skill swap – Pokémaniacal

i feel like you’ve almost certainly answered this question before, but how do you think abilities work? some abilities seem more like physical features (tough claws, thick fat, compound eyes) whereas others are a lot more abstract (pixilate, mold breaker, cloud nine). wouldn’t a tinted lens butterfree’s eyes be just as compound as one with the compound eyes ability? what makes a gluttony snorlax have less fat than one with thick fat?

I’ve tried to answer this one before; let’s see… here.

It’s a bastard of a question, to be quite honest with you.

My natural inclination is to say that abilities have nothing in common and they all work in different ways because… why would they? As you rightly note, “abilities” covers a very wide range of traits and skills. There’s no reason to expect that the rules governing a Butterfree’s vision would be anything like the rules governing Snorlax’s rolls of fat. Continue reading “Z-nogyroP asks:” →

What do you think abilities are? I have a grumpig whose signature move is Skill Swap and his ability is Thick Fat. So when he swaps his ability, does that mean he loses his body fat and the other pokemon gets overweight? What if the other pokemon had flame body, does Grumpig suddenly burst into flames (let’s say the other was rapidash; it’s just a plain unicorn now)? What about steel types? They suddenly get biological fat on top of their alloy? Why can they only have one ability?

Well… abilities cover such a wide range of concepts that it’s sort of difficult to talk about them as a group – what can you possibly say about a category that encompasses physical traits like Thick Fat and Flame Body, psychological traits like Oblivious and Rivalry, skills like Technician and Sniper, magical properties like Levitate and Wonder Guard, and whatever the hell Mold Breaker is? Looking at stuff that interacts with abilities, like Skill Swap, might be more productive than trying to deal with abilities themselves, but let’s see… Continue reading “Vikingboybilly asks:” →