[Guide] Competitive Analysis: Laissure

[Dragonstrike]

Swords Dance really is superior to Hone Claws, I would never use Hone Claws if SD was an option.

I dunno, my logic here is that its base Atk stat is high enough to not warrant SD if you have Moxie available, assuming you switch into something that can be KO'd by EQ/Subduction/what have you after only a one stage boost, and if the moves in the set besides HC aren't 100% accuracy, then my observation is that letting the moves hit is more valuable than jumping them up an extra stage in power then netting a possibly fatal miss the next turn. I like to roll the dice, but I don't like gambling on accuracy, especially if I'm trying to sweep... to each their own.

Your first observation about Subduction not having a 100% chance to confuse the user is really interesting however. If what you are saying is true, then Lanthan's Sheer Force ability overrides Subduction's confusion chance entirely, since not being 100% would mean that the confusion is a secondary effect and would go away with Sheer Force.

It's only a guess. Again, it MAY just have bugged on me since I haven't seen anyone else report the same thing I did.

As for the Sheer Force arm of the discussion, it doesn't negate primary effects inflicted on the user, only secondary effects (the speed drop that affects anything that survives Subduction). This means for maximum impact, you should have a Safeguard user set things up before sending out Lanthan, so you get a few turns to spam Subduction and hope the opponent doesn't switch in anything that flies or Levitates.

And the logic for running SD instead is that it not only gets you more power, but very few of Laissure's moves actually could use that accuracy boost.  Subduction and Stone Edge are the only notable ones, and they aren't even that bad accuracy wise compared to things like Thunder and Blizzard outside of their weathers.  There's a reason coil is used on pokemon that learn it, and it's not for the accuracy boost usually (even though some niche mixed attacking variants of such sets do like it with things like Zap Cannon and Thunder).

Concerning Safeguard, that's...actually a dangerous thought.  I'd completely forgotten the move existed for the most part, and never even knew it blocked confusion.  Safeguard support for a Subduction user...blegh, that sounds terrifying.  But because Safeguard is almost never used on anything in most competitive environments, even Wobbuffet or Wynaut, the strategy would be incredibly obvious to anyone who has seen it already, so you'd really have to make sure to clean out anything immune or resistant to ground before trying to abuse it.

Actually, scratch that last part.  Safeguard can't protect you from self inflicted confusion from moves like Outrage, so it shouldn't protect you from Subduction's either. The only out would be to skill swap Own Tempo onto the pokemon, which is needlessly complicated since Ludicolo is the only mon with that ability in Uranium.