4th Gen Stat Trainers

'Stat Trainers' is a fan term to refer five certain Trainers that the players encounter during their journey in the Sinnoh region.

Cheryl - She's the very first one that the DPt Players encounter. It's compulsory to travel with her in Eterna Forest. She specializes at the HP department and her signature Pokémon is Chansey/Blissey.

Mira - She's the very first optional encounter-travel partner. She can be found in Wayward Cave (the one without GIble appearing). She's an expert at Special Attack, her trusty partner is Kadabra/Alakazam.

Riley - The hot yet mysterious guy who gives you the Riolu Egg in Iron Island as well as giving you HM04 Strength in Platinum. He specializes at Attack and Lucario happens to be his signature Pokmon like Maylene, Sir Aaron and Korrina.

Buck - He's the brother of the Sinnoh Elite Four member Flint. He masters 2 stats: Defense and Special Defense. Claydol is his ace.

Marley - The shy Marley along Buck are the post-game Stat Trainers the Player meets. She seems to be fond of Shaymin, who holds the meaning of gratitude. Arcanine and her Speed are the best of the best out there.

Additionally they can be partners at Battle Tower in a Tag Team Challenge format for both Sinnoh-based and Johto-based games.

Discussion:
Do you like the idea of Stat Trainers? (Either exploring places together or Battle Tower-related answers are fine.)
Which member is your favorite and strikes as memorable?
AND you are very encouraged to express other related opinions to the topic!

I've always really liked Marley. I like that name, I like the bow she wears, I especially loved her hair when I was in high school because that's what mine looked like, just not black haha. Plus Arcanine! Buck always seemed like a hot-head, so he's probably my least favorite. :( The others I just feel pretty indifferent to. I'd say the most useful partner is Mira though. Kadabra is a great Pokemon, especially at that point in the game when you can team up with her, so she's not really useless like some of the others. Riley is pretty fun to team up with as well since Lucario is also a good Pokemon.

I loved these characters, with their unique designs, stat specialties showing their Pokemon preference, and the fact they have a naming theme in that their names are based on grains.

My fave of the bunch is Marley because I love her design, and her dress make you think that Gothitelle was based on her. Mira is really adorable and has a powerful partner to boot (that Kadabra...), ditto Riley and his Lucario. He's mysterious but also uses some strong Pokemon.

Honestly, these 5 were one of my favorite parts of gen 4. If/When a Diamond/Pearl remake comes out I hope they become more integral to the story and have more development (I'm a believer that the strength of a pokemon story and memorable characters isn't necessarily the gym leaders)

I've always thought that Riley was the coolest, and remember being pleasantly surprised when Cheryl joined and followed me. Changing all the battles and having a partner to heal me after every battle was great. I mean, those 5 are walking pokemon centers! Marley also looks awesome and has a very cool personality. Sinnoh just wouldn't have been the same without them. I just wish I could talk to them more or travel with them again. Maybe go on a random side quest with each of them post-game, like with Buck

I never even knew they had stat specialties. How cool! I really liked them and I thought that traveling partners were a great addition to the series. My favorite is Cheryl. She's such a sweetheart! Her design is cute too.

I really like these guys, they are super cool. Especially Marley. I also liked how Buck was Flint's brother and I really enjoyed how they were all different colours. A trivial thing I know, but for some reason I found it really striking.

Riley seems interesting fellow, I like the design also I adore Cheryl she is sweet and charming, also Buck because he is the younger brother of the Elite four

Battle tower-wise.
- Riley possibly do much damage, but might lose too because of very fragile defense, Mira is also same very fragile at DEF, but Alazkam and Kadbra surely survive specials.

- Cheryl if she isn't choosing chansey line and chansey line are fragile towards psychical attackers and withstand strong special attackers, Wailmer line are fine and tanky too. Very tanky

- Bucks being most enduring and a solid wall towards attackers

- Marley can cope damage and defense because speed on her favor.

and their performance on battle tower varies from their and our pokemon.

Riley is my favorite out of those bunch because he was the one that first introduced me to Lucario long ago.

I remember it like it was yesterday. We had just trashed Team Galactic at Iron Island when he hands me this blue and black egg. He told me that I should show the Pokemon in the egg the world. And that I did. The egg eventually hatched into a Riolu; it was kind of cute.

I gave the Riolu the exp share and we did a quick tour of Sinnoh. He then evolved into Lucario and from there, we defeated the Sinnoh League, the Johto League, the Unova League, the Kalos League, and then the Hoenn League. I showed it the world!

I love the Stat trainers! I'm particularly fond of Marley, she's a shy girl in my eyes. :D Riley comes as a close second, he was particularly helpful and we sync perfectly when teaming up. :)

Never heard that term before, admittedly, but it makes sense. Never heard a term for them though, beyond something generic like the npc partners or the like.

I really liked them, actually. They each had their own characterisations, and they made for excellent grinding material given their tendency to heal your Pokemon. I also liked talking to them multiple times to get extra dialogue (to an extent, anyway). Something I miss from the DPPt games, certainly.

I just wish you could throw a Pokeball when there's two Pokemon on the other side like in Colo/XD when with them. Come on, game, two targets to pick from doesn't make it that hard to throw a capsule... Also Wayward Cave was a bugger. >:[

bobandbill said:

Never heard that term before, admittedly, but it makes sense. Never heard a term for them though, beyond something generic like the npc partners or the like.

I really liked them, actually. They each had their own characterisations, and they made for excellent grinding material given their tendency to heal your Pokemon. I also liked talking to them multiple times to get extra dialogue (to an extent, anyway). Something I miss from the DPPt games, certainly.

I just wish you could throw a Pokeball when there's two Pokemon on the other side like in Colo/XD when with them. Come on, game, two targets to pick from doesn't make it that hard to throw a capsule... Also Wayward Cave was a bugger. >:[

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It's a fan term, also used by Bulbapedia. I should have said that in the OP. :)

And I thought I was the only one who talked to those special trainers. {XD} While traveling with a trainer isn't new to the franchise, I believe DP were the first games to have this feature, which made the Sinnoh games special.

I'm not sure how things in the said side games work, but I have to agree that we should be able to pick capture targets during those wild double battles. In my experience, sometimes the Stat Trainer just 'accidentally' killed off the Pokémon that I want to catch. Now imagine if a shiny Pokémon appeared in that situation. There should be a countermeasure to prevent these kind of unfortunate incidents from happening.

Sun said:

It's a fan term, also used by Bulbapedia. I should have said that in the OP. :)

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Hmm. The term could have just been made by the first person to give them such a class on that wiki though, so that may explain my ignorance of the term. I suppose they should be called something, but us fans have not always been the best with names. =p

I'm not sure how things in the said side games work, but I have to agree that we should be able to pick capture targets during those wild double battles. In my experience, sometimes the Stat Trainer just 'accidentally' killed off the Pokémon that I want to catch. Now imagine if a shiny Pokémon appeared in that situation. There should be a countermeasure to prevent these kind of unfortunate incidents from happening.

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Exactly! I'd hate to encounter a shiny Pokemon in the wild in that situation, and would probably try to faint my partner's Pokemon first.

In Colosseum and particularly in XD (when sometimes you could 'snag' either Pokemon on the field, not just at maximum one from the opponent's entire party), you could throw your choice of Poke Ball when there are two Pokemon on the opposing side. You never got a message saying 'you are unable to throw a Pokeball because there are two creatures!!'. (You did get prevented from snagging Pokemon you weren't meant to however, haha. But that's fair enough in the context of the game.)

Cheryl and Marley were pretty cool.

colter519 said:

Honestly, these 5 were one of my favorite parts of gen 4. If/When a Diamond/Pearl remake comes out I hope they become more integral to the story and have more development

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Same.
I loved all of them, and I found each of the stat trainers' personalities to be refreshing. If I had to choose, my favorites are Marley and Buck, but the other three were cool as well!

I haven't battled in the Battle Tower for a long time so I don't exactly remember how each of them did but I remember using Buck a lot, mainly due to the fact that I kind of lean towards defensive plays, haha. I did try out everyone though, and while Riley was the most reliable, I'd say all of them are relatively decent partners. They're controlled by the AI, anyway; you can't exactly expect much, lol.