IIRC you don't battle Tristan before the post-game. He's the youngster you first encounter, but it's just a short talk with Kukui.
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(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon
- Thread starter BriarRose
- Start date
This feels like a missed opportunity. It'd be really easy to argue that your exclusive Alolan Rattata was indeed in the "top percentage" of Rattata.
More little annoyances from the Battle Tree: So apparently some of the Special Trainers are version exclusive. These are:
Sun: Sina, Kiawe, Plumeria
Moon: Dexio, Mallow, Guzma
Now for Sina and Dexio, whatever. They're a cameo from XY/Kalos and it's not like they played a massive role in the game where you would be disappointment in fight one over the other (though if you're playing Moon version that does mean you never fight Sina as, no matter what version you play, you battle Dexio to get the Key Stone and Alakazite).
But for Kiawe, Mallow, Guzma, and Plumeria, why? Like I would have even understood if they made Cynthia and Wally version exclusive since they're cameos like Sina & Dexio, but make the characters who have a role in the game version exclusive? Oh, and this means if you're playing Sun, after battling Guzma on the beach post game, that's it. At least Moon players can get Plumeria as a Defense Title Challenger (which oddly don't have any version exclusive challengers which further makes this one odd). But back on point, I don't get why they made plot important characters version exclusive to rebattle and partner up in the Battle Tree.
I have to wonder if this was a time restraint thing. Like they wanted to add more trainers (one pair I'm surprised they didn't put in was Steven & Wallace, especially when they have 3D trainer models), but ran out of time so to make the games feel there's a point of the different versions (why start now?) they just split some of the trainers they had ready to go.
Oh, and how about more team nitpicks. You know how I complained that Guzma's Golisopod didn't use Buginium Z? Well Plumeria's Salazzle is the one holding a Z-Crystal, but it's Firium Z.
"Well, her Gengar is her Mega Pokemon which is part Poison so they probably wanted to ignore her having a Mega Poison-type and Poison-type Z Move. Much like how Guzma has a Mega Pinsir and Honchkrow carrying Darkinium Z. Since the game picks their Pokemon at random they didn't want to overspecialize in one type."
True, but then I noticed Cynthia, Wally, Sina, & Dexio's team. Cynthia & Wally have multiple Pokemon holding Mega Stones while Dexio & Sina have multiple Pokemon holding Z-Crystals, so either the game knows only to choose one of their Pokemon with a Mega Stone/Z-Crystal or they could be battling with a useless item. In addition, Cynthia & Wally don't use Z-Crystals while Dexio & Sina have Pokemon holding a Z-Crystal the same type as their Mega Pokemon! This makes me question whether what they did for Guzma and Plumeria being a balance reason or just that those planning teams have no idea what they're doing/want to do.
And now that I'm looking through their possible team options, I'm more believing the team designers had no idea what they're doing. It's late so maybe tomorrow I'll go through them (and maybe the Defense Title Matches to see if there's any oddities there).
Sun: Sina, Kiawe, Plumeria
Moon: Dexio, Mallow, Guzma
Now for Sina and Dexio, whatever. They're a cameo from XY/Kalos and it's not like they played a massive role in the game where you would be disappointment in fight one over the other (though if you're playing Moon version that does mean you never fight Sina as, no matter what version you play, you battle Dexio to get the Key Stone and Alakazite).
But for Kiawe, Mallow, Guzma, and Plumeria, why? Like I would have even understood if they made Cynthia and Wally version exclusive since they're cameos like Sina & Dexio, but make the characters who have a role in the game version exclusive? Oh, and this means if you're playing Sun, after battling Guzma on the beach post game, that's it. At least Moon players can get Plumeria as a Defense Title Challenger (which oddly don't have any version exclusive challengers which further makes this one odd). But back on point, I don't get why they made plot important characters version exclusive to rebattle and partner up in the Battle Tree.
I have to wonder if this was a time restraint thing. Like they wanted to add more trainers (one pair I'm surprised they didn't put in was Steven & Wallace, especially when they have 3D trainer models), but ran out of time so to make the games feel there's a point of the different versions (why start now?) they just split some of the trainers they had ready to go.
Oh, and how about more team nitpicks. You know how I complained that Guzma's Golisopod didn't use Buginium Z? Well Plumeria's Salazzle is the one holding a Z-Crystal, but it's Firium Z.
"Well, her Gengar is her Mega Pokemon which is part Poison so they probably wanted to ignore her having a Mega Poison-type and Poison-type Z Move. Much like how Guzma has a Mega Pinsir and Honchkrow carrying Darkinium Z. Since the game picks their Pokemon at random they didn't want to overspecialize in one type."
True, but then I noticed Cynthia, Wally, Sina, & Dexio's team. Cynthia & Wally have multiple Pokemon holding Mega Stones while Dexio & Sina have multiple Pokemon holding Z-Crystals, so either the game knows only to choose one of their Pokemon with a Mega Stone/Z-Crystal or they could be battling with a useless item. In addition, Cynthia & Wally don't use Z-Crystals while Dexio & Sina have Pokemon holding a Z-Crystal the same type as their Mega Pokemon! This makes me question whether what they did for Guzma and Plumeria being a balance reason or just that those planning teams have no idea what they're doing/want to do.
And now that I'm looking through their possible team options, I'm more believing the team designers had no idea what they're doing. It's late so maybe tomorrow I'll go through them (and maybe the Defense Title Matches to see if there's any oddities there).
If there's something I find odd (and kinda annoying) is that Sun players never get a chance to battle Mallow, and Moon players never get the same chance to battle Kiawe, while in the other game players battle them as trial captains, after you beat Olivia and in the Battle Tree.
But the one I found had a Hasty nature
You know what really grinds my gears? The fact that Poni Island only has ONE Pokemon Center for the entire island. Ok, I get it. It's a (mostly) undisturbed wildlands. I can get that theme. But I REALLY wish there was a Pokemon Center at least by the Battle Tree! You know it's a settlement of sorts - in particular a settlement for Pokemon trainers. And yet, there is no Pokemon Center there. So, if I want to grind my Pokemon to level 100 in Poni Gauntlet and they're all low on health now, my only way to solve it is to either a.) do the box trick where I keep depositing and then withdrawing my team or b.) fly ALL the way back to the other side of the island to the Pokemon Center there. And, of course, if I need to stock up on items or pick up a mystery gift, I need to inconvenience myself too. It's a real pain in the ass there to go all the way back and forth like that.
Also, completely dropping the Doctor or Nurse training class after Gen V.
They were awesome for experience grinding. Why removing them?
Especially since during the first trip in the Vast Poni Canyon, Lillie works just like the Nurses, in her only moment of worth in the game.
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Maybe we're either encountering one searching for food or have fled from the group?
I can only think the reason why they didn't is because they thought players would only be there for the Battle Tree which heals their Pokemon upon entering it, not thinking people would grind on the path before it overlooking that is where the highest leveled wild Pokemon are.
With the updated checkpoint fly system, you're really no further from a Pokemon center than any other area. The only place that really suffers is our pseudo victory road, Poni Gauntlet.
Given that area is supposed to be a trial, it's really not so bad when you compare the island to other gens.
I will admit that it's weird that the battle tree doesn't have its own Pokemon center though. And that you have to face Red and Blue right after several routes of trainers but right before the next fly checkpoint. Got a bitter loss to Blue's flinch hax Aerodactyl just because my team was already near death by the time I arrived.
Given that area is supposed to be a trial, it's really not so bad when you compare the island to other gens.
I will admit that it's weird that the battle tree doesn't have its own Pokemon center though. And that you have to face Red and Blue right after several routes of trainers but right before the next fly checkpoint. Got a bitter loss to Blue's flinch hax Aerodactyl just because my team was already near death by the time I arrived.
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Actually, if you're REALLY careful, you can enter into it and then leave without triggering that event (as I found out myself in my Moon playthrough) and then you get the Fly Checkpoint
At least there are Miltanks to heal your party. Only two though- one is next to the lady who gives you Eggs in the daycare while the other is inside Hapu's house which slightly helps save you from backtracking all the way to the only Pokemon Centre in the island if you need healing.
That said, I did not see Resolution Cave in my first journey towards the Battle Tree in Poni Poni island (didn't know it existed until the post-game story), so it was pretty annoying for me to get to the Battle Tree the first time since my team wuld be pretty low on health a lot of the time. If I needed to go to the Pokemon Centre for items I flew all the way back to the Pokemon Centre then have to walk all the way back towards the Battle Tree area...not realising Resolution Cave even existed and was a Fly checkpoint to easily resume my trek...
Problem is, Acerola is a species of bush (Malpighia emarginata).
But I guess that's why she's called Zarala instead of Acerola in Spanish, as for those of us who didn't know about the acerola before playing the game, it would be misleading.
(Since she turned up in this thread, I was a little disappointed in that she didn't use Mimikyu in the Elite Four)
I was a little disappointed that very few of the Captains use their Totem Pokemon's species in their battles. (Ilima uses a Gumshoos but not Alolan Raticate) Only Sophocles definitely uses his, (Vikavolt) and that's for the title defense battle.
I really wish sending Pokemon to Gen 7 didn't irrevocably taint them for... reasons I guess, so I could use Sun/Moon to check the IVs of things in Gen 6 games without losing the ability to use them in Gen 6 games.
But why would you need Sun or Moon to do this when gen 6 does have the IV judge at the only point in-game where IV's actually hold any real importance: around the Battle Maison? Granted, I'd love it if transferring in Bank was backwards compatible with the gen 6 games, but I guess Bank has no way to detect if a Pokemon's stats have been altered via Hyper Training and the gen 6 games don't know what to do with that extra data, so better to not allow it at all. Besides, who cares about the old games, right? (aside from the fact EB Games, and I assume GameStop as well, had X/Y and OR/AS for $5 off each for a time, so there could be some new players to these that may want to transfer up their teams and such...)
I always felt RBY Rock Tunnel served as the perfect barometer of where your team should be at that point in the game: if you could get through the place without too much trouble or burning through too many items, your team was progressing at a good pace; otherwise, you probably should have backtracked and level grinded a little before continuing.
That the place was gutted for GSC and was merely a quick jaunt to get through gave me fits at the time: I was bothered that GF did this merely to speed up the trip through Kanto. Like, why?
That the place was gutted for GSC and was merely a quick jaunt to get through gave me fits at the time: I was bothered that GF did this merely to speed up the trip through Kanto. Like, why?
If I recall correctly, there wasn't really a lot of space left on the cartridge for Kanto. They had to cut the number of areas drastically and reduce the number of trainers sharply just to fit it in there. Hence why the region has no real dungeons.
Granted, while I never experienced RBY's Rock Tunnel, only Fire Red's version, I always felt it was artificially difficult because you had to have a Pokemon with Flash just to see your way through so you're not stumbling around blindly. And I never really enjoyed teaching Flash or dragging another Pokemon along for the sole purpose of using the HM move to light the way...
Maybe it's my "Crystal was my first Pokemon game" showing through. To each their own.
You seem to forget that the actual difficulty of rock tunel comes in the vein of the campers, they have surprisingly varied teams for that area in the form of oddish bellsprouth and a couple of poison and water types.
Its not so much artificial difficulty but a spmehow difficult trial to go in a single sitting.
Its not so much artificial difficulty but a spmehow difficult trial to go in a single sitting.