#electrictypes

Oricorio’s English name references the orioles, a family (or rather, two unrelated families, one native to the Old World and one to the New) of brightly-coloured insectivorous songbirds.  Her names in other languages are more generic references to birds and dance, and her actual design probably draws, if anything, not on the orioles but on Hawaiian honeycreepers – another family of brightly coloured songbirds, most of them in various shades of yellow and red.  Like “Darwin’s finches” in the Galápagos Islands of Ecuador, Hawaiian honeycreepers are famous for having rapidly adapted from a single basic form to fill a wide variety of different ecological niches.  Some have short, thick beaks that can crush seeds, some have long, thin beaks for spearing insects, and others have curving beaks for sipping nectar from flowers, hence the name “honeycreeper.”  The technical name for the phenomenon is “adaptive radiation,” and it’s particularly common on remote islands, like the Hawaiian archipelago, where there may be a large number of unoccupied ecological niches for a species to diversify into.  Oricorio, accordingly, has four forms, which individuals can switch between by feeding on the sweet nectar of special flowers that are unique to each of the four main islands of Alola.  The different colours of the flowers correspond to the meanings of each of the islands’ names in Hawaiian: yellow flowers on Melemele, pink on Akala, red on Ula’ula, and purple on Poni.  Wild Oricorio can be found wherever the flowers grow, and mimic their colours, but also gain different costume-like features that evoke a distinctive style of dance from the real world, characteristic of particular regions, with personality traits to match.

Each form has a different type: Electric/Flying for yellow, Psychic/Flying for pink, Fire/Flying for red, Ghost/Flying for purple.  The yellow, Electric-type, Melemele Oricorio is energetic and cheerful, with puffs of feathers like a cheerleader’s pom-poms on the end of her wings – a North American style of dance, associated with giving energy to others.  The pink, Psychic-type, Akala Oricorio is laid-back and relaxed, with a long skirt and crown of pale feathers that bring to mind a Hawaiian pā’ū skirt and lei, the paraphernalia of hula dance, which is linked in modern pop culture with tropical relaxation.  The red, Fire-type, Ula’ula Oricorio is proud and passionate, with frills of feathers like a flamenco dancer’s long dress, and white curlicue feathers that evoke hooped earrings, evoking the intense traditional dances of southern Spain that are now a shorthand for burning, desperate love.  Finally, the purple, Ghost-type, Poni Oricorio is calm and quiet, with fans of feathers at the ends of her wings like the sensu fans used by geisha in old-fashioned Japanese dances that still evoke tradition and ceremony.  We’re also told that the purple sensu Oricorio’s style of dance famously reminds immigrants from Kanto of the traditional dances of their homeland, just to push home that these styles are meant to have geographical and cultural resonance, as well as emotional connotations.  Their different styles of dance are said to have corresponding effects on onlookers; the pom-pom style dance giving energy to friends, the pā’ū style dance lulling and slowing enemies, the baile style dance “causing its enemies to combust in both body and mind” (ouch), and the sensu style dance “sending the minds and hearts of its enemies to another world” (ouch?).  Those four distinct personalities and the magical effects associated with the dances link Oricorio’s core theme of dance with the characteristic traits of her four possible elements – Fire-types are passionate, Psychic-types are sedate, and so on.  This is quite important, since Oricorio otherwise has relatively few connections to those elements (as we’ll see later).

The point of all these different styles is probably to emphasise that Alola is multicultural, like the real Hawai’i, where American, Japanese and Polynesian (and to a lesser extent Iberian) culture are all important parts of the regional identity.  We should probably imagine that, for the people of the Pokémon world, all those styles of dance and their paraphernalia are based on Oricorio’s dances and plumage (in the same way as, for instance, the Roman alphabet actually comes from the Unown).    There is something a little bit odd going on here, though.  Hawai’i’s multiculturalism is essentially a legacy of colonialism, of American, Iberian and East Asian interference in, and immigration to, the islands.  The real-world dance styles that Oricorio is based on – with the exception of the Polynesian pā’ū style – are relatively modern imports to Hawai’i.  But Oricorio is not native to Kanto, Unova, or Kalos (the closest region we have to Iberia so far); to our knowledge, she is found only in Alola, and her different forms have specific niches that relate closely to the floral ecology of the four major islands.  It seems reasonable to think that the four forms all originated right here, in the Alolan archipelago, and that the resulting dance styles were also adapted by humans in Alola.  Should we turn it all on its head and imagine that in the Pokémon world Alola was not colonised, like Hawai’i, but a coloniser – an ancient maritime power whose kings had a ship in every port and a finger in every pie?  Did Alolan sensu dancers introduce the forms they learned from Oricorio to Kanto and Johto centuries ago?  Does the stamp of Oricorio’s intercontinental influence represent the last remaining trace of an ocean-spanning empire that left different shards of its cultural heritage all over the Pokémon world?

…or is this just the kind of subtle nonsense that happens when you create a particularly anthropomorphic Pokémon without thinking through what it would imply about human culture in the Pokémon world?

Such a question, dear readers, this meagre blog is hardly adequate to answer.

We are, however, reasonably equipped to answer the less speculative question of whether Oricorio is actually any good.  Oricorio seems at first to be a pretty rubbishy fast and frail special attacker.  And… well, in singles, she kind of is.  She’s got good, but not excellent, speed and special attack, average defences, and a movepool that makes me sad.  To elaborate – with one exception, the only special attacks she learns are Flying attacks and Hidden Power, and of the Flying attacks, Air Slash is below average in power and Hurricane is below average in accuracy (barring appropriate weather support).  Heck, she doesn’t even have any attacks of her own secondary types on her move list – except for her signature move, Revelation Dance.  This is a respectably powerful special attack with no secondary effects, but one interesting property: its type changes to match the type of Oricorio’s dance style, Electric, Psychic, Fire or Ghost.  In principle it’s a cool little trick that links Oricorio’s in-game tactics to the central features of her design.  In practice, it means that, although Oricorio technically has Electric, Psychic, Fire and Ghost attacks, she can’t have them at the same time, which is what she would actually like, because there’s no way to change her style mid-battle.  In some ways, Oricorio would be better off without Revelation Dance, since it would force Game Freak to give her actual attacks from each of her possible types.

The support options are a bit more inspiring.  Oricorio has Baton Pass, respectable speed, and a few useful set-up moves, including Agility, Calm Mind and Swords Dance, and she probably wouldn’t be terrible at passing buffs, although her defences leave something to be desired.  With Calm Mind, Baton Pass, Revelation Dance and either Agility or a Flying attack, she can help out a more competent team member without being totally helpless herself, although there are probably better Pokémon out there for the job.  She can use her speed to Taunt other support Pokémon, and she can heal herself with Roost.  U-Turn lets her dart out of danger, although it’s largely superfluous on a Baton Pass set, and probably not much good on a more straightforwardly aggressive set either, since Oricorio pretty much needs a turn or two of Calm Mind setup before she can do a worthwhile amount of damage.  There’s not much else to give her more variety.  Even Swords Dance can’t really enable a proper physical attacker set, since Oricorio’s base score is not impressive and her movepool basically extends to Acrobatics and Steel Wing.  But don’t worry – the best is still to come.

Oricorio’s most interesting feature is the unique Dancer ability, which immediately copies any “dance” moves used by another Pokémon (Oricorio still gets her regular turn).  In singles, this is situational at best; mostly it makes Oricorio an interesting switch-in to some Dragon Dance or Quiver Dance sweepers, since they won’t be able to outrun her.  In doubles, on the other hand, this ability allows Oricorio to really shine and do all kinds of ridiculous stuff.  You see, Oricorio will also copy her partner’s dances, letting her piggyback off their setup moves, particularly Quiver Dance.  Strictly speaking you could also try this trick with Swords Dance, but again, Oricorio’s poor attack stat and physical movepool advise against it.  Special mention here goes to Volcarona, who can buff Oricorio with Quiver Dance and give her free attacks with Fiery Dance, or to a pair of Oricorio (if you’re allowed two Pokémon of the same species on a team, which you often aren’t) who will copy each others’ Revelation Dances.  Lilligant is also an interesting option here – with her Own Tempo ability, she’s immune to confusion, so you can get Oricorio to disrupt your opponents with Teeter Dance without harming Lilligant, and Oricorio will copy both Quiver Dance and Petal Dance off her.  Practically the only downside is that you have to actually use Lilligant.  Some credit should also go to Pheremosa and Ribombee, who, along with Volcarona, learn Quiver Dance and are faster than Oricorio, ensuring that she gets a special attack boost before her own first attack.  In any case, if you can set Oricorio up to get a free Quiver Dance, she rather suddenly becomes an extremely threatening special attacker with quite solid special defence.  Her movepool is still weak, with just Air Slash or Hurricane, Revelation Dance and an appropriate Hidden Power (Ice for a pom-pom Oricorio, Grass for a baile Oricorio, or Fighting for a pā’ū or sensu Oricorio).  However, she’ll now have the power to bludgeon enemies into submission even through resistances, and with the right partner she may also be able to cheat out a bunch of extra Fiery Dances or Petal Dances.  In any turn-based game, the power to just get extra turns for free, even in such a limited way as this, can be tremendously game-breaking, to the point that I actually sort of understand how limited Oricorio is in other ways.  She’s rubbish in singles, and I don’t think there can be any changing that, but a good dance partner in doubles can let her steal the whole show, and with better defences and a good movepool she might become downright unstoppable.  Take her for a spin and see if you can make her work – just remember that Cresselia’s Lunar Dance kills her instantly.

Vikavolt’s species designation – “the Stag Beetle Pokémon” – immediately gives away what it’s supposed to be.  Stag beetles are a family characterised by their oversized, powerful mandibles; where Pinsir uses these to tenderise and brutalise enemies in close combat, Vikavolt instead uses them to charge up its Electric attacks.  This family includes some of the largest beetles – and by extension some of the largest insects – in the world, like the giraffe stag beetle, which can reach an impressive 12 cm long, not counting the mandibles (Vikavolt is quoted as 1.5m long, which probably does include the mandibles but is nonetheless downright terrifying).  Drawing on the beetles’ hard carapaces, Vikavolt’s design is very angular, with lots of sharp corners and straight lines, giving it an almost robotic appearance.  The Sun and Moon website describes it as “like a fortress that zooms through the forest,” which is an odd image, in that zooming through forests is not in my experience something fortresses are known for, but pushes the same sort of design angle.  It’s odd that the Pokédex says it “zips around,” and that the website talks about its speed and aerial acrobatic skill, since Vikavolt is very much not a “zippy” Pokémon, nor is it one that has much cause to be “on sharp lookout for an opening.”  Stag beetles, much like fortresses, are not exactly graceful in flight, so Vikavolt is slow, and not an actual Flying-type (though it does come with Levitate).  This is not a subtle Pokémon.  Vikavolt is forceful, rampant and destructive, like Genesect, Drapion or Scolipede.  From reading its flavour text, you get the impression that Vikavolt is very good at navigating around opponents to hit their weak points from unexpected directions, but using this thing is rather different: Vikavolt actually handles like a drugged whale, but has no qualms about blasting its way through any and all obstacles with overwhelming electrical attacks.  Still, I suppose they did give it Acrobatics and Agility, so I suppose I shouldn’t be too critical of any disconnect there.

What’s interesting about Charjabug and Vikavolt is the weird relationship they have in the wild.  Charjabug, we’re told, have a phenomenal capacity to store electricity (hence the battery-inspired design).  Vikavolt can take advantage of this by picking Charjabug up and carrying them into battle, slung under their bodies.  Charjabug’s extra power can then supercharge Vikavolt’s already devastating electrical beam attacks.  In the game, this tactic is represented by Charjabug’s signature ability, Battery, which enhances the special attacks of allies in multiple battles.  The ability doesn’t carry over to Vikavolt (who replaces it with Levitate), so at the moment its competitive relevance is pretty sharply limited, though I expect in future it will probably be distributed more widely (it sure kicks the cr@p out of Plus and Minus, while conveying much the same theme).  I suppose you can do a kind of support-focused Eviolite Charjabug in doubles (for those not in the know, a Pokémon holding an Eviolite that is not yet fully evolved gets a substantial +50% buff to both defence and special defence), but… ehhhhhhhh?  As for where this even comes from in terms of Charjabug’s flavour, larval insects spend most of their existence eating, storing energy in order to sustain their metamorphoses into their adult forms… so we might think that Grubbin, in a similar vein, are devoted entirely to charging themselves up with electrical energy so that, as Charjabug, they can act as power-packs for adult Vikavolt.  In turn, we may suspect that Vikavolt’s ability to generate its own electricity is relatively limited compared to more conventional Electric-types.  Charjabug, then, isn’t an intermediary stage in quite the same way as Metapod, Silcoon, etc.; it’s actually a fairly specialised organism in its own right that provides important support to its own much rarer adult form.  Of course, in the games, trainers’ Vikavolt don’t have the luxury of having Charjabug to assist them with free power… except for Sophocles’ Totem Vikavolt, who totally squanders the Battery bonus by using only physical attacks, a la Ghetsis’ Hydreigon on Black and White 2.

*headdesk*

Before me move on, a quick note on Vikavolt’s evolutionary path.  Actually playing with Grubbin in the game’s story is a bit of a pain, because Charjabug is one of three Pokémon (the others being Nosepass and Magneton) whose evolution requires exposure to a “special magnetic field.”  In Sun and Moon, this means you have to take them to the Vast Poni Canyon, close to the end of the game, and long after you will have first encountered an enemy Vikavolt (Sophocles’ Totem), which is extremely unusual for the past three generations (normally a Gym Leader’s signature Pokémon is one that either would have recently become available to you, or very soon will).  Three-stage Bug Pokémon in the past have been known for evolving very quickly, and being strong early- to mid-game choices as a result.  This is basically the key draw of early-game Pokémon – they tend to reach their peak power very quickly.  Purely because of the geography of the game’s setting, this is emphatically not true of Vikavolt, making a very odd departure from the way Pokémon availability normally works, to the extent that I almost think it has to be an oversight.

Once you actually get Vikavolt, it’s a pretty tricky Pokémon to use.  Vikavolt takes “artillery” to a whole new level. Painfully slow and with defences no better than decent, it nonetheless comes with a special attack score to rival some of the most powerful in the game, like Chandelure.  Certainly it has the strongest special attacks of any Bug Pokémon in the game, with even Pheromosa and Volcarona noticeably behind; among Electric-types, only Xurkitree and Mega Ampharos can best it.  The previous Pokémon to wear the Bug/Electric type combination, Galvantula, was able to wield incredible forces by enhancing the accuracy of Thunder with the Compoundeyes ability.  Vikavolt’s Thunderbolt (or Discharge in doubles) just blows that out of the water on raw power alone, but can’t match Galvantula’s blistering speed.  Bug/Electric, as Galvantula taught us, is a pretty solid combination.  You only have two weaknesses, Fire and Rock, and Vikavolt adds a useful Ground immunity, courtesy of the Levitate ability.  Bug attacks – for both Galvantula and Vikavolt, this is primarily Bug Buzz – cover Electric’s blind spot for Grass-types, and being a Bug-type also makes it thematically appropriate for you to learn Energy Ball, so it’s difficult for Ground-types to switch in and absorb your Thunderbolts with impunity.  Those three attacks form the core of Vikavolt’s offensive capabilities.  Flash Cannon is its other significant special attack, and is mostly useful to punish anyone who tries to counter you with a bulky Fairy-type special tank like Florges or Sylveon; if you’re confident your team can handle them by other means, ditch Flash Cannon.  Air Slash is technically there, but it’s a weak move and doesn’t really fill any major holes in Vikavolt’s type coverage.  Volt Switch, the special Electric-type counterpart to U-Turn, is on Vikavolt’s movelist as well.  It’s a fantastic move, and always worth consideration, but Vikavolt’s simply not the best Pokémon to use it, for similar reasons to Incineroar, Gumshoos and Toucannon: being slow with mediocre defences, it’s a very difficult Pokémon to get into play safely, and once it’s there, its time is best spent causing as much havoc as possible with its obscene special attack stat.  It shouldn’t be aiming to keep itself safe with a hit-and-run, because it may not live to do it a second time; it should be aiming to brutally murder things in, if possible, a single Choice Specs- or Life Orb-boosted attack.

Unlike all those other sledgehammer-style Pokémon I’ve been reviewing so far, Vikavolt actually learns Agility, and the thought of what this thing could do if it could actually move is nothing short of terrifying.  Even after using Agility, there are still a number of perfectly respectable Pokémon that will outrun Vikavolt, especially ones that carry Choice Scarves, so you’re probably never going to make Vikavolt a proper sweeper as such, but it might be worth playing around with.  Getting Trick Room support from your team is a bit difficult to pull off in singles, but makes Vikavolt damn near unstoppable for a short time if it works.  Alternatively, you can Thunder Wave things to slow down important targets in a way that helps your entire team, but playing support seems like something of a waste of Vikavolt’s talent for destruction.  If you’re facing multiple opponents, you can slow them all down with String Shot or Electro Web; these moves aren’t worth it in singles but can be useful support options in other formats.  Finally, Vikavolt can learn Roost for healing, so, like many Alolan Pokémon, you could theoretically try shoehorning it into a sort of off-tank role, dumping speed and putting a lot of points into Vikavolt’s HP.  I’m not convinced it has the durability to really make that work though.