(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon

[R_N]

I guess part of that is because "LA" is an abbreviation that some people might do a double take at because it has a very common non-Pokemon usage that still could come up in a Pokemon context or at least the mindset of the very Euro-American-centric English-speaking Playerbase (on this forum or a lot of Internet circles)?

I see this reasoning and raise it: through context clues it becomes pretty obvious that i am not talking about something akin to Los Angeles when complaining about how Peat Blocks are pointless rare or commenting on its release date and sales vs "man the traffic in LA sucks"

Counterwise, it's for this exact reason that I write it as L:A not LA

that said, I respect this especially in a post Z-A world

 

[BIG ASHLEY]

"man the traffic in LA sucks"

yea, all those wyrdeer... i never get to work on time :/

 

[Axiemeister]

Wait, Scream Tail is inspired? It reads like every other bulky Fairy with the occasional sound move thrown in.

It does make some sense for Paradox mons to be pulled towards short-term value since the conditions that activate their Abilities are temporary (and Booster Energy is single-use). I feel Hands and Treads still manage to be reasonably focused on bulk and support respectively, Tusk probably could have made it as well if it was less loaded up with glass cannon moves like Headlong Rush and Head Smash.

mons focused on bulk AND speed with offense specifically being the weak spot are much less common than other kinds of spreads and scream tail commits to it with the possibility to increase one of its defenses or speed with protosynthesis. the usefulness of such a role hasn't been huge in a generation so tailored to offense, but it's still a very interesting approach

 

[Samtendo09]

I'm more accepting of the "evolution/slightly better version" Paradoxes in cases like Donphan, where the original Pokemon has a clear and obvious point to its build but was statted poorly or just too short on numbers to make it work. Working off R_N 's list for what is a "similar" vs different builds

• Great Tusk and Iron Treads work for me because Donphan has a clear point being a tanky Physical attacking mon, so Great Tusk gives bigger, more useable numbers to the same distribution, while Iron Treads tries to balance things a bit more with the speed increase while still fundamentally being a mon that can take a hit with the defensive typing. Pass x2
• Brute Bonnet I'm not a fan of. The increased Attack does give it some punching power, but the speed is too low to make use of it given the typing undercuts its admittedly impressive bulk increase (fear of Spore). It's the kind of "upgrade" that either didn't get what the original's shortcomings/strengths were or didn't want to commit enough to changing up its style. Lame
• Flutter Mane. This one's kind of funny to me.
  • Statwise it's obviously just a more min-maxed Misdreavus/Mismagius, and just done as such it'd probably be a decent if unremarkable mon.
  • Then they gave it Fairy typing to make possibly the best combination that statline could ask for on offense AND defense. We all know what this one does, but it's to the point I almost think in another world it would have been more busted if they diverged from Mismagius's "three-and-three" stat numbers and gave it more HP or Defense instead of SpA or SpD.
  • Flavorwise I'm always conflicted on Flutter Mane because everything they gave it feels like it'd make sense as an extension of the line (Mismagius and Misdreavus messing with people by screaming is very Fair-Folk), yet all of it together makes such an optimized mon that I think they happened by accident there as much as it did with the gameplay performance.
  • Pass?
• Roaring Moon: This one's also funny: Flutter Mane I thought of as a Mega Mismagius, and RM is clearly made to evoke Mega Salamence in the same manner. Because Pseudos have a bit more than Paradoxes for BST, it achieves this by essentially min-maxing regular Salamence's build to better perform its most popular role, compared to Mega Mence's 700 BST giving it free reign to do everything and then some as it felt like. This one gets a pass because it funnily feels like an evolution of Salamence despite resembling its Mega Evolution (the former probably needing more restraint/budgeted building than the latter) Pass
• Iron Bundle is ostensibly an upgrade of Delibird's sort-of Stat line in that it's mainly really fast and really SpA focused, the two highest stats even in imitation Santa's joke BST. I could see something like this being Delibird if it got a Dudunsparce "lethal joke" or Archaludon sort of "fix it up" evolution, and the former is clearly what it succeeded at given its performance in several competitive formats. Big Pass
• Iron Hands I also think is kind of interesting. Most of the stat gains over Hariyama go into slight increases on their shared specialties (HP/ATK/DEF), but their actual kits affect a lot about how (well) they can leverage those traits.
  • Hands has a second STAB via Electric but in exchange gains a Ground Weakness that significantly counterbalances his Physical Bulk increase over Hariyama
  • Hariyama's ability access gives it some traits Hands would kill for: Guts lets it sort of ignore status effects even if not running an Orb to inflict it on itself, while Thick Fat gives it two pseudo-resistances that are for often-Special types, the side their statline struggles with
  • In essence, while Iron Hands is a more optimized stat spread, Hariyama has some unique traits that theoretically allow it to fill roles on a team that Hands cannot, which leaves it more room for consideration than most "you but better" Paradoxes left their counterparts.
  • Really good Pass
• Iron Thorns I don't care for. It is the most blatant case of the above as 3 stats are literally identical to Tyranitar, and the ones they moved around matter very little since it lacks the Sand that made Ttar's SpD work for it in a notable capacity. This wouldn't bore me as much if it had moves to play with that Ttar didn't but lol Physical Electric options. This is a case where a full shift might have been neat since Special Rock has Power Gem and Tyranitar's Special movepool was always cool but not something it had the stats to use for more than a Lure. Mega Lame
• Iron Jugulis actually does rearrange all of Hydreigon's stats in pretty small but noteworthy ways. The most significant is it does away with Hydreigon's 105 ATK stat for 86 and 10 of those points are re-allocated to Speed for a more useable 108 Spe. Most of the other stat drops seem to be minor chip downs to fit within the 30-point drop while still letting them increase a stat useably. The thing that ultimately lets Jugulis down more than stat changes (or lack thereof) is its movepool. Dark/Flying is a really good typing for offense and defense vs Dark/Dragon (even with Levitate for Rock/Spikes stuff), but its a typing that has way better Physical move options than Special (even without comp stuff, Hurricane's inaccuracy is annoying vs Draco's 140 BP and 90 Accuracy, and they took its boosting options). This one I don't care for at the end of it because the stat tweaks did have some effort but they actively excluded things Hydreigon needed to work with that distribution. Lame
• Iron Moth. This one disappoints because it has both the creative duality GT/IT showed for a dual-Paradox approach, and its counterpart is the much more creatively designed (regardless of viability) Slither Wing. Statwise it's Volcarona (one of the smallest BST jumps so without rearranging there's not much variety), but given a slightly better STAB than Bug and very little Snowballing potential. This does result in Iron Moth seeing different playstyles than Volcarona with Booster Speed and Fiery Dance leans, but it feels telling that the type/stat lines still leave it ultimately outclassed in any meta where it and Volcarona are both options. Lame (Also no QD unless Slither Wing gets Victory Dance too).
• Iron Boulder (only one of the trio that's very similar). This one feels like a Letdown because on paper it fixes a lot about Terrakion but, again, other aspects fall short to kneecap its potential (albeit it's at least better than its counterpart compared to most of the above "Lame" judgements). The Signature move even addresses one of the issues its build would run into by giving it a good Physical STAB Rock move without Accuracy trouble (since less-than-tanky Sweepers suffer a lot more from an unlucky miss), but the STAB combo hurts it too much. Rock/Psychic don't compliment each other very well offensively or defensively compared to Rock/Fighting on Terrakion, which drags it down to the point of demanding Tera to hit hard with another option. This thing legitimately might have fared better as a Rock/Ground type for EdgeQuake and an immunity even with the infamous 4x weaknesses. Light Lame

Going over this list also made me realize the Futures leaned a bit more into the "original but SORT OF not" design for their paradoxes, and a lot more of them turned out less interesting whether for it or in spite of creative use of it, save for Iron Hands which I will still give a good defense of.

Considering that Iron Hands managed to be a truly viable powerhouse in VGC for at least a while despite effectively No Ability (until Miraidon arrives, that is), I feel like it’s for the best that Iron Hands is the Paradox Pokémon.

Because if the moment Hariyama got a standard Evolution arrive, then it will be the moment people have to deal with two bulky and powerful Sumo Pokémon instead of just Iron Hands, since Hariyama could now use Eviolite to make it just as bulky as Iron Hands holding Assault Vest on the special side (and perhaps physical) while the Hariyama evolution actually have an Ability at all time like it’s pre-evo, either Guts or Thick Fat depending on it’s secondary Ability, and having more natural bulk so it can run any other item.

It’s not like Duraludon + Archaludon since both shares weaknesses by virtue of same type, and Duraludon doesn’t offer any sort of support making Eviolite a noob trap at worst, though it can be a niche backup with Stalwart if used well.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

I was curious to see how fast someone could do the beginning slog of aLOLa, so I did a quick check...

It took the current world record speedrun 47 minutes to get out of Hau'oli City in USUM. And that's not counting the cutscenes before the player even gets to move.


As for another thing that makes me throw up... The Rock type's identity is that most of its moves range from imperfect to bad accuracy. Gee, thanks Game Freak.

 

[Axiemeister]

i agree and if i were in charge i would make a rock-type variation of aerial ace as a new TM just to disown that identity

anyway, little thing that annoys me: i miss the concept of the national pokédex in the sense that only a select amount mons are available in the main game but you can obtain more after the hall of fame.

however, the national mode moniker itself always felt kinda dumb because... you aren't leaving your region to catch them...? it's specially egregious in the original unova dex where they exist literally in the routes right next to cities you are visiting in the main game, but in sinnoh it's pretty silly too. i know it's just semantics, but surely there were better words available..

 

[Coronis]

i agree and if i were in charge i would make a rock-type variation of aerial ace as a new TM just to disown that identity

anyway, little thing that annoys me: i miss the concept of the national pokédex in the sense that only a select amount mons are available in the main game but you can obtain more after the hall of fame.

however, the national mode moniker itself always felt kinda dumb because... you aren't leaving your region to catch them...? it's specially egregious in the original unova dex where they exist literally in the routes right next to cities you are visiting in the main game, but in sinnoh it's pretty silly too. i know it's just semantics, but surely there were better words available..

I mean in Galar (iirc) and Paldea there aren’t postgame areas (due to DLC covering that and thus bringing its own dex) so it makes perfect sense to me. It’d feel forced and off to just have new Pokemon start appearing in old places after you complete the story, to me at least.

 

[Axiemeister]

I mean in Galar (iirc) and Paldea there aren’t postgame areas (due to DLC covering that and thus bringing its own dex) so it makes perfect sense to me. It’d feel forced and off to just have new Pokemon start appearing in old places after you complete the story, to me at least.

oh, i agree because that's exactly what happens in sinnoh and it feels silly to need a "national" pokedex mode to register mons that are very much living in sinnoh, but i do miss postgame areas not associated to a DLC. original BW has a great postgame, even if it becomes the biggest example of "national mode" being nonsense wording because of it

 

[LonelyGaruga]

Just learned the official pronunciation of Z-A is "Z to A" and not simply the two letters...just sounds really awkward compared to what I would have normally read it as.

 

[DrPumpkinz]

Just learned the official pronunciation of Z-A is "Z to A" and not simply the two letters...just sounds really awkward compared to what I would have normally read it as.

It's better than the "Z minus Upside-down V" that I originally read it as.

 

[ScraftyIsTheBest]

Just learned the official pronunciation of Z-A is "Z to A" and not simply the two letters...just sounds really awkward compared to what I would have normally read it as.

Out of curiosity, where is this stated?

The only thing close to implying an official pronunciation thus far is the Japanese website transliterating the text to "zetto-ei", but Z in Japan is pronounced "Zetto", seeing as how Z-Moves in Japan are called "Zetto-Waza". The "Zetto" is closer to the original greek letter Zeta that Z originates from, which is still evident in how non-US countries, especially Europe, pronounce Z, as they call it "Zed", not "Zee" like the US does.

 

[Coronis]

 

[LonelyGaruga]

Out of curiosity, where is this stated?

The only thing close to implying an official pronunciation thus far is the Japanese website transliterating the text to "zetto-ei", but Z in Japan is pronounced "Zetto", seeing as how Z-Moves in Japan are called "Zetto-za". The "Zetto" is closer to the original greek letter Zeta that Z originates from, which is still evident in how non-US countries, especially Europe, pronounce Z, as they call it "Zed", not "Zee" like the US does.

Wasn't aware of this and was initially thinking it was not always correct on the basis of Rockman ZX being pronounced "Zex" (as opposed to Zetto-Ex or Zee-Ex), but further looking into it indicates that's just the game title being "unique" and every instance of a standalone Z within the Rockman series is also pronounced as "Zetto". Really inelegant pronunciation (like, "Zetto Waza" instead of "Zee Waza", really?), but not as much as "zed". The fact that - can be read as "to" in the context of Z-A resulted in a really awkward misunderstanding on my part.

I still don't like the name, just for a different reason now.

 

[Genuine_Angus_B33F]

Wait, Scream Tail is inspired? It reads like every other bulky Fairy with the occasional sound move thrown in.

Late kind of but adding to this, Scream Tail's stat spread isn't just unique among Fairies, it's unique among everything.

There are some things that have comparable spreads such but it's significantly different from all of them.

• It's incredibly fast relative to the similarly bulky spreads. At 115 speed, it blazes past Umbreon, (60) Claydol, (70) Mandibuzz, (80) Cresselia and Suicune, (85) Deoxys-D and Orbeetle, (90) and Uxie (95)
• It's incredibly bulky relative to the similarly fast spreads. 115/99/115 bulk is far beyond Serperior, (75/95/95) Crobat/Noivern, (85/80/80) and even Latias's bulk (80/90/130)
• Unlike lots of super high BST pokemon that hit similar stat thresholds, neither of its attacking stats are high whatsoever, with both being even lower than Deoxys-D's 70/70 and Uxie's 75/75. (and unlike Deoxys-D, it can't supplement that low SpAtk with a 140 BP STAB move)

If it's at all stereotypical, it's of a bulky Psychic type.

 

[pika pal]

Late kind of but adding to this, Scream Tail's stat spread isn't just unique among Fairies, it's unique among everything.

There are some things that have comparable spreads such but it's significantly different from all of them.

• It's incredibly fast relative to the similarly bulky spreads. At 115 speed, it blazes past Umbreon, (60) Claydol, (70) Mandibuzz, (80) Cresselia and Suicune, (85) Deoxys-D and Orbeetle, (90) and Uxie (95)
• It's incredibly bulky relative to the similarly fast spreads. 115/99/115 bulk is far beyond Serperior, (75/95/95) Crobat/Noivern, (85/80/80) and even Latias's bulk (80/90/130)
• Unlike lots of super high BST pokemon that hit similar stat thresholds, neither of its attacking stats are high whatsoever, with both being even lower than Deoxys-D's 70/70 and Uxie's 75/75. (and unlike Deoxys-D, it can't supplement that low SpAtk with a 140 BP STAB move)

If it's at all stereotypical, it's of a bulky Psychic type.

The closest I can think of is Lugia, who has a similar "all high" bulk spread and a near identical speed stat. All its defensive stats are higher than Scream Tail's at a slightly lower HP, but proportionally there's a similar offense/defense gap, just bigger since Lugia has an Uber BST instead of a "minor Legendary" one.

 

[DrPumpkinz]

The closest I can think of is Lugia, who has a similar "all high" bulk spread and a near identical speed stat. All its defensive stats are higher than Scream Tail's at a slightly lower HP, but proportionally there's a similar offense/defense gap, just bigger since Lugia has an Uber BST instead of a "minor Legendary" one.

Also, due to their movepool differences, Lugia plays like a traditional wall (or maybe it's a CM sweeper nowadays I dunno) while Scream Tail is more of a disrupter with stuff like Encore and Disable.

 

[Sixfortyfive]

Ether is really badly designed where it's an item you don't really care about when you get it, and you don't want to use ever. In most Pokemon games (saying most in case I am wrong lol, big serious) they are a limited item that you can only find, and never buy. But they are also items that you would only really feasibly care to use in the story mode, because it's only really useful if you really need an item heal between Pokemon Center visits.

So why are Ethers so rare and yet also split up into tiers? I don't care when I get one because it's just a healing item that isn't even that useful most of the time, but it's an item I don't want to waste because I can't buy them. An identity crisis where I dislike getting them instead of a cooler item, and I still don't care to use or discard them because of their rarity.

Am I the only one who feels this way?

This stands out a ton especially in the older games where bag space is limited. Like I'm playing RSE right now and one thought that occasionally crops up is "why do any of the items in this class except Max Elixers even exist in the first place?" I try to make it a point to be more cavalier with the lower tier versions of these now since it just doesn't make sense to hoard them for multiple reasons.

The relationship between Revive and Max Revive sort of makes sense. Revives are easily available for purchase past a certain point but are a little on the pricey side, while Max Revives tend to be rare and not easily obtainable at all. This at least dilutes the tactic of using meat shields and HM mules to revive/heal the "real" party members a little bit; being stuck with only the lesser Revive means that you're going to have to use twice as many turns to bring another party member back up to 100%, and that can actually make a difference in important battles. So, conserving Max Revives for the bigger obstacles makes sense, and there tend to be just enough of those scattered throughout the game to make resource management for them mostly sensible.

Meanwhile, Ethers are in this weird place where a Max Ether is way more valuable to the player who needs to replenish his Squirtle's Water Gun in the early game where he's still over-reliant on his starter and would actually be in a position to want to replenish a whole 25PP, than it is for the one who would need to replenish his Blastoise's Hydro Pump in the late game where he's got a whole team to juggle and an Ether and Max Ether are functionally the same thing for a powerful 5PP move.

 

[Just A Shroom God]

The hidden ability system in general. A lot of pokemon have such cool hidden abilities that basically define them and I'd really love to use them in the main story of the games. For example, Swoobat would be so much more useful if it got Simple, which would encourage people to use this frail, weak psychic a bit more past like the first gym. It'd at least be a way to reward using setup moves instead of just clicking your strongest supereffective attacks over and over, which is a problem pokemon has always struggled with. But unfortunately these abilities are locked behind this random postgame barrier. Thanks GameFreak :(.

edit: especially when gamefreak decides to make EXCLUSIVE abiltiies hidden. What did grass pelt gogoat ever do to you?

 

[TerrickTerran]

It would be nice to simply move from HA to second or third option for ability.

 

[R_N]

I'm fine with HAs being this special "other" thing provided the option to obtain it is decent. Like being this extra thing you can grab, that's fine in concept to me.

Gen 5? Dream World was actually great for it, and it was easy for anyone to do during its hayday. The only issue was that until BW2 it was just for gen 1-4 and even after BW2 the options were pretty scattershot.
XY? Significantly less great. Hordes could sometimes have them but that's a pretty limited set of Pokemon. The only other option is the post-game Friend Safari which also needed a stable of Friends with the mons in question (and you two needed to be online at least once together to get the HA to show up)
ORAS? The Dex Nav was a good compromise. There were some hiccups but you could get quite a number of Pokemon's HAs without too much trouble throughout the story iirc.
Gen 7? SOS Battles were pretty much always available, the problem is it sure felt like more of a slog and unless you had stuff to check abilities mid-battle (or they had an ability that would go off on its own) you'd have to get the chain up, kill the other thing, catch and see. But! It is an option you can do at most any time, and Ultra's SOS changes do make it slightly more managable.
SWSH? Max Raid Battles were already not great, but iirc it also had to be specific kind of raid dens and I'm not sure the ones that spawn HA Pokemon were (1) common and (2) really available before post-game. Dynamax Adventures had some presets with HAs you could get which was nice, and you didnt HAVE to beat the game to get them, but also its a specific selection of Pokemon and they're very high level. Ability Patches are kinda expensive for the Ore cost, but also are there I guess.
BDSP? I had to look it up, it's PokeRadar only and it's a bout a 3% chance to spawn one. Rough stuff. Ability Patches are 200 BP and post-game too
SV? I actually thought for sure raids around mid-game could have Hidden Abilities but I guess it's just 6* (& 7* but those dont count)? Bummer. At least Titan Bombirdier has Rocky Payload? Ability patches are also effectively post game (though I suppose with DLC you stil lget access to the club room before beating the game, so you could go hard on the item printer...)

Really just feels like they can't make up their mind how accessible they want them to be.

 

[doipy hooves]

SV? I actually thought for sure raids around mid-game could have Hidden Abilities but I guess it's just 6* (& 7* but those dont count)? Bummer. At least Titan Bombirdier has Rocky Payload? Ability patches are also effectively post game (though I suppose with DLC you stil lget access to the club room before beating the game, so you could go hard on the item printer...)

Any raid above 3* can have hidden abilities with a random chance between all the options. When Serebii says "Hidden Possible" on the 6 stars, that actually means it's fixed to be the hidden ability, which data dumps show like https://gist.github.com/sora10pls/8ab6212b85ef1fec014cf0f77ca7fe9d for Indigo Disk or https://stevecooktu.github.io/sv_raid_lookup/ in general.

Before postgame playing Indigo Disk you get to unlock the BP missions, but not the clubroom itself since you don't get to meet Carmine and progress the story past that point.

 

[R_N]

Any raid above 3* can have hidden abilities with a random chance between all the options. When Serebii says "Hidden Possible" on the 6 stars, that actually means it's fixed to be the hidden ability, which data dumps show like https://gist.github.com/sora10pls/8ab6212b85ef1fec014cf0f77ca7fe9d for Indigo Disk or https://stevecooktu.github.io/sv_raid_lookup/ in general.

Serebii I'm glad you're around but sometimes you really have to format your data better.

Anyway that elevates SV for me, doing Tera Raids is a lot more fun/possible and they feel way easier to do a bunch of. Getting access to them around a quarter/mid into the game is fine

Before postgame playing Indigo Disk you get to unlock the BP missions, but not the clubroom itself since you don't get to meet Carmine and progress the story past that point.

Well at least you get to use the blueberry school store, but kind of a bummer anyway.

 

[Genuine_Angus_B33F]

Hidden Abilities are a bad feeling mechanic because what they actually do varies wildly but how they're accessed tends to be universal. This means that while they're often very fun in abstract, they have a tendency to create a lot of non-choices when actually applied to structured play while still being a pain to grind for in the RPGs themselves

 

[ianlazerbeem]

I get that a lot of early movepools are poorly optimized and not well thought out, but who signed off on Flareon getting Smog at level 57?

 

[R_N]

I get that a lot of early movepools are poorly optimized and not well thought out, but who signed off on Flareon getting Smog at level 57?

Smog Flareon is really something because
1. It wasn't even in its movepool originally, so you can't fully go "oh, well, you know how janky and long RB's development was!", it was added in Yellow! Specifically at level 42! To replace leer (which was now 47 so really it replaced Rage I guess)
2. This was kept through Gen 2 & 3 unchanged, as they largely just copy pasted movepools forward for a lot of Pokemon
3. Then gen 4 happened where all the eeveelution movepools got expanded but also all somehow terrible in different ways they decided to not touch Smog beyond bumping it up to level the previously mentioned 57 due to earlier additions. But it's not like they're opposed to tweaking becfause Leer became Scary Face
4. They FINALLY lowered the level in BW2, because they lowered the levels of everything, but only to level 33 which is better but still you know. bad. Because it's Smog, the move no one wants to use in gen 1 much less 5
5. Then this stayed through all of Gen 6 and 7 despite other tweaks to the moveset going on....onyl to finally change in Gen 8 where the way they restructed most movesets by power finally landed it where it is much more natural: level 20




Which is frankly still too far deep for Smog, a move learned by every other Pokemon at sub-20 levels (most of them level like 1....) aside from Gen 1 Magmar (Level 52 but that IS because of specific design jank) and the Tepig line (which get it at level 19/20) because it's bad.

And frankly the tepig line probably shouldn't learn it at level 20 either!