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“That One Pokémon You Just Have Beef With”
- Thread starter bdt2002
- Start date
thank you for coming to my TED Talk
Traditionally when people do a TED Talk they actually use words
a picture speaks a thousand words
You've got me there.
Ledian
I hate this thing so much.
A few teeny changes could have made it... actually usable. It has similar BSTs to most of the other early bugs, but even Dustox is an upgrade on this thing. Its movepool is mostly only saved by Light Screen and Baton Pass... That's literally all it has going for it. It took an interesting design choice and did it so badly they straight up did a new LadyBug Pokemon which is much better (Orbeetle)! As a sick joke GF even gave it basically every Punching move AND had the gall to give it IRON FIST. WITH 35 BASE ATTACK.
The other mons with similar BSTs all functionally work better. Better offences (Kricketune, Ariados), better movepools (Butterfree, Dustox) or have had upgrades which give them new leases of life (Beedrill, Sableye, Mawile). Or even the mons with gimmicks all work better as well (Smeargle, Shedinja, Wobbuffet). There is just nothing going for it. I used it once on a team which included both Delcatty and Luvdisc, and it STILL managed to be bottom of the barrel in terms of usefulness... I could write a long essay on how badly it performs.
The only other mon which comes CLOSE to this level of disdain for me is Noctowl. For similar reasons for really. Outclassed by even Pidgeot, its also by far the weakest of the starter birds (And this includes the ridiculousness of Unfezant).
I hate this thing so much.
A few teeny changes could have made it... actually usable. It has similar BSTs to most of the other early bugs, but even Dustox is an upgrade on this thing. Its movepool is mostly only saved by Light Screen and Baton Pass... That's literally all it has going for it. It took an interesting design choice and did it so badly they straight up did a new LadyBug Pokemon which is much better (Orbeetle)! As a sick joke GF even gave it basically every Punching move AND had the gall to give it IRON FIST. WITH 35 BASE ATTACK.
The other mons with similar BSTs all functionally work better. Better offences (Kricketune, Ariados), better movepools (Butterfree, Dustox) or have had upgrades which give them new leases of life (Beedrill, Sableye, Mawile). Or even the mons with gimmicks all work better as well (Smeargle, Shedinja, Wobbuffet). There is just nothing going for it. I used it once on a team which included both Delcatty and Luvdisc, and it STILL managed to be bottom of the barrel in terms of usefulness... I could write a long essay on how badly it performs.
The only other mon which comes CLOSE to this level of disdain for me is Noctowl. For similar reasons for really. Outclassed by even Pidgeot, its also by far the weakest of the starter birds (And this includes the ridiculousness of Unfezant).
Ledian
I hate this thing so much.
A few teeny changes could have made it... actually usable. It has similar BSTs to most of the other early bugs, but even Dustox is an upgrade on this thing. Its movepool is mostly only saved by Light Screen and Baton Pass... That's literally all it has going for it. It took an interesting design choice and did it so badly they straight up did a new LadyBug Pokemon which is much better (Orbeetle)! As a sick joke GF even gave it basically every Punching move AND had the gall to give it IRON FIST. WITH 35 BASE ATTACK.
The other mons with similar BSTs all functionally work better. Better offences (Kricketune, Ariados), better movepools (Butterfree, Dustox) or have had upgrades which give them new leases of life (Beedrill, Sableye, Mawile). Or even the mons with gimmicks all work better as well (Smeargle, Shedinja, Wobbuffet). There is just nothing going for it. I used it once on a team which included both Delcatty and Luvdisc, and it STILL managed to be bottom of the barrel in terms of usefulness... I could write a long essay on how badly it performs.
The only other mon which comes CLOSE to this level of disdain for me is Noctowl. For similar reasons for really. Outclassed by even Pidgeot, its also by far the weakest of the starter birds (And this includes the ridiculousness of Unfezant).
This is one is particularly tragic because you literally can't even save this with a mega evolution (though god knows people have tried). Even if you minmax it like Beedrill, it's still outclassed by stuff that can hold an item and too frail thanks to that terrible HP - 490 just isn't a high enough BST to divide up effectively. You could opt to work on its slightly better Special Attack, but then that makes Iron Fist pointless and you have to think about giving it an ability it can make better use of.
It's a shame because I really like the design, out of all the Johto Bugs I'd say it's my favourite. 110 Special Defence is pretty darn spectacular for an early-game mon, and 85 Speed isn't bad either. Tbf I may be biased but think it's just about passable in GSC (largely thanks to the generally lower power level in Gen II, but it also has a far better movepool than most Bug-types in those games can hope for) and in the Orre games, actually (XD, at least - the fact it comes late in the game enough in Colosseum to be encountered after Entei is frankly a crime). In XD it comes with Psybeam and Aerial Ace which are not bad attacking options at all, but its true value is in being a team supporter that's fast enough to not have to take two attacks before it can move.
Having used it in-game a few times I'd say its best use isn't really in being the star of the show, much as I might want it to be. It's one of the small handful of Pokemon that learned Baton Pass in earlier generations, which pairs nicely with Agility - it doesn't have a whole lot else it can pass to a teammate unless you count Light Screen, Reflect, and Safeguard but it does get Silver Wind too. With a little retooling I think it could be a much more optimised Baton Passer; Serene Grace and +10 to its HP would be the least I'd give it. Why not Quiver Dance too, it's hardly out of the question.
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