Game Theory - What Level Is Ash's Pikachu? (Pokemon)

Episode Date: March 18, 2023

Pokemon is one of the longest-running series out there and for years, one question has plagued us all. What level IS Ash's Pikachu? This little electric mouse defeated CRAZY POWERFUL foes. They've made it to the top of multiple leagues. So, you'd think Pikachu is one of, if not THE STRONGEST Pokemon around, right? Well... 

It's been three years since I undertook the mammoth task of calculating Ash's age. Two videos that drove me insane with days of research, cross-referencing, watching the show, but it was definitely worth it. What do you mean? That was nothing. I ripped my hair out researching that episode. Oh! Wait, is that it?

I barely felt a tingle. You've traveled to eight different regions at this point. Surely you have to be stronger than the... Oh, that's what the episode's about, isn't it? Bigo! Oh, internet, welcome to game theory. Back in 2018, I did a theory that nearly broke me. I wanted to figure out how old Ash Ketchum from the Pokemon anime really was.

And if you watched that theory, you'd know that it took a toll on me. Days and weeks of solid research and writing with details hidden in the craziest of places. But alas, dear theorists, that was just the warm up. Today, we are going to be looking at the other biggest question people have about the Pokemon anime. What level is Ash's Pikachu? You see, what started me down this path was the first episode, of Season 14, the start of the Pokemon black and white or best wishes arc. In this episode, Ash challenges a trainer who's just received his first Pokemon from Professor Juniper, a snivey.

In this battle, Pikachu lands one hit on his opponent and receives two hits in return. But after the second hit, Pikachu faints. He just loses the battle. How? At this point, Ash and Pikachu have traveled to five different regions, earn themselves a total of 52 badges and one against the toughest trainers, even literal gods. So that was it, friends. My theory brain went to work to figure out what level Pikachu would have to have been by the time he fought Snivey in that episode,

to prove definitively that there was literally no way that he could possibly lose. And to do it, I had to sit down and watch the preceding 651 episodes of the anime and 13 movies, which, yes, are considered canon. I double-checked. I had to watch every single one. Because guess what? All the battles that Pikachu appears in and makes a Pokemon faint in are not clearly marked off on any fan wiki in existence. Oh, boy, this was a rough. one, but I can tell you that my work was worth it because what I found at the end of my anime binge was shocking, to say the least.

Pikachu was nowhere near the level that I or anyone else in the fandom currently thinks he should be at. So what level is Pikachu? Our epic Pokemon journey starts now. So obviously the answer we reached today is going to be our best approximation of his level. The anime timeline and geography don't really line up with the games perfectly, and we all know that they don't totally follow the same rules as the games. They like their attacks won't work. Pikachu the horn! Smart move.

Brydon's horn acts just like a lightning rod! As such, I needed to set some ground rules. We're only going to be counting battles that we see on screen. Pikachu has had to have fought in the battle, and the opponent has had to have fainted, usually shown by big spirals across their eyes. Or they have to have been deemed unable to battle by a referee. We also won't be counting every time Team Rocket blasts off again.

There are, however, occasions where Team Rocket's Pokemon are shown to clearly faint prior to their blast off, and so those will be counted. We also won't be considering moves used as a sign of Pikachu leveling up. This is because the names of moves are sometimes used interchangeably, especially in the early seasons of English dub. They also have a habit of giving Pokemon moves that they can't physically learn, like Charmander using Skullbash, a move that the Charmander family can never learn,

or Pikachu learning the move Volt Tackle, a move that can only be obtained through breeding and not learned naturally. Now, for this theory, we're going to be using the flat rate EXP equation from the games, hence why this is a game theory, where the amount of EXP you earn is based off of the the following factors. If the opponent is wild or owned by a trainer, if the winning Pokemon is with its original trainer, the base experience yield to that specific Pokemon, if the Pokemon is holding a lucky egg, the level of the fainted

Pokemon, if an EXP point power is active, if the Pokemon has an affection rating of two and above, and if the winning Pokemon is past the level, it should evolve. All of that then gets multiplied together and divided by seven, multiplied by an amount based on if the EXP shares on, which leaves you with an equation that looks a little something like this. Section TEP, V, and S are all going to be set to one, as Ash is Pikachu's original owner, and the other items are not seen to be used. Variable V was only implemented in Gen 6, which we're not getting to today because we're stopping our calculation at that particular snivey fight. Pikachu's affection, though, is an interesting one. It becomes 1.2 if the affection is above 2,

which I believe happens around episode 30 onwards, as Pikachu there is shown to put aside his own feelings to help Ash get what he wants. So those are all the obvious and easy variables. The big challenge, is figuring out the level of each and every losing Pokemon throughout every single one of the anime battles. For the sake of the theory, we use two ways to calculate this. If the Pokemon is wild, I took the route that they were on, or at least the route they should be on, based on which cities they're traveling between, and from there, I looked at the highest level Pokemon and lowest level Pokemon that you can find on said route. From there, I simply took the median number, or middle number.

For example, on Route 1, the highest level is 7, but the lowest is 2, so the median level for that route is 5. For any trainer battles, I instead use the mean level or average level for that route, adding them all up and dividing by the number of trainers. The exception to this was when gym leaders or Team Rocket used Pokemon that their in-game counterparts also use, in which case I just use the level from that Pokemon directly. The final, final factor is that we'll be calculating Pikachu's level by taking his total experience and finding the cube root of that number. This is because Pikachu is part of the Medium Fast EXP group, and so this is how the game calculates it.

Alright, all right, geez, enough table setting. Let's actually start the quest, shall we? Pikachu's adventure begins in the Kanto region, when Professor Oak gives him to Ash as his first Pokemon, meaning that we start with Pikachu at level 5, just like he does in Pokemon Yellow. In that first episode, Pikachu actually gets his first win, and it's an impressive one.

Ash and Pikachu get chased by a flock of Spiro, which forces Pikachu to leap into the air and unleash an incredible thunder shock. Now, these Spiro would have been about level 5, considering that they're on Route 1. The most we see on screen at any given time is 46. So that right there gives us a nice, healthy 1,905 EXP right off the bat, immediately jumping Pikachu to level 12 in the first episode alone.

Things are looking good. Pikachu's victories after that first episode, though, become few and far between. Beating Brock's Geo Dude, a wild squirtle in episode 12, Lieutenant Serge's Rai Chu, a wild Grimer in episode 29, and a trainer's Paris on episode 41. Though in this episode, we're going to assume that Paris is level 5, due to the story pointing out that he's particularly weak. What a pathetic Paris.

At this point, we come to one of our first tricky calculations. Pikachu defeats Ash's Charmilian in that same episode, episode 41, which on its own is fine, but Charmilian only evolved the episode prior and will evolve again in just two episodes' time, not even appearing in the next episode. This means that we have very little to go off of what his level would be. So for the sake of simplicity, I'm just going to assume that he's now level 26, right in the middle of Charmellian's two evolutionary.

Evolutionary points. After this, Pikachu wins against a wild Doge Rio in a hospital in episode 44. Our first team Rocket faint in episode one of season two Then there's Blaine's Rydon and a return of Jesse's Arbock in episode six Few more uneventful battles before Pikachu has an incredible victory against three Pokemon at the start of the first movie Then have a fight with a trainer's Merriwack in season two episode 19 Pete's Arcanine in the third round of the Pokemon League episode 22 and his final Kanto victory Richie's Butterfree in the fourth round episode 25 So by the end of the Kanto region, Pikachu has won 21 battles,

and by my calculations, is now level 30, which makes his victories that much more impressive. Considering by the fourth round of the Pokemon League, your opponents are supposed to be in their high 50s. So, I guess Ash is either smarter than we think, or he's incredibly lucky. Either way, his luck soon runs out. He's defeated by Richie,

and Ash and Pikachu head on over to the Orange Islands. And, um, this is where things go a little off the rails. See, the Orange Islands have never appeared in any Pokemon. game. Why? Why couldn't I have picked a simpler episode? It's okay, Matt Pat. Remember what the therapist said. Breathe in, breathe out. It's okay. I'm good. I'm good. Let's get to it. The closest thing I could find to the Orange Islands was the Sevi Islands, introduced in fire red and leaf green, which, uh, fun. I never thought about this when I was actually playing the games, but it finally clicked as I was researching for this episode. Sevi. VII, that's seven in Roman numerals, but it's also a pun. See, Sev is short for seven, and then the two eyes at the end represent the two other islands. Mind explosion. Anyway, the Sevi Islands are located in a similar place on the wider world map, and they're basically the adventure after your main adventure in the Conto region, so I'm guessing they're gonna have to do. Pikachu doesn't have many battles in the Orange Islands,

but he does have himself a few wins. He beats Team Rockets Arbock, Weising, and Liketong in Season 2, Episode 34, which would be similar levels to that of the Rocket Grunts that you find in the warehouse on Island Five. There's a wild ride-on and Jesse's Arbock a second time in Season 2, episode 48, and a gym leader's Merrowack and Alika-Zam in Season 2, episode 52, which I based off the trainer tower on Island 7. To finish it off, Ash challenges the champion of the Orange League, whose levels I was able to calculate from the Fire Red and Leaf Green League champion rival Blue,

when you challenge him to a rematch after beating the Sevy Islands, making them all about Level 73. Pikachu crushes it, beating both his Ditto and Dragonite in Season 2, episode 55 and 56. Ash actually wins this battle entirely, and enters the Orange Island Hall of Fame, which, strangely enough, nobody ever seems to acknowledge. The show talks all about how the Orange League has trainers that are... whole lot tougher.

And even though Ash wins, no one ever seems to remember it. Even in blogs outside of the show, he only got attention when he finally won the Alola League. Like, oh my gosh, Ash actually won something for a change. He won back in season two guys. I mean, what does a guy gotta do to get some recognition around here? Your time will come, Ash, your time will come. But before that, we got three more regions to plow through.

At the end of the Orange Islands, Pikachu has amassed 35 levels. Wait, really? Is that it? Are you taking down Pokemon that are twice as powerful? At this point you might think that my pursuit's been wasted, as by my own logic, Pikachu shouldn't have been able to win those fights, but I'm not gonna let anime logic get in the way of my cold hard calculations. That is, empirically speaking, what level he should be at based on all the fights he's

done at this point in the series. So, we're carrying onward to the Joto arc, which brings around a shift in the way that the anime works. The first two seasons had two regions and two leagues, but in Joto, we actually have three seasons just to complete that one league, meaning that there are way more battles per region along the way. So you would think that this is where Pikachu's level would start to climb faster, but there are two problems. First, Pikachu takes a bit of a back seat during the Joto arc to let Ash's shiny new Pokemon take the spotlight.

Secondly, the start of a new Canon region also means an interesting twist with regards to the game mechanics. The Pokemon levels within the region reset. Although at this point, Pikachu is at level 35, the Pokemon in the early routes will be very low-level Pokemon, as you'd expect when you start a new game. The anime does does make a point of this when Ash first arrives, showing that he's too overpowered. Hence, Pikachu taking a back seat and us say goodbye to characters like Charzard and Squirtle early on. Now instead of me, just rattling off a bunch of battles, I'm gonna show you the list here. You can trust me, I watched them all.

Some noteworthy things worth mentioning, episode 41, Ash runs into the other team rocket, Cassidy and Biff. The name is Butch. Can't you get anything right? Sorry, Butch. So for these guys, I decided to take the grunts from the radio tower because it's the same city of Golden Rod, but also there's a striking resemblance between Cassidy and the female Rocket grunt. Next, Pikachu has a run-in with Whitney's famous Mil-Tank in season 4 episode 1, which he does defeat upon second try, much like I did back in the day, stupid Mil-tank and your stupid rollout. But the big headache and calculations came from our old friends, the original Team Rocket.

In episode 33 of season 4, Pikachu defeats Jesse's Arbock, and in episode 24 of season 5, he defeats James's wheezing. This is where the problems begin. See, these Pokemon are from the very first region, meaning that they must have grown since we last beat them on the Orange Islands at level 49. However, because the region reset, we can't take our usual levels from the surrounding trainers, as suddenly they'd be back to, like, level 20, which just isn't possible. So I had to make an educated guess as to what level they'd be. Assuming they're growing at a similar rate to Pikachu, I'd put them down as Arbach being level 55 and wheezing being level 60 at the time of their respective battles. But if you don't agree with that methodology, it doesn't matter in the long.

run, which you'll see later. As I mentioned, Pikachu was used a lot less in this region. Only 21 winning battles, the same as Kanto, but spread out over three seasons. This gives Pikachu a current level of 40. Only five levels more since we last left off in the Orange Islands. But at least now he's at a point where taking on Pokemon League opponents is at least a little bit more believable. Which brings us to the next stop on our journey, Hoin. And this is where things really get interesting. You see, there's a theory online written by Reddit

user Joe's Cool that claims that Pikachu's level resets at the start of every other region, not including the Orange Islands. To quote from that original theory, in the final Joto episode, Hoan Alone, James fires up a giant magnet which causes a bunch of stuff to come up and whack Ash, knocking him out. In addition, Pikachu gets trapped onto the magnet and his electricity is drained. These two events cause Ash to lose part of his memory and Pikachu to lose the power it gained through its journey. This explains why Ash and Pikachu seem to reset. They both get caught up in an accident that seriously hurts them.

And this is a great theory that explains a lot. Or at least it would be if the episodes didn't directly contradict all of it. And again, I know this, because I gotta watch them all to do the theory. Sure, we see Pikachu get overcharged at the end of Joto. Pikachu! But the very next episode, the start of Hoan, were told multiple times that Pikachu is able to recover back to his normal state. Pikachu's output is incredible.

It appears that Pikachu's electricity pressure has reached normal levels. And all this is without even mentioning the fact that Ash's memory seems completely unaffected by all of it. A similar thing happens in In the Shadow of Zekrom, the first episode of the Black and White series. In this episode, Pikachu and Ash get caught up in a thunder cloud, and Pikachu gets overloaded by electricity from Zekrom. Pikachu is completely enveloped inside a powerful electric field. All that electrical energy Pikachu absorbed from the thunderstorm was too much. And that would explain why Pikachu's not able to use any electric-type moves. And while it does certainly seem to hamper him temporarily,

Picchu's level again doesn't actually reset, as even without electricity, he's still able to use advanced moves like Iron Tail, that, as we see earlier in the anime, Pikachu had trouble actually learning. It's also worth noting that Pikachu fully recovers one episode later, and also, also, Pikachu getting overcharged is a very common occurrence throughout the series, with no long-term consequences to his power levels. Anyway, all that's to say that there isn't solid evidence of levels getting reset here. Plus, it would ruin the fun of figuring out what the big number is at the series. the end of this thing. So Hoan, the playable region from Ruby, Sapphire, and later Emerald. This region spans four whole seasons of the anime and Ash returns to using Pikachu as his primary

Pokemon, which means a lot more battles for him. Things start off simple enough, just a basic journey following along the path of the games, but midway through things get a little funny as season 8 shifts to follow more closely with Pokemon Emerald in order to coincide with that game's release. You can tell this in season 8 episode 18 with the introduction of Juan, who's the 8th gym leader in Emerald as opposed to Wallace from Ruby and Sapphire. The anime also includes the Battle Frontier, which is only present in Pokemon Emerald. How the Battle Frontier works in Pokemon Emerald is that there are two categories of gameplay. Level 50 and Open Level 50 is the first class for Pokemon level level 50 or below,

and all the opponent Pokemon will be at level 50 themselves. Whereas Open Level Level means any Pokemon over Level 50 can enter, and the opponent's Pokemon will match your highest level, Pokemon. Fortunately for us, at this point in the series, Pikachu actually caps in at 47. So he only qualifies for the level 50 mode, meaning that all the frontier brain Pokemon are going to level at 50. I love it when things just work out. After beating the brains, he only gains himself one level, and so Pikachu finishes off the Hoan

region at level 48. Next up, Sino. And this region. Ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho. Ho-in was a breeze, nothing complicated, easy to follow, but I knew it was too good to be true. Sino was determined to break me. Another four-season region, another 49 battles, which you can see here. But the worst part?

The worst, worst part was Team Rocket. Curse you, Jesse and James! In the immortal words of Markiplier, it's big brain time. So the first Pokemon Pikachu encounters in the Sino region is Dawn's new Piplup. That's easy enough, it's level 5, all-starter Pokemon are. However, in that first episode, Pikachu also encounters Meowf, Mime Jr., and Wobafet from Team Rocket. He of course makes quick work of him, but the issue is that we have very little to go on for the levels. Mime Jr. is probably the least

complicated, as we see him use the move Mimic in episode 17 of season 9. We also know that move-based evolution is considered important within the Pokemon anime universe. As later in Diamond and Pearl, A-Pom learns double hit and soon after evolves into Ambipom. So even though time has passed since Mime Jr. used Mimic, he can't have leveled up, otherwise he would have evolved into Mr. Mime. Meaning Mime Jr. here in this battle is sitting at level 30. Wavafet's a little harder to figure out, but we know that he was traded back on Route 34 of the Joto region, which would have made him at about level 11. So going on the idea that he's traveled two regions and taken into account Pikachu's level gain,

I put him at level 40. The hardest in this instance though is Miao. Last time we saw him lose a battle was in Kanto, where I estimated his level to be 31. It would be safe to assume that he grew at the same rate as Arbock and Weezing until they were released, which means by this point I've estimated Miaoth to be level 7. Which I know seems high, but once again, it's not gonna make all that big of a difference in the final tally The last anomaly in this region is the battle tower that Ash partakes in during his time back in Twin Leaf Town Episode 36 of Season 12.

The Battle Tower in Diamond and Pearl is slightly different to the Battle Frontier in that the only option is level 50, with all Pokemon being dropped to that level in your party regardless of their actual level. As this throws off a lot of calculations, I instead opted for the open level approach from the battle frontier, making his opponents the same level as Pikachu, which at this point is 58. And now, we're finally here. After Pikachu fights a few more Pokemon, we are finally in the Univa region. This is once again where the series tries to do a soft reboot by trying to make Ash and Pikachu seem like a new team. However, we know that this is absolutely 100% not true.

Ash retains all of his memories of the journey thus far. When Dawn rejoins the team, we get this interaction. And later when Dawn specifically asks about Brock cooking for her and Ash on the journey, we also know that Pikachu retains all the moves that he's learned up to this point, like Iron Tail, which a new Pokemon trainer is unlikely to have taught a brand new Pikachu. Even the show only half-heartedly adheres to its own reboot, as in that very same episode we get this. Hard to say Pikachu reverted back to level five when he's actively being called

the world's most powerful Pikachu. So, with all that being said, it means we're here. We finally arrived at that big final number. Pikachu's level in his battle against Snivey. What is he? Level 90? 100? 200?

We'll strap in because that number is, after compiling all 148 Pikachu battles across 600 plus episodes and doing really elaborate calculations to get there. Drum roll please. Pikachu's final level is 61. Kind of underwhelming, right? Like, he's traversed five whole regions. Most people are getting close to that level.

after doing a single run through a game. Even if you didn't like some of my estimations for Team Rocket Battles, if we remove them entirely from the equation, it would still only put Pikachu at level 59. Any way you slice it, he's not as powerful as we all think he should be. I've seen forums of people online saying, it must be 100. If the levels went over 100, he'd be like a thousand at this point.

But having sat down and painstakingly scrubbed through all the episodes, looking for every tiny detail, I can tell you definitively that, That is not the case. He is like low 60s at best. So what's that mean for our battle against Snivey? Long story short, Snivey still should have been toast. As I mentioned at the start, Pikachu is the first to land a hit with a successful quick attack. To give Snivey the best, best possible chance, we're going to assume that this is just the buffest level five you could possibly get, with an HP of 21 and defense of 12. And let's also say that Pikachu is my lower

estimate of level 59. At that level, the lowest Pikachu's attack stat could be is With quick attack's base power being 40 and the randomizer feature set to its lowest setting of 0.85, we can use the in-game equations to figure out that Pikachu's attack would do 95 damage and 21 Snivey HP minus 95 damage equals negative 74. Snivey could be knocked out three more times with just that one hit. And to really round it off, let's just say that somehow Snivey did survive the quick attack. When it goes on the offensive, its attack and special attack stats are both 11. Pikachu's lowest possible stats here would be HP 110, defense 52, special defense 64. Let's also say the randomizer hits at its highest point, and both attacks are critical hits for Snivey. With tackle having a base power of 50 and Leith Tornado being 65, the most total damage that could be done would be 32 hit points.

Pikachu would still have 78 HP remaining. So where does all this leave us? Well, I did it. I calculated what level Pikachu is, a task that no sane person has ever completed. I feel amazing and also very, very empty. This show is just painfully repetitive. Anyway, kudos to you, Ash. Sure, you lost against Snivey.

You don't know they have to weaken a Pokemon before catching it, and you didn't realize that bug Pokemon are weak against flying types, but you've managed to win against the Elite 4 using a Pokemon that's half their level, and that's got to account for something. So maybe you are better than everyone gives you credit for. Trico! So is it a water type? No, Ash, it's a grass type.

Never mind. Still an idiot. But hey. That's just a theory. A game theory. Thanks for watching.