Why Swampert over Blaziken?

Question

Blaziken Attack and Sp. Atk stats are higher than Swampert, Swampert has high Defenses but in-game offense matters more than defense. Why?

Comments

Swampert is much bulkier than Blaziken, and has a great matchup against a majority of the Gym Leaders. Also, Swampert has only 10 less Attack then Blaziken, so they have similar firepower. On another note, which game do you mean? It's tagged both oras and rse.

---

All Hoenn games.

---

Who says Swampert over Blaziken? They're both viable options, and pretty close in power.

---

Ultimately Swampert is more versatile than Blaziken.  You can build Swampert a lot of different ways for him to be effective, while Blaziken really only has variations on 1 theme -- punch them hard before they can do anything.

Both are effective, Swampert just has more options.

Answer 1

Matchup against the gyms.

Swampert has an incredible matchup against Hoenn’s gyms. I’ll take you through them:

Roxanne: Mudkip wins, Torchic doesn’t do well

Brawly: Both neutral.

Wattson: Marshtomp is immune to electric and is super effective, Combusken is neutral.

Flannery: Marshtomp wins, Fire resists Combusken’s Fire and fighting is neutral

Norman: Combusken’s fighting is super effective, and Marshtomp can mess with Truant by using Dig

Winona: Blaziken is weak to flying and flying is immune to Swampert’s ground, but water is still neutral

Liza and Tate: Swampert’s water beats Lunatone and Solrock, and Blaziken is weak to psychic.

Wallace: Water beats Blaziken and is resistant to Swampert’s water, but ground is neutral.

Blaziken does pretty well against the elite 4 and champion, beating Sidney, Glacia, and Steven, while Swampert is neutral against all but Drayden and beats Steven with ground.

Swampert also learns a ton of HMs- Surf, Waterfall, Dive, Strength, and Rock Smash.

TL;DR: Swampert has a better matchup against the gyms. However, anything works in-game, so Blaziken is a perfectly good choice.

Hope this helps!

Comments

swampert beats winonna with rock slide

Answer 2

100 SpA Blaziken Flamethrower vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Girafarig: 86-102 (59.3 - 70.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
100 Atk Blaziken Brick Break vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Girafarig: 73-87 (50.3 - 60%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
100 Atk Swampert Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Girafarig: 90-106 (62 - 73.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

source
Offense does matter more than defense in-game, but Swampert's damage output is stronger than Blaziken's in RSE. Like the other answer said, there are also a lot of strong opponents that use water, flying, or psychic attacks and far less that use grass attacks. Both of these reasons (and probably a few more that I forget) make Swampert significantly better than Blaziken.