#146: Moltres

So we now reach number three, the final of the Spanish legendary birds, the majestic phoenix Moltres.

So, Moltres... This again suffers from the 580 syndrome, and is basically the same as Zapdos in stats with the same HP and special attack (90 and 125 respectively), and with similar everything else, with a few swaps. This leads to 100 physical attack, 90 speed, the defences swapped (90 physical and 85 special), and the same pressure ability as the standard. This time, the hidden ability is flame body, which is pretty much the same as static but results in a burn instead of paralysis, and can be used to hatch eggs faster. Oh, and you're flying/fire this time.

I more imagine this kicking young Harry Potter's ass than dragging him through the sewers...

We have the same deranged move situation again, this time running through roost (we know this one), hurricane (which pops up through this trio quite a lot as a special flying move with 110 damage, 70 accuracy and the chance to ignore the accuracy check in rain, though that said it will be ruined by sunny day), sky attack (base 140 flying physical with a charging turn and 90 accuracy, with the chance to flinch the foe, too, but still not really worth it when fly exists), heat wave (base 95 fire special with 90 accuracy, 10% chance of inflicting a burn and can hit all adjacent foes), wing attack (base 60 physical flying attack with good accuracy and huge PP as 35PP, and can hit ANYONE other than the user, so the middling power is the only drawback), and then ember (base 40 fire special with the chance to burn the foe). All of these before the actual levels kick in.

When the levels kick in, they still don't really matter until the last four before level 50, do they? Fire spin is a fire special move with only base 35 power and 85 accuracy (and 10 less PP than ember), but it does trap the foe for a few turns to do regular slight damage, so there's that. I'm bored of describing agility on these ones, so I'll go straight to endure, which allows you to survive a hit, even if you get taken down to 1HP, and then you get ancient power YET AGAIN! You should know flamethrower, which is a base 90 fire special with 100 accuracy, the chance to burn the foe and 5 more PP than heat wave (which has 10), so that leads to a hard decision... Safeguard prevents the team being afflicted by status problems for a while, and the other move you'll no doubt find on it is air slash, a base 75 flying special move that can hit any target you so wish with a good chance of a flinch and 95 accuracy.

Sunny day is an interesting choice since it will boost your fire moves and remove the charging on solar beam (which comes up next but one as a base 120 grass special) but it will also kill the accuracy of hurricane, so the choice is yours. Up comes heat wave again, and since that's written up above, just go back... Solar beam is next as I hinted, then sky attack, roost and hurricane (see above).

Yet again there are no egg moves (for obvious reasons), and the TM list is very familiar to the other two, but of course lacking ice and electric moves, including hail. You still get U-turn, roar, toxic, return, steel wing, sandstorm and facade. This time you get solar beam and flamethrower again, along with fire blast, overheat (base 130 special fire, 90 accuracy, 5PP and kills your stats), flame charge (base 50 fire physical that boosts your speed a stage on use), will-o-wisp inflicts a burn, and incinerate destroys the foe's berry along with dealing base 60 fire special damage. Sky drop is back, and the HMs are the same again. Moving on to the tutor to see if we can find something really new that offers any sort of coverage will leave you disappointed: just 4 moves, being sky attack, heat wave, snore and tail wind.

I'd be tempted to argue that this is the weakest of the three, but looks pretty, and still has good stats to back it up. You can really use a mixed attacking set, if only to allow for U-turn, return and maybe even flame charge as alternatives or utility, flame charge making up a little for the lower speed than Zapdos for allowing a free stage boost. You can still maybe take a hit or two, especially with some nice resistances and the ground immunity, but stealth rock will mess you up like mad. You also need to decide: rain or shine?

(All artwork presented by Ken Sugimori, taken from the Bulbapedia image archives)

Oh, and for the few of you who read this far (or this at all), I'm planning soon to introduce some companion Youtube series (when I have some time after this silly season I'm in the middle of and when the generation one run is done). I have two ideas to put to you:
1) battle videos: basically I upload some of my online battles from Y and Alpha Sapphire, and this will make me do some more of this, which you can then issue challenges such as just a duel challenge or a challenge team, though Matthew (Lizzie's brother) and I have a good set of these already founded
2) WonderTrade Adventures: I sort out something (halfway) decent to stick on wondertrade, whether it's something cool I've bred or something rare I've caught, and we keep trading what we receive until we get something decent.

Bare in mind I don't have the fancy gadgets to do proper recording people like Pimpnite and Verlis have setup, so it will be on a cheapo handheld recorder we bought when I had an awkward run trying to vlog. I'd like some feedback on the ideas and which you'd rather I did first. Thanks.