Of course, because of the fact that 0% probability does not mean “the event does not happen”, myths about Focus Blast hitting (because they do sometimes) abound.
Focus Blast is like that one job you hate but gives you good money but once you leave, you find that other jobs don’t pay you that well and so you go back to that job you hated.
Reminds me of that one player who missed like four Will-o-Wisps in a row during a high-stakes tournament, which led to the move being buffed to its current accuracy.
It reminds to how in a VGC World championship someone lost because they failed Will o wisp 4 times in a row, and in the next gen they buff its accurancy😂 Someone pls ask wolfey to take Focus Blast to worlds just so that they take notice
Gamefreak's split opinion on balance like "No, we can't make better physical electric moves, special fighting moves, and accurate rock moves, the balance will get out of hand!" and then make moves like Astral Barrage, abilities like pre-nerf Intrepid Sword, and entire Pokemon like Flutter Mane.
The difference is likely this Adding new non-signature moves, “we can’t do that, we might accidentally make an unknown Pokemon stronger than we want them to be” Adding an OP Pokemon, “yes, this is the type of Pokemon we want to see players using”
I remember a Ditto vs Hydrygon battle, with Ditto trying to revenge kill Hydrygon. Both clicked Focus Blast. It went as follows: Ditto Misses Hydrygon misses Ditto Misses again Hydrygon hits Revenge kill failed.
@@shadeslayer2297 coverage in fairy metas. Many drei sets drop dragon stab in order to get that extra coverage move. While Draco Meteor is really strong, it doesn't hit much that dark pulse doesn't already hit, and sometimes you need to hit stuff with super effective coverage more than you need a big neutral hit.
@@Zorothegallade-gg7zgFurthermore, Scald is guaranteed to do 80 base power chip damage. The burn is an added bonus. A Focus Blast miss means a wasted turn
As a Pokemon Stadium 1 GLC speedrunner, we live and breathe 70% accuracy on our main move (Thunder) and feel the pain often. To make it feel worse, whenever you miss a Focus Blast, you hit a OHKO move in another reality.
The crazy thing about Focus Blast is if its accuracy was good it would have been one of the most broken moves in the game when it was released. Special fighting coverage is so powerful for so many mons and I think gamefreak was afraid of giving them something super consistent. I think in todays era of Pokemon and power creep they could afford to buff it and it wouldn't be super oppressive.
Especially since fighting has so much coverage offensively, and covers most of psychic's weaknesses. alakazam and reunicles would be practically uncounterable with ghost and fire coverage.
Honestly, Stone Edge has hit much less than Focus Blast for me...Then again, maybe it's because I was so scared of Focus Blast missing that I used it less. Skewing the data.
@jaretco6423 They are two turn moves Great against lobotomised NPCs who don't switch Pokémon and take the hit, horrendous against actual functioning humans who can switch out Pokémon for that express purpose
Not Focus Blast, but one time i was using specs noivern against a +3 sp.def gastrodon in gen 6. I locked into Hurricane and hit once, confused gastro, gastro hits itself, i hit second hurricane, gastro hits itself, i hit a third hurricane, critical hit, gastro goes down. I could not believe my luck and neither could my opponent, they were both our last pokemon and his gastro had ice beam, one hit and i lose, i beat literally all odds to win.
Funny how you mentioned possessing a lucky Noivern: I had one named Bassface that was squared up against my opponent's Mega Blastoise. Bassface survived it's iceberg (with no focus sash), but *then it got frozen*. It thawed out the next turn and boombursted a dub against the Blastoise and our opponent because we were both using our last pokemon.
Even with access to Aura Sphere, Magearna usually still uses Focus Blast, because Aura Sphere is just too weak to get it the numbers on Heatran, Ferrothorn, Melmetal, etc that it needs. Something to consider.
Yeah I feel like the idea of competitive optimization should have been covered. Most mons that get Stone edge also get rock slide and yet edge is almost always preferred because the extra damage is just too much to pass up. A mon that hits 100% of its Focus Blasts will be objectively superior to the same mon running aura sphere, and if you're trying to play to win you're gonna play those odds and pray.
@@skeetermania3202 Nope he's using it correctly. If you want to OHKO Tyranitar, you would rather take the chance of 70% hitting Tyranitar with that OHKO rather than a 2HKO and then get KO'd back by Earthquake.
There's a video where Pimpnite uses a Simisage with Focus Blast to sweep an opponent with six hacked Slakings with Huge Power by hitting all six times.
Add 10, most other moves of similar power are at least at 80%, and anything else that shares a low 70%, usually have conditions that can override accuracy checks
@@brendanboomhour7606technically this does have an effect though but I agree, 80 accuracy would put it alongside Hydro Pump and make a near special counterpart of Cross Chop
@@Breakaway-ic5gj one issue there, Game Freak doesn't tend to completely change the effects of a move, they may alter the power, accuracy, or chance of a secondary effect, but they've yet to completely change a move
To think that most of the problems everyone has with Focus Blast wouldn't happen if Aura Sphere was just more well distributed Honestly my favorite part about Focus Blast is the animation they made for it on Showdown, love how they gave it that extra tension by making it stay still for a bit before you can tell if it hit
Yeah but going from 120/70 to 80 but guaranteed is a HUGE shift for a lot of mons. What they needed to do is make NEW special fighting-type moves and give them good distribution but like physical electric moves, Gamefreak has this weird fear that it would ruin the game or something.... Yet for some reason, we're getting more Special Fairy moves and Physical Fire moves as though most things aren't running Flare Blitz or Moonblast/Dazzling Gleam.
@@shujinkoMKnot really, Aura as an ability can be learned, that's what an Aura Guardian is, last I checked, so other pokemon being able to learn it via TM, makes sense, Lucario and Legendary Pokemon that can live for, or have lived for, centuries, if not millennia, learning it naturally, makes sense. It being limited to only the pokemon with a natural affinity for it, is just stupid
@@aghadlarhen9397tbf those moves they're making are either signature or gimmicky, and gimmicky moves need to benefit from it rather than suffer, and outrage clones are no good and no other fairy moves even approach the base power of moonblast. Moves like these aren't intended for just mons of its type after all, and very few mons learn flare blitz or moonblast outside of the type
New Theorem idea: Pokémon who have middling speed stats (between 50-70) are either too slow to use a Choice Scarf, or too fast to use under Trick Room. Even if they have decent attacking/defensive stats, their middling speed hinders them from high-level success. Title it: Why Middling Speed is Detrimental: The Decidueye Theorem
0:15 "Wanna tell me where the focus went?" Tbh, random anime trainer woman (aka Betty), your quote should be more iconic😂 Tbh I had never used Focus Blast for that exact reason, and also why I jumped from joy that Tera Blast exists
There is another special fighting move that also has limited distribution: Vacuum Wave. The Scyther line, Mew and Kartana were the only non-fighting types to get it before Gen9, where it was expanded a bit, but not to those that would've appreciated the coverage. It isn't much of an option, but it is there.
@raysay1818 yes, because they decided that a tanky, high SpA, slow pokemon that could hit ghosts with normal and fighting moves and ignore accuracy, with one of the best signature moves in the game needed a priority fighting move.
thought this would be a Rock Slide video, imperfect accuracy, extremely common coverage move, flinch lucksacking and as an added bonus for doubles where it's the most popular, the RNG layers increase exponentially
0:25 "... your roommate who has to watch videos at 1.5 speed, otherwise they can't concentrate" As someone who watches things at 1.5 speed, I feel called out.
@@AwesomeHairoare we thinking of the same falseswipegaming? Cuz this man talks pretty fast already. I'd think that if someone was speeding him up they have a negative attention span
@@tripleaaabattery8480 If I had a short attention span, I wouldn't be speeding up the video. I swear he talks slow, and this is coming from an American English talker with a moderate speaking pace.
I'll never forget the end of my ultra moon nuzlocke where on turn one, Hau's alolan Raichu OH-KO'd my Krookadile with a critical hit focus blast. I then proceeded to bring out my bulkiest Pokémon and give it 6 roto boosts before sweeping his team. I was done playing fair after that.
0:16 This is such an underrated burn from the anime. You can use this on anyone who misses focus blast at a crucial moment before their glass cannon gets wiped off the map.
My most hated move in all of pokemon is Dragon Rush because of my PTSD from Cynthia. Her Garchomp’s Dragon Rush hit me without fail, I use it on her and it misses each time.
wild pokemons hit zap cannon or inferno all the time, but you face a lot of wild pokemons meanwhile i occasionally die cause i used high jump kick, but i only have 6 pokemons
Hypnosis is one of those moves that makes me irrationally angry at times but I still use it frequently anyway. Fun fact: The move was buffed to 70% accuracy in DP and then immediately dropped back to 60% in Platinum. I think that's the fastest buff to nerf between games ever.
Your point about Scald still doing _something_ even when it fails to burn is a good one. IMO, a good change to Focus Blast (and maybe most lower accuracy moves) would be to make them still do a bit of chip damage or something even when they "miss"
They buffed Gunk Shot from 70 to 80 accuracy. So Focus Blast should get the same treatment or a gimmick for example when you hit first the moves accuracy is increased by 20% .
Sad thing is that most Pokemon that learn focus blast should be able to learn aura sphere. Psychic and ghost types should have auras. Couldn't we have a special fighting move that's somewhere between the accuracy and power of aura sphere and focus blast
75 power, 95 accuracy, special Probably named something like “fighting punch”, “flying punch”, or “throw punch” The idea is the Pokemon is throwing punches like how Shadow Punch is sometimes depicted
@@genarorios5055 Kiai would be an interesting name, having it be a sound based move It would probably be renamed in localisation as something like “Fighting Burst” or “Battle Scream” or “Brawl Voice”
If only there were some other special fighting move with less power but reliable accuracy. It could be a tm and spread to mons dependant on focus miss ... game freak.
yeah there is a good reason why fan's like to call Focus Blast "Focus Miss" plus tbh they always tend to balance out high power moves with some kind of drawback be it lower accuracy or some kind of negative effect on the user after it's use
Focus Blast feels so bad because its the only fighting type coverage for psychic types during the generations with dark type Pursuit users. God I'm glad Pursuit is axed forever now; but gamefreak please give psychic types a better coverage move 😥😥😥😥
Bro, it's as easy as having good luck. 🙄 Jokes aside, I've always wanted a special-focused pokemon with the likes of inferno, zap cannon and focus blast (maybe not all of them) to get No Guard as an ability, it would be interesting.
i think the only reason focus blast is so hated is that most mons that need it for coverage lack aura sphere, which is also 2/3 of the power. And unlike hurricane it doesnt have a synergistic way to make it more accurate
focus blast is hated because it makes already powerful pokemon nearly impossible to counter reliably. just let gallade learn aura sphere (and maybe ralts as an egg move) and delete focus blast entirely.
For synergy, Gravity exists - but it's a niche option that's very hard to justify for Focus Blast alone, and I don't think it gets any use outside of very specific doubles comps (trickroom Groudon teams etc).
People look at 70% accuracy and think it's not much different from 85% But you have to think of those percentage in reverse: you have one move with 30% chance to miss and another with 15% chance, the first one can miss twice as much as the other.
It's so weird. I almost always land Hypnosis, even though it's only **60%** accurate. But I have never ever managed to land Focus Blast in all the time I've been a Pokemon fan.
Yeah, I lost a small showdown tournament due to me missing 5 crucial focus blasts in a row in the game after I won the first one and the tie breaker. Lovely stuff
The issue Focus Blast presents to a competitive game is that if you ever wish to perform exceptionally, like in a tournament setting, not only would you have to account for the possibility that Focus Blast can misd whenever you'd want to use it, you'll also have to account for the fact that any Pokemon that's wrecked by special fighting moves cannot reliably deal with a large amount of Pokemon they would otherwise deal with easily. So a move like Focus Blast is not used the most effectively when it's spammed, it's at its best when you're aware of your opponent's fears of the move, how its mere existense shapes their lines of play. This is a lot easier said than done, of course, and a lot of times, a player might be backed into a corner where they'll have to rely on focus blast hitting/missing one way or another. But it's an important thing to bear in mind the implications of its existence and the consequences of clicking it. If you ever find yourself in a situation where your Zam is up against a Conkeldurr and they have a Pursuit TTar in the back. You may have more options on hand than Psychic and Focus Blast, even if you have to look to the rest of your team.
One thing I realized: Mega Pidgeot would've been one of the best users of Focus Blast due to No Guard, especially since it lacked good coverage against Rocks and Steels. Everything else gets either blown away by Hurricane, or blasted apart by the rarer Hyper Beam.
I think that the problem is not only Focus Blast, I think pokemon has a problem with their move variety. You have a million of different moves, but a lot of them are uselesss, ember for example (I got that is an early game move and bla bla bla). However, you can have good physical electric moves, even an accurate “standard” move for flying (physical and special) and so on. It’s funny how a lot of pokemons can’t even use their stabs (gyarados, landorus…).
We also need wider distribution of currently existing fighting moves. Vacuum Wave is a great special priority move that a lot of special mons could stand to use, and Aura Sphere should exist on psychic types at the least.
And physical electric moves that don’t have terrible drawbacks or low distribution. Supercell Slam was soooo close but they just had to make ground immunity cause crash damage to rub salt in the wound
Speaking of Aura Sphere, I think you'd be happy to find that some of the pokes you've spoken of do get access to it via TM/TR (if unavailable as a tutor move anywhere) from Gen 8 & 9 along with Togekiss being able to learn it in some form from its start
This video couldn't have came at a batter time. Literally watched my friend miss 3 Focus Blasts in a row last night while playing Gen 4 random battles. He's gonna be so pissed when he sees this video.
Ah yes, the special fighting move Game Freak couldn't help but slap on to fully evolve pokemon, as their only fighting move, even when aura sphere exists.
The accuracy broken thing is actually very interesting. I think Focus Miss wouldn't be the laughing stock that it is if it got a Fire Blast or Hydro Pump accuracy. Is anyone really going to argue that the 10 extra BP requires 15% less accuracy. Then again, we could just give Aura Sphere to more damn Pokemon but oh no, it's Lucario's move so it has to still be a little special even though freaking Mienshao gets it. Mienshao most likely isn't even going to *be* a special attacker.
Makes me think of the old Red and Blue days where it was annoying when the 95% accurate Tackle always seemed to miss at the worst times. I know there were less accurate moves but that's always been a memory of the old days going through the game proper.
I remember back in Gen 6 OU the standard set for Mega Zard Y was Roost, Fire Blast, Solar Beam, and Focus Blast. I swapped Focus Blast out for HP Ice and never looked back.
having focus blast in your arsenal is like being in a shitty relationship. Its 90 percent of the time unreliable but that 10 percent of the time its the best thing you can't imagine not having.
Fun fact: Tornadus-Therian learns both Hurricane and Focus Miss, and uses both somewhat regularly (hurricane more, obviously.) So its not uncommon to just...lose to torn-t rng. I played SS OU for most of the time it was current gen, and I almost never used Tornadus-Therian despite it being arguably busted because hurricane miss
At least Hurricane can have its accuracy worked around by having rain setup [of course, by a similar consequence, it can be made _worse_ with the sun] Meanwhile there's very little that can be done about ol' Focus Miss
The frequency in which I miss 2-3 times in a row with tackle has scared me so much that the next time I used a not 100% move was hydro pump on ash greninja, a full decade later.
"The user heightens its mental focus and unleashes its power. This may also lower the target's Sp. Def stat." (Focus Blast, Bulbapedia) You know what's wild: It only has a 10% chance to do so, and only by a single stage, AND most of the time it's gonna oneshot whatever it smacks anyway. So some guy at Gamefreak (During DPP) saw a move with 120 BSP, and freaked out about it so they gave it 5 PP and 70% accuracy. With its only reward (pure damage output) being circumvented by specially defensive pokemon, berries, and items, as you only have a SLIVER of a chance to debuff your opponent. This gets even crazier when you look at some other wildly busted moves and their drawbacks. Blast Burn, Frenzy Plant, and Hydro Cannon all have 150 BSP with 90% accuracy, and their drawback is you need to recharge after using them. Boomburst has 140 BSP with 100% accuracy, no drawback. Brave Bird is 120 BSP with 100% accuracy, and you take 1/4 the damage as recoil. Bolt Strike and Blue Flare have a 30% chance to paralyze and 20% to burn respectively, both having 130 BSP with 85 accuracy and probably one of the weirdest offenders: Future Sight, which has 120 BSP and 100% accuracy, you just have to wait two turns to use it. There were a bajillion better ways to balance Focus Blast dawg. (Okay I'm done yapping.)
I seen someone got so infuriated with Focus Blast missing that they ran two Gravity supports just for it to hit consistently. Only to run into a team of 3 ghosts + Kingambit.
The funny thing about Aura Sphere's exclusivity is that it's not like Lucario is doing much with it either. Most of the times it prefers to run physical with close combat.
