Why would a completely male Pokemon have egg moves?

Question

Braviary has egg moves, but you can only make eggs of the female parent, so what's the point of having unusable egg moves?

Comments

Gen 9 introduced the mirror herb, so you can give a Pokemon egg moves without having to actually breed.

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My memory of how egg moves might be incorrect, but bulbapedia says that egg moves can only be inherited from the father before Gen 6. Not sure why a pokemon being all male would change anything.

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In the case of braviary, it can only be male so it wouldn't be able to get any egg moves in any generation besides Gen 9 with the mirror herb as of now.

Answer 1

Male only Pokemon can get egg moves via the Mirror Herb in Gen 9.

In Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, if the player goes on a picnic while one of their party Pokémon holds a Mirror Herb and has at least one empty move slot, they may learn an Egg Move from another party member. This is the only way for male-only and gender unknown Pokémon, as well as Battle Bond Greninja and Bloodmoon Ursaluna to inherit Egg Moves.

Source. (Found it easier to quote than explain it in my own words.)

Although prior to Gen 6 only males could pass down egg moves, and Gen 6 onwards, both genders could, this is of course completely irrelevant to Braviary since it can only be male, meaning it can't pass down egg moves through breeding since it can only breed with Ditto. That leaves the Mirror Herb the only solution for the Pokemon mentioned in the quote above to get egg moves.

This is a relatively new mechanic so if you haven't played Gen 9 or didn't know about this, I can see why there would be confusion. Regardless, I hope I helped to clear things up!

Comments

Thanks for the simple answer! (I can FINALLY get a Braviary with Roost!)

Answer 2

As of Scarlet/Violet, the latest and simplest way to get egg moves on any male Pokémon is through using Mirror Herb in a picnic. Directly quoting Bulbapedia,

In Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, if the player has a picnic with one Pokémon that holds a Mirror Herb and has an empty move slot, and another Pokémon that knows a move the first Pokémon can learn as an Egg Move, after the picnic the first Pokémon will learn that Egg Move, even if there is no matching Egg Group or if both Pokémon are of the same gender. This does not consume the Mirror Herb.

This allowed for the Male-only Pokémon who once never had egg moves to finally have them! Despite this however, even in previous generations, a myriad of Male-only Pokémon were able to learn egg moves through a few similar methods:

Through Breeding with a female-counterpart of their Evolution Line.

This only really applies to Gallade, as Burmy is incapable of learning any egg moves, but by breeding a female Ralts/Kirlia/Gardevoir with any male Pokémon with an egg move, you can simply hatch a male Ralts and evolve it into a Gallade no problem.

Through Breeding with a female-counterpart of their species

For both the Nidoran♂ line and Volbeat, the female-counterpart of their species, being Nidoran♀ (as Nidorina/Nidoqueen cannot breed) and Illumise, both have an equal chance of producing an egg of either species, allowing for Illumise to produce Volbeat eggs and Nidoran♀ to produce Nidoran♂ eggs.

Through Breeding with their Evolution Line's alternate Evolutions

Exclusive to Tyrogue and Hitmonchan/lee/top, when breeding with a Ditto, either of the Hitmon's can produce eggs of Tyrogue. As a result, these eggs can evolve into any other Hitmon, allowing for, say, a Hitmonchan to pass eggs move onto a Tyrogue, which then evolves into a Hitmonlee.

Additionally, methods of obtaining egg moves beyond breeding, such as the BDSP Grand Underground, work just the same for male-only Pokémon.

Comments

Huh, interesting.
+1