Sylveon Is Being Woefully Underused By Pokemon Unite
Sylveon, who has been a support Pokemon for eight years, is for some baffling reason an Attacker in Pokemon Unite.
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Fairy fans rejoice, Sylveon has finally joined Pokemon Unite’s rapidly expanding roster. Unfortunately, this marks yet another misstep in terms of properly integrating new ‘mons into the game – while Pokemon Unite is obviously a Pokemon game, it regularly demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of its source material.
Despite already having a whopping seven Attackers on offer, Timi Studios has made the baffling decision to make Sylveon yet another offensive pick. While it’s true that Sylveon has an excellent Special Attack stat and access to Pixilate-boosted Hyper Voice in mainline Pokemon, it is far more renowned for its ability to learn moves like Wish, Heal Bell, and Protect. On top of that, its Special Defense clocks in at a massive 130 – it’s more of a Defender than Mamoswine, who was also weirdly miscategorised.
I don’t mean to say Sylveon should be a Defender as much as I want to highlight how this issue – miscategorisation – is not new to Unite. Gardevoir, its first post-launch character, was also messed up. Blissey was properly introduced as a Support pick, although its build – while not egregiously bad – is a little lacking. Blastoise is excellent by every metric. Mamoswine should have been labeled an All-Rounder, although aside from its green pre-match card, it’s a stellar addition to the game.
Sylveon, though? Sylveon is fine, but that’s almost worse than Sylveon being bad. For such an excellent Pokemon – and one of the better Eeveelutions – to be this undeniably lukewarm is extremely disappointing. It’s an alright Attacker, sure, but it could have been an S-tier Support.
As I mentioned before, Sylveon’s primary role in competitive Pokemon is to serve as a tanky support capable of keeping its team healthy with Wish and Heal Bell. It can also eat most non-super-effective special moves for brekkie and keep its own health bar topped up by alternating between Wish and Protect. Several Eeveelutions are similar – Vaporeon and Umbreon, my other two favourites, spring to mind – while ‘mons like Jolteon are far better suited to going on the offensive.
Speaking of which, if Jolteon had been added to Unite – which would be a little bit silly given how biased it already is towards Gen 1 – then I wouldn’t be complaining about its status as an Attacker (although Jolteon would clearly be a Speedster). It’s only annoying because it’s Sylveon, a brilliant and beloved Eeveelution who is specifically known for its defense and support capabilities. Sylveon as a Defender? Not great, especially off the back of Blastoise and Mamoswine, but I’d take it. Sylveon as a Support? Game-changer.
You’ve probably noticed this if you’ve played a decent amount of Unite, but a lot of people tend to steer well clear of Support Pokemon. This is understandable to an extent – I’ve already written about how Pokemon Unite needs to drastically overhaul its scoreboard weighting if it intends to incentivise role diversity. What’s less understandable is that ‘mons like Wigglytuff are extremely good, which makes the fact they’re rarely played pretty strange.
While some people complain about characters being overpowered in online games, I’m almost always okay with supports being strong because it means people will actually play them. If Sylveon’s build was slightly adjusted – say, exchanging Draining Kiss for Wish or Mystical Fire for Heal Bell – it could, with its current stats remaining largely unchanged, make for an excellent offensive Support. Given its ability to rack up kills, it could have partially mitigated the prominence of Greninja, Zeraora, Pikachu, and Cinderace in every single match you play. I don’t dislike these Pokemon as Pokemon, but in Unite they do my nut in. If I hear Cinderace’s Unite Move screech one more time this week, I might accidentally put my head through my Switch.
Sylveon isn’t bad by any means. I’m also admittedly happy it was added to the game – whenever Unite adds new ‘mons from my own personal pool of favourites, I’m obviously going to be pretty stoked. I’ve only played two ranked matches as Sylveon – both of which I scored over 100 points in, both of which I lost on account of my supposedly Veteran team not knowing Zapdos exists – but I’m having a good time with it for the most part.
The issue isn’t that Sylveon was chosen for Unite or even that Sylveon is broken in some way. The issue is that Sylveon in Unite is not really Sylveon in the same way that Mamo isn’t Mamo and Garde isn’t Garde. A striking example of this same principle is Absol being labeled a Speedster. Consider this: Absol has a higher Attack and Special Attack stat than Cinderace, while Cinderace’s Speed is a whopping 44 points higher than Absol’s. In Unite, however, Absol is a Speedster and Cinderace is an Attacker. Even Mega Absol is slower than Cinderace. It’s also worth noting that Greninja is faster than all of them.
I know Unite is a different game and therefore isn’t necessarily tied to stats from the main series, although I think the stats established in numbered gens are what have traditionally defined spin-offs for years – even the anime largely honours them, despite occasionally indulging in some… let’s say ‘creative’ liberties. Unite ditches all of this entrenched information in order to create its own versions of existing characters, which is both weird and a little over-important, if not entitled. Most of the Gen 1 ‘mons are pretty spot on – Sunny Day Venusaur used to be a great sweeper, Charizard has always had various utilities, and Blastoise’s bulk makes it a bona fide rock, making their Attacker, All-Rounder, and Defender designations, respectively, relatively accurate. Previously mentioned ‘mons like Cinderace, Absol, Mamowsine, Gardevoir, and of course Sylveon are unfortunately not privy to this same level of precision. Timi wants Sylveon to be a ranged Attacker? Well, it can just ignore its comp viability and established stats. Give it a couple of hard-hitting techniques and inflate its Special Attack so it can dominate top lane. Job done.
Job not done, though. For someone like me – a Pokemon fan for decades who loves competitive video games and has already put so much time into Unite that I’m embarrassed to reveal my hour count here – it’s deeply disappointing to see a potentially great Support being designed as yet another unnecessary Attacker. Sylveon could have changed Unite for the better – instead, it’s being wasted to the extent that I can lock it whenever I want because nobody else is using it. Given that this could be the only Eeveelution we ever see in Unite, it’s all just a bit sad.
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