Heracross
Encyclopedia : H : HE : HER : Heracross
Heracross (ヘラクロス Heracross in Japanese, Skaraborn in German and Scarhino in French) is a fictional character of the Pokémon franchise.
Heracross is a beetle-like Pokémon, who was obviously modeled after the hercules beetle, a beetle named after the mythological hero Hercules. This is were the "hera-" part of the Pokémon's name comes from. "Hercules" is the latinized version of the character's Greek name, "Heracles". As for the "-cross" part, this most likely refers to the cross-like shape at the end of the horn.
Appearance
Heracross is a large, beetle-like, winged bipedal insect. Its entire body is blue. It has a capsule-shaped thorax similar to Pinsir's, a pair of yellow eyes and two clawed arms and feet. Growing from its head is a large T-shaped horn, which is flanked on either side by a smaller antenna. When it first appeared, many thought it would be the evolved form of Pinsir although they are related.Biology
Heracross is a powerful but docile Pokémon. Its natural habitat is forests and its diet consists of tree sap and honey. Its strength is such that it can topple large trees if it so wished.Heracross is endowed both defensively and offensively, giving it excellent protection against potential predators. Its body is entirely covered in a shell as hard as steel, which wards off many attacks. Heracross's main weapon is its large horn, of which it is particularly proud. However, it only uses it in the wild to deter its foes, not hurt them.
To chase off intruders, Heracross tends to charge at them in a straight line, diving beneath them, scooping them up by thrusting its horn under their belly, and finally flinging them away with considerable force. Thanks to its power, Heracross can easily lift in this way foes a hundred times heavier than it is (5400 kg). It keeps a steady footing while doing this by planting its claws into the ground or a tree trunk.
In the video games
In Pokémon Gold, Silver and Crystal, Heracross could be encountered by using the Headbutt move on trees in mountainous areas of the Johto region. In Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire, Heracross is located in the Safari Zone. In Pokémon Colosseum, Heracross is a Shadow Pokémon and can be Snagged in Realgam Tower. In Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen, Heracross is available in Pattern Bush.
Heracross's stats are decent and generally above-average, especially its very high attack and high special defense. Heracross can further raise its attack, commonly using its Swords Dance technique.
Heracross is often used in a purely offensive manner in battle, since it learns many powerful physical moves that match its types, such as Brick Break, Earthquake, Reversal and its signature move, Megahorn. When Heracross was first introduced, its unique knowledge of Megahorn made it a good counter to Psychic-type Pokémon, if a rather risky one due to its Fighting type. Heracross's type combination of Bug and Fighting also makes its quadruply weak to Flying-type attacks, weak to Fire-type and Psychic-type moves, but resists a handy five types; Fighting, Grass, Ground, Bug and Dark. While its Rock Slide techniques can be used to cover its Flying-type weakness, the speed of flying-type Pokémon generally makes this a risky play.
A popular strategy used by many is to equip Heracross with a Choice Band, an item that only allows the use of one attack (the first one used after the Pokémon comes out), but increases that move's power by 50%, in conjunction with Megahorn, an already powerful move with high accuracy. This combination, in conjunction with Attack training, can easily one-hit-knock-out many Pokémon.
Heracross' unique typing makes it unusual as it has type advantages of many types, it is well known for using Megahorn as a counter against many high defense Pokémon like Umbreon and Claydol.
In the anime
Heracross is one of the Pokémon Ash has used in his team. He caught it during Episode #121 (A Sappy Ending), after helping its swarm against a rival swarm of Pinsir. Heracross is a powerful Pokémon, but it is often distracted by the sight of trees, going over to them to suck their sweet sap. When in the presence of Ash's Bulbasaur, Heracross tries to feed off Bulbasaur's bulb, much to the latter's frustration. Ash eventually left Heracross in the care of Professor Oak, where it has remained since.Heracross is voiced by Katsuyuki Konishi in all adaptations of Pokémon.
In the trading card game
Heracross, like many other Basic Pokémon with no evolutions, is not overwhelmingly represented in the card game. It has appeared in all the following sets, in all cases Grass-type unless otherwise noted:- Neo Genesis
- Neo Destiny
- Skyridge
- EX Hidden Legends
- EX Team Rocket Returns (Fighting/Ground type)
References
- The following games and their instruction manuals: Pokémon Red, Green, and Blue; Pokémon Yellow; Pokémon Stadium and Pokémon Stadium 2; Pokémon Gold, Silver, and Crystal; Pokémon Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald; Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen; Pokémon Colosseum and
External links
- [Official Pokémon website]
- [Bulbapedia] (a Pokémon-centric Wiki)’s article about Heracross as a species
- *[Serebii.net]’s 3rd Gen Pokédex entry for Heracross
- [Pokémon Dungeon] Pokédex entry, full of statistics analysis
- [PsyPoke] - Heracross Pokédex entry and Usage Overview
- [Smogon.com] - Heracross Tactical Data
- *[WikiKnowledge.net’s] entry for Previously hosted by Wikibooks
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.