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Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield will allow players to change the nature and the stats of their Pokémon through new items and features.
A Pokémon’s Nature was introduced in the Pokémon Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald games. It affects two of the Pokémon’s stats and gives them a varying archetype in battles; for example, the Sassy Nature increases their Special Defense but decreases their Speed. Nature would be randomly rolled by the game, but there were a few workarounds that could ensure a certain personality for a wild Pokémon.
However, Pokémon Sword and Shield has introduced Mints. These little candies will change the development of their stats. Each type of Mint has a Nature associated with it, like a Modest Mint, a Hasty Mint, and so on. So, a player will be able to feed their Relaxed Pokémon a Naive Mint to focus on their Speed stat so it will increase at a faster rate. Expectedly, this would be at the expense of their Defense stat which would therefore develop at a slower rate. Be aware, the Mints won’t actually change the Nature of the Pokémon, it only alters the rate at which certain stats develop over the course of the game.
Moreover, Pokémon will hit their five a day and guzzle vitamins like their battling career depends on it. Which it kind of does. But anyway, Pokémon Sword and Shield lets players buff a Pokémon’s base points using these supplements over the 10 item limit. And, Exp. Candies are a new method of levelling up Pokémon very quickly.
These items will award experience points to the Pokémon instantaneously, so players do not need to grind out battle after battle so that their beastie levels up. Exp. Candies are collected after Max Raid Battles so there’s all the more reason to get stuck in to the Dynamax shindigs.
Last but not least, if the player puts two Pokémon of the same species in the Pokémon Nursery together, the two may transfer an Egg Move between them. As Egg Moves are only determined when they hatch and often don’t have a TM equivalent, this is a powerful way of customising the battle capabilities of a Pokémon. This is only possible if the Pokémon knows three or fewer moves, though.
Pokémon Sword and Shield releases for Nintendo Switch on November 15. Watch the trailer explaining the new items below.
