Requested by: TheRainbowSylveon 

    Ah, Venusaur. The first time I ever saw one was in Chuggaconroy's playthrough of FireRed back in 2010 or 2011 when I was younger... In competitive, Venusaur has slipped down into a lower tier lately, from RU to NUBL, which took place about a few months ago, likely because it had a lot of weaknesses and was susceptible to a lot of sweepers there. In X&Y, they gave it a Mega Evolution, with a great ability that mitigates 2 of it's weaknesses, ice and fire type moves called Thick Fat. Today, I'm here to inform you about my opinion on both Venusaur and it's Mega Evolution, on how they do in competitive!

  Venusaur is currently in NUBL, with there being some strong Fire type Pokemon who can knock out Venusaur in one hit if they can take the heat. Unfortunately for Venusaur, most of them can handle it's ability Chlorophyll which doubles it's speed, and survive an unboosted Earthquake or Sludge Bomb without Growth. Growth is a great move on this Kanto Starter, as it not only doubles the offensive stats of Venusaur in the Sun, but complements it's ability nicely as well, at least until the sun fades. Venusaur's speed is quite decent, and it's max speed that it can hit is 284, and when doubled, is nothing to scoff at. Solarbeam is a strong move on it, but Giga Drain is much better with Life Orb as it doesn't need two turns to charge outside of the sun and allows Venusaur to recover some needed HP. Earthquake is great for fellow Poison types and Fire types, and Sludge Bomb to hit opposing Venusaurs. There is one Pokemon who can take most of what it can dish out, and it's one of the Pokemon that one of my friends on here hates a lot... INCINEROAR! 

   Incineroar has a great ability in Intimidate and can carry an Assault Vest to put a stop to Venusaur's plans, taking not too much damage from Sludge Bomb or even it's strongest Grass move in Leaf Storm, and Intimidate lowers the effectiveness EQ will have. Even though it's in NUBL(which I forgot about up until now), I believe that some people will use Xatu and Sigilyph in RU for reasons of their own, which makes them a threat. In RU, Venusaur...well...let's just say that it likes Choice Specs according to the Smogon website. As mentioned before, there's also the Life Orb Chlorophyll set, but you can make your Venusaur specially defensive. This is great for engaging a specially offensive Virizion, building a wall against it. So what could possibly go wrong with this set? 4 words: Yanmega, and physical attackers. 

      Yanmega has the potential to have either Choice Specs or Life Orb on it combined with Air Slash, and strong physical attackers really give Venusaur trouble, especially the devious Honchkrow. As a sweeper, Venusaur heavily relies on it's Chlorophyll ability and the sunny weather to be up - and the weather can easily be changed by weather inducing abilites, preventing it from sweeping. Even with Growth boosts, against foes who it can handle well under the heat, it can do somewhat of what it can do under those circumstances, though to a lesser degree. Paralysis really gives it a problem, and without Earthquake, Salazzle loves to roast this Pokemon or use it as setup fodder. As a defensive mon, it does alright, but without using Mega Evolution to give it a powerup, there's not really much that it can do. Besides, Fire types enjoy similar powerups to it in the sun, and can easily KO it with Flamethrower or Fire Blast. Dragon types who can take Giga Drain, Sludge Bomb, HP Fire, or Earthquake are also great counters to offensive or defensive Venusaur. 

    Mega Venusaur, on the other hand is currently in UU, but is being suspected tested at this point in time and will likely move up to OUBL due to it being way too tanky for the tier to handle. It's bulk is great, and has an impressive base 120 Sp Def, as well as 123 Def. Mega Venusaur has another option in using a heavily offensive based set for foes. I'll be telling you mainly about the sets for OU since IMO Mega Venusaur is way too powerful/tanky for UU to handle. I mean, look at the tier, it's like heaven for it. It can use Giga Drain and Sludge Bomb on the Water and Fairy types, and Earthquake for the Steel/Fire types. Plus, it gets Knock Off, a great utility moves, and as previously mentioned in the Lando-T chapter, can knock off an item, which is also used to cripple Psychic types such as Latias or Starmie(the former I think usually carries a Z Crystal). HP Fire is a great coverage move for hitting Scizor and it's Mega. The only problems it has are with Flying and Psychic types, or Pokemon who can survive or resist it's moves. Now that my rambling about UU has stopped, let's get right into it's sets. 

   Since Venusaur has a wonderful ability in Thick Fat for it's Mega evolution, this complements it's defenses perfectly. Of course, this will make the player who has Mega Venusaur on their team worry a bit less about the weaknesses it has, although they need to watch out for set up moves. Mega Venusaur hates those setup moves which raise the opponent's stats, since it has no way of getting rid of them. This is a reason why some good team members for Mega Venusaur are those that are able to take a flying type Return or Psyshock from Mega Pinsir and the Latis. Status ailments are detrimental to Venusaur's tankiness, and it lacks a reliable source of recovery outside of Giga Drain and Synthesis. Heatran can give it a run for it's money should it not be running the move Earthquake, since it's virtually impossible for Venusaur to hit it that hard without it. Flying types like Lando-T, Tornadus, Mega Charizard Y, and Mega Pinsir really give a problem as well due to it not having anything to hit them with, especially Mega Charizard Y. Strong physical attackers that break it apart into smithereens, such as Mega Medicham or the Latis. Knock Off is good for crippling Chansey as well, since chansey is able to tank hits from Mega Venusaur pretty well, although according to the Smogon website, Chansey can't do much back with Seismic toss. Finally, entry hazards are a big problem for Venusaur, as nothing in it's movepool can get rid of them, if they are piled up. 

     Teammates who can rid it of it's problems by healing it's status ailments or getting rid of entry hazards, and throwing Stealth Rocks at the sky to put a damper in the Flying types' attempts to get revenge on Venusaur are great. Be sure to put enough pressure on it's foes while keeping your side of the field as safe as possible. If necessary, you might even need to sack off Mega Venusaur to get a certain opening, or go at it with all of the firepower that you've got!!! As for the regular form of Venusaur, it's recommended that Torkoal and Pokemon who can cover it's shortcomings like Tyrantrum be there. Ignore the part of the sentence where it mentions Zoroark, as they seem to have forgotten to update the Smogon dex lately. I think that Venusaur can be a good sweeper if you know what you're doing in RU, and the same applies to it's Mega. Mega Venusaur is no undoubtedly a great defensive mon, but it can be pretty strong as a sweeper as well(I guess).

Score: 5.5/10(Venusaur) Mega Score: 7.5 or 8.5/10