I did do some digging on what the E4 are capable of, though I didn't go any farther than what threatens Shedinja. Sidney's crawdaunt, Glacia's walrein, Drake's Kingdra, and Wallace's Wailord, Wishcash and gyarados are safe.
Sidney:
Mawile vs mightyena. Sand-attack keeps me from setting up comfortably, so I go Sableye. I outspeed and 3hko, but I'm in the red. I swap mawile against shiftry. after a two-sided setup match involving the yellow flute to abuse my opponent's swagger, he reveals his only pure damage is psychic-type. I baton pass +6 attack and defence back to sableye. After PP stalling swagger, I get through the evasion boosts surprisingly fast. Cacturne gets me with Leech seed before going down, so I confuse absol with shedinja on the switch from crawdaunt. It works in my favour, only letting absol get one attack before it goes down to Azumarill. I finish off crawdaunt with shedinja.
It's at this time I realize I forgot to buy X Speeds for my planned strategy for the ghost user.
Phoebe:
Mawile is the lead once again. Unfortunately, Dusclops' Curse puts a damper on my ability to stack defence boosts. I crunch through with little extra damage. The second Dusclops is played more aggressively, with banette winning the duel of Shadow Balls. My sableye OHKo's her first banette shortly thereafter, and I go Azumarill against her sableye. Poorly spaced damage has her heal and take out Azu in the next cycle. I go Gardevoir for speed reasons and drop it's few remaining health. The second Banette is removed just like the first one.
Glacia:
I lead Azumarill against Sealeo #1. Easy +2 attack from X items, but I miss rollout 2 and need to heal, and get paralyzed by Body Slam at that time. Healing on Glacia's part means that I need to use rollout 3 on a very small amount of hp (because rollout 2 took it down to the red). Glaile 1 uses Light Screen of all things before getting rolled, and I outspeed Sealeo 2. Glaile 2 uses hail, so it doesn't look like shed'll see action even though walrein's the only one left after it Explodes its second turn out. I only chip it with Garde before it lands Sheer Cold, due to the earlier light screen. It misses Banette, letting me play the damage-over-time game with Curse. I go down after (big surprise), but my opponent's berry works against it, preventing a heal. Mawile and Banette's Curse finish the job just as hail runs out.
Drake:
I lead Banette against Shelgon, who I know carries fire coverage. I burn it to mess up its offence and punish it for spamming protect, then dodge a heal and take a crit, surviving in the red and KOing. Flygon is next, because it has Crunch. It also has earthquake, which is capable of hitting Azumarill for nearly half. It also also has flamethrower, preventing an intimidate-based solution. I go Gardevoir and am extremely lucky to get my stuff off rather than dying to -1 earthquake or crunch. Salamence comes out, and I heal and dodge the first rock slide, enough to win that fight. I repeat the strategy against Altaria. I get it to the red in one Psychic and get a calm mind off on the healing turn. I then make the massive miscalculation of assuming another double-edge instead of a second heal and switch, losing my boosts. Awful play on Drake's part lets me get a 3HKO with Azumarill, though only barely (3HP). Kingdra is the victory lap, though it takes a little longer thanks to smokescreen.
I won 5-0, though with 3 in the red.
Wallace:
Wailord is his lead, and so Shedinja is mine. He doesn't immediately switch, letting me Swords dance up. I only go to +4 because I'm expecting to need to switch later. As expected, Toxic-wielding Tentacruel is next. Garde 2hkos with Psychic. Ludicolo is next, another thing I want rid of. I curse it with Banette as it double teams, then go mawile to bait it away from using either Grass move. It works and Luicolo falls, though I only barely survive Surf. I go Shed on Wishcash and revive Banette, since I might need to curse down Milotic. The reluctance to switch is still there, and I have enough PP to go to +6. He brings out gyrados instead, and I simply cancel out intimidate with another SD and keep going. Milotic's threatening move is Toxic, which means it can't avoid one last +6 STAB shadow ball. It can't survive it either, apparently.
I am intending to do various Battle frontier events on this file, though at a higher level of optimization. There would be too much grinding for meaningful updates, so I'll probably stop posting after I have all (nonmobile) legendaries and have beaten Steven. There's still going to be some grinding though, since I want to show that fool how to make a monosteel team.
So apparently I can't just walk up and catch the legendaries even though I'm going to do exactly that at some point. Onwards to the Sky Pillar, I guess. Hopefully This won't completely screw my type-restricted run...
Alright, we've waited for this so-called master of the skies that flies slower than a level 14 taillow. Time to do the gym!
Juan:
I clear inventory while waiting for Luvdisc to run out of Sweet Kiss PP. That was the only thing that threatened shednja. Even crawdaunt lacks dark moves. Easy. I think we have different ideas on what qualifies as an elegant solution though. Especially since victory relied on Juan going for the same move ten times in a row.
So now that we can use Waterfall and also have the TM for Outclassed-by-waterfall, I head briefly back to lilycove to swap the HM moves on azumarill and head towards Victory Road.
While trying to find the stairs, I run into Wally.
Spoiler:
I had Garde out, and try setting up against Altaria. It has the same idea, with dragon dance and safeguard. Aerial Ace on turn 3 takes a little under half, and I 2hko at +1. He sends out Delcatty, and I one-shot with a crit. I swap to Shed against magneton, though it has supersonic. I swap again to Banette, though confusion and thunderbolt doesn't let me do anything. Sableye takes over half in one attack, so I use shed to buy time for healing (I'm only at risk if I attack). Luck isn't kind to me, so I don't get another hit with sableye on cycle 2. cycle 3 is much better, forcing a heal and getting all the night shades I need. Roselia is faced down by Gardevoir and one-shot by Psychic. Wally's own Garde has the species' characteristic lack of coverage, allowing for an easy finale with Shednja.
Once I finally find the basement, I can catch the sixth and final member of the team: mawile.
I'm going to train the team to level 50 for the elite four, which is going to involve some grinding (I don't currently have one mon above 45). On the off-hand chance that anybody is anxiously awaiting the next update, it may be slightly longer before anything interesting happens.
Since apparently preparing for a known attack isn't a thing that happens, it's time to bail the space agency out of a fuel robbery.
"outnumbered 3 to 1" he says. From where I'm standing, I outnumber them 6 to 3.
team fight:
Azumaill/sableye/gadevoir paired with metang/skarmory/aggron. Surf doesn't hit my ally yet, so I am free to 2hko Tabitha's camerupt, though previous chip and Maxie's Mightyena puts me in the red at the end of turn 2. I fall on turn 3 from tabitha's mighty, since maxie's one missed. I send out sableye and apparently go for a pretty useless leer since they swagger both me and metang. The conspicuous lack of dark moves helps survivability as metang slaps itself around. I take out Tabitha's mighty since it would allow for a 2v1 sooner. Steven instead focuses on the weaker mightyena so maxie gets a free switch to camerupt before I'm ready. Fortunately, I paralyze golbat with secret power, leaving it to be Ko'd by metang. I know garde can handle crobat, I just need to hope Steven goes Skarm to draw a fire move instead of another earthquake after the first one takes us both out.
He doesn't. He goes for protect so I don't get the power reduction for a spread move. Garde is alive in the red, but won't survive an attack from crobat anymore, which is accenuated by steven using a special move on a physical attacker when he could have used a physical STAB super-effective on the incoming bat. *checks moveset* Why do you have solarbeam on an aggron? I heal, hoping for low incoming damage. I get it, and aggron both hits and KO's with thunder. Yes, this thing has no STAB and special attacks only. What.
After that display of ...whatever that was, I quietly resolve that I am going to beat steven with a monosteel team. I'll wait until after the league, though.
With Dive in hand (until I use that moveslot for Waterfall later), It's time to find Seafloor Cavern. Oh, I need Rock Smash? Never mind, BRB. And by BRB, I mean "Let me just go to Sootopolis and Pacifidlog so I can fly there later" Due to the risk of flying moves from zubat/golbat, crunch from sharpedo, and swagger from mightyena, shed is benched for this one.
I'm not entirely sure why Archie wants to awaken Kyogre instead of just taking the real power sleeping in this cave, the only Earthquake TM around. Oh well, more for me
Archie:
I lead Banette to mess with mightyena. Turns out having a dark type against a ghost with night shade only matters if you have dark moves. Turn 2 swagger gets one self-hit, but that's mighty's only source of damage. I take another swagger and another hit after Archie heals, then switch a bunch to clear the debuffs while the burn finishes the job. Crobat loses to Gardevoir, and I go azumarill against sharpedo. healing during rollout when you could have KO'd was a mistake, and one that cost him the match.
The time has come for the final showdown with the neighbor, because I have decided that I want to use the departmant store!
Spoiler:
I lead shedinja against tropius. I figure based on its level-up moves that it doesn't have a flying move right now, confirmed when she switces to slugma. I get some more scouting done when tropius is sent out agian after azumarill KOs, showing that grovyle still has pursuit (and also that the move doesn't check confusion when used on a switching target?) Anyway, one calm mind while it hits itself allows Psychic to one-shot. It's not a completely flawless sweep, but Garde has no problem taking out Tropius and Pelipper at +1
And no, the battle on route 103 didn't help make me stronger at all. I'm not using any mon I had back then.
The hideout is pretty empty, so I decide to poke around a while and steal the Master Ball right off of Archie's desk. Nothing else to see here besides a few warp panels. And apparently, Aqua Admin Matt doesn't have any attacks on his Mightyena. I didn't find about Golbat, because it was KO'd instantly.
As is normal for questing, I went off to the Mossdeep Gym because I can't actually do anything about team Aqua until I beat it. Future sight doesn't check type matchups in gen 3, so Shed is threatened by both it and night shade
Tate&Liza:
I lead Gardevoir to hit Xatu with thunderbolt, and newly-evolved Banette to mess with everything else's secondary STAB Raising a big team is taking its toll, with my lvls 36 and 37 against a team of 41s and 42s. I am outsped, so I get Will-o-wisp off after the first earthquake. Clever prediciton gets me some spare turns to KO xatu by constantly switching Shedinja in and out. Basically, both will go for psychic against most mons, which is absorbed by wonder guard. Then, xatu uses confuse ray (which dosn't matter if I switch out right away) and claydol uses ancientpower (extremely weak while burnt). Claydol is down immidiately afterwards on a further wasted turn.
With both rock types on the field, I make a final switch out to azumarill. Interestingly, lunatone lacks a rock move and solrock has flamethrower instead. But with azumarill asleep and the sun up, it won't be doing much. Fortunately +1 thunderbolt removes solrock, making the battle completely safe for both shedinja and sableye. As soon as either one wakes up, that is. 6-0 victory.
Since apparently Wattson neither has anything with surf nor the foresight to build a bridge, maintenance in New Mauville falls to me. Nothing much, just hit a few switches, and I get a thunderbolt TM as a reward. I might use it to give kirlia Gardevoir some coverage before the flying gym, since I can get repeats at the game corner.
I tour the weather institute, wondering if there's a way to make Shedinja immune to sandstorm and hail damage. I find team aqua there, and take them wout while shed sits on the bench from all the zubats and dark types. This pattern is disturbingly common.
rival 4:
I have Sableye as my lead against her Slugma. Easy 2hko, and I see if I can set up as shed against lombre. She switches, showing that lombre cannot hit shed, but I'm pursuit trapped and taken out by grovyle. I get it in the red with sableye, but go down to a leaf blade crit. Gardevoir outspeeds and kos. I calm mind once before realizing that lombre is going for physical attacks in the form of nature power->swift, so then I OHKO at +1 with psychic. So more of the same, I have a good team of 3 and a way of scouting sets.
A little more stealth (to save trainers for after Mt. Pyre) later, I get a way of clearing the path to the Fortree gym. And yes, the kecleon does know a dark move.
Winona:
I lead Azumarill, hoping to dent the team with rollout. Swablu goes for safeguard on its one available turn, and tropious loses its initiative charging solarbeam. Pelliper is one-shot by the fifth hit. I decide to keep Azumarill safe for altaria and use sableye's night shade against skarmory. I win a three-turn slugfest with 7hp. Altaria fails to deal enough damage to stop a 3-turn rollout from bringing it down. The battle went pretty much exactly according to plan.
Time to reap the rewards of playing mailman, Devon Stone has given me the Exp share! I don't have an explicit use for it, but it'll be useful if I ever bring my team above four members.
Well, the two trainers that were expressly told to go all out in Dad's gym were also the only two that couldn't hit shedinja.
Norman:
Spinda has Teeter dance, both Vigoroth and Slaking have faint attack. Linoone is safe. I lead kirlia against Spinda. Luck is not on my side, and a turn lost to confusion at the same time as an opposing crit prevents the 2hko with psychic. Sableye is next, and I notice that it cannot hit me. Dad refuses to switch, letting me blow whatever X items I had on hand to buff sableye to the gills. At +3 attack, +2 defense, +1 speed and crit rate up, I attempt to kick butt. After one turn of confusion, (glad I didn't go to +6 and kill myself) Spinda drops in one more attack, and then vigoroth chips and takes a second Secret Power to ko. I get the paralysis on slaking, though it sleeps me through yawn. Since it can't ohko with faint attack, I effectively have him at my mercy until I run out of healing items. I Leer a bit to skip norman using a potion, and take the KO. The match is effectively over a this point, he can't hit either of my ghosts. I Swords Dance up with the one-HP wonder itself and take my fifth badge.
I get Surf right after the fight from Wally's parents being glad for my contribution to their son's life. I'm not going to say no to a mobility boost like that, especially since bubblebeam has started to fall off in relative strength.
At Meteor falls, I run into another group of ne'er-do-wells, and as is tradition, decide to take the law into my own hands. Unfortunately for me, my bug type got a whole lot worse against dark types in since the last time I fought Team Poochyena. Azumarill takes on most of the trainers at the volcano simply enough
Maxie:
I lead sableye so I can Night Shade instead of caring about Intimidate. It's a 3hko, giving him enough time to heal and also attempt to sand-attack something with Keen Eye. Zubat falls to Kirlia's new Psyhcic, and base 50 SpA doesn't let Camerupt take a STAB bubblebeam.
Onwards to the Lavaridge gym, I'm expecting more or less an Azumarill solo, so I leave a few trainers unfought to even out my levels later. Wow, I still know the exact route through this gym
Flannery:
I don't quite one-shot camerupt, but it goes for tackle instead of something more useful. I attempt to get Secret Power's secondary effect against torkoal, but I don't and body slam paralyzes me. Fortunately, it puts in the range where two bubblebeams ko it without flannery healing
Unfortunately for evening out the levels, sandstorm isn't kind to shedinja. I see an old structure with fragile floors, so I do the completely normal strategy of reducing my surface area for more pressure while going full speed. I grab a fossil that isn't important right now and carry on.
Plenty of trainers near Mauville, so I have all four members of the team at 23 before the leader fight. Ralts and Marill evolved, but I'm deliberately holding off on Nincada until 25 so that it'll have swords dance when it splits.
Wattson:
This battle was pretty messy. I had an electric immunity with no way to boost offence and no moves over an average power of about 50, and no other resists. And Night Shade from sableye and water gun from Azumarill were the only things not resisted by magneton. Oh, and half my team's sturdiness came from accuracy/evasion stuff, which works really poorly when every opponent knows a never-miss move. After more resets than I would like to admit, my strategy was this:
Lead nincada, sand-attack voltorb to have it miss rollout, heal back the damage from the early hits with Leech Life (when it was weak, mind you), dodge or tank selfdestruct with voltorb's poor attack and nincada's surprisingly good physical defence.
Send in Sableye against electrike, probably get paralyzed from thunder wave, heal through the 3hko and take it down with night shade
Chip magneton with sableye (sacrificing it), bring in nincada and sand-attack for sonicboom, send in kirlia and set up calm mind, healing through shock waves. KO with confusion only when you think you're set.
take out manectric before it howls enough to make quick attack threatening.
I can't really say much for setting up a treehouse without having seen the rest of the region, but I will gladly join this club. Right now, a TM I can repurchase for a respectable-damage physical move that has good coverage with water and ghost is too good to pass up. I head back to slateport and buy two more, noticably bumping the power of sableye, nincada, and azumarill. I do the second trick house challenge while I'm there, though this one makes a little more sense than planting trees on a tile floor.
What better way to celebrate going to a route raining volcanic ash than to finalize a teamslot with something that dies instantly to anything resembling fire? I'm so ready for swords dance + STAB shadow ball to be a thing in 13 more levels. In gens 2 and 3, Shadow Ball is physical. In gen 1, it didn't exist, causing the convention for Ghost moves to be set off of Lick
Everything I do, I look at it and say "this is stupid." And then I think "But boy am I glad I'm feeling that my dumb crap is actually dumb, and boy am I glad that I can do something as crazy as this in the first place
Pulled in a favour with a friend of the ex-hostage to get a free boat ride to Dewford. Time to check out the cave, since that's probably where the guy I need to deliver mail to is (if they had a normal location, they could have just used the postal system). I see a pair of glowing eyes in the darkness. I decide that I want it to be my partner for any future adventures. It pays off immediately when I noticed that there is nothing at all in the Dewford gym that is capable of damaging dark/ghost.
Brawly:
I swap train on him, except for meditite that would always attempt and fail Focus Punch just as I remember it. Night shade was nice since he kept boosting defence
Back on the mainland, I break up an attack by having my ground type wipe the floor with a group known for water types. I'm serious, everything they had was weak to Bug and they had no water moves. Weird that there was absolutely no questioning afterwards given this was in a public museum.
Though perhaps I spoke too soon about the relative lack of otherworldly mischief around here. I have no other explanation for the contents of the Trick House. Not even Psychics can pull that kind of stuff off. Worried, I train the team up for a while: Ralts to 18, the others to 16.
Rival 3:
Ah yes, the hard one. I lead ralts, and use a few potions while setting up Double Team. I get through Wingull, Grovyle, and chip Slugma before bad luck catches up with me. There's a reason evasion is banned in competitive. Marill finishes the job.
There you are, Pinsir! The hazards are set, do you have enough Moxie to get wings and plow through these guys?
*continues ignoring that The CLAW looks nothing like a pinsir, because there's only one bug that has grabs and throws as an important part of their movepool*
So here we are. Gen 7 is behind us, and nothing known of gen 8 besides its existence. Perfect time to go back to the first region I came to love, Hoenn. This is still my original cartridge, dead battery preventing the clock from moving and all
So after realizing for the fist time that the boxes actually shift in the moving van, I climb out into Littleroot Town. Sometimes a family's gotta follow their work, and seems Johto's current Normal leader is a bit to (in)famous to replace. Doesn't take long for the local researcher to prove himself inept, but I have enough time to consider my first pokemon carefully. I know my stuff (possibly better than Birch) and decide that learning Earthquake without a currently-consumable TM is going to be important a lot later on, and so my starter is Mudkip.
Introductions to the neighbor go simply remember, lvl 5 starters don't have any STAB moves yet, I help another kid get on his journey, and stop a thug on the way to the first gym run by somebody who isn't my dad. I've picked up a few other 'mons by this point, but I have no idea what my final team is going to look like. As a kid, I thought wurmple's evolution was time- or version-locked, since I always got Cascoon. It's actually random, and I just had weird luck
Roxanne:
Water gun wipes out both geodude, and I decide to use mud-slap and debuff accuracy on Nosepass. A few crits on the part of my opponent brings it down to the wire, but eventually poison damage from Silcoon takes them down
After another brief diversion in a tunnel with somebody who doesn't know what to do with their hostage, I get some shiny new tech given to me for free. So now I can listen to people talk to me all the time. I can't say I'll be impressed until I can start getting rematches out of them.
Rival 2:
Wingull was concerning, but I just beat it down with Mudkip's tackle. I had plenty of bugs to handle Treeko
It's been fun, but any shmuck can save the world and become champion. Half the reason I'm here is because Kanto wouldn't let me do it in style. I look at my Ralts, Huge Power Marill, Nincada, and the itinerary showing Granite Cave and decide to play with life and death. From now on, this journey is Ghost and those that would be Fairy only (and prevos, of course). Fortunately this is well away from the creepier aspects of the latter type (Mawile, especially mega Mawile, isn't concerning. you know exactly where you stand with them: ready to be torn to shreds by an effective base 200+ attack)
Been looking for an interesting fight, given that the current direction seems to be dumbing down the situation.
1d118 ⇒ 99Quarg the Stone Dragon
Well, that's an extremely obvious typing. Let's be generous and assume literally god-tier stats, (i.e. 120 across the board) fully invested physical attacker. I'll be using princess
round-by-round:
My mon's HP: 397
they outspeed me, so
stone edge accuracy:1d20 ⇒ 20 hits on a 5+, 19-20/*1.5 crit
damage roll map:1d16 ⇒ 6 188*1.5=282 after rounding
115 hp left.
leech seed accuracy:1d20 ⇒ 3 hits on a 2+, not damaging.
I drain 55 HP and heal an extra 24 from an item, putting me at 184 hp.
Turn 2, I have them protect themselves so no incoming damage. I heal to 273 hp.
Turn 3:
stone edge accuracy:1d20 ⇒ 7 damage roll map:1d16 ⇒ 9 195 damage. Princess is at 78
Flash cannon has full accuracy, so it's just the crit roll
needs 20:1d20 ⇒ 15 damage roll map:1d16 ⇒ 11 174 damage, putting my opponent at 23% after the leech seed drain. We're at 157 hp at end of turn.
Turn 4 is another protect, putting us at 236 and them at 11%. Next round is the decider.
I attempt to double-protect: needs a 3:1d3 ⇒ 1 stone edge accuracy:1d20 ⇒ 13 damage roll map:1d16 ⇒ 13 203
Leech Seed takes them down, leaving princess standing with 20% remaining hp.
Simple enough, though I might want a setup sweeper to really plow through this horde
Edit: and apparently they had a significant damage-boosting item without the usual drawbacks (life orb, for the curious). weird.
a small family of pikas (short-eared arctic mammals related to rabbits)
I'd even go so far as to say that they were all killed by "Albino" Pikachus
That's not any less embarrassing. "Oh no, I was hit by a shock under half the strength of something that only ever runs away without effort put into it." Seriously, this thing's best offecnce (physical, by the way) is less than rattata's and it doesn't get STAB on it's priority. Even as a FEAR strat (which would be harder without the fight being 1v1), It's got nothing on taillow.
And how is that weird? I have a pet magnet, a pet fake tree, a pet antlion, a pet landshark, a pet lamp, a pet wrestling bird, and a pet pile of sand, among others.
This thread is really fun now that smash has other meanings.
Indeed. It’s very amusing to picture a typical fantasy barbarian playing any of the Super Smash Bros. games.
And here I thought my first post here would involve finally making an AM MESMERIST alias.
Plenty of reasons to get rage. I know some of my buddies count themselves in the hundreds that deserve that fame more than the rat and I might need to swap out Return if we ever run into one.
I have no complaints with any character introduced in SSB4. But **** it, zard is a fast special attacker. Dude outspeeds both lucario and pikachu, and physical attack is its lowest stat. Even the more physical mega X has tied offenses (and megazard y has a higher special attack than mewtwo).
I have a singular title within my region. Occasionally, I get together and compete with others with the same title. It helps if we are all the single champion of the same place since that means we have the same resources available.
I don't claim to have ever really been thinking the same way as the locals, but I've begun to notice I've been drifting away from the ordinary. As an example, someone asked what held item is best for enduring sunlight. My response was the Red Orb. As if everybody I meet has an ancient artifact available and the god to use it. In my defence, I've mostly been interacting with members of other realities that do.
Probably my last LP post, there's not a whole lot of exciting to read stuff left
So this is your base for Alola, Master of Many. Poised between the pinnacle of trainers, the tapu's ruins, and the gateway to the beyond. I have little doubt, that you've been keeping watch over my journey, as one who mediates divine conflicts does. Of course, I would not have crusaded if I wasn't sure it would be worthy of your indifference. I have cured Nature's madness. But I'm not here for the past. Maintaining an order, even a natural one, isn't something one being, or even seven, can accomplish. As such, I ask for your support. We both know I couldn't catch you if you dispersed, and once you had fled, I cannot stop you from branding me an abomination and raising a force I cannot make a stand against. Will you go and, should we ever meet again, it will be at your discresion or will you stand beside me as you stand now: the Will, Voice and Legion of nature?
Not willing to serve with someone weaker than you? I can respect that.
It was a long fight, since it was not only ground type, but outsped palossand and had safeguard. I eventually caught it in a great ball blowing turns for a timer ball.
Over on the route 16 outpost, I battle dexio for the remaining 50. He has a fenrir mode on his team, but for some reason he doesn't mega evolve his Alakazam this time.
Does the cosmog from the lake count as "some other random thing picked up while planeswalking?" I guess so.
Because the parameters have been changed for the low levels, you cannot do the regular multi battle challenge with a non-ultra game.
How does this even wear a scarf? Wouldn't normal movement cut the thing to shreds?
One mega stone purchase for Banette later (metagross doesn't need the help as much), and noting that the move tutors, while they'd be useful later, aren't great right now, I set off.
The first target is both the biggest threat and the most likely for their warnings to be ignored: Lele. If they do gang up, I want to be sure my mind is clear. That's not the only reason it's the biggest threat, since while all 4 are OU (second highest singles tier), Lele was banned from monotype. Fortunately for me, said ban was because it made psychic, fairy and steel the only viable options Two Zen Headbutts using their own terrain against them put them low enough, and I thunder wave with magnezone. I win 5-0, leaving the ruins of life with one fewer ruiner of lives.
Bulu's the next target, since both the others remaining can get some benefit from grassy terrain. As well, the sandstorm nearby may conceal my approach. This time, the paralysis comes first, as the destroyer comes face to face with the ultimate embodiment of vengeance, straight from the other ruins of abundance. "Fellow" physical grass type kartana false swipes him to 1, and takes quite a few hits since Bulu ends up requiring more resources to imprison.
pokedex wrote:
Although it's called a guardian deity, it's violent enough to crush anyone it sees as an enemy
Violent enough, but not powerful enough.
While it would normally be unimportant which of the two remaining I pick off, I have a way of hitting Fini's weakness: Net balls. It tries to prolong with aqua ring, but it goes down in about 8 turns regardless.
I cross the bridge to the final tapu in style, by which I mean holding onto magnezone for dear life. After all, this bridge fell before and I can guarantee I won't be saved in the same way this time. the electric typing means I can't paralyze, but his only offence against palossand undergoes exponential decay. As such, I safely wait for the terrain to end, hit with hypnosis, and capture next turn.
In myths, gods punish the hubris of mortals who think they can rule the world. In truth, mortals punish the hubris of gods.
Here's the plan: the tapus know I don't like them. However, they don't know when. Since I've already blown some time saving Lillie's butt, I figure we map out the last section of the region and get some gear for the showdown.
First thing, a Z-crystal in some cave in Poni. Of course, I'm not stupid enough to try a dragon/fighting type where I'm going, so it's pretty useless right now.
"Instead of telling you about the mega ring, why don't I show you?"
*Pokemon trainer dexio sent out metagross*
*mega is still alakazam*
Disappointed in you.
It turns out the postgame parts of poni island actually do have some great stuff lying around, including several of the EV boosters and a metal coat. Hooray for not ending up with another saltily-named shiny (this is my shiny alolan Muk. It's named "Metal coat")
Red has no personal battle music when fought the first time
Spoiler:
Lvl 74 pikachu only threatening against kartana for the possibility of special attacks. Nonetheless, I switch to palossand on Volt Tackle. Red switches, revealing he has no coverage. I get some good damage on lapras before going to metagross. Blizzard freezes me, so I PP stall a little bit before using a full restore. Second Hammer arm KOs after the first one misses. Having metagross baits charizard out for muk to rock slide. a miss and a burn causes me to KO using magnezone's sturdy. I outspeed venusaur and corksrew crash, doing about 2/3 and revealing earthquake.
Kartana's smart strike finishes, but a single attack boost isn't quite enough for brick break to OHKO snorlax. I do however take less than half from a high horsepower crit. I OHKO blastoise, but another crit from Volt tackle stops my sweep. However, Light screen is the only thing it can do against my (still at full health) palossand, and it doesn't stop a single earth power from KOing.
I'll eventually work out how to challenge the Tree on my own, but since I don't have all the time in the world (I haven't cought Dialga yet), I chat up my previous associate (the one who got me the rotom egg) for a few loaners: Aggron, Celesteela and porygon-Z.
Aaand there's no level cap in the non-super modes, making a lvl 67 competitive-EV'd and moveset porygon-Z slight overkill. Should have brought lvl 100 metagross and dhelmise. Not even missing 3 ice beams from brightpowder brings us down. Heck, celesteela tanks +4 (*3) charge beams from electrode with under half health damage.
Porygon-Z:
Remember how +1 to all stats can make something like Kommo-o scary when you know exactly what type you're up against? Think about that on the strongest non-legendary non-mega special attack extant, that you don't even know what type it is until it boosts, and it gets adaptability for that type that it becomes. That's what happens when you Z-move conversion.
Immediate Ghetsis! He's trying to one-up Giovanni, but then decides to challenge me instead of falling back.
Spoiler:
He leads cofagrigus, so I switch metagross for muk. It's a stallmon, so I toxic it. Some mistimed hits has him heal, so I Z-move with magnezone. He goes for boufallant, I go back to metagross. I know he has earthquake, but I need rotom healthy. I switch after the first and pick up the KO with rotom. Mangezone then takes out bisharp.
I go muk against hydregon to tank. even burnt, gunk shot takes out nearly half. Unfortunately, that means he heals, which I toxic him that turn. I revive muk in exchange for metagross and KO it.
I bring out palossand fresh and ready for zekrom. Hypnosis hits turn 1 and earth power 2HKOs.
Lillie is taken hostage, but I'm not the only tech paladin in this region. Colress has developed not only an invisibility device, but also one for banishment. How fitting that Ghetsis falls to his former subordinate.
Back in the vaults, face to face with Giovanni. Apparently his going to try to weaponize UBs, and I finally have that purpose back in me. Shame I don't currently have any in my team
Spoiler:
Battle starts immediately. I swap metagross for rotom on dugtrio's earthquake, and hydro pump. Guy has enough savviness to go for stealth rock, but I have plenty of resists. Nidoking dodges two hydro pumps, severely weakening rotom. I still outspeed and use the last PP on rhyperior. Zen headbutt from metagross nearly takes out nidoqueen, and I take an earth power and get the KO after using up one of his full restores.
Remember how I said stealth rock was a good move? Well it's mewtwo X with earthquake and I don't have sturdy available. After magnezone goes down, mewtwo falls in the same way as zekrom: slept by palossand.
Apparently the other leaders just... despawn on defeat. I'm disappointed, I kind of hoped to see Archie and Maxie fight.
Back with the first team, I venture forth once again. Upstairs has a little more security, which makes me think the higher-ups were worried about Archie and Maxie's rivalry getting in the way
Next up: Lysandre. I don't really believe he's stupid enough to not have both buttons activate the weapon. I mean, he actually defeated some random kid this time.
Spoiler:
Leads mienshao, gets good damage on metagross but is OHKOd. the pattern continues for much of the battle, with Magnezone tanking a heat wave from honchcrow and palossand v pyroar. Mold breaker would be scarier if mega gyarados actually had earthquake for rotom.
Muk, not even at full health, tanks xerneas' moonblast and gets of toxic (I was expecting geomancy). Someday, I will remember items exist. A newly-revived magnezone goes for corkscrew crash and OHKOs.
Spin panels, when you really want to use the D-pad for movement but can't
Galactic time!
Spoiler:
Houndoom immediately takes out metagross, and gets about a third in on rotom. Next crobat falls to magnezone. Since it broke sturdy, I keep mag in to blow through honchcrow and weavile.
He has diagla, which works to my advantage. originally because I had more super effective options than palkia, but actually because of roar of time's recharge turn. Banette's curse brings it down.
Never thought I'd be calling Guzma the more competent partner, but here we are.
Warp panels! Always a nice thing to put in a fortress. Lets you not bother with the weak points known as doors.
memorization puzzles too unexciting? Put battles in the middle of repeating the sequence!
Hey, a free electrode! Shoot, it had explosion.
First boss: Maxie
Spoiler:
I lead palossand, but I need it later, so I switch immediately against mightyena. Fire fang doesn't do as much damage to magnezone as he'd like, but does burn. Camerupt takes hydro pump, dark pulse flinches don't stop metagross from beating crobat, weezing is reliant on pain split so I curse with banette.
Now this is somthing worth fighting. I switch a bunch between rotom and muk to stall Drought, and hit him with hydro vortex after 5 turns. I'd have been completely screwed if he was primal.
Expecting archie after the next segment, I tweak the team a little.
Spoiler:
I lead with muk, expecting mighteyena this time. I start with toxic due to intimidate. He does heal, but it saves me some gunk shot PP. Sharpedo comes out, I go Rook. I get some good damage off on Muk too with volt switch. Palossand finishes the job. I use rotom for crobat, who tries to toxic stall and fails miserably.
Kyogre doesn't start out great, with ice beam KOing dhelmise and me forgetting to refresh sturdy on magnezone. Rotom tanks hydro pumps and gets paralysis with discharge to bring me the win
"I haven't quite figured out what a Champion is, but you're very strong, right?" -Dulse
So apparently there are a few wanderers about. I consider going for the beings disrupting the natural order first, but I decide saving Ultra Beasts from them is a higher priority.
Hau wonders why I received Null and not him, but it's probably because I'm something of a specialist in taking beings considered nearly mindless attackers under my proverbial wing.
These guys are way out of their element. As far as I can tell, they're apex predators, something that isn't challenged often. I used the Beast Balls immediately so they didn't injure themselves from prolonged strain.
"Perhaps a day will come when the Ultra Beasts will live here in Alola as normal pokemon" -also Dulse
I'm working on it.
The rainbow rocket scenario starts immediately after catching all the UBs
TRR, part 1:
Sophocles can't make a cyberspace that's stable when the rest of reality is distorting, so a halfway competent group infiltrates it. Maybe later I'll work up my anger at them using tech for evil, but for now I'm just laughing at Sophocles.
Wait, I have to use the loaners from random other people? I won't be able to clear the honour of technology? ARE YOU KI- nevermind, this guy has a palossand.
Okay, they're continuing to target the few tech-heavy parts of the region, but that's just basic strategy. Lillie seems to have forgotten she no longer has a legendary to bail her out, so I guess I have to do it. I'll bring Banette for training purposes.
"Do you want to know how we took over the foundation so easily?" Because they don't have nearly enough steel types and you keep using poison types?
Faba says something to the effect of "It'll be easier to fight 2-on-2 than 1-on-1 if you're with Lillie" and considering she leads with an unevolved pokemon that sets up the wrong screen for the situation, I'm inclined to agree. Especially since I can't effectively use discharge. Doubles stall isn't usually viable, but that's assuming two competent opponents. At least the grunt with him is just as bad, effectively making this 1v1.
Muk put in the most work due to Faba's love of psychic types, and being a physical attacker through the grunt's use of snarl.
the hardest part of the GTS: typing "stakataka" correctly
I decided to go with magnezone, palossand, muk, rotom, knight, and metagross.
Kukui calls himself a professor and couldn't beat Lance. They don't even have multiscale, all you needed was something sturdy with ice beam!
Good to see they haven't forgotten some representation of the tech that keeps this impractical setup off the ground. Molayne is in the elite four!
battle:
I have no idea of his lead, so I start with rotom, due to its resistances. He goes klefki. I was expecting spikes, but he instead forgoes prankster and uses 4* resisted flash cannons. He wastes a full restore on it.
dugtrio is next, but I want to preserve hydro pump PP. I go palossand and OHKO with earth power.
Bisharp is next, meeting a brick break from knight. metagross comes out, and I'm surprised how well it takes X-scissor. Palossand comes out on the next hammer arm, and finishes with shodow ball.
an unnecssary earth power crit brings his magnezone to sturdy, cousing him to use his last full restore. It didn't save him the match
Thanks dex rotom, but I don't think going to a centre is practical right now.
I go for Acerola next, so I can afford to spam shadow ball later
Spoiler:
I lead muk for obvious reasons, she starts with banette. the only thing I had to fear was will-o-wisp, but it used screech, missed, and wend down to crunch. knight takes out palossand, but I didn't trust his speed enough to stay in against froslass. I instead flash cannon with magnezone.
Muk finishes, taking only minor damage from dhelmise and drifiblm. I only need to heal due to Aftermath.
Olivia's next, and sturdy will be the only thing stopping Knight from soloing.
Spoiler:
I lead metagross to draw out ground attackers. I get an attack boost from meteor mash well still one-shotting armaldo. Probopass comes out, a special attacker with possible sturdy. I break it with psychic while she thunderwaves, then I give up on speed entirely with hammer arm. Sandstorm doesn't seem like it'd do much for her. Bad luck puts me bleow half before I take out lycanroc. I go palossand, timing my special attacker to the end of sandstorm She doesn't have golem, the sturdy user that ended my mono-posion E4 run and gave my bug team a lot of trouble. and probopass just went for status. Knight could have beaten this in a clean sweep Her last mon is cardily, ony threatening with leech seed and toxic. It couldn't set up against Knight.
Hey, you're that person who came out of nowhere when I got the flying Z-crystal! Why are you suddenly important? You play pro golf? Why would you expect me to know that? What kind of 11 year old wathces golf?
I switch Magnezone's Z-crystal to electric for this fight.
Spoiler:
I screw up and keep metagross as lead.She drops the spikes sturdy skarmory lead from the last game, despite those spikes being a major contributor to her team's total damage done in my previous runs. Braviary? okay, not having magnezone out might be good, since I can avoid fighting moves on it. It may not even have any, since it keeps using brave bird. Misses with Zen headbutt put me pretty low, but I don't think I'll need metagross much more anyway. Hawlucha is next, and ulike every AI hawlucha in XY packs dark coverge in throat chop. it also crits palossand, so I emergency switch to rotom and KO with discharge.
Oricorio is next, I go muk for the more consitent SE damage with rock slide. It's the fire type one, so even after featherdance, it's in the red. I toxic it immediately after she heals, which allows me to KO next hit.
Mandibuzz, infamously sturdy bird that it is, is the one recieving gigavolt havoc. I stay in for the final, Toucannon, knowing I can take overheat with sturdy. It goes for... screech.
Assesment: the E4 hang around level 56. I have 62-69 coming out of it. That sidequest really destroyed late game, even if I'm not using knight much.
Full heal for the champion, and Corcscrew crash back on magnezone. Let's do this! Oh hey, an empty seat! Yeah, I don't beleive this. They try to keep the champion fight a secret in Kanto, too.
champion:
Kukui was a good champion, gave me trouble for the first time since Cynthia, and I was still trying to brute force everything with my starter then. Granted, that challenge might have been that he had a magnezone against my team of bugs with no ground coverage and only fighing move user weak to electric.
Hau, seriously? You haven't even come close to beating me You didn't even have 6 pokemon as a league challenger before, and you call this a battle theme? These whistles are driving me insane!
Electric/psychic against ground/ghost as our leads. Expected result. Vaporeon falls to Knight, tarous does under a quarter with earthquake, and is only surviving brick break due to intimidate as Hau wastes full restores. Knight also easily OHKOs crabominable.
I know noivern will outspeed and KO, so I use metagross. Second damage roll is much higher than first, so his dark pulse 2HKOs. Muk finishes with rock slide.
Starter vs starter is how I choose to end it, with corkscrew crash leaving about the same amount of health left as spirit shackle does damage. He heals, and I pump lasers into him. He has enough full restores that it takes 5 more flash cannons at a normal 3HKO, but he couldn't KO magnezone first.
And so the historic moment of the first alola champion is engraved with a supercomputer, a sandcastle, a posessed washing machine, a few magnetic orbs, a pool of sludge, and
Knight:
an extradimensional papercraft
Take that, tapus!
I wasn't ready for the crowning ceremony. Not only was I marched across that stupid bridge without being able to hang on to magnezone, we were up in Koko's ruins without being able to keep our defenders out and ready. The blood knight probably felt my intent up there and now has time to prepare.
You find some interesting stuff in Victory Road. Stuff like impact craters with weakened legendaries. I was pretty worried since it was under a hailstorm, but the guy wants to be with me since I got him with a single try when he still had over half health. Colress shows up and has hilariously modified the devices to depower necrozma into ways of increasing it's strength. He also drops the second hint that Solgaleo is waiting in Mahalo trail, so I finally check it out. Fortunately, it's on my side of the bridge. Why is the new bridge the same style as the old bridge that collapsed?
Messing around a bit while I decide on the team for the elite four. Almost definitely going to have magnezone and palossand (the two highest level), as well as Muk for coverage and resistances. and Acerola. Any suggestions for the remaining three? I am willing to grind up, and have already started a bit for some
current usage box:
magnezone Lvl. 68
Palossand Lvl. 66
rotom(wash) Lvl 65
dhelmise Lvl 65
metagross lvl 64
muk lvl 63
Rook lvl 62
Knight lvl 60
Queen lvl 60
klefki lvl 60
banette lvl 53
probopass lvl 48
drifiblm lvl 46
golurk lvl 43
Claydol lvl 43
bisharp lvl 36
trubbish lvl 33
Highlights of combing the desert:
Was not expecting a Z-crystal pedestal here. Well, he wasn't. With it being so close to the Tapu, I gotta wonder if the area was destroyed because some psychic type annoyed him. An attempt to stop the legendaries from getting more power, ignorant of their personal equivalents?
A guy who's apparently been lost for over a year and doesn't want a ride out on charizard. I guess he likes sand.
Today we finish off the fourth island. Plot should be mostly finished for now, so I'll stop spoilering everything.
Anything I picked up duing the Gap will be referred to by an alias.If you would like to know what my team is,
Spoiler:
Knight is kartana,
Rook is Xurkitree,
Queen is celesteela
The callenge for Mina's trail (which seems to be chosen specifically so she can do the least work) is fight all the other captains. They're in the low 50s. I trained my team to 60 for the sidequest. Knight's been doing well for the early ones, possibly due to type and natural coverage. AFAICT, you need to do them in order
Lana's fight is skipped, Kiawe's includes Hiker David, Sophocles' entire team is double-weak to ground, Acerola's is also skipped.
fairy totem:
Not even +2 to all stats stopped metagross from taking half it's health in one meteor mash. Unfortunately, it would be a 2HKO, so I swap out. This is absolutely one where you need to take out the summon, who knows heal pulse. Some terrible luck allows it to get 2 quiver dances up. (I missed thunder wave) It's at this point that I notice something: Its two STAB moves have 10 PP each. I have 21 revives and am willing to use them all to avoid losing to... this.
Okay, truns out it also has draining kiss. While continuing to PP stall, I take out blissey, and pelliper shortly thereafter (I had magnezone out)
Was this more costly than taking the loss, leading with Muk and killing it with poison? Yes. But I know better than to be defensless near a fey.
Eventually, helped by the fact it only 3HKO's magnezone at maximum offense, it could only dance. It was at that point the battle ended as it began, with a Meteor Mash to the face.
I would like to disintegrate this abomination-engraved artifact. Seriously, everything about this thing is creepy. Anybody else remember the creepy background objects in the one level of Mario Galaxy 2? The fairy Z-crystal looks pretty close to what you'd get if you gave one of those an extra head.
Time for Hapu, and she's taken advantage of the expanded pokedex. Rotom takes out Golurk, and Knight beats mudsdale. Flygon comes out and takes out Knight. Remembering a previous encounter with flygon, I take the hit with Sturdy and corkscrew crash with magnezone. Dhelmise then takes out gastrodon. I'm still slightly overleveled.
Why does victory road only have one elevator? If it's going to see use it should have more. Gladion was here, I wanted to have some fun with Rook, but I keep forgetting how slow he is. He takes a Z-move from zoroark, but falls to silvally. rest of fight was uneventful. Weird that using the Z-move removes zoroark's illusion. Congrats on getting the mask off, I guess.
Looks like it repeating locations after a loss only applies if you go right back in. Had to PP stall Xurkitree's power whip and electric terrain, but eventually slept and caught him with palossand.
a good many warp rides later... Maybe it's possible that these are actually dangerous. Then again, since the guy in the hazmat suit dosn't seem to be giving any ill will towards the Guzzlord I caught in a single ultra ball, it might have ended up in a post-apocalyptic city by coincidence.
informative pokedex entries:
Guzzlord wrote:
Although it’s alien to this world and a danger here, it’s apparently a common organism in the world where it normally lives.
Xurkitree wrote:
Although it’s alien to this world and a danger here, it’s apparently a common organism in the world where it normally lives.
Buzzwole wrote:
Although it’s alien to this world and a danger here, it’s apparently a common organism in the world where it normally lives.
There's plenty of this in Umoon as well
I am now low on rescources and cash with which to buy them. Total captures in ultra space:
Nihilego
Buzzwole*2, one traded for pheromosa
Xurkitree
Kartana*2, one traded for celesteela
Guzzlord
Articuno
Latios
But I never learned an instrument! Can I get one of my team to play it? I mean, most of them don't have limbs or breathe, but we should be able to think of something.
Hey look, cutscenes of the tapus and their lapdogs fighting UBs! Unfortunately, things aren't looking too great. Blacephalon doesn't have the sustain to fight Koko, hala and hau, given that it's going to need Mind Blown. Buzzwole could beat Olivia, but the list of things that beat lele is extremely small (Megearna, metagross, celesteela, kartana, nihilego are the only non-ubers). Guzzlord seems like it has the best chance due to Bulu's lack of good fairy moves, but it'll be a long slog of dark v dark beforehand. If Xurkitree naturally got energy ball in addition to by TM I'd give it the best chance, but it's not getting through Hapu without it.
Dusk mane Necrozma is not catchable. The option to use pokeballs is unavialible. It took me a while to notice, leaving me to wear it down. This was difficult, because it knew morning sun.
I got to try on the Squad's armour! I was so exited I forgot to get sidetracked and actually went to the Ultra Meagapolis. During the first warp ride session, tilt controls are required, but an NPC in the Game Freak building in Heahea will change it to circle pad.
And then we fight necrozma in it's true form. It's not catchable this time either, which was its weakness. Between aura boosts and base stats, it's pumping out more offensive potential than mega mewtwo. I was thinking on this issue before SuMo came out and we didn't know if UBs were catchable. A single entity that requires a KO is a terrible boss for a core pokemon game. It's only a challenge if it's so offensively powerful that it can one-shot the entire player team, which isn't all that fun. If you let the player get a single move in, a one-health bar boss can be trivialized by any move dealing continuous damage. In a sense, it stops being about taking hits while perfoming other actions to accomplish the goal, and becomes waiting out the clock. Compare that to cathing a legendary, where your team will be taking hits for possibly 40+ turns while you throw pokeballs. It could 2HKO anything on the team and outsped them as well, so I got next to no direct damage in. It died to Toxic, nothing more.
For saving a few realms, the other half of the Squad has gifted me with their Poiple. My teammate preferences aside, I know enough to not refuse an adorable little alien.
Also, the Squad lent me their transport Lunala.
*idea forms, buy 99 ultra balls*
Mina isn't going to know what hit her.
*gets swept by kartana*
Good to know you come back to the same place if you fail to capture or KO.
*KOs kartana*
*gets swept by nihilego*
maybe I'm a little underleveled they are level 60, my highest is magnezone at 56
I prove myself to dulse just inside the canyon. He sure hasn't figured out coverage, since his poiple is walled by all my steels.
The canyon is full of wooden bridges with no rails. Good thing most of my team can float. Heights don't bother me, unsound bridges do.
One step from the trial, I decide to fight one more guy. took a few revives. Flygon and Gengar could hit everything super-effectively.
I need to stop running back to the centre right before Lillie heals me.
So there's an uncontrolled pokemon in this area that is more powerful than usual. People use this route! This thing is a safety risk! Why has nobody contained this thing?
dragon totem:
I lead with klefki for obvious reasons. Minor damage at first due to the roseli berry, about half HP from the second attack to both Kommo-O and Noivern (spread moves have a slight power reduction). They alternate between dragon moves and drain punch/boomburst (blocked by Kommo-o's soundproof), so clever switching with klefki and palossand nullify most hits. Because the totem has drain punch, it takes a while to wear it down. Eventually beat it with shadow ball from rotom, switched to preserve my 6-0 lead, and Z-flash cannon takes out noivern.
Never try to animate that hair again. It looked like a cylindrical block taped to the back of her head.
Also, I can't think of an in-character explanation for continuously fishing for something I had no way of knowing exists, or making it call backup so I could use it against hapu immediately (the first one was level 12). But I have an anchor now.
I'm pretty annoyed I don't have the posion Z-crystal yet, considering some random trainer used it on me.
Wait, we're going to the ruins? *frantically stuffs rare candies into metang* *looks around for convienent mega stone* Oh boy...
"If you want to get to vast poni canyon, you need permission from the kahuna first" The kahuna does not currently exist!
Survived the ruins, was a little uncertain about leaving Lillie with just a trial captain, since she was abandoned and kidnapped last time. Cleared out a path with effeicency (and corkscrew crash), got the flute.
Skull, you don't know what you're in for. I need to get to that canyon!
*uses remaining rare candies to evolve nosepass and magneton*
Since I have another grass type, I go to change over rotom to water type. I was not expecting Molayne to be exercising in Kukui's basement. I waited for him to leave before rummaging through the appliances.
story picks up with actual changes, will be spoilering from this point
Spoiler:
Offscreen heal after faba
Skull, you're jerks but you aren't the targets of rightous fury. For your saftey, I strongly urge you to leave. They didn't listen, and nothing much happened of interest. Guzma's new vikavolt only got pallosand because my rock user was weakened from pinsir.
Dulse, neither of us want this fight. You don't want to give up on allies, I don't want to burn this place to the ground. As soon as I'm done with politics here, I'll go to save your world. But there are those that must be stopped, and I will not let anybody prevent that.
It's worth pointing out the collection is far to large to have been gathered in such short time if it was to be from the first encounter. It wan't nihilego that put lusamine over the edge. She did that herself. Cryostasis? really? We have matter/energy converters with accurate pattern storage and you use cryostasis? You are aware of how risky it is to store pokemon in such a type-cast environment, right? Just look at fossils, they've been with the rock so long, we can't seperate what essense is the pokemon and which is the rock?
Oh, right. Misguided applications of the "the needs of the many" speech. What's the point of all this tech if you can't do fine control? We saw that the nihilego brought in the previous setup had unstable energy. There's no indication you've improved your apparatus. Furthermore, if the Squad had used cosmog's abilities, you wouldn't have needed this particular one. The fact that they've pulled of stable transport without death and you haven't marks you a failure. I will teach you your place, below the other masters of technology. Also, are you seriously considering adventuring in a dress, heels, and with that much hair? You won't make it very far.
Talk is uninformative compared to battle. Her lead says everything I need to know about her fall: a pure fairy-type.
lusamine:
Do I ever miss swords dance. I could set up on clefable and sweep, as opposed to my current luck, which included multiple crits and secondary effects from lopunny alone. I started to spam heals once muk froze from ice punch. He was ko'd in the process, so I tanked through liligant with rotom. My luck improved after liligant, with hydro pump and take down misses. Bewear is much less of a threat due to my resistances to it's STABs
None of the rest of her team is doing favours for either the cause of her instability or her prospects in surviving in a territory dominated by posion-types as far as I know right now, point still stands
So now instead of babysitting a legendary magikarp, I'm babysitting a legendary metapod?
I feel vindicated for that rant earlier. I told you that the Squad had a better plan! Why can't you wait 5 minutes for them to tell you? [sarcasm]It's not like they know exactly what you'd be facing, where to find it and how to get there safely or anything like that[/sarcasm]
also, I keep forgetting metang evolves at 45, not at 40
I remind Gladion it's Acerola's fault. He doesn't believe me.
I wish I could be surprised the guy with a Z-crystal around his neck is the kahuna, but instead I teach bisharp X-scissor (the colour is obvious since I already have ghost, and klefki doesn't know play rough yet)
Nanu battle:
Sableye is his lead, I still have magneton. He switches to krokorok, but I switch to rotom, and he stayed in for the Z-leaf storm. His swagger gets revenge before I can leaf storm sableye, but Muk out-darks him. GarfieldPersian meets Bisharp's X-scissor, taking it below half despite being the 9-level underdog. A crit ends klefki. with persian in the red, but not beore mirror shot drops the accuracy. Muk dodges and kos
I drop having the last slots as training. If there is evil using all this tech, I need to stop them. It's like any other tribe, if somebody else takes down your evil outlier, suddenly your entire clan is a bunch of criminals. But if you can beat your own traitor, you can hold on to some respect.
I will show you technology, I will fight alongside it, and we will take you down. For every magnemite living in a city, for every golett still running, for every porygon yet to be programmed, you will fall!
I've made similar speeches at the setting many times, most recently in Breath of the Wild. I made sure that all bosses were only fought using ancient or guardian weapons.
I don't know why I keep coming back to this place. I should be worried about a collapse, or actually dealing with team skull. But there's something here, I just feel like I have a purpose. But it's a calming feeling, not like the rage I've felt at the other marks of the tapu's true nature.
shuppet wrote:
It eats up emotions like malice, jealousy, and resentment, so some people are grateful for its presence.
Oh. That's why.
*muk grew to level 40, learns gunk shot*
*ace trainer Karla is about to send in wigglytuff*
*grins maliciously*
Since I have no intent to honour this deal, I scope out the area around Po Town. The leader of a small group was willing to duel my magneton over the question of his allegiance. I checked Bisharp's nature later, it was gentle.
The supposed parameter was alone, and I arrived with 6 or 8 more supporters than that, depending on how you count magneton. Their preparations were not the most impressive. They had plenty of time to realize that if I was going to fight, posion types wouldn't be the best way to counter me. Are they that worried about rotom as opposed to all the steel, ghost, and ground types I have?This is an unreasonable place for there to be so many totem stickers.All they accomplished is giving sandygast enough EXP to evolve.
I was half-expecting Guzma's pinsir to mega evolve just so he can continue to be cripplingly weak to electric. Instead, it actually gave me some trouble with it's fighting and completely new dark coverage. Shuppet evolved from that battle.
Acerola, what are you doing over here? I haven't yet gotten Dulse to agree to take on cosmog! This is like all those movies where the two are reuitied and stop fighting to save the world to tell each other the magnitude of the mutual love. Pay attention, you idiots!
Excited for the free steel Z-crystal, though I'm not sure what that action had to do with the laser I boosted.
I have so many questions. Why are there no stairs to the telescope? Why are they too lazy to herd their own bugs? What's the point of unique names if they all look the same? Do the other scientists just not care about you bringing in random pokemon? Haven't you heard of circuit breakers?
electric totem:
Why isn't Molayne still in charge? It's a toegdemaru that summons skarmory. How does the skarmory know 3 TM/egg/move tutor moves? This was kind of a hot mess, especially since I led grimer to try to poison the vikavolt or electivire, both of which had previous appearances in the trial (dewpider was at least in the water trial).[
Plowed through grimer and sandygast easily. Metang (who had evolved when I wandered around misinterpreting which bus station to look for charjabugs near) tanked a few hits and recieved a few stat boost items, but the one turn I go for brick break it goes for spiky shield. Then I die to a crit. Nosepass gets a single bulldoze in thanks to the eviolite.
Rotom carries with ominous wind, something I wasn't expecting given he's still a lawnmower. Bounce and Spiky Shield run through the 5 PP, but Bloom Doom takes out the last ~1/4 (the aura boosts physical defnese, and togedemaru never had good Sdef). I switch to magneton to finish skarmory
Guzma is an idiot. He expressly heard that I had a magneton as my main, but he still challenges me with two mons weak to electric. Results are predictable.
You want me to keep cosmog away from the rest of team skull? I've got an idea on how to do that.
Dulse! Just the man I wanted to see. Think you could run some protective custody for me?
With the devastation just next door, how can these people still venerate the tapus? If it was near to the ruins and if there were few casualties I could understand, but this is across the town and has more ghosts than the graveyards. He'll know your pain, I promise you.
ghost totem:
My team is pretty weak to ghost, and dark is weak to fairy, so I went pure offence against mimikyu. Poison fang breaks digusise, but doesn't get the status hit. Z-flash cannon brings it down to the red, charge beam KOs and gives the SPA boost for another flash cannon to take down banette. Would have lost magneton if banette had attacked rather than will-o-wisp.
Skull is holding a ransom, but that puts them on reaction. I can do whatever to prepare before going in. So I explore the desert for relics who won't mind sticking around after to kick some fairy butt. After much effort, SOS only encounters, *grumble* I find golett. after a brief diversion to catch a ditto A copy of the machine has been sent to a fringe collaborator. I expect their automaton shortly. version exclusives: baltoy and golett Revisiting the mass unmarked grave, I realize that if battle is going to erupt, a specialist in sabotage and infiltration may be useful. A prankster tempered by their second type, Klefki had been added to the team.
So you're telling me that you're a bunch of park rangers with enough tech for an island-sized boat? Would you mind taking over the job of managing park infrastructure? You seem like the kind of people to build a bridge that stays up. Unrelated, but does Wicke actually work for you? Given how exited she is to find the elevator buttons I have my doubts.
Wandered around, looking for the magnemite habitat. They are endemic to a very small area in the region, after all. Didn't find it in the main area, but they have grimer, so they're not blind to urban life.
What do you mean, "It's just wrong somehow?" It's a space jellyfish! Half my team is weirder than that! You know this, because I keep beating you with it.
We could have furthered extradimensional research along immediately, but nobody turned off the pokeball jammer. We even had somebody with the authority right there with us. You also get an offsceen heal both before and after the nihilego encounter
Back on boring old real islands, Hau is showing some signs of intelligence as he switches dartrix out against drifiblm. He still hasn't figured out how to effectively hit steel types though, so once his electric resist was down, he took a charge beam powered sweep.
Libraries have helpful information, like how the tapus have met together and nobody bothered to find out what they're actually doing. Also that Solgaleo is an idiot for giving those guys power.
Space is cool and all, but you drove by a mountainside route. I backtracked and added a quarter of a supercomputer to the team. It'll probably soak up exp to evolve and learn moves during the electric trial, as I won't be needing drifiblm
So there are holes in space? Okay. It's not like it's been the most euclidean thing after warp panels were developed, but I am curious about why so much of this dimensional research deals with Legendaries. Is it still an emerging field with little information, or should I really stop running off with Brunt's husband's appliances?
After trekking through a cave where I wondered who designs a uniform with the insignia on the buttocks, I met a pretty incompetent policeman. By which I mean he tried to cover up his profession and failed. I'm probably going to have to get him out of trouble later.
I added a new member to the team! I didn't start with too many options if I wanted to keep magnemite, but the blocky moai has grown on me. And he has the eviolite because it'll be a week before he evolves.
and so the traitor's child meets with the demon. Olivia was escorting Lillie and her exotic magikarp over to the ruins, so we battled there. Mirror shot took care of the first two, fossils less likely to have ground coverage against magnemite. Z-leaf storm beat out Lycanroc, who for some reason wanted to bite a lawnmower over using a Rock attack.
The guy with the stoutland is finally gone! How many things were on this 10 meter bridge that it took this long, anyway? It's time to hit the beach and all that entails: recruiting an animate pile of sand. That's not what people do at beaches? I came from Kanto, okay? The coast there is rocky!
Finishing up a stint as a wandering trainer, I found the Flying Z-crystal lying around. Was the person hanging around to teach me the pose hired by park staff? It had the honor of the first z-move I used, attached to drifloon's gust.
Tradition's weakness is it's failure to adapt, and rotom destroyed the trial.
Fire totem:
The original plan was to poison it firs with grimer, but a missed poison gas and 2HKO ended that. Hydro torrent takes out marowak from full, and the unboosed pump mops up salazzle
Shortly after unblocking the road (how do vacationers get to the motel?), I met up with the Squad, this time meeting with another researcher. He made a comment about their outfits, but I'm not sure he can complain with that hairstyle.
I don't know why Kukui has so many working appliances boxed up in his basement, but the pilot has changed over to prepare for the exremely obvious grass-type trial.
I end up leading with Drifloon, since it's so close to evolution. Unfortunately, fake bugs didn't push it over.
grass totem:
It led with X-scissor, double resisted while I set up minimize. I only dodge one solar blade, and drifloon falls with 3 turns of sun left. Enough for Inferno Overdrive and Overheat to clear this.
I probably won't be able to be this devastating on future trials, since we're running out of types Rotom's extra move can take down. However, it was just mentioned the Kahuna specializes in Rock, so I'm going to try to mow her down.
Ever since my life flashed before my eyes from a poorly-engineered and poorly-maintained structure, I've been wanting to show this region what technology can do for you. You don't mess with a guy championing tech into this backwater dump of a region. Tech implies innovation, a way around any given problem. Under the cover story of paranormal research, I've recruited a rotom to the team by way of another recently-arrived kanto native. Conveniently, a researcher who has already had rotom has the machinery needed to integrate it. No reason to mindlessly train up the new guy, I carried on with the investigation I used as cover. Results are inconclusive for the most part, but they lean towards ghost-based explanations. At least it's not fey influence. Frankly, I'm not sure how you can be so willfully ignorant to let beings as unreliable and outright malicious as those be your supposed "guardians." You made a mistake saving me, Tapu Koko. I will be coming for you.
So I was dumb and didn't heal beyond the backup revive during the totem fight, but whatever adorable thing Dulse sent out really didn't have a good way of hitting mangemite.
Rather large problem, the fire totem is a marowak, which you may realize counters my entire team. The fact that the aura is a speed boos means I can't reliably get grimer in to poison for healing spam or with bite.You'd expect I'd have had similar problems with my bug run, but Water Bubble is such a strong ability that araquanid swept cleanly
Why does nobody sell sunglasses? I'm going to need those to interact with the Blinding One.
From certain angles, the female sightseer looking around looks like she's in a T-pose.
Some guy was hanging around with those bandana-wearing nutjobs. Is he the straight man for this comedy routine? In any case, he had this pokemon I had no recollection of. Mask looks a little haphazard, though.
In other news, I remembered how terrible SOS battles are when you aren't exp grinding
Water totem:
badly poison from posion fang round 1. disable bubble round 2, grimer faints from reingforcement. 2 flinches from bite take down magnemite. drifloon tanks and posion kills totem. hard part is the remaining dewpider, since it still has water STAB (araquanid is actually a respectible attacker because of Water Bubble, in spite of its low attacking stats)
I'm so excited, the guys with the armour are thinking about trusting me with this region! Does nobody else here share their appreciation for tech? Though if they're that interested in pokeballs, wait til they see warp tiles.
*gets to end of route 3, sees wooden bridge* I think I'll take the long way around...
Hala's a complete joke with drifloon. I got minimize up on his machop (which had to switch because it had nothing that could hit me, allowing me to dodge crabrawler's pursuit. Makuhita had no moves that could hit ghost either. Yet another z-crystal I have nothing to use with!
Reminds me of X. Fighting gym had no answers to honedge.
What is even with these currents? Is there an extremely weirdly shaped reef under this entire region? And given the rate, it'd be a long and painful grind to use the move tutors before the battle tree
Beat him this time by throwing out any concept of strategy. I feel dirty.
So apparently this balloon I picked up in the cemetary is full of souls. Seems normal enough to me. Wish it had a half-decent move though.
Those guys with the armour keep talking about The Blinding One. Why doesn't Hau'oli sell sunglasses?
Route 2 complete. Verdict: not ready for electric types.
I gotta say, Ilima, your trial was pretty boring compared to the nonstop battles of a gym. Even thoes two comedians you hired were pretty bad. Drowzee couldn't even touch Drifloon.
I'm reminded how stupidly slow everything in gen 7 is. Magnemite is outspeeding everything.
totem battle:
Pecha berry was not enough to stop grimer from poisoning. I then switched to magnemite to tank normal attacks. The lack of STAB on bite really mattered. Spammed thundershock, starting with the reinforcement. 5 turns, 3-0. I now have a purely cosmetic award due to the lack of normal moves on the team
takes an embarrasingly long time to find the save button
