What's up with Necrozma's catch rate?

Question

So, I looked up Necrozma's catch rate, and holy Arceus, it's more than Xerneas! Is there any reason for this catch rate?

Answer 1

No particular reason// GameFreak Logic

A Pokemon's base catch rate is an independent factor decided by the code input by the developers. It is as such based on the decisions by the developers, and hence can range from 0-255 based on their discretion. That can be changed based on what they choose as fit depending on other things such as lore or ease of play. It has nothing to do with rarity/legendary status.

That said, I'll try to justify why the developers might have chosen it to have such a huge catch rate:

• Every year, the games are made "easier" to appeal to a larger, younger audience.
• This is seen in Sw/Sh, where Eternatus also has the base 255 catch rate.
• This is probably to balance how difficult they are (relatively, for newer players) to beat, so to ensure that trainers aren't put off, make it easier to catch, as a reward/ incentive.
• It is the primary "antagonist" or focus of USUM, so it is more important to have it caught. This is clearly a big factor as in the original Su/Mo it had a dismal base catch rate of 3, which is that of standard legendary Pokemon.

Now, for explaining the "lore" as to why the base catch rate might be higher (which is what the other answer has tried to cover):

• It could be that Solgaleo/Lunala are fighting in their own way to ensure Ultra Necrozma is contained so it won't disturb cosmic balance
• As its energy source is Solgaleo/Lunala, once they're no longer providing the obscene quantities of energy, it is weakened considerably (which is what SYL pointed out)

Comments

Also, please note that this answer is an elaboration of SYL's answer, which is the condensed form, and as such I don't any reason why they are downvoted because at best they can theorize from a lore perspective about why devs chose 255 over 45 or 3 or whatever

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Awesome, you made everything in my answer more clear and added facts yourself. +1

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Very detailed! Thanks for this! And the  energy made everything so much clearer! Thanks for this, SYL and Emty!

Answer 2

All the reasons:
1. It's weakened, it can't fight back against the Pokéball.
2. It wants to be catched just to take over Solgaleo/Lunala.
3. It's also because the story (developers) want you to catch legendaries in newer generations. And at some hours, Mount Lanakila can have hail in battle, imagine that with a Pokémon that has a hard to catch catchrate.

Comments

Why did this get a downvote?