I've played through Moon, Sun and Ultra Sun with the following teams:
Moon
My initial playtrough and the team I liked the most out of the three.
I picked
Rowlet for my starter and I remember thinking he was weak to everything in the beginning of the game. However ones it became a
Decidueye my opinion drastically changed, it's a great Pokemon with a very fun move pool and decent enough stats for the main game. If I ever ply trough gen 7 again, I'm definitely picking this guy again as my starter.
I was sold on
Salandit the moment GameFreak released that initial trailer of it, and I had been hoping he would be the pseudo of the gen (dreams that got crushed a few weeks later when Jangmo-O got revealed). I still think Salandit has one of the best designs and best animations of the entirety of Pokémon. Sadly
Salazzle was not the evolution I was hoping for, as it seemed to ruin everything that I liked about Salandit. However I still liked using it as a glass canon, because wow, this thing died a lot.
Since I always try and go for a trifecta of Grass/Fire/Water core I needed a water Pokemon, and the choice was between
Golisopod and Araquanid, I decided to go for Golisopod , which was not that bad of a decision. I remember this thing being incredibly tanky and a heavy hitter, a decent move pool and a blast too see on the screen. Samurai bug is one of my more favourite Designs of the generation, and one of the more reliable members of my team.
Mudsdale was the OG of my original playtrough. I don't think I need to explain why to anyone who used stamina Mudsdale in the main campaign. A fun and string move pool, decent design, incredible power and tankyness.
I got a
Jangmo-O in wonder trade very early in the game, and I breeded one myself before the fourth trial. Very powerful (pseudo, so I should have expected it), but much like Salazzle, I wsn't fond of the later stages.
Hakamo-O was great, but I'm not sold on the
Kommo-O's design, it is starting to grow on me, but the earlier stages had so much more potential. (Salandit should have been the pseudo
).
The last member was
Minior, who I love design wise, but it was by far the lest reliable member on my team. To weak to do something without shell smash, and dead in the water defensively after a smash (while still not being strong enough most of the time).
Overal 4,5/6 team.
Sun
For my second playtrough I picked Sun, which was a lot less fun to use then my original Moon team.
The starter this time round was
Litten, as opposed to many others, I do like
Incineroar's looks, BUT I hated his movepool, he does learn a few fun moves but the levels are absurd, and you're stuck with less fun moves for 99% of the game. I missed my Rowlet the entire way trough the game, despite Incineroar being an objectively better Pokemon in-game.
My grass Pokemon this time around was the
Bounsweet from the ingame trade. But this thing leveled up so quickly I barely got to use it (I like my team to be around the same levels). So yeah, I honstly don't really remember
Tsareena because of that. Decent design, average movepool.
Araquanid was the cornerstone of this team. Not a single Pokemon I couldn't handle, and while this thing is basically 'Pick a water move and win' I really liked using it. This was a great generation for Bug types. Nothing bad to say about this guy.
Crabrawler was amazing early game, but dropped of in power so quickly he was nearly useless for half of the game.
Crabominable was good when you got it, but I felt it was to frail for some reason, I feel no real urge to use this Pokemon again in a future playtrough.
Alolan
Raichu was good,but suffered from the same issues as Minior, in being to weak without setup, and dead if you attempted setup. This generally only came in when Araquanid faced someting it couldn't handle and the last member of my team was out.
Lycanroc day, fun Pokemon. Bit of a disappointing moveset, but really nice design. I named it after my pet dog.
Overal 3/6 Team.
Ultra Sun
The least fun of the teams. I made some picks I wouldn't pick again.
Popplio line had a better movepool than the litten line, but I didn't really how Primarina looks and I ws once again missing Decidueye, which (while objectively) a lesser Pokemon, has a more fun movepool and way better looks. But hey, at least Primarina dishes out some hefty damage and is very reliable.
Dhelmise felt like discount Decidueye, which made me miss him even more.
Turtonator is one of those Pokemon's I really like based on it's looks, but it wasn't fun to use and it wasn't good. Suffered from the Minior-complex, but even worse.
Grubbin and
Charjabug were great.
Vikavolt was boss, next.
Alolan
Sandshrew and
Sandslash is most likely my favourite member of the team. I'm an ice-type enthusiastic and this was a good one.
Stuffel and
Bewear are really good Pokemon, but I didn't like using them for some reason.
Overal 2,5/6.
General
I tried out all other non mentioned Pokemons in between, these are the ones I enjoyed using.
- Decidueye
- Vikavolt
- Oricorio
- Lycanroc
- Mudsdale
- Araquanid
- Golisopod
- Palossand
- Mimikyu
- Drampa
- Nagandel
- Alolan Sandslsh
- Alolan Ninetales
- Alolan Marowak
- Alolan Muk