From Jonathan's Reference Pages
As of Pokémon Black & White, 26 types of Pokéballs appear in the main Pokémon game series, of which 15 are normally available in Black and White. The same 15 are available in Diamond, Pearl and Platinum, with 7 further apricorn balls in HeartGold & SoulSilver.
The effectiveness of special Pokéballs is never given in game. Eevee's Pokéball performance calculator is useful for calculating the exact catch rate under specific circumstances.
Outside of Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver, the best general use Pokéball is the Dusk Ball. By playing at night (8:00pm - 3:59am), you always gain the benefit of a 3.5x capture rate, which is actually superior to the Ultra Ball (2x). The Dive Ball is equally good in water, but hard to obtain before Black & White.
Only three balls can give a better bonus. The Timer Ball is better than 3.5x after the 26th round of combat, useful for long battles with legendaries. The Quick Ball is only useful if you're lazy: it's 4x, but that's the same as paralyzing the opponent and using an Ultra Ball. The Nest Ball below level 5 gives a bonus is 3.6x-3.9x, but most Pokémon of that level are easily caught in any ball.
If you aren't playing at night, Repeat Ball gives you 3x on any Pokémon you already have, and Net Ball gives 3x on anything Bug or Water type. After that, nothing below Ultra Ball is worth using except for happiness evolution (Golbat in a Luxury Ball) or novelty (Chansey in a Heal Ball, legendaries in Premier Balls).
All the DPPt/BW advice applies to HG/SS, except that apricorn balls are superior in some circumstances.
Heavy Ball is the best in the game, but only for certain exceptionally heavy legendaries: Lugia and the Embedded Tower trio. These get an effective bonus of 7x-9x due to the unusual way the Heavy Ball works.
Fast Ball beats a Dusk Ball, offering a 4x bonus against 22 available species (see below), including six legendaries. Moon Ball works likewise for the six capturable species out of 14 whose lines include Moon Stone evolutions. Level Ball is a superior Nest Ball, offering 4x to capture Pokémon half your level or lower and 8x at a quarter of your level, useful for late-game Pokédex filling.
Safari Balls are only as good as Great Balls (1.5x). This is why you can't catch anything.
Only the following Pokémon benefit from the Fast Ball, being capturable with any Pokéball in HeartGold/SoulSilver and having a base speed stat of 100 or greater:
Dodrio, Dugtrio, Electabuzz, Electrode, Entei, Fearow, Kadabra, Latias, Latios, Linoone, Lugia, Mewtwo, Miltank, Mismagius, Persian, Raikou, Rapidash, Sneasel, Tauros, Tentacruel, Voltorb, Zapdos.
In the original Gold, Silver and Crystal, only roaming Pokémon gain benefit from the Fast Ball.
Only the following Pokémon benefit from the Heavy Ball, being capturable with any Pokéball in HeartGold/SoulSilver and having a weight of 451.5lbs (204.7kg) or greater:
Groudon, Gyarados, Kyogre, Lapras, Lugia, Mantine, Onix, Rayquaza, Snorlax, Steelix.
Of these, the Heavy Ball is only the best Pokéball for Groudon, Kyogre, Lugia, Rayquaza and Snorlax, as its flat numerical bonus benefits extremely heavy, difficult to capture Pokémon.
The Dusk Ball is still superior to the Heavy Ball for Snorlax at night (3.5x for Dusk Ball, vs 2.6x for Heavy Ball or 2x for Ultra Ball). Gyarados, Lapras, Mantine, Onix and Steelix are only found in caves or water and the Dusk Ball, Dive Ball or Net Ball is superior. Except for Steelix (2.2x with Heavy Ball), even an Ultra Ball is superior.
All other Pokémon are so light that the Heavy Ball actually has worse performance than a standard Pokéball.
Timer Ball takes until the 10th round to equal the Ultra Ball and 25th round to equal the Dusk Ball. It's really only useful for very long encounters, such as legendaries.
0 turns: 1.0 bonus 1 turns: 1.1 bonus 2 turns: 1.2 bonus 3 turns: 1.3 bonus 4 turns: 1.4 bonus 5 turns: 1.5 bonus 6 turns: 1.6 bonus 7 turns: 1.7 bonus 8 turns: 1.8 bonus 9 turns: 1.9 bonus 10 turns: 2.0 bonus 11 turns: 2.1 bonus 12 turns: 2.2 bonus 13 turns: 2.3 bonus 14 turns: 2.4 bonus 15 turns: 2.5 bonus 16 turns: 2.6 bonus 17 turns: 2.7 bonus 18 turns: 2.8 bonus 19 turns: 2.9 bonus 20 turns: 3.0 bonus 21 turns: 3.1 bonus 22 turns: 3.2 bonus 23 turns: 3.3 bonus 24 turns: 3.4 bonus 25 turns: 3.5 bonus 26 turns: 3.6 bonus 27 turns: 3.7 bonus 28 turns: 3.8 bonus 29 turns: 3.9 bonus 30+ turns: 4.0 bonus
Level Ball is as effective as an Ultra Ball at level 20, and as effective as a Dusk Ball at 5.
level 1, bonus 3.9 level 2, bonus 3.8 level 3, bonus 3.7 level 4, bonus 3.6 level 5, bonus 3.5 level 6, bonus 3.4 level 7, bonus 3.3 level 8, bonus 3.2 level 9, bonus 3.1 level 10, bonus 3.0 level 11, bonus 2.9 level 12, bonus 2.8 level 13, bonus 2.7 level 14, bonus 2.6 level 15, bonus 2.5 level 16, bonus 2.4 level 17, bonus 2.3 level 18, bonus 2.2 level 19, bonus 2.1 level 20, bonus 2.0 level 21, bonus 1.9 level 22, bonus 1.8 level 23, bonus 1.7 level 24, bonus 1.6 level 25, bonus 1.5 level 26, bonus 1.4 level 27, bonus 1.3 level 28, bonus 1.2 level 29, bonus 1.1 level 30+, bonus 1.0
Page created: 9th April 2011
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