Ho-Oh

The feathers have no colour of their own. They break up light and return a different shade depending on the angle they are viewed from, so the same individual can look golden, green or violet without anything having changed; that is where the seven colours repeated in the three Pokédex entries and the official category, Rainbow Pokémon, come from. The legend adds the rest: that it leaves an arc of colours behind when it flies, that it lives at the foot of that arc and that its feathers bring happiness to whoever carries them.

Behind it is the eastern phoenix, the Chinese fenghuang, which became Japan’s hōō in temples and on folding screens. The silhouette gives it away — long peacock tail, cockerel crest, wading-bird body — and explains why it is 3.8 metres tall and weighs 199 kilograms, figures more suited to a tapestry animal than a woodland one.

The other part of the legend is more selective: it only appears before trainers with pure hearts. In the games, that translates into a habitat listed as rare and one individual per game. It does not evolve from anything or into anything, and it only has one recorded form.

Its 680 base stat points are weighted in one very specific direction: 154 Special Defense, the figure that leads the whole sheet, backed by 106 HP and accompanied by 130 Attack. Physical Defense, on the other hand, stays at 90, and Speed is another 90, which is slow among Legendary Pokémon.

Pressure is the standard Ability and does what it always does, draining the opponent’s PP, but the one that changes its role is Regenerator, its Hidden Ability: it recovers HP every time it leaves battle, so it can switch in to take a special hit, fire back with Sacred Fire and leave without paying for it. Sacred Fire, which it learns at level 54, is a 100-power physical attack that also burns the opponent very often — burning lowers Attack, turning an offensive move into a defensive one. Recover comes at 45 and Calm Mind at 27, although the latter fits poorly with 130 Attack.

The problem is its other type. Fire/Flying is the worst possible combination against entry hazards: it loses half its HP before it can move. And its four-times weakness to Rock leaves it at the mercy of anything carrying a move of that type, starting with Tyranitar, whose sandstorm also steadily chips away at the Special Defense holding it up. Water and Electric complete the list.

Being Legendary keeps it out of almost any tournament with standard rules. In a normal playthrough, it is a different story: it already has Sacred Fire and Brave Bird available and tears through the endgame without asking anything in return.

It cannot breed. Its Egg Group is Undiscovered and it has no assigned gender, so even with a Ditto in front of it, nothing comes out of the Nursery; the 120 Egg Cycles listed in its data are never used — they would be about 30,855 steps. Its Egg Move list is empty for the same reason.

What you need to know, then, is how to obtain it. Its habitat is listed as rare, which here means a fixed, scripted encounter. In Gold and Silver, it waits at the top of the Tin Tower in Ecruteak City and does not come down until you are carrying the Rainbow Wing; HeartGold and SoulSilver remade the scene in the Bell Tower with the Clear Bell and the Kimono Girls’ dance. In FireRed, LeafGreen and Emerald, it appeared at Navel Rock, which could only be reached with the event-exclusive MysticTicket. Scarlet and Violet brought it back by a different route: the snacks handed out by a DLC character after completing his challenges, which make the Legendary appear at a specific point on the map.

Its catch rate is 3. That is the lowest in the game, and with a standard Poké Ball the odds barely move. It usually holds a Sacred Ash, the item that revives and heals the whole team at once. It grows at a slow rate and its base friendship is 0, making it one of the few species that start out hating the person who catches them.