When I first pulled Winona and Pelipper, I was admittedly kind of disappointed, both because their stats seemed sub-par even for a 3* unit, and because I like Altaria a lot more. However, Winona has been one of the biggest dark horses for the EX metagame, having found a useful niche in both EX Rosa and EX Flannery thanks to the power of Rain Dance. But we’re not here to discuss her role in team strategies. Let’s take a closer look at the lore behind this sync pair.

Winona and Pelipper

In-game Description: This Gym Leader loves bird Pokémon more than anything. She has passionate fans in the Fortree City Gym thanks to her graceful appearance.

Winona is the flying-type gym leader from the Hoenn region. Like many of you, I was puzzled by the decision to have Pelipper as Winona’s sync partner. Winona has always had Altaria as her ace in her various appearances, and she always leads with it in the Pokemon World Tournament in BW2. The most likely explanation is that they’re saving Altaria for Lisia, who was introduced in the 3rd gen remakes. Lisia‘s only associated Pokemon is Altaria, and she even dresses like one too.

With Altaria no longer available, Winona’s options would include Swellow, Skarmory, Tropius, and Pelipper, all of which she has used as a gym leader in the gen 3 games. Skarmory isn’t a gen 3 Pokemon, so that was probably less likely. Tropius isn’t a bird, which wouldn’t really mesh with her description on how much she loves bird Pokemon. This just leaves Swellow and Pelipper, either of which could have made sense. However, she doesn’t use Swellow in Emerald version, while she has Pelipper in every single version, so that leaves us with Pelipper by process of elimination.

There is one more subtle reason why Pelipper could be a good match for Winona. As a dual type Flying/Water Pokemon, Pelipper might be a reference to Winona’s relationship with Wallace in the manga series. In the Pokemon Adventures manga, Winona and Wallace were originally lovers when they were gym leaders, but their relationship broke apart after Wallace turned down the Hoenn Champion title, as Winona didn’t want herself to be the reason for Wallace to decline the champion position. The couple patched things up during the events of the Hoenn arc, and may be back together again.

Air Slash

• Winona’s Pelipper has never had the move Air Slash in the games, but in general her Pelipper has been special-attack focused and has favored attacks that inflict status effects. Her Pelipper has had moves such as Water Pulse, Scald, Ice Beam, and Supersonic in its various incarnations. Air Slash was a fine choice to continue this trend while still sticking to its primary type in Pokemon Masters.
• Curiously enough, Pelipper can’t actually learn Air Slash as a level-up move, but its pre-evolved form, Wingull, does learn Air Slash naturally.

Hurricane

• Winona’s Pelipper didn’t have Hurricane in the gen 3 remakes, and Hurricane wasn’t even around in the original gen 3 games, but her Pelipper does indeed know Hurricane when she uses it for the Pokemon World Tournament in BW2.

Rain Dance

• While Winona’s Pelipper has never had Rain Dance as a move, Pelipper did gain the ability Drizzle in the Sun/Moon generation games, allowing it to change the weather to rain when it is switched in.
• This could be yet another reference to Winona’s relationship with Wallace, a water-type gym leader and champion from the Hoenn region.
• From a gameplay perspective, Rain Dance is the perfect self-contained combo with Hurricane, which Pelipper also has. Hurricane’s spotty 70% accuracy gets completely patched up when it is raining. This also happens to make Winona useful for the EX Rosa stage, to support allied Pidgeots after mega-evolution.
• In the manga, Winona has been closely associated with Kyogre, the legendary Pokemon most well-known for making it rain. Winona led the charge to stop Team Aqua, teaming up with Roxanne and Wattson to battle against the Team Aqua admins. The gym leaders were victorious but Team Aqua still bought enough time for Kyogre to awaken.

Graceful Acrobatics!

• This is likely a reference to the Trainer’s Eyes/Match Call feature in the RSE games and their remakes, which had short blurbs for each trainer. Winona’s team is described as “Graceful sky dancers” in RSE and “Those that dance gracefully in the sky” in the remakes. Interestingly enough, there is one other noteworthy trainer who describes their Pokemon as graceful in the Trainer’s Eyes feature: Wallace.
• Winona has a habit of using the phrase “elegant choreography”, which is a pretty close synonym to this move’s name. She says it when she is first challenged as a gym leader, when she is fought in the Pokemon World Tournament, and when she beats the player in the PWT. Winona also uses the phrase when in Pokemon Masters when you click on her profile in the Dex and when you add her to your team.

Passive: Racing Rain

• This passive is the functional equivalent of the ability Swift Swim from the mainline games. Interestingly enough, Pelipper may have been the reason this ability’s name was changed, because Pelipper doesn’t swim so much as fly (in the rain).
• Pelipper never gets Swift Swim in the mainline games. However, it does have Rain Dish as a hidden ability, which is another ability that grants a bonus when it is raining.

Sync Move: Flyaway Air Cutter

• Winona awards the player with the Feather Badge upon defeating her as a gym leader, which allows the player to use, you guessed it: HM02 - Fly.
• Fortree City is visible in the background during Winona’s sync move.
• Once again, it is curious that Pelipper can’t learn Air Cutter naturally as a level-up move, but its pre-evolved form Wingull does get it as a level-up move.

A Day with Winona

• Winona begins with the phrase “A little bird Pokemon told me...”, which is similar to what she says when she congratulates the player for becoming the Hoenn champion in the gen 3 remakes.
• Winona’s sync pair story episode is about an unnamed Ace Trainer who admires her and wants to learn the secret of how she became a strong trainer. This is very similar to Winona’s relationship with Sapphire in the manga.

That about does it for now with Winona. Who would you like to see next?

(Previous pair: Marley and Arcanine )