Anywhere you go, you’re likely to see teams led by Vaporeons, gyms defended by Vaporeons, or people talking about Vaporeon.
Chances are, if you don’t have a Vaporeon, you probably still want one. I know I do.
The entire Pokémon Go meta is now centered around Vaporeon, the water Pokémon that can evolve from Eevee. The funny thing is, Vaporeon is technically not even the most powerful monster within Pokémon Go. On the list of best overall stats, Vaporeon ranks 13th. Specifically, it has an attack of 186, a defense of 168, and a Stamina of 260:
Granted, many of the Pokémon ahead of Vaporeon are legendaries which aren’t available yet. But out of the entire roster of mighty Pokémon, Vaporeon is one of the easiest to attain. Creatures like Dragonite and Snorlax are rather rare, or some, like Blastoise, typically require a lot of candies if you never find it out in the wild.
Eevee, on the other hand, is relatively common. In an informal poll on Twitter, many people told me that they were surrounded by Eevees, with a large percentage within that already owning all three of the Eeveelutions. On a Reddit survey with 17k responses, most people flagged Eevee as one of the most ubiquitously available critters near them, right up there with Ratatta, Pidgey, and Doduo. Sometimes, Eevee is more common in a region than the typical Pokémon fodder, which is absurd to think about. Some people actually live in the middle of what is known as an Eevee nest, which is a locale where Eevees spawn by the buttload.
In battle, Vaporeon’s edge lies mainly in its high damage per second output, as well as its ability to take a hit thanks to high stamina. And given that “super effective” moves only do 1.2 times damage instead of the typical 2x in the main games, even monsters that are supposed to wreck Vaporeon don’t really pose much of a threat. It’s no wonder that everyone is using a Vaporeon right now.
For some, all of this is enough to make them wonder if maybe Vaporeon should be nerfed in some way:
One of the major problems highlighted in the thread above is that Vaporeon has a move called Water Gun, which has a power of 10 and can be used twice a second. Traditionally, a move like Thunder Shock should be equally effective, but instead it only has a power of 5 and a slightly longer cooldown.
But even if Vaporeon was tweaked, it’s not like Pokémon Go has such a great combat system in the first place, eh? It’s just not enjoyable to fight other people in Pokémon Go, thanks to the real-time combat mechanics and the wonky balance.
At some point, when Niantic releases more of the Pokedex, or some legendaries, Vaporeon won’t dominate Pokémon Go. For now, though, if you want to be the very best like no one ever was, here are two quick tips:
- You can find specific Pokémon, like Eevee, using Poke Radar and Pokevision, both of which display monsters on a map. Read more about that here.
- Once you have 25 Eevee candies and are ready to evolve, make sure to name your critter “Rainer,” as this will typically ensure that Eevee will evolve into a Vaporeon.