Too Spooky: Timber's Ghost Monotype Run

[Timber Dragon]

Oh, Noel

Ghosties:

From the get-go I didn't believe I had an advantage over Noel just because he's Normal-type and I'm Ghost-type. If anything, it puts ME at the disadvantage because some of my strongest moves (i.e. Shadow Ball) are useless, and a lot of Noel's most dangerous moves aren't even Normal-type. At the top of my head, the only Normal-type moves I would otherwise need to worry about are Porygon-Z's TriAttack and Swellow's Facade.

*shudder* Sorry. Getting some flashbacks here.

So since I don't have any particular advantages, and two of Noel's mons are Fairy-types, my idea is to turn the field into a Corrosive Field with Jellicent's Sludge Wave, then have Gengar wreck whoever he can with Venoshock... unless either of them pull a fast one with Psychc... which I think Clefable has. Crap. Well, we'll see how this goes.

Jellicent leads against Wigglytuff. He's a tad underleveled (43 to Wigglytuff's 52) but he survives Dazzling Gleam just fine and successfully lands Sludge Wave for decent damage, corroding the field. We keep pounding each other and healing. Noel uses up all his healing potions, but a final Dazzling Gleam eventually faints Jellicent. Gengar finishes off the last of its HP with some Venoshock action, boosted with a Poison Barb.

Porygon-Z and Girafarig take entry damage from the field, and are KO'd. Cinccino however is faster and deals heavy damage to Gengar with Rock Blast... and flinches him. Dick. I switch to Aegislash. Cinccino tries Bullet Seed, but thanks to the field, it makes Aegislash immune. While he's still in Shield Forme, I use his turn to heal Gengar. Cinccino tries a useless Bullet Seed again, then tries Rock Blast, which doesn't deal much damage. Aegislash gets it down to the reds with Iron Head, but doesn't quite KO it. Cinccino's Hidden Power is somehow super effective, though I don't know what type it was and it did little damage despite Aegislash being outside Shield Forme. A final Iron Head KOs it.

Swello, hmm. I didn't really think about how I would deal with Swellow. I switch back to Gengar for Venoshock since Swellow is squishy. Apparently anticipating how badly this would end for it, Swellow U-Turns back to Noel and brings out... Clefable. Who is then OHKO'd by Venoshock. With nowhere to run, Swellow desperately tries a Steel Wing, gives a good effort, but is similarly OHKO'd.


Arceus

Ghosties:

Uh oh. Arceus has Shadow Ball.

Okayokayokay, so I raided the Department Store for some goodies. Among those goods were six X Sp.Defs, two Focus Bands, a Quick Claw, and anti-super-effective-Ghost-move berries. Dunno how much of those I'll use, but it beats shelling out another Heart Scale like I already had to do with PULSE Abra.

Being my only ghost not weak to his own haunted fraternity, and having among the highest special defenses of my crew, I lead with Spiritomb. I use up most of the X Sp.Defs, negating Arceus's Shadow Ball to manageable damage. I need to be wary that Shadow Ball still has a chance of lowering special defense, and it does so at one point, but the damage eventually becomes minimal.

When it's safe, I set up three Nasty Plots, and Dark Pulse turns the field into a Dark Crystal Cave. This is a double-edged sword since it also boosts Shadow Ball's power, but with three Nasty Plots and all those special defense boosts, Spiritomb should be okay. And he is. Arceus tries Judgment (useless), Focus Blast (equally useless), and Recover (it's at full health). In other words, it tries everything except for the thing that will actually give me problems. Yay AI!

Anyhoo, now that Spiritomb is all set up, he can finally start attacking. Dark Pulse changes the field and WHAMMO, look at that damage. It's not quiiiiite enough, even when the first Dark Pulse gets a critical, and we spend a few turns going back and fourth between Dark Pulse and Recover.

Eventually Dark Pulse wins out and lookie! I didn't even need to waste another Heart Scale.

Way to go, Spiritomb. You earned that exp.


Sorry, Radomus, I might be getting too comfortable with these 'buff then sweep' strategies

Ghosties:

Psychic mixed with Rock is a weird typing to counter, making both Gengar and Chandelure risky to use. Luckily Spiritomb is up to bat again, being immune to Radomus's most dangerous attacks, and thanks to the field typing, Golurk and Aegislash are also resistant.

The fight pretty much boiled down to Spiritomb setting up two Nasty Plots, boosting his special attack to max thanks to the field effect, and sweeping everyone. Radomus's tendency for secrets and plotting backfired on him spectacularly. I think he's proud.

Spiritomb and Golurk lead against Reuniclus and Gallade. Golurk OHKOs Gallade with Shadow Punch... huh. That was easy. Well, Metagross comes out to replace him, and he and Reuniclus gang up on Golurk to KO him, too busy keeping Spiritomb healthy to heal himself. Don't worry, I'm sure my ghosts know the drill by now.

Anyhoo, once Spiritomb gets his Nasty Plots in, the rest of the fight is all downhill for Radomus. Aegislash remains in Shield Forme to keep Spiritomb or himself healthy, while Spiritomb utterly wrecks Radomus's team. Aegislash eventually comes out of Shield Forme to OHKO Gardevoir with Iron Head, and Metagross, who'd been on the field this whole time watching his teammates get wailed on, takes his Dark Pulse like a champ.

And that's how my evil plot cheesed Radomus. Two really hard PULSE battles, but two easy gym leaders. I should enjoy this while I can, because the next gym is... Luna.

Let me remind you how much I love Dark-types.

Edited August 23, 2016 by Timber Dragon

[Dreamy]

Looking forward to seeing how you weep before beat Luna XD. Cinccino's hidden power is fire from memory, as it normally ignites the grass for more damage. also wait, you can BUY FOCUS SASHES?!?! WHY DID NOBODY TELL ME THIS

also you wrote "Spiritomb tries Judgment (useless)....." instead of "Arceus tries Judgement(useless)..." FYI

Edited August 22, 2016 by DreamblitzX

[Timber Dragon]

Looking forward to seeing how you weep before beat Luna XD. Cinccino's hidden power is fire from memory, as it normally ignites the grass for more damage. also wait, you can BUY FOCUS SASHES?!?! WHY DID NOBODY TELL ME THIS

also you wrote "Spiritomb tries Judgment (useless)....." instead of "Arceus tries Judgement(useless)..." FYI

Focus Bands, not Sashes. XD If only we could buy those things.

Luna the Ghostbuster

Ghosties:

Welp, here it is, folks. The fight that I've been dreading, and Luna did not prove me wrong. This was by far the hardest battle in the game. Harder even than PULSE Abra and Arceus -- at least I found ways to cheese them, but never has a gym leader in this run taken this much planning and trial-and-error.

Dark-types have always been my Achilles heel in this run. They often outspeed my team and have higher-than-normal attack power, which is not good for my relatively slower and squishier spookies. Normally my solution for that is to send out my tankier ghosts like Cofagrigus and burn them with Will-O-Wisp, but as PULSE Abra and Arceus previously demonstrated, it doesn't help against special attackers. And even when I can defend against them okay, I still don't have any reliable ways to attack them. Golurk had only recently learned Hammer Arm. Before that, my only anti-Dark counter methods were Aegislash with Fury Cutter, who can't survive long enough to get its maximum effect.

With all that, a Dark-type Pokemon -- or even just a Dark-type move -- can derail an otherwise simple fight pretty quickly.

And now I get to fight against a full team of 'em! Time to die.

Chandelure OHKOs Bisharp with Flame Burst. If only the rest of the fight was that easy.

Golurk against Tyranitar. The giant dark Barney can somehow outspeed Golurk, so he has a Colbur Berry that resists a super effective Dark-type move, giving him a freebie while so he can Earthquake the Dark Crystal Cavern into a boring old regular cave.

Tyranitar winds up doing my work for me. It uses Earthquake, because a move that destroys your own beneficial field effect is a good idea. Golurk gets in his own Earthquake. Make a mental note of this. Luna heals, giving Golurk a chance to OHKO it with beautiful Hammer Arm.

Cofagrigus goes against Honchkrow. He survives a Night Slash with 17 HP and successfully Will-O-Wisps it, burning it and also Mummying it so WHERE'S YOUR MOXIE NOW HUH ASSHOLE? Now that Honchkrow is burned, the next few turns are spent healing and stalling her while burn does its thing, occassionally attacking. As Luna has about two more Hyper Potions to go through, this... takes a while.

Many potions later, the cheap stalling tactic works. Honchkrow apparently runs out of PP for Night Slash and starts using its birb moves, including Brave Bird and... Roost. Dammit. I go back on the offensive and the hit, combined with recoil damage and burn, finally finally faints it. Can't say I'm proud of this one, but cut me some slack, I'm fighting Luna.

Cofagrigus stays for Malamar to burn it, but he doesn't have enough HP to survive a Night Slash and faints, though Malamar gets Mummy'd in payback. Chandelure comes out and does the Will-O-Wisp instead. She's not off the hook yet, as a critical Night Slash can do serious damage, but she's not vulnerable. Minimize gives me some lucky RNG and she safely faints Malamar with some Flame Bursts.

Sableye KOs Chandelure with Dark Pulse, but she managed to weaken it. Aegislash finishes the job with Iron Head, though he gets Confuse Ray'd.

Now for the really tricky part: Umbreon. Umbreon's only offensive Dark-type attack is Dark Pulse, which is special. I switch to Spiritomb, having the best special defense of everyone besides Aegislash in Shield Forme but without the weakness to Dark. I use Spiritomb's turns to heal Golurk. Umbreon uses Toxic, which is fine because Spiritomb isn't strong enough to bypass type resistance combined with its overall beefiness. I let Spiritomb take the fall, using his remaining turn to revive Chandelure. Dark Pulse finishes him off, and I'm hoping that Spiritomb's Pressure had did SOMETHING to Dark Pulse's PP.

Golurk comes out. Umbreon uses Toxic while Golurk and uses Hammer Arm, which does... a little over 1/4 damage. Oh screw it. Earthquake. Except that Umbreon uses Confuse Ray, Golurk hits himself. Umbreon uses Dark Pulse, which would have finished him... except he's still holding a Colbur Berry, dampening it enough for Golurk to survive.

Remember how Tyranitar had previously used an Earthquake that demolished the field into a cave? And that Golurk then used his own Earthquake? This makes two Earthquakes, and in this field, you know what that means!

Golurk and Umbreon both go down, and that's how a Ghost trainer beat a Dark trainer: by being very, very cheap.

So that's a major fight out of the way, and now it's time to move onto Agate. Before crossing the point of no return, I'll be spending some time catching the remaining available spookies, because you never know when I'll need them. This means Misdreavus, Dusclops, Rotom, Shuppet, Sableye, and possibly Pumpkaboo and Shedinja. Since I tend to soft reset for not-bad nature and IVs, this might take a while.

But! For the next post on I plan to change the formula up a bit. I got some recording software and an imgur account, which means that from here on out there will probably be... PICTURES

Yay now you can actually see stuff instead of having me describe it to you

[Dreamy]

Woohoo I love pictures! and not sure how I managed to misread the sash/band thing.....

Rules mean you aren't allowed to switch rotom out of its normal form right? darn.

[Timber Dragon]

Woohoo I love pictures! and not sure how I managed to misread the sash/band thing.....

Rules mean you aren't allowed to switch rotom out of its normal form right? darn.

Yup, unfortunately by the rules of a monotype run, Rotom's alternate forms are illegal. I can usually justify using a mon if a future evolution gains the proper type, but Rotom's forms lose the type. Too bad, because those alt forms seem much more useful than its base form.

Team Updates

And here are all the remaining ghosties available before venturing off to Agate, caught all at once in a flurry of soft resets, Heart Scales, and various creepy. Boys and girls, this is why you don't wait until the last minute to do stuff.

Ability: Levitate

-A wildcard of sorts.

-One of my few mons with a special defense above double-digit numbers.

-Haunts the girls' restroom.

-Tends to moan.

Ability: Levitate

-My only Electric-type.

-Stat-wise is unfortunately a bit of a lightweight.

-Obsessed with TVs and outdated recording technology.

Ability: Cursed Body

-I have no idea what I'm gonna do with this thing.

-Probably possessed by a demon or something.

Ability: Pickup

-But I already have Trevenant...

-But ooh Pickup, that's useful.

-Apparently I'm running out of names for ghosts so I'm using horror media in general.

Ability: Wonder Guard

-I'll find a specialized use for this thing, probably.

-Probably should've been named Beetlejuice instead of Spiritomb, because cicadas are totally crickets.

-Cries a lot.

Ability: Prankster

-Prankster would be useful if it naturally learned any status moves worth pranking.

-I'm really running out of ghost names here.

-Eats teeth.

Ability: Frisk

-At last, a proper tank!

-May or may not replace Cofagrigus once she evolves to Dusknoir.

-Whoever said Bloody Mary wasn't a bit chubby?

Knock it Off, Samson

Ghosties:

I probably shouldn't have underestimated Samson as much as I did. Sure, we were immune to his most dangerous Fighting moves, but that just meant we had to deal with his other dangerous, non-Fighty moves. Like Dark-type moves.

As if Luna wasn't enough.

Isn't Dark-type, like, the antithesis of Fighting-type? Like, Fighting-types are all about hard work and honor and stuff, and Dark-types are just a bunch of ghost-hating assholes? So why would Samson's team be carrying around anti-ghost equipment? It's like he expected someone to come in with a team of ghosts that would offset his main strength, and so planned accordingly. I dunno, this is why I'm not a gym leader.

You don't know the half of it.

Anyway, Samson caught me by surprise and swept me with only Hariyama and Mienshao. Second attempt, I swapped out Froslass for Cofagrigus and had him lead instead of Golurk, and the second attempt was much less embarassing.

Cofagrigus wound up being the MVP. In addition to having the highest natural defense, Mummy also nullified any abilities that made Samson roll consistently high High Strikers. Combine that with constant Will-O-Wisps, and Samson's team is crippled.

Cofagrigus leads against Hariyama. He attempts Will-O-Wisp, but misses and is KO'd by a Smack Down and a Knock Off. Hariyama gets Mummy'd, meaning it's as vulnerable to the High Striker roulette as anyone. Haw haw.

Chandelure successfully Will-O-Wisps Hariyama instead. She then uses Minimize and starts attacking, though healing frequently, as Knock Off can still do good damage even if it's no longer a OHKO (and assuming it even hits her). Samson heals, and when I have an opening, I revive Cofagrigus and finally finish Hariyama off.

For Mienshao, Cofagrigus is back on the field and heals. Mienshao gets Mummy'd after Poison Jab, and nearly finishes Cofagrigus off with Acrobatics + Life Orb, but Cofagrigus hangs in there like a true champ. He lands a Will-O-Wisp and heals, though he still takes good damage with a field-boosted Acrobatics. Mienshao finally faints from Hex and burn + Life Orb damage.

Golurk is sent out for Blaziken. He tanks a Blaze Kick and OHKOs it with Earthquake.

Whatever you say, dude.

Golurk stays for Hawlucha. Probably not my best decision this fight.

Cofagrigus is tired but we known by now he's a trooper, as long as he gets his meds. He heals and barely survives two Acrobatics, but Hawlucha is now Mummy'd and burned through Will-O-Wisp. Cofagrigus alternates between healing and attacking with Hex before fainting Hawlucha.

Chandelure is up against Lucario. There's no need for Will-O-Wisp in this set up, and goes straight to Flame Burst. Lucario sets up a Swords Dance, and a priority Bullet Punch knocks her down to about half HP, but another Flame Burst finishes it off.

Now time for the behemoth.

Chandelure stays for Conkeldurr.

Courtesy of Terra, I assume.

Chandelure lands a Will-O-Wisp. I later found out that Conkeldurr has Guts, and Knock Off wrecks her. Probably revenge for that Terrably distasteful joke.

Cofagrigus is back, though still weakened from fighting Hawlucha. I heal, but thanks to burn + Guts, Knock Off OHKOs him. Fortunately, Conkeldurr gets Mummy'd, so burn actually does its job now.

Trevenant finally gets some action, but high striker doesn't like him and Wood Hammer doesn't do impressive damage. He also gets Mummy'd too, but it doesn't matter -- Knock Off is a OHKO.

So Aegislash uses his turn to revive Cofagrigus, and Conkeldurr uses Bulk Up. Hoo boy. Aegislash tries Iron Head and can only knock its HP into the reds. In Blade Forme, Knock Off is a OHKO.

Err. Okay. Cofagrigus again?

Never mind.

Welp, after burn damage, Conkeldurr only needs one hit to go. It's not like I have many options here.

With a single Shadow Ball, Gengar faints Conkeldurr and earns someone else's hard-earned exp.

Besides your sanity and possibly your virginity, again courtesy of Terra.

Damn straight.

[Timber Dragon]

Team Updates


Bloody Mary is a Dusknoir now wheeeee


... Wow, now this is bittersweet. Unless I ever decide to evolve that Shuppet or Pumpkaboo, this could very well be the last Team Update in the run. I mean, besides our Dead Lord Giratina and that guy with the hoops, I now have every Ghost-type Pokemon. Not just in Reborn, I mean period. There sure aren't a lot of members in the Spooky-type club. At least we're all alone and annoying together.



Noooo Eclipse! Chandelures are friends, not

Ghosties:

Ahh, the final Aster & Eclipse fight is a pain in the ass even in a normal run. Took me two or three tries to get it right, and even then, things might've gone better if I made less stupid decisions.

This fight also established why my core team is who it is. You see the Ghosties up there? Besides Dusknoir, who filled in for Cofagrigus as the tank, those are my best players. They've been constants in my team (with some occassional switches), and it turned out there was a good reason for that. The first attempt went poorly because I tried giving some of my other mons like Jellicent and Mismagius some time to shine, got wrecked, went in with my normal team... got wrecked again, went in a THIRD time and actually succeeded.

I guess it's a combination of better team synergy and overall better stats (except defense; that's always been a problem and why Cofagrigus/Dusknoir are so valuable), but the point is my team is pretty much established now. It just took getting smacked around by Aster and Eclipse for me to confirm it.

But I digress! Onto the fight.



Part of the luck of the draw was hoping Aya did useful things. Her team is competent enough, but Aster & Eclipse pounded us with high-powered moves on high-powered Pokemon. Unlike her brother, my team can't handle pounding well. Unless we're doing the pounding. Then it's awesome. Oh my.

Anyhoo, Gengar OHKOs Solrock with Shadow Ball. Lunatone Blizzards us for decent damage, and Dragalge Hydro pumps it, though can't faint it.



Golurk comes out, and this is the first of many not-too-bright decisions. Having a Golurk myself, I knew that it could wreck my ghosts if it had the chance, and I could even potentially one- or two-hit KO it with Gengar.

Who did I focus on instead? Lunatone. Because its defense-boosting moves were annoying.

So Eclipse heals Lunatone to full health, Gengar OHKOs it, and Golurk prepares Phantom Force, the ghost equivalent of Fly and Dig. And since Lunatone fainted, I now have two really strong mons on the field.



Sensing this will end badly on multiple fronts, I switch Gengar out for Dusknoir. It ends badly when Dragalge's Hydro Pump misses it and Dusknoir is then double-teamed with a Thunderbolt from Magmortar and Golurk's Phantom Force. Dragalge Hydro Pumps Magmortar the best it can, all alone.

Gengar comes back out and uses Shadow Ball.



Against Magmortar.

In my defense, I do KO Magmortar.

Unsurprisingly, Golurk uses Phantom Force again, targeting Gengar. Since Magmortar fainted, which I assume was Dragalge's original target, its Thunderbolt hits Golurk instead for negative damage.

Milotic is now out. It seems Gengar accepts his inevitable defeat and uses his turn to revive Dusknoir. Seconds later, Milotic brings him down to the reds with Scald while Golurk, enjoying overkill, finishes him off with a critical Phantom Force. And Dragalge does useful things with Thunderbolt against Milotic. Too bad they still have Hyper Potions.



Aegislash comes out and uses his turn to revive Gengar, then Scalded by Milotic and targeted for a Phantom Force. Dragalge is whittling down Milotic with Thunderbolt, who then uses Recover. Aegislash uses Night Slash... and misses. And Phantom Force KOs him.



Apparently FINALLY realizing that Golurk is becoming kinda sorta a big problem, I bring Chandelure out and gloriously OHKO it with Shadow Ball, which I probably could've done about three knockouts ago.

Apparently not done with my bad decisions, I either forgot or ignored the Milotic-related issue still on the field. Scald nearly OHKOs her, but she hangs on with a sliver of HP. I guess someone's gotta pick up the slack.

Dragalge has weakened Milotic with enough Thunderbolts, letting Chandelure finish it off. Aster sends out Rhyperior, who utterly destroys an already-near-fainted Chandelure with Rock Wrecker. Imagine taking a boulder to a cute little lamp that was already nearly broken. Poor thing, paying for my bad decisions.



Dusknoir is back out, and Eclipse sends out Aromatisse. Dragalge nearly OHKOs Aromatisse with Sludge Bomb while Dusknoir lands a Will-O-Wisp on Rhyperior, who must recharge after Wrecking Rocks. Even weakened, Dusknoir survives Aromatisse's Dazzling Gleam, and I heal her.

Eclipse withdraws Aromatisse for Vileplume. Dragalge nearly KOs Rhyperior with Hydro Pump and burn damage does the rest.



Electivire takes Rhyperior's place. Dusknoir seems to be a magnet for pain, as they both keep wailing on her. She serves as a reluctant tank while Dragalge handles the offense. Dusknoir eventually lands a Will-O-Wisp on Electivire and Dragalge manages to faint Vilepulme. Aromatisse returns to deliver more punishment, but a combination of healing and stubbornness (on the trainer's part) keeps her on the field. A combination of burn + Life Orb damage gets Electivire's HP low enough for Dragalge to finally faint it. Teamwork!



Now two-against-one, Dusknoir and Dragalge are free to gang up on Vespiqueen together. More teamwork later, and Dusknoir lands the finishing blow with Thunder Punch.



Damn straight. And I really gotta give props to Dragalge, too. Aya's whole team fell on the first attempt, but this time not a single one of her mons fainted. Dragalge stayed on the field the whole time with no healing but a Black Sludge. I guess that's what happens when the opponent makes your Pokemon the designated punching bags. Teamwork!



Er. That Chandelure's not mine. My Chandelure fainted. Honest.

[Dreamy]

Will Froslass get any love or will she just remain a somewhat dead team member?

pun only slightly intended.

[Timber Dragon]

Will Froslass get any love or will she just remain a somewhat dead team member?

pun only slightly intended.

Pun accepted. I'd like to use Froslass more often, but since she doesn't excel at anything in particular but speed, and there aren't many situations coming up where I'd need an Ice-type in specific (Charlotte and Blake, for instance), it's hard for me to find times to use her when my other, stronger spookies usually get the job done.

Meh, I've been meaning to bench some of my core team for a while just to shake things up for a bit... after Charlotte, I mean. But Chandelure will probably stay since I can't function without her Blake and an Ice-type dungeon is coming up.

Like the phoenix, we rise from the ashes to get KO'd again

Ghosties:

Well, this one didn't go as smoothly as I thought it'd go.

Ironically, this was the first time I ever looked forward to fighting Charlotte. Come to think of it, I wanted a Chandelure solely for the purposes of this battle. It just so happened that Lizbeth's freakish special attack and speed made her a competent battler in general, but honestly, I just wanted a strong Fire-type to use against Charlotte. And boy, did she deliver a good pounding.

It's a very good thing she did, because the rest of my team had no purpose but to GET pounded.

Well said, Charlotte.

Before the battle, I switched Chandelure's ability to Flash Fire (and it took two Ability Capsules to get it... geez, Chandelure). This keeps her immune to the main threat as well as boosting Flame Burst, further boosted with her Charcoal and the Burning Field effect. Combine that with her insane natural special attack, and you get... well, not OHKOs, but she hit pretty damn hard.

The genius strategy went as follows:

-Chandelure spams Flame Burst.

-Her partner takes the beatings like a good non-Fire-type punching bag.

-Said punching bag inevitably faints. Punching bag #2 comes out and revives punching bag #1.

-Rinse and repeat until all the revive items are used up or Chandelure gets mauled with a Rock-type Hidden Power. Or we win. Or get wrecked. Whichever comes first.

Our two punching bags for the day were Dusknoir and Cofagrigus. Getting pounded and then revived again isn't anything new on this team, especially not for my lovely meat shields, but this fight probably set a personal record of mine for the faint-revive count in a single battle. It also might've made Cofagrgus and Dusknoir rethink their alliance with me, but meh, where are they gonna go? I can't imagine idling the rest of their afterlives back at Shade's gym makes for an exciting existence. At least on this team they get to sacrifice themselves for the sake of victory.

Enough Flame Bursts and recoil damage from Flare Blitz knocks out Darmanitan, leading to the mon that stalled me the last time. Volcarona has a Rock-type Hidden Power (as does two of Charlotte's other mons), so learning from my mistake the last time, Volcarona goes down first. Luckily it uses Heat Wave instead, giving Chandelure a free OHKO.

After a few more of my and Charlotte's mons get smacked around, I realized an unfortunate side effect of using revival items: they tend to disappear when you use them.

No Cotton Candy.

No Revive.

Uh-oh.

Welp, do the best we can, I guess.

Uh-oh.

It's up to you, Chandelure!

You are so lucky that Hidden Power missed. That would've ended things fast, especially after that Nasty Plot. Thank you, Minimize.

WHY DIDN'T YOU ATTACK ROTOM

Oh, right. Nasty Plot + Hidden Power.

THANK THE GODS OF RNG

Playing field is level now. Heal, one last Flame Burst, aaaaand

Damn straight.

Already on it. Question is whether to keep doing it with Flame Burst for field effect stuff, or with my spiffy new Flamethrower TM for Even Moar Power. Hmmmm

[Dreamy]

Ah the good ol "fight fire with fire" strategy for charlotte. my strategy on my first (and only) run was similar, except it was typhlosion using STAB full hp field boosted flash fire boosted eruption to double OHKO and his partner to throw potions at him to keep him topped off for full power. don't even remember if I lost a pokemon or not, might've been a couple.

[Timber Dragon]

Hey look progress and stuff. Spoiler'd so you guys don't suffocate from pictures.

PULSE Avalugg

Ghosties + 1 HM Slave:


Kay so I'm shaking things up a bit and giving some of my other ghosts a chance to do stuff. Except Chandelure. Because. I need her.

Anyway. Pretty straightforward stuff here.



Dusknoir burns it.



Switch to Mismagius. Even after a Nasty Plot, Mystic Fire does pitiful damage due to the field and lack of STAB, but lowers Avalugg's special attack... which is probably pointless if all its attacks are physical. She eventually gets taken out by two powered-up Rock Slides.



Hey look at that, Froslass is doing stuff. It even gets a critical AND lowers Avalugg's special defense. Twice! That's useful stuff.

And enough Shadow Balls plus burn damage eventually faints it.

Aster minus one Eclipse

Ghosties:


Hey, lookit those ghosties you pretty much never see, besides Chandelure and Dusknoir and sometimes Spiritomb, so it's actually just Mismagius and Froslass and Jellicent who're doing things for a change, except when they're too fainted to be useful.

Aster's a little more manageable now that his partner got Chandelure'd (again, it was Sirius's, not mine). I say only 'a little' because even Aster by himself is still kind of a dick.



Mismagius OHKOs Solrock with Shadow Ball.



Jellicent does the same against Rhyperior with Surf.



Surf doesn't completely cut it against Golurk, though. Aster heals and Jellicent attacks again before Golurk knocks him out with Shadow Punch.

Our heroine Chandelure finishes the job with Shadow Ball, before heroically fleeing from Milotic.



Dusknoir does her usual burn thing, not because I'm worried about damage (its attacks are special, anyway), but because Milotic is a tanky asshole with Recover and Leftovers and I need some extra damage. So many freakin' Leftovers with these Reborn trainers. I wonder if they haxed their way to the upper floors in the Department Store.

Then Aster withdraws Milotic for Magmortar and faints her.



Oh go screw yourself.



Luckily our heroine is back to save the day.



Mismagius is out to handle Milotic. She prepares a Shadow Ball to finish it off, and Milotic gets healed instead. In revenge for Aster's good luck, Mismagius gets a lucky critical and burn damage does the rest.



Sending Chandelure out against Electivire probably would've been a smarter decision if she wasn't paralyzed and half-dead. Realizing my mistake, Chandelure instead becomes a revive slave for Dusknoir before a Life Orb'd Thunder Punch smashes her adorable face in.



Dusknoir comes back and heals, but a field-boosted Ice Punch nearly OHKOs her... and freezes her solid. Now a vulnerable ice sculpture, she can't do much except to use her turn to heal Mismagius and then shatter like a popsicle.



Hey it's Froslass! She's doing stuff again.



Or not.



God dammit.



You're our last hope, Spiritomb!

Just in case, she uses her first turn to revive Dusknoir, and in a twist of RNG, Electivire uses Fire Punch instead. It's dampened by the field effect, but with Life Orb, Fire Punch still packs a... good power.

Speaking of Life Orb, since Electivire outspeeds everyone on my team, Life Orb is pretty much the only damage Electivire's been taking this whole time, and it's already whittled its health down quite a bit.

For lack of any other ideas, Spiritomb uses Sucker Punch.



I did not expect that.



Wow.

Right now I'm just kinda picturing Spiritomb with part of his blob mass extended outward like an arm, figure skating right into a punch in Electivire's face.



Welp, that's one way to do things. Good job, Spiritomb. You're a lovely dancer.

Freezer Dick

Ghosties:


Compared to Aster, Blake was pretty easy. I also forgot that it's a double battle and unlike at the Fiore Mansion battle ahead, he doesn't lead with Walrein. This lets Chandelure safely burn away the field... and since I'd forgotten it was a double battle, she just happened to be in the second slot. I don't always pay attention to these things.



Dusknoir and Chandelure gang up on Jynx. Chandelure uses Flame Burst, eliminating the field and nearly OHKOing her, while Dusknoir finishes her off. Rotom Volt Switches to Weavile (yay Dark-types), and after Jynx faints, Blake sends out Rotom. Welcome back!

Dusknoir tries to Will-O-Wisp Weavile, but she gets Night Slash'd immediately, only for Weavile to immediately get OHKO'd by Chandelure. Thank goodness Weavile is so squishy and that it chose Dusknoir as the punching bag.



Froslass vs Froslass, because why not. Kayako barely survives a Shadow Ball from Blake's Froslass, who is then knocked out by Kayako and Chandelure.



Chandelure and Froslass are both nearly KO'd, but that's okay, because we have delicious ice cream. It even has a face! Yum cannibalism.

Anyway, Froslass uses her turn to heal Chandelure and Chandelure OHKOs the ice cream. Rotom uses Shadow Ball on Chandelure, but she hangs on. Good thing Rotom loses its ghost typing as a refrigerator.



Walrein time! This time Froslass heals and Chandelure takes the fall. She Will-O-Wisps Walrein before Rotom finishes her off. Walrein's Surf knocks Froslass into the reds, but it also deals heavy damage to Rotom.

Mismagius takes Chandelure's place and uses her turn to heal Froslass, but a Surf + Thunder Bolt combo faints her. Surf also happens to faint Rotom as well, because letting your teammates take the fall for the sake of victory is what a certain trainer Team Meteor does.



It's two against one now. Jellicent is safe from Surf thanks to Water Absorb and Mismagius manages to survive, and they double team Walrein respectively with Brine and Shadow Ball.



Damn straight, Freezer Dick.

[Timber Dragon]

Aw shit look what I have IT'S VIDEOOOOS

The one where Mewtwo learns that you can be cheap without relying on Gen 1's bullcrap mechanics

And the one where Terra gets swept by a dead jellyfish

No commentary this time so I can get used to this weird... Youtube upload thing which I've never done before because Youtube is an awful awful place for any kind of intelligent discourse. I'm also a very private and very paranoid person who apparently wants to make her content as hard to access as possible, because honestly, if I had it my way I wouldn't even be using Youtube at all -- it's just the most convenient way to host videos.

The videos aren't perfect and there are some de-syncing issues with the audio that I gotta figure out how to counter. I also gotta figure out how my actual commentary will go now that I'll have videos where you actually get to see what I did rather than just have me describe it to you, bad decisions and all.

In any case, this is a trial run for another direction I'll be taking with my Reborn runs from now on, now that I'm aware of this mysterious new technology called Youtube uploading.

[Timber Dragon]

We all fight dirty here

Ghosties:


This thing is an asshole in the best of days, but we can be assholes too.



Kinda looks like the biomass living in my shower drain. Come to think of it, Titania and I are gonna need an injection or five after playing around in the sewers all day. Something about all this just doesn't feel kosher.

Anyway, the first order of business is to burn it, releasing the wonderful fragrance of Swalot waste. PULSE Swalot hits like a truck and the field effect heals it faster than what we can safely dish out. Even burn isn't enough to keep up with its healing, so it's time to bring out an old friend.



And since Dusknoir got fainted, it's up to our resident Curser Gengar to take the fall, who is then Discharge'd by the icky water in one of the most disgusting ways to go down.



Golurk also tanks a cleanly Sludge Wave to the face and unleashes an Earthquake, which I can only hope doesn't crack through any walls and flood the city with gallons of sewage and Meteor corpses. Earthquake deals heavy damage, and burn + Curse damage takes care of the rest.



Is my reward some steel wool? 'Cause I really don't wanna know how many bacterial friends I'm infected with.


Somehow, Taka stayed clean this whole time

Ghosties:


This fight is optional, but I always choose to battle Taka here. He's a cool guy. Plus I just feel like annoying Titania. She can go ahead and attack me, I have my own Aegislash. And he's shiny! I bet she's just jealous because my Aegislash fits the bloodstained murder weapon image better than hers. (Fun fact: my Aegislash is a bit of a pacifist.)



As you might've noticed from the PULSE Swalot fight, I figured I'd get some of my old team back in the game (plus one HM slave again). Welcome back, gaiz.

This fight wasn't too bad, but in the video you may have noticed me pausing to heal instead of going in for a finishing hit. That's because I hadn't realized that Taka doesn't carry any healing items. You can't exactly blame me for the mistake when almost every other major battle besides, like, PULSE Abra and Avalugg had a secret stash of potions.

Anyway, Taka not pausing to heal tripped me up a bit, but nothing humiliating for once.

Then I got to Chatot, because of course things go to hell whenever it shows up. It's... kinda my own fault, though. I was so worried about the Chatter issue that I forgot about all the other important issues Chatot has.



Good decision #1: Forgetting that Chatot is a Normal/Flying-type.



Good decision #2: Forgetting that Chatot has Heat Wave despite spamming it for the last three turns.



At least Aegislash gets a final hoorah. He uses his last turn to revive Dusknoir before getting immolated by the Heat Wave that I apparently kept ignoring because I was focused on defending against Chatter, instead of the freakin' HEAT BLASTS directed towards my face for multiple turns in a row.



Oh that's always a good sign. Well, thankfully even after a Nasty Plot'd Heat Wave, Dusknoir manages to survive and KOs Chatot with Thunder Punch.



See? Even bad decisions can work out in the end. Edited September 14, 2016 by Timber Dragon

[Timber Dragon]

Haunted (Fiore) Mansion

Ghosties:


Three twelve-on-twelve, back-to-back double battles with partners who may or may not do useful things. My body is ready.



Isn't Florinia a Grass-type trainer? What's she doing with a Hippowdon, unless she wants to annoy everyone with that sandstorm? Must be that 'Desert Rose' thing. Too bad it doesn't help when the opponents' movesets seem tailor-made specifically to counter her.



So many mons have Ice-type moves or Hidden Power, and then there's Blake. To Florinia's credit, she does contribute as well as she can given how much this fight hates her.



Will-O-Wisp is liberally used against some of the more dangerous mons. Otherwise, it's an offensive race to KO everyone before Florinia's whole team faints and leaves me at the mercy of getting double-teamed. And believe me, you do not want that to happen from people like Fern and Blake.



Fortunately my reward for beating Solaris's Garchomp is getting Julia for a partner in the last battle (and seeing Florinia getting mauled by a Seviper, if that's your kink). Julia is a bit more useful than her KO'd sorority sister is, or at least she doesn't have any prominent weaknesses that Solaris and Orderly John can exploit for Super Effective evil.



Overall, despite being such high-ranked Meteors, the battle against Solaris and Orderly Not-Cena went more smoothly than the previous battles. I guess that's the benefit of having a coffee- and explosion-obsessed cheerleader for your battle partner.



Although, you do have to wonder.

[Dreamy]

Looks like you only have one more foe to..... put to rest.

[Timber Dragon]

Fun fact: I finished and recorded this thing, like... two weeks ago. I was just too lazy to upload it and write about it and stuff. Not bad for the final post of this run until ep 16 amirite?

Yeeeah. Anyway. Here ya go.


Ciel

Froslass is a heavy hitter, but between Archeops, Talonflame, and Noivern's Heat Wave, it's risky for her to stay on the field. FORTUNATELY she also happens to be super speedy and critical hit Frost Breath is enough to one- or two-hit KO whoever she faces.



Talonflame is a bit of a stall point. Jellicent and Dusknoir put up a good fight, but they can't quite keep up with field-boosted Acrobatics combined with constant healing. Chandelure eventually saves the day. Again.



Froslass takes out a good chunk of Altaria's HP, but she'd already been weakened by Gliscor previously and Earthquake KOs her.

... Proooobably wouldn't have happened if I'd used Chandelure's final turn to cure Froslass's paralysis instead of burning Gliscor, making me waste a turn curing Froslass while she's on the field and letting Gliscor get in a free Acrobatics, but shut up. I am a Pokermons master.

Fortunately my ghosts are immune to Hyper Voice and Sing, Altaria's two biggest threats, and Gengar can avoid Earthquake with Levitate. Altaria's Mega Evolution also happens to gain the Fairy-type, making it vulnerable to Venoshock, which Gengar has. Gengar is pretty much untouchable.

Looks like my choice for this one is clear.



Pokermons. Master.

Look, Mega Altaria is weak to Steel too, 'kay? 'Kay.





So! With that, this run comes to a hiatus until ep 16 comes out. My order of priority is my normal game and my bird-themed run, then this one, and theeeen a new canine-themed run! Because apparently three runs aren't enough.

Edited September 30, 2016 by Timber Dragon