(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon

[Cheryl.]

Whatever happened to the opponent’s mons holding items ingame? Gym Leaders and such used to commonly run berries on their aces which honestly went a long way in creating more challenge especially for battles like Juan. But ever since Gen 6 this feature seemed to have gotten phased out of the main series games completely which is a real shame. Funnily enough this becomes a pro to BD/SP which luckily kept the items, even added more to the gym fights and rival battles.

 

[Karxrida]

Whatever happened to the opponent’s mons holding items ingame? Gym Leaders and such used to commonly run berries on their aces which honestly went a long way in creating more challenge especially for battles like Juan. But ever since Gen 6 this feature seemed to have gotten phased out of the main series games completely which is a real shame. Funnily enough this becomes a pro to BD/SP which luckily kept the items, even added more to the gym fights and rival battles.

Click to collapse...

It's because in Gen 6 enemy trainers got lobotomized to completely kill any semblance of difficulty. Check out any random boss trainer's team in X and Y, a bunch don't even have full movesets some mons even when approaching endgame.

 

[ScraftyIsTheBest]

Whatever happened to the opponent’s mons holding items ingame? Gym Leaders and such used to commonly run berries on their aces which honestly went a long way in creating more challenge especially for battles like Juan. But ever since Gen 6 this feature seemed to have gotten phased out of the main series games completely which is a real shame. Funnily enough this becomes a pro to BD/SP which luckily kept the items, even added more to the gym fights and rival battles.

Click to collapse...

It actually seemed to be phased out as of Gen 5. I can't remember a single Unova Gym Leader or Elite Four member who had a Sitrus Berry on their ace. And before that, it was mostly in Hoenn and Sinnoh in Gens 3 and 4.

I think they shifted towards other means of signaling which Pokémon is the "ace" in a boss Trainer's roster. Gen 5 has the special battle theme for when the Gym Leader is down to their very last Pokémon, which ideally should be for the ace in most cases, even though it isn't always such. Gen 6 I can't really say, but Gen 7 onwards tends to signal the ace by having them use the respective super mechanic. Like in the Alola games, the Kahuna's ace will use a Z-Move, and a Gym Leader's ace in Galar or Paldea will use Dynamax/Gigantamax or Terastal, respectively.

 

[R_N]

It actually seemed to be phased out as of Gen 5. I can't remember a single Unova Gym Leader or Elite Four member who had a Sitrus Berry on their ace. And before that, it was mostly in Hoenn and Sinnoh in Gens 3 and 4.

I think they shifted towards other means of signaling which Pokémon is the "ace" in a boss Trainer's roster. Gen 5 has the special battle theme for when the Gym Leader is down to their very last Pokémon, which ideally should be for the ace in most cases, even though it isn't always such. Gen 6 I can't really say, but Gen 7 onwards tends to signal the ace by having them use the respective super mechanic. Like in the Alola games, the Kahuna's ace will use a Z-Move, and a Gym Leader's ace in Galar or Paldea will use Dynamax/Gigantamax or Terastal, respectively.

Click to collapse...

Gen 5 had items only in BW2's challenge mode (which had a variety)

I thought SV brought it back, but it seems I was just thinking about AI Professor (who gives the Booster Energy to their ace) and the blueberry trainers (including the final battles of Carmine & Kieran in Teal Mask). Bit of a missed opportunity to not have the Blueberry clubhouse rematches use items, especially since they jacked up the levels, tweaked the teams, changed some movesets,e tc. Guess they just really wanted to emphasize how "competitive" blueberry is vs everyone else. still a shame this game had no sort of battle tower equivalent...

 

[Karxrida]

still a shame this game had no sort of battle tower equivalent...

Click to collapse...

It's super irritating that the game in the series with the (current) best competitive accessibility thanks to easy-access nature mints and bottle caps doesn't have even the basic Battle Tower. Would have vastly preferred that over raids being the only substantial postgame content.