Is Salamence or Altaria better for Emerald playthroughs?

When I do casual playthroughs, I always have a Dragon type on my team, and I am tied between a Salamence and Altaria for my team. What are the pros and cons of both?

Pleaselog inorregisterto add a comment.

Salamence- Excellent Ability in Intimidate- Phenomenal Attack, Special Attack, HP, and Speed- Can easily run a mixed set- Learns Fly, Dragon Claw, Flamethrower, Earthquake, Brick Break, and other excellent moves- Evolves late- Can be tricky to find

Altaria- Natural Cure is pretty good- Good defenses- Learns Fly, Dragon Claw, Earthquake, Body Slam, and other solid moves- Equal attacking stats means it can go mixed easily- Swablu is fairly easy to find- HP, Attack, Special Attack, and Speed are only average

If you have no qualms against potentially waiting longer for a Bagon, then absolutely use Salamence. It’s better than Altaria in pretty much every way, even if it does evolve later. You can use Altaria until you get Salamence, or keep it with you for the whole game if you so choose, but I think Salamence is the better option.

Hope I helped!

Ok, Let’s see.Salamence:PROS:-Insane Attack and Respectable speed-Middling Hp-High Base stat total-Good stab moves in Dragon Claw (TM) and Fly-CONS:-Learning Dragon Claw, a decent physical move is at level 79, and the TM may not be in emerald-Evolves very late-Getting a bagon is very late-You must level up the bagon a lot to evolve it, and bagon does not have very good stats-Found in Meteor falls (need waterfall) which you can access very late (this section at least)

Altaria:PROS:-Can be found before the fire type gym (swablu)-Good Defenses-Decent stab moves in Dragon Breath and Fly-Can learn Dragon Dance to Set upCONS:-Low Attacking stats in 70 on both, and attacking is the main point of a playthrough-It’s moveset without TMS is quite bad with only normal flying and dragon moves (not including astonish)

I personally think salamence is much better, so if you are willing to wait, then get salamence definitely, however if you don’t want to, then go with altaria.

Well first, let’s look at their stats.

Now let’s look at availability. Altaria can be found as a Swablu on Routes 114 and 115. It then evolves quickly at lv. 35. They are much more common than Bagons, which are in the back of Meteor Falls and require you to get the HM Waterfall. Bagon evolves into Shelgon at lv. 30, and Salamence at lv. 50. Altaria is the better choice in this regard, as using Bagon will mean a lot of grinding.

Both Altaria and Salamence have decent movepools, but Salamence can make more use of great moves like Earthquake, Fire Blast, Fly, Dragon Claw, and Brick Break due to it’s large attacking stats. Altaria can also learn these moves (with the exception of Brick Break) and tacks on stuff like Solar Beam, Ice Beam, and Perish Song.

Altaria gets the ability Natural Cure, which is nice, but not as useful as Salamence’s Intimidate.

I personally would useAltariafor more ease of play, but if you’re not scared of grinding and long Pokemon hunts, useSalamence.Salamence is better overall.

One thing I don’t like about the other answers is that they seem to assume that grinding and stats are inherent properties of each Pokemon. Base stats and evolution level are inherent properties. Stats and grinding are variable.

84 Atk Salamence Fly vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Glalie: 63-75 (40.6 - 48.3%) – guaranteed 3HKO+1 Lvl 61 84 Atk Altaria Fly vs. Lvl 50 0 HP / 0 Def Glalie: 79-94 (50.9 - 60.6%) – guaranteed 2HKO

sourcetldrIf you’re not willing to grind, then Altaria is stronger.If you’re willing to grind, then Altaria is still stronger.Also Swellow is stronger than both of them.

Lvl 58 84 Atk Swellow Return vs. Lvl 50 0 HP / 0 Def Glalie: 82-97 (52.9 - 62.5%) – guaranteed 2HKO