Welcome to Pokemon Mechanics! With this guide, I am channeling my inner Earl, hoping to teach you the finer points of Pokemon and how to improve as a player. If you love the games, but want to learn more about the competitive side, then this series of articles is the perfect place to start. By the end of it, you will have all of the information you need to begin your journey to becoming a master trainer.
Today, we’ll get started with types, one of the most iconic aspects of Pokemon. Each Pokemon can have either one or two types, and together these types will primarily determine which attacks will benefit the Pokemon on offense and hit it hardest on defense. While most of you know that Water beats Fire, there are a lot more interactions between the types, and below you can see this helpful refresher on the type chart:
Source: Pokemon Database (pokemondb.net)
Now, that is a lot to take in, but there are a few things you can take away from the chart without having it memorized. The first is that certain types seem to have much more favorable spreads than others on a given part of the chart. Ground, for example, hits 5 types for Super-effective damage and has only 2 resistances and one immunity, making it a formidable offensive type. On the other side of the equation, Steel resists a whopping 10 resistances and an immunity, while only 2 types can hit it for Super-effective damage.
After further examination of the chart, more of these roles become apparent. Fighting and Ice are some of the premier offensive types, making up for lackluster defensive utility with wide ranges of neutral and super effective typing. On defense, Water and Fairy seem similar to Steel, denying several types the opportunity to hit for super effective damage. It also is clear that certain type groupings work very well on defense together. The starter trio of Grass, Fire, and Water can resist nearly every type, and no type can hit all 3 for super effective damage. Dragon, Fairy, and Steel can perform a similar role, and synergies like this will prove useful when building teams.
Of course, plenty of other types have not entered the discussion yet; if they lack offensive or defensive utility, what else could they offer? Types like Bug, Dark, and Psychic may not be impressive in most situations, but the utility their moves offer is phenomenal. Pokemon with these typings tend to have incredibly deep move pools, and these types specifically have moves that provide amazing utility or setup. Especially with Terastralization existing in Generation 9, Pokemon with these types can transcend their weaknesses and thrive, with the most obvious example being Volcarona. All in all, while type does not determine everything about how a Pokemon is used, it can be a good starting point for evaluating a Pokemon and getting an idea of how it might fit in a metagame.
Last and certainly not least, beyond these general roles, each type also has some specific features that are somewhat arbitrary, but still essential for all trainers to understand. Below, is a table with each type, along with any special rules that may accompany it in Generation 9. While this information is less essential than that above, it still is handy to use the given table as a reference until knowledge of these interactions becomes second nature:
Type | Unique Mechanics |
Normal | None |
Fire | Immune to Burn |
Water | None |
Electric | Immune to Paralysis |
Grass | Unaffected by powder moves, Leech Seed |
Ice | 1.5x Defense in Snow, Immune to Freeze |
Fighting | None |
Poison | Absorbs Toxic Spikes on switch-in, immune to Poison status |
Ground | Immune to Sand damage |
Flying | Immune to Spikes, Toxic Spikes, and other moves that specifically affect grounded Pokemon |
Psychic | None |
Bug | None |
Rock | 1.5x Special Defense in Sand, immune to Sand damage |
Ghost | Cannot be trapped by moves or abilities |
Dragon | None |
Dark | Immune to moves affected by Prankster |
Steel | Immune to Poison status, immune to Sand damage |
Fairy | None |
With that, you now know the basics of Pokemon types. Look out for the next guide on Pokemon stats, and let me know if you have any questions below. Thanks for reading!