TheManyFacesOfGlalie
11-07-2013, 08:01 PM
Introduction to Breeding - Gen 6
Gen 6 brings a few new tricks to the world of breeding,. Let's start by saying what we already know - Pokemon breed within Egg Groups, meaning that a Pokemon can breeding with any Pokemon of the opposite gender, so long as they are in the same Egg Group. Genderless Pokemon, however, can only breed with Ditto.
Egg Moves are moves passed on by the parents, and in gen 6, the mother can pass down Egg Moves (whereas only the father could in gen 5). The get an Egg Move, you need a father with the move and a female of the species you intend to pass it onto. Since females can also pass down Egg Moves, it is possible to get Egg Moves from different Pokemon by following this process:
Breed father with Egg Move with the mother
Once you hatch a female with the move, breed that female with the next father
Repeat this until you get all the Egg Moves you want
Lastly, I have some more Breeding basics and terms you should know. Power Items, if held by a parent, can be used to pass down the parent's corresponding IV. So, if a parent holds the Power Weight (which corresponds to HP), the child will have the same HP IV as that parent. The Destiny Knot, on the other hand, will pass down 5 random IVs from the parents, 3 from the holder and 2 from the other (pattern may just be a coincidence for me though). These items are the epitome of general IV breeding. For specific natures, however, you want to make sure you know the effects of the Everstone. It will pass down the Nature of the holder to the child, so if a Pokemon is Brave and holds the Everstone, the child will also be Brave.
A term you may not know is Egg Steps. That simply refers to the amount of steps it takes to hatch an Egg, and keep in mind that this varies by Pokemon. Zubat, for example, is a pretty quick hatch compared to Eevee. Speaking of this, Eggs and breeding are not at all based on time. RNG would say otherwise, but as far as we're concerned, steps are the big factor here, not time.
Hidden Abilities were introduced in Gen 5, and breeding them is almost as tedious as finding them. First of all, only a female can pass down a Hidden Ability. Apparently, a father can as well, but it has only ever worked with me when using females. There is also no guarantee that an HA will be passed down, so this takes longer than normal breeding. My Infiltrator Zubat took forever to breed because if I got good IVs, the Hidden Ability wasn't passed down most of the time, so keep that in mind.
Lastly, Serebii has information regarding what Egg Groups Pokemon are in, the Egg Steps for each Pokemon, and possible Egg Moves (with the possible fathers). For information regarding any of that, you may refer to Serebii.
Advice Going In
My biggest piece of advice is not to set your standards too high, because then you become disappointed when you can't get there right away. I recommend you set your goals low, and gradually increase them. You won't get a 6x31 Pokemon right away, but a good goal would be 3x31 - 4x31 - 5x31 - then 6x31, gradually increasing your goals. That way, you are also satisfied in some way no matter what.
Tricks and Tips
When catching Pokemon, which is also a part of breeding, you can control that Pokemon's nature. How? Well, a Pokemon with Synchronize will only encounter wild Pokemon of the same Nature. Hordes will only have one of that Nature. This allows you to Everstone your father and hack time off of your breeding, because you'll already have the nature you want. This, however, also restricts you to an absolute maximum of 5 IVs (unless you breed hundreds of Eggs).
Another tip is for hatching. Flame Body Pokemon being in your party will cut down the number of steps needed to hatch an Egg, so using Pokemon with that Ability in your party is extremely useful, especially for Pokemon that have many Egg Steps, like Eevee, which can be a pain to breed.
If you are using Egg Moves, keep in mind that if a Pokemon in the Day-Care levels up too much it could lose those Egg Moves and be unable to breed them again if you take it out, so you want to level the Pokemon up a lot before leaving it in the Day-Care. Doing this also cuts down on the fees.
Beginning
Before you begin, you need a few father Pokemon to breed with (duh). The FS offers many Egg Groups for you to catch from, so catch away! You want to catch a few fathers, so that you have many different IVs. Even more obviously, you need the viable mother to breed. If the mother can be caught in the FS, great! That will cut down your time dramatically. Of course, before getting into the IV portion of breeding, make sure you have a female with all the Egg Moves you want if you want them from different fathers, because doing this later will take longer. Make sure that if both parents are from FS, that their IVs are different. You don't want to double-up on an IV because this will cut down your productivity.
The Actual Breeding
If both parents are from the Friend Safari, give one of them the Destiny Knot and give the other a Power Item. If the mother doesn't have good IVs, you can either pass down its nature, if it is one you'd like, or you can put it in with nothing. You'll likely need a few Eggs before this happens, but getting 4x31 IVs shouldn't take very long, depending on the Egg Steps of what you're hatching. It could take a little bit if you aren't using a Power Item, but if you are you'll be out quickly. Something important is to check the IVs of each Pokemon you hatch with the IV checker, who is in the Pokemon Center of Kiloude City. He'll tell if the stats "can't be beat", meaning perfect. He'll also tell you if they suck, by saying things like "it won't put a dent in anything with that Attack". Keep little things like that in mind, because if it has a terrible IV you don't want to breed it anymore (unless you plan on a Foul Play Klefki with 0 Attack, or something of the sort).
Once you get your four IVs, you'll want to learn a little trick I call Cousin Breeding. Basically, take that four IV Pokemon and check which ones it has perfect, and mark them. With the same mother, breed with a father of different IVs, preferably the ones that the 4x31 Pokemon didn't have. Allow me to break this down with an example:
The mother has perfect Def ans SpD, and the father has perfect HP and Spe. The male child you just got has perfect HP, Def, SpD, and Spe.
The same mother still has perfect Def and SpD, and the new father has perfect Atk and SpA. The child they produce has perfect Atk,Def, SpA, and SpD, and is female.
In that example, you want the two children to breed now, thus, Cousin Breeding. (Technically, step-sibling, but whatever). In this situation, The child they produce, if you use a Power Item and a Destiny Knot, will always have perfect Def and SpD, because that IV is perfect on both of them. The Power Item here needs to go to anything other than those stats now.
Clearly, you want the Pokemon to be useful, and that's why a nature is also something that should be passed down. You can't get 6 IVs with an Everstone, but the chances of getting 6 IVs either way isn't perfect. 5 is also a good stopping point anyways - 6 will almost always be unnecessary, since Pokemon usually focus on one attacking style (special or physical). So, at this point, you could go the route of having a definite Nature and less definite IVs, or you could go for the better chance at higher IVs and test your luck with the nature. Either way, you'll eventually end up with something that should meet a goal.
A tip for breeding for natures is to get the natures on 3-4x31 IV Pokemon from the first step, so that you have a good chance at getting the nature and IVs, even without a Power Item. This is also the easiest stage to get good natures and IVs on (unless, you SynchHunt for a certain Nature prior to breeding, in which case you'd have a different story). To get a nature from an IVless parent that you SynchHunted, you can just go through the process, excluding Power Items and instead using an Everstone to pass down the nature. Once you get to 4 IVs, it is still a good parent to go with a Pokemon that will hold the Destiny Knot and yield different IVs.
Concluding Emphasis
So, to conclude this wordy tutorial, I hope I got you to wrap your head around the concept of breeding! If you can visualize it, the concept becomes a whole lot clearer, which is why I might make a video in the future showing my visualization process in breeding. For now, try to visualize it all on your own and get it down.
I'd like to repeat that 6 IVs and a perfect nature and Egg Moves is only in the most ideal scenarios with a lot of time involved, so for beginning breeders, you want to keep your standards low. If you keep them low, you feel even more accomplished when you exceed them!
Gen 6 brings a few new tricks to the world of breeding,. Let's start by saying what we already know - Pokemon breed within Egg Groups, meaning that a Pokemon can breeding with any Pokemon of the opposite gender, so long as they are in the same Egg Group. Genderless Pokemon, however, can only breed with Ditto.
Egg Moves are moves passed on by the parents, and in gen 6, the mother can pass down Egg Moves (whereas only the father could in gen 5). The get an Egg Move, you need a father with the move and a female of the species you intend to pass it onto. Since females can also pass down Egg Moves, it is possible to get Egg Moves from different Pokemon by following this process:
Breed father with Egg Move with the mother
Once you hatch a female with the move, breed that female with the next father
Repeat this until you get all the Egg Moves you want
Lastly, I have some more Breeding basics and terms you should know. Power Items, if held by a parent, can be used to pass down the parent's corresponding IV. So, if a parent holds the Power Weight (which corresponds to HP), the child will have the same HP IV as that parent. The Destiny Knot, on the other hand, will pass down 5 random IVs from the parents, 3 from the holder and 2 from the other (pattern may just be a coincidence for me though). These items are the epitome of general IV breeding. For specific natures, however, you want to make sure you know the effects of the Everstone. It will pass down the Nature of the holder to the child, so if a Pokemon is Brave and holds the Everstone, the child will also be Brave.
A term you may not know is Egg Steps. That simply refers to the amount of steps it takes to hatch an Egg, and keep in mind that this varies by Pokemon. Zubat, for example, is a pretty quick hatch compared to Eevee. Speaking of this, Eggs and breeding are not at all based on time. RNG would say otherwise, but as far as we're concerned, steps are the big factor here, not time.
Hidden Abilities were introduced in Gen 5, and breeding them is almost as tedious as finding them. First of all, only a female can pass down a Hidden Ability. Apparently, a father can as well, but it has only ever worked with me when using females. There is also no guarantee that an HA will be passed down, so this takes longer than normal breeding. My Infiltrator Zubat took forever to breed because if I got good IVs, the Hidden Ability wasn't passed down most of the time, so keep that in mind.
Lastly, Serebii has information regarding what Egg Groups Pokemon are in, the Egg Steps for each Pokemon, and possible Egg Moves (with the possible fathers). For information regarding any of that, you may refer to Serebii.
Advice Going In
My biggest piece of advice is not to set your standards too high, because then you become disappointed when you can't get there right away. I recommend you set your goals low, and gradually increase them. You won't get a 6x31 Pokemon right away, but a good goal would be 3x31 - 4x31 - 5x31 - then 6x31, gradually increasing your goals. That way, you are also satisfied in some way no matter what.
Tricks and Tips
When catching Pokemon, which is also a part of breeding, you can control that Pokemon's nature. How? Well, a Pokemon with Synchronize will only encounter wild Pokemon of the same Nature. Hordes will only have one of that Nature. This allows you to Everstone your father and hack time off of your breeding, because you'll already have the nature you want. This, however, also restricts you to an absolute maximum of 5 IVs (unless you breed hundreds of Eggs).
Another tip is for hatching. Flame Body Pokemon being in your party will cut down the number of steps needed to hatch an Egg, so using Pokemon with that Ability in your party is extremely useful, especially for Pokemon that have many Egg Steps, like Eevee, which can be a pain to breed.
If you are using Egg Moves, keep in mind that if a Pokemon in the Day-Care levels up too much it could lose those Egg Moves and be unable to breed them again if you take it out, so you want to level the Pokemon up a lot before leaving it in the Day-Care. Doing this also cuts down on the fees.
Beginning
Before you begin, you need a few father Pokemon to breed with (duh). The FS offers many Egg Groups for you to catch from, so catch away! You want to catch a few fathers, so that you have many different IVs. Even more obviously, you need the viable mother to breed. If the mother can be caught in the FS, great! That will cut down your time dramatically. Of course, before getting into the IV portion of breeding, make sure you have a female with all the Egg Moves you want if you want them from different fathers, because doing this later will take longer. Make sure that if both parents are from FS, that their IVs are different. You don't want to double-up on an IV because this will cut down your productivity.
The Actual Breeding
If both parents are from the Friend Safari, give one of them the Destiny Knot and give the other a Power Item. If the mother doesn't have good IVs, you can either pass down its nature, if it is one you'd like, or you can put it in with nothing. You'll likely need a few Eggs before this happens, but getting 4x31 IVs shouldn't take very long, depending on the Egg Steps of what you're hatching. It could take a little bit if you aren't using a Power Item, but if you are you'll be out quickly. Something important is to check the IVs of each Pokemon you hatch with the IV checker, who is in the Pokemon Center of Kiloude City. He'll tell if the stats "can't be beat", meaning perfect. He'll also tell you if they suck, by saying things like "it won't put a dent in anything with that Attack". Keep little things like that in mind, because if it has a terrible IV you don't want to breed it anymore (unless you plan on a Foul Play Klefki with 0 Attack, or something of the sort).
Once you get your four IVs, you'll want to learn a little trick I call Cousin Breeding. Basically, take that four IV Pokemon and check which ones it has perfect, and mark them. With the same mother, breed with a father of different IVs, preferably the ones that the 4x31 Pokemon didn't have. Allow me to break this down with an example:
The mother has perfect Def ans SpD, and the father has perfect HP and Spe. The male child you just got has perfect HP, Def, SpD, and Spe.
The same mother still has perfect Def and SpD, and the new father has perfect Atk and SpA. The child they produce has perfect Atk,Def, SpA, and SpD, and is female.
In that example, you want the two children to breed now, thus, Cousin Breeding. (Technically, step-sibling, but whatever). In this situation, The child they produce, if you use a Power Item and a Destiny Knot, will always have perfect Def and SpD, because that IV is perfect on both of them. The Power Item here needs to go to anything other than those stats now.
Clearly, you want the Pokemon to be useful, and that's why a nature is also something that should be passed down. You can't get 6 IVs with an Everstone, but the chances of getting 6 IVs either way isn't perfect. 5 is also a good stopping point anyways - 6 will almost always be unnecessary, since Pokemon usually focus on one attacking style (special or physical). So, at this point, you could go the route of having a definite Nature and less definite IVs, or you could go for the better chance at higher IVs and test your luck with the nature. Either way, you'll eventually end up with something that should meet a goal.
A tip for breeding for natures is to get the natures on 3-4x31 IV Pokemon from the first step, so that you have a good chance at getting the nature and IVs, even without a Power Item. This is also the easiest stage to get good natures and IVs on (unless, you SynchHunt for a certain Nature prior to breeding, in which case you'd have a different story). To get a nature from an IVless parent that you SynchHunted, you can just go through the process, excluding Power Items and instead using an Everstone to pass down the nature. Once you get to 4 IVs, it is still a good parent to go with a Pokemon that will hold the Destiny Knot and yield different IVs.
Concluding Emphasis
So, to conclude this wordy tutorial, I hope I got you to wrap your head around the concept of breeding! If you can visualize it, the concept becomes a whole lot clearer, which is why I might make a video in the future showing my visualization process in breeding. For now, try to visualize it all on your own and get it down.
I'd like to repeat that 6 IVs and a perfect nature and Egg Moves is only in the most ideal scenarios with a lot of time involved, so for beginning breeders, you want to keep your standards low. If you keep them low, you feel even more accomplished when you exceed them!