Competitive Pokémon History - Victini Quiz

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. At first glance, Victini looks absolutely toothless. Its statbuild is distinctly mediocre. Much like fellow mythicals Celebi and Mew, each stat of Victini's holds the same exact number. What is it?

Answer: 100

A 100 in everything makes Victini about to be barely average, with mediocre offenses, average at best bulk and merely decent speed. As such, Victini never would've established itself as a threat if it had to do so off the strength of its stats.

2. Fortunately, Victini's subpar stats were saved by having a brilliant signature move, V-Create. V-Create is a devastatingly powerful 180 base Fire type move, utterly annihilating anything weak to it and often even things not weak to it. However, it mustn't be used recklessly; its drawback upon use is equally powerful and it must be used carefully. Upon using V-Create, what drawback befalls Victini?

Answer: It lowers their defenses and speed by one stage

With diminished speed and defenses, the user is ripe for a revenge killing after using V-Create. In particular, Victini's weakness to Pursuit did it no favors, as once it KOed something with V-Create, a Pokémon such as Houndoom or Tyranitar could be brought in and click Pursuit pretty brainlessly to ensure Victini could get no farther.

As such, the user really did have to be careful using V-Create. Its massive power made it doubtlessly potent, however.

3. If V-Create was all Victini had going for it, this would not do. In fact, at the very beginning of its time in the fifth generation, this was the case. It was later aided, however, by a fairly surprising set of benefits- access to Zekrom and Reshiram's signature moves, Bolt Strike and Blue Flare respectively. The window to get these moves on Victini was pretty small, however. How was it possible to do this?

Answer: Participate in a sponsored giveaway

In late 2011 through early 2012, then again in June of 2012, Nintendo hosted a WiFi based giveaway called the 'Movie 14 giveaway.' As you'd expect, the Pokémon in question being given away was a Victini with Bolt Strike and Blue Flare in its move set. Beyond having participated in this giveaway, it is not possible to have legally acquired a Victini with these moves.

As it happens, Bolt Strike especially became a critical coverage move for Victini on the competitive scene, granting it a high powered attack to thwart Water types looking to tank a resisted V-Create. Blue Flare was more niche, but it did make specially offensive-based Victini sets worth using.

4. Often, the subject of whether or not a Pokémon is shiny is trivial on the competitive scene, as being shiny does nothing to change a Pokémon's stats. In Victini's case, however, this was different and the user would always want their Victini to not be shiny. Why was this?

Answer: It impacted its moveset

The Victini distributed during the Movie 14 giveaway has a 0% chance to be a shiny, deliberately made to be impossible. As such, if you see your opponent with a shiny Victini, you can be 100% certain it does not have either Bolt Strike or Blue Flare and can potentially act on that information.

As such, even if you did not plan to use one or either of Bolt Strike or Blue Flare, it would be imperative to ensure your Victini was not shiny to keep your opponent honest.

5. Victini's ability, Victory Star, was exclusive to itself and was quite useful. What does Victory Star do?

Answer: Improves the user's accuracy

Victini receives a 1.1x boost to its accuracy thanks to V-Create. This is actually quite good, as V-Create and Bolt Strike have naturally imperfect accuracy which Victory Star solves. If used in doubles, this benefit extends to Victini's ally as well.

6. Victini had a wild debut generation, seeing use even in Ubers, though it was not banned to this tier. Which competitive tier was Victini native to?

Answer: UnderUsed

In UU, Victini was a fearsome wall breaker who could reliably nuke defensive Pokémon for an allied sweeper to have an easier time cleaning up. This was also the case in standard play and even Ubers thanks to the sheer might of V-Create and the strong coverage offered by Bolt Strike.

The reason Victini wasn't banned to Ubers, much less banned from UU was its terrible defensive typing, mediocre statbuild and overall lack of defensive utility. Victini couldn't really switch into anything with its typing and uninspiring bulk. It was somewhat of a one-trick pony in that regard, which made it out to be fairly predictable.

7. Victini spent time in a myriad of competitive environments in the fifth generation. Like many Pokémon, Victini often had to contend with a counter. Which of the following could reliably switch into Victini and win?

Answer: Dragon types in general

The thing to note is that if a given Pokémon doesn't resist Fire, you can immediately rule it out as a counter because it will simply fail to switch into V-Create with any sort of consistency and win. Water types are also hard pressed to pull it off, as nuclear Bolt Strikes are typically too much to come in on.

Dragons, however, resist both Fire and Electric. Bulky Dragon types can switch into Victini without keeling over, especially if sunny weather isn't active. In UU, Kingdra boasts a 4x resistance to V-Create and it can boost with Dragon Dance, put up a Substitute as Victini switches, or simply drown Victini with a strong Hydro Pump or Waterfull. In standard play, the Lati Twins, Garchomp and Dragonite function similarly. Finally, in Ubers, one could throw a dart at a board of coverage legendaries and likely land on one who can counter Victini. The Giratina forms, Palkia, Reshiram, Zekrom and more are more than capable of achieving this.

8. In the sixth generation, Victini's colorful movepool gained access to a new move, exclusive to the Kyurem trio, that got it banned from UU and made it native to standard play. What move was this?

Answer: Glaciate

Glaciate is a base 65 specially offensive Ice type move. It wields the secondary effect of guaranteeing a one stage speed drop on the target, basically making it a significantly stronger version of Icy Wind.

While this seems like a weak addition to Victini's movepool, it was actually a welcome buff for it. Dragons were now far less consistent counters, as Glaciate not only hit the majority of them for super effective damage, but its speed reducing side effect meant they couldn't setup on Victini even if they didn't take much damage from the move. This made Victini overall harder to take advantage of. In particular, it now had essentially nonexistent counterplay in UU, making it a very easy ban candidate from the tier.

9. The seventh generation, often hailed as the "Z-Move era" gave Victini quite the useful option for its offensive palate. It didn't get a personal exclusive Z Crystal, but it's access to one bizarre, typically useless move could be paired with Normalium-Z to make it a threatening sweeper. What move was this?

Answer: Celebrate

When used as Z-Celebrate, all of Victini's stats experience a one stage boost, making it decently bulky, quite fast and hit like a truck with its high powered attacks. The arrangement could either allow Victini to break through something it would've fallen short of, such as Toxapex or Landorus-T, or it could allow Victini to easily clean up a weakened team.

This extra dimension gave Victini useful depth that kept it very much viable in standard play.

10. In the eighth generation, Victini was back and rocking after a DLC release in standard play, with nobody doubting its viability for the tier. Much like many others, it received a buff in the form of a new item that helped patch up one of Victini's biggest weaknesses- Stealth Rock. What item helped it here?

Answer: Heavy Duty Boots

Heavy Duty Boots render the user immune to all forms of entry hazards. Not only is Victini weak to Stealth Rock, but it's tendency to make itself vulnerable with V-Create meant that the user would often want to switch it out. This meant Victini would constantly be losing 25% of its health to Stealth Rock, with no way to get this health back.

Heavy Duty Boots patches this problem up and allows the user to be more aggressive with V-Create, which is hugely beneficial.

Source: Author cavalier87

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor kyleisalive before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.

Competitive Pokémon History - Victini Quiz

One of the most eccentric competitive Pokémon ever, we have the Victory Pokémon Victini! See if you know how well it's title held up on the competitive scene here, from generations 5-8!

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