Soundproof

Soundproof provides complete immunity to moves that are flagged as sound-based, making the user impervious to a wide range of disruptive attacks and status moves. This includes common competitive staples like Boomburst, Hyper Voice, Bug Buzz, and Roar, as well as status-inducing sound moves such as Sing, Grass Whistle, and Chattering. The ability effectively shuts down many disruptive strategies that rely on sound-based phazing or sleep induction.

However, Soundproof has several notable exceptions that can catch players off guard. Heal Bell, despite being sound-based thematically, still affects Soundproof users and will cure their status conditions. Uproar maintains its sleep-preventing effect even against Soundproof Pokemon, meaning they cannot fall asleep naturally while Uproar is active. Additionally, if a Pokemon receives a Perish Song counter and then gains Soundproof through an ability change, or if the counter is passed via Baton Pass, the countdown will continue normally.

The ability sees niche competitive use on Pokemon like Kommo-o and Exploud, where it can provide valuable protection against common sound-based attacks. Some moves that might intuitively seem sound-based, such as Howl, Roar of Time, Sonic Boom, and Yawn, are not actually flagged as such and will still affect Soundproof users normally. This makes the ability somewhat situational but potentially game-changing against sound-heavy team compositions.