Gentleman Jaggi

Preparations are done (read: I blew all my money on anything that might come in handy at some point). I also (finally) trained up two new team members: With that we finally have that empty sixth slot filled, but will also have to kick another 'Mon out of the permanent team. Here's how the reast of the team looks by now: Right after arriving at Agate Circus we also turn around back into the Gatehouse to get another, obligatory team member: After a trip through Route 2 and back (during which I made the frightening realization that I know the Crustle Puzzle by heart now) be secured that Aya and Hardy are both alright and get to fight our next Gym Leader. Cue Battle VS Strongman Samson This battle Was a MAJOR pain. Samson just seems to get worse with every run I do, jeebuz. The main issue was Hariyama pretty much always taking out one of my Pokémon before going down and Mienshao being faster than everything else. Hawlucha was also an issue, although if I had known his is actually a good deal slower than Mienshao I wouldn't have struggled quite so much. Blaziken's Speed Boost was also kind of annoying, because Camerupt was just never in any shape to go up against it. I don't know how many tries it took, but I think it was something about 2.5 hours. I actually won once relatively early, but there was so much dumb luck involved that I decided I wouldn't count that. I wish I had counted that one. Now we finally have the Fury Badge we never got back in Apophyll. It lets us use Surf, but doesn't do anything to the Level Cap. Not like that would be neccessary, anyway. We also get Brick Break - just another TM we won't use. That's it for today. Until next time See ya!

Hu, don't know what's up then. In Cellia, every sixth (I think) battle should be a random Elite trainer. I don't think there are any restrictions to it, healing definitely doesn't affect it. Did you try talking to some of the NPCs? Maybe the Elites only get "unlocked" when somebody tells you about them or something like that.

Sounds like you're in Blacklight's Fight Club; you need to be in Cellia City.

Probably the best Speed spot is the first part of the Underground Railnet accessible from Peridot. There are two Woobat spots only a few steps apart which can be reset quickly by exiting and entering again. They're also only Level 5, so even freshly bred Pokémon can take them on without much hassle. Using the Power Items this is an ideal spot to train Sweepers.

@Cataline It's been some time since I had that scenario happen in my game, but the impression I took away at that time was that Florinia might just be the only person Fern really cares about. The protagonist is a rival to him, somebody he wants to surpass, but Florinia is family. Possibly even the only one he has, although with the Pokémon games generally just ignoring the topic of "Where are your parents?" it's somewhat ambigious. (The fact that afaik the only other parents that get mentioned are Heather's, Cain's and Luna's doesn't really help here.) The reason for his outburst at Fiore Mansion rather clearly wasn't that he lost again, but rather how Florinia barely even reacted both to the Fern-as-hostage act and the revelation that he's in Team Meteor. @RedAlert: (forum refuses to properly @ you, no idea why) I actually don't even hate the guy anymore; to me he's become that sort of pitiful existence who's not worth hating, but also too much of an ass to want to help him. That's why I wanted to put my opinion somewhere since the previous discussion was pretty much divided between "he's an asshole" and "he's unfairly screwed over by the writers". I think that's a pretty apt way to put. He prides himself in his skill as a trainer and then we show up and constantly undermine his efforts. It's even somewhat apparent in his battles: He's considerably tougher in the early battles than later on. His Roserade during the battle inside the Grand Hall can be downright frighteningly powerful if you don't have anything to counter it. Starting with the battle in Aya's Gym he becomes considerably easier, culminating in him basically playing second fiddle to Blake at Fiore Mansion. It would be an interesting twist if he really ended up being just a mole in Team Meteor. Him being Fern he'd still need to ruin the moment somehow, but it'd be enough to at least get some grudging respect out of whichever NPCs are present. Discussions about individual characters have so far mostly come up in other threads where some character was relevant to the topic the thread was about. Only reason I started this thread was because I wanted to add my opinion on him without further derailing the thread this started in. I thought about making a thread like this about Cain as well, but right now I don't really have enough insightful thoughts about him to start it. I'd probably post in it if somebody else were to create such a thread however. *hinthint*

@Jess @wildebeast & @Cataline I went ahead and created a thread specifically for discussing Fern over here: If you're interested in discussing him some more we can freely do that there. I'd be especially interested in reading more about your opinion, wildebeast, since you have a rather different view of Fern than is typical here.

After a discussion about this guy broke out over in Team Showcase I figured there would be merit to a thread like this. We all know Fern. Our Rival #3, a Grass Type specialist that later branches out into other Types. From what we see in the game he is cocky, full of himself, uncaring about the personal situation of those around him and just generally an unpleasant person to everyone around him. But what about the facest of his personality we don't get to see, or at least not as plainly? Much like probably most people I thought that the above description was all there was to him, but over time my opinion of him shifted. Don't take me wrong, he remains a thoroughly unlikable individual, but I've found that at the root of that sits a pitiable fool, who went off the deep end trying to prove himself to others. Often in media a character like Fern - who constantly belittles others despite his own obvious failures, who pretents that his defeats do not exist - acts this way due to a lack of self confidence and a resulting need to prove themselves. Fern is the same and his way to prove himself to others is via his aptitude in Pokémon Training. He is a talented Trainer no doubt, a back up Gym Leader, which likely places him in the top few percent of trainers in the Region. That's a fact he takes much pride in, and it's what allowed him to become Onyx School's "top dog" - by herding the students there under his leadership, using Pokémon Battles to cement his status. That's where the protagonist comes in. They are a rooky trainer, just showed up in the region and already starting to make a name for themselves. To Fern, the protagonist is, at first, just an annoyance. They're there during the factory raid, taking attention away from him. Instead of Fern beating Team Meteor, the situation turned into him having to share the spotlight with someone else. That someone than proceeds to drive Team Meteor out of Obsidia Ward, saving two Gym Leaders in the process. Fern eventually starts to perceive the protagonist as a threat, because not only are they challenging the Reborn League, proving themselves to be of an even higher level than the Gym Leader-position Fern prides himself in, they're also out there making that fact known. And then they basically show up on his doorstep. Fern's attempt to lock the protagonist out of Florinia's Gym is supposed to take them down a peg. To stop them in their tracks before they can get even bigger. Unfortunately for Fern it backfires - spectacularly. The protagonist proceeds to battle their way through the school, battling all of Fern's goons along the way and eventually beating Fern himself. At that point he sees his position as the top dog of Onyx Trainer's School in shambles. The students have just personally experienced that there even better trainers out there than Fern. Subsequently they are no longer willing to put up with him. Fern's next step is to abandon his position both as the school's top dog, as well as a backup Gym Leader. The protagonist has just shown that neither of those mean anything to them, so Fern decides to hit them with something they do care about. Beating them at the Reborn League. Over his following appearances Fern's attempts to prove himself to everyone else increasingly turn into attempts to prove himself to the protagonist. He constantly challenges them to remind them that he's there, doing the same thing they're doing. At least that's what he thinks. The protagonist quickly ends up more and more entangled in Team Meteor's plans. They go from coincidentially being there for their League Challenge when Team Meteor shows up to actively pursuing and fighting Team Meteor, with the various Gyms only happening to be on the way. Fern knows nothing of that at first, but eventually news of the protagonist working alongside several Gym Leaders in fighting Team Meteor reach him as well. Fern has constantly been trying to get the attention of those around him, but the only ones who have ever recognized him are trainers of lower skill levels. He doesn't realize that his attitude is the reason none of his fellow Gym Leaders ever respected him. But now he knows a surefire way to get their attention; their's and the protagonist's. What better way to force them to take him seriously than to join the organization they've been fighting tooth and nail - Team Meteor? Fern wants those around him to pay him attention, to be aware of his presence, more than anything. In Team Meteor his skill instantly propels him to an executive-level position, while their enemies are forced to take him serious as a threat. They can no longer brush him off as just some jerk they should ignore, because now he's an enemy. Team Meteor's raid on Fiore Mansion is his first assignment. It ends up failing in a way that most likely could not be worse for him. He is defeated by the two people whose attention he wanted more than anyone else's - the protagonist and his own sister. Even worse: Blake, his partner during the Double Battle, proves himself a bigger threat than Fern. In the end the protagonist remains unmoved, as they always are, while his sister shows no signs of emotions about his actions either. At that point he's close to a breakdown. None of his actions achieved anything. He tried to make himself out as the top dog, but was brushed aside. He tried to be a Rival, but failed to outdo his opponent, or even get a rise out of them. Finally he tried to be a threat, a traitor, but nobody showed any signs to care about that either. Fern tried to get the attention of those around him, but the only way he knew was to be obnoxious. He tried to be respected as a skilled trainer, but only knew how to push around those that couldn't stand up to him. He tried to be recognized for something, but failed to achieve anything. Fern's story is that of a guy who's so bad at trying to be popular that he eventually spirals out of control and loses track of what he was trying to be. Anyhow, that's my thoughts on Fern so far. Hopefully I managed to bring up some points that don't come up that often. Admittedly a lot of it is speculation that all started running from a certain thought and then build itself up to what you can read up there. Tell me what you think and, more importantly, what kind of person Fern really is in your eyes.

Hoppip can also have Grassy Field as an Egg Move, which is pretty generally usefull as well. Not particularly against Fire or Poison Types, but otherwise it is.

Praise be to the Type Berries! Sometimes they'll discourage an enemy from using their supereffective attacks altogether, which is pretty dang neat. Except if that results in Mamoswine getting oneshottet by a Field-boosted Boomburst - that wasn't very neat. That Mienshao is evil though. It swept my entire Flying team at one point, whoops.

Yeah, trainers will skip the healing if they think that they can KO your Pokémon that turn. And Contrary Leaf Storm is even more unfair than Eruption.

Sometimes even the enemy AI makes really weird decisions. I also like how it will often try to cherry tap your Pokémon when they're low on HP, but fail because either you healed, or the attack they used was just way too weak. xD Tangrowth is extremely tanky for that point, yes. The next ones aren't going to be much easier either, so hopefully you've got a plan for them. Also: Chatot

I've swept Julia using only Grovyle twice, so shame about that Fury Cutter missing. It's still a pretty useful attack whenever neither combatant can properly hurt the other. (Hint: using a healing Item doesn't reset Fury Cutter's power.)

@rayyan I could still set up while he heals if my Pokémon was knocked out the previous turn, but yeah, it's a bit trickier with him.

Flamethrower rather than Lava Plume actually by now. But yes, that's actually good coverage. I'll just need to have her relearn Earth Power because I skipped out on it so I could keep Hidden Power and both STABS against Luna. Should've maybe planned that out a little better. ^^" ...as long as the Field cooperates, yes. xD Overall Nature Power really is very good in this game, particularly for Special Attackers. I'm glad Typhlosion has that one, because Fire+Swift+Hidden Power would be really bad coverage. xD (I could use the one with Extrasensory from 7th Street, but hell's gonna freeze over before I ever replace my Starter with anything else.)

It's one of those Pokémon I never even looked at before. The only thing about Shell Smash I somewhat regret is the fact that it takes away one moveslot that could be used for coverage. I like coverage. On the other hand I'm running Typhlosion with three Fire moves, so there's that. xp

He, I remember that one. All those Moxie Boosts and Close Combat debuffs. It is pretty funny, at least. Magcargo did get to sweep Bennett (again) right before, so at least she already had her moment to shine.

Geez, I already feel overloaded with my 12 Ground Types and you're running twice the number. ;P Also gonna second the suggestion to screenshot the coming battles. It's just nicer to actually see the combatants, especially the various Shinys you have.

After our last Gym Battle we had to deal with another kidnapping, this time Luna's, resulting in us raiding a cult's base. After rescuing Luna we make our way through Iollia Valley so we can challenge her to a Gym Battle, but Bennett shows up and wants us to leavi him alone with her. Yeah, that's not happening. Cue Battle VS Lepidopterist Bennett II The most hardest battle everest! With that out of the way we can go get our next Badge. Cue Battle! VS Dark Dreamer Luna Well, that was pretty easy. No Eruptions this time, because Typhlosion didn't even see any action. Neither did Pyroar. Umbreon's the only one of her Pokémon that put up something resembling a fight. This battle earned us another Badge, raising the Level Cap to 70, which I'm still far away from. We also get Dark Pulse, Pyroar learns it. (RIP Crunch, now what am I gonna do about her ability?) That's it for now, next up is Agate Circus - the Point Of No Return! Before that there are still a few preparations to be made. Until next time, see ya!

Totodile unfortunately needs all three Water HMs to get as far as I know, so that's not gonna help. You can look here for any other Pokémon you might like: You can go through the parts that require Surf&Co with just an HM Slave; the only troublesome Boss fight along the way lets you switch out your team beforehand.. There are two mandatory Boss fights where you are forced to have something that learns Surf and Waterfall on your team, but they're managable; there's also one probably harder battle that's optional. You'd still have to give up one teamslot for a whole bunch of grunt battles though. Whichever Pokémon you left in the Box would miss out on a good chunk of Exp.

Remember that you can remove HM moves whenever you want, so there's no need to have them as permanent parts of the moveset. You've got some decent coverage, although Ground Types can do a number on four of your Pokémon, while Charizard and Swoobat have nothing to counter them with. I know you said you're not planning to switch anything out, but you might want to get a Water Type anyway, since you'll have to use the Water HMs a lot later on. As for suggestions: Toxicroak looks good; Poison Jab would be more accurate than Gunk Shot, but that's a matter of preference. Bulk Up isn't a bad boosting move, but if you really want you could replace it with Bulldoze or one of the Elemental Punches later on. For now Toxicroak doesn't really get anything better. Swoobat can combine the ability Simple with Calm Mind for doubled SpAtk and SpDef after just one turn. That should improve his offense and staying power quite a bit. Electivire wants some more coverage. Fire Punch is available via Move Relearner and Brick Break should show up soon. Electric Field (also from the Move Relearner) is also an option, to gimp enemies' strategies. Arcanine gets Extreme Speed which is always worth consideration. You've already got Sucker Punch on Toxicroak, but ES is just a little more reliable. Crunch would be an option for Ghost and Psychic Types - the latter in particular Toxicroak doesn't like to go up against. Golem seems fine, aside from Strength. Potential replacements could be Bulldoze, Stealth Rock, Heavy Slam or maybe even Nature Power. Charizard wants Air Cutter over Wing Attack, available from the Move Relearner. Heat Wave is a little more powerful than Flamethrower and hits both enemies in Doubles, but is also less accurate. Its biggest plus over Flamethrower is probably being able to set a Burning Field and to melt Icy Field and Snowy Mountain. The last two moveslots can be situational TMs, it gets a decent bunch of them.

@rayyan I wann try not to abuse it too much... but it's just so fun to destroy everything with its ridiculous firepower.

That's a very nice Treecko you've got there, lucky. ;P I'm looking forward to see her performance throughout your run. *points at avatar and signature* There's no real rules on what is or isn't allowed in a Monotype, only what you yourself decide to be acceptable or not. Good luck with all the Poison trainers; I've got a feeling those are gonna be more of a hassle than Charlotte.

Mini-Update: We make our way back to Vanhanen Castle for our next Gym Battle. VS Grandmaster Radomus That was easy. Victory on the second try, althouth the first try was just trying out if Reuniclus and Gallade would go down to Eruption+Hyper Voice without the Normal Gem. They didn't, both just barely withstood the attack. Typhlosion's Eruption obviously carried me through here. Slowking's Trick Room could've easily put a stop to that, but for some reason the enemies seemed to prefer attacking Camerupt. Well, we got our next Badge, which raises the Level Cap again, and the TM for Trick Room, which might just come in handy way, waaaay later. That's it for this mini-Update. More should come tomorrow, or maybe even later on today. Until then, see ya!

I think most of us are here for the challenging battles, not the puzzles. With how tedious some of them *cough*AventurineWoods*cough* can get I'd say there's nothing wrong with looking up the solutions, so that you can at least get them done as quickly as possible.