Pokémon: How meta are you?

[The Diabolical Biz]

I've dabbled. Obviously in Pokémon Showdown you have to max EV's and IV's and so on, and I've played a bit of that (because it's fun).

Aside from that, I haven't really done much. I've tried to EV train a few guys but I really really really sucked at counting and in the end I think I botched it a bit. Oh well!

The whole group that I played with tried to get into it and it was aite for a while, but time consuming etc. When I'm playing the game alone I don't bother, I just try to get the best movesets. For competitive battling (with friends and stuff) I usually make a new team after I've finished the game.

 

[Darren716]

I just started to play my first Poke'mon game (Emerald) and I have heard about the meta game but I have no interest in using it since I can beat any challenge the game throws at me by grinding for a bit (ok maybe a lot of grinding since the last member of the elite 4 has thoroughly kicked my ass the last 2 time I went against him). Team Fortress Trading on the other hand, well that's a different story (if you would even count that as meta gaming).

 

[The White Hunter]

snip.

Actually the Sleep clause is understandable.

Sleep is the worst status condition to get, besides being frozen of course. But with sleep, a team of 4 pokemon is lost, Dark Void = WAY to OP of a move, 90% hit rate and hits all pokemon for sleep. Far too powerful. I have counters to it, Insomnia on a Honchkrow and Magic Bounce on a Xatu, but Dark Void can crush all teams, making it way to OP.

Even once countered Darkrai's dark pulse is a very painful thing to take for most creatures.

I can understand how it's horrifying under Gen 5 sleep mechanics, under gen 4 it was much more managable. I will agree that Darkrai can get way out of hand, it's fast as hell, great attacking stats, it can boost the hell out them, sleep, damage while sleeping with it's ability to break focus sashes/sturdy and then wreak havoc with powerful stab and coverage options.

Also spore is much worse. At least Dark Void can miss. I mostly play singles and rotation so spore is the big difficulty for me. God damn Breloom leaves many a team at it's feet once those rules are taken away..

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why MACH PUNCH should be on at least one of your pokemon. Kinda wrecks all of Darkrai's shit, considering it's built like a wet paper towel.

Though I have to ask - why is Breloom such a threat? Everytime I go up against one, I end up insta-killing it with a Fireblast or Aerial Ace. Is there some way to get around it's atrocious speed that I'm just not seeing? Or has everyone I've been fighting not been using sashes?

Mach punch is legendary, or vacuum wave if you can find a good pokemon for it! Thats pretty much exactly the thing with Darkrai, you need to hit and you need to hit it first and hard, once it's got itself set up it's likely to do unpleasant things.

They've not been using Breloom well, you need to keep it away from those things... The trick to using Breloom well is Spore, once you get your opponent asleep you're free to set up a substitute and rain away your foes, or set up a substiture and go focus punch crazy. Brelooms speed is middling and a sticking point for it, and it's a touch fragile, so you have to be careful how you use it. Given a setup opportunity it can cause pretty insane amounts of damage. It's also a pretty poor lead pokemon. Heracross is similar, let down ina big way by being kind of slow, but it hits like a freight train with some really nice stab moves.

 

[KarmaTheAlligator]

I was content with playing the games normally until I learnt about all the stuff going on under the hood (EV/IV, shiny, catch rate, etc...). Now I feel compelled to get the best 'mons I can to enjoy the journey, and it annoys me.

 

[EstrogenicMuscle]

INB4 Metapod/Metagross jokes

Darn you. Darn you to pants.

I experiment around with this stuff a little bit. But I'm not super hardcore because there's a lot of other games I want to obsessive over and master and there's only so much time for so many games. If you play a variety of games, that is. For instance, I play a lot of scrolling shooters and fighting games. That, too, takes a lot of time to master. Or even get remotely good at. I really like it, though. It is one of my favourite video game franchises of all time. I'd like to honestly get better at it, but much of what I do is relax and play and don't get too serious into this stuff.

Partially because of time. Partially because I kind of like mystery and being superstitious. I like to deceive myself that my Pokemon are real and I'm in a Pokemon anime when I'm playing. Knowing everything takes of of the mystery away and makes some of my decisions more impersonal. I don't even like knowing all of the causes for affection levels, so that I can treat Pokemon the way I like and get them to like me "naturally". And feel like my affection levels actually came from some sense of compassion or empathy for them as fictional characters rather than just playing by the books.

On the other hand, I do check stuff. Like Smogon and other things occasionally, even if I like to pretend it never said my favourite Pokemon is weak. I tend to like cute Pokemon, and cute Pokemon are often fairly weak in some areas. So I like the idea of them being as strong as possible. And breeding Pokemon is always fun, so the grinding doesn't bother me.

But then again, I treat Pokemon as pets. In fact I wish there were more companion content in Pokemon. Pokemon are a lot like animals in our own world, if the animals in our world were full of magic and dreams. And I tend to be more empathetic seeing them like pets even though they're not real. The idea of breeding them and then favoring Pokemon based upon natures and so forth, and getting a perfect Pokemon with perfect IVs feels degrading. I like to like my Pokemon as they are and not treat Pokemon as superior and inferior to others. Doesn't make sense, right? They're just pixels on the screen. But part of the fun of video games is suspension of disbelief, and part of the fun of role playing games is being taken to another world. I like the fantasy of having a Pokemon companion.

I like EVs because it actually gives rhyme and reason to grinding. Instead of just seeing things in terms of getting exp. and leveling up, I actually feel like a trainer. In which the way I raise my Pokemon determines the outcome.

And I'm very happy this stuff is there. I know there are some closed minded people in the world who look down upon Pokemon. This should hopefully educate some people on how deep Pokemon is. There are a lot of people who think the mechanics of the game are childish and not "deep" or complicated. They're wrong. They're very wrong.