I Didn't Get To Choose My Friends - Pokemon Platinum Random Team Run

UPDATE 21: THE RIDDLE OF STEEL

Welcome back my dear reader(s)! Since we are now moving into uncharted territory and we’ve had a few evolutions, I thought we should start this off with a T E A M U P D A T E!

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DASH! DASH! dan dan dadan
DASH! DASH! dan dan dadan
DASH! DASH! dan dan dadan
SCRAMBLE! DASH!

because that’s how the Great Mazinger them starts
and it’s big move is the Thunder Break
and that’s what i’ve been calling mina using thunderbolt

DON’T MAKE FUN OF ME OR SO HELP ME I’LL TAKE HER TO THE MOVE RELEARNER TO GIVE HER FIRE PUNCH AND SPEND THE REST OF THIS LP YELLING DRILL PRESSURE PUNCH!

Anyway whatever Mina Thunder Breaks oughta be left hurting, and she’s got Thunder Wave for utility now. Since she’s fully evolved she’ll start coming into some spread moves too.

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Claydol’s actually got balanced base Attack and Special Attack, although you’d never know it from the massively special slanted movelist it has.

Dogu leans into the Special side of things, and having some kind of ancient astronaut idol blasting beams out of its helmet suits me just fine.

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Reina’s got Surf in the first move slot and that’s all she needs. Kingdra doesn’t have particularly great Dragon moves by level-up, but we’ll get around that (she can get Draco Meteor if we’re desperate). She packs a potent Ice Beam as well.

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Seviper’s actually got balanced base Attack and Special Attack, although you’d never know it from the massively physically slanted movelist it has.

Now that we’ve pulled away from the early game where stats are not very differentiated, Sid’s lack of defenses is coming back to haunt him. If I have any speed boosting medicines I should give them to him along with the Quick Claw. If he does get that attack in, though, a good Return or (eventually) Poison Jab should put a hurting on something.

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Castellia gets to sit in front of physical attackers and wait them out, since she’s got few weaknesses and a lot of resistances. With Sturdy she’s guaranteed to set up a Light Screen, and would be guaranteed to apply Toxic if she didn’t always seem to take one or two turns to zero it in. If she’s not getting Chesto Berries I might pass her the lens so she could hit Toxic on the first try.

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Anomalo is here to crush whatever gets in his way. If he needs it, he’s got 220 attack and a bevy of good moves to put it to use. His vulnerability to some special types is a little rough to deal with, but he can just claw through enemies like the jaws of life vs. a flimsy car exterior, so I’m not that worried.

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At any rate, it’s time to fight Shaq. I apologize for the images being slightly different in size, I had to change my process slightly (but I did learn how to make my Switch Pro Controller work with deSmuME so if you’d like to learn, let me know).

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Or if he has a steel body does that make him Metallo?

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Canalave Gym could nominally be called a maze, but really much like Pastoria Gym it’s a maze you solve be walking forwards. There really aren’t that many dead ends or loops.

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I enjoy the implication that Spamigo just walks up to a Gym leader and yanks out the badge case to show off the goods.

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He doesn’t have a sledgehammer I am immeasurably disappointed.

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Byron’s team is somewhat geared to take advantage of Metal Sound lowering Special Defense, and he’s got multiple Flash Cannon Pokemon.

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But he didn’t really do much to stop Dogu from melting his Magneton’s three brains.

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I forget that this Steelix has Ice Fang and Reflect probably wouldn’t save Dogu.

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But this Steelix forgets that it has Ice Fang too. But Dogu was low enough that trading blows didn’t work out.

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But Reina’s more than enough!

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I’ll be honest with you, in my head Steel resists Water, and not the other way around. Also in my head Steel is weak to Electric, but I actually managed to remember that here. So I thought I was just going to hit the Bastiodon in its comparatively softer Special Defense, not drain most of it with a single Surf.

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At least he didn’t give up!

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badges
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STRENGTH PUZZLE TIME YEAH!

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Reina can actually learn this, and I’m kind of considering it. It would give her something that can blast Ice pretty hard after she evolves.

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Feel like I should be telling this to my nephew if/when he ever gets into Pokemon.

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“So why did they abandon the Iron Island mine?”

“Gravelers love to Selfdestruct there.”

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Yeah yeah, you have to say that to everyone who gets this Badge.

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It’d be real awkward if we’d washed out of beating Byron and were slinking out doing the walk of shame back to the Pokemon Center to heal up.

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Hmm, that explains the distinctly plot-like rumble I’ve been hearing as I walk past the Library.

NEXT TIME: books zand papers