Delta Charmander line issues I have

General Discussion
1

So this is my first time posting, so sorry if it is wrong in some way.

I downloaded the game yesterday and am loving it so far, however I did have a bit of issue with the Delta Charmander starter.

My first issue is Ghost/Dragon typing doesn’t offer it a lot, its effective against other Ghost’s and Dragon (and Psychics), but not much else. It does have a lot of resistances and immunity to Normal and Fighting though. However as far as the 3 starters go, the other two are both super effective against it, but it is only super effective against Delta Bulbasaur thanks to Ghost > Psychic.

The second issue is with the abilities it learns. Delta Charizard has a pretty good Sp.Atk, a lot higher than its Attack stat. However its most powerful STAB moves are all physical, in fact the strongest moves it learns are Physical with the exception of Lunar Cannon, but it doesn’t get STAB with it since it is a Dark-Type move. Normal Charizard also has a higher Sp.Atk than Atk, but it differs in that it learns very powerful Special Fire and Flying moves. In fact some of its most damaging STAB spells are in fact Special.

The third problem I have has a lot to do with the first two problems and their effect on Noctem, its Mega’s ability. First off, the Delta Charmander line only learns only one Dark-Type move, Lunar Cannon, by level up. Second, Dark and Ghost are both effective against the same things, but Ghost can’t affect Normal Type, and Dark is resisted by Fight and Fairy. Now the problem, Noctem boosts the power of Dark and Ghost type moves by 35%, which is beautiful, but it also has the effect of making Lunar Cannon, Phantom Force, and Shadow Force only take 1 turn instead of 2. Why is this a problem? Well like i said, D. Charizard benefits more from Sp.Atk then Atk, Phantom Force is a physical ability (it can not learn Shadow Force) so his high Sp.Atk is not being used here. So the Dark Boosting effect of Noctem is almost wasted and the strong STAB abilities it effects are not as useful as they could be.

So I do have one solution to this and that would be to create a new move similar to Phantom Force, but make it Special Ghost-Type and give it a base damage of 100 with 90% accuracy and 5 PP. That way both his Sp.Atk and his Atk builds have strong viable moves.

Of course this is just one persons opinion and I don’t really know what I am talking about. So feel free to tell me I am wrong, but if you do agree with me I would appreciate if you could elaborate or better explain on what I am trying to say. I don’t know a lot about the viability of a pokemon so if you think I am correct, please help me fight my battle lol

2

It can still learn Dragon pulse, lunar cannon, and shadow ball, all special attacks with ok coverage along with stab on shadow ball and dragon pulse. Noctem, besides boosting the damage and lunar cannon to one turn, can set the weather for another pokemon to come in and sweep, like a weavile can boost fast with hone claws, and have a 50% boosted surf.

Edit: It’s typing also gives it a whopping 6 resistances, including fire, grass, water, and electric, some of the most used attacks as well as two immunities.

3

That is very true, but I still find it weird it doesn’t have access to stronger moves of its own. It seems like its movepool favors its Atk build more despite its Sp.Atk being higher. If that is its purpose then I suppose my post is invalid, I just can’t imagine such a powerful looking pokemon being more of a setup for other pokemon with better movepools.

I didn’t mention it in my post because I know this game is a WIP, but it doesn’t have great variety in its movepool right now. So its is forced into learning only Ghost, Dragon, Dark and Normal type TMs, which further exacerbates the problem of it lacking powerful Sp.Atk moves. It can’t even get a decent coverage in its move set, since Ghost and Dark cover the same Types and Dragon is only effective against other Dragons.

Edit: I did mention the resistances actually, that is one reason I am not still using it. It is very easy to switch it in and out as long as there are no Dark Types.

4

TM’s are severely lacking currently, when 1.2 comes out we will have a much greater variety. Most of the physical attacks it learns have a higher base power than it’s special attacks, I assume to account for it’s lower attack. If it’s special attacks were as powerful as the physical, it would become overpowered. I just added the set-up part as a bonus, I don’t think many people would use it as that, I also didn’t choose it as my starter, so I could be wrong about all this. XD The lack in coverage is a pretty big gap though, it might be fixed when more tm’s come out, but if not, it is still able to dish out decent damage and the typing lets it absorb more damage than a pure sweeper could.

5

I figured, thats part of why I didn’t mention the lack of TM variety. That is true, but if you look at Sp.Atk pokemon, they do have high Base Damage Special abilities, or at least 1 or 2. I am not really complaining about it having more Physical Attacks, but it doesn’t have 1 special attack over 90 damage that it has STAB with. I am guessing if there is a move tutor, Draco Meteor will be available? but i think it would be cool if it had an Insurgence exclusive Ghost Type Special move.

6

Yes, most will have moves with higher base power, but most of the pokemon with a high (SP)attack and higher base power moves also have horrible defence and/or resistances. They can deal out massive damage, but they die very quickly. D. Charizard can take a lot more hits of common types than most of those pokemon. Like a Lucario, he has great attack and access to multiple moves with 100 or more base and stab, but he is very frail. The same goes for Charizard, with great special attack and moves like fire blast, it kills easily, but common moves that are water or electric will do a lot of damage to him. Unlike those sweepers, D. Charizard won’t deal as much damage, but he also won’t die as fast, I think you are trying to compare D. Charizard to a full sweeper, which he is not. Also I assume Draco Meteor will be available, considering it lowers his SP attack by a lot, it won’t be as overpowered as having moves that you could spam with 100+ base and stab.

7

good points, I still believe he needs a better Special Ghost move and perhaps access to more Dark-Type Moves to give him meaningful choices. You are right, I was comparing him to Charizard, but he has a significant deal more bulkiness and his typing allows him far more resistances, whereas Charizard has great typing and variety in movepool to attack a lot of the common pokemon.

8

Don’t forget that currently, New Moon boosts both Dark and Ghost type moves, but in next release, only Dark moves will get a boost, so it means that not only Mega Delta Charizard’s Noctem will only boost Lunar Cannon since it’s the only Dark type move it can learn (as of now), but it won’t get a boost on Shadow Ball or Phantom Force AND it will boost one weakness it has against Dark types.

So imagine Mega DChar against a Dark type… he can’t do anything. More, if you switch it out and the opponent uses Pursuit, you lose it for nothing.

If DChar can learn Poison, Fighting or even Fairy moves by TM or tutoring in next release, then maybe it won’t be as weak. He NEEDS to learn at least one of these moves for coverage:

Against Dark types: Bug Buzz/X-Scissor or Superpower/Close Combat/Hammer Arm Against Fairy types: Sludge Bomb/Sludge Wave/Poison Jab or Flash Cannon/Iron Head/Steel Wing

Then a good set would be:

Hasty (+Spe/-Def) Delta Charizard w/Delta Charizardite Draco Meteor (should learn it by tutoring) Lunar Cannon Superpower/Close Combat/Hammer Arm Sludge Bomb/Sludge Wave/Poison Jab or Flash Cannon/Iron Head/Steel Wing

But fo now, my conclusion is to not use Delta Charizard as a Mega. If you want New Moon, use Noctem Spiritomb instead.

9

Honestly, in my opinion, Ghost/Dragon is not an amazing typing with the stats that D.Charizard has. Sure it gives D.Charizard a lot of resistances but it is not very effective against anything except Psychic Types (which it doesn’t have a resistance for meaning it can still take a beating from a fast strong Psychic like Alakazam). Due to its lack of powerful STAB moves that match its higher Special Attack, it is often out traded when facing other Dragons or Ghosts, not to mention most powerful Psychic Types with much higher Sp.Atk learn Shadow Ball anyways so they can often OHKO it. As if that wasn’t bad enough, Noctem is not a great ability for it to have since it boosts 2 of his weaknesses (if what you say is true it is even more useless on it.) which makes its Mega kind of useless as anything except for as a setup for an actually useful Dark-Type pokemon.

One thing Ghost has over Dark is the ability to hit Fairy-Types, however thanks to its Dragon typing it can’t even even effectively use that advantage.

If it had an ability that more matched its Ghost and Dragon typing, it would be a better pokemon. Something that reflects a powerful undead dragon like Physical attacks are nullified or something.