What is your opinion on critical hits?

[Sweet Serenity]

Critical hit, a random event that occurs in Pokémon battles that multiply the damage by 1.5 and ignores stat changes. Do you think they are useful occurrences or do you think that they are just too luck-based and screw you over during the wrong time? To be honest, I kind of feel both ways about them. If you take a look at the image below, you would learn that the result of this crazy battle happened solely because of a critical hit:

Spoiler:

If you look at the Poké Balls on the bottom, that means that literally all of our Pokémon were knocked out in this battle. That's just how crazy it was! Nevertheless, If he didn't land that critical hit when he did, I would have won. Yet, I can't really complain about critical hits! They helped me win just the same. They're also pretty fun in regular playthroughs as well, especially when combined with the affection/friendship features.

What is your opinion on critical hits?

 

[Squirtkipfan01]

Critical hits are something i really dont think about in any game, let alone in pokemon. Just kinda something I acknowledge exists. Making you have to get 3 in a battle for a sir fetchd is stupid though

 

[Devalue]

Appreciates critical hits. Adds some randomness to battles. Always likes a dose of random for variety. Provides an out against massive defense boosts or attack drops too. Helps the AI a bit. (Values anti-critical abilities like Shell Armor on certain Pokemon for this reason.)

Prefers the weaker Generation 6+ criticals, despite that. Should affect battles, but rarely determine them.

Admits hating criticals when catching Pokemon sometimes. Requires playing around them or accepting the risk of knocking something out.

 

[Sweet Serenity]

Admits hating criticals when catching Pokemon sometimes. Requires playing around them or accepting the risk of knocking something out.

That's why I never go out catching without False Swipe!

 

[Duck]

They're not really something I consider that often, so I guess I'm lukewarm on them?

Sirfetch'd evolution was frustrating though since even by stacking the odds as much as you can outside of doubles, it takes on average 14 turns to a battle to be able to evolve it unless you're level 55, managed to grind TRs (probably at a high Max Raid level or via Cram-o-Matic) or got the Farfetch'd by breeding. It's just frustrating.

 

[Sweet Serenity]

They're not really something I consider that often, so I guess I'm lukewarm on them?

Sirfetch'd evolution was frustrating though since even by stacking the odds as much as you can outside of doubles, it takes on average 14 turns to a battle to be able to evolve it unless you're level 55, managed to grind TRs (probably at a high Max Raid level or via Cram-o-Matic) or got the Farfetch'd by breeding. It's just frustrating.

I agree. Those convoluted evolution methods are just very frustrating. However, what I did to evolve my Farfetch'd was let it hold a Leak, maxed its Friendship, taught it Leaf Blade, and let it use it three times in a trainer battle. When you equip a Leak to a Pokémon with max Friendship and have it use a high critical hit move, it would literally land critical hits 100% of the time.

 

[Duck]

I agree. Those convoluted evolution methods are just very frustrating. However, what I did to evolve my Farfetch'd was let it hold a Leak, maxed its Friendship, taught it Leaf Blade, and let it use it three times in a trainer battle. When you equip a Leak to a Pokémon with max Friendship and have it use a high critical hit move, it would literally land critical hits 100% of the time.

The Leek was what I meant by stacking the odds.

I forgot Friendship increased critical hit ratio in later games, mostly because I don't really do camping / Pokemon Amie but that's my point really, both maxing Friendship or teaching a hit critical ratio move (you don't need both iirc, Leek increases by +2 so either should force a crit) are either still luck dependent or very much grindey in a way that's annoying and detracting to the experience if you don't already want to do something (like going on Max Raids or doing the friendship minigames).

 

[Corveone]

I don't like battle mechanics that depend too much on luck, which is why I hate and never use things like Confuse Ray, Attract, Minimize, the Freeze status, or Abilities like Moody.

Definitely didn't like Crits in Gen 1-5, they happened too often for my taste, and the damage boost was too big. Lowering the base critical chance and nerfing it to 1.5 was a great decision.

I wouldn't mind if the base Crit ratio was flat 0% and Crits could only happen at +1 onwards. Of course don't remove the whole mechanic because there are some moves, Abilities, items, etc. that play and allow some strategies around crits.

 

[ReKoil]

They're just there for me.
They can be fun when they help you knock something out fast but compared to the amount of times the opponent crits me gone instead that rarely happens =P

 

[Sheep]

Honestly, I appreciate them too, like some others. I know they're not exactly the most fun thing to exist when you lose (especially in competitive) due to an unlucky streak with taking crits, but they make battles less same-y - something that I feel would get boring fast with its predictability. I see the appeal in no randomness in battle though, but as someone who doesn't battle competitive, it is more good than bad. I like not knowing fully how each battle will go.

 

[soulzzii]

i gotta admit, critical hits was something i dint really mind until i played some QoL hacks like Radical Red/Emerald Kaizo, even on XY where i had some pokemon to land more critical hits due to high affection (Sylveon + Lucario) but i have to say, as much as its more luck based, it helps a lot! cant coutn how many gyms on rr i won due to landing a critical hit lmfao

 

[Amore]

Critical hits are something i really dont think about in any game, let alone in pokemon. Just kinda something I acknowledge exists. Making you have to get 3 in a battle for a sir fetchd is stupid though

They're not really something I consider that often, so I guess I'm lukewarm on them?

Sirfetch'd evolution was frustrating though since even by stacking the odds as much as you can outside of doubles, it takes on average 14 turns to a battle to be able to evolve it unless you're level 55, managed to grind TRs (probably at a high Max Raid level or via Cram-o-Matic) or got the Farfetch'd by breeding. It's just frustrating.

I agree. Those convoluted evolution methods are just very frustrating. However, what I did to evolve my Farfetch'd was let it hold a Leak, maxed its Friendship, taught it Leaf Blade, and let it use it three times in a trainer battle. When you equip a Leak to a Pokémon with max Friendship and have it use a high critical hit move, it would literally land critical hits 100% of the time.

Just a heads up that if Farfetch'd holds the Leek, any move with an increased critical hit ratio is guaranteed to be critical. Like Leaf Blade :)

 

[Squirtkipfan01]

Genuinely useful info, but still a stupid requirement

 

[PageEmp]

That time in my nuzrun of Glazed where I lost my Ekans from full health to a crit, the very battle before he'd evolve.

I just really wanted to try out mons I have yet to use and Glazed just has a beyond abysmal variety of mons so there's that.

 

[Amore]

Genuinely useful info, but still a stupid requirement

Agree to disagree :) but I'm biased, I absolutely love Sirfetch'd because I was watching A Knight's Tale when it was revealed, so I have a ferocious duck named Sir Ulrich!

I don't want it to become too common though - if we're going to add more and more random evolution methods I want like 5/100 new Pokémon max, the rest need simpler ones like item + trade, trade, or evolution stone. Sneasel and Gligar's Gen IV evos were nice and simple. Would have happily had Sirfetch'd just have to hold the leak at a certain time (it would be reasonably limiting due to SwSh setting the story at specific times of day)

 

[Sweet Serenity]

That time in my nuzrun of Glazed where I lost my Ekans from full health to a crit, the very battle before he'd evolve.

I just really wanted to try out mons I have yet to use and Glazed just has a beyond abysmal variety of mons so there's that.

Nuzlockes definitely sound like your favorite way to play. I'd bet being a victim of a critical hit is a nuzlocker's worst nightmare.

 

[edyedy]

The recent generation's addition of Affection and it increasing the rate of critical chances has definitely broken my lategame experience, because I'd always see my Pokemon crit and a heart pop up and all that affection stuff, and it kinda makes me steamroll the endgame battles.

 

[Sweet Serenity]

The recent generation's addition of Affection and it increasing the rate of critical chances has definitely broken my lategame experience, because I'd always see my Pokemon crit and a heart pop up and all that affection stuff, and it kinda makes me steamroll the endgame battles.

Personally I love that feature for that very reason. It adds such as great, cute, game-changing, and adorable dynamic to a playthrough.

 

[Corveone]

The recent generation's addition of Affection and it increasing the rate of critical chances has definitely broken my lategame experience, because I'd always see my Pokemon crit and a heart pop up and all that affection stuff, and it kinda makes me steamroll the endgame battles.

Yeah, Affection bonusses basically ended up ruining my first Sun playthrough. I started avoiding that mechanic entirely since then.

 

[colours]

shrugs

they're fun when they happen... to people i'm facing, not so much to me! but that's kind of what it is in jrpgs these days, right? there's always that little element of luck that can make or break a game and i've kind of accepted that as a normal part of rpg battles, so my opinion has largely been neutral towards them.