1 Billion Lions vs 1 of Every Pokemon

Chou Toshio

Chou Toshio

Over9000
is an Artist Alumnusis a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnusis a Top Smogon Media Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
(Mods feel free to move to Orange Island if better but this seemed more Cong to me)
The internet meme, but someone made this brilliant video simulating it out:


Now I think this is a framing I think everyone can appreciate here at Smogon because he framed it as every Pokemon taking on lions in endless singles battles for as long as possible with each Lion treated as a Normal type with Litleo’s stats, offensive stats swapped, with the move set Slash, Crunch, Bite, Noble Roar and ability Strong Jaw.

TLDR the simulation did not go well, with the Pokemon not even getting over 100k kills let alone a billion, and PP being a massive issue.

So I thought this would be a hilarious Smogon exercise to take on here.

Thoughts? Sets?

The video creator mentioned Harvest Tropius was actually able to break the simulator by never losing in the bounds of the simulation but I think we can do better. With PP being the biggest limiter for the 1000 Pokemon and PP also being potentially what hands the win to an individual Pokemon that could stall infinitely against a Billion Lions. I think we can do better though!


IMG_2077.png

Bold
252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
@ Leppa Berry
Tera: Steel
-Recycle
-Slack Off
-Iron Defense
-Stored Power / Drain Punch / Double Team (Old Gen exclusive move)

Funbro, but remodeled for his ultimate mission to avenge the honor of all Pokemon by going the distance against 1 Billion Litleo lions.

Leppa, Recycle, Slack Off straight from Funbro.
Tera Steel off the bat to shed Dark Weakness and resist Slash. Iron Defense to tank and overcome Crunch defense drops. Last move is unneeded but might as well start mowing down enemies with Stored Power.

Thoughts all? Better sets? I’m sure folks here would find better ideas. Also any dumb theory Mon stuff welcome—

what would happen with team Strats available (Harvest Eggy on Koraidon’s back running around and refueling the army with infinite Leppa Berries)

Are Pokemon too dumb to execute optimal strategy without trainers, especially Slowbro?

Lions mobbing instead of singles; do they actually do Dark type Bite damage?

Best build for max kill count for non-Leppa offensive build? (YouTuber’s best build was Moxie Quaquavel at 147, Eviolite Drain Punch Scrafty got to 30 beating out Mewtwo by far in the simulator)

Whatever— this is a safe space for radical ideas.
 
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if this is gen 1, this is ezpz if the lions know a paralyzing move (or you can enter battle pre-paralyzed): you can fish for PAR with something that knows dig/fly to make yourself invulnerable using the fly/dig glitch, then click rage, which has unlimited PP. only thing is that if mufasa is among those 1 billion lions then this won't work
 
For this to work you'd require infinite PP, meaning only Harvest and Recycle are eligible here. Harvest requires the user to know Skill Swap and would require a Block + Skill Swap Exeggutor-Alola with Covert Cloak (for Bite flinch) in addition to a Mist + Eject Button user to block Noble Roar drops. Additionally, if the Litleo can switch, then you'd need Timid Gothitelle with Tera Fighting Tera Blast and Webs + Rocks + 3 Spikes, which will KO any Litleo spread and has sufficient bulk to live Crunch crit (on switch-in) + Slash Crit (on Skill Swap). Assuming they don't switch, then anything with Skill Swap that can OHKO a ~62% Litleo (Rocks + 3 Spikes) works.

Recycle won't work without an ability to block stat drops (or a Pokemon that knows Mist + Recycle), and neither of these combinations exist, let alone with a move like Drain Punch (and Smeargle doesn't do nearly enough damage, even accounting for hazards).

As for completely solo setups, you'd basically need Imprison; even something like Funbro is, with multiple billion potential Bites, going to lose to crit flinches.

e: the above will probably run out of Leppas at some point, as Harvest can hit a 1/1024 and not give you Leppas 10 turns in a row. You can Protect stall to improve these odds, but not much else can be done with that set. You could alternatively run Tera Fight + Calm Mind + Psychic + Tera Blast Goth with 40 HP / 252 Def / 164 SpA / 52 Spe and Sitrus Berry, which allows Goth to switch in, Skill Swap, and Calm Mind while guaranteed to live, and it then has 32 PP to sweep and hopefully not run out.
 
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I remember thinking through the endless single battle against infinite copies of Red's HGSS pikachu (based off this comic), it feels significantly more threatening than the lions both from having infinitely many more opponents and also threats from priority and Static. Rather than attempting to prevent struggle, I chose to instead outheal it with Poison Heal and Shell Bell, though it took other members of the 6-mon standard team to get everything set up.

There's probably a chain of Skill Swap/Wandering Spirit abuse that ends with the current lion having wonder guard, which would then allow a trace mon with the right coverage (or a passive damage source) to copy it. Both Porygon2 and Gardevoir have trace without a dark weakness and access to recycle.

Edit: another approach occurred to me: sit around until the lions struggle. Regenerator and an item heal 38.5% per turn, so in a single battle format you could just infinitely swap between two sufficiently bulky regenerator mons and let recoil (or Toxic Spikes) take care of the rest. If EV'd for the job, most regen mons without a Dark weakness can hit that threshold.
 
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let's talk more abot struggle strats.
General premise:
  • Use struggle to kill things, and find a way to heal the recoil without spending PP.
  • Passing stats is a good idea.

Breakdown by generation:
  • Gen 1 (Struggle recoil = 50% of damage dealt)
    • Not viable as there's no way to heal off the recoil without spending PP. Plus, you get gg rekt by Mufasa again.
  • Gen 2 (Struggle recoil = 25% of damage dealt)
    • You now have access to Leftovers. So if you have > 4x the average HP of a lion, you can beat unlimited lions if you can go first and OHKO. But if they're all level 100 then it probably won't work.
      • Spikes makes this slightly easier, bringing the HP constraint down to 3.5x
  • Gen 3 (Struggle recoil = 25% of damage dealt)
    • Plenty of new toys to play with here. You now have access to Shell Bell, Ingrain and Rain Dish. Shell Bell beats Leftovers if the average HP of a lion has more than 50% of your HP. Ingrain can be Baton Passed, and Kyogre can set up rain. So you would have a suicide Kyogre lead, then add Ingrain to your BP chain (which conveniently handles Roar from enemy lions), and pass to Ludicolo. This gives you 12.5% healing per turn. Putting these two together:
    • With Leftovers, you get 18.75% healing. If you have 133% of the average HP of a lion and you can OHKO first, you kill unlimited lions
    • With Shell Bell, this is 12.5% passive healing per turn, with 12.5% recoil. This is objectively better as it means you just need to have the same average HP as a lion to sustain infinite struggle kills.
      • With three layers of Spikes, this reduces the HP requirement down to 75%.
  • Gen 4+ (Struggle recoil = 25% of HP)
    • The most straightforward approach here is to pass Aqua Ring + Ingrain to a Poison Heal user with Toxic Orb, giving you 25% healing per turn. Honorable mention to Dry Skin + Rain instead of Poison Heal if before Gen 6. In practice, this means that a Breloom is your best shot here, which also has sky-high attack so it maximises the chances of an OHKO
The main flaw in this approach is that it assumes you can OHKO a lion with struggle, which is very stat- and level-dependent. But to shorten the odds you can introduce entry hazards to make them easier to KO (and also reducing the recoil received in earlier gens)
 
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Doesn't Klefki solo with Recycle, Rest, Iron Defense, Foul Play while holding a Leppa Berry?

Assuming worst case scenario that every Litleo lion manages to land a critical hit, the damage is still extremely poor.
85 Atk Litleo Slash vs. 85 HP / 85 Def Klefki on a critical hit: 48-57 (17.3 - 20.6%) -- possible 7HKO
85 Atk Strong Jaw Litleo Crunch vs. 85 HP / 85 Def Klefki on a critical hit: 55-65 (19.9 - 23.5%) -- possible 6HKO

Meanwhile, Klefki can just use Foul Play.
85 Atk Klefki Foul Play vs. 85 HP / 85 Def Litleo: 80-95 (27.9 - 33.2%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
 
gali said:
Muk-Alola @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Poison Touch
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Imprison
- Bite
- Crunch
- Recycle

This should solo all 1 billion lions, but it will take a while.
Click to expand...
TIL all 1 billion lions only learn 2 attacks, bite and crunch. No slash, no elemental fangs, nada. I see you have a tera type ghost and the OP specified all lions sets, but that's not very practical lol. what happened to genetic diversity?! Moreover, in what world is Muk, a literal pile of ooze, moving before all 1 billion lions in order to get its imprison off?!

even taking this premise as is (which is dumb, the lions won't be homogenous), at least do this with jolly smeargle which has base speed 75 and can guaranteed outrun any non-choice scarf lions. it'll be slower with lower attack and no poison touch but who cares with leppa berry.
 
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Bughouse said:
TIL all 1 billion lions only learn 2 attacks, bite and crunch. No slash, no elemental fangs, nada. I see you have a tera type ghost and the OP specified all lions sets, but that's not very practical lol. what happened to genetic diversity?! Moreover, in what world is Muk, a literal pile of ooze, moving before all 1 billion lions in order to get its imprison off?!

even taking this premise as is (which is dumb, the lions won't be homogenous), at least do this with jolly smeargle which has base speed 75 and can guaranteed outrun any non-choice scarf lions. it'll be slower with lower attack and no poison touch but who cares with leppa berry.
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counterpoint: muk just needs to survive one hit, which is more likely than it is for smeargle. Remember: some lions are evil so they get stab on crunch/bite/night slash, so stab + crit could be a problem. You could also get unlucky and face a jolly lion as your first one which might outrun smeargle anyway
 
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cookie said:
counterpoint: muk just needs to survive one hit, which is more likely than it is for smeargle. Remember: some lions are evil so they get stab on crunch/bite/night slash, so stab + crit could be a problem. You could also get unlucky and face a jolly lion as your first one which might outrun smeargle anyway
Click to expand...
Um, no?
jolly smeargle base 75 would ouspeed every jolly lion base speed 72. Fully guaranteed to tera and imprison turn 1 every time.

Muk would be outsped by many of them. And depending on the premise of this stupid situation, it doesn't have to tera and imprison only once, I would think it's more likely that it's a new battle every time with no healing in between, rather than one single battle vs 1 billion sequential lions.
 
Faux Focalors Furina said:
:blobthinking:I assume Shedinja + tera electric + air balloon should do the trick but will it really solo against a billion lions? Will the lions somehow summon a sandstorm and just insta-kill shedinja?
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Shedinja lacks the ability to sustain its PP, especially if it's using a non-Leppa item. Eventually struggle recoil will happen and get through Wonder Guard.

It's a pretty decent wincon in a massive brawl that wins with field-wide damage, but not in a single battle chain.
 
Bughouse said:
TIL all 1 billion lions only learn 2 attacks, bite and crunch. No slash, no elemental fangs, nada. I see you have a tera type ghost and the OP specified all lions sets, but that's not very practical lol. what happened to genetic diversity?! Moreover, in what world is Muk, a literal pile of ooze, moving before all 1 billion lions in order to get its imprison off?!

even taking this premise as is (which is dumb, the lions won't be homogenous), at least do this with jolly smeargle which has base speed 75 and can guaranteed outrun any non-choice scarf lions. it'll be slower with lower attack and no poison touch but who cares with leppa berry.
Click to expand...

Premise came from the YT video.

I think you actually go 252Hp/252Def Impish and in the simulator the first lion has to click Bite and it has to get 7 flinches in a row to stop the sweep.

If not simulator but in a real mass brawl, then the answer is clear— all 1000 other Pokemon (Groupon, Kyogre, Xavian, Ultra Nekrozma, Arceus, every Mega Pokemon, etc.) have to do is just HOLD THE LINE around Muk/Smeargle/Slowbro/Klefki for 1-2 turns while they set up.

4 Small Pokemon is not a wide defensive circle to defend when you have 1000 defending Pokemon and moves like Reflect.
 
Chou Toshio said:
Premise came from the YT video.

I think you actually go 252Hp/252Def Impish and in the simulator the first lion has to click Bite and it has to get 7 flinches in a row to stop the sweep.

If not simulator but in a real mass brawl, then the answer is clear— all 1000 other Pokemon (Groupon, Kyogre, Xavian, Ultra Nekrozma, Arceus, every Mega Pokemon, etc.) have to do is just HOLD THE LINE around Muk/Smeargle/Slowbro/Klefki for 1-2 turns while they set up.

4 Small Pokemon is not a wide defensive circle to defend when you have 1000 defending Pokemon and moves like Reflect.
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Turn 1 of the brawl is actually extremely free since the lions don't have any setup or Protect-bypass moves so everything they can do is blocked by one of Mat Block or Crafty Shield, both of which cover the entire team. If there needs to be a second turn to rack up passive damage or Perish Song count before the action starts, everything can just Protect turn 2 and the only losses will be the very few mons that can't learn it.
 
RainWaiv said:
The point of this hypothetical is to use the pokemon engine. If we used actual logic, it would be too easy for the lions.
Click to expand...
I remember seeing a meme years ago, something to the effect of "if you asked whether to fight one horse-sized duck or 100 duck-sized horses, a DM will lecture you about the action economy." I remember thinking as to what I had learned as a DM and wargamer. My conclusions?
  1. Do not underestimate the advantage of flight
  2. Do not underestimate the advantage of AoE damage
Under actual logic, there are too many mons that can comfortably live in locations the lions can never reach. No PP concerns here, just a measured retreat to rest and reload. Heck, there's a decent chance the legendaries don't even need to do anything but taunt out of reach, starvation and disease would inflict massive casualties on the lions just as a result of gathering all of them into one spot.
 
Ironmage said:
I remember seeing a meme years ago, something to the effect of "if you asked whether to fight one horse-sized duck or 100 duck-sized horses, a DM will lecture you about the action economy." I remember thinking as to what I had learned as a DM and wargamer. My conclusions?
  1. Do not underestimate the advantage of flight
  2. Do not underestimate the advantage of AoE damage
Under actual logic, there are too many mons that can comfortably live in locations the lions can never reach. No PP concerns here, just a measured retreat to rest and reload. Heck, there's a decent chance the legendaries don't even need to do anything but taunt out of reach, starvation and disease would inflict massive casualties on the lions just as a result of gathering all of them into one spot.
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If I'm being completely honest you're gonna keep using actual facts and logic and i'll keep making shit up like a "lion ladder" or something so maybe we should stick to the game engine (y'know, the actual point of this thread?)
 
If I'm being completely honest you're gonna keep using actual facts and logic and i'll keep making shit up like a "lion ladder" or something so maybe we should stick to the game engine (y'know, the actual point of this thread?)
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Well ig to stick to the pokemon engine mixed with reality, I think in there will be atleast 1 leader in a pride which a pride makes up to 2-40 lions and we have a billion lions so if we do the calcs there will an estimate of 1 billion divided by 40 there will be an estimate of atleast 25 million prides within a billion lions so then at best there will be 1/25,000,000 leaders out of the pride at best and which I assume the leader lions will evolve with having Supreme overlord as they're the one taking over the whole pride and if all a billion lions somehow made a union or truce to defeat the 1000+ pokemon they're fighting against then the leaders will become huge powerhouses if only just a 100 of them are gone. So maybe the lions DO have a chance against the pokemon if I did some theorymonning.


You can say whether my calcs are wrong but make sure to use the nerd face emoji to correct me so I won't feel bad ok bye.
 
RainWaiv said:
If I'm being completely honest you're gonna keep using actual facts and logic and i'll keep making shit up like a "lion ladder" or something so maybe we should stick to the game engine (y'know, the actual point of this thread?)
Click to expand...
Jumping in to say that you brought up using facts and logic first to try and claim a victory.
RainWaiv said:
The point of this hypothetical is to use the pokemon engine. If we used actual logic, it would be too easy for the lions.
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Right there. So you don't really have room to complain about adding logic to the dispute; you opened that can of worms.

Without the logic that many Pokémon are simply the end of reality (or at least very large regions) if left unchecked, then:
ON TOPIC: Pokémon have tricks including Recovery move + Recycle/Harvest + Leppa Berry + two attacks (I like Porygon2 for this), that Recycle + Imprison Muk, those Regenerator shenanigans, and cookie's hypothetical Breloom.

Summary: All it takes is a single infinite sustain build that can't be haxxed with -defense or flinch (or only needs to win once before it's invulnerable) and Pokémon easily win.
 
i mean i hate to be that guy but Mew & Mewtwo are winning and I think someone like Muk or Weezing are running em off cus of the poison lol.

just for amusement I see Mr. Mime vs 1000 Lions almost like a Celebrity Deathmatch moment lol.
 
I am not convinced that PP stalling will work. According to the Pokemon damage formula, even the weakest attack will do at least 1 HP of damage to a Pokemon (that isn't immune). Slowbro has a max HP of 394. 394 lions attacking Slowbro all at once will defeat it. 394 lions is 0.0000394% of the lion army.

Let's just assume that Slowbro has Blissey level HP, at 714 HP. And there are 1025 of them (the total number of Pokemon species). 714*1025 is 731,850. So 731,850 lions attacking their respective Pokemon at once could wipe the Pokemon, assuming they only do 1 HP of damage each. That is just 0.00073185% of the lion army.

This is all assuming the lions can coordinate somewhat and we are basing things on the damage formula, but it can maybe give an idea on a different style of battle.
 
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