A thing about analyzed Leech Seed users.

[Glen ^^]

I've seen some analisys about Leech Seed users suggesting to invest a lot into Hp. My question is, won't this lower the % of Hp recovered from Leech Seed?
Pumping the defenses isn't better? You take about the same percentage of damage, but recover a lot more.

 

[Suicune137]

Erm...doesn't Leech Seed depend on the opposing pokemon rather than the user?

 

[Justin8649]

Ok well some people might be a little bit confused about Leech Seed. There is no point in suggesting to a person to use extra HP EVs -because- they have Leech Seed. You will get the same benefits of Leech Seed regardless of your HP stat. They aren't really relevant issues at all. You should EV your pokemons HP and Defensive stats depending on their stats. If they have shitty HP and nice defenses, max hp before adding to the defenses. If they have good hp and shitty defenses, put EVs in the defenses before the HP.

yeah.

 

[obi]

But you will recover more HP as a % of your max HP with lower HP, and the difference between max HP and middle defenses vs. max Defesnes and no HP isn't that big. You will take hits harder, but you'll recover from them more, too.

 

[west ham sandwich]

Analized sounds dirty. Leech seed absorbs a % of opponents HP, has nothing to do with you.

 

[Synre]

In most situations it's probably totally irrelevant, but as far as infinitely subseeding, you will be able to do it on a slightly larger group of pokemon with a lower max hp than with a higher one, but more often than not you're either going to able to do it or you aren't going to be able to do it on most targets regardless of your EV spread.

Additionally it's 'analyzed,' I changed it in the title as apparently it was distracting some of our more stellar users.

 

[Shinn Asuka]

I think what he's trying to say is that you get a certain amount of HP recovered no matter what. If your defenses are higher and HP is lower, this recovered hp with be "worth more" because you are more durable and will keep it for longer rather than if you had lower defenses and higher HP.

 

[JimBob]

I think the general rule is that your defenses should be about equal, and HP should be two times your defense if possible (like Defense 200, SDef 200, HP 400).

assuming that you aren't trying to focus on surviving a certain attack or sponge only special or physical moves, obviously

Just because you're getting added recovery from leech seed doesn't mean you should abandon optimal defense

 

[bulbasauresrec]

but for Subseeding, wouldnt it be better if you have lower Hp and higher SpDef/Def?
With lower hp, and against a high hp opponent, the 10%(am i right) hp drain from the enemy may be just abit less than the 25% require for a substitute.

Pretend your enemy has 500hp and you have 200hp.
Every leech seed would grant you 50hp(10%of500) which is 25% of your 200hp which allows you to substitute EVERY TURN.

Now lets say your enemy has 500hp and you have 400hp.
Every leech seed would grant you 50 hp which is 12.5% of your 400hp which means you earn enough hp for a substitute every 2 turns as compared to once.

Thus I think you might only want to have low hp/high def only if you plan on subseeding.

 

[Mekkah]

However, we are not talking about 200HP versus 400HP. We are talking about, to make it complicated, x HP versus x - 63 HP, since that's as far as EV shifting goes unless you're willing to lower your HP DV or your level or something, or changing to an entirely different Pokemon.

Assuming the maximum difference is 63 HP, you are probably looking at a very small difference when it comes to how much Leech Seed recovers. And it often comes at the price of having less efficient defenses, considering most good subseeders have about equal stats in these regards (think Sceptile, Jumpluff and Roserade). You should also take into account that it is more likely that you:
a) die to another cause
b) run out of Substitute PP
c) end up killing your opponent(s) anyway without the help of this

And in all of these cases, it would be more efficient to have more HP than to have less HP.

 

[obi]

But then there's also the case in Pokemon like Sceptile and Jumpluff that the attack will OHKO you anyway, then it really doesn't matter what your stats are, which is a point in lower HP's favor.

 

[obi]

I decided to work some numbers for Leech Seed, so here it is!

Compare these two Celebi:

EVs: 252 HP / 64 Def / 160 SpDef / 32 Spd
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)

This has 404 HP, 277 Defense, and 276 Special Defense. This gives it an overall defense stat of 404 / ( 1 / 277 + 1 / 276) = ~55,850

EVs: 226 Def / 252 SpDef / 32 Spd
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)

This has 341 HP, 321 Def, and 299 Special Defense. This gives it an overall defense stat of 341 / (1 / 321 + 1 / 299) = ~52,780

This is a difference of only 5.8%. However, against a Pokemon with 404 HP, Celebi recovers 50 HP, which is 12.4% HP regained for the first set, compared to 14.7% for the second. This means that, if Celebi wishes to Subseed, it loses 9 HP every turn on the second spread, but 26 for the second. The first one will run out of Substitute PP, whereas the second will only be able to do so for 12 turns, assuming it starts out at max HP.

However, imagine a Pokemon like Sceptile, who is far more likely to be Subseeding. It usually has a 252 SpAtk, 252 Spd spread. Compare the differences in Subseeding for a Sceptile with a 31 HP IV and 4 HP EVs and a 3 HP IV (for max power HP Ice) 0 HP EVs Sceptile.

282 HP, 165 Def, 206 SpDef (17 HP from Leftovers, 70 HP per Substitute)
253 HP, 165 Def, 206 SpDef (15 HP from Leftovers, 63 HP per Substitute)

That's a 10% decrease in defensive abilities. However, the HP of a Pokemon needed to Subseed against for all 16 PP of Substitute is 312 for the first set, but it's 288 for the second spread. In a Sandstorm, against a Pokemon with 404 HP, the first set can safely Substitute for 9 turns, the second one can do so for 13 turns.

 

[Great Sage]

Obi, I think you got mixed up between first and second with your Celebis... :P

I think that the analyses may suggest HP EVs for things like Tangrowth because things like that are meant to take hits; Leech Seed is just a health and damage bonus.