Expanded Tier List - What If?

[Eeveeto]

Felt like doing a Random Theorymoning for Nuzlocke runs:

What if Sneasel participated in a Nuzlocke run of Pokemon Crystal but was found at Route 29 (first route of the game)?

Lets do another one:

What if Qwilfish participated in a Nuzlocke run of Pokemon Crystal but was obtainable with an Old Rod?

In modern generations Qwilish is not bad. With either endless TMs or the option to change its ability to Intimidate (one of the best abilities for Nuzlockes) give it a useful niche. Futhermore, in some fan games you have the option to use a Hisuian one, which gets a powerful evolution with just one weakness. More movepool compensate the bad Stats Qwilfish has as well, it can use SD or support the team with Thunder Wave.

If Overqwill existed in GSC, it would certainly be very good, walling a big part of the in-game opponents and smashing them with Sludge Bomb. What we have instead is another F Rank Mon. Few Water Mons can be F rank in a Nuzlocke run, by virtue of learning Surf you should be saved from irrelevance, especially if you have a secondary and quite powerful STAB. But Qwilfish has the disgrace of only obtainable with a Super Rod in 2 Kanto routes and Johto 32 Route. Super Rod is given in Kanto, the game is almost done at that point, you will 100% certainly have a better Water type already. The other Water-Poison Mon, Tentacool can be fished with an Old Rod on the same route Qwilfish appears in, after the first Gym. Yep, Qwilfish is screwed and irredeemable.

But what if that wasn,t the case? Just like Sneasel, what a fully evolved Mon obtainable early can do? So, imagine Qwilfish replaces Tentacool on Route 32 as a Old Rod encounter. Under Nuzlocke rules, this means that we need to avoid Grass, pick Old Rod and fish. There a little problem in that there is still a 85% chance to get a Magikarp, but this is solved by going to Violet City first and fishing Magikarp there, guaranteeing that Qwilfish will be our first fish encounter on Route 32. So, how the run would look?

Vs Bugsy: Level cap is 17. Give a Berry to your Qwilfish and teach it Swift (TM is in Union Cave). Use 6 Hardens and 6 Minimizes (both early level-up moves) vs Metapod, then just hax your way through the whole team with Poison Sting and Swift. Its extrmely unlikely that Bugsy can hit and crit Qwilfish before ir murders the whole team. A rank performance, misses S due to being very slow and a little luck dependant. Realibility is priorized in Nuzlockes over time consumption, but 12 turns just to set-up is way too many.
Vs Whitney: Qwilfish needs to kill some random trainers too, so you will have to give up on Harden and learn Water Gun at level 19 (level cap is 20). You will also forget Swift due to getting Headbutt TM. With this in mind, strategy is similar, you can use 6 Minimizes vs Clefairy, kill it with Headbutt and hax Miltank with Poison Sting poison. Gold Berry from National Park would help a lot at this point of the game. There are 2 problems, however. First is Clefairy being much more dangerous than Metapod. If Metronome triggers a Thunderbolt, Qwilfish is screwed. Second problem is that Miltank not only wont actually die from poison quickly enough (has Milk Drink), but can also murder our poor fish with Stomp, which if hits when Minimize is used, has 130 power. So, actually using Qwilish vs Whitney is quite dangerous, it might be better to just flinch and kill Clef with Headbutt, maybe take a hit vs Miltank (trying to get lucky with Poison Sting) and switch out. D rank performance.
Vs Morty: Use Mint Berry here. At this point, you have Surf already. You will 1vs1 Gastly with it and if lucky enough (Curse usage and Hypnosis accuracy), even the first Haunter. You have no business fighting Gengar however, Dream Eater is a OHKO and Mean Look could trap Qwilfish. Even STAB Shadow Ball does a lot. If Qwilfish is healthy enough, second Haunter can be fought, just be careful with Night Shade. C rank performance.
Vs Chuck: You 1vs1 Primeape and can damage Poliwrath a little before having to switch out. You won,t be beating Poliwrath, however. C rank performance, but could be B if you do Rocket sidequest and get Sludge Bomb before facing Chuck. Sludge Bomb increases the chance to beat Poliwrath by a lot.
Vs Jasmine: One of the rare cases in which you quite reliably beat the ace but should not risk the fish vs Magnemites, which will probably OHKO even if you have 5 levels advantage. B rank performance.
Vs Pryce: You have Sludge Bomb and Surf here. Very bad luck is needed to not clean sweep Pryce. S rank performance.
Vs Claire: To optimally use Qwilfish, you will have to spend 2 of the most valuable TMs for Nuzlocke runs, there are only 1 of each in the game: Rest and Sleep Talk. GSC Sleep Talk mechanic makes this strategy even better than in later games. From this point, if you plan to continue using Qwilfish until the end of the game (or its death), the set should be: Rest, Sleep Talk, Surf, Sludge Bomb. Think carefully if you want Qwilfish as a long-term teammate, because almost every Mon (Sneasel being one of the few exceptions due to its frailty) wants Rest and Sleep Talk.
This being said, Qwilfish with Cheri Berry will easily 2HKO first Claire's Dragonair. However, you will need to switch out, because she will most certainly send the Thunderbolt one next. If Qwilfish's teammate wins vs the second Dragonair but ends very damaged, Qwilfish can come back vs the third one and win with the Restalk + Sludge Bomb strat (you can actually delete Surf with Move Deleter for this match to increase Sludge Bomb chance with Sleep Talk). Kingdra however, hits too hard with every move it has. Use your Meganium to deal with it.
Vs Silver in Victory Road: Qwilfish will beat Sneasel. Golbat is beatable too if it isn,t too lucky with the Confuse Ray. Unless very overleveled, run away from Kadabra, but if you are, Sludge Bomb will OHKO. Don,t fight Magneton and don,t fight Haunter either, it has Mean Look, Confuse Ray and Curse. Due to Claire being at level 40, you will be at least a little overleveled, so every starter can be beaten by Qwilfish. B rank performance.
Vs Will: First truly F rank performance for Qwilfish, every Mon here OHKOs with Psychic. Avoid this match-up.
Vs Koga: Avoid Ariados due to Mean Look + Baton Pass. Avoid Forretress due to Explosion. Avoid Venomoth due to Psychic. With Restalk + Surf, it will take a while, but Qwilfish will 100% reliably beat Muk and has a good chance to beat Crobat too. Those are the main threats, therefore C rank performance despite being useless vs 3 Mons.
Vs Bruno: One on one, you beat every Mon. You might want to switch out of Hitmontop due to Dig crit threat. If asleep when Onix appears, avoid it too, since it has EQ, otherwise just Surf it. Hitmonchan has Thunder Punch and Qwilfish has bad Special bulk.... but Hitmonchan has an even worse Special Attack, so its not really a threat. Hitmonlee can be a threat with Swagger, so a Berry that cures the confusion is your best item for this specific fight (and will help to kill faster the rest of the team). Due to several doubtful interactions, this can only be an A rank performance instead of an S one. Fortunately, Bruno is the worst Elite Four member by far, every teammate (starting with Meganium) has an easy time assisting Qwilfish.
Vs Karen: Every Mon here either hits Qwilfish too hard or has some dirty tactic (like Mean Look + Sand Attack + Confuse Ray Umbreon or Dbond Gengar). Even Murkrow, which should be the easiest match-up, could outspeed Qwilfish, crit with Faint Attack and then murder you with Pursuit if you try to switch-out. Sorry, this is another F rank performance.
Vs Lance: If Qwilfish is at level 50, it should have more than enough power to 2HKO Gyarados and live anything the sea dragon throws. After that, things go more dicey. Qwilfish certainly could beat one on one Aerodactyl, Charizard and the Blizzard Nite, but not all of them and has a hard time switching-in. In the case of Blizzard Nite, you first need to confirm its the Blizzard one, Thunder deletes Qwilfish from existance. Level 50 Nite is a very bad match-up too. D rank performance, will just kill 2 Mons at best (but 1 at worst).

Vs Kanto Gym leaders except Blue: Due to being overleveled, almost every Mon does well here. Qwilfish, however, is surprisingly bad. Surge is a no go, Sabrina is even worse and somehow even Janine is not a complete free win due to Qwilfish's special Attack being quite low and having 2 Explossives + Psychic Venomoth. Misty has half of her team with moves that target the Poison typing (surprisingly, Starmie is actually beatable and doesn,t have Psychic). Erica is our first free win in East Kanto, then Brock falls too, but Blaine has a Thunder Punch Magmar. D rank performance.
Vs Blue: Qwilfish easily beats Pidgeot, Gyarados and Arcanine. If asleep and Exeggutor gets to use Sunny Day, run away from that Solar Beam, it will hit very hard. Vs Rhydon only fight when awake, don,t risk Sleep Talk not getting Surf and taking an EQ. Obviously don,t face Alakazam either. B rank performance, can beat up to 5 Mons.
Vs Red: Charizard, Blastoise and Snorlax are all beatable, but probably not at once. D rank performance.

Overall, just like Sneasel, early availability would improve Qwilfish's run a lot. If your starter is a Chikorita and for some reason (mainly bad luck) you didn,t get a Rock Mon, Qwilfish is a pretty reliable way to get through Bugsy, which Tentacool isn,t able to achieve. It will then contribute vs every Johto Gym leader and be only useless vs 2 Elite Four members and 2 Kanto Gym leaders (which is pretty irrelevant, your Meganium will sweep Surge in the absence of a Ground Mon and Sabrina is doable too). I have mentioned Meganium a lot in this post and not only because its my favorite (and best in a Nuzlocke run) starter, but also because it sinergyzes well with Qwilfish. Bayleef can beat Whitney's Miltank, Chuck's Poliwath (if you don,t have Sludge Bomb yet) and Claire's Kingdra, all Mons with which Qwilfish struggles. Apart from that, Qwilfish apreciates some Dark teammate that fights vs Will, Umbreon being the best choice (and its also the best Eeveelution in a Nuzlocke run, since its a Defense Mon).

Despite needing 2 of the best TMs, overall I think early Qwilfish would jump from F rank right to a decent C rank, its a bulky Water that hits hard with Sludge Bomb and has been robbed by being placed in the post-game. In fact, this has been the case in almost every game in which Qwilfish appeared: in Fire Red is in post-game too, in DPP too. In HGSS, GF has realized they have done Qwilfish dirty and now its obtainable with a Good Rod, but for Nuzlocke runs this is not an option, since you will likely have already caught something at Route 32 by the time Good Rod is a thing. BW is post-game again. I have not played XY, but Kalos Route 8 (with Super Rod again) looks to be something quite late too. Its pretty sad, since Qwilfish is a pretty cool Mon. Fortunately, GF finally realized that they treated Qwilfish unfairly and gave him a Hisuian form and an evolution, but Johto Qwilfish is still currently condemned to only be used in fan games, never official ones (even outside of Nuzlockes).

Have a nice Eeveening!

 

[R_N]

See, that wasn't my experience with the RSE tier list. Route clearing isn't mentioned at all in write-ups for example. Maybe that list in general needs a bit of a rework but a ton of mediocre but perfectly fine Pokemon are down in the dumpster with unusable trash, while Pokemon like Skarmory and Tropius, that suck against route trainers, are in C-rank. Mostly it concerns defensive Pokemon. These are maybe good enough to eventually win against some gym leaders, after you stalled through them for a ton of turns. But that sort of strategy is just horrible against route trainers. And there are a lot of purely defensive Pokemon in each generation that fall into that category. Okay against gym leaders, bad against route trainers because they take too long.
I really am only invested in this because I want to save some medicore Pokemon from F-rank into like D-rank. Because currently their representation gives the impression that they are just unusable, but they are not. Then again, usually only the top ranks, that are all great against route trainers, even get write-ups for the site articles, so maybe the topic just isn't worth the hassle.

As someone who generally just passively kept up with the tier lists, to me it seems like every tier list just had an unspoken set of rules that could silently deviate from how other tier lists tiered their Pokemon. Like no two tier lists had the same criteria, but the exact criteria weren't really visible as they could be.

I imagine that happens for a few reasons (lists made at different times, lists made & run by different people, unspoken shifts in write up thoughts that barrel away, etc), but I think route-consideration is one of those things.

 

[Ravenson]

What if Qwilfish participated in a Nuzlocke run of Pokemon Crystal but was obtainable with an Old Rod?

Isn't it already obtainable with an Old Rod? Fisher Ralph (also on Route 32) can trigger a swarm once you've registered him, and during swarms Qwilfish appears for all three Rods. Obviously this is way more work than a person probably wants to put in for a Nuzlocke and it's harder to guarantee you don't get screwed by the Route 32 grass that you have to walk through, but it's vaguely possible with the game as it exists... right?

 

[Punchshroom]

See, that wasn't my experience with the RSE tier list. Route clearing isn't mentioned at all in write-ups for example. Maybe that list in general needs a bit of a rework but a ton of mediocre but perfectly fine Pokemon are down in the dumpster with unusable trash, while Pokemon like Skarmory and Tropius, that suck against route trainers, are in C-rank. Mostly it concerns defensive Pokemon. These are maybe good enough to eventually win against some gym leaders, after you stalled through them for a ton of turns. But that sort of strategy is just horrible against route trainers. And there are a lot of purely defensive Pokemon in each generation that fall into that category. Okay against gym leaders, bad against route trainers because they take too long.

As someone who's contributed much with the RSE in-game tiering lists, this statement is kind of misleading. In-game doesn't really use "stalling strategies" much at all; it is usually more efficient to just spam X items + ~1 Hyper Potion to sweep an opponent instead of relying on passive damage + a couple of Hyper Potions to stall out a whole team. Both Skarmory and Tropius are usually more interested in actually attacking enemies; Skarmory just 1v1s most physical opponents due to its resists and has the bulk to accumulate X item boosts on itself for clean sweeps, while Tropius's best form of in-game pressure is actually Chlorophyll Sunny Day + Solarbeam.

For that matter, performance against route trainers isn't usually a highlight since of course your Pokemon are expected to clear them decently; efficient clearing of route trainers near where the mon is caught only really factors if said Pokemon happens to contribute against the upcoming Gym(s) as well, such as Geodude, post-Surf Electrike, Chinchou, etc. What does get highlighted though is if the Pokemon performs inefficiently against route trainers; the aforementioned Skarm and Tropius end up lagging behind in this regard since consuming X items or using SunnyBeam against random mooks isn't particularly efficient so those Pokemon end up trading unnecessary hits. Hariyama is one such example because despite good performance against boss trainers, its slow Speed, high HP, and low defenses means that against swarms of route trainers, Hariyama ends up taking more damage and consuming more Potions than is to be expected of higher tiered Pokemon with similar availability. Pokemon like Cradily and Magcargo suffer the most from route trainers since their awful speed and mediocre offenses means they don't even do a great job at clearing out route trainers, boss matchups not withstanding, so their ranking suffers as a result.

Tl;dr: Route clearing isn't usually highlighted for ranking, but if the pokemon does perform below average against route trainers, its ranking can be affected.

 

[Eeveeto]

Isn't it already obtainable with an Old Rod? Fisher Ralph (also on Route 32) can trigger a swarm once you've registered him, and during swarms Qwilfish appears for all three Rods. Obviously this is way more work than a person probably wants to put in for a Nuzlocke and it's harder to guarantee you don't get screwed by the Route 32 grass that you have to walk through, but it's vaguely possible with the game as it exists... right?

Oh, didn't realize Swarm affected to Old Rod encounters too. This means that my post is not actually theorymoning but a guide about how to use Qwilfish in a Nuzlocke run, thanks for the clarification. And yes, it's still a big time investment to make it appear, since apart from going back to New Bark Town, you still need to fish a Magikarp elsewhere and avoid the Route 32 Grass.

 

[pe5e]

[...]

I maybe worded that poorly. By stalling I just meant that Pokemon like Skarmory need to slowly chip down the opponent with its weak attacks while it takes hits and needs some amount of healing items. I didn't mean stuff like Rest or Toxic. I agree that those don't really have much of a place in normal in-game runs.

Also, aren't X items usually banned from in-game tier lists? That was my understanding. Since nearly any Pokemon can sweep with them, I thought they weren't considered. If RSE did allow them, then I wasn't aware of that.

I can see that is more important to highlight when a Pokemon has trouble against even route trainers, since that is kind of the base line a Pokemon needs to reach. So for most good and even decent Pokemon, it really isn't worth the mention since it is kind of expected.

The way I see it there are three different kinds of Pokemon (of course with some overlap):

• Pokemon that are good against a number of major battles (Abra, the starters etc.)
• Pokemon that aren't good enough for helping much against the major battles, but are solid enough for beating most route trainers (Aron, Plusle, Sandshrew etc. or even Volbeat and Spinda)
• Pokemon that aren't of much help against major battles as well as route trainers (Nosepass, Dustox etc.)

And I feel like there should be a separation between the last two. If a Pokemon isn't good enough to beat gym leaders, then I think it would be a good idea to highlight route cleaning if it is good at it. Pokemon in the first group don't need the reminder but if mentioned shortly in the second group, then the reader understands that those Pokemon can at least do something useful and aren't just a burden like the Pokemon in the last group.

But maybe I just get too passionate about this because the low tier stuff in tier lists mostly doesn't matter. But it just hurts me to see some of them on the same rank as some unusable garbage.

 

[Merritt]

I maybe worded that poorly. By stalling I just meant that Pokemon like Skarmory need to slowly chip down the opponent with its weak attacks while it takes hits and needs some amount of healing items. I didn't mean stuff like Rest or Toxic. I agree that those don't really have much of a place in normal in-game runs.

Also, aren't X items usually banned from in-game tier lists? That was my understanding. Since nearly any Pokemon can sweep with them, I thought they weren't considered. If RSE did allow them, then I wasn't aware of that.

I can see that is more important to highlight when a Pokemon has trouble against even route trainers, since that is kind of the base line a Pokemon needs to reach. So for most good and even decent Pokemon, it really isn't worth the mention since it is kind of expected.

The way I see it there are three different kinds of Pokemon (of course with some overlap):

• Pokemon that are good against a number of major battles (Abra, the starters etc.)
• Pokemon that aren't good enough for helping much against the major battles, but are solid enough for beating most route trainers (Aron, Plusle, Sandshrew etc. or even Volbeat and Spinda)
• Pokemon that aren't of much help against major battles as well as route trainers (Nosepass, Dustox etc.)

And I feel like there should be a separation between the last two. If a Pokemon isn't good enough to beat gym leaders, then I think it would be a good idea to highlight route cleaning if it is good at it. Pokemon in the first group don't need the reminder but if mentioned shortly in the second group, then the reader understands that those Pokemon can at least do something useful and aren't just a burden like the Pokemon in the last group.

But maybe I just get too passionate about this because the low tier stuff in tier lists mostly doesn't matter. But it just hurts me to see some of them on the same rank as some unusable garbage.

X items were allowed in the RSE ingame tier list because I didn't see a particularly great reason to ban them, they're not entirely imbalanced the way that they are in Gen 7+ when they give a +2 boost, they're not an unintuitive strategy for players to use the way forcibly poisoning Taillow would be, and they're reasonably balanced in effectiveness, particularly since x spdef didn't exist yet meaning that a strategy of boosting defenses to allow fully safe setup would be dramatically less effective than it is in later generations.

Skarmory is being somewhat unfairly maligned here though - calling it names by saying it has weak attacks while simultaneously making a case for Volbeat who is most certainly weaker (Bug STAB is mediocre at best against most route trainers and Signal Beam with assorted Normal type moves is all Volbeat has until after Fortree, all off a lower base attack than Skarmory) is a bit odd. Skarmory comes early enough that it's fully capable of taking on the various route trainers as long as you give it a low demand TM, since its Attack is definitely competitive for the early 20s part of the game it joins in, without much if any babying due to its defensive stats and typing letting it punch above its level. It's really not until the ocean when Skarmory falls off in route clearing effectiveness and even then it's able to participate against Pokemon it's got a strong matchup against.

Beyond that, both Tropius and Skarmory provide extremely useful HM support - particularly in the case of Tropius who covers all 8 HMs when paired with Tentacool - which is in many ways as or more valuable than clearing out route trainers. Pokemon that are only really capable of clearing route trainers are a dime a dozen and require specific circumstances to shine (using Pokemon that are only efficient against slower paced major fights like Wobbuffet maybe?) because the reliable Pokemon who are fighting the major battles are both generally capable of also taking on route trainers and should be the ones to fight the route trainers so they gain exp and have an easier time in major battles. Keeping the snowball rolling will be more efficient in almost every case than having a slightly easier time fighting route trainers who pose little to no threat.

 

[pe5e]

X items were allowed in the RSE ingame tier list because I didn't see a particularly great reason to ban them, they're not entirely imbalanced the way that they are in Gen 7+ when they give a +2 boost, they're not an unintuitive strategy for players to use the way forcibly poisoning Taillow would be, and they're reasonably balanced in effectiveness, particularly since x spdef didn't exist yet meaning that a strategy of boosting defenses to allow fully safe setup would be dramatically less effective than it is in later generations.

I was not aware of that, thanks for letting me know. That certainly gives some more passive mons a real opportunity to sweep in major battles. Even if it still requires a decent bit of support and time.

Skarmory is being somewhat unfairly maligned here though - calling it names by saying it has weak attacks while simultaneously making a case for Volbeat who is most certainly weaker (Bug STAB is mediocre at best against most route trainers and Signal Beam with assorted Normal type moves is all Volbeat has until after Fortree, all off a lower base attack than Skarmory) is a bit odd. Skarmory comes early enough that it's fully capable of taking on the various route trainers as long as you give it a low demand TM, since its Attack is definitely competitive for the early 20s part of the game it joins in, without much if any babying due to its defensive stats and typing letting it punch above its level. It's really not until the ocean when Skarmory falls off in route clearing effectiveness and even then it's able to participate against Pokemon it's got a strong matchup against.

Beyond that, both Tropius and Skarmory provide extremely useful HM support - particularly in the case of Tropius who covers all 8 HMs when paired with Tentacool - which is in many ways as or more valuable than clearing out route trainers. Pokemon that are only really capable of clearing route trainers are a dime a dozen and require specific circumstances to shine (using Pokemon that are only efficient against slower paced major fights like Wobbuffet maybe?) because the reliable Pokemon who are fighting the major battles are both generally capable of also taking on route trainers and should be the ones to fight the route trainers so they gain exp and have an easier time in major battles. Keeping the snowball rolling will be more efficient in almost every case than having a slightly easier time fighting route trainers who pose little to no threat.

While Skarmory really does have a respectable attack stat, I have found its damage output to be much less impressive in practice. That is because of a number of reasons. One of which is that its attacking options are very medium. You kind of have to give it the Steel Wing and Secret Power TMs for some early attacking options. Those moves are okay but Steel is a pretty bad attacking type, even before you get to the Water routes, and Secret Power without STAB is very often only a 2HKO. And for a long time you won't have a better Flying STAB than Peck, or later Air Cutter. Skarmory also comes really underleveled and has a slow level growth, so it takes a lot of EXP until Skarmory catches up.
Volbeat certainly is worse than Skarmory, as it basically can't help with any gym leader but it still floats over stuff like Nosepass, and is actually fine against most route trainers at least. While Bug is also not a good attacking type, I think it is better than Steel, and it does have just enough coverage to still hit most things. I know its special attack is a joke, but with Tail Glow and good special TMs in Shock Wave first, and later Thunderbolt and Giga Drain, it is less of a joke, and it can actually set up some sweeps because of its decent speed.

I am aware that Tropius and Skarmory have a lot of HM utitlity but because of their encounter location, I think its not a big point for a long time. Both are behind the third gym, so you had to put Rock Smash on something else already, and there is a big chance that Cut and the optional Flash also found their way on another Pokemon. So the advantage that those two Pokemon can carry those bad HMs for your team only comes up after Lilycove City when it is possible to rearrange the HMs of your team with the Move Deleter. Before that, they can only really help out with Fly and / or Strength. Which are generally fine in-game moves, so you don't have much of a problem putting those moves onto other Pokemon. Their ability to hold several HMs is still good but I don't think it is all that impressive. Many HMs also become redundant at some point, so I don't think the topic is all that big in Hoenn anyway, even if there are a total of 8 of them.

You are correct in stating that only route trainer Pokemon are less impressive the fewer trainers you fight. Because your actually good Pokemon need the EXP to beat the next gym leader.

 

[bdt2002]

I don't mean to interrupt any ongoing discussions that might be taking place here, but I did want to write a post going over my idea to look into how good (and bad) the different Types are in the different games, using the Bug-Type in Hoenn as my example for this post.



Unless I'm forgetting someone, I believe these are all of the fully-evolved Bug-Types in Hoenn that I would be willing to consider "early-game". For the sake of In-Game Tier Lists, there isn't really a consensus agreement on what counts as early, mid, and late-game respectively from what I can tell, especially for regions like Alola, the GameCube-exclusive Orre, or the Legends games which each have their own changes made to the standard Pokémon gameplay loop. Right away, this list of Pokémon does a pretty good job at illustrating one of the Bug-Type's major issues in the older generations- they just don't have that much offensive firepower to speak of. Between poor access to STAB moves on average- let's assume for the sake of casual play that you're probably not going to have access to Hidden Power Bug- and poor attacking stats, often times made actively worse by Bug being a physical Type prior to Gen 4 (sorry, Beautifly and company), most of these Pokémon will lack the access to the tools they need to develop into full-time members of your team. Either that, or they will start to regress relative to the game's power level far too quickly to consistently be useful. However, I would still argue that something like Volbeat is in fact the best "true Bug-Type" in the region, especially in the remakes on account of access to a buffed Tail Glow and reusable TMs for coverage. Let's compare Volbeat to what is Gen 3's highest-tiered Bug-Type in multiplayer out of the ones available for use in Hoenn, that being the UUBL resident Armaldo:



On paper, you would think Armaldo would be an easy pick for Hoenn's best Bug-Type. It comes a bit later than most of the others, sure, but it has a unique dual STAB typing, a decent movepool, and noticeably better stats than the other fully evolved Bug-Types. However, longtime Hoenn fans can tell you that in practice, this underrated UUBL multiplayer pick still has to tread through a slow Anorith phase before it reaches its full potential in single player, on top of its lack of access to a truly viable Bug-Type STAB for most of the game. Remember that oddly specific memory you probably had of Steven's Armaldo using X-Scissor? Yeah, turns out that this is also only in the remakes, and even if it wasn't, that still doesn't change the fact that in Gen 3 specifically, Anorith and Armaldo's only Bug-Type STAB move they have access to for the majority of the game is the far weaker and less reliable Fury Cutter, which- oops, my bad, isn't even available until after Anorith's natural evolution level. Its Rock-Type STAB, while not as bad, isn't that much better. Unless you decide to use the Rock Tomb TM, you don't get a Rock-Type STAB until Ancient Power at Level 37 since the Rock Slide move tutor is locked behind the postgame for some stupid reason. These movepool issues are better off in the remakes, sure, but even in ORAS where Anorith has better moves to use before it evolves, Rock/Bug just isn't a very good typing in Hoenn. You only resist Normal and Poison, only one of which has a major story battle opponent, and you're weak to Water, Steel, and other Rock-Types on defense, while on offense, two matchups that should be winnable in Flannery and Winona are made harder because of your secondary Bug typing.

Volbeat, which is a ZU tier Pokémon in Gen 3, I might add, does not have some of these issues. Bug has probably the worst overall Gym matchup spread in Hoenn (even the Psychic Gym is harder than you'd expect because of stuff like Solrock, Lunatone, and Xatu), but access to a viable STAB move earlier (or entirely) than other Bug-Types makes all the difference here. I'm not going to act like Volbeat is S Tier in Gen 3 or in Gen 6, far from it, but I think this is a great example of how a Pokémon can be good in single player and bad in multiplayer, and vice versa for Armaldo itself. Pokémon need access to different things to be good in different settings, and the Bug-Type in Hoenn, especially Gen 3, was just dealt such a bad hand to the point where Volbeat- not even Illumise, just Volbeat- being a legit contender for best Bug-Type in the game says a lot about how awful the Type really is.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

I don't mean to interrupt any ongoing discussions that might be taking place here, but I did want to write a post going over my idea to look into how good (and bad) the different Types are in the different games, using the Bug-Type in Hoenn as my example for this post.



Unless I'm forgetting someone, I believe these are all of the fully-evolved Bug-Types in Hoenn that I would be willing to consider "early-game". For the sake of In-Game Tier Lists, there isn't really a consensus agreement on what counts as early, mid, and late-game respectively from what I can tell, especially for regions like Alola, the GameCube-exclusive Orre, or the Legends games which each have their own changes made to the standard Pokémon gameplay loop. Right away, this list of Pokémon does a pretty good job at illustrating one of the Bug-Type's major issues in the older generations- they just don't have that much offensive firepower to speak of. Between poor access to STAB moves on average- let's assume for the sake of casual play that you're probably not going to have access to Hidden Power Bug- and poor attacking stats, often times made actively worse by Bug being a physical Type prior to Gen 4 (sorry, Beautifly and company), most of these Pokémon will lack the access to the tools they need to develop into full-time members of your team. Either that, or they will start to regress relative to the game's power level far too quickly to consistently be useful. However, I would still argue that something like Volbeat is in fact the best "true Bug-Type" in the region, especially in the remakes on account of access to a buffed Tail Glow and reusable TMs for coverage. Let's compare Volbeat to what is Gen 3's highest-tiered Bug-Type in multiplayer out of the ones available for use in Hoenn, that being the UUBL resident Armaldo:



On paper, you would think Armaldo would be an easy pick for Hoenn's best Bug-Type. It comes a bit later than most of the others, sure, but it has a unique dual STAB typing, a decent movepool, and noticeably better stats than the other fully evolved Bug-Types. However, longtime Hoenn fans can tell you that in practice, this underrated UUBL multiplayer pick still has to tread through a slow Anorith phase before it reaches its full potential in single player, on top of its lack of access to a truly viable Bug-Type STAB for most of the game. Remember that oddly specific memory you probably had of Steven's Armaldo using X-Scissor? Yeah, turns out that this is also only in the remakes, and even if it wasn't, that still doesn't change the fact that in Gen 3 specifically, Anorith and Armaldo's only Bug-Type STAB move they have access to for the majority of the game is the far weaker and less reliable Fury Cutter, which- oops, my bad, isn't even available until after Anorith's natural evolution level. Its Rock-Type STAB, while not as bad, isn't that much better. Unless you decide to use the Rock Tomb TM, you don't get a Rock-Type STAB until Ancient Power at Level 37 since the Rock Slide move tutor is locked behind the postgame for some stupid reason. These movepool issues are better off in the remakes, sure, but even in ORAS where Anorith has better moves to use before it evolves, Rock/Bug just isn't a very good typing in Hoenn. You only resist Normal and Poison, only one of which has a major story battle opponent, and you're weak to Water, Steel, and other Rock-Types on defense, while on offense, two matchups that should be winnable in Flannery and Winona are made harder because of your secondary Bug typing.

Volbeat, which is a ZU tier Pokémon in Gen 3, I might add, does not have some of these issues. Bug has probably the worst overall Gym matchup spread in Hoenn (even the Psychic Gym is harder than you'd expect because of stuff like Solrock, Lunatone, and Xatu), but access to a viable STAB move earlier (or entirely) than other Bug-Types makes all the difference here. I'm not going to act like Volbeat is S Tier in Gen 3 or in Gen 6, far from it, but I think this is a great example of how a Pokémon can be good in single player and bad in multiplayer, and vice versa for Armaldo itself. Pokémon need access to different things to be good in different settings, and the Bug-Type in Hoenn, especially Gen 3, was just dealt such a bad hand to the point where Volbeat- not even Illumise, just Volbeat- being a legit contender for best Bug-Type in the game says a lot about how awful the Type really is.

Bug was straight up an unviable offensive type before Gen 4.

I'd almost throw Grass in the mix too. These two were the poster children for Hidden Power STAB or bust.

 

[MoonlightRose]

Bug was straight up an unviable offensive type before Gen 4.

I'd almost throw Grass in the mix too. These two were the poster children for Hidden Power STAB or bust.

I feel like you could also throw Flying on non bird pokémon in there as well

 

[Merritt]

I don't mean to interrupt any ongoing discussions that might be taking place here, but I did want to write a post going over my idea to look into how good (and bad) the different Types are in the different games, using the Bug-Type in Hoenn as my example for this post.



Unless I'm forgetting someone, I believe these are all of the fully-evolved Bug-Types in Hoenn that I would be willing to consider "early-game". For the sake of In-Game Tier Lists, there isn't really a consensus agreement on what counts as early, mid, and late-game respectively from what I can tell, especially for regions like Alola, the GameCube-exclusive Orre, or the Legends games which each have their own changes made to the standard Pokémon gameplay loop. Right away, this list of Pokémon does a pretty good job at illustrating one of the Bug-Type's major issues in the older generations- they just don't have that much offensive firepower to speak of. Between poor access to STAB moves on average- let's assume for the sake of casual play that you're probably not going to have access to Hidden Power Bug- and poor attacking stats, often times made actively worse by Bug being a physical Type prior to Gen 4 (sorry, Beautifly and company), most of these Pokémon will lack the access to the tools they need to develop into full-time members of your team. Either that, or they will start to regress relative to the game's power level far too quickly to consistently be useful. However, I would still argue that something like Volbeat is in fact the best "true Bug-Type" in the region, especially in the remakes on account of access to a buffed Tail Glow and reusable TMs for coverage. Let's compare Volbeat to what is Gen 3's highest-tiered Bug-Type in multiplayer out of the ones available for use in Hoenn, that being the UUBL resident Armaldo:



On paper, you would think Armaldo would be an easy pick for Hoenn's best Bug-Type. It comes a bit later than most of the others, sure, but it has a unique dual STAB typing, a decent movepool, and noticeably better stats than the other fully evolved Bug-Types. However, longtime Hoenn fans can tell you that in practice, this underrated UUBL multiplayer pick still has to tread through a slow Anorith phase before it reaches its full potential in single player, on top of its lack of access to a truly viable Bug-Type STAB for most of the game. Remember that oddly specific memory you probably had of Steven's Armaldo using X-Scissor? Yeah, turns out that this is also only in the remakes, and even if it wasn't, that still doesn't change the fact that in Gen 3 specifically, Anorith and Armaldo's only Bug-Type STAB move they have access to for the majority of the game is the far weaker and less reliable Fury Cutter, which- oops, my bad, isn't even available until after Anorith's natural evolution level. Its Rock-Type STAB, while not as bad, isn't that much better. Unless you decide to use the Rock Tomb TM, you don't get a Rock-Type STAB until Ancient Power at Level 37 since the Rock Slide move tutor is locked behind the postgame for some stupid reason. These movepool issues are better off in the remakes, sure, but even in ORAS where Anorith has better moves to use before it evolves, Rock/Bug just isn't a very good typing in Hoenn. You only resist Normal and Poison, only one of which has a major story battle opponent, and you're weak to Water, Steel, and other Rock-Types on defense, while on offense, two matchups that should be winnable in Flannery and Winona are made harder because of your secondary Bug typing.

Volbeat, which is a ZU tier Pokémon in Gen 3, I might add, does not have some of these issues. Bug has probably the worst overall Gym matchup spread in Hoenn (even the Psychic Gym is harder than you'd expect because of stuff like Solrock, Lunatone, and Xatu), but access to a viable STAB move earlier (or entirely) than other Bug-Types makes all the difference here. I'm not going to act like Volbeat is S Tier in Gen 3 or in Gen 6, far from it, but I think this is a great example of how a Pokémon can be good in single player and bad in multiplayer, and vice versa for Armaldo itself. Pokémon need access to different things to be good in different settings, and the Bug-Type in Hoenn, especially Gen 3, was just dealt such a bad hand to the point where Volbeat- not even Illumise, just Volbeat- being a legit contender for best Bug-Type in the game says a lot about how awful the Type really is.

Honestly? If you really want to use a bug type in Gen 3 Hoenn then your best bet is to use Dustox (beats Brawly with ease, has sufficient earlygame stats when it evolves at 10 to be ok enough as a midground fighter) up until midgame. It's able to provide some work against Norman's Slaking specifically due to Protect and after that point it's done and gets to retire with honor.

I'd never claim it's particularly good but it's probably the best bet for earlygame, having a single extremely positive major battle matchup while the rest of the bugs are either only as good or mostly worse. Beautifly is better vs route trainers and can do some small damage to Roxanne but falls off just as hard while not having any niche vs Norman. Surskit is an incredibly frustrating 1% encounter who has to rely on 20 BP Bubble to do anything until Level 25 (meaning it doesn't even have a particularly good Roxanne fight despite Water STAB) and doesn't scale at all outside being an Intimidate support after evolution. Nincada takes ages to evolve due to its EXP group and terrible offense and Ninjask doesn't become particularly notable until endgame if you drag it there while Shedinja is a binary mon with a fantastic Wattson matchup and little else going for it in the earlygame (Shedinja for Brawly requires skipping him which means he's easy as sin), though Shedinja scales decently. Illumise is a garbage TM hog who does have Encore for later but no setup outside X items. Volbeat is also pretty bad, being close to dead weight against most fights and its only real claim to fame is the ability to utilize a decent Bug type move in Signal Beam, despite Bug as an offensive typing not being particularly valuable.

Once you hit midgame your options for bugs are pretty much three things. Try your luck with Anorith and struggle with its terrible movepool and extremely late evolution or, if you're willing to learn how to, RNG for a Hidden Power Bug with 65+ BP Anorith which will instantly make it fairly competent (not included in the tier list for obvious reasons). Option 2 and 3 are almost identical - grab a Safari Zone bug of your preference. Pinsir is the inferior choice but it's a capable enough STABless physical attacker, basically a pseudo Fighting-type that probably has Swords Dance for the endgame. Heracross meanwhile is able to hit very hard neutrally, has a good setup option with Bulk Up, and is just overall a good Pokemon with many positive matchups and little dead time. The main flaw with all three is that they don't really act like Bug-types due to lacking a STAB there (bar Heracross if you get it to 53 before fighting the league), but that's honestly the case for basically every bug in RSE Hoenn.

This isn't to say that you can't make pretty much any Pokemon work if you give it enough investment, there's plenty of stories and personal experiences of beating the games with "shitmons", but forcing Bug-types to act around their STAB is a mostly futile effort in Gen 3.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

I feel like you could also throw Flying on non bird pokémon in there as well

Aerial Ace is aggressively mid, but it gave non-bird mons some breathing room depending on the game. Especially since a lot of in-game trainers like Double Team.

If I were to classify all types based on whether or not they have reliable STAB, it'd be like this:

 

[Eeveeto]

New edition of forgotten Pokemon in Pokemon Crystal Nuzlockes.

What if Gligar participated in Pokemon Crystal Nuzlocke but appeared on Route 46 and learned Dig and EQ (by TMs)?

Even before having Toxic Orb + Poison Heal, Gliscor is a solid Pokemon in Nuzlockes by virtue of having great typing, good bulk, decent Speed and Atacking power, access to recovery move (Roost) and good movepool in general. Seriously, Gliscor can do anything, from being just a CB attacker, to being a wall, to just using SD + Agility + Baton Pass. Very good Pokemon and hard to take down, since in-game opponents won,t be using Hidden Power and you will see Water and Ice Moves telegraphed most of the time.

In Pokemon Emerald Gligar could have been a good Mon if it appeared before the post-game. Despite relying on TMs, it learns some very good ones and the physical bulk and interesting typing would have certainly helped it.

Then, we come to its original region... and see a complete disaster. Gligar only appears on Route 45, which can only be accessed after the 7th Gym. By then, you already have most of your team, so for a Pokemon to enter in, it needs to be really good. Skarmory is such Pokemon for example. You slap the Rest TM on it and the metal bird becomes unkillable, while doing decent damage with Fly (a useful for Nuzlocke runs move, since it helps in the PP Stall strategy). Skarmory is entirely justified to be used despite its late access, its one of the best Pokemon in the game.
Gligar has worse (but still good) typing than Skarmory and worse (but not by much) Stats as well. This could have been salvageable, if not for the final nail in the coffin. The complete absence of a movepool.

What. The. Hell. Is. This. You know that when your best level-up moves are non-STAB Slash and Guillotine you are in trouble, but hey, other Pokemon have bad level-up movepools too, we can use the EQ TM and the Fly HM, right?
Well, no. Gligar is the ONLY Ground Pokemon that doesn,t learn neither Dig nor Earthquake in GSC. They fixed this in Stadium by giving it EQ and in Gen 3 they gave him both Dig and EQ. In regards to the Flying STAB, Gligar only learns Wing Attack... as an Egg Move (so, not practical in a Nuzlocke and even in normal runs you need to breed it with a Scyther or a Yanma, both hard Pokemon to get). As a result, Gligar would be an F rank Mon if a Nuzlocke Tier lists were made for Pokemon Crystal.

Unlike with Sneasel or with Qwilfish, early availability (in route 46, which is close to Route 45, but can be accessed at the beginning of the game) wouldn,t save Gligar without a STAB, so in this case we need to go further and make it learn Dig and EQ. After all, its pretty logical for Gligar to be able to use both moves. Not adding Mud Slap to the mix, because weird as it is, Gligar has not been able to learn this move until Gen 9.

So, lets theorymon about how a run with early Gligar would go:

Vs Falkner: At level 9, Gligar just has Poison Sting and Sand Attack. This means that Falkner's Pidgey will hit harder than Gligar... but Gligar has more than double of Pidgey's bulk and will have a Berry too. Therefore its safe to assume that Gligar will be able to beat Pidgey and have some more health left. Pidgeotto is very unlikely to be beaten, however. Gligar will only be able to use Sand Attack once or twice before having to switch-out in order to avoid dying. D rank performance.
Vs Bugsy: Strategy here is to use Sand Attack to Metapod once or twice, then set-up 6 Hardens. At +6, just slowly sweep with Swift. However, Swift won,t OHKO (and probably won,t even 2HKO) Kakuna, meaning that it will have a chance to poison Gligar with Poison Sting, ruining our plan. Therefore, B rank perfomance, not reliable enough.
Vs Whitney: Headbutt (forgetting Swift at this point) Clefairy, hoping it won,t call Ice Beam with Metronome. After that, use Sand Attack on Miltank until Gligar is weak and switch out. Gligar has enough bulk to take 1 or even 2 Miltank's hit. D Rank performance, you are still not beating Miltank with Gligar.
Vs Morty: Vanilla Gligar would be useless here, but in this theorymon sesion we have Dig. Therefore Gastlys and Haunters are murdered. If both Gastly and first Haunter have been outsped (which is likely, Gligar has been gaining EVs up to this point and should be at level 25), Gligar will beat Gengar even if it doesn,t OHKO, as long as it has a Mint Berry. S rank performance.
Vs Chuck: Primeape has weak moves and its therefore easy to beat. Don,t even try beating Poliwrath with Gligar, though. C rank performance.
Vs Jasmine: Gligar obviously OHKOs both Magnemites, but even if Steelix is weak to Ground, its unlikely to be beaten by Gligar due to enormous bulk and Dig's weak (60) power. Gligar can still hit Steelix once or twice, wearing it down a little. The moment Steelix lands an Iron Tail or a Screech, though, you should switch your Water Mon in. B rank performance.
Vs Pryce: In theory, you can try beating Seel, but why risk your Gligar here? F rank perfomance.
Vs Claire: Even the Thunderbolt Dragonair probably wins vs Gligar with Dragon Breath doing solid damage. You could try stalling with Restalk here, but unlike Qwilfish, Gligar is not a good user of the strategy due to not having 2 spammable moves. F rank perfomance.
Vs Rival on Victory Road: Finally, Gligar has EQ and will be overlevelled for this battle. Gligar has the option to use the Return TM (only 2 Mons resist both EQ and Return, those being Skarm and Aerodactyl) and the Sludge Bomb TM in case the rival has Meganium. With this in mind, Gligar will likely sweep this battle. Sneasel has no Ice Moves, Golbat might confuse Gligar forcing it to switch-out, but it can return right on the same Golbat and finish it with a second Return. Haunter, Kadabra and Magneton will all be OHKOd by EQ. Typhlosion will fall to EQ too, Meganium will be beaten by Sludge Bomb and Feraligatr has Water Gun as only STAB. S rank performance.
Vs Will: Use Return vs the first Xatu. If Gligar outspeeds the bird and avoids Confuse Ray, it will win. However, that will be its only contribution in this battle. E rank performance.
Vs Koga: Gligar is strong enough to 2HKO Ariados with EQ. It can beat Venomoth too, but not directly switch-in. Muk is very likely to be beaten. Forretress is an Explosion danger, while Crobat is fast, bulky and has Double Team + Toxic. D rank performance.
Vs Bruno: Hitmontop, Onix and Hitmonlee are easily beaten. If you have a confusion healing Berry and Hitmonlee uses Swagger, you win vs everything. However, at +0, Gligar is probably the only Pokemon that can be threatened by Hitmonchan's Ice Punch and also will struggle to beat the bulky Machamp. B rank performance.
Vs Karen: Like Qwilfish, everything here is danger for Gligar. Umbreon has Mean Look + Sand Attack combo. Gengar is faster and has Destiny Bond. Vileplume hits hard with Petal Dance and is quite bulky. Both Murkrow and Houndoom are beatable one on one, but Gligar can,t directly switch into either and won,t beat both at the same time. E rank performance.
Vs Lance: Just don,t use Gligar here at all. F rank performance.

Vs Kanto Gym leaders not named Blue: Gligar starts its Kanto journey by sweeping Lt. Surge with EQ. Janine falls due to being underleveled, Erika is swept with EQ and Sludge Bomb, not hitting hard enough to threaten a Mint Berry Gligar. Vs Sabrina, Gligar will beat one Mon at most, they hit way too hard with Psychic. Misty is a no go, but both Brock and Blaine are swept. Overall, as good as an overleveled Mon in Kanto should perform. A rank performance.
Vs Blue: When not overleveled, Gligar goes back to being mediocre. It will win vs any Mon not named Gyarados one on one, but unlikely to kill more than one of them. Even Pidgeot is a threat with Mirror Move copying Return. To improve the match-up vs Pidgeot, Gligar can try using Guillotine vs it. Still, E rank performance.
Vs Red: Gligar murders Pikachu. After that, he can try fighting vs Espeon, Venusaur or Snorlax, but at best will defeat only one of them and can,t directly switch into neither of them except maybe Snorlax. Vs Snorlax, Gligar can try to fish with Guillotine. Gligar doesn,t need Sludge Bomb or Return in this match, meaning that it can use Sandstorm + Protect (and Leftovers as the item) to troll Venusaur's Solar Beam (full set for the game would be EQ, Protect, Sandstorm and Guillotine). Despite that, can,t give it more than D rank performance.


Unlike Sneasel or Qwilfish, even with the Ground moves now being learnable, early Gligar access doesn,t solve its core issues. The lack of Flying STAB or even Sword Dance, the bad special bulk and the extreme TM reliance (Swift, EQ, Sludge Bomb and Return) hinder its potential. It does decently vs some Johto Gyms, excelling vs Morty and Jasmine, but performs terribly vs Elite Four and the last 2 battles (Blue and Red). Only truly commited Nuzlockers will be able to hold this Mon alive to the end of the game, therefore from F rank I would only mark it E with an aearly availability + Ground Moves.
In terms of partners, Water Mons resist both weaknesses. Meganium (best starter in Nuzlockes) also lives Water Attacks and easily kills Water Mons, which matters vs Chuck's Poliwrath, Pryce and Claire. Take into account that with Gligar needing EQ, neither Meganium nor the other 2 Starters will have the move available, same goes for Dig.
Gligar will become better in Gen 4 when it gains evolution and an impressive movepool, but until then, it will be mediocre at best outside of some fan games (preferably in Gen 3).

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

New edition of forgotten Pokemon in Pokemon Crystal Nuzlockes.

What if Gligar participated in Pokemon Crystal Nuzlocke but appeared on Route 46 and learned Dig and EQ (by TMs)?

Even before having Toxic Orb + Poison Heal, Gliscor is a solid Pokemon in Nuzlockes by virtue of having great typing, good bulk, decent Speed and Atacking power, access to recovery move (Roost) and good movepool in general. Seriously, Gliscor can do anything, from being just a CB attacker, to being a wall, to just using SD + Agility + Baton Pass. Very good Pokemon and hard to take down, since in-game opponents won,t be using Hidden Power and you will see Water and Ice Moves telegraphed most of the time.

In Pokemon Emerald Gligar could have been a good Mon if it appeared before the post-game. Despite relying on TMs, it learns some very good ones and the physical bulk and interesting typing would have certainly helped it.

Then, we come to its original region... and see a complete disaster. Gligar only appears on Route 45, which can only be accessed after the 7th Gym. By then, you already have most of your team, so for a Pokemon to enter in, it needs to be really good. Skarmory is such Pokemon for example. You slap the Rest TM on it and the metal bird becomes unkillable, while doing decent damage with Fly (a useful for Nuzlocke runs move, since it helps in the PP Stall strategy). Skarmory is entirely justified to be used despite its late access, its one of the best Pokemon in the game.
Gligar has worse (but still good) typing than Skarmory and worse (but not by much) Stats as well. This could have been salvageable, if not for the final nail in the coffin. The complete absence of a movepool.

View attachment 618197

What. The. Hell. Is. This. You know that when your best level-up moves are non-STAB Slash and Guillotine you are in trouble, but hey, other Pokemon have bad level-up movepools too, we can use the EQ TM and the Fly HM, right?
Well, no. Gligar is the ONLY Ground Pokemon that doesn,t learn neither Dig nor Earthquake in GSC. They fixed this in Stadium by giving it EQ and in Gen 3 they gave him both Dig and EQ. In regards to the Flying STAB, Gligar only learns Wing Attack... as an Egg Move (so, not practical in a Nuzlocke and even in normal runs you need to breed it with a Scyther or a Yanma, both hard Pokemon to get). As a result, Gligar would be an F rank Mon if a Nuzlocke Tier lists were made for Pokemon Crystal.

Unlike with Sneasel or with Qwilfish, early availability (in route 46, which is close to Route 45, but can be accessed at the beginning of the game) wouldn,t save Gligar without a STAB, so in this case we need to go further and make it learn Dig and EQ. After all, its pretty logical for Gligar to be able to use both moves. Not adding Mud Slap to the mix, because weird as it is, Gligar has not been able to learn this move until Gen 9.

So, lets theorymon about how a run with early Gligar would go:

Vs Falkner: At level 9, Gligar just has Poison Sting and Sand Attack. This means that Falkner's Pidgey will hit harder than Gligar... but Gligar has more than double of Pidgey's bulk and will have a Berry too. Therefore its safe to assume that Gligar will be able to beat Pidgey and have some more health left. Pidgeotto is very unlikely to be beaten, however. Gligar will only be able to use Sand Attack once or twice before having to switch-out in order to avoid dying. D rank performance.
Vs Bugsy: Strategy here is to use Sand Attack to Metapod once or twice, then set-up 6 Hardens. At +6, just slowly sweep with Swift. However, Swift won,t OHKO (and probably won,t even 2HKO) Kakuna, meaning that it will have a chance to poison Gligar with Poison Sting, ruining our plan. Therefore, B rank perfomance, not reliable enough.
Vs Whitney: Headbutt (forgetting Swift at this point) Clefairy, hoping it won,t call Ice Beam with Metronome. After that, use Sand Attack on Miltank until Gligar is weak and switch out. Gligar has enough bulk to take 1 or even 2 Miltank's hit. D Rank performance, you are still not beating Miltank with Gligar.
Vs Morty: Vanilla Gligar would be useless here, but in this theorymon sesion we have Dig. Therefore Gastlys and Haunters are murdered. If both Gastly and first Haunter have been outsped (which is likely, Gligar has been gaining EVs up to this point and should be at level 25), Gligar will beat Gengar even if it doesn,t OHKO, as long as it has a Mint Berry. S rank performance.
Vs Chuck: Primeape has weak moves and its therefore easy to beat. Don,t even try beating Poliwrath with Gligar, though. C rank performance.
Vs Jasmine: Gligar obviously OHKOs both Magnemites, but even if Steelix is weak to Ground, its unlikely to be beaten by Gligar due to enormous bulk and Dig's weak (60) power. Gligar can still hit Steelix once or twice, wearing it down a little. The moment Steelix lands an Iron Tail or a Screech, though, you should switch your Water Mon in. B rank performance.
Vs Pryce: In theory, you can try beating Seel, but why risk your Gligar here? F rank perfomance.
Vs Claire: Even the Thunderbolt Dragonair probably wins vs Gligar with Dragon Breath doing solid damage. You could try stalling with Restalk here, but unlike Qwilfish, Gligar is not a good user of the strategy due to not having 2 spammable moves. F rank perfomance.
Vs Rival on Victory Road: Finally, Gligar has EQ and will be overlevelled for this battle. Gligar has the option to use the Return TM (only 2 Mons resist both EQ and Return, those being Skarm and Aerodactyl) and the Sludge Bomb TM in case the rival has Meganium. With this in mind, Gligar will likely sweep this battle. Sneasel has no Ice Moves, Golbat might confuse Gligar forcing it to switch-out, but it can return right on the same Golbat and finish it with a second Return. Haunter, Kadabra and Magneton will all be OHKOd by EQ. Typhlosion will fall to EQ too, Meganium will be beaten by Sludge Bomb and Feraligatr has Water Gun as only STAB. S rank performance.
Vs Will: Use Return vs the first Xatu. If Gligar outspeeds the bird and avoids Confuse Ray, it will win. However, that will be its only contribution in this battle. E rank performance.
Vs Koga: Gligar is strong enough to 2HKO Ariados with EQ. It can beat Venomoth too, but not directly switch-in. Muk is very likely to be beaten. Forretress is an Explosion danger, while Crobat is fast, bulky and has Double Team + Toxic. D rank performance.
Vs Bruno: Hitmontop, Onix and Hitmonlee are easily beaten. If you have a confusion healing Berry and Hitmonlee uses Swagger, you win vs everything. However, at +0, Gligar is probably the only Pokemon that can be threatened by Hitmonchan's Ice Punch and also will struggle to beat the bulky Machamp. B rank performance.
Vs Karen: Like Qwilfish, everything here is danger for Gligar. Umbreon has Mean Look + Sand Attack combo. Gengar is faster and has Destiny Bond. Vileplume hits hard with Petal Dance and is quite bulky. Both Murkrow and Houndoom are beatable one on one, but Gligar can,t directly switch into either and won,t beat both at the same time. E rank performance.
Vs Lance: Just don,t use Gligar here at all. F rank performance.

Vs Kanto Gym leaders not named Blue: Gligar starts its Kanto journey by sweeping Lt. Surge with EQ. Janine falls due to being underleveled, Erika is swept with EQ and Sludge Bomb, not hitting hard enough to threaten a Mint Berry Gligar. Vs Sabrina, Gligar will beat one Mon at most, they hit way too hard with Psychic. Misty is a no go, but both Brock and Blaine are swept. Overall, as good as an overleveled Mon in Kanto should perform. A rank performance.
Vs Blue: When not overleveled, Gligar goes back to being mediocre. It will win vs any Mon not named Gyarados one on one, but unlikely to kill more than one of them. Even Pidgeot is a threat with Mirror Move copying Return. To improve the match-up vs Pidgeot, Gligar can try using Guillotine vs it. Still, E rank performance.
Vs Red: Gligar murders Pikachu. After that, he can try fighting vs Espeon, Venusaur or Snorlax, but at best will defeat only one of them and can,t directly switch into neither of them except maybe Snorlax. Vs Snorlax, Gligar can try to fish with Guillotine. Gligar doesn,t need Sludge Bomb or Return in this match, meaning that it can use Sandstorm + Protect (and Leftovers as the item) to troll Venusaur's Solar Beam (full set for the game would be EQ, Protect, Sandstorm and Guillotine). Despite that, can,t give it more than D rank performance.


Unlike Sneasel or Qwilfish, even with the Ground moves now being learnable, early Gligar access doesn,t solve its core issues. The lack of Flying STAB or even Sword Dance, the bad special bulk and the extreme TM reliance (Swift, EQ, Sludge Bomb and Return) hinder its potential. It does decently vs some Johto Gyms, excelling vs Morty and Jasmine, but performs terribly vs Elite Four and the last 2 battles (Blue and Red). Only truly commited Nuzlockers will be able to hold this Mon alive to the end of the game, therefore from F rank I would only mark it E with an aearly availability + Ground Moves.
In terms of partners, Water Mons resist both weaknesses. Meganium (best starter in Nuzlockes) also lives Water Attacks and easily kills Water Mons, which matters vs Chuck's Poliwrath, Pryce and Claire. Take into account that with Gligar needing EQ, neither Meganium nor the other 2 Starters will have the move available, same goes for Dig.
Gligar will become better in Gen 4 when it gains evolution and an impressive movepool, but until then, it will be mediocre at best outside of some fan games (preferably in Gen 3).

I'm not sure how early you can get the Stadium 2 Gift mons, but assuming you can get it as early as Cherrygrove, there's a Lv. 5 EQ Gligar that you could use.

Now THIS little guy could make waves. Early EQ is just incredible, and having Wing Attack from the jump means a valuable STAB option without the need to gamble on Hidden Power.

That theorymon of yours could change a lot, and maybe you could even actually use it on a run.

 

[Just A Seaking]

I'm not sure how early you can get the Stadium 2 Gift mons, but assuming you can get it as early as Cherrygrove, there's a Lv. 5 EQ Gligar that you could use.

Mystery Gift is only unlocked once you reach Goldenrod, so you'd have to deal with a Level 5 Gligar going up against Whitney. Not the worst level deficit in the world, and the Falkner and Bugsy match-ups are pretty mediocre so it's not really a big loss to miss those, but you would have to go out of your way to train it.

Still, it's basically a completely different Pokemon once you give it an actual move and some real availability!

 

[doipy hooves]

Mystery Gift is only unlocked once you reach Goldenrod, so you'd have to deal with a Level 5 Gligar going up against Whitney. Not the worst level deficit in the world, and the Falkner and Bugsy match-ups are pretty mediocre so it's not really a big loss to miss those, but you would have to go out of your way to train it.

Still, it's basically a completely different Pokemon once you give it an actual move and some real availability!

You don't need Mystery Gift unlocked to redeem the Stadium 2 prizes since they get sent directly from Oak's lab. It's not like modern Mystery Gift where all the gifts need to be received from there.
The minimum requirement to use that is just having the Mystery Egg delivered/the point where you get Poke Balls which I just tested with a fresh Crystal save/100% Stadium 2 save.

 

[Just A Seaking]

You don't need Mystery Gift unlocked to redeem the Stadium 2 prizes since they get sent directly from Oak's lab. It's not like modern Mystery Gift where all the gifts need to be received from there.
The minimum requirement to use that is just having the Mystery Egg delivered/the point where you get Poke Balls which I just tested with a fresh Crystal save/100% Stadium 2 save.
View attachment 618485
View attachment 618486

My bad for the error, thanks for correcting me! In that case, EQ Gligar looks even more promising for in-game.

 

[Eeveeto]

I'm not sure how early you can get the Stadium 2 Gift mons, but assuming you can get it as early as Cherrygrove, there's a Lv. 5 EQ Gligar that you could use.

View attachment 618350

Now THIS little guy could make waves. Early EQ is just incredible, and having Wing Attack from the jump means a valuable STAB option without the need to gamble on Hidden Power.

That theorymon of yours could change a lot, and maybe you could even actually use it on a run.

Damn, this actually changes a lot. Falkner, Bugsy and Whitney (with Counter) are completely demolished, Jasmine now is fully swept, Bruno is swept easier, contribution vs Koga is bigger and performance in Kanto, Blue and Red improves too. This is what Gligar should have been from the beginning.

 

[pe5e]

Nincada takes ages to evolve due to its EXP group and terrible offense and Ninjask doesn't become particularly notable until endgame if you drag it there while Shedinja is a binary mon with a fantastic Wattson matchup and little else going for it in the earlygame (Shedinja for Brawly requires skipping him which means he's easy as sin), though Shedinja scales decently.

Is Shedinja's matchup against Wattson even good? I didn't even try to use it against him in my run, because early game gate keeper Magneton takes a ton of luck for Shedinja to overcome, when one self hit from Supersonic knocks it out and its best attacks at this point are Cut and Fury Cutter.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

Is Shedinja's matchup against Wattson even good? I didn't even try to use it against him in my run, because early game gate keeper Magneton takes a ton of luck for Shedinja to overcome, when one self hit from Supersonic knocks it out and its best attacks at this point are Cut and Fury Cutter.

Shedinja won't even have Mud-Slap by that point, let alone Dig. It looks like a mon that can buy you some time to heal up your other mons at best. Ain't no way Shedinja will get the ball rolling with Fury Cutter without getting paralyzed or knocked out by Supersonic, and get past both Magneton and Manectric.

 

[R_N]

Shedinja won't even have Mud-Slap by that point, let alone Dig. It looks like a mon that can buy you some time to heal up your other mons at best. Ain't no way Shedinja will get the ball rolling with Fury Cutter without getting paralyzed or knocked out by Supersonic, and get past both Magneton and Manectric.

it wont have mud slap thats odd isnt that a--level 31?!

 

[pe5e]

it wont have mud slap thats odd isnt that a--level 31?!

Yeah, some gen 3 level-up movepools are ... special.
But clearly Mud Slap is a powerhouse that you have to lock to higher levels. That is why it costs 24 BP in the Battle Frontier, right?

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

Yeah, some gen 3 level-up movepools are ... special.
But clearly Mud Slap is a powerhouse that you have to lock to higher levels. That is why it costs 24 BP in the Battle Frontier, right?

I'd guess somebody was still mad about Falkner's cheese starts in GSC.

 

[Geta92]

I just remembered something I considered a while back but then forgot about again. Did anyone try using event Pokémon for ingame-tiering purposes? A couple of smart people managed to set up custom servers to download event Pokémon by simply tweaking your DS settings and using mystery gift in Gen 4 and 5. While using some level 100 Arceus obviously would be a pretty boring thing to do, there do exist some event Pokémon with low levels. There are also some that are distributed by items, so you can catch them yourself so those would kind of even be covered by the more conventional tiering restrictions. Plus you could get your hands on some pretty useful items this way as well.

Some noteworthy examples on top of my head would be:

• Get a Lv. 50 Darkrai prior to gym #6 in Platinum with the Member Card.
• Get a Lv. 15 Victini prior to gym #3 in BW1 with the Liberty Pass.
• Get a Lv. 5 Mew prior to gym #1 in HG/SS.
• Get a Lv. 30 shiny Suicune, Entei or Raikou prior to gym #1 in HG/SS and control it past gym #4.
• Get a Lv. 15 Genesect prior to gym #1 in BW2.
• Get a Lv. 15 Keldeo prior to gym #1 in BW2.