Competitive Pokémon History - Persian Quiz

Answer: 115

Persian, crucially, was able to outspeed the king of standard play, Tauros, which could let it revenge kill it if weakened. This was huge for its viability.

Speed also influenced critical hit rate, and every attack Persian used therefore had an eye-popping 22.46% chance to critically hit.

Answer: Slash

Due to the way generation one worked, if Persian moved first, Slash had a 99.6% chance to hit for a critical hit. Persian's 115 Speed meant it was just about always moving first, meaning it practically always critically hit when it used this move. This helped to patch up its awful base 65 attack stat considerably.

Answer: Haunter and Gengar

On paper, having humongous defense stats and a Rock typing to resist Slash makes Golem, Rhydon, and their pre-evolved forms seem like pristine counters. However, Persian had access to Bubblebeam, clearly outsped them, and Bubblebeam had just barely enough power to guarantee a 2HKO on both Rhydon and Golem, preventing them from being counters.

Gengar in standard play and Haunter in UU gave Persian fits big time. They were immune to Slash and Hyper Beam, often the only two physically attacking moves Persian could use. It's terrible special attack stat and Gengar and Haunter's decent specially defensive capabilities meant some stray Thunderbolt or Bubblebeam would do pathetic damage to either of them. This meant they could switch into Persian all day and force damage against its team, while also threatening potential Hypnosis against whichever of Persian's teammates switched in. Thus, before even revealing the existence of Persian on one's team, it was a good idea to make sure the opponent did not have a Haunter or a Gengar waiting to take advantage of the helpless kitty.

Answer: NeverUsed

Tauros and Rhydon were at least able to use their decent move pools and workable stats to remain somewhat relevant in standard play. Persian's stats were abysmal except for its speed, and its movepool was relatively unexciting as well. This caused it to totally fall out of favor in standard play big time, and it was barely even spared a passing glance in UU either.

In NU, which was somewhat of a joke of a tier at the time, Persian wasn't wickedly horrible, but it also wasn't a superstar either. The debate on who was truly the #1 most nerfed between these three has no true objective answer, but what isn't deniable is that Persian suffered the worst fate of the three and its competitive usage directly reflects that.

Answer: Limber

Limber renders the user immune to being paralyzed by any source. This was actually a better ability for Persian than it was on mostly anything else which got it, as this ability protected Persian from having its one redeeming quality - its speed- get ruined by the opponent.

Answer: Ambipom

Ambipom shared the same speed stat as Persian, while having a much higher attack stat and the Technician ability to make it even stronger. There was simply no reason at all to ever use Persian over Ambipom if the goal was to win a game, as Persian was badly outclassed by it.

Answer: Fur Coat

Fur Coat doubles the user's defense stat in exchange for making them weak to Fire. This was overall a net gain in a big way, giving Alolan Persian a bit of tankiness it could use to switch into battle and be an effective offensive utility or sweeper Pokémon. This gave it genuine viability in PartiallyUsed, the lowest tier in the game.

Answer: Dark

Normal, Kantonion Persian's typing, cannot hit anything super effectively while Dark hits prominent typings super effectively, so this was an upgrade for sure. Gaining access to Nasty Plot let Alolan Persian best make use of this trait.

Answer: Parting Shot

Parting Shot was by a million miles the best pivoting move in the game, and Alolan Persian had the stats to make it work. This could be a great move to just click when Alolan Persian was in a bad matchup, or it could be viably clicked when the user simply has no idea what the opponent is going to and wants to take a low risk, decent reward option.

Answer: Primeape

The thing to note is that, due to Parting Shot and Alolan Persian's excellent speed, it is difficult to properly counter it. Mostly anything which tries will just get hit by Parting Shot before they can move, allowing Alolan Persian to bring in an appropriate teammate.

The deadly exception to this is Primeape, whose mere presence deters Alolan Persian from using Parting Shot. Primeape's Defiant ability means that Parting Shot will actually feed it a +3 to its attack stat, causing humongous consequences should the Primeape user switch it in in this particular move. If the Primeape does this and also is wielding a Choice Scarf, the game can very easily be effectively over then and there, as it will have the speed and power to turn a deadly sweep.

Even if the Alolan Persian user is careful and does not give Primeape the Parting Shot, Primeape can still switch in anyway, leverage its typing advantage, and tear Alolan Persian apart from super effective Close Combats. Thus, the game plan for the Alolan Persian user changes dramatically if the opponent ends up having a Primeape, and it would be near compulsory to get Primeape out of the way before Alolan Persian even touches the battlefield.