-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
Little things you like about Pokémon
- Thread starter Kurona
- Start date
Popping in to mention the emotion theme from Scarlet/Violet might be one of the saddest and best songs in the series. It just so perfectly captures how close Arven is to his Mabosstiff and how important healing it is for him.
Yung Dramps
awesome gaming
Alright, hear me out.
This is not an attempt at a narrative defense of Tobias' existence, don't worry. What I am instead trying to convey is a weird form of "one man's trash is another man's treasure". Because all the things that make Tobias so rage-inducing and indefensible for Pokeani diehards, some of whom have had the misfortune of witnessing his roflstomp of Ash as it was first airing, are exactly what make him so utterly fascinating to me as an outsider.
Here we have a character who was explicitly designed for the purpose of making the main protagonist of a long-running television lose a big tournament arc by unleashing a duo of monsters so powerful and mystical within the setting that they once had entire movies centered around them. This character did not receive any sort of buildup, nor even the most haphazard and last-minute excuse backstory one could think of to address his power level. They didn't even reveal his full team. Upon acquiring his win, this character would never be seen or acknowledged again.
In their hilariously ill-conceived, deeply cynical ploy to deprive Ash of a win and continue the series, the DP anime accidentally created what is, to me at least, one of Pokemon's most intriguing mysteries. I quite simply cannot think of another character from a remotely well-known work of fiction quite like him. There are asspulls, and then there's Tobias. He has a similar appeal to me as one of those incredibly convoluted franchise timelines like Zelda or Dragon Quest, a strange puzzle that my brain from time to time goes to work trying to solve. Nobody else has ever made me joyfully waste so much time coming up with ideas about who he is, what his goals are and the experiences he must have gone through to wear that regal garb and have the partners he does.
I massively doubt Aim To Be a Pokemon Master will choose to touch upon him, but I honestly hope it doesn't and Tobias remains this inexplicable phantom trainer shrouded in mystery. For better or worse, that's what makes him stand out in the vast tapestry of Pokemon's multimedia empire.
The anime did I think make a reference to him, very obliquely: in the Darkrai/Cresselia 2 parter has Ash go "yeah i've dealt with Darkrais before"
And the only reason I don't think it's referencing the original Darkrai/Cresselia episode is because the way he talks about it, or at least the way its delivered in the dub, was very "yeahhhhhh it's. Pretty strong...." in a way of "yeah he had a ridiculous fight against it" and less "we saw it do weird stuff in an awkwardly animated episode nobody likes" (& far lesser, the movie)
well it got chuckle out of me at least.
And the only reason I don't think it's referencing the original Darkrai/Cresselia episode is because the way he talks about it, or at least the way its delivered in the dub, was very "yeahhhhhh it's. Pretty strong...." in a way of "yeah he had a ridiculous fight against it" and less "we saw it do weird stuff in an awkwardly animated episode nobody likes" (& far lesser, the movie)
well it got chuckle out of me at least.
As somebody who doesn't like Ash at all, Tobias ends up representing the most casual way possible to play the games: blow through everything with one or two mons and then drop after the credits. Ash being unable to even get to Tobias spamming Revives and Full Restores as he sacrifices one HM slave after another is then another example of his ineptitude. I guess it isn't so much "Tobias is a plot contrivance for Ash to lose" as "Tobias is when Ash no longer has a plot contrivance to win."
One of the tiny things I like about Pokémon is how the world in Pokémon actually works. I like it when the Pokédex actually touches upon things like the ecosystem for example. It's a small detail but I love it when they world build like that.
That fight did produce two of my favorite moments in the series though.
Alright, hear me out.
This is not an attempt at a narrative defense of Tobias' existence, don't worry. What I am instead trying to convey is a weird form of "one man's trash is another man's treasure". Because all the things that make Tobias so rage-inducing and indefensible for Pokeani diehards, some of whom have had the misfortune of witnessing his roflstomp of Ash as it was first airing, are exactly what make him so utterly fascinating to me as an outsider.
Here we have a character who was explicitly designed for the purpose of making the main protagonist of a long-running television lose a big tournament arc by unleashing a duo of monsters so powerful and mystical within the setting that they once had entire movies centered around them. This character did not receive any sort of buildup, nor even the most haphazard and last-minute excuse backstory one could think of to address his power level. They didn't even reveal his full team. Upon acquiring his win, this character would never be seen or acknowledged again.
In their hilariously ill-conceived, deeply cynical ploy to deprive Ash of a win and continue the series, the DP anime accidentally created what is, to me at least, one of Pokemon's most intriguing mysteries. I quite simply cannot think of another character from a remotely well-known work of fiction quite like him. There are asspulls, and then there's Tobias. He has a similar appeal to me as one of those incredibly convoluted franchise timelines like Zelda or Dragon Quest, a strange puzzle that my brain from time to time goes to work trying to solve. Nobody else has ever made me joyfully waste so much time coming up with ideas about who he is, what his goals are and the experiences he must have gone through to wear that regal garb and have the partners he does.
I massively doubt Aim To Be a Pokemon Master will choose to touch upon him, but I honestly hope it doesn't and Tobias remains this inexplicable phantom trainer shrouded in mystery. For better or worse, that's what makes him stand out in the vast tapestry of Pokemon's multimedia empire.
One, when Sceptile hits Darkrai with Leaf Blade it's flat out one of the most cathartic things I've ever seen given the level of bs Ash was up against.
And two, when Ash pulls his hat backwards just like the old times when it's him and Pikachu up against Latios and four other mystery Pokemon still waiting in the wings, I like to think of it in my head as Ash giving the middle finger to the writers saying, "I know you guys are royally fucking me but I'm still going down firing." A nice little Defiant to the End moment for the goofball who once tried to aim for the horn.
To be fair on the "it's pretty strong" take, the movie is canon and he did watch a Darkrai in that film take on the Avatars of the Space-Time Continuum, going even against Palkia and taking quite a while to go down against both of them. It's also funny to me imagining Ash repressed the Sinnoh League semi-finals because that Darkrai BS was simply too much for the human brain to comprehend.
And as much as I hated it at the time, I consider that fight's effect vindicated by Ash defeating Cynthia (much less winning the Coronation Series), because Tobias being completely ignored since his debut (whether or not it was just the writers sweeping him aside) means he got absolutely nowhere against the Elite Four, much less Cynthia, and by extension probably comes out worse than any trainer that poses a challenge to Ultra Class trainers like Iris, Paul, Volkner (my excuse here being he didn't go to Sunnyshore or got his badge during the "take it and leave" slump), or Marnie. This would bring my weird meta read of the character full-circle: Paul is the competitive Battler who has consistent results but a very cold-calculated perspective; Ash is the for-fun Maverick player who learns but doesn't get hyper-intense with strategy over the Pokemon as companions; Tobias is that one scrub who thinks using Legendaries makes him hot shit but can't win against someone where he has to think and doesn't have a raw power advantage.
This video showcasing so many Pokemon is incredible, props to whoever involved with Pokemon helped put this together. It reminded me of the announcement trailer for Sun and Moon.
The way I read it is Spidops is about to get the drop on this scyther
*Looks at like half the dex entries for Ghost- and Dark-type Pokemon*
"Don't talk to me or my son ever again."
Anyway, I just realised something: -vish is based on Dunkleosteus, and it's a head fossil. Apparently, people have only ever found fossils of Dunkleosteus' head. At least according to Blathers in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. (Don't get me started on his description of Dimetrodon in Wild World...)
So, just found this out: When having a picnic, if a Pokemon is holding a Mirror Herb and has an empty move slot, if there's a Pokemon which knows a Move it can learn via Egg Move it'll learn that move; won't even use up the Mirror Herb.
Um, well, THAT'S very useful. How did I miss that? Maybe I should read item descriptions more carefully:
Um, well, THAT'S very useful. How did I miss that? Maybe I should read item descriptions more carefully:
Huh, burying the lead there a bit GF. Here, let me give this a try:
A little lengthier but I think informs on both of its useful functions and even adds a bit of flavor text.
We kind of touched on it before with Egg Groups but for all the ways they've improved stuff in the games and try to increase visibility of odds & ends, stuff pertaining to breeding is still weirdly obscured in the actual games
Like Everstones & Destiny Knots don't mention any of their secondary features and I'm not sure have ever talked about it in games by anyone.
That said that description still wouldn't work, because it works on moves yo ucan't actually pass along by breeding, its why various male & genderless-only Pokemon suddenly got "egg moves". I wonder if guide books might start referring to them as "Shared Moves" or something to that effect.
Like Everstones & Destiny Knots don't mention any of their secondary features and I'm not sure have ever talked about it in games by anyone.
That said that description still wouldn't work, because it works on moves yo ucan't actually pass along by breeding, its why various male & genderless-only Pokemon suddenly got "egg moves". I wonder if guide books might start referring to them as "Shared Moves" or something to that effect.
I am surprised you hadn't asked yourself how Grimmsnarl is meant to learn its newly gained Parting Shot egg move
Well what brought it to my attention was that the following, which started with one of your above posts:I am surprised you hadn't asked yourself how Grimmsnarl is meant to learn its newly gained Parting Shot egg move
- Sees your post mentioning this is a kid's game.
- Originally was going to post one of JWittz new videos going through the weird dex entries in SV.
- Decided they didn't really have that many child unfriendly stuff, though one part which got my attention was him joking he knows where the little mouse in Maushold comes from since he has a kid.
- Curious if Maushold has a gender, checked it on Bulbapedia. It doesn't as expected.
- I then noticed it was in two Egg Groups. Odd, didn't think there was a Gender Unknown Pokemon with two Egg Groups before (there are, not common but there's a handful).
- Decided to check Moves and, to my surprise, it does have Egg Moves.
- Confused, I checked online to see if it's possible to get them, and that's when I learned about Mirror Herb's more handy use.
Is "Egg Move" an official term?
It gets thrown around in Guide Books and I assume the occasional official post, though I don't know if they're referred to as such anywhere internally.
Now that higher quality official artwork is available in the official Pokédex, I have noticed something about the Tinkatink line:
The evolved forms' hammer is not just a bigger hammer, it is directly built over its previous versions: Tinkatink's rattler and the outer part of Tinkatuff's hammer/mace remain clearly visible.
The evolved forms' hammer is not just a bigger hammer, it is directly built over its previous versions: Tinkatink's rattler and the outer part of Tinkatuff's hammer/mace remain clearly visible.