Favorite Starters

[Fabulously Olivier]

Overall, Gen 3 has to be my favorite batch of starters, with Gen 5 being the worst set. Gen 3 all look great in their 1st and 3rd stages (and I ultimately value 3rd stages completely). Treecko slightly edges out the others to be my favorite of the three.

 

Speaking of which, when it comes to grass starters, it's a very tough fight between Treecko and Rowlett. They have awesome final evolutions. I suppose I'll give the slight edge to Rowlett for how conceptually awesome an owl archer is. My least favorite grass type is Grookie.

 

Onto fire, my favorite is cyndaquil by a fair margin. Typhlosion is just a very cool final form. Charmander and Torchic are great runners-up. My least favorite is Litten, and I'm not a fan of Incineroar being picked for Smash.

 

Water's one of my favorite types. And I like most of them, except for Popplio and Quaxly. My favorite has got to be Piplup, who has an adorable initial form and a very badass final form. Squirtle, Totodile, and Mudkip certainly put up a good fight though.

Edited May 24 by Fabulously Olivier

[vanguard333]

Overall, I'm not sure which set of starter Pokémon is my favourite. I ended up picking gen 4 because Torterra is my favourite and Chimchar and Piplup are also pretty cool.

My favourite fire starter would be Charmander, as I like Charizard.

My favourite water starter would probably be Froakie, since that's the only water starter that I have actually preferred over the other two starters.

My favourite grass starter would have to be Turtwig, as Torterra is my favourite Pokémon and a turtle with a tree on its back is a cool design. My second favourite grass starter would have to be Rowlett because Decidueye being an owl archer is pretty cool. 

[lenticular]

Fire is definitely Litten. Grass is definitely Turtwig. Water is much closer; I said Poplio today, but if you asked me on another day I might have said Squirtle or Piplup. Generally speaking, I think that generations 1, 4 and 7 have great starters, and the other generations are pretty underwhelming. I am curious to see whether the "every three generations" pattern will continue when we reach gen 10.

[Lord_Brand]

For Fire, I picked Fennekin, partly because it's a fox which I adore, and partly because I've become fond of Braixen in general.

For Water, Popplio, because I like Primarina the most of all Water starters. A pretty mermaid seal, with a Water/Fairy typing to boot.

For Grass, Snivy, because it's a snek and I like sneks. Serperior of course is my favorite stage of the family.

For favorite overall set, I picked Gen I out of nostalgia. Though Venusaur, Charizard, and Blastoise may not be my favorites, they were the originals, not to mention Blastoise is one of the coolest Water starters to this day.

[Eltosian Kadath]

Water is the tough one, as Fire is definitely the little goof ball Fuecoco, and Rowlet is my favorite starter overall, but water types tend to end up far more generic. I went with the meme mon Mudkip in the end, but I could very easily go with Piplup, Poplio, or Squirtle as well.

Oddly enough I didn't go with any of the generations with one of my favorite starters here, but there is some logic to that. When one mon dominates the others, it unbalances the group, brings the other's faults into sharper relief, and keeps their best qualities from shining. So I thought about which trio were the strongest as a group, where it wasn't necessarily obvious which I would pick among them because all of them are good, and three headrunners came to mind, Gen 1, Gen 2, and Gen 4. Honestly it was a tough decision, but I let Gen 1 take the lead, as I felt there were some clear weak links in the other pairs, for Gen 2 the Chikorita line is infamously weak from a gameplay stand point (and I have actually used the little fellow in a playthrough and got to experience the weakness of the little cutie first hand), and as for Gen 4, the region has an issue with fire types which unbalances the trio in a way that Kanto's hatred of Fire types doesn't as much (plus monkeys can be kind of ugly at times, which I probably wouldn't notice if I were not pushed into using them by the gameplay).

[Zapp Branniglenn]

Some of these are conflicting. My favorite Fire Starter is Torchic. Such an awesome design. Basically Wooper but as a much funnier animal that chirps fire. And then it evolves. Combusken is awful and Blaziken...I guess I just don't like the 80s hair band aesthetic with long hair and parachute pants. Doesn't look like an animal anymore. Got a similar situation with Piplup. The Initial design is perfect, but I don't care for the evolutions. Ultimately most of my favorites are Grass starters. Some of them downgrade a bit as they evolve, like Bayleef -> Meganium, but I'd still say Meganium is at least average among the other types' final evolutions.

As for my answers, Litten, Squirtle, Chikorita, Gen 1 as sort of the No Notes Overall pick.

[Venger_06]

Cyndaquil>Fennekin>Charmander>Torchic>Fuecoco>Chimchar>Scorbunny>Litten>Tepig

Piplup>Oshawott>Popplio>Mudkip>Squirtle>Totodile>Froakie>Sobble

Snivy>Rowlet>Turtwig>Sprigatito>Bulbasaur>Chikorita>Chespin>Grookie

Gen 4 had the best starters overall.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

I went with Chikorita (my first-ever starter, and a bonafide cutie), Litten (ugh Intimiroar is so good, especially in doubles), and Oshawott (just look at it, holding that precious shell). Reckon I'll give honorable mentions to Rowlet (I have it on a hat), Chimchar (perfect arc from cute, to derpy, to cool), and Popplio (love the Fairy secondary typing). Unsurprisingly, I picked Gen VII as the best batch overall (admittedly, the latest batch I've played).

[KMT4ever]

Fire: Charmander, both for being my first ever Pokémon and for evolving into Charizard. Torchic and Fennekin get honorable mentions.

Water: Mudkip, because Swampert and the Water-Ground typing in general are cool. Honorable mention to Totodile.

Grass: Sprigatito, because it's cute and I like Meowscarada's trickster theme. Honestly a tough one because I'm not a big fan of the Grass type as a whole.

Overall: This was a really tough choice. I think a lot of the generations are very good (1, 3, 4, 6, 9), but none stand out to me as particularly amazing enough to put them above the rest. In the end I went with Gen 1 for nostalgia's sake.

[Fabulously Olivier]

23 hours ago, Venger_06 said:

Cyndaquil>Fennekin>Charmander>Torchic>Fuecoco>Chimchar>Scorbunny>Litten>Tepig

Piplup>Oshawott>Popplio>Mudkip>Squirtle>Totodile>Froakie>Sobble

Snivy>Rowlet>Turtwig>Sprigatito>Bulbasaur>Chikorita>Chespin>Grookie

Gen 4 had the best starters overall.

Mine is (and I'm judging entirely by final evolutions)

 

Cyndaquil > Charmander > Torchic > Fuecoco > Scorbunny > Tepig > Chimchar > Litten

 

Piplup > Mudkip > Totodile > Squirtle > Froakie > Sobble > Oshawott > Quaxly > Popplio

 

Rowlett = Treecko > Bulbasaur > Snivy > Turtwig > Sprigatito > Chikorita > Chespin > Grookie