Aka. the Nemesis Challenge, I created this challenge because I disliked the overabundant randomness of the Nuzlocke yet craved a more difficult game. The challenge revolves around picking up a team of two types only, which share a common weakness to your nemesis type. In this challenge, you can choose and create your team as you see fit (as long as they're of the correct types), but you'll always have a hard time against your natural enemy type. No reviving 'mons either, fainting means death.
For the best experience, I recommend picking your pokemon teams types by random. It's the only random part of this challenge. Look up the type chart and select one using RNG. Then, use RNG again to select a type that is strong against your first type. This will become your arch-nemesis. Lastly, use RNG once more to pick another type for your team, but it must also be weak to your nemesis type.
So for example, for my test-run I first rolled between 1-18 and got 5, which corresponds to Ground type. Ground is weak to Ice, Grass and Water, so I rolled from 1-3 and got 2, so my nemesis is Grass type. The other types that are weak to Grass are Rock and Water, so I rolled from 1-2 and got 2, so my second type is Water. Now my team is set, I can only have Ground and Water types, and my entire team is terrified of Grass.
Optionally, if you'd prefer even less RNG, you could just choose your own type or nemesis type yourself, I'm not all that strict about that since you could reroll the dice as many times as you want until you get the types you wanted anyways ;).
Type-weakness list (For Gen VI, for any other Gen you'll need to check wiki for what type matches are different)
Fighting --> Dark, Ice, Normal, Rock, Steel
Flying --> Bug, Fighting, Grass
Poison --> Fairy, Grass
Ground --> Electric, Fire, Poison, Rock, Steel
Rock --> Bug, Fire, Flying, Ice
Bug --> Dark, Grass, Psychic
Ghost --> Psychic, Bug, Poison (check exceptions down below for an explanation)
Steel --> Fairy, Ice, Rock
Fire --> Bug, Grass, Ice, Steel
Water --> Fire, Ground, Rock
Grass --> Ground, Rock, Water
Electric --> Flying, Water
Psychic --> Fighting, Poison
Ice --> Dragon, Flying, Grass, Ground
Dark --> Ghost, Psychic
Fairy --> Dark, Dragon, Fighting
Using these rules, you might notice that Normal or Dragon can never be your arch-nemesis, but they can be one of your types.
Rules:
1. Use only pokemon of your types. You can use your starter until you find the first pokemon of correct type. HM slaves are also OK, as long as they don't participate in fights.
2. Dual-type pokemon are allowed, as long as at least one type is the type you picked.
3. If your pokemon faints, it's gone for good. Either release it or stuff it into a graveyard box.
4. You can catch as many pokemon on a route as you want, but you can only catch one pokemon in each evolutionary line. So if you capture a Geodude, you cannot capture any other Geodudes or Gravelers.
5. Hacking, trading or any other out-of-game tool use is frowned upon. The game should be beatable without these, and if it's not just roll a new type combination.
6. The challenge is lost once you run out of pokemon, you can continue from a black out if you still have alive pokemon in your PC box.
7. The challenge is completed when you beat the final encounter (most often the elite 4).
This challenge should work with any game and generation, with only a few exceptions to the rules:
~ In Gen II-V, if you pick Grass and your nemesis is Poison, then it'd be impossible to pick another Type weak to Poison. In this case, pick a type that is resisted by Poison (Bug or Fighting)
~ If you pick Ghost, your nemesis can't be Ghost, or vice versa. This's a bit complicated so I broke it into two points
- In gen II-VI, if you picked Ghost, your nemesis is Dark, and in Gen I it's Psychic.
- In gen II-VI, If you picked Psychic and your nemesis is Ghost, your other type is Bug or Poison as they're resisted by Ghost.
~ If you pick Dragon, your nemesis is Ice (or alternatively Fairy in Gen VI)
That's about it, I hope you find this challenge interesting! If you do decide to pick this challenge up, leave a message with the types you picked, the game your playing and post about your experiences (any particularly memorable moments, triumph story against your nemesis gym, moments of frustration etc.) and I might even add a hall of fame for people who are able to finish this!
Challengers:
Spoiler:
Crescend: Pokemon White 2, Ground + Water VS. Grass Shoot|The|Puck: Pokemon Crystal, Bug + Flying VS. Rock Slnxdx: Pokemon X, Grass + Dragon VS. Ice
3DS FC: 1203-9340-6083
My friend safari: Phantump, Lampent, Golurk
I realized I'd be in trouble when I picked Oshawott as my starter and was immediately reminded that my rival would automatically have my worst nightmare as his first pokemon. Having repeated battles against him at random times (I forgot when rival battles occur, and I'm not checking) sounds just like the kind of thing that could get me killed in this run.
It wasn't until I reached Castelia city that I was able to add new pokemon to my team, where I catched both Sandile and Onix. Both of them excellent additions to my team, I figured I could stomp the Burgs bug gym back into the hole it crawled out of with Onix's rock moves. A mistake that almost got me killed too.
See even though my team isn't weak to bug, I had all but forgot about the threat that Gen V had introduced; Leavanny and it's offspring. Onix was brought down to 4 health by a single shot of razor leaf by a Swadloon, a pokemon that I always though to be harmless as I equaled it to be more akin to a Metapod. I was able to finish it off with Dewott, but not before bringing me uncomfortably close to death.
So a new plan was hatched. Seeing no better option, I leveled up the Sandile on wild Audinos until it evolved. A slightly cowardly tactic, but hey whatever works... My new Krokorok has Moxie after all, so after I crunched my way through the small fry my Kroko was strong enough to take out Leavanny in two hit, and tank one razor leaf in the process. A victory!
We shall see how this proceeds from here, and I'm now terrified of every important-looking junction in the game that looks like a potential rival battle spot. Last time I saw him, it was just a tiny Snivy, but by now it's probably a healthy-sized Servine...
3DS FC: 1203-9340-6083
My friend safari: Phantump, Lampent, Golurk
Luckily I can get most of these guys by the Ilex Forest.
EDIT
I only had midterms today so I've had a bunch of free time, so with that and yesterday I got through a bunch of Crystal.
I got Pidgey on Route 29 and pretty much trained it up until Ilex Forest. It took out Falkner easily and mopped the floor with Bugsy. It was so overleveled that nothing really stood a chance. Dark Cave was a little tough but most of the Rock-types didn't know any Rock moves, so I just used Gust until they died. I went into Ilex Forest and caught a Venonat, Paras, and Heracross. I trained those guys up a bit in the wild and on Team Rocket, along with the routes leading to Goldenrod. Once I got to Goldenrod I realized Whitney was going to be a pain so I grinded up Heracross and had to use X Defends and X Attacks to deal with Miltank. I then realized that Venonat and Paras were really underleveled so I trained them up and went on to Ecruteak. I beat my rival easily and then had to train up Venonat a bit to learn Confusion. Then Venonat got a lot more levels by beating all the trainers in Morty's gym and then Venonat + Pidgeotto took out Morty. Paras was looking like the runt of the pack by then so I had to grind it up as well and trained it all the way to Olivine City, in the lighthouse too. Now I'm ready to head off to Cianwood. Venonat and Paras were kind of sucking in the beginning but now I have a Parasect and Venonat has a decent attacking move, so it's looking better. Parasect will really shine once it learns Spore and Giga Drain, while Venonat is going to be awesome when it evolves. Heracross is great and Pidgeotto is my failsafe Pokemon.
Level 26
Gust
Quick Attack
Whirlwind
Sand Attack
Level 22
Confusion
Disable
Poisonpowder
Supersonic
Level 24
Fury Cutter
Rock Smash
Poisonpowder
Stun Spore
Level 22
Strength
Rock Smash
Horn Attack
Endure
you don't have enough talent to win on talent alone
The numbers I rolled were 13, 1, 4, meaning I ended up with the types Electric/Steel, and my nemesis is Ground. I guess I should probably get my hands on a magnezone haha :D I'll work on adding an update later today most likely.
Oh, and I'm playing this challenge on X, with Castform!