Ardy Nuzlockes Renegade Platinum!

[Ardy]

Hello everyone! Yes, Im back, yes, I love you all, no, we will not be commenting on my abandoned projects. If youre particularly interested and this if your first time seeing me, you can find aforementioned abandoned projects here, here, and here. If youre not interested in reliving my past mistakes, then great! Lets go forth with what is surely not yet another mistake that I will be abandoning faster than my exes abandoned me.

The Game

Pokemon Renegade Platinum is a Drayano hack of Pokemon Platinum. If you've never played a Drayano hack before, he specialises in enhancement hacks. Renegade Platinum is far more difficult than regular Platinum, has all 493 pokemon that were available in Gen 4 spread throughout the region, has a bunch of QoL changes, and has revamped movesets and the like for all the pokes. It just looks like a great great hack, thats supposed to be immensely difficult all the way through.
I have not finished this game before. I started playing it last night, and I got to about Fantina before realising what an awesome nuzlocke it would be.

This playthrough is also a semi-blind nuzlocke. Ive been spoiled for some of the fights, but Solaceon onwards I have no idea what to expect.

Nuzlocke Rules

1. I can only catch the first unique encounter in every route.
2. I can only have 1 pokemon per encounter location. What this means is that for gift pokemon, if there are two or more gift pokemon in a certain location, I have to choose one of them to keep and instantly release the other. Additionally, I cannot have a gift pokemon and a capture from the same location; if I encounter a pokemon on the way to a gift pokemon, I can no longer use the gift pokemon and I have to release it.
3. Any pokemon fainting must be released.
4. If all six pokemon in my party faint, I must restart the run, even if I have pokemon in the PC.
5. Battle Style=Set.
6. I must choose my starter based on the last digit of my trainer card, with 1-3 being Grass starter, 4-6 being Fire Starter, 7-9 being Water Starter, and 0 meaning I can choose any starter I want.
7. I cannot use items in battle.
8. I must nickname all my pokemon and shed atleast 1 tear in real life if they die.
9. Every time a pokemon of mine dies I must text my boyfriend and tell him so he can shame me for my negligence.

With all that out of the way, lets just get started with the insanity.
Watch my death counter be at 30 and my wipeout counter be at 22 by the end of this

Episode One: Humble Beginnings

I have not mentioned this before, but Platinum is my favorite pokemon game of all time. It has such an immense nostalgia factor with me. I really love it.

Just a recap of everything I mentioned before.

Im just gonna skip the intro stuff honestly

If you havent seen any of my other playthroughs, its TERRY over Terry because something something childlike wonder something something

Im gonna be honest; I really love Barry, hes probably my favorite rival in any game, maaaybe tied with Silver. Im naming him after what I always call my boyfriend when hes grumpy

LETS GO
Alright so the first thing Im gonna do is check the trainer card for my starter.

And thats a 9, with Piplup! I would have preferred Chimchar honestly, but Piplup is good too. They are all good. All good boys and girls. I love gen 4 so goddamn much.

Babey comes into our room and tells us to meet him at Route 201 as always. Leggo

Right off the bat, we get the Running Shoes and the Bike. Sinnoh is not slow anymore, WOOT WOOT

Theres a pokeball in the corner of the room with an Eevee, but we cant take it with us yet.

God, Gen 4 is just so beautiful. I love the winter theme these games have. Ahhhhhhhh i love platinum

Babey bumps into us, forgets something, and runs back inside. Rude of him, but lets follow him.

Kinda cute that they added this in.

Awwwwwwww
Anyways he leaves and now we go find him at Route 201

Shut up its not my fault these games lag
Anyways Babey wants to go to Sandgem Town to see Rowan and get Pokemon.

You are an idiot and your head has no thoughts in it, yet i love you dearly.

Doesnt seem advisable but okay
Also apparently the screenshots didnt save but Rowan shows up, stops us from going into the grass, then gives us the choice of the starters. Since my trainer number ended in 9, I chose Piplup.

LEGGO

Piplup starts with Bubble in this one. Love that.
This fight is not hard if you chose Piplup, but I have legitimately lost it choosing Chimchar before. Spamming Growl is way better than Spamming Leer.

We knock out the Turtwig with 4 health to spare

Then we just warp home.

I agree. Babey could have gotten me killed. Or, worse, I could have been forced to have Bidoof as my starter.

Yes maam

Me too! Lets go together!

oh no
He wants us to catch the legendary Lake Acuity pokemon.

Babey I have a level 5 piplup. Uxie is like, level 50 atleast. Thats 10 times my level, Babey. 10 times.

Awww look at us we're holding hands

Yes we are, but I dont think this is gonna end well

Dont make eye contact Barry, they consider that a threat

I really really really love Cyrus as a villain. Hes just so fucking evil. I love him.

Of course, my Evil Highness.

Youre not wrong, babes.

Ah
There appears to be a flaw in your master plan

Blah blah we dont have Pokeballs so we go to Rowans to get some.

Anyways, Piplup gets registered as a Route 201 encounter. This means I cant catch anything else in Route 201. While typing this out I realise I could have gone to Lake Acuity and caught something there, but oh well. Next episode maybe. I grind Piplup up to Level 10 as well. Doesnt take that long in Sinnoh.

Umm I have a boyfriend

See, there he is!

Babe this guy is hitting on me say something

Why are you like this

I know, isnt he amazing

Its a me, Chris Pratt as Mario

YES

Pippy pippy pippy

I dont like your tone, old man

Bad SS but we also get the pokedex and its National Dex by default.

We get the Pokeradar and Repels. I dont think Ill be using the Pokeradar unless i wipeout but the repels are nice

He takes us on the obligatory tour of the city, blah blah

Am I crazy or does this man have a double outline

Anyways we go home now

Skipping plot stuff but Mom lets us take the Eevee now!

Yes, this is final

As you can see, the encounter place is different from Pippy, so this is valid and good

We quickly grind our Nomnoms to level 10 as well cause its a decent benchmark.

Now lets go beat the shit out of Lucas

BRING IT ON

He has a level 9 chimchar that I Sand Attack once and then Covet until it dies.

Yes, Im aware. I had two. You had one. Do not presume to educate me, foolish NPC.

This is a welcome gift to leave at my altar, though.
Anyways, let me get my first encounter and Ill cut off there
A whole world of possibilities, including Shinx, Poochyena, Growlithe, Zigzagoon! I wonder what we'll get!

Why am I not the least bit surprised

Meet Trashbag, everyone.

And thats where Ill cut off for now. New update tomorrow! Love you all!

Counters

Deaths: 0
Wipeouts: 0
Pokemon Obtained: 3
Pokemon Alive: 3

 

[Ardy]

Episode 2: Comrades and Companionships

Last time we left off after just catching our first encounter, Burmy.
I went through the documentation last night, and found that Wormadam was buffed immensely. She now has 110 SP.Atk at the cost of 6 speed. This makes me much happier about finding the Burmy. Id still have preferred something else, but atleast Trashbag isnt completely useless.

In a nice coincidence, Trashbag (who was caught knowing Hidden Power) has a HP type of Bug with 56 base power. Given that burmy was also given a nice buff upto 45 Sp.Atk, this makes it able to pull its own weight in battles for now.

I bring Trashbag upto level 9, then very, very carefully, approach the first trainer in the game.

This would be an embarassing time to lose a pokemon, wouldnt it?

Thankfully she just has these two pokemon. Trashbag kills both of them with HP Bug.

This trainer is a different story. He had a Hoothoot and a Psyduck. Hoothoot put Nomnoms to sleep with Hypnosis as I went to it, but missed the next Hypnosis on Pippy, who killed it with two Bubbles as it hit me with a tackle. I switched back to Trashbag on the Psyduck, and took 2 water guns as I killed it with two HP Bugs.

Not a bad start.

As for the last trainer, I forgot what he had apart from this Growlithe, but Nomnoms took care of business fabulously with Covet and Quick Attack.

Anyways, we get to Jubilife easy.

We do the little plot with Looker, and then Lucas points me in the direction of the Trainer School.

Before we go there, however, theres this nice event in the Pokecenter that we can do to start filling out our roster.

Hello!

Lets do it!

The correct answers are whatever the cursor is on

BRING IT ON

Trashbag easily takes care of the Bulby with HP Bug, one shotting it. Char comes in, so I switch to Pippy, who takes an ember on the switch. Bubble OHKOs. I go back to Burmy on Squirtle, who water guns, and then I OHKO with HP Bug.

YASSSSSS
Of course, as per Rule 2, we have to choose one of them and release the other two.
Now the gen 1 starters got some nice buffs. In particular, Charizard got a type change to Fire/Dragon, which does him wonders. However, I already have another Fire Type in mind, and I have Pippy for my water, so Im gonna go with the best gen 1 starter and keep Bulby and release Char and Squirtle.

Named it Weed cause thats the obligatory Bulbasaur nickname.

Before releasing, i do take the Mystic Water from Squirtle and the Charcoal from Charmander. I give the Mystic Water to Pippy.

Next, in the trainer school, theres this NPC who gives us an egg that hatches into a Baby Pokemon. Because she gives us an egg and not a pokemon, we can do a little sneaky sneaky where we put the egg in the PC, then go back to Sandgem and hatch it over there so it doesnt conflict with our Bulby.

We hatch a Mime Jr. When i got this thing, I was really disappointed I didnt get a monster like Riolu or Munchlax or heck, even Happiny would be a monster in a nuzlocke once it evolved. However, as we will go into, Mime Jr. has so far been the MVP of this episode.

As you can see, the location is set to Sandgem, so it doesnt break Rule 2.

Anyways we go back to the Trainer School, pick up the Scope Lens in the corner, then talk to Barry.

We give him the package and

Not that we need it, but its still nice to have

Theres a couple battles in the trainer school we can clear out...
The first one is an Abra followed by a Psyduck. The Abra only knows HP Grass, so Burmy can easily take it out. The psyduck is taken care of by Ivysaur.
The other trainer has a Ralts and a Staryu. Same story.
After beating both of them, we get the Hidden Power TMs. And thats where the true monstrosity of Mime Jr hit me.
Mime Jr has Technician, and a very decent Sp.Atk stat of 80. It has HP Grass with a base power of 47, and it comes with the 50 BP Confusion. With 80 Sp.Atk and dual 75BP moves (one of which is STAB) that have great coverage in the early game, Mime Jr is actually unstoppable. At level 8 it was outdamaging my Level 12 Eevee and Piplup. I thought Mime Jr was my punishment, but it was my salvation.

I legitimately got Mime Jr from Level 3 to Level 10 without switch training in an area where the wild pokemon are levels 5-7. Thats how insane his offense is. I fucking LOVE our wanna-be sewer clown.

We DID have a close call VS this Sentret who Fury Swiped me from full health to 2HP. Luckily, I outsped and Confusion killed.

We also get the Poketch with every app installed.
Im prolly just gonna keep it at the party app the whole time.

Anyways, onto the Route 204 trainers.

Ez wins

I forgot what this one had but it wasnt too bad.
Also, Route 204 encounter time!

Not bad. Lemme just look up the documentation and...

MINE

Wtf is up with these horrible natures though

We also pick up a Paralyze Heal here.

Yes you may!

She leads off with an Oddish. I switch to Ralts as she Growths one time. I then proceed to Psychic as -

Oh.
Acid crits and OHKOs.

Thus ended the extremely short lived career of Gamecube the Ralts.

:(((( Our first loss.

Oh well.
We continue on to Ravaged Path and this is our encounter.

What the FUCK is up with these natures

We also get the TM for Rock Tomb. I teach it to Balboa instantly.

Now we have a rival fight on Route 203. Im reasonably sure he wont lead with Turtwig, and Geodudes great resistances mean he'll likely match up well against the lead.

BRING IT ON

His last was a munchlax that I just went back to Balboa for. Ez wins.

im sorry babey thats just the way the cookie crumbles

This is our Route 203 encounter. Nicknamed Birb.

There is also this Shroomish here that wants an Oran Berry

We get the Silk Scarf, which I instantly give to Nomnoms

Unfortunately, I get a little too excited biking, and run headfirst into this double battle. Oh well.

They lead off with Shinx and Kriketot. I switch birb out for Nomnoms as Rock Tomb OHKOs the Kricketot. The Zubat gets 2HKOd by Rock Tomb as Shinx gets 2HKOd by Covet. In come Sandshrew and Rattata. I switch out to Pippy and Weed, who both take a bulldoze on the switch in. Another bulldoze brings them into the danger zone, but the two bulldozes also kill the Rattata, allowing Pippy and Weed to KO sandshrew with a combination of Bubble and Razor Leaf.

All in all, we got out of there okay.

In the meanwhile, I decide to not cheese this run and ban evasion increasing and accuracy decreasing moves. I wont ban stuff like Mud Slap, in which the accuracy drop is a secondary effect, but I will ban Double Team, Minimize, Sand Attack and the like.
Anyways I clear out the rest of route 203

I also find a Soothe Bell, which I give to Mime Jr.

Next, we enter Oreburgh Gate. The hiker gives us Rock Smash.

Heres our encounter for the tunnel.

Dont ask me why. Again with the horrible natures.
Mime Jr really shines in the tunnel, OHKOing all of the trainer pokemon. I am LOVING the monster he is turning out to be.

Hello!

Yes!
Anyways, Roark is in the mines. We're gonna go to him, but first...

Time for a second set

Pretty trivial fight.
After the fight, I collect Treeko and Torchic, not leaving enough space in my party for mudkip. This is purely because it would hurt my heart to have to release my favorite Hoenn starter, so I would rather just not take him at all.

The Torchic has Speed Boost. Thats HUGE.

Ugh these fucking natures...

God I love Pokemon
Near the mines, we have Stephen Stone, who will give a Beldum if we talk to him. Unfortunately, since we already have our encounter from Orreburgh, we cannot claim this. It is truly the greatest of tragedies.

The Orreburgh mine is another story, however, so we pick up this Trapinch. Named Pinchynips at my boyfriends request.

We replace tackle with Sleep Powder.

We head to the gym then to clear out the trainers.

In the middle of it, I replace Double Slap with Encore.

We also have this INCREDIBLY close call VS this Anorith. Get out of there alive, though.

Given that Roark's ace, Cranidos, is level 16, I go ahead and level Weed, Pippy and Stoner to level 16.

Learns Metal Claw over Water Sport

Learns Magical Leaf over Razor Leaf.
And with that, lets go with the gym battle!

I lead with Weed as he leads with Nosepass. Weed outspeeds and puts Nosepass to sleep. I magical Leaf it down to red, then magical leaf it back down to red on the super potion. A third Magical Leaf takes out Nosepass. Next comes Geodude, who promptly dies to a single Magical Leaf. Next comes Cranidos, who takes me down to red with a surprise Zen Headbutt, but gets OHKOd for his trouble. Next comes Onix. Given that Im low health, I dont want to risk Onix outspeeding and finishing me off. I debate between Birb and Pippy, trying to decide if he would go for the rock move or the ground move. In the end, I figure that Pippy has enough bulk to take 2 bulldozes anyways, so I switch to Pippy, who does indeed tank a bulldoze and then OHKO with bubble as Onix sets up rocks. Roark brings in Larvitar, who Bulldozes us down to yellow and dies to Bubble. In comes Bonsly. Bonsly gets 2HKOd by bubble, but uses his first and only turn on the field to give me a heart attack as Brick Bread brings Pippy to red. Fortunately, we outspeed and KO with Bubble the following turn, winning us the Boulder Badge.

We'll leave it off at that. A close victory with no losses.

Counters

Deaths: 1
Wipeouts: 0
Pokemon Obtained: 11
Pokemon Alive: 10

 

[Ardy]

Episode 3: Grinding and Gravestones

Last time we left off, we had just beat Roark in the Orreburgh gym.
However, I messed up slightly
I evolved Torchic at level 16, but I kinda wanna hold off on evolving it until level 20, where it gets Baton Pass.
So I reloaded to before Roark and did the whole fight again
It went p much the same except this time Cranidos missed with Zen Headbutt so I beat the whole gym with Weed
Also, I forgot to mention this:

When we see Roark for the first time in the Mines, he gives us a choice of an evolution stone to take for ourselves. This is obviously for our Eevee.
I thought about this, and chose the Moon Stone. With Fantina, I would really like a bulky dark type, and honestly I have the FWG core covered, Espeon overlaps with Mime, and Glaceon, while amazing, is a little too slow and frail for my liking. So we choose the Moon Stone for Umbreon.
I will hold off on evolving Eevee though, because I want it to learn Wish at Level 22 first.

We head back to Jubilife City to go towards Floroma to clear out Valley Windworks. Theres this lil event with Team Galactic in Jubilife.

I appreciate the interest, Rowan, but arent you getting mugged right now?

Oh man of mystery, shut the fuck up

YEAH YOU TELL THEM ROWAN

BOOOM KEEP GOING

GOT THEM ON THE ROPES PROF

Weak follow up but okay

AND HES BACK ON TOP

I love Rowan so much

LETS GO

Not much to say honestly
I switch to Birb, who takes care of their very underleveled pokemon with ease

Didnt u just try to beat us into submission
Anyways

A path through the Ragged Path has opened, allowing us to enter the upper path of Route 204. We have already had an encounter from Route 204 (our ill-fated Gamecube the Ralts) so theres not much to do on this route except clear the trainers.

Nothing very memorable about the trainers, except that Stoner levels up to 20 in this Double Battle and learns Baton Pass. I take it over Sand Attack.

Leggooo
I do miss out on Double Kick by doing this :(( but Baton Pass Speed Boost is worth it

We get to Floroma and see our favorite roster-fillers here

She sounds bored, huh

So far so good

Huh?

LETS GOOOO

Confusion on Chikorita, Switch to Balboa on Cynda and Bulldoze, Weed on toto and Magical Leaf

I actually dont need any of these right now. So Im just gonna...leave her here. For later. If anything happens to my FWG core, I can just come back and get these later.

Next I head to Valley Windworks
I swap out Stoner and Weed for Nomnoms and Pinchynips because I want to train those two up a bit

This is our encounter for Valley Windworks

From my Blazed Glazed playthrough

I then do some grinding. No Mimic for IT

Tackle forgotten for Rollout

No Magnitude

I use the Rock Tomb TM on Pinchynips

Btw Trapinch is so good. I got it from level 9 to level 20 without switch training. Immensely good mon.
Didnt get a screen but i taught it bulldoze over mud slap

Rock Slide over Rock Tomb

Not learnt

Learnt over Quick Attack

Not learnt

I also found the Shock Wave TM

Given that its going to make It even more monstrous than it currently is, I replace Barrier with Shock Wave. It now has 2 75 BP moves and one 90 BP move with great coverage between them

Anyways, having gotten Nomnoms, Balboa and Pinchynips up to level 20 each, I decide to go ahead and do Valley Windworks

In order: Shock Wave, Confusion, Shock Wave, Shock Wave

Mime Jr Stronk

bastard
Anyways lets go fight his friends

Unfortunately didnt realise this was a double battle and had Pippy as my second oh well
I switch to Nomnoms, and then IT and Nomnoms take care of the Zubat, Croagunk, Spinarak and Ledyba with ease

There there
Anyways we get the key so time for valley windworks babey

Confusion, confusion
Next trainer

Confusion, confusion, confusion
Next

O its just Mars now
I kinda wanted Pippy to get EXP so I put him in lead

LETS GO

This Zubat is her lead.
Its very fucking annoying, as it confuses me.
I use bubble as It wing attacks once, then bubble again as it misses a hypnosis. Its now slower than me, so the next bubble takes it out. In comes Yanma. Ez, I have peck, so I got for that. Its not doing great damage, but neither is Yanma, so Ill just weaken it before switching and-

Oh
Pippy hits itself in confusion then gets crit by Air Cutter
Thats unfortunate.
I go to Balboa, and set up a Rock Polish as the yanma Detects, thinking I can maybe atleast sweep to make up for it. I kill it next turn with Rock Tomb.

unforunately my sweep is cut short by a wall

I go to Pinchynips.

Faint Attack brings it down to half, but Im in danger of a KO here.

I switch to Nomnoms. Bite takes it out.

In comes purugly

Balboa time

I bulldoze twice then get slept. Oh well, its not doing great damage so-

Faint attack crits.
Just.
Wonderful.
I bring in It, and thankfully confusion knocks it out, but damn.
That was not a good battle.

Fuck you, Mars

Looker comes, is surprised that we took out Team Galactic, then leaves.

It is with a heavy heart that we bid farewell to our fallen companions.
Thats all for this update. See you all soon!

Counters

Deaths: 3
Wipeouts: 0
Pokemon Obtained: 13
Pokemon Alive: 10

 

[Stellar]

Cool run, but did you purposely avoid evolving Mime Jr. or did you forget it evolves by knowing Mimic at level up…?

It’s going to be a while until the relearner in Pastoria.

 

[Ardy]

Cool run, but did you purposely avoid evolving Mime Jr. or did you forget it evolves by knowing Mimic at level up…?

It’s going to be a while until the relearner in Pastoria.

Oh my god i thought it was a happiness evo
FUCK

 

[TerrickTerran]

Both it and Bonsly are Mimic evolvers.

 

[Ardy]

Episode 4: Having Fun With Hauntings

The first thing I do after booting the game up is take stock of my current party and whatever is in my box.
I know that Gardenia is the next gym leader, so I want to have a good matchup VS grass types. Trapinch at this point of the game completely outclasses Burmy, so I ditch that from our party first. In the end, I take Zubat because of the quad resistance to grass and dual SE STABs that could help me out quite a bit.

Thus our team ends up looking like this.

I give Pesticles the EXP share since theres no way Im switch training it now. I also lead with Birb cause I want it to get that sweet sweet EXP.

With great trepidation, I approach Route 205. I dont have my encounter from this route yet, and theres a whole bunch of trainers up ahead to get EXP from. Starting with this Picknicker. Picknickers are known for grass types, so I figure this is a good battle to get birb started.

Except she has not a single grass type on her team. I still take them all out.

Back at the pokecenter, I realise I should probably grab the totodile to make up for Pippy's tragic death.

I couldnt think of a better name honestly. Anyways, Noodles will stay in the PC until after gardenia. The totodile line is blessed in this game with a secondary dark typing and Intimidate. Makes me feel better about losing Pippy.

The other two are released. Chikorita would also have been a good choice, as Meganium gains a nice Grass/Fairy typing, but Id rather have Feraligatr than Meganium anyways.

I thought this was going to be a battle, but it was not. Anyways, onto the Route 205 encounter.

Not bad

Worm backwards. I dont know. After Gamecube the Ralts if you still have hope in my ability to not give a shit nickname you have more faith in me than I do.

Horrible horrible screenshot but I pick up the Bulk Up TM

Stoner needs a moveset uphaul honestly

Replaces scratch.

Rock Tomb replaces Fire Spin for now.

Then its just rounding off levels on Pesticles. Wing Attack replaces Astonish

I know this hiker is gonna have rock types, so I switch around to lead It.

HP Grass, Shock Wave, Confusion, in that order

I switch to Birb, who takes a Poison Powder on the switch but OHKOs both with Wing Attack.

Luckily i have a Pecha berry to cure this ailment

LEGGO

Im so sleepy rn

Get a stardust, battle trainer

Zubat learns poison fang over supersonic

I pick a Pecha and Oran Berry

I find the totally useless destiny knot

Again, we go Mime

How does a hiker get lost on completely flat ground

A story in 3 parts

This might be useful

Given that we are about to fight a battle girl and Birb is low, I use my one and only potion to bring him back up

Ez money

Learnt over Aerial Ace even though they are p much identical

But honestly, sometimes certain moves feel different from others. Like I know mathematically speaking, Wing Attack and Aerial Ace are the same, but Aerial Ace just feels stronger. Its kinda like how u never expect to hit a Focus Blast but u do expect to hit Hurricanes. Much to think about.

Anyways we go back to Floroma and take a trip to the mart.

I buy a nice 14 balls to round off to 30

Pick up 2 super potions

5 potions

and 3 antidotes

Well that would have been useful 10 minutes ago

LEGGO

Everything reminds me of Pippy :((

Die monkey

Zubat does not learn Confuse Ray

Annoyingly, theres a rest stop literally 100 steps away from where I stopped to go back to Floroma

Time for Eterna Forest methinks

Spoooooky

You too!

The strongest B)

LETS GO

She leads off with Drifloon as I lead off with Birb. Im outlevelled and can only hit it with AA, so I switch to Stoner.

Stoner takes a Shock Wave on the switch, then Rock Tombs twice as he takes an air cutter.

In comes Wailmer. I baton Pass out to It so I can keep my speed boosts.

Two shock waves take it out.

But leave me at low HP.

Makuhita comes in. Since Cheryl has another pokemon in the back, Im confused as to why she would bring out Makuhita here, so I switch to Pinchynips to be safe. And its a good thing too, since it goes for Bullet Punch. Two Bulldozes take it out.

In comes Chansey. Must be Serene Grace because she freezes me with Ice Beam.

I immediately thaw, fortunately, and Bulldoze smacks it for good damage. I switch to Nomnoms

Who manages to take it out with Covet.

Yeeee

She joins us and this gives us free healing after every battle. Suddenly this isnt so bad.

Now, we come to the question of what to do about Encounters. I get 1 encounter from Eterna Forest, but with Cheryl with me, every battle will be a double battle. But being able to choose between the two pokemon sounds like cheating. Im very confused as to how to resolve this, leaning towards maybe flipping a coin or something.

Hilariously, it turns out to be a moot point since I get a double Misdreavus encounter.

She looks like one ;-;

Zubat does not learn Air Cutter.
With free healing, we breeze through every battle in the forest, getting our team up to an even footing.

Eventually we get to the exit

She gives us TM 27. Lemme check what that is again...

YES

I save here and open my save in PKHeX so I can check the friendliness values and see how strong itll be on the relevant pokemon
The data comes out to:
Nomnoms: 72 BP
Pinchynips: 57 BP
Birb: 69 BP
Stoner: 54 BP
So its obvious that Nomnoms and Birb are the winners of this reward, with Nomnom getting a 12 BP boost from Covet and birb getting a 29 BP boost from Tackle and both getting STAB from it.
I teach it to them immediately.

I then find Shadow Claw next to the Old Chateau.
Now, about the Old Chateau.
I fucking.
Hate.
The Old Chateau.
Im not like an exceptional scaredycat or anything, I enjoy horror movies, my favorite TV show is Hannibal, I love reading creepy stuff and all that. But I was already on edge. Im going with my boyfriend to his parents house for thanksgiving, and they live in fucking new hampshire. I have never been out of a city in my entire life, and I HATE the woods. Im comfortable in metal and mortar, nature freaks me the fuck out. Also there is the possibility of my white boyfriend Get Out-ing me (Im veery dark skinned brown) but I did make him pinky promise he would atleast sell my body to someone who lives in a city so thats not a huge issue. I also read the Aron Raltson biography before doing this run, and it was really harrowing and full of way more details than my mind at midnight probably should have been exposed to. So I was on edge.
Ontop of that, I HATE THE OLD CHATEAU.
I first played Platinum when I was around like 8 years old and it was the newest game. And 8 year old me, who was still afraid of the dark, went into the old chateau not knowing anything and the fucking ghost butler and ghost girl freaked me out so much I always do my best to never go back in. The music, the atmosphere, the layout...Its just fucking terrifying to me, even to this day. So, I really, REALLY didnt want to go into the Old Chateau.
But.
Theres two event pokemon in there. A Gengar and a Rotom.
The only place in the entire game where you can pick up the gastly line or a rotom.
And i really, really, wanna complete this Nuzlocke.
So, I said, fuck it. Im 20 years old, Im moving in with my boyfriend later this year, I go to college, I work a job, I pay taxes. Im old enough, mature enough, to not let a fucking Pokemon game freak me out.
How naive I was an hour ago.
Anyways,
The choice was simple: gengar or rotom.
I really really thought about it. Gengar would be point blank the strongest thing on my team for quite a while. For that matter, so would Rotom-A, but Gengars 130 vs Rotoms 107 is still striking. But Rotoms MUCH superior bulk was tempting.
Rotom-A in this game takes on the typings from gen 5 onwards, and Im VERY close to being able to change formes at will. So, as much as I would have loved to take a Gengar, I decided to go ahead and get the rotom. I stocked up on Repels and set foot into the old chateau.

Here goes nothing.
It was horrible. The atmosphere IMMEDIATELY started to freak me out. I dont know how they managed to make this place so fucking creepy. I've played the original Pokemon Red with the fucked up Lavender Town theme, and even that doesnt get to me, so why this place does is beyond me. The music instantly started to freak me out, so I just muted the game and went on.

Got to the TV room.

Lets get this over with

Okay thats done.
...except I could see a Pokeball in the room next to the one I was in. Goddamn it...

I figured I might as well take a look at the docs to see if there was anything else worth getting.
The Substitute TM and Spell Tag are both here.
I really didnt want to have to return, so I just said fuck it and went looking.

I found Substitute with no problem.

And found another old Gateau.
All that was left to explore was the central dining area.
I fucking hate that dining room.

I entered, saw this, and went nope. Walked out.
WHY ARE THERE TWO OF THEM WHAT THE FUCK I HATE THIS I HATE THIS I HATE THIS
Okay okay. Its fine. We can do this.
I try again.

He walked off to the side of the screen but the other one stayed. I fucking hate this I hate this I hate this I hate this

Im
so
fucking
scared

I HATE THIS I HATE THIS I HATE THIS SO FUCKING MUCH PLEASE

I HATE THIS I HATE THIS I HATE THIS

Pls why did this message scare the shit out of me

ugh still no spell tag

I HATE THIS I HATE THIS I HATE THIS

That was it. I SLAMMED my laptop shut, scrambled to turn the lights in my room on, then hid under the covers and just trembled for fifteen minutes straight. I can neither confirm nor deny whether I cried a little bit. I am an adult woman who fucks and drinks, and I was reduced to a shaking mess by a Pokemon game. I have to live with that for the rest of my life.
After fifteen minutes, I had calmed down. I opened my laptop, grabbed the pokeball in the corner, which was the spell tag I had been looking for, then talked to him again to get the screenshot (the first time around I had just slammed my laptop shut without doing that).
then i RAN THE FUCK OUT OF THE OLD CHATEAU AND IM NEVER GOING BACK YOU CANT MAKE ME PLEASE
I love Drayano hacks but this lil addition to platinum was something I hated. Pls I literally have goosebumps just looking at the screenshots.

I got to Eterna, saved the game, and Im just done for the night. Holy fucking shit i hate the old chateau.
Love you all but please dont make me go back there

 

[MoonlightRose]

I completely get you being scared of the Old Chateau, for a solid 4-5 years I refused to go to a certain area in one of my favourite games due to something that wasn't even in the game. Thankfully at no point did you have to go there to play the game.