The In-Game Team Advice Thread

[Puddle]

No, if I remember correctly you can get Lunala by going back to that bridge from the very beginning of the game, the one where you save Nebby from the Spearow.

Edit: Wait that might be post-game only.

You can catch Lunala before the Elite Four. After you defeat Gladion outside Mount Lanakila, he mentions that he saw Lillie heading to Mahalo Trail (where the bridge is) with something on her mind. Then you can go and find her there, and challenge Nebby to a battle.

 

[Rocket Messiah]

I'm doing a playthrough of all the Pokemon games for the year (I started last november and beat Y and Moon, I'm trying to beat as many as I can in a year).
I'm going Y, Moon, Ultra Moon, White, White 2, Platinum, Emerald, Crystal, Yellow, Leaf Green, Soul SIlver, and Alpha Sapphire. Maybe I'll beat Shield again (I beat it about a year ago so I don't really feel like it), and I don't have Let's Go Eevee at the moment.
Anyways, now I'm on the Elite 4 of Ultra Moon, and need to grind my team. Any tips? Should I change up my team/items?
Here's my team:

Spoiler

View attachment 144341View attachment 144342View attachment 144343View attachment 144344View attachment 144345View attachment 144346

I don't think you're going to have much trouble specially with Necrozma arround but try giving some coverage to some Pokémon.

Give Golduck Psychic and Ice Beam instead of Soak and Screech

Solarbeam for Talonflame is not a really good idea specially for his two turn to charge and Talonflame not having great special Attack, Steel Wing is better for Rock types and Fairies.

Instead of Roar put Brick Break on Lycanroc, personally I don't relly in Counter so I would put one of the fangs, preferably Thunder Fang

Zoroark should have Night Pulse too and Flamethower and Brick Break or Focus Blast

 

[Okido]

Hey all. I'd like to start a new Emerald playthrough soon, but it's been so long since I've touched Gen III that I don't really seem to remember what life was like before the physical/special split, so I need some advice before heading back in. Tell me what you guys think about this hypothetical team, and what should be changed:

Spoiler

(*asterisks denote moves that can benefit from STAB)
1. Blaziken

Ability: Blaze
-Brick Break*
-Earthquake
-Aerial Ace
-Flamethrower*

2. Ludicolo

Ability: Rain Dish
-Rain Dance
-Surf*
-Ice Beam
-Nature Power*

3. Raichu

Ability: Static
-Thunderbolt*
-Iron Tail
-Light Screen
-Double Team/Thunder*

4. Cradily

Ability: Suction Cups
-Confuse Ray
-AncientPower*
-SolarBeam*/Giga Drain*
-Toxic

5. TBA.

I'm considering Muk, Banette, Gardevoir, or Metagross but that's subject to change.

6. Reserved seat for the HM user.

Worth noting I'm most likely not going to attempt any Frontier facilities besides the Battle Factory, so I just need a team to get me through the main story.

Anything obvious/crucial that I'm missing? Gaps in coverage that could be filled? Recommended held items? Different moves/different Pokemon altogether that would work better? Things I should know about Emerald in general before going in? Let me know! Thank you very much.

 

[EmpoleonProd]

Hey all. I'd like to start a new Emerald playthrough soon, but it's been so long since I've touched Gen III that I don't really seem to remember what life was like before the physical/special split, so I need some advice before heading back in. Tell me what you guys think about this hypothetical team, and what should be changed:

Spoiler

(*asterisks denote moves that can benefit from STAB)
1. Blaziken

Ability: Blaze
-Brick Break*
-Earthquake
-Aerial Ace
-Flamethrower*

2. Ludicolo

Ability: Rain Dish
-Rain Dance
-Surf*
-Ice Beam
-Nature Power*

3. Raichu

Ability: Static
-Thunderbolt*
-Iron Tail
-Light Screen
-Double Team/Thunder*

4. Cradily

Ability: Suction Cups
-Confuse Ray
-AncientPower*
-SolarBeam*/Giga Drain*
-Toxic

5. TBA.

I'm considering Muk, Banette, Gardevoir, or Metagross but that's subject to change.

6. Reserved seat for the HM user.

Worth noting I'm most likely not going to attempt any Frontier facilities besides the Battle Factory, so I just need a team to get me through the main story.

Anything obvious/crucial that I'm missing? Gaps in coverage that could be filled? Recommended held items? Different moves/different Pokemon altogether that would work better? Things I should know about Emerald in general before going in? Let me know! Thank you very much.

Since all of your Blaziken's moves are physical besides your Fire move, you might as well slap Overheat on there, I think the rule of thumb is that even a second Overheat is about as strong as Flamethrower, but I could be wrong, either way Overheat is just an absolute nuke compared to Flamethrower. For Ludicolo I'd recommend Giga Drain over Nature Power, gives you nice recovery in a stab move so you can't go wrong with that, but then you'd have to go with Solar Beam for Cradily. If you do decide to trade Nature Power for Giga Drain, I'd also trade your ability from Rain Dish to Swift Swim, as you'll be able to out-speed and out-heal most damage with doubled speed + Giga Drain.

If you haven't filled your 5th team member yet I think getting a Bagon right after you get Waterfall can be interesting, it can be a little tough to train a Bagon that late in the game but it's really rewarding and satisfying to pull it off and have a Salamence by the Pokemon League, even if it is a little under-leveled. For Salamence I'd run Dragon Claw, Fly, Flamethrower as the first three moves for sure. Salamence doesn't learn Dragon Claw until Level 79 but you will get the TM for it in Bagon's room, but there's a way to circumvent using the TM up if you don't want to, Bagon learns Dragon Claw at Level 49, you could keep it as a Bagon then let it evolve at 49 after learning Dragon Claw, then Shelgon will evolve into Salamence at 50 which is the natural level for that evolution anyways so you wouldn't even be keeping it as a Bagon for too terribly long.

Also for Raichu I'd go with Thunder over Double Team since you have the Ludicolo with Rain Dance.

 

[swiftgallade46]

Since all of your Blaziken's moves are physical besides your Fire move, you might as well slap Overheat on there, I think the rule of thumb is that even a second Overheat is about as strong as Flamethrower, but I could be wrong

Not quite; once your SpAtk is lowered by 2 stages it effectively cuts the damage in half which would mean that Overheat would go from 140 to 70 Base Power while Flamethrower was 95. Granted, the damage calculations and rounding for Base Power are slightly different than those from your stats (the Base Power is technically still 140 after one use but the stat reduction is what functionally makes it 70), but the math is about the same.

 

[EmpoleonProd]

Not quite; once your SpAtk is lowered by 2 stages it effectively cuts the damage in half which would mean that Overheat would go from 140 to 70 Base Power while Flamethrower was 95. Granted, the damage calculations and rounding for Base Power are slightly different than those from your stats (the Base Power is technically still 140 after one use but the stat reduction is what functionally makes it 70), but the math is about the same.

Okay, I think maybe what I meant to say was two Overheats is still more damage than two Flamethrowers (140 + 70 vs. 90 + 90).

 

[swiftgallade46]

Okay, I think maybe what I meant to say was two Overheats is still more damage than two Flamethrowers (140 + 70 vs. 90 + 90).

Flamethrower was 95 BP back in gen 3, but yes this is correct. Although Flamethrower does also have a small Burn chance.

 

[Rounded Chick]

So I'm having a Pokémon midlife(game?) crisis! I wanted to switch up my team, and now I've leveled up lots of Pokémon and can't decide which to use! I thought maybe getting some advice might help, especially as I'm not great at team balancing so maybe you could give some method to my madness. At the end of the day, I'm using Pokémon I like and if that means being overleveled so be it, but some strategy is probably a good idea. Anyway, up until now my team was Incineroar, Haunter, Toucannon, Phantump, Gumshoos, and male Salandit. My Pokémon are in their 30s BTW. This started by me really not liking Litten's final evolution. So I'm wondering whether to use a Litten I bred from it and stop it reaching its final evolution, or use a Rowlet someone traded me, or give up on using a starter. Then I thought using a normal type was pretty boring and maybe I should switch it out for something, but what? I got someone to evolve my gift Eevee into a Glaceon so I'd like to use that... I've thought maybe I should switch my Phantump out for the Trevenant I got at Poké Pelago… and maybe I should switch out my male Salandit for a female I've got almost to the point of evolving. Then I wonder if I should switch some of these Pokémon out outright and use something totally different - as I said, I've leveled other stuff up. I've got a Pyukumuku, but it's moveset only seems useful for double battle support, which is not something I'm going to be needing often... Purify is useful for if I end up giving a damaging status condition to a Pokémon I want to catch, but I might as well teach it to a Smeargle who can learn other moves good for catching. Other than that I'm seriously considering using a Magar... So as you see I'm very indecided about some stuff, and I've kinda just stopped playing because of that... I'm pretty sure I want to keep Haunter and Toucannon in my party, but that's about it. Help me decide what on earth to do!

 

[CynthiaLover]

I'm still currently playing my X playthrough and I need a little help on a potential Mega Mon to use. I've got three pretty good candidates to fill that slot, even though using a Mega will break the game into itty-bitty pieces. My choices are Aerodactyl, Lucario, and Mawile. While I know that Mawile's Mega Stone is post-game, I've got a fair few spares hanging around that I can trade over if it becomes the winner. So, my question is this: Which one would be a better Mega to use for an in-game playthrough? Oh, I should also mention their natures/abilities if it'll help. Lucario has a Bashful nature and Inner Focus, Aerodactyl has a Bashful nature and Pressure, and Mawile has a Naughty nature with Intimidate. Thanks in advance.

 

[Pwikachu213]

I'm not sure, whether my team actually balances, I'm thinking Primerina, Toucannaon, Salazzle, Gengar, Vikavolt , and Garchomp

 

[Pwikachu213]

I have a team in ultra moon consisting of Primerina, Toucannon , Salazzle , Vikavolt , Gengar , and Garchomp , Im wondering if this team is balanced

 

[Pwikachu213]

I have a team in ultra moon consisting of Primerina, Toucannon , Salazzle , Vikavolt , Gengar , and Garchomp , Im wondering if this team is balanced

 

[Greninjaman]

I have a team in ultra moon consisting of Primerina, Toucannon , Salazzle , Vikavolt , Gengar , and Garchomp , Im wondering if this team is balanced

Your team is balanced except for the fact that half of them are weak to Rock: Toucannon, Vikavolt, and Salazzle

 

[Pwikachu213]

Your team is balanced except for the fact that half of them are weak to Rock: Toucannon, Vikavolt, and Salazzle

I see , but I think Primirina can counter that right .

 

[Enzo]

I'm not sure, whether my team actually balances, I'm thinking Primerina, Toucannaon, Salazzle, Gengar, Vikavolt , and Garchomp

Both Gengar and Salazzle seems redundant to me. I don't think you need them both, besides, Gengar lost levitate, so both of them are weak against Ground.

But, however, while both very good choices (Salazzle scorchs her way through Alola and Gengar is aways a good Pokémon and in Alola is no exception, which I assume it's the game you are playing), I'm inclined to say to you to drop Salazzle, since half of your team is weak against Rock, and you battle against Rock types quite a lot in that region. So if you were to drop anyone, I would say to get rid of the fire/poison lizard.

 

[Greninjaman]

I see , but I think Primirina can counter that right .

Yeah.

 

[Pwikachu213]

I know , but I dont really like any other fire types , I'm open to suggestions

 

[Enzo]

I know , but I dont really like any other fire types , I'm open to suggestions

Why not a Scrafty?

It's a Fighting type, which resists Rock, and completely rams through Olivia's team (just watch out for her Carbink's Moonblast tho), besides, it's your only resistence against Acerola's Ghost types (which your only answer would be Gengar who's weak against her too) by being a Dark type as well. And if you are playing the Ultra games, it's an even bigger W for this mon since it loses one of it's weakness against Hala's Fighting types and gains a type it's strong against in Molaine's Steel types.

Besides, while not too problematic, you also don't have anything to respond againsy Psychic types, which Scrafty is also powerful against by being immune against it.

 

[Pwikachu213]

Thanks , I was thinking bulk-up and knock of , and not sure of what moves to give him , and doesn't seem to have many weakness except for faries

 

[Enzo]

Thanks , I was thinking bulk-up and knock of , and not sure of what moves to give him , and doesn't seem to have many weakness except for faries

-Crunch (level up move at lv 38, use others until you get it)
-Brick Break/HJK (one is TM and the other is level up, use the former for less power but more PP and more reliable, or the latter for more power, but less PP and less reliable and for chance of recoil)
-Poison Jab (against Fairies and some Grass types)
-Ice Punch/Fire Punch (this takes Beach Points, but it's very worth it due to reliability and coverage), or use something like Bulk up, Swords Dance or Work Up for more damage, or use Rock Slide.