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Spike vs Charmander (redone) (0-7-0)

Hold the match real quick. He's undergoing revisions atm. It should probably wait until I find a speed for him too. I'm almost positive he's not peak human.
 
Unrelated but good to see more pony stuff being done here.
 
Range calculation still needs evaluation before doing anything with this match. Matchups should never be made when a character is in the middle of revisions. And I'm fairly certain I've seen Spike run faster than his profile, so I'll need to check that out too.
 
Well it seems now Spike has a 1.2x AP advantage, and they both resist the fire attacks so...yeah this might take a while.

Charmander still generally outranges, scary face is ranged and reduces speed, growl reduces physical strength, Smoke Screen has had a variety of ranges and can still blind, Dragonbreath isn't resisted and can trigger paralysis, and Inferno always burns (Spike may resist heat and fire, but not Status effects, so this can likely still trigger). By the time they've engaged close up, Spike is almost certainly debuffed, slower, and is possibly Statused and/or blinded.

Spike now for sure out lifting strengths, and has the slightest of AP advantages, but that's about it.

Charmander still has the better range, the wider and more useful versatility, and naturally are competent fighters as pokemon tend to be.

Spike's only move that's useful is knocking Charmander back with his higher LS breath to chip it down, but that won't stop status effect projectiles like Scary Face, and it also by definition knocks Charmander back. Either Spike needs to pin them against something and never stop breathing, or Charmander gets the range advantage back in their court.

I still vote Charmander.
 
Spike would resist that as well. He swam in lava once
That's a resistance to heat and magma, but pokemon's 'burn' is a standalone status effect that can still affect pokemon that otherwise resist fire, heat, and magma manipulation.

The only exception are pokemon who are outright immune to the effect triggering, like having fire absorbing abilities or being fire type, which Spike's resistances may not translate to.

Regardless, not the most important tool in the kit anyways, especially since Dragonbreath can still trigger statuses too
 
That's a resistance to heat and magma, but pokemon's 'burn' is a standalone status effect that can still affect pokemon that otherwise resist fire, heat, and magma manipulation.

The only exception are pokemon who are outright immune to the effect triggering, like having fire absorbing abilities or being fire type, which Spike's resistances may not translate to.

Regardless, not the most important tool in the kit anyways, especially since Dragonbreath can still trigger statuses too
Im pretty sure that’s game mechanics
 
Im pretty sure that’s game mechanics
Gonna go into detail before the main comment since I'm the one who brought it up off-site and I quote myself here:
See, that's why fire types being immune is complete bullshit. They've been harmed by fire in the past and seasoned fire specific trainers have used fire attacks against fire types (Suggesting they aren't immune to fire) from my watching of the series, but are somehow immune to burns? You know? Burns? The thing fire and heat causes damage with?

Naw, that's straight up game mechanics.
 
Im pretty sure that’s game mechanics
The reference image for burns on the anime section of Bulbapedia is a Swanna, a pokemon resistant to Fire attacks and the elemental manipulations related to it.

There's a concious choice between what pokemon can and can't be burned, and it's represented outside of the games. Resisting fire, heat, and magma has a clear example of not being enough.
 
The reference image for burns on the anime section of Bulbapedia is a Swanna, a pokemon resistant to Fire attacks and the elemental manipulations related to it.

There's a concious choice between what pokemon can and can't be burned, and it's represented outside of the games. Resisting fire, heat, and magma has a clear example of not being enough.
Resistance to /=/ immunity. You can still be burned despite resisting it. The burn page doesn't say water types can't be burned, only pokemon with abilities like water veil can't. Funnily enough, the moved that burned it was scald, and I've found that water burns are far far worse than standard burns due to higher heat density. So there's another reason why it got burned so easily despite it's typing.

I've also found that Charmander can still burn themselves when younger. And that's because they aren't familiar with fire yet and thus aren't careful. Not because they are too young to be resistant or immune to heat/burns, but their lack of knowledge just makes them less careful when messing with it. So if Pokedex entries outright say Charmander can be burned, I have my doubts it's not gameplay.
 
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The reference image for burns on the anime section of Bulbapedia is a Swanna, a pokemon resistant to Fire attacks and the elemental manipulations related to it.

There's a concious choice between what pokemon can and can't be burned, and it's represented outside of the games. Resisting fire, heat, and magma has a clear example of not being enough.
Idk, the anime is kinda inconsistent. Pikachu was apparently capable of harming a geodude with electric type moves
 
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Charmander still generally outranges
Spike does this thing called countering with his own fire. Also, subsonic means he's closing the gap much faster. The range for his fire breath also means he doesn't have to run as far.
scary face is ranged and reduces speed
Unless I'm missing something, this will only reduce his movement speed. His attack and reaction speed are still the same to my knowledge (Might be wrong, but idk, so I won't assume the latter speeds are affected). As long as he still has the ability to react, he can still counter the majority of Charmanders attacks.
Smoke Screen has had a variety of ranges and can still blind
It's a puff of smoke. I'm positive Spike can either A: Incinerate it, or B: Blow it away with his fire breath because his fire breath has force, allowing for his fire breath to simply shove it out of the way.
Inferno always burns (Spike may resist heat and fire, but not Status effects, so this can likely still trigger)
Can we not be pedantic here? How exactly do you think the burn status effect inflicts damage? How exactly do you think fire and heat inflicts damage? Not commenting on Dragon Breath since Spike can yet again just counter when he sees it coming, and with Spike having the AP advantage, it's going to stop dead in its tracks.
By the time they've engaged close up, Spike is almost certainly debuffed, slower, and is possibly Statused and/or blinded.


and naturally are competent fighters as pokemon tend to be.
Said while assuming Charmander is going to spam status effects just because Spike dodged or countered the damaging attacks literally a couple times. If the anime if being applied, I'll point out as far as I've seen thus far, that pokemon, whether wild or under ownership have often spammed the same attack or merely another damage-dealing attack. They don't always just go right for the status moves just because they happen to have them
chip it down
Both the games and anime comment on type effectiveness being 50% or double depending on whether the pokemon resists or is weak to the attacks typing. So instead of 920 tons, Spike now hits with 460 tons, more than 64% of Charmander's stats. It's going to hurt like shit. Even getting punched by a guy half as powerful as you still hurts a fair bit, and Spike can spam over and over again for several, several seconds.
Either Spike needs to pin them against something and never stop breathing
Iirc, isn't the standard location Central Park if not specified? Plenty of buildings to pin Charmander to in that case.
 
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Resistance to /=/ immunity. You can still be burned despite resisting it.
...yes, that's my point. Spike has a resistance, not an immunity or a status effect resistance, thus that's likely not enough. If pokemon who resist the same effects as Spike are still affected, then the status clearly has a unique aspect to it. Thus, it's reasonable to assume while Spike will take less damage from Inferno, the burn can still trigger.

Idk, the anime is kinda inconsistent. Pikachu was apparently capable of harming a geodude with electric type moves
And yet other times the immunity is brought back up and corrected. The anime trips up, a lot, but very clearly makes an attempt to adapt the game rules outside of a game mechanic setting.

Burns function in spesific situations that have some pretty clear rules, it's shown in multiple mediums (Happens in the Manga too, Dreadnaw has a double resistance even). It's just a part of the pokemon world's ruleset. We're going to need to start tossing out a lot of move interactions just because this fictional setting has strange logic that they generally stick to with this kind of mentality.

Burn is caused by fire, heat, magma, ghost energy, tri attack being tri attack, and a weird ice/fire mix, but it's properties as a status effect are, admittedly strangely, unique from all of those.

---

Spike does this thing called countering with his own fire. Also, subsonic means he closing the gap much faster. The range for his fire breath also means he doesn't have to run as far.
Charmander will still have a variety of options, some Spike can't counter, and sone Spije won't correctly counter in time.

Yeah the speed update and range means there's less ground, but it still exists. Attacks are going to be thrown.
Unless I'm missing something, this will only reduce his movement speed. His attack and reaction speed are still the same to my knowledge (Might be wrong, but idk, so I won't assume the latter speeds are affected). As long as he still has the ability to react, he can still counter the majority of Charmanders attacks.
Movement speed reduction will massively hurt the range game if Spike can't keep up as well, and for combat it kinda does? Reactions aren't down, but the movements for doing attacks are slowed, so it hurts combat speed.
It's a puff of smoke. I'm positive Spike can either A: Incinerate it, or B: Blow it away with his fire breath because his fire breath has force, allowing the possibility for his fire breath to simply shove it out of the way.
It's occasionally a cloud, occasionally a projectile, and capable of AOE. Even if Spike can remove it, doesn't stop the fact that Spike needs to act to even do that, meaning it's done it's job as a distraction, Spike needed to take time to see again.

Plus it's been portrayed as getting into and irritating the eyes, explaining why it can disperse but the victim can still have accuracy issues.
Can we not be pedantic as all hell? How exactly do you think the burn status effect inflicts damage? How exactly do you think fire and heat inflicts damage? Not commenting on Dragon Breath since Spike can yet again just counter when he sees it coming, and with Spike having the AP advantage, it's going to stop dead in its tracks.
Above I explained burns in the fictional pokemon world, the kind that are sometimes glowing red energy fields (anime not games), the kind that have stat reductions, and the kind that work on creatures who resist fire and heat.

Unique properties of a verse and how their abilities work don't go away because they sound stupid. I am aware that it's riduculous that, say, rock types can burn yet wander in lava caves. But they can, the 'Burn Status Effect' is differant from fire damage on its own.

Also on Dragon Breath, 1.2x AP advantage is not a lot, I assume you meant LS? Regardless, a lot of this is assuming Spike sees, reacts, dodges, or counters everything, on time, every time.
Said while assuming Charmander is going to spam any status effects just because Spike dodged or countered them literally a couple times. If the anime if being applied, I'll point out as far as I've seen thus far, that pokemon, whether wild or under ownership have often spammed the same attack or merely another damage-dealing attack. They don't always just go right for the status moves just because they happen to have them
They also just...will? They're a population and from user to user their move choice varies wildly, some clearly make use of status effects more often. Especially since they're composite profiles, pokemon tendancies are almost impossible to determine. They'll use whatever they can, and have been shown to adapt to situations where things aren't working.

"If the anime is being applied" we'll get back to this...but of course it will be, it's a canon media. That should just be assumed.
Both the games and anime comment on type effectiveness being 50% or double depending on whether the pokemon resists or is weak to the attacks typing. By that logic, Spike now hits with 460 tons, more than 64% of Charmander's stats. It's going to hurt like shit. Even getting punched by a guy half as powerful as you still hurts a fair bit, and Spike can spam over and over again for several, several seconds.
Pokemon are high stamina fighters, so having an AP disadvantage like that means that it's still going to take a while. It's going to be a drag out.
Iirc, isn't the standard location Central Park if not specified? Plenty of buildings to pin Charmander to in that case.
It is, but they're starting in Central Park. Less terrain for pinning, Spike will need to get Charmander up against a random building with positioning and aim or out of the park entirely.

TLDR. A lot of your reasonings are Spike will use the same move over and over, it will always work, and he will make the right decisions and always have the advantage in reactions, didging, countering, ect.

Spike has only 1 move here, less range, still an AP disadvantage. Charmander will not just stand there, stare, and let itself be countered at every turn and not make use of any of it's advantages. Using positioning and range while knocking down Spike's movement speed to always stay ahead and afar, spamming things like Smokescreen to really get in disorienting him, not just taking it when Spike reveals the LS advantage but the range disadvantage that can be worked around. Actually dodging attacks itself.

---

And back to the anime comment. What you originally wrote was: "Since you like to use the anime". Which much more agressive than you edit.

You're filling your replies with a lot of frustrated and condescending language. Calm down. It's entirely uncalled for.
 
...yes, that's my point. Spike has a resistance, not an immunity or a status effect resistance, thus that's likely not enough. If pokemon who resist the same effects as Spike are still affected, then the status clearly has a unique aspect to it. Thus, it's reasonable to assume while Spike will take less damage from Inferno, the burn can still trigger.
I mentioned above that Swanna was burned by scald, which causes worse burns than fire-based ones due to liquids carrying more heat density. I've also mentioned (In my edits to the reply that is) that Charmander can still burn themselves as infants because they aren't careful when playing with fire and not because they are too young. I'm not sure if you saw those edits since I don't see a response, so I brought them up.

In addition, Spike is straight-up immune to being burned. He says so himself. The only time he's ever been affected by heat was in the presence of a fully grown Dragon, who scales multiple orders of magnitude above his current tier.
Charmander will still have a variety of options, some Spike can't counter, and sone Spije won't correctly counter in time.
All of them can be countered except for scary face I believe, but idk since you called it a projectile and need more information.

Attacks like Dragon Breath can be matched in power and therefore stopped, and smokescreen can simply be blown away with pure force. And, yes he can counter in time, speed is equalized, and while that may make projectiles harder to counter as he gets closer, he's dodged close-range attacks from equals/superiors before, so it's not that big of an issue.
Spike has only 1 move here, less range
I'm aware, and long as it can counter Charmanders projectiles, it's all he needs.
It's occasionally a cloud, occasionally a projectile, and capable of AOE.
For the first two, I think it depends on the pokemon using it. Weezing just lets it flow out of its mouth, but its whole shtick is gas. As for the bolded: How so? Like as a bomb that explodes it? A stream the spreads outward when it hits something? Maybe when Weezing does it from all holes on it's body? I don't know what the projectile would look like as aoe.
Even if Spike can remove it, doesn't stop the fact that Spike needs to act to even do that, meaning it's done it's job as a distraction, Spike needed to take time to see again.
Depends, if it's launched as a projectile he might just try and match it.
Plus it's been portrayed as getting into and irritating the eyes,
He's fallen face-first into lava and was just fine. I doubt smoke will do much better as an irritant.
Charmander will not just stand there, stare, and let itself be countered at every turn
All I said was a couple of times. With Spike's speed and his range, he only needs literally a couple of seconds to bridge the gap, and that's assuming Charmander doesn't come in closer to hit him easier.

Furthermore, you said yourself that user-to-user move choice varies wildly. So depending on this Charmander's personality, it very well might. I remember at least a couple of times where Ash's Charizard would just spam flamethrower over and over if it was feeling particularly disobedient. This Charmander could be that way, then maybe it won't be. I have no idea. Not saying it will or anything, but it's worth considering.
They also just...will? They're a population and from user to user their move choice varies wildly
That's exactly the problem I was trying to point out. Based on what I know on how pokemon are treated: This is a random Charmander with perfect stats and knows every move it can possibly learn via level up. This isn't a Charmander whose personality and fighting style we're familiar with, so I don't know if it'll spam status moves in response to being countered a couple of times or not, and If I don't know I'm not going to assume.
Pokemon are high stamina fighters
It really depends on the pokemon. This should not be applied to a random Charmander without good reason.
still an AP disadvantage.
He does not. Physical strength if Charmander decides to reduce his physical attack via growl sure, but Fire Breath is most definitely not physical. The disadvantage only applies in regards to hurting Charmander through fire.
A lot of your reasonings are Spike will use the same move over and over,
It's the only move he can use at this range. What else do you expect him to do?
it will always work,
Stronger than Charmander, strong enough to cancel out the projectiles (And it doesn't matter if you don't think a 1.28x advantage is that much, it's at least good enough to stop the projectiles), fast enough to react to them even at closer ranges, can blow away the smokescreen even if it does provide Charmander a distraction. It seems like it will for the most part, emphasis on that last part.
and he will make the right decisions and always have the advantage in reactions, didging, countering, ect
Well, why wouldn't he? He's canonically responded to lasers by throwing fire back at them. Literally, the only decision for him to make is either dodge or use his own attack to cancel it out.

Side question, but where does Charmander's range come from anyway? I can't find anything on any of the profiles.
 
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It is, but they're starting in Central Park. Less terrain for pinning
I meant to respond to this but it must've gotten deleted by mistake, and since you've already seen my reply, you're probably already making a new one. That taken into consideration, I think it would be best to make a new comment to catch your attention.

Anyways, Central Park is still surrounded by the city, and it's full of stuff to pin on. It's a park, not an open plain. Heck, Spike could just jump in the air and pin him to the ground with a downwards fire breath once he gets within range. He literally held himself in the air for all 6 seconds he spent vaping the ice.
 
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Look. I started writing a response, just like you guessed. I even commented on how long these were getting, tried to make it 1 sentence bullet points to get back on track...and it was still obnoxiously long.

I was writing a lot of what I've said before. Explaining a bit more, but not much, not enough to warrent how much more I realized I needed to write. And most of it was just reiterating the same things, re explaining my stance, ect.

TLDR: I don't think you're correct, you're not convincing me, but I've also said, basically, everything I wanted to.

I do not want to make this a thread where you and I write a novel. My vote remains unchanged, I leave it to future votes.
 
I believe that people are somewhat ignoring the good part of charmander's wincon and arguing whether fire will work or not for whatever reason.
idk if it can burn but ik that it cannot burn fire types who can swim in magma.

I am more interested in status conditions and such.
Charmander can indeed use moves which would lower Spike's attacks and if fire doesn't work then Charmander still has Dragon breath which can easily paralyze opponents and lower their speed.

Also while Burn has been seen to not bypass resistance, general fire attacks such as ember can damage other pokemon, even those who are fire types, though not to the same extent.


here is magby casually strolling through a pool of magma. though it it seems blocky, the game made it intentional, as such you cannot traverse water if you aren't a water type or you cannot traverse magma if you are any other type than fire. If you stand in magma and click to swap places with your partner who isn't a fire type, they'll fall into magma and get burned and teleport themselves out.
So fire attacks can probably bypass spike's resistance.

Overall: even with a 1.28x advantage in AP i feel like spike just has less combat options. Charmander has paralysis inducement attacks and attack power reducing moves

Charmander could knock Spike down from his superior AP in like a move or two and he has two effective ways of slowing down Spike one of which is a move that needs him to make a grimace and the other being a useful non fire based attack which has a 30% chance of paralysis inducement.


Basically, Charmander just has more abilities that he can use and could probably bypass fire resistance.

I vote Charmander
 
Well, evidently, I'm not convincing anyone, so I'll just stop and trying and instead pose a question: What are Spike's wincons? Superior AP doesn't count since A: Charmander's fire resistance cuts it in half. B: AP means **** all if you can't actually use it. Like, the man needs to actually have a reliable wincon, and at this range, he has nothing going for him. We ain't talking a hundred meters, we're talking hundreds of meters. You know? More than one?
 
Well, evidently, I'm not convincing anyone, so I'll just stop and trying and instead pose a question: What are Spike's wincons? Superior AP doesn't count since A: Charmander's fire resistance cuts it in half. B: AP means **** all if you can't actually use it.
1. He still can damage him physically
2. He can restrict him with LS
3. Charmander doesn't lead with status reduction so Spike can get hits in
 
1. He still can damage him physically
2. He can restrict him with LS
3. Charmander doesn't lead with status reduction so Spike can get hits in
1.
AP means **** all if you can't actually use it.

2. So does lifting strength.
3. Doesn't lead with /=/ doesn't use them. From what I'm getting, it'll go for them very quickly if Spike dodges or counters a few times, and it'll take a long time for him to actually get with hit range.
 
Charmander would go for offense first and stats later and it could get knocked around beforehand.

If spike restricts Charmander and beats him up then he could win.
 
Charmander would go for offense first and stats later and it could get knocked around beforehand.
Define "stats later". Would Charmandner use any of its status moves within 4.2 seconds of the fight? Because that's how long it would take for Spike to get with his range and his speed assuming Charmander's range is 200 meters. Would Charmander try running up to Spike for cqc?
 
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