Pokemon SoulSilver Part 24: A dance with death, I taste the victory

[kjorteo]

In this update:

* More treatises on the music!
* Two more badges!
* A fantastic showing for the original party and even the second-stringers!
* Surprisingly tiny routes!
* WFGR does not condone or endorse bullying but we are not sure how else to describe what happened here, honestly!
* Erika confirmed bottom!
* Oops that last quip was maybe a bit dirty. Speaking of which, how about we wrap this up with a whole big speech on why WFGR still has the mature content flag set even though we are like the tamest thing?

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Some notable clips and highlights from this session:
A grueling journey
So Granbulls can just Limit Break apparently
Nice try, but not this time!
Oh, right, forgot about that
Just two besties with their beasties (thanks to SeireaSong for this clip)
absolute domination (thanks to SeireaSong for this clip)

Comments

[kjorteo]

Even when that random trainer on the cape threw out a Vaporeon, I immediately got flashbacks of the Kimono Girls Aurora Beaming poor Empress and looked at Nimbly in the lead and was like ahahaha nope nice try but not falling for THAT shit again, and SURE ENOUGH.

(It was a nice try, though. Well played. Just. You know. We learned from last time.)

Erika's Bellossom sounds like an absolute monster of a troll build when you describe it like that, but it turns out that when you bring a Scizor with a Technician-boosted Bug Bite, it just eats her entire team's lunch, literally (mmm, free Sitrus Berry to heal off the Sunnybeam combo that Omnihunter completely no-sold anyway.) I know that OHKO sweeping entire gym leader teams with our quite franky OP mons is nothing new (hi Badgertwo, Rock Biter, Priscilla) but something about the Bug Bite berry theft elevates the experience into feeling like downright "give me your lunch money, nerd" levels of bullying. (But at least Erika is into that, I guess?)

I will agree and give full credit to Misty's team, though. She had about as good switch-forcing balance as it's possible to have while still being a thematic single-type trainer, without just cheating and adding some completely unrelated mons to your team (hi Karen.) I knew that Quagsire just completely walls anyone who thinks "lol I'll just go in with an Electric type and sweep everything" because Crasher Wake pulled that exact trick in our Diamond run; he just hadn't counted on my strategy actually being "lol I'll just go in with a Grass type and sweep everything" because Torterra is the best starter. Misty actually does have an answer to that angle, though; she doesn't even need a surprise "wait why does this pure Water type know Ice moves" Aurora Beam Vaporeon; she just goes all in with a goddamn Lapras. And the Starmie... yeah, that could have just about anything.

As for Cassandra vs. Starmie... hmm. If you mean "trust an Absol to deal with a fast as fuck Confusion[move]-spamming Starmie that knows Recover," Dark is completely immune to Psychic-type moves (and Confusion[move] is not that much of a threat at this stage of the game anyway since it's just Psychic[move] we have at home.) If you meant "trust an Absol to deal with a fast as fuck confusion[status effect]-spamming Starmie that knows Recover" like with Confuse Ray or something, then yeah, that could have been an issue.

[penguinmayhem]

Yeah not just Ghost typed Confuse Ray, it also has Water Pulse which, as you saw, can also confuse AND hit Absol's not-exactly-stellar defenses while doing it. Bringing an Absol against a Starmie is basically betting on being able to dodge its traps and OHKO it before it gets you stuck wasting turns with status effects and whittles you down anyway.

But Erika's extremely specific weakness to Scizor in particular almost feels intentional. You bring in a fire type, Tangela trips you up with Ancient Power. But if you went and caught the crown jewel Scyther out of the bug catching contest and evolved it, congratulations, you found the one weapon that Erika's entire team seems almost intentionally set up to lose to. If she had a single fire move anywhere it'd be an expert level trap.

[kjorteo]

And it has to be Scizor, in particular. As Flare pointed out in stream, even an unevolved Scyther would have been rocked (ahem) by AncientPower.

That said, that is why we were a bit concerned when not just her but her whole gym seemed to have Sunny Day builds ("are they pacoing Flamethrower or something? That would be... bad....") until we realized oh they're just Sunnybeaming and that's actually a quad resistance for Omnihunter, so like, lol.