Gimmicks That Make Pokemon Worse

Happy Friday!! Go to tryfum.com/JPR and use code JPR to get a discount off your order today!

Bro I saw the thumbnail and was hoping jpr uploaded a SpongeBob video out of nowhere "Why The First 3 Seasons Of SpongeBob is better than Pokemon"

It really shows how valuable and useful some items are when a select few Mega's have to weigh their options between one or the other. Boy am I glad that there aren't any Pokemon that get to have a Mega boost and a free item slot. That would be pretty broken. We would have to make a new tier for them.

As a VGC player, hearing that Tera Poison is considered a bad Tera type is insane to me. It’s considered one of the best defensive Tera types right now, with it being a common defensive types on the likes of Roaring Moon, Urshifu, Rillaboom, and even some Kingambit sets. In fact, the 2023 world champion won using a live orb Tera poison Chien Pao set.

No way this man just advertised a vape

Mega Alakazam is by no means a downgrade to regular Zam. Base 150 Speed is among the fastest in the game, and base 175 Sp. Atk is also among the highest in the game. Mega Alakazam can still take plenty advantage of Magic Guard to avoid entry hazard damage switching in, and Trace allows it to do funny stuff vs guys like Heatran, Magearna, and Tornadus-T. Save it for when the opposing team is weakened and you've got quite the potent late-game cleaner. In Gen 6 OU, Mega Alakazam is ranked A+ in viability (9th overall) compared to base Alakazam's C+ (75th overall). In Gen 7, the Mega is once again ranked A+ in OU (also 9th overall), while the base form isn't even ranked in OU. Then Gen 8 gave it Nasty Plot and now Mega Zam is banned in all Nat Dex formats. Similar story with Latios actually. In Gen 6 the Mega is far less useful than the base form, but Gen 7 onward the Mega is actually preferred due to its better defenses and mixed-attacker potential. Mega Latios is ranked A in Gen 7 OU (25th overall), while base Latios is nowhere to be seen. The unofficial Nat Dex formats play out similarly, with the Mega being ranked somewhere while the base form remains absent

The BIGGEST issue with mega garchomp is that you're only allowed to mega evolve one pokemon per battle. So if you're going to do it you want to do it to a pokemon that only benefits from it. Mega evolving a pokemon for a trade off is a waste of opportunity cost.

I see Tera poison somewhat commonly because it makes you immune to toxic/poison status along with the some decent resist

Well Alakazam was UU while mega zam stayed uber two generations in a row so I'm not sure what you are getting at. 175 spatk + 150 speed, case closed

Another pokemon that can run tera poison well in my opinion is Hydreigon. Not only does it lose its weakness to fairy and turn in intona Resistance but levitate makes it immune to ground which poison is normally weak too. And you might ohko some slower psychic type because tera also keeps the STAB of the original pokemon and hydreigon was a dark type.

That thumbnail is killing me wtf😂😂 But also, the “worst” tera type tends to change a lot depending on what’s popular in the meta. Because in VGC, we’re forced to deal with the wrath of Flutter Mane, Poison became really common for a while. Dragon was pretty bad at first, but now it’s almost as common as Fairy because of Ogerpon.

Im honestly surprised he didn't mention Blaziken. Mega Blaziken is largely outclassed by normal Blaziken since it gains speed boost...while already having speed boost. It gains more speed when it already does that with speed boost. Life orb Blaziken also outclasses Mega Blaziken in terms of damage(I think) so Mega Blaziken is just a downgrade from Hidden Ability Blaziken

I’m still bitter we got worse Garchomp instead of Flygon getting thrown a bone.

Few things to add 1.) Mega Alakazam never saw much use in Gen 6, but it got a ton of indirect buffs in Gen 7. It's huge speed stat now activated immediately, so it could start threatening "fast" offensive pokemon like Weavile immediately. Then trace became a lot more useful because of stuff like Beast Boost, Soul Heart and Swift Swim from Swampert becoming more common. Alakazam was maybe the only offensive mega with a good match up into Mega Swampert, pretty notable. Lastly, Psychic Terrain made is figuratively impossible to wall and literally impossible to knock out with priority. Teams with Alakazam and Tapu Lele were everywhere and there was never an easy way to stop them. Imo it was one of the better megas of the gen. 2.) Diancie never gets to play in VGC because of its mythical status, but it seriously got so little out of dynamax. Its main thing is spamming strong Diamond Storms, an amazing spread move, but when Dynamax'd it just becomes an average rock type. 3.) Poison Tera has recently caught on with a lot of Calm Mind sweepers like Cresselia in OU and Sinistcha in UU because it gives toxic immunity while not opening themselves to wallbreakers who spam Close Combat. It's niche but nowhere near Tera Psychic. 4.) As is the norm for Gen 9, Tyranitar is the biggest loser when it comes to tera. A lot of people expected Tyranitar to love tera because that typing has so many weakness, but terastalizing leads to it being hurt by its own sand. Not only that, but Ttar's typing was a double edged sword. Because of Spdef buff in sand, Ttar has long been one of the best answers to ghosts, fire and a lot of other general special threats and now you just have to throw that in the trash. It really can't take part in the defining feature of Gen 9 which sucks

7:54 aight there’s some apple slander is here so imma clear some things up 1) gmax sweetness does not heal any hp, it only heals status conditions, so it’s a lot more niche 2) gmax tartness is the only max move that can lower evasiveness which is a unique effect which can be used in tandem with flapple’s hustle, which sacrifices some of its accuracy for power. The issue with flapple is that it isn’t that good cuz of stats and typing, not that it’s gmax was worse

I love what you've been doing with the new thumbnails! The old ones were more uniform, but I appreciate a fresh new take every now and then.

8:06 you are wrong, or more accurately somewhat right but not for the reason you think. bug is trash offensively but defensively it is actually okay. resisting both ground and fighting (the best offensive types) at once is a very valuable defensive trait. the reason why it is not such great choice defensively is because the flying-type is usually better since it offers an immunity to ground instead of a resistance. bug has the defensive niche over the flying type of not being hit super effectively by volt switch and not being weak to ice (an other excellent offensive type). its fire weakness does not come in place thaaaat often.

Trace might not always be better than Magic Guard, but Mega Alakazam's increased Speed and Special Attack are nothing to sneeze at. And Trace is really useful at times, e.g., copying Flash Fire from Fire-type Pokémon. Fun Fact: the Mega was banned from National Dex OU thanks to, among other things, Alakazam's newfound access to Nasty Plot and the absence of Pursuit.

Love how Alakazam's yellow matches Spongebob

Mega alakazam was better than regular in both gen 6 and 7, at least in smogon singles