Alright y'all, I've just completed my emerald run and I'm going to address the six Pokemon I used along the way. Please bear with me as I'm writing this on my phone while trying to prevent my children from murdering each other.
Torchic - Red Curry
Due to the other mons I was asked to test, Torchic was the best starter to accompany them. I had extremely high expectations for my little Red Curry, due to it being listed in the S Tier of these rankings. After a full run through, I must unfortunately disagree with this placement.
Make no mistake, Torchic and its evolutions are very strong. With the offensive stats to effectively utilize both of its STABs, the Torchic line is able to deal damage to a wide range of opponents. Reaching its first evolution, gaining dual typing, and learning Double Kick so early (all at level 16) make it extremely useful in the early game. It cleans up Roxanne without any trouble, can overpower Brawly, and breaks through Wattson's low defense electric types. Once I reached the mid game, however, its usefulness dropped off a fair bit. Combusken is not terribly fast, so I found myself being outsped more often than I wanted to be. This made life more difficult as I was taking damage frequently, which combusken is not built to do. Resisting the Fire moves from Flannery's mons was a plus, but it couldn't stay in to take ground attacks from her fire camels. Norman was also tougher than I expected, because by then he was still in his middle evolutionary stage and running a 50bp Fighting move. Failing to ohko faster mons like Vigoroth and Slaking when they already outsped me meant combusken was only able to pitch in a bit in a supposedly plus matchup.
The second half of the midgame was kinder to Red Curry, as I had purchased Flamethrower from the mauville game corner. The long route from Mauville to Fortree is littered with Bug maniacs, Picnickers, and Rangers who all tend to cakrry mons weak to Fire, so he was highly effective here. He was also surprisingly useful against Winona, as she carried both Skarmory and Tropius who were promptly roasted. He had to sit out the rest though, as Altaria and Swellow would have made short work of him.
After Winona was defeated and I obtained the 6th badge, Red Curry again faced a challenging slog down the route toward Lilycove. Permanent rain and numerous water types neutered his best stab, leaving him again with the now underpowered Double Kick for damage. Once in Lilycove and beginning the various Team Aqua and Magma arcs, Red Curry was decently useful again, being able to take on the frequent Dark types carried by grunts and resisting the Fire stabs of Magma. This, unfortunately, was the last time he'd be useful until the Elite 4.
As I entered the final third of the game, the late game, a newly evolved Blaziken found himself completely ineffective against the Psychic Twins in Mossdeep and the hordes of water type trainers floating around those massive ocean routes you have to navigate. He was able to contribute against Juan, as stab Brick Break scored ohkos on Sealeo and Crawdaunt, but took a seat again when the other water types came out. Things began to look up as I entered Victory Road, however, as his dual stabs found much success against the more diverse teams of the Cooltrainers.
The final phase, the Elite 4, saw a healthy contribution from Red Curry. Sidney could do very little as stab Brick Break mowed through his Dark types. He was also helpful against Phoebe, being immune to burns from Will o' Wisp and dealing very strong damage with stab Flamethrower. The final dusclops was a problem, though, easily tanking a Flamethrower and firing back with super effective Earthquake. Glacia was a plus matchup on paper, but the level differences proved more challenging than expected, specifically against mons like Glalie who outsped and carried Earthquake and Walrein who eats Brick Break for breakfast. As expected, Red Curry was not much involved versus Drake and Wallace due to horrendous matchups.
Which brings me to the important part of my analysis: the summary and final grade. Going back to the beginning of my post, I mentioned that I had very high expectations for Torchic based on its current rank. I expect an S rank mon to face very little opposition throughout the game and be able to even break through some minus matchups. Though Torchic and his evolutions are strong offensively, middling speed and horrible defenses caused more problems than is acceptable for an S rank. It is with this in mind that I officially recommend Torchic be dropped to
A Tier, as its from-the-start availability, early and late game usefulness, and strong mixed offensive stats make it an excellent Pokemon for any team.
Phew, that was long. I'll keep the remaining Pokemon more concise...
Ralts - Weeb Bait
Ralts is available to catch before you've faced your first random trainer, though it is only a 4% encounter rate. This is not a huge deal though, as it's well worth the brief wait. It only took me about 15 minutes to find one, and it was female and positive natured. I nicknamed her Weeb Bait, which I felt was appropriate. Ralts learns Confusion at level 6, so it only requires a level of babying before it can fend for itself after being caught. Confusion is very strong for the early game and has great matchups against the second gym. Ralts and Kirlia have average stats, but stab Confusion and ability to learn tbolt as soon as you can afford it make them tolerable while you level up. Learning Psychic very early (lv26) is also a huge boon, and from there it's just a short few levels to reach your final evolution. Gardevoir was the star of my battle with Norman, able to withstand enough punishment from Slaking to successfully ko him. From there, Gardevoir runs basically unopposed through the rest of the game, facing no real bad matchups aside from the dark types of Team Aqua/Magma and the Psychic gym in Mossdeep. Psychic and Thunderbolt are all the coverage you really need, coming in handy on the water routes and against Juan. Sidney and Phoebe were rough on her of course, but that was the only time in the game she really struggled.
Final rank:
A Tier
Electrike - Raikou?
Hmm, tough one here. On one hand, his combination of high Special Attack and Speed allows him to hit hard and avoid most damage if he ohkos as he is almost always going to go first. He's also available pretty early (as soon as you arrive in Slateport) and is very easy to catch. He also evolves very early, reaching peak power before you're halfway through the game. Electric also has great matchups against Team Aqua, Gyms 6 and 8, the long water routes, and Wallace.
That, sadly, is where his advantages end. Electrike suffers from the same thing most early gen Electric types suffer from: horrible movepool, lack of coverage, and reliance on a game corner tm. Additionally, Electrike requires a tremendous amount of babying when you first get him. 7 levels to be exact, which is very slow and painful at that stage of the game. He's also a one trick pony, essentially spamming Thunderbolt against everything that isn't immune to it. Its attack is too low to really make use of physical coverage like Return, and its ONLY other special coverage move is Bite, learned very late and actually still weaker than a resisted Thunderbolt. It's also frail, making it vulnerable to heavy damage against mons it can't ohko. I think these numerous flaws are enough for me to disagree with its B ranking, and recommend lowering it to
C Tier
Oddish - Legalized
Not as much to say here. Useful for Sleep powder and resisting the electric moves of Wattson, but Grass is a terrible attacking type throughout the game, especially when your best move is Bullet Seed. Interestingly, your best offensive damage ends up being from the physical side with Sludge Bong. Despite Oddish's relatively low Attack, it has very high base power and gets stab, making it one of the more powerful moves your team has to offer at the time you obtain it. Getting Giga Drain in time for those notorious water routes is a plus, and grass is good against Juan. Unfortunately, by the time you reach the elite 4, your attacks aren't as relatively powerful and there aren't too many plus matchups to take advantage of. Most of Wallace's mons carry super effective coverage against grass so you're not doing much here.
Final rank:
C Tier
Staryu - B Tier lol
I must admit, when I first found out I was using Staryu and how late it showed up in the game, I was highly skeptical of its rank. 2 gyms, the water routes, victory road and the e4 just didn't sound like very much time for it to contribute. The difficulty in finding it was also uninspiring (15% encounter rate with the awful fishing mechanics of gen3). However, once I got it and began to use it, I began to see why others rated it so high. By the time you get Staryu, you should have plenty of money to buy at least one game corner tm, probably both if you obtained the amulet coin as soon as it was available and used it constantly. Couple that with the Ice beam tm you can get at the same time from the abandoned ship and you're able to give Staryu its endgame moveset the moment you catch it. This boosts its usefulness considerably as you can pretty much cruise to the end of the game without much trouble, based on your excellent stats and amazing versatility. The only real snag you'll face is against Sidney and Phoebe, but they are trouble for any psychic type. When it's all said and done, Staryu fits nicely in the
B Tier, but could easily be A or S if it were available earlier in the game.
