Fomantis and Lurantis

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Fomantis

Today we’re talking about Fomantis and Lurantis, the “Sickle Grass Pokémon” and “Bloom Sickle Pokémon,” a pair of deceptive Grass-types that take on the appearance of insects, their names evoking the words “faux” and “lure.” According to the Pokédex, Lurantis is often called “the most glamorous Grass Pokémon,” which… well, I think Roserade, Lilligant, Virizion and fellow Alolan Grass-type Tsareena are all going to want a word with you about that one, Lurantis, but for now we’ll agree that you’re top 5 material. Let’s take a closer look. Continue reading “Fomantis and Lurantis” →

Anonymous asks:

This doesn’t have anything to do with pokemon, but I was wondering if you might have any thoughts with your Archaeology background: In a lot of stuff written about Greco-Roman mythology I’ve read, Hectate is called a goddess of witchcraft and Circe a witch, and there’s probably other examples I don’t know of. However, I’m not really sure what being a witch would mean outside of the context of Christianity or modern pop-culture. Was this just something that was added in by much later writers?

Well, what is a witch, exactly?  Ugly old woman, warty nose, pointy hat, flies around on broomsticks, brews potions in cauldrons, turns people into newts, weighs the same as a duck, that sort of thing?  Circe, Hecate and Medea aren’t witches in that sense, no; they predate that stereotype of what a “witch” is by a good couple of millennia.  Continue reading “Anonymous asks:” →

RandomAccess64 asks:

I personally always liked the fan Pokémon concept of basing a poison/ice type after a cold, with a counterpart poison/fire type after a fever.

And Anonymous asks:

When I think Ice/Poison, my mind first goes to pollution. Some sort of frozen sludge monster, perhaps, or a rotting corpse trapped under a layer of permafrost, its putrescence leaking into the surrounding environment.

Some interesting ideas!  The cold/fever one could definitely be played with in some neat ways… maybe as alternate forms of a single Pokémon, even?  If it’s a disease-based Pokémon, it might need to spread illnesses in order to keep itself healthy, which could make training one a challenge.  The rotting corpse might be pushing it for a Pokémon game – I don’t know if Game Freak would go for that one – but the sludge monster idea sort of makes me want to see a Polar Muk regional variant.

Anonymous asks:

This isn’t a question but I wish I had you as a history teacher when I was in school – history was always my weakest subject and I genuinely enjoy the way you explain things, it actually helps me understand without zoning out!

Sorry for leaving this one languishing in the inbox for so long.  And thank you!  That really means a lot, as someone who, uh… actually does have to teach history sometimes, to students who are often less than enthusiastic at the prospect.

Anonymous asks:

When is WordPress opening?

Uh… soon.  I don’t know; I was going to try and reformat all the old posts first (because the image captions are all gone, and the paragraph breaks are weird, and there’s slime in all the tubes, and reader questions came through really ugly, and all the hyperlinks that refer to other stuff I’ve written will point back to Tumblr, and the new school buses are up on blocks, and so on), but I did the Unova Pokédex ones and it took ages so now I don’t know if I have the heart to do it all at once.  So I’ll probably just declare the move and then clean up the mess later.

Anonymous asks:

Is it just me, or do Pokemon Black and White seem like they were intended to be a lot longer? Many Pokemon in the game reach their final stages well after they’d be useful (like Bisharp, Braviary, Hydreigon etc) and the ending sequence feels so rushed, with N’s castle popping up out of nowhere, and you catching your dragon in the very last scene. I know it’s a weird time to be talking about Black and White, but it’s always felt so odd…

Well, that is the only generation so far that included a direct sequel to its main title.  Purely as a practical reality of development cycles, Game Freak must have decided that they were going to do Black and White 2 as sequels long before Black and White were actually released, but I wouldn’t be totally shocked if they had originally planned a more typical “Grey version” – Black and White with some extra bells and whistles – and changed course only when they realised there was too much material that wouldn’t fit in the initial release.  So it’s plausible that there was something unusual about the writing process in Generation V that could be responsible for that truncated feeling you’re sensing. Continue reading “Anonymous asks:” →

Anonymous asks:

Personally, I do see the Kalos Trio being based off of Norse Mythology, but more generalized, and not drawing inspiration from just the one myth. Like, eagles in general are associated with death in Norse mythology. Not just Hraesvelgr, but other beings such as the God of Death (who turns into an eagle), and the Blood Eagle ritual. (Also, Zygarde is more Jormungand than Nidhogg, with its other two forms likely being based off Fenrir and Hel.) Those are just my thoughts: you’re free to disagree.

Let the disagreement commence. [rolls up sleeves, cracks knuckles]

It is honestly baffling to me that this idea is so widely and unquestioningly accepted, because personally, I don’t think I’ve ever been less convinced by a Pokémon fan theory in my life.  I don’t even understand why people look at Yveltal and think “eagle.”  The “ruff” around its neck is almost certainly meant to make us think “vulture,” which is a much easier association with death.  Stags can be associated with nature without having to bring Norse mythology into it; birds of prey or carrion birds can be associated with death without having to bring Norse mythology into it; insisting that Norse mythology has anything to do with these Pokémon makes the concept weaker and more confusing. Continue reading “Anonymous asks:” →

Anonymous asks:

Quick! Describe a concept for a Ice/Poison type Pokemon!

I feel like this has come up before… yeah, here we go.

I can come up with ideas, they’re just sort of hackneyed, and not really very elegant.  The polar regions aren’t known for poisonous or venomous animals in the real world, so there’s not a lot of inspiration that obviously lends itself to Ice/Poison.  You kind of wind up producing either a polar animal with venom slapped on it out of nowhere, or a venomous animal with ice powers slapped on it out of nowhere… hmm.

Okay, mild flash of inspiration, maybe something based on a glass frog, with hints of poison dart frog for good measure?  See-through skin made of ice, poisonous glands… steps on Toxicroak’s toes a bit, but that’s all right if we make it weird enough… maybe the skin splinters when it’s injured, and the shards inflict poison?  Maybe make it a stained-glass frog, with lots of bright colours?  But then you’re drifting away from anything that justifies making it an Ice-type… I suppose this is a start, anyway.

AndrewQ asks:

Are Staryu and Starmie the only Pokemon that don’t have eyes, or any discernible kind of face? If so… why? (In-universe explanation and/or designers’ perspective explanation welcome)

They’re not quite the only ones.  Regirock, Regice, Registeel and Regigigas don’t have faces, just arrangements of dots (possibly eyes or some other all-purpose sensory organ?).  Those do look as though they should stand for faces, but you can sort of say the same thing about Staryu and Starmie’s cores.  Roggenrola has a thing that sort of looks like it should be an eye, but if you actually read the Pokédex is more a sort of… huge forward-facing ear?  And it’s not clear to me whether that counts as a face or not.  A couple of the Ultra Beasts don’t really have faces as such, but perhaps we shouldn’t count them.  A few others arguably have only parts of faces – like, Zubat kinda just has a big gaping mouth, and Magnemite and Sigilyph are just single eyes.  It’s not clear to me how many faces Claydol should be counted as having – 0, 1, 2, 4 and 8 all seem like acceptable answers to me.  I find it difficult to think of Unown or Beldum as having faces.  Certainly Staryu and Starmie are unique amongst non-legendary Pokémon, and unique among Pokémon of the first two generations, in having no facial features at all.  From the designers’ perspective, not giving something a face is a good way to make it seem alien and inscrutable, because humans express emotion through our faces and it’s hard for us to relate to something that doesn’t appear to have one.  That’s clearly in line with the design goals for Staryu and Starmie (given their mysterious nature and connections to outer space), the legendary golems, and especially the Ultra Beasts.

Continue reading “AndrewQ asks:” →