Ravuri1

Hey Posty, I did not use Scizor. I started a new save for episode 5. It is good to know Garret is going to receive a buff. I don't know if you answered this anywhere else. Did you give the opponent mons EVs?. I really liked your selection for the new starters and the changes for Hardy's and Amelia's teams. I had to struggle a bit fighting with Baron though. Are you aiming for a difficulty that is a bit below Reborn's difficulty?

There was one more thought that I forgot to write down here: Hey Caz, Thank you so much for your reply. I understand it is difficult for devs to implement the balance. I also understand that there will be significant changes in future episodes and it is totally the decision of the devs to come up with what the difficulty of the game should be. Thank you for clarifying what you intend the difficulty of desolation to be. It is just that I struggled with the battles till Tristan and after that felt that the difficulty dropped drastically. I would say the availability of breeding, decent pokemons and ev training made it so. I am sorry if the talk of game difficulty hurt the dev team's feelings. I am eagerly waiting for episode 6 .

I have already mentioned my team in a post above. In a sense, you are right: most of the opponents team rely on outspeeding and sweeping you. Ribombee is the fastest sticky web setter, and my strategy from the Electric gym till the end of the game has been the same, i.e. Set up sticky web and sweep. So I finished most of the story-important battles in a single try. I had to reset once or twice for random battles where I had some extreme type disadvantage and had to switch mons.

If you do breeding, then you can also consider vileplume. You can breed strength sap to it which can be really useful and TM Sludge Bomb is also available.

Here is my team. I didn't care about the nature. Bred some egg moves and did ev training: Ribombee (252 SpAtk, 252 Spd): Sticky Web Moonblast Pollen Puff Quiver Dance Mamoswine (252 Atk, 252 Spd): Icicle Crash Earthquake Ice Shard Thrash Dodrio (252 Atk, 252 Spd): Return Drill Peck Jump Kick Swords Dance Bewear (252 HP, 252 Atk): Hammer Arm Return Payback Baby-Doll Eyes Magmortar (252 SpAtk, 252 Spd): Flamethrower Sunny Day Clear Smog Fire Blast will replace a move with Focus Blast when I get the TM Decidueye (252 Atk, 252 Spd): Leaf Blade Spirit Shackle Brave Bird Sucker Punch ON ROTATION: Alolan Muk (252 HP, 252 Atk): Gunk Shot Minimize Crunch Knock Off Magnezone (252 SpAtk, 252 Spd): Flash Cannon Discharge Thunder Wave Tri Attack Starmie (252 HP, 252 SpAtk): Rapid Spin Hydro Pump Psychic Cosmic Power I had to do some breeding for the egg moves on Ribombee and Mamoswine. Sticky Web really paid off. Most of the battles, Ribombee would just lay sticky web and sacrifice itself for the rest of the team to sweep the opponent

I felt she was actually nerfed. I remember getting sucker punched to death by honchkrow during my E4 run. I might also be a shitty player then lol.

Aah, I see. I opted not to tell Tristan about the visions. I then forgot to see what his reaction would be if I told him. Good to know how he reacts. I would be ok with the difficulty if it was easy from the start, but it became very easy once Tristan's battle was done. I expected Garret's battle to be tough atleast, considering the fact that the player character spends most of his time in Celia with him and that is the battle most players would look forward to; but yeah, I felt a bit disappointed there.

All power items, destiny knot and ditto will be available after Emily's gym but luckily before the 5th gym. I would advise you to save up on your credits as you would require a lot of investment.

Is the Aurora's flashback you were referring to, the one in the archives? Yeah Tristan is still of a mystery to me, though and it is like the devs forgot about kuiki just like Shiv did lol.

You cannot evolve charjabug and magneton in the generator room now. It has been shifted to another place.

You need to beat Aaron to get Surf. He gives the TMX Surf after you defeat him.