Pokéwatch: Final Push

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Over the last week and a half I've been combining my longtime interest in Pokémon with my appreciation for the more recent Overwatch.  I thought it would be fun to go one by one through the different heroes of Overwatch and determine which creatures each of them might use.  Both Overwatch and Pokémon feature large casts of diverse, iconic characters, and it wasn't difficult to find three Pokémon for each character that represent their abilities and personality in their own game.  If you've missed any of the previous installments, you can check those out right here.

Part one: Genji, McCree, Pharah

Part two: Reaper, Soldier: 76, Tracer

Part three: Bastion, Hanzo, Junkrat

Part four: Mei, Torbjörn, Widowmaker

Part five: D. Va, Reinhardt, Roadhog

Part six: Winston, Zarya

Part seven: Lúcio, Mercy, Symmetra

 Today will be the final installment of Pokéwatch, until and unless Blizzard decides to release some more characters.  Since the teams are all set, we'll also be finishing the character's tournament today.  Due to the odd number of combatants, both the Tank and Support classes all receive a bye in the first round.  Mercy got one in the second as well, because if Mom ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.  We'll resume the tournament after finishing up the teams with Zenyatta.

Zenyatta

Source: ElStrawFedora's DeviantArt.

Zenyatta Tekhartha is one of the more unusual characters in Overwatch, a machine intelligence that has become a devout Buddhist monk.  It reminds me a lot of the character Lobsang in The Long Earth series, an artificial intelligence who claims to be the reincarnation of a Tibetan motorcycle repairman for legal purposes.  Zenyatta uses the free-floating orbs of its Mala (prayer beads) to attack, heal its friends, and to boost the damage its team deals.  Its ultimate, Transcendence, makes it temporarily invulnerable and heals anyone within range by crazy amounts for as long as the ability remains active.  This can be used like Lúcio's Sound Barrier to help the team break through a troublesome defensive position, or to neutralize the damage dealt by an enemy's ultimate ability.  Zenyatta's feet never touch the ground, as it prefers to levitate wherever it goes.  This makes it a little more stealthy since it doesn't make any footstep noise while it hovers over the battlefield.

As a side note, the internet seems to think that Zenyatta should use Rowlet, but since they're not available yet, according to my rules, it can't.  I couldn't pass up sharing this artwork, though.  

Source.

Lead Pokémon: Medicham (#308)

Type: Fighting/Psychic

Reason: Zenyatta uses both its advanced mental capacity and its knowledge of physiology to make itself one of the more dangerous Support classes to play against.  It can deal considerably more damage than any of the other Supports, and there's no damage falloff when it throws its prayer beads at long range, meaning it can stay behind its more durable teammates.  Medicham shares a body type and appears to share some of the Jieba marks (Scroll to entry 2) that Zenyatta has on its own frame.  Its typing also allows it to combine spirituality (Psychic) with physicality, (Fighting) much like a Shaolin monk.  Medicham can Mega evolve and gains spirit arms like its master when it does so, making it another option for Zenyatta.  However, Pokémon teams are limited to one Mega evolution per battle.  Zenyatta could decide to give both Medicham and Alakazam their respective Mega stones and decide which to power up based on what it's facing. 

Support Pokémon: Registeel (#379)

Type: Steel

Reason: Although Zenyatta is a spiritual leader, it's important to remember that it was built, not born.  Registeel serves as Zenyatta's tie to the machine world as it, too is a Steel body animated by some divine force.  Like Zenyatta and Medicham, Registeel also appears to have several Jieba marks on its forehead, though these may just be ocular inputs.

Finisher: Mega Alakazam (#065)

Type: Psychic

Reason: Zenyatta's Mala beads use either its spiritual energy or some advanced form of antigravity to levitate close to Zenyatta's body, allowing it to select the one it needs quickly.   Mega Alakazam has embraced the realm of the spirit entirely, gaining a flowing white beard and the ability to levitate both itself and its trademark spoons.  It also gains the ability Trace, allowing it to experience another creature's ability for itself.  

Analysis: Both Medicham and Alakazam are capable of Mega evolution, but Zenyatta will have to choose which it'd prefer to have backing it up.  If it goes with Mega Alakazam, it will have a fast, hard-hitting special attacker, albeit one with somewhat weak defenses.  Mega Medicham is better balanced and a good physical attacker, but can't hit as hard.  If it wants to split the difference, Zenyatta gives up using a hold item on one of these creatures, but the flexibility is probably worth it.  Medicham and Alakazam share the Psychic type, meaning both will need to watch out for Dark attacks, and Alakazam will need to watch for Bugs and Ghost moves as well.  Medicham's Fighting type opens it up to Flying and Fairy attacks, and Registeel's Steel makes it vulnerable to Fire, Fighting, and Ground moves.  Zenyatta will do very well against Poison or Fighting types, and Psychic moves do reasonably well against most other types as well.  Deciding which Pokémon to Mega evolve quickly will be key for Zenyatta, since both options benefit greatly from striking before the opponent has a chance to launch a counterattack.

 With all of the combatants ready, it's time to get into the battles.  I'll throw in a few more pictures I've found in between to break them up a little bit.  All of those found below came from http://cottonwings.tumblr.com/post/144355016822.

D. Va Vs. Reinhardt

D. Va's got sort of a squishy team, and Reinhardt has little difficulty defending against everything she can throw at him.  Her Azumarill does well against his Pyroar and Bastiodon, but gets stopped cold when he drops his Mega Aggron.  Not even her last resort move, exploding her Electrode, can make a dent in Aggron's massive armor.  She makes some headway when her Furret starts using Surf, but Aggron outlasts her, letting the Sandstorm chip away at her team.  Reinhardt admonishes D. Va to respect her elders; she responds by slamming a Dew and sulking for the next few hours.

Winner: Reinhardt

Roadhog Vs. Winston

Although both teams are diverse and capable of handling multiple types of threats, Roadhog's team has the edge here.  His Mamoswine takes down Winston's Tropius in one hit, and the Thick Fat on his Grumpig and Mamoswine means he doesn't have to worry about Darmanitan's Fire.  Once Darmanitan enters Zen Mode it does manage to take out his Emboar, but Grumpig is still fresh and shrugs off both the Fire and Psychic attacks it's dishing up.  Winston's Primeape can't survive long enough to trigger its Anger Point, and Roadhog coasts to an easy victory.

Winner: Roadhog

Zarya vs. Lúcio

This is a close fight.  Lúcio is initially fooled by Zarya's Zoroark and switches his Chatot in to hit it with a Flying attack.  When the illusion drops, he uses U-turn to deal some damage and swap to Mega Lucario.  Lucario manages to finish off Zoroark without any difficulty, but is forced to switch when Zarya brings out her Machamp.  His Chatot deals only a little damage before it's overpowered, and Zarya thinks she'll have an easy victory when Lúcio brings back his Loudred.  But it's harder to take this Loudred down than she'd anticipated, thanks to the Eviolite and the surprise move Zen Headbutt.  Loudred still goes down, but it's softened up Machamp enough for Lucario to finish it off.  Once that's taken care of Lucario and Scrafty trade blows, but the healing provided by Drain Punch gives Lucario the victory.  

Winner: Lúcio

Symmetra Vs. Zenyatta

Symmetra likes to have foreknowledge of what the enemy is planning, and this battle only reinforces that desire in her.  While choosing to make her Arceus carry the Fighting Plate was the most prudent choice when she didn't know what she was up against, it proves to be a disastrous mistake in her battle with Zenyatta.  Her Golduck can use Shadow Claw against Zenyatta's Psychics, but Registeel can wall it until it lands a Zap Cannon, and it's not strong enough to take down both before they can lace into Arceus's Fighting type.  Arceus takes down Zenyatta's Registeel, but Medicham's Fighting moves make short work of Porygon, and it deals enough Psychic damage to Arceus to allow Alakazam to finish it with a single hit.  

Winner: Zenyatta

That takes care of the preliminaries.  From the initial rounds, we still have Hanzo, Pharah and Torbjörn waiting for their matchups.  They'll begin by facing the winners of today's battles in the quarterfinals.

Hanzo Vs. Roadhog

Hanzo's main challenge is getting past Roadhog's Mamoswine.  With its immunity to Electric attacks and the extra damage it does to Dragons, it's very capable of shutting down his Zekrom.  While his Gyarados does gain the Dark type and an immunity to Psychic moves when it evolves, it's unfortunate for Hanzo that Roadhog's Grumpig can still use Charge Beam to attack his Gyarados, powering itself up at the same time.  After that, Mamoswine has little difficulty overpowering his Dragonair and dealing the final blow to his Zekrom.  

Winner: Roadhog

Pharah Vs. Reinhardt

Another close match here.  Pharah's Mega Charizard would seem to be a good match for Reinhardt's Mega Aggron, but when it loses its Flying type, it gains a weakness to Ground moves that Aggron can exploit with Earthquake.  Switching to Skarmory evens things out and prevents the damage caused by Reinhardt's Sandstorm, but it can't do much damage to Aggron, so they end up just staring at each other for a bit while Pharah waits out the Sandstorm.  Her next move is to switch in Cofagrigus and try to hit Aggron with some status attacks, but Reinhardt counters with Pyroar, whose Fire type makes it immune to burns.  Pharah brings back Charizard to remove Pyroar, but Reinhardt's got Sandstorm active again and his years have taught him the value of patience.  His Pyroar avoids the Sandstorm by using Safety Goggles, but Charizard has to hold its Mega stone.  It's a long, drawn out battle, but Reinhardt eventually prevails.  Since he can't do much to an airborne Pharah on the battlefields of Overwatch, he takes the time to savor this victory.

Winner: Reinhardt

Torbjörn Vs. Lúcio

I've found that Lúcio does a reasonably good job of taking down Torbjörn's turrets as long as he's not there to defend them.  Lúcio can fire off a few shots, then duck back into cover to heal himself, repeating as neccesary.  He can even use Soundwave to blast Torbjörn away long enough for the rest of the team to finish the turret off.  That's not the case in their Pokémon battle.  Although Klinklang and Zweilous share a vulnerability to Lucario's Fighting attacks, Lucario takes extra damage from both Camerupt's Fire and Ground moves thanks to its secondary Steel type.  Once Lucario is out of the picture, Klinklang has no problem tanking Lúcio's other two creatures.  No matter who won, I'll still have to use an unusual diacritic mark when writing their name, so in a way, I'm the loser here.  You can keep your reactions to that last sentence to yourself.

Winner: Torbjörn

Mercy Vs. Zenyatta

Mercy's first battle gets off to a rough start; when Zenyatta sees that she's opening with Blissey, it decides to Mega evolve its Medicham, doubling its attack with Pure Power.  She switches to her Shedinja, and lands a Toxic before Zenyatta realizes it can't hurt her Ghost Bug with Fighting or Psychic moves.  When it switches in Alakazam to take it out with a Shadow Ball, she has another Toxic waiting.  That's all her Shedinja can do, so she switches to Togekiss after it falls.  Togekiss is able to use Roost long enough for the poison to finish Alakazam, so Zenyatta brings out Registeel to try and remove Togekiss before it can mess with Medicham.  Mercy counters by switching back to Blissey, and by alternating Soft-boiled with Power-up Punch, she manages to remove Zenyatta's Registeel despite its immunity to poison.  It's 2 vs. 1 now, but Zenyatta evens the score when its Medicham scores a huge hit on Blissey.  Zen's in serious trouble though, its Medicham losing health rapidly to the poison while Togekiss shrugs off both Psychic and Fighting attacks easily.  Togekiss' ability to recover health lets Mercy wait out the poison, and she gets the victory.  

Winner: Mercy

With the quarterfinals out of the way, the winners heal up and prepare for the Semifinal round.  

Torbjörn Vs. Reinhardt

In the leadup to the Super Bowl, the semifinal games are often much more interesting to watch than the Bowl itself.  The matchup between Reinhardt and Torbjörn is a knockdown, dragout fight with both combatants scrambling for any slight advantage and having to change their strategies on the fly.  Reinhardt leads with a Sandstorm, boosting his Bastiodon's already considerable defense.  This makes little difference to Torbjörn's Klinklang, though, since it's also immune to the storm's effect.  It takes a while, but Klinklang cuts through Bastiodon's armor despite taking some damage and having its speed reduced by Bastiodon's Bulldoze.  Reinhardt's Pyroar is able to capitalize on Klinklang's weakened state, evening up the battle at 2 apiece.  Torbjörn brings in his Mega Camerupt next, and Pyroar falls swiftly to its Sheer Force boosted Earth Power.  It's 2 to 1 in favor of Torbjörn, but Reinhardt's Mega Aggron puts up a good fight, taking Camerupt's Earth Power and throwing back an Earthquake in return.  Camerupt barely survives the hit but has enough energy to launch a Lava Plume, and eventually Reinhardt is forced to concede. 

Winner: Torbjörn

Mercy Vs. Roadhog

Mercy probably shouldn't have gotten this far into the tournament, but the combination of seeding and the unusual number of combatants combined to give her an advantage.  Her Blissey starts at a disadvantage to Roadhog's Emboar, so she immediately switches to Togekiss.  Roadhog counters with Mamoswine, and its Ice attacks overwhelm Togekiss' self healing.  Blissey is able to deal with Mamoswine long enough to remove it with Toxic, but it still can't handle Emboar's Fighting attacks.  Mercy is forced to bring out Shedinja, but it expires to a single Fire Punch from Emboar.  Roadhog grunts amiably and extends a hand, but Mercy flips him off with a hearty double deuce, spits on the ground and curses ripely in German as she flies away. 

Winner: Roadhog

The semifinals are over, so now it's time for the main event.  Before we continue, I'd like to say that this has been a lot of fun for me, so I hope others have enjoyed it as well.  There hasn't been as much feedback as I thought there would be, so maybe I went a little too technical when describing the teams and the battles.  I realized partway through working on yesterday's entries that I was basically writing fanfiction, so that's embarrassing.  Still, it let me practice writing about two topics I'm reasonably knowledgeable about, and I learned some things about both games while doing research.  It's been fun, even if it seems like nobody's been reading what I've been writing.  With that out of the way, let's get to the final battle.

Torbjörn Vs. Roadhog

Torbjörn is off to a bad start, since his Klinklang is vulnerable to both of Emboar's types.  He quickly switches to Camerupt and starts laying down Earth Powers to remove it.  Roadhog counters with Mamoswine, and its Thick Fat nullifies its weakness to Fire moves, giving it long enough to take out Camerupt with Earthquake.  With his team's main threat neutralized, Torbjörn switches back to Klinklang, and it's fast enough to finish Mamoswine with Steel attacks without taking a hit in return.  Roadhog brings back Emboar, and this time there's nothing Torbjörn can do to stop it.  Klinklang and Zweilous both fall to Emboar's Fighting moves, and Roadhog wins the championship.  He celebrates the only way he knows how.

Winner: Roadhog

And we're done!  Thanks as always to Pokestadium for the Pokémon sprites, and also to Pokecharms for their trainer card macros.  Thanks also to Curvedlines, who posted all the sprite sprays for the Overwatch heroes.  

LOOK WHO CAME:

Kevin McClusky   

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Batthink   1

itsalita   1

C-bastion   1