Damage category

The category (Japanese:  classification) or kind of a move is an element of said move that determines the kind of damage it deals.

In games prior to Generation IV, the type of a damaging move determines whether the move is physical ( is performed using the user's and the target's ) or special (the user's  and the target's ).

It was first assigned to individual moves in for Shadow moves, and then applied to all moves starting in Generation IV. Among fans, this change is often known as the Physical/Special split.

Physical/Special split
The Physical/Special split allows to use moves from a wider variety of types. For example, prior to Generation IV,, which has a much greater Attack than Special Attack, was not effective at using moves with STAB, due to moves and  moves both being special.

Several new moves were introduced to give more balance to formerly all-special and all-physical types, such as the physical moves  and ; and the special Fighting-type moves, , and. Other moves, such as (which was physical prior to Generation IV but is now special), gained physical counterparts with the same characteristics (in this case, ).

Type-based categories
The move categories used from Generation I to Generation III are listed below.

The unused type from the Generation I games is physical.

In other languages
Schadensklasse Catégorie de Capacité Categoria danno 物理招式