Pokémon Movepool Oddities & Explanations

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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I edited my post for some thoughts for clarity. I just found it wonderfully ironic that Hatterene wouldn't "curse" or "get mad" at a Toxicity for making loud sounds, it was a joke but I decidedto cut it out so people don't assume I don't know typing effectiveness. I should have edited that earlier. Thank you guys!
D'oh, sorry, that joke went above my head, lol! :bloblul:
 
  • Water Starters get Torrent, annoying I know and sadly Sniper isn't much better.
While I agree it could have had a more...flavourful HA, its signature move also has a built in +1 crit. Intelleon can reach 50% crit with holding a item which is realistic for an actual sniper-fantasy honestly. It's not really something that'd be used competitively.. (or would it?) but it at least does fit the sniper fantasy.

Now, imagine if its G-max move makes the water stab give it +crit as buff... that'd be actually pretty clever, would reach 100% crit combining G-max with HA and holding a +crit item and make it possibly potent anti-staller... (I believe Machamp G-move also gives +2 crit currently)

...and since it's clever, we can expect it to not happen.
 
Bandwagon time.


Y'all say it's weird that Zeraora doesn't get Iron Fist and a bunch of punching moves. I say it's weird that it has any association with punching in the first place. Almost all of its Pokedex entries talk about how it fights with its electrically-charged claws, not fists. If anything, it's missing moves like Crush Claw and Night Slash, and Plasma Fists should be called Plasma Claws or something. Also, Iron Fist is a garbage ability. It is the Virgin to the Chad Tough Claws.


Parting Shot would make total sense. It's a secret agent. It's a classic trope to give the enemy a witty one-liner before dipping out. Gunk Shot would work, but Sludge Bomb would be better because it's special. One move that I'm very surprised that it lacks is Lock-On. That seems to be the express purpose of its special eye lenses: to lock onto its target. On that note, it also lacks Laser Focus, which would have paired nicely with Sniper.


For a Pokemon supposedly known for violent reactions to hostility, it oddly lacks any counterattack moves. With its moderate SpDef, Mirror Coat would have been nifty. I guess Magic Bounce is sort of a counterattack? Throat Chop would have also been very fitting for this Pokemon. If you're too loud, but it doesn't want to outright murder you, it gives you a swift punch to the neck to shut you up.


The lack of Trick or Switcheroo is honestly insulting. As is Fling. Come to think about it, a Pokemon focused around held item manipulation would be kinda cool. Fling + some method of stealing items has always been an entertaining prospect, so it would be neat to see something designed to make that viable.


Lack of Body Press is a crime, as is Counter and King's Shield. Earthquake would have been nice, too. Zacian really doesn't need it (shit's broken as it is) but Zamazenta is significantly heavier, so I can totally see it causing tremors by slamming its bigass shield into the ground.

~~~~~~~~~~

Some of you may remember that back in the SwSh datamine days, I was baffled by the distribution of Power Whip.
Power Whip is now a TM, so some Pokemon that didn't used to learn it now can. Let's review what now learns Power Whip, and what doesn't. As a refresher, here's Power Whip's move description:

"The user violently whirls its vines, tentacles, or the like to harshly lash the target."

Gyarados
Either Gyarados uses its moustache, or it uses its whole body. The former isn't very satisfactory, and the latter doesn't really fit the description.

Mew
Mew gets every TM. No surprise here.

Palpitoad and Seismitoad
I guess they use their tongues? They are frogs, so they probably have long tongues, and that's presumably how Lickitung and Lickilicky use Power Whip. Though I don't know if Palpitoad and Seismitoad have ever actually been shown having long tongues.

Gourgeist
I suppose its hair arms work...

Sizzlipede and Centiskorch
These things have to be using their whole body as a whip. Again, not really in line with the move description.

Hatterene
The Pokedex says this thing has tentacles, even though I don't really see it, at least not on the normal form.

Grimmsnarl
Grimmsnarl is covered in hair Bayonetta-style, and the Dex says it can use its hair as tentacles.

Cufant and Copperajah
I suppose they use their trunks. That makes enough sense.

Octillery, Frillish, Jellicent, Inkay and Malamar
and Clobbopus and Grapploct

Octopuses, jellyfish, and squids are all animals known for having tentacles.

Onix, Steelix, and Milotic
and Silicobra and Sandaconda

If having a serpentine body is enough for Gyarados and the centipedes, why don't these mons get Power Whip?

Whiscash
If Gyarados is indeed using its whiskers, why not Whiscash?

Shuckle, Drifloon, and Drifblim
These mons have tentacle-like appendages.
Now that we have movepool data from HOME, let's continue this list of Pokemon that do and do not learn Power Whip, the move in which "the user violently whirls its vines, tentacles, or the like to harshly lash the target."


 
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Gligar and gliscor are fine imo. The tail must be strong to whip and they can control it freely so the move comes out easier.
Was seviper the only grounded serpentine pokemon to get power whip? If yes, I wonder if its because it doesnt naturally uncoil itself and actually walks uncoiled (like a weird toy), so it could choose to uncoil and whip you out... While the other snakes... Are stuck to ground I guess? Too heavy to whip around, fat idiots in gamefreaks eyes

Politoed and chimecho I don't see the whip appendage. All politoed has is that weird whisker thing and chimechos bottom looks like its made of silk vs something sturdy. The rest were probably for balance only or somethinh LOL
 
Politoed and chimecho I don't see the whip appendage. All politoed has is that weird whisker thing and chimechos bottom looks like its made of silk vs something sturdy. The rest were probably for balance only or somethinh LOL
Politoed would use its long frog tongue, presumably the same way Seismitoad uses Power Whip.
 
I would argue there's noting wierd about the jellyfish not getting power whip, considering that their inspiration is straight up incapable of moving their tentacles quickly.
their inspiration is also knwon for being squishy but Nihilego is part rock and learns Head Smash.

It also learns Brutal Swing and Poison Jab. It doesn't really have use for Power Whip but, well, same goes for all these other physical moves.
 

Pikachu315111

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Nihilego is essentially living malleable glass, probably able to both be squishy when moving around though condense when attacking. That said its tentacles aren't really for smashing but for constricting and poisoning.
 
  • They really need to make a Magnet Rise clone simply called "Hover" for all the other Pokemon which have the ability to hover though hard to justify them having Magnet Rise. Though even then, you can justify if still getting hit by Ground-types by saying it doesn't hover enough off the ground to ignore it bursting up on it (not to mention all the projectile Ground-type moves that for some reason are also nullifed by Flying-types/Levitate/Magnet Rise).
Not precisely for the evolutionary family your quoted post was about, but Meditate could also grant a Magnet Rise effect, as it's the main thing people associate to meditation. Not much of a competitive change, but it's a cool flavor thing.

(Yeah, a bit late answer, but I just got in the mood for this, huh)
 
Not precisely for the evolutionary family your quoted post was about, but Meditate could also grant a Magnet Rise effect, as it's the main thing people associate to meditation. Not much of a competitive change, but it's a cool flavor thing.

(Yeah, a bit late answer, but I just got in the mood for this, huh)
I like this idea. Magnet Rise could also give a speed boost to match. I could see these being decent on something like Electivire, who could boost its stats and remove its weakness at the same time.
 

Pikachu315111

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So while it's not Move or Abilities, what I want to mention I do feel is an oddity: Unique Type combinations. Or rather, ones certain Pokemon have held onto a long and ones which haven't been done yet. Let's break it down into categories but first here's two helpful Bulbapedia pages:

List of Pokemon with Unique Type Combination
List of Type Combination By Abundance

Combinations A Pokemon (Family) Held Onto For A While:
  1. Poison/Flying by Zubat family. For over 20 years the Zubat family have been the only Poison/Flying-types. That just seems odd to me. Now, on further thinking I guess it does make sense as, aside from bugs (which would be part Bug-type), what other poisonous flying animals are there? There's a few poisonous birds like the Hooded Pitohui, but other then that nothing else. Of course, Pokemon just don't have to be animals (and the animal doesn't even need to be poisonous to be made into a Poison-type), they could do objects and most likely mythological creatures (while not having wings originally, manticores are scorpion tail lions which has been given wings in recent times; cockatrice also isn't a bad choice).
  2. Bug/Fairy by Cutiefly family. With how often fairys are drawn with bug-like features it's surprised not only more weren't made but they didn't go back to make other Bug-types into Fairy like Volbeat & Illumise.
  3. Ghost/Poison by Ghastly family. Another longtime holder since Gen I. When something dies it starts to decompose and become poisonous or at least a biohazard, so it doesn't seem like a rare Type combination. Like I can imagine a zombie being Ghost/Poison.
  4. Ghost/Fairy by Mimikyu. I'm just surprised they didn't go back and make Misdreavus into a Fairy-type. The banshee is a ghostly fey.
  5. Grass/Ground by Torterra. This feels like a really obvious combination, like one of those combinations you'd be going "oh, another Grass/Ground-type". But it's not, only Torterra has it.
  6. Dark/Fairy by Impidimp family. With how the fey are often described as being malicious creatures in mythology it's a surprise only one Pokemon family have been dedicated to the concept.
  7. Fairy/Flying by Togetic & Togekiss. Like Fairy's with bugs, flying fairys is often a common trait yet, not only is there one family that's Fairy/Flying, it was one that was retconned.
Combinations They Haven't Done Yet:
  1. Fighting/Ground. Feels like would have been done at least once, like a low-to-the-ground fighter (or how about a mud wrestler? Female only of course).
  2. Bug/Dark. There's plenty of nasty and vicious bugs, but apparently none have been made into a Pokemon yet!
Any which you think should have had more Pokemon by now or been done?
 
Outside of some Pokemon XD moves and some(but surprsingly not all, like Swords Dance Seaking) Gen II NYPC moves, Sword and Shield has been fairly consistent about giving back Pokemon moves they had at least once in the past, even obscure event moves(Like Hydro Pump Magikarp and Blaze Kick Genesect), with the new TMs and TRs. But one of the exceptions that stands out to me is that Combee cannot learn the Swift TM, even though it could learn it via Move Tutor in Gen IV, the only Post-gen III example I can think of for TM/TR Incompatibility in Sword and Shield outside of Earthquake Melmetal
 
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While browsing Bulbapedia's page on move errors, I came across something ridiculous.

There are only four Pokemon that can learn Poison Gas in gen 1:


Meanwhile, these Pokemon could not learn Poison Gas in gen 1:


Koffing and Weezing did end up receiving Poison Gas in gen 2, while the Gastly family can only learn the move in Let's Go.
 
While browsing Bulbapedia's page on move errors, I came across something ridiculous.

There are only four Pokemon that can learn Poison Gas in gen 1:


Meanwhile, these Pokemon could not learn Poison Gas in gen 1:


Koffing and Weezing did end up receiving Poison Gas in gen 2, while the Gastly family can only learn the move in Let's Go.
This is some Lickitung-cant-learn-lick nonsense, wow
 
So I was looking through a list of Pokemon that can learn Roost, and one of the oddities I noticed was that Giratina, despite having wings on both forms, is unable to learn Roost.

  • Bunch of Bug types with wings, including Dustox, Buzzwole, Volcarona, Ribombee, and Illumise.
  • Doduo, Dodrio, Tapu Koko, and Drampa despite not having any wings.
  • Lot of other Winged Dragons, including the Eon Duo, Tao Trio, Flygon, and Hydreigon.
  • Pheromosa
Yes, that's right. An extremely feminine Cockroach with no wings and bulk equivalent to a tissue paper can learn Roost, but not a Ghostly dragon with wings and has the bulk equivalent to a steel fortress. Is there any lore I am missing out to explain this?
 
So I was looking through a list of Pokemon that can learn Roost, and one of the oddities I noticed was that Giratina, despite having wings on both forms, is unable to learn Roost.

  • Bunch of Bug types with wings, including Dustox, Buzzwole, Volcarona, Ribombee, and Illumise.
  • Doduo, Dodrio, Tapu Koko, and Drampa despite not having any wings.
  • Lot of other Winged Dragons, including the Eon Duo, Tao Trio, Flygon, and Hydreigon.
  • Pheromosa
Yes, that's right. An extremely feminine Cockroach with no wings and bulk equivalent to a tissue paper can learn Roost, but not a Ghostly dragon with wings and has the bulk equivalent to a steel fortress. Is there any lore I am missing out to explain this?
The lore is that if you used Roost Giratina on your stall team no-one would ever want to play Pokémon again
 

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