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Part 7: Having A Wild Time Wild Pokemon? In my desert region? It's more likely than you think.  Poke Spot   DUKING is said to be the driving force behind the booming popularity of wild POKEMON in PYRITE. DUKING, so is this the POKE SPOT you discovered?  Fifteen years?! Is that true?! Yeah, uh... one shouldn't let details get in the way of the story, isn't that right, BETTY? It's POFTY! All right! Let me explain how one goes about attracting wild POKEMON to a POKE SPOT. Well... seeing as you're here, wouldn't it be better if I got someone to demonstrate?   I've heard a lot about this Duking, savoir of Pyrite, or something like that. Let's get a lesson in catching Pokemon!   All right, my friend. Let me show how you attract wild POKEMON to a POKE SPOT. First, and above all else, you need these: DUKING brand POKE SNACKS. Here, I'll give you some.   Okay, so getting wild Pokemon in this game isn't the usual fare of walking through grass or in a cave. We'll be needing these Duking brand Poke Snacks (tm) before we can even get wild Pokemon to appear. Orre hasn't changed that much over 5 years.   The more POKE SNACKS you lay out, the longer a POKEMON will stay to eat, making it that much easier to catch. This is also important. My specially made SPOT MONITOR. This, I'm sure you'll agree, is truly something awesome! My goodness! You developed this device yourself? Yeah, uh... one shouldn't let details get in the way of the story, isn't that right, BETTY? It's POFTY! By the way, DUKING. Can you tell us what a SPOT MONITOR is? I'm glad you asked me that. My SPOT MONITOR is a dandy! It lets you know what's happening at any POKE SPOT wherever you are. Here, my friend! As my thanks for you hearing me out patiently, I'll make a gift of this, too! Slot it into your P*DA. That's all you need to do to make it work. Simple!  All right, now you're set! Now, when a wild POKEMON appears at any POKE SPOT, your SPOT MONITOR will respond and alert you. I've found three POKE SPOTS in all. There's one to the west of this one here.  Oh, you are so lucky! To get a private lesson from DUKING himself, I mean. It makes me a little envious! Oh! Goodness! Is the camera still rolling?!  I just hope you got my good side.   With the Poke Snacks set, we can now catch wild Pokemon. Er, in a little bit, after enough in-game time has passed and you're in a different area, the Spot Monitor will notify you of a wild Pokemon which, depending on the Pokemon, will eat one Poke Snack every certain amount of steps. If you can get to the Spot before it eats all the snacks, you can battle and catch it! We'll go over what wild Pokemon we can find in a little bit, since we gotta wait for one to show up first.   I'm surprised you came out to a place like this. It must mean you're seriously interested in wild POKEMON. That's marvelous! This makes it all worthwhile, my teaching you, I mean. So, you fine, upstanding lad, lover of wild POKEMON, I have some information that you'll find to be special. But, my friend, I also have a favor to ask. That's a fair deal, right? Yeahah! Thank you kindly. You see, there are several POKEMON that hardly ever show up at POKE SPOTS. TRAPINCH, SURSKIT, and WOOPER... I'm having a rotten time of it, trying to catch those three. If you were to catch them, I'd gladly trade you some of my POKEMON, mate. I'm counting on you, mate! I've got to be on my way now!  That's my favourite POKE SPOT. You've got to go see it. Well, I guess I should be going on my way. Real pleasure chatting with you again, mate. I'll be heading back to PYRITE. Come visit whenever you'd like! Let's meet again, mate! Adios! One more spot to visit. Hold onto to your butts, friends.    Eh, don't whine too much. You know what the boss always says. He'll get TEAM MIROR B. together one day, and we'll own all the POKEMON in the world! Sure... do you really think we could pull off something like... Wah! Boss?! ...oh, whew, it's just some kid. Don't sneak up on me like that! Don't be so jumpy. I've got my RADAR. We'll know if the boss is coming around. Uh... yeah, that's true. Hehehe. Huh?! The RADAR's got something! It's the boss! MIROR B.! Miror B.'s Theme      Sniff... oh, oh, oh! I sense the pleasing scent of POKEMON, oh yes I do! Maybe you're just a little hood, but maybe you're also one fine TRAINER with the goods? How about you get with it and join my posse? yesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyes   Fuhohoho! I thought you'd say that! You always had this smell to me, you see, that you would be our enemy. How I deal with a threat is to nip it while it's a bud yet. Fuhohoho! I'll be showing you my power now. Try not to be blown away by a sense of wow! Let the music play! VS Miror B.     Well would you look at that, the best character in the franchise returns with the usual Rain Dance Swift Swim team of before, though he only has Lombre since this is still the early game.   Unfortunately we're way too strong for him at the moment, so this won't be an interesting battle, but you can see how it'll go.   I don't know why he didn't have this Pokemon last game, seems almost impossible to consider otherwise.     Despite the STAB in the rain, the strongest move he has is Water Gun, so it's not gonna do a lot of damage. Even less so to me in my current situation.  Voltorb, 190 catch rate (78%, half health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Rush/Mirror Coat, Shadow Panic/Refresh, Spark, Swift Since Nincada isn't in this game (spoilers, sorry), Electrode is the fastest Pokemon in the game you can use (last game the fastest was Raikou/Sneasel), so it will, barring priority, go first, guaranteed and let loose strong Electric attacks, which Ninjask definitely can't take. Uh, that's about all it does, since its movepool is pretty drat shallow and the only coverage move it gets is... Hyper Beam, since it's slightly stronger than two Facades. Of course, it can go boom and easily set up screens before the opponent can even blink, but Ground types will stop it very quickly. Still, in the rain, it'll wreak some havoc, though since it sacrifices a lot of stats for its Speed, it won't deal a massive punch like you expect and also be pretty fragile, especially to Earthquake. Still, Selfdestruct. (Explosion is past postgame, alas) Oh hey, there's also a new Shadow move and this one is pretty nasty. Shadow Panic has 60% accuracy and confuses both opponents, like Teeter Dance, but better, if inaccurate. It's blocked by Own Tempo, but also Soundproof, despite no indication it's a sound move.  Aw man is it over already? Poke Spot Just you wait and see! One of these days, with my elegant steps, I'll knock you sideways! Let's go! Escape!  Oh my. What I hold in my hands is something men and women all over the world could only dream of.   This RADAR shows you where MIROR B.--that's the boss--happens to be. Whenever the boss appears somewhere, a mark appears on the screen. When you see the mark, check out the RADAR. It'll tell you where he is. You'll probably ask me where the boss is when he's not on RADAR. You know how mysterious he can be. Who knows where he goes off to? Probably off getting POKEMON or something. Somewhere far away, out of the transmitter's range.  Well we can dream about finding Miror B. at a later point, for now, back to Pyrite. But when a Pokemon shows up, we'll definitely drop everything to go catch it. But I doubt anything important is gonna happen for a while anyway. Cipher Invasion  Ah goddammit, what now?   Of course, it's always Cipher.     And they're 10 levels lower than me because the opposing trainers are STILL under level 20. Come the heck on game. But it's partly my fault since my team members are a lot more paced out, but I didn't think it would make things this bad!   Hmm, might as well, need those morality points.   MEGG is NETT's younger sister. You know, she's the receptionist. You've seen her, right? The intruders grabbed her and hustled her upstairs with them in the elevator!  If anyone tries to get out, there will be serious consequences! Get it?! Hunh?! You're acting mighty suspicious!  Oh god the levels just keep getting lower, what is going on?   It doesn't help that most of these Cipher battles are optional, so the game has to account to that, which I get, since it's mean to account for doing everything like me.     We could save everyone by going up to the top and clearing out the leader of this pack, but that's no fun.  Hahaha! You look mystified! You don't know how I managed to be on the elevator with you, do you? I'll tell you what I did... I braced myself flat up against the ceiling! It takes a lot of strength! Not bad, huh? I demand your respect! And now, we battle!  Alright, this is a Shadow Pokemon that Anca can apparently see- wait a minute, why is Makuhita reappearing like this?   Well it doesn't have a 100% catch rate this time around, so we'll need to weaken it. It can take two weak attacks, right?  No? poo poo. Shadow Pokemon Resets:   Makuhita, 180 catch rate (78%, half health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Blitz/Brick Break, Shadow Shed/Refresh, Arm Thrust, Rock Tomb Well this mon looks familiar. There's a couple of differences for Makuhita this time around, mainly a coverage move to let it hit Ghost types in, ugh, Rock Tomb. That's the best you'll get all game, so hey, a free Brick Break is pretty good, letting another member have the TM. Otherwise, give it Body Slam and Earthquake and it'll be pretty good. It gets a bit of competition from Breloom as a Fighting type, but Hariyama is a lot more dependable and has less weaknesses and no special STAB to mostly ignore, so if you didn't fancy using it last time, it's still pretty drat good, so why the heck not?   Hey, pick on someone your... own size? Hmm, I'm a small boy this time around.    Well he was definitely punching above his weight class.  .png) They came looking for NETT. I'm guessing that your DATA ROM contains sensitive information that they want to keep secret at all costs. I'll be fine. I'm worried about NETT, though. Please go to him. It was terrible! They suddenly barged in here and started beating SECC up. We'll save Nett soon enough, I'm sure, but the cry of a woman and an item will keep me busy for the moment.   W-what? Who are you?! I'm getting ANCHA's autograph! You stay out of this!  See, Portobello's Grass STAB is still useful! Sometimes...    Alright you've had your fun, get outta here.   Keep up the fake news combatting. If anyone says Fake News in the thread in a sincere way, you're banned.     In Tiksi, Hotdog bites you! ... okay I'll ban myself for that one.   Anyway, since this is a trainer you have to fight, here's a Shadow Pokemon. The game is pretty good about that, since it's rude to miss out of them.   Vulpix, 190 catch rate (78%, half health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Wave/Heat Wave, Shadow Hold/Charm, Ember, Dig This popular internet browser is a fine choice, though you'll have to rely on Vulpix's meh stats for a bit, since a Fire Stone is still a while away. It's a bit simple, as far as Fire types go, since it doesn't learn any good moves after evolving and has very limited coverage, including no special coverage. Best to evolve it after 29 to save a Flamethrower TM, unless you want to skip straight to Fire Blast and then go for Body Slam and Iron Tail with its acceptable, though not amazing, Attack. Dig is tempting, but of course Earthquake will always be a problem, since it's physically frail, but with Will-o-Wisp and good SpDef and Speed, it works weirdly well as a speedy tank. It's something different, but it won't really wow you otherwise.  Now that Pofty's gone, we can get this item. Neat.   Greetings    Ooh, a fully evolved Pokemon. Maybe that's a sign of things to come? Oh wait, it isn't.   Right, who else is there to save?  Uh-huh. I wonder who's going to be the one hurting? Huh? What do you want, kid?! Stay out of the way if you don't want to get hurt!  Gotta save prop man!    Still doesn't have a beak, so I dunno what that line is doing.   Neat, we can sell that! While the EV drinks are more available in this game, we still won't be picking up many, so I'd rather sell them for cash money.   Least we know why that healing machine is there. Nearly at the top too.   Now that is one scary image. Uh, not the yet another level up, the spooky ghost shrouded in a dark aura.   Duskull, 190 catch rate (78%, half health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Wave/Shadow Ball, Shadow Hold/Helping Hand, Astonish, Confuse Ray It's time for another defensive mon! Duskull has a pretty good typing and a moveset to take hits and be annoying, which is always tough to recommend for single player, but at least double battles can make it shine, since hey, Helping Hand is nice and Shadow Ball, Confuse Ray and Will-o-Wisp will also be good moves. With Ice Beam, even its low SpAtk can target weaknesses, but because it evolves so late and doesn't do much offensively, it's gonna be a rough journey. It obviously has its benefits, but can you use them here in one player land?  Oh hey those are in short supply right now, nice.    Now this is a gatekeeper, take notes Cail.   Ah, finally, our first Kadabra of many.   Ralts, 235 catch rate (99%, half health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Wave/Shock Wave, Shadow Hold/Sing, Reflect, Confusion Oh hey it's something I used. Guess what, since it didn't get anything particularly fancy from purification, if you read my Emerald LP, you know everything this mon will do! Yeah, it hits things hard with Psychic and Electric moves. And that's it. At least this time you can save a Shock Wave TM, but still need a Thunderbolt one and you can Sing stuff. Ain't that neat? But yeah, it hits really hard, learns Psychic nice and early and that's about it! Wasn't that fun?    Whoops! Who cares about that?! The creeps took MEGG hostage, and they took her into this room. You're really strong, aren't you? Please, help MEGG!  .png) ...all right. Keep your hands off my sister. The DATA ROM is right here... Good boy! You catch on real quick. Toss me that DATA ROM nice and easy now. Heh... okay, I'll thank you for returning the DATA ROM. By the way... let me guess. Are you maybe thinking it doesn't matter because you've already copied the data on this?  Waahahaha! That's why I'm not worried! It's heartbreaking, isn't it?! Well, thanks for being such a great host, but we've got to go. Here's your sister back..png) NETT! MEGG, are you alright?  You don't look like an admin, so I don't think I'm all that worried.   Well they're starting to catch up in levels, but I'm still five over them, which is a bit nuts.   But now we have a pretty tough Pokemon to catch, since they've been a little too easy for a while.    This guy does have a tough team, with evolved Pokemon and some TM moves to hit weaknesses with, so it could be a surprise. But I'm guessing you have a full team by now or something to keep levels low, cause I might be snowballing out of control here. Ah it should be fine.   Hey now, you can't use Dig strats before I get Protect!   Still, we survive that.   Alright, all we need to do is catch Mawile. Bit of a pain, but at least we have a few Great Balls still.   Mawile, 45 catch rate (40%, low health, paralyzed, Great Ball), starting moves: Shadow Rush/False Swipe, Shadow Wave/Sing, ViceGrip, Iron Defense I think that's probably the worst starting moveset yet, mainly because Mawile in Gen 3 had plenty of other problems aside from that, from the various Dark moves it can't make use of, to ZERO Steel attacks unless you get lucky with Hidden Power and a large special moveset that, again, can't be used. Still, because of its wide movepool, it can be given a host of physical moves to offset its lack of STAB, though of course Sludge Bomb and Return are postgame and it can't learn Iron Tail or Earthquake, so at least you've got... Rock Tomb. Even then, it cannot take Fire attacks well and will take a lot of damage due to its low Speed, and even when it hits, its Attack isn't outstanding, so it'll fall short. If you want to challenge yourself, this Pokemon is usable, but boy it has a lot of things against it.    See ya important guy (we never see him again). ONBS  Still, from what we did manage to decrypt, a part of CIPHER's criminal plan became clear. For instance, CIPHER was behind the disappearance of that cargo ship, the S.S. LIBRA. There's more. CIPHER is planning a major attack on PHENAC CITY. Oh, no, NETT! Is that true? MARCIA'S gone off to PHENAC CITY! She said she was going to investigate why the town's communication systems are down..png) What?! CIPHER could attack there at any time! DAVID, we need your help. Please, could you inform the MAYOR of PHENAC CITY about CIPHER's coming attack?  MARCIA... I hope she's okay... In PHENAC CITY, there's a guy named JUSTY who's the LEADER of the PRESTIGE PRECEPT CENTER. Try to hook up with him. I'm sure he'll be eager to help you stop CIPHER from attacking his town.  Darn it! I'd go myself, but they worked me over pretty darn thoroughly. DAVID, please. Can you go help MARCIA? I keep telling him not to move, but he just won't listen. He is so obstinate!   It's amazing. They pulled a caper of this scale so brazenly in broad daylight... if this incident is any indication, it appears certain that CIPHER will become even more active in the days to come.  Womp womp. We've still got enough time to explore Phenac City, so let's see what's changed after five years! Phenac City   Ooh, I like the music change. Still looks the same, even have Dash and Duskull running around the fountain, just like I remember!  Incredible as it may seem, you're exactly the one millionth visitor to PHENAC! In commemoration, please accept this: a DISC CASE, which already comes with some BATTLE CDs!    Oh, uh, lucky me! Ah poo poo I'll soon be covering Battle CDs...   The REALGAM TOWER is a top battling facility where TRAINERS can enjoy BATTLE SIMs, among other events, using BATTLE CDs. Off you go! Have a good time! R-Right. So, since Phenac City seems to be perfectly fine, I think we can have a hero's break and check out Realgam Tower. You ready for lengthy side modes? Haha... I'm not, gotta make the images first...
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Aug 1, 2018 00:53
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Onmi posted:Pad what? lmao
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Aug 1, 2018 00:54
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PokeSpots were a nice idea but in execution felt kind of lacking. But I guess we'll see that soon. All the Duking interactions are great, though.  even the texture on the afro is improve. And bounce physics!
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Aug 1, 2018 01:59
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...is Miror B moonwalking in heels? I don't think I noticed that before, that makes a great GIF.rannum posted:even the texture on the afro is improve. And bounce physics! And scoliosis treatment! Duskull was my star team member last time I played this game. It's a bit situational but there are some strategies that make it really shine. It's one of three Ghost types in this game that can learn Helping Hand, which is loads of fun if you run something with Selfdestruct or Explosion (and it's the most durable of them, which is important because if it goes down before your other pokemon's turn, you're probably losing three pokemon that turn). The rest of the time, it's mostly disabling opponents with status, but that utility alongside Helping Hand is surprisingly good in an all-doubles game. It's not very good at doing damage, I'll admit, but it has its niche and I had fun with it. (Amusingly, I hadn't even planned for it to be in my team when I started the run. It just so happened that around this point I noticed my other pokemon were way ahead of the level curve, like yours, so I figured I'd let it soak up some exp... then I noticed how useful it was being and kept it around permanently.) Speaking of which, those three Ghost pokemon that get Helping Hand in this game? They're completely unique to XD, as no game since has allowed a Ghost type to learn that move. I wonder if they decided it was unbalanced?
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Aug 1, 2018 02:40
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What doesn't necessarily come across in SSLP format like this is that the first clapping sound in the new battle theme is timed perfectly to Miror B's snap in his intro animation. It's perfect.
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Aug 1, 2018 02:41
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Crosspeice posted:
I'm just gonna go out on a limb and assume nothing else in the game will manage to top the perfection that is Miror B. 
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Aug 1, 2018 02:51
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Explopyro posted:...is Miror B moonwalking in heels? I don't think I noticed that before, that makes a great GIF. AweStriker posted:What doesn't necessarily come across in SSLP format like this is that the first clapping sound in the new battle theme is timed perfectly to Miror B's snap in his intro animation. Hobgoblin2099 posted:I'm just gonna go out on a limb and assume nothing else in the game will manage to top the perfection that is Miror B. Saladin Rising fucked around with this message at 03:12 on Aug 1, 2018 |
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Aug 1, 2018 03:07
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Also, their scrubbing the server was surprisingly competent for a Pokemon villain team.
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Aug 2, 2018 01:54
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Part 8: Distracted From Distractions Realgam Tower  POKEMON appear all right, but when the battle ends, they just fade away? You don't get to keep them?! Oh, sheesh... I dropped all my secret savings into them because I thought I'd get rare POKEMON for real! There goes money down the proverbial drain! Let's get out of here! What'll we do with these BATTLE CD things? What good are they if they won't give us any POKEMON? Just toss them out somewhere.  Oh wait, we're not going to Realgam Tower just yet, we gotta drop everything and go see what wild Pokemon we have! Wild Pokemon Battle  Oh hey a Gligar, that's pretty good! So yeah, I didn't just happen to walk enough by the time I got to Realgam Tower for a wild Pokemon to appear, it works on in-game time whether you'll get a Pokemon to spawn. What the Poke Snacks are there for is to keep a Pokemon there, as the wild Pokemon will take a certain amount of steps to eat one, so if you ignore it, it'll eventually eat all 10 in one go. In the Rock Poke Spot, we can find Sandshrew at a 50% rate, Gligar at 35% and Trapinch at 15%. We'll go over the more common Pokemon now and the rarest one later, since it's unlikely you'll find the rarest Pokemon first go and it helps split up the second part to this. I will eventually catch all of them once, might as well right?   Oh yeah, I got a bit unlucky, Gligar is the lowest level it can be, every Pokemon from a Poke Spot can be found from level 10-20. Roosevelt will be needed to catch them, anyone else will just one shot them and you have to lure another Pokemon if you want another go. Sandshrew, 255 catch rate (99%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Scratch, Defense Curl, Sand Attack, Poison Sting The very first wild Pokemon in Orre is... alright. It's a pretty simple Ground type, able to deal a lot of damage, if a bit weak to special attacks. But really, what Ground type isn't? Don't post examples in the thread. Sandshrew starts off pretty rubbish, but it evolves early and gets Slash to help patch it up a bit, but it will be mediocre until you get Earthquake later on, and then you can give it Brick Break and, ugh, Rock Tomb to help it out. Then Body Slam I guess? It's not very exciting, but hey, it's a perfectly fine Pokemon to obtain pretty quickly, so if you want to use it, go ahead. There's just nothing else to say. Gligar, 60 catch rate (34%, low health, Great Ball), starting moves: Poison Sting, Sand Attack, Harden, Quick Attack Like the last game, Gligar starts off pretty rubbish and needs some TMs for all its important moves, but at least this time around it can learn Aerial Ace and have STAB on both sides! Woah! But like Sandshrew it's pretty standard for a Ground type, aside from really not liking Ice moves. Since Sludge Bomb and Steel Wing are postgame, it gets a lot less options to work with, but at least you've got, uh, Double-Edge? Still, its STAB will be good enough (well, Earthquake) to get it through the game, it'll just fall short towards the end and it'll be pretty meh until you get it those TMs.  Neat! I won't be placing any Poke Snacks in the other spots until later, but if something else pops up here I might as well go see what it is. At the Oasis Poke Spot, there's Hoppip, Phanpy and Surskit, all at the same rates as the Pokemon in this spot. The Cave Poke Spot has Zubat, Aron and Wooper, same rates again. Let's go! Hoppip, 255 catch rate (99%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Splash, Synthesis, Tail Whip, Tackle (level 10) or Poisonpowder, Stun Spore, Sleep Powder, Leech Seed (level 20) Eh, I was relatively kind to Skiploom last game since it was a Pokemon you could get early and had Sleep Powder to make catching Shadow Pokemon really convenient, even if it didn't do anything else all that well. Hoppip does not have that, since there's a much wider selection of Pokemon this time around and there's even a few that start with Sing! It's still good at spreading status and being annoying, but it won't be dealing much damage for you, though it can get Flying STAB this time around, as well as Double Edge... for all the damage it'll do. Anyway, that's not why you should catch a fair few Hoppip if you get the chance. Since they're regular wild Pokemon, you can shove them into the Purify Chamber immediately and help out. Hoppip is the most common Pokemon we can find that can reach max tempo in a set all by itself, if you can catch four Hoppip. It's not that hard to do and can give you a nice early boost to keep the purifying snowball rolling. That's the best thing it does in this game, don't use it for anything else. Phanpy, 120 catch rate (78%, low health, Great Ball), starting moves: Tackle, Growl, Defense Curl, Flail Hmm, yet another Ground type that's pretty standard but gets a million times better when you get the Earthquake TM. At least Sandslash and Gligar could use Fighting or Flying moves, respectively, Phanpy gets none of that, just Rock Tomb and Body Slam. Cool. I mean, I guess you could teach it Iron Tail, but you shouldn't be happy about it. If you were feeling spicy you could reteach it Horn Attack, but yeah, there's nothing all that interesting about Phanpy compared to the other options, but IT'S REALLY CUTE. What else do you need? Zubat, 255 catch rate (99%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Leech Life, Supersonic, Astonish, Bite Of course you'll find Zubat, it's a Poke Spot in a cave. Anyway, despite being annoying, it's quite good, but mainly because it can learn Sludge Bomb. ...wait isn't that postgame? Hmm, poo poo. Okay, you will eventually learn Poison Fang in the postgame and have some cool moves to learn otherwise, like Giga Drain, Aerial Ace, Shadow Ball and Steel Wi- oh wait that's postgame as well. Usually I would recommend this mon if you haven't used it before, but, uh, it becomes tricky without Sludge Bomb, like last gen. Still, if you want to make a bat happy today, it's an alright Flying attacker. But man it could be so much better. Aron, 180 catch rate (99%, low health, Great Ball), starting moves: Mud Slap, Headbutt, Metal Claw, Iron Defense Well you know how this mon works, I think it worked out quite well in Emerald, despite taking a million years to evolve. Well it'll take another million years to evolve in this game, just before the end of the game in fact! Yeah this game's level curve is wonky. Anyway, its stats are pretty good for right now, but as the levels go on, it'll become less and less impressive, since it'll be sticking to Steel attacks for the most part. It'll need to learn Rock Tomb, alas, as well as Earthquake and Aerial Ace. And of course Protect, since even with its monstrous Defense, it's really, REALLY weak to both Surf and Earthquake. If you get one with Rock Head, then it can use Double Edge just fine and it'll be a drat good attacker and defender, if you have the patience. You can see the results for yourself and hey, there's not a massive ocean towards the end full of Water specialists to ruin its day, so it'll probably do even better here. Realgam Tower  ANYWAY, that was a fun diversion, but let's head into this place full of more fun diversions for me to go into ridiculous detail for... ah man I dunno if my typing hands will make it.   The tube maze has been remodelled to be very, very simple, since Evice probably spent millions of Pokedollars just to make Wes's life more annoying at the end. So there's only three ways to go.   We won't need the Pokemon Center, er, ever, since Phenac is way more convenient to get to. MET: ROCK   On the left is where the gooooooood shiiiiiiiiiit is, plenty of TMs to keep you happy, which we will abuse instantly after I've sold the HP Up and Carbos we just obtained. We've got, ahem, Hidden Power, Blizzard, Hyper Beam, Light Screen, Protect, Safeguard, Thunder, Reflect and Fire Blast. Oh god I did all of that from memory...    Despite Flamethrower being more obtainable in this game, the accuracy of Fire Blast doesn't make me want to completely regret life's choices, so I usually go for it. Oh yeah, because we can get it this early, it'll basically one shot anything that doesn't resist it, ESPECIALLY with this level curve we're dealing with. And then Protect is never a bad idea, though it'll be a while before we'll need to use it.    Neat. This is where the main attraction is.  .png) Unfortunately, I must inform you that the COLOSSEUM is undergoing maintenance. Please do come back and make a challenge when we reopen.Uh, okay, this is where the main attraction will eventually be. Shame too, it would actually be a challenge since the opponents are all level 40. But it would also make us overlevelled until the final boss, so maybe we'll hold off. Anyway, there's more to this place than just the Colosseum.   What's more, two customers just came in and bought up most of what we had left. Oh, but if you have BATTLE CDs of your own, you certainly may use them for BATTLE SIMs. Please do let me know if you have a BATTLE CD you would like to play. So, how may I serve you today?  VR gaming, bitches! Battle CDs are a main collectible in this game and are also completely optional. They're just fun wacky challenges the developers probably had a lot of fun with and will really test your Pokemon noggin. We'll be finding them around the region as we do stuff in the main game, so when we've got a chunk of them, I'll be coming back here to show them off. Because I will be showing them off. All FIFTY of them. After buying these three, we'll have six. Hmm.    Before starting a Battle CD, you seriously need to check its contents and figure out what scripted event they want you to play. It does kinda suck that you're railroaded to do something and get punished for straying from it, but there's some variance in a few of them. The big info you should take away from this is the order of the opponent's Pokemon moves, the Speed of every Pokemon and what Pokemon you'll have to puzzle out when you need to use them.   I'll be going over the first CD in this update, but the other 49 will be covered in separate bonus updates when we've obtained a good chunk to go over. So I don't have the first one ready just yet, I do have a life! Kinda... Battle SIM  Of course as we saw with the Tutorial VR battles, loading into one of these takes TWENTY FOUR SECONDS. Now if we're good at maths (like me  ) then doing all of these optional battles just once would waste 1200 seconds, so 20 minutes. If you fail them, then you're watching that animation all over again. But it's fine, we've wasted way more than 20 minutes on these fuckin LPs!!! The good music helps with all this at least.   So quite a few of these CDs require you to know real obscure stuff about the battle mechanics, such as Pokemon taking double damage from certain moves while using Fly. So all you need to do is just hit it twice with Gust and that's it?   Oh no no no, it's never that easy. These Pokemon are crafted in such a way that if you try and do something they don't want you, you'll just miss out on whatever it is you were trying to do. Now, since this is just the regular battle engine, you can get carried by RNG, damage variance, critical hits, status, etc, but it also goes both ways, even when you follow it to the letter, a random crit can seriously gently caress you up.   Still, they're pretty easy to retry since they're often pretty short challenges and if you have no idea what to do, you can get a hint which may or may not help you.   There we go. Uh, first try.   Each Battle CD has an item upon first completing it and some of them are actually really good and can't be found anywhere else, so is it worth doing all of them? Well, decide for yourself at the end of the LP.  But one large extra mode isn't enough, so how about two?   Time to play some BINGO! Battle BINGO   Alright, let's go over Battle Bingo, since I'm sure that's what you were all expecting to do with your Friday evening. To start with, pick any tile to flip over and choose your starter to battle the Pokemon inside. This uses up one EP (Energy Point) and if you run out of EP, it's game over! But there are multiple ways to keep going and flip over every tile! You also start with two Master Balls to catch Pokemon with to help you out and can find a third one under a tile. Battle BINGO Battle  Our first tile is a Squirtle. You'll know what the type of the Pokemon will be, but not what it is, nor which move it has, as every BINGO Pokemon has just the one. When I go over every BINGO card in a side update (again, later), I'll be showing you every Pokemon and what move they have so you can follow along, since I won't be going step by step for every single one of them. The first card has these Pokemon:  Obviously as we get to harder and harder cards the Pokemon variety increases and becomes much harder to predict, so the main strategy of this game is first figuring out what you need to pick up and then try and take out the remaining Pokemon using those you've caught. The numbering goes from left to right, top to bottom, so 1-4, then 5-8 for the second row, etc.  Against a Pokemon you can Fight it (Dragonair's Outrage will not be used in this card), quit the card, throw a Master Ball at the wild Pokemon, or BINGO to check the game board. There's no way to stop midway and cash out, despite what the bar on the right shows. It's weird. The tiles remain the same no matter what, so get out some paper if you need to figure it all out, or just cheat like I did, since I'm REALLY BAD at puzzle solving.  I could've shown off David's sweet throwing skills against Gligar, but we were gonna do it here anyway and it's much flashier. Also we'll be using the Master Ball later on to Snag a specific Pokemon, so we won't see this specifically. Anyway, that's a team member.  All Pokemon start off with 2EP so it's a way to save yourself from losing, so things might get a bit hairy, but it'll be fine. You don't have to follow this strategy at all, there's many different paths to take, even on the harder ones.   No matter what you do, you must always spend 1EP, even if you're not fighting the Pokemon, or flipping over a panel to get sweet loot.  Like that, we need to catch our fourth Pokemon after all, though you don't have to on every card. One Pokemon usually becomes useless as you go on, so gets designated the flipper over using its spare EP. No point keeping it on there if it's not gonna use it otherwise!     There's no exp or anything like that, so defeating wild Pokemon is just a slug match of who has the best moves/RNG. But completing a row gives us 1EP!  We can distribute that EP however we choose and depending on what we flip over, or how many rows we get, we can get +5EP at once. Though that never actually ends up happening in my playthrough.   Alright, that's everyone. It's not a massive deal who you pick, so long as they can beat whoever they're meant to be fighting, you can use anyone. Though the stronger they are, the less turns, which means less times RNG will gently caress you. And it will gently caress you sooner or later.     Under one of the ? panels is EP +2 and under another is EP +1, they can be lifesavers and you can spread individual EP to your Pokemon as you see fit, I just chose to dump it all on Torchic to take out the last of the Grass types and get another BINGO, thus resulting in another +1EP. And that's how you clear these cards, get some Pokemon early to keep your EP up while you get lines and the +EP cards. Then just fill in the rest. Simple. Kinda.   We're always beholden to RNG, so status, flinches, critical hits and damage varience can and will play a part in these cards. The developers tried to minimize it as much as they could, but they can only do so much against the unstoppable Pokemon machine. Thankfully it doesn't matter in this instance, since we're knocking everyone out in two hits max. You can use any Pokemon for any card so long as you have the EP, but having resistances makes life a lot easier.     From there we're just filling out the board from the top. You'll usually want to get the +1EP in a BINGO, or if it's the very last move you can make, otherwise you're basically breaking even if it doesn't help you clear rows immediately.   And there we go. I hope that was easy enough to follow along, because I won't be going into that much detail later on.     It can be worth it to play BINGO, since you get Pokecoupons from it! Not a huge amount, mind you, but enough that you don't need to clear Mt. Battle infinite times to get all the stuff you want. There are other places to get Pokecoupons, but that won't be for a while yet.    Like with the Battle CDs, you get a reward for your first clear. Though the rewards are less exciting since they're the same for each card in a certain difficulty. But hey, it'll solve your PP problems for the rest of the game. I will not change the previous sentence in any way.  And since I recorded all of the Battle CD and Battle BINGO stuff in bulk, the Spot Monitor went off again, confirming it's not step based, since I was standing still when it went off. I got pretty lucky here, since this just leaves the most common Pokemon to find in this spot!   Though since you don't know what Pokemon it'll be until you enter the area and you fight it immediately, things can get a bit dicey. Hey wasn't Duking wanting a Pokemon like this? That actually worked out nicely.   That'll be convenient, we're gonna need a lot of Poke Snacks to catch every wild Pokemon and then some!   If you manage to catch any rare POKEMON, bring them to me, DUKING, all right? Hm? Do you maybe have a TRAPINCH, SURSKIT, or a WOOPER with you? That's mighty fine! Your super rare POKEMON, I've got to have it! Please, lad, I beg you! Trade it to me! So which super rare POKEMON will you trade me?  That's might fine! Wonderful, lad! I've accepted your TRAPINCH! I'm counting on you to raise my MEDITITE with care and love, lad!  Well this is quite the prize! For catching these 15% encounters, Duking will give you a Meditite for Trapinch, a Shuckle for Surskit and a Larvitar for Wooper, all knowing interesting TM and Egg moves. And like Plusle, they'll have Duking's OT, though you didn't blink, there is no trade animation for this game, which is a small shame, but no matter the Pokemon you give him, they'll always be level 20, which is neat. Alright, let's go over the last six Pokemon you can get from Poke Spots, since I'm counting these traded ones! Trapinch, 255 catch rate (99%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Bite, Sand Attack, Faint Attack What a lovable scamp digging its way back in. Vibrava was a great choice last game since you could evolve it immediately and pretend you never had to use Vibrava at all, however this time, you'll be using it for the entire time, so it's a bit of a shame, but Trapinch is a lot of fun before that, if annoyingly reliant on Sand Tomb as its only physical attack until it evolves. Yeah, let's fix that with... Body Slam? Rock Tomb? poo poo.Still, when it gets Earthquake as a Vibrava, it becomes much easier to use and can use its special moves a bit more easily. But you're waiting for the main attraction and unfortunately it's way too far away, you might accidentally reach postgame before you reach Flygon, which is a problem, since there's other things lurking in the endgame that will very easily outclass it. However, its sheer versatility and interesting typing make it a neat choice if nothing else. But it's a lot easier to recommend in the previous game. By a lot. Meditite, Traded, starting moves: Dynamicpunch, Confusion, Shadow Ball, Detect Mmm, I love a good destroyer of worlds in the early game. Meditite was very good last game and, guess what, it's still really good in this game, especially since you can make it a powerhouse immediately with Brick Break and it even comes with Shadow Ball! Sure, it's got a while to go until it evolves, but when it's got a moveset this good early on that only gets better, then it's really easy to see why you should use it. By far the best of Duking's traded Pokemon, since it'll also get boosted experience and can even get Rock Tomb! Truly, this is a monster that'll serve you well, but if it doesn't KO the opponent it'll probably die. Hey, it's not perfect, but drat is it close. Surskit, 200 catch rate (100%, low health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Bubble, Quick Attack, Sweet Scent, Water Sport Well... we've had worse. This is probably the easiest way to obtain Surskit in Gen 3, believe it or not, but it's still a Surskit and pretty tough to use. Still, there's always positives, uh, Intimidate is a VERY good ability in this game and it'll get its only Bug move when you start the postgame. Woo. Admittedly its movepool is pretty big and it has an okay SpAtk to deal some non-STAB damage. But its Aerial Ace is gonna be pitiful, so load up on the special TMs and go for broke, I suppose. Hey, at least it has more offensive presence than Shuckle. Damning it with faint praise, I loving know, but it might be the better choice here. I'm still gonna trade it anyway, since I'm not using it. What do I care, it's fuckin Surskit. Shuckle, Traded, starting moves: Toxic, Substitute, Sludge Bomb, Encore Well you can probably guess what the game wants you to do with this. So since we get this at the start of the game instead, there's more room to play around with Shuckle and... it does exactly the same thing it did before. Just Toxic stall stuff and, uh, use Sandstorm? It's pretty slow for an in-game team but some people like stall, so who am I to question those weird, broken people? Dunno why they bothered to give it Sludge Bomb, plenty other Pokemon could use it instead. Ah whatever, it's not gonna faint anytime soon, so at least when we eventually get to difficult fights (lol), Shuckle can be counted on to be the last mon standing. Unless it's against a Poison or Steel type. Then it's hosed. Wooper, 255 catch rate (99%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Water Gun, Tail Whip, Slam, Mud Shot Oh hey it's a super duper Wooper! Unfortunately since it doesn't get Surf in this game, it becomes a bit harder to recommend, since it's not the king of spread moves anymore. It'll still wreck fools with Earthquake, but you'll use the TM on it before it learns it naturally, alas, unless you put it off for a bit. Otherwise you have Iron Tail and Brick Break for TMs due to no Sludge Bomb and Return, but there's also Rock Tomb and Body Slam, so while you'll do piddly damage with Water Pulse, it's still a fine option that'll only fall to uncommon Grass types. Mud Shot will be a poor mans Earthquake for most of the game, but since it evolves early, it has the STAB and movepool to be perfectly effective. It just gets more competition, especially from Water types that'll come with Surf. Larvitar, Traded, starting moves: Sandstorm, Dragon Dance, Bite, Outrage Now this is an interesting choice, you ever wanted to use a Pupitar? Cause it will not become a Tyranitar in this game, you will probably finish it first, unless you grind. Now due to it being traded, you never know, you could get a Tyranitar early and sweep the rest of the game, because man, DRAGON DANCE. Outrage isn't too useful, but it's different at least and until that absolute monster, Pupitar is just a slow Rock/Ground type, so it won't be great until Earthquake, though an early Rock Slide is very nice, so Larvitar won't be complete deadweight until then. It can also get Brick Break, Thrash and Body Slam, so it'll do some damage, but it won't change after it evolves until you finish the game, so if it's not working for you since it'll be slow and take damage from common special moves... uh, it won't do anything else. I think using the Tyranitar from the end of the last game is probably a better idea.  Okay, I've spent a couple hours doing all the side stuff in Realgam Tower and it wasn't too bad. So, uh, what we were doing? Phenac City   Oh yeah, Phenac City. Still seems perfectly fine, it's just been five years since Dash directed someone to the Mayor's house, not surprising he's forgotten.   But what is with this town's POKEMON CENTER? There's no one here! How am I supposed to get my POKEMON healed? We're kind of hooped here... I don't see the problem, might just be out to lunch or whatever. We can still use the PC anyway, so it doesn't matter if they're in or not. Could also be on holiday.   See this guy gets it. We've got all the supplies we need from both Pyrite and Realgam, so we don't need anything else. Everything's perfectly fine.   Let's see if anything's up in the Pre Gym.   I mean, is she wrong?    Things are too hectic, so all battles are canceled. Can I help you with anything? Huh? What's that? CIPHER is going to attack the town? And you came to warn the MAYOR? Hahaha! Are you sure you didn't dream all this up?  Still nothing wrong, Justy was a prick last game with his Double Team Sand Veil garbage, so it's a shame he hasn't changed.   Oh, hi, guy. The MAYOR's bedroom is upstairs. There's no going up there! Oh, I am so bored! If there was some music, it might make things less boring. Let's see if we can't help that nice lady.    If you're looking for a little rest, feel free to take a snooze in that bed there. If you're bored, you can listen to some tunes. I think there's something there.  Oh, that. It's popular among girls, but it's not what a man like me needs or wants. It seems a waste to just throw it out, so you can have it. Take it with you, okay?  Well I guess there's no reason to ever enter the Phenac Stadium. Least we won't have to bother with that old weirdo again, just offering us his bed to sleep in and dumping an old anime CD on us since he got the DVD, what a creep. I bet it's some Precure poo poo.  Oh, wow, score! Maybe this will make things less boring! Oh, wow! It's "Rumba of Love"! I'll borrow this. Rumba of Love I hope the Mayor isn't sleeping, that big dunderhead!    JUSTY, there is bad trouble brewing! Of all places, our beloved PHENAC is now the target of CIPHER! Already, CIPHER members are secretly taking the places of prominent members of our community! If something's not done, the city will be taken over by CIPHER without anyone noticing what's happened. JUSTY, I must turn to you for help. We need your abilities to overcome the crisis facing our city. You, as the LEADER of the PRESTIGE PRECEPT CENTER, should be able to do something. It may be too late, however. Already, I feel threatened by...  You're not getting the silly idea of delivering that letter to PRE GYM's JUSTY?  Oh, you naughty boy! You need to be taught a lesson for snooping!  Oh hey Cipher has infiltrated this town. I didn't really notice.    Oh this is gonna be fun.  Snorunt, 190 catch rate (99%, low health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Wave/Water Pulse, Shadow Shed/Sing, Bite, Icy Wind Shivering its way in, the Snorunt line is tough to recommend, since it's a jack of all trades. It was pretty good in the LP, but I got it late and used it as a pretty nice Ice attacker when there wasn't a million Water types to deal with. Since there's a lot less of that in this game, an Ice type is pretty great, but carting around a Snorunt for 22 levels is not gonna be fun. Still, Ice Beam is immediate and Crunch ain't far behind, while Water Pulse gives it something to work with. But aside from Shadow Ball, it'll remain very static for the rest of the game, which will be annoying when it falls behind later on. There are better Ice types, but this is a tricky Pokemon to recommend most of the time, so hey, if you want it early, here you go!  You weren't supposed to find that. But, you what? I think you'll be wasting your time delivering that to JUSTY. Phenac City    Yeah they did, that's a good impersonation! ...oh, everyone's disguised aren't they? Goddammit.   Oh hey another Pokemon to go over, I was thinking I hadn't done enough of that already today.   gently caress me this thing is fragile. Shadow Pokemon Resets:   Pineco, 190 catch rate (99%, low health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Blitz/Pin Missile, Shadow Shed/Refresh, Spikes, Counter Well this was a good defensive tank last game and, well, if you evolve it it'll do just that. And hey, this time you actually get Bug STAB and a way to remove status to do your walling even more effectively. So hey that's cool, but otherwise it doesn't do anything else. It doesn't get any Steel STAB later on and you'll just be exploding or setting Spikes or Toxic stalling for most of the game, so if you need something to take hits and set up hazards, then hey, you've got your mon, but it's a bit challenging getting Pineco to evolve since it doesn't do a huge amount to contribute until you get the real good stuff. I won't knock this stuff (mostly), but it's just not for me.  Alright, let's get outside and find Justy! He should still be sitting in his chair like an rear end in a top hat.    Six! Five! Four! Three! Two! One! ...that's it! Perfect! When we all look this much alike, even I, your own brother, can't tell any of us apart... Everyone knows why we're here? Our job is to confound any enemies that stumble onto us here. We'll all scatter and deflect attention away from PRE GYM. If my plan works, we may be in line for an ADMIN position! ...maybe. Brothers! May you undertake your order with pride and diligence! To your positions! Hunt down Justy? Don't mind if I do... Crosspeice fucked around with this message at 21:38 on Aug 4, 2018 |
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Aug 4, 2018 04:51
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Your memory's failing you, TM10 is Hidden Power. Also what's with Game Freak and completely ruining level curves in direct sequels? First Johto, now this...
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Aug 4, 2018 17:34
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Ugh, Poke Spots. I can see what the game was trying to do with them, but the mechanics are infuriating.Crosspeice posted:We've got, ahem, Protect, Blizzard, Hyper Beam, Light Screen, Protect, Safeguard, Thunder, Reflect and Fire Blast. Oh god I did all of that from memory... Pretty sure the first Protect should've been Hidden Power. Still, I'm pretty impressed even so! Fire Blast and Protect are definitely the big winners here; Thunder is frustrating without Rain Dance support, and the weather TMs come really late in this game for some reason (Colosseum deifnitely encouraged weather teams to some degree, this one doesn't at all). Blizzard is okay, I guess; the accuracy hurts a bit less since it attacks both opponents and rolls separately for each, but it's still annoying and I was rarely satisfied using it. I really enjoy the Battle CDs and think they might be my favourite thing in this game; I'm definitely looking forward to seeing you show them off. That said, there's a lot of variation in them: some are really clever puzzles with interesting solutions (involving things you'd never do during normal Pokemon gameplay), some are fairly boring slugfests, and some are just plain stupid or unfair (#35 aaaaaaargh). And there are definitely cases where RNG bullshit will mess up the intended solution, or make it so you can get away with a strategy that by all rights shouldn't have worked (I do sometimes think they might have been better off with preset/scripted RNG, although I go back and forth on that). I agree the tedious unskippable startup animation is a problem, though; it's especially bad when many of them require a bit of experimentation to figure out, and many players will need multiple attempts. Battle Bingo, on the other hand, I have very mixed feelings about. First off, it's not really Bingo in any sense of the word, but honestly that's beside the point. I did enjoy it, and it does create some interesting kinds of decisions. The biggest issue I have is that (especially as you get into the harder cards) they don't seem designed to be completable "fairly" (by which I mean, without foreknowledge of what every space is), but rather expect the player to keep retrying until they've memorised what goes where and can plan out a strategy and route. The early cards are fun blind, the late cards can be fun with foreknowledge but are utterly painful blind, you will inevitably run out of EP and lose because you have very few to spare. And the RNG can easily screw you over with an unexpected crit or status proc, just like everywhere else. I don't think they really knew what they wanted this game to be, and honestly it kind of shows. Still, the prizes aren't bad. Also, a few minor corrections about what things do in the (bingo) battle menu: "GIVE IN" just forfeits the battle, you lose the 1 EP you spent just as if you'd lost the battle normally but that's it. This is purely to save time if you notice you can't win, bad matchups can really drag on here. "BINGO" just shows you the current state of your card. I guess this is there to help with decision-making if you can't remember (maybe you want to see if catching the thing you're up against will be important for upcoming type matchups?), but otherwise it's pointless. As far as I know, there's no way to cash in an incomplete card (despite the game seeming to provide a prize structure for doing so  ), you have to successfully fill in the entire thing or YOU GET NOTHING, GOOD DAY SIR.
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Aug 4, 2018 17:36
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quote:Cause it will not become a Tyranitar in this game, you will probably finish it first, unless you grind. Says you OP! My boy evolved in the second-last area, just in time for the final level.
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Aug 4, 2018 18:09
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13 years ago today, XD came out in Japan.
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Aug 4, 2018 19:01
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Blaze Dragon posted:Your memory's failing you, TM10 is Hidden Power. At least this game has a way to grind up levels if you really want them. The level curve is low but it never felt as strangling as GSC's. On the other hand the ability to grind caused a surge in levels like 3 areas ahead I forgot about Battle Bingo! I loved that thing. It & Battle CDs were great diversions. oh and pokespots....like, it's nice that they introduced some sort of wild pokemon into the game for variety's sake but there's only 9 of them and the selection is questionable. I don't know, just feels like there could have been more here. It can take a while for the alert to go off, too, which is annoying.
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Aug 4, 2018 19:33
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rannum posted:At least this game has a way to grind up levels if you really want them. The level curve is low but it never felt as strangling as GSC's. On the other hand the ability to grind caused a surge in levels like 3 areas ahead Crosspiece touched on this, but the Pokespot Pokemon seem more like Purify Chamber fodder than anything else, especially Hoppip. Most of them I just shoved in the Chamber, honestly, and it really drove the purification machine into high gear, until I was getting five notifications in the span of minutes.
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Aug 4, 2018 20:20
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Ah whoops, if I'd noticed I put Protect there twice I would've corrected it beforehand, but oh well.Explopyro posted:"GIVE IN" just forfeits the battle, you lose the 1 EP you spent just as if you'd lost the battle normally but that's it. This is purely to save time if you notice you can't win, bad matchups can really drag on here. I was thinking of the Battle CDs, where Give In is what I thought it was for BINGO as well. You don't really have EP to spare unless you're at the end of the card, so I don't really see the point in something like that, you'll just get screwed later on. And since I have the solutions to everything, I never used BINGO once, so I'm also surprised you have to do literally everything in one go because of that prize structure. How strange. Now that I've thought about it the level curve is very similar to Gen 2, which was a shame, since your team also get too strong, especially when everyone was using level 20 Pokemon around the 7th badge (part of the reason why I hate Neo Team Rocket so much), the problem is there's so many optional Cipher Peon battles and the game never accounts for them in the curve AND since they're optional they never have Shadow Pokemon, so it's a real double whammy.
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Aug 4, 2018 21:36
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Crosspeice posted:I was thinking of the Battle CDs, where Give In is what I thought it was for BINGO as well. You don't really have EP to spare unless you're at the end of the card, so I don't really see the point in something like that, you'll just get screwed later on. And since I have the solutions to everything, I never used BINGO once, so I'm also surprised you have to do literally everything in one go because of that prize structure. How strange. Oh yeah, it's never really a good idea, but that's what it does. I've used it a handful of times because I tried to play fair with this game and not look up what was where, and there are a few cards where you can legitimately have battles get to the point both combatants are using Struggle (sometimes a foregone conclusion, sometimes not), or you get trolled and something has a secondary type that gives it an immunity to your one move (which happened more than I'd care to admit). I may be misremembering, but I think it gives you 3 more EP than you'd need to play a card perfectly, so you can theoretically afford a mistake or two. You do get fewer coupons if you waste EP, though, which is more incentive to look up the answers and never use this. Also, the arrangement is fixed the first time you play a card, but if you replay them (e.g. to grind coupons) the spaces get shuffled, which sort of forces you to play fair. Interestingly, though, if you fail a shuffled card it'll immediately offer you the option to retry and it won't be shuffled again if you accept, so you can still brute force them by learning where everything is (it just costs 500 money each time you retry). That is the only way I've been able to beat any of the cards on "1-Panel mode" (which gets unlocked after you clear all 10 normal cards, and restricts your options even further by requiring each move be adjacent to the last move), which is utterly brutal and I gave up on completing all of them because it's stupid and unfun. And I'm normally an OCD completionist type who's willing to go through a lot of bullshit, my partner's always asking me why I play games when I'm not having fun. The design decisions they made for this mode baffle me, really. If EP hadn't been so tight, it could've been a fun diversion. If I'd been a playtester, I'd have suggested increasing the EP from 2 to 3 per Pokemon, and shuffling them every time so you can't prerecord solutions or brute force attempts until you memorise them. (Well, either that or give perfect information and be open about treating it like a puzzle.) I think overall it's better for a minigame like this to lean toward being easy, more players will have a positive experience that way than if it's designed to frustrate them. Why do I know all of this? I honestly couldn't say. I think your comparison of this game's level curve to gen 2 is pretty spot-on, really.
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Aug 4, 2018 22:22
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Couldn't you guarantee winning that battle CD without dealing with damage variance by using Double Edge instead of Gust on the first turn? 120 base power with STAB vs 40 base power with STAB and super-effectiveness.
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Aug 5, 2018 00:19
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Crosspeice posted:Zubat, 255 catch rate (99%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Leech Life, Supersonic, Astonish, Bite Since Colosseum and Gale of Darkness both take place in Orre, this means Zubat's natural range is best described as "literally loving everywhere". The Zubat line is one of only three Pokemon lines that appear in every regional Pokedex; the other two are Psyduck and Magnemite and neither are part of the nine Pokemon you can find in Poke Spots, unlike Zubat. Zubat's range also includes all the various Ranger games, all the Mystery Dungeon games, Pokemon Conquest, and other irregular stuff like Rumble, Trozei, Pinball, etc. You can even catch a Zubat in the Pokewalker, if you consider that to be a separate Pokemon game. Oh, and Super Smash Bros: Melee has a Crobat trophy. In summation: if there's a Pokemon game, it's got the Zubat line in it.  Image source Saladin Rising fucked around with this message at 01:51 on Aug 5, 2018 |
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Aug 5, 2018 01:37
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Crosspiece, I wonder if you should try taking screenshots as JPEGs instead of PNGs. There shouldn't be any noticeable drop in quality because this is a 3D game (as opposed to the pixel art of the other Pokemon games) and the files will be much smaller in size.
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Aug 5, 2018 08:31
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How the heck is Cipher coming up with all these clever disguises? I mean, I realize they come free in a box of Villain-Os, but I didn't think mass-scale impersonation was their theme.
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Aug 5, 2018 14:03
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Procrastine posted:Couldn't you guarantee winning that battle CD without dealing with damage variance by using Double Edge instead of Gust on the first turn? 120 base power with STAB vs 40 base power with STAB and super-effectiveness. Yeah that's what I did the second time around, it's just something that maybe the devs would let you do, just using Gust twice, since hey, it was super effective and it would be even stronger when Tropius used Fly! That wasn't the case... and probably crafted in such a way that damage variance might not have been enough. Who knows. Solumin posted:Crosspiece, I wonder if you should try taking screenshots as JPEGs instead of PNGs. There shouldn't be any noticeable drop in quality because this is a 3D game (as opposed to the pixel art of the other Pokemon games) and the files will be much smaller in size. Hmm, that's something I could've considered when I started this LP, but I just carried on from Emerald with the same settings and everything. 300kb on average per image is fine... right? Well, something to think about if I do other 3D games in future. I'll stick with PNGs for the last chunk of this LP.
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Aug 5, 2018 20:09
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This image: is ~300 KB. As a JPEG:  It's ~66 KB. I poked at a couple screenshots from your Emerald LP, and they were all ~10 KB. Those were PNGs. I agree there's no need to switch now, but it would explain why your updates can take a while to load.
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Aug 5, 2018 20:27
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Side Course 3: Battle CD Selection 1 Battle SIM What up people looking at their screens? We've got our first chunk of Battle CDs to go over. Let's have a look. Reward: Super Potion   We're starting off with a real exciting one here. Woooooo.   What's good to remember is your opponent will very often go down their list of moves one by one unless they have reasons for otherwise. This makes them very predictable and makes them a puzzle to taking them out or stopping them before they reach their more dangerous moves.    You can make a couple mistakes, but it's just Counter then Mirror Coat.  Riveting.  Reward: Great Ball     This one is simple enough, though you should note the Speed tiers as that might slip you up.    Not a lot to it, but now that Skarmory is out...   We switch to Ludicolo since it can then outspeed and dive before Sky Attack is used. It'll take too long for Quagsire to go down, so you need to switch immediately.  You can waste a couple turns to see how it's supposed to go, it's mainly waiting for your attacks to go off.  Reward: Antidote     Like before, pay attention to the Speed tiers. If you make a mistake, you will die.   Thankfully you don't need to use Thunder at all, a fair few moves you'll get are ones to throw you off, or to make you think about a certain strategy you won't need, like the Rain Dance Thunder combo. No need for it.    Though for Tropius a Helping Hand Thunderbolt isn't enough, but two attacks are. See how they can be tricky already?    Since we cleared all the Battle CDs we bought from the shop (2, 3 and 4), three more become available to buy. Of course we weren't gonna only do 5 in this chunk.  Reward: Great Ball   Alright, how can we take down this one?   You just Swords Dance twice (a move Machamp can't learn, but get used to that) while Aggron does its listed moves of Protect, then Counter.   And then you loving murder it.  Reward: Full Heal      Alright now this is a bit of a puzzle. You can see what Kecleon is gonna do, it's strong enough to knock out one of your Pokemon per turn, so you need to use the faster Pokemon to change Kecleon's typing so the second Pokemon gets in a super effective hit. Can you see the path we need to take?   The first two moves are Mach Punch from Hitmonchan to change it to Fighting, to Wing Attack to change it to Flying.  Since Aerial Ace is first to be used, the AI chooses the Pokemon it would do the most damage to, be it super effective damage, or if it'll knock out a Pokemon regardless. So that'll be important in some CDs.   We'll send out Hariyama since Aerodactyl goes for Ancientpower to turn it Rock type, but I get pretty lucky here and crit, which will save a turn.  Meaning I can knock it out with Arm Thrust, instead of going for Vital Throw while Kecleon knocked out Aerodactyl so Girafarig could use Psychic. In this case, we didn't need to use Girafarig at all!  Reward: Ultra Ball   If you haven't used the Conversion moves before, you'll learn about them.   Regular Conversion turns the user into a type of one of its moves. Since the only non-Normal move we have is Aerial Ace, that's what we'll get.  Since we're not statused, Aerial Ace does more damage due to our new STAB, so we'll use that. And hey another bonus crit saves a turn, how considerate.  Reward: Energy Root   I think this one's a bit obvious.   Since we're barely faster than Shuckle, we can go for Super Fang before Bide starts, so that's half of its health gone already.    Since we have one turn to burn while we wait for Toxic damage to rack up, we can get a sub up and then Super Fang again, since Bide fizzled out to nothing. Remember that Bide is 2 turns no matter what, starting in this gen, so you're free to go for another Super Fang on turn 3 or 4.  With CDs 9, 13 and 17 complete, another 3 more appear in the shop!  Reward: Awakening        Hmm, what do we do about this? Salamence is really strong and fast, but has no attacking moves and is trapped by Shadow Tag (abilities and nature are the few things you need to find out for yourself). We don't have a lot of time to take everything down, so we've gotta think of something.   It doesn't matter what Salamence does, as long as it's not Protect. And since we have no items, a Knock Off from a Banette is gonna do absolutely nothing.   Sorry, Salamence, you're in the way. It also doesn't matter what Wobbuffet does, as we'll soon see.     Did you remember? Mirror Coat does nothing against Dark types and Counter does nothing against Ghost types, so our Pokemon are completely safe. While we didn't knock out Wobbuffet, we're still on track.    Banette and Wynaut go down in one hit to Houndoom, so so long as Wobbuffet is weak enough that Dusclops can deal with it, we can finish by the end of the fourth turn!  Reward: White Herb      This is a tricky one mainly because there's little room for error and you need to be precise in what moves you use. The Vigoroth are basically identical, we've just gotta make sure Ursaring doesn't wreck us and Clefable doesn't annoy us too much.     We're not exactly aiming to knock out Clefable, but it's gotta be ready to go down when we want it, so since Ninjask is using Protect, we can focus on one thing at a time.   Ninjask gets +1 Speed every turn, but that won't matter unless it passes those boosts, so we need it stuck with Encore. There's some RNG is this, as while Taunt is always 2 turns no matter what, Encore is 2-6, so if Ninjask gets an early one, then we're screwed, since we need to damage Clefable a bit more.   Pound won't do much, so it's whatever.   But we need Clefable to use an attacking move, otherwise Encore will fail and we'll waste a turn that could've been a Facade. We don't want Clefable wrapping back round to using its status moves.   Now we can focus down the Ninjask and then whittle down the Ursaring.     Well that's unlucky, we just lost. We need to damage Clefable enough that it gets taken out by Earthquake, but it can get off three attacks while Encored. It's a 50/50 chance of which opponent gets targetted and unfortunately it was on the same Vigoroth each time, meaning it was unable to survive an Earthquake. We need to hit Ursaring with 3 Facades to take it out, so the second Vigoroth won't deal enough damage and will get knocked out by another Earthquake.  ...but if we crit, it doesn't matter. Huh. Well that saved me repeating that CD.  Reward: Ultra Ball       Hmm, another tricky one. Since the opponent cycles through their attacks, if we don't do something, they'll always use Protect when Slaking needs to attack. The Choice Band also adds to the problem, so we need to be careful what attacks we lock ourselves into. We have two Double-Edge targets and one Shadow Ball target, so one is more worthwhile to be locked into than the other.     Since we only have 3 Pokemon, we can't double switch, so one Slaking has to attack, it doesn't matter what it uses or what it targets. The opponent will always Protect on odd numbered turns, so we need the Slaking to attack on even numbered turns to get around it.   The opponent's have rubbish moves, so we don't need to worry about them knocking us out. Let's get Dusclops out here. We don't need to be careful with Roar, since Protect will prevent us from desyncing the opponents even if we were able to switch them out on odd numbered turns.    There we go, we switch one Slaking for another and it's ready to attack on the fourth turn, after they've used Protect. Hehehe.   Now go for Double-Edge, since this Slaking will get another chance to attack and there's only one Ghost type. Exploud doesn't have anything to do this turn.     Now we swap out Exploud for our second Slaking while both opponents Protect. Now they're both ready for action.   And since our first Slaking is locked into Double-Edge, the other Slaking goes for Shadow Ball. As easy as that.  Reward: Ultra Ball     The Battle CDs like Shedinja, for obvious reasons, so we need to figure out how we're going to knock out both opponents. We don't have enough firepower on our side and not enough time to make that firepower more firey or whatever this metaphor needs. So what can we do?   Detect just adds to the problem, but we'll only have two turns to do something!  Oh would you look at that, something.   Now Raticate can do whatever the hell it likes while Shedinja reduces an opponent to 1HP.  Alright, that's both of them at 1HP, but we're on the last turn and they're about to use Detect, what can we do???   While weather effects occur at the end of the turn, they still happen before the turn rolls over, so it counts and we knock them both out through Detect!  Farewell my friend.  That's it for Battle CDs this time around, we've done 12 of the drat things. Next time, we'll do around half of the Battle BINGO. Crosspeice fucked around with this message at 01:49 on Aug 6, 2018 |
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Aug 5, 2018 22:42
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These are actually pretty cool, and I wish they brought the back. Also I think you put :gero: when you meant (geno)
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Aug 6, 2018 01:47
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What I really enjoy about the Battle CDs is that the interactions and manoeuvres vital to succeeding in them are very often things nobody would ever do in real battles. It's not all of them, but even from this set you can see the kind of out-of-the-box thinking going on, and it's pretty cool (and sometimes makes for the kind of puzzles you can feel clever for solving). How often does anyone even use Fly or Dig, let alone remember the interactions with Gust and Earthquake? (They seemed to like the 2-turn moves in these, using Dive to dodge Sky Attack is another thing you'd almost never see...) Helping Hand is a move that gets overlooked a lot, but even if you do run it, how often do you weigh it against doing two of the same attack, and get different answers depending on your opponent's speed? When's the last time anyone used Conversion? The Salamence one is a bit obvious, but still, when outside of this kind of scenario does the player get handed a worthless pokemon and forced to find a way around it? You're never going to see a Salamence like this (or, really, this goes for most of the CD pokemon) in any game that lets the player raise their own pokemon. I really enjoy the Vigoroth one too, for making you think about how to disable opponents with moves like Taunt and Encore (and having to use them to get around Follow Me, no less!). I know these moves see actual use, but this CD is a surprisingly tight tutorial on how they work. The Slaking one is also really great, when would you ever think to use Roar on your own pokemon in doubles? Before seeing this CD I'd had no idea you could even do that. And yet it lets you cheat past Truant and Choice Band. Very satisfying. They really liked using Shedinja to good effect in these, too. I'm always here for that, and of course it doesn't stop with this one. Having to use Mimic to get Endeavour on it is a fun trick to figure out (and again, when's the last time any player bothered using Mimic?). The scenarios are awfully contrived, of course, but that's half the fun of it to me. There are so many things in the Pokemon battle engine that barely anyone sees in normal gameplay, so why not make Rube Goldberg-esque puzzles out of them? And this game was made back in generation 3, imagine the kinds of things they could do now. I would absolutely play a game made up of nothing but these.
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Aug 6, 2018 02:03
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That guy ninjaing behind you to silence you was actually kind of creepy.
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Aug 6, 2018 05:42
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Part 9: The Fight for Phenac Phenac City There are six of us, so our sense of presence is sixfold! Our appeal is sixfold, too! We're not just bit players!  Oh hey it's the Hexagon Brothers again. Been a while since I've taken down all six of them, might as well do it again.   So do you think I'm a bit overlevelled, here, 10 levels above my opponents? Well I'm about to be even more so, since we can head into the Pre Gym and completely skip fighting anyone else! But where's the fun in that? We're gonna root out all the evil from this city and fight every trainer and get even stronger! Yaaaaaaaaay!    You haven't seen anything of our brotherly love yet!  We might as well fight them, since it's more experience and they each drop a Battle CD! You get these after saving Phenac and ignoring them anyway, but what if... we battled them instead?   Nonsense! For someone as elegant and gorgeous as I, only a setting this plush is worthy. You... don't use that condescending tone on me. I'm older than you! And besides, we're both JUSTY now. What the... what are you looking at? You think we're putting on a show or something? But, what's been seen can be used as witness testimony. You can curse your luck, but we can't let you walk away!  I am starting to get a bit bored of being so strong.     I just finished the first Battle CD chunk and we're already getting the collection for the second one! I just can't win.    It's a different story when it comes to pests!    Despite what he says, Browsix is absolutely the strongest brother since his Pokemon evolve early. Everyone else's teams are basically identical, aside from a couple new catches here and there.   So hey, I take my first lot of damage in a while.   And we'll see what these exciting disks contain soon enough.   Hi, there! I'm JUSTY and I brawl for justice! If it's advice you need, I'm here for you, my friend! Huh? A LAB? In the desert, you say? I don't have the faintest idea. ...you don't believe me. You little snoop! Why can't you just let certain things slide by?    No Shadow Quilava, but hey, this'll do.   Oh yeah, anyone who seems out of place is a Cipher Peon to battle. Completely optional of course, so lots of Pokemon at the level 20 mark because they don't want your Pokemon getting too strong now!   This ain't Gen 1 anymore buddy, that stuff won't fly here.   Since they're all optional, it also means no Shadow Pokemon. Eh, I'm not huge on Gen 3 Absol anyway.    All the women here and my comrades in arms! They all know me! There's no point in chatting them up!  Honestly, the one time you can attack and you whiff a Poison Gas. Or, uh, the opposite of that? Hmm.    This ego stroking from most characters is getting old. I get it, I'm strong.    Huh? You'll help me? Why, thanks! But you should be worried about yourself first! Warrrrgh!   I can't believe Dash was evil all along.   What's that?! You're taking on CIPHER in town?! I bet you could use an item for healing your POKEMON. I'll tell you what! I'm sure you'll get something if you can beat me!  Oh hey Seviper is pretty tanky. Though that's cause I'm still using Thundershock. I haven't felt the need to upgrade just yet...   Alright, where are the store clerks? They're probably terrified!  No wonder we weren't getting any customers! Fine and dandy! In times like this, the things we sell truly come in handy!  This game is so loving dumb, I love it. And hey, that's a good variety of stuff, we'll be coming back to Phenac pretty often.  Hunh?! I... I'm sorry! I must have nodded off! It's so quiet here... Now these are some drugs we can use! Well, since we can just EV train in Emerald where you can get these for 1BP each, it's just not worth it. I'd rather spend my money on Poke Snacks.   Heheh! I can move freely again! Now I can battle without feeling squashed!   Good battle m8  In other words, I look just like JUSTY even without putting on a disguise! Look at me! I look cool like JUSTY, eh? Come on, I'll take you on!  I'm blue, dabadee    Alright, now we'll never see the Hexagon Brothers for the rest of the game. Yeah I don't know why either. I suppose we can find them again in the depths of the desert, or something.   You should have just stayed happily entertained at the REALGAM TOWER!   I ran out of things to do! Cool team btw.   Hah? You're asking me if I'm a fake? How rude of you! How could there be any fake as handsome as me, I ask you!  There are many things that you'll be better off not knowing, little boy!  Okay, that's most of Phenac liberated. Place is a bit empty now though. Wasn't it fun at least? ...you're right, it wasn't, but hey, I got some sweet cash I guess.   We'll heal everyone up and... hmm, weren't we supposed to be going somewhere?  Oh yeah poo poo the Pre Gym. I am too easily distracted.   And that voice tells me to take that letter from you! Since we're back on the main path, Shadow Pokemon appear again.   Natu, 190 catch rate (99%, low health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Blitz/Future Sight, Shadow Shed/Baton Pass, Night Shade, Aerial Ace The sun staring birb is back and it's about as meh as when I used it in Crystal. Well at least it's got Flying STAB to start off with and Psychic isn't postgame! It was in Colosseum, but from doing all the Realgam Tower stuff, I've actually got enough Pokecoupons to get a TM, so I can get Psychic right now if I wanted to. You'll also get it for free in just a little bit, so it'll be fine to wait, since it can do some damage with Night Shade or something. Otherwise it doesn't learn anything all that interesting, there's Giga Drain or Solarbeam and then Shadow Ball. So not much, but there's also Sky Attack and Thunder Wave from tutors, if you want some crazy options. But yeah, not a lot to say, since there's not many special moves to consider and its Attack ain't that great.    The way you battle... you play things too safe with your POKEMON. Since you don't seem to hear what I'm saying, I suppose I'd better just beat it into you!  Ah, it's good to have Fire Blast PP again, they go so quickly.   More levels and more Shadow Pokemon. That describes this game quite well.   Roselia, 150 catch rate (78%, low health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Wave/Magical Leaf, Shadow Shed/Sweet Kiss, Grasswhistle, Leech Seed If you wanted a Grass attacker, it definitely has the SpAtk for it... but not much else. Since its Attack is pretty meh, it can't use its Poison moves all that well, but it can't get Sludge Bomb until postgame so it's not a big deal anyway. However that's all it does, the strongest Grass move it really gets is Magical Leaf, unless you want to use Solarbeam, which ain't a bad option as we saw last LP, and Petal Dance isn't until postgame. But uh, yeah, it's got Shadow Ball and Body Slam for its coverage moves, which ain't amazing, but you've got Grasswhistle, so what are you moaning about? Man Grass types kinda sucked before Energy Ball huh?   Even JUSTY couldn't do a thing when we showed him we had hostages galore. He's being a model prisoner along with the MAYOR and the rest of them right here in PRE GYM's basement. If you want to play hero and rescue them... well, you need to deal with me first!  A Shadow Pokemon? Meowth, that's right! ...mods put me in kitty jail kthnx.   Meowth, 255 catch rate (99%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Rush/Slash, Shadow Hold/Sing, Pay Day, Bite Time for cat puns? No? Well, Meowth is a fine Normal type, but without Return, it's not as good as it could be, but with relatively even stats and a wide movepool, it can do whatever it fancies. Getting Slash is a good compromise, since the RSE moveset both Orre games run on means it wouldn't learn that for a long time, and Sing is... there. Then you've got Water Pulse, Thunderbolt, Shadow Ball, Aerial Ace and Icy Wind as coverage moves, which is pretty cool, but it doesn't exactly have the stats to use them well and they could be used on other Pokemon instead. At least it's fast, but the Gen 1 days of forever critting are long gone, making Persian... meowwwwwwt of luck!  You need the ELEVATOR KEY to get into PRE GYM's basement. Sorry to say, nobody trusts me with anything important like that. Of course we're not done just yet, there's still one place left to go.   Whoops! Did I say recovery operation? Don't you worry about it! It's got nothing to do with you!   Why can't other evil teams use Pokemon as interesting and varied as Cipher?   Swinub, 225 catch rate (78%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Blitz/Ancientpower, Shadow Wave/Charm, Mist, Mud Shot Shame Mamoswine doesn't exist still, but how's this little digging child? Well the only move it really learns through level is Take Down, since it can't use its Ice STAB very effectively, but at least it has a physical coverage move that isn't Rock Tomb. Cause that's what it could've gotten. Also not waiting a million years for a good Ground move is pretty good too, since Earthquake isn't too far away now. Ice Beam is literally in the next room, so even though it won't do a lot of damage, the type coverage is too good to ignore. Otherwise, there's Body Slam and that's about it. Pretty simple mon, but starting off with alright moves means it's not completely painful to get to the good stuff. And by good stuff I always mean Earthquake.   Time for a four round bout.    Oh thank god it's the fourth team member. Took long enough, sheesh.   Spearow, 255 catch rate (99%, low health, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Blitz/False Swipe, Shadow Panic/Baton Pass, Leer, Aerial Ace The Spearow line can be rightly described as a poor man's Doduo line, but there's nothing bad in that, after all, Drill Peck determines if you're a good Flying type or not until that was moved to Brave Bird (powercreep yo) and since it gets Drill Peck, hey it's good, I guess. Though unlike Dodrio, Fearow gets Drill Peck a lot later and doesn't really do much aside from that. Since there's no Return or Steel Wing, you'll be using Double-Edge and you will like it. Maybe Mirror Move if you're feeling fancy. And I will be feeling fancy. At least it has Drill Peck, otherwise its best move will be Sky Attack, and no one wants that.   Yeah yeah yeah, looks interesting or whatever, let's look at our newest team member!    We haven't encountered a huge amount of Shadow Pokemon since we got Shroomish, but it sure as hell feels like it. Sure I could've come here almost immediately and picked up Spearow, then faced everyone in town, but one, I only just thought of that, and two, it would've been a little disjointed, I prefer things looking nice and smooth while we explore a new area.  I came into this area with 5 Pokemon since I knew Spearow was the first Shadow Pokemon we'd encounter, so it works out quite nicely, since instead of 2/3 of our Pokemon being on the field getting exp, now only 1/4 will be for the moment, which is going to hopefully cut down on our team's levels. Though to begin with, Spearow is a bit fragile to stay out.   Grimer, 190 catch rate (99%, low health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Blitz/Sludge Bomb, Shadow Hold/Helping Hand, Shadow Punch, Minimize If you were tempted by Gulpin at the start of the game, but decided on something else, then this is the Pokemon for you! Since it gets Sludge Bomb, it's a good Poison type and Helping Hand and Shadow Punch are just neat bonuses. When you add in Brick Break and, ugh, Rock Tomb, then you've got some pretty nice coverage here, since you're ignoring all of the many special moves it can learn. Good, its SpAtk is terrible and it has plenty of moves to keep busy with, such as Body Slam and Selfdestruct. It'll need Protect, being weak to Earthquake after all, but it's a pretty good physical attacker that can help its team if you want and has the coverage to keep up, even if those options are a little weak. It evolving pretty late is a shame, but Grimer has enough Attack that it won't be awful, but you'll be embracing a bigger pile of sludge soon enough.     Before we head into the center, hot drat there was a stash of good poo poo here. We'll be using all of these items soon enough, maybe even on the same Pokemon! Cipher Admin   I have been promised the position of ORRE's GOVERNOR by none other than MASTER GREEVIL. So, you must understand, it wouldn't do to have it be known that I have muzzled the citizens of PHENAC. If that got out, imagine what harm it would bring to my pristine political record. Now, hand over the videotapes, please. I don't care about your sick aspirations! Don't you dare underestimate the power of the free press! ONBS stakes its very existence on delivering the truth for justice! I will get this news out! It's so sad that you won't listen to reason. Very well, I suppose you leave me with no option...   Sir, yes, sir! MR. SNATTLE, sir! Aye, aye, sir! Hey, boy! Playtime is over!  I don't have any reason for Portobello to keep Mega Drain, but it's still being weirdly useful. That might be because of my level though.   Look at this crazy high damage flying around everywhere!   Hey, let's see what else Spearow has. This Shadow Panic move seems pretty good.   Neat.   Seel, 190 catch rate (99%, low health, paralyzed, Pokeball), starting moves: Shadow Wave/Surf, Shadow Mist/Helping Hand, Safeguard, Ice Beam Ususally placed a bit awkwardly to make use of, Seel is actually pretty good, not only getting Surf, so making it a good Water type, but also coming with a free Ice Beam, so you can spend your TM elsewhere. And due to its mediocre even attacking stats, it can use its Normal coverage also. Cause that's all it gets, Normal moves. Since this is based off Emerald movesets, it can't learn Signal Beam from the move reminder since that was FRLG only. What a dumb concept. In any case, Water and Ice moves are pretty drat good and nearly all you need in life, so it's not a huge deal that it does literally nothing else. At least you've got Helping Hand. It also evolves a little bit late than its stats would allow and it won't be blowing you away with damage output, but hey, you could try your luck with Sheer Cold! It's nothing amazing, but seriously, when was the last time you used a Dewgong? And you call yourself a Pokemon Master!   Oh, for... this is precisely the time your camera should be rolling! Show some journalistic guts! Cut! Cut! If MASTER GREEVIL were to see this, he would be most displeased! I have no mercy for anyone in my way, even for a child like you! You answer to me now! Cipher Admin Battle    It's nice to see the game is finally trying to crawl out of the low 20s. Snattle can be a bit tough to face if you haven't been doing much, that's quite a few evolved Pokemon after all, but... well... you can probably guess how this might go.   He's mainly a bitch due to this Shadow Lunatone being annoying to catch. Still, we'll get our proper fighters out in a moment, I only sent out Spearow to lower its gauge, since Lanturn is about to knock it out.  W-What??? I... hate the AI in these games. Beating thick poo poo AI is never rewarding.   Anyway, we've got a new Shadow move here and this one is a real annoying one. Shadow Sky is weather move with 100% accuracy that damages all non-Shadow Pokemon at the end of the turn by 1/16th of their max HP. So a more picky Sandstorm or Hail. However, like Rain Dance and Sunny Day, it'll boost certain moves (in this case Shadow) by 50%. It can be pretty dangerous, since later Shadow moves are also pretty dangerous.   What is this AI doing??? Well I don't mind, since Spearow's moves are boosted and I can lower his gauge more AND it makes this battle vaguely tougher.    It also means there's one less Pokemon to get hit by Shadow Sky, so yeah, this is working out weirdly well, actually.     Does this guy hate mushrooms or something?    Shadow Panic working its magic there.   I would've sent out Pineapple to make catching Lunatone easier, but Spearow is only taking damage from Shadow Wave, so it's not going anywhere! Also, while Castform obviously doesn't have a Shadow form under Shadow Sky, Weather Ball is boosted to 100BP and becomes ???-type. Not Shadow type like you'd think, but this is the only time in the series that the ???-type's effectiveness becomes a thing. Spoilers, it's neither effective against nor resisted by any type. I'd rather they made it Shadow type.    Sheesh, finally. Let's bring out the big guns.    Lunatone, 45 catch rate (41%, low health, paralyzed, Great Ball), starting moves: Shadow Wave/Psychic, Shadow Shed/Baton Pass, Shadow Sky/Rain Dance, Rock Tomb A bit of an odd Pokemon available to us, but perfectly usable and maybe even pretty good. You just got some pretty good coverage in Ice Beam as the only other special move it learns, but Rain Dance and screens are pretty helpful for the rest of the team. It can also use some physical moves, I guess, but the best it gets is Rock Tomb, so that's actually worse than nothing, but there's also Earthquake and Shadow Ball and even Explosion in the postgame, so that could be fun. From the relearner, you can also get Rock Throw and Hypnosis and, uh, that's about it. Sure, Psychic and Ice are a weird combo and it doesn't really do much else aside from that, but it's not a bad thing. It'll start to fall behind in the endgame, but for right now, this crescent moon is a perfectly fine choice, though its weaknesses are everywhere. Phenac City   Today, we will leave quietly. But don't you forget about us!  But there's a silver lining in this--we managed to capture your heroics on tape! We did, didn't we? Hehehe, yeah, you bet we did! I got everything on tape this time. Okay, we need to rush back to PYRITE and get this news out on the air as soon as possible. Let's meet again! Thank you for everything! MARCIA! Wait for me!  Oh no! He dropped the ELEVATOR KEY!    Alright, let's restore this town back to normal, the emptyness is giving me the creeps, like being at school late when no one's around.    Oh, my! So, you, DAVID, sent that scoundrel SNATTLE packing? That is quite amazing! Does that mean we can finally leave this miserable place? Everyone! I need your attention, please! Let us all thank DAVID heartily, then get out of here! DAVID, I thank you sincerely! Phenac City!  On behalf of the whole city, I sincerely thank you. In fact, I can't thank you enough right now. If you could, please visit me at my home later.  Thank you. I'll be in touch. I've been thinking. I think PHENAC was targeted because CIPHER wanted to quash rumours that were spreading in town. People in the city have seen shady characters coming and going in the desert. People were talking about it.  Our desert travels continue. Though surely we would've seen whatever's there when we visited the Rock Poke Spot.   Thank you so much. We can finally return to AGATE. I was going to visit AGATE with my grandma, but then those people came and locked is up. I'm going to run a DAY CARE just like my grandma when I grow up. Thank you, DAVID! If you visit AGATE, please come to the DAY CARE.  I got seperated from my POKEMON when they held us prisoner. Hey! Where are you?! Come on, TRAPINCH, come back! Our city was saved by your selfless actions. I sincerely thank you! This is a mere token of our appreciation. Please accept it.  Honestly, if you hadn't arrived, I shudder to think what could have become of our city.  They left behind all sorts of things in their haste. Please, if you find it useful, do take it with you. We'll be using the Exp Share on Spearow when it can actually gain exp and when it doesn't need the Sharp Beak to not be left behind in damage output. Also, when we reach certain points in the story, more Battle CDs become available for us to find, either in bookshelves around the region, or on the ground in places we've been before. There are lists for Battle CD locations, sure, but not when they became available, I had to piece that together myself and put it in a document so I wouldn't forget. Freeing Phenac is the first story beat and there are plenty more to get plenty more CDs.     Huh? Trapped underground? What are you saying? I just got back from a stay at MT. BATTLE. I haven't the faintest idea what you're trying to say.  At least Dash is okay, that's all that matters. We'll check on everyone to make sure they're alright and then head north.    At least the center is back for some quick healing, but we can't trade Pokemon between games still.  It would give me great pleasure to battle the hero of our fair city. Ah! You'll grant me my wish? Then, let us begin!    It's nice to use another Pokemon on the team, I'd missed it.  Alright, let's see whatever this is!  I knew this lovely thing would ruin me one day!   What did CIPHER want to keep secret much that they would imprison us all? Oh! Could it be... that they're building a new base in the northern desert?  Gah! Uh, well, since we're a bit stuck right now, I guess we can head back to ONBS! ONBS    Might as well check how everyone's doing after our crazy adventure. Poke Poke Pokemon     I hope you'll learn this song and sing along with me. ONBS  DAVID, if you don't mind, please hear him out. Hi, DAVID! Thank you so much for helping MARCIA. Speaking of help, these people here came to us for some. They wanted our help find a POKEMON that went missing with the S.S. LIBRA. This is where it gets exciting. They say it's a POKEMON that's never been discovered before. Yow!  You're familiar with the news about the ship S.S. LIBRA's disappearance? My granddaughter's POKEMON was on board, and it vanished with the ship. The POKEMON is one I found while tending to my garden. It was among my tiny bonsai trees. It's a new species, I'm certain of it! ...can I catch it? I mean, this Pokemon was in PMD as well, but only as a statue. If you're gonna endlessly tease these Gen 4 Pokemon at least let me use one!   My granddaughter has a photo of BONSLY. Please ask her if you may see it. We'll try collecting information on our own, but to be honest, it's like trying to find a needle in a haystack. For the time being, there may be nothing we can do but gather information while tracking CIPHER's movements. DAVID? Your clothes are covered in sand. What happened to you?  But it may be too difficult for an ordinary scooter to cross the desert. It won't be easy getting there to investigate. Well, for help with something like that, how about PERR in GATEON PORT? If anyone can help... Oh, yes, that's it! Good idea, BITT! PERR's an old buddy of ours. He runs a mechanical parts shop with his grandpa, MAKAN. Huh? You know the guy? Well, then we can cut right to the chase! I'll get in touch with him. I'm sure he'll come up with the means for you to cross the desert.  Alright well don't hold your breath. I get very easily distracted.    What kinda overdesigned rubbish is that? Is it the baby form of Rhyhorn or something? Honestly, Game Freak are just running out of ideas.  In the meantime, DAVID, you should speak to PERR about your scooter. It would be best if we could get information on what's happening in the northern desert as soon as possible. We didn't expect you to know about PERR. Small world, huh? PERR's grandpa used to run a junk shop in a town named THE UNDER. If it's anything to do with machines and parts, leave it up to those two. There's nothing to worry about with them. Alright, let's turn this lovely dinky thing into a real machine! Next time!
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Aug 8, 2018 05:04
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Our team continues growing, so it's time for the next nickname! I would prefer something that isn't food related, but I know it's hard considering it's a delicious bird.
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Aug 8, 2018 05:05
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Ok I'm late to the party. Have you gone over how these games have the most hilariously awful NPC names in the history of videogames?
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Aug 8, 2018 05:38
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Well if it's a bird it's clearly a Turducken
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Aug 8, 2018 06:20
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Can we name Spearow Squire? We may not be able to make a bird of prey sing, but maybe we can make him play bass.
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Aug 8, 2018 06:24
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Cpt.Falcon because I'm unoriginal and can't think of anything
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Aug 8, 2018 06:25
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Perhaps fitting the direction of this game's tonal shifts, I suggest we call the bird Schmaltz.
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Aug 8, 2018 06:41
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Angrybirb.
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Aug 8, 2018 08:32
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Crosspeice posted:Our team continues growing, so it's time for the next nickname! I would prefer something that isn't food related, but I know it's hard considering it's a delicious bird.
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Aug 8, 2018 11:00
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name it dril
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Aug 8, 2018 11:28
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Spatula City posted:name it dril "i'm not snagged! i'm not snagged!!", i continue to insist as i slowly shrink and disappear into a poke ball (Seconding this.)
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Aug 8, 2018 11:57
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 03:20 |
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If you don't want food related, how about Cap'n Jack Spearow.
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Aug 8, 2018 13:16
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