What move for Absol?

Question

I'm playing Emerald, and I have an absol with strength, bite, aerial ace, and swords dance. So I just got the TM for Shadow Ball, and since it's phys in this game, while dark is spec, I am wondering which to use: Bite, with STAB, but lower special stat, or Shadow ball with no STAB but higher power, and higher attack stat. I'm leaning toward shadow ball, but I want confirmation. (It has quiet nature) +spa. tk -speed

Answer 1

I used this Damage Calculator to figure this out. I calced the damage against a Vaporeon because that was the first Pokemon that came to mind that was neutral to both Ghost and Dark. I made sure to make Vaporeon's Special Defense and Defense equal so that would not influence the damage.

0 Atk Absol Shadow Ball vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Vaporeon: 109-129 (27.1 - 32.1%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
0+ SpA Absol Bite vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Vaporeon: 84-100 (20.9 - 24.9%) -- guaranteed 5HKO

As you can see, even with a Quiet Nature Shadow Ball does way more damage. Use it over Bite.

Comments

If he does, then he can't use the TM for shadow ball for another Pokemon. I'd recommend that you stop using the Absol completely and use Sableye, which learns shadow ball by level up.

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Sableye is much weaker than Absol though.

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Thanks so much!

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Also, I'm only using Blaziken, Breloom, and Absol on this Emerald run. I don't think any of the other two learn it.

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lol, i beat the game

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You're welcome :)