How you feel about the Kalos Champion

[Diana]

Hate to bust your bubble but I actually did this twice...first time was with Garchomp, second time was with Mega Gengar. They were ~Level 68 so not terribly overleveled either.

Although to be fair one is Garchomp and the other one is an Uber...

Overall I felt that Diantha would have been cool with more character development, shame she wasn't really involved in the story. Her team also isn't horrendously tough aside from Goodra and Gardevoir (and Tyrantrum I guess if it gets a Head Smash off).

Not horrendously tough, agreed, though varied enough at least to me. I guess what I used just didn't have the same effect, because I didn't really wreck her nearly as easily as other people seemed to. In retrospect using Goodra and Clawitzer may not have given me the best view here.

Totally agreed on the character development, no question about it. She could have been better if they did more with her. Maybe I like her because of her potential more than what actually happened... Oh well, you make some good points here, and now I should probably play through XY again so I can see what you all were talking about with being able to sweep her team.

 

[BlackButterfree]

I agree on the point of her not having nearly enough to do with the story. You'd think you'd have more recognition of her if she's both a movie star and a champion.

That being said, I have nothing wrong with her team. Even though you've seen her Pokemon before it's not like you've been overrun with facing tons of them (Kalos has 450 Pokemon, after all) and they have good variety. Aurorus and Gourgeist aren't that great, but then you have Hawlucha, Goodra, and Mega Gardevoir, all of which are quite tough Pokemon. At least you're not going to sweep her with one Pokemon near her level, unlike Wallace or GSC Lance.

Was she the best champion? No, definitely not. I'd leave that for Cynthia. But I can't see her as the worst by any means. I'd easily put at least Wallace and Alder behind her, with possibly Lance and his horribly overlapping teams nearby.

I destroyed her entire team with a well timed balance between Florges and Butterfree. LOL

While Lance's teams leave a lot to be desired, I do have to say that him and Cynthia are IMO the best Champions, followed by Steven, Blue/Green and Red (in no particular order). Alder, Iris, Wallace and Diantha aren't really 100% terrible they leave a lot to be desired:

Alder is great character-wise, but he seems like kind of a push-over.

Iris is actually pretty decent, but I can't take that bitch seriously after seeing her anime counterpart. Hell no.

Wallace is great as a character, and while I hope he'll be the Champion in ORAS (to prevent Juan from being retconned out of the game canon, since I really like him), his team sucks. If he's going for a monotype water team, he needs a good Sap Sipper to cancel out the Grass-types, and a Water-Ground or Pokémon with Lightning Rod to take care of Electric types.

Diantha is just overall underwhelming. Not enough presence in the story, never tries to take down Flare (Lance, Red and Blue actively tried to take down Rocket in their respective generations, Wallace and Steven both helped take down Aqua and Magma, Cynthia was extremely useful with Galactic, and Alder and Iris helped in B/W 1.0 against Plasma) and she doesn't even notice Malva is a Flare Admin when they literally are a room apart 24/7... (although the Elite 4 have never been confirmed to be law-abiding citizens. That's just our assumption that they'd be good. They're just extremely strong trainers. Maybe Diantha knew and didn't care, which is even worse...)

 

[Deleted User 220884]

shes garbage, didn't really help in the main events against Team Flare, unlike other champions in the past generations.
easy to beat

 

[KingHeracrossTheBug]

I could make a better team for that kiddish bitch in 10 minutes. After playing with Exp. all off, harsh Nuzlocke rules, and no trading, SE or anything, the only hard stuff she had was Goodra and Gardy. Fuck that.

 

[BlackButterfree]

I could make a better team for that kiddish bitch in 10 minutes. After playing with Exp. all off, harsh Nuzlocke rules, and no trading, SE or anything, the only hard stuff she had was Goodra and Gardy. Fuck that.

What team would you give her?

I'd let her keep:
Goodra
Gardevoir
Hawlucha

And I'd give her:
Malamar
Carbink (weak Pokémon but it'd somewhat link her to Diancie, since her name is DIANtha...)
Pangoro

 

[KingHeracrossTheBug]

What team would you give her?

I'd let her keep:
Goodra
Gardevoir
Hawlucha

And I'd give her:
Malamar
Carbink (weak Pokémon but it'd somewhat link her to Diancie, since her name is DIANtha...)
Pangoro

This is what I'll do. Fuck any matches on her personality, I just want a challenge:
-Leads with Contrary Malamar, similar to Xeronic or however you say it.
-Follows up with Staraptor, pretty much unseen.
-Next goes Archeops, which is only seen on a Sky Battle (I think)
-The fourth Pokémon would be either Goodra or Flygon.
-The fifth Pokemon would be the Kanto starter that's strong against yours, without mega. For instance, if you choose Squirtle she'll have Venusaur.
-And finally, Mega Mawile, because it's the Pokémon with the highest practical attack.
Now that's a challenge.

 

[Deleted User 220884]

my level 100 salamance sweeps her all team.

 

[Kurona]

This is what I'll do. Fuck any matches on her personality, I just want a challenge:
-Leads with Contrary Malamar, similar to Xeronic or however you say it.
-Follows up with Staraptor, pretty much unseen.
-Next goes Archeops, which is only seen on a Sky Battle (I think)
-The fourth Pokémon would be either Goodra or Flygon.
-The fifth Pokemon would be the Kanto starter that's strong against yours, without mega. For instance, if you choose Squirtle she'll have Venusaur.
-And finally, Mega Mawile, because it's the Pokémon with the highest practical attack.
Now that's a challenge.

Well she doesn't really have any personality to speak of anyway sooo.

 

[Mulan15262]

Why not simply give her Diancie? Sure, you'd be giving her a legendary, but N got that treatment in BW and Ghetsis in BW2, both games expecting your pokemon to be lower in level. It would do decently well, having nice bulk and somewhat high attacking stats.

 

[Phione]

Diantha was completely underwhelming in battle. I OHKOed or 2HKOed Wikstrom's entire team, swept Malva with Greninja until I had a little trouble with Torkoal, and had a decent battle with Drasna until Siebold completely and utterly murdered me. Over and over again. Luckily, I had a ton of money and bought about 99 Max Revives, and finally made it to Diantha. I crushed her without using a single item. Her Mega Gardevoir was the only thing that gave me even remote trouble (by killing Charizard) and even that was easily defeated by Lucario. Meh.

Plus, the Ralts she gives you is female, so I had to hunt for about an hour trying to find one to evolve into Gallade.

She should get Diancie, though. Her main is a Fairy and she has a ridiculously similar name, and Mega Diancie looks a lot like her.

 

[KingHeracrossTheBug]

Diantha was completely underwhelming in battle. I OHKOed or 2HKOed Wikstrom's entire team, swept Malva with Greninja until I had a little trouble with Torkoal, and had a decent battle with Drasna until Siebold completely and utterly murdered me. Over and over again. Luckily, I had a ton of money and bought about 99 Max Revives, and finally made it to Diantha. I crushed her without using a single item. Her Mega Gardevoir was the only thing that gave me even remote trouble (by killing Charizard) and even that was easily defeated by Lucario. Meh.

Plus, the Ralts she gives you is female, so I had to hunt for about an hour trying to find one to evolve into Gallade.

She should get Diancie, though. Her main is a Fairy and she has a ridiculously similar name, and Mega Diancie looks a lot like her.

XY2/Z/Whatever should have a rematch for the whole E4 with Mega-Diancie. And her team full of fairies/strong-ass Pokémon

 

[Durant]

This is what I'll do. Fuck any matches on her personality, I just want a challenge:
-Leads with Contrary Malamar, similar to Xeronic or however you say it.
-Follows up with Staraptor, pretty much unseen.
-Next goes Archeops, which is only seen on a Sky Battle (I think)
-The fourth Pokémon would be either Goodra or Flygon.
-The fifth Pokemon would be the Kanto starter that's strong against yours, without mega. For instance, if you choose Squirtle she'll have Venusaur.
-And finally, Mega Mawile, because it's the Pokémon with the highest practical attack.
Now that's a challenge.

Well her whole team was generation 6 Pokemon so if they would improve her team I would keep the gen 6 Pokemon theme.

But seriously though generation 6 elite 4 and champion were a cake walk and way to easy. You don't even need to overlevel to get an easy win as most of her Pokemon are pretty meh. The only things I can consider somewhat challenging are the Starmie, Talonflame and the Probopass but only because Sturdy is a bitch. As a character Diantha was also pretty lame. Unlike other champions like Lance, Blue, Cynthia or even Steven you rarely see Diantha in the game. You meet her once in a cafe but that is it really. Even then when I saw her I had no idea who she was because she did nothing through the whole story. Diantha is seriously lame compared to other champions and thus I find her to be the worst.

Ow yeah and she looks like a giant ass cupcake and doesn't have a Slurpuff which is stupid.

 

[Stef0w]

She really felt super bland, compared to Cynthia, and Alder.

 

[BlackButterfree]

This is what I'll do. Fuck any matches on her personality, I just want a challenge:
-Leads with Contrary Malamar, similar to Xeronic or however you say it.
-Follows up with Staraptor, pretty much unseen.
-Next goes Archeops, which is only seen on a Sky Battle (I think)
-The fourth Pokémon would be either Goodra or Flygon.
-The fifth Pokemon would be the Kanto starter that's strong against yours, without mega. For instance, if you choose Squirtle she'll have Venusaur.
-And finally, Mega Mawile, because it's the Pokémon with the highest practical attack.
Now that's a challenge.

Considering they went with an all Kalos team, aside from Gardevoir, although her Mega is from Kalos, I doubt they'd give her that kind of varied team.

 

[KingHeracrossTheBug]

Considering they went with an all Kalos team, aside from Gardevoir, although her Mega is from Kalos, I doubt they'd give her that kind of varied team.

Well the "all Kalos" shit is pointless, specially with no Aegislash, Talonflame, Pyroar, or legendaries.

 

[Kurona]

Well the "all Kalos" shit is pointless, specially with no Aegislash, Talonflame, Pyroar, or legendaries.

Because all Champions had a legendary, right? They've all needed a Legendary to stand out otherwise they're not worth the title of Champion, SURELY.

 

[Kairyu_Gen1]

Yes, Diantha is terrible. So bad that I would've scrapped her and all the E4 and started fresh (the E4 was fine, but you need to structure it around the champion), but I have to disagree with a lot of the sentiment here, especially KingHeracrossTheBug 's. You're proposed team layout made no sense, specifically your sentiment that a champion shouldn't base their team around pokes from their region. Some outsiders are fine (Steven's Skarmory, Wallace's Starmie, and Cynthia's Milotic), but the champion represents the greatest challenge that region has to offer, and sure as hell shouldn't have only 1 or 2 pokes from their own region while having another region's starter or regional bird.

And Mawhile for it's attack stat? Lol, in the hands of an NPC, that'd be an easy win because you'd outspeed and OHKO and laugh. Mawhile would not be a challenge for any competent six year old.

At the same time, the pokemon you did list from Kalos in your last post don't make much sense either. Aegislash is a very themed pokemon that makes more sense on a themed team like Wilkstrom's. Talonflame and Pyroar aren't overly powerful, and while I wouldn't mind either on a champ's team, there are other, better options. And did you really suggest an NPC to have a legendary?

Honestly, based on the region, the champ only had so many options. I think her theme of movie star with the tie in to Gardevoir made sense, and so did Goodra, because champs having psuedos is nothing new. I would've given her 1 more good Kalos mon, and made the rest non-Kalos mons that you saw through your journey. Only 32 fully evolved (not counting legendaries) isn't much, so if she had been more like Lance, with a lot of outsiders, it woulda been fine, but keep it based on Unova.

 

[The_Emperor]

I managed to beat the Kalos champion and Elite 4 with quite underleveled pokemon! X and Y had the easiest champion and E4 so far!

 

[Raravian]

Which Pokemon did you use then?
-suspicious-
Did you use Super Training?
These things matter yo

In my experience it's just as difficult/easy as always

 

[The_Emperor]

Raravian said:
Which Pokemon did you use then?
-suspicious-
Did you use Super Training?
These things matter yo

In my experience it's just as difficult/easy as always

I used Tyrantrum, Malamar, Chesnaught, Lucario, Talonflame are the ones i can remember. I think i had alot of fighting type pokemon in my team at the time. I did not sweep the intire team with Lucario mega. Talonflame was the pokemon which saved me.

 

[Crymsia]

Diantha is an okay champion, easy to defeat and all with or without the experience share. Her team's biggest threats to you have some pretty big weaknesses so they're not hard to wipe out if you have good coverage, and if you have a mega you can just trash the team. Pokémon games continue getting easier and easier, or at least that's the way I'm seeing them.

 

[meowmachine]

Bland and uninvolved in the story.

The champion is meant to show up and help the development of a young trainer with obvious talent and Diantha doesn't do that. Part of this lies in the issue of XY being incredibly plot-light but more it still makes her the worst champion. (I've never played Emerald so I don't know about Wallace in the story.)

As a battle, she is okay, not too tough, not too easy.

 

[Suspicious Derivative]

I realize this thread is super old but I thought I might write down my thoughts on the subject since I haven't done it anywhere else.

Overall, I'd rank the Champions like this:

Iris > Alder = Cynthia > Steven = Wallace > Diantha > Lance > Blue

I'm not including Red or N here as I don't consider them to be "Champions".

So, to put it simply. Diantha is not my one of my favorites, but she is not my very least favorite either. I actually didn't mind the fact that she didn't have a large role in the story, it just made it a bit more surprising when I found out that she was the Champion. I managed to stay unspoiled about it when I played through X back when the games were first released. Although, she was the one I expected to be the Champion, so it wasn't that much of a surprise. And at the same time, she does literally nothing compared to all other Champions which had some role in the story at least. Character-wise, she is lacking just like pretty much all other important characters in X/Y except Malva, Lysandre and the ones involved in the Looker missions. Her design is hit and miss for me, her dress is great and I don't mind her being dressed like a Fairy (or what it now is supposed to be) but I am not a big fan of her hairstyle. Her team was okay, though her main Pokemon happens to be my least favorite so that's a negative. Being able to smash it to pieces every time I face her feels good though. As for the difficulty... she was easy, just like all other Champions if you know how to play the game efficiently.

As for what I thought about the others... from favorite to least favorite:

Iris is my favorite. A young and energetic girl with a fantastic design and a good team, in addition to having the best battle theme and being the strongest in terms of levels when battled on Challenge Mode. I surely didn't mind battling her 36 times while playing B2/W2.

Alder is great too. His design, personality and backstory is great, plus his team is interesting and I like his part in the story in both 5th Gen pairs.

Cynthia is another good Champion. She has a great personality (I don't mind her backstory being shrouded in mystery), she is involved in the story in a great way and has a great team. Neat design too.

Steven is cool. I liked his involvement in the story, his personality and interets in stones and his team. OR/AS made most of these things even better.

Wallace seems (or at least seemed) to be very hated judging by many previous posts when I read through this thread. I found that a bit surprising (though most posts are over 2 years old so the general opinion might have changed). I liked him though. I didn't mind him being another Water-type trainer, he still managed to stand out compared to Juan.

Lance is one I have a hard time caring for. While he has a part in the story and not a bad personality or design by any means, I just find myself liking him less than the others. I remember when I played G/S/C that I just found it so surprising that he suddenly was the Champion when he had been a regular E4 member in R/B/Y. I liked him better as an E4 member to be honest.

Blue. The first Champion and my least favorite. As a Rival, he is a jerk with zero character development. As a Champion... he stays the same. That should have changed. I would have liked to see him change his attitude a bit upon becoming the Champion. He wasn't very involved in the story, only showing up at various places through the games to challenge you as a Rival, I don't like his personality either, and his design is the most generic out of all Champions. So he is my least favorite.

 

[The_Emperor]

So much negativity about champions!

In my opinion Blue and lance were two of my favourite champions

 

[BlackButterfree]

Lance, Cynthia and the Hoenn duo were the best. Diantha and the Unova duo were the worst. Blue, Red and N are in the middle. In my opinion.