Many water pokemon suffer from distorted vision when brought above the water or onto dry land, because they are accustomed to living in a place where light is refracted by entering water, and their brains have adjusted for this optical illusion in the way they process light even when the actual illusion is not present. This is not challenging for water pokemon trainers, who battle primarily on land and whose pokemon eventually learn to adjust, but for wild amphibious and surface water pokemon the constant adjustment leaves them with extremely poor eyesight.
Froakie have found an ingenious way around this conundrum, in the form of small glasses made of bubbles. Of human glasses, they resemble most closely the pince-nez style, and their length of the Froakie nose along with changes in glasses fashion has seen many mistake them for two very misplaced bubbles – yet in the context of a Froakie eye, they are fully functional, and give these pokemon excellent vision on both land and water.
Froakie do not, however, mind this mistaken identity; although their nose bubbles create a minimal shield in battle, this rarely makes up for the loss in vision they suffer when a trainer targets them; Froakie trainers struggle to win victories against opponents who have discovered this severe weakness. Although there are known counter-measures such as teaching Froakie to remake the glasses from the bubbles on their tail, this often requires time which a pokemon in combat can ill afford to waste and takes practice away from far deadlier techniques. Most trainers settle for teaching Froakie when their glasses are being targeted, and relying on their speed to try and avoid the tactic; a few, to their Frokaie's chagrin, pop their bubbles and hope it will teach them to see.
