Why does Shedinja....?

Question

.....Have defensive stats? It just doesn't make any sense if he faints in one hit.

Answer 1

Well, I believe I can give some feedback to this.

• GameFreak can be trolls sometimes. Smogon has this perfectly stated in this statement: "Alongside the likes of Flareon, Limber Stunfisk, and Final Gambit Shedinja, Rotom-S is often described as one of Game Freak's attempts to troll competitive battlers."
• If Shedinja had little to no defense, that, in a sense, would be quite overpowered. If Guard Swap was still still used, Shedinja would be a perfect switchin to it, rendering the opponent with much lower defense than before. Shedinja can learn Mimic, so it can use it on a opponent.
• Shedinja needs a Defense stat in order to use Power Trick via Mimic.
• If Shedinja gets a Substitute via Baton Pass, its Def & SDef will be calculated to the damage calculation formula.
• If a Pokemon Transforms into Shedinja, it will have more than 1 HP. Meaning Defensive stats will be used, in that case.

Comments

Don't forget Baton Pass Substitute.

Answer 2

Because of the ability download. It raises special attack if the opponent has higher defense and vice-versa for attack. That is basically the only reason. Also, someone could hack shedinja to have a lot of HP :P.

Also, remember that a Pokemon is a Pokemon. They all have different characteristics, meaning they have stats. Shedinja gets its stats the same way any other Pokemon does. It is there characteristics.

Comments

Shedinja was in Generation III. Download was only introduced in Gen IV. So Download is obviously not the reason -.-