Which gym leader do you think is the strongest so far?

[Ice Cream Sand Witch]

I had the most difficulty with Serra. Cloyster takes out a large amount of health with its 5 hit moves (it actually brought Sylveon into red health), and I could one shot it if not for Focus Sash and Ultra Potion. The only Pokemon I had that was faster than it was weak to Rock Blast. Avalugg has low special defense, but 2/3 of my special attackers, who were also the ones with super effective moves against it, were weak to Earthquake. Lapras is Lapras. When I won, I had just Scrafty left with 9 HP.

Other ones that were notably difficult for me: Florinia (solely because of Cradily), Shade (because of type disadvantages), and Randomus (because of Gardevoir and bad strategy/timing on my part).

Edited March 1, 2015 by StrawberryLoveIntervention

[Alaris]

From hardest to easiest (v. 14.5)

Corey (Corrosive mist field)

Samson

Shade

Blake

Aya

Terra

Noel

Kiki

Serra

Luna

Radomus

Shelly

Florinia

Charlotte

Julia

idk why but I found Charlotte incredibly easy (in ep. 13). Please don't nerf her more ._. PLEASE...

Of course, if we consider the leaders with their pre-nerfed teams, the order would be:

Aya (I agree with the nerfing, she was FAR too strong)

Noel (I don't like the change, the battle against his team was amazing)

Serra (no comments on this lady)

Samson

Shade

Blake

Terra

Luna

Kiki

Radomus

Shelly

Florinia

Charlotte

Julia

Poor Julia... ._.

[Xiri]

Based on my first playthrough, nearly all the gym leaders gave me trouble (there weren't many leaders that I defeated at the first attempt). I'll have to say Noel was the most difficult for me. Oh how I underestimated that blasted Cinccino (who is now an extremely good member in one of my teams, so I guess I should be thankful to Noel)

...and as I celebrate the fall of the chinchilla, the Flame Orb Guts Swellow comes in. FML

[Autumn Rain]

If I had to vote for "other", there would be a reason behind that but I still voted for Charlotte.

At first, I was thinking if the dragon gym leader (Saphira?) will be the hardest but I doubt that because of fairies and misty terrain.

Hardy, on the other hand, would probably ruin your life with Earthquake and Stone Edge but we have steel types with balloons, right?

Amaria, or somebody else, would probably be like Hardy's difficulty unless we change the field or use it to our advantage.

Ciel, dunno about her true power but I guess she will be difficult.

For Adrienn, we either change field or there are a ton of ways we can beat xem.

Titania, if she's still around, would be a piece of cake.

Those are just my theories though. I'd say Hardy may be the biggest threat here but as of now it's Charlotte.

[sound of silence]

Charlotte was by far the hardest for me playing through 14/14.1. It took me several goes, and in the end I only got past her due to a questionable decision by the AI to have ninetales use nasty plot when it didn't really need to (and potentially Rotom-H unless it's hidden power was water as opposed to grass)

Serra came in a close second because I stupidly rocked up without any status outside of force palm hariyama, and it took me 4 goes to hax out cloyster because SS cloyster at that point is cruel. The rest of her team was way easy for me though outside of cloyster (to be fair I did bring in a boldore and set up sandstorm after abomasnow fainted).

Aya, Terra, Luna and Samson all tie for third each requiring 2 goes. Aya I was just stupid against the first time, and made it easier for myself with light clay and light screen from meowstic. Terra I forgot about the glitch field the first time and rage quitted before managing to use air balloons to my advantage (haha to both excadril and claydol). Luna I got massacred by her malamar because escavalier couldn't quite secure the OHKO the first time. Second time T-spikes got me over the line. Samson I just wasn't prepared for the large jump in the level increase from luna to him. Thank god for arcanine because I was sweating when I fell just short of KO'ing hawlucha and finding lucario had a focus sash.

Everyone else didn't give me much trouble, though a few were close calls. Also corey can be dealt with quite easy with his field change, as skrelp is way too slow to stop you getting rid of the field effect. His crobat is a nightmare regardless though if it gets to set up.

[Alisae]

Aya was hard...Till I decided to pick up a full team and grind.

Had to use a couple Cotton Candies on Samson and Charlotte, which I actually didn't find too difficult. If anything, I'd say Samson was the hardest out of those 2 because of that god dam Conkeldurr. Samson would probably be the 5th hardest to me.

Shade was a pain to deal with though, because I had to rely on a bulk-up Blaziken to even at 4x atk and def, sweep a Chandelure with peck. Was fun. Not really. 2nd hardest

Shelly was hard till I found out that Common Candies are a beautiful thing because training 3 pokes at the time was cool.

Corey was a bitch though. I had to get the perfect set up against that skulp in order to beat him cause I only had 2 pokes at the time. Probably the hardest.

Blake was just annoying because I wanted to get rid of the hail, and I ended up making a rainbow field (lol) because I wanted to make sure the stupid hail was gone. 4th hardest.

Noel's porygon-z was an asshole. I don't even remember how I stopped it from murdering my whole team, but I actually found this fight to be somewhat challenging. 3rd hardest.

Edited March 2, 2015 by bote

[Fury]

Been playing Reborn since Episode 8's release and while Double-Battle Serra was difficult, I found myself very frustrated with Charlotte to the point where I had to walk away from the game for a week (Gyarados' Aqua Tail missing on Rotom-Heat was what set me off since that was her LAST Pokemon left alive). I was able to beat Charlotte with four Pokemon still alive (w/o using Rain Dance!) when I resumed playing the game, but man, it's been a while since I've had *that* much trouble beating a leader in Reborn. So Charlotte gets my vote for Most Difficult Leader. Took me four attempts to beat her. >_>;

Keeping in mind that the early leaders had their Ep. 8 teams and the rest were battled on an Episode-by-Episode basis, this is my track record so far in terms of who was difficult for me. My starter was Chimchar:

Charlotte (4) - Got destroyed the first two times. Gyarados missed the crucial Aqua Tail hit on Rotom-Heat the third time. Fourth time was easy because Dragon Dance + Moxie + Aqua Tail *not* missing = OP. No rain required.

Serra (3) - Tbh I miss her old Double Battle team. It was very challenging but beatable. I remember walking out of that battle with 23 HP on Infernape, my last Pokemon alive.

Aya (2) - Wasn't expecting a Double Battle, so I got owned the first time around. Made adjustments and won the rematch. Took FOREVER to down Muk since it spammed Minimize on me...

Florinia (2) - Foongus absorbing the Toxic Spikes set by Trubbish threw me off the first time around. I made adjustments in the rematch and took Cradily out with poison.

Blake (1)

Cal (1)

Corey (1)

Julia (1)

Luna (1) - I almost lost to her the first time around. Once again Toxic Spikes saves the day. It was the only way to take out her Sableye and Umbreon while I stalled with Drapion.

Noel (1) - I think this only reason why this battle wasn't difficult for me was because I had Infernape. Skill Link Cinccino is very scary unless you have a Fighting-Type that's faster than it that knows Close Combat, lol.

Radomus (1)

Samson (1) - I actually found Samson to be the easiest leader next to Julia, and this was even with Hariyama OHKO'ing my Gardevoir with Heavy Slam. I'm glad he has Lucario now. Chesnaught needed to go.

Shade (1)

Shelly (1)

Terra (1)

[Monochrome_Complex]

I found Samson difficult because of how luck-based he was and Conkledurr, already a strong pokemon being 7 levels higher than the cap. He one to two-shots just about everything not resisting him with drain punch + whammo max and gets health recovery on top of that. I got screwed over more than once off getting a WEAK off a closecombat that otherwise should've KO'd while he ends up with a nice or powerful. I had to catch a sawk and raise a Braviary just to take him and even lost the first time. However sawk with endure + reversal does a LOT of damage to his conkledurr, as it almost one-shot him.

His Lucario and Blaziken were the weak links of his team I thought, Lucario is fragile so it's easy to stop its set up and Blaziken just isn't that strong.

EDIT: After finally reaching Charlotte my vote goes to her...granted I wasn't using any healing items or had any water types but she definitely lives up to her hype. Thing about her is that every member of her team is a hard threat with the potential to utterly destroy you. Delphox and Darminitan especially gave me issues. Ninetales wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.

I won with Golurk, Drapion, Absol, Purugly, Infernape and Noivern who I had to raise from like level 34 just to stand a chance . That said, he was crucial and tailwind gets rid of those pesky flames(as does hurricane but good luck hitting with it lol).

So far top 5 hardest for me would be: Shade, Charlotte, Aya, Corey, and Samson.

Edited March 3, 2015 by Monochrome_Complex

[jamesw0102]

I found Samson difficult because of how luck-based he was and Conkledurr, already a strong pokemon being 7 levels higher than the cap. He one to two-shots just about everything not resisting him with drain punch + whammo max and gets health recovery on top of that. I got screwed over more than once off getting a WEAK off a closecombat that otherwise should've KO'd while he ends up with a nice or powerful. I had to catch a sawk and raise a Braviary just to take him and even lost the first time. However sawk with endure + reversal does a LOT of damage to his conkledurr, as it almost one-shot him.

His Lucario and Blaziken were the weak links of his team I thought, Lucario is fragile so it's easy to stop its set up and Blaziken just isn't that strong.

EDIT: After finally reaching Charlotte my vote goes to her...granted I wasn't using any healing items or had any water types but she definitely lives up to her hype. Thing about her is that every member of her team is a hard threat with the potential to utterly destroy you. Delphox and Darminitan especially gave me issues. Ninetales wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.

I won with Golurk, Drapion, Absol, Purugly, Infernape and Noivern who I had to raise from like level 34 just to stand a chance . That said, he was crucial and tailwind gets rid of those pesky flames(as does hurricane but good luck hitting with it lol).

So far top 5 hardest for me would be: Shade, Charlotte, Aya, Corey, and Samson.

True

[laggless01]

I found the hardest one to be Terra, mostly due to that field that I'm just terrible at to use. Charlotte got steamrolled on the first try by Flygon, especially with her 2 Ninetails, so not that difficult in my opinion. Serra was annoying, too, having to hope Heat Wave would do just enough to take her pokes out at level 50 (it did, but training at that point is quite annoying due to few encounters in that bloody forest...).
Aya got second in my opinion, it's why I trained that flygon in the first place. No, I haven't tried the new fields for Serra and Aya yet, but I it could make them harder than Terra, especially if I can get around that goddamn field better.

Edited March 4, 2015 by laggless01

[Kithros]

None of the gym leaders gave me too much trouble once I caught up with my pokemon levels (my first attempt at each gym was usually with pokemon about 5-7 levels below the level cap). Aya, Luna, and Charlotte were the ones that actually made me grind my pokemon to catch up with the level cap to beat them - though that might not be the same thing as being the hardest since my pokemon wouldn't be as underleveled for the following gym after I had grinded too etc. Aya was giving me a ton of trouble at first but then I kind of overprepared and I got my growlithe to level 45 before evolving it and evolved a flygon etc., and the first attempt after that was pathetically easy - so I'm not sure if it's fair to say the fight was hard because I had to grind or if it was easy because after I had grinded there was no difficulty to it.

[BreezyPonie]

I'm surprised at how many people said Shelly was hard... I beat her pretty easy, Burning Field and Sleep Powder combo pretty much owned her, but I guess without the field effect she would've been way harder.

I feel kinda bad that so many of the Gym Leaders have been nerfed. I guess the battles I won don't really mean anything, then?

I didn't vote because I haven't actually finished the game yet ><" I keep reading about how awful Charlotte is, and now I'm freaking out XD (pls dont nerf her tho kthx ame) I have to say so far the hardest battle was Julia. The other ones were hard, but after some thinking and incorporating a strategy (with a little bit of luck) I got out in the end... but Julia? I have no idea how I beat her. I just spammed Fake Out a lot, and she made a couple bad calls... I pretty much won by a thread. I had no idea you could get Onix, so I didn't get it until after beating Corey, I think (completely by accident, too).

Aya was also hard... I came out of that battle with only one Pokemon left, I think, at really low health too... and supposedly she got nerfed twice. I feel really nooby now ;-;

[jamesw0102]

I'm surprised at how many people said Shelly was hard... I beat her pretty easy, Burning Field and Sleep Powder combo pretty much owned her, but I guess without the field effect she would've been way harder.

I feel kinda bad that so many of the Gym Leaders have been nerfed. I guess the battles I won don't really mean anything, then?

I didn't vote because I haven't actually finished the game yet ><" I keep reading about how awful Charlotte is, and now I'm freaking out XD (pls dont nerf her tho kthx ame) I have to say so far the hardest battle was Julia. The other ones were hard, but after some thinking and incorporating a strategy (with a little bit of luck) I got out in the end... but Julia? I have no idea how I beat her. I just spammed Fake Out a lot, and she made a couple bad calls... I pretty much won by a thread. I had no idea you could get Onix, so I didn't get it until after beating Corey, I think (completely by accident, too).

Aya was also hard... I came out of that battle with only one Pokemon left, I think, at really low health too... and supposedly she got nerfed twice. I feel really nooby now ;-;

I thought julia was the easiest in my opinion

[Xiri]

I thought julia was the easiest in my opinion

Who doesn't find Julia easy? Oh wait I forgot... I almost got defeated by her in my first playthrough whoops

[Monochrome_Complex]

I find julia harder than Flobot really and she can be difficult with the charge boost if you're using special oriented mons or get para-haxed.

Oh man forgot about Noel's porygon Z. That thing was stupidly hard to KO for some reason.

[Wolfox]

For me the hardest gym was Serra by a landslide, and simply because my team wasn't made for her battle(Using a Pidgeot, Gyarados, Golem and Delphox as main set up) and because her ******* Lapras was to damm bulky >. but eventualy I beat her and on other saves she was easy since I knew what to expect, but still by far my hardest gym on my main save file.

[Commander]

I just saw Ame's post after all this time and all I have to say is YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!! Seriously, I would love seeing that battle being back because of how strategic you had to be (outside the cheap use Ninetales method). It'd make me even happier if it was a double again (but I won't complain if it's not).

I'm a bit surprised Corey didn't get more votes (then again, I'm probably thinking about when he had Haunter). No matter what playthrough, he always seems to give me a lot of trouble. I probably struggled a lot more on him compared to Charlotte as well.

[Azeria]

I just saw Ame's post after all this time and all I have to say is YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!! Seriously, I would love seeing that battle being back because of how strategic you had to be (outside the cheap use Ninetales method). It'd make me even happier if it was a double again (but I won't complain if it's not).

I'm a bit surprised Corey didn't get more votes (then again, I'm probably thinking about when he had Haunter). No matter what playthrough, he always seems to give me a lot of trouble. I probably struggled a lot more on him compared to Charlotte as well.

Corey's the perfect gym leader in a way,really challenging but not hard enough to warrant giant nerfs though i want him to have his Haunter back,he'll have his Core back then Haunter+Skuntank+Crobat=DOMMAGE!

Edited March 14, 2015 by Scublord McFoxy

[Captain]

Without a doubt it was Charlotte before she got nerfed. Kingdra + Rain Dance was my only out, and even then it was far from a guaranteed victory. Her Typhlosion nearly one shot my Kingdra with Eruption. My face when I first saw she had a second Drought Ninetales. Regardless, it was a fun gym battle.

Before I even thought about using Rain Dance I tried to power through her using Darmanitan and Flare Blitz. That strategy half worked. Darmanitan one shot half of her team. Only half. After Darmanitan fell it was over.

[fireflame]

Char- to the freaking -lotte. it took a long time, plus at dull power (drought+field) she could sweep my entire team, including fully resisting ones.

Edited March 15, 2015 by fireflame

[Monochrome_Complex]

I still feel like two ninetales is easier to deal with than scarfed Darminitan, can't agree charlotte is "nerfed"

Ninetales isn't THAT strong even boosted so you just have to focus on stopping Typhlosion. first(easy with fake out + a strong SE move). But darminitan basically forces you choose between Koing it or Koing typhlosion first unless you can somehow KO both immediately(which is essentially the only way I could win the fight). You really just have to hope the AI doesn't use flare blitz.otherwise.

If anything her ninetales was the easiest thing on her team.

[Xiri]

I still feel like two ninetales is easier to deal with than scarfed Darminitan, can't agree charlotte is "nerfed"

Ninetales isn't THAT strong even boosted so you just have to focus on stopping Typhlosion. first(easy with fake out + a strong SE move). But darminitan basically forces you choose between Koing it or Koing typhlosion first unless you can somehow KO both immediately(which is essentially the only way I could win the fight). You really just have to hope the AI doesn't use flare blitz.otherwise.

If anything her ninetales was the easiest thing on her team.

I agree. It was pretty easy to counter the lead Ninetales as you can just use Prankster Rain Dance and get rid of the field - weakening Typhlosion's attack power.

[Commander]

Ninetales isn't THAT strong even boosted so you just have to focus on stopping Typhlosion. first(easy with fake out + a strong SE move). But darminitan basically forces you choose between Koing it or Koing typhlosion first unless you can somehow KO both immediately(which is essentially the only way I could win the fight). You really just have to hope the AI doesn't use flare blitz.otherwise.

But Ninetales is my Showdown ace...nevermind that's Venusaur. I like her having a Darmanitan better even though that means she won't hit as hard. Something didn't just settle in right when she had two of her ace.

[Personthing]

But Ninetales is my Showdown ace...nevermind that's Venusaur. I like her having a Darmanitan better even though that means she won't hit as hard. Something didn't just settle in right when she had two of her ace.

Yeah, I was always kind of bothered by her having two Ninetales. Charlotte was also completely lacking in physical attackers as well, so I think Darmanitan was a good addition to her team.

[Prankster Meowstic]

I generally find the double battles to be easier because the AI is so derpy with them. If you have a poke that has protect or detect in its learned moveset they are all pretty much a breeze. The psychic gym leader was probably the easiest because setting up trick room is a terrible idea when the opponent has an Escavalier on the loose. It is probably different for players with switch on. I found Corey to be the hardest just because of the auto damage from the field followed by Terra because of the monster that is Garchomp.

Edited March 16, 2015 by Prankster Meowstic