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Pokémon Movepool Oddities & Explanations

How does Toxtricity (Amped) learn Shift Gear but the Golett doesn't?

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Golems based on mechs with movable parts & has jet propulsion: Nah, none of that stuff uses gears.
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A lizard that makes sounds with scales on its chest: Well it's based on electric guitars which uses a gear to tune so ROCK ON! What, Clanging Scales ("Scale Noise" in Japan)? It's not JUST making "noise", mom, it's ROCKING OUT!
 
Pikachu315111 said:
How does Toxtricity (Amped) learn Shift Gear but the Golett doesn't?
849Toxtricity-Amped.png

A lizard that makes sounds with scales on its chest: Well it's based on electric guitars which uses a gear to tune so ROCK ON! What, Clanging Scales ("Scale Noise" in Japan)? It's not JUST making "noise", mom, it's ROCKING OUT!
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(It's never stated the strings on the chest are scales, they might as well be just membranes)

That being said, HOW does Toxtricity use Shift Gear in the first place? Yes, it's thematically justified that it can learn the move due to guitars having gears... but Toxtricity itself does not have any. What does it use as a gear? Its tail? Whatever those things in its hips are?
 
Siggu said:
(It's never stated the strings on the chest are scales, they might as well be just membranes)

That being said, HOW does Toxtricity use Shift Gear in the first place? Yes, it's thematically justified that it can learn the move due to guitars having gears... but Toxtricity itself does not have any. What does it use as a gear? Its tail? Whatever those things in its hips are?
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I think it's less "shifting gears" in the literal sense and more in a "crescendo" kind of way, literally having its rhythm pick up.
 
The real oddity with Shift Gear Toxtricity's is why it learns that over the other gear-based stat-boosting move, Gear Up. Amped and Low Key have exactly two moves different between them: Amped learns Venoshock and Shift Gear, while Low Key learns Venom Drench and Magnetic Flux. Venoshock and Venom Drench make for good offensive/defensive counterparts, but Shift Gear has very little to do with Magnetic Flux. However, Gear Up is a 1:1 copy of Magnetic Flux, with the only difference that it boosts offense instead of defense.
 
Ralph176 said:
Can anyone please explain why Venusaur learns String Shot?
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It's not the only odd Pokemon that learns String Shot, and by looking at the other examples I think I sort of see GF's (rather selective) logic. So, odd Pokemon (we're going to skip over all the Bug-types that learn it even though there are probably some that shouldn't based on what bug they're based on; also Mew) that learn String Shot via HGSS Move Tutor (this alone already sort of explains the reasoning is going to be loose just so they could have oddball choices get it): Bulbasaur family, Remoraid family, Mantine, Lileep family, & Shellos family.
  • Bulbasaur family, Remoraid family, & Lileep family: They get it probably because of the way they fire projectiles: via a "cannon". Bulbasaur family shoots energy from its bulb/flower, Remoraid family from their mouths (which are mouths of a handgun & cannon/turret), and Lileep family from within the black void where its eyes are. "But, why just them and not say Rhyperior?". That's a harder question to answer, but going to guess GF figured plant creatures would more likely be able to recreate some kind of sticky plant fiber similar to silk. As for Remoraid family, their whole gimmick is being able to fire all sorts of projectiles so it's just par for the course they get one which shoots sticky string.
  • Mantine: Mantine itself probably doesn't fire it, hence why Mantyke doesn't learn it, but Mantine likely can have its Remoraid buddy use it.
  • Shellos family: When threatened some sea slugs are able to expel a sticky "thread" to ward off their attacker... though it's not actually thread but rather internal organs which they can grow back. I'd imagine if String Shot was still a Tutor move in Gen VII that Pyukumuku probably would be able to learn it for the same exact reason.
 
So the talk of baby Pokemon in Unpopular Opinions reminded me of how one of their supposed benefits, that being exclusive access to certain moves, has been completely eliminated by Sword and Shield's stupid decision to include every prevo-exclusive move at level 1. However, as I looked through the evolutions of baby Pokemon to see what exclusive moves there used to be, I learned that a few moves slipped through the cracks.

Splash remains a prevo-exclusive move for Marill and Cosmoem, despite Gyarados, Milotic, and Wobbuffet having it added to their movepools. I don't know if there are any other moves like this, but at least the joke move that doesn't do anything was partially spared during the Great Movepool Slaughter of 2019.
 
DrPumpkinz said:
Splash remains a prevo-exclusive move for Marill and Cosmoem, despite Gyarados, Milotic, and Wobbuffet having it added to their movepools. I don't know if there are any other moves like this, but at least the joke move that doesn't do anything was partially spared during the Great Movepool Slaughter of 2019.
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Honestly considering Splash is basically the "signature" move of Magikarp (even though it isn't), I doubt they'd rid of it.
It's too iconic to movexit it , considering they basically made a entire game based on it :bloblul:
 
Worldie said:
Honestly considering Splash is basically the "signature" move of Magikarp (even though it isn't), I doubt they'd rid of it.
It's too iconic to movexit it , considering they basically made a entire game based on it :bloblul:
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Oh, I wasn't talking about them deleting moves. That's part of it (specifically the part where removing midlevel options like Signal Beam and Mirror Shot created a huge power vacuum), but there was also putting almost every prevo move at level 1 (except for Splash, sometimes), ordering level up moves almost exclusively by base power, and handing out optimal moves like candy through TRs. Pretty much everything related to movepools was horribly mismanaged in Sword and Shield.
 
Revenge of Depressed Gay said:
IDK if this has been mentioned before but why can't Zarude learn knock off.
:ss/Zarude:
You mean to tell me this motherfucker with the long ass arms can't use them to knock off items. Hell it's a rude monkey, that seems perfectly in character for it.
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i had never actually looked at this things movepool before and....

Why is the only dark move it learns by level up, damaging or status, bite.
It gets a wide variety of grass and normal moves by level up, but all its dark moves need TMs or TRs

e: Because, to be clear, its not like being a TM/TR excludes yo ufrom getting it normally. Even if that does wind up happening a weird amount. Like Taunt! Let the dark monkey have taunt! LIke 30 other pokemon still learn taunt by level up!
 
why does rotom wash wash mothafucka learn will o wisp? it's a water type and supposedly the fire would've been washed away.

another one, why does yanmega not learn fly? it carries humans
 
earl said:
Rotom can change between forms freely with the only movepool change being the respective STAB attack for each form.
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And when it changes forms it loses the exclusive move of that form, thus why it only has one STAB move to use with its new Type...

Which makes me come to a realization: Why didn't they then just give Rotom a Signature Move which changes Type with its form? "Malfunction", 95 Power, only works if Rotom is possessing an object, Type is the same as its secondary Type in that form, and have a secondary effect that changes between forms (Heat burns, Wash soaks, Frost freezes, Fan flinches, and Mow seeds).
 
Pikachu315111 said:
And when it changes forms it loses the exclusive move of that form, thus why it only has one STAB move to use with its new Type...

Which makes me come to a realization: Why didn't they then just give Rotom a Signature Move which changes Type with its form? "Malfunction", 95 Power, only works if Rotom is possessing an object, Type is the same as its secondary Type in that form, and have a secondary effect that changes between forms (Heat burns, Wash soaks, Frost freezes, Fan flinches, and Mow seeds).
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To give each type more of an identity. For example, Rotom-Heat and -Mow are the nuke forms of Rotom, with Overheat and Leaf Storm that deals massive damage but drops its attack (they could have just given Heat Fire Blast, this was clearly intentional); Rotom-Wash and -Frost have the more inaccurate and inconsistent high-powered moves that are risky in a different way (hitting happens less to start with, but they don't have to switch out afterwards); Rotom-Fan is just chilling with Air Slash, being a much more spammable and consistent move with a fun 30% flinch chance, for the players who don't need a nuke at all. Electric- and Flying-Type also cover themselves pretty well, making it seem like the "technical" form.

It varies how the forms play much more than us receiving Techno Blast a generation early, or hell having a Judgment clone within the Gen IV games. I'm definitely a bigger fan of them doing it this way. It makes Rotom feel like it's properly using the elements of each type as well, being able to harness moves that Pokémon of those particular types already tend to use instead of just being a Rotom whose signature move changes type conveniently.

Also, technically, Rotom's type didn't change in different forms until Gen V, so your version where Malfunction's type changes to Rotom's second type wouldn't work. Of course that doesn't matter too much since they could have hardcoded it to change type to whatever form it's possessing represents anyway, even though Rotom was still Electric/Ghost regardless.
 
Pikachu315111 said:
Which makes me come to a realization: Why didn't they then just give Rotom a Signature Move which changes Type with its form? "Malfunction", 95 Power, only works if Rotom is possessing an object, Type is the same as its secondary Type in that form, and have a secondary effect that changes between forms (Heat burns, Wash soaks, Frost freezes, Fan flinches, and Mow seeds).
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Celever said:
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...to be fair, probably simply cause back in gen 4, they didn't have or didn't want to make the code for dynamically type changing moves.
They only had Hidden Power (with its complicate IV calculations) and likely didn't explore the concept.

Gen 5 introduced Arceus, so they probably decided to showcase the fancy dynamic type changing with Genesect as well, but Rotoms already had their moveset and were recognized by it , so likely did not feel the need to change anything.
 
Worldie said:
Gen 5 introduced Arceus
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Um...

EDIT: TBF, I did forget Rotom kept it's Electric/Ghost-typing even when in its Appliance Forms. Find the mid generations are easier to mix up being they're like 10 years old now. With many of the Gen 3 & 4 com mons I need a second to think which gen they're from (I guess also Gen 5 but that's my favorite gen so generally I'm able to immediately remember them), and starting to do the same with Gen 6 & 7.
 
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