Ranking the Pokemon: #3- Starmie

We're finally here. The Top 3. If we were dishing out Olympic medals, Starmie would get the bronze. You obtain a Starmie by giving a Staryu a Water Stone, and it essentially just doubles itself and turns purple. Love it. Along with Staryu, Starmie is also part of a glitch in Pokemon Gold and Silver, in which they could learn egg moves, but because they're genderless Pokemon and couldn't breed, you couldn't actually get said egg moves. Good work, GameFreak.

But anyway, we're talking about Starmie in Generation I here. And even back then, Starmie was a beast. HP isn't anything special, but it only improves from there--its Attack and Defense are both above average, its Special is great, and its Speed is outstanding. Plus it looks cool hurtling itself through the air like some sort of rogue ninja star.

Starmie technically only learns Tackle, Harden and Water Gun, so you either need to use whatever moves you learn as Staryu before evolving it, or just load up on TMs. I prefer the latter, because Starmie learns an abundance of moves. You'll definitely want to go the route of a special sweeper; I personally like the Thunder Wave/Thunderbolt/Surf/Psychic combo. That way you can annoy people by paralyzing 'em, and you get two STAB moves with Surf and Psychic. But you could also throw Blizzard on there as another attack, or add to the annoyance with Double Team or Reflect, or keep Recover on there to gain back some HP and duet with the band CHVRCHES.

The point is, Starmie is quite versatile. With the tremendous Speed, you'll be attacking first in nearly every situation, and the quality Special means those attacks will be doing strong damage. Also, if you've ever held a starfish in your hand, it's pretty incredible. So brownie points for that.

Battling Grade: A

Previously: #4- Mewtwo