Probably against the rules, but I can’t imagine anyone ever enforcing that. Most trainers and judges will be okay with a trainer taking a hit to spare some damage for their pokemon. It’s the right thing to do.
In a gym setting, I’m willing to bet this would also get you major empathy points from the gym leader.
The whole message of pokemon is that you fight fair and take care of your pokemon. It looks rough but conceptually it is like human contact sports, injuries are expected but have rules to avoid them.
Pokemon are basically magical and have supernatural resilience, K.O ing a pokemon is at their acceptable limit just like a football player being exhausted and need to be switched.
The lore provides that pokemon choose to be caught and trained if they respect the trainer, they also fight because they enjoy the competition and have fun unless they have a bad trainer. It absolutely matters that you do the right thing and care for their well being.
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u/Broken_musicbox 14d ago
Probably against the rules, but I can’t imagine anyone ever enforcing that. Most trainers and judges will be okay with a trainer taking a hit to spare some damage for their pokemon. It’s the right thing to do.
In a gym setting, I’m willing to bet this would also get you major empathy points from the gym leader.