I'm always kind of impressed Mudsdale and Tauros can be used in Seafolk Village. Then again, one of my more major fears has always been of uncertain footing, that may just be a me thing.
You can actually see me having appeared from the Seafolk Pokemon Centre, rather than the entrance of town. Cutscene starts either way, though.
Lillie gets a moment to be grateful to Hapu for what she's done for her, which Hapu brushes off as just her being normal things to do.
Also, once again, Lillie is happy to include Mudsdale in her words.
Your mother has really done a number on your self-esteem, girl. Then again, by this point, she's become a Kahuna, it does seem more natural to have a less personal relationship, more like the one you have with Olivia.
Also, Hapu's aid has been more magnanimous than personable, so I can see the hesitance. But no, Hapu totally thinks you're cute.
This turns out to be a particularly inspiring moment for Lively Lillie, and it will in fact continue playing through the overworld gameplay up until we finally arrive at Exeggutor Island.
All the girl really needed was a friend, clearly.
Incidentally, there's a bit of an awkward stretch of gameplay here where the changes between SM and USUM gets particularly heavy. Basically everything in this update has at least something significant in its USUM portrayal, enough that I'll just handle it separately to make my lot easier. As a result, we're just talking to the chief here.
The Chief is hanging around in front of the Magikarp boat, and Lillie parks herself there to set the map marker.
Lively Lillie continues playing while in Seafolk Village- although it does change to the normal music in other areas. Made for quite the experience doing my Poke Pelago stuff before I finally did the Exeggutor Island gameplay.
"Her" is about Hapu- the Chief was last seen directing us her way. Probably a good idea he makes sure we actually did find her, because it otherwise looks like we're crawling back for more information.
Not only did Hapu help us with what we were looking for, but Hapu became the person we were looking for in the first place. Really good for making sure we got what we needed, and also for Poni in general.
Only one of those people is worth honouring, Lils, and it's not the one who taught you that you weren't worth having friends.
So yeah, Hapu actually pointed us right back to you. You wouldn't happen to be able to get us to the Forbidden Isle, would you?
If you ask to go to Exeggutor Island, he realises you want the flute instantly, too. Clearly there's nothing else to pick up there, apparently
There isn't going to be a Trial of any sort in the near future, owing to Hapu's fresh promotion and Mina's vacation, so the Chief sees no reason for us to not to be able to go just for the Flute. Apparently its status as "former Trial site" makes it weird to judge whether or not it's available to whom.
Like most Trial sites, we'll be allowed to freely look around the place after our plot business is done. Although considering we're probably not technically supposed to be allowed in Verdant Cavern, Lush Jungle, the Abandoned Thrifty Megamart or so forth outside a Trial means Exeggutor Island isn't too special here.
Both us and Lillie will be going to Exeggutor Island to pick up the Flute. Hopefully it won't be a precarious trip.
Welcome to Exeggutor Island. Population- Exeggutor. Well, mainly. Actually, not even mainly.
This is when we learn Exeggutor Island was a Trial site. Which kinda makes the whole weirdness of "hm, do we let you go there?" even weirder. Especially since he phrases it as if no Trials have been conducted there in living memory.
Right, let's see if that Flute is still where we left it.
Pokemon, as a societal model, is one of those things that kinda snowballs. If you're good at Pokemon, you're able to get more Pokemon, and your options for going around the world expand in turn. Unlike capital, it's also not like it's nearly impossible to maintain a steady course with the Pokemon you already have.
Pokemon does have capital as well, although Pokemon isn't too interested in exploring what that means. It wants to be a fantasy.
She is having a lot of "I'm out of my shell" joy on this quest.
The Chief seems pretty pleased with Lillie's condition. This is when Lively Lillie finishes up and the normal theme starts playing- the normal theme being the general overworld theme for Poni Island here. Exeggutor Island may be its own area, but it's not special enough to have a unique overworld theme.
The Chief has now taken on the role of ferryman between Seafolk Village and Exeggutor Island. We totally can go back if necessary, but it really shouldn't be.
Anyway, let's keep up with Lillie. She likes to hang around chokepoints, so I'm not entirely sure if you can barrel ahead of her, but if you can, there's no terrain stopping you from getting to the Flute's pedestal.
They can open the door, but it typically depends on them to find their path from there.
Lillie moves forward, and bumps into an encounter. She didn't even touch the grass yet!
Lillie looks around, and realises it's the tree that she attracted the attention of.
Whatever it is up there, I'll handle it.
Exeggutor (Sun): Alola is the best environment for this Pokémon. Local people take pride in its appearance, saying this is how Exeggutor ought to look.
What else can we find on Exeggutor Island but Exeggcute's gigantic evolution? Exeggutor, when found in its evolved form, lose access to most of its nifty status ailments it could've learned as an Exeggcute, but apart from Sleep Powder, it already lost a ton of those from being too high level in this game. It also loses access to its signature move Dragon Hammer (90 BP Physical Dragon move with no bonus effects), which it got as an evolution move, but Exeggutor prefers being Special anyway. Since most of Exeggutor's ideal moves were going to be taught externally anyway, this is a good way to save a Leaf Stone or something, if Leaf Stones weren't one of the easy Stones to get.
Exeggutor's giganticism is a complete meme in and out of universe, to the extent that it was added as a Poke Ball Pokemon in Smash Ultimate with the sole function of standing around and blocking the stage with its giant body. No matter whose side it's on in a Pokemon battle, its giant head is out of frame. It first appeared with a giant neck on a japanese TCG box, and despite its late appearance as a player option in the main story, its head and tail have been common sights on various Alolan memorabilia- most prominently on the bus we used to get to Mount Hokulani.
That would've been frightfully convenient if I hadn't already evolved an Exeggcute for the Dex entry.
(Speaking of, the pose they have to put it in in order to fit it into the Pokedex listing.)
You can catch this one if you want. It's a normal wild encounter in all the ways that matter.
Huh. They actually get rid of the tree after it's done attacking us. I would've thought that them using a generic tree model rather than an Exeggutor was them trying to get away with passing off a standard environment model as an Exeggutor, but no. If they were going to that trouble, why not just make it an Exeggutor model?
Lillie gets a moment that looks a lot like she realised what she said sounds very slightly suggestive, and has a nice laugh over it. Were this not a Pokemon game, this sort of thing might've been a punchline to a set up beforehand, but no one's made any sort of moderately risque humour until now. Mostly it's just another expression of Lillie's newfound confidence in going outside her comfort zone.
If you're wondering, the encounter tiles on Exeggutor Island are 40% Exeggcute, 30% Pelipper, 20% Exeggutor, and 10% Gastrodon. There's a new find on USUM (and USUM finally gets Exeggcute now), but nothing you haven't seen is in that easily avoidable tall grass around here.
Island Scan does work here, though, giving a Serperior with Glare on Thursdays for SM.
As you catch up to Lillie, you get caught in a sudden rainstorm. Exeggutor Island does have ambient rain around midday and in the early night, but I imagine it's turned off during the story so this story event can work. This does mean that Sliggoo and Castform are available on the SOS weather tables, though.
Lillie finds a small bit of shelter you can use to wait out the storm. Not that a little rain stopped us in Tapu Village, but Lillie did sit that place out.
She's really turning up the tension on that dialogue, isn't she? If I didn't know better, I'd say she really was trying to flirt.
Lillie gets a moment to talk with us a little about her past, as Lusamine's kid.
I'm not sure if Singing In The Rain is too old for Lillie (it was 1952, and if Lillie's our age, she'd be born in 2005), but considering the sorts of movies that Pokemon usually mentions, it probably is the movie she's referencing and not a modern movie referencing it.
Kids and their boundless curiosities. I mean, it must've looked so fun...
I probably would, too- much more convenient to grab her and bring her back in.
Well that comes as a bit of a shock.
For what it's worth, being in the rain is not the cause of catching cold. Cold weather just renders your immune system more vulnerable. Which makes me wonder who else was hanging around these two when they got back from their little jaunt.
...The fact this stuck with you so strongly suggests to me that she wasn't exactly the most motherly of characters the rest of the time. Not sure if that's because she was busy or because she was Lusamine, but you should probably check that.
There's no event that's placed next to this change, leading to all sorts of theories on what exactly was the catalyst event. I'd like to see a bit more evidence on what it might've been, because the order of events confuses me somewhat. The most common ones include "whatever caused Professor Mohn to disappear" and "an encounter with an Ultra Beast before the one with UB01 we saw".
So much for top secret projects. Frankly, I'm disappointed in Lusamine for somehow failing to keep one or both of these from both her kids. One leak, I'd be fine with. But seriously?
It's nice to feel like an inspiration. Especially to someone who's never been inspired before.
There's always an option to take.
This is one of those cases where the SM "Beth doesn't have Pokemon" wins over the USUM "Ailey does". Though that might just be me having a personal preference for agency in an individual over agency as provided by specifically Pokemon. That's not necessarily the position Pokemon takes, though.
Considering her resources, I wouldn't necessarily say Pokemon alone would protect you from her, but they sure wouldn't hurt.
The romantic chemistry's so thick you can slice it with a knife. It's not hard to see how Lillie and the protagonist got to be such a widespread ship.
This is a genuine question, with actual responses to offer. Doesn't really change anything, it's just part of Lillie's path.
There's a lot to think about what I mean when I say that. Mostly, I'm just not sure what I have in mind fits into one of those two categories.
Her response to this particular prompt is a rather lovely one, in my opinion, and one that I suspect would have a long-term improvement for her. Right now, she thinks of us as a paragon of perfection, and it's going to do her a lot of good if she realises that she doesn't have to become that herself.
If you say you have a goal in mind, even an intangible one like "get stronger", Lillie just admires the idea of having an aim. Aside from helping Nebby, that's probably also something she hasn't had to rely on herself.
If you wanna be a Triner, I'll gladly lend you anything I can for that.
This is the only line in this entire sequence that changes if you happen to be a boy and not a girl. Her expression also has a matching change, and this tweak does suggest they were trying to make Lillie less romantic for women as compared to men.
Yeah, uh, what did you call the rest of this conversation?
Because Lillie is definitely crushing on me no matter which gender I went with.
This is the point where the weather clears up to allow us to proceed.
Depending on what time of day it is, you get a rainbow or a meteor shower afterwards. I believe these are also things that can happen normally, although considering how rarely you have reason to come this direction, I wouldn't blame you for not knowing when that is.
Meteor Showers have always struck me as moments to make a wish.
...I wish you all the best with your future endeavours. And I wish you'd give me Nebby.
I could walk the length of this island in ten minutes in real life. If she gets lost, we can find her with a cursory look.
Hidden item in the cave.
A branching path for a ramp back here.
The lower ramp has a bit that causes the camera to slightly turn so you can see behind the island, as well as a freebie Prism Scale. This is where SM finally gets one for their Feebas. USUM, in comparison, had one back in Kala'e Bay.
And a Heart Scale up here, as if it were immediately useful.
Right, Flute. Should probably wash this.
I'm amazed it's still there. That little bracket it's sitting on looks like one it could fall off at any time. And we don't exactly have Dive in this game.
If you say no, you don't get a funny line from Lillie or anything. It's just an option for no reason.
But with that, we have acquired the Flute matching our version!
Incidentally, we have acquired it- the other Flute is in Lillie's inventory, for want of a better term. But between us, we've got both Flutes, and it's not like one of us can play both.
Even Lillie's like "the journey will be worth it even if the destination isn't" about our prospects.
Her happiness is infectious, I swear.
We are automatically taken off Exeggutor Island on this note. Probably just so there wasn't any weirdness if you wanted to Glide away, but they could also disable Glide.
That shall be our next destination. It'll be a bit of a trek, but what are we if not game for a trek?
The Vast Poni Canyon is SM's largest and most involved dungeon, and we'll have to traverse the whole thing to make it to the altar. So yeah, might take a while.
Hapu'll find us on the way. I mean, her house is right next door.
...Also we'll need her permission to go inside.
The Chief has now pretty much been demoted to mechanical NPC, being the only way to get to Exeggutor Island. Strangely, it's never made a Glide point, even though you can Glide from it. Leaving the poor man at the other end.
Anyway, making our way over to Vast Poni Canyon, and our roadblock of "one reasonable Black Belt" has been completely replaced by these boneheads. Say what you will about them, but their capacity to block a road is much greater.
Only question is, what do they want? Their bosses are both gone who knows where, they're acting independently.
Apparently, trouble.
As opposed to the rest of you lot, who have had us as priority one for what's felt like my entire Island Challenge. Do you lot really have one brain between you, or did Gladion take it with him when he defected?
We have an idea, and we are trying to perform that idea. You are in our way.
It was tricky to catch, but the camera actually cuts to black specifically so it can switch Lillie and Bethany's positions for this shot.
No, they have not upgraded at all.
It's important to have a Pokemon who can hit two different types SE as your lead, but it shouldn't be the hardest combination to hit. Keokeo is actually using a coverage move for the job!
Ice cream headache, I've heard bad things.
Whatever was going on here, this lot has clearly overestimated themselves.
There's a shot of Plumeria, sitting up out of reach here, before cutting back to our business with the rest of the grunts.
This Grunt comes up with a clever idea, and the way this idea is phrased, it feels like the developers were intending to bring back a mechanic from ORAS, only for them to be stopped by their own limited capacity to make things work correctly.
In XY, you could randomly find a pack of five wild encounters instead of one, engaged in something called a Horde Battle. This used all the normal rules of Triple Battles, except your two "allies" were also opponents instead. ORAS added two Horde Battles against enemy Grunts, and this looks like a setup for another one. However, SM's capacity to even host Double Battles is pretty compromised, and there is absolutely zero support for Triple Battles in any capacity- you can't even do them against friends wirelessly.
As a result, this battle against five Skull Grunts at once is merely a single Grunt with five Pokemon.
Classic Pokemon games had multiple Grunts with five Pokemon, including inside the dungeons that the evil teams infest. The only reason this fight is significant within SM is because we've only seen Grunts with three Pokemon very rarely- although there have been examples in both Skull and Aether.
Keokeo is solving the first Salandit with Extrasensory. After that, we get a nice little barrage of Team Skull's standard fare.
Mareanie, Zapple had a nice chance to show off her psychic power.
Haunter, that was a job for Bernie-Bear.
Raticate actually outsped Lord Huggington, but even Double Edge was little match for Fluffy.
K9 had to take two attacks to take down Golbat, but Leech Life gave her little reason to regret her choices.
1%?
Melia had a nice fun rampage through this team for Noah- why not pay a Gen 1 callback in kind with a Gen 1 solution? For reasons that make zero sense to me, it took this long for the Skull Grunt to deploy Raticate to stop her.
And even then, the only reason Melia was stopped was because she doesn't carry Focus Blast, only Psychic/Shadow Ball- a combination helpless against Raticate.
Somehow, the Skull Grunts who weren't throwing the Poke Balls wound up on the ground. You'd think we were playing a traditional RPG and not one where our opponents did not directly attack us.
He may not have a plan, but he does have moxie. It won't help him, but he's trying.
Plumeria stops him from embarrassing himself any further, and also tries to instill him a moral that Team Skull hardly carried around itself often. I always did think she was the most sensible of the bunch.
This is what attracts Lillie and Bethany's attention to the fact she was even there.
Plumeria comes down, and talks some sense into the Skull Grunts.
First time I saw this, I thought she was talking about us. No, gendered term, that's referring to a character with a fixed gender.
So it seems.
Plumeria's done her part for Team Skull to advance Lusamine's goals, and that's something she personally regrets.
She doesn't personally apologise, although it's more like "I know you won't forgive me, so I won't bother trying" rather than genuinely not wanting to. Bit of a pessimistic thing, although Plumeria did always have that edge of "I wouldn't forgive me, so nobody else would."
And that would explain what Guzma was doing listening to Lusamine in the first place.
She's been pulling the same thing to him as she was doing to Lillie, except Guzma didn't have the conflicting nature of "source of comfort is also source of pain", the way Lillie did. Made it much easier to come across as angelic.
She lavished her love onto her children, ignorant of what they wanted out of life, and actively choked anything that was not continuing to be Lusamine's own image of family life. She lavished her love onto her favourite Pokemon, disrupting their home environments and freezing them the way she wanted. She lavished her love onto Guzma, purely to make him into a weapon to claim what she really wanted.
Yes. Selfish is the perfect word for it.
"Save" her, that the word you want to use? I suppose there really isn't anything worse in this dimension than what's happening to her right now, at least from a non-warped perspective.
He, at least, will definitely appreciate being taken out of Ultra Space. Although after that, he's got a lot of pride and we represent his greatest failures...
I... I think I get what you're going for, but also, that is a loaded comparison, and I'm not 100% convinced it's one that really works here. Like, yeah, Lusamine is a woman of conviction, but that's where her biggest flaws come from. Praising Lillie for having same convictions, even if you mean it in a positive way, really reads as more commenting on her potential for darkness than her strength.
Especially when Lillie's "strength of conviction" is currently directing her to help someone who's meant her nothing but harm purely out of idolising a positive past they've shared.
She's saying this about Guzma, but it's definitely the strongest argument we've got for helping Lusamine.
I hope any of these characters are planning on pointing it at Lusamine.
This is a callback to Plumeria's very first scene, where her comment about seeing us was to remark that "we didn't look anything special" with regards to how we took out all those Grunts.
I wonder if Plumeria wishes that was something she could've done.
She tells us to keep up with helping Lillie- and coming from someone who was previously responsible for our greatest failure to do exactly that, it certainly has a nice ring to it.
As Alola's resident Poison expert, it's no surprise that Plumeria is associated with the Poisonium Z. On the other hand, it's not like Sina and Dexio gave us Icium and Psychicium either. Most of Poison's Status moves, particularly those that inflict Poison, tend to be +1 Def for a bonus effect, but both SM and USUM have a tempting target with which to direct Acid Downpour itself. Not the same target in both games, though.
Are we just bringing that up to remind me because of Hapu? Or is that really what's so important about me? I barely remember to bother using Z-Moves in this game, it's not like that was a really valuable part of the quest...
I do certainly have a team worth bringing with me. Had to make a few cuts along the way, including of Pokemon I really had hopes in, but such is life.
I can certainly trust the Pokemon I've got. Even if I've got way more than most.
Plumeria's not planning on fighting us now. The fight with her at Aether House was the last one in the main story, and her postgame match does require a bit of RNG to access.
Just misguided. They failed to beat the Island Challenge, which one can't entirely blame them over, and most of their more unfortunate decisions seem to have been entirely down to Lusamine's directives. Like, sure, they maybe shouldn't have followed her, but that was entirely Guzma responsible for pushing them on that path.
There is a full heal here. That's worth mentioning for something I discovered after the fact.
And off Lillie runs.
...Well, I suppose you can't deny their branding efforts. But still... meh.
Lillie was right about one thing, though... there's a boss coming up.
Murphy's a bit of an odd pick for this upcoming boss, but he has what I need for the lead, and he certainly has a good reason to appear...
I really wish Oatchi got Leaf Blade. Still, Scope Lens Razor Leaf should still have some good damage to it.
Keokeo is just one of those Pokemon that can accomplish a lot with the right stuff. And she's basically a perfect counter to one of the Pokemon we'll see in that upcoming boss. As such, she's on Amulet Coin duties.
Oh hey, speaking of "I almost never remember to bring Z-Crystals". Dottie has found a fight where Flyinium Z can prove its worth.
Bernie Bear... EXP and an emergency Shadow Sneak if I need it. Mostly EXP, though. Level 46 is a hell of a time to get Play Rough...
If an emergency "click priority" button is needed, Jaws will make a far better candidate.
Welcome to Vast Poni Canyon. We're going to spend a lot of time running up and along the length of it, though- it's not that much vaster than this. Vast Poni Canyon is based on Waimea Canyon, the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific"- not as big or as old as the one in Arizona, but one with a much more violent birthing process. Strangely, the water at the base of Waimea that gave it its name is absent from this one, with the reddish stone around here serving another purpose. Although that's for next time.
Vast Poni Canyon has its own theme. It doesn't really have the bittersweet feel of the main Poni areas, although it does have a rather catchy feel to it. But hearing it for a while will come later.
There are some nice, impressive camera angles going on here, although it's worth noting I've got player control going on here.
Hey, Hapu. Seems a shame I forgot to check in on you at your house, but nice to see you've caught up.
...So was I supposed to bring up the whole "can we go into Vast Poni Canyon" thing with you at some point? Only person who was in our way was Team Skull...
One Sun Flute acquired. And Ray's got a nice friend to show for it, too.
Just the one Exeggutor, really, those things are walking piles of trouble. One shake of their neck covers a quarter of the length of their own island- it's a wonder why they flocked to it.
Hapu reinforcing that nice lesson of "just because you need help doesn't make you any lesser of a person, Lillie.
I mean, what else is S.O.S. but Pokemon coming together to take care of their own?
Your grandfather was a grand kahuna, all right. I'm sure you'll be just the same.
Hapu is so taken with how much Lillie likes us that she declares the desire to finally have the chance to take a good look. We fought in her presence once before, but she was a little busy at the time. Besides, we're double the level now, have more evolutions, and in general make a better fight.
Hapu gets a lot of extra merit on account of being a lategame kahuna and thus using a lot more evolved Pokemon, but in general, her team has the strongest cohesion and team choices.
Although it has also gone unmentioned thus far, I imagine you don't need to think as hard about Hapu's type choice as you did Nanu's.
Now, here's a surprising bit I found when checking the script- if you say "Yes, fight me" and you are not fully healed, Hapu will chide you and heal your team before she accepts your statement.
Remember how Lillie full healed us after the last event, and there have been no Trainers or tall grass in between? Yeah, I think this only bothers the kinds of people who want to start a fight with Overgrow, Torrent, or Guts in effect.
If you say yes immediately, you get some nice dramatic camera angles as Hapu does the dramatic speech appropriate of a grand trial.
Come to think of it, does Hapu have a Z Ring added to her model after her encounter with Tapu Fini? Her big gloves are pretty good about obscuring that sort of thing.
Come to mention it, the Z-Move equivalent of past games only required Trainers to possess a small bauble, and between XY, ORAS, and the anime, they had a lot of fun finding fitting places for enemy Trainers to wear it to go with their outfits. Z-Power is only performed with the clunky bracelet.
Let me just say, ahead of time, I don't think Tapu Koko being at my side is going to inspire a lot of confidence against you in specific.
I trust you'll understand I do the same?
Noah checked what Hapu's like if you pause, and it's worth mentioning now, because there's two funny things to note here.
You know how, when major plot characters appear after a cutscene, they repeat their last line of dialogue from said cutscene? This is the first instance of it where I'm looking at the line that is repeated and wondering "hey, is this a glitch and not intentional?" Whatever's going on to make Lillie repeat this line, it's definitely lazy.
Meanwhile, if you talk to Hapu after passing on battling her immediately, she won't actually get her dramatic camera angles. Which is weird, because there are other instances of the game allowing you to leave a cutscene early to heal, and when you return, picking up where they left off. This entire setup is just weird.
...That is a very visible Z-Ring. Never mind, guess it wasn't put on the model. Anyway, Hapu uses the Ground type, and the Ground type is famous for one thing: overwhelming force. Ground's standard Physical move has the highest base power among moves with no negative side-effects, and Ground types are SE on five different types, including the typical all-purpose defensive counter Steel. Fortunately, two of Hapu's Pokemon are Special Attackers. Less fortunately, I'm not sure that helps.
Ground types are resisted only by Grass and Bug types, and are of course helpless against Flying types and Pokemon with the Levitate Ability. Spelling it out, it's little wonder Ground remains balanced in the face of how widespread Levitate and other ways to get off the ground are.
Hapu's Dugtrio is 31/31/15/15/15/31, 252 EVs in Atk and Spd, Serious Nature, and with the moves Iron Head, Earthquake, Sucker Punch, and Sandstorm. It has chosen the Sand Veil Ability, and with 152 Speed, it's putting up Sandstorm regardless of whether you want it to. An excellent lead, and one that depends on you having a strong plan to get a good hit in where it's frail.
Murphy is such a plan, with its high Defence. And hey, why not fight Hapu with a Mudsdale of our own?
Well that's irritating. It'll also deal scratch damage to everything I've brought that isn't Murphy. One thing worth mentioning, on that note, is that Ground is SE against both other types innately immune to Sandstorm. Fortunately, she's not carrying anything buffed by Sandstorm except Sand Veil on this Dugtrio.
Phew. Nailed it. Odds weren't lovely, but I'll take what I can get.
31/15/31/15/31/15 IVs, 252 EVs in HP/Def, Serious Nature, and the moves Muddy Water, Mud Bomb and Recover. Gastrodon is a bit of a pain on account of the fact that Water/Ground carries only a single weakness- Grass. Fortunately, Hapu has chosen Sticky Hold and not Storm Drain- this team could get up to some nasty shenanigans if Hapu was the sort of person to switch in a Storm Drain Gastrodon if you were using Water moves on Dugtrio or Mudsdale. As it is, both of her moves have 85% accuracy, meaning her odds of doing anything with her extended time are pretty bad.
The Physical Defence build sucks, particularly for Oatchi, but considering we just got an Energy Ball TM, you have plenty of options for avoiding it and hitting her right where it hurts.
Well, darn. Razor Leaf's low power really is starting to be an issue.
(...That was the 3/16 low roll. Anything else was a oneshot.)
And that was the last thing I needed.
Fortunately, the nerf to Hyper Potions works in our favour, and a second Razor Leaf will have good odds of finishing the job. This gets Sandstorm out of our hair faster, and consumes that Hyper Potion early.
I thought that might've been necessary, but I've got 11 HP to spare even with a low roll. Certainly could've stood to be more pleasant odds, though.
Flygon (Sun): The flapping of its wings sounds something like singing. Those lured by the sound are enveloped in a sandstorm, becoming Flygon's prey.
31/15/15/31/15/31 IVs, 252 EVs in Sp. Atk and Spd, Serious Nature, and the moves Earth Power and Dragon Breath. Trapinch's final evolution Flygon is a serious opponent, and one we'll meet in full force later, although the fact it's working with its weaker offensive stat here helps us a ton. Still, though, the Dragon typing covers for its weaknesses to Grass and Water, meaning you must hit it with Ice, Dragon or Fairy- not the more reliable options on offer right now.
Part of the reason for Flygon's terrifying nature is its 100 base Speed- with Hapu's investments, this Flygon has a Speed stat of 143, a few points short of that Dugtrio (a Pokemon known for being fast), and faster than anything I brought with me.
Keokeo could take a Special hit, though, enabling her to hit Flygon right where it hurts. Good thing Bethany has a fast, strong Ice type that isn't weak to Ground!
85 BP Physical Psychic move, this move has the semi-unique bonus effect of being a screen-breaker, like Brick Break. Only Bruxish can learn it in the main story, although Carvanha and Lillipup get it by breeding. This will become a widespread TM move in SwSh, but it has not earned that honour yet. Since we do have a Bruxish, we do have that option open to us.
31/31/31/15/15/15 IVs, 252 EVs in Atk/Def, Serious Nature, the moves Earthquake, Heavy Slam, Double Kick and Counter. Mudsdale is as much a threat against us as it is with us, although I'm not sure what it's doing with Counter. It, of course, is the Pokemon carrying the Groundium Z, as well as having the Stamina Ability. Expect Physical fights to not go your way.
(Side note, but remember when Hapu said her Mudsdale was a female? Most Trainers in series history typically used Pokemon matching their own gender- I'm not entirely sure how often that pattern is broken across the series- but all Kahunas other than Hala use a mixed-gender team.)
Not only will Earthquake pose no threat, but neither will Stamina. I'm a little leery about Keokeo's odds (and I was correct to be- even with an Expert Belt, Ninetales is not even able to secure a oneshot with any damage roll, and is oneshot by Earthquake, let alone Heavy Slam), so going for Dottie felt like a good call.
This looks like a job for Z-Power. I love the way the Z-Pose for Flying looks on Bethany- the way her hair bounces as she strikes the pose.
Surprise! Z-Feather Dance, not Supersonic Skystrike. This gives a total of three damage stages in my favour, turning Heavy Slam from 47-52% damage to a more reasonable 15-18%.
Also Mudsdale has decided it wants to use Double Kick. This does even less damage.
And it can't even count on Sandstorm scratch. Incidentally, Double Kick right now is pretty close to flat damage- it's 10 damage on every roll except the top 1/16, which is 12.
I have plenty of time to shore up my Sp. Atk.
OK, seriously, either Hapu knows something the damage calculator doesn't, or she's rolling for crits.
...And that wasn't even an impressive outcome.
Even with +2 Sp. Atk, Dottie requires a solid two-shot. Good thing I have all this time, because imagine the chip if I just went right for Air Slashes.
Just a second one was sufficient.
It's a lot easier to describe a battle as "earthshaking" when it actually shakes the earth.
I sure liked having a nice chance for Dottie to show her stuff. The fact that I wound up finding a use for an Electric type in a Ground Trial was a nice bonus.
You ready to start your lifelong learning? You don't get as smart as your precessor suddenly one day.
Ground, as a type, is really lacking in subtlety and finesse. Of the types, I think Ground has the fewest status moves, and the only one of any merit is Spikes- itself a move that doesn't appear to be Ground type for any particular reason. We're using this, we're planning on Tectonic Raging. Somewhat unfortunately, the fact we don't have reliable access Earthquake means we need to find some high-power Ground move to use as a basis ourselves.
I think that Stamp gets your Pokemon up to level 80 without disobedience. We still haven't hit Olivia's threshold, of course.
The Ground Z-Pose is a spin before pushing your palm into the ground. This is one that really feels like you're contributing to the massive earthquake your Pokemon is about to unleash.
The worst part is? I'm not even entirely sure Lillie did much to become our friend. Our own gut instinct compelled us to enter a dangerous situation, all Lillie did was keep looking in our direction.
I think I'll let her have this one. She sure hasn't done anything to try and prevent this. Well, since she tried locking us out of the loop early on, but she hasn't even told Kukui everything.
Well, OK, the Vast Poni Canyon is a linear experience. But saying "head straight through here" implies something relatively untrue.
Yeah, that's more like it. Not only are there a ton of Trainer battles, but there's also a few carrying multiples. And also the occasional investment in one's stats.
Ah, to be any other RPG and have this mean "Lillie is going to be a mechanic". Nah, what she means is that Lillie will be following us as a portable heal point. Of sorts.
This, at least, is not her talking about a mechanic, just her being appropriately prepared.
As will I.
Well, we say that... it's such a beast of a place that it'll have to be saved for its own thing.
Well, OK, there was this. This is a TM in USUM, so I thought it would be more impressive here in SM than it ultimately was. Ah well, we can start with Lillie next time.
Next time: Not having Lillie.
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