SPOILERS! Pokemon Sword & Shield Pre-Release SPOILERS - Check Post 2!

i was doing some numbers, after steam engine activates a Coalossal can reach 183 speed at lv50. thats close to speed of a mega sala
i used a adamant Coalossal with 100hp/252atk/4sp.def/152 spe spread

i can see some double gimmick strats using lava plume to just speed boost it to a crazy level
very impressive
 
Do we have any info on Mystical Fire's BP, PP, secondary effs?
Yes. (Got sort of sniped)

I like how a lot of Pokemon that were snapped by Dexit now have their previous exclusive moves as TMs. It's like going to Goodwill and buying someone's dead grandma's dress.
Eh, since many Pokemon are now going to learn it, I'd say it's more akin to putting out a line of dresses inspired by your dead grandma's hand-sewn clothes. What was once exclusive to one old lady is now available to the masses. Oh, and there's always the chance of your grandma rising from the grave at some point down the line.

That was a weird metaphor.
 
At times, I actually doubt they aim for optimal set, to control the meta.

Remember, they have locked Contrary Serperior for a long time and even then its movepool is too barren to really make use of it. There's Contrary Lurantis, which is well....
Minor example would be Koko having higher Atk, yet people have to use its SpA more because of how its Atk options are devoid of Fairy.

What are you talking about?

Contrary Serperior is amazing. It’s by far the best offensive mono-Grass, and an absolute baller utility (Glare, Taunt , Leech Seed) and stall breaker mon and anti-sweeper with a scarf. All it really needs for coverage is Dragon Pulse and Hidden Power Fire.

I’m a little upset Lurantis is gone too, actually. I was able to use it to some effect or Trick Room teams with a mixed set of Leaf Storm, Superpower, Knock Off and Hidden Power Fire.
 

ScraftyIsTheBest

On to new Horizons!
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Oh wow, I didn't even know it was already a move. I thought it was a brand new Gen8 move.

I hope they give Gengar a new way to learn Sludge Wave
Mystical Fire has been a move since Gen 6 actually. It was initially Delphox's signature move and had 65 BP in XY, then Mismagius could learn it starting from ORAS. I don't blame you for not realizing it was a move though, its low BP makes it virtually unseen in competitive and only two Pokemon ever learned it prior to Gen 8 (both of which happen to be based on witches, mind you xD).
 
So i have a question. With max moves and the ever blessed heavy duty boots, has Hail finally been blessed with the buffs it needs to be taken seriously?
eh, what hail needs is a blizzard buff really imo, or even something like 1.25x power on ice moves. All the buffs seem to be more or less defensively related, but ice typing is notoriously bad.
 

Yung Dramps

awesome gaming
I hope they don't get too restrictive with the TM/TR distribution. I don't want the vast majority of TMs to be fodder shit while having to go through a tedious pre-Gen 5 style grind to get the actually useful moves. Thankfully, not every single viable move has been restricted to TRs (the TMs for U-Turn, Rock Slide and Will-O-Wisp still exist, Giga Drain has transitioned from tutor to TM and Mystical Fire seems like a promising new addition if it gets distributed to Pokemon that previously relied on HP Fire), but unless a lot of the currently known TM moves are getting buffs the ratio is still not ideal, and some critical moves already being delegated to TR status like BoltBeam and Focus Blast is not a good sign.

With that concern out of the way, this system sounds really cool for the sheer variety it provides. Offering the effective equivalent of 200 TMs is really neat, and from what we've seen so far there's tons of different choices, including formerly incredibly restricted moves like Mystical Fire and Darkest Lariat. Now, just include the "big three" tutor moves (Defog, Stealth Rock, Knock Off) between either TM/TR set and we're good to go!
 
So i have a question. With max moves and the ever blessed heavy duty boots, has Hail finally been blessed with the buffs it needs to be taken seriously?
That new moth Pokemon with the boots and Quiver Dance should be good. Gets walled by steels and some fire types, but that's it.

The other big buff ice has gotten is G-max Lapras, which can set Aurora Veil with a damaging move and no Hail requirement.

Neither of these options needs hail, but they appreciate it.
 
So i have a question. With max moves and the ever blessed heavy duty boots, has Hail finally been blessed with the buffs it needs to be taken seriously?
Doubtful. These don't address the issues Hail has. The other weather effects are so powerful because they:

A: Benefit multiple types of Pokemon. You're not stuck using only water types in a rain team. You can bring electric types, things 4x weak to fire, and etc. In sandstorms you can bring Rock/Ground/Steel, but Hail? You can only use Ice types or you'll take chip damage that does more harm than good.

B: No passive secondary effect. Sandstorm, Sun, and Rain, all give stat boosts, resistances, damage boosts, accuracy boosts and etc. while they're active. Hail only gives Blizzard a accuracy buff and that's it. If you meet the requirements to not take damage in a Sandstorm, you can be rewarded with a stat boost. If you meet the requirements to not take damage from Hail it doesn't "help" you... it just doesn't punish you. And that's no good enough.

C: The one type that it was made to serve: Ice types. And that type is too much of a liability. Very few Pokemon want Ice as a secondary type because it brings so many weaknesses with it.

If Hail is going to become a huge threat, it needs to give passive bonuses if you meet the requirements of being an Ice type (and not just punishment avoidance), it'd need to benefit more than one type like how Rain benefits more than just water moves/pokemon, and/or Ice type itself would need resistance changes to help it be worth running a whole team of ice types/ice-hybrid types.
 
So i have a question. With max moves and the ever blessed heavy duty boots, has Hail finally been blessed with the buffs it needs to be taken seriously?
Unlikely, because the issue was always hail itself providing little benefits compared to other weather besides making blizzard always accurate. So until that's fixed it's always going to be inferior to sandstorm boosting special defense or the boost to fire and water attacks in strong sunlight and rain.

That and with Sandslash gone we're back to Beartic as your only slush rush user.

Edit: ninja'd.
 
What are you talking about?

Contrary Serperior is amazing. It’s by far the best offensive mono-Grass, and an absolute baller utility (Glare, Taunt , Leech Seed) and stall breaker mon and anti-sweeper with a scarf. All it really needs for coverage is Dragon Pulse and Hidden Power Fire.

I’m a little upset Lurantis is gone too, actually. I was able to use it to some effect or Trick Room teams with a mixed set of Leaf Storm, Superpower, Knock Off and Hidden Power Fire.
I'm not saying Serp is terrible to use it. I meant Serp can't really make the best use of its SpA/Contrary with such movepool, and as such rely on what it has as of now. When all you got is hammer....
 

Punchshroom

FISHIOUS REND MEGA SHARPEDO
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Some other pokemon have another problem where they look too much like thing they take their design inspiration from. The best example of this is dragapult, which is quite literally a jet plane with a face on it and a dragon's body dangling below it. Now, there's nothing wrong with a pokemon being based on a jet plane, but the execution here is just very unsubtle. If you compare it to Garchomp, a dragon that also heavily resembles a jet, the difference becomes clear. Garchomp's execution is just a lot more subtle, which makes the design less goofy and one-dimensional, and more badass, suiting for a pseudo legendary. Another example is Stonejourner, which is quite literally just stonehenge with a face on it. It makes me question why that concept even had to be a pokemon in the first place. It's just so forced to me, like gamefreak thinks that we expect stonehenge to be in the game in some way, so they just make it a pokemon since that's in the name of the game after all. If GF can't be bothered to do something interesting with the concept, I'd rather them not even try. Stonehenge could have easily been a location instead of a pokemon.
Would just like to point out that "Jet Plane Face Dragon" is based on the Diplocaulus, a prehistoric animal that actually existed.

So yeah the fact that you didn't even know about Dragapult's origins speaks a lot more about its subtlety than your comparison to "Land Shark" Garchomp.
 
Doubtful. These don't address the issues Hail has. The other weather effects are so powerful because they:

A: Benefit multiple types of Pokemon. You're not stuck using only water types in a rain team. You can bring electric types, things 4x weak to fire, and etc. In sandstorms you can bring Rock/Ground/Steel, but Hail? You can only use Ice types or you'll take chip damage that does more harm than good.

B: No passive secondary effect. Sandstorm, Sun, and Rain, all give stat boosts, resistances, damage boosts, accuracy boosts and etc. while they're active. Hail only gives Blizzard a accuracy buff and that's it. If you meet the requirements to not take damage in a Sandstorm, you can be rewarded with a stat boost. If you meet the requirements to not take damage from Hail it doesn't "help" you... it just doesn't punish you. And that's no good enough.

C: The one type that it was made to serve: Ice types. And that type is too much of a liability. Very few Pokemon want Ice as a secondary type because it brings so many weaknesses with it.

If Hail is going to become a huge threat, it needs to give passive bonuses if you meet the requirements of being an Ice type (and not just punishment avoidance), it'd need to benefit more than one type like how Rain benefits more than just water moves/pokemon, and/or Ice type itself would need resistance changes to help it be worth running a whole team of ice types/ice-hybrid types.
Just for curiosity’s sake, what would some theoretical benefits be for hail to bring? No doubt about it hail and ice types have gotten a bit better this gen, but I agree, there’s still a long way to go.
 
Allow it to mirror Sandstorm’s special defense boost by giving Ice-types a physical defense boost
Now my Abomasnow can switch in on all those Flare Blitz, Close Combats, Iron Head, U-turns, and Stone Edges. Finally.

Seriously though that would be an improvement but I think it needs to be pushed even more. Perhaps 2x defense or negating ice type weaknesses. Ice types are awful so to make up for it I think you would need something stronger than just a clone of the other weathers.
 
Why doesn’t ice get more resistances at least, it just makes it feel like game freak just needed a type or two to screw over. Steel is of course the inverse of it, too many resistances but it at least has common weaknesses.
 
Allow it to mirror Sandstorm’s special defense boost by giving Ice-types a physical defense boost
Would that on top of Aurora veil be too much? Ehh, what the heck, give it to them anyway.

More hail abilities woukd be nice as well (only 2?!). I was going to suggest make fighting types weaker in hail but poor crabominabme would be doomed by design
 
A blanket 1.5x in physical defense would be cool. Also probably like 1.2x ice type move damage boost or something.

Overall the issue is that Ice types generally just have piss poor resistance combined with the general slow moving iceberg concepts GF loved giving to em. If most Ice types have really good speeds rather than having the tendency of being tanks (which they absolutely suck at) then it would be awesome, if not a bit too powerful.
 

Yung Dramps

awesome gaming
If there's something positive we can say about Ice types this generation, it seems like GF is on the whole finally understanding they were built for offense and designing new Ice types accordingly. Mr. Rime has good Special Attack and an ability that negates damage reducing screens, Frosmoth is basically Ice Volcarona in every sense and Galarian Darmanitan likely won't stray far from the original's 140 Attack and 95 Speed considering other Galarian forms haven't done so. The odd man out is Eiscue, but he's more comparable to something like Shedinja in being a very situational but potentially extremely durable blanket check rather than Avalugg.
 
Using just the new non-legendary pokemon and regional variants introduced this gen, you could make a mono-type team of fully evolved Electric types, Water types, Ice types, or Dragon types. This is entirely thanks to the fact that the four slots reserved for fossilmons this gen were for 1-stage creatures without evolutions, otherwise almost every type would only have 4-5 new pokes that you could reasonably obtain before the end of the game:

- Electric: Boltund, Morpeko, Toxtricity, Pincurchin, Dracozolt and Arctozolt
- Water: Intelleon, Drednaw, Barraskewda, Cramorant, Dracovish and Arctovish.
- Ice: Frosmoth, Eiscue, Arctozolt, Arctovish, Mr. Rime, Darmanitan.
- Dragon: Duraludon, Flapple, Appletun, Dragapult, Dracozolt and Dracovish.

You could do the same with Fairy types and Steel types if you include Zacian (Alcremie, Hatterene, Grimmsnarl, Rapidash, Weezing) and/or Zamazenta (Corviknight, Copperajah, Duraludon, Perserrker, Stunfisk). Eternatus is the seventh new (fully evolved) Dragon type, so if the fossilmons this gen were two-stage evolutionary lines again then Dragon might have been the only type you could form a full gen8-only team out of.
 
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