Types you always have in your in-game team?

[zoroarctic]

To go along with the "types you never use" thread.

I'm always sure to carry a fire-type with me. It's a very good offensive type, and it includes many of my favorite Pokemon. I like to have a psychic and/or dark Pokemon in my team if there are any in the region that appeal to me. And of course, I keep water and flying-types for HM purposes.

Prior to Gen VI, I would have an ice-type because of the near certainty of encountering a dragon user late in the game.

 

[Bolt Strike]

I almost never go without a Fighting or Ground type because they're the only types SE against Normal and Electric respectively (which they should really fix at some point, those types are way overused). Other than that, I usually use an Electric type and a Flying type.

 

[GhostFingers]

flying and water for HMs. Fighting for working well against a lot of types and Ghost because it's my favourite. Trouble is in most games it takes ages before you can find where ghosts live.

Wait... were ghosts un-live.

 

[CynthiaLover]

For me, Fire is a necessity. It's one of my favorite types, and, more often than not, my Starter is a Fire type. It's also so powerful and the Pokemon are generally fast-moving (bar ones like Torkoal and Magcargo), so it works well for me.

Water should be a big, fat duh, due to the constant need for Mons to use Surf and such outside of battle. While I think Water should be toned down a bit, it's still a regularly-used type for me.

Fighting has also been a very common type I use. While Gens I and II were a bit lackluster there (with some exceptions), Gen III introduced some good Fighting types, and, like I said before, I often have a Fire Starter, so the Fighting type comes with the package as well. Plus with how powerful Fighting type moves have become, it's a good idea to have one.

Like with Fighting, Psychic types are popular with me now. Again, Gens I and II were lacking there, but Gen III made up for it with some awesome new Psychic Mons. Plus with their ability to use a wide range of other moves makes them very useful to me. So they're now on the list.

Electric has been pretty commonplace for me as well, though it can be on and off at times. I rarely use Grass types, so Electric types are often used by me to combat Water types. I just feel they hit harder, faster, and with greater potency. Plus Thunderbolt is my favorite Electric move, so I have to have that move in at least one of my Pokemon's arsenal.

 

[----]

Electric is almost always on mine because it's my favorite

 

[Big B]

Well, except for two tims I've always picked the Fire Type Starter, And since my Starter rarely leaves my Party, that means there's usually a Fire Type in it. Water and Grass I often have too, just to kinda represent the three types of starters (recently I've actually been doing runs with all three starters, planning on doing that again in ORAS). There have been Playthrough's where I had a Flying Type with me at all times, though that has somewhat diminished over the years. Metagross is also a favorite to have on my team, so that Steel and Psychic right there.

 

[Sakuraa]

I don't think there's a single type I make sure to always have. Though I will say that I've had an electric-type on nearly every team so far, if not all of them. Water, fire, grass, normal, and flying-types are also common, though there have been some teams where I've gone without one.

 

[chaos_Leader]

Electric. Hands Down. I always, without fail so far, have at least one strong Electric type on my team in a playthrough, often more. They generally hit hard, hit fast, and have just enough shenanigans in their movepools to throw off an opponent, which has always been my favorite way to do gaming when I can. I even use Jolteon on my VGC competitive team, with a lot of success so far.

Steel. Mostly this is because I've had a lot of success using Steel types in-game, with their (generally) strong defenses to outlast the opponents. And it's always been a wide variety of the steels, never just one or a select few mons.

 

[Steel_Justice]

Grass: Probably because I like grass types since my original starter is Bulbasaur and most of the time I chose a grass starter. When I don't usually a strong grass type like Ferrothorn is easily available and has more benefits to use than most other grass types.

Fighting: Lots of stuff is weak to it and they have high attack to use with spammable moves like Return. The only gen where I didn't use one was gen 1 for obvious reasons.

Steel: Lots of resists against in-game opponents especially the evil team, surprisingly easy to find most of the time and often have secondary types to help with the poor attacking type problem.

Flying: I'm not walking across an entire region to go shopping. Flying types like Skarmory, Staraptor and Talonflame are strong so why not make them a main part of the team?

Water: Someone needs to know surf since it's a strong move it might as well go to a main battler than an HM slave. I tend to pick grass starters so my rivals have fire types and I need something to counter them. And because late game Dragon type users are still all the rage having someone with Ice Beam is handy.

 

[skyradiant]

I pretty much always have a dragon-type since it's my favorite type overall. I also tend to use fire- and grass-types quite a bit.

 

[BettyN]

Hmm, let's see...

1. Water: This one should be obvious. Not only is it the games' most common type, but it's also a very good type to have. Strong against the common Rock/Ground/Fire, only weak to Grass/Electric, and can easily cover those weaknesses with Ice Beam (a must for late-game Dragon users, anyways) or sometimes, Earthquake. Plus, you need Surf to complete the game, anyways, and Surf also happens to be a strong, reliable attack (and with infinite use in every Gen, thanks to it being an HM).

And, even the first two Generations (which often didn't have the best variety of types) are full of great Water Types with great stats, such as Starmie, Vaporeon, Gyarados, Blastoise, Lapras, Tentacruel, Slowbro/Slowking, Feraligatr, Lanturn, and Kingdra, so you have large variety of good Pokémon to choose from (with many of those being gifts you can get for 100% free, such as the starters, Vaporeon, Gyarados, and Lapras). A Water Type is a must for any team.


2. Grass: While Grass isn't the strongest type in the world, it has its uses. Early on, they're fantastic against all of those Hikers with Geodudes and Onixes, or Fishermen with teams full of Poliwag/Goldeen, at a point when Water and Electric Types (besides starters) are a little harder to come by. I know I found Ivysaur/Gloom/Weepinbell to be a life-saver against Misty and her evil Starmie countless times, and I know I'm not alone.

Grass Types tend to fall behind later in the game as Water and Electric types become A LOT more available and their lack of a reliable STAB over 70 BP starts to hurt, but that doesn't mean it's all over yet. Most Grass Types learn moves like Sleep Powder and Stun Spore, making them great annoyers and supporters, as well as for catching other Pokémon. Plus, if all else fails, many of them get Cut and Flash, so they have HM Slave uses.


3. Electric: As I said, Grass starts to fall behind as the #1 answer to Water Types around the middle of the game with its weak moves, and Water Types without a Grass weakness like Tentacool, Tentacruel, and Gyarados start to become more common on NPC teams. Plus, you're also more likely to start seeing Water Types packing Ice attacks, especially Aurora Beam, which Grass Types can't handle at all. A good Electric Type becomes a must.

Electric isn't the easiest type to find, but there's usually a good one somewhere. Wherever there's an Eevee and a Thunder Stone, there's a Jolteon. The Magnemite, Electabuzz, and Mareep families are also good whenever they're available. Lanturn, of course, can double as a Water type. And, if you can catch them and don't mind using Legendaries, Zapdos and Raikou are fantastic.


4. Psychic: When you mainly focus on Kanto and Johto like I do, you're going to be seeing A LOT of Poison Types. Most of the Grass Types are part Poison, bats and jellyfish are everywhere, and it's Team Rocket's favorite type. Plus, both iterations of the Indigo Elite Four have Fighting and Poison users--Bruno and Agatha/Koga. With all of that Poison going around, a strong Psychic is nice to have (especially in RBY, where they're the game's strongest type).

And, Psychic has some cool Pokémon, to boot. The best one, of course, is Alakazam, with that astronomical Sp. Attack, great Speed, and access to the Elemental Punches (pre-Physical/Special split). If you can't trade, Espeon (who gets Bite/Shadow Ball, depending on Gen, to deal with other Psychics), Starmie (who doubles as a Water type), the Slowfamily (also Water Types), and even, Jynx (who gets Ice coverage) are good substitutes. If you don't mind Legendaries, Mew (RBY glitch) and Lugia (Silver and SoulSilver) are incredible Pokémon with great designs and amazing movepools.


5. Flying: The games are a lot harder to navigate without HM02, that's a hard fact. Even if you just use it as a Fly Slave, a Flying Type is pretty much a must for navigation. That being said, Fly is a decent move (NPCs rarely switch), and there are some good Pokémon (in the early Gens) who can learn it--Charizard, Crobat, Aerodactyl, Dragonite, and Skarmory. Include Legendaries, and you also have Mew, the Bird Trio, Lugia, and Ho-Oh.


There are other types that I use on my team semi-often, such as Fire, Ground, Dragon (well, mostly just Dragonite or Kingdra), Ghost, Dark, Poison (dual types only), and even, Normal, but these 5 are the ones that I always have.

 

[Life]

Aside from some Sinnoh runs, I know that I always have a fire-type on my team. I usually have a grass-type as well, though I can't say always since I'm unsure. It's not a case of "having to have", I just end up with the type on my team without really thinking about it.

 

[Zeb]

Grass, Fire and Water, usually. It's not a definite rule, but I usually have those three types on my team; they are generally very useful when together, so it helps balance the team out.

 

[Chibster]

I always need to make sure I have a Water type and a Flying type in my team. They're my two favorite types, after all!

 

[eonator]

always have a dragon, need that bit of op at the end of the maingame ;P

 

[lavachickens]

The definite types are Water and Flying and then the maybes are any 4 of Electric, Fighting, Ground, Psychic, Dragon and Dark.

 

[Barfing Ogres]

Electric because Thunderwave spam is best spam.

Flying and Water because Fly and Surf.

Steel because I like Steel, no particular rhyme or reason to it.

 

[Pinball Wizard]

Even though Electric is my favourite, ever since switching to a more defensive strategy I haven't really used them as much (Still love Magneton and Electrode, two of my Sapphire MVPs <3).

As for types I use every time, I'm always down for a good solid Steel-type. Incredibly useful defensively, especially when paired with another type. Bronzong in Platinum and Klefki in Y, for example. I think that's the only type I've consistently used in every game I've played.

 

[Jyo]

For me, unless I'm playing a challenge, Normal and Fighting are always in my team, aside from being my favorite types overall.

Fighting the main reason that Steel_Justice mentioned:

Fighting: Lots of stuff is weak to it and they have high attack to use with spammable moves like Return.

and the normal types can learn a wide variety of attacks from other types (via TM's & HM's), with the right ability and held item, it will help cover weakness that my team will have (a huge majority of my favorite Pokemon are normal types, or have normal as one of their types)

 

[Muur]

Flying because fly
Water because surf and the like
Grass because I like the grass type best
Not always but I've had a lot of electric types
Normal is frequent too just cuz of the normal/flying dudes.
Platinum+ has seen fire, before that I believe it was only Charizard.