Pokémon Sword and Shield guide: How to create the perfect Pokémon for catching other Pokémon

In Pokémon Sword and Shield, once you start outleveling the Pokémon in past routes, going back to catch Pokémon to complete your Pokédex can be tricky. We’ve figured out what the best Pokémon to catch things is.

Most Pokémon can be caught with Quick Balls, which are purchased from the Wyndon Pokémon Center or a Watts Trader in the Wild Area. However, for the Pokémon that manage to break out and have low catch rates, consider using a Gallade.

Gallade can learn False Swipe from a TM, and it learns Hypnosis naturally, so it’s the perfect Pokémon for putting enemies to sleep and lowering them to one health point without killing them, thus improving the catch chance. If you’re catching Pokémon in weather where it’s hailing or there’s a sandstorm, you can also set Gallade up with Sunny Day to cancel out those damage-dealing weather effects to prevent an accidental death.

The last move can be whatever you want, but we recommend something that relatively hard, like Psycho Cut, so Gallade can clear out any Pokémon you don’t want to catch with ease.

Catching a Ralts, Kirlia, or Gallade

Game Freak, The Pokémon Company/Nintendo via Polygon

Ralts can be caught in the Dappled Grove, North Lake Miloch, Rolling Fields, South Lake Miloch, Watchtower Ruins, and West Lake Axewell zones of the Wild Area in foggy weather. It can also be spotted in overcast weather in Rolling Fields, but at a significantly lower spawn rate.

Gallade can be caught in the Wild Area if you have all the gym badges on the island in the Bridge Field area.

Neither Ralts nor Kirlia can learn False Swipe, so you will need to find a male ‘mon to evolve into a Gallade. Use a Dawn Stone on a male Kirlia to grab a Gallade. These can be found in the Lake of Outrage.

Finding the False Swipe and Sunny Day TMs

Game Freak, The Pokémon Company/Nintendo via Polygon

TM94, False Swipe, can be purchased from the western Pokémon Center in Motostoke. TM34, Sunny Day, can be bought from the western Pokémon Center in Hammerlocke.

Learning Hypnosis

Hypnosis is learned by Ralts at level nine. If you accidentally forgot it, you can relearn it from a Move Tutor at the Pokémon Center.

Once you have all of these components, your Gallade should make a fearsome Pokémon catcher. For every battle just use Sunny Day to clear any bad weather, False Swipe to get the ‘mon down to 1HP, and Hypnosis to put them to sleep. At that point, it should make catching the Pokémon a breeze.