Timber Dragon

I don't know why I never consider the Meteor Admin fights a threat when almost every time I've fought them so far, they actually kinda hurt. Team Update Redrum (M) Species: Murkrow Nature: Lonely/Mischievous Ability: Super Luck Gotta love that nickname. This is the spawn of the Murkrow I got from the Team Aqua base and my Ditto prostitute. While the original Murkrow is mainly a kamikaze Prankster + Perish Song mon, Redrum is intended to be a more respectable battler. Funnily enough, it was a dark and stormy night when I hatched him. Honchcrow and eventually Mandibuzz will probably be the only Psychic-type countermeasures I'll have. He has a good physical attack stat I'm looking forward to, but like a lot of my flock, sneezing on him too hard will faint him. I won't be using much of him until I get a Dusk Stone. Aster and Eclipse pt something something Aster and Eclipse got off to a bad start... well, about three bad starts. Solrock and Lunatone in particular can be tricky, even moreso in this run. I have no dependable anti-Psychic measures besides Honchcrow, who I'm keeping benched until I get a Dusk Stone, and the birds who aren't weak to Rock can't get past their Psychic-typing. Even Swanna who can effectively damage them can be effectively damaged in return. The most I can do is brute force them with my hard hitters and hope for the best. Even Electabuzz and Magmar can be a pain in the ass -- Electabuzz because most of my team are pretty much lightning rods for Electric-types, and Magmar because my heavy hitters are either Fire-type too (like Blaziken and Talonflame) or their attacks are resisted by Fire (like Aromatisse). It's simple enough to just brute force Magmar, but remember Electabuzz and the lighting rod issue. Once those threats are out of the way, it's usually only a matter of hoping the final wave can be countered by someone who's still conscious. Luckily, during the fight Altaria leveled up enough to learn Dragon Pulse. It and Altaria herself wound up being one of the saving graces for the next battle... Taka Okay, so, um. You know how Talonflame obliterated Kiki with Acrobatics? Well, thanks to Taka's Gligar, Kiki and her mons got their revenge. I can call this fight a lot of names (mainly bad ones), but Karma is the first one that springs to mind. The fight had a number of bad starts and worse luck. I kept Talonflame in the PC to make the universe hate me less, so I made Blaziken take care of Klefki. The problem is Blaziken hit so hard that Taka usually didn't get a chance to use any of his healing items, meaning he got to save them for mons who really really needed to be taken down fast. Like Gligar. Blaziken was a no-no, so Swanna took his place. But where Swanna had the advantage in type, Gligar had the advantage in sheer brute force. Two Acrotabics and literally anyone in my team was down. I'm glad I decided to start using Swablu/Altaria again. She was kind of dead weight for most of the game so far, but now she's able to reach levels where she can finally become the defensive birb she was intended to be. Praise be to Cotton Guard, because holy Arceus's crap, without Cotton Guard this fight probably could not have been won. Of course, karma was still punishing me. In two battles in a row, Gligar managed to critical hit Altaria before she could get a chance to use Cotton Guard. Two battles! In a row! The asshat also had a habit of U-Turning at very inconvenient moments (which in this battle, all moments were inconvenient). In the final attempt, I got lucky and Taka sent out Cradily. But since I was being punished, it was usually Chatot. You know how Chatot hurt in fights even when there was no Gligar? Yeah. Chatot + Nasty Plot ended things pretty fast. Altaria and Aromatisse did most of the work, and that was mainly due to Cotton Guard and Calm mind, respectively. During the final attempt, Altaria got two Cotton Guards in to raise her physical defense to the max. You know that Acrobatics is unholy when even with maximum defense buffs, it still managed to do decent damage. When she was buffed, I used Dragon Pulse, but then Gligar U-Turned and sent out Cradily. I wanted to save Altaria's strength so I switched to Atomatisse. Luckily with some Calm Mind buffs and general durability, he did decent damage while being mostly safe. It wound up being a race of endurance. Taka used the rest of his healing items on Cradily and Cradily kept spamming Recover. I think by that point Cradily's other moves ran out of PP, but so were Aromatisse's. Luckily Aromatisse got a critical and finally fainted it. Gligar came back. I managed to get a Charm in to harshly lower its attack. Proud and exhausted, Aromatisse went down like a trooper. Altaria was sent back out, and this was the point when Timber finally learned, despite all the years of playing, a cardinal mechanic in the Pokermons games she did not realize: did you know that buffs/debuffs wear off when you switch out? Because I didn't! And because Altaria had switched out, those Cotton Guard buffs -- the ones she needed to survive, period -- were gone! It caught me by surprise, but luckily the attack left her with enough HP to set up a Cotton Guard and survive the next attack. Gligar had already been somewhat weakened before U-Turning, so Altaria just needed to finish the job. Finally! Threat #1 is finally down. Then I forgot about Chatot, Threat #2. Great. Like usual, it was a race to see who could KO who first. I was very lucky with RNG. When Altaria fainted (Cotton Guard protects physical damage, and Chatter is special), I sent out Swanna since my options were pretty limited at this point. It was super super lucky that Swanna's Water Pulse confused Chatot and at a critical moment, it hurt itself instead of attacking. That let me finally win. gg Taka. gg Karma. (Fun fact: I'd put Talonflame back in my party sometime around the final attempt. If Swanna and/or my other mon had fainted, then Talonflame definitely would've finished the fight. Luckily it didn't come to that, so she was mainly there for good luck. Thanks, Talonflame! Even when you don't do anything, you're awesome.) Solaris's Garchomp Actually, remember how I said that karma got me back with Taka's fight? Well, after the results of this fight, now I'm not sure what to think except the end result for me will probably be humiliating. But before that happens, I get to celebrate the first time I ever beat Solaris's Garchomp, ever. And the way I did it turned out to be very simple, and very stupid. First off, Aromatisee got a nice little Air Balloon to make him avoid Earthquake. He was immune to Dragon Rush, and I just had to hope that Fire Fang and/or Stone Edge wouldn't kill him. At first I stuck with debuffing Garchomp with Charm and then switching to Altaria to attack, but if Garchomp ever got criticals (which he often did, the prick), then my HP was either in the reds or it was over, and I couldn't depend on that kind of hax. But even with all those debuffs, a single Dragon Rush could take out Altaria before she could even set up a Cotton Guard, critical hit or no critical. I gave it one last shot, but this time, rather than debuff Garchomp, I buffed Aromatisse with Calm Mind. And I guess this method confused Garchomp's tiny little dragon mind, because sticking with Aromatisse and her stupid balloon locked Garchomp into spamming Earthquake. Of course, that was like keeping a T.rex behind an electrical fence in Jurassic Park -- it's artificial safety, and Earthquake only had so much PP before Garchomp switched to a move that would hit Aromatisse for some painful, OHKO-y damage. I got some Calm Minds in, kept using Moonblast, and watched as Solaris's freakin' Garchomp actually fainted atop Pyrous Mountain. And that's how I beat a level 75 Garchomp: tie a pink fairy bird thing to a balloon and watch it Moonblast stuff. Victory is pink and fluffy.

Yeeeeah Reborn's not the type of Pokermons game that lets you win just through type effectiveness. XD Well, okay, you can brawn your way through, but the standards for brawn is higher than what the official games demand from you. In addition to typing, you also gotta consider the Pokemon itself -- stats, moveset, ability, and even its place within the rest of your team. (Drawing from my bird-themed run here.) Like, Unfezant has a high physical attack stat, but most of its moves (barring TMs/HMs) are special. It's kind of deadweight at first, but it can eventually learn some potent physical moves like Facade and Fly that cater to its high attack. Coupled with its Super Luck ability that boosts its critical rate, and a held item to boost it even further, and Unfezant goes from a feathery paperweight to a pretty competent battler. I hope. Those are the sorts of things to consider, and honestly, I didn't give them much consideration either until Reborn kept kicking my ass. Now I don't suck as much am a TOTAL CHAMP at this game. And trust me, victory is sweet when you manage to figure it out... even if you made yourself bald from tearing out all your hair, because victory is only as sweet as it is frustrating.

Acrobatics is awesome but Emolga itself doesn't hit that hard, and it's a Pokemon that'll start to lag behind by this point in the game anyway. If you want more flying types, Route 2 has Hawlucha and Rufflet/Braviary, which are both hard-hitters. Psychic-types are a little risky in this fight since they're so squishy (even the Ame-Box in the gym recommends sticking to Flying-types) and a lot of Samson's team can consistently roll high High Striker attacks.

Chandelure. Dear lord, Chandelure. Shade showed everyone what it felt like to be at the receiving end of that freakishly high stat. There's also Mismagius. Spiritomb and Cofagrigus have respectable Sp. Atk too while being fairly beefy. ... Unless you never got them before the point of no return, which in that case, you're out of luck in the spooky department. But really, Flying-types might be a better bet anyway. Samson and Ciel share the same field effect, so all of Ciel's Flying bonuses apply to you. If you wanna use Fairy-types, I'm using an Aromatisse in my bird-themed run and it's surprisingly durable, so it might be handy here. Besides, it'll also come in handy against Ciel's Altaria... *shudder*

Le Team Updates Name: Ditto Status: Getting busy You know that's the face of a skank. ZEL and PULSE Muk Honestly I never figured out the mechanics of how/when PULSE Muk changes its type. I... never really paid attention. *cough* But anyway, ZEL leads with Glaceon and I KO it with Talonflame. I sent out Porygon2 for Muk, but Muk was too bulky for it to substantial damage and Porygon2 wasn't bulky enough to last long. I really want that Conversion2 bug fixed... I was lucky that Muk switched from Water to Electric, because Blaziken fainted it with two Blaze Kicks. The stinky puddle of whatevertypeitis is down, and so is the main threat. A weakened Talonflame gets some good hits on Espeon, but ZEL didn't want to waste any Ultra Potions. Talonflame weakened Espeon, but alas, too many Psychics to the bird brain is no good. Swanna takes over and did some good damage with Aerial Ace... but she's hit with Espeon's previous Future Sight and faints. What a dick. Well, Fearow finished the job. By this point my whole team is either fainted or their health is in the reds, but luckily I only had to worry about Umbreon. Blaziken's back, though he's still weak from battling Muk and I had to heal him. Good thing I did, because another Future Sight that Espeon had used beforehand finally hit. Dick! Luckily Blaziken survived. Umbreon could only pathetically hit him with Quick Attacks or Confuse Rays while Blaziken Double Kicked it in the spleen. Cal Swanna's in the lead to take care of Infernape. She's such a trooper, taking a Swords Dance + Close Combat to the beak and not dying. Good job, Swanna! She did such a good job that I figured that, despite her being weakened, I could reward her by letting her take on Charizard. Apparently the reward was Charizard Thunder Punching her. Look, it was the thought that counted. Welp, I figured, now's as good a time as any for Talonflame to try out her new toy. Yup, she grew to level 44, so you know what that means? I have an early Archeops? It means Acrobatics! I mean. Holy light of Arceus, Acrobatics on Talonflame. I won't even bother getting into the specifics of the fight. Blaziken took care of Magmortar and Swanna already had her win against Infernape, but honestly you can probably picture what had happened. The One Where Timber Finally Understands Why Talonflame is Currently Banned or The One Where Kiki Dies Early Kiki, I... I am so sorry. You're gonna die, and then this happened, and I just... Sorry, there are no words. I can't help it if Talonflame is a beast with Acrobatics, and you just happened to throw a bunch of Fighting-types at me. It's just how things go, y'know? I'll tell you what. Just to make amends (kinda), I'm putting Talonflame in the PC for a while, just so I don't wreck everything. Gotta raise some other birbs anyway. I also just might change Talonflame's ability to Flame Body, just because Gale Wings can cause so much trauma for others. So, no hard feelings, Kiki? Oh who am I kidding. I LOVE THIS BIRD

First off, that Psyduck avatar is awesome. Second, you can attach stuff under More Reply Options. Third, ouch, Corey's a tough one with your team. I tried about three times and couldn't get past Crobat either, and you're especially stuck since your flat broke and can't afford anymore healing items or other nifty stuff. I evolved Hoothoot into Noctowl just to see what would happen, and Noctowl got a bit more useful. I timed things so that when Corey was down to his fifth Pokemon (it's usually Nidorina), I send out Emolga and used that X Speed in your inventory so that it'll outspeed Crowbat. It worked, but like you said, Crobat takes it down in about two hits, and it especially gets nasty after Nasty Plot. If you have the patience, I'd suggest catching a Phanpy, evolve it to Donphan, and level it to 30 where it'll learn Magnitude. I know leveling at this stage in the game is a total pain, but Donphan is worth it, especially against Corey. If you have even more patience, I'd also suggest leveling that Mareep of yours into Ampharos. Ampharos hits harder and is beefier in general than Emolga, who'll probably be outclassed down the line anyway, so you might as well start using a more reliable Electric-type. It won't be as fast as Emolga and certainly won't outspeed Crowbat, but it should be able to take a few more hits to the face and live. Again, I know grinding is a pain, and I usually don't like to suggest raising specific Pokemon, but honestly I can't figure out a way to do it with your current team... unless you grinded them up a bit more, maybe.

Shadow = Shade + Ow Oh lordy, Shade. So, I in all my ADD totally forgot that Shade's field boots both Ghost- and Electric-type attacks. I was only reminded of it after fighting a few randoms in the power plant, but I didn't give it any thought because, Rotom aside, what could Shade's ghosties possibly do with Electricity? Well, Gengar used Thunderbolt. That was the first hint that I'd probably be in for a rough time. But first let's do a quick Team Update I grinded Adagio into a Swanna, hoping I could use her against Chandelure. And after taking a back seat for the most part due to a lack of offensive and defensive prowess, I bit the bullet and grinded Weiss to an Altaria, making sure she kept Mist for a strategy I had in mind. Now, I don't consider Shade easy, but in most of my runs he's usually one of the gym leaders I don't have too much trouble with. Ohh, how naive I was. I'd almost forgotten that this was Reborn. Reborn won't let me off easy just because I managed the previous gyms so far. In fact, this bird run gave me a better understanding of why so many people have trouble with Shade. Shade was punishing me for my hubris. I grossly underestimated the field effect. I thought I mostly had Ghost-type attacks to worry about, but nope. I had led with Swanna but she wasn't dealing enough damage, so I withdrew her for Porygon2. This wound up being a good call because Gengar's Thunderbolt would've OHKO'd her twice over (4x weakness to Electric, after all). Porygon2's Twisted Spoon + Psybeam did decent damage, but he wasn't sturdy enough to survive for long. I managed to brute force him and some other ghosts with my other mons. Then Shade caught me by surprise by withdrawing someone early and sending out Rotom. Not good for the Flying-type who was out. I sent out Blaziken again and managed to faint Rotom, but Shuppet came out and Destiny Bonded him. There goes Blaziken. Well, I managed to squeeze by the rest of his team. And theeeen came the brick wall. PSA: Don't throw bricks at birds. Chandelure was the mon who threw a wrench in my plans, for reasons I kinda anticipated and others I... did not. One problem I foresaw was its ability, Flash Fire. I didn't think anything of it until I realized that the only bird that could reasonably stand up to its freakish Sp. Attack movies is Blaziken... who only knows Fighting-type moves (useless against Ghost-types) and Fire-type moves (BAD IDEA). I thought, okay, I have Swanna! She'll be able to handle an Energy Ball. Chandelure laughed and hit me with an Electric-based Hidden Power. I thought, okay, Aromatisse is surprisingly bulky! He can take a few attacks to the face. Yeeeeah, you can tell that I use Fairy-types a lot because I kinda sorta keep forgetting that Fire-types resist Fairy-types. So just to recap, my whole team is either weak to Electric, or their only damaging moves are resisted by Chandelure's ghostiness or fireness. Well, fuck. I pondered my ponderer and remembered that Aromatisse has Calm Mind. Since I have zero type advantages against Chandelure (barring Swanna with her 4x Electric weakness), I figured if I can't resist, then the only way to get past this is through brute force. Brute force usually works! Swablu's Mist could set up a field effect to further boost Aromatisse's attacks. This meant also needed to be bulky enough to survive getting Mist set up, so I leveled her into an Altaria. (She was falling behind, anyway.) For my next attempt(s) I led with Aromatisse. I had him use some Calm Minds while tanking Shadow Claw (a physical attack) and Thunderbolts (special, but often caused Paralysis). I healed when I needed to and when I thought Aromatisse was safe, I started using Moonblast or getting some free heals with Healing Kiss. Of course, Gengar also resists Fairy-type attacks, but enough Calm Minds let Aromatisse deal respectable damage. Okay, so things looked good. I used Blaziken against Doublade, Shuppet, and Rotom, and Fearow against Trevenant. Porygon2 was a backup or meatshield when the situation called for it. Chandelure's up, so this was the moment of truth. Altaria is sent out. Chandelure was unfortunately a little faster, but fortunately, Altaria managed to survive Shadow Ball so she could use Mist. The next attack took her down, so now it's time for Aromatisse to save the day. The plan might've went better if I'd used the max amount of Calm Minds. Even with all the buffs and the Misty Terrain, Aromatisse's Moonblast was only able to take down, maybe, 1/4 of Chandelure's HP at best. Aromatisse could deal decent damage, but so could Chandelure. But the Mist effect eventually faded, Chandelure's attacks were boosted again, and that was that. For the final attempt, I once again led with Aromatisse but this time used a full six Calm Minds for maximum buffs. I tanked Gengar's attacks the best I could, healed when necessary, and pounded Gengar in two hits despite resistance to Fairy. Mwahaha. I handled the rest of Shade's team similarly to how I did last time. When it was time for Chandelure, I didn't send out Altaria to use Mist (either I thought I didn't need it, or I forgot. Overconfidence, or sheer forgetfulness? You decide!). I just went straight to Aromatisse and tried to wail on it. In hindsight, the Mist would've made things a little easier. Aromatisse's Moonblast hit harder than last time, except... I wailed on the rest of his team beforehand, without waiting for Shade to use up all his healing items. That gave Chandelure two freakin' Ultra Potions to himself, plus whatever berry it was holding. Aromatisse hit hard, but unfortunately he could only take so much damage, and eventually he faints. Well, fuck! I knew it'd be dangerous, but screw it, I sent out Swanna. Swanna got in two Water Pulses before Chandelure quit toying with me and KO'd her with Hidden Power. Luckily, Chandelure was down to the reds by this point. And who would save the day but, of all mons, Porygon2? Yup, the mon who mainly took a backseat to this fight wound up landing the finishing blow with Psybeam. It took all the exp for itself despite this supposedly being a team effort (ahem), but you know what? I don't care. Shade is down and my squishy birbs never have to deal with him or his brick walls ever again. I kinda wanna do a Ghost montype run now.

Oh silly me, I forgot that fun orphanage things come after fun Shelly things. I took care of the Shelly things okay and now it's time for some team update things. Team updates things Cochin's a Blaziken now whoooooo Nova's a Talonflame now whoooooo P-Sharp's a Porygon2 now whoooooo Hesslich's an Unfezant now whoooooo Adagio (F) Species: Ducklett Nature: Quiet/Proud of its power Ability: Hydration Finally got around to hatching this thing. Hydration + Aqua Ring + Rain Dance + Hurricane seems like a pretty sexy setup, but the 4x weakness to Electric is not so sexy. At any rate, Ducklett/Swanna will be my only access to Water-type moves until I get a Piplup from 7th Street way down the line. Miasma (M) Species: Aromatisse Nature: Relaxed/Highly curious Ability: Healer inb4 any "aromatisse iz not birb" comments. Aromatisse is bird-like enough for me; it has a beak and feathers and is most likely based on Plague Doctors which are also based on birbs, so just to preempt you, shaddup. Anyhoo, Aromatisse is an early Fairy-type that I was mostly thinking of using against Ciel's Altaria way way way way down the line (hey, fail to plan, plan to fail), but then I noticed that oh yeaah, Fairy-types are a good anti-Kiki thing. Good ol' Fairies! Murkrow (M) Species: Murkrow (surprise!) Nature: Lonely/Likes to thrash about Ability: Prankster I haven't named him because I wasn't sure I wanted to get too attached to him. Murkrow was such a pain in the ass to catch that I finally lost patience for wanting good IVs or egg moves or whatnot, so for now he'll just become 1) a last-ditch Prankster/Perish Song kamikaze, and 2) a sperm donor that I'll eventually Ditto breed with for a proper battler. Sorry, guy. Poor poor Shelly Sorry Shelly, but Blaziken and a bunch of Flying- or Fire-types against Bug-types doesn't make for a good victory on your part. Moving on! Orphanage of fun and Electric-types and pain Aromatisse serves another nice function of not having one or more of the weaknesses the rest of my team has (Electric, Ground, Rock, and... Water). He whittled the opponents down with Draining Kiss and/or Moonblast while I leveled him up. Shelly's team carried most of the weight since a lot of the Pokemon here were Steel-types, and Blaziken and Porygon2 took care of what Aromatisse couldn't handle. My only complaint with Aromatisse so far is how he's so damn slooooooow. Luckily he seems like he can take a punch to the beak long enough to do useful things, especially with a Calm Mind setup.

I recommend an Eelektross or Ampharos if you need any backup Electric-types (for Eelektross, you'd need a Thunder Stone if you don't have one). And this is just me but I evolved my Eevee into Sylveon to get some Fairy-types going in there. ... honestly I have Ciel in mind when I'm giving out these suggestions.

Noel was the easiest for me because of how much I cheesed him. I had so many bad experiences with him in previous episodes that when it came time to face him, I was like, nope. Blaziken + 4 or 5 Bulk Ups = wreck everything. It was total overkill and the only fight where I ever used such a 'strategy,' but I did NOT want to take any chances with that guy. The hardest for me was probably Ciel. I just so happened to have an Eelektross, Ampharos, and Walrein to do most of the work, but her Altaria was an utter nightmare. I had to grind up my Espeon to Moonblast it, and that was only after my Donphan with Sturdy used Earthquake to do some preliminary damage. Her opening lead with Togekiss was also frustrating due to how you're almost guaranteed to get flinched. But that's only in the current episode. In previous episodes, the hardest were always what I called the 'Big Three': Florinia, Aya, and Noel. They were always huge stall points for me. But after some nerfs and me getting a bit better at Pokeymanz (or in Noel's case, being totally cheap in Pokeymanz), they're much more manageable.

So after starting over because you people can't seem to agree that Magmar is totally bird-like, I did stuff that involved throwing birds at things and winning and feeling proud cuz I like winning and I like birds. Wing's journey of birdiness seems to be going well so far. Team Updates The new team lineup isn't as much of a female harem as before, but oh well. Julia Since I had to go in Magby-less, I had less brute force and less not-weak-to-Electric-ness on my side, so I leveled up Porygon a bit more than I did in my previous run. It was able to sweep the first half of Julia's team before Combusken took over. Cyber Birb is proving its stuff. PULSE Tangrowth and Florinia Tangrowth and Fletchinder took turns with PULSE Tangrowth. Florinia got a bit tricky with Cacnea and bad luck with RNG, but a bunch of Flying- and Fire-types against a team of Grass-types went about as well as you expect. Combusken took care of Cradily and that was that. The Fern fight previously actually gave me more trouble. For some reason I sometimes have more trouble with that Fern fight than Florinia. PULSE Tangrowth pt 2 and Taka Chatot was a bitch. Won that one by the skin of my teeth. It didn't help that I was forced to take a Kricketune as a Cut slave so I could navigate the forest, so I technically only had five Pokemon to use. PULSE Tangrowth pt 3 and Taka + ZEL Definitely had a rocky start with this one. Glaceon got some OKHOs, Umbreon was a tank, and Espeon was no slouch either. Combusken had to pull most of the weight since only he and Fletchinder had any kind of effectiveness against Taka and ZEL. I focused on ZEL's team while Lileep wasted time weakly choking my birbs with Constrict. Combusken took down Glaceon, but Espeon returned the favor. I had to use a Cotton Candy to revive Combusken so he could handle Tangrowth, as no one else in my team at the time could hit hard enough to be effective. Once ZEL's team was finished, I could use both my mons to wail on Taka. Lileep and Tangrowth didn't give me many problems, but Chatot, like last time, was pretty much a race to see who could KO who first. I won, again, but barely. Corey Blegh. I lost on the first attempt. A little bit of bad RNG (how did Corey's team get so many criticals?!) and a little bit of bad decisions on my part, mainly relying too much on Porygon's Psybeam + Twisted Spoon when other members of my team could've handled it. I led with Pidgeotto so he could Gust away the Corrosive Mist field effect, and my Flying-types were able to avoid the normal Corrosive field's entry hazard. I was thankful for that, but it wasn't enough. It turned out that Fearow's Aerial Ace was a decent brute force move. I played a bit more carefully the next time, being sure not to rely on Porygon too much. I was also lucky that Corey withdrew one of his team and sent out Crobat early, getting Porygon a free hit in and allowing Fearow to safely finish it off. So Corey wasn't too fun, but neither will the upcoming orphanage be fun either. Lots of Electric-types and lots of pain. Yay pain

Edit: asklghalkhsg aaaaugh okay fine, if I'll have to spend time justifying the decision and if I'm having any doubts about it, then it's probably not worth the effort, so I'll start over without the Magby. kslhglkhs man you people and your anti-Magbutt. I'll admit that it's stretching the definition of 'birb,' and now that it's brought to my attention even I'm starting to have second thoughts, but when I look at Magmar I swear I can justify it being bird-like! It has a duck bill and those turkey thigh/legs like what Combusken has, a black ring around its neck that makes me think of a duck's neck ring, and even those frills on its arms kinda remind me of feathers. Magby and Magmortar are more ambiguous in comparison, but I've always considered Magmar somewhat bird-like. But honestly, it's usually the beak or the head that does it for me. If a mon makes me go aww what a cute little birb, that's usually good enough for me. That's why I listed the Togepi line, Archeops, and Sigilyph as ambiguous: they don't have beaks. XD Thanks, I can check it out. Maybe I'll get some pointers on how to get around Rock- and Electric-types. Luckily I'm not doing a Flying monotype run so I have access to mons like Blaziken and Empoleon, but it still might be worth looking at.

Good ol' normal Reborn. I'm not hardcore enough to try Reborn Hardcore, especially with a team like this. Cyber birb is coming into its own with Analytic. I was considering switching it to Download, but maybe I'll keep the ability after all. It's not as bird-like compared to the others, but I always considered the Magby line vaguely bird-ish. Even Bulbapedia describes it as being like a duck or a booby (tee hee), and its original Japense name probably references this. Besides, it's too late now -- I just beat the first gym, Magbutt and all, and Request-a-Mon probably wouldn't have obliged me if they didn't agree it was at least kinda like a birb. I at least have arguments to support the decision, and besides, I think it's ultimately up to me to decide what's bird-like and what isn't. I heard someone say that Porygon wasn't enough of a bird for this run, yet there it is. But, at least I have validation that Togepi, Sigilyph, and Archeops can be birbs as well, so that's good to hear. Fern and Mosswater Factory Fern was up against a bunch of Fire- and Flying- types on a sunny day, so not much to say here (poor Fern). Torchic, Magby, and Porygon did most of the heavy lifting in the factory due to the prevalence of Rock- and Steel-types. The others hadn't been properly grinded yet and I didn't feel like sending them to their dooms, so they were just kinda... sitting there in my team. Freeloaders. Aster and Eclipse Oh goody, an Elekid. Electric-types are gonna be boatloads of fun in this run. Luckily there was only Elekid and Magby to worry about this fight. Porygon put up a decent fight, but Elekid + field effect = fainted Cyber Bird. Magby picked up the slack with Feint Attack on her twin, and down goes the first Aster and Eclipse fight. Julia Julia is an interesting first gym in this run. I couldn't send any of my Flying-types in there, so just like factory, Combusken, Magby, and Porygon are in the front lines. Porygon handled the gym's trainers. I had intended to switch its ability to Download, but Analytic proved useful since most of Porygon's opponents outsped it, boosting its attacks. That same ability took down the first few members of Julia's team, but they eventually whittled Porygon down. I sent out Magby next. She did fine until Emolga. I knew she probably wouldn't last long, so I got in two Smoke Screens to help out Combusken, who would have to carry the rest of the fight -- no one had the type advantage or the levels to go on the front lines. Speed Boost let him outspeed Julia's team. He kicks ass, and then it's time to face Electrode. Blitzle had paralyzed him, so to put him in top shape for Electrode, I switched in Swablu so I can heal him safely. Poor Swablu takes the fall (don't worry, her sacrifice was not in vain). Thank god I found a Super Potion somewhere in the factory, because he desperately needed to recover all his HP. He's restored, Combusken uses Double Kick... and brings Electrode's HP to the reds. Electrode finishes him off. Crap. No one else is fast enough to land a hit on him before getting wrecked. Luckily! Fletchling has Quick Attack. She's sent in, Quick Attack, and the freeloader mooches off everyone's hard earned exp and gains, like, five levels. What a bum. Team Updates Cochin evolves from Torchic to Combusken yaaaaaay Aaaand we have a new member! Contrail (F) Species: Pidgey Nature: Brave/Likes to thrash about Ability: Keen Eye (subject to change) Anyhoo, onto Obsidia, where I plan to get Pidove and bask in the thrashing of plenty of Grass-types (hopefully).

Welp, I beat her with your save file, and I gotta say, no wonder you were having trouble... WHERE ARE YOUR HEALING ITEMS? o.o You clearly didn't explore much in Spinel because you would've found a vending machine in a hidden building on the museum roof (and the Exp. Share elsewhere, but that's another story). Berry Ice Cream is a very good healing item at this point in the game, better than Super Potions. I splurged a bit with your funds and got some Berry Ice Cream and even a Cotton Candy from Obsidia's candy shop in case I needed to revive someone, but it turned out I didn't need it. tbh I had a little easier of a time with Serra than I did on my own save file. Charizard was very useful in this fight. He's strong in general and outspeeded most of her team. Even when he overleveled and stopped obeying commands mid-fight, I still managed to sweep most of Serra's team with him. First off, I went to Pyrous Mountain and got the hidden Charcoal in the rock next to Heatmor. It boosted Charizard's fire attacks and that helped tremendously. But Charizard is also useful due to the field's effects. Physical contact moves are dangerous because if they miss (and they tend to, since Serra's team likes to boost their evasiveness), your mon will take damage. Charizard's Flamethrower became useful because 1) it's strong, even stronger with the Charcoal, 2) it's a special attack and even when it missed, there was a chance the mirrors 'reflected' it and hit the opponent anyway. Since the field effect also boosts critical attacks, Charizard managed to OHKO most everything. The only mon he didn't deal big damage to was Aurorus, and that was quickly dispatched with Scrafty's Brick Break (Aurorus has 4x weakness to Fighting). So, this fight is totally doable with just Charizard and Scrafty. I'll attach the save file with the Berry Ice Creams, Cotton Candy, and Charizard's Charcoal (and the Exp. Share -- you're welcome), and give you the chance to try again. If Charizard and/or Scrafty are weakened after fainting a mon, switch to one of your 'meat shields' (it happened to be Pancham, Slugma, and even Barbaracle) and heal them. Let the meat shield faint and switch back to your battler. It may take some luck due to the random crits, but you should be okay. Game.rxdata

Timber Decibel Wing loves birdies. In fact, they love birdies so much that when they set out to conquer the Reborn league, they decided that rather than skillfully craft a well-balanced team to overcome any situation, they'd throw a bunch of birds at everything. Only time will tell how badly this will end. So! This is a bird-themed challenge where all Pokemon I use are birds or have bird-like features (beak, wings, feathers, basic shape, etc). Just so we're all on the same page, the list of non-Legendary birdies goes as follows: Since many of the birdies on that list are some variation of Normal/Flying -- and, let's face it, not that spectacular -- the nice folks at the Request-a-Mon thread haxed in some early (and illegal) birdies to make Wing's quest less suicidal, especially during the early game. With that said, let's introduce our starting team! Whoooooo Cochin (M) Species: Torchic Nature: Jolly/Somewhat Vain Ability: Speed Boost My starter, our hero, and thus far the only dude in this harem of female feather brains. He'll be one of my few defenses against Rock- and Electric-types, although the trade off is a vulnerability to Rock-type's sister, Ground -- moves of which Rock-types tend to have at their disposal. In any case, Blaziken will eventually be one of my main powerhouses due to his high stats in general. He's considered broken in the main game, and he'll be a goddamn lifesaver in this run. Nova (F) Species: Fletchling Nature: Serious/Loves to eat Ability: Gale Wings The Request-a-Mon thread was generous enough to supply me with a powerhouse, or so people say it's one. I took a chance and asked for a currently illegal Pokemon because of how limited my options are. Although it doesn't have great IVs, beggars can't be choosers, and hopefully I'll soon learn why people consider this thing OP. P-Sharp (Yes) Species: Porygon Nature: Timid/Thoroughly cunning Ability: Analytic Once the Conversion2 bug gets fixed, Porygon will come in handy when I need type resistances that absolutely none of my team have. When I requested a Porygon, I also requested an early Up-Grade in my inventory so I can evolve it once I get my first Linkstone. That was nice! Weiss (F) Species: Swablu Nature: Modest/Very finicky Ability: Cloud Nine Honestly, she's here so I have something that's not Normal- and/or Flying-type. But she'll also be one of the few Dragon-type countermeasures I have, as my main battlers are all Fire-types. And hey, if Ciel taught me anything, it's how utterly painful an Altaria can be... under the right conditions, at least. Honestly, a number of things about this run do worry me. The first is how I have no effective way to deal with Electric-types. Unless one of you can make the argument that an Archeops can be a bird, I pretty much have NO access to Ground-type moves and 90 percent of available mons are vulnerable to Electric. The best I can do is brute force it with my Fire-types, but that makes Water another concern. The other concern is the overall low base stats of many of my options. I love birdies, and in the official games I can gladly take a Pidgeot into the Elite 4 and Champion, but Reborn demands a bit more than the official games, and I fear a large number of my available mons won't deliver. That's the main reason I had the guts to request mons like Fletchinder, so I'd stand a more reasonable chance. The rest will probably need to take more specialized roles beyond damage dealing. But those concerns will come up when they come up. On with the run! go birbs

If you post your team with their levels and moves, and any other mons in your PC that might come in handy, then we could give you suggestions. Serra is needlessly tricky because of the randomness of her field effect, but if you have some decent Fire-types like Arcanine or one of the Fire starters if you chose it, you should be able to get past her.

You may wanna get some Dark-types in there to help you out. I like using Drapion. You can find a Skorupi in the Underground Railnet and grind it up. It's fairly bulky too. Sneasel would probably be worth it, but it'll probably get OHKO'd by Chandelure, which is the biggest threat in this fight. I don't remember all of Shade's team off the top of my head, but Camerupt and Monferno could probably take a few mons down through type effectiveness or brute force. If you evolve Monferno into Infernape (it should be a short grind by this point), it'll be even smoother. imo I'd be careful about using Gourgeist. One reason I don't like using Ghost-types against Ghost-types is because they're weak to each other, so Gourgeist would need to be able to take as much as it dishes out. Vanillish should be effective against Shade's Grass-types if Monferno/Infernape isn't available. And if all else fails, grinding a level or two wouldn't hurt, or mining for some nifty items like elemental Plates to boost a mon's attacks.

I may not remember correctly, but are you truly stuck in that dungeon? I thought there was an exit somewhere on the left-ish side of the dungeon, in the last tunnel Steelix makes. That way you could get some much-needed items. Of course, you could actually be stuck, which in that case, too bad you saved in a location you can't escape from. That Duskull could use Curse on Steelix if it knows it. Then it's just a matter of surviving long enough for it to finish Steelix off (luckily, Duskull itself doesn't have to survive as long as Curse lands). Otherwise, the way I usually get past it is throwing my hard-hitters like Donphan and Blaziken at it and hope things go well. And I don't think that Heatmor is a bad Pokemon, but I do agree it's probably time to retire that Mightyena. Granted, Steelix is a brick wall, but Mightyena will be outclassed soon enough.

Thanks a bunch! *-* tbh I forgot to mention Skarmory too. Sorry! It kinda slipped my mind since I deleted all the unobtainable Pokemon off my little list... but funny how I remembered Fletchling (the IVs on it actually aren't bad Is the line really that OP? I've never used it before). However, I wouldn't want a Skarmory so early in the game. It's too stronk to have as an immediate party member, and there's probably a reason why it's currently unobtainable, so I wonder if it's possible to put it somewhere else... like replace it with another event Pokemon somewhere. If it's not asking too much, I mean. It's mainly there for type variety, and it still shares most of my available mons' weakness to Electric. (Dr. Sigmund's gonna be fun...) And hey, if need be I can just depend on an Empoleon to cover any Steel-type defensive-y needs. But anyway, thanks again. I even got the Up-Grade for Porygon! Much appreciated.

I'm doing a bird themed run, where mons are either birds or have bird-like features. While the list happens to include awesome mons like Blaziken, the vast vast majority of what's on the list is some combination of Normal/Flying. I was wondering if you could hax some birdies into my team so the lack of type diversity for most of the game doesn't drive me crazy. Decent IVs and not-awful natures would be very much appreciated. -Magby. I'd honestly be okay even if I never got Magmortar as long as I get a Magby from the get-go. -Porygon, hopefully including an Up-Grade in my inventory so I can evolve it once I get a Linkstone. It shouldn't be too unreasonable since I don't get one until Lapis Ward, so I wouldn't have too much power too early. -Fletchling... with Gale Wings. In my defense, this would be my third Fire-type (my starter is Torchic fyi) -And Swablu, I guess? This one isn't that big a deal. It's mainly so I can have something early on besides Normal or Fire. -Oh, and I'd like the mystery egg to be a guaranteed Vullaby. I've already fought Victoria in my save file. thankyouplz Game.rxdata