Pokemon Black Version 2 – Moveset Guide

Versions & Updates

• Version 1.0, August 8, 2016
• General Strategies finished.
• TM/HM List finished.
• Movesets finished.

Introduction

Pokemon is an interesting franchise. It managed to keep my interest for such a long time even if I no longer watch the TV series. I still remember the Pokemon craze that was Red, Blue, and Yellow when I was in middle school, and thought it was somehow ridiculous. But soon after that (soon being a year or so), I bought my first Pokemon game which was Crystal, and became immediately enchanged. The experience prompted me to play at least a game each generation afterwards. So here I am, writing a guide about Pokemon, my second I believe, because for some incredible reason I still enjoy playing it very much.

This guide is more for those who are new to Pokemon and would like some help on what to capture without using a full walkthrough. I will list which Pokemon I think are good to use and their movesets, so you will you have an easier time playing the game. It is my belief that if you have your Pokemon right, then you don't need step by step instructions on what to do at specific points of the game, hence the lack of needing to use a walkthrough. Instead of catching a new pokemon just to beat a gym, you'll use your own Pokemon and form your own strategies. Sounds fun?

Some people will say that you can beat the game with any Pokemon. This is true. But with some Pokemon, you might have to spend extra time leveling them up to beat a gym, or catch more Pokemon than you needed. It might even turn what would normally be a 10 hour game into 25+ hours, which prompts the new Pokemon trainer to ask why everyone likes this horrible game so much. However, I will say that if you like a Pokemon, then by all means go ahead and use it, no matter what its stats are! I give you suggestions on how to improve your team, but they are not rules. It's important to balance planning and having a good time.

Aside from movesets, I will also give general guidelines about what types of Pokemon you should have in your party and which moves you should keep and forget. You may even read that section and come to the same movesets as I did! The difference between this guide and a Pokemon wiki/Pokedex is that I take into account where you are in the game and the limitations that are available at that point. For example, it's great that you know Archeops can learn Earthquake, but you can't get the TM before beating the game! Therefore, I added sections such as listing the TMs/HMs as you get them so you don't have to worry about surprises in the future.

Thank you for taking your time to read this guide, and I hope it will prove to be useful.

General Strategies

In this section I will first about how to build your party so it will be efficient and good enough to tackle any gym. After you get the concept down, it's time to look more closely at each Pokemon and see what moves they should get.

Building Your Party

If you play RPG games like Suikoden and Fire Emblem, then you should know what it means when the game gives you a huge pool of usable characters. You will soon figure out that it's better to focus on some characters instead of using them all. The same applies here. While Pokemon's motto is to "catch 'em all", you don't have to train them all. Doing so would take way more time to finish the game than required, and if training up many Pokemon is your thing, then you should do it after you finish the game. But until then, it's best to focus on your main party only.

You can carry around a maximum of 6 Pokemon, so it makes sense to use only 6 or less. I would say your target is 3-4 strong Pokemon before legendaries. Using less Pokemon means your Pokemon will be higher leveled and you will spend less time training. Why not use all 6 Pokemon you say? Well, first, you will actually get quite a few high-leveled Pokemon right before the end of the game. Second, you will need to keep a few Pokemon around for key HM moves, which are either needed or makes life a lot easier, but not strong enough moves to be put on your main Pokemon. Let's explore what I mean.

HM Slaves

Note that while Black & White does not require HMs to advance the plot besides Cut (HM 01), it's good to have them anyways because they are nice to have. For example, having Strength means you get access to an area unneeded to finish the game but trains for experience along with some rare items, maybe even a TM! Having Fly means you can revisit any town you want for any reason, very convenient if you ask me! Some TMs such as Flash have field effects too, so they are useful to have but useless for battles.

If you are using 6 Pokemon to battle, you can spread the HMs across each Pokemon, which is fine. The disadvantage is each Pokemon will be a little bit weaker due to having HM moves, but you'll have all 6 Pokemon to use for gyms and whatnot. Or, since Cut and Strength are most used, just get a 1 HM Slave that can learn both and have Fly and Surf learned on your other 5 Pokemon. This does means you need a flying and water type though. Lastly, you can have complete flexibility with your 4 main Pokemon if you decide to have 2 HM Slaves, which is what I will recommend you do.

Getting Really Choosy

Now it's time to discuss what Pokemon you should have on your team. Let's say you decided to have 4 main Pokemon and 2 HM Slaves. Does it make sense for all 4 of your Pokemon to be grass? Probably not, because then your entire party will be weak once you encounter a fire or flying type. The first rule is for all 4 of your Pokemon to different types. It's fine you have a Water/Ground and then Ground/Dark, since that's still some variety. But having two of the exact same types is not very good. If 3 of your 4 Pokemon are flying, that's also probably not a good thing, regardless if they are dual-type or not. And there's definitely no reason for you to have two of the exact same Pokemon!

You probably understand now the important of having variety in your team, let's talk about the Pokemon themselves. You want to pick something that last you for a long time and won't fade away near the end of the game. This means you want Pokemon with high stats. For example, when you capture Woobat it has two strong moves, Gust and Confusion. If you evolve it to Swoobat, it will probably nuke a lot of things with Air Slash and Psychic. But when you get to the Pokemon League, Swoobat is no longer very good and will be OHKO'd often. Usually you'll need to refer to a Pokedex to figure out which Pokemon have good stats and which are not, but this is exactly why I created this guide! You'll have that information easily at the tip of your fingers later on.

Lastly, we want to talk about stat distribution and availability. A Pokemon may have high total stats but is extremely slow. Now there's nothing wrong with slow but bulky and powerful Pokemon, but depending on your playing style, you may quickly become annoyed at your Pokemon getting hit first all the time. Therefore, for in-game purposes, you generally want fast Pokemon. Stat distribution also means you don't want an extremely average Pokemon with no strong points. You have 4-6 Pokemon, so let each of them specialize instead of having one being completely boring. Even if a Pokemon is good, you need to consider when you get it too. If you get a really good Pokemon after the 6th badge and you have to train it from Lv1, then you might decide that it's not worth it.

Picking the Right Moves

One of my gripes about Pokemon is how you can only have 4 moves at a time, so after 4 you will have to forget a move to learn a new one. This means you need to carefully pick what moves you want, or you'll regret it. There is a way to relearn forgotten moves, but it costs a rare item each time so you won't be able to make many mistakes. So in this section, I'll be giving you tips about how to decide which moves you want on your Pokemon.

Having Different Types of Moves

The first thing you need to know is actually quite intuitive. If you've read the lecture about having Pokemon of different types above, then it should be no surprise for you when I recommend that you have moves of different types on your Pokemon. Let's say you have a Sawk, a fighting type, and all you have are fighting moves. When you face something that resist fighting, you would be at a huge disadvantage. Having moves of different types would remedy this.

There are some exceptions to this rule of course. If you have Confuse Ray and Shadow Ball, that's fine. Both are grass moves, but one inflicts a status effect and the other one actually deals damage. Even then, there are some cases where you can have two damage moves of the same type on a Pokemon. This happens when one of the moves have too low PP (Fire Blast) so you can't use it a lot or if it has a secondary effect like lowers speed (Bulldoze) or heals user (Giga Drain). I'll explain this in more detail for each Pokemon later on, so for now just keep the "all moves should of different types" mentality.

Damage Category, Power vs. Accuracy

After that, you should consider your Pokemon's stats. Let's use Sigilyph for an example this time, a Pokemon with low physical attack (Atk) and high special attack (SpAtk). In this case, you would know to not give it Fly, a 90 power physical attack, but instead Air Slash, a 75 power special attack. Although Air Slash looks weaker, Sigilyph's SpAtk almost doubles its Atk, making Air Slash do more damage.

Next, you have to consider power and accuracy. Both Ice Beam and Blizzard are power special attacks and ice type, but they have differences. Ice Beam is 95 power with 100% accuracy, while Blizzard is 120 power with 70%. Usually, choose accuracy over power, so in most cases Ice Beam is preferably over Blizzard. Also consider PP as well, which is how many times your Pokemon can use each move. Ice Beam has 10 PP and Blizzard has 5 PP. So Ice Beam is a bit less damage, but way more accurate and you can use it 10 times. That beats Blizzard, which may or may not hit and you can't use it many times.

Same Type Attacking Bonus (STAB)

STAB is so important that it deserves its own section. In short, if you use a move that has the same type as the Pokemon's type, then that move is 1.5x more powerful. A STAB Fly has 135 base power instead of 90 base power. Therefore, even though you want moves of different types, don't forget to use moves that matches your Pokemon's type too! In short, if your Pokemon is Sigilyph, a flying and psychic better, then you better keep a flying move and a psychic move! It's as simple as that, but never overlook STAB.

As an aside, STAB is what makes normal type Pokemon boring to most trainers. Normal moves are not strong against any type, so a STAB normal attack won't be super-effective against anything. That's sort of a waste, don't you think? I only have two normal type Pokemon on my list of usable Pokemon, and one of them actually has a second.

Non-Damaging Moves

Over the course of your adventure, your Pokemon will learn moves that raises or lowers a stat, or inflicts a status effect. I'm talking about moves like Tail Whip and Growl. Most of the time, you want to avoid using these moves because attacking is better. If you use Tail Whip and attack twice, that would be exactly the same result as if you attack three times. And for most battles, you can win with attacking twice. Therefore, they are sort of useless.

There are however some exceptions. Swords Dance will raise your Atk not once but twice! This immediately doubles your damage, so Swords Dance + attack is the same as attacking twice. Other moves like Quiver Dance raises 3 stats at once, SpAtk, SpDef, and speed. Now isn't that nice! Sleep Powder is inaccurate, but if it hits, your opponent will spend up to 5 turns doing nothing. That's worth a slot on your Pokemon. I will note these exceptions on my Pokemon list further on.

While attacking is the fastest way to win, stat changing moves are actually incredibly strong. If you use Work Up (which increases your Atk and SpAtk once) six times, throwing in a potion or two to keep your Pokemon alive, then that Pokemon can pretty much beat anything. But here's where you have to a decision. Do you want to spend every battle boosting up your stats? Or do you want to just win and get on with it? This is the reason for preferring attacking moves over non-damaging moves. You give the nod to stat changing moves for being potentially really good, but you also understand that you don't have all day either.

TM/HM List

Markup:

• TMs that are bolded are given by gym leaders. This means all TMs before that are usable to fight that gym.
• Entries that are italicized are move tutors and move relearners that can be extremely useful.

Comments

• item: Probably appears on the ground as a PokeBALL
• given: Someone gives this to you for free or after doing something
• shop: You can buy this in a shop

Pre-League TMs/HMs

• About the Battle Subway, it can be a bit hard to gain BP right when you first reach it. The main TMs of interest are Brick Break and Swords Dance. Note that Sludge Wave and Frost Breath are nice, but very restrictive in who can learn it.
• As for Move Tutors, I will assume that you can collect at least 10 shards of red, yellow, and blue by the end of the game but less than 20. Ten is easily achievable if you walk around with Dowsing Machine on every route and run into all Dust Clouds you see.

Post-League TMs

Pre-League Movesets

In this section, I'll be listing what I think is the best moveset for the final evolutions of each Pokemon that I think are good to use. Of course, many Pokemon are not included because I don't think it's going to be fun training them up and using them in-game. I also included a rating for each Pokemon and the moveset I gave. There will be no rating below 4/10 because I using the 1-10 scale fully. This means there exists Pokemon with a rating below 4/10, but for those Pokemon I disregard them as being very useful and therefore won't give them a subsection.

I will not include Pokemon that requires to be traded, Pokemon that comes so late, or Pokemon that hatches from an egg and requires too much training. I will also not include moves that requires a Post-League TM or a move that requires breeding. I will use the full capacity of Move Tutors and Move Relearner.

Recommended Pokemon

• Note: When I recommend an item such as Mystic Water, you can substitute it with its respective plate or incense, such as Splash Plate or Sea Incense.

Serperior

Item: Miracle Seed

• Coil / Swords Dance*
• Leaf Blade
• Aqua Tail
• Dragon Pulse / Outrage

Unlike Black & White, Serperior isn't stuck with Coil, grass moves, and Return. However, this does mean you have to utilize the Move Tutor quite heavily just for one Pokemon. Coil is still good because you are lacking in offense and there are not that many alternatives. Iron Tail isn't useful in terms of coverage. Leaf Blade is your STAB move. Aqua Tail is quite good at combating Fire and Steel types. Dragon Pulse or Outrage is up to you, and it's nice as neutral damage or against Dragons. The strategy is use Coil a few times, then hyper potion, and sweep.

(*) Do note that Swords Dance requires you to spend time in the Battle Subway to get it. If you do get Swords Dance, then you are a pretty bulky physical sweeper. Take Outrage in that case.

Rating: 8/10

Emboar

Item: Charcoal

• Flamethrower
• Hammer Arm / Superpower / Brick Break / Scald
• Wild Charge
• Flame Charge / Scald

Perfect. Flamethrower is special, but I'd rather have that over other fire moves. Hammer Arm lowers Speed, and Superpower lowers Attack, so take what you hate less. You can always switch out to negate the effect. Wild Charge is electric which guards against Water types. What's not to love? Flame Charge raises Emboar's Speed after using, which is great because it's what makes Emboar a sweeper. It does learn Iron Head, but Steel's coverage (Ice and Rock) are already covered by Flamethrower and Hammer Arm. It also learns Scald which gives it perfect coverage against Rock and Ground, but you would be replacing either your STAB Fighting move or your sweeper setup move.

(*) Do note that Brick Break requires you to spend time in the Battle Subway to get it.

Rating: 8/10

Samurott

Item: Mystic Water

• Swords Dance (Lv57)
• Aqua Tail / Waterfall
• Megahorn
• Superpower / Dig

Samurott is, in my opinion, the best starter, but it beats the others by only a little. While Emboar can cover all its weaknesses, Samurott is an outright sweeper with Swords Dance. Its speed isn't too bad either, and can be fixed by resetting Oshawott for a speed nature/high speed IVs, or feeding it a lot of Carbos to raise its EVs.

It's pretty obvious what to do here. Just Swords Dance, then attack with whatever that works. Usually the STAB Waterfall is enough here, having more PP and 100% accurate for just 10 less power. But you can go with Aqua Tail if you so choose. Megahorn is for those grass types, but can do well against grass/poison too. Superpower is a good addition in B2W2, giving Samurott super-effectiveness over 120 more Pokemon. Lowering attack should be fine because you already used Swords Dance, but if you don't like it, you can always use Dig. The problem is you won't get Swords Dance until Lv57, so you might want to keep Ice Beam until you do.

Rating: 9/10

Leavanny

Item: Miracle Seed / Silver Powder

• Swords Dance
• Leaf Blade
• X-Scissor
• Return / Giga Impact

At first I was turned off by Leavanny needing happiness to evolve. But then I turned my head when I saw it can learn Swords Dance naturally. This thing is a beast! The only problem is that its 4th move must be Return. It can learn Shadow Claw, but take a look at the bug/grass combo. If it's trying to sweep and comes across a Poison type, then Leaf Blade and X-Scissor are useless. So you really need that very strong neutral move for coverage. Giga Impact isn't bad either.

So in fact Leavanny isn't a bad Pokemon if you can set up a Swords Dance. If you do attempt to get it, beware that you will be stuck with Swadloon for quite some time. But the end result is worth it. Make sure to give Swadloon a Soothe Bell and daily massages at Castelia City after you get Fly. Excadrill, Samurott, and Cobalion are more reliable Swords Dancers, but Leavanny is the cutest of the bunch! (Seriously)

Rating: 9/10

Stoutland

Item: Silk Scarf / Choice Band

• Return
• Crunch
• Wild Charge
• Dig / Giga Impact

I sort of love Stoutland, and if it weren't for my hate of normal types, I'd have it on my team. With a low SpAtk, it gives room for of Stoutland's other stats to be higher than expected. It also has a very respectable 80 base speed, which equals some of my favorite in-game sweepers. But the reason why I love it is its ability, Intimidate. It makes Stoutland's decent HP/Def stats become good. It has a great movepool as well. The ability to learn both Crunch and Wild Charge is nice. If you want to go out with a bang, then Giga Impact is for you.

Rating: 7/10

Azumarill

Item: Mystic Water or Wide Lens Ability: Huge Power

• Aqua Tail / Strength
• Ice Punch
• Bounce
• Waterfall

Azumarill is a pretty good Pokemon due to its ability, Huge Power, which raises its pitiful 50 base Atk to around 120 base Atk. Aqua Tail can actually destroy almost anything that doesn't resist it. Bounce removes most of Water's offensive resistances. Ice Punch is for Dragon and Grass. Bounce is for Bug and Fighting. For your last move, I prefer Waterfall over Brick Break or Superpower. If you are running 6 Pokemon, then Azumarill is a great choice since you can give it both Waterfall and Strength if you desire. The only reason it doesn't get a higher rating from me is because it's so slow.

Rating: 5/10

Golduck

Item: Mystic Water / Choice Specs

• Surf
• Ice Beam
• Psychic
• Signal Beam

Golduck has extremely average stats, with highest being SpAtk and Spd, which makes it pretty decent. It can learn Surf and Ice Beam like most Water types. Psychic and Signal Beam is nice for coverage too, since it can't learn anything interesting yet. Overall, it's a decent Water type that's actually better in B2W2 because this game doesn't have that many great water types.

Rating: 7/10

Lucario

Item: Black Belt / Metal Coat

• Aura Sphere
• Iron Head
• Dragon Pulse / Ice Punch
• Psychic / Shadow Ball

Let's face it, Fighting and Steel has overlapping coverage, but Lucario has great stats and good defensively being Steel as well. We do get Iron Head because Fighting can't hit Ghost along with nullifying other resistances. You do get Aura Sphere late, so you'll have to make do with Force Palm for a long time. Dragon Pulse or Ice Punch is useful because you'll be facing Dragon in gyms and the Elite 4. Get Psychic or Shadow Ball depends on your other Pokemon's moves. Note that you do learn Dig, but its coverage largely overlap with Fighting.

Item: Muscle Band

• Swords Dance
• Drain Punch
• Iron Head
• Zen Headbutt / Elemental Punch

This setup relies on Swords Dance, which Lucario learns naturally. Because you can't learn Brick Break pre-league, you'll need to use Drain Punch from the Move Tutor. The last move can be Zen Headbutt or any elemental punch, again depends on what your party already knows. Ice Punch does give you the most super-effective coverage so get that if you don't have an Ice Beam user. To get the Muscle Band, use the Battle Subway

Rating: 9/10

Vaporeon

Item: Mystic Water / Choice Scarf

• Surf
• Ice Beam
• Shadow Ball
• Scald / Waterfall / Rain Dance

Before we talk about Vaporeon, let's first talk about Eevee's evolutions. You can capture Eevee in Castelia Park after you clear Castelia Sewers, and it has 7 evolutions. Most of them are decent, but many have heavy competition. The main problem is that they have terrible movepools. Jolteon has good stats but can only learn Thunderbolt and...Shadow Ball. Espeon lacks Grass Knot and a Fairy move in this game. Umbreon is meant to be used competitively. Glaceon, being a single-type Ice Pokemon, is a terrible idea. So that leaves us with the three good ones that may be worth to train up this late: Vaporeon, Leafeon, and Flareon

Now, Vaporeon is not the best Water type to use in-game mainly because it's somewhat slow. That can be solved by Choice Scarf or a +Speed nature. Vaporeon's main draw is that it really has no competition. Golduck and Jellicent are equally decent. Azumarill and Floatzel gets Aqua Tail instead of Surf. That really leaves Samurott, but it takes one of your precious starter slots, and that's why Vaporeon fits in. Other than Surf and Ice Beam, its movepool isn't impressive. Shadow Ball won't OHKO a Ghost type of the same level, but it's good to have nonetheless. It learns Dig, but its Atk stat isn't good enough to use it. For the last slot, you may want Scald as another STAB filler move, Waterfall for field use only, or Rain Dance as a boost.

Rating: 8/10

Flareon

Item: Charcoal

• Flamethrower
• Shadow Ball
• Dig
• Flame Charge

Flareon is a Pokemon that can actually make good use of Dig. The downside is that Shadow Ball is less effective, and so is Flamethrower. It doesn't learn Flare Blitz for another generation. It is also as slow as Vaporeon, but that is solved by one use of Flame Charge like Emboar. Overall, it's a decent Pokemon, but I think Arcanine, Volcarona, and Emboar are better.

Rating: 6/10

Leafeon

Item: Miracle Seed

• Swords Dance
• Leaf Blade
• X-Scissor
• Dig

Hm, this moveset looks familiar...oh yeah it's almost the same as Leavanny. In return for STAB X-Scissor, Leafeon gets Dig for pretty good coverage. Leafeon is, in my opinion, the best Eevee evolution of B2W2, but some people still have qualms about using a pure Grass type. If you want one, then by all means go for it! (But it's still not as cute as Leavanny.)

Rating: 9/10

Magnezone

Item: Choice Scarf / Magnet / Metal Coat

• Thunderbolt
• Flash Cannon
• Signal Beam
• Tri-Attack / Thunder Wave

Magnezone is great, albeit a little slow. I would try to rectify that by either getting a Choice Scarf or catching one with a +Speed nature. It learns Flash Cannon naturally, which is nice, because we can't get that TM pre-league. However, the main annoyance is you will have to stick with Volt Tackle for a very long time, since you won't learn Discharge until level 51 and Thunderbolt until the end of Victory Road! Nevertheless, if you like electric types, then I can't blame you for getting a Magnezone. While it is an extremely good Pokemon, my rating for it is low based on its move availability.

Rating: 5/10

Arcanine

Item: Charcoal

• Flamethrower
• Crunch
• Dig
• Dragon Pulse / Outrage

Arcanine has an interesting move problem that's different from Magnezone. Even though you get Fire Stone early, you can't evolve Arcanine if you want access to Crunch or Flamethrower. Growlithe learns Crunch at level 39, you will have to wait that long to evolve it, which can be annoying. The reason why Arcanine is viable is because it learns Dragon moves, which helps combat certain annoying Pokemon. You can choose whether to use Dragon Pulse or Outrage from the move tutor. Other than that, it learns Iron Head, but Dig is much better in terms of coverage. Arcanine has amazing stats, but too bad you have to train Growlithe for so long.

Rating: 7/10

Crobat

Item: Sharp Beak / Poison Barb / Choice Band / none

• Fly / Acrobatics
• Cross Poison
• X-Scissor / Heat Wave
• Zen Headbutt / Heat Wave

Crobat you say? Trash Pokemon? Surely not! Similar to Leavanny, you do have to stay as Golbat for some time for friendship to kick in, but Crobat has pretty nice overall stats. Fly with Sharp Beak actually does more damage than Acrobatics, but less accurate so it's your pick. If no one knows fly in your party then you should learn Fly. Cross Poison is your other STAB move since Poison Jab isn't available. As for your final two moves, just pick whatever moves fill your party's gaps the most. Note that X-Scissor and Zen Headbutt allows you to use Choice Band, while X-Scissor and Heat Wave has the most super-effective coverage. All in all, if you need a Pokemon that can use Fly in your main party, then Crobat is a good consideration.

Rating: 7/10

Excadrill

Item: Soft Sand

• Earthquake
• Iron Head
• Rock Slide
• X-Scissor

This is pretty much my favorite Gen V Pokemon that isn't legendary or pseudo-legendary. At first glance, its defenses are poor. Then you look at its respectable 110 base HP. But the key is that its 135 base Atk can OHKO often. Since Excadrill has a great movepool, finding super-effective moves is easy too. Rock Slide is just a great move against Flying types. X-Scissor will OHKO grass types as well as some annoying dark types later. Iron Head can be learned now. Although it's overlapping in coverage with Earthquake, considering Earthquake's PP, it's a good move to use to save PP.

Item: Muscle Band

• Swords Dance
• Earthquake
• Rock Slide
• X-Scissor

If you like Swords Dance, then this is the moveset for you. This moveset guarantees normal effectiveness against all Pokemon. To get the Muscle Band, use the Battle Subway. Do note that it can be annoying to find a Drilbur, because they only appear in dust clouds, which means lots of Repels, resetting, and patience. But it's definitely worth it.

Rating: 10/10

Krookodile

Item: Soft Sand

• Earthquake
• Crunch
• Rock Slide / Stone Edge
• Outrage / Hone Claws

While everyone is learning cool moves like Swords Dance and Overheat, Krookodile is stuck with...well, Stone Edge. It remains that Krookodile can't boost up its Atk stat...unless you use Hone Claws! In combination with potions, Hone Claws will make Krookodile very strong, not to mention making Stone Edge accurate. After this, you no longer need Outrage to take down dragons. If you want to keep Outrage though, you can. In short, use Rock Slide without Hone Claws, and Stone Edge with.

Rating: 7/10

Darmanitan

Item: Charcoal / Life Orb Ability: Sheer Force

• Fire Punch
• Rock Slide
• Zen Headbutt
• Hammer Arm / Superpower

You want one with Sheer Force. Fire Punch, Rock Slide, and Zen Headbutt will have increased power but lose their secondary effects. I don't like putting Flare Blitz on Darmitan, because Fire Punch is plenty powerful with Sheer Force. The last move is the slightly inaccurate Hammer Arm or Superpower; both do not get boosted by Sheer Force but are there for coverage. If you want to grind 48 BP for Life Orb, then Sheer Force to apply Life Orb's attack boost but negate its HP drain! Oh, and before I forget, it has 140 base Atk! And it's fast too! I'm excited!

Rating: 9/10

Sigilyph

Item: Sharp Beak / Life Orb Ability: Magic Guard

• Psychic
• Air Slash
• Shadow Ball
• Ice Beam / Energy Ball

Get one with Magic Guard! This...thing is amazing. Because it can learn flying attacks, it solves the boring Psychic/Shadow Ball low coverage problem of other Psychic types. It has a pretty good SpAtk and Spd to sweep, and it can learn Psychic naturally. Definitely get Shadow Ball for the best coverage, and then Ice Beam or Energy Ball depending on what you lack in your party. Why, this is the second Pokemon in a row with Life Orb as a possibility...why? Magic Guard, like Sheer Force, will negate Life Orb's HP drain. You will have to grind in the Battle Station for it, but it's well worth it.

Rating: 9/10

Flygon

Item:

• Dragon Claw / Outrage
• Dig
• Crunch
• Fly / Rock Slide / Fire Punch / Thunder Punch

Trapinch is an addition to the Desert Resort in B2W2, and it's great. Being the first Dragon Pokemon you may get, it has good stats, especially Atk and Spd. Dragon Claw is probably enough, but Outrage is nice too. Dig and Crunch are good coverage. For the last move, I usually take Fly for field use (plus it does good damage), but if you already have Fly, then consider any of the other moves.

Rating: 8/10

Cinccino

Item: Silk Scarf Ability: Skill Link (event)

• Tail Slap
• Bullet Seed
• Rock Blast
• Dig

Note: This is the Minccino that Bianca found at the Hidden Grotto, with the Skill Link ability, which allows multi-hit moves to always hit 5 times! Cinccino learns three of them: Tail Slap, Bullet Seed, and Rock Blast, totalling 125 damage for 5 hits. For Bullet Seed and Rock Blast, this is even more damage than Energy Ball or Rock Slide with STAB! Tail Slap, combined with STAB and Silk Scarf, hits for an unbelievably 225 damage. As a bonus, Bullet Seed is good against those annoying Rock types with Sturdy! Although Cinccino is a glass cannon, the truth is that it easily OHKO (5HKO?) almost everything and never gets hit, unless you're facing a very high Def Pokemon. That's why this is one of my favorite Pokemon of B2W2.

Rating: 9/10

Roserade

Item: Poison Barb / Miracle Seed

• Energy Ball
• Venoshock
• Shadow Ball
• Giga Drain

As much as I much Roserade in XY/ORAS, it's not that great in B2W2, but it's very much usable because of its high SpAtk and Spd alone. Energy Ball will take out anything not resistant to it. Venoshock is a unfortunately here because you don't get the TM for Sludge Bomb pre-league. It's still usable, and I use Poison Barb instead of Miracle Seed to boost up Venoshock's power. Shadow Ball is the only other coverage move it learns (can't get Uproar without Budew). Giga Drain is a solid final move to heal back any damage taken.

Rating: 5/10

Lilligant

Item: Miracle Seed Ability: Own Tempo

• Sleep Powder
• Quiver Dance
• Petal Dance
• Giga Drain

Although Lilligant is my favorite Pokemon of all time, it sucks pre-League. The major problem is that Lilligant does not learn anything except grass moves and...Hidden Power. However, Lilligant is the queen of sweeping most things, as you will see below. In short, Sleep Powder, Quiver Dance, repeat if necessary, and your SpAtk will be through the roof. Try to set this up against a Pokemon that uses special attacks and you're golden. Afterwards, even if grass attacks do half damage, it is still powerful. Petal Dance is your best move (Own Tempo means no confusion) and Sleep Powder + Giga Drain when you're semi-low on health. The only problem is that this setup is way to long for an in-game moveset, but there's no denying how well it works!

Note: If you are playing Black 2, you can still trade a Cottonee for a Petilil on Route 4.

Heracross

Item: Wide Lens

• Megahorn
• Brick Break / Close Combat
• Rock Slide
• Swords Dance / Dig / Night Slash

Heracross is mega powerful. It has just enough Spd and very high Atk. All its moves are powerful, but if you want extra assurance, then get Swords Dance. Wide Lens (Battle Station) are recommended here, since it increases the accuracy of both Megahorn and Rock Slide. If you don't want to use Swords Dance, then Dig or Night Slash are options, although the latter are strictly for Ghost Pokemon. The reason Heracross gets a perfect score is because it is super-effective against 72% of all Pokemon with Dig. That's impressive!

Rating: 10/10

Pinsir

Item: Silver Powder

• X-Scissor
• Storm Throw
• Rock Slide
• Swords Dance / Dig

Pinsir is often considered a strictly worse Heracross, with almost the same stats but only one STAB. However, that's not saying much as all since it still destroys just as well as Heracross with Swords Dance. Storm Throw isn't as good as its XY/ORAS version, but it's still better than Brick Break. Again, if you don't want to use Swords Dance, then Dig is there for you.

Rating: 9/10

Swanna

Item: Mystic Water / Sharp Beak

• Surf
• Fly
• Ice Beam
• Return / Brave Bird

Swanna isn't a...terrible...Pokemon, but it's not good either. You may think that its high Atk is a waste, but that's not true since you use it for Fly. In fact, it learns Fly and Surf and is not an HM Slave...Swanna is actually usable in combat! However, I wouldn't send out Swanna against anything it's not strong against since its defenses are very poor. Its fourth move can be anything since you're never going to use it. Return can be nice if you think you can OHKO something with it. It's too risky to let Swanna use Rain Dance for one turn... Might as well give it Brave Bird to guarantee a OHKO that Fly can't or something. I swear, if Substitute was available before the Elite 4, I would use it.

Rating: 4/10

Zoroark

Item:

• Dark Pulse / Night Daze (Lv64)
• Flamethrower
• Dig
• Nasty Plot / Bounce

Zorua is given to you late, but once it evolves, it has amazing stats to make an effective mixed sweeper. The problem? It doesn't learn anything. It does learn Flamethrower which means you don't need a dedicated Fire Pokemon, but after that you're stuck with Dig and...Bounce. Shadow Ball is useless because it has the same coverage as Dark, and it can't learn Grass Knot yet. I would just use Nasty Plot for the last slot.

Rating: 7/10

Sawsbuck

Item: Miracle Seed

• Horn Leech
• Return
• Jump Kick
• Megahorn / Wild Charge

Hold up, that annoying little deer thing is actually decent? Why, yes! It has high Spd and Atk and learns some pretty nifty moves. Jump Kick is 95% accuracy but 100 damage! Megahorn or Wild Charge is luxury, depends on what you prefer. Horn Leech and Return are for STAB, and Horn Leech drains HP! Overall, it's pretty nice, albeit late. It gets an 8/10 rating because it has the best Fighting move for a non-Fighting type.

Rating: 8/10

Galvantula

Item: Magnet / Silver Powder Ability: Compound Eyes

• Thunder
• Bug Buzz
• Energy Ball
• Volt Switch / Giga Drain

Galvantula does come late, but seeing Magnezone's struggle to get decent Electric moves throughout the game, it's good to have another Electric alternative. Make sure you get one with Compound Eyes, which will allow you to use Thunder at 91% accuracy. That's quite good. Bug Buzz is the other STAB move, although it should be noted that you'll be stuck with Signal Beam until level 60. Energy Ball is good for coverage, and you get that right after Surf. For the last move, I like Volt Switch because Galvantula has very low defenses and don't want to stick around. But if you like Giga Drain for recovery, then that's fine too.

Rating: 6/10

Ferrothorn

Item: Miracle Seed / Metal Coat

• Power Whip / Seed Bomb
• Iron Head
• Bulldoze
• Swords Dance

Ferrothorn would usually fall under the "late" category, but it may be that tanky type that you need. It's definitely slow, but it has the defenses to back up getting hit. Its Atk is quite good too, which means that with Swords Dance, it should get hit once and OHKO back. Power Whip and Iron Head are for STAB, but Seed Bomb is good too, especially with Swords Dance. For the last move, Bulldoze is great because it's good against Fire and Steel, two types that Ferrothorn's STAB is weak against. It's such a shame it can't learn Dig!

Rating: 9/10

Volcarona

Item: Charcoal / Silver Powder

• Flamethrower / Heat Wave (Lv60)
• Signal Beam
• Psychic
• Quiver Dance / Giga Drain

Volcarona looks powerful when you get it because it's fully evolved with high stats, but there are a few issues. It doesn't learn any STAB move for...forever. Luckily, you can teach it Signal Beam via the Move Tutor immediately, so if you play to use Volcarona, save your shards for that. However, it will still be stuck with Ember or Fire Spin for eternity. You won't get the Flamethrower TM until the route before Victory Road, and it learns Heat Wave at level 60. Thankfully, you can learn Psychic and Giga Drain along the way if you wish. Quiver Dance is its signature move, but with already high SpAtk and Spd, you may want to just use Giga Drain.

The other thing is that Volcarona has a 4x weakness to Rock types. This is especially a problem because many Rock types have Sturdy, so you can't OHKO them and get OHKO back. Some Fighting types also have Sturdy or can't be OHKO'd, and will use Rock Slide back at you. Just keep that in mind. The combination of hard to get moves along with its 4x Rock weakness knocks a potential 10/10 down to a 7/10. It's still a great Pokemon, but you just can't use it in all situations.

Rating: 7/10

Cobalion

Item: Shell Bell / Muscle Band

• Swords Dance
• Sacred Sword
• Iron Head
• Bounce / X-Scissor / Zen Headbutt

Here is your first legendary Pokemon. It comes at a high level so it's fine if it comes late. Just remember that they take more experience to level up than normal Pokemon. Its movepool is uninspired, but the moves it does learn are great. Just roll with those after a Swords Dance you got yourself a very nice sweeper. I like Cobalion's steel typing. Bounce gives you the best coverage with Fighting and Steel but is inaccurate.

Rating: 10/10

Virizion

Item: Shell Bell / Muscle Band

• Swords Dance
• Sacred Sword
• Seed Bomb / Leaf Blade (Lv67)
• Bounce / X-Scissor / Zen Headbutt

Your second legendary Pokemon is a strange one. Giga Drain doesn't benefit from Swords Dance, but it does heal you. It might have more staying power than Cobalion and Terrakion. But I like it the least, at least for now. Once it learns Leaf Blade, it will be almost on par as the other two. Bounce gives you the best coverage with Fighting and Grass but is inaccurate.

Rating: 9/10

Terrakion

Item: Shell Bell / Muscle Band

• Swords Dance
• Sacred Sword
• Rock Slide
• X-Scissor / Zen Headbutt / Iron Head

I would say Terrakion comes too late since you get it just before challenging the Pokemon League, but hey some people don't mind it. Its moveset is almost identical to Cobalion's, but it has better Atk, with inaccurate Rock Slide instead of Iron Head. I prefer Cobalion though because it's steel and comes earlier. X-Scissor gives you the best coverage with Fighting and Rock.

Rating: 9/10

Pokemon Not Included

Here I'll give you a brief reasoning on why a Pokemon that some might consider usable but were not included. Most of them fall under three categories:

1. other Pokemon can do the job better
2. its movepool is insufficient before the post-league TMs
3. it requires trading

Pokemon That Come Late

Here I will list Pokemon, both good and bad, that comes too late. If you want to raise these Pokemon, then you will probably have to put off your Pokemon League fight to do it properly.

HM Slaves

Patrat

Drilbur / Sandshrew

Ducklett

Woobat

Basculin / Frillish

Rufflet / Vullaby

Contacts & Credits

About the Author

• If you can't find what you were looking for in my guide, feel free to send me a GameFAQs PM.

Suggestions are welcome. Make sure you realize, however, that my guide is meant for helping players beat the game. So please don't suggest me some mind-blown competitive moveset. If you see an error on my guide, then please tell me! I will credit all contacts properly if I use your information.

Thanks To

• Game Freak and Nintendo for creating Pokemon, the game we all know and love. Here's to you, Tajiri Satoshi, for starting something insane.
• http://www.pokemon.com/
• Bulbapedia, an incredible Pokemon encyclopedia that I use frequently not just for this guide but for playing Pokemon in general.
• http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/
• Serebii.net, for their Pokedex that displays information in a different format for when I need it.
• http://www.serebii.net/
• veekun, for yet another Pokedex that displays information in a different format for when I need it.
• http://veekun.com/
• Smogon University, for helping me with my Pokemon knowledge from the days of GSC competitive battling.
• http://www.smogon.com/
• GHPF, my first Pokemon community where I learned loads of stuff and made many friends.
• http://ghpf.pokemondungeon.com/