Vaporeon

Crystal-clear waters are where it belongs, and pretty coastlines too: several Pokédex entries insist that it chooses the shoreline carefully and then stays there. The reason is that there is barely any boundary between the animal and its surroundings. Its cellular composition resembles the molecular structure of water so closely that it can merge with it and disappear completely. That is where its hunting method comes from. It dissolves, waits without moving and catches the first fish Pokémon that comes near; if it detects an attack, it dives and is simply gone.

The games explain it as a sudden mutation, flippers and gills appearing all at once on a body that did not have them, along with the ability to control water that came with them. It is 1 metre tall and weighs 29 kilos, and is classified as the Bubble Jet Pokémon. Its split tail is responsible for a confusion that the Pokédex itself records: some people mistake it for a mermaid.

In its evolution line, it is one of Eevee's nine possible evolutions and one of the first three, alongside Jolteon and Flareon. Those three shared the same method: an elemental stone and no other condition—not level, time of day or friendship.

The distribution of its 525 points is deliberately lopsided. 130 HP and 95 Special Defense make it a genuine special wall, and with 110 Special Attack it can hit back while taking punishment. The hole is its 60 Defense: any decent physical attacker gets through without resistance, and with 65 Speed it does not get to choose when it takes the hit. The other 65, its Attack, is useless except for powering up opposing Facade users.

Water Absorb is what defines the set. It does not just nullify opposing Water-type moves: it restores HP when hit by them, and on a base 130 stat that is a lot of free health. Against a team that relies on Surf or Scald, switching it in means trading one turn for recovery.

Its natural plan is to stay alive. Aqua Ring, learned at level 35, restores HP every turn without using up the move; Scald trades power for a chance to burn and cripples physical attackers, which is exactly what it handles worst; Hydro Pump, at level 50, is there when the big number is needed. Rest and Sleep Talk, both learned by TM, complete the cycle.

What holds it back is its single typing. Water attacks run into Water, Grass and Dragon, and without Ice Beam it has no answer to Grass types that also hurt it. Its two weaknesses, Grass and Electric, are among the most common types on special attackers. In a normal playthrough it fills another role: it is the traditional Surf user, resists half of what it comes across and turns Water-type Gyms into a formality with Water Absorb.

It belongs to the Field Egg Group, the most populous in the Pokédex, which gives it compatibility with almost any land-dwelling quadruped. The gender ratio is 7 to 1 in favour of males: only 12.5% are female, so starting your own breeding project means looking for the female or relying on Ditto. Its 35 egg cycles amount to roughly 9180 steps, one of the longest figures around; the egg itself does not hatch into Vaporeon. It hatches into Eevee, and the branch is decided afterwards.

It has no egg moves of its own. Anything it does not learn by levelling comes through TMs, and that catalogue is broad: Ice Beam, Blizzard, Calm Mind, Substitute, Rain Dance and Baton Pass.

Its evolution condition is the simplest in the family: use a Water Stone on Eevee, with no minimum level, no friendship requirement and no time-of-day condition. Nothing like Espeon or Umbreon, whose conditions require friendship of 160 or more and daytime or nighttime.

Its catch rate is 45, the figure for a Pokémon that is difficult to catch, although it rarely matters in practice: the habitat assigned to it by the games is urban, not the waterside setting described in its entries, and it almost always arrives through a stone rather than a Poké Ball. It grows at the Medium Slow rate and gives 2 HP EVs when defeated.