IvsEvs

Individual and Effort Values

Ivs and Evs are known as Game Mechanics. Game Mechanics are the inner workings of the game. Unlike the numbers of your level and your stats, Ivs and Evs are hidden values, determined on the inside but do not show on the screen of your gba.

Ivs stand for Individual Values. I've also seen them called Dynamic Values, Diversification Values, and Difference Values. Just to get the record straight though, they're all the exact same thing. Oh, and I hate to say it, but Serebii.net's dynamic values don't really exist to any real degree. Also Ivs are one of two hidden statistical values in the Pokemon games. They were known as game mechanics up to GSC but were overhauled for R/S.

Now. Enough with the historical stuff, let's go.

Ivs are essentially the genes of your pokemon. They're set up when you get the pokemon and unlike Evs cannot be altered. Ivs, as genes, represent a value from 0-31 in each stat category of your pokemon. Got that? So... Suppose you've got a Dragonite.

Dragonite -

Hp: 0 - 31
Attack: 0 - 31
Defense: 0 - 31
Special Attack: 0 - 31
Special Defense: 0 - 31
Speed: 0 - 31
Dragonite's Ivs, when you caught it as a Dratini, were determined when you caught it. So they could end up something like this:

Dragonite -

Hp: 15
Attack: 24
Defense: 14
Special Attack: 21
Special Defense: 6
Speed: 11
Now. As you can see, the Ivs of Dragonite are different for each stat category. Now, of course, they could be the same. But for the purposes of in the game, they're almost always different, at least in wild pokemon. Ivs, in general, being from 0-31 make the pokemon stronger. They're the reason why two different Dragonite's will have completley different stats. Also, obviously, you want a higher numbered Iv for your pokemon's stats. 31 is the best.

Also, while Ivs cannot be altered once gotten, before getting your pokemon you can do certain stuff to increase the chances your pokemon will come out with better Ivs. I'll just do a little thing about how Ivs are obtained in the different ways of getting pokemon.

Wild Pokemon - It is very difficult to get good Ivs for a wild pokemon. Since its just keep catching until you get good ones. This will take a very long time or a very short time dependings on your luck, though given the statistics, it'll probably take you a long time.
Traded Pokemon - When your friend trades you a pokemon the Ivs will already be set at what your friend got them at. If its an in-game trade, its the same thing as wild pokemon.
Breeded Pokemon - In general this is the best way to predict your Ivs. When breeding your pokemon, the baby pokemon resulting has a 25% chance of inheriting a Iv in any particular stat from a parent. Whic means that it has a 50% chance of inheriting an Iv from its parents. Another 50% chance of inheriting a random Iv. Thus if you continue breeding and and getting babies with better Ivs then putting them back into the breeding program as parents you'll increase that 50% chance from the parents of getting better Ivs. It might take a while but its a much surer thing than the other two options. One thing also to keep in mind about eggs is that they're preset when you get them. So saving after you get it, then hatching then turning off the game to hatch it again, won't do anything for you.
So. That about explains it I think. Ivs are values which can help or harm your stats depending on their value. Thus it's in your interests to have values higher up in the scale. Usually above 24 is a safe bet. Breeding helps, so don't beat it till you've tried it.

Why should you worry about Ivs. You really don't need to. For all in-game purposes it doesn't matter. But for competitive battling purposes against real live opponents, it will. Most people are pretty sharp about their teams. And any and every edge you can get will help. That's why its important to make sure your Ivs are as high as you can get em'. Course that's for the gba games. If you're using NetBattle they'll be preset at 31.

Also, one more thing about Ivs is that the only reason you'd want them all less than 31 is for HP. HP is Hidden Power, not Hit Points. Hidden Power, the attack. It's type is determined by your pokemon's Ivs. So if you were using HP then you might want to predict your pokemon's Ivs and get em' to a certain way so you could get a certain type of HP.

Anyway, that should just about covered everything you'll need to know about Ivs. Hope you caught all of it. Don't be afraid to read it twice, this stuff isn't necessarily light reading. If in some chance you actually read this. I'll be putting in the calculation methods for Ivs later. You can do math to calculate your Ivs.

Effort Values are the second hidden statistic you'll need to worry about. Effort Values or Evs aren't really known, as Ivs are, by multiple names. They're really just called either Effort Values or Effort Points. Both are applicable.

Like the amount of experience needed to gain a level, Evs are experience within stats. Each stat can gain up to 255 Evs. BUT in total you can only gain 510 Evs. What does this mean? It means that you'll be able to put, at most, 255 Evs into two stats. So only two stats will be able to max out in their experience. Like Ivs there's no way to tell what your current Evs are or how much you've gained, or not without a little math, but that'll be later. How do you gain Evs? Through Battling. I'll go into that now.

Gaining Evs: When you battle any pokemon in the game, whether it's in a trainer's roster or in the wild, each pokemon will give you a certain number of Evs in a certain particular stat. Just like there's an Iv for each stat, you'll have a number (if you battle the right pokemon) in each stat for Evs. However, it's not exactly in your best interests to do so. Especially if you're trying to prepare your team for competitive battling. Now, what I mean by "battle the right pokemon" is that each pokemon that you defeat in battle, as I said, will give your pokemon a certain number of Evs.

Like when you battle a Dragonite from Lance's team. If you defeat it, each pokemon that battled against it will get 3 Evs toward's its attack stat. What this means is that when that/those pokemon that battled the Dragonite will have every 4 Evs per stat equal to 1 pt gain in that stat. Which means that if you battled only Dragonite's then you'd eventually gain enough Evs to max out at 255 Evs toward your attack stat. Now if 4 Evs = 1 pt gain, that means that at lv. 100 those 255 Evs will equal 64 points more in your attack stat then if you hadn't battled those Dragonites at all! That's a lot. Now you're starting to see the advantage in Effort Training. Now you might be asking about other pokemon, how many Ev points do other pokemon give and in which stat? For that I'd reccommend going to Serebii.net Their pokedex is really quite complete and includes the number of Evs gained from fighting each and every pokemon.

Allrighty, back on track. One thing I ought to warn you about is the way you Battle and against what pokemon. Now. In Competitive Battling it's best to focus on a couple stats, and max out those rather than do some in all stats. Let me show you what I mean.

The Best Way to Spread Evs: Suppose you're training a Jolteon. Jolteon, as you probably know, is very good in special attack and speed. Now with those two high stats you're probably gonna put ThunderBolt and some other special attacks on him. Thus you might make him a special sweeper (I'll get into that stuff in another section). A special sweeping Jolteon has no need, necessarily for Evs in Hp or Defense. Thus it would not be to your benefit to spread your Evs across all six stat categories. In this case, and in almost all cases, you'll want to focus on two stats. While it's up to you to decide what kinda spread you want to use with the pokemon on your team the two most commonly used are:

252, 252, 6
252, 129, 129
The best bet though is to give your pokemon Evs in the stats you'll want to be using in battle. So Jolteon you'll want to be fast and have a great special attack. So you might use the 252 in special attack, 252 in speed and 6 in something else. Probably Hp.

Switching Pokemon: You might be wondering about switching pokemon. With regular stat experience needed to gain levels, the pokemon you're battling, when defeated, will have its experience split up among the pokemon that battled against it. This is not true for Evs. All pokemon that battle against a pokemon will each gain the full number of possible Ev points gainable from that pokemon.

Vitamins: Another thing deals with Vitamins. Vitamins, when used, affect the Evs of the stat they're for. Each Vitamin when applied to your pokemon counts as 10 Ev points. Now that's a lot. And will really help you get closer to the 252 or 129 you're looking for. Of course there's a limitation involved with Vitamins. You might have noticed that after giving a pokemon 10 of a particular Vitamin that Vitamin stops having any effect. That's because Vitamins will only work up until that pokemon has 100 Evs. Which means if you've already gained 100 Evs Vitamins won't work at all. Thus Vitamins are very useful in getting a head start on Effort Training.

MachoBrace, PokeRus, and Natures: Couple other effects dealing with Evs. The Macho Brace, the PokeRus, and Natures. First off a nature, postivley affecting a stat will increase the stat's final number by 1.5x. That's a lot. Conversley, if its affects a stat negativley it will decrease the stat by 1.5x. The Macho Brace will double the Evs gained in battle. So with our example above. If you battled Dragonite, instead of gaining 3 Evs in attack, with the macho brace you'd gain 6! The exact same thing is true with the PokeRus. Except! The Macho Brace will halve Evs gained in speed. Not that big a deal if you don't care about Speed Evs, but the PokeRus doesn't have that disadvantage, so the doubling will work with speed too.

Okay. Base Stats are values which reflect the potential, as a result of your nature, for your stats. They are set values. Usually when you see the Base Stats on a person's site, you'll see four values for each stat. The first is the base stats. Those reflect the stats without any interference. So nothing is affecting them at that time. Then the other three values for each stat reflect the nature. So there'll be a value for a lower nature, a neutral nature, and a higher nature.

The Base Stats of a pokemon are identical throughout the species. Which means all Pikachu's have the same base stats. All Typhlosions have the same base stats. And so on. Now, when a Totodile for instance evolves into a Croconaw, its base stats go up to reflect the change.

Now what exactly makes this important? Its good to know the capabilities/base stats or your pokemon so you can know what Evs to give it. Not only that but you'll need to know base stats for move sets too. Like if you're trying to figure out whether its worthwhile to give your Tyranitar Dragon Dance. You'll want to figure out whether or not it can survive long enough, against the average opponent, to make Dragon Dance worthwhile. Thus you'll want to know Tyranitar's base stats so you'll be able to see how many times he'll need to use Dragon Dance to be able to outspeed Base 130s.

That's an important term right there. What it means is that it refers directly to the Base Stat of a pokemon, the one not affected by a nature yet. So anyway you'll hear around forums and sites people referring to base 160s and Base 130s. Those, depending on what they're talking about, are referring usually to a particular stat. And that on the average you'll want to alter your pokemon's stats with a move, like Dragon Dance or Amnesia, so that you're either equal or higher to the average of the best in that particular stat.

Heh. That's a bit long-winded though. I'll try to make it simpler. What it means is that... Well I'll make an example. The Base 130s. Those are talking about the speed stat. In competitive battling if you're going to outspeed an opponent then you're looking at trying to equal or exceed a Base 130 pokemon. Base 130 is the average, that I was talking about. The average is different for each stat, obviously. But speed is generally considered the most important. Thus when making your team you'll want to figure in those speed upping moves and figure out how long it'll take you to be able to outspeed Base 130s. Anyway, that's the stuff basically behind these things. And I think that just about covers this section!

Let me know if you feel I'm missing something or you can add something to it. You can either e-mail me or pm me on the forums