Bethany Plays: Pokemon Alola Paniola Bonus: Rivals

There's a reason I'm showing Hau's Paniola battle separately this time. But first, let's see who my team is.

Shiva really loves the tutors. Full set of moves, and her set can't fit Water Pulse and other moves she kinda wishes she had.

Neo's been kinda weird, since I kinda want both Tickle and Barrier on hand for the next Totems. Tickle's probably more important, though.

Usagi has turned from "sorta liability" to "queen bunny" remarkably quickly. Her somewhat low Atk score is going to be her long-term undoing, but being Lopunny should cover a lot of her midgame.

Hawkeye got nothing out of the Tutors. He needed nothing.

Basilissa got nothing from the Tutors. She wanted something. Being an Intimidate bot can't be healthy for your self-esteem.

Moss doesn't get much good yet. Moss really likes the Tutors, but not as a Litten.

Hau's challenge reframes his encounter with Hala to imply he was more successful. The old line kinda sounds like Hala took pity on him, and suggests he didn't succeed at getting the Fightingium Z at all.

He praises Dartrix, his new lead in USUM, but also praises Pikachu. Also a joke about Alolan pancakes and... weirdly, Alolan pride? Where was this literally anywhere else in Hau's character?

In addition to matching his overworld model, they also gave Hau the correct Z-Power Ring. Strictly speaking, if all the Z-Power Ring does is let Hau use the brand-new Z-Crystals, he doesn't even need one- he only plans to use Z-Crystals available in the vanilla SM.

Now that is a team. Four Pokemon, up from two. It's almost embarrassing, to see just how stark the difference is.

As he did in his Route 3 encounter, he leads with his starter rather than Pikachu. And if this isn't an owl that wants to win. 25 IVs flat, 252 IVs in HP and Atk. Still with a Neutral nature, though. His moveset remains as it would have been in SM- Razor Leaf, Peck and Pound, with Normalium Z to fuel a Breakneck Blitz if he wants.

Unfortunately for Dartrix (and it having lost a level compared to SM, weirdly), it has two crippling weaknesses. The first of which is a pretty bad Speed stat of 25- look at my team, even Basilissa outspeeds that.

The second is a Flying typing for a double weakness to Ice moves.

Granted, Smoochum is the only real source of those for this fight on a Litten run, but still.

Somehow Dartrix survived that one. Smoochum's poor BST coming in clutch for Dartrix.

Although if you can't even oneshot a Smoochum, what are you doing with an Atk score that high?

Noibat was picked to follow up that Dartrix. I switched out Shiva because this could probably outspeed her, but outspeeding would be all that would be accomplished: 15 IVs flat, 252 Spd EVs (with no matching second stat like Dartrix), Neutral Nature, and its moveset has been pared down to Tackle and Bite. This is not a Pokemon that does more than try to flinch you. He's not doing much to help Hau prove his team has expanded beyond having more members.

So, uh, that "high Speed"? 31. Anyone other than Basilissa in this party could've outspeed. Granted, I've got a team of speed demons here, but still.

Right, Pikachu's back out. Aside from the lost level, all of its data is identical to SM's Pikachu, so any strategy that worked in SM works here.

I do not have a Ground type on this team yet, though. So I'm going to need more than just blocking and laughing.

You know, mate, Neo is more Sp. Def than Phys, but I think Quick Attack isn't exactly the right move here...

Then again, it looks like that one hasn't done you much good either. Immunities are cheap. Just be good at bulk.

Flat 15 IVs, 252 Atk, neutral Nature. Knows the moves Baby-Doll Eyes and Quick Attack, and has the Adaptability Ability. This guy's trick is that he'll always go first, because all his attacks are priority-based, but also Eevee alone was never that great at battling. It really needs to evolve as soon as possible.

Hawkeye may have been overkill.

Imagine oneshotting with -1 Atk. Both of us need to be contributing to get that score.

You might need to train up your team a bit before you can really go toe to toe with mine, there... Make 'em work for each KO.

Torracat (Moon): It boasts powerful front legs. With a single punch, it can bend an iron bar right over.

Moss evolves into the final of the second-stage starters: a pretty cool cat for one whose neck is on fire. Torracat claims the same "is Litten, but with every stat given a 10-30 increase" trend as Dartrix and Brionne- the starters seem to get their most substantial powerups when they reach third stage this time.

Having his starter out allows him to actually gesture at him for this line- not that it really shows up if you don't see it emoting in the screenshot.

Yeah, yeah, "look at these cool features we give you to overpower our overtuned bosses."

As for Noah's fight with the two-Pokemon Hau?

Melia has Pikachu handled. Granted, I think there are few things that a Kadabra does not handle.

Remember, Noah plays on Set. I manually switched, and it turns out this was a fantastic timing-

Hau decided to finish off Melia with Breakneck Blitz- something that was way too overkill, he was probably prepping this for whatever I swapped into regardless.

The animation doesn't even get to play if the game realises "oh, the other Pokemon is immune to this type...

Eunie still has a deficit on moves- and will for a good few levels yet- but can still set Confuse Ray.

...Honestly, SM might not be Misdreavus's game.

Wow, Daj got a free switch in. Poor Torracat.

...That's a lot of damage for Scratch. Torracat's choices in both games are Fire Fang, Lick and Scratch, and Fire Fang is resisted, so this made some sense.

It also got off a Fire Fang on its next move. Admittedly, this is a Blaze-powered Fire Fang, so maybe the extra bonus from Blaze is what pushed it up in power over Scratch...

And there's Mio to complete the trinity of Alola starters on my side.

Ray's team. Guardia is here for the EXP, I'm not planning on using him.

Candy turned out to be a really good choice for this fight, and it really shows when you see how Torracat does.

Granted, starting with a Scratch was weird. Even if you just wanted to "break Sturdy", Lick is unresisted and Fire Fang has STAB and a burn chance.

On top of that, I don't have Sturdy.

Candy spends her first turn setting these up to hurt the back end of the party. Rocks pose scarier threats to other teams, though, not so much this guy.

No dodging this one, though. We've gotta sit back, accept it, and hope this doesn't hurt our -1 Def pebble too hard.

Spoilers, it did not.

Rock Blast has a 90% chance of landing at all. I always kinda wish the multi-hit attacks were actually calculated as "each individual hit rolls its own accuracy check", but if this system was put into practice, things would start going badly.

Plus, they'd probably have to nerf the actual accuracy.

With the +4 Spd granted by having two Weak Armour triggers, Candy now moves first. It's by a very narrow margin: The fact that Candy's Spd IV is 20 and not 15 actually swung the difference. Then again, I guess when your printed speed is 12, any point makes a big difference when you're using a x3 multiplier to do any actual Speed matching.

Three hits were all I needed, and three hits were all I landed.

Huh. Two new moves from that. Of course, both are Special moves on Physical attackers, but the fact they beat whatever they had already says more about the movesets they had than the movesets they're getting.

Weak Armour is one thing. That Electro Ball will murder Candy. At least I got some free damage- not great damage, though...

Ray also has a Ground type, so Pikachu won't be much.

...What do you mean, you weren't planning on using Electro Ball to mulch Roggenrola? Even at +4 Speed, I'm sure "being a STAB Special attack" would finish off Roggenrola.

Paul doesn't have Bulldoze, sadly- he will learn it at level 18. For now, though, Paul is relying on the move Magnitude, a Physical Ground move that has a random base power, based on what magnitude earthquake you generate. You get the scale of 4-10, with a bell curve distribution like so:

Magnitude 4: 10 BP (5%)
Magnitude 5: 30 BP (10%)
Magnitude 6: 50 BP (20%)
Magnitude 7: 70 BP (30%)
Magnitude 8: 90 BP (20%)
Magnitude 9: 110 BP (10%)
Magnitude 10: 150 BP (5%)

That was a Magnitude 6. Overall, even though you've got that chance for a super-powerful Magnitude, Earthquake and Bulldoze's consistent base powers work out better for it. Magnitude is worse than Bulldoze 35% of the time, and Earthquake 85% of the time.

...Noibat is weak to Rock. Why isn't it doing that much visual damage, that should be a 25%...

Yes, I'm using two Rockruff. The fact they're both in Sun files is a little weird, but they're good to have on hand. Albeit Rockruff and Roggenrola might be a bit overkill...

Still, though. Noibat continues to Noibat. There's a reason Ailey isn't using one.

Shame, too. I actually like Noibat's evolution.

Right, what's the plan for Eevee...

Sheesh. Rockruff is a very good girl.

Still. Might as well finish with Fist Jr.

Even if I have to fight through all the Baby-Doll Eyes.

The real surprise is that, while I brought Oatchi, Moss, Mio and Sirehound to all four Hau fights, I never used any of them once.

As for Gladion, well... a few switches out, but whether I need them will be another matter.

Gladion will approve if you don't tell him your name. Although he already does know it either way.

He also calls his Pokemon by species name and not by just "Null". I dunno, I think I prefer the nickname.

Like Hau, USUM Gladion has picked up additional Pokemon: a third team member.

The Zubat is completely identical, though. Same stats, same moves, same level.

...Uh... OK. Apparently it has Feint Attack too. Noted.

Genevieve goes in for an Electroweb, dealing impressive damage. Although for a super-effective hit, that wasn't too great...

...Looks like we found Taira. Gladion leads with his Zorua disguised as a Zubat, and woe betide if you planned to win with your Psychic type. Flat 15 IVs, no EVs or Nature, knows the moves Feint Attack and Scratch. Aside from making decent use out of Illusion (especially since he's come from the second version), this isn't an impressive opponent.

Fortunately, Genevieve had an app for that.

As for the real Zubat he sends out, that can be hit in the face with blast of Confusion.

Now for Null. Usagi gets to take point, as a fully evolved Pokemon herself.

And she's found a use for Baby-Doll Eyes. That was a Tackle- looks like I won't need many stacks of Baby-Doll to get the best benefit out of Usagi.

Perfect opportunity to use this in a real fight, then. Since Growlithe, we've upgraded from 40 BP to 102 BP as our offensive move, as well as +10 base Atk. Null won't know what hit it.

...I have literally never seen this before. I knew it existed, but I never tried to benefit from it, nor did I ever want to cheat this blatantly. But yes, Rotom Pokedex can, if it likes you enough, recharge your Z-Power Ring. If I wanted to, Usagi could slam Null in the face with a +3 Breakneck Blitz- probably punching it so hard it breaks the control helmet.

I refuse to resort to this.

(There is one more condition to meet in order to get the double Z-Power bonus: A Rotom Power must be in effect- whether a field effect or a battle boost. You, uh, remember the free Roto Hatch I only used about a sixth of on hatching Eevee? I entered this fight with that still up.)

Be grateful I ignored the helper fairy. Because I could've irritated you even worse.

The post-Gladion dialogue is identical: Which is significant, because Gladion still brings this up. Earlier, Hau was implied to have succeeded at Hala's Grand Trial this time around. I'm not sure if Gladion is implying Hala went easy on Hau or they just made a mistake here. I could believe both.

Only in USUM does Rotom Pokedex think that weird kid with the genetic freak of nature is worth commenting on.

Ailey does not fear a mere edgy teenager.

Noah's turn. Although with just Zubat and Null, it all comes down to whether Noah's got the right stuff.

It's a little hard to be entirely confident in the guy when Zubat manages to flinch him and take a Thunder Shock. Granted, this doesn't slow PRNDL down anywhere near enough, but it does mean it's got more damage on it going into Null.

As numbers go, this is not a scary one, but since PRNDL isn't all resists, it is one I have to think about.

Especially since switching out is going to get a face full of Pursuit for his trouble.

Sometimes it's best to keep the Pokemon in and have them do their best effort, just for the free switch in after they faint.

HP Fighting is also pretty decent damage.

...I got it off twice? And here I was treating you like you were scary.

Still, there goes PRNDL, and out comes Nimue.

It'll be her job to do the residual damage. Although at this point, there isn't that much of it to do.

Wouldn't even heal her up that significantly afterwards. I probably needed to switch her back out anyway if she came straight back in. Good to think about for next time, perhaps.

Remaining HP left after all the draining happened. Good but not great. The healing works wonders when you can hit like a cannon, less so when you're doing the slow but sure path.

Now then, Ray's turn.

This would be a lot scarier if that was actually the Zubat.

Oh, I meant to show this with Genevieve, but missed it in the heat of the moment. When Zorua is under an illusion, the effectiveness calculator functions as if you were fighting the thing that you can see- so Electric moves are SE, Dark is Neutral and Bug is NVE.

Eh, might as well cut the Speed a little, just in case.

When the Illusion wears off, the light effect also jumps to the other side of the field so you can see it from the back.

There we go, that's the accurate effectiveness calculation for a Zorua. It's kinda funny how Veeka's set includes all three of the major effectiveness calculations in her three moves for both Zubat and Zorua, and all three of them are different between the two. Could not have planned that on purpose.

It turns out this actually does wipe out the rest of his HP.

...Yeah, uh, as mentioned, Veeka does not like to be facing the real Zubat. It's weak to Flying moves.

Now, it could attack with its Electric moves, but also Electroweb has a miss chance, so Dawn it is.

Another notch on the belt of "what the hell did you just do, Dawn?" Dawn and K9 both, really.

Now for Null. Time to select my plan carefully...

First, get the hell out of dodge. That Pursuit is nice for the next person, although I would like to have had Dawn in reserve.

It is time for the Running of the Bulls. Tauros won the battle of the Intimidators, and while I would have a Herdier for this battle and thus get the Atk drop had I gone dog route, this lets me go more toe-to-toe with Null's numbers. Tauros's Atk and Spd outnumber Null's (...Well, OK, of course it's faster...), and it has the same Def. Herdier is many things, but it does not enjoy that.

Start with a Tail Whip, tank a Tackle like a boss.

The description for Tail Whip has, since FRLG, described the move as being a "cute" tail wiggle, accompanying the JP name Tail Wag. Just imagine this gigantic bull wagging its three-pronged tail cutely.