It Can/Can't Learn This Move?!

[Hashimi]

Can't learn...
Tauros: Counter
Heracross: X-Scissor and Dual Chop
Walrein: Freeze-Dry
Emboar: Drain Punch - I guess this move makes more sense on Happiny and Togekiss(?)
Excadrill: Stone Edge
Goodra: Giga Drain or Mega Drain - it can learn absorb but not the two upgraded stages of the move.
Dragapult: Shadow Claw
Zamazenta: Body Press - Zamazenta's movepool downright sucks, especially for fighting type. This one particularly makes so much no sense it isn't even funny. The developers must really love Zacian and really hate Zamazenta.
Also... To get facade in Pokémon Scarlet and Violet you need Komala's materials, even though the Pokémon is not suited at all for this move.

 

[Sweet Serenity]

Crobat can learn "Brave Bird" when it's not even a bird? What's going on here?! 😮

 

[Duck]

Fair. Points to the phrase "to sink like a rock", on the other hand. Seems very hard to stay afloat as a giant, slow-moving rock beast.

Notes Rhydon to be less dense than one might expect, however. Weighs 264.6 pounds (120 kilograms) at 6 feet, 3 inches (1.9 meters) tall. Somehow only gained 11 pounds from Rhyhorn, despite nearly doubling in height. Might explain why Rhydon can swim and not Rhyhorn. (Has nothing for Aggron, though. Weighs triple what Rhydon does with only a small increase in height.)

I mean, rocks sink because both because they're heavy but also because they're not sentient. Both Rhyperior and Aggron are less dense than whales under any reasonable estimate of volume and whales obviously can swim just fine.

If I had to guess, Rhyhorn wouldn't be able to swim more due to anatomical problems. Stubby, not very flexible legs don't seem very conductive for swimming, while Rhydon has arms and bigger legs.

(Also, physics are out the window. Wailord is less dense than air, unless it's explicitly attempting to counteract that it should float off into upper atmosphere and starve / become Rayquaza food.)

Crobat can learn "Brave Bird" when it's not even a bird? What's going on here?! 😮

What is and isn't a bird (or a fish for that matter) is actually historically very cultural.

The Bible calls bats birds and one of the fathers of modern biology, Linneus himself only classified bats as not birds in the late 18th century. Heck, in the UK 🐞 are called "ladybirds" to this day. I'm pretty sure there are some medieval bestiaries that call bees birds too.

A plausible enough Wattsonian perspective is just "if it flies it's a bird" (although I will note that the Crobat line is the only one that can learn Brave Bird without being a bird under modern sensibilities.)

(Sidenote but my favorite "fish" is the beaver, whose fishness was lobbied by the Catholic church)

 

[Rock_Salazar]

Many pokemon in gen 2 could not learn sludge bomb despite being poison, like Nidoking. Thankfully that was changed in gen 3.
I get that spore is a powerful move only learnable by a select few, but why not make it available to pokemon like Vileplume, Victreebel, or Venusaur as an egg move or tutor? They have spore-like moves.

Nidoking/queen can also learn surf, so that's another set of pokemon to add to the list of learnable surf users.

 

[Sweet Serenity]

I get that spore is a powerful move only learnable by a select few, but why not make it available to pokemon like Vileplume, Victreebel, or Venusaur as an egg move or tutor? They have spore-like moves.

I think that the move Spore is only exclusive to mushroom Pokémon rather than plant or flower Pokémon.

 

[Duck]

I think that the move Spore is only exclusive to mushroom Pokémon rather than plant or flower Pokémon.

It is, and its Japanese name is explicitly "Mushroom's Spore" (キノコのほうし - kinoko no houshi), so yeah, I wouldn't expect a non mushroom Pokémon (that doesn't have some kind of special out like Smeargle or Mew or something like that) to get it anytime soon.

Effect Spore, which is an ability that some plant Pokemon (Vileplume, Gossifleur and Edelgoss) can get, is just "Spore" (ほうし - houshi) in Japanese.

 

[Adam Levine]

Guess which of these Pokémon could, at one point, learn Frost Breath.

The fish with lips, or the dragon whose Scarlet dex entry literally states it "blasts cryogenic air out from its mouth"?