You’ve answered a lot of asks about anxiety management, so I want to know what Pokémon GIVE or PROMOTE anxiety and depressive tendencies??

Well, certain ghost-types may induce this in sensitive people, as their general presence affects humans on a more psychic and spiritual level. For example, a particularly sensitive person can tell that members of the gastly line are present because they inherently evoke a sense of dread. The same can be said for misdreavus, mismagius, the duskull line, and spiritomb. On the other hand, many others who are less psychically inclined have no trouble handling ghost-types, so whether or not they would induce or promote anxiety in a human being really depends on the human themselves.

Meanwhile, poison-types who emit gaseous toxins actually do this more reliably, meaning these will affect most people, regardless of whether or not you’re sensitive to poison-types. The reason why is because the toxins actually affect us humans on a physical level by interacting with our respiratory systems (and thus, everything from our immune systems to even our skin, digestion, and so forth). In turn, this can induce anxiety because, well, the more our bodies react to pollutants, the more our minds react to the warning signs that we’re breathing in toxic air. It’s very much akin to living in a city full of smog and pollution for prolong periods of time: while it’s possible for you to exist that way, you may find that you’ll feel more at ease when you escape to the country and get some fresh air, so to speak.

This isn’t, of course, to say that it’s impossible or not recommended to train a poison-type (or even a koffing or weezing). Many people who own such pokémon find that they’re perfectly happy with their companions. It’s just that it’s highly recommended to give yourself and your body a break from them, especially if you notice changes in your physical or mental health.

(Also, their gases are literally carcinogenic, so don’t plant your face in your weezing, regardless of how tempting it may be.)

My boyfriend got me a buneary for Valentine’s Day, while Cute I have a very rambunctious espurr and sylveon who mess with it constantly. How should I handle bunearys comfort?

Sometimes, teammates push around new recruits because they perceive them as easy marks, so to speak. This may be the case with your new buneary, as not only are members of this species bred to be rather cute and docile, but also, given the typical dispositions of espurr and sylveon, I wouldn’t be surprised if either of yours were attempting to assert some sort of dominance. Think of it as your espurr and sylveon showing the newcomer that you prefer them, in a way.

While team building and mediation techniques are still most certainly important (to make it clear to all members of your party that they are a team and that you expect them to treat one another with respect), what may be more effective is simply training your buneary a bit. Teach it moves to defend itself and make it be a valuable part of your team’s day-to-day activities. If you battle, then most definitely allow your buneary to battle as well. The more you train your buneary, the more its confidence will grow, which in turn will allow it to assert itself to your espurr and sylveon.

Best of luck, anonymous!

There’s a rotom loose in my neighborhood who is going through the power lines and scaring people by popping up in their homes. We’ve had rolling black outs since this rotom showed up. What do we do?

Have a pokémon who can use Mean Look on hand. The faster, the better. Once this rotom appears, have your pokémon trap it with Mean Look, then attempt to catch it.

This might seem a bit brutish, especially since my typical philosophy is to understand a pokémon and then meet its needs first, but rotom are unfortunately extremely quick, especially when close to sources of power. It’s better to trap it if at all possible, then attempt to communicate with it. Catching it is merely a form of security (to prevent it from escaping once Mean Look wears off), but if you’re quick or can appeal to it thoroughly, that may not entirely be necessary.

As for how to get it to come to you in the first place, this may be a bit tricky, but typically, the more appliances you have on hand, the more enticing you may make your own home. Having a lot of personal fans, for example, or computer equipment you wouldn’t mind losing—anything to give rotom a wide variety of options to possess.

Best of luck, anonymous!

I run a breeding facility and have a shiny eevee companion. This woman, clearly rich, came to my facility something and saw my eevee and decided to make offer upon offer for him. When I told her he wasn’t for sale she threw an absolute FIT saying that I was unreasonable and could just “make another”. I banned her from my facility. She was livid and said she’d never come to me again and that she’d tell her friends I was awful and blah blah blah. I don’t regret it but how do I save my reputation?

Be a reputable breeder.

While it’s a shame that a wealthy, supposedly influential terrible customer has been through your establishment and while it’s also a shame how common that is, reputable trainers and customers who are actually concerned about pokémon will care a lot more about the, well, care you put into breeding. If a bad customer spreads the word that you’re a terrible breeder because you won’t fulfill a request—as if a pokémon is an object and not a living being—then while that could damage your reputation a bit, it could also serve as a testament to your concern for quality care over the mass-production of certain traits.

Moreover, reputable trainers understand that breeding for shiny pokémon is not a guaranteed thing and that requests for shiny pokémon are not easy to fill and require enough breeding to tire out the parents and produce more hatchlings than one may be able to home. It’s only a thing that may be done with two mated pokémon that are extremely fond of each other, by a breeder with enough connections to rehome hatchlings humanely. Trainers who don’t recognize this and demand shinies anyway say more about themselves than the breeder, and a breeder who obliges says more about the way they care for their pokémon than their skills.

In short, anonymous, she was a bad customer, but no matter how she spins her story, if she convinces others to avoid your services, those others are not customers you would have wanted anyway.

on pokemon stench, I would like to mention that it is entirely possible to find grimer and muk that dont smell at all. These are the ones without the ability “Stench”, generally. I really wish more people would realize that not all of these goopy friends smell awful….. They still are pretty toxic though.

Actually, all of them do smell due to the combination of chemicals and bacteria in their bodies. It’s just that some grimer and muk’s bouquet of aromas are more subtle than others’, and in any case, the longer you spend with a grimer or muk, the less you notice their stench.

Speaking of which, it’s true that grimer and muk with the Stench ability possess more potent aromas than those without, to the point where they’re able to weaponize it (as opposed to making use of their sludgy, amorphous bodies or their toxic composition, as with Sticky Hold/Gluttony/Power of Alchemy or Poison Touch, respectively). These pokémon are indeed harder to become acclimated to, so whereas the scents of Stenchless grimer and muk are actually rather bearable after a while (perhaps even pleasant to a number of people), the scents of those with Stench may be a different story.

Nonetheless, though, I agree that grimer and muk are a highly misunderstood pokémon, and even if they do possess rather odd aromas, this should be no deterrent to a human trainer.

Just … don’t handle them with bare hands. Trust me on that.

When my Pidgeot was a little Pidgey, my neighbors Poochyena got hold of him and tore his wing up. I took him to a Pokémon center, and he seemed fine. Fast forward, hes now a pidgeot, but his wing bothers him and he can’t fly more than a few miles. I think it’s causing him self esteem issues, because he seems really depressed. Any suggestions?

Sometimes, the older a pokémon gets, the more past injuries come back to haunt them, so to speak, especially if those injuries were particularly traumatic.

However, keep in mind that just because a pokémon can no longer function in certain ways due to physical disabilities doesn’t mean they can’t function at all. You therefore have two options, anonymous. The first is work with your local pokémon center to develop a training regimen that builds your pidgeot’s endurance. There is always a chance that he can regain use of his wing with regular therapy and exercise.

On the other hand, your second option is to change your training regimen. Focus on quick, powerful attacks (not literally Quick Attack, although this too) and teach your pidgeot either Roost or Toxic or both. When training and battling, teach him to fire off one of his wing- or wind-based moves, then land and use Roost or run about on the ground, perhaps while outlasting an opponent thanks to Toxic.

If you don’t typically battle, train your pidgeot to be quick on his feet (literally this time) and perhaps to use his wings for other means (such as secondary hands, which many handless pokémon can do—take scyther, for instance).

The point of the second option is simple: if your pidgeot can’t regain his flight endurance, then it’s important to teach him other ways of moving or making use of his body so that he can continue to feel valid as an individual and useful at that. The more you can reassure him that he’s valuable to you and your team (or that he is, in general, still a perfectly valid pidgeot) despite his inability to fly as far as pidgeot with perfectly healthy wings, the easier it will be for him to understand that flying and his identity are not inseparable concepts.

Of course, if by “bother” you mean that your pidgeot is in physical constant pain, I urge you to take the first option before trying the second as that would be humane, but aside from that, if your pidgeot simply can’t fly for long distances before his wing gives out, at the very least, the second option may help ease his mind a bit.

Best of luck, anonymous!

My Cubchoo is a pain! He has this disgusting habit of slathering his mucus, gnawing and leaving freezing saliva on things that he likes. Including me for some reason. It is not a pleasant experience, I’ll tell you that. Why is he doing this? There are moments where he taps me with his paw and looks up with this blank, vacant stare before he whacks me on the shin with his hardened snot like a club. And then he runs away. Yet he keeps stalking me too (he caught himself). What is wrong with him?

Nothing, really. A lot of base-level bear pokémon (such as teddiursa, pancham, and—yes—cubchoo) are mischievous in nature and enjoy displaying affection through bizarre acts designed to catch their trainers off-guard. It sounds as if your cubchoo is particularly affectionate towards you, which is a good thing! Cubchoo can be difficult to get close to compared to their ursine cousins.

However, if you’d like for this behavior to stop (especially if it’s physically painful for you), it may be best to train him not to do this. Use positive reinforcement to teach him acceptable ways of showing affection, and avoid responding (even through shock) when he reverts to using this method instead.

My brother and I both adopted a pair of sibling Pikachus we found on our ranch when we were small. Mine has now long evolved into a Raichu. When my brother returned from his stay in the Alola region, his Pikachu had evolved too, except it looks completely different from the Raichu I have, with a rounded physique and the ability to float?! He told me it might have something to do with the diet of his Pikachu during its stay in Alola. Something about sweets? I’m so confused!

Your brother is not that far off. You see, your raichu evolved into a standard form, whereas your brother’s evolved into the Alolan variation. To be more specific, certain pokémon, such as pikachu, are capable of evolving into different forms in the region of Alola than the forms they attain anywhere else. In most cases, this has to do with the unique environment of the Alola region itself.

However, pikachu’s evolution into the half-psychic Alolan raichu has less to do with the environment specifically and more to do with the fact that the pancakes of that region really are about as powerful as natives say they are.

Hey Bill, can you get me Cassius’s contact info? I was hoping to employ his services for… a thing. You’re less culpable if you don’t know any more than that, but suffice to say it’s technically legal in international waters via an esoteric loophole in maritime law, and also it’s pretty cool.

I’m neither going to inquire any further about your upcoming project, nor inform you that you may reach Cassius at [REDACTED]@[REDACTED].com so long as you tell him that I did not send you and that you are perfectly willing to pay in Bitpyen, as that would be irresponsible of me, and as I’ve said to my partner, I am in no way going to use this blog to encourage anyone or Cassius to engage in business that is frankly none of my concern.

I recently got a baby togepi and people keep getting very concerned because if rides on the back of my houndoom. Now my houndoom is nothing but loving and nurturing, having had a litter of her own and adopted a shinx and growlithe when they were rejected by their mothers. I’m just really frustrated with all the bias

Unfortunately, anonymous, I’m afraid that there is quite a lot of discrimination against dark-type pokémon and their users. This is largely in part due to long-standing folklore that states dark-types in general are ruthless, bloodthirsty, or dangerous tricksters. Houndoom in particular are victims of this, as their alarming appearances, pack habits, and notorious bites made them rather frightening creatures to the humans who lived near their territories. This is all despite the fact that members of the houndour line are among the most loyal and gentle fire-type pokémon (never mind the most loyal dark-types) one can own.

The best you can do is try your best to not let it affect you. If someone attempts to confront you about your houndoom, show them that yours is gentle and do your best to educate them while deescalating the situation. Don’t give in to your frustrations. The important thing is whether or not your houndoom and togepi are safe and happy.

Best of luck, anonymous, and hang in there!