Pokemon Y Playthrough: Catching all the Misfits

I found Espurr in an alleyway along the Northern Boulevard.  By dancing for it, I gained it trust and both Mimi and FriendofMimi decided to come back with is to the Bureau.  I hope that I never have to dance (literally dance) for my new boss.  FriendofMimi introduced herself to us as Emma.

Chapter 3: Detective, Tourist, Gang

It wasn't long before our next case presented itself to us.  In walks a Japanese tourist.  I know she was japanese because she spoke in written japanese text.  I hope you understand what I mean by that because it's just as incomprehensible to me now that I think on it.  Hopefully the attached picture will help explain.

Looker didn't want to let on that he doesn't know one word of Japanese, so he left to buy the lady tea, leaving the irritated woman to Emma and I.  Luckily, Emma knows Japanese and Mimi knows "psychic", so Emma responded and Mimi used Psychic to link our minds.  I like to see examples of pokemon using their abilities outside of battle.

Apparently, her pokemon were stolen at the train station.  Because this is a kid's game, Emma immediately knew the culprits to be the Lumiose Gang.  Looker ran off to challenge them, but as it were, he doesn't have any pokemon...

...anymore.

The backstory was explained in one line of seemingly throw-away dialogue: Looker's only pokemon died a long time ago.  It isn't a thing that is often discussed in the games, but Pokemon death is a real thing at least in my head cannon.  Whenever I restart a game these days, I make sure to transfer all of the pokemon that I consistently used to the Pokemon Bank so that they may be used later on.  If not, I view those pokemon as having died.  This probably makes me a psychopath, but honestly I was a psychopath well before this came to light.

I battled in Looker's stead and defeated the gauntlet.  It turns out that little, innocent Emma used to be their leader of the Lumiose gang.

And then Looker hired the entire Lumiose gang to be his assistants as well.  He really seems to be building an army of misfit future detectives.  It's like he's collecting 'em all, if " 'em " refers to scrubby street urchin types.

Current Squad:

Greninja/Froakles/lvl 94
Pikachu/PikaPi/lvl 63
Flareon/Rox/lvl 60
Hippowdon/Leviathan/ lvl 68
Dragalge/Toxie/lvl 55
Aerodactyl/Scarydactyl/lvl 54

Pokemon Y Playthrough: Mimi and FriendofMimi

Looker told me to come back later, so I decided it might be a good idea to re-acquaint myself with my pokemon.  I found a restaurant that specialized in double battles and ordered up a several-course meal and series of pokemon battles.  Please, it is what it sounds like and just allow me to skip over the explanation.

After the mealmatch (seriously, I'm not making this up), I got my call from Looker--we had our first case.

Chapter Two: Suspicious Alleys

The request was a letter from a concerned mother.  She was concerned about the growing number of children hanging out in the alleyways in Paris...erhm...Lumiose City.  She mentioned her concerns, specifically, for her precious honor role child whom she wants to go do a top Ace Trainer Academy.

All the sighs.

Looke rtold me to start in the Southern Boulevard.  It was there that I found the alley in question.  It was filled withPreschool trainers with greatly over-leveled pokemon.

Don't worry, Froakles is used to tight spaces.

My first battle was against a little girl who carried a level 53 Swinub and a level 53 Bonsley.  Are you kidding me?!  Next was a level 55 Igglybuff.  Ultimately I fought a little boy with a level 56 Spiritomb.  Christ, if I was eight years old with a level 56 Spiritomb, I don't know what I would do. Fuck, this kid must get all the preschool tail...or whatever the equivalent of "tail" is in preschool...coloring books?  I mean, for sure I wouldn't be hanging out in some crumby alley.

At the end of the gauntlet of the Children of the Damned, I found an Epurr named Mimi and a human who only referred to herself as "friend of Mimi".  Looker soon join

ed us and FriendofMimi explained that she lives there with Mimi.  Mimi is not her pokemon, though, because FriendofMimi is too poor to afford a pokeball.

Wow.  I had forgotten that this sort of issue would exist.  Even if you want to be theverybestlikenooneeverwastocatchthemismyrealtesttotrainthemismycause, this doesn't mean anything if you can't catch pokemon because you're poor.  Pokemon has a socio-economic component to it--and for some people, it might just be financially impossible to be theverybestlikenooneeverwastocatchthemismyrealtesttotrainthemismycause.

Looker offered Mimi and friendofMimi a home at his bureau working as his assistants, but Mimi ran off.  It would be my job to find and befriend Mimi.


Current Squad:

Greninja/Froakles/lvl 94
Pikachu/PikaPi/lvl 63
Flareon/Rox/lvl 59
Hippowdon/Leviathan/ lvl 67
Dragalge/Toxie/lvl 54
Aerodactyl/Scarydactyl/lvl 53

Pokemon Y Postgame: Looking for Looker Books (#nailedit)

Our story begins...for the second time...at the Looker Bureau of Investigations.  Detective Looker is a character that was introduced in Pokemon Platinum as a member of InterPol.  I scummed his wiki page and he apparently also appeared in Pokemon White somewhere and Pokemon Omega Ruby.  Several Pokemon Generations episodes feature him; he is depicted in these as being involved with the Giovanni case in Pokemon Red among other side story tales.  I think this is revisionist history--he never really played any part of the story in any previous games that I have played...at least as far as I can remember.

Looker asked me to be his partner as a detective He had been looking me up and was aware that I was the newest Kalos League Champion and that I was responsible for taking care of that...ahem...Team Flare problem.  He then casually told me to go back to school to become a detective.

Hhhhaaaa...you're kidding me?

The schooling that Detective Looker mentioned apparently involved me tracking down and finding five books that he had hidden around the city.  He told me, roughly, where they would be found, but it still seems as though he just wanted me gone so that he could beat off or take his coke or something.

The books were hidden all around Lumiose City: the first in a Pokemon Center, the next in a medicine shoppe.  The final clue brought me to an art museum.  I found the book Easily enough, but stayed to browse through the exhibits: paintings of different scenes and locales in the Kalos region--places that I had been to before way back when I played this game for the first time.

I have to admit that being there with Froakles and the rest of my former teammates--pokemon that I had spent so much time with so long ago--was quite the experience.  I have to admit to smiling rather stupidly as I thought back to all the adventures I had had; I also thought of how happy I am to make those same adventures with my Pokemon Moon team and with Pako Pako.

Because of Pokemon Bank, I keep all of my past teams these days.  I have teams from Heartgold, Diamond, Black 2, White, Omega Ruby, and now X and Y versions all in there.  Pokemon that I had played so much with:
Pokemon I can't let go.

Quick shoutout to a few of my favorites:
"Jolty the Jolteon" who took care of me from Heartgold through Black 2.
"Yinkin the Alakazam" who single-handedly defeated the Elite Four in Pearl.
"Yako the Staraptor" whom I could always count on as a reliable switch-in in tougher Diamond battles.
"Zappy the Minun", they said I was crazy for picking you, but you were the MVP of my Sapphire replay.

I'm glad that I took this time to replay this game.

Current Squad:


Greninja/Froakles/lvl 93
Pikachu/PikaPi/lvl 61
Flareon/Rox/lvl 57
Hippowdon/Leviathan/ lvl 66
Dragalge/Toxie/lvl 52
Aerodactyl/Scarydactyl/lvl 51

Pokemon Y Postgame: Once More unto the Breach

I didn't even know that there was a postgame bit in Pokemon Y until recently, when I saw Pokemon Generations episode 17.

Best Personal Time

It has been a long time since I have played my Y version game.  In the time between my Pokemon Y playthrough and the start of my Pokemon Moon playthrough, I have played through and Beaten Pokemon X twice, Pokemon Omega Ruby, much of Pokemon Red, all of Pokemon Yellow, and Pokemon Blue via speedrun.  When I played competitively, I used the endgame state from Omega Ruby.  I'm so far removed that I'm no longer on the same planet as Pokemon Y anymore.  But even so, I had this compulsive desire to complete that endgame.  Obviously, I have major psychological issues--namely in reference to leaving things in the forever state of "incomplete".

And that is how I found myself blowing the dust off the Pokemon Y cartridge that I had erroneously marked as completed.

Let's start with squad building.

I pulled up my list of prior teammates: Greninja, Venusaur, Gardevoir, Flareon, Hippowdon, Lucario, Pikachu, Dragalge, Scrafty, and Aerodactyl.  I decided to exclude Venusaur since I have, since defeating the Chapion, changed his moveset to use him as a support pokemon for seeking out horde pokemon with hidden abilities.  On the other hand, I excluded Knives because he is level 100.  Greninja is not optional.

Current Squad:


Greninja/Froakles/lvl 93
Pikachu/PikaPi/lvl 61
Flareon/Rox/lvl 57
Hippowdon/Leviathan/ lvl 66
Dragalge/Toxie/lvl 52
Aerodactyl/Scarydactyl/lvl 51




Time for the

Pokemon White Y Moon Y Postgame Playthrough

Once more unto the breach, my pokemon friends--or close the wall up with our dead.

Friendly Rivalries: An Assessment

I boarded the ferry with Professor Kukui, my friend and rival Hau, and the office supplies bandit and we traveled by map to the second island, Akala Island, to continue the Alola challenge.  Apparently there are three challenges on Akala Island with three different Trial Captains.  One of these captains, Mallow, and the Kahuna of the island, Olivia, greeted us at landfall.  I did my best to come up with an appropriate joke for the situation, but all I could think of was "it's really sweet that Marshmallow would come to greet us."  Clearly I shouldn't quit my day job anytime soon.
______________
Continuing with the trend started in Generation 4 (yes I said Generation 4,:fight me about it), Pokemon Sun offers you the "rival is your friend" plotline.  I have spoken with my similarly-minded friends about this and we came to the conclusion that the whole friendly rival thing doesn't quite work the way that Nintendo/Gamefreak would hope it does.  I would say that the reason for this failure is in the nature of the game as a whole.

Let's look at Gen 1 and 2 as the counter-examples.  These two games had ruthless, tough, mean-spirited rivals that are always one step ahead of you with tough pokemon and tough attitudes.  Blue was cocksure and ambitious.  He had no reservations about admitting that he was out to show the world that he is the best; he was always quick to demean and belittle the main protagonist--the player character.  Gen 2 had Silver--an actual pokemon thief.

"Geez, Silver calm down"

Fast forward to Generation 4, 5, 6, and now 7 and the player's rivals are all childhood friends or new friends of the player character.  Gen 5 tells you, the player, outright that the characters Bianca and Cheren have been your friends from childhood.  The Band of Pokemon thieves in Gen 6 were all one-note character stereotypes (of course the big buy is into dancing, of course the small whiney kid is into collecting and analyzing data, of course the girl is scared of everything--because who cares about breaking down gender and character tropes in artistic media, right?) and they were all presented as friends who are competing with you.

Generation 7's rival character is Hau and Hau's character trait--Hau's only character trait--is that he likes to eat malasada. Woo.

The reason that Blue and Silver always make the short list of everyone's top Pokemon NPC countdowns is because their implementation was in line with the player's expectations of the medium of the videogame.

One plays a video game to be challenged.  A game is a puzzle--it's a thing that needs to be solved.  It's a set of obstacles that present themselves to the player such that the player has an innate desire to push on and overcome these same obstacles.  The reward is coming out on top.  "You did it!  You won!"  In a game you're trying to overcome the odds--it's a natural outcome of the medium.  There's something working against you.  As a direct result of this, it's really easy to put together a mean, intimidating rival for your game.  Your rival, especially in pokemon, is the personification of the game--the game is trying to beat you and your rival is working against you in that same way.  On the other hand, it's nearly impossible to implement a friendly rivalry that works.

The best way to rationalize it is that a friendly rivalry, even in Pokemon, breaks game flow.  It's hard to get a player to care about an NPC.  That's even before we factor into the equation the fact that these same NPC's lack dimension.  It's hard to care about a cardboard cutout--and no amount of Tierno's dancing, nor Hau's joking about food is going to get me to care about them.  It's hard to get someone to care about your video game character as a friend, but it's easy to identify an enemy.

That's why friendly rivalries so easily fall flat on their faces.  In a show or in a book or a comic, these characters could be written in such a way that they are more sympathetic and, dare I say it, friendly.  However, in the medium of "video game", the friendliness of the rivalry undercuts the rules of the game.

If the game is trying to beat you, the avatar and personification of that very same game should be as heckling and mean as well.  It's easier to pull off--and it's just plain better motivation to get good, son.

And this one?  Honestly I don't even know what I should be feeling here...

_____________
Wasn't that a nice diversion?  Here I am teaching you all these things.  You're gonna be so smart by the end of this play through.

I ran into Sina and Dexio, Professor Sycamore's assistants) from Pokemon Y version.  Sina challenged me to a battle.  This was actually interesting for me because I had never seen what kinds of pokemon either one of them uses.  Turns out, she uses Ice Pokemon: Delibird and Glaceon.

[Insert Sex pun here]

Too bad I had Growlie with me, huh?

Bye Bye Butterfree!

The next step was to make my way across Route 2 to meet the professor at his lab.  Professor Kukui likes to study pokemon moves, specifically.  I do like how each professor has their own specialty.  As I recall, Professor Sycamore (Pokemon X, Y) studied Mega Evolution and Professor Rowan (Pokemon Diamond, Pearl, Platinum) studied Pokemon Evolution.

On my way there, I managed to snag Wingull, Slowpoke, and the Alola from of Rattata.  I named them Gulliver, Pokey, and Snackers, respectively and added the later two to my party.  I waved "Alola" to Felix, my Butterfree-in-training in order to do this.  I'm always sad to see Butterfree go, but I've used Butterfree so much in my pokemon career, I don't feel too too bad about opening up that team slot for something weird and new.

For example, this cool, Dark-type Alola Rattata.

As an aside, I checked the pokedex entries of these pokemon and they revealed some cool information about the region.  Apparently, Alola Rattata work as mafia droogs for their Raticate boss and Slowpoketail is a popular dish in the Alola region, especially when dried and served in a salty stew.  I can't quite believe that the pokedex entry for my most recent pokemon catch is telling me how I should be cooking it.  I'm glad my Slowpoke's ability is "Oblivious" because those hungry looks I've been giving it might otherwise make training and taming it difficult...


Current Squad:

Popplio/Pako Pako/lvl 7
Yungoos/Chompy/lvl 7
Pikipek/Pip Pip/lvl 8
Pichu/Rai Rai/lvl 8
Slowpoke/Pokey/lvl 7
Rattata/Snackers/lvl 7

Pokedex: 9 caught

A Battle with the Champion

I had met the champion before in Lysandre's cafe, but I had forgotten who this Diantha was.  In the best game of all time, Pokemon Red version, I remember being absolutely taken aback by my rival Gary being my final opponent.  Whenever someone had referred to the final gauntlet of trainers in that game, it was always the "Elite Four" or the "Final Four".  It was never the "Elite Four and also the Champion".

Battling Gary specifically, even, was a surprise--and it was even more shocking because the last time I had encountered him in that game was in Saffron City in the Silph building--at least three gym-badges before.  This is exactly enough time to totally forget about that character.

Similarly, the re-introduction of Diantha here was a surprise: "oh yeah, you're still a person aren't you?!" It's not nearly as cool as battling your rival, but it's still something.  It was like battling Steven in Ruby version or Cynthia in Diamond.

Diantha thanked me for taking care of Team Flare and graciously accepted my challenge.  Time for battle!

I find it a little funny that I spent an entire day earlier in this year gushing about how cool Hawlucha is given the fact that it was never formally on my team.  When I made my way through Victory Road, I was reminded of this since it seemed like every single trainer carried one--and all of them had some obnoxious Fairy-killing move like Steel Wing or Poison Jab.

Her first pokemon was Hawlucha.  Is the word I am looking for "opportune" or "destined"?

I had led the match with Hippowdon for tanking and scouting purposes--most of the pokemon I am coming across are physical attackers (like Hawlucha) and Hippowdon can at least put things to sleep and stall them with Sandstorm.  This is exactly what happened, I put Hawlucha to sleep, letting sandstorm whittle it down,then sent in Froakles, hoping to score an easy kill with a super-effective ice beam.  However, Diantha used a Full Restore on the switch.  The result of this is that I switched my Greninja into a fully healthy Hawlucha who not only outspeeds my low-level ninjafrog, but also hits it super-effectively (since Fighting is strong against Dark). 

After sacrificing Greninja to get a free switch-in, I chose Venusaur for some sleep powder/leech seed stalling while I used Revive and hyper potion.  I was positive that I would need that froggie later in the match.

I had calculated it so that Venusaur would survive four hits after Hawlucha woke up, so I set-up my now-trademark "Leech Seed KO/Solarbeam switch KO" move (charging Solarbeam on a turn such that it will hit a switch-in pokemon after a KO).  The issue is that Hawlucha scored a critical hit at the most important part of the exchange and Venusaur was taken out.  Hippowdon had just enough durability to take out Hawlucha.

I remembered her next pokemon, Aurorus, from a trainer battle following my eighth gym match.  Aurorus is the evolution of the fossil pokemon I got at the start of the game--and is Rock/Ice typed.

Now, what do both Ice and Rock HATE?

I sent in Lucario and immediately "went Mega".  The question was whether I wanted to risk MegaLuk's health with a turn 1 Swords Dance or if I wanted to go for the sweep immediately.  I play dangerously.  Mega Lucario used Swords Dance against Aurorus, who used Reflect (thank you).

The rest of the match was an easy sweep: Lucario One-Hit KO'ed Aurorus with Aura Sphere, then the bulky Dragon Goodra with Close Combat and the evolution of the fossil Tyrunt, Tyrantrum, with another Close Combat.

Her next pokemon was the Grass/Ghost pokemon Gourgeist, but I had taught Lucario Shadow Claw when I took on the Psychic gym for type coverage, so the Swords Dance-boosted super-effective ghost move One Hit KO'ed Gourgeist as well.  Lucario just cannot be stopped.

Her final pokemon was Gardevoir, who actually surprised me by Mega-Evolving, but Lucario outsped it and defeated it in one hit as well.

Steel

Steel is a type that has always been special to me, this has been true ever since I had first heard of it back when my entire exposure to Pokemon news was the monthly "Beckett Pokemon Collector" magazine.  A new pokeon type?  This was unprecedented!  And when I caught my Skarmory, it was instantly my favorite from that game.  SUCH a cool design.

However, when on the other side of the coin and steel is my opponent, they love to give me headaches.  While Water types are typically weak to grass and electric, and flying types are more-or-less always weak against rock and ice, the steel type is made up of a whole bunch of nonsense pokemon with crazy dual types: steel/rock, steel/bug, steel/psychic.  As a result, you can't always count on the typical fire, ground, fighting weaknesses of the steel type to always work for you on the fly.

I had Venusaur take the lead on this one--deciding to Err on the side of caution and keep Flareon alive and healthy just in case Wikstrom decided to send in something crazy like Empoleon (Steel/Water).
His first pokemon was Klefki, a Steel/Fairy pokemon.  After going through the regular rigamarole of weakening it with Leech Seed and Sleep Powder, I sent in Lucario on a free turn and powered-up with Swords Dance for an easy KO.  I may rename this particular pokemon squad "SailorScout Mega-Venusaur-cario".

The next pokemon, Probopass, was a Steel/Rock type: easy pickings for Lucario's Close Combat move.  "Hahahaha, fear my 120x2x2x2 power fighting move!" I could see the end of the battle right before my eyes.

However, due to a miscalculation on my part, or more specifically "general idiocy", Probopass survived the 960-damage hit with exactly 1 HP left due to his "Sturdy" ability.  Lucario was taken-out handily.  Dang, guess it's going to be one of those matches...

I got the easy revenge kill with Greninja, but W's third pokemon was called Aegislash and it was a pokemon I had no prior knowledge of.  I had come across a pokemon called Honedge in my travels and it was a Steel/Ghost pokemon, and I assumed that Aegislash was the higher form of it, but I wasn't sure how it would battle.  As a result, I sent in Venusaur for some reconnaissance.

Aegislash kept changing its form due to its weird ability and I think the result of each transformation must have been a change in its base stats, but Leech Seed wore it down enough so that Flareon could come in for the finishing "Flame Charge" attack and gaining the +1 Speed increase to boot.

My heart sank as Wikstrom sent in Scizor.

I think my fear of Scizor stems from my old competitive Heartgold/Soulsilver battling from years ago.  I had a fantastic team at the time but no real answer to opposing Scizor.  I had to hope that I could wear it down with incessant chicanery and luck.  I guess mostly luck...

LUCKILY, Flareon outran Scizor due to that Flame Charge Speedboost and KO'ed it with Flare Blitz.  I checked the numbers: if Flareon hadn't gotten that speed boost against Aegislash, it would have been outrun by Scizor.  Given Scizor's massive attack and Flareon's weak defense, I could not guarantee Flareon's safety.  One Superpower from Scizor would have taken it out.  Basically, without Leech Seed wearing Aegislash into KO range, Flareon would have had to Flare Blitz, and Scizor would have removed it.

Of course this doesn't mean I was in danger of losing the whole match--I mean let's be realistic, I still had four other pokemon after Flareon.  We don't have to be so histrionic about this debackle.  However, it is interesting to consider the importance of even small decisions in a game like this.
_________________
Score that match: 5-0
Hyper Potions: 17 -3
Revives: 23 -1
_________________
Current Squad Status:

GRENINJA/Froakles/lvl.57
VENUSAUR/Venus/lvl.56
FLAREON/Rox/lvl.54
LUCARIO/Knives/lvl.56
HIPPOWDON/Leviathan/lvl.54
GARDEVOIR/Missy/lvl.53

Sidelines: Pikachu, Scrafty, Aerodactyl, Dragalge

Dragon

Originally, I had planned to battle Steelio the Steel-Type Elite Four Trainer before Drasma's Dragons, but I realized my squad was a lot stronger against Dragons than Steel pokemon--especially if one of those steel types happens to be Scizor...<shudder>

I wanted to keep Greninja and Gardevoir at full health for as long as possible in this match.  I wanted to be able to move them in for an easy revenge kill in case the match started going sour, so I lead with Hippowdon.  I didn't expect the sandhippo to do much: maybe a little Sandstorm damage, maybe put the first pokemon to sleep before it is taken out.

However, luck was with me and her first pokemon was the Poison/Dragon typed Dragalge.  Hippowdon was just bulky enough to survive one Surf attack and countered with a knockout Earthquake.


Her next pokemon was Altaria.  After my battle against Serena, I knew Altaris would be too slow for my Greninja, so I sent out Froakles for the One-Hit KO Ice Beam.

Next came a particularly bulky Druddigon which took several turns of Gardevoir's Fairy-type attack to remove since Drasna kept spamming her Full Restores whenever her pokemon got injured.  All through this time, the sandstorm was whittling my own health away, so I was glad when Druddigon finally fainted as the sandstorm subsided.

Her final pokemon was Noivern, which outsped my Greninja, but failed to KO it in one hit--Greninja retaliated with one final Ice Beam to end the incredibly boring match of the boring one-hit-KO's.
_________________
Score that match: 6-0
Hyper Potions: 20 -1
Revives: 24
_________________
Current Squad Status:

GRENINJA/Froakles/lvl.57
VENUSAUR/Venus/lvl.56
FLAREON/Rox/lvl.55
LUCARIO/Knives/lvl.56
HIPPOWDON/Leviathan/lvl.55
GARDEVOIR/Missy/lvl.56

Sidelines: Pikachu, Dragalge, Scrafty, Aerodactyl

Fire

As I crept into the inner sanctuary of the Pokemon League I was met by an auspicious lady with pink hair.  She introduced herself to me as Malva, a fire trainer and Elite Four Champion.  The purpose of the Elite Four is to try to wear you out--as a final test to see if you are worthy of battling the strongest trainer--and she made it absolutely clear to me that I was no hero for defeating Team Flare--and that this meant nothing as I challenged her for my first battle.

And there is no better way to put me in the mood for battle than to tell me I can't do it...

I had decided to open with Hippowdon  to be safe--I knew that Froakles was going to do most of the "heavy lifting" for the match, but his frailty made me take pause from scouting with him.  I knew Hippo' would be able to take anything that she could throw at me--so I started her against Malva's Pyroar.  The exchange was quick, but it left my sandhippo with low health.

Her next pokemon was Torkoal and I knew that this was going to be the time where I set-up Froakles for the game-ender.  Due to Torkoal's naturally high defense and the fact that it kept using 'Curse', I knew Greninja's special attacks would be best for the match, so I used Yawn to put her turtle to sleep and then switched Froakles in and put up a Substitute (for safety).  I took her Torkoal out with one "Scald" the next turn.

Her next pokemon was Chandelure and I outran and overpowered it with one attack.

Her final pokemon was another level 65 Talonflame--and I know that the last time I played, I stall-killed one of those with Mega Venusaur, but in-battle against the fifth-strongest trainer in the known universe is not the place to get cute, so I kept Froakles in for the one-hit-KO Scald.  But thank goodness for that Substitute because Talonflame moved first with Brave Bird--and that would have definitely hurt.
_________________
Score that match: 6-0
Hyper Potions: 24 -1
Revives: 25
_________________
Current Squad Status:

GRENINJA/Froakles/lvl.56
VENUSAUR/Venus/lvl.55
FLAREON/Rox/lvl.53
LUCARIO/Knives/lvl.55
HIPPOWDON/Leviathan/lvl.55
GARDEVOIR/Missy/lvl.52

Sidelines: Pikachu, Scrafty, Dragalge, Aerodactyl

Water

Part of the reason I always choose the water-type starter is this weird fascination I have with bulky "stall" pokemon--that is, pokemon who take hits like they are nothing and retaliate with the same predictable (albeit reliable) moves.  In the case of the "bulky water", these moves are surf, hydro pump, and ice beam (repeat).  As a result of this, I chose to lead with Gardevoir for round 2 of my pokemon gauntlet--Gardevoir has the special defense to take hits--and with calm mind, I could set-up against those very same bulky waters that always loved to set up on me...

Siebold opened the match with a pokemon called Clawitzer.  I used Charge beam, trying to test it out to see how strong his pokemon was and found that Clawitzer takes away exactly 50% of my health while I am unboosted (no Calm Mind).

This was good to know, but it meant that I was going to have to sacrifice Gardevoir initially (I wasn't going to survive long enough to set up, but one revive would fix that).  I sent-in Venusaur and Mega-Evolved to use Leech Seed and Sleep Powder while I used revive and hyper potions on Gardevoir.  Mega-V was doing so well, as a matter of fact, that I kept him in.

What happened next was nothing short of genius.

Solarbeam is a two-turn move: on turn one you gather sunlight to charge your attack and on turn two you fire the 120-damage solarbeam.  I timed my attack so that the sleeping Clawitzer died due to Leech Seed on the turn where I charged my attack and the Solarbeam hit the switch-in for the one-hit KO.  Starmie was the lucky recipient.  I have to say, this was one battling moment that I will most likely remember forever.  It is second only to the time that I predicted the move "Explosion" and switched-in my ghost-type Gengar to ignore this Normal-type attack.

I decided not to test my luck and brought-in Gardevoir on the free switch to start setting-up Calm Minds while I burned through my hyper potions keeping her alive.  The final two turns of the match were two consecutive one-hit-KO's against Gyarados and Barbaracle.
_________________
Score that match: 5-0
Hyper Potions: 21 -3
Revives: 24 -1
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Current Squad Status:

GRENINJA/Froakles/lvl.56
VENUSAUR/Venus/lvl.55
FLAREON/Rox/lvl.55
LUCARIO/Knives/lvl.56
HIPPOWDON/Leviathan/lvl.55
GARDEVOIR/Missy/lvl.56

Sidelines: Pikachu, Dragalge, Scrafty, Aerodactyl

On the Doorstep

And here we are at the Elite Four, ready to take on the best in the world in final battle.

Not quite.

See, I haven't chosen my six-pokemon squad yet--something I should have done at the game's start.  Guess I'm way behind on this one...

As I procrastinated at the doorstep of the Pokemon League, I found a trainer who offered a bit of helpful advice: that the elite four each specializes in a pokemon type and that I could fight them in whatever order I pleased: Fire, Water, Steel, and Dragon.  Let's team build...
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Okay, so let's start with the core pokemon: Froakles has Ice Beam and Scald, so he will be invaluable against a fire team and against a dragon team.  And Venusaur is, as previously established, unkillable.

 Let's add Pikachu for that Water gym and Gardevoir for the dragon team.  The addition of Gardevoir will allow my team to maintain some general bulkiness since it takes Special Hits like a champ.

 But I bet that water gym has a water/ground type or two kicking around--and water types are generally known for their bulk, so Pikachu is more of a weak link for this team.  It won't be outrunning anyone at such a low level either...Let's put some more bulk of our own in that slot instead.  And let's get Lucario in here--he just learned Close Combat.

And for the last one...hm...Aerodactyl is pretty fast and powerful and I know a lot of those dragons are actually also flying types...plus the rock moves will be doubly effective against that fire team...but it doesn't look like I have much to battle the steel team...and I know there's got to be a Metagross, there is always a Metagross...Oh god, what if there is a Scizor...it's decided then.

Elite Four Battle Squad: The Secret Six

We may be underleveled and we may be disconnected, but we have the tactical skills and we have the foresight to overcome any obstacles.  Plus, I just bought 50 hyper potions, so there's always that...

Current Squad Status:

GRENINJA/Froakles/lvl.55
VENUSAUR/Venus/lvl.54
FLAREON/Rox/lvl.52
LUCARIO/Knives/lvl.55
HIPPOWDON/Leviathan/lvl.54
GARDEVOIR/Missy/lvl.52

Sidelines: Pikachu, Aerodactyl, Scrafty, Dragalge