Ula'ula Island Is A Stupid Island

As soon as we set foot on Ula'ula Island, my rival challenged me to a battle. He picked the grass starter, the stupid thing Joe has, so he's been a total pushover so far. This time his Dartrix was still a pushover, being thoroughly pushed over by Struan, but boy was I unprepared for his new Raichu.

What had been a silly Pikachu in previous battles was now a speedy, hard-hitting force. Electric is weak against Grass, so I let Snusan take a stab at him with her grassy ways. But he didn't just know Electric moves, no. He busted out a whopping Psychic that took Snusan down into yellow health. I knew he was too fast for Snusan and another hit would take her out, so I super potioned up. He used psychic again. Repeat and repeat and repeat. This was going nowhere, and I was running out of super potions. I didn't want to be stuck without healing items for the rest of the fight, so I bit the bullet and let Snusan take another hit. She was no more.

The rest of the fight was fine because his Raichu was fairly squishy and Dartrix is a pushover.

I flew back to the second island to hatch the fossil I'd been given there to fill out the gaping wound in my lineup. This became Gord the Shieldon, a stocky Rock/Steel tank from Gen IV. He was a good kid.

While training him up against random trainers, I faced off against a Black Belt with a Hariyama. I knew the thing would hit hard, and Gord would be wrecked, so I switched out. The safest choice would have been Kagimarp, to get that type resistance and the leadoff Intimidate, but I was not making good choices this day. I had it in my head that Bouncee would resist Fighting, maybe from the abundance of Grass/Poison types throughout the years who most definitely did have the resistance. Well, Grass is not resistant to Fighting. In one move, one Vital Throw, the Hariyama ripped Bouncee out of the ground and chucked her into a stupid grave.

Was Bouncee my Waifu? No, not quite, but she was a great Pokemon, hard hitting and reliable, a brilliant example of her type. Maybe if we'd had more time together. Sigh.

Pour one out for Bouncee yall

And so the perennial pinch hitter, the eternal backup, the leader of the B team, Delbert the Makuhita joined the party once more. But the death toll wasn't done climbing yet.

There's an ability called Magnet Pull that stops Steel Pokemon from retreating. Just Steel types. Normally this doesn't matter at all. It's kind of a worthless ability because it's so rarely useful. It had never occurred to me to worry about it when training Gord in the tall grass. I should have.

A wild Magnemite appeared. Gord, with Rock Tomb and Take Down as his only offensive moves, wasn't the right guy to fight it, so I opted to switch... but it failed. Gord wasn't going anywhere. As the Magnemite cut right through Gord's defenses with Sonic Boom and summoned a second Magnemite to the battle, my heart sank. This wasn't an issue of being conservative with my healing items like with Snusan (in hindsight, she was worth far more than I gave her credit for). This was just a straight up hopeless situation. I could buy a little time with Protect, but against double Sonic Booms, and with Gord doing almost zero damage with his attacks, it was over before it began. So long, Gord. I barely knew yee.

My luck turned around when I caught my first new wild Pokemon in a while. Or did it? I've been using Slamuel the Komala for a couple days now, and I still have no idea if he's good or not. Let me explain. He's a little Normal-type Koala who's just napping against a little log. He doesn't seem to evolve. His gimmick lies in his ability, Comatose. Basically, Komala is perpetually sleeping. Like, it never wakes up. Not in battle, not out of it. It is literally in a coma.

He still fights somehow. Comatose doesn't show up as the Sleeping status effect, rather he's somehow immune to all other status effects and fights normally. I think? I think that's all there is to it. And that's all good - I haven't found a drawback at all, except maybe that he can't use Rest, and who cares. As a fighter, Slamuel is pretty well rounded, with a surprisingly hard-hitting STAB Slam and lots of good utility moves - I caught him with Yawn and Rapid Spin, and he's since learned Sucker Punch and U-Turn. So far he's come through every time I've needed him.

With Slamuel and Delbert filling in the gaps left by Bouncee and Snusan, I pushed onward, fighting some Team Skull goons and training against a number of wild Pokes and trainers... until we got to the Electric captain.

Another bossy trainer greets you at the door, using Steel Pokemon and giving you a Steelium Z crystal after the fight. He was a pleasure to battle, and Struan wiped the floor with him hardily.

Oh, I should also mention that at this point Joe, the sweet boy whose Nuz runs parallel to mine on this blog, traded with me to evolve Macho into a Machamp. I HAVE A MACHAMP NOW.

So I encountered Sophocles, the endlessly entertaining chubby shut-in engineer buddy who summoned the Electric Totem Pokemon. This time it's a gigantic Vikavolt with all his stats boosted, summoning Charjabugs for backup - both Electric/Bug types.

Two of my most reliable sluggers, Kagimarp and Aoife, who recently evolved into Toucannon, were weak to Electricity, so I started out with Slamuel - good for initial status attacks, ready to U-turn out at the first sign of danger. We landed a Yawn right out the gate that kept the Vivavolt sleeping for several turns. Slamuel tried a Slam, decided it wasn't doing enough, and U-Turned, and out came Delbert with the Fake Out and Bulldoze. He probably should have used Fake Out on the Charjabug, not the sleeping Vikavolt. But I was a fool, and then Delbert was Thunder-Wave paralyzed. He missed the next turn due to paralysis, the Vikavolt finally woke up, using Spark. We healed, and the Vivavolt used Charge to boost its next Electric attack. We tried Bulldoze again. That's when I learned the hard way that Vivavolt's ability is Levitate. Bulldoze killed the Charjabug, but another immediately took its place. And Vivavolt's charged Spark was not forgiving.

Delbert, you gave it your all just to please me. Even though I never let you be on the A team, constantly choosing Macho over you as my Fighting-type buddy, you never stopped loving me and doing your best. Now that you're gone, there's so much I wish I'd said to you, so much I wish I could say now. Maybe you can read this from my graveyard box in my PC. I hope you are.

The Vikavolt didn't go down easy. Struan softened it up a lot, but once he was paralyzed I U-Turned him out of there. The Vikavolt was in the red health now. I just needed someone fast who could land the final blow. It was then that I made what could have been my stupidest move yet: sending out Kagimarp, he of 4x Electric weakness, to seal the deal. Yeah, he would probably be fast enough. Yeah, the Charjibug on the side probably wouldn't kill him. But I was going out in faith alone. I was so lucky that it worked.


We won, and I've been taking it slow and coasting off of that intensity. After the battle Struan evolved into a Digimon, or maybe a '90s Disney movie villain. I'm not sure how I feel about it, but Struan the Fire/Dark Incineroar is psyched af about his new bipedalness, humungous pecs, and giant hammy forepaws. But with Delbert gone, on top of all the other deaths, it's a bittersweet victory for my weary party of five.



RIP: Snusan :( Gord :( Bouncee :( Delbert :(



THE PARTY

Struan the Incineroar
-Signature move: Darkest Lariat, a hilariously dramatic pro wrestling move
-Now has the combo of Flame Charge and Swords Dance, making him a really legit sweeper


Aoife Toucannon
-Her facial expression makes me laugh constantly. She's always giving the side-eye, with her giant beak and judgmentally furrowed brow. Sometimes, because of our deep-ass bond, my avatar says things to her during battle, and her look in the camera's direction is so deadpan, like "dude, can't you see I'm fighting a battle here"
-Her signature move is Beak Blast, which charges up at the beginning of the round but attacks at the end of it -two parts, but one turn. If she's hit directly while charging, the foe is burned. I love this move so much.


Macho the Machamp
-Still has no guard. Can't wait to learn weird moves that take advantage of that
-Evolved af


Kagimarp the Gyarados
-Finally learned Aqua Tail, so this dude can wreck


Slamuel the Komala
-Sleeping. Not sure if he knows who I am.


Small Doggo the Herdier
-C-Team, he's here in case I need a sacrifice.
-He's got Baby-Doll eyes, which takes priority to lower attack, so he'll be able to make a slight difference even though he's underleveled
-Also Thunder Wave, if he can manage to sneak it out.

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