Alakazam, The Psi Pokémon. The spoons clutched in its hands are said to have been created by its psychic powers.Its brain cells multiply continually until it dies. As a result, it remembers everything. Closing both its eyes heightens all its other senses. This enables it to use its abilities to their extremes. Its superb memory lets it recall everything it has experienced from birth. Its IQ exceeds 5,000.
Overview
Alakazam, the original powerhouse Psychic Pokémon. It used to be incredible, but has sort of dwindled in usefulness over the years. With the 2nd generation bringing Steel and Dark in to counter the overpowered Psychic type, it hasn't really been as powerful since then. 3rd gen it was pretty strong, being probably the most powerful Psychic type outside of ubers. 4th gen brought phsycial Pursuit into play. Bye bye Alakazam. 5th gen brought Dream World, which brought Alakazam a neat new ability in the form of Magic Guard. One of the coolest abilities, it really makes Alakazam more useful. With a huge base Special Attack and a nice base Speed, Alakazam is a key example for special sweeper.
Abilities
Synchronize: Alakazam's second most useful ability. Being able to bounce statuses back is always useful.
Inner Focus: nowhere near as useful as the other two abilities. Stopping flinching? Yeah, really not too useful when you have that base Speed.
Magic Guard: Magic Guard stops status damage, stops Life Orb, stops Sandstorm... always awesome.
Pure offensive Zam
- Psychic / Psyshock
- Focus Blast
- Grass Knot / Trick
- Shadow Ball / Trick
Item Attached: Life Orb / Choice Specs
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
Hit hard, try not to get hurt. Psychic has more base power than Psyshock, but Psyshock can possibly deal more damage with the whole targetting Defence thing. Focus Blast ruins Steels and Darks, which will want to switch into your Psychic attacks. Grass Knot can destroy bulky Waters and bulky Grounds, always useful. Shadow Ball combos perfectly with Focus Blast, and helps deal with other Psychic Pokémon. Trick is great with Choice Specs, as you can completely ruin a Pokémon if you Trick it properly.
Alakabooster
- Calm Mind / Charge Beam
- Psychic / Psyshock
- Focus Blast
- Shadow Ball
Item Attached: Life Orb / Leftovers
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
A boosting set. Calm Mind gives you Special Attack and Special Defence, but Charge Beam deals some damage and possibly boosts your Special Attack. Psychic or Psyshock, pick whichever you think would be more useful. Focus Blast nails Steels and Darks, and Shadow Ball rounds off the Fighting/Ghost combo, as well as being a nice attack in its own right.
LeadZam
- Taunt
- Encore
- Magic Coat / Snatch / Trick / Knock Off / Thunder Wave / Focus Blast / Counter
- Psychic
Item Attached: Focus Sash
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
Taunt+Encore is disgustingly brutal. You Taunt the Stealth Rock and Encore it, forcing them to Struggle or switch out. You could also use Magic Coat to bounce Stealth Rock and other entry hazards away. Snatch steals boosts but ideally steals a Substitute. Trick steals your opponent's item, same as Knock Off. Thunder Wave hits the opponent with a damaging status. Focus Blast helps with coverage and decimates the opponent's Steel and Dark Pokémon. Counter is useful considering you are running Focus Sash. Psychic stops you being Taunt bait.
Twin Screens
- Reflect
- Light Screen
- Psychic / Taunt / Encore / Thunder Wave / Recover
- Psychic / Taunt / Encore / Thunder Wave / Recover
Item Attached: Light Clay
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SAtk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
More of a support set than an offensive one. Reflect and Light Screen make you sort of crazy durable. Psychic is always a useful attack, and stops you being Taunt bait. Speaking of Taunt, it is still useful on a set like this. Encore is also very handy, as it can force a switch meaning you get a free screen set up. Thunder Wave is a cool way of dropping a status on the opponent. It's awesome due to the fact it has 100% accuracy. Recover means you can heal yourself.
EVs & Natures
Pure offensive Zam
It has no stats except for Special Attack and Speed. Why invest in anything else?
Alakabooster
HELLO COPY PASTA.
LeadZam
You're running Focus Sash. There's no point in running HP or defences.
Twin Screens
An Alakazam set with HP? Yeah. You want max HP for this set, as you will be ideally using Reflect and Light Screen more than once.
Other Options
Choice Band, Energy Ball, Psych Up, Substitute, Signal Beam
Choice Band can be used with Trick and Focus Punch to deal nice damage to Blissey switch ins. However, Choice Band can still be useful with just Trick.
Energy Ball is an option over Grass Knot.
Psych Up can steal boosts from something. Always handy.
Substitute protects Alakazam from damage, allowing Alakazam to boost up with Calm Mind or just attack freely.
Signal Beam helps take out Psychic types and Dark types. It's an option.
Countering Alakazam
Dark types are immune to your STAB moves. Tyranitar, Honchkrow, Scrafty, Hydreigon, Dark types are great switch ins. However, watch out for Focus Blast. Blissey, Chansey, Snorlax, Jellicent, these are all good switch ins. But, be very careful around Psyshock. Priority really hurts Alakazam, basically because of its awful HP and Defence. Sucker Punch, Ice Shard, Aqua Jet, ExtremeSpeed, Bullet Punch, anything but Mach Punch works. Sableye and Spiritomb get a special mention due to being immune to Alakazam's most common moves. Psychic types themselves work well, such as Cresselia, Starmie, Reuniclus and stuff like that. Honestly, there isn't too much to say. Alakazam has giant Special Attack but... doesn't seem to use it well. Ironically it is outclassed by Espeon now as a Psychic type, where it used to be Espeon only beating Alakazam as a Baton Passer.
Animé Appearences
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Alakazam has had a plerhora of appearances in the animé, notably under the control of Salon Maiden Anabel, the Orange Islands gym leader Luana and Kenny.
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Synopsis
Pictures
