Which of Ash's friends made the least impact on his journey?

[marshiyanmisuta]

Wasn't Iris supposed to be his guide through Unova? What happened to that?

What's this and what's that got to do with anything?

 

[CrackFox]

But Iris is belittling him, how is that not impacting him? Didn't Misty do the same?

The only sign that Ash hasn't completely reset is that he doesn't rise to it like he used to do with Misty's taunts. Maybe that's the one sign that he has matured.
I don't think it would make him perform any worse for it though, if anything that attitude would push him to work harder.
Anyway. they seem to have kind of dropped it now, and most of Iris's disapproval lies with Dent's exuberant behavior.

 

[Cybersai]

I wonder why this poll played out the way it did. Perhaps like Tracey, I should have not included Max in the poll either, that way people would only have to choose between the most important main characters.

I purposely excluded Tracey for this reason, because with his short run and character, he had not much importance.

 

[marshiyanmisuta]

I wonder why this poll played out the way it did. Perhaps like Tracey, I should have not included Max in the poll either, that way people would only have to choose between the most important main characters.

Maybe you shouldn't count Masato and Haruka as same person? And what's the point of the poll if you didn't list all of Satoshi's friends? Kasumi-bashing?

 

[Cybersai]

Maybe you shouldn't count Masato and Haruka as same person?

I wouldn't, but you have people treating them like a set. Likewise if I excluded Max from the poll, you really think the votes would be different?

And what's the point of the poll if you didn't list all of Satoshi's friends?

Because Tracey obviously didn't make much impact so I excluded him because everyone would vote for him. Orange Islands would have played out almost exactly the same if it were just an Ash and Misty adventure whether Tracey was there or not. Likewise if I excluded Max it would be for the same reason besides the Ash eps he interacted with him.

 

[marshiyanmisuta]

I wouldn't, but you have people treating them like a set.

You're the only person I ever seen who count them as same person in a poll...

Likewise if I excluded Max from the poll, you really think the votes would be different?

Yes.

Because Tracey obviously didn't make much impact so I excluded him because everyone would vote for him.

Then what is your criteria for this poll?

 

[temporaryaccount]

I vote May AND Max.

We've established that Max did pretty much nothing for or to Ash.
But I don't think May did much either. Obviously Ash influenced her a lot and helped her see battles weren't her thing. But I can't really think of anything significant May did to help him grow. She allowed him to be her "mentor" for a while, but there wasn't too much of that once we got into mid-AG.

 

[Almonds]

May and Max didn't seem to have much impact on Ash - rather, didn't they learn from Ash?

 

[P0KEM0N]

Iris because she did nothing but call Ash a kid. Cilan didn't impact Ash either because he never did anything.

 

[Covershot]

The only three people on that list who I remember having any impact on Ash as a Trainer at all are Brock, Misty, and Dawn.

Brock, and Misty to a lesser extent, had the role of teaching Ash (and, by proxy, the viewer) about the basics of being a Pokemon Trainer. They were the ones to inform him of things like only being allowed to carry six Pokemon at a time, how to catch Pokemon, type advantages, etc. Brock was also the one to show Ash how he could use Pikachu's speed to overwhelm bigger and stronger opponents such as Lt. Surge's Raichu, which is how Ash continues to battle with Pikachu to this day. In AG and DP, Brock was also a frequent training partner.

By the time Dawn appeared on the show, Ash was the experienced one while Dawn was the rookie, but even then I thought that the Diamond & Pearl anime did an excellent job of still having Ash adopt moves showed to him throughout her Contests and enhance his own battling with him. For example - without Dawn, Ash wouldn't have the Counter Shield technique (speaking of which, it'd be nice if the writers could have Ash use it again sometime). Like Brock, Dawn also trained her Pokemon with Ash's frequently and traded her Buizel - which got him is third and fourth Badges, and defeated one of Paul's Pokemon in the League - to him. And then there was the moral support all three of them provided. You really get the sense that without Brock, Misty, and Dawn, Ash's journey in through the Kanto, Johto, or Sinnoh regions wouldn't be the same.

Neither May, Max, Iris, or Cilan really had any of that. I can't see any way Ash's journey in Hoenn would have been significantly different if, say, he and Pikachu never met May and instead went it alone. At most, all Iris and Cilan could really do was introduce Ash to some of Unova's native cities and Pokemon, but those are things that I'd imagine Ash would eventually be figure out for himself or with the help of a COTD or something.

 

[1rkhachatryan]

I'm gonna go with Iris because without Dento, Ash would of starved lol.

The only time Iris helped Ash was when she helped Krokorok evolve.

 

[SammyW27]

I'm going to get in trouble for this, but I vote Brock.

Why, you ask? Because he stayed a LOT longer than he should have and ended up being a useless third wheel who was just there.

 

[G50]

I'd have to say May and Max. Ash really helped them throughout their journey, but at the same time there wasn't much that they did in return. The one main thing Max did, was help them know where to go and the information about the area they are entering. The last episodes, especially with the contest that they faced each other there was quite a bit of impact from May on Ash during that time.

 

[Pikafanboy]

I'm thinking Iris and Cilan, I can't think of anything they did that affected Ash. Brock and Misty got him started with the basics, May and Max gave him a chance to be a mentor which seemed to help him mature a bit and also introduced him to contests, Dawn practiced with Ash constantly and they learned from each other's battle styles to make new ones and also did a trade.

 

[Team Gaara]

Only Misty, Brock, and Dawn really had any kind of impact on Ash's journey. Brock and Misty taught him many of the basics of Pokemon and greatly helped him throughout Kanto, and Dawn helped to train Ash learn how to use Contest techniques that would help him in Gym battles.

Everyone else did next to nothing to impact Ash during his travels. May and Max cheered him on and supported him, though I wouldn't call that an impact on him. Iris belittled the man the entire time she was with him; hardly an impact, or at least, not a positive one. Cilan was also a supporter, but not much else. Not even his evaluations really changed much in the way Ash did things.

 

[vjohnson679]

Iris because she did next to nothing to impact Ash's journey other than calling him "such a kid".