Type Effectiveness

[Alola]

Alola everyone! Regarding Sun & Moon, do you think Generation 7 will implement any new type effectiveness? In Gen 6, Steel lost resistances to the Dark and Ghost types. Then we were given the new Fairy type to throw into the mix.

Are there any nerfs/buffs you would like to see?

This thread can be for both speculation and discussion once the games actually come out.

For example, I think Ice types should at least resist Water if not be super effective to it.

 

[Velvet]

I'd personally like to see a boost in Fairy, Ice and Steel types.

Make Dragon weak to Steel too; cause you know, the hero uses the sword against the dragon and all that. Ice should definitely be either resist water or have immunity since Ice is frozen water. I'd also like to see it be strong over poison too, as Steel being strong over poison as well.

 

[Arceus the Dragon]

I want Dragon to be super effective on Grass, Fire, Water and Electric since it can already resists them.

 

[techitisJ]

I totally agree on ice need to resist water, I remember first learning that ice wasn't immune to water. That was completely garbage. It would be nice if it could be super effective against water types too, but that is praying.

 

[Velvet]

I want Dragon to be super effective on Grass, Fire, Water and Electric since it can already resists them.

I do not think thats a good idea, think that would make Dragon Types a wee too OP. But maybe strong against Dark types?

 

[GiraFragMich]

Ice being SE on Water doesn't really make sense. Even less having an immunity, how can something be immune to anything that is its literal substance? Have you ever poured cold water over ice cubes in a sink? They melt.

Ice & Water should be purely neutral to each other in every way. Ice can freeze Water and Water can melt Ice. So what I'd do is remove Water's resistance to Ice and make Ice resistant to Flying and Ground. That is all there needs to be done IMO.

 

[Tente]

Ice should be super effective on water, I think

Ice could also resist Fairy

Bug should be normal effective on Fairy and Ghost

 

[Memo326]

I don't know about specific type matchups, but I'd like for Ice (and maybe Grass) to be buffed a bit defensively.

 

[Esserise]

Bug didn't need to be resisted by Fairy, get out of here with that mess.

 

[Kevzo8]

I really want to see changes in type matchup this gen to balance the chart. I hope to see improvement for Ice type most of all.

I think the biggest blunder they did last gen was when they had the chance to balance everything upon introducing new type, but they didn't do justice for ice type they should have made it resistant to fairy and some of the type it's super effective against, like grass, ground or flying.. Can grass penetrate ice? Can ground have power when it's covered by ice? Can flying still fly when they're freezing? They did well on improving dark, ghost, steel and poison, and balancing dragon type. I really hope they reconsider.

I'd personally like to see a boost in Fairy, Ice and Steel types.

Make Dragon weak to Steel too; cause you know, the hero uses the sword against the dragon and all that. Ice should definitely be either resist water or have immunity since Ice is frozen water. I'd also like to see it be strong over poison too, as Steel being strong over poison as well.

Steel is already powerful defensively; good offense is good defense, they say. Super effective on rock, ice and fairy is enough, it already has a lot of resistance and an immunity. It's just that we don't see rock and ice that much that's why it looks like their offensive side aren't that much used.

I want Dragon to be super effective on Grass, Fire, Water and Electric since it can already resists them.

Dragon is already powerful enough.. We don't want another weakness for grass please.

Bug didn't need to be resisted by Fairy, get out of here with that mess.

I agree.. When bug is already weak type, they weakened it more :/

 

[DoctorWhy]

I'd really appreciate if Dark types got a slight buff. I feel like the Ghost type outclasses Dark in most respects and does the same jobs.

-Ghost and Dark are both SE against Ghost and Psychic only. So, similar offensive purpose.
-Dark has 3 weaknesses, whereas Ghost only has 2 (and one is itself, so it can counter itself, so I wouldn't count it as much)
-Dark has 1 immunity, Ghost has 2 (which are more common)
-Ghosts can escape battlefield traps iirc


Also, I think Fairy needs a nerf.

-Fairy should only resist Dragon, rather than be immune
-gain one weakness


Finally, I think Grass's weakness to Poison should be removed, and given to Water. So:

-delete Poison's SE against Grass, have Poison simply resist Grass
-make Poison SE against Water instead (as I have asked since I started Pokemon pretty much)

It balances Grass and Water, two starter types, a lot more. Would also be a nice and needed boost for Poison types to then be 4x against Water/Fairy monsters.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

Dark is already arguably the best offensive type in the game, no buff pl0x

 

[DoctorWhy]

Dark is already arguably the best offensive type in the game, no buff pl0x

Care to elaborate? I find it hard to see Dark as the best offensive type when it is only SE against 2 types (which Ghost already covers, which means Dark isn't really exclusive in that sense). Especially in the case of pure dark type Pokemon. And the only notable moves I can think of (that can't be easily replaced by a move of another type) are Knock Off and Sucker Punch.

I see Dark as being somewhat (slightly) similar to Ice, in a sense. Like Ice, it's moves are much better than the type itself (and often used on Pokemon who don't possess the type) and many Pokemon of the type.

I would think that Fighting is probably the best offensive type in the game. SE against 5 types and has some of the best moves.

 

[Soki]

Like a lot of other people, I just want Ice and Grass to become better. I don't have the knowledge to actually be able to say what should happen to achieve that, but just give me something to fix them.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

Care to elaborate? I find it hard to see Dark as the best offensive type when it is only SE against 2 types (which Ghost already covers, which means Dark isn't really exclusive in that sense). Especially in the case of pure dark type Pokemon. And the only notable moves I can think of (that can't be easily replaced by a move of another type) are Knock Off and Sucker Punch.

I see Dark as being somewhat (slightly) similar to Ice, in a sense. Like Ice, it's moves are much better than the type itself (and often used on Pokemon who don't possess the type) and many Pokemon of the type.

I would think that Fighting is probably the best offensive type in the game. SE against 5 types and has some of the best moves.

This isn't really in dispute lol, Dark is easily top 3 offensive types if not literally the best offensive type in the game. This is a common consensus among competitive players - I'm going to assume that you might not be familiar with the Smogon/Pokemon showdown community? In that case I can certainly explain for reference exactly why this is true:

Point 1: SE coverage doesn't matter at all compared to neutral coverage - there's a reason that Dragon was the indisputably best offensive type in Gen IV and V, even tho it only hits itself super effectively. Only 3 things resist dark - dark itself, Fairy, and Fighting. Since you compared dark with ghost, it is relevant to point out that while only Dark resists Ghost, Normal is completely immune to it, making Ghost type attacks easy to walk even if the attacker has boosted their SpA - especially since typically the only way a Ghost has to hit a Normal type such as Chansey is either the extremely unreliable Focus Blast or the extremely weak HP Fighting. On top of all of this, most of the best Fighting types (such as Keldeo and Mega Lopunny) and Fairy types (such as Mega Gardevoir and Mega Diancie) have low physical Defense, meaning that even a resisted hit can do big damage to them.

Point 2: Dark moves have high base power and useful effects, meaning that it is GREAT to have STAB on them. You said the only notable dark moves you could think of were Knock Off and Sucker Punch... But getting STAB on those two moves ALONE would probably put Dark into the top 5 offensive types. That's not even considering Pursuit. Knock Off and Pursuit are both easily top 10 moves in the entire game, alongside titans like Scald, Stealth Rock, and Thunder Wave; and Sucker Punch is not far off from that mark. A 100% accurate 97.5 base power attack, such as Knock Off, is just a good move by any standards - it's stronger than Thunderbolt/Flamethrower/Ice Beam, for instance. On top of that, unlike Earthquake (a move with similar base power), NOTHING is immune to Knock Off AND Knock Off has one of the MOST broken effects in the game - depriving the opponent of their held item. This means that you have to be hesitant to switch even strong physical walls or resists like Fairy/Fighting types in on an offensive Dark type - even if the attack does not do much damage, that Pokemon is irreparably crippled for the rest of the match, just as if it had gotten paralyzed or burned (barring certain exceptions such as Megas).

Point 3: While it's true what you said about many other Pokemon running Dark type moves, nothing could ever usurp the niche that dark types have. Bisharp is literally one of the best Pokemon in the game thanks to its absurd Knock Off and Sucker Punch. Choice Band Tyranitar and Weavile are titans of OU thanks to their ridiculous STAB Pursuits that can do so much damage that they put an opponent in a Catch-22 were they faint whether they stay in OR switch out. Crawdaunt is unparalleled as a wallbreaker because even the things that CAN survive it's Adaptability boosted Knock Off take massive damage and are crippled due to item loss, meaning that either Crawdaunt itself can pick them off with Aqua Jet or one of Crawdaunt's teammates can simply clean up the remnants of the opponent's team.

Point 4: Dark types have ample opportunity to switch in and set up. Unlike Ghost types (weak to Dark and Ghost, extremely common offensive types, and usually have low defenses) Dark types are weak to Fighting (limited to just STAB users and things that pack either Superpower for Heatran or the unreliable Focus Blast), Fairy (uncommon outside of Gardevoir, Diancie, and Clefable), and Bug (uncommon outside of the weak and usually not STAB U-Turn). It is easy to prevent your Dark types from being OHKOed, as it is easy to scout for coverage moves like Focus Blast and Superpower and the other two weaknesses (Bug and Fairy) are essentially non-existent as coverage moves and thus can easily be avoided by simply not staying in with a dark type on a fairy or bug type Pokemon. On top of having easy to avoid weaknesses, dark has solid resistances in Ghost and Dark, and an immunity to Psychic. This makes it easy to set up Swords Dances on things like Landorus Choiced into Knock Off, Raikou Choiced into Shadow Ball, Latios Choiced into Psyshock, walls that depend on Foul Play to deal damage, Pokemon like Mew who might be running only Knock Off in way of damaging move, etc. On top of all of this resistance stuff, Dark types tend to have good secondary types such as Water, Steel, Ghost, and Rock, and they have good abilities that allow them further opportunities to switch in - Bisharp's Defiant lets it come in on Defog for a FREE swords dance, tyranitar's Sand Stream boosts its own special defense, Mega Sableye's Magic Bounce allows it to switch in on status moves with impunity. They also have good coverage moves to power through "resists" once they set up - no Fairy or Fighting type Pokemon wants to eat a +2 Bisharp Iron Head or a Life Orb Crawdaunt Crabhammer. And if we start talking about a +2 Crawdaunt Crabhammer (which is a very real possibility against more stall-y teams that give Crawdaunt a chance to work its magic), then no Fairy, Dark, or Fightinf type in the WORLD is eating that (unless they have Water Absorb, but who uses Poliwrath in OU? Lmao)

Point 5: Dark Pokemon are GOOD. This is less to do with the type itself inherently, and more to do with distribution. If every Ice Pokemon had a similar star distribution and secondary type to Weavile, Kyurem-Black, or Mamoswine, then it's doubtful that anybody would complain at all about Ice being underpowered. The problem is mainly that Ice gets assigned to Pokemon that synergize with it shittily. Nobody is going to use Avalugg as a physical wall if it's weak to Fire, Fighting, and Rock, and nobody wants a Rapid Spinner weak to Stealth Rock. But a fast, powerful Pokemon like Weavile that can OHKO opponents before they can respond? A wallbreaker such as Mega Abomasnow that can blow through teams with powerful Blizzards whenever it gets to come in for free? Yes please. THESE are the sorts of things Ice types are lacking - good users of their moves. Dark, on the other hand, gets some of the best Pokemon in the game all to itself - like i mentioned before: Bisharp, TTar, Mega Sableye, Crawdaunt, Weavile. Even if you believe that Dark is underpowered in a vacuum, if you just consider the attributes inherent to the typing itself, you can't reasonably give the typing a buff because that means that you're also DIRECTLY BUFFING some of the best Pokemon in the game, who certainly don't need any further buffing.

 

[Lufenium]

Grass now resists Rock.
Ice is immune to Water. Scald is now super effective against Ice types.
Ghost & Fairy no longer resist Bug type moves.

 

[PkmnTrainerV]

Allow Dragon to hit something else super effectively.. please.

And have ice resist dragon. Scald now deals super effective damage to Ice, and resisted damage to fire.

Make fire type super effective against fairy.

 

[GhostLucario]

I'd remove Fairy's resistance to Bug and Fire's resistance to Fairy.
Make Ice resist Water and remove Water's Ice resistance.
And I'd make Ghost super effective on Fairy.

 

[DoctorWhy]

@UB-01 Kenobi

Okay, well detailed and fair argument on their offensive capabilities, but how about pure Dark type Pokemon? You mention several great Pokemon that possess the Dark type, but not a single one was a pure Dark type. Pure Dark types seem practically useless, then? Which could signal an issue in the type (or possibly, the stats given to pure Dark types being usually mediocre). In addition, would most of those dual-typed Pokemon not be better off without the Dark type? Several of the ones you mentioned possess a 4x weakness to Fighting, one of the most common and strong offensive types, and with a 4x weakness, a Dark/(weak to Fighting) type can be OHKO'd by a non-STAB Fighting move.

Like, for instance, take Tyranitar. Would it not be better off without the Dark type? Really? Or take any other dual typed Dark (especially ones with a 4x weakness) Pokemon, and take away the Dark type. Do they suffer? Or become stronger because of it?

I see what you mean by them having a couple moves with some of the highest utility in the game (Knock Off and Sucker Punch are total beasts, but they'd be just as useful if not more useful if relegated to a different type. It's not the TYPE that makes them strong, necessarily; it's their effects), and I understand that Dark is resisted by very few types (Fairy, Fighting, and Dark itself), and SE/Immune against Psychic, which is great. But even here there's a huge advantage for Ghost--While Ghost does not affect Normal types, nothing else resists Ghost besides Dark. Therefore, Ghost hits more types than Dark does, and has immunities to two of the more common types. As long as a Normal or Dark type isn't the opponent, Ghost (as a type, on its own) is better offensively before considering stats. Huge difference between the stats of a Pokemon being good and their type itself being their strength.

Take Dragon--without good stats, it's practically useless.

But hey, maybe the mix of stats and type is so closely bound that it doesn't matter. And I do understand that a Dark buff could make certain Dark types (dual typed) overpowered. So I guess it's more of a complaint about how many (mainly pure) Dark types are given meager stats and their type doesn't make them any better.

I understand we likely fundamentally disagree.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

The issue is that you seem to have some misconceptions about quantifying "goodness" based on numbers of weaknesses/resistances/etc.

Fighting is NOT one of the most common/good types simply because there aren't that many really good fighting types. MMedi, Keldeo, Mlopunny. The occasional MHeracross or Terrakion, but only once in a blue moon. What do all these Pokemon have in common? They're frail to the point that +2 Sucker Punch is doing upwards of 50% (or slow enough that you get to click Iron Head, in MHeracross's case). This means that Fighting types do NOT pose a significant challenge to Dark as an offensive type.

On the other hand, Ghost lacks powerful moves (the best Ghost move is only 80 base power, and the best offensive Ghost type in the game (Gengar) can't even use Nasty Plot to boost its power). On top of that, imagine a Calm Mind Mega Sableye. It has +6 SpA, and it has Calm Mind, Will-o-Wisp, Recover, and one attack move. If it has Dark Pulse, well, the opponent's team is done. They lose, right there. If it has Shadow Ball? The opponent has an easy answer if they have Chansey, Mega Lopunny, Diggersby, etc because the only amount of damage that the Sableye can even do is 12% per turn with Burn. This shows why Ghost is less reliable as an offensive type.

Next, you keep mentioning things like weaknesses to Fighting or how Ghost has immunities. These are only tangentially relevant to the fact that dark is the best offensive type in the game. I have specified since my first post in this thread that I was discussing Dark as an offensive type. Resistances and immunities matter only to the extent that they afford setup opportunities, and Dark gets plenty of those. Ghost types generally care more about taking neutral hits because their defenses tend to be lower, and many of them simply don't have set up moves at all (again, see Gengar).

Finally, the idea that Bisharp or TTar would be better without the Dark type is laughable. They quite literally would not be used* if they lacked the Dark type. The dark type is what let's them do important things like drag Lati@s through the trash, punch holes through teams with ridiculous Knock Offs and Crunches, and snipe weakened Fighting types with STAB Sucker Punches. There is a reason Bisharp and Crawdaunt weren't seen in Overused until XY came along and buffed Dark types - they became good BECAUSE they are are Dark, not IN SPITE of it.

*ok maybe ttar would be used but just because it has pseudo-legend level stats

EDIT: and in terms of pure dark types... There just aren't very many of them? There's not a problem with them when their stats are geared right. Mega Absol is really good, for instance, it's just plagued by the extremely high opportunity cost that comes with the Mega slot, which is why it is stuck in UU. Other pure dark types, such as Umbreon, lack the necessary stat and move distribution - too slow, too weak, no Sucker Punch, stuff like that. Again, Dark is the best OFFENSIVE type, not necessarily defensive. It's middle of the road in that regard