The Important Difference Between Atk And Spec Atk:

aside from the obvious difference in the name, there is a difference.

when you use a move of the following types of attacks, the game puts your 'attack' and the opponent's 'defense' into the damage formula.

- normal
- flying
- fighting
- bug
- poison
- ground
- rock
- steel
- ghost

i think thats all... anyways, these attack types are called the *physical* attack types. Like i said before, they use the attack stat from your pokemon as opposed to the special attack. if you boost your attack (through moves such as swords dance), you'd do more damage with these moves than before. keep in mind that moves like swords dance (commonly called 'stat upping' moves) go away once you withdraw your pokemon or the battle ends.

when you use one of the following types of attacks, the game puts your 'special attack' and the opponent's 'special defense' into the damage formula:

- fire
- water
- grass
- electric
- ice
- psychic
- dark
- dragon

these attack types are called *special* attacks, but used to be called *elemental* attacks. if you boost your special attack (through moves like calm mind), obviously these attacks will do more damage.

and as a bonus, here is a quick guide on how stat upping works:

- if the game says 'its rose!', then the game has raised that stat 50%.
- if the game says 'its sharply rose!', the game has that stat doubled.
- if the game says, 'its fell!', then the game has lowered that stat 50%
- if the game says, 'its harshly fell!', then the game has halved that stat.
- you cannot use 'rose' moves more than 6 times (without it become ineffective), or 'sharply rose' moves more than 3 times, unless the opponent lowers that stat, uses haze, ends the battle or you switch. in this way, you cannot raise a stat more than 8x its original value.
- you cannot use 'fell' moves more than 6 times (without it becoming ineffective), or 'harshly fell' moves more than 3 times, unless the opponent raises that stat, uses haze, ends the battle or switches. in this way, you cannot lower a stat more than 1/8 its original value.
- belly drum totally maxes out your attack stat as if you used three swords dances.
- all these changes go away once you switch, haze or end battle.
- the receiver of a baton pass will have its stats recalculated according to what stat ups the user of baton pass had on it at that time
- haze eliminates all stat ups or downs from both battlers
- whirlwind and roar force a switch and by doing so remove all stat ups or downs from the opponent.
- the 'in a pinch' stat upping berries raise that stat by 50%, but only activate once your health gets in the red, or below 25%.