SPOILERS! Mysteries and Conspiracies of Pokemon

To clarify something, since the Breeding mechanics are fairly obfuscated in game, where do the names for the Egg Groups come from? Datamines, guide books consistently using a term, or just fan dubs that caught on like "Eeveelution" was for a long time?
They're explicitly referred to internally, and then the names themselves were given for Stadium 2/Pokedex 3D

I also assumed or misremembered that they were given in guide books as well, and it's possible they are in other books, but i pulled out a few of mine (a nintendo power Crystal guide, a Versus Gold/Silver guide and a Prima Ruby/Sapphire guide) and they actually aren't. They do list out the "interest" messages (something I forgot and also I'm pretty sure is removed entirely in SV oops), list out the ones that can't breed, and talk at length about Ditto's interactions. Even the otherwise super detailed Versus guidebook for GS I have doesnt have egg groupings.
 
They're explicitly referred to internally, and then the names themselves were given for Stadium 2/Pokedex 3D

I also assumed or misremembered that they were given in guide books as well, and it's possible they are in other books, but i pulled out a few of mine (a nintendo power Crystal guide, a Versus Gold/Silver guide and a Prima Ruby/Sapphire guide) and they actually aren't. They do list out the "interest" messages (something I forgot and also I'm pretty sure is removed entirely in SV oops), list out the ones that can't breed, and talk at length about Ditto's interactions. Even the otherwise super detailed Versus guidebook for GS I have doesnt have egg groupings.
My Emerald guide lists them, as does my Diamond/Pearl guide.
 
I remember having some sort of "complete battler's pokedex" book (no longer remember the exact title and lost my copy years ago) from gen 3 which listed egg groups by their common names (along with availibility in each GBA game, full movepools, and approximate base stats).
 
I have a Crystal guidebook that lists Egg groups of each Pokemon, using the names used in Stadium 2. Even explains Chain Breeding(by name) and the more specific "Chain Smeargling" as they call it to since some Egg moves can only be obtained via Sketch Smeargle, with the specific example given in the guide being Heal Bell Chansey(Teach wild Male Smeargle Heal Bell via using it with a Miltank in front of it, breed with female Snubull/Granbull until you get a Male Heal Bell Snubull, then breed that with Chansey).
 
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Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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Why was TM 95 Snarl locked behind an unreleased event item in Black and White.

Whose idea was this. Why Snarl of all things.

I just don't get it.
Why the method, they just thought it would be a cool idea. So far the only thing you could transfer between gens was just Pokemon, but what if they made some special items which could also? And then they took it a step further: What if this item was something that did nothing in the game it was given out to, you had to transfer it to the next gen game where you can use it! An Event Item instead of an Event Pokemon!

But, being this was something never done, they probably wanted a Move which would certainly be useful, but no one would be missing out if they didn't get it. They probably chose Snarl also due to Zoroark being an Event Pokemon, in a way it being a pseudo Signature Move: An Event Move to go along with the premier Event Pokemon.

The big question is more why they never did the Event, even if they didn't like it and thus wrote it off as a one time thing. Heck, I don't think this idea of "Transfer Items" is even a bad idea either, yet they killed it before even trying.
 

Karxrida

Death to the Undying Savage
is a Community Contributor Alumnus
Why the method, they just thought it would be a cool idea. So far the only thing you could transfer between gens was just Pokemon, but what if they made some special items which could also? And then they took it a step further: What if this item was something that did nothing in the game it was given out to, you had to transfer it to the next gen game where you can use it! An Event Item instead of an Event Pokemon!

But, being this was something never done, they probably wanted a Move which would certainly be useful, but no one would be missing out if they didn't get it. They probably chose Snarl also due to Zoroark being an Event Pokemon, in a way it being a pseudo Signature Move: An Event Move to go along with the premier Event Pokemon.

The big question is more why they never did the Event, even if they didn't like it and thus wrote it off as a one time thing. Heck, I don't think this idea of "Transfer Items" is even a bad idea either, yet they killed it before even trying.
I can kind of see the gimmicky appeal of having a transfer item, but GF had already made it clear by that point that obtaining old items wasn't hard. Just seemed pointless, which they must have quickly realized since the TM is easy to get in BW2.

Additionally, Snarl isn't really associated with Zororak. It doesn't learn the move by level-up (nothing does in Gen 5), and it was already given a signature move in Night Daze.

The whole situation is just so weird.
 
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Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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Is there much of a reason why Magneton is 10 times heavier than Magnemite? My theory is that its strong magnetism pulls it to the ground harder, increasing its gravity? But apparently magnetism and gravity are completely seperate
Well obviously a Ton is heavier than a Mite. :blobuwu:

Okay, being serious, first we need to make some assumptions & observations:
  • We'll assume that the weight measurement was not affected by their electromagnetism.
  • Magneton's Height is about 3 times Magnemite's, plus a bit more. Assuming Height means the distance between their "leg" bolts to their top bolt (and we'll assume it's the maximum amount they can have it unscrewed) and not one tip of the magnet to the other (aka their front facing length), I guess that's about right if for Magneton they counted length being the bottom magnets' tips to the top bolt. If true, that also means the individual unit's bodies haven't changed shape, they're just stuck together by strong magnetic forces (which seems to be supported by the games when we see them together).
  • Though, note, as a Magnemite, when grouped with other Magnemite or even with other Magneton/zone, they aren't forced together; Magnemite remain their own units, Magneton are only ever in pairs of three of the same units, and Magnezone is 3 units in one body.
  • The increase done to Magnemite's stats are thus: +25/+25/+25/+25/+15/+25//+140 (looks like when they made Magneton's Special Defense staff they forgot all of its other stats increased by 25). Taking that into account, the "power" increase done when combined was evenly spread throughout Magneton; BST wise it increased by more than a third.
So, if I had to come up with an explanation for the sudden increase in weight, I would suggest its from a sudden increase in mass. And not just from the 3 sticking together, but rather each unit's body gained mass but in a way which doesn't change their physical appearance (so each unit goes from weighing 13.2 lbs/6 kg to 44.1 lbs/20 kg). In order to now be sticking together, my first hypothesis is that the metal which Magneton is made of has changed from what Magnemite was made of. If so, this metal could just be heavier; there's also a possibility that the inner casing of the units got thicker for whatever reason. BUT there may be more! Whatever mechanism/organ that's operating Magnemite, we'll call it its "battery", may give it enough power to levitate and produce electricity, would it be able to support 3 combined together even with the other 2's battery? It could be that, in order to handle the extra electricity need to keep Magneton operating (which would include the extra magnetism that's keeping them together), they all developed a stronger battery which would add on additional weight (said extra weight also have to be accounted for to keep it levitating). This could be why Magneton is in pairs of 3 but not 2 or 4 or more; 3 is the magic number that's just enough to give the "individual" more power, any other combination and no matter what changes are made it won't be the right balance of weight = power. This is also likely why the family don't attract other units, Magnemite (and Magnezone) are made of different metal which aren't strongly attracted, and Magneton's magnetism is at an equilibrium meaning only the 3 units are attracted to one another and have a negative force pushing away others.
 
I'm probably just overthinking this, but...

Steven's Aggron has a very odd moveset in Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald. It has no Steel- or Rock-type attacks, instead running the moves Earthquake, Thunder, Solarbeam, and Dragon Claw. On one hand, I understand why it doesn't have STAB moves; its only Rock attack in Ruby and Sapphire was the weak Rock Tomb, and its only good option for a Steel move would be Iron Tail. What I don't understand entirely is why Game Freak decided to almost entirely eschew physical moves for it, instead giving it three Special attacks to run off of its extremely mediocre base 60 Special Attack. Its Physical movepool in RSE was a bit limited compared to its Special options, but a set of Double-Edge (with Rock Head), Earthquake, Iron Tail, and mayyybe Rock Tomb seems like it would be serviceable enough.

While thinking about this the other day, it occurred to me that Thunder and Solarbeam are moves bolstered by weather, the very weather conditions that Kyogre and Groudon are known to summon. Conveniently, they are also weak to those attacks. Looking at Dragon Claw, Aggron is one of a relatively small number of non-Dragon Pokémon to learn the move, and as a Dragon move, it's super effective against Rayquaza, the third weather-manipulating legendary in Hoenn (Aggron also gets Ice Beam/Blizzard which would be better against Rayquaza but I'm ignoring that for the sake of this argument). If it was actually the intention for Aggron to know these moves to counter the titans, it ignores the unfortunate fact that Aggron is weak to Water and Ground, and is slower than the legendaries, meaning it's (probably) not going to get a chance to attack against them before dying.

Of course, it's also just possible that it knows Thunder and Solarbeam to help cover it's general weaknesses to Water and Ground, but I found the fact that Game Freak chose those weather attacks interesting.
 

Karxrida

Death to the Undying Savage
is a Community Contributor Alumnus
This is more of a programming thing but I felt like this was still the right place to bring it up.

I was reading Bulbapedia's page on Baton Pass, and it has this sentence.

Baton Pass passes the effect of Telekinesis. This effect disappears if the replacement Pokémon is Mega Gengar.
This is so bizarrely specific that there has to be some kind of story behind it.

In case you're wondering, the page for Telekinesis contains this passage.

Mega Gengar, Diglett, Dugtrio, Sandygast, and Palossand cannot be affected by the move Telekinesis, but a Pokémon transformed into one of these Pokémon can be affected. If Mega Gengar is affected by Telekinesis before Mega Evolving or receives the effect via Baton Pass, the effect disappears; the other four will retain the effect if they obtain it via Baton Pass.
The list does make sense lore-wise, but the fact that Telekinesis still works on them in specific circumstances (Transform or Baton Pass) is just odd.
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
is a Community Contributoris a Top Smogon Media Contributor
Steven's Aggron has a very odd moveset in Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald. It has no Steel- or Rock-type attacks, instead running the moves Earthquake, Thunder, Solarbeam, and Dragon Claw. On one hand, I understand why it doesn't have STAB moves (...). What I don't understand entirely is why Game Freak decided to almost entirely eschew physical moves for it, instead giving it three Special attacks to run off of its extremely mediocre base 60 Special Attack. (...)

While thinking about this the other day, it occurred to me that Thunder and Solarbeam are moves bolstered by weather, the very weather conditions that Kyogre and Groudon are known to summon. Conveniently, they are also weak to those attacks. Looking at Dragon Claw, (...), it's super effective against Rayquaza (...). If it was actually the intention for Aggron to know these moves to counter the titans, it ignores the unfortunate fact that Aggron is weak to Water and Ground, and is slower than the legendaries, meaning it's (probably) not going to get a chance to attack against them before dying.

Of course, it's also just possible that it knows Thunder and Solarbeam to help cover it's general weaknesses to Water and Ground, but I found the fact that Game Freak chose those weather attacks interesting.


You (can) catch Groudon and Kyogre before facing Steven in all the games, and Rayquaza in Emerald. With them also covering a batch of its weaknesses (and Dragon just in general is a strong Type that hits most Pokemon for neutral, also super effective on Salamence), they may have been banking on surprise factor and possibly even the player setting themselves up. And sure, Aggron isn't really going to stand against them, though if you did send Kygore or Groudon out that means you've permanently set up Rain or Sunshine, if the AI was smart and able to it would try to send Aggron in when those two aren't out so that it can have boosted accurate Thunder & instant Solar Beam on whatever poor Pokemon it'll be facing. And if it has to face Grounon or Kyogre, well, if it gets lucky and survives a hit it has something to hurt them with.

Very good observation. :blobthumbsup:

I was reading Bulbapedia's page on Baton Pass, and it has this sentence.

"Baton Pass passes the effect of Telekinesis. This effect disappears if the replacement Pokémon is Mega Gengar."

This is so bizarrely specific that there has to be some kind of story behind it.
Hm, it could just be oversight that they forgot the Diglett family and Sandyghast family, I imagine Mega Gengar would have some more additional priority to make sure mechanics are working properly for it.

If you're stretching for a lore-reason, well could be that since Gengar is a more ethereal ghost it can just phase out of the effect of Telekinesis. Diglett family are alive thus have a physical body, and the Sandyghast family are being lifted up via the sand which makes up its body than the spirit itself thus can't slip out like Gengar can.
 

QuentinQuonce

formerly green_typhlosion
I can kind of see the gimmicky appeal of having a transfer item, but GF had already made it clear by that point that obtaining old items wasn't hard. Just seemed pointless, which they must have quickly realized since the TM is easy to get in BW2.

Additionally, Snarl isn't really associated with Zororak. It doesn't learn the move by level-up (nothing does in Gen 5), and it was already given a signature move in Night Daze.

The whole situation is just so weird.
It kind of is, in that Zoroark is the one who gives you TM95 in B2W2, and that there was that event Zoroark distributed with it.

I guess they just figured "well, may as well lump the event-locked species and the event-locked move together".

The bigger question is why Snarl was considered so valuable it had to be kept concealed from Team Rocket (which is the justification given in-game). Like, if it was a Hyper Beam variant or something, sure.

I'm probably just overthinking this, but...

Steven's Aggron has a very odd moveset in Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald. It has no Steel- or Rock-type attacks, instead running the moves Earthquake, Thunder, Solarbeam, and Dragon Claw. On one hand, I understand why it doesn't have STAB moves; its only Rock attack in Ruby and Sapphire was the weak Rock Tomb, and its only good option for a Steel move would be Iron Tail. What I don't understand entirely is why Game Freak decided to almost entirely eschew physical moves for it, instead giving it three Special attacks to run off of its extremely mediocre base 60 Special Attack. Its Physical movepool in RSE was a bit limited compared to its Special options, but a set of Double-Edge (with Rock Head), Earthquake, Iron Tail, and mayyybe Rock Tomb seems like it would be serviceable enough.

While thinking about this the other day, it occurred to me that Thunder and Solarbeam are moves bolstered by weather, the very weather conditions that Kyogre and Groudon are known to summon. Conveniently, they are also weak to those attacks. Looking at Dragon Claw, Aggron is one of a relatively small number of non-Dragon Pokémon to learn the move, and as a Dragon move, it's super effective against Rayquaza, the third weather-manipulating legendary in Hoenn (Aggron also gets Ice Beam/Blizzard which would be better against Rayquaza but I'm ignoring that for the sake of this argument). If it was actually the intention for Aggron to know these moves to counter the titans, it ignores the unfortunate fact that Aggron is weak to Water and Ground, and is slower than the legendaries, meaning it's (probably) not going to get a chance to attack against them before dying.

Of course, it's also just possible that it knows Thunder and Solarbeam to help cover it's general weaknesses to Water and Ground, but I found the fact that Game Freak chose those weather attacks interesting.
Honestly this might be overthinking it (though I am the last person on Smogon to discourage overthinking). A few NPC Pokemon in earlier gens have quite janky movesets that seem more designed with style in mind rather than efficiency; Palmer's Rhyperior in DP has a similarly lacklustre moveset (Rock Wrecker, Ice Beam, Flamethrower, Thunderbolt).

In this case, my hunch is that his Aggron goes the special route because most of Steven's team have fairly restricted movepools: Armaldo mixes things up a bit with Aerial Ace and Water Pulse and Skarmory has Toxic, but otherwise it's largely Steel, Rock, and Normal moves with Earthquake thrown in for good measure. But Aggron learns a wide variety of moves so it seems like they took the chance to give it Dragon, Grass, and Electric moves for nominal coverage since nothing else on his team has them, even though doing so makes it pretty underwhelming to fight.

Interestingly, the Prima Games guide I have for Ruby and Sapphire contains a hint in the Meteor Falls section which is along the lines of: "Iron Tail and Dragon Claw are both rare moves - one Steel, one Dragon. Save them for a good Pokemon!" Aggron comes to mind as one that learns both, though without checking I believe it learns Iron Tail naturally in Gen III. But it's not as if there are a lot of Pokemon who can efficiently make use of both of those moves.
 
For a more mechanical mystery: NPC trainer gender ratios. In general, Trainers will have mons that match their gender, with some exceptions for certain trainer classes or mons with extreme M/F ratios. Except occasionally GF will just override that for no apparent reason. Scarlet/Violet is a major example, with a lot of the significant NPCs having set genders for their mons.
Which, fine, they need something to determine whether Bug Catcher #3's Weedle is M or F and they don't want to make it random, makes sense. And they do want to put effort into making sure the genders of the major trainers' teams are consistent across multiple appearances and don't auto-lose to Cute Charm. Sure.

And for what kicked me off on this: So why does Penny have 3M and 3F pokes from a 7/1 ratio species? Why does the raw trainer data only set the gender for 5 of her pokes? Why can't GF ever just be simple?
(Also, Eri has an all-male team, which feels kind of insulting? A bit?)
 
For a more mechanical mystery: NPC trainer gender ratios. In general, Trainers will have mons that match their gender, with some exceptions for certain trainer classes or mons with extreme M/F ratios. Except occasionally GF will just override that for no apparent reason. Scarlet/Violet is a major example, with a lot of the significant NPCs having set genders for their mons.
Which, fine, they need something to determine whether Bug Catcher #3's Weedle is M or F and they don't want to make it random, makes sense. And they do want to put effort into making sure the genders of the major trainers' teams are consistent across multiple appearances and don't auto-lose to Cute Charm. Sure.

And for what kicked me off on this: So why does Penny have 3M and 3F pokes from a 7/1 ratio species? Why does the raw trainer data only set the gender for 5 of her pokes? Why can't GF ever just be simple?
(Also, Eri has an all-male team, which feels kind of insulting? A bit?)
I assume Penny has a 3/3 split because of her hair. Blue/Red and all.

Eri's actually got a girl on her rematch team: her primeape!



Looking at some other teams kind of interesting how most trainers tend towards a 2/3 or 2/4 split.
Ryme actually has all male pokemon and Saguaro has all female.
 
The Scyther to Scizor evolution is a bit odd, because Scizor has the same base stat total as Scyther. Why do you think they did this? Why wouldn't they make Scizor's base stat total a little higher? Scizor at least has a better stat distribution and typing overall though. I get Scyther already had a high BST, but instead of giving Scizor the same 500 BST, why not bump it up a bit to around 520 or 530? It's the only evolution to have the same BST as its prevolution. The alternate Scyther evolution Kleavor also continues this trend. I can understand that some though because it was established with Scizor.

I wonder how the developers were thinking during GS development. Was it for game balancing? Was it because Scizor is already better overall than Scyther as is, so there was no need to increase its BST?

Scizor almost seems like an alternate form to Scyther in a way, and this was before forms existed. It's better overall, but Scyther has a lot more speed. And Scizor has a more defense and attack. So Scizor unfortunately loses a lot of speed
 
The Scyther to Scizor evolution is a bit odd, because Scizor has the same base stat total as Scyther. Why do you think they did this? Why wouldn't they make Scizor's base stat total a little higher? Scizor at least has a better stat distribution and typing overall though. I get Scyther already had a high BST, but instead of giving Scizor the same 500 BST, why not bump it up a bit to around 520 or 530? It's the only evolution to have the same BST as its prevolution. The alternate Scyther evolution Kleavor also continues this trend. I can understand that some though because it was established with Scizor.

I wonder how the developers were thinking during GS development. Was it for game balancing? Was it because Scizor is already better overall than Scyther as is, so there was no need to increase its BST?

Scizor almost seems like an alternate form to Scyther in a way, and this was before forms existed. It's better overall, but Scyther has a lot more speed. And Scizor has a more defense and attack. So Scizor unfortunately loses a lot of speed
My theory is that Scizor was originally designed as a separate counterpart species to Scyther and was made an evolution later without altering its stats. In gen 1, Scyther paired with Pinsir, both being 500 BST bug-types that were version exclusives of one another. Gen 2 introduced Heracross which made for a better counterpart to Pinsir since the pairing of the stag and hercules beetles shows up a decent amount in Japanese media. However, this would leave Scyther partnerless, so Scizor was designed to fill that void. At some later point, they decided they needed a second mon that evolves by Metal Coat and that Scizor could work as an evolution.
 
My theory is that Scizor was originally designed as a separate counterpart species to Scyther and was made an evolution later without altering its stats. In gen 1, Scyther paired with Pinsir, both being 500 BST bug-types that were version exclusives of one another. Gen 2 introduced Heracross which made for a better counterpart to Pinsir since the pairing of the stag and hercules beetles shows up a decent amount in Japanese media. However, this would leave Scyther partnerless, so Scizor was designed to fill that void. At some later point, they decided they needed a second mon that evolves by Metal Coat and that Scizor could work as an evolution.
Scizor was always going to be a Scyther evolution


it even looked more like Scyther. At this point it wasn't steel type & evolved by level. It also existed alongside a Pinsir evolution.
unfortunately we have no idea what the stat situation was planned as, at this time they only had placeholder stats (as did most of the new Pokemon).


I think "balance" might be why, though. After they ironed out Special Defense for the old Pokemon, Scyther would be the only 500 BST Pokemon to receive an evolution. While there would be evolutions that would go past 500 in Gen 2, they all evolved from weaker Pokemon and aside from the "split" evolutions all of them had higher stat bumps. Now with stat rearranging I think yeah it could have taken a stat bump as well, but I think they wanted to play it safe this go around. They'd be significantly more likely to both make Pokemon with high stats into normal evolutions and more willing to give a slight stat bump while rearranging other stats. Porygon-Z & most evolutions in gen 8, hello. Porygon-Z in particular is a really good example since it completely shifted how Porygon2 worked and had a very minimal BST increase; if gen 2 had gotten P2 AND PZ (or if 2 had happened in gen 1 I guess), Z likely would have worked like Scizor did.
They also may have wanted parity with Pinsir & Heracross so they were all still a trio.

basically scizor might've just been a really goofy situation of their own making and effectively making it a form change before form changes were a thing was their solution.
 
Scizor was always going to be a Scyther evolution


it even looked more like Scyther. At this point it wasn't steel type & evolved by level. It also existed alongside a Pinsir evolution.
unfortunately we have no idea what the stat situation was planned as, at this time they only had placeholder stats (as did most of the new Pokemon).
There was plenty of leaked developments documents leaked a while back(Which can be found on the Cutting Room Floor website) that showed that Scizor at one point was going to have a BST of 540. Pinsir's evolution actually lasted a bit before being permanently cut, going through an almost identical process (Started as having the same typing as its pre-evolution, ended up Bug/Steel, started at 540 BST, ended up with Pinsir's 500 BST re-distributed with less speed but more Attack and Defense) though unlike Scizor it was dropped and replaced by Forretress around 1998-1999
 
There was plenty of leaked developments documents leaked a while back(Which can be found on the Cutting Room Floor website) that showed that Scizor at one point was going to have a BST of 540. Pinsir's evolution actually lasted a bit before being permanently cut, going through an almost identical process (Started as having the same typing as its pre-evolution, ended up Bug/Steel, started at 540 BST, ended up with Pinsir's 500 BST re-distributed with less speed but more Attack and Defense) though unlike Scizor it was dropped and replaced by Forretress around 1998-1999
Oh cool, I tried looking through the 99 builds on tcrf for Scizor's later incarnation stats but I didn't see stat listings. So many subpages.
 
https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/515/831/c8d.png
The more that I read the purported X/Y conceptual leak, the more I believe that it was made more so out of wish fulfilment that X and Y were actually interesting instead of being boring than anything else. Like, beings from another world showing up in ORAS and the Alolan games, differing Pokemon sizes being experimented on first with Pumpkaboo, and an imposter Professor that has its origins with imposter Oak and later being fulfilled with the A.I Professors in Scarlet and Violet lend it credence, but everything else reads like the leaker swearing every single major complaint of X/Y has an answer.
1675609785511.png

"I swear guys, X and Y were meant to be good! Diantha and AZ had actual character presence, Goodra was a Dragon/Water, but they had too many Water types. Delphox was Fire/Fairy and Chestnaught was Grass/Steel. Pyroar had actual differences like Meowstic. Olympia wasn't meant to be made of cardboard. Alexa had something to do. Carbink/Diancie were supposed to be a family and not an expy of Phione/Manaphy..."

I also love the exchange about Sylveon at the bottom. "Bro, people thought Sylveon was a Flying type even without its wings".
 
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