Dragon types are often incredibly powerful and are seen as pseudo-legendary Pokemon. One extremely powerful Pokemon like this is the dragon/ground type Garchomp. This Pokemon started its notoriety for power when it appeared as the ace of Cythia’s team, the champion of the Sinnoh region.
About Garchomp
| First appearance in anime | In the Diamond and Pearl Series episode ‘Top-Down Training!’ |
| First appearance in game | Diamond and Pearl |
| Region | Sinnoh |
| Evolution | Gible-->Gabite --> Garchomp |
| 1st Evo level | 24 |
| 2nd Evo level | 48 |
| Pokedex Entry | Garchomp makes its home in volcanic mountains. It flies through the sky as fast as a jet airplane, hunting down as much prey as it can. Garchomp is fast both underground and above. It can bring down prey and return to its den before its body has chilled from being outside. |
Garchomp’s Base Stats
| HP | 108 |
| Attack | 130 |
| Defense | 95 |
| Sp. Attack | 80 |
| Ap. Defense | 85 |
| Speed | 102 |
Appearance of Garchomp
Garchomp is a dark grey-blue mix of dinosaurs. Its tail resembles aquatic dinosaurs or sharks but the rest of its body is closer to that of a T-rex and its arms are like small wings of pterodactyls. Leaning more into its shark inspiration, it has a large fin on its back that sticks straight out.
Behavior of Garchomp
Garchomp is a strong and aggressive Pokemon. It's often seen being used by very skilled trainers and can be an incredibly formidable opponent. In the wild, Garchomp can dig underground and move through the earth incredibly quickly but can also fly and it uses both skills to hunt.
Strengths and Weaknesses
While dragon types tend to be strong, they have a few major weaknesses and Garchomp’s ground type added to that makes its weaknesses more potent. Though it is strong against poison, rock, and fire type moves, taking half damage from them and it is completely immune to electric type moves. Its weaknesses are few but strong. Garchomp takes double damage from dragon and fairy type moves and takes quadruple damage from ice type moves.
Shiny Garchomp
Shiny Garchomp is quite understated. Shiny Garchomp takes the colors in normal Garchomp’s palette and desaturates them. Shiny Garchomp has a completely grey color over most of it and its red accents are now orange. While Shiny Garchomp is sort of underwhelming in its design, it is still desirable to have such a powerful Pokemon in its shiny form.
Garchomp Evolutions
Mega Garchomp
In games with Mega Evolution, a Garchomp holding a Garchompite can Mega Evolve into Mega Garchomp. Mega Garchomp is very similar to its base form but Mega Garchomp has more red accents on its sharper features like its arm fins. Mega Garchomp also has more intense spike patterns along with its limbs. And, like all Mega Evolutions, Mega Garchomp has boosted stats, with an emphasis on Attack and Special Attack.
Shiny Mega Garchomp
In its Mega Evolved form, Garchomp can also be shiny. Mega Evolving a Shiny Garchomp will turn it into a Shiny Mega Garchomp. However, unlike its normal shiny form, Shiny Mega Garchomp has changed immensely. The greyscales on Shiny Mega Garchomp are replaced with a deep reddish-purple color, pairing with the now pinkish color of the red accents. This form of Shiny Mega Garchomp is far more different from its normal form when it comes to shiny changes.
Cynthia's Garchomp
Cynthia’s Garchomp is probably the most popular appearance of Garchomp. Cynthia’s Garchomp is the ace of her team and no matter if you encountered Cynthia’s Garchomp in the games or in the anime, you’ve seen its power. Cynthia’s Garchomp is frequently shown to be incredibly powerful, especially when it's the perfect counter to Ash’s Pikachu with its ground typing.
Best Movesets for Garchomp
Defensive Sweeper: Garchomp is a very tanky Pokemon and keeping such a strong team member in the match for as long as possible to keep dealing damage is what this set is all about.
| Swords Dance | Earthquake |
| Rock Tomb | Substitute |
Offensive Sweeper: Combined with a Choice Band, Garchomp can be a terrifying offensive Pokemon. This set is all about high damage moves combined with the bonus of the Choice Band doing massive damage.
| Outrage | Earthquake |
| Poison Jab | Fire Fang/Stone Edge |
How to Catch Garchomp in Pokemon Go
Garchomp is only obtainable through evolution, you have to use 100 Gible candy to evolve Gabite into Garchomp. But that requires a lot of Gible and Gible is notoriously difficult to obtain. It appears in the wild incredibly rarely and hatches only from 10 Km eggs. Though once you have enough you can evolve a member of your horde of Gables into Garchomp.
Trivia
Of all Pokemon known as pseudo-legendary, Garchomp has the highest HP stat. However, in the group, Garchomp also has the lowest special attack stat.
A prototype sprite for Garchomp can be seen in an early trailer for Pokemon Platinum.
FAQs
Q. Can Garchomp fly?
While Garchomp cannot learn the move Fly, its Pokedex entries say that it can fly at incredible speeds.
Q. Why was Garchomp banned?
Garchomp was competitively banned for a time due to it being too unpredictable as well as its ability, Sand Veil increasing that randomness.
Q. Who is better Garchomp or Tyranitar?
In a 1v1, Garchomp would have the advantage over Tyranitar due to its ground type being super effective against Tyranitar’s rock typing.
Conclusion
In any Pokemon game, Garchomp is a force to be reckoned with. It also, however, can be difficult to obtain. But after putting in the work, this Pokemon can be an absolute powerhouse and will shoot your team from good to amazing.
