Pokémon Sword & Shield Surprise Trade Week 1: Grookey
8I have decided to start doing Surprise Trade each weekend, the main inspiration behind it was Wonder Trade Wednesday from back in the days of Pokémon X & Y, where you can Wonder Trade with random players and you won't know what Pokémon you will get until you receive it from the other player. Even though many people did Wonder Trade Wednesday, the main inspiration behind it was Marriland, because back in the days of X & Y, I watched his Wonder Trade Wednesday Streams on Twitch, and he would breed different Pokémon, like Buizel, Shinx, Nidoran, and a few others, and he did do some Shiny Hatching. I will not be doing any Shiny Hatching, as that takes up a lot of time, so I will base it more on luck, the easiest way is the Masuda Method, where if you have a foreign Pokémon, so if you breed a Japanese Pokémon with an English Pokémon, you will have a higher chance of hatching a Shiny Pokémon.
How I will handle it is that I will breed a full box of the Pokémon that I will Surprise Trade for that week, so in this case, I will be doing Grookey, the Grass-type starter in this game, and see what good Pokémon I end up getting. When breeding, I will try to go for at least 3 to 5 perfect IVs, or Individual Values, and some Egg Moves, so these Grookey have Leech Seed, Hammer Arm, Fake Out, and Worry Seed. Grookey's other Egg Moves include Growth, Strength, and Nature Power. Fake Out is a nice move to have, specially in Double Battles, most of the Pokémon I will breed are more towards competitive battling, or if you happen to be doing a Surprise Trade challenge, like the Wonderlocke from Pokémon X & Y, and to those that don't know, it's basically the Nuzlocke challenge, but you use Pokémon obtained through Wonder Trade for each encounter, so if anyone happens to get one of my Pokémon that I bred, it could be good for either competitive battling or if you are doing a challenge. I will not be doing it by Pokédex order, but I do want to do the Galar starters just to start things out, and then I will be doing random Pokémon.
As for Grookey, its best stats are Attack and Speed, but it won't have high Speed once it fully evolves, it does get some nice level up moves like Razor Leaf, Taunt, Screech, and Knock Off. It evolves into Thwackey at Level 16, and at Level 35 is when Thwackey evolves into Rillaboom. Rillaboom's best stat is Attack, and it has good HP, and unfortunately at the time, its Hidden Ability, Grassy Surge has yet to be released, so all those Grookey have Overgrow.
Rillaboom's signature move, Drum Beating, is learned once it is evolved from Thwackey, it is an 80 power Physical Grass-type move that lowers the targets Speed, so this is a great move to have on Rillaboom, it does also get Wood Hammer at Level 46, but Drum Beating is more preferred. All of these Grookey have an Adamant Nature, but you can use Mints to change the Pokémon's Nature, so Jolly or Careful are other decent Natures to go with, but Adamant is the most preferred.
It does have a nice TM and TR movepool, for its TM moves, it can get Brick Break, Bulldoze, Acrobatics, Drain Punch, Stomping Tantrum, Brutal Swing, U-turn, Assurance, and False Swipe, and for TRs, it can get High Horsepower, Earthquake, Darkest Lariat, Bulk Up, Superpower, Swords Dance, Low Kick, and a few others. As for what moves to have on Rillaboom, Drum Beating is a must have, and for good move options, U-turn, Earthquake, Knock Off, and Superpower are nice moves. Once Grassy Surge is released, High Horsepower will be more preferred over Earthquake, as Grassy Terrain decreases the damage from Earthquake. Fake Out is also a nice move in Double Battles, and it can learn Frenzy Plant since it is a fully evolved Grass starter, but Rillaboom's Special Attack stat isn't that good enough, so Rillaboom should not be using Special Attacks.
It is decent for competitive battling, but once its Hidden Ability is released, Rillaboom will end up being a very popular Pokémon in competitive battling, as Grassy Surge is a nice Ability, and Rillaboom does have the stats to make good use of Grassy Surge, as this will boost the power of its Drum Beating and Wood Hammer.
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