wraith89 Posted March 21, 2011 Posted March 21, 2011 Pokemon Black/White In-Game Movesets Guide by Nobody ImportantWraith89 [icon]018[/icon]Stuff No One Cares AboutOpening Credits Just like the old movies. I'm so old fashioned Firstly, I would like to give credits where credits are due. Cast of Characters: [shinysprite]186[/shinysprite] [hgsssprite]162[/hgsssprite] [hgsssprite]164[/hgsssprite] [shinysprite]448[/shinysprite] [sprite]359[/sprite] [sprite]150[/sprite] [hgsssprite]109[/hgsssprite] [hgsssprite]246[/hgsssprite] [hgsssprite]001[/hgsssprite] [sprite]386-1[/sprite] ParaDoX65: For proofreading this atrociously large guide I wrote with a bit of carelessness in many ways. I've been stressed out a lot this week and without the help of peers, this would look a lot messier than it does right now. He also got rid of the troll movesets I made when I was in a bad mood. Also, he is the one who uploaded ALL of those Pokemon sprites into Imageshack. Until Project Pokemon gets a sprite tag for Black and White Pokemon, we will have to use these. This would not have been possible without all his efforts, so please remember to thank ParaDoX65. Tbird: For being a bumFor looking into my whole guide when it was in its infancy. Well, since he has not been online for the whole Friday and Saturday, I allowed ParaDoX65 to do the revising instead. UnderXRay: For giving me insights about some Pokemon I have not played with, such as Zoroark, Excadrill, Gigalith, Krookodile, etc. Again, many thanks. Gin: Because I quoted him. He plays a lot of Competitive Battling though instead of in-game though. Why am I giving credits to him again? o_o Mewtwo EX: He sparked my interest in Black and White first by showing me the new Pokemon. I thought of them dull and uninspiring at first, and thanks to him, I thought of them as dull and uninspiring. Wait, nothing changed? Anyways, it's him that got me to do this whole Pokemon Black/White thing by showing me Reshiram and Zekrom first and then others like UnderXRay and Tbird reinforced it. Smogon University: I know they are a competitive battling community, but they also sparked my interest in Generation V. Pokemon Online: For giving me more knowledge of how the Generation V Pokemon work. This was the ultimate factor for my Generation V interest, more than anything else. I still hate it and think it's rather unsteady, but regardless, playing the whole thing is fun rather than just analysing everything. This was when everyone was running Doryuzuu or Shandera or Roobushin or Nattorei and Burungel... ha ha good times. Thanks to Gin, Tbird, Mewtwo EX, CuleX, and a few others who spent a lot of time in Pokemon Online with me until we gradually lost interest. Bulbapedia: For a lot of Pokemon information, including level up moves, hereditary moves, and the sprites ParaDoX65 ripped from them. Project Pokemon: It's obvious I'm not a fan "for the people", but I guess y'all are the reason why I took the time writing this. I have to hand it to you that because many of you were just as disappointed at the new Pokemon I took the pain and decided to analyse every single Pokemon obtainable in game by myself. [icon]018[/icon]Introduction Some people tend to ask the question "What Pokemon should I use to go through the game and how should I do this?" I would normally say "use the Pokemon that appeals to you the most", but there are many fallacies to that, as there are only 6 slots in a team and some people like more than 6 Pokemon to keep them in a team or some people just hate the new Pokemon and want to just get through the game with whatever works. I know... the new Pokemon are uninspiring and it becomes difficult to find something to use because of xenophobia (fear of foreigners), but it's time to meet them and see what they can do for you. I know, no old friends is disappointing for veterans, but fortunately, they come after you beat the game. This is a thread to guide you into teambuilding throughout the game, but keep in mind this is how I rate their usefulness and create their movesets: In-Game as in Pre-National Dex: I will not cover Post-National Dex for now, but maybe in the future I will. EV/IV and Nature are not important: Playing Pokemon in-game is completely different from playing Pokemon competitively. Yes, competitive players will probably stare in horror as they realise my Serperior has 37/160/40/42/10/112 EVs in her stats, along with 16/15/26/1/27/3 IVs and a Hardy nature, but if we are playing in game, who cares about having perfect stats or whatnot? Outside of those specialised battle facilities, in-game trainers do not even run EVs on their Pokemon, and EV training and calculating EXACTLY how much stats you should have to outpace X or OHKO Y is just tedious and takes the fun out of the game. In other words, forget about it. Also, as for natures, this is something you can control of course, but I'm not going to soft reset 9001 times just to get a, I don't know, a Modest Oshawott when I keep getting Gentle or Lax or something. For me, what I get is what I get and it really doesn't matter much. If it bothers you a lot, then neutral natures are OKAY, and you would probably want to stay away from hindering natures if possible. Dream World Abilities: For the time being I will not consider Dream World Abilities only because not everyone has access to Dream World Pokemon. Hereditary Moves: I will not consider hereditary moves in these in-game movesets, as they require breeding and will probably slow the player down a lot. However, breeding is very important for competitive battling, but this is not competitive battling. This doesn't mean you cannot get hereditary moves for yourself, it just means I will not cover it in this guide. Overall Stats and Ability: Usually this determines how useful a Pokemon is by their ability and their overall base stats. Starters tend to have well-rounded stats in general, legendaries tend to have exceptional stats, while common Pokemon such as Patrat tend to have less than stellar stats. However, keep in mind some Pokemon have abilities to assist their stats that hinder them (such as Azumarill with Huge Power, though this is Black/White and Azumarill is nowhere to be found, but that is an example) Natural Movepool/TM Compatibility: Another factor to consider in a moveset, of course, are what they learn! This can be either by their natural movelist or TMs that you pick up throughout the game. Keep in mind that I am only dealing with pre-National Dex TMs/HMs for now. Level: By the time you are at the end of the game, I would expect you to be in the high 40s to 50s, so the sets will be appropriately be set as if the Pokemon are in those levels. Availability: This factor is quite important for the Pokemon, as when they are available and how easily they are attained is a key to their usefulness as well. If a powerful Pokemon was not attainable at all, then it would be useless. Format:Picture: MANY THANKS to ParaDoX65 for uploading all the pictures of the new Pokemon into Imageshack when I was too lazy to. This is the picture of the Pokemon obviously. Some people don't know the name of these new Pokemon, and sadly, the majority of the competitive community are still accustomed to their Japanese names to even pay attention to their English versions. Besides, pictures make it much easier to one's eyes and doesn't become a tl;dr like this passage I am writing right now.Pokemon: The name of the PokemonBase Stats: The Pokemon's base stats in this order: HP / Atk / Def / SpA / SpD / SpeAbility: The Pokemon's AbilitiesLocation: Where they are located or how to obtain themRating: Overall rating of the Pokemon due to the factors described above. They turn to either Excellent (A- to A), Good (B- to B+), Satisfactory (C- to C+), Poor (D), or Unsatisfactory (E). NOTE THAT RATING HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE POKEMON'S COMPETITIVE VIABILITY. It is how viable the Pokemon is IN-GAME during the Pre-National Dex part of the game.Recommended Movesets: The point of this mess of a guide I am writing. Keep in mind this is not strict and you are free to make your own movesets of course... more often than not there are times there is a filler slot. It's a mere suggestion to what you could be running, but the degree of freedom is still high. [icon]018[/icon]General Ideas Into Making a Moveset: Know Your Pokemon: You should get to know your Pokemon before using it. Get to know their stats and what their abilities are and try to see what works best for them. For example, running special attacks on Darmanitan would be foolish because of its incredibly low special attack while physical attacks would be a lot better from that insane 140 base attack. STAB (Same Type Attack Boost): ALWAYS take advantage of this nifty mechanic. When a Pokemon uses an attack that is the same type as themselves, they gain a 1.5x boost, which is always nice. So it is definite that a Pokemon should run STAB attacks. However, keep in mind of your Pokemon's stats. Like, you do not want to run Fire Blast on Darmanitan because of that incredibly low Special Attack, but run Fire Punch instead because it is a physical Fire attack. That is just an example. Main Moves With More PP and Decent Base Power Win Out: When I say decent I mean something like at least 70ish or above. There are exceptions, such as 60 BP moves that get powered with Technician, for example. It usually depends on the abilities. Usually, I would suggest against high powered moves, because they always come with drawbacks such as low accuracy or low PP or both. For example, Fire Blast has a high base power of 120 BP, but an accuracy of 85% and 5 PP, which is less than ideal for in game as there are MANY Pokemon to fight. A safer alternative comes in the form of Flamethrower or Flame Burst, which are both of decent power and have 15 PP, but do not stick with things like Ember in the end, because it is really weak, in spite of that 25 PP. So the general idea is to not stick with the extremes, but somewhere near the middle. Try Not To Run Two or More of the Same Type Moves In One Set: It may come to a surprise to you that Ember, Flamethrower, Heat Stamp, Flare Blitz Emboar is not the best set you can run on it. It is always better to have moves of different typing so your Pokemon can deal with some foes it would otherwise have trouble beating much better than it would by running the same moves over. This rule is much more strict in Competitive Battling than in-game, however, so there are many exceptions to this rule. One exception is if two moves have different effects while one is a main move and the other is an auxiliary move. Example would be Flame Charge + Flamethrower, for example, as Flame Charge's main purpose is NOT to do damage, but to raise a Pokemon's speed that would otherwise be inadequate, such as Emboar. Flamethrower would be the main move. Return + Quick Attack is another example, as Return would be the main move, but Quick Attack is a good finisher especially if the Pokemon is normally slower than its foes. Another example would be a Pokemon who can run both attack and special attack with little problems, knowing that there are many Pokemon with radically different stats in their physical defence and special defence. Example would be Surf + Aqua Tail from Carracosta, for example. Or a strange example in the form of Psyshock and Psychic, as the former deals with Pokemon with lower special defence while the latter is usually the main move and deals with Pokemon with higher physical defence. Another reason is if the Pokemon simply has very little other options to use. Cryogonal, for example, has little to work with otherwise so running Ice Beam and Frost Breath in the same set is not uncommon, not to mention Ice Beam has a relatively low PP so it may cause problems if all it uses is Ice Beam. How To Deal With Non-Attack Moves: While Competitive Battling emphasizes on having powerful set up moves to subdue your opponent, could the same be true for in-game battling? I mean, isn't just straight out attacking better in-game? You're right, it absolutely is, and running all attack moves is not uncommon in-game and I do that quite a lot too. However, there are MANY Pokemon who learn set up moves and it would not be smart to relinquish an opportunity to make that Pokemon stronger than it already is. Also, some Pokemon were designed to utilise set up moves to actually win out, such as Serperior. With pretty high defences and a low offensive movepool and rather mediocre attack power and high speed, you wouldn't think they added Growth and Coil for no reason. If you did not run a set up move, what else would fit into its moveset? You would probably have a bunch of Grass and Normal moves, which does not look all too great. Some Pokemon do fine without setting up stat boosts, such as Emboar. But... aren't you giving your foes a free turn when you set up while they continue busting your Pokemon? Yes, but unlike competitive battling, there are TWO main factors that you have to remember. One, the AI will usually NOT switch out their Pokemon, so Setting Up on a Pokemon that you have an advantage of makes it a lot easier. For example, set up Serperior's Coil against a Pokemon that uses not very effective Ground attacks, such as Krokorok or something. And the second factor is the ITEM factor. That's right, you can use your Hyper Potions or Full Restores if your set up Pokemon looks like it is going to go down the next turn. Setting up is usually reserved for tough or important battles, but it is also quite good in regular trainer battles too, and helps you learn new strategies. But be wary that if you attempt setting up in competitive battling, it is best that you know your opponents and know WHEN and WHAT to set up before they switch in a counter and foil all attempts on setting up. The game's AI may encourage "greedy" set ups, and while that works in-game it may prove detrimental against other people. Nonetheless, I digress and my final verdict is that non-attacking moves will prove useful no matter it be in-game or competitive battling. The Pokemon Listed Are In a Certain Order!: It seems that the Unova Pokedex are listed on when the player can first attain each Pokemon, as they are all in a regional group. For example, Joltik and Ferroseed are near each other in the Pokedex, because both are obtainable in Chargestone Cave. Let this help you on finding which Pokemon you may want to have in a certain area within the game. MOVESETS HERE ARE FINALISED: This means this is the moveset recommended to use during the Elite 4 or acquire during that time unless otherwise stated (such as utility Pokemon). But as stated above, you are free to change it around to whatever you desire. Suggestions are ALWAYS welcome: As long as they comply to the "pre-National Dex" and "no hereditary moves" requirement, I'm all ears. [icon]018[/icon]Pre-National Dex TM Locations TM02 Dragon Claw: Victory Road TM05 Roar: Route 10 (must have Surf... I think) TM07 Hail: Mistralton PokeMart for 50000 TM10 Hidden Power: Professor Juniper in Nuvema Town will give you after seeing at least 100 Pokemon TM11 Sunny Day: Mistralton Pokemart for 50000 TM12 Taunt: Victory Road. No use in-game as everything just attacks. Really. TM14 Blizzard: Icirrus City Pokemart for 70000 TM15 Hyper Beam: Department Store in Route 9 for 90000 TM16 Light Screen: Nimbasa City Pokemart for 30000 TM17 Protect: Professor Juniper in Nuvema Town will give you after seeing at least 60 Pokemon TM18 Rain Dance: Mistralton Pokemart for 50000 TM19 Telekinesis: Route 18. Little use in-game. TM20 Safeguard: Nimbasa City Pokemart for 30000 TM21 Frustration: Nimbasa City Pokemart for 10000. Generally you want to use Return. TM22 Solarbeam: Pinwheel Forest. You need to catch Cobalion first to unlock the eastern side of Pinwheel Forest. TM23 Smack Down: Battle Subway for 36 BP TM24 Thunderbolt: P2 Laboratory TM25 Thunder: Icirrus City Pokemart for 70000 TM27 Return: Nimbasa City Pokemart for 10000 TM28 Dig: Route 4 (house near Desert Resort) TM30 Shadow Ball: Relic Castle (during Team Plasma takeover) TM31 Brick Break: Icirrus City PokeCenter (old woman) TM33 Reflect: Nimbasa City Pokemart for 30000 TM34 Sludge Wave: Battle Subway for 48 BP TM36 Sludge Bomb: Route 8 TM37 Sandstorm: Mistralton City Pokemart for 50000 TM38 Fire Blast: Icirrus City Pokemart for 70000 TM39 Rock Tomb: Desert Resort TM40 Aerial Ace: Mistralton City. Beat the gym and talk to the kids in the house behind the Pokemon Center. Then look at the top left area near the Greenhouses. TM41 Torment: Route 4. Don't bother. TM42 Facade: Route 8 TM43 Flame Charge: Cylinder Bridge TM44 Rest: Castelia City TM45 Attract: Castelia City TM46 Thief: Wellspring Cave TM47 Low Sweep: Wellspring Cave (must have Surf) TM48 Troll Round: Battle Subway for 36 BP TM49 Echo Voice: Nimbasa City Musical Hall (girl at right) TM51 Ally Switch: Battle Subway for 48 BP. You won't ever use this, methinks. TM52 Focus Blast: Wellspring Cave (must have Surf) TM54 False Swipe: Professor Juniper in Nuvema Town will give you after seeing at least 30 Pokemon TM55 Scald: Cold Storage. It is invisible to your eyes when you first come in but it's at the bottom right area of the first ice floor. TM56 Fling: Route 9. Some random baseball player will throw it at you as soon as you enter the route. Nice guy? Fling is not too useful in-game. TM57 Charge Beam: Route 7 (NPC Girl) TM58 Sky Drop: Mistralton City near an airplane TM59 Incinerate: Battle Subway for 48 BP. Like Struggle Bug, do not bother, BUT it does have the merit of hitting both enemies in double battles, but still, usage is limited. TM60 Quash: Battle Subway for 48 BP. Useless except in doubles / triples, but generally not used. Also, no Generation V Pokemon can learn this move, making it the most useless TM for in-game. It is troll. TM61 Will-o-Wisp: Celestial Tower TM62 Acrobatics: Mistralton City Gym TM63 Embargo: Dragonspiral Tower. TM64 Explosion: Battle Subway for 48 BP TM65 Shadow Claw: Celestial Tower TM66 Payback: Route 16 TM67 Retaliate: Nacrene City Gym TM68 Giga Impact: Department Store in Route 9 for 90000 TM70 Flash: A guy's gonna mug you in the alley in Castelia City. Scary encounter... TM72 Volt Switch: Nimbasa City Gym TM73 Thunder Wave: Nimbasa City Pokemart for 10000 TM74 Gyro Ball: Nimbasa City Pokemart for 10000 TM76 Struggle Bug: Castelia City Gym, quite useless of a TM in my opinion. You will probably NEVER use this. Gamefreak please think before replacing something like Stealth Rocks with a move like this! TM77 Psych Up: Battle Subway for 48 BP TM78 Bulldoze: Driftveil City Gym TM79 Frost Breath: Icirrus City Gym TM80 Rock Slide: Mistralton Cave TM81 X-Scissor: Route 7 TM82 Dragon Tail: Opelucid City Gym TM83 Work Up: Straiton City Gym TM84 Poison Jab: Route 6 TM86 Grass Knot: Pinwheel Forest TM87 Swagger: Battle Subway for 36 BP TM88 Pluck: Battle Subway for 36 BP TM90 Substitute: Apparently only available in Winter at Twist Mountain, but I never got it yet TM91 Flash Cannon: Twist Mountain TM93 Wild Charge: Victory Road TM94 Rock Smash: Pinwheel Forest TM95 Snarl: Event Only TM... and it isn't that great anyways HM01 Cut: Straiton City, Fennel HM02 Fly: Driftveil City, Bianca HM03 Surf: Twist Mountain, Alder HM04 Strength: Nimbasa City, the house at the top left of the Pokemon Center. This HM is so easily missable, but do NOT miss it because now you know where it is HM05 Waterfall: Route 18 Continued Below...
wraith89 Posted March 21, 2011 Author Posted March 21, 2011 (edited) [icon]018[/icon]Pokemon Movesets Snivy/Servine/Serperior Base Stats: 45/45/55/45/55/63 60/60/75/60/75/83 75/75/95/75/95/113 Abilities: Overgrow Location: One of the starters offered to you by Professor Juniper. Snivy will evolve at level 17, Servine will evolve at level 36. Rating: Good (B) - Serperior's stats are decent like most starters. She has a defensive leaning, which is odd because this thing does not look like it, and yet she is. She is also the fastest starter of the three Unova starter, and outpaces the majority of other Pokemon encountered in this game. Use that to your advantage. - Movepool is rather poor. All she learns are grass moves which is pretty much resisted by the majority of the game. Her only coverage move from the beginning to Nimbasa Town is Tackle or Slam if one is gutsy. TM27 is highly recommended starting from Nimbasa Town. Even in the end, this starter is the only one aside from Samurott who does not learn Earthquake. USE GROWTH in the beginning as that move is Snivy's saving grace to boost her mediocre attack power up. You may replace with Coil later as a Servine, depending on your tastes. - It is also to be noted that Serperior has a disadvantage against 5 gyms in Unova while having a clear advantage in only one. Overall, she is not all too bad because she can take hits well and can boost her attacking power, but she does not have a large movepool to back it up. She is more suited competitively and is better off setting up for in-game battles. She requires SKILL to play, and is rewarding if you can pull it off. If you want a Pokemon that just attacks, I would suggest you select Tepig instead. Movesets: Lilith Serperior @ Miracleseed Ability: Overgrow - Return - Coil - Leaf Blade - Giga Drain / Leaf Storm / Dragon Tail This is the moveset I used for my Serperior in game. The idea is simple: when you see a set up bait Pokemon such as the many Ground Pokemon or Water Pokemon who can hardly damage you, Coil up to raise Serperior's Attack and Defense and Accuracy simultaneously and laugh as their attacks do measly damage. When Serperior has taken enough beating, proceed to Giga Drain your foe to gain health again and when that foe is down, use boosted Leaf Blades or Returns to sweep an entire team. You can be gutsy and leave Serperior at low health to active Overgrow to further empower Leaf Blade's damage. This strategy is VERY effective against N's final roster (aside from Reshiram, but very easy to set up against Zekrom). If you do not like Giga Drain, there is always Leaf Storm to deal with things with higher physical defence and the Coil Up will ensure Leaf Storm will hit. Dragon Tail is there as an option for laughs to force a switch on a foe, but beware of its negative priority (meaning you will move last). This set is very practical and highly recommended, but it is very susceptible to critical hits that just happens to hit every now and then so be wary when setting up. The Sun King Serperior @ Heat Rock / Miracleseed Ability: Overgrow - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Growth - Return This is a set suggested by Tbird, who is planning on using this set. Solarbeam can be found in Pinwheel Forest if you wanted to know and Sunny Day is a purchasable TM later in the game (the city's name escapes me atm). The idea is to set up Sunny Day and empower Serperior with Growth the next turn, which becomes + 2 Attack and Special Attack in the sun. When ready, fire off super powered STAB Solarbeams and Return as an auxiliary move. When done right, this set is more powerful than the set mentioned above, but be wary of taking extra damage from Fire Attacks in the sun, which Serperior hates. Tepig/Pignite/Emboar Base Stats: 65/63/45/45/45/45 90/93/55/70/55/55 110/123/65/100/65/65 Abilities: Blaze Location: One of the starters offered to you by Professor Juniper. Tepig will evolve at level 17, Pignite will evolve at level 36. Rating: Excellent (A) - Emboar's stats are very offensively leaned and defensively, Emboar is no slouch either, boasting a large base 110 HP stat. His offenses are good in both sides of the spectrum. However, his downfall is that low speed of his (the slowest Unova starter) and his low defences, which is somewhat compensated for his high HP. - Movepool is great. Emboar learns all sorts of moves which can help improve coverage against the Pokemon he hates and gains STAB in both Fire and Fighting. Only problem is that he learns only Arm Thrust as his natural Fighting move, but a Heart Scale can get him Hammer Thrust, and there are plenty of good Fighting type TMs out there such as Brick Break or Focus Blast. He is the only Unova starter with access to Earthquake, but unfortunately, that can be attained after the E4. - Overall, this pig is worth getting, as he has advantage against three gyms in Unova and has the tools to mess with those he has trouble against. Certainly he is no slouch and they would say he is the "easy mode" of this game. Yeah playing with him is too easy. Movesets: Angry Suicidal Bacon Emboar @ Charcoal Ability: Blaze - Heat Crash / Flare Blitz - Head Smash / Rock Slide / Flamethrower - Wild Charge / Flamethrower - Low Sweep / Hammer Arm This set is "suicidal" because of all the recoil moves suggested, meaning Emboar will take TONS of damage from all the recoil done. While it is not practical, he will certainly get the job done by showing off that 123 base attack power and the enormous base power these attacks have. Flare Blitz is your primary Fire STAB move and will certainly dent anything that does not resist it. Because Emboar learns it at level 62 and some of us will not reach that level, Heat Crash is another viable option. Wild Charge takes care of flying or water Pokemon that dare stand in Emboar's way, and Head Smash will do the same to fliers if Wild Charge does not OHKO them for some reason. If recoil does not look fun, then go ahead and replace it with Rock Slide (found in Mistralton Cave), whose flinch rate works great with Low Sweep. Low Sweep is your Fighting STAB so that opponents will be slowed down, usually enough to be slower than Emboar himself, but if you do not care about that speed reduction, Hammer Arm is your most powerful Fighting STAB, but it does the opposite by lowering your OWN speed. Nitro-Pack Elemental Pig Emboar @ Charcoal Ability: Blaze - Flame Charge - Flamethrower / Fire Blast - Scald - Grass Knot The name Nitro-Pack comes from the fact Flame Charge is called Nitro Charge in Japan. This set actually looks pretty interesting as Emboar is the only starter that has access to Fire, Water, and Grass moves! Flame Charge is there so Emboar can become faster and then go ahead and choose between the three elemental moves. Flamethrower is your STAB move and it is the common power vs accuracy argument for your choice between Flamethrower and Fire Blast. Be warned, however, that Fire Blast has only 5 PP to burn. Scald is a good water attack and it deals with other Fire Pokemon and has 30% chance of burning other Pokemon. The TM is in Cold Storage. Grass Knot is found in Pinwheel Forest and is there to deal with Water Pokemon, who are usually heavy enough to take heavy damage from Grass Knot. This, however, leaves you with no options to deal with Dragons, who are prevalent in the 8th gym. You can replace the last two moves with Focus Blast if you desire a special Fighting STAB move, though you would probably prefer Brick Break. Working Bacon Emboar @ Charcoal Ability: Blaze - Work Up - Brick Break / Focus Blast - Heat Crash / Flamethrower - Grass Knot / Flamethrower I know I know... so many slashes makes this look unappealing, but this at least can make use of Work Up, which raises both Attack and Special Attack. You have many choices here, but keep in mind that if you only use Fire and Fighting attacks, you have no tools to deal with Jellicent, who can be taken down after adequate set up with Grass Knot, but against the Ghost specialising Elite 4 it is pretty hard to set up, but whatever... it still hurts other Water Pokemon hard. Bacon in the Sun Emboar @ Heat Rock / Charcoal Ability: Blaze - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Flamethrower / Fire Blast - Heat Stamp / Low Sweep / Brick Break / Flame Charge Use Sunny Day to power up Emboar's own Fire moves, weaken Water moves, and fire back Solarbeams to deal with Water Pokemon. However, keep in mind that unlike Serperior, Emboar is really slow so this could leave him open to assaults while setting up. Low Sweep can help reduce the speed of opponents before attempting a set up, but if you are going to set up, do it to the right opponent. Oshawott/Dewott/Samurott Base Stats: 55/55/45/63/45/45 75/75/60/83/60/60 95/100/85/108/70/70 Abilities: Torrent Location: One of the starters offered to you by Professor Juniper. Oshawott evolves at Level 17, Dewott evolves at Level 36. Rating: Excellent (A) - Samurott's stats are very well rounded in offence and defence. While Samurott is a bit on the slow side, he is usually fast enough to deal with the game and can reliably defeat many of his opponents, as it is hard to OHKO this Samurai otter. - Movepool is slightly lacking, but regardless, he has enough to work around with. He has both physical and special attacks to deal with his foes and just the right tools to utilise his high offences with. He can also run Surf of course. - Overall, Samurott is great in the beginning and reliable through the end, making him a great clean upper due to his movepool and nice offences. He is certainly reliable to have in your team. Movesets: Code of Bushido Samurott @ Mystic Water Ability: Torrent - Swords Dance / Surf - Return / Aqua Jet - Megahorn / X-Scissor - Aqua Tail / Waterfall This is assuming you can reach Lv. 57 to learn Swords Dance. If not, feel free to run Surf. Swords Dance will raise Samurott's Attack by 2 levels, which is basically doubling it, allowing him to fire high powered STAB Aqua Tail and throw Megahorns against Grass Pokemon who come in after you have defeated an opponent. Megahorn is obtained via Heart Scale move tutor. Run X-Scissor if you hate Megahorn missing at times. Return is your other "coverage" move, but if that is not needed, you can try to circumvent Samurott's low speed with priority Aqua Jet, which is just awesome. This set cannot deal with Jellicent though, but even Jellicent will hate boosted Megahorns. I would recommend Waterfall over Aqua Tail if you ventured to Route 18 and picked up the HM because of the accuracy and PP boost. Flaming Katana Samurott @ Mystic Water Ability: Torrent - Scald / Surf - Blizzard - Grass Knot - Return / Aqua Jet / Aqua Tail / Waterfall / Megahorn I fail at naming sets. The only reason I named it Flaming Katana is because Scald can burn your opponents, allowing Samurott to take physical hits better. If you do not care about that, run Surf for better power. I know Ice Beam is infinitely better than Blizzard, but you have no access to Ice Beam pre-National Dex. Sucks right? But this is the best way to deal with that angry Haxorus at the 8th gym who will otherwise sweep your team if you let it. Grass Knot is an option to deal with other Water Pokemon such as Seismitoad. Afterwards, just choose one of the four choices that I put up. Any of them will do as Samurott does not have many other options. Patrat/Watchog Base Stats: 45/55/39/35/39/42 60/85/69/60/69/77 Abilities: Run Away / Keen Eye Illuminate / Keen Eye (starting from Watchog) Location: Try searching the first 3 routes. They also appear in the Dreamyard apparently. Patrat evolves at Level 20. Rating: Satisfactory © - Stats speak for themselves. They blow. They're nearly useless competitively and their abilities do not help either. - Movepool, on the other hand, shines, much like other Normal type Pokemon. They can learn a whole bunch of irritating moves, such as Hypnosis, Confuse Ray, Super Fang, and a whole sort of scary moves. He even learns Crunch early at Level 18, which is very respectable. He is also a VERY useful HM mule, having access to Cut and Strength, and even Flash and Rock Smash. This is probably the only reason you would want to use a Patrat or Watchog unless this guy was your favourite Pokemon or something. - Overall, keep one if you hate it when there are inaccessible places requiring Strength or Cut. This guy is a very good utility Pokemon. As a battler, he shines with his high movepool and annoying moves, but there are better battlers out there. But I will not stop you if he just happens to be your favourite or something or if you are doing a Patrat only run or something ridiculous. He is good early-game, but starts dwindling later. Movesets: Vengeful Rodent Watchog @ Anything Ability: Keen Eyes - Retaliate / Return / Super Fang - Hypnosis / Attract - Confuse Ray / Attract - Crunch / Return If someone from your party faints, Watchog becomes angry that his friend went down. Show your foe who's boss by using STAB Retaliate, becoming effectively base 210 attack for that initial turn he is sent out. If foe is still alive, go ahead and finish off with Crunch or STAB Returns. Hypnosis and Confuse Ray are there to just annoy the opponents. Attract can also accomplish the same thing, and besides, who wouldn't fall for this sexy beast? If you want to make use of his powerful Super Fang, go for it. If you run Return on the last slot, you are completely helpless against Ghosts unless Confuse Ray hax works in favour of you. Busy Rodent Watchog @ Anything Ability: Anything - Cut - Strength - Rock Smash - Flash Yep, you've seen this coming. Utility Watchog. Cut down any trees in your way, move any boulders out of your way, smash boulders that troll you, and light up in the dark. Illuminate can help you encounter more Pokemon if you ever need to while Keen Eyes decreases random encounter chance like a boss. Unlike the other rodents (except Raticate), Watchog cannot learn Surf. Bibarel still outshines it Lillipup/Herdier/Stoutland Base Stats: 45/60/45/25/45/55 65/80/65/35/65/60 85/100/90/45/90/80 Abilities: Vital Spirit / Pickup Intimidate / Sand Rush (starting from Herdier) Location: Search the first 3 routes and I guarantee you they will pop out like crazy. Lillipup evolves at Level 16, Herdier evolves at Level 32. Rating: Good (B+) - Stats are very well rounded, as he is not too slow and he is not fragile either. He also has that beast base 100 attack, which is never bad and can come in handy a lot. Unfortunately, that comes with the price of a very low base Special Attack of 45, which puts into question why Bianca runs Surf on this doggy (the Bianca I face has Samurott so NO EXCUSES). - As for his movepool, it is as good as most of the other Normal type Pokemon and can become quite versatile. He even has the Elemental Fangs as Heart Scale moves once he is Stoutland. - Overall, this loyal doggy can serve you well and can become quite the force since the very beginning of the game. He is very strong and has no real weak points. Now, I know many of you will bash his design and hate him because he looks ugly or something. I thought that too, especially because he is no Arcanine. However, after looking at his Pokedex entries, I can forgive him and now I just love him more. "That thing can go die." ~ Tbird about Stoutland "Stoutland... stupid name for a stupid design right?" ~ UnderXRay about Stoutland "Eh... it's not what I expected." ~ Wraith89 about Stoutland "It rescues people stranded by blizzards in the mountains. Its shaggy fur shields it from the cold." ~ Pokemon Black about Stoutland "This extremely wise Pokémon excels at rescuing people stranded at sea or in the mountains." ~ Pokemon White about Stoutland Opinionated but I know... I just wanted to point something out. Movesets: Dogged Doggy Stoutland @ Anything Ability: Intimidate - Return / Retaliate - Crunch - Ice Fang / Fire Fang - Wild Charge / Thunder Fang This is pretty much the set you would want to end up with Stoutland to make him as effective as possible. Return is the primary STAB option while Retaliate would work if Stoutland wants to avenge a KOd teammate. Crunch is there for Ghosts, and the last two moves are there for extra coverage. While Wild Charge is powerful, it also hurts Stoutland himself, so a safer alternative would be the weaker and less accurate yet no recoil damage Thunder Fang. Wild Charge is found in Victory Road, near the end but you have to slide down just to grab it and climb up again. Work Dog Stoutland @ Anything Ability: Intimidate - Work Up - Return - Crunch - Wild Charge / Fire Fang Similar set to above except with a set up move in the form of Work Up. Wild Charge vs Fire Fang is about power and recoil while Fire Fang has a better coverage than Wild Charge. Parashuffler Stoutland @ Anything Ability: Intimidate - Thunder Wave - Roar - Return - Crunch / Fire Fang A fun concept though I do not know if it is all that practical. However, Thunder Wave is VERY useful for slowing down otherwise scary Pokemon such as Haxorus or Chandelure, and Stoutland has enough bulk to paralyse what he needs to and Roar away to paralyse even more foes. Thunder Wave is purchasable in Nimbasa City and this set works well with Stealth Rocks or Spikes support from a team member, such as Garbodor or Crustle. I know I sound so competitive and whatever, but you can attempt this in-game to get a feel of a familiar strategy in competitive battling. Not recommended over the other sets though as in-game favours offence. Purrloin/Liepard Base Stats: 41/50/37/50/37/66 64/88/50/88/50/106 Abilities: Limber / Unburden Location: Search for the little cat in Route 2 and 3 and even the Dreamyard. The big cat can be found later in Routes 5 and 9. Purrloin evolves at Level 20. Rating: Poor (D) - Stats are actually decent in the offences, being equally powerful on both sides of the spectrum. She is also very fast too with a base speed of 106. Unfortunately for the cat, she is VERY fragile and a powerful blow can either severely dent her or worse, faint her. - Movepool is severely lacking, though not as bad as Serperior's. Although she has set up moves in the form of Nasty Plot and Hone Claws, a fragile Pokemon such as Liepard needs either defences or a better movepool to function well. She has neither. Now why does this not get U-turn? That is trolling. - Overall, this Pokemon can be quite nasty and deal powerful blows against her foes, but she must be handled with care. She is still a popular choice among trainers but she works better competitively rather than for in-game. Note that the poor rating does not mean she is useless, but rather she takes more skill to pull off, and there have been many successful Liepards for in-game. Movesets: Chesire Cat Liepard @ Blackglasses Ability: Limber - Fake Out - Night Slash - Return - Hone Claws / Attract / Sucker Punch Simply put, open up with Fake Out, and continue pounding your enemy with STAB Night Slash or Return. Sucker Punch is your strongest move here, but requires the opponent to use an attacking move to even work. Since Sucker Punch is Lv. 55, you may not be able to access it, so Hone Claws is another option, as it boosts your attack power and accuracy. If setting up does not work, try Attract so you have 50% chance of making the opponent infatuated with your kitty. Either way, you are not getting past Steel Pokemon but this is the best your kitty can do. Tricky Kitty Liepard @ Blackglasses Ability: Limber - Fake Out / Return / Night Slash - Nasty Plot - Shadow Ball - Grass Knot Aren't those Boldores annoying? Problem solved. Watch as they stare in horror as Sturdy is negated via Fake Out and start dealing major damage to them with Grass Knot. If you can pull off a Nasty Plot set up then Liepard is going to hurt a LOT. I know Shadow Ball does not get STAB, but it has the same coverage as Liepard's Dark moves so it is probably your best choice here for a special move. Unfortunately for Liepard, she does not learn Dark Pulse, which I call troll, but at least Shadow Ball hits Fighters neutrally. Everybody Wants To Be A Cat Liepard @ Blackglasses Ability: Limber - Fake Out - Attract - Assist - Night Slash / Return An Assist set. Liepard depends entirely on her teammates here. Just hope the Random Number Goddess is generous here and Assist can be very assisting. However, this is a rather impractical set as Assist is a very random thing, but if you want to have fun just try it out. Pansage/Simisage Base Stats: 50/53/48/53/48/64 75/98/63/98/63/101 Abilities: Gluttony Location: If your starter is Tepig, a girl in Dreamyard gives you a Lv. 10 Pansage. Evolve into Simisage via Leaf Stone. Rating: Satisfactory (C+) - For his stats, just like his two brothers, Simisage has decent offences, high speed, but low defences. - His movepool is largely consisting of Grass moves, but there are a fair share of other types of moves that can be used unlike Serperior. - Overall, Simisage can prove to be a powerful ally and is sure to aid you for your Grass Pokemon need. He's boring though because everyone and their mother seems to have this guy or all three of the elemental monkeys. It's Vine Whip is rather weak, however, and just isn't as good as Serperior. There will be better Grass Pokemon later in-game. Movesets: Physical Green Monkey: Simisage @ None Ability: Gluttony - Acrobatics - Seed Bomb - Crunch - Brick Break / Return The reason for carrying no items is to power Acrobatics, which becomes a whopping base 110 attack... no joke! Seed Bomb is there for STAB and it is very powerful. Use Crunch to deal with Ghosts and at least dent Chandelure if you fight it. Brick Break deals nearly perfect coverage with Crunch (and the two Pokemon it doesn't hit well do not exist in BW and even if they did they are hit by Acrobatics) or you can just run Return. Special Green Monkey: Simisage @ Miracleseed Ability: Gluttony - Work Up - Grass Knot - Focus Blast / Brick Break - Return / Seed Bomb Basically a work up set. With Grass Knot, Boldores get hit for a lot more damage than they would with Seed Bomb, for example. Work Up allows you to power up your physical and special attacks. Use Return for coverage or run Seed Bomb instead. Focus Blast vs Brick Break is up to you and for obvious reasons: former is special and more powerful but less accurate while the latter is physical yet weaker but accurate and can break screens. Annoying Green Monkey: Simisage @ Big Root Ability: Gluttony - Leech Seed - Protect - Dig - Seed Bomb / Return Basically making use of Leech Seed, which the other monkeys do not have access to for obvious reasons. Dig is there to stall along with Protect for some leech seed effect to take place. Seed Bomb or Return for self-defence. Pansear/Simisear Base Stats: 50/53/48/53/48/64 75/98/63/98/63/101 Abilities: Gluttony Location: If your starter is Oshawott, a girl in Dreamyard gives you a Lv. 10 Pansear. Evolve into Simisear via Fire Stone. Rating: Satisfactory (C+) - For his stats, just like his two brothers, Simisear has decent offences, high speed, but low defences. - His movepool is largely consisting of Fire moves, and does not really have the same advantage Emboar has in terms of movepool. However, he has just enough to work with. - Overall, Simisear can prove to be a powerful ally and is sure to aid you for your Fire Pokemon need. He's boring though because everyone and their mother seems to have this guy or all three of the elemental monkeys. Unfortunately, Incinerate is really weak, and he turns out to be the worst of the elemental monkeys in-game, but can prove useful in the 1st, 3rd, and 7th gym. Movesets: Physical Red Monkey: Simisear @ None Ability: Gluttony - Acrobatics - Flame Burst / Fire Blast - Crunch - Brick Break / Return The reason for carrying no items is to power Acrobatics, which becomes a whopping base 110 attack... no joke! Though Flame Burst is not physical, it is Simisear's STAB Fire move of choice. You can run Fire Blast if Flame Burst feels lacking, but beware of low PP. Use Crunch to deal with Ghosts and at least dent Chandelure if you fight it. Brick Break deals nearly perfect coverage with Crunch (and the two Pokemon it doesn't hit well do not exist in BW and even if they did they are hit by Acrobatics) or you can just run Return. Special Red Monkey: Simisear @ Charcoal Ability: Gluttony - Flame Burst / Fire Blast - Yawn / Will-o-Wisp / Work Up - Focus Blast / Brick Break - Grass Knot Main STAB move of choice would be Flame Burst, or Fire Blast, depending on your tastes. Yawn is there to be annoying and to put the other guy to sleep after a while. Or if you want to take physical hits better run Will-o-Wisp. If that is undesirable, use Work Up to boost your attack powers. Focus Blast vs Brick Break is up to you and for obvious reasons: former is special and more powerful but less accurate while the latter is physical yet weaker but accurate and can break screens. Grass Knot deals with some Water Pokemon. Sunny Day Simisear @ Heat Rock / Charcoal Ability: Gluttony - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Flame Burst / Fire Blast - Return / Brick Break / Crunch Another weather variant Pokemon whee. Sunny Day for the obvious WHOO I CAN SOLARBEAM mode and to power up Fire moves and mess with Water moves. Last slot for coverage, yadda yadda yadda. Panpour/Simipour Base Stats: 50/53/48/53/48/64 75/98/63/98/63/101 Abilities: Gluttony Location: If your starter is Snivy, a girl in Dreamyard gives you a Lv. 10 Panpour. Evolve into Simipour via Water Stone. Rating: Good (B-) - For his stats, just like his two brothers, Simipour has decent offences, high speed, but low defences. - His movepool is largely consisting of Water moves, but is similar to Samurott in terms of movepool. However, Simipour has a LOT to work with. - Overall, Simipour can prove to be a powerful ally and is sure to aid you for your Water Pokemon need. He's boring though because everyone and their mother seems to have this guy or all three of the elemental monkeys. This is the best of the elemental monkeys in my opinion, and unlike most other Pokemon games, there is a lack of Water Pokemon, giving you more reasons to use this one. Movesets: Physical Blue Monkey: Simipour @ None Ability: Gluttony - Acrobatics - Surf / Scald - Crunch - Brick Break / Return The reason for carrying no items is to power Acrobatics, which becomes a whopping base 110 attack... no joke! Though Surf is not physical, it is Simipour's STAB Water move of choice. You can run Scald over Surf for a chance of burn, which can be very helpful. Use Crunch to deal with Ghosts and at least dent Chandelure if you fight it. Brick Break deals nearly perfect coverage with Crunch (and the two Pokemon it doesn't hit well do not exist in BW and even if they did they are hit by Acrobatics) or you can just run Return. Special Blue Monkey: Simipour @ Mystic Water Ability: Gluttony - Surf / Scald - Blizzard / Work Up - Focus Blast / Brick Break - Grass Knot Main form of attack is STAB Surf. Use Scald if you want burn chance but it comes with less power and PP. Unfortunately, Ice Beam is NOT available pre-National Dex so you would have to settle with the more powerful Blizzard yet less accurate. If that is undesirable, use Work Up to boost your attack powers. Focus Blast vs Brick Break is up to you and for obvious reasons: former is special and more powerful but less accurate while the latter is physical yet weaker but accurate and can break screens. Grass Knot deals with other Water Pokemon who may just give you trouble. It's Hailing! Simipour @ Icy Rock / Nevermeltice Ability: Gluttony - Hail - Blizzard - Scald / Surf - Grass Knot / Focus Blast Because Blizzard has a terrible accuracy, there is a hail moveset. Mind you, it is less than desirable to hurt yourself just to get Blizzard to become 100% accurate, but this option is always available. I would suggest Grass Knot over Focus Blast because 5 PP low accuracy moves are generally NOT preferred in-game. Munna/Musharna Base Stats: 76/25/45/67/55/24 116/55/85/107/95/29 Location: Dreamyard. Evolve her through Moon Stone. Rating: Poor (D) - Stats look rather strange. Defensively, Musharna is definitely no slouch, as she has high HP and enough defences to weather through assaults. She is entirely one sided in offence and prefers to hit hard with special attacks rather than her pitiful physical attack. However, she is VERY slow and it is unlikely Musharna will attack first without Trick Room assistance. - Movepool is slightly limited but she has just about enough to work with. - Overall, Musharna is a mixed bag and can fit or not fit in your team depending on your tastes. She is not bad by any means but it can take a while to get used to a slow tankish Pokemon. Movesets: Not Drowzee Musharna @ Anything Ability: Synchronize - Hypnosis / Yawn - Nightmare - Dream Eater - Psychic / Psyshock / Shadow Ball You basically put your foe to sleep by method of choice, start casting a Nightmare and then eat their dreams much like her predecessor, Hypno, did. It is an interesting battle strategy and is certainly different from what one is used to in competitive battling or your typical "hit or get hit" Pokemon that run amok in-game. Scary Embryo Musharna @ Anything Ability: Synchronize - Calm Mind / Charge Beam - Shadow Ball / Psyshock - Psychic / Psyshock - Thunder Wave / Moonlight Bear with me despite all these slashes and I will explain. Firstly, the whole point of this Musharna is to boost her Special Attack and Special Defense and let out her power eventually. Charge Beam is there if you want to inflict damage and have 70% chance of raising your Special Attack. The choice between Psychic and Psyshock depends on your foes; are they more physically defensive or special defensive? Shadow Ball is for coverage, but if you don't want Shadow Ball, feel free to run both Psychic moves. Thunder Wave slows down your opponents, but as Musharna is already hopelessly slow, Moonlight is an alternative to restore your lost health during set up. If you are gutsy run Stored Power over Psychic because that move powers up if you have more stat boosts via Calm Mind. Support Musharna @ Anything Ability: Synchronize - Yawn / Hypnosis - Lucky Chant - Thunder Wave - Psychic / Psyshock I know this is not competitive battling, but you can attempt a similar strategy by making your Musharna a pure support Pokemon. I would use this because I'm DEADLY scared of critical hits, and this would grant me 3 turns to set up a Pokemon without fearing the chance of critical hits all because of Lucky Chant (2 turns wasted because of the initial turn casted and the 1 turn switching out). Thunder Wave definitely helps slow opponents down while Hypnosis puts foes to sleep, making Musharna's job easier. The last slot is an attack move because obviously you want Musharna to defend herself if needed to. But 10 PP to attack kind of fails so prepare to give this thing EXP Share if needed. Tapir Behind the Screens Musharna @ Light Clay Ability: Synchronize - Reflect - Light Screen - Safeguard - Psychic / Psyshock Same idea as above, except you are setting up walls to support your teammates. IF you can get a Light Clay, try equipping it so it can help the walls last longer. They are found from Wild Goletts. Same deal, it needs EXP Share. Pidove/Tranquill/Unfezant Base Stats: 50/55/50/36/30/43 62/77/62/50/42/65 80/105/80/65/55/93 Abilities: Big Pecks / Super Luck Location: They are available starting from Route 3 and will be more available later as well. Pidove evolves at Level 21, Tranquill evolves at Level 32. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Stats are actually not too bad as one would think it is. Unfezant has a high attack score of 105 and a decent speed of 93, which can outpace almost a lot of things. His physical defence is pretty decent as well, though his special defence is lacking. His Special Attack is not too good though. - Movepool, however, is a HUGE problem for Unfezant. It is not really what he does not learn that is the problem, but rather what he DOES learn. Many of his moves, as it appears, are SPECIAL. That base attack of 105? What use is it when the moves he learn from the movelist almost exclusively special? Yeah, HUGE problem here, as his physical movepool is nearly barren. - Overall, this is the main bird of Pokemon Black/White... and he is worse than Pidgeot! I did not even think that was possible, but they showed it. Okay, he is not worse than Pidgeot, but he is quite near its efficiency to be precise, but he can still work well in-game, especially during the beginning. What can he do? Movesets: Cricket Killer Unfezant @ Anything Ability: Anything - Return - Quick Attack / Work Up - Fly /Air Slash / Aerial Ace - Roost I pretty much use this set, though since mine is a female, she is not a cricket killer. Believe it or not, Return is the most powerful move in this set, and believe me, Return HURTS, especially when STAB'd. But just in case the opponent survives, Quick Attack is a nice finisher. Work Up is an alternative and I used it throughout the earlier parts of the game, really helping out Unfezant at times when it needs to land that extra oomph. Now we need a Flying STAB. Oh great... too many special moves. Air Slash is the best of them lot, but unfortunately it left a lot to be desired as it would not even 2HKO Scrafty and even left a Chandelure with 1 HP even though I weakened it to red HP beforehand, allowing that Chandelure to basically nearly sweep my team. Because of that apparent weakness, Aerial Ace is a suitable replacement for Air Slash (not only is it physical but it never misses). Fly is also another consideration and is the strongest move possible. Unfortunately, I keep missing with it, but more often than not, it will hit. Last but not least, use Roost to heal up lost health. Both abilities work, though Super Luck is definitely most desired for its critical boost. However, I found Big Pecks so useful in many ways because I found myself contending against Leer and Screech and defence lowering moves such as Crunch, and the lack of defence reduction helped me succeed. Stealing Pidgeot's Thunder Unfezant @ Anything Ability: Big Pecks - Featherdance - Roost - Fly / Air Slash - Return / Quick Attack Similar set to above, except we are using what used to be Pidgeot's signature move: Featherdance. Basically, we are messing with physical attackers' attack power by halving it and roosting off the damage that has been done. Air Slash is for flinching and we have an auxiliary move in the form of Return or Quick Attack, your choice. Since the main goal of this set is to wall off physical attacks, Big Pecks is preferable so that Unfezant's Defence will never lower. Blitzle/Zebstrika Base Stats: 45/60/32/50/32/76 75/100/63/80/63/116 Abilities: Lightningrod / Motor Drive Location: Route 3 for Blitzle, Route 7 for Zebstrika. Blitzle evolves at Level 27. Rating: Satisfactory © - Stats is basically something similar to Liepard, perhaps even better. In fact, I have a feeling his stats were designed to beat Liepard's, which is trolling. Anyways, he is fast but quite fragile, and it is more powerful physically than specially. Special Attacks are still usable, despite what some people say. Also, both of his abilities offer electric immunity, which is not bad at all. - Movepool, however, suffers much like the other electric Pokemon. He has a bunch of electric moves, two fire moves, and really not much else. - Overall, he is not all too great, but if you need an electric Pokemon, this Zebra can serve you quite well. He's fast and can hurt quite a lot. "Look I know my abilities are fun to abuse but ENOUGH ALREADY, look at my hair >_<" ~ UnderXRay Movesets: Quick as Lightning Zebstrika @ Magnet Ability: Lightningrod - Flame Charge / Volt Switch - Thunderbolt / Discharge - Wild Charge / Spark - Return / Stomp / Quick Attack I honestly really don't know much else to do with someone like Zebstrika. Flame Charge can help do a bit of damage against Grass Pokemon, but unless their name was Ferrothorn or Leavanny, Return will do more damage if Zebstrika has max happiness. If that does not appeal, feel free to run Volt Switch so you can switch out of your foe and switch into a counter should there ever be a need to. Discharge is your special Electric attack used for paralysis (not really needed on someone as fast as Zebstrika but can help a teammate). Your main form of attack is probably going to be Wild Charge. However, if that recoil is not appealing, you can always choose the safer alternative in the form of Spark. In spite of the high physical power of the Zebra, Discharge will probably outdamage Spark in many cases. Return is for "coverage", and Quick Attack if you want to finish off foes. I know Stomp looks crazy there, but paralysis + flinch is fun fun fun. Just ask Togekiss. Lightningrod is prefered over Motor Drive on someone as already fast as Zebstrika because Zebstrika can certainly use the Special Attack boost and in those double/triple battles all electric moves aimed at your water type friend are automatically directed at Zebstrika. Motor Drive is still good though so do not fret if you have it. Thunderbolt works over Discharge if you ventured your way to P2 Laboratory. Summer Rain Zebstrika @ Damp Rock / Magnet Ability: Lightningrod - Rain Dance - Thunder - Volt Switch / Wild Charge / Spark - Return / Quick Attack Though Zebstrika can easily set up rain and spam Thunders all it wants to, you would probably want to set up for a teammate. I know, I am thinking competitively again, but don't forget all 6 of your Pokemon are gears working on the same clock to make it function. If one breaks, the others will fall apart. This is for someone who is looking for powering up Samurott or something or a lone Thundering Zebra smashing through an opponent's electrically weak team. Volt Switch is there if you are aiming to support, while Wild Charge would be still a good choice to fight physically weak Pokemon, and again Spark for those who are too young to die. Roggenrola/Boldore/Gigalith Base Stats: 55/75/85/25/25/15 70/105/105/50/40/20 85/135/130/60/70/25 Abilities: Sturdy Location: They are common within caves, much like their predecessor Geodude. UNFORTUNATELY, like Graveler, you need to trade Boldore to evolve it. Roggenrola evolves at Level 25, Boldore evolves through trade. Rating: Good (B) / Satisfactory (C-) as Boldore - Stats are just amazing. Really, it is very amazing as his physical attack and defence are above the roof, both in the 130s. His special stats however are pretty poor, and his speed is abysmal, as expected of a Rock Pokemon. Still, Sturdy ensures that he survives one fatal hit and be ready to fight back with his powerful rock moves. - As for his movepool, it is mostly Rock moves and some Ground moves, but like most Rock Pokemon of Gigalith's niche, it is to be expected. - Overall, he is the stereotypical Rock Pokemon, but he does what he does very well. What hinders him from being excellent is the fact you need to trade to evolve him, but other than that, he is quite solid. Movesets: Stonehenge Gigalith @ Anything Ability: Sturdy - Return - Rock Slide / Rock Blast / Smack Down - Bulldoze - Stone Edge / Stealth Rock This is pretty much your bread and butter Gigalith set. Return is your physical move of choice for "coverage". With Bulldoze being your best Ground option pre-National Dex, you will have to stick with that. As for your STAB option, you have Rock Slide, which will land a dent in almost anything, Rock Blast for multiple hitting move, or Smack Down so that even flying Pokemon can be hit by Bulldoze. Last slot is open for anything; Stone Edge is your most powerful attack and will leave a huge hole on the opposing foe or Stealth Rock to support your team and to get rid of Sturdy on opposing Pokemon. Special Gigalith Gigalith @ Anything Ability: Sturdy - Power Gem - Flash Cannon - Solarbeam - Stealth Rock / Explosion This owns! Just do it, no questions asked! In all seriousness, don't bother with this. Gigalith's Special Attack is too poor to even consider this. Woobat/Swoobat Base Stats: 55/45/43/55/43/72 67/57/55/77/55/114 Abilities: Unaware / Klutz Location: In just about every caves you see. No joke, they take a similar role to your old buddy Zubat. Woobat becomes Swoobat when it is happy enough. Rating: Poor (D) - Swoobat's only amazing stat is his speed. As for the rest of his stats, they are very negligible and his defences make him too fragile. However, due to Unaware, he can ignore boosts made by his foes and still break through, which is not bad. - Swoobat's movepool is actually pretty decent, as he has the tools he needs to utilise his STAB options and other coverage moves. He learns early special moves like Confusion and Gust and uses it better than Pidove and its family. - Overall, Swoobat is a pretty common sight but the problem with him is that he is not overwhelming (though it is very fast) and he is very vulnerable and requires HAPPINESS to evolve. That's right... you are as good as staying a Woobat for a long time if he is not happy. He is okay from the early point of the game though. Movesets: Not Zubat Swoobat @ Anything Ability: Unaware - Calm Mind / Attract - Shadow Ball / Attract - Psychic - Air Slash Calm Mind is cool as you are setting up Swoobat's low Special Attack and Special Defence and hit with a choice of three moves. Nothing much to say here. If you do not like setting up Calm Minds, why not try Attract, Swoobat's specialty? Or better yet... Attract + Calm Mind so you have some chance of setting up uninterrupted? Setting up is usually done in major battles though and not against regular trainers, so it is your call. Leap Swoobat @ Anything Ability: Unaware - Attract - Heart Stamp - Fly - Return "you know if you slam it hard enough on paper, you can use it as a marker o-o" ~ UnderXRay Drilbur/Excadrill Base Stats: 60/85/40/30/45/68 110/135/60/50/65/88 Abilities: Sand Rush / Sand Force Location: In caves, you know how sometimes the ground starts rumbling and there's that one spot that seems to do it? Usually it is an item but sometimes it is a wild Drilbur. Drilbur evolves at Level 31. Rating: Excellent (A) - Stats are just amazing. He has high HP, decent speed (which doubles in sandstorm), and a VERY impressive Attack score. His defences are not the best but that high HP is good. And special attack? Who needs that? - Movepool is great! He even learns Earthquake NATURALLY at Level 36.. and that coming from base 135 attack? That seems too good to be true! He does not have an outstanding movepool but the movepool is just about all he needs. Really, he really does not need much else and even without TMs it is self-sufficient. - Overall, great stats, adequate movepool, and an awesome ability and typing make Excadrill probably the best Ground type this game has to offer. Unfortunately, he is pretty hard to find, but regardless Excadrill makes a good teammate for anyone who needs a Ground type. He just so happens that this guy is used a lot in the competitive metagame as well, which just shows how useful he can be. Movesets: Gold Rush! Excadrill @ Soft Sand / Smooth Rock Ability: Anything - Swords Dance / Hone Claws - Earthquake - Rock Slide - Sandstorm / X-Scissor / Brick Break / Return There is nothing much to say really, though you probably want to set up Sandstorm with someone if you are attempting a Sand Rush sweep. To be honest, either ability works, but to outpace crucial threats sand rush is required. Anyhow, you have a choice for a boosting move between Swords Dance and Hone Claws. Usually the former is preferred because that is just about enough to get you to one shot almost anything you can find, but Hone Claws makes Rock Slide more accurate. Earthquake is probably the best non-penalty move in game, except it cannot strike fliers. But from Excadrill it is POWERFUL and gets STAB. For Fliers, that is why Rock Slide exists. Your third attack can be any of the choices listed above, though X-Scissor is recommended to hit that evil Hydreigon later (though you might not outpace it). However, you can equip a Smooth Rock and run Sandstorm instead, which can REALLY HELP with Excadrill. I would run Sand Rush if you have Sandstorm, because that's the whole point to Excadrill. Sand Power also works though for nearly overkill damage, but do what you will. If you don't want a boosting move though, feel free to just run 4 attacks as that is sometimes enough. Unfortunately, the only STAB Steel move Excadrill gets is Metal Claw. Audino Base Stats: 103/60/86/60/86/50 Abilities: Healer / Regenerator Location: They are in every route in Unova. Seriously. But they're like 1% encounter rate or something ridiculous, so... Rating: Poor (D) - Well, she is bulky... equally bulky on both sides in fact, but that's not enough to deter the fact she is slow and offensively inadequate, which is preferred more in-game. - Her movepool is TREMENDOUS, as expected for a Normal type Pokemon, so you can do MANY MANY things with her. - Overall, Audino is a rather rare Pokemon only made for collectors or people abusing the poor thing to make it into an EXP fodder. And even if you do find one, she is not too great in battle. She can be helpful for healing other Pokemon in-battle, but there are others, such as Alomomola, who does that better usually. Movesets: Prepped and Ready! Audino @ Anything Ability: Regenerate - Thunder Wave - Charge Beam / Work Up - Shadow Ball / Return - Grass Knot / Surf / Fire Blast An attacking Audino... what did you expect? There's just SO many things Audino can do that it is hard to list all of them in here. For starters, Thunder Wave is extremely helpful for slowing down foes not only for Audino but for your teammates too should Audino fall. Charge Beam raises special attack 63% of the time (factoring in the 90% accuracy) while Work Up raises both Attack and Special Attack. From then on just pick whatever move you want to use in whatever combination you feel is proper. This is probably the set you want to use with Audino for in-game, should you be fortunate enough to find one in spite of all odds. The Doctor Is Here! Audino @ Anything Ability: Any, though Healer is preferred - Helping Hand - Heal Pulse - Refresh - Return / Last Resort I suppose this would work in double/triple battles. I don't have much to explain here and as usual, the last move is there for self-defence. Helping Hand helps your allies' attack become stronger, Heal Pulse can heal your ally, and Refresh can help with your own status problems. Timburr/Gurdurr/Conkeldurr Base Stats: 75/80/55/25/35/35 85/105/85/40/50/40 105/140/95/55/65/45 Abilities: Guts / Sheer Force Location: I've seen some Timburrs outside of Pinwheel Forest, and a few by Cold Storage. I do not know any other locations. Timburr evolves at Level 25, Gurdurr evolves through a Pokemon trade. Rating: Excellent (A-) / Satisfactory (C+) as Gurdurr - The guy hits like a monster. His attack stats are literally up the roof. Even Gurdurr has the same attack power as Unfezant. The big guy's bulk is just amazing too. His HP is high and its physical defence is very high too. Though his Special Defence lacks and its speed is abysmal, Conkeldurr is surely a force to be reckoned with. If he gets burned, Guts will ensure that its power RAISES instead of falling. Talk about power! - As for his movepool, it seems that unlike most other fighters, he actually learns non-Fighting moves naturally. In fact, he learns Rock moves to deal with his flying adversaries, possibly to reflect the stone pillars it carries. - Overall, this guy is the Machamp of BW; and he knows how to mess with anything that comes in his way. Conkeldurr is nearly broken and is a solid fighter that one should be prepared for or have one in a team. Unfortunately, like Machoke, Gurdurr requires trade to evolve. Movesets: THOR IS HERE! Conkeldurr @ Anything Ability: Guts - Bulk Up - Hammer Arm / Brick Break - Rock Slide / Stone Edge - Payback / Return / Facade Named after Gin's Conkeldurr. With Bulk Up, Conkeldurr is nearly unstoppable physically and will continue to mow through an enemy while being nearly unstoppable. As for STAB, you can go either Hammer Arm or Brick Break, depending on your tastes. Rock Slide vs Stone Edge is the usual power vs accuracy argument, not to mention the amount of PP Stone Edge has, making Rock Slide usually better in-game. Payback can hit ghosts who would otherwise not care much for Conkledurr's attempts on plowing through a team. If Ghosts are not your main concern, go with the more reliable Return. If you think Conkeldurr will suffer a status problem, be gutsy and attempt Facade. Tympole/Palpitoad/Seismitoad Base Stats: 50/50/40/50/40/64 75/65/55/65/55/69 105/85/75/85/75/74 Abilities: Swift Swim / Hydration Swift Swim / Poison Touch (starting from Seismitoad) Location: Oddly, I've seen some Tympole outside of Pinwheel Forest. I thought they can only swim? Palpitoads seem to be around Icirrus City in the waters. Tympole evolves at Level 25 while Palpitoad evolves at Level 36. Rating: Good (B-) - Stats are pretty decent, as it is well rounded, defensively and offensively. His speed can be fixed with its ability Swift Swim in the rain. - As for his movepool, Seismitoad has a lot of things going for it, and can go either physical or special (a lot of those in this game, isn't there?). He also gets STAB for Water and Ground move. Not bad, eh? Unfortunately, unlike most waters, he does NOT learn Ice moves. What in the world? - Overall, Seismitoad can be very useful in a team, especially because his only weakness is Grass (albeit 4x) and he is immune to Electric moves. Problem is, he is a bit middling; while he is well-rounded, he does not excel all the way. That is not really a problem in-game however, but Tympole is pretty difficult to train, especially when the forest is all Grass Pokemon. But still, he is a possible water Pokemon to consider for your team, because there is not a lot of Water options. I'd say he's the best Water next to Samurott in the game. Movesets: Slippy Seismitoad @ Damp Rock / Mystic Water Ability: Swift Swim - Rain Dance - Surf / Scald - Grass Knot - Focus Blast / Sludge Bomb / Sludge Wave This is where we can make good use of Seismitoad's Swift Swim ability, which allows him to double his speed AND power up his Water moves. Surf vs Scald, you know the deal. You want power or the chance to burn? Grass Knot hurts other Waters really well. As for the last slot, I guess Focus Blast is your last resort against stuff like Hydreigon or something, or you can try to hurt Grass type Pokemon with Sludge Bomb or Sludge Wave. Now, Sludge Wave is quite expensive and is accessible from Battle Subway via 48 BP. Also, it has the drawback of hitting everyone in your team as well in Double/Triple battles, but it is slightly more powerful than Sludge Bomb. Poison-Dart Frog Seismitoad @ Mystic Water Ability: Poison Touch - Drain Punch - Return - Bulldoze / Dig - Surf / Scald Well, here I am trying to make use of the Poison Touch ability if your frog happens to have it. Drain Punch is just beautiful: it replenishes health and it has a good type advantage against many things. Choose betwen Bulldoze and Dig for your Ground STAB, either can work. Return is for an extra physical attack. As for your water move, unfortunately there is no physical water moves to run here, but Surf has the power while Scald can burn your foes. However, this is counterintuitive to the whole Poison Touch strategy, but regardless, if you need to burn something, it is still an option. Throh Base Stats: 120/100/85/30/85/45 Abilities: Guts / Inner Focus Location: In White version they are outside of Pinwheel Forest. You need to encounter a shaking dark grass patch if you are playing Black. Rating: Good (B+) - Stats are almost reminiscent of Conkeldurr. This guy is bulky and has a decent attack power and also has Guts. He's also quite slow but for the most part, Conkledurr does the job better. Though Throh is still actually attainable and requires no trade (unless you're Black version), he has tools of his own to differentiate himself, but we can go to that later. For starters, he has higher Special Defence than Conkeldurr. - Hmm... all he learns are Fighting moves for his natural level up. He also has a few extra attacks from TMs but otherwise a generic Fighter. His signature move Storm Throw is a Fighting Frost Breath with 100% accuracy, which is not bad. Circle Throw is also an interesting move, which is basically Roar that does damage (but also 90% accurate). Movesets: Storm ThrowThroh Throh @ Anything Ability: Guts - Bulk Up - Body Slam / Return - Storm Throw / Brick Break - Rock Slide / Payback A regular bulk up set, though with Body Slam, you have a chance of paralysis, allowing you to outpace some enemies. Return is another option. Storm Throw is his signature move and always deals critical hit, being effectively 120 base power attack. Run Brick Break instead if you feel like it, though I prefer Storm Throw here. As for the last move, depends on who you fear more, ghosts or fliers, but both at least hit their intended targets. Circle ThrowThroh Throh @ Anything Ability: Guts - Bulk Up - Circle Throw - Storm Throw / Revenge / Rock Slide - Payback / Rock Slide It's really fun shuffling your foes with Circle Throw, though you have to take a hit before being able to execute it. The other moves are for extra coverage or for having an actual fighting move in case you don't feel like tossing them away. Sawk Base Stats: 75/125/75/30/75/85 Abilities: Sturdy / Inner Focus Location: In Black version they are outside of Pinwheel Forest. You need to encounter a shaking dark grass patch if you are playing White. Rating: Good (B+) - Now we have what you call a "fast yet fragile fighter" that we are used to in the form of Primeape and all. However, he isn't all that fast but he is quite powerful. Also, his fragility is compensated due to his ability Sturdy, allowing to survive one fatal hit. - His movepool is just like a generic fighter and unfortunately nothing interesting to boot. However, he DOES get Close Combat, which is possibly the best fighting move there is. - Overall, Sawk is an interesting fighter but somewhat fragile, which can be a hinderance. However, Sawk is available early on from the game and can be a good fighter in many ways. Movesets: Imma SockSawk Ya! Sawk @ Anything Ability: Sturdy - Bulk Up - Close Combat / Brick Break - Payback / Return - Rock Slide Bored of these Bulk Up sets? You betcha. But this guy has Close Combat, which is very powerful and will make a short work of anything that doesn't resist it. If you don't like the fact Close Combat lowers your defences, you can run the safer Brick Break, but it is noticeably weaker... MUCH weaker. However, it has way more PP than Close Combat, which is good reason enough for consideration. Then there are the whole coverage moves, and you know the deal by now. I SuckSawk Sawk @ Anything Ability: Sturdy - Counter - Reversal - Return - Rock Slide / Payback This makes good use of Sturdy. If you know something is going to use a powerful physical move like, I don't know, Acrobatics, use Counter to destroy your foe and afterwards, you will have a powerful 300 BP Reversal at your disposal! The other moves are there just to leave a dent on stuff that resist Fighting moves or to defend against Ghost Pokemon. Payback is weak, however, if you are faster (and this set assumes Sawk is faster than its target). You can leave Sawk at 1 HP after an encounter, but at that point, it is quite dangerous because ANYTHING can KO it, especially things with priority attacks. But Reversal will HURT, coming off a base 125 attack and 300 base power. Sewaddle/Swadloon/Leavanny Base Stats: 45/53/70/40/60/42 55/63/90/50/80/42 75/103/80/70/70/92 Abilities: Swarm/Chlorophyll Leaf Guard/Chlorophyll (Swadloon only) Location: Sewaddles are all over Pinwheel Forest. Sewaddles evolve at Level 20 while it takes Happiness to get Swadloon to evolve. Rating: Good (B) - Stats are pretty okay. Her attack power is the highest physically and her speed is pretty decent too. Defences, however, leave more to be desired. Special Attack is not too good but it is somewhat usable regardless. - As for her movepool, most of it are Grass moves and Bug moves. She has a bit of other moves as well, but not enough to allow much coverage, which is bad. - Overall, this thing takes a lot of effort to raise, as a caterpillar who only has Tackle and Bug Bite, becoming a middle stage bug who requires happiness to become a Leavanny, and even then she is still difficult to use. However, she is not a bad choice and is still pretty cool. She just requires a lot of effort and it usually is not worth the effort. The design needed a skirt-like appendage though if it wanted to represent a Dutch woman. Oh well. She is quite similar to Unfezant though in terms of stats. Movesets: Sword Wielding Dutch Nanny Leavanny @ Miracleseed Ability: Anything - Swords Dance - Leaf Blade / X-Scissor - X-Scissor / Aerial Ace - Return / Shadow Claw You can see there are a lot of options here. If you are using X-Scissor, Swarm is a viable ability for powering up Leavanny's X-Scissor in a pinch. Otherwise, Chlorophyll is helpful here. After a Swords Dance, Leavanny will HURT, but she lacks coverage. Bug and Grass are pretty redundant actually, and usually Bug is the better choice, though Leaf Blade is much stronger. It is up to you to decide though, and she is certainly scarier than Serperior in terms of power, but she is just slightly fragile at times (that 4x weakness to Fire and Flying moves for example). Zon Kindermeisje Leavanny @ Heat Rock / Miracleseed Ability: Chlorophyll - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - X-Scissor - Return / Shadow Claw I don't know... just thinking of a Sunny Day set here for fun. She may have a lower Special Attack score but it is still salvageable, so it is not all so bad. Onweer Leavanny @ Miracleseed Ability: Anything - Leaf Storm - X-Scissor - Leaf Blade - Return / Shadow Claw Well, I guess it is the same as the set mentioned above except without Swords Dance. Oops. Leaf Storm hurts like a maniac though so it is to your best interest to use it when an emergency occurs. Venipede/Whirlipede/Scolipede Base Stats: 30/45/59/30/39/57 40/55/99/40/79/47 60/90/89/55/69/112 Abilities: Poison Point / Swarm Location: Venipede is found within the inner parts of Pinwheel Forest. Rating: Good (B-) - Well, his HP is not great. However, his attack power is pretty decent and his speed is just fabulous. His defences are okayish, but not enough to be considered bulky. - As for Scolipede's movepool, he has the moves he needs to learn. The movepool itself is not too great, but Scolipede has access to the powerful Megahorn. Not bad I must say. - Overall, it does not take that much to get a Venipede to evolve into a Scolipede, and the results are not too bad either. He sort of middles in offence, but his high powered moves make up for it. Scolipede can certainly be a good bug anyone can consider within his team. "dude look out!, it's a venipede using roll out gone bad!" ~ UnderXRay about Whirlipede Horny Centipede Scolipede @ Anything Ability: Swarm - Megahorn / X-Scissor - Poison Tail / Bulldoze - Return / Double-Edge - Rock Slide / Screech Blast your foes with a powerful Megahorn, which is effectively 180 BP thanks to STAB. It requires a Heart Scale however. X-Scissor can be used if you hate Megahorn's accuracy, but that kind of defeats the whole purpose of being super-imposing. The other moves are there for extra coverage, and you know the rest. Unfortunately, Scolipede's Poison STAB is not very kind and is pretty weak, so there are alternatives, such as Bulldoze to at least hit Fire types for super effective damage, even though Double-Edge pretty much does the same damage, with recoil, and Rock Slide does even more. Screech is always fun as it makes the foe take double damage from your attacks. Baton Pass Scolipede @ Anything Ability: Swarm - Agility - Baton Pass - Return / Double-Edge - Megahorn / X-Scissor Basically, the idea is to pass Agility on someone in your team that you know needs that speed boost so it can get a chance to sweep. The other two moves are just fillers and can be whatever it wants to be. Scolipede needs to attack after all; a Pokemon without an attack move is useless in-game. Intoxication Scolipede @ Anything Ability: Swarm - Toxic - Protect - Dig - Megahorn / X-Scissor It looks like a competitive set or something, but it's merely toxic stalling. Just hit Toxic on a large foe, maybe that tough Haxorus, and start Protect and Dig stalling. If Scolipede lives, maybe it can fire off a Megahorn to finish his nemesis off. Just an idea. Cottonee/Whimsicott Base Stats: 40/27/60/37/50/66 60/67/85/77/75/116 Abilities: Prankster / Infiltrator Location: In Black version, they are all over Pinwheel Forest. In White version, there is a house in Nacrene City where there is a girl who will trade a Petilil for a Cottonee. This Cottonee is Modest and has 20/20/20/31/20/20 IVs. Wait... Black Version... Cotton... plantatio-*gets shot*. Use a Sun Stone to evolve a Cottonee. Rating: Poor (D) - Well, he is quite fast, but he does not have a lot of defence. His offences are not all too great either, but thanks to Prankster, he can use non-attack moves to go first, though he is usually faster than most others. - As for his movepool, if only he had Sleep Powder. If only. Alas, it was not meant to be. He has some annoying status moves like Leech Seed and Stun Spore, but his offensive moves are rather lacking. You can however, set up Growth under the Sun and fire some Solarbeams. - Overall, Whimsicott seems to be a Pokemon designed for competitive play rather than in-game. In-game he seems to lack a lot, but competitively, many people know how annoying he is. But if you really like he, there are ways to use Whimsicott in game. Also, it requires a Sun Stone to evolve, so training one will be very hard. "Dude. I can play Erufuun in my sleep!" ~ Gin Note: Erufuun is Whimsicott's Japanese name. This just comes to show you that competitive players know Whimsicott's competitive potential; it's just annoying. Movesets: RaisinCotton in the Sun Whimsicott @ Heat Rock / Miracleseed Ability: Prankster - Sunny Day - Growth - Solarbeam - Shadow Ball / Return / Hurricane Basically you are able to set up the sun and start firing Solarbeams and all. Growth becomes + 2 Attack and Special Attack in the sun, which makes Whimsicott's mediocre attack power all of a sudden scary. Last slot can go to anything... Shadow Ball can be used for Psychics and Ghosts, Return for neutral coverage. While Hurricane becomes 50% accurate under the sun, it is still a base 120 power attack that can come in handy. But only use it if you are gutsy. King Cotton Whimsicott @ Big Root Ability: Prankster - Substitute / Cotton Guard - Poisonpowder / Protect - Leech Seed - Giga Drain Okay, so this is SIMILAR to the competitive set, but not quite because this is not Whimsicott's full potential, but is an in-game variant. The general idea is to use Substitute, but if you cannot access TM90 because it is ONLY available in Twist Mountain during winter, then you can use Cotton Guard. You can start by using Cotton Guard to add + 3 Defence to Whimsicott. That's right, + 3! Proceed to annoy your foes by Poisoning them and Leech Seeding them and if you need to, use Giga Drain. However, if you like to stall them out, run Protect instead of Poisonpowder. While this is utterly walled by Grass / Poison Pokemon such as Amoongus, this can work well against major monsters of a Pokemon that you might have trouble dealing with, such as Zekrom or something. It is almost guaranteed to take someone out due to pure stalling, but make sure they do not have a Full Restore ready, or else that is just annoying. Try this set out in competitive battle with Substitute/Protect/Leech Seed/Taunt and it will surely frustrate your foes. Petilil/Lilligant Base Stats: 45/35/50/70/50/30 70/60/75/110/75/90 Abilities: Chlorophyll / Leaf Guard Location: In White version, they are all over Pinwheel Forest. In Black version, there is a house in Nacrene City where there is a girl who will trade a Cottonee for a Petilil. This Petilil is Modest and has 20/20/20/31/20/20 IVs. Petilil evolves via a Sun Stone, not the Crest of Sincerity. Rating: Excellent (A-) - Lilligant has the stats of a special sweeper. While her physical stats leave more to be desired, her special stats and her decent speed makes her a good grass Pokemon. - Lilligant's movepool, however, is what you call Gamefreak trolling. She has some very good moves in the form of Teeter Dance and even better, Quiver Dance, which raises Special Attack/Special Defence AND Speed by 1 stage. However, her offensive movepool is literally ALL Grass moves. That means NO coverage of any sort and therefore difficult to sweep. - Overall, Lilligant is fascinating. She can be useful at the right times but should be handled with care. She requires a Sun Stone to evolve to obtain. I got smitten by her the moment I saw her and is possibly one of the few Gen V Pokemon I like. Movesets: Grace des Fleurs Lilligant @ Miracleseed Ability: Own Tempo - Sleep Powder - Quiver Dance - Petal Dance / Giga Drain - Giga Drain / Synthesis This is probably the most you can make out of Lilligant in-game. Remember you gain Quiver Dance at Lv. 28 and Petal Dance at Lv. 46, so use that Sun Stone early on if you need to (or use Heart Scales). With Sleep Powder, you can put someone to sleep and set up Quiver Dance with impunity. If her health begins to sink, use Synthesis or Giga Drain to heal her HP. Once enough Quiver Dances are set up, Lilligant can begin to thrash all about with a base 180 Petal Dance (which is 120 + STAB), which will hurt. Oh you're scared of confusion? Own Tempo says denied! You can basically have infinite Petal Dance without the fear of confusion this way. However, there is only 10 PP for Petal Dance, so be wary. Best used in major boss battles such as the battle with N or something, though unlike Serperior, Lilligant focuses on her special side. Something ParaDoX65 noted is that Cofagrigus's MUMMY will activate with Petal Dance and destroy Own Tempo. If you are fighting Shauntal or Ghetsis, you may not want to lead with Lilligant. Lilligant CAN learn Dream Eater, though that TM is found POST-NATIONAL DEX, but Sleep Powder + Dream Eater may be something you may want to give a try, considering Lilligant's coverage is otherwise VERY limited with just Grass. Plein Soleil Lilligant @ Heat Rock / Miracleseed Ability: Chlorophyll - Sunny Day - Growth / Sleep Powder - Solarbeam - Return I know you are getting bored of this set being used over and over, but this is an alternative. Lilligant however, has Chlorophyll, making her speed nearly OD, beating almost anyone. Also, she has access to Sleep Powder which is always helpful. With that in mind, fire Solarbeams and Return for coverage, though if you don't care about Solarbeam you can always run both Growth and Sleep Powder. This set can power up faster than Quiver Dance, but be wary of the sun running out. Basculin Base Stats: 70/92/65/80/55/98 Abilities: Reckless / Adaptibility Rock Head through an In-Game Trade in Pokemon White Location: Use Surf on water and you may find one of these guys. Rating: Satisfactory (C+) - Stat wise Basculin has some good traits. He is pretty fast and powerful on both sides of the spectrum, though more powerful physically. However, his defences are quite low, which is to be expected. He is odd that he can use three abilities, Reckless, Adaptability, and Rock Head. However, Rock Head can only be obtained through a trade in Pokemon White in Driftveil City, or so they say. - Basculin has a movepool good enough to be useful, but his TM/HM list is mostly Normal and Water moves. Unfortunately, Ice Beam is post-National Dex and Basculin cannot use Blizzard. - You get this guy WAY too late in the game to be of practical use, when all your guys are at least 30 + you find him in level 5-20s. He is still all right, but you might prefer another Water due to him being difficult to train. Movesets: Angry Bass Is Angry Basculin @ Mystic Water Ability: Adaptability - Waterfall / Aqua Tail / Surf - Double-Edge / Return - Crunch - Aqua Jet Basculin is one angry fish. With Adaptability, his Aqua Tail and Aqua Jet will become 2x effective instead of the usual 1.5x from STAB, meaning they will hurt. The other two moves, Double-Edge and Crunch, are there for coverage. Use Return instead of Double-Edge if you hate recoil at the cost of a bit of power. Aqua Tail is his strongest move in this set, but you can run Surf instead if you like special moves over physical moves. No use getting Scald as Basculin wants to do as much damage as possible as he is already frail. Use Waterfall if you have the HM instead of Aqua Tail. Sandile/Krokorok/Krookodile Base Stats: 50/72/35/35/35/65 60/82/45/45/45/74 95/117/70/65/70/92 Abilities: Intimidate / Moxie Location: Search around Desert Resort and Route 4. Sandile evolves at Level 29 while Krokorok evolves at Level 40. Rating: Good (B+) - Krookodile has a HUGE attack power which makes Feraligatr a tad bit green. His speed is not so bad either, and it even troll's on Pidgeot's by 1! His bulk is not so bad either, with 95/75/75 defences, which isn't spectacular, but not bad by any means. That leaves his low Special Attack, which would not be of much use anyways. - Krookodile's movepool is surprisingly quite good. He has access to an assorted amount of moves, mostly Ground, Dark, Rock, Fighting and even Dragon moves. Unfortunately, it does not learn a decent Ground move until 32, which is Dig. Before that he is stuck with the weak Sand Tomb and Mud Slap. - Overall, Krookodile is a solid Ground Pokemon for any team. While he is not as good as Excadrill, the Dark typing can be helpful in fighting some Psychic and Ghost Pokemon that will appear later in the game. Movesets: Gangsta Croco Krookodile @ Blackglasses / Soft Sand Ability: Anything - Crunch - Earthquake / Dig / Bulldoze - Brick Break - Return / Rock Slide / Smack Down / Dragon Claw This set is just a simple concept: hit your foes with hard hitting moves. Crunch is your Dark STAB while Earthquake is your Ground STAB. Unfortunately, Earthquake is Lv. 54, so if you did not reach that point yet, feel free to run Dig or Bulldoze instead. Brick Break gives nearly perfect coverage alongside Crunch, and last move can either go to Return or Rock Slide or Dragon Claw. Mind you, Dragon Claw is a TM found in Victory Road, so it can come in quite late. Smack Down will allow you to hit fliers and levitaters with Earthquake, so that can also work. However, Smack Down is available from Battle Subway for 36 BP. Either ability works here; Intimidate for helping take a hit or two while Moxie means a KO will raise Krookodile's attack power, which is always welcome. Darumaka/Darmanitan Base Stats: 70/90/45/15/45/50 105/140/55/30/55/95 Abilities: Hustle Sheer Force (as Darmanitan) Location: Route 4 and outside of Desert Resort has Darumaka. Darumaka evolves at Level 35. Rating: Excellent (A-) - Darmanitan is purely physical. 140 base attack power? That's insane... it ties with Conkeldurr's attack power! However, Darmanitan is very fast as well, sporting 95 speed. He has pathetic Special Attack, so there is no use attempting special moves, even if it is something like Overheat. His defences are VERY fragile, though he has 105 base HP already. His ability Sheer Force makes moves with secondary effect that affect the foes become much stronger, at the cost of the effect. - The guy has a pretty good movepool, which is useful enough to sweep for himself. They work well with his ability Sheer Force. - Overall, Darmanitan is amazingly powerful and can be a good Fire Pokemon for your team. Watch out, however, because he is very fragile, and will probably not survive stuff like Water or Ground moves. To give you an idea of how strong he is, his Flare Blitz took half of my Jellicent's HP, a Water Pokemon known for its bulk. Movesets: Ape With Power Darmanitan @ Anything Ability: Sheer Force - Flare Blitz / Fire Punch - Rock Slide - Brick Break - Bulldoze Darmanitan's Sheer Force ability is SCARY because it powers up already powerful moves such as Flare Blitz, and those without STAB such as Rock Slide and Brick Break and Bulldoze become more powerful, though they lose their secondary effects. If you are too young to die, go ahead and replace Flare Blitz with Fire Punch. With Darmanitan, expect to play reckless. You either KO or get KO'd. Maractus Base Stats: 75/86/67/106/67/60 Abilities: Water Absorb / Chlorophyll Location: Desert Resort Rating: Poor (D) - Aside from Maractus's Special Attack, most of her other stats are very mediocre. She is not too physically powerful either, and is definitely not defensively adequate either. She's a slow customer too. However, her ability Water Absorb gives her a good way to be immune to Water while Chlorophyll solves her otherwise unsalvageably speed. - Another Grass Pokemon with low movepool. Sigh. Well, there are some quirks like Sucker Punch. - Overall, Maractus is a quirky Pokemon that can function well as your Grass Pokemon, but eventually she gets boring really quickly. She is not too useful either, but can get her job done. Just don't send her out against, you know, Fire Pokemon or something. Movesets: Not Cacturne Maractus @ Miracleseed Ability: Water Absorb - Cotton Guard / Acupressure - Needle Arm / Giga Drain - Sucker Punch - Return A physical set... though Maractus is much better in the special department. Cotton Guard for awesome defence boost while Acupressure can give + 2 random stat. Now we have three physical moves to deal with, though she is better off with special moves. Run Giga Drain instead of Needle Arm if Needle Arm becomes inadequate. Giga Drain also replenishes half HP drained. Sunny Cactus (Not Another Sunny Day Set!) Maractus @ Miracleseed Ability: Chlorophyll - Sunny Day - Growth - Solarbeam - Return Wow, we must have seen this gazillions of times now, but at least you can boost your speed with the Sun. Then proceed to set up and start firing Solarbeams. Dwebble/Crustle Base Stats: 50/65/85/35/35/55 70/95/125/65/75/45 Abilities: Sturdy / Shell Armor Location: You can find them at Desert Resort. Crustle evolves at Level 34. Rating: Good (B) - Crustle has amazing defence, as expected for a Rock Pokemon. His attack score is decent as well, but of course, there is that low speed which is made almost unsalvagable. - Crustle's movepool is largely Bug and Rock moves. Not much to expect, huh? His early moves are pretty weak though, but he will learn some good support moves like Stealth Rock and the dangerous yet powerful Shell Smash. He even stole Rhyperior's Rock Wrecker, though using it is not always the best choice. - Overall, Crustle is a good armoured bug that can be a teamplayer and a stand alone sweeper. Crustle can surprise you, despite how this humble hermit crab looks like. This Pokemon ended up in ParaDoX65's roster, and to give you a feel of how he seems to play... "Shell Smash is broken X_X" ~ ParaDoX65 Movesets: Out of the Shell Crustle @ Anything Ability: Anything - Shell Smash - X-Scissor - Rock Slide / Smack Down - Dig / Return / Shadow Claw / Flail This Crustle is dangerous, for you and your opponent. If you get in a Shell Smash, then Crustle will gain + 2 Attack, Special Attack AND Speed at the price of -1 Defence and Special Defence. That means stuff like Surf can go KO Crustle, but Crustle made a huge transformation from a humble hermit crab into a scary monster. Obviously, we want that Bug STAB X-Scissor and that Rock STAB Rock Slide. Smack Down is an option if you want to make fliers to get hit by Dig, but usually Rock Slide is better for the job. Last slot depends on your preferences, as Return can normally hit stuff well, but Dig can take care of Excadrill. Shadow Claw is also an option so Ghost Pokemon do not wall X-Scissor. Flail is a funny option, if you run Sturdy as your ability. If someone manages to leave Crustle at 1 HP, Flail will do a number on a lot of things, especially when boosted with Shell Smash. This is a high risk, high reward set, but as ParaDoX65 has experienced first hand, beware of priority attacks like Aqua Jet! B-b-but I Like My Shell! Crustle @ Anything Ability: Sturdy - Cut - Strength - Rock Smash - Stealth Rocks / Whatever If you don't like Watchog, this can also work, except no Flash. Yeah. However, with Sturdy, you can come in after someone fainted and set up Stealth Rocks. I mean, it's a waste of Pokemon slot, but if you want that HM mule to actually do something even in battle, you can run Stealth Rocks to contribute to the team. Useful against someone like N or Ghetsis. Scraggy/Scrafty Base Stats: 50/75/70/35/70/48 65/90/115/45/115/58 Abilities: Shed Skin / Moxie Location: They're all over Route 4 and Desert Resort. Scraggy evolves at Level 39. Rating: Good (B+) - Whoa, would you look at that typing? Dark/Fighting? Yikes. It is a weird one... because it is really slow, but has good attack power and quite high defences on both sides. It is somewhat messed up... a bulky sweeper? It doesn't seem to make sense. - Its movepool is just enough for it to succeed. I don't know WHY it learns Dragon attacks... it shouldn't. Like, I know it's a lizard, but not every lizard Pokemon knows Dragon moves. Whatever. At any rate, you can make use of both Dark and Fighting STABs, and it even knows Hi Jump Kick. Talk about scary! - Overall, it seems Tbird says this guy is broken, so that means it makes a good teammate. I know I don't like this guy or anything, but I won't deny how useful he is. He can take hits very well and hit back with powerful attacks. He is definitely something to be considered, and shows his face often in the competitive scene. Movesets: Problem, Punk? Scrafty @ Anything Ability: Moxie - Hi Jump Kick / Brick Break - Crunch / Payback - Return - Rock Slide / Dragon Claw / Swagger Scrafty has STAB Dark and Fighting, which means nearly perfect coverage (the two Pokemon that resist the combo do not exist in Unova). Anyhow, the choice between Hi Jump Kick and Brick Break is for you to decide. Hi Jump Kick is almost always superior, as it has a base 130 power (talk about jacked), but if you miss (10% of the time you WILL), you will hurt yourself... A LOT. Brick Break is safer but a lot weaker, so choose your poison. Crunch vs Payback depends on your preferences, but since Scrafty usually goes last, Payback will usually deal more damage than Crunch would, but Crunch is more stable and can lower Defence. Do what you will. The last two moves are for extra coverage and whatever. Rock Slide is appealing because it hits Fliers, which is one of Scrafty's weakness, but whatever works for you are also available. While Moxie is usually preferred because once Scrafty KOs a Pokemon, he becomes stronger, Shed Skin is also a possibility because face it, status is annoying. Scrafty has a lot more moves available for competitive battling, but this will do for in-game. Sigilyph Base Stats: 72/58/80/103/80/97 Abilities: Wonder Skin / Magic Guard Location: They are at Desert Resort. I can't find them, but they are about the same rarity as Dwebble and Maractus (10%). Rating: Excellent (A-) - Sigilyph has some pretty good stats, sporting high Special Attack and Speed. Its Defences are not bad either. Its Ability Magic Guard protects it from indirect damage, which is ALWAYS good. I wouldn't consider its other ability, Wonder Skin, to be of practicality, but it can be useful at times. As expected, it has low Attack power. - As for its movepool, it has some interesting moves which can be of use, and has STAB Psychic and Flying attacks. It also has defensive Light Screen and Reflect for personal usage. Unfortunately, ROOST is a HEREDITARY move, which makes me want to facepalm. Sigh. That is amazingly troll. - Now why isn't this the evolved form of Unown? It certainly looks as if it is. Pokemon BW is troll. I suppose Sigilyph is a good Pokemon as its stats are pretty good and it has good moves, but it is just so rare and in one place only. Oh well, if you do get it, Sigilyph can be the "bird" of your team. And another strange thing about it is the fact it has a gender. How? I don't even know. Movesets: What Is This I Don't Even- Sigilyph @ Anything Ability: Magic Guard - Cosmic Power / Hypnosis - Psychic - Air Slash - Shadow Ball / Flash Cannon / Miracle Eye Cosmic Power is pretty fun and utterly evil. This is incredibly frustrating for the foes as they have to directly attack Sigilyph as moves such as Toxic or Will-o-Wisp will FAIL to even have an effect on Sigilyph due to Magic Guard. Unfortunately, critical hit will do a number to Sigilyph, and super effective Frost Breath ALWAYS criticals, but other than that, after a bunch of Cosmic Powers, Sigilyph becomes nearly untouchable. If Cosmic Power is not appealing, go ahead and run Hypnosis to put your opponent to sleep. Note Hypnosis is a Heart scale move. Then there are your STAB attacks, Psychic and Air Slash, and Sigilyph is not a slouch in Special Attack. Last slot can go to Shadow Ball for Ghosts, Flash Cannon for Rock Pokemon, or even Miracle Eye. I know, funny idea, but if you Miracle Eye a Dark Pokemon, they can get affected by Psychic! Heh heh... Scrafty would hate that, but you would probably just Air Slash it anyways. Kachina Sigilyph @ Anything Ability: Magic Guard - Charge Beam - Psychic - Air Slash - Shadow Ball / Flash Cannon This is the only way without Calm Mind's help to boost Sigilyph's special attack. After boosting Sigilyph's Special Attack to powerful levels, not many Pokemon can stand in Sigilyph's way and expect to live. Blessings of the Ancients Sigilyph @ Light Clay Ability: Magic Guard - Reflect - Light Screen - Psychic / Tailwind - Air Slash Setting up two screens would indefinitely help your teammates. The next options are the two STAB moves as usual, but you can try Tailwind to help your teammates in gaining speed. Too bad it lasts for only 3 turns. It is probably better just to run Psychic and Air Slash. Curse of the Ancients Sigilyph @ Anything Ability: Magic Guard - Thunder Wave - Whirlwind - Air Slash - Psychic / Hypnosis It really is fun setting up Thunder Waves all over the enemy and shuffling them with Whirlwind... it really is. And then there's that annoying Air Slash which can cause flinching, and add that up with paralysis and you have one annoying monster in your hands. Hypnosis is also an option if you want to sleep shuffle, but it is inaccurate and not practical. It also costs a Heart Scale. Yamask/Cofagrigus Base Stats: 38/30/85/55/65/30 58/50/145/95/105/30 Abilities: Mummy Location: Relic Castle. Yamask evolves at Level 34. Rating: Poor (D) - Cofagrigus looks like your stereotypical defensive Ghost; high defences (particularly the physical side) but LOW HP. That is usually enough to offset its high defences unfortunately. Low Attack and abysmal speed as well. I guess we will have to resort to its Special Attack, which is actually pretty good. Its Ability Mummy is pretty funny, as it disables the opponent's ability upon contact. - Cofagrigus has a good movepool, but unlike most of the other Ghosts, it does not learn Thunderbolt, which is rather strange. Its pre-National Dex movepool is, however, pretty poor because many of the good TMs it learns cannot be accessed until after beating the E4. - Overall, Cofagrigus is one scary customer. This thing is certainly not what I want to meet, but training it in game is just difficult. VERY difficult. In fact, it is just frustrating and evolving it is a chore. It is not as bad as Lampent though, but Cofagrigus has a hard time getting through the game as a Yamask and as a Cofagrigus, too little options. Also, Cofagrigus cannot be traded in the GTS without a nickname because of that. Really? Movesets: Tutankhamen Cofagrigus @ Spell Tag Ability: Mummy - Will-o-Wisp - Shadow Ball / Hex - Grass Knot - Protect This seems to be the only moveset I can come up with for Cofagrigus because of the lack of TMs it can learn pre-National Dex. Sigh. Anyways, Will-o-Wisp burns stuff and raises Cofagrigus's already high defence indirectly. Shadow Ball is your main attack, but you can run Hex if you think you can burn your opponent and proceed to Attack. However, Shadow Ball is more reliable and has more PP, but it is up to you. Grass Knot is the only other option Cofagrigus seems to have. If only Psychic was available earlier... if only. Oh well. Last but not least we have Protect so you can stall an opponent out while they burn. I Want My Mummy! Cofagrigus @ Spell Tag Ability: Mummy - Curse - Protect - Will-o-Wisp - Shadow Ball / Hex I don't even know... but it would certainly be a good battle finisher. Cofagrigus has high enough defences, so you might as well attempt this. Curse is the crux of this set, as it means the opponent you want to finish off will lose 25% HP per turn. Will-o-Wisp is to add salt to injury: just this means 37.5% per turn from then on. Protect is there to help you stall and get more damage in, and if Cofagrigus is still standing tall in the battlefield, go ahead and either Shadow Ball or heal it with a Full Restore or something. The trollish part is that Cofagrigus does not learn Pain Split. Sigh... seriously? Tirtouga/Carracosta Base Stats: 54/78/103/53/45/22 74/108/133/83/65/32 Abilities: Solid Rock / Sturdy Location: In Relic Castle, talk to the female Backpacker at the left (note: WALK, not RUN, over the Quicksands) and choose the Cover Fossil. Revive the fossil in Nacrene City. Tirtouga evolves at Level 37. Rating: Good (B+) - Carracosta is incredible. He has a good attack power and even a usable Special Attack. His physical defence is huge, a whopping score of 133. However, he is incredibly slow and has a pretty low Special Defence. His two abilities Solid Rock and Sturdy are leaning defensively and either two work. - As for his movepool, he has all the right tools to help him become a successful Water Pokemon. He has STAB Rock and Water to work with, along with a few coverage moves. He even has the relatively exclusive Shell Smash and Aqua Jet. Hmmm.... > : ) - Overall, Carracosta is available very early and is a good Water Pokemon for your team if you feel like you need one. He is on the slow side but he does not go down easily and he packs a heavy punch. The 4x weakness to Grass is evil, but he shouldn't fight Grass Pokemon anyways. Movesets: Archelon Rising Carracosta @ Mystic Water Ability: Anything - Shell Smash - Waterfall / Aqua Tail / Aqua Jet - Rock Slide - Surf / Crunch / Dig / Return Where have we seen this before? Oh yeah, Crustle... except this guy might just do the job better, as Water tends to be the better typing here and he can even attack from both sides of the spectrum. You know what Shell Smash does, it lowers both your defences by 1 stage in return for + 2 Attack / Special Attack / Speed. Slow Turtle? Not with this, that's for sure, though it is still kinda slow even at + 2. That is why there is AQUA JET which is a priority move which you can consider. Aqua Jet is a bit on the weak side, however, so you can go ahead and use Aqua Tail instead. Waterfall is the safer alternative to Aqua Tail for its accuracy and flinch chance. The last two moves afterwards are all dependent on your preferences; Rock Slide is your secondary STAB and for your last move you can either go Surf for your swimming needs and a decent Special Attack, or Crunch to hurt Jellicent, Dig to beat Electric Pokemon, or Return for coverage. You can even run both Aqua Tail and Aqua Jet if you wanted to, which isn't a bad idea either. But once Carracosta is all set up, he will be a large dominating force to be reckoned with. Shell Smash is BROKEN. Prehistoric Tank Carracosta @ Mystic Water Ability: Solid Rock - Curse - Aqua Jet - Rock Slide - Waterfall / Aqua Tail / Return / Dig / Surf This takes a more defensive approach with the skill Curse. Curse raises your attack and defence by 1 stage at the price of lowering your speed by 1 stage. For someone already as slow as Carracosta, that is not much of a problem, as it has AQUA JET to negate all that speed drops anyways, making it very tough to beat. Aqua Jet does, however, have a low base power, so there are other moves in this set to take advantage of Curse's effects, regardless of speed drop or not. STAB Rock Slide can deal with flying foes while Waterfall or Aqua Tail will utterly destroy many things that do not resist it. Return is an option for more coverage, while Hydro Pump aims to mess with things with lower Special Defence than physical Defence, but Lv. 61 is a long way to go, so Surf may be a suitable alternative, especially as it already does numbers to Boldore and Gigalith anyways (not to mention more PP). Either way, this is one scary set too, just not as immediate as Shell Smash version. The reason why Crunch is not used here is because you will be inevitably slower than Jellicent and its Energy Ball will more often than not OHKO you (or do heavy damage), so that becomes a problem. Archen/Archeops Base Stats: 55/112/45/74/45/70 75/140/65/112/65/110 Abilities: Defeatist Location: In Relic Castle, talk to the female Backpacker at the left (note: WALK, not RUN, over the Quicksands) and choose the Plume Fossil. Revive the fossil in Nacrene City. Archen evolves at Level 37. Rating: Excellent (A) - My my, Archeops has some incredible INCREDIBLE attack, special attack and speed. In fact, he makes even Salamence look bad. However, Archeops has low defences and is INCREDIBLY fragile, making him similar to Deoxys-A. Also, he comes at a HEAVY price: the ability Defeatist. When Archeops reaches 50% of his HP, both of his Attack and Special Attack goes down in HALF. That's right, that's a large price to pay for such a powerful Pokemon. - Unfortunately, Archeops's movepool is not all too interesting. He does get STAB moves but overall, the movepool is pretty shallow, but they are powerful enough to make a dent to the opposing Pokemon. - Overall, Archeops is the "KO or get KOd" Pokemon. He usually does OHKO his foes (an ARCHEN did 100 + damage to my Serperior with Acrobatics, for example), but you have to know what fights to pick and what fights not to get involved in. That being said, Archeops is a good Pokemon in any team and is available pretty early. Despite learning Double Team, I wouldn't ever set up with this Pokemon because of how easily Defeatist will activate on him. Be cautious when handling Archeops. Movesets: The Great Archeopteryx Archeops @ Nothing Ability: Defeatist - Rock Slide - Acrobatics - U-turn - Dig / Return / Dragon Claw With no item attached, expect Acrobatics to HURT. Yeah. Rock Slide is the obvious #2 STAB move to go along with Acrobatics. U-turn is there simply because Archeops is normally faster than its opponent (note: beware of priority moves) and can inflict some large damage if he simply knows it is not the fight to pick on, so U-turn is very valuable. The last slot can go to either Dig or Dragon Claw or Return, though STAB Acrobatics will hurt Hydreigon more than Super Effective Dragon Claw would, but it's still there as a consideration. It should be noted that Dig has a good coverage with Rock Slide. Trubbish/Garbodor Base Stats: 50/50/62/40/62/65 80/95/82/60/82/75 Abilities: Stench / Sticky Hold Stench / Weak Armor (as Garbodor) Location: They say it is available in Route 5, but I've never seen one yet. I see a lot of them from female Team Plasma grunts though. Garbodors are at Route 9 UnderXRay says. Trubbish evolves at Level 36. Rating: Poor (D) - Garbodor has well rounded stats, but usually middles in many of them. His defences are okay, his attack power is pretty good, and his speed is not all that bad. His Special Attack is on the weak side though, but not abysmal. His Speed can be raised with its ability "Weak Armor", which lowers Defence by 1 while raising Speed by 1 when hit by a contact move. - His movepool is absolute garbage (no pun intended). Literally, absolute garbage. He has very little coverage moves and he can only hope for using his STAB Poison moves and a few others. - Wow, I don't know what they were thinking when they designed a Pokemon based off garbage. Ugh. Though some people will probably be appealed by it (I know I'm not)... it just shows where Pokemon is going. But I digress. He's well rounded, but he doesn't have a lot of attacks to make use of unfortunately. And he is a pain to train. However, he does tend to keep away wild Pokemon with Stench... so... he's pretty handy to have. "It looks like this guy went into a fight with Smeargle, and Smeargle won X_X" ~ UnderXRay Movesets: Junk Man Garbodor @ Black Sludge Ability: Anything - Body Slam / Return - Stockpile - Acid Spray / Gunk Shot / Swallow - Sludge Bomb / Sludge Wave / Swallow / Payback Yes, it's so bad I actually had to recommend Acid Spray on this guy. Reason being that Special Attack is rather weak Acid Spray will help make Sludge Bomb much stronger. If you don't care about Acid Spray, you can make use of Gunk Shot which is Garbodor's most powerful attack. Unfortunately, it only has 5 uses and is 70% accurate, so make it count. Sludge Wave is another alternative to Sludge Bomb. It is superior to Sludge Bomb in singles battles, but in doubles, it will be a nightmare for your allies. Body Slam will slow your foes down if it inflicts paralysis, but Return is more powerful when Garbodor is happy, so make your choice. Stockpile is useful for raising Garbodor's defences. You can run Swallow so you can recover lost HP, but keep in mind all your defence boosts will be lost in that process. Payback is another choice so you can actually do some damage against Ghosts. Clean Up Crew Garbodor @ Black Sludge Ability: Anything - Toxic / Toxic Spikes - Protect - Clear Smog - Sludge Bomb / Return This is more of a utility set, but if worst comes to worst, the Garbage Man is here to clean the mess up. The idea is simple; if that Haxorus gets greedy with Dragon Dances, Clear Smog so it gets rid of them. Yay! Then you can intoxicate it with Toxic, and continue stalling it with that evil move Protect. Sludge Bomb or Return are used for your own self defence, so choose your poison. I was going to suggest Toxic Spikes, but then I realised that the later trainers will begin to use Full Restores, rendering it useless. However, if there is a Pokemon who uses Roar or Dragon Tail in your team, then we might have something going on here. Zorua/Zoroark Base Stats: 40/65/40/80/40/65 60/105/60/120/60/105 Abilities: Illusion Location: Zorua is an EVENT Pokemon and for that reason it can only be attained through event. Zorua evolves at Level 30, and it is said through an event Zoroark can be attained at Lostlorne Forest. Rating: I actually cannot rate this Pokemon as it is unattainable without activating the event. - Zoroark's stats are a lot more offensive than defensive. She is basically Lucario-esque in terms of stats. She is really frail, however. - As for her movepool, she doesn't seem to get anything interesting without TMs. Most of her attacks are Dark moves, and all the other moves that will help it are either hereditary or post-National Dex TMs. - Overall, Zoroark is a quite powerful Pokemon. She has good attack score and an even more powerful Special Attack and awesome speed. However, there's one thing Zoroark has, and that is her ability Illusion. Using Illusion, Zoroark will take the form of the last Pokemon in your party. She will also trick the AI and Illusion will last until Zoroark is damaged directly. Try taking the form of something like a Fighting or Poison Pokemon so they will try using Psychic or something on Zoroark. You will find the movesets a bit lacking in coverage though, and as my friend UnderXRay found, she learns too many Dark moves. Movesets: Much Ado About Nothing Zoroark @ Blackglasses Ability: Illusion - U-turn / Hone Claws - Night Slash - Low Sweep / Focus Blast - Return Physical Zoroark. Surprise your opponents by not being the one they expect you to be, and then either U-turn out to an appropriate counter Pokemon or start smacking them with STAB Night Slashes and other moves. Unfortunately, Low Sweep is Zoroark's only physical Fighting move, but you can try the risky yet powerful Focus Blast. If you don't feel like you need U-turn (a Heart Scale move), use Hone Claws to power up your attack power to ensure that your foes will regret staying in. Heh, fighting a Lilligant with hard hitting physical Dark moves is surely interesting, isn't it? Behind That Mask Zoroark @ Blackglasses Ability: Illusion - Nasty Plot - Night Daze / Shadow Ball - Focus Blast / Night Slash / Return - Grass Knot Unfortunately, Zoroark does not learn enough Special attacks to take advantage of that wicked 125 SpA. But use Nasty Plot to become a lot stronger once the foe finds out the Pokemon they thought they were fighting was not who they thought it was. Then start attacking with STAB Night Daze. However, Night Daze is a level 64 attack, so if you are not that high leveled, you can use the alternative Shadow Ball, which has the same coverage, but unfortunately NO STAB. It is a shame Dark Pulse is a hereditary move. The last two slots are dedicated to the... other special moves Zoroark can learn. If only Flamethrower was available before National Dex... oh well. If neither of the moves are appealing, go ahead and replace them with physical moves. Zoroark may be more powerful specially, but has more physical moves. Minccino/Cinccino Base Stats: 55/50/40/40/40/75 75/95/60/65/60/115 Abilities: Cute Charm / Technician Location: I found some near Cold Storage, but it is also in Route 5 and 9. Minccino requires a Shiny Stone to evolve. Rating: Satisfactory © - Cinccino is a LOT like Ambipom. She has the same abilities, and VERY similar stats. She is very fast, and physically powerful, but weak defence and low Special Attack. - As for her movepool, overall, many of her moves are Normal types, and she learns very little other moves, strangely for a Normal Type Pokemon. - Overall, Cinccino is an interesting Pokemon. She's cute, she's fluffy, she's just awesome, but she is not too powerful and pretty fragile. Use her ability Technician to make her more powerful and her multiple hitting moves, and you'll be set. Movesets: Winter Coat Cinccino @ Anything Ability: Technician - Work Up / Return - Tail Slap - Bullet Seed - Rock Blast Here we are taking advantage of Cinccino's ability Technician, powering up its weaker moves by 1.5x. Work Up is a good way to make Cinccino stronger, and Tail Slap will be Cinccino's main attack, though it can sometimes miss. The other two moves are also multiple hitting moves, but it requires Heart Scales. If you do not have 2 Heart Scales, you can replace one with Return and still use Work Up. If only Technician and Skill Link could be one ability. Oh well... it is still a pretty good way to use Cinccino. Gothita/Gothorita/Gothitelle Base Stats: 45/30/50/55/65/45 60/45/70/75/85/55 70/55/95/95/110/65 Abilities: Frisk Location: Pokemon Black only, they are in Route 5, and I've seen some Gothorita in Route 9. Gothita evolves at Level 32 while Gothorita evolves at Level 41. Rating: Satisfactory (C+) - Gothitelle actually has decent defensive stats, oddly enough for a Psychic. Her Special Attack is pretty good too. However, she has pretty low speed, and also a low attack score. - Gothitelle has a lot of Psychic moves and the moves Psychics normally learn such as Shadow Ball, but oddly, she can learn Dark moves and physical Fighting moves. It is rather strange that she can learn a lot of physical attacks. - Overall, Gothitelle is a difficult Pokemon to train, coming at a rather inconvenient time, but she can prove to be a useful Psychic, as she is very well rounded and has a lot of interesting options which can be useful. Movesets Elphaba Gothitelle @ Anything Ability: Frisk - Charge Beam - Grass Knot / Shadow Ball / Thunderbolt / Thunder Wave - Psychic / Shadow Ball - Psyshock / Shadow Ball This is basically a set that attempts to help Gothitelle sweep. Using Charge Beam, there's 63% chance of raising your Special Attack, then hit hard with STAB Psychic or Psyshock. You can run both if you want, as Psyshock targets the opponent's physical defence while Psychic is your main STAB option. You should normally run another coverage move, such as Grass Knot or Shadow Ball or Thunderbolt, or just replace one of the Psychic moves, but Thunder Wave is also a consideration to compensate for Gothitelle's low speed. Best of all, Gothitelle is quite bulky enough to take punishments from both sides; she does not fear a lot aside from STAB Dark or Ghost moves or Megahorns from Escavalier or something. Supportive Goth Gothitelle @ Light Clay Ability: Frisk - Reflect - Light Screen - Thunder Wave / Psyshock - Psychic Another team playing supportive psychic sets that has been mentioned MANY times before in this guide. Reflect, Light Screen, all helping Gothitelle's already decent defences. Thunder Wave can mess with fast people and Psychic is there so Gothitelle actually has an attack. Problem is, this is more suited competitively than in-game. Goth with Muscles Gothitelle @ Anything Ability: Frisk - Low Sweep / Brick Break - Return - Payback - Tickle / Rock Tomb / Rock Slide Lol. Solosis/Duosion/Reuniclus Base Stats: 45/30/40/105/50/20 65/40/50/125/60/30 110/65/75/125/85/30 Abilities: Overcoat / Magic Guard Location: Pokemon White only, they are in Route 5, and I believe Duosion are also in Route 9. Solosis evolves at Level 32 while Duosion evolves at Level 41. Rating: Satisfactory © - Reuniclus's stats seem interesting. It is another one of those SLOW Psychics like Musharna, but it has VERY high Special Attack and ridiculously high defences, along with the ability Magic Guard. It is almost Musharna on steroids. - Reuniclus's movepool is like most other Psychics, with the moves it needs, and yet it learns Thunder but not Thunderbolt. Er... wow. But aside from that, it gets RECOVER, something Gothitelle wishes she had. It has enough moves to get by, and can also use Trick Room, but unfortunately, that is post National Dex. - Reuniclus has to be one of the most broken Psychics they've made. It got away with huge defences, HUGE Special Attack, all for the cost of low speed (this again) and low attack. It also has Magic Guard as its ability! While this thing is DIFFICULT to train, and I mean VERY difficult, the final form pays off way too well. It even shows its face a lot in competitive play as well, and some even think it should be banned to ubers. Movesets: Man's Attempt on Creation Reuniclus @ Anything Ability: Magic Guard - Recover - Shadow Ball / Grass Knot / Flash Cannon / Thunder Wave - Psychic - Psyshock / Focus Blast Try getting Magic Guard over Overcoat because Magic Guard is infinitely superior. This set is similar to its counterpart Gothitelle's, except it has one difference: RECOVER. With Recover, Reuniclus can heal itself from all the damage it has taken. Then comes its attacking options. Pick your poison; there are so many to choose, but you must absolutely have your STAB Psychic or Psyshock or both. Unfortunately, there is no way to boost Reuniclus's Special Attack, but it is already quite powerful. Homunculus With Support Reuniclus @ Light Clay Ability: Magic Guard - Reflect - Light Screen - Thunder Wave / Recover - Psychic / Psyshock Another team playing supportive psychic sets that has been mentioned MANY times before in this guide. Reflect, Light Screen, all helping Reuniclus's already decent defences. Thunder Wave can mess with fast people and Psychic is there so Reuniclus actually has an attack. Recover can also take the slot of Thunder Wave so you can heal yourself during the process if needed. Ducklett/Swanna Base Stats: 62/44/50/44/50/55 75/87/63/87/63/98 Abilities: Keen Eye / Big Pecks Location: Charizard Bridge (the Drawbridge) sometimes has shadows you can walk over, which will usually result to wings, but sometimes, a Ducklett will appear. Ducklett evolves at Level 35. Rating: Good (B+) - Swanna has a rather offensive stat spread, with both attacks equaling each other, and her speed rather decent (although an odd speed tier). She also has quite low defences. - Swanna's movepool is literally ALL FLYING and WATER moves. LITERALLY. She learns Normal moves and Ice Beam through TMs though, but aside from that, ALL WATER and FLYING. However, she does get POWERFUL Flying moves to make up for the lack of moves she learns, such as Brave Bird and Hurricane. - Overall, Swanna is a pretty interesting Pokemon. She is elegant and I really wish I can find one one day, but they still elude me. She can hit hard, but only when she starts learning all the hard hitting moves. Overall, a fairly good Pokemon, good for Flying or Surf or both, but the bad defences can be hazardous. Movesets: Silver Swan Swanna @ Damp Rock Ability: Big Pecks - Rain Dance - Surf / Scald - Hurricane - Roost / Air Slash Swanna is a monster in the rain... but don't use her against something with Thunder. You will regret it! Anyhow, after setting up Rain, Swanna's Surfs will become monstrously powerful, becoming 1.5x as effective as it was before. Scald is another option if you think burns are appealing, but watch out for benefitters like Conkeldurr or Throh. If they decide to crash the party, that is what Swanna's other STAB, HURRICANE, is for. Hurricane becomes 100% accurate in the rain, and has a chance of causing confusion. It is amazingly powerful and should be used more often. I suppose Roost is there so damage that has been done before can be healed, but anything else can go in there, such as Air Slash because Hurricane's low PP can be annoying after a while. Cygnus Knight Swanna @ Mystic Water Ability: Big Pecks - Fly / Brave Bird - Surf / Scald - Return - Roost This time, Swanna will try to be more physical and attack with Brave Bird. Brave Bird HURTS... but it also hurts you. Roost is there to accomodate for that, but Swanna does not survive very long. Use Surf for your water STAB or to deal with those Boldores (watch out for rock moves however), while Scald has the ability to burn but is generally weaker. Return is for coverage, as usual. The Ugly Duckling Swanna @ Mystic Water Ability: Big Pecks - Featherdance - Roost - Scald / Aqua Ring - Air Slash / Fly / Protect This is an attempt to make Swanna more defensive. Obviously, you want to get Swanna to have at least ONE attacking move, so don't get Aqua Ring + Protect for the last slot. With Featherdance, Swanna effectively doubles her defences, and Scald has a chance to burn. Air Slash is a cool STAB that can also cause flinching, while Fly is another way to stall burn damage. If Fly does not work for you, try Protect instead. When Swanna is damaged, she can Roost off the damage to annoy once again. And any attempts to lower Swanna's defences are foiled due to her Big Pecks. Vanillite/Vanillish/Vanilluxe Base Stats: 46/50/50/65/60/44 51/65/65/80/75/59 71/95/85/110/95/79 Abilities: Ice Body Location: I found Vanillite near Cold Storage. Vanillite evolves at Level 35 while Vanillish evolves at Level 47. Rating: Satisfactory © - Surprisingly, Vanilluxe is not as bad as people make her out to be. She isn't too slow, and she isn't too vulnerable. She is just a snack that smiles back and is an Ice Cream, so no one takes her seriously. Anyways, that beast Special Attack is something, and her defences are not all too bad either. Her physical attack power, though not the best, is not bad either. - Movepool, however, is severely lacking. She is mostly Ice moves (what did you expect?) and... Flash Cannon. However, early Ice Beam is always cool and she can learn Weather Ball with Heart Scale. If the weather turns rainy, you will have an awesome Water move in your hands! Unfortunately, some of the cool moves, like Autotomize, Ice Shard, and Water Pulse, are all hereditary moves. - Overall, I think the Ice Cream is rather underrated. I admit, I was joking when I first put it into my team, but afterwards I realised it was not all that bad. It was a pain to train, however, and it kept getting KOd very easily early on, but later on, it is a big mistake to underestimate Vanilluxe's power. Two of the game's major "bosses" do not use it for no reason you know! Movesets: iScream Vanilluxe @ Nevermeltice Ability: Ice Body - Ice Beam - Flash Cannon - Acid Armor - Avalanche / Mirror Coat / Frost Breath iScream and uScream for iScream's Ice Beam! This is basically the set I use. Ice Beam is Vanilluxe's main attack, and it really hurts. Not many Pokemon can take an Ice Beam from Vanilluxe easily. Flash Cannon is there to hurt Rock Pokemon, and it also lowers Special Defence, and there really is nothing else to put in there. Acid Armor makes Vanilluxe much more durable and is very useful against hard physical hitters. Last but not least, I run Avalanche because some Pokemon have higher Special Defence than Defence, and the fact that it becomes a base 180 attack when Vanilluxe was directly attacked before. It's pretty good, but you can also run Mirror Coat if a non STABd Fire move comes your way and you want to bounce it back, or Frost Breath for always hitting critical hits for whatever reason you want (or if you find Ice Beam running out too quickly). Frozen Treat from HellHelsinki Vanilluxe @ Icy Rock / Nevermeltice Ability: Icy Body - Hail - Blizzard - Flash Cannon - Acid Armor/ Ice Beam You thought Ice Beam hurt? Wait until you get a load of this. Hail not only damages non-ice foes, but it also makes Vanilluxe's most powerful move, Blizzard, 100% accurate. And due to Vanilluxe's ability Ice Body, Vanilluxe will HEAL from hail every turn! Talk about nice bonuses. Then there's all the other coverage moves and blah blah blah you know the rest. Deerling/Sawsbuck Base Stats: 60/60/50/40/50/75 80/100/70/60/70/95 Abilities: Chlorophyll / Sap Sipper Location: Routes 6 and 7 are swarming with them. Deerling evolves at Level 34. Rating: Good (B+) - Sawsbuck's stats are well rounded overall. Though his defences are not too great, his attack power is solid and his speed is decent as well. With Sap Sipper as his ability, Sawsbuck's attack power will increase further when hit by a Grass attack. - Sawsbuck has a good enough movepool for a Grass Pokemon. With Megahorn and Wild Charge and even Jump Kick, there are some pretty good supplementary attacks which will always be useful. - Overall, this deer is a rather excellent addition to Black and White, and his forms are different each season as well to add to the spice. Sawsbuck is a great Grass Pokemon for anyone who wants a Grass Pokemon in their team and can do a lot to help. It is not too difficult training one either, but it is frail and comes slightly late. Movesets: Oberon, Lord of the Forest Sawsbuck @ Big Root / Miracleseed Ability: Sap Sipper - Horn Leech - Jump Kick / Megahorn - Return / Double-Edge - Wild Charge / Megahorn Sawsbuck's STAB of choice, Horn Leech, is an excellent signature move and pretty powerful. It is essentially a physical Giga Drain, which complements perfectly with Sawsbuck. You probably started off with Jump Kick from the start as a Deerling, and since that move is powerful, it is best you keep it. Don't forget Sawsbuck also has a Normal STAB, so Return will do. If you want more power, Double-Edge is a good choice, but that recoil is painful. Last but not least, Wild Charge is an electric move helpful for taking down Flying Pokemon, but again, more reckless recoils here. You may replace either Jump Kick or Wild Charge with Megahorn, which is brutally powerful. Bambi Sawsbuck @ Big Root Ability: Sap Sipper - Leech Seed - Protect - Horn Leech - Return / Charm This is a more defensive but more annoying set to use for Sawsbuck. Leech Seed + Horn Leech = easy way to gain extra health. Protect is for extra seed recovery and stalling. For the last slot, STAB Return always works well, but Charm will indirectly double your physical defence, which is always a good thing for this deer. Golden Hind Sawsbuck @ Heat Rock Ability: Chlorophyll - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Return - Megahorn / Horn Leech / Jump Kick Though Sawsbuck's special attack is lacking, Solarbeam still packs quite a punch, so all is not lost if you want to run Solarbeam. Try it out for fun, but aside from that, there is not much it can do, so run two physical attacks to complement Solarbeam. Note that in the sun Sawsbuck's speed doubles with Chlorophyll as its ability. Emolga Base Stats: 55/75/60/75/60/103 Abilities: static Location: You can trade a Boldore to a Hiker inside a house in Route 7 for an Emolga. I never did it so I do not know how good it really is. Rating: Poor (D) - Emolga is another fast but frail electric Pokemon that we see 9001 times. - His movepool is mostly electric and some flying moves. Yeah. He also has some annoying moves like Double Team, Encore and Volt Switch. - This is just another electric rodent, except he flies now, so rejoice, as he is no longer weak to Ground but immune! Whee! Movesets: Not Pikachu Emolga @ None Ability: Static - Double Team - Charge Beam - Discharge / Thunderbolt - Acrobatics This is Emolga's attempt to be annoying. After 6 Double Teams (if you get that far) Emolga is nearly unhittable (unless they use moves like Faint Attack or Swift) while Emolga can do whatever it wants to its foes. Charge Beam is Emolga's method of raising its Special Attack. No item means Acrobatics will hit HARD, and it is a good Flying STAB in general. If you ventured to P2 Laboratory, feel free to replace Discharge with the harder hitting Thunderbolt. Icarus Emolga @ None Ability: Static - Volt Switch - Acrobatics - Discharge / Thunderbolt - Encore / Light Screen You know how annoying Volt Switch is. You don't have to rely on Double Team in this set. Use Discharge for the paralysis to help your teammate, or Encore that annoying Dragon Dancing Haxorus, and Volt Switch out to a Pokemon who can deal with Haxorus. Light Screen is another option to help your team soak special attacks better, and Acrobatics is Emolga's most powerful move. Karrablast/Escavalier Base Stats: 50/75/45/40/45/60 70/135/105/60/105/20 Abilities: Swarm / Shed Skin Swarm / Shell Armor (as Escavalier) Location: Route 6. Karrablast evolves through a strange method of just trading with a Shelmet, stealing the Shelmet's armor to become an Escavalier. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) / Bad (E) as Karrablast - Escavalier is certainly a very peculiar Pokemon. With a HUGE attack score of 135, and very high defences, there's nothing that can stop him... well, except Fire attacks. He has really low speed though, but that is to be expected from that armour. - Escavalier's movepool is quite poor. He learns mostly bug moves, but it also has Iron Head for STAB and the amazing Swords Dance. It should be noted that Megahorn is a hereditary move and is Escavalier's most powerful attack. Escavalier stole Heracross's thunder as the strongest Megahorn user. - I should not rate this so low, but the reason I did it is because Karrablast is VERY difficult to train. To become an Escavalier, Karrablast MUST be TRADED for a SHELMET (very specific requirement) in order to become an Escavalier. But if you do get an Escavalier, he is certainly a force to be reckoned with and not an easy Pokemon to take down. Movesets: Yes my Liege? Escavalier @ Anything Ability: Anything - Swords Dance - X-Scissor - Iron Head - Return While Escavalier's slow as a snail, this guy can take hits very well and dish back obscene damage very well. After a Swords Dance, Escavalier might as well OHKO almost anything he fights. Well, maybe not Ghost Pokemon, but regardless, Escavalier will make his potential known. If only his movepool were a bit bigger... oh well. Foongus/Amoonguss Base Stats: 69/55/45/55/55/15 114/85/70/85/80/30 Abilities: Effect Spore Location: They appear as Pokeballs, a lot like Voltorb from the previous generations. They are in Route 6 and 10, I think. Foongus evolves at Level 39. Rating: Poor (D) - Well, Amoonguss is quite bulky on both sides, and has a pretty high HP score. He even lived through a Flame Burst from Lampent. His attack score is the same on both sides of the spectrum at 85. What had to give? Yeah, speed. - His movepool is rather barren though, as it is mostly Grass moves. However, he is full of useful support moves, and though the game is not really kind to support Pokemon, Amoonguss can be useful nonetheless. He learns Spore much like the other mushroom Pokemon, but really late. Notice the lack of Poison STAB as well. - Overall, Amoonguss should not be underestimated. Despite the fact he is not as powerful as one would like it to be, he can become really annoying very quickly. He is quite difficult to train, however. "it's a potion, NO it's a ball, NO IT'S FOONGUSMAN!" ~ UnderXRay Movesets: RenegadeShroom Amoonguss @ Big Root Ability: Effect Spore - Toxic - Ingrain / Synthesis / Return - Giga Drain - Protect / Clear Smog This is the epitome of bulky grass. You Ingrain to gain extra health (though Ingrain means no switching out), intoxicate your foe, and start Giga Draining or Protect stalling them out until your foe is overcome with indirect damage over and over. Synthesis can be used to instantly recover Amoonguss's health instead of using Ingrain. Return can be used if you don't want to stall your opponent out (it slows down battles, really). Protect stalling is fun though, but Clear Smog is a Dragon Dancing Haxorus deterrent. Mushroom Under the Sun Amoonguss @ Heat Rock / Miracleseed Ability: Effect Spore - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Growth - Return / Toxic Yeah, another boring Sunnybeam set... only difference is this guy is actually slow and does not have Chlorophyll. That's kinda bad for a Grass Pokemon, but it is here to make use of Solarbeam. Growth is + 2/2 under the sun, meaning Solarbeam and Return will work well. Just watch out for Fire attackers and you are all set. Good Night Shroom Amoongus @ Big Root Ability: Effect Spore - Spore - Giga Drain - Return - Payback Nothing much to say, aside from the fact I ran out of ideas. But Spore is a selling point in Amoonguss, and should certainly be used. Unfortunately, it is a Level 62 move, which I doubt you will reach before the Elite 4 unless you are a dedicated trainer of some sorts, but this option is here. Frillish/Jellicent Base Stats: 55/40/50/65/85/40 100/60/70/85/105/60 Abilities: Water Absorb Cursed Body Location: Surf around Route 4 and Driftveil City. Frillish evolves at Level 40. Rating: Poor (D) - Jellicent is a rather defensively leaning Pokemon, having great special defence and HP. Its Special Attack power is decent as well but its other stats, notably attack, defence, and speed, are lacking. Defence problems can be circumvented though with moves that cause burn and its unusually high HP for a ghost Pokemon. - As for the movepool, Jellicent has a lot of toys to play with. Be it defensive, offensive, or a combination of both, Jellicent has a lot to offer. Unfortunately, Psychic and Energy Ball are available after National Dex is obtained. - Overall, Jellicent is a good Pokemon to try out. However, the fact you get it at Lv. 5-20 AFTER you beat the 6th gym (meaning you should be somewhere in the 30s if not 40s) makes it difficult to train it. Jellicent can catch up quickly by grinding in caves or the desert and whatnot, but aside from that, that one thing is what brings Jellicent down. It was supposed to replace Tentacool and Tentacruel, but I don't know, I don't think a Ghost would be THIS common in the waters or something... it is just really weird. Movesets: HRM Jellicent Jellicent @ Mystic Water Ability: Water Absorb - Surf / Scald - Shadow Ball / Hex - Recover - Brine / Ominous Wind / Blizzard / Hydro Pump / Will-o-Wisp For you republicans, HRM means His/Her Royal Majesty. This is the set I ran. Two STABs in the form of Surf and Shadow Ball is really nice. However, Scald is useful for Jellicent's "low" defence and also gets STAB. If you do get burns, Hex will do more damage than Shadow Ball, but Shadow Ball is more consistent. Recover off any damage Jellicent has sustained, and as for the last slot, almost anything can be used, so just choose! It's in game so do whatever you feel. Alomomola Base Stats: 165/75/80/40/45/65 Abilities: Healer / Hydration Location: Surf around Route 4 or Driftveil City Rating: Poor (D) - Alomomola has some of the weirdest stats ever. Her HP is VERY high, nearing Wailord's HP and her physical attack and defence are in the "decent" zone. Her special stats, however, are VERY low and nearly inconsiderable. Her speed is quite low too. Looks like this Pokemon was meant to be a supportive Pokemon. - Alomomola's movepool is very shallow, but she has all the moves she needs to support her teammates, but she does not have adequate self-defence. - Overall, Alomomola was meant more for competitive battling more so than in-game usage. One thing bothers me about Alomomola... why did she NOT evolve from Luvdisc? Movesets: Mary Seacole Alomomola @ Mysticwater Ability: Anything - Wish - Protect - Aqua Jet / Waterfall - Return / Scald Alomomola can heal your Pokemon by passing gigantic Wishes, which is her main purpose. She can also heal herself as well. Aqua Jet is its STAB move here, as it runs off her physical attack. Return is there to complement it for coverage, but Scald also works, not for damage, but for inflicting burns, which can be very useful, but NOT recommended due to Alomomola's low Special Attack. Florence Nightingale Alomomola @ Mysticwater Ability: Healer - Heal Pulse - Helping Hand - Return / Safeguard / Wide Guard - Waterfall / Aqua Jet This Alomomola was designed for the Double or Triple battles, not that this is common in-game anyways. While she does not have a lot of power to offer, she can certainly keep its teammates standing on the battlefield using her valuable Heal Pulse. Every other turn she can either set up Safeguard, Wide Guard an Earthquake/Surf, or usually just Helping Hand to give a teammate a boost. Return or Waterfall are there for self-defence, but Scald is for the burn chance if you feel like it is needed. Too bad doubles and triples are not prevalent. Overall, this isn't plausible in-game. Joltik/Galvantula Base Stats: 50/47/50/57/50/65 70/77/60/97/60/108 Abilities: Compoundeyes / Unnerve Location: Chargestone Cave. Joltik evolves at Level 36. Rating: Satisfactory © - Galvantula's defences are poor, but his speed is incredibly high. His Special Attack is higher than his Attack, though neither are all too great. Using Compoundeyes + Thunder, however, may be something interesting. - The movepool is horridly barren, as it is mostly bug or electric moves. His signature move Electroweb is of little use because Galvantula is already really fast, and it lowers the foe's speed by 1 stage. - Overall, Galvantula is an interesting Pokemon. The new Bug/Electric combo is surely something to spark someone's interest, and he loses its flying weakness that way. He is just rather weak and can get unnerving to people with arachnophobia. Also useful vs Skyla's gym that occurs afterwards. Movesets: Static Shock Galvantula @ Magnet Ability: Compoundeyes - Thunder - Signal Beam - Sucker Punch / Thunder Wave - Return Using Compoundeyes, Thunder's low accuracy is boosted up to a whopping 91% (30% boost), making it hit more often than it normally should. Signal Beam is the Bug STAB of choice. The rest are "extras" and useful coverage moves. Eensy Weensy Spider Galvantula @ Damp Rock Ability: Anything - Rain Dance - Thunder - Signal Beam / Bug Buzz - Sucker Punch / Thunderbolt / Return / Thunder Wave ... climbed up the Water Spout. Down came the RAIN and washed the Spider out. Anyways, using Rain Dance will bring you two advantages: you can never miss with Thunder, AND it will weaken Fire moves so MAYBE Galvantula can have a better chance of standing pretty in the battlefield. Use Signal Beam as your Bug STAB. If you reach level 60, then run Bug Buzz. The rest are coverage moves. Along Came a Spider Galvantula @ Magnet Ability: Anything - Agility - Electroball - Signal Beam / Bug Buzz - Thunderbolt / Thunder / Sucker Punch / Return / Thunder Wave ...who sat down beside her, scaring Miss Muffet away! Why use Agility on something as already fast as Galvantula? Good question... but the primary use of this is to raise the power of Electroball, which becomes base 150 power WITHOUT STAB if the opponent is 25% or lower speed than Galvantula's. All of a sudden it sounds appealing doesn't it? It takes one turn to set up Agility, but that turn can be costly, so make it count. Signal Beam and Bug Buzz I've already discussed, and the last slot doesn't matter really. Ferroseed/Ferrothorn Base Stats: 44/50/91/24/86/10 74/94/131/54/116/20 Abilities: Iron Barbs Location: Chargestone Cave. Ferroseed evolves at Level 40. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Ferrothorn has very high defences, as expected of a Steel Pokemon. He also has a usable physical attack, but his special attack suffers, and his speed is abysmal (we have too many of these). Iron Barbs means everytime someone touches Ferrothorn they take quite a bit of damage, helping Ferrothorn greatly. - As for the movepool, Ferrothorn learns all sorts of moves that can help play a defensive role in a team. However, he is also physically offensively capable with powerful moves like Gyro Ball or Power Whip. Only problem is that they lack PP. - Overall, Ferrothorn is a LOT more suited for competitive play than in-game. However, Ferrothorn is also useful in game, but eventually, that low PP from the moves he learn will bite him harder than anything. Also, it is quite difficult to train with his natural movepool going all over the place. He learns normal weak moves like Metal Claw or weak multi hitting move Pin Missile, then all of a sudden it learns Gyro Ball and the special Mirror Shot. Movesets: Audrey Jr. Ferrothorn @ Miracleseed Ability: Iron Barbs - Curse / Thunder Wave - Power Whip - Iron Head / Gyro Ball - Payback / Return There's not much Ferrothorn can do but set up Curses to boost his already good physical side while reducing his already hopeless speed. However, that can come in handy as it powers up its STAB Gyro Ball, which becomes a lot stronger the more slower Ferrothorn is against its opponents. However, 5 PP is disappointing so while Iron Head will do no good flinching as Ferrothorn is too slow to utilise that, Iron Head is a reliable Steel STAB attack. Power Whip is Ferrothorn's main Grass STAB, and it is very powerful, so it should not be skipped. Last slot can go to either Payback or Return. He learns Payback at Level 53 or by TM. Note that setting up Curse when the opponent has a foe that uses Fire moves is pointless, so know your foes before attempting! Klink/Klang/Klinklang Base Stats: 40/55/70/45/60/30 60/80/95/70/85/50 60/100/115/70/85/90 Abilities: Plus / Minus Location: Chargestone Cave. Klink evolves at Level 38 while Klang evolves at Level 49. Rating: Poor (D) - Klinklang is pretty well rounded. It has a surprisingly decent speed, but its main attraction is its high attack and even higher defence. Its special side is a little weaker than its physical side, but overall it is not too bad. As for its ability... that is troll. Plus and Minus. If you want to make use of those abilities, get an opposite charged Klinklang - Its movepool is just... ewww. All it learns are Steel and Electric moves... LITERALLY. Well, there's Return, but so what? It does not even receive STAB for electric moves either! Sigh, oh well. It might as well be electric as well, but they did not even do that. Oh well. - Overall, Klinklang is quite tough to train because the majority of its moves are special, while it is best physically. It does not even learn any physical moves after Bind, which is bad! It does have interesting moves like Shift Gear though. Movesets: Gear 1 Klinklang @ Magnet Ability: Whatever - Charge Beam / Metal Sound - Autotomize / Thunder Wave - Thunderbolt / Discharge - Flash Cannon This makes use of Klinklang's special moves. Use Charge Beam to have a 63% chance to raise its special attack, or just Metal Sound to mess with your foe's Special Defence (note: Defiant Bisharps will enjoy that more than hate it, so beware). Then there is Autotomize to double Klinklang's speed, or just Thunder Wave to mess with your foe's Speed. However, usually Autotomize will help Klinklang better in the long run. Now there are two special moves, Flash Cannon for STAB and Discharge because there really is not much else to get. Use Thunderbolt instead if you found TM24. Gear 2 Klinklang @ Magnet Ability: Whatever - Shift Gear - Gear Grind - Return - Thunderbolt / Discharge / Volt Switch If you ever reach Lv. 54, try this out to take advantage of Klinklang's better physical stats. Using Shift Gear gives you + 2 speed and + 1 attack, which is not bad at all. Gear Grind is for STAB while Return is the only other physical move it can really make use of. Thunderbolt is usually better in the long run for the last slot, while Discharge is the alternative if you do not have TM24. Volt Switch is there to switch out while dealing some damage to a foe. Tynamo/Eelektrik/Eelektross Base Stats: 35/55/40/45/40/60 65/85/70/75/70/40 85/115/80/105/80/50 Abilities: Levitate Location: Chargestone Cave (2% chance appearance, 8% in the basement). Tynamo evolves at Level 39 while Eelektrik evolves with a Thunderstone. Rating: Bad (E) - Eelektross, despite being an eel, is not water but is found floating in Chargestone Cave. Yeah. It's slow but it is quite powerful on both sides of the spectrum. He is not too defensively weak either. Because of his ability Levitate, Eelektross has no weaknesses (beware of Gastro Acid or Mold Breaker!). Pretty cool right? - His movepool is not too bad either. Eelektross learns all sorts of good Electric moves and even has Dark, Dragon, Fire, Poison, and assorted others. - If he is so good and all, then why did I give him a bad? Answer is because Eelektross is VERY difficult to obtain. First of all, Tynamo is VERY difficult to find in Chargestone Cave. He has a low chance of appearance or something ridiculous. And when in that stage, he only has Tackle and Charge Beam and Spark to work with, no TM access and very low stats. Then it takes up to Level 39 to evolve! He takes a LONG time... and even after that, you will need a Thunderstone to evolve Eelektrik and once you do that, he cannot learn any more moves via level up. If you do get him, great, but this thing takes a lot more effort than he is worth. He is a good Pokemon, but nearly impossible to train. This trend will continue later on with other good Pokemon. Movesets: Electrophorus electricus Eelektross @ Magnet Ability: Levitate - Acid Spray / Charge Beam - Thunderbolt / Discharge - Grass Knot / Crunch - Thunder Wave / Flash Cannon All these Slashes look atrocious, but bear with me. Using Eelektross's special movepool is rather fun. For one, he learns Acid Spray, which lowers the foe's Special Defence by 2 stages, allowing Eelektross's next move to be twice as strong as long as it is special. STAB Thunderbolt will definitely do that job. Ground Pokemon? Not a problem. Hai Grass Knot (Note: this strategy is ineffective against Excadrill). Flash Cannon is there just to be another special attack, but you don't have to run these if you don't want to. Charge Beam can work if you want to raise Eelektross's special attack instead of relying on Acid Spray. Thunder Wave is a good option for the last slot if Eelektross's low speed bothers you, but if you run Discharge instead of Thunderbolt, note that Discharge has a 30% chance of paralysis. The last two slots can also be replaced with physical moves, such as Return or Crunch or even Wild Charge. Super Eel Eelektross @ None Ability: Levitate - Coil / Return - Wild Charge - Crunch - Acrobatics / Brick Break / Return This is something like Serperior minus the Speed and the weaknesses and the lack of power. Note that Eelektrik learns Coil at Lv. 54, which will take a while, so use Return instead if you do not have it. Using Coil raises Eelektross's attack, defence and accuracy by 1 stage, which is cool. Wild Charge is Eelektross's most powerful move, receiving STAB, but the recoil is annoying. Crunch is his other physical move so just put that in. Last slot can go to either Return or Acrobatics, but if you use the latter, make sure there is no item attached to Eelektross for full damage. Brick Break can also be considered for unresisted coverage from Crunch and Brick Break combination. Elgyem/Beheeyem Base Stats: 55/55/55/85/55/30 75/75/75/125/95/40 Abilities: Telepathy / Synchronize Location: The top floor of Celestial Tower holds RARE Elgyems. Most of the time you will met Litwicks. Elgyem evolves at Level 42. Rating: Poor (D) - It's another powerful Special Attacking but Slow Psychic. Gamefreak seems to love these variants in this game - Its movepool is similar to the other Psychics. It learns STAB Psychic and has access to Shadow Ball, but unlike the others, it learns Calm Mind AND Recover naturally! - Overall, it's another boring Psychic Pokemon when you probably already have Duosion or something by now. However, if you do not, this Little Green Man (Elgyem.. LGM) has something to offer and should not be underestimated. Movesets: Chief Grey Beheeyem @ Anything Ability: Synchronize - Calm Mind / Charge Beam / Thunder Wave - Psychic - Shadow Ball / Thunderbolt - Recover Using Calm Mind or Charge Beam, raise Beheeyem's special attack so it can hit much harder than it already does already with STAB Psychic, or Shadow Ball to nail other Psychics. Thunderbolt is stronger than Shadow Ball in general and can be helpful against Skyla's Pokemon. Use Recover to heal up damage done to Beheeyem. Thunder Wave can replace Calm Mind if you think Beheeyem already hits hard enough. E.T. Beeheeyem @ Light Clay Ability: Synchronize - Reflect - Light Screen - Thunder Wave / Recover - Psychic You saw this coming. Another supportive set which can help your team. Why is this becoming so prevalent among the Psychics? Hmmm, I sense a pattern here. Litwick/Lampent/Chandelure Base Stats: 50/30/55/65/55/20 60/40/60/95/60/55 60/55/90/145/90/80 Abilities: Flash Fire / Flame Body Location: They are all over Celestial Tower. Litwick evolves at Level 41 while Lampent evolves with a Dusk Stone. Rating: Poor (D) - Chandelure's most frightening and most noteable stat is her beast special attack of 145. That's near the amount of Kyogre's 150, and you know how strong Kyogre is. Her other stats are somewhat mediocre, but they are workable. Her defences are okay, and her speed is usable, just not remarkable. Flash Fire means immunity to Fire and it powers her fire attack while Flame Body can burn someone on contact. - Her movepool is not too great before national Dex, unfortunately. She does not even get Flamethrower. However, she has enough moves to work with so all is not lost. - I had the most frightening experience with Chandelure. As a Litwick, she was outpaced by everything, got OHKOd more often than not, and she took a great deal of effort just to evolve her at a high level of 41. Even my Level 11 Frillish evolved before her, which was really shameful. Once she was a Lampent, she became more bearable, but she was still torn to shreds by nearly everything. I did not even evolve her with a Dusk Stone until AFTER I beat the E4. Movesets: Hitodama Chandelure @ Spell Tag Ability: Anything - Flame Burst - Shadow Ball / Hex - Will-o-Wisp - Fire Blast This is... pretty much all Chandelure can learn for now, so bear with it. Flame Burst is somewhat weak, but it still gets its job done. Shadow Ball should be your main Ghost attack, as it is powerful, but if you want to use the Will-o-Wisp + Hex strategy (Hex doubles its power when the opponent is status'd), then by all means try that out. Keep in mind Hex has 10 PP as opposed to Shadow Ball's 15 PP, and Shadow Ball is more stable. Last but not least is Fire Blast, which is Chandelure's most powerful attack in this set. Is the Sun Safe? Chandelure @ Spell Tag Ability: Anything - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Flame Burst / Fire Blast - Shadow Ball It's interesting that Chandelure can use Sunny Day. Ever heard of a Ghost in the sun? Thought not, but at any rate, this will help Chandelure a LOT as it powers her already nightmarish Fire Blast and weaken Water moves coming to her. Solarbeam will make sure Water Pokemon are taken down, such as Seismitoad. Flame Burst and Fire Blast is dependent on your preferences, but usually I go Flame Burst only because Fire Blast has 5 PP and is less than perfectly accurate. Shadow Ball is your other STAB, so that should definitely be there. Axew/Fraxure/Haxorus Base Stats: 46/87/60/30/40/57 66/117/70/40/50/67 76/147/90/60/70/97 Abilities: Rivalry / Mold Breaker Location: Mistralton Cave. Axew evolves at Level 38 while Fraxure evolves at Level 48. Rating: Good (B+) - Haxorus is a monster. See that HAX power of 147? Yeah, this is the result of Gamefreak's fetish for high stats in this generation. His speed is not bad either, while his defences somewhat suffer, they are not incredibly poor. He should not use special attacks. Mold Breaker is a good ability as it ensures abilities do not interfere with his attacking (such as Earthquake hitting Levitaters) - Haxorus learns mostly, you've guessed it, DRAGON moves, but that's pretty much all it needs to dominate. He does learn a lot of other moves too, of course. - Overall, this dragon is powerful and pretty easy to train. Though he reaches his final form at 48, even Fraxure is pretty powerful. He is nice to have but sometimes it becomes too easy. Movesets: O NO ITS HAXORUS! Haxorus @ Anything Ability: Mold Breaker - Dragon Dance / Swords Dance - Dragon Claw - Shadow Claw / X-Scissor / Return - Brick Break / Dig / Return Haxorus. Hurts. Use a single Dragon Dance and he hurts like a bulldozer. You will mainly use Dragon Claw as it gets STAB and undoubtedly almost always OHKO your foes. If you meet a Steel Pokemon, go ahead and Brick Break or use Dig on them so they do not resist your main form of attack. There are other options and many are useful in their own rights. Use Swords Dance instead of Dragon Dance if you think Haxorus is already fast as Swords Dance makes Haxorus much stronger than a Dragon Dance. Rock Slide is another option. Cubchoo/Beartic Base Stats: 55/70/40/60/40/40 95/110/80/70/80/50 Abilities: Snow Cloak Location: Twist Mountain, though rare. Cubchoo evolves at Level 37. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Beartic is well rounded in most of his stats. He has a high attack power as expected of a bear. However, his speed is rather low, which is a problem. - His movepool is a mix of physical and special moves of many kinds, mostly Ice and Fighting and even Water. He even learns Brine naturally, interestingly enough, and has the powerful Superpower as a Heart Scale move. - Overall, while he is rare and not very easy to train, Beartic is a solid Pokemon that can work, but his weaknesses and his slowness brings him down a notch. He is powerful and can tear a lot of things apart when used right. Movesets: King of the Arctic Beartic @ Nevermeltice Ability: Snow Cloak - Icicle Crash - Brick Break / Dig / Bulldoze - Shadow Claw / Rock Slide - Return All out physical attacking Polar Bear is angry, and is ready to take his foes out in rage! RAWR! First option is Icicle Crash because it is his best physical STAB option. Brick Break + Shadow Claw offer very good coverage, but there's also the option of Bulldoze and Rock Slide. Bulldoze will lower the foe's speed, and Rock Slide has good coverage alongside Bulldoze or Dig. Mind you, these moves are pretty weak, so there's also Return for a more powerful attack should Icicle Crash not suffice. Where's the Polar Bear? Beartic @ Icy Rock / Nevermeltice Ability: Snow Cloak - Hail - Blizzard - Brick Break / Return - Icicle Drop Though Beartic's Special Attack isn't spectacular, one cannot ignore the powerful Blizzard. Use Hail to not only make Blizzard 100% accurate, but also give Beartic an evasion boost due to Snow Cloak. The other moves are there to basically give coverage, and Icicle Drop is still a good physical Ice move, so it's good to have it. Cryogonal Base Stats: 70/50/30/95/135/105 Abilities: Levitate Location: Twist Mountain. 1% encounter rate though... unless winter, which is 5%. Ha ha. Rating: Bad (E) - Cryogonal has to have one of the strangest stat distribution ever created. For one, it has the highest Special Defence of all Ice Pokemon not named Regice. Its Speed is quite surprisingly high and its Special Attack is not bad either. Then look at those physical stats. 50 attack. Okay, I won't use physical attacks. 30 defence. 30?! 30?!!! Yeah, basically a Tackle will hurt a LOT on this guy while it sponges Flame Bursts from Litwick well. What a strange Pokemon. It has Levitate which grants it Ground immunity. - Cryogonal's movepool is in shambles. Most of it is Ice attacks and some supportive moves like dual screens and Acid Armor. It even learns Recover, but it is lacking in offensive moves. It really begs for more options to attack with. Trollingly enough, it gets Solarbeam... but no Sunny Day? What is this madness? It wants Dark Pulse, not Night Slash. - At any rate, Cryogonal is an interesting concept. I like the guy, but the lack of its availability and its rather low usefulness if it is even obtained makes it deserve a "bad". One good thing about Cryogonal is that it outspeeds both Haxorus and Hydreigon, so it can destroy both of them with Ice Beam if it wanted to. The one Hydreigon you face only uses special attacks as well, so even better. It has some utility in competitive battling, however, but not as high as one would hope for. It truly deserved more than this. Movesets: Angry Snowflake Cryogonal @ Nevermeltice Ability: Levitate - Acid Armor - Ice Beam - Confuse Ray / Frost Breath / Solarbeam - Recover Cryogonal ABSOLUTELY needs Acid Armor. Without Acid Armor it is going to get pummeled over by physical moves 9001 times over. Now what can it do? It needs to attack. Very well, but with what? Hello Ice Beam, that's its best STAB option. But just 10 PP... it needs another move. ... er... I suppose Frost Breath works as a great alternative, as it always strikes with critical hit and it is good to have another attack. It isn't like it gets anything else. Want to try Solarbeam? I guess it can work, so try it out if you had to. Confuse Ray is cool for confusing stuff, hopefully buying you some turns. Last but not least, Recover is for recovering some lost health. Fortified Snowflake Cryogonal @ Light Clay Ability: Levitate - Reflect - Light Screen - Recover - Ice Beam I know that these sets are probably not the best in game, but there is not much Cryogonal can do anyhow. If anything, it is probably quite useful to run this particular set on this guy because it is fast and can set up both screens. Recover lost health later and Ice Beam is so it can defend itself. Mind you, setting up against a physical attacker would probably be foolish as it would go down rather quickly. Shelmet/Accelgor Base Stats: 50/40/85/40/65/25 80/70/40/100/60/145 Abilities: Hydration / Shell Armor Hydration / Sticky Hold (as Accelgor) Location: You can find them in the puddles in Icirrus City or in Route 8 and the Moor of Icirrus City. Shelmet evolves through a trade with Karrablast, resulting to having its shell stolen and becoming a ninja. o_o Rating: Satisfactory (C-) / Bad (E) as Shelmet - Accelegor has one outstanding trait about him; speed. He is even faster than Electrode, trollishly enough. His special attack is higher than his attack power. However, he is frail defensively and should be cautioned at all times. - His movepool is mostly bug moves, no surprise there. he also learns Grass moves and even has things like Recover, Power Swap, Guard Swap, and the ever so redundant Agility. - This thing has an odd way of evolution, by trading specifically with a Karrablast. The Shelmet will become an Accelgor while Karrablast will become an Escavalier. Strange. Overall, he is pretty tough to train as a Shelmet, but as a Accelgor, he is not a bad choice, but he is really fragile. Movesets: Ninja Ambush Accelgor @ Big Root Ability: Anything - Double Team / U-turn - Acid Spray / Swift - Bug Buzz - Giga Drain What's more annoying than Double Team? And what's more annoying than puking Acid Spray all over your foes to reduce their special defence sharply while you can STAB Bug Buzz all over their faces? Giga Drain restores some lost HP, and it is even better with Big Root. If Double Team is not your style, U-turn is the way to go so that you can U-turn out of something and gain some experience along with a teammate. Swift is another option to run a "neutral" attack, or if someone just angers you with mass Double Teams (those Emolgas for example). Stunfisk Base Stats: 109/66/84/81/99/32 Abilities: Static / Limber Location: Icirrus City, Route 8, Moor of Icirrus Rating: Derp (D) - He has a peculiar stat spread. Stunfisk has high HP and some nice defences, but a rather low attack power, although his special attack is okay. He suffers with his low speed, like many of the other Gen V Pokemon that has been covered. - Stunfisk's movepool mostly consists of Electric, Ground, Water, Rock, and Poison moves. He has many options to work with. - Overall, Stunfisk is a troll. He looks like a Water Pokemon, but he is not a Water Pokemon. He even learns Water moves, but it is weak to Water moves and even his own Ground moves. But he is quite an interesting Pokemon, though his design was officially trolled by Gamefreak. If you want something different, definitely try it out. Movesets: I Swear, When I Evolve- Oh Wait, I Don't Evolve Stunfisk @ Soft Sand / Magnet Ability: Anything - Discharge / Thunderbolt - Surf / Scald - Mud Bomb / Dig - Sludge Bomb / Sludge Wave / Thunder Wave We should run both of Stunfisk's STAB attacks. While Stunfisk has some good electric STABs, he suffers with his Ground STAB. His special attack value is better than his physical attack value, so usually Mud Bomb would do better. However, Dig is more powerful, but it runs on his lower physical attack and also 100% accurate. Surf is a good water move to have, though the weaker Scald can inflict burn. Last slot can be Thunder Wave for paralysis, but Sludge Bomb / Sludge Wave can help defend Stunfisk against Grass Pokemon in general. Mienfoo/Mienshao Base Stats: 45/85/50/55/50/65 65/125/60/95/60/105 Abilities: Inner Focus / Regenerator Location: Dragonspiral Tower and Victory Road. Meinfoo evolves at Level 50. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Mienshao has a mix of good attack power and special attack, oddly for a fighter, who are usually purely physical. He is quite fast as well but he is really fragile. This can be made up for by his ability Regeneration, which will heal 33% of his health after switching out. - Mienshao's movepool is mostly fighting moves of course, but he also has strange moves like Calm Mind and even the relatively exclusive Aura Sphere. A lot of milestones being broken in this generation, that's for sure. - You know what blows? Mienfoo evolves at Level 50. If he did not evolve at such a high level then he would rate rather higher. He is a good Pokemon but he just comes a bit late and is one of those Pokemon who take forever to evolve. The "latecomer syndrome" is what I call it. Movesets: Everybody Does Kung Fu Fighting! Mienshao @ Anything Ability: Regeneration - Fake Out - Drain Punch / Brick Break - U-turn - Rock Slide Mienshao's physical moveset. Fake Out your foes first then begin to attack with Drain Punch to heal and do damage. Rock Slide hits fliers and can cause flinching. If the opponent you fight are at an advantage against Mienshao, simply switch out with U-turn, which will also heal some health because of Regeneration. A rather simple but effective set. Druddigon Base Stats: 77/120/90/60/90/48 Abilities: Rough Skin / Sheer Force Location: Dragonspiral Tower, outside and inside. They are more common inside than outside. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Druddigon is a weird Dragon. He has decent survivability and a good attack score, but he is really slow. In fact, he is the slowest dragon out there. His abilities Sheer Force and Rough Skin both aid Druddigon and can be useful in their own ways. - Most of what Druddigon learns are physical Dragon, Fighting, Dark, and Normal attacks. There is not a lot of other things that are noteworthy - Overall, Druddigon is one strange customer. He's some filler Pokemon that was apparently designed after a gargoyle, but they could have done a little better with the design. I digress, but if Axew is a pain getting or whatever, Druddigon can somewhat work, but he is a lot more bulkier but slower. Take advantage of what he has and he can work for sure. Movesets: Victor Druddigon @ Anything Ability: Sheer Force - Hone Claws - Crunch / Rock Slide - Revenge / Rock Climb - Dragon Claw This takes advantage of Druddigon's ability Sheer Force, which ignores secondary effects of moves but makes those with secondary effects more powerful. Hone Claws is an attack + accuracy boosting attack, making Druddigon take down a lot of things in one shot. Keep in mind Hone Claws require a Heart Scale to unlock. Dragon Claw is your main STAB option and should always be there. Crunch is there to take advantage of Sheer Force. Revenge is the same deal and if Druddigon is hit the turn before Revenge works, it will do double damage. Aside from Crunch we did not take advantage of Sheer Force, so there are other options to consider. Rock Slide certainly works, as Rock Slide also benefits from Sheer Force. Rock Climb also does the same, but it is less than 100% accurate, though Hone Claws can fix that accuracy problem. Overall just try out what you think will work best. Hugo Druddigon @ Anything Ability: Rough Skin - Dragon Tail - Dragon Claw / Hone Claws - Revenge / Superpower / Dig - Payback / Crunch Using Dragon Tail is rather fun because you keep forcing the other guy to switch out, and since Druddigon is already quite slow, it does not mind the negative priority much anyhow. Dragon Claw is your main attack otherwise and should not be ignored. However, Hone Claws can also work to make Dragon Tail 100% accurate because a miss is frustrating. The rest of the other moves are other toys Druddigon can play around with, many dealing with the fact Druddigon are slow and therefore works well. Just choose what you like the most and it should work out. Dig is pretty cool in general if you would like a Ground move. Golett/Golurk Base Stats: 59/74/50/35/50/35 89/124/80/55/80/55 Abilities: Iron Fist / Klutz Location: Inside of Dragonspiral Tower. Golett evolves at Level 43. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Golurk is another Pokemon with high attack but low speed and well rounded defence. Low speed seems to be this generation's favourite theme or something. At any rate, its ability Iron Fist makes Hitmonchan obsolete makes its punch moves like Shadow Punch and Dynamicpunch stronger by 20%. Do not try using special moves as it is not Golurk's forte. - Golurk has a movepool of Ground, Rock, Fighting, and Ghost moves. By TMs, for some reason it has a large special movepool, allowing it to learn Thunderbolt and Ice Beam and Grass Knot, for example. - Overall, I don't know how the heck this guy is Ghost, but it is. It is immune to three types of attacks, doesn't go down easily, and evolves at a reasonable level at least (reasonable by this generation's standards). It is fairly common but it makes a good ghost Pokemon for your team and a good ground as well if you are looking for one. Movesets: Sentinel Golurk @ Soft Sand Ability: Iron Fist - Shadow Punch - Earthquake - Rock Slide / Return - Brick Break / Heavy Slam Nothing much to explain here, aside from the fact that two of its STAB moves are going to be its main moves. Shadow Punch is a weak move in general, but with Iron Fist, it becomes a bit stronger and it also never misses. Earthquake is strong but it learns it at level 50. Use Magnitude or Dig instead if you did not reach Level 50 yet. Great, now that makes you walled by something as dumb as Pidove, which is why we have extra attacks. Rock Slide and Brick Break give you good additional coverage, but there are other options, such as Return and the new Heavy Slam, which does more damage the heavier Golurk is than its foes. Since Golurk is incredibly heavy, expect a lot of damage done by it. Pawniward/Bisharp Base Stats: 45/85/70/40/40/60 65/125/100/60/70/70 Abilities: Defiant / Inner Focus Location: Route 9. Pawniard evolves at Level 52. Rating: Poor (D) - Bisharp is a peculiar Pokemon with another boring high attack trait. His Defence is high too at base 100. However, his speed is somewhat middling but it is not atrocious. His HP and Special Defence are also on the low side, and special Attack should not be considered. His ability Defiant is a rather scary one, as when any of his stat decreases, his Attack power raises by 2 levels. Pretty interesting actually. - As expected, Bisharp learns a lot of Dark and Steel moves, but he also has some Fighting moves and a few other physical attacks. Oddly, he learns Grass Knot, which for some reason became nearly universal in distribution. - Overall, Pawniard is pretty cool until you realise... he suffers the "latecomers syndrome". Yes, Pawniard evolves at Level 52, and there are not enough attacks he can learn before he does; all the good stuff seems to come when he evolves. Seriously Gamefreak... what is with this whole late evolution business we are ending up with? Movesets: Mordred Bisharp @ Anything Ability: Defiant - X-Scissor / Thunder Wave - Night Slash - Iron Head - Brick Break / Thunder Wave Note that Swords Dance is obtained at Level 63, which is a long way to go, but if you do get it, Swords Dance will allow Bisharp to pretty much OHKO almost anything. However, an alternative would be Thunder Wave, which can slow down his foes to make sure Bisharp can KO uninterrupted, but it is rather pointless in-game if you ask me. Next comes his two STAB attacks Night Slash and Iron Head, the latter being stronger vs neutral targets. Iron Head also comes with the added bonus of flinch chance, so let that be your incentive to run Thunder Wave. Lastly, we need some coverage moves. Brick Break can take care of other Dark Pokemon like enemy Bisharps, while X-Scissor is another interesting move to have, but taking down Steel Pokemon will be more difficult. Bouffalant Base Stats: 95/110/95/40/95/55 Abilities: Reckless / Sap Sipper Location: Route 10 Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - What, another one of these guys? Bouffalant is another high attack but low speed Pokemon that they keep cooking up with. He even has very good defences too, all at 95/95/95. And as usual, don't bother with his special stat of 40. His ability Reckless is noteworthy for powering up his recoil moves, which he is full of. - His movepool is rather pretty low for a Normal Pokemon, but he has just enough to work with. His signature move Head Charge is Double-Edge with less recoil damage - Overall, he comes pretty late, so he requires slight more grinding than other Pokemon usually. However, he already has decent stats and quite powerful moves, so not all is lost. He just should have come earlier and he would have been a better addition to the team. Movesets: Afro Break Bouffalant @ Anything Ability: Reckless - Head Charge - Wild Charge - Revenge - Megahorn Head Charge was called Afro Break in Japanese. What a shame its name changed. Oh well... but this is the reason why Bouffalant should ever be used. Head Charge is incredibly powerful, and with the ability Reckless, Head Charge becomes even more powerful because it is a recoil move. Teach Bouffalant Wild Charge and you have another move to abuse with Reckless. Because Bouffalant already has low speed, Revenge is a good Fighting move to use. Megahorn is another strong move to put in, so it's definitely a good idea to consider. Bouffalant does get Swords Dance at Level 56, and if you reach that level, feel free to try it out. Rufflet/Braviary Base Stats: 70/83/50/37/50/60 100/123/75/57/75/80 Abilities: Keen Eye / Sheer Force Location: Route 10 and Victory Road, White Only. Rufflet evolves at Level 54. Rating: Bad (E) - Braviary is well rounded and is not a bad Pokemon at all. His speed may be middling, but it is salvageable. His attack power stands out immediately with that insanely high score of 123. His defences, unlike most other birds, is actually not bad. Sheer Force helps with very few moves that Braviary has though. And yeah, he has low special attack. - Braviary is an odd bird. His movepool suggests he is a "fighter" that he might as well been a Fighting/Flying. He even learns Rock Slide. But unlike Staraptor, he gets Superpower over Close Combat. Come on Gamefreak what is that? - Why is this good Pokemon rated bad? He suffers from the "latecomer syndrome. Why does Gamefreak keep on doing this? He is available in the Route right at the north of the 8th gym, so there is a LOT of grinding needed to even get him to be in sync with your team. Oh, and did I mention he evolves at Level 54? Yes, I kid you not, 54. What a shame. This bird would definitely replace Unfezant if he did not come at that inconvenient time and have a troll evolution. Movesets: Battle Hymn of the Republic Braviary @ Anything Ability: Sheer Force - Return / Hone Claws / Work Up - Fly / Aerial Ace / Sky Drop - Shadow Claw - Rock Slide / Superpower This eagle is one scary customer. There are two STABs available, Return and a Flying move. Aerial Ace or Sky Drop, take your pick. Either way, both are the same power. Shadow Claw is there so you can hit Ghost Pokemon super effectively, while Rock Slide is the only move in this moveset that benefits from Sheer Force. Hone Claws can be used if you want Rock Slide to be perfectly accurate. However, that requires a Heart Scale, so you can just attempt to use Work Up if you still want to power Braviary up. Another alternative can be Crush Claw, which lowers the foe's defence AND benefit from Sheer Force, but the lack of PP and accuracy is not appealing. It is also weaker than Return. Superpower can be used too, but that requires a Heart Scale, because trollingly enough, it is learned at Level 51 as a Braviary, while a Rufflet evolves at Level 54. Are they kidding me? Vullaby/Mandibuzz Base Stats: 70/55/75/45/65/60 110/65/105/55/95/80 Abilities: Big Pecks / Overcoat Location: Route 10 and Victory Road, Black Only. Vullaby evolves at Level 54. Rating: Bad (E) - Mandibuzz was not built offensively, but she was built to be a wall. She has tankish defences and not so bad speed either. Her offences are atrocious however. Her abilities Big Pecks or Overcoat help reinforce her defences. - Barren movepool... really. Mostly just Dark and Flying moves.. and Bone Rush even. However, she does learn Nasty Plot. You know what's troll? Roost is a hereditary move. - Ok you thought Braviary was bad? Wait until you get a load of this (Sorry Black Version players.. wait that includes me too!). Mandibuzz is more fitting for competitive battling rather than in-game, and she comes very late, evolves very late (level 54 like her rival Braviary), and is not even worth it in the end. She just does not have anything good to run in-game, and just tough to level, and hardly does any damage against anything. She could have been a lot better if she came earlier, because her only selling point, Nasty Plot, requires a Heart Scale. It's a shame really. I really like her, much like Braviary, but she suffers "latecomer syndrome" and "bad movepool disease" and "maligned stats-itis". Movesets Dia De Los Muertos Mandibuzz @ Blackglasses Ability: Anything - Nasty Plot - Air Slash - Dark Pulse - Flatter / Fly / Bone Rush I really do not know what else would do. I guess you can just go Faint Attack / Air Slash / Dark Pulse / Fly or something if you wanted to, but I remembered that this guide was written to suggest what would be a "viable" moveset for in-game. I mean, you can do that, and I think I just would because I'm too impatient for defensive in-game Pokemon, but I want to make this vulture do what it can do best. Sorry, it will require a Heart Scale for Nasty Plot, and it will require leveling up to 54 to even become a Mandibuzz. Anyways, if you use Nasty Plot, Mandibuzz's attacks will actually start to hurt. Due to her defences, you will find plenty of opportunities to set up multiple Nasty Plots. Her two STABs are Air Slash and Dark Pulse, and unlike a lot of the new Pokemon, she actually learns Dark Pulse without breeding. Interesting? Okay, but after her two STABs, now what? Well, I guess Flatter is a way to buy you a few turns if it works (use it against physical attackers for best results). You can just run physical attacks like Return or Faint Attack or Fly or something, anything can go in that last slot really. ... honestly, save up Mandibuzz, breed her with someone with Roost, and use it for competitive purposes. This vulture is a lot better competitively. Heatmor Base Stats: 85/97/66/105/66/65 Abilities: Gluttony / Flash Fire Location: Victory Road Rating: Bad (E) - Heatmor has pretty high offences, both attack and special attack, but special attack is larger. His defences are rather low and its speed is not too great either. Flash Fire gives him immunity to Fire, but other than that, nothing else to look up to. Gluttony of course will not help unless you use a berry. - This Pokemon actually has one selling point with his movepool: he learns Flamethrower naturally (albeit at level 51). The other moves he learns however is not too impressive and rather barren. Trollingly, many of the Dark type moves he learns are through breeding. - Heatmor comes wayyyyyy too late. Although he is slow and all, Heatmor at least does not need an evolution, but he still cannot offer a lot for the player to defeat the Elite 4. What a shame. I actually have to tell Tbird, who wanted to use this guy, that Heatmor comes much too late to be of practical use. Also competitively, he serves little purpose. They only made him as a filler Pokemon to serve as an anteater to eat Durant, but Durant can defeat Heatmor any day of the year Movesets: Need a Light? Heatmor @ Heat Rock / Charcoal Ability: Flash Fire - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Flame Burst / Flamethrower - Return / Dig / Shadow Claw / Rock Tomb You want to know what is troll? He cannot even learn Flame Charge! What kind of a Fire Pokemon does not? They really messed up this guy. Anyways, this is what seems to work the best... the usual Sunny Day + Solarbeam tactic, along with Flame Burst or Flamethrower (depending on your level), and the last slot can go to anything really, Return being your most powerful option overall. Rock Tomb is also an option to help make up for Heatmor's rather low speed. That is, if it hits. Durant Base Stats: 58/109/112/48/48/109 Abilities: Swarm / Hustle Location: Victory Road Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Durant has a very odd stat spread. He has high attack and defence for an ant. Like really... 109 and 112. Heck, he even has 109 speed, which just trolls on the musketeers and Infernape by 1 point. Wow. His HP and special stats suffer. - His movepool is not too great, but he gets all the moves he really needs to take down his foes. Fire Pokemon will probably get manhandled by Dig and Durant's high attack and speed, for example. Strange Pokemon. - Overall, Durant comes way late, much like his rival Heatmor. However, even though Heatmor obliterates Durant (after all, he is an anteater), Durant is probably a lot more useful to run. Durant, if trained, can actually be useful against some of the Elite 4 members, such as Grimsley's Dark Pokemon or Caitlin's Psychic Pokemon (though beware of special attacks). The only thing holding him back is his tardiness and requirement to grind to get him to be ready. Movepool: Mr OwlHeatmor Ate My Metal Worm Ant Durant @ Anything Ability: Anything - X-Scissor - Iron Head - Crunch - Dig / Aerial Ace Note the Mr Owl statement is a palindrome (just get rid of Heatmor and Ant). Anyways, any of Durant's ability works, but keep in mind that messes with Durant's accuracy, though the boost is good. Anyhow, X-Scissor and Iron Head are Durant's two STABs, which is good. Crunch can help deal with Ghost Pokemon while Dig can hurt some Fire Pokemon. However, I'm not sure how good Dig is against the Elite 4 or even N, though both Reshiram and Zekrom are weak to Ground. But either way, Reshiram will roast Durant. Aerial Ace, however, can help against Marshal's Fighting Pokemon, and with Hustle, it does not even miss! A worthy consideration to tell you the truth. While X-Scissor is learned at Level 51, there is also a TM for it if you cannot reach that level. Deino/Zweilous/Hydreigon Base Stats: 52/65/50/45/50/38 72/85/70/65/70/58 92/105/90/125/90/98 Abilities: Hustle Levitate (as Hydreigon) Location: Victory Road. Deino evolves at Level 50 while Zweilous evolves at Level 64. Rating: Bad (E) - Hydreigon's stats should not even be explained. This is the pseudolegendary Pokemon of Pokemon Black and White, and you had better believe it; this guy is strong. He has good speed, decent defences, and high offences. His Special Attack is higher than its Attack power, but both are usable. Hydreigon is very scary and Levitate gives him an extra immunity to Ground. - Hydreigon's movepool is great. He learns Dark and Dragon moves along with others like Fire and Water and Ground and other stuff. Trollingly enough, he learns Dark Pulse through BREEDING. Come on, not even naturally. - Hydreigon is a pseudolegend and of course he would come with a catch. You get his baby form Deino, and you must evolve at Level 50 to become his SECOND FORM Zweilous. That's when Shelgon became Salamence, and 2 levels after Gabite became Garchomp, and 5 levels after Metang became Metagross. Seriously while these folks became their final form raging and ready to obliterate, this guy gets stuck at his second form at that level, which just grew an extra head. Then to become the ferocious Hydreigon you have to train him until Level 64... that's right, 64, to witness his ultimate glory. Talk about the ultimate grind-fest, because this will take a long time. And he is available only at Victory Road. Come on, what is that? This is the ultimate example of the "latecomer syndrome". It seems one Pokemon after another all I am rating are the latecomers. Sigh. Without further ado, here comes the movesets. Movesets: Змей Горыныч Hydreigon @ Nothing Ability: Levitate - Dragon Pulse - Crunch - Surf - Fire Blast / Acrobatics I suppose this is the best I can come up with Hydreigon. This Lemean Beast at his finest, using both Dragon and Dark STAB to subdue his foes. At Level 64, nothing would stand in his way (beware of Marshal however), so this is the ultimate beast of pre-National Dex Pokemon Black/White. But that's ONLY if you reach Level 64. Ha ha. Run Acrobatics instead if you want to beat Marshal easily. Anyways, just run these moves and you should be able to have an easy time defeating the Elite 4. Ghetsis's Hydreigon has got nothing on this one; you are way overleveled if you have this. You can try Work Up to boost your power and pretty much OHKO almost everything the game has to offer. GG. Devon and Cornwall *"i think you took the two heads are better then one thing too seriously o-o" ~ UnderXRay Deino / Zweilous @ Eviolite Ability: Hustle - Thunder Wave / Work Up - Crunch - Dragon Rush / Dragon Pulse - Body Slam / Return I am going to assume you will be using either Deino or Zweilous since reaching Hydreigon stage will be nearly impossible. Unlike Hydreigon, Deino or Zweilous are better PHYSICALLY than specially, and this is also aided with their ability Hustle. Work Up can boost his attack and special attack while Thunder Wave helps his low speed. Crunch is his main STAB option and his Dragon STAB is either the powerful yet inaccurate Dragon Rush while Dragon Pulse can also work provided you have a bit of Work Ups set up. Last slot can go to Body Slam if you wish to paralyse your foes to aid Deino/Zweilous's speed problems while Return is generally more powerful. Take note that Hustle will LOWER his accuracy, so take caution. Larvesta/Volcarona Base Stats: 55/85/55/50/55/60 85/60/65/135/105/100 Abilities: Flame Body Location: There are two, but one is post game, who is a Level 70 Urugamosu Volcarona in Relic Castle. However, the Larvesta you CAN get before that event is a man in Route 18 who will give you an egg. Yeah an egg to hatch. Fun. Rating: Bad (E) - Volcarona may as well be the sun god or a legendary Pokemon with her stats. Her physical side is weak but her special side is way too good for regular Pokemon standards. Well okay, Alakazam is similar like that, somewhat. Flame Body can be good for burning Pokemon who touch Volcarona. Strangely, Larvesta's attack power is better than Volcarona; she loses that physical power when she evolves. - Volcarona's movepool is interesting, as it is Fire and Bug moves mostly, but she also has access to other moves like Psychic and strangely, Wild Charge. Quiver Dance is Volcarona's selling point, giving her + 1 Special Attack, Special Defence, and Speed all in 1 turn. And those three stats are already high on Volcarona. - So you can access the egg as soon as you get Surf, but then what? Try hatching that egg... it will take a long time. Then training Larvesta from Level 1 all the way to 59 + is a difficult trip, nearly impossible to get to by the time you reach the Elite 4. Let alone training REGULAR POKEMON to past the 50s by then. Volcarona is a good Pokemon, but as stated earlier, good Pokemon does not mean good in-game, all because of that availability factor. "Why does it take so long to evolve this Arceus head bug into some butterfly?" ~ Mewtwo EX Movesets: 태양은가득히 Volcarona @ Charcoal Ability: Flame Body - Quiver Dance - Heat Wave - Silver Wind / Bug Bite - Double-Edge / Return / Hyper Beam It's really hard making a set for Volcarona. It really is. Quiver Dance is an obvious choice, as it is Volcarona's main selling point. Then 1 more level later it learns Heat Wave, which will be Volcarona's main attack. As for the Bug STAB, use a Heart Scale to get Silver Wind, but the MUCH weaker Bug Bite can be used in Silver Wind's spot for more PP in case Heart Scaling for Silver Wind does not seem right. Last slot can go to Double-Edge it learned as Larvesta, or Return for a safer alternative, but both are weak. Why not just go ahead and try Hyper Beam? It's 150 base power, special, and just annihilates the foe, but once you KO them, I think it would be of your best interest to switch out lest you want, I don't know, Carracosta to come in and Stone Edge Volcarona. Helios Volcarona @ Heat Rock / Charcoal Ability: Flame Body - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Heat Wave - Quiver Dance This basically takes Volcarona's persona to be truly be revealed; the Sun! Use Sunny Day to have chargeless Solarbeams blasting Water Pokemon like Carracosta while Heat Wave still remains a powerful Fire move for Volcarona's use. Quiver Dance is still there because it is awesome. Late Bloomer Larvesta @ Eviolite Ability: Flame Body - Flame Charge - Bug Bite - Double-Edge / Return - Wild Charge Face it, you're not going to be a Volcarona before you hit the Elite 4 unless you really took your time in this game. Larvesta hits higher physically than Volcarona does, strangely, so we will run physical attacks here. Flame Charge and Bug Bite are weak, but those are her only options for physical STAB. Double-Edge and Return is a choice between power or no recoil. Lastly, Wild Charge gives you an advantage against water and flying Pokemon, though Larvesta is still not too powerful. Cobalion Base Stats: 91/90/129/90/72/108 Abilities: Justified Location: Mistralton Cave. This guy unlocks the other two Musketeers as well Rating: Good (B+) - Cobalion has a huge defence, as you can see. Its speed is very good as well, and has well rounded offences too. Its weakest point is its Special Defence. Thanks to Justified, Cobalion will gain + 1 attack power whenever hit by a Dark move (try switching into a predicted Dark move). - Cobalion learns a lot of Fighting and Steel moves, but it also has access to electric moves strangely, such as Thunder Wave and Volt Switch. - A Level 42 Pokemon accessible right after getting Surf? Not bad, not bad at all. Cobalion is the leader of the three Musketeers and rightfully so. It is not the best one but it works quite well. Movesets: Athos Cobalion @ Anything Ability: Justified - Swords Dance / Volt Switch - Sacred Sword - Iron Head - X-Scissor / Return Swords Dance makes Cobalion very scary. Run both of its STAB moves Iron Head and Sacred Sword of course. Sacred Sword is an interesting move that ignores ALL defence boosts, so if that Serperior keeps setting Coils up, Cobalion will have a field day setting up Swords Dances and quickly obliterate with Sacred Sword. Last slot can go to X-Scissor, but Return also works. If set up is not your thing, try out Volt Switch for fun. Terrakion Base Stats: 91/129/90/72/90/108 Abilities: Justified Location: Victory Road. You must first unlock Cobalion first for it to appear Rating: Satisfactory (C+) - Terrakion definitely has the best stat distribution of the three musketeers. High Attack Power and well rounded defences and high speed makes Terrakion an awesome fighter. Its only weakness is that special attack value, but it does not need to use that, so whatever. Take advantage of Justified and switch into a Crunch or Dark Pulse or something to raise its attack power further. - Terrakion has a very usable movepool. It is the only one of the three musketeers to learn Earthquake, though Earthquake is not accessible before the Elite 4. - Overall, Terrakion is the best offensive Musketeer. Unfortunately, it comes MUCH too late as a price for its value and it has a lot of elemental weaknesses. Regardless, if trained, it can become a valuable partner, and it sees use in competitive battling a lot for a reason too! Movesets: Porthos Terrakion @ Anything Ability: Justified - Swords Dance - Sacred Sword - Rock Slide - X-Scissor / Bulldoze / Return Using Swords Dance on Terrakion is overkill, but when you feel like it, use it. Terrakion's STAB Sacred Sword and Rock Slide work great together, and Sacred Sword ignores all defence boosts. Rock Slide can also cause flinching, and unlike most rocks not named Aerodactyl, Terrakion is actually fast. Last slot can go to any physical attacks that fit your tastes. Virizion Base Stats: 91/90/72/90/129/108 Abilities: Justice Heart Location: Pinwheel Forest. You must unlock Cobalion first for it to appear Rating: Good (B-) - Virizion is the opposite of Cobalion in terms of stats. It has high special defence, high speed and evened out attacks, but low defence. Justified raises Virizion's attack even further if it gets hit by a Dark move. - Virizion's movepool is fit for an offensive Pokemon. Not surprisingly, it learns Grass and Fighting moves, but it wuold really help it if it learned more defensive moves like Leech Seed. Virizion looks like a defensive Pokemon slapped with an offensive movepool. - Overall, Virizion can be a good team member, but unfortunately some flaws are apparent, such as learning Leaf Blade at level 67, which is a long way to go. It is still a good Pokemon and can aid against the fight against Brycen, in spite of the ice weakness. Movesets: Aramis Virizion @ Miracleseed Ability: Justified - Swords Dance / Work Up - Giga Drain - Sacred Sword - Return / X-Scissor / Aerial Ace Virizion can obtain better moves after the game, but this is all it can work with as of now. Unlike its brothers, Virizion's primary STAB is NOT physical but rather special. That being said, Work Up can replace Swords Dance so both attack stats can be boosted. Giga Drain is a useful move anyhow as it drains health and restores Virizion's lost HP. Sacred Sword, as we know, is Virizion's most powerful move at this time and ignores defence boosts when it hits. Last slot can go to anything you see fit. Unfortunately, Virizion has got nothing against Chandelure, which can spell trouble. Zenith Virizion @ Heat Rock Ability: Justified - Sunny Day - Solarbeam - Sacred Sword - Return / X-Scissor / Aerial Ace Basically this makes use of the Sunnybeam combo if Giga Drain does not do Virizion any good. Solarbeam is very powerful and most likely anything weak to Grass that is not Jellicent will be OHKOd. Well actually, maybe Jellicent too. The other moves are still useful regardless. Tornadus Base Stats: 79/115/70/125/80/111 Abilities: Prankster Location: He roams Unova but you have to listen to an old woman's story in Route 7 first before his presence is activated. Pokemon Black only. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Tornadus has a high attack, special attack, and speed, but relatively low defences. His stats are the exact same as Thundurus's... talk about laziness. - Most of Tornadus's moves involve Flying and Dark moves. It learns Hurricane, its ultimate move, at Level 67 unfortunately. Some fighting moves are also present. - Pure Flying Pokemon? What were they thinking? And he looks like a green Thundurus. What is with these uninspiring designs really? Gamefreak, seriously. God of the wind is powerful but a very hard deity to catch. Use your Master Ball if you have to. Movesets: 風神 Tornadus @ None Ability: Prankster - Air Slash - Extrasensory / Brick Break - Crunch - Acrobatics / Grass Knot Tornadus is strong. Really strong that there is really nothing much you can do with him but give him STAB and a few coverage moves. Really, anything can go in here, but don't forget that Tornadus's physical attack power is also pretty good, so Acrobatics is an amazing choice. Use Grass Knot if something like Carracosta starts bothering you. Thundurus Base Stats: 79/115/70/125/80/111 Abilities: Prankster Location: He roams Unova but you have to listen to an old woman's story in Route 7 first before his presence is activated. Pokemon White only. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Thundurus has a high attack, special attack, and speed, but relatively low defences. His stats are the exact same as Tornadus's... talk about laziness. - Most of Thundurus's moves involve Electric and Dark moves. It even learns Nasty Plot, though at level 61. Some fighting moves are also present. - Thundurus outclasses Tornadus in every single way possible, which is just trolling Black version people. However, it does not learn Hurricane, but Hurricane takes a long time to learn for Tornadus anyways. It looks like a blue Tornadus. Oh wait, it is. Laziness on the spriting and the stats. Gamefreak really, what is this I don't even... use your Master Ball against the god of thunder if you are having trouble. Movesets: 雷神 Thundurus @ Magnet Ability: Prankster - Charge Beam / Volt Switch - Thunderbolt / Discharge - Grass Knot - Brick Break / Return / Fly / Wild Charge Basically just keep charging Charge Beam until Thundurus becomes very scary and fire powerful Thunderbolts. If Charge Beam does not appeal, use Volt Switch instead. Last slot is your choice. Reshiram Base Stats: 100/120/100/150/120/90 Abilities: Turboblaze Location: Right near the end of the game in Pokemon Black only. If you fail to catch it, it is supposed to end in Dragonspiral Tower. Rating: Satisfactory © - Reshiram, being a legendary Pokemon, has incredible stats. Its speed is good for standard Pokemon but rather slow for uber standards, but its high special stats are what is appealing. Its physical power may not be as strong but it is strong regardless, do not forget that. TurboBlaze ensures NO ONE is immune to ANYTHING Reshiram uses, which is scary. However, it is irrelevant during this part of the game. - Reshiram has a useful movepool and its signature move Fusion Flare is very powerful as it has NO DRAWBACKs. Unfortunately for this time of the game, Reshiram will have a fixed moveset. - Reshiram has an easier time fighting Zekrom than the other way around due to Dragonbreath being a special move which Reshiram specialises in. If Zekrom uses Light Screen then it will become more difficult. However, Zekrom tends to spam Fusion Bolt a lot. Reshiram can also fight Ghetsis's Cofagrigus easier due to its lower special defence as opposed to its higher defence. You will have to wait until AFTER you beat the game to even customise Reshiram unfortunately, but even during that time being, it rocks! It's a shame it only gets two battles to prove its worth. Spoiler Warning: Reshiram fights for truth while Zekrom fights for ideals. It seems to fit right there with the hero using Reshiram to fight for truth while N uses Zekrom to fight for ideals, such as Pokemon and humans living in separate worlds. It's probably just me but I think this way made the story make much more sense than the other way around. Movesets: שָׂרָף Reshiram @ Nothing Ability: TurboBlaze - Dragonbreath - Slash - Extrasensory - Fusion Flare When you fight Zekrom just Dragonbreath it as even with something as bad as Impish nature, you should usually be able to 2HKO it. However, keep in mind Zekrom has Light Screen to weaken Dragonbreath's impact. However, more often than not, all Zekrom will do is spam Fusion Bolt. Carracosta is usually trouble so stay away from it. Vanilluxe = Fusion Flare! Archeops is also trouble so get someone else to fight it. Klinklang = Fusion Flare, oh that was Zoroark? Whatever that thing also hates Fusion Flare too so two down and everyone is down. Ghetsis rages and you fight without a break. Just Fusion Flare Cofagrigus, Bisharp and Eelektross, and stay away from Bouffalant and Seismitoad. Same deal for Hydreigon as it is probably faster and will use Dragon Pulse to get rid of Reshiram. Not bad, but unfortunately Fusion Flare runs out quickly so have some Ethers or something along with you to have more than 5. Zekrom Base Stats: 100/150/120/120/100/90 Abilities: Teravolt Location: Right near the end of the game in Pokemon White only. If you fail to catch it, it is supposed to end in Dragonspiral Tower. Rating: Satisfactory (C-) - Zekrom, being a legendary Pokemon, has incredible stats. Its speed is good for standard Pokemon but rather slow for uber standards, but its high physical stats are what is appealing. Its special power may not be as strong but it is strong regardless, do not forget that. TeraVolt ensures that abilities like Volt Absorb or Motor Drive or Lightningrod do not get in Zekrom's way, so that is always good. Keep in mind unlike Reshiram, there is a type that is naturally immune to electricity without the aid of an ability (Ground types). Like Reshiram's ability, it is irrelevant during the last part of the game. - Zekrom has a useful movepool and its signature move Fusion Bolt is very powerful as it has NO DRAWBACKs. Unfortunately for this time of the game, Zekrom will have a fixed moveset. - You might realise that Reshiram is tougher to take down with Zekrom than using Reshiram to take Zekrom down because of Dragonbreath being a special attack. However, all Reshiram normally does is spam Fusion Flare. Try to play along with its game and use Fusion Bolt because it gets powered up after getting hit by a Fusion Flare, then use 2 Dragonbreaths or something, lest you want N to use that Full Restore. Zekrom has a difficult time fighting N and Ghetsis more than Reshiram does unfortunately. Two battles with this... it might as well stay out for that time being. Movesets: שד Zekrom @ Nothing Ability: Teravolt - Dragonbreath - Slash - Zen Headbutt - Fusion Bolt Against Reshiram it will be a bit tough but you will trump Reshiram because Reshiram does not have any dragon moves. Use Fusion Bolt against Carracosta. Archeops should be easy to beat, BUT it is faster and carries Dragon Claw, so it might be best to use someone else. Vanilluxe = get out of there as Ice Beam will eat Zekrom alive! As for Klinklang you basically wall it but Metal Sound is annoying. Zoroark is too fragile to stand up to Fusion Bolt so... there's N. As for Ghetsis, Cofagrigus has a high defence so even Fusion Bolt might not work too well. In fact, I would stay away from using Zekrom against Ghetsis as they all seem to do too well against Zekrom. However, Zekrom CAN trump Eelektross and Cofagrigus if you play it right. Moar Stuff Below! Edited September 2, 2013 by wraith89
wraith89 Posted March 21, 2011 Author Posted March 21, 2011 (edited) [icon]018[/icon]Age Old Question Who is Better, Reshiram or Zekrom? Image by Tuooneo While I'm on the subject let's talk about the tired and old debate of Reshiram vs Zekrom. Who is better? No, this isn't an in-game thing, but rather overall for their competitive value, who is? Everyone I know swears that Zekrom is far better than Reshiram while a few others say Reshiram is better and some saying neither is and both are good. Well, let's get into the field they were intended to be in: Ubers battling. You know, the battlefield where all the scary legends like Ho-oh or Kyogre run amok? The Zekrom party people do know what they are talking about; Zekrom resists the attacks Ho-oh and Kyogre throw at it (Brave Bird, Sacred Fire, Water Spout, Surf, etc...) while Zekrom hits them back with its incredibly powerful physical Bolt Strike. The Ubers metagame is filled with Pokemon that have bigger special defence than physical defence, so in that case, Zekrom certainly does have an advantage. Not to mention Reshiram has a weakness to Stealth Rocks while Zekrom does not. Kyogre is one of the biggest threats in the Ubers metagame, and many of us know that. The fact that Zekrom can crush a Kyogre and live to tell the tale is an amazing feat; it really is. We have MANY reasons to prove Zekrom is better right? Well, not quite. Let's look at Reshiram, the special attacking version of the two. It's true that many of the Uber Pokemon have higher Special Defence than Physical Defence, but what can Reshiram do? Its ability TurboBlaze means NOTHING will switch into Reshiram unharmed, NOTHING. While Ground Pokemon like Groudon are hard counters to Zekrom because Electric moves are naturally ineffective against Ground Pokemon, the same cannot be said about that Flash Fire Heatran switching in to take a Fire attack. Nothing can actually switch into Reshiram immune, which means it can also use Flame Charge to boost its speed that turn without the fear of a Flash Fire Pokemon negating it. Then Reshiram has powerful special Dragon moves like Draco Meteor or Dragon Pulse to abuse, effectively destroying the many Dragon Pokemon in the battlefield as well. Also, with the power of the sun, Reshiram's signature move, Blue Flare, can 2HKO Blissey with the aids of Stealth Rocks. And we all know what Blissey is famous for. Reshiram is also not weak to Ice nor Water so it can usually survive a hit or two from Kyogre, which is not all too bad. Also, it has higher special defence than Zekrom, which can prove slightly more useful in the scary-legends zone, but can also be detrimental to something like a revenging Extremespeed Rayquaza. Also, people forget the fact Reshiram has a base 120 attack power because they are busy drooling over its base 150 special attack. This means it has a potential to go mixed, with Outrage being a powerful Dragon attack while Stone Edge can deal with Ho-oh who think they can wall Reshiram. Of course Zekrom is stronger physically, but that does not mean Reshiram cannot use physical attacks too! From my experience and what I have seen, Reshiram is naturally the bigger offensive threat than Zekrom. Zekrom has hard counters in the form of Ferrothorn or Groudon, though both CAN be defeated should Zekrom choose the right move, but in a largely physically frail metagame, Zekrom can revenge many of those Pokemon and have plenty of health left to spare. Both of them have three weaknesses: both are weak to Dragon and Ground, but Reshiram is weak to Rock while Zekrom is weak to Ice. Reshiram has a handy resistance to Bug moves (things like Scizor or Heracross need to watch out) while Zekrom has a handy resistance to Flying (Ho-oh's Brave Bird is a killer), so both of them have their merits and neither can really be considered better than the other. [icon]018[/icon]Closing Words In conclusion I think there are a few fundamentally wrong things in this game. Some Pokemon are just placed in random areas, and the Pokemon at the end of the Pokedex have high evolution requirements than the others in the beginning, making them nearly unusable. I don't know what a Throh or Sawk would be doing near Pinwheel Forest when they are more mountainous... or Solosis in the middle of a route when they are more fitting for a laboratory or something. They have somewhat done most of this with very little thoughts and it could have been done better if it looked a bit like the previous Pokemon games, placing Pokemon in the appropriate places and giving every Pokemon a niche of its own rather than stuffing some in the front and others with high level evolution requirements placed near the end of the game. Truthfully, I don't even know why some Pokemon have to evolve in the 50s or something when Axew reaches its final form at Level 48. The point is, they messed up royally and it should have been done more carefully. Also, a warning for those who have just beat the Pokemon League. First off, congratulations! Second off, there is a HUGE level spike here. Every trainers you meet from now on on the eastern side of Unova have Pokemon at Level 60 +. Yeah, I know your Pokemon are in the mid 40s or 50s, but the level spikes up for no apparent reason. It is poor planning on the developers' part, BUT, you can still defeat them because many are not fully evolved Pokemon or if you can take advantage of type advantages. You now have access to old Pokemon as well. Well, that is all for the forgettable cast of Pokemon Black and White. Now it is up to you to plan accordingly and decide what belongs in your team and what you want to use during your journey across Unova. Happy hunting! Deep in the center of a giant chasm, a ferocious monster awaits its chance to shine. With its wings clipped and its body frozen, will its true form ever arise from the abyss? [icon]018[/icon]Coming Soon Post-National Dex Movesets Organizing each Pokemon by Ranking. This is a must. EV Training Mini Section Major Battles / Hard Battles Naked TbirdThe world is not ready for that yet SUGGESTIONS ARE WELCOME, be they additions/modifications/removals of sets mentioned here, changing of a Pokemon's rating placement, etc... Edited April 1, 2011 by wraith89
Gin Posted March 21, 2011 Posted March 21, 2011 Good to see that this has been posted! I'll give you my opinions later, and I'll be using this for my retail walk through.
UnderXRay Posted March 22, 2011 Posted March 22, 2011 wow nice thread wraith, alot of effort o_O, good job (and to all the people that helped you aswell, me not included ).
Tbird Posted March 22, 2011 Posted March 22, 2011 Glad to see this bad boy up and posted . Also cool to see my lovely Louis up there too . It's also cool to see some of the sets I'm planning on running are quite valid too . For Swana, You can make quite a good set that kind of slaves it yet makes it offencively viable by running Fly/ Surf/ Ice Beam/ Roost. I'll probably be running back through this when I decide to finish this run through. I can't bring myself to play this game much though
wraith89 Posted March 22, 2011 Author Posted March 22, 2011 Glad to see this bad boy up and posted . Also cool to see my lovely Louis up there too . It's also cool to see some of the sets I'm planning on running are quite valid too . For Swana, You can make quite a good set that kind of slaves it yet makes it offencively viable by running Fly/ Surf/ Ice Beam/ Roost. I'll probably be running back through this when I decide to finish this run through. I can't bring myself to play this game much though Unfortunately, TM13 isn't available until Giant Chasm, after the E4. Trolled We can run Return or something instead in that slot..
nxnja Posted March 22, 2011 Posted March 22, 2011 Thank you for this, definitely bookmarked. Samurott @ Mystic Water Ability: Torrent - Swords Dance / Surf - Return / Aqua Jet - Megahorn / X-Scissor - Aqua Tail / Waterfall Why swords dance or surf? I think this would be a better swords dance set, putting the attack gained from swords dance into x-scissor and aerial ace actually makes Samurott a decent mixer sweeper. Surf as your STAB move. Samurott @ Mystic Water Ability: Torrent - Surf - Swords Dance - X-Scissor - Aerial Ace
wraith89 Posted March 22, 2011 Author Posted March 22, 2011 (edited) Thank you for this, definitely bookmarked.Samurott @ Mystic Water Ability: Torrent - Swords Dance / Surf - Return / Aqua Jet - Megahorn / X-Scissor - Aqua Tail / Waterfall Why swords dance or surf? I think this would be a better swords dance set, putting the attack gained from swords dance into x-scissor and aerial ace actually makes Samurott a decent mixer sweeper. Surf as your STAB move. Samurott @ Mystic Water Ability: Torrent - Surf - Swords Dance - X-Scissor - Aerial Ace Problem is, not everybody can reach level 57 to learn Swords Dance before that time, so I am taking that into accommodation. Also, it is good to run physical and special water moves together sometimes. Hm, I definitely should have considered Aerial Ace, though STAB Surf and Waterfall does more damage or just as much as super effective Aerial Ace, respectively. The set you posted can work though of course, but too similar to that one posted already. *facepalm* UnderXRay has brought to my attention that I have not included the Pokemons' typings. I guess I should start. Edited March 22, 2011 by wraith89
Relyte Posted March 27, 2011 Posted March 27, 2011 Wow, this is impressive! Don't forget about Eviolite sets, like for Lampent or maybe Klink. This makes them a lot more useful if you're waiting to evolve them (like I did. Pain Split=fun >: D ) Haxorus can also use Rock Slide. Accelgor is really good. Giga Drain is a must; it shouldn't be optional unless you've got Recover on there. He needs the recovery, and the coverage is needed too. Throw a Big Root on him (it's in Pinwheel Forest, for those interested). I'm running Yawn/Giga Drain/Big Buzz/Focus Blast. You should avoid any physical moves (his attack stat is completely dwarfed), and priority is basically useless on him: he's fast enough not to need it.
wraith89 Posted March 27, 2011 Author Posted March 27, 2011 Lampent learns Pain Split at Level 61 (55 as Litwick) On average people tend to be in the late 40s-50s by the end game. Did you get yours up to 61 or something? O_O And thanks for the tips on Accelgor. I haven't really played him, and he looks pretty good on paper, but Shelmet is just blah. I don't know if I should rate as if the person had access to trade or not, as some people do not. I should probably put some Eviolite sets, but I imagine they look the same as their final form's sets, just with an Eviolite.
Relyte Posted March 27, 2011 Posted March 27, 2011 No... pain split came later. Waaaaaaay later. He was only around 50 for the E4. Yeah... I guess I got lucky with Shelmet. There's about four of us at school who play it :3 I think the fact you have to trade it doesn't outweigh its power. Since you're taking into account the availability, C- is a good score. Yeah, the sets with and without eviolite are pretty much the same, but it's probably worth mentioning for a few that evolve late. It'll make them a bit more appealing.
KyoMcFizzle Posted March 28, 2011 Posted March 28, 2011 This is my current Zoroark I'm using on one of my teams. I'll explain my choices: Nope! Try again~ Zoroark @ Bright Powder/Focus Sash Ability: Illusion - Night Daze - Grass Knot - Flame Thrower - Protect Fun thing, this Pokemon. See, one of my main strategies with this Pokemon is to use it to throw people off. Running this with a Conkledurr or a Spiritomb in the last slot of your party is what I normally do. -When running Conkledurr: Since it comes out disguised as a Conkledurr, the opponent's initial thought is one of two things: 1) Use a psychic move. 2) Use a flying move. If played correctly, your unsuspecting opponent will play right in to your hand and attempt to try and nail you with a psychic type move. Since Zoroark is a dark type, Psychic moves won't affect it. By the time they realize this mistake, you'll have gotten a hit in and hopefully done some massive damage with Night Daze or even Flamethrower/Grassknot (Depending on the opponent's Pokemon). In the event they do figure you out right away or they use a flying move, you still have a bit of back up. Use Protect to stall them and keep them at bay while your other Pokemon take your attacker down a couple notches. Yes. This is built for my doubles/triples team. I've managed to use this particular strategy and last an entire match without being found out, though to be fair the guy I was fighting wasn't too bright. -When running Spiritomb: A nice recommendation my friend Kyle made to me when we were discussing Zoroark. Being a Dark Type, Zoroark is prone to two major weaknesses: Fighting and Bug. While discussing this weakness, Kyle brought up a good point: "If you run with a Spiritomb, you eliminate the major threat of a Fighting type trying to hit you. Most people are aware of Spiritomb's immunity to Fighting type moves, and as such that'll be the last thing they want to try and use on you. Not only that, but its moves also blend well enough to allow you to remain undetected if you can keep the pressure on and keep on hammering away at the long enough to deal some good damage before being found out." As such, I decided to run with the same move set and test it out. Sure enough, keeping the pressure on allowed me to take down half their team in a triples battle and two of their Pokemon in a doubles before being found out. -Why the Bright Powder: You can whine and complain about the Accuracy Clause all you want, but this item allows for a nice bit of insurance in battle. Lowering the enemy's accuracy gives you that extra turn to keep going if their attack misses, giving you ample time to whittle your opponent's tank or wall down using Zoroark's wicked 125 base Special Attack. In the event that you wanna run a better item, Focus Sash is a good bit of insurance.
Greencat Posted April 11, 2011 Posted April 11, 2011 *Claps at the master piece* Wonderful job! Very informative! *Bookmarks*
wraith89 Posted July 30, 2011 Author Posted July 30, 2011 Eh? I ended up with this after E4: But of course things have changed a lot since then. However, I haven't touched my game in a long time... so I'm too lazy to check.
Dewgongs Posted July 30, 2011 Posted July 30, 2011 So what Pokemon would you suggest to complete my team consisting of: Serperior, Chandelure, Swanna, Golurk, and Vanilluxe?
wraith89 Posted July 30, 2011 Author Posted July 30, 2011 It really doesn't matter what you do. To be honest, I got my 6th member (Gothitelle) right after the 8th gym. This guide is NOT here to tell you what you should use and what you should not use, just play with what YOU like. Anything can fit in that 6th slot; use what appeals to you the most. If I were someone who goes by types, it looks like you're missing Electric or Psychic Pokemon, but I played through without a single electric, so it's not a problem. As you can see, I was missing a Ground Pokemon as well. Wanna try a dragon?
wraith89 Posted December 17, 2011 Author Posted December 17, 2011 Hmmm, that's rather space consuming though. I would, but anyone can make their own sets with their own resources and whatever at that point. Maybe I should be discussing about how to use each Pokemon and what roles they fill... I suppose. I don't know.
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