Noel was always a stop sign for me. Once I got to him, I would always end up having to get another pokemon. On my mono dark run, Drapion was the mvp against him, good defense, not weak to fairy, and destroys Clefable with Cross Poison. After that, I kinda just default to Drapion for help against him, or well, just torch the field with eruption like I did on my last run. Typhlosion rocks against him.