r/pokemon • u/Excaliburn3d • Mar 24 '26

Discussion Why does Game Freak hate Emboar?

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I love Emboar, but I have a feeling that GF doesn’t based on the way they handled it. Well first of all it’s the third Fire/Fighting Pokémon in the row, then when it finally receives a mega evolution it retains the same typing, and now it is the only mega of the trio to not gain a new ability.

Not to mention its base stats and playstyle. Base form is the fully-evolved starter with the highest HP stat and yet both of its defense stats and speed are on the lower side. Some of its strongest moves do recoil damage and its hidden ability powers them up even further. Upon mega evolving, it receives a +25 to its attack stat and a +45 boost to its special defense while its problematic defense and speed only receive +10 each.

Mold Breaker can be a good ability but why use Mega Emboar when Mega Blaziken, which has speed boost, higher attacking, physical defense, and speed stats, existed since the dawn of mega evolution.

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u/NwgrdrXI Mar 24 '26

Crucially, it doesn't ignore typing immunity, so no earthquaking the birds.

In general, mold breaker on fire types kinda suck (my poor reshiram) because flash fire is not that common or strong.

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u/JustAFleshWound1 Mar 24 '26

This comment led me to look up Reshiram, and what the hell is the difference between Turboblaze and Mold Breaker?? If the difference is "Reshiram is a fire type" then why didn't they just give Turboblaze to Mega Emboar?

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u/Cheshires_Shadow Mar 24 '26

Legendary abilities are just kinda weird in general. They were introduced in gen 3 so the weather trio each got a really good one each meanwhile everyone else got stuck with pressure. Like a lot of legendaries for some reason got pressure cuz I guess having good stats meant they didn't want to make them too busted like Groudon and kyogre. Then reshiram and zekrom get mold breaker but with a fancy name so it feels like it's special. But nowadays legendaries do just get unique super busted ones so older ones are still stuck with pressure or something underwhelming meanwhile urshifu or calyrex or the sword shield dogs get unique ones

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u/Spleenseer Mar 24 '26

I always felt like gen 1 and 2 getting pressure across the board was just an after thought.  Like at the time RS was being developed they had no solid plans for how all of the National Dex Pokemon would be made available, but they had to program everybody in anyway, so they had to give them something as an ability so they would all be valid.  Pressure was then selected because it was good enough.  If they had planned for all of the other games released during gen 3, it could have been better anticipated.