Ikaru

I agree; these are pretty good tips. More or less what I've been doing too. I have a box with around 9ish Pokemon that I can bring out at any point (granted they need a little catching up at this point) and five boxes of random things I run into that I don't have yet. If you train six Pokemon evenly it's really hard to break the level cap, and if you have MORE than that, it's even harder. My suggestion is to basically always have six wherever possible; in the beginning of the game at the end of like episode three this was my "team": Bunch of things that don't really matter but were still there to be useful- Noctowl and Masquerain resist Grass (Masquerain doubly so!) for the notorious Florinia and Loudred + Noctowl were surprisingly useful with the 90 base power STAB Uproar, not to mention Noctowl's Hypnosis. I think the best thing to keep in mind for this game is that you should never expect to steamroll it with full force and it will almost always require a hint of strategy. Typically for Shelly and Shade I would use Noctowl to Hypnosis big threats (i.e. Yanmega and Chandelure) and switch immediately to Gigalith to dunk them hard. Admittedly, Ariados is terrible and it didn't really do much ever, but it's one of my favorites so I had to try. Sucker Punch and Shadow Sneak were nice against Shade at least.

Basically this. I played when the level cap was higher early on, and when it was lowered Blaziken was stuck at 45 forever; I had Growlithe and Ninetales as backup fire types for that entire time, and then I ran over Serra because I had Ninetales and Blaziken lol EDIT: Ame has said the mining rocks will be unlimited eventually (or something along those lines), but as of now doing that would make things too easy for anyone who has the time to sit there and get tons of nice things. I currently have seven Heart Scales I don't even need to use and only one or two of them were from wild Luvdisc. They're not rare at all, just small and hard to notice when you're mining. As has been said, save and repeat if you really really need to. Generally I would reset if I didn't get anything but otherwise just take what I get.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CRNBrkjSMk This again. I should find something new to listen to again... #waiting for new sick puppies album

ITT: Cyrus is better than all of us also first time wukong

zzzz i make a conscious effort to solo dragon the moment i get to level 6 zzzzz

I don't recall specifying a time frame.

Diving in nose-first and making a fool of yourself is standard around here. I've done it more than once; don't worry. Also welcome!

Last I recall, leveling Magneton in Shade's gym is what does it.

Oh, yeah, sorry I guess I should have mentioned that first. Umm, I think Porygon will be okay once it evolves at least- Porygon2 is pretty decent in different roles, depending on its ability. Keep it as a backup if anything. Zangoose is fine (especially if it has Toxic Boost and you get poisoned). As I recall, Ghost resists Poison so Spiritomb would be nice too... Seconding Magnezone though, if you're just looking to beat Aya. It's probably the easiest win-button you can have for her, although I think Ame is changing some things in the next release so that might change?

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP

....... WELP. Now I look stupid. It's just now coming back to me that it had Adaptability in Gen IV too. Don't mind me.

Huh. I didn't notice Tynamo was available already... Not that I have ANY idea where it is, but Eelektross might actually be a good idea, since it has good bulk, no weaknesses, and can learn quite a few moves for coverage. Magneton/zone has been proven to be pretty good by now, although I don't think we'll be facing excessive Steel-types anytime soon (probably going to eat my words) so that might not be an issue. Personally seconding Flygon- I have one as well and I feel like had I gotten a better nature (read: remembered to save before I got Trapinch) it'd be so much more useful. Gligar would be pretty good as well, but I think you might want to hold off on that until a Razor Fang is available.

Other way around- that leads to Eevee. And yes, unfortunately, Glaceon isn't possible yet. I'm waiting for that too.

Everyone and their mothers will probably tell you to use Gyarados so I'll avoid that (except for just now). Just looking at my own boxes to remind myself what exists so far and what doesn't, I see an Azurill-- Azumarill is actually pretty strong if you can get Huge Power on it, and it'll have Aqua Tail (90 base power) by level 21; it actually learns Rain Dance on top of that, at 35; and if you REALLY want to go full-competitive, you can get Superpower at level 42. I imagine Escavalier to be pretty good in Rain as well, as its only weakness is eliminated. I'd also vote for Lanturn because it has much-needed bulk and potential Water/Volt Absorb, although at the same time it's, and I hate to say this because I love it, pretty bad overall. I stopped using it after I beat Aya, but then again I stopped using a lot of things then (or before) like Noctowl, Gigalith and Crawdaunt. ... Speaking of Crawdaunt, it's not terrible either, especially with Adaptability, and you might even be able to get Dragon Dance on it with a little effort c: (not yet, of course, since it comes from the Horsea and Dratini lines)

Seems to be the case early on, although I sometimes think maybe the level cap is the hardest leader, and not Florinia. ...Of course, I had Combusken and this was back when she had a Ferroseed instead of... whatever was replaced by it, so it was kind of a breeze for me. Thinking about it now, I'm not entirely sure who was the hardest leader. Some say Aya and I think I've seen some issues with Serra, but to be honest I didn't find either of those too difficult either. Especially not Serra because i ran her over with Ninetales and Blaziken (the second time, at least). Point is, "hardest" is subjective and may vary for everyone idk. I should thank Shade, though, because... ... I went out and got a Mawile just for him and I still have it. It was even my highest leveled Pokemon until the end of this episode when Misdreavus passed it up at 49 and I haven't done much else since. Most likely, the game will eventually come to a point where we'll need to get a little (read: a lot) more competitive-like, but it's not so bad for now I think. c: EDIT: Also, in the future, do try to avoid double/triple posting consecutively, please~

HELLO FRIEND I HAVE NOTICED YOUR TOPIC TITLE AND CAME RUNNING *cough* Definitely not gonna tell you where, but I can at least tell you you'll be able to see it each time you run into it, and I'm 70% sure it has to be night time but I have really (non-)selective memory and could be wrong.

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I don't know about any extra conditions, but the encounter rate is probably just really low.

If you like Psychic in addition to the other two, you're probably my new favorite already. ... Okay, maybe a little exaggerated, but those three are my favorite types as well c: In any case, welcome!

If there's no switch on it the pillar itself, it's affected by one that DOES have a switch.

Dream World abilities are basically normal abilities in this game; you have as much a chance of getting Drought as you do any of the other abilities it can have. For breeding specifically, I'm not sure. There probably isn't a "Dream world" mechanic so you probably can't influence it the same way, but again I'm not sure.

Good luck, and will do