Is there a reason for the fact that dragons can shrug off the "starter" types as well as Electrics?

Question

For those that don't know, the "starter" types are Fire, Water, and Grass, the typings of the starter Pokemon of every core Pokemon game ever conceived.

Comments

They have tough, reptilian skin.

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I think it's because those four types often represent "natural elements", and dragons are supposed to have control over those.

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Personally, I've always thought of it like this: when fighting a dragon, conventional methods aren't going to work. The only way that any dragon has ever been taken down is by hitting weak points. So really, dragons should probably have more resistances than they do, but they can't be too overpowered.

Answer 1

That's an interesting observation that you make.

My Illogical Theory

Dragon has always been considered a generally OP type due to their lack of weaknesses and how good Dragon-type Pokemon tend to be stat-wise. The superiority of Dragon-types seems justified though. The other types represent generic elements like water, electricity, ice - you see them all the time and they are generally harmless (in most cases, anyway). But dragons!? THEY'RE SO COOL. Unlike the other types, Dragon-types are associated with mythical, fire-breathing creatures that could destroy anything and everything in their path. Even debatably mythical creatures like Fairy- and Ghost-types are a hell of a lot less frightening than Dragon-types.

And I think that's why Dragon-types are resistant to the Fire-, Water- and Grass-types. These types are the first types you encounter - they're the types that you would be most familiar with, the complete opposite of the mythical fire-breathing dragons. I imagine Electric-types fit this criteria as well, but I couldn't be too sure. Among all the non-starter types, I would think the Electric-type is the most 'familiar' type.

Of course, we can't know for sure because only Game Freak knows blablabla. It's an interesting observation you make, though!

Hope I helped. :)

Comments

A notable exception to the harmless category would be one of the types in question (Fire), which is much more destructive when left uncontrolled; however, Dragon skin is usually thought of to be very resistant to fire, especially considering the fact that many can breathe it (try me, you can teach just about any Dragon-type Fire Blast, Kyurem and I think Zekrom being notable exceptions).

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This theory is good enough for me, Indigo. Nice work!