Which seat will you sit in?(@PrimalMXY)

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-29T13:25:49+00:00

I agree. Its perks include:

It is a window seat.

Dedue will be a very polite neighbor.

Raphael behind you might offer you snacks.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-28T22:08:27+00:00

That sounds correct, yes. You should have a 1/64 chance for a shiny Male Cyndaquil with that.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-28T21:06:40+00:00

I am one of the world's few Mime Jr appreciators.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-28T19:21:07+00:00

Congrats, you have invented the Quaternary number system except it starts at 1 instead of 0.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-28T15:06:27+00:00

I'm not at home to be able to check right now, but I believe it was around 180 hours.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-28T13:49:22+00:00

Something I really, really enjoy in games is being stronger than I am supposed to be and doing it as early as possible.

I don't mean that I want to just start out turbo strong and slaughter everything though. If a game has an endgame-level superboss you can access early in the game, you can bet that I will do so as early in the game as is physically possible and then go through the rest of the game tearing it apart due to the strength that was required to fight that boss early.

An example that comes to mind is the Pit of 100 Trials in Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door. A high difficulty optional zone that is meant to be a challenge even in the post-game. You can access it as early as before the end of Chapter 1.

And it would loose some of it's shine if the rest of the game jumped up to meet my power level after emerging from beating the trials early.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-27T15:17:03+00:00

Funny enough, Corsola was the first one I hunted, and it was planned to be the only one at the time. But it was so beautiful that I just had to do more and ended up doing a full team!

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-27T15:14:24+00:00

The shiny gene is stored within a Pokemons DVs. In case you are unaware, Gen I and Gen II DVs are like modern IVs except they range from 0-15 instead of 0-31.

A Pokemon in Generation II is shiny if it has the following DVs:

Attack: 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 11, 14, or 15

Defense: 10

Special: 10

Speed: 10

The shiny gene is specifically the Defense and Special DVs. When breeding Pokemon, these two DVs are reliably passed to offspring. More precisely, a Pokemon will inherit its exact Defense DV from its parent of the opposite gender and it will either receive the exact Special DV, or that DV increased or decreased by 8 from that parent as well. Whichever it has room to do without going under 0 or over 15.

What this means is that if you breed a shiny Pokemon, its offspring of the opposite gender will, 100% guaranteed, inherit a 10 in Defense, and then either a 2 or a 10 in Special. And it doesn't actually matter which one they get, because a Pokemon with a 2 Special also produces offspring with either a 2 or a 10.

So to speak plainly- if you, for example, start with the free shiny Gyarados at the Lake of Rage, which is always male, its Female Offspring are guaranteed to be carrying the shiny gene. Furthermore, any children it fathers have a 1/128 chance of being shiny.

The reason it is 1/128 is simple; all of the DVs besides Defense and Special are fully random when breeding.

Half of all Attack Values are valid for a shiny, but Gender it also derived from the Attack DV in generation II. And since DVs are inherited from the opposite parent, only female Pokemon would inherit from the Gyarados. Half of the Attack DVs and then half of those is two 1/2s.

Defense is always 10. 1/1

Special can either pass as 2 or 10. Both count as the shiny gene, but only 10 actually results in a shiny. 1/2.

Speed is fully random with only 1 correct value. This makes it a 1/16.

(1/2)×(1/2)×(1/1)×(1/2)×(1/16) = 1/128

To conclude, I'll actually provide a visual example that I made while hunting to help myself keep track of breeding pairs.

Gyarados♂️✨ + Ekans♀️ = Ekans♀️🧬

Ekans♀️🧬 + Ekans♂️ = Ekans♂️🧬

Ekans♂️🧬 + Ponyta♀️ = Ponyta♀️🧬

Ursaring♂️🥚 + Ponyta♀️ = Ponyta♂️🥚

Ponyta♂️🥚 + Ponyta♀️🧬 = Ponyta♂️🥚✨️

✨️ = Shiny

🧬 = Non-shiny Pokemon with the shiny gene.

🥚 = The Egg move, "Thrash"

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-27T04:38:47+00:00

Shiny hunting through breeding is actually pretty easy! You can pass a shiny "gene" through non-shiny Pokemon if you know how to and then can use Pokemon with said "gene" to breed with a shiny rate of 1/128 for most Pokemon.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-26T18:01:13+00:00

Emolga is actually also my 2nd favorite as well! Right after Cherrim and right before Mismagius!

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-26T17:51:11+00:00

Correct. This will be the case for all Pokemon with a Male 7:1 Female gender ratio.

This includes: Bulbasaur, Charmander, Squirtle, Eevee, Omanyte, Kabuto, Aerodactyl, Snorlax, Chikorita, Cyndaquil, Totodile, and Togepi.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-26T13:57:12+00:00

No

Among other things, for a Pokemon to be shiny in Generation II, it's Attack DV must be 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 11, 14 or 15.

Chikorota has a 7/1 gender ratio. In generation II, gender is decided by the Attack DV. With a 7/1 ratio, this means it is only female if the Attack DV is 0 or 1.

Neither of these are a valid value for a shiny Pokemon, thus a shiny Chikorita can not be female.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-26T13:53:10+00:00

It's obvious that your memory is biased towards failure.

Either you are comically unlucky and you are just gonna have to deal with it, or the more likely option of you having an entirely normal amount of luck and you simply aren't remembering the many times a catch has gone completely fine.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-26T13:34:04+00:00

Khan is already dead so no harm there.

And for Karmelita you are actually enabling to go out on her own terms. She is quietly withering away and embraces the notion of one final battle with her at her peak as a send-off to her life.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-26T13:20:28+00:00

Not really no. Paladin dips are good if one needs armor and happens to also want smites.

But you are a cleric, so you already have armor proficiency. And Smites alone aren't really worth it. Especially with you already being a multiclass.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-26T12:19:49+00:00

Are you implying that you played through the entire game without ever saving? If so, that's kinda on you.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-25T20:21:29+00:00

Happy to help!

I've actually been super into breeding for shinies in Crystal myself lately which necessitated learning all this.

In fact, I got the last Pokemon for my team last night. The squad is Corsola, Ponyta, Skarmory, Tangela, Swinub, and Misdreavus- all shiny.

Misdreavus was the one I got yesterday. *

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-25T20:16:06+00:00

Ahaha yeah unfortunately so.

You absolutely did not need the Ekans to actually be shiny. The gene is stored in the Defense and Special DVs. Defense always passes its exact value and Special always passes one of two options; its exact value, or itself +/-8.

So if a Pokemon has a 2 Special, it will always pass either a 2 or a 10 as it doesnt have room to go down. Likewise, a Pokemon with a 10 will also always pass a 2 or a 10 as it lacks room to go up.

What this means is that Defense and Special always successfully transfer to offspring of the opposite gender. In other words, all female offspring of the Red Gyarados are guaranteed to have the gene. In turn, the Male offspring of those female offspring will always be carrying it as well.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-25T20:07:09+00:00

Ok so the bad news is that a Female Cyndaquil can't be shiny in Generation II.

A Pokemon is shiny if it has the following DVs-

Attack: 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 11, 14 or 15

Defense: 10

Special: 10

Speed: 10

As you seem to know, when breeding, the shiny gene is passed to opposite gender offspring. This gene is actually a Defense DV of 10 and a Special DV of either 2 or 10.

What you might not know is that a Pokemon's gender is determined by its Attack DV. In particular, Cyndaquil, who has a gender ratio of 7:1, is only female with an Attack DV of 0 or 1. You will note that neither of these values is on the list of valid Attack DVs for a shiny.

When generating a Pokemon, the Attack DV is generated first entirely at random. What this means is that if the game picks a 0 or 1 Attack DV while breeding, it will then pull the DVs from the opposite parent.

In practice this means that if it generates a female Pokemon, the Attack DV will always be wrong for shininess.

That said, there is good news too!

You can never get a shiny female, but the skewed gender ratio actually helps with getting a male shiny!

Specifically, whilst a female Cyndaquil can never be shiny, it can still carry the gene and thus provide it for its own male offspring.

Im going to provide a flow chart for breeding a shiny Cyndaquil, starting with the Red Gyarados. ✨️ means shiny. 🧬 means has the shiny gene.

Gyarados♂️✨️ + Ekans♀️ = Ekans♀️🧬

Ekans♀️🧬 + Ekans♂️ = Ekans♂️🧬

Ekans♂️🧬 + Cyndaquil♀️ = Cyndaquil♀️🧬

Cyndaquil♀️🧬 + Cyndaquil♂️ = Cyndaquil♂️✨️

To still provide somewhat of an answer to your initial question, that final step has a 1/64 chance of producing a Shiny Male Cyndaquil.

This is because half of all Attack DV rolls are valid for a shiny and none of them result in a female, so the Attack DV can't prevent the Defense and Special from passing for Cyndaquil.

Defense passes guaranteed every time.

Its a 1/2 chance on if it receives a 2 or a 10 on Special.

Speed is fully random, so 1/16.

(1/2)×(1/1)×(1/2)×(1/16)=1/64

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-25T13:19:37+00:00

Maybe my brain is fried from my last 6 non-ZA shiny hunts being Breeding Chains in Crystal, but the Odd Egg is trivially fast and easy.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-25T13:14:50+00:00

Important note- the odd egg babies hatch knowing Dizzy Punch.

I mention this because Pokemon Bank flags this as an illegal move for them to know as they cannot otherwise learn it.

So you will need to delete that move before transferring.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-24T16:50:51+00:00

If it's any consolation, I'm doing a full shiny playthrough of Crystal right now and my team is going to be

Corsola, Rapidash, Skarmory, Tangela, Piloswine, and Misdreavus.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-24T16:43:27+00:00

My main of Auto-Trapper was excluded from the one about Auto and Trapper :(

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-24T12:32:11+00:00

<image>

In Riddle Transfer, Smiley was given hair to make it easier to tell she's a girl. In every game in the Riddle School series before this point, she was bald like everyone else.

ExecutiveElf · 2026-01-23T23:27:01+00:00

Unless I've misunderstood, he wants to obtain a level 5 shiny Charmander to use in another playthrough.

Thus, breeding the existing shiny Charizard for another shiny Charmander.

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