September 8th: SM138 - The Finals! The Ultimate Rival Showdown!!

[Almighty Zard]

It's good writing.

if proving Gladion is more of a coward than Guzma is when it comes to losing, sure.

 

[Zoruagible]

yet Gladion using drives in the middle of a fight is perfectly fine?

Right
Besides, Ash hasn't had a mid-battle evolution in..... well, forever. Pretty terrible way to win the finals, yes. But so is Gladion being allowed to switch discs on a whim

 

[RileyXY1]

It's perfectly fine for Gladion to change out drives in the middle of battle because that shows that he is very adaptive to changes in the battle.

 

[mehmeh1]

Right
Besides, Ash hasn't had a mid-battle evolution in..... well, forever. Pretty terrible way to win the finals, yes. But so is Gladion being allowed to switch discs on a whim

Since Litten->Torracat, aka the last time he had an evolution

 

[Zoruagible]

Since Litten->Torracat, aka the last time he had an evolution

Not to win though
That's the point here.

 

[Almighty Zard]

It's perfectly fine for Gladion to change out drives in the middle of battle because that shows that he is very adaptive to changes in the battle.

this league is already treading on thin ice as it is, have any leagues in the past allowed a trainer to use items in the middle of a fight? It only worsens the credibility of Alola's league if Gladion wins getting away with that.

Look at the fight he just had with Kiawe, it's obvious to most that if he had not equipped the fire drive when he did, Silvally would've probably gone down to Inferno Overdrive, not to mention Gladion showed signs of relief when the fight was over, meaning he was tense about it.

If he equipped a drive before the battle it'd be different, but doing so during battle to prevent himself from losing is just flat out DEM.

Kinda makes me wonder how durable Silvally is without it's drives installed, and how much damage could it take then?

 

[GarchompChain]

It's perfectly fine for Gladion to change out drives in the middle of battle because that shows that he is very adaptive to changes in the battle.

Haha, nice one

 

[UltimateNinja]

yet Gladion using drives in the middle of a fight is perfectly fine?

It's as shitty as Meltan evolving. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying Gladion is better or that he deserves to win. Although Ash winning with DEM would piss me off more.

 

[Red and Blue]

It's as shitty as Meltan evolving. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying Gladion is better or that he deserves to win. Although Ash winning with DEM would piss me off more.

It's not deus ex machina it's a means to an evolution. Besides we already have a Chekov's Gun with Ash's Meltan calling for the others a few episodes ago in advance

 

[Sham]

I don’t even know why Gladion is being attacked for the disks. It’s not like type matching is the most relevant thing in a show where a Dragonite can tank multiple blizzards/ice beams and be perfectly fine. The anime cares about type match ups when it pleases them. I highly doubt Gladion changing disks would really effect any of his battles to the point he loses.

 

[Doppelgänger]

Months in advance. This evolution was foreshadowed as soon as we learned the Meltan were multiplying.

 

[AuraChannelerChris]

I don’t even know why Gladion is being attacked for the disks. It’s not like type matching is the most relevant thing in a show where a Dragonite can tank multiple blizzards/ice beams and be perfectly fine. The anime cares about type match ups when it pleases them. I highly doubt Gladion changing disks would really effect any of his battles to the point he loses.

Hypothetically speaking, him simply changing his Silvally to Ground-type against Pikachu would be stupid in a writing sense, since that would render half of Pikachu's moves useless.

But then Pikachu uses Iron Tail and he changes it to a Fire-type before the attack connects.

Then Pikachu uses Quick Attack and he changes it to a Rock-type.

Rinse and repeat.

The only way to make things interesting would be if someone somehow goads Gladion to change the type to a certain type they can suddenly exploit with effective damage, but I highly doubt that, because "talking is a free action" makes things a bit too tricky and unbelievable, and so is shouting out loud your attacks.

 

[Sham]

Hypothetically speaking, him simply changing his Silvally to Ground-type against Pikachu would be stupid in a writing sense, since that would render half of Pikachu's moves useless.

But then Pikachu uses Iron Tail and he changes it to a Fire-type before the attack connects.

Then Pikachu uses Quick Attack and he changes it to a Rock-type.

Rinse and repeat.

The only way to make things interesting would be if someone somehow goads Gladion to change the type to a certain type they can suddenly exploit with effective damage, but I highly doubt that, because "talking is a free action" makes things a bit too tricky and unbelievable.

We’ve already seen that the anime doesn’t care about Ground being resistant to Electric type attacks (which is what I was saying earlier). Type match ups just don’t matter that much and there’s 10x battles to prove that. If they want a character to win, they’re going to win. That scenario would be interesting but I don’t see Gladion falling for that since he seems quite experienced.

 

[mehmeh1]

Hypothetically speaking, him simply changing his Silvally to Ground-type against Pikachu would be stupid in a writing sense, since that would render half of Pikachu's moves useless.

But then Pikachu uses Iron Tail and he changes it to a Fire-type before the attack connects.

Then Pikachu uses Quick Attack and he changes it to a Rock-type.

Rinse and repeat.

The only way to make things interesting would be if someone somehow goads Gladion to change the type to a certain type they can suddenly exploit with effective damage, but I highly doubt that, because "talking is a free action" makes things a bit too tricky and unbelievable, and so is shouting out loud your attacks.

He'd have to be Deoxys-Speed to switch so fast (heck, now that I think of it, have we seen Silvally actually change from one memory to another?)

 

[AuraChannelerChris]

We’ve already seen that the anime doesn’t care about Ground being resistant to Electric type attacks (which is what I was saying earlier). Type match ups just don’t matter that much and there’s 10x battles to prove that. If they want a character to win, they’re going to win. That scenario would be interesting but I don’t see Gladion falling for that since he seems quite experienced.

If it didn't care, why did Ash go through the trouble of soaking Hapu's Mudsdale with water?

(Ignoring the fact Hapu stupidly had her battle set close to the water.)

He'd have to be Deoxys-Speed to switch so fast (heck, now that I think of it, have we seen Silvally actually change from one memory to another?)

Talking is a free action = Deoxys-Speed, however!

 

[Red and Blue]

We’ve already seen that the anime doesn’t care about Ground being resistant to Electric type attacks (which is what I was saying earlier). Type match ups just don’t matter that much and there’s 10x battles to prove that. If they want a character to win, they’re going to win. That scenario would be interesting but I don’t see Gladion falling for that since he seems quite experienced.

Outside of Kanto(which suffered from early installment weirdness) Ground type Pokemon have been consistently immune to Electric type moves

 

[Sham]

If it didn't care, why did Ash go through the trouble of soaking Hapu's Mudsdale with water?

(Ignoring the fact Hapu stupidly had her battle set close to the water.)

Oh we’ve tons of examples of Ground types being hit by Electric types without an explanation (the battle with Ursula and May in Daybreak town where Mamoswine was hit with Pluse’s and Minun’s Spark). The anime doesn’t care because they suddenly decided to make ground type weak to Electric type as long as water is around. What’s the point of having a resistance if something as easy as water can cancel it? And clearly this is an easy exploitable weakness since it’s been done before. The best part of it was them comparing it to Soak which makes you wonder why that move even exists.

Outside of Kanto(which suffered from early installment weirdness) Ground type Pokemon have been consistently immune to Electric type moves

I suggest you watch “playing the performance encore”

 

[Leonhart]

Months in advance. This evolution was foreshadowed as soon as we learned the Meltan were multiplying.

And I love the fact that they foreshadowed the evolution so far in advance because the writers tend to evolve Satoshi's Pokemon on a whim most of the time. So it was nice to see some hints before an evolution happened in this case.

 

[AuraChannelerChris]

Oh we’ve tons of examples of Ground types being hit by Electric types without an explanation (the battle with Ursula and May in Daybreak town where Mamoswine was hit with Pluse’s and Minun’s Spark). The anime doesn’t care because they suddenly decided to make ground type weak to Electric type as long as water is around. What’s the point of having a resistance if something as easy as water can cancel it? And clearly this is an easy exploitable weakness since it’s been done before. The best part of it was them comparing it to Soak which makes you wonder why that move even exists.

...Not exactly a good counterpoint to use given that was a while ago in a type of battle that liked doing flashy effects...and that was the same generation with the ever-so amazing Thunder Armor.

 

[Sham]

...Not exactly a good counterpoint to use given that was a while ago...and that was the same generation with the ever-so amazing Thunder Armor.

No that was DP, Thunder Armor was AG.