On Starter Pokemon in Pokemon GO
Starter Pokemon in Pokemon GO are kinda weird. Almost all of them are somewhat useless until they get their Community Day moves. However, the time it takes to get a Community Day move is generally quite a while. For example, Greninja was unable to get his Community Day moves for a good year or so, maybe two. And at the same time, Charmander’s evolution Charizard already has two Community Day moves. One of which is honestly kinda useless outside of PvP. However, most starter Pokemon are missing out, and even fewer manage to get their signature moves. Greninja and Blaziken both have theirs, but that’s about it.
With their Community Day moves though, these starters are fine. Not amazing, but fine. Having a team of 6, powered up and ready to go is a fine thing to do. But, depending on other Pokemon, this is generally not as good as a team of something else. For water types, Kyogre rules supreme, does more damage and often lasts longer compared to starter Pokemon and their Community Day moves. Palkia would be even better if it had decent water moves. And shadow Pokemon, ironically mostly shadow starter Pokemon, are better than their normal or purified counterparts. Fire and Grass have the same problem. Starters for the fire type are outclassed by Reshiram and Heatran with Magma Storm, as well as shadow Moltres and Entai. Grass types have Roserade, a normal Pokemon that just about outclasses grass starters, but most of the work is done by Kartana, a glass cannon that does huge damage. Zarude and Shaymin (air form) are both also better than these grass types, but are much harder to level up.
Even among each other, starters are not made equal. Meganium is beefier than Venusaur and lacks the poison type, but its damage is a lot lower, meaning Venusaur is more useful. Greninja is technically the best water starter, but it will be outclassed by Primarina when that thing gets a Community Day. When that will happen, no one knows.
The biggest problem though is the waiting. The Paldea starters have just arrived in Pokemon GO, and they are currently useless, because none of them can learn their special or Community Day moves. So there’s no point in evolving them. You might as well just catch them for the candy, keep a few good ones and chuck away the rest. And then hold on to them until they get a Community Day. In 2025 or something. And that’s not even including their special moves. Meowscarada, the evolution of Sprigatito, learns its unique move Flower Trick, but we might not ever actually see it, considering how long it takes to get a Community Day. There’s also the question of how Meowscarada will use it – will Flower Trick be a fast move or a charge move? And will we need two charge attack slots to have both Flower Trick and Frenzy Plant?
And on top of all that, will the Paldea starters even be as good as other starters, when they eventually get their special moves? Who knows?
All that being said, I still really want to evolve my Paldean starters. Well, not Quaxly, Quaxly sucks. Maybe I’ll just evolve them anyway, and walk them for candy, assuming they’ll disappear after the Paldea events are over. I just want a Skeledirge, even if it’s currently useless. I just wish that Elite TMs weren’t so damn rare…