I like how when I typed in physical special split, RUclips immediately knew I was thinking Pokemon. But you know, when we say that phrase out loud, it sounds like we're ordering an ice cream flavor & not talking game freak. Lol...
This is the worst reality up to gen 3. And not just the physical/special split as many pokemon have a type or 2 and they can't even learn one stab move. I played Sapphire and Green Leaf and allways used the same team because there is no alternatives to so many problems of design in pokemon,one of the most annoying is that bullshit "evolve by trade",it's like you find a baby dog that will remain baby until death because it wasn't traded. Nintendo may be one of the greatest game producers but they did many dumb things.
@@grumpygengar22Easy trick to remember which type was special, or physical. All eevelotuions type + dragon type were special, all other type were physical.
Little fun fact : prior to the split Dark wad a special type, but once the split happened, EVERY SINGLE offensive Dark type moves present in gen 3 became physical, which I find hilarious
I think this is because they got confused over what dark type was meant to represent. I assume it was meant to be like dark magic so it would be special. But then they gave it moves associated with being underhand which would be dark in a gangster sort of dark.
Part of this feels like it was also done to compliment the already existing Dark, all of which were strong physical attackers except for the Houndour line
Ghost and Dark should have been switched regarding special/physical. Houndoom was the only one who benefited. All other dark and ghosts were severely nerfed, especially Gengar and Tyranitar. What a waste.
@@jolteon43Tyranitar is prob the best non Uber mon in gen 3 while Gengar is at least top 5. Tyranitar and Gengar are probably the most customizable pokemon in that aswell.
But in exchange it received coverage moves that actually properly complemented its Psychic STAB, namely Shadow Ball and Focus Blast, which is easily better for Zam in the long run instead of being highly meta-dependent.
@@cultofmel ghost is NOT offensively lacking lmfao, it doesnt hit a lot of things supereffectively but its still one of the best offensive typings in the game due to how few things resist it and immunity it. There's a reason that Shadow Ball is one of the most notoriously spammable moves of all time. It doesn't need to hit things supereffectively as often as, say Flamethrower, when barely anything resists it.
Sure Alakazam lost the usability of those moves so Fighting types like Hitmonchan (you know, the boxer Pokémon, which fights with his fists) or physical Attackers like Feraligatr can use it.
@@cultofmel and then heatran gets blown back by dragapult carrying hydro pump for coverage. Shadow ball isnt just spammable because it's a good move on its own, but coverage for its resists is common and easy to slot in. You can also u-turn on the switch, bringing in something that threatens the check to your ghost type, or alternatively double if you dont have uturn. The game isnt as simple as 'just counter it' because its a 6v6 game and as soon as your check to shadow ball is dead or chipped, the shadow ball user (blaceph, dragapult, aegislash, you know how this goes) is getting a kill every time its safely sent in.
@@cultofmel the point is that Alakazam got the coverage it needed to actually hit the types that resisted Psychic, letting post phys/special split Alakazam achieve something that it could not before: perfect neutral coverage, which is especially relevant against Dark-types like Tyranitar and Houndoom which otherwise shrugged off its elemental punches and dicked it over with Pursuit every time. Also, you view Focus Blast as a 30% chance to fail, but you should be seeing it as a 70% chance to just KO your supposed counter that no other move can do for you (this is why you don't see "Hidden Power Fighting" Alakazams, as the move is a 100% chance to hit BUT NOT KILL the target so you might as well not bother). Speaking of power, you are overestimating the strength of the elemental punches as those alone won't carry a Pokémon; to put it into perspective, Starmie (100 SpA) does more damage with its BoltBeam than Alakazam (135 SpA) does with its Thunder/IcePunch. Even Gengar has Thunderbolt to fall back onto so it's not completely relying on unSTAB 75 BP moves to carry its offense. Heck, Gengar is another example of a Pokémon who loves trading away special elemental punches in favour of special STAB + Focus Blast coverage instead.
The reason that Gen 3 Dark types got dicked over in particular may be that they were already thinking of doing the physical/special split back then in Gen 3, but kinda didn't have the time for it so it got pushed back to Gen 4. Chances are, the Dark types of Gen 3 were all made with the physical/special split in mind, and weren't changed when they ran outta time to enact it
Hoenn in general has a weird mix of Pokemon that got screwed over in some way by the lack of P/S split _and_ ones that got screwed _by_ the said split. The former are the Dark types (as you've mentioned), Breloom, Medicham, Masquerain, arguably Metagross or Flygon. The latter are Sceptile and Banette... OK there aren't actually that many of them but the two I listed are very severe cases.
Fun fact: Bite in Gen 1 was Normal, meaning it was physical. It’s the ONLY move to go from Physical to Special (changing from Normal to Dark) back to Physical again (Physical/Special Split).
You forgot to mention how Sceptile also had a lot of special coverage that changed into physical attacks in gen 4, being thunder punch, crunch, and dragon claw.
@@AzureGreatheart i mean give it these moves and give it tail glow because why game freak did not give it dragon pulse by level up and did not even give it a set up move for special attack is just what game freak would do nowadays and is just strange
In case some of you newer players find it hard to remember which types were physical or special before the split, here's a simple way to remember it: Every single eeveelution type (water grass electric fire ice dark psychic) + dragon were special, every other type was physical
2 pokemon who got immensely better thanks to the split, Sneasel and Dragonite. Sneasel is a physical attacker who was cursed with a dual typing both special. Now it can learn STAB physical dark and ice attacks. Dragonite is also a physical attacker and wasn't hitting at full power with any Dragon, Electric, Fire or Water moves they are a favorite to learn. Outside of Hyper Beam, Dragonite wasn't at full potential before gen 4.
Dragonite was kind of a mixed bag. It gained physical dragon STABs, but lost its physical flying STAB, and Flying/Earthquake coverage is really good to the point where once it finally got back one turn physical flying moves with Z-Fly and Dual Wingbeat, Flying/Ground became its dominant dragon dance attacks again.
Didn't Banette learn Shadow Claw in Gen 4? Meaning it wouldn't lose its offense as a physical ghost? It does get weaker in the sense that every other ghost type can now hit with stab, but its not like Banette had to solely rely on dark type moves now
Rainbow Rattle Cross Poison and Poison Jab are good, but going from 90 bp to just 80 or even 70 bp still hurts a lot. For comparison, 90 bp to 70 bp is more drastic of a damage dropoff than going from Thunder/Fire Blast/Blizzard to Thunderbolt/Flamethrower/Ice Beam (22% damage loss vs 18% damage loss).
True, which is why it's so strange that they didn't have this in place from the beginning. It's like, if you're already treating bite like a physical attack, then why is it special?
I think there are a couple other notable mentions. The elemental punches going from special to physical was mostly beneficial to most, but it really hurt certain Pokémon such as Typhlosion and Sceptile who both were unique in that they had thunderpunch to round out their coverage.
Always found it dumb that dark was a special type. The dark moves usable in gens 2/3 would all become physical attacks (bite, crunch, pursuit, faint attack, etc). Most dark types were also physical attackers
I love how they changed Crunch lowering Sp.Def to lowering Def as it became a physical move. Also why did GameFreak made "Ghost" a physical move like why?
Because Lick was the only damaging Ghost move that didn't deal fixed damage and licking is clearly a physical thing. I'd still argue that being licked by a ghost would deal "supernatural damage" though.
Yeah i guess you are correct. However this poses a new question... Why is Lick a Ghost type move in the first place :D You would think it would be normal type like lickitung
@@fratbarsmeric901 Because it was the Gastly line's signature move (and Jynx, for some reason), they used their tongues a lot in stuff like the Stadium models and the anime. Lickitung didn't even learn Lick yet lmao.
Really excited to see the whole video it was one of my favorite new changes when I was a kid playing Pokemon diamond and pearl for the first time. Thank you RUclips recorded
Remember is Physical attack is not only based if made contact or not. Bite makes contact, so triggers stuff like poison point. Earthquake is physical but doesn't make contact, so poison point dont trigger
Its so crazy to think that before this split that Bite and Crunch were such weird and confusing moves. Glad the split happened and god don't remind me about Absol and Mightyena. They were both done SO dirty.
A lot of Pokémon benefited from the Physical/Special split, so it is fascinating to see those who suffered from it. A similar sort of video could easily be done for the Gen 1 Special split into Special Attack/Special Defence. 1:51 - I always found it odd that Ice was Special and Ground was Physical. Given there was a lot of Water/Ice and Rock/Ground types originally, I felt having them in those respective categories meant they were too similar. That an Ice has quite a physical presence whereas Ground was presented through less solid things such as sand, mud and the vibrations of quakes. 2:40 - Which is a shame for Ledian, who could actually use Ice Punch and Thunder Punch quite effectively in Gen 2 and 3 (though to be fair, this Pokémon was clearly meant to be some physical puncher... they just didn't give it the stats for it). 4:28 - As someone who has used an original Gen 3 Mightyena, I knew this dark puppy was likely to make this list. They knew that Dark was special and still made a Physical attacking Pokémon with Bite and Crunch as it's main attacks. A similar situation occurs with Mawile, a Steel type lacking offensive Steel moves and having Crunch as it's strongest natural attack. 7:07 - Having watched someone do a solo Misdreavus run recently, it did make me realise that Banette and Shedninja were the only Physical focused Ghost types made before the Attack/Special split. Again, they knew Ghost was a physical based attack and yet kept making Special stat focused Ghost types. Rather coincidental to see Banette pop up here. Fun video; tons of info and explanations packed into a concise package.
it's interesting to think about who was hurt from the split DEFENSIVELY too. I think the steel types with huuuuge physical defense (i/m thinking steelix and aagron in particular) were wayy tankier in gen 3 because most of the super effective moves (ground/fighting) were physical. Fire is really the only exception, and their ground/rock moves usually could cover for them. You couldn't really hit them with a special move since they resisted it, and super effective physical moves were papercuts to their massive physical defense. just food for thought
@@nlb137 oh right this is so true. particularly thinking milotic, mantine, tentacruel. wow looking through the pokedex there are a ton of evolution lines that fit this lol
Aggron has glaring 4x weaknesses to both ground and fighting, two of the best offensive types in the game. Having such huge physical defense doesn’t matter much when your typing sucks defensively. For Steelix, it’s special defense is awful and it’s ground typing gives it a weakness to the plethora of bulky waters in Gen 3 OU such as Suicune, Swampert, Vaporeon and Milotic (same goes for Aggron since, again, its typing sucks defensively).
While Flygon definitely got better with the split, I don’t think it deserves to be on this list. You can get the Dig TM on Route 114 in the Fossil Maniac’s Hut before you even have access to Trapinch, so you aren’t stuck using Sand Tomb for ground STAB before you get the Earthquake TM. Additionally, it’s special attack is still base 80 as opposed to something truly awful like the base 60 of Gyarados. While not great, it’s still serviceable for powerful moves like Flamethrower, Fire Blast, STAB Dragon Claw and even Crunch when we’re talking about a playthrough.
I think the most benefited Pokémon from the Physical Special Split will always be Gengar. The ghost boy literally gained access to his two STAB types in Gen 4 which he essentially couldn't use for 3 whole generations, having to rely on Psychic, Thunderbolt and Elemental Punches to do special damage, coupled with some Explosion shenanigans. Gaining access to Shadow Ball and Sludge Bomb as STAB, special attacks was what turned Gengar from a great Pokémon to a top tier Pokémon 👌 On the other side of the spectrum the biggest loser from the Physical Special Split, for me, by far, is Milotic. Milotic is a massively specially defensive tank, one of the infamous bulky waters, and it really carried that name on with pride because if you wanted to hit it for super effective damage you HAD to hit the mermaid on it's far stronger special defense, since both Grass and Electric moves (the only types that hit Water for super effective) were exclusively special hitting types. Henceforth, if you wanted to take care of an opposing Milotic, you really had to hit hard on its physical defensive side with strong, neutral hits, or you needed to boast an outstanding special attack stat to truly make a dent on it (which also could imply putting yourself at risk of being hit with a brutal Mirror Coat in return). Nowadays you can target Milotic with physical Grass or Electric attacks to achieve far better results.
Funny enough there's a whole counter argument to your Gengar point from some competitive gen 3 players as the split took away Gengars use of elemental punches (ice and fire specifically) for coverage and essentially making it's sets more predictable as not including moves like shadow ball focus blast tbolt or sludge bomb after the split would come as a surprise. The split also made Gengar a lot more vulnerable to a Ttar pursuit. I think Gengar is just as versatile since the split but the physical special split itself did make movesets in general more predictable and STAB oriented. I think this change was entirely necessary and did way more good than harm but I do wish certain pokemon were still as viable as they were in gen 3.
Fun fact, bite is the only move to change it's attacking stat twice. It was a normal type move in gen 1 so it was based on the attack stat. Second fun fact, the fighting and psychic types are the only types to have none of their older moves effected by the physical/special split. All gen 3 and older fighting moves remained physical, while all gen 3 and older psychic moves remained special
I've been playing Pokemon games since Gen 2 was released, and didn't know of the Physical/Special split until a few weeks ago. I never knew that certain types were either all physical or all special instead of the move itself. I knew Steel, Rock and Fighting were all physical moves back then, but that's common sense. Just crazy how it took them to Gen 4 to correct it to make it the move itself as Physical or Special and not the typing.
you forgot the biggest one imo that got so much worse after the split, Alakazam. back in gens 2 and 3 having an Alakazam with psychic+ 3 punches basically guaranteed you have almost all you needed in terms of special attack for your team. once he lost the coverage of his punches he basically fell hard
Honestly I feel like the physical/ special type split makes so much more sense that I just assumed it was always there so I’m thrown off every time I play the old games or see someone playing them lol
Ironically, Tranquil from Gen 5 would’ve thrived in Gen 3 because a lot of flying type moves it learns are special like air cutter, before air slash was introduced in Gen 4. A physical flying type move with a high Crit rate alongside an ability that raises critical hit rates would’ve made Tranquil a powerful Pokémon.
GEN 3 is my favorite games. They where my first games I played and hoenn is just so beautiful. I am not a fan of the physical spechial Split. I know that most Pokémon got better because of this but i though it where more difficult and intressting. For example Flareon has a good special deffense and therefore water attacks wont work good at it. Instead you need to find a ground type and use that instead of just using a tm or having 2 water type moves in your arsenal. You doing good content keep going.
Ironically forgot to mention Gengar. It was the king of Gen III due to its access to Tbolt, fire and ice punch and G drain. Sure it's stabs got better but that coverage was phenomenal back in Gen III. Alakazam also benefitted from this but it wasn't as good due to an inability to hard counter Swampert with G drain
This video popped up so randomly just after finishing studying and was so nicely done mate. I think an employee from game freak hated dark type and it got done so bad, in gen 3 like how can u make dark a special attacking type and give it no special attacker. Gen 4 did many things right including special/special split. Enjoyed the video alot mate
The physical special split actually hurt gyarados and salamence a bit by removing hidden power flying as one of the only reliable physical flying moves they ever learnt
But gaining physical Water and Dragon STAB exchange, both of which are stronger than physical Hidden Power Flying? They definitely gained more than they had lost.
nah, i'd say an 80 power STAB physical water move is worth it, not to mention he can learn Crunch, even non-STAB with its attack stat, thats going hurt, he can really mess up psychic types with little to no problems. this is huge in Lets Go!!! (i am meming here, Lets Go!! is pathetically easy and for Arceus Sake, get the Alolan Muk)
My favorite part about Shadow Ball before the physical special split is that it still lowered Sp. Def at the time. Which wasn't confusing at all when playing the games for the first time, especially when Crunch had the same effect and was an actual special attack.
Worth noting the phys/spec split removed a lot of interesting choices. It created a situation where there's always a clearly best move to learn. And it was a huge jump in the general power creep in the series. So maybe it was good on balance, but the split wasn't without downsides
In terms of competitive, Gyara isn't actually that big of a loser just because you can still use STAB HP Flying, and it is still an excellent mon in ADV OU as a result. Also just something funny is Flygon can function as a really good mixed attacked
So as three kinda niche examples of this: - Certain defensive pokemon took a hit to thier portfolio. Gen 3 Milotic for example had huge special bulk, and was only weak to special attacking types. The special split forced her to have to accommodate for physical attacks on her electric and grass weakness. - All physical attackers lost access to multiple coverage options, as the split forced previously physical Hidden Power types to become special. Pokemon Gyarados lost access to thier most viable stab, and a lot of Physical attackers lost Ghost/Fighting/Ground coverage they were desperate for. Conversely, special attackers had a field day. And continued to do so for the next 4 gens 😒 - Azumarill. Medicham to a lesser degree but Azumarill the most. The little gremlin was previously running around with Special only STAB moves, and could now finally have physical water attacks backed up by huge power. Medicham didn't have it as rough in gen 3, but did still appreciate getting access to Pure Power Psychic STAB.
Gyrarados is a particularly weird case here because it could actually use its massive special move pool... in Gen 1 where it had 100 Special. Then Gen 2 split the stats and it was saddled with 65 SpAtk. Really got done dirty imo. It's why Gyarados feels so janky in Gen 2 / 3. As an aside, I still have mixed feelings (pun not intended) about the physical/special split. A lot of mons were balanced by having STAB on their weak stats and coverage on their strong stats. While I do think the split was a good thing in the long run, I don't think it was very well executed. Everything suddenly getting access to STAB on its strong stats caused Gen 4 to, in my opinion, be the most power crept of all generations to date. Mons like Gengar went from being high value utility mons to high value utility mons that are also terrifying sweepers. If you ever play gen 1-3, the feel and power level of the games feel much tamer.
This is a really good point, and honestly it might be one of the bigger reasons why I liked gens 2 and 3 the most. I loved gen 1 too, it's just more of a mess.
The split made a lot of sense, though I dont know why they decided to make almost every poison moves special, the type was clearly meant to be mostly physical, most of the pokemon were physical attackers, and sludge bomb doesnt sound particulary special to me anyway.
Your content is extremely good considering your sub count, I definitely see a future for u on the platform. I bet a bit of work on the thumbnails will change everything. Much love
I coulda sworn Banette gets access to Shadow Claw in Gen 4, which is a great physical ghost move. While it is weaker than Shadow Ball, it does have the higer crit rate which helps it out
There's also the reverse though, how some Pokemon defensively really benefited or suffered from the physical/special split. Water types only have special weaknesses and often had high special defense or ran Calm Mind. No physical Fire/Electric moves meant Skarmory was nearly impenetrable to physical attackers (aside from having no recovery outside rest). Steelix also took more damage from Grass moves than Fighting even though the latter is super effective lmao
Another thing that you have to remember is that Dark hits the exact same types as Ghost for SE damage and with Ghost being Physical, Dark also being Physical would have been redundant. The obvious solution would be changing Ghost to Special and making Dark Physical but that would propably cause compatibility issues between gens 2 and 1. As for why they did not change this in gen 3, you got me, no idea
Yeah those are good points. The gen 2 games were supposed to be the last ones originally, so they probably didn't think that far ahead. I bet if they had, we would've seen the physical/special split in RSE instead of DPP
while I agree with you that Flygon got buffed by the split I don't think it was weak in gen 3. You get the TM for dig super early (even before you can catch a Trapinch) so you can just teach that immidiately. Later you can chanage that for earthquake. These two moves are basically all the ground moves Flygon needs in any gen and ground is already physical. The only benefit Flygon had from the split was that dragonclaw is now physyical but Flygon's physical is only 20 BST higher than its special anyway. So yeah like I said, it got buffed but only a bit
winners: gengar, gyarados, and basically every dragon type ever. losers: every physical attacker that needed hidden power, physical poison and ghost types.
Wobuffet became a lot harder to use because selecting the physical Counter or the special Mirror Coat was easier when you could go "water type, special moves incoming" or "ghost type, physical moves incoming"
@@et34t34fdf because it's coverage is that limited it wants to have hidden power bug or ghost besides earthquake and rock slide, and then there's an open 4th slot for gust to kill heracross, toxic or another, more gimmicky move
The best way to remember the pre Split types are All the Types Eevee can be + Dragon was Special (except Fairy that didn't exist) And all other Types were Physical
Sceptile didn't really loose much in term of viability, since Leaf Storm is an extremely one time nuke for it, but man did it suck that his signature move became unviable for it. At least Leaf Blade is still used to great effect by the likes of Leafeon, Leavanny and Gallade.
I remember in Gen 2, my Kadabra would learn Elemental Punches from Goldenrod TM's and run Psybeam, Ice Punch, Elec Punch and Fire Punch... almost everything died in my path... haha
I grew up on gen 3 but even I forgot about the split so I was so confused when bite did nothing compared to the worst normal moves. Went through that playthrough super confused.
I love this video, but small suggestion for you - you repeatedly use the "he" pronoun for all pokemon, despite pokemon having either gender. At one point you even call Garydos "he" while showing a female garydos on screen. It's a small thing, but it would be better to just use neutral pronouns
Not to mention Gyarados is Water/Flying. The only physical type is Flying which Gyarados to this day learns NO good moves to take advantage of. So Gyarados before Gen 4 was relying entirely on non-stab moves
Bruhh there is no way in hell dragon type attacks are special in gen 1-3. I used a jolly flygon with 255evs in physical attack to beat battle facility in pokemon emerald and its dragon claw did only slightly leas than earthquake 😐
I discover that in Pokémon XD. I kept the bite of my eevee. So I had an espeon with bite. I tested on the field and did nt understand why bite was stronger than shadow ball. I made some research and find why. Even if I started pokemon with blue and red. I was to young to create strong pokemon.
Sceptile is an awful example, his attack is only 20 base stats lower than his special attack which is also not even that high. It also got energy ball, leaf storm, and grass knot in the generation that split the attacks. Can you honestly say leaf storm, energy ball, grass knot, or the buffed giga drain from gen 5 are worse than leaf blade?
Zangoose was a great abuser of physical Shadow Ball. It's that the mon was only available in Pokemon Ruby so people don't talk about it much, but that thing could clear nearly the entire game on its own with Swords Dance, Return, Brick Break, and Shadow Ball.
And I've never been able to play with him for that reason, I've only really played through Sapphire and Emerald. One day I'll have to pick up Ruby as well and give him a go.
Has anyone else realized how many quadrepedal sword fighters are in pokemon. Absol, samurott, and 5 legendaries in the musketeers and the new sword game
Surprised Grumpy Gengar didn't mention how Gengar benefitted greatly from the split since both of it's STABs used to be physical when it's special attack heavily outweighs it's physical.
Gengar was still OU in 3rd gen because of it's triple immunity to normal, earthquake, and toxic. And he still had will o wisp, confuse ray, hypnosis, etc to make him useful outside of straight attacks.
The thing that surprises me the most is that not a single dark type move remained special after the split. They all were made physical. The dark type special moves were introduced in generation 4.
Dodrio lost access to physical Tri Attack and had basically nothing else available to replace it since it can't learn Strength, and Secret Power was also special
Honorable mention to Celebii getting nerf'd from this. In Gen 3 it could spec to tank certain Super Effective hits better, like into SpD to tank ice better for instance. Without that it lost a lot of it's bulk, while it's attacking game stayed the same.
One other Pokemon that might be worth a mention for those liking the physical/special split from my experience is Manectric, which can use Bite (or Crunch if you breed it) as coverage off its much higher Special Attack stat
Insane you didn't mention the mascot of your channel, Gengar. Who is a special attacker but both of his stabs were physical... But then he learned the elemental punches Which helped a solid amount (thunder and ice punch) until they changed to physical
gengar was never bad to begin with. With the lower power level from gen 3 it could handle physical attackers more easily thanks to wisp and its 3 physical immunities
I despise all praise for gen 4 adding a feature that was CLEARLY meant to be there from the beginning. Good instance is how shadowball lowered sp.def despite being a physical move when it was added in GENERATION TWO
I wouldn’t mind if GF reintroduced the Typing physical/special category like it was in the first 3 Gens. It should more of a feature, NOT a permanent change, nor a one time gimmick or a one generational mechanic, BUT a core feature moving forward. It can accessed via NPC like Hyper Training, and we select the Pokémon and its move we want for its category to change. For example Typhlosion can now regain its competitive use for Thunderpunch, or Marowak can have good use for Scorching Sands which is normally special. A lot of Pokémon will now be able to take full advantage of their move sets this way, and potentially be more competitively viable.
Or, we keep things the way they currently are and just have better moves that fall into each category. Thunder Punch isn’t doing much for Typhlosion nowadays because of its middling base power while Marowak would never use Scorching Sands when Earthquake exists.
@@yorecf9641 like I said, it won’t be a permanent change, it’ll just be a feature where we’d be able to change the category of our Pokémon moves based on their Type. That means Typhlosion will now have electric Type coverage with Thunderpunch, bc any and all electric Type moves will now be Special. However, not all Types of moves can be switched from Physical to Special or vise versa, for example Sky Uppercut has always been Physical bc it has been a Fighting Type move in Gen 3, which were always Physical, but it wont be able to turn into a Special category bc it remains Physical since the Gen 4 PhA/SpA split happened. Basically any moves that have remained Physical or Special regardless of Type even after the PhA/SpA split in Gen 4, can’t be switch over to the the other category bc they never had been any other category, but moves like the elemental punches that started out as Special due to their Typing, but are now Physical, can now be changed back to Special. Any moves introduced in Gen 4 or later can also be changed around, but that depends on their Type, and initial category, for example Aura Sphere is Special, but bc it’s a fighting Type it can be changed to Physical. Similarly Flare Blitz which is Physical, can also be changed to Special bc it’s a fire Type move. Yet a move like Smart Strike which is Physical and a steel Types move, can’t be changed to Special bc steel has always been Physical, or Volt Switch which is Special, can’t be a Physical move bc electric has always been Special. As you can see, it’s still an idea, but with some limitations, bc if their wasn’t m, then all moves can swapped around and it’ll more of a mess than what I made it out to be.
@@Abraham_Torres I get what you’re saying. What I’m saying is that’s a terrible idea. Just make new moves that each Pokémon can use. What you’re proposing is an even bigger mess and for moves that really aren’t worth the effort. Why have a physical Aura Sphere when Close Combat exists? Why bother with a special Thunder Punch when you can just expand the number of Pokémon who are able to learn Discharge or Thunderbolt? Why not just make up new moves like a physical equivalent to Shadow Ball? Going back to the old physical/special split is an awful idea that would need in game viability for a ton of Pokémon until they’d be able to change them back to the current classification, which Game Freak would probably lock behind the post game with some sort of tedious to get item like the ability patches in Sword and Shield.
@@yorecf9641 I hear what you’re saying, but again not permanent, just a feature we can use for some moves and Pokémon, not to replace it again. Also, doubt they’ll give Typhlosion or Sceptile Thunderbolt, and Aura Sphere having a chance to do physical damage is safer then lowering defensive stats every use. I’m trying to broaden the options by allowing certain Types of moves to now be able to switch between Physical or Special damage depending on their Type. But the regular PhA/SpeA split is still the same as is.
@@Abraham_Torres which is why I said it’s better to just make new moves. Also, hard disagree on the physical Aura Sphere example. Lucario can learn the move and has a higher special attack stat yet it still goes physical with Close Combat. Why? Because the defensive stat drops are worth the extra power. It doesn’t matter if your stats don’t drop when you’re defenses are already glass and you can’t OHKO your target. This is also why high damage but poor accuracy moves like Hydro Pump and Fire Blast are often used over their more accurate counterparts: it doesn’t matter if your hit is guaranteed if it’s too weak to actually drop the target.
I feel like Gyarados has constantly been being spoiled by new mechanics from gen 3 onwards: Gen 3: Abilities: Gyarados gets Intimidate, one of the strongest abilities in the game Gen 4: Physical Special split: Gyarados gets access to more physical moves, including STAB Waterfall Gen 5: Hidden Abilities: Gyarados gets Moxie, allowing it to snowball out of control much faster Gen 6: Mega Evolution: Gyarados gets a mega form with amazing attack ...And I'm gonna be honest, I lost interest in Pokémon for a bit around when gens 7-8 came out so I don't know that much about how Z-moves and Dynamax affected it, but I have a feeling that Terastall in gen 9 will probably do wonders for it. Being able to get rid of the Electric weakness that's haunted it for its entire existence while maintaining Water/Flying STAB... yeah I have a feeling it'll be fun
In Gen 7, regular Gyarados sometimes ran Flyinium Z with Bounce for a one-time, STAB flying nuke in UU. For Gen 8, the biggest improvement in singles was actually TRs giving it access to moves like Power Whip for bulky water types since Dynamax as a whole is banned. Couldn’t tell you about it’s VGC performance.
Not that you should feel sorry for Skarmory or anything, but before gen 4 it was only weak to electric and fire which are both special. This made Skarmory an insanely good physical wall. It's not like it's really weaker in gen 4 though since Roost was introduced.
The fact that this had to happen at all baffles me. Like, who came up with the idea that each type had to go off a specific stat regardless of move? It must've been impossible to make each move individually phys or spec because I can't imagine the typing idea being literally anyone's first thought.
Pokemon is a classic RPG, types were similar to classes. You even see it in the stat distrubutions, as most pokemon in a type would fit a character archetype. Electric types were glass cannons, rock types slow physical tanks etc.
10k views.. so crazy haha. Thanks again to everyone for the support!
Great vid man I subbed :)
I like how when I typed in physical special split, RUclips immediately knew I was thinking Pokemon. But you know, when we say that phrase out loud, it sounds like we're ordering an ice cream flavor & not talking game freak. Lol...
@@aroperdope I got a chuckle out of this haha
This is the worst reality up to gen 3.
And not just the physical/special split as many pokemon have a type or 2 and they can't even learn one stab move.
I played Sapphire and Green Leaf and allways used the same team because there is no alternatives to so many problems of design in pokemon,one of the most annoying is that bullshit "evolve by trade",it's like you find a baby dog that will remain baby until death because it wasn't traded.
Nintendo may be one of the greatest game producers but they did many dumb things.
@@grumpygengar22Easy trick to remember which type was special, or physical.
All eevelotuions type + dragon type were special, all other type were physical.
Little fun fact : prior to the split Dark wad a special type, but once the split happened, EVERY SINGLE offensive Dark type moves present in gen 3 became physical, which I find hilarious
I think this is because they got confused over what dark type was meant to represent. I assume it was meant to be like dark magic so it would be special. But then they gave it moves associated with being underhand which would be dark in a gangster sort of dark.
Part of this feels like it was also done to compliment the already existing Dark, all of which were strong physical attackers except for the Houndour line
@@dlake1224Well the Dark type was known as the Aku type (Aku meaning evil) so I assume it’s basically nefarious actions.
Ghost and Dark should have been switched regarding special/physical. Houndoom was the only one who benefited. All other dark and ghosts were severely nerfed, especially Gengar and Tyranitar. What a waste.
@@jolteon43Tyranitar is prob the best non Uber mon in gen 3 while Gengar is at least top 5.
Tyranitar and Gengar are probably the most customizable pokemon in that aswell.
I think alakazam lost a lot of versatility with the physical/special split since it had access to the elemental punches which were special upto gen 3
But in exchange it received coverage moves that actually properly complemented its Psychic STAB, namely Shadow Ball and Focus Blast, which is easily better for Zam in the long run instead of being highly meta-dependent.
@@cultofmel ghost is NOT offensively lacking lmfao, it doesnt hit a lot of things supereffectively but its still one of the best offensive typings in the game due to how few things resist it and immunity it. There's a reason that Shadow Ball is one of the most notoriously spammable moves of all time. It doesn't need to hit things supereffectively as often as, say Flamethrower, when barely anything resists it.
Sure Alakazam lost the usability of those moves so Fighting types like Hitmonchan (you know, the boxer Pokémon, which fights with his fists) or physical Attackers like Feraligatr can use it.
@@cultofmel and then heatran gets blown back by dragapult carrying hydro pump for coverage. Shadow ball isnt just spammable because it's a good move on its own, but coverage for its resists is common and easy to slot in. You can also u-turn on the switch, bringing in something that threatens the check to your ghost type, or alternatively double if you dont have uturn. The game isnt as simple as 'just counter it' because its a 6v6 game and as soon as your check to shadow ball is dead or chipped, the shadow ball user (blaceph, dragapult, aegislash, you know how this goes) is getting a kill every time its safely sent in.
@@cultofmel the point is that Alakazam got the coverage it needed to actually hit the types that resisted Psychic, letting post phys/special split Alakazam achieve something that it could not before: perfect neutral coverage, which is especially relevant against Dark-types like Tyranitar and Houndoom which otherwise shrugged off its elemental punches and dicked it over with Pursuit every time.
Also, you view Focus Blast as a 30% chance to fail, but you should be seeing it as a 70% chance to just KO your supposed counter that no other move can do for you (this is why you don't see "Hidden Power Fighting" Alakazams, as the move is a 100% chance to hit BUT NOT KILL the target so you might as well not bother).
Speaking of power, you are overestimating the strength of the elemental punches as those alone won't carry a Pokémon; to put it into perspective, Starmie (100 SpA) does more damage with its BoltBeam than Alakazam (135 SpA) does with its Thunder/IcePunch. Even Gengar has Thunderbolt to fall back onto so it's not completely relying on unSTAB 75 BP moves to carry its offense. Heck, Gengar is another example of a Pokémon who loves trading away special elemental punches in favour of special STAB + Focus Blast coverage instead.
The reason that Gen 3 Dark types got dicked over in particular may be that they were already thinking of doing the physical/special split back then in Gen 3, but kinda didn't have the time for it so it got pushed back to Gen 4. Chances are, the Dark types of Gen 3 were all made with the physical/special split in mind, and weren't changed when they ran outta time to enact it
That honestly must be it, because otherwise I have no idea what they were thinking when they designed the typing and the Pokemon involved.
Hoenn in general has a weird mix of Pokemon that got screwed over in some way by the lack of P/S split _and_ ones that got screwed _by_ the said split.
The former are the Dark types (as you've mentioned), Breloom, Medicham, Masquerain, arguably Metagross or Flygon.
The latter are Sceptile and Banette... OK there aren't actually that many of them but the two I listed are very severe cases.
Main offenders that come to mind are Sharpedo and Crawdaunt; wtf were they thinking..!
Yeah all moves in gen 3 have a byte attached to indicate special or physical. But that byte went unused and doesn't change anything when changed
@@coreyscolaro288 say sike right now
For those wanting to memorize the type split. Just remember all Eeveelutions and dragon are special.
Except Flareon who has an Attack stat of 130. It didn't get Flare Blitz til X and Y
@@Kali_Krausethey are referring to the types, Flareons fire type was all special before gen 4
Thank you for this
Thank you for answering my question "was Fairy physical or special before the split"
@@NotBamOrBing Fairy fits the theme of being special. Plus then physical and special types would be even
Fun fact: Bite in Gen 1 was Normal, meaning it was physical.
It’s the ONLY move to go from Physical to Special (changing from Normal to Dark) back to Physical again (Physical/Special Split).
Yes, very good point. Gen 1 was an interesting time
You forgot to mention how Sceptile also had a lot of special coverage that changed into physical attacks in gen 4, being thunder punch, crunch, and dragon claw.
Dragon Claw I forgot about, I didn't realize he got Crunch and Thunder punch too!
thunderbolt dark pulse and dragon pulse
@@somechupacabrawithinternet8866 The fact that it got new special coverage doesn’t change how its existing special coverge became physical.
@@AzureGreatheart i mean give it these moves and give it tail glow because why game freak did not give it dragon pulse by level up and did not even give it a set up move for special attack is just what game freak would do nowadays and is just strange
Leaf blade too
It's funny that all dark type move introduced prior to gen 4 were special, but each and every one of them have become physical since the split.
Gen I Bite: Normal Type Physical Move.
Gen II-III Bite: Dark Type Special Move.
Gen IV Bite: Dark Type Physical Move.
Except for Houndoom
@@librathebeautifulwarmonk1283 Oh yes Houndoom, my favourite dark type MOVE
@@olafmikoaj3121 My bad!
Dark-type Status moves: **lol**
My way of memorising the pre-split stats is the special is all eeveelutions + dragon, physical is remainder
That's actually super helpful, great tip!
In case some of you newer players find it hard to remember which types were physical or special before the split, here's a simple way to remember it:
Every single eeveelution type (water grass electric fire ice dark psychic) + dragon were special, every other type was physical
2 pokemon who got immensely better thanks to the split, Sneasel and Dragonite. Sneasel is a physical attacker who was cursed with a dual typing both special. Now it can learn STAB physical dark and ice attacks. Dragonite is also a physical attacker and wasn't hitting at full power with any Dragon, Electric, Fire or Water moves they are a favorite to learn. Outside of Hyper Beam, Dragonite wasn't at full potential before gen 4.
Yes, very good examples. Sneasel was such a cool pokemon too in Gen 2, so it was a shame that he was so tough to use.
@@grumpygengar22 and on the opposite side of the spectrum was…Gengar, a super strong special attacker whose STABs were both physical until Gen 4.
Dragonite was kind of a mixed bag. It gained physical dragon STABs, but lost its physical flying STAB, and Flying/Earthquake coverage is really good to the point where once it finally got back one turn physical flying moves with Z-Fly and Dual Wingbeat, Flying/Ground became its dominant dragon dance attacks again.
@@Aquilenne maybe, but it didn’t become a certified OU Pokémon until the split. I’d say the trade off of not having physical HP Flying was worth it.
Another thing that makes Gyarados’ bite even more funny is that in gen 1 it WAS a physical move, because it was normal type that generation.
Didn't Banette learn Shadow Claw in Gen 4? Meaning it wouldn't lose its offense as a physical ghost?
It does get weaker in the sense that every other ghost type can now hit with stab, but its not like Banette had to solely rely on dark type moves now
You're right, I missed that on the TM list
Rainbow Rattle Cross Poison and Poison Jab are good, but going from 90 bp to just 80 or even 70 bp still hurts a lot.
For comparison, 90 bp to 70 bp is more drastic of a damage dropoff than going from Thunder/Fire Blast/Blizzard to Thunderbolt/Flamethrower/Ice Beam (22% damage loss vs 18% damage loss).
@Rainbow Rattle Also Crobat has a really respectable Special Attack stat so it could still use Sludge Bomb
@@christiancinnabars1402 shadow ball was 80 bp not 90
One thing i miss is putting shadow ball on my snorlax to fully counter ghost types
In gen 3 bite was considered special but still suffered from contact effects (effect spore, poison point, ect.)
True, which is why it's so strange that they didn't have this in place from the beginning. It's like, if you're already treating bite like a physical attack, then why is it special?
there is still a special contact move
Contact moves are different from whether they are physical and special. Even if more physical moves are contact.
I think there are a couple other notable mentions. The elemental punches going from special to physical was mostly beneficial to most, but it really hurt certain Pokémon such as Typhlosion and Sceptile who both were unique in that they had thunderpunch to round out their coverage.
Always found it dumb that dark was a special type. The dark moves usable in gens 2/3 would all become physical attacks (bite, crunch, pursuit, faint attack, etc). Most dark types were also physical attackers
I love how they changed Crunch lowering Sp.Def to lowering Def as it became a physical move.
Also why did GameFreak made "Ghost" a physical move like why?
I know right?!
Because Lick was the only damaging Ghost move that didn't deal fixed damage and licking is clearly a physical thing. I'd still argue that being licked by a ghost would deal "supernatural damage" though.
Yeah i guess you are correct.
However this poses a new question...
Why is Lick a Ghost type move in the first place :D
You would think it would be normal type like lickitung
@@fratbarsmeric901 Because it was the Gastly line's signature move (and Jynx, for some reason), they used their tongues a lot in stuff like the Stadium models and the anime. Lickitung didn't even learn Lick yet lmao.
I love how shadow ball still lowered special defense even when it was physical
Really excited to see the whole video it was one of my favorite new changes when I was a kid playing Pokemon diamond and pearl for the first time. Thank you RUclips recorded
My homie breloom also was less useful in Gen 3 (still packed a hell of a punch, just less so). Seed bomb actually let’s it use physical damage
Remember is Physical attack is not only based if made contact or not. Bite makes contact, so triggers stuff like poison point.
Earthquake is physical but doesn't make contact, so poison point dont trigger
Dark type being special never made sense. Every single dark move in gen 2 or 3 was physical sounding attack. Bite, cruch, faint attack, thief.
I think the opposite is true for Ghost types. They should’ve been special before gen 4 because they utilize shadowy powers.
Its so crazy to think that before this split that Bite and Crunch were such weird and confusing moves. Glad the split happened and god don't remind me about Absol and Mightyena. They were both done SO dirty.
An interesting case can be made for mono-type mixed attackers, like Typhlosion.
Flygon doesn’t actually have a bad spatck stat it’s known for it’s mixed set for a reason
BTW DO MORE PLZ
He's definitely still good either way. And thank you haha
A lot of Pokémon benefited from the Physical/Special split, so it is fascinating to see those who suffered from it. A similar sort of video could easily be done for the Gen 1 Special split into Special Attack/Special Defence.
1:51 - I always found it odd that Ice was Special and Ground was Physical. Given there was a lot of Water/Ice and Rock/Ground types originally, I felt having them in those respective categories meant they were too similar. That an Ice has quite a physical presence whereas Ground was presented through less solid things such as sand, mud and the vibrations of quakes.
2:40 - Which is a shame for Ledian, who could actually use Ice Punch and Thunder Punch quite effectively in Gen 2 and 3 (though to be fair, this Pokémon was clearly meant to be some physical puncher... they just didn't give it the stats for it).
4:28 - As someone who has used an original Gen 3 Mightyena, I knew this dark puppy was likely to make this list. They knew that Dark was special and still made a Physical attacking Pokémon with Bite and Crunch as it's main attacks. A similar situation occurs with Mawile, a Steel type lacking offensive Steel moves and having Crunch as it's strongest natural attack.
7:07 - Having watched someone do a solo Misdreavus run recently, it did make me realise that Banette and Shedninja were the only Physical focused Ghost types made before the Attack/Special split. Again, they knew Ghost was a physical based attack and yet kept making Special stat focused Ghost types. Rather coincidental to see Banette pop up here.
Fun video; tons of info and explanations packed into a concise package.
it's interesting to think about who was hurt from the split DEFENSIVELY too. I think the steel types with huuuuge physical defense (i/m thinking steelix and aagron in particular) were wayy tankier in gen 3 because most of the super effective moves (ground/fighting) were physical. Fire is really the only exception, and their ground/rock moves usually could cover for them. You couldn't really hit them with a special move since they resisted it, and super effective physical moves were papercuts to their massive physical defense. just food for thought
Yeah, really good point.
"Bulky Waters" got hit by it. Prior to the split, Water had no physical weaknesses.
@@nlb137 oh right this is so true. particularly thinking milotic, mantine, tentacruel.
wow looking through the pokedex there are a ton of evolution lines that fit this lol
@@nlb137 yup this is a primary point on how the game was changed significantly by the split. water types had a niche there
Aggron has glaring 4x weaknesses to both ground and fighting, two of the best offensive types in the game. Having such huge physical defense doesn’t matter much when your typing sucks defensively. For Steelix, it’s special defense is awful and it’s ground typing gives it a weakness to the plethora of bulky waters in Gen 3 OU such as Suicune, Swampert, Vaporeon and Milotic (same goes for Aggron since, again, its typing sucks defensively).
Don't forget bulky waters. Water had no physical weaknesses, which made it absolutely insane as a defensive type
Yes, very good point
I ranted about Milotic on another vid but Gen 3 Milotic is stupid good. Gen 3 had so many good water types tho.
While Flygon definitely got better with the split, I don’t think it deserves to be on this list. You can get the Dig TM on Route 114 in the Fossil Maniac’s Hut before you even have access to Trapinch, so you aren’t stuck using Sand Tomb for ground STAB before you get the Earthquake TM. Additionally, it’s special attack is still base 80 as opposed to something truly awful like the base 60 of Gyarados. While not great, it’s still serviceable for powerful moves like Flamethrower, Fire Blast, STAB Dragon Claw and even Crunch when we’re talking about a playthrough.
That's fair. His impact is still great.
I think the most benefited Pokémon from the Physical Special Split will always be Gengar. The ghost boy literally gained access to his two STAB types in Gen 4 which he essentially couldn't use for 3 whole generations, having to rely on Psychic, Thunderbolt and Elemental Punches to do special damage, coupled with some Explosion shenanigans. Gaining access to Shadow Ball and Sludge Bomb as STAB, special attacks was what turned Gengar from a great Pokémon to a top tier Pokémon 👌
On the other side of the spectrum the biggest loser from the Physical Special Split, for me, by far, is Milotic. Milotic is a massively specially defensive tank, one of the infamous bulky waters, and it really carried that name on with pride because if you wanted to hit it for super effective damage you HAD to hit the mermaid on it's far stronger special defense, since both Grass and Electric moves (the only types that hit Water for super effective) were exclusively special hitting types. Henceforth, if you wanted to take care of an opposing Milotic, you really had to hit hard on its physical defensive side with strong, neutral hits, or you needed to boast an outstanding special attack stat to truly make a dent on it (which also could imply putting yourself at risk of being hit with a brutal Mirror Coat in return). Nowadays you can target Milotic with physical Grass or Electric attacks to achieve far better results.
Yes, very good examples!
Its very funny that Gengar’s STAB’s were both physical but the only physical attacks it ever ran were explosion and focus punch
Funny enough there's a whole counter argument to your Gengar point from some competitive gen 3 players as the split took away Gengars use of elemental punches (ice and fire specifically) for coverage and essentially making it's sets more predictable as not including moves like shadow ball focus blast tbolt or sludge bomb after the split would come as a surprise. The split also made Gengar a lot more vulnerable to a Ttar pursuit. I think Gengar is just as versatile since the split but the physical special split itself did make movesets in general more predictable and STAB oriented. I think this change was entirely necessary and did way more good than harm but I do wish certain pokemon were still as viable as they were in gen 3.
@@grumpygengar22 make a video about that, the biggest winner and biggest loser of the p/s split and credit that dude!!
I love Absol so the p/s split definitely benefited him. Although that still doesn't stop me from using one when I replay Ruby
Absol is still pretty good in emerald since swords dance boosted facade does work
I never really thought about that before. I'll have to try that!
Fun fact, bite is the only move to change it's attacking stat twice. It was a normal type move in gen 1 so it was based on the attack stat. Second fun fact, the fighting and psychic types are the only types to have none of their older moves effected by the physical/special split. All gen 3 and older fighting moves remained physical, while all gen 3 and older psychic moves remained special
I knew about Bite but I had no idea about the Fighting and Psychic types, that's really interesting!
Gengar got a major buff with the physical special split since both his STABs were physical
He lost options in the elemental punches
@@idontcheckmynotificationsBut it got Focus Blast and Dazzling Gleam which were better options over the elemental punches.
I wouldn't say a major buff, but a good retooling. Gengar is still amazing in gen 3 ou. Just does a different job than gen 4 to now
I've been playing Pokemon games since Gen 2 was released, and didn't know of the Physical/Special split until a few weeks ago. I never knew that certain types were either all physical or all special instead of the move itself. I knew Steel, Rock and Fighting were all physical moves back then, but that's common sense. Just crazy how it took them to Gen 4 to correct it to make it the move itself as Physical or Special and not the typing.
Great video as always, keep up the good work bro 👏
you forgot the biggest one imo that got so much worse after the split, Alakazam. back in gens 2 and 3 having an Alakazam with psychic+ 3 punches basically guaranteed you have almost all you needed in terms of special attack for your team. once he lost the coverage of his punches he basically fell hard
Honestly I feel like the physical/ special type split makes so much more sense that I just assumed it was always there so I’m thrown off every time I play the old games or see someone playing them lol
Ironically, Tranquil from Gen 5 would’ve thrived in Gen 3 because a lot of flying type moves it learns are special like air cutter, before air slash was introduced in Gen 4. A physical flying type move with a high Crit rate alongside an ability that raises critical hit rates would’ve made Tranquil a powerful Pokémon.
GEN 3 is my favorite games. They where my first games I played and hoenn is just so beautiful. I am not a fan of the physical spechial Split. I know that most Pokémon got better because of this but i though it where more difficult and intressting. For example Flareon has a good special deffense and therefore water attacks wont work good at it. Instead you need to find a ground type and use that instead of just using a tm or having 2 water type moves in your arsenal. You doing good content keep going.
Gen 3 - Shadow Ball and Sludge Bomb are physical
Gengar Grumpy
Gen 4 - Shadow Ball and Sludge Bomb are special
Gengar happy
:D
Ironically forgot to mention Gengar. It was the king of Gen III due to its access to Tbolt, fire and ice punch and G drain. Sure it's stabs got better but that coverage was phenomenal back in Gen III. Alakazam also benefitted from this but it wasn't as good due to an inability to hard counter Swampert with G drain
People were wondering what attack category the fairy type would’ve been classified as if it was introduced before the split…
Definitely special.
This video popped up so randomly just after finishing studying and was so nicely done mate. I think an employee from game freak hated dark type and it got done so bad, in gen 3 like how can u make dark a special attacking type and give it no special attacker. Gen 4 did many things right including special/special split. Enjoyed the video alot mate
The physical special split actually hurt gyarados and salamence a bit by removing hidden power flying as one of the only reliable physical flying moves they ever learnt
But gaining physical Water and Dragon STAB exchange, both of which are stronger than physical Hidden Power Flying? They definitely gained more than they had lost.
@Yoshi’s Woolly World Yes. To the point it's deleted in SwSh before coming back as an Unown exclusive move.
@@breloommaster12 yeah, and special and mixed Salamence are both still viable competitive options even in Gen 8.
idk HP is hell
nah, i'd say an 80 power STAB physical water move is worth it, not to mention he can learn Crunch, even non-STAB with its attack stat, thats going hurt, he can really mess up psychic types with little to no problems.
this is huge in Lets Go!!! (i am meming here, Lets Go!! is pathetically easy and for Arceus Sake, get the Alolan Muk)
My favorite part about Shadow Ball before the physical special split is that it still lowered Sp. Def at the time. Which wasn't confusing at all when playing the games for the first time, especially when Crunch had the same effect and was an actual special attack.
Worth noting the phys/spec split removed a lot of interesting choices. It created a situation where there's always a clearly best move to learn. And it was a huge jump in the general power creep in the series. So maybe it was good on balance, but the split wasn't without downsides
Very true
In terms of competitive, Gyara isn't actually that big of a loser just because you can still use STAB HP Flying, and it is still an excellent mon in ADV OU as a result. Also just something funny is Flygon can function as a really good mixed attacked
Yeah I think I gave Flygon a little too much hate
Easy way to remember the phys/spec types, Eevee evolves into every Special type except dragon.
So as three kinda niche examples of this:
- Certain defensive pokemon took a hit to thier portfolio. Gen 3 Milotic for example had huge special bulk, and was only weak to special attacking types. The special split forced her to have to accommodate for physical attacks on her electric and grass weakness.
- All physical attackers lost access to multiple coverage options, as the split forced previously physical Hidden Power types to become special. Pokemon Gyarados lost access to thier most viable stab, and a lot of Physical attackers lost Ghost/Fighting/Ground coverage they were desperate for. Conversely, special attackers had a field day. And continued to do so for the next 4 gens 😒
- Azumarill. Medicham to a lesser degree but Azumarill the most. The little gremlin was previously running around with Special only STAB moves, and could now finally have physical water attacks backed up by huge power. Medicham didn't have it as rough in gen 3, but did still appreciate getting access to Pure Power Psychic STAB.
Gyrarados is a particularly weird case here because it could actually use its massive special move pool... in Gen 1 where it had 100 Special. Then Gen 2 split the stats and it was saddled with 65 SpAtk. Really got done dirty imo. It's why Gyarados feels so janky in Gen 2 / 3.
As an aside, I still have mixed feelings (pun not intended) about the physical/special split. A lot of mons were balanced by having STAB on their weak stats and coverage on their strong stats. While I do think the split was a good thing in the long run, I don't think it was very well executed. Everything suddenly getting access to STAB on its strong stats caused Gen 4 to, in my opinion, be the most power crept of all generations to date. Mons like Gengar went from being high value utility mons to high value utility mons that are also terrifying sweepers.
If you ever play gen 1-3, the feel and power level of the games feel much tamer.
This is a really good point, and honestly it might be one of the bigger reasons why I liked gens 2 and 3 the most. I loved gen 1 too, it's just more of a mess.
First person that comes to mind for me is Hitmonchan. All those punches using his Special Attack was just sad
The split made a lot of sense, though I dont know why they decided to make almost every poison moves special, the type was clearly meant to be mostly physical, most of the pokemon were physical attackers, and sludge bomb doesnt sound particulary special to me anyway.
You think you could do a part 2? This was really entertaining
I would love to come back to this at some point!
Your content is extremely good considering your sub count, I definitely see a future for u on the platform. I bet a bit of work on the thumbnails will change everything. Much love
Honestly, base 80 Special Attack isn't too bad. Sure it's Physical Attack is higher, but it's still pretty good.
the punches going physical really f**ked up Huanter/Gengar and Abra's line too, those are nuts in my Crystal run right now.
The fact he forgot to talk about Gengar who's situation was similar to crawdaunt's
Dotrio before the p/s with its high speed and stab physical tri attack was pretty good too.
Yeah that was a good one
I coulda sworn Banette gets access to Shadow Claw in Gen 4, which is a great physical ghost move. While it is weaker than Shadow Ball, it does have the higer crit rate which helps it out
Yep, only via TM though. I did miss that.
Dusknoir cries in lack of good Ghost physical stab aside from Shadow sneak and Shadow punch.
There's also the reverse though, how some Pokemon defensively really benefited or suffered from the physical/special split. Water types only have special weaknesses and often had high special defense or ran Calm Mind. No physical Fire/Electric moves meant Skarmory was nearly impenetrable to physical attackers (aside from having no recovery outside rest).
Steelix also took more damage from Grass moves than Fighting even though the latter is super effective lmao
Another thing that you have to remember is that Dark hits the exact same types as Ghost for SE damage and with Ghost being Physical, Dark also being Physical would have been redundant. The obvious solution would be changing Ghost to Special and making Dark Physical but that would propably cause compatibility issues between gens 2 and 1. As for why they did not change this in gen 3, you got me, no idea
Yeah those are good points. The gen 2 games were supposed to be the last ones originally, so they probably didn't think that far ahead. I bet if they had, we would've seen the physical/special split in RSE instead of DPP
Maybe the single best improvement to the series
i always thought dark moves sucked in gen 3 but because of the low base strenght of most dark moves
while I agree with you that Flygon got buffed by the split I don't think it was weak in gen 3. You get the TM for dig super early (even before you can catch a Trapinch) so you can just teach that immidiately. Later you can chanage that for earthquake. These two moves are basically all the ground moves Flygon needs in any gen and ground is already physical. The only benefit Flygon had from the split was that dragonclaw is now physyical but Flygon's physical is only 20 BST higher than its special anyway. So yeah like I said, it got buffed but only a bit
winners: gengar, gyarados, and basically every dragon type ever. losers: every physical attacker that needed hidden power, physical poison and ghost types.
Wobuffet became a lot harder to use because selecting the physical Counter or the special Mirror Coat was easier when you could go "water type, special moves incoming" or "ghost type, physical moves incoming"
Flygon does occasionally run gust on it's banded set. That shows how much physical coverage it gets
In gen3 it would use HP flying over gust, surely?
@@et34t34fdf because it's coverage is that limited it wants to have hidden power bug or ghost besides earthquake and rock slide, and then there's an open 4th slot for gust to kill heracross, toxic or another, more gimmicky move
Dugtrio gets aerial ace but FLYgon doesn't?
The best way to remember the pre Split types are
All the Types Eevee can be + Dragon was Special (except Fairy that didn't exist)
And all other Types were Physical
Really good tip!
Sceptile didn't really loose much in term of viability, since Leaf Storm is an extremely one time nuke for it, but man did it suck that his signature move became unviable for it.
At least Leaf Blade is still used to great effect by the likes of Leafeon, Leavanny and Gallade.
It's funny.
All three of the Hoenn starters got a signature move that they never use anymore, but other things use pretty well
Doesn’t Sceptile learn Swords Dance through TM in Gens 4 and up? That makes Leaf Blade more powerful.
@@simplyrenirambus2982
Eh.
Stab Grass ain't a sweep bossanova
I remember in Gen 2, my Kadabra would learn Elemental Punches from Goldenrod TM's and run Psybeam, Ice Punch, Elec Punch and Fire Punch... almost everything died in my path... haha
I grew up on gen 3 but even I forgot about the split so I was so confused when bite did nothing compared to the worst normal moves. Went through that playthrough super confused.
I love this video, but small suggestion for you - you repeatedly use the "he" pronoun for all pokemon, despite pokemon having either gender. At one point you even call Garydos "he" while showing a female garydos on screen. It's a small thing, but it would be better to just use neutral pronouns
Not to mention Gyarados is Water/Flying. The only physical type is Flying which Gyarados to this day learns NO good moves to take advantage of. So Gyarados before Gen 4 was relying entirely on non-stab moves
Bruhh there is no way in hell dragon type attacks are special in gen 1-3. I used a jolly flygon with 255evs in physical attack to beat battle facility in pokemon emerald and its dragon claw did only slightly leas than earthquake 😐
Poor Weezing.
Man is pretty much still a loser to this day, it has a higher physical attack but no physical poison moves, not even Gunk Shot.
I discover that in Pokémon XD. I kept the bite of my eevee. So I had an espeon with bite. I tested on the field and did nt understand why bite was stronger than shadow ball. I made some research and find why.
Even if I started pokemon with blue and red. I was to young to create strong pokemon.
love the last 23 seconds of the video
Sceptile is an awful example, his attack is only 20 base stats lower than his special attack which is also not even that high. It also got energy ball, leaf storm, and grass knot in the generation that split the attacks. Can you honestly say leaf storm, energy ball, grass knot, or the buffed giga drain from gen 5 are worse than leaf blade?
Yeah the more I thought about that after making the video the more what you're saying makes sense.
Some special attackers couldn't use the elemental punches after the physical/special split, but at least they were able to learn other moves in Gen 4
The editing is really REALLY well done
Zangoose was a great abuser of physical Shadow Ball. It's that the mon was only available in Pokemon Ruby so people don't talk about it much, but that thing could clear nearly the entire game on its own with Swords Dance, Return, Brick Break, and Shadow Ball.
And I've never been able to play with him for that reason, I've only really played through Sapphire and Emerald. One day I'll have to pick up Ruby as well and give him a go.
Has anyone else realized how many quadrepedal sword fighters are in pokemon. Absol, samurott, and 5 legendaries in the musketeers and the new sword game
Also Flygon running twister used to be a thing.yeah it was that bad
Surprised Grumpy Gengar didn't mention how Gengar benefitted greatly from the split since both of it's STABs used to be physical when it's special attack heavily outweighs it's physical.
Gengar was still OU in 3rd gen because of it's triple immunity to normal, earthquake, and toxic. And he still had will o wisp, confuse ray, hypnosis, etc to make him useful outside of straight attacks.
The thing that surprises me the most is that not a single dark type move remained special after the split. They all were made physical. The dark type special moves were introduced in generation 4.
Dodrio lost access to physical Tri Attack and had basically nothing else available to replace it since it can't learn Strength, and Secret Power was also special
Honorable mention to Celebii getting nerf'd from this. In Gen 3 it could spec to tank certain Super Effective hits better, like into SpD to tank ice better for instance. Without that it lost a lot of it's bulk, while it's attacking game stayed the same.
amazing video!
One other Pokemon that might be worth a mention for those liking the physical/special split from my experience is Manectric, which can use Bite (or Crunch if you breed it) as coverage off its much higher Special Attack stat
Insane you didn't mention the mascot of your channel, Gengar. Who is a special attacker but both of his stabs were physical... But then he learned the elemental punches
Which helped a solid amount (thunder and ice punch) until they changed to physical
Gengar has/had Thunderbolt so Thunder Punch wasn't needed.
fire and ice punch were actually really good on gengar to cover steel types and salamence/flygon
gengar was never bad to begin with. With the lower power level from gen 3 it could handle physical attackers more easily thanks to wisp and its 3 physical immunities
This would actually be a really cool FSG topic!
I despise all praise for gen 4 adding a feature that was CLEARLY meant to be there from the beginning.
Good instance is how shadowball lowered sp.def despite being a physical move when it was added in GENERATION TWO
And gen 3 adding natures with no physical special split made catching good Pokémon a chore
I wouldn’t mind if GF reintroduced the Typing physical/special category like it was in the first 3 Gens. It should more of a feature, NOT a permanent change, nor a one time gimmick or a one generational mechanic, BUT a core feature moving forward. It can accessed via NPC like Hyper Training, and we select the Pokémon and its move we want for its category to change. For example Typhlosion can now regain its competitive use for Thunderpunch, or Marowak can have good use for Scorching Sands which is normally special. A lot of Pokémon will now be able to take full advantage of their move sets this way, and potentially be more competitively viable.
Or, we keep things the way they currently are and just have better moves that fall into each category. Thunder Punch isn’t doing much for Typhlosion nowadays because of its middling base power while Marowak would never use Scorching Sands when Earthquake exists.
@@yorecf9641 like I said, it won’t be a permanent change, it’ll just be a feature where we’d be able to change the category of our Pokémon moves based on their Type. That means Typhlosion will now have electric Type coverage with Thunderpunch, bc any and all electric Type moves will now be Special. However, not all Types of moves can be switched from Physical to Special or vise versa, for example Sky Uppercut has always been Physical bc it has been a Fighting Type move in Gen 3, which were always Physical, but it wont be able to turn into a Special category bc it remains Physical since the Gen 4 PhA/SpA split happened.
Basically any moves that have remained Physical or Special regardless of Type even after the PhA/SpA split in Gen 4, can’t be switch over to the the other category bc they never had been any other category, but moves like the elemental punches that started out as Special due to their Typing, but are now Physical, can now be changed back to Special. Any moves introduced in Gen 4 or later can also be changed around, but that depends on their Type, and initial category, for example Aura Sphere is Special, but bc it’s a fighting Type it can be changed to Physical. Similarly Flare Blitz which is Physical, can also be changed to Special bc it’s a fire Type move. Yet a move like Smart Strike which is Physical and a steel Types move, can’t be changed to Special bc steel has always been Physical, or Volt Switch which is Special, can’t be a Physical move bc electric has always been Special. As you can see, it’s still an idea, but with some limitations, bc if their wasn’t m, then all moves can swapped around and it’ll more of a mess than what I made it out to be.
@@Abraham_Torres I get what you’re saying. What I’m saying is that’s a terrible idea. Just make new moves that each Pokémon can use. What you’re proposing is an even bigger mess and for moves that really aren’t worth the effort. Why have a physical Aura Sphere when Close Combat exists? Why bother with a special Thunder Punch when you can just expand the number of Pokémon who are able to learn Discharge or Thunderbolt? Why not just make up new moves like a physical equivalent to Shadow Ball? Going back to the old physical/special split is an awful idea that would need in game viability for a ton of Pokémon until they’d be able to change them back to the current classification, which Game Freak would probably lock behind the post game with some sort of tedious to get item like the ability patches in Sword and Shield.
@@yorecf9641 I hear what you’re saying, but again not permanent, just a feature we can use for some moves and Pokémon, not to replace it again. Also, doubt they’ll give Typhlosion or Sceptile Thunderbolt, and Aura Sphere having a chance to do physical damage is safer then lowering defensive stats every use. I’m trying to broaden the options by allowing certain Types of moves to now be able to switch between Physical or Special damage depending on their Type. But the regular PhA/SpeA split is still the same as is.
@@Abraham_Torres which is why I said it’s better to just make new moves. Also, hard disagree on the physical Aura Sphere example. Lucario can learn the move and has a higher special attack stat yet it still goes physical with Close Combat. Why? Because the defensive stat drops are worth the extra power. It doesn’t matter if your stats don’t drop when you’re defenses are already glass and you can’t OHKO your target. This is also why high damage but poor accuracy moves like Hydro Pump and Fire Blast are often used over their more accurate counterparts: it doesn’t matter if your hit is guaranteed if it’s too weak to actually drop the target.
I feel like Gyarados has constantly been being spoiled by new mechanics from gen 3 onwards:
Gen 3: Abilities: Gyarados gets Intimidate, one of the strongest abilities in the game
Gen 4: Physical Special split: Gyarados gets access to more physical moves, including STAB Waterfall
Gen 5: Hidden Abilities: Gyarados gets Moxie, allowing it to snowball out of control much faster
Gen 6: Mega Evolution: Gyarados gets a mega form with amazing attack
...And I'm gonna be honest, I lost interest in Pokémon for a bit around when gens 7-8 came out so I don't know that much about how Z-moves and Dynamax affected it, but I have a feeling that Terastall in gen 9 will probably do wonders for it. Being able to get rid of the Electric weakness that's haunted it for its entire existence while maintaining Water/Flying STAB... yeah I have a feeling it'll be fun
In Gen 7, regular Gyarados sometimes ran Flyinium Z with Bounce for a one-time, STAB flying nuke in UU.
For Gen 8, the biggest improvement in singles was actually TRs giving it access to moves like Power Whip for bulky water types since Dynamax as a whole is banned. Couldn’t tell you about it’s VGC performance.
Except the special split
@@strange17 that was in Gen 2, hence, “…from Gen 3 onwards.”
@@strange17 Yep, that's why I say "from gen 3 onwards". He lost a lot of special attack from gen 1 to 2 because of that.
came for the breakdown of the physical special split, stayed for the content
Not that you should feel sorry for Skarmory or anything, but before gen 4 it was only weak to electric and fire which are both special. This made Skarmory an insanely good physical wall. It's not like it's really weaker in gen 4 though since Roost was introduced.
The fact that this had to happen at all baffles me. Like, who came up with the idea that each type had to go off a specific stat regardless of move? It must've been impossible to make each move individually phys or spec because I can't imagine the typing idea being literally anyone's first thought.
Yeah it was a very strange time for sure.
Pokemon is a classic RPG, types were similar to classes. You even see it in the stat distrubutions, as most pokemon in a type would fit a character archetype.
Electric types were glass cannons, rock types slow physical tanks etc.