Kangaskhan

The official category is Parent Pokémon, and for once the label describes the entire design. Everything revolves around the pouch: the baby stays inside it, and the Pokédex entries barely talk about anything else. It only lets the baby out to play when it senses no danger, and keeps watch over it in the meantime. One entry gives unusually blunt advice for the series: it is best not to disturb the babies while they are playing, because the mother is nearby and will react “with anger and violence”.

The starting point is a kangaroo. Two metres twenty tall, eighty kilos, thick brown skin, a counterweight tail and a lighter belly where the pouch opens. The baby is a different colour and much smaller, showing its head and little else.

There is one detail the series has repeated from the beginning, and it sums up the rest: separation. The baby leaves at around three years old, and according to the Pokédex, that is the only time the mother cries with real intensity. The rest of the time, the behaviour described is vigilance and retaliation.

It does not evolve from anything or into anything. Its evolutionary line has a single entry. What the Pokédex records as a second form is not an evolution but Mega Kangaskhan, and that is when the baby leaves the pouch.

490 base points, distributed with an imbalance that determines everything else. 105 HP with 80 Defense and 80 Special Defense give it a body that can take hits comfortably; 95 Attack and 90 Speed are workable numbers, neither slow nor fast. The 40 Special Attack is the hole, and it is a serious one: its TM list is full of Flamethrower, Ice Beam, Thunderbolt, Surf and Solar Beam, none of which do anything at all with that stat. Everything it carries has to be physical.

Scrappy is the Ability that gives it a purpose. Normal- and Fighting-type moves can hit Ghosts, wiping out the only immunity its typing comes with. With that, a Gengar stops being a wall and takes Facade or Double Hit head-on. And the Normal plus Fighting combination, with no immunities in the way, is resisted by almost nobody: Brick Break, with 75 power, or Focus Punch, with 150 in exchange for missing if it gets hit before it can use it, cover Rock and Steel, which are exactly the types that stop Normal.

What holds it back is power. 95 Attack does not break through much on its own, it has no reliable recovery beyond Rest or Drain Punch, and Last Resort, the 140-power move it learns at level 52, requires moving last to be of any use. In a normal playthrough it is a different story: it comes in late, takes hits it should not survive and brings Earthquake, Crunch and Sucker Punch, which is more coverage than most pure Normal types tend to have by that point. The form that actually caused trouble in organised formats was the Mega, and that no longer exists.

One Egg Group, Monster, and a gender split that leaves no room for nuance: 100% of the species is female. Breeding it requires a male from the Monster Egg Group or, by the short route, a Ditto. Its 20 Egg Cycles come out to around 5355 steps, around the middle of the table.

Of the Egg Moves, the ones worth the effort are the Fighting-type moves: Hammer Arm, with 100 power, and Circle Throw and Counter for anyone who wants to send back what hits them. Double-Edge, 120 power with recoil, is the strongest Normal move it can carry without spending a turn recharging. Endeavor, Crush Claw, Uproar, Disable, Stomp and Focus Energy complete the list.

Its evolution condition is that there is none: it is born this way and stays this way, with no level, stone or friendship involved. It grows at a medium rate and leaves 2 HP EVs when defeated.

Its recorded habitat is the grassland. A catch rate of 45 puts it among the difficult ones, the same figure as the Kanto starters, and with 105 base HP it will last a few turns before the ball lines up.