Zygarde

Zygarde.

I’m down to the last few legendary Pokémon now (well, the last few legendary Pokémon… and Carbink, whom I’m still intending to do together with Diancie on account of their weird relationship). By necessity, these final four entries are going to be… more than a little speculative. There’s still a lot that we don’t know about Zygarde and Diancie, and heck, I don’t think we’re even supposed to know that Hoopa and Volcanion exist yet (I mean, we’ve all known about them for months, but no one dares tell Game Freak that, because it would hurt their feelings and they might cry, which would be awkward). I may have to make up a lot of stuff. Should be fun. Anyway, let’s do Zygarde.

I already spoke at some length in Xerneas’ and Yveltal’s entry about my reasons for being generally dismissive of the Norse mythology interpretation of this triad that’s become popular. Still, I suppose it’s worth quickly going back over my objections as they apply to Zygarde specifically. Zygarde, the great serpent of order, the internet would have us believe, is likely based at least partially on either the dragon Nidhoggr, the world serpent Jormungandr, or both. Certainly Nidhoggr makes a decent parallel, as a giant snake who lives underground; what I don’t like about this is that both of these creatures are very much on the side of chaos and destruction in the Old Norse cosmology, which doesn’t seem at all appropriate for the role that Game Freak appear to have in mind for Zygarde in whatever conflicts are yet to come. This role actually bothers me for other reasons as well – mainly, it seems almost too obvious. The Pokédex calls Zygarde the ‘Order Pokémon,’ and credits it with a “secret power” which it uses to protect the Kalosian ecosystem from disruption. Meanwhile, on the gameplay side of things, the mechanics of the Aura Break ability (which we’ll talk about later) seem intended to let Zygarde nullify the most dangerous powers of its two trio-mates. The analogy with Rayquaza’s Air Lock, which likewise nullifies the effects of Drought and Drizzle, should be obvious, and at that point it seems like Zygarde’s cosmological role is likely to be parallel too – a balancing force between Xerneas’ influence on life in Kalos and Yveltal’s influence on death, presumably coming into play to resolve whatever bastardry Lysandre attempts next. This makes a lot of sense. It’s kind of intuitively obvious to most of us why Kyogre and Groudon need to be kept in balance, but it’s not so immediately clear why we would want to balance Xerneas and Yveltal, who seem almost like “good and evil” – one of the themes X and Y deal with, though, particularly X and particularly through Diantha’s dialogue, is the idea that change, age and death are all parts of life. The reference to Zygarde as a protector of Kalos’ ecosystem also works well here – life, spreading without limit and unchecked by death or decay, would consume resources at an exponential rate and ultimately destroy itself, which is more or less what Lysandre believes is happening to humanity already. The whole thing could very easily be spun as a more nuanced and philosophical version of the same story we were originally told in Ruby and Sapphire… to which I would have no objection, if not for the fact that we are about to get remakes of Ruby and Sapphire anyway. If I were Game Freak, I would want to do something very different with Zygarde.

Probably the way I would spin Zygarde’s involvement in Z Version (assuming that is what they call it; after Black and White 2 I’m not prepared to rule out the possibility of another curveball) would be to have Lysandre know about Zygarde from the start and make it the main goal of Team Flare’s campaign. Lysandre might well believe that Zygarde, as a Pokémon who values order and balance in the ecosystem of Kalos, could potentially be won over to his side – after all, what Lysandre sees in X and Y is an ecosystem thrown out of balance by the reckless consumption of humans. What Maxie and Archie do by accident in Emerald is instead Lysandre’s whole gameplan: summon Zygarde by provoking a big enough fight between Yveltal and Xerneas that the serpent feels compelled to intervene. After that, even once the player is able to calm down the other legendary Pokémon, Zygarde still goes on a rampage because it’s been convinced by Lysandre that human civilisation is the real imbalance. At this stage, we could go one of two ways. The first is to have Zygarde abandon Lysandre and take matters entirely into its own… er… coils, I suppose, immediately destroying Team Flare and working its way towards Lumiose City but leaving Geosenge Town and Shalour City largely untouched, apparently in accordance with its own understanding of what constitutes ‘harmony’ in Kalos. The plot from there involves convincing Lysandre that modern civilisation shouldn’t be given up on, and him going on to earn his redemption by helping to show Zygarde the same thing. The other way I could see this going is for Zygarde and Lysandre to keep working in unison, Lysandre becoming visibly more irrational as events unfold and Zygarde being corrupted by his influence as well, until they can be defeated and convinced that destroying humanity and filling the gap with new life isn’t the way to achieve harmony. I’m not sure which of those two I like better; at the moment though I think probably the first.

The last underwhelming third member of a legendary triad...

Much like Kyurem in Black and White, Zygarde seems to have been left out in the cold a little bit when you compare him with the other two members of its triad, the almighty Xerneas and Yveltal. The most obvious reason for this is that, while Xerneas and Yveltal enjoy broadly applicable and extremely powerful passive abilities – Fairy Aura and Dark Aura, which give major damage bonuses to their already strong primary attacks – Zygarde is lumped with the decidedly underwhelming Aura Break. Aura Break reverses the effects of all other ‘Aura’ abilities… and there are only two of those, Xerneas’ and Yveltal’s, so if you happen to be fighting an opponent who is not Xerneas or Yveltal, it just doesn’t do anything. Even if you are, well, frankly Xerneas still murders Zygarde with Moonblast, in spite of the damage penalty imposed by the reversed Fairy Aura, and Yveltal is still in with a chance too thanks to his immunity to Ground attacks and the excessive healing provided by Oblivion Wing (which isn’t weakened by Aura Break). What else can Zygarde do? Well, something with legendary stats can’t be that bad; Zygarde is a perfectly solid physical attacker by almost anyone’s standards, with pretty good high-power type coverage from Earthquake and Outrage, Stone Edge for backup, and even a strong priority move in Extremespeed. Its stats also allow it to choose comfortably between very aggressive strategies with Dragon Dance to boost its power and more defensive ones with Glare (which is 100% accurate as of X and Y and thus unambiguously better than Thunder Wave, which can be blocked be Ground-types – Zygarde is also only the seventh Pokémon to get it, by the way) or Coil. As is by now tradition, Zygarde gets a signature move too: Land’s Wrath. It’s a bit of an odd one, in that it doesn’t appear to be all that good at first glance. In fact, in a single battle, it’s strictly worse than Earthquake; they’re both physical Ground-type attacks, and they have the same accuracy and PP, but Land’s Wrath does a little bit less damage. Like so many of X and Y’s signature moves and abilities, it only really has potential in doubles, where it acts as a ‘party-friendly’ version of Earthquake – which is kind of a big deal, since most Ground-types, if you want to avoid the possibility of friendly fire, don’t actually have any good alternative, or even any tolerable one. Still, there’s no way this competes with the amazing healing provided by Oblivion Wing or the ridiculousness that is Power Herb Geomancy.

Just comparing Zygarde to Xerneas and Yveltal, it seems almost certain that there’s more to it than we have yet seen. Giratina in Platinum was given a vastly expanded role in both the plot and the backstory, along with a new form and new powers. Kyurem in Black and White 2 got a whole new subsystem entirely unique to him, the unprecedented ability to fuse with another Pokémon and thus become one of the most powerful Pokémon in existence (well, in terms of raw stats, anyway), surpassed only by Arceus and, as of X and Y, both variants of Mega Mewtwo. There were also a couple of new signature moves; they were and are total garbage, but hey, it’s the thought that counts, right? These perks also came with an important place in the story’s mythology as a ‘remnant’ or ‘fragment’ of the original dragon that gave rise to both Zekrom and Reshiram. More to the point, like Black and White’s ‘ruined’ Kyurem, Zygarde has noticeably lower stats than the other two Pokémon who seem clearly intended to make up a trinity with him. Considering that Rayquaza is getting a Mega form in Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby, and that Groudon and Kyogre too are expecting a new toy in the form of this ‘primal’ nonsense, whatever that means, I would, frankly, be utterly floored if it turned out that Game Freak didn’t have something extremely dramatic planned for Zygarde’s eventual involvement with the plot of Generation VI. Exactly how that will happen, I wouldn’t like to guess, though I imagine Zygarde’s physical form will change quite a bit (maybe it will become the first sixth-generation Pokémon to get a Mega evolution [EDIT: the SECOND, after Diancie. Herp derp.]). As far as mechanical changes go, higher stats are practically a given, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see its ability upgraded, maybe to something that just nullifies all other abilities, or weakens all Fairy and Dark attacks around Zygarde, not just Xerneas’ and Yveltal’s. There are also two unused moves lurking in the game’s coding, in the same way as Kyurem’s Freeze Shock and Ice Burn were before the release of Black and White 2 – Thousand Arrows and Thousand Waves, both Ground attacks with the same power as Land’s Wrath. Thousand Arrows, apparently, can hit Flying and Levitating Pokémon despite being a Ground attack, and also knocks them to the ground in the same way as Smack Down; Thousand Waves, on the other hand, can trap the Pokémon it hits (for one turn? Until the user leaves play? Not sure). Those probably belong to Zygarde, and the fact that there are two of them could suggest that there are options involved in whatever power-up Zygarde will receive – possibly, like Kyurem, two different forms, each one associated in some way with one of the other two members of Zygarde’s triad. Thousand Arrows would certainly do a number on Yveltal, so maybe each move is supposed to help it defeat one of the others? Anything more than that is hard to say.

There was a lot you could say about Kyurem long before Black and White 2 were actually announced (and indeed I did), if you were willing to think about how exactly he could work with the Yin-Yang thing that Reshiram and Zekrom were apparently doing and how a third dragon would fit into what we knew about their origins. There isn’t, as far as I can see, any similar big tip-off for Zygarde (perhaps partly because the internet’s dominant interpretation for his design is one that has me utterly unconvinced). I’m perfectly fine with this. I’ve liked generation VI so far, and despite my usual cynicism about their abilities I’m confident that Game Freak have something interesting in mind for the serpent of order – and it’s the mystery that makes it worth the wait.

Bunnelby and Diggersby

Official art of Bunnelby by Ken Sugimori; Nintendo is the way and the truth and the light, etc.

Tradition is tradition is tradition, and tradition dictates that no Pokémon generation is complete without an evolutionary line of exceptionally mundane Normal-type rodent Pokémon. [EDIT: correction for my phylogenic carelessness; rabbits and hares are not rodents but belong to a closely related group of their own, the lagomorphs – for our purposes, though, the distinction is probably academic] As with Talonflame, Game Freak seem to feel that they are in quite an odd position; if the Pokémon they design is not sufficiently banal and inconsequential, it will not fulfil the implicit requirements of Tradition, but if they go too far… well, is there really anyone out there who wants more perfectly generic rodent Pokémon? Pokémon are weird creatures with a penchant for doing the impossible, but they are also a representation of the variability of life in the real world, variability that includes the animals we see all over the place and get, frankly, a little bored with – how should that conflict be handled?

History lesson time.

My difficulty with Raticate is that, although larger-than-life as all Pokémon are, otherwise he is a rat and does rat things: gnawing and chewing and infesting and breeding and surviving everywhere it has no right to be. That’s great, don’t get me wrong, but it’s also just about the only Pokémon I can think of that has no supernatural powers whatsoever – even the ability to gnaw through concrete is something actual rats can do, which I suppose in a way is just testament to what a badass animal the Norwegian rat is. Similarly, Furret’s most significant power, as far as I can make out, is being long and bendy, while Linoone… can run in a straight line, I guess? Bibarel represents an early experiment in the same kind of encouraging dual-typing as we see in both Talonflame and Diggersby, but Water is a type that tends to get splashed around (pun most heinously intended) rather liberally, normally on the grounds that a Pokémon lives in or near water, and I’m shadowed by the question of what it actually adds to Bibarel. Don’t even get me started on those creepy Unovan hell-beasts. Linoone’s Belly Drum shenanigans notwithstanding, none of these are particularly effective Pokémon either, because if there’s no flavour reason for a Pokémon to have useful abilities, it often won’t get them (although it has to be said that many of them make amazing HM whores in generations three and four, particularly Bibarel with his access to water-related abilities). Bland designs make bland strategies; the two can’t be completely separated. With that in mind, let’s go to Bunnelby and Diggersby.

Some species of rabbit are very social creatures and build complex interconnected systems of burrows, normally with at least two entrances - as mammals go, they are quite impressive architects.

Bunnelby’s thing is his ears. Rabbits’ long ears are of course among their most distinctive characteristics, but they don’t really do a whole lot other than… well, hear things. Presumably help to radiate heat in species that live in hot climates. Pretty standard stuff for ears to do, really. Not so Bunnelby’s ears. They are the largest organ in his body and are also his primary manipulative appendages, with ends almost like paws that he uses to scoop earth and dig the warrens that rabbits are famous for; the anime also portrays him as using his ears for most of his attacks. The tips are brown, as though stained by mud, but a ruff of brown fur around his neck, the same shade, suggests that this is their natural colouring. Diggersby continues to create the same impression with a speckled pattern at the edge of the brown portion; it’s a nice way of bringing his Ground typing into his physical appearance. His mighty ears, even more potent than Bunnelby’s, can pummel through bedrock or lift and carry heavy loads. How they can do this, tethered as they are to his body by the relatively slender and probably hollow parts of his ears responsible for hearing, is something of a mystery; in a real animal it would be difficult to understand how they can even be held up, let alone swung forcefully without simply ripping them off. Then again, many Pokémon are in the habit of doing six impossible things before breakfast, and anatomical plausibility should probably be low on our list of criteria for evaluating them (although, having said that, this is one of the harder ones to overlook since Diggersby doesn’t have a lot of explicit special powers that could be used to justify it). Ground Pokémon are known for being especially solid and stable, so maybe their flesh and bones can take a great deal more weight than we are accustomed to putting on our various appendages? The information about Diggersby presented to us by the Pokédex focuses on their uses in the human world, where like Machoke and Gurdurr they are regularly enlisted as construction workers – like the comedic stereotype of construction workers, they are also lazy and like nothing more than lounging around once their work is done. I’d actually be more interested in how they work ecologically, though; Bunnelby only dig into soil like ordinary rabbits (albeit rabbits with prehensile ears) but Diggersby can go much deeper and presumably can only navigate larger tunnels as well. What might their ‘warrens’ start to look like? The purpose of a burrow is surely defeated if something much larger than a Bunnelby can easily get inside, so the resulting structures could end up looking quite complicated, with the Diggersby-sized entrances protected carefully from smaller predators.

The thing about my relationship with Diggersby is that I can’t help but think he looks a little bit like a mouldy potato. A damning assessment, one might think. I’m pretty sure Diggersby isn’t meant to be a particularly elegant or awe-inspiring Pokémon, though; in fact I’m pretty sure he is meant to look fat and lazy, and he does that remarkably well. He doesn’t exactly look like he could crush bedrock (although he certainly could – see below for the reasons bludgeoning power is at the core of Diggersby’s skill set) and is a little out of place in the traditionally ‘tough’ and ‘badass’ Pokémon crowds; to be honest, I’m not sure who he’s supposed to be appealing to. The unkempt lazy bastard demographic, I suppose (you know, now that I put it like that, I’m really starting to empathise). In a way, strangely, the fact that Diggersby is so shamelessly unappealing is actually what I like about him. Rabbits are cute and cuddly; making a cute and cuddly rabbit like Buneary – or, to an extent, Bunnelby – is just a little bit cliché and predictable. Making a muscular but pudgy rabbit who looks kind of like he needs a shave is much more out of left field, while still tying into a well-known trait of actual rabbits via the construction worker aesthetic: they’re good at digging. This Pokémon has undeniable personality – not exactly an attractive personality, but nonetheless a much clearer one than his normal and Normal rodent predecessors have tended to exhibit… with the possible exception of Watchog, who, again, scares me. Some unorthodox ideas went into this Pokémon, and I think on some level they kind of work.

Diggersby.

If you want to use Diggersby, you’re going to want one with the hidden ability, no ifs, no buts. As truly entrancing as Diggersby’s Cheek Pouch bull$#!t is (I mean, who doesn’t want to get bonus health back for eating any kind of berry? That thing is gold, am I right?), there is simply no passing up the ridiculousness that is Huge Power. To make clear how big a deal this ability is, I should clear up a common misconception about it – a lot of people seem to think Huge Power doubles the abstract ‘base attack’ score generic to a Pokémon’s species, which would effectively move Diggersby from an abysmal 56 to a fairly convincing 112. In fact, it doesn’t; what it doubles is the Pokémon’s actual concrete attack stat with training, level, nature and individual variation factored in – for a level 100 Diggersby, this is likely to be somewhere in the low 200’s if he’s been trained for physical attacks (which he should be!) and will double to about 440-460 – equivalent to a base attack score around 160, approaching the likes of Slaking and Rampardos. This Pokémon is a blunt instrument of epic proportions. Earthquake is, of course, the key move here, backing up Huge Power with similarly dramatic bludgeoning force. Either Stone Edge or Wild Charge is practically mandatory to punish Flying-types who seek to take advantage of their Ground immunity. Normal attacks are, as always, mainly useful for being able to do neutral damage to most things, which isn’t that great an asset on a Pokémon like Diggersby, who has a fairly solid array of offensive types to choose from, but since he is a Normal-type, Return is probably worth checking out. Hammer Arm and Power-Up Punch add Fighting-type options to round out the spread of dangers Diggersby can present. Power-Up Punch is probably the smarter option unless you’re looking at a Choice Band set, since Diggersby can’t really afford to lose speed using Hammer Arm, and the power you sacrifice on your Fighting attack (which isn’t going to be your main one anyway) is relatively easy to justify when you can get a boost for your other attacks by using Power-Up Punch. Always worth consideration, especially in conjunction with Choice items, is U-Turn; with Diggersby’s doubled attack stat, even this relatively weak move will leave quite a sting as he flees the scene.

The bad news for Diggersby is practically everything else about him: his defences are reasonable, but nothing to write home about, and he’s not the fastest thing on two legs. The former, he mostly just has to deal with; the latter, on the other hand, can be at least partially alleviated by his access to Agility and Quick Attack – you probably should use one or the other, since, again, Diggersby is great at dishing out hits but not so good at taking them. Being a Normal-type with such a colossal attack stat actually makes Quick Attack reasonably solid – after all, Aqua Jet always worked for Azumarill, who functions on the same basic principles. As an alternative to Agility, Diggersby also gets Swords Dance (you know, just in case that 460 attack stat starts to bore you); you definitely want Quick Attack available if you pick that option. He can also learn Flail, and a Focus Sash set with Flail and Agility might be sufficiently amusing and destructive to be worth a shot if you can keep him from taking any passive damage that would break the sash – it helps that Diggersby is immune to Sandstorm damage, but with entry hazards as popular as they are it’s probably more trouble than it’s worth (still… as Epic Flails go, Diggersby’s would be pretty impressive… maybe the AI trainers in the Battle Maison would fall for it…). There aren’t really any other compelling options for this guy, which is sort of a weakness – he’s fairly predictable. Almost nothing can absorb his attacks with impunity, but he’s naturally slow, not all that tough, has only a passable defensive type combination, and is very likely to be carrying a Choice item that will restrict his tactical options further. Reliance on Normal and Ground attacks is also a big welcoming invitation to any of the many Levitating Ghost-types out there. Diggersby is a sledgehammer – use him as such, but remember to bring your chisels along as well.

The bottom line for me is that you can pretty much explain Raticate, or Furret, or Bibarel, by saying “it’s a rat Pokémon” “it’s a ferret Pokémon” or “it’s a derpy beaver Pokémon.” Saying of Diggersby “it’s a rabbit Pokémon,” while certainly correct, would clearly be missing the point. There should be rodent Pokémon in the game, there should be Normal Pokémon in the game, and there should be common Pokémon based on common animals in the game – indeed, some of these categories deserve, if anything, more attention! Bunnelby and Diggersby are a step in the right direction; they take something generic and everyday, and they twist it. It doesn’t necessarily make total sense, but it’s interesting, and it immediately suggests a battle role based on overwhelming physical force, giving this Pokémon something cool to do. Diggersby is far from my favourite Kalos design, but for once that’s mostly because of my own taste in Pokémon and not because the template has led to a half-assed creation.