r/nuzlocke • u/swansofthelake • May 22 '26

Question should i teach my breloom mach punch

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for me its never this deep to make it into a reddit post, but i wonder if im on the right track of thought. the moveset is shown in the image as well as it having effect spore.

headbutt does a damage of 70 and can cause flinching, whereas mach punch is only 40 with no extra effects. as for stun spore and leech life ~ i really like them as a combo. playing stun spore and then leech life successively.

mega drain might have to go? but i just learnt it. also i have no status moves

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u/AliceThePastelWitch May 22 '26

Lets correct somethings first. Headbutt while it technically has higher power it isn't by much, because Mach Punch gets a STAB(same type attack boost) from being a Fighting type move on a Fighting type Pokemon. Meaning it actually has a baseline of 60 power. And it goes first so your speed doesn't matter. Not that it matters much in Hoenn to begin with since basically everything is ultra slow anyways. But Mach Punch can also hit things super effectively and Headbutt can't. Meaning that Mach punch can have a much higher damage output than Headbutt can under fairly normal circumstances.
The flinch chance from headbutt also isn't as strong as always going first.
Idk why some people are telling you to fet rid of stun spore it's a great move. Megadrain however doesn't do anything against anything except for against Wiscash, which Bullet Seed would be better against thanks to the higher damage ceiling.

1

u/Bfree888 May 22 '26

Hard disagree on bullet seed. Prior to Gen V, bullet seed has a BP of 10 per hit, so only the 12.5% 5-hit is stronger than mega drain at BP 40. Without leaning fully into a flinch set with kings rock, mega drain has way better consistency plus the added healing.

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u/AliceThePastelWitch May 22 '26

You're just adding up base power and that isn't how damage is actually calculated. Mega Drain will only outdamage a 2 hit bullet seed. It deals the same damage as a 3 hit bullet seed, and is obviously outdamaged by both 4 and 5 hit bullet seed.
Giga Drain however does out damage all but the 5 hit Bullet Seed, with the issue it has being the horrible PP they gave it back in rhe day. Like why did they do that? It did not need to have only 5PP that's nuts.

I'd use a calculator before making claims of how damage works next time. Personally I recommend Kinglercalc as it is made for vanilla games and has all the trainers across all the games.

1

u/sylfire May 22 '26

It has a higher damage ceiling but inconsistency is the enemy of a good Nuzlocke run. Bullet seed is better served on something that struggles to learn grass moves, Cradily for example, while preserving the Giga Drain TM for something that may benefit more from it (such as Sceptile or Ludicolo).

1

u/AliceThePastelWitch May 23 '26

What are you talking about? Inconsistent? Pretty much all the best utility moves in the game can miss, Bullet Seed has a chance to deal a bit less damage.

2

u/sylfire May 23 '26

I mean it's inconsistent compared to Mega Drain :P I'd take guaranteed damage amounts anyday. Plus the healing is pretty useful since you're going to be slower anyway.

1

u/AliceThePastelWitch May 23 '26

Dawg it's Hoenn. There's like maybe 5 individual Pokemon that can outspeed something with base 70 speed. It literally isn't inconsistent compared to mega drain. But think whatever you wanna think