Gentleman Jaggi

@Jess I remember Anorith's Rock Slide from my Flying Run. Nasty thing. @Neco I did use Compound Eyes, but only after some time. Afaik there aren't any Pokémon with Compound Eyes available while you're stuck past Agate City and I didn't have any in the PC, so I had a friend trade one over to me. Otherwise I probablywould've half a dozen more shinies before finally getting that Life Orb. Didn't use Frisk, just had my Pokémon get attacked. It's time to go deeper into freezing, hostile territories. After diving through Ametrine Mountain for a bit we reach the inside of that pyramind of ice, where a PULSE Avalugg is revelealed as the creator of the obstruction. Cue Battle. VS Pokémon Redoubt Avalugg lets out a last roar and disappears along with the pyramid, leaving only the PULSE-02 machine. Shelly is here and wonders about the machine's placement before going ahead towards Ametrine City. The exit to Ametrine Mountain is only a few minutes ahead. Upon arriving we search the entire cirty, talking to literally everybody, and find out about some mysterious "guardian angel" that's been supplying everyone with food for some time now. Gee, wonder who that might be. We also find a "suspicious" house and, in the process of searching it, learn about the origins of PULSE and how ZEL came to be three people. And then Nunya B. Snes shows up and shoos us out. Outside Shelly squeezes some information about Heather and that guardian angel out of a random kid, who shows us where to find her and that Blake guy. Surprisingly, he looks a lot like that Nunya guy earlier. Blake cuts straight to business and demands us to go get him the Ruby Ring in exchange for Heather. When we don't immediately bite he also offers the HM Waterfall on top. Shelly ends up revealing that we already have the Ring in our possession, so Blake changes his mind and just plain mugs us. That's, what, the third time now? We run out after Blake, but only find Cal. He has a little reunion chat with Shelly, talking about his new look on life and his new old hair colour. He also tells us that he heard Blake call in reinforcements from Team Meteor, so we have to hurry. He tells us about a secret passage in Blake's apartment that will likely lead us to Heather while he himself goes after Blake. One googled puzzle solution and a bit of walking later we find ourselves in front of the shack Heather is stuck in. Apparentally that door somehow managed to keep in her Salamence. We listen to her reflecting on her actions after Corey's death and then her and Shelly work together to bust open that door with Salamence and Yanmega. After Shelly's and Heather's heartfelt reunion they both fly towards the mountain peak to help Cal stop Blake. We follow after them. On foot, of course... We run into Cal talking to Blake and end up in a double battle against two Meteor Aces with him. After a second double battle Heather shows up on her Salamence and recruits Cal so he can help her make an aerial attack on Team Meteor's helicopters, one of which has Solaris on it. A bit further on we run into Shelly and team up with her for some more double battles. All the while Blake regularly waits for us to catch up so he can (ineffectively) taunt us. Eventually we reach a little cave that leads up to the very top of the mountain. Shelly goes on ahead, but we're held up by Aster insisting we fight him and baiting us with Waterfall. Cue Battle VS Meteor Ace Aster ... This battle went pretty smoothly, although I had to reset a few times because Milotic status-haxed its way through Swampert's HP and I refused to accept that. Aster holds true to his word and presents us with the HM Waterfall. "I thought if I could beat you- maybe once, if I used all my strength, and Eclipse's too-- Maybe I could be the one to fix everything. But it looks like that's your job." With that, he resigns from Team Meteor, wishes us good luck and tells us that he'll see us around. You've got a new start going there, now make it matter. We move on to the peak and find Shelly already having been defeated by Blake. Not much talking, cue Battle. VS Agent Blake And that was the long-awaited battle against Blake! My tactic went pretty much flawlessly here, although I expected Claydol to be faster than Rotom. This was the second try, the first had Claydol holding an Amplified Rock which resulted in a OHKO courtesy of Jynx's Blizzard. Blake refuses to give back the Ring anyway and since we're too nice to sic Swampert to crush his head or something we just watch a Meteor helicopter come closer. Blake gets ready to board it, but gets pummeled by Heather and Cal riding Salamence and Charizard respectively, the latter snatching the Ruby Ring back. Cal goes for another charge against Blake, who decides to get the hell out. Shelly manages to make him spit up that he doesn't know anything about Agate's sleeping signal being broadcasted from Ametrine and that somebody must have fooled us pretty good. That somebody was Terra, of course. Team Meteor leaves and we all just watch; so much for Heather crashing Blake's face in the ground as she wanted to. Heather and Shelly decide to return to Calcenon. Cal tells us that, as far as he's aware from his time in Meteor, there's no base up on the mountain that could broadcast a strong enough signal and that he knows Terra is a member of Team Meteor. Should have maaayybeee notified the authorities of that one, don't ya think? Cal gives us a lift back to Ametrine City and we start our long trek back to Agate Circus, so we can tie up some loose ends with Terra. Thanks to the shortcut we prepared way in advance the trek back actually isn't that long. We enter the Big Top's back room and, to our dismay, discover that Terra isn't around to receive her scheduled asskicking. Turns out she's been disapperaing for days at a time for quite a while now. Despite that Ciel findd the idea that Terra is a Meteor to be absolutely ridiculous, Samson seems to think it's possible, but Terra loudly crashes the party before he gets to articulate his thoughts. He confronts her with the Meteor deal which she tries to dodge for all of three seconds before just admitting that she's a member. Probably because she likes the attention from everyone that immediately earns her. She tries to sell us Batman's backstory as her reason for joining, but that falls flat. She then just disappears into her computer. Ciel: "I... beg your pardon?" The computer is waiting for a "Player 2" - that's us. Samson uploads us into Generation I so we can chase down Terra. We make our way through Glitch World, along the way possibly getting a glimpse of Reborn's Victory Road? Quickly afterwards we reach Glitch Cerulean Cave where we are challenged by, naturally, Mewtwo. Cue Battle VS PKMNPKMNT M2 Mewtwo Nothing to say here, moving on. Terra positioned herself in the Indigo League's Champion's room, of course. She tells us that she joined Team Meteor because she was bored. It's time to establish who's the better Ground Type Master, Cue Battle! VS M3G4 Terror T3RR4 Victory on the first try, though it was a bit off a weird battle. "Oh geez, that Mamoswine has two HP left, better nuke him!" Aside from Garchomp her team isn't really threatening. This victory earned us the Gravity Badge which doesn't do anything to the Level Cap but does allow us to use Waterfall. We also get the TM Bulldoze. That would've been useful about ten Badges ago. Terra says a bunch of stuff, but I skip her dialogue because UUUGGGH... She then runs off deeper into Glitch World with no way to follow, so we head back to the Big Top. Once we're out, Samson pulls the plug. Wow dude, you just straight up deleted her. That's savage. ... I'm not actually that optimistic. She's gonna show up again... Samson and Ciel promise to try and get some intel out of Terra, if she's still alright in there, so we're left to pursue our next objective. Next chapter: We're gonna save Amaria! And deal with Titania... Until then: See ya!

After the episode in the PULSE control center we're left to walk the rest of the way to Calcenon alone. Up at the waterfall on route 4 we spend three days some time trying to get a Life Orb from the Absol Event. For the record: two Shinys showed up before I finally got an Absol holding a Life Orb. That's gonna be a nice boost to Nidoking's attacks. Hardy is waiting for us inside Calcenon City's eastern gate house and tells us that Cain went to go visit some friends in the city, i.e. Shelly and co. When we tell him about Aya's kidnapping he just goes "u wot m8" and walks out on us. We find him again near the barrier cutting Calcenon off from Labradora, alongside Saphira. Upon talking to him he headbutts the barrier for a bit, when Fern shows up on the other site. Yup, he joined Team Meteor and thus graduated from Jerkass to proper Bad Guy. He riles up Hardy for a bit and then leaves. We leave Hardy be and go visit Cain and the others. Shelly wants to go look for Heather in Ametrine City, but there's still the matter of that giant ice pyramid. Anna announces that we'll just have to go under it; we've already got Dive so the only thing missing for that is Charlotte's Badge. It's amazing how all these Badges just happen to fall into the plot. Upon entering Calcenon's Gym we run into Laura fretting over having her position in the Elite 4 revoked. She runs out, and Charlotte goes after her. We go back to Saphira and Hardy right when Sirius shows up with Aya on the other side of the barrier. He demands the Ruby Ring in exchange for Aya. Saphira says to keep it while Hardy demands we hand it over, until Charlotte shows up and snathces the Ring away from us as part of a ruse. We meet up with Charlotte in the eastern gate house, get back the Ruby Ring and then agree to challenge her in the gym. Cue Gym Battle VS Firebug Charlotte This was actually the first time I battled her without just using Rock Slide and/or Earthquake on a fast Pokémon to destroy most of her team. Also the first time more than one of my team got KO'd. Now I finally really understand the trouble people have been having with her. Her team is overall pretty fast, with at least four of them being faster than everything I have; maybe five, not sure about Darmanitan vs Krookodile. Getting momentum with Trick Roomright at the start didn't work due to Doubles format, so I had to circumvent their Speed with Sand Rush. Once I got a headstart I was in a much better position than previously, but made som stupid mistakes... As far as I know Rotom knows Reflect - the fact it didn't use that absolutely saved me. This Bait-And-Switch tactic wasn't perfect either; I had to try a bunch of times because Typhlosion would randomly choose between Eruption, Heat Wave and Solar Beam. I also wanted to set a Sword Dance with Sandslash before starting the attack, to better get rid of Volcarona, but that just resulted in Darmanitan Flare Blitzing him into oblivion, so it had to work without. It'sfunny how my Type advantage meant absolutely nothing here... This victory earns us the cinder Badge, raising the Level Cap to 75 and allowing us to use Dive. Charlotte also gives us the TM Flamethrower, so we can "make [Team Meteor] pretty" for her. I.e., burn them. Nidoking and Camerupt learn it. That's it for today. Tomorrow we'll finally head for Ametrine City, getting ever closer to that anticipated battle with Blake. Until then, see ya!

Didn't really get into any of the other Digimon stuff, but Tamers is awesome. Not much of an anime-watcher (or TV in general), but that's one that just stuck with me. Dukemon is my fave, followed by Guilmon, Growmon and Renamon. I haven't really made myself notable outside of my own thread, so here's some info: I'm more of an introvert; although I can get (very) loud and excited when I'm around the right/wrong sort of people, most of the time I prefer to have a relaxed time when with friends. And in general really - I can be somewhat of a lazy bastard. I dislike having put unneccessary pressure on me, so everything I do in my own free time is usually without responsibilities and for the sole reason that I'm having fun doing it and will only keep doing it as long as it's still fun. I'm more task-oriented when money is involved, but I always remain a carefree and laid-back person. I'm basically immune to stress. I've got a certain tendency to get lost in what I'm doing, or to just completely space out when I'm not doing anything in particular. Walking a familiar path counts as "not doing anything". Once almost got run over by an ambulance, siren and all. Gaming-wise I'm open to mostly all genres, though I don't have any particular interest in shooters and horror games. RPGs tend to be pretty high on the list. I also prefer fantasy settings. In games where you get a choice, I'm always playing the good guy. Uhmm, I like dogs, but would never get because I know I'd get sick of the amount of work they require. I've lived all my life with cats; I like their general character and just having them around. I guess that should be enough to get a general picture of me?

Oh, you! Small progress was made. Chapter X: On The Road To Ametrine City We went to Amaria's and Titania's house to go grab Surf, but accidentally got dragged into a relationship drama by not reading Titania's diary and then getting chewed out for it. Turns out Titania was only together with Amaria because the latter is suicidally depressed. And now she knows. Which is, of course, totally our fault. So now Amaria jumped down the waterfall and Titania right after her, demanding that we go find some way to drag them both up again. We did get Surf though, so onwards to Calcenon City! The way through the mountains has a whole lot of ice and water. Also absolutely no way to tell where you have to go, so that's nice. Along the way we run into a shiny Phanpy! After wandering around for some time we eventually run into Aya, Cain and Hardy, all staring at a giant pyramid of ice that's blocking the way to Ametrine City. Great. We ask about Waterfall and Hardy informs us that that one's in Ametrine as well. Double Great. The pyramid withstands all attempts to destroy it, so we decide to head on to Calcenon for now. The exit to Route 3 is only a short bit ahead and there's an entry into the city just a few steps further. Said entrance gets bombarded right in front of us; Cain almost dies. That explosion was courtesy of a PULSE Clawitzer pelting the city with its attacks and Saphira rather has her hands full protecting the city. Poor Cain nearly turned into collateral damage. With the entrance here destroyed we have to go around to the eastern entrance instead. Route 3 is supposedly no big deal to get through, except all the bridges turned into collateral damage, so now it is a big deal. Our grip gets split up and we're left to go the long way through the caves teamed up with Aya while Cain and Hardy go ahead. Said caves, naturally, are also Meteor infested. After battling our way through the caves on Route 3 we find out that we've sort of accidentally infiltrated the base where Team Meteor controls the PULSE Clawitzer from. Success? Aster and Eclipse are here, apparentally in charge. He wants to battle, she not so much but gets dragged along anyway. Cue Battle. VS Meteor Knight Aster and Meteor Dame Eclipse This battle is so goddamn long, there's just so much opportunity for something to go horribly wrong and their teams are filled with some of the most pesky things I have encountered in this game, dear me. x.x Nevertheless, I might've actually managed this on the first try if I had taken away Claydol's Amplified Rock. Or if I had gotten/taken a better opportunity to start a Moxie Sweep. Eclipse declares that she's done - not with this fight, but with Team Meteor outright - and turns off the PULSE Clawitzer; we weren't here for that, but still cool. Our aimless wandering achieved something! Eclipse gets into an argument with Aster and reveals that she turned off the PULSE because her father lives in Calcenon. We just kind of awkwardly stand by with Aya. Our newly reformed enemy offers up some information about Team Meteor; that, while Solaris was still their leader, they were strictly using non-violent means to try to get people out of Reborn City and that Lin is the one who's responsible for their current course of action. All the while Sirius calmly marches in and, without saying anything beforehand, has his Chandelure burn away Eclipse's soul. Alas, denied a chance at redemption for your deeds. Maybe we shouldn't have been standing around talking so much. Sirius tries to sic his Chandelure at us next, but Aya gets in the way and he promptly decides to keep her as a hostage. With our team in a pretty bad shape we can't do anything but to let him leave. Aster leaves as well, taking Eclipse's body with him. We are left to make the remaining way to Calcenon City on our own. That's it for today, I really need to go sleep. That battle took way too long. Until next time, See ya!

Oh? I was absolutely sure that a high Attack stat also plays into it. Need to look that up once I get to it. Preparation can make or break a battle, definitely. Preparation is the entire reason I've got Claydol around, in fact. xD I've got a good feeling about all the upcoming battles. There's no shortage of options at this point, and I know what's still in store for me. I'm well prepared, I'd dare say.

Chatter is a crime and should not exist. Seems like many of your Pokémon have some specific way in which they deal with enemies. (Dustox poison-stalling, Ariados's Night Shade and Sucker Punch) They may lack raw power, but they've got their tools and you're obviously smart enough to know how to utilize them. (I tend to be way too focused on quickly beating everything, so this is completely honest praise here.) Looking forward to the battle against Shelly. Also Corey's Crobat, I'd expect that one to be a real pain.

I knew about the ability thing, but still you'd expect a Pokémon with a good Attack stat like Mamoswine to at least not get terrible rolls, wouldn't you agree? RNG screwing people over isn't new in Pokémon, but it's still annoying when it happens at a crucial moment. Hmm, maybe on my next run I should make sure to have something with one of those abilities to test it out. Thanks for the words of encouragement! The Ametrine Mountain Arc is getting closer and I'm really anticipating the battle against Blake. In general, I'd say that some of the most interesting fights are still coming up. (For me, anyway - the records here will likely end up being pretty straightforward, if my plans work out.)

Alright, I've bred and trained some new Pokémon so this is how our core team will look from now on: These guys are in rotation for whenever they'll be usefull: I also debated about training a Flygon, but decided against it because I'm already using one on my main run. Krookodile already plays a similar role anyway. Grinding the new guys also maxed out my money, so I went and bought a lot of Berries, Gems and Hold Items that might come in useful at some point. With that done it's time to meet up with Cain at Agate City. The guards at the entry point are still asleep, so Cain has his Nidoking crash the door. The city itself is pretty much dead; completely silent and nobody's to be seen. Well, except for Aya and Hardy just sleeping right on the street. As well as this Meteor Grunt that quickly retreats out of the screen: Aya and Hardy won't wake up and Cain notes that he feels tired as well. Just as we're about to fall asleep forever as well we are saved by the timely arrival of Reborn's worst character. I hate Terra. She disregards physics and reason with no explanation whatsoever other than "She just does that" and is extremely obnoxious. I'm the type of player that reads every piece of dialogue no matter how often I've played a game, but Terra makes me skip any scene she appears in. She's also the Ground Type Leader, so at least I'll get to prove myself the better Ground Type Master later on. Anyhow, There's something putting everybody in the city to sleep (obviously), so Terra sends the two sleepers flying for miles with a giant mallet she pulled out of hammerspace; Cain decides he'd rather walk out of the City. After exiting the city (the normal way) we find ourselves in Chapter IX: Circus of no Return Agate Circus has become kind of a refuge for everyone stranded by Agate City being impassable. Aya apparentally crashed down somewhere around here and sure enough, we find her in the biggest tent around here, already having been taken care of by the other two Gym Leaders here - Samson (Fighting) and Ciel (Flying). Hardy didn't have as much luck - he soared right over the circus and probably landed somewhere on Route 2 Crustle Hell. Cain wants to catch up with Aya for a bit, so it's up to us to find Hardy - not because Aya misses him or anything like that, b-baka! Before leaving the Circus we buy a shit ton of Cotton Candy to Revive team members and get the HM Dive so we don't have to do so later. Route 2 is, well, Crustle Hell. I like Reborn, just not the overly blown-up puzzles. After shoving about a dozen Crustles into holes in the ground so we can trample over them we finally reach the end of Route 2. There's a giant waterfall, the Celestinine Cascade, as well as a house. Amaria, the Water Type Leader from way back when lives here, together with her girlfriend Titania, that pointlessly angry lady from Route 1. Remember how Amaria took a Superpower from a freaking Tyranitar? She's still recovering from that one. Hardy is here as well, still sleeping. Titania is his sister and she wakes him up by beating the crap out of him. You know, just in case you didn't yet know what kinda person she is. As we're about to leave our attention is brought to a news report on the TV. Remember how our friends from the Orphanage Raid were headed to Calcenon City? Turns out Team Meteor took over Labradorra City right next to it and now they're basically at war. We, obviously, want to help our friends so we'll have to get there, but to do so we'll need the HM Surf. Luckily, T&A have that one lying around somewhere and they'll give it to us if we go beat Samson, since we're gonna need another Badge to use it anyway. Time to backtrack all the way to the Circus! Once we're there, we pretty quickly get to face Samson. Cue Gym Battle VS Strongman Samson Pretty sure that's the highest number of screenshots any battle got so far. Anyhow, this one took about half a dozen tries. The first ones were all just trying various ways to get past Hariyama without having all my best 'Mons taken out. Then I had one where I ended up with almost exactly the same situation (minus Krookodile and Claydol, plus Nidoking, Mamoswine didn't need to get healed) once Conkeldurr came out. I lost at the last second that time, but now I won. Okay. Screw the High Striker Effect though. At one point Mamoswine, who has higher Base Atk than Hariyama, got two "WEAK" in a row. What's that thing's idea of a "high" Attack stat? This victory earns us the Fury Badge (long overdue) which doesn't raise the Level Cap (it's at 70 right now anyway), but does boost the Attack stat a bit, as well as the TM Brick Break. Fighting Attacks are useful for coverage, so this is nice. Nidoking learns it. After the battle we meet up with everyone in the Big Top's back room again, where Terra's giant computer has apparentally identified the sleeping signal over Agate as coming from Ametrine City. Another new destination, and we'll need Surf to get there as well. We decide to meet up with Cain, Aya and Hardy at Calcenon and continue on from there. That's it for today! Until next time See ya!

Hey, thank you! Screenshotting everything actually isn't hard at all since pressing F8 automatically saves one to the Reborn folder and I know a good uploading site. Still, sometimes when I have to restart a battle a lot I end up forgetting to screencap more often. Luckily enough I don't think I've ever forgotten to screenshot any key points in battle, only random in-between things. Bug Monorun sounds like it would be pretty difficult in early and midgame. I'd like to do one myself some time in the far off future, so I'll definitely keep my eyes peeled for your thread.

Congratz on your victory! Sounds like you had quite a number of nerve wracking moments in that battle. Personally I think that kind of battle is one of the most fun kind. Mmh, would it be too much of a spoiler to tell if any Pokémon you used ended up accomplishing much more than you expected? ;p

We move back through the darkened Gym and promptly walk into a trap that El had set up for us. Surprise! Seems Luna has been kidnapped this time and El planned to take care of us while we're softened up from the previous Gym Battle. Cain will be having none of that and holds El up so we can get out of there. The garden maze outside is already blocked off by Meteor Grunts, but Radomus is there to show us a secret passage. Namely to just run around up on the walls where the Grunts can neither see nor reach us, because periphery vision does not exist in a 2D world. Radomus leaves us with a bunch more cryptic words, as well as a new destination: Reborn City's 7th Street. Apparentally the city's underworld can lead us there, so we go hit up Maxwell's Magma Gang, who arranges for us to gain entry. 7th Street is a hellhole of criminals and drug addicts, but the person we run into down here happens to be Bennett. He rather helpfully agrees to let us enter their cult's base where we immediately walk into a trap and get stuffed behind bars. Bennett: "You actually thought I was that dumb, didn't you?" Yes. The guy in the cell next to us somehow managed to sneak in his Klefki and graciously has it open our cell, leaving us to roam about. After sneaking past a bunch of cultists we beat up some more of them and then puzzle our way through a door to get to an altar where El is planning to do some sort of ritual on Luna. Totally doesn't look like he's going to sacrifice her. Normally this would be the point where we wreck some faces, but El has Cain as hostage. Fortunately, Radomus is already here in disguise and has Gardevoir pop in and Teleport out all those cultist goons while he personally restrains El. The following scene is pretty hilarious; there's like three separate conversations going on at the same time which just doesn't translate well into dialogue fields. Anyhow, El takes the Emerald Brooch away from Luna and our group Teleports out. Radomus announces that he has something to attend to and Teleports away with Gardevoir (rip Cain's gym battle), while Luna hands us the Crystal Key so we can come challenge her in Backtrack Iolia Valley. Cain leaves to maybe wake up those guys at Agate City. Iolia Valley is pretty uneventful, being mainly a trek back and forth to get more pieces for the Crystal Key so we can progress through. Bennett shows up here though and apparentally wants to apologize to Luna. He also wants us to stay away and leave the two alone. No. Eventually we find Luna, but unfortunately Bennett is still stalking us. Luna doesn't want to hear his confessions and runs away to her arena, prompting Bennett to attack us so he can get the Crystal Keys from us. Cue Battle. VS Lepidopterist Bennett I'm not gonna lie, this guy always manage to be a lot stronger than I'd expect a team half made out of common Bugs to expect, but he's still got many weaknesses. Yanmega is the main threat, get that out of the way and it's pretty much over. Still, there's always that low chance he might decide to go Sleep Powder=>Quiver Dance with any of his two Pokémon who can do that, but I guess unless he gets hardcoded to do so the chances of his AI being that smart are pretty low. Bennett calls himself stupid a few times and then leaves, but announces that he's still planning to go for the top and that next time we meet "things will be different." Just one more person out for our blood, I guess. No biggie. With that out of the way it's time for Luna. Cue Gym Battle VS Dark Dreamer Luna I initially tried to go through this fight without abusing Moxie or the cave in mechanic, but kept running into problems with Tyranitar and Malamar. Eventually I ran out of patience... This took way too many tries, but I feel like that was just because I overlooked something that would have made it easier. Definitely had a number of strategically weak moments in these battles. This victory earns us the Eclipse Badge, raising the Level Cap to 70, as well as the TM Dark Pulse. Which is pretty useless for this team. Luna decides that it's probably safer for here to stay in Iolia Valley for now. She also reminds us that Cain wanted to go to Agate City, so I guess that's where we're going next as well. That's it for today, next update will likely take some time. I want to prepare some more before crossing the point of no return; breed and train two or three Pokémon to put into rotation, maybe fiddle with my current team's EV if I can be bothered to do the South Hell Woods puzzle. Until next time, see ya!

I'm not dead! *cough* Yeah, I, uh, underestimated how long an Open World-Zelda with 120 mini-Dungeons spread arounnd would take me to go through. And afterwards I got a bit sidetracked playing Odin Sphere Leifthrasir. Pretty great game, though at times depressing... Crushingly so. That Bad Ending, I swear. Anyhow, I've got nothing better to do right now so time to finally get back to this. I dislike leaving things like this unfinished. Chapter VIII: El's plan So, more than a month ago we got done with the Tanzan Mountain Arc and now it's time to move on towards Route 1. The path leads through South Aventurine Wood HELL for a short bit, but we quickly reach the Route proper and are immediately greeted by Fern. He's apparentally pulled ahead of us in the Badges department somehow and now wants to show off his stuff again. Cue Battle VS Swag Jockey Fern (Why are there different colours in that dropdown now this is gonna make everything so much harder) It's been some time but I'm pretty sure this is the first time in this run that Fern received such a thorough defeat. We sure have come a long way since Mud Slapping things to survive and complaining about low Speed stats. Fern kindly, via his gloating, informs us that there's a Gym towards the east, so time to move there. He also tells us that Agate City is apparentally closed off by sleeping people -okay- and that he's going to track down Noel. (Good luck with that; I'm sure Saphira would react really well to some random ass tracking their group.) While making our way east Sandslash learns Earthquake. We also come across some mysterious red-haired lady who totally isn't having suspicious dealings with Team Meteor, but still decides to not tell us what she's doing. "I don't know what sort of hero-complex you've got ingrained into your head that you feel the need to jump into anyone else's business." I was literally passing through, not my fault you're doing your little conspiracies in a public forest. Besides, my hero-complex is currently saving this region so, in your words, "get over it." We eventually reach the gym located here - Vanhanen Castle. That name ring a bell? It should, because inside we are immediately greeted by Luna. Remember Luna? That girl that adopted herself into Serra's household along with a Gardevoir and then one day just up and vanished. The one that Bennett sold out to El. Uh-oh. Turns out she adopted herself into this place as well. The Gym Leader here is Radomus, an... eccentric fellow. His partner is that talking Gardevoir from the TV. They're a weird pair. Soon enough Cain shows up, also planning on a Gym Battle. He also informs us that he's managed to find Heather, who apparentally has been adopted by some guy named Blake up in Ametrine City. We totally don't know that name from Meteor-related affairs, so I'm sure she'll be fine. Anyhow, Radomus doesn't quite feel like Double Battling Cain and us so we end up having a battle to decide who gets first turn. I guess "first come first served" doesn't count? Cue Battle VS Pretty Boy Cain Pretty easy battle overall. Krookodile could have probably swept this thing if I had let him. Turns out that while we were distracted with that battle somebody went ahead and abducted Gardevoir and is now holding her for ransom - the ransom in question being Luna. Cain immediately decides that we're going to have to rescue her while Radomus insists that that isn't neccessary. Cain, rather understandably, declares that Radomus isn't making any sense and goes off to rescue Gardevoir. Luna attempts to follow behind, but is stopped by Radomus explaining that she shouldn't put herself in danger when she's the one the enemy is after and then announces that he'll be going himself. He also changes into some sort of Sherlock costume. We follow after, leaving the in-very-high-danger-of-being-abducted Luna behind alone. Radomus deduces that the only place the monnapper could have fled to is Reborn City, meaning we get to cross Route 1 all the way to its western end. I somehow managed to miss the guy with a Lv. 60 Luxray on the way despite looking around for trainers. That means I probably missed a bunch more and that's going to be bugging me for hours. We're the first to arrive at the city's still sealed gates and thus witness El disappearing somewhere into the huge city wall. After a rather amusing scene we follow the rapidly descending Cain down into the cave system Below The Grand Staircase. Eventually we find ourselves on the other side of that huge sealed door where we first met Solaris. A bit further in is a large tower-like structure with a weird name. Citae d'arc da-something. There we run into some Adrienn person and Gossip Gardevoir, who apparentally now hates Radomus's guts. (Everybody who has watched their interview knows that that's just about the opposite of the truth.) No shifty things going on here, no sir. Apparentally we're also now thieves who stole the Ruby Ring and Amethyst Pendant from El. Something's shifty here and it ain't us. "Guardevoir" then proceeds to mug us for the Pendant and only doesn't manage to get the Ring too because Cain intervenes. Our newly gained adversaries retreat into the tower and we follow after, solving "some of these guys are lying"-kinda puzzles. I hate those. Somehow still have the answers memorized tho, there's a pattern. Halfway up we run into Adrienn who has now begun questioning this whole situation. We all decide to go further up to the top to get our answers from El. Up there we find El which leads into an outrageously long cutscene with no movements whatsoever. Turns out Arceus is supposedly resting behind the door up here, which requires all four keys to unseal and El is planning on doing just that. Radomus also continues making no sense to everybody out of the loop. Eventually we're presented with a choice: we can side with either El or Radomus in this whole deal. Let's consider this for a bit: Radomus has so far been acting rather suspicious, callous and uncaring. He didn't feel any need to go rescue Gardevoir and has been very nonchalant about her apparent surfaced hatred towards him. He also made no efforts to explain himself in any way, constantly leaving everyone in the dark about his thoughts. Doesn't look too good for him, huh? On the other hand we have El - some sort of religious fanatic, works with Team Meteor, wants to end this world. Claims to be the owner of the keys, but we know better. Overall has Bad Guy stampled all over him. Turns out things actually are looking good for Radomud; we have essentially no idea what's his deal, but we know for a fact that El is bad news and Radomous couldn't possibly be worse, so the answer is clear. We side with Radomus. And, unsurprisingly, we picked right. That "Gardevoir" right there was actually El's Ditto. Which somehow managed to talk. Suddenly his behaviour makes a whole lot more sense. El doesn't particularly like that we saw through him *cough* and has his Ditto use the energy surrounding this place to Transform into Arceus. Uh-oh. Cue Battle. VS Dittoceus Parson El I've actually never before had so much trouble with this battle. My teams before were either strong enough to brute force it or had the neccessary move to cripple it ready. This was the first time I actually had to go back and switch out one of my team members to go grab something with a particular attack. After the battle the question of "but where is Gardevoir" gets answered by Radomus having her Teleport in and Hypnosis El to sleep. So, in the end, this whole trip was somewhat pointless. But we got plot out of it, I suppose. As we leave the Citae's cave some (presumably) creepy child voice calls out for that "it was fun" and to "come back and play again" sometime. As soon as we get out of the cave system we notice something off: The Grand Gate is open Adrienn also notes that the city is in a decidedly more sorry state than before they fell down into those caves "a few hours ago". After a bit of confused questions on all sides they rush off to check on their Gym at Coral Ward. We already came across that one earlier; it's abandoned and quite destroyed. Adrienn continues insisting that their Gym, as well as the city as a whole, was still fine "this morning", which has Radomus deduce that they must have been frozen in time for more than a decade. The hell is Dialga doing? Rather dejected at the state Reborn City is in now our new friend declares their intent to fix it. Yes, the whole city. Cain directs them to Ame at Grand Hall and the rest of the group returns to Vanhanen Castle. We do still have a Gym Battle to win. Back at the Gym we find Luna still there waiting for us. She's pretty happy everything worked out. Radomus then brings in El, who has apparentall been brainwashed into being the Castle's butler. Sure Radomus, you just go ahead and be as suspicious as you possibly can. Luna is, quite understandably, perturbed und proceeds to get the hell away from him. El then hands the Amethyst Pendant over to Radomus who announces that he will be keeping it for some time. Suspicions. That was quite a lot of plot; I promise the following parts will be less wordy but all of this was fairly important and I want all these happenings to have some context, even if we all already know it. With all that out of the way it's finally time for our next gym challenge. The puzzle here is chess-based, which makes me really want to play some chess again. Once we've solved the puzzles and beaten the trainers it's time for Radomus himself. Cue Gym Battle VS Grandmaster Radomus This battle wasn't particularly challenging, but I did need a few tries to find an initial setup that takes care of Reuniclus without sacrificing Krookodile, Nidoking or Camerupt to Gallade and Metagross. Turns out Sandslash can do really well if he's faster than his foe which, unfortunately, doesn't happen very often. Anyhow, this has still reaffirmed my decision to keep him around. This battle earns us the Millenium Badge, raising the Level cap to 65, as well as the TM Trick Room. I might end up building a secondary team around that one, depending on how grindy I feel. Luna announces that she wants to battle us next and goes into a little spiel about darkness, before someone turns off the lights. There's a bit of general confusion following and everyone quickly decides to go look what's up here. That's it for today. The next part will follow tomorrow, if nothing else comes up. See ya!

Have Charizard relearn Air Slash as well; it's stronger than Wing Attack and Charizard's SpAtk. is higher. There's a Move Relearner hanging out somewhere in the south ark of the circus I think. Best training spot should be the colour-themed clown near the Big Top, although some of his teams can be pretty tough.

There's only a few more things to do in Tanzan Mountain. First: Going back into the Tanzan Depths to capture a Hippopotas. The one I got has the wrong ability and unfitting IV and nature, but it's female, so I'll probably just breed it some time later. Next, since Saphira's nowhere to be found, going back up to everyone else at Belrose Manse. Anna and Noel are, somehow, both already here as well; after some discussion about Saphira's situation and Team Meteor's plan we actually get to fight Noel this time. Cue Gym Battle VS Prodigy Noel This battle was actually somewhat tough, but only due to Minccino. Clefable was pretty much just a matter of wearing it down and Girafarig only managed to really do stuff because I got sloppy. This victory earns us the Standard Badge, which raises the level cap to 60, as well as the TM for Hidden Power. I don't think anybody in my time has use for that though... After the battle Noel asks us to go look around for Saphira, right when Team Meteor's base in the mountain explodes. Better hurry up. We find Saphira on the west side of the mountain when she blasts right through a wall. Unsurprisingly it turns out she's the reason for the explosion earlier. She entrusts us with the Ruby Ring and Amethyst Pendant she manage to take back from Meteor, trusting us that we'll be able to fend off Team Meteor when they try to take them from us. She also tells us to split up from the group for now to minimize the risk on the kids and to meet them again at Calcenon City later on. With that, she takes her leave and we're left to exit Tanzan Mountain and explore Route 1. That concludes Chapter VII. We've been fighting Team Meteor for quite some time now, but from now on the plot revolving around them will really pick up. An important note: Updates will be put on hold for the next about two weeks. Starting Friday I'll be busy playing Zelda: Breath of the Wild and I'll be away from home for most of the week after. Updates will resume on March 12th at the earliest, most likely one to three days after. Until then, See Ya!

Anna expects us to fight Noel, so everybody runs outside and takes position. Cue Gym B- ? Nope. We're interrupted by a person riding on a Dragonite. She's Saphira, Charlotte's eldest sister, and a Gym Leader. Turns out Sigmund and Team Meteor are on their way over to get the kids, so our Gym Battle will have to wait. Saphira orders a battle plan and everybody takes position. Our job is to guard the door while Laura will guard the upper floor. Saphira charges the Meteors coming across the lake and Charlotte, Anna, Noel and, for some reason, Shelly keep themselves hidden. Soon enough Sigmund waltzes right through the door, but instead of facing us he just has his two Orderlies keep us busy while he goes upstairs. So much for "any dumb Meteor or doctor who comes through gets their face smashed in." After we're done knocking around those Orderlies Team Meteor's Sirius walks in, cursing about Saphira attacking his troup on the lake. He's pretty pissed and not at all happy to see us. Cue Battle. VS Meteor Admin Sirius That was an almost disappointingly easy battle, but to be fair: His team's pretty weak to Ground. Right after we finish our battle we hear Laura upstairs scream. Now, we could go up there to check on her, but that would leave Sirius free reign on the lower floor. And besides: Laura's an Elite 4, she's gotta be able to handle herself, no? So we stay. And watch Sirius nearly piss his pants when Saphira comes in. He quickly teleports out, but not without informing us that Sigmund has apparentally managed to capture two of the kids. Turns out Laura couldn't handle herself against Sigmund, because he didn't even bother fighting her and instead just had his Pokémon shock her. So now the twins got kidnapped, again. And we're gonna meet up with Saphira in Meteor's base in Tanzan Mountain to rescue them, again. By the time we reach the entrance to their base Saphira has already murderized the dudes guarding the door. Gee, chill out woman, they're just Grunts... There's not much to say about the base. Spinny transporter things and Grunts out the whazoo. We battle our way through and run into Anna and Noel behind bars; they're pretty used to it by now. We move on to go find the key to their cell, along the way running into Saphira and protecting her while she hacks the security. We move on again and beat up some more grunts and scientists so we can open the door to the project room, where Sigmund and ZEL (well, mostly ZEL, Sigmund's just standing there) are rather unsuccessfully trying to get a PULSE Abra under their control. Sirius shows up as well and he still doesn't like us, but apparentally it's more important that Lin, their true boss, is going to check up on their work. Which is bad, because if it doesn't work she's going to take everyone's heads. Be that as it may, Saphira announces that she's going to wreck their faces anyway and promtly gets teleported away by Abra. Immediately followed by us. I guess Abra dislikes us even more than Team Meteor? Rude. We find ourselves in some dark cave filled with toxic waste. After running about for a bit we find Saphira, who's stuck even deeper below at the bottom of an abyss. We run around some more and eventually find the source of the earthquakes that have been plaguing the area recently. Or rather, the source finds us - a gigantic Steelix pissed at all the trash getting tossed into its home attacks us. Cue Battle. VS Pokémon Gargantuan It retreats back into the chasm and immediately comes back up - with Saphira riding on its head. With Onix hel we make our way back to the entrance to the base and, while Saphira goes to bust out the twins, we go to take care of that PULSE Abra. We find ZEL still unsuccessfully trying to get Abra under controle all the while being teleported around the room. And then right outside the door. They then have us fix their problems for them. Cue Battle. VS Meteor Admin ZEL... kinda sorta Sirius shows up and informs everybody that Lin has just arrived. He also notes that we managed to make it back here. Since he can't have an enemy run around while their Big Boss comes to visit he rather plainly decides that we're now a new recruit, because that way maybe we won't all get murdered to shreds. Lin doesn't buy it for one second, but aparentally doesn't care. During the conversation Sirius also casually drops that El is working with Team Meteor to get the four keys. He has no reason to believe we already know that (In fact, playing through this the first time you can't know, only have a hunch.), so why would he mention it so casually? A Grunt runs in and reports that a giant Steelix has been ripping their base a new one and took the entire holding cells with it. Lin goes out to deal with it and sure enough, we're treated to a short cutscene of Lin shooting down Saphira and Steelix with her Hydreigon. That's our chance to hightail it out of here, so we leave Tanzan Mountain's Meteor Base behind us. That's it for today; I'll try to get the last bit of Tanzan Mountain done sometime in the coming days. Until then, See Ya!

Nope, not dead yet! I tried to post an updates earlier this week, but something ate it and then I got sidetracked with breeding. Anyhow, let's not delay this any further: Chapter VII: Tanzan Mountain I lost the first part I had already written up, featuring saving the kids at Yureyu HQ and fighting Sigmund, as well as arriving at Belrose Manse, so here's a summary: We fought our way through the Meteor-infested Yureyu HQ and eventually battled Sigmund to free Heather. That battle was more of a hassle than it had any right to be, mainly because Electivire's Ice Punch kept freezing the 'Mons I was relying on to beat it and Cain was being no help whatsoever. Right after exiting the Railnet Heather jumped on her Salamence and flew away while followed to make sure she's gonna be OK. Shortly afterwards we arrived at Belrose Manse and were introduced to Charlotte's sister Laura, who's one of the Elite 4. We quickly got sent away to go pick up some medicine in Spinel Town because Anna Nostra is sick. Before leaving Onix gets put into the PC. Byebye, see you once I find a metal coat. A small detour back to Reborn City's Daycare and Move Relearner resulted in following changes to the team: I also picked up a whole lot of Type Berries - including, of course, those that weaken Ice. With that done it was time to trek back through the Railnet and towards Spinel Town's Pokémart. Unfortunately, everything in Spinel Town recently has picked up the habit of randomly teleporting around, so the Pokémart ends up porting itself right on top of the local Gym. We're introduced to Ice Leader Serra and her son Bennett, as well as Elias, who is totally not a cult fanatic. Since we can't reach the Pokémart Serra decides that we might as well have a Gym Battle. Before that, however, we're challenged by Bennett, who wants to become a Gym Leader and thus battles all of his mother's challengers. Cue Battle VS my hair is a Zorua Lepidopterist Bennett I got lucky that Larvesta's Flame Body didn't burn Krookodile and that Vivillon got flinched; from then on there wasn't even any resistance. Still, using a Dark Type of all things to sweep this guy... Hehe. El announces that Bennett is apparentally Elite 4-material. Guess that makes us the Champ, huh? Like we didn't know that already. The two leave to discuss their dealings and El leaves us with an ominous "All is reflected within the eyes of the lord, remember this." Ugh With that out of the way it's time to face Serra. Cue Gym Battle, while Bennett sells himself out for fame. VS Beauty Queen Serra Victory on the first try and a lot easier than I had expected at that. Didn't even have to crash her mirrors. This victory earns us the Rime badge, which raises the Level cap to 55 and slightly boosts our Speed (hooray!), as well as the TM for Frost Breath. It's always a Critical, but nothing in my team can learn it. No, not even Mamoswine. During the post battle-dialogue a quake shakes the house, so we go check outside. Meanwhile Bennett sells out his adoptive sister-slash-crush as well. Serra tells us that the Pokémart seems to be gone, and so is Bennett. "I'm sure he can take care of himself, but he doesn't always make the best choices." Hoo, boy. You have no idea. Serra sends us away, though I've got doubts about how good of an idea it is to just leaver her alone. I just don't know what to think of her... Anyhow; the Pokémart teleported right to the other side of Chrysolia Forest, right next to the path leading to Tanzan Cove, so that's good. Less good is the fact that there's now some random kid stranded inside it. Err... It's time to finally go give Anna that Medicine! She proceeds to pour it all over her Jirachi doll of questionable liveliness. And gets better anyway. Alright, moving on. Anna wants to Noel to have a Gym Battle with us, because apparentally it's important we get as many badges as possible as fast as possible. Charlotte passes for now, because apparentally we're not up to her "rank" yet. Rude? That's it for now. I'll try to post another part later today, hopefully finishing everything at Tanzan Mountain. Until then, See Ya! Current playtime: 23:32

Charizard most definitely isn't a bad choice for a starter. Almost all major battles are fought indoors anyway, with only Noel and most Rival fights being affected by weather. Charmeleon's Dragon Rage destroys everything early on. (Well, except Cradily) Charizard only falls into a slump a bit after evolving when it's lack of special moves drags it down. It's still plenty powerful against everything it can just use Flame Burst on. Heat Wave and Air Cutter then pump up its offensive capabilities a whole lot. During my Flying Run Charizard has quite consistently been the powerhouse of my team with just those two moves and some varying physical TMs - Charizard's Attack stat is still workable and it can use some potentially useful TMs like Shadow Claw and Brick Break. Can't say anything about Tepig; never used that one. Treecko/Sceptile suffers from lack of special options pretty much the whole time, but its good physical movepool can help it carry though. To me it's always been very reliable. I'd agree that the more difficult starter choices are probably the defensive one. They may not neccessarily be bad, but the way they have to be used can make it harder for them to pull their weight in random battles where you don't want to spend much time setting up defenses and disabling the enemies.

The very first thing we run into on Azurine Island turns out to be a shiny Amoonguss of all things. A Timer Ball, Heavy Ball I think(?) and... no idea what the head is We find one of Cain's earrings lying on the ground here, so that's confirmation that he's at least been here. Also I think it's funny that the protagonist can recognize Cain's jewelry even though we've only met him like five times so far. We also run into a shiny Foongus (WHY?) That one's easy - a Great Ball Just when I start to get sick of mushrooms we finally reach the only hut on this island. Inside we run into Aster and Eclipse who note that, this time, we're outnumbered. Cue Battle VS Meteor Grunts Aster&Eclipse Mostly an easy battle, but Milotic made me sweat for a bit. Eclipse taunts us that we'll never find Cain, but Aster lets slip that he's somewhere in this building, much to Eclipse's chagrin. The two bail using the Secret Villain Teleporter Exit™, leaving us to find a hidden passage. At its end we run into Taka, as well as both Cain and a Camerupt behind bars. Taka: "Anyway, we were also ordered to capture you. And since you sorta just waltzed in here... Yeah, that's a thing." He cares so much. Cue Battle VS Meteor Admin Taka Team Meteor plans to erupt Pyrous Mountain with a PULSE Camerupt, so we have to head there and stop them. Cain rushes ahead, even though our boat should really be faster. Cain rushed up the mountain first, followed by us teamed up with Victoria. The constant Double Battle along the way allow Piloswine to catch up in levels; Nidoking also learns Earth Power, finally giving him a useful STAB. Considering his lack of one, he's held up surprisingly well so far. Up at the crater we run into Cain, Cal, Taka and Solaris. Cain already lost to Taka and Solaris, so we and Victoria take on one each. We also find out that Taka is Solaris's son. Cue Battle VS Meteor Leader Solaris Everybody present is suitably freaked out by our unstoppable protagonistness being soundly beaten. Except for Kiki, because she doesn't know us well enough. She sics her Medicham right on the PULSE machine, but Cal, on Solaris's order, has his Magmortar throw it into the Lava. Solaris then has his Garchomp kill Kiki. Cal complains that this wasn't part of the plan and, after reflecting on the nature of strength and weakness for a bit, has his Magmortar destroy the PULSE. Solaris calls him useless for a bit and then retreats along with Taka. Cal subsequently gets chewed out by Victoria and leaves. Back at the Academy Victoria presents us with the TM Strength, but also informs us that with Kiki's death our Gym Battle with her and claim on the Fury Badge are now null and void. At least we got the main objective of this whole trip and Apophyll didn't get nuked. What's missing now is only the Venom Badge so we can use Strength; Cain heads off back to the city to meet us there at the gate to the Wasteland. Victoria will remain at the Academy to take Kiki's place there. "Don't keep those kids waiting. We've done that enough." Seriously Cain is waiting for us in South Obsidia, but won't open the gate without fighting us first. Cue Battle VS Pretty Boy Cain Not much to say about this battle. The level cap is looming... Cain opens the gate for us and heads off back to the Railnet to meet us there later. Aah, the Byxsbbyggisigbyg Wasteland! I hate it. Partially because this ages old laptop I'm using always lags to a crawl while wading through here, partially because the Wasteland Field is one of my least favorite fields. It's one of those fields that really only benefits its intended Type and offers no way to turn it around. Shelly's Forest Field can be set on fire, Serra's Mirror Arena gives Flamethrower perfect accuracy, Kiki's Ashen Beach boosts Psychic and Calm Mind etc. At least the music is kinda cool/funny. There's a Black Sludge hidden a bit out of the way. Nidoking gets to hold it. We finally arrive at the Wasteland Hideout, where Cain's familiy lives. Aya is already in a battle with her first challenger who turns out to be Fern - ergh. Hardy, Reborn's Rock Leader, shows up as well and he knows Fern from their time at Onyx Trainers' School. Aya proves to be way too susceptible to Fern's... Fern. He reeatedly calls her a noob, pushover etc and then challenges us to a battle, "so we won't have come the whole way without getting at least on roper battle." How considerate of him. Cue Battle VS Swag Jockey Fern Still not an easy battle, but decidedly less of a pain than previously. Serperior and Roserade are the only things to look out for and they'd both be much less of a pain if they didn't know Giga Drain. Hardy agrees that seeing Fern get beat is worth trudging though the Wasteland. Shame Aya wasn't around for the fight, maybe that would have cheered her up. With that out of the it's about time to raise our level cap again. Cue Gym Battle VS Wasteland Punk Aya Probably the easiest battle against Aya I had so far. Her Dragalge coming out early somewhat messed up my planning, but in the end it worked out. Even though the level cap reared its ugly head a bunch of times. This victory earns us the Venom Badge, raising the level cap to 50, as well as the TM for Sludge Wave, meaning Nidoking gets a second useful STAB! Swampert learns it as well - probably doesn't do that much for coverage but it's better than Rock Smash, no? AND, most importantly, we can now use Strength to push around boulders. You know what that means? That means this concludes The Longest Fetch Quest Ever! Next chapter should come some time next week and will probably get split into multile parts again. Until then, See Ya!

Disobedience can be a real pain. I don't think I ever had an overleveled 'Mon use a random move even though I'm pretty sure that's how it works in the main games? Anyhow, good luck on your adventure! And good luck with Taka+ZEL; I've got a feeling you'll need it.

So I've spent quite some time breeding a new team member: That nature isn't particularly helpful, but I kept getting ones with <10 IV in Atk, so just getting this took way too long. Just gonna have to change the nature later on. Anyway - last time Shelly and the other kids got kidnapped by Team Meteor while Cain managed to get away, so we rush back to the Railnet. Cain isn't here anymore, but Victoria is. She tells us that we'll need Strength to get through the now blocked tunnel and where to get it; this starts: Chapter VI: The Longest Fetch Quest Ever Objective 1: Get the HM Strength from Fighting Leader Kiki at Apophyll Academy across the lake Objective 2: Get the Venom Badge from Aya, Cain's sister and the new Poison Leader so we can use Strength At Coral Ward's pier we run into Cain, who hops on his Muk and surfs off across the lake. Poisonous water and a Pokémon made of poisonous sludge, I wonder if that's healthy... Right after we run into Amaria who recruits us to go find the source of the lake's pollution in Peridot's Blackstream factory. Unsurprisingly, it turns out that Team Meteor are responsible. We get separated from Amaria and end up fighting our way through the factory on our own. Eventually, we run into ZEL and ???-Man III in a room filled with a whole bunch of Meteor Grunts and scientists, as well as a Muk hooked up to a PULSE-machine. Amaria shows up right in time to stop us from getting killed by ???-Man and takes him on. Our job is to deactivate the PULSE, which ZEL tries to prevent. Cue Battle VS. Meteor Admin ZEL Probably the easiest PULSE battle... Their leader, who's name is revealed to be Solaris, calls all of our efforts uselessuselessuseless and orders Team Meteor to retreat - but not without leaving Amaria a arting gift in the form of his Tyranitar using Superpower on her. RIP She somehow survives having mini-Godzilla smash her and, after a bit of reflecting on how we just did something really important for fixing up the city, offers us her boat to cross over to the Apophyll region. She then decides to head home to recuperate for a bit. Contrary to what you'd expect from previous dialogue the boat doesn't just dissolve into wreckage as soon as we reach Apophyll, meaning we'll get to use it a bunch more times. At Apophyll Beach there's a whole bunch of trainers as well as Apophyll Academy, where Kiki is. After we beat up all trainers in the area locate Kiki Victoria catches up to us. Kiki tasks us with going up Pyrous Mountain and defeating a certain student of hers as a test while Victoria will take the Academy's graduation test to get Strength. Along the way up the mountain we capture a Shiny Magcargo: Up at the crater we run into Cal, ex-Fire Leader and the guy we're supposed to beat. Cue Battle VS Ex-Leader Cal Another easy victory on the first try due to Type Advantage. Back at the Academy we arrive just in time to see Kiki recover from some sort of illness-related attack. She pushes it aside and tells us to come face her in an official Gym Battle. Before that however we have to deal with Victoria trying to stop us from battling her out of worry over her condition. Cue Battle VS Apprentice Victoria Another easy battle. Onix is starting to fall behind, but for now she still has some utility with Screech. "...It's for the kids, right? They're more important than her, right?" Shit, Victoria, you're making me feel like the bad guy. But, in a sense, yes. Because last time I saw them, they weren't dying... Kiki is still waiting, so time to heal up and Cue Gym Battle VS Sensei Kiki This battle was easier than I expected. I still managed to lose on the first try by underestimating her Medicham though. NEVER underestimate someone's Ace, I really should've learned that by now. >_> Swampert had to pull an uncomfortable amount of weight here, considering he's already at the level cap... This victory earns us... nothing, because Kiki collapses right when she's about to give out the Badge. Victoria carries her into her room, where she proceeds to habe a breakdown about her situation. She shoos us out and Victoria reminds us of another issue: Cain was heading to Apophyl but never showed up. She sends us to go look for him on Azurine Island, located between Coral Ward and Apophyll Beach and the only place he could've ended up on the way. There's our next destination, but it'll have to wait until next time. Hopefully I'll get the remainder of the Apophyll Arc as well as the Wasteland done tomorrow. Until then, See Ya!

Why feel sadness for someone who's just setting a challenge for themselves? I wouldn't be doing this if it wasn't fun, so no worries there. ;D Part of Reborn's challenge is to to be restricted to using Pokémon you wouldn't normally consider for your team - I'm kind of bad at that, so I decided to do Monotypes to really limit my selection. And to gain some new appreciation for certain 'mons. My Flying Monotype Run really changed my mind about Charizard, Jumpluff and Butterfree - all Pokémon I hadn't used in ages and who then surprised me with their power, utility or perseverance. Shoutout to Butterfree taking down three of Aya's Pokémon and soloing Noel's entire team, never expected that little guy to pull through for as long as he did. This time it's Camerupt that's really been exceeding my expectations, even if I like to complain about her abyssmal Speed. xD Still, I definitely wouldn't do a blind Monotype Run on a game like this; knowing what you'll still have to go up against leaves you plenty opportunity to prepare accordingly. To make sure you're not missing anything vital. This time I'll have to change my team later on since I'm still lacking some options and only use certain Pokémon to bolster my numbers. Claydol, Hippowdon and Krookodile are just the ones I'm seriously planning to use; Flygon, Torterra, Gliscor and Excadrill are all things I might use depending on what my team needs. That's an entire second team. xD Delphox is great, you've got good taste. ;D And thank you. :3

Shelly wants us to go report the whole situation with Corey to Ame at Grand Hall, but before that there's some stuff to do. Like getting the Mining Kit and mining everything in sight. Or wandering through a dark cave to get to this guy: Corey's Nidorina is also here: Lastly I go capture a female Swinub and a male Cubchoo which I'll use for breeding a bit later on. (Beartic refused to show up.) With that out of the way it's now time for Chapter V: Kids from the Orphanage At Grand Hall we find out that somebody has already beaten us to reporting Corey's death. Fern is here and tells us about how we're going to need a key to get to the new Poison Leader in the Byxsbbyggisigbyg Wasteland and he'll only tell us where to get one if we beat him. Cue Battle VS Swag Jockey Fern To be fair, this battle was a major pain and that was entirely Roserade's fault. That goddamn Giga Drain. After a number of failed tries I decided to slightly beef up the team, mainly by evolving Marshtomp to Swampert and having Nidoking learn Thrash (plus getting a bunch of Persim Berries from the Dept. Store). The next attempt is the one you can read above, where I got so lucky that 2/3 of my team didn't even need to do anything. Go figure. Fern actually keeps his promise and tells us where he got his key to the Wasteland from. The description is 100% Cain, who's apparentally at the Beryl Ward Graveyard right now, so that's where we go next. True enough, Cain is there at the Cemetery looking at Corey's grave and tells us he wants to go find Heather to make sure she's okay. He doesn't want to give us the key to the Wasteland though, because he doesn't really like his sister that much. (I don't see why that's an issue, since he doesn't have to come along...) If we want the key, we have to beat him, so Cue Battle VS Pretty Boy Cain An easy, first try victory; no surprise here, considering the Type Advantage. Cain starts up some post-battle dialogue but stops when he notices Heather staring at us from a bit up the mountain. He tries to be nice to her but falls on deaf ears, leading to Heather flying off to Shelly and Cain running after her - without giving us that key. That means now we have to run after him. Another trek through basically the entire city. Over at the Lapis Ward Gym we run into Heather once again yelling at everybody. She runs off again, prompting this response from Cain: To be honest, I'd probably react like that as well. We follow Heather outside and watch her run right into the clutches of Dr. Geezer who pulls some legal stuff to take her with him for "treatment". After Shelly has another breakdown the three of us prepare to storm the orphanage and rescue Heather! ... Only to be stoped by the door being locked. Fortunately, Ann lets us in. Cain stays at the Ground Floor to keep the Orderlies there from rushing out while we team up with Shelly and raid the upper and lower floors. This is probably my favourite point of the game. Not sure why, maybe it's just because it's the first time we team up for a "dungeon" since Fern, or because we're doing this together with Shelly and Cain, or because every single thing Anna says makes me wonder what exactly her deal is. Or maybe it's this guy: The only negative point I have to say about this episode is that there's no Boss Battle of any sort at the end, making it feel slightly anticlimactic. Anyway, after cornering the Doctor he lets us take Heather but also tells us that he's already contacted the authorities, so we decide to hightail it out of there and meet at the Underground Railnet. The plan is to go to the Chrysolia Region from there and to where Charlotte's sisters live. There's a cutscene showing Dr. Connal being aproached by Team Meteor's Question Marks Man I and offered an alliance. Back under the railnet our group's way is blocked by a computer-controlled door lacking power, so Anna suggests that we go meet Shade at the Abandoned Power Plant to ask him to turn it back on and to have a Gym Battle with him. So off we go right into that ambigiously monstrous Shade's domain! At the entrance of the power plant/Gym we're greeted by an Absol... We go inside and deal with the four monitors each showing a death scene and then get to Shade. Cue Gym Battle VS Entity Shade Victory on the second try. The first attempt went much like the second, with the difference that I unsuccessfully tried to beat Banette with Sandslash, so to keep it alive I switched in Nidoking earlier. Chandelure later took apart my team because I underestimated its Speed and did't have anything left that could take a hit. In hindsight, I probably wouldn't have needed Onix to muck around with Gengar, but oh well. She wouldn't have survived one turn against Chandelure anyway. This victory earns us the Omen Badge, which raises the Level Cap to 45, as well as the TM for Shadow Claw. Nidoking and Sandslash learn it. Shade also turns on the power and shows us something on the big screen behind him: the locked door in the Railnet opens, causing Meteors to rush out and kidnap our new friends. (That's just about the most awkward cutscene in the game btw; the way the kids just stand there while Meteor grunts walk out one by one and grab one of the kids each. xD) Only Cain gets away by having Nidoking Earthquake the path in front of his would-be-pursuer. That's it for Chapter V; next chapter will see the beginning of The Longest Fetch Quest Ever. It's been some time since the beginning so this feels like a good moment for a current status summation: current team: current badge count | level cap: four | Lv. 45 current playtime: 9:23 Until next time, See Ya!

Their Offenses are about equal, with Venomoth having 90 Base SpAtk and Ariados 90 Base Atk and their other attacking stat at 65 (Venomoth) and 60 (Ariados). Their defenses are also very similar. Venomoth is however more than twice as fast as Ariados (90 Base Speed vs 40). Their natural movepools both aren't shabby, getting some nice STABs of their chosen Attack stat and Coverage Moves, although Venomoth doesn't get any special Poison Moves via Level Up with its only choice being the rather out of the way Venoshock TM and both of them take quite some time to get their good moves. Venomoth's biggest asset is Quiver Dance, but by the time it learns that (Lv. 63 or Move Relearner) it likely might not even survive long enough to get the chance to boost itself. Ariados's only boost move right now is Fell Stinger; Ep17 should add Sword dance to its LevelUp pool, but that's still quite some time off. Venomoth's three abilities (Shield Dust, Tinted Lens and Wonder Skin) probably all have some limited usage, but none of them are articularly good. Ariados gets Sniper, but only has a single attack that can abuse it; Insomnia and Swarm also have limited usage. Ariados gets some useful attacks earlier than Venomoth, so it should be more useful against Florinia, but Venomoth's Quiver Dance gives it some better options later on. They'll probably both start falling behind around the halfway point of the game; Ariados has practically nothing to raise its damage or survivability and Venomoth would rely on Quiver Dance to keep itself afloat, but there's little opportunity to even get some boosts.

A note about updates from now: I decided to cut down my updates to only the major battles and general lot hapenings, cutting out most all of the stuff happening inbetween. Originally I wanted there to be some connectivity between everything everything, but with how slow of a writer I am it all just ended up taking way too long. With that out of the way here's the continuation of Chapter IV: We return to Shelly and Victoria and the latter sends us back out to go check out the local psychiatrist to see if he can maybe help Shelly not become traumatized. After arriving at his clinic-slash-orphanage it quickly becomes apparent that Dr. Connal is not someone you want to be treated by. Since we still need some kind of reason to be there we end up in a battle with Orderly John. I guess he kind of counts as a Miniboss, but Sandslash takes him out alone. Afterwards, Anna more or less shoves us out of the door and gives us a message for Shelly: To look out for the one who's really hurt by all this. I.e. Heather, who's going to keep us busy in the near future. We return to Shelly with Anna's message and she agrees to face us in a Gym Battle, but before that we have to deal with Victoria trying to protect Shelly from potential stress. Cue Battle VS Aprentice Victoria (Is it just me or does Lucia totally look like a somewhat younger and more tanned Victoria?) Victoria tells us to better win so it won't be for nothing and then leaves. So now we have to deal with Shelly's bookshelf puzzle. While battling the trainers in the Gym Numel evolves into Camerut, learns Rock Slide and gains the ability Solid Rock which lowers damage taken from super effective attacks, all of which is very nice. Not it's finally time to battle Shelly - Cue Gym Battle VS Bookworm Shelly Overall, that was a decent battle. Rain Dance kept Camerut from going full force on a Burning Field, but Graveler's Stealth Rock did some nice damage and the enemies ususally targeted my less important Pokémon first. Definitely some luck involved, but another nice victory on the first try. This battle earned us the Cocoon Badge, raising the Level Cap to 40 and allowing us to use Rock Smash outside of battle, as well as the TM for Struggle Bug which, unsurprisingly, nobody in my team can use. That concludes Chapter IV which turned out to feature fewer falling rocks than I expected. Chapter V will happen sometime this week, probably, but before that there's some stuff to do with Rock Smash. Until then, See ya!