Magmortar, The Blast Pokémon. It blasts fireballs of over 3,600 degrees F from the ends of its arms. It lives in volcanic craters. Its breath also sears and sizzles.When shooting 3,600 degree F fireballs from its arms, its body takes on a whitish hue from the intense heat.
Overview
Magmortar is a strange Pokemon. It has great Special Attack and an okay movepool but it isn't really good at much else in higher tiers. Infernape, Blaziken, Moltres, Talonflame, Volcarona, Chandelure, Houndoom... even Delphox and Emboar are potentially more useful than Magmortar is. It's still better that Camerupt I guess. Magmortar pretty much only has power going for it. Its typing, stats, and even movepool are nothing spectacular. While Mag may be pretty awful competitively its pretty cool looking. I mean its basically a clown with flamethrowers. How is that not awesome? It really isn't so much a bad Pokemon as it is outclassed. So many things can do what it does better... except for being a clown... with flamethrowers... Magmortar is still best at that.
Positives
- STAB Fire Blast hits extremely hard.
- While Fire / Electric / Fighting / Ice coverage isn't perfect it certainly can get the job done.
- Despite being useless in standard play and terrible in all official Nintendo formats Magmortar is a real terror in lower Smogon tiers like NU or RU.
- Magmortar is a CLOWN with FLAMETHROWERS.
Negatives
- All of Magmortar's primary moves have been nerfed. Fire Blast, Thunderbolt, and Hidden Power are all much weaker this gen.
- Being a pure Fire type comes with the unfortunate side effect of being weak to Stealth Rocks.
- Pretty much every other fire type either has a good secondary STAB move, better stats, or a better movepool.
- Special Defense is okay at best while defense and HP are sub par.
Abilities
Flame Body: The opponent has a 30% chance of being induced with BURN when using an attack that requires physical contact against this Pokémon. Usable, but you have to remember how few contact moves Magmortar can survive. Pretty much just U-turn, Bullet Punch, and Iron Head. Flame Body sounds really useful in theory, but in practice it's probably better to just use it to hatch eggs faster.
Hidden Ability (Available):
Vital Spirit: The Pokémon cannot be under the SLEEP condition while having this ability. Immunity to sleep lets Magmortar crush puny grass types ever harder. MAGMORTAR SMASH.
Movesets
Did you hear about that circus fire? It was in tents.
- Fire Blast
- Thunderbolt
- Cross Chop
- Hidden Power [Ice]
Item Attached: Life Orb
Ability: Vital Spirit
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 232 Spd / 52 Atk / 226 SAtk
Hasty Nature
One thing that Magmortar is actually really good at is mixed sweeping. Even Infernape and Emboar have trouble matching the sheer coverage Maggy has. Fire Blast has tremendous power, smashing aside all who do not resist it. Thunderbolt rounds out the coverage beating things that many other fire types have trouble with, such as Azumarill or Tentacruel. Cross Chop is able to OHKO Tyranitar as well as 2HKO Heatran and Blissey after Stealth Rocks. It deals heavy damage to Chansey as well, though it needs some prior damage to KO. Hidden Power Ice OHKOs every single Pokemon in standard that take 4x damage from it like Garchomp and Landorus. It also brings Latias down in two hits and cripples Latios. 52 Attack guarantees the OHKO on Tyranitar after Stealth Rocks and 2HKO on Blissey. 232 Speed outruns Jolly Mamoswine and Adamant Lucario. The rest goes in Special Attack to maximize Fire Blast's damage. To give you an idea of how devastating Magmortar can be here are some damage calculations.
Fire Blast vs...
252 HP / 4 SpD Hippowdon: 290-343 (69.04 - 81.66%)
252 HP / 4 SpD Skarmory: 595-702 (178.14 - 210.17%)
248 HP / 8 SpD Scizor: 1061-1253 (309.32 - 365.3%)
252 HP / 4 SpD Mega Venusaur: 195-229 (53.57 - 62.91%)
4 HP / 252 SpD Assault Vest Conkeldurr: 153-183 (43.46 - 51.98%)
Thunderbolt vs...
252 HP / 0 SpD Tentacruel: 208-247 (57.14 - 67.85%)
252 HP / 0 SpD Azumarill: 294-346 (72.77 - 85.64%)
4 HP / 0 SpD Talonflame: 294-346 (98.65 - 116.1%)
Cross Chop vs...
252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Chansey: 250-296 (35.51 - 42.04%)
252 HP / 252+ Def Blissey: 343-406 (48.03 - 56.86%)
252 HP / 0 Def Heatran: 179-213 (46.37 - 55.18%)
252 HP / 0 Def Tyranitar: 354-416 (87.62 - 102.97%)
HP Ice vs...
4 HP / 0 SpD Garchomp: 374-442 (104.46 - 123.46%)
252 HP / 0 SpD Landorus-T: 390-463 (102.09 - 121.2%)
4 HP / 0 SpD Latias: 133-156 (44.03 - 51.65%)
We spent all day debating about house fires. It was quite a heated argument.
- Belly Drum
- Mach Punch
- Thunder Punch
- Fire Punch
Item Attached: Situs Berry
Ability: Vital Spirit
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 4 SDef / 252 Spd / 252 Atk
Adamant Nature
Here is a really bad set. If you want shock the world, if you really want to show Bad Horse just what you're made of you could try an unexpected Belly Drum set. Please be aware that misplaced and unnecessary references to the Thoroughbred of Sin aside Belly Drum Magmortar is very weak. For example Linoone's Extremespeed hits with about two and a half times more power than your weak Mach Punch. Mach Punch is so weak that even after a Belly Drum it isn't even guaranteed a OHKO on Blissey ... CALM Blissey. But really. Don't waste your time with this unless you're bored.
Oh, I'm sorry...didn't mean to get you all fired up again.
- Fire Blast
- Thunderbolt
- Focus Blast
- Hidden Power [Ice]
Item Attached: Choice Specs
Ability: Vital Spirit
EVs and Nature:
EVs: 252 SAtk / 252 Spd / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
If Magmortar has one thing going for it, it is power. Choice Specs boosts Magmortar's power up to planet cracking levels. Thunderbolt, Focus Blast, and Hidden Power Ice round out the coverage. This set can't get past Blissey or Chansey nor can it really touch Lanturn but it has the capabilities to take down almost everything else in the game with a few well placed hits. Running Choice Specs removes your ability to switch moves so be aware that using Magmortar's phenomenal coverage becomes far more difficult with Specs.
Other Options
Hidden Power Grass, Sunny Day, Toxic, and... that's it. Maybe Flamethrower?
HP Grass can crush Gastrodon and Quagsire while badly hurting Lanturn. It doesn't hit much else though.
Sunny Day boosts your Fire moves and allows usage of Solarbeam but literally every Fire type can do that and Magmortar isn't fast enough or bulky enough to make it work well.
Toxic can hit Latios and Latias on the switch in as well as beating Gastrodon sort of. Hidden Power Ice / Grass are usually better options for that however.
Magmortar has a very big movepool but the vast majority of it is useless. I suppose Flamethrower is worth mentioning just to say that it isn't worth it. Magmortar isn't about accuracy, it's all about power.
Double & Triple Battle Options
Magmortar stands out from the crowd of fire type Pokémon on multiple levels. It has the highest Special Attack Stat of all Fire Types that can learn Thunderbolt, though lacks STAB. It is also one of six Pokemon that have access to Belly Drum and a physical priority move. With Vital Spirit, it is also the only Fire Type Pokemon that is immune to the sleep status.
Now, how do all of these traits translate into doubles and triples? Not very well. Sure, it counters Amoongus entirely and throws off Dark Void Smeargle, but 75/67/95 defenses on a fire type isn’t going to take Earthquakes or Rock Slides too well, nor will it be able to do much to said Earthquake or Rock Slide user, considering that base 83 speed is just a little fast for trick room, but a little slow outside of Trick Room. Tailwind can help with this problem though. The one problem that Tailwind, or any amount of support from Magmortar’s partner won’t fix however, is that despite Magmortar’s unique traits, there are superior options to Magmortar on most if not all fronts. Say you opt for a special attacking set, with Fire Blast/Thunderbolt/[Filler]/Protect, that’s ok, but Rotom-H gets STAB on thunderbolt, has arguably better defenses AND Levitate.
How about a Physical Belly Drum Mach Punch set? Base 95 attack isn’t terrible, especially at +6. Though at that point why not use Hitmontop or Conkeldurr? Both sport equal or more power, and don’t need to half their health or be at +6 attack to OHKO Tyranitar.
Ah HA! How about a mixed set with Belly Drum/Mach Punch/[Fire Move]/Thunderbolt? Allow me to save you the agony of trying to figure out what sort of EV spread, Nature and Item this might use and just tell you this set is the perfect example of a Pokemon trying to accomplish too much, and in practice will accomplish nothing beneficial to the team it’s used on.
Unfortunately, Magmortar’s unique movepool puts it in a “Jack of some trades, master of none” position, and I cannot, in good faith recommend anyone use it in Doubles/Triples.
Countering Magmortar
Chansey can tank every hit Magmortar can dish out barring the rare Focus Punch or Belly Drum boosted hits are stall it out with Toxic. The Lati twins can tank any hit, even Hidden Power Ice and retaliate with devastating Psyshocks. Gastrodon resists Fire Blast and doesn't fear anything except Hidden Power Grass. Rotom Wash also fears Hidden Power Grass but can easily survive multiple Fire Blasts. While lower tiered Lanturn shrugs off everything in Magmortar's movepool except I guess Earthquake. Camerupt duels Magmortar for the illustrious title of "terrible fire type" and comes out on top for once. Azumarill can't take a Thunderbolt well but it can take everything else and can demolish Magmortar with Aqua Jet. Garchomp is wrecked if it switches in on HP Ice but can take anything else and scare Maggy away with Earthquake. Hard countering Magmortar is very hard due to the deadly coverage it has but taking it down is very easy. It falls to basically any STAB physical move from things like Terrakion, Landorus, Kyurem, and Talonflame so even if you can't switch in with 100% safety Magmortar will rarely be in a position to attack for very long.
Locations in Games
Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald:
Not in game
FireRed/LeafGreen:
Not in game
Colosseum/XD:
Not in game
Diamond/Pearl/Platinum:
Evolve Magmar
HeartGold/SoulSilver:
Evolve Magmar
Black/White:
Evolve Magmar (White)
Trade from White (Black)
Black 2/White 2:
Evolve Magmar (White 2)
Trade from White (Black 2)
X/Y:
Evolve Magmar
Animé Appearences
