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How do you play Pokemon in-game?

I've only just started seriously thinking about competitive battling (beyond Random PBR), so I'm curious how having all this stuff in the back of my head is going to affect how I go through HG/SS.

Previously, I've just created teams out of Pokemon I liked (often with lots of NUs) and not worried about EVs until I beat the games, at which point I used the EV berries to allow me to EV train right.

I have, at various points, done quite a bit of breeding, but, having not read any breeding guides, my end results were often no better than I would have gotten by catching good wilds.
 
Well I usually just play 5 or 4 pokemon (depending on how many HM Slaves I need) who's types combine to beat all the gyms and/or E4. My last poke(s) are HM Slaves, of course.
The game is too easy to actually put any thought into building a team for it.
 
Well, in the past, I've planned out teams. I try to go for usable natures because of having a piss poor nature has always irked me. I honestly can't stand the thought of going through the game with an Impish Kadabra or something, ya know? I don't mind using a Hasty Kadabra, though.

This time around for HG/SS, there aren't any completely new Pokemon that would revolutionize the playing experience...after all, I'm getting these games mostly for the nostalgia factor. I've planned out some teams, but I've only decided on what Pokemon I'll use.

EV-training randomly captured Pokemon in-game is the definition of cumbersome, and I feel like it'll take the enjoyment out of the game . Actually, no I'm absolutely positive that it will take the enjoyment out of the game because I've done it before, and in the end, it isn't even worth it. However, I regularly do pseudo-EV training, which is basically EV-training with less intensity. For example, if I know the opponent that I'm about to face is going to send out a Pidgey, I'm going to switch in something that will benefit from Speed EVs.

This time around, however, that won't be possible for me to do because I plan on playing with the SET option on this time...I'm tired of dominating everyone because I can switch into a faster sweeper that hits my opponent's Pokemon for super-effective.

I also plan on keeping my team somewhat reasonably leveled...I usually have my Pokemon horribly over-leveled, but over the years, I found that it has taken away a certain joy I have for the game.

Damn, I can't wait to get HG/SS.
 
Well, I normally just do whatever, but for HG/SS, I'm going to use a mono-normal team.
Ambipom
Clefable
Porygon2
PorygonZ
Togekiss
Dunsparce

The team is primarily just for kicks.
 
Amen.

I always just play through making sure to do the following:
-Examine every house
-Talk to every person
-Catch as many Pokemon as possible
-Raise a full team of Pokemon (screw that 1-3 bullshit. I play like a fucking man!)
-Don't give a shit about natures

That's how I played as a kid, and as they say, "Kids do the damned best things".

This. I played Platinum like an old man. Every morning I woke up, turned on my radio (playing a mixture of classic hits and up to the minute local news) and walked around the whole map watering my berries, picking and replanting them; every Friday I'd go catch a Drifloon ^.^, it was glorious. I would sit all day with the strategy guide on my lap (didn't have the internet) and figure out ingenious ways of raising my Pokémon. Now I can't have a Poke without checking Smogon first, if the moveset I planned out isn't listed anywhere on the page I completely doubt it's effectiveness and usually change it. It almost sucks, to be honest.

So even though I've been playing for 11 years SS will be the first game I've played kinda knowing about all the "secrets."
2 weeks til the game comes out I can't decide whether I want a Totodile or Typlosion, whether I'm going to soft reset for nature/shiny, whether I'm going to EV train from the beginning. I really don't know.
I'm thinking about playing normally until I get to Goldenrod then hatching any Pokémon I plan on using from there on, mostly for the eggs moves and natures.

Pseudo ev training sounds neat.
 
I, being not a metagamer but not too suckish (If I do say so myself :P) use Pokemon that I generally just like, but don't suck. My team is usually as follows: (1) Starter, (2)the staple Flying type, (3) the staple Normal HM slave, (4) the legendary you get before the E4, (5) other Pokemon to counter the starter's weakness, and (6) a Psychic/Dragon or Ghost type which shreds the NPC teams (they rarely have super effective moves against theses types for some reason).
 
I started my Platinum last weekend (yes, I know HGSS just came out, but I've had this forever and I haven't had time for it until now, as spring break just started, and I want to finish it before starting my HG). I'm about to face my fourth gym, and here are some things I've noticed:
Normally I don't plan out my team, but I already played Pearl so I know where things are, more or less, which inevitably led to some planning. For example, when I played Pearl, I immediately picked up the first Shinx I found because it's so goddamn cute AND it has intimidate. Now I know better. Also, in Pearl, I didn't even bother considering capturing a Starly because of the bad rep early-game flying types have, but this time I eventually captured a Staravia (more details below).
I started with Chimchar (Turtwig was my starter in Pearl), not because I needed a fire type or didn't want Ponyta (I really like Ponyta), but because I wanted to try Floatzel. My half-planned team consisted of Infernape, Floatzel, and Roserade.
I found a shiny Bidoof! Of course it immediately became my HM slave.
I always name my main-party Pokemon, often with historical/mythical names. My Monferno is called Dirichlet (after a 19th century mathematician) and my Floatzel is called Beatrice (after Beatrice Portinari).
I caught a Staravia (Minerva) because it reminded me of Minerva's owl. This was unplanned, but since Staraptor is pretty good and I need something that can use Fly, I decided it was the best decision. Of course, that's when I remembered Minerva's owl is called Glaucus and it's male.
I had originally planned on naming my Budew Dionysus, but the one I caught was female (and it had decent IVs to boot). Failing to come up with a good nickname, I just named it after my latest (failed) crush. I spent most of my playthrough thus far trying to get it to like me, and I was overcome with a terrible feeling of Déjà vu. For the record, it's still a Budew.
So yeah, my party so far is a Monferno (Dirichlet), Floatzel (Beatrice), Staravia (Minerva), Budew (Andrea), and my shiny Bidoof. Right now I'm thinking about something that can learn ice and electric moves. I used a Medicham in Pearl, so that's out, but I still have time to consider my options.
 
I always play through old school style, not caring about natures or EV's. just play and enjoy the plot. I catch everything i can along the way and pick the ones i enjoy, but try and keep it balanced. I always keep a surfer, flyer, rock smash/strength and cutter around for ingame use. once i get past the E4 then i start building fun teams with good natures, amazing moves and goals (like taking on the tower and what not)

I also nickname everything! lol. Really no rhyme or reason to it

Its interesting to see how everyone plays!
 
Yesterday I replayed Sapphire to try and get a decent natured Latias for Platinum's Battle Frontier. (My current one was Jolly D;)

It was okay for my first speed run (most of that was running around aimlessly, I forgot how bad Generation 3 really was), pseudo ev training was pretty fun to start off with battling Zigzagoons and Poochyenas, but since I was only using one Pokémon the thoery kinda took a hit with numerous hikers having 4-6 Geodudes on their party.

It definitely gave me some cool ideas for SoulSilver (still not released over here-.-), I now feel it's possible to ev train to a degree whilst still having fun. If anything I'll be switching from my starter a lot more so it doesn't pick up worthless evs, there's a chance I'll have a strong party and an under levelled starter which is the opposite to how it's always been.

Oh and the Latias turned out to be Impish, I'm currently training my original Jolly one but I'm not happy about it..
 
Can you not get hold of Emerald? There the Latias is set soon after you beat the Elite 4, so SRing is somewhat practical. Ideally bring your catcher with you through your E4 run.
 
don't try to get good roaming legendarys in s/r and /fr/lg. Theres a glitch ( i think thats what it is) that alwasy makes their iv's horrible
 
I know it applies to FRLG, and I think it's not a glitch but rather deliberate programming. Not sure about RS, and I don't think it's the case in E. (IIRC it makes 3 IVs zero, and I'm pretty sure my Latias isn't that).
 
It's definitely a glitch if you look at how it happens:

IVs are stored like this in binary:

00000|00000|00000|00000|00000|00000
These are Sp.Def, Sp.Atk, Speed, Defense, Attack, and HP.

So IVs of 31/30/29/28/27/26 (Sp.Def last) would be stored as:
11010|11011|11100|11101|11110|11111

Normally, when you catch a Pokemon, data for its IVs is copied from the "wild" data slot to the "box/party" data slot.

However, on a roaming Pokemon, the copying messes up, copying only the last eight bits instead of all 30 of them. The uncopied bits are all set to zero.
So the 31/30/29/28/27/26 example changes from:

11010|11011|11100|11101|11110|11111
to
00000|00000|00000|00000|00110|11111
or 31/6/0/0/0/0. Ouch.

(And this glitch occurs in Ru/Sa and FR/LG, but not Emerald).
(Random trivia: A glitched wild roamer has a 1/256 chance of having all zero IVs. lol)
 
It's definitely a glitch if you look at how it happens:

IVs are stored like this in binary:

00000|00000|00000|00000|00000|00000
These are Sp.Def, Sp.Atk, Speed, Defense, Attack, and HP.

So IVs of 31/30/29/28/27/26 (Sp.Def last) would be stored as:
11010|11011|11100|11101|11110|11111

Normally, when you catch a Pokemon, data for its IVs is copied from the "wild" data slot to the "box/party" data slot.

However, on a roaming Pokemon, the copying messes up, copying only the last eight bits instead of all 30 of them. The uncopied bits are all set to zero.
So the 31/30/29/28/27/26 example changes from:

11010|11011|11100|11101|11110|11111
to
00000|00000|00000|00000|00110|11111
or 31/6/0/0/0/0. Ouch.

(And this glitch occurs in Ru/Sa and FR/LG, but not Emerald).
(Random trivia: A glitched wild roamer has a 1/256 chance of having all zero IVs. lol)

Anyone have 0/0/0/0/0/0 wild roamers, just for giggles?
 
I feel like an old timer because I started with RBY when it first came out so I didn't have to worry about natures or specific EV training. Basically I started with the water pokemon (even for later versions) and caught wild pokemon to balance out the types (a Pikachu to handle Misty, a Dugtrio for Lt. Surge, etc.). And I always made a point to catch legendaries without the Masterball. It's more fun that way. Only after I beat the Elite Four would I bother getting a team of 'good' pokemon (species, EVs, and Natures in later versions). Also, I never use TMs until after the Elite Four, except if you can buy more.

In my current run through of Platinum I started with Chimchar (I know its not the water one, but fire fighting is badass). I tried to train the fewest number I could get away with. I also tried not to worry about natures too much. I just got lucky and the first Starly I caught was Adamant, and my first Shinx happened to be Naive with Intimidate. My Elite Four team was Infernape, Staraptor, Luxray, Giratina (caught with my last Ultra Ball!) and two nearly useless HM slaves. Bertha was a bit tough, especially since I had not trained Giratina at all. The type coverage was not great, so my main three had to be in the 60s before I could beat them, but trying and failing to beat the Elite Four is still more fun than beating a bunch of wild pokemon to train my Golduck HM slave to useful levels.
 
I trade myself a well-bred egg of something with 3 evolutions similar to the starters that aren't the usual starters. For example, in my Pearl version, I beat the game with a Gardevoir rather than an Empoleon. I EV train it properly as I play, which usually results in picking lots of battles early into the game.
 
My friend played platinum only levelling his empoleon (to 65 by E4) and his staraptor (to 50 by E4). Needless to say, his half-hour struggle with Cynthia's garchomp was the most epic battle I have ever seen. The rest of the adventure was smooth though.
 
In Diamond, I chose Piplup and then caught Starly and Shinx like pretty much everyone. Went to the GTS and got a Turtwig and then just happened to swing by the Windworks on a Friday and caught Drifloon. For HeartGold, I chose Cyndaquil and traded over the other two starters in eggs, then caught a Pidget.

I always go with every starter now, except in Pearl because I only got it since I was so bored [regret it, obviously], and I didn't use Chimchar in Diamond or Platinum. I hate Chimchar, it's retarded.

Yellow was by far my favorite game (besides Crystal, which is by default everyone's favorite Pokemon game) because all three starters were available naturally.
 
The franchise has become less appealing after discovering the extra layer of complexity (Effort Values and whatnot) added to the simple Pokemon formula. I have yet to finish my Emerald journey because of stressing about the perfect set of stats. Play for fun, competition second.

I always choose the Grass-type starter; although I have never been quite fond of Treecko. Tradition dictates I train my team, consisting of the aforementioned starter and another Pokemon, to level 20 before challenging the first Gym Leader. A fond memory of destroying Brock’s rock-solid defense with Charmeleon still brings a smile to my face. From there I progress at a steady pace: grinding here and there, catching Pokemon on a whim, and type-balancing my fighting force. Nicknaming my precious Pokemon is a joy. I worry about the ideal blend of type, nature, and Effort Value points only after defeating the Elite Four and their so-called Champion. Concerning myself with competitive battling early on zaps all the fun out of the game.
 
When I used to play, it was all mindless egg hatching and finding a good-stat legendary. And when I started liking Netbattle a lot more, I stopped playing completely. The games are just too much of the same thing and I have been playing since Red+Blue..
 
Just finished playing HG

I used the event Jirachi and a beedrill for the playthrough. I started having the attack animations on, then I turned them off after morty. I had some fun playing the game, but after team aqua magma and galatic of the previous games this team rocket seemed exceptionally lackluster as antagonists. It was disappointing to have to fight rockets with pokes in there low 20 when you had a level 45 beedrill.

Now that I have the game beaten I will probably complete the dex, then figure out how to rng for the legendaries. However, the new safari zone looks interesting.

I thought sentret was supposed to be the bidoof of this game, but I have yet to see one in the wild, but it seems that every damn place has a rattata or raticate. Rattata is the new bidoof (or is it the original?) I just started using repels wereever I went because for some damn reason it seemed like rattata composed 50% of the total pokemon population.
 
I remember Pokemon Red... I didn't save the entire game and when I got to Lorelei, I sent out my Beedrill with Rage (LOL). I used Rage, which was a 3HKO, and her Dewgong used Rest. Since I was locked on Rage and her Pokemon had unlimited PP, I was locked into a Rage, Rest, Rage, Rage, Rest, Rage, Rage, Rest, etc. circle and I had to start over.
 
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