To Espurr or not to Espurr?

[redangel]

I just started playing Reborn today and I was wondering about Espurr since I've never used one in X and Y. Chikorita is my starter and I'm planning on keeping her around but other than her, I have no permanent team members in mind. (except maybe a Growlithe since its my favorite Pokemon) I was thinking of putting Espurr on my main team since it looks like an interesting pokemon to use.

Should I use Espurr on my main team and if so which one as well as which ability?

[Simon]

Espurr, especially a Female Espurr, does really well in-game due to its pretty decent good learnset that it gets. Its only issue is that it becomes outclassed by other mons with better stats such as Gardevoir or Alakazam.

Anyways, it is up to you to use it mate but I would say to try it out and have fun with it. That being said, give it Competitive if a Female or Prankster if a Male.

[Fury]

I just started playing Reborn today and I was wondering about Espurr since I've never used one in X and Y. Chikorita is my starter and I'm planning on keeping her around but other than her, I have no permanent team members in mind. (except maybe a Growlithe since its my favorite Pokemon) I was thinking of putting Espurr on my main team since it looks like an interesting pokemon to use.

Should I use Espurr on my main team and if so which one as well as which ability?

Chikorita, huh? Godspeed, soldier.

As for Espurr, the Hidden Ability of Own Tempo is generally the preferred one because when it evolves it'll either become a Male Meowstic with Prankster or a Female Meowstic with Competitive. If you've ever used or gone up against Sableye or Klefki, you'll know just how annoying Prankster can be. That Ability coupled with Male Meowstic's movepool makes it a decent support Pokemon to have. But having said that, Meganium will probably end up filling that support role, so you may want to soft-reset the game until you capture a Female Espurr with Own Tempo so you won't need to waste an Ability Capsule early on.

Female Meowstic's movepool is better suited for attacking since it learns Shadow Ball at Level 30 and can also learn Charge Beam to boost its Sp. Attack and deal with pesky Water and Flying-Types, the latter of which will be problematic for Chikorita/Bayleef/Meganium.

Ultimately it depends on what role you want your Meowstic to fill.

[Aurorain]

Glad to see another Chikorita soldier! o7 Well, I picked her(and she happens to be my favorite starter of all 18), though she eventually got replaced by..others. >3>

Anyway! Yeah, considering that early on you don't really get access to many psychic types, Espurr is definitely a good addition to your team.

Edited May 3, 2015 by Aurorain

[JapaneseWallpaper]

USE IT, HOLY FUCK USE IT. (its great early game cos 2 poison gyms lmoa)

[Reno]

From personal experience, male Meowstic can be a godsend for a good 3/4 of the game. Prankster screens can really help you out in most battles.

Meowstic also has access to the Charge Beam you get early on, so making it a sweeper is pretty viable at least in the early portions of the game.

[dankicks83]

My Prankster Male has put in a lot of work in the double battles. Never underestimate the usefulness of a priority Reflect/Light Screen/Flash/Safeguard/Substitute + Fake Out.

Offensively it's outclassed by the Female because of it's slightly more varied movepool. Which in turn is eventually outclassed by Gardevoir/Alakazam. But until you get to that point in the game it's the best Psychic type I found.

[Fumble]

What everyone said.

Male Meowstic is amazing for support with Prankster, since it gains Dual Screens, stat dropping moves, Substitute, etc. It also can handle itself decently with Psychic/Psyshock and maybe a few stat boosts from Charge Beam?

Female Meowstic is a very nice hard hitter, with either Infiltrator or Competitive. It has a quite a big movepool, too.

Still, after you get deeper and deeper into the game, you'll find that Meowstic doesn't do quite as well. However, by then, Meowstic would've done the deeds it is good for.

[redangel]

Chikorita, huh? Godspeed, soldier.

As for Espurr, the Hidden Ability of Own Tempo is generally the preferred one because when it evolves it'll either become a Male Meowstic with Prankster or a Female Meowstic with Competitive. If you've ever used or gone up against Sableye or Klefki, you'll know just how annoying Prankster can be. That Ability coupled with Male Meowstic's movepool makes it a decent support Pokemon to have. But having said that, Meganium will probably end up filling that support role, so you may want to soft-reset the game until you capture a Female Espurr with Own Tempo so you won't need to waste an Ability Capsule early on.

Female Meowstic's movepool is better suited for attacking since it learns Shadow Ball at Level 30 and can also learn Charge Beam to boost its Sp. Attack and deal with pesky Water and Flying-Types, the latter of which will be problematic for Chikorita/Bayleef/Meganium.

Ultimately it depends on what role you want your Meowstic to fill.

Since Meganium will have screens it'll probably be best to use a female Espurr for type coverages.

Glad to see another Chikorita soldier! o7 Well, I picked her(and she happens to be my favorite starter of all 18), though she eventually got replaced by..others. >3>

Anyway! Yeah, considering that early on you don't really get access to many psychic types, Espurr is definitely a good addition to your team.

Chikorita Soldiers unite!

I think I'll give Espurr a shot since I've always wanted to use one I just tend to get distracted by Gardevoir or Espeon more often than not.

Using a female Espurr would probably help out with Meganium's weaknesses since she can learn moves that cover up type disadvantages. Can an event Espurr have the possibility of being a shiny? Also should I look for a particular nature or no?

[Omega_Ra1der]

Every event pokemon can be shiny and about the natures, no idea because not a pro battler.

[Simon]

Timid or Modest Nature for Female and Bold or Calm for Male.

[redangel]

Timid or Modest Nature for Female and Bold or Calm for Male.

After about 13 resets, female one just popped up with a Rash nature which is Up Special Attack Down Special Defense, that scatters things ofte,n with own tempo. Would a rash nature hinder espurr at all?

Edited May 3, 2015 by redangel

[Simon]

Not really except that fact that it might not be taking hits that well.

That being said, considering its a Female Espurr, it won't have that much bulk to it so don't worry about it.

[Frostilicious]

Rash is fine honestly. Any nature that ups Sp.att (except quiet) is good for female espurr, because it will probably start to get 1 shoted at some point in the game (45-50+), but by then you will have access to gardevoir and/or alakazam.

Although to be perfectly honest, the pokemon that's helped me most (out of the psychic line) in reborn was deffinitely Delphox. It's a nice special sweeper having Good speed/sp.attack and if you want can teach it will'o'wisp so defense problems kinda solved (or reduced xD). Espurr is good but only on early stages of the game (lvl 40-45). After that it becomes inadequete. As for gardevoir.. It is a good pokemon. Deals tons of dmg honestly, but it has many more weaknesses due to it's fairy typing now, that against a toxicroak, for example, that would poison jab it, it might not even make it to kill the toxicroak :x. So that's why i think Delphox is the best.

Edited May 3, 2015 by timbla

[dondon151]

There is not much reason to use Meowstic-F. Its level-up movepool is overrated; Charge Beam at L28 is meaningless because it's the first TM that you get. Shadow Ball at L31 comes approximately 8 levels before when you get the TM for Shadow Ball. Signal Beam provides coverage against dark types, but it's not going to do very much without STAB and coming off base 83 SpAtk.

Meowstic-M, on the other hand, has Prankster with a whole bunch of good support moves learned by level up. You can have a Meowstic-M with the right moves and never level it up and it'd still do just fine.