Many people just create offensive setups for any pokémon, they completely forgot about other important setups that are best suited for other situations.
When building a team to use against strong NPC's or other players, think about what you need at the moment, maybe a pokémon giving support for example is juts what you need! Try to identified what each pokémon can do, what each can do best and what each can do worse, what each can do that no other can if avaiable, what situation would that setup be best suited and in what situation it wouldn't. Sometimes you are building a pokémon for something he just don't do good, or are just forgoting about others roles that can be more usefull at the especific situation.
Mar 13
by
Hórus
About one pokémon outranking the other:
Talking about fully evolved pokémon, pokémons that cannot evolve, or other particularities, there is no pokémon that outrank the other by standarth or in everything, for example imagine a slowbro with this setup used for defensive roles -->
Iron defense, rest, surf, blizard and Evs in defense and HP
and then imagine a blastoise with this exact same setup used for this same role.
Of course in this situation a slowbro will outrank a blastoise because slowbro has more defense and HP stats by standarth and they are using the exact same moves and their abilities has little impact in fulfiling this particular role. However, before saying that slowbro outrank blastoise by a rule understand that blastoise can also fill this exact same rule using another moveset, one with for example dragon tail or instead of blizzard, and think about it, slowbro can't learn dragon tail. So imagine a situation in wich you will need a pokémon for this role but especificaly with the move dragon tail, to spoil or oponent's strategy or just to further defense yourself, since your oponent could just buff himself when he realize you will make the most of iron defense and rest. A slowbro wouldn't be able to counter that, but a blastoise using dragon tail would. So in the end, in a situation in wich a move like dragon tail (for example, cause it could have alot of other combinations regarding moves, abilities and maybe even more) will be needed, a blastoise will be better for this exact same role, but in a situation in wich would be best using the moveset described for slowbro earlier that blastoise can also learn, slowbro would be best. So in the end, none of the two outrank the other for this especific role by standarth, each can outrank the other for this especific role only in a especific situation. And after knowing all this, things still go further becase both blastoise and slowbro can't only fill one role, each of them can fill several, and among thoose several, many of them are things that only one of the two can. So none outrank the other by standarth, is the exat same thing with other pokémons.
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Resume: In my explanation i may have generalized, because maybe there is an exception for what i said there. I may be wrong but maybe in incredible very rare situations, maybe one pokémon can outrank the other in everything, but i'm not sure about this!
But in general, if someone tell you that a pokémon outrank the other simple as that, the odds of he being wrong is incredibly high. However if a person say to you that one pokémon outrank the other in a especific situation, he can be right or wrong, depending on the situation given.
Mar 13
by
Hórus
About keeping a team of only six pokémon for ingame journey:
Many people have the false conception that they need to keep a team of only
six pokémons, always! However this conception is wrong.
Is not hard to use more than six pokémon for ingame, i frequently see many people strugling to keep a team of only six, even when they clearly need both of the pokémons in wich they want to remove one among them to keep only six. And the right answer for this question is that they should just keep them both! If their team become seven pokémon or more instead of six, is ok!
Many of them worry because of Exp and things like that, however the gameplay of thoose kind of games, is around the player stop and grind once a while anyway. Even for the people who just want to strugle with the exp they will gain battling NPC only, they will eventualy have to stop to grind at least one or two times in their ingame journey on older pokémon games, at least before the elite four and champion battles and their rematches.
The point is that you don't need to strugle for XP, you just have to grind whenever you need, that also means that the number of pokémons you have will barely made any difference regarding XP, and from generation six onward, you can even have a team of something like fiveteen for example and maybe never have to grind because of the exp share/all and looks alike mechanic there. But even if you are indeed able to use alot more than just six with no problem on your ingame journey, that doesn't mean you actualy need to use more than six pokémons.
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So in resume: If you need more than six pokémons on your ingame team or just want to have more than six because you have fun in using more than six, go ahead and use more than six, never limitate yourself to only six, if you need more or just want to have more! However if you don't need more than six pokémons on your particular teams and setups and is having fun in having six or less, go ahead and have six or less! Sometimes even having less than six pokémons works just fine. But having good sense is imporntant, sometimes having something like "Twenty" pokémons on your ingame journey, even if it works fine, (cause you just have to grind to be good) it may slow you down when you you have to grind, most especificaly in older games. So in this situation if spend a bit more time grinding is not a problem for you, just have any number you want! (The game doesn't give you any bad outcome just because you spend more time grinding) But if you do care about how much time you spend grinding, not exceeding a number like twelve/thirteen could be a good limite for your particular taste.
Mar 13
by
Hórus
A wrong ideia is that moves like fire blast for example are worse than moves like flametrower cause they have less accuracy.
People who believe this are wrong. The explanation is actualy very simple, is a matter of math.
If you have a move with 90 base power that always hit and you does hit your oponent, there is still a great chance that him can survive, retaliate and even beat you one hit. Simple as that! However if you hit him with a more powerfull move the odds of him of him surviving and retaliate are much less likely. And some think but if you miss the hit? If you miss the hit the odds of your oponent surviving a 90 base power that could hit and beat you in one hit is very high, so you would take damage or even be beaten even if you had hitted with the 90 base power move, so if you understands this, it makes no sense in being afraid of that.
Also a move with 85% Accuracy means it will hit 8.5 times in 10 times, so the odds of you hitting your target is actualy very high, even for people who are too much afraid of the misses.
And also, most of the pokémon games if not all works with percentage for some things, include the STAB feature. If a STAB increase the move base power by 50% when you use a move that match the type of the pokémon using it. The 50% of a higher value will be much more than the 50% of a small value. That means that in the end, the increase in damage is too much to not take into consideration.
Jan 14
by
Hórus
Alot of people avoid moves like Hyper bean, Giga impact, Sky attack and alike believing that these kind of moves are bad because it require two turns to attack and make you unable to attack on the next turn and that this halves their damage on two turns for example. Some people say that Hiper bean is bad cause is was if you use a move of 75 base power two times.
However they are wrong! They don't understand that the point of thoose kind of moves are to beat enemies with one hit and not more than one beside some other things. For example, imagine a situation in which if you hit your oponent with a 100 base power move he not only survive but also retaliate back and worse! Beat you one hit! If you just had use a move with 150 base power you would just beat him in one hit and he wouldn't survive to retaliate and cause damage on you or even worse to beat you! Can you understand now the maim point of thoose kind of moves? If your oponent doesn't have more pokémon to use or you is in the ingame journey you have even an easy way in using cause, if he doesn't have more pokémon to use, the battle end and the recharge time of your pokémon will mean nothing, also if you are in the ingame you can just change your pokémon when your oponent is about to sent another, cause they ask if you want to change pokémons. Even if you waren't on this situations, this kind of moves would still be very important on the situation they are needed and it does happen often.
Some of them like sky attack even work well with power herb and can hit right alway to serve the same purpose as the others with recharge time but without making you have to recharge next, it means you doesn't even lost a turn in using it properly.
The only situation in wich moves like sky attack and solar bean would be bad it would be in the generation of games in wich items like power herb didn't exist yet. In this situation they would only be good if you have time to charge the move and they cause more damage than the other base moves you could have that only have like 40 base power, 50 base power. Then a solar bean would be like two turns of a 60 base power move. In a situation in wich you only require two hits of 60 base power he would serve that purpose better than have to hit an enemie with three or more times with moves of 50, 40 base power for example. Sometimes the odds of your pokémon enduring a hit and retaliate later beating an enemy in one hit are better than him keep hitting, but his hits just doesn't have enought power to beat the oponent before he beats you. However this is just a example, moves like sky attack and solar bean work very nicely and much more better than before thanks to moves like sunny day, abilities that make the weather sunny, items like power herb and alike.
Some of these moves was outranked by other moves in older generations and had their eficient related to the moves you currently had acces at the moment. But in later generations, all of them are very good!
I definitely recomend moves like Hyper bean, Giga impact, Sky attack in alot of setups.
Jan 10
by
Hórus
I noticed that alot of people ran jolly or timid on any pokémon with 70 or around base speed, just because they believe that being able to act first is more important than other related things, so i'll teach the ones who want to know this right.
Being able to act first is important indeed, however being able to resist damage, cause damage, purposely using your move as last and many other related things are also equaly important. And more important than all! Diversity! The diversity is the most important factor. So you will much more better suited builiding your pokémon to do what he does best (Who usualy makes the most of one of two of his base stats, which in many cases may not be speed stat, even if he is speed is high)
For example: Non mega metagrós has 70 base speed stat, however he has 135 base attack and 130 base defense. This means if you are EV training him on attack and speed, you will not only be outspeeded alot by pokémons who have higher base speed stat, that are many! But you will also be avoid his innate strenght, that is his impressive 130 base defense!
If you EV train an adamant metagrós on attack and defense he will be much better suited than a metagrós with attack and speed. An metagrós with attack and speed will still be useful but only in very few situations. By standarth he is better if you maximize what he is already good at doing, instead of avoiding it.
The only situations in which you should EV train him on other combination of stats is to fulfill different roles. (Not his maim one, that is causing damage using physical moves. And use him for this role using EV in speed and attack instead of Attack and def for example, is avoiding his innate powerfull way of fullfiling that role and focusing on a whay he cannot do very well, that only be usefull in very few situations and most especificaly because you don't have acces to a pokémon that is an expert in speed and you need someone with a bit of speed in the moment)
Another very important thing: Most of the pokémon games, if not all. Works with a system of increase and decrease in percentage on alot of things. For example:
The STAB works increasing the move that matchs the type of the pokémon with a 50% increase, the nature increase and decrease a giving stat by 10%.
When you understand this you know that 50% and 10% of a high value is alot more than the 50% and 10% of a lower value.
That means the different in power from a hit of fire blast from a fire type pokémon is significantly more than a hit from flametrower for example. Is not a small difference!
Also means that the 10% increase of 135 base attack stat from a high leveled, fully EV trained and high IV stats adamant metagrós for example will make him have incredible alot more attack stat than an high leveled, fully EV trained, with high IV stat jolly metagrós. So knowing this, you know that you can build a pokémon with a very high stat or just build him with several low stats. And is much better be good at one thing than be rasoble in alot of things. Like having razoable good speed stat, when you can have incredibly good attack and def.
The diversity is one of the most important things, if you try to make the most of each pokémon, build him to do what only he can do, or the best thing he can do among all the things he can do, eventualy you will have perfect pokémons each perfect for a particular role or situation, but if you always try do build all your pokémons to be good at the same thing, paying atention only on his small differences, you will have alot of razoable pokémons but no even a single good pokémon!
A good example of building diversity is that staraptor is fast and have more base attack stat than speed, talonflame is fast and have more speed stat than attack. They bear alot of similaritiesm but a true professional will understand in what each one will shine more than the other. There will be situations in which the speed of an adamant staraptor will be enought but his alot more attack stat than talonflame will be a necessity and the oposite is also right, sometimes the base attack stat of a jolly talonflame will be enought, but his alot more speed stat will be a necessity. So knowing this a person who knows how to make the best of each and even have acces to both pokémon for fulling their maim roles, would always ran adamant staraptor and jolly talonflame, and will never in any situation say that one outrank the other. (I'm talking about what each one can do best because is the current subject but of course each can also be run with other natures and builds to fulfill other roles)
Try to learn this and avoid a pokémon's innate strenght only in a very situational situation in which he is the only one that you have acces and you need him to do that job cause you doesn't have acces to pokémon who would fulfill that role better. Otherwise, always try to make the most of your pokémon strong points instead of avoid them.
Jan 10
by
Hórus