Eleventh-Hour Team Additions

[PokePoindexter]

Picture the following scenario: you're getting close to the end of a game, and you're feeling pretty good about your chances to finish it. But when you look at your team, you feel as though you could use one last Pokemon to fill any potential gaps in it. So, you go out, find that mon, place it on your team, and lo and behold, every intuition you had about it proves to be justified as it powers you through the final stretches of the game.

If you have ever been in that scenario before, feel free to share which Pokemon it was that did so. Here is one of mine:

I always wanted a polar bear Pokemon during the aughts, so you can imagine I was stoked when Beartic came along in Gen 5. And after training one, I felt justified in my excitement. My first time playing Black, I went into Mistralton City with a Dewott, Whimsicott, Krokorok, Darumaka, and Sigilyph. So when I learned that the gym leader used Flying-types, and the only attack I had that could hit that type super-effectively was Rock Tomb, I went out to the outlying route to see if I could find something - and the first thing I came across was a Cubchoo. A few KO'ed Audinos later, it reached Level 37, evolved, and ripped through Skyla's team. It then proceeded to Brick Break its way through the Icirrus City gym, Icicle Crash its way through Opelucid's, and ultimately delivered the final blow against Ghetsis's Hydreigon after just barely surviving a Focus Blast to beat the game.

 

[ZettaiRyouiki]

In my first White playthrough, near the endgame I felt like using Haxorus as Zebstrika wasn't cutting it. It was awesome and made most of endgame easier.

 

[pokemon4eva]

Bouffalant, also from White version. Fantastic Pokemon, it helped me inmensely against the final bosses and postgame bosses. Reckless Head Charge, a killer movepool and solid bulk was enough to take on lots of stuff.

Although I was already planning on using it, Bouffalant was one of the few mons revealed before release and I wanted to use one. I wasn't expecting it appeared so late.

 

[The Mind Electric]

Bisharp in White. The extremely late evolution prevented it from seeing much use during the period right after it first becomes available, but it got real good when it evolved in time for the E4. Turns out, Dark/Steel is a pretty good type combination for the Unova E4.

 

[Scorpio]

I usually don’t use particularly late Pokémon, since I like to have a full team before Badge/Trial 5. However, something that might count here is Beldum in Moon; I caught it right before tackling the Electric Trial (and thus right at the tail end of when I wanted to fill my team up), and it’s served me pretty well. It evolves pretty much immediately, Bullet Punch is nice for priority, and it’s been pretty strong with that, Metal Claw, Bulldoze, and eventually Zen Headbutt. I haven’t evolved it to Metagross yet, but I’ll update when I do.

 

[Suspicious Derivative]

Apologies if legendaries aren't allowed, but due to the way I usually play the games, I don't have that much else to add here, sadly.

Groudon in Ruby. On my first playthrough of the game, I was originally not going to use it as I was planning to use Aggron as my final team member. But after catching Groudon, I realized that it was way more awesome than I had expected, so I added it as the final member of my team instead of Aggron. I didn't use it that much as I was mostly just soloing the game with my starter Swampert anyway, but I recall using Groudon against Phoebe. It was really great as it swept most of her team.

During my playthrough of Diamond, I experienced a mini-burnout towards the end of the main game. Right before facing Volkner, I got really tired of my in-game team since it was really bad, the only really good member was my starter, Torterra. The others were just plain bad and I was tired of using them since they sucked so hard. I realized that I couldn't keep using my team if I wanted to beat the game, I just had to change it. I used my Torterra to solo the Sunyshore Gym, then it was time for some changes. I had caught Dialga and was considering using it, but I didn't want to use it alone. So I decided to catch Azelf as well. Afterwards, I EV-trained them (the first and only time I have EV-trained any Pokémon during the main story of a game) and made sure they had good movesets. Then I used them and they annihilated the rest of the game, both the main game and the post-game. And in retrospect, it was a good decision since it managed to restore my interest in the game and the series for the time being, making it last for about one more year before I got burnt out on Pokémon for real.

On my Sword playthrough, I did not plan my team in advance like I had done for most previous games since I went into the game 90% unspoiled, the reason being that I wanted to be surprised by all the new Pokémon. I just caught Pokémon along the way and used the new ones that seemed fun and cool. Due to the fact that the Exp. Share couldn't be turned off, I quickly started getting overleveled. So I started using more than 6 Pokémon in rotation. Around Ballonlea, I had 13 Pokémon in rotation but I was thinking about adding more. I did not have all types represented, the most notable one that I was missing was Ghost, which is my second favorite type. I decided to add a Sinistea to my team since I had seen one at the Glimwood Tangle. I evolved it into Polteageist and used it as my Ghost-type on the team. It was pretty good, it had a powerful STAB Shadow Ball combined with Giga Drain for coverage as well as Shell Smash to boost. The most notable situation where I used it was during the battle against Eternamax Eternatus, which was completely unplanned. It just happened to be the first one in my party at that point, so I used it and I recall it working surprisingly well there.

The last member of my Sword team ended up being Frosmoth. Ice and Bug were two other types I did not have represented among my previous team members, so I decided to add a Snom since it was both Ice and Bug. Sadly, I never used Frosmoth that much so I don't have a lot to say about it, but it was at least not completely dead weight. I kept it as a member of my Reserve team during the post-game and used it more there.

 

[aegon the unlikely]

I added a Parasect to my team against Red for like no reason.

 

[The Mind Electric]

I added a Parasect to my team against Red for like no reason.

Did it work out?

 

[Aduro]

I swapped out Incineroar for Alolan Marowak pretty late in my first SM playthrough.
I went through the game blind, so I didn't know what litten would evolve into. But I hated its design as soon as I saw it. It just looks like a cereal mascot.
It wasn't that useful either, it was so slow. Incineroar may be fantastic in VGC, but in singles, before intimidate it was just something that's not that heavy hitting, or all that bulky for its speed. Marowak was slower, but it had three immunities with lightningrod, and hits much harder with thick club.


I know it was late game. I did it after Exeggutor Island, because I went and caught an Exeggutor, just so that I'd have something with frisk so that I could and get myself a Thick Club. Then I levelled up Cubone 30 levels to catch up with my team.

I think it was the first game where I didn't take my starter to the Elite 4.

 

[aegon the unlikely]

I think it was the first game where I didn't take my starter to the Elite 4

Did it work out?

I don't think they even did anything lol.

 

[NuttyRabbit]

There's been quite a few Pokemon I've picked up towards the latter half of any given game, usually right after the 6th or 7th gym or its equivalent, and usually as the result of me going "These 4 or 5 team members are already really good buuut I might as well pick something else up, just to round out the team". Here's just a few of the best ones



Vileplume was something I decided to add onto my Omega Ruby team after finding a Gloom in the Safari Zone, both because I'd had success with the line in randomized nuzlockes in the past and because I just figured it'd be the best way to round out my 5 mon team of Swampert/Swellow/Electrode/Machoke/Linoone. It did not disappoint, not only helping me with Wallace but also putting in quite a bit of work in the E4. But where it really shined was when I went legendary hunting. Decent bulk + Sleep Powder+ a STAB combo that is great at carefully whittling down most legends while also doing enough damage to get them into catching range quickly was a godsend. I have nothing but respect for the line after the performance it put on



Ultra Moon was one of the rare cases where I had two lategame additions, both of them actually coming at the same time, which was right after the Mimikyu trial. By that point, I'd actually been looking for good options for the last 2 slots of my team for a while, and had gone through a few duds (Alolan-Duggy, Larvitar, even Pineco) and was beginning to get worried that I'd only have 4 Pokemon by endgame (those being Primarina, Hawlucha, Malamar, and Ampharos. Honestly I wanted 6 mons just for the sake of having a full team because those 4 probably could've solo'd the rest). It was then that I remembered that not only could I find Trapinch in the desert, but that I could find Haunter in the Abandoned Mall. Seeing as I was really wanting for good Ground and Poison types at the time, I quickly hunted them down and caught them up, even getting Haunter to become Gengar immediately thanks to me having 2 systems. Almost immediately after reaching their final forms, they really began to shine, blowing through most routes and even some bosses, with Flygon destroying Molayne and Olivia and Gengar ripping Acerola apart.



Magneton was brought onto my Leafgreen Nuzlocke team as the result of a tragedy. See, after beating Blaine, I'd decided to do the Sevii Island quest since it unlocked some new trainers, a great grinding spot, and a couple of new encounters, all of which are excellent for nuzlockes. However, when I was doing the biker fights on Three Island, I'd decided to try and have my Butterfree Harvest solo all of them and she did...until the last Weezing, which tanked a Psychic and used Explosion, killing itself...and taking Harvest down with it. Harvest had been with me the whole game, so I was crushed at losing it, and I also hadn't planned on having a slot open. But after plowing through the rest of the game and getting to the E4, I realized something: my team wasn't ready. It could take on most of it no problem, but Lance and Lorelei were very intimidating owing to their strong Flying, Water, and Ice types that I had no real answer for. Figuring that I might as well fill that empty slot with something that could give me a chance vs them, I decided to go down to the Power Plant and get my free Electric, which turned out to be Bastet the Magnemite. After grinding it up to speed, I decided to try it vs the E4 and see what happened---and it didn't disappoint. It not only crushed Lorelei, soloing her team with minimal damage, but also put in work vs Lance's Gyarados as well as the Rival's Pidgeot (I used Green Day the Venusaur to beat his Gyarados which, while risky, had such a cathartic payoff). Honestly I'd say it was the only reason I was able to beat the E4 without any casualties



Following the trend of "Last minute additions to Nuzlocke teams specifically for the E4", Painting the Electrode and Department the Rhydon (The naming theme was random nouns) were added to the team following both the death of Poet the Beautifly at Tate and Liza and me getting to the E4 and realizing that a team of 4 mons just wasn't going to cut it. So using my Safari Zone and New Mauville encounters, I picked up these two, grinded them up to speed, and threw them at the E4, and like Bastet before them, they didn't disappoint, with Department bulldozing through Phoebe (the fight I was the most worried about), and Painting putting in serious work vs Glacia though sadly dying to her Walrein, though not before giving my Blaziken the edge it needed to win. For being literal last minute additions, I really liked these two and I'm glad I got to use them. Also I've apparently developed an affection for using Gen 1 Electric types that come after you get Surf...huh



Abomasnow, unlike the other Pokemon here, was something I at least conceptually planned to have on my Platinum team the moment I could find it, since I needed some sort of Ice type for Cynthia's Garchomp. I was hoping to use something else, but given my self imposed rules of "Sinnoh native lines only" and "no type overlap", it just so happened that Abomasnow was the best choice I really had. To be frank, it basically saw no use until Cynthia herself (though it did kill a couple members of Bertha's team), but when it came time to take on the Champion, it performed well, revenging Garchomp after it muscled through my Empoleon and even manging to defeat both Milotic and Roserade (The AI switched to it predicting a Grass move and I called it perfectly) and chipping Togekiss. I had to baby it severely to get it to this point but the payoff was more than worth it



The final one I want to mention is probably the least spectacular of the bunch and that's Grapploct. As with Vileplume, Flygon, and Gengar before it, I had just beaten the 6th gym/gym equivalent and was still rocking an empty party slot or two. This time around, I was just kind of winging it in regards to party comp and had passed up some otherwise solid additions that I either wasn't feeling at the time (Falinks, which in hindsight I regret not using, Impidimp), couldn't find (Sinistea), or couldn't figure out how to evolve and didn't really care to put in the time ot learn (Applin>Flapple). I was also nervous about dealing with Hop's Snorlax but moreso Raihan's Duraladon. As luck would have it, I managed to encounter the static level 50 Grapploct and decided to add it to the team. It was perfectly fine, taking care of all the Normals and Steels as it should (and also giving me the most hilarious Chairman Rose matchup with my entire team being good or at least neutral) vs Steel. It also did really well vs the final Marnie fight though frankly anything could have. Honestly still kinda wish I'd used any of the other mons I listed just because I like them more but Grapploct did its job pretty well and rounded out the team perfectly fine.

There's a few others that fit this category, but I just wanted to talk about the most notable/good ones.

 

[khlaylav]

I slapped Naganadel on a recent Ultra Moon team. It was a perfectly cromulent Pokemon.