You know Regigigas is permanently married to it’s Ability when even Legends Arceus (a game with NO Abilities) still forced it to keep Slow Start.

Rampardos is the Anvil in a looney toon. Realistically, such a specifically small item is never going to land on your head. But my GOD, if it did you’d be paste.

I'm surprised you didn't talk about why Trick Room Rampardos still can't cut it, because that's the obvious retort to a glass cannon having speed issues

Kartana is the Rampardos everyone on this video wishes to be. Being brutally strong, with the capacity to be even stronger, actual defensive typing (and even physically defensive stats), ability that allows it to snowball and sweep and an actual speed stat to which it outspeeds Garchomp and everything else below. Special mention to how some specific Pokemon in Gen 7 ran HP Fire just so they wouldn't get walled/lose to this thing.

You could also argue towards the existence of a "counterpart" Bastiodon Theorem, when defensively built Pokémon are hindered by being far too passive or lacking good recovery or just having a bad defensive typing. Comparing the namesake Bastiodon to Toxapex is a strong case of the latter two points; Bastiodon needs Rest if it wants its own quick recovery and doesn't have Regenerator either, and Rock/Steel happens to be one of the most surprisingly abysmal defensive pairings out there. Just as you need more than a really good attacking stat, you also need more than a really good defensive stat.

I feel like rampardos would actually be usable if gamefreak cared enough to give it priority moves. Like seriously Accel rock would be amazing on rampardos.

A theorem on "defensive" ice types. Any ice type that wants to be defensive is inherently flawed because ice is such a bad defensive typing. Even though you kind of already did that in the ice type video itself.

Funny enough, I feel like there's a sister theorem that Rampardos' fossil counterpart embodies. The Bastrodon Theorem. Just having High defensive stats does not make you bulky. Typing and abilities matter too.

Can't wait for the Bastiodon Theorem

Theres also the opposite. The Shedinja theorem, in which shedinja consistently underperforms in every singles tier, because if the abundance of coverage moves for it's very common weaknesses yet several times it has performed exceptionally well in ubers paradoxically whilst being unviable in any tier below it due to its extreme niche at absolutely walking very specific threats

I feel like this can also apply to Shedninja who has the most broken ability theoretically, even if he has like 9 weaknesses that's still a massive amount of pokemon he could theoretically checkmate If literally everything else didn't completely dominate him like entry hazards, status, weather and even some items

I feel like a lot of Pokémon who shouldn’t fall in the rampardos theory actually end up doing so because of the power creep, a really good exemple of this would be Lucario who was a feared set up sweeper but ended up becoming way too slow for the meta and not even that threatening once he is set up

Speed is one of the most important stats in the game. Deoxys Speed is a testament to that, where its massive speed and utility move pool compensate for its lackluster offense and defense. A fast Rampardos would have potential as a devastating sweeper (or just give Aerodactyl the Head Smash and Brave Bird it so rightfully deserves).

What I love about Regigigas is that the moment it could dispose of it's ability with relative ease (Neutralizing Gas) it made it to worlds in VGC

While everyone else is talking about the Rampardos Theorem’s counterpart in the Bastiodon Theorem, I would like to propose a corollary to the Bastiodon Theorem. The Aurorus corollary would be that it does not matter what your stats are; a Rock typing or an Ice typing will screw you over. There is also the Calyrex-Ice Rider corollary, which is that if your Pokémon need legendary stats to be bulky then there is no way your typing can ever be bulky.

Rampardos's counterpart, Bastiodon, is also a perfect example. It came in with a duo of two of the most defensive types in the game, it had the sky high defense stats to back up the coveted steel resistances, it had moves to boost defense, it could set hazards and status, it could phase with roar and yet it was another example of the on paper good qualities being overshadowed by the glaring, crippling weaknesses. Bastiodon's typing left it DOUBLY weak to two of the most powerful and prominent offensive types in the game, ground and fighting, it was weak to water and didn't resist many of the types you expected each one of its own types to resist because the other counteracted it, like steel not resisting grass or steel, and rock not resisting fire, and it didn't have a particularly high health pool to actually sponge multiple hits with its high defenses. Having mitigated damage doesn't change much when you still get 1-2hkod by attacks by virtue of your low health inhibiting how long you can tank. Since it had no reliable recovery, poor offensive stats, and inconsistent damage output through passive damage by status and hazards, it wasn't able to capitalize on its good defensive traits like its raw stats and the few good situational type matches like being a steel not weak to fire, or a rock not weak to grass.

How about a video on Pokémon who went from worthless to weapon-grade after the addition of one or a few attributes like Politoed and Drizzle, or Beedrill and Mega evolution? I’m sure there are other examples with moves, items, the physical special split, new tiers, etc.

I feel sorry for Rampardos. I always thought it looked cool, and the Pachycephalosaurus is cool dinosaur. I remember when I was once drawn in by the allure of Rampardos' "power potential", only to soon realize it was basically unusable. Truly heartbreaking.

And then there's the opposite case of Rampardos Theorem: what I'll tentatively call "The Zacian Principle". Instead of a Pokemon with immense power but a crippling (even comical) drawback, you get a pokemon that gets just enough of everything to be a mindless threat against any team that doesn't run a hard counter defacto.

In chess there is this theory (backed by stats) that the player that makes the first move has always an advantage over the one moving second, with first movers winning 52 to 56% of the time (rather than 50-50). Therefore Speed being king more than ever in modern Pokemon (and old games too, just remember how relevant Jolteon was in RBY), specially with so many damage boosting items going around, is not surprising. All rounder Pokemon have been thrown to the wayside, save for those with really good abilities.

Rampardos: Who are you? Tyrantrum: I’m you, but stronger Rampardos may arguably be the 15th most viable fully evolved fossil Pokémon, however Rampardos still finds a place in my heart to be my favorite fossil Pokémon. It’s just so cool regardless

I’m surprised you didn’t mention flareon syndrome. Sometimes, you have a Pokémon with an amazing attack/special attack, but little to no moves that rely on it. Flareon had amazing attack and guts, but for many generations, its only usable move was return. The introduction of the physical-special split and eventual access flare blitz helped. But at that point, power creep made it an afterthought.

A potential video idea might be "the lifeblood of a generation", where you go over what makes each generation tick and unique. This of course is generally covered by the how good were they actually series, but showcasing deep dives into each metagame could be a nice addition to this channel.

With the Mega Mewtwo Y situation at the start, you could have matched it up against Croagunk, Toxicroak, Sneasel-Hisui, or Sneasler instead of Infernape because of their 4x weaknesses to Psychic-type attacks.

I think Flareon can somewhat be considered under the rampardos theorem, having great attack especially with a toxic orb, but being weak to rocks and being slow makes it really hard to use. JUSTICE FOR FLAREONNNNN IT COULDVE BEEN SO MUCH MORE

Sheesh that art tho

14:30 "That's why the strongest pokemon in the game are balanced by severe weaknesses" Zacian Crowned:

I would recommend an honorable mention to RBY machamp. His attack stat was amazing for its time, and seemingly a great threat due to how good normal types were that generation. But it ends up getting destroyed by status and the psychic types roaming the tier

0:38 nine year old me spamming blast burn because it has the biggest number: YOU TAKE THAT BACK

And abilities too, Adaptability makes Porygon Z STAB slightly stronger than Mewtwo Y (although 80 base dmg is weak, it has access to a surprise hyper beam), the same way darmanitan outdamages Mewtwo X by a laarge margin, thanks to flare blitz too, which is the equivalent of almost a non stab explosion (234 base damage)

Rampardos is such a shame to me. I instantly fell in love with the pokemon when I evolved it in the original Diamond version. It hit like a TRUCK but was so frustratingly frail. As much as I liked him I had to knock him off my team for the rest of the game.

I like how everyone is coming up with their own unique theorems. Videos on these would be similarly amazing as this one.

One mustn't forget Hoopa's default form when thinking about this theorem. It's got frankly staggering special attack coupled with decent physical attack, but it's very slow, insanely physically brittle, and saddled with two quad weaknesses due to its Psychic/Ghost typing.

14:23 Reshiram and Rampardos: "is it possible to learn this power?" Mega Rayquaza, Zacian: "the dark side is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural"

Slaking was legitimately terrifying in pokemon colosseum when its partner slowking swaps abilities with it

These sort of bigger picture documentary type videos are exactly what I want. I love the humor you added with the figures and plushes too. More of this please!

Another great example of the Rampardos Theorem is Absol, particularly in gens 4-5 when it actually had usable dark stab but before mega evolutions. It had a great 130 base ATK, access to swords dance, a ton of coverage moves and at least one useable ability in super luck for crit hax. The problem was it had the lethal combination of poor speed AND poor bulk. Poor bulk meant that it couldn't switch in whenever it wanted and poor speed meant you couldn't just lead off with it. Also its other 2 abilities, pressure and justified, were poor fits on such a glass cannon of a pokemon. Granted, Absol was not Rampardos or Slaking bad, it has ways around its flaws. It actually had access to priority in the form of sucker punch, getting around the problem of just never being able to launch an attack. Also its speed stat, while not good was also not so terrible as to be unable to run choice scarf, which combined with it's coverage meant it could function as a revenge killer. I would say it's about on par with Porygon-Z. However like with the other Rampardos Theorem mons, if one were to just take a cursory look at Absol (130 ATK, swords dance, good coverage) it looks a lot better than it actually is.

'Theorem' is one of those words that turns any subject into something that sounds like you could teach it at university.

I like the direction you guys are taking fsg, these new videos are pretty interesting and fun to watch!

I would love to see how the rampardos theorem affects VGC, because Regigigas did have a small niche in Series 12 with Galarian Weezing being able to neutralize slow start

Regigagis: Pretty good stats, has slow start. Mega Rayquaza: Has higher base stats than Regigagis, can hold an item, and has an ability that isn’t detrimental. *Seems fair.*

This video was on my plan to watch list for two months, but I really enjoyed watching it! The demonstration part was really good and satisfying to watch, and you talked about Pokémon that are kinda popular because their case isn't unknown, like, we've all tried to play Regigigas or Slaking... But regrouping them allow us to understand more about how they are designed. I really like how you pointed out that each Pokémon in these examples don't like to switch in due to their ability/entry hazards!

Super cool to see you guys branching out like this! Keep it up!!

Xurkitree imo actually benefits from having most of their other stats be more well rounded. Ignoring his special attack, its overall stats look like something you'd see on a Nidoking. Alot of the other Ultra Beasts have big enough weaknesses that one chance to hit them usually is the way of KO'ing them. Xurkitree meanwhile i've seen plenty of times been able to shrug off a powerful hit just because their stats were just enough to survive a hit and win the exchange, (kinda like that one deoxys normal vs deoxys attack example.)

Fun fact: regigas is actually fairly good in PMD explorers. It still has its monstrous stats and slow start, but the ability is much less hindering. Given that you usually spawn in room without any enemies nearby, you can comfortably wait it out then start tearing mons apart. Even if there's something in the room, you can usually use some items to crowd control the enemies. However, he's only bad if you spawn in a monster house (not super common)

PLEASE keep these coming. Ngl, was skeptical about these at first but so far they're all wonderful.

I use Rampardos in ORAS with Trick Room Claydol and I somehow sweep every single team I find online. It can be somewhat inconsistent though due to Head Smash’s 90% accuracy.

Honestly, a slow, powerful breaker CAN work, but with just one caveat: it has to ALWAYS break. The problem with Pokémon like Rampardos is that after all the effort you get into putting it on the field, it still doesn’t always get a KO against a slow opponent.

I think another example of the Rampardos Theorem in Ubers could be Zamazenta Crowned. It has great defensive stats, good speed, and good attack. Yet it is hampered by it's shallow movepool and need to hold an item. It has no recovery moves and lacks any form of passive recovery due to needing to hold the rusted shield. Even if you just use Zamazenta it is outclassed by other pokemon due to it's shallow movepool. It is also another example of Gamefreak screwing a pokemon over for no reason as it is a fighting type with amazing defensive stats, yet it doesn't have access to Body Press which was introduced in Gen 8 and uses a pokemons defence stat to calculate damage. Even it's signature move just uses it's attack stat to calculate damage.

I'm actually curious about a video that can describe the different ways "power creep" had surfaced across the generations. We hear it all the time from our beloved FSG narrator - "Like for many pokemon, Gen 5 powercreep led to... "Unfortunately, the gen 6 power creep wasn't kind to..." "Gen 7 UU was an amazing one for X, despite the power creep that made so many older pokemon struggle..."

I've love to see some videos on particular items that made massive changes, like "How meta-game transforming was Eviolite actually"? (For little cup anyway) Because I recall in several little cup episodes there were a lot of pokemon that instantly dropped out of the meta because of it.

Aggron also seems to be an example of this imo. Great defense and good attack, but that doesn’t matter when that STAB earthquake obliterates it before it can hit.

The immediate mic quality shift when you said "active schadenfreude" cracked me up

Rampardos: UN-LIMITED POWERRR...ittybittylivingspace

this was an awesome watch! Thank you guys for your hard work!

Really love these kind of videos. Obviously the normal "How GOOD was ____ ACTUALLY" are top tier, but these videos are also a lot of fun to switch it up sometimes.

I love these types of videos, id hope to see more of them discussing the other side of the coin where pokemon with minimal checks and balances are the most difficult to check and are legitimate threats to the meta

Really cool video! Loved the different format and thoughtful execution.

This was a really cool video! Keep up the good work!

I will never get over why Gamefreak gave Rampardos Sheerforce and Bastiodon Sturdy. Both of these abilities are either useless overkill or in the case of Bastiodon an active gameplay contradiction.

And then Dracovish happened. The crazy thing about Dracovish is that it's almost as if GF learned from their Rampardos mistakes when making it. Dracovish actually has fantastic stats and typing for OU, being insanely naturally bulky paired with it having one of the best typings in the game. It was really funny how much it was discounted at first, and then people saw what Fishious Rend did to Toxapex in the rain. Dracovish was so unbelievably powerful that it made SEISMITOAD an OU staple and present on almost every single team.

I like the change in style! I hope to see more, also nice thumbnail, dusty did great

This was super interesting to watch, and I'd love more like this in the future. Also, good lord your writing is so good. I just wanted to mention that.

The only way to fix Rampardos is give it a mega with all the 100 stat buff going into Attack. Full send

This kind of exploratory videos about the franchise are AWESOME, thanks for the great content 👍🏻

Love the video, varying the content is sweet. Keep up the good work!

The Rampardos Theorem is an example of why I love Trick Room

Imagine being so hilariously bad that the fans name a theorem after you about what NOT to do

I feel like you can include Flareon to a lesser extent. It was tied for 2nd highest attack stat in the first gen, and even by the 4th gen its stat would have been tied as top ten. Unfortunately, not only was fire limited to being only special in the first 3 gens, but Flareon didn't even get any other good physical attacks. Even after the physical-special split, they didn't bother to allow access to flare blitz until later generations, and by then the power creep had become too much to make it worth while. But the biggest detriment would be it's very low speed. Wish they would have gave it a priority physical fire move similar to aqua jet, mach punch, shadow sneak, ice shard, or bullet punch as those moves allowed certain Pokemon to be competitive. Then they also still gave it moderately high special attack instead of going into defenses and making it more bulky, though fire isn't a good defensive typing to begin with but it would at least have some kind of identity. All of their decisions ended up making Flareon the most useless Eveelution. By the way, I feel like Luxray is Flareon's electric equivalency

Man, the writing and word choice was top notch. Well done!

You said that you are trying new things, and I will say that I thoroughly enjoyed the analysis in this video, very entertaining. Keep up the great work!

This was very fascinating, I hope this kind of video gets turned into a series. I feel like it'd be a good guide for people trying to get into competitive, or just some nice meta analysis that's more general instead of being focused on 1 single mon.

have not watched the video yet but that thumbnail absolutely ROCKS. pun definitely intended

I really enjoyed this, looking forward to seeing more theory/theorems

Been really enjoying these types of videos. As someone who was completely ignorant of the pokemon competitive scene growing up this channels always been a way of going "Huh. I never thought of that." When it comes to pokemon and move choices

Thanks for making this video - the team's been confusing for a while! Seeing Reshiram tossed in the garbage hurt a little, but the segment as a whole was quite enlightening.

At this point, I feel that Rampardos is almost like a second mascot of the channel. By the virtue of a theorem with it's namesake.

I actually really like this kind of video! there's a lot that goes into competitive and It's nice to see them be explained!

I remember a community-post back when you uploaded the Stealth Rock video and asked which move should be covered next and I believe Trick Room won. I would looove to see that video since it's one of my favorite moves in Pokémon. :) Awesome video btw, really like the fact that you're willing to experiment

Really solid video. Usually when youtubers try to do new stuff it starts off very rough. This seems nice right off the bat. Maybe because it's similar and doesn't try to change the way information is presented but change what is presented.

This was an awesome vid. While your content is always awesome due to your writing and performance, the how good series has started feeling a little samey, so branching out is awesome

I love this video format, keep the good work!

How about the Bastiodon theorem? A theory on how even if you have good defenses doesn't mean you can be a good defensive Pokémon. Bastiodon, aggron, mega Audino, avalugg jus for examples.

Could Deoxys Attack be considered part of this or is it too fast to count (since it has some of the highest attacking stats in the game but has the defenses of like Magikarp)

"Great strategy will beat sheer power every time." Zacian: "And I took that personally."

These videos are so fun! Thanks for making them!

i like tis new video type, gives a fresh air and still as informative as always

Rampardos, Regigigas, Haxorus... man, this video's like a 15-minute blooper reel of Pokémon I love getting dogpiled on by life. Still hitting that like button, though.

I'd love to see a lower tier awards show, where you pick some nominees and then a winner for best pokemon from UU,RU, etc. through all the generations. Charizard comes to mind, I'm sure there are plenty more for each tier.

Textbook example of a Glass Cannon. Hits like a Mack Truck, shatters instantly.

Man that song from pokemon colosseum rocks, keep the good music fsg :)

I think a video on the history of the weather conditions would be an interesting topic considering Tyranitar's affect on Gen 3 OU and the Weather Wars of Gen 5 maybe could even staple on the terrains from Gen 6

Holding out hope for an epic remake. How Tyrannical was Tyranitar actually? Attempt number 2.

Love these types of videos can't wait for the next one!!

Love the fresh air in theses videos 🫶🏻

This is why I love Scizor. None of its stats are super high, but it’s solid on both offense and defense, with more than plenty of tools to succeed move-wise

I’d like to see more of the type overview videos. It feels like a bit of a bummer that we got to see that kind of thing with only the ice-types

Love these style of videos!

That is really cool art on the thumbnail!

i feel like a great video could be made on the HP stat and why mons like wailord are trash while mons like blissey are consistently ou for multiple generations.