Utilizing Illusion

Illusion isn't all its cracked up to be. In metagames like stat swap its very useful thanks to Zoroark having bulk but unfortunately Zoroark lacks the stats to utilize illusion to its best ability. This is seen in his mediocre speed, his unfortunate ability to not hit hard without life orb and specs and not enough bulk to make use of both. In a tier like RU it would do enough work for it to have a solid, counterable assured niche but when it still resides in BL2, its not going anywhere soon.

Spoiler

Poor Zoroark

 

If I remember correctly, you don't need bulk to use LO well.

Anyway, Illusion is a useful ability if used correctly and can really help you take out important Pokémon down. However, entry hazards limit the usability of this and like any prior damage or status. Your opponent will also see that you have Zoroak in your team and could prepare for it. While it's Attack and Special Attack can do some work with Life Orb, it's Speed isn't just high enough in meta where common scarfers and other fast Pokémon like Gengar, Latis, and Azelf can outspeed it can most likely either heavily dent it or even OHKO it due to Zoroark's 60/60/60 Bulk. It's movepool is also rather small to effectively pose as other Pokémon.

 

In gen5, I ran zoroark on my main OU team. Since the tier was weather dominated, I actually threw on sunny day for him just to screw over everyone else's weather dependent people. He had night daze and flamethrower and I think grass knot too. Life orb, he was pretty strong. The illusion though I disguised him as a jolteon. Everyone expected him to be disguised as my conkeldurr, so jolteon worked out well. Sometimes I could scare out a ground type to counter "jolteon" and grass knot them for an easy KO. Not to mention the not so smart people who thought jolteon could learn flamethrower or grass knot, he did kind of look the part.

 

I haven't used it much on showdown, but I have gotten a good few uses of illusion working in battle spot. I use something like toxicroak that people would normally hit with a psychic attack, and use that immunity to set up a nasty plot. It's worked a good number of times in battle spot, and I certainly don't consider the ability useless.

I definitely don't consider zoroark's speed 'mediocre' as well. It may not be the fastest, but with a speed at approx 310 maximum it sure outspeeds a lot of pokes I use.

Also, I don't get why entry hazards and status would be a problem to it. Illusion doesn't break with entry hazards, poison/burn damage, life orb recoil, or weather damage.

I think illusion is used best when it is used to make somebody switch out or to make them hit you with a psychic move you are immune to. It certainly is a creative ability, if nothing else.

 

Entry hazards can give away the fact that it is a Zoroark, especially stealth rock, and with most fighting types, since they take less damage from it than Zoroak. And if either Zoroak or the Pokémon it is disguised have taken prior damage or has some status, and if opponent is paying enough attention to it, they'll immediately know that is a Zoroak. It can also be used to confuse the opponent, if they don't know which one they paralyzed, Zoroak or the Pokémon it was disguised as.

 

I like the concept of Illusion, and it's certainly a creative ability. I kind of wish more Pokémon got it though, because for it to be most effective you need perfect type and movepool synergy with the user.

The problem is that Zoroark is a Dark type, and entry hazards can help you detect if something is actually a Zoroark or not. If you see a Flying, Magic Guard or Levitating user affected by (Toxic) Spikes damage or Sticky Web then you know either the game is messed up or it's a Zoroark lol. If you see the switch in only take 1/8th of damage from Stealth Rocks when they normally lose more or less (say it was a Flygon or Chandelure that lost 1/8th), that's also a giveaway. In addition, the longer the battle is, the more difficult it is to maintain the disguise due to health bars; once your foe sees 2 different health bars for the same Pokémon it's an issue.

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Ok, so when looking at the Dark type, we see it's immune to Psychic; weak to Fighting, Fairy and Bug; and resists Dark and Ghost. Hm, but doesn't the Poison type resist all of its weaknesses? Yep! Ghost types also resist 2 of its weaknesses, but is weak to what Dark resists.

Putting this together, I've used Gengar as a Zoroark disguised and it worked pretty well haha. If you see a Gengar you probably would try hitting it with a Psychic move (which Zoroark is immune to), or a Ghost or Dark move (which Zoroark resists). You'd also be discouraged from attempting a Fighting move (unless you're Mega Lopunny but hell Zoroark loses to that thing anyway due to speed), and Bug and Fairy moves would be discouraged (save for U-Turn due to scouting/momentum purposes).

I had a friend with a Latios and I sent in my disguised Zoroark (we were playing ORAS on 3DS) with just Stealth Rocks on the field. To make it more believable, I was like "oh god this might be awkward cause of speed tie", but he told me after he had an imperfect Speed IV due to carrying Hidden Power Fire. His face was priceless when he went for Psyshock and it didn't affect my Gengar though. And I nabbed the free KO with my Dark Pulse. xD

In addition to Gengar, I'd say Infernape, Chandelure, Toxicroak and Crobat can synergize well with Zoroark's Illusion (as long as hazards are off the field for the latter 3). Zoroark shares a near identical movepool with Infernape (Grass Knot, Swords Dance, Flamethrower, Nasty Plot, etc.) and the typing baits out Psychic moves, but also prevents a Stealth Rock switch from immediately giving away the disguise since they both lose 1/8th. A Chandelure disguise discourages Fighting, Fairy and Bug (and Fire due to Flash Fire), along with baiting the Dark & Ghost moves for a free turn, but you'd need Stealth Rocks kept off. Toxicroak also shares quite a similar movepool with Zoroark as well and baits out the Psychic moves Toxicroak hates (but again Stealth Rock must be off). Crobat is an interesting choice since he quad resists Fighting and Bug and baits Psychic, AND actually gets Nasty Plot and Dark Pulse (but it's uncommon lol), but for that to work you'd need all sorts of hazards off the field.

Also I think Togekiss could work as well since it also gets Nasty Plot and Flamethrower, along with the fact it quad resist Bug & Fighting and its ability to force switches which can nab Zoroark a free turn.

 

Ahh, I understand about the hazards now. I actually never thought about looking at the hazards damage like that. I'm certainly going to be doing so from now on though.

I guess I didn't think about status either because usually I don't end up switching out zoroark, it stays in until I sweep or I die on most times I've used it.

I might go with gengar for the illusion now. As long as (toxic) spikes aren't up that sounds like a better bait. And I don't have a very good toxicroak set anyways, it was mostly there for the illusion setup.

 

I've only used Zoroark and Illusion in random battles, and it's hard to effectively bait Illusion there. There was one time though where my opponent had only a Choice item Pokémon (don't remember exactly what it was) locked into Psyshock and I sent in a Raichu. It took 2 turns for them to realize Psyshock hadn't done any damage and they were really confused. XD

 

Well, my favorite thing to do is to use a Zoroark with Flamethrower at a Ferrothorn, because if you send Zoroark like...I dunno... Psyduck (thanks to Ilusion)? The enemy will do a lot of predictions that will be their ruin

 

Wish somebody would have told me this topic was here, anyways regarding Zoroark and Illusion, back in generation 5 when i got back into competitive Pokémon, after i started using Zoroark i just fell in love with it. The point of illusion is to trick your opponent while also throwing them off. Zoroark is capable of ruining your opponents original plan or strategy if done right. Usually i run a few rules when running a team with Zoroark. First rule is have a Pokémon where it's ability doesn't activate when sent out, such as Tyranitar. Use a fighting type, or ghost type, as illusioning into those types helps Zoroark avoid some of it's weaknesses. Run something that tends to be slow, there have been times where my opponent as fallen for a Rotom-W illusion as they don't realize the speed is a bit outrageous, and just think its choiced. I have used Zoroark to the fullest in VGC format and singles format. Zoroark is so troll worthy, that I have even been accused of hacking in battles and official tournaments. Also similar to what @[member="Xarn"] said, Flamethrower to a Ferrothorn is the most common strategy and it's just hilarious. For those wanting to use Zoroark, try making a strategy to keep your opponent guessing, and make sure it isn't too obvious.

One extra thing I want to add. Considering Zoroarks Illusion ability, I believe Zoroark will not be receiving a mega evolution for many reasons. The one big reason is in the actual games, i can see a mega evolution for Zoroark while it's in its illusion, causing the game to glitch out a bit, again maybe i'm wrong on this matter but i feel it can become buggy.

Also Zoroark doesn't need LO or Choice specs to be able to manage. People have made strategies with things like nasty plot focus sash, and many more other shenanigans. Heck the choice specs set has Trick, which means your gonna be getting rid of the item and still are capable of doing some massive damage.

 

If we were take a look at Pokémon which would benefit from Illusion the most, they should have decent movepool with lot's of options, have a typing that has immunity to a type and/or has weakness to a type that has an immunity. Good attack, special attack and speed would also be beneficial to especially if it has a wide and mixed movepool.

This would mean that Pokémon like Hydreigon and Toxicroak would be great Pokémon to have Illusion, since their stats and movepool allow them to go mixed, and their typing can be used to either fool opponent, or prevent them from using strong attacks. If you have Toxicroak with illusion, the best Pokémon to disguise as would be something like Mandibuzz. Toxicroak is weak to Ground, Flying, and Psychic, and Mandibuzz is immune to two of them and neutral to one. It would discourage the opponent to use those moves, and rather use moves that would be super effective to Mandibuzz, which Toxicroak is neutral to with the exception of Rock, resisting it, and thus potentially increasing the turns toxicroak can stay in before dying.