Why do some status moves say they have no effect in Gen I?

Question

I'm playing Red right now, and in Gen 1 I've noticed that sometimes when you use a stat move or something like that it sometimes says "It didn't affect the foe's (Pokemon name)" or something like that. Why is that?

Comments

I'm looking on this.

Answer 1

The "no effect" message triggers when the AI hits a 25% chance to miss a stat-lowering status move like Growl or Tail Whip. This only occurs in Generations I and II.

In the Generation I and II core series games, when an in-game opponent outside of the Battle Tower uses a status move that would decrease one of the target's stats, that move has a 25% chance to fail in addition to its normal chance to miss.

Status move (Bulbapedia)

Answer 2

The only reason I could see why this would happen is the following:

• Your using status moves that match the opponents type
  (Will-o-wisp on a Fire Type or Sleep Powder on a grass type)
• The opponents ability prevents status
• Its a early game Glitch, remember Gamefreak are just getting into the swing of programming.

EDIT: Speed Freak had the same problem here and some answered saying it may of been a glitch.

If its none of these then i'm not sure :/

Comments

well, like sometimes they would use Growl or Leer or sand-attack on my ivysaur  or pikachu and it would say "But it failed" or something like that