How would you design a Dewgong Crest?

[ty_taurus]

I love Dewgong design wise, but he struggles to compete in any semblance to other defensive water type Pokemon and pales in comparison to every other fully evolved Water/Ice type Pokemon as well.

 

I've been wracking my brain around what a Dewgong Crest could look like--something that's interesting and provides Dewgong with a solid niche, but it's kinda tough. Dewgong's moveset has a lot of limitations, so it becomes difficult to think about what kind of mechanics might genuinely benefit him.

 

So I'm curious what others think about the topic. 

[Gastronely]

Memejuvforms has one. It gives Dewgong 2 permanent stockpiles, which essentially grants it great recovery and semi-consistent damage output (spit up with base 200 power is stronk). 

[ty_taurus]

That's an interesting option. I've yet to settle on anything that I really clicks for me. Some examples of ideas I though of:

 

- Early Bird effect + something else... Dewgong resting is probably his most famous tactic and makes it a much stronger form of recovery, but then idk what you'd add to that.

- Something to do with Encore, like countering attacks with Encore, but then it gets really cheesy really fast. Or Dewgong only counters moves resisted by water (Fire, Water, Ice, Steel) with Encore, but idk.

- Something to do with Perish Song, perhaps while making Dewgong immune to it. Idk what direction I'd take this, and it could also get cheesy pretty quickly.

- Giving Dewgong some kind of cleric functionality, like a reverse Regenerator (i.e. heals the Pokemon you switch in by 30% or something). Not sure if I could possibly make that work, but it's an idea.

[Outside Indoorsman]

Actually, I think Dewgong is based on - well, Dugongs, to some degree. Using that as an inspiration... Dugongs are long lived and have few natural predators, and they feed on seagrass and algae. It seems they'd probably get a defense-boosting crest, like what Phione has?

And they're... related more closely to elephants than other marine mammals, according to wikipedia? Huh. Gonna have to look that up... okay, it seems to be the case, according to a brief browsing session. Huh. Well, Dewgong has Drill Run, Smart Strike, and Iron Tail as learnable moves, and Donphan and Copperajah are Ground and Steel-types. Hm.

We're probably going to have to think of something weird for poor Dewgong... Maybe a Perish Body effect and heightened defense, to go with what ty-taurus said? But with Dewgong being immune to said Perish Body effect.