What Pokemon would you like to see get buffed?

[Mr.Fiend]

I'd like to see the majority of NU and UU Pokémon be on par with Mega Evolved Pokémon in terms of base stats, abilities, and moves even though the Alolan Forms were a step in the right direction to some degree. Mega Evolutions were already bad enough in Gen 6 but then Nintendo / Game Freak had to add more power creep to competitive battles with Ultra Beasts in Gen 7. At least the meta in Gen 4 was relatively balanced until we got Dream World Ability Pokémon in Gen 5 which didn't last long.

This is an extremely unrealistic expectation and you will have nobody to blame but yourself when it doesn't happen. On a side note, i wouldn't mind seeing farfetch'd getting some extra speed, like maybe 20+.

 

[Pokemon Fan]

Personally I think it unlikely that any pokemon intended to be "gimmicks" like Unown will get buffs. They aren't meant to be useful in battle.

That said, I am super in favor of the type chart getting some more adjustments, especially for Bug and Ice types. Gen 7 tried to help Ice types by giving them Aurora Veil, and while that is a nice move it ended up meaning that pretty much only Alolan Ninetales benefited from it (as its the most reliable user of the move and people aren't likely going to use multiple Ice types on a team when the have so little defensive capability and so many weaknesses).

And of course, nerfing Stealth Rock would help things a ton. It makes no sense to have that one move make life so hard for various type combinations when every other entry hazard in the game has a set damage regardless of the target's type (provided it can do damage of course).

As for stat buffs, I'd like to see Rapidash get some, like 10 points added to its Attack and Speed stats. Another that comes to mind would be a similar buff for Tauros. Anything to make them more noteworthy than they currently are.

Moving around stats that pokemon don't need or use to ones they would benefit from would be nice too. This would mainly be for pokemon whose "good" stats are still so average that the stats devoted to their below average stats are nothing but a waste. Regular Ninetales for instance has no use for its 76 Attack base when none of its other stats go beyond 100.

 

[Sceptile Leaf Blade]

Ice and Bug do need a bit of a buff on the type chart indeed. I'd say Bug needs an offensive buff, like lose the resistance of Fairies or Ghosts, and Ice just needs an additional resistance, like Ghost.

Stealth Rock isn't that broken in the official formats I think, in the 3v3 singles and 4v4 doubles formats it's usually just not worth sacrificing a moveslot and a turn setting it up for a little bit of chip damage. It's just the 6v6 singles battles which are so switch-into-a-counter-and-predict heavy that kind of makes it broken, pokémon usually switch in and out several times in those battles, while in the official formats they usually switch in once or twice. If players have six pokémon in a team, they almost always have a pokémon in there that counters whatever the enemy has out and is a safe switch to try and get the advantage, and the switch is usually worth it. With fewer pokémon in a team that changes and switches are far less frequent.

You also see that happening in the 3v3v3v3 Royals formats. With only three pokémon in a team and three enemy pokémon on the field at once a 'safe switch' is far from a common thing. Manually switching isn't really something you do much in Royals. You can still switch, but mostly with Volt Switch or U-Turn. A pokémon like Tapu Koko or Manectric can use a fast Volt Switch to get quick damage and potentially a kill in and then hop to a defensive pokémon (like Alolan Muk or Incineroar) to take other hits for that turn. Incineroar has a slow U-Turn that doesn't do a lot of damage but does bring in a frailer fast sweeper (like Mega Manectric) in relatively safely because Incineroar has plenty of bulk. Stealth Rock is useful to slow down those kinds of VoltTurn teams, and Stealth Rock affects every enemy team with only a single setup turn, but you still don't see it too often in the Royals because switching without such moves is so risky.

 

[Pokemon Fan]

My point is that when used its a lot more than "chip damage" for anything 4x weak to Rock. It just seems unfair for a pokemon to lose half its health simply by switching in just because its 4x weak to Rock, especially when no other weakness combinations have to deal with anything like this. I'd prefer the damage mechanics worked like Spikes.

 

[Zaide]

My point is that when used its a lot more than "chip damage" for anything 4x weak to Rock. It just seems unfair for a pokemon to lose half its health simply by switching in just because its 4x weak to Rock, especially when no other weakness combinations have to deal with anything like this. I'd prefer the damage mechanics worked like Spikes.

My solution would be to make it (stealth rocks only) last 3-4 turns. So if you use it on turn 2, they would deal damage when your opponent switches on turns 3, 4 and 5 (and 6 if 4 turns). It won't make it obsolete, but at least, you won't always need a spinner/defogger if you have Charizard, Moltres, Articuno, Ho-oh, Volcarona, etc.

 

[Erron Black]

For me it's mostly my favorites that I feel could use more to actually be usable in competitive and have worth to teams, if I had to choose 5 from each gen I'd go with these Pokemon:

Gen 1:

1. Dewgong
2. Sandslash(Both forms)
3. Arbok
4. Lapras
5. Rapidash

Gen 2:

1. Meganium
2. Girafarig
3. Lanturn
4. Granbull
5. Donphan

Gen 3:

1. Zangoose
2. Banette(and it's Mega)
3. Tropius
4. Sceptile
5. Kecleon

Gen 4:

1. Lumineon
2. Torterra
3. Leafeon
4. Skuntank
5. Drapion

Gen 5:

1. Cinccino
2. Beheeyem
3. Reuniclus
4. Swoobat
5. Golurk

Gen 6:

1. Slurpuff
2. Chesnaught
3. Pangoro
4. Clawitzer
5. Goodra

Gen 7:

1. Komala
2. Bewear
3. Palossand
4. Ribombee
5. Lycanroc

 

[shoz999]

More like an Mega Evolution. Empoleon. You know why? Sceptile's original form looks like a badass physical attacker and yet it's Sp. Atk is higher. It made no sense until they gave it a mega evolution with a Leaf Storm nuke at the back of it's tail. Empoleon is similar, it has a higher Sp. Atk and high Sp. Def and looks like a physical attacker. Needs a mega evolution to justify it's special attack. Empoleon just does not look like a Special Attacker to me, looks like a freaking torpedo if anything.

 

[RileyXY1]

I'm pretty sure that some Pokemon will receive stat buffs in these games. The last two new gen games (XY & SM) both gave some Pokemon stat buffs.

 

[Ignition]

More like an Mega Evolution. Empoleon. You know why? Sceptile's original form looks like a badass physical attacker and yet it's Sp. Atk is higher. It made no sense until they gave it a mega evolution with a Leaf Storm nuke at the back of it's tail. Empoleon is similar, it has a higher Sp. Atk and high Sp. Def and looks like a physical attacker. Needs a mega evolution to justify it's special attack. Empoleon just does not look like a Special Attacker to me, looks like a freaking torpedo if anything.

I thought they were going to have all 3 Hoenn starters be physical attackers to contrast all 3 Kanto starters being special attackers (Mega Charizard X who?)

 

[shoz999]

I thought they were going to have all 3 Hoenn starters be physical attackers to contrast all 3 Kanto starters being special attackers (Mega Charizard X who?)

Sceptile's a Special Attacker with a lot of Physical moves.

 

[Ignition]

Sceptile's a Special Attacker with a lot of Physical moves.

Exactly. That’s what I was hoping for

 

[shoz999]

Exactly. That’s what I was hoping for

Yeah but it's high special attack is still quite a surprise and makes people wonder how it works considering it's often depicted in both the anime and Adventures manga as a physical attacker who uses Leaf Blade a lot. The closest I ever seen showing how Sceptile uses it's special attack before ORAS came out with Mega Evolution is in Pokemon Adventures Emerald Chapter where Sceptile's yellow nodules on his back blasts Frenzy Plant like a barrage of missiles which is somewhat similar to ORAS's Mega Evolution I suppose where Mega Sceptile makes some sense out of the high special attack.

 

[Lucario At Service]

Yeah but it's high special attack is still quite a surprise and makes people wonder how it works considering it's often depicted in both the anime and Adventures manga as a physical attacker who uses Leaf Blade a lot.

I guess the problem is the Physical/Special Split that happened during 4th Gen.

Before that all Grass types attacks were Special, so Sceptile never had a problem, and the creators could depict it using its special energy to physically damage the opponent. But after the split, while the core concept remained the implication changed.

 

[pokedigijedi]

If they aren't going to give them evolutions, I'd like to see Pokemon such as Farfetch'd, Dunsparce, and Komala get stats boost, any kind of stat boost would help them

 

[KKS-Lapras]

There's a solution to the "this Pokemon looks like a Physical attacker", or "this Pokemon has a lot of Physical moves", but has a higher Special Attack stat. Every Pokemon should have more then one set of base stats.

 

[Poke Trainer J]

This is an extremely unrealistic expectation and you will have nobody to blame but yourself when it doesn't happen. On a side note, i wouldn't mind seeing farfetch'd getting some extra speed, like maybe 20+.

Pokémon was originally designed with the casual player in mind where as Nintendo / Game Freak never expected competitive battling to become as mainstream with Wi-Fi Battles at least until Online Simulators ended up replacing them. The more the main series titles continue to progress the harder it is to continue keeping up with the video game franchise. They can only add so many new Pokémon to the National Pokédex before it becomes almost impossible to "catch 'em all".

 

[shoz999]

Pokémon was originally designed with the casual player in mind where as Nintendo / Game Freak never expected competitive battling to become as mainstream with Wi-Fi Battles at least until Online Simulators ended up replacing them. The more the main series titles continue to progress the harder it is to continue keeping up with the video game franchise. They can only add so many new Pokémon to the National Pokédex before it becomes almost impossible to "catch 'em all".

Most devs don't really consider the competitive "meta" in the early days or even creating it.

As an old quote I can't recall where says...
"A competitive meta isn't made. It's discovered." something GameFreak understands and Blizzard... clearly doesn't...

 

[Nodame]

Aromatisse.A pretty design like her deserves some boost.

 

[Poke Trainer J]

Most devs don't really consider the competitive "meta" in the early days or even creating it.

As an old quote I can't recall where says...
"A competitive meta isn't made. It's discovered." something GameFreak understands and Blizzard... clearly doesn't...

If that's the case then why does Nintendo / Game Freak always take the "one step forward, two steps back" approach by removing features in the main series titles that actually benefit more to competitive players than it does to casual players (or vice versa) with each new release? Stuff like getting rid of auto Lv. 100 flat battles from Gen 4, discontinuing Super Training in Gen 7, or have Pokémon follow you around like in HGSS and Let's Go.

Let's Go, Pikachu! / Eevee! is obviously a litmus test to see what features will be in store for us in Gen 8 such as catching wild Pokémon to gain Exp. instead of having to battle them like in Pokémon GO or multiplayer co-op in Story Mode that I can get behind. Part of the reason why they remove these features in the first place is because they feel as though the region isn't able to support it or there's simply not enough memory on the 3DS to support it as opposed to the Switch.

 

[shoz999]

If that's the case then why does Nintendo / Game Freak always take the "one step forward, two steps back" approach by removing features in the main series titles that actually benefit more to competitive players than it does to casual players (or vice versa) with each new release? Stuff like getting rid of auto Lv. 100 flat battles from Gen 4, discontinuing Super Training in Gen 7, or have Pokémon follow you around like in HGSS and Let's Go.

Let's Go, Pikachu! / Eevee! is obviously a litmus test to see what features will be in store for us in Gen 8 such as catching wild Pokémon to gain Exp. instead of having to battle them like in Pokémon GO or multiplayer co-op in Story Mode that I can get behind. Part of the reason why they remove these features in the first place is because they feel as though the region isn't able to support it or there's simply not enough memory on the 3DS to support it as opposed to the Switch.

Because at that point they care about the competitive scene that is slowly being discovered by fans like you and me, slowly balancing certain things to make sure things aren't too OP but not necessarily all Pokemon based on what the fans discover. Your confusing with balancing the discovered meta with trying to attempt, and usually results in failure which is what's happening to Overwatch, trying to change and control the meta. It doesn't take a genius to see that each Pokemon were given love and care individually without the competitive scene in mind, such as Mega Kanghaskhan and Talonflame which clearly has specific playstyles even before the Gen 6 competitive scene was discovered and by then were "discovered" to be extremely OP and were balanced by Gen 7.