PotW: Ursaring

Ever been camping? If you have, you know an essential part of sleeping outside is hanging your delicious foodstuffs from a tree to protect them while you slumber. Protect them from what, you ask? Bears. Yes, that's right, bears. Nature's unstoppable, hibernating, honey-loving eating machines.

As you may have guessed, this week's Pokemon of the Week is Ursaring, the Hibernator Pokemon.

Ursaring is based on, you guessed it, a bear. The ring on his chest is somewhat remnant of the half-ring on the Sun Bear's neck, but Ursaring's body type and shape is definitely more akin to that of a Grizzly.

Ursaring, when introduced in Generation 2, wasn't that powerful in battles with other trainers. It was in Generation 3, when his ability, Guts, was introduced that this big bear became a remotely viable Poke. With Guts/Quick Feet, and a STAB with Facade, Ursaring is a great fighter when he's affected by a Special Condition. With a normal typing, he is immune to ghost, resisted by only rock, steel, and ghost, and weak to only fighting. 

Stat-wise, Ursaring is nothing to be scoffed at. Though he is UU, Ursaring's attack stat sits at a very rescectable 130, with pleasantly semi-bulky defenses, both at 75. His unfortunately low speed stat hinders him in his potential of being a top-tier physical sweeper, however.

But, fear not! Ursaring's secondary ability, Quick Feet, gives Ursaring the speed he needs to be a competitive battler. With a Toxic Orb (Instead of a Flame Orb, attack lowering is bad), Ursaring's Speed becomes not stellar, but usable, and with a Swords Dance or two, he can definitely get some KO's before having to switch out to avoid being knocked out from his self-bestowed Poison.

The reccomended moveset for Ursaring goes a little something like this:

Facade, Swords Dance, Close Combat, Crunch

EV's: 252 Attack/252 Speed/4 Whatever

Jolly Nature/Toxic Orb

This moveset is pretty self-explanatory, with Facade being powered up big time by a STAB and the Toxic Orb, Swords Dance for super attack boosts, and the other moves for awesome type coverage. Of course, you'll have to switch out eventually to reset the poison counter on your special condition to get the damage you take down to its initial percentage after it's risen between turns for a while. The only problem here is that you'll probably be outsped by some of the quicker hitters like Weavile, Mienfoo, and Garchomp.

Well, folks, be sure to check out Leftovers, the new podcast coming out in a couple of days, as well as all the awesome stuff in the store on our June 1st sale! Hit me up on Twitter (@AtDavidThomas), and email me suggestions for the next Pokemon of the week at DavEdwTho@gmail.com! Thanks for reading, and I'll see you next week!

-David

Comments

[Ursa]

David,
I was excited to see you picked Ursaring because that is my favorite pokemon. I've found that using him on a Trick Room team works great.

Here is the one I use:
Brave Nature
Guts Ability
Toxic Orb
252 HP/252 Atk/4 Def
Facade
Fire Punch
Close Combat
Crunch

I usually have no need for Swords Dance due to Guts boost and I'm usually in a hurry anyways as I'm limited on Turns left before Trick Room runs out. He works best if you can try to switch him in or u-turn to him mid-turn so he can get the poision boost from his first turn. Facade will kill just about anything that doesn't resist it and all the other moves cover everything else. There are a lot of new Trick Roomers in Gen 5 so he fits in well with new teams.

One other small note. If you feel like using flame orb with Guts you can since it won't cut your attack. Over a small amount of turns toxic will do less damage. After about 3 turns though it surpasses the damage from burn. I've found most of the time though by the 3rd turn you've already defeated several pokemon if not all of them.