Why is Gyarados the Best Nuzlocke Pokémon?

Across (almost) every generation of Pokémon games, Gyarados takes the crown as a top-ranked choice for Nuzlockers.

While individual games might see one or two Pokémon outrank it in their specific regions, no other Pokémon is as consistently dominant across so many different games as Gyarados. Understanding why will help you use it to its full potential, and will help you identify similar traits in other Pokémon, making you a more skilled and flexible Nuzlocker.

Let’s explain five factors that make Gyarados the most consistently strong Nuzlocke Pokémon.

1. You’re Virtually Guaranteed to Get One

With the exception of Pokémon Black/White, Magikarp and Gyarados are available early on in every mainline Pokémon game.

Usually, all that’s required is an Old Rod, and because it can be found in virtually any body of water, you can often fish for it in a town without having to use up one of your encounters on a route. In that way, Magikarp/Gyarados is literally a “free” encounter in almost every Pokémon game, which contributes to its consistently high ranking.

2. Powerful stats, early

Magikarp evolves into Gyarados at Level 20, meaning that even if you play with level caps you’ll acquire it before the second or third Gym.

Gyarados has a Base Stat Total of 540, which is higher than a fully-evolved starter Pokémon… at just level 20. Even in past generations where Gyarados had a weak early movepool, these stats alone make it a full tier stronger than any other Pokémon available at that point in the game.

3. Intimidate

Gyarados’ ability Intimidate lowers the foe’s Attack by one stage every time it enters the battle. Combine this with Gyarados’ high defensive stats, and Gyarados is even bulkier in practice than it appears on paper.

What’s more – because you’re lowering the opponent’s Attack, you “share” this defensive bonus across your whole team, effectively making all your Pokémon physically bulkier. Again, you get access to this at just Level 20 – on a virtually guaranteed Pokémon.

4. Access to Dragon Dance

Dragon Dance is a stat-boosting move introduced in Generation 3 which boosts the user’s Attack and Speed by one stage each in a single turn. It’s possibly the best setup move in Pokémon… so of course Gyarados gets it.

While it didn’t learn the move until Level 50 in Generation III, this was dropped to Level 44/45 in Generations IV through VII, and then to just Level 36 in Generation VIII and beyond. With Gyarados’ stats, a single Dragon Dance will often be enough to outspeed and OHKO your opponent’s entire team.

5. Perfect Pivot Typing

One of Gyarados’ only true flaws is its 4x weakness to Electric-type attacks. However, if a player is clever, this weakness actually becomes an easy way to exploit the opponent AI and make enemy trainers behave how you want them to.

Because the enemy AI will almost always “see” an OHKO on Gyarados with any Electric-type attack, you can predict that if your opponent has one of these moves they will virtually always use it. You can exploit this by switching into an immune Ground-type Pokémon for free, or you can do something similar in reverse, using an Electric-type Pokémon to bait a Ground-type move from your opponent in order to switch your Flying-type Gyarados in unharmed.

If you’re playing a Hardcore Nuzlocke or any ruleset which requires you to play on Set mode, switching in your Pokémon safely is one of the biggest challenges, and Gyarados’ typing makes it easy to switch in and out, positioning yourself to deal with your opponent’s threats.

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So that’s five factors that make Gyarados a consistently powerful Nuzlocke Pokémon. Any one of these factors would be enough to give a Pokémon a useful niche, but all five together on a single Pokémon makes Gyarados truly overpowered.

Check out our tier lists index to see where Gyarados ranks in different generations of Pokémon, and check out Nuzlocke University for more Nuzlocke guides, tips, articles, resources, and more.

Happy Nuzlocking!