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After beginning my search for Feebas in Mt Coronet last week, I managed to find one in my 45th tile today. On the first night of trying I failed to find any after searching 130 tiles, so today I upped my search from two Pokemon per tile to three, and it looks like this strategy paid off. I proceeded to catch a number of the elusive blighters before leaving Mt Coronet feeling very satisfied. My attention will now turn to catching a Spiritomb, having caught most other base stage Pokemon in the Sinnoh Dex on Diamond.
Played for a little bit today. I began another attempt at the Battle Hall and got back to 20 wins, clearing all the ranks for Ice and Dark types. My Garchomp fortunately didn’t run into much trouble and won the battles pretty easily. The worst thing that happened was getting hit by Umbreon’s Confuse Ray, but luckily Garchomp didn’t hurt itself so it wasn’t too bad.
After finishing those 20 battles, I didn’t really feel like continuing on at the moment. Instead, I used my Vs Recorder and checked out some old battle videos I recorded several years ago. I watched them all and then saved for now. I’ll continue my streak soon.
Time for the third gym update. Last time I left off, I was right outside the Slowpoke Well, and Kurt had rushed in to chase after Team Rocket. With my team fully leveled for what I needed them to be at, I followed Kurt into the well. At the bottom, he was disabled, so I set after Team Rocket on my own.
Since they're the evil team, they obviously use a lot of Zubats and Ratattas, so Ransack, Starscream, and Jetfire were the Pokémon to lead this venture. For most of the Zubats, Starscream and Jetfire was the best ones to use, since they hit hard and fast. If I were to let the Zubats keep fighting, there was a good chance they'd confuse me and just drag the battle out longer than it needed to be. One Rocket used an Ekans, which is where Ransack came in handy. Being a Poison-type, he's immune to being poisoned. Fortunately, though, between Constrict and Supersonic, I could maintain the upper hand. The Rocket Executive Proton used a Zubat and a Koffing, so I employed the same strategy. I used Starscream to take out he Zubat, and used Ransack to tank out the Koffing. Between Confusion and Constrict, I was able to maintain regular outgoing damage, while soaking up as much damage as I could by resisting the poison and healing some of it off with the Shell Bell.That done, it was time to head to the Azalea Gym.
As a Bug-type Gym, it was a good idea to use Jetfire for offense, and Nightbird, Ransack and Starscream for defense. By this point, Jetfire had learned Aerial Ace, so he was able to thoroughly decimate anything he was up against. The others were able to provide a good semblance of offense against the various Gym Trainers. To my surprise, there was some semblance of variation between the Trainers. Only two trainers used a Weedle, but the rest were all unique. One used a Kakuna and a Beedrill (along with his Weedle), one used the other Weedle and a Caterpie. One used only a Paras, and a pair of twins used a Spinarak and a Ledyba. All in all, though, they were all super easy to defeat, since I had power leveled a bit.
Then it was time for Bugsy. He led with his big powerhouse, Scyther. I, of course, led with a clever strategy, with Ransack. First two turns, I laid two layers of Toxic Spikes. The idea was to poison his other Pokémon. However, I didn't look up who his others were, so my strategy didn't exactly pan out like I had wanted. He switched into his Kakuna, and absorbed the Spikes, rendering that entire strategy useless. So, I switched into Jetfire, and let loose with the offense. Kakuna's Poison Sting managed to poison Jetfire, but two Aerial Aces are all that were needed to faint the Kakuna. He brought his Scyther back in. His Scyther had the advantage of level and speed, but Jetfire had the advantage of typing and power. His Quick Attack guaranteed a first strike, and he was able to get some pretty good hits on Jetfire, and eventually wore him down to the red. But, not before I fainted his Scyther. Two down and one to go. I switched back into Ransack for his Metapod. My idea was to Poison the Metapod, so that it couldn't spam Harden and reduce my Physical Offense which comprised the vast majority of my offense at the time. I managed to poison it, but completely forgot about Metapod's ability: Shed Skin. So, I decided to just use Acid to take out Metapod, since it was the only Special Attack that I had at the time. It took a bit, but I eventually managed to take out the Metapod.
And with that, Bugsy was defeated. I got the Hive Badge, and left the gym. Along my venture, I did manage to get some Apricorn Balls. Specifically, some Level Balls and Love Balls. I had no other task in Azalea Town, so I moved on to Ilex Forest. But, before I could, Silver accosted me again, and immediately challenged me to battle.
He led with a Gastly. First turn, I switched into Soundwave for a one-hit KO with Confusion. But, he did manage to get a Curse on me on the switch. He threw in his Zubat, which only made things easy. I left Soundwave in, and continued to use STAB Confusion. Another one-hit KO. His Quilava was next. At level 18, he had the advantage of level on me. But, Ransack had the advantage of typing. I switched Ransack in, and shrugged off an Ember. He tried to use Smokescreen on me, but Clear Body prevented it from working. I threw out a few Acids and the battle was over. He spouted some nonsense about weak Pokémon or some such grief. I ignored him and moved onto Ilex Forest.
Ilex Forest comes in two parts. First was the Farfetch'd side quest. A man has lost two of his Farfetch'd, and he makes me catch them. It was a simple puzzle of cracking some sticks to make them look in a specific direction, then grabbing them from behind. Completing this yielded the HM01, which is Cut. I went back to Azalea Town and swapped out Jetfire, who had gained a few levels above the rest of the team, and pulled out one of my two HM Slaves.
I continued along the second half of Ilex Forest. Eventually I came across a move tutor who teaches Headbutt. So, I decided to teach Headbutt to every Pokémon who could learn it, which was all except Jetfire. I had to make two more trips back so that I could have Jetfire learn Headbutt and then promptly put him back in the box. But, after a few trainers and some exploration, I reached the other end of the forest, and moved onto Route 34.
I progressed further along the route, and came across the Daycare Couple and Ethan. He introduced me, and they teased him about me being his girlfriend. They explained how the Day Care system worked, but I already knew. I moved on and eventually reached Goldenrod City. I healed up at the Pokémon Center, and checked out the Department Store. I only ended up buying two different TM's for Esmeral. Fire Blast and Blizzard. Esmeral is significantly more Specially-based than she is Physical. There wasn't that much to do in town right now, aside from exploring a bit. I fought a few trainers in the underground passage, and got my picture taken while dressed up as a member of Team Rocket. I did manage to get a Bicycle, from the Bike Shop, for free, since he's having trouble getting sales. Of course, if his prices were anything like they were in Kanto ... it's small wonder. The last thing I did was headed over to the Radio Tower to get the Radio Card for my Poke Gear. Of course, when I did, Goldenrod's Gym Leader, Whitney was a bit jealous but returned to her Gym.
Before I followed her to the Gym, I put Jetfire back in the party and did some more training on Route 34. I grinded up a few levels, until everyone was around level 21-ish. And, with that, it was time to challenge Whitney.
Whitney's Gym is a Normal-type Gym, so there's really no type advantages or disadvantages. The Gym Trainers were all very easy to beat. First up were two beauties. One used three Sentrets, and one used two Meowths. A little further on, I ran into two Lasses. One used a single Snubbull, and another used a three Jigglypuff's.
Whitney herself trains a Clefairy and her infamous Miltank. She led with the Clefairy, and I used led with Ransack again. I tried to execute the same strategy that I employed before, by laying two layers of Toxic Spikes. I took out her Clefairy fairly easily using Bubblebeam and Acid. She switched into her Miltank after the Clefairy went down. The last time I battled against her, the Miltank was a pain. I brought Nightbird in for two reasons. First, Ground-types are resistant to Rollout, which is one of Whitney's most difficult moves to contend with. The other reason is because Nightbird is a female, so Miltank's Attract is useless. Thanks to Nightbird's high defense, I was able to take a few of Miltank's Stomps, and counter with Headbutt. Once the Miltank was in the red, Whitney used a Super Potion and healed it up to full. I hit Miltank with a Headbutt, and used a Super Potion myself once it hit me with a Stomp and brought Nightbird down to the red. I then proceeded to use Whitney's own strategy against herself, and popped Rollout and destroyed the Miltank after a few rounds.
Once I was done with the Gym, I did some trading to my Platinum version, and used some of my old TM's to power up my team. I didn't give them anything I wouldn't normally find on my journey, anyway. I gave Nightbird Earthquake and Shadow Claw. Soundwave was given Shockwave and Grassknot, and evolved when I traded him. Ransack was given Brine, Sludge Bomb, and Giga Drain. Esmeral got Flamethrower and Ice Beam. Jetfire and Starscream didn't learn anything, since the moves they need to complete their final move set are learned naturally.
Finally, I left Goldenrod to the north. Here's the team's levels, as of this update.
Decided to stay up way too late as usual >> to continue at the Battle Hall. I was determined to keep playing until I either lost or reached 170 wins.
My Garchomp got through the really tough types pretty well and didn't struggle that much. I did have a very, very close call against Yanmega when I was doing Bug types, though. That Yanmega survived my Outrage, took out a lot of my HP with Bug Buzz, then had its Speed Boost raise its Speed stat. It was faster than me on the next turn and tried using Air Slash, which definitely would have killed me...but it missed!
After that, I had a pretty easy time blasting through the remaining types. I soon reached the Argenta battle for the gold print! I was so nervous about which Pokemon she was going to use and feared that it would be something that could defeat Garchomp...but it ended up being Lucario, who was an easy OHKO with Earthquake.
So, I got the gold print for the Battle Hall on Platinum! have to get it on my HeartGold next
I'm only missing the Factory gold on Platinum now.
After slaying Elite Four Aaron, I took a lift up and walked into Bertha's chamber. I challenged her inside and I used my Golduck's Waterfall to slay her Whiscash, then I used Golduck's Ice Beam against her Gliscor. I defeated Bertha's Golem with Gallade's Close Combat and then her Hippowdon with Golduck's Surf attack. Finally, Togekiss creamed Bertha's Rhyperior using Aura Sphere and I headed to Flint's chamber next. I fought him and used Garchomp's Earthquake attack to defeat Flint's Houndoom and Rapidash, then I switched and used Golduck's Surf against Flint's Flareon and Magmortar. All that remained was Flint's ratchet Infernape, which Togekiss thrashed with Air Slash. I healed my darlings next and saved.
Major congrats! Really well deserved after all the tries you made.
I played Platinum a little today. Didn't do anything of major importance though. I had saved at the Resort Area last time I played since I had checked what items I was missing at the Villa. Decided to use my Super Rod and fish for Magikarp in the pond, but didn't find any weak fish above level 50 so I gave up. Flew to the Fight Area and entered the Battle Frontier. Bought a few scratch-off cards to see if I could win anything. Won a Nugget on one of them, so that was at least something. Booted up my VS. Recorder to watch my recorded video which was my Gold Battle against Argenta from last year. The battle is fun to watch, albeit a bit short. Memorable because it was the last one I saved before the Wi-Fi support went down. After watching it, I entered the Battle Factory. Will start a new streak here at some point, hopefully rather soon.
Apart from that, I also played SoulSilver a little today. Didn't really do anything though, just went to various places in Johto and Kanto. Picked some Apricorns from Apricorn trees. Spoke to the Day-Care Man to see what Pokemon I had left at the Day-Care, turned out to be a Larvitar and a Kabuto. Took the Magnet Train to Kanto, entered a wild battle at Route 7 to see what I could find. A level 19 Raticate. Truely thrilling. Went down to Pallet Town to check things there and met a Level 4 Pidgey at Route 1. Spoke to the people in the town to see what they had to say. Then I quit. But still... for whatever reason, I feel like giving the Pokedex on HG/SS another try. I... never thought this would happen. These are the only games I own (as of now) that I have never completed the Pokedex on, and I feel like I have to do it. It is as if otherwise, I'm not an actual Pokemon fan. Don't know why, but somehow, my motivation for it is higher now than it has ever been for the past 4-5 years. I can't explain it. Not sure if there will come anything of it though as I might not feel the same tomorrow. Nothing is set in stone yet and nothing might come out of this... but still. We'll see what the future brings.
After getting the gold print at the Hall, I continued battling there until I lost in order to “finish” my streak. My final record with Garchomp ended up being 179 wins. I lost to Yanmega, who had Speed Boost again and didn’t miss with Air Slash this time. Guess it wanted revenge after the last time lol.
Don’t care about that loss, though, since my main goal was to finally earn my gold print.
Next, I left the Hall and headed over to the Battle Factory. I continued a level 100 streak I started a while back and rented a team of Toxicroak, Dragonite, and Glalie. I did pretty well at first and defeated the first six trainers easily. Toxicroak’s DynamicPunch and Glalie’s Explosion were very useful for dealing with tough foes. Before the seventh battle, though, I swapped Toxicroak for Tyranitar because I thought Tyranitar would be more useful against the two Pokemon I was told the opponent had. Unfortunately, I didn’t do well in that battle at all. My opponent lead with a Rapidash that Horn Drilled Tyranitar and Dragonite, then took out Glalie too.
That loss sucked, but I’ll probably spend some more time at the Factory soon.
Platinum: Started a new streak at the Battle Factory. Won the first round of seven battles which is a start at least. Got to use some good Pokemon like Salamence and Hippowdon, also had a Gliscor for the last battle but it didn't do much as it got confused by my opponent's Weezing which used Swagger. It only hit itself instead of using Aerial Ace like I wanted it to. Doesn't matter though since I won in the end anyway. Will continue on my streak soon.
SoulSilver: Played this a little today again in order to do what I actually wanted to do yesterday. To try and add some new entries to my Pokedex just to see what it actually is like. I withdrew a Slakoth from my PC and started training it since I didn't have Vigoroth or Slaking registered. Some trainers in Johto wanted rematches which was shown on my PokeGear Map, so I battled them for some training. This made Slakoth evolve into Vigoroth. Then I went to Saffron and rebattled Blaine and Morty three times each. Why does Morty have 2 Gengar on his team? There's no excuse for that with all the Ghost-types that exist this generation. Anyway, it gave a bit of training for Vigoroth, it reached level 35 in the end. Didn't feel like trying to call regular trainers for rematches as I didn't have the list in front of me, flew to Mt. Silver instead and battled some wild Pokemon. Vigoroth reached level 36 and evolved into Slaking.
So I got two more entries added to the Pokedex that way. It felt like it took forever to do, even it was probably not more than an hour in total. Which honestly feels like too long, though I guess I have just been spoiled by all the awesome training spots in 5th/6th gen and D/P/P. But that's no excuse for the fact that HG/SS are seriously lacking when it comes to good training spots. Anyway, I haven't done my final decision on this matter yet, will do so later this week. For now though, it is looking like I am actually going to do it, even with the hardships I had to experience today.
After slaying Flint, I sashayed to Lucian's chamber and spoke with him and we fought next. I defeated Lucian's Mr. Mime with Infernape's Shadow Claw and then I defeated Lucian's Espeon using Togekiss's Shadow Ball attack. Infernape's Flamethrower defeated Bronzong, then I defeated his Alazakam and Gallade with Shadow Claw. I arrived in Cynthia's room next and challenged her. I defeated her Spiritomb with Golduck's Surf attacks, then her Roserade with Togekiss's Air Slash. I used Rotom's Thunderbolt to slay Milotic and her Togekiss. I used Infernape's Flamethrower to beat Lucario, and finally Golduck's Ice Beam to thrash Garchomp. Professor Rowan showed up next and I was registered in the Hall of Fame.
Started a new lv. 100 Battle Factory streak today. I rented a team of Manectric, Ludicolo, and Breloom at the beginning because the other options were pretty bad. My first battle was kind of tough because I faced a Slowbro that destroyed Manectric with Surf and then a Starmie that was pretty strong, too. I managed to win, though, and decided to swap out Manectric for the Starmie afterwards. Starmie ended up being very useful and really helped during the rest of the battles. After five battles or so, I swapped Ludicolo for a Rapidash, whose Fire Blast came in handy. I soon defeated 7 trainers and earned some more BP.
On Platinum, I continued on my current streak at the Battle Factory and won one more round of 7 battles. Got to use some good Pokemon like a Swampert (one of the few level 100 Factory sets which have Protect) and a Froslass with Destiny Bond which is amazing, though it doesn't have as much potential early on as it does in the later rounds. I won all battles without major problems, got down to only having one Pokemon left at some battles but it was nothing too difficult. I won and got some BP, will continue tomorrow.
After the game credits, I awoke in my bedroom in Twinleaf Town and dashed downstairs. I gossiped with my mom and she mentioned Barry and Snowpoint City. I headed out next and I flew to Hearthome City. I went south to the mansion on Route 212 and saw Manaphy's picture in Mr. Backlot's office. I flew to Sandgem Town afterwards and spoke with Rowan at his lab, then Professor Oak showed up. He upgraded my Pokedex into a National Pokedex and he mentioned that the Pal Park on Route 221 was now open. Professor Rowan then handed me the Poke Radar and next I visited the Pal Park and Oak gave me a Poketch app there. I left and flew to Eterna City and saw Oak again, who mentioned the Legendary Birds.
Continued on my streak at the Battle Factory. I won 6 more battles but ended up losing in the 7th, which was against Thorton. I had a team of Swampert, Charizard and Gardevoir while he had Electrode, Froslass and Regirock. My Swampert managed to take down both his Electrode and Froslass by itself which was really cool. Swampert does probably actually live up to its epithet as 'The most consistently good Pokemon in the Factory'. Unfortunately though, it then fainted by damage from the Hail that Froslass had set up. I sent out Gardevoir and Thorton sent out Regirock. I go for Psychic which does around 40%, he uses Stone Edge, it hits and Gardevoir dies. I send out Charizard, hoping that Focus Blast will hit. Instead, Regirock's Quick Claw activates and it uses Stone Edge again, hits, Charizard faints and I lose. But even if I lost, I am happy that it was a quite even battle and not a 3-0 from Thorton which I have experienced quite many times.
With that, I am going to take a break from the Battle Factory, but I will be doing other things in Platinum relatively soon.
So after gossiping with Professor Oak at his home in Eterna City, I flew to Veilstone City and headed south and visited Turnback Cave. I waltzed through many chambers and passed some pillars and caught a wild Dusclops, then I saw a portal to the Distortion World. I picked up a Griseous Orb there, then I sashayed back outside and flew to Jubilife City. I headed west to Canalave City from there and spoke with Sailor Eldritch, whose son was trapped in a nightmare. We set sail to Fullmoon Island afterwards and I spotted Cresselia in the forest clearing and grabbed the Lunar Wing next. Once Sailor Eldritch's son was cured via the Lunar Wing, I flew to the Pokemon League and re-entered Victory Road and saved inside.
So, picking up where I left off in Goldenrod City.
Immediately leaving the Gym, I headed just to the right into the flower shop. She refused to give me a watering can, or rather the SquirtBottle, until I had the Plain Badge. But, now that I was armed with the bottle, I had a date with a very odd tree.
I made my way north out of Goldenrod City onto Route 35. The path heading north held several trainers, but before I headed on to the National Park, I looped back around through the grass and explored a bit. There was a portion of this route I couldn't explore because I couldn't Surf, so I'll have to return here if I want to fully explore it. If I had taken one of my HM Slaves with me, I could have skipped the entire next session, but I chose to keep my battle team on me. I prefer to keep them on me as often as possible. Eventually, I went through the gate into the National Park. I didn't participate in the Bug Catching contest, because it wasn't active that day. I fought more trainers in the grass. I really like the grass in this area, because it's styled like a PokeBall. I did make it a point to explore through the areas just outside the fencing, because there were items hidden beyond. I headed further on to Route 36, and my date with the odd tree was about to commence. Armed with my mighty SquirtBottle, I steeled myself for almighty hell, and sprayed the odd tree! It wiggled, and attacked. The Sudowoodo was no match to my team, of course. I checked back in Violet City and healed up at the Pokémon Center, before heading on to Route 37. This area had a few Double Battles, and a few Single Battles. It wasn't hard, and my Pokémon were growing rather quickly. The level limit that traded Pokémon would listen to me was still 30, since Whitney's badge didn't give me a boost in that regard, and I was nearing that limit.
Eventually, I made my way to Ekruteak City. Before challenging the Gym, I explored the town a bit. My first stop was the Kimono Girls' house. When I walked in, one of the girls was being harassed by a Rocket Grunt, and none of the patrons were willing to help, the bunch of louts. So, I had to intervene, and threw in Soundwave. I utterly decimated the Rocket Grunt, and sent him fleeing. One of the patrons gave me the Dowsing Machine, which is awesome. The next point of interest was the Burned Tower. Upon entering, I was accosted by Euscine who explained he has an unhealthy obsession with Suicune. Next person I met was Morty, the town's Gym Leader. I also noticed three Pokémon at the basement, and I tried to make my way to them. Finally, I ran into Silver, who challenged me to another battle. The battle was pretty boring, since I was rapidly becoming more and more powerful. I utterly wrecked him this time around, but before I put an end to his flailing, he said that he "was taking it easy on me". It's funny, because why would he take it easy on me if he was so obsessed with strength and was still getting wrecked by somebody he deems inferior? Upon his defeat, he left the town and I continued exploring the tower. In the basement floor, the three Pokémon saw me and fled. Euscine said that Suicune took interest in me, which means I was something special. Morty said he'd wait for me in the Gym, and left.
I followed suit, and headed to the Gym myself. It was time to challenge Morty and take the Fog Badge for myself. His Gym's gimmick was pitch blackness, only lit by the candles on the gym trainers. If I walked off the set path, I ended up back at the beginning of the Gym, which was actually useful for when I needed to heal up. Each trainer went down without much of an issue, and once I reached Morty, the battle was on!
I led with Ransack, as I usually do. But since his team consists of all Gastly-line Pokémon, Toxic Spikes was a pretty bad idea, since it does no good. But, being a Poison-type, I was protected against being poisoned, and it was a good way to scout out the opponents team at the start. He led with Gastly, the weakest of his team. I used Brine twice to take out his Gastly, and I'm not sure exactly what his strategy really was. His next Pokémon was one of his two Haunters. I switched Jetfire in, and tried to use Knock-Off to deal some Super-Effective damage. However, he outsped Jetfire and put him to sleep. After two Dream Eaters, Jetfire was hurting pretty badly, but he woke up and struck with Knock-Off. Jetfire's Stick stacked some odds in my favor, and I was able to get a one-hit KO thanks to a Critical Hit. He decided to bring out the big guns, and threw in his Gengar. I brought in Starscream, and it was the battle of the best. I wanted to save Soundwave until I absolutely needed him, since he could easily wreck Morty's entire team with barely any effort. Normally, I would have used Starscream's Focus Energy, but I didn't want to risk being hit with a powerhouse move, so I immediately used Pursuit. It wasn't a one-hit KO, but it did some fairly powerful damage. Starscream had the speed advantage, as well. Morty's Gengar went down on the next turn, and he was reduced to his final Pokémon, his second Haunter. I brought in Nightbird, and with a single Shadow Claw, I was able to take out his final Pokémon.
My reward was the Fog Badge, and now all Pokémon up to level 50 will obey me. Which is nice, because it's now double my current level. Up next is the areas east and west of Ekruteak. First is the start of Route 42, and then the path west on Route 38.
I dashed along Victory Road and accessed a new area, then I spotted that chick named Marley in a huge cavern. We decided to explore together and we fought several trainer duos as we pranced around. We also thrashed many wild Pokemon as well as we navigated through the cave and Marley's Arcanine came in handy. I picked up a Dusk Stone, then Marley left once we had reached Victory Road's exit and I Surfed on some lakes next and caught a wild Dewgong and Lapras next for my Dex. I finally exited Victory Road afterwards and I arrived at Route 224. I caught a wild Weepinbell, Oddish, and Shuckle in the tall grass and battled against some trainers. I picked Berries as well and soon I flew back to Snowpoint City.
I have made my final decision on this now. I am going to complete the Pokedex in HG/SS. No, I will not just try to do it, I am going to actually do it. I might be crazy, but I will really do this. I have to. It is fate. Or destiny. Or maybe those are the same thing? Either way, I have to do it, and I swear, I will. No ifs or buts. It will feels like it will be a challenge, and that will probably be just the thing I need right now. I have decided to not rush it (which won't be possible anyway due to the lack of training spots in the games, thanks Game Freak) but rather take the time I need. Which will be a lot of time. The goal is to have it done before the end of the year which should give me roughly four months, which should be enough. But it isn't... no big deal, I'll have more time after that as well. And with that... it begins.
SoulSilver: When I started today, my Pokedex progress for the Johto Dex were 236 Pokemon caught and 252 seen. For the National Dex, it was 370 caught and 404 seen.
Since I don't have much left on the Johto Dex, I will start with completing it. Withdrew an Aipom from the PC and started training it. Started against wild Pokemon at Mt. Silver but had to give up because it was going so slowly. Instead, I called a random trainer and managed to get rematches, this was very fortunate as I didn't have the list of times in front of me, I just selected one of the first trainers on the Phone list. Though I had to rematch the same trainer over and over again which is the very opposite of fun. Anyway, after a few battles, Aipom reached level 32, learned Double Hit and evolved into Ambipom. Deposited it, withdrew a Yanma and started training it instead.
Started training it by having two rematches with Clair. Why has she only got 3 Dragon-type Pokemon on her team, and why does she have a Dragonair? There are so many other Dragon-type options in this generation. Come on, Game Freak. Anyway, I didn't feel like rebattling her anymore as I found it hard to defeat her with my team, which is just showing how bad said team is and that I shouldn't use it for much longer. Instead, I rebattled the Hiker on Route 33 several times. He proved to be useful for this as Yanma could use Detect against his Golem's Explosion, gaining some extra experience this way. After battling him enough times, I went to Mt. Silver and defeated some wild Pokemon outside. Yanma grew to level 33, learned Ancientpower and evolved into Yanmega. And that's it for today, more tomorrow.
HeartGold: My Pokedex progress on this game when I started today was the following:
Johto Dex: 165 Pokemon caught and 235 seen
National Dex: 216 caught and 327 seen
So I have a bit more left here compared to SoulSilver. Which isn't surprising as I never even bothered with the Pokedex here, while I at least made a failed attempt on SoulSilver. I will start on the Johto Dex here as well. Started from Azalea today, recieved some Moon Balls from Kurt and gave him new Apricorns to work with. Headbutted some trees in the town and caught Heracross and Aipom that way. Withdrew a Togepi and gave it the Soothe Bell since I will need a Togetic for my Pokedex later on. I wanted to catch some other Pokemon as well, but couldn't find any of the ones I was looking for, so I gave up. Which isn't exactly a good start. I'm hoping to get more done tomorrow instead.
In addition to this, I have also been thinking of breeding and training some new Pokemon just for the purpose of making it easier to train other Pokemon. Because honestly, my in-game teams in HG/SS are garbage, especially the one in SoulSilver. I will try using my current teams for a short while but I am almost convinced that I will need to create new "teams", which I will do rather soon. So I have already started planning the Pokemon I will use for them.
Picking back up where I left off in Ekruteak City, right outside the Pokémon Center.
Before moving onward, I switched out three of my Party Members for two HM Slaves and a Smeargle with a few out-of-battle moves (like Dig and Teleport). I started by heading east onto Route 42. I picked up the Shadow Claw TM just outside of Mt. Mortar, before heading inside. I explored as much as I could inside the mountain, which was quite a bit. I slowly worked through the mountain, picking up a lot of basic items, and fighting a few trainers. I noticed the encounter rate was incredibly high here, though. The music couldn't get through more than a couple notes before I was in another random encounter. It was difficult to trudge through it, but I managed to come out on the other side. I surfed back across the water after healing up in Mahogany Town, and picked a few Apricorns to add to my growing collection.
There wasn't much of note in Mahogany Town, since I was here a little ahead of the course of the game. I couldn't exit to the east, since a guy who works for Team Rocket was preventing me from going that way. I was able to head north toward the Lake of Rage, and I did a bit more exploration in this direction. Fought a few more trainers, including one that had a level 20 Nidoking who went down in a single hit from Soundwave's Psybeam. I didn't explore out onto the waters yet, because if I remember right, the Gyarados is level 30.
I headed back to Ekruteak, and headed west to Route 38. This way was a bit more traditional, in that there were two routes. One was a paved route that led to an Apricorn Tree, and the other was a grassy route littered with trainers. I managed to find the Miltank Farm, but I wasn't able to help. I didn't have any Oran Berries on me at the time, so I couldn't help heal the sick Miltank. Moving onward, I made my way down the small Route 39 toward Olivine City.
As I entered the town, Silver came out of the Gym and spouted some drivel about how it's a waste of time to help heal sick Pokémon, yada yada. He didn't want to battle me, because I probably would have annihilated him again. I made my way to the Pokémon Center, healed up, and called it quits. Here's the team's levels, as of this update.
Once in Snowpoint City again, I met up with Cynthia again and next I boarded the ship to the Battle Zone and upon arrival at the Fight Area, I spotted Barry and we headed towards the Battle Frontier. We couldn't pass though due to Flint and Volkner blocking our way, so we challenged them. We struggled to slay their Fire and Electric teams, but we won eventually and next Barry's dad Palmer stopped by to gossip. After explaining the facilities, I encountered Buck and he mentioned the Survival Area and Stark Mountain. Afterwards, I sashayed towards the Fight Area's northern exit and gossiped with a Fisherman and he handed me the Super Rod. I explored the Battle Frontier next and fought at the Battle Factory.
Since my last update I proceeded into Kanto and defeated Lt Surge, Sabrina, Misty, and Erika. (Misty and Erika were today). I am doing a bit of grinding before taking on Janine later on tonight.