AOTW: Levitate

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What’s up, trainers? Giving you an easy one to sink your teeth into this week, an Ability I’m sure you’ve come across plenty of times. Literally the most common Ability in the game, this sucker weighs in with a whopping thirty-three pokémon capable of using it. Somebody page Link, we might need to borrow his Iron Boots. This is Ability of the Week: Levitate!
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AOTW: Sniper

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Hello there, trainers! Friday’s Ability class is now in session, please take your seats. SBJ, stop shooting spit wads in Aaron’s ears! This week, folks, we’re discussing a rare but useful little Ability that can make critical hits absolutely devastating. Recommended listening: Misirlou by Dick Dale (AKA, the theme from Pulp Fiction). This is Ability of the Week: Sniper!
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AOTW: Snow Cloak and Sand Veil

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Weather effects were an insane addition to the Pokémon franchise back in 2000 (1999 for Japanese players- jerks) with the release of Gold and Silver Versions. Weather conditions debuted with three possible effects as we took our first excursion through the Johto region: intense sunlight, sudden downpours, and damaging sandstorms. In generation three, hailstorms became a possibility, and we would find our paths obscured with fog in generation four. The most obvious uses for weather involved improving moves like Solar Beam and Thunder, but of course, Abilities that generated and took advantage of the weather were sure to follow. We already discussed Dry Skin a few weeks ago, and this week it’s a twofer! Get your Mamoswines and Garchomps out, because this is Ability of the Week: Snow Cloak AND Sand Veil!
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AOTW: Motor Drive

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Goooood morning, pokefans! It’s Friday once again, so it’s time to discuss another one of those profuse passive pokemon powers, a new featured Ability! I love Electric type pokemon, despite their obvious Achilles ’ heel of low HP and defense stats, there’s something inherently cool about what are usually small, fragile creatures housing such volumes of voltage. Electric types have always been included on my team in past incarnations of the franchise we all love, whether it's the recognizable mugs of Pikachu and his evolutionary line, the speedy and spiky Jolteon, or the cool and powerful Luxray. The most recent in the string of Electric monsters I’ve employed in my party is the grossly popular evolution of the first generation classic monster, Electivire, who appears in both Featured Teams that will be discussed in episode 27 of It’s Super Effective. And this Electric titan of a pokemon brings his own unique Ability to the table; this is Ability of the Week: Motor Drive!
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AOTW: Dry Skin

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Another week, another Featured Ability! At the end of last week’s article about Intimidate, I promised something a little more obscure, and with a touch more subtlety this week. I’ve scoured Bulbapedia for ideas, looking at Abilities I’ve never even heard of, and I think I’ve found something interesting to discuss. Go grab yourself a bucket-load of moisturizer! This is Ability of the Week: Dry Skin!
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AOTW: Intimidate

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It’s Friday, folks! And that means it’s time to learn about another Ability. But first, a quick correction from last week’s article about the generational starter Abilities; in my example, I stated that Surf had a base damage of 80, when it’s actually 95. At first, I thought that this was a recent development, but a quick query on Bulbapedia reveals that Surf has always dealt 95 damage, so I don’t know what I was thinking.

This week, we’re talking about an Ability that I noticed a lot in my initial play-through of generation four: Intimidate.

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AOTW: Overgrow, Blaze, and Torrent

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How goes it, folks? Wil here, now officially an Editor for the site! I’ll be going over a featured Ability every Friday. Before we dive into this week’s selection, let’s start with a primer on Abilities. Inspired by Pokemon Powers from the trading card game, Abilities are passive powers first introduced in the core games in Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire versions. Most Abilities influence battles in some way (changing stats, triggering weather effects, etc), but a few are used only in the overworld map. Some pokemon are known as “Dual Ability” pokemon, meaning that they can potentially have one of two, or in Black and White with the Dream World addition, three Abilities. Some Abilities are common, others are exclusive to just one monster, but every pokemon has one and they can make or break a battle for you. So, now that we’ve gone over the basics, I thought that for my first article it would make sense to start at the beginning. This is Ability of the Week: Overgrow, Blaze, and Torrent!
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