Create a Pokémon

Create a Pokémon is a Pokémon metagame created by Smogon, which attempts to create Pokémon that have specific roles in the metagame. Eleven were created for Generation IV. The CAP process was then suspended until the Black and White metagame stabilized. A popular spin-off, Create-A-Pokémon Anime-style Battling (CAP ASB) was formed to keep the forum alive in the meantime. A new Create-A-Pokémon project for Generation V began in February 2011 and restarted the numbering system at 1. In addition, a new portion of the process was dedicated to creating a pre-evolution for the CAP.

Tropes used in Create a Pokémon include:

• Butt Monkey: Most Create-A-Pokémon Pokémon have fluff that makes them predators of Delibird. Even the shrimp.
  • It's not even exclusive to the main forum. The Training mode of Battle CAPacity pits you against a sack that shows multiple signs of containing a Delibird. You're training against that thing.
    • CAP ASB is almost certainly going to fall into this eventually.
• Fighting Game: A fan-made game using the CAP characters (and a submission for CAP 6 from user Cartoons!) called Battle Capacity.
• Gone Horribly Wrong: CAPs do not always turn out the way the process hopes they do. The most notable example is Krilowatt, which rather than fulfilling its point of being a utility counter instead abused its ability Magic Guard to spam fast, recoil-less-Life-Orb-boosted attacks from its bizarrely expansive movepool. It even had the raw bulk to be virtually unkillable - and it was the last straw before the CAP Pokémon received a massive nerfing.
  • Voodoom is an aversion - it turned out to be nigh-incompatible with its intended partner Togekiss, but it worked very well with Zapdos. As its point was to inspect how offensive pairs worked, it is considered one of the best CAPs to date.
• Gone Horribly Right: Several CAPs before movepool revisions were far more potent than the standard Mon, leading to teams made entirely out of CAPs that could do VERY well in the metagame. Additionally, the revisions for the first three CAPs were this as well: people were trying to buff up Syclant, Revenankh, and Pyroak. The results? Syclant generally averted this trope (thanks to Scizor still being more effective than it, although Syclant gained an interesting niche as a suicidal Spikes lead) but Revenankh turned out to be nigh-impossible to kill due to the increased bulk it gained, and Pyroak turned from a Master of None into a Dragon-Dance-spamming Game Breaker.
• Nerf: Movepool revisions were this for Syclant through Krilowatt.
• Original Character: All of them.
• Ridiculously Cute Critter: Scratchet.