What are the best and worst regions and Types for Monotype in-game playthroughs?

[bdt2002]

For a while now I’ve wanted to start another Monotype playthrough of a mainline Pokémon game- I’ve only ever done one, and it unfortunately didn’t end up going anywhere because my SoulSilver cartridge isn’t exactly in good condition which really sucks since it’s arguably my favorite core series game to date. This got me thinking, though. Out of all of the games and all of the Types, which regions are the “best” to play through using only one Type of Pokémon?

Admittedly, this question is pretty heavily skewed in favor of the three Starter Types, as well as Poison in Kanto (Bulbasaur) and Flying in Alola (Rowlet). Assuming you don’t trade in another Pokémon to use as your so-called Starter Pokémon, depending on your chosen combination of Type and region you may be waiting a little while for your first viable encounters. There’s also difficulty to take into consideration, since the different regions and their major battles have a tendency to be easier and harder for different Types of Pokémon (Johto Grass, anyone?). And going back to my first point, there is of course the roster of available Pokémon, because let’s be real, I don’t think anyone wants to be running a team of one Infernape and five Rapidash in Diamond & Pearl if they don’t have to. In a perfect world, the less repeats you would need for a full team of six, the better.

I’m hoping to use this thread for creative inspiration and to see what you’ve come up with and played in the past. If we’re purely talking original releases and number of Types in each region, which would mean no remakes or Legends games, I believe there would be just over 150 possible combinations of Type and region with that number obviously being much higher if you include upper versions, remakes, sequels, et cetera.

I’ll get this started off with an example of my own from that SoulSilver game I mentioned:

Poison-Types in HGSS Johto

Recommended “Starters”: Weedle, Spinarak, Bellsprout, Zubat, Gastly
Difficulty: Moderately challenging

With Poison being one of if not my favorite Type in Pokémon, SoulSilver being as special as it is to me and that same cartridge being the one I found two full-odds Poison-Types in the same playthrough on (the previous playthrough before this, actually), it didn’t take me and my friends long at all to decide I should give this a shot. Unfortunately the cartridge being… not great caused issues for both of these playthroughs, but the good news is that HeartGold & SoulSikver offer a nice blend of “challenge because of the Type chosen” while having plenty of Pokémon to go around. Giving the rival Cyndaquil and starting with one of four available Poison-Types before Falkner provides a solid foundation for the rest of the run with later options providing better depth and type coverage. Black Sludge is notably a thing in Gen 4 unlike in GSC, but so is the Ability Levitate, meaning certain enemy Poison-Types like Gastly and Koffing can’t be hit super-effectively by the Ground STAB of Nidoqueen and Nidoking anymore. Oh, and the Grass Gym doesn’t arrive until Kanto, so that’s fun.

 

[Hugin]

XY, you can reasonably play through with Dragon. (I've done it). Charmander(X-Mega preferred) when you get to Lumoise, various temp mons if you must, and then you get the costal Dex and it all opens up. Axew, Bagon, and Tyrunt are before Gym 2. Skrelp(if Y), Horsea, Trapinch, Gible, Mega-Ampharos, all before gym 3. You have to beat Clemont before any other Dragons are added to your options, but lategame? Goomy, Noibat, Druddigon, Deino, Dratini. 7 mons early(even if they're technically not all of the type yet) is FAR BETTER than mono-dragon has any right to be.

Also, shoutout to SV. It's not quite the same, but my preferred playthrough method of beating one storyline, grabbing a new team, and then using that team for a second story, and then grinding a third team through storyline 3 is PERFECT for monotype runs, especially with more obscure/rare types.

 

[Altissimo]

I've done a Ground mono of Emerald three times now. My team is Swampert, Flygon, Golem, Camerupt, Sandslash, and Claydol. This is fun because every team member has a different type combo, because there's a very real resource allocation problem since not everyone gets EQ by level, and because Emerald is particularly unfriendly to this type because of bosses like Winona, Team Aqua, Tate & Liza, Wallace, Glacia, Drake, and Juan.

On the other hand, please for the love of God don't anyone try Grass mono of HGSS. The game is already unfriendly to Grass types so just running multiple of them is bad, bad, bad.

 

[R_N]

Just due to the wild area, SWSH seems like it's pretty good for most mono-type runs.

Certainly probably has the easiest way to actually run a full team of ice types through the entire game. If it's snowing the Rolling Field will spawn Swinub, Delibird, Snorunt, Vanillite and Shellder is in the nearby lake you can fish out. All before you even do the League Kick-off in Motostoke and with no caveats about levels or having to do a huge trek.

 

[Ironmage]

My initial thought was what I did for one of my earlier monotype runs: Bug in Alola. You get a lot of mons early, and I was still seeing some success with stuff like SD Ariados and Screens Ledian pretty late. One of the big sore points was that the two main gen 7 heavy hitters were both Bug/Water. USUM might be interesting with Buzzowle/Pheremosa available a little earlier.

As a Steel and Poison guy, I've had runs pretty close to monotype for both of these in Sinnoh. Steel has the advantage of being able to excuse an actual starter alongside Steelix being readily available without trade. Wormadam-Trash is honestly not that bad as a temporary mon for a couple gyms. Poison instead runs into a really awkard moment with its early-game mons. Budew, which would otherwise work well as a substitute starter, will take a long time to evolve from friendship. I found that I would generally get access to wild Roselia first and just replace Budew entirely.

 

[Eeveeto]

Played only games until BW, so can only comment about those.

Grass: Johto. Meganium is a very good Mon despite what everyone loves to say. It tanks everything and supports the team, it embodies the part of teamwork that Pokemon as franchise promotes. The problem is that the rest of the Grass Mons are mediocre at best. Leaf Stone is hard to obtain without manipulation (and straight up unavailable in Gold and Silver), which means Weepinbell, Vileplume and Exeggutor are hard to obtain. Parasect has 7 weaknesses and it's slow. Tangela has no movepool (and comes incredibly late), Sunflora is slow and bad, Bellosom is outclassed by Vileplume (and you need to win a Contest). Jumpluff is the remaining option, but does no damage, though at least its fast, so he can Sleep to give free turns for Meganium, Weepinbell/Victreebel or Egg. Also, regarding Egg, even if you get to evolve it, Psychic is in Kanto, but the 7 weaknesses are everywhere. You can somehow beat Faulkner, but Bugsy is very hostile to Grass Mons, Morty even more. Game is pretty smooth after Morty (neither Jasmine, nor Pryce are roadblocks), but Claire's Dragonairs are hard to overcome and every Elite Four member except Bruno is a threat. Out of first 5 regions, Grass is definitely at its worst in Johto.

Fire: Sinnoh, specifically DP. You get Infernape and Rapidash. You are going to struggle Water Gym and vs Cynthia. The other opponents won't be easy with 2 Mons, even if those 2 are going to be overleveled. The number limit is what makes Fire weakest here.

Water: BW Unova. Water is never a bad type, but Unova has the worst options, starting from the starter. Usually with great secondary type variety, Unova only has Carracosta, Seismitoad, Swanna and Jellicent as non pure Waters. All 4 are great in-game Mons, so the journey is still going to be quite easy. It's just easier in the other regions.

Bug: Kanto. Here the problem is that you can only use one out of Scyther and Pinsir. In all other regions you can get 6 different Bugs. Also, you will need to grind for Brock and Blaine, a lot.

Normal: Unova. You don't have Staraptor, Slaking or Dodrio destroying the whole game. You will still destroy the whole game with Stoutland and Unfezant, but it won't be as easy. Normal is a good in-game type in every game, it's just at its worst in Unova.

Poison: Unova. Amoonguss, Garbodor and Scolipede. Good Mons, but that's the only ones you have. All other games have more variety.

Ground: Kanto. Only region in which you don't have ANY neutrality to Water, Ice and Grass. You have to grind a lot.

Electric: DP Sinnoh. Kanto has Zapdos, Unova has 2 Ground immune Mons, Johto and Hoenn have a lot of Mons. In Sinnoh you get Luxray, Pachirisu and Raichu, good luck. Also, you don't get to use Surf on your Raichu and only have 1 Grass Knot (which you have to use on Raichu, cause Pachirisu does 0 damage with anything not named Super Fang).

Fight: Kanto. Only one out of Hitmonlee and Hitmonchan (both mediocre Mons at best). Primeape, Machamp and Poliwrath add up 4. And a Psychic Gym exists. Not an enjoyable journey.

Psychic: BW Unova. Secondary typing variety is at its lowest, just Sigilyph. It's still a manageable situation, but your non Sigilyph Mons are all slow and pure Psychic. You don't get to throw nukes with Alakazam in this region.

Rock: Hoenn. It takes a lot to obtain actual Rocks and you get a Fight Gym right after that. Once you get the Solrock/Lunatone and evolve the rest it becomes quite easy, but you will struggle to get there.

Ghost: Kanto. I mean, one line and incredibly late. It will most likely clean the game by itself but lots of grind will be needed. With one line, it will also be quite boring.

Ice: Hoenn. Ice types are also late to be obtained, but this is extreme. At least in Unova you get a fully evolved Cryogonal, here you need to evolve both Spheal and Snorunt and do some insane journey for Regice to have any chance at all. At least both Walrein and Regice are usable, so there is that.

Dragon: Kanto. Just one Mon, and only from Gym 4. Rest of regions have it easier. Not much easier, but easier.

Steel: FRLG Kanto. You are unlikely to beat Giovanni below level 70 or so. Your best chance is using an army of Meowth to get Hidden Power TM.

Dark: Kanto aside (0 Mons), it's Johto. Umbreon is the only one you get before Kanto in GS, Sneasel is the accomplice in Crystal. Even overleveled, Umbreon will struggle vs Chuck and generally it won't be an easy to journey due to low damage output even with the fact that at taking hits, Umbreon is very good.

Flying: Unova. Just like with many types, you won't struggle, but it's harder to work with Unfezant, Swanna, Swoobat and Emolga than with Staraptor, Zapdos or Gyarados. The fact that Braviary and Mandibuzz come very late doesn't help. You still easily beat the game, but it's even easier in prior Gens.

Fairy: Idk, but probably XY is where the variety is at its worst.

 

[Ernesto]

I had a successful mono-Water run in Emerald (I didn't want to use Swampert because I'd already decided to try DD Gyara and they competed for the EQ TM but I still had to use Marshtomp for Wattson; my "starter" otherwise was Lotad who ended up being cool outside of the really late evo and the rest were Whiscash, Tentacruel, Walrein, Lanturn, and the aforementioned Gyara who swept Wallace) but now I'm kinda curious how a mono-Fighting team would fare in Ruby/Sapphire. I specify those because Medicham is unavailable in Emerald and it feels like Tate & Liza (and Phoebe kinda as no one else learns SBall) would be a real pain without it.

Blaziken/Breloom/Hariyama/Machamp/Heracross/Medi looks like a fun squad, biggest issue is only Ken learns Bulk Up by level up so I'd have to choose who gets the TM—which I've found in previous runs makes some boss fights significantly easier. Outside of the previously mentioned fights the other big threat is Winona's Altaria since unless you use the move relearner for Ice Punch Medi the strongest coverage move is Rock Tomb so you might have to get lucky against Swellow and set up Bulk Ups as it Double Teams.

Fun topic.