Vs. Bede

I have been giving Trash the Zigzagoon a lot of attention recently. After my most recent teammate shuffle (henceforth called "the great purge"), I have been waffling with respect to the roles that I have pokemon filling. I have been curious about what Trash has to offer the team other than "Pickup" and those sweet face markings. Trash knows how to party, but she had yet to prove herself.

Bede led with the Psychic type Solosis. Trash was able to take it out handily with its STAB Payback. Hmm. Maybe Trash has a place here after  all...

His next pokemon was called Hatenna and my immediate reaction was just "what the fuck is that?" For some reason, I was seeing a blobfish in its design. I had no clue what type it should be, but my first instinct was water.

It had the ability Anticipation; ancitipation activates  on switch in and clues the trainers in that the opposing pokemon has a super effective move against it.

When I noticed that Anticipation activated,  I knew that something that Trash knew would hit it super effectively.

Trash's Moves: Payback, Headbutt, BabyDoll Eyes, Lick

Since Headbutt is normal and BabyDoll Eyes is a status move this meant that either the dark type Payback or the Ghost Type Lick were effective against it. Since Dark and Giost are effective against the same tyes--Ghost and Psychic--I knew that I could choose either move to hit Hatenna effectively.

Payback scored a huge hit, but Hatenna retaliated with Disarming Voice and sent Trash packing.

I had figured out that Hatenna was either a Psychic or Ghost type and decided to test this out by sending in Bleppo the Dottler for some recon. If Struggle Bug hit it for Super Effective damage, then Hatenna is a Psycjic type. If it hits it weakly, then it is a Ghost.


Just cross your fingers and take a big breath and...

Psychic

Sometimes a gamble pays off.

Bede sent out Gothita for his third pokemon and then it clicks all of the sudden.  He is a psychic type specialist.  For being the best pokemon trainer ever, I sure can be dense sometimes...

Pokédex:33/54

Current Squad:

Thwackey/Cheeto/lvl 17
Nickit/Kat-Kit/lvl 16
Chewtle/Snorkle/lvl 16
Rookidee/Chirpy/lvl 16
Dottler/Bleppo/lvl 16

Stufful/Stuffy/lvl 15

On Rotation: Growlithe, Zigzagoon

Exploring *cough* Totally Not Versailles *cough*

I remember reading something in passing a few months ago about how Pokemon Y's "Kalos region" is based loosely on France in the same way that Pokemon White is based loosely on the Unites States (namely New York).  This is the kind of thing that you forget about until it starts to stick out, and then it becomes all you think about and it changes your perception of the game.


Just two weeks ago, I came back from a brief excursion to France to attend the wedding of one of my sweetheart's cousins (note apostrophe placement).  I say this because realizing that I am playing a game about a place that I have visited in real life must be up in the top ten most disorienting things I have ever done (of course, right behind staying up for an entire week and also behind eating 7 McDonald's double cheeseburgers).

So here is the "Parfume Palace", a nearly exact copy of the Castle Versailles if the Castle Versailles was made of cartoons.

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I was sent here to recover the PokeFlute to wake up a Snorlax who fell asleep on the road.  I guess this means that Pokemon X and Y are definitely going to stay true to established "Pokemon lore"

I have the strange feeling that Snorlax don't exist in the wild as animals.  Rather, they exist as features of the terrain in any given area.  Every road in the pokemon world most likely has some statistical likelihood that they will, at any given moment, grow a Snorlax out of the ground in order to become blocked.  Maybe the cement they use contains some weird mineral called "Snorlaxium" or something and here is where my digression really starts to fall apart.

After arriving at the Parfume Palace and exploring every room of the Parfume Palace and playing around in the hedge gardens of the Parfume Palace I realized that I hadn't done any actual pokemon battling in over a quarter of an hour.  Usually this is no big deal but I am of the opinion that if you're playing Pokemon and more than 20 minutes go by without fighting any pokemon then you're officially doing it wrong, so I left and started exploring the surrounding grasslands where I caught Sentret, Oddish, Kecleon, and Gulpin in order to remind myself that I was playing a game and not something that could be confused for a game like a dishwasher. 

Normally I would take-up Sentret immediately over Zigzagoon for my team (since it's another favorite of mine) but I am really only keeping Ziggy for the free items I get from his ability "Pick-Up" at the moment.

Current team:

FROAKIE/Froakles/lvl.15
BULBASAUR/Bulby/lvl.15
SCRAGGY/Scrappy/lvl.15
FLABEBE/Pixie/lvl.13
PIKACHU/PikaPi/lvl.16
DODUO/Birdface/lvl.15

On Rotation: Ralts, Pickup...erhm...Zigzagoon

Running the Gauntlet to Gymleader Viola

Something I've always wanted to do but never have done is to battle my way through a pokemon gym to a gymleader without healing my pokemon at the 'center.  I'm not sure if this is a man thing or just me being a tool, but I always wanted to experience this as a challenge.  The problem is that I'm something of a nervous little baby (when it comes down to it) and I have never been able to force myself to ACTUALLY go through with it.

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After thoroughly exploring Santalune city, I found myself in the pokemon gym--headed by Gymleader Viola, the Bug gymleader. 

Let's just be perfectly honest with ourselves: the only pokemon type less threatening than the Bug type is the Normal type--so I was not worried at all heading-into this place.  I ended-up spending most of my time trying to level-up Pikachu and Spewpa (evolved from Scatterbug).

My favorite leveling technique is the "sacrifice KO" wherein I weaken an opponent to within one sliver of health with a stronger pokemon of mine, then allow that pokemon to be knocked-out so I can finish the weakened foe off with a pokemon I am trying to level (so that the second pokemon gets ALL the exp.).  I guess this is like the "Sacrifice Fly" in Baseball--but this makes me quite possibly the worst pokemon trainer in the known universe.  Honestly, I kind of see where Team Plasma was coming from with the whole mistreatment of Pokemon thing from the previous game, because I obviously only see them as tools. 

Sorry I'm getting so emotional, but cut me some slack; I just realized I'm the villain.

Usually this sacrifice KO would not be a problem, but in this one case, there was no exit from the gym, so I found myself at the gymleader with three pokemon left remaining and no way to heal-up.  What is worse is that nice, shiny, super-effective against Bugs Farfetch'd I just got was one of my sacrifice KO's.

I found myself challenging Viola with a fully rested Froakie, a weakened Zigzagoon, and a Metapod who was barely alive.  It is times like this that I thank the game for forcing me to get those 90 potions at the start.

She had two pokemon and her first was Surskit, who I took out with Froakie, my lead.  Her second pokemon, Vivillon, who was much harder.  In the end, the battle came down to a "next hit wins the
game" moment between Metapod and Vivillon, and let me just say THANK GOD FOR PARALYSIS.

Metapod evolved into my favorite pokemon, Butterfree, after the battle.  Let me just say that I hope the whole game is this exciting.


Current Squad:


FROAKIE/Froakles/lvl.11
BUTTERFREE/Felix/lvl.11
ZIGZAGOON/Ziggy/lvl.10
SPEWPA/Bubbsey/lvl.9
PIKACHU/PikaPi/lvl.10
FARFETCH'D/Quackin'/lvl.11

Hey, You Got Your Kanto in My Kalos!

After being told to meet Tree-of-the-Moment Professor Sycamore in the next town, I made my customary game first purchase of a thousand pokeballs and exactly six potions at the nearest store.  Little did I know that I would then be given ten more pokeballs and potions free from the gang of pokemon thieves (who are supposed to be my friends) I described in the last post.  While being tricked into getting fifty potions and pokeballs is not nearly as bad as the time I was tricked into catching five Lilipups, I still take this afront personally.

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Remember how in the last game, there were ONLY new pokemon?  Well in this game, the pokemon mix is actually fairly decent.  The first pokemon I encountered (and failed to catch, damn) was a Pidgey (who evolves directly into my favorite bird pokemon (that link was a joke)) and the next two were Zigzagoon and a new pokemon called Fletchling.  I caught both of these as well as a cool rabbit pokemon called Bunnelby and found out that in this game, you actually gain experience from catching pokemon as well as defeating them--which is a fairly banal change, but it was all the change necessary to convince me to try and catch every single pokemon I encountered.  I was kind of glad to have those 70 pokeballs as I made my way to the first area of the game (can you call them "dungeons"?), Santalune Forest.

Now, as soon as I stepped-into the forest I was struck with an odd sense of deja-vu: "Have I been here before?  Couldn't be...I bet there isn't a dead end to the left...wait, there is...or an item forward and to the left...there is...and the path to the right winds up and around..."

Item to the left, twisting path, Encounters with Caterpie, Weedle, and rare cases of Pikachu?  THIS IS VIRIDIAN FOREST!!!  As I would soon find out, Santalune Forest has an identical map to the Original Viridian Forest from Red Version.  What the Hell, Nintendo!  You can't take my very first pokemon adventure and lovingly recreate it in 3D with fantastic graphics and an amazing selection of new pokemon...

...

What the heck was I complaining about again?

I went on a spree here, catching Weedle, Caterpie (who evolved into Metapod), Pansage (we meet again, my old nemesis), Pansear, Panpour, a new bug type called Scatterbug, and NARROWLY MISSED CATCHING PIKACHU.

I am still a little sore about that Pikachu, because then I would be one step closer to having my three favorite pokemon on my team (Butterfree, Raichu, Milotic if you're asking).

I am immediately reminded of Red Version.  I remember back then how long I would look in Viridian Forest (which, as established, is Santalune Forest) just to find one Pikachu for my party--and how when I did finally encounter him, Bulbasaur was already level 12 and I was scared of knocking it out too quickly (Oh yeah, I chose Bulbasaur, by the way).  My solution was to use "Leech Seed" and "Growl" until his health was low enough to start tossing Pokeballs.  On more than one playthrough, I got to this point to realize I was out of Pokeballs, so it is a good thing I have 80 of them this time.

After 40 minutes of looking I decided to quit for the moment.

Current Squad:
Pokemon/Nickname/Level
FROAKIE/Froakles/lvl.9
METAPOD/Felix/lvl.8
ZIGZAGOON/Ziggy/lvl.8
SCATTERBUG/Bubbsy/lvl.7
BUNNELBY/Buns/lvl.4
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