Pokemon Red, Blue, and Yellow In-Game Tiers - Reboot

Ryota Mitarai · Nov 8, 2020

generally, I'd do another run before posting a batch of noms, but I am gonna make an exception so I can bring in some Vulpix logs

Ekans has very noticeable flaws. The first one is the initial stages. Ekans is absolutely terrible upon capture, as its only damaging move is going to be Wrap, so you are taking a lot of time grinding it (assuming you try to actually use it and not just switch grind, which would make it underleveled for Misty anyways). Another flaw of Ekans is that it needs Dig to be good enough for a higher tier than D. Even with Dig, however, Arbok will often not OHKO something and the E4 shows its lack of power (after all, you are stuck with base 85 attack, which is lower than Seaking).

All in all, I am personally fine with D-tier. Ekans has numerous flaws that make it incredibly hard to use. While you could argue that it performs fine with Dig, it's still hard to ignore the fact that it's super reliant on it to do anything and that Arbok is not really the best user of Dig, because its damage output is a lot lower than other Pokemon with the same move.

TMs used: Dig, Rock Slide

Misty(21): almost 2HKOed by Starmie's Water Gun and 2HKOed by Bubble Beam. Even if evolved, it needs many Leers to deal damage due to X Defend trolling, even with Dig. Not a good matchup, as a whole

Blue # 3 (24): Bite 2HKOs Kadabra and Raticate and 3HKOs the rest. Dig improves the matchup a lot. Wrap can put Pidgeotto into range, as Sand-Attack can be annoying

Lt. Surge(25): Bite 2HKOs, OHKOs, and 3HKOs Voltorb, Pikachu, and Raichu, respectively. Raichu's Thunderbolt is a 3HKO (though it puts you in a single digit number after the second one). Dig OHKOs all of them, obviously.

Giovanni #1 (30): Dig 2HKOs Rocks and seems to be a 3HKO on Kanga. You can Glare Kanga to make it somewhat easier to deal with

Blue #4 (30): Bite 3HKOs Pidgeotto and Ivysaur, 4HKOs Gyarados, 2HKOs Growlithe, and OHKOs Kadabra. Dig can help for Ivysaur and Growlithe, but is not needed

Erika(31): Dig 3HKOs the Poison-types. You can use Glare + Wrap to put everything into a range for Dig/Bite, but you will be spending a lot of time doing so

Blue #5 (40): Rock Slide 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyarados, though Gyara can damage it hard with HPump. Growlithe is OHKOed and Venusaur is 3HKOed by Dig. Zam is likely killing it, but if you survive Psybeam (doable if healthy), you can Glare it and Wrap it till you can KO it safely

Giovanni #2 (42): Dig OHKOs Nidorino, 3HKOs Kanga and 2HKOs the rest

Koga(42): Dig OHKOs Koffing and 2HKOs the rest

Sabrina(43): Dig OHKOs Kadabra and 2HKOs the other Psychic-types, with Rock Slide 2HKOing Venomoth. Zam is faster, but if it doesn't kill you, you can Glare it and then spam Wrap till it's in range for a Dig

Blaine(46): Rock Slide OHKOs the unevolved stuff and 2HKOs the rest. Dig also OHKOs Rapidash

Giovanni #3 (47): Dig 2HKOs Rhyhorn and Nidos and 3HKOs Rhydon. Unless you have a better move, Wrap is the only way to beat Dugtrio, as your Dig is faster Dugtrio's.

Blue #6 (47): Dig OHKOs Growlithe, 2HKOs Rhyhorn, and can muscle through Venusaur. Rock Slide 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyarados, though the latter hits hard with Hydro Pump. Zam is faster and murders you with Psychic, but if it goes for Reflect, you can Glare it and spam Wrap till Dig can KO it.

Lorelei(52): Rock Slide 3HKOs Dewgong and Cloyster, though the former just spams Rest. Slowbro is annoying to break through, but it spams Amnesia, so you can just Wrap it to preserve Dig and Rock Slide PP. Rock Slide OHKOs Jynx. By the time you reach Lapras, you will have like 1 Rock Slide PP, so the only way to win here is Wrap spam till Lapras is in range for Rock Slide. Even then, Lapras hits it hard with special moves

Bruno(52): Dig 2HKOs Onix #1, almost 2HKOs Onix #2, 2HKOs Lee, 3HKOs Hitmonchan, and 4HKOs Machamp. While not bad, this is pretty bad, compared to most Pokemon that can one- or two-shot his Pokemon

Agatha(52): Dig OHKOs Haunter and 2HKOs the rest (bar Golbat, which is 2HKOed by Rock Slide). You are slower than the Ghosts, so prepare for some hax

Lance(53): Dig 3HKOs Dragonair and Rock Slide seems to be around a 3-4HKO on Dragonite. You take a lot of time to beat those. Aero seems to be a 2HKO with Rock Slide, though it hits you hard.

Champion Blue(53): Rock Slide 3HKOs Pidgeot and Gyarados, though the latter murders you with Hydro Pump. Arcanine is 2HKOed by Dig. Rhydon seems to be a 3HKO with Dig. Zam Murders it. Venusaur can be muscled through with Dig (looks to be a 4HKO), but Growth + Solar Beam can damage it. Glare + Wrap can help with trolling anything you are struggling with.

Vulpix period is.... really bad. You are stuck with Ember and QA as your best moves (unless you teach Dig, but that is a contested TM) till you get Flamethrower.

However, once it evolves and has Flamethrower, it definitely skyrockets in terms of performance. Flamethrower isn't OHKOing everything (though it does that sometimes), but you will rarely fail to 2HKO at worst outside the E4.

However, there's no denial that the line wants the Dig TM as a whole. I found through my testing of it that Blaine and Agatha are a lot better with Dig. While you could try spamming Thrower there, there's no denial that Dig makes those matchups a lot faster.

As for what tier I'd give it, I am personally leaning towards C-tier, where it's located right now. Yes, Flamethrower is nice, but Vulpix period was very bad, needs Dig to be efficient for two matchups, and its usefulness diminishes after Agatha, as it's fairly bad against Lance and Champion Blue. I do not see it as powerful enough to be B-tier, though someone may think differently.

TMs used: Fire Blast, Dig for some matchups to see if they are better

Giovanni #1 (29): bad. Ember doesn't even 3HKO anything and they hit it hard. Rock Throw from Onix itself is a 3HKO, for example

Blue #4 (29): Ember seems to be a 4HKO on Pidgeotto and a 3HKO on Ivysaur. Quick Attack 4HKOs Growlithe and 3HKOs Kadabra, though Dig will likely help here. Gyarados will murder you with HPump, so don't bother

Erika(31): Ember 4HKOs Victreebel and 3HKOs the rest. Victreebel can be tough due to poison + Wrap, though Confuse Ray can help. If you just ignore it, Vulpix should take out the rest safely

Blue #5 (41): bar Gyarados, Flamethrower 2HKOs everything with little issues, only Zam can prove problematic due to crits and confusion from Confusion / Psybeam, but it is outsped and thus poses little problems

Giovanni #2 (41): Flamethrower OHKOs Kanga and 2HKOs the rest

Koga(42): Flamethrower OHKOs Koffing and 2HKOs the rest.

Sabrina(43): Flamethrower OHKOs Venomoth, 3HKOs Zam, and 2HKOs the rest. Zam can deal heavy damage with Psywave or troll you with Recover, but its Psybeam is not dangerous and you outspeed.

Blaine(47): Flamethrower 4HKOs Arcanine, 3HKOs Rapidash, and 2HKOs the rest. Dig improves the matchup a lot, as it 2HKOs Arcanine and OHKOs the rest

Giovanni #3 (47): spam Flamethrower and you win. Note that I am going off memory, since I forgot to write this up, apologies

Blue #6 (47): Flamethrower 2HKOs Pidgeot, Rhyhorn, Growlithe, and Venusaur. Zam is 3HKOed and trolls you with Recover + Psychic. Gyarados is a bad matchup, obviously

Lorelei(51): Flamethrower 3HKOs Dewgong, 2HKOs Cloyster, and OHKOs Jynx, though watch out for Clamp from Cloyster. Slowbro is something you don't really want to fight and Lapras beats you with Hydro Pump

Bruno(51): Flamethrower OHKOs Hitmons and 2HKOs the rest, with Fire Blast also OHKOing Onix #1

Agatha(52): Dig 2HKOs Gengars and OHKOs Arbok and Haunter. If you go the Flamethrower route, 3HKO on Gengars and 2HKO on the rest. You also outspeed everything bar Gengar #2, which you speedtie

Lance(52): bad. Flamethrower doesn't even 3HKO Dragonair and Dig is only a 3HKO.

Champion Blue(52): beats Pidgeot (2HKO with Flamethrower) and Venusaur with no problems. Arcanine is 2HKOed by Dig. Flamethrower seems to be a 4HKO on Rhydon. Zam and Gyara 1v1 t no matter what

D-tier. Scyther is not bad for Gym Leaders, as Slash can actually be handy. However, it falls off against the E4. Even with SD and DEdge, it's largely unimpressive. Logs speak for themselves.

TMs used: Double-Edge, Toxic

Giovanni #1 (29): 3HKOs Kanga with Slash (and beats it). The rocks wall it, though you could probably muscle through them, but still inefficient

Blue #4 (29): Slash 2HKOs Gyarados and Ivysaur and OHKOs the rest

Erika(31): Slash 2HKOs everything and is not threatened whatsoever, as Victreebel is outsped and goes for PPowder first

Blue #5 (41): Slash OHKOs Growlithe and Zam and 2HKOs the rest. Gyarados may threaten you with HPump, though. You also outspeed everything. +2 DEdge OHKOs Pidgeot and almost OHKOs Venu and Gyara.

Giovanni #2 (41): Slash 2HKOs Kanga and Nidorino, 4HKOs Rhyhorn, and 3HKOs Nidoqueen. SD + DEdge does not improve the matchup, unless you spam SD

Koga(42): Slash 3HKOs Weezing and 2HKOs the rest. Smokescreen can become an issue. +2 DEdge OHKOs Koffing and 2HKOs the rest

Sabrina(43): Slash 2HKOs Venomoth and OHKOs the rest. Easy sweep

Blaine(46): Slash OHKOs unevolved stuff and 2HKOs the rest, though Fire Spin weakens Scyther a lot and Arcanine murders it with Fire Blast. You can set up SD on Growlithe, so DEdge OHKOs Rapidash and puts Arcanine in red.

Giovanni #3 (47): Slash OHKOs Dugtrio and 2HKOs Nidos. Rhyhorn line can eat multiple Slashes, but you can Toxic them to speed up the process. Note that Rhydon can actually beat you with Tail Whip and Stomp

Blue #6 (47): Slash 2HKOs Pidgeot, Gyarados, and Alakazam, OHKOs Growlithe, and 3HKOs Venusaur, though the special attackers will cause it a problem if they decide to attack. Rhyhorn can be muscled through with Toxic + Slash. +2 DEdge OHKOs Pidgeot and Zam, but fails to OHKO Gyarados

Lorelei(52): Slash 3HKOs Dewgong and Slowbro, but the former 2HKOs with Aurora Beam. Slash comes very close to OHKOing Jynx, though it murders you with Ice Punch if it lives. Lapras OHKOs it with Blizzard. You are unable to set up SD to spam DEdge, unless you are facing Slowbro

Bruno(52): Slash 3HKOs Machamp and 2HKOs Hitmons, only watch out for Counter. Onix have Rock Throw, though you can Toxic + Slash them if they derp enough

Agatha(52): useless against Ghost-types (lol), but Slash spam gets Golbat and Arbok

Lance(52): Slash 2HKOs Dragonair. However, you will unlikely beat DNite, though you can Toxic it and Slash it as much as possible

Champion Blue(52): Slash 2HKOs Zam and 3HKOs at best everything else. You can Toxic them to help yourself, especially against Rhydon. If you want to go safe, Venusaur is a guaranteed win if healthy and you are likely beating Zam too.

D-tier. Pinsir is better than Scyther due to better movepool and a higher Attack, though movepool is still somewhat poor, as your only coverage for Rock-types is Submission. Furthermore, Pinsir is only amazing when you use SD more than once. I think D-tier is fine, it can certainly be useful, but requires a lot for that.

TMs used: Swords Dance, Submission

Giovanni #1 (29): Submission 2HKOs everything, though due to recoil, you are likely losing against Kanga, unless it misses or it derps

Blue #4 (29): Submission 2HKOs Pidgeotto and OHKOs Growlithe and Raticate. Seismic Toss 3HKOs Gyarados and Ivysaur, though Gyara can hurt it with HPump

Erika(31): Strength seems to be a 2HKO on Victreebel and Tangela and a 3HKO on Vileplume. If you sidetrack and get the SD TM, Strength becomes an OHKO on rolls on the former two and a 2HKO on the latter. Regardless, poison + wrap is your only issue here, though Pinsir is faster and it goes for PPowder first

Blue #5 (41): +2 Strength OHKOs Growlithe ahd Zam and 2HKOs the rest, though Pidgeot was almost OHKOed. Set up another SD to make the fight faster, as Gyarados may be able to KO you with HPump if given the chance. Zam also outspeeds, but won't KO without crits

Giovanni #2 (41): +2 Strength OHKOs Nidorino and 2HKOs Nidoqueen, while +2 Submission OHKOs the rest

Koga(42): +2 Strength OHKOs Koffing and 2HKOs the rest. +3 Strength also OHKOs Muk

Sabrina(43): SD then spam Strength, outspeed and OHKO all

Blaine(46): +2 Strength 2HKOs Arcanine and OHKOs the rest, though Arcanine murders it with Fire Blast. Set up another SD to OHKO it as well

Giovanni #3 (47): +2 Strength OHKOs Dugtrio and 2HKOs Nidos. +2 Submission OHKOs Rhyhorn and puts Rhydon in range for Strength or Seismic Toss

Blue #6 (48): you need two SDs to sweep here. +3 Strength OHKOs pmuch everything, with Rhyhorn being OHKOed by Submission. Without another SD, +2 Strength would 2HKO Pidgeot and Gyarados, with the latter being able to KO you due to taking damage + recoil from Submission

Lorelei(51): +2 Submission OHKOs Dewgong and Lapras and 2HKOs Cloyster, only watch out for Growl and for recoil KOing you. +2 Strength OHKOs Jynx and seems to be a 2HKO on Slowbro

Bruno(52): +2 Submission OHKOs Onix and +2 Strength OHKOs Lee, almost OHKOs Chan (watch out for Counter), and 2HKOs Machamp. +3 Strength OHKOs Chan with no crits and 2HKOs Machamp

Agatha(52): SToss 3HKOs the Ghosts and Strength 3HKOs the rest. Gengar are faster, so prepare for some hax

Lance(52): +2 Strength fails to OHKO Dragonair, which either knock it to red or even beat it. +3 Strength does OHKO them and +3 Submission OHKOs Aero if you don't faint to it. DNite manages to avoid an OHKO from +3 Strength and will KO you with Hyper Beam

Champion Blue(52): +4 Strength 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyara and OHKOs Arcanine and Alakazam. +3 Submission OHKOs Rhydon. You outspeed Zam, but Arcanine outspeeds you, I think this is due to the badge boost glitch (I leveled up before fighting Arcanine). Venusaur is 2HKOed by +2 Strength and doesn't threaten you if you are healthy enough.

next run team: Onix / Marowak / Hitmonchan / Magneton

Longfellow · Nov 8, 2020

Yeah, the Vulpix nom is in line with what I observed. It's in a weird position where it really wants Dig, but Dig really doesn't want Vulpix. For instance, something like Rattata or Ekans isn't necessarily better than Vulpix, but they definitely make better use of the Dig TM (coming earlier, evolving earlier, having a better Attack stat). On the other hand, the Fire-typing isn't as bad as it sounds (Lance does suck though) and 95 power on 100 special is a lot of firepower, so to speak. You can also use Confuse Ray to try to cheese through fights you shouldn't win, like Gyarados and Lapras.

DrumstickGaming · Nov 9, 2020

Updated the tiers based on Ryota's recent logs!

Caterpie falls to D
Flareon rises to C
Krabby falls to C (it looked okay until the matchups started tanking around the E4)
Lickitung falls to D
Pikachu (RB) stays in B
Dratini falls to D
Horsea stays in C
Tauros stays in C

Jynx stays in S for now though A could be a thing, depends on what others think
Pidgey stays in D
Rhyhorn stays in C
Psyduck (RB) stays in C
Mankey stays in C
Geodude merged into one ranking in B
Goldeen rises to C (eh, why not)
Kangaskhan stays in C

Ekans stays in D
Vulpix stays in C
Scyther falls to D (thanks Modulo for suggesting it to be run)
Pinsir stays in D

Ryota Mitarai · Nov 15, 2020

ok did that run I mentioned above + another to give myself some time to think about the first one's ranks

Easy D-tier. Onix is very reliant on Dig in order to be usable on the route (before Silph Co., though you can teach EQ, but you keep Onix bad for a longer time). Furthermore, even with it, Onix's lack of power shows itself in the end-game, as it will often not even 2HKO with super effective STAB moves. It also has to resort to Bind trolling for anything may potentially OHKO it. As a whole, Onix is definitely usable due to Dig, but has myriads of issues that prevent it from being a higher tier

TMs used: Dig, Rock Slide

Lt. Surge(24): Dig spam wins

Giovanni #1 (30): Dig 3HKOs Kanga and 2HKOs the rest

Blue #4 (31): Rock Slide OHKOs Pidgeotto, Growlithe, and Kadabra, and 2HKOs Gyara, which murders you with HPump. Ivysaur is 3HKOed by Rock Slide and 2HKOed by Dig, so use the latter or just avoid it

Erika(31): Dig 3HKOs the Poison-types. While you die to any Grass move, you are faster and can potentially troll them and put them in range for Dig with Bind. In all honesty, Onix performed better than I expected lol.

Blue #5 (41): Rock Slide 2HKOs Gyara and Pidgeot, but Gyara has to be trolled with Bind, cause it murders you with HPump. Dig OHKOs Growlithe and 2HKOs Zam, though it and Venusaur beat it (as Zam is faster and 2HKOs with Psybeam)

Giovanni #2 (41): Dig OHKOs Nidorino, 3HKOs Kanga, and 2HKOs the rest

Koga(42): Dig OHKOs Koffing on rolls and 2HKOs the rest. No issues

Sabrina(43): Dig OHKOs Kadabra and 2HKOs Mr. Mime and Zam. Rock Slide 2HKOs Venomoth. Zam will likely beat it

Blaine(45): Dig 2HKOs Arcanine and OHKOs the rest. Rock Slide 2HKOs Rapidash, but is the same elsewhere

Giovanni #3 (48): Dig 2HKOs Rhyhorn and the Nidos, 3HKOs Rhydon, and OHKOs Dugtrio. You can use Screech to preserve Dig PP

Blue #6 (48): Rock Slide 2HKOs Pidgeot and Dig 2HKOs Rhyhorn, while also OHKOing Growlithe. The rest beat it for obvious reasons

Lorelei(52): loses the 1v1 against everything. Cloyster, Dewgong, and Lapras survive a Rock Slide (not even 2HKOs) and OHKO with super effective move. Jynx outspeeds and OHKOs with Ice Punch. Slowbro is obvious

Bruno(52): Dig 2HKOs Onix, 3HKOs Hitmonchan, 2HKOs Lee, and doesn't deal much to Machamp. Onix struggles against Fighting STAB moves. Note that I had forgotten to write this up, so going off by memory

Agatha(52): Dig OHKOs Haunter and 2HKOs the rest, with Rock Slide 2HKOing Golbat.

Lance(52): Rock Slide almost OHKOs Aero after a Screech, while Dig 2HKOs Dragonair after a Screech. Rock Slide after Screech is a 2HKO on Dragonite. Watch out for Dragon Rage and note that DNite will actually attack you.

Champion Blue(52): Rock Slide 3HKOs Pidgeot. Dig 2HKOs Arcanine and 3HKOs Rhydon

The biggest issue with Cubone is probably the fact it's outclassed by every Ground-type that comes before it, except Onix. While it learns Bone Club by level, its low power + faulty accuracy are far from ideal and, more often than not, you will see yourself using Dig or EQ. So when you are using Cubone, you should just spare a Ground TM for it (granted, it can hold on just fine with Bone Club till Silph Co.).

However, its 80 Attack is still somewhat problematic, especially if you are not using STABs (unfortunately, Marowak does NOT learn Rock Slide, so your only coverage is... Strength). It is also rather slow. I think the Exp. group can also be problematic (Medium Fast, which is faster than Slow only, for most of the game), but I don't know if it's that bad, so not going to factor it in.

Tiering it is certainly tricky. On one hand, it is significantly better than Onix, which is also D-tier. On the other hand, its lack of power, especially when not using STABs, + poor coverage + low Speed make nomming it to C-tier certainly harder. I am personally leaning towards C-tier, because it is somewhat more usable outside of specific matchups and is not outright bad, though I'd say it only barely makes the cut to C and I probably wouldn't bat an eyelid if it remained in D.

TMs used: Earthquake

Giovanni #1 (30): Bone Club 3HKOs Kangaskhan and 2HKOs the rest. Defense drops + Comet Punch are the only threat here

Blue #4 (30): Headbutt 3HKOs Pidgeotto. Gyarados murders it. Bone Club 2HKOs Ivysaur and OHKOs the rest

Erika(31): Bone Club 3HKOs the Poison-types, while EQ 2HKOs. Victreebel is faster and OHKOs with Razor Leaf. Vileplume is slower and fails to OHKO with Petal Dance. Tangela can also be defeated with Headbutt spam

Blue #5 (41): Strength 3HKOs Pidgeot. Gyarados murders it with Hydro Pump. EQ OHKOs Zam and Growlithe and 2HKOs Venusaur, though Venu will generally beat it. Growlithe is also OHKOed by Bone Club

Koga(42): Bone Club OHKOs Koffing on rolls and 2HKOs the rest. Weezing just explodes on you. EQ speeds up the matchup, but is not needed to win it

Sabrina(43): EQ puts Venomoth in red and OHKOs the rest, though it's slower than all of them. Kadabra's Psychic is a 2HKO. Bone Club OHKOs Kadabra and 2HKOs the other Psychic-types

Blaine(47): Bone Club 2HKOs Arcanine and OHKOs the rest. The horses can be annoying with Fire Spin, as they are faster.

Giovanni #3 (47): EQ 2HKOs Rhydon and OHKOs the rest. No issues

Blue #6 (48): 3HKOs Pidgeot with Strength and OHKOs Rhyhorn, Growlithe, and Zam with EQ. Zam can Reflect, though.

Lorelei(52): at most beats Jynx by living an Ice Punch and OHKOing on rolls with EQ

Bruno(52): EQ 3HKOs Machamp and 2HKOs the rest. Lee and Machamp can hit it hard with STABs or even KO it

Agatha(52): Strength 3HKOs Golbat and EQ OHKOs the rest. However, it is outsped by the Ghosts, so prepare for some hax

Lance(53): EQ 2HKOs Dragonair, while they do not threaten it much. The rest are bad matchups

Champion Blue(53): beats Rhydon and Arcanine with EQ, the rest are slow to beat or just beat you. Zam can be beaten if it derps and spams Recover

The following analysis may be seen as somewhat controversial, so read with caution

Hitmonchan has tons of issues. The first one is its poor movepool. It consists mostly of Submission and Strength, coupled with SToss and Toxic for utility. Its Special is atrociously low, but, unlike Hitmonlee, Chan does not have the immediate power to make up for it. Its performance was also very questionable, as it almost never sweeps. While you could argue that you don't have to sweep to be good, I personally believe the games are so easy that not being able to sweep anything is heavily questionable.

Therefore, I am going to call for a serious consideration to drop Hitmonchan to E-tier. I generally avoid nominating anything to E-tier, because it just dooms the Pokemon to "uselessness", so it has to be taken care with. The only way for me to see D-tier is to emphasize heavily on its lack of need for serious investment (I mean, its movepool is poor, after all) to get going, since it also comes at level 30. However, Hitmonchan can definitely rank in my "Top 10 worst Pokemon in RBY". D-tier may also be possible if we just consider it "useful enough" to pick up KOs, which it certainly does, just mostly on the trivial members of bosses' teams.

And before someone says "this is not Ditto bad", I personally do not like this argument, because it somewhat implies E-tier was created to put Ditto in it, which is not true; E-tier is there to denote the Pokemon with the lowest efficiency for the games and Ditto just happens to be one of them (at least the way I see it).

I am ready to hear any arguments that support Hitmonchan staying in D. As I implied, I myself am not 100% confident in dropping it to E-tier, but it's certainly a possibility.

TMs used: Submission, Toxic, Seismic Toss

Giovanni #1 (31): Submission OHKOs everything, though Kanga is rolls

Blue #4 (31): Submission OHKOs Pidgeotto, Kadabra, and Growlithe, while Seismic Toss spam beats Ivysaur. Gyarados is 3HKOed by SToss, but can KO you with HPump

Erika(31): Strength and SToss 3HKO everything. However, Vileplume avoids the 3HKO through Mega Drain healing and Victreebel almost murders you with Razor Leaf. Furthermore, any sleep pmuch beats Hitmonchan

Blue #5 (41): beats Pidgeot and Growlithe. Gyara murders it with HPump, Zam murders it with Psybeam, and Venusaur takes Strengths like nothing and returns damage with Grass moves

Giovanni #2 (41): Strength 2HKOs Nidorino and 3HKOs Nidoqueen, while Submission OHKOs the rest. Nidoqueen may be able to take it down due to recoil

Koga(43): Strength 2HKOs Koffing and 3HKOs the rest. You are likely taking out 3/4 of his team if you don't get Smokescreened

Sabrina(43): Strength OHKOs Kadabra and 2HKOs the rest. Venomoth KOs it if it has taken a Confusion from Mr. Mime. Zam always wins

Blaine(47): Submission OHKOs the unevolved stuff, 2HKOs Rapidash, and 3HKOs Arcanine. Due to recoil, you may end up losing to Rapidash due to Fire Spin. Arcanine always wins, unles you get really lucky

Giovanni #3 (48): Submission OHKOs Rhyhorn and 2HKOs Rhydon. Strength OHKOs Dugtrio (though Duggy outspeeds) and 3HKOs Nidos. You may not sweep due to taking damaging from the Nidos while you are wearing them down with Strength

Blue #6 (48): 3HKOs Pidgeot with Strength. Submission OHKOs Rhyhorn and Growlithe. Gyara and Zam murder it, while Venusaur beats you, though you can weaken it with Seismic Toss or Strength

Lorelei(51): Submission 2HKOs everything bar Slowbro. Dewgong and Slowbro are no problems. Cloyster's Clamp is incredibly dangerous and Aurora Beam deals a lot of damage, with Supersonic also being annoying. Jynx outseeds and will likely KO you with Ice Punch if it picks that. Lapras OHKOs with Blizzard

Bruno(51): Submission 3HKOs Machamp and 2HKOs the rest. Due to recoil, you will likely be KOed by Lee and Machamp will also likely KO you due to that.

Agatha(52): Seismic Toss 3HKOs Ghosts and Strength 3HKOs the rest. Gengar is faster.

Lance(52): beats Dragons with no problems. Use Seismic Toss, along with Toxic against DNite, to beat them safely

Champion Blue(52): beats Rhydon by 3HKOing it with Submission. Can also beat Arcanine if it derps and spams Roar. The rest murder it mercilessly (Pidgeot OHKOs with Sky Attack and 3HKOs with Wing Attack while outspeeding, Zam is obvious, Gyara is obvious, Venu is obvious)

I honestly think C-tier could be considered for the line. It's important to note that you can just catch it at level 35 as a Magneton, thus giving it a better start. Magneton has one of the highest Specials in the game, behind Gengar, Zam, the Legendary birds, and Exeggutor (and Mewtwo too, but we aren't tiering it), and being on par with Tentacruel and Kadabra. Therefore, if you spared the TBolt TM for it, you will have a mon that hits insanely hard, even harder than Jolteon, which is currently B (though if we are gonna apply the Psychic logic to Thunderbolt (aka it's reasonable to spare it for Pokemon of the same type, I'd argue Jolteon could even make it to A, but anyways). And regardless, sparing it the TBolt TM is not hard, as most things that want it can perform well without it (see Gyara/Mr. Mime/Gengar/Haunter).

While it's availability sucks a bit, it's the same as most late-game Water-types if you decide to catch them overleveled and you also sidetrack a bit to the Power Plant, just like Seafoam Islands. In terms of performance, it sucks against Giovanni's Ground-types, unless you decide to Toxic them, but it makes it up for its amazing matchup against Lorelei and being a good Gyarados killer. So I think C-tier is definitely possible for Magnemite. And yes, it's significantly better than Electabuzz, that thing is just not good.

TMs used: Thunderbolt, Toxic

Blue #5 (41): TBolt OHKOs Pidgeot, Gyarados, and Growlithe, and 2HKOs Alakazam. Venusaur is hard to break through, so just avoid it

Giovanni #2 (42): Thunderbolt OHKOs Nidorino and Kanga, but Magneton cannot hit the rest bar with Sonic Boom, which would take some time

Sabrina(43): TBolt 3HKOs Zam and 2HKOs the rest. Zam can be poisoned to help slow it down if it decides to troll you with Recover

Blaine(47): TBolt 2HKOs Rapidash and Arcanine and OHKOs the rest. Fire Blast is only a threat when it's a crit and, even then, if you are healthy enough, it shouldn't be a problem

Giovanni #3 (47): There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a respectful whistle.

However, there was another catch and that was Catch-23, which specified that Magneton was not doing anything against Giovanni #3. Ryota was crazy and thought it would have the tools to deal with Ground-types; and as soon as he checked its Generation I learnset, he was no longer fooled by his illusion. Although Double-Edge was a move he could teach to his Magneton so it wasn't fully useless against Ground-types, he remembered that many Pokemon would probably put a better use of it in a realistic situation. DrumstickGaming was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-23 and let out a respectful like.

Blue #6 (47): beats Pidgeot, Gyara, and Growlithe. Zam can be worn down with Toxic and TBolt, but Psychic and Psybeam 3HKO it.

Lorelei(51): TBolt 2HKOs at worst everything and they do not threaten it in return

Bruno(52): TBolt OHKOs Hitmons and 2HKOs Machamp. Toxic + Sonic Boom can be used to beat Onix

Agatha(52): Thunderbolt OHKOs Golbat, 2HKOs Haunter and Arbok, and 3HKOs the rest. All the Ghost-types outspeed it, however

Lance(52): TBolt OHKOs Gyarados and Aero and 3HKOs DNite. You can weaken any Dragon with Toxic + TBolt

Champion Blue(52): beats Gyarados and Pidgeot. Zam can be taken down with TBolt + Toxic, but it 3HKOs with Psychic. Arcanine is 2HKOed by TBolt and is beatable if healthy enough. Rhydon can also be poisoned, but you don't have anything to hit it with (other than Sonic Boom)

D-tier. Zubat has one very useful advantage, which is a great matchup against Misty and Erika (and potentially Lt. Surge). However, take away those, and Zubat is E-tier. Zubat's terrible period + its lack of power for most of the game (now that I check logs, maybe I should have used DEdge instead of Bite, but anyways). It is all around a bad Pokemon that is only saved by miraculously having a great matchup against two of the more difficult bosses.

TMs used: Mega Drain

Misty(22): Bite 2HKOs Staryu. Leech Life 7HKOs +1 Starmie. Starmie's Water Gun is a 5HKO, while Bubble Beam is a 4HKO. Confuse Ray can help a lot here. Only crits are an issue. All in all, Golbat performs well here.

Blue #3 (25): Bite 2HKOs Pidgeotto and Raticate and almost OHKOs Kadabra. Leech Life 2HKOs Ivysaur

Lt. Surge(26): Bite 2HKOs Voltorb, OHKOs PIkachu, and 3HKOs Raichu. Raichu 2HKOs with Thunderbolt and 4HKOs with Thundershock. Confuse Ray can help a lot here.

Blue #4 (28): Bite 3HKOs Pidgeotto and seems to be a 4HKO on Gyara. 2HKOs Growlithe and OHKOs Kadabra as well. Leech Life 2HKOs Ivysaur. Watch out for Sand-Attack

Giovanni #1 (31): Bite 5HKOs Kanga, throw in a Confuse Ray to help yourself. Onix and Rhyhorn require Leech Life spam + confusion hax to fall quickly, unless you have Mega Drain

Erika(31): Leech Life 3HKOs the Poison-types and Bite spam beats Tangela. You are not threatened in this fight at all.

Blue #5 (41): Bite 3HKOs Pidgeot and 2HKOs Growlithe and Alakazam. Wing Attack 3HKOs Venusaur. Avoid Gyarados

Giovanni #2 (41): Bite spam beats Nidorino, along with Kanga with Confuse Ray. Mega Drain OHKOs Rhyhorn. Nidoqueen can also be muscled with Confuse Ray and Bite, but if Body Slam paralyzes, you may actually lose.

Koga(43): Bite 3HKOs Koffing and 4HKOs Muk. Weezing will generally explode on you. This is by far the worst matchup I've ever experienced against Koga

Sabrina(43): Wing Attack 2HKOs Venomoth and Bite 2HKOs Kadabra and 3HKOs the rest. Golbat takes heavy damage from Kadabra and Mr. Mime has to derp to win this. You also need to be healthy enough to live a Psybeam from Venomoth. The best way to sweep safely is use Confuse Ray

Blaine(47): Bite 3HKOs the unevolved stuff and seems to be a 3-4HKO on Rapidash. Arcanine takes them like nothing. You outspeed all of them, so help yourself with Confuse Ray

Giovanni #3 (48): Mega Drain OHKOs Rhyhorn and 2HKOs Rhydon. Bite 2HKOs Dugtrio and you need to spam it against the Nidos. However, Dugtrio Growls and thus makes taking the Nidos down more time-consuming than it already is.

Blue #6 (48): Mega Drain OHKOs Rhyhorn. Bite seems to be a 4HKO on Pidgeot, 4HKO on Gyarados, 2HKO on Growlithe, and a 3HKO on Zam. Venusaur can be muscled through with Wing Attack. As a whole, you are beating Growlithe, Rhyhorn, Pidgeot, and Venusaur, though the latter two will take some time

Lorelei(52): Can beat Cloyster and Jyxn with confusion (4HKOs the former with Mega Drain and 3HKOs the latter with Bite). Slowbro can be muscled through, but slowly.

Bruno(52): Mega Drain OHKOs Onix. Wing Attack 3HKOs Chan, 2HKOs Lee, 4HKOs Machamp, though none of them threatens you

Agatha(52): in general, you won't be 2HKOing anything here with Wing Attack or Bite. Your best bet is Confuse Ray + Wing Attack / Bite and hope for the best. Though only Gengar #2 outspeeds

Lance(52): can muscle through Dragonairs, but DNite, due to Barrier, is not worth it

Champion Blue(52): beats Rhydon and Venusaur. Pidgeot, Arcanine, and Gyara can be beaten with confusion hax, but it takes a while. Zam murders it

D-tier. Just like Zubat, it happens to have great matchups against Misty and Erika (along with Lt. Surge), but is rather bad elsewhere. It's slightly more useful than Zubat, because it can utilize Dig and SD. However, it's likely worse without Dig, as I found myself using it a lot. Furthermore, while Spore is a great move, Parasect doesn't use it to its best, because it's slower than most of the game, so it cannot 1v1 everything with it, though I have found that abusing the badge boost glitch through SD can help.

TMs used: Dig, Swords Dance

Misty(21): Leech Life 6HKOs Starmie if Misty goes X Defend turn one. Staryu is 2HKOed by Dig even at +1. Stun Spore helps greatly against Starmie. Starmie's Tackle (it doesn't click anything else) is easily negated by Leech Life recovery, only repetitive crits may cause some issues

Blue #3 (25): Leech Life OHKOs Kadabra and Ivysaur and 3HKOs Raticate. Body Slam 2HKOs Pidgeotto, watch out for Sand-Attack

Lt. Surge(25): Dig OHKOs everything, unless you get a Growl or something. You can also resort to spamming Leech Life, as you are not super threatened, but it takes a long time. Also note that Raichu's Thunderbolt is a 5HKO on it and crits speed up its defeat. Also note that Growl on Leech Life is annoying

Blue #4 (28): Body Slam 2HKOS Pidgeotto and seems to be a 3HKO on Gyara. Dig OHKOs Growlithe. Leech Life 2HKOs Ivysaur and OHKOs Kadabra

Giovanni #1 (31): Dig 2HKOs the Rocks and seems to be a 3HKO on Kanga. You can put things to sleep with Spore if you are feeling threatened

Erika(31): Leech Life 2HKOs the Poison-types. Put Tangela to sleep so Constrict doesn't lower your Speed. Victreebel can also be put to sleep so it doesn't annoy you with Wrap. No threats here whatsoever, as poison damage is negated by Leech Life recovery

Blue #5 (41): +2 Slash 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyarados and OHKOs Growlithe and Zam. +2 Dig and Slash KO Venusaur. However, Wing Attack + Bite + Ember put it in red, with Zam finishing it off. Venusaur gives it a chance to strike it, as it goes for Poisonpowder. Put Pidgeot and Gyara to sleep in order to beat them

Giovanni #2 (41): +2 Dig 2HKOs Kanga and OHKOs the rest. Put Nidorino and Kanga to sleep to set up and attack more safely. +2 Slash 2HKOs Nidoqueen if it's not a crit

Koga(42): +2 Dig OHKOs everything. Also outspeeds everything bar Weezing, so it can 1v1 them with Spore anyways

Sabrina(43): +2 Dig OHKOs everything, but you have to Spore everything in order to win safely. Zam will likely finish you off if it doesn't derp

Blaine(47): +2 Dig OHKOs everything. However, you only outspeed Growlithe, so you need the rest to derp and use Super Potion in order to be defeated, otherwise they either Fire Spin you or Fire Blast you.

Giovanni #3 (47): +2 Dig 2HKOs Rhydon and OHKOs the rest. You outspeed the Rhyhorn line, so they are not an issue. Nidos don't threaten you, even with Poison Sting, unless they crit

Blue #6 (47): Pidgeot 2HKOs with Wing Attack, but you can put it to sleep. +2 Slash should 2HKO it. Rhyhorn and Growlithe are outsped and OHKOed by +2 Dig. Gyarados can be put to sleep (never KOs you without crits) and 2HKOed with +2 Slash. You need to heal against Zam, as it will KO you if it doesn't derp, though if you do not die, you can put Zam to sleep and kill it with Slash. Venusaur is 2HKOed by +2 Dig and can be put to sleep. All you have to do is be healthy enough to withstand enough poisoning

Lorelei(52): Dewgong outspeeds and 2HKOs with Aurora Beam, but you should put it to sleep. Then set up SD twice, as you will outspeed after that due to badge boost glitch. Then just spam Slash and put Cloyster and Slowbro to sleep (outspeeds the former thanks to badge boost glitch). Jynx always wins, even if you are at +6. Lapras will OHKO you with Blizzard, but if it misses, Spore then SD twice

Bruno(52): put Onix #1 to sleep and set up SD twice, this way, you outspeed everything bar Lee, which won't threaten you anyways. Then just spam Slash or Dig, as appropriate and put everything you outspeed to sleep

Agatha(52): +2 Dig OHKOs Arbok and the Ghosts, though it's outsped by all of them. Badge boost glitch is ineffective for the Ghosts, as they are faster anyways

Lance(52): you need to put Gyara to sleep. Set up SD three times, as you outspeed Gyara and Dragonairs this way. +6 Dig OHKOs Dragonair and Slash spam will beat Gyara safely as long as you put it to sleep. Aerodactyl is 2HKOed by uncrit Slash, but you can put it to sleep (it's faster, though if it doesn't go for Hyper Beam, you are safe). DNite is also 2HKOed and is faster.

Champion Blue(52): you pmuch need three SDs to KO things. +6 Slash 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyara and OHKOs Zam. +6 Dig OHKOs the rest. However, you need tons of luck, as you take heavy damage from Wing Attack and you need to be healthy to withstand an Ember from Arcanine.

Conveniently linking to my Machamp post. For most parts, there don't seem to be drastic differences between Machamp and Machoke. It looks like Machoke is mostly weaker at the E4, because it 3HKOs things that Machamp would 2HKO. I am not really sure if that is worth a tier difference or no, so I will let Drumstick decide based on logs (and I am in need of sleep anyways, so maybe I will change my stance when I wake up).

TMs used: EQ, Rock Slide

Blue #4 (28): Rock Slide OHKOs Pidgeotto, Kadabra, and Growlithe and 2HKOs the rest. Note that Kadabra and Gyara are faster

Giovanni #1 (30): Low Kick 2HKOs everything, with Dig OHKOing Rhyhorn

Erika(30): EQ 2HKOs Victreebel and 3HKOs Vileplume. Tangela is not an issue. Victreebel and Vileplume pmuch beat it if they put it to sleep and Petal Dance seems to be a 3HKO on Machoke

Blue #5 (41): Rock Slide 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyarados and OHKOs Growlithe. Gyarados murders it, along with Zam and Venusaur

Giovanni #2 (41): EQ OHKOs Nidorino and 2HKOs Nidoqueen, while Low Kick 2HKOs the rest

Koga(42): EQ OHKOs Koffing and 2HKOs the rest. Only Weezing outspeeds

Sabrina(43): EQ OHKOs Kadabra and Rock Slide OHKOs Venomoth. You can only beat one of them 1v1 without healing, as Kadabra puts you in red with Psychic

Blaine(46): EQ 2HKOs Arcanine and OHKOs the rest. Note that Arcanine 2HKOs with Fire Blast and that Rapidash is faster and can Fire Spin you

Giovanni #3 (48): EQ OHKOs Dugtrio and Nidoking, 3HKOs Rhydon, and 2HKOs the rest

Blue #6 (48): Rock Slide 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyarados, though the latter deals heavy damage with Hydro Pump. EQ dispatches Rhyhorn and Growlithe. The rest are guaranteed loses, since Venusaur spams Razor Leaf.

Lorelei(51): Low Kick 2HKOs Dewgong, which just spams Rest, 3HKOs Cloyster, watch out for Clamp, and 3HKOs Lapras, which generally beats it due to murdering it with special moves. Slowbro is not a threat whatsoever and Jynx is OHKOed by Rock Slide, though Ice Punch hurts

Bruno(52): EQ 2HKOs Onix (if no X Defend), 2HKOs Lee and 3HKOs Chan. 4HKOs Machamp. Watch out for Chan's Counter and Lee can deal heavy damage that will make you an easy target for Machamp

Agatha(52): EQ OHKOs the Ghosts and 2HKOs Arbok. Rock Slide 2HKOs Golbat. Ghosts are faster, so prepare for some hax.

Lance(52): 3HKOs Dragonair with EQ and 2HKOs Aero with Rock Slide. DNite's Barrier makes it a hell, unless you taught Seismic Toss

Champion Blue(53): Rock Slide 3HKOs Pidgeot, though it can hit hard with Sky Attack. EQ 3HKOs Rhydon and 2HKOs Arcanine

D-tier. It's a bit similar to Butterfree, in all honesty, except it comes later, but hits harder with Psychic and has Leech Life to perform better against Psychic-types. But yeah, this isn't really powerful and needs Sleep Powder to get past any tougher opponent. Keep it in D-tier

TMs used: Mega Drain, Psychic

Erika(32): note that I caught it as Venomoth directly. Psychic 2HKOs the Poison-types, with Confusion also being a viable option, but slower one. It is not threatened in this fight whatsoever

Blue #5 (41): Psychic 3HKOs Pidgeot. Gyarados is 4HKOed, avoid it. Leech Life 3HKOs Zam, though it generally beats you if you are not at full health. Venusaur is 3HKOed by Leech Life. Growlithe is 2HKOed by Psychic

Giovanni #2 (42): Psychic 2HKOs Kanga and Nidoqueen and OHKOs Nidorino. Mega Drain OHKOs Rhyhorn

Koga(42): Psychic OHKOs Koffing and 2HKOs the rest.

Sabrina(43): Leech Life 2HKOs Kadabra and 3HKOs the other Psychics. Psychic 2HKOs Venomoth. You must put everything to sleep with Sleep Powder. Zam is faster, so it may be able to kill you

Blaine(47): Psychic 4HKOs Arcanine, 3HKOs Rapidash, and 2HKOs the rest. Put the evolved stuff to sleep to make the matchup safer

Giovanni #3 (47): Mega Drain OHKOs Rhyhorn and 2HKOs Dugtrio and Rhydon. Psychic 2HKOs Nidos

Blue #6 (48): Mega Drain OHKOs Rhyhorn. Psychic 3HKOs Pidgeot, 4HKOs Gyarados, and 2HKOs Growlithe. Leech Life can muscle through Zam with crits. Venusaur is 3HKOed by Leech Life. You must put a lot of things to sleep, with Zam being faster and needing to use Reflect, since it will murder you otherwise.

Lorelei(51): Leech Life 3HKOs Jynx. Mega Drain 3HKOs Cloyster. Dewgong seems to be 5-6HKOed (3HKOed by all crits). Lapras takes a lot of time. Slowbro can be muscled through with Leech Life. You need to put everything to sleep bar Slowbro

Bruno(51): Mega Drain OHKOs Onix, while Psychic 2HKOs Machamp and OHKOs Hitmons. No issues

Agatha(52): Psychic 3HKOs Gengar and 2HKOs the rest. Gengar #2 is the only one that outspeeds you, so the rest you can put to sleep and spam Psychic

Lance(52): muscles through Dragons with no problems. Gyara and Aero can be put to sleep and be muscled through with Psychic

Champion Blue(52): Mega Drain 2HKOs Rhydon and Psychic 3HKOs Venusaur. The rest have to be put to sleep, though Zam murders it, as it's faster

next team: Magmar / Ponyta / Koffing / Grimer. I may have some level issues, cause same availability, but we will see.

e: Blue #2 not present for Paras and Zubat cause they were underleveled, so I didn't bother there

DrumstickGaming · Nov 16, 2020

Quick update:
Magnemite rises to C
Machop (as a whole) merged in C (for mostly reducing clutter, though I can see Yellow Machamp going to B potentially)

Onix stays in D
Cubone stays in D (lots of 3HKOs, ehhhh)
Hitmonchan stays in D by the skin of its teeth (if people wanna throw it in E, just say so and I'll do it)
Zubat stays in D
Paras stays in D
Venonat stays in D

As for my Yellow run, yeah still kinda unmotivated with it at the moment (I'm busy writing a book and after I run a game three times in like roughly half a year my motivation just starts tanking).

I still want this list to see publication though! I'm glad with how smooth it's going and I don't think we're too far off from moving onto writeups it looks like.

Ryota Mitarai · Nov 17, 2020

did my run. Also did a run with Porygon / Tangela / Zapdos / Moltres

Magmar's biggest issue is the availability. Comes rather late and Fire is not a particularly useful typing at this point. I wouldn't go as far as calling it completely useless, though I personally found it very unimpressive myself. I don't think D-tier is impossible, but, in all honesty, I really wouldn't bat an eyelid if it stayed in E-tier, but this statement likely comes out of bias, rather than out of objectivity. The only unique thing I can think of about it is that it learns a decent Fire move by level (Fire Punch), though you are stuck with Ember for some time.

TMs used: Fire Blast, Double-Edge, Psychic

Blue #5 (42): DEdge puts Zam in red. Psychic 2HKOs Growlithe and 3HKOs Pidgeot. Ember 3HKOs Venusaur

Giovanni #2 (42): Psychic spam wins this

Sabrina(43): DEdge OHKOs Kadabra. Fire Punch 2HKOs Mr. Mime and Venomoth, though Mr. Mime can use Light Screen. Zam is 2HKOed by DEdge, but is faster, 3HKOs with Psybeam, and can set up Reflect and troll with Recover

Blaine(47): DEdge 3HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest. Rapidash may be able to beat you due to recoil. Growls are fatal. Arcanine beats you, unless you troll it with Confuse Ray

Giovanni #3 (47): Psychic 2HKOs Rhyhorn and Nidos. DEdge OHKOs Dugtrio. Fire Blast 3HKOs Rhydon

Blue #6 (49): Fire Punch 2HKOs Pidgeot, though seems to be rolls, and Venusaur. Psychic 2HKOs Rhyhorn and Growlithe. Gyara and Zam generally wins

Lorelei(52): Fire Punch 2HKOs Cloyster and seems to be a 3HKO on Dewgong. Fire Blast OHKOs Jynx (Fire Punch doesn't). The rest are bad matchups

Bruno(52): Psychic OHKOs Hitmons and Onix #1 and 2HKOs the rest.

Agatha(52): Psychic 3HKOs Gengar and 2HKOs the rest. Gengar are faster, so prepare for hax

Lance(52): Psychic 3HKOs Dragonair, which 2HKOs with Hyper Beam. As a whole, do not bother

Champion Blue(53): Fire Blast 2HKOs Pidgeot and 3HKOs Rhydon. Fire Punch 3HKOs Venusaur. The rest are not efficient matchups, so do not bother with them

Pretty much what I said about Magmar, but slightly worse. The only thing it has above Magmar is Fire Spin to troll opponents. E-tier or D-tier, depending on how useful it is deemed to be. If Magmar stays in E, then Ponyta should, as well.

TMs used: Fire Blast, Double-Edge

Blue #5 (42): DEdge 2HKOs Pidgeot on rolls, OHKOs Growlithe, and OHKOs Zam on rolls. Venusaur is 3HKOed by Ember and can be trolled with Fire Spin

Giovanni #2 (42): DEdge + Stomp KO Nidorino. DEdge 2HKOs Kanga on rolls. Rhyhorn is 5HKOed by Ember, can be trolled by Fire Spin. Nidoqueen is 3HKOed by DEdge and may beat it due to recoil from DEdge.

Sabrina(43): Stomp OHKOs Kadabra. DEdge 2HKOs the rest, with Ember 3HKOing Venomoth. Zam doesn't threaten it, as you are faster and it also often goes for Recover or Reflect, neither of which changes the matchup too much. Rapidash can live a Psybeam after recoil from 80 HP or so.

Blaine(47): DEdge 3HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest. Arcanine beats you, unless you troll it with Fire Spin. Growls are fatal

Giovanni #3 (48): Fire Blast 3HKOs Rhydon and 2HKOs the rest. FBlast + Stomp KO Nidos. You can also troll with Fire Spin and put them in range.

Blue #6 (48): Fire Blast 2HKOs Pidgeot, Rhyhorn, and Venusaur. DEdge 2HKOs Zam, which you outspeed, and OHKOs Growlithe. Zam ideally should go for Reflect, since no additional recoil or damage

Lorelei(52): Fire Blast 3HKOs Dewgong (and seems to also 3HKO), 2HKOs Cloyster, and OHKOs Jynx on rolls. You need to Fire Spin a lot to put them in range to preserve Fire Blast PP

Bruno(52): Fire Blast 2HKOs Onix and Machamp and OHKOs Hitmons. For Onix, you can also Fire Spin it to preserve Fire Blast PP

Agatha(52): Fire Blast 3HKOs Gengar #1 and Haunter, 4HKOs Gengar #2, and 2HKOs the rest. You may need to Fire Spin a lot to preserve Fire Blast PP. Note that Gengare (pun intended) faster

Lance(52): bad. Dragonair isn't even a guaranteed 2HKO with DEdge and it 3HKOs with HB.

Champion Blue(52): Fire Blast 2HKOs Pidgeot and 4HKOs Rhydon. Fire Blast 2HKOs Venusaur. The rest are not efficient matchups, so do not bother with them

D-tier. While it is not great and comes somewhat late, it has a movepool that makes it useful enough (mostly Fire Blast and Thunderbolt, sometimes Sludge). I found its E4 performance to not be that bad, most notably Lorelei. Nothing higher, though, since it requires the contested TBolt TM and comes late.

TMs used: Fire Blast, Thunderbolt

Blue #5 (42): TBol 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyara. Sludge 3HKOs Pidgeot, OHKOs Growlithe, and almost OHKOs Zam, though it beats you anyways. Venusaur is 3HKOed by Sludge and you beat it if you are healthy enough

Giovanni #2 (43): TBolt 2HKOs Kanga and Nidorino (Sludge 3HKOs the former). Rhyhorn can be muscled through with Toxic + Sludge. If you taught it Self-destruct, you can explode on Nidoqueen, but you are not OHKOing

Sabrina(43): Sludge OHKOs Kadabra and 2HKOs the rest. However, Kadabra puts you in red with Psychic and 2HKOs with Psybeam. Venomoth 4HKOs with Psybeam and Zam murders you with Psybeam. You are also slower than everything. Not a great matchup, in all honesty

Blaine(47): Sludge seems to be around 4HKO on Arcanine and a 2HKO on the rest. Growls are fatal and you are likely losing against Arcanine, which Fire Blasts you to death, though you can weaken it with Toxic + Sludge. Watch out for Fire Spin too (you outspeed the unevolved stuff)

Giovanni # (48): Fire Blast 3HKOs Rhydon and 2HKOs the rest. You are not doing much without item support, unless you decide to Toxic stall

Blue #6 (48): TBolt 2HKOs Pidgeot and OHKOs Gyarados. Sludge 2HKOs Growlithe. Fire Blast 3HKOs Rhyhorn. Venusaur is 2HKOed by Fire Blast, though you can also just muscle through it with Sludge

Lorelei(52): Thunderbolt spam beats Dewgong. Slowbro can be taken down with Sludge + Toxic, cause it spams Amnesia. Jynx is 2HKOed by Sludge and is not threatening outside of Ice Punch. Cloyster is outsped and 2HKOed by Thunderbolt, watch out for Clamp. Lapras 2HKOs with special moves, but is 3HKOed by TBolt

Bruno(53): Fire Blast 2HKOs Onix, 3HKOs Machamp, and OHKOs Hitmons on rolls. You can also Toxic stall if needed, since you are not threatened as a whole

Agatha(53): Thunderbolt 2HKOs Golbat, 3HKOs Arbok, and 4HKOs Haunter (which is faster). Gengare (pun intended) a lost hope.

Lance(53): beats Dragonair with no problems. Gyarados is 2HKOed by TBolt, but HB and HP are 2HKOs. Aero is 2HKOed by TBolt, but it may finish you off. DNite doesn't threaten you, but if you don't have Toxic, you will be spending some time killing it

Champion Blue(53): TBolt 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyarados, though both 2HKO it with their strongest moves. Venusaur and Weezing 3HKO each other with Razor Leaf and Fire Blast, though if it goes for Mega Drain or Solar Beam, you gain the upper hand.

D-tier. Just like Weezing, it is useful enough to actually contribute something worthwile. While its Thunderbolt isn't as powerful as Weezing's, it hits much harder with Sludge and also has Mega Drain to deal with Rhyhorns.

TMs used: Mega Drain, Thunderbolt, Body Slam (forgot it after Gio #2), Fire Blast.

Blue #5 (42): Sludge 2HKOs Pidgeot on rolls (TBolt is a sure 2HKO) and OHKOs Growlithe and Alakazam, though Zam hits it hard with Confusion. Gyarados is 2HKOed by TBolt and Sludge 3HKOs Venusaur. You may not be able to sweep, because you will take a lot of damage, but avoid Zam and you will beat 4/5 of his team, for most parts

Giovanni #2 (42): Body Slam 2HKOs Nidorino and 4HKOs Nidoqueen. Sludge 3HKOs Kanga. Mega Drain almost OHKOs Rhyhorn

Sabrina(43): Sludge OHKOs Kadabra and 2HKOs the rest. However, Kadabra puts you in red with Psychic and 2HKOs with Psybeam. Venomoth 3HKOs with Psybeam and Zam murders you with Psybeam. You are also slower than everything. Not a great matchup, in all honesty

Blaine(47): Sludge 3HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest, though Ponyta seems to outspeed you. Other than Growl and Fire Spin trolls, you should not have too many problems here

Giovanni #3 (48): Mega Drain OHKOs Rhyhorn and 2HKOs Dugtrio and Rhydon, though the former trolls you with Dig. Nidos are 3HKOed by Fire Blast, you likely take out one of them without item support

Blue #6 (48): Sludge OHKOs Growlithe and 3HKOs Venusaur. Mega Drain OHKOs Rhyhorn. TBolt 2HKOs Pidgeot and OHKOs Gyara on rolls

Lorelei(52): beats Dewgong due to Rest spam and Slowbro due to Amnesia spam. Sludge 2HKOs Jynx and it's not threatening you unless it picks Ice Punch. Cloyster is 2HKOed by Thunderbolt, watch out for Clamp. Lapras is 4HKOed and 2HKOs with special moves.

Bruno(52): Mega Drain OHKOs Onix. Sludge without X Defend seems to 3HKO Chan and 2HKOs Lee. Machamp can be muscled through. Nothing on his team threatens you

Agatha(52): beats Arbok and Golbat, but useless against Ghosts

Lance(52): beats Dragonair with no problems. Gyarados is 2HKOed by TBolt, but HB and HP are 2HKOs. Aero is 2HKOed by TBolt, but it may finish you off. DNite doesn't threaten you, but if you don't have Toxic, you will be spending some time killing it

Champion Blue(52): Thunderbolt 3HKOs Pidgeot, which 2HKOs with Sky Attack. Gyara is 2HKOed, but 2HKOs back. Rhydon is 2HKOed by Mega Drain on rolls. Venusaur is like 4HKOed by Sludge, but it can beat you if it spasm Razor Leaf, but if it were to spam anything else, you would be safe

I only used this for write-up data. I have no intentions of nomming it higher than E-tier. Obviously, it's performance-wise not E-tier, though this largely depends on if you teach it good TMs. Due to the fact I didn't feel required to test it as optimally as possible, I was at liberty to inflate it with TMs.

TMs used: Tri Attack, Ice Beam, Psychic, Thunderbolt

Blue #4 (31): Ice Beam OHKOs Pidgeotto and 2HKOs Ivysaur, TBolt OHKOs Gyarados and 2HKOs Growlithe, and Tri Attack OHKOs Kadabra. However, you only outspeed Growlithe

Erika(31): Ice Beam 2HKOs the Poison-types and kills Tangela. Victreebel is faster and 2HKOs with Razor Leaf. Vileplume doesn't threaten you, unless it puts you to sleep

Koga(43): Psychic OHKOs Koffing and 2HKOs the rest. No problems

Blue #5 (43): Ice Beam 2HKOs Pidgeot and Venusaur and TBolt OHKOs Gyara. Tri Attack 2HKOs the rest. Note that you are pmuch outsped by everything (bar Growlithe), so you are very unlikely to sweep

Giovanni #2 (43): Psychic OHKOs Nidorino and 2HKOs Kanga and Nidoqueen. Ice Beam OHKOs Rhyhorn

Sabrina(43): Tri Attack 2HKOs everything. However, Zam 3HKOs with Psybeam and can troll with Recover + Reflect, so you may not be able to beat it, especially if you've taken damage

Blaine(47): Tri Attack 4HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest. Ponyta onwards are faster and can Fire Spin you. Growl is also fatal here.

Giovanni #3 (48): Ice Beam OHKOs Rhyhorn and 2HKOs the rest

Blue #6 (49): TBolt 2HKOs Pidgeot and OHKOs Gyarados. Ice Beam 2HKOs Venusaur, though it likely beats you, and OHKOs Rhyhorn. Tri Attack 2HKOs the rest.

Lorelei(51): Thunderbolt 2HKOs Dewgong on rolls, Cloyster, and Slowbro. Jynx is 2HKOed by Tri Attack and Lapras is 3HKOed by TBolt. You are unlikely to sweep due to not being able to OHKO anything

Bruno(51): Ice Beam OHKOs Onix, Psychic 2HKOs Machamp and OHKOs Hitmons. However, it gets KOed by Fighting moves and is slower than all of them.

Agatha(52): Psychic 3HKOs Gengar #1 and Haunter, 4HKOs Gengar #2, and 2HKOs the rest. You are slower than everything

Lance(52): Tbolt 2HKOs Gyara and Ice Beam 2HKOs the rest. It is slower than all of them and takes heavy damage from Hyper Beam

Champ Blue(53): Thunderbolt 2HKOs Pidgeot and Gyarados, while Ice Beam 3HKOs Venu (which beats you) and 2HKOs Rhydon

D-tier. Traded one can catch up fast with your team through the water routes and can actually beat opponents with SD + Body Slam and sleep. I am not sure if I would nominate it to C-tier, though, because, as logs will show, you need to spam Sleep Powder and SD a lot, but feel free to disagree with this statement. Note that I had forgotten SD for Growth, as I felt Growth would be more useful against the E4 than SD, where Body Slam would drop in usefulness.

TMs used: Body Slam, Mega Drain, SD (replaced with Growth)

Blue #5 (41): put Pidgeot to sleep with Sleep Powder. Set up a SD, which causes you to outspeed it, then set another two. Body Slam puts it in red, 2HKOs Gyarados (outspeeds even after a level up, weirdly enough), OHKOs Growlithe (outsped) and Zam (not outsped) and 2HKOs Venusaur (outsped). Still, you want to put stuff to sleep in case you crit

Giovanni #2 (43): Body Slam 3HKOs Nidorino. Mega Drain 3HKOs Kanga, OHKOs Rhyhorn, and 4HKOs Nidoqueen. You outspeed all of them, so you can put them to sleep, if anything worries you

Sabrina(43): put Kadabra to sleep and set up a SD. You outspeed after that and OHKO it with +2 Body Slam. You also outspeed and 2HKO Mr. Mime and Venomoth (put the latter to sleep). Zam is faster, but can be put to sleep (3HKOs with Psybeam). As a whole, you can win this if you do not miss Sleep Powder too often

Blaine(47): outspeeds Growlithe and can put it to sleep. +2 Body Slam OHKOs it and Ponyta, while outspeeding them. Rapidash can only be outsped if you have +3 and still have the glitch intact (and is OHKOed, otherwise 2HKOed by +2). Arcanine is 3HKOed by +2 Body Slam and 2HKOed by +3 one, though you can put it to sleep.

Giovanni #3 (48): Mega Drain kills Rhyhorn line, 2HKOs Dugtrio and muscles through Nidos. You are faster than Nidos, so put them to sleep if you worry about Poison Sting.

Blue #6 (49): note that I had forgotten SD for Growth. Put Pidgeot to sleep and 4HKO it with Body Slam, youcan set up two Growths on it (since you outspeed after that). Rhyhorn dies to Mega Drain, can also be used for setting up. Gyarados is 3HKOed by +2 Mega Drain with a possible roll for 2HKO. Growlithe is 2HKOed. Zam is 3HKOed, put it to sleep to avoid Recover trolling. Venusaur is like 5-6HKOed by Body Slam with no boosts. It is also faster if you do not have badge boosts and can poison you though you can put it to sleep.

Lorelei(51): +2 Mega Drain 2HKOs Dewgong, Slowbro, and Lapras. OHKOs Cloyster. Jynx is 3HKOed by Body Slam. Dewgong is slower, so you can put it to sleep. Also put Lapras to sleep just to avoid Blizzard hax. Jynx is your biggest threat if it crits.

Bruno(52): Mega Drain OHKOs Onix, 2HKOs Hitmons, and 4HKOs Machamp. Not threatened whatsoever

Agatha(52): nope. At most you can muscle through Golbat and Arbok, but, honestly, why are you using Tangela for this?

Lance(52): similarly here, you are not doing a lot, other than Sleep Powder + spam Growth. I would not bother here, personally

Champion Blue(52): kills Rhydon. Gyara and Zam can be muscled with +2 Mega Drain and putting them to sleep. The rest can are not great matchups (Pidgeot almost OHKOs with Sky Attack)

Tiering this one is tricky because, unlike Articuno, this thing needs a TM to function (granted, it's very likely you will keep the TBolt TM for it). It is also very bad against any Ground-type it faces and has to resort to Toxic stalling. However, its access to a more powerful Flying move (Drill Peck) certainly gives it an edge over Articuno, especially against Agatha (though not by a large margin). Zapdos is also more useful against Lorelei, but doesn't sweep.

In general, I see both birds as B-tiers in performance, but I am fine with Articuno in A for the mere reason that it requires no resources whatsoever to function. But again, those birds are special cases of tiering, so we can be more flexible in this scenario. If Zapdos rises to A, I think we could definitely consider Jolteon to A.

For logs, before Lorelei, assume level 50 with no EVs whatsoever. Lorelei and onwards, level 52 with some EVs from VR trainers.

TMs used: Thunderbolt, Toxic

Sabrina: Drill Peck almost OHKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest. No problems

Blaine: TBolt OHKOs the unevolved stuff and 2HKOs the rest. No issues

Giovanni: Drill Peck OHKOs Dugtrio, 2HKOs Nidoking and 3HKOs Nidoqueen. Rhyhorn and Rhydon need to be Toxic stalled

Blue #6: TBolt OHKOs Pidgeot, Gyarados, and Growlithe. Drill Peck 2HKOs Zam and Venu, though Zam is faster and 3HKOs with Psychic. Rhyhorn can be Toxic stalled

Lorelei(52): Thunderbolt OHKOs Slowbro and Cloyster and Dewgong on rolls. Lapras and Zapdos 2HKO each other. Jynx is 2HKOed by Drill Peck, but its Ice Punch causes Lapras's Blizzard to KO it

Bruno: Thunderbolt OHKOs Hitmons and 2HKOs Machamp. Onix has to be Toxic stalled

Agatha: Drill Peck 2HKOs Gengar #1 and Haunter and 3HKOs Gengar #2. TBolt OHKOs Golbat and 2HKOs Arbok. Gengar are faster

Lance: TBolt OHKOs Gyarados and Aero and 3HKOs DNite. Dragonair is 3HKOed by Drill Peck, rolls for 2HKO. DNite will likely finish you off with HB if you go for a sweep

Champion Blue: beats Gyara and Pidgeot with no problems. Arcanine is 3HKOed by TBolt. Zam and Venusaur are 2HKOed by Drill Peck, though Zam outspeeds and 3HKOs with Psychic. Rhydon can be Toxic stalled

Yeah, this one is also not going to be an easy case of tiering. It has one of the worst availabilities for the games, only rivaled by Porygon's. With that said, though, its Fire Blast is actually the most powerful in the whole game. However, you are mostly using that, which means you will often have to restore its PP due to low PP and imperfect accuracy (imagine missing and thus wasting PP for nothing).

I found Moltres somewhat lackluster against Agatha's Gengar (cause they are faster) and is also somewhat useless against Lance. It is also not particularly noteworthy against Champion Blue. Therefore, I am leaning towards E-tier. I have a hard time seeing its performance outweighting its inconvenient availability in any ways. However, I understand that someone may think it's D-tier due to technically being able to do something, so I am ready to discuss this if there's a need to.

for logs, assume level 52 with some EVs from VR trainers

TMs used: Fire Blast, Sky Attack, Toxic (never used it, but could be useful ig?)

Lorelei: Fire Blast OHKOs Cloyster and Jynx, 3HKOs Lapras, and 2HKOs Dewgong. Slowbro can be Toxic stalled.

Bruno: Fire Blast 2HKOs Machamp and OHKOs the rest.

Agatha: Fire Blast 3HKOs Gengar and 2HKOs the rest, with Arbok being rolls for an OHKO. Gengar are faster, so prepare for hax there

Lance: Fire Blast doesn't 2HKO anything here. While you can muscle through the Dragonairs, you are overall not doing much here. Sky Attack puts them in red, but that is as good as Moltres can be here

Champion Blue: Fire Blast 2HKOs Pidgeot and Venusaur. Sky Attack OHKOs Alakazam, which damages you hardly if it goes for an attacking move in both turns, and 3HKOs Arcanine, which can weaken or even KO you in the process. Gyarados should be avoided. Rhydon seems to be 3-4HKOed by Fire Blast.

with that, I have more or less tested everything in RB. I am planning on taking a break from testing for this list, because I want to help out HGSS in the near future and because I am in need of a break from gen 1 as a whole, in order to keep my tests at a good quality.

I will be available to discuss things, it's only the testing part that I am abstaining from currently.

e: I am planning on retesting everything in Yellow to make sure we have data for both games before we move to write-ups, but this will happen at a later point.

Ryota Mitarai · Dec 16, 2020

heyo, I started running Yellow and did a few runs already in the last few days. Before I post logs, I want to clear out few things:

- I will use a Pokemon and say whenever it should split from its RB tier or keep them in the same tier. I may extrapolate a bit, because Yellow is notably more difficult for some Pokemon (aka a Pokemon that performs better in RB is not necessarily a different tier from its Yellow counterpart). This assumes that we don't split the lists, which I don't think is needed

- I am not going to test everything, for the mere reason that I don't see the need for that. I am mostly going to test B-tier (and maybe later C) and above and anything I feel like may actually change tiers. The Pokemon that I am not going to test for now (list may change in the future) are: Dratini, Pidgey, Onix, Abra (I think we all know this is S-tier anyways), Ditto, Porygon, Zubat, Hitmonchan (maybeee I am gonna test it at the very end), and Pinsir. I am also going to test only a few of the late-game Water-types, as they all perform the same, bar Staryu and Seel, which are higher tiers for a reason. Per calculations, if I were to complete one run every day (which wouldn't be hard, as we do nothing in online classes and analyzing tiers is much easier when I have data from RB), I could theoritically be done within 13 days, so perhaps we can push to write-ups just before the end of the year.

- I am not testing rival in those, bar the Champ fight. Half the fights barely have anything evolved and, bar the Champion, all his mons have a questionable movepool, except the starter in the 6th fight. I tried testing him in one of my runs, but I honestly gained nothing from them, so I stopped bothering. My runs assume that the player defeated Blue the first time but skipped the second fight, which gives him the Flareon team

- Levels are slightly higher here due to the increased levels of the opponents. For Koga and onwards, I do every single fight I can do (including Gym trainers) before fighting the Gym. For example, I complete routes after Rock Tunnel, Silph Co., Saffron's Gym Trainers, then Koga. After that, I complete the water routes, Pokemon Mansion, and Blaine's Gym trainers before fighting Sabrina. The reason for doing that is to be as close as possible to the level 50 Pokemon. I think, when we get to making the list as an article, we can reasonably suggest to the reader to use less Pokemon in Yellow so they don't do this, but we can deal with this later.

- I will post multiple runs in bulk, mostly to avoid multiple postings in here. Assume somewhere three per post.

===

run #1: Primeape / Golem / Vaporeon / Chansey

TMs used: Dig, Rock Slide

Brock(11): Low Kick 2HKOs Geodude and 3HKOs Onix. Onix is faster and can Wrap you to death.

Blue #2 (18): Low Kick OHKOs Eevee and Rattata, 2HKOs Spearow, and 3HKOs Sandshrew

Misty(22): Karate Chop 2HKOs Staryu and 3HKOs Starmie. Starmie 2HKOs with Bubble Beam and 3HKOs with Water Gun, so you need it to derp to win

Lt. Surge(28): Dig OHKOs Raichu, while Karate Chop 2HKOs. Raichu is slower and also 2HKOs with Thunderbolt, so you always win

Gio #1(30): Low Kick spam

Erika(32): Dig 2HKOs the Poison-types, though Weepinbell's Razor Leaf 2HKOs as well. Status can be very problematic here

Gio #2(43): Dig deals with Poison-type, rest is dealt with Low Kick

Koga(45): Rock Slide OHKOs the first two Venonat, with the third one being rolls. 2HKOs Venomoth. Outspeeds all, though Venonat 3HKOs with Psychic, while Moth 2HKOs, so missing can be fatal

Sabrina(48): outspeeds and OHKOs Abra and Kadabra with Karate Chop (Kadabra is rolls, but dies to Dig if no X Defend). Zam is speedtied and it OHKOs with Psychic, though KChop 2HKOs it

Blaine(48): Dig OHKOs Rapidash and Ninetales on rolls and 2HKOs Arcanine, while outspeeding. However, Flamethrowers 2HKO it

Gio #3 (48): Dig 2HKOs Nidos and 3HKOs Rhydon. Karate Chop puts Dugtrio in red and Low Kick puts Persian in red. Outspeeds all. Rhydon may beat you if too weakened

Lorelei(53): Low Kick 2HKOs Dewgong and 3HKOs Cloyster and Lapras, the latter 2HKOs with special moves. Rock Slide OHKOs Jynx while outspeeding. Avoid Slowbro, it has Psychic this time

Bruno(54): Low Kick 2HKOs Onix, while Dig 2HKOs Hitmonchan and Hitmonlee. Machamp is 3HKOed and will generally beat you.

Agatha(54): Dig OHKOs the Ghosts and Arbok, while Rock Slide 2HKOs Golbat. Outspeeds all

Lance(54): Dig 2HKOs Dragonair and Rock Slide 2HKOs Aerodactyl. However, you are easily worn out, so you don't do much here

Blue (54): beats Flareon and Magneton (though enjoy the TWave). Cloyster is 4HKOed by Low Kick and likes to Clamp

Primeape is somewhat better here, actually. This is mainly because Mankey now can perform well against Brock and the higher levels allow it to be a Primeape against Lt. Surge. Its mid-game is more or less the same, no notable differences, at least that's what I felt when I used it. However, its end-game is a bit shakier, mainly because it no longer has the free matchup against Giovanni #3 and Lance and Lorelei is a bit more difficult

so maybe split tiers by raising Mankey (Y) to B, but the shakier end-game perhaps can keep it in C, but that depends on how much or whenever you extrapolate.

TMs used: Dig, Rock Slide

Blue #2 (18): -1 Rock Throw OHKOs Spearow and 3HKOs the Normal-types. Sandshrew is 3-4HKOed by -1 Mega Punch

Misty(21): no

Blue #3 (25): Rock Throw OHKOs Spearow and Rattata and almost OHKOs Eevee. Sandshrew is OHKOed by Dig

Lt. Surge(25): win

Gio #1 (30): win

Erika(32): outspeeds and 2HKOs Gloom with Dig. Speedties and 2HKOs Bell with Dig. You can also Self-Destruct on anything for a KO

Gio #2 (42): EQ spam

Koga(43): Rock Slide OHKOs everything while outspeeding Venonat (EQ also OHKOs the first two). Moth 3HKOs with Psychic. Great mu

Sabrina(47): EQ OHKOs everything. However, it is outsped by all and Psychic 2HKOs it. Note that Kadabra is OHKOed even if Sabrina goes for X Defend

Blaine(47): spam EQ, only worry about Fire Spin

Gio #3 (48): EQ OHKOs Dugtrio and Nidos and 2HKOs the rest. However, Nidos and Rhydon's EQ 2HKO it. Nidos are also faster.

Lorelei(54): lives an Ice Punch from Jynx and OHKOs it back with EQ. Then you can outspeed and OHKO Lapras with Explosion

Bruno(54): EQ OHKOs Onix #1 and Lee and 2HKOs Chan and Onix #2. Machamp is outsped and OHKOed by Explosion

Agatha(54): EQ OHKOs Poisons and Rock Slide OHKOs Golbat. Gengar #1 2HKOs with Mega Drain. You are also outsped by the Ghosts

Lance(55): EQ OHKOs Dragonairs on rolls and Rock Slide OHKOs Aero and 2HKOs the rest. Dragonair #2 has Bubble Beam and 2HKOs with it. DNite finishes you off with Blizzard, but dies to Explosion if it misses

Blue (55): EQ OHKOs Magneton, Flareon, and Alakazam. Eggy spams Leech Seed on you, so spam Rock Slide. Cloyster and Sandslash beat it

keep same tier
Golem is not really different here from its RB counterpart. Both are amazing if you teach them the contested Dig. End-game is slightly harsher to it, but RB end-game wasn't super ideal either, so I don't think they are different enough to split them

TMs used: Bubble Beam, Ice Beam

Gio #1 (30): Bubble Beam 2HKOs Persian and OHKOs the rest

Erika(32): Ice Beam 2HKOs everything while outspeeding. Due to Stun Spore, you may be able to take out only Tangela and Weepinbell

Gio #2 (42): Surf spam

Koga(44): Surf OHKOs the first two Venonat and almost OHKOs the second one. 3HKOs Venomoth. Moth doesn't pose much issue, other than DTeam + Toxic. Also watch out for Sleep Powder

Sabrina(48): Surf 2HKOs Kadabra and 3HKOs Zam. Kadabra 4HKOs with Psychic, while Zam 3HKOs. Watch out for Kinesis against Kadabra and Zam can Recover on you, delaying the fight

Blaine(48): Surf spam wins easily

Gio #3 (48): Surf 2HKOs Persian and OHKOs the rest. Nidoking outspeeds it (along with Persian and Dugtrio), but, bar Thunder paralysis, doesn't do a lot.

Lorelei(54): can muscle past Cloyster and Jynx, along with Dewgong if it derps enough and doesn't go for Rest. You can also try Toxic stalling, as they deal little to you

Bruno(54): Surf 2HKOs Machamp and OHKOs the rest, no issues

Agatha(54): Hydro Pump 2HKOs Gengar #1, OHKOs Arbok on rolls, and seems to 3HKO Gengar #2. Surf 2HKOs Haunter and Ice Beam puts Golbat in red. Outspeeds only Arbok

Lance(54): OHKOs Dragons with Ice Beam and Aero with Surf. You can set up Acid Armor on Gyara and not fear physical damage at all. You outspeed all Dragons and badge boost glitch helps with securing OHKOs against Dragons

Blue (55): beats Flareon, Eggy, and Sandslash. The others take a lot of time or beat it

keep same tier
Vaporeon in Yellow is now actually the best Water-type, imo, because it comes at a high level and has a high Special (Squirtle comes after three Gyms, underleveled, and is notably weaker than Vaporeon). It can take on the improved Lance incredibly well and its Surfs were all around strong even for the improved Gyms. It faces similar hurdles against opponents like Agatha and Lorelei, but Vaporeon is still good for the rest, even though they are improved, so Vaporeon definitely deserves A-tier in Yellow

TMs used: Ice Beam, Thunderbolt, Psychic

Erika(32): super effective moves 2HKO everything. If Gloom locks itself into Petal Dance, it poses even less issue

Gio #2 (42): Psychic OHKOs Nidorino and 2HKOs Nidoqueen and Persian, while Ice Beam OHKOs Rhyhorn. Nidoqueen can deal heavy damage with Double Kick

Koga(43): outspeeds and OHKOs Venonat with Psychic. Moth is 2HKOed and doesn't deal much damage in return

Sabrina(47): TBolt 4HKOs Kadabra and 5HKOs Zam. They do not deal much in return, but Kinesis and Recover are annoying, so put them to sleep with Sing

Blaine(48): Thunderbolt 3HKOs Rapidash and 4HKOs the rest. Takes lots of damage from Take Down, so Sing as much as possible

Gio #3 (48): Ice Beam OHKOs Dugtrio and OHKOs Rhydon rolls, though Dugtrio is faster. Persian is 3HKOed, while Nidos are 2HKOed by Psychic. They deal heavy damage with Double Kick. You also die to any physical move if you get Screeched

Lorelei(53): Thunderbolt 2HKOs Dewgong, Slowbro, and Cloyster, and 3HKOs the rest. You can use Sing if you are feeling threatened, but you are not taking much from special attacks

Bruno(53): Psychic OHKOs Hitmons and 2HKOs Machamp, while Ice Beam OHKOs Onix. Hitmonlee is faster and can OHKO with DKick, while Machamp can OHKO with Submission

Agatha(54): Psychic OHKOs Arbok and 2HKOs the rest. While slower and thus susceptible to hax, you can also put them to sleep with Sing and effectively shut them down

Lance(54): Ice Beam OHKOs Dragons and TBolt OHKOs Gyara, while 2HKOing Aero. It fears physical attacks greatly, but special ones are nothing for it

Blue (55): Ice Beam OHKOs Sandslash on rolls and 3HKOs Eggy (put it to sleep so it doesn't Leech Seed you). Thunderbolt 2HKOs Cloyster. The rest are special attackers that are 4HKOed at best by attacks and you want to put pmuch everything to sleep

keep same tier
While I have no experience with Chansey in RB, I can vouch for D-tier in Yellow. It has the same issues in RB in that it's got an atrocious availability and needs TMs to function, but Yellow is slightly harsher to it (and maybe other Special attackers). I cannot see this in C-tier, so keep them same tier.

===

run #2: Dugtrio / Hitmonlee / Flareon / Scyther

TMs used: Rock Slide

Lt. Surge(28): outspeeds and kills Raichu

Gio #1 (29): Dig OHKOs rocks and 2HKOs Persian

Erika(32): beats Gloom if it isn't put to sleep

Gio #2 (43): Dig spam

Koga(45): outspeeds and 2HKOs everything with Dig. Venonat don't deal much damage to it, but can status it

Sabrina(48): outspeeds everything. EQ OHKOs everything, with Zam being rolls. Dugtrio also lives one non-crit Psychic

Blaine(48): EQ OHKOs the first two and puts Arcanine. Outspeeds all and can live a Fire Blast

Gio #3 (49): EQ OHKOs Dugtrio and 2HKOs the rest. You won't be able to sweep without derps because you often get 2HKOed

Lorelei(54): EQ 2HKOs Dewgong and OHKOs Jynx

Bruno(54): EQ 2HKOs Onix and Chan, OHKOs Lee, and 3HKOs Machamp, which tends to beat it

Agatha(54): outspeeds and 2HKOs Golbat with Rock Slide and the rest OHKOs with EQ.

Lance(56): bad, cannot handle the powerful attacks, so it won't be doing much

Blue (56): beats Magneton and Flareon. Slash spam Eggy as well

keep same tier
Remains a low-cost Pokemon that can take on most opponents thanks to great STABs and high Speed. I personally didn't feel it was substantially worse. If anything, its performance here is better in some places, but not enough to split them

TMs used: Double-Edge

Gio #1 (30): DKick spam wins

Erika(32): +2 DKick 2HKOs Tangela, while +2 DEdge OHKOs the rest. However, Tangela 3HKOs with Grass moves, so you need it to use Constrict or Bind to win without healing

Gio #2 (42): +1 DEdge OHKOs Nidorino and 2HKOs Queen. DKick beats the rest

Koga(45): +1 DEdge OHKOs all Venonat. You either faint when you kill the third one if you took a Psychic from the first one or Moth outspeeds and KOs with Psychic

Sabrina(48): outspeeds and OHKOs Abra and Kadabra with DEdge. Zam is faster and can live one DEdge, so you are at its mercy

Blaine(48): +1 Jump Kick 2HKOs everything, with +2 OHKOing the first two. 2HKOed by Flamethrower, however

Gio #3 (49): +1 DKick OHKOs Dugtrio and Persian. Dugtrio is faster, but Meditate gives you badge boost, so you outspeed. Nidos are 2HKOed, but Nidoqueen generally stops your sweep. Rhydon is 3HKOed by Jump Kick, but almost OHKOs with EQ

Lorelei(53): +1 DKick OHKOs Dewgong. +1 Jump Kick OHKOs Cloyster on rolls. +3 DEdge 3HKOs Slowbro, which needs to Amnesia. +1 DKick OHKOs Jynx and +1 Jump Kick OHKOs Lapras

Bruno(54): +2 DKick 2HKOs Machamp and OHKOs the rest.

Agatha(54): cannot damage Ghosts outside of Seismic Toss. At most beats Golbat and Arbok

Lance(54): +1 Jump Kick OHKOs Dragonair, though they can paralyze it while setting up. The rest are not doable

Blue (54): rather useless. Sandslash 2HKOs with EQ, Zam OHKOs with Psychic, Eggy generally wins, Magneton OHKOs with TBolt while you don't OHKO, Cloyster is 2HKO on rolls with Jump Kick, and Flareon is not a 2HKO due to Reflect

Hitmonlee is actually notably worse here. It can't really function as a glass cannon, because everything can eat its attacks and hit it harder in return. Therefore, Hitmonlee performs a lot worse here.

I think there should be a consideration to split Hitmonlee, by dropping it to C in Yellow, where the power creep is much higher. But I didn't extrapolate, so this is more of a suggestion than a definitive nomination. As a whole, Lee is worse in Yellow, because it cannot OHKO opponents or survive their attacks due to low bulk

TMs used: Fire Blast, Double-Edge, Body Slam

Gio #1 (29): beats Persian with DEdge

Erika(32): DEdge 3HKOs Tangela and 2HKOs the rest, though the 2HKOs are put in range for Body Slam, if you taught both moves. Healing is not likely gonna be needed, but they leave you at red

Gio #2 (43): DEdge OHKOs Nidorino and Persian and 2HKOs Nidoqueen. Rhyhorn can be muscled through with Fire Spin

Koga(44): Fire Spin 3HKOs first two Venonat and 4HKOs the third one. Moth needs around six or seven to fall, though you can also DEdge it when in range

Sabrina(48): Quick Attack OHKOs Abra. Body Slam OHKOs Kadabra and puts Zam in red. Zam's Psychic is a 3HKO. You are outsped by everything unless you use QA.

Blaine(48): DEdge 2HKOs the first two and 3HKOs Arcanine. Arcanine also sets up Reflect.

Gio #3 (49): Fire Blast OHKOs Dugtrio and 2HKOs the rest bar Rhydon, which is 3HKOed. You aren't doing a lot due to EQs hitting you constantly

Lorelei(53): Fire Blast + Flamethrower 2HKO Dewgong. Flamethrower OHKOs Jynx. Fire Blast OHKOs Cloyster. Lapras seems to be a 2-3HKO with Fire Blast, though it murders you with HPump

Bruno(53): Fire Blast OHKOs Onix and 2HKOs Machamp, while Flamethrower OHKOs Hitmons

Agatha(53): Fire Blast 2HKOs Gengar and OHKOs Arbok, while Flamethrower 2HKOs the rest.

Lance(53): DEdge 2HKOs Dragonair, you beat only one

Blue(53): Fire Blast puts Sandslash in red, but it OHKOs with EQ. 2HKOs Cloyster and Magneton, watch out for Clamp. Flamethrower also 2HKOs Cloyster. Deals with Eggy. Flareon and Zam are 2HKOed by DEdge, though they can easily beat if if worn out (or Kinesis it, in Zam's case)

keep same tier
Didn't feel much of a difference. Still useful with high Attack + Double-Edge, though getting Flamethrower a bit earlier is nice (lv. 52 in Y, 54 in RB). It's hard to really pinpoint any difference from memory and, if anything, having Fire Spin for Koga is nice, so perhaps it's only slightly better here, but that doesn't matter. They shouldn't be split, imo

TMs used: Double-Edge

Gio #1 (30): beats Persian

Erika(32): Slash 3HKOs Tangela and 2HKOs the rest. Acid 3HKOs it, so it shouldn't be much of a problem

Gio #2 (44): Slash OHKOs Persian and Nidorino and 2HKOs Queen. 4HKOs Rhyhorn

Koga(45): +2 DEdge OHKOs everything while outspeeding (Slash 2HKOs instead)

Sabrina(48): outspeeds everything. Slash spam works easily

Blaine(48): Slash seems to 2HKO everything, though it dies to Flamethrower

Gio #3 (49): Slash OHKOs Dugtrio, 2HKOs Persian, and 3HKOs Nidos, which 2HKO with Thunder

Lorelei(53): Slash 2HKOs Dewgong, OHKOs Jynx on rolls, and 3HKOs Slowbro while it sets up

Bruno(53): Slash 2HKOs Hitmons and 3HKOs Machamp

Agatha(53): can only hit Ghosts with Wing Attack (lol), but that'd require many SDs to deal damage. Slash spam can get past Golbat and Arbok

Lance(53): at most OHKO Dragonair with +2 DEdge, but you get paralyzed, in most cases. Slash 2HKOs them

Blue (53): spam SD to the max and OHKO the first three before falling down. Also 2HKOs Flareon with Slash, though watch out for Fire moves.

keep same tier
Scyther is functional here, but you still spend lots of time finding it in the Safari Zone or getting it from GC and you have to deal with its non-existant movepool, which often forces it to set up SD more than once. It's slightly better here, but that may be because Scyther isn't that bad against the improved teams as opposed to being better by itself.

===

run #3: Magneton / Gengar / Snorlax / Aerodactyl

TMs used: Thunderbolt

Lt. Surge(28): Sonic Boom 4HKOs Raichu, which you can paralyze. Mega Punch is a 3HKO and Mega Kick is a 2HKO, though it almost never clicks Mega Kick and often spams Growl. The matchup is doable, though technically luck reliant

Gio #1 (32): TBolt OHKOs Persian, while Sonic Boom spam gets through the rocks

Erika(34): TBolt 3HKOs everything. You can paralyze to assist teammates

Gio #2 (43): beats Nidorino and Persian. Rhyhorn can be Sonic Boomed. Nidoqueen as well, but it beats you generally

Koga(43): Thunderbolt OHKOs the first two, 2HKOs the third, and 3HKOs Venomoth. You can paralyze Moth to make the matchup easier

Sabrina(47): TBolt 3HKOs Kadabra and Zam. You can paralyze them and make the matchup easier

Blaine(47): TBolt 3HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest. Arcanine can beat you, but it can also derp

Gio #3 (48): beats Persian

Lorelei(52): OHKOs or 2HKOs everything with TBolt spam

Bruno(53): OHKOs Hitmons and 2HKOs Machamp with TBolt

Agatha(53): TBolt 3HKOs Gengar, OHKOs Golbat, and 2HKOs the rest. You can paralyze the faster threats to prevent hax

Lance(53): beats Gyara and Aero

Blue(53): beats Cloyster and Flareon

split

Yellow Magnemite appears a lot earlier, just before Rock Tunnel. The fact that you not only don't need Surf to get it, but you also don't have to sequence break for it is a great plus for its availability. Considering Magnemite was put in C, Magnemite (Y) should be added to B. Sure, Jolteon is probably better, but we don't outclass stuff here anyways. And its Thunderbolts are more powerful anyways

TMs used: Psychic, Mega Drain

Erika(32): they can't really touch it, so you can just spam Night Shade or Psychic and win with no problems

Gio #2 (42): easy mu, as they cannot hit you with anything relevant.

Koga(43): Psychic 2HKOs Moth and OHKOs the rest, while outspeeding all

Sabrina(47): outspeeds everything. Night Shade 2HKOs Abra and 3HKOs the rest. You need Hypnosis a lot here

Blaine(47): 4HKOs Arcanine and 3HKOs the rest with Night Shade. You may wanna put Arcanine to sleep

Gio #3 (48): Mega Drain 2HKOs Dugtrio and Rhydon, while Psychic 2HKOs the rest. Put the Grounds to sleep, as they can easily OHKO with Earthquakes and so on

Lorelei(52): Mega Drain 4HKOs Dewgong and 3HKOs Cloyster. Night Shade 3HKOs Jynx and Slowbro. Lapras spams Confuse Ray. You may need to spread Hypnosis around, particularly against Slowbro

Bruno(52): Psychic and Mega Drain spam win this easily

Agatha(52): Psychic 2HKOs Gengar and Haunter and OHKOs the rest, though Golbat is rolls. You outspeed all Ghosts and can put them to sleep if you fear danger

Lance(54): Psychic 2HKOs Dragonair and Aerodactyl, while Night Shade spam is needed for the rest. Hypnosis is also very needed here, due to taking long to beat them or because of Thunder Wave

Blue(54): Hypnosis + Mega Drain/Night Shade is the only way to come close to a sweep against him

keep same tier
Gengar is a bit worse in Yellow, in all honesty, because you need to put a lot more things to sleep than in RB, but with extrapolation, Gengar performs all around the same for both games. And the differences mainly come in the end-game, as opposed to it being a prevelant thing. I think it may be worth merging Haunter and Gengar, though, considering that Haunter is B in RB for the same reason, I don't really mind a merge to A-tier.

Erika(32): Headbutt 3HKOs Tangela and 2HKOs the rest. Weepinbell 3HKOs with Razor Leaf, while Gloom 4HKOs with Petal Dance, so you need to maintain high HP for the fight to sweep. I assume Amnesia + Ice Beam would work well here, if you have the combo

Gio #2 (42): spam appropriate move and you win

Koga(45): Body Slam OHKOs the first Venonat and 2HKOs the rest. It's slower, so it may get some hax

Sabrina(46): Body Slam OHKOs everything

Blaine(47): +2 Surf OHKOs Rapidash and 2HKOs the rest. Only worry is physical attacks + Tail Whip (or if they are crits), otherwie, you win this easily

Gio #3 (47): +2 Surf OHKOs Dugtrio and Rhydon and almost OHKOs Nidos. Persian is 2HKOed by Body Slam, watch out for Screech, which will make Nidos harder to deal with

Lorelei(52): Body Slam 3HKOs Dewgong, Slowbro, and Lapras, and OHKOs Jynx. You may lose against Lapras

Bruno(52): +2 Surf 2HKOs Machamp and OHKOs the rest. Only fears Fighting moves

Agatha(52): without EQ, you can only beat Arbok and Golbat

Lance(52): Body Slam 2HKOs Dragonair and 3HKOs Gyarados and Dragonite. Surf 2HKOs Aerodacty. You may need to heal to beat all those

Blue(52): +2 Surf OHKOs Sandslash and 2HKOs Flareon. Body Slam 2HKOs Zam and Magneton and 3HKOs Eggy. Avoid Cloyster

keep same tier
Snorlax has the same issues it has in RB, which are eh availability and being too slow. I didn't try TMs much in this run, so it felt a bit worse, but if you use TMs where I used them in RB, the results shouldn't be too different, I suppose.

TMs used: Double-Edge, Sky Attack

Gio #2 (42): only avoid Rhyhorn, the rest re easy targets for Aerodactyl

Sabrina(47): outspeeds everything. Bite OHKOs Abra and DEdge OHKOs Kadabra and 2HKOs Zam. Even with the recoil, it can live a Psychic from Zam, thus winning this matchup easily

Blaine(47): Bite 4HKOs Ninetales, while DEdge 2HKOs Rapidash and 3HKOs Arcanine, though Arcanine can beat it

Gio #3 (48): DEdge 2HKOs Dugtrio and 3HKOs Persian. The rest are inefficient for it

Lorelei(52): nope. At most OHKOs Jynx with Sky Attack if you manage to hit it

Bruno(52): Sky Attack OHKOs the Fighting-types

Agatha(52): Sky Attack OHKOs the Ghosts, though the first Gengar can troll it with Sub

Lance(52): Sky Attack OHKOs Dragonair on rolls, though they 2HKO with super effective moves

Blue(52): Sky Attack OHKOs Eggy and Zam

keep same tier
Performs all around the same in both games and has the inconvenient availability. Useless at the E4 unless it is to OHKO something with Sky Attack. I don't think there is a difference that can split them.

expect more in the near future

DrumstickGaming · Dec 16, 2020

Sorry for not updating for a while.

Tiers updated with all mons split! We should be moving onto writeups soon!

Rejoice!

Also footnote: my old Yellow run is being repurposed into solely testing Lee for the remainder. Put Y Lee in C for now, will consider moving him back to B depending on results.

I think Clefable will simply stay in S - there's been plenty of support for it there and it's only a smidgen worse than King.

DrumstickGaming · Dec 17, 2020

Okay done with Lee.

I overleveled at first which is why there are duplicate logs for Blaine and Giovanni 3. I then went back at a lower level. I used Ryota's logs as a basis for what was worth testing.

Giovanni 2 (44): Meditate twice then own everything. Only Nidoqueen survives your +2 Strength (obviously Jump Kick Rhyhorn).

Koga (45): Okay: +1 Double Edge / +2 Strength OHKOs the Venonat but they 2HKO with Psychic. Venomoth pretty much outspeeds and finishes you off.

Sabrina (48): Easier than you’d think. Meditate, OHKO twice with Strength. Problem is Sabrina can X Defend Zam and deny a OHKO with Double Edge (Strength can barely leave it alive). Regardless, you easily tank Psywave so really, as long as they don’t click actual STAB you’re good. Alternatively, you can get up to +2 on Abra, but that means dealing with Flash. Also, somehow I outsped Zam in one attempt but not my others.

Blaine (49): +1 HJK OHKOs all but Arcanine. You can take one Flamethrower or Fire Blast from Arcanine. Confuse Ray and Growl are annoying. Pretty good.

Blaine (53): +1 HJK OHKOs all but Arcanine who is left in red (everyone is left in red otherwise). You can take one Flamethrower or Fire Blast from Arcanine. Confuse Ray and Growl are annoying. Pretty good.

Giovanni (50): Definitively worse than below. Dugtrio didn't even hit me and I got to +1. OHKO with Strength, then OHKOed Persian with HJK (Slash 2HKOs), 3HKO Queen with Strength, 2HKO King with Strength. You will indeed die to a Nido. Rhydon is 2HKOed by HJK and Dugtrio and Persian are OHKOed by HJK unboosted, for reference. Rhydon needs +2 to be OHKOed by HJK.

Giovanni (56): +1 Strength OHKOs Dugtrio, +1 HJK OHKOs Persian (+1 Strength leaves it alive), +1 Strength 2HKOs the Nidos, and +1 HJK OHKOs Rhydon. You can impressively live a critical hit Earthquake from Dugtrio, allowing you to setup. You outspeed everything, surprisingly. +2 doesn’t seem to hit any relevant benchmarks. Easy sweep. Note I’m kinda high leveled here, but still.

Sidenote for Rival (51): +2 beats everything easily save Sandslash (I crit it).

Lorelei (53): Everything is OHKOed by +1 HJK. You want to be +2 so Slowbro is 2HKOed roughly by Strength though. Unboosted HJK OHKOs Dewgong and Jynx by the way. Unboosted HJK only 2HKOs Lapras though.

Bruno (54): +1 HJK OHKOs everything. +2 HJK comes close to OHKOing Machamp.

Agatha (55): N/A. No, I don’t care about Golbat or Arbok.

Lance (55): OHKOs Dragonair with +1 HJK: avoid the others

Rival (55): Meh. Can barely 1v1 Sandslash with HJK 3 times before it kills you. Seems to 2HKO Cloyster and Ninetales with unboosted HJK. Jolteon seems to outspeed destroy you with Thunder.

Overall, I'm going to move Lee up to B tier across all three games. Sure, it's not super amazing or what I think of when I think of great RBY Pokemon, but it gets the job done while having a few missteps. I think having good Sabrina and Lorelei matchups are what decides it for me, while its losing matchups are easily handled by stuff most people have (read: Waters with Ice Beam).

Also, I moved Koffing, Grimer, Moltres, Magmar and Tangela up to D. Congratulations Ponyta, you suck so hard that you share space with Ditto and Porygon.

Moved Zapdos to A as I used it for the fights Lee couldn't perform in. Pretty much murders everything.

Ryota Mitarai · Dec 18, 2020

I also have some things to say about Ponyta in logs below, so I recommend checking it out:

run #1: Sandslash / Blastoise / Dodrio / Exeggutor

TMs used: Rock Slide, SD, Dig

Misty(22): outspeeds and OHKOs Staryu with Slash. Dig 2HKOs Starmie, but Starmie 2HKOs with any Water move

Lt. Surge(28): wins

Gio #1 (30): wins

Erika(32): outspeeds and OHKOs Weepinbell with Dig and 2HKOs Gloom, though Gloom doesn't OHKO

Gio #2 (41): spam dig

Koga(43): OHKOs everything with +2 Dig, only watch out for Sleep Powder. Moth is faster, but 2HKOs with Psychic

Sabrina(46): Slash 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest. It is outsped by everything and is 2HKOed by Zam's Psychic

Blaine(46): Dig 2HKOs Arcanine due to Reflect and OHKOs the rest. You are outsped by everything and the only way to outspeed is to set up two SDs to abuse badge boost glitch

Gio #3 (47): +2 Dig OHKOs everything. You outspeed Nidos and Rhydon, so the matchup is good

Lorelei(52): best way to perform here is to set up two SDs (Rock Slide Dewgong then hope it uses Rest). With that, you outspeed and OHKO pmuch everything with Dig. +2 Rock Slide OHKOs Jynn and Dewgong, but Cloyster generally beats it, unless it misses with Clamp

Bruno(52): set up SD and spam Dig

Agatha(52): Dig OHKOs all grounded Poisons while Rock Slide 2HKOs Golbat. They are all faster and special moves deal lots of damage

Lance(54): set up a SD on Dragonair #1 and OHKO it and the next one with Dig. Then OHKO Aero with Rock Slide. You outspeed DNite and 2HKO it, though it OHKOs with Blizzard

Blue(54): best performs with SD to the max, as it can outspeed (due to badge boost glitch) and OHKO everything, which guarantees a good matchup in a vacuum

keep same tier
No experience with it in RB, but can confirm this is A-tier material. Slash is awesome for route cleaning, STAB Dig is just broken and Sandslash fares well against most physical attackers. If only it didn't require contested TMs to be that strong...

TMs used: Ice Beam

Gio #1 (30): wins

Erika(32): Ice Beam 2HKOs everything, Weepinbell generally beats you

Gio #2 (41): Surf spam wins

Koga(43): Surf 2HKOs Venonat and 3HKOs Venomoth. You outspeed Venonat, but you get a Sleep Powder ASAP

Sabrina(46): Strength OHKOs Abra (while outspeeding), 2HKOs Kadabra, and 3HKOs Zam. Not the best matchup

Blaine(46): Surf 2HKOs everything, with Rapidash being outsped.

Gio #3 (47): Surf 2HKOs Nidos and Persian and OHKOs the rest. Only watch out for Thunder

Lorelei(52): Strength 2HKOs Jynx and can muscle through Dewgong. Surf can also muscle through Cloyster

Bruno(52): spam Surf

Agatha(52): Surf 2HKOs Arbok and Ice Beam 2HKOs Golbat. The rest are 3HKOed at best with Surf and are faster

Lance(52): Ice Beam 2HKOs Dragons and Surf almost OHKOs Aerodactyl. You want to heal, as they deal lots of damage to you

Blue(53): beats Sandslash and Flareon. Eggy spams Leech Seed, so spam Ice Beam. Zam is 3HKOed by Strength, but is hard to beat.

split
Squirtle comes later this game and this availability does affect its performance (sort of). It comes after you defeat Lt. Surge and, unfortunately for it, level 10, which means you have to grind it up. One of the reasons I believe Squirtle is A on first place is because of its good early-game, being able to handle both Brock and, with Seismic Toss, Misty. Not to mention that Dig can be useful for Lt. Surge.

All in all, I feel like Squirtle should drop to B for Yellow, because it misses on two important matchups, Misty being the more important of those two, where it's good and also misses one where it can be good with the correct TM. It's hard for me to see them in the same tier. Without the headstart, Squirtle feels a lot more like a B-tier due to its not-so-high Special (not low, but stuff like Vaporeon have a higher Special, if I have to compare)

TMs used: Tri Attack

Gio #1 (30): beats Persian

Erika(32): click Drill Peck

Gio #2 (41): Drill Peck spam wins, 2HKOs everything bar Rhyhorn

Koga(43): outspeeds and OHKOs everything with Drill Peck

Sabrina(46): outspeeds and OHKOs the first two with Drill Peck. Zam is faster and lives one, but if it derps enough, it's an easy win

Blaine(46): outspeeds everything. 2HKOs the first two with Drill Peck and 3HKOs Arcanine. Watch out for Flamethrower

Gio #3 (47): Drill Peck OHKOs Dugtrio, 2HKOs Persian, and 3HKOs Nidos. Nidoking can hit you with Thunder and KO you

Lorelei(52): Drill Peck OHKOs Jynx and 3HKOs Dewgong. You beat Dewgong if Lorelei heals heals it after the second Drill Peck

Bruno(52): beats the Fighting-types

Agatha(52): Drill Peck OHKOs Haunter and 2HKOs the rest while outspeeding

Lance(52): beats one Dragonair, as they 2HKO it

Blue(52): beats Sandslash and Eggy easily. Zam is faster, but is 2HKOed by Drill Peck. Flareon is 3HKOed, but outsped

keep same tier
No notable differences, other than a slightly better matchup against Koga due to his team being an army of Bug-types. If it's gonna stay in B (not disagreeing with that), then B-tier for Yellow one too

TMs used: Mega Drain, Psychic

Erika(28): Psychic 3HKOs Tangela and OHKOs the rest. You are outsped by everything, put Tangela to sleep

Gio #2 (41): wins

Koga(42): outspeeds and OHKOs Venonat with Psychic. Moth is faster and is 2HKOed, though it 3HKOs with Leech Life

Sabrina(46): Strength OHKOs Abra and 2HKOs the rest. Eggy can easily 1v1 Zam, as it can only deal real damage through Psywave. Put it to sleep so it doesn't Recover troll you.

Blaine(46): Psychic 2HKOs Rapidash and 3HKOs the rest. You are slower than everything, so you are at their mercy

Gio #3 (47): Mega Drain 2HKOs Dugtrio and OHKOs Rhydon, while Psychic 2HKOs Persian and OHKOs the rest. You outspeed Queen and Rhydon

Lorelei(51): Mega Drain 3HKOs Dewgong and Lapras and 2HKOs the other Waters. Strength 2HKOs Jynx. You may want to spread Hypnosis sleep, especially against Jynx and Lapras

Bruno(52): wins

Agatha(52): Psychic 2HKOs Gengar and OHKOs the rest. You are outsped by all, though

Lance(52): Psychic 2HKOs everything bar DNite (3HKO) and Gyarados. You want to put stuff to sleep

Blue(52): beats Sandslash, Cloyster, and Magneton easily. Eggy and Zam can be put to sleep and muscled through Strength

keep same tier
Nothing out of ordinary when it comes to matchups. I don't think there are any notable differences, so just keep them the same tier.

===

run #2: Venusaur / Wigglytuff / Jolteon / Articuno / Zapdos

TMs used: Body Slam

Misty(20): easy win

Lt. Surge(28): Vine Whip 6HKOs Raichu, which 2HKOs with Mega Kick and 3HKOs with Mega Punch. Body Slam 3HKOs, if you taught it that. As a whole, you only want it not to click TBolt the most, though anything else works. Leech Seed can help

Gio #1 (31): Razor Leaf spam wins

Erika(32): you can spam Body Slam and 3 or 4HKO them, they don't really have anything to threaten you with

Gio #2 (44): spam Razor Leaf

Koga(44): +2 Body Slam OHKOs the first one and 2HKOs the rest. Moth outspeeds you. Multiple Psychics will quickly wear it out. Set up another SD to OHKO the Venonat, at least

Sabrina(48): Body Slam OHKOs Abra while outspeeding and almost OHKOs Kadabra. Zam is generally a 2HKO. You get put in red by Kadabra's Psychic

Blaine(48): +2 Body Slam seems to 3HKO Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest. You outspeed Rapidash and Tales due to badge boost glitch

Gio #3 (50): Razor Leaf OHKOs Rhydon and Dugtrio and 2HKOs the rest. Nidos don't do anything to you (they spam Leer / Tail Whip), while Rhydon is outsped

Lorelei(54): Razor Leaf OHKOs Slowbro and Cloyster and 2HKOs the rest. Lapras puts it in red with Blizzard, so avoid Jynx. You outspeed all

Bruno(54): spam Razor Leaf

Agatha(54): didn't bother testing this for obvious reasons

Lance(54): +6 Body Slam OHKOs Gyarados and Dragonair. Aero typically finishes it off. DNite is 2HKOed by +6 Body Slam

Blue(54): beats Magneton, Cloyster, and Sandslash

keep same tier
The only complaint I've got with this Bulbasaur is that you have to grind it and that it skips Brock, but otherwise, it functions the same. The grinding isn't that bad, because you can just beat Misty's trainers with Vine Whip (once you have it) and Ivysaur is likely beating Misty underleveled anyways. By the way, my tier assumes you use the Potion glitch, which allows you to make Pikachu happy enough in a relatively fast period, which I don't think should be forbidden for Bulbasaur's tier, given it doesn't really break tiering like glitches that allow you to duplicate items.

TMs used: Mega Punch, Bubble Beam, Body Slam

Misty(17): Seismic Toss 3HKOs Staryu and 4HKOs Starmie. Starmie comes close to 3HKOing it with Water Gun and 2HKOs with Bubble Beam. The matchup is a lot worse than in RB. Sing can help, though

Lt. Surge(28): Tuff and Raichu 3HKO each other with Seismic Toss and Thunderbolt, though if you put it to sleep, it's pretty much down

Gio #1 (30): Bubble Beam kills Rocks, SToss 3HKOs Persian

Erika(32): Strength 3HKOs Tangela and 2HKOs the rest. They shouldn't prove much of a threat, but you can put Weepinbell to sleep to prevent Stun Spores and Razor Leaf

Gio #2 (44): Strength 2HKOs Nidorino and Persian and Bubble Beam OHKOs Rhyhorn. Seismic Toss can handle Nidoqueen if you got Growls, just watch out for Double Kick

Koga(45): Strength 3HKOs Moth and 2HKOs the rest. You can eat many Psychics, but Toxic can be disastrous

Sabrina(48): Strength OHKOs Kadabra and Abra and 2HKOs Zam. However, Kadabra's Psychic 2HKOs it

Blaine(49): Seismic Toss 4HKOs Arcanine and 3HKOs the rest. Sing is needed here, because they can deal lots of damage to it, especially if you get Tail Whipped

Gio #3 (50): Strength 2HKOs Persian and Dugtrio and 4HKOs Nidos. Bubble Beam 2HKOs Rhydon. Even if you spread Sing around, your sweep will likely end at Nidoking. Note that Rhydon also 2HKOs with EQ, so you need to be healthy to take it down

Lorelei(54): Seismic Toss 3HKOs Cloyster and 4HKOs Slowbro and Lapras. Strength 3HKOs Dewgong and 2HKOs Jynx. You need Sing here and maybe healing

Bruno(54): Bubble Beam OHKOs Onix. SToss 4HKOs Machamp and 3HKOs the rest. You want to put Lee and Champ to sleep due to their super effective moves

Agatha(54): Sing + Seismic Toss, I am not really sure what else to say

Lance(55): deals with Dragonair by outspeeding them and putting them to sleep and then.... spam Seismic Toss. The rest are faster, so they can crush it before it can act

Blue(55): Strength 2HKOs Zam. Bubble Beam 3HKOs Sandslash. Seismic Toss spam can handle the rest, though Strength also 3HKOs Magneton. Sing is needed for almost everything

maybeee split, but depends on if the issue below is deemed valid

Jigglypuff in Yellow has one major flaw, compared to its RB counterpart. Jigglypuff (Y) does not come at Route 3, but Route 5 instead. This means that Jigglypuff has to be obtained with sequence breaking on first place and, in order to be at like-levels for Starmie, has to be grinded with the trainers on the next routes. If you do not do so, Wigglytuff can be at best level 17, which makes the Misty matchup worse. One of the reasons why I nommed Jigglypuff when I ran RB was because it had a flawless matchup against Misty, which is now not present. So I think Jigglypuff (Y) could be dropped to C, though Wigglytuff can still win against Misty, just not in a flawless manner.

Worth mentioning that someone here in the early pages suggested splitting them, for reference.

TMs used: Thunderbolt

Gio #1 (31): TBolt 2HKOs Persian, while DKick deals with the rocks

Erika(34): Thunderbolt 4HKOs everything. Not a great mu

Gio #2 (44): Thunderbolt kills Nidorino and Persian. DKick muscles through Rhyhorn. Pin Missile can be used to weaken or muscle through Nidoqueen, though its Body Slam after Tail Whips hurts

Koga(44): Thunderbolt OHKOs the first two, 2HKOs the third, and 3HKOs Moth. Moth's Psychic doesn't deal a lot of damage, though Double Team may be annoying

Sabrina(48): Pin Missile KOs Abra with two, Kadabra with 4, and Zam with 6, while outspeeding all of them

Blaine(48): Thunderbolt 3HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest.

Gio #3 (49): beats Persian, avoid the rest

Lorelei(54): Thunderbolt 2HKOs Lapras and OHKOs the other Waters. Hydro Pump and Blizzard from Lapras 3HKO it. Jynx can be dealt with Pin Missile, though that is a bit RNG-y

Bruno(55): beats the Fighting-types easily, but struggles with Onix

Agatha(55): Thunderbolt OHKOs Golbat, 3HKOs Gengar #2, and 2HKOs the rest

Lance(55): Thunderbolt OHKOs Gyara and Aero and 3HKOs DNite, though DNite may KO it

Blue(55): beats Cloyster easily. Eggy and Zam can be muscled through with Pin Missile, though Zam has Kinesis. Flareon and Jolteon 3HKO each other with strongest STABs, though you are faster

keep same tier
Nothing too different, in my opinion. Still spams Thunderbolt and manages to hit hard. The only difference is that Jolteon in Yellow doesn't learn Thundershock by level (well it does, but at level 16 and you get Eevee at level 25), but nothing else. B for both versions is fine

TMs used: Mimic, Toxic

Sabrina(51): Ice Beam 3HKOs Zam and 2HKOs the rest. Fly 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest.

Blaine(52): Ice Beam 2HKOs everything. Flamethrower threatens it, though, Ninetales's comes close to 2HKOing it

Gio #3 (52): Ice Beam 2HKOs Persian and OHKOs the rest. Persian and Dugtrio outspeed it, but the latter doesn't threaten you at all

Lorelei(54): can Toxic stall all but Dewgong, especially if spamming Fly, which gives you a free turn. You can Mimic Slowbro's Amnesia and boost your Special so Ice Beam deals more damage to the rest

Bruno(54): spam Ice Beam

Agatha(54): you can Mimic her Gengr #1's Substitute and hide behind it, which saves you lots of HP. Ice Beam 3HKOs or 2HKOs most things, though Hypnosis still gets past Substitute. Same as in RB, honestly, except the Substitute part

Lance(54): Ice Beam OHKOs everything bar Gyarados

Blue(55): beats Sandslash and Eggy with no problems. Flareon causes issues with Fire moves, while Magneton deals tons of damage with Thunderbolt. Cloyster and Zam can be Toxic stalled and you can heal if necessary

keep same tier
Articuno is slightly worse here, but honestly, beating Lance with no TMs whatsoever and still performing well just by spamming Ice Beam convinced me that this is still A-tier material

TMs used: Thunderbolt, Toxic

Sabrina(51): outspeeds everything. Drill Peck puts Zam in red and OHKOs the rest

Blaine(52): Thunderbolt 2HKOs everything

Gio #3 (52): Drill Peck 2HKOs Dugtrio and 3HKOs Nidos, which just spam Leer. Persian is 2HKOed by TBolt. Rhydon beats you with Rock Slide, though you can Toxic it

Lorelei(54): Thunderbolt 2HKOs Lapras, which 2HKOs with Blizzard, and OHKOs the other Waters. Jynx is 2HKOed by Drill Peck, whose Ice Punch puts it in range for Lapras's Blizzard

Bruno(54): beats Fighting-types easily. Inefficient agaisnt Onix, though it can Toxic them

Agatha(54): Thunderbolt OHKOs Golbat and 2HKOs Arbok. Drill Peck 2HKOs the rest. You are faster, so hax is less likely

Lance(54): TBolt OHKOs Gyara and Aero and 3HKOs DNite and Drill Peck 2HKOs Dragonair. You aren't sweeping, but you are reasonably beatting 4/5 of his team

Blue(54): beats Cloyster and Eggy effortlessly. Zam is 2HKOed, but deals heavy damage with Psychic and can Kinesis you. Sandslash and Magneton can be Toxic stalled. Flareon is 3HKOed by Thunderbolt

keep same tier
Zapdos was recently put in A and I agree with it. While I did nominate it to B back then, I think it was due to me holding against it the reliance on the TBolt TM. However, ignore that, and it just clicks buttons and murders everything. Outside of Lance and Gio #3, I'd argue Zapdos is actually better than Articuno.

===

run #3: Gyarados / Victreebel / Machamp / Rapidash

TMs used: Bubble Beam, Double-Edge

Misty(20): wins easily with Bite spam

Lt. Surge(26): Dragon Rage 2HKOs, but it dies to TBolt instantly

Gio #1 (30): didn't bother, but should be obvious

Erika(32): Dragon Range 3HKOs everything. You get statused a lot, so you may need to hope for some luck

Koga(44): Surf OHKOs Venonat #1, 3HKOs Moth, and 2HKOs the rest. The 2HKOs are OHKOs with HPump

Sabrina(48): DEdge 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest, though only Abra is outsped

Blaine(48): spam Surf

Gio #3 (48): spam Surf. Nidoking manages to live one Surf, but HPump kills it. Persian also lives one, but isn't an issue

Lorelei(54): DEdge + HBeam KO Dewgong. HPump almost 2HKOs Cloyster. DEdge + Surf + HB KO Slowbro and HB OHKOs Jynx. HB 2HKOs Lapras, which tends to spam Confuse Ray and Body Slam

Bruno(54): spam Surf

Agatha(54): HPump 2HKOs Gengar #1 and Haunter and 3HKOs Gengar #2. Surf 2HKOs the rest

Lance(54): DEdge and HB KO Gyarados. HB OHKOs Dragonair on rolls. Surf OHKOs Aerodactyl. DNite hsa Thunder, so it can easily kill you

Blue(54): beats Sandslash and Flareon easily. Zam is OHKOed by HB, while Eggy can be put in range for that after 2 DEdges

keep same tier
Still destructive as hell, but held back by Magikarp period + Slow Exp. group. Thanks to higher level curve, you also get Hyper Beam more reasonably.

TMs used: Swords Dance

Misty(19): Vine Whip spam easily wins this. Tackles don't deal much damage, but put Starmie to sleep if you are worried

Lt. Surge(28): Vine Whip is like a 6HKO, but Mega Kick comes close to 2HKOing (and Mega Punch is a hard 3HKO). Sleep Powder + Growth can make this matchup better

Gio #1 (30): didn't bother, but should be obvious

Erika(32): Acid 3HKOs Tangela and Weepinbell and 4HKOs Gloom. The Poisons generally spam Acid, which shouldn't cause many issues, unless you get Defense drops. You can also just put them to sleep

Koga(44): +2 Acid 2HKOs everything, while being outsped only by Moth. Putting things to sleep is essential if you are not setting up more than once

Sabrina(48): +2 Acid 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest, but you need to SD twice to get enough Speed to outspeed Kadabra and Zam. Put Abra to sleep

Blaine(48): outspeeds everything for sure after a SD. +2 Acid 3HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest, put them to sleep

Gio #3 (49): Razor Leaf OHKOs Dugtrio and Rhydon and 2HKOs the rest. Dugtrio and Persian are faster. Nidos spam Leer / Tail Whip

Lorelei(53): Razor Leaf 2HKOs Dewgong, Lapras, and Slowbro and OHKOs Cloyster. Jynx is faster, but doesn't OHKO with Ice Punch, while Acid seems to be a 2HKO. Lapras and Jynx need to be put to sleep, though you can also put Dewgong to sleep

Bruno(53); Razor Leaf 2HKOs Machamp and OHKOs the rest

Agatha(53): I mean, you could spam SD and Acid, but I didn't really bother here

Lance(53): +6 Acid OHKOs Dragonair and 2HKOs DNite and Gyara. Aerodactyl is 2HKOed by Razor Leaf. Sleep Powder is essential here

Blue(55): beats Cloyster and Sandslash instantly. The rest you may wanna put to sleep and spam Acid (or RLeaf for Magneton)

keep same tier
Still a great Misty counter, even underleveled, and maintains usefulness throughout the games, albeit held back by reliance on Sleep Powder in a lot of scenarios. But still, no major differences

TMs used: Dig, Rock Slide

Erika(31): Karate Chop crit 3HKOs Tangela and 2HKOs the rest. However, it takes heavy damage from Razor Leaf and is statused quite often. I also had to deal with disobedience

Koga(44): Rock Slide OHKOs Venonat and 2HKOs Moth, though Moth outspeeds and 2HKOs with Psychic

Sabrina(48): KChop crit 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest, though all outspeed, so it's at their mercy

Blaine(48): Dig puts Arcanine in red and OHKOs the rest. You are slower and 3HKOed by Ninetales's Flamethrower

Gio #3 (49): Dig OHKOs Dugtrio and 2HKOs the rest. Low Kick also 2HKOs Persian. You are unlikely to sweep

Lorelei(53): Low Kick 2HKOs Dewgong, Lapras, and Cloyster. KChop 4HKOs Slowbro. Rock Slide OHKOs Jynx. You will beat the Water/Ices relatively easily

Bruno(54): Low Kick 2HKOs Onix. Dig 2HKOs Hitmons and seems to 3HKO Machamp, though X Defend is nasty. Machamp also can end your sweep

Agatha(54): Rock Slide almost OHKOs Golbat and Dig OHKOs the rest. You are outsped by all, though, so a sweep is not guaranteed

Lance(56): Rock Slide 2HKOs Flying-types, Dig 2HKOs Dragonair. You are unlikely to sweep, but, depending on AI's plays and some luck, you will be able to take out some threats

Blue(56): Dig 2HKOs Magneton and also 2HKOs Flareon even with Reflect up. Cloyster is 3HKOed by Low Kick.

split
Performs similarly to RB Machamp, but this one comes with another bonus: boosted Exp. This is because you can get a Machoke by trading a Cubone in the route south of Cerulean. This makes it very easy to grind and allows it to easily outlevel opponents, as long as you have the appropriate badge for that. Note that I say "Machoke" but it will evolve into a Machamp. So I propose to split Machop and put the Yellow one in B

By the way, I don't think we will need a separate entry for "Machop (No Trade)" rank or whatever, because there's no reason not to use the traded one. As for formatting purposes, it probably should be formatted as Machoke, since you obtain it as such and will always evolve.

TMs used: Fire Blast, Double-Edge
Erika(32): Ember 3HKOs everything. Your sweep ends against Gloom, unless you heal

Gio #2 (42): DEdge 2HKOs Nidorino and Persian. Fire Spin can troll the rest

Koga(44): Ember 2HKOs Venonat and 4HKOs Moth. Fire Spin can be used on Moth to safely wear it down

Sabrina(48): DEdge 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest, while outspeeding all of them

Blaine(48): DEdge seems to 3-4HKO Arcanine and 2HKO the rest.

Gio #3 (48): Fire Blast 2HKOs everything bar Rhydon, though you are not sweeping whatsoever. Fire Spin can help

Lorelei(54): Fire Blast OHKOs Jynx, 3HKOs Lapras, and 2HKOs Dewgong and Cloyster. The Water-types can be put in range with Fire Spin as to not waste Fire Blast PP

Bruno(54): Fire Blast OHKOs Hitmons and 2HKOs the rest. Fire Spin can help preserve PP

Agatha(54): Fire Blast 3HKOs Gengar and 2HKOs the rest. Fire Spin, as always, helps here

Lance(54): DEdge 2HKOs Dragonair, but that's it

Blue(54): Fire Blast 2HKOs Sandslash, Eggy, and Cloyster. Cloyster and Sandslash should be put in range with Fire Spin, if possible.

When I used Ponyta in RB, I felt it sucked. A lot. And I still do. However, I wasn't sure whenever it was worth a place in E-tier, considering it was still usable.

This run confirmed to me that Ponyta probably shouldn't be in E-tier whatsoever. While it is indeed bad and the RB one comes rather late, Fire Blast + Fire Spin are still useful enough to warrant *some* use. Fire Blast nets useful OHKOs and 2HKOs even in the Pokemon League and Fire Spin is just a trolly move in general.

Yellow Ponyta shoud be D-tier as well, in my opinion. It does come earlier, but, outside of Koga and Erika, it's pretty much the same. And Erika is like 3HKOs anyways, so it's not as useful there.

all in all, keep same tier if Ponyta is pushed to D along with Magmar and Moltres. Otherwise, split

more logs to come in the next days. Per estimates, I should be done with Yellow as a whole within 9 days, though it might be less if I don't test every single late-game Water-type

e: some of Gio #1 and #2's logs are missing in run #3, this is intentional, I didn't really bother with the obvious stuff

Bloomer28 · Dec 18, 2020

Man, starmie and staryu were op in gen 1, looking at * cough* *cough* satan's type,but starmie had good stats, good movepool and the forbidden typing and water, so it's really nice. On the other side, tangela was kinda un-needed in that gen, ( only getting good with tangrowth in gen 4) but it really had no reason to exist because it had bad stats, bad movepool, one location, basically, it was the dunsparce of gen 1.

Volt-Ikazuchi · Dec 18, 2020

Ryota Mitarai said:
I also have some things to say about Ponyta in logs below, so I recommend checking it out:

run #1: Sandslash / Blastoise / Dodrio / Exeggutor

TMs used: Rock Slide, SD, Dig

Misty(22): outspeeds and OHKOs Staryu with Slash. Dig 2HKOs Starmie, but Starmie 2HKOs with any Water move

Lt. Surge(28): wins

Gio #1 (30): wins

Erika(32): outspeeds and OHKOs Weepinbell with Dig and 2HKOs Gloom, though Gloom doesn't OHKO

Gio #2 (41): spam dig

Koga(43): OHKOs everything with +2 Dig, only watch out for Sleep Powder. Moth is faster, but 2HKOs with Psychic

Sabrina(46): Slash 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest. It is outsped by everything and is 2HKOed by Zam's Psychic

Blaine(46): Dig 2HKOs Arcanine due to Reflect and OHKOs the rest. You are outsped by everything and the only way to outspeed is to set up two SDs to abuse badge boost glitch

Gio #3 (47): +2 Dig OHKOs everything. You outspeed Nidos and Rhydon, so the matchup is good

Lorelei(52): best way to perform here is to set up two SDs (Rock Slide Dewgong then hope it uses Rest). With that, you outspeed and OHKO pmuch everything with Dig. +2 Rock Slide OHKOs Jynn and Dewgong, but Cloyster generally beats it, unless it misses with Clamp

Bruno(52): set up SD and spam Dig

Agatha(52): Dig OHKOs all grounded Poisons while Rock Slide 2HKOs Golbat. They are all faster and special moves deal lots of damage

Lance(54): set up a SD on Dragonair #1 and OHKO it and the next one with Dig. Then OHKO Aero with Rock Slide. You outspeed DNite and 2HKO it, though it OHKOs with Blizzard

Blue(54): best performs with SD to the max, as it can outspeed (due to badge boost glitch) and OHKO everything, which guarantees a good matchup in a vacuum

keep same tier
No experience with it in RB, but can confirm this is A-tier material. Slash is awesome for route cleaning, STAB Dig is just broken and Sandslash fares well against most physical attackers. If only it didn't require contested TMs to be that strong...

TMs used: Ice Beam

Gio #1 (30): wins

Erika(32): Ice Beam 2HKOs everything, Weepinbell generally beats you

Gio #2 (41): Surf spam wins

Koga(43): Surf 2HKOs Venonat and 3HKOs Venomoth. You outspeed Venonat, but you get a Sleep Powder ASAP

Sabrina(46): Strength OHKOs Abra (while outspeeding), 2HKOs Kadabra, and 3HKOs Zam. Not the best matchup

Blaine(46): Surf 2HKOs everything, with Rapidash being outsped.

Gio #3 (47): Surf 2HKOs Nidos and Persian and OHKOs the rest. Only watch out for Thunder

Lorelei(52): Strength 2HKOs Jynx and can muscle through Dewgong. Surf can also muscle through Cloyster

Bruno(52): spam Surf

Agatha(52): Surf 2HKOs Arbok and Ice Beam 2HKOs Golbat. The rest are 3HKOed at best with Surf and are faster

Lance(52): Ice Beam 2HKOs Dragons and Surf almost OHKOs Aerodactyl. You want to heal, as they deal lots of damage to you

Blue(53): beats Sandslash and Flareon. Eggy spams Leech Seed, so spam Ice Beam. Zam is 3HKOed by Strength, but is hard to beat.

split
Squirtle comes later this game and this availability does affect its performance (sort of). It comes after you defeat Lt. Surge and, unfortunately for it, level 10, which means you have to grind it up. One of the reasons I believe Squirtle is A on first place is because of its good early-game, being able to handle both Brock and, with Seismic Toss, Misty. Not to mention that Dig can be useful for Lt. Surge.

All in all, I feel like Squirtle should drop to B for Yellow, because it misses on two important matchups, Misty being the more important of those two, where it's good and also misses one where it can be good with the correct TM. It's hard for me to see them in the same tier. Without the headstart, Squirtle feels a lot more like a B-tier due to its not-so-high Special (not low, but stuff like Vaporeon have a higher Special, if I have to compare)

TMs used: Tri Attack

Gio #1 (30): beats Persian

Erika(32): click Drill Peck

Gio #2 (41): Drill Peck spam wins, 2HKOs everything bar Rhyhorn

Koga(43): outspeeds and OHKOs everything with Drill Peck

Sabrina(46): outspeeds and OHKOs the first two with Drill Peck. Zam is faster and lives one, but if it derps enough, it's an easy win

Blaine(46): outspeeds everything. 2HKOs the first two with Drill Peck and 3HKOs Arcanine. Watch out for Flamethrower

Gio #3 (47): Drill Peck OHKOs Dugtrio, 2HKOs Persian, and 3HKOs Nidos. Nidoking can hit you with Thunder and KO you

Lorelei(52): Drill Peck OHKOs Jynx and 3HKOs Dewgong. You beat Dewgong if Lorelei heals heals it after the second Drill Peck

Bruno(52): beats the Fighting-types

Agatha(52): Drill Peck OHKOs Haunter and 2HKOs the rest while outspeeding

Lance(52): beats one Dragonair, as they 2HKO it

Blue(52): beats Sandslash and Eggy easily. Zam is faster, but is 2HKOed by Drill Peck. Flareon is 3HKOed, but outsped

keep same tier
No notable differences, other than a slightly better matchup against Koga due to his team being an army of Bug-types. If it's gonna stay in B (not disagreeing with that), then B-tier for Yellow one too

TMs used: Mega Drain, Psychic

Erika(28): Psychic 3HKOs Tangela and OHKOs the rest. You are outsped by everything, put Tangela to sleep

Gio #2 (41): wins

Koga(42): outspeeds and OHKOs Venonat with Psychic. Moth is faster and is 2HKOed, though it 3HKOs with Leech Life

Sabrina(46): Strength OHKOs Abra and 2HKOs the rest. Eggy can easily 1v1 Zam, as it can only deal real damage through Psywave. Put it to sleep so it doesn't Recover troll you.

Blaine(46): Psychic 2HKOs Rapidash and 3HKOs the rest. You are slower than everything, so you are at their mercy

Gio #3 (47): Mega Drain 2HKOs Dugtrio and OHKOs Rhydon, while Psychic 2HKOs Persian and OHKOs the rest. You outspeed Queen and Rhydon

Lorelei(51): Mega Drain 3HKOs Dewgong and Lapras and 2HKOs the other Waters. Strength 2HKOs Jynx. You may want to spread Hypnosis sleep, especially against Jynx and Lapras

Bruno(52): wins

Agatha(52): Psychic 2HKOs Gengar and OHKOs the rest. You are outsped by all, though

Lance(52): Psychic 2HKOs everything bar DNite (3HKO) and Gyarados. You want to put stuff to sleep

Blue(52): beats Sandslash, Cloyster, and Magneton easily. Eggy and Zam can be put to sleep and muscled through Strength

keep same tier
Nothing out of ordinary when it comes to matchups. I don't think there are any notable differences, so just keep them the same tier.

===

run #2: Venusaur / Wigglytuff / Jolteon / Articuno / Zapdos

TMs used: Body Slam

Misty(20): easy win

Lt. Surge(28): Vine Whip 6HKOs Raichu, which 2HKOs with Mega Kick and 3HKOs with Mega Punch. Body Slam 3HKOs, if you taught it that. As a whole, you only want it not to click TBolt the most, though anything else works. Leech Seed can help

Gio #1 (31): Razor Leaf spam wins

Erika(32): you can spam Body Slam and 3 or 4HKO them, they don't really have anything to threaten you with

Gio #2 (44): spam Razor Leaf

Koga(44): +2 Body Slam OHKOs the first one and 2HKOs the rest. Moth outspeeds you. Multiple Psychics will quickly wear it out. Set up another SD to OHKO the Venonat, at least

Sabrina(48): Body Slam OHKOs Abra while outspeeding and almost OHKOs Kadabra. Zam is generally a 2HKO. You get put in red by Kadabra's Psychic

Blaine(48): +2 Body Slam seems to 3HKO Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest. You outspeed Rapidash and Tales due to badge boost glitch

Gio #3 (50): Razor Leaf OHKOs Rhydon and Dugtrio and 2HKOs the rest. Nidos don't do anything to you (they spam Leer / Tail Whip), while Rhydon is outsped

Lorelei(54): Razor Leaf OHKOs Slowbro and Cloyster and 2HKOs the rest. Lapras puts it in red with Blizzard, so avoid Jynx. You outspeed all

Bruno(54): spam Razor Leaf

Agatha(54): didn't bother testing this for obvious reasons

Lance(54): +6 Body Slam OHKOs Gyarados and Dragonair. Aero typically finishes it off. DNite is 2HKOed by +6 Body Slam

Blue(54): beats Magneton, Cloyster, and Sandslash

keep same tier
The only complaint I've got with this Bulbasaur is that you have to grind it and that it skips Brock, but otherwise, it functions the same. The grinding isn't that bad, because you can just beat Misty's trainers with Vine Whip (once you have it) and Ivysaur is likely beating Misty underleveled anyways. By the way, my tier assumes you use the Potion glitch, which allows you to make Pikachu happy enough in a relatively fast period, which I don't think should be forbidden for Bulbasaur's tier, given it doesn't really break tiering like glitches that allow you to duplicate items.

TMs used: Mega Punch, Bubble Beam, Body Slam

Misty(17): Seismic Toss 3HKOs Staryu and 4HKOs Starmie. Starmie comes close to 3HKOing it with Water Gun and 2HKOs with Bubble Beam. The matchup is a lot worse than in RB. Sing can help, though

Lt. Surge(28): Tuff and Raichu 3HKO each other with Seismic Toss and Thunderbolt, though if you put it to sleep, it's pretty much down

Gio #1 (30): Bubble Beam kills Rocks, SToss 3HKOs Persian

Erika(32): Strength 3HKOs Tangela and 2HKOs the rest. They shouldn't prove much of a threat, but you can put Weepinbell to sleep to prevent Stun Spores and Razor Leaf

Gio #2 (44): Strength 2HKOs Nidorino and Persian and Bubble Beam OHKOs Rhyhorn. Seismic Toss can handle Nidoqueen if you got Growls, just watch out for Double Kick

Koga(45): Strength 3HKOs Moth and 2HKOs the rest. You can eat many Psychics, but Toxic can be disastrous

Sabrina(48): Strength OHKOs Kadabra and Abra and 2HKOs Zam. However, Kadabra's Psychic 2HKOs it

Blaine(49): Seismic Toss 4HKOs Arcanine and 3HKOs the rest. Sing is needed here, because they can deal lots of damage to it, especially if you get Tail Whipped

Gio #3 (50): Strength 2HKOs Persian and Dugtrio and 4HKOs Nidos. Bubble Beam 2HKOs Rhydon. Even if you spread Sing around, your sweep will likely end at Nidoking. Note that Rhydon also 2HKOs with EQ, so you need to be healthy to take it down

Lorelei(54): Seismic Toss 3HKOs Cloyster and 4HKOs Slowbro and Lapras. Strength 3HKOs Dewgong and 2HKOs Jynx. You need Sing here and maybe healing

Bruno(54): Bubble Beam OHKOs Onix. SToss 4HKOs Machamp and 3HKOs the rest. You want to put Lee and Champ to sleep due to their super effective moves

Agatha(54): Sing + Seismic Toss, I am not really sure what else to say

Lance(55): deals with Dragonair by outspeeding them and putting them to sleep and then.... spam Seismic Toss. The rest are faster, so they can crush it before it can act

Blue(55): Strength 2HKOs Zam. Bubble Beam 3HKOs Sandslash. Seismic Toss spam can handle the rest, though Strength also 3HKOs Magneton. Sing is needed for almost everything

maybeee split, but depends on if the issue below is deemed valid

Jigglypuff in Yellow has one major flaw, compared to its RB counterpart. Jigglypuff (Y) does not come at Route 3, but Route 5 instead. This means that Jigglypuff has to be obtained with sequence breaking on first place and, in order to be at like-levels for Starmie, has to be grinded with the trainers on the next routes. If you do not do so, Wigglytuff can be at best level 17, which makes the Misty matchup worse. One of the reasons why I nommed Jigglypuff when I ran RB was because it had a flawless matchup against Misty, which is now not present. So I think Jigglypuff (Y) could be dropped to C, though Wigglytuff can still win against Misty, just not in a flawless manner.

Worth mentioning that someone here in the early pages suggested splitting them, for reference.

TMs used: Thunderbolt

Gio #1 (31): TBolt 2HKOs Persian, while DKick deals with the rocks

Erika(34): Thunderbolt 4HKOs everything. Not a great mu

Gio #2 (44): Thunderbolt kills Nidorino and Persian. DKick muscles through Rhyhorn. Pin Missile can be used to weaken or muscle through Nidoqueen, though its Body Slam after Tail Whips hurts

Koga(44): Thunderbolt OHKOs the first two, 2HKOs the third, and 3HKOs Moth. Moth's Psychic doesn't deal a lot of damage, though Double Team may be annoying

Sabrina(48): Pin Missile KOs Abra with two, Kadabra with 4, and Zam with 6, while outspeeding all of them

Blaine(48): Thunderbolt 3HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest.

Gio #3 (49): beats Persian, avoid the rest

Lorelei(54): Thunderbolt 2HKOs Lapras and OHKOs the other Waters. Hydro Pump and Blizzard from Lapras 3HKO it. Jynx can be dealt with Pin Missile, though that is a bit RNG-y

Bruno(55): beats the Fighting-types easily, but struggles with Onix

Agatha(55): Thunderbolt OHKOs Golbat, 3HKOs Gengar #2, and 2HKOs the rest

Lance(55): Thunderbolt OHKOs Gyara and Aero and 3HKOs DNite, though DNite may KO it

Blue(55): beats Cloyster easily. Eggy and Zam can be muscled through with Pin Missile, though Zam has Kinesis. Flareon and Jolteon 3HKO each other with strongest STABs, though you are faster

keep same tier
Nothing too different, in my opinion. Still spams Thunderbolt and manages to hit hard. The only difference is that Jolteon in Yellow doesn't learn Thundershock by level (well it does, but at level 16 and you get Eevee at level 25), but nothing else. B for both versions is fine

TMs used: Mimic, Toxic

Sabrina(51): Ice Beam 3HKOs Zam and 2HKOs the rest. Fly 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest.

Blaine(52): Ice Beam 2HKOs everything. Flamethrower threatens it, though, Ninetales's comes close to 2HKOing it

Gio #3 (52): Ice Beam 2HKOs Persian and OHKOs the rest. Persian and Dugtrio outspeed it, but the latter doesn't threaten you at all

Lorelei(54): can Toxic stall all but Dewgong, especially if spamming Fly, which gives you a free turn. You can Mimic Slowbro's Amnesia and boost your Special so Ice Beam deals more damage to the rest

Bruno(54): spam Ice Beam

Agatha(54): you can Mimic her Gengr #1's Substitute and hide behind it, which saves you lots of HP. Ice Beam 3HKOs or 2HKOs most things, though Hypnosis still gets past Substitute. Same as in RB, honestly, except the Substitute part

Lance(54): Ice Beam OHKOs everything bar Gyarados

Blue(55): beats Sandslash and Eggy with no problems. Flareon causes issues with Fire moves, while Magneton deals tons of damage with Thunderbolt. Cloyster and Zam can be Toxic stalled and you can heal if necessary

keep same tier
Articuno is slightly worse here, but honestly, beating Lance with no TMs whatsoever and still performing well just by spamming Ice Beam convinced me that this is still A-tier material

TMs used: Thunderbolt, Toxic

Sabrina(51): outspeeds everything. Drill Peck puts Zam in red and OHKOs the rest

Blaine(52): Thunderbolt 2HKOs everything

Gio #3 (52): Drill Peck 2HKOs Dugtrio and 3HKOs Nidos, which just spam Leer. Persian is 2HKOed by TBolt. Rhydon beats you with Rock Slide, though you can Toxic it

Lorelei(54): Thunderbolt 2HKOs Lapras, which 2HKOs with Blizzard, and OHKOs the other Waters. Jynx is 2HKOed by Drill Peck, whose Ice Punch puts it in range for Lapras's Blizzard

Bruno(54): beats Fighting-types easily. Inefficient agaisnt Onix, though it can Toxic them

Agatha(54): Thunderbolt OHKOs Golbat and 2HKOs Arbok. Drill Peck 2HKOs the rest. You are faster, so hax is less likely

Lance(54): TBolt OHKOs Gyara and Aero and 3HKOs DNite and Drill Peck 2HKOs Dragonair. You aren't sweeping, but you are reasonably beatting 4/5 of his team

Blue(54): beats Cloyster and Eggy effortlessly. Zam is 2HKOed, but deals heavy damage with Psychic and can Kinesis you. Sandslash and Magneton can be Toxic stalled. Flareon is 3HKOed by Thunderbolt

keep same tier
Zapdos was recently put in A and I agree with it. While I did nominate it to B back then, I think it was due to me holding against it the reliance on the TBolt TM. However, ignore that, and it just clicks buttons and murders everything. Outside of Lance and Gio #3, I'd argue Zapdos is actually better than Articuno.

===

run #3: Gyarados / Victreebel / Machamp / Rapidash

TMs used: Bubble Beam, Double-Edge

Misty(20): wins easily with Bite spam

Lt. Surge(26): Dragon Rage 2HKOs, but it dies to TBolt instantly

Gio #1 (30): didn't bother, but should be obvious

Erika(32): Dragon Range 3HKOs everything. You get statused a lot, so you may need to hope for some luck

Koga(44): Surf OHKOs Venonat #1, 3HKOs Moth, and 2HKOs the rest. The 2HKOs are OHKOs with HPump

Sabrina(48): DEdge 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest, though only Abra is outsped

Blaine(48): spam Surf

Gio #3 (48): spam Surf. Nidoking manages to live one Surf, but HPump kills it. Persian also lives one, but isn't an issue

Lorelei(54): DEdge + HBeam KO Dewgong. HPump almost 2HKOs Cloyster. DEdge + Surf + HB KO Slowbro and HB OHKOs Jynx. HB 2HKOs Lapras, which tends to spam Confuse Ray and Body Slam

Bruno(54): spam Surf

Agatha(54): HPump 2HKOs Gengar #1 and Haunter and 3HKOs Gengar #2. Surf 2HKOs the rest

Lance(54): DEdge and HB KO Gyarados. HB OHKOs Dragonair on rolls. Surf OHKOs Aerodactyl. DNite hsa Thunder, so it can easily kill you

Blue(54): beats Sandslash and Flareon easily. Zam is OHKOed by HB, while Eggy can be put in range for that after 2 DEdges

keep same tier
Still destructive as hell, but held back by Magikarp period + Slow Exp. group. Thanks to higher level curve, you also get Hyper Beam more reasonably.

TMs used: Swords Dance

Misty(19): Vine Whip spam easily wins this. Tackles don't deal much damage, but put Starmie to sleep if you are worried

Lt. Surge(28): Vine Whip is like a 6HKO, but Mega Kick comes close to 2HKOing (and Mega Punch is a hard 3HKO). Sleep Powder + Growth can make this matchup better

Gio #1 (30): didn't bother, but should be obvious

Erika(32): Acid 3HKOs Tangela and Weepinbell and 4HKOs Gloom. The Poisons generally spam Acid, which shouldn't cause many issues, unless you get Defense drops. You can also just put them to sleep

Koga(44): +2 Acid 2HKOs everything, while being outsped only by Moth. Putting things to sleep is essential if you are not setting up more than once

Sabrina(48): +2 Acid 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest, but you need to SD twice to get enough Speed to outspeed Kadabra and Zam. Put Abra to sleep

Blaine(48): outspeeds everything for sure after a SD. +2 Acid 3HKOs Arcanine and 2HKOs the rest, put them to sleep

Gio #3 (49): Razor Leaf OHKOs Dugtrio and Rhydon and 2HKOs the rest. Dugtrio and Persian are faster. Nidos spam Leer / Tail Whip

Lorelei(53): Razor Leaf 2HKOs Dewgong, Lapras, and Slowbro and OHKOs Cloyster. Jynx is faster, but doesn't OHKO with Ice Punch, while Acid seems to be a 2HKO. Lapras and Jynx need to be put to sleep, though you can also put Dewgong to sleep

Bruno(53); Razor Leaf 2HKOs Machamp and OHKOs the rest

Agatha(53): I mean, you could spam SD and Acid, but I didn't really bother here

Lance(53): +6 Acid OHKOs Dragonair and 2HKOs DNite and Gyara. Aerodactyl is 2HKOed by Razor Leaf. Sleep Powder is essential here

Blue(55): beats Cloyster and Sandslash instantly. The rest you may wanna put to sleep and spam Acid (or RLeaf for Magneton)

keep same tier
Still a great Misty counter, even underleveled, and maintains usefulness throughout the games, albeit held back by reliance on Sleep Powder in a lot of scenarios. But still, no major differences

TMs used: Dig, Rock Slide

Erika(31): Karate Chop crit 3HKOs Tangela and 2HKOs the rest. However, it takes heavy damage from Razor Leaf and is statused quite often. I also had to deal with disobedience

Koga(44): Rock Slide OHKOs Venonat and 2HKOs Moth, though Moth outspeeds and 2HKOs with Psychic

Sabrina(48): KChop crit 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest, though all outspeed, so it's at their mercy

Blaine(48): Dig puts Arcanine in red and OHKOs the rest. You are slower and 3HKOed by Ninetales's Flamethrower

Gio #3 (49): Dig OHKOs Dugtrio and 2HKOs the rest. Low Kick also 2HKOs Persian. You are unlikely to sweep

Lorelei(53): Low Kick 2HKOs Dewgong, Lapras, and Cloyster. KChop 4HKOs Slowbro. Rock Slide OHKOs Jynx. You will beat the Water/Ices relatively easily

Bruno(54): Low Kick 2HKOs Onix. Dig 2HKOs Hitmons and seems to 3HKO Machamp, though X Defend is nasty. Machamp also can end your sweep

Agatha(54): Rock Slide almost OHKOs Golbat and Dig OHKOs the rest. You are outsped by all, though, so a sweep is not guaranteed

Lance(56): Rock Slide 2HKOs Flying-types, Dig 2HKOs Dragonair. You are unlikely to sweep, but, depending on AI's plays and some luck, you will be able to take out some threats

Blue(56): Dig 2HKOs Magneton and also 2HKOs Flareon even with Reflect up. Cloyster is 3HKOed by Low Kick.

split
Performs similarly to RB Machamp, but this one comes with another bonus: boosted Exp. This is because you can get a Machoke by trading a Cubone in the route south of Cerulean. This makes it very easy to grind and allows it to easily outlevel opponents, as long as you have the appropriate badge for that. Note that I say "Machoke" but it will evolve into a Machamp. So I propose to split Machop and put the Yellow one in B

By the way, I don't think we will need a separate entry for "Machop (No Trade)" rank or whatever, because there's no reason not to use the traded one. As for formatting purposes, it probably should be formatted as Machoke, since you obtain it as such and will always evolve.

TMs used: Fire Blast, Double-Edge
Erika(32): Ember 3HKOs everything. Your sweep ends against Gloom, unless you heal

Gio #2 (42): DEdge 2HKOs Nidorino and Persian. Fire Spin can troll the rest

Koga(44): Ember 2HKOs Venonat and 4HKOs Moth. Fire Spin can be used on Moth to safely wear it down

Sabrina(48): DEdge 2HKOs Zam and OHKOs the rest, while outspeeding all of them

Blaine(48): DEdge seems to 3-4HKO Arcanine and 2HKO the rest.

Gio #3 (48): Fire Blast 2HKOs everything bar Rhydon, though you are not sweeping whatsoever. Fire Spin can help

Lorelei(54): Fire Blast OHKOs Jynx, 3HKOs Lapras, and 2HKOs Dewgong and Cloyster. The Water-types can be put in range with Fire Spin as to not waste Fire Blast PP

Bruno(54): Fire Blast OHKOs Hitmons and 2HKOs the rest. Fire Spin can help preserve PP

Agatha(54): Fire Blast 3HKOs Gengar and 2HKOs the rest. Fire Spin, as always, helps here

Lance(54): DEdge 2HKOs Dragonair, but that's it

Blue(54): Fire Blast 2HKOs Sandslash, Eggy, and Cloyster. Cloyster and Sandslash should be put in range with Fire Spin, if possible.

When I used Ponyta in RB, I felt it sucked. A lot. And I still do. However, I wasn't sure whenever it was worth a place in E-tier, considering it was still usable.

This run confirmed to me that Ponyta probably shouldn't be in E-tier whatsoever. While it is indeed bad and the RB one comes rather late, Fire Blast + Fire Spin are still useful enough to warrant *some* use. Fire Blast nets useful OHKOs and 2HKOs even in the Pokemon League and Fire Spin is just a trolly move in general.

Yellow Ponyta shoud be D-tier as well, in my opinion. It does come earlier, but, outside of Koga and Erika, it's pretty much the same. And Erika is like 3HKOs anyways, so it's not as useful there.

all in all, keep same tier if Ponyta is pushed to D along with Magmar and Moltres. Otherwise, split

more logs to come in the next days. Per estimates, I should be done with Yellow as a whole within 9 days, though it might be less if I don't test every single late-game Water-type

e: some of Gio #1 and #2's logs are missing in run #3, this is intentional, I didn't really bother with the obvious stuff

I find it interesting that you didn't grab the Hyper Beam TM for Dodrio by late-game.

I suppose that without it, it'd be just excellent, but Hyper Beam Dodrio is a superstar in RBY and it's not like you're not swimming in cash late, so the cost is somewhat mitigated by just how well it performs with just Tri Attack. (Which also has the bonus of freeing up the Body Slam TM.)

Even without Hyper Beam early on, you can also give it Double-Edge for those cases you're just short of finishing a mon. Hyper Beam is just tremendous tho.

Honestly, I think Dodrio is an A-tier mon. It comes a bit late, but Normal STAB is good and it can easily catch up by sweeping Erika's Gym for free. It's an incredibly low-cost mon for the raw power it provides.

Longfellow · Dec 18, 2020

We talked about Hyper Beam a page or two ago and Ryota and I, at least, agreed that the time you have to sit there buying coins (about 8 and a half minutes of mashing A) is long, boring, and should probably not go into the tiering. It's probably worth a mention when we do the write-ups though (and yeah Normal-types like Dodrio really appreciate it).

DrumstickGaming · Dec 18, 2020

Longfellow said:
We talked about Hyper Beam a page or two ago and Ryota and I, at least, agreed that the time you have to sit there buying coins (about 8 and a half minutes of mashing A) is long, boring, and should probably not go into the tiering. It's probably worth a mention when we do the write-ups though (and yeah Normal-types like Dodrio really appreciate it).

Yeah, what do you think of Dodrio in A Longfellow? I'm not super sold on it, to be honest. It really hangs up at the League I feel. It's a solid mon for sure, but with Sandslash and co? Dunno.

Longfellow · Dec 18, 2020

My (very broad) gut feeling is Dodrio in B given the constraints/levels we're doing things at, though it has been a long time since I ran it. Dodrio with early Hyper Beam would be A for sure though.

Bloomer28 · Dec 18, 2020

Longfellow said:
My (very broad) gut feeling is Dodrio in B given the constraints/levels we're doing things at, though it has been a long time since I ran it. Dodrio with early Hyper Beam would be A for sure though.

Out of all the normal types, Dodrio is the runner up to snorlax.

DrumstickGaming · Dec 18, 2020

If Dodrio is the runner up to Snorlax, then it's also B. I think Dodrio is better than Lax though, thanks to Speed.

Here were my thoughts on Dodrio , I was leaning A but I think in the end I decided B for these very reasons, more or less. It missed KOs without Hyper Beam.

Bloomer28 · Dec 18, 2020

DrumstickGaming said:
If Dodrio is the runner up to Snorlax, then it's also B. I think Dodrio is better than Lax though, thanks to Speed.

Here were my thoughts on Dodrio., I was leaning A but I think in the end I decided B for these very reasons, more or less. It missed KOs without Hyper Beam.

K, good reasoning. All i knew was hyper beam was phsyical in gen 1 along with tri attack so dodrio could hit really heavy.

DrumstickGaming · Dec 18, 2020

You know what I'm gonna be a bit deeper on what I'm implying because I feel like it. Note some of this is kinda off memory as it's been a while since that moldy playthrough.

Dodrio, on paper, looks very good. It has the stats to say it's a sweeper, and it has the moves to say it's a sweeper. Hyper Beam is indeed very good. But with 5 PP, is this the move you want to spam, even if it is effective? I don't know man. Sure, Drill Peck and Tri Attack work fine. I just like Hyper Beam as an occasional finisher, and in the League, well, you Hyper Beam a lot, which doesn't sit the best with me. I think it's mostly the mon relying on the move, a sentiment I have shown disdain for elsewhere (see: HGSS Dragonair relying on Game Corner TMs).

Could Dodrio be A? Maybe. It's just quite on the borderline, with arguments for A (sweeper stats, STAB HB is nutty) and B (fragility, really relies on HB, even if cost isn't an issue) being almost equally valid. Not needing to hit SE much to win in RBY helps too.

Longfellow · Dec 18, 2020

Yeah, I probably do like HBeam too much for its 5 PP. It is a hell of a nuclear option though.

DrumstickGaming · Dec 18, 2020

Longfellow said:
Yeah, I probably do like HBeam too much for its 5 PP. It is a hell of a nuclear option though.

Indeed.

Longfellow is there anything that looks out of place to you in the current rankings before we move onto writeups?

Volt-Ikazuchi · Dec 18, 2020

DrumstickGaming said:
Here were my thoughts on Dodrio , I was leaning A but I think in the end I decided B for these very reasons, more or less. It missed KOs without Hyper Beam.

Reading up on those, yeah, it does need HB for the League. It can beat a lot of mons 1v1, but sweeps without HB will be hard.

OHKOing Blue's Alakazam ain't no joke tho.

Could go either way. If we count Hyper Beam, it makes a very strong case for A. Otherwise, B.

DrumstickGaming · Dec 18, 2020

Volt-Ikazuchi said:
Reading up on those, yeah, it does need HB for the League. It can beat a lot of mons 1v1, but sweeps without HB will be hard.

OHKOing Blue's Alakazam ain't no joke tho.

Could go either way. If we count Hyper Beam, it makes a very strong case for A. Otherwise, B.

We could maybe give it the push for beating Alakazam. It's arguably the most dangerous threat in the game. Wish Dodrio could outspeed it normally though.

Longfellow · Dec 19, 2020

DrumstickGaming said:
Indeed.

Longfellow is there anything that looks out of place to you in the current rankings before we move onto writeups?

Yeah, let me run through the tiers and share some gut feelings:

Jynx vs. the legendary birds: we talked about this a little before—I'm glad we've brought the birds back up to A, since I don't think a two-tier difference between Jynx and the birds can be justified. I still kiiiiiinda think Jynx shouldn't be ranked above the birds at all (I do give a lot of weight to the immediate power/level advantage of Articuno and Zapdos). I'd probably knock Jynx down to A citing availability as its (only) downside. But I'd be sad because I like Jynx very much.

Haunter/Gengar: I love these Pokémon but I am a little anti-ghosts for the in-game tiers—TM reliance is annoying and the power isn't as good as I'd hope due to the lack of STAB. Gengar feels like it's a Jolteon/Pikachu-tier mon, all as users of Tbolt. But maybe I'm underestimating Psychic and the immunities (and having two TMs to choose from is a lot better than having only one)

Birds: I always ranked the Normal/Flying-types as Dodrio > RB Farfetch'd > Fearow (>> Pidgeot obviously), so I'd probably move Farfetch'd up or Fearow down. Though maybe Fearow's speed advantage over Farfetch'd is more important than I thought. It's worth noting that Farfetch'd and Fearow both share Spearow's pretty good early game.

Jigglypuff vs. Snorlax: not to dredge this up again but I'd put Jigglypuff at least a tier above Snorlax for the availability (not sure if Puff in A or Lax in C or both)

Exeggcute/Rhyhorn: I'm probably just wrong here since I never run them, but they just seem so bad to me instinctively. I should probably read the logs to see what brings them up to C-tier

Otherwise they pass my sniff test. Good work everyone!

Ryota Mitarai · Dec 19, 2020

everyone already said my stance on HB, so not gonna comment on it

Longfellow said:
Haunter/Gengar: I love these Pokémon but I am a little anti-ghosts for the in-game tiers—TM reliance is annoying and the power isn't as good as I'd hope due to the lack of STAB. Gengar feels like it's a Jolteon/Pikachu-tier mon, all as users of Tbolt. But maybe I'm underestimating Psychic and the immunities (and having two TMs to choose from is a lot better than having only one)

I think A is fine, personally, Normal immunity has been pretty valuable to me and Gengar seems to operate a bit like a worse Zam. Worth mentioning that if you cannot TM Psychic, you can TM Dream Eater instead. A bit more inefficient, but it's more powerful and also happens to heal, so it has its own pluses, I guess?

Longfellow said:
Jynx vs. the legendary birds: we talked about this a little before—I'm glad we've brought the birds back up to A, since I don't think a two-tier difference between Jynx and the birds can be justified. I still kiiiiiinda think Jynx shouldn't be ranked above the birds at all (I do give a lot of weight to the immediate power/level advantage of Articuno and Zapdos). I'd probably knock Jynx down to A citing availability as its (only) downside. But I'd be sad because I like Jynx very much.

I think I've raised my own concerns with Jynx in the past, but I ended up feeling fine with either tier. I found that it's pretty good even without Psychic and that, with Psychic, it's got an S-tier performance. But I don't really have a solid stance myself on this issue

Longfellow said:
Birds: I always ranked the Normal/Flying-types as Dodrio > RB Farfetch'd > Fearow (>> Pidgeot obviously), so I'd probably move Farfetch'd up or Fearow down. Though maybe Fearow's speed advantage over Farfetch'd is more important than I thought. It's worth noting that Farfetch'd and Fearow both share Spearow's pretty good early game.

I am gonna be honest, Spearow is not my favorite thing. I think the main person that pushed Spearow to B was Modulo. When I used it, I felt like this was low B at best (per memory). I don't mind it dropping, though it's still fine with Drill Peck for most parts. Early availability probably saves it too

Longfellow said:
Jigglypuff vs. Snorlax: not to dredge this up again but I'd put Jigglypuff at least a tier above Snorlax for the availability (not sure if Puff in A or Lax in C or both)

if I had to pick one, then ig put Puff (RB) in A, though I question as to whenever there's a need to "split" them. Even if Puff is better than Lax, for most parts, it's important to agree whenever a Pokemon meets the criteria for a given rank; thus, even if Puff is better, it shouldn't be put in A because it's better than other Normal-types. Likewise, Lax shouldn't be dropped to C just cause it's worse than them.

I do have to say that Jigglypuff (Y) is not A-tier, if we do push Puff to A. The inconvenient situation in regards to its availability there is simply too big for A-tier imo.

Longfellow said:
Exeggcute/Rhyhorn: I'm probably just wrong here since I never run them, but they just seem so bad to me instinctively. I should probably read the logs to see what brings them up to C-tier

both are actually fine. Rhydon hits quite hard with EdgeQuake (or, well, SlideQuake, cause Stone Edge doesn't exist yet) and its got a pretty good Attack to abuse them, too. Water and Grass-type moves don't seem to be as common and the Route ones generally suck anyways. Exeggutor's Psychic is pretty strong, that's it mostly. Strength helps with special attackers, if you need that. And, although a bit reliant on it, also has access to a sleep move (albeit one of the worst ones). I'd say both would, in fact, be B-tiers if it weren't for their Slow exp. groups

Rhydon also comes as an in-game trade in Yellow at Pokemon Lab. You need to trade a Golduck, though, so either you have to grind a Psyduck or catch an underleveled Golduck.

e: for Gengar, it also comes at a high level (think it was 29 or 31) if you repel trick at the last floor of Pokemon Tower

Pokemon Red, Blue, and Yellow In-Game Tiers - Reboot

Ryota Mitarai

Shrektimus Prime

Longfellow

DrumstickGaming

Ryota Mitarai

Shrektimus Prime

DrumstickGaming

Ryota Mitarai

Shrektimus Prime

Ryota Mitarai

Shrektimus Prime

DrumstickGaming

DrumstickGaming

Ryota Mitarai

Shrektimus Prime

Bloomer28

Volt-Ikazuchi

Longfellow

DrumstickGaming

Longfellow

Bloomer28

DrumstickGaming

Bloomer28

DrumstickGaming

Longfellow

DrumstickGaming

Volt-Ikazuchi

DrumstickGaming

Longfellow

Ryota Mitarai

Shrektimus Prime

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