Although Magmortar are best known for the remarkable and seemingly indiscriminate destructive force of their fireballs, their cannon-like arms allow them to aim their flames with expert precision. In warfare, they were used as siege weapons, for their flames could bake even the toughest stone fortifications, and they could hit a castle's weak spot at quite a distance from the battlefield. These qualities, however, have also led Magmortar to be a favorite of arsonists and extortionists. Corrupt and unscrupulous men throughout history have made themselves very wealthy by hiring Magmortar to burn down houses, then buying the property while the house burned and using water pokemon to end the fire after the sale was completed. Others, more motivated by grudges than greed, stopped at burning the houses.
Training a Magmortar requires no shortage of time and effort, and must be done far from civilization if one wishes to avoid arrest for arson, for the volume of these pokemon's flames on their body make them prone to accidental fires even by the standards of fire-type pokemon. However, it is not necessary or even recommended to own a Magmortar in order to use one for arson, extortion, or even terrorism. Wild Magmortar live in volcanoes, which double as an excellent platform to rain down fire from the sky on hapless structures of every type built by man.
Magmortar live their lives in severe pain, which they can only alleviate by giving their fires a fuel not from their own body, one which must be taken from the outside world. For the short time free from pain that a lump of charcoal gives them, they will acquiesce to committing horrific acts of destruction – acts which almost seem justifiable when one considers that gathering fuel themselves will make them burn down far, far more.