#I’d have to repost my works and struggle to get my stats back up again

[adrift-in-thyme]

Sometimes I’m super tempted to delete my ao3 account and just start all over again

[cielenruine]

yoinked from neffi! thank you

Celebrating TOA and the people who contribute to make our group what it is.

Repost, don't reblog. Only fill in what you feel comfortable sharing!

Happy anniversary, TOA! Here's to many more years spent together.

Name: Kuno

Pronouns: He/Him

Birthday (no year): 8/29

Where are you from? What is your time zone? Georgia! EST

How long is your roleplay experience? A little over a decade

How were you introduced to roleplaying as a whole? Google Plus Black Butler Rp that turned into rping literally any series I got into including fusing them most of the time

How were you introduced to TOA? Dewy :3

Do you have any pets? Two hamsters named Grahammy and Daryl

What is your favorite time of year and why? (Season, holiday, general period) Winter, hot coco and blankies is a combo unbeaten

What is your IRL occupation? University student majoring in art

Some interests and things you like/enjoy? I’m boring I just do whatever occupies my time the most interestingly

What non-Fire Emblem games do you play?Splatoon, FFXIV, MGS:PW and PP. EXVS: Maxiboost On, HSR, and Arknights

Favorite Pokemon type & Pokemon: (I have not played much pokemon) Water and Garchomp

Tell us some funfacts and trivia about yourself! (Optional bonus challenge: if you filled this out last year, try not to repeat what you said back then!)I have spent well over 1k on gundam figures despite only getting into the series in 2020

How did you get into Fire Emblem? I played heroes here and there beforehand, but I went to Texas to join a friend for locals and he had the game so while he was off at work he let me borrow it and then the night after the tournament, a bunch of the guys we were playing with gave me $80 to buy the game +dlc

What Fire Emblem games have you played? Heroes, Warriors, 3H, and 3hopes

First & Favorite Fire Emblem games: Warriors, 3 Hopes

List your 5 favorite Fire Emblem characters across the series! Jakob beloved, Lambert, Dimitri, Rhea, Flayn

Who was the first character ever to make you go “ooh I like this one in particular” and why? Can be any context and reason! Dimitri, give me a guy with issues surrounding both chivalry and his father’s will/legacy and I am easily swayed

Any Fire Emblem crushes? 😳Lambert there will never be another man like you

If you’ve played (or are familiar with) the following games, who was your first S support? Who would you S support nowadays?- Three Houses: Flayn, probably no one honestly, Byleth gives their love to everyone equally in my heart

If you were a Fire Emblem character, what would be your class and stats? Would you be playable? Paladin and put that luck and charm in the gutter

If you were a Three Houses character, what would be your affiliation? Unafifiliated Faerghan citizen obsessed with the history of the place

If you were an Officers Academy student, what would be your boons, banes and potential budding talent? Boons: Reason, Swords Banes:Faith, Authority

If you were an Engage character, which nation would you originate from? Brodia what can I say I am nothing if not predictable

How do you pronounce TOA? 🤔separate letters

Current TOA muses: Matthias

Past TOA muses? N/A

Who was your first TOA muse? If you no longer have them, can you see yourself picking them up again? Matthias :3

Do you believe you have a type of character you gravitate towards writing? Fathers who’s actions can be taken as morally dubious and children of said fathers who struggle with whether to follow in their footsteps or not

Do you have characters or types of characters you don’t think you can handle writing, but wish you could? I don’t think I could handle a genki character but I’d love to try some day

What kind of scenes, situations etc do you believe you enjoy writing the most? (If you filled this out last year, has this changed in any way?)The moments in between action where the characters reflect on themselves and have a heart to heart with one another,

Do you have any scenario in mind for your muse(s) that gets you thinking “man I hope I get to write this one day”?I would love to write Matthias at his current age tapping back into the whimsy he had before his wife and kid died

Favorite TOA-related memories?I doubt I’m ever going to forget Matthias and Edelgard tying with each other during All Aboard

Present or past tense?Both at the same time. (Past more so)

Normal size text, small text, no preference?No preference really

Got any potential muse delusions to share? 😉 Mayhaps….a Dedue or Annete….mayhaps…

[jaybug-jabbers]

All-Glitch Pokemon Blue Run Pt10: Creating Hybrids

June,

To answer your first question, yes, the headaches are likely related to Superglitch, but you need not worry about them. It’s a side effect, but because you followed my steps closely, we’ve done our best to mitigate those effects. If you notice your name no longer shows up on your Glitchdex, er, don’t worry about it.

To answer your second question, you are almost ready to meet your new glitchmon. First, however, I suggest you pay a visit to the Daycare Center. A few of your party pokemon might be slightly mutated from the effects of Superglitch. Don’t worry, though-- the Daycare Center man is an old friend of mine and fellow glitchmon researcher. If you leave them in his care he can nurse them back to health, for a small fee. 

Finally, I strongly recommend healing at the Pokecenter before doing anything else. This step is very important if you want to save data on your Glitchdex. Ah, it’s a long explanation as to why that is, but trust me, it helps reboot the system so things function normally again. 

After all of that, you now will be ready to meet your new glitchmon friends! 

---

Professor,

All right, I completed your directions and then Teleported back to Lavander Town. When I  withdrew the new glitchmon, though, I uhhhh . . . ran into a bit of a problem. I immediately lost the pokeball.

I searched in a panic for like ten minutes before finding it. I’m not sure how I was so careless. Then I let the glitchmon out of the ball.

It . . . looks like it’s just a Charizard? I don’t get it. I mean, don’t get me wrong, Charizard is really cool, but I thought this was supposed to be a glitchmon. At any rate, I named it Charmed.

She seems awfully shy, actually. I turned around for just a second and looked back and she was just GONE. It took me several minutes to find her again. You’d think it would be pretty difficult to lose a giant fire-breathing dragon, but apparently I’m talented.

-June

---

June,

What you have in your possession is no ordinary Charizard. That is Charizard ‘M, or glitchmon FF. 

This species needs careful handling when in your party. It has a ‘cloaking’ ability somewhat similar to a Kecleon’s camouflage, although more extreme. Indeed, this cloak is so powerful it can hide even the Pokeball it resides in, as well as other pokemon in its immediate vicinity!

You’re also correct in noting it can be quite shy. It takes a long time to establish trust with this species, and they rarely trust the nurses at the Pokecenter. You may need to potion them by hand if they see any sort of battle. 

I must give a word of caution, though; Charizard ‘M has also been known to accidentally induce mutations in pokemon nearby. Merely exposing pokemon to its presence is enough. Try to keep its pokeball a bit further away from the others, at the bottom slot in your party. You don’t want an accidental hybrid on your hands, after all.

-Professor Gingko

---

Professor,

I kinda wish you’d said something about that a little bit sooner. I had stopped to capture a Paras I’d found . . . and when I went to deposit things in the PC, uh. It was kind of disturbing. The Paras and my HM slave Kadabra had melted together. I wasn’t sure what to do. I thought maybe if I’d evolved . . . it, then that would force them apart, so I tried a few Rare Candies.

Didn’t really work, though? Now I just have a Parasect with all these strange moves. 

-June

---

June,

For goodness’ sake. Well, all you’ve done is ensured they remain fused together as a hybrid, now that it’s gone and evolved. You’ve lost your Kadabra HM slave for good, I’m afraid. It became the recipient for the hybridization process. You can still normalize what’s left of the Paras, however. If you return to the Daycare man and give him the Paras-- which should be currently hybridized with Charizard ‘M-- he should be able to get it back to normal. 

You’ll have to keep the Parasect as is, though.

-Professor Gingko

---

Professor,

Honestly? I’m ok with that. My new Parasect is pretty neat, and now is an even better HM slave then I had before. This Charizard ‘M has some cool abilities. I wonder what other bug hybrids I could make?

For now though, I’m keeping her at the bottom of my party, away from the other pokeballs. I’m taking along Wobbles, Fractal, Dustdevil, Giago and the new Charizard ‘M, and leaving Azure and Dirge in the PC for the moment.

Oh, and I spent some time exploring Celadon City at last. It was nice to finally do that. There’s some casino there that all the locals are talking about, so I gave that a visit. The games are actually pretty lame, but I’ve never liked gambling. I came across something weird, though-- there’s a basement to the casino. I went down there and it looks like the casino is just a screen for some underground illegal pokemon trafficking by a shady group of thieves. That's pretty wild.

The badguys weren’t too happy to see me there, but fortunately I could defend myself just fine with my team. It helped that I’d recently taught Ice Beam to Dusty. I also came across the Double Edge TM in that basement, so I taught it to Fractal, who now hits like a freaking meteor. 

After a little more exploring, I came across the HM for Fly, but I learned I didn’t have the air clearance to actually use it for travel unless I’d earned Lt. Surge’s badge. For some odd reason? So . . . I had to backtrack all the way to Vermilion and defeat the guy. After that, I could teach Fly to my Missingno. and get around MUCH easier.

This let me fly back to Lavander Town. I made the trip because I’d picked up something interesting in Celadon-- a Silph Scope. I figured I should use it and take a tour of that creepy tower.

The trip taught me a lot about my team. The climb up the tower was a slow and difficult one. Starting off, I ran into Oak’s damned grandson again.

His team wasn’t bad to face, although his starter had evolved to Wartortle by now. Still, I had picked up a TM from Lt. Surge, so Wobbles had Thunderbolt now. It was an easy kill. 

In general, Wobbles had no problem with any of Pokemon Tower. His Special is just sky-high. My other pokemon had to work a bit harder, though.

Gia is a defensive sort of poke. She’s not huge on offense, especially Special offense. But all her physical attacks were Normal type moves, which are useless against the ghosts. She was stuck chipping away at ghosts with her Surf, while the ghosts para-fused her. Fortunately she at least has so much bulk she sometimes came out on top of those fights. Gia’s fight style is all about long-term survival.

Meanwhile, Dusty struggled a fair bit because her stats are just not great in general. Despite that fact, she was scrappy and determined and could scrape by. Her speed also meant she could get in hits at vital times.

When paired together, Dusty and Gia could manage to take out the ghosts with teamwork. This was great, since Wobbles and my new Charizard ‘M had plenty of levels and didn’t need the XP at the time. My last pokemon on the team, Fractal, is the very definition of a glass cannon. Fractal could take pokemon out with his raw power, but only if he didn’t fall first. He was knocking himself out cold in a single hit if he got confused-- but he also sometimes knocked his foes out cold in a single hit. This is why I gave him Double Edge; his fighting style was hyper-offensive to an extreme.

After touring to the top of the tower, we took care of the local rowdy ghosts and some trainers rambling about something called ‘Team Rocket.’ I dunno, but the way they were dressed looked awfully similar to the creeps at the casino. Maybe they’re the same crew. I wasn’t paying much attention, to be honest. 

There was an old man up in the tower who talked to me after my battles, though, and invited me back to his house. Normally I’d nope the heck out of that sort of situation, but he seemed harmless enough. . . and he gave me a flute as a gift. He tells me it can wake up any sleeping pokemon. I have the perfect pokemon in mind to test it on.

-June

---

Glitchdex #: FF/255

Family: Charizard Hybrid

Type(s): Fire/Flying

Species Keyword: CLOAK

This shy POKEMON is so good at disguise it can even fool highly trained POKECENTER nurses. It only trusts its trainer to heal and care for it. 

---

End Notes

Glitches used/mentioned in this post:

* Making Superglitch useful

* Creating pokemon hybrids

* Charizard ‘M

* This Charizard ‘M was created by placing a normal Charizard named ‘Charmed’ in my sixth party slot and then using the controlled superglitch corruption mentioned in my last blog post. The Charizard ‘M that appeared in my seventh expanded party slot then inherented the ‘Charmed’ nickname once I deposited the first pokemon in my party into the PC.

Click for the next part of the series! 

This is a repost on a new blog. The original post was on Nov 30, 2019.

[fehelp]

Roy

Overview

It’s Roy! He’s been in the game since launch and was my first 5* unit so he holds a special place in my heart.

Roy is an infantry sword unit with a weapon upgrade that gives him effectiveness against dragons, Quick Riposte 4 (hp above 50% instead of 70% to double if attacked), and def/res +4 if enemy initiates combat. This is a pretty good upgrade, building on his 25/28 defenses to boost them to 28/32 if attacked.

His biggest downside is that he does not have the offensive prowess of other dragon killers. He has only 30/31 atk/spd which is pretty low, but we can fix that!

Pros/Cons

+ Balanced stats

+ Good weapon upgrade

- Balanced stats... nothing really shines, especially not his atk/spd

- Outclassed by the Falchion users generally

Similar Units

Well, Alm was in a similar place before his upgrade which made him a monster with that brave Falchion. Similarly low atk/spd with 33/30 but not great defenses at 28/22 def/res. Unfortunately for Roy, Alm has a better weapon offensively and can also work as a healer with his built in Renewal. Alm is 5* locked currently, though, so if you don’t have an Alm and just need a dragon killer, Roy’s your boy. If you want someone who can be even tankier than Alm, Roy’s your boy.

Team Options

So I have him on my main arena team with Myrrh because I love my Myrrh but they seem to work pretty well together, tanking and killing. Any green unit with good def/res will work well with him to protect him from Reinhardts and similar blue threats. 

He’ll also struggle against anything that’s too fast for him to double, namely Mia, Karla, Ayra, etc etc. Having a blue unit who can take care of them (Delthea, Micaiah, etc) can help him out a lot.

IVS

There seems to be disagreements on his best IVS but I would say +spd is the absolute best option. The difference between neutral spd of 31 and a spd boon of 34 is pretty big and can determine whether he gets doubled or not and effects his tanking capabilities. With spd boosting sklils and merges, he’ll even be able to double back on his own which increases tanking AND offensive power. That’s why I’d say +spd is the best.

If not +spd, +atk is the second best choice to patch up his low atk and get him to 33 atk. 

Def/Res I’d say keep neutral so he can have mixed bulk and take out dragons and melee units alike.

-HP then would be his best drop. He’ll end up with 41 hp which isn’t bad at all really.

Builds

the best boi, our roy

Weapon: Binding Blade (Eff refine)

Assist: Reposition

Special: Moonbow

A: Fury 3

B: Swordbreaker 3

C: Up to you, Atk Tactic is cheap though

Seal: Close Def, ideally, if you want him to be tanky

With budget skills, he can be pretty good.  Moonbow is a quick cooldown and cheaply available, Fury can boost all of his stats which he likes. The HP hit is bad for Swordbreaker and his built in QR4, but if you’re just doing like one map or arena match, you’ll be fine. Swordbreaker is just there to help him kill the speedy sword units, of which there are many. This is even better if you merge your Roy up honestly.

get a load of that roy (that roy!)  look at that roy get a loAD OF THAT ROY

Weapon: Binding Blade (Eff refine)

Assist: Reposition

Special: Aether, Moonbow

A: Distant Counter, Fury 3, Warding/Steady Breath 3

B: Wrath 3, Guard 3

C: Again, Atk Tactic is cheap but it’s up to you

Seal: Close Def, again, is a good choice. Or, with DC, Distant Def

So those are some expensive skills. Fury 3 is still gonna be a good option and works really well with Wrath. But, if you want him to counter mages and dagger/archers as well as all physical threats, feel free to put Distant Counter on him. He really does have the defenses to use it pretty well. If you would rather focus on him being a close ranged tank, you can use Warding or Steady Breath. Warding Breath might be cheaper if you still have that free Legendary Ike, but Steady Breath is generally going to be better.

Wrath is great so that when his health starts plummeting, he’ll be able to to do even more damage with his special activations. If using Aether, it can pop him right back up to the range to use QR, making him good at surviving on his own. If you don’t want to use Wrath, you can use Guard instead to help him avoid painful specials. They’re both good options.

**You can feel free to merge the two sets if you want!**

Get skills from...

Repostion: 3* Selena, Barst

Moonbow: 4* Odin, Palla, Athena

Fury 3: 4* Hinata

Distant Counter: 5* Hector, LA Hector

Warding Breath: 5* Legendary Ike

Steady Breath: 5* Brave Ike

Swordbreaker 3: 4* Abel

Wrath 3: 5* Nephenee, Karla

Guard 3: 5* Titania, Leon, Micaiah, FMorgan

Atk Tactic 3: 4* Legault

[museumgirlsarah]

Thoughts on EdTech, Autism, and Pokemon Go

Revised and reposted from elsewhere -- it may look familiar to a few of you.

So this year continues to be tough, and as a way to get active after six months of being sidelined by foot injuries, I’ve been playing a lot of Pokemon Go. Which has combined in my brain with a lot of the work I’m doing to try to integrate tech and distance learning into our programming, and as a result, it’s given me a lot to sort through. But one particular cool thing I discovered was the mitigating effect it has on one of the aspects of ADHD that’s cropped up since, well, basically, my sliders shifted.

Backing up a bit...

I’ve long loved this comic about the autism spectrum as a colour wheel, and it helped sort out a lot of personal understanding about my own autism and why it went undiagnosed for so long (this article helped a lot too, and made me cry with how much I identified). But the colour wheel didn’t quite explain why I’d changed so fast from functional to struggling with things, autism and ADHD-related, that I’d never been hindered by before (or at least, not to the point of not being able to function – I had my first auditory sensory overload moment at work this year. That was an experience). And then I was rereading John Scalzi’s blog on how Straight White Male is playing the game of life on the lowest difficulty setting, and figured out a metaphor that actually works for me. 

All those pie slices on Rebecca Burgess’ comic are kind of like autistic difficulty sliders on the game of life, and most of my life, they’d all been set at levels that were challenging, but I could still progress through the game, farm for items, read the codex, etc.  Then, in the last couple of years, two sliders got pushed within a couple of months of each other up to the highest setting and haven’t gone back down, and combined with everything else, they knocked out my ability to do things that had always been second nature.

Two of the big ones were reading and writing.

It’s not that I can’t. It’s that it’s now SO HARD to maintain that focus that it’s like running a marathon, and I’m so exhausted by trying to act neurotypical at work that I don’t have the energy to maintain it during my free time. Certainly not for fun. As soon as I relax, the ADHD kicks in, and I realize that nothing I’ve read or typed makes sense because my mind has wandered without even realizing it. I have no idea what happened on the last three pages I read, and the stuff I’ve written contains words that have no reason to be there, because my wandering brain just grabbed them and stuck them in.

But here’s where we get back to the interesting thing about Pokemon Go. One of the other things I just kind of gave up on was listening to podcasts. Listening to something has ALWAYS been a challenge for me. Always. From lectures, to author readings, to podcasts, my brain cannot keep focus on the auditory information without dekeing off elsewhere. I wrote entire novels in my head during the lecture portions of English class, and those were lectures about things I was interested in. But when I discovered that doing cross-stitch during author readings at conventions meant that I could not only follow the story for the first time ever, but I was getting sensory information I never had before (I could smell the descriptive passages), I thought hey, there’s something to this fidget tool thing, let’s see what else I can connect.

Which is when I discovered that Pokemon Go is the perfect thing for putting my brain into “listening to podcast” mode. I’ve ripped through all three seasons of the phenomenal @curiosityinfocus podcast while wandering around looking for Pokemon, just started Imaginary Worlds, and am currently looking for other awesome stuff to listen to (I’m open to suggestions!). And oh hell, did it get me thinking about other things, too.

A lot of Curiosity in Focus touches on Daniel’s passion for teaching science (and other things) through D&D. Some of the conversations seemed really familiar, too, overlapping with some of the struggles and challenges I’ve faced while trying to integrate tech into our programming at work. For a lot of different reasons, there’s resistance from many different avenues, but I believe passionately that the work we’re doing is really important because it gives students the ability to engage with materials through the communication tools they’re used to using. And much like the work Daniel is doing with D&D, it’s a way of opening up opportunities for learning and engagement to the learners who typically struggle with the “traditional” learning environment.

Gamification is one way of dealing with these obstacles. We’ve been doing it to an extent with tabletop gaming based on the Blue Whale exhibition, but I’m going to come back to Pokemon Go again.

For all the problems the game has, and I’m not going to deny it has its issues, I’m really fascinated by the game design in Pokemon Go. There’s enough to occupy casual players, but between IV stats, Pokemon types, fighting counters, and evolutions, there’s also a ton to occupy people like me who engage in obsessive collection and categorization as one aspect of our autism.  But they’ve built up a system that actually encourages that and turns it into an asset.

The game has individual competition – collect the best Pokemon with the highest IVs and power them up.  It has competition between teams to control the neighbourhood. But with the introduction of raid bosses, it now also compels the teams to work together to take them down, preventing the competition from becoming too alienating (most of the people I’ve played with have gotten into the habit of wishing each other luck when the battle begins, regardless of team affiliations). And it encourages cooperation.

A few weeks ago, I ran into a group of people trying to take down a Tyrannitar at a gym. And now I’m in a chat group of people who work together, share ideas, meet up with each other, and help newcomers. With a few exceptions, everyone, no matter what team they’re on, is willing to wait, support, and help others. People freely give tips on how to catch Pokemon and teach you how to succeed. The person more or less in charge of the neighbourhood group I’m part of is really glad that there’s one guy in the group who will explain all the minute details to everyone else, because he knows he scours the internet keeping up with all the recent developments, they’re accurate, and he will patiently walk newbies through it no matter how many times they ask.

And it goes beyond that. While raiding at a gym the other day, a guy walked past, looked at us on our devices, and yelled “TALK TO EACH OTHER.”  Then an older woman walked over and asked “what would you people do without those devices? When I was little, we had to entertain ourselves.”

And I explained to her (as the teacher in the group, I’ve gotten pretty good at this and people are starting to expect it), that yes, as a Xennial (I don’t use that word when I’m explaining this, but damn it’s useful), I had to entertain myself, too. Which meant I spent a lot of time growing up isolated, alone, unable to find anyone who shared my interests. I spent most of my time indoors, and that carried into adulthood. And that in the past year playing this game, I’ve discovered parts of my neighbourhood I never knew existed, and talked to more people in the neighbourhood than I have in the ten years of living here prior to that. I now pass by people on the street, here and around the city, who smile and greet me by name. I’ve had strangers I’ve only encountered for a few moments looking out for me and walking me to the subway after dark. People are looking out for one another and establishing a strong sense of community in a city of a million people.

That’s a hell of an accomplishment for a little game about catching cute cartoon animals.

Yes, I’m aware my experience isn’t universal, but it does illustrate something really critical in regards to the work that I do. Like everything else about technology, it’s a tool. It can be used for good or for ill, but for many, it has become a way to facilitate engagement in something that was previously insurmountable. For some people, that insurmountable thing was starting a conversation with a stranger on the street.

This is the kind of power I want to harness with the work that I do with social media, and Google Classroom, and Makerspaces, and Minecraft programs. We’re not using technology to replace traditional learning. We’re using it to build bridges to invite more people to the party who could never reach it before.

[jaybug-jabbers]

Bug Run 4: Through Fog, Smoke and Snow

Diving boldly forth into the fog of night, I eagerly set out!

But I am a tight-ass bitch who doesn’t want to waste a move slot on Defog, so instead I toughed it out with thrilling battles such as these:

Yeah. ROFLCOPTER still doesn’t have a flying move. It’s pretty messed up, honestly.

Battles on this route were a rather dreary affair, the most difficult being a tag-team of Raichu and Gyarados. Eventually I clawed my way out of the fog and immerged into the sleepy town of Celestic. Although it’s not so sleepy tonight, as an old lady informs me a spaceman is ranting about a bomb. I go kick his butt, check out some cave paintings, and then Cyrus pays me a visit.

After all my trouble to lay down tox spikes on his opening poke, I find out his next two are Crobat and Murkrow. Dangit. Cleo’s Power Gem is essential for flying types, although I mix it up a little this time and try some Ancient Powers to finish things off. It really wasn’t a problem.

Running into Gavin at Canalave, however …that was a little scary. Cleo took out his Staraptor just fine, because she’s a tanky beast, but next up was fully-evolved Infernape, a few levels higher then me. Ooof.

After a lot of thinking I sent Sparkler out against him. She was my fastest with a useful move. I tried Psybeam, but not surprisingly, Infernape still outsped.

What was surprising, though, was that Sparkler lived on 8 HP and got a good Mind-Plate-powered Psybeam off. Not enough to finish things entirely, but I used toxic and stalled him out with Cleo the rest of the way, just barely.

Next was his Heracross.I had Fiberglass’ Psybeam for that, no problem. Except, uhh. Despite my decent defense and Brick Break only being neutral, it was still doing a huge chunk. I couldn’t win at this rate. I swapped to ROFLCOPTER, feeling the pain of lacking a Flying move more keenly then over. Pelted away with Ancient Powers until eventually Heracross went down.

Finally was Floatzel, and after the rest of my Ancient Powers, I just chipped away with Pursuit until he caved.

So that was that. MAN, I need to get decent moves on Yanmega.

Next, I went to train hard in the gym! I never miss my workout! Just …gimme a minute let me watch some TV, I’ll go soon … *grabs a bag of chips* *flops on couch*

Hey, see? The TV says bug lovers are happy, well-adjusted people. We’re not freaks, I swear.

Anyway, I eventually got off my butt and went to visit Byron in his steely gym of doom. Most of his underlings were easy pickings for Sparkler’s HP-ground. For the rare few with Levitate, I had plenty of others to deal with it.

Byron himself, however, wasn’t exactly a pushover.

I did the Byron fight twice. The first  time, Black Fang crit the opening Magneton and 1HKO’d. Buuuuut then Bastiodon came out and wrecked my face with Stone Edges. I had to try again and think a little harder about strategy instead of charging in so recklessly.

Second time round, Black Fang only got Magneton a little below half HP with his Dig. Somebody had to faint to give my Mothim a safe switch-in. I decided to toss ROFL out there for the slaughter, as I doubted he’d be doing much this match. Sparkler took Magneton out, but next was Bastiodon. I used Hidden Power Ground, did a great chunk but activated Bastiodon’s berry and healed him back up to 3/4s HP. Goddamnit. I hoped for a miss, but down Sparkler went to Stone Edge. Not a chance in heck he was livin’ that.

Next, I sent out Maestro. He’s easily my weakest of the team; I’m willing to bet nobody has ever sung the praises of Kricketune’s base stat totals. Around this time in the run, he’s been really struggling to be useful on the team at all, usually going down in one hit to everything. It makes sense; he’s available so early-on in the game, and those pokes tend to have low base stats. Sooner or later, that fact was going to bite Maestro in the butt.

Still, I had a plan. I’d recently given Maestro Brick Break. This fantastic upgrade was 4x effective on Bastiodon. The only thing is, I knew from my last attempt it wasn’t a 1HKO. I had to Screech if I had any hope at all. I also knew Maestro went down to a single Stone Edge, so it would be up to the others to somehow chip away at Bastiodon… maybe? Though … that seemed unlikely. I had to try, though.

I screeched. It thankfully landed. And … Stone Edge missed. Sweet mercy. After that, Maestro was able to take level 41 Bastiodon out clean. Hoorah! Maestro took out Byron’s ace!! HE DID A THING!

The final was Steelix, though. I tried Brick Break first, and was apalled at how little it did. Utterly disgusting. So I screeched again, but this time it missed, unfortunately. However, Maestro managed to survive long enough to try one more time, successfully landing the second screech before going down. This ended up being very essential indeed.

Things were a bit tricky, because I didn’t exactly have much for Steelix– especially with Sparkler down, since Sparkler and his HP Ground was my main go-to for dealing with all these Steel and Rock types. I sent out Fiberglass and tried out a Bug Bite just to see … mmm yeah that’s not working in a million years. Psybeam was no better, quite frankly. Steelix took Fiber out with several Earthquakes.

Out of other options, I put Cleopatra out. I had to hope the Screech would be enough help for her to chip away with her newly-learned Attack Order. I honestly thought the battle was done at that point, though, because if Steelix knew Rock Slide …

Steelix used Ice Fang on me and the damage really wasn’t too horrible for super-effective damage. Ok, if that was the best he could use on me, I could work with this. I chipped away with Attack Order and kept healing up. Steelix used Sandstorm to do more chip damage for me– but despite the super effective Ice Fang and the Sandstorm, if I was careful enough with my heals and when I timed my attacks, I could maintain a good amount of health and come out on top.

It was a very slow process, though, and I was terrified of getting frozen, which had decent odds considering how many ice fangs I was taking. That would probably spell the end. Still, I couldn’t get too hasty.

Another thing I knew was probably coming was Byron would probably soon use–

Yeah, Full Restore. MMM THAT’S GREAT.

So back to chipping away all over again.

Somehow, I eventually prevailed (and was thankful Byron did not use another Full Restore).

(everyone was level 36 except Cleo and Sparkler at lvl 38)

After this was some more Team Galactic plot and exploding lakes, but beating the grunts and even the admins was really pretty trivial. After taking care of two lakes it was time to head in the direction of the final lake, first passing through Mt. Coronet.

Charging through the snow, I didn’t expect to have many problems, but almost immediately ran into somebody with a high-levelled Tropius and I was convinced I was going to full-party wipe after my ace Cleo was taken out. I’d stalled long enough for Maestro to take care of it, though. Whoo. Maybe I should be more careful.

I hadn’t exactly started out on this journey well-stocked, either. A little resthouse saved me from that problem, fortunately. Yeah! W-we’re good! Let’s just carry on then!

… oof. I was fine until an Electabuzz and Magmar tagteam wrecked my shit. I decided to backtrack and train on some of the other Ace Trainers, only to meet somebody with a Golduck, Rapidash and Sudoowoodoo that also wrecked my shit. A second try with a LOT of careful planning had me scraping through, though: lay down toxic spikes at the start with Golduck, clear Golduck out with Yanmega to get my speed boosts up and running, hit Rapidash with a good Ancient Power, then come in and finish stalling with Cleopatra. Sudoowoodoo was tough, though, man, his Rock Slide taking Cleo out cold. Black Fang got one Dig off, and then Maestro could finish with Brick Break.

Did I mention I was working with only five pokes since I had an HM slave at the time? All of them sub-level 40? Boy.

Getting past the gatekeeper with the Electabuzz and Magmar was going to take some thinking, though. I decided I’d leave that for another day, though. It had been a long day of work, and we all deserved to retire for the night in our rustic lodge.

This is a repost on a new blog. The original post was on Nov 25, 2018.