With all that taken care of... it's time to see what's going on in the observatory.
For some reason, Kukui comes with us to introduce us to this man. I have no idea why, but it happens in both games.
This guy is apparently someone in on the "secret" that Kukui is the Royal, since he drops a lot of the textual hints. Other than Bethany knowing immediately.
Molayne is... a semi-important character. He got a bit of an importance buff in USUM, but on a grand scale, he does a lot more things narratively than mechanically.
For instance, him and the Electric Trial Captain are closely acquainted, and he continues to serve in an advisory capacity.
...You know, this is probably why Trial Captains aren't supposed to have real jobs.
This is a bit of an interesting point, and part of why I'm counting this in the Electric Trial: He only does this in SM.
Oh hey, you two are old adventure buddies!
...So wait, how old are you two? I always thought Molayne was a bit closer in age to Sophocles than Kukui, but then again, Kukui is already a very young Professor character.
Molayne is a class-less NPC with a type specialty in Steel. I didn't judge his team to be good enough to warrant going over my stats, but I basically brought my Fire/Fighting/Ground types, Kasplashle, and things that want EXP.
Steel-type specialists and Skarmories, name a more iconic duo. Skarmory is running the 15/15/31/15/31/31 IV spread with 252 Def/Sp. Def EVs you'd expect to see from a Skarmory (Molayne does not have Natures) and the Sturdy Ability, but his kit is Air Cutter and Metal Claw. Even on an offensively good Pokemon, those moves aren't scary anymore, and Skarmory is not an offensively good Pokemon. Where are your Spikes? Tailwind?
Easy prey for Flambebe.
Especially if you use Metal Claw. Mate, Air Cutter isn't a resist, and I don't think Flambebe's defences are lopsided enough for that to be a factor.
Huh. Dugtrio is Molayne's ace, but I suspect he's sending it out early because it counters Flambebe. The other one does too, but... anyway, Dugtrio has an IV spread of 31/31/15/15/15/31, 252 EVs in Atk and Spd, the Tangling Hair Ability, and the moves Metal Claw, Mud Bomb and Sucker Punch. Really taking it easy on us there, what with using the Special Mud Bomb instead of Bulldoze.
Sucker Punch is a 70 BP Physical Dark move with +1 priority, but it only works if the opponent was planning on performing an attacking move that turn. This is actually a pretty potent move, and governs the competitive scene pretty heavily, but my counter for Dugtrio doesn't happen to care about it much. It's a bit more intimidating on some other opponents we'll encounter, especially the Dark types.
Well, I wasn't planning on Lord Huggington staying in, but that's another good reason to switch there.
Metang will be the last Pokemon we see, running IVs 31/15/31/15/31/15 and 252 EVs in Def/Sp. Def. Clear Body for the Ability and Zen Headbutt, Bullet Punch and Pursuit for the moves. Like Skarmory, it thinks being a Steel type and kitting for defence is pulling more weight than it is. And I suppose it would be if you weren't forewarned he was coming. But even then, Metang is an inherently less impressive Pokemon and stops being scary if you have a good Psychic counter on hand.
Murphy isn't a Psychic counter, but he is a valid Metang counter.
...When he hits with High Horsepower, anyway.
No skin off my nose, Metang only gets more and more futile.
Oh hey, you took the first hit! Good work!
...Oh
So much for finishing you with a more accurate attack. He only had the one Potion, though.
While I do trust his judgement (...when it comes to scouting Trainers, I do not trust his judgement in any other matters), it was Tapu Koko who scouted me. I'm not sure what Kukui's intuition was about me before that happened, but I doubt it would matter much afterwards.
Mudsdale (Sun): It spits a mud that provides resistance to both wind and rain, so the walls of old houses were often coated with it.
I had a lot of luck with evos this Trial- three of the four kids either evolved off Molayne or off the Trial itself. Murphy has reached level 30 and evolved into Mudsdale, making its already great physical defence even higher, as well as making it weigh 920 kilos (2028 pounds). I feel like anything getting hit with this thing's High Horsepower is going to feel that next week.
Don't be silly, Molayne. You assessing the capacity to handle Sophocles's Trial is USUM.
...While I can certainly admit my teams tend to be pretty good ones, I feel like that says a lot about you, in a way. I mean, didn't you guys use at least some of these Alolans?
This line makes a little more sense in USUM, since it's a lot closer to when Molayne mentioned it, but still. Molayne only called you "Royal", not the Masked Royal. May want to work on your kayfabe.
...We left him behind three updates ago. If he's not done, I'm worried.
That might be a full-time job, Kukui.
Yes. That is certainly a word.
There'll be a little bit of exploring in this observatory, but not that much. Only a few rooms and a handful of scientists, and only one item.
Electric is weak only to Ground, but this Trial is themed around Pokemon that are only part Electric, and K9's job is to hit the other typing. Hard and fast, that's his plan.
Oatchi isn't as good an Electric counter as it seems, as a Grass counter (the Flying type gets in the way), but I figured he's be worth a shake. Wouldn't count on it, anyway.
Flambebe has several good reasons to be here. Pretty much all of these moves, with the arguable exception of Hidden Power, have value here.
Murphy's job is less to be a powerhouse, and more to be a wall. Considering it's Murphy, that'll be an easy job.
I have hopes that Sturm will get to come with. It is weak to Electric, though, so it's not an encouraging prospect to switch it in, although Shields Down will give me a decent in.
Cranky's more here for the EXP, and the hilarious idea of using my Z-Move on Z-Bulk Up. It's +2 Atk, +1 Def.
Hokulani Observatory uses the same theme as Burnet's lab, which is a huge indicator it's a new theme and not a B2W2 throwback for Burnet's sake.
...The Comet Shard is a selling item that goes for 30K Poke. We genuinely got something that sells for the equivalent of 300 bucks as a welcome gift. Mechanically, this is kinda fair, but, uh... how many comets do you get up here?
...The comet didn't land? Odd... There's a part of me that doesn't think that's how space works, but also I can get where they're coming from. But if a space rock is close enough to us to be burning up in the atmosphere, it's landing on the planet too.
It's easier to broadcast those at scale as compared to looking through a telescope.
Also important, taking pictures allows you to run compare and contrasts to help you find planets faster- and also finding bodies that are similar, too.
While yes, a lot of space exploration is done on computers, the scale of the effort requires an actual understanding of the craft. "Please don't fail us now, computer" kinda sounds like you're edging closer to "not actually qualified" levels.
Probably one of those science-explainer videos they show the tourists.
They say this is news, but also this isn't news, this is the opinion page. Which is probably why it's on the brochure rack.
That's astrology, not astronomy. Now, does astrology work in Pokemon? I dunno. But this is definitely the place for astronomy.
Cleffa came from outer space! Surely that's better than the correlation!
...This room doesn't really feel like the public should be allowed, but also it's where the Trial is. I love how the Trial barricade pattern is painted on the walls, down to the patterns on the support pillars.
There is one thing to these hallways, and that's a night-time only Zygarde Cell.
I don't know if these two are related, but they're certainly BFFs.
They're neurodivergent-coded enough that I think this a failure to adapt to them, but yeah, they also sound like terrible people to be comparing yourself to on a professional level. For multiple reasons.
...Once again, I'm getting the vibe this is not a room I should be in.
We can't explore it, since we're immediately thrown into the cutscene with Sophocles.
Indeed I am. You must be the Captain. Hey, haven't I seen you before...?
Oh, right.
...I do not like to speak ill of a passion project to the creator's face, so this is where my sentence will be ending.
(I did wind up telling him "No". Strange reaction.)
He doesn't mind enough to compromise him professionally, and declares that we're going to be having a Trial entirely confined in this cluttered office.
It's a test of courage, ingenuity and skill.
You sound like the wrong kind of person to be a Captain here.
...Also, wait, aren't you supposed to be in charge of raising/training it? I don't like this lack of control you seem to have over it.
That was the last of my questions.
...Is that something real observatories do? It sounds like something that'd be hard to track down, it's not exactly "normal operations".
We're basically summoning it with a giant dog whistle, then?
What an odd thing to say.
Oh, just wonderful. You can practically already smell the smoke of an electrical short already.
How did 1.0 go? I'd say it's how you met the Totem for the first time, but even then I have my doubts.
...Sophocles, who put you in charge of the Trial?
I'm so far beyond judging your capacities as a Trial Captain at this point. This system is fail-deadly and should never have made it to implementation, let alone a system that's going to have your Totem-summoning monstrosity grafted onto it. It takes several failures to get to this point.
Frankly, at this point, I don't even care anymore. Although yeah, this text-based format is going to have a hell of a time conveying what's going on in this Trial! Hope you like black screens.
Somehow, I'm kind of reassured by that.
The Trial Start animation looks a lot funnier like this.
Oh, and yeah, the Trial theme does play while the audio you need for the quiz is not.
It's the short chime that plays during the healing effect- you know, this one.
Well, good news, your Pinger has, against all odds, performed the function it was designed to do.
Similarly to Kiawe's Trial, Sophocles's Trial will be an enemy gauntlet, where we will have no opportunity to access the Bag or the Pokemon menu between fights. The wild Pokemon preceding the Totem are purely randomly generated IV and Nature wise (0 EVs), while their movesets are set. This Grubbin has the moves Vice Grip, String Shot, Bite, and Bug Bite.
It's also, you know, a Grubbin. The important thing is really to come prepared, not with a Ground type (while Ground is Electric's only weakness, Bug counts it as a Resist), but something flinging Fire or Rock moves. Fortunately, many Ground types can learn Rock Tomb, but still.
Screw fail-deadly, this is fail-actively malevolent.
On the other hand, that explains why we get trapped in Festival Plaza when we're dragged in.
Oh, sure, that's going to make us feel better.
They actually play a short clip of the Totem making its approach. You mean it was on Route 10 the whole time?
The sound is the short sound effect that happens when Rotom Dex comes out of our pocket. I'm... not sure if that grammar is correct, but I guess it would be a comparable sound effect to "got a TM!" and "got a Berry!" in length and tone.
Yeah, yeah, I hear ya. Charjabug is actually Bug/Electric, but other than messing with its Resists and taking Flying away as an option (you were planning on bringing a Flying type to an Electric Trial, right?), that doesn't really change your plan on offense. Its moveset is Charge, Bug Bite, Vice Grip and Spark- the Electric Trial, now featuring Electric moves!
How's that double bulk working out for you?
SOPHOCLES IF I'M GOING DOWN I'M TAKING YOU WITH ME
You've gotta wonder what the people standing on the pathway are thinking when they see this thing flying overhead.
Molayne? Other scientists? You guys any help?
You really should get this one, you just fought a Charjabug, you heard its cry like three times.
No wonder Festival Plaza is so terrible.
I did not capture a screenshot of me defeating this Charjabug with Accelerock, but its moveset does have a scary move in it. Charge, Mud Slap, Spark, and Acrobatics. If you're carrying a Rock type, you'll probably be fine, but if you don't resist Flying, that can do more damage than you might think- Charjabug isn't holding an item.
I think all three of these things need to be shamed. Not in equal amounts, though- there's only so much guilt a security system can have for being designed in such a fail-deadly way.
So does it crash through the door or does it wait for it to open?
OK, I will actually give some decent credit for this one, mostly because it's charming rather than difficult.
They knew exactly when the best time to start playing the violin chords was.
It turns out it wasn't the security system playing that audio clip...
Heeeeeeere's VIKAVOLT!
Vikavolt (Ultra Moon): Vikavolt flusters opponents with acrobatic flying maneuvers. This creates an opening for it to deliver an electric beam attack.
As one might expect, the Totem Pokemon of Hokulani Observatory is the evolved form of Charjabug, Vikavolt. Vikavolt is Bug/Electric, like Charjabug, and has exchanged Battery for Levitate. It's also pivoted hard from being a pretty respectable Physical attacker in Charjabug to being a gigantic Special delete button as a Vikavolt- albeit a delete button with a lead foot base Speed stat of 43. It's still got Charjabug's fairly respectable Defence, but it's not that bulky.
Totem Vikavolt is the first Totem to show off how the lategame handles Totems: that is an omnibuff to all five stats that can be raised. It has the IV spread 1/X/31/1/31/1 (why are Atk values always random...), a very precisely selected EV distribution of 170 Atk and Sp. Def EVs, 100 Def EVs and 70 HP EVs, a random Nature (...guys, really?), and a... pretty unfortunte kit. Notice the lack of Sp. Atk investment on a primary Special Attacker?
- Spark is its primary offense in the signature type, a 65 BP Physical Electric move with a 30% paralysis chance. By which I mean... yeah, maybe we're not at the point where Thunderbolt is OK, but at least throw on Electroweb. Vikavolt gets that through breeding, too, not just USUM Tutor.
- Bug Bite as its other STAB, a 60 BP Physical Bug move that at least does something cool by preventing you from reliably using Berries as part of your strategy. Strangely, Vikavolt does not have access to any of the non-Bug Buzz Special Bug moves we've seen thus far- Struggle Bug would actually be a pretty neat one in and of itself.
- Charge is an Electric Status move that raises Vikavolt's Sp. Def by one stage, and if it decides to click Spark the next turn, Spark is given double the base power. A good reason to run a Ground type, but not that terrifying unless it actually uses that power.
- Vice Grip is a 55 BP Physical Normal move with no bonus effect. Give it Dig, give it Air Slash, give it Acrobatics, give it Flash Cannon, give it Crunch! Just... something worth playing around.
- Its held item is an Occa Berry, halving the power of the first Fire move it takes. Hence why we brought K9 out first and not Flambebe. Fire is the more accessible means of hitting it Specially, so this one's pretty worrying, but it's easy enough to avoid.
- Its Ability is Levitate, making it immune to Ground moves unless Grounded. It already takes neutral damage, anyway, a good reason to drift away from Ground moves to begin with. Levitate isn't as amazing as it seems at first blush here.
Incidentally, before Nature comes into play and assuming 31 Atk IV, Vikavolt's stats are 88/66/73/89/69/30 before the Totem Aura, boosted to 88/99/109/133/103/45 (at 0 IV, the Atk stat is 57 > 85). Curiously, this sorta means that a Physical Vikavolt working with +1 Atk is sorta the same as a Special Vikavolt working without? Still say there were better fourth slot moves, but with that in mind, that makes things feel not quite so bad...
With a Physical Defence score worth writing home about, K9 buffs its own Atk to prepare its move.
Ah, great, got stuck with the Paralysis. At the very least, Accelerock won't have to worry about the Speed drop.
These guys are probably the big reason Totem Vikavolt being a Physical attacker is so weird. Did you know Battery only works on Special attacks? Charjabug's whole gimmick is that Vikavolt carry them around to buff their Special cannon power, and these ones aren't actually doing that. Which means going for them is a bit of a waste, but their movesets are hardly anything to scoff at. The level 27 one (which is summoned if Vikavolt is at full health) has String Shot, Vice Grip, Mud Slap and Thunder Wave- Vikavolt is slow, and if you're not careful, you will be too. The IVs are 15 flat except for the Atk, and both Atk and Nature are randomised.
I'm not sure whether this says more about the weakness of Accelerock as our sole STAB or the power of Swords Dance for bringing this so close. If Vikavolt didn't have a Def buff, that would've been a oneshot.
It was not taking another round, but fortunately, that just means the next guy gets to come in for free.
Now Flambebe gets to play.
Now, there's something kinda funny about to happen. Flame Burst, as you might recall, is a 70 BP Fire move that does scratch damage to any opponent you didn't directly target- 1/16 HP as a fraction of their max, not based on the damage you dealt.
And you're looking pretty low there, Vikavolt.
Sadly, wasn't quite enough to KO.
Fortunately, I survived the KO and wasn't paralysed. And I'm moving first...
The other Charjabug, level 28 and using the same IV/Nature build as the first, instead runs the moves Bite, Thunder Wave, Mud Slap and Spark. Much more offensively focused than the first, although not meaningfully distinct enough for you to base a strategy around.
Right. You need to go down as well at some point.
And that was enough to KO Vikavolt with splash damage. This way I didn't even make it eat the Occa Berry! Not that I get to keep it without stealing it, though.
...Come to think of it, that's your third Totem victory in a row, Flambebe. And there are good odds that she'll be a part of my strategy next Totem, too. I wonder how Theodore and Flambebe really stack up...
Fortunately, the lights have come back on.
There's just something cold going on between these two. I know Sophocles is at the bottom of the list of people I want to be locked in a dark room alone with. For several reasons.
Molayne rushes in to congratulate Sophocles on fixing the mess he made.
Success is a word. I don't know if I'd use it, though.
...Is no one going to address the security system? No? Just me?
At least we come away with this one.
I'll gladly take a way for Zapple to not take recoil on Volt Tackle back.
Of the Z-Poses, Electric is the hardest one for real-world me to mimic. The only component is really the thunderbolt-shape, and it actually looks different when used by the player than it does when used by the very stubbly Sophocles. From a practical perspective, it shouldn't be so hard- it's just trying to conceive of how the arms are positioned to form this diagonal-thunderbolt shape. I don't really think Sophocles or Selene does a very good job, to be honest.
You were fine without the power on? You're really out of your element here.
Molayne covers for Sophocles's awkwardness. And continues to make me question why he was ever appointed.
There is such a thing as being too polite.
Thud Nepotism hire. Granted, because of the dumb "Trial Captains have to be under 20" rule, there's probably a lot of nepotism going around, but...
...Ula'ula's the one with unusual circumstances? Well, I guess that's one way of putting it.
I think there were a few better solutions to this issue than the one provided.
Thanks. Glad somebody had their head screwed on.
In both SM and USUM, this is roughly the point they drop Steelium Z on you too. Either way, it wouldn't have been much use against Vikavolt.
...I wonder if the flux of Trial Captains shakes up what Trials are on offer. Like, was the Hokulani Trial a Steel type one at any point recently? Like, when Molayne was Captain himself?
I'm certainly not coming back and being a Steel type Trial Captain.
...There are only four native-to-Alola Steel types in the main story, and Bethany is using one of them.
Funnily enough, this is a mandatory case of backtracking, and they handle it in the funniest way possible. It's less that this is relevant to anything, and more a blatant excuse to railroad us to go visit a previous area.
The mask that belongs to The Masked Royal. This pro wrestler apparently sews his mask on a machine himself.
Not even pretending this isn't Kukui's, on any front, are we? At least the description is a little more circumspect.
Fortunately, it's not too far. And really... Malie Garden is right next to the closest Fly point to Route 12. Is it really backtracking, at that point?
I'd be down.
Apparently he really likes the aesthetic.
This meteor's another piece of cruft that Pokemon's picked up to support a legacy Pokemon. Fallen Meteorites can be used to transform the Mythical Pokemon Deoxys between its four Formes. Of all of them, I'm amazed this never became a Key Item- although that would pose its own issues for distribution. At least it's non-intrusive if you don't know why it's here.
Strangely, this is the only other clickable object in the room. Considering one of them is mechanical, it's even weirder.
Next time: Sophocles was told, in no uncertain terms, never to use the Pinger again.
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