Challenge 4th Generation Battle Facilities Discussion and Records

This is my turn to share about bad RNG. I’m new to competitive teams and I’m not that great at the battle frontier, but Darach is making me very mad. I probably should have just used dragon claw on Staraptor with a SD because if it’s not 100% accurate it’s 50% accurate. :( Even on the silver print he still makes me unable to play the game. I’ve lost to Palmer twice and Darach once today and this game is making me very upset right now.
I can see you must be new as many mistakes made in that battle, for 1 using smogon sets in frontier do not work its a completely different meta, moves likes stealth rock are completely redundant, also stone edge should only be used if its your only shot at winning, I have it on my garchomp but will usually only use it on moltres articuno regice etc. Leading with heatran isnt great either its coverage is very limited, garchomp is the ideal lead cause it can deal with half the pokedex alone and is a beast, alakazam is very underwhelming as has no immunites and is frail so cant really switch into anything safely, try gengar or lati@s they are way better, practice makes perfect you will get the hang of it after some time, hope these tips help and GL :)
 

The Mind Electric

Calming if you look at it right.
You have done factory but not hall?? Thats seriously odd lol
There are a lot of reasons why someone would do Factory before Hall. I would personally do it first if I was trying to do all the facilities on retail both to get it out of the way and to get a hefty supply of BP so I have an easier time getting my shit for the other facilities set up. The Factory allowing you to win BP consistently without doing any prep is really a godsend since many of the best items and TMs can only be purchased with BP at a pretty steep price.
 
I can see you must be new as many mistakes made in that battle, for 1 using smogon sets in frontier do not work its a completely different meta, moves likes stealth rock are completely redundant, also stone edge should only be used if its your only shot at winning, I have it on my garchomp but will usually only use it on moltres articuno regice etc. Leading with heatran isnt great either its coverage is very limited, garchomp is the ideal lead cause it can deal with half the pokedex alone and is a beast, alakazam is very underwhelming as has no immunites and is frail so cant really switch into anything safely, try gengar or lati@s they are way better, practice makes perfect you will get the hang of it after some time, hope these tips help and GL :)
Ok thanks! I thought using competitive Smogon sets would work fairly well but was confused when I didn’t breeze through even the earlier rounds. I’m not very good at building competitive builds by myself yet so ig I needed a little help from Smogon. I’ll replace Alakazam with Latias and get rid of some other bad moves. I didn’t realize that the battle frontier was so different from actual competitive. Any suggestions for a Lati@s build for me? Should I just make it a super fast and strong special sweeper with choice scarf or specs or set up with calm mind or something? I’ll make some changes to the team and hopefully it goes a little bit better, thanks for all the help! I’m still learning how the battling in the frontier works, thanks for being patient with my dumb strategies! :D
 
Ok thanks! I thought using competitive Smogon sets would work fairly well but was confused when I didn’t breeze through even the earlier rounds. I’m not very good at building competitive builds by myself yet so ig I needed a little help from Smogon. I’ll replace Alakazam with Latias and get rid of some other bad moves. I didn’t realize that the battle frontier was so different from actual competitive. Any suggestions for a Lati@s build for me? Should I just make it a super fast and strong special sweeper with choice scarf or specs or set up with calm mind or something? I’ll make some changes to the team and hopefully it goes a little bit better, thanks for all the help! I’m still learning how the battling in the frontier works, thanks for being patient with my dumb strategies! :D
For me special life orb sweeper works best for latis, something like draco meteor psychic grass knot and thunderbolt
 
Ok thanks! I thought using competitive Smogon sets would work fairly well but was confused when I didn’t breeze through even the earlier rounds. I’m not very good at building competitive builds by myself yet so ig I needed a little help from Smogon. I’ll replace Alakazam with Latias and get rid of some other bad moves. I didn’t realize that the battle frontier was so different from actual competitive. Any suggestions for a Lati@s build for me? Should I just make it a super fast and strong special sweeper with choice scarf or specs or set up with calm mind or something? I’ll make some changes to the team and hopefully it goes a little bit better, thanks for all the help! I’m still learning how the battling in the frontier works, thanks for being patient with my dumb strategies! :D
Main difference between OU and frontier is in OU you have a full team of 6 to battle with and you are just catering to a small selection of OU mons, in frontier you have half the team and an entire pokedex to counter so the needs are hugely different, whereas slower stall plays work in the OU they will not work in the fast paced frontier facilities
 
Hey everyone:

New here, so let me know if there's a better place to ask this.

I was wondering if anyone had an explanation for a baffling AI decision I saw against Dahlia-49 in Platinum's Arcade.

So I've been leading with a Tyranitar in the Arcade since it gets a boost from sand in an environment with no held items (and turns any weather space on the board into a free space). This is its set:

Tyranitar
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 6 Def
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 28 HP / 20 Def / 1 SpA / 28 SpD / 8 Spe
- Crunch
- Stone Edge
- Earthquake
- Thunder Punch

I realize it's far from perfect. Its job against Dahlia was basically just to beat Zapdos 938, which she led with:

Zapdos
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: all 31? not sure about Gen 4 Frontier Brains and the IVs of trainers in fight 7 of a set
- Thunderbolt
- Air Cutter
- Heat Wave
- Signal Beam

So it hits TTar with Signal Beam, does about 33% (IIRC), TTar kills with Stone Edge. Dahlia sends out Blaziken 766:

Blaziken
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: all 31?
- Flare Blitz
- Superpower
- Thunder Punch
- Night Slash

At this point TTar's job is done, so I just leave it in to die, expecting Superpower.

It goes for Flare Blitz.

I'm not sure why. Superpower is an outspeed + easy OHKO, even if TTar weren't sitting at ~67%. Its other moves barely scratch it. Dahlia's AI should be "Smart" in the sense of choosing the best attack; I realize that Smart AI is sometimes reluctant to use moves like Superpower because of their stat reduction, but Flare Blitz is a recoil move and should fall into that same category.

At worst, I'd expect Thunder Punch since it does the most damage of any non-drawback move. And if she's willing to use a drawback move, why not the one that will KO? I don't remember all the details of the fight afterward, as it was several months ago, and I did win, but it spooked me because my plan for lead Blaziken would've been to switch in a Gengar on Superpower, and Flare Blitz obviously would've annihilated it. It contradicts everything I know about predicting the AI in Gen 4. Is recoil just prioritized above stat reduction?

Hilariously, it burned TTar, so EQ didn't even kill it. I think it finished it off with Burn Damage + another Flare Blitz in Blaze. I landed on a no-event space for the fight, so that wasn't a factor; I don't think Dahlia's Pokemon actually get their items, so Blaziken 766 is without its usual White Herb, which I guess makes Superpower a bit less likely.

I tend to use suboptimal/ingame-team Pokemon I catch in the wild for the Frontier, so predicting the AI and running calcs makes a big difference in getting the Prints. If anyone can provide insight on this, I'd be very grateful--especially because I'm trying to repeat my success with the same TTar lead in SoulSilver.

Thanks again.
 
Hey everyone:

New here, so let me know if there's a better place to ask this.

I was wondering if anyone had an explanation for a baffling AI decision I saw against Dahlia-49 in Platinum's Arcade.

So I've been leading with a Tyranitar in the Arcade since it gets a boost from sand in an environment with no held items (and turns any weather space on the board into a free space). This is its set:

Tyranitar
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 6 Def
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 28 HP / 20 Def / 1 SpA / 28 SpD / 8 Spe
- Crunch
- Stone Edge
- Earthquake
- Thunder Punch

I realize it's far from perfect. Its job against Dahlia was basically just to beat Zapdos 938, which she led with:

Zapdos
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: all 31? not sure about Gen 4 Frontier Brains and the IVs of trainers in fight 7 of a set
- Thunderbolt
- Air Cutter
- Heat Wave
- Signal Beam

So it hits TTar with Signal Beam, does about 33% (IIRC), TTar kills with Stone Edge. Dahlia sends out Blaziken 766:

Blaziken
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: all 31?
- Flare Blitz
- Superpower
- Thunder Punch
- Night Slash

At this point TTar's job is done, so I just leave it in to die, expecting Superpower.

It goes for Flare Blitz.

I'm not sure why. Superpower is an outspeed + easy OHKO, even if TTar weren't sitting at ~67%. Its other moves barely scratch it. Dahlia's AI should be "Smart" in the sense of choosing the best attack; I realize that Smart AI is sometimes reluctant to use moves like Superpower because of their stat reduction, but Flare Blitz is a recoil move and should fall into that same category.

At worst, I'd expect Thunder Punch since it does the most damage of any non-drawback move. And if she's willing to use a drawback move, why not the one that will KO? I don't remember all the details of the fight afterward, as it was several months ago, and I did win, but it spooked me because my plan for lead Blaziken would've been to switch in a Gengar on Superpower, and Flare Blitz obviously would've annihilated it. It contradicts everything I know about predicting the AI in Gen 4. Is recoil just prioritized above stat reduction?

Hilariously, it burned TTar, so EQ didn't even kill it. I think it finished it off with Burn Damage + another Flare Blitz in Blaze. I landed on a no-event space for the fight, so that wasn't a factor; I don't think Dahlia's Pokemon actually get their items, so Blaziken 766 is without its usual White Herb, which I guess makes Superpower a bit less likely.

I tend to use suboptimal/ingame-team Pokemon I catch in the wild for the Frontier, so predicting the AI and running calcs makes a big difference in getting the Prints. If anyone can provide insight on this, I'd be very grateful--especially because I'm trying to repeat my success with the same TTar lead in SoulSilver.

Thanks again.
I don't think I've seen any instance where good ai will go for superpower, in any situation, even if it kills and its other moves do very little. I don't believe it's something I've seen with other attack-lowering moves(draco, overheat), and good ai will freely click close combat in situations where it's good, but for some reason, superpower seems to be so heavily weighted down due to its lowering of both attack and defense that the only situation where I would expect superpower to be used is if none of the other moves that it could use would have any effect (e.g. donphan2 vs skarmory)

I'd like to see a replay of a battle 35+ where the ai will actually go for superpower, because I don't think I've seen it.
 
AI has the ability to branch into separate subroutines for each move effect, and for effect #182 (Superpower), "expert AI" discourages the move in the following cases: it's not very effective/immune, or the user's attack stat is already lower than -1, or the user is faster and its HP is above 40%, or the user is slower and its HP is below 60%. Meanwhile, effect #253 (Flare Blitz) is grouped in with the other recoil moves, and that block contains no cause for discouraging the move, only for encouraging it (if the user has Rock Head or Magic Guard, and the move isn't NVE/immune). So the way they've laid out the reward structure there is going to give a bias toward recoil moves with that particular combo, and the discouragement for being fast and full health with Superpower cancels out the bonus it gets for being the most damaging move/KO move.
 
Thank you both! Is there a resource for further reading on AI behavior and move choice subroutines? And is it reasonable to expect Blaziken to pretty much always use Flare Blitz in the scenario I described? It is the strongest move besides Superpower, but I don't want to switch in a Gyarados and get bopped by Thunder Punch.

Also, any info on Frontier Brain IVs, or those of fight 7 in a given set? I found a list of the Emerald Brains' sets and stats, although I realize that unlike them, the Gen 4 Brains pull from the same sets that all the other Battle Frontier trainers do. It makes things a little ambiguous.
 
Frontier brains in PtHGSS will always have maximum IVs, except for fighting Thorton at battle 21, where he has 12 IV.
Thanks. I figured as much, but I wanted to be sure. I ended up getting the Gold Print in SoulSilver the other day with the TTar lead. Swapped out TPunch for Ice Punch, Dahlia led with Zapdos again anyway.

Funnily enough, I saw another baffling Blaziken play during Set 7. Basically the same situation, ~67% TTar against Blaziken, except it was Blaziken3 (630) this time.

Blaziken
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 24
- Blaze Kick
- Earthquake
- Shadow Claw
- Stone Edge

It goes for Stone Edge instead of EQ, a stronger move with no drawbacks and better accuracy. Granted, EQ probably wasn't a KO move if I remembered TTar's HP right, but still. I saw this matchup as a little testing ground for Dahlia in the event it was Blaziken4 (and figuring an EQ from Blaziken3 would be even better) and switched to Gyarados, only to eat rocks. At least it didn't crit, but it makes even less sense than the previous example. If high-crit moves are encouraged in the absence of a kill move, I'm surprised I haven't noticed before.

I legit almost never see the AI choose a move I didn't expect, and they definitely don't predict switches. It doesn't seem like a quirk of the Arcade AI since it's been consistent (random move choice through Set 4 besides Dahlia, smart move choice for Set 5+).

I'm starting to think Blazikens are just stupid.
 
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Was your ttar given a shuca berry or something from the roulette? If so, that easily explains its decision to use stone edge.
It definitely didn't have a berry, or any item. I think I landed on either freezing or lowering HP for the opponent. Other possibilities were sleep, level-up on me, weather (all irrelevant thanks to Sand Stream), board speed decrease, or no event.

Sorry that I don't remember all the details more clearly, but I'm pretty sure I'd recall if something would've made an obvious difference.
 
Let us revamp a fun 12-year-old challenge! Battle Tower in 71 minutes and 32 seconds
(from "Welcome to the Battle Tower" to the first black frame after Palmer as per speedrun rules; it's slightly over 72 minutes until "We hope to see you again!")
[edit: also note that at least some of the previous records did the challenge in Platinum, which is slower because HGSS doesn't have the Pokémon animations when they enter the field]

I did at least a couple of big mistakes, but it was pretty fast overall.

Starmie @ Life Orb, Natural Cure, 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe, Modest, Surf / Psychic / Thunderbolt / Ice Beam
Garchomp @ Focus Sash, Sand Veil, 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe, Jolly, Outrage / Earthquake, Fire Fang, Swords Dance
Scizor @ Sitrus Berry, Technician, 84 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 168 Spe, Adamant, Bullet Punch / Bug Bite / Superpower / Swords Dance (should have been 84/252/4/0/4/164, but oh well)
Dragonite @ Lum Berry, Inner Focus, 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe, Adamant, Outrage / Earthquake / Extreme Speed / Dragon Dance

Round 1: Dragonite, Starmie, Garchomp
Round 2: Starmie, Garchomp, Dragonite
Round 3: Starmie, Scizor, Dragonite
Rounds 4,5,6,7: Starmie, Garchomp, Scizor

 
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atsync

Where the "intelligence" of TRAINERS is put to the test!
is a Pokemon Researcheris a Contributor to Smogon
I added that. I could maybe note which game is used for each record on the list, but it isn't entirely clear to me which game was used for some of the records (one even says "PtHGSS"), although some could maybe be guessed at based on the post date (circa 2009 makes HGSS less likely unless the record was done on a Japanese cart).

If there ends up being enough interest in speed-running 1-49 Tower, a part of me thinks that it might be better to start the list fresh, with a clearly defined standard set of rules regarding timings, etc., so that records can be compared more easily. The old records could be listed separately or removed (they are archived in the old Frontier thread so they could still be accessed).
 
When I am doing the first 49 wins I always lead with crown Raikou, it saves me so much time, it 1 shots 70-80 of everything with expert belt or life orb, and aura sphere dodging hax is fantastic
 
I've gone ahead and added that guide to the OP for easier access.

Spoke about this briefly on discord but:



Thorton actually seems to use different sets depending on whether you're playing in Platinum or HGSS. As far as I know, this is the only difference between both versions.

In Platinum:

Level 50Open Level
Battle 21 (Thorton1, Silver) (IV=12)High Tier (set 1)High Tier (set 4) and Legendaries (any set)
Battle 49 (Thorton2, Gold) (IV=31)High Tier (set 1)High Tier (set 4) and Legendaries (any set)

In HGSS:

Level 50Open Level
Battle 21 (Thorton1, Silver) (IV=12)High Tier (set 1)High Tier (set 1)
Battle 49 (Thorton2, Gold) (IV=31)High Tier (set 4) and Legendaries (any set)High Tier (set 4) and Legendaries (any set)

In other words, it looks like they swapped the Level 50 Gold battle with the Open Level Silver battle in the transition from Platinum to HGSS.

I'm not 100% certain about his IVs in Platinum. In HGSS he uses IV=12 for battle 1 and IVs=31 for battle 2. It may be similar in Platinum but if this was a straight swap between the versions it honestly wouldn't surprise me if both of his Level 50 battles were done with IVs=12 and both of his Open Level battles were done with IVs=31. Probably the first way to test this would be to challenge Open Level in Platinum and check his IVs during the Silver battle - if they are 31 then I would suspect that the IVs for the Gold battle in level 50 are 12.

EDIT:

This video of Thorton2 in Platinum is from TotalPotato's 52 win streak. In the battle, Ambipom1 inflicts 53 damage with Shadow Claw against TotalPotato's 31 IV Nidoking3 which is only possible if Ambipom1's Attack IV is 21 or higher. Since it can't be 12, I therefore believe that the Platinum IVs are probably the same as HGSS (12 for battle 1, 31 for battle 2).
Is this true? Would that mean that Level 50 Platinum is easier than Open Level and that HGSS Open Level and Level 50 are equally balanced? aka
L50(Pt)<L50 or OL (HGSS) < OL (Pt)?
 
Hi. Long time, no see. I haven't really posted here in a few months. In that time, instead of working on a long streak, I got several smaller streaks in a variety of modes in this place. Here's what I've managed.

Completed streak in Castle Singles (389 wins)

Obviously, losing my Castle streak in the 200s was a huge bummer. The very next thing I did was start up Castle again for a second try. The team may look the same, but the strategies were somewhat different.
Garchomp (M) @ Persim Berry / Sitrus Berry / Lum Berry / Leftovers / Liechi Berry / Salac Berry / Choice Band / Choice Scarf / Haban Berry / Wide Lens / Focus Sash / Shell Bell / Yache Berry / None
Ability: Sand Veil
Level: 50
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 22 SpA
- Earthquake
- Outrage
- Swords Dance
- Substitute
Persim became my go-to item instead of Shell Bell, because Garchomp needed to switch items a lot. I even used a few items that weren't listed above in super-niche scenarios. Even so, all of these items listed above are something I have given chomp in a scenario that I would call semi-common.

Gengar (M) @ Focus Sash / Petaya Berry
Ability: Levitate
Level: 50
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 Def
- Shadow Ball
- Energy Ball
- Thunderbolt
- Destiny Bond
Compared to Garchomp, Gengar lacks the huge item variety. Petaya is a niche item for Gengar because it doesn't lead and can have a bit of trouble switching in. During this streak, I started d-bonding on evasion item users.

Scizor (M) @ Aspear Berry / Sitrus Berry / Lum Berry / Leftovers
Ability: Technician
Level: 50
EVs: 80 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD / 168 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 22 SpA
- Bullet Punch
- Superpower
- Bug Bite
- Swords Dance
Compared to last run, I bought Leftovers on Scizor way less, mainly because I needed a freeze-healing berry more often and Leftovers was too expensive to constantly buy and replace. Sitrus gave it healing at way lower CP cost, and became my go-to item for Scizor whenever I didn't need a freeze immunity.

The loss was against a trainer with Exeggutor3, Leafeon4, and Abomasnow34. My plan here was to set up Scizor and sweep under trick room, but immediately after switching Scizor into a wood hammer and seeing TR go up, Exeggutor immediately exploded despite being at almost full health, instantly KOing the scizor. Garchomp was at half health from the previous battles in the set, no way could it beat two grasses with trick room being up.
I may come back to castle, but not for a while. I'm also miffed about just barely missing out on the #3 leaderboard spot.

Completed Arcade Singles streak (114 wins)
Garchomp (M) @ None
Ability: Sand Veil
Level: 50
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 22 SpA
- Earthquake
- Outrage
- Swords Dance
- Substitute

Gengar (M) @ None
Ability: Levitate
Level: 50
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk / 30 Def
- Shadow Ball
- Energy Ball
- Thunderbolt
- Destiny Bond

Scizor (M) @ None
Ability: Technician
Level: 50
EVs: 80 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD / 168 Spe
Adamant Nature
IVs: 22 SpA
- Bullet Punch
- Superpower
- Substitute
- Swords Dance

I'll be honest. Arcade was more entertaining than I was expecting it to be, and my team suited Arcade way better than I expected it to. Scizor gets Substitute here because I no longer need it to maintain high health throughout the round.
My strategy with the roulette put some thought into it. First, I'd take note of the opponent's trainer class and sets, and try to figure out a game plan before opening up the roulette wheel. I'd think of some outcomes that I'd really want to go for, and some that I really want to avoid. Then, I'd open up the roulette. I'd take note of which squares were available, and I'd aim for clusters of squares that were either favorable or that didn't hinder me too much, like being poisoned or losing HP. Sometimes, there weren't good clusters available, so I'd aim for clusters that didn't contain anything that'd make me straight up lose if I mistimed the wheel. Over the course of the streak, I got much better at timing the wheel, to the point where I could semi-consistently hit a square at default speed.
The loss, as could be expected, was to a team-swap square at the worst possible time. I overshot my cluster by four squares and swapped teams with a guitarist with Lanturn4/Infernape4/Jolteon4 at 21 IVs. All three of those mons lose to Garchomp, but I nearly managed to hax my way to a victory, only to get shut down by my own Gengar.
That said, there's lots of room for improvement here, and I think that stealing the #1 Arcade spot is feasible if you're willing to put some effort into it.

In between losing my Castle streak and finally deciding to get Arcade over and done with, I played Factory a bit at random, testing out different formats whenever I had the spare time. Here's what I managed to get:

55 wins in Battle Factory Singles (Level 100)
Yeah. Not exactly the longest streak, but still worthy of submitting to the leaderboard. I got this in December 2020, so my memory is really foggy, but I still have the discord logs. I got to round 5 with 21 trades, and my team was Skuntank4/Gyarados4/Regice4. Traded my first slot around, ending up with Magnezone4. Saw a Salamence4 that I then took over Regice, and a Roserade that I never listed the set for but ended up taking over Salamence.
Round 6, I got a bad draft and settled on Zapdos1/Umbreon4/Nidoqueen4(rivalry). Fortunately I hit a lot of Thunders and survived long enough to get a better team. Ended up with Zapdos1/Lickilicky4/Milotic3, which somehow managed to survive to make it through the round.
Round 7, the draft railroaded me into Jolteon4/Whiscash1/Weavile4, but I luckily managed to get my hands on Starmie1 after the first battle. That team lasted me until Thorton's Flying specialization, where I took Salamence3 over Starmie so that I would have a switch-in for any Grounds he brought. He brought all 3 kanto birds, and I swept with Jolteon.
Round 8, I drafted Latias4/Medicham1/Togekiss3(Serene Grace). Team was good enough for me to keep the entire round. I lost to Gyarados/Luxray4/Sceptile after Latias missed Draco Meteor vs. Luxray, which OHKOed back with a crit Crunch. It was hopeless from there as Luxray managed to spread paralysis and the Sceptile killed my dreams of coming back.

But we aren't done here! See, before playing round 5 of that streak, I said that the next time I lost level 100 factory, I'd start doing level 50 doubles for the sake of variety. So, after I got that streak, I switched to doing Doubles streaks instead, and the results were nothing short of crazy.

49 wins in Battle Factory Doubles (Level 50)
Yeah. Factory doubles is absolutely horrible because you're using 3-mon teams in Doubles, never mind the fact that you still have to deal with normal Factory bullshit. To make things even worse, the AI will intelligently target moves from the get-go, making them a lot deadlier in early rounds while still being somewhat unpredictable. In level 50 this isn't as bad since they'll still occasionally select a "nothing" move, but in level 100 this means that you're effectively playing against strong AI. I died in round 2 a bunch, but somehow, on what I'm guessing to be less than 15 attempts at level 50, I got this run. I'm not going to cover rounds 1-3 here, but since round 4 isn't actually a freebie I'll write it up.
Round 4: Draft milotic1/weezing2/slaking1/snorlax2/golem1/vespiquen2. Incredibly unsynergetic draft in Doubles. Milo/Golem/Lax. I hate having to lead Golem but it's the only way to make this team work. I got a Sudowoodo2 from battle 22, and a Staraptor1 from battle 23. Opponents fortunately drew bad mons - battle 28 had a lead Absol2 and Drapion2. Snorlax put in a lot of work throughout the round.
Round 5: Draft medicham2/magnezone2/shiftry3/muk3/ambipom3/starmie3. Actually a decent draft. Went Starmie3/Medicham2/Shiftry3. Immediately run into Dusknoir2/Lopunny2 leads in battle 29, which Medicham's moveset is actually really nice to have. Got a Blaziken1 from battle 30 for EndRev/Surf abuse, and kept it throughout the round. The opponents got consistently strong teams here - I don't think I ever steamrolled a battle during this round. I had close battles here, and had to think a lot. Here's an example of something I had to get through during that round.
Battle 35
My team:
358 | Blaziken | Adamant | Salac Berry | Blaze Kick | Reversal | Aerial Ace | Endure | Atk/Spe
722 | Starmie | Modest | Wise Glasses | Surf | Psychic | Power Gem | Signal Beam | SpA/Spe
660 | Shiftry | Modest | White Herb | Leaf Storm | Dark Pulse | Focus Blast | Shadow Ball | HP/SpA

Opponent's team:
650 | Raichu | Timid | Petaya Berry | Thunderbolt | Focus Blast | Signal Beam | Nasty Plot | SpA/Spe
750 | Magmortar | Adamant | Passho Berry | Flare Blitz | ThunderPunch | Earthquake | Brick Break | Atk/Spe
713 | Gliscor | Jolly | Focus Sash | Guillotine | Earthquake | U-turn | Counter | HP/Spe

Raichu/Magmortar leads scared me. Starmie outsped Raichu by one point, but Passho berry on Magmortar means I can't OHKO it. Furthermore, Magmortar is extremely unpredictable here. I decided to switch Starmie out to Shiftry on turn 1, expecting Tbolt into that slot from Raichu and either ThunderPunch or Earthquake from Magmortar. Meanwhile, Blaziken can put Raichu in the red with Blaze Kick while surviving anything Magmortar does. If Magmortar goes for EQ, then it KOs its partner Raichu, while if it uses ThunderPunch, Blaziken gets through the turn unscathed.

Turn 1:
Switch Starmie out for Shiftry
Raichu uses Thunderbolt, Shiftry takes 25.1-29.8% damage
Magmortar uses ThunderPunch, Shiftry takes 15.1-18.3% damage
Blaziken uses Blaze Kick, Raichu KO (11/16 chance to KO)
Gliscor sent in to replace Raichu

Perfect. Blaze Kick hits and gets a KO range on the Raichu, while Shiftry soaks up some Electric moves and is still over half health. I'm in a weird position - Gliscor3 is faster than its ally Magmortar, but not only does Magmortar live the hit if it EQs, it's unlikely to do so anyway, as U-turn would OHKO (and then some) Shiftry. I absolutely need to chip that Gliscor before it has a chance to hax Starmie. Blaziken actually lives EQ, so I'll aim Dark Pulse into the Gliscor slot so that even if both enemies EQ, I'll have chipped the Gliscor into spread Surf range.

Turn 2:
Gliscor uses U-Turn, Shiftry KO
Magmortar uses Flare Blitz, Blaziken takes 44.5-52.7% damage
Magmortar is hurt by the recoil! 14.7-17.5% damage
Blaziken uses Aerial Ace, Gliscor takes 16.4-19.8% damage
Starmie sent in to replace Shiftry

This is perfect. Starmie can spread Surf while Blaziken endures, and I win from there. In case Starmie gets crit by Magmortar, Blaziken is ready to finish it off next turn with a full-power Reversal.

Turn 3:
Blaziken uses Endure!
Starmie uses Surf, Gliscor KO, Magmortar takes 44.1-52.4% damage, Blaziken endured the hit! Blaziken ate its Salac berry
Magmortar uses Earthquake, Starmie takes 34.6-40.7% damage, Blaziken endured the hit!

Turn 4: Blaziken used Reversal, Magmortar KO.

A really awkward lead situation instantly turned to my favor thanks to good knowledge of AI tendencies.
Round 6: Draft weavile4/aggron3/ludicolo4(rain dish)/heracross4/yanmega4(speed boost)/arcanine3(intimidate). Pretty decent draft. Heracross4 screams "Lead me!". Took Arcanine3/Heracross4/Ludicolo4. Ludicolo4 helps deal with battle 36's water specialist. Took Gyarados3 as a better intimidator than Arcanine. Team was actually really good. Took Absol3 over Ludicolo4 to help deal with a grass specialist, then had several scares vs. Dugtrio2 of all things thanks to its Alakazam2 partner. Made it through the round fine, though.
Round 7: I'm already past the record, let's try to go the distance here. Draft tyranitar3/gliscor4(24 IV)/ampharos4(31 IV)/heracross4(31 IV)/latias1/electrode4(24 IV), which is straight-up incredible. I took Heracross/Electrode/Gliscor, with the strategy that Electrode goes boom on turns Heracross is likely to faint anyway, which both does good damage to the enemy team and procs my Salac berry, while Heracross and Gliscor clean up. Took a Crobat4 from battle 45, and steamrolled pretty much everything until battle 47, which had a horrendous Gengar3/Machamp3 lead pair with Blaziken3 backup. The battle ended with Crobat on literally 1 HP after a Machamp QC stone edge and Blaziken missed stone edge(In gen 4, a double KO results in a loss). Steamrolled battles 48 and 49, yay.
Battle 50: Flareon2/Lanturn2/Floatzel1/Garchomp3/Feraligatr2/Lucario2 draft. Awful draft in doubles. None of these mons are any sort of reliable or consistent. I picked Lucario/Gatr leads, with Chomp in back so that I could maybe block an Electric move aimed at Gatr. Battle 50 had Skarmory3/Abomasnow2 leads. Double targetted Abomasnow with Ice Punch (Lucario) + Superpower (Feraligatr), and it didn't die. Politoed2 came out last, and bullied my team to death with Perish Song + Dive. Pretty hopeless battle there without risking a cross chop miss.

But wait, there's more!
48 wins in Battle Factory Doubles (Level 100)
Obviously, after my miraculous Level 50 doubles run, I had to try to be the first person to reach 49 wins in all gen 4 factory formats. I didn't quite reach it, but I came damn close.
Level 100 Doubles Factory is the worst format in any facility. It puts Palace and Gen 6 AI Multis to shame with how little control you have and how you're thrown directly into the deep end. In nearly four months of sporadic attempts, I only got past round 3 once. My recollection of this is even hazier since I'd only logged it on Discord after the fact, but here's how it went.
Round 4, I got a solid draft, chose Garchomp4/Meganium4/Floatzel4, and ended up with the opportunity to trade for Staraptor3. I apparently faced 5 lead intimidators during that round and ended with 21 trades.
Round 5, I got Electrode4(20IV)/Rapidash4/Froslass3/Latios1(20IV)/Swampert4(20IV)/Regirock2 as my draft. While this looks pretty fine at a glance, when you take a closer look at the sets there's some glaring issues. The only thing that can absorb Electrode's explosion is Froslass3, which is a huge crapshoot. Latios1 and Regirock2 are their worst sets for Doubles, and the only thing that can take Swampert's Earthquake is Latios. I chose Swampert4/Latios1/Rapidash4 and survived 6 battles thanks to not facing any Dragon-type leads, which would probably have instantly ended the run. Going into Battle 35, my trade options were Snorlax4/Venusaur4/Infernape4. When I saw I was facing a Dragon specialist, my first thought was to pick Infernape, and pray that they were leading a slow Kingdra set and that their other dragon was in back. When I saw Flygon and Salamence leads, I resigned myself to losing. The Flygon was set 4 and Outrage went in to Latios, while Swampert took a Dragon Claw from Salamence1 and KOed back with Avalanche. Last mon was Lucario, and I wasn't out of the woods yet, but Outrage went into Infernape and Swampert managed to survive another turn to 2HKO the Flygon. Overall, this round actually got me to warm up to Latios1 due to how much work it put in.
Round 6: Nidoking4 (24 IV, poison point)/Donphan4 (20IV)/Regice3 (20IV)/Golduck3 (24IV)/Staraptor4 (20IV)/Exeggutor4 (24IV) draft. Took Nidoking/Staraptor/Regice. Poison Point Nidoking4 and Staraptor4 are a very respectable lead pair, and Regice takes advantage of Intimidate while not instantly crumpling to Blizzards. Steamrolled the entire round, except for 41, where I ended up with a solo Regice vs. half-health Whiscash3 and a +1 Alakazam2, which missed Fissure and Focus Blast respectively.
Round 7: Rhyperior4/Salamence4/Mismagius4/Swampert3/Suicune2/Aggron2. There isn't much of a choice to be made here. Rhyperior4 and Salamence4 are incredible sets with incredible synergy, and Mismagius4 complements them both very well. I eventually got my hands on a 24IV Infernape4. I didn't record much of this round, so I have to assume I steamrolled everything until the loss.
Battle 49, Infernape4/Salamence4/Mismagius4 vs. Yanmega4(speed boost)/Floatzel2/Gliscor2:
On turn 1, I was scared of Floatzel's Ice moves, so I tried to double into it. Unfortunately, it used Double Team, and Infernape's Thunder Punch missed while Salamence's Outrage went into the Yanmega slot. Yanmega survived and OHKOed Infernape with Psychic.
Turn 2, Yanmega aimed Air Slash at Salamence, Mismagius finished off the Yanmega, and Floatzel DT'd again.
Turn 3, Outrage goes into Floatzel and misses, Thunderbolt misses Floatzel, and Gliscor Ice Fanged my mence.
Turn 4, Floatzel Attracts and immobilizes Mismagius, while Gliscor starts working towards a 3HKO with fang moves.
Turn 5, another double team, and Thunderbolt finally hits. Too little, too late, as by now I'd need either a Shadow Ball crit or for Gliscor to miss.
It's hard to say whether I misplayed this at turn 1. Obviously, against the actual sets, what I did was pretty much the worst thing possible, but 3 out of 4 Yanmega sets were nearly harmless and 3 out of 4 Floatzel sets were immediately threatening.

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Hi! I've been lurking here and reading the archived thread for a while while coming up with stuff to get the 100 victories on the battle tower for the first time to get 5 stars, but I didn't want to just use trickscarf since I hadn't thought of it myself, even though it looked like the main strategy people used. Took me 8 tries with this team and I'll probably just leave it at 105 for now since I managed to complete my objective but here's the team:

Swampert (9,29,27,2,28,31) @ Sitrus berry (lum berry for the first 6 rounds) , Torrent, 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Spe, Adamant, Waterfall / Superpower / Earthquake / Ice punch
Registeel (25,29,25,14,23,20) @ Leftovers, Clear body, 252 HP / 188 Def / 68 SpD, Careful, Iron head / Curse / Amnesia / Substitute
Gengar (17,15,31,16,28,30) @ Focus sash, levitate, 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe, Timid, Sludge bomb / Shadow ball / Thunderbolt / Destiny bond

I was happy to see it was original enough, the general strategy was that Swampert is only weak to grass type, and both Gengar and Registeel fare very well against grass types for the most part. Psychic type mons with grass type attacks were generally dealt with by registeel alone, and if they had focus blast, a timely switch to Gengar who usually outsped them did the job, in fact, this synergy between Gengar and Registeel where I could often switch to gengar from registeel without taking any damage was very useful. Had to pp stall a Lickilicky's earthquake because it knew power whip but power whip did just about no damage to registeel.

Breloom and Polywrath were notable threats to this team, breloom in particular would just destroy me if Gengar had been taken out before (which ended at least one of my runs and taght me to value gengar more) and Polywrath was annoying because of hypnosis + water hits all my team for neutral damage, and it could always hit Registeel for supereffective damage, it ended my first run. Water types in general are why Gengar's last slot was thunderbolt, plus Gyarados' was a massive threat otherwise.

There'd be plenty of battles that would end immediately because the first enemy mon wouldn't be able to deal enough damage to Registeel and I'd just set up and win. Sometimes Swampert would get easy matchups that didn't favour Registeel and I'd just use Swampert then. Sometimes I'd be faced with mons like Heracross where I recall determining my best bet was to pivot through Registeel to Gengar to preserve the sash since they usually began with megahorn. Other times Swampert would just die, and Gengar would have to clean up.

Here's proof, I hope I did it correctly since it's my first post.
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Yo.

I got a streak of 220 wins in the Battle Hall (HeartGold) with Garchomp. Nothing special about this Garchomp or the run which I recorded in it's entirety here. I ended up losing, predictably, to Weavile.

Picture:

20211129_202205.jpg


Garchomp set:

Garchomp (M) @ Focus Sash
Ability: Sand Veil
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
IVs: 0 SpA
- Earthquake
- Outrage
- Fire Fang
- Swords Dance

Shamelessly borrowed stolen set and strategy from this post. I am also giving the Battle Factory a go so I will probably be back :]
 
Yo again!

I said I would be trying out the Battle Factory and that I'd probably be back. Well here I am with a win streak of 45 in Singles lvl 50.

I recorded the run in its entirety here. Picture proof:

battle factory singles lvl 50 - 45 win streak.png


Data:
Round 1 Set: Aron-74, Volbeat-136, Mantyke-93, Magnemite-59, Weepinbell-127, Bulbasaur-1
Round 1 Choices: Mantyke, Magnemite, Volbeat

Round 2 Set: Hitmonchan-215, Ivysaur-151, Chimecho-285 , Primeape-213, Grumpig-236, Shelgon-179
Round 2 Choices: Grumpig, Chimecho, Primeape

Round 3 Set: Rampardos-430, Primeape-313, Monferno-261, Sunflora-284, Skuntank-383, Kadabra-278
Round 3 Choices: Primeape, Skuntank, Kadabra

Round 4 Set: Gengar-555, Nidoqueen-407, Leafeon-457, Lickilicky-581, Probopass-461, Drapion-568
Round 4 Choices: Drapion, Lickilicky, Gengar

Round 5 Set: Bastiodon-547, Toxicroak-677, Absol-646, Wailord-700, Kingdra-746, Tentacruel-578
Round 5 Choices: Toxicroak, Kingdra, Absol

Round 6 Set: Lickilicky-717, Staraptor-789, Wailord-836, Yanmega-854, Muk-690, Mr. Mime-777
Round 6 Choices: Staraptor, Mr. Mime, Yanmega

Round 7 Set: Infernape-361, Houndoom-834, Marowak-500, Aggron-599, Granbull-775, Slowking-810
Round 7 Choices: Infernape, Slowking, Marowak

- Bold: Elevations | Italic: Selected Elevations | Numbers: The index of the Pokemon

Loss:
Lost on battle #46 to Houndoom, Mamoswine, Ampharos using Infernape, Slowking, Floatzel.

T1: Fake Out on Houndoom
T2: Close Combat KO on Houndoom, out Mamoswine

Mistake: T3: Switch to Floatzel, Mamo KOs with Double-edge. Now I know it's Mamoswine-873.
When I calc'd Infernape vs Mamoswine, Close Combat did not KO. What I did wrong was calculate with IVs of 31 on Mamo instead of 24:

With 31: 252 Atk Infernape Close Combat vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Mamoswine: 212-252 (97.6 - 116.1%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO
With 24: 252 Atk Infernape Close Combat vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Mamoswine: 218-258 (102.3 - 121.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Had I correctly calc'd I would've just CC'd Mamo for the KO and 3v1'd Ampharos. Instead, the following happened.

T4: Out Infernape, Fake Out
T5: CC, KO Mamoswine, out Ampharos
T6: Infernape is currently at -1 def/spdef, so I looked at calcs. Infernape CCs for a lot, Static activates, Ampharos hits Focus Blast and KOs.
T7: Ampharos outspeeds and KOs Slowking with Thunder.

Focus Blast KOs of course but Thunder was a roll (56.3% chance to OHKO). Focus Blast was 84% accurate with Zoom Lens whereas Thunder was the raw 70% due to Ampharos going first. A bit unlucky there.

Other:

- I got lucky a few times such as needing to hit 2 focus blasts in a row with Mr. Mime at one point and Kadabra Psychic 2HKO roll on Thorton's Vespiquen.
- I think I chose well for every round with the exception of the 7th, did not like my choices.
- Swapped poorly a few times throughout round 5 I think.

I will be back with a 49+ win streak eventually :]
 
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Why does a sandstorm from a sandstream setter not subside in the battle tower, is it just Platinum or HG and SS as well. I'm currently in a stall battle with a Blissey and it been over 10+ turn since I knocked out Hippowdon. Any info would help!
 

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