5th Gen A physical Unova?

[Ho-Oh]

WARNING: NUMBERS TL;DR.

Okay so I was checking up on something and I noticed that Unova had a lot of strong physical types. I decided to go through and actually count how many of those specialised in physical attacks, those who specialised in special attacks and those that were mixed although those figures weren't included (final evolutions and no-evolutions only).

I checked only the released Pokemon, and my numbers might be a little off (so just approximate figures in case I missed one or two basically), but there were 39 physical attackers and 26 special attackers. From this I still figured there was something missing, Unova can't really have 26 strong special attackers can it? Nope. It doesn't. I went through and checked for each Pokemon classified as special and each classified as physical by that search, working out how many have a base stat of at least 100 for the attacking type they specialise in. My discoveries were pretty on-par with what I thought. 31 physical attackers had a base stat for attack of over 100, while only 17 special attackers had a base stat of over 100 for what they specialised in.

In other words, both physical and special had at least eight attackers that were not really that strong on either side. But the fact that the difference of the "good" attackers versus the bad is so much higher just interests me. Also to compare this to Sinnoh, rough estimates = that there are around 30 physical which were first found in Sinnoh, and 24 special. What makes this different to Unova is that for physical attackers, only around 18 had a base stat for attack of at least 100, and only about 15 had a base stat of at least 100 for attack in terms of special attackers. Not only does this mean that there's an nine number difference between the physical attackers, but there's only a two number difference for special attackers between the two regions. And to complicate things even more, the difference between base stat over 100 Sinnoh Pokemon? 12, while for Unova? Eight.

**********Skip the above if you don't feel like reading the statistics*****************

SO TO FINALLY EXPLAIN, Unova has a lot more physical attackers than Sinnoh. The number of physical attackers with at least 100 in base stat for attack is pretty much more than the number of physical attackers as a whole native to Sinnoh. Interesting right?

So why do you think Unova has concentrated so heavily on physical attackers? Do you feel this is attributed to the typings, or the fact that you generally associate "physical" with humans (I do at least in regards to fighting and such), and the fact that there's just... so many of them in Unova? And why do you think Unova's Pokemon are so much stronger in what they specialise in (mostly physically), compared to Sinnoh's? Discuss!

I hope I didn't bore anyone to sleep. ;x

 

[Yoshikko]

I don't think it was really deliberate. I don't think they thought 'oh let's make Unova more physical than special', that doesn't even matter lol, because defense and special defense balances it out. I really don't think there is any more to this than just coincidence. Really lol.

 

[The Author]

Like Yoshikkko said, I don't think it was deliberate.

However, Sinnoh was a very legend-based region. You may notice, the more "epic" moves are usually special attack moves, such as Judgement, Roar of Time, etc. I think Game Freak knew that trying to top Gen IV on the legendary scale would just lead them down the same path of Yu-Gi-Oh. It gets to a point where if you try to make things too "epic" or "legendary" you end up going overboard.

Thus, Gen V was a lot less mythical. With less legendariness (that's a word, hopefully), Game Freak naturally designed more physical moves for the Unova Pokémon.

Just my thought. ;)

 

[MoreThanLuck]

Maybe they wanted to balance out all the special sweepers from previous generations. I always felt there were way more. And also look at the special attackers. This gen we were given the strongest non-legendary special attacker - Chandelure.

 

[Dragonmage]

I've noticed that they are doing what World of Warcraft is doing. The stats and numbers get bigger, and bigger. You know, for a bigger sense of accomplishment. However, eventually, they are going to have to do a number squish before this gets out of hand,

 

[bwburke94]

Don't forget, there's Haxorus on the physical side, with that massive Attack and trollish Speed.

 

[Archer]

I've noticed that they are doing what World of Warcraft is doing. The stats and numbers get bigger, and bigger. You know, for a bigger sense of accomplishment. However, eventually, they are going to have to do a number squish before this gets out of hand,

Yep. It's called a power creep and for a series that has been progressing this long, it's a very dangerous thing. They're going to have to think about how they handle the next generation because more and more pokemon are left behind in the wake. While it's also in an-game problem, you only have to look at the changes in tiers from generation to generation. Snorlax struggled in late gen 4 and now it's not viable at all in OU, for the most part. Thanks to even harder-hitting special sweepers and a plethora of brutal Fighting-types. It's not the only long-time OU that's suffered. Zapdos, Swampert, Flygon, Machamp, etc. Machamp is rather ironic, because it basically embodies what has overtaken the current gen.

I honestly believe that the "Physical" thing is mostly due to this power creep. In the past, more important Pokemon were predominantly Special (with a few obvious exceptions). With the creep of standard pokemon (non-dragon/legendary) you have the likes of Conkeldurr, Darmanitan pushing the power of the physical side up. Then you have other semi-legends, such as Terrakion and Landorus that probably would have been special in previous generations - they're sporting stupidly good offensive stats.

It's also a typing thing. As noted by others, Fighting is incredibly common in this generation. Water types have drastically reduced in population. This has been the case for a lot of types (shifting more-so than normal), so when you consider that these types are usually linked to a particular side of the stat spectrum, it's not surprise the stats have taken a similar turn.

Just some food for through. :cer_nod:

 

[Vodoun]

I've noticed that Pokémon are predominantly Offensively oriented, with Defensive stats on the back-burner... I'd definatly like to see a delicate balance of Stat allocation - with special attention payed to the viability of Mixed Attackers, as well as the very rarely observed Physically Defensive Special Attackers or Specially Defensive Physical attackers.

The meta-game shift that I'm looking for is too far reaching of a project to be undertaken by Game Freak; I'd like to see it be viable that Pokémon invest in a balanced mix of EV allocations, and the viability of chance based moves improved (by essentially slowing down combat / steering it away from being totally 0-2 HKO oriented) so that players can effectively manage risk & reward, even in the presence of extreme chances, a lot of which may be accomplished by removing the complete emphasis towards Offensively oriented Pokémon; which of course is a tricky balancing act when considering the worth of the Speed stat, and the utility based Moves/Abilities in the game.

Overall, I think there's a lot more room for creativity, and I am looking forward to free user-made projects in the future, which may emerge as a totally revised and improved-upon version of the Pokémon game that we've all come to love so much.

 

[XFeralTSDX]

You may notice, the more "epic" moves are usually special attack moves, such as Judgement, Roar of Time, etc. I think Game Freak knew that trying to top Gen IV on the legendary scale would just lead them down the same path of Yu-Gi-Oh. It gets to a point where if you try to make things too "epic" or "legendary" you end up going overboard.

What's that supposed to mean!? D:< Lol. I'm just kidding. I play the Yugioh card game and I usually use some decks with interesting cards that aren't so "legendary or epic" but forget that--this is a Pokemon discussion.

I kinda find it interesting that they decided to base Unova off America and ALSO have it use a lot of Physical attackers...probably just a coincidence.
Thanks to this forum, I'm gonna add a new Physical attacker to my WiFi Team! =P

 

[Comerion]

Meh, I didn't really notice it. However I didn't like the way that there were so many strong pokemon in gen 5, I think the tiers were messed up on smogon.

 

[Keras]

When I played through both Pearl and Platinum (for what seems like ages ago now), I actually felt that there were too many trio type legendaries. After the 2nd set of trios, I just put catching them on my back burner. I'm actually relieved BW gave us a good amount of non-legendaries. Gen IV was somewhat a bust for me (save the GEN II remakes and a certain few Pokemon.)

 

[Mr Cat Dog]

Ooh, I love reading stuff like this! It's an almost-scientific analysis of Pokemon which, saying out loud makes me sound all kinds of ridiculous. In any event, while I agree that it is probably coincidence and not some grand conspiracy on the part of Game Freak, I still find this really interesting. As Archer mentions above, the predominance of Fighting critters and dearth of Water ones probably had a lot to do with it.

I'm more of a Special-abuser, so I do hope that Gen VI does something to rectify this, despite my previously mentioned fascination with the journalistic way you've uncovered this 'scoop', Nica!

 

[Blade_of_darkness]

I'm glad that I'm not the only one who thinks that Unova has more physical attackers than special attackers.

I did have a really tough time finding myself a reliable special sweeper in Unova without having to rely on the Dream World. There has to be a balance for both of them; if a region is more physically inclined with regards to its Pokémon's attacks, a bulky physical wall can pretty much stop whatever offense the opponent has dead in its tracks without a special sweeper. The same can be said if a region is specially inclined.

I'm hoping the the second installment fixes this issue as well.

 

[Kyogia]

I think that it just "happened" and they weren't paying attention. Maybe it's due to the typings and because there just are.
That's what I believe. I haven't noticed this before, though; nice catch!

 

[vaporeon7]

I don't think it was really deliberate. I don't think they thought 'oh let's make Unova more physical than special', that doesn't even matter lol, because defense and special defense balances it out. I really don't think there is any more to this than just coincidence. Really lol.

I have to agree with Yoshikkko here. I think Game Freak were just filling in some of the gaps in typing and what not and they just happened to be more physical than special.
Totally overanalysed this Nica.

 

[OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire]

This always bothered me as a Special user...Unova's pokemon are too physically strong but annoyingly weak defensively...
I think GF was going for Physical glass cannons this gen... or maybe it's frigid brilliance and they are saying American (Unova) Pokemon have a different fighting style than their Japanese (KJHS) counterparts, perfering raw power over balance.