I'm surprised at how many mons got the dragon buff, but they were all balanced very well despite that imo. Honestly, some of the comments seem so oblivious to the fact that secondary typings also play an important role in balancing the trio. And there are many trios with unbalanced secondary typings that still work, as each member is still individually strong and has ways to deal with the starter they're strong against, either defensively or offensively. So as long as the trio is well balanced, it shouldn't matter if a starter has the Dragon typing. I do have fun alternative ideas for some of the starters, though. I'd love to know what you think about them. For Blastoise, I'd give it Shell Armor over Rain dish to nerf it in rain on top of the other buffs you mentioned, while making it a bit more reliable defensively. For Feraligatr, in addition to your buffs, I'd give it Fishious Rend. For Swampert, I'd buff it how you would, but I'd give it Regenerator/Mold Breaker/Water Veil (really can't decide which one's better) over Thick Fat and add Fake Out to it's movepool. But with freeze dry being a thing, it's still completely valid to give it Thick Fat imo. For Blaziken, on top of the buffs you mentioned, I'd personally change it to a Fire/Flying type with Brave Bird (if it doesn't already get that) or keep it's existing typing and give it Flying Press and Brave Bird (again if it already doesn't get that) for a better matchup into Sceptile. For Torterra, I'd buff it as you did, but instead of giving it Filter, I'd go with Multiscale. For both Samurotts, on top of the buffs you gave them, I'd give them Shell Smash. High risk, but very high reward on top of your buffs. For Emboar, I'd give it Rock Head over Reckless, on top of buffing it how you would, since Reckless kinda defeats the purpose of Emboar's bulk. For Greninja, it's ability should be pre nerf Battle Bond and it should be made accessible for VGC (Mostly for the Water Shuriken buff and the ability to keep buffs in between switches). I'd change it stats like you did, but carry those stat changes over to the Battle Bond form as well, so the Battle Bond form would now have 135 atk and 163 sp. atk. Now for the movepool, a funny move that can work with Greninja's frog inspiration while buffing protean is Boomburst. Especially with the stat changes that you made for regular Greninja, it sounds fun to spam boomburst while having the option to click dark pulse into ghost types. Greninja already gets Surf, which is slightly stronger and more accurate than Muddy Water, and more suited to procking Battle Bond if that's the intent. Yeah accuracy drops can be clutch, but it's not a consistent strat. So, Boomburst is the better buff imo, being marginally stronger than Surf with STAB, but honestly neither seem particularly essential. Mat Block, on the other hand, not only should come back, but also be buffed to have +4 priority like protect and wide guard. It's not like you can spam this anyway, so having normal priority just makes support greninja vulnerable to priority, something which is already an incredible weakness for offensive greninja and a weakness that most good support mons don't share. You can say Greninja can still be offensive while being supportive, but that puts it in direct competition with redirecting Ogerpon Wellspring, which is infinitely better than it. It doesn't feel like there's a good trade-off that makes mat block Greninja worth using without buffing mat block. For Chesnaught, an alternative ability buff would be Wind Rider, effectively removing it's major weakness to flying, but Unburden is a great choice as well. For Delphox, I'd change the stats like you mentioned, but I'd keep it's regular typing and instead of changing it's ability to Magic Guard, I'd change it to Adaptability/Sheer Force (I know Sheer Force is better, but I can't decide if it's overwhelming with the regular typing). For Primarina, I'd give it Boomburst instead. For Inteleon, in addition to giving it Water bubble, I'd take away 20 sp. atk and give it 10 more stat points in both defenses instead of any in atk, as that still keeps him pretty frail while offsetting the sheer power of Water Bubble. Or I'd simply use Drizzle instead, without nerfing it's sp. atk ofc. For Hisuian typhlosion, on top of your buffs, I'd also take away 5 stat points in sp. def in favor of 5 more in speed. Other than that, solid changes!
ok first, pinning this because someone finally got the point of adding dragon; it wasn't because of the trio balance it's because the other trio members for those respective trios all still pressure said dragon type starter well anyway (or if not both other starters, at minimum the starter that should have if they were purely FWG). as for your individual buffs: Blastoise im on board with Feraligatr another person pointed this out asw, I wish I remembered it with the vid but Fishious Rend would fix a lot of Gatrs issues, I do think fwiw it needs the other buffs in addition to that as even Dracovish got crept easily; this could be pretty powerful tho in addition to my other buffs and I'm glad people pointed it out as Gatr was definitely still bottom 5 Pert mostly got Thick Fat to help check ice types better since its neutral as its stats were decent anyway, but it kinda was a victim of me writing Hoenn-Kanto first then taking a couple days away, and having better ideas for gen 4 onward. Regen in hindsight was the right call, your other ideas are great asw Blaziken would be sick as a Fire/Flying type; I regretted not doing that when explaining my choice behind going Water/Flying for Quaquaval to another commenter, wish I went with that asw as the Brave Bird stab would be more needed on a mon like that to keep it unique competitively as a physical fire/flying but more of a wallbreaker than Talonflame. Torterra with Multiscale was considered, I think strictly this gen Multiscale is better but moving past tera I think it could genuinely go either way. Shell Smash Samurotts could be decent fwiw, I think both would still have to be very smart about the setup timing at least and neither become unkillable thanks to Rillabooms existence. Also even with their blistering speed and Shell Smash, both would still need to survive the setup turn, it'd be strong for sure but very risky! Emboar was another thing I read earlier asw completely agree, wish I caught that but it's strictly better! I'm super here for your Battle Bond route that'd be great, Boomburst is interesting. I like Muddy Water here more because it doesn't hit the partner which Boomburst and Surf do hence why that buff was imo necessary. Boomburst is still cool thought I think certain teams would use it fwiw. Mat Blocks buff would be great, I thought +4 would be too much but you're super right about the wellspring competition being high. Chesnaught with Wind Rider could be cool, if Chesnaught had more consistent priority I think it'd fit but maybe this is a better suited buff if anything for Decidueye in tandem with what I gave it ngl as Chesnaught needs the speed badly. Delphox could be cool with this, I purely just wanted the unique typing and we need more fairies anyway rn Primarina needed Boomburst you're right, I still stand by the Liquid Voice buff in tandem with that though but that'd be plenty Inteleon I considered Drizzle and the defense buffs, the issue being I didn't want to buff a stat I thought people would get tangible benefit from for Inteleon (as we've seen these extremely good glass cannons like Kartana, Flutter, Pheromosa, etc invest into defenses a bit due to their high damage and become bulky, and Inteleon already has decent bulk for a glass cannon); and being a fast rain option felt pretty bleh considering how mons such as Miraidon and Koko with terrain that's a pretty fatal flaw. A-Ninetales only really makes it work because of veil, but fwiw Inteleon as a glass cannon maybe could work fine. I think this is the only one so far I like strictly disagree with because I pondered this so heavily in my head for like a half hour and already wrestled these same thoughts actually. Hisui Typhlosion this could be cool for, I think I mentioned it here I mostly did the stats this way to mirror Johto Typhlosion but fwiw if we're talking about what's best for it this technically is better for it as a general buff Thanks for the well thought out comment and for the general understanding of what I was going for, as much as I love the interaction I have read too many comments especially related to Sceptile with this. I could probably make a drinking game out of it I s2g
@@oLivSama Yeah I figured that's why you pinned this (Thanks btw). It's always so jarring to hear people say Fairy type starters are OK, but dragon ruins everything. I was wondering why Quaquaval had it's type changed, but Blaziken didn't. A physical Fire/Flying wallbreaker seemed like an interesting idea, if nothing else. Thanks for clarifying. As for some clarifications regarding some of my choices in the balance changes: For Torterra, I was only considering past gen 9 since GF doesn't make balance changes to the game in the same generation. With Tera, Filter is far healthier for the metagame. I completely blanked and forgot about Boomburst and Surf hitting allies. So yeah, with that in mind, Muddy water is the best choice. And as for Mat Block, I'm glad you agree. An important thing to note with Mat Block is that +4 priority is kind of a nerf in the sense it's now susceptible to Feint. Yeah I agree, Chesnaught does need the speed very badly. I'm just concerned as to how it'll deal with Flying type special attacks without Tera and if it'll get to prock Unburden. Though I agree it's still amazing on Chesnaught, and so is Wind Rider for Decidueye. With the aforementioned con of Boomburst in mind, Liquid Voice getting buffed to boosting sound moves in addition to it's regular effect, while also giving Boomburst to Primarina seems like a great buff without it being too overwhelming. I always underestimate how much difference even a little bit of bulk can make on a frail Pokemon. And terrain boosted Koko and Miraidon invalidate a lot of water types. However, for Koko, a Scarf set with Snipe Shot/Weather Ball kind of works. It's just that the thought of Specs Water Bubble Snipe Shot terrifies me, let alone Hydro Pump. I guess an alternative is just Adaptability, which doesn't buff Inteleon to the moon, but I doubt it does enough to make Inteleon viable. That's why I considered Drizzle which opens up some potential team support and a 150BP STAB Rain boosted, potentially item boosted Weather Ball, which is still strong, but there's still an upper limit to it's strength. The thing with Water Bubble is that it can stack with rain, which makes it downright absurd in a rain team. But I can see where you're coming from. Araquanid still surprises me with how much it can do, so I guess it's more of my bias against Water Bubble than anything else. And don't stress about it! You did a great job and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
@@triggeredcheese5318 I never knew it got ally switch before. But tbf, on open team sheet, Ally switch is less useful. Unless you partner up with Mienshao, but even then it's more of a mind game than a consistent strat. Cool idea though, especially for closed team sheet.
@@samuelegaione3953 honestly it doesn't really matter lol, water bubble already makes araquanid reach some insanely high damage with its water stab, inteleon, even with the spa reduction, can straight up ohko kyogre with specs hydro pump, and the accuracy doesn't even matter that much because you could genuinely afford to run 3 different water moves + ice beam (at the very least on a specs set), because with water bubble coverage barely matters (and it's not like inteleon has all that many moves it would like to run). It might be too much but it does still die if you breathe a bit too close to it so it could be ok :3
@@oLivSama I think the following changes would make Sceptile able to compete with them as a physical attacker: - Make Razor Leaf score automatic critical-hits, like Frost Breath, Flower Trick, etc. - Make Rock Tomb a spread move. - Give Sceptile Technician, and the Dragon-typing you mentioned earlier. Auto-crit SPREAD Razor Leaf, SPREAD Rock Tomb, and Dual Chop, boosted by Technician is EASILY enough to compete w/ Meowscarada. It should also provide a meaningful, albeit specific niche (along w/ Shed Tail) over Rillaboom and Ogerpon.
Especially if you lowered the power to 70 to be more in line with flower trick that actually becomes very viable without being so absurdly busted that everyone hates it
The inherent problem with this video is that it only considers the current game and format(or previous format). Charizard, venosaur, swampert, blaziken, empoleon, infernape, surperior, greninja, primerina, skeledirge, and meowscarada all don’t need to be buffed in any way and would likely make lower power formats much worse in future
Fwiw I think even stuff like Serperior, Meowscarada, Primarina, and Venusaur in a format similar to regulation A would all have been fine. Meowscarada getting technician over Protean and fake out doesn't make it overbearing, and really the buff was more for Axel which during both gen 8 and 9 was locked to only the DLCs where we escaped this power level. Primarina doesn't really fundamentally break the game gaining the sylveon style boost and it's just dual type sylveon; venusaur gaining 10 base speed honestly also still makes it slower than most mons with tailwind which murkrow tailwind dominated this format, etc. I think genuinely the only mon overtuned for an early format is inteleon, the rest are more matchup fish options into meta staples so they have better speed tiers for current threats that won't exist in these formats anyway.
@@oLivSama i mean do u remember how much of a monster meow was in reg A? Fake out and tech would have given it 50% usage. I think the main thing about all these is that you know not every pokemon needs to be as strong as every other one, even starters. What we should aim for is to give each one a distinct niche, which is why I think stuff like giving blastoise follow me is a great idea.
@KanderUdon fwiw meow was by the end of A while still great falling a bit in favor of other wincons like sylveon, gholdengo, and baxcalibur. It was still #1 I honestly don't think tech fake out raises it's usage much though in a format like that where outside of bax and gholdengo nothing cared about good fake out. It's why despite the lack of good dark types besides meow in reg A we didn't see weavile pop off, granted Meow has a better movepool but technician only benefits fake out and trailblaze for it in exchange for the weaker flower trick, which for sash sets that low hp overgrow boost was massive for certain KOs. I think it gives meow a bit more of a niche as a viable fast fake out mon, but fwiw a lot of mons that would need to be fake outed have good responses to meow such as kilowattrel and garchomp, which could also just run Covert Cloak for the MU (which kilo already did)
One (kinda) tiny change I would make that would affect every starter pokemon is change the base ability (torrent, blaze, overgrow). It’s now: “When HP is at half or lower, attacks with the water/fire/grass type are critical hits” It’s still 50%, but with some spice for breaking down your debuffs and breaking enemy defense buffs. Abilities bouncing off of crits can be spicier too, and for younger casual players I can imagine just a big old smile from the comeback feel
Just spitballing but maybe it would also be interesting if there was some kind of defensive counterpart to the base starter abilities for less offensive focused ones, something like it takes half damage from its base type weaknesses when at 50% hp, but the weaknesses of its second type would remain the same (so for example venusaur would take less damage from fire moves but still take the same amount of damage from psychic moves). This not only helps more defensive starters, but also gives a reason to use monotype starters, as they'd essentially have no weaknesses at half health. If this is too strong, maybe just taking a quarter of the damage instead would be ok.
@@aquashuriken1634torrent type abilities is already very useful for defensive pokemon, they would need that tiny bit of bonus power since they cant put a lot of stat points into offense normally
A good Universal buff would be raising all fully evolved starters BST to 550. The moms who are already goated like Incineroar or Rillaboom can get a buff to a stat they don't use like special attack, while mons that could use the extra speed, bulk, or power could get 15-25 added to their Speed/HP/Attack/Special Attack to make them more viable, such as Venasaur, 80->105 Speed Charizard, 109->125 Sp.Attack Blastoise, 79->99 HP And so on
With all of these new Grass / Dragon types, were definitely going to see Iron Bundle Stocks rise (Also we all know Incineroar should get the niche Revival Blessing to buff it, because it 100% needs it)
Ngl I think giving Feraligator Fishious Rend and strong jaw would be such a dope idea. I doubt we’ll see Dracovish for a good while. I personally would give Primarina (the soloist Pokémon) Follow Me to fit the theme
The stat spread of swampert was already good, I don't think it had to change. For it to become viable it only needs one thing : trading Damp for Regenerator. Not only is it a wonderful ability, but swampert being an axolotl, it fits thematically too ! There is a tier in showdown where we can put any ability on any mon and swampert with regenerator is a beast there.
Fwiw I think the combo only helps it tbf, the only good regen mon in doubles isn't good solely because regen it's the combo of regen and Spore. For water types not named urshifu there's a high barrier for entry and the speed reduction for TR teams or slower flip turns out would be a huge deal in making it more used. With just regen it gets usage, in tandem with the spread it's arguably a strong but not op mon. I've seen a few say regen fwiw I like it more than thick fat idk why that didn't come to mind. Thick Fat still is decent but regen helps a lot more
yeah personally I don't think Swampert needs a stat change, he's already very good as is so just replacing Damp with Regenerator would be the only buff he need's and swampert would be perfect
I can here to say exactly this! I'd love for Swampert to get Regenerator. Swampert is already a really decent Pokemon. It just needs some reliable recovery to truly shine. Even giving it Recover or Shore Up would suffice.
Also for inteleon, I think to make it viable, you could actually take 10 away from its attack and move it to both Spa and Spe, and then buff snipe shot to a base 100 move that also does 1/4 of its damage through protect. I would also give it flip turn and grass knot as well as replacing sniper with super luck. All of this would make inteleon a dangerous specs sweeper who can ignore most forms of blocking it such as follow me, protect and defensive boosts like calm mind.
I think that could at least get it usage fwiw, it'd have viability in early formats at minimum with this. My concern with an ability like super luck tho would mostly be inteleon not generally having easy crit access for this; and in a format where the best grass has stab priority not being either incredible defensively or a huge wallbreaker is rough
True. The reason why I chose super luck is because snipe shot has a boosted crit rate, but I see your point. Maybe a defensive ability like multiscale could work instead?
@theaverian5513 multiscale could also be cool tbh protect 3atks sets with some snipe shot damage boost to like 90bp fully through protect to match mighty cleave could work ngl, at minimum it's worth exploring
oh you're actually right going with calcs against mons like flutter mane and rillaboom it seems that the more offensive sets generally have a couple percent better rolls going HP; but the defenses matter more when investing heavily into bulk the calcs before more even. generally you're probably right though the HP would probably have been smarter, the defensive investments are more situationally better choices
Easy buff to all starters Give them the new Battle Bond but make it that it's only a original starter hidden ability any starter can get mega op but It only the starter you get from the professor not any bred down Starters It also make the original starter more valuable though it'll be hard to track
Honestly regen helps a lot but I think it also needs at least a speed reduction to 50 if not more, it's still gonna get passed up for things like prim/azu/bears otherwise
Yes please buff Samurott Gamefreak. I love Samurott but not only do most people hate it's design but it sucks competitively too. Give it Shell Smash, a secondary typing, rearrange it's stats, Horn Leech, Bulk Up, ANYTHING.
I LOVE the meganium buff you came up with. Meganium would need something pretty revolutionary to be usable, and this would probably make it actually good
Sceptile needs a more diverse special attacking move pool. Currently its only options are grass stab, dragon pulse, and focus blast (and I guess tera blast). Giving it something like earth power or vacuum wave would help a lot.
I'd personally make Meganium a better support for doubles by raising its HP a bit, giving it friend guard as its ability, give it sleep powder and rage powder. With synthesis it can be a real nuisance to get through.
I would've swapped Reckless for Rock Head so that now Emboar isn't a kamikaze. Heck he could've even taken a reduction in his special attack since his bread and butter is his brute strength
i mean that is a fair change, but tbh with how much HP emboar has he can tank the recoil for a while, but i get what you mean since emboar has flare blitz, wild charge and head smash
I understand many of these buffs/reworks are for VGC. As a singles player myself, I can tell some these buffed guys would either get sent to #1 usage in OU instantly or just not be affected by much at all. You’d be surprised at how good Samurott-H specifically is at dealing damage and spreading hazards simultaneously (and yes, I absolutely agree normal Samu is basically unusable). That Intelleon change with Water Bubble might even get it banned for its terrifying offensive potential! Great video & ideas! 👍
honestly, inteleon could be a bit of a simpler fix. mainly, give snipe shot a higher crit rate, give it a few more high crit rate moves, and buff sniper to also boost crit rate. from there, reallocate some of it's hp, def, and spdef to it's speed, spatk and maybe atk. i think that might work?
I think Inteleon should double down on the Snipe ability. Being able to ignore defense buffs is its unique trait. Have Snipe Shot always crit like Meowscarada. Maybe buff Snipe to increase the crit rate too so with focus energy it'll always crit when using special attacks.
I'll say this, I've been playing various hacks for so long that I thought Emboar had Sheer Force as a Hidden Ability. And I was also surprised that he didn't get this ability here
Swampert is actually something i thought the other way around on, leaning in a similar direction to its mega and giving it swift swim, though i did have a bulkier idea. Giving it regenerator would not only fit its inspiration (axlotls), but it would also synergize SUPER well with flip turn. Though, tbf, that might be a bit too busted lol
I disagree with Swamperts buffs, he doesn't need 85 SpA it would better to invest +20 on hp and +30 on def, with filter as HA. With AV he would be a viable tank and giving it more of a tank role and shrugging off hits regenerator would also fit since the animal Pert got inspired by an axolotl have healing powers and make him a really good tank with AV flip turn
The spatk is nice for it's other moves, I think cutting the speed so it's a slow pivot is more valuable. Regen would be a better call tho for sure ability wise
@@oLivSama thought also maybe dd if we can go far with filter + recovery and giving it healing and setup Edit: while for VGC cutting the speed off is nice. My idea is more focused on Smogon singles play different meta's.
1) she* 2) didn't know your tolerance was that weak that you can't handle 4 shots 3) two of those 4 had megas with the type anyway I just reintroduced the buff...
@@oLivSama to clarify, top 50 on the Pokémon Showdown ladder, not on the in-game battle system. Slightly less impressive and time consuming, but still something I’m pretty proud of. Thank you though😂
Personally for me, I’d like to see Sceptile get a physical attack buff. Leaf Blade is his signature move, so let’s lean into that, also his Special attack is still nicely viable. I know this is for VGC, but as someone who prefers singles I did enjoy this
Glad you enjoyed it anyway! I think for smogon it'd be better physical but with vgc since it's competing with ogerpon rillaboom meowscarada it's a lot rougher to go physical!
new to the channel but i love the way you have layed out everything in the video with types, moves, stat changes, its visually appealing and really easy to watch!
Honestly I like the idea of giving Meganium Flower Veil in this Tera Grass heavy meta, making it and its allies immune to both status conditions and stat drops. Then take 10 from its Attack, put 10 in each defense, and give it moves like Floral Healing and Rage Powder, and it’d be a brutal support Pokémon that abuses the defensive advantages of Grass and its utility movepool to stay alive while superbuffing its friends. It’s a lover, not a fighter, so let it maximize its partner’s ability to fight for it.
Honestly with a more average ability like Flower Veil Spore would probably still be balanced on this with your other buffs, it'd be essentially amoonguss but no regen and instead a better typing. There'd be a huge but worth considering tradeoff with fastest spore and better type vs best defensive ability
@@oLivSama I personally don’t see it getting Spore since that’s a mushroom based move, but maybe it could get something like Lovely Kiss to be able to sleep Grass types like Rillaboom and Ogerpon.
In singles yea but the goals doubles where this would be decently better, fwiw it's triple Axel would still basically feel like STAB and it wouldn't need to swap to keep it's dual type so maybe it wouldn't be? It'd be a lateral move for singles tbh
Charzard not being a dragon type but instead a flying type has always been odd to me, the mega evolution doesn't count since I'm talking in general available to everyone, and not everyone has a megastone
Inteleon buff: make it a mixed attacker with no stat reductions. And give it more tail moves! Seriously it can't even learn aqua tail by level up or egg move!
as someone who's tried to make swamp work with sceptile, i think the best option is giving it 140 speed so it doesn't get speedcreped by the 135's because that is infuriating.
140 could also be good ngl I think the spatk buff should help Unburden sets enough asw but you could definitely just give the buff to speed and specs sceptile
Bro likes dragons is what I’ve taken from this so far. There are a lot of things that would be cool to do to the starters but I’m not a fan of changing types unless they are new forms.
One nice move that Meowscarada could learn that could tip the edge ever so slightly into broken territory would be parting shot. There's not too many Parting shot users, let alone fast ones. Meowscarada from a thematic standpoint, and kit standpoint, would be the perfect wielder of such a devastating pivot move. This could make Meowscarada a devastating scarf lead as it could possibly chip an opposing paradox mon, or cripple it to help soften up a safe switch in. You could even abuse contrary shenanigans.
For me I think if they just left Chestnaught the same stats and movepool and just switched it to grass/steel typing it would shoot up in viability . It fits flavor wise since it's whole design revolves around being a heavily armored knight and it gets a bunch of steel moves anyway I also think even without Liquid Voice being buffed, if they just made it so Sparkling Aria works like Pollen Puff and heals in addition to curing burn if it targets an ally that would give it just the bit of tech it needs to move up from the better side of mediocre to actually decent
Totally here for the sparkling aria buff tbh that'd be huge, chesnaught grass steel could be cool asw but the typing rn gives it a big niche as a check to both urshifus fwiw so I didn't wanna ruin that niche for it
My honest opinion on starters, they all need to be the same BST (base stat total) when fully evolved. The highest is swampert with 535, the lowest is 525 (majority are grass starters) and some slight stat tweaks.
I feel like changing Feraligatr's ability hurts it more than it helps. Currently, it wants to use Life Orb and attacks like Liquidation, Crunch, Ice Punch, etc. Life Orb. Tough Claws has the same boost as Sheer Force, but it makes Life Orb impossible to use which makes the item slot less open. I guess Tough Claws has its benefits like harder hitting Aqua Jets with no recoil (and if you run Life Orb, you will hit harder than with Sheer Force), but Sheer Force is way more versatile with the same damage with any item Fun video otherwise even if I disagree with some changes
It somehow has been the most controversial buff i gave a mon I genuinely thought inteleon would be but sceptile has been by a mile, glad someone sees the vision!
I honestly felt like they missed an opportunity to make it the first Fire/Electric type ((outside of Heat form Rotom)) give it Wild Charge, Thunder Punch, Spark ((for Scorbunny)), Super Cell Slam, etc
I honestly think it would be kinda cool to see how these guys would perform in singles with their new buffs even if they’re VGC orientated, cause I imagine lead Hamurott becoming better in OU with the speed and attack buff.
great work! i love how much thought you put into all of these! my one nitpick is that unovian samurott shouldve kept its special lean, and had the +13 go into spa instead, and then since sharpness wouldnt work maybe maga launcher? solid rock could also work to keep samurott's original defense oriented ability.
I agree with earth power and sleep powder on scept I think with the rest of the buffs anything more would be overtuned fwiw. Infernape if it kept it's old ability could maybe get the not flip turn and Axel options, as much as I'd love to make my fav starter op it'd be like incin good with this
What about nerfing every pokemon with 5% usage or higher. In order to make them still usable but not overwhelming. My ideas: Taking Fake out from Incineroar and Rillaboom or changing Flutter mane stats completely
@@oLivSama That doesn't relate to my comment in any way but some starters might have success if given enough tools and trust from players. And yes starters are made to have balanced stats in order to have different roles in a playthrouh. But that didn't stop some of them to have success.
It kinda does relate tbf but I'll elaborate if you insist it wasn't enough: Even if we nerf other pokemon, others will rise at the top. For example, let's start small with just the top 10 of Reg F in usage because it's easier to do the theoretical in a non restricted format. This list includes: Raging Bolt - absurd from thunderclap matching up well into most teams asw as it's benefit from sun and ability to 1v1 itself with well timed Tera. To make this not still obscenely relevant you'd probably need to delete thunderclap and give it a pretty big spatk rework or it could just adjust to CM sets or av Snarl sets with volt switch over Thunderclap. This mon alone with its typing invalidates most starters Urshifu-Rapid would honestly need to disappear entirely or remove both its ability and surging strikes for any offensive water starter not named primarina to even exist Flutter Mane shockingly doesn't really affect any starter usage it just is really good Rillaboom even without fake out would just stop choosing between u-turn or high Horsepower, it'd need to lose terrain or its still usurping most if not all grass starter usage Incineroar needs parting shot and u-turn gone far more than anything else, fake out doesn't solve much honestly as with these alone we'd see a rise in ting-lu or lando-t as it's replacement Pao would need its ability gone or a speed tier below like 90, even still pao existing benefits most starters as niche picks Torn needs pre gen 8 speed mechanics back or Prankster tailwind still rules the format, Prankster tailwind existing only helps starters anyway a lot of them have awful speed and decent offenses Amoonguss needs spore gone or any defensive grass can't really exist without also being a powerful offensive piece like rillaboom and ogerpon Lando is inconsequential to starters Gholdengo is inconsequential to starters Even with these 10 alone, the replacements aren't other starters it'd be other lower-ish mons that enable most starters like ogerpons or ting-lu. At best skimming the >5% pool if everything faster loses speed maybe meowscarada pops up, which fears below 5% iron jugulis and Roaring Moon stealing the spotlight, skeledirge which maybe gets above 1% finally, or primarina which probably could maybe get there if most of those TR threats just were outright deleted. There's so many mons between .5 and 5% usage tho that would rise before most starters, for some examples: Lando-t Archaludon Ursaluna Entei Torkoal Bloodmoon Kingambit Regidrago Roaring Moon Iron Hands Volcarona Tsareena Ogerpon-corner And that's before below .5% mons like: Baxcalibur Brute bonnet Salamence Iron Bundle Kommo-o Dragapult Gyarados Iron Moth And arguably I'd say the starters should be more afraid of this pool as a lot directly steal usage from starters.
@@oLivSama Oh so you thought it's about how starters can rise when we nerf good pokemon. I just wrote is as a general concept with nothing about specifically starters in mind. But that was a long explanation. Good you wanted to write that much as a comment explanation.
@olafmikoaj3121 yea we must have been just thinking different points, apples to oranges sorta thing. Idt most nerfs influence the starters since we are like 5 tiers worth of power creep too low even for reg f standards, they need to catchup
I think a better fix for Sceptile would be to give it dragon type like you did, but instead switch it’s special attack and physical attack stat, buff the attack up to 115, and then give it sharpness. Sceptile already learns a lot of moves that benefit from it and having a 135 base power leaf blade with stab would very good. Sceptile also just has an incredible physical move pool that it would use better than any special move buffs
My only criticism here is changing the typing of any Pokemon. I don’t think any Pokémon’s type will change any time soon. The only exception to that rule so far has been Normal Fairy types and regional variants. I feel like everything else is fair game. I do have criticisms about other stuff in the vid but I’m not too pressed about it. I do think Pokemon/Gamefreak SHOULD make their starters more competitively viable in either singles, doubles format, or both. I’d say if I could identify or fix one problem about the starter Pokemon, it would be their lacking move pool. Like a lot of these Pokemon don’t have enough to work with.
Disliking type changes as a whole is fair, the changes were more whats necessary with the fewest tweaks (without just giving every grass starter spore + follow me)
@@oLivSama Thank you for the comment! I think there’s so many ways to fix Pokemon like grass types without giving it spore follow me etc. For Grass types, moves like Snarl, Baby Doll Eyes, Spikes, Pollen Puff (this is a really good idea for a move), Flamethrower and Draco Meteor (for the reptiles), and all accessibility to Solar Blade/Beam (a lot don’t get both). Fire Types, give it rock, fighting, ground moves, maybe like Brutal Swing or Breaking Swipes (good for proccing Weakness Policy or similar abilities). Water types, Baby Doll Eyes, Ice Fang/Punch, Play Rough, Iron Head, etc. Giving the move Beat Up to some mons would be cool too. Kinda like how you want to avoid giving Spore and Follow Me to many Pokemon, I’m the same way with Rock Slide, they thing is obnoxious and too many already have it. I think to give to generally all Pokemon starters: Baby Doll Eyes, Snarl, Brutal Swing, Pollen Puff, bring back Scald. Give Helping Hand or something to squishier Pokemon, doesn’t have to be beefy Pokemon like Torkoal or Toreterra. It really does depend on what the Pokemon is missing. I’d need to take a more thorough look at the list of moves available but these are some suggestions.
@@stealthgamer4620 fwiw the spore + follow me was more hyperbole, there are a lot of moveset specific things that could be tailored asw, typing was a lot simpler of a buff to visualize impact for since at minimum it gives more distinction between the starters, and those typings being vital to a format would usually give these pokemon a new automatic niche. If they were mostly move related while there could be usability, at a certain point they would probably to a degree still be creeping each other rather than non starters. there's certainly ways to just buff these with moves/stats/abilities only though, it just gets a lot more complicated since sometimes buffs that seem massive on paper do nothing (Shell Smash Torterra, and Competitive Empoleon with Roost are the big two, though Empoleon keeping Scald would at least have made its specific issues less glaring. These were both HUGE buffs though and neither get even .1% usage right now, I think Empoleon was .08% and Torterra .02% if I remember correctly, which is insane because these are huge buffs, especially to Empoleon)
@@oLivSama Also, a rule I stayed away from was making up my own moves, or changing existing ones; Pokemon in general are missing consistent attack moves for their types like Physical Water has a lot of good moves, but not Special Water. Grass has bad physical and special moves, I seriously don’t know when anyone would use a grass attack besides Energy Ball back then-nobody runs that now. Fire types are pretty okay so far, maybe abilities with more chance to burn maybe. There are types like fighting, rock, and electric-non starter types-that have very inconsistent moves and those are their best moves; like for water you’re banking on Hydro Pump to land. My main thing is that I want more to work with in terms of attacks, and it doesn’t help that a lot has been nerfed in move pool in Gen 8 and 9.
Fwiw with like Tera flying the STABs and flying combo pressures a ton in the format, after gen 9 maybe steel would be better but didn't wanna make an empoleon clone with shell smash
I was thinking for Meowscarada Since it has nasty plot,I say give it swords dance (even tho it doesn’t use setup moves) And add Leaf blade,gunk shot and pollen puff to its moves so it can be a support even with its frailty
The only issue with changing types is the symmetrical interactions with subtypes like how quequeval losing fighting means he can’t hit meowscarada - I personally would rather have a good pokemon than a symmetrical one (if that makes sense idk what other word to use)
I'd like to see regional forms/alternate evolutions for the kanto starters with their mega form designs as inspiration. A bulkier venasaur with thick fat abd maybe higher attack stat, a slower blastoise with mega launchers and the 2 zards. An X variant with the 109 sp attack moved to its physical attack, with dragon typing, tough claws and a stat redistribution to make it its defenses higher but a few point slower in speed than base zard, and a Y zard with maybe a lower defence stat but a bit faster than base zard and maybe lower special attack to balance drought a bit. (Swap the speed and sp attack maybe?) Basically the main problem with early starters is they aren't as specialized as the newer mons. 84 points on charaizard's attack is wasted, same with venasaur and blastoise. They needed to be balanced i nthe first gen for the playthrough but these days they should be switched up to shine. Also, maybe a custom move for all the starters that dont have one yet.
that'd be a pretty cool approach tbh, a lot of starters I agree just lack identities of their own which was the goal of this! custom moves would also be helpful for them ngl!
I think you should buff Incineroar by giving it the grass type. Don’t replace a type, just make it Fire/Dark/Grass, so now it’s immune to being burned, moves affected by prankster, AND powder moves. My reasoning is cuz tigers live in the forest. And to really show off its new grass typing, let’s give it Spore and Pollen Puff (I know it’s not a grass type move but pollen is in the name). Let’s give it Follow Me as well cuz it looks like the type to learn it. And let’s remove 80 from its Special Attack and give 40 to each of its Defense and Special Defense. And let’s give it Wide Guard and Quick Guard cuz why not, it looks like the type to learn it. I think this is balanced because
I think that incineraor should also get water bubbles but it now its fire bubbles which 2x fire moves and water moves and half The dmg of water and fire moves but 4x weak to electric type
@@oLivSama sure thing brotha we can also give it a item specially made for incineraor that boosts all it stats by 1.5x and a built in prankster so incineraor have fire bubble
Also change sceptile from unburden to something useful like sharpness or grassy surge. Plus give it nasty plot Didn't mean to critic your video but I just love sceptile so much it needs to be way better than how garbage it is rn Good video 😊
I honestly think the best buff possible for Scep is a wider special movepool since right now it is really shallow and offers no diversity, I think unburden is pretty neat if you can use it properly so for me personaly I dont se much need to change it, that said, I would give Sceptile access to moves like Earth Power, Vaccum Wave, Discharge, Incinerate, Dark Pulse and Tail Glow. Vaccum Wave is a nice priority option and doesn't lock Scep with focus miss as its only viable special fighting move, Earth Power ir a good fit por him to help with steel and fire mons, and Incinerate more of a gimmick and would be cool to have a grass type with a fire type move without being too op, Discharge is a nice call back to his mega form and coverage for flying threats and Dark Pulse for some good neutral damage. Tail Glow is the one move that coul potentialy become stupid with sets using Weakness Policy and Unburden but come on, it fits sceptile so much better than nasty plot and he really needs a special set up move
In my heart dragon type is still this rare near-legendary typing so I want to be against giving it to starters. But since the typing has been getting more common recently that argument will not hold up for long :(
We've gotten a lot of dragons since gen 7 and two of these 4 starters had dragon typing on their megas, I'd have maybe ignored it if not for the megas gaining it
I'm cool with the Dragon typing on Gatr, Sceptile, and Serperior because you're just adding onto a monotype. However, I would've kept Zard Fire/Flying and buffed it differently. I also would've buffed Gatr's physical atk. by 10 BST.
@oLivSama I understand. I just personally would rather see Zard gain the Fire/Dragon typing through a new regional variant. That way, u could build Zard's new BST distribution from the ground up, thus making its stats more optimized. I just wanted to keep it's flying typing so it could get dual wing beat, defog, roost, and tailwind. I would probably also give it nasty plot, raging fury, aura sphere, and grass knot and give it a different hidden ability.
What if we gut meganiums speed by 60 and give the 20's to its defenses and health and give 20 to its special attack and give it strength sap and moon blast The bst now is Hp 100 Atk 82 (still the same ) Def 120 SpA 103 SpD 120 Speed 20 The total is 545
I think Sceptile needs to benefit more from its physical attacking movepool and speed which GF has been neglecting since they doubled down on making Sceptile a frail special attacker. Keep the Dragon typing, reduce its Sp Atk and Def by 10 increase Attk by 20 and change its hidden ability to Technician making it an effective mixed attacker with use of both its STAB’s. It has access to Bullet Seed, Grassy Glide, Trailblazer, Scale Shot, Breaking Swipe and non-Stab alternatives like Rock Tomb, and Aerial Ace.
My one thought was Sceptile needed a new ability. Sceptile’s speed is already ridiculous, so doubling it is unnecessary. Idk what you would give it though, maybe Adaptability, Tinted Lens, or No Guard?
Ok I can't lie despite liking the Unburden route for outpacing weather or tailwind teams on your own volition, you're the first to suggest other abilities I'd say I vibe with. I could get behind tinted lens sceptile for sure asw as no guard, adapt would be fine asw but I like the other two a lot more
Zard: dragon/fire Maganium: fairy/grass *also staples dragon to starters because lol reptile Incredible video to go to sleep to, these changes had me yawning all the way through
Honestly I would give hisui Decidueye fake out and cut the sp atk for bulk It would have solid niche as a scrappy fake out user that can fake out ghost types
I think it would've been really cool to lean into sniper more on inteleon, maybe increase its speed and buff Snipe Shot itself to have an even higher crit ratio and/or bp
Ok here’s my opinion for them, first despite the 4x ice weakness, I think that censure should be ground instead of poison, blastoise literally walls venasaur due to grass being neutral and poison being immune, also give the ground type to johtonian typhlosion the ground type since he’s a bit mor like a volcano with him getting eruption, then give blaziken the flying type over fighting, then for the galar starters I think they would be like cinderace being fighting, inteleon being dark and maybe rillaboom be psychic idk
Earth power is stronger and on an ability like solar power that amplifies your damage in sun it'll go a lot further using a base 90 move vs a base 75 move
Scorching Sands should be buffed to receive the same damage boost in Harsh Sunlight that Fire type moves do. Walking Wake's move Hydro Steam already does that, so why not Scorching Sands?
@@solitare4602 Because Scorchin sands is a move that many pokemon can learn, hydro steam is exclusive to walking wake, look at volcanion, steam eruption doesn't get booster either
Primarina stats can be revamped to make it work like a bulky water type 80 60 80 130 120 60 And its ability : Pure liquid voice All sound based moves become water type and Body of this pokemon is so pure like pure water such that it doesnt conduct electricity ( electric immune) New moves : Followme trickroom Boomburst
This could honestly be like a top tier mon ngl, tried to dial back on prim a lot because it's like the 3rd best starter and still has some niche in vgc but a new immunity, better stats, and follow me + tr would be game changing.
You know, I'd just love for all the starters to get an extra 10 to 20 points to work with when it comes to their base stat totals. See what they can do with a lil extra oomph
Giving serperior more speed on top of stab Draco meteor was baffling to watch. Even with the ice type buff this gen, contrary stab Draco meteor possibly with dragon terra and choice specs is crazy to think about. Ice, fairy and trick room would be decent counters (especially trick room) but outside of that I doubt even steel types would be able to stop that.
Maybe quaquavels typing can stay the same, since legendaries won't always be in the format, especially in the current one. The changes to its stats can stay though, as it makes aqua step even better.
For Sceptile, I would have gone the opposite way and leaned in heavily to it being a physical attacker. Leaf blade used to be its signature move after all. It should really be a physical glass canon.
I would also change A-Decidueye's hidden Ability. Super luck instead of Long Reach. Not much but still fits the "archer" vibe and giving a better ability that can work in tandem with Leaf Blade and Shadow Claw (altough I think Spirit Shackle should have high crit ratio too but that's just me lol).
Super luck could be cool but as you said kinda defeats spirit shackle existing if it'd aim for crit sets. Giving spirit shackle like 1 stage increased crit tho would solve that issue
@@oLivSama That's what I was thinking. I know it's not exactly the purpose of the video (changing only the mons not the moves), but I couldn't help it. Owl boi is my fav starter and it needs all the help it can get in competitive lol
I'm surprised at how many mons got the dragon buff, but they were all balanced very well despite that imo. Honestly, some of the comments seem so oblivious to the fact that secondary typings also play an important role in balancing the trio. And there are many trios with unbalanced secondary typings that still work, as each member is still individually strong and has ways to deal with the starter they're strong against, either defensively or offensively. So as long as the trio is well balanced, it shouldn't matter if a starter has the Dragon typing. I do have fun alternative ideas for some of the starters, though. I'd love to know what you think about them.
For Blastoise, I'd give it Shell Armor over Rain dish to nerf it in rain on top of the other buffs you mentioned, while making it a bit more reliable defensively.
For Feraligatr, in addition to your buffs, I'd give it Fishious Rend.
For Swampert, I'd buff it how you would, but I'd give it Regenerator/Mold Breaker/Water Veil (really can't decide which one's better) over Thick Fat and add Fake Out to it's movepool. But with freeze dry being a thing, it's still completely valid to give it Thick Fat imo.
For Blaziken, on top of the buffs you mentioned, I'd personally change it to a Fire/Flying type with Brave Bird (if it doesn't already get that) or keep it's existing typing and give it Flying Press and Brave Bird (again if it already doesn't get that) for a better matchup into Sceptile.
For Torterra, I'd buff it as you did, but instead of giving it Filter, I'd go with Multiscale.
For both Samurotts, on top of the buffs you gave them, I'd give them Shell Smash. High risk, but very high reward on top of your buffs.
For Emboar, I'd give it Rock Head over Reckless, on top of buffing it how you would, since Reckless kinda defeats the purpose of Emboar's bulk.
For Greninja, it's ability should be pre nerf Battle Bond and it should be made accessible for VGC (Mostly for the Water Shuriken buff and the ability to keep buffs in between switches). I'd change it stats like you did, but carry those stat changes over to the Battle Bond form as well, so the Battle Bond form would now have 135 atk and 163 sp. atk.
Now for the movepool, a funny move that can work with Greninja's frog inspiration while buffing protean is Boomburst. Especially with the stat changes that you made for regular Greninja, it sounds fun to spam boomburst while having the option to click dark pulse into ghost types. Greninja already gets Surf, which is slightly stronger and more accurate than Muddy Water, and more suited to procking Battle Bond if that's the intent. Yeah accuracy drops can be clutch, but it's not a consistent strat. So, Boomburst is the better buff imo, being marginally stronger than Surf with STAB, but honestly neither seem particularly essential.
Mat Block, on the other hand, not only should come back, but also be buffed to have +4 priority like protect and wide guard. It's not like you can spam this anyway, so having normal priority just makes support greninja vulnerable to priority, something which is already an incredible weakness for offensive greninja and a weakness that most good support mons don't share. You can say Greninja can still be offensive while being supportive, but that puts it in direct competition with redirecting Ogerpon Wellspring, which is infinitely better than it. It doesn't feel like there's a good trade-off that makes mat block Greninja worth using without buffing mat block.
For Chesnaught, an alternative ability buff would be Wind Rider, effectively removing it's major weakness to flying, but Unburden is a great choice as well.
For Delphox, I'd change the stats like you mentioned, but I'd keep it's regular typing and instead of changing it's ability to Magic Guard, I'd change it to Adaptability/Sheer Force (I know Sheer Force is better, but I can't decide if it's overwhelming with the regular typing).
For Primarina, I'd give it Boomburst instead.
For Inteleon, in addition to giving it Water bubble, I'd take away 20 sp. atk and give it 10 more stat points in both defenses instead of any in atk, as that still keeps him pretty frail while offsetting the sheer power of Water Bubble. Or I'd simply use Drizzle instead, without nerfing it's sp. atk ofc.
For Hisuian typhlosion, on top of your buffs, I'd also take away 5 stat points in sp. def in favor of 5 more in speed.
Other than that, solid changes!
ok first, pinning this because someone finally got the point of adding dragon; it wasn't because of the trio balance it's because the other trio members for those respective trios all still pressure said dragon type starter well anyway (or if not both other starters, at minimum the starter that should have if they were purely FWG). as for your individual buffs:
Blastoise im on board with
Feraligatr another person pointed this out asw, I wish I remembered it with the vid but Fishious Rend would fix a lot of Gatrs issues, I do think fwiw it needs the other buffs in addition to that as even Dracovish got crept easily; this could be pretty powerful tho in addition to my other buffs and I'm glad people pointed it out as Gatr was definitely still bottom 5
Pert mostly got Thick Fat to help check ice types better since its neutral as its stats were decent anyway, but it kinda was a victim of me writing Hoenn-Kanto first then taking a couple days away, and having better ideas for gen 4 onward. Regen in hindsight was the right call, your other ideas are great asw
Blaziken would be sick as a Fire/Flying type; I regretted not doing that when explaining my choice behind going Water/Flying for Quaquaval to another commenter, wish I went with that asw as the Brave Bird stab would be more needed on a mon like that to keep it unique competitively as a physical fire/flying but more of a wallbreaker than Talonflame.
Torterra with Multiscale was considered, I think strictly this gen Multiscale is better but moving past tera I think it could genuinely go either way.
Shell Smash Samurotts could be decent fwiw, I think both would still have to be very smart about the setup timing at least and neither become unkillable thanks to Rillabooms existence. Also even with their blistering speed and Shell Smash, both would still need to survive the setup turn, it'd be strong for sure but very risky!
Emboar was another thing I read earlier asw completely agree, wish I caught that but it's strictly better!
I'm super here for your Battle Bond route that'd be great, Boomburst is interesting. I like Muddy Water here more because it doesn't hit the partner which Boomburst and Surf do hence why that buff was imo necessary. Boomburst is still cool thought I think certain teams would use it fwiw. Mat Blocks buff would be great, I thought +4 would be too much but you're super right about the wellspring competition being high.
Chesnaught with Wind Rider could be cool, if Chesnaught had more consistent priority I think it'd fit but maybe this is a better suited buff if anything for Decidueye in tandem with what I gave it ngl as Chesnaught needs the speed badly.
Delphox could be cool with this, I purely just wanted the unique typing and we need more fairies anyway rn
Primarina needed Boomburst you're right, I still stand by the Liquid Voice buff in tandem with that though but that'd be plenty
Inteleon I considered Drizzle and the defense buffs, the issue being I didn't want to buff a stat I thought people would get tangible benefit from for Inteleon (as we've seen these extremely good glass cannons like Kartana, Flutter, Pheromosa, etc invest into defenses a bit due to their high damage and become bulky, and Inteleon already has decent bulk for a glass cannon); and being a fast rain option felt pretty bleh considering how mons such as Miraidon and Koko with terrain that's a pretty fatal flaw. A-Ninetales only really makes it work because of veil, but fwiw Inteleon as a glass cannon maybe could work fine. I think this is the only one so far I like strictly disagree with because I pondered this so heavily in my head for like a half hour and already wrestled these same thoughts actually.
Hisui Typhlosion this could be cool for, I think I mentioned it here I mostly did the stats this way to mirror Johto Typhlosion but fwiw if we're talking about what's best for it this technically is better for it as a general buff
Thanks for the well thought out comment and for the general understanding of what I was going for, as much as I love the interaction I have read too many comments especially related to Sceptile with this. I could probably make a drinking game out of it I s2g
@@oLivSama Yeah I figured that's why you pinned this (Thanks btw). It's always so jarring to hear people say Fairy type starters are OK, but dragon ruins everything.
I was wondering why Quaquaval had it's type changed, but Blaziken didn't. A physical Fire/Flying wallbreaker seemed like an interesting idea, if nothing else. Thanks for clarifying.
As for some clarifications regarding some of my choices in the balance changes:
For Torterra, I was only considering past gen 9 since GF doesn't make balance changes to the game in the same generation. With Tera, Filter is far healthier for the metagame.
I completely blanked and forgot about Boomburst and Surf hitting allies. So yeah, with that in mind, Muddy water is the best choice. And as for Mat Block, I'm glad you agree. An important thing to note with Mat Block is that +4 priority is kind of a nerf in the sense it's now susceptible to Feint.
Yeah I agree, Chesnaught does need the speed very badly. I'm just concerned as to how it'll deal with Flying type special attacks without Tera and if it'll get to prock Unburden. Though I agree it's still amazing on Chesnaught, and so is Wind Rider for Decidueye.
With the aforementioned con of Boomburst in mind, Liquid Voice getting buffed to boosting sound moves in addition to it's regular effect, while also giving Boomburst to Primarina seems like a great buff without it being too overwhelming.
I always underestimate how much difference even a little bit of bulk can make on a frail Pokemon. And terrain boosted Koko and Miraidon invalidate a lot of water types. However, for Koko, a Scarf set with Snipe Shot/Weather Ball kind of works. It's just that the thought of Specs Water Bubble Snipe Shot terrifies me, let alone Hydro Pump. I guess an alternative is just Adaptability, which doesn't buff Inteleon to the moon, but I doubt it does enough to make Inteleon viable. That's why I considered Drizzle which opens up some potential team support and a 150BP STAB Rain boosted, potentially item boosted Weather Ball, which is still strong, but there's still an upper limit to it's strength. The thing with Water Bubble is that it can stack with rain, which makes it downright absurd in a rain team. But I can see where you're coming from. Araquanid still surprises me with how much it can do, so I guess it's more of my bias against Water Bubble than anything else.
And don't stress about it! You did a great job and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
Delphox mostly just needs a huge ability change as well as utility moves, give her back ally switch
@@triggeredcheese5318 I never knew it got ally switch before. But tbf, on open team sheet, Ally switch is less useful. Unless you partner up with Mienshao, but even then it's more of a mind game than a consistent strat. Cool idea though, especially for closed team sheet.
Ally switch still has had niche use in ots, I think it made stream on a goth team in reg b iirc. But yea far more closed sheet
Remember kids, araquanid was already really good with 70 attack. Imagine 95/115 :)
That'll be great for sure
Only with water moves, because water bubble is basically huge power on those moves, any other move won't do much damage unless it was supereffective
@samuelegaione3953 fwiw inteleons offenses with options like Ice Beam still would do a bit to grasses.
@@samuelegaione3953 honestly it doesn't really matter lol, water bubble already makes araquanid reach some insanely high damage with its water stab, inteleon, even with the spa reduction, can straight up ohko kyogre with specs hydro pump, and the accuracy doesn't even matter that much because you could genuinely afford to run 3 different water moves + ice beam (at the very least on a specs set), because with water bubble coverage barely matters (and it's not like inteleon has all that many moves it would like to run). It might be too much but it does still die if you breathe a bit too close to it so it could be ok :3
I give my araquinid choice band
The fact that Samurott doesn't have Shell Smash still after all these years is a crime
It truly is tbh
At least Torterra FINALLY got it in gen 9.
@djdrizzy9139 honestly I'll take what I can get
With how much oshawott likes its shell, it kinda makes sense that it doesnt get shell smash ngl.
Maybe its cause that's its weapons and it would be weird to smash your weapons
Dear Gamefreak,
Give Primarina Boomburst you cowards xD
Honestly that alone makes it viable ngl idk how I spaced on that
granted this gen, primarina's stocks are sure to go up as she doesn't have to compete with Tapu Fini who's absent
I'd disagree and say give her the Let's Go version of Bouncy Bubble ( the one w/ 90BP) bc Draining Kiss is not enough
Absolutely not with liquid voice and Primarina SA that is way too powerful
@@mgeezylaslo7054 nah I'm down for it justice for primarina
Sceptile just needs to switch its Attack and Special Attack, Sceptile was meant to be a physical attacker by just looking at its moveset
Sceptile can't compete with ogerpon rillaboom and meowscarada unless you gave it like kartana stats
Always felt like it was meant to go in, and sweep with it’s crit attacks.
@@oLivSama I think the following changes would make Sceptile able to compete with them as a physical attacker:
- Make Razor Leaf score automatic critical-hits, like Frost Breath, Flower Trick, etc.
- Make Rock Tomb a spread move.
- Give Sceptile Technician, and the Dragon-typing you mentioned earlier.
Auto-crit SPREAD Razor Leaf, SPREAD Rock Tomb, and Dual Chop, boosted by Technician is EASILY enough to compete w/ Meowscarada. It should also provide a meaningful, albeit specific niche (along w/ Shed Tail) over Rillaboom and Ogerpon.
@@haydeniskander5306 interesting idea
@@oLivSama Gift it Sharpness as a new ability then
Another way to buff Inteleon is to make Snipe Shot always crit, there's seriously no reason to have Urshifu and Inteleon in the same generation
Especially if you lowered the power to 70 to be more in line with flower trick that actually becomes very viable without being so absurdly busted that everyone hates it
1:32 when i saw earth power i was like "wait doesnt charizard already get that as an egg move?"
turns out im way too pokerogue-pilled 😭
Yea I had to double check this asw
Charizard at least gets Scorching Sands and Earthquake.
I think scorching sands needs a universal buff to 80 BP, so it can be on par with scald.
Honestly Charizard needs a non- solar beam grass move. Energy ball would give it something helpful.
101 in giving buffs: change secondary type to dragon and add fake out to movepool
Also give it prankster, tailwind and follow me
The inherent problem with this video is that it only considers the current game and format(or previous format). Charizard, venosaur, swampert, blaziken, empoleon, infernape, surperior, greninja, primerina, skeledirge, and meowscarada all don’t need to be buffed in any way and would likely make lower power formats much worse in future
Fwiw I think even stuff like Serperior, Meowscarada, Primarina, and Venusaur in a format similar to regulation A would all have been fine. Meowscarada getting technician over Protean and fake out doesn't make it overbearing, and really the buff was more for Axel which during both gen 8 and 9 was locked to only the DLCs where we escaped this power level. Primarina doesn't really fundamentally break the game gaining the sylveon style boost and it's just dual type sylveon; venusaur gaining 10 base speed honestly also still makes it slower than most mons with tailwind which murkrow tailwind dominated this format, etc. I think genuinely the only mon overtuned for an early format is inteleon, the rest are more matchup fish options into meta staples so they have better speed tiers for current threats that won't exist in these formats anyway.
@@oLivSama i mean do u remember how much of a monster meow was in reg A? Fake out and tech would have given it 50% usage. I think the main thing about all these is that you know not every pokemon needs to be as strong as every other one, even starters. What we should aim for is to give each one a distinct niche, which is why I think stuff like giving blastoise follow me is a great idea.
@KanderUdon fwiw meow was by the end of A while still great falling a bit in favor of other wincons like sylveon, gholdengo, and baxcalibur. It was still #1 I honestly don't think tech fake out raises it's usage much though in a format like that where outside of bax and gholdengo nothing cared about good fake out. It's why despite the lack of good dark types besides meow in reg A we didn't see weavile pop off, granted Meow has a better movepool but technician only benefits fake out and trailblaze for it in exchange for the weaker flower trick, which for sash sets that low hp overgrow boost was massive for certain KOs. I think it gives meow a bit more of a niche as a viable fast fake out mon, but fwiw a lot of mons that would need to be fake outed have good responses to meow such as kilowattrel and garchomp, which could also just run Covert Cloak for the MU (which kilo already did)
One (kinda) tiny change I would make that would affect every starter pokemon is change the base ability (torrent, blaze, overgrow). It’s now:
“When HP is at half or lower, attacks with the water/fire/grass type are critical hits”
It’s still 50%, but with some spice for breaking down your debuffs and breaking enemy defense buffs. Abilities bouncing off of crits can be spicier too, and for younger casual players I can imagine just a big old smile from the comeback feel
That'd be a decent buff ngl I'm here for it
ngl I'd use the starter pinch abilities more if they were like that
Thats actually really clever
Just spitballing but maybe it would also be interesting if there was some kind of defensive counterpart to the base starter abilities for less offensive focused ones, something like it takes half damage from its base type weaknesses when at 50% hp, but the weaknesses of its second type would remain the same (so for example venusaur would take less damage from fire moves but still take the same amount of damage from psychic moves). This not only helps more defensive starters, but also gives a reason to use monotype starters, as they'd essentially have no weaknesses at half health. If this is too strong, maybe just taking a quarter of the damage instead would be ok.
@@aquashuriken1634torrent type abilities is already very useful for defensive pokemon, they would need that tiny bit of bonus power since they cant put a lot of stat points into offense normally
A good Universal buff would be raising all fully evolved starters BST to 550. The moms who are already goated like Incineroar or Rillaboom can get a buff to a stat they don't use like special attack, while mons that could use the extra speed, bulk, or power could get 15-25 added to their Speed/HP/Attack/Special Attack to make them more viable, such as
Venasaur, 80->105 Speed
Charizard, 109->125 Sp.Attack
Blastoise, 79->99 HP
And so on
With all of these new Grass / Dragon types, were definitely going to see Iron Bundle Stocks rise
(Also we all know Incineroar should get the niche Revival Blessing to buff it, because it 100% needs it)
Can't wait for g10 incin getting revival blessing asw as spore
@@oLivSamaand follow me
@oLivSama nah it's getting a new signature move, catnip, it's like spore but it's dark type so it's better and cooler
@@abrawolf Also, Grass types and Safety Goggle holders are no longer immune to it.
Yall cooked
Ngl I think giving Feraligator Fishious Rend and strong jaw would be such a dope idea. I doubt we’ll see Dracovish for a good while.
I personally would give Primarina (the soloist Pokémon) Follow Me to fit the theme
I forgot about fishious rend but that'd fit well, similar speed to vish too great idea
If there was a water biting move that wasnt fisheous then yes
Dd Fr Sj
It doesn't have gills tho
Make it water/dark for Strong Jaw to also benefit Crunch
The stat spread of swampert was already good, I don't think it had to change. For it to become viable it only needs one thing : trading Damp for Regenerator. Not only is it a wonderful ability, but swampert being an axolotl, it fits thematically too ! There is a tier in showdown where we can put any ability on any mon and swampert with regenerator is a beast there.
Fwiw I think the combo only helps it tbf, the only good regen mon in doubles isn't good solely because regen it's the combo of regen and Spore. For water types not named urshifu there's a high barrier for entry and the speed reduction for TR teams or slower flip turns out would be a huge deal in making it more used. With just regen it gets usage, in tandem with the spread it's arguably a strong but not op mon. I've seen a few say regen fwiw I like it more than thick fat idk why that didn't come to mind. Thick Fat still is decent but regen helps a lot more
True this guy knows his stuff
yeah personally I don't think Swampert needs a stat change, he's already very good as is so just replacing Damp with Regenerator would be the only buff he need's and swampert would be perfect
Truth!
I can here to say exactly this! I'd love for Swampert to get Regenerator. Swampert is already a really decent Pokemon. It just needs some reliable recovery to truly shine. Even giving it Recover or Shore Up would suffice.
Also for inteleon, I think to make it viable, you could actually take 10 away from its attack and move it to both Spa and Spe, and then buff snipe shot to a base 100 move that also does 1/4 of its damage through protect. I would also give it flip turn and grass knot as well as replacing sniper with super luck. All of this would make inteleon a dangerous specs sweeper who can ignore most forms of blocking it such as follow me, protect and defensive boosts like calm mind.
I think that could at least get it usage fwiw, it'd have viability in early formats at minimum with this. My concern with an ability like super luck tho would mostly be inteleon not generally having easy crit access for this; and in a format where the best grass has stab priority not being either incredible defensively or a huge wallbreaker is rough
Dont even make it hit 1/4 though Protect, make it do full damage. Urshifu already does it with every move, Inteleon needs the help lol
@yunaka_gaming honestly I kinda agree
True. The reason why I chose super luck is because snipe shot has a boosted crit rate, but I see your point. Maybe a defensive ability like multiscale could work instead?
@theaverian5513 multiscale could also be cool tbh protect 3atks sets with some snipe shot damage boost to like 90bp fully through protect to match mighty cleave could work ngl, at minimum it's worth exploring
Putting those 10 points in Blastoise’s HP stat would make a much bigger difference than adding 5 to each defense
oh you're actually right going with calcs against mons like flutter mane and rillaboom it seems that the more offensive sets generally have a couple percent better rolls going HP; but the defenses matter more when investing heavily into bulk the calcs before more even. generally you're probably right though the HP would probably have been smarter, the defensive investments are more situationally better choices
Easy buff to all starters
Give them the new Battle Bond but make it that it's only a original starter hidden ability any starter can get mega op but It only the starter you get from the professor not any bred down Starters
It also make the original starter more valuable though it'll be hard to track
That'd go hard ngl
...nah screw Onion(my drizzile), that douche had a -spcl atk +spcl def nature
@Roman_the_black_cat use a nature mint
@ketto2034 Can you get those without the dlc?
You see i have this highly heraditary condition known as being poor
@@Roman_the_black_cat Sword/Shield you can't BUT in SV you can buy them from the Delibird Delivery after some gym badges
I really liked how you managed to improve all of them, while keeping the changes still in theme with the Pokemon. Great job and awesome video!
Give swampert regenerator and recover and it’ll do fine.
Honestly regen helps a lot but I think it also needs at least a speed reduction to 50 if not more, it's still gonna get passed up for things like prim/azu/bears otherwise
Stall
Yes please buff Samurott Gamefreak. I love Samurott but not only do most people hate it's design but it sucks competitively too. Give it Shell Smash, a secondary typing, rearrange it's stats, Horn Leech, Bulk Up, ANYTHING.
Those would go hard for buffs ngl, justice for samurott
I LOVE the meganium buff you came up with. Meganium would need something pretty revolutionary to be usable, and this would probably make it actually good
In Radical Red they used a lot of these buffs and it's a powerful choice there, saved me during my lorelei fight even for her hail team
Sceptile needs a more diverse special attacking move pool. Currently its only options are grass stab, dragon pulse, and focus blast (and I guess tera blast). Giving it something like earth power or vacuum wave would help a lot.
Those would be huge for it ngl
I would have swapped sceptiles special and physical attack stats to make it a better physical attacker which is the set it runs most often.
That also works fwiw but you'd probably be locked into clear Amulet so I wanted to try a different approach
@@oLivSamaI'm curious why the Clear Amulet? Wouldn't something like Life Orb work better for a Physical attacking Sceptile?
i think OG typhlosion deserves contrary for overheat spam, or drought for OP eruptions
Now this is a Typhlosion buff. You cooked.
I'd personally make Meganium a better support for doubles by raising its HP a bit, giving it friend guard as its ability, give it sleep powder and rage powder.
With synthesis it can be a real nuisance to get through.
Ngl that's also pretty decent, meganium honestly has so many potential lines they almost could have given it and yet we got this...
8:06 yeah i give up on this video lmao
I would've swapped Reckless for Rock Head so that now Emboar isn't a kamikaze. Heck he could've even taken a reduction in his special attack since his bread and butter is his brute strength
Oh honestly great idea I very much overlooked
i mean that is a fair change, but tbh with how much HP emboar has he can tank the recoil for a while, but i get what you mean since emboar has flare blitz, wild charge and head smash
I understand many of these buffs/reworks are for VGC. As a singles player myself, I can tell some these buffed guys would either get sent to #1 usage in OU instantly or just not be affected by much at all. You’d be surprised at how good Samurott-H specifically is at dealing damage and spreading hazards simultaneously (and yes, I absolutely agree normal Samu is basically unusable). That Intelleon change with Water Bubble might even get it banned for its terrifying offensive potential! Great video & ideas! 👍
honestly, inteleon could be a bit of a simpler fix. mainly, give snipe shot a higher crit rate, give it a few more high crit rate moves, and buff sniper to also boost crit rate. from there, reallocate some of it's hp, def, and spdef to it's speed, spatk and maybe atk. i think that might work?
Honestly that's a route I didn't think of that could be cool, like a set that could basically just always or near always crit with scope lens!
I think Inteleon should double down on the Snipe ability. Being able to ignore defense buffs is its unique trait. Have Snipe Shot always crit like Meowscarada. Maybe buff Snipe to increase the crit rate too so with focus energy it'll always crit when using special attacks.
I'll say this, I've been playing various hacks for so long that I thought Emboar had Sheer Force as a Hidden Ability. And I was also surprised that he didn't get this ability here
I had to redo a lot of takes when recording from messing up saying meganium was a grass fairy type already from rom hacks tbf
I’d buff Emboar by changing it to Fire/Ground and Samurott to Water/Fighting, and Quaquaval is fine as a Fighting type
I stayed away from water fighting since urshifu automatically invalidates any other mon of the type unless we somehow made urshifu 2
Swampert is actually something i thought the other way around on, leaning in a similar direction to its mega and giving it swift swim, though i did have a bulkier idea. Giving it regenerator would not only fit its inspiration (axlotls), but it would also synergize SUPER well with flip turn. Though, tbf, that might be a bit too busted lol
regen would be pretty big for it I should have thought of that, a few commentors suggested that over Thick Fat I agree 100%
I disagree with Swamperts buffs, he doesn't need 85 SpA it would better to invest +20 on hp and +30 on def, with filter as HA. With AV he would be a viable tank and giving it more of a tank role and shrugging off hits regenerator would also fit since the animal Pert got inspired by an axolotl have healing powers and make him a really good tank with AV flip turn
The spatk is nice for it's other moves, I think cutting the speed so it's a slow pivot is more valuable. Regen would be a better call tho for sure ability wise
@@oLivSama thought also maybe dd if we can go far with filter + recovery and giving it healing and setup
Edit: while for VGC cutting the speed off is nice. My idea is more focused on Smogon singles play different meta's.
@doubler5318 that's fair then but that's also why you disagree with the buffs, they were made for specifically VGC!
@@oLivSama still regenrator and focusing more on HP and physical def is nice for AV sets
Also add the movie recover to swapper with his regenerating ability
Take a shot every time he adds dragon type, you’ll be dead before the end lol
1) she*
2) didn't know your tolerance was that weak that you can't handle 4 shots
3) two of those 4 had megas with the type anyway I just reintroduced the buff...
As someone who got top 50 in the world using a trick room team with a water bubble Araquinid back in Gen 8, yeah, water bubble is awesome.
Super cool achievement massive congrats to you, thats a huge deal
@@oLivSama to clarify, top 50 on the Pokémon Showdown ladder, not on the in-game battle system. Slightly less impressive and time consuming, but still something I’m pretty proud of. Thank you though😂
Personally for me, I’d like to see Sceptile get a physical attack buff. Leaf Blade is his signature move, so let’s lean into that, also his Special attack is still nicely viable.
I know this is for VGC, but as someone who prefers singles I did enjoy this
Glad you enjoyed it anyway! I think for smogon it'd be better physical but with vgc since it's competing with ogerpon rillaboom meowscarada it's a lot rougher to go physical!
@@oLivSama touché!
new to the channel but i love the way you have layed out everything in the video with types, moves, stat changes, its visually appealing and really easy to watch!
Glad you're enjoying the content and I hope you continue to enjoy your stay!!
Honestly I like the idea of giving Meganium Flower Veil in this Tera Grass heavy meta, making it and its allies immune to both status conditions and stat drops. Then take 10 from its Attack, put 10 in each defense, and give it moves like Floral Healing and Rage Powder, and it’d be a brutal support Pokémon that abuses the defensive advantages of Grass and its utility movepool to stay alive while superbuffing its friends. It’s a lover, not a fighter, so let it maximize its partner’s ability to fight for it.
Honestly with a more average ability like Flower Veil Spore would probably still be balanced on this with your other buffs, it'd be essentially amoonguss but no regen and instead a better typing. There'd be a huge but worth considering tradeoff with fastest spore and better type vs best defensive ability
@@oLivSama I personally don’t see it getting Spore since that’s a mushroom based move, but maybe it could get something like Lovely Kiss to be able to sleep Grass types like Rillaboom and Ogerpon.
Lovely kiss actually is a very cool idea ngl
I think that the Meowscarada change would probably make it a little worse in singles
In singles yea but the goals doubles where this would be decently better, fwiw it's triple Axel would still basically feel like STAB and it wouldn't need to swap to keep it's dual type so maybe it wouldn't be? It'd be a lateral move for singles tbh
Just make Protean good again and Meowscarada becomes awesome
Charzard not being a dragon type but instead a flying type has always been odd to me, the mega evolution doesn't count since I'm talking in general available to everyone, and not everyone has a megastone
Thanks to this video I now know the entire Dex would be better with 30 points to their stats, the dragon typing, and draco meteor.
Inteleon buff: make it a mixed attacker with no stat reductions. And give it more tail moves! Seriously it can't even learn aqua tail by level up or egg move!
no aqua tail on level up is a crime ngl
@@oLivSama that's what I'm saying. Make it a mixed attacker, give it aqua tail!
as someone who's tried to make swamp work with sceptile, i think the best option is giving it 140 speed so it doesn't get speedcreped by the 135's because that is infuriating.
140 could also be good ngl I think the spatk buff should help Unburden sets enough asw but you could definitely just give the buff to speed and specs sceptile
when buffing mons in my romhack i tend to the info described in their dex entries, bulbapedia and origins info.
charizard is fine, gamefreaks gonna give it another broken mode, probably
Honestly fair
Bro likes dragons is what I’ve taken from this so far. There are a lot of things that would be cool to do to the starters but I’m not a fan of changing types unless they are new forms.
womp womp
One nice move that Meowscarada could learn that could tip the edge ever so slightly into broken territory would be parting shot. There's not too many Parting shot users, let alone fast ones. Meowscarada from a thematic standpoint, and kit standpoint, would be the perfect wielder of such a devastating pivot move. This could make Meowscarada a devastating scarf lead as it could possibly chip an opposing paradox mon, or cripple it to help soften up a safe switch in. You could even abuse contrary shenanigans.
For me I think if they just left Chestnaught the same stats and movepool and just switched it to grass/steel typing it would shoot up in viability . It fits flavor wise since it's whole design revolves around being a heavily armored knight and it gets a bunch of steel moves anyway
I also think even without Liquid Voice being buffed, if they just made it so Sparkling Aria works like Pollen Puff and heals in addition to curing burn if it targets an ally that would give it just the bit of tech it needs to move up from the better side of mediocre to actually decent
Totally here for the sparkling aria buff tbh that'd be huge, chesnaught grass steel could be cool asw but the typing rn gives it a big niche as a check to both urshifus fwiw so I didn't wanna ruin that niche for it
I don't think gamefreak wants edit the old types unless the type didn't exist beforehand. Charizard being dragon breaks the type triangle entirely
Check pinned comment they addressed the dragon type already!
Just make regional forms instead
Mega Evos:
My honest opinion on starters, they all need to be the same BST (base stat total) when fully evolved. The highest is swampert with 535, the lowest is 525 (majority are grass starters) and some slight stat tweaks.
550 across would be so good to fix a lot of these
@@oLivSama indeed, for starters I always thought they're BST isn't so big
First time I’ve seen a video adjust the typings of the starters, and I’ve agreed with every single choice!
I feel like changing Feraligatr's ability hurts it more than it helps. Currently, it wants to use Life Orb and attacks like Liquidation, Crunch, Ice Punch, etc. Life Orb. Tough Claws has the same boost as Sheer Force, but it makes Life Orb impossible to use which makes the item slot less open. I guess Tough Claws has its benefits like harder hitting Aqua Jets with no recoil (and if you run Life Orb, you will hit harder than with Sheer Force), but Sheer Force is way more versatile with the same damage with any item
Fun video otherwise even if I disagree with some changes
Anything that helps my favorite Starter evolution Sceptile out im all for
It somehow has been the most controversial buff i gave a mon I genuinely thought inteleon would be but sceptile has been by a mile, glad someone sees the vision!
I honestly felt like they missed an opportunity to make it the first Fire/Electric type ((outside of Heat form Rotom)) give it Wild Charge, Thunder Punch, Spark ((for Scorbunny)), Super Cell Slam, etc
Honestly that's a cool idea asw
I honestly think it would be kinda cool to see how these guys would perform in singles with their new buffs even if they’re VGC orientated, cause I imagine lead Hamurott becoming better in OU with the speed and attack buff.
That does sound kinda fire ngl, it'd be a very terrifying Spikes lead with that speed tier
@@oLivSama ngl the thought of life orb sheer force hamurott immediately got me thinking “haha x1.69 boosted Ceaseless Edge go brrr”
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
@@oLivSama Hell, might make sweeper Hamurott a thing that exists (I think it doesn’t currently but my knowledge of Gen 9 OU comes from stinkposts)
@tangerinepaint3643 it is like an OU option rn but it'd be probably meta defining now
great work! i love how much thought you put into all of these! my one nitpick is that unovian samurott shouldve kept its special lean, and had the +13 go into spa instead, and then since sharpness wouldnt work maybe maga launcher? solid rock could also work to keep samurott's original defense oriented ability.
Special is fair tbh, could always give it solid rock ngl or even armor tail if we wanna get very spicy
I think if we give samurott shell smash it will be broken with might cleave
Fwiw it needs to Tera or rillaboom still invalidates it, and it'd be difficult to setup. It'd be high risk high reward
Sceptile should receive earth power, sleep powder, discharge, aura sphere and power gem.
Infernape should receive, earth power, sucker punch, bullet punch, scald, ice punch, flip turn, and triple axel.
I agree with earth power and sleep powder on scept I think with the rest of the buffs anything more would be overtuned fwiw. Infernape if it kept it's old ability could maybe get the not flip turn and Axel options, as much as I'd love to make my fav starter op it'd be like incin good with this
What about nerfing every pokemon with 5% usage or higher. In order to make them still usable but not overwhelming.
My ideas: Taking Fake out from Incineroar and Rillaboom or changing Flutter mane stats completely
I still think honestly at best maybe a handful of starters become good, a lot of them are not made with doubles in mind
@@oLivSama That doesn't relate to my comment in any way but some starters might have success if given enough tools and trust from players. And yes starters are made to have balanced stats in order to have different roles in a playthrouh. But that didn't stop some of them to have success.
It kinda does relate tbf but I'll elaborate if you insist it wasn't enough:
Even if we nerf other pokemon, others will rise at the top. For example, let's start small with just the top 10 of Reg F in usage because it's easier to do the theoretical in a non restricted format. This list includes:
Raging Bolt - absurd from thunderclap matching up well into most teams asw as it's benefit from sun and ability to 1v1 itself with well timed Tera. To make this not still obscenely relevant you'd probably need to delete thunderclap and give it a pretty big spatk rework or it could just adjust to CM sets or av Snarl sets with volt switch over Thunderclap. This mon alone with its typing invalidates most starters
Urshifu-Rapid would honestly need to disappear entirely or remove both its ability and surging strikes for any offensive water starter not named primarina to even exist
Flutter Mane shockingly doesn't really affect any starter usage it just is really good
Rillaboom even without fake out would just stop choosing between u-turn or high Horsepower, it'd need to lose terrain or its still usurping most if not all grass starter usage
Incineroar needs parting shot and u-turn gone far more than anything else, fake out doesn't solve much honestly as with these alone we'd see a rise in ting-lu or lando-t as it's replacement
Pao would need its ability gone or a speed tier below like 90, even still pao existing benefits most starters as niche picks
Torn needs pre gen 8 speed mechanics back or Prankster tailwind still rules the format, Prankster tailwind existing only helps starters anyway a lot of them have awful speed and decent offenses
Amoonguss needs spore gone or any defensive grass can't really exist without also being a powerful offensive piece like rillaboom and ogerpon
Lando is inconsequential to starters
Gholdengo is inconsequential to starters
Even with these 10 alone, the replacements aren't other starters it'd be other lower-ish mons that enable most starters like ogerpons or ting-lu. At best skimming the >5% pool if everything faster loses speed maybe meowscarada pops up, which fears below 5% iron jugulis and Roaring Moon stealing the spotlight, skeledirge which maybe gets above 1% finally, or primarina which probably could maybe get there if most of those TR threats just were outright deleted. There's so many mons between .5 and 5% usage tho that would rise before most starters, for some examples:
Lando-t
Archaludon
Ursaluna
Entei
Torkoal
Bloodmoon
Kingambit
Regidrago
Roaring Moon
Iron Hands
Volcarona
Tsareena
Ogerpon-corner
And that's before below .5% mons like:
Baxcalibur
Brute bonnet
Salamence
Iron Bundle
Kommo-o
Dragapult
Gyarados
Iron Moth
And arguably I'd say the starters should be more afraid of this pool as a lot directly steal usage from starters.
@@oLivSama Oh so you thought it's about how starters can rise when we nerf good pokemon. I just wrote is as a general concept with nothing about specifically starters in mind. But that was a long explanation. Good you wanted to write that much as a comment explanation.
@olafmikoaj3121 yea we must have been just thinking different points, apples to oranges sorta thing. Idt most nerfs influence the starters since we are like 5 tiers worth of power creep too low even for reg f standards, they need to catchup
I think a better fix for Sceptile would be to give it dragon type like you did, but instead switch it’s special attack and physical attack stat, buff the attack up to 115, and then give it sharpness. Sceptile already learns a lot of moves that benefit from it and having a 135 base power leaf blade with stab would very good. Sceptile also just has an incredible physical move pool that it would use better than any special move buffs
How does a channel with this high quality only get 1k Subs? You deserve so much more.
Thank you so much hoping to only keep growing!!!
My only criticism here is changing the typing of any Pokemon. I don’t think any Pokémon’s type will change any time soon. The only exception to that rule so far has been Normal Fairy types and regional variants.
I feel like everything else is fair game. I do have criticisms about other stuff in the vid but I’m not too pressed about it.
I do think Pokemon/Gamefreak SHOULD make their starters more competitively viable in either singles, doubles format, or both. I’d say if I could identify or fix one problem about the starter Pokemon, it would be their lacking move pool. Like a lot of these Pokemon don’t have enough to work with.
Disliking type changes as a whole is fair, the changes were more whats necessary with the fewest tweaks (without just giving every grass starter spore + follow me)
@@oLivSama Thank you for the comment! I think there’s so many ways to fix Pokemon like grass types without giving it spore follow me etc. For Grass types, moves like Snarl, Baby Doll Eyes, Spikes, Pollen Puff (this is a really good idea for a move), Flamethrower and Draco Meteor (for the reptiles), and all accessibility to Solar Blade/Beam (a lot don’t get both). Fire Types, give it rock, fighting, ground moves, maybe like Brutal Swing or Breaking Swipes (good for proccing Weakness Policy or similar abilities). Water types, Baby Doll Eyes, Ice Fang/Punch, Play Rough, Iron Head, etc. Giving the move Beat Up to some mons would be cool too.
Kinda like how you want to avoid giving Spore and Follow Me to many Pokemon, I’m the same way with Rock Slide, they thing is obnoxious and too many already have it.
I think to give to generally all Pokemon starters: Baby Doll Eyes, Snarl, Brutal Swing, Pollen Puff, bring back Scald. Give Helping Hand or something to squishier Pokemon, doesn’t have to be beefy Pokemon like Torkoal or Toreterra.
It really does depend on what the Pokemon is missing. I’d need to take a more thorough look at the list of moves available but these are some suggestions.
@@stealthgamer4620 fwiw the spore + follow me was more hyperbole, there are a lot of moveset specific things that could be tailored asw, typing was a lot simpler of a buff to visualize impact for since at minimum it gives more distinction between the starters, and those typings being vital to a format would usually give these pokemon a new automatic niche. If they were mostly move related while there could be usability, at a certain point they would probably to a degree still be creeping each other rather than non starters. there's certainly ways to just buff these with moves/stats/abilities only though, it just gets a lot more complicated since sometimes buffs that seem massive on paper do nothing (Shell Smash Torterra, and Competitive Empoleon with Roost are the big two, though Empoleon keeping Scald would at least have made its specific issues less glaring. These were both HUGE buffs though and neither get even .1% usage right now, I think Empoleon was .08% and Torterra .02% if I remember correctly, which is insane because these are huge buffs, especially to Empoleon)
@@oLivSama Also, a rule I stayed away from was making up my own moves, or changing existing ones; Pokemon in general are missing consistent attack moves for their types like Physical Water has a lot of good moves, but not Special Water. Grass has bad physical and special moves, I seriously don’t know when anyone would use a grass attack besides Energy Ball back then-nobody runs that now. Fire types are pretty okay so far, maybe abilities with more chance to burn maybe. There are types like fighting, rock, and electric-non starter types-that have very inconsistent moves and those are their best moves; like for water you’re banking on Hydro Pump to land.
My main thing is that I want more to work with in terms of attacks, and it doesn’t help that a lot has been nerfed in move pool in Gen 8 and 9.
@stealthgamer4620 honestly yea the movepool cuts hurt so many mons
Fell Stinger speedy Araquanid sounds like a walking sweeper.
* gives samurott water/rock typing as a buff to compete amongst the other starters*
Rillaboom: 😏
Fwiw with like Tera flying the STABs and flying combo pressures a ton in the format, after gen 9 maybe steel would be better but didn't wanna make an empoleon clone with shell smash
I always forget that emboar has 100 spatk. I think it could be somewhere between 30 and 60 and no one would bat an eye.
Gen 9 has to be the only gen where every single starter is viable.
I was thinking for Meowscarada
Since it has nasty plot,I say give it swords dance (even tho it doesn’t use setup moves)
And add Leaf blade,gunk shot and pollen puff to its moves so it can be a support even with its frailty
The only issue with changing types is the symmetrical interactions with subtypes like how quequeval losing fighting means he can’t hit meowscarada - I personally would rather have a good pokemon than a symmetrical one (if that makes sense idk what other word to use)
TIL flying cant hit grass xdd
@BeccaGuinn grass types gained an immunity to flying in gen 9 keep up
I'd like to see regional forms/alternate evolutions for the kanto starters with their mega form designs as inspiration.
A bulkier venasaur with thick fat abd maybe higher attack stat, a slower blastoise with mega launchers and the 2 zards. An X variant with the 109 sp attack moved to its physical attack, with dragon typing, tough claws and a stat redistribution to make it its defenses higher but a few point slower in speed than base zard, and a Y zard with maybe a lower defence stat but a bit faster than base zard and maybe lower special attack to balance drought a bit. (Swap the speed and sp attack maybe?)
Basically the main problem with early starters is they aren't as specialized as the newer mons. 84 points on charaizard's attack is wasted, same with venasaur and blastoise.
They needed to be balanced i nthe first gen for the playthrough but these days they should be switched up to shine.
Also, maybe a custom move for all the starters that dont have one yet.
that'd be a pretty cool approach tbh, a lot of starters I agree just lack identities of their own which was the goal of this! custom moves would also be helpful for them ngl!
I think you should buff Incineroar by giving it the grass type. Don’t replace a type, just make it Fire/Dark/Grass, so now it’s immune to being burned, moves affected by prankster, AND powder moves. My reasoning is cuz tigers live in the forest. And to really show off its new grass typing, let’s give it Spore and Pollen Puff (I know it’s not a grass type move but pollen is in the name). Let’s give it Follow Me as well cuz it looks like the type to learn it. And let’s remove 80 from its Special Attack and give 40 to each of its Defense and Special Defense. And let’s give it Wide Guard and Quick Guard cuz why not, it looks like the type to learn it. I think this is balanced because
you forgot to give it revival blessing :(
I think that incineraor should also get water bubbles but it now its fire bubbles which 2x fire moves and water moves and half The dmg of water and fire moves but 4x weak to electric type
@raeidmorad8093 can we also give it a ground typing then
@@oLivSama sure thing brotha we can also give it a item specially made for incineraor that boosts all it stats by 1.5x and a built in prankster so incineraor have fire bubble
Also change sceptile from unburden to something useful like sharpness or grassy surge. Plus give it nasty plot
Didn't mean to critic your video but I just love sceptile so much it needs to be way better than how garbage it is rn
Good video 😊
Sceptile had a lot of options fwiw excited to see the ideas others came up with
I wanted that Sceptile change unburden for contrary, like they did to Serperior but with better offensive stats
I didn't wanna make it too similar considering I gave both the same added type
I honestly think the best buff possible for Scep is a wider special movepool since right now it is really shallow and offers no diversity, I think unburden is pretty neat if you can use it properly so for me personaly I dont se much need to change it, that said, I would give Sceptile access to moves like Earth Power, Vaccum Wave, Discharge, Incinerate, Dark Pulse and Tail Glow. Vaccum Wave is a nice priority option and doesn't lock Scep with focus miss as its only viable special fighting move, Earth Power ir a good fit por him to help with steel and fire mons, and Incinerate more of a gimmick and would be cool to have a grass type with a fire type move without being too op, Discharge is a nice call back to his mega form and coverage for flying threats and Dark Pulse for some good neutral damage. Tail Glow is the one move that coul potentialy become stupid with sets using Weakness Policy and Unburden but come on, it fits sceptile so much better than nasty plot and he really needs a special set up move
Earth power and sleep power would probably suffice ngl, maybe power gem too
A 110 speed eruption user sounds like absolute madness.
Its always interesting seeing the different takes between singles and vgc
1v1 vs 2v2 truly changes so much fundamentally, it's night and day what works or doesn't work
I’ve said for years now that the early starters, gens 1 and 2, need stat buffs and/or min/maxed. If they did they wouldn’t even need forms.
I think Mega Swampert should get Fishous rend
If only Mega pert was still with us
That sounds like cancer with the Mega
In my heart dragon type is still this rare near-legendary typing so I want to be against giving it to starters. But since the typing has been getting more common recently that argument will not hold up for long :(
We've gotten a lot of dragons since gen 7 and two of these 4 starters had dragon typing on their megas, I'd have maybe ignored it if not for the megas gaining it
I hope we get a dragon starter eventually. Charizard should have been a dragon
I'm cool with the Dragon typing on Gatr, Sceptile, and Serperior because you're just adding onto a monotype. However, I would've kept Zard Fire/Flying and buffed it differently. I also would've buffed Gatr's physical atk. by 10 BST.
Zard more transitioned to the megas typing
@oLivSama I understand. I just personally would rather see Zard gain the Fire/Dragon typing through a new regional variant. That way, u could build Zard's new BST distribution from the ground up, thus making its stats more optimized.
I just wanted to keep it's flying typing so it could get dual wing beat, defog, roost, and tailwind. I would probably also give it nasty plot, raging fury, aura sphere, and grass knot and give it a different hidden ability.
What if we gut meganiums speed by 60 and give the 20's to its defenses and health and give 20 to its special attack and give it strength sap and moon blast
The bst now is
Hp 100
Atk 82 (still the same )
Def 120
SpA 103
SpD 120
Speed 20
The total is 545
More BST than swampert gotta gut 10 from the attack maybe
I think Sceptile needs to benefit more from its physical attacking movepool and speed which GF has been neglecting since they doubled down on making Sceptile a frail special attacker. Keep the Dragon typing, reduce its Sp Atk and Def by 10 increase Attk by 20 and change its hidden ability to Technician making it an effective mixed attacker with use of both its STAB’s. It has access to Bullet Seed, Grassy Glide, Trailblazer, Scale Shot, Breaking Swipe and non-Stab alternatives like Rock Tomb, and Aerial Ace.
For singles this would go hard, but sceptile wouldn't be able to compete with ogerpon, rillaboom, or meowscarada as a physical grass in VGC
Floral healing Meganium will be a nightmare.
It'd finally be usable ngl
My one thought was Sceptile needed a new ability. Sceptile’s speed is already ridiculous, so doubling it is unnecessary. Idk what you would give it though, maybe Adaptability, Tinted Lens, or No Guard?
Ok I can't lie despite liking the Unburden route for outpacing weather or tailwind teams on your own volition, you're the first to suggest other abilities I'd say I vibe with. I could get behind tinted lens sceptile for sure asw as no guard, adapt would be fine asw but I like the other two a lot more
Zard: dragon/fire
Maganium: fairy/grass
*also staples dragon to starters because lol reptile
Incredible video to go to sleep to, these changes had me yawning all the way through
As an insomniac glad I could help, sleep tight thomasadams8463 hope this video plays in your dreams!
Honestly I would give hisui Decidueye fake out and cut the sp atk for bulk
It would have solid niche as a scrappy fake out user that can fake out ghost types
That could also be huge ngl
I think it would've been really cool to lean into sniper more on inteleon, maybe increase its speed and buff Snipe Shot itself to have an even higher crit ratio and/or bp
Ok here’s my opinion for them, first despite the 4x ice weakness, I think that censure should be ground instead of poison, blastoise literally walls venasaur due to grass being neutral and poison being immune, also give the ground type to johtonian typhlosion the ground type since he’s a bit mor like a volcano with him getting eruption, then give blaziken the flying type over fighting, then for the galar starters I think they would be like cinderace being fighting, inteleon being dark and maybe rillaboom be psychic idk
Alright here's what we're going to do. Give cinderace swords dance/bulk up and give back pre nerf libero.
1:40 Charizard already learns scorching sands
Earth power is stronger and on an ability like solar power that amplifies your damage in sun it'll go a lot further using a base 90 move vs a base 75 move
@@oLivSama Scorching sands can burn, earth power can drop special defense with a lowee chance
@Ezecool-3105 zard has other moves to burn anyway tho its a more unique effect for zard
Scorching Sands should be buffed to receive the same damage boost in Harsh Sunlight that Fire type moves do. Walking Wake's move Hydro Steam already does that, so why not Scorching Sands?
@@solitare4602 Because Scorchin sands is a move that many pokemon can learn, hydro steam is exclusive to walking wake, look at volcanion, steam eruption doesn't get booster either
Primarina stats can be revamped to make it work like a bulky water type
80 60 80 130 120 60
And its ability : Pure liquid voice
All sound based moves become water type and
Body of this pokemon is so pure like pure water such that it doesnt conduct electricity ( electric immune)
New moves : Followme trickroom Boomburst
This could honestly be like a top tier mon ngl, tried to dial back on prim a lot because it's like the 3rd best starter and still has some niche in vgc but a new immunity, better stats, and follow me + tr would be game changing.
You know, I'd just love for all the starters to get an extra 10 to 20 points to work with when it comes to their base stat totals. See what they can do with a lil extra oomph
That'd be massive ngl
I mean, anything to make my dino flower viable 🌸
Also Chesnaught's buffs are great, too
Had to buff the grass starters most unfortunately aren't great :(
Liv really went "Lets give this Pokemon the Dragon-typing" on half of them, smh
Two had it before and I only gave it to 4 total of the I believe 9 or 10 type changes I handed out
Giving serperior more speed on top of stab Draco meteor was baffling to watch. Even with the ice type buff this gen, contrary stab Draco meteor possibly with dragon terra and choice specs is crazy to think about. Ice, fairy and trick room would be decent counters (especially trick room) but outside of that I doubt even steel types would be able to stop that.
Maybe quaquavels typing can stay the same, since legendaries won't always be in the format, especially in the current one. The changes to its stats can stay though, as it makes aqua step even better.
For Sceptile, I would have gone the opposite way and leaned in heavily to it being a physical attacker. Leaf blade used to be its signature move after all. It should really be a physical glass canon.
Personally, I wouldn't do THIS many dragon starters, but because this is a more competitive type video I'll let it slide
I really like how similar the meganium buff is to the one in radical red
I’m still praying we get Grass Fairy Meganium as a mega or new “hisui-like” form in the new region 😭
Typhlosion my favorite pokemon but it really need its hidden ability change to drought and it need earth power
That'd go hard ngl
Scorching sand is ok
fwiw earth power going for spdef drops asw as having a naturally higher base power is decent at least
I would also change A-Decidueye's hidden Ability. Super luck instead of Long Reach. Not much but still fits the "archer" vibe and giving a better ability that can work in tandem with Leaf Blade and Shadow Claw (altough I think Spirit Shackle should have high crit ratio too but that's just me lol).
Super luck could be cool but as you said kinda defeats spirit shackle existing if it'd aim for crit sets. Giving spirit shackle like 1 stage increased crit tho would solve that issue
@@oLivSama That's what I was thinking. I know it's not exactly the purpose of the video (changing only the mons not the moves), but I couldn't help it. Owl boi is my fav starter and it needs all the help it can get in competitive lol