Sets
“The Tech”
- Item Held
- Life Orb
- Ability
- Technician
- Nature
- Adamant (+Attack, -Special Attack)
- Effort Points
- 252 Attack – 232 HP – 24 Defense
- Swords Dance
- Quick Attack
- Roost
- Iron Head / Metal Claw / X-Scissor / Night Slash / Brick Break
Here’s a set that will give trouble to your opponents’ the moment they belive they are safe. After using Swords Dance just once, this thing gets unlimited power. Just think of it. Swords Dance + Technician + Life Orb + attack priority with Quick Attack = powerful. Let’s see. Quick Attack has a base power of 40, 1.5x by Technician, 1.3x by Life Orb and 2x by Swords Dance, that equals 156. Pretty high for a first-strike move, don’t you think? This Quick Attack damages even those Pokémon that can be considered counters. Infernape gets about 90% by a Swords Danced, Life Orbed Quick Attack if it has a neutral Nature and 0 HP/0 Defense EPs, Electivire is OHKOed in the same conditions. Note that Infernape usually uses a -Defense Nature as most people use it as a Mixed Sweeper and it is easily OHKOed. Quick Attack does a whole lot of damage but Stealth Rock support is essential as it puts more opponents in Scizor’s OHKO range. Roost is here because Life Orb will be taking away some HP after every attack but if you want you can replace it for another offensive move. Now, there is a wide variety of offensive moves to choose for the 4th move slot. Iron Head gets STAB and may flinch but since Scizor is kinda slow, it’s effect is neglected. That’s why Metal Claw is included as an option too. Their base power difference is little but Metal Claw has a small possibility to further raise your Attack. X-Scissor gets STAB as well and hits Psychic-types hard, particularly Celebi. Night Slash does the same thing but sacrifices STAB for a high critical-hit ratio. Brick Break hits Tyranitar and, more importantly, Skarmory. How? Scizor is slower than the standard Skarmory and during turns that Skarmory uses Roost and loses its Flying-type, Brick Break hurts particularly hard. If Skarmory is at 252 HP/252 Defense (highly unlikely), a Swords Danced, Life Orbed Brick Break does about 45%. Not enough to 2HKO but since a Skarmory with less EPs in Defense (like the standard one) may switch into Stealth Rock and use Roost to recover that damage, it may have a chance to do more than 90% to it, even OHKO it. And 90%+ to Skarmory by a Physical Sweeper is a great amount.
Pure Baton Passer
- Item Held
- Leftovers
- Ability
- Swarm
- Nature
- Impish (+Defense, -Special Attack)
- Effort Points
- 228 HP – 134 Defense – 148 Speed
- Baton Pass
- X-Scissor
- Swords Dance / Agility / Iron Defense / Substitute / Roost
- Swords Dance / Agility / Iron Defense / Substitute / Roost
First of all, this Scizor set needs 203 Speed, if you don’t have an IV of 31 in Speed, take some EPs out of HP and put them in Speed. With 203 Speed, Scizor will be able to reach 406 after one Agility, enough to outspeed Choice Scarf Pokémon with 270 Speed like Heracross. The purpose of this set is simple. Use your stat-upping move(s) and just Baton Pass the boosts away to a Pokémon that needs them. Attack can be passed to a non-Choice Banded Aerodactyl to make it invincible, Speed can be passed to a Metagross or Rhyperior and Defense can be passed to powerful sweepers that cannot last, like Gengar or even Alakazam. Substitute can be used in a Baton Pass chain team, otherwise it is not so useful and Roost is here in case you want to recover.
Agil-Zor
- Item Held
- Life Orb
- Ability
- Swarm / Technician
- Nature
- Adamant (+Attack, -Special Attack)
- Effort Points
- 252 Attack – 148 Speed – 78 Defense – 32 HP
- Agility
- Roost
- X-Scissor
- Iron Head / Metal Claw
The way this set works is exactly the same as Agil-Gross. Switch in on something that fears Scizor (like a Choice item user stuck in a not effective move) and Agility as they switch. Now, you are faster than almost everything and you can sweep to victory with two STABed moves. Use Iron Head with the Swarm ability and Metal Claw with the Technician one. I would personally choose Metal Claw because that 10% boost seems appealing but flinching them with Iron Head is also nice. Roost when Life Orb damage becomes too much. Like in the previous set, you must reach 203 Speed, take some EPs out of Defense if your Speed IV isn’t 31.
Reversal
- Item Held
- Liechi Berry
- Ability
- Technician / Swarm
- Nature
- Adamant (+Attack, -Special Attack)
- Effort Points
- 252 Attack – 252 Speed – 6 HP
- Agility
- Endure
- Reversal
- Night Slash
Since Scizor is able to take a hit, Agility once and then Endure their hit. Now you are faster than most Pokémon and able to hit with a max-power Reversal, powered up even more by the Liechi Berry. Night Slash is here for the Ghost-type Pokémon that will come in to ruin your fun. The only thing that makes Scizor use this set better than other Reversalers is its immunity to Sandstorm which means that Tyranitar can’t come in and kill it off just with the Sandstream ability.
Choice Bander
- Item Held
- Choice Band
- Ability
- Technician
- Nature
- Adamant (+Attack, -Special Attack)
- Effort Points
- 252 Attack – 252 Speed – 6 HP
- U-Turn
- Iron Head
- Pursuit
- Quick Attack / Double Hit / Brick Break
Standard Choice Bander set. U-Turn is your main attack as it enables hitting and switching to a counter in the same turn. Iron Head for STAB, Pursuit for hitting foes that are likely to go away when they see Scizor (Azelf, Alakazam, etc.), Double Hit for ruining Substitute users and Brick Break for Tyranitar mainly. Choose Quick Attack if you want a first-strike move for screwing Endure-Reversal/Flail users.
Other Possible Options
Most of the useful moves it can get are mentioned in the sets. Thief can annoy your opponent while Light Screen will make Scizor a really sturdy Pokémon. Aerial Ace could be put in a set (especially if you are using the Technician ability) for OHKOing Heracross and Breloom. Counter could do something too but there are many better Pokémon to use Counter out there.
Choice Scarf should get a mention too but Scizor’s maximum Speed without a +Speed Nature is 343, not enough to outrun many threats. But you can always use it for a surprise KO on Tyranitar with Brick Break or on Celebi with X-Scissor. Occa Berry could be used as well in order to save Scizor by a Fire-type move.
Counters
I suppose you all know what Scizor fears the most. Yeah, that’s Fire. With a 4x weakness to Fire-type moves, it can’t just stay in and get them. Infernape could switch while Scizor uses Swords Dance but it is really threatened by Quick Attack.
Skarmory can wall Scizor forever if it doesn’t carry Brick Break and Swords Dance. Other Steel-types can wall it too but they fear Brick Break more than Skarmory. Lucario is good if it carries a Fire-type move like Blaze Kick and Steelix can just Roar Scizor’s boosts away.
Gyarados is an excellent counter unless it switches in on an Agility. Then Scizor is able to Baton Pass its boosts away before Gyarados has a chance to use Taunt.
Finally, Magnezone, especially one with Substitute, will beat Scizor easily one-on-one as it traps it and kills it with Thunderbolt while Scizor is unable to break its Substitute (unless it uses Brick Break of course). A Thunder Wave by Magnezone or any other Pokémon will do wonders, as will Will-O-Wisp.
Opinion & Notes
Earlier today I had a conversation with Blue about a group of Pokémon in which Scizor belongs. We were talking about Pokémon which would be the best if only Game Freak gave them some more Speed. Scizor, and other Pokémon in that group, like Absol and Gallade, have fantastic movepools and some really awesome stats. 130 base Attack is great, same for 100 base Defense. But with that 65 base Speed, Scizor will need a turn to Agility before sweeping. Sure, that Speed is backed up with Quick Attack but some more wouldn’t be bad, don’t you agree?
Anyway, Scizor got a nice array of new moves and the awesome Technician ability between the two generations. Namely, Night Slash, X-Scissor, U-Turn, Roost, Iron Head and Life Orb. The only bad thing is that now, it has to worry about Physical Fire-type moves too and that makes it a not so great Physical Wall as it used to be in the 3rd generation. But I used Scizor as a standard member of my team in GSC, I used it in my Baton Pass team in RSE and I am sure I’ll use it in DP as well.