Pokemon Ultra Sun and Moon - How to Effectively Catch Wild Pokemon: Guide

How to Effectively Catch Wild Pokémon

Capturing wild Pokémon is one of the main features of the Pokémon games. As you battle your way across the different locations in the game, you’ll need to have a versatile team composed of different Pokemon types for every situation.

To catch Pokémon, you’ll need throw Poke balls (or other stronger balls) at them when you encounter them in the wild.

There are two things to consider when trying to catch wild Pokemon. First, the less health they have, the greater your chances of capturing the Pokémon. Second is that the Pokémon are more susceptible to being caught when they are disabled (i.e. Frozen, Asleep, Paralyzed, etc.)

Weakening a wild Pokemon often forces it to use SOS call in battle. A good strategy then would be to disable the Pokemon before dealing damage to it. This is not the case for Legendary or psuedo-Legendary Pokémon, so disabling them with sleep should suffice.

Freeze, Sleep and Paralyze are three of the best disabling status effects when catching wild Pokemon. Using moves that inflict these effects greatly increases your success rate regardless of the type of Ball you use to catch Pokemon.

Recommended Moves for Catching Wild Pokémon

Spore

Spore is a Grass-type move that puts the target to sleep. With 100 percent Accuracy (meaning that the target is guaranteed to be put to sleep), it is very useful when catching wild Pokemon. The move lasts for 1 to 3 turns before the target wakes up.

Sleep is not effective against Pokémon with Insomnia and Vital spirit.

Thunder Wave

Thunder Wave is another effective when trying to catch wild Pokémon. It has 90 Accuracy and gives you the upper hand in a fight. Thunder Wave does not have any effect on Electric-type Pokémon and those with the Quick Feet Ability.

False Swipe

False Swipe is a Normal-type move that inflicts damage on a Pokémon but will leave it at 1 HP (should the damage be enough to knock it out).

Although this is not a staple offensive move, False Swipe is essential for capturing Pokémon without the risk of them fainting. The move is also very effective against Pseudo-legendary Pokémon. However, since the move type is Normal, it will not deal damage to Ghost-types Pokemon.

Mean Look

Mean Look is an Ability that prevents the target from being switch out in battle. This Ability works well with wild Pokémon who often escape when encountered, particularly certain Pseudo-legendary and Legendary Pokemon.

Soak

Soak is a move that can be used on both friendly and enemy Pokemon. The move turns your target into a pure Water type to either aid them or make them more vulnerable to certain moves in battle. This is particularly useful when trying to catch Ghost-type Pokemon, since changing them to Water-type allows you to damage them enough to catch them.

Recommended Pokémon for Catching Pokémon

Butterfree

Butterfree is useful for capturing wild Pokémon with items with its Compound Eyes Ability. Compound Eyes increases the chances of finding wild Pokémon with items by as much as 5, 20 or even 60 percent. Butterfree can also learn Sleep Powder to put wild Pokemon to sleep.

Absol

Absol can learn both Thunder Wave and False Swipe, two of the best moves for capturing wild Pokemon. Absol also has the Pressure ability which increases the chances encountering high-leveled Pokémon in the wild.

Octillery

Octillery can use Soak to catch Ghost-type Pokemon. You can then switch out to a Pokemon with False Swipe to lower the target’s HP to 1.

Breloom

Breloom can learn Spore and False Swipe. These two moves have good synergy to easily catch wild Pokemon in the game.

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