Hello everyone,
Let me begin my stating that this game is amazing and has given me probably hundreds of hours of enjoyment.
I started a speedrun route for E17 a while back, and I wanted to finish it before E18. I did manage to complete a route and revised it a couple times and since E18 is hopefully out soon I figured I should share this before E18 comes out.
Unfortunately working life has not allowed me to do a full, non-interrupted run. I have completed several segmented runs and if I had to guess they would range from 10-16 hours rta. My last finished run had an ingame time of 15 hours and 45 minutes, this however is affected by the speedup-function which is allowed according to 'my rules'. Without it, the run would not be RTA viable.
The route can be found here: (it's a 154 page .pdf document, 28mb in size)
https://mega.nz/#!4FxDyJBD!EHcDc_zfLuPQnwtYS0uBGmiTdijGFgJeQOPX_aVUaz8
In general the run uses Blaziken with great stats and speed boost throughout the game. Blaziken is probably the best/easiest starter and therefore the most suitable for the speedrun. Notable fights with Blaziken include solo'ing Benny, Serra, Luna, Samson, and Titania. Early on we pick up male meowstic with good stats which will be used in battles until about lvl 50. After that it will be used for prankster screens and fake outs. Notable fights include solo'ing Corey and Kiki. We also pick up poochyena and use it early on, basically only to moxie cheese Julia and after that he's simply an hm slave. We catch a flyer early on (pidgey/pidove) but don't use it at all until we unlock fly. The next pokemon we get is Mareep which is used throughout the game. Notable fights include solo'ing Ciel and Amaria. We also pick up Corey's Nidorina. It has 3 random 31 IV stats. We try to get great stats with sheer force. Notable fights with Nidoqueen include Aya and Adrienn. We also get Sharpedo with speed boost from the Aqua event as a water pokemon. Sharpedo solo's Terra and is used in plenty of fights. We abuse destiny bond strats to get through Garchomp, Mewtwo and other legendary and pulse fights. A great benefit of these pokemon is that they gain boosted EXP. During the run a lot of items are picked up (seeds, heart scales, ability capsules) and bought. The most important items are definitly the x-items. To be honest, x-items completely break this game, which is why they are used in the speedrun. I would be really glad to see x items nerfed in E18, even though that would render this entire route useless. Ideally I would like to see x-items to only raise stats by 1 stage as well as being moved to like the top floor of the department store. I have shared this, and other feedback (such as fun bugs like skipping the part where you are stuck in the nuzleaf cage in Rhodocrine Jungle) with Amethyst already.
The route also features detailed instructions about various puzzles which could be helpful in a casual playthrough (route 2, finding Amaria, Tourmaline Desert Scrapyard).
I hope I can do a full run before E18 and record it, but I don't think I can find the time for it.
I invite you to take a look at the route and maybe try the route for yourself. I will be checking out this topic every now and then.
Thanks for reading.
Arkadius
