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Some battles in the anime you thought were complete BS?

Sham

Sham

The Guardian of War
Of course most battles in the anime could fall under this but I’m talking battles that have little to defend (in your opinion)

my personal ones are

Mallow vs Lana
That battle was BS for a number of reasons I don’t care to explain but the writers really were on something when they expected us to believe that Lana was some master despite her and Mallow doing almost the exact same amount of training during the duration of this series with the exception of maybe the last 20 episodes. You’re telling me Mallow got no hits in and had a type advantage?

May vs Drew (GF)
While one of my favorite May battles the fact that we are suppose to believe that Combusken’s already weakened Overheat weakened Absol’s Water Pulse and landed May that win was a stretch especially when it already took damage to it prior.

Dawn vs Iris
Dawn’s Mamoswine was already shown to be a powerhouse so the fact they made him lose to a Pokémon in a pretty weak fashion with a 4x weakness was weird.

Serena vs Ash
Despite this being a spar battle and people claiming Ash was going “easy” on her...Serena was battling a little too competent for my tastes. If this was Ash starting Kalos that would be fine but this was almost straight after the League ended and somehow Braxien was able to keep up with Pikachu.


Notable mentions
May vs Drew final battle
Ash vs Cameron (notably when Riolu evolved)
Ash vs the twins
Ash vs Viola (first battle)
Tobias in general
 
Ubermuk

Ubermuk

Sticky & Sweet
Viola vs Ash round 1 was dumb. Yeah I get that Ash didn't have experience with ice fields that were completely flat by damn son, you're telling me that Ash 'Resourceful' Ketchum couldn't come up with a solution at the spur of the moment...?

Then freaking Fletchling had to save the day and beat Surskit but still got beat down by Vivillon after.
 
345ash-greninja

345ash-greninja

Auto-Memories Doll
No mention of Ash vs Morrison here? I'm surprised.

That battle was TBH a piece of garbage, in order to create some pointless cheap drama of Morrison getting over his insecurity, they basically made the battle a 6 vs 4 while ridiculously nerfing Ash's strength. Somehow Morrison's Gligar became strong enough to take out Ash's Grovyle + Swellow, 2 of Ash's major powerhouses in the League....I mean if we go by that battle's power scaling Morrison's Gligar is the strongest Pokemon in the entire Hoenn League which pretty obviously looks ridiculous.
 
Ignition

Ignition

We are so back Zygardebros
Ash vs:
- Brock/Hapu (I can somewhat excuse the former but the latter felt like a cheap counter even with the excuse of it mimicking Soak)
- Ritchie (the start of contrived ways to make Ash a failure)
- Morrison (the forced drama)
- Brandon (specifically Charizard's part)
-Trip/Elesa/Skyla/Cameron (BW shenanigans)
-Valerie (I liked this battle but X Scissor shaterring Trick Room because of their respective typings..)
-Hau (the Rowlet fake out was unnecessary and unfunny. Poor Hau)
-Faba (less about the fight itself and more of how a stadium full of people didn't see his obvious cheating)
-Gladion ("Counter the counter")

Yes, I'm aware the anime doesn't follow the same logic and functions different due to its more "realistic" setting. Doesn't make it any less absurd based on established rules that could still work in the anime.
 
345ash-greninja

345ash-greninja

Auto-Memories Doll
Leonhart said:
Satoshi's Ohsubame versus Takuto's Latios has always rankled me. Ohsubame had incredible endurance and stamina in all of his AG battles, yet all it took was one attack from Latios to bring Ohsubame down. To me it wasn't realistic, and it felt like quite a blow to Ohsubame's reputation.
Click to expand...

I don't really see much unrealistic there, cuz Swellow never really held its own against an elite-tier/legendary calibre Pokemon before IIRC. It was also immobilized by a single Extreme Speed from a wild Deoxys beforehand so getting one hit-KO'd by a trained Latios, especially via a move as powerful like its Luster Purge, isn't really surprising.

Swellow was a strong/tenacious Pokemon in its own for sure, but you can't really compare the opponents it defeated/did well against to elite-tier/legendary calibre opponents like Tobias's Latios. Latios was just that powerful, as simple as that.
 
D

DatsRight

Well-Known Member
Sham said:
Mallow vs Lana
That battle was BS for a number of reasons I don’t care to explain but the writers really were on something when they expected us to believe that Lana was some master despite her and Mallow doing almost the exact same amount of training during the duration of this series with the exception of maybe the last 20 episodes. You’re telling me Mallow got no hits in and had a type advantage?
Click to expand...

Sham said:
Serena vs Ash
Despite this being a spar battle and people claiming Ash was going “easy” on her...Serena was battling a little too competent for my tastes. If this was Ash starting Kalos that would be fine but this was almost straight after the League ended and somehow Braxien was able to keep up with Pikachu.
Click to expand...

I think the implication was that Lana had at least invested a sort of 'crash course' before the league and was better at implementing her niches into a proper battle style, though yeah, it was kinda spurious that she never done ONE competitive battle beforehand (even Sophocles did a handful of warmup matches to make for SOME sort of transition). She got the spoils of being the 'battler girl' of the group but never really was allowed to act upon it.

Truthfully I'm more bothered by their battle royale contribution. It was completely offscreen. Shaymin and Sandy should have at least got to do SOMETHING onscreen.

It feels like in recent years someone's told the writers to ease down on scenes with the feminine characters getting roughed up, hence most of the female trainers (or at least ones with feminine Pokemon) being non-battler characters that only take part in minor battles usually completely one sided in their favour, with maybe one exception allowed where they can lose so they don't look undeservedly invincible (all the XY and SM girls have suffered a single KO). If so it seems like SM timed this more carefully and had the Alola league one big 'reality ensues' with the female companions getting slaughtered when they were against a proper adversary.

Serena was a rather awkward case since she was stuck in an action series, where lots of intense battles were bound to happen. They had to keep contriving why Ash and Clemont's more experienced lot would get roughed up while Serena's would seldom take a scratch back (at least in later episodes, maybe Fennekin getting roughed up a bit too much early on was what spurred this direction). They also hadn't quite got as good a gist of her slowly implementing her other talents into a proper battle style so it looked weird when Serena was suddenly strategising and choreographing fluently against Ash. At least Lana and Lillie were shown being reasonably clever with their Pokemon throughout the series, even if they rarely got to demonstrate it though proper battles.

Concerning others, while I'm not as irritated by Ash vs Hau as much as others are, I admit it felt kinda cruel for poor Hau, especially since he didn't really get much to do after to throw the bone (besides helping against the Guzzlord trio which seemed to be everyone's consolation prize for losing the league).

I'm also kinda bugged that the Ash vs Team Rocket trial was ultimately just a plot device for Pikachu to learn Electro Web. Not even a mild deviation from formula, Pikachu gets thrashed, learns Electro Web at just the right time, and Mimikyu, who has 'outlived his usefulness' as a plot pivot, is instantly defeated. I'm glad Pikachu got Electroweb since it's one of his most versatile moves, but I feel like Mimikyu should have gotten a more respectful 'showdown' battle where he didn't get curbstomped through plot armour, maybe if Pikachu learned it earlier but still had to beat him through clever use of the move like in nearly all his other battles using the attack.
 
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AznKei

AznKei

Dawn & Chloe by ddangbi
Ash vs Korrina during the gym battle, mainly the outcome when Pikachu defeated Mega Lucario. It's like the latter just stood still while taking the hit from the former attack because...
Sham said:
Serena vs Ash
Despite this being a spar battle and people claiming Ash was going “easy” on her...Serena was battling a little too competent for my tastes. If this was Ash starting Kalos that would be fine but this was almost straight after the League ended and somehow Braxien was able to keep up with Pikachu.
Click to expand...
Yeah, power levels aren't really consistent, but other shows/franchises suffered from these too, like Dragon Ball.
 
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Leonhart

Leonhart

Imagineer
SerenaRulez said:
Harley vs. May at the Wisteria Town Contest when Harley used Octillery against Munchlax bugged me because it was Munchlax's first Contest but he lost in an embarrassing way. :(
Click to expand...

Gonbe's lack of battle experience was its downfall, so I thought it was a rather convincing loss for Haruka. What bothered me more was that Harley won the whole Contest given that he was supposed to be a villainous rival character.
 
TheCrazyMaster

TheCrazyMaster

Well-Known Member
The first part of Torracat vs Incineroar, where Torracat absorbed blast burn because:
a) It felt like Thunder armor all over again.
b) If you want to set up the final battle between 2 rival Pokemon and bring their rivalry to a proper conclusion, the last thing you ever want to do is throw in a last second power up. While their final battle 2 episodes later was incredible, the fact that Torracat ultimately was only able to fight on par with Incineroar because of a superpower that was never once foreshadowed ruined it a bit for me and made me feel as though Torracat would never have been able to fight on par with its rival without this.
 
Emboar_Rulez

Emboar_Rulez

Pokémon Master (Kinda)
TheCrazyMaster said:
The first part of Torracat vs Incineroar, where Torracat absorbed blast burn because:
a) It felt like Thunder armor all over again.
b) If you want to set up the final battle between 2 rival Pokemon and bring their rivalry to a proper conclusion, the last thing you ever want to do is throw in a last second power up. While their final battle 2 episodes later was incredible, the fact that Torracat ultimately was only able to fight on par with Incineroar because of a superpower that was never once foreshadowed ruined it a bit for me and made me feel as though Torracat would never have been able to fight on par with its rival without this.
Click to expand...

I thought that was stating that Torracat would have flash fire as its ability 9I know hw can't legit have that ability) but then he is revealed to have Blaze.


I thought Ash vs Cameron was total bs from the part where he stop Pikachu from battling three times in a row despite using Pignite for three or having Riolu dodge Aeriel Ace.Not to mention the Pokeon he brought weren't exactly the best like Unfezant,Bolder,and Oshawatt.

Then theres the Sinnoh Semi finals against Tobias which I get the fact that Ash only knew about Darkrai but he still could've brought a better team.I get he might've been saving Charizard for the finals but he shouldve brought Snorlax instead of Torkoal and Tauros instead of Gible.Snorlax obviously hates being attacked when asleep as shown in the Johto league so he would be a good match against Darkrai.I did like hoe Heracross had sleep talk though that was good planning on Ash for once.
 
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