There's a few moves that I can think of that qualify for the worst moves in pokemon. Gen 1: Waterfall- Only Goldeen and Seaking could this move. Psywave- Literally causes a desync in Link Battles in gen 1. Glare- Only Ekans and Arbok could learn this move but had not so good accuracy. Constrict- Weakest Normal type move with only 10 base power. Poison Sting- Weakest poison type move. Only has 15 base power and 30% chance to poison the target. Splash- This move does nothing. Gen 2: Conversion 2- Only Porygon and Porygon 2 learn this, followed by Porygon Z in the remakes. It no longer changes the user to its current type in gen 4. In gen 5, it can bypass accuracy checks. Present- Only Delibird learns this move. Has a 50% chance to heal the target.
Conversion past Gen 1 works based off of your own moveset, not your opponent's, so it has use in giving yourself STAB + Adaptability on a coverage move of your choice.
Conversion was actually really good in gen 7 because Z-Conversion gave you an omniboost (+1 on all stats) and then transforms you into the type of your first move. Basically you can slap psychic or thunderbolt shadowball icebeam etc in your first slot then transform into whatever type you want and get a sweeper with +1 on all stats WITH adaptability boost
To add on this, when I used this strat in competitive, I would have shadowball in the first slot so I could predict an incoming fighting move/pokemon and get a free boost
@EggRo11s That doubles as Fake Out bait which, back in Gen 7, was kind of everywhere. Its only weakness in your strategy then would've been Knock Off, given how that's a Dark type move.
What sucks even more is that if you transfer hisuian sliggoo it can get acid armor which is even better because it has twice as much as shelter yet goodra can't learn it. Seriously why did they nerf it this badly
"Why did they nerf it this badly?" Because Game Freak seems convinced that every other Pokémon is broken, when that couldn't be farther from the truth.
On the subject of Heart Swap, I've actually seen it used to decent effect. Mash Fleur Cannon with Magearna because you're a talented player, then use Heart Swap to give your opponent the Special Attack drops and bring you back to neutral. Still omega cheese but it's had its moment.
Maybe more useful: you could use magearna as a xerneas check in gen 7 Ubers as you could heart swap away its boosts (that it can’t easily get back) and then reverse sweep your opponent
@@reesecarlton getting rid of Xerneas and doing big damage to P-don/DM Necrozma is already enough for Ubers standards I think. But yeah heart swap definitely has its uses, just not on manaphy :P
In the anime, Heart Swap basically served as a body swap button. I'm confused as to how a man-made Poke like Magearna can swap bodies with organic beings.....
Conversion was bad… then gen 7 happened and made PZ an even more ridiculous cleaner/sweeper than it already was. Similar with Freeze shock. People hate on Z moves but they certainly allowed some moves to have a glow up, even splash became viable.
@@theonlyshinyumbreon yeah, funny thing is for me, I didnʻt really use offensive Z moves as much as I did status so it was a surprise to find that people didnʻt like the “free nuke.” I just never looked at it as one haha.
Fun story, I thought that Glaciate was just a random ice move Kyurem had and I replaced it with Blizzard. Then my friend told me it was his signature move and I got mad, just to then calm down when he said it sucked and I did good deleting it.
Okay but that’s not actually what Conversion does!! From Gen 2 onward, its based on the user’s moves, not a target’s. That’s not to say that it’s excellent, but the point is to give you STAB on moves you normally don’t have STAB on. It’s also fantastic as a Z-move on Porygon Z
Actually, Conversion changes your type to one of *your* moves' types, not the opponent's, so you can control it. Plus, its Z-move version was actually pretty good, giving you a boost to every stat.
Conversion’s evolution (from Bulbapedia): Gen 1: Opponent’s type (now the effect of Reflect Type) Gen 2-5: Type of random move from user’s move-set *Not the opponent’s move-set* Gen 6-present: Type of move in first slot of move-set *Not the opponent’s move-set* Conversion 2’s evolution (also from Bulbapedia): Gen 2-present: Type that resists/is immune to last move user was hit with (minor details changed throughout the generations) Just wanted to simplify and clarify things 😊
Conversion is really good. It was basically the original tera, changing your type to the first move slot. Z-conversion offers an omni boost too, like an ancient power. Pair both with Porygon-z's large sp.a and adaptability for 2x stab instead of 1.5x... yeah it's really good on a thunderbolt, ice beam, or psychic (as needed for your team comp).
Seviper is actually my favorite pokemon so if I can add my 2 cents on this I think poison fang is a better move personally as it gets the toxic or badly poisoning effect
@@PrayingMantisEyes Toxic is 100% accurate if it's used by a poison type. However as a die-hard Seviper fan myself I love it's moves Poison Fang and Poison Tail.
Magic coat is predominantly used on leads. Which are used to reflect taunt and Stealth rock. An example of a great lead with Magic coat is Uxie; which allows it to set up stealth rock or trick room without worry of being shut down or losing momentum.
Magic Coat past Gen 5 is genuinely great but before that, it didn't work on hazards and I believe it didn't bounce Taunt back either so it was just a generally bad move, only bouncing things like stat lowering moves or status inflicting moves back.
What makes Shelter EVEN WORSE somehow is that it is also a worse version of Acid Armor, of which it has only HALF the PP of. Sure, while Iron Defense is also worse than Acid Armor, at least Iron Defense has superior distribution. Shelter is a _signature move_ , and not only that, Hisuian Goodra ALSO gets Acid Armor already, just to drive home how utterly pointless this move is.
He says that about Heart Swap, but I remember my Gen 7 run in Showdown where my Magearna made people quit because they were trying to Extreme Evo Boost on me.
I always thought the point of Heart Swap was to set up with Tail Glow (and Acid Armor if you're greedy), swap the boosts to your doubles partner, and set up again.
I did not know Powder existed until now because early game Bug Types aren't worth training that long (except maybe Beedrill in Gen 6 or Butterfree in Gen 8 but even that's pushing it).
@@robertlupa8273 I mean yes. Since it isn’t technically an evolution or form of Delibird since it’s it’s own Pokémon with its own number and everything.
They should've made it where shelter was like a +2 cosmic power or something to make it stronger. It baffles me how weak it and bitter malice are when there's hisuian moves like ceaseless edge, dire claw and triple arrows.
Unique fact about camouflage one of my favorite pokemon Leavanny gets the move via breeding and uses it really well! It has a pretty bad typing that's only good for its stab moves but it's defensively horrible. However, using camouflage it can get a much better defensive typing and thanks to it's OK defensive stats camouflage gives Leavanny a lot more longevity and I think that's really neat
Can't forget one of the best/worst signatures moves of that being Splash. Would also be very funny if Splash could 1% of the time could damage the opponent but probably for a small amount of damage to a OHKO.
The thing is, splash IS useless, but given it was originally intended to be used by Magikarp, which is a Pokemon that's intended to be pitifully weak, it makes sense why they made it do literally nothing. Not saying it's not bad or anything of the sort, just that it's honestly not really worth talking about because it would be a bit of a cop out to include it
Except in Gen 7 where it could turn into Z-Splash and give the user +3 ATTACK. And then Gyarados can Dragon Dance and destroy everything with just its STAB moves
Gen 2 Present was actually deceptively strong: if the move dealt damage, it would use a bugged version of the damage formula with modified level, Attack, and Defense variables. In this glitched out formula, the level is replaced with the index value of the defending Pokemon’s secondary type, the Attack is 5 if the target is Rock or Steel and 10 otherwise, and the Defense is replaced with the index value of the attacking Pokemon’s type. This enabled Blissey, a Normal type (Normal type has an index value of 0) could deal fucktons of damage to a Pokemon with a special secondary or solo type (special types have higher index values) if it rolled 80 or 120 bp. Ofc Delibird wouldnt use Present both because it isnt a Normal type and because it just sucks.
@@skeetermania3202 Except in link battles, to maintain consistency with GS. Honestly I wish that Gamefreak kept the idea of a type-based Present instead of making it the useless gimmick that not even people on r/stunfisk make memes about.
In gen 6 Ubers my favorite mon was Wobuffett but it had a very easy way to deal with it in just setting up. However, if you use encore when they're setting up then swap to Manaphy and heart swap, it's game over. That's why I nicknamed my Manaphy on showdown ggwp.
Still a disappointment we couldn’t keep Drowsy, Frostbite, and(maybe not) Obscure Sure they coulda been annoying in the meta, but it’d at least be something new and interesting
Glare actually had some use before it got 100% accuracy. It's similar to Stun Spore in being able to paralyze ground types and after Gen 6 where Stun Spore can't affect Grass types, Glare still can. Unfortunately Arbok has always been ass, especially against ground types so it doesn't really have much use there.
Good idea Power-Up Punch (and that’s without mentioning its now gone in Gen 9) Heal Bell Hidden Power (now just a signature of Unown whose only in BDSP and PLA) Roost Defog Toxic Knock Off Scald Superpower (now that they made Close Combat a TM since Sw/Sh) Darkest Lariat High Horsepower Triple Axel, Poltergeist, Scale Shot, Flip Turn, Expanding Force, Meteor Beam, etc. Aromatherapy (another now deleted move) Sucker Punch (in case you didn’t know, it was a tutor move in Gen 4 and then never again) and also Strength and Cut but who cares about these moves?😂
Honestly either of those would work and not be completely broken since it needs contact, is not priority on a slower Pokémon and punching glove and shoulder pad are usable items.
I feel like a lot of these moves are actually decent. Heart swap could be useful WITH tailglow to pass it to your partner flutter or now cresselia setting up calm minds and stealing the defense buffs (if both users were actually legal in vgc). And intimidate is a strong ability, so decreasing the power of an urshifu close combat or an ursaluna isn’t something to take lightly
i think the reason they changed bitter malice is because it was almost the same as hisuian typhlosion signature move, the only difference being that it inflict burn, instead of frostbite, but both kinda do the same thing, just halve a different stat, so even if it feel worst, at least it's not a homework copy meme anymore, and i still love it
Shelter would be busted if it also doubled as a form of protect to mimic the obscure effect. Although I could see it easily being balanced out by only increasing Defense by 1 stage
If they were translating the move accurately, it should by a decreased priority move that raises defense, special defence, and evasion by one stage each; but then lower Defence, Special Defence, and Evasion by one stage each after four turns have passed. Not quite a perfect translation, but far more accurate then just making it iron Defence. It would be better, if less accurate, if it drastically raised your Defence and Special defence, but caused all of your moves to go down a priority bracket. Similar thing with bitter malice. They should have made it 45 power and kept it's doubled power against pokemon with non-volatile status conditions, but then allowed it to emulate Frostbite with a unique volatile status condition (halving Special Attack, reducing health by 1/16th at the end of each turn, lasting between three to five turns, and not affecting pokemon that can't be frozen) if used when it is snowing. This makes it more similar to it's arceus counterpart, without making it "Hex, but better".
@@twobladedswordsandmauls2120 Making it raise evasion or reduce your priority for its duration both suck as additional elements though lol. Nobody likes fighting evasion which is why evasion increasing strategies are banned and losing priority is not worth the tradeoff when there are other defense increasing moves that don't have that kind of downside, the drastic increase would be a good counterbalance, but in a way that wouldn't be very fun. Honestly if it just raised both defense and sp.def at the same time, that would already make it unique because the only move that already does that is stockpile.
4:30 Poison fang BADLY poisons the opponent O.O That actually makes it somewhat good (for mid game at least). I knew about conversion, but apparently not how poison fang worked, neat
Also in poison tail got overshadowed and replaced immediately in gen 4 by cross poison a move that does the same thing but with a higher base power of 70 instead of 50.
"Isn't H.Zoroark a normal and ghost type; I think he meant that people are more likely to use Shadow Ball over Bitter Malice as their ghost stab instead".
You should start a series on the mechanics of Pokémon moves. Would be hard but I think it would be super cool to see a video on how a move like hyper beam would theoretically work in real life. Like what is it, some kind of particle beam?
Idk heart swap can seem potentially devastating. You can straight up steal your opponents set up or in doubles give yourself a tail glow. The move isnt bad its just that it's stuck on a very small roster. Then another move i thought id see is egg bomb as the few Pokemon who learn it can hardly use it. Like chansey with its pathetic attack stat and also with its awful 75 accuracy. Its dragon rush but normal pretty much
Bitter malice is better then shadow ball, 5 less base power but you can help your team, tho you gotta be careful of defiant ape since you’ll have no more to hit it
In Gen 4 Cresselia got a signature move in Liner Dance sacrificed Cresselia but fully healed any Pokémon in the back. Then in Legends it got another one: Lunar Blessing. It was Lunar Dance, but didn't kill Cresselia.
Some of these moves could’ve worked if they were retooled a little bit but they still feel lackluster. Poison tail having a 60 base power with a high Crit rate and 30% chance to badly poison the foe would be much better as well as Conversion 2 being a guarantee type change to make every incoming attacks not very effective for 3 turns is much better and maybe a little too good. As for Shelter, I just wish it was a new King’s Shield that buffs Goodra’s defenses while also giving it a turn of protection.
conversion should change porygon's type to whatever its hidden power type is, that way you could try to get a useful hidden power type like dark and use conversion to get stab from a move like dark pulse. or have your porygon learn thunderbolt if your HP type is electric, etc
I mean if you have Thunderbolt in your first move slot and use Conversion, you become an Electric type already, but it would be cool to have a move that interacts off of the Hidden Power factor.
Z-conversion is actually really good. Porygon Z was known for using this to change most commonly to a ghost type that had omniboost and adaptability shadow ball.
Poison Tail isn't anywhere near that bad. Seviper still gets STAB on it, plus the higher crit rate AND the poison chance, to actually do a good amount of damage.
Magic Coat does at least protect your ally as well in doubles so definitely handy if you are expecting status moves from certain pokemon for mind games
For me, the move Barrage was so annoying to deal with in the Mystery Dungeon series with Execute and Executor randomly barraging you from who knows where
5:42 i think the justification comes from a similar reason to marshadows spectral theif, taking there stat boosts, and if your stats are heavily lowered the opponent comes out much lower. The only thing heart swap is missing to be amazing is increased priority. Add to that heart glow and baton pass can be learned by manaphy.
Giving the Paradoxes signature moves: -Great Tusk: Tusk Slam (Ground, physical, hits all active opponents, makes contact, lowering their Attack by 1) -Brute Bonnet: Fungal Fury (Grass, physical, rolls for poison, paralyze, or sleep) -Scream Tail: Savage Scream (Psychic, special, sound-based) -Slither Wing: Solar Scales (Bug, status, heals all active Pokémon on user’s team for 1/4 of max, heals for 1/2 of max in sun) -Flutter Mane: Primal Phantom (Ghost, special, chance of confusing the target) -Sandy Shocks: Magnet Powder (Electric, status, paralyzes target and reduces their Speed by 1) -Roaring Moon: Lunar Slash (Dark, physical, makes contact, chance of flinching target) -Iron Treads: Steel Wheel (Steel, physical, makes contact, raises user’s Speed by 1) -Iron Hands: Volt Slap (Electric, physical, makes contact, chance of flinching the target) -Iron Bundle: Subzero Seafoam (Water, special, chance of freezing target) -Iron Moth: Solar Seraph (Fire, special, hits all active opponents and traps them) -Iron Jugulis: Triple Tornado (Flying, special, hits target 3 times in a row) -Iron Thorns: Repeat Volt (Electric, physical, hits 2-5 times in a row) -Iron Valiant: Twin Saber (Fairy, physical, hits twice)
Funny how Game Freak just loves making bad Pokémon and bad moves, and when makes good ones, they nerf those :P (I know it doesn't happen every time, I'm trying to make a joke)
I find Camouflage's history interesting. For example gen 4 added the ability to turn into an ice type. Pretty simple. But gen 6 added *a lot* of new situations. For example turning into a dragon type when fighting in *space.* Gen 7 got rid of some extremely niche situations, like space, and just added psychic for psychic terrain. Lastly, gen 8 removed the move entirely.
because stealing a dragon dance means they need to waste a turn to set up when its unsafe to do so and risk getting hit by a dragon dance set up pokemon. its not psych up where it copies but steals the stat boosts. essentially, they not only made you safe to set up but also made themselves unable to set up safely in the process. its a two turn momentum shift that happens in one turn.
Magic coat is actually not that rare in 1v1 singles. Heart swap was also used quite a bit by magearma to counter other set up magearnas and weepers in gens like 7-8, which is quite crazy
I remeber when gen 6 came out there was a kid at school who thougt fire was the best type and that he had the best team because it was 4/6 fire type. Powder was a lot of fun to use on him.
I agree, Attack decrease doesn't really fit Bitter Malice. The original effect is good as it is but if they want to change it, it should be Sp. Def. Down (Maybe add an effect where if you got hit the turn you used bitter malice, you will get a Sp. Atk. buff, just like Rage) For shelter, they could add an effect like No Critical Hits(Lucky Chant) or No Priority Moves(Armor Tail) for 5 turns.
To be fair, glare allows you to paralyze ground types, so it had more utility than just paralysis plus wrap. Of course, body slam has a 30 percent paralysis chance and most ground types are already slow... so it's not a huge deal.
I feel like Present should be updated so it has an identical effect to Pollen Puff: Healing allies and damaging opponents. Maybe change it into an Ice-type move while we're at it. It always annoys me when a Pokemon's signature move is a different type than the Pokemon itself.
IMO Shelter at least should've gotten priority to make it that much different to Iron Defence if they didn't want to make it Iron Defence x Double-Team. Also how hard is it to make Present just normal type Pollen Puff? ... Also also~ I'm surprised that Present wasn't turned into a Fairy type attack.
Worst part about Kyurem's glaciate is that in spanish it's translated to Mundo Gélido (frozen/frigid/cold world) and with such a cool name you'd expect it to be great but nope.
Buffs I'd give to these moves Barrage: Give it 30 base power Camouflage: User only takes 75% of any incoming damage while Camouflage is active Conversion: Becomes a priority move Conversion 2: Becomes a priority move. User always takes half damage from the selected move. Present: Is a Flying move, has a minimum power of 60, always damages enemies and heals allies, the healing is now 50%. Poison Tail: Give it 70 bp like Slash and make it a cutting move. On a related note, give Seviper the Sharpness ability. Magic Coat: lasts for 3 turns Take Heart: Priority move Glaciate: Has 90 bp. Freeze Shock and Ice Burn: Have 200 bp and 100 accuracy. This makes these moves hard to switch in on between the huge damage and status chance. Life Orb boosted Freeze Shock now deals enough damage that Toxapex can't switch in on it. This makes the charge turn not as much of a problem because even resists will get absolutely slammed by it. If Kyurem can take a hit from the enemy and outspeed, these moves will annihilate. That's not even mentioning Power Herb. Powder: lasts 2-4 turns Bitter Malice: Still doubles in power against statused foes. Shelter: User takes half damage from all moves for 5 turns
It's also just pretty helpful in general, and not just exclusively for more tanky Pokemon. It can also help a frailer party member to have a better chance of surviving another turn or two longer in some cases, similar to how you see strategies utilizing the dual screens to enable a frail Pokemon in the party to set up without fear of being instantly knocked out
Conversion and Conversion2 are actually pretty good if you know how to use them properly. Conversion changes your type to any one of your OWN moves, giving you great STAB options. And while Conversion2 does change your type to match the type of a random opponent's attack, half of all Pokemon types resist themselves meaning you can effectively turn many enemy STAB moves into resisted hits.
Although extremely cheesy, you can make powder somewhat work in hackmons. If you have a speedy Bug/Steel type (Likely durant) and give it wonder guard, you can deter the opponent from attacking you. Thus, you get practically free turns to set-up or what have you. Only issue is that it isnt that useful vs safety goggle users and also you are better off using an air balloon ground weak wonder guard user in the first place.
What Game Freak could have done with the move Shelter is also improve evasion by one stage. Or add a obscure mechanic in Scarlet and Violet. Than its PP would be justified. Also the sad part of Goomy line is that it also gets Acid Armor. It has more PP than Shelter and Iron Defence.
I still dont understand why they got rid of the hex-like effect from Bitter Malice. It just makes sense to keep that at LEAST. Its literally a move born from rage and spite.
How I would improve some of these moves Barrage, either increase the power, or have it be “Population Bomb but with max of 6 instead of 10” Present, if they want it to move that isn’t just a gimmick they can have it work like Pollen Puff (damage opponents but heals allies) Poison Tail, increase power or increase chance to badly poison Powder, have the powder last for at least 2 moves so that you can guarantee the opponent doesn’t use a fire type attack for 1 turn Bitter Malice, bring back the hex bonus affect Shelter, increase defence by +2 and evasion by +1
Powder would be an amazing move on other Pokemon. Imagine something like Durant having this move to check something like Heatran. The mind games and then you could counter them
If they bring Barrage back in the DLC, the Exeggcute line can finally get STAB for it. But I doubt they'll bring it back after removing it from Sword and Shield.
We have Porygon and Porygon 2, as well as Conversion and Conversion 2. It’s a shame that when Porygon-Z was introduced, we didn’t get Conversion-Z. I know in gen 7 we got Z-Conversion, but that’s not quite the same. The idea of a glitchy conversion sounds fun.
What signature move do you think is the worst?
Gen 1 Waterfall, no reason for it to exist when Surf is literally right there
Present
There's a few moves that I can think of that qualify for the worst moves in pokemon.
Gen 1:
Waterfall- Only Goldeen and Seaking could this move.
Psywave- Literally causes a desync in Link Battles in gen 1.
Glare- Only Ekans and Arbok could learn this move but had not so good accuracy.
Constrict- Weakest Normal type move with only 10 base power.
Poison Sting- Weakest poison type move. Only has 15 base power and 30% chance to poison the target.
Splash- This move does nothing.
Gen 2:
Conversion 2- Only Porygon and Porygon 2 learn this, followed by Porygon Z in the remakes. It no longer changes the user to its current type in gen 4. In gen 5, it can bypass accuracy checks.
Present- Only Delibird learns this move. Has a 50% chance to heal the target.
Tail Glow + Heat Swap in doubles sounds busted af, imagine an instant +3 Walking Wake >.>
Huh... Why didn't they just add a +1 to special defense or evasion to that "Shelter" move?? Still not as good, but more useful I think o. O
Conversion past Gen 1 works based off of your own moveset, not your opponent's, so it has use in giving yourself STAB + Adaptability on a coverage move of your choice.
yeah and in gen 7, conversion was actually quite useful because z-conversion gives an omni boost.
Especially in gen 7, it was Terastallization before terrastallization was a thing
Be great if it had a fire move, like hell even Overheat works for the damn computer
@@omarpride3021why fire? porygon-z benefits more from ghost so it ran z-conversion shadow ball for a while
Tera at home
Conversion was actually really good in gen 7 because Z-Conversion gave you an omniboost (+1 on all stats) and then transforms you into the type of your first move.
Basically you can slap psychic or thunderbolt shadowball icebeam etc in your first slot then transform into whatever type you want and get a sweeper with +1 on all stats WITH adaptability boost
To add on this, when I used this strat in competitive, I would have shadowball in the first slot so I could predict an incoming fighting move/pokemon and get a free boost
"we have terrastalization at home"
terrastalization at home:
I used that strat too. I like to think of it as a prototype for terastalisation.
@@revalentinemashups510 actually terastalisation should be Z-Conversion at home
@EggRo11s That doubles as Fake Out bait which, back in Gen 7, was kind of everywhere. Its only weakness in your strategy then would've been Knock Off, given how that's a Dark type move.
What sucks even more is that if you transfer hisuian sliggoo it can get acid armor which is even better because it has twice as much as shelter yet goodra can't learn it. Seriously why did they nerf it this badly
I think it couldve been cool if it added a lucky chant effect
@@pageclayton6850 That actually sounds much better than just slapping an evasion boost on top of it. Definitely a fan of this idea!
@@pageclayton6850 Lucky chant on shell armour very pog
@@creeeamy7133 My favourite set is Air Balloon Fan Rotom, what can I say
"Why did they nerf it this badly?"
Because Game Freak seems convinced that every other Pokémon is broken, when that couldn't be farther from the truth.
On the subject of Heart Swap, I've actually seen it used to decent effect. Mash Fleur Cannon with Magearna because you're a talented player, then use Heart Swap to give your opponent the Special Attack drops and bring you back to neutral. Still omega cheese but it's had its moment.
Maybe more useful: you could use magearna as a xerneas check in gen 7 Ubers as you could heart swap away its boosts (that it can’t easily get back) and then reverse sweep your opponent
@martijn2809 That's a good use for it too, beats bringing P-Don and hoping it's not Focus Blast Xern
@@reesecarlton getting rid of Xerneas and doing big damage to P-don/DM Necrozma is already enough for Ubers standards I think. But yeah heart swap definitely has its uses, just not on manaphy :P
In the anime, Heart Swap basically served as a body swap button. I'm confused as to how a man-made Poke like Magearna can swap bodies with organic beings.....
@@DrawciaGleam02because it has a soul-heart, the actual heart.
Conversion was bad… then gen 7 happened and made PZ an even more ridiculous cleaner/sweeper than it already was. Similar with Freeze shock. People hate on Z moves but they certainly allowed some moves to have a glow up, even splash became viable.
I'll always remember how fun z hone claws hustle durant was, it certainly wasn't the _most_ viable but it caught people off guard.
@@theonlyshinyumbreon yeah, funny thing is for me, I didnʻt really use offensive Z moves as much as I did status so it was a surprise to find that people didnʻt like the “free nuke.” I just never looked at it as one haha.
Fun story, I thought that Glaciate was just a random ice move Kyurem had and I replaced it with Blizzard. Then my friend told me it was his signature move and I got mad, just to then calm down when he said it sucked and I did good deleting it.
Okay but that’s not actually what Conversion does!! From Gen 2 onward, its based on the user’s moves, not a target’s. That’s not to say that it’s excellent, but the point is to give you STAB on moves you normally don’t have STAB on.
It’s also fantastic as a Z-move on Porygon Z
Actually, Conversion changes your type to one of *your* moves' types, not the opponent's, so you can control it. Plus, its Z-move version was actually pretty good, giving you a boost to every stat.
Conversion’s evolution (from Bulbapedia):
Gen 1: Opponent’s type (now the effect of Reflect Type)
Gen 2-5: Type of random move from user’s move-set *Not the opponent’s move-set*
Gen 6-present: Type of move in first slot of move-set *Not the opponent’s move-set*
Conversion 2’s evolution (also from Bulbapedia):
Gen 2-present: Type that resists/is immune to last move user was hit with (minor details changed throughout the generations)
Just wanted to simplify and clarify things 😊
Funny enough, with mons like Dondozo, Flamigo, and Espathra boosting their stats so much, Heart Swap might have a use now
Thankfully we have manaphy now in game
Conversion is really good. It was basically the original tera, changing your type to the first move slot.
Z-conversion offers an omni boost too, like an ancient power.
Pair both with Porygon-z's large sp.a and adaptability for 2x stab instead of 1.5x... yeah it's really good on a thunderbolt, ice beam, or psychic (as needed for your team comp).
Seviper is actually my favorite pokemon so if I can add my 2 cents on this I think poison fang is a better move personally as it gets the toxic or badly poisoning effect
But why not just get a 100% accurate toxic
@@emileemile7451 it’s 90 accurate plus poison fang gives you stab chip to
A FELLOW SEVIPER ENJOYER
@@PrayingMantisEyes Toxic is 100% accurate if it's used by a poison type. However as a die-hard Seviper fan myself I love it's moves Poison Fang and Poison Tail.
Since my favorite Pokémon is Zangoose, I think we can never be friends
Magic coat is predominantly used on leads. Which are used to reflect taunt and Stealth rock. An example of a great lead with Magic coat is Uxie; which allows it to set up stealth rock or trick room without worry of being shut down or losing momentum.
Magic Coat past Gen 5 is genuinely great but before that, it didn't work on hazards and I believe it didn't bounce Taunt back either so it was just a generally bad move, only bouncing things like stat lowering moves or status inflicting moves back.
What makes Shelter EVEN WORSE somehow is that it is also a worse version of Acid Armor, of which it has only HALF the PP of. Sure, while Iron Defense is also worse than Acid Armor, at least Iron Defense has superior distribution. Shelter is a _signature move_ , and not only that, Hisuian Goodra ALSO gets Acid Armor already, just to drive home how utterly pointless this move is.
He says that about Heart Swap, but I remember my Gen 7 run in Showdown where my Magearna made people quit because they were trying to Extreme Evo Boost on me.
I always thought the point of Heart Swap was to set up with Tail Glow (and Acid Armor if you're greedy), swap the boosts to your doubles partner, and set up again.
I did not know Powder existed until now because early game Bug Types aren't worth training that long (except maybe Beedrill in Gen 6 or Butterfree in Gen 8 but even that's pushing it).
Conversion made some sense because many types resist themselves, so if your opponent is for example water type, you now resist its stab, so its cool
However if it was dragon or ghost your boned.
Present is no longer Delibird’s signature move as Iron Bundle now gets it.
Does it really count?
@@robertlupa8273 I mean yes. Since it isn’t technically an evolution or form of Delibird since it’s it’s own Pokémon with its own number and everything.
They should've made it where shelter was like a +2 cosmic power or something to make it stronger. It baffles me how weak it and bitter malice are when there's hisuian moves like ceaseless edge, dire claw and triple arrows.
Unique fact about camouflage one of my favorite pokemon Leavanny gets the move via breeding and uses it really well! It has a pretty bad typing that's only good for its stab moves but it's defensively horrible. However, using camouflage it can get a much better defensive typing and thanks to it's OK defensive stats camouflage gives Leavanny a lot more longevity and I think that's really neat
Can't forget one of the best/worst signatures moves of that being Splash. Would also be very funny if Splash could 1% of the time could damage the opponent but probably for a small amount of damage to a OHKO.
It’s the funny Sniper Tf2 man!
After Gen 1 it wasn’t a signature move though. Tons of ‘mons get it at level 1 today
The thing is, splash IS useless, but given it was originally intended to be used by Magikarp, which is a Pokemon that's intended to be pitifully weak, it makes sense why they made it do literally nothing. Not saying it's not bad or anything of the sort, just that it's honestly not really worth talking about because it would be a bit of a cop out to include it
Except in Gen 7 where it could turn into Z-Splash and give the user +3 ATTACK. And then Gyarados can Dragon Dance and destroy everything with just its STAB moves
Gen 2 Present was actually deceptively strong: if the move dealt damage, it would use a bugged version of the damage formula with modified level, Attack, and Defense variables. In this glitched out formula, the level is replaced with the index value of the defending Pokemon’s secondary type, the Attack is 5 if the target is Rock or Steel and 10 otherwise, and the Defense is replaced with the index value of the attacking Pokemon’s type. This enabled Blissey, a Normal type (Normal type has an index value of 0) could deal fucktons of damage to a Pokemon with a special secondary or solo type (special types have higher index values) if it rolled 80 or 120 bp. Ofc Delibird wouldnt use Present both because it isnt a Normal type and because it just sucks.
That only applies in Gold and Silver. Crystal fixed the buggy mechanics of the move.
@@skeetermania3202 Except in link battles, to maintain consistency with GS. Honestly I wish that Gamefreak kept the idea of a type-based Present instead of making it the useless gimmick that not even people on r/stunfisk make memes about.
@@grassfish01 I think it’s fine as a gambler.
Conversion is actually based off your own moveset.
In gen 6 Ubers my favorite mon was Wobuffett but it had a very easy way to deal with it in just setting up. However, if you use encore when they're setting up then swap to Manaphy and heart swap, it's game over. That's why I nicknamed my Manaphy on showdown ggwp.
Still a disappointment we couldn’t keep Drowsy, Frostbite, and(maybe not) Obscure
Sure they coulda been annoying in the meta, but it’d at least be something new and interesting
Drowzy and Frostbite are much better than their alternatives since they still allow the Pokemon to act.
Changing Frozen with Frostbite in core games could give way to SpA oriented versions of Guts and Flame Orb
Glare actually had some use before it got 100% accuracy. It's similar to Stun Spore in being able to paralyze ground types and after Gen 6 where Stun Spore can't affect Grass types, Glare still can. Unfortunately Arbok has always been ass, especially against ground types so it doesn't really have much use there.
Glare couldn't Paralyze Ghost types though. Plus it has fairly low distribution.
What about a video on moves that used to be more widespread, but have narrowed down to the point that some of them have become signature moves?
Good idea
Power-Up Punch (and that’s without mentioning its now gone in Gen 9)
Heal Bell
Hidden Power (now just a signature of Unown whose only in BDSP and PLA)
Roost
Defog
Toxic
Knock Off
Scald
Superpower (now that they made Close Combat a TM since Sw/Sh)
Darkest Lariat
High Horsepower
Triple Axel, Poltergeist, Scale Shot, Flip Turn, Expanding Force, Meteor Beam, etc.
Aromatherapy (another now deleted move)
Sucker Punch (in case you didn’t know, it was a tutor move in Gen 4 and then never again)
and also Strength and Cut but who cares about these moves?😂
Fun fact, Z Conversion was used in Gen 7 to make Porygon Z a powerful sweeper.
Shelter could be buffed easy by an evasion boost or turning it into a king's shield or spikey shield for a contact speed-reducing protect type of move
Honestly either of those would work and not be completely broken since it needs contact, is not priority on a slower Pokémon and punching glove and shoulder pad are usable items.
I thought it was gonna be a variation of Cosmic Power which Goodra doesnt learn unlike Acid Armor.
Leave it to gamefreak to take 5 steps backwards in removing the buffs and unique traits of the moves from legends Arceus
I feel like a lot of these moves are actually decent. Heart swap could be useful WITH tailglow to pass it to your partner flutter or now cresselia setting up calm minds and stealing the defense buffs (if both users were actually legal in vgc). And intimidate is a strong ability, so decreasing the power of an urshifu close combat or an ursaluna isn’t something to take lightly
i think the reason they changed bitter malice is because it was almost the same as hisuian typhlosion signature move, the only difference being that it inflict burn, instead of frostbite, but both kinda do the same thing, just halve a different stat, so even if it feel worst, at least it's not a homework copy meme anymore, and i still love it
Shelter would be busted if it also doubled as a form of protect to mimic the obscure effect. Although I could see it easily being balanced out by only increasing Defense by 1 stage
If they were translating the move accurately, it should by a decreased priority move that raises defense, special defence, and evasion by one stage each; but then lower Defence, Special Defence, and Evasion by one stage each after four turns have passed.
Not quite a perfect translation, but far more accurate then just making it iron Defence. It would be better, if less accurate, if it drastically raised your Defence and Special defence, but caused all of your moves to go down a priority bracket.
Similar thing with bitter malice. They should have made it 45 power and kept it's doubled power against pokemon with non-volatile status conditions, but then allowed it to emulate Frostbite with a unique volatile status condition (halving Special Attack, reducing health by 1/16th at the end of each turn, lasting between three to five turns, and not affecting pokemon that can't be frozen) if used when it is snowing.
This makes it more similar to it's arceus counterpart, without making it "Hex, but better".
@@twobladedswordsandmauls2120 Making it raise evasion or reduce your priority for its duration both suck as additional elements though lol. Nobody likes fighting evasion which is why evasion increasing strategies are banned and losing priority is not worth the tradeoff when there are other defense increasing moves that don't have that kind of downside, the drastic increase would be a good counterbalance, but in a way that wouldn't be very fun. Honestly if it just raised both defense and sp.def at the same time, that would already make it unique because the only move that already does that is stockpile.
9:02 why can't Shelter increase both Defense AND Evasiveness by one stage in Scarlet and Violet?
I really don't get why they didn't just make shelter a +3
4:30 Poison fang BADLY poisons the opponent O.O That actually makes it somewhat good (for mid game at least). I knew about conversion, but apparently not how poison fang worked, neat
Also in poison tail got overshadowed and replaced immediately in gen 4 by cross poison a move that does the same thing but with a higher base power of 70 instead of 50.
shadow ball on hisuian zoroark? i thought he was normal ghost
8:35 ah yes people are just going to use a ghost type move on a NORMAL pokemon.
"Isn't H.Zoroark a normal and ghost type; I think he meant that people are more likely to use Shadow Ball over Bitter Malice as their ghost stab instead".
The fact that Glaciate is OP... in Masters EX, it hit multiple target, does insane damage and can freeze your opponents team
9:10 it could raise evasion
heart swaps purpose is to be used in doubles, manaphy tail glows and heart swaps to its partner, hence “heart” swap
You should start a series on the mechanics of Pokémon moves. Would be hard but I think it would be super cool to see a video on how a move like hyper beam would theoretically work in real life. Like what is it, some kind of particle beam?
Idk heart swap can seem potentially devastating. You can straight up steal your opponents set up or in doubles give yourself a tail glow. The move isnt bad its just that it's stuck on a very small roster. Then another move i thought id see is egg bomb as the few Pokemon who learn it can hardly use it. Like chansey with its pathetic attack stat and also with its awful 75 accuracy. Its dragon rush but normal pretty much
Bitter malice is better then shadow ball, 5 less base power but you can help your team, tho you gotta be careful of defiant ape since you’ll have no more to hit it
Wait so camouflage was Staryu’s signature move in the same generation they introduced Kecleon?
A storm knocked out my power and internet for hours. I'm glad this video was here when it came back. Always love seeing new videos from ya, JPR.
In Gen 4 Cresselia got a signature move in Liner Dance sacrificed Cresselia but fully healed any Pokémon in the back. Then in Legends it got another one: Lunar Blessing. It was Lunar Dance, but didn't kill Cresselia.
Some of these moves could’ve worked if they were retooled a little bit but they still feel lackluster. Poison tail having a 60 base power with a high Crit rate and 30% chance to badly poison the foe would be much better as well as Conversion 2 being a guarantee type change to make every incoming attacks not very effective for 3 turns is much better and maybe a little too good. As for Shelter, I just wish it was a new King’s Shield that buffs Goodra’s defenses while also giving it a turn of protection.
I have literally never heard of barrage before today. Wild😂
Couldn’t Gamefreak make Shelter raise Def and Sp. Def by one stage or raise one of the user’s defenses and evasion by one stage?
conversion should change porygon's type to whatever its hidden power type is, that way you could try to get a useful hidden power type like dark and use conversion to get stab from a move like dark pulse. or have your porygon learn thunderbolt if your HP type is electric, etc
I mean if you have Thunderbolt in your first move slot and use Conversion, you become an Electric type already, but it would be cool to have a move that interacts off of the Hidden Power factor.
Z-conversion is actually really good. Porygon Z was known for using this to change most commonly to a ghost type that had omniboost and adaptability shadow ball.
You mean Dark Pulse? Not Shadow Ball. Hisuian 'ark is immune to SB
"I think he means they're more likely to run Shadow Ball on H.Zoroark instead of Bitter Malice as the ghost stab".
Poison Tail isn't anywhere near that bad. Seviper still gets STAB on it, plus the higher crit rate AND the poison chance, to actually do a good amount of damage.
Magic Coat does at least protect your ally as well in doubles so definitely handy if you are expecting status moves from certain pokemon for mind games
fun fact: present was busted in gen 2 because of a very strange programming error that made your opponents defense different depending on their type
For me, the move Barrage was so annoying to deal with in the Mystery Dungeon series with Execute and Executor randomly barraging you from who knows where
Barrage is one of the moves I absolutely forgot exists until I replayed Gen 1
5:42 i think the justification comes from a similar reason to marshadows spectral theif, taking there stat boosts, and if your stats are heavily lowered the opponent comes out much lower. The only thing heart swap is missing to be amazing is increased priority. Add to that heart glow and baton pass can be learned by manaphy.
Giving the Paradoxes signature moves:
-Great Tusk: Tusk Slam (Ground, physical, hits all active opponents, makes contact, lowering their Attack by 1)
-Brute Bonnet: Fungal Fury (Grass, physical, rolls for poison, paralyze, or sleep)
-Scream Tail: Savage Scream (Psychic, special, sound-based)
-Slither Wing: Solar Scales (Bug, status, heals all active Pokémon on user’s team for 1/4 of max, heals for 1/2 of max in sun)
-Flutter Mane: Primal Phantom (Ghost, special, chance of confusing the target)
-Sandy Shocks: Magnet Powder (Electric, status, paralyzes target and reduces their Speed by 1)
-Roaring Moon: Lunar Slash (Dark, physical, makes contact, chance of flinching target)
-Iron Treads: Steel Wheel (Steel, physical, makes contact, raises user’s Speed by 1)
-Iron Hands: Volt Slap (Electric, physical, makes contact, chance of flinching the target)
-Iron Bundle: Subzero Seafoam (Water, special, chance of freezing target)
-Iron Moth: Solar Seraph (Fire, special, hits all active opponents and traps them)
-Iron Jugulis: Triple Tornado (Flying, special, hits target 3 times in a row)
-Iron Thorns: Repeat Volt (Electric, physical, hits 2-5 times in a row)
-Iron Valiant: Twin Saber (Fairy, physical, hits twice)
Oh my God. A poketuber said Arceus the right way?! This might be the happiest I’ve ever been watching a poketube vid. I literally subscribed for this.
To be fair to Shelter, there’s a good amount of Pokemon who learn both Imprison and Iron Defense, so Shelter gets around Imprison.
I didn’t even know there was a second conversion😂
Funny how Game Freak just loves making bad Pokémon and bad moves, and when makes good ones, they nerf those :P (I know it doesn't happen every time, I'm trying to make a joke)
Heart Swap Magearna was amazing in Gen 7 and used on most ubers teams to counter Geomancy Xerneas. Even without that it synergised with Fleur Cannon
Heart Swap is helpful if your opponent has Belly Drum. They use it, you steal the x6 Attack but there HP is still at half.
I find Camouflage's history interesting. For example gen 4 added the ability to turn into an ice type. Pretty simple.
But gen 6 added *a lot* of new situations. For example turning into a dragon type when fighting in *space.*
Gen 7 got rid of some extremely niche situations, like space, and just added psychic for psychic terrain.
Lastly, gen 8 removed the move entirely.
because stealing a dragon dance means they need to waste a turn to set up when its unsafe to do so and risk getting hit by a dragon dance set up pokemon. its not psych up where it copies but steals the stat boosts. essentially, they not only made you safe to set up but also made themselves unable to set up safely in the process. its a two turn momentum shift that happens in one turn.
Magic coat is actually not that rare in 1v1 singles.
Heart swap was also used quite a bit by magearma to counter other set up magearnas and weepers in gens like 7-8, which is quite crazy
The dog years joke made me laugh really loud, thank you 😂
I remeber when gen 6 came out there was a kid at school who thougt fire was the best type and that he had the best team because it was 4/6 fire type.
Powder was a lot of fun to use on him.
I agree, Attack decrease doesn't really fit Bitter Malice. The original effect is good as it is but if they want to change it, it should be Sp. Def. Down (Maybe add an effect where if you got hit the turn you used bitter malice, you will get a Sp. Atk. buff, just like Rage)
For shelter, they could add an effect like No Critical Hits(Lucky Chant) or No Priority Moves(Armor Tail) for 5 turns.
To be fair, glare allows you to paralyze ground types, so it had more utility than just paralysis plus wrap. Of course, body slam has a 30 percent paralysis chance and most ground types are already slow... so it's not a huge deal.
5:51 its not what we are getting out of it, its that they cant use it so they have to spend another turn boosting while you do something else.
I feel like Present should be updated so it has an identical effect to Pollen Puff: Healing allies and damaging opponents. Maybe change it into an Ice-type move while we're at it. It always annoys me when a Pokemon's signature move is a different type than the Pokemon itself.
IMO Shelter at least should've gotten priority to make it that much different to Iron Defence if they didn't want to make it Iron Defence x Double-Team.
Also how hard is it to make Present just normal type Pollen Puff? ... Also also~ I'm surprised that Present wasn't turned into a Fairy type attack.
It would be nice if you can change the move order in battle. You can basically change Porygon to various types in one duel.
Worst part about Kyurem's glaciate is that in spanish it's translated to Mundo Gélido (frozen/frigid/cold world) and with such a cool name you'd expect it to be great but nope.
Buffs I'd give to these moves
Barrage: Give it 30 base power
Camouflage: User only takes 75% of any incoming damage while Camouflage is active
Conversion: Becomes a priority move
Conversion 2: Becomes a priority move. User always takes half damage from the selected move.
Present: Is a Flying move, has a minimum power of 60, always damages enemies and heals allies, the healing is now 50%.
Poison Tail: Give it 70 bp like Slash and make it a cutting move. On a related note, give Seviper the Sharpness ability.
Magic Coat: lasts for 3 turns
Take Heart: Priority move
Glaciate: Has 90 bp.
Freeze Shock and Ice Burn: Have 200 bp and 100 accuracy. This makes these moves hard to switch in on between the huge damage and status chance. Life Orb boosted Freeze Shock now deals enough damage that Toxapex can't switch in on it. This makes the charge turn not as much of a problem because even resists will get absolutely slammed by it. If Kyurem can take a hit from the enemy and outspeed, these moves will annihilate. That's not even mentioning Power Herb.
Powder: lasts 2-4 turns
Bitter Malice: Still doubles in power against statused foes.
Shelter: User takes half damage from all moves for 5 turns
Barrage is a move that for some reason you will only see if you breed an Exeggcute.
i really like the new bitter malice, the attack drop can be good for the tanks in the party
It's also just pretty helpful in general, and not just exclusively for more tanky Pokemon. It can also help a frailer party member to have a better chance of surviving another turn or two longer in some cases, similar to how you see strategies utilizing the dual screens to enable a frail Pokemon in the party to set up without fear of being instantly knocked out
Conversion and Conversion2 are actually pretty good if you know how to use them properly. Conversion changes your type to any one of your OWN moves, giving you great STAB options. And while Conversion2 does change your type to match the type of a random opponent's attack, half of all Pokemon types resist themselves meaning you can effectively turn many enemy STAB moves into resisted hits.
Although extremely cheesy, you can make powder somewhat work in hackmons. If you have a speedy Bug/Steel type (Likely durant) and give it wonder guard, you can deter the opponent from attacking you. Thus, you get practically free turns to set-up or what have you.
Only issue is that it isnt that useful vs safety goggle users and also you are better off using an air balloon ground weak wonder guard user in the first place.
What Game Freak could have done with the move Shelter is also improve evasion by one stage. Or add a obscure mechanic in Scarlet and Violet. Than its PP would be justified.
Also the sad part of Goomy line is that it also gets Acid Armor. It has more PP than Shelter and Iron Defence.
I would think attack order would be listed under the pretty good ones at least, but maybe it's just not quite good enough.
Conversion had its niche in doubles where you could give wonder guard to porygon2 and porygon2 was a electric type with a baloon v:
i think exeggcute should learn population bomb and get a new ability "yoke" where it decreases speed after getting 2-3 hits on an opponent
I still dont understand why they got rid of the hex-like effect from Bitter Malice. It just makes sense to keep that at LEAST. Its literally a move born from rage and spite.
Will-o-wisp + Bitter Malice spam and you successfully shut down physical attackers
How I would improve some of these moves
Barrage, either increase the power, or have it be “Population Bomb but with max of 6 instead of 10”
Present, if they want it to move that isn’t just a gimmick they can have it work like Pollen Puff (damage opponents but heals allies)
Poison Tail, increase power or increase chance to badly poison
Powder, have the powder last for at least 2 moves so that you can guarantee the opponent doesn’t use a fire type attack for 1 turn
Bitter Malice, bring back the hex bonus affect
Shelter, increase defence by +2 and evasion by +1
Shelter should have been made so that it boosts def and spec def by 2 but lowers atk, spec atk, and speed by 2.
Goodra's signature should've increased defense and evasion
Currently converision changes you type to the type of your first move's type.
Powder would be an amazing move on other Pokemon. Imagine something like Durant having this move to check something like Heatran. The mind games and then you could counter them
If they bring Barrage back in the DLC, the Exeggcute line can finally get STAB for it. But I doubt they'll bring it back after removing it from Sword and Shield.
We have Porygon and Porygon 2, as well as Conversion and Conversion 2. It’s a shame that when Porygon-Z was introduced, we didn’t get Conversion-Z. I know in gen 7 we got Z-Conversion, but that’s not quite the same. The idea of a glitchy conversion sounds fun.
conversion changes to the type of the move on the top of the users move list, not the opponents