Updates on stuff

So yea just continuing on with last weeks updates, I've recorded basically nothing because I've still got a massive backlog of footage from Terraria. I will be recording FF7 tomorrow though and that series will be resuming this week for sure. I still have to edit and render the last sessions I recorded for Pixelmon and Terraria but those should both be ready to go up by the end of the week.

Outside of that, I'm considering starting a Pokemon series, playing one game from each generation. I'm not sure if I'll do gen 1 because of how mediocre the graphics were for that generation, but I'm definitely open for doing gen 2 and onwards. Gen 4 and up will be weird because I have no good way of recording DS games, and even if I used an emulator I have no way of cropping videos or doing picture in picture stuff with my current editing software. I'd probably have to figure out some kind of free alternative for editing those games because movie maker isn't gonna cut it for DS stuff. As for the games I'm considering, I'll likely do Crystal for gen 2, Emerald for gen 3, Leaf Green to compensate for not doing gen 1 (because it's basically just a re-release of the gen 1 games using gen 3 mechanics), Platinum for Gen 4, and I'll probably do White or White 2 for gen 5. I have no idea when I'll start this series but it'll probably be sometime before Christmas. If I can find a way to record 3DS games I'll consider doing Gen 6 as well, and just a heads up if I do gen 6 I'll probably be doing X.

Outside of that, my current stroll through gen 4 is going just fine. I've managed to catch every available Pokemon in Diamond that can be found in the wild. I'll likely just hack in the version specific ones when I've done everything else that's possible in the version just to complete the Pokedex (because you can't trade using emulators). As far as game progress goes I'm just about to head through Victory Road, so I'm training up my main party to around level 60 because after taking a peek at the Elite 4 they seem to be far better balanced than in previous generations, with the final battle looking like it could potentially be the hardest Champion battle ever made in Pokemon games. Before I go into this I'm working on completing the Pokedex for the Pokemon I currently have and need to evolve, so I'll probably be another 10 hours away from even setting foot in a room with the elite 4. My current party right now is made up of the following:

Roserade lvl 51
Garchomp lvl 52
Milotic lvl 53
Crobat lvl 50
Lucario lvl 51
Luxray lvl 43

Yea I know Luxray kind of has a level drop off between him and the rest but that's mostly because I've had him boxed since before the 7th gym in order to work on some of the friendship based evolutions. Honestly he's not exactly my ideal electric type since his special attack is actually fairly low and his nature isn't helping him in that department, but thunder fang is at least a physical attack and as such it works perfectly paired with his high attack stat. I'm probably gonna have to work him up quite a bit to get him back on par with everyone else but for right now I'm planning on having him as my ace in the hole against Cynthia's Milotic in the champion battle (because Milotic has a lower Def than Sp. Def). As usual Milotic is a real beast of a Pokemon, with a nature that boosts its special attack. It's not super high but it's high enough to deal massive damage to most Pokemon, even if it's not very effective. I'll likely be teaching her a powerful Ice type attack to take on Cynthia's Garchomp.

Garchomp is just a pure heavy hitter with decent speed and defenses. His attack stat allows him to potentially one hit most enemies, and he doesn't even have dragon rush yet. Unfortunately his special attack is complete garbage so Draco Meteor isn't really a viable attack option with him since dragon claw does nearly the same damage to most Pokemon with 20% higher accuracy. Roserade is a pure special attack Pokemon, and is pretty mediocre at everything else. Right now his special attack is just a bit ahead of Milotic, and that's with a 2 level difference. Unfortunately it only knows grass type moves, and cut so it's very limited in its attack options.

Crobat right now has a lot of speed, decent attack and health, but falls flat pretty much everywhere else. I'm considering replacing her with Mismagius (which I trained up to level 48 to help with capturing the three legendary lake Pokemon). And yes, I did hack in a Misdreavus just as a test and then ended up needing a Pokemon with Mean Look and a lot of speed for capturing one of the lake guardians. Even though I hacked it in, I did keep the IV's within the legal limits, only gave it 10 EV's in each stat to start off with, started it at level 11 (within the same level parameters you would find it in the wild), selected the nature at random, gave it one of its two abilities via coin flip, and most importantly took the time to figure out what both number sets were for my trainer ID so that it doesn't get the xp boost from trading. It was a super tedious process to be sure and took me over half an hour of learning the system and searching for any video tutorials to figure out how to do it properly. But yea even though I took the time to do it as legitimately as possible I did still cheat it in since I didn't use the trade system in the game (which doesn't work on Emulators). But yea asides from that, Mismagius is at this point looking like a far better choice than Crobat against the Elite 4, specifically for when it comes time to deal with the final Elite 4 member who uses nothing but Psychic type Pokemon. Even though I do have several Pokemon with Dark type attacks, Crobat and Roserade both have a weakness to psychic types and Lucario even though he isn't weak against psychic types, can't take much of a hit and probably wouldn't survive a full on blow from an attack like Psychic. The reason I'd pick Mismagius over Honchkrow is because Honchkrow is slow, and I really don't like using slow Pokemon because it puts me at a disadvantage for pretty much the whole fight. Not only that, but it'd give the enemy a chance to set up barriers against my attacks (which I know for a fact is gonna happen when dealing with Psychic types). So yea, Crobat is probably gonna have to sit out the Elite 4.

Moving on to the last member of my team, Lucario is kind of an odd Pokemon stat wise because despite being a Fighting and Steel type Pokemon, he really has no defenses at all and can't take much of a hit. He'll be absolutely useless against the entire elite 4 due to being at a disadvantage against almost all of their Pokemon, however I'll likely use him as my ace in the hole. The first and fourth member will be able to resist his hardest hitting fighting type attacks due to them specializing in bug and psychic types, and the second and third members use Pokemon that have earth and fire type moves that will be able to one-shot him. Despite this, Lucario is likely gonna be used as a backup plan against Garchomp because despite his inability to take hits, he is the only Pokemon I have with the ability to resist Dragon Type attacks. Lucario also has Dragon Pulse, which even though it won't have any STAB, should be able to deal significant damage to Garchomp in the event that my Milotic plan fails. Lucario doesn't exactly have the highest attack or speed stats but at the very least they're balanced so this makes him much more versatile when it comes to dealing with Pokemon that have unbalanced defensive stats.

In particular Cynthia's Roserade, Gastrodon, and Lucario all have low defence so those three are likely candidates for Lucario to attack physically. Roserade can resist fighting type moves, however with the STAB and fist plate, even fighting type attacks that aren't very effective will still deal normal damage. This is where a powerful move like Close Combat comes into play. Honestly my biggest fear is her other 3 Pokemon as they are potentially the threats that are hardest to eliminate. Luxray is my best bet of tackling her Milotic with it's Thunder Fang, but even with that  Milotic is still no pushover to deal with considering it has both water and ice type attacks that can definitely deal serious damage to my Pokemon. Spiritomb I fear mostly due to how annoying it could be, especially considering it's her first Pokemon out. It literally has no weaknesses normally and it has high defenses but low health. My only option is to hit it with my strongest attacks out of the gate to prevent it from doing anything potentially annoying. My best bet for this is likely a Dragon Rush from Garchomp, however that may provoke her into releasing her own Garchomp early, or sending out Milotic to put an end to this quickly. But beyond that, her Garchomp scares me the most. I can see why it's banned from tournaments just by looking at its base stats. The thing is the stuff of nightmares honestly, even with its double weakness to ice type attacks. With such a high attack it has the potential to one shot Pokemon, specifically my Lucario, Roserade, Mismagius, and Luxray. It can also one shot my own Garchomp if it has a speed advantage so literally my entire party can be dismantled by just this one Pokemon. The best chance I have against it lies in my Milotic with at attack like Blizzard, but even that probably won't be enough to one shot it. Not to mention Milotic has a lower defense stat so even my Milotic could potentially be one shot with a critical hit. Being able to deal with Garchomp is my biggest challenge in this final fight and honestly the outcome of the whole battle as far as I see it is directly related to how long it takes me to take down Garchomp, and how early on Cynthia throws out Garchomp. If Garchomp comes out early, I may not have enough left to deal with the rest of her party, so there's gonna be a fair bit of luck involved in this for sure.

Some of you may have noticed I'm not using any of the starters in my party, and that's mostly because I really haven't found them to fit in with the kind of party I want to build. Both Torterra and Empoleon are slow, which isn't necessarily bad but as far as damage output goes my Milotic just outmatches Empoleon at this point. I was considering swapping Torterra and Roserade but honestly outside of helping with Cynthia I really can't find much of a spot for Torterra in my lineup. I may replace Roserade with Torterra at some point depending on how the Elite 4 plays out but at this point I think I'm probably fine with what I've got. Infernape is one of the few fire types in gen 4, but honestly I really don't see any particular situation where having a fire type will help against the Elite 4 outside of the first member.

But yea that's more than enough about Pokemon for one day. Look forwards to the return of FF7 this week.