.....The Ghost trial can go burn.
Episode 3 - Your Boy Guzma Strikes Back
So between losing a good chunk of my team during the Akala Island Disaster, getting a couple of useless encounters, and all sorts of general disasters so far, I think this run is going fairly standard for me when it comes to nuzlockes. That's beside the point, though. It's time to get our encounter for Blush Mountain (because even though Secluded Shore is a seperate area, there's basically only things there I've already caught, just like a couple of other areas we're hitting up for encounters.) Anyway, Blush Mountain. I managed to get myself an Alolan Geodude, but at the time, since I had Roxanne, I boxed Eleczilla and headed inside to get some free rocks that'll make Smokey's Drought a bit more useful.
I swear this game is filled with ways to halt progression, even for a little bit. This time, I'm not even referring to the team destroying disasters. I'm talking about Gladion sliding on over and warning me about Team Skull's Cosmog hunting even though they end up capturing the wrong Pokemon later on when that plot point becomes somewhat relevant. We'll talk about that later, I promise. Let's just slide on over to Tapu Village and get ourselves an encounter...
...or get interrupted less than five minutes later by Hau because Pokemon League is under construction. Keep in mind that at this portion, I haven't gotten my Haina Desert encounter, partly because you need to do the Ghost trial and partly because I seriously forgot about it because of what happens during the Ghost trial, then remembered it while I was typing this up. More on that shortly.
Tapu Village encounter was something I wasn't expecting to run into until near the end of the run, and that's Alolan Vulpix. Is it good or not, I have no idea. I figured since it's probably the only Ice type I'm gonna get in the run, I'll hold onto her and leave her in the PC until one of my other team members die. Yeah right, like that'll happen. I'm totally good at this game. This totally isn't sarcasm at all.
On an off topic note, can I just say that I'm not a fan of the random transition from Tapu Village to Route 15. It's just like "oh, we're suddenly at Route 15, and we gotta do a random required battle against one kid with an easy to kill Elekid. Totally a good time, bro" and it's just kinda...meh. That's just how I see it. Alright, folks, let's kill the happy times for a bit, because it's time for everyone's favorite part. The part where disasters happen and I go cry in the corner because I'm stupid and make misplays like an idiot during important battles. The short version is our sixth trial.
Let me just say this right away. The Gastly, Haunter, and Gengar you have to deal with before the totem were not really a problem. Spiderman dealt with them all pretty well. Sure, Gengar gave me a bit of trouble because Hypnosis, but no real problems a Super Potion couldn't fix. Then, there was Totem Mimikyu. I knew Disguise would be a problem, so I had a game plan set up for this one. My plan was to spam Curse with Smokey to eat any of the totem's attacks, then Lava Plume until eventual burns drained it's HP along with it's ally. Because my luck is the physical embodiment of suck, that didn't happen at all.
So here's the story of how my team got turned upside down. Grab your popcorn, kiddies, because it's story time. Trust me, this one's worse than how I lost Bloodwing solely because I didn't know Totem Salazzle had a berry that raised it's Special Attack. Haunter, ladies and gentlemen, is part of the reason this went to hell. Now, we all know that Hypnosis is a lackluster move due to it's awful accuracy, right? Apparently, this Haunter had his glasses on today because he never missed Hypnosis at all. That threw my whole gameplan out the window because I had to heal Smokey every turn because, even at +1, Mimikyu's Shadow Claw hurts. The only positive of this early segment was that Mimikyu is a Ghost type and it used Mimic to learn Curse. We know where this is leading, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.
In an attempt to get Mimikyu to kill itself on it's own via Curse, I tried to continuously switch out to lure it into using Curse until it died. This only lead to Spiderman getting put to sleep and nearly killed the next turn. Under the assumption that Tabitha could survive a turn and hopefully kill the Haunter or something, I switched him in. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I have a question for you. What move do you obviously think Mimikyu would have in a situation like this? If you answered Play Rough, then you are clearly much smarter than me and totally deserve a cookie because the turn after I switched in Tabitha, the game gave me a heavy slap in the face because Play Rough sent Tabitha on a one way trip to the Shadow Realm.
So my possible best team member died, and I was pretty tilted. I decided to continue with my Mimikyu suicide strategy by trying to use Delta to bulk out hits. Haunter's 100% Hypnosis made that a wasted effort and then Night Shade and Shadow Claw spamming occurred, then after a high roll from Astonish (I continued stalling with Smokey for a bit to drain those Shadow Claws since it was obviously it's most devastating move outside of Play Rough), a Night Shade did 2 HP just enough to kill Delta. After that, all it took was getting Mimikyu to Curse to death, then I sent in Master Derp to attempt to clean up the Haunter. After another Hypnosis and praying to Arceus to get paralyzed by Lick so Haunter couldn't put me to sleep anymore, we finally finished off the penultimate trial.
Now, with that text wall of dread completed, it's time for Frozen to join the team. Along with that, we got a rematch with that one Team Skull chick. What was her name again? Plumeria. Yeah, her. She was easy. Sure, I missed a Zen Headbutt on her Golbat, but it was still an easy battle thanks to Eviolite Slowpoke. Anyway, remember earlier when I mentioned that Team Skull is filled with idiots and they snagged the wrong Pokemon? Guess what? They actually did it. They screwed it up. Now we gotta go to their base in Po Town, alone. Oooh, scary...is what I would be saying if I didn't need to grind.
Speaking of which, remember Mount Hokulani and Melemele Sea? I never got encounters at either of those places (or Haina Desert), and there's nothing in the nuzlocke rules saying I can't not get my encounter on my required visit then come back for it later. I ended up leaving Mount Hokulani to rush over and battle Guzma, so I never caught anything there, while Melemele Sea was unable to be accessed without Lapras Paddle, but I waited until I got Sharpedo Jet.
Long story short, Arceus smiled down on me and I got a Beldum for Mt. Hokulani but then Melemele Sea got me the most useless mon since Weedle, Luvdisc (and then the horrible memories of my Gen 3 Luvdisc solo started to flood back). Route 15 had nothing for me because I was playing at night, and Route 16 was more of the same stuff Route 15 offered. I did do some grinding on Route 16, though. After that, we come to the motherload of Ula'ula grinding, the Ula'ula Meadow. My encounter was Buzz Buzz, the Ribombee. Once that was done, I did some major grinding for the new team members to catch them up to the rest of the team, and it was off to Route 17.
Fearow. It was bound to come eventually, and it did sooner rather than later, which is good. With that out of the way, let's go to Po Town and take care of business.
Right away, Team Skull really let the place go. It's the only place I have to pay to heal, which sucks a bit because I've been hurting for money most of the run. That aside, Team Skull grunts are getting destroyed left and right and we're on our way to the Shady House. First priority was to pick up the Ice Stone so I can evolve Frozen when I feel she's ready (which may or may not be soon). After that, between the destruction of all the grunts, I went around and found all the answers to the questions for the "Guzma likes" quiz, then memed it up with a nice and clean no. Now, it's time, once again, for our boy, Guzma!
Long story short, he got wrecked. Gladion did too. After that, I can admit I got a bit cocky and wanted to just get the Grand Trial over with. Bad idea. I ended up losing Roxanne to the Z-Move, then had to kill off Spiderman due to Power Gem being able to crush most of my team and I needed a chance to get Smokey back in there to finish the job. On the bright side, I went and got my Haina Desert encounter. Sandile isn't a bad catch. I'm gonna need to do some major grinding to prepare myself for Aether Paradise, next time on the Pokemon Sun Nuzlocke.
Team Ruby

Master Derp (Slowbro) Lv. 39 @ Mystic Water
Nature: Naive
Ability: Own Tempo
Moves: Psychic, Slack Off, Zen Headbutt, Water Pulse

Smokey (Torkoal) Lv. 39 @ Heat Rock
Nature: Impish
Ability: Drought
Moves: Rock Slide, Flamethrower, Lava Plume, Body Slam

Frozen (Vulpix) Lv. 39 @ Eviolite
Nature: Timid
Ability: Snow Cloak
Moves: Extrasensory, Feint Attack, Hex, Ice Beam

Buzz Buzz (Ribombee) Lv. 38 @ Nothing
Nature: Hardy
Ability: Shield Dust
Moves: Silver Wind, Dazzling Gleam, Psychic, Bug Buzz

Shades (Sandile) Lv. 30 @ Nothing
Nature: Calm
Ability: Intimidate
Moves: Mud-Slap, Embargo, Swagger, Crunch