Wherever in the world you go, strangers will be eager to confront you in a pokemon battle, often accepting a simple stare as a challenge without saying a word. This, admittedly, has been the case for generations – but it is only in this modern, globalized age, with the popularity of televised world championships run by the Pokemon League, that people around the world have agreed on what a pokemon battle means. Triple and Rotation battles remain popular regional variants in Unova and Kalos, while most Alolan adults still remember when a "Pokemon Battle" involved four contestants, each trying to emerge the winner.

Whatever the rules of the battle, most pokemon understand and obey them; many a would-be cheater on the road has been foiled by their own pokemon's refusal to fight seventh or 2-on-1. Yet there is one pokemon so powerful and so alien that it can subvert this understanding for both teams. Naganadel is known in this world for turning 6-on-6 matches into a 3-on-3 and wiping the slate clean; victory usually goes to whoever has the three healthiest remaining pokemon.

Proponents of the increasingly unpopular and seemingly antiquated 3-on-3 format claim that this is how the Ultra Megalopolitans prefer to battle, in an example of convergent evolution even more unlikely than their appearances; some even extrapolate this fact into a galactic standard for pokemon battles, which they urge Earth to join. Those who prefer double battles or 6-on-6, however, counter by alleging that 3-on-3 is the only format where Naganadel has any strength. In any case, when entered into a 3-on-3 match, Naganadel often use that same attack to allow for the participation of more pokemon; perhaps they simply never grow out of the fondness for trolling that characterizes their larval stage of Poipole.