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Why do people always say Elesa is hard in BW?

I'm pretty sure that it was the volt switches of the Emolgas and sudden appearance of Zebstrika (with its power and speed) that annoyed and gave most players a hard time. All 3 starters were not too effective in this match as well (water was at a disadvantage while the grass and fire/fighting was at a slight disadvantage from the Flame Charge and aerial ace moves).

She can pretty challenging; however, if you plan the battle ahead she shouldn't be too hard to defeat. Going in without a plan; however, might cost you a loss.
 
I also did not have much trouble with Elesa. My team was Pignite, Zebstrika, Scraggy, and something else that I can't remember. She didn't Volt Switch that much when I was battling her. I thought it was relatively easy. I did have trouble with Clay, though. Clay was the only gym leader I had any real issue with. Brycen was definitely the easiest, lol.
 
I plan out every gym battle out carefully, makeing shure I have covered all of the bases. Exept on my current run through White, I used my movie Victini against Brycen. So Elesa was easy.
 
I found Elesa to be a challenging battle, I always found that when playing competitively U-Turn and Volt Switch are awesome and sneaky moves, and although Elesa only scratched the surface with the use of Volt Switch, she did manage to get the idea across the incredible usefulness of the move by creating a challenging battle that tested your nerves and strategic thinking. It took me a couple times to finally defeat her, but I got her on my third challenge. Just had to pay attention to how much she used Volt switch and how to trap her. It involved a "Motor Drive" Blitzle and well timed switching.
 
Because of her emolgas. I always carry a Sandile or a Palpitoad with me and even then I have to rely on water-type or dark-type moves.
 
Elesa was the easiest gym leader ever for me. Palpitoad with Echoed Voice takes her down like it isn't even funny.
And not only her, since Echoed Voice is an overpowered move for Palpitoad to have.
 
What? Pokémon gyms, difficult? Am I missing something here? Elesa's gym was pretty forgettable, I think I would have remembered it if she caused any problems.
 
The last four Unova gyms were easy for me. I easily beat Clay with Simipour, Skyla with Gavalunta, Brycen with Litwick and Serperior (grass beat ice lol wut), and Drayden with Gothorita. Yeah, I beat Drayden with an underleveled GOTHORITA - I used Attract on his Fraxure and it never attacked... so I spammed Shadow Ball till it fainted...
In Black, the last three were pretty easy--Skyla fell to my Boldore, Brycen got kicked in the face by my Sawk and Drayden got his skidplate handed to him by my Druddigon. Clay, however, kept nailing me with that stupid Excadrill. One Hone Claws and almost none were left standing. It didn't matter that his hits "weren't very effective" my team still kept getting nailed. If I did Nuzlocke, that would have ended my entire game.

Different story on White, though. Golett, FTW!!
On the other hand, I had trouble getting through the first four gyms - pretty much because I didn't have a decent team. I lost to all four gyms at least once. AND ELESA WAS HARD FOR ME. Only when I went all the way back and caught a Roggenrola with Sturdy did I win...and that was after I lost three times.
On Black, my Boldore finally nailed her...but I lost count of all the Revives and Soda Pops I had to use. If I hadn't healed, I would have been massively screwed.
But looking at the above posts - maybe they made the Black and White gym battles differently? Yes, in Black version, Elesa uses Volt Switch ALL THE TIME. But seeing people say that she never did in White... lol?
She tried it on me once during White but found it useless. My dearest little Braver, one of my refugees sent from Black, "took" the hit.

...did I mention he was a Golett? Oopsie, part Ground type. Yeah, too bad for you, Elesa. Your stupid rats can't do anything to him! :evil:

(I owe a lot of my wins on White to that little, now a big, guy. He took out Elesa, Clay and Iris without breaking a sweat. Needless to say, I adore him.)
 
My first time facing her I remember my team was Dewott, Zorua, Conkeldurr, Blitzle and Swadloon. I actually put Conkeldurr out due to being fully evolved and having a Rock Type attack to defeat her two Emolga and then used brute force to defeat the Zebstirike.

Though when I did import the game I remember her being tough for me since my team was really underleveled. I believe I used my Japanese Blitzle to resist her attacks thanks to it's ability being Lightning Rod.
 
Which one is Elesa?

The only one I had trouble with was the first gym, because I trained all 3 of the Pokemon I had equally, so no one Pokemon was strong enough to take them on.
 
Emolga used Volt Switch
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And now all 6 of my pokemon fainted................................................ refresh and repeat.
 
There are several factors to it that makes this gym difficult:

- First off, there's the fact that Elesa really did her homework in terms of typing. Emolga has an immunity to Ground of course, and it has STAB-Aerial Ace to deal with the frail Drilbur and Sandile. Zebstrika, on the other hand knows Flame Charge.

- Also it's worth mentioning that Emolga has Double Team.

- Thirdly, Emolga may be weak to Ice and Rock, but the former can't be exploited at all, and the latter is problematic. The first Ice-type (Vanillish) appears after this badge, and Rock-type Pokémon up to this point are either too slow, have type disadvantages, or accuracy issues with their movepool.

- Level-grinding is unusually cumbersome in Route 4-5 and 16 (and the whole BW1 game in general). The Pokémon there have annoying moves, and the experience payout in this generation by the level difference make such wild-Pokémon training not worth the pain. Also note that Emolga may appear in rustling grass instead of Audino.

- Finally, on a more opinion-based note, I've found that a bigger percentage of the earlier Pokémon up to this point seem to have poor balance (for the play though) than in XY, GSC, or even RBY. They seem to be either really fragile, or really slow, and while the wild Pokémon's moves are quite annoying, the same moves ended up being lacklustre when I caught that particular Pokémon. Not helping matters is that they are the only Pokémon you can catch - you don't get access to any previous-generation Pokémon to rely on as an emergency measure.
 
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No idea. Lenora was a lot more challenging than Elesa to me. Watchog's Retaliate destroyed my team once.
 
I wouldn't say she's super-hard to beat, but from what I remember Elesa, Lenora, Drayden, and Clay provided the most challenges for me.

For Elesa's difficulty level, I think it just depends on an an individual player's strategy. I see that there's people on here saying she's hard to beat, and people saying she's easy to beat. Meh, to heck with it I guess.
 
I didn't really have a problem tbh but people seemed to struggle against her Emolga.
 
Because Volt Switch is the most annoying move ever, and she spams it constantly.
 
I'd say she was more "annoying" than "hard". But even then, I don't recall ever having much trouble with her. She might use Volt Switch a lot, but the Pokemon she switches out to should still take damage if you attacked that turn. It's not like Volt Switch allows her to keep switching and damaging you without her Pokemon taking any damage in the process.
 
I'd say she was more "annoying" than "hard". But even then, I don't recall ever having much trouble with her. She might use Volt Switch a lot, but the Pokemon she switches out to should still take damage if you attacked that turn. It's not like Volt Switch allows her to keep switching and damaging you without her Pokemon taking any damage in the process.

It is mainly annoying because you end up doing damage to 3 pokémon instead of fainting them one at a time. Zebstrika's Flame Charge surprised me when I thought I could switch in Sevine to heal my other pokémon.
 
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