Hardest Monotype Run per Gen?

[Jedi]

I've been looking into doing some Monotype challenges for the various pokemon generations, now assuming little to no grinding generally, what do you lot think would be the hardest Monotype per Gen?

The one on my mind is like Grass in Gen 2, because while you can get the 6 grass types fairly early, they are kinda mediocre and Johto stuff tends to hate Grass in general lmao, but I was wondering what the rest of you thought on that and the other generations.

[Magical Glace]

Fire in Diamond and Pearl, you get no options beyond Chimchar and Ponyta.

[Garland Chaos]

Ghost in Gen 1, since your only option is the Gastly line.

[Jedi]

Fire in Diamond and Pearl, you get no options beyond Chimchar and Ponyta.

Oh wow, I forgot how much Fire didn't really exist in Gen 4.

Ghost in Gen 1, since your only option is the Gastly line.

Yeah this is true, what about an alternative type that has more than one pokemon? For curiosity sake

[Ether]

If anything, I would say that having low numbers of pokemon available leads to being overlevelled without grinding, and probably makes those runs fairly easy so long as the available mons are good. If people can solo pokemon yellow with Pikachu, doing the same with Gengar of all things should be a relative cakewalk, and I'm sure with enough doing, Infernape could eventually roll over D/P.

Grass in gen 2 seems like a fairly good bet, but unlike a lot of types, grass has relatively little variation in what it's mons do, Most of them end up spamming powders because grass offense tends to be mediocre. It might be one of the more difficult runs, but it'd be amazingly boring.

EDIT:

As for the topic question itself, perhaps gen 1 mono-bug? You have a fairly strong start... well, once Beedrill and Butterfree come into play, and you get a decent chunk of bug types, though most of them are rather late and hard to come by. Most importantly, you can get some bugs before the first gym, which at least IMO, is necessary for a monotype run. Blaine is probably the hardest part of the run, since I think Pinsir probably handles Bruno's rocks... decently with submission.

Edited August 5, 2016 by Ether

[Jedi]

If anything, I would say that having low numbers of pokemon available leads to being overlevelled without grinding, and probably makes those runs fairly easy so long as the available mons are good. If people can solo pokemon yellow with Pikachu, doing the same with Gengar of all things should be a relative cakewalk, and I'm sure with enough doing, Infernape could eventually roll over D/P.

Grass in gen 2 seems like a fairly good bet, but unlike a lot of types, grass has relatively little variation in what it's mons do, Most of them end up spamming powders because grass offense tends to be mediocre. It might be one of the more difficult runs, but it'd be amazingly boring.

EDIT:

As for the topic question itself, perhaps gen 1 mono-bug? You have a fairly strong start... well, once Beedrill and Butterfree come into play, and you get a decent chunk of bug types, though most of them are rather late and hard to come by. Most importantly, you can get some bugs before the first gym, which at least IMO, is necessary for a monotype run. Blaine is probably the hardest part of the run, since I think Pinsir probably handles Bruno's rocks... decently with submission.

Thanks for the reply, and its funny you mention Mono-Bug because Refa just stated how it would probably work, and yeah thats why I want to avoid "One pokemon" because overleveling is kind of dull haha.

Grass in Gen 2 pretty much amounts to Chikorita, Bellsprout, Oddish, Exeggcute (By hitting trees alot), Sunkern (lmao) and Hoppip, yeah the variety is pretty lame, do you have another Gen 2 suggestion that could be somewhat challenging yet interesting?

And speaking of Refa, he just said Gen 3 Rock would be funny because of all the Water encounters and Brawly.

Edited August 5, 2016 by Jedi

[Ether]

Rock in gen 3 is another good one, yeah, though anything weak to water would be kinda painful(well, except Ground I guess, since Swampert)

As for other options in gen 2... well, before Falkner you have access to... Fire, Water, Grass, Flying, Normal, Rock, Ground, Bug, and Poison.

Rock and Ground are both out, as Geodude trivializes the first 3 gyms on it's own, and is the only option for both of them. Fire is also likely out, since Cyndaquil actually had fairly good gym matchups, and with Growlithe and Vulpix being mutually exclusive, you won't have all that many mons to use.

Normal is, well, fairly normal. You have a wide variety of mons, early focus, late focus, plenty of variation in roles. You won't really struggle outside of Chuck(and Jasmine if nothing on your team gets Fire Punch, I suppose) but it's not a cakewalk either since you have neutral matchups in pretty much all gyms.

Bug is, ironically enough, a decent candidate again. You basically get to pick between Beedrill or Butterfree, with Ledian and Spinarak along for the ride, though Heracross will be a strong rock for you to hold on to if you can find one. Early bug contest access also gives you another potentially strong mon in Scyther or Pinsir.

Grass is as discussed, viable, but kind of boring.

Poison might be a decent run. Neutral gym matchups(outside of Jasmine), gives good variety with access to Beedrill/Spinarak, Zubat, and Bellsprout straight off the bat, with more poison types coming available later on. Not overly difficult, but is probably one of the least run monotypes I can think of.

[Jedi]

Poison actually sounds really fun for Gen 2, as does Normal, but I felt Normal might give me overall too much variety to deal with like everything, I think I could get Miltank to Fire Punch Jasmine possibly?

Never mind just double checked that, it couldn't until move tutoring was a thing whoops. Poison is looking like the best option for me right now

I'd consider Bug, but I'd hate to have it lined up for two gens in a row (as its looking likely for Gen 1) ^^; thanks for taking the time to line those all up!

Edited August 5, 2016 by Jedi

[Ether]

Hey, no problem. The only other two were water and flying... water didn't seem worth mentioning since it's water and it's pretty much statistically the best type around. Flying is fairly neutral, strong against Chuck and weak against Pryce, and you sort of mix and match your picks from poison, normal, and bug earlygame.

[Jedi]

Yeah I figured Water and Flying were just like "Too good" and "So much to pick from" haha.

So Gen 1 Bug, Gen 2 Poison, Gen 3 is sounding like Rock, hmmm 4 & 5 might be harder to figure out.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

Yeah was gonna say Gen 1 Bug. You had Paras, Caterpie, and Weedle and the rest is super rare thing. Probably need Psychic Sleep Power Buterfree to cheese through it

Gen 2 Normal is actually easy simply because of Sentret being ridiculously overpowered with Curl Out combo

Edited August 5, 2016 by JSND

[Garland Chaos]

Yeah this is true, what about an alternative type that has more than one pokemon? For curiosity sake

Probably Ice (Not 100% sure about this since it has Jynx), Bug or Poison, then.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

Kinda curious, is there even a game with a possibility of Dragon Monotype?

[Randoman]

Just to clarify, you want Pokemon types that are both easy to access early on (within the first 3 gyms) and Pokemon types that have enough of them for a full team, right?

For Gen 5, it's going to be a really hard finding a type that's particularly bad. All the new Gen 5 Pokemon mostly have high base stats for their final evolutions, Though it won't be as challenging as the ones for the first 3 Gens you pick, Bug for Gen 5 is the best I could think up. Yeah, you've got Leavanny, Scolipede, Galvantula, Volcarona... okay, actually, that sounds really easy and powerful. The only other one I can think of for Gen 5 is normal, but Stoutland is insanely strong for a Rattata equivalent and you could probably solo a good chunk of the game with it.

[Light Strategist]

Fairy in Gen 6? Maybe? I'd at least guess that it's kinda varied.

I'd say Steel in Gen 3 but Steven proved it's a non-issue... sort of...

Edited August 5, 2016 by Light Strategist

[Shinehollow]

Fairy in Gen 6? Maybe? I'd at least guess that it's kinda varied.

I'd say Steel in Gen 3 but Steven proved it's a non-issue... sort of...

The only Steel type you can get early game in 3 is Aron, I think, but even then it's after the first gym.

[Shadow Mir]

I would think Poison for Gen 1 because Sabrina.

[Moblin Major General]

Kinda curious, is there even a game with a possibility of Dragon Monotype?

If Viola wasn't so early, maybe Gen VI because of Axew and Tyrunt?

[Jedi]

Just to clarify, you want Pokemon types that are both easy to access early on (within the first 3 gyms) and Pokemon types that have enough of them for a full team, right?

I'd like at least more than 2 Pokemon haha. Full team would be nice but isn't required, 3 to 6 mons work mostly I just don't want to roflstomp the game with overleveling.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

Just to clarify, you want Pokemon types that are both easy to access early on (within the first 3 gyms) and Pokemon types that have enough of them for a full team, right?

For Gen 5, it's going to be a really hard finding a type that's particularly bad. All the new Gen 5 Pokemon mostly have high base stats for their final evolutions, Though it won't be as challenging as the ones for the first 3 Gens you pick, Bug for Gen 5 is the best I could think up. Yeah, you've got Leavanny, Scolipede, Galvantula, Volcarona... okay, actually, that sounds really easy and powerful. The only other one I can think of for Gen 5 is normal, but Stoutland is insanely strong for a Rattata equivalent and you could probably solo a good chunk of the game with it.

Volcarona is super impractical for Gen 5 in game, although yeah Galvantula is super OP

Edited August 5, 2016 by JSND

[Shinehollow]

I would think Poison for Gen 1 because Sabrina.

But the Gastly line can take care of her. Especially if you can evolve it into Gengar.

[Shadow Mir]

Volcarona is super impractical for Gen 5 in game

Because its moves are crap, right?

Well, that, and its learnset doesn't have anything good.

Edited August 5, 2016 by Levant Mir Celestia

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

Because its moves are crap, right?

Well, that, and its learnset doesn't have anything good.

No, its the part where it involves raising Larvesta from level 1 to 59 after getting Surf.

After evolution is surprisingly decent since 59 give Quiver Dance, and 60 give Heat Wave, and you had Fire Blast, and Egg Move Scales had Silver Wind so at least it had something to work with

[Shadow Mir]

No, its the part where it involves raising Larvesta from level 1 to 59 after getting Surf.

After evolution is surprisingly decent since 59 give Quiver Dance, and 60 give Heat Wave, and you had Fire Blast, and Egg Move Scales had Silver Wind so at least it had something to work with

Oh.. That. I was thinking about the Volcarona in Relic Castle, but maybe I'm thinking about the wrong game.

[BBM]

I don't think Gen 3 Rock really works? The first rock type you get is Aron, after the first gym, and Aron gets wrecked too hard by Brawly for it to be realistic unless you grind a ridiculous amount. You don't get Geodude/Nosepass until Rock Smash, after the third gym.

I would suggest Gen 3 BUG; you get a bunch early on with the Wurmple evos and potentially Surskit if you get lucky, and keep getting semi-interesting reinforcements like Nincada, Volbeat/Illumise, Anorith, and even Pinsir/Heracross.

By the way, what's your stance on using pokemon that evolve in to your monotype? I think Poison could also be interesting if you allow Wurmple until it evolves into Dustox. You would have serious problems with Roxanne with either of these though.

Gen 3 is probably one of the best Grass generations- you have Treecko, Seedot, Shroomish, Cacnea, Lileep, Lotad, etc which are all relatively unorthodox Grass types. It starts off easy but I think Flannery/Winona introduce some challenges, especially if you play Ruby and have to also fight Team Magma.

Edited August 5, 2016 by BBM