Competitive Pokemon History - Manaphy Quiz

Answer: 100

The whole "good enough to not be bad" dynamic simply doesn't cut it in Ubers, where everything is far better than simply not being bad. Fortunately, Manaphy's movepool and, to a lesser extent, ability delivered and allowed it to carve out a niche for the tier.

Answer: Instantly heals status effects in rainy weather

If Manaphy switches in to, say, Blissey's Toxic if the weather is rainy, it will simply absorb the status effect. At the end of the turn, the poison will go away immediately and Manaphy will have essentially received a free switch-in. This also applies if Manaphy uses Rest and puts itself to sleep.

The healing effect of Rest will occur, and Manaphy will then immediately wake up at the end of the turn if the weather is rainy.

Answer: Tail Glow

Tail Glow immediately boosts Manaphy's Special Attack by three whole stages at absolutely no expense. It was the most potent drawback-free boosting move in the entire game. The only move that could boost more than Tail Glow was Belly Drum on the physically offensive side, and it had the drawback of halving the user's HP. Thus, Manaphy could become a frightening threat almost instantly that had to be addressed by the opponent immediately as it took the field.

Answer: Heart Swap

Until Magearna in the seventh generation, nothing other than Manaphy would ever get access to this move. Heart Swap takes any boosts or stat drops Manaphy has received, gives them to the opponent, and takes the opponent's stat ups/drops and gives them to Manaphy, "swap"ping the two. Manaphy has sadly never been a good user of this move due to its subpar bulk, but Magearna's amazing Steel/Fairy defensive typing and great bulk would prove to let it make great use of the move in the seventh generation, stealing away an opponent's stat boosts and potentially even threatening a counter-sweep off the heels of doing so.

Answer: Dialga

Dialga resisted or took minimal damage from anything Manaphy could run, had a great Special Defense stat, and frequently carried Thunder that it could use to easily deal with Manaphy. Simply put, Manaphy could never defeat a healthy Dialga, and because Dialga was a top level threat, this necessitated Dialga checks on Manaphy's team. Sadly, the best Dialga check in Groudon happened to have incredibly poor synergy with Manaphy, taking away its rain and neutering its Water type attacks with its Drought ability anytime it came into play. Thus, the trainer would have to get more creative with their choice of Dialga check(s) and play very carefully once the opponent revealed that they had a Dialga on their team.

In addition to Dialga, a Blissey with Calm Mind, Palkia, Latias, and to an extent Latios can also pull this off. If Manaphy is not running Grass Knot, opposing Groudon with investment in Special Defense can competently switch into it and take it on. If Manaphy chose to run Grass Knot instead of Ice Beam, Rayquaza would then become a huge problem, as its Air Lock ability also negates Manaphy's rain and hinders its offenses. By a similar token, Tyranitar and its sandstorms can become problematic, but Tyranitar needs to be Choice Banded and hope Manaphy isn't running maximum Speed EVs, or it will usually fail to counter it.

Answer: Kyogre

Groudon and Tyranitar were mostly terrible teammates for Manaphy, as their respective weathers would debilitate it rather than help it. Groudon's sun heavily lowers Manaphy's Water type attacks, while Tyranitar's sand passively damages Manaphy every turn. In either case, its Hydration ability cannot function, which makes Manaphy easy to take advantage of and deal with either offensively or defensively.

Rayquaza and Manaphy could co-exist, since Rayquaza's Air Lock ability only works when Rayquaza itself is on the field, thus enabling Rayquaza to immediately return Manaphy to rainy weather if Rayquaza switched out or got KOed. However, Kyogre was Manaphy's best friend and the only thing making it usable in Ubers. Kyogre automatically summons the rainy weather which Manaphy so desperately needs to function. Manaphy notably can obliterate stall teams for Kyogre, allowing it to preserve its HP and come in later to finish the job with its terrifying Water Spouts. Thus, the partnership was mutually beneficial.

Answer: Arceus-Electric

New mechanic to EV training meant Arceus formes in general could now specialize with their EVs, rather than always be forced to place 100 EVs into all of its stats. This meant offensive formes, such as Arceus-Electric, could now run maximum Special Attack and Speed EVs.

This gave way to the rise of numerous different Arceus typings creating viable sweeping sets, with Electric becoming Manaphy's worst enemy in this generation. A Calm Mind based Arceus-Electric will always defeat Manaphy as it switches in, either being able to boost with Calm Mind alongside Manaphy and win, or switching in as Manaphy uses Tail Glow or an attacking move and casting judgment on it (sometimes literally) and banishing it to the depths of Poke-Hell with a super effective Thunder or Judgment. Thus, add Arceus-Electric to the list of threats a Manaphy user had to consider when teambuilding.

Answer: OverUsed (standard play)

The removal of permanent weather made it so that Calm Mind Manaphy was rather unviable, making it somewhat one-dimensional. Really, Manaphy's viability in Ubers during the fifth generation had been somewhat clinging to dear life, so any noticeable nerf was always going to kick it down and kick it down hard. Fortunately, the removal of permanent weather made Manaphy a reasonably strong and competitively-healthy threat in standard play.

Here, it put its still-exclusive access to Tail Glow to lethal effect, often running Tail Glow + 3 Attacks sets to threaten a wide majority of the overall meta.

Answer: Clefable

Clefable's Unaware ability lets it totally ignore Tail Glow and Calm Mind boosts Manaphy accrues. From there, Clefable's excellent bulk exposes the fact that Manaphy's unboosted offenses are quite mediocre, and Clefable can turn the tables on it by counter-boosting with Calm Mind or simply beat down Manaphy with a few attacks and call it a day.

Answer: Waterium-Z

Waterium-Z, when used on Manaphy's Rain Dance, immediately boosted its Speed by one stage and set up the rain simultaneously. On various hyper offensive teams, this was useful to simultaneously augment Manaphy's Speed and offenses, enabling it to retain the momentum its team may have had.