Altairis

take me ☆ take you

Female
database database
Seen December 29th, 2022
Posted October 5th, 2018
5,170 posts
10.9 Years
It really depends on what role the Pokemon is going to play. For example, Armaldo can be a Swift Swim sweeper and it would be beneficial to max out its Speed, or it could be more of a defensive wall and maxing its Speed wouldn't be a good idea. It isn't so much the stat itself.

ORAS/XYBW

Zeffy

g'day

Male
Seen December 1st, 2022
Posted January 30th, 2021
6,395 posts
14.1 Years
The rule of thumb is to invest in the most prominent stat of the Pokemon, unless circumstances say otherwise (ie mixed sets). It all boils down into what you want your Pokemon to achieve. Generally you'd want your attackers to have max EVs in attack/special attack and speed, whilst defensive Pokemon have max HP and max defense/special defense. Never invest in every stat because you think it's better: it's actually not.

There are special cases, like when you want to achieve a certain KO or outspeed a certain 'mon. This Smogon article helps immensely when you're not very familiar with EVs and EV training. Though the name implies 4th gen, the practice still applies since there hasn't been any changes with how EVs and stats are handled anyway.

Anti

return of the king

Non-binary
Kobe's Reality
Seen March 6th, 2022
Posted January 17th, 2022
10,818 posts
15.8 Years
Well, Chansey has base 5 Defense and still gets a Bold nature and max investment, so I guess we're looking at base 1 as too low to EV train?

Anyway it's more about if any stats are so low that it makes a poke as a whole unusable, along with external factors like typing movepool etc. EV training is all about getting and avoiding certain KOs and outspeeding certain mons, and if that means investing in Mega Mawile's Speed, then that's what I'm going to do.
Why are the beautiful sick and divided like myself?