Legendary Breeding?

[ZebraikaKnight]

People always bring up how most Legendaries can't lay eggs and are genderless, and there always seems to be some argument about whether Mew "giving birth" to Mewtwo was a factual account and not a misinterpretation.

I propose that though the majority of Pokémon are divided into Egg Groups, the Legendary Pokemon instead give birth to live young in a similar vein to Mammals, and that is precisely why there aren't as many Legendaries as there are common Pokemon. In a world of rising battles, the live birth style of existing is dying out in the Pokémon world, even if it does bring about a more powerful being.

Legendaries with Genders must breed with their alternate counterpart to produce live offspring, and Legendaries "without genders" are in actuality hermaphroditic and can breed with any of it's species.

The rarity of these births occuring, and why they do not breed when in captivity (Day Care, Pokeballs) is an analogue to the rarity of births in captivity of certain animals.

 

[Mortalis]

Interesting insight. I actually thought relatively the same thing, but in different perspective; the legendaries were asexual, allowing them to birth live young without need for mating. Perhaps it's a little complicated for the Pokéverse, but it's what I theorize.

It's gotta' be one of the two.

 

[Zeffy]

There are some legendary Pokemon who are practically "immortal", thus having no need to reproduce (like Arceus). I don't really see the point of them breeding since they just can't (well, most of them at least). Arceus, Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina are all some sort of deities while Groudon and Kyogre hibernates.

I don't think I'm being that clear but I do hope you're at least getting my point.

EDIT: also, lol, everybody knows Mew did not give birth to Mewtwo. :/
Mewtwo was a man-made clone from the DNA of Mew.

 

[Deleted member 211486]

I agree with Zeffy. Some Pokemon are basically immortal so they don't need to reproduce. However, Arceus DID lay an egg, remember?

It is said to have emerged from an egg in a place where there was nothing, then shaped the world.

In the Pokemon Anime, we see a baby Lugia and its mother as well... how the heck did Lugia give birth without breeding?

Also, we all know that if you leave a Manaphy and Ditto in a Daycare Center together, they will breed a Phione egg, despite Manaphy being a legendary.

And all Pokemon have been said to be from Mew, so it is possible that there were multiple Mews at one time and they bred all Pokemon, which then evolved and reproduced themselves... then the time came when somehow only one Mew was remaining. Like the process of evolution xD Of course, Mew could have just cloned itself or something, but that's a different story :D

Aah, the Pokemon World is full of mysteries indeed. It is one of these theories that are unfathomable enough for us to understand indeed... unless Satoshi Tajiri reveals something xD

 

[ZebraikaKnight]

There are some legendary Pokemon who are practically "immortal", thus having no need to reproduce (like Arceus). I don't really see the point of them breeding since they just can't (well, most of them at least). Arceus, Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina are all some sort of deities while Groudon and Kyogre hibernates.

I don't think I'm being that clear but I do hope you're at least getting my point.

EDIT: also, lol, everybody knows Mew did not give birth to Mewtwo. :/
Mewtwo was a man-made clone from the DNA of Mew.

Well my theory applies to most of the Legendaries. In the case of Arceus, we know it gives birth to Dialga/Palkia/Giratina via eggs, the creation of which we see in the HGSS Arceus event.

And in the case of Manaphy/Phione, note that Manaphy gives birth to Phione via Egg, solidifying Phione as a new Pokémon. Perhaps if, in the wild, two Manaphys mated, it may result into a Manaphy giving birth to a live Manaphy.

In both these cases however, the "new" Pokémon is born via an egg. Perhaps we can presume that mammalian birth results in the same species with possible gradual evolution over time in a natural selection method rather than the ultra-sensitive metamorphoses of most Pokémon.

The scientists may have captured an already pregnant Mew. Is there any definite line in the games as to when they created Mewtwo? By this I mean, maybe the scientists took the Mew baby (which would naturally be smaller than a Mew with this theory) and only after it was born did they experiment on it and turn it into Mewtwo.

As for the clone line, maybe they cloned the BABY Mew, and experimented on a few, with them dying off as they perfected their method on the Mew that was to become Mewtwo. Then technically it's both born AND cloned.

 

[CliveKoopa]

Some legendary pokemon can breed such as Latios and Latias and most of the bird pokemon.

Others such as Arceus and Ho-Oh, however cannot breed as they are one-of-a-kind and immortal.

 

[DarkDoom3000]

Legendaries just don't breed in captivity.

 

[Sayan]

Yes, legendaries don't breed after you catch them. Why? Cause the omnipotent, omniscient god of Pokemon, Nintendo, has instructed them not do so, so that we have to resort to trading if we want more than 1 of each species.

Sigh! Some legendaries would improve considerably if given the right egg moves. But their only hope of improvement is new events and move tutors.

 

[shinysweety]

Well there is two legendary's that can breed that i know of. Rotom can breed and so can Manaphy. Manaphy makes a baby Phion which DOES not evolve into Manaphy. And Rotom, well i just tried breeding one and it worked. xD But im not sure if u can breed Rotom in any other game than Black/White.

 

[Nakuzami]

The scientists may have captured an already pregnant Mew. Is there any definite line in the games as to when they created Mewtwo? By this I mean, maybe the scientists took the Mew baby (which would naturally be smaller than a Mew with this theory) and only after it was born did they experiment on it and turn it into Mewtwo.

As for the clone line, maybe they cloned the BABY Mew, and experimented on a few, with them dying off as they perfected their method on the Mew that was to become Mewtwo. Then technically it's both born AND cloned.

Going by the movie, they found the DNA of a Mew and cloned it, and since Mew was a legendary pokemon, it was the first one able to survive the cloning process.

Well there is two legendary's that can breed that i know of. Rotom can breed and so can Manaphy. Manaphy makes a baby Phion which DOES not evolve into Manaphy. And Rotom, well i just tried breeding one and it worked. xD But im not sure if u can breed Rotom in any other game than Black/White.

Rotom has always been breedable.
However, I don't know if they consider Rotom to be Legendary, rather than just rare. The fact that a female scientist in BW trades you a Rotom for a Ditto probably means it's just rare, lol.


And, yeah, perhaps they just don't breed in captivity. /too lazy to come up with my own theory.

 

[psyanic]

Yeah, Rotom is not a legendary Pokemon. They're just rare, I'm sure of it.

I'll board the wagon and say a few legendaries are practically immortal and shouldn't be able to breed, because they don't need to. Breeding should basically be something that's a necessity to legendaries, kind of like Latios and Latias in the movie. Well, then again, that situation was a bit vague.

 

[bobandbill]

Yeah, I also believe Rotom is just a rare Pokemon with an interesting backstory. Sure, it has legendary battle music... but fits no other definition for a Pokemon to be legendary (not called one by game freak/etc, not treated as such in other games...). Furthermore, that music fact means diddly-squat when you consider the accepted-as-legendary Pokemon in Shaymin did not have legendary battle music for its battle.

Ignoring the whole 'it is a game mechanic' thing, I suppose it depends on each Pokemon legend. After all, several ones suggest different cases. Heatran has a gender but cannot breed. Latias/Latios can be assumed rather easily to be relatable. Entei dex entries suggest they are born from volcanoes. Manaphy can breed but only to give the lesser Phione. Given Kanto birds both in Platinum (Sinnoh) shortly after HGSS (Kanto) one could argue there are more than one of each bird. Then there's other canons (anime/movies with Lugia, for instace). And so forth. I personally believe each one has different stipulations or 'rules', and some may just simply be shrouded in mystery still.

 

[Mew~]

Take a look at this theory Toujour's posted a while back;

What this doesn't explain, however, is why legendaries can't breed. In-game, the reason is obvious - the game doesn't want you to pump out legendaries. But could there be some reasonable theoretical explanation, based on my theory that eggs are created by energy? Certainly legendaries would have this most basic energy, that even a Rattata has, right?

This leads to the belief that a legendary has an energy similar to a noble gas, that only very, very rarely reacts with another. Obviously legendaries can breed canonically, there have been eggs of multiple legendaries. But it's so rare and under such particular conditions that a daycare with a mini pool and a fence isn't enough to convince a legendary to breed. They are the pandas of the Pokémon world; they know that their species is important, revered, and will be attacked, especially a nearly defenseless infant, for capture. Therefore, they need private, comfort, knowledge that the child will be defended, etc. for breeding purposes.

I have nothing to add to this discussion other than that, I suppose I agree with it, it's an interesting read to say the least.

 

[deoxys121]

I think the justification behind not being able to breed most legendaries in the games is that, in captivity, they don't feel comfortable enough to breed. We have seen in the anime that legendary Pokemon are indeed capable of breeding. But, in captivity, they just refuse to breed unless you use Action Replay.