DISCUSSION: Type Specialist Motivations

[Lightning Flame Blast]

Monotyped trainers are a staple of the Pokemon franchise, but the games rarely go into depth as to why each type specialist chose their theme beyond mostly generic ones (people who like swimming go for water, martial artists go for fighting, psychics for psychic, etc.). Fanfiction also has its fair share of monotype protagonists, whose mindsets for these decisions really interest me. Is there a reason for it? Do they have a goal involving said type? Do they have something personal in regards to it? Do they just find it cool?

What‘s an out of the box way you would write about a trainer’s motivation to specialize in a specific type?

Here’s a few I came up with:

Spoiler: Normal

A generalist trainer going for a gym leader position that gets caught in type restricting clauses. They decide to go for the Normal type as a loophole, since the variety in that is so big they can essentially remain a generalist.

Spoiler: Fire

A trainer raised in the colder areas of their home region and who grew up around Fire types that kept them warm. They have grown a special fondness for the type and decide to specialize in it.

Spoiler: Water

A Hoenn dweller with water related PTSD who takes on the Water typing as both a safety net in this heavily oceanic region and a way to face their fear by constantly dealing with marine creatures.

Spoiler: Poison

A former Team Rocket grunt that took a special liking to the Poison type due to the sheer variety of poison pokemon they got saddled with during the Kanto operations and decide to work on ridding Kanto of leftover stigma against the typing after the Rockets disbanded.

Spoiler: Dark

A person born with psychic abilities too potent for any attempts to control. As a last resort, they surrounded themselves with Dark types to suppress their own powers.

Spoiler: Fairy

The child of a heavily conservative Dragon clan raised with dragons constantly shoved down their throat. They decide to train the Fairy type as a rebelious move to distance as much as possible from their family’s legacy. The Fairy type’s usual peaceful and cheery traits could be a good clash with the trainer’s spiteful mindset.

Spoiler: Ghost

A person born with disabilities who had serious difficulty growing up, but who was helped through their daily life by friendly Ghosts that sparked a wish to delve into their mysteries and train them.

Spoiler: Dragon

A person raised close to a Dragon community that manages to get their hands on one. Faced with disbelief from the community that they could successfully train dragons, they take on the challenge to prove themselves.

 

[Serverus Snope]

I actually wondered why people become monotype trainers in-universe despite the potential drawbacks. It became an interesting discussion on the Pokemon Tabletop Adventures Discord. People like to assume that a monotype team could be easily swept by a single Pokemon of a certain type (and some can like Chairman Rose,) but having a monotype team can be legitimately effective. Knowing a type well means being able to counter its common weaknesses. And on poorly-planned "diverse" teams, if the sole Pokemon capable of dealing with that type goes down, the fight gets a lot harder. Thus, it also forces non type specialists to up their game to up their game by considering other ways to deal with type matchups than just "If a water-type Pokemon appears, send out an Electric-type"... because said Water-type could be a bulky tank with Earthquake. Or they use a stalling strategy pairing Aqua Ring and Leftovers with one or more status effects.

Also, some types benefit from certain weather or Terrain effects. A Water specialist, for example, could easily create a weather-based team using Drizzle or Rain Dance. Or an Electric or Flying specialist can pair it with Thunder or Hurricane.

I guess that while there are many different was a person could theme a trainer's team, types have the most established... well... identity in-universe. There are expectations and stereotypes associated with users of certain types, after all. (There are non type specialists with heavy motifs, like Lucy from the Battle Pike and her serpentine Pokemon. But people don't talk about those as much in-universe.) Focusing on a type could mean being a part of a community of people who love that type.

A former Team Rocket grunt that took a special liking to the Poison type due to the sheer variety of poison pokemon they got saddled with during the Kanto operations and decide to work on ridding Kanto of leftover stigma against the typing after the Rockets disbanded.

Team Rocket's hardly the only group in Kanto associated with the type. You also have Koga's ninja clan.

 

[Welkamo]

Great now I want to write Gym Leader backstory fanfics again. Thank you.

I'll add my own idea: A trainer who specializes in Normal/Ghost/Dark/Ground/Flying/Fairy because they're still petty about that one Ghost/Normal/Psychic/Electric/Ground/Dragon type Pokémon who beat them.