Pokemon Gen I Mechanics
Fleshing out the Endgame Tier List
My previous post introduced the D-Tier of the endgame Gen I Pokemon tier list. Now I want to dive into the mechanics and flow of the game to better set the framework for the rankings. Let’s start with various status effects to better understand Pokemon battles.
Pokemon Base Stats
Pokemon have base stats that increase as they level up. Each Pokemon has unique effort values (EV) and individual values (IV). These are influenced by supplements.
Pokemon raised from low levels are stronger than wild ones at the same level.
Attack influences the power of physical moves like Tackle.
Defense increases resistance to physical attacks.
Special applies to both the damage and defense against special moves like Surf. This is split into separate special attack and defense stats in Gen 2.
Speed affects both turn order and critical strike chance.
Temporary Statuses
Many status effects are cleared simply by swapping Pokemon out. These includes Leech Seed, confusion, substitute and any stat boosts or decreases.
Ice move Haze clears existing statuses. Mist blocks such statuses from taking effect.
Leech Seed does chip damage similar to poison, and restores the resulting damage to the attacker. It persists if the attacker swaps, but not if the defender swaps.
In the original games, Leech Seed is bugged to stack damage with Koga’s Toxic. This helps Bulbasaur and Exeggcute clear otherwise difficult matchups like Lance’s dragons.
Confusion is useful when applied 100% by Confuse Ray, or as a side effect from psychic attacks Confusion and Psybeam. It causes a 50% chance that your opponent hits themselves with a 35-attack Tackle equivalent, causing damage and skipping their turn. The 55% accurate Supersonic move is less useful.
Stat increases are useful when applied to your own Pokemon, particularly damage boosters like Swords Dance and Amnesia. Defensive boosts like Acid Armor and Substitute can also work well. Lowering opponent defense and special is a nice side effect of attacks like Acid and Psychic.
HM-01 Flash is the same as Pidgey’s Sand Attack meme, lowering opponent’s accuracy by one step. You only need it once to clear Rock Tunnel between Cerulean and Lavender Town.
Note that critical strikes pierce armor boosting effects. Items like X-Attack duplicate various status change effects. X-Accuracy is useful to hit Minimize/Sand Attack spammers.
Focus Energy is supposed to 4x the attacker’s crit rate, but is bugged on GameBoy to quarter it instead. Bruno is so weak because he uses uses this move on Hitmonlee and Machamp. On Game Boy use moves like Swords Dance, Meditate, and Amnesia instead to increase power. Same applies to the Dire Hit consumable.
In Pokemon Stadium this bug is fixed and Focus Energy significantly increases your crit strike chance.
Persistent Statuses
The sticky statuses include Frozen, Sleeping, Paralyzed, Poison and Burn. These all are useful to increase your chance to catch a wild Pokemon and put the hurt on enemy trainers.
Frozen is a rare side effect of high-power Ice moves. A frozen Pokemon is a sitting duck without a healing item. Skip Ice Heal in favor of Full Heal since the condition is so rare.
The next strongest is sleep which is imposed by Sing with 55% accuracy, Hypnosis with 60%, Sleep Powder and Jynx’ Lovely Kiss at 75%, and Parasect’s Spore at 100%. Snorlax also Rests to heal itself to full. It can be cleared by Awakening, Poke Flute, or Full Heal. Otherwise the Pokemon misses its turn it wakes up. In Gen 1, the sleeper misses the wake up turn while in Gen 2 they can attack right away.
Paralysis is inflicted by moves like Stun Spore, Glare, and Thunder Wave, or as a side effect of Body Slam and electric moves. It reduces the opponent’s speed by half, making them go later in the turn order and reducing their critical strike chance. Then they have a 50% chance of missing their turn due to full paralysis. Clear with early game Paralyze Heals, then switch to Full Heals.
Poison causes chip damage at the end of each turn and out-of-combat damage to your Pokemon as you walk around. Koga’s Toxic causes severe poison which accelerates damage over the course of a battle. Clear it with an Antidote or Full Heal. Or just heal through it with Recover, Softboiled, Lemonade…
Burn is an occasional side effect of fire moves like Ember. It causes the same chip damage at the end of the turn as Poison. It’s attack is also cut by half, which is rough for physical attackers. No out of combat damage. Burn Heal or Full Heal clear it.
Move/Type Run Through: Normal
Normal type moves and Pokemon are useful in most situations, excluding rocks, fighters, and ghosts. Damaging an opponent is purely cosmetic until they faint, but you want high power moves to accomplish that goal.
Normal type Pokemon like Raticate have a 50% same-type attack bonus (STAB).
Offense: Rock types resist normal damage. Ghosts are immune. Full damage to all other types.
Defense: Normal types are immune to the ghost move Lick. They take double damage from fighting moves.
Let’s run through what some of these moves do, starting with your basic attacks. These are all physical moves. I’m going to skip over shit moves like Constrict.
Tackle is the basic accurate 35 attack move. Gust and Scratch step up to 40 power. Quick Attack upgrades by always striking first.
Razor Wind is a piece of crap with 75% accuracy, charge up round, and 80 power. So 30 expected power per round. It gets better in Gen 2 with increased crit chance.
Cut is taught by HM and steps up to 50 power. Since HM’s cannot be forgotten don’t teach it to your starter. It’s useful for getting around midgame areas and needed to open Erika’s Grass gym.
Squirtle’s Skull Bash has 100 power but requires a charge up round. Consider it a bursty 50 power move.
Horn Attack hits with 65 power. Kangaskhan’s Dizzy Punch hits 70.
Swift has a consistent 100% accuracy and 60 power. This penetrates evasion/accuracy effects, Dig, and Fly.
Karate Chop is a great move with 50 power with increased crit chance. It changes to a fighting type move in Gen 2.
Slash is a top tier move with increased crit chance and 70 power.
There are various multi-attack moves like Fury Attack which are less accurate and hit 2-5 times for variable damage.
Bind and Wrap are low power attacks that trap the defender for two to five turns or until they switch out. These are commonly banned in competitive battles because they slow down the game and do not allow counter-play. Useful for tough fights.
Bite, Stomp, and Headbutt are 60, 65, and 70 power each. When attacking first in a turn, they feature a 30% chance to make the opponent flinch and miss their turn.
Raticate’s Hyper Fang has 80 power, 90% accuracy, and 10% flinch chance. Super Fang hits for precisely 1/2 of the opponent’s current health. It’s a great way to soften up and catch wild Pokemon.
Takedown is a cheap TM from Celadon Mall that most Pokemon can learn with 90 power at 85% accuracy. Double Edge steps it up to 100 power and 100% accuracy. Both deal 1/4 damage as recoil back to the attacker, using the attacker’s own health as a resource.
Brock’s Bide TM soaks attacks for 2-3 turns, then returns double damage.
Slam has 80 power with 75% accuracy for an expected 60 power.
Strength is an HM with 80 power and 100% accuracy. It can be learned by Pokemon with beefy arms like Machop. It’s useful to access late-game areas like Seafoam Islands and Victory Road.
Tri Attack is learned by Porygon and Dodrio with the same 80 power. Also buy TM 49 from the Celadon Department store for 2000 yen.
The next step up is the top-tier Body Slam with 85 power and a 30% chance to paralyze the opponent. The TM is found on S. S. Anne.
Thrash has a respectable 90 power. It attacks for 3-4 turns unless it gets interrupted. Then the user is confused and can be switched out. It powerful but risky to lose control.
Exeggcute’s Egg Bomb hits with 100 power at 75% accuracy. Hitmonlee’s Mega Kick steps this up to 120 power. The risk of reduced accuracy moves is they can miss multiple turns in a row. So Mega Kick is higher expected damage than Strength but less reliable.
Big bad Hyper Beam has 150 power at 90% accuracy. On Gameboy, if fails to KO the enemy, the user has to take a turn to recharge. Various glitches are caused by being hit with a binding move during the recharge round. In Pokemon Stadium recharge is always required. Lance’s dragons can sweep your team with Hyper Beam occasionally if you don’t bring a rock or ghost. You can outfit your whole team with the TM from Rocket Game Corner.
The 130 power Self Destruct and 250 power Explosion halve the opponent’s defense. So the real power is 260 and 500 respectively. These KO the attacker so use them as a last resort.
There are 30% accurate one-hit KO meme moves like Pinsir’s Guillotine and Rhydon’s Horn Drill. It’s strong when it works.
Healing Moves
A known bug on GameBoy can cause healing moves to fail.
Recover heals for up to half your maximum HP.
Chansey’s Softboiled does the same. Use it out of combat to transfer 20% of her massive HP pool to your other Pokemon. Less useful in Stadium.
Rest heals a Pokemon to full and puts them to sleep for two turns, waking up on the third. On GameBoy wake up with Poke Flute. It’s a riskier play in Stadium.
Flappy Bird Moves
Flying types are available from the humble Pidgey to end-game Moltres. Flying is similar to fire in crushing early game bugs and mid-game grass gym leader Erika. Early game birds lose steam relative to the legendaries.
Flyers are are immune to ground, resistant to grass and fighting, but weak to electric, rock, and ice.
Flying is offensively strong against fighters, bugs and grass. And offensively weak to rock.
Flying moves can target ghosts and psychics low defense stats.
Whirlwind flees the battle with a wild Pokemon if you are stuck. Mirror Move copies the previous Pokemon’s attack.
Peck and Wing Attack are accurate basic attacks with 35 base power. Drill Peck is a significant upgrade to 80 power.
Fly HM is a solid upgrade on the basics with 70 power. It takes a turn to charge up, during which the attacker is invulnerable to everything except Swift. This gives the opponent a chance to swap out to a tanky rock boi.
Moltres’ Sky Attack has 140 power but requires a vulnerable charge up round, so effectively it’s 70 power. Like the heavy duty version of Fly attack.
Flying is a very useful early to midgame type, but the early game birds fall off. The late-game is dominated by higher stat flyers like the legendary birds, Dragonite and Charizard. It’s super effective against Bruno’s fighters and the rival’s grass type.
Burninate the Countryside
Fire attacks key off the attacker and defender’s special attribute. Fire types tend to have high attack power and can threaten the opponent with normal, flying, or ground moves.
Fire attacks are strong against grass, bugs, and ice. But most ice types are dual type water. Fire attacks are weak against ground, water, rocks, dragons and fellow fires.
Fire are defensively strong against bug and grass types - not ice! They are weak to ground, rock, and water.
Fire attacks cause the burned condition with some probability. Fire types are immune to burn.
Ember is the basic 100% accurate fire attack with 40 attack and 10% burn chance.
Fire Spin is a binding move with 15 power and 70 accuracy. It’s best when the attacker goes first.
Magmar’s Fire Punch steps up to 75 power and full accuracy.
The capstone fire move Flamethrower has 95 power. Flamethrower is the best overall fire move, but only certain Pokemon learn it by leveling up. The quickest is Vulpix at 34, followed by Charmander at 38.
Consider duplicating Blaine’s Fire Blast TM. It hits with 120 power with 75% accuracy, and steps up to 30% chance of burn.
The fire starter Charmander does well against early bugs, then struggles against Brock and Misty. Fire types do well in the midgame gyms, particularly Erika. And Flamethrower scales nicely with special. But leveling fire types feels slow without Flamethrower or Fire Blast.
The late-game is challenging against Giovanni’s strong ground types, then Lorelei’s water and Lance’s dragons. Only two fights in the Elite Four strongly favor fire types: Lorelei’s Jynx and the rival’s grass.
Rock ‘Em
The rock type has all of two moves. All rocks are dual types. Half of rock types are fossils who don’t learn rock attacks. And Onyx blows.
Rock, fighting, and ground form a broader cluster of Pokemon. In the trading card game they all get grouped under the fighting umbrella.
Rock attacks are strong against flying, bug, fire, and ice types. They are weak against fighting and ground types.
Rock types are defensively weak against fighting, ground, water, and grass types. They resist normal, flying, poison, and fire.
Rocks tend to have high defense.
Geodude and Onyx Rock Throw has 50 power and 65% accuracy. That’s damn inaccurate with 32.5 expected power.
Rock Slide is a TM acquired by giving the girl on the top floor of Caledon Mall a soda pop. It steps up to a respectable 75 power and 90% accuracy. This is a solid TM to duplicate. Teach it to whoever can use it. Geodude and Rhydon are prime choices.
Rock is an overall useful type for its strength against normal, poison, and birds. Koga, Blaine, Agatha, Lance, and the rival are all great fights for rocks.
And Fighters Sock ‘Em
The fighting type is similar to both rock and normal. The strongest fighting moves are Hitmonlee’s kicks. But other fighters have great attack and do well with normal, rock, and ground moves.
Fighting moves are super effective against normal, rock, and ice types. They are ineffective against flying, poison, bug, and psychic. Ghosts are immune.
Fighters are defensively weak against only flying and psychic moves. They resist rock and bug attacks.
Bug and fighting are both low effectiveness against each other. Rock types have high defense and low special, making grass and water moves more effective.
Low Kick hits for 50 power with 90% accuracy and a 30% chance of flinch on the opponent when attacking first. It’s a great early move for Mankey and Machop. As of Gen 3 the power is based on the opponent’s weight.
Double Kick hits twice with 30 power and 100% accuracy. So 60 power in practice.
Hitmonlee’s Rolling Kick has 60 power, 85% accuracy, and 30% chance to flinch the opponent when attacking first.
Jump Kick has 70 power with 95% accuracy. On a miss Hitmonlee takes 1 damage from the crash. Hi Jump Kick steps up to 85 power and 100% accuracy.
Seismic Toss deals consistent damage equal to the attacker’s level and hits ghosts.
Submission is a specialty of Machop. The TM can be bought at Celadon Mall. It features 80 power, 80% accuracy, and 25% recoil damage to the attacker. Though the base power isn’t stellar, it scales well with a high attack and HP.
Counter is a Hitmonchan meme and TM from Celadon mall. It always goes second and returns double damage if your opponent hit you with a normal or fighting move. Else it wastes the turn.
Fighting is great for wild fights and trainer battles against rock and normal types. But it has niche defenses. Fighting types struggle in the midgame grass, poison, and psychic gyms. Fighters do well in the Giovanni and Lorelei fights.
Into the Ground
Ground rounds out the cluster with fighting and rock. Ground features powerhouse physical moves.
Ground is super effective against poison, rock, fire, and electric. It’s not effective against bug and grass. Flyers are immune to ground.
Ground is defensively strong against poison and rock, and immune to electric. It’s weak to water, grass, and ice.
Note the polarizing immunities against electric and flying.
Bone Club is Cubone’s basic move. It hits with 65 power at 85% accuracy. Very solid damage for a basic attack.
Then Bonemerang steps up to two hits with 50 power and 90% accuracy, for 90 expected power.
Sand Attack lowers enemy accuracy. And Diglett’s Fissure is a 30% accurate one-hit KO.
Dig has a charge-up round during which the attacker is semi-invulnerable similar to Fly. It has 100 power at 100% accuracy. A few moves can hit the attacker underground: Swift, Earthquake, and Fissure. Dig can be disrupted due to paralysis and confusion.
Overall Dig is clunky but incredibly powerful. It's learned by Diglett and from a TM from defeating a Rocket Grunt in Cerulean City. Useful out of combat for teleporting to a Poke Center.
Earthquake hits right away with the same 100 power as Dig. The move is learned by Geodude and Diglett lines, and is picked up as a TM in Silph Co. A great candidate for duplication.
Ground moves sweep Surge’s electric gym, Koga’s poison, Blaine’s fire, and Agatha’s ghosts. Watch out against flyers, grass, water and ice.
Bring the Thunder
Electric types are offensively strong against the many flyers in the sky and fish in the sea. They tend to be offensive with high speed and special but lower HP and defense.
Electric moves are super effective against water and flying.
Electric moves are not very effective against grass, electric, and dragons. Ground types are immune. Electric moves cannot paralyze electric opponents.
Electric types resist other electric and flying type attacks. They are weak to ground.
All electric moves are special attacks. The basic Thunder Shock starts with 40 power, 100% accuracy, and 10% chance of paralyzing the opponent.
Electabuzz’ Thunder Punch upgrades to 75 attack.
Thunderbolt is the best electric attack with 95 power. The TM is a reward from beating electric gym leader Lt. Surge and can be learned by companion Pikachu in Yellow. A great TM to duplicate.
Thunder has 120 power and 70% accuracy for 84 expected power. Pick up the TM at the Power Plant.
Thunderwave paralyzes the opponent with 100% accuracy. Does not affect ground types but does hit the target behind Substitute. Run this or Agility to boost your own Pokemon’s speed.
In a normal playthrough, electric’s strongest matchups are Misty, Lorelei, and flyers on Lance’s and your rival’s team. It’s also very helpful for farming common birds, Zubats, and the Seafoam islands for XP. There are many top tier water and flyers in Stadium to counter like Gyarados, Articuno, Charizard, etc.
Pikachu just needs to sit out in Giovanni’s ground gym.
Grass: The Devil’s Lettuce
Grass moves deal less direct damage with more status effects than other types. Most grass Pokemon are dual type, especially grass/poison. All grass moves are special attacks in Gen 1.
Grass moves are super effective against water, ground, and rock Pokemon. Fire, flying, poison, bug and dragon types all resist grass.
Grass types resist water, ground, and electric attacks. They are weak to fire, flying, poison, bug, and ice type moves.
Absorb is Oddish’ basic attack with 20 power and 100% accuracy. The user recovers half the inflicted damage. Equivalent to the bug move Leech Life.
Mega Drain TM is a reward for beating grass gym leader Erika. It hits with 40 power and the same recovery mechanic as Absorb.
Vine Whip is a physical grass attack with 35 power. I haven’t mentioned Power Points previously since they are rarely relevant. But the 10 PP of Vine Whip is challenging in the early game before you have access to Ether refills.
Razor Leaf is learned only by the Bulbasaur and Bellsprout lines. It has power 55, 95% accuracy, and increased critical ratio. Think of it as the grass version of Slash. This is in practice the strongest grass move.
Oddish’ Petal Dance is a special move with 70 power and 100% accuracy. It attacks for up to 3-4 turns if not interrupted, similar to Thrash. Then the user is confused. The damage compares well to Solar Beam but losing control sucks.
Solar Beam is a special attack which requires a charge up round. On the second round it hits with 120 power and 100% accuracy. TM 22 is found in the Cinnebar mansion, learned eventually by Bulbasaur and Exeggcute. Consider it 60 power per turn.
Leech Seed is a 90% accurate move. It causes a temporary status that deals chip damage and heals the attacker’s Pokemon at the end of the turn. It’s useful for tough fights like Zapdos and Lance. The bug effect to stack damage with Toxic is fixed in Stadium.
Sleep Powder sleeps the opponent with a solid 75% accuracy. Parasect’s Spore is 100% accurate. Stun Spore paralyzes the opponent with the same 75% accuracy.
Growth increases the user’s special. Useful against weak or sleeping opponents to power up your Mega Drain and Solar Beam.
Overall grass has a solid early game against Brock, Misty and Surge. Then it is weak in the midgame against Erika, Koga, Blaine, and Sabrina for grass/poison types. It picks back up for the Seafoam Islands, Giovanni, Lorelei and Bruno.
Watch out for ice moves from ice types or high special opponents. Like Lorelei’s Lapras or your rival’s Blastoise.
Don’t Eat Ze Bugs
Bugs are among the weakest types in Gen 1. The move-pool is limited and type matchups are rough. Most bugs have low stat point totals. Only Beedrill learns any good bug moves.
Bug moves are super effective against grass, poison, and psychics. They are resisted by fire, flying, and ghosts.
Bug types are weak to fire, flying, and rock type attacks. They resist grass, fighting, and ground.
In Gen 2 the super effectiveness against poison types is removed, as well as resistance to ground types. And they learn better moves.
All bug moves are physical. The high attack bugs, Scyther and Pinsir, don’t learn any of these.
Leech Life hits with 20 power and 100% accuracy. The user recovers half of the HP damage, similar to Absorb.
Beedrill’s Twineedle hits twice with a power of 25 and 100% accuracy, with 20% chance to poison a non-poison type opponent. Effectively 50 power.
Pin Missile is a multi-attack move unique to Beedrill and Jolteon. It has 85% accuracy with power 14 and hits from 2-5 times. Twineedle is more reliable, but Pin Missile can high roll for greater power with 4+ hits.
Overall the most useful bugs are Paras, Butterfree, and Venomoth for Stun Spore and Sleep Powder. Scyther hits hard with normal attacks like Slash. Pinsir can learn fighting attacks like Submission and Seismic Toss.
Bugs are always great against grass types. Bug/poison dual types work well against poison and fighting. Non-poison bugs have better defense against psychics.
The Taste of Poison
Poison moves have low damage and apply status effects. Poison types tend to have more defensive stats and rely on chip damage. It’s useful against grass, bug, and fighting opponents. Watch out for psychics and ground.
Poison moves are super effective against grass and non-poison bugs. They are not effective against ground, rock, and ghosts.
Poison types resist poison, grass and fighting attacks. They are weak to ground, psychic, and bug type attacks.
Poison types are immune to the poison type condition including Toxic.
The basic Poison Sting has 15 power, 100% accuracy, and a 20% chance to poison.
Koffing’s Smog has 20 power with 70% accuracy and 40% chance to poison.
Poison Gas poisons the opponent with 55% accuracy. Poison Powder steps up to 75%.
Acid Armor increases defense by two stages. Learned only by Grimer and Vaporeon.
Acid hits with 40 power and has a 25% chance to lower the target’s defense.
Sludge hits with 65 power and a 40% chance of poison.
Toxic TM is a reward from beating gym master Koga. It badly poisons the target with 85% accuracy, causing accelerating damage over the course of the battle.
Overall poison has a few favorable matchups against Erika, the Saffron fighting gym, and Bruno’s fighters. It sucks against Sabrina, Giovanni, and Agatha.
Arbok learns the useful 100% paralysis move Glare. And there are many great dual-type poisons like Bulbasaur, Bellsprout, Nidoran…
Spoopy Ghosts
Related to poison, there is one line of ghost type Pokemon: Gastly → Haunter → Gengar, all of which are ghost/poison. They feature low attack and defense but high speed and special.
Lick is a physical attack with 30 power and 30% chance of paralysis. Lick is the only move that can be super effective or resisted. It’s not great.
Lick is super effective against other ghosts
Normal, psychic, and fighting types are immune to Lick
Ghosts are immune to normal and fighting moves. They resist poison and bug attacks.
Confuse Ray inflicts confusion with 100% accuracy, upgrading on the normal type Supersonic’s 55% accuracy.
Night Shade deals consistent damage equal to the user’s level like Seismic Toss.
The strength of the ghost line is the immunity to normal and fighting moves like Lance’s Hyper Beams. And the resistance to poison.
Watch out against psychic and ground attacks. Haunter/Gengar can sweep Koga, Bruno, and Lance.
Psychic Melts Everything
Psychic is the most powerful type. All psychic attacks are special and psychic types have high special.
Psychic moves are super effective against fighting and poison-type Pokémon. They are not very effective only against other psychics.
In Gen 1 psychic types are vulnerable to the very few bug type attacks. They resist fighting attacks and are immune to Ghastly’s Lick.
Psychic feels overpowered due to the lack of real counters. The best counter to psychic is a tanky boi that hits with a strong physical move or inflicts paralysis or sleep.
The basic attack Confusion has 50 power, 100% accuracy, and a 10% chance of confusing the opponent.
Kadabra’s Psybeam steps up to 65 power with the same accuracy and confuse chance.
The Psychic move has 90 power with a 33% chance to lower the target’s special stat. The precious TM 29 is given by Mr. Psychic in Saffron City. Great choice to duplicate.
Dream Eater only is available to the Gastly line and Drowzee via TM 42 near Viridian City. It only hits when the opponent is asleep, with 100 power and 100% accuracy. The attacker is healed for health like Mega Drain.
Psywave is 80% accurate and deals a random amount of damage between 1x and 1.5x the user’s level. The TM is given to you after defeating Sabrina. It’s like Seismic Toss and Night Shade with more variability.
Psychic has a bunch of useful status changers:
Light Screen halves the damage of incoming special attacks for 5 turns. Pierced by critical strikes.
Reflect similarly halves damage of incoming physical attacks, but ignored by confusion self-hits and critical strikes.
Barrier raises the user’s defense by two stages.
Agility raises speed two stages.
Amnesia raises special two stages. Killer on Mewtwo, Slowbro, etc. ALSO WTF IS GOING ON?
Hitmonlee’s Meditate increases attack
Abra’s Teleport flees the battle or returns to a Poke Center out of combat
Psychic types easily sweep Koga, Giovanni, Bruno and Agatha. Pokemon with high special like Gengar are a bit trickier. Psychic is seriously overpowered.
Water: Thanks for All the Fish
Water moves have excellent coverage against some common and powerful types. Water types tend to have great special and HP. They can learn ice moves and the reliable Surf HM.
Water-type moves are super effective against ground, rock, and fire-type Pokémon. They are not very effective against water, grass, and dragon types.
Water-type Pokémon resist water, fire, and ice moves.
Water is the most Pokemon common type!
Most water moves are special, except for Clamp and Crabhammer. Withdraw increases defense.
Bubble is the basic water attack with a power of 20 and 100% accuracy. It has a 33% chance to lower the target’s speed.
Water Gun is a step up to 40 power. Available via TM in Mt. Moon. Gyarados is a prime candidate.
Shellder’s Clamp is a physical binding move with 35 power and 85% accuracy. It can hit from two to five times. It’s a step up from Wrap.
Krabby’s Crabhammer is another physical move with 90 power, 85% accuracy and increased critical. It’s the water version of Slash and Razor Leaf.
Goldeen’s Waterfall is a special move with 80 power and 100% accuracy. It gets better in Gen 2.
Surf is a killer move with 95 power. The HM is a reward for finding the secret house in the Fuchsia Safari Zone. It’s needed to access late-game areas like the Power Plant. Teach it to all your water types for free.
Hydro Pump is 80% accurate with 120 power for 96 expected power. It’s a higher miss risk for more potential damage compared to Surf.
Overall water is an incredibly useful type. Squirtle is considered the best starter for speed runs. Giga chad Gyarados is arguably the most powerful Pokemon over the course of a playthrough.
Water starts with a great matchup against Brock, falls off with the mirror against Misty and unfavorable matchups against Surge and Erika. Then comes back strong against Blaine, Giovanni, and Bruno.
Ice Kills
All ice Pokemon are dual types, most being Water/Ice. And most water Pokemon can at least learn Ice Beam or Blizzard. Ice is a very strong offensive type that keys off special, with a few notable weaknesses.
Ice moves are super effective against grass, ground, flying, and dragon type Pokemon. It’s not very effective against water and ice. Neutral vs fire.
Ice Punch, Ice Beam, and Blizzard all have a 10% chance to freeze the opponent.
Ice-type Pokemon are weak to fire, fighting, and rock type moves. They resist other ice attacks and are immune to freeze.
Aurora Beam is learned by Shellder and Seel. It has 65 power and 100% accuracy, with a 33% chance to lower the target’s attack stat. No freeze chance.
Jynx Ice Punch has 75 power with 100% accuracy.
Ice Beam is 100% accurate with 95 power. It’s learned via leveling by Lapras, Seel, and Shellder. Give the girl at the top of Celedon Mall a water for TM 13.
Blizzard is 90% accurate with 110 power, for expected power of 99. Learned by Jynx and Articuno, or via TM 14 in Cinnebar Mansion.
Haze clears temporary statuses like stat changes and confusion. Mist prevents status effects.
Ice types are rare and powerful. All of them are powerful, and Articuno rules the roost. Ice Beam or Blizzard is dangerous on any Pokemon with decent special. Ice smokes Giovanni and Lance and is very strong in the rival fight.
Here Be Dragons
There’s only one line of dragon Pokemon and one dragon move. Dragon is strong on defense except against ice.
Dragon Rage deals a flat 40 damage that is not affected by type. It can be obtained as a TM in Rocket Game Corner, or learned by Dratini and Gyarados. It’s fine for the early game but outclassed past level 40 by Seismic Toss.
Dragons resist fire, water, grass, and electric-type attacks. They are weak to ice.
Dragonair learns Hyper Beam at level 55 and evolves into the pseudo-legendary Dragonite. Dragonite is dual type dragon/flying and therefore 4x vulnerable to ice. But it’s got a solid 600 total stats to wreck your opponent with Hyper Beam and any TMs you fancy. It’s great in Stadium.
You won’t level Dragonair to 55 before the Elite Four. Instead teach it a nice move like Surf for Blaine, Giovanni, and Bruno. Stay away from Lorelei’s ice types.
SPOILER ALERT: Snape Kills Dumbledore
Let’s wrap up with how the game flows in practice. The early game is pretty linear. After getting your starter from Pallet Town, you go to the Viridian City Poke Mart and come back to deliver Oak’s Parcel.
Then you can then catch wild Pokemon with Pokeballs. You work your way up through the Viridian Forest to Pewter City to face Brock’s Rock/Ground gym. Charmander and Spearow are great to take on Bug Catchers. Squirtle, Bulbasaur, Butterfree, or Mankey in Yellow all work great in the gym.
Then you go through Mount Moon, facing Team Rocket and a horde of Zubats. Pikachu and Geodude are helpful for these fights. You can use Moon Stones to evolve your Clefairy or Nidorino for beastly stats.
You then come out to Cerulean City and have the option to fight Misty’s water gym right away or catch Pokemon and level in the area. It’s a good chance to pick up a grass type like Bellsprout and evolve your dudes.
Then you head to Vermillion City. Diglett and Sandshrew (Blue) are helpful ground types for Lt. Surge’s electric gym. Clearing the S. S. Anne and gym lets you use the Cut and Flash HM’s.
The Old Rod lets you fish up Magikarp which can evolve to Giga Chad Gyarados. Psychic types are available in Abra and Drowzee. Diglett’s cave is a great place to level up to 20+.
With your HM’s you can head east through Rock Tunnel to Lavender Town. Machop is a great pick up here. Now the game opens up a bit. Beating up Team Rocket in Celadon City gives you the Silph Scope. This let’s you catch Cubone and Gastly in the Pokemon Tower, and earn the Poke Flute.
You can take on Erika’s grass gym, fighting gym, and Sabrina’s psychic gym whenever you’re ready. Sabrina is by far the strongest gym before Giovanni.
Poke Flute let’s you wake and catch the Snorlax that block your way to Fuchsia City. Pick up the Fly TM west of Celadon for fast travel. Then catch more Pokemon and pick up the Surf and Strength TM in the Safari Zone. Take on Koga’s poison ninja gym to enable the HMs.
This let’s you access the Power Plant, Seafoam Islands, and Cinnebar Island. These have many options electric, water, ice, and fire and poison type Pokemon. Catch Zapdos, Articuno, and anything else your heart desires.
Clear Cinnebar Mansion and level up your water and ground types. Then take on Blaine’s fire gym and any others you had skipped.
With seven badges you can return to Viridian City for one more showdown with Giovanni. He now has an expanded roster of ground and normal types. Water, grass, ice, and fighting types do well here.
Make sure you have Strength and Surf in your party, then head west of Viridian for another rival battle and Victory Road. You can level up Pokemon to the mid 40’s here against various trainers and wild Pokemon. And catch the third legendary bird Moltres.
Then comes the Elite Four fight. There are no Poke Center breaks, so bring a level 40+ team that counters the opponents and plenty of consumables. Zapdos and Articuno are level 50 and awesome.
Lorelei fights with a mix of water, psychic, and ice types. Dewgong and Slowbro don’t do much. Cloyster Jynx and Lapras are bigger threats. Fighting and electric do well here.
Bruno has rock/ground and fighting types: two Onix, Hitmonchan, Hitmonlee, and Machamp. He likes to use X Defend and Focus Energy LOL. Grass, water or psychic types easily clear.
Agatha uses ghost and poison. Two Gengar, Haunter, Golbat, and Arbok. The second Gengar knows Toxic. Golbat alternatively applies Confuse Ray then clears it with Haze. She often switches Pokemon or tries Dream Eater and Hypnosis. Bring your Poke Flute and a ground or psychic attacker.
Lance is a dragon trainer. He has a Gyarados, two Dragonairs, Aerodactyl and Dragonite. Watch out for Hyper Beams from all five. Electric or grass works against Gyarados. Ghosts, rocks, and ice otherwise do well.
Finally take on the rival one more time. He has now levelled his team up to 60+. His line-up depends on your version and starter. The Yellow team features his fully evolved Eevee. In Red and Blue expect:
Pidgeot with Sky Attack
Alakazam
Rhydon
Arcanine or Charizard
Gyarados or Blastoise with Blizzard
Exeggcutor or Venusaur
Oak comes back, scolds his dumbass grandson, and inducts you to the Hall of Fame. After the credits roll, restart your game and you are back in Pallet Town. Heal up at Mom’s house.
Surf to the cave northwest of Cerulean City to pick up more items and catch Mewtwo. Fly back to Indigo Plateau to farm the Elite Four for XP cash. Keep catching Pokemon and trade to get all 150 Pokemon and a neat diploma.
Congrats Poke Master!