VS Falkner!
Feb. 9th, 2019 05:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marchionessofmustacheOK, so I'm really enjoying Pokémon Crystal already.
With our team of little weaklings, we trudged forward toward Violet City where the first gym awaited. Having our only decent offense being Poison Sting on a little bug, trainer battles are pretty harsh. Fighting a Weedle was so annoying because it was just a big train of "It's not very effective..." back and forth until someone finally one.
Violet City is a kind of traditional little town with a big tower in the back. What I really love is how the town has so much personality for a place with like... three buildings. There's a little schoolhouse in one corner, a couple residences, and the tower, and of course the gym, center, and shop (yes I know that's many more than three lmao).
But look at this! The houses are more than just the bare minimum furniture like the first game where every single building had the same table, bed, and bookcase you've seen since the beginning of the game. This place looks totally different from our hometown. The homes are floored with tatami. There's even a genkan with little shoes in it!
The Sprout Tower is said to have been first created because there was a giant Bellsprout that was like 100ft. tall or something and people built a tower around it. Either it's folklore or there really was a giant Bellsprout at one time that like got petrified over time or something... either way, that tiny bit of lore adds so much more personality to this little village. We didn't really see stuff like this in the first game.
This kind of personality to the different towns is exactly why I love the Sinnoh Region -- I feel it really did well with the lore and worldbuilding, making the world you explore seem like an interesting, living place, and not just a path from the beginning to the end of the game.
It's even been a while since HeartGold, so I hope the Johto Region is as diverse as I'm thinking it is.
It makes me wonder "why do I hate this generation so much?" and I think it's more that I've let my distaste for the 100 new monster designs (which I still can't really stand, heh) sour my opinion of the entire game over time.
Sprout Tower is basically just fighting like 14 Bellsprouts in a row (the first dude in here was named "SAGE NICO" heh) with a HootHoot thrown in there for no reason, and learning already that our rival NICO is cruel to his Pokemon and doesn't care how they feel because only strength is important. We also get the HM05, Flash!
We head to the gym next, having scooped up as much EXP from the Sprouts as we could. I made the mistake of trying to train everyone kinda evenly at first, when I realized I should be dumping all the EXP into either MAILLET or DONNELLY, so I'd have one thing to reasonably fight in the first gym with. Alas, DONNELLY only got to like level 7.
Falkner's Gym is pretty rough when your primary attacker is a bug, because that bug is going to die in a couple hits. Well, not against Pidgey who only knows Tackle at this point. So against the Pidgeys we were able to send BARON out and try to Poison them while whittling away their HP.
The others -- Spearow and Pidgeotto -- needed a different approach. DONNELLY was the only one who could even stand up to them, but his Leech Life attack dead a measly ONE damage. So instead, he would use Supersonic to confuse them, and then try to hold on by eating his Berry and taking Potions until they eventually hurt themselves to death. Meanshilwe, I was Leech Lifing every chance I could to make up for the lost HP and whittle away at the enemy, hoping the combined damage would make it take one less hurt-themself to win.
I only ended up consuming 4 Potions the whole time, which was pretty nice. Pidgeotto hurt itself three times in a row at the beginning of battle, making things go a lot more smoothly.
The fact that this strat was even an option at this point is already making this game a lot more exciting. This was a lot more fun than VS Brock which was basically "keep hitting until he's the one that dies first."
So from that Gym Battle, depite the rocky and slow start (almost at 4 hours just to walk a couple routes and fight one gym), I'm really enjoying the game and excited about moving forward.
BARON Lv10
DONNELLY Lv10
MAILLET Lv4
With our team of little weaklings, we trudged forward toward Violet City where the first gym awaited. Having our only decent offense being Poison Sting on a little bug, trainer battles are pretty harsh. Fighting a Weedle was so annoying because it was just a big train of "It's not very effective..." back and forth until someone finally one.
Violet City is a kind of traditional little town with a big tower in the back. What I really love is how the town has so much personality for a place with like... three buildings. There's a little schoolhouse in one corner, a couple residences, and the tower, and of course the gym, center, and shop (yes I know that's many more than three lmao).
But look at this! The houses are more than just the bare minimum furniture like the first game where every single building had the same table, bed, and bookcase you've seen since the beginning of the game. This place looks totally different from our hometown. The homes are floored with tatami. There's even a genkan with little shoes in it!
The Sprout Tower is said to have been first created because there was a giant Bellsprout that was like 100ft. tall or something and people built a tower around it. Either it's folklore or there really was a giant Bellsprout at one time that like got petrified over time or something... either way, that tiny bit of lore adds so much more personality to this little village. We didn't really see stuff like this in the first game.
This kind of personality to the different towns is exactly why I love the Sinnoh Region -- I feel it really did well with the lore and worldbuilding, making the world you explore seem like an interesting, living place, and not just a path from the beginning to the end of the game.
It's even been a while since HeartGold, so I hope the Johto Region is as diverse as I'm thinking it is.
It makes me wonder "why do I hate this generation so much?" and I think it's more that I've let my distaste for the 100 new monster designs (which I still can't really stand, heh) sour my opinion of the entire game over time.
Sprout Tower is basically just fighting like 14 Bellsprouts in a row (the first dude in here was named "SAGE NICO" heh) with a HootHoot thrown in there for no reason, and learning already that our rival NICO is cruel to his Pokemon and doesn't care how they feel because only strength is important. We also get the HM05, Flash!
We head to the gym next, having scooped up as much EXP from the Sprouts as we could. I made the mistake of trying to train everyone kinda evenly at first, when I realized I should be dumping all the EXP into either MAILLET or DONNELLY, so I'd have one thing to reasonably fight in the first gym with. Alas, DONNELLY only got to like level 7.
Falkner's Gym is pretty rough when your primary attacker is a bug, because that bug is going to die in a couple hits. Well, not against Pidgey who only knows Tackle at this point. So against the Pidgeys we were able to send BARON out and try to Poison them while whittling away their HP.
The others -- Spearow and Pidgeotto -- needed a different approach. DONNELLY was the only one who could even stand up to them, but his Leech Life attack dead a measly ONE damage. So instead, he would use Supersonic to confuse them, and then try to hold on by eating his Berry and taking Potions until they eventually hurt themselves to death. Meanshilwe, I was Leech Lifing every chance I could to make up for the lost HP and whittle away at the enemy, hoping the combined damage would make it take one less hurt-themself to win.
I only ended up consuming 4 Potions the whole time, which was pretty nice. Pidgeotto hurt itself three times in a row at the beginning of battle, making things go a lot more smoothly.
The fact that this strat was even an option at this point is already making this game a lot more exciting. This was a lot more fun than VS Brock which was basically "keep hitting until he's the one that dies first."
So from that Gym Battle, depite the rocky and slow start (almost at 4 hours just to walk a couple routes and fight one gym), I'm really enjoying the game and excited about moving forward.
BARON Lv10
DONNELLY Lv10
MAILLET Lv4
no subject
Date: 2019-02-11 09:03 pm (UTC)Heh. That was a quick change of tune.
SAGE NICO sees the value of a conga line of Bellsprout, for he is Wise.
our rival NICO is cruel to his Pokemon and doesn't care how they feel because only strength is important
Asshole. And possible commentary on competitive players who fight for glory and not tap into the
heart of the cardsthe bonds of friendship? Must investigate further.Gah, the first gym sounds like a major drag. Did Donnelly’s Leech Life return a decent amount of HP? Or is it directly correlated with damage output i.e; 1 HP lost to 1 HP gained?
no subject
Date: 2019-02-12 01:01 am (UTC)Though a nice thing about the Sun/Moon generation is that Leech Life was buffed to be four times as strong, making it as strong as Grass-Type's Giga Drain and overall just one of the most useful Bug-Type moves in general. I love it <3