Hey bill, I live in the Fiore region, and both my parents are Rangers, but I want to be a trainer. It would mean leaving Fiore, and my parents don’t approve of it (they want me to be a ranger). What should I do?

You could do what I did and obtain a starter and trainer’s license behind their backs, leave them a note, and run off, only to contact them almost a year later after you’ve figured out what you wanted to do with your life through a series of exciting adventures that bring you closer together with your pokémon.

Bill! —LH

Or alternatively, parents can often be difficult to convince, as they typically believe they know what’s best for their children. Not saying that the majority of them don’t, of course! It’s simply that parents (the good ones, anyway) often worry, so many of them are reluctant to watch their children take considerable risks.

With that in mind, though, it’s certainly worth it to try. A trainer’s journey is about discovery, both outside oneself and in, and that may be a good thing to remind them of. You simply need to be strategic about it.

First, come up with a plan—one with concrete dates. You’ll need to tell your parents exactly how long you plan your first journey to be. For example, consider telling them that you’ll spend a year as a trainer (this is roughly how long going through a single league circuit takes anyway) and that afterwards, you’ll contact them, and the three of you can discuss what your next plan of action is. Include a promise to keep in touch periodically—either once a week or whenever you reach a new pokémon center, whichever would be more comfortable for you to follow through with. Giving them a timeframe reinforces the idea that this is a temporary part of your life, that you’re simply trying out new things, and that becoming a ranger is still very much an option for you. The latter especially will make it easier to reason with them because you’re opening up an avenue for compromise down the road.

Additionally, do a bit of research into the logistics of a journey too. Think about how much one would cost and go in with a rough budget. I know that seems a bit overboard (especially if you’re the minimum age for obtaining a license), but telling your parents that you plan on being responsible with your money or responsible in general (through showing them that you’ve thought of these things) will also help them relax when it comes to the idea of letting you take care of yourself on something as exciting as a journey far from home. Here’s the part where you can also bring up the fact that training will teach you how to interact and handle pokémon, which are essentials for becoming a ranger anyway.

Of course, it wouldn’t also hurt to actually be more responsible. Helping out around the house without asking or taking small jobs around your neighborhood (but preferably both of these things) will show your parents that you have the sort of ambition, motivation, and responsibility you’ll need out there on a journey.

Above all else, though, when you do sit down to talk to your parents, do so as an adult: level-headed and willing to negotiate. Chances are, your parents will be far more willing to compromise or even relent if you’re confident enough in your arguments and you’ve come in with a thought-out plan.

Best of luck!

(As a note, yes, this doesn’t work with all parents. Some are indeed not the sort who can be reasoned with, but your situation sounds like it might not be the case.)

What pokemon would make a good sparring partner for an inexperienced noibat? I have had mine for about a week and he’s already interested in evolving, however, I live in an area where the wild pokemon are rather tough for a Noibat to deal with. This is simply for evolution purposes as I’m not a trainer – noibat is a companion pokemon – so attacks and strength building aren’t what I’m particularly looking for. Any r ecommendations or extra advice would be very appreciated!

He may fare best with another flying-type, particularly more common ones such as pidgey or pidove. It’s not because these are often weaker than noibat and thus can guarantee yours the victories it needs to evolve (although yes, that too) but also, as many of noibat’s attacks are flying-based prior to evolution, a more experienced pidgey or pidove can provide a level of tutelage and expert help. Not only that, but these pokémon can provide experience other ways, such as flight training or group hunting.

Alternatively, you could match your noibat with pokémon that have type disadvantages against him, such as grass- or bug-types. Or you can try something with a resistance (and thus an ability to take more of his attacks during sparring sessions) such as a rock-type. If you go with the latter, just make sure your noibat knows how to dodge. (For this reason, I’d strongly suggest a rock-type over an electric one. Rock-types are generally slower and may be easier to evade.)

Best of luck!

Do pokemon age relative to their level? Would a Level 20 Eevee be 20 years old?

You know, I was a trainer for a year, and I’ve spent all my life thereafter working with them and studying enough of their culture to build machines to help them and to understand our species’ relationship with pokémon.

Yet I don’t think I’ll ever understand why they measure something as abstract as battle experience with levels or why other trainers take that system so seriously.

(Not to be rude about it, of course, anonymous. Levels are just measures of a pokémon’s battle competency, not an indicator of age. A newly hatched pokémon can be a higher level than an elderly one and vice versa.)

Why are Bite and Crunch Dark-type moves? Biting seems like a pretty basic attack, so why aren’t they Normal type?

To put it in short, for the same reason Twineedle is a bug-type move, despite the fact that it’s just the act of stabbing something with a stinger: it’s not just about how basic a move is but also with which element is incorporated into its use. Bite may look like an ordinary bite, but it’s only truly the Bite technique if it also involves imbuing the user’s teeth with dark-type energy. Crunch is the same way but in larger, easier to see doses. (This, plus the fact that the dark type was discovered after Bite’s registration as an officially recognized technique, is why it was originally classified as a normal-type move, by the way.)

i’m an experienced trainer looking for a challenging new partner pokémon but i’m not sure which line would be best. i want one that’s powerful, rare, and a pain to train but there’s just so many to choose from that i’m stuck. do you have any recommendations or info on not so common species? i’m experienced with most pokémon types and have plenty of resources so i can take care of pretty much anything. i’m leaning towards fire or dragon but i’m open to anything really, as long as it’s strong.

Well, ignoring legendary, mythical, or UB pokémon (all of which are nigh unobtainable), most dragon-types are rare and strong, so the easiest way to answer this would be to simply advise you to consider quite literally any dragon-type in existence. In fact, dragon tamers are a class of trainer who set out to do specifically and explicitly exactly what you want to do; they just settle on dragon-types because those are the most notoriously rare and strong. (That is, they settle on this type for this reason, if not because of tradition or something according to their culture.)

Fire is a bit more varied in terms of what you can and can’t train according to the criteria you’ve set. In terms of rare and strong pokémon, you may wish to consider female salandit/salazzle, which are both wily and deadly but can only be found in the volcanic and tropical areas of Alola. Then you have larvesta, which evolves into volcarona (a fire/bug-type that’s so powerful legend says its heat rivals that of the sun), which is difficult to train because of the fragility of its base form, not to mention difficult to find because it’s only native to very remote spots of Unova and extremely difficult-to-find islands off the coast of mainland Hoenn. While you’re in the Unovan desert searching for volcarona nests (and thus larvesta hatchlings), you may also come across another candidate in the form of darumaka/darmanitan, who possesses potent psychic abilities under certain circumstances.

Then you have Alolan marowak, which can evolve from practically any cubone if trained on Alola only, requiring you to brave the rugged wilderness of the island region. Finally, there are also the seven fire-type starters, although these are specifically bred to be easy to work with, so while they may be strong and rare, they might not be what you’re looking for if you want a challenge.

Personally, though, I think that if you’re an experienced trainer looking for a challenge, what you might wish to do is train a pokémon not known for being powerful or rare. Maintaining a healthy battling record is, from what I understand anyway, fairly easy if you train pokémon that are already powerful from the outset, such as charizard, volcarona, dragonite, and so forth. It’s far more impressive if you manage to succeed on the battlefield with, say, a camerupt, simisear, talonflame, or torkoal. As Karen of the Elite Four says, it’s not about strong or weak pokémon but instead which pokémon resonate with you the most. Pick a pokémon you stumble across on your journey and challenge yourself to train it until you can bring out its inner strength, even if it’s, say, a slowpoke.

Best of luck, anonymous!

Why can Pokemon learn only four moves at a time?

They don’t, anonymous. Not really. It’s just that sometimes, learning new tricks builds on concepts used for old tricks, so it’s easier both for the trainer and the pokémon to stick to newer techniques (or a certain set, at least) and build on those. The reason why is because … have you ever learned something advanced and then stumbled or had to think for a moment about something in the same field that’s far simpler? For example, have you ever gotten so used to solving complex algebraic equations or calculating tips on the go that when faced with a third-grader’s word problem, you had to stop and think for a second to recall old concepts? Pokémon do the same thing when trying to recall moves they haven’t used in a while, and those few seconds can be crucial to a match. On the other hand, attempting to reinforce new moves as well as old holds pokémon back and prevents them from mastering the new properly, so it’s either be a jack of all trades (and master of none) or rely on newer moves and avoid that moment of confusion when attempting to use old.

So in other words, it’s just easier for trainers and pokémon to recall a set of four specific techniques than it is to recall every technique they’ve ever learned. (Why four? Oddly enough, this seems to be the ideal number for a vast majority of pokémon. No one’s quite sure why.)