Life Orb or Choice Specs.?

Great Sage

Banned deucer.
In a metagame that is full of Ice attacks added on to the facts that while 102 base Speed is good, but not great, and Garchomp has few worthwhile resistances compared to many other Pokemon, it often finds setting up a Swords Dance and then sweeping to be a herculean task.
 

kingofgames

auctually, my Garchomp will survive a Ice Beam..... Cause His special Defense is "fairly" high

But... You never seened Lefties on Garchomp?
I might put Life Orb on Garchomp if I cant OHKO the pokemon in the battle tower with him at higher levels
 
cim

cim

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On a sweeper, its a simple trade off of power over the right to switch moves. Specs is great for things made of glass or anything not bulky that doesn't have Nasty Plot, while Life Orb lets you set up and still pack a boosted punch.

At a certain point, the need for Specs is transcended. Porygon-Z with Choice Specs is a bit redundant, for example, when you could be Plotting or Scarfing. Some things like Gengar have so much power that they could get off 2 or 3 OHKO's just by switching moves. Other things with Specs can reach power levels insane enough to beat Blissey, like Lucario, Alakazam, and aforementioned Gengar.

tl;dr: Choice Specs if you can't NP, Life Orb if you can or like freedom.

The real debate is Life Orb v. Expert Belt.
 

Yoko Rains

Has your Chomp ever survived an Ice Beam...? Don't just assume it can, remember, Ice is a quad weakness...Try and think getting Ice Punched by a CB Weavile...whats that, like 150 Base Power + High Attack?

And of course it will survive Ice Beam from a Blissey... But I'm pretty sure any STAB'ed Ice Beam will overkill it, let alone if its Choice Spec'ed, or Life Orb'ed, etc..
 
Warthog

Warthog

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if its a pure special sweeper then go with Specs.. usually it stays in one turn then bails. However if youre using Explosion or any other physical moves on Gengar Life Orb is the better option. Similar strats are used on Infernape so you can get use out of using both physical and special attacks.
 

kingofgames

Yoko Rains said:
Has your Chomp ever survived an Ice Beam...? Don't just assume it can, remember, Ice is a quad weakness...Try and think getting Ice Punched by a CB Weavile...whats that, like 150 Base Power + High Attack?

And of course it will survive Ice Beam from a Blissey... But I'm pretty sure any STAB'ed Ice Beam will overkill it, let alone if its Choice Spec'ed, or Life Orb'ed, etc..
Click to expand...
It has.
Well... Against another HUMAN.. I;'m not sure, never used him, but against the Battle Tower, yes.

But just about any weavile kills Garchomp

Expert Belt or Life orb or choice item on Garchomp?
 

Yoko Rains

Choice. Life Orb maybe.

Trust me, don't expect Garchomp to be surviving any good Ice Beams (not Blissey ones, I mean real ones lol).
 

Yoko Rains

Choice Band or Scarf. Life Orb depending on if you really need to have access to different moves without switching.

But yes, take off the lefties, and pick the item that suits your team best.
 

kingofgames

Ehhh... well the only pokemon that has lefties on my team now is Milotic

Milotic- Leftovers
Starmie- Choice Specs
Scizor- Scope Lens
Staraptor- Brightpowder
Garchomp- Life Orb
Electrivire- Expert Belt
 

Spaniard

I simply think that life orb recoil is a very high price. I don't say it's not useful, but i don't like the idea much.

Going for either life orb and choice band/specs means that you want to hit very hard. But in early game you are likely to get stalled, so you lose 10% with life orb and u'll probably have to switch. Next time you use your life orb poke you will be taking a hit to switch in (and life orb pokes don't tend to have good defences) and again 10% to hit something, and you'd better hope your opponent won't stall you again.

Now you say: I can predict fairly well, so I don't care about my opponent attempting to defend. Ok, but you're actually dealing more damage with choice band/specs.

Or: I use life orb because i don't relly much on my prediction. Then don't use the attack boosting strategy at all, you're not ready for it yet. Choice band became popular because setting up is difficult and players realised that, with skill, it could be exploited with success.

I'd say that life orb is fantastic in end game, when the walls are out of the way, but I think that hard hitters have to be used as soon as possible.

Nevertheless, life orb is still a very dangerous and useful item that i don't personally like.
 

kingofgames

The 10% health is far too unattractive to me, but the choice items makes you LOCKED into that one move. And switching out so you can choose again....

But a Surf against a Relicant does..... Regular Damage.....from a starmie ...with Specs.

I really might just use the Belts instead, since theres no costs to them
 

CZ

My Opinions:

All out sweeper that is frail and doesnt change moves to often: Spiecs
All out sweeper that needs to pick and choose its moves: Life Orb
Durable: Go specs fir extra power. Life orb Limits its durability, so it may not be the best bet.
 

Muchabi

A life-orbed pokemon can finish off a weakened team very nicely. I think it's made for pokemon that are either very fast and can switch moves without getting hurt by the new switch, or for mixed sweepers. The 10% is annoying, but what about the damage your new switch-in has to take when you're locked into the wrong move?

Expert belt seems to be a more comparable item anyways, as if you're going to be using different moves, you probably have decent type coverage.
 

kingofgames

Muchabi said:
A life-orbed pokemon can finish off a weakened team very nicely. I think it's made for pokemon that are either very fast and can switch moves without getting hurt by the new switch, or for mixed sweepers. The 10% is annoying, but what about the damage your new switch-in has to take when you're locked into the wrong move?

Expert belt seems to be a more comparable item anyways, as if you're going to be using different moves, you probably have decent type coverage.
Click to expand...
thats why I have the Expert Belt on Electrivire, 13 of the 17 types
Cant get any better than Expert Belt
 
Aeroblacktyl

Aeroblacktyl

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See, the thing is, if people are using a neutral wall, etc, Life Orb hits will always hurt them as opposed to Expert Belt on stuff. Infernape is a good case of this, with Cresselia switching into it a lot. Just run Wish if it's really that big of an issue.
 

forbidden

Life orb is awesome for Mixsweepers like ape. Spec is mainly to hit super hard on the special side. However, I wouldn't use Spec on something like Charizard which has a 4x SR weakness.
 

kamikaen

It depends on the Pokemon.
For a Pokemon like... Heatran, with a lot of useful resistances, he doesn't mind continually switching in and out, as he'll have lots of opportunities to do so. But, if it's something like, say... Azelf, that doesn't have lots of opportunities to switch in, and can utilize moves like Nasty Plot, Life Orb is awesome.
 
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