Pokemon Red Any% FAQ

Pokemon Red Any% FAQ (by Luckless)
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Q: What Does Any% Mean?
A: What I am trying to achieve is reaching the game credits as fast as possible without using glitches. This category was originally named 100% but changed due to arguments that it's not 100% if it doesn't catch all the Pokemon/get them to level 100 etc.

Q: What Pokemon Do You Use In This Run?
Short A: 1) Nidoran Male 2) Squirtle 3) Pidgey/Spearow 4) Paras/Oddish/Farfetch'd.
Long A: As Soon As Possible I catch a Male Nidoran and use it throughout the run as my main pokemon. I still use Squirtle for Brock but after that it doesn't feature other than teaching it Surf for travelling and sometimes Dig depending on which Cut Slave I get. I catch a Spearow or Pidgey so that I can use HM Fly. I also catch something that can learn Cut which in the best case scenario will be a Paras in Mt. Moon but if I don't find one of those I will try instead to get an Oddish or trade my Spearow for a Farfetch'd. (Farfetch'd can learn both Fly and Cut.)

Q: Why Do You Need To Catch A Male Nidoran?
A: Male Nidoran is the best early-game pokemon available in terms of stats and moveset. It learns Horn Attack and Thrash quite early and later on is able to learn a really diverse combination of TM moves like Bubblebeam, Earthquake, Thunderbolt, Ice Beam, etc.

Q: Why Not Use A Female Nidoran?
A: Female Nidoran's are not as good since they learn Scratch instead of Horn Attack and Body Slam instead of Thrash. They also have worse Speed, Attack and Special Attack base stats which are vital for the run to happen.

Q: Why Not Use Squirtle As Your Main Pokemon?
A: It is well known that this run can be completed just as fast if not faster with Squirtle; but I prefer Nidoran because it's more consistent (as in, less things need to go right for the run to happen) and less reset-intensive.

Q: Why Do You Speedrun Red Instead Of Blue?
A: In Pokemon Red, the chance of finding a Male Nidoran on Route 22 is 40% while the chance of a Female is only 5%. These encounter rates are reversed in Blue, meaning a Male Nidoran would be 5% and therefore inefficient to rely on. The only other difference between the games for speedrunning is that Blue has Sandshrew as a backup for the HM Cut, but we already have both Oddish and Farfetch'd as possible backups anyway so that doesn't matter much.

Q: What Stats Are You Looking For?
Short A: At Level 8 - 15/16 Attack and 14/15 Speed.
Long A: First of all, Squirtle stats don't matter much at all so they are not worth checking at the start. What I'm really interested in is Nidoran's stats when it levels up to Level 8 after I defeat Brock. The best possible stats are 16/14/15/13 and I will run with any Nidoran that has 15/??/14/?? or better. 13 Speed is possible to run with if all the other stats are near perfect, but is still very sub-optimal so will likely only be used during a Race.

Q: Why Did You Reset?
A:
- If the timer goes past 8 mins+ I might reset if I haven't caught a Nidoran Male that's Level 3/4.
- If at Level 8 my Nidoran doesn't have good stats I will reset (see above).
- If I die at any point in the run I will probably reset because it will take too much time to re-attempt the fight.
- If I randomly reset in a patch of grass or a cave I probably lost too much time due to the amount of encounters.
- If I randomly reset anywhere else I probably made a mistake with item management or forgot a move that I needed.