As a trainer, what types of attacks should you be most concerned about: Out of 559 possible moves that all Pokemon should know, 366 of them actually cause damage (excluding “One Hit KO” moves). Though one could argue that the move pool of an opponent is predictable, I’m mainly focusing on approaching a random Pokemon in the game, not battling between your friends. (for that’ you’d would want to use a complex decision tree or game theory analysis to figure out best paths. And even then, it gets complicated.) And covering all the possible move types probably won’t cut it.
See the analysis after the break!
So taking the entire moves list (Bulbapedia has one list that’s easy converted to a data format), we can analyze how each type fairs in number of moves and attack strength. We can crunch the numbers into a summary table, as seen below.
| Type | Average | Count |
| Fire | 91.0 | 29 |
| Dragon | 89.1 | 12 |
| Electric | 83.4 | 17 |
| Grass | 81.0 | 22 |
| Psychic | 77.8 | 18 |
| Flying | 76.2 | 17 |
| Steel | 75.9 | 14 |
| Fighting | 74.7 | 36 |
| Rock | 73.6 | 11 |
| Water | 71.5 | 21 |
| Ice | 71.3 | 17 |
| Normal | 68.9 | 83 |
| Dark | 61.8 | 17 |
| Poison | 60.7 | 14 |
| Ground | 60.4 | 14 |
| Ghost | 58.9 | 10 |
| Bug | 58.5 | 14 |
In terms of parity of move strength, well I’d be worried about fire moves. With a higher than average move count per type (average is 21, but skewed because of Normal type’s large number) and the highest average move power, you’d be best to bias your team slightly against fire damage. However, the clear type winner is “Normal Types.” With a high number of possible moves and a decent move power rating, it’s most likely the move you’ll see the most of as you’re walking around the Pokemon World. Fighting does fairly well with higher than normal moves. Grass attacks are plentiful and quite powerful.
So is it safe to say that you build your team to defend against these four types (Fire, Normal, Fighting, and Grass)? Probably not. In this analysis, I’ve assumed that each move will be represented equally. That is to say, standing in a battle, you’ll be equally likely to see Fire Blast and Scratch. Unlikely. However, this is a step up from a broad “defend against all types” analysis. This would inform that type of broad analysis, where you assume that you’ll see each move type equally. And from the chart above, that’s certainly not true. For a more indepth analysis, one would have to really get at the probability of seeing a Pokemon and its move type. That requires a guide, which sort of defeats the purpose of this entire exercise. However, we already apply a simple heuristic to give ourselves an advantage. You most likely already perform this analysis when approaching a trainer or a gym.
The environment is a huge clue into what type of Pokemon you’ll be seeing in a battle or in the wild. If you’re on the beach, you assume that there will be water Pokemon, while if you’re in a cave, you assume that you’ll see Rock and Ground types (and Zubat… I hate you Zubat). If you’re in a haunted house, you’ll think that Jigglypuff will come out. No, I’m kidding, you’ll be repositioning your first Pokemon to defend against ghosts.
Okay, so what sort of information does this provide me when constructing a team? Pick something that does well against the Fire, Normal, Fighting and Grass and send it out first against an unknown trainer. If you had a ghost type, how many times do you just laugh as some poor Machop tries to karate chop you? In a battle against the unknowns, a good defense would be to send out a ghost type, or ghost/poison, or ghost/dragon. Granted, with that strategy, you’ve got a selection of 13 Pokemon, including Giratina, and the trio Gastly, Haunter, and Gengar. Not good pickins.’
Alternatively, you might want to send out a rock type. Though bad against grass types, you sit defended well against normal and fire types, which has the potential to do the most damage to your party. You most likely have something against a grass type in your party. Steel seems to be a good type, but against an unknown moveset, you’ve have fire and fighting attacks to contend with. There are a multitude of options, but my argument is that your leadoff batter should try to cover two of the four types there. For more information about your options on defensive and available Pokemon (of a specific type(s)), head over to Pokemon Database’s Pokemon Type Chart (with dual types as well!).
Though by no means is this a definitive guide on battling, I hope to shed some light on what type of Pokemon would best deserve a place in your party as you walk around the new world. With very little known at this point about the types of Pokemon or the movesets available, we can hopefully use the past to inform us about the future. With the bulk of my experience in R/B/Y and G/S/C, having a handy rock or ghost Pokemon did serve well in facing a trainer (or your rival) wherever you go. The most surprising thing to me was that steel has to be downgraded slightly because of it’s weaknesses to fire and fighting. However, if you had a good steel type, it wouldn’t serve you horribly to send it out first to preserve another type. Or to stall. Or to tank while everyone else gets a max revive.
image by KT245
