Medicham, The Meditate Pokémon. It elegantly avoids attacks with dance-like steps, then launches a devastating blow in the same motion. Through the power of meditation, Medicham developed a sixth sense. It gained the ability to use psychokinetic powers. This Pokémon is known to meditate for a whole month without eating. This Pokémon hides its presence by merging itself with fields and mountains. Through daily meditation, it hones its spiritual power. It can sense what others are thinking.
Overview
Medicham hasn't changed role too much in the generation shift. Its main gimmick continues to be its massive Attack stat, backing its fairly versatile physical move-pool, which has seen some minor setbacks but some significant improvements. The major setback has been the loss of Shadow Ball, with no physical counterpart to replace it. In exchange though, it's gained physical Psychic STAB and the three elemental punches. It's also gotten a stronger Fighting STAB. Although Close Combat has eluded its move-pool, the improved Hi Jump Kick is a welcomed addition. Item-wise, much like many other sweepers, Medicham benefits from the additions of Life Orb and Choice Scarf.
Despite some rather nifty improvements, it's still in the same kind of position that it used to be in. Really good offences are enough to justify its use, but it's fragile, and it isn't alone in being an effective physical attacker.
Trait
Pure Power: doubles Medicham's Attack stat, and as such, serves as the source of its main gimmick. The main thing to watch out for is physically-inclined opponents Tracing or Skill Swapping this ability, but that will be a rarity.
Move Sets
Choice Scarf / Band
- Hi Jump Kick
- Psycho Cut
- Ice Punch
- Thunderpunch
Item Attached: Choice Scarf / Band
Ability: Pure Power
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk) / Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
Choice items remain the standard way to go with Medicham. The hit-and-run mentality suits it quite nicely, and the Stealth Rock resistance is a nifty bonus when compared against other Choice Pokémon.
Being relatively slow, Medicham benefits a lot from Choice Scarf. As well as outrunning a lot of opponents head-to-head, it also opens up the opportunity for Medicham to go on an unexpected sweep, or pull off revenge KOs.
Alternatively, Medicham can use Choice Band, the standard of the previous generation. With a Choice Band, Medicham can reach a potential Attack stat of 720. The obvious advantage is it makes Medicham an even harder hitter than before, leaving a large dent in even the toughest physical walls.
The move-set itself is quite self-explanatory. Hi Jump Kick provides its strongest STAB. It's worth noting that there is a risk of it missing however, and should it miss, it'll do half the damage to Medicham that it would have done to the opponent (capped at 50% of the target's maximum HP). This damage still occurs even when Medicham aims at a Ghost or is blocked by Protect, so some caution should be exercised.
Psycho Cut provides it with Psychic STAB. As well as providing some more type coverage, it also provides another powerful move to use against opponents who resist Hi Jump Kick (such as Dusknoir). Having a lot of neutral type coverage is also useful, especially when predicting the opponent's next move is difficult or when intending to sweep a weakened team.
Ice and Thunderpunch primarily serve to deal with Flying types. Ice Punch particularly deals with Salamence and Gliscor, whilst Thunderpunch deals with Gyarados. Aside from fliers, they deal with a select few Psychics. Ice Punch is super-effective against Claydol and Celebi whilst Thunderpunch is super-effective against Slowbro and Starmie.
Reversal
- Reversal
- Endure / Substitute
- Psycho Cut
- Ice Punch / Thunderpunch
Item Attached: Salac Berry
Ability: Pure Power
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
Reversal sets have been mentioned before in previous PotWs, and the story is still the same. The addition of another source of Sandstream (Hippowdon), the popularity of Tyranitar, Abomasnow (Snow Warning), as well as the addition of new 'Quick Attack' moves have all made Reversal a significantly less viable strategy than it once was. It can be a game-winning strategy, but at the same time it can simply be a waste of a Pokémon.
The obvious focus is to get Medicham down to 1 HP, preferably when the opponent's team is weakened enough to be exposed to a possible sweep. This is done through one of two ways. Using Endure to absorb a hit that would have KOed it or using four Substitutes to bring its HP down to 1. In turn, the Salac Berry will be activated and Reversal will reach its maximum power.
Psycho Cut provides it with a different STAB, as well as its most effective move to use against Ghosts and Poison types. An elemental punch would be chosen to deal with Flying types, with the choice being defined by which Pokémon are considered a bigger threat to the move-set (Salamence or Gyarados, Gliscor or Slowbro, etc.).
EVs and Nature:
Medicham has little use for anything other than the 252/252 EV spread. The main area of variation comes from which nature it uses. Since Medicham deals with such high numbers in its Attack stat, Adamant obviously gives a huge boost (42 points, counting Pure Power).
Jolly isn't too notable without a Choice Scarf. It'll nod it ahead of Adamant Heracross and the odd Pokémon with an unusual EV spread, but not much else. With Choice Scarf though, it makes a notable difference. A Jolly Scarf-Medicham can reach a Speed stat of 426, nudging it ahead of a lot of the Base 130 Speed-freaks (Jolteon, Aerodactyl and Crobat) as well as the standard Scarf-Cross and other Scarf Pokémon who linger around that Speed stat. Without Jolly, Scarf-Medicham caps at a respectable 388. It's enough to beat Weavile, but falls short of other threats.
Other Options
Brick Break, Rock Slide, Fake Out, Bullet Punch, Focus Punch, Fire Punch, Baton Pass, Bulk Up, Calm Mind, Recover, Reflect, Light Screen, Power Swap, Guard Swap, Counter, Focus Sash.
Brick Break is an alternative to Hi Jump Kick. There's a significant drop in power but Brick Break is more accurate and doesn't come with the missing recoil. Breaking defensive screens is a useful side-effect.
Rock Slide is another move that can cover flying types, and it also covers both Gyarados and Salamence at the same time (admittedly at only 2x effectiveness, instead of the 4x effectiveness experienced by the elemental punches). It's pretty much lost its place on Medicham's move-sets, but it's a viable option.
Fake Out used to have some popularity with Choice Band to pick up some quick damage at no cost. It strikes first and flinches the opponent (barring those immune to flinches). Whether it's worth a move-slot is very questionable however, especially with better alternatives being available.
Bullet Punch is its only other priority move. Steel is a poor offensive typing, and its power is quite low, but it's worth a mention purely for granting Medicham the opportunity to strike first, both on weakened opponents and opponents weak to the move (such as Weavile and Aerodactyl). Even with poor Base Power, Medicham's huge Attack stat means it can produce some respectable damage.
Focus Punch is its strongest move, and a useful attack to use on opponent's who are switching-in.
Fire Punch is an okay move, but its super-effective power is equal to a STAB HJK, and not too many opponents resist HJK and are weak to Fire Punch. It's a stronger hit on Forretress and Scizor, but little else of note that wouldn't be handled by one of its other moves.
Baton Pass is worth a mention for any Medicham involved in a Baton Pass chain. Medicham wasn't an overwhelmingly popular choice on Baton Pass chains, but it's usable. Bulk Up and Calm Mind present stat-up options that it can Pass and Recover helps keep it conscious. As a lone Baton Passer, Medicham isn't too worthwhile, other Pokémon can perform it more efficiently and Medicham has better things to be doing.
Reflect and Light Screen present defensive options it can provide for its team. They're really not worth the effort on such an offence-minded Pokémon.
Power Swap switches Attack and Special Attack boosts and drops with the opponent. Guard Swap switches Defence and Special Defence boosts and drops with the opponent. They're too situational to be worth the while, but being such odd and thinly distributed moves, they're worth a mention.
Counter and Focus Sash can be used in a modified variant of the Reversal set, where the objective would be to get a KO from the Counter-Sash strategy and then use Reversal for sweeping. Medicham is a bit too slow to take advantage of this effectively, but it's a possibility.
Countering Medicham
With the loss of Shadow Ball over the generation shift, Psychics and Ghosts have become particularly problematic for Medicham. Cresselia stops Medicham comfortably, resisting both of its STAB moves and having Thunder Wave and Reflect accessible to hinder its sweeping efforts. Spiritomb is immune to both of Medicham's STAB moves and can halt it with Will-o-Wisp or take it down with STAB Ghost moves. Dusknoir might take a bit of a dent from Psycho Cut but it's immune to its Fighting moves and, much like Spiritomb, can turn to Will-o-Wisp or STAB Ghost moves.
Celebi is comfortable against all of its moves except from Ice Punch. It has decent enough offences to bring it down or it can throw up a Reflect. Slowbro is comfortable against all but Thunderpunch, and likewise, has the capability of throwing up a Reflect or bringing it down with its offences.
Salamence, Gyarados and Gliscor are capable, provided they don't switch into the wrong elemental punch, but with 4x weaknesses, they are risky choices to use as counters.
Locations in Games
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Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald Victory Road Basements 1 & 2 (RS) Trade from RSCXD (E) Colosseum/XD Evolve Meditite Fire Red/Leaf Green Trade from RSCXD Diamond/Pearl Route 217, Lake Acuity, Mt. Coronet Top, Victory Road
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Animé Appearences
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Medicham has had a few anime appearances. First, May fought against one in the Fallarbor Contests. After that, Greta used on in her Battle Frontier match against Ash.
Episode 326: Pros and Con Artists! |
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