>>33233679Stantler isn't just a deer, it's based on a deer-scarer, which is basically a scarecrow. It's a pun, but it goes over everyone's head because deers aren't associated with scaring things outside of Japan.
It's a a device that scares away fauna....but it IS fauna. Which is why it gets Intimidate and Astonish and such. It's like if they made a scarecrow pokémon that was itself a scary crow. Also, the place you can find it in G/S/C is analogous to a real-world location where they let wild deer roam freely around the town.
I should make a thread about the design origins of some pokémon so people can appreciate them better. I've been meaning to do that.
