ITT I Rate Pokemon Platinum

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

How many FF did it usually take to kill Bronzong anyway?

Because Outside of Bronzong, IIRC Garchomp kinda stomp all of them

[Smiley Jim]

Cranidos/Rampardos

Type: Rock

Ability(s): Mold Breaker

Fossil time.

How fossils work in this generation differs quite significantly from other generations, where instead of finding them in a fixed spot, you now find them in the Sinnoh Underground. The Explorer Kit required to access the underground is located in Eterna City, which combined with the fact that the Pokemon Lab is located in Oreburgh gives the fossils of this generation somewhat early availability. Compare this with the fossils of Hoenn and Unova, which can be obtained midgame, or even the Kanto fossils, which are only obtainable lategame.

Like in every other game with obtainable fossils, the two fossils are mutually exclusive. Which fossil the player can obtain depends on the trainer ID given to him at the start of the game. If the player's trainer ID ends in an odd number, he can dig up Skull Fossils, which will become Cranidos, and if the trainer ID ends in an even number, he can dig up Armor Fossils, which will become Shieldon. This rating will cover Cranidos.

The two fossils of this game fall under one of two extremes, and Cranidos's stat build is offense taken to the extreme. Unevolved, he has 125 attack. This is beyond ridiculous for something that's not evolved, and even a few doubly evolved Pokemon wouldn't mind having his attack stat. Evolution at Lv30 grants him a mind-blowing 165 attack, the highest non-legendary attack stat in the game, bar none. Just to give an idea on how high Rampy's attack is, he beats out monsters like Groudon and even Slaking, and is only superseded by Deoxys-A's 180 base.

For something that hits like a fucking freight train, his bulk is, unfortunately, roughly the equivalent of untreated window glass. While 97 base HP is above average, 60/50 defenses are not, and rock isn't particularly great defensive typing either, sporting 5 weaknesses and making him relatively useless in most boss fights as pretty much every boss has at least one move that can really fuck him up. Now, this wouldn't be so much of a problem if he didn't have a speed stat of 58. Thankfully, his speed woes can be mitigated to a large extent with the Rock Polish TM, but this isn't available until after the sixth gym.

One other problem that Cranidos has is that he's deprived of a strong STAB option for most of the game. Rock Tomb exists early on, but you better get used to it, because stronger rock moves aren't available until very late in the game. For starters, the Stone Edge TM isn't available until Victory Road, and even Rock Slide is unavailable until you beat the Snowpoint gym. Granted, a lack of good STAB isn't that huge a deal when you have 165 attack, but he still begs to have something with a bit more bite in the later stages. An interesting option is Head Smash, which has an astronomical 150 BP before factoring in STAB, but not only is it learned very late(Lv52), but it also inflicts half the damage you deal as recoil, which is detrimental for something that is frail(and slow) to begin with.

Other than this, Rampy's movepool is fairly wide. The Earthquake TM is available at around the same time as Cranidos, which gives him excellent synergy with his Rock move of choice, and one advantage he has over other EQ users is that he can hit levitating Pokemon courtesy of Mold Breaker. Other ok physical option available to him include Lv36 Zen Headbutt, as well as the Fire Punch and ThunderPunch tutors.

In a nutshell, VERY high attack power, but can't take a hit to save his own ass, and isn't particularly fleet of foot.

5

[Smiley Jim]

Shieldon/Bastiodon

Type: Rock/Steel

Ability(s): Sturdy

The other of the two fossil Pokemon that you can pick up and take back to Oreburgh for resurrection, Shieldon is basically Cranidos's polar opposite. While Cranidos took offense to the highest level, Shieldon leans towards the other extreme, boasting 118/88 defenses unevolved and additional steel typing, giving him MUCH better survivability than his counterpart. While the addition of the steel type gives him 5 more resistances than Cranidos, it also gives him unwanted 4x weaknesses to both Fighting and Ground.

Unfortunately, this is where his positives end. For something that's based off a triceratops, Bastiodon has piss-poor offensive stats, and with only 52Atk/47SpA, he's REALLY hard-pressed to damage anything significantly, and what makes this a lot fucking worse is that he gets no attack raising moves through level or TM to mitigate this. Just to pour another scoop of shit on an already shitty rating, Bastiodon also has half Rampardos's speed, and Rampy wasn't fast to begin with. Granted, having low speed isn't too detrimental when your bulk is high, but it's still a point against him.

Like Rampy, Bastiodon has issues getting good quality STAB early on, and in his case, he needs all the strong moves he can get because his attack just sucks. The Rock Tomb TM exists, but it's laughably weak, and while Lv28 AncientPower can help to some extent, it's still only 60 BP and runs off Bastiodon's(inferior) SpA. However, these are the best he has until the Rock Slide TM is available. At the very least, he does get access to Flash Cannon after the sixth gym, and will serve as his primary steel STAB, as Iron Head isn't learned until Lv52.

An interesting option in his arsenal is Metal Burst, learned at Lv43. This move is basically Counter and Mirror Coat blended together into one move, but the damage bounced back is only 1.5x instead of 2x. This is, admittedly, Bastiodon's best way of dealing damage. Even so, it has a few drawbacks, notably the fact that it has a priority of 0, meaning that the user must be slower than the target for Metal Burst to have any effect(this one isn't an issue due to Bastiodon being as slow as a paraplegic turtle). The other one being that due to his steel typing and high defenses, he takes lol damage from anything except fighting and ground moves, and moves of those types are damn near fatal to Bastiodon if not outright so(if you can actually survive an EQ/CC, Metal Burst is a guaranteed KO).

While focusing heavily on defense is a cute strategy in competitive play, for the purposes of ingame runs, offense reigns supreme, and Bastiodon really fails at that.

2

[Smiley Jim]

Ralts/Kirlia/Gardevoir/Gallade

Type: Psychic, Psychic/Fighting(Gallade)

Ability(s): Synchronize/Trace(Ralts/Kirlia/Gardevoir), Steadfast(Gallade)

Time to do the stuff east of the Coronet mountain range.

The first new thing encountered on the other side of Sinnoh, Ralts is another psychic type, similar to Abra. Like Abra, Ralts has a tendency to use Teleport, so if you don't have a means to sleep him, just throw a ball and hope to god it works. Thankfully, the capture rate is quite high, so it should only take a few tries tops. Once caught, you will find that Ralts has very poor stats for this point in the game, but fortunately evolves only 2 levels after capture.

As a psychic type, Kirlia stacks very poorly in the Hearthome gym, even with very early CM access(the only other specially oriented psychic who gets it naturally, Alakazam, doesn't get it until Lv36), but is very helpful in the Veilstone gym due to that place being fighting heavy. After the Veilstone gym fight, Kirlia will be primed and ready for evolution, though in this game he has one of two choices, both of which will be covered here:

Gardevoir:

The first evolution I will cover is Gardevoir, obtained by leveling a Kirlia of any gender to Lv30. As far as stats go, the first thing you'll notice is that both his special stats are above average, with 125 SpA being especially noteworthy seeing as the only non legendary Pokemon that have better than this as of this game's release are Gengar, Espeon, Glaceon and Magnezone(all base 130), as well as Alakazam, and Porygon-Z(both base 135). 68/115 special bulk combined with CM access also allows him to fearlessly tank most of the specially oriented bosses. However, Gardevoir is somewhat frail physically, though not to the extent Alakazam is, and 80 speed is kind of average by the standards of this gen.

I've already covered this in Abra's rating, but psychic typing isn't exactly awesome in Sinnoh's maingame, largely due to the large amount of dark/ghost move users that appear lategame, as well as the boss setup not being kind to psychic types in general. Aaron in particular is nasty as he uses high powered STAB bug moves against you, and Cyrus is no walk in the park either, 3 of his 5 mons being dark(Granted, you CAN nail them with Focus Blast, but the prospect of being reliant on a 70% move to defeat dangerous opponents like dark types is... undesirable.)

Like with Abra, Gardevoir's movepool expanded greatly with the physical/special split, the most notable moves he gets are Focus Blast and Shadow Ball. Thunderbolt is still there, but this is unavailable until you get Surf, so he can use either Grass Knot or Magic Leaf to tide him over until then. Speaking of Grass Knot, he can even use that over T-bolt in order to harm Bertha's Pokemon even more than Psychic.

Nice Pokemon, but pure psychic typing is not exactly stellar in this gen's maingame. Such is life...

7

Gallade:

The other evolution of Kirlia, this one being a dawn stone evolution. The first dawn stone is available to the player once he enters Pastoria, being a hidden item just outside the western gate. The other requirement to getting a Gallade is that the Kirlia you use the stone on is male, as there are no female Gallade. But I think that goes without saying, as female Gallade would be almost as creepy as female Machamp(the latter of which CAN happen)

The addition of the fighting type gives Gallade a much broader range of good matchups in the boss battles to come, being super effective against steel and ice(Byron and Candice's specialty types, respectively), as well as being a lot more reliable in fights where he's neutral(Volkner and Crasher Wake come to mind.) The resistance to psychic is lost, however, making him a bit worse off against Lucian.

Gallade's stats are actually identical to Gardevoir's in every way, except with one major difference: Gallade's attack and special attack are an inversion of Gardevoir's, turning him into a potent physical sweeper, especially when combined with fighting STAB. While he doesn't learn any fighting moves through level until Lv52's Close Combat, he can easily pick up the Brick Break TM. As far as psychic STAB is concerned, while he loses out on Psychic(he doesn't make good use of it anyway), he does gain Psycho Cut(a physical psychic Slash clone) at Lv31. The Zen Headbutt tutor is also available if you need more power to the punch.

Being physically oriented, Gallade's coverage is actually quite a bit broader than that of Gardevoir. For starters, he can get access to the punches immediately after evolution, as well as both Leaf Blade and Night Slash through the relearner. He can also learn Stone Edge or Rock Slide later down the road. In place of Calm Mind, he can learn Swords Dance from the relearner, thus negating the need to buy it in the Game Corner.

In a nutshell, fighting type+natural SD+good coverage=better than Gardevoir.

7.5

[Smiley Jim]

Eevee/Vaporeon/Jolteon/Flareon

Type: Normal, Water(Vaporeon), Electric(Jolteon), Fire(Flareon)

Ability(s): Run Away/Adaptability(Eevee), Water Absorb(Vaporeon), Volt Absorb(Jolteon), Flash Fire(Flareon)

I've dreaded the day when I have to compose this rating, mostly because it's going to be LONG. So long in fact, I'm going to split it into three parts. It's probably the only way I can do this rating without it being a complete mess.

Eevee himself is acquired as a gift from Bebe at Lv20, and has rather shitty stats for this point in the game, sporting 55Atk/55Spe when most good things by this point should have around 80Atk/80Spe(or 80SpA/80Spe if special) on average. The good news is that Eevee can evolve into not one, not two, not even three, but SEVEN distinctly different Pokemon(and as of Gen VI, still growing), and all but one of the evolutions can be acquired by at the very least Pastoria City.

This post will cover the Kanto Eeveelutions, since they all have a similar evo method.

[spoiler=Vaporeon]

The three evolutionary stones you need to evolve Eevee can be found as hidden items in the Solaceon Ruins, so Vaporeon has relatively good availability as per custom. As far as stats go, Vaporeon is more of a defensive beats, sporting a titanic 130 base HP, as well as good special defense. 60 base defense is actually rather mediocre, but the HP augments it somewhat. Water typing, despite the advent of more powerful Mons and moves, is still an excellent defensive typing, sporting only two weaknesses, which, thankfully, aren't very common(unless you count Volkner's gym as electric being common, but we're not deploying Vaporeon against that gym.)

So, how's Vaporeon doing on offense, may we ask? The good news is that he has 110 base special attack(65 speed sucks, but he's bulky enough not to care anyway.) The bad news is that he literally gets no STAB whatsoever until the player reaches Pastoria when he can trade a Heart Scale in to reteach Water Gun(or use the Brine TM you get from Wake, whichever comes first), and has no access to any special moves before then unless you buy a Blizzard TM for him in the Veilstone Shoppe(and the thought of being reliant on a 70% accurate move for good damage is... questionable. Well, it's either that or being stuck with unSTAB Quick Attack off 65 base attack. Pick your poison.) This is basically Vaporeon's existence before the Surf HM shows up, and that wait is long indeed, as that isn't happening until after gym 5.

So what if it is? At this point, Vap's combat improves greatly, and Surf couldn't have come at a better time too, as Byron's gym and Iron Island are full of water weak things. Water STAB is also effective against Bertha and Flint, if I needed to say it again. Ice Beam access after the Snowpoint gym allows him to take on Cynthia's Garchomp. Other than this and Shadow Ball, his movepool is rather bland.

In a nutshell, VERY rough start due to a lack of STAB, but becomes good after getting Surf.

6

[spoiler=Jolteon]

Using the thunderstone on Eevee will transform him into Jolteon, who is built just like every other electric type in this game: a fast glass cannon. The most notable thing about Jolteon is his 130 base speed, the stat itself being one of the highest in the game, tying with Mewtwo, Aerodactyl and Crobat, and only dwarfed by Electrode, Ninjask, and Deoxys. This combined with 110 special attack makes him one of the more potent cleaners in the game. Unfortunately, 65HP/60Def isn't exactly what I'd like to call bulky, and the high frequency of Earthquake users lategame does not help.

Unlike Vaporeon, Jolteon doesn't have to wait a horrendously long time to get proper STAB, as the Shock Wave TM exists by the time the player reaches Veilstone(Alternately, one could buy a Thunder TM from the Veilstone Shoppe, which has double Shock Wave's power, but it is inaccurate), and will serve as his bread and butter until the Thunderbolt TM is available. The rest of his movepool is nothing special, though. He does get some rather strange moves in his level up movepool, like Double Kick and Pin Missile, but he has neither the attack stat to make use of those moves nor are they particularly powerful to begin with.

Like all electric types, Jolt is quite awesome against Wake and Cyrus, and Volt Absorb lets him neuter Volkner's STAB. Do not use him against Bertha ever.

Overall, not that bad. Only real complaints are the slightly rough start and the lack of a good special movepool outside of Thunderbolt and Shadow Ball.

7

[spoiler=Flareon]

The last of the three original Eeveelutions I have to cover here, Flareon is an interesting beast indeed. On one hand, we have 130 base attack, which is the highest among Eevee's evolutions, as well as tying with monsters like Machamp and Garchomp. On the other, we have... 65/60 physical bulk with water and ground weaknesses combined with 65 base speed. Yeah... not a winning combination. I suppose 110 special defense is kind of cute, though it's mostly superficial outside of fighting Lucian.

Ok, movepool, or lack thereof. First off, buy Fire Blast at the Veilstone Shoppe. I don't care how stingy you are with money at this point in the game. Do it. While Flareon's SpA pales in comparison to his attack, 95 base is still serviceable, and even if it wasn't, 120 BP with STAB still bloody well hurts at that point in the game. Unfortunately, he doesn't get any physical fire moves of equivalent power, the strongest he gets is Lv43 Fire Fang, which is outdamaged by max power Return of all things. Cut me a fucking break. His coverage is also basically non existent, his only real saving grace is getting Dig(Superpower is a postgame tutor.)

As a fire type, Flareon actually has it good boss wise(at least, compared to his Kanto performance), being effective against Byron, Candice, and Aaron. Crasher Wake just pisses on him, though.

In a nutshell, nice attack and ok boss performance, but shitty speed and durability, and has a movepool shallower than a poodle's piss puddle.

6.5

The Johto Eeveelutions are coming up next. Stay tuned for those, I guess.

[Smiley Jim]

Espeon and Umbreon

Type: Psychic (Espeon), Dark (Umbreon)

Ability(s): Synchronize

Moving on to the Johto Eeveelutions. Unlike the last batch of Eeveelutions I rated, these guys don't evolve through stone exposure, but through happiness, though which form will evolve into which depends on the time of day. If you level an Eevee with high happiness between the hours of 8 am and 8 pm, he will evolve into Espeon, and evolving the same Eevee between the hours of 8pm and 8 am will yield Umbreon instead. Either way, due to starting with only 70 happiness, Eevee will most likely not gain enough to evolve until Pastoria, unless given special dedication happiness grinding to get to that point.

[spoiler=Espeon]

Espeon is basically your definition of a classical psychic type: fast, powerful, and a tad frail. He basically has one of the best stat spreads out of the Eeveelutions, sharing Gengar's special attack and speed bases while having 20 higher special defense. However, as noted in previous ratings, psychic typing is not particularly useful typing in Sinnoh's maingame (many, many trainers lategame use dark moves), and like Gengar, Espeon can't take a physical-based hit to save himself.

Like Vaporeon, Espeon suffers from the lack of STAB until the player reaches Pastoria City, as Confusion needs to be relearned and Psybeam isn't learned until Lv36 (as for learning Psychic outside the TM, forget it. That's learned at Lv64.) Should you manage to evolve Eevee before Veilstone, you will find that without psychic STAB, Espeon is mostly dead weight in the Veilstone gym, since Swift won't do enough damage and the fighting type's coverage moves can likely 2HKO him. Beyond this, he has a shallow movepool, his coverage consisting of Shadow Ball and Grass Knot.

Hits like a truck, but not particularly useful in any of the boss fights and is practically dead weight until Pastoria City.

5.5

[spoiler=Umbreon]

The other happiness based Eeveelution, this one focuses on raw bulk. Unlike the previous four Eeveelutions I've rated, Umbreon has 95/110/130 defenses to his name, which is a somewhat interesting change from the norm. It also helps that dark typing is significantly more helpful than psychic in this game's story mode, being effective on Lucian while assuming immunity to his attacks.

For all his bulk, how's Umbreon doing on offense? Poorly. Let's be honest here; 65/60 attacking stats are right fucking awful for ingame purposes, where you want to kill things as quickly as possible, and Umbreon fails at that. Not helping matters is the lack of strong dark moves, though the pain is lessened somewhat by early Payback, which doubles in power if the user goes last (and Umbreon is a fairly slow Pokemon, so Payback will have 100 BP in most scenarios.) Dark Pulse is also there, but it doesn't show up until Victory Road, and Umbreon is too slow to make use of the flinch chance.

lodefensivemonwithpisspoorattackingstats.jpg

3

Edited November 19, 2013 by General James

[Smiley Jim]

Leafeon and Glaceon

Type: Grass (Leafeon), Ice (Glaceon)

Ability(s): Leaf Guard (Leafeon), Snow Cloak (Glaceon)

Ok, last two Eeveelutions, and thank god too. Anyway, to get these forms, you need to level them up in a certain location, the location depending on the form you want to get. To get Leafeon, you must level your Eevee in the grass next to a moss-covered rock, and for Glaceon, you need to do your training in grass next to an ice-covered rock. Due to their locations ingame (Lost Woods and Snowpeak, respectively), this makes these two forms the earliest obtainable and latest obtainable Eeveelutions, respectively.

[spoiler=Leafeon]

Due to the moss rock's location being in the entrance to the Lost Woods, Leafeon has the best availability of the seven forms (well, technically, you can get Espeon and Umbreon just as early, but that requires special dedication happiness grinding.), and as such, is actually available for the Fantina fight. While he's not so great there due to a variety of reasons, it is something he has the others don't.

Statwise, Leafeon's biggest draw is his 130 base defense, which is among the highest of all grass types, and unlike Umbreon, his attack isn't a complete joke at base 110, so he hits reasonably hard. He is also quite fast for his type, but his special bulk... leaves a LOT to be desired.

As far as movepool goes, Leafeon is actually quite a bit better off in the beginning than others due to having access to STAB right from the start. While Razor Leaf is out of reach until Pastoria, he can use Bullet Seed to tide him over until then. It also helps that he gets access to Razor Leaf right before a water gym. Unfortunately, it's the strongest physical grass move he has access to during the maingame, as Leaf Blade isn't learned until... Lv71. As far as coverage goes, he can utilize the Dig, X-Scissor, and Aerial Ace TMs if one is so inclined. He also gets Swords Dance through level, but he learns it seven levels after Leaf Blade, so prepare to shell out 8K in funds if you want to set up with him.

Like all grass types, Leafeon only has three fights he is good against; the aforementioned Wake battle and the Bertha battle. He is disadvantaged against most of the other bosses by virtue of either type advantages (Candice, Cyrus, Aaron, Flint) or being incredibly special heavy (Fantina, Lucian). Byron is also an ass due to his steel types being resistant to grass.

Leafeon, overall, is quite a bit better than most grass types due to his passable offenses, but his typing leaves a lot to be desired, and not getting anything stronger than Razor Leaf in the maingame sucks.

5.5

[spoiler=Glaceon]

On the other end of the availability scale, we have Glaceon. Unlike the other Eeveelutions, who are generally available between the third and fourth gyms, Glaceon is only obtainable on the way to the seventh. This is due to the fact that the ice rock needed to trigger the evolution is located on the northern side of Route 217. As one can guess, this is unforgivably late, but let's see how he fares despite this.

As far as base stats go, Glaceon is basically Espeon, but with speed and defense swapped. This is good and bad in that while Glaceon can actually survive physical hits, it also means that he gets outsped by a lot of really dangerous Pokemon. Furthermore, ice is atrocious defensive typing, being resistant only to itself, and being weak to all of rock, fire, fighting, and steel. While the Oreburgh, Veilstone, and Canalave gyms are behind the player by the time Glaceon is available, Flint is still around to cause him problems. He does remarkably well against Bertha and Cynthia's Garchomp, though.

Like all Eeveelutions, his movepool is sparse, but workable. While he also arrives at too high a level to learn Icy Wind, with the alternative being Lv43 Ice Fang, by this point, the player should have enough heart scales to reteach him Icy Wind, which will tide him over until the Ice Beam TM is available. Other than this, he gets Shadow Ball like his brethren, and Water Pulse for chip damage against fires, I suppose.

In a nutshell, comes too late to be of much help to the player and has awful defensive typing.

3

Edited November 19, 2013 by General James

[Smiley Jim]

Chansey/Blissey

Type: Normal

Ability(s): Natural Cure/Serene Grace

Chansey is yet another Pokemon that does great in competitive matches, but does rather poorly ingame.

Where to begin? Chansey can be found on Route 209 at an average level of 18. The first problem I have with this thing is her rarity. Chansey is somewhat hard to find with an encounter rate of 5, and the catch rate of 30 at a point in the game where Ultra Balls are hard to come by does not help. To make things even more tedious, she will constantly heal herself with Softboiled and can remove paralysis with Refresh, making her a fucking pain in the ass to catch. Is the aggravation of catching this thing actually worth it ingame?

Absolutely not. As far as stats go, Chansey is a premier special wall with 250 HP and 105 special defense, allowing her to take special hits all day and basically never die to them, and natural Softboiled access helps. Unfortunately, I can't say the same for her physical bulk, which is 21 times lower than her special defenses. Not even evolution can fix this, as while Blissey's defense doubles upon evolving, 10 base is still beyond terrible. Not to mention that 255HP/135SpD is downright overkill as far as special bulk is concerned...

Chansey's offensive parameters are a joke; 5Atk/35SpA offenses are more disgusting to look at than the BME Pain Olympics video and there is no Seismic Toss tutor to lessen the pain before she reaches the 220 Happiness threshold required to evolve, at which point, her special attack raises to a much more usable 75. And even so, 75 is still rather weak for the standards of this gen. Thankfully, good quality special moves are easy to come by, seeing as Fire Blast and its clones can be bought in the Veilstone Shoppe and both Flamethrower and Thunderbolt can be acquired after getting Surf (Ice Beam isn't available for free until after the seventh gym.) However, she doesn't get any special STAB moves outside of Hyper Beam.

In a nutshell, Blissey might be one of THE best special walls in PvP, but ingame, it's completely overkill, and her lack of a good offensive game coupled with absolutely atrocious physical durability destroy any viability she has in the main story.

2.5

Edited November 19, 2013 by General James

[Smiley Jim]

Duskull/Dusclops/Dusknoir

Type: Ghost

Ability(s): Levitate(Duskull), Pressure(Dusclops/Dusknoir)

Back just in time for Halloween, and how convenient. A ghost type.

One of the other new finds that one can find on Route 207, caught at Lv17 if found on the route itself or at up to Lv21 at the summit of the Lost Tower, Duskull is a more defensive option to Gastly if you want to try 'something different' (and just to spoil you now, Gastly is better.) Lacking Gastly's good offensive stats and speed, as well as a relatively early evolution, Duskull boasts really good defenses for something that is unevolved (90 apiece), which improve to a meaty 130 base upon evolution at Lv37. This allows him to take on practically anything that isn't dark or ghost typed, and even then, he can take at least one hit from an unSTAB Crunch or Shadow Ball, despite the rather garbage HP stat.

However, as good a wall as he is, Duskull really sucks at attacking. 40/30 attacking stats are very painful to look at, and what makes this worse is that his level up movepool is positively fucking disgusting. He gets no good damaging moves through level up until Lv37, when he gets Shadow Punch upon evolving. Night Shade, learned from the relearner, can alleviate this lack of offensive prowess to an extent, but face it: it... hurts.

I already mentioned how late Duskull's first evo is, and how much of a commitment you have to make to get that far, but the evolution itself is pretty kind to Dusclops, granting him 30 points in both Atk and SpA, as well as a much broader physical movepool. For starters, the addition of arms to his physiology allows him to relearn the elemental punches (again, getting the punches by relearner means that shards can be spent on someone else.) He can also learn Earthquake and Rock Slide, if one is so inclined. He also gets Will-O-Wisp before evolution, bolstering his physical bulk even further, though it is somewhat unreliable due to having only 75% hit.

After you get your Glacier Badge (Icicle Badge in US), one can find a reaper cloth stationed at the top of the ledge leading up to Lake Acuity. Trading Dusclops with this equipped will trigger the evolution to Dusknoir. Assuming you're lucky enough to find another player who's willing to trade, whjat are the changes? Well, Dusknoir's durability doesn't really improve much, all three parameters going up by 5 each, but his speed nearly doubles (he's still not outspeeding anyone ever), and his attack finally becomes respectable at 100. Unfortunately, he doesn't get a physical ghost STAB stronger than Shadow Punch, but his good physical movepool makes up for it.

The elites are where Dusknoir truly shines, resisting Aaron's STAB and hitting 4/5 of Lucian's Pokemon super effectively. He can also avoid getting 2HKO'd by anyone on Bertha's team except Rhyperior (and WoW will ensure that it doesn't 2HKO), though he doesn't want to face Flint due to the enemies there spamming sun boosted Flamethrowers and Flare Drives, which 2HKO him. Against Cynthia, he can survive a shot from Garchomp, burn it so he's in 3HKO territory, and retaliate with an Ice Punch, which can actually 2HKO with Expert Belt backing. This is a very admirable feat, especially considering that most Pokemon have severe issues with this thing. Other than this, he can feasibly take on any of her Pokemon with the exception of Spiritomb and Lucario (Neither Milotic's Surf nor Roserade's Energy Ball can 2HKO him from full HP, assuming he's ~Lv52, unless they either crit or Roserade gets a SpD drop.)

Anyway, Dusknoir is a pretty potent tank that can also hit back hard, but evolves late and is a complete burden until that happens. He also happens to be reliant on a 75% accurate move in order to tank some of the later bosses, but that is the least of his worries.

4

[Smiley Jim]

Goldeen/Seaking

Type: Water

Ability(s): Swift Swim

FUCK YEAH SEAKING!

Goldeen is the first Pokemon that's available to be caught with your shiny new good rod that you can get from Route 209, and while he's still as bad as always, he has been given a few noticeable improvements over the generational shift.

Goldeen can be caught on this route at Lv18 on average, already knowing Water Pulse (unlike in previous generations, he actually gets STAB early on), though his special attack is far from adequate to use it except against Geodudes. His attack is significantly higher at 67, and he has Horn Attack right off the bat, so his offense early on is decent. Though that isn't saying much, as Gyarados has 125 attack Bites to work with and both Shellos and Buizel have better SpA to make use of their STABs. He also has decent speed and bulk for something that is unevolved, but that will not be the case when he evolves... at Lv33.

One thing that Seaking has in his favor now is that he now has access to physical STAB. Unfortunately, he learns Waterfall at Lv40, which is kind of a long wait for something that's admittedly crappy, but the player will most likely have it in time for Byron (while he does get it early, you still can't use Waterfall until after you defeat Volkner, which Seaking is not participating in.) Besides this, the only physical coverage he gets is Poison Jab and assorted normal typed moves. While he indeed does learn Megahorn, he learns this move at Lv63, which isn't happening until postgame. Still, it's better than nothing.

While Godeen is a noticeable improvement over previous generations, he is still horribly outclassed by water types that join earlier than he does, and still has the issue of bad speed+bad bulk.

4

[RJWalker]

If only Eviloite existed in this game. Correct me if I'm wrong but Duskull hasn't been available in early/mid game in a game where you can get Eviolite early on, right?

[MacLovin]

Gligar is definately not 1 point worse than gible.

Gible takes longer to get going, and gligar evolves after the 3rd-4th gym and gets swords dance on lvl.

Garchomp is good, but it'll arrive laaate and gabite is kind of just on par with the starters 2nd form for a long time.

if you're giving gible 8.5 because it'll end up great eventually, then Gligar should be closer due to reaching its full power sooner.

[Smiley Jim]

Barboach/Whiscash

Type: Water/Ground

Ability(s): Oblivious/Anticipation

Another Pokemon that you can catch with your newly acquired good rod, this time in the underground river in Oreburgh Gate. Coming at Lv18 on average, Barboach already comes with Mud Bomb and learns Water Pulse 4 levels later, giving him a solid offensive game... if it weren't for his unevolved stats. On offense, we have 48 attack and 46 special attack, which is pretty bad for this point in the game, and his durability isn't much better at 50/43/41. Evolution at Lv30 more than doubles his HP stat and gives him +30 to everything else, but even after evolution, his stats are simply... average.

One thing in his favor is his ground typing, discussed earlier with Gastrodon. The typing removes his weakness to electricity, turning it into an immunity, while leaving him with a solitary double weakness to grass. This is pretty good when you consider that grass type users are relatively rare after the Eterna Gym. It also makes him quite awesome against Byron and Volkner.

Whiscash's movepool is relatively unchanged from his Gen III incarnation, the only difference being that he gets his stronger moves a bit later than he did before. Remember how back in Emerald how he could get Earthquake as early as Lv31? Here, he now has to wait until Lv45. Definitely a letdown. It also doesn't help that the only free Ice Beam TM shows up after the seventh gym.

Whiscash has very good typing, but has rather mediocre stats that are made worse by the power creep. It takes a lot to make it in an economy, and Whiscash is one of the bronze medalists.

5.5

[Smiley Jim]

Finneon/Lumineon

Type: Water

Ability(s): Swift Swim/Storm Drain

Ok, last of the good rod Pokes, though in this case, you'll need to take a detour to the Valley Windworks area. Finneon's earlygame is mostly the same as Barboach's, coming at Lv18 on average and learning Water Pulse 4 levels after capture. One thing in his favor is that he gets Gust at base, allowing him to deliver super effective hits towards grass types and Maylene's party, though Gust isn't powerful enough nor is Finneon's SpA high enough to do significant harm to her team.

Speaking of stats, this is one of two areas where Lumineon fails. The good news is that his line is rather fast, with 91 speed evolved. The bad? Unevolved, he has 49 in both attacking stats, which upgrades to 69 in either attacking stat upon evolving at Lv31. So, we're dealing with soemthing that basically has Claydol level offense... but without Claydol's good movepool. His durability is nothing special either, with 69/76/86 in that area.

On the topic of movepool, Lumineon's coverage is rather... bland. Sure, he gets Surf and Ice Beam, but so does every single other water type. I suppose getting Bounce and U-turn is kind of cute, if you need alternate ways of killing grass types.

Another generic fish with crappy stats and a shallow offensive movepool. No wonder this Pokemon is often forgotten about.

3

[Smiley Jim]

Spiritomb

Type: Ghost/Dark

Ability(s): Pressure

Spiritomb is like Sableye if he had better stats, but the way to obtain him was over 9000 times more convoluted.

Spiritomb is only the second in a class of Pokemon that are in the category of 'Great if you can get it, but holy fuckballs is it hard to get', the first one being Munchlax. What I mean is that in order to even add a Spiritomb to your party, the player must first get an Odd Keystone from a karateka on Route 208, and place it in the Hallowed Tower on Route 209. Unfortunately, that's the only easy part, as what one must do next is far, FAR more time consuming. The player must then go into the fucking catacombs and chat with 32 different players. And note that the hikers that give you shit do NOT count towards the total. And good luck finding other players to talk to, seeing as the catacombs are not Wi-Fi compatible (yes, you actually need the other players next to you IRL in order to talk to them.) The good news is that you can simply leave the underground and re-enter and talk to the same guy over and over again (the game counts this as talking to a different person.) All that for a single fucking Pokemon?!

So you manage to find a friend, talk to him 32 times, then go back to the Hallowed Tower to catch your Spiritomb, now what? For starters, Spiritomb possesses ghost/dark typing. This typing is very interesting in that, prior to the introduction of fairies in gen VI, it possesses NO elemental weaknesses whatsoever. In fact, the typing makes him perfect for the Maylene and Lucian fights, seeing as he's immune to their STABs and their coverage won't do enough damage for him to care. What makes this even better is that Spiritomb has great mixed bulk to capitalize on the lack of weaknesses, with 108 in either defensive stat (50 HP kind of blows, though.)

So, with a great defensive game, how's Spiritomb doing on offense? Well, he has 92 in either offensive stat, so for something whose job is to tank, he's hitting quite hard. As far as offensive movepool is concerned, his is decent, but could be better. Coming in at Lv25, he already comes with Feint Attack and Ominous Wind, and can eventually upgrade to Dark Pulse at Lv49. As far as TMs and tutored moves go, he gets Psychic, Shock Wave, Water Pulse, and Icy Wind. While it would've been nice if he got BoltBeam itself instead of a poor man's version, this is still fairly impressive coverage. His only real gripe is that the Calm Mind TM is available postgame.

Overall, Spiritomb is above average as far as combat ability goes, but he is so fucking time consuming to obtain, I gotta dock points.

7.5 (3.5 if factoring in difficulty of acquisition)

[Smiley Jim]

Ok, going through some of my previous ratings, and I've decided to give out the rating of a Pokemon with a convoluted acquisition method before factoring in said difficulty. Me and Sharpy had a briefing about this on Skype and he said I shouldn't factor in rarity or difficulty of acquisition. Now, I obviously still think that Pokemon should be penalized for having a convoluted method of capture, so I came up with the compromise that I talked about earlier in the announcement.

Hopefully, this will show what a Pokemon is actually worth if one actually goes out of his way to get that Pokemon.

That is all.

[Smiley Jim]

Unown

Type: Psychic

Ability(s): Levitate

Funnily enough, I could simply skip this one and no one would shake two shits over it, but I promised to give my thoughts on every single Pokemon here and well... it can't be helped.

Anyway, Unown is a pretty shitty Pokemon. Coming in at Lv20 on average, Unown's base stats are complete fucking shit, with 48 in all of its HP, defense, special defense, and speed and 72 in both attacking stats, probably to ensure that Hidden Power won't completely suck regardless of what its type and base power are. Hidden Power is the only move it starts with and it's literally the only fucking move it ever fucking gets. And you cannot change its properties once it is caught, so it's stuck with whatever type and BP its IVs yield.

One problem with evaluating Unown is that you really cannot tell how strong or what type your Hidden Power is. Thankfully, there is a Hidden Power tester in Veilstone City that can check what your Hidden Power's type is, but that still doesn't help determine the base power. Determining that can only be done by checking your Unown's IVs on an IV calculator (and at only Lv20, you probably can't tell what your precise IVs are anyway, but if you know what type your Hidden Power is, the IVs can essentially be narrowed down.)

Due to how fucking unreliable this is, Unown could end up with something crappy like HP Poison with 30 BP or something respectable like HP Psychic with 70 BP. Even with the best case scenario (which have about the same odds as winning the jackpot prize on Lotto 649), Unown can 'kinda' function as a poor man's Kadabra. And let's be fucking honest here; that is being awfully generous.

The only thing remotely interesting about this piece of horse shit is that it comes in 28 different forms. And all of them happen to have the same shitty stats and lack of movepool. Case closed.

0

[Smiley Jim]

Scyther/Scizor

Type: Bug/Flying, Bug/Steel(Scizor)

Ability(s): Swarm/Technician

Wow, finally, a good Pokemon.

Scizor is known as being one of the most threatening Pokemon in competitive play, reaching #1 in usage in B2W2 and still being quite good in X and Y. But, how does he fare ingame?

Scyther can be found in the tall grass on Route 210 at Lv19, or on Route 215's grass at Lv20 (it is possible to get them 2 levels higher than this in the morning), being at worst 2 levels off learning Wing Attack, giving him a very potent STAB move that is also boosted by Technician. He also happens to join just before a fighting gym, so he has plenty of opportunity to gain some relatively cheap exp.

Scyther's stats are alarmingly high for something that is unevolved, packing 110 base attack coupled with 105 speed and natural Swords Dance access (though, as it's learned at Lv57, good luck getting it in time for the credits), giving him very solid offenses. He is also somewhat bulky for a sweeper, despite bug/flying being utterly dreadful defensively. Also helping are that he gets strong STABs early, with the aforementioned Wing Attack being learned at Lv21 and X-Scissor coming 20 levels later. This combined with the Brick Break TM gives him solid coverage.

While Scyther is a very solid Pokemon regardless, there is the option to trade evolve your Scyther using the Iron Island Metal Coat. As far as the changes go, Scizor gains steel typing in place of the flying type he once had, cutting his weaknesses down from 5 to just 1, but he loses STAB on Wing Attack in the process. He also trades 40 points of speed for 20 more points in attack and defense, which can be both good and bad; good in that he now hits harder and can tank physical hits better, and bad in that he's now getting outsped by most things, though the latter isn't insurmountable due to the relearner granting him Bullet Punch, a priority move that is especially powerful on him due to not only him getting STAB on it, but it getting the Technician boost as well.

The addition of the steel typing turns Candice into a complete joke due to having a resistance to ice instead of a weakness, as well as Bullet Punch manhandling her entire team due to all of them having shoddy durability. Scizor also does much better against Lucian due to steel resisting psychic and the fact that nothing in his party has super effective coverage against him (the same cannot be said for Scyther since both Mr. Mime and Gallade have SE coverage against him.) Do not use him against Flint. Just don't. Volkner is another poor matchup for him due to two of his dudes having fire moves.

Trade evolution or no, Scyther is still a very impressive Pokemon.

8.5 (8 without trade option)

[Smiley Jim]

Marill/Azumarill

Type: Water
Ability(s): Huge Power/Thick Fat

First showing up on Route 215 at Lv21 on average, Marill can be a promising Pokemon to train. Right off the bat, he's of high enough of a level to evolve almost immediately after capture, thus skipping the rather painful unevolved phase that is Marill, though unfortunately, Azumarill's stats are still fairly bad. On one had, we have 100 HP and 80/80 defenses combined with water typing, which gives him usable bulk for a sweeper. On the other, we have... 50/50 attacking stats, which basically equates to Pachirisu level offense. What sort of contribution can we get out of this?

Thankfully, Azumarill has one saving grace, that being the Huge Power ability. Like with Medicham's Pure Power, this ability doubles Azumarill's attack stat, giving him an attack stat comparable to monsters like Groudon and Rayquaza. Just like with what I said about this ability in the Emerald rating, Azumarill absolutely needs this ability to function, so it is best advised to get rid of any that have Thick Fat.

One massive problem that Azumarill has over the course of the game is that he hardly gets any physical STAB. For starters, the Waterfall HM isn't available until after you defeat Volkner, and Aqua Tail, which would otherwise solve the issue, isn't learned until... Lv47, just as late as the Waterfall HM. Thankfully, the Dive tutor is available once you reach Pastoria, which is basically Waterfall which takes two turns. If you are not willing to spend shards, Azu is SOL until endgame.

Beyond this, his physical movepool is pretty nice. Brick Break and Dig are two TMs that he can take early on for the sake of coverage, and once you reach Pastoria, he can pick up Ice Punch from the tutor there.

Overall, great sweeper, but lack of physical STAB until endgame (or if you use the Dive tutor) really hurts him.

6.5

Edited January 19, 2014 by General James

[Smiley Jim]

Lickitung/Lickilicky

Type: Normal

Ability(s): Oblivious/Own Tempo

Man, I slept on this thread for quite a while...

Another normal type that one can collect on his journey, Lickitung can be found in Route 215's grass at Lv20. And right off the bat, this thing has a shaky start. For starters, he shows up right before a fighting gym, of which he does poorly in due to being normal typed. And even if he didn't, he has poor offenses due to having 55Atk/60SpA, which is decidedly mediocre for this point in the game. Getting Stomp one level after capture helps, as does having 90/75/75 defenses, but let's get real here; Lickitung has some issues damaging things before evolution at Lv33 (when he gets Rollout), and 30 speed does not help in the slightest.

Once he does evolve, Lickilicky's future starts to look slightly brighter. For starters, his offense has upgraded to a more respectable 85/80, and he gains a little more bulk and speed to go along with the improved attack. As far as movepool goes, one interesting move that Licki gets is Wring Out, learned at Lv53. What this move does is that it works like Eruption or Water Spout, but the damage is based on how much HP the target has. Really, it's not worth the trouble to get, as it really only works if your target is at around full HP.

Outside of this, his coverage is standard normal type fare. He gets a few rare gems through level up, such as Power Whip (Lv49) and Gyro Ball (Lv57, good fucking luck getting this before the credits), and obviously, he has a wide TM and tutor movepool. While getting this TM is an absolute pain in the ass, an interesting option to teach him as Explosion. While this move could theoretically be taught to several other things, Licki is notable in that he is the ONLY Explosion user that gets STAB, which equates to him being able to kill practically any problematic Pokemon that doesn't resist normal (Cynthia's Garchomp, I'm looking at you.) However, getting this TM requires you to get 10 bonus rounds at the casino, which no one has any patience for (I certainly don't, as I suck at slot games and they are rigged anyway), so this is mostly irrelevant information, but it is worth mentioning.

I really don't have much more to say here.

4

[viyut]

Getting 10 bonus rounds is rather easy to do when you know the trick (i did it twice), but it's not worth the time.

[Smiley Jim]

Porygon/Porygon2/Porygon-Z

Type: Normal

Ability(s): Trace/Download (Porygon/Porygon2), Adaptability/Download (Porygon-Z)

Man... it's been... damn. Almost 3 months. I've been away for too long. Probably because I got caught up in Fairy Tail shipping antics on DeviantArt.

In previous generations, the only way to procure a Porygon was to buy one as a prize at your local casino. This is already bad enough, but to make things worse, Porygon came at the low, low price of... 9999 coins. This is already pretty ridiculous, considering that getting that amount is either time consuming or expensive. And would you waste time or money on a Pokemon that doesn't exactly have good endgame stats (only decent stat he has is 85 SpA. 40 speed combined with 65/70/75 bulk doesn't cut it lategame)? Due to these two things, Porygon was relegated to bottom tier trash.

How does he fare in this game? Well, for starters, he's not gotten in the casino, instead being given to you for free by an NPC in one of the houses east of the shopping mall. This is already a huge improvement, but the biggest buff he got this generation, as far as ingame goes, is that he can be evolved immediately after acquisition if traded while holding the upgrade obtained from the Eterna Galactic building. The benefits of the evolution are that Porygon2 gets a little more speed to work with (though he is still quite slow), his special attack goes up to a meaty 105 base, but most importantly, his bulk goes up from 65/70/75 to 85/90/95, which combined with Recover, keeps him durable.

So how does P2 fare against the various bosses in this game? Coming at Lv25 and knowing Psybeam at base, he can kind of do something against the trainers in Maylene's gym, but do take note that fighting moves are still super effective on him. Wake and Cyrus are also good matchups for him because of his access to powerful electric moves (P2 will have to make due with Shock Wave for Wake, as Discharge isn't learned until Lv40), but he isn't so hot against Byron.

The fourth generation games were also kind enough to bless P2 with yet another evolution. By trading P2 to another game cart while holding a dubious disc (this item cannot be obtained until the player infiltrates the Veilstone Galactic building. It's quite funny that both items needed to evolve Porygon are found in Galactic strongholds), one can acquire Porygon-Z. Compared to P2, PZ loses a considerable amount of bulk (his HP remains the same, but his defenses revert to 70/75), but in exchange, his special attack and speed are increased by 30 points each, giving him damage output on par with that of Alakazam, with some decent speed to go along with it. Another advantage of the evolution is that PZ can learn Nasty Plot from the move relearner, allowing him to play set up against the vast majority of lategame enemies (Aaron, Bertha, and Lucian each have one Pokemon that you can set up on with relative safety.)

One issue that the Porygon line has is the lack of good special STAB until lategame. For starters, Tri Attack isn't learned until Lv51, and while the Swift tutor could alleviate this a little, this option is unavailable until you reach Snowpoint, so you are still SOL most of the game. At the very least, P2 still has Return coming off a decent 80 base attack if you want to use that to fill the time. Other than this, he has a fairly expansive special movepool, getting moves like Discharge, Ice Beam, Psychic, Shadow Ball, and even Signal Beam.

If you can't trade, let's just say that Porygon's stats will cause him to fall very far behind by the time the player gets out of Canalave. Still, Porygon is a lot better here than he was in previous generations.

Untraded: 3

P2: 7

PZ: 7.5

Edited May 16, 2014 by James the Salamander