Hypothetical: everything has the option to use quick attack

[kid]

This is just a hypothetical question, if every single mon in RBY had the option to have quick attack as a move slot, it being the only priority move, would anything use it? I know flareon has it as one of it's moves, but it isn't OU, and it's move selection kind of sucks. For normals they'd get STAB on it which isn't super top-tier awful even given it's shitty BP.

[Isa]

I think that Quick Attack isn't as needed in RBY as priority in general is in future generations, due to the bulkiness of the tier and high frequency of paralysis. It's also laughably weak even with STAB:

Snorlax Quick Attack vs. Jynx: 82-97 (24.6 - 29.1%) -- 99.9% chance to 4HKO

So no, I don't think it'd see more use.

[jorgen]

Flareon shouldn't be using Quick Attack as its 4th anyway. It should be using Fire Spin or, failing that, something a bit more useful like Substitute, Sand Attack, Mimic, Reflect...

[Crystal_]

Maybe Rhydon? About as situational as Substitute/Hyper Beam probably

[piexplode]

It'd definitely be superior to Hyper Beam since that only does more damage to Egg, and Rock Slide+QA must do about the same damage. Sub's more useful than both though.

[Raish]

You need to find a situation where a Pokemon often leaves its faster (whether through base speed or common Paralysis conditions) opponents at just a few percent. Unfortunately, the most common example of Pokemon getting left at low %s regularly tends to be bulky pokemon barely surviving Hyper Beam rolls, but you can't follow that up with Quick Attack. Many specialists leave Tauros at just a few % if they don't get good damage rolls afterfighting a 1v1 starting from full health, so it could have a niche in that matchup but wouldn't be worth a moveslot in most cases. Jynx vs. Paralyzed Tauros who FPs once in 2 turns (43.75% chance) is the highest reward case I can think of for this: Blizzard 44-52%, Quick Attack 6-7%, and Jynx's 4th move isn't always that valuable but this matchup rarely happens unless it's from Jynx waking up late game. The Quick Attack would be preferable to Psychic in case Tauros gets a Paraslam.

A 1-4% unparalyzed Snorlax (such as one that barely survived a low roll HBeam in the ditto or got low rolls from an opponent who hits in the 30-35% range) coming in as a revenger against a Paralyzed lead Jynx is the most common scenario where this would be useful. Quick Attack (5-6%) would prevent them from getting that free Boom/Hbeam opportunity that is often Lax's last hurrah. Out of the OU cast, Jynx probably makes the best usage of Quick Attack because it often finds itself Paralyzed or waking up late game in scenarios where remaining Pokemon are more likely to have very low health, presenting situations where Quick Attack would outshine its current often lackluster 4th moves of Rest, Counter, and to a lesser extent Mimic. I would consider Quick Attack Jynx in a Physical-dominated metagame where Rest wasn't proving useful if it was an option.

I have lost exactly one game to a Flareon using Quick Attack where no other move could have gotten my opponent the win, so it definitely has some viability, but you really need a team which can reasonably make those low health situations occur. You also need to be playing no-wrap for Fire Spin not to be a usually better and more versatile source of chip damage and switches throughout the game so you're not walled by Rocks as hard. Dodrio has cases where Quick Attack could be its optimal play over Agility or Substitute, but because Dodrio tends to get clean kills if it's working well, those cases are even more rare than for Flareon whose Fire Blast can end up leaving an opponent damaged by a previous skirmish at those awkward low percentages.