A PvP Analysis on Gogoat (City Safari New Release)

EDITOR’S NOTE: Niantic quietly removed Rock Slide from Gogoat’s movepool just before they released it. Unfortunately those parts of the below analysis are now moot, but hopefully they will bring it back upon its future non-event release.

Howdy folks! While there is surely some controversy about the limited nature of its release (with announced releases only in upcoming City Safaris in Seoul, Barcelona, and Mexico City), the fact is that GOGOAT is coming to Pokémon GO at long last, so it’s time to take a look at it. 🐐

If you want to cut RIGHT to the guts of the analysis, let’s put our TLDR right here up here at the top with our Bottom Line Up Front:

B.L.U.F.

• Gogoat is a better Tangrowth, with a better Grass charge move and slightly better bulk. Sorry, shaggy one.
• Gogoat has a fantastic (and completely unique) Grass moveset and a near-perfect coverage move that deals super effective damage to four of the five typings that represent its most direct counters.
• This one has some legit value in all three main Leagues. Ultra is where it may make the most immediate impact, but certain Great League Cups will surely feel its impact, and it even has some potential way up in Master League. This is a good one to grind when able, folks!

Now for details on that summary, read on!

GOGOAT Stats and Moves

Gogoat Grass

Great League Stats

Ultra League Stats

Master League Stats

Many of the bigger Grasses in PvP have a secondary typing, so a quick reminder on a mono-Grass like Gogoat: resists Water, Ground, Electric, and other Grass, and vulnerable to Fire, Ice, Poison, Flying, and Bug damage. Not great, not terrible.

Gogoat falls in the middle of Grasses in terms of stats, being bulkier than things like Venusaur, Trevenant, and Lurantis, but less bulky than things like Meganium and Serperior. Overall its stats track very closely to Abomasnow, and almost directly in line with Chesnaught, just to give some frames of reference.

But enough of that. Let’s get to what’s shaping up as a fantastic movepool.

Fast Moves

• Vine Whip – Grass type, 2.5 DPT, 4.0 EPT, 1.0 CoolDown
• Rock Smash – Fighting type, 3.0 DPT, 2.0 EPT, 1.5 CD
• Zen Headbutt – Psychic type, 2.67 DPT, 2.0 EPT, 1.5 CD

So as an analyst of the game, I’ve had to spend a lot of time explaining various fast moves and explaining in countless articles why one is better than another for a particular Pokémon, sometimes diving deep in nuances of effectiveness and STAB and synergy with the charge moves and such between multiple seemingly viable fast moves.

This is not one of those times. Vine Whip blows the other two away, as you can see by their stats. Rock Smash and Zen Headbutt are just not viable moves unless you happen to be Zen Headbutt Throh in Fighting Cup or something.

Go with Vine Whip. Fast move analysis complete! 😁

Well, I do have one more interesting piece of analysis. Other than Generation 9’s Legendary Ogerpon, Gogoat is the last Pokémon we’ll see introduced into Pokémon GO that learns Vine Whip in the main series games. Everything else is either Gen 6 or earlier, Comfey from Gen 7, or Zarude from Gen 8, all of which are already in GO. This is a shame, as Vine Whip is by far the best overall PvP move Grass has, IMO. After Gen6, Bullet Seed and Leafage increasingly took over and Vine Whip basically disappears. Keep this in mind as we get to Dolliv/Arboliva analysis next week…. 😬

For now, though, on to the charge moves.

Charge Moves

• Brick Break – Fighting type, 40 damage, 35 energy
• Leaf Blade – Grass type, 70 damage, 35 energy
• Seed Bomb – Grass type, 60 damage, 45 energy
• Rock Slide – Rock type, 75 damage, 45 energy

As with fast moves, charge move analysis can be painstaking, even onerous work.

But yet again, this is not one of those occasions.

Leaf Blade makes Seed Bomb unnecessary, dealing 10 more damage for 10 less energy. And it also makes Brick Break mostly superfluous too, as it takes two levels of effectiveness for Brick Break to be better than Leaf Blade. “Uhhhh… what does ‘levels of effectiveness’ mean, JRE?” Things at the same “level of effectiveness” are moves that both deal neutral damage to a target, such as when facing a Normal type, everything is at the same level of effectiveness (neutral) except for super effective Fighting damage, and not very effective Ghost damage. Similarly, Grass and Electric both deal the same level of effective damage (super effective) versus Water types, and similarly, the same level of effectiveness (resisted, or “not very effective”) versus opposing Grass types. Things separated by one “level” of effectiveness would include, say, Brick Break and Leaf Blade versus a Normal type, where Break is super effective, and Blade is merely neutral. However, in cases like this, Leaf Blade is STILL better because it still ends up dealing more damage than Brick Break for the same energy cost. (For example, versus Vigoroth in Great League, Leaf Blade deals 58 damage on average, while Brick Break — despite being super effective — still deals only 44 damage.) This is also true versus things like Umbreon, which also takes super effective from Break and only neutral from Blade… and Blade consistently deals notably more damage. (And with Leaf Blade alone, Gogoat defeats Umbreon AND Vigoroth, by the way.) The only cases where Brick Break would be better is where there are TWO levels of effectiveness between it and Leaf Blade, such as versus Steel types where Break is super effective and Blade is not very effective. One such example would be Registeel, which takes about 27 damage from Brick Break, but only 22 from resisted Leaf Blade. Admittedly, however, these cases are rather rare, as in fact Steel is the ONLY typing that resists Grass and takes super effective damage from Fighting. Most Steels in PvP have a secondary typing, such as Ground (Galarian Stunfisk, Steelix, Excadrill) which takes neutral from Grass and thus leaves Leaf Blade better (just one level of effectiveness difference).

All that to say: while there ARE edge cases for Brick Break, I think it is, at best, a possible standout in certain funky Limited metas. In Open, I think you want Leaf Blade for sure. And as a fun aside, this makes Gogoat the ONLY Pokémon in the game with the potent Vine Whip/Leaf Blade combo. I ran a poll on Twitter (it’s only ‘X’ if I acknowledge the name change! 🙉) asking folks to pick the best Grass fast move out of Vine Whip, Bullet Seed, Magical Leaf, and Leafage, and Vine Whip took 70% of the vote. And as hinted earlier, other than future Gen9 Legendary Ogerpon, Gogoat is the last Pokémon we’ll be getting in Pokémon GO with Vine Whip. No other unreleased Pokémon (other than Ogerpon) learns that move in MSG. At least they got that Whip/Blade combo in once, here at the end of the line!

For coverage/second move, I think it’s Rock Slide without question. Not only does it deal much more damage than anything else here NOT named Leaf Blade, but it provides excellent coverage versus Ice, Fire, Bug, and Flying types that plague Grasses like Gogoat. The only thing that Gogoat is left vulnerable to that Rock Slide does not directly threaten with super effective damage are Poison types, and it at least deals neutral to them (Grass is resisted).

Put it all together (Vine Whip + Leaf Blade + Rock Slide), and you get the following:

GREAT LEAGUE

So here is how Gogoat ends up in Open Great League. Not surprisingly shreds most all the big Waters except freeze-em-out Dewgong and buffed-Aerial Ace Mantine, but including scary Walrein and Pelipper (Rock Slide helps a lot in that latter case), as well as the big Grounds (to include even Galarian Stunfisk). Then it goes out and overpowers Umbreon, Obstagoon, Vigoroth, Dunsparce, Defense Deoxys, and Cresselia in neutral-on-neutral battles. And just for good measure, thanks to Rock Slide, Gogoat runs through Froslass, Charm Alolan Ninetales, Talonflame, and non-Shadow Charizard too! (Gogogoat CAN outrace Shadow Charizard too, but it’s a much closer race.) And Rock Slide also gives it a leg up versus other (non-Poison, non-Fighting) Grass types as well.

Admittedly, it’s probably not quite good enough for general Open GL play, and is instead perhaps better suited to Limited metas. But I do believe we’ll start seeing it pop up at least in Cups, and having one on your Great League bench will be a good idea.

ULTRA LEAGUE

At this level we have a perhaps more encouraging story. Grasses already thrive a bit better versus the current Ultra League meta, and Gogogoat does as well. You still lock down nearly all Waters (the very few exceptions include things like Pelipper/Mantine, Tentacruel, and Shadow Walrein), as well as Rocks (Crustle, Aurorus, and Nihilego being the only exceptions) and Grounds (Steelix, Nidoqueen, Shadow Gliscor and Shadow Flygon being the only notable exceptions), as expected. You still beat Charizard, though Talonflame becomes more of a who-has-more-energy coin flip. Gogogogoat has enough bulk and neutral damage output to outlast the big Charmers and things like Scrafty, Obstagoon, Greedent, Dubwool, Snorlax, Cofagrigus, Cresselia, and CharmTales (mostly similar to Great League), and with the right IVs, Umbreon still as well. Here too I suspect we’ll see it more in Cups than in Open play, but on the right team, there are far crazier ideas.

Gogoat Sprite	Shiny Gogoat Sprite

MASTER LEAGUE??

Wait wait… Master League? THE Master League? For a Grass type that tops out at 3163 CP? ‘JRE, have you completely lost it?!’ I mean, maybe. But just hear me out.

Grass types have sneaky high potential in Master League. A full dozen of the top meta options are Water and/or Ground types, including Groudon, Kyogre, Swampert, Landorus, Excadrill, Gyarados, Garchomp, Mamoswine, Ursaluna and others. Gogogogogoat beats ALL of those except Groudon, despite what is often a massive CP gap, as well as all the main Fairies (Charmers and Zacian/Xerneas). And it even comes a breath away from outmuscling the mighty Mewtwo.

Now of course, that doesn’t quite stack up to the performance of Legendary/Mythicals like Virizion or Zarude. They can beat things Gogogogogogoat cannot like Dialga and Yveltal (Virizion), Mewtwo and the Giratinas (Zarude), and Snorlax and Melmetal (both) thanks to the typing and/or coverage of that pair’s secondary typings. That being said, neither of them can beat Fairies like Gogogogogogogoat is able to. And Gogogogogogogogoat can be built much more easily (once it eventually becomes a more common spawn/hatch for those of us not attending City Safaris) and cheaply than a Legendary like Virizion or especially a Mythical like Zarude, of course. If you can’t afford those and want to see what a Grass can do in Master, consider giving Go⁸goat a try. 🐐

Alright, that’s all I got for today. Sorry this one took a while, it’s just been one heck of a week with very little free time to write. At least this is going out ahead of the first City Safari!

Until next time (which will be JRE Article #494!), you can always find me on Twitter with regular Pokémon GO analysis nuggets or Patreon, if you’re feeling extra generous.

Thanks for your faithful readership, folks. Stay safe out there, and catch you next time, Pokéfriends!