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Pokémon Sword and Shield News and Discussion: Isle of Armor out now


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I finished Shield's main story the other night so I can say that while I do enjoy the game, it still has a lot of glaring problems and is an overall step backwards compared to Sun and Moon in most aspects. I can only hope that Game Freak takes this game's criticisms (the reasonable ones, I should say) to heart going forward heh, wishful thinking me and that the next games are far more finished polished than these were.

As for my team, because I'm prone to be a bit eccentric I ended up rotating a team of twelve for this game (with every type represented). They were:

Spoiler

Gex (Inteleon, M): Snipe Shot, Acrobatics, Shadow Ball, Ice Beam; Water, Torrent
Vika (Corviknight, F): Brave Bird, Steel Wing, Payback, Taunt; Flying/Steel, Pressure
Miriel (Orbeetle, F): Bug Buzz, Psychic, Energy Ball, Calm Mind; Bug/Psychic, Swarm
Ghirahim (Obstagoon, M): Night Slash, Double-Edge, Seed Bomb, Obstruct far better here than in FEH; Dark/Normal, Reckless
OldKingCoal (Coalossal, M): Rock Slide, Heat Crash, Body Press, Tar Shot; Rock/Fire, Steam Engine
Sophia (Appletun, F): Apple Acid, Dragon Pulse, Payback, Bulldoze; Grass/Dragon, Ripen
Punk ([Amped] Toxtricity, M): Overdrive, Sludge Bomb, Boomburst, Toxic; Electric/Poison, Punk Rock
Ursula (Cursola, F): Hex, Power Gem, Scald, Earth Power; Ghost, Weak Armor
Validar (Sandaconda, M): Dig because I can never a find a guy who sells Earthquake, Body Press, Rock Slide, Zen Headbutt; Ground, Shed Skin
Bronie4Life (Rapidash, M): Psycho Cut, Play Rough, High Horsepower, Megahorn; Psychic/Fairy, Run Away
WadlDooters (Falinks, -) Close Combat, Rock Slide, Megahorn, No Retreat; Fighting, Battle Armor
Cuboon (Eiscue, F): Ice Punch, Zen Headbutt, Liquidation, Hail; Ice, Ice Face

Some of those nicknames should be obvious, others not so much. Rapidash's, though, was very blatant plucking of low-hanging fruit on my part and no I'm not sorry.

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So... haven't played the game or anything but...

Is it me of are the final evolutions of the starters are utterly uncharismatic and unspired ? Except the grass one, the green one is fine.
The shower is especially colder after seeing just how awesome those of SM/USUM were.
Like, you have a cat who evolve into a Fire/Dark TigerMask, a birdy who become a Grass/Ghost bird archer, then you have a sea lion that become a beautiful Water/Fairy mermaid like creature. And then there's Greninja.

I wasn't disapointing by a starter design since Serperior, but they basically create a boring thiner water version of it.

And it's sad because most of the others looks cool. Alcremie anyone ?

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Leon has fallen! Spoilers below.

Spoiler

...to be honest, everything up to his battle was painfully easy. My team was overleveled as hell (I think the battle against Bede everyone had at least 10 levels to his pokemon) and it was mostly because I don't think it's possible to turn off the automatic EXP Share we apparently own, so every captured pokemon (which by the end I had caught 6 boxes worth and started on the 7th) was just exp for everyone, and battling a ton of Max Raid Battles just meant a lot of EXP candies.

Then Leon goes and has his team in the level 61-65 range and suddenly I was on an even playing field. He was my first actual loss, though I attribute that to not knowing the type of his Dragapult (Dragon/Ghost it turns out) and losing half my team to it alone. The rematch went a lot better when I actually had an idea of what to do.

So yeah, I can see some of the issues with the game that people would have, but none of them I feel are actual deal-breakers or worth boycotting Gamefreak like it was sounding like people were going to do. I will say, however, that the final stretch of the game felt very dragged out, and it's all because of freaking Rose. It's even established that he was worried over an issue that wouldn't happen for another thousand years, so it just feels very unnecessary...

Also, I was calling that twist, that Rose was the bad guy, ever since we first saw him. I mean... Team Yell doesn't even have a proper "leader". Meanwhile, here's the most powerful man in the Galar region and here's his kinda hot but serious secretary. What did you think was gonna happen, exactly...?

My final team...

Spoiler

 

For some of these nicknames, they were just made up on the spot. Others had a little more thought put into them.

  1. Rillaboom (Giddyin), Adamant. I didn't soft-reset for that by the way, that's just how he came. Very strong and even had a bit of speed to him sometimes. He even landed the final hits against Leon's Charizard, albeit after letting his Gigantamax form burn out. I consider it poetic.
  2. Bewear (Hau'la) Brave. Named after a certain Malasada and his grandpappy, excessively strong the whole way through. I think he was the first Brilliant Aura pokemon I caught to, and he came with Force Palm, which saved me the struggle of having no fighting-type moves.
  3. Weezing (Cess) Modest. I actually had a different Koffing at the time, Calm nature, they even got me through some of the Fire gym and learned Shadow Ball from the only SB TR I had, but then Cess appeared in a Max Raid Battle and just looked way better in comparison. I gave her Flamethrower and has been my only source of fire for about 97% of the journey.
  4. Bronzong (Root Beer) Relaxed... listen, while all y'all were playing Sw/Sh from day 1, I was at an anime convention not playing Sw/Sh, but anyway there was this Root Beer stand that, if you bought one of their steel mugs (there was even a limited edition one printed with the convention logo!), you could endlessly refill it with 6 different flavors of Root Beer throughout the con and even if you bring the mug to their stand at another event. I easily had more Root Beer in those 3 con days than in my entire life, and when I caught Bronzong in a Max Raid Battle it just reminded me of the mug I bought to get all that root beer. Bulky if low on HP, but also a strong Heavy Slammer and even got off Hypnosis reliably a number of times.
  5. Darmanitan (Avlanch) Impish. I initially saw there was Galarian Darumaka/Darmanitan and decided what the hell, it looks pretty good! And then... it turns out that it's a pretty rare pokemon. I had to use two Wishing Pieces after finding out which Max Raid spots had Darumaka in them just to find this guy.
    ...and it was worth it, my god. I used a Unovan Darmanitan before and it was strong, but they had nothing on Avlanch. Pretty much everything was OHKO if he was sent out, and he didn't even have a Life Orb until the final battle against Leon.
  6. Cloyster (Caspar) Hasty. Named after a certain Crestless Black Eagle. I use Cloyster in competitive sometimes, so I knew what I was doing (helps that most of the moves Cloyster would want were TMs this gen for some reason!). But that wasn't what I was thinking with Caspar, I was just thinking "My god, my team sucks against fire, and Leon's whole freaking thing is Charizard so I need a Water type yesterday". I was originally thinking Frillish/Jellicent, but then I saw a Shellder in the water, caught it, and saw that he had potential.

And special mentions...

  • Linoon. He had pickup, but for some reason even when it was clearly nighttime he never evolved, letting him get up to level 54 before I boxed him to make room for Cloyster.
  • Thievul (Ninis) My first capture. I pretty much thought of her as the Purrloin/Liepard of Galar, so I was already set on dropping her once I felt I was satisfied. She was dropped right before the gym battle with Milo, though not before she evolved.
  • Perrserker (Pestal) Pretty much just used because I was curious about Galarian Meowth and wanted to see it evolve, though at the time I couldn't just force-feed him candies, so I decided to just use him for a while. Can't quite remember where I dropped him...
  • Vespiquen (Valencia) Early capture, and thank god we're allowed to see the gender differences of pokemon on the field because catching her would have been a pain otherwise. She probably would have been a more permanent member of the team had I not caught Bronzong, but even then I was already feeling like I was pushing the number of not-Galarian pokemon I was using, so... she got the box.
  • Koffing. This is the original Koffing I used, before changing over to the Cess I have now. This Koffing got through the Fire gym and learned Shadow Ball before being dropped.

 

...alright then, time for post-game stuff...
...also I'm just learning you can't soft-reset in Sw/Sh... so you can't soft-reset in the game you are most likely to soft reset in, but you can soft-reset in freaking Fire Emblem?

...yooooo I found the theme of the Annoying Yamper!

Edited by Xenomata
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Just finished the game. Even with exp share, I found Leon to be a pretty good challenge compared to the rest of the game. I think without exp. share, Leon would be pretty tough so I think they really should've given us the option to turn it off.

Also shoutout to Raihan's gym challenge cause I really liked the idea and strategy behind his choice of pokemon.

Overall, I enjoyed the game a lot. I actually think I had more fun with SwSh than Sun and Moon.

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Spoiler

@Xenomata I wasn't expecting any evil team honestly. Call it a twist or whatever but all I see is something that GF pulled out of their ass last second because they felt the need to have one.

There was never any build up to what Rose does. It just spontaneously happens. And his plan isn't even inherently evil but he cause a bunch of unnecessary trouble for something that won't happen for another thousand years because he can't wait until tomorrow or some other day to do set the events in motion. No, it has to happen during the league right at the finals because """""plot""""" and """""drama"""""

USUM butchered the SM story hard but SWSH somehow manages to do worse and it barely even had a story.

 

On 11/21/2019 at 6:12 PM, B.Leu said:

Is it me of are the final evolutions of the starters are utterly uncharismatic and unspired ?

Maybe they are but I ended up liking them anyway. Cinderace was my least favorite but the animation of its signature move w̶h̶i̶c̶h̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶w̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶a̶l̶l̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶b̶u̶d̶g̶e̶t̶ ̶w̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶i̶n̶t̶o̶ changed my mind about it.

On 11/21/2019 at 3:23 AM, Diovani Bressan said:

The only gym that I had not a easy time was the 8th Gym, because of his final Pokémon that is Dragon/Steel.

I knocked on Raihan before because he didn't have use all dragons but I actually like that about him now. His focus on wheather is much more interesting and he gave me a hard time too because of his partial focus on ground types and ground hard counters half of my team while the other half still wasn't particularly great at tackling them.

I also like he has different dialogue for changing the wheather on him.

9 hours ago, Xenomata said:

...yooooo I found the theme of the Annoying Yamper!

I found it too! I initially wasn't gonna do the bastardized battle tower but I wanted to keep using my team a little bit more and it was the only thing left. Glad I did because the theme was so good.

I also got to see a particular someone's snazzy new outfit and disappointed mug which I'm happy about

Spoiler

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Do wish there was more unique trainers in the tower than just him though. Especially after SM had some great trainers like Red, Blue, Wally and Cynthia.

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@NegativeExponents-
 

Spoiler

 

At least as far as "evil teams" go, Team Yell would have been perfect as an "evil team" if they didn't throw in the "Oh no there's a great evil threat that requires the aid of the legendary pokemon!". I mean, if more focus were put into the story of the Gym Challenge, their entire focus is interfering with the Gym Challengers progress for the sake of one girl; they would have been the perfect antagonists. But... nope, instead they don't even get a proper "leader" or even "admin characters", have about as much impact on the Gym Challenge as a wild pokemon has on traveling a route, and now that I think about it they don't even do that great a job at the whole "impeding progress" thing in the first place, they kinda just hold up lines, shout at people a bunch, and drive off with a water-traveling pokemon while a dude is explaining he made a way to bike on top of water.

Man, I have to wonder how Pokemon Adventures is gonna handle this one, if the "evil team" is just made up of a bunch of mildly annoying gym trainers and the "main bad guy" isn't even bad until literally the absolute last possible second.

 

 

Edited by Xenomata
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26 minutes ago, Xenomata said:

@NegativeExponents-
 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

At least as far as "evil teams" go, Team Yell would have been perfect as an "evil team" if they didn't throw in the "Oh no there's a great evil threat that requires the aid of the legendary pokemon!". I mean, if more focus were put into the story of the Gym Challenge, their entire focus is interfering with the Gym Challengers progress for the sake of one girl; they would have been the perfect antagonists. But... nope, instead they don't even get a proper "leader" or even "admin characters", have about as much impact on the Gym Challenge as a wild pokemon has on traveling a route, and now that I think about it they don't even do that great a job at the whole "impeding progress" thing in the first place, they kinda just hold up lines, shout at people a bunch, and drive off with a water-traveling pokemon while a dude is explaining he made a way to bike on top of water.

Man, I have to wonder how Pokemon Adventures is gonna handle this one, if the "evil team" is just made up of a bunch of mildly annoying gym trainers and the "main bad guy" isn't even bad until literally the absolute last possible second.

 

 

Spoiler

Clearly the most logical thing to do with Rose in the manga is to turn him into a genocidal maniac (like Lysandre) who wants to use Eternatus to wipe out Kalos as retribution for Lysandre's attempted genocide or something similarly over-the-top.

....Though, maybe an idea like that is too far-fetched when they've already turned someone like Lance (who wasn't evil in the slightest in the games) into a genocidal maniac.

 

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On 11/18/2019 at 4:22 PM, Sasori said:

I know we have a wifi topic for questions like this, but that topic seems to have died. I think it might be a better idea to ask a trading question here. Is there a kind soul around here that wants to trade my Boldore back and forth? To my surprise I found a shiny one in the wild.

As a 'rare' mon it earned itself a slot on my team, but I just need a little bit of help to make the most out of it.

I'm up for trades. When I get home I can help out.

On 11/21/2019 at 5:23 AM, Diovani Bressan said:

Now that I completed the game after playing non stop for 3 days (I beat it on Monday? 

I really liked the game, and now I am working in complete the Pokédex. Right now I am at 301/400. If someone needs help with trading or need some Pokémon, I believe I can help. I will also need help in getting some exclusive, since I have Pokémon Shield.

I have Sword and I'll also be up for helping others fill the Dex. I'm gonna start mine soon but keep in mind I haven't beat the game and I'm still pretty early on. 

 

Also can anyone answer this, but since exp share is always on, does that mean EVs are constantly being shared too?

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1 hour ago, Tybrosion said:
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Clearly the most logical thing to do with Rose in the manga is to turn him into a genocidal maniac (like Lysandre) who wants to use Eternatus to wipe out Kalos as retribution for Lysandre's attempted genocide or something similarly over-the-top.

....Though, maybe an idea like that is too far-fetched when they've already turned someone like Lance (who wasn't evil in the slightest in the games) into a genocidal maniac.

 

Nah, Lance aint no genocidal maniac!
He only wanted to massacre all HUMANS! See? Completely reasonable.

Max Raid Battles are going decently well for me since becoming Champion. First one after beating the post-game, Gigantamax Butterfree 5IV, all in the right stats to. Unfortunately Jolly and Tinted Lens (Compoundeyes woulda been better), but while the latter can't be fixed (stupid hidden abilities...), all I'd need for the other issue is a Timid Mint. And just now got Wailord with Best in all but Def and Sp.D as well as HA.

...they were hard as hell though, if and only because I had to rely on computer allies for them, and it took waiting for a great combo to appear to get anywhere. Wailord it took both the Maractus and Dhelmise trainers to appear before I could beat him, and even then I still had to consider the Salazzle trainer as meat fodder...

...I also want to add, getting a single Beast Ball, I feel insulted... I was the guy who actually exploited the trick that let you get as many Beast Balls as you wanted in Sun and Moon, when you only got them from Looker in the Ultra Beast post-game. I got over 200 of those things, and it took forever, but I did it. And yes, I was quite insulted when we could just buy them in USUM, but now just getting one while also being told that the damn things have a low catch rate... I kinda wanna go back to Alola now.
Least we can get infinite of the Apricorn and Dream balls I guess.

Edited by Xenomata
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I also just beat the game and... soloed Leon with Clefairy. I can't believe how easy that was, really. Probably not going to do shiny hunting or any of that since it doesn't interest me, but good luck to those that do!

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So hey, if anyone needs a little help with their pokedex... well, I have all the amalgamations that by all means should not even be alive right now, so that might be worth contacting me about.

Wonder if I should join SF discord to make contacting me easier...

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Apparently, there's a twenty-minute time limit on battles, with a 60 second time limit for turns.

...

Look, I know Nintendo Switch Online is bad, but this? This is a whole new level of ridiculousness. Sun and Moon didn't have this, if I recall.
Warning: Language.

You gotta download rules too, it seems...which...was never a thing?

Edit: As well as there still being no, you know. 6 v 6 with no time limit, if that's what you're into.

Edited by Dai
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17 hours ago, Dai said:

Apparently, there's a twenty-minute time limit on battles, with a 60 second time limit for turns.

...

Look, I know Nintendo Switch Online is bad, but this? This is a whole new level of ridiculousness. Sun and Moon didn't have this, if I recall.

Battles always had a time limit though?
I mean, not as strict as 20 minutes and 60 secs per turn, but it's not a new thing.

@Diovani Bressan BRB, officially becoming a member of the Serenes Forest discord.

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1 hour ago, Xenomata said:

BRB, officially becoming a member of the Serenes Forest discord.

I am not in the Serenes Forest Discord, but I could join it.

I just need to know how to do it... lol

Edit: nevermind, I found it.

Edited by Diovani Bressan
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On 11/23/2019 at 10:39 AM, Tediz64 said:

I'm up for trades. When I get home I can help out.

I have Sword and I'll also be up for helping others fill the Dex. I'm gonna start mine soon but keep in mind I haven't beat the game and I'm still pretty early on. 

 

Also can anyone answer this, but since exp share is always on, does that mean EVs are constantly being shared too?

Thanks for the offer. I did't see the message till now though so I already managed to evolve my pokemon through other means. But i'm also up for trading if you have a pokemon you want from shield or if you have a trade evo.

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Does anyone happen to have a Defiant Falinks? If so, I can offer HA Galarian Corsola among a few other things. Honestly I should get around to making a list...

On 11/26/2019 at 1:37 PM, Xenomata said:

Battles always had a time limit though?
I mean, not as strict as 20 minutes and 60 secs per turn, but it's not a new thing.

If I'm not mistaken, Sun and Moon had a 60 minute total battle timer, and a 45 second move timer. So longer for each turn, but 20 for the whole battle is WAY too short.

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20 minutes ago, Emerson said:

Does anyone happen to have a Defiant Falinks? If so, I can offer HA Galarian Corsola among a few other things. Honestly I should get around to making a list...

If I'm not mistaken, Sun and Moon had a 60 minute total battle timer, and a 45 second move timer. So longer for each turn, but 20 for the whole battle is WAY too short.

First off, so glad you asked ohohohohohohoho.
...actually not really, I just had to breed a 5IV HA Falinks for a bud, and that damn thing took forever. All you have to do is select Sp.A as the not passed down stat, stop wanting to be a special attacker Falinks.
But otherwise yes I do have an HA Falinks, they're in a Repeat Ball and are glorious in battle, and I'd be glad to breed one for you. HA Corsola would be just fine. I've been accepted into the Serenes Forest discord, but I'm also on Serebii.net's discord if you aren't in SF Discord yet.

As for battles... I dunno about you, but whenever I battle, they NEVER last more than maybe... I dunno, 10 or 15 minutes was the longest I ever had, and that ended in a stallfest between my Suicune and an opponents Sableye. And that's just the battle that involved a stallfest.

Edited by Xenomata
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1 minute ago, Xenomata said:

First off, so glad you asked ohohohohohohoho.
...actually not really, I just had to breed a 5IV HA Falinks for a bud, and that damn thing took forever. All you have to do is select Sp.A as the not passed down stat, stop wanting to be a special attacker Falinks.
But otherwise yes I do have an HA Falinks and I'd be glad to breed one for you. HA Corsola would be just fine. I've been accepted into the Serenes Forest discord, but I'm also on Serebii.net's discord if you aren't in SF Discord yet.

As for battles... I dunno about you, but whenever I battle, they NEVER last more than maybe... I dunno, 10 or 15 minutes was the longest I ever had, and that ended in a stallfest between my Suicune and an opponents Sableye. And that's just the battle that involved a stallfest.

I've been on the SFcord forever lmao so yeah thats fine.
 

It really depends, personally I'm in the same boat with time, I rarely would take over 20 minutes, but some people play that way. It's still a very... strict timer. But it does help prevent timer stall which is useful.

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44 minutes ago, ZeManaphy said:

Aegislash lost 10 points in Sp.Atk,Sp.Def,Spd, and Atk.

That's it? That's pretty disappointing considering that GameFreak had really put the nerf bat to use between Gen 6 and Gen 7, hitting confusion, Swagger, paralysis, and Talonflame, among others.

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1 hour ago, Shadow Mir said:

I'm curious - did any Pokemon, moves, etc. get nerfed?

Besides Aegislash, Mimikyu now loses 1/8 of its HP when its disguise is broken, preventing it from using focus sash.

Edited by Nobody
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