Competitive Pokémon History- Virizion Trivia Quiz

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. For a Fighting type, Virizion's statbuild is truly unique for its kind. Its highest stat would be its Special Defense of all things. What is it?

Answer: 129

A 129 in Special Defense to go with a Grass typing makes Virizion ideal at taking on bulky Water types as well as certain bulky Grass types- even a super effective Ice Beam, provided it doesn't have significant investment or any boosts, will bounce right off of Virizion courtesy of its impressive Special Defense.

This gave it a valuable niche that other Fighting types struggled to contest.

2. Most Fighting types in fifth generation UU had a blanket of typical checks who could properly respond to them. In fact, the #3 most used Pokémon in fifth gen UU was one of these Pokémon-- Virizion became unique for being the only Fighting type who could have a consistently advantageous matchup against this Pokémon, who would typically be a hard counter to other Fighting types. Who was it?

Answer: Slowbro

The other options for answers are Pokémon who themselves have the upper hand against Virizion. Slowbro, however, cannot outgun Virizion due to the fact that Virizion is both faster and can slam Slowbro with super effective Grass moves before Slowbro can tame Virizion with super effective Psychic moves. Switching into Slowbro is risky, so Virizion shouldn't be viewed as a counter- classifying it as a Slowbro check is appropriate.

3. While Virizion could handle a few threats the average Fighting type could not, fifth generation UU unfortunately saddled it with a nasty hard counter. Which threat of the following could reliably switch into Virizion and win?

Answer: Crobat

Chandelure is immune to Fighting and resists Grass, but Virizion out speeds and 2HKOes it with Stone Edge, or even a resisted Leaf Blade followed up by Stone Edge, so switching Chandelure in is far too risky to accurately call it a counter.

Escavalier can go toe to toe trying to counter Virizion's physically offensive sets, but specially offensive builds semi-commonly carry Hidden Power Fire, and Escavalier will outright lose to such sets. So it's status as a counter has a chance at falling apart completely if the Virizion is a specially offensive variant.

Crobat won't enjoy taking a Stone Edge or a potential Hidden Power Ice as it switches in, but it can tank these hits if need be. Uniquely, Crobat was one of few Pokémon who could naturally outspeed Virizion- it could do this and then expose Virizion's 4x weakness to Flying but annihilating it with Brave Bird, swiftly putting Virizion down. Crobat's 4x resistance to Grass and Fighting also gave it easy avenues to switch in using prediction.

4. Like the other Swords of Justice, Virizion has a signature move called Sacred Sword. Apart from deal solid damage, what else does this move do?

Answer: Ignore stat changes

Sacred Sword will completely ignore any of the target's stat changes, specifically Defense, meaning it will deal consistent damage barring a rare critical hit. While niche, this means Bulk Up or Curse users won't be able to protect themselves from the full force of this move's damage output like they could with other physical attacks. Sacred Sword's raw power is noticeably lesser than Close Combat's and its utility is fairly obscure and specific, meaning Close Combat usually gets the nod for its advantage in power.

However, Close Combat also diminishes the user's defenses upon use, which may not be ideal for a slower, slightly more defensively oriented Pokémon like Virizion, so Sacred Sword is a perfectly viable, less risky alternative.

5. All of the Swords of Justice carry the same ability, including Virizion. What's Virizion's single ability?

Answer: Justified

Justified grants the user a +1 to Attack if they are struck by a Dark type move. With Virizion's solid defenses, it could afford to easily tank a Dark type attack with its resistance to the typing. Thus, physically offensive Virizion variants could utilize this ability well with good prediction.

The fact that it was Virizion's only ability would naturally make the opponent wary about just throwing out a Dark type move in a fairly straightforward situation to do so, however.

6. Virizion would encounter some issues after the fifth generation included; for an offensive Pokémon, its Attack and Special Attack stats were somewhat lacking. What was the number for Virizion's Attack and Special Attack stats?

Answer: 90

Wielding the same offenses as those of Lugia, Virizion had managed to somewhat mask this problem with the use of Swords Dance and good bulk to effectively use it in the fifth generation. The advent of Fairy types in the sixth generation made this harder, though, as there were now more Pokémon who could hit Virizion really hard and make setting up challenging despite its decent bulk.

7. Combined with its fairly middling power, and Virizion's lowest overall stat, Defense, was beginning to cripple it more with the transition into the power creep frenzy of the seventh generation. What's Virizion's Defense stat?

Answer: 72

A 72 in Defense to go with a 91 in HP isn't super, duper fragile by any means, but with fairly mediocre offenses, Virizion would need to boost at least one to pose a significant threat- doing so in front of a physically offensive threat, particularly one who could hit Virizion super effectively, would be incredibly hard.

8. In the seventh generation, Virizion had dipped to the RarelyUsed tier, no longer viable for UU. Here, it encountered big problems with a seventh generation newcomer who would totally shut Virizion down regardless of what it tried to do. Which of the following posed as a counter in this sense?

Answer: Necrozma

The other three options could go one on one with Virizion and win, but cannot afford to directly switch into it and do so.

Necrozma was incredibly tanky and was a Psychic type, resistant to Virizion's Fighting STAB. As a result, Necrozma could switch in and just starting boosting with Calm Mind fearlessly, or threaten to 2HKO at worst with a Psychic move of some kind. As such, Dark type teammates were quite helpful at alleviating this flaw for Virizion.

9. The eighth generation became well known for opening up the movepools of many Pokémon courtesy of the brand new "Technical Record" mechanic. Virizion was a benefit of this system and gained a new coverage move to destroy Psychic types with on the physically offensive side. Which new move was this?

Answer: Megahorn

With an incredible 120 base power, Swords Dance variants of Virizion now became a bit harder to stop with this new toy to play. Notably, Necrozma and Cresselia would be 2HKOed by a Swords Dance boosted Megahorn- lacking the ability to outspeed Virizion or OHKO it, this means Virizion would now prevail if they switched in as it used Swords Dance, meaning they no longer functioned as full counters to it.

In a nutshell, this means Megahorn provided quite a lot of utility for Virizion.

10. In the realm of new eighth generation goodies, for the first time ever, Virizion received a priority move it could use! What would this be?

Answer: Grassy Glide

A base 70 STAB priority move could definitely serve Virizion well in fending off potential revenge killers. It could also turn Virizion into a revenge killer itself, allowing it to potentially cut off sweeps from dangerous foes such as Feraligatr, Diggersby or Sharpedo.

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- Virizion Quiz

One of three Swords of Justice, let's talk about Virizion's competitive history from gens 5-8!

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