Bethany has been spinning wheels on the Altar of the Sunne, where Kahuna Nanu has shown up after Lillie gave us Nanu.
One wonders why Nanu got stuck with messenger boy duties. Surely there was someone else who'd be more willing to lend a hand.
To be fair to Kukui, part of the reason Nanu is available is because he refused a more strenuous task here.
Bethany finished up her Island Trials before the events in Ultra Space. But now that she has no prior arrangements, the time has come for her to approach this duty.
Nanu also mentions the last job being "defeat all four kahunas". One thing that the change this year fixes is that now Nanu has less responsibilities on his plate.
Nanu actually tells us what it is ahead of time- Kukui's finished the job on his whole "shake up the Island Challenge by doing what everyone else is doing" thing.
I guess we've got no choice but to see whether Kukui's pulled this one off for ourselves.
The content of this update will be focused on climbing Mount Lanakila, the game's equivalent to one of Pokemon's traditional final challenges- Victory Road.
Nanu offers to fast-travel us to the base of the mountain, too, while he's here. Tapu Village is one of his stops on the way home, which is the main reason I expect he's doing this.
He drops us off without a word in Mount Lanakila directly. Fortunately, he doesn't start the immediate next event, but it's worth mentioning, since the last thing Bethany did was catch Nebby- the first event is a Battle.
Mount Lanakila is probably the coldest Victory Road in the series- where other games have icy mountains as destinations, they're usually separate from Victory Road.
While Mount Lanakila is the first Victory Road to have a unique name, it's not that unique- Lanakila is the Hawai'ian word for Victory.
So what happened was I left Mount Lanakila and had Bethany idle in front of the Pokemon Centre until Ailey caught up. Turns out the Trial Guide has dialogue now that her job's been set up.
So anyway, about that battle I promised...
Sturm continues to be Sturm. Stealth Rock, Calm Mind, Power Gem. If his opponent is happy to let him get those turns off. Fortunately, this opponent will be so kind.
Lord Huggington drew a nice opponent for his fight, and one that certainly supports the idea of having Lord Huggington remain Bethany's Fighting type over Isabella. Although considering he's picked up Dragon Claw, he clearly knows who almost replaced him.
Yeah, I forgot to put Flash Cannon back. It's been a while since I got to play with Bethany's team, admittedly, and Flash Cannon shouldn't be important for this fight. Hopefully it redeems Jigsaw after that Kommo-o.
Low Sweep and Rock Tomb? Murphy's clearly of the school of thought that High Horsepower will carry him to victory, and everything else is just supplements. By which I mean... is he wrong?
Jaws doesn't have a job to do, but Aqua Jet might come in handy as cleanup.
Keokeo... I imagine she's just here for EXP, but she could be important if I find the right opening to fill.
Walk close enough to the elevator, and you notice it's currently in the wrong position for us to use it.
That's because someone's coming to meet us. I think he had to do this on purpose- I have no idea what he was doing on Mount Lanakila until we showed up, or why he chose to meet us at the base after he was done.
Look at him. This is a man who has gone out of his way to engineer a situation in which he has an excuse to utter this line.
He then immediately follows it up by trying, desperately, to follow up this cool dramatic line with his significantly less cool and dramatic "thing he actually wanted to talk to us about"- us helping out with Lillie and Lusamine was something he approved of. Not that I'm entirely proud of it, but you know your sister better than I know my girlfriend, I suppose...
Gladion was never one for words, so this time, he's going to battle us- as our friend.
You know, I don't believe "that old man" is actually specific enough to pinpoint exactly who it is that gave him a Z-Ring. I'm going to assume Hala, since "old man" fits him in a way that it doesn't fit many of the other major men in this story who might be considered old.
Then again, Nanu was the guy who soft-talked him out of Team Skull...
Gladion has properly ditched Team Skull at long last, and no longer uses Team Skull's encounter wipe or battle background. He does, however, retain his edgelord animations and personal theme.
Ah, yes, this is an interesting trick they pulled off in GSC- Silver, an edgy rival, raised a Golbat, and only evolves it when he undergoes his character development- a neat gameplay implementation in the very generation that introduced friendship evolutions. Gladion only evolving his Golbat into Crobat after becoming a more personable character seems like them carrying on that tradition, but it's not exactly like he ever had the problem of treating his Pokemon badly. It's more like Cyrus having a Golbat that evolves into Crobat, except Cyrus's issues came from indifference. I'm just chalking this one up to a gameplay thing.
Gladion has been doing more than just grinding friendship- to a point. This Crobat is running 15/15/15/15/15/31 IVs, and he actually has EVs now- 252 in Speed. Just the Speed. Still a Serious Nature, and still carrying just the moves Cross Poison and Acrobatics. Any Rock or Steel type should have few problems here.
Sturm, for its immunity to being Poisoned, makes an excellent lead for this exact purpose.
This will not be a battle in which Sturm will be leaving Meteor Form. Pity, that.
It turns out that, in addition to not entirely kitting out his team, Gladion's team is also Stealth Rock weak! To be fair to him, this is a specific set of circumstances that only Bethany really stands to benefit from- it requires both him being in his SM form and the player have chosen Rowlet. Any other combination of game and starter will weaken Stealth Rock's value to the point of "nice, but far from necessary".
Still, Crobat has given me more than enough turns to work with to set some up.
Not a oneshot. Of course not, I'm still in Meteor Form, but still. A bit of a shame.
Of course now you go into Core Form.
His Sneasel has evolved into Weavile! There's nothing in Mount Lanakila that would help with that, though. Weavile has a very Weavile set of 31/31/15/15/15/31 IVs, 252 EVs in Atk, a Serious Nature, and the moves Ice Shard, Night Slash, and Metal Claw. Weavile has a bit of a problem with finding moves of high BP to accompany its excellent Atk, so carves itself a niche with priority. Fighting itself does not inherently resist Ice, but so long as you can survive one Weavile attack and carry SE on it, you should be able to oneshot it in turn- and surviving one Weavile attack is trivial if you resist Night Slash. Like Fighting types do.
It's also Stealth Rock weak, just in case you thought landing that oneshot would be hard.
For... some reason, Weavile carries Pressure. Making moves cost 2 PP matters little when you only need the one attack to knock it out.
That's kind of a respectable chunk to take out of Lord Huggington. I don't think Ice Shard is contact, but still.
Brick Break handily deals with Weavile.
Lucario (Moon): They can detect the species of a living being- and its emotions- from over half a mile away. They control auras and hunt their prey in packs.
Now here's something that's not scared of Stealth Rocks and a little SE. A Pokemon from DPPt that gained a strong reputation by a combination of being given basically everything it could want for a ticket to popularity, Lucario is a Fighting/Steel type hat, while present in the Alola Pokedex, is limited to the postgame here. In battle, Lucario has excellent offensive stats (Speed's a little shaky, but it's easy to make it fast), and its less-than-average defences are well supplemented by its Steel typing. Its weaknesses are strongly supported by Lucario's massive movepool, giving it an element of surprise. It's carried hard by its own popularity- built up in part thanks to pre-DPPt marketing materials- but it can make a terrifying sight with the right kit.
Gladion's Lucario has the IVs 15/31/15/31/15/31, 252 EVs in Speed, and the moves Aura Sphere, Metal Claw and Quick Attack. Aura Sphere is an 80 BP Special Fighting move that never misses, and is Lucario's signature move. It is also, sadly, the only move you're really scared of on this one. Lucario happens to have the Inner Focus Ability (it doesn't have great Abilities, to be honest) and is carrying Gladion's Z-Crystal... Steelium Z. A Corkscrew Crash based on Metal Claw has 100 BP- we've been seeing normal moves with this power, albeit rarely moves that have no drawbacks. Gladion's Lucario is not exactly a great one, but simply being a Lucario is enough to give pause.
I resist Steel and am Specially weak, which is why it went for Aura Sphere, but Jigsaw could still take it.
And did wind up with the oneshot. A Flamethrower out of Jigsaw isn't "a little" SE.
Still, I don't think Jigsaw could've taken the second Aura Sphere. Or outsped with Shell Smash.
RKS Silvally (Ultra Sun): Having been awakened successfully, it can change its type and battle- just like a certain Pokémon depicted in legends.
Gladion has evolved his Type: Null and restored it to its rightful status as Type: Full- or Silvally, which, as one of it's Pokedex entries in Moon reveals, is a name chosen by Gladion personally. Silvally has a flat set of 95 stats in its BST- which, if one might recall, is an improvement on Type: Null only in Speed. Gladion's partner retains its flat 30 IVs, has gotten its EV investment in Speed, and now carries the moves Multi Attack, X-Scissor, Crunch, and Crush Claw. Its Ability is now RKS System, Type: Full's planned ability to change its type while holding a Memory item. Gladion has chosen to give Silvally the Fire Memory, in recognition of our choice in starter of Rowlet- the Memory Gladion chooses will always be the one of Grass/Fire/Water that is SE on your starter choice. Multi-Attack is a 90 BP Physical Normal move that will also change its type to match Silvally's Memory.
Since being a Fire type renders Silvally weak to Stealth Rock, setting it here has done us some favours for chipping down this familiar, tanky foe.
Hm, he also went for Multi-Attack. To be fair, Murphy does not resist it, but still... that is certainly a number.
You know those stats that were impressive to us because we only had two Trials under our belt? They're, uh, far less impressive now. Then again, it's not like Gladion wasn't a paper tiger with the rest of his team.
You can try as hard as you might, you're not going to be cool just by acting cool.
Part of Gladion's development has resulted in this pose getting a shakeup for a new, much more confident expression. At least one of the kids has gotten better from being out of Lusamine's shadow.
It's not like your Pokemon are bad. The worst one on a competent team is, ironically, Silvally itself.
Gladion is really working on that theatre kid energy. This conversation does not need to be nearly this dramatic.
The way this camerawork is framed, this shot of Bethany almost feels like a reaction to Gladion's news. And, because of Bethany's shallow emotional range, we don't have a lot of direction on how exactly we're meant to take this news. I, personally, am reading a certain degree of "...fuck, I ruined a perfectly good girlfriend", but that's because I'm bringing in a Lusamine-negative energy the story hasn't consciously primed me to carry.
Having your protagonist being a walking Kuleshov demonstration is certainly a choice. Nice for a story that wants a self-insert, I guess, but limits their story ideas somewhat- which is part of why Lillie's options can't really involve latching onto us.
Despite the fact she clearly wants to be our girlfriend.
...While yes, these don't exactly grow on trees, was this really the sort of gift you'd expect from that emotional weight?
This lends credence to the "Gladion got his Z-Ring from Hala" theory- presumably, he'd have seen one at the same time he saw the other.
You can start by remembering to EV train your Pokemon. And give your team coverage moves. I can loan you my TMs?
When you think about it, the last time we met Gladion, he dragged us by the ear to tear down the Aether Paradise to save Lillie. I'm not sure if "not friends" is exactly what you want to use to describe the girlfriend of your sister, but it's a perfectly apt word if you think our co-operation with Gladion was entirely unwilling- which is an opinion Gladion has. "Sorry for dragging you into the family mess", after all.
How apt that he makes that claim. We'll see if your team gets better once we do.
And off he walks, as dramatically as possible without a cape.
...Impregnable, that's the word we're going with? Even for the dictionary definition of the word, that's not what I'd go with. "Impregnable" implies being a natural wall, not something that is routinely overcome by those that complete the Island Challenge.
And certainly not something with an installed elevator.
Anyway, Mount Lanakila proper. Intriguing angle on the climb up, wouldn't expect to see the elevator at an angle.
Not particularly surprising in the slightest there.
Also a Zygarde Cell. These things are everywhere.
...Huh. Unevolved Pokemon. These are relatively common in Victory Road encounter tables, and it always kinda weirds me out that the self-proclaimed most dangerous encounter tables in the region don't go fully-evolved or bust, but to be fair to Vulpix, they also don't like wild encounters that evolve by Stone. Exeggutor was meant to be an outlier.
The outdoor encounter tables around here contain Vulpix/Sandshrew, Absol, Snorunt, and a brand new encounter we have already added to our Seen Pokedex, but are just now getting here. I found mine inside the cave, though, so I'll wait to discuss it. Much like the base in USUM, the outdoor areas also have weather encounter tables, allowing you to find Vanillite's evolutions Vanillish and Vanilluxe during Hail. Vanilluxe takes the 1% slot from Castform, but Castform can of course be found during Rain and Sandstorm as normal.
Speaking of, the inside of the cave. Nice and snowy, and I think you can just barely see a relatively cool detail that's hard to screenshot- Bethany is actually cold in here. Her breathing is actually animated as puffs of visible vapour, and she has a shivering idle animation to match. In Sun, the interior caves have the same encounter tables as the outside, with Moon adding a version exclusive.
At long last, we can finally add Sneasel to our collection! Ice types are famous for showing up late, and it's hard to deny that fact when Sneasel takes back its place as "last location visited in the story" from its original appearance in Gold and Silver. As a Pokemon, Sneasel is two things: Fast, and with a high Atk score. You can't count on it to take a hit on either side (its Sp. Def is higher, but it's still pretty low), but if it can pull off an outspeed oneshot, that won't matter. The problem, therefore, is the low BP moves it's stuck using to supplement that power.
Sneasel's Abilities are Keen Eye (prevents accuracy loss) and Inner Focus (blocks flinching). Both are turned into Pressure (moves that hit it deduct 2 PP from the user) on evolution, and of the bunch, only Keen Eye really plays into Sneasel's strengths? If Sneasel takes a Headbutt, flinching is the least of my worries here. Its HA is Pickpocket, which will cause it to steal an opponent's held item if it is hit with a contact move and its hold item slot is currently empty. An all-around terrible Ability, and one that kinda feels like it was designed to be used offensively (like the similar Magician Ability) rather than defensively.
As one last note, Sneasel evolves when it is levelled up at Night while holding a Razor Claw. Ray and Ailey acquired one from a scientist outside Tapu Village for showing him they possessed 50 TMs, but there is no freebie Razor Claw in SM. The only way to acquire one is to steal one from a 5% Jangmo-o or Hakamo-o (50% on Kommo-o, although obviously not the Totem). I can't imagine a more nightmarish evolution requirement- well, maybe SM King's Rock, but...
Wild Pokemon on Mount Lanakila are... well, this is exceptionally weird. In Moon, they are a flat 42-45. In Sun, they are 45-48, except in a single patch of grass where they're 42-45. That patch of grass was the smaller one just outside the cave here- I can only imagine a rebalance that didn't spread as far as it should have, although I'm not sure which one is the rebalance.
It's worth noting that Bethany and Noah cannot use Repels, with their levels.
Thanks to Sneasel and evolving Dratini and Jangmo-o, I'm now at 90% Dex completion in SM, too. Everything I haven't caught is in postgame, or requires trading around.
Also, it turns out Bethany forgot to evolve Crabrawler. We only just got access to Mount Lanakila now to finally perform that evolution. Ray has evolved and benched Fist Jr. at this point. SM Crabrawler didn't stand a chance.
Noah has to find this one- it's unique to Moon and Ultra Moon. The lateness of Sneasel is relatively excusable. There is no good excuse for you to lock yourself so late, Drampa. An amazing Special Attack stat is supplemented by mediocre-to-decent defences and atrocious Speed- it's not good enough at its job for most competition, but put it in the kiddie pool and it is overpowering. It does fill a niche as a Normal/Dragon, but the type is more of a gimmick than useful to it- Normal and Dragon are kinda terrible offensive types without supplements, and supplementing each other doesn't count.
Drampa's Abilities are Sap Sipper (+1 Atk when hit by a Grass type move, and complete immunity to them) and Berserk (+1 Sp. Atk when reduced below half HP). Berserk is unique to it, and if Drampa heals back above 50% HP with Roost, it will get the buff again when dropped back down. Drampa is bulky enough to count on that buff, but don't expect it to carry it to a sweep. Its HA is Cloud Nine (treats the battlefield as having no weather), which doesn't really help it in any strong way.
The first break in the path is off to the left here, and it's immediately obvious which path has the secret goodies.
And what goodies they are! Ice Beam is a 90 BP Special Ice move that can be learned by most Water types and an insane amount of other Pokemon, and is the Ice move of choice for virtually any purpose. Considering we've been depending on Ice types directly until now, this is a valuable way to diversify our team's portfolio.
It's a little less obvious which way is which here. The left path is a shortcut, while the right side will pass us by some useful items.
Oh. It's about damn time.
The Icium Z is the eighteenth and final typed Z-Crystal to add to our collection, and did the icy mountain it called home have to be in the endgame? Ice is an amazing type, but not nearly valuable enough to be worth all this locking away! As a result of its remoteness, I've not used much of Subzero Slammer, although it turns out Hail and Aurora Veil give +1 Spd. An interesting choice, but a welcome one were I to be playing in that direction.
Going left at the "shortcut" branch takes us to the Ice Rock, an important sight for Pokedex completion, and yet another instance of Mount Lanakila's late arrival into the plot causing a cool Pokemon to be denied to the main story.
The Ice Rock is how we finally add the eighth and final Eeveelution to the set! Until its evolution condition was changed to the Ice Stone in SwSh, Glaceon has never been available sooner than having acquired the sixth Gym Badge- and even then, it's only because of the open world of SwSh and SV that players are physically capable of going out of their way to get a Glaceon in what one might call "reasonable" time. Glaceon has invested most heavily in Sp. Atk, backing up with the two defensive stats. A bit of an odd build, but I "acquired" a Glaceon early for the mono-Ice run and it turns out it's actually kinda good? The Snow Cloak Ability, that run making extensive use of Hail, and Eevee's Baby-Doll Eyes seem to be the basis of that assertion, though. I couldn't say for certain how well it performs without Hail, but I know that Glaceon isn't exactly beloved in environments where availability isn't a factor.
Its HA is Ice Body, which exchanges evasion for passive healing in Hail. Either way, its Ability is doing the same thing.
This is north of the Icium Z, and east of the Ice Rock. This is where the paths converge here.
...Huh... already leaving the cold?
Indeed we are.
(While I was out here, I tried to do my best to get a good shot of the icy breath effect. This one's about as good as I'm going to get while in motion- the puffs hang in place even as the player has moved past them.
Max Revive over here, gotta remember to grab it.
...I think it's about time we addressed the Donphan in the room. That was an incredibly short, almost disappointing Victory Road. It's fairly clear that time, at least, was a factor in not populating Victory Road with Trainers, but it is worth mentioning that GSC's Victory Road also lacked Trainers. Of course, GSC's Victory Road also had puzzles, and at the end of the road, Silver implies the reason that there are no Trainers was because he chased them away. SM lacks both of these elements, leaving Mount Lanakila as empty, wanting, and its role in both Crabrawler and Glaceon's evolutions (and locking Drampa late) makes it fairly loathed from even a casual mechanical perspective.
I will say that I have been carefully avoiding discussing USUM's Mount Lanakila, and that is because USUM has delivered and expanded the place. They'll get their own update, though. Again.
...The way he makes that sound, he climbed the mountain before the elevator was installed.
The worst part is, I believe it.
Anyway, our last Pokemon Centre.
...Uh huh. Please never tell this story to random children again. Or anyone.
...Hey yeah, when you put it like that... changing the end of the Island Challenge from a rite-of-passage to what is often considered a one-man-wins system is... kind of going to become a Team Skull factory? This is why I always took issue with the idea that there was one and only one Champion.
And fortunately, that Socialite over there is just the lady to do it.
The shop only sells the basics- it's not until USUM that they added the X Items.
Ladies and gentlemen, it has been a long time incoming, but at long last... THE MOVE REMINDER! They did like to give them names like "Move Maniac" here and there, but we'll literally never hear this name again- her dialogue is shortened after the first time.
In SM, Madam Memorial is able to teach any Pokemon any move in their current learnset. You're up the creek without a paddle for moves that can only be learned by pre-evolutions (sorry, Ridley, no Shell Smash), but otherwise, you're not even restricted by whether you've reached the required level. One Heart Scale per reminded move, but remember you can get eight daily for free from Malie's restaurant.
I'm not going to show every Pokemon's available learnset by reminder, nor am I going to show you everything I learned piecemeal- I was planning on showing off my pre-League stats, but that's a separate thing. But I will show one off as a sample:
Zapple, it has been a long time incoming.
You need a Special Electric move and you needed it two islands ago.
You only give a Heart Scale once you choose a move- but you will need one to browse the list.
And yeah, we can't get Volt Tackle back even if we wanted it. Zapple's not crying about it, but best not forget Nasty Plot.
This is a sample of what Nebby can get from the reminder. Its learnset is a little weird, because of mechanics we'll discuss in the postgame.
I'm starting to doubt this whole "rite-of-passage" thing. This sounds like an extensive procedure if the Island Challenge is anything near what we've been told it ought to be.
"World-class" is a brave statement. Most nations have a League, Kukui, isn't that why you're building one?
Now, this is a slightly annoying for me- I had thought there was a boss fight trigger here. It's actually a little ways up the path- not too far- but the cutscene is back here.
Which does give us a chance to pick these up before we get there, at least. Team check...
Bernie-Bear is weirdly good, given who it is we're fighting. Then again, that's just Bernie-Bear.
Jaws does what Jaws does best, but this time as a frontliner.
Lord Huggington is going to be up against something slightly sturdier this time, so he needs a backup plan.
Not only does Thunderbolt now bestow an actual means to inflict damage, but it also means Zapple finally has access to her Z-Move! The fact she hasn't had it until now says more than I'd like it to.
Oatchi was a no-brainer. I don't think he'll be necessary, but I will appreciate him if he is.
And K9 is just here for some good old-fashioned "hit them hard with priority and hope that sticks."
Heya, Hau. Bethany hasn't seen you since... Aether Paradise?
I hope you've been clearing your Trials, same as USUM Hau, right?
Yup. Although Ilima is a choice in training partner. I'd have thought he'd call out Hala- or even Gladion. Then again, I suppose Gladion is supposed to be responsible and cleaning up Lusamine's messes.
Mate... Gladion only found out five minutes ago. Hell, I only found out ten minutes ago. I'm not sure how Gladion learned so fast.
Glad to know this is when you book it. I appreciate the gesture, but like, I could've waited. I had plenty of team-sorting to do.
Ah. That explains the rush. Kinda surprised in Hau's newfound determination to do this first- I always took him to be more happy to have it done at all. He just doesn't have a competitive bone in his body.
It's about time, buddy.
Hau hasn't battled us since Malie City, a battle that was largely tough because it was duct taped to a point players were probably unprepared to have their save files in. Apparently, his off-screen training montage to take himself more seriously resulted in the addition of a single Pokemon to his ranks.
...Oh wow, it's been so long I forgot you weren't exactly much better than Gladion. 15/15/15/15/15/31 IVs, 252 EVs in Sp. Atk/Spd (at least he remembered to invest in two stats!), and a Serious Nature, Hau's Raichu is every bit the terror we remembered it back then. Thunderbolt, Psychic, Quick Attack, and Focus Blast, it now comes with an answer prepared for Krookodile. Now granted, 70% accuracy is infamously terrible, but do you really think Focus Miss won't come through for him when it matters?
Now then, it's been ages since we fought Hau, so you might not remember we didn't have Bernie-Bear back then.
It turns out that Bernie-Bear's Disguise is the perfect way to deal with Raichu. You spend so much time used to Raichu being Electric that you forget Ground isn't the only way to deal with it anymore.
It says a lot that Hau's team is ten levels higher and I'm still winning. I'm slightly concerned, but I mean... I'm winning?
Komala is a choice. It actually manages to put in work, but it's a choice. 31/15/15/15/15/15 IVs, 252 EVs in HP/Atk, and the moves Wood Hammer, Sucker Punch, Earthquake, and Shadow Claw. No Normal move- and Sucker Punch/Shadow Claw is kinda redundant coverage- but it's hard to hard-counter Komala. Only three type combinations can pull it off, with Dark/Flying being the only one available in Alola.
I'm hoping Lord Huggington can pull it off with stats.
He sure can. You don't need to fake it that much, Lord Huggington.
Now, I know for a fact that was a damage range, because I needed to redo this fight for reasons and on the first go, Lord Huggington did oneshot. I don't think "only just barely escapes Weavile's fate" is high praise for it, though.
Particularly when it can't use that time to finish me off.
Hau's starter is always 31/15/15/15/15/15 IVs, with 252 EVs in HP and whichever Attacking stat they fancy (Sp. Atk for Primarina, Atk for the other two). Serious Natures and the STAB Z-Crystals all around- yes, Hau isn't carrying the starter-specific one- and the following moves:
- Sparkling Aria, Moonblast, Hyper Voice
- Spirit Shackle, Leaf Blade, Smack Down
- Darkest Lariat, Flare Blitz, Earthquake
Incineroar won by a landslide, and Decidueye lost. Decidueye is the only one really threatening its mirror match, but Smack Down is not what one would call great coverage. Then again, I'm running Brave Bird and U-Turn, can I talk?
At long last, Zapple has come into her own as her own Raichu, and it's time to see if she can pull it off on her own merits.
Sadly, it turns out the answer is no, but this is a fair enough opportunity to show off Alolan Raichu's Z-Move.
It took an annoyingly long bit to charge up there, give it a sec...
This turned out to be a tricky animation to catch, despite the fact I didn't think it went that fast. There is a lot of zipping and zapping, though.
Raichu soars into the sky, readying some electricity.
With the Trainers call, Raichu drops to the ground at high speed, piercing the opponent and surfing out the other end like a badass. Absolutely none of that translated to shots. I have no idea how it went that badly.
That would've been a guaranteed paralysis had it taken the hit. Sadly, Zapple is made of tissue paper and would not have taken the Moonblast in return fire.
Oh, to be left with nothing but a Flareon. Hau's Eevee is improperly specced no matter what, really- 31/15/15/15/15/15 IVs, 252 EVs in HP and Spd no matter which, and a Serious Nature, of course. It carries Quick Attack, Charm, and Baby-Doll Eyes no matter what form it is, with the fourth slot being filled with Flare Blitz, Hydro Pump, or Leaf Blade- whichever is the STAB move. It's a one-trick pony, and Vaporeon's the only one backing that trick up in any way.
Jaws did not have to try.
Oh, come off it, Hau. Now's not the time to go about claiming there's no real losing.
That loss seems to have gotten to Hau this time. Poor kid.
Try again with a full team of six, maybe.
...That's... kind of an unhealthy way to look at things. Frustration will incentivise you to do some real training, it's not a training method in and of itself.
Hau, in his trademark standard way, bounces right back before the textbox even has a chance to clear itself. Hau, have you learned anything?
...Actually, considering the lesson was about not taking the danger Lillie was in seriously, perhaps we should be concerned Hau has learned the lesson too well...
I wish you all the best of luck in that particular endeavour.
And just in case Lillie's Max Elixir looked like an appropriate reward for helping her with her family issues, here's Hau with three Max Revives just 'cause. I'm not saying one of them is trying harder than the other, I'm saying the comparisons are easy to make.
...Did, uh... did you have any friends your age before I came to Alola? That explains a lot...
And off Hau goes on his own little adventure.
We have ours.
(Photo opportunity here. You can apparently get Vanillite and Vanillish regardless, Absol and Glalie during the day, and Froslass and Sneasel at night. Glalie is, for some reason, USUM locked.)
At any rate, let's look back on our team.
The first and the bravest, Oatchi kinda had a big drop in the middle of the adventure, between the point where Razor Leaf stopped cutting it and when it got Leaf Blade. I have faith in it now that it carries a nice assortment of options thanks to the Move Reminder, but he's definitely flagging slightly.
Zapple: Now with Thunderbolt. She's still very much only here for the situations that match her exact set, but now she should be able to contribute when it's Electric we want. As opposed to kinda defeating herself on the way.
Woodstock's job is and always has been to take hits and then cause some strong residual damage in return. We're getting to the point I'd prefer Toxic Spikes to Toxic for that purpose, but Woodstock should be more than adequate if it can corner an opponent.
Razzly's a little on the frail side, but she should still be good to go. Her skill really depends on whether Quiver Dance works as she hopes it does. Never really had a good chance to use her skills before now, though, which is worrying.
Dottie's turned out to be surprisingly good at her job. She can do a pretty good job at filling in for Zapple, should it be necessary- lest we forget, Revelation Dance is actually an Electric move.
K9 really wishes she has more slots. Perhaps I'll drop Crunch for Rock Slide, but K9 really sticks to "if I can't kill it fast, it's someone else's job."
Murphy's a variant on Woodstock that relies less on passive damage. Only really has a plan for Physical damage, though, so it comes down to what the opponent has.
Flambebe is the offensive Poison type. Her main problem is that most of the opponents she wants to be fighting are high on Sp. Def, but she remains valuable for Steel types. And I mean... it's not like she got five Totem victories for nothing.
Lord Huggington has been doing a great job on taking hits, which is the advantage he has over Isabella. Brick Break is a bit of an unfortunate Fighting move to be stuck with, but at least it means we have an answer to opposing Reflects.
Sturm's been doing surprisingly well for himself. Shell Smash will really get him into gear when/if he gets to trigger Core Form, assuming he's not dropped right to 0. Dazzling Gleam is hilarious coverage, though- if nothing else, Rock/Fairy is a hard type to pack.
Flash Cannon is back. Jigsaw lost her signature move Shell Trap- a 150 BP Fire move that only functions if the opponent strikes with a Physical move. That seemed like it has bad synergy with Shell Smash, but the fact remains that, looking at these numbers, I am kinda leaning towards Flambebe to turn up the heat. Jigsaw only has the advantage if Physical attacks are flying.
Jaws makes a potent sweeper if things go his way, despite his lack of setup moves- Water remains a pretty good type in the face of everything. Strong Jaw would be nice, but I like Sucker Punch blocking.
Keokeo is an amazing Ice type with the minor flaw of being an Ice type, and her coverage falling behind. Still, with a Nasty Plot, she should be able to sweep. Ice is just that nice to have.
Bernie-Bear is much better at being a Ghost and Fairy type than anyone carrying those types elsewhere- which sadly includes Oatchi, causing his slump. Still, since she can only do this, it's not like the rest of the team is pointless.
I haven't used Nebby yet because a) we've only been in two fights since I got him and b) his level is way higher. He'll get to join in for the final challenge, of course, because the plot's momentum has built up to that (and there is unique dialogue associated with doing so).
Now then, for some honourable mentions:
Snaggletooth tried her best, as a Shiny, but being a Normal type didn't really carry her. The fact she doesn't really replace Tackle until Return wasn't helping.
Sam wishes Dottie wasn't around. And also that it had more Skill Link moves than Fury Attack. It probably could've done some serious damage if those weren't an issue.
Cranky, Cranky, Cranky... I'm not sure why you didn't work out as well as I've been used to. Probably put in the wrong situations.
Haruka lost to strong competition in all three of her niches: Rock, she lost to K9 and Sturm, Electric, to Zapple and Dottie (somehow on Zapple's part), and Stealth Rocks to Sturm decisively. Galvanise really isn't worth it, Sturdy's so much better.
You can kinda see what's happening to Kasplashle here: Going Physical just makes it an alternate take on Jaws, but its Special coverage is very wanting and it kinda wants to go Physical. Unfortunate, particularly because its EXP requirements are so low, but that's how the cookie crumbled. I could easily see an alternate timeline where it was Jaws who got benched for Kasplashle to shine.
Dhelmise was only on the team provisionally in case Woodstock couldn't handle Motherbeast Lusamine's Clefable. That went just fine, so Steel will be represented by Nebby, and Dhelmise didn't even get the dignity of getting a nickname.
Next time: What's taking Ailey so long?
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