Beedrill2001 Presents : Let's Talk Pokémon

#229 - Houndoom

While Bug is my favorite pokémon type, Dark is a really close second.

Out of all dark type pokémon, the hellhound from Gen 2 is easily one of my favorites.

I love Houndoom's design so much!

A black and red guard dog decorated with bones appeals to me quite a lot.

Seriously, you could put Houndoom on the cover of an 80s metal album and it would look absolutely amazing!

Unlike some of its typemates, Houndoom is a pretty decent mixed attacker, having base 90 attack and 110 special attack, plus a pretty good 95 base speed to make use of them.

Also, the dark/fire doggo has the moves to complement its attacking stats like Flamethrower, Crunch, Shadow Ball, Thunder Fang, Fire Fang, and Iron Tail.

A major negative aspect of Houndoom through....is a pitiful base 50 defense, meaning almost any physical attack will ruin its day (especially the vast number of fighting moves, which poor Houndoom already has a weakness to).

Houndoom's two standard abilities are Early Bird and Flash Fire, neither of which are all that useful.

Early Bird reduces the number of sleep turns, which while situationally useful when fighting pokémon who have moves like Hypnosis, situational is the key word here.

Flash Fire grants an immunity to fire attacks while also boosting the power of Houndoom's own fire type moves.

This is also situational, but can be useful by switching Houndoom in on a fire attack meant for one of its teammates for example.

Houndoom's hidden ability isn't great either, that being Unnerve.

Unnerve prevents your opponent's pokémon from consuming held berries, which hardly ever happens in the games except for certain Elite 4 and Gym Leader ace pokémon, but even then Unnerve hardly matters much due to those trainers having healing items.

Before I move on to talking about Houndoom's Mega, I'll take a moment to bring up something that really irritates me.

Why can't Houndoom be caught in its own frickin' region?!

Seriously, you cannot catch Houndour anywhere in Johto, not even in the remakes!

The only place to find Houndour in the Johto games is some random ass route in Kanto!

(Game Freak didn't even fix this in HGSS by putting Houndour in the Safari Zone like they did with Murkrow, Larvitar, and Misdreavus!)

I cannot even begin to comprehend why this decision was made.

It's not like Houndoom is some super awesome pokémon that would wreck the game if you could catch it during the main story, so what the hell?!

Houndour and Houndoom might as well be considered Kanto pokémon, because that's where they seem to exist rather than the actual region they're supposedly native to!

It would be like in real life if the Bald Eagle, known as a symbol of the United States and one of the things that come to mind when thinking about America, is actually only found in Canada.

Thankfully you can catch it in Platinum, but that's besides the point.

Ok, now that I got that rant out of my system, time to talk about Mega Houndoom.

Everything I said about Houndoom's design earlier applies to its Mega tenfold.

It really does look like a creature from Hell, and it's hungry for battle!

Upon mega evolving, Houndoom's defense, special attack, special defense (but only by 10 points), and speed all increase.

140 special attack is monstrous, working in tandem with a high base 115 speed.

A +50 to defense is much appreciated too, allowing Houndoom to actually tank a physical attack....sometimes.

Mega Houndoom's ability Solar Power is high risk high reward, boosting its already great special attack while Sunny Day is in effect, but at the cost of losing 1/8th of its HP at the end of every turn.

This ability is a double-edged sword, but Mega Houndoom should be knocking out its opponents so quickly that the downside shouldn't be much of a problem, but that's if you even decide to set up harsh sunlight in the first place.

In conclusion, Houndoom is a good dark/fire type I like a lot and has a really solid Mega, I just will never get over the fact of it not being available in the main story of any Johto game.