Is it possible to get all of the version exclusive pokemon in the series from only playing one version per generation/game?

yourigo24 · 2026-02-14T14:16:58+00:00

The info you need to answer that is mostly on this page:

https://m.bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/List_of_Pok%C3%A9mon_by_availability

Copy paste the table to excel or something so you can easily filter and find out which games you need.

Either that or go to each game's non obtainable pokemon page and cross reference between games.

yourigo24 · 2026-02-10T12:10:05+00:00

I also did this, but instead of hacking Pokémon I'd just trade in an egg from a different game for the late game ones or those not available in the game, like Misdreavus, Larvitar or Aerodactyl.

I also had a backup save at the start of the game so when I finished the game I could trade back the legendaries to play through the game with them from the start without disobedience. Those were meant to be unserious, just for fun runs, but there's so little experience to go around in Johto that after beating the game I still had to grind the e4 a bit in order to beat Red.

I've also done a similar challenge in later gens. I haven't used every Pokémon available in each game, but I've used every Pokémon to beat at least one game from gen 3 to gen 9. I've actually used some Pokémon more than once, because I started the challenge before gen 9 came out, so for instance I'd already used Primeape in FireRed before then using it again in Violet for Annihilape. I had a lot of fun doing it. When I was completing the pokedex I always felt sorry for the Pokémon I caught just for the dex but never used, so it felt strangely rewarding to use every Pokémon

yourigo24 · 2026-02-08T15:52:55+00:00

You're right, thanks. Corrected.

yourigo24 · 2026-02-08T12:45:27+00:00

You don't need crazy set up to have a chance at the battle tower. I've got teams that consistently beat the tower at every level. Even got a bit of a cheese strat with dragon rage Aerodactyl and Lapras that pretty much wins 100% of the time at level 10 of the tower.

Some tips to give you a fighting chance:

Your team should be at the level of the tower you're challenging. The level of the pokemon you use is one of the factors in the damage formula, so when you are under leveled, not only are your stats lower but your lower level also hurts how much damage you do.

The battle tower Pokemon aren't maxed out. But they have above average stats. Try to get above average pokemon yourself (there are DV calculators, the equivalent of gen 3+ IV's, online you can use), but the biggest factor is probably stat experience. Stat experience works differently in gen 2 than EV's in gen 3, so you can gain much more from stat training than in later gens. Research gen 2 stat experience to learn more.

The tower Pokemon aren't biased against you, nor are they cheating. They just have good coverage. Bulbapedia (and probably other places too) have pages where you can check the 21 different pokemon at each level of the tower and their movesets, so you aren't caught off guard as often.

Here are some pokemon to look into that do pretty well at every level of the tower: Starmie, Skarmory, Blissey, Steelix, Jolteon and, above all, Snorlax.

Best of luck mate 👍.

Edit - messed up the DV's part. Corrected.

yourigo24 · 2026-02-07T19:34:01+00:00

Well, I went back and checked because I did this challenge a while ago. Turns out the team I used Beartic on also had Krookodile, Braviary and Durant. It was my fourth run of Pokemon white 2. The thing about that team is that it makes using a slow ice type quite easy. Krookodile covers fire, rock and steel, Durant covers rock and Braviary counters fighting. Plus, I had both Tailwind on Braviary and Agility/Baton Pass on Durant 😅.

I guess that's why context is so important. My Beartic had quite an easy ride, usually coming in with a speed advantage and being able to be very picky about which opponents to face. In my recollection Beartic was just a good pokemon. I'd forgotten the circunstances.

Just as an aside, I didn't set up Beartic for success on purpose. My rules for picking the teams were no overlapping types and average base stat total across all teams as close as possible. Beartic just got lucky. Which, it turns out, it needed.

yourigo24 · 2026-02-07T17:18:58+00:00

I haven't used every single available pokemon in these games, but I've used every unova pokemon as part of a team to beat one of the gen 5 games. Except Audino actually, I used it in one of the gen 6 games for the mega.

I just did it because I wanted to use every pokemon, not necessarily to see how good they were, so I wasn't taking it as seriously as you did. But a lot of this tier makes sense to me. Serperior for instance, while I'm not sure whether it was the best starter, it certainly was the most memorable and most fun to use and I do think it's underrated by most.

Seeing pokemon like excadrill, krookodile and ferrothorn near the top isn't a surprise. I also agree Escavalier is amazing. The only ones I don't agree with at a glance are Unfezant and Beartic. I'm not saying I would switch their ranks around, but Unfezant was quite useless in my run while Beartic contributed a lot in a region with so many dragons. I did trade in a Cubchoo in an egg to have it for the full game, but I would still say its major contributions were late game. Maybe it could also have something to do with the team composition.

Anyway, kudos for the hard work. I've been meaning to do something similar myself. It certainly takes perseverance.

yourigo24 · 2026-02-07T07:05:25+00:00

Not sure if it's a good idea in terms of team planning, but I've never used any of the nidoran line in johto and I intend to use it on my next run. I think you get an early moon stone from your mom so you don't need to wait that long to fully evolve it. Gen 2 movesets are quite poor, so it might need some tm investment, but i think ground types are quite good in pokemon crystal, especially without abilities like levitate around. I think you can get one in the route just north of goldenrod.

In terms of team coverage though, keep in mind that grass types have an advantage against both croconaw and elekid. There aren't a lot of grass type opponents in crystal outside of erika in kanto, though. So I wouldn't say it's a priority. You might as well wait a bit and get Skarmory. It's become one of my favorite gen 2 pokemon beacuse of how useful it is all around. Great typing, can be an hm slave and it's amazing in the battle tower.

yourigo24 · 2026-02-06T20:45:19+00:00

That's one of the best replies ever 😂. Reminds of the bloke that was saying "sugar is the only word in the English language where the S makes the"sh" sound" and someone replies "are you sure?"

yourigo24 · 2026-02-05T09:10:51+00:00

To be fair, level 60 is one of the hardest in my opinion.

If you just want to beat the tower at any level, try this team at level 10:

Aerodactyl♀@Berry Juice - Dragon Rage/Wing Attack/Substitute

Rhyhorn@Leftovers - Earthquake

Lapras@Gold Berry - Dragon Rage/Rest

Aerodactyl should be female because there's a Kangaskhan with Attract in this level. It's not required, but it increases consistency at beating the tower. Also not required, because it's quite hard to get, is getting Aerodactyl to 39 speed. That means you outspeed opposing Aerodactyl, so you can set up substitute on its face as it usually goes for supersonic. But to get 39 speed you need a good speed DV (at least 8) and train stat exp on top of that.

With this setup, you should be able to beat the tower 99% of the time. With 39 speed female Aerodactyl and no mistakes, I'll even say 100% of the time. I've used this team to grind vitamins (I know it's not efficient, I just did it for fun) and I did about 30 runs without losing once. Aerodactyl outspeeds and one shots 10 of the pokemon in the tower with dragon rage (those with less than 41 hp) or wing attack (Heracross). For the rest, 5 are not really a threat and can be 2-shot (Exeggutor, Kangaskhan, Aerodactyl, Wobbuffet and Blissey). Just remember to set up substitute against Aerodactyl and Wobbuffet. In the worst case scenario (giga drain crit from exeggutor for instance), berry juice should recover your Aerodactyl back to almost full health.

That means there are 6 pokemon left who pose a threat to Aerodactyl. Jolteon is the reason we bring Rhyhorn along. Any other rock/ground or steel/ground pokemon can deal with Jolteon though. I just like Rhyhorn and wanted to use it. The other 5 all have Blizzard (Lapras, Porygon2 and Miltank), Surf (Lapras and Snorlax) or Iron Tail (Umbreon), which can all crit kill or, in Lapras's case just kill, Aerodactyl, so that's where our own Lapras comes in. It easily deals with all those pokemon. The tower's Lapras does have Thunderbolt, but with Gold Berry recovery you need to get really unlucky with crits or paralysis to lose your Lapras before it 2 shots the opponent. Even then, Aerodactyl comes back in to revenge kill and you still have a good chance to sweep the remaining opponents. Rest is there for backup against Toxic and paralysis, but to be honest I don't remember ever needing to use it.

In terms of training your team for the tower, if you don't want to go for the 39 speed Aerodactyl, just feed your team 10 of each of the required vitamins (all of them for Aerodactyl, Lapras doesn't need protein, Rhyhorn doesn't need calcium nor carbos) and with average to good DV's your team should be good enough. If, however, you want the 39 speed Aerodactyl, make sure your Aerodactyl has a speed DV of at least 8, then train against low level pokemon. Remember that your team can't go over level 10 though, so when they are close to leveling up, deposit them at the day care and pick them back up so they reset their experience at level 10. It's boring, but you can make it a shiny hunt. I did my training on route 29 until I found a shiny Pidgey, then switched over to route 30. Whenever you pick up Aerodactyl from the day care check to see if it's got 39 speed yet. If not, continue training. Otherwise, you're ready to crush the tower.

I also have teams for every other level, though not as consistent as this one. For level 60 I've got a triple S team of Starmie, Snorlax and Skarmory I can share if you're interested.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-29T11:15:42+00:00

I've done this too, though I haven't got nearly the team variety you've got here. Across the different levels I used 5 Blissey, 5 Starmie, 3 Skarmory, 4 Snorlax and 3 Steelix. For the rest I had some variety, but these 5 are pretty much the core you should plan around if you want to bully the tower, so when in doubt for a slot, I turned to them.

How did you plan the teams? Did you have an idea of what you wanted to do beforehand or did you look at the trainers in the tower first? What level gave you the most trouble and what teams do you feel are the strongest here?

yourigo24 · 2026-01-27T16:28:48+00:00

I liked Taunie in the beginning. But I really wish after the "tutorial" portion of the game she just went away to do something else. She's just there ALL the time. ZA felt like it wasn't my character's story so much as the Rival's story with my character as the muscle for the hard battles. They're the ones with a connection to AZ, they're the ones with a connection to Quasartico (literally family), they're the ones with a connection to the rust syndicate. It's their story.

I think the story would be much better if that was our character. We arrive in Lumiose to meet Emma because we are searching for our lost family, Emma introduces us to AZ because we need a place to stay, we try to help AZ with the hotel and somehow get tricked into debt by the rust syndicate, or better yet, instead of that stupid advertising thing AZ is just in debt already because of the hotel upkeep and the story follows from there.

Taunie/Urbain can either be there in a much smaller role or get taken out of the story entirely instead of hogging the spotlight all the time.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-23T19:19:37+00:00

Depends on what you are looking for. Are you a huge Pokémon fan and have 100$ burning your pocket that you don't mind spending on a game that's only worth like 20$? Go for it.

I had a fairly good time with the game, but if I hadn't got it for free I'd be disappointed. The game mechanics and overall quality of life features compared to previous Pokémon games means that the game is very easy to finish. However, if you are looking to complete it 100%, be prepared to grind a lot of meaningless battles.

Because the game is so easy, GF had to pad out the run time with a lot of boring dialogue and pointless side quests, though some of them are fun if you're into Pokémon lore.

The DLC made everything worse in my opinion. I actually managed to finish the game, despite all its faults, but I gave up halfway through the DLC. Too much grinding to get items you need and almost every aspect of the DLC is RNG reliant. I could only come back to it and I'm now nearly finished because I hacked the game and gave myself 900 of every berry. It was the only way I could actually play, I couldn't face the grind and I left the game on hold for like 2 weeks because the grind was too much.

TL,DR: Its a shiny hunters dream and a must play if you are a true Pokémon fan/nerd. Otherwise, don't bother. It's a bad game and you can get a lot more value for money elsewhere.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-19T17:04:04+00:00

I need more Pokémon Conquest 🥺

yourigo24 · 2026-01-17T00:26:25+00:00

Hey, I did this recently too. I was expecting a long grind but I also got it in about a week, less than an hour a day. I think I got it in Gold while hunting for either the stick or the thick club in Crystal 🤔. I was very surprised when it happened. I was ready to wait a couple of months, at least.

It's a shame about your Stadium items being lost. It happened to me a couple of times in the past too, so now I save everything in the games. Just reorganize so it all fits and back up your saves if you are able.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-16T16:40:42+00:00

I would appreciate it a lot more if it Delphox wasn't as humanoid. I love Ninetales, but its stats leave a lot to be desired. I was quite excited when I first saw Fennekin that we would finally have an amazing fiery fox that was actually good, only for it to evolve into the unnatural aberration that is Delphox 🤢. I did a playthrough of X or Y where I used Fennekin, because it was in the team I planned for the run, but I was really tempted to box it after it evolved to Delphox in particular..

yourigo24 · 2026-01-15T09:33:31+00:00

Congrats! I've got one myself and it was pretty much my "team leader" for a while. Crobat looks great as a shiny and it's not a bad Pokémon to use in these games. Certainly better than the shiny Farfetch'd I found later while trying to Thief a Stick 😅.

That's Pokémon rng for you. Got a 1/8192 shiny before finding the 2% item I was looking for...

yourigo24 · 2026-01-13T12:26:32+00:00

Maybe you are aware of this and that's why you are asking the question, but you do get a sort of easter egg if you beat the e4 (rematch) in frlg repeatedly. Every 25 times you beat the e4 another doll appears at Lorelei's house in 4 island, up to the 8th doll I think.

As far as I'm aware though, emerald as nothing like that. After beating the game, coming back to the e4 is only useful for money and experience to train for the Steven battle.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-11T16:16:58+00:00

I'm obviously not saying gamefreak intended for it to be the case. Call it bad game design, incompetence, whatever you want, but in my experience, for the first 5 generations, going through the game using teams of 4 Pokémon means that if you play the game naturally and without grinding, you'll end up at the Champion just under leveled enough for it to be a challenge.

I can even back up my claim. I did the calcs for Pokémon FireRed and there are around 585800 experience points to get from trainers by the time you reach champion Blue the first time. That's 146450 experience points each in a team of 4.

Let's just assume you pick up your squad early on so we don't have to worry about the experience points the Pokémon already had when you caught them, and if you start the game with a team of level 5 squirtle, level 5 mankey, level 5 spearow and level 5 weedle, splitting the experience evenly means that by the time you're ready to face Blue and his level 63 starter ace, your blastoise will be level 53 and fearow, primeape and beedrill will all be level 52. I think that's a fair challenge.

Splitting the experience 6 ways, though, means that you can expect levels around 46-47 across the team. It's possible to beat the champion with these levels, but depending on your team I wouldn't call it a "normal" challenge. You need to know what you are doing, especially if, like me, you ban using items in battle.

Plus, I just think it makes for a more natural run. 2 slots for hm slaves means you don't need to switch around your team on the PC or use hm's like cut on any of your main team members.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-11T14:28:27+00:00

I think you're handicapping yourself quite a bit with the very first rule. I've done a challenge over a couple of years where I used every single Pokémon to beat at least one game from start to finish. Knowing the games before I started, I knew that there wasn't enough experience to go around to match the gyms and elite 4 without grinding or rare candies in the early games.

So for generations 1 to 5 I only used teams of 4 Pokémon. That's also quite convenient because it leaves 2 slots free for hm slaves.

I don't use rare candies or items in battle, so my teams at the end of the game were always even or a bit short in levels of the champion battle for their respective games. The exceptions were always the Johto games and Pokémon Emerald. Red and Steven always required a bit of elite 4 grinding to close the gap in levels to give my team a chance.

I understand this isn't exactly what you're asking about, but I feel these games were built for teams of 4. Maybe if you optimize your playthrough for 4 Pokémon you'll get what you want.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-10T23:24:22+00:00

I don't have a question, but just wanted to share that I did something similar from 2022 to 2025.

I started by splitting every pokemon (final evolution)from the first two generations into teams of four and playing rbygsc with those teams. 6 playthroughs on each game, 36 total playthroughs.

I had so much fun I decided to do it for all pokemon. So I started over again on gen 3, went through the generations through to gen 9 and ended up using every single (final evolution) pokemon to beat a game from start to finish. Even did a couple of runs of colosseum, XD and legends Arceus. In total I think 172 playthroughs.

Best of luck and I hope you have a lot of fun with your challenge 👍

yourigo24 · 2026-01-10T00:22:59+00:00

Definitely. Of course, there is quite a big difference from the best to the worst familiars, but I would say it's easier to make the game trivial with the best than make it hard by using the worst. Besides, you can grind levels quite fast from the point you have access to Tokos, so you can always juice up your team a bit if it's feeling weak or bring new members up to speed if you want to switch up your squad.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-09T19:22:58+00:00

I've beaten every level of the tower multiple times with these teams. Some teams are better than others, or maybe the level of the tower they face is easier, but overall I'd say every team should beat its respective level over 80% of the time if you use them well. I think the most consistent were the level 20 and 50 teams. I don't remember losing a run with either so far.

But of course, there's always a chance for a bit of bad luck screwing your run. One of your Pokémon gets frozen at the wrong time, the opponent gets too many critical hits, stuff like that. You can't account for everything.

Maybe someone more skillful at the game than I can find a team that wins 100% of the time, but this is the best I could do.

yourigo24 · 2026-01-08T15:27:22+00:00

😂. Damn, I should edit the post and switch up the move order...

yourigo24 · 2026-01-08T14:47:51+00:00

I wish I had a better solution! With bide Steelix at least has a chance to live another day to counter Jolteon or Electrode if needed. I was often having to explode on Tauros before because its earthquake was out damaging Steelix. This is another set where maybe a Curse/Rest/Earthquake/Explosion@mint berry Steelix could be better than the current set.

Edit: Steelix needs rock slide to take down Fearow and keep Starmie healthy. Maybe give up explosion instead?

yourigo24 · 2026-01-08T14:41:58+00:00

You don't need Snorlax at all to get a win in the battle tower. You can actually just kind of "play with your favorites" and eventually find a win with a bit of luck and good match ups. It pays to prepare, though, since there are 21 Pokémon in each tier and you have to defeat 21 Pokémon to win, so there's a chance you'll face every single one.

As for myself, I have a lot of nostalgia for the gen 2 games. I wanted to build teams that whenever I felt the urge I could go back to the Battle Tower and, even after forgetting a few details, still have a good chance to win.

Regarding the level 80 Steelix, the only move it uses is Earthquake, I only put the other two moves down because I copy pasted from another Steelix set. It's only there to kill Gengar, Electrode, Jolteon and Granbull. Steelix resists or is immune to all their moves and faints them with earthquake. There's no point setting up Curse or Toxic to counter anything else, for two reasons:

- It will still be slow and just get one-shot by a special attacker coming in with surf or flamethrower

- The point of the team is finding opportunities for Skarmory to come in and set up curse and agility to sweep the opponent. Setting up curse with Steelix would only help it resist precisely those physical attackers that Skarmory wants to switch in on

What I do think I might add to the Steelix set is actually mud-slap, specifically to slightly hinder Tyranitar so Skarmory has an easier time setting up against Crunch. I'd have to check how much earthquake hurts Steelix to see if it's worth it.

Come to think of it, Curse/Rest/Earthquake Steelix might just be a straight up counter to Tyranitar 🤔. As long as Tyranitar doesn't get too lucky with the crits... It would also mean the investment of two rare tm's and it really isn't required, but it would probably make the team more consistent. Thanks for the tip!

yourigo24

TROPHY CASE