves like Solid Rock Rhyperior or Slowbro (espically in case of burn-based users).
 
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Cosmic Potato

Sexy Trainer
Should we really list OU pokemon as counters when this mon has no place in OU whatsoever?
 

Divine Retribution

Conquistador de pan
Should we really list OU pokemon as counters when this mon has no place in OU whatsoever?

He always does that, as well as listing things that are literally never used for a good reason (Ancientpower Omastar??? Ancientpower on anything??? Rock Tomb Spiritomb? Is that a bad pun, or are you serious?)


Also, I forgot to mention that a Specs set can be really fun with Flamethrower, Hidden Power (Ice), Overheat, and some filler move like Solarbeam or something. Really, it's not fun, I'm just avoiding an infraction.
 

sbktdreed

Veteran Trainer
He always does that, as well as listing things that are literally never used for a good reason (Ancientpower Omastar??? Ancientpower on anything??? Rock Tomb Spiritomb? Is that a bad pun, or are you serious?)


Also, I forgot to mention that a Specs set can be really fun with Flamethrower, Hidden Power (Ice), Overheat, and some filler move like Solarbeam or something. Really, it's not fun, I'm just avoiding an infraction.

#1- I only listed Ancientpower Omastar because of STAB bonus and the chance of raising all of its stats; espically its defenses. I already removed the Ancientpower option.
#2- I only listed Rock Tomb Spiritomb because of high defense and Rock Tomb is one of the only moves that Spritomb knows that is Arcanine is weak against. Also, Rock Tomb can slow down Arcanine and Extremespeed is useless against it. I already removed it.
#3-As for the remianing pokemon I listed, I bold the ones that are in the same UU tier as Arcanine; according to Smogon.
 
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Miror

De-le-le wooooooooooop
Staff member
Moderator
Physical Set
Intimidate/Justified w/ Muscle Band/Life Orb/Leftovers
Adamant w/ 252 Attack, 252 Speed, 6 HP
Flare Blitz/Flame Charge/Flame Wheel
Thunder Fang/Wild Charge
Close Combat
Aerial Ace/Outrage/Crunch

Partners
Beat Up-users for Justified users
Lava Plume-users for Flash Fire users
Helping Hand-users

Countering
High Defense pokemon with Water/Ground/Rock-type moves like Aggron, Earthquake Dusknoir/Gliscor/Hippowdon, Solid Rock Rhyperior/Carracosta, Gigalith, Crabhammer Kingler, Head Smash Scrafty, Kabutops, Huntail, Armaldo, or Feraligatr.
Slowbro, Wash Rotom, Earth Power Omastar, and Gorebyss are also included; in case of burn-based users.

First off, why even list Aerial Ace as an option on Arcanine when almost any Fire move that Arcanine runs will do more damage (and if you're going to argue the accuracy portion, in most competitive play evasion boosting moves are banned anyhow thus making it useless), especially when you could be running the much more useful Extremespeed. Flame Wheel and Thunder Fang aren't even worth consideration unless you're running a Choice Band set (and even then they're still pretty useless), as even though they have no recoil, the damage they deal out is very inconsequential and can even leave Arcanine in a worse position than it would already be in as it cannot even get close to KOing many of the Pokemon it can with Flare Blitz and Wild Charge, while those same Pokemon would KO Arcanine in return, and thus recoil isn't that bad of an option. Moving onto items, Muscle Band only gives a 10% increase to physical damage, leaving it often outclassed by items like Expert Belt (which boosts by 20%) and Life Orb (which boosts by 30%), and although is less situational than Expert Belt and doesn't have recoil like Life Orb, the boost in power in most situations is barley noticeable, being around a 3%-6% addition on anything you're not hitting for super effective damage.

For partners, using Beat Up on a Justified Arcanine is generally a terrible idea, as 1) it is outclassed by Pokemon in its own tier such as Cobalion in this role, 2) Arcanine does not have the bulk to handle getting Beat Up used on it and 3) Partners section doesn't solely encompass Doubles play (which you would notice if you read POTW), it means Pokemon that work well with Arcanine in Singles, while the Double and Triple Battle section handles this sort of thing. I don't see why Lava Plume would be the only option for Fire type users to use on Flash Fire Arcanine, which once again it is outclassed by Pokemon in its own tier like Chandelure who has much higher power to take advantage of the boost, although hardly anyone uses this strategy. Helping Hand is also as noted earlier a Doubles strategy and doesn't apply to the Partners section, and even in Doubles Arcanine is still outclassed in general as a Physical Fire type by Darmanitan.

Moving onto your counters, I agree with Divine Retribution's post that just because Pokemon have a move that can hit Arcanine super effectively does not make them a Counter or even a Check to it. For example:

252+ Atk Life Orb Arcanine Close Combat vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Omastar: 273-322 (97.15 - 114.59%) -- 81.25% chance to OHKO

This is against offensive Omastar (the main one that would even consider using Ancientpower/Earth Power) which is very likely to be OHKO'd by Arcanine, meaning it definitely does not work as a counter or as a check to it, in addition to the fact that Water moves are super effective against Arcanine which 1) get a STAB boost, unlike Earth Power, 2) in Surf and Hydro Pump's case are stronger than Ancientpower and Earth Power even without the STAB boost and 3) even in Sun, Hydro Pump only does 1% less damage than Earth Power, making the move pretty much useless to run over something else that Omastar needs.

252+ Atk Life Orb Arcanine Flare Blitz vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Spiritomb: 169-200 (55.59 - 65.78%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

This is obviously against fully defensive Spiritomb, showing that it is 2HKO'd by Flare Blitz from Arcanine, meaning it definitely isn't a counter to it, and defensiveTomb at best 3HKOs in return with Dark Pulse, with Rock Tomb doing 21.82 - 25.95% if it hits, meaning any STAB move off of Spiritomb will be doing more, especially off of offensive Spiritomb (which by the way takes 77.22 - 91.41%, meaning with Stealth Rock up it can be OHKO'd). This shows once again that just because a Pokemon has a weak coverage move that does super effective damage, it does not mean that it is even remotely close to being a counter.

Onto your revised list of counters. The first part of the list is pretty vague, though you have the right idea, as high defense Water types like Swampert, Milotic, etc do very well against Arcanine, though Rock types generally have trouble with Close Combat, and Ground types have to have some dual typing to be able to survive in most cases. Aggron however is a pretty bad example as it is 4x weak to Close Combat, and is OHKO'd even with full defensive investment (but fortunately Sturdy keeps it alive), meaning that it can't switch in and you basically have to sacrifice it in order to beat Arcanine anyhow. Earthquake Dusknoir is another example of what I was talking about before (super effective coverage doesn't make a counter), as it is 2HKO'd by Flare Blitz (meaning no switch in), is slower than Arcanine (meaning if it does switch in, it gets KO'd before it can do anything), and Earthquake only does 51.32 - 60.76% off of defensive Dusknoir (and even with full Attack investment it doesn't OHKO), basically showing that Dusknoir will not beat Arcanine. Gliscor and Hippowdon aren't and shouldn't be considered for the POTW because POTW only deals with Pokemon that can be in Arcanine's tier, and as both of those Pokemon are OU, they can't and won't be considered as counters. Rhyperior is a decent check to Arcanine, but only if it comes in after something else has been KO'd, as even the tank Rhyperior set is 2HKO'd. This means that Rhyperior has to come in after something dies to scare out Arcanine or OHKO it if it stays in, although if it does you lose a bit more than half your HP. Carracosta is outclassed in UU by Omastar, as well as having to be fully Defensive to manage to beat Arcanine. Gigalith is 2HKO'd by Arcanine, and is outclassed in UU by Rhyperior. Kingler has a high chance of being OHKO'd, and is OHKO'd if it has any previous damage (say from Stealth Rock), and suffers from the same problem that Gigalith does (mainly that it's outclassed and not that great of a Pokemon in general). Scrafty is OHKO'd by Close Combat, meaning it definitely isn't a counter or a check (although you are right that it is in the same tier lol). Kabutops (unless some weird Defensive version) is OHKO'd, Huntail has a high chance of being OHKO'd and is OHKO'd with previous damage, Armaldo is 2HKO'd or OHKO"d with Stealth Rock damage and only has around a 50% chance of OHKOing in return, and Feraligatr is 2HKO'd or OHKO'd with Stealth Rocks up. Slowbro is a decent check, though it has a chance of being 2HKO'd with previous damage, and can only 2HKO in return, meaning it has to worry about switching in. Rotom-Wash is in the same category as Gliscor and Hippowdon as it is an OU Pokemon and thus wouldn't even be considered for POTW counters for Arcanine. Gorebyss is in the same boat as Huntail, being very likely OHKO'd with a guaranteed OHKO if there's previous damage. Note that this all only applies to the Life Orb set, with sets with Intimidate or Choice Band being better able to handle a lot of these "threats."

Thusly for you tl;dr people, Muscle Band is outclassed, Flame Wheel and Thunder Fang don't do enough damage to be worth it, Aerial Ace gives redundant coverage and is weak, the partners section doesn't apply to the POTW partners as well as not being that good to use, Rhyperior and Slowbro are the only 2 Pokemon remotely close to being counters on his list (as well as his general defensive Waters statement), with the rest either being outclassed by something in UU or (in the case of most of his counters) are OHKO'd by Arcanine.

Yes, I know I have no life :3
 
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