[Challenge] The Monotype Challenge v8, Tera Edition

[MachoPony]

Pokemon White Ground Mono part 2

Spoiler:

After heading north towards Route 4 again i had been forewarned by Bianca that she wanted a battle.
VS Bianca
So Sandile took the intimidate, swap in Drilbur who eats a crit Take Down from Herdier but finished with a single dig anyway. Then pansage comes in, takes a metal claw lands a crit vine whip but Drilbur takes it with Eviolite.
A 2nd Metal Claw takes out Pansage, a single bite from Sandile one shots Munna and then tympole takes a flame charge, bubblebeam knocks Pignite low, she heals, another bubblebeam, defense curl for some reason and a final bubblebeam ends the fight.

Healed, bought some repels and went north to find....
VS Cheren
Sandile took a quick attack then bit Pidove, a 2nd bite finished it. Drilbur used attract on Servine, then hone claws, then metal claw while sandstorm chipped it down. it did get up 2 growth but after a sitrus berry, 2 more metal claws finished it.
Drilbur then one shot Panpour and Liepard with dig.

On the next route, tympole finally evolved into Palpitoad. Trained palpitoad and sandile a little there and in the desert resort. In Nimbasa City I beat up some plasma grunts and then.

VS N
Sandile swapped out to Palpitoad immediately who got Embargo'd. Bubblebeam one shot it, one shot darumaka too. Scraggy was surprisingly bulky but palpitoad ultimately knocked it out too.
Sigilyph finally beat Palpitoad and Sandile was one shot by a crit air cutter. in comes Drilbur to attract, hone claws and take it out with a few metal claws.

After seeing some events i went through the gym mostly training up Palpitoad. actually lost to Elesa because emolga crit Palpitoad twice, 2 shot sandile and Drilbur only had metal claw to hit them with.
(who decided an electric gym leader should have 2 pokemon immune to ground?)

VS Elesa
So this time i had a better idea. I took the Eviolite off Drilbur and gave it to Palpitoad. Then after setting up Aqua Ring. Emolga was barely scratching it.
A few bubblebeams took out one Emolga, before levelling up to learn Muddy Water, a 2nd emolga got 2 shot by muddy water and then after a quick attack a crit mud shot one shot Zebstrika.

Went on to route 5 where Guess who! Cheren! why do they pop up out of nowhere so much? Well i beat Liepard and Panpour before Servine one shot palpitoad, a weakened drilbur and sandile
Gave drilbur the eviolite but this time Servine used Leech seed!? why is the AI so inconsistent in this game? *sigh* take 3.
Attempt 3: leech seeded me, then hit a crit leaf tornado
Attempt 4: broke through attract 3 times in a row to KO me
Attempt 5: missed leech seed, but hit it later, then broke through attract and high rolled a leaf tornado where one final metal claw would have KOd

Was getting annoyed at this point till I learned something fun, Panpour can hold Rindo Berries, at a 5% chance....and Panpour is only available in shaking grass in pinwheel forest but hey it's something.
Gave palpitoad the one rindo berry i managed to steal.

VS Cheren
So Sandile managed to get Liepard low before fainting, it used torment as Palpitoad finished with muddy water. This is where my plan came in. Servine used leech seed so i used mud shot to slow it down.
Had to use muddy water on leaf tornado because of torment and survived thanks to the rindo berry but a 2nd mud shot slowed it further as it finished Palpitoad.
Drilbur used attract, hone claws a couple of times and then metal claw took it below half, sitrus berry healed. I decided to try dig and sure enough even resisted Dig did more than Metal Claw.
with Servine down dig one shot panpour and metal claw 2 shot Tranquil after a quick attack.

After teaming with cheren to beat up some children Sandile evolved into Krokorok by training on the other trainers on that route.


On to Driftveil, Krokorok and Drilbur handled most of the trainers and plasma grunts in the cold storage. then on through the Driftveil gym. Drilbur evolved to Excadrill in the gym.

VS Clay
So after a crunch Palpitoad one shot Krokorok. his Palpitoad took a crunch, slowed with bulldoze and then finished with muddy water (i had eviolite so i could have taken a muddy water at full), My palpitoad finishes with Muddy Water.
Finally Excadrill uses hone claws while mine Digs down then dodges a bulldoze and one shots his Excadrill with soft sand boosted dig.

After healing and trying to leave....

VS Bianca
This game has way too many Rival battles I swear. Like, platinum had what. Outside jubilife, hearthome, pastoria, canalave and the pokemon league. that's it. Meanwhile i've had at least 5 rival battles with Cheren alone already I swear never mind all the Bianca ones.

Oh right, the battle.

Palpitoad slowed herdier with mud shot after a work up then Muddy Water for the KO. Excadrill knocked pansage low with metal claw, she tormented then healed. Meaning Excadrill had to use rock slide but a crit rock slide one shot pansage anyway.
Palpitoad one shot Pignite with Muddy Water before Krokorok crunched Musharna, it used defense curl and a 2nd crunch ended the match.

Current Team

Spoiler:

Chomp(Krokorok) LV32
Dig
Crunch
Torment
Swagger

Froggo(Palpitoad) LV33
Muddy Water
Mud Shot
Uproar
Rain Dance

Moley(Excadrill) LV32
Dig
Metal Claw
Rock Slide
Hone Claws

 

[Reginald Cosmic]

I've started the Pokemon Ultra Moon Ghost Monotype challenge tonight. I've never played USUM in full before. I only made it past the first totem Pokemon the first time, but I just wasn't feeling the team I'd selected. Most of the Alolan Pokemon I actively like are ghost-type, so I thought, "Man, forget it! Yo, home, to Bel Air!" I've got my team more or less decided on at the moment. I'll update as things progress, but for now, I'll say that I got an Adamant-natured Rowlet second try, and I'm really thankful for that because I was not prepared for Professor Kukui to give a college lecture while I picked my starter. I'm not nicknaming my Pokemon this playthrough because that would involve naming them after dead guys, and I don't think I'm ready for that.

Name: Reggie
Type: Ghost
Game: Pokémon Ultra Moon
Challenge Type: Single
Standard Mode: In a sequentially ranked hierarchy based on level of critical importance, the disparity between us is too vast to quantify. (Translation: "Standard")

 

[StenirRPG]

Ultimate Dark Run
Gold / First and Final / Man, Dark

In this post (i.e., TL;DR)

Spoiler:

-- Breakdown
-- Gyms 1 and 2
-- Gym 3
-- Gym 4
-- Gym 5
-- Gym 6
-- Gym 7
-- Gym 8
-- Elite Four and Champion

The full read:

Spoiler:

So, this was an interesting run. As previously stated, there was a breakdown to when I got Pokemon, since many were not available until postgame. Here's the breakdown:
- Start with Houndour
- Beat First Gym: Acquire Larvitar
- Beat Third Gym and play plot: Earn Eevee from Bill
- Beat Fourth Gym: Acquire Sneasel
- Beat any of the three gyms you can to earn Sixth Badge: Acquire Murkrow

I knew I wanted Murkrow for Chuck's gym, even though I'd only have Peck. I debated, then decided that my best bet was probably defeat go Ice->Steel->Fighting. And I did trade the Scale to get the Exp. Share, which helps the level grind. I think those of us who have played Gen 2 just know the experience curve is horrible. Let's see just how bad it is...

-- Gyms 1 and 2
Taking down Faulkner was easy enough, given I can just spam Ember with Houndour. It's not as nice taking Houndour through the caves to Azalea, but having Larvitar makes it easier to deal with. I accidentally got caught by the trainer just before Azalea, and there's a Machop that just deals massive damage to my team...so I save-scummed to make it past on the second time through the cave. Bugsy was pretty straightforward to get through, with a mix of Sandstorm, Ember, and Bite.

-- Gym 3
I really wish I had an Umbreon. Tanky boy would be helpful here. But, since I don't, I'm stuck with just my Larvitar and Houndour. I attempted the battle with Whitney multiple times, and Rollout just ends my Houndour...and by that time, Larvitar is not going to survive much. I fought every trainer in the gym and where I could get in the world, and just hoped for a win. I didn't want to keep leveling, because I was out of trainers which meant I was going to have to train in the grass, which can be very slow. I think it was a combination of Poison from Smog and Sandstorm that net me the win.

-- Gym 4
Now armed with an Eevee...I try to do a lot of training, giving it as many X items as possible, leveling as best as I can, using other items on it...andI reach level 26...with nothing. But Houndour and Larvitar do have Bite, so I decide to take on Morty with Eevee in the team to get those points as well towards evolving. As you'd guess, Dark against Ghost makes this gym fairly straightforward.

-- Gym 5
I finally get my Eevee to evolve by just focusing on using it as much as possible...while Sneasel holds the Exp Share. Oh look, finally got Umbreon. And it's 10 levels higher than the rest of my team. Houndoom has evolved as well, and I've completed the Mahogany portion of the Rocket Plotline. Having Rock Slide means I have a fairly decent attack against the Ice gym, so I go ahead and work on taking that out. I give Sneasel Fury Cutter as soon as I can, and then pick up my Murkrow. The team is now complete.

-- Gym 6
Steel type gym goes down to a mix of Ember and Dig. I really wish I had held off on evolving Houndour just to get Flamethrower earlier, but it is what it is.

-- Gym 7
Fighting type is basically spam other moves, starting with Umbreon. I end with Murkrow after having spent some time training it up to over level 25. Wasn't fun to watch my team keep going down. Good thing I won't have any trouble with a leader who uses Fighting in the near future...right?

-- Gym 8
Dragon type is not hard. I was hoping Icy Wind on Sneasel would be helpful. It was not. Mostly, I was using a mix of Feint Attack, Shadow Ball, and Rock Slide. Sneasel not good with Icy Wind...But hey, easy enough to get through...once you train up enough.

-- Elite Four
First up - Psychic. <insert this is easy gif here>

Second up - Poison. <insert Rock Slide on bugs/flying, and Dig on everything else, other than Forretress who needed Ember/Flamethrower to make it through>

Third up - Fighting. Rock...crap, what is this...This was obviously the main pain point. I was hoping Fly would get me through, but I have to get past Himtontop first, because of Detect. It was about this time that I realized the game had been set to Set the entire run. I'd noticed it, but it didn't process. I shrugged my shoulders and just kept going, because I normally start by ensuring animations are off and battle style is set to switch. Anyways...gaining Flamethrower and using it in conjunction with Fly is what helped me make it through this one, but it was very close.

Fourth up - Dark. Uh...not really a problem. After "we don't talk about" as the previous battle, this was a cinch. Just spam Headbutt, or if I want, Fury Cutter. Fly. Flamethrower. Rock Slide. etc. Whatever.

Champion - If it flies, Rock Slide. Otherwise, spam hardest attack.

So, the caveat here is that I beat it without Pupitar evolving. It ended at 46. So, I wrote down my team at that point, and then went back and started trying to level up to see how much extra time it would take to level Puptiar up. 2 1/2 hours around Victory Road. That's not accounting for anything other than getting Pupitar up to Tyranitar, which was 9 levels. Looking at the ending levels, I would have then had 41/55/43/37/41, which is quite a range, so I probably would have been fearing that I needed to level them all up to at least 45-48...adding even more time.

But, hey, the benefit is that I would have had Crunch instead of Bite...so there's always that.

Spoiler:

New Chart! Generation by Type!
After each game is complete, I want to share how the types for that Gen look compared to each other. The one big chart is just every data point combined without any breakdown by type. This is google sheets so it doesn't have the best options for trendlines, but the best I've found is Polynomial set to 3. This is what I got, and it works the best across the board, so we'll start there. Welcome to Gen 2 lol

Spoiler:

On to Gen 3!

 

[Reginald Cosmic]

The first update for UM is coming, but I haven't made progress the last day or two, so please be patient.

I'm looking over some of what Stenir wrote regarding the Elite Four, and I feel like I should try Set Mode out sometime. I should probably try it with a casual run first though, so I know what I'm getting into. I actually find it weird that this is the only built-in challenge mode for most Pokemon games*, yet I've never seriously tried it out. I just feel like that's not what I look for in a challenge mode. (Someone once proposed the idea that there'd be a middle option where you can switch your Pokemon for free, but the game won't tell you the next opposing Pokemon. I'm curious how that would work out... or maybe it would be dumb. I don't know.)

*I know about B2W2's challenge mode, but they seemingly coded that wrong. I've never tried it out for myself, but I think they forgot to change the final stats of each Pokemon.

 

[MachoPony]

Pokemon White Ground Mono: Main Game Complete

Spoiler:

Kept going and through Chargestone cave, at least this time they warned me about...


VS N
Crunch and Dig finished Boldore after a Smack down. Krokorok then one shot Joltik with a +1 dig, ferroseed unfortunately used Iron defence so dig did just over half. Then again, and a third time so a 2nd dig didn't quite KO a third one however did.
+3 dig then one shot Klink.

After making it out to Mistralton and through the Celestial tower. I faced the Mistralton gym

VS Skyla
With an expert belt attached Excadrill one shot all 3 of her pokemon with a single Rock Slide each.

Heading back up and over to Twist mountain Palpitoad finally evolved into Seismitoad, I rememberred there was a Cheren battle here.

VS Cheren
So unfezant wasted 2 of my Muddy Water PP with detect, i hit a 3rd after a taun and after an air slash uproar finished it. Excadrill took a couple of hits getting a hone claws up and 2 shot Servine with metal claw.
hoped Excadrill could outspeed Simipour alas not, scald finished it. Seismitoad fell after slowing it down with mud shot letting Krokorok finish Simipour, a +1 soft sand boosted Dig one shot Liepard to win.

After the maze that was Twist Mountain i made it to Iccirus City and went straight for the gym. Excadrill handled it

VS Brycen
Excadrill one shot Vanillish, but after Beartic survived a metal claw, swagger confused Excadrill, a +2 metal claw after a potion one shot Beartic. bad confusehax meant Cryogonal took out Excadrill.
Seismitoad's surf wasn't doing as much as i'd like so i set up rain dance both to boost its power and trigger Swift Swim meaning it outspeeds Cryogonal and 2 more Surfs finishes the match.

Now I can finally get some new team members. Catching Flat the Stunfisk on Route 8 to the east then heading into Dragonspiral Tower and catching Punchy the Golett

Slapped the exp share on Punchy and began climbing, at level 40 Krokorok finally evolved into Krookodile.

Walked all the way back to and through Desert Resort to the Relic Castle, through there then after the scene, back to Nacrene. After the scene there i finally caught a pidove outside Pinwheel Forest to fly with.


after flying back to Icirrus and walking east through route 8 Bianca wanted a battle.

VS Bianca
This was annoying. So after Seismitoad hit surf and took a retaliate, i realized Rain Dance would let Seismitoad outspeed Stoutland, after a retaliate it did outspeed and A Rain boosted Surf finished Seismitoad.
But then came Simisage, it outsped Excadrill who took a seed bomb, set swords dance then fainted to a crit seed bomb. Of course. After Krookodile took a seed bomb and used Swagger, stupid grass monke refused to hit itself for 3 turns
as i sacced Stunfisk to heal Krookodile then foddered Golett and Seismitoad, on what could have been the final turn, it hit itself, Krookodile finished with Crunch then one shot Emboar with dig and Musharna with Crunch.


After getting to Opelucid, meeting Drayden and Iris i headed through the gym.

VS Iris
So I used dig to see if it one shot, she used dragon dance, then again as dig hit, she healed so i went for crunch to knock her low again, a third dragon dance and crunch KOs.
+1 crunch doesnt KO Druddigon (Soft sand boosted Dig might have) so it dragon tail's Krook out into Golett, night shade hurts it as she heals then night slash one shots golett.
Krookodile didn't quite finish druddigon with dig so Revenge took it out, Excadrill finished with Rock Slide, then Haxorus used Dragon Dance, earthquake did about half, 2nd Dance, 2nd EQ and that's the match.

Trained up Golett and evolved to Golurk, also finally trained Stunfisk.

Part way through the next route....

VS Cheren
Unfezant's Air Slash hit Golurk who retaliated with Mega Punch, then a crit Air Slash and another Punch, I thought he'd heal so i went for a final Mega Punch but no, air slash again.
It Taunted Stunfisk who discharged it for the KO, in comes Serperior so i swap to Excadrill. After 2 Coils his Serperior sweeps my team.

Take 2:
So this time I led Stunfisk, it took out Unfezant, poisoned Serp with Sludge Bomb and then after most of my team was down i revived Excadrill, Serperior finally went down and Excadrill one shot Liepard before falling to Simipour

Take 3
So i rememberred a Strategy that worked before. I led Seismitoad to knock Unfezant to half with surf as he charged Razor Wind, then rain dance and rain boosted Surf took it out.
With Rain Dance up, Swift Swim let Seismitoad outspeed and mud shot Serperior to slow it down as he KOd with Giga Drain. Krookodile then outsped and one shot Serperior with a black glasses boosted Crit Crunch.
Stunfisk got leered, hit sludge bomb, leer again and discharge to take out Simipour while Krookodile 2 shot Liepard with Dig to win.


Made it to Victory road, and through it. Trained everyone to 50. Stocked up on items and prepared for the challenge.

VS Shauntal
with Black Glasses Krookodile can sweep her entire team!....except Mummy removes moxie, and Cursed Body disabled Crunch. le sigh.
Seismitoad 2 shot Golurk after an earthquake and Krook came back in to one shot Chandelure.


VS Grimsley
so Krookodile hit dig on Scrafty, took a brick break and i swapped for Golurk, Earthquake didn't kill so after a crunch and a full restore 2 more knocked it low, and he knocked out Golurk.
Another full restore but this time Excadrill 2 shot with Earthquake. after Rain Dance seismitoad took an earthquake and one shot Krookodile before a rain boosted surf did a lot to Bisharp but ultimately Seismitoad fell.
Excadrill finished with Earthquake, then took a fake out and night slash from Liepard befor another Earthquake ended the fight.

VS Caitlyn
This time Krookodile got a clean sweep with Crunch and Moxie boosts.

VS Marshall
Stunfisk paralyzed Throh with Thunderbolt, which is bad because it has guts. After a payback, i missed mud bomb, it hit bulldoze, hit mud bomb and bulldoze finished Stunfisk. Excadrill finished with Earthquake.
then came Conkeldurr. Golurk went back and forth, he used 2 full restores, i used 1 hyper potion, finally Golurk won. 2 Shadow Punches knocked out Sawk and finally Seismitoad slowed down Mienshao twice before fainting letting Golurk finish it with Shadow Punch.


Knocked out Zekrom but the game wouldn't let me progress without catching it, so i did....and it forced Zekrom into my first slot. so I threw pokeballs till Reshiram knocked it out, now the real fight begins.

VS N
Now that Zekrom is down. I can use my team.
Seismitoad slowed Reshiram with Mud shot, took a hyper beam, rain dance and a couple of surfs got it low before a hyper beam finished Seismitoad. Leaving Krookodile to finish it and get a moxie boost.
Krook knocked Vanilluxe low who used Hail, N healed it, Krook knocked it low and then out. Klingklang was next and....outsped Krookodile and one shot with Focus blast? Ok weird, Golurk should take it out.
...Night Slash!? Oh, right, he has a Zoroark. well Earthquake knocked it low and it KOd golurk. Stunfisk took a night slash and KOd it Carracosta KOd stunfisk. Excadrill used Metal Claw ot break sturdy, took a waterfall and then fainted to Aqua Jet.

Attempt 2:
This time Reshiram finished Zekrom with Hyper Beam so i wasted one more turn to make it fair.
Again Seismitoad slowed it, set rain dance and hit surf before fainting to hyper beam. Excadrill blew a turn of Reflect by using Swords Dance and Earthquaked it for the KO.
Next came "Klingklang." and by that I mean It's Zoroark, not making the same mistake twice Stunfisk took a night slash, knocked it below half with thunderbolt showing yes, Zoroark, then another slash and thunderbolt KO.
Third came Vanilluxe so i swapped into Excadrill, Rock Slide took it low, he set hail, he healed, metal claw, 2nd metal claw KOd
Fourth out was Carracosta, so i stayed in, earthquaked it to sturdy, it waterfalled Excadrill low and both fainted to hail
Then Archeops hit acrobatics and got knocked low by Krookodile. Since he'd used a full restore already i felt no guilt in healing Krookodile, dragon claw scraped it, acrobatics hurt but a crunch finished it.
Last was the real Klinklang which was a clean Dig one shot by Krookodile for the win.

VS Ghetsis
So after letting Toxic knock out Zekrom...
Krook missed the one shot on Cofagrigus, it used toxic, figuring it would protect i used a full heal...but it used shadow ball....then protect on the following turn when i wasnt poisoned anymore. ok sure. Crunch KOd.
Hydreigon was the big threat. I had one shot, a very small shot. Surf knocked golurk low. then Golurk hit dynamic punch! then hydreigon hit itself in confusion and mega punch finished it!
I used Mud Shot on his Seismitoad as he used Rain Dance, with Swift Swim my toad outsped and hit surf, took a muddy water and KOd with another surf.
Surf took a chunk off bouffalant before Head Charge finished Seismitoad. Excadrill set Swords Dance, took an Earthquake then KOd with Earthquake.
+2 rock slide took a chunk off Eelektross before flamethrower finished Excadrill, Krookodile finished with Crunch
Lastly was Bisharp Krookodile outsped and a +1 dig finished the match.

Final Main Game Team

Spoiler:

Moley(Excadrill) LV52 w/ Expert Belt
Earthquake
Rock Slide
Metal Claw
Swords Dance

Chomp(Krookodile) LV53 w/ BlackGlasses
Crunch
Dig
Sandstorm
Torment

Flat(Stunfisk) LV50 w/ Magnet
Mud Bomb
Thunderbolt
Sludge Bomb
Muddy Water

Froggo(Seismitoad) LV51 w/ Amulet Coin
Surf
Sludge Bomb
Mud Shot
Rain Dance

Punchy(Golurk) LV52 w/ Spell Tag
Shadow Punch
Mega Punch
Earthquake
Dynamicpunch

MVP: This is tough. it's between Excadrill and Krookodile. Excadrill's bulk as a Drilbur with Eviolote was crucial earlygame and Sandile was pretty weak, but Krokorok was sweeping whole teams while Excadrill could only manage that like, once. Krookodile also hit like a truck and there were times when it felt like Excadrill was too slow, But i did handle most grass types not named Cheren's Serperior pretty well

Close Call but i'm gonna say Krookodile. Good STAB on both sides plus Moxie is just too strong.

LVP: Stunfisk
I mean, it's not its fault. I didn't get it till 7 gyms in. And it helped in a couple of crucial late battles, just. Not that good overall.

 

[StenirRPG]

The first update for UM is coming, but I haven't made progress the last day or two, so please be patient.

I'm looking over some of what Stenir wrote regarding the Elite Four, and I feel like I should try Set Mode out sometime. I should probably try it with a casual run first though, so I know what I'm getting into. I actually find it weird that this is the only built-in challenge mode for most Pokemon games*, yet I've never seriously tried it out. I just feel like that's not what I look for in a challenge mode. (Someone once proposed the idea that there'd be a middle option where you can switch your Pokemon for free, but the game won't tell you the next opposing Pokemon. I'm curious how that would work out... or maybe it would be dumb. I don't know.)

*I know about B2W2's challenge mode, but they seemingly coded that wrong. I've never tried it out for myself, but I think they forgot to change the final stats of each Pokemon.

Honestly, set mode didn't really feel any different across the run. I did notice I tried to have more coverage on each of my team as I went, just on the off chance the opposing trainer switched into something I could still do damage with. That's why I ended up having, for example, Houndoom with a Ghost move. I even thought about teaching Surf to Sneasel at one point. I decided against it in the end, but I did think about it.

If you're clicking super fast, Set mode is easy to ignore because it's basically the same as accidentally saying "no" to the swap option when a new 'mon is thrown out on the other team.

I would be interested to see one where the swap is free but you don't know what's coming out next, but I do think most of the logic has been mapped for how trainers behave, so it's not hard to figure out what would be thrown out next.

Now, if it randomly adjusted the logic on the fly, that would be interesting. I don't know how it would be adjusted on the fly, but would be fun to play a Pokemon game where an opposing trainer has a "stress" meter, where the closer they are to losing, there's a higher chance they might go off script and do something ridiculous.

 

[MachoPony]

Pokemon White Ground Mono Finale

Spoiler:

After the Credits rolled, I went around gathering the sages and their TMs only leaving one i couldn't reach yet on route 14. I headed east of Nimbasa to route 15 and after much deliberation, finished my team with the return of Pinchy the Gligar

In the Abundant Shrine i found a Razor Fang, then waiting till night i evolved Gligar to Gliscor, at this point i did find the last sage.

After a full loop around the east of Unova i wound up back in Opelucid and started to train.

After reaching Level 70 with everyone. (Read: a lot of grinding) I finally returned to the Pokemon League

VS Shauntal 2
Stunfisk took some hits and 3 shot Cofagrigus with Thunderbolt, then dodged 2 hydro pumps to 2 shot Jellicent. Excadrill knocked Froslass low, Swords Dance as she healed, then after a 2nd blizzard, metal claw took it out.
Earthquake took out Chandelure, a crit took out Golurk and a +2 expert belt boosted Rock Slide took out Drifblim to win.

VS Grimsley 2
So after Stunfisk took a waterfall and one shot sharpedo with Thunderbolt. Gliscor set swords dance against Krookodile and then swept his team. X-scissor on krook, acrobatics on scrafty, X-scissor on liepard, Earthquake on drapion and bisharp.

VS Caitlyn 2
So she immediately swapped Musharna for Reuinclus which took a crunch, she healed and a 2nd Crunch finished it. Sigilyph outsped and hit a hard ice beam but Krook took it and one shot with crunch. Since she already healed and i was afraid of Metagross having bullet punch I also healed.
After a bullet punch, earthquake KOd metagross. +3 crunch one shot Bronzong, +4 on Gothitelle and +5 to one shot Musharna and end the fight.

VS Marshal 2
Gliscor one shot Breloom before it could do much, then i knocked Sawk to sturdy and dodged a stone edge, got up swords dance as he healed, broke sturdy with x scissor and took a stone edge before finishing with Acrobatics.
Gliscor then one shot the rest of his team with one +2 acrobatics each.

VS Alder
Accelgor's Me First let it outspeed and hit Gliscor but the return Acrobatics one shot it. Vanlilluxe dodged a rock slide from Excadrill and set light screen but a 2nd crit took it out.
volcarona was a threat, seismitoad used Rain dance on a quiver dance but unfortunately got outsped and KOd by hyper beam. Excadrill finished it with a single Rock Slide
I meant to use Swords Dance on Druddigon but i hit metal claw instead, he however did Night Slash, after a swords dance unfortunately he made the right choice this time and Superpower finished Excadrill
Golurk KOd it with a crit shadow punch before hammering a chunk off Bouffalant with hammer arm and going down to 2 earthquakes. Gliscor finished Bouffalant with Earthquake.
Escavalier was his last and acrobatics did about half as he used aerial ace. I used Swords Dance to try and knock it out without him healing but he used Giga impact to take out Gliscor.
Krookodile's Earthquake barely missed the KO so yeah, he healed, 2 more earthquakes and it one shot Krook with X-scissor, thankfully Stunfisk outsped and finished it with Thunderbolt.

...but you know, i don't think that's enough. There's one more challenge this game has that's not technically part of the optional endgame but i'm doing it anyway.

VS Cynthia
So Gliscor set Swords Dance vs Spiritomb and then one shot with Acrobatics taking a shadow ball. +2 acrobatics didn't quite KO Milotic and blizzard KOd Gliscor.
she healed as Stunfisk knocked it to half, then survived a hydro pump and knocked it low before fainting. Krookodile finished off Milotic with crunch
Golurk took a dragon pulse and one shot Lucario with Earthquake then hit Eelektross hard with shadow punch before falling to crunch. krookodile finished it off
Krookodile took an Earthquake from Garchomp, landed a +2 crunch then fainted. Seismitoad took an earthquake and then not taking any chances i used Rain Dance, outsped with swift swim and finished with a rain boosted Surf.

Final Team

Spoiler:

Moley(Excadrill) LV72 w/ Expert Belt
Earthquake
Metal Claw
Rock Slide
Swords Dance

Chomp(Krookodile) LV72 w/ Blackglasses
Crunch
Earthquake
Sandstorm
Rock Slide

Flat(Stunfisk) LV71 w/ Magnet
Thunderbolt
Mud Bomb
Sludge Bomb
Muddy Water

Froggo(Seismitoad) LV70 w/ Shell Bell
Surf
Rain Dance
Rock Slide
Mud Shot

Punchy(Golurk) LV70 w/ Spell Tag
Shadow Punch
Hammer Arm
Earthquake
Fly

Pinchy(Gliscor) LV73
Swords Dance
Earthquake
X-Scissor
Acrobatics

 

[StenirRPG]

Ultimate Dark Run
Gold / First and Final / Man, Dark
Sapphire / First and Final / I Swear I Know Which Game I'm Playing (Added because I accidentally missed updating the game I was playing)

In this post (i.e., TL;DR)

Spoiler:

-- Breakdown
-- Gyms 1 and 2
-- Gym 3
-- Gym 4
-- Gym 5
-- Gym 6
-- Gym 7
-- Gym 8
-- Preparing for the Elite Four
-- Elite Four and Champion

The full read:

Spoiler:

-- Breakdown
I thought I was going to have fun with this one, and there were points that I did, but the tail end of the run was just horrible. Evidence? 21h51m to beat Gym 8, and then another 17 hours before beating the game. But we'll get there...

-- Gym 1
Poochyena, at the start of the game, is nice to have. Sand Attack is nice in the Rustboro Gym, and I just basically spam Bite. No real challenge here.

-- Gym 2
Oh boy, the cheese of using Sableye to take down every single Pokémon in the second gym. I was laughing my way through it.

-- Gym 3
I don't really have much power, especially when all I can say is "I used Night Shade way more than I thought I would". I'm still in the era of "Steel resists Dark and Ghost", so I'm kinda stuck at the moment. Only thing I can really do is a mix of lucking out with Swagger and spamming Night Shade. It's not pretty. I had to gain so many levels to get through this.

-- Gym 4
No change in moveset, but I picked up enough levels that it was just me spamming Bite and Feint Attack (and Night Shade, to some degree, being mid-30s).

-- Gym 5
I picked up Cacnea on my way back to Petalburg, and I also picked up the Exp Share and threw it on. Gotta get those levels up. This is a point at which I'm like "should I adjust the formulas on my spreadsheet to ignore the lowest level of Pokémon since the current calc throws the average down with new lower level team members".

Other things I had thought about were ignoring Pokémon that didn't take part in the battle (i.e., only average those who fought at least one turn), ignore Pokémon for one gym after catching, and just not bothering with changing it. I decided to do the latter, because I want to continue comparing with past data. Besides, tracking all of this is all just in fun and keeps me motivated.

-- Gym 6
Fortree was an exercise in keeping Cacnea out of the battle, but I've picked up Carvanha and Corphish, so there's some planning in how best to use those starting, but I didn't anticipate them being of any help until the Elite Four at this point. From this point on, I'm basically swapping Exp Share around like a madman. Wasn't much I could think about doing at this point. After I end up getting to Lilycove, I thought about how I might have come over and picked up Thunder and/or Blizzard for Fortree, which might be something I keep in mind going forward for more runs.

-- Gym 7
Mossdeep. This. Gym. Was. Dumb. The first time, I plowed through all of the trainers with no problem, but lost horrible to Tate and Liza. I won the second time by spamming Surf and Bubble Beam. I think, the first time through, something was screaming at me to just spam Dark. And that they couldn't hit me because I'm Dark. Then I realized while watching movesets that one is more defensive and the other is very much able to hit me. So, Surf tactics it is, and that was simple enough.

-- Gym 8
I wish Cacturne didn't learn Needle Arm so late. It would have been great in here. I take down all the trainers, then go back, pick up Thunder for Absol, Blizzard for Crawdaunt...and that was about it. I taught Rock Smash to Sableye just in the hopes it did some defense dropping on Ice types.

Wasn't too bad, especially with two Water types and a Grass type on my team.

-- Preparing for the Elite Four

Trying to get through Victory Road was basically me running from anything that was a Golbat line or Makuhita line. Those. Just. Stink. At least when Dark type. Well, that and they like to Roar or Whirlwind or what have you. Ingrain helps keep me there, but my main farming Pokémon are Aron and Lairon. Those are really the only ones I really want. There was a lot of grinding here to try and get to at least 40-43.

-- Elite Four
Dark type friend is up first...and this takes some doing. Mightyena is first, and I Surf it down. Usually, I do enough damage that the first Full Restore is triggered, so I get back to back Surfs after that to take it down. Cacturne comes out next and I throw out Absol for Aerial Ace. When that goes down and Shiftry comes out, it wastes turns boosting evasion and I just throw more Aerial Aces. Then Sharpedo, which goes down to Needle Arm on my Cacturne, and then I have to switch out because the opponent Absol has Aerial Ace also. But easy enough.

Phoebe, being Ghost, is just spamming Dark moves to get through.

Glacia is a little bit of a pain, until I realized I can take out the Sealeo line with Needle Arm easily enough (I keep forgetting Ice doesn't resist Grass). That, and Thunder from Absol helps out when needed. If I can make it past Glacia, I know I'm at least on a good run.

I start off Mr. Dragon's battles with trying to spam Blizzard and hope for a full set without missing. The first few times I tried, I didn't have the luck, but once I was in the late-40s for my team, I just saved and kept trying over and over, until I managed to break through enough. Which was nice. I was tired - even 17 hours being played at 3x speed is over 5 1/2 hours actually playing.

Finally, the Champion. Oh, what's that? More of a Chump-ion.

Skarmory is just a few Surfs to go down, then Armaldo comes out and has the same result. Cradily comes out, so I sort of just spam some Dark moves to wait it out. Eventually, I break through and Claydol is next. More Surf/Dive/Waterfall to dark it out. Metagross comes out, so I switch back to Dark type moves, and then when Aggron comes out, I'm hilariously down to just Crawdaunt at half health against Aggron at half health. Some Crabhammers and a Full Restore later, and I've pulled it off. Yay.

Team Stats:

Spoiler:

Hoenn by Type:

Spoiler:

On to Sinnoh...once I hatch an egg for Murkrow at the beginning...

 

[Explorer of Time]

Ultimate Dark Run
Gold / First and Final / Man, Dark

Since this is clearly a Hoenn game and not Gold, I'm going to need to double-check which Hoenn game you beat before adding you to the Hall of Fame. I assume Sapphire?

 

[StenirRPG]

Oh, jeez, sorry, I keep the same format in a text document and just make updates as I do each new one. Totally had a brain fart and didn't change that.

This was indeed Sapphire. Thanks for catching that. I'll go strikethrough that line and add a better line underneath it in the post.

 

[StenirRPG]

Ultimate Dark Run
Brilliant Diamond / First Entry / Smaller Posts, Still Going

In this post (i.e., TL;DR)

Spoiler:

-- Gym 1
-- Gym 2
-- Gym 3

The full read:

Spoiler:

This time, I start with Murkrow. Got my wife to breed one for me, and then transfered the egg over. Then ran around for about 20 minutes (she was pre-hatching it ahead of time while I pushed quickly through the opening).

-- Gym 1
Up through Gym 1, I'm just basically taking out everything I can, because I know it's going to be a starting pain point as I'm part Flying. Geodude knows Rollout, which is my first pain point. If I can make it past there, I'll get to the Onix, who has Rock Throw. If I can make it through them, I should be fine. All Cranidos can do is Headbutt, as Bulldoze is a waste of a turn.

My Murkrow turned out to be a weird combination. It has a +SpAtk nature, but ended up having 30 IV in Attack. The nature has actually made my Special Attack be higher, meaning I definitely am wanting to use Gust on Roark's team. I tried it at 15, but it was not going to happen. I pushed to 16, then tried using Astonish to break Rollout. That's also something that wasn't going to happen, so I just spammed Gust to get through Geodude. Onix's Rock Throw ended up only doing 14 damage, meaning my Potion usages are actually getting me back health. When Rock Throw fails, I use Gust. This gets me through to Crandios, who goes down to a bunch of Gusts as well.

-- Gym 2
The big thing coming into the second gym is that I'm able to collect three new Pokemon from the Grand Underground: Houndoom, Skorupi, and Absol. The last two I'm going to pick up in this run will be after this point (Stunky right after this gym and then Sneasel much later after the 6th Gym). I think make a quick run through the Grass gym, using Murkrow only when needed. Skorupi gains a bunch of levels here thanks to Bug Bite.

-- Gym 3
I pick up Stunky under the bridge just after getting the bike. Yay.

The trainers in this gym didn't cause much of a pain for me, and neither did Maylene's Meditate or Machoke. The Lucario was the pain point. It is fast enough to take out my team before I can do anything. So, I lose once, and go back to the Department Store and pick up a bunch of X Attack and X Defense. When I get in this time, I use 3 X Defense on Murkrow, and then do the same with 3 X Attack. This is more than enough to turn all three into OHKOs, netting me the third gym and the end of this first post.

Team Stats:

Spoiler:

 

[Mochorro]

The Ultimate Monotype Challenge! (Fighting)

Yellow, HeartGold, Sigma Σmerald, Platinum, White 2, X, Ultra Sun, Sword, Violet.

Additional Rules: - No Revives inside battles.
- No PP stalling by healing all the time.
- Set mode for important battles.

1. Started Pokémon X with Chespin!

Started the game, took Chespin as it will evolve into Chesnaught, a Fighting-type, caught a Riolu, and went for the first badge. It was an easy sweep with Chespin's Rollout, both Surskit and Vivilion had nothing to do. The Combee from the previous trainer was actually worse than the gym leader, as I missed 3 Rollout in a row there, and Gust almost killed me. Against the Surskit Rollout missed once as well, 4 out of 5 misses, with 90 accuracy, insane. After getting the badge I also caught a male Ralts, and that's it so far, so yeah, 2 out of 3 are not yet Fighting-types, and not many new things to train compared to my previous monotype runs, but we'll see how it goes.

I actually beat Y on release and never played gen VI again, so a bit less known for me this game. As I remember it being extremely easy, I have turned off the Exp. Share, not gonna use it unless I see myself very underleveled.

Spoiler: Current Pokémon

@ Nothing. Lv 15 (M). Overgrow.
Hardy Nature. Leech Seed, Bite, Vine Whip, Rollout.

@ Nothing. Lv 13 (M). Steadfast.
Timid Nature. Foresight, Quick Attack, Return, Counter.

@ Nothing. Lv 11 (M). Trace.
Serious Nature. Growl, Confusion, Double Team.

Number of Gym Badges: 1.

Current Location: Lumiose City.

Number of losses: 0.

 

[StenirRPG]

Ultimate Dark Run
Brilliant Diamond / Final Entry / Well, That Was Interesting

In this post (i.e., TL;DR)

Spoiler:

-- Gym 4
-- Gym 5
-- Gym 6
-- Gym 7
-- Gym 8
-- Elite Four
-- Champion

The full read:

Spoiler:

--Gym 4
Quite a few upgrades.

I upgrade to Air Cutter from Gust on Honchkrow. I can get Honchkrow now because you can get a Dusk Stone by hopping into the Grand Underground just south of the resort. Gotta keep that in mind for the Flying run I end up doing at some point. I also swap in Nasty Plot, which will serve me the rest of the way through the game. Honchkrow stays at this moveset the rest of the game.

Absol gets Night Slash to replace Knock Off. Absol also stays at this moveset the rest of teh game.

No change on Houndoom or Skorupi. Stunky gets Toxic, which makes Venoshock actually usable.

One of the things I like about the gyms in BDSP is that you basically are forced to fight all the trainers. Serves me well and makes Crasher Wake very easy.

--Gym 5
It's the Ghost gym. I basically OHKO everything except Misdreavus, only because it likes to Phantom Force to drive me crazy. No real issue here. Stunky does evolve to Skuntank through fighting all the trainers (this one you can avoid them, but why would you...free experiences for the taking).

Houndoom gets Fire Fang to replace Roar.

--Gym 6
I worried a bit about this one, because I only have Flamethrower to see me through, but I didn't really have any issues with it. Had to ensure to keep my Skorupi and Skuntank out as much as possible since it's sort of pointless.

--Gym 7
I get Sneasel into my party, and it'll just kinda sit there for now, but will serve me well in the Endgame. Houndoom just runs this gym into the ground.

--Gym 8
By Gym 8, there's almost a ten level jump on average because of all the Sinnoh Bad Guy Team (TM), which means Sunyshore's Gym is only frustrating because I keep getting paralyzed. I keep Honchkrow out of battles for obvious reasons.

-- Elite Four
Aaron/Bug: Use Honchkrow with a few X Speed, X Def, and then Nasty Plot. This lets Air Cutter OHKO everything, including that nasty Heracross.

Bertha/Ground: Do the same boosting on Weavile, allow for Beat Up to take out everything. I did use Metal Claw to OHKO Sudowoodo.

Flint/Fire: This was just sort of make it through. Drifblim does pass +6 Evasion to Infernape, but I let it do a few Close Combats so when Honchkrow comes out, one single hit will take it out.

Lucian/Psychic: This is just Ghost 2.0 for me.

-- Champion
I tried a few different approaches, but I ended up just boosting Honchkrow's...well, everything except Attack. Then just a bunch of Air Cutters to easily take Cynthia down. I felt that was the best thing to do to ensure I got through the big two in this battle - Lucario and Milotic (at least, they've been my pain through all these runs in this battle).


Takeaways? This was a quick run. Been a while since I had a run in the lower 20s for hours. Everybody had a good balance of Dark and non-Dark moves. It does help X items at this point are +2. Always something I have to remember when I jump to this gen.

Team Stats:

Spoiler:

Hoenn Sinnoh by Type:

Spoiler:

Off to Unova. Catch you after the flight!

 

[Reginald Cosmic]

What's Hoenn by Type?

 

[StenirRPG]

What's Hoenn by Type?

I swear, you'd think after this many runs I wouldn't goof. That's supposed to be Sinnoh by type (I'll get it fixed). It's me showing each region, type by type. So, it shows the progression of average level by time across the run. For Sinnoh, you can see how Dark and Grass (and partially Fairy) progressed over time for party level.

 

[Reginald Cosmic]

I had to shelve the video until early 2025 for numerous reasons. On that note: I swear I'm gonna resume updates to this thread soon, but my best friend is going through a lot of real life BS right now, and I gotta be a good friend to him by participating in the stream chat of his October streams. I thought the Ghost Monotype run would be an excellent thing to do in October, but I don't know one way or the other how much of that I can do this upcoming month. I could get a lot done, or I could get nothing done. It could go either way or some in-between way. There's other stuff I'm doing for my mental health such as reading more. My mom and I agreed to watch TV together every Monday cuz we found a couple cartoons we might both like. I'm continuing to do livestreams of my own with a different circle of friends.

 

[Explorer of Time]

I had to shelve the video until early 2025 for numerous reasons. On that note: I swear I'm gonna resume updates to this thread soon, but my best friend is going through a lot of real life BS right now, and I gotta be a good friend to him by participating in the stream chat of his October streams. I thought the Ghost Monotype run would be an excellent thing to do in October, but I don't know one way or the other how much of that I can do this upcoming month. I could get a lot done, or I could get nothing done. It could go either way or some in-between way. There's other stuff I'm doing for my mental health such as reading more. My mom and I agreed to watch TV together every Monday cuz we found a couple cartoons we might both like. I'm continuing to do livestreams of my own with a different circle of friends.

Take your time if you need to. Video games should be for fun, not a job. Do what's best for your mental health, whether it's reading, spending time with your friends and family, et cetera. Your Pokemon games will still be around if you wait, and so will this website.