Many of the Delta Pokemon in the game are mediocre, and a major reason for that is their ability. Most of the delta pokemon that are balanced are because of their mega evolution, like Charizard getting Noctem or Bisharp becoming a sweeper. Sometimes they might just be missing a move, which I’ll mention if it makes sense for the pokemon. If some pokemon have great abilities that overshadow the rest, I’ll get into that somewhat, but since the pokemon can be decent it will not be the focus.
Starters: The starters are actually pretty well balanced. Blastoise is the weakest in my opinion because of the 4x fairy weakness, least game changing mega, and is still outsped by Venusaur. However, Shadow Dance will net it a place on new moon teams, benefiting from weakened fairy moves, being the only fighting Shadow Dance user, and with mew moon boosting Dark types it can save M.D Charizard’s weakness to them. M.D Venusaur is a great late game pokemon, able to sweep a weakened team after checks and counters are removed. Its not a sweeper like Typhlosion, whose lack of bulk makes it countered by anything that can outspeed it, while Venusaur can survive a few hits. I will say that I think it should get recovery, being a psychic type. Since it can’t run leftovers, leech seed and rest are the only recovery options, which is the only thing holding it back. M.D Charizard is, once again in my opinion, the best out of the three in terms of taking up a mega slot. It doesn’t require a new moon team to do well, but benefits them greatly. There’s not much I can say; its a good pokemon.
I mentioned this on another thread, but I think M.D Gardevoir and Gallade should have Refrigerate. As we get more move tutors and tms, hyper voice Gardevoir would be great for doubles and to counter most dragons in the game, and retaliate would be able to ohko any pokemon that doesn’t resist it. For that, it would be balanced by Gallade’s stealth rock weakness, 80 speed before mega evolving, and mediocre defenses. Unless it takes less than 50% from a single attack, it would be a one trick pony, while still being countered by pokemon above 100 speed or choice scarf users.
I can’t think of any way to balance Sunflora; Giving it analytical was probably the best move to take advantage of its 30 base speed, but it would need a lot more than an ability change to be better.
Avalugg will be good once it gets sand stream to cover its special defense. The other ones are just okay, but sand stream might bring it up to OU.
For Scizor, I’m a bit sad that it loses hustle. With pursuit and night slash it doesn’t need help hitting ghost types, and hustle would’ve been great with its high attack. Plus on new moon teams, it could take advantage of hone claw’s accuracy boost. Scyther isn’t bulky enough to set up, so it can’t take advantage of it.
For Scrafty, I’m not sure why it has rough skin; its not bulky enough to use it, in addition to having too many weaknesses from grass without a secondary type like steel to cover them. Having something like intimidate would be much better. Also, why doesn’t it get high jump kick? It already gets two recoil moves, why not carry over the other one it knows naturally? That way, it doesn’t get outclassed by Delta Snorlax.
Treavant seems like it’ll be a good pokemon. I have no clue why it has snow warning, but as long as it gets some physical ice move I’m fine with the additional coverage. With snow warning it can summon hail for Scyther without needing to run two ice types. Prankster is just an amazing ability on any pokemon. However, its hidden ability looks pretty bad. Even a neutral ability like sap sipper would be much better, and would make sense as a reference to his previous form (even if the original didn’t have it).
Frostlass also seems perfect with its ability. Once it can mega evolve, it can counter both setup and intimidate leads. If it could learn stealth rock without Glalie I’d call it the best lead in the game. Glalie is pretty mediocre, but I think it would be good if its mega got a fire type refrigerate, and it got the explosion tm. Flash fire is useless on all of them, but especially on Glalie with a quad resistance to fire. I’d suggest solid rock for Snorunt and Glacie, and levitate for Frostlass, for better switch ins and because it makes sense for the pokemon.
Luxray doesn’t have the best normal abilities; poison point is always mediocre and sniper doesn’t make sense because it doesn’t learn focus energy or cross poison. For this, I’d say just updating its moveset would work better than changing the ability. Its hidden ability looks pretty cool and may give it a few niches; if toxic spikes badly poisons after one it would be a good hazard setter, for instance. Also poison gas may be good for double / triple battles, although quad earthquake weakness may kill its potential there.
Delta Muk should get water absorb. There’s a few reasons I think this, and it is the suggest that I think works best. The first reason is to force the opponent to guess which you’re running, so they’ll be cautious about going for super effective moves. The second is for recovery, and to not interfere with the niche it would will. Muk is a bulky pokemon, so having addition recovery on top of knowing recover would work well. The main niche I see is coverage for a doubles rain team. Getting stab on earthquake in addition to recovering from surf without needing to protect, or worry about opposing pokemon in the rain, and without storm drain stealing scald from other pokemon, would round off a rain team well. Leftovers + surft + recover allows for 13/16 health regeneration on a single turn, and since it has stockpile it can survive long enough to recover. Plus it can mix it up by running sap sipper to deal with grass types.
For the others, I think they’re pretty balanced with their abilities, none greatly surpassing the others, but not enough to make them decent pokemon, since they have flaws separate to their ability. I’d like to have some discussion on this. If you think I missed one, or if you can think of better abilities, please mention it below.
