Part 16: Rezzai Desert

Hello everyone and welcome back! Today we've got it all! There's two new towns, new pokemon to meet, a rival battle, and actual plot developments too!

Just over 18 and a half hours so far. By the end of the update, we'll be past 20. It's kind of a lengthy update.



First off, let's meet the route 5 trainers.





Been there, done that.





Huh... it's not often you see an electric type beating up on a ground type.





Too bad so sad cry more.



We'll be able to buy these before too long. If I'm not mistaken, the third gym badge is locking away the really cool shit like this. We'll never be able to buy ethers, however. Which I find bullshit. For some reason the developers are really against you being able to refill your PP on the go. Even PP-restoring berries are basically nonexistant.











According to Bulbapedia, Poison Tail has a 10% chance to poison the opponent. I've used it many many times since picking up Rollgirl and not once has it ever inflicted poison. I know anecdotal evidence doesn't hard data make, but it still irks me.

Mostly I want to use Venoshock's "deals double damage if the target is poisoned" effect. Sure, Rollgirl is closing in on learning Toxic, but I want to use it now dammit! For what it's worth, Rollgirl learning Toxic means she'll stay on the team for a long goddamned time. (The TM isn't found until the absolute end of the game. Like in the final plot area just before Victory Road.)







At least he's self aware about it?



Hold on I think I have that around here somewhere...





By popular demand, Dracolich is being benched in favor of the cockapidgey. So this is his last appearance until it's time to give him a mega stone.





All the trainers here on Route 5 are weird. I'm outta here.





It's not very big, but it can look confusing in the screenshots. Anyway, Koril Town is a pretty nice place, but we never have cause to come here ever again after this. You remember that desert I pointed out in the opening cinematic?



Koril Town is that little collection of buildings in the upper right of the screenshot. I don't even know why, but I just like the ecotone where grasslands meet desert sands.







The upper reaches of Samsara Cave keeps going and going. It's a gigantic maze with an obnoxiously high encounter rate. If I'm not mistaken, between the entrance and the end of the puzzle, there are something like 7 or 8 screen transitions.



exactly like them.

That's just a cockatrice. It's mine now, so Samsara Cave is safe once again.



Torren!

Neat!



I need an adult!

Hoenn, all those years ago.



Yeah can I talk to you about that?







I like a lot of the dialogue in this town, just because of how absolutely insane it is.





Oh you work at Wright & Co? Cool.





The only thing I really remember strongly about my trip through Gen 5 in BW2 was desperately searching for one of these in order to evolve my Lampent. I'm not sure I ever did find one.







We might be putting this to use sooner rather than later. You'll see at the end of this update.





idgi is it because Castform has breasts?







Uh... thanks? I guess? I'll just... give this to Chompy Boy?



We'll be back here later in the update. This is the site of a small sidequest.



Handy, I suppose.





This is doubly funny because he's using the Rich Boy trainer model.

headed for the desert.



Hoo boy. Is it that time already? If you recall, we've met four of the five cults. Well, this hat-wearing lady is talking about the fifth cult... the Sky Cult.













I can count on one hand the total number of times I saw New Moon in my first playthrough. I'm actually half tempted to say "on one finger" because I'm about 75% sure that it only ever came up in the Champion battle. It may have also come up during one of the gym fights, but I'm lucky if I remember that fairies beat dark. Thanks to that stupid Kamen Rider reference in the type chart, I'll forever remember bug beating dark.

I don't even watch Kamen Rider. Or any other Sentai shows.

Please don't try to get me to watch KR. I'm not interested.



Welp.





This will make the Audino grinding even less painful than it was. A free 1.5x on every pokemon in our party, and 2.25x on traded pokemon? Sign me the fuck up!







See what I mean about the NPCs in this town being completely nuts?





I don't know exactly how much we have at the moment. It's very likely somewhere north of $75,000. Each training session with those level 40 Audino, by the way, takes $720. That shit adds up fast! So some bonus cash is well appreciated.



I'm pretty sure that's all the houses worth visiting. Koril Town is just one of those towns that serves to break up the endless parade of routes. It's a much appreciated checkpoint!



For all I have in the past and will in the future complain about this game, the quality of life stuff is legitimately amazing.



Fuck. This is one of those things I haven't been looking forward to.



I forgot to mention this cave in my wrapup last time. So just real quick...

Koril Cave

Hitmonlee
Hitmonchan
Hitmontop

Koril Cave (Surf)

Gastrodon (West Sea)
Skrelp

Koril Cave (Fishing)

Lanturn (All Rods)
Qwilfish (All Rods)
Kabutops (Good and Super Rod)

Koril Cave (Requires Rock Climb)

Terrakion (Level 95)



So, throughout this entire LP I've been talking about Relic Song and the game-spanning quest to obtain it. This, finally, is the first step. Just talk to the musical note stalagmite.



It's a 15-tile sliding puzzle. Unfortunately we have no idea what the image is supposed to be. The only clue we get is the fucking musical note. So, allow me to bring in some outside help...

From the Pokemon Insurgence Forums

I linked to it because it's their domain and I'm pretty sure they wouldn't appreciate me embedding it. If you step back about 5 feet and relax your eyes, it turns into the world's least clear picture of Meloetta.



I am fucking terrible at sliding tile puzzles. I never learned how to do them properly. Intellectually I know. You work line by line from the top down. But when it's a bunch of context-less two-color images...

Well, I spent about 20 minutes tabbing back and forth between the game, that image, and this website very tediously translating the individual tiles to numbers and then putting them into the proper slot on the site.

Then I had to redo it eight times because the site tripped me up repeatedly. It turns out that after you put in numbers 1-13, the site then switches to asking you where the hole is. This isn't communicated... anywhere. Also the site doesn't register clicks every time, so it's very easy to move faster than the little applet.

The good news is that if you hit the SOLVE button on the site, it takes you through step by step. And as long as you translated the tiles to numbers correctly, you'll get to the end eventually.





One down... seven to go.

They're all the same picture of Meloetta, just scrambled up differently.



Pictured: a relic song wall half out of frame. This one is holding Steelixite. So no Mega Steelix for us until the late postgame.



Say goodbye to Dracolich for now. He'll come back out soon enough.



Out comes Cockatrice! I forgot to get a picture of his level 12 stats. So there's no before image. Sorry Kyrosiris. I like the name YASD, but it's kinda awkward to type! _{Also fuck you for getting me back into Nethack after I'd been clean for 3 years}







Medusa Ray may be Delta Pidgeot's signature move, but it's an 80 accuracy status move that doesn't even give it a leg up. Delta Pidgey's line is amazing in terms of being a fully-realized idea, but it's mediocre in every other sense. It's pretty damn cool at least!





With a little math, we can figure out that Cockatrice's stats used to be..

31 HP
16 ATK
14 DEF
14 SpATK
16 SpDEF
21 SPD



Pretty nice gains!



He had Twister, but that's kind of a bad move to have at level 40. So I replaced it with a Flying-type coverage move instead.





Fancy and Chompy Boy are in a neck-and-neck race for who has the higher attack stat. I'll pick up a Wide Lens in Helios City and she'll become complete her transformation into "a ground type that flying types actually fear." Remember, the Helios Gym is sky themed!





Our shark head is extremely powerful, and I'm extremely interested to see how high that attack climbs by the endgame.





Rollgirl learned Steamroller and now her name is once again fitting.





HenryDavid continues to impress me. I never gave Throh a second thought before, but he's much better than I thought he would be! In fact, he's quite good. He's sturdy, and his stat boosting move makes him even better. This is one of those pokemon I'm quite happy to have been wrong about.





Thundervolt is here too. She'll be evolving soon, so that's something to look forward to!





It's right behind me. It's that terrifying lizard bird that's currently turning the trees and grass to stone.



This is definitely a pokemon lab. It's got those vending machines lining the front like all the others.





Reukra, if you don't remember, is the leader of Perfection. He's the nice fellow who gave us Dracolich way back in the second update.









Nobody who talks about how rare Deltas are, and how cool it would be to see one, are willing to acknowledge the Delta following behind me. Though to be fair I don't think it would be a great idea to look at Cockatrice anyway.





She doesn't want to tell us what they're all about, but wants us to join. Sounds legit!









I cut out about 3/4 of her text boxes. She kept discussing the mission talking about how they can't help themselves because they're not trainers and how much trouble this pokemon was causing and



Saving here was a mistake. Y'see, I made a realization...



This Archen is level 5. All my pokemon are between 40 and 44. They could cough in this thing's general vicinity and knock it the fuck out.



This is as close as I can get. There's a slight problem, however...

Archen has a 45 catch rate like, it seems, every fucking thing else I want to catch. Across three resets, I threw 27 Ultra Balls at it. It broke out of all of them.



On the fourth reset I was in a bad mood. So a level 40 abomination against nature rampaged through a warehouse knocking out a bunch of baby level 5 fossil pokemon.



Not pictured: the Archen and two Lileep I already KOed. Also another Archen somewhere else.



The Kabutops is the ringleader here.





This thing has 1 HP, is paralyzed, and it still breaks out of a bunch of Ultra Balls. Great. Cool. Wonderful.



Like many other things, this is somewhat remedied when we reach Helios City. I swear, exploring that town is going to take multiple updates just because of how much shit is in it.







Works for me!



Show of hands... who is going to remember her when she finally calls us in the postgame? That little excursion was actually the first part of a sidequest that doesn't continue until then. What a pity.



That's enough of Koril town. There's one more thing we can do here in the not-too-distant future, and then we have nothing else to do here ever again. I'm probably never going to come back for the Steelixite or Torrakion.





Read: every battle takes 3x as long because you have to sit through a bunch of messages about the sandstorm.



The desert's a big open area with a bunch of trainers. So please don't mind me while I give you the highlights...

desert!



Hiker Henry is another of those guys who can go fuck themselves.



He only has two pokemon and you don't get bonus points for guessing the other one.



I don't feel the least bit bad for using STAB supereffective Crunch to mess his day up. That fucking Lunatone would have one shot Fancy were it not for her Sturdy! Ground isn't even weak to psychic!





We meet again Dr. Jones! Not really, but I always wanted to say that.





I don't catch him, but I wanted to point him out to ask a question. Are Hippowdon good? I've always wanted to use one, but never had the opportunity early enough in the game. Fancy is gonna be sticking with us for most of the game so no-go in this run sorry to say!









You're the one who ran half across the screen to demand a battle. The least you can do is fork over half your cash so I can pay off my debts to the Level Trainer mob.







I don't think a 10 year old girl is allowed to be a hiker. They just can't grow a big enough beard to qualify. Instead they get handed a picnicker uniform.









There's a reason I spent the time to get everyone in the team up to their 40s. This cave is it. I'm pointedly ignoring all the trainers in here and beelining for the exit.





Y'see, we've caught up to the plot. It's very nearly done running from us.











have a problem with letting me borrow it!



This idiot is trying too hard. He was actually being menacing until he felt the need to overclarify his statement.



You can't just take what's not yours!







Jesus Christ.

that cavern.







That sound you hear is me grinding my teeth.

















should.











JESUS CHRIST.



remain so.



Fucking hell. So uh... I think that qualifies for the plot becoming edgy again. That was only a taste of what's to come. It's going to go into overdrive to make up for lost time once we get to Helios City.



I never heard of Pokemon Insurgence until its development was finished. But even I can tell that this was obviously the end of one of the early chapters. Why?



RANDOM RIVAL BATTLE OUT OF NOWHERE!









losing again!



I feel bad for Damian here...





Water/Dark vs pure Fighting. HenryDavid used Storm Throw until the Crawdaunt stopped moving.





Steel/Psychic vs Dark/Dragon. Cockatrice introduced Metang to Crunch. There's so little to say about this battle. Just entirely by accident, my team has evolved to cover 100% of what he's fielding. I seriously didn't do it intentionally.



That's Delta Blastoise all grown up. Remind me when I'm not 194 images deep into an update to cover all the Delta Starters sometime. This footage still has another 20,000 frames to go, and I've still got 3 Deltas to cover before we're done. I'll probably cover them when we get the mega stone.



Storm Throw don't fuck around. Also... Dark/Fighting vs pure Fighting.





Electric vs Ground. A super high attack Bulldoze put the hurt on this Luxray.





Rollgirl is basically Shaymin's worst nightmare. Grass doesn't like either Poison or Bug. Even being Leech Seeded didn't stop her from Steamroller rolling over this poor grassy hedgehog.



Because I'm the protagonist and I understand the type chart have a well-rounded team.





Damian acts like a kid at least.





way to do it.







The reason before that I mentioned that this was obviously the end of a chapter was because of that bit there. That's one hell of a cliffhanger to end on until the next chapter is finished.



We're not done, though. There's more trainers here, but I'm skipping all of them in order to get on with things.





Roggan Town is famous for two reasons: the Game Corner and the Battle Frontier are both found here. The Battle Place is blocked off until the postgame because of Rock Climb.



The game corner, however, is right here. I'll cover that in a bit. First, let's explore...









I will never interact with this area in a meaningful fashion. I don't find competitive battling remotely fun. I actually dread to think about just how fucked up these battles must be.



This is a regular Larvesta. Even in this game with its fucked up level curve, it evolves far too late to be of any use to me.

Evolution on their team.

Many of these mega evolutions are unique to Insurgence! In fact, most plot critical battles will feature mega evolution.





Sometimes the writing in this game is legitimately pretty great.









In about 50 hours, after we have the 7th badge, he will call us about a Delta Pokemon he wants us to take.









Meet, uh, Delta Emolga? It's Dark/Fire type. Juding by its base stats, it's pretty fucking terrible for how late you get it. 428BST with a 75 base SpAtk is not great! It learns a lot more fire type than dark type moves, but I'm just not convinced it's worth using.

Its two abilities are Flash Fire (+50% fire power when hit by fire moves) and Blaze Boost (Hidden; When the user uses a Fire-type attack its Attack, Special Attack, and Speed are increased by 1 stage) I... what? Holy shit. I... wow. That actually... huh. It's hidden, so that means it's postgame only. But that's kinda fucking broken. Neat!

I'm never going to pick it up because I will never remember to come back. I didn't even realize it existed until just now when I was looking at the wiki page. So there's still three more Deltas to cover in this update!

What gets me is that the wiki doesn't show it has a mega evolution. However the graphics are right there in the data.



This game corner, because Insurgence is a Mature Game, has slot machines and Voltorb Flip. And Triple Triad.






Cool?

Super Effective!







Holy shit!







Sweet.





Finally, let's look at the Game Corner!









I think I must be the only person on the earth to be, at best, apathetic about Triple Triad. I don't care enough to play it whenever I subscribe to FFXIV, so I certainly won't be playing it here in Insurgence.





This lady offers us a TT deck. I take the grass one because my first pokemon ever was Bulbasaur.



The lotto is the same as it ever is. In Insurgence, you get prizes for matching differing amounts of numbers.

1 - Ultra Ball
2 - PP Up
3 - Exp Share
4 - Max Revive
5 - Master Ball





Welp.





We'll come back to this in a minute. I'll cover these three Deltas as the last thing in the update before the Looking Ahead section.





TM10 - Hidden Power
TM16 - Light Screen
TM33 - Reflect
TM108 - Ally Switch (I've literally never heard of this move. Bulbapedia makes it sound, at best, like a gimmick.)
TM117 - Dragonify (Insurgence-added move. Turns the foe into Dragon Type)



Insurgence mercifully lets you buy coins. So for $200,000 you can buy that Delta Wooper you were eyeing.





These machines seem to pay out fairly often, but it is only paltry amounts. A whole 4 coins when I spent 3!



Gonna be honest, my first thought was mahjong and I'd be down for that. But no, this is just a static item in the world.



Gonna be honest, again. If I wanted to play Picross, I'd play fucking Picross. If I wanted to play Minesweeper, I'd play that. I know a lot of people enjoy the two combined, but I hate how much guessing gets involved here. What I love about Picross is that it's all about logic and thinking the puzzle through. This... this isn't. There's just enough randomization involved that you can't solve it 100% of the time and invariably wind up guessing.



Guess today's the unpopular opinions day from me. So let's go back to that list of pokemon...



Let's start with the most expensive one.









Delta Wooper is Grass/Fire type. However, it still has Wooper and Quagsire's very physical-focused stats. To put it bluntly, it's pretty fucking terrible. At the best of times, Quagsire is mediocre mid-game fodder. It doesn't excel in anything and is slower than molasses.



They have the same moveset, just Quagsire learns everything a few levels later. The only Fire-type STAB it gets is Ember. By default.

As far as abilities go, it has Pickpocket (Steals an item from an attacker that made direct contact), Flash Fire, and Harvest (Hidden; May create another Berry after one is used). You'll excuse me if I don't trip over myself to use this piece of shit.

However, I AM going to buy it. And then he or she will be the second inhabitant of the SHAME BOX. Let's move on, however to something much brighter.













This little cutie is Delta Litwick. It's Fairy/Fire type! Lampent evolves to Chandelure with a Shiny Stone, for whatever that's worth. Unlike Wooper, Litwick's line puts its new typing to great use. Chandelure is a special powerhouse anyway, and between Fire and Fairy both, it will kick everything's ass.

In terms of abilities, Litwick's line has Flash Fire, Weak Armor (Physical attacks lower Defense and raise Speed), and Fairy Aura (Hidden; Powers up each active Pok�mon's Fairy-type moves)

Finally...









Delta Misdreavus, with its the Holiday-themed look, is Ice/Fairy type. The one weird thing about its move set is that it doesn't learn Ice Beam outside of TMs, and that one in particular doesn't show up until Victory Road. It's another special powerhouse and it's been custom built to make dragon-types shit themselves in abject terror. Like Lampent before it, Misdreavus needs a Shiny Stone to evolve.

Misdreavus' and Mismagius' abilities are... Magic Guard (The Pokemon only takes damage from attacks) and Winter Joy (Hidden; Strengthened in winter and weakened in summer. 40% increase in Atk and SpAtk from Nov-Feb. 30% decrease between May-Aug.)

And that finally... FINALLY brings me to the end of this update.

Looking ahead...

Route 6

Farfetch'd
Plusle (10%)
Minun (10%)
Pachirisu (10%)
Emolga (10%)
Gogoat

Route 6 (Surf)

Dewgong
Lapras
Swanna (10%)

Route 6 (Fishing)

Seaking (Good Rod)

Route 7

Skitty
Chimecho
Chatot
Stoutland
Phantump
Pumpkaboo

Route 7 (Surf)

Dewgong

Helios City

Wynaut Egg ($2500)
Bonsly (Gift)
Smeargle (Trade Stunky)
Barboach (Trade Gyarados)
Delta Lotad (Trade a Dragon Type)

Helios Sewers

Grimer
Koffing (14%)
Gulpin (14%)
Stunky (10%)
Yamask (2%)
Trubbish
Foongus (10%)
Delta Heatmor (After 7th Gym)

Jesus. That was the longest update yet. Should've just cut this in half

NEXT TIME: Onward to the Capital!