Playing Around Abilities — Intimidate, Levitate, Huge Power in Practice
Abilities are power that doesn't show up in base stats. How the major offense- and defense-changing abilities work, and how to play around the opponent's. (updated: 2026-07-22)
Abilities are a Pokémon's "invisible base stat"
Abilities don't appear anywhere in a Pokémon's numbers, but they can completely change the outcome of a matchup. Doubling an attack, nullifying an entire move type — playing without accounting for abilities is a great way to lose a fight the math said you should win.
Abilities that boost offense
- Huge Power / Pure Power: effectively doubles physical Attack. This pushes damage well past what the base stat suggests, so it must always be factored into hit-count calculations (see reading damage calculations).
- Intimidate: lowers the opponent's Attack by one stage on switch-in. Blunts a physical attacker's opening hit and makes your own defensive plays much more stable. Since it re-triggers every time you switch in, it's powerful over the course of a whole match.
- Weather-setting abilities (Drought, Drizzle, etc.): set the weather the instant the Pokémon is sent out, kicking off a weather team's whole gameplan for free.
Abilities that change defense
- Levitate: nullifies Ground-type moves. Even a Pokémon with a 4x Ground weakness on paper can safely tank a Ground move if it has Levitate. This is a critical exception that never shows up on a type chart (see learning type matchups).
- Various absorbing abilities: nullify a specific move type entirely, and convert it into healing or a stat boost instead. Correctly predicting one of these and switching in can waste an opponent's entire turn.
Reading the opponent's ability
Abilities matter on offense too. A classic mistake is assuming "this Ground move finishes them off," only to find the opponent has Levitate. Always check the opponent's ability before committing to a plan.
- Don't lean on a move that gets nullified: if the opponent's ability blocks your main attacking type, don't build your whole plan around it — bring a secondary attacking option instead.
- Turn Intimidate against its user: if you're a special attacker, an Attack drop from Intimidate does nothing to you. Consider hitting back with special damage instead.
- Use it to read switches: if you expect the opponent to bring in an Intimidate or absorbing-ability Pokémon, switch into something that's favorable against it too.
How our tools handle this
Our damage calculator and counter pages already factor in the abilities with the biggest real-world impact — Levitate (Ground immunity) and Huge Power/Pure Power (2x physical Attack). Matchup evaluations that include abilities are exactly why a result might feel off from your gut instinct at times; abilities are very often the reason. Understanding them fills in the gaps that raw numbers alone can't explain.