Pokémon Sword and Shield - How to create a competitive Pokémon

After talking to you in one previous guide of how the knowledge of types is the fundamental basis for starting to approach the competitive Pokémon, the time has finally come discuss this topic in more detail.

In this new guide dedicated to Sword and Shield Pokémon in fact we will go there to explain how to create a Competitive Pokémon.

What is a competitive Pokémon

A Pokémon is suitable for battles against other players when, through the exploitation of its particular characteristics such as IV, EV, nature, etc., it appears to be suitable for filling a certain role in a competitive team.

It goes without saying, therefore, that the creation phase of this category of Pokémon is crucial in determining its effectiveness against other teams.

The factors that must always be taken into consideration are the following:

The base stats of each Pokémon

Each Pokémon has 6 base stats: HP (Health Points), Attack (Physical), Defense (Physical), Special Attack, Special Defense and Speed.

Put simply, each of these parameters will determine how much the Pokémon it will resist attacks (PS, Defense, Special Defense), how many damage will inflict (Attack, Special Attack) and if will act sooner or later than other Pokémon in battle (Speed).

Each of them, then, is influenced by other factors such as natures, IVs and EVs, but, before starting the creation of a competitive Pokémon, it is essential to carefully observe their basic values ​​to identify any strengths o weakness of our pocket creature.

The IVs ...

Acronym of Individual Values, they are values ​​that vary from 0 to 31 associated with each statistic of the Pokémon, which give a significant boost to the characteristic with which they are associated.

As can be deduced from the name, they are innate, but you can check their value through the so-called caps or through the most classic breeding.

For now, however, just know that a competitive Pokémon generally needs 5 IV al 31, or 4 to the characteristics defensive and speed (HP, Defense, Special Defense and Speed) and one for Attack or Special Attack, based on which of these values ​​the Pokémon will make the most of.

There are also exceptions (such as Distorted Zone Pokémon) which may also need fewer IVs at most, but in general it is always ideal to have 5.

… And the EVs

Acronym for Effort Values, they are characteristics that vary from 0 to 252 that the Pokémon will acquire by defeating certain Pokémon or with particular objects called supplements.

Every 4 EV, a Pokémon will receive a boost of 1 to a certain stat, and each Pokémon can have a maximum 510 EV totali.

Since this number is limited, it is recommended that you choose carefully which features to distribute each of them to.

Nature

The nature of a Pokémon, just like IVs, is a innate factor which will enhance one statistic and weaken another.

In Pokémon Sword and Shield, specific objects have been introduced called "Mind”That will modify the effect of a nature, but breeding is also a decent method to be able to control it at will.

The moves

A Pokémon can learn a maximum of 4 moves, both via level and via MT e DT, which, however, are obviously limited by the ability or not of our pocket monster to learn them.

It is extremely important for a competitive Pokémon that the moves we are going to give it reflect the our needs and its characteristics (in 99% of cases we will not go, for example, to give a Pokémon with a high Special Attack a physical move, and vice versa).

The skills

Each Pokémon can have up to 3 possible abilities, of which often a "hidden" called Special and obtainable only in Dynamax Raid.

Skills are innate characteristics of each Pokémon they will give him different specific advantages in battle.

For example, Dragapult can have as a skill Corpochiaro (which avoids stat decreases by other Pokémon's moves or abilities) or Interpass (which avoids the effects of any screens or Substitute), but may also have a third secret ability named Corpofunesto (which can deactivate a move he was hit with).

To take a look at all the new Pokémon Sword and Shield abilities, we recommend the our guide on this.

The items we're going to assign to each Pokémon

Depending on the areas in which you have concentrated to create your competitive Pokémon, it will be extremely useful to equip it with an item that can expand its capabilities even more.

We talk about objects such as the Band of Choice, the Absorbisphere, the Focalnastro etc.

In case you don't know where to get them, we refer you to our guide with all their locations.

Read IVs and get Pokémon from Raids

Before you think about creating your competitive Pokémon, you'll need to unlock the ability to read its IVs from the box.

To get this function you will have to finish the main story of the game, and then unlock the Torre Lotta and face there 5 coaches.

Once this is done, in the box, by pressing "+" while you have the cursor on a Pokémon, you can read its IV, whose values ​​will be represented by a particular adjective.

For this guide, you just need to know that "Stellar" corresponds to 31 IV and “At the top” will represent instead the use of a cap on that statistic.

Your goal, in general, will be to get or create a Pokémon with 5 IV al 31 in the statistics useful to the Pokémon. In old versions this process was very long and slow, but in Spada and Scudo everything was speeded up thanks to the Raids.

Addressing the 5-star raid you will have a chance to get a Pokémon with at least 4 IVs at most, obtaining among other things other items and bonuses at the end of the fight such as:

• Various types of Rare candies which we will talk about later.
• Berries that will allow you to reset the EVs of the Pokémon.
• I DT, items that will allow you to teach your Pokémon moves that they would otherwise not be able to learn.
• Items to sell as the Pearl.
• A lair occupied by a Pokémon emits a ray of red or purple light and will donate to the player 2000 Watt. Empty burrows, which do not emanate any ray of light, will instead give 200 Watts.

Watts can be spent to get caps, for more information on this subject, please refer to the guide dedicated to the topic. Let's put them aside for now and talk about their usefulness later.

You will certainly have understood that the first phase for creating a competitive Pokémon mainly consists of farming di raid.

For this reason, if you want to speed up this first phase, we recommend that you bring the legendary cover or the third legendary, in order to take advantage of their peculiar move capable of inflicting double damage to the Dynamax Pokémon.

Create the Pokémon with the best IVs using eggs

Once the raid phase is over you will find yourself with various Pokémon with 4 IVs to 31, but it is not said that these have the IVs in the right characteristics or the best nature.

You will then have two choices: head to the battle tower and buy a mint to change nature to the price of 50 Battle Points, or use the classic egg method.

We advise you to use the latter, because even if it is slightly more complex, it will still take you less time than it will take to get 50 Battle Points, since more advanced encounters will donate no more than 2.

Furthermore, the process has however been speeded up compared to previous generations.

Then open the box e look for a female and a male Pokémon with IVs desired, the latter may not belong to the same species but must belong to the same egg group.

Il Female Pokémon will decide the species of the Pokémon that will come out of the egg. Nature will be passed on to the parent holding a Stone Stone or will be randomly selected if no one is holding it.

Taken the two Pokémon, go to one of the two Pokémon pensions and, after giving the specimen with the desired nature a Pietrastante and to the other one Destincomune, give them to the mistress, get on the bike and start moving around.

After a while the owner will warn you that an egg has been laid, take it and wait for it to hatch by getting back on the bike and moving around. We recommend that you use the guesthouse on Route 6, taking advantage of the long bridge to the right.

To speed up their hatching, you just need to have obtained theOvamuleto (after completing the game, go to the hotel to the left of Circhester square, take the elevator and enter the first door on the left) and have a Pokémon withFirebody skill o Magmascudo.

In this way it will be possible to halve the hatching process.

By following these steps and with a little luck you will get in 3/4 attempts your Pokémon with at least 3 IVs at most and better nature.

Don't worry if you don't get the right IVs right away, as 5 will be randomly passed (if one of the two parents holds Destincomune, otherwise 3) between the 12 of the parents.

When you have the Pokémon with desired IVs, nature and abilities you will have to bring it to the maximum level using the Rare Candies that you have collected during the raids.

If the Pokémon already has all 5 of the right IVs (or 4 in the case of a Pokémon to use with Distortion Zone), you can skip the section on Silver Caps.

The Silver Caps

In order to make your Pokémon competitive now you will have to take advantage of the Silver Caps to be able to maximize the missing useful IVs.

They are located near the Piana del Ponte pension the Vanga Brothers in Shoulder.

Talk to the Brother on the left and send him digging in exchange for 500W, do this until you run out of watts in order to get a good number of Silver Plugs and other rare items.

Once this is done, go to the Battle Tower to be able to use of the Pro Workout. To do this, talk to the employee and, once you have chosen the Pokémon at level 100 to upgrade, you will be taken directly to the statistics menu.

At this point you will have to use the Silver Caps for increase the Pokémon's missing VI.

The EVs in the competitive

Another very important part regarding the Pokémon competitive scene are the EVs, or the values ​​that your Pokémon will have and that can reach a maximum of 510 EV.

EVs are distributed in a particular way: each statistic can have from 0 to 252 EV, Each 4 EV correspond to 1 point more on the chosen statistic and we can have in total 510 EV that match 61 more points on statistics.

If you aim for the competitive one you will need to check the meta-game of the moment, as each Pokémon may need certain stats over others.

The new games simplify the game a lot EV assignment phase.

In the past you were forced to have to continuously fight against certain Pokémon or you had to take advantage of the Pokéresort (Sun and Moon), instead now you just need to buy supplements, which can be bought in City Center Pokémon in Goalwick at the cost of 10.000 Pokédollars each.

On average you will need them 500.000 Pokédollars to maximize a Pokémon's EVs. If, on the other hand, you want to save something, we recommend that you follow the following table, which shows all the locations of the Pokémon to be defeated in order to get the EVs:

To speed up this process, you can purchase Vigor items from the Knuckleburg Pokémon Center, which will add 4 EVs to the stat indicated by the item after each battle.

On the other hand, if you don't have enough pokédollari or want to save money, we recommend using the Poké Job, accessible from any PC in the Pokémon Centers.

Just deposit a Pokémon al Poké Job e wait a couple of hours, so you'll get some HOME.

Below we leave you a table with the ore e the EVs received:

If yours Pokémon will have the Pokérus you will get double the EV, even when you face wild Pokémon.

In order to reset the EVs of your Pokémon, in the event of a meta-game change or a mistake on your part, you will need to use the berries obtained in Raid Pokémon or from some trees, so as to reset or decrease the stats and be able to redistribute the EVs.

The berries that will reduce EV by 10 for each use are: the Baccagrana (PS) Codfish (Attack) Baccaloquat (Defense) Baccamelon (Special Attack) Baccauva (Special Defense) and Tomato Berry (Speed).

The egg moves

Le egg moves are special moves that your Pokémon will be able to obtain through the Pokémon Hostel.

Let's give you an example: you have a Dragapult ready for the competitive, but you want to make him learn Codadrago, one a move that he cannot normally learn.

All you need to do is pair a female Pokémon from the evolutionary line of Dragapult with a male Pokémon from the evolutionary line of Commo-o with the move Codadrago to get a Dreepy Egg with Codadrago.

At this point you will have to evolve the Dreepy with Dragon Tail into Drakloak or Dragapult so that it is of the same species as the competitive Pokémon, remove a move from the latter and leave them in the hostel until an egg is laid.

Just refuse the egg and retrieve the Pokémon to notice that it will have inherited Dragonfly without any problem.

The latest precautions

Now you know everything you need to be able to permanently build your Pokémon.

Then make use of the DT you have farmed during raids, of the moves that you can learn thanks to Remember moves and finally to the use of the aforementioned mechanics of the egg moves to finally get yours Competitive Pokémon. 

Sword and Shield Pokémon is available exclusively on Nintendo Switch.