Uploaded December 2014 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
IMPORTANT: Okay, so as you can notice from quality the video without any sort of editing and played at hyper speed carelessly, this wasn't intended to be a public video, just an unlisted video used as a mechanic/bug report for competitive Pokemon simulators. I just thought I might as well make it public considering the impact this newly found RBY mechanics have in competitive RBY, and the discussion it has already generated in Smogon subsequently: smogon.com/forums/threads/normal-types-cannot-be-paralyzed-by-body-slam.3525371
So what is this about? It turns out that the secondary effects from burn (e.g. from Fire Blast), freeze (e.g. from Blizzard), and paralysis (e.g. from Thunder), will NEVER occur if (one of) the target's type(s) matches the type of the attack. This was already known for burn and freeze since all moves that can burn are fire-type and all moves that can freeze are ice-type, and it was well known fire-type and ice-type pokemon can't be burned and frozen respectively.
However, and here's the bomb, Thunder, Thunderbolt, Thundershock, and Thunderpunch can't inflict paralysis on electric-type pokemon like Jolteon or Zapdos, Lick similarly can't paralyze ghost-type Pokemon, and finally Body Slam can't paralyze Normal-type Pokemon like Chansey, Tauros, and Snorlax, which are arguably the three best Pokemon in the RBY OU metagame.
Once again, sorry for the lack of effort in making and editing the video; as I've said, it wasn't intended to be public!
IMPORTANT: Okay, so as you can notice from quality the video without any sort of editing and played at hyper speed carelessly, this wasn't intended to be a public video, just an unlisted video used as a mechanic/bug report for competitive Pokemon simulators. I just thought I might as well make it public considering the impact this newly found RBY mechanics have in competitive RBY, and the discussion it has already generated in Smogon subsequently: smogon.com/forums/threads/normal-types-cannot-be-paralyzed-by-body-slam.3525371
So what is this about? It turns out that the secondary effects from burn (e.g. from Fire Blast), freeze (e.g. from Blizzard), and paralysis (e.g. from Thunder), will NEVER occur if (one of) the target's type(s) matches the type of the attack. This was already known for burn and freeze since all moves that can burn are fire-type and all moves that can freeze are ice-type, and it was well known fire-type and ice-type pokemon can't be burned and frozen respectively.
However, and here's the bomb, Thunder, Thunderbolt, Thundershock, and Thunderpunch can't inflict paralysis on electric-type pokemon like Jolteon or Zapdos, Lick similarly can't paralyze ghost-type Pokemon, and finally Body Slam can't paralyze Normal-type Pokemon like Chansey, Tauros, and Snorlax, which are arguably the three best Pokemon in the RBY OU metagame.
Once again, sorry for the lack of effort in making and editing the video; as I've said, it wasn't intended to be public!
