This week's entry of The Alola Pokedex was commissioned by Crashmoth. I also "borrowed" the concept of elastic energy from Mutitus on Deviantart. They've made their own pokédex project and you should definitely check it out.
Downloading from The Alola Pokédex Online Appendix . . .
Breloom (Shroomish)
Agaricustos colaphus ruber
Overview
Most fungi are stationary. This presents two problems for their survival: 1) it is difficult to spread spores to reproduce and 2) self-defense options are limited when dealing with intelligent and mobile predators. The mushroom pokémon have all evolved methods of overcoming these obstacles. The fungal portion of parasect infects a host and uses it for spore spreading and defense. Shiinotic alter the floral environment around them to better spread illusions to deter attackers. Shroomish developed an adult stage that can hop around to spread spores and punch out anything that tries to eat the mushrooms. Even by fungal standards, breloom is strange.
The tropical, or red, breloom is native to southern China, mainland Southeast Asia, and the island of Java. It has since been introduced to Guyana, Madagascar, Queensland, and Alola. Breloom is currently listed as high priority for removal by the DNR and there are bounties on the capture of breloom and the marking of shroomish spawning locations. This is not because breloom themselves are bad for the environment, but because their aggressive protection of mushrooms removes what few predators exist for shiinotic. If left unchecked the shiinotic could permanently alter several of Alola's tropical forests to better suit their needs.
Breloom have several characteristics that make them desirable for trainers. They have a great deal of status-infliction options with the addition of powerful punches. It is also not difficult to convince breloom to fight. Unlike many pokémon that are both powerful and eager to battle, breloom have a very pleasant disposition and are cheap to care for.
The bounties mean that breloom may not be on the archipelago for long. Trainers interested in unconventional grass-types may want to catch a shroomish or breloom while they're still around.
Physiology
Shroomish are classified as dual grass- and poison-types. Breloom are equally capable of capitalizing on status effects but have fighting as their secondary type due to their propensity for combat and physical power.
Shroomish is a mushroom with a large bell and two short stalks. Most of their scales are bright red with a few blue and green spots mixed in. The edge of the bell is fringed by several 'petals.' When the shroomish spins around the petals help direct the released spores and scales to the sides rather than towards the ground. Small eyes and a narrow slit that serves as both a mouth and nose are found on the bell. Shroomish have a basic sense of sight but rely primarily on sensing vibrations and smells. Their other senses are not fully developed until evolution. Shroomish's stems can be used to walk. Their top speed is only around 0.4 miles per hour, which is still much faster than non-pokémon mushrooms.
It is true that shroomish's spores can cause respiratory problems if inhaled. Yet the real danger is in their scales. The red scales on a shroomish's bell are psychoactive. If inhaled or ingested the consumer will become increasingly drowsy and disoriented until they fall unconscious. The blue scales also target the brain. They result in motor control problems that can render the target unable to move. Finally, the green scales are highly toxic and will cause increasing damage to the body over time without treatment. Older shroomish can also learn leach seed to further debilitate opponents. Their flesh is also toxic to most animals.
Breloom are bipedal. Their head is separated from the rest of the body by a long stem. The bell has lost most of its depth but grown even wider and now has more prominent gills. Breloom often adorn their bell with flower petals. Right beneath the bell is breloom's head. They have large eyes that, while not particularly well-developed when compared to animals, still give them the best vision of any fungal pokémon. Breloom also have a prominent beak and mouth. The mouth can be used for either ejecting scales or ingesting food. Breloom prefer to eat dead and decomposing things. This can include rotting wood, carcasses, and manure.
The hands of a breloom end in two hard growths vaguely resembling blunted claws. Their arms are not usually visible but are instead tightly coiled and compressed inside the body, much like a spring. They can be shot out for extremely fast and powerful punches far beyond that of a human boxer. The arms must then be withdrawn, coiled, and compressed again before another punch can be fired. The full process can take nearly a minute to complete.
Breloom's tail is tipped in three pods. These are for spores, not scales. Scales are either shaken from the head or spit in a narrow stream from the mouth. Surprisingly, the spores are the only part of breloom that is edible, although they have an extremely bitter taste.
Breloom move by hopping. The initial hop is done by building and releasing elastic energy within the pokémon's legs. Subsequent hops are mostly powered by the elastic energy built up by the impact of the prior one. Alternatively, breloom can make short, quick hops to better position themselves. These are energy intensive as less energy is conserved from prior movements.
Shroomish can grow to be one foot tall and can live for up to three weeks without evolving. The mycelium network that spawned them (see Breeding) can live for years and fruit multiple times.
Breloom can grow to be five feet tall and can weigh up to ninety-five pounds. Because their purpose extends beyond fruiting, they can live for up to six years in the wild or captivity.
Behavior
Shroomish are the fruiting phase of a mycelium network (see Breeding). Their only purpose is to release spores to develop a network elsewhere. From the moment they cut themselves free shroomish are looking for a place to die. Sometimes in very harsh conditions they will partially burrow back into the soil for protection. Most of the time they wander endlessly in search of ideal conditions for spore release: something decomposing in a moist, dark place. Anything that disturbs them on their quest will be peppered with scales until they go away.
Breloom are far more active and interesting to observe. While shroomish live for only a few weeks, breloom are active for years. During this time they hop around the forests they live in to check for potential threats to shroomish and the mycelium networks. If a threat is found it will be killed. They will not eat their kills. At least, not right away. Breloom eat things that are already decomposing. Plant matter is preferred but they also eat some rotting meat. A blend of fungi in their gut finishes breaking down the organic material for nutrients and energy.
Unlike most grass types, breloom are not photosynthetic. They actively avoid direct sunlight and are primarily active at night. When they are observed patrolling in the day it is almost always under dense canopy cover or in cloudy weather.
Breloom are naturally curious and can be very friendly to creatures they do not perceive as threats. Wild breloom will often watch humans from a distance to see if they eat mushrooms or disturb shroomish. If they do not see such behavior, they will hop right up to the human and carefully check them over. They will even accept petting, although it is best to pet their back instead of their head. Directly touching the cap can send scales into the air and potentially lead to serious health problems.
The species is not territorial with conspecifics and can often be seen patrolling together.
Husbandry
Shroomish do not live long unless they evolve. While active they prefer having large fenced in areas with several damp and dark places to hide in. They will not need to eat or drink. Shroomish should not be touched or even approached without protection for at least the eyes, nose, and mouth. Some mycologists recommend wearing a full hazardous materials suit when entering an outdoor garden with more than ten shroomish. It is not recommended to bring a shroomish indoors. If you must interact with a shroomish without full protections make slow movements, do not get close, and do not touch the pokémon.
Breloom make for much better companions. There are still a few safety measures that must be taken around them. While breloom are much better at controlling scale release than shroomish, trainers with respiratory problems should wear eye, nose, and mouth protection when cuddling breloom. All trainers must refrain from eating mushrooms around a breloom. The species can easily adjust from caring for the mushrooms of their forest to caring for a human trainer, but they will never entirely forget their biological purpose.
Breloom are happiest when they have a mushroom garden to watch over. More information on caring for the mycelium network that produces shroomish can be found in the Breeding section of this article. The enclosed area containing the garden should be at least 1000 square feet to support a breloom. They prefer to spend the night watching over the garden. During the day breloom can be very affectionate and will often fall asleep on the couch curled up against their trainer.
The occasional introduction of harmless changes in the garden helps to provide enrichment. These can include the introduction and removal of potted plants, changing the placement of rocks around, painting the fence a different color, or adding or removing simple toys like rubber balls. Some mycologists recommend occasionally laying down urine from other species in the garden to give the breloom something more to investigate.
The amount of exercise required varies by individual. Some are very energetic and will appreciate near-daily training exercises and chances to hop alongside their jogging trainer. A few will even attempt to follow along with exercise videos meant for humans. Other breloom will be content with the occasional low-key walk around the neighborhood with light battle practice mixed in every week or so. It is usually best to err on the side of giving too many exercise opportunities to them as they will not overextend themselves. When they are exhausted they will stop for the day.
In addition to their garden breloom should have a dark, moist den to retreat to when they want. Some trainers have found dusk balls meet this need. Most breloom are reluctant to enter pokéballs and prefer to be out at all times, even when sleeping.
On the trail breloom can scavenge for food. A tropical wilderness has no shortage of decomposing logs and corpses to be found by a pokémon willing to look hard enough. It can be more difficult to feed breloom at Pokémon Centers or in urban settings. Some grocery stores are willing to contract with trainers for the sale of expired produce and meat. Breloom will also eat manure, although decomposing produce and meat are much better for them nutritionally. Trainers should not stop breloom from eating their teammates' droppings, but this should not be the core of their diet. In lean times breloom can go up to six days between meals with no major health consequences. Two to three days between meals is much better for a regular feeding schedule.
Illness
Trainers who inhale red shroomish or breloom scales may suffer from increasing feelings of vertigo and apathy until they eventually fall asleep. Try to immediately call for help when poisoned as it will become progressively more difficult to work up the effort to do so. Blue scales interfere with chemical receptors and nerves. Within a minute it may become impossible to make voluntary movements of the body. This effect should pass within fifteen minutes. Consult a doctor after the effect clears up to ensure there are no lasting health problems. Green scales are far more dangerous. Ingesting even five grams can be fatal in an adult human. It takes less to kill a child. Breloom will seldom discharge this much, but shroomish can and will if they feel threatened.
The biggest problem for breloom and shroomish themselves is mold. Mold, like mushrooms, is a fungus that prefers damp and dark places. Some types of mold can cause tissue damage, respiratory problems, loss of energy, and death in breloom. Make sure to regularly inspect the den and gardens of breloom for mold. Plastic dens disconnected from a permanent building are often recommended because of the ease of disposing of and replacing them if mold is found.
The easiest solution to mold, chemical fungicides, cannot be used anywhere near shroomish or breloom. A fully grown breloom might be able to survive very low doses. Shroomish and small or injured breloom will be killed by virtually any exposure.
There are some species of fly that like to lay their eggs in shroomish. The maggots will then eat the pokémon from the inside out. There is little that can be done if this occurs. Veterinarians are generally reluctant to give any care beyond a potion spray to an injured shroomish. The combination of a short lifespan and highly dangerous scales makes them undesirable patients. On balance, shroomish with minor injuries have a much greater chances of evolution than a pristine specimen.
Evolution
Ideally every shroomish would find a place to die and release their spores there (see Breeding). Occasionally there are threats to this process such as predators, wildfires, or human intervention. These problems require more mobility and intelligence than shroomish are capable of. Some shroomish in the area will begin to evolve into breloom. The process is a flash evolution that changes shape but not mass. The new breloom will need to eat to grow.
Shroomish evolution is most common in specimens that are either mildly injured or have been close to specimens that were injured. In captivity very light battle with a pokémon unlikely to be affected by shroomish scales can usually trigger evolution in the specimen used in battle. Others nearby are also likely to evolve. Inorganic pokémon, especially steel and poison types that are resistant to grass energy, are the best in this role. Do not use a team member for this battle: the newly evolved breloom will be hostile to whatever pokémon caused it to evolve.
Battle
Breloom has a small but effective set of tricks. Grass and poison specialists used to dealing with gardens and toxins often add one to their team. On occasion a non-specialist ranked trainer will also use one.
The most important trick breloom have is not their punches but their scales. They can spit a stream of red scales up to two meters out. Most animal pokémon that inhale them will become increasingly disoriented and eventually fall asleep altogether. Leagues are divided on if sleep moves are an automatic knockout or not. At present the United States League Association allows trainers to continue fighting with a sleeping pokémon. The switch timer runs at double speed for a pokémon asleep due to moves such as hypnosis or sleep powder. Blue scales can slow down enemy movements without doubling the switch timer speed but are less effective at creating an opening.
Red scales should be used with caution. Most professional arenas are stocked with antitoxins that can negate fungal or common plant-based poisons. Amateur ones may not be. Most pokémon are durable enough to take a few grams of red scales. Some are not. Killing a pokémon due to misjudging the strength of the toxin applied and being unable or unwilling to provide an antidote after surrender will result in an excessive force ticket.
Leech seed rounds out breloom's utility kit. They are not naturally gifted with it like they are for status afflictions, but most breloom know it upon evolution. Leech seed can keep breloom healthy while whittling down opponents over time.
If this were the extent of breloom's abilities they would not find much use on the competitive circuits. There are plenty of grass-types with similar movepools and a better ability to take damage while their opponent slowly succumbs to the inflicted ailments.
What makes breloom unique is the combination of utility moves and a very powerful punch. This punch can only be fired twice in a minute, once from each arm, so timing is everything. Breloom will make short hops from side to side to try and find a good opening for their punch. They will also spit out scales during this process to make an opening more likely. Once breloom sees their chance they will unleash one or two devastating punches to sensitive areas. Many opponents will go down to a single punch. More are unable to take two. Only the most heavily armored of foes can shrug off the hits altogether, and several of those are undone by the fighting energy imbued in the strikes.
The biggest drawback of this strategy is that breloom can only really damage foes within their six-meter reach. Anything outside that area cannot be hit by either scales or punches. Breloom need to get close for this strategy to work. Unfortunately, they are not particularly fast compared to the average pokémon used on the competitive circuits. Fast ranged attackers shut breloom down. The same goes for any flier that can dodge or tank a fairly weak stone edge.
Breloom's cooldown time and list of counters makes them somewhat unpopular in the current metagame that favors fliers and ranged attackers. In past eras more dominated by hard stall teams and powerful fighting-types breloom was far more dominant.
On the island challenge breloom's secondary attacks are more effective. Competitive pokémon are usually fast or durable enough that the moves breloom does not naturally employ. Breloom can learn many coverage options such as seed bomb, bullet seed, stone edge, rock tomb, and iron tail. They can also be taught swords dance, bulk up, and growth to hit even harder. Their punches can be imbued with different elemental properties with enough training. Thunder punch helps deal with flying-types, mach punch hits even faster, and drain punch can establish leech seed on contact.
Breloom's fighting and grass attacks can be dangerous for Olivia, Nanu, and Hapu's teams. Hala's reliance on melee attackers also plays to breloom's strengths. The cooldown time is also less relevant if totems can be knocked out with a pair of well-placed punches. The current set of kahunas makes breloom well suited for the island challenge, but future retirements could make the path through the island challenge more treacherous for it. Professional trainers have already learned how fickle the metagame can be for their mushrooms.
Acquisition
Shroomish and breloom can be found in Alolan Rainforests National Preserve on Akala Island. Unlimited captures are permitted and a bounty can be obtained for each breloom or shroomish captured. Shroomish can be obtained with a Class III license while breloom require a Class II.
Breloom are not particularly receptive to proving battles. Trainers desiring to keep them long term may use unfair tactics such as attacking with multiple pokémon when securing the capture. As long as the breloom is nursed back to health and given a plot of mushrooms to look after shortly after there should be no long-term problems. Eventually a breloom will come to care for its teammates and trainer as much as its garden.
Sale of breloom or shroomish to entities other than the Alolan Commonwealth is currently prohibited. Even adoption arrangements are viewed with skepticism. Trainers wanting to raise a breloom should capture their own.
Breeding
The mycelium networks that produce shroomish are not presently classified as a pokémon in their own right. They are necessary to produce shroomish and breloom prefer to have a garden with mycelium in the ground so their husbandry will briefly be discussed here. Mycelia are thin white fibers that tunnel through the dirt. They form complex networks underground. In order to spread to other areas the mycelium produce a mushroom that becomes a shroomish. In most non-pokémon fungi the mushroom is only an organ of the network and not an organism in its own right.
The mycelium networks that produce shroomish grow best in damp, dark places. They feed by breaking down organic matter in the soil. It is recommended to start a culture by spreading spores over a patch of manure in a shaded garden. If a half inch covering of manure is brought in every month there should always be enough food for the network and shroomish should be produced every two to three months.
Wild shroomish wander until they find a good place to release spores. These are areas that are shaded, moist, and free of competing mycelia. Then they will settle down and begin to unfurl from the top down. The process ends with the shroomish dead and millions of spores released. Some of these will land on fertile ground, spread roots, and establish a new mycelium network.
Breloom also occasionally release spores from their tail as they travel. They are less discriminate about where they release their spores because accidentally dropping them in the wrong place is not lethal. In time the spores will regenerate and breloom can scatter them again.
Shroomish cultivation is currently illegal on Akala and Ula'Ula due to the established shiinotic populations. Intentional breeding of shroomish is heavily regulated on the other islands as well. The Alolan government will not pay bounties for specimens born in captivity. Sale or, in many cases, adoption are also illegal in Alola. Trainers who do not desire to raise shroomish on their own or arrange for export to the mainland should clip the tail of their breloom. This prevents them from releasing spores. It also does not cause serious pain or impair daily functioning.
Relatives
There is one other species of breloom, A. c. viridilanx, more commonly known as kinogassa, or the green or temperate breloom. They are well-suited for the narrow zone of mixed forests between the tropics and the taiga. A coordinated removal campaign in China eliminated the population there in the 1950s. Today they are only found in the wild in Kinogassa Sanctuary in Hoenn. Feral specimens also occasionally pop up around the world. Some are culled by the local governments before they can outcompete native fungi. Others are tolerated because they protect endangered native mushrooms. There is currently a small experimental colony in Unova's Pinwheel Forest State Park.
Kinogassa are much smaller than tropical breloom. They rarely grow to be more than four feet tall and are usually less than half as heavy as their tropical counterparts. They are also primarily coated in green toxic scales with blue and red patches. This gives them greater access to poison scales at the expense of sleep-inducing scales.
Kinogassa have seasonal activity patterns due to the reduced biomass to eat in their temperate homes. They are most active in the autumn when leaf litter provides an abundant source of food. They retain some activity through the early winter when the first freezes kill off some plants and animals. As the winter becomes harsher they find a cave or abandoned burrow and begin to hibernate for the winter. Come spring they will periodically emerge when they sense distress from the local shroomish population. Even when out of their burrows they spend most of their time inactive. It is rare to see a kinogassa patrol outside of the autumn and early winter. They rely upon the toxicity of their scales to deter would-be predators from eating the exposed and unmoving target.