Thank you to Holzkern for sponsoring this video! Click my link www.holzkern.com/adef and use my code adef at checkout to save 15% on your holiday gifts site-wide for a limited time only! Corrections: • Pokerus doesn’t work the same in the most recent generation • starting in gen 6, EVs are capped at 252 flatly • macho brace doubles all EVs; the other power items add a flat bonus of EVs to a certain stat • you can also use power items to transfer one specific IV to an egg from breeding • there are some GREAT comments below that I’ve heart-ed explaining that my explanation of destiny knot inheritance is incomplete, and why. Please find them and read!! They do a better job at summarizing than I could!!
Starting in gen 7, the Power Items now add 8 to the EV instead of 4. Also, the Power items allow passing specific IVs when breeding, for example, a pokemon holding the Power Weight(HP) will always pass its HP IV to the child when breeding.
@@OsirusIrdia It is *primarily* a kids game, just because adults can enjoy it does not mean they are the primary target That’s like saying Shrek is an adult movie because it has some adult jokes, its E for Everyone, but in order to be E for Everyone, you need to focus your content to be enjoyable for children primarily
@@OsirusIrdiaWhen I stopped being a kid I stopped being interested in Pokemon. I'm sure that goes for most people as they get older because it's primarily a series for kids.
There are 4 things you missed about EVs. Starting in gen 6, the EV cap for a stat was lowered to 252 to prevent wasting any EVs, and before gen 8, vitamins couldn't raise EVs above 100. Then there are the EV reducing berries, which all reduce the corresponding stat by 10 EVs and increase friendship as a bonus. And there are the 7 mochi from the Scarlet and Violet Teal Mask DLC; 6 of the mochi are equivalent to vitamins for their corresponding stat and the 7th can fully reset all stats to 0 EVs.
He actually missed more then 4 things. He mentioned the power items giving double the EV's, but that's wrong. The Macho brace gives double the EVs, the power items gave +4 EVs in gens 4-6 and +8 EVs from gen 7 onwards. And seeing how specific you are with the gen 9 mochi, which may or may not end up being gen 9 exclusive you also forgot about other generation exclusive methods like super training
@@MatijaReby they never gave double. it was +4 from gen 4 to 6, then +8 from gen 7 onwards. the only item that gave double EVs was the macho brace, but that's not what Adef showed on screen
my guess for as to why the +5/+10 exists is to prevent a stat being 0 at lvl 1 and breaking things take shuckle for example, with its 5 base speed at lvl 1 and assume no IVs or EVs you get (2*5+0+0)*1/100 giving 0.1 and after floor 0 so adding the +5 prevents this stat from being 0 which is probably easier to code around
I think this is true for low levels in general to help balance the game. Your defense going from 1->2 is VERY different than your defense going from 6->7 (instead of halving all damage, you’re only decreasing damage taken by less than 20%). The first battles would be drastically different without those buffers
similar situation for HP, the +10+level means the absolute lowest amount of HP a Pokemon can have at level 1 is 11; in fact, a pokemon would need at least a base HP of 50 to have any more than that at level 1 I think it also plays into the damage formula and how the base damage dealt (before modifiers like typing, critical hits, weather, certain abilities like Flash Fire, etc) is also based in part on level
@@IceMetalPunk maybe, though working in increments of 5/10 is extremely common in rpgs. It is due to balancing, but only at low levels. JoeSmith already explained it in this thread. Other than that it's legit just clean and easy to keep track of.
You could also risk a divide by zero error if defence is 0 on a low level pokemon. I wonder if 5 is the minimum number for avoiding a 0 stat with a minus nature and in max in battle statdrops or if 5 just looked better than 3 or 4
This is exactly correct, but it's incomplete. +1 would have solved the mathematical problem -- so why did they pick +5 in particular? That, I think, is a matter of balancing the game at low levels.
@@codahighland Probably because 1 HP is as good as 0 HP in a battle, I guess you need more if you don't want to get KO'd by every attack. But I wouldn't be surprised if there was some insane number trick behind the 5 to balance certain things even at higher levels. The ingenuity of game developers when it comes to stuff like this is insane to me.
@@codahighlandIn gen 1, each stat has 10 bits to represent it, but the damage calculation takes only 8 bits of attack and defense. To account for this, if your attack is above 255, and thus require a 9th bit, It would shift both the attack and defense over by 1. If you had an attack stat 512 or greater, and the opponent had a defense of 4, the effective defense stat in the calculation would be 0, and thus destroy the universe.
Weirdly, pokerus does exist in gen nine, but it has no effect. However I believe you can transfer an infected mon in gen 9 to gen 8, and it will gain the benefits of the virus
Two corrections: • Eggs don't generate IVs when they hatch, they generate them when you get the egg. Otherwise you could soft reset one step away from hatching an egg until you get the set you want. • The Destiny Knot guarantees 5 IVs will be passed down from either parent, not just the one holding it. Normally this is 3 so the Destiny Knot leaves the egg's IVs less to chance, but the odds of getting a specific one aren't that high. For the record, the Destiny Knot does not stack with the power items. If you have both parents hold one each, the egg will still only get 5 IVs passed down from its parents, one of which will be guaranteed every time. Happy you basically gave permission for this at the end :-)
You can find some corrections to some things from the the video in my pinned comment. Thank you to all the kind folks who have pointed out the inaccuracies and said how it actually is. Apologies!!!
As a VGC player, I highly appreciate the way some of the stuff in this video was explained. The guys in the scene try their best but having someone actually explain how and why some things work in the formula is much more clarifying, at least to me.
@@aeong2889nah, competitive pokemon is unique in that training your pokemon is half the effort. But I do agree that they should make acquiring some mons easier.
@aeong2889 I don't disagree with the idea that all of it are cumbersome, but the idea of genned mons being competitive legal kinda beats the whole spirit of the game
@@jamesaditya5254 Idk but in VGC for most players the "spirit of the game" isn't about going through all of these hoops just to get one viable pokemon but the strategy and the execution on the battlefield
At 16:20, I think the +10 is specifically for the very weak Pokémon. Poor Sunkern at level 1, no EVs or IVs, would otherwise have a pitiful one HP with its 30 base HP; it would literally die if breathed at the wrong way. Thus, those bonus numbers are meant to keep the low level Pokémon above certain minimum acceptable parameters, is my guess. In the case of HP, it makes sense they want to reserve the depressing sight of single digit numbers for Pokémon like Shedinja that are never meant to survive a damaging attack. The same applies to the other formula, too: without the +5, Sunkern would be literally zero in all stats in this situation.
I really want a video about how the Roman Empire fell and why it was because of their number system after watching this. "Odoacer had less infantry than the Romans on paper, but because the number system is terrible, Romulus Augustulus misread the number of troops and failed to fortify the city of Ravenna properly." That probably didn't happen that way, but it would be funny.
15:58 The +5 is making sure a pokemon can't end up with a stat of 0. For example Chansey has a base atk of 5, so for levels 1-9 the inner floor function would return 0, making the end result also 0. So there needs to be an offset. Why 5? Because any smaller integer would still make it possible to end up with a 0 stat inside of battle: Let's say it's 4. Bad nature makes that slightly smaller and it gets floored to 3. Then in battle, you get your stat lowered to -6, which is a 1/4 multiplier. That makes our stat less than 1 which I'm pretty sure gets floored again inside the battle. If you use an offset of 5, that makes the minimum value 1. Except for speed, because paralysis is a thing and it is an additional multiplier of 1/2 (1/4 in earlier gens). I don't know how that interacts. Could be worth trying though (base 5 speed pokemon are Shuckle, Munchlax and Pyukumuku).
@@kylebrainpresents when you use growl, your opponents attack stage goes down by -1 meaning it is 0.66 of the original attack stat, if you use 5 more times it gets to -6 making it 0.25 of the normal attack, and if the original was 3 it would go down to 0.75, and after rounding down it would make it 0
Destiny Knot chooses IVs from both parents at random. If I had a Ditto with perfect stats across the board and bred it with some plebian Zigzagoon I just got on route 1, the knot could theoretically choose stats entirely from the Zigzagoon parent and leave me with a baby with no perfect IVs.
13:20 One line of code isn't always more efficient or faster than three, in this case the one line is doing just as much work as the three would be, and it's just harder to maintain. Most likely, the actual code for this calculation is split up into multiple lines (you can imagine the main floor function is stored as an intermediate result, then the final touches get applied to it based on whether we're calculating HP or another stat), and the monolithic formulas are summaries made by data miners
yes, this. the datamined formula is /functionally/ identical to the original code. but the nicest and/or most succinct mathematical representation of a calculation isn't always the best way of coding that calculation (and the original code isn't necessarily what you'll end up with when disassembling/decompiling that program, and the compiler is going to optimize the code during compilation anyway, and all of those are abstractions that often don't look very similar to the sequence of instructions the CPU actually executes to do the calculation... there's a number of different steps that could change the final representation we end up with)
@@amconners I'm so glad you mentioned all of that. I'm only aware of the formulas because I familiarized myself with them while doing ROM Hacking, and this exact thing was why I was struggling to make changes to stat calculation. I mostly knew this was why at the time, but it's nice to see just how far it goes LMAO
This guy: "Every profession or hobby has a confusing thing" My brain: "A monad is just a monoid in the category of endofunctors" Me, a computer programmer: "Yep, that checks out"
Even with corrections this is by far the best and most succinct explanation for Pokemon stats I've ever seen. I've been around the competitive Pokemon community in some form since gen 3, and until this video I wouldn't have even been able to tell you specifically what '50 base speed' MEANT outside of the fact it's relatively faster or slower than other base speeds.
The irony of the character in the sponsor segment going to an *improv* show and insisting on performing *written* material 😂 "Well, I improvised this on the spot.... last week, with five drafts and a handful of edits."
Some incorrect information here. For one, as of generation 6, evs do actually cap out at 252, not 255. Also pokerus doesnt only double evs gained while infected, it doubles them PERMANENTLY for that pokemon. Even after pokerus is healed, it still gains double evs for life.
the pkrs confusion is pretty easy to explain: even in game, a pkrs pokemon is forever marked by pkrs. It isnt "curing" the "ailment" as much as it is removing contagiousness. if you have the letters, it is contagious, if it has a purple face symbol, it is not contagious, maybe even asymptomatic. The reason you dont want to "heal" pkrs is so that it more easily spreads through your boxes, though if anything, the warning does the exact opposite for casuals. (My first experience with pkrs as a kid: "your pokemon is infected with something." "oh no, heal it please!" "congratulations, you stopped the outbreak of a POSITIVE STATUS!")
Bro this video had me crying laughing. You're a phenomenally talented youtuber with a unique style that I just adore. I remember seeing you at multiple GDQs over the years. I hope the algorithm blesses you, you've found a niche and hopefully it draws people in to learn and laugh as I have. Even the parts I already understood were enjoyable, and your ad segments are entertaining. Good luck!
A few corrections I haven't seen mentioned in the comments yet regarding the Destiny Knot and IV breeding-- By default, in every generation since gen 3, IVs from three stats are passed down via breeding (with a few caveats in gens 3 and 4), and the IVs that are passed down can come from either parent. Starting in gen 6, he Destiny Knot can be held by either parent to increase this number from three to five stats, but which parent the IVs are passed down from is still random. Combining this with one of the Power items can still only result in a maximum of five IVs being passed down (three without the Destiny Knot), it only guarantees that one of the five will be the stat corresponding to the specific Power item. Also in regards to Power items, the mechanic with breeding was only introduced in HGSS, with DPPt not having it, and from gen 7 onward, they grant +8 EVs to their corresponding stat rather than the +4 previously.
Omg the Improv skit for the sponsorship... Adef you are honestly doing fantastic and your scripting and delivery is seriously superb. Excellent work. Just that look alone when he interrupts you a second time is just *chefs kiss*
03:28 Correction (I think) - In breeding, the attributes of an individual Pokemon are determined when the egg is generated, not when the egg hatches. Right?
Yes, the egg is functionally a "Pokemon" in the database. The only difference is that the flag that checks whether it is an egg is set to "true". Other than that, it is identical to its hatched counterpart, i.e. already fully generated.
Adding a way to max out IVs and Natures was one of the best things Pokemon has done for competitive. Now they just need a way to minimize their IVs for Speed.
The +5 and +10 at the end of the stat formulas is probably so at very low levels, your stats aren't just 0. Like, if I take a lvl 1 Sunkern, it has 11 HP and 5 in the rest. Without these +5 +10 it would have 1 HP and quite literally 0 in the rest. It's also why the damage formula has a +2 at some point, so at low level you still deal some damage (and that's what makes multi hit moves busted in little cup)
The +5 in the stat formula exists to stabilize damage calculation at very low levels. The damage formula computes a number based on the power of the attack and level of the attacker, then multiplies it by the ratio between the attacker's relevant attacking stat and the defender's relevant defending stat, then adds 2, then applies all the other modifiers multiplicatively (type effectiveness, STAB, critical hit, etc.). So in effect, the ratio of attacking stat to defending stat is *basically* a multiplicative modifier to the damage as well. If you're using a physical move and your attack stat is twice their defense stat, then the damage you deal will be roughly twice as much as what it would have been if the stats were equal, and similarly if your attack stat is half of their defense, then the move would do roughly half as much instead (note: because the +2 is added after the A/D multiplier, the actual difference in damage isn't quite equal to the A/D ratio, but unless the damage value prior to applying A/D is extremely low it's a close enough approximation for illustrative purposes). Since the A/D ratio is *basically* a multiplicative modifier, the impact it has on the move's damage becomes exponentially larger the further away it gets from 1. In most cases a 2:1 or 1:2 ratio on a neutral move is effectively the same as using a SE or NVE move respectively. And since it's *basically* a modifier, it *basically* stacks multiplicatively with other modifiers. A 2:1 A/D ratio can effectively turn a resisted move into a neutral move, or a SE move to quad effective. A 1:2 A/D ratio can effectively turn a neutral move into a NVE one, or a SE move to a neutral one, etc. etc. etc. And unlike other modifiers, there isn't really an intrinsic restriction on how high or low the ratio can be. If your level 100 Garchomp's attack is 50x their level 3 Pidgey's defense, your neutral Dragon Claw will be 50x effective. This is the underlying mechanism behind why over-leveled and legendary Pokemon will one-shot everything and take no damage in return. Really the only regulation on this in competitive comes from the simple fact that every Pokemon is the same level and that people tend to avoid Pokemon with low stats. Outside of stat boosts, it's pretty difficult to find a Pokemon whose attack or defense is consistently multiple times higher than your opponent's defense or attack. Back to the +5 thing. Pokemon who are very low level (let's say 5 or less) have very low stats. There's also very little variation between stats. (Assume 0 EV's and IV's and neutral nature for all stat calculations). At level 3, the difference between a base stat of 30 and 130 is only 6, and given the base stats of the Pokemon one would typically encounter at that level, the vast majority of stats are going to be within 1-3 of each other. In most contexts, if the attack and defense are only 1-3 different, the ratio is still going to be very close to 1, so the difference has a very small impact on damage. But, a level 3 Geodude has 9 attack, and a level 3 Pidgey has 7 defense. If Geodude attacked, their A/D ratio would ~1.29. In a world where the +5 stat increase didn't exist, Geodude's attack would instead be 4, and Pidgey's defense would instead be 2, making the A/D ratio of that attack now 2. So even though the stats across the board are lower, the damage actually got higher. If Pidgey were instead the one attacking, its 7 attack vs. Geodude's 11 defense would be an A/D ratio of ~0.64, and without the +5 boost it would instead be 2 attack vs. 6 defense, dropping the A/D ratio down to ~0.33. If the +5 boost didn't exist and Geodude was just a single level higher, its attack and defense would instead be 6 and 8. If it attacked the same Pidgey, it's A/D ratio would now be 3 instead of 2, and if it were defending a Pidgey attack the ratio would be 0.25 instead of ~0.33. Because it's a ratio between such small numbers, even a single point change will drastically change it. Basically, for low level Pokemon in this system, tanky Pokemon get way tankier, frail Pokemon get way frailer, strong Pokemon get way stronger, and weak Pokemon get way weaker. Adding a flat number to the stats is a pretty elegant solution to this. It makes very little difference at higher levels, but it effectively dampens and smooths out stat variations at low levels. If the absolute minimum stat a Pokemon can have is 5, then in order to achieve an A/D ratio of 2 your Pokemon would at minimum need to have an attack stat that's 5 higher than their defense, or vice versa for a ratio of .5. The concept of adding flat numbers to the components of the ratio is actually also what makes EV's and IV's so impactful. Fundamentally, increasing the numerator and denominator of a ratio by the same amount will always alter the ratio to be closer to 1, so the flat stat increase that both Pokemon would get from having 31 IV's in their attacking and defending stats has the exact same damping and smoothing effect on the ratio as the +5 boost. EV's are a really interesting mechanic because they can both dampen and amplify the ratio depending on how they're applied. Since you only have enough EV's to fully max 2 stats, there is a lot of variation to how you can spread them out, and different EV spreads will effect the ratio differently depending on how many are on the attacking stat and how many are on the defending stat. And because the amount of stats 252 EV's gives you is so high (32 at level 50), having max attack vs. 0 defense ends up increasing the ratio pretty drastically, 0 attack vs. max defense decreases the ratio drastically, and max attack vs. max defense ends up dampening the ratio more than IV's and the +5 boost combined.
important thing to remember about stat boosting items and abilities: items like eviolite and abilities like huge power apply their multipliers after evs and ivs, meaning they're greater than boosting the base stat. for example, huge power doubles your attack stat, so if you have maximum attacks evs and ivs, you double your base attack *and* add an extra 99 at level 100. looking at azumarill, you may expect huge power to double its 50 base attack to 100, but in actuality you'll be hitting almost as hard as groudon, who has 150 base attack
For the Destiny Knot being held by one of the pokémon parents, shouldn't the chance of a given stat being inherited from that specific parent be 5/12? Since it's 5/6 stats but it could still be from either parent
And the actual most reliable way to get one specific IV inherited from one specific parent is to have that parent hold the corresponding power item (in the case of speed it would be the power anklet).
@@ddot9885 Everywhere I look says it just guarantees five of the Pokemon's IVs will be inherited from its parents (as opposed to the normal 3). I can't find any source saying it's specifically inheriting from the parent holding the knot.
Discovered you from your comment on point crow’s newest video when someone said you made Pokemon content. I appreciate that your channel is 90% Pokemon content and I wasn’t betrayed
If we assume you get a Pokemon with a base stat less than 50 at level 1, the first floor function would give us a 0. If the base stat is between 50 and 99 , the first floor function would give us a 1 now, but without the +5 and with a detrimental nature, the stat would be less than 1 and, therefore, equal to 0 with the last floor function. That +5 is the real MVP of that formula for guaranteeing any stat is always a positive number.
6:13 My mood is "stabbed through the heart, the weapon is still inside and it's getting very painful, today was the first day in years that my heart didn't hurt, this is normal for me".
8:25 Specifically, it's that the child inherits 5 of the 12 IVs from either parent, regardless of who holds the Destiny Knot (without the item, 3 of 12 get passed down). If two IVs for the same stat are chosen, the mother's (or non-Ditto parent's) IV takes priority and the other is discarded, reducing the number of IVs that actually get passed down.
the addition of 5 is to handle an edge case where the floor division results in 0 for a stat. this can happen for a level 1 chansey which has 5 base attack and 0 IVs and EVs. so we add 5, and then the nature effect results in a final stat value no less than 4.
Small correction: Egg stats are generated the moment the egg is generated, not when it hatches. You can't soft reset to change anything about the Pokemon in the egg except for OT and, by proxy, shininess - trading the egg to another trainer and having them hatch changes whether it's shiny or not (prior to Gen 8). It's by this principle that you can get around the Manaphy egg shiny lock in Gen 4, but obviously, this is different in Gen 8 as they changed how shininess is determined.
13:08 To my knowledge, the Pokérus effect remains even after the pokémon is cured. It just wont be able to infect new Pokémon with the Pokérus. So if your pokémon ever had Pokérus, the EV multiplier remains forever.
15:54 A leftover from Gen 1 where a weird quirk could result in the game dividing by a defensive stat of 0 when calculating damage and softlocking as a result. The +5 was to ensure a stat was never less than 4 (but could be anyway thanks to stat modifiers, whoops!), which would trigger this if the attacker's attacking stat was greater than 255. Additionally, after Gen 3, an out of battle stat can't go below 4 with this formula.
alot of people have already pointed out that the +5 is to prevent stats from hitting 0, but im pretty shure it also serves as a balancing tool for the early game to put all the pokemon on a more even level
Since Gen 6 EVs max out at 252 instead of 255. Which I’m sure is something everyone can appreciate since it reduces worry and headaches from trying to avoid wasting EVs.
This episode was SO GOOOD i love the depiction of theyr abusive relationship and the was it uses Nemuscapacity for self destruction even for a parent so abusive that is y he thaught her to be perfect. Also the animation looks SO MUCH BETTER than in the fiirst half genuinly fantastic.
Would have been cool to show a practical example of a min vs max configuration and practically demonstrate how much of a difference results in the stats and in the damage dealt with an attack
Great explanation, and I've watched many for fun over the years. I made 1 or 2 competitive teams in Emerald (way way back), X/Y, ORAS, and mostly stopped playing the mainline games after that. But I loved Pokemon Showdown online for quickly building any competitive team I wanted and engaging with an actual meta. Copied and tweaked dozens of teams, made a few original ones for UU and OU as well. So fascinating, but I can't imagine the effort it would take to respond to a meta in mainline game by re-breeding, move learning, re-EV-training, etc to get that delicate spread you actually want /right now/, not 10 hours from now.
The importance of the nature was new to me. Didn't realize that it was the last multiplication step. Might be good to include how you essentially have a 1/26 chance to get the nature you want (barring the neutral ones), and what could help you get your desired nature. Which I think are everstones when breeding, Synchronize ability in battles, and if it's Scarlet/Violet, those new mint items.
THANK YOU for starting by explaining what the number in "Base Stat" actually means. It is surprisingly annoying to get a simple answer to this seemingly simple question!
minor correction, i believe the destiny knot being held by one parent allows the egg to inherit 5 of the 6 stats from _either_ parent, not just the parent holding it. so if one parent had all IVs at 0, and the other had all IVs at 31, and one of them was holding a destiny knot, the egg would have a 50/50 chance for 5 of its stats to be 0 or 31 (the 6th is completely random).
if I had to guess, the additive terms exist to avoid potential values of zero to avoid division by zero errors later down the road in damage calculation
I love this guy so much dude I’m learning math and how to smack everyone I play in a Pokemon battle for all eternity cause this video was perfect you answered every question anyone will ever have about this
FINALLY. I've been so confused about these for so long. I had a general understanding of what they were (IVs are fixed and you can change EVs), but I had no idea what having IVs or EVs actually did other than just "they make your stats better!"
There's another really good comment mentioning how the +5 and (+ level + 10) modifiers exist as a failsafe to make sure that Pokemon stats will not under any circumstances be 0. This is partially true, but they used the most extreme example of a level 1 Shuckle, so I wanna expand on that! In every generation up until 4, since eggs hatched at level 5, there was no way to get a Pokemon at level 1, the weakest was always level 2. The reason for that was that the gen 1 and 2 games had a glitch wherein Pokemon with the Medium Slow exp group were calculated to have -54 experience at level 1, causing an underflow glitch bringing them to level 100 upon completing a battle, provided they don't get enough exp to make up for that negative difference. This glitch was fixed in gen 3 because the mechanics of exp curves were changed to use a lookup table rather than a formula, but they didn't end up revising the breeding mechanics to make level 1 Pokemon accessible until gen 4. Essentially, the stat formula was originally designed with level 2 as the minimum in mind. This difference isn't entirely significant, because there are still very frequent cases where a Pokemon at low level would have 0 in a stat without those modifiers, and so the formula works exactly as well at level 1 as it does at level 2, but I think it is interesting to note. To be even more specific, at level 2, it takes a minimum of base 25 in a stat to hit the point where any given stat would be 1 pre-modifier even assuming a positive nature, and a minimum of base 50 with a negative nature. More than just Pokemon like Shuckle with an extremely low stat, a very large portion of unevolved early game Pokemon would fail to meet that threshold, and so, that +5 is doing a lot of heavy lifting. The rest of the reason is just game balance. First and foremost, Pokemon is an RPG, and so, from a game design perspective, they need to balance the game with the singleplayer experience in mind. A very simple alternative to what they did would have been to hard code it so that the minimum the stat calculation function can pump out will always be 1. All it'd take is an if statement, something along the lines of "if (stat) < 1, then (stat) = 1". However, if Pokemon at very low levels could have 1 in their stats, then battles would work out to being boring in the early game, which is an absolute death sentence for game devs who ostensibly want people to play the whole game. Adding +5 to most stats, and (+ level + 10) to HP, very neatly fixes this potential issue. Those modifiers are doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sense. So, tl;dr, beyond the factor of trying to avoid gamebreaking calculations involving a stat being 0 or god forbid negative, I believe the primary purpose of the modifiers at the end of the stat formula is to make it so that the early game in singleplayer is able to be fun for players, rather than the alternative of being stuck with 1 stat point in any of your stats for any amount of time.
Another slight complication that warrants mentioning: In generation 3 onward, the game is hardcoded to bypass the stat formula entirely and always leave it at 1 point specifically in the case that a Pokemon's base HP is exactly 1. The reasoning for this is, fairly obviously, as a simple way to make Shedinja's gimmick work, as it is the only Pokemon in the series that has base 1 HP.
i enjoy content like this with raw calculations and formulas like the one's that got me interested in shoddy cast "THE SCIENCE" series and matt pat game theory before it changed hosts which have their own charms but they're not the same in terms of scientific analysis that i enjoy such as from you and matt pat or shoddy cast, so thank you for sticking true to the style you enjoy creating because i certainly love it. ^.^
Well, it may be a one line equation, but it’s definitely going to take more than one line of code to calculate all of that. Especially considering Base, IV, EV, Level and Nature are all going to be variables (likely arrays, especially for Natures) that are defined elsewhere, which are each different lines of code.
Some minor errors I noticed: - Destiny Knot doesn't transfer 5IVs from the Pokemon holding the item, it changes the inherited IVs from 3 to 5. Hatched Pokemon inherit 3 IVs chosen at random across their parents' 12 stats. Destiny Knot changes this to 5. It's still random which parents the combination of 5 IVs are pulled from - The maximum number of EVs in one stat since Gen VI (X/Y/ORAS) was reduced from 255 to 252, which means it's no longer possible to waste those three EVs - Vitamins can only raise a stat's EVs to maximum in Gen VIII and IX (SwSh/BDSP/SV). Prior to this, you could not use vitamins to raise a stat's EVs above 100, even if the previous EVs were acquired by battling wild Pokemon - Power Items don't double EVs. They add a flat +4 to their particular stat whenever a Pokemon holding the item gains EVs from KOing wild Pokemon. For example, my Pokemon is holding the Power Anklet to train Speed and KO's a Gyarados (+2 Atk EVs). My Pokemon gains the 2 Atk EVs from the Gyarados and then gains 4 Speed EVs from the Power Anklet (Macho Brace is the item that doubles all EVs but is generally less efficient if you're manually EV training Pokemon by KOing wild Pokemon) BONUS: Pokerus doubles ALL EV gains from KOing wild Pokemon, including both the Power Items (+8 now) and stacks with Macho Brace. Don't ask me to fact check any of the math stuff though, I'm just a dude who has hatched altogether too many Pokemon eggs in my time.
There were 5 stats (Sp. Att and Sp. Def were combined). Each DV was worth 2 points instead of 1, and ranged from 0-15. And only 4 of them were random, HP was calculated from the others. EVs were also completely different, usually called ‘Stat Experience’, but that’s a whole other can of worms.
okay ... basically they are "kind of the same" but they work differently internally. As mentioned, DVs are kinda like IVs but with more "early technology awkwardness". Stat Experience is like EVs, but the main difference is that you may max out all of them. Also, there are a lot of internal differences, but these don't actually matter THAT much in practice (e.g. Stat Exp goes up to 65535 but as the formula takes the square root of the Stat Exp value, that effectively comes down to 255 in the end, just like with EVs) Also, for both DVs and Stat Experience, both special stats share one DV and Stat Exp. value respectively in gen 2, in order to ensure compatibility with the generation 1 games.
5:30 It actually does not change their individual values. Rather, it alters the stats to match what they would be with those values. For breeding, it is still inherited with the original values, for example. Same with mints.
Thank you to Holzkern for sponsoring this video! Click my link www.holzkern.com/adef and use my code adef at checkout to save 15% on your holiday gifts site-wide for a limited time only!
Corrections:
• Pokerus doesn’t work the same in the most recent generation
• starting in gen 6, EVs are capped at 252 flatly
• macho brace doubles all EVs; the other power items add a flat bonus of EVs to a certain stat
• you can also use power items to transfer one specific IV to an egg from breeding
• there are some GREAT comments below that I’ve heart-ed explaining that my explanation of destiny knot inheritance is incomplete, and why. Please find them and read!! They do a better job at summarizing than I could!!
Great sponsored segment. Makes me actually watch through it and consider looking into it. Also great work on the video!! Appreciate the uploads
Thanks adef 🙏
I don't even play Pokémon but I love your videos.
also in terms of the Romans, 2024 AD would be MMDCCLXXVIII
@@Balablaaa you think its just another bit, but its actually a sponsored section 😂
Starting in gen 7, the Power Items now add 8 to the EV instead of 4. Also, the Power items allow passing specific IVs when breeding, for example, a pokemon holding the Power Weight(HP) will always pass its HP IV to the child when breeding.
Deriving a formula from a 20 year old children's game AND Roman numerals? You're too good to us, white boy in front of green screen
With microphone!
not a children's game. nintendo markets to kids and adults.
@@OsirusIrdia
It is *primarily* a kids game, just because adults can enjoy it does not mean they are the primary target
That’s like saying Shrek is an adult movie because it has some adult jokes, its E for Everyone, but in order to be E for Everyone, you need to focus your content to be enjoyable for children primarily
@@justadummy8076 thats called marketing to everyone, not specifically kids. Do u see the nuance here?
@@OsirusIrdiaWhen I stopped being a kid I stopped being interested in Pokemon. I'm sure that goes for most people as they get older because it's primarily a series for kids.
There are 4 things you missed about EVs. Starting in gen 6, the EV cap for a stat was lowered to 252 to prevent wasting any EVs, and before gen 8, vitamins couldn't raise EVs above 100. Then there are the EV reducing berries, which all reduce the corresponding stat by 10 EVs and increase friendship as a bonus. And there are the 7 mochi from the Scarlet and Violet Teal Mask DLC; 6 of the mochi are equivalent to vitamins for their corresponding stat and the 7th can fully reset all stats to 0 EVs.
That sounds really nice and not just cuz I really like mochi. 😋
There's also the fact that the Power items give you 8 extra EVs of the relevant stat nowadays instead of double
@@MatijaReby Isnt it 12?
I might be dum tho
He actually missed more then 4 things.
He mentioned the power items giving double the EV's, but that's wrong. The Macho brace gives double the EVs, the power items gave +4 EVs in gens 4-6 and +8 EVs from gen 7 onwards.
And seeing how specific you are with the gen 9 mochi, which may or may not end up being gen 9 exclusive you also forgot about other generation exclusive methods like super training
@@MatijaReby they never gave double. it was +4 from gen 4 to 6, then +8 from gen 7 onwards. the only item that gave double EVs was the macho brace, but that's not what Adef showed on screen
Pokemon also has Eevees, they very important
And Ivy(saur)s!
and IVs (Unown)
@@azuredrew the most incorrect thing in this video is expecting both of these jokes in his opening and getting neither
And I have HIV!
@@LorxZoroxfun fact: in Gen 2, unown I and V are the only unown letters that can be shiny!
my guess for as to why the +5/+10 exists is to prevent a stat being 0 at lvl 1 and breaking things
take shuckle for example, with its 5 base speed at lvl 1 and assume no IVs or EVs
you get (2*5+0+0)*1/100 giving 0.1 and after floor 0
so adding the +5 prevents this stat from being 0 which is probably easier to code around
I think this is true for low levels in general to help balance the game. Your defense going from 1->2 is VERY different than your defense going from 6->7 (instead of halving all damage, you’re only decreasing damage taken by less than 20%). The first battles would be drastically different without those buffers
similar situation for HP, the +10+level means the absolute lowest amount of HP a Pokemon can have at level 1 is 11; in fact, a pokemon would need at least a base HP of 50 to have any more than that at level 1
I think it also plays into the damage formula and how the base damage dealt (before modifiers like typing, critical hits, weather, certain abilities like Flash Fire, etc) is also based in part on level
I agree, but I think it's a little more balancing than that as well, otherwise they'd have added 1 instead of 5/10.
@@IceMetalPunk maybe, though working in increments of 5/10 is extremely common in rpgs. It is due to balancing, but only at low levels. JoeSmith already explained it in this thread. Other than that it's legit just clean and easy to keep track of.
You could also risk a divide by zero error if defence is 0 on a low level pokemon. I wonder if 5 is the minimum number for avoiding a 0 stat with a minus nature and in max in battle statdrops or if 5 just looked better than 3 or 4
I bet the +5 is basically just so that low level pokemon don't end up with zeros probably.
This is exactly correct, but it's incomplete. +1 would have solved the mathematical problem -- so why did they pick +5 in particular? That, I think, is a matter of balancing the game at low levels.
@@codahighland Probably because 1 HP is as good as 0 HP in a battle, I guess you need more if you don't want to get KO'd by every attack. But I wouldn't be surprised if there was some insane number trick behind the 5 to balance certain things even at higher levels. The ingenuity of game developers when it comes to stuff like this is insane to me.
@@knoblauchbrotbiszumtod1278 say that first sentence to Shedinja 😤
@@JoeSmith-db4rqYeah but with any other ability Shedinja dies even faster.
@@codahighlandIn gen 1, each stat has 10 bits to represent it, but the damage calculation takes only 8 bits of attack and defense. To account for this, if your attack is above 255, and thus require a 9th bit, It would shift both the attack and defense over by 1. If you had an attack stat 512 or greater, and the opponent had a defense of 4, the effective defense stat in the calculation would be 0, and thus destroy the universe.
Adef, I’m so sorry to tell you that Pokérus doesn’t exist in gen IX anymore
you can really tell it was the first game made after the pandemic, rip
Weirdly, pokerus does exist in gen nine, but it has no effect. However I believe you can transfer an infected mon in gen 9 to gen 8, and it will gain the benefits of the virus
They fucking removed pokerus?
THEY WHAT
Pokemon cannot be transferred backwards through generations. IE once a pokemon has gone into gen 9 it cannot go back to 8. @@Shadowbane0
Two corrections:
• Eggs don't generate IVs when they hatch, they generate them when you get the egg. Otherwise you could soft reset one step away from hatching an egg until you get the set you want.
• The Destiny Knot guarantees 5 IVs will be passed down from either parent, not just the one holding it. Normally this is 3 so the Destiny Knot leaves the egg's IVs less to chance, but the odds of getting a specific one aren't that high.
For the record, the Destiny Knot does not stack with the power items. If you have both parents hold one each, the egg will still only get 5 IVs passed down from its parents, one of which will be guaranteed every time.
Happy you basically gave permission for this at the end :-)
This is the comment (droid) I was looking for 😈🥚
Yes exactly! I was sure I remember the Destiny Knot being like this
You can find some corrections to some things from the the video in my pinned comment. Thank you to all the kind folks who have pointed out the inaccuracies and said how it actually is. Apologies!!!
Only the Macho Brace doubles EVs gained. The Power items add 4 EVs of the specific stat.
It was increased to 8 in gen 7
0:16 missed opportunity for ivy’s (pokemon professor) and eevee’s
As a VGC player, I highly appreciate the way some of the stuff in this video was explained. The guys in the scene try their best but having someone actually explain how and why some things work in the formula is much more clarifying, at least to me.
They should just allow gen'ed pokemon imo, and skip all of this hubris. Guys just wanna battle with pokemon
@@aeong2889nah, competitive pokemon is unique in that training your pokemon is half the effort. But I do agree that they should make acquiring some mons easier.
@@jamesaditya5254 ask any pro player, they'd choose an option that would skip all breeding, training, etc.
@aeong2889 I don't disagree with the idea that all of it are cumbersome, but the idea of genned mons being competitive legal kinda beats the whole spirit of the game
@@jamesaditya5254 Idk but in VGC for most players the "spirit of the game" isn't about going through all of these hoops just to get one viable pokemon but the strategy and the execution on the battlefield
Conspiracy theorists: Of course they wouldn't teach you about this in school
What they didn't teach me about in school: The floor function
man, I wish I learned about the functionality of floors. I've always wondered what their purpose was. Why is my floor made out of floor?
At 16:20, I think the +10 is specifically for the very weak Pokémon. Poor Sunkern at level 1, no EVs or IVs, would otherwise have a pitiful one HP with its 30 base HP; it would literally die if breathed at the wrong way. Thus, those bonus numbers are meant to keep the low level Pokémon above certain minimum acceptable parameters, is my guess. In the case of HP, it makes sense they want to reserve the depressing sight of single digit numbers for Pokémon like Shedinja that are never meant to survive a damaging attack. The same applies to the other formula, too: without the +5, Sunkern would be literally zero in all stats in this situation.
I really want a video about how the Roman Empire fell and why it was because of their number system after watching this. "Odoacer had less infantry than the Romans on paper, but because the number system is terrible, Romulus Augustulus misread the number of troops and failed to fortify the city of Ravenna properly."
That probably didn't happen that way, but it would be funny.
Love your content abyssoft super peak
15:58 The +5 is making sure a pokemon can't end up with a stat of 0. For example Chansey has a base atk of 5, so for levels 1-9 the inner floor function would return 0, making the end result also 0. So there needs to be an offset. Why 5? Because any smaller integer would still make it possible to end up with a 0 stat inside of battle: Let's say it's 4. Bad nature makes that slightly smaller and it gets floored to 3. Then in battle, you get your stat lowered to -6, which is a 1/4 multiplier. That makes our stat less than 1 which I'm pretty sure gets floored again inside the battle. If you use an offset of 5, that makes the minimum value 1. Except for speed, because paralysis is a thing and it is an additional multiplier of 1/2 (1/4 in earlier gens). I don't know how that interacts. Could be worth trying though (base 5 speed pokemon are Shuckle, Munchlax and Pyukumuku).
also interesting to note that Shedinja's HP stat doesn't use this formula at all. But I'm glad somebody elaborated the +5, thumbs up.
Burn also halves physical attack.
Actually it halves the power of the move, because body press gets halved and it uses the defense stat
New to Pokémon, what does lowered to -6 mean?
@@kylebrainpresents when you use growl, your opponents attack stage goes down by -1 meaning it is 0.66 of the original attack stat, if you use 5 more times it gets to -6 making it 0.25 of the normal attack, and if the original was 3 it would go down to 0.75, and after rounding down it would make it 0
1:06 So we're finally going to learn which Pokémon should be able to learn dive?
Very good question!
Destiny Knot chooses IVs from both parents at random. If I had a Ditto with perfect stats across the board and bred it with some plebian Zigzagoon I just got on route 1, the knot could theoretically choose stats entirely from the Zigzagoon parent and leave me with a baby with no perfect IVs.
No
Destiny know will make it so 5 of the holders IVs be chosen rather than 3
@@lorekeeper685destiny knot gets five ivs from the parents, but they could be from either parent, not just the destiny knot holder
@@lorekeeper685 This may be a generational change, but in the current games, and according to Bulbapedia, it's both parents.
@@patrickmohr6985 Huh
I remember reading it was the parent somewhere weird
I've been doing competitive Pokemon since gen 3 it is always been both parents @@patrickmohr6985
Just in time for my annual Pokémon Fixation! Thank you!
What do you mean I had my annual fixation only two months ago?!
Just in time for my daily pokemon fixation
Just in time for my I binged his channel in one night oh no what is happening help me!
13:20 One line of code isn't always more efficient or faster than three, in this case the one line is doing just as much work as the three would be, and it's just harder to maintain. Most likely, the actual code for this calculation is split up into multiple lines (you can imagine the main floor function is stored as an intermediate result, then the final touches get applied to it based on whether we're calculating HP or another stat), and the monolithic formulas are summaries made by data miners
yes, this. the datamined formula is /functionally/ identical to the original code. but the nicest and/or most succinct mathematical representation of a calculation isn't always the best way of coding that calculation (and the original code isn't necessarily what you'll end up with when disassembling/decompiling that program, and the compiler is going to optimize the code during compilation anyway, and all of those are abstractions that often don't look very similar to the sequence of instructions the CPU actually executes to do the calculation... there's a number of different steps that could change the final representation we end up with)
@@amconners I'm so glad you mentioned all of that. I'm only aware of the formulas because I familiarized myself with them while doing ROM Hacking, and this exact thing was why I was struggling to make changes to stat calculation. I mostly knew this was why at the time, but it's nice to see just how far it goes LMAO
This guy: "Every profession or hobby has a confusing thing"
My brain: "A monad is just a monoid in the category of endofunctors"
Me, a computer programmer: "Yep, that checks out"
Gen 10 desperately needs to introduce the Rusty Bottlecap to set an IV to 0.
Even with corrections this is by far the best and most succinct explanation for Pokemon stats I've ever seen. I've been around the competitive Pokemon community in some form since gen 3, and until this video I wouldn't have even been able to tell you specifically what '50 base speed' MEANT outside of the fact it's relatively faster or slower than other base speeds.
Shout out to the Any Austin reference for white boys with green backgrounds
The irony of the character in the sponsor segment going to an *improv* show and insisting on performing *written* material 😂 "Well, I improvised this on the spot.... last week, with five drafts and a handful of edits."
Some incorrect information here. For one, as of generation 6, evs do actually cap out at 252, not 255. Also pokerus doesnt only double evs gained while infected, it doubles them PERMANENTLY for that pokemon. Even after pokerus is healed, it still gains double evs for life.
the pkrs confusion is pretty easy to explain: even in game, a pkrs pokemon is forever marked by pkrs. It isnt "curing" the "ailment" as much as it is removing contagiousness. if you have the letters, it is contagious, if it has a purple face symbol, it is not contagious, maybe even asymptomatic. The reason you dont want to "heal" pkrs is so that it more easily spreads through your boxes, though if anything, the warning does the exact opposite for casuals. (My first experience with pkrs as a kid: "your pokemon is infected with something." "oh no, heal it please!" "congratulations, you stopped the outbreak of a POSITIVE STATUS!")
Bro this video had me crying laughing. You're a phenomenally talented youtuber with a unique style that I just adore. I remember seeing you at multiple GDQs over the years. I hope the algorithm blesses you, you've found a niche and hopefully it draws people in to learn and laugh as I have. Even the parts I already understood were enjoyable, and your ad segments are entertaining. Good luck!
A few corrections I haven't seen mentioned in the comments yet regarding the Destiny Knot and IV breeding--
By default, in every generation since gen 3, IVs from three stats are passed down via breeding (with a few caveats in gens 3 and 4), and the IVs that are passed down can come from either parent. Starting in gen 6, he Destiny Knot can be held by either parent to increase this number from three to five stats, but which parent the IVs are passed down from is still random. Combining this with one of the Power items can still only result in a maximum of five IVs being passed down (three without the Destiny Knot), it only guarantees that one of the five will be the stat corresponding to the specific Power item. Also in regards to Power items, the mechanic with breeding was only introduced in HGSS, with DPPt not having it, and from gen 7 onward, they grant +8 EVs to their corresponding stat rather than the +4 previously.
You are insanely good at getting me to watch the sponsor sections with how entertaining you are
I believe the "+ 5" modifier to every stat (except HP, which is "+ Level + 10") is to guarantee that level 1 pokemon don't have zero in any stat.
can't wait to see how adef manages to traumatize both himself and me this time
takeaways: i'm never going to be good at pokemon
adef is never going to escape the wrath of the comments
Omg the Improv skit for the sponsorship... Adef you are honestly doing fantastic and your scripting and delivery is seriously superb. Excellent work. Just that look alone when he interrupts you a second time is just *chefs kiss*
03:28 Correction (I think) - In breeding, the attributes of an individual Pokemon are determined when the egg is generated, not when the egg hatches. Right?
Yes, the egg is functionally a "Pokemon" in the database. The only difference is that the flag that checks whether it is an egg is set to "true". Other than that, it is identical to its hatched counterpart, i.e. already fully generated.
I hope Holzkern did you good, because this was the first time I've ever intentionally watched an ad. It was a wildly compelling premise
Adding a way to max out IVs and Natures was one of the best things Pokemon has done for competitive.
Now they just need a way to minimize their IVs for Speed.
And ability. Now it’s just do I need 0 IV and do I want shiny, fix the rest later
The +5 and +10 at the end of the stat formulas is probably so at very low levels, your stats aren't just 0. Like, if I take a lvl 1 Sunkern, it has 11 HP and 5 in the rest. Without these +5 +10 it would have 1 HP and quite literally 0 in the rest. It's also why the damage formula has a +2 at some point, so at low level you still deal some damage (and that's what makes multi hit moves busted in little cup)
Love that adef is an AnyAustin fan
Biggest green flag imaginable.
I already knew everything you spoke about and was STILL thoroughly entertained, well done fr
Just realized how best to describe you to someone who's unfamiliar, Drew Gooden but he solves Pokemon with math
HOLY SHIT
The icy Super Mario Galaxy background is such a specific place but I love your choice of it
The +5 in the stat formula exists to stabilize damage calculation at very low levels. The damage formula computes a number based on the power of the attack and level of the attacker, then multiplies it by the ratio between the attacker's relevant attacking stat and the defender's relevant defending stat, then adds 2, then applies all the other modifiers multiplicatively (type effectiveness, STAB, critical hit, etc.). So in effect, the ratio of attacking stat to defending stat is *basically* a multiplicative modifier to the damage as well. If you're using a physical move and your attack stat is twice their defense stat, then the damage you deal will be roughly twice as much as what it would have been if the stats were equal, and similarly if your attack stat is half of their defense, then the move would do roughly half as much instead (note: because the +2 is added after the A/D multiplier, the actual difference in damage isn't quite equal to the A/D ratio, but unless the damage value prior to applying A/D is extremely low it's a close enough approximation for illustrative purposes).
Since the A/D ratio is *basically* a multiplicative modifier, the impact it has on the move's damage becomes exponentially larger the further away it gets from 1. In most cases a 2:1 or 1:2 ratio on a neutral move is effectively the same as using a SE or NVE move respectively. And since it's *basically* a modifier, it *basically* stacks multiplicatively with other modifiers. A 2:1 A/D ratio can effectively turn a resisted move into a neutral move, or a SE move to quad effective. A 1:2 A/D ratio can effectively turn a neutral move into a NVE one, or a SE move to a neutral one, etc. etc. etc. And unlike other modifiers, there isn't really an intrinsic restriction on how high or low the ratio can be. If your level 100 Garchomp's attack is 50x their level 3 Pidgey's defense, your neutral Dragon Claw will be 50x effective. This is the underlying mechanism behind why over-leveled and legendary Pokemon will one-shot everything and take no damage in return. Really the only regulation on this in competitive comes from the simple fact that every Pokemon is the same level and that people tend to avoid Pokemon with low stats. Outside of stat boosts, it's pretty difficult to find a Pokemon whose attack or defense is consistently multiple times higher than your opponent's defense or attack.
Back to the +5 thing. Pokemon who are very low level (let's say 5 or less) have very low stats. There's also very little variation between stats. (Assume 0 EV's and IV's and neutral nature for all stat calculations). At level 3, the difference between a base stat of 30 and 130 is only 6, and given the base stats of the Pokemon one would typically encounter at that level, the vast majority of stats are going to be within 1-3 of each other. In most contexts, if the attack and defense are only 1-3 different, the ratio is still going to be very close to 1, so the difference has a very small impact on damage. But, a level 3 Geodude has 9 attack, and a level 3 Pidgey has 7 defense. If Geodude attacked, their A/D ratio would ~1.29. In a world where the +5 stat increase didn't exist, Geodude's attack would instead be 4, and Pidgey's defense would instead be 2, making the A/D ratio of that attack now 2. So even though the stats across the board are lower, the damage actually got higher. If Pidgey were instead the one attacking, its 7 attack vs. Geodude's 11 defense would be an A/D ratio of ~0.64, and without the +5 boost it would instead be 2 attack vs. 6 defense, dropping the A/D ratio down to ~0.33. If the +5 boost didn't exist and Geodude was just a single level higher, its attack and defense would instead be 6 and 8. If it attacked the same Pidgey, it's A/D ratio would now be 3 instead of 2, and if it were defending a Pidgey attack the ratio would be 0.25 instead of ~0.33. Because it's a ratio between such small numbers, even a single point change will drastically change it. Basically, for low level Pokemon in this system, tanky Pokemon get way tankier, frail Pokemon get way frailer, strong Pokemon get way stronger, and weak Pokemon get way weaker. Adding a flat number to the stats is a pretty elegant solution to this. It makes very little difference at higher levels, but it effectively dampens and smooths out stat variations at low levels. If the absolute minimum stat a Pokemon can have is 5, then in order to achieve an A/D ratio of 2 your Pokemon would at minimum need to have an attack stat that's 5 higher than their defense, or vice versa for a ratio of .5.
The concept of adding flat numbers to the components of the ratio is actually also what makes EV's and IV's so impactful. Fundamentally, increasing the numerator and denominator of a ratio by the same amount will always alter the ratio to be closer to 1, so the flat stat increase that both Pokemon would get from having 31 IV's in their attacking and defending stats has the exact same damping and smoothing effect on the ratio as the +5 boost. EV's are a really interesting mechanic because they can both dampen and amplify the ratio depending on how they're applied. Since you only have enough EV's to fully max 2 stats, there is a lot of variation to how you can spread them out, and different EV spreads will effect the ratio differently depending on how many are on the attacking stat and how many are on the defending stat. And because the amount of stats 252 EV's gives you is so high (32 at level 50), having max attack vs. 0 defense ends up increasing the ratio pretty drastically, 0 attack vs. max defense decreases the ratio drastically, and max attack vs. max defense ends up dampening the ratio more than IV's and the +5 boost combined.
important thing to remember about stat boosting items and abilities: items like eviolite and abilities like huge power apply their multipliers after evs and ivs, meaning they're greater than boosting the base stat. for example, huge power doubles your attack stat, so if you have maximum attacks evs and ivs, you double your base attack *and* add an extra 99 at level 100. looking at azumarill, you may expect huge power to double its 50 base attack to 100, but in actuality you'll be hitting almost as hard as groudon, who has 150 base attack
For the Destiny Knot being held by one of the pokémon parents, shouldn't the chance of a given stat being inherited from that specific parent be 5/12? Since it's 5/6 stats but it could still be from either parent
And the actual most reliable way to get one specific IV inherited from one specific parent is to have that parent hold the corresponding power item (in the case of speed it would be the power anklet).
The destiny knot only works for the stats of the parent holding it
@@ddot9885 Everywhere I look says it just guarantees five of the Pokemon's IVs will be inherited from its parents (as opposed to the normal 3). I can't find any source saying it's specifically inheriting from the parent holding the knot.
Discovered you from your comment on point crow’s newest video when someone said you made Pokemon content. I appreciate that your channel is 90% Pokemon content and I wasn’t betrayed
If we assume you get a Pokemon with a base stat less than 50 at level 1, the first floor function would give us a 0.
If the base stat is between 50 and 99 , the first floor function would give us a 1 now, but without the +5 and with a detrimental nature, the stat would be less than 1 and, therefore, equal to 0 with the last floor function.
That +5 is the real MVP of that formula for guaranteeing any stat is always a positive number.
This is the one debate kid in high school that was cool and everyone liked!
6:13 My mood is "stabbed through the heart, the weapon is still inside and it's getting very painful, today was the first day in years that my heart didn't hurt, this is normal for me".
You okay? What happened?
8:25 Specifically, it's that the child inherits 5 of the 12 IVs from either parent, regardless of who holds the Destiny Knot (without the item, 3 of 12 get passed down). If two IVs for the same stat are chosen, the mother's (or non-Ditto parent's) IV takes priority and the other is discarded, reducing the number of IVs that actually get passed down.
This was a nice surprise, wasn't expecting another video so soon. Cheers
6:19 I was expecting a Lt. Surge joke to be worked in there lol
Great video
At 16:16, the reason 10 was added was to give starter pokemon more than 5 or so hp at level 5.
It's alwyas nice to see any_austin get a shout out in a video. His videos literally changed my worldview. Literally.
the addition of 5 is to handle an edge case where the floor division results in 0 for a stat. this can happen for a level 1 chansey which has 5 base attack and 0 IVs and EVs. so we add 5, and then the nature effect results in a final stat value no less than 4.
3:30 technically, it's when the egg is generated that the stats are set. You can't save scum a step from hatching to influence stats.
like the fact that you put the ad timer and respect the time of viewers, subscribed
Small correction: Egg stats are generated the moment the egg is generated, not when it hatches. You can't soft reset to change anything about the Pokemon in the egg except for OT and, by proxy, shininess - trading the egg to another trainer and having them hatch changes whether it's shiny or not (prior to Gen 8). It's by this principle that you can get around the Manaphy egg shiny lock in Gen 4, but obviously, this is different in Gen 8 as they changed how shininess is determined.
IVs and EVs. No apostrophe needed.
Top 5 sponsored segment I’ve ever seen on UA-cam that was actually fire
any_austin and Jakey are goated
This genre of videos are like specifically crafted for me. Thank you god to be living in a wonderful world with such a wonderful channel.
13:08
To my knowledge, the Pokérus effect remains even after the pokémon is cured. It just wont be able to infect new Pokémon with the Pokérus.
So if your pokémon ever had Pokérus, the EV multiplier remains forever.
10:04 the idea that you got to level 100 off 8 magi cards is a fun unimplied thought-🎹Mari
I feel like I'm watching a man slowly descend into Pokémon math madness
Your intro and ad read were hilarious, and I think you'd legitimately crush a comedy set (and ngl I'd like to see it)
I love UA-cam's algorithm, second time they've delivered me an adef video almost as soon as it got released, I'm being blessed
I'm guessing off the top of my head that the pokemon shown at 1:30 was a careful mudkip. How did I do?
8:20 Oh no, he's trapped in the ice puzzle again
15:54 A leftover from Gen 1 where a weird quirk could result in the game dividing by a defensive stat of 0 when calculating damage and softlocking as a result. The +5 was to ensure a stat was never less than 4 (but could be anyway thanks to stat modifiers, whoops!), which would trigger this if the attacker's attacking stat was greater than 255. Additionally, after Gen 3, an out of battle stat can't go below 4 with this formula.
alot of people have already pointed out that the +5 is to prevent stats from hitting 0, but im pretty shure it also serves as a balancing tool for the early game to put all the pokemon on a more even level
just went from a video analyzing fashion in pokemon games to this. what a ride.
Since Gen 6 EVs max out at 252 instead of 255. Which I’m sure is something everyone can appreciate since it reduces worry and headaches from trying to avoid wasting EVs.
This episode was SO GOOOD i love the depiction of theyr abusive relationship and the was it uses Nemuscapacity for self destruction even for a parent so abusive that is y he thaught her to be perfect. Also the animation looks SO MUCH BETTER than in the fiirst half genuinly fantastic.
Would have been cool to show a practical example of a min vs max configuration and practically demonstrate how much of a difference results in the stats and in the damage dealt with an attack
Great explanation, and I've watched many for fun over the years. I made 1 or 2 competitive teams in Emerald (way way back), X/Y, ORAS, and mostly stopped playing the mainline games after that. But I loved Pokemon Showdown online for quickly building any competitive team I wanted and engaging with an actual meta. Copied and tweaked dozens of teams, made a few original ones for UU and OU as well. So fascinating, but I can't imagine the effort it would take to respond to a meta in mainline game by re-breeding, move learning, re-EV-training, etc to get that delicate spread you actually want /right now/, not 10 hours from now.
"The ancient romans have IVs and E pluribus unum". That got me.
Dude you absolutely KILLED it on the GDQ opening that was awesome
3:30 the IVs are not set when the egg hatches, they are set when the egg is generated
Idk if I'm slow on the uptake, but I just realised that adef's style of humour in his vids strongly reminds me of Drew Goodon. I love it
The importance of the nature was new to me. Didn't realize that it was the last multiplication step. Might be good to include how you essentially have a 1/26 chance to get the nature you want (barring the neutral ones), and what could help you get your desired nature. Which I think are everstones when breeding, Synchronize ability in battles, and if it's Scarlet/Violet, those new mint items.
THANK YOU for starting by explaining what the number in "Base Stat" actually means. It is surprisingly annoying to get a simple answer to this seemingly simple question!
for the stat/hp equations, removing the +5 from the brackets gives you +10
so it might just be a y-intercept of +10 to ensure stats are viable
minor correction, i believe the destiny knot being held by one parent allows the egg to inherit 5 of the 6 stats from _either_ parent, not just the parent holding it. so if one parent had all IVs at 0, and the other had all IVs at 31, and one of them was holding a destiny knot, the egg would have a 50/50 chance for 5 of its stats to be 0 or 31 (the 6th is completely random).
10:35 a function you may not have seen before
Meanwhile me a JEE aspirant:
hes done it again, a 10/10 video made by ADEF. I will make sure my kids watch this one day. Keep it up!
if I had to guess, the additive terms exist to avoid potential values of zero to avoid division by zero errors later down the road in damage calculation
I love this guy so much dude I’m learning math and how to smack everyone I play in a Pokemon battle for all eternity cause this video was perfect you answered every question anyone will ever have about this
6:15 was not expecting to see adef in a Kvelertak t-shirt (Norwegian punk band that sings in Norwegian)
FINALLY. I've been so confused about these for so long. I had a general understanding of what they were (IVs are fixed and you can change EVs), but I had no idea what having IVs or EVs actually did other than just "they make your stats better!"
Banger intro, and a thorough explanation. Good stuff, adef!
One Pokemon that takes the stat calculation and throws it in the trash is Shedinja, whose HP stat is hardcoded to never be any more or less than 1.
Just a perfect video to watch with my meal
There's another really good comment mentioning how the +5 and (+ level + 10) modifiers exist as a failsafe to make sure that Pokemon stats will not under any circumstances be 0. This is partially true, but they used the most extreme example of a level 1 Shuckle, so I wanna expand on that!
In every generation up until 4, since eggs hatched at level 5, there was no way to get a Pokemon at level 1, the weakest was always level 2. The reason for that was that the gen 1 and 2 games had a glitch wherein Pokemon with the Medium Slow exp group were calculated to have -54 experience at level 1, causing an underflow glitch bringing them to level 100 upon completing a battle, provided they don't get enough exp to make up for that negative difference. This glitch was fixed in gen 3 because the mechanics of exp curves were changed to use a lookup table rather than a formula, but they didn't end up revising the breeding mechanics to make level 1 Pokemon accessible until gen 4. Essentially, the stat formula was originally designed with level 2 as the minimum in mind. This difference isn't entirely significant, because there are still very frequent cases where a Pokemon at low level would have 0 in a stat without those modifiers, and so the formula works exactly as well at level 1 as it does at level 2, but I think it is interesting to note.
To be even more specific, at level 2, it takes a minimum of base 25 in a stat to hit the point where any given stat would be 1 pre-modifier even assuming a positive nature, and a minimum of base 50 with a negative nature. More than just Pokemon like Shuckle with an extremely low stat, a very large portion of unevolved early game Pokemon would fail to meet that threshold, and so, that +5 is doing a lot of heavy lifting.
The rest of the reason is just game balance. First and foremost, Pokemon is an RPG, and so, from a game design perspective, they need to balance the game with the singleplayer experience in mind. A very simple alternative to what they did would have been to hard code it so that the minimum the stat calculation function can pump out will always be 1. All it'd take is an if statement, something along the lines of "if (stat) < 1, then (stat) = 1". However, if Pokemon at very low levels could have 1 in their stats, then battles would work out to being boring in the early game, which is an absolute death sentence for game devs who ostensibly want people to play the whole game. Adding +5 to most stats, and (+ level + 10) to HP, very neatly fixes this potential issue. Those modifiers are doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sense.
So, tl;dr, beyond the factor of trying to avoid gamebreaking calculations involving a stat being 0 or god forbid negative, I believe the primary purpose of the modifiers at the end of the stat formula is to make it so that the early game in singleplayer is able to be fun for players, rather than the alternative of being stuck with 1 stat point in any of your stats for any amount of time.
Another slight complication that warrants mentioning: In generation 3 onward, the game is hardcoded to bypass the stat formula entirely and always leave it at 1 point specifically in the case that a Pokemon's base HP is exactly 1. The reasoning for this is, fairly obviously, as a simple way to make Shedinja's gimmick work, as it is the only Pokemon in the series that has base 1 HP.
i enjoy content like this with raw calculations and formulas like the one's that got me interested in shoddy cast "THE SCIENCE" series and matt pat game theory before it changed hosts which have their own charms but they're not the same in terms of scientific analysis that i enjoy such as from you and matt pat or shoddy cast, so thank you for sticking true to the style you enjoy creating because i certainly love it.
^.^
Well, it may be a one line equation, but it’s definitely going to take more than one line of code to calculate all of that. Especially considering Base, IV, EV, Level and Nature are all going to be variables (likely arrays, especially for Natures) that are defined elsewhere, which are each different lines of code.
Some minor errors I noticed:
- Destiny Knot doesn't transfer 5IVs from the Pokemon holding the item, it changes the inherited IVs from 3 to 5. Hatched Pokemon inherit 3 IVs chosen at random across their parents' 12 stats. Destiny Knot changes this to 5. It's still random which parents the combination of 5 IVs are pulled from
- The maximum number of EVs in one stat since Gen VI (X/Y/ORAS) was reduced from 255 to 252, which means it's no longer possible to waste those three EVs
- Vitamins can only raise a stat's EVs to maximum in Gen VIII and IX (SwSh/BDSP/SV). Prior to this, you could not use vitamins to raise a stat's EVs above 100, even if the previous EVs were acquired by battling wild Pokemon
- Power Items don't double EVs. They add a flat +4 to their particular stat whenever a Pokemon holding the item gains EVs from KOing wild Pokemon. For example, my Pokemon is holding the Power Anklet to train Speed and KO's a Gyarados (+2 Atk EVs). My Pokemon gains the 2 Atk EVs from the Gyarados and then gains 4 Speed EVs from the Power Anklet (Macho Brace is the item that doubles all EVs but is generally less efficient if you're manually EV training Pokemon by KOing wild Pokemon)
BONUS: Pokerus doubles ALL EV gains from KOing wild Pokemon, including both the Power Items (+8 now) and stacks with Macho Brace.
Don't ask me to fact check any of the math stuff though, I'm just a dude who has hatched altogether too many Pokemon eggs in my time.
man i wish i had this video 15 years ago lol
so how do DVs work? at the beginning you did say that you start with IVs and made it sound like you will circle around to the DVs later.
There were 5 stats (Sp. Att and Sp. Def were combined). Each DV was worth 2 points instead of 1, and ranged from 0-15. And only 4 of them were random, HP was calculated from the others.
EVs were also completely different, usually called ‘Stat Experience’, but that’s a whole other can of worms.
okay ... basically they are "kind of the same" but they work differently internally. As mentioned, DVs are kinda like IVs but with more "early technology awkwardness".
Stat Experience is like EVs, but the main difference is that you may max out all of them. Also, there are a lot of internal differences, but these don't actually matter THAT much in practice (e.g. Stat Exp goes up to 65535 but as the formula takes the square root of the Stat Exp value, that effectively comes down to 255 in the end, just like with EVs)
Also, for both DVs and Stat Experience, both special stats share one DV and Stat Exp. value respectively in gen 2, in order to ensure compatibility with the generation 1 games.
Damn, adef and Kvelertak is a combination I didn't think I would see, but that's definitely nice.
5:30 It actually does not change their individual values. Rather, it alters the stats to match what they would be with those values. For breeding, it is still inherited with the original values, for example. Same with mints.
you truly solved something I've always wondered about but wasn't invested enough in googling. Thank you