CAP 25 - Part 4 - Secondary Typings Discussion

[ShunosaurusLii]

1 (Water). What types can make effective use of defensively-oriented moves that coordinate with eligible abilities?
I'd like to bring more attention to the idea of Water/Dragon for Cap25w, as I believe that it offers a unique, unexplored defensive typing with two very useful 4x resistances, effectively nullifying a certain kraken. While most water types aren't known for their diverse reliable recovery moves or the ability to paralyze opponents many dragons have vast movepools that tend to include a greater variety of reliable recovery(mostly roost, although between latias and cyclohm, dragons have the option to use slack off as well) and/or utility moves such as thunder wave and glare. Dragons also tend to have a natural affinity for dragon tail, offering an interesting phasing option, but we would have to be careful to not encroach on arghonaut's circle throw spikes phasing strategy. Dragon types tend to show a diverse ability pool as well, including defensive abilities such as multiscale and marvel scale(also including rough skin and natural cure only to show the diversity of abilities, not arguing for them, as they are banned)

4. Given our BST limitations, how can we intelligently use typing in order to prevent our starter trio from being outclassed by similar Grass, Fire, and Water Pokemon, even if they should share a somewhat similar role? Read: how can we use typing to carve out a new role in the CAP metagame?
I believe that with the role as a bulky water type, this CAP will face stiff competition from Toxapex and Arghonaut as a bulky water type. I think that this CAP can set itself apart as a bulky water with recovery and a beneficial defensive ability by using a diverse movepool to provide a passable offensive presence. While Arghonaut does have a diverse movepool, I hardly see it running many offensive moves bar earthquake and circle throw. This CAP can use a diverse movepool of many elemental moves indicitave of a dragon type to forego pure stalling capabilities by denting the opposing team.

I hope I kept to the framework and concept there, I'm more than happy to clear up any confusion my ramblings may have caused.

 

[Warren685]

1 (Grass). What are some underexplored types that have the potential to allow us to create an as-of-yet unseen niche for CAP 25g? How does this typing help us to explore our concept?

Now a typing I'm going to suggest is Grass/Ghost. Now before you argue that we already have Necturna, I'm presenting this niche as more of a disabler kind of role as oppose to a Sweeper. Now if you look at Grass and Ghost they have a number of moves that can affect the opponent's pokemons such as paralyzing with Stun Spore, planting Leech Seed to lengthen their lives, changing their type to Ghost with Trick or Treat, using Hex to inflict massive damage on them when they have any status on them or even inflict a Curse on them. Pair it up with Prankster and you can abuse all these status moves with priority. There's also a couple more grass combination that can work great with the ability Berserk, can't believe no one mention this yet. Now If we look at Grass/Poison both typings have a good number of special attacks that can benefit from the Berserk boost and it has great synergy with recovery from the grass typing. Grass/Electric can also synergize with this ability and can possibly be a pivot. I was also going to suggest Grass/Rock, but Rock only has 2 special attacks unless people are okay with that.

1 (Fire). What types have healthy STAB movepools that they can coordinate with eligible abilities for offensive use? What types might be better suited to coordinate with an eligible ability as non-STAB coverage, due to their faults defensively or otherwise, and why?

A really interesting type combination to explore would be Fire/Ice. Now say that it has the ability Sheer Force then a healthy amount of Fire and Ice moves would benefit from this. To name a few there's Ice Punch, Fire punch, Fire Blast, Flamethrower, Ice Beam, Blizzard, Icicle Crash, Mystical Fire, and etc. Serene Grace also work on these moves as well.

 

[Deck Knight]

I will add more detail later, but for 25f I think an awesome typing to explore is Fire/Rock. Its sole representative is worse than Grass/Ice's, not being able to use that slow speed in Trick Room because of weak offensive presence.

But no more. Fire/Rock is an incredible offensive type boosted by a multitude of relevant abilities from the obvious Rock Head with recoil moves to Sniper and Super Luck with Blaze Kick and Stone Edge. While it is insanely weak to Water Shuriken, an extremely fast CAP could outrun and pick off a weakened Gren with Accelerock.

While it is definitely a risky type, it's a combination perfect for exploring many ability-based options on both the physical and special side. Few typings bring the kind of pressure that only gets stopped by exposing the opposing team to a 4x Grass or 4x Ice weakness.

 

[Steel With It]

A really interesting type combination to explore would be Fire/Ice.

Given that so many Fire and Ice moves have iffy-to-nonexistent accuracy, an unexplored Ability that'd go well with this unexplored typing is No Guard. STAB No Guard Fire Blast and Blizzard, with No Guard Focus Blast and/or Stone Edge as coverage (which most offensive Pokemon can learn regardless of type) or even No Guard WoW as a last-ditch Hail Mary, would be a lot of fun to both workshop and use. There's also the option of No Guard Inferno, buuut that might be a little too much. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Of course, there'd be the issue of opposing Stone Edges and Hydro Pumps, but we're talking about a presumably-frail 'Mon with a 4x Stealth Rock weakness. It's not going to be surviving many hits regardless.

 

[Hardrocknerd]

I really like that Fire/Ice has (finally) been brought up in the recent posts because that is a typing that immediately came to my mind when we agreed on making CAP 25f an offensive mon. While on paper the Ice type doesn't add a lot of types it hits effectively to the Fire type, I think it significantly amplifies CAP 25f's offensive capabilities by being able to remove Lando-T, Zygarde and Tomohawk, three of the most common Mons in the metagame. As already stated, Fire and Ice also share a lot of low accuracy moves as well as moves with potential side effects so both types can synergize with abilities like No Guard as well as Sheer Force/Serene Grace among others, preserving us quite some freedom for the stages to come in this process. Therefore, it is one of the two options I favor for CAP 25f, together with Fire/Dragon which has also been talked about already; I don't think I can add much more there.
Two other typings that were brought up for CAP 25f so far are Fire/Electric and Fire/Rock. These ones, I think, are way too vulnerable to be successfully executed as they not only most likely get outsped and KO'ed by (Ash-)Greninja and Scarf Lando-T, but also probably really struggle to break past defensive Lando-T, Zygarde, TTar(-Mega) and, in the case of Fire/Rock, Toxapex, while probably also being OHKO'ed by all of these. I don't think an offensive Mon that gets walled and/or eliminated by this many top-tier threats can be made viable regardless, especially not with starter limitations.
Fire/Flying has also been brought up quite a bit already. I do see the clear arguments for this dual typing, for example the similar movepool in e.g. recoil moves, and I believe we could make it work, but I want to emphasize that, if we choose this a our type combination for CAP 25f, we should be very careful not to make our Mon too similar to Mega-Charizard Y, an already existing sort-of-starter offensive Fire/Flying-type in the tier.

For CAP 25w, I want to join the 'no-Water/Poison' bandwagon as we simply won't make a better defensive Mon than Toxapex out of our starter. Other than that, though, I feel like Water is a really flexible type and can work with a lot of different combinations; my personal favorites are Water/Psychic, Water/Grass, Water/Normal and Mono-Water, all of which have also been talked about already while my European ass was sleeping.

Immediate Edit: Fixed some typos.
Second Edit: Added stuff about Fire/Flying.

 

[SpiritOfLemur]

1 (Grass). What are some underexplored types that have the potential to allow us to create an as-of-yet unseen niche for CAP 25g? How does this typing help us to explore our concept?

For Grass, I agree that either Grass/Electric or Grass/Normal are our best options. Both of these types are pretty underexplored with the Grass typing (Rotom-M and Sawsbuck respectively), which could help Cap 25g carve itself a unique niche in the CAP metagame, and both have the potential to combo well with Grass: Grass and Electric share a lot of moves with similar traits, giving us a lot of room for ability-movepool coordination, which is the main aspect of the concept, while the Normal type is known for it's extremely diverse movepool, which works really well with our concept as well (also, Grass/Normal still keeps it's resist to the common Ground type, while Grass/Electric doubles the resist to Electric, but loses the Ground resist).

1 (Fire). What types have healthy STAB movepools that they can coordinate with eligible abilities for offensive use? What types might be better suited to coordinate with an eligible ability as non-STAB coverage, due to their faults defensively or otherwise, and why?

For Fire, we have a few options: I don't think that CAP 25f can directly compete with the other Fire types in the current meta (Heatran, Volkraken and Volcarona), so I believe that allowing CAP 25f to deal with mons that the other Fire types cannot is the key to making this particular mon successful and as such, I would like to suggest Fire/Psychic or Fire/Electric. First of all, both of these type combinations give CAP 25f the option to deal with both Arghonaut and Toxapex, which would help CAP 25f carve itself a niche in the meta. Second, both of these secondary types' moves have similar effects to a lot of Fire type moves, which again, would help us to coordinate movepool and ability.
another viable option is Fire/Flying, both types are great at offense and both have similar moves (Flare Blitz and Brave Bird for instance). The main problem is the x4 weakness to SR, which would severely hamper this mons ability to switch in and out often, but it is a viable option nonetheless, in my opinion.

1 (Water). What types can make effective use of defensively-oriented moves that coordinate with eligible abilities?

For Water, I believe that either Water/Steel or Water/Ground are pretty good options. Water/Steel is an amazing defensive typing, sporting 8 resistances (with a key resist being Psychic, which threatens both Argho and Toxapex as mentioned above) and one immunity. Being weak to common offensive types such as Ground and Fighting is indeed a big disadvantage, but the amount of safe switch ins Water/Steel grants is more than enough to make up for it. Water/Ground is also a great defensive typing, mainly because it only has one weakness in Grass and an immunity to Electric is pretty appreciated as well. The only real issue I see with this typing is the relatively large amount of mons already possessing it (main examples being Swampert, Gastrodon and Quagsire) but if executed correctly, it could differentiate itself from these.

2. What types place the most restrictions on our list of potential abilities? Are these types worth discussing anyway, if they can avoid pigeonholing us into only one or two viable options? What types leave the most variety available?

The type that places the most restrictions for this concept probably has to be Fairy type, most notably for it's incredibly small movepool, especially on the offensive side (Dazzling Gleam, Moonblast, Play Rough and Draining Kiss kinda) so trying to coordinate movepool with ability is going to be quite difficult if not impossible. However, I believe that we can still create a unique mon even with the restrictions that this type puts on us. If we're going to choose Fairy as a secondary type, I think that the best type to pair it with is Fire: Jumbao and Bulu already fill this type combination quite well, and Water/Fairy leaves a lot to be desired for a defensive mon, especially when compared to Water/Steel. Fire/Fairy however, could make for a pretty unique mon. This type combination hasn't been explored yet, so it's a big plus for this concept. In addition, Moonblast and Play Rough pair quite well with a lot of Fire type moves because of their secondary, stat-lowering effects, which could be paired with abilities that affect such moves (Sheer Force or Serene Grace for example).
Dark type stands out to me as one of the most unique types in the game, sporting a wide array of offensive moves with a lot of different effects, such as Crunch (lower stats), Dark Pulse (flinch), Feint Attack (never misses), Foul Play (uses the opponent's stats), Knock Off (gets rid of held item), Night Slash (higher crit chance) and many more. Dark type also has many good status moves at it's disposal, such as Nasty Plot, Taunt, Torment, Switcheroo and Memento, to name a few.

3. Based on their primary types and decided roles, which members of our trio will need a more versatile second typing to be viable? What is it that makes a typing versatile?

Based on our decision to create CAP 25g as a specialized mon with a unique place in the current meta, I believe that giving CAP 25g a versatile secondary typing is going to be crucial to ensure its success. There are already a few pretty good Grass types in the meta, both offensive (Bulu and Kartana) and defensive (Ferrothorn and Jumbao) so making sure that CAP 25g has a unique niche it can fulfill without other Grass types doing it better is key for this specific mon's success.
CAP 25f and 25w also have to be unique, to make sure that they have a place in the meta as well and not get outclassed by other Fire or Water types, but for 25g it's especially important because of its decided role.

4. Given our BST limitations, how can we intelligently use typing in order to prevent our starter trio from being outclassed by similar Grass, Fire, and Water Pokémon, even if they should share a somewhat similar role? Read: how can we use typing to carve out a new role in the CAP metagame?

In my eyes, there are 3 mains factors that form the basis of any and all competitive mons and they are Typing, Stats and Ability (Movepool is sort of tied to Typing). Stats dictate the "flow" of the mon: when should it be sent in to the fight and what should it do once it is out. Ability is also tied to Stats in this aspect, but the Typing is the main factor that affects the mon's different matchups, which leads me to my next point: uniqueness. A Pokémon is unique, if it fulfills a role that no other mon currently in the game, can fulfill. From countering a specific other mon or core of mons, to fulfilling a role in a different way than the ones that have been presented thus far, and I believe that Typing is the main factor in play when creating a unique mon, because as stated previously, it dictates the mon's matchups. For example, let's look at CAP 25f: trying to build CAP 25f so it could directly compete with Heatran or Volkraken is going to be extremely difficult, mainly because these two already fulfill their roles extremely well, so instead, we can try to give CAP 25f the tools to fulfill a role that Heatran and Volkraken cannot: deal with bulky Water types, which is why I suggested Fire/Electric (among other reasons). This, of course, comes at the cost of other weaknesses, but that's what team building is all about: carefully balancing the stats and types on your team, to "plug" as many holes as possible. This logic also applies to CAP 25g and 25w as well. Steel is by far the best defensive type in the game, and paired with Grass makes for a great defensive mon, only having 2 weaknesses and 8 resistances. But the reason I didn't suggest this typing for CAP 25g is Ferrothorn. Ferro already takes full advantage of this typing, and trying to compete with it for the role of an unbreakable defensive wall and hazard setter with our own mon is going to be nigh impossible.

In conclusion, the best way that we can ensure that each of CAP 25's mons have a place in the current meta, with a unique niche to fulfill, is to give each of them a unique or an incredibly underexplored typing. Abilities, Stats and Movepool will come later, and will definitely play a huge role in deciding the specific niche our mons fulfill, but a unique typing gives us a great base to start working from.

Constructive criticism is always welcome and appreciated, and I can't wait to see where this discussion leads us in the future.

 

[Raikoben]

First of all, my apologizes if I make some grammar mistakes (not native)

1- Grass/Rock
In my opinion is a great typing comination. It allows to be good under Sun while Rock still cover from Firex1.5 atacks and in Sandstorm with the Spdx1.5 and being Grass type almost guaranteed be check/counter of other good Sandstorm abusser/setters like Tyranitar, Hippowdon and Gigalith. This two types also allow to have a good number of set up moves (Growth, Rock Polish) and support moves (Leech Seed, Stealth Rock)

List of potential abilities

Drought: Solarbeam, Growth, Synthesis, Solar Blade
Sandstorm: Shore up
Prankster: Synthesis, Leech Seed, Stealth Rock, Growth, Spore, Rock Polish, Aromatherapy, ¿Spikes?
Adaptability: Petal Dance, Power Whip, Wood Hammer, Frenzy Plant, Stone Edge, Head Smash.
Superluck/Sniper: Razor Leaf, Stone Edge, Leaf Blade
Skill Link: Bullet Seed, Rock Blast

1-Fire/Electric
Since we already have Psychic, Ghost, Flying, Dark and Fighting offensive pokemons, Electric seems to me like a great choice allowing us to make a new combination and avoiding this CAP to be outclassed. Probably, the main reason why Electric and Fire have never been together before is that they share a lot of factors:
-Bad against Rock and Ground
-Strong special moves with poor accuracy and status effect
-Strong fisical moves with recoil
-Damage-boosting moves

List of potential abilities

No guard: Inferno, Zap Cannon, Fire Blast, Thunder
Rock Head/Reckless: Flare blitz, Wild Charge
Serene Grace: Flamethrower, T-Bolt, Fire/Thunder Fang
Simple: Flame Charge, Charge Beam, ¿Sword Dance? ¿Hone Claws? ¿Calm Mind? ¿Work Up?
Sheer Force: Flamethrower, T-Bolt, Fire/Thunder Punch
Adaptability

 

[Dece1t]

For CAP 25f, I really like some of the type combos being brought up so far! Fire/Rock really stands out to me, there's a lot of moves we can take advantage of with rock-related abilities. I'd definitely support that. I think Fire/Fairy is still something worth considering as well, since offensively, the part fairy typing really benefits us (you can refer to my earlier post where I explained this much more in detail). Although, I have to shoot down the proposed Fire/Ice typing. While this is a really eclectic combo, we're gaining a 4x weakness to SR, and that isn't getting fixed without Magic Guard (an ability that's against our concept). Monotype back at the very end of Gen 6 explored this in its own Create-A-Pokemon Project, where that typing was apart of the concept chosen. I'll link the thread here so ya'll can peruse our long discussions, I'd recommend it. No Guard, funny enough, was chosen as the 2nd ability alongside Magic Guard (mind you, it is for the Monotype meta, but it did explore the type combination very well). Without something to negate SR, it's gonna be difficult to make this mon viable enough to pose a serious threat.

I saw snake_rattler mention Grass/Ice for CAP 25g, that typing I am a bit more inclined to than Grass/Normal, but we're majorly staking weaknesses on a mon that we want to perform a mixed role, so that won't be doing us any favors. I will say though, the Refrigerate argument is pretty enticing. Grass/Rock is also really interesting, and something I wouldn't mind supporting, that does help against our fire weakness and we'd have a pretty good range of movepool. I'm still liking Grass/Electric the best overall.

As for Water, this is tricky. I agree to avoid Water/Poison for CAP 25w because we'll fall into the trap of trying to out-Toxapex Toxapex lol. It's already a dedicated defensive mon that's A+ in OUs VR. As for Water/Steel, we need to be careful. Empoleon, while niche in OU, does exist as a defensive defogger. We also don't want it to compete too much with Naviathan, something that's already used relatively frequently in CAP, especially for its defensive CM set. I think we'd have a lot we'd need to live up to to make Water/Steel work, so I'm personally a bit weary of it. Water/Grass as of now seems to give us the best defensive chances while giving us a very definitive and unique defensive role. It would give us another Grass type, yea, but defensively it offers so much that some of these other type combos don't come close to, at least as of yet. I do want to give Water/Psychic a special mention real quick, because that one also offers decent-ish defensive utility, we just need to be careful of making a Slowbro clone (though I think that's much easier to avoid compared to if we were to pick Water/Poison, making a Toxapex clone).

EDIT: After putting a little more thought in, the only thing we need to worry about with CAPf being Fire/Rock is trying not to be as similar as Crucibelle. Using Rock Head for Head Smash and Flare Blitz, the popular ability with that combo it sounds like, while tempting, could give us serious competition with the best Mega in the metagame, who provides a similar role with a similar play execution. So long as we're careful to differentiate ourselves, I'm still very on board with Fire/Rock.

 

[superstrike66]

Grass). What are some underexplored types that have the potential to allow us to create an as-of-yet unseen niche for CAP 25g? How does this typing help us to explore our concept?

I agree that the Grass starter should be Grass-Rock. Not only is it rare (only the Cradlliy line has this typing), Grass-Rock is pretty good offensively, as well as on the defensive side with grass checking most of rock's weakness, as well as having multiple ability options like thick fat, triage, sheer force, regenerator, wonder guard, or skill link, which sinergyse well with its typing/ STABs.

(Fire). What types have healthy STAB movepools that they can coordinate with eligible abilities for offensive use? What types might be better suited to coordinate with an eligible ability as non-STAB coverage, due to their faults defensively or otherwise, and why?

For the Fire type, I think Fire-Ground or Fire-Fairy would be excellent here. fire-ground is a fantastic offensive typing, as well as a pretty good defensive typing, as like Grass-Rock, Fire-Ground check a bunch of their weaknesses. Here, I think good abilities could be sheer force (if you run a special set), or tough claws. This 'mon would also need grass coverage, as it hits both of the typing's weakness for SE damage.
For Fire-Fairy, This would also be fantastic offensively, and could have some defensive merit as well. Options for abilities could be serene grace, pixelate, sheer force, or maybe tough claws. For coverage moves, I think having Ice, Electric, Fighting, or other strong attacking types would be good to try to hit as much for SE damage as possible. With a wide range of coverage, I also could see wonder guard as a possible ability.

1 (Water). What types can make effective use of defensively-oriented moves that coordinate with eligible abilities?

Here, I think Water-Poison or Water-Electric could be good defensive typings, as both eliminate one of water's weakness (poison covers grass, and electric covers itself). For Water-Poison, I see the 'mon having corrosion. For Water-Electric, Volt absorb or Lightning rod could be nice abilities, especially lightning rod if this 'mon is a special attacker. Also, both typings would benefit from levitate.

 

[Mx]

Here's some feedback regarding some of the suggested typings:

Grass/Electric: While I already expressed that I don't like how this typing exchanges a Ground-resistance for a Flying-neutrality, this is still not a bad option, and can be viable both offensively and defensively.

Grass/Ice: I think this is an interesting idea, and has a lot of offensive potential, but I'm not a fan of how offensively oriented this typing is, as anything other than a glass cannon would not definitely fail because of its multiple weaknesses, which in turn makes things like snake's idea of an unblockable Refrigerate Rapid Spin much less viable in practice. I'm also worried that this might be a bit too easy to revenge kill, particularly because of Scarf Volkraken, Kartana and M-Scizor

Grass/Rock: Because of how it takes away the most valuable resistances of both types, this is probably my least favorite option. I don't really see it having use neither offensively, where it could have to compete against M-Crucibelle, Bulu and Jumbao, nor defensively, where Ferrothorn or even Tangrowth have much more valuable resistances.

Fire/Normal: I like the idea of exploring Normal-type, and in theory you can beat bulky Waters with Boomburst (Example: 252+ SpA Choice Specs Exploud Boomburst vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Toxapex: 166-196 (54.7 - 64.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery). However, its more than likely that to balance this firepower we would need a relatively low Special Attack, to avoid being able to 2HKO everything but Tyranitar with just our STABs + HP Ground, making us very reliant on Choice Specs to achieve these kind of benchmarks.

Fire/Dragon: This is pretty similar to Fire/Normal, but with better defensive utility. However, this runs into the problem that if we go special, Toxapex has to at least check us, because if we can blow past it, then there would be basically no defensive counterplay to us, and if we choose to go physical, it will be extremely hard to differentiate ourselves from M-Charizard-X.

Fire/Flying: While this type has good coverage, I fear that the x4 weakness to SR might be too detrimental to the project, and I don't see it achieving anything that Fire/Electric, Fire/Psychic or even Fire/Normal couldn't do.

Water: Outside of Water/Steel this is probably my favorite option, because by itself Water is still a very solid typing, and we can easily use the lack of a Psychic, Ground or Flying weakness to separate ourselves from the competition.

Water/Poison and Water/Ground: I group these two together because they face the same problems. By themselves, they are great typings, but by choosing them, we put ourselves in even more direct competition with Toxapex, Gastrodon and to a lesser extent Quagsire, and are just not very interesting to explore.

Water/Psychic: I'm not a fan of this one at all, as Psychic is not a good defensive typing, having some unfortunate weaknesses to Bug and Dark in particular. It might have a good match-up a against Toxapex and Arghonaut, but I fail to see how is that relevant for a defensive mon, and in fact, assuming that we don't run SpA/Atk investment, we are most likely not going to 2HKO neither of them (0 SpA Slowbro Psyshock vs. 248 HP / 8 Def Toxapex: 120-144 (39.6 - 47.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Black Sludge recovery | 0 SpA Slowbro Psychic vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Toxapex: 110-132 (36.3 - 43.5%) -- 98% chance to 3HKO after Black Sludge recovery| 176 Atk Protean Greninja Zen Headbutt vs. 248 HP / 8 Def Toxapex: 138-164 (45.5 - 54.1%) -- 3.1% chance to 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery ). Not only that, but Slowbro and Slowking already serve as example of defensive Water/Psychic, and neither of them are too good outside of Trick Room teams, as Toxapex outclasses them most of the time.

 

[VannAccessible]

I’d like to throw some support in for Fire/Ice. While at first glance this is merely a garbage defensive typing, being weak to both Stealth Rock and Spikes and being completely walled by other Fire types and Water types, the key game changer element I’d consider with such a typing is Freeze Dry. With this move a subpar dual STAB is transformed into a unique Fire type capable of nailing Water types with a Super Effective STAB. While Fire/Electric could also accomplish this, Fire/Ice could uniquely penetrate the meta, especially if given an ability which negates its hazard weakness, such as Magic Guard or Regenerator.

Similarly Fire/Fairy is a nice attack combo. Fairy bops Dragons and Fire bops Steels so the two complement each other well in terms of coverage, only really missing Heatran and bulky Water types.

If we do want to pursue an Electric second typing, I’d prefer Grass/Electric as an amazing offensive combo, as Grass benefits from hitting Flying types and Electric benefits from hitting Ground and bulky Rock types like Tyranitar nicely.

Grass/Flying is another typing I can see working with great success. A lot of teams rely on things like Amoongus, Mega Venusaur, Tangrowth and Pyroak to be their Grass resists and absorb incoming Leech Seeds or Sleep Powder/Spore. Having a Flying STAB backing up a sleep move would definitely carve out a handy niche for dismantling cores with this typing.

Water’s dual typing is harder to create a unique niche, given that every dual typing already exists. Water/Steel could make for an interesting defensive mon but besides being Empoleon/Naviathan with recovery, it’d seems like it’d need Levitate or something to be truly ground breaking as a defensive water type, when pure water is already better at countering Ground types. Besides, this just seems BLAND and lazy to me.

One option I’d think would be interesting to pursue would be a Water/Flying type. While this isn’t a new combo either, the typing could excell very well in the form of a slow bulky Trick Room abuser. Water/Flying is great offensive STAB, and defensively it meshes well with other TR mons like Magenera, Stakataka, Fidgit, Mawile, Camerupt, Marowak, etc. What’s more, it can help counter Ash Greninja, whose Water Shuriken stops a lot of TR sweeps.

 

[Warren685]

Although, I have to shoot down the proposed Fire/Ice typing. While this is a really eclectic combo, we're gaining a 4x weakness to SR, and that isn't getting fixed without Magic Guard (an ability that's against our concept).

If your only argument of Fire/Ice not being viable is because of Stealth Rocks then that's not sufficient. Look at Volcarona, it's Fire/Bug and also 4x weak to Stealth rock and yet it seen a lot of usage for being a set up sweeper.

 

[david0895]

>mfw the post starts when i'm going to sleep so i have to wait the next day when i finish to work


1 (Grass). What are some underexplored types that have the potential to allow us to create an as-of-yet unseen niche for CAP 25g? How does this typing help us to explore our concept?

Electric and Normal are the most unseen type that can be added into a Grass type.
Other types like Ice, Rock or Flying have shown a viable role or niche during the past gens.

*Note: i'm not counting Rotom-Mow because it can has only a single Grass type move*

Electric covers the Flying weakness at the cost of the Ground resistance, in return, The Grass type threatens the Ground types that are immune to Volt Switch.
Normal is an awesome type that threatens all the types that are supposed to resist Grass, with the exception of Steel.

1 (Fire). What types have healthy STAB movepools that they can coordinate with eligible abilities for offensive use? What types might be better suited to coordinate with an eligible ability as non-STAB coverage, due to their faults defensively or otherwise, and why?

Ice, Electric and Fairy are my wet dreams fantastic types that can be coordinated with an ability that can help a Fire type.
I would like to make some examples, but i think that most of you have already covered them all.

1 (Water). What types can make effective use of defensively-oriented moves that coordinate with eligible abilities?

This is a little bit thorn for me because whatever the secondary type will be, this mon will have some heavy weaknesses.
Btw i like pure Water and the Water/Poison options, because they seems to be the most balanced on the defensive sides at the level of resistances/weaknesses.

 

[Dece1t]

If your only argument of Fire/Ice not being viable is because of Stealth Rocks then that's not sufficient. Look at Volcarona, it's Fire/Bug and also 4x weak to Stealth rock and yet it seen a lot of usage for being a set up sweeper.

Well for one mate, its also, without coverage at least, hard walled by Heatran (and HP Ground doesn't benefit Volcarona much until it's +3 or 4). Two, I posted an entire thread that completely exploits the pros and cons of building a good Fire/Ice CAP, so yes, what I posted is sufficient, SR seriously hinders it. With Volcarona, it also has good coverage, decent bulk, and it's able to abuse QD. The reason why Talonflame, Moltres, and Articuno are almost never seen anymore is because of how bad the SR weakness is. The few Pokemon that you do see in higher competitive play have very very definable pros that allow you to get at least moderate or high reward for high risk. That doesnt change the fact that using Volcarona isn't high risk, just because its OU.

david0895 can help me vouch for this one since he actually participated in that same project I referenced wayback when.

 

[KrazianEP]

4. Given our BST limitations, how can we intelligently use typing in order to prevent our starter trio from being outclassed by similar Grass, Fire, and Water Pokemon, even if they should share a somewhat similar role? Read: how can we use typing to carve out a new role in the CAP metagame?

New to Discussion

Hey, I’ve been lurking the forums and not really participating in discussions before now, so hopefully this makes an amount of sense.

Defensive Water types have always been afraid of powerful Electric type Pokémon who can blow through their guards and pave the way to destroying the rest of the team. Gastrodon was reintroduced to the OU metagame as a way around those powerful Electric types, with an added bonus of being strong against Greninja. But Gastrodon, being a Water/Ground type, is terrified of Grass types, such as Kartana. To make sure CAP 25w stands out among the other viable defensive Water types, I believe it needs to be able to throw up a passable defense against these Pokémon.

I would like to propose Water/Grass for this purpose. Grass resists itself, which helps against those powerful Grass-types, it also resists Electric, which makes it less likely to quail in fear against Pokémon like Tapu Koko, and it resists Ground, which makes it ever so slightly more appealing than Toxapex, who doesn’t exactly appreciate the Earthquakes many offensive Pokémon run as coverage. The Water typing also Grass’ typical weakness of Fire and Ice, which are common threats presented in the form of coverage moves. Of Grass’ additional weaknesses, Poison and Flying are both a bit concerning, but easily handled with a Steel type partner, who would also appreciate the Water/Grass’ Ground resistance, and the Bug weakness is annoying, due to the presence of U-Turn, but acceptable.

In addition, a Grass typing allows us to explore alternative recovery options to Recover/Slack Off. Synthesis would be an option, and perhaps give 25w a niche on Sun teams, and Leech Seed has the added benefit of slowly weakening the afflicted enemy. We would also have access to debilitating moves other than Scald and Toxic. Sleep Powder/Spore and Stun Spore allows 25w to cripple an incoming threat, we can explore Worry Seed as a tech option against other Pokémon that care about their ability (CAP 25f, maybe?) and Strength Sap hurts physically offensive attackers, and gives us a third form of recovery(!!!).

Finally, Water/Grass’ only other representative, Ludicolo, is a subpar Rain abuser, so we would have plenty of space to explore.

Water/Steel and Water/Dragon have also been thrown around as options for 25w, and both would address the problem I’ve presented.

However, Water/Steel would still be majorly harmed by Electric, Ground, and Fighting type moves, all of which are very prevalent both as Pokémon and coverage moves. There would also be an amount of pressure to ensure that the movepool and ability are truly enough to make it wildly different from Empoleon, the Generation V specially defensive Water Starter.

Water/Dragon avoids these pitfalls in exchange for a weakness to both Dragon and Fairy types, two extremely powerful and popular Pokémon types. There is also an amount of internal concern regarding the Starter Trio if we give the already defensive member resistances to the other two members.

 

[Squidy822]

Water/Dragon avoids these pitfalls in exchange for a weakness to both Dragon and Fairy types, two extremely powerful and popular Pokémon types. There is also an amount of internal concern regarding the Starter Trio if we give the already defensive member resistances to the other two members.

A. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I dont think dragon typing is usually much of an offensive presence in the meta besides Dragonium Z Outrage on Zygarde sometimes. Fairy, however, is a fairly alright point, since though I can only think of Jumbao, there are probably others im not thinking of.

A Edit. oh yeah and naviathan i guess maybe idk

B. Nobody cares about the trio. Or at least, I dont. Its just 3 mons at once with starter flavor features.

 

[reachzero]

1 (Grass). What are some underexplored types that have the potential to allow us to create an as-of-yet unseen niche for CAP 25g? How does this typing help us to explore our concept?

One of the fallacies I see brought up again and again in this thread is the idea that if a typing has been used before, it is wholly explored--people see Grass/Steel, for instance, and they think immediately that we have nothing to learn because Ferrothorn and Kartana have done everything there is to be done with that typing. That is, of course, not true--aside from both of those Pokemon being extremely physically oriented, they are almost guaranteed to have a different ability and therefore a different focus than 25g will have. The same applies, of course, for 25f and 25w when discussing typings like Fire/Fighting and Water/Poison. Having the same type does not mean that the Pokemon will be even somewhat similar, any more than Camerupt is similar to Primal Groudon.

That being said, I do feel that the best typings for Grass in particular are not especially common ones: Grass/Normal has unusually good ability-movepool based synergy in that Normal is strong in the places where Grass is most weak: it has priority options where Grass has none, sound based options for hitting targets beyond Subs (especially good since Grass types are often called about to beat Zygarde), virtually every imaginable kind of secondary effect imaginable to supplement the secondary effect-poor Grass movepool. It is also strong in the areas where Grass is strong, possessing great contact moves, good moves under 60 base power, multi-hit moves--you name it. Normal has one of the best possible movepools for all three starter types, actually, but Grass has a bit less innate flexibility, and thus appreciates it more. It also does well defensively against Necturna, which is important these days.

Grass/Fighting is another solid defensive combination, adding important resistances to Dark and Rock, neutrality to U-turn, and access to the extremely varied Fighting movepool, which is a gateway to a number of other powerful abilities that are less useful to pure Grass.


1 (Fire). What types have healthy STAB movepools that they can coordinate with eligible abilities for offensive use? What types might be better suited to coordinate with an eligible ability as non-STAB coverage, due to their faults defensively or otherwise, and why?

Fire/Flying has excellent offensive synergy, especially since Fire and Flying have a lot of shared movepool strengths, on both the offensive and defensive sides. The 4x Stealth Rock weakness is an issue, but the strengths are very potent and almost certainly worth it.

Fire/Electric also has excellent synergy throughout its movepool, as well as having some really useful resistances.

I don't really see the appeal of Fire/Fairy or Fire/Rock, since both Fairy and Rock have pretty limited offensive movepools with relatively limited options for coordination with the ability.

1 (Water). What types can make effective use of defensively-oriented moves that coordinate with eligible abilities?

Pure Water is not to be underestimated. Water has one of the best and most versatile movepools already, and is really strong defensively by itself.
Water/Poison is excellent defensively, immunity to Toxic opens up a world of possibilities in terms of stat boosting, and both movepools possess tons of secondary effects if we want to go that route. Truthfully, this is almost guaranteed to be nothing like Toxapex. Here is why.

--Toxapex has two choices to make in its movesets: Toxic vs Toxic Spikes and Scald vs Knock Off. Toxic Spikes are very mediocre in CAP considering the number of grounded Poisons, Steel types, and defensive Flying types. Moreover, we have tons of hazard removal Pokemon, none of which are adversely affected by Toxic Spikes! Toxic is usually better, except that Scald/Toxic gives up terrible momentum to Krilowatt, Pajantom, Plasmanta and Mollux, while Knock Off/Toxic gives up terrible momentum to Mega Crucibelle, Colossoil, Heatran and Gliscor. Toxapex is a massive momentum sink in CAP, in other words, which 25w is almost guaranteed not to be.

--Toxapex has almost negligible offense, which might or might not be true of 25w. This means that Toxapex is totally walled in some matchups that it should theoretically be able to win, such as against Fairies. 25w could actually threaten Fairies.

--The actual effect of 25w's ability is very likely to be something that Toxapex can't do.

--Differentiating 25w from Toxapex at the movepool stage would be very, very easy with even one or two utility moves.


2. What types place the most restrictions on our list of potential abilities? Are these types worth discussing anyway, if they can avoid pigeonholing us into only one or two viable options? What types leave the most variety available?

Fairy has already been mentioned, and I feel it is the worst possible choice for this project, for all three starters. Ground has a surprisingly shallow movepool, so I see relatively few options for it.

On the other hand, Electric, Normal, Dark and especially Ice have an insane pool of options, fitting a very wide span of abilities. The latter two are unfortunately very offensive and give little defensively, which makes them harder to pair with the starter typings.

3. Based on their primary types and decided roles, which members of our trio will need a more versatile second typing to be viable? What is it that makes a typing versatile?

I feel that Grass has the fewest native options and needs a versatile secondary typing the most. Versatile typings are those that have options for creating an incredible number of builds: Dark, for instance, has the option of using STAB Sucker Punch, Knock Off, Foul Play or Power Trip, all of which offer very unique effects that can support a number of possible Pokemon builds and sets. Having many and varied secondary effects is also a big factor in versatility.

4. Given our BST limitations, how can we intelligently use typing in order to prevent our starter trio from being outclassed by similar Grass, Fire, and Water Pokemon, even if they should share a somewhat similar role? Read: how can we use typing to carve out a new role in the CAP metagame?

Typing greats affects our matchups--every popular CAP bulky Water type loses to Clefable (barring the stray Arghonaut Gunk Shot, which is ultra rare), so a Water starter that can actually take on Clefable would be unique. The most important point in terms of typing, though, is to enable our ability to do something really, really well. We want to make sure we have good enough typing to actually take on the major threats, but it is our ability that I would expect to make the CAP 25 starters truly unique.

Finally, please do not lobby for specific abilities now. That is poll jumping, and posts that do so will be moderated.

 

[Mr Holiday]

1. Yes, we've had 3 before. However, did they really have the coordination between ability and moves and typing like we're doing? Well, Emboar had flare blitz and wild charge coverage, Infernape had...Mach Punch. I guess. And Blaziken's Speed Boost was just plain ow.

2. I find your point against Fire/Fighting ironic since you kinda just mentioned Toxapex. Just saying.

The difference (and point of my comment) is that we don't stand to learn anything from another Fire/Fighting Type, while there's still meat on the bone in terms of Water/Poison. Toxapex and Water/Poison CAP25w would be similar, likely competing, Pokemon but they wouldn't be identical, nor do I believe we would have to make a better Toxapex. The difference would come down to Stats; Toxapex has a BST of 495, significantly lower than what CAP25w will likely end up with, but that's only because of it's highly focused stat spread, devoted entirely to Def/Sp.Def, with nothing of substance on it's offensive Stats. All of Toxapex's Stats fall well above or below the limits set for this CAP, meaning CAP25w will likely have a more internally balanced Stat Spread, with a higher BST distributed more evenly over it's six Stats, meaning it will likely function differently than Toxapex does. In contrast, Blaziken, Infernape, and Emboar all have comperable BST and, most likely given it's intended role, Stat distribution to CAP25f. If we make CAP25f Fire/Fighting, we really will be making another Blaziken/Infernape/Emboar, and that doesn't help us any. A Water/Poison Type CAP25w will have to prove itself against Toxapex, but it will also give us an opportunity to learn something about how similar Pokemon can differentiate themselves.

(reachzero already said all of this and more, but I spent two hours writing this post and I'm not rewriting it just because he can post faster than me lamo.)
--

That being said, I've been giving it some more thought, and reading the other posts, and I think another Type combination that could be viable is Water/Ghost. Jellicent is hardly a premier Pokemon in OU/CAP, meaning we already have something to distinguish ourselves from other bulky Water Types, the Ghost Type offers useful role compression with Spin-blocking and, if we go that way, status moves (something we can coordinate our Ability with), and a solid STAB combo so it's not complete Taunt bait. Being weak to Ghost, Grass, Electric and Dark is a fair trade for resistances to Poison, Bug, Steel, Fire, Water and Ice, plus being immune to Fighting and Normal. I also like Water/Dragon and straight Water, but I do worry if they would have enough viable moves to coordinate with, and I think straight Water would have a hard time distinguishing itself from other pure Water Types, and justifying it's existence among arguably better duel-Typed Pokemon.

I'm still against Fairy, but I think if we had to use it somewhere, Fire/Fairy would at the very least be something new, giving us ample opportunity to learn about how the two Types work in conjunction with one another. I also like Fire/Dragon because Dragon is the best Type of the potential for Contrary abuse (Not trying to polljump, or say we should give it Contrary. It's just the only reason I can see for using Fire/Dragon), but I feel like going Fire/Dragon would limit our choices when we get to the Ability stage. While they both have Moves that you can coordinate with, they don't share many move categories outside Overheat/Draco Meteor lowering Sp.Atk. Unless I'm forgetting something, I'm not sure what else Fire/Dragon would do to contribute to the Concept. But, a non-Mega, non-Uber Fire/Dragon would at least add something new to the metagame.

CAP25g is still really tricky, though. I think the problem people have is they want to give it a solid Type, which is certainly understandable, but somewhat contrary to finding it a niche. If you're generally good, you're a generalist, not a specialist. I think CAP25g should have a Type that is, in most situations, poor, but that excels at doing one thing in particular. By that definition, Grass/Flying still stands out to me as a worthwhile contender. It has a clear cut job: Come in on resisted Fighting, Water, Grass and Ground Type moves, and force out/eliminate enemy Fighting/Water/Grass/Ground Types. Is it going to be useful to every team, or in every situation? No, it's not. In fact, there's a good chance it'll be a liability if you just use it because you can. However, will it be very useful to teams that problems with Fighting/Water/Grass/Ground Types, but don't want to dedicate more than one Pokemon to dealing with those four, pretty specific, threats? Absolutely. It's a specialist. It has one job, and if we make sure it is exceptional at that one job, it's other failings (and I admit, it has plenty of other failings) won't really matter.

However, for those of you who aren't convinced, I present to you an alternative: Grass/Fighting. To my knowledge, neither Breloom nor Chesnaught see much usage in OU/CAP, which already helps distinguish CAP25g from other Grass Types in the tier, and Grass/Fighting gives us the potential to come in on resisted Ground, Rock, Water, Grass, Electric and Dark Type moves and bully those Type Pokemon with impunity. Things like Mega Gyrados, Greninja, low-offense Water and Grass Types, most Ground and/or Rock Types, Hydreigon (Without Fire Coverage), etc. would all have a hard time with a competent Grass/Fighting Type.

 

[david0895]

Well for one mate, its also, without coverage at least, hard walled by Heatran (and HP Ground doesn't benefit Volcarona much until it's +3 or 4). Two, I posted an entire thread that completely exploits the pros and cons of building a good Fire/Ice CAP, so I think yes, what I posted is sufficient, SR seriously hinders it. With Volcarona, it also has good coverage, decent bulk, and it's able to abuse QD. The reason why Talonflame, Moltres, and Articuno are almost never seen anymore is because of how bad the SR weakness is. The few Pokemon that do have very very definable pros that allow you to get at least moderate or high reward for high risk. That doesnt change the fact that using Volcarona isn't high risk, just because its OU.

david0895 can help me vouch for this one since he actually participated in that same project I referenced wayback when.

Nobody has defined the stats or movepool, so you can't say if a specific pokemon will wall it. Also If a pokemon is walled only by heatran, also it will be perfectly viable (if not broken), since it will heavily guide the teambuilding.

The reason why Talonflame, Moltres, and Articuno are almost never seen anymore is because of how bad the SR weakness is.

Not exactly: gen 6 talonflame was OU thanks to the big power of Gale Wings. Also if Moltres had Adaptability, it would be scary thanks to the Z moves.
Articuno has several problems even outside the 4x SR weakness like the small movepool and the low offensive stats

 

[Dece1t]

Nobody has defined the stats or movepool, so you can't say if a specific pokemon will wall it. Also If a pokemon is walled only by heatran, also it will be perfectly viable (if not broken), since it will heavily guide the teambuilding.

Not exactly: gen 6 talonflame was OU thanks to the big power of Gale Wings. Also if Moltres had Adaptability, it would be very scary thanks to the Z moves.
Articuno has several problems even outside the 4x SR weakness like the small movepool and the low offensive stats

I get it, but youre failing to see that they're nerfed. Moltres would be extremely scary if it had Adaptability, but it doesn't. Talonflames Gale Wings was severely nerfed, so it can only go first if it manages to keep full HP. Articuno, yea outside of stats, isn't great as it is, even if its stats were good. Do you see the trend that's going on here? Because all 3 have a 4x weakness to SR, they're pretty high risk to use because of how prevalent SR is. What separates them from Volcarona is that they do not reep high reward, in Gen 7 they're all very sub par and maybe get moderate reward at best (and even thats a stretch).

As for stats and moves, yea, I acknowledged that, that's why I made sure to mention "without coverage," meaning our proposed cornerstone STABS Fire and Ice would be rendered useless. Heatran is at peak popularity, so I think it is fair to have concerns about how well it fairs against it. Nowhere did I say though its not viable because of Heatran, however it would be a very significant and commonplace threat for CAPf.

 

[david0895]

I get it, but youre failing to see that they're nerfed. Moltres would be extremely scary if it had Adaptability, but it doesn't. Talonflames Gale Wings was severely nerfed, so it can only go first if it manages to keep full HP. Articuno, yea outside of stats, isn't great as it is, even if its stats were good. Do you see the trend that's going on here? Because all 3 have a 4x weakness to SR, they're pretty high risk to use because of how prevalent SR is. What separates them from Volcarona is that they do not reep high reward, in Gen 7 they're all very sub par and maybe get moderate reward at best (and even thats a stretch).

As for stats and moves, yea, I acknowledged that, that's why I made sure to mention "without coverage," meaning our proposed cornerstone STABS Fire and Ice would be rendered useless. Heatran is at peak popularity, so I think it is fair to have concerns about how well it fairs against it. Nowhere did I say though its not viable because of Heatran, however it would be a very significant and commonplace threat for CAPf.

That's the point: they are not viable because they lack of a strong ability, so what if we will to 25f a strong one?
I know that this will be an even more important step on the process, but since this will be already heavily looked, why not try it anyway?

 

[Dece1t]

That's the point: they are not viable because they lack of a strong ability, so what if we will to 25f a strong one?
I know that this will be an even more important step on the process, but since this will be already heavily looked, why not try it anyway?

Almost all Fire mons viable in OU currently (with exceptions, of course) are considerably high risk, why not instead of capitalizing on that with a type combo that gives you a 4x SR weakness, we try to pull off a fast, offensive Fire mon with moderate if not little risk to switch in easy and have STABs to threaten big name Pokemon high up in the VR? That would be something decently unexplored, and a great ability can only further capitalize that.

 

[Gross Sweep]

What types place the most restrictions on our list of potential abilities? Are these types worth discussing anyway, if they can avoid pigeonholing us into only one or two viable options? What types leave the most variety available?

I’m honestly not sure if any secondary typing puts this project into a box restricting creativity immensely. I don’t believe any typing pair should be cut for the sake of no abilities, but that’s from the broad perspective. As an example people mention a lack of fairy type stab moves as a reason to bypass it, which just isn’t something I agree with personally.

"An ability that coordinates with the movepool that has one or more moves that are significantly impacted by the ability to change that Pokemon's match-ups at some point in the game"

This definition provided by Mx was the final definition of coordinating that I believe was discussed and accepted by Reachzero. Reading it I see the phrase “one or more” meaning that if we have a Fire/Fairy using an ability that “changes” the match up of this mon by improving one of its fire type attacks or some other utility move we are completing our mission. With that I have mainly had my focus set on choosing an overall good typing for all of these mons, since at the end of the day there are effective ability options for all of our starters even if both stabs don’t make amazing use of the ability. Especially since the concept we’re approaching is based off movepools and abilities cooperating to make an effective mon, not movepools and abilities that cooperate with both stabs well to make an effective mon. also I put changes in quotes since I still don’t think that was the proper word for this definition as explained in one of my concept assessment posts, but I digress on that.

If you really want to talk about most variety it’s Normal types. I have seen Normal brought up for all three types, and that’s because it offers a huge movepool and ability options. Similarly Dragon is known for a wide movepool, which is effective for a project like this. I’ll stand by my point that we can make a large number of pairing work, so we should try to find a good typing > one that has some crazy flexibility just for having 30 options instead of 15.

Based on their primary types and decided roles, which members of our trio will need a more versatile second typing to be viable? What is it that makes a typing versatile?

My first thought is Grass since it’s the undefined specialist. We don’t have a strong lead on what our unused niche is going to be, so having options is more important for it than the other starters. The water type needs a solid defensive secondary typing, since at the end of the day its role is to be a bulkier mon. meaning if we go with a lackluster defensive typing for the sake of options we’ll end up with a lesser mon in the end imo. Fire is on a similar boat wanting a strong typing pair offensively. Either two solid offensive typings or two typings that are offensive while very complementary like Fire/Electric as Fire hits grasses and Electric hits waters. Unlike Fire and Water, Grass is still a little unsure on what it wants to do, so it makes sense that typings like Grass/Normal and Grass/Dragon are leading the pack as they give options in excess.

I’m taking a typing to be versatiled based upon the granted movepool. Obviously all types have coverage, but some types have a lot of coverage. With our goal being linking ability to movepool having a diverse justifiable movepool makes a typing diverse in my eyes.

Given our BST limitations, how can we intelligently use typing in order to prevent our starter trio from being outclassed by similar Grass, Fire, and Water Pokemon, even if they should share a somewhat similar role? Read: how can we use typing to carve out a new role in the CAP metagame?

I brought this up when discussing improving on Empoleon and Swampert in my original role post, and Reachzero also hit the nail on the head when discussing Toxapex. Once our typing is decided we look at mons with the same typing, or something just fighting for a slot fulfilling the same role – and then we break down what it does and doesn’t do well. If we pick Water/Poison we obviously stay away from fully defensive as it’ll be hard to beat Pex, so we try to find a way to apply offensive pressure. If we pick Water/Ground we look at what Gastrodon is missing, hazards, and potentially look into that in our movepool stage. It simply comes down to breaking down the existing mons, and finding a weak point we can improve upon. While also not trying to make a Pokemon that overlaps with a similar mons strong points to much.

Carving out a new role is interesting. I think for offensive mons a solid unseen stab combo would do the trick, and from a defensive aspect a rarer typing with natural resistances to big threats would also accomplish this. People mention Grass/Normal not just for its variety, but because it’s a natural stop to Shell Smash Necturna which is a top tier threat in the meta. Being able to naturally wall a big threat more or less is an excellent asset.

Wrap this up for now, looking forward to next slate of questions/potentially giving some comments on other posts in the coming days.

 

[Cinnamelon]

I've been looking through the replies for a while, and I figured that dropping in wouldn't hurt.

2. What types place the most restrictions on our list of potential abilities? Are these types worth discussing anyway, if they can avoid pigeonholing us into only one or two viable options? What types leave the most variety available?

I'm going to second what's been said before about the Fairy type being restrictive; unless the Pokémon in question is heavily reliant on status moves, I'm not sure if it's worth analyzing as a viable option.
On a semi-similar note, Ghost- while more flexible w/movesets than Fairy is- seems to have its own restrictions if paired with any of the traditional starter types.
-I'd imagine that 25f (Fire/Ghost) would be pushed out of a niche by Blacephalon.
-25g- Grass/Ghost- might fare better, especially if it was more versatile than Trevenant, Gourgeist and Dhelmise (I don't know if the Decidueye line would edge it out). The flying, ghost, dark, water and ice weaknesses should be considered, however- but that being said, its resistances are pretty okay.
-25w- Water/Ghost- doesn't risk competition for a niche + being overshadowed, since Jellicent is the only one with that typing right now. Would Ghost work with defensively-oriented Water moves? Possibly, but there's better options than that.

tl;dr- Fairy and Ghost both seem pretty restricting for different reasons, and as such I don't necessarily think they're worth discussing extensively.

Hopefully I did this right..?

 

[Yay61]

Given our BST limitations, how can we intelligently use typing in order to prevent our starter trio from being outclassed by similar Grass, Fire, and Water Pokemon, even if they should share a somewhat similar role? Read: how can we use typing to carve out a new role in the CAP metagame?
Cap25w suffers a huge amount of competition defensively, however one thing it can differentiate itself with is offensive prowess. Most defensive water types are very passive and force out pokemon through sheer bulk rather than coverage. As such, I believe cap25w should have a typing that is passable offensively as well as defensively to fill this niche. Think how Pyroak threatens out grass types like Jumbao through its powerful stabs, where a more defensively oriented pokemon may fail to do so. This is why my favourite typings are ones that are flexible offensively and defensively, such as Water/Psychic.
For Cap25f, the key is the ability to break through pokemon other fire types can’t. To differentiate cap25f from Volkraken, we need to either be able to break through bulky dragons like Pajantom, or water types like Toxapex and Gastrodon. As such, I think the best typings are Fire/Normal, Fire/Electric and Fire/Ice. Whilst this amount of offensive coverage could in some cases be disastrous, if we pick our stats and movepool intelligently there shouldn’t be any problems.