Current Events > Why was Cynthia's Garchomp so comically overpowered?

(+) Yeah! (+)

It tanked a Blizzard with no damage done I remember

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A blizzard would definitely kill it, or at least come very close.

The reason her Garchomp is so nasty is first and foremost that Garchomp itself is a beast. It's very fast and hits like a truck, but it's also reasonably sturdy.
It also runs obscenely powerful attacks: in D/P, it has Earthquake(100 BP), Dragon Rush(120 BP), Giga Impact(150 BP), and Brick Break(75 BP). Dragon Rush can miss, and Giga Impact is basically Hyper Beam(because Hyper Beam became a special attack in Gen 4). Add in the fact it likely has several levels on your team(particularly on a first attempt) and it's not hard to see why it's a challenge. Unless you have something really sturdy(that's not weak to any of its attacks), most of your pokemon are going to die in 1-2 hits.

In Platinum, it swaps out Brick Break for Flamethrower and drops 4 levels. And before you ask, yes: Garchomp is a respectable special attacker, and you're very lucky it's not Fire Blast. Brick Break comes back in rematches, and also it shoots up to level 78.

Because Cynthia wasn't fucking around

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Is Cynthia generally considered to be harder than Steven in ruby/sapphire? I remember struggling a lot with him but not so much with Cynthia at the time.

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Garchomp was so good it was voted uber in DPP OU
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Because Garchomp was a completely broken pokemon until the fairy typing came into play.

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Because Garchomp is really fuckin good

That said, it ain't surviving a blizzard unless the thing using blizzard has garbo special attack

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I'm pretty sure her Garchomp has perfect IVs and maxed out EVs where they matter, for her entire team.

Contrast with Leon, who I read has his team with 0 IVs and no EVs at all, which I need verification for but is hilarious if true.

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The most enjoyable thing about Cynthia is she doesn't monotype herself so it's much harder to sweep her with a single Pokemon.

My normal strategy for E4 is to have a Pokemon for each member, and then the one open slot is for something to operate as a jack of all trades if need be.
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literally use abomasnow lmao

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MC_BatCommander posted...

That said, it ain't surviving a blizzard unless the thing using blizzard has garbo special attack. Now if it held a Yache berry as well then it would be a nightmare, luckily that is not the case.

ElatedVenusaur posted...

A blizzard would definitely kill it, or at least come very close.

NightMarishPie posted...

Is Cynthia generally considered to be harder than Steven in ruby/sapphire? I remember struggling a lot with him but not so much with Cynthia at the time.

Guys I'm talking about the anime that's where the Blizzard thing happened.

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Doe posted...

Guys I'm talking about the anime that's where the Blizzard thing happened.

You need 266 special attack to ohko a standard garchomp with a non stab ice beam
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Doe posted...

Guys I'm talking about the anime that's where the Blizzard thing happened.

You're talking about the same series that gave us Thunder Armor.

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Solar_Crimson posted...

You're talking about the same series that gave us Thunder Armor.

And aim for the horn!
And activating the gyms sprinklers to defeat Onix(LOL).

ElatedVenusaur posted...

And activating the gyms sprinklers to defeat Onix(LOL).

Which is funny in hindsight, because there's now a move (Soak) that turns Pokemon into the Water-type.

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Doe posted...

Guys I'm talking about the anime that's where the Blizzard thing happened.

Champions and the elite 4 were nerfed by XY. And arent absurdly powerful anymore that they can brush off x2 or even x4 weaknesses without a stratch or OHKO sweep trainers with 6-7 badges entire teams with ease.

Solar_Crimson posted...

You're talking about the same series that gave us Thunder Armor.

You know somebody hasn't watched the anime in like 2 decades when their still referencing stuff like this.

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Prismsblade posted...

You know somebody hasn't watched the anime in like 2 decades when their still referencing stuff like this.

And I'm all but certain that TC is referring to an episode that aired not long after that.

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Thunderbolt and Ice Beam is all you need to take Cynthia down.

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Imagine referencing the anime as an explanation for something being good/bad in Pokemon
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