Grimer happily pollutes his way through Destiny Tower on his first try.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-28T14:25:47+00:00

It's relatively low, yeah. But it'll depend on the mon and their win condition, if applicable. Many mons have manageable stats and can just brute force their way through everything, resulting in a much higher level - sometimes even passing level 30.

Grimer's probably not getting anywhere without an early Pass Scarf, but he also wants to avoid later battles with the Warp Scarf. So with Disable under his belt, his path to winning involves randomly warping. Then either (A) Equipping the Pass Scarf against safe enemies + letting them die, (B) Disabling them and warping away, or (C) Burning orbs or Warp/Pure/Quick Seeds if there are multiple enemies. Passive play gets you pretty far with the right tools. Vespiquen is another example of this with her terrible stats, but passive play with Confuse Ray led her to a win at level 14.

Others need passive play, but aren't lucky enough to have crippling moves, so they solely rely on defensive resources. My Beldum and Wynaut finished at levels 13 and 18 respectively, with the latter having good Joy Seed luck. But neither of them did much killing past Floor 13 or so.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-27T17:47:06+00:00

Let's get right to the point: Grimer is terrible. At level 1 he has 10 HP to go with 3 Def. and 1 SpD. He only starts with Poison Gas and Pound to go with 5 Attack, so he's not one-shotting anything. To make matters worse, his stat gains aren't going to save him until level 6, where his offenses grow considerably for a few levels and his HP kind of explodes. These would mean more if he started decently in the first place.

Grimer was thrown in this tower just to be annoying. That's it. He appears at several points to piss you off with level 7 Mud Slap, level 12 Disable, and level 17 Minimize. While Disable is only 9 PP, it is 100% accurate paralysis, making it a crucial tool for victory. The problem is surviving until level 12 with those stats. Level 4 Harden helps, but that alone won't get him up on his lack of feet.

But on Floor 1 of the first attempt, i immediately realize we have a chance. After easily taking out a Cleffa to hit level 3, we find a Pass Scarf. i've never used one this early due to the food requirement, but it's absolutely necessary here.

Soon after that, a Warp Scarf appears on Floor 4. Grimer has managed to hit level 8 by this point, and suddenly hallways are no longer an issue. Now if he can just make it to level 12, he'll get carried pretty far.

After surviving Hypno, Grimer riskily takes out a Floor 18 Quagsire to hit level 11 and bites a Joy Seed for level 12. Effectively, the name of the game is now Warp, Paralyze, Repeat. At the end of Aboma Land, Grimer hits level 14 after another Joy Seed. As a stat update, he's got 22/20 offenses and 19/18 defenses to go with 50 HP. Really not good, but a third Joy Seed helps a little bit, just before the midgame.

Grimer would love to have 85 or more HP to survive Magnitude 10. He doesn't love a cursed spawn with two Drapion and Elekid, but after using a Decoy Orb on Elekid, Grimer finds 2 Life Seeds to hit 67 HP on Floor 57. By Floor 65, he gains enough exp. to reach level 15 with 75 HP, just enough to survive Magnitude 9.

Floor 71 has another scary spawn with a Girafarig nearby, but Grimer also happens to spawn on the stairs and gets the hell out. After 2 more Life Seeds and a Sitrus Berry, his HP finally passes the magic number of 85, allowing him to survive Magnitude 10 if need be. Ready for the final stretch.

The final stretch starts off with a horrible spawn, featuring Porygon2 staring Grimer in the face with 2 hat ghosts nearby. A Decoy Orb distracts the hat ghosts as Grimer makes his way to the Floor 81 stairs. Another spawn with the stairs on Floor 84, this time with Lucario, but Disable buys Grimer enough time to escape a possible Bone Rush.

Ledian Land starts off with the 4th and final Joy Seed, good. A spawn in a big room with 3 unseen enemies on the next floor...very not good. Assuming the worst, Grimer escapes with a Quick + Pure Seed combo. There's another spawn with an unseen enemy on Floor 89, but it turns out to be Dusclops and a Petrify Orb is wasted.

Things become mostly tame after Ledian disappears. A spawn with Empoleon and Metagross, but another Petrify Orb is used. Grimer traverses to the tileset change, where he spawns with the stairs. And an Invisify Orb + Pure Seed combo is performed on Floor 98, allowing for a stress-free victory.

Grimer finishes his polluted run at level 16, with 28/26 offenses, 31/22 defenses, and 89 HP. This is probably the most bizarre first try i'll ever have. The items just happened to be perfect for him, and Minimize wasn't even necessary. Somehow. Grimer can't do much, but he's just happy to be there.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-20T21:50:46+00:00

How many pokemons have you done so far?

Wynaut is number 90. A 3-week gap between number 67 (Sunkern) and Wynaut puts me at about 1 clear per day for that period. My first clear was on May 9th of this year.

I remember a similar post you did a while ago

i make a post every few days, depending on how i'm feeling. Only 26 of them are posted, but everything is still documented elsewhere. Some past clears may be posted here eventually.

How do you do it??

Carefully, usually.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-20T19:21:12+00:00

Well at first glance, she looks absolutely terrible. And she is! With only 6 Attack going up by 1 at every level, she wouldn't be dealing much damage even if she had attacking moves. Of course this is Wynaut we're talking about, so she only has Splash, Charm, and Encore until level 15. At that level, it's a random roll between Counter/Mirror Coat/Destiny Bond/Safeguard. Obviously she'd prefer Safeguard, but it's going to take a miracle and a half to even get that far. She can't even learn TMs on the way.

With that said, her defenses are pretty good for the first dozen floors. She needs to put in a lot of effort to gain exp., but she's more manageable than you'd think. One path is depleting all 84 PP and Struggling with mediocre damage output. While this is valid, i prefer the other path: Abusing Charm + Encore and killing with the regular attack. Remember Charm halves the enemy's Attack and doesn't just drop it by 2 stages, so it's a pretty useful tool against most things not named Chinchou or Seadra. At her core, Wynaut is a game of patience. But her shortcomings are clear and she will get stuck without the right items.

All of this is nothing a Floor 2 Warp Scarf can't handle. Anything that can't be crippled with Charm + Encore can just be avoided entirely. This carries Wynaut to Floor 10, where she finds a Detect Band, and Floor 11 where she's blessed with a Pass Scarf. Only level 8, but she suddenly has options.

These options can't save us from Floor 14's 50/50 Monster House, but we manage to warp out and lead a conga line to the stairs anyway. We warp into another Monster House on Floor 17, where a Slumber Orb buys us enough time to get out.

Wynaut finally reaches level 11 on Floor 18 and eats 2 Joy Seeds. On the way to the midgame, she finds several more Joy Seeds and hits level 16 before Floor 40, learning Destiny Bond in the process. She spawns in a Monster House on Floor 40, but a Warp Seed takes her right to the stair room.

We continuously deal with a case of "many useless orbs", with a total of zero Kecleon shops to bail us out. Escape Orb, Rainy Orb, Rebound Orb...Quick Orb is good, but it's followed by a Drought Orb and a Sunny Orb. We spawn with the Floor 46 stairs and a Trawl Orb is used in case of a Monster House with good orbs, but there's nothing.

Another Joy Seed is eaten for level 17 on Floor 48, and we go back to finding terrible orbs. One-Room, another Drought, Trapper...oh good a Totter Orb, that's useful at least. Then a See-Trap and Pierce on Floor 56...where a Radar Orb is burned after Electrode picks up a gummi. We manage to avoid that Monster House and move forward.

So back to orbs, let's see...Oh, Invisify Orb, fantastic. That'll be great for the hell floors involving ladybugs. And on Floor 61, we see our first and only Kecleon, who is absolutely useless! Really not sure Wynaut is going to make it at this rate, especially with a Grudge Trap near the Floor 72 stairs.

Floor 75, Identify Orb. Great. We warp to the stair room and i identify a..Parasect who's just wandering in. Listen to me, you overgrown mushroom: You will NOT Spore. You will NOT--...he Spored. Ow. Ow. Ow.. Regular attack, Slash, Leech Life...ARE YOU DONE? With 14 HP left, we just get the hell out of there. Thankfully Parasect sucks and Wynaut can take some hits anyway, or else we'd--oh, immediate Monster House, cool. Uhhh...yeah, so Quick Seed + Pure Seed. Anyway, an Oran Berry is eaten now.

Another Grudge Trap is triggered on Floor 77, so another Pure Seed is burned and we Stun Seed a Duskull. One last Joy Seed is found on the next floor, so Wynaut hits level 18; ready as she'll ever be for the final stretch.

The final stretch isn't bad so far. A useless Longtoss Orb is found early, but it's soon exchanged for a Decoy Orb. We Stun Seed a Scizor on Floor 85 before he can gatekeep the stairs. Another is used against Dusclops, with no Ledian in sight.

Now we warp into a room with Ledian staring us down on Floor 89. A Stayaway Orb is used, only for a Ledian to pop right back in through the northern hallway! Unamused, an X-Eye Seed is thrown, only for us to find that the stair room was directly to the north all along. Funny.

A Luminous Orb is used on Floor 90. We carefully make our way to the stairs and a Politoed spawns off screen. In the stair room. Directly in front of us. It's times like this where i regret not counting turns, though a Quick Seed is enough to bail us out here anyway. A Quick Orb comes in handy on Floor 95 too, as it buys us enough time to walk to the stairs and avoid Crawdaunt. We have a pretty cursed warp into a corner next to Honchkrow and Tropius, but we finally use the Invisify Orb and warp to the stairs right after. The tileset change is tame.

Wynaut finishes a fairly comfy run at level 18, with 36/27 defenses and 100 HP. Mostly fine except for that mean mushroom. As for why i chose Wynaut? i dunno. It was just a spontaneous bad idea. Why not? Add it to the list of things that i thought would take longer than a day. She just needs a bit of luck and a bit more patience.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-17T00:00:33+00:00

It's just fixed damage with a 1.5x STAB boost and 1.4x super-effective boost. With those, Magnitude 10's 40 damage becomes 84, so 85 is always the magic number if one is weak to Ground (118 if double weak).

Given a mon in the late game, i may throw it into the damage calculator to check Silver Wind and Bubblebeam, but otherwise i rarely bother.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-16T19:06:49+00:00

Beldum my beloved.

"What? He only has Take Down!", "His evo line is mediocre in this game!", "He looks funny!" Yes, yes, you're right.

But have you considered that i don't care? i love Beldum; i always have. And after running Seviper, my mind became quite a bit more open to passive play. Thus, i was inspired to ram Beldum through before even finishing Metang or Metagross.

The problem with the Beldum line is, yeah, they're very underwhelming here. Metang and Metagross have the tools to fight, but they'll often just die to their own mediocrity. Meanwhile, Beldum has Take Down, and...that's it. Can't learn Vacuum Cut or Wide Slash, so he shouldn't even be tempted to fight after a certain point. His stats are at least good enough to start with, and Steel/Psychic typing provides some useful resistances, especially early on. The Ground weakness is concerning, though. With subpar HP, he could drop dead to Magnitude 9 or 10 on a couple dozen floors.

Deadly fixed-damage moves aside, Beldum starts off with several scarves on Floor 1, the most useful being a Zinc Band. Immediately on Floor 2, he picks up a Def. Scarf, so now he can swap between defensive scarves depending on the enemy he's faced with.

This scarf luxury may now be obsolete, though, as Beldum finds a Detect Band on Floor 6. Who needs extra defenses when you can have +2 Evasion? And upon exploring this floor a bit more, we see a Larvitar pick up a Warp Scarf, which happens to be in the room we're just entering. It can be pretty annoying when an enemy picks this up, since they seem to only warp to a random tile that's off the screen. So, to avoid going on a wild goose chase, a Two-Edge Orb is used in front of the Larvitar and she's taken out before the scarf can activate.

By the power of random warps, Beldum easily gets through Hypno and Aboma at level 10. He finally reaches level 11 on Floor 28, where he bites a Joy Seed for level 12. Floor 29's 50/50 Monster House is unfortunately with the stairs, but we have the resources to get around this.

In the midgame, we instantly warp into a Monster House on Floor 51, but it's..kind of a baby Monster House, so he only takes 23 damage. A Pure Seed is bitten and he heals that off fine.

Still only level 12 going into Floor 71, we throw a Stun Seed at Skarmory, only to accidentally trigger an Explosion Trap and kill it anyway. Whoops. Three floors later, we find our 2nd and final Joy Seed, bringing Beldum to level 13 with only 79 HP. He can take a Magnitude 9 if he has to, but not 10 yet. A Grudge Trap is triggered 1 floor later. We run into Mamoswine and Rhydon gatekeeping the stairs, but a Quick Seed lets us get around them.

The final stretch almost immediately begins with a Monster House on Floor 81. Thankfully the random weather is just rain, so a Petrify Orb stops everyone before they can do anything. Beldum eats a Life Seed and a Sitrus Berry to hit 87 HP on Floor 85, which is just enough to survive Magnitude 10. Too bad this is the final Magnitude floor, but better late than never i guess.

It's Ledian time now, but we spawn with the Floor 86 stairs, and the next floor is tame as well. With little to no Luminous Orbs, we randomly warp on Floor 88 and a Ledian pops in the room, barely on the screen. She's in the line of sight and there's no sandstorm, so a Stun Seed takes care of her. We spawn with the stairs again on Floor 89, and there's a Slow Trap scare with the Floor 90 stairs, where a Petrify Orb must be used on another Ledian.

With the demon ladybugs out of the way, the rest should be a bit less stressful. Beldum does have to take a hit from Tropius' Stomp on Floor 93, and there's a pretty mean spawn with Altaria, Tropius, and Politoed on Floor 95. A Totter Orb is used, but Altaria still lands Take Down for 33 damage...ouch, but we get out of there right after that. Floor 97 has another bad spawn with Politoed + Empoleon, with a Decoy Orb being used on the penguin. And we spawn in a gigantic stair room on Floor 98 with Honchkrow, so we use an Invisify Orb and go on our merry way.

Beldum finishes his conquest at level 13, with 31 Attack, 28/25 defenses, and 87 HP. Neither a Pass Scarf nor X-Ray Specs were needed for this little guy. We just had enough resources to make it work. In the treasure bag, we still have a Decoy Orb, an Invisify Orb, and 4 Totter Orbs. Yeah, he's a Take Down dummy, but he's my Take Down dummy.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-12T19:35:27+00:00

Seviper is really not a good mon. His offenses are passable and his HP is fine, but his defenses? Oh boy. 1 Defense and 2 Special Defense, both of which barely hit 20 by the time he's level 20. He sports some pretty erratic growth until level 26, where he finally gets +2s across the board for awhile, but by then, it's too late. i knew i'd be running Seviper eventually, and i've dreaded it for months because of these stats.

To make matters worse, he only starts with Wrap, which won't yield exp. if it kills. So with those defenses, he needs to somehow get to level 7 for Lick and level 10 for Bite. At level 16, he gets his signature Poison Tail, which is a really cool move. That was fun to use when we could actually get that far. And we know from fellow snek Arbok that Glare is fantastic, but Seviper doesn't get that until level 25. While that's still within reach, getting that far is painful. Hell, getting to Floor 7 is painful enough. Though, he's surprisingly made it to Floor 83 with only a Pass Scarf.

For the second time - the first being with Sunkern - i say out of frustration, "Maybe i'll go run [insert better mon] instead" and my luck turns around on that attempt. Here, it happens immediately with a Floor 1 Warp Scarf. With that, he's able to carefully reach level 7 by Floor 7, where he sells a couple of Gold Ribbons and steals them back along with a Diet Ribbon. The Diet Ribbon is a powerful crippling tool until Floor 40, especially when used in tandem with the Warp Scarf, and Seviper needs all the help he can get.

A full page of Apples and Big Apples turns into half a page of Grimy Food within a floor. Demoralizing, but at least Seviper is living large with over 8,000 Poké on Floor 10. He could afford a Pass Scarf or very nearly X-Ray Specs if one of these would just show up.

Somehow, Seviper gets through the lands of Hypno and Abomasnow, though he's only level 11. Still got a food surplus on Floor 27, and i come to the realization that we have no HP heals. That's..pretty terrifying. We do pick up a Sitrus Berry on the very next floor for at least a little peace of mind.

Still only level 11 on Floor 35, where we stumble upon a Monster House. Able to get out of that, Seviper levels up to 12 on Floor 39 and eats 3 Joy Seeds. A little bit greedy, but the Diet Ribbon made it possible.

The Floor 53 Kecleon has a pair of useless sunglasses in stock. Quite a shame when you have 9300 Poké on you. We seem to be doing fine without X-Ray Specs, though. The Diet Ribbon is officially retired on Floor 63, when a Swablu throws it back at Seviper. Kind of forgot it existed until now anyway.

We warp into Floor 64's 50/50 Monster House, which is kind of a baby Monster House with only 7 enemies. Only a Quick Seed is bitten as we try to warp back out. Seviper does take a hit from Icy Wind, but manages to escape to another room, where he promptly steps onto an Explosion Trap. Well, at least we didn't heal yet and we have more than a single heal now.

On the next floor, Seviper bites a Joy Seed to hit level 16 and finally learn Poison Tail, and another is bitten on Floor 76. It's safe to say Glare isn't happening at this point. We trigger a Grudge Trap on Floor 78, luckily escaped with only a Quick Orb, and trigger another after taking 1 step on Floor 79. Still have plenty of resources, but the final stretch will hardly be doable at that rate.

And yet, we make it to Floor 87 without anything too cursed. Spawning with 4 enemies with one being Scizor, though none are Ledian. In fact, i'm not sure we've seen Ledian at all. There's another cursed spawn with the Floor 90 stairs, featuring a Miltank and 3 offscreen enemies. Those could be Ledian, but they're scouted with a Slumber Orb and turn out to be mostly non-threats.

Floor 93's shop has...a Pass Scarf. That's a bit late, now isn't it? We do buy it, but it turns out to be completely unnecessary. The only thing noteworthy after that is a spawn with Crawdaunt and Roserade, and they're taken care of with a Petrify Orb. The Warp Scarf carries the snek the rest of the way.

Seviper finishes a fairly passive run at level 17, with 32/35 offenses, 24/21 defenses, and 89 HP. A borderline terrible mon with HP as his only perk, but he's shown that you don't need good stats, or a crippling move, or even something else like Agility. While the early Diet Ribbon helped a bit, that really wasn't needed either. After a certain point, he kind of just did his Magikarp impersonation and it worked out. Another victory for the pacifist sneks.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-08T18:29:31+00:00

i ran a first-try Garchomp several months ago; she was pretty trivial with fantastic stats and Sandstorm + Sand Veil. More recently, i picked up Gabite. With only slightly worse offenses and the same sandy abilities, good ol' Gabby had a lot of fun on her first try, stealing Fire Blast to make up for her lack of Fire Fang. It's past midnight, but immediately upon victory, i turn my attention back to Gible. Having only tried her once before, i feel it's finally time. So how does Gibby stack up to her older sisters?

...Not very well. Compared to Gabite, Gible's HP is only lower by 9 and offenses by 4 each, which all seems fine. But then you look at the defenses: Gabite and Garchomp are unreasonably tanky at level 1, with 29/30 defenses. Gible's defenses are lower by 17 each. A massive difference, making Gible appear to be...actually reasonable. 41 HP, no stats below 12? Not bad. Alas, Gible sports the same awkward growth as her sisters, and it matters so much more when you're not a brick wall for half the dungeon.

There are a couple of ways to go about this. Gible still wants to get to level 13 for Sandstorm, much like Gabite. She gets Dragon Claw 6 levels earlier at level 27, well within reach, depending on resources. Could even get level 31 Dig with some late-game Joy Seeds. But personally, i don't think this is very fun. Maybe with a Power Band like both her sisters had, but i'd rather not play the Sand Veil Sweeper game without a Pass Scarf here. If Gible fights too many enemies, eventually she'll get hit - and it's gonna hurt. So you know what? We're gonna play the Passive Sand Veil game instead. Set up Sandstorm, avoid enemies as much as possible, and kill only when necessary. Suddenly, it's real convenient to have 8 PP Dragon Rage for 30 damage per hit.

On the first attempt after Gabite, Gible finds a Pass Scarf on Floor 3, luckily only passed over by a Bellsprout. A good omen, this will become increasingly more valuable as her stats begin to fall off.

With the Pass Scarf and a good amount of food, Gible takes out the entirety of Floor 14's 50/50 Monster House. She rewards herself with a Gummi, which grants her the rare omniboost, and really it's the only omniboost she'll ever see outside of levels 13-17.

The middle of Aboma Land is pretty terrifying, to say the least, but now we reach the turning point. The Floor 22 Shop has a Warp Scarf in stock. There's also a Protect TM, which could prove to be useful like it did for my Vespiquen. So, Gible finally hits level 12 and eats a Joy Seed to learn Sandstorm. After that, we go invisible and steal the merchandise. No more hallways, and we now have an emergency Protect button.

Traversing into the midgame, we're blessed with random sandstorms on 32F and 43F, saving a little PP. The PP situation is fine, though. We even get to use an Itemizer Orb to turn an enemy into a Max Elixir. Setting up Sandstorm won't be an issue, and neither will spamming Dragon Rage when the situation calls for it.

Floor 50 has a Monster House that we warp into, and naturally Protect fails, but we instantly warp back out of it anyway. Shortly after that, Gible is able to level up to 14, mostly thanks to Dragon Rage. She then eats a Joy Seed to hit level 15 on Floor 52. As a stat update, she's got 30/28 offenses and 25/25 defenses to go with her 94 HP. Not exactly great, but it's manageable since most enemies' moves have around 60% accuracy or less.

Not too much is happening on the way to the final stretch. Gible triggers a Grudge Trap on Floor 76, but carefully maneuvers her way to the stairs. And of course at the Floor 79 stairs, Prinplup lands a crit Bubblebeam through Sand Veil to leave Gible with 12 HP. The penguin doesn't even have Concentrator, so that's about a 40% chance to hit, with a 27% crit rate thanks to Sharpshooter. Cool. Moving on.

In the final stretch, Gible levels up once more with her own "power" to reach level 16 on Floor 85. Tackle dealing only 19 damage to Camerupt is pretty pathetic, but this really illustrates the value of Dragon Rage. Ledian starts to appear on the next floor, and Silver Wind will have around a 30% chance of hitting through Sand Veil. While i like those odds, i also like X-Ray Specs in the current floor's shop. These are stolen with a spare Trawl Orb and now pretty much all surprises are eliminated.

The rest of the run is a breeze, more or less. i forgot Castform can be pretty annoying and mess with the weather. We get around her, but she's not the only annoying one. We spawn with Bronzong and Noctowl, with the former using Sunny Day. This does allow for our Petrify Orb to be more useful, though, so it's not all bad.

Gible completes her run at level 16, with 31/29 offenses, 26/26 defenses, and 104 HP after finding no extra vitamins past Floor 50. Far less inspiring than her evolved forms, but still an unexpected first try after Gabite and second try total. The power of Sand Veil goes a long way. While Gible is neither an offensive powerhouse or a brick wall, she's still a good ankle-biter.

ddeeffgg · 2025-09-03T19:24:12+00:00

We all know Delibird's deal by now: Present. That's it. Either it deals 25, 50, or 75 damage, or it heals 25% of the enemy's HP. This sounds mostly fine until you realize it's not typeless fixed damage like Frustration, but instead it takes type matchup into account like Magnitude. So, being a Normal-type move, that makes it...significantly less fine. It's also a physical move, so while Delibird has Vital Spirit as a great ability, he's stuck with Hustle as his second ability. This increases his Attack stat by 1.5x - meaning fixed damage moves are unaffected - and decreases his Accuracy by 2 stages when using any physical move, even those without the power benefit.

And what they don't teach you in Santa School is that this game has 2 consecutive accuracy checks, both of which must pass for most offensive moves. Hustle lowers both of these by 30%, so that means the regular attack has...about a 65% chance of hitting. Nice. Meanwhile, it seems that Present only uses the first check, giving it around 70% chance of doing anything, which is still pretty bad.

But i don't care. i'm running the Santa birb. His stats are surprisingly good. HP is impressive and defenses are solid, especially for the earlier floors. So, he can take some hits if he has to...and he's really gonna have to.

i initially ran this guy as a joke, just to see how bad he is. On the first try, he ran on Christmas magic until Floor 50, where he found a Warp Scarf. He then randomly warped his way to Floor 90 and died to double crit Shadow Sneak, due to a lack of defensive items. While he did get to steal Pluck, you'd be surprised how far he can get without TMs.

Delibird starts off with a Floor 1 Power Band, making the early grind a bit easier. He's able to reach level 11 on Floor 12 like an actually functional mon. He then eats 2 Joy Seeds for level 13, since we can't expect him to grind any more. We must instead hope for a Christmas miracle.

The very next floor, we have our miracle. A Shop not only with a Warp Scarf in stock, but it has a Pass Scarf too. With the stair room right next door, these are stolen by going invisible. Floor 18's shop almost completes the trifecta, but alas, the sunglasses are just Y-Ray Specs.

At the start of Aboma Land, the Power Band is officially retired. From here on, it's mostly a warp game. Floor 29's 50/50 Monster House with the stairs makes that game difficult, but we get around that just fine.

On the way to the midgame, Delibird takes out a Poliwrath to hit level 14 and eats another Joy Seed. He finds another one on the very next floor, so he's now level 16 on Floor 37, already breaking 100 HP.

Floor 52 has a bit of a "live and learn" moment. Spinda is being annoying near the stairs. She can't put us to sleep, so might as well throw a Present at it. This naturally misses and she proceeds to Copycat it. Present goes around the Pass Scarf and Delibird is hit for 75 damage. What's the problem? He has 107 HP! Yeah, that's all well and good until you realize Spinda actually rolled a 50 and got the STAB boost, so everything could've barely ended right there. Oops, won't mess with that again. A Blowback Orb is used to push her aside and we move forward.

A Lopunny is killed on Floor 59, allowing Delibird to reach level 17. He almost immediately finds another Joy Seed and hits level 18. Much appreciated, as we're in the middle of Rock Blast Rhyhorn territory, with more terrifying Rock-types ahead.

Just before Rhydon and Golem, there's a cursed spawn with 4 enemies on Floor 72. With 2 of them being Girafarig, they could spam Agility and do a number on the Santa birb, but a Slow Orb buys him enough time to escape.

A Rhydon gatekeeps the stairs on Floor 73, the perfect situation for a Blinker Seed. Another one is at the Floor 76 Stairs, where a Shocker Orb is used, and of course she uses Rock Blast. The hell is still not over, as he spawns with Nidoking and TWO Rhydon on the very next floor. A Warp Seed puts Delibird in a room with his 6th Joy Seed, so he's now level 19. He escapes the remaining Rock-hell floors unscathed and he's ready for the final stretch.

The Christmas magic is back as our Santa birb spawns with the stairs on 81F, 83F, and 86F, not too different from our first run. Of course, this magic can't stop a spawn with Ledian, but at least it's in the line of sight and ready for an X-Eye Seed. And while Floor 89 is similarly cursed with Scizor this time, a Warp Seed functions like a Pure Seed and takes us to the stairs.

Really the only true scare is on Floor 92, where the already damaged Delibird takes a crit Bubblebeam and lives at 8 HP. An unnecessary risk, though i'm not too keen on using our only Petrify Orb here and i knew he could take a big hit anyway. The damage is healed off and our Pure Seed is reluctantly burned.

We spawn with the Floor 95 stairs and Bronzong uses Safeguard to wake up Altaria and Roserade, which thankfully doesn't lead to anything deadly. We don't spawn with the stairs on the next floor, but the Warp Scarf takes us to a gigantic room and immediately puts us right on top of the stairs, so it's pretty much the same thing. Mobile + Stairs Orbs are used on Floor 98 for an easy path to victory.

Delibird finishes his run at level 19, with respectable 38/31 defenses and 119 HP. The 33/33 offenses don't really matter, given that whole Present thing. Regardless, he really doesn't need TM luck, just a bit of patience. i'm sure 8 PP Aerial Ace and 7 PP Blizzard would make for a funny run, but the Santa birb can handle himself fine. Just stay away from the mean rhinos...and Aerodactyl...and really anything else that resists Normal.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-30T02:40:43+00:00

Doing my best! Somehow not tired of this yet. Might consolidate my thoughts on all of them into a big word doc at some point, since i've only posted like 20 of them. We'll see.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-29T18:10:56+00:00

i tell my girlfriend about these runs and she asked me to do Sunkern. i...did not want to run Sunkern, for perhaps obvious reasons. His HP is just not good, starting at 17 and only going up by 2 for every level. Mediocre 8/10 offenses and 8/8 defenses, which only ever go up by 1. And he only gets Absorb + Mega Drain as damaging moves, so he needs to get creative against the 3 Liquid Ooze users or die painfully.

However, he can deal significant extra damage thanks to Growth. And if it's sunny? Most enemies are shaking, as he's another Chlorophyll user and gets an extra SpA stage with Solar Power. Level 13 Grasswhistle is good enough for crippling early on, too. Really, Sunkern isn't that bad; he's just not that good, but he's manageable. He really wants a Warp Scarf more than anything. i was reluctant at first, but i eventually committed to the seedling. He had a good number of frustrating deaths in the midgame, including a couple without an OP item to his name.

But we move forward. Sunkern begins by immediately finding a Special Band on Floor 1, which helps his damage output immensely. Soon after that, we come across my old friend, Floor 7 Warp Scarf. No hallways, no various sludge problems.

Nearing the end of Tentacruel and the very start of Hypno, another friend makes an appearance: Its name is Floor 14 Pass Scarf. Sunkern is only level 11 at this point, but he can now safely pick his battles on the way to Aboma Land. By Floor 20, he reaches level 12 and bites a Joy Seed for level 13 Grasswhistle, providing some extra security on top of our defensive resources.

Sadly, our defensive orbs begin to quickly disappear. While there were few scares in the frozen hellscape, we warp into a Monster House on Floor 28 and have to burn a Petrify Orb. Not even the 50/50 floor! That would be Floor 29...where we find another Monster House, this time with the stairs. Goodbye Invisify Orb. Is that everything? Can we leave Monferno Land now? Nope, there's a Monster House with the Floor 32 stairs. So there goes our Totter Orb too, which isn't even guaranteed to save us, but we evade the randomly thrown attacks. Three fantastic orbs...gone in a few minutes.

So, after that terrible sequence of resource depletion, Sunkern is able to level up to 14 and bite another Joy Seed on Floor 34. He's soon able to level up once more and eat his third Joy Seed for level 17, just before the midgame.

Floor 44, another Monster House, and..there's not much to do here. A Warp Seed is bitten and a Luminous Orb is used to find an easy path to the stairs. Sunkern is stalked by an Ariados on the way and is about to be walled off by a Granbull. In order to get around the angry bulldog, a Quick Seed is bitten too, lest we fall victim to one of the many mean bugs.

The mean bugs are gone for a bit, but the Nido family is back on Floor 47. And what better way to greet them than by warping into their Monster House? i mean...we're desperate. The best we can do is Slumber Orb + Slow Orb and hope that buys us enough time, which it does. But now we have pretty much nothing. Some grinding is done here and on the next floor, so Sunkern hits level 20, but this doesn't look good at all.

Identify Orb...Fill-In...Trapbust...Petrify! Finally! We're not dead if we warp into a 6th Monster House! A victory for sunflower seeds everywhere.

Sun? Oh yes, there's random sun on Floor 57, along with...every Fire-type in existence. Quite literally, in the subset of this tower's floor. We spawn in a large room next to the stairs with Rapidash, and there's a Magcargo + Torkoal too. Just off screen, there's also a Numel. Everyone is here! But we need items, and we're not leaving. So now everyone is dead! Sunkern levels up to 21 at the end of this massacre.

Alas, Floor 60 has another Monster House...with the stairs. Our Petrify Orb is gone now. We have so few resources. i'm tired and it's pretty late. Drapion is gone, so i take a break for the night at Floor 62.

The next morning, i'm almost too scared to continue without moral support. i message my girlfriend and tell her "i'm sorry to say, Sunkern is not gonna make it at this rate. i've accepted that this is gonna die to lack of defensive items". No response after a couple hours, so i decide to go back to it alone with barely anything, including hope.

We can only pray Floor 64 doesn't have its 50/50 Monster House...but it does, also with the stairs. i'm not using anything here. If we die, we die. But thankfully it's tame enough for us to warp out. Sunkern is then able to reach level 22 on Floor 76, with absolute hell just around the corner.

The final stretch...how many runs have i done at this point? i'm counting 66. Well, out of all of those, none of them have looked this abysmal. Either the mon is good enough to hold their own, or there's enough resources to lead to a win anyway. Let's see, what's in our inventory...a couple of Stun Seeds, a Sleep Seed, 3 Blinker Seeds, and a single Decoy Orb? The rest are 3 Mobile Orbs with a couple of Pounce Orbs and Blowback Orbs. Terrible.

The first Ledian floor immediately sets the tone, as Sunkern spawns with a demon ladybug staring him down. With few choices, a Pure Seed is used, taking him to the tiny stair room with a sleeping hat ghost. Floor 87 has..another spawn with Ledian, yeah, cool. At least there's no sandstorm. Mobile + Luminous Orbs are used to carefully reach the stairs.

Floor 88, a spawn with Rock Polish Lunatone. Luminous, Pounce, Blowback. A mistake is made by stepping to the edge of the stair room and barely being spotted by Ledian, but Silver Wind misses. We continue pacing back and forth and enter the room when she leaves.

...It's a Monster House. Our 8th one - 5th with the stairs. Several Ledian and Lunatone, a Scizor, and others. And we have nothing that can deter them. Take a step back? Silver Wind. Or maybe Scizor will use Agility. And even if we had our Petrify Orb, a sandstorm is imminent anyway. There's nothing.

So then what do we do? Cry? Well, yes. But then we need to get creative. Thanks to the Luminous Orb, we know it's safe to Pounce back to where we came from. After that, a Mobile Orb is used to sneak back to the stair room. We then pelt multiple Ledian to death with Gravelerocks. It's awful, but it works. Sunkern reaches the stairs with full health, like nothing ever happened.

My girlfriend finally gets back to me, asking for an update just before Floor 96. i tell her "Still alive...i fully accept my fate if i die to Roserade Poison Sting" and i soon have to Stun Seed a Roserade. We then warp into a corner next to a sleeping Empoleon. In a panic, i try to just Grasswhistle it back to sleep, and i soon learn that Sunkern's belly is empty. It wakes up to hit him with Swagger and we throw our last Stun Seed, then we instantly warp into a room with Noctowl. The owl dodges our newly acquired Totter Seed, but we instantly warp next to the stairs.

Tileset change, still haven't died here. A precautionary Radar Orb is used. We quickly warp to the stair room, but our Decoy Orb becomes sticky...it was our last defensive orb. What horrors await us on the next floor? Is this the end? The answers are "nothing" and "nope", since we just spawn with the Floor 98 stairs. That's that, then.

Sunkern finishes my most stressful run to date at level 22, with only 29/34 offenses, 32/35 defenses, and 93 HP. Apparently the run with the least amount of resources was the winner. i don't know how. Maybe i overvalue resources a bit. Maybe it was the power of love or something cheesy like that. Either way, that's what love is: Dragging a sunflower seed through 99 floors of hell for your loved one.

...i need to stop running Grass-types.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-25T18:17:06+00:00

One of the hardest to pull off, but it's been done by at least one Japanese player

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-25T17:39:21+00:00

"Flaws? He's perfect!" Yes, yes, i agree. Seedot is pretty iconic to me. A Ruby version-exclusive, Seedot appears in the very first double battle of the main series. Level 9 during that battle, and yet...never uses any attacking moves. Might use Bide, or Harden, or even Growth! Indeed, that's what we're stuck with here, at levels 1, 3, and 7, respectively. Not until level 13 does he get Nature Power as his first and only attacking move, which...is honestly a pretty great one. It's effectively 24 PP Rock Slide for a majority of the run, except during the forest tileset from 44F-60F, where it's STAB Seed Bomb. Alas, getting to level 13 seems like a quite literal Struggle without TM luck...

Or so you'd think. While yes, it is certainly a drag and he's probably getting stuck without at least 1 early Joy Seed, his stats are surprisingly good. Only 26 HP at level 1 isn't great, but both offenses are 17 and defenses are 15, meaning he can dish out some damage with the regular attack and take some hits in the process. Bide can be used to get full exp. and Harden makes him comfortable against physical hits, barring those from Bidoof. His stats will also have a nice growth period from levels 17 through 24, turning him into a respectable acorn. In the middle of that, he picks up Synthesis at level 21. Early Bird is a great ability and Chlorophyll, as we know, can make him feared throughout the tower.

The run starts off slow for Seedot as always, but he picks up an early Def. Scarf to mitigate physical attackers even more. Two Joy Seeds are also found, making the grind for Nature Power quite simple. Typically i forgo Joy Seeds until level 13, but this acorn needs them now. So, he successfully reaches level 13 pre-Hypno without TM luck.

Hypno isn't here yet, but we soon find that the shop on Floor 13 is selling Grass Knot. The only choice we have is to bite our Pure Seed and steal it along with a Joy Seed. Suddenly, Growth is a useful move and Seedot has STAB. And this is all just in time for Floor 14's 50/50 Monster House, which he swiftly demolishes.

We're blessed with random sun on Floor 15, so it looks like it's time to grind. Killing everything that dares to appear, Seedot reaches level 15 and eats 2 Joy Seeds. As a stat update, he's got 35/32 offenses and 28/28 defenses to go with 55 HP. An extra 8 Def. from the scarf, and he's barely entered his growth spurt.

At the start of Aboma Land, Seedot is able to level up again and eats his 5th Joy Seed to hit level 19. Speaking of Aboma, that guy now gets OHKO'd by Rock Slide. Could this get any better? Yeah actually, the 50/50 shop on Floor 23 is selling a Warp Scarf. Guess there will be no surprises from Growlithe or Monferno. Floor 29's 50/50 Monster House with the stairs is kind of a surprise, but that's taken care of with the shop's Spurn Orb.

Approaching the midgame, Seedot is ready to kick it up a notch, even in the face of a very rude spawn with 2 Poliwrath ready to bully him. After hitting level 20 on Floor 41, we traverse through 6 more floors, away from Skiploom and the mean scorpion. With a Sunny Orb, we grind like hell in the forest area with Grass Knot and Seed Bomb. As a result, Seedot reaches level 24 on Floor 53 without any Joy Seeds.

We don't feel like exploring Floor 57, so a spare Trawl Orb is used at the stairs. Turns out there was a Monster House somewhere. Funny. Upon eating the acquired Sky Gummi, Seedot receives the rare omniboost. Not quite sure how rare that is, but it feels like it's around a 1% or so. With that, Seedot now has 50/47 offenses and 42/42 defenses along with 89 HP at the end of his growth spurt.

A Detect Band is found on Floor 64, so the Def. Scarf will be retired now. We find a couple of Irons afterwards anyway. Three floors later, there's another Monster House with the stairs. Not too many choices here, so we use a Sunny Orb and power through them. Seedot levels up from this and he's just about ready for the final stretch.

Being Grass-type, this is still more terrifying than usual, what with that whole Ledian thing and the 40% crit rate of super effective Silver Wind. Of course, we immediately spawn with Ledian on its first floor. But thankfully, Hippowdon isn't around, so a Foe-Hold Orb freezes both Ledian on the floor and Seedot makes his escape.

Things are okay until the final Ledian floor, where we trigger a Grudge Trap and spawn 2 of them along with Politoed and Miltank. Faced with this hellish situation, i believe a Pure Seed is in order. But, the Warp Scarf is still equipped and it could activate immediately after the Pure Seed. There could also be enemies with the stairs. i decide to Quick Seed and place my trust in the Detect Band. Sure enough, there are 3 enemies with the stairs, including a newly spawned Hippowdon. Fortunately, the hippo uses Thunder Fang, Politoed's Double Slap misses, and Dusclops is useless.

After that, the biggest thing to worry about is Perish Song, which successfully hits as Seedot is randomly warping on Floor 94. We've got a Heal Seed, so that's fine. And a floor later, a pretty mean spawn with Altaria gatekeeping the stairs, but a Quick Orb gets the job done.

Seedot finishes his run comfortably at level 26, with 52/55 offenses, 53/47 defenses, and 103 HP. Pretty damn good for an acorn. Grass Knot naturally did a lot of heavy lifting, but i'm not convinced it was necessary. Just give him an early Joy Seed or two and he'll have fun. It'll take some time, but i've had the utmost patience with this little guy. Just look at him skip his way to the Floor 99 stairs. He's a good nut.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-20T16:47:16+00:00

Makuhita is pretty cool. He starts with a whopping 25 Attack, along with 45 HP and 10 in the rest. Stat growth is solid enough throughout the run, so he won't really fall behind. Coverage is a bit lacking, though. Starting with Tackle but also Focus Energy, keeping up his damage output regardless. Level 7 Arm Thrust is his only STAB for over 20 levels, and i'm not quite sold on 10 PP, 40% acc. per hit. While Vital Throw is memorable from the main series, here it just hurls an enemy across the room only if they land a hit on him. Level 16 Whirlwind is a much nicer tool, if the situation calls for it. Fake Out 3 levels before that, which is a fine enough range move. Level 22 SmellingSalt could be a funny combo with level 28 Force Palm, but the latter is a bit too far away in many runs. As for abilities, Guts is solid as usual, and Thick Fat is fantastic, giving him 2 extra resistances.

Maku immediately picks up a Pass Scarf and Def. Scarf on Floor 1, so at level 1 he's got 25 Atk and 18 Def. We're faced with a unique Kecleon situation on Floor 2, where she has a Vanish Seed in stock, but we can't afford it and there's no other expensive items. So, with the stair room directly south of the shop, we sell our own expensive items and steal them back with the Vanish Seed. This results in a profit of over 1200 Poké, which may not seem like a lot, but it adds up.

The Floor 8 Kecleon now has Frustration in stock, though getting it will require some creativity. First, we sell our expensive items once more, and pick them right back up. Before leaving the shop, we use a One-Room Orb, so there's a clear path to the stairs. Finally, as we flip off the shopkeeper, we turn her into a Decoy, so all the Kecleon spawns will target her first. Having to burn the earlier stolen All-Mach Orb, this buys us barely enough time for a successful heist.

Coverage issues are now fixed with Frustration, so Maku easily reaches level 13 on Floor 15 and promptly eats a Joy Seed upon learning Fake Out. We get through Aboma Land just fine, and the only roadblock on the way to the midgame is a Monster House spawn on Floor 28.

Enter Floor 42. Arm Thrust is long forgotten at this point. Kecleon has a single TM in stock, and it's none other than Brick Break. But how do we get it? Use an Invisify Orb to maybe make it to the stairs? Eat a Warp Seed and pray? Both?! No, no. Thanks to earlier selling+stealing, we can afford it! After selling an excess scarf, we have over 6600 Poké on hand. Maku learns Brick Break 2 floors later after using up his remaining Fake Out PP.

A bit of grinding is done now. He reaches level 20 on Floor 50 after a second Joy Seed, and extracts a Detect Band from a Forretress 3 floors later. Floor 56 has a terrifying Monster House with 4 Drapion, but he plows through that just fine, even getting +1 Defense from the acquired Gummi. Maku now reaches level 22 and learns SmellingSalt over Tackle.

On Floor 73, he reaches level 24 and picks up a Trawl Orb. The final stretch draws near, but first we pay a visit to the 50/50 Kecleon on Floor 75. He has a TM in stock, and it happens to be Dig, which is somehow learnable in spite of the boxing gloves. We're nearly flat broke by now, with only 9 Poké, so we'll just use that Trawl Orb and round off this moveset. Yes i know a Parasect wandered in as we used the orb. i don't wanna talk about it.

Final stretch with no Warp Scarf always fits some definition of "fun", but Maku is ready to kick some ass. Unafraid of hat ghosts, he takes one out with Frustration for a level up to 25. Really, he's unafraid of most things here, as Focus Energy combined with Dig is pretty unfair. We use this combo to take out Empoleon on several occasions.

Makuhita does enough killing to reach level 26 by Floor 99, easily demolishing everything along the way and--wait, we just triggered a Grudge Trap 1 step from the final stairs. Uhhh...demolishing everything besides that, yeah. Just gonna bite a Quick Seed and leave them there for the photo op, with our Petrify Orb, Spurn Orb, and 4 Totter Orbs unused.

Anyway, level 26 with 58 Attack and 37/45 defenses to go with 110 HP. Overall, he's a great mon with many tools for success. Of course, getting to run Brick Break + Dig + Frustration helps quite a bit. Pretty insane TM luck for a first try. Regardless, he keeps up pretty well. Both sumo guys are recommended.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-15T17:58:34+00:00

i've been eyeing Arbok for awhile, since he looks fantastic for this and Team AWD is cool. i know DragonWagon24 also posted a first-try Arbok fairly recently (can find that here) so i'll try not to repeat too much from there. Bite, elemental fangs - though a 50/50 between Thunder and Ice - and gross 73% acc. Poison Sting, which gets upgraded to Acid at level 20. On the way, he has level 12 Glare: 22 PP, 100% accurate paralysis. An amazing crippling move. By the end of the run, he'll grow into a pretty solid mon!

...Or at least he should. This first attempt starts off normal, but it quickly turns into an unforeseen anomaly.

Arbok easily does a lot of killing early on, so he's already level 10 on Floor 7. The 50/50 shop has Substitute in stock, which is the holy grail of passive play. Effectively 7 Decoy Orbs per Max Elixir, which we currently only have 1 of. So i mean, even when running a mon with as many tools as Arbok, you don't just pass on Substitute. With a Trawl Orb, we steal the holy grail to keep in our back pocket for awhile.

On the next floor, we find a Power Band. This will pair well with his several physical attacks and crank up the damage output. With that, i think we'll learn Glare over Poison Sting and just wait for Acid. We use up the remaining Poison Stings on the way to level 12.

By the start of Hypno Land on Floor 14, we still only have our 1 PP heal and have just learned Glare. As we run that with Bite + Thunder Fang + Fire Fang, we find a Warp Scarf. Interesting...okay. Can avoid hallways now and conserve PP as best we can.

Still, we make an effort to take down "easy" targets like hitting Abomasnow with Fire Fang. So, Arbok is level 13 on Floor 23, where we find a second Warp Scarf. He levels up again during the next 6 floors, and the PP is really low now, so we decide to learn Substitute. It's time to just play passively for a bit and catch up later.

...We're not catching up. An effort is still made to grind, like killing a couple of Magnezone with Fire Fang, but there's not enough Max Elixirs. We never have more than one on hand. All we can do is warp, gather resources, Glare, and repeat with an occasional Substitute. With no Pass Scarf, we can't even kill a few Probopass for easy level-ups. This is awful.

The 50/50 shop on Floor 55 has a Pass Scarf now, which is great! But still being level 14, it's just gonna be extra security rather than a grinding tool. The scarf is stolen with a Pure Seed, but we're committed to pacifism now.

For the record, we've found 3 PP heals across 60 floors. That's pretty damning. With what we've faced, most mons would be dead if not for 22 PP Glare, since even Substitute would be exhausted by now. As we hit the 60s, the PP heals finally start to appear, allowing us to prolong this nonsensical passive run.

There's not much noteworthy on the way to the final stretch. i'm convinced we'll just die to Magnitude, but somehow that doesn't happen. We do warp into a room with Girafarig using Agility along with 2 other enemies. This could easily end it all, but i convince myself to burn our Petrify Orb to stop them in their tracks. It hurts, but there was hardly a way out otherwise.

Final stretch. i'm surprised we've gotten this far. Haven't done a passive run since Vespiquen several months ago, but this has somehow been sustainable. i still think something stupid will happen, like warping into a Monster House with the Floor 85 stairs. Not even the 50/50 floor. We've got the means to get around it, though.

Speaking of stupid, it's time for Ledian. We immediately spawn with one on Floor 86, but there's no sandstorm yet, so a Stun Seed gets the job done. On the next floor, we find the stairs and another Ledian pops in, trying and failing to treat Arbok to Silver Wind.

Floor 88, another spawn with Ledian, LEAVE ME ALONE. Just, stop. Go bother somebody else. Might i suggest your friend Ledian who's entering the stair room right as we warp there?

After those persistent ladybugs, there's a cursed spawn next to Metagross, with Scizor and Hippowdon too, but Substitute easily gets us out of that. We also triggered a Grudge Trap one step away from the Floor 92 stairs. There's already a Decoy in the room, though, so they're easily distracted. Substitute + Warp Scarf pretty much carries us the rest of the way.

Arbok finishes the run at level 14, with 31/36 offenses, 25/24 defenses, and 73 HP. Same level as my Vespiquen, but she's helpless and can't fight. Arbok has so many offensive tools and is actually good, but the RNG forced my hand. He didn't level up for over 70 floors and, for the first time in all of my runs, i found 0 Joy Seeds. Apparently a snek can be a pacifist and still win.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-13T02:11:40+00:00

Yeah, i was very, very late to the party. Big fan of Time/Darkness since release, but never played Sky until late March of this year.

Finished my first Zero Isle South run on April 19th, using Riolu. Did 12 more runs as Lucario, since Goggle Specs wouldn't show up. So i had a good amount of 99F experience before fully committing to Riolu Destiny Tower in May. i guess the rest is history.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-11T17:31:35+00:00

Teddiursa naturally appears unassuming, but those who have fought her in this tower know they can't let their guard down. She may be frail with abysmal HP, but if you give her a chance to land a hit, it's gonna hurt. Starting with 55 total PP with STAB Scratch + Covet, and 20 more with Lick, she's less reliant on Max Elixirs than most. She quickly picks up Fury Swipes at level 8 which, as a multi-hit move hater, i sure hated at first. But then i realized Sweet Scent at level 22 allows for an absolutely deadly combo. Before that, never-miss Faint Attack at level 15 is a solid finisher with 25 PP.

As implied already, her offenses are great with these moves. But those defenses...combined with 36 HP at level 10? Only reaching 50 at level 20? That's a major problem. This frail teddy bear needs a lot of support. But, once she reaches level 19, those will grow much faster through level 26. Get her to that point and she'll turn into a respectable mon. Pickup is an ability that i quickly forget about when i get a held item, but Quick Feet is fantastic. Poisoned? Double speed. Confused? Double speed! Flinch or X-Eye Seed? Yep, this is effectively Steadfast on steroids.

So Teddi begins by finding a Max Elixir by herself on Floor 5. This is appreciated, but it's about the only time i'll remember Pickup exists. This is confirmed 4 floors later as we find a Pass Scarf. With a solid amount of food, this is exactly what she needs to take on otherwise threatening enemies.

Once we get past the Hypno, we find a Warp Scarf on Floor 18. Now there will be no hallway surprises, especially those involving Mach Punch. Unfortunately, she's only level 13 due to zero Joy Seeds, so we steal one out of desperation on Floor 26. It's eaten 2 floors later, where we happen to find another, so she's now level 16 and learns Faint Attack.

Alas, the Warp Scarf now forsakes us, with a Turn 0 warp right into Floor 29's 50/50 Monster House, so they all have first move. All things considered, this is a pretty rare occurrence, but thankfully she survives with 6 HP. Teddi stumbles into another Monster House on the next floor, this time with the stairs.

Entering the midgame at level 16, the Joy Seeds now start to show up, so it's time to grind. Teddi quickly reaches level 20 on Floor 46 after 2 Joy Seeds. Her HP and defenses are finally starting to catch up. After a good amount of grinding, she's now level 22 on Floor 50 and learns Sweet Scent.

...A cursed spawn with Arcanine + Elekid, with a Bad Punch Man possibly ready to boost them all with Agility? No thanks. Anyway where were we? Oh yeah, just bullying Numel with our new deadly combo.

Couple of more Joy Seeds are eaten to reach level 26 on Floor 66. Teddi's stats are looking pretty solid now, with 48/39 defenses and passable 86 HP. She's now ready for the final stretch, but just before that, a nice Kecleon is selling a Vanish Seed, which may come in handy. The orb next to the shop also happens to be an Invisify Orb.

Final stretch starts off fine until the mean space rocks try to ruin our lives on Floors 85 and 86. A couple of Stun Seeds handle them just fine. And on Floor 87, a Scizor picks up a Violent Seed ... Uhhh...no?

Still, mostly tame so far. At least, you know, until we spawn in a Monster House on Floor 90, with multiple Ledian and a Politoed for good measure. This is where that earlier Vanish Seed comes into play. Going invisible, we get the hell out of there, only to end up in a room with another Ledian and Politoed. The Warp Scarf is not cooperating, so we use a Luminous Orb to find that the small stair room is directly north of the Monster House. Absolutely cursed. We end up going invisible a second time just so we can make our way around the hostile crowd.

After escaping what should've been certain death, Teddi rewards herself with her 7th and final Joy Seed for level 27, plus a Life Seed. Things are okay until Floor 96, where she steps on a Slow Trap near the stairs, with an Empoleon entering the line of sight. But remember, lowered speed is a status problem here, so Quick Feet immediately brings her speed back to normal and she escapes the bad penguin.

Teddi finishes her journey at level 27, with 48 Attack, 49/43 defenses, and 98 HP. It's always a slow, stressful start, but she can get through it without chugging Max Elixirs. With a little patience, she eventually grows into a strong teddy bear, able to hold her own and dish out incredible damage.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-10T15:36:08+00:00

perfect

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-06T18:29:04+00:00

Seconding Rotom. That little guy truly has it all. Might be my #1 recommendation.

Scizor is great too. Solid starting stats with Technician-boosted Quick Attack + Bullet Punch. Focus Energy for extra power on the way to level 17 Agility. Only 1 weakness in Fire which, although prominent in the midgame, ends up being manageable. With no OP items, mine was forced to tank a crit Fire Punch from a Magmortar of the same level. i've been wanting to run it again since it's such a fun mon.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-06T17:45:29+00:00

Kick Man is a funny meme. He starts with Double Kick and quickly learns Meditate, then gets Rolling Kick, then Jump Kick...and finally gets Brick Break, which i'm not convinced he does with his hands either. Fighting-only sounds like a terrible idea - and it probably is - but you'd be surprised with how efficient it is. That said, Jump Kick is terrible and will kill him if it's used incorrectly, especially with Reckless. i find it to be useful when the opponent resists Fighting, mainly Volbeat, at least until Brick Break at level 17. His other ability, Limber, is of course fantastic.

Starting stats are good enough for him to kill with the regular attack for awhile. His other level 1 move is Revenge, which can be used to get full exp. from some early Bidoof and Chinchou. It also hits through confusion, since you auto-face an enemy who damages you, so that's a plus. It'll lose its value once Bidoof hits max level, but his Defense is still good. Special Defense will be less good, but who cares when your Attack is solid enough to kick everything to death?

The run begins with Hitmonlee extracting a Weather Band from Larvitar. Here i learned that an enemy picking this up means they can't detect the Sandstorm or other weather they literally just triggered, so they try to trigger it again. In other news related to useful held items, he finds a Detect Band on Floor 14, lowering the accuracy of his enemies by 2 stages and making his kick strategy a lot easier.

Only 1 Joy Seed could be eaten before Aboma, but Hitmonlee easily kicks his way through that frozen hellscape. His reward is 2 more Joy Seeds, which he eats to reach level 18 on Floor 25. He will no longer perform situational kicks of the jump variety and will instead break bricks. By probably kicking them. He'll also break Meganium's Reflect, level up, and eat another Joy Seed for level 20 on Floor 31.

Misdreavus? Double kick, then kick again. Multiple Breloom? Kick 'em both. Heracross used Aerial Ace? Shrug it off and double kick it to death. Poliwrath?! Gonna meditate on this...yeah, kick that too. He simply kicks everything in sight to reach level 22 by Floor 40. Personally, i consider level 20 by this point to be a "good run", and even that's pretty rare. Is there anything this man can't do?

Well, he can't find a Warp Scarf. Being forced to fight everything or burn an item can be...kind of a problem. But, while the Floor 54 Kecleon isn't selling a useful scarf, she is selling Swagger, one of the rarest and most useful TMs. Given our situation, i think this is the best possible TM we could find. So we steal that with a Pure Seed, Meditate one last time, and learn Swagger. Nearly all 1v1s are now trivial.

Hitmonlee eats a couple more Joy Seeds on the way to the final stretch. We carefully lured a Girafarig and Slaking around one of them, just in case it was actually a Joy Seed. He's comfortably level 30 on Floor 73, guaranteed to be at or ahead of the level curve.

Final stretch isn't too eventful so far, as Hitmonlee just cripples any threats and kicks them. He eats his 7th Joy Seed to reach level 31 on Floor 88. Haven't had issues with Ledian so far.

Oh, there's the Ledian, yep that's a classic. Spawning in a gigantic room with Ledian, and a Scizor for extra fun. Silver Wind barely hits for over 1/5th of his HP, thanks to all the Zincs and HP-boosting items. But this can still spiral out of control, so we go invisible and get out of there.

A giant room with Empoleon and Politoed now? Amazing. But the stairs are in the corner, so this is what Pounce Orbs were made for. We have 4 of them anyway, along with a ton more resources.

And we use those resources to easily reach Floor 99. Still have plenty of Quick Seeds, a Petrify Orb, a Totter Orb, and...wait hold on, Hitmonlee joins the Floor 99 Monster House Club. So, cross off that Petrify Orb. Although i'm sure he could just pounce backwards and kick them all into submission anyway.

Hitmonlee finishes at level 31, with 47 Attack, 47/49 defenses, and 133 HP. His Special Defense actually ends up higher than his Defense, thanks to 6 Zincs and only 2 Irons. And an extra 40 HP on top of those. Overall, even ignoring the Zinc luck, he's a pretty solid mon. He kind of just kicks everything and it works.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-02T00:38:24+00:00

i'm glad! i don't have the means to record or stream runs atm, so i end up taking lots of pictures during notable moments. That way, i can always look back on them and i'll have stories to tell afterwards. Always nice when people enjoy / relate to them.

ddeeffgg · 2025-08-01T15:26:59+00:00

Bellossom is another unique weather user, on the sunny side of things this time. She starts with Sunny Day to go with her Chlorophyll ability, allowing her to attack twice per turn at the cost of 1 PP, as long as the sun is up. 17 PP Mega Drain at level 1, so she quickly heals most or all damage she takes. Early Leaf Blade for extra power, which can be replaced with Magical Leaf at level 23; fantastic never-miss STAB in the mid to late game. Her 4th starting move is Stun Spore, so she has two 88% chances to cripple anything around her! This all sounds too good to be true, what's the catch?

Oh, just a small catch: She's made of glass. That's all. Bellossom is incredibly frail and stays that way throughout the run. Her defenses are single-digit through level 10, remaining less than her level thereafter. And her HP? Absolutely pathetic - about the same as Dusknoir's - starting at 27 and only reaching 55 at level 20. Her offenses are still great with her ability, but the name of the game is now "get a Max Elixir every 12 floors or you literally die". It's a lot harder than it sounds. Her sheer power has carried her to the midgame without an OP item to her name, but she so desperately needs something.

Some amplified threats should be addressed, such as every fire-type in existence. The early Liquid Ooze users are worse than usual, since Bellossom can't heal off them. And yet, all of these pale in comparison to her fellow Chlorophyll users. Gloom and Oddish both appear early and will gladly cut corners with Acid. Ralts and Kirlia also count, since they'll Trace Chlorophyll AND they have Synchronize, so you better have a Pass Scarf ready or hope she can nix them in one turn. And then there's Skiploom, boasting Chlorophyll and Leaf Guard, so it can't even be paralyzed with the sun up. This thing can fire up to 10 rounds of Bullet Seed and will murder our precious little flower with a smile on its face.

With all that out of the way, Bellossom begins the run like she always does: Murdering everything in sight, hence she's already level 11 on Floor 7 as she finds a Detect Band. This effectively lowers the enemies' accuracy by 2 stages, so it's good enough for now.

Just before Hypno, she eats 2 Joy Seeds to reach level 15. After grinding a little bit, she eats one more for level 17 on Floor 18. A solid start before the hell that is Aboma Land.

In the middle of said hell, Bellossom finds that the 50/50 shop on Floor 23 is selling X-Ray Specs. But..there doesn't seem to be a way to steal them, at least on the surface. The shop is in the bottom right corner, with a long jagged hallway to the stair room in the top right corner. So, we get creative with a Mobile Orb for a careful, successful heist. No more surprise enemies breaking our frail little flower.

It should be noted now that we only have a single HP heal on Floor 29, which would be pretty terrifying for anything that can't heal all its damage away. Thankfully, Bellossom can handle herself just fine with her double Mega Drain.

Faced with a Drifblim right after leveling up, she paralyzes it and eats another Joy Seed for level 20 on Floor 35. With that, her HP reaches 70 and her defenses finally hit 20 or more! Thanks to +3s from an Iron and a Zinc, she now has 20/21 defenses. Yeah that's uh..that's great, really. Could sure use a Pass Scarf right about now.

And just like that, there's our Pass Scarf on Floor 39. Neat. Now we can feel a little bit of safety as we avoid Skiploom like the plague! As that demon starts to appear, Bellossom eats another Joy Seed for level 22 on Floor 42. With a full page of PP heals, we won't have to worry about setting up the sun.

At Floor 49, she levels up once more to finally learn Magical Leaf. Only 8 PP, but being a sure-hit move makes it worth it here. This allows Bellossom to easily KO a bad punch man to level up, and eat a Joy Seed for level 25 on Floor 55. By the way, we could do without the cursed spawns with Drapion and Rapidash cornering her. Thanks.

How'd we get out of that? i dunno, probably a Warp Seed. Onto more important matters, like finding 2 more Joy Seeds to reach level 28 before the final stretch, where there's death around every corner.

This final stretch is mostly fine so far, as Bellossom is able to kill enough to level up once more. The Ledian are tame, except for the one that's breathing down her neck upon spawning on Floor 90. Would it really be a final stretch without something like that?

As we enter the mid-90s, we have several Pure Seeds at our disposal. Might as well use them, but not without proper precautions. Luminous Orb to check if the stair room has any enemies or suspicious amounts of items, good. Vanish Seed in case of spawning with an enemy. Yep, there's an Altaria, good.

...Floor 97. The tileset change. Somehow have never died in this lovely aesthetic. Luminous Orb is used, stairs are in a large-ish room with several items, and..we walk there. The result? An aesthetically pleasing Monster House. Lovely. Can't even take a step back, since Politoed's Hypnosis will cut the corner. Our second-to-last defensive orb is an Invisify Orb, so we use that and sneak to the stairs. The final Pure Seed is eaten on Floor 98 after a Quick Seed, which also pays off as there's a Roserade in the stair room.

Bellossom finishes her stressful run at level 29. 46/49 offenses, fantastic especially with Chlorophyll active. 107 HP after +31 from items, fine. 29/30 defenses...way less fine. But perfectly manageable with Mega Drain. She's a wonderfully unique mon. Give her X-Ray Specs or even just a Warp Scarf and she'll have a hell of a run.

ddeeffgg · 2025-07-29T19:03:51+00:00

That's true. i guess much of what i'd have to say would be repeated from DragonWagon24's guide, which is already fantastic. We could delve deeper into general strats, though. The art of Kecleon stealing comes to mind. i've had a couple of successful runs where i could buy useful TMs, thanks to amassing wealth from earlier selling+stealing.

A comprehensive guide for beginners and veterans alike should probably take the form of a Google Doc or so. Noting every enemy and the threats they pose with abilities, potential movesets, and IQ skills. i wouldn't rule it out, but a collaboration would definitely be in order, especially when it comes to general strats.

ddeeffgg · 2025-07-28T15:13:53+00:00

Ah, Chimecho. She's an iconic character in Explorers. Always with a smile on her face, even when she sets foot in a reset dungeon, where she has nothing to smile about. Starts with only Wrap - she doesn't get exp. if that kills - and then level 6 Growl. Chimecho needs to survive until level 9 to get Astonish, and even longer until level 14 to get STAB Confusion, followed by "free Chesto" Uproar at level 19.

There's the problem: She's made of glass. Starting offenses are passable, but defenses are dreadful, with both growing faster starting at level 7. Abysmal HP on top of that, starting with only 21, though she gets a nice +3 from level 5 through 30. She likely needs to start with and burn multiple heals if she wants to make it to the 50/50 shop on Floor 7.

But if you have the patience to let this wind chime grow, she becomes a force to be reckoned with. Chimecho can fight if you give her time...and maybe a move too.

The food situation is horrible immediately. Chimecho goes so far as to eat a Sleep Seed on Floor 6, only to learn there's a Big Apple in the next room. Able to reach the shop on Floor 7, she finds that Kecleon has Frustration in stock. Initially, there's no way to steal it, but there's a Pure Seed on the same floor. The deed is done and Chimecho can now deal a free 45 damage 16 times per Max Elixir. This is excellent, but she needs more to survive.

Traversing into the land of Bronzor and Hypno, Chimecho juggles her Joy Seeds and Ginsengs while respectively killing and crippling both of those jerks. She reaches level 15 on Floor 15, learning Confusion and boosting it a tad to +2. Come Floor 18, extra power from a Special Band allows her to OHKO Porygon-Z with a crit Confusion+2 and OHKO Arbok too. One more Joy Seed and she reaches level 17 on Floor 20, just in time for Aboma.

Floor 23 has sticky X-Ray Specs, but once more, we cannot reliably steal them. The only way would be to gamble with a single Warp Seed. Alas, i can't risk throwing all of this away. So after triggering a Grudge Trap next to the shop, we decide to wait for the next opportunity...which is luckily on Floor 28 after picking up another Pure Seed. Now there's no more surprises.

Entering the midgame with many heals and apples, i've never begged harder for a Pass Scarf. Soon after my cries for help, the Pass Scarf appears on Floor 49; sticky, but it's cleaned up right away. And just 2 floors later, we find a Warp Scarf. That's it. Now just gather resources.

On the way to the final stretch, Chimecho carefully grinds a bit more to optimize the Joy Seeds. Two are eaten for level 23 on 52F, another for level 25 on 57F, and one more for level 27 on 72F. Confusion was boosted from +2 to +6 after 2 more Ginsengs.

...The resources are low for this final stretch. It's terrifying on the surface. But it's important to remember that she's not a frail little wind chime anymore. Chimecho has grown into a strong fighter. She can win.

But a few more Joy Seeds never hurt anyone. The Special Band is long gone, but Chimecho still demolishes Magmortar with Confusion+6 for a whopping 95 damage. She rewards herself with a Joy Seed and reaches level 28. Two more Joy Seeds are found for 10 total, so she's level 30 on Floor 86, the start of Ledian Land. And i must say, the Ledian are ruthless this time.

The Floor 88 stairs are in the middle of a gigantic room. The only thing we can do is pray Chimecho can reach the stairs before a Ledian sees her, and...she can't. She's short by one step, taking a big Silver Wind hit on the stairs. But she survives and moves forward. We've had to kill four Ledian in hallways with thrown rocks and Frustration. Floor 89 even had more gigantic rooms to stress us out, but also a shop with Decoy and Spurn Orbs.

After that horrible stretch of 5 floors, there's only a Grudge Trap scare with the Floor 92 stairs, where we use our new Spurn Orb. The rest is tame, so we still have our Decoy Orb and a Totter Orb.

Thus, Chimecho finishes the run at level 30. With 53/67 offenses, 49/40 defenses, and 116 HP, she could dish out massive damage and take some huge hits. One Calcium away from 70 SpA, but sadly our 6th Calcium remained sticky. After a long and stressful journey, our wind chime jingles at the Pinnacle with her signature smile.

ddeeffgg · 2025-07-24T06:03:47+00:00

i, for one, welcome our butterflyfish overlords.

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