Competitive Battling Volume 2: Types of Pokemon

Welcome to Volume 2 of Dragonite's Competitive Battling guide. In this volume, we will be covering the different types of Pokemon. I am not referring to water type, or ghost type. I am talking about the roles Pokemon play in a team.

There are 4 types of roles in a team: Sweeper, Tank, Wall, and Support:


Sweeper
Offense: 10/10
Defense: 1/10
Support: 3/10

The sweeper is the core of most teams. It is quick, hard-hitting, and has a diverse set of attacks. Sweepers are built to outspeed the opponent and hit hard enough to knock-out in 1 or 2 attacks. In a sweeper vs. sweeper dogfight, speed it all that matters, so speed maxing is essential. Defense doesn't matter because the opponent will be gone before it has a chance to attack (hopefully). There are Physical, Special, and Mixed sweepers, as well as late game sweepers who rely more on an enormous attack stat than a variety of moves and clean up after their threats are eliminated. Examples of sweepers are: Infernape (Mixed), Gengar (Special), Lucario (Late-Game), and Weavile (Physical). Sweepers are usually shut down by walls.


Wall
Offense: 2/10
Defense: 10/10
Support: 7/10

Walls are the opposite of sweepers. They act as sponges against attacks. They take hits, support the team, and then heal back to full health. Walls are the reason why there is all the switching I talked about in Volume 1. People like to switch to their walls because it's safe. There are Physical, Special, and Mixed walls. Examples: Blissey (Special), Skarmory (Physiacal), and Cresselia (Mixed). Tanks are usually able to outstall Walls because of their higher attack.


Tank
Offense: 7/10
Defense: 8/10
Support: 5/10

Tanks are like a mix between a sweeper and a wall. Their focus is dealing damage, but they are bulky and can take attacks and heal up if they are lucky enough to be blessed with a healing move. Many tanks are part water, which has given tanks that are water type, "bulky waters". Examples of tanks are Swampert (Bulky Water), Dusknoir, Suicune (Bulky Water), and Umbreon. Though it might seem like tanks have no weakness, they can be outspeed by sweepers who can outspeed them knock them out in one or two hits, while they lack the firepower for a 1 hit KO.

Support
Offense: 4/10
Defense: 6/10
Support: 10/10


Support Pokemon come in all shapes and sizes, but the majority can be broken into two groups. There are status-inducers, who use moves like thunder wave and sleep powder, and stat-raisers, who use moves like light screen or swords dance + baton pass. The further explain baton pass, it is a move that copies your stat changes to a Pokemon on your team that you switch to. If you've used swords dance before it, the Pokemon you switch to will have double attack. Examples are Ninjask (Baton Passer), Butterfree (Status-Inducer), and Smeargle (They can learn any move in the game, so the options are endless). Support Pokemon are countered by tanks and sweepers, so switch in on a wall, set up, and get out of there.