Dear fellow gamers and Pokefans, I have to celebrate an amazing novelty that's going to change the face of my solo running career forever. As I was innocently watching a Youtube video about a Feebas Solo Run, I stumbled upon the most life-altering piece of Poke-data of them all: it is actually possible to trade Eggs. This means that you can raise the hatched 'Mon as your own, and thus do away with the Obedience cap entirely. I swear this never even crossed my mind; and I would have kept ignoring that blessed feature, possibly for years, if not for that video. So, a giant shout-out to Jrose for broadening my solo run horizons in the most dramatic and exponential way! I totally encourage you to check the man's channel if you don't know it already. He's kinda my polar opposite when it comes to running solo: while I'm all about slick cruising, one-shooting and over-leveling, he's all about mad challenges, under-leveling and pitch-perfect strategies — and it's quite fascinating to watch.
Indeed, the number of potential solo runs exploded with that discovery: I can now cruise with literally every single 'Mon, in any entry from Gen III onwards. Heck, I could even go as far back as Gen II if I had functioning GSC cartridges! And I'm not even mentioning the fact that trading Eggs allows me to run with a Lv. 1 'Mon from the very beginning of the game, thus experiencing the absolute quintessence of solo running and creating the most outstanding bond with my lone ranger. It also conveniently removes the temptation to slap a powerful TM on my One and 'Monly before Trading it, thus altering the purity and regularity of its growth. Not only that, but getting rid of the Obedience matter means that I can now battle to my heart's content, without ever having to worry about hitting the current cap. It always felt a tad counter-intuitive to delay my lone ranger's growth and pace myself, skipping battles and counting levels to avoid a mutiny. This is not how I envision a fulfilling solo run; I want to run and rush around, fight as many Trainers as I want, and generally blaze through the whole region while one-shooting every living thing.
Of course, there has to be a bit of a catch in such a amazingly perfect situation; and the catch is none other than the impossibility to pick up my One and 'Monly's Nature and Ability — lest I'm ready to go through the trouble of hatching several Eggs. On the other hand, Nature is not really relevant before Gen VI, and the choice of the Ability is only important in the case of an hindering Ability such as Normalize; so things are really not that dramatic after all. (And hey, getting a random Nature and Ability can even provide a modicum of challenge!) With that said, trading an Egg may not be exactly optimal for some 'Mons. Right now, the ones I can think of are the ones that evolve in a given place that may be far into the game, such as Glaceon or Leafeon. For those 'Mons, and those 'Mons only, a regular trade might prove the best option. But hey, we'll cross that bridge when we get to it! I'm hardly done wrapping my head about all my brand-new solo run options; for now, I'll just bask in the sheer joy of being able to cruise with 'Mons that were faraway dreams until now.
This also neatly solves the eternal quandary of 'Which entry should I tackle?'. The answer used to be "the entry that hosts the coveted One and 'Monly early on", then it became "any entry that hosts the coveted One and 'Monly and has an Obedience cap-friendly Gym Distribution "; now, it can be "any entry that hosts the coveted One and 'Monly" — full stop. Mind you, I'm certainly not planning to go as far as to cruise with a given 'Mon in every game it appears in; however, I can very well envision tackling a 'Mon's introducing entry, along with a much later entry if said 'Mon has been revamped in the meantime. As for 'Mons hailing from trade-devoid Gen I, I'll just cruise with them in FireRed and LeafGreen.
Of course, I had to try that shiny new trading avenue right away; and that's how I found myself trading an Egg in my freshest Y run, along with a Magna Armor Slugma to speed up hatching — and a Lucky Egg for my future One and 'Monly, just because I can. Gotta give the new baby a welcome gift, right? The ensuing run is still in progress, but let me tell you: this is absolute dope. I'll keep you posted soon enough, dear fellow gamers!
Before I take my leave, here's one last new rule for the Poke-posts to come — and the ones already written, which I'll amend in the process. Since Pokemon solo running has become a bit of a second career for me, I feel like it's time to be a mite more precise in my run reports titles; and thus, starting now, I'll use the name of the final form my lone ranger reaches in said titles. This way, you'll know immediately if we're dealing with a full evolution line run or a no-evo run. Well, that's all for now, dear fellow gamers; until next post, keep playing and take care!
I didn't even have to click the link to figure out you were talking about Jrose11. The man is a legend. The only one who did better videos was Pikasprey, who actually started the whole Pokemon solo run crazy with his Ditto challenges.
ReplyDeleteBut really, GF should just give you the option to start a new game with any pokemon you want; a cool little NG+. But that'd cut into the profits they make on their stupid Pokemon-Bank like apps, so that will never happen. Can't have any quality of life improvements when there's money to be made!
BTW, what are your thoughts about Nexomon? I'm going to buy it for my birthday soonish, but while it does look absolutely gorgeous, I still don't know what to expect from it. Still, since Digimon Survivor and any other Digimon games are in limbo for now, might as well get it. It's a better buy than getting the last Sw&Sh DLC that's for sure (which yes, it means I'm still not gonna play those games anytime soon even after they are 'complete').
I follow both Pikasprey and Jrose11; and man, do I dig their solo and challenge runs. Watching them nearly makes me want to put out my own Pokemon solo run videos — that is, before I remember that I'm way too lazy to edit videos and that I'm more at ease blogging anyway. :P These days, I'm gorging on Mah-Dry-Bread's runs — and reaping tons of new ideas for future solo endeavours in the process. Listening to Pokemon solo run videos while I'm cruising with my One and 'Monly du jour is very close to perfect happiness indeed. ^^
DeleteMan, I wish a feature similar to the Universal Pokemon Randomizer could be built into the games. Pokefans are already ditching the Starters in favour of other 'Mons for solo runs anyway; GameFreak might as well acknowledge this and let players pick up whatever 'Mon they fancy.
Funny that you should ask about Nexomon, because I purchased a physical copy a couple of days ago! I totally fell for the art style, and the prospect of playing a retro-ish monster collecting game is very alluring indeed. Let's trade impressions once we're both done playing it, shall we? Also — Happy Birthday, whenever that may be!^^
I have a vacation scheduled around Halloween, so I'll be sure to play it then (along with maybe, finally, getting around to beating Sheep Dog n' Wolf/Sheep Raiders on PS1). One thing is for sure, the battle art is amazing, and having 9 choices for a starter is just as amazing. I haven't wanted to spoil myself on the designs of the mons so far, but just picking a starter alone is going to be hard. Water bird, electric chameleon, a myriad of cute cats and dogs? How can one choose?
Delete(I have also heard it's open world and that the encounters scale to your level, so it might be possible to get a starter, ignore the story and travel get the actual mon you want without making any progress. If that's so, it'd make this game suited for solo runs.)
Thank you very much for the birthday wishes!
You can bet your sweet life I'm gonna try a Nexomon solo run first thing first - although level scaling could make the deed difficult. Oh well, we'll see soon enough! :D
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