Gym Leaders

[mishy.]

So I was having a discussion with a friend of mine about how Gym Leaders work in the anime and thought to bring it up here to see what everyone's opinions are on the matter. Basically, Gym Leaders are an important part of Ash's journey because he has to defeat eight of them in order to get into the region's league. The thing is, over time people have gotten more and more frustrated and Ash's losses to gym leaders because at this point he should be 'really powerful'. But I feel that these people always think about how the games work when they're talking about this and forget that the anime works differently. There is less leveling involved and more skill involved. We've seen more disadvantages winning, combos that can never happen in the games, and so forth. It's far more versatile than what is provided in the video games.

Therefore, I really don't think the gym leaders are 'set' and that Ash just restarts every region. Gym Leaders are gym leaders for a reason. They are recognized for their skills. And it's been shown that there are many gyms in a region and (unless you're a certain gym leader in Kalos) you don't have to take the gym leaders in any certain order. They're more versatile (if you really have to think about the games think Johto where you can face three of the gym leaders in any order you wish, and then in Kanto when you're facing them in a different order than in the Kanto games.) That said, a gym leader could easily make it easier or harder for the trainer in question depending on when they had started their journey. So, in the case of Ash, he's been a trainer for a while now so I don't really think the gym leaders will be going easy on him.

But those are my thoughts! What are your thoughts. How do you think Gym Leaders work in the anime?

 

[Wobbu]

Well I'd imagine that each Leader has a team of Pokémon for each amount of badges from that region that the opposing Trainer possesses. Look at Roxie, for example. In the games she has two Pokémon at low levels. In the anime, however, she uses three Pokémon that are very strong (and Ash had seven badges before the battle started). Ash still loses battles every once in a while because his strategy is nowhere near perfect and his stubbornness occasionally gets in the way. Also, as mentioned earlier, Gym Leaders are well known for their abilities and skills.

It's known in the anime that regions can have more than eight Gym Leaders. An episode of OS showed Gary's badge case containing ten badges. In BW, Ash battled the Striaton Trio, Lenora, Burgh, Elisa, Clay, Skyla, Brycen, Roxie, and Cheren, Cameron battled Marlon, and Iris battled Drayden (although I can't remember if Drayden is a Gym Leader in the anime). Having more than eight Leaders is necessary because it allows Trainers to gain more experience, learn more about battling techniques, and become better prepared for the [insert region name here] League.

 

[Megan]

Gym Leaders aren't supposed to test the strength of their opponents (well, lets just say its not the main part), but rather their adaptability to new situations. Ash simply lacks the ability to create strategies on the fly. He technically knows a lot of strategies from his traveling experiences but sadly he doesn't seem to remember any of them which means that he must make every experience over and over again. And even then he remembers them only for a short amount of time, rendering him pretty incompetent in the longrun.

Even though the anime technically isn't a game it can be considered as such, it's a strategy game. A Pokemon doesn't act on its own, it's just reacting like the trainer wants them to react. It's pretty much the same with the Team Rocket Pokemon: they aren't evil, they just do, what their trainers tell them to do. The only difference is, that Team Rocket seems to be even more incompetent.

As they say: if a Pokemon loses it's not the Pokemons fault, but rather that of its trainer.
Pikachu for example is pretty strong, but since Ash isn't able to use it to it's full potential, it loses every so often. If he'd take everything a little more serious, he wouldn't lose as much and would even be able to win in a Pokemon League.

But that also would make the anime more serious and the creators seem to think young kids (the targeted viewership) don't like serious animes.

 

[Aquacorde]

I'm gonna have to disagree with you, R.F. One of Ash's strengths is his ability to come up with things on the fly. His adaptability and versatility are the main factors involved with him winning battles. As long as he figures out what his opponent is doing, he can counterstrategize. That's why he had such a hard time with Brawly- he just could not figure out how Brawly's Pokémon were rolling with the punches.

In fact, I think the main thing we see with gym battles is Ash's versatility versus the leader's honed strategy. Every gym leader seems to have a favoured technique or skill that is apparent in the way they train and battle which is very tuned to the kinds of Pokémon they use.

As Cilan has said many a time, a gym leader's job is to bring out the potential of their challengers. I feel like that means they assess their challengers and give them an appropriate challenge- not too difficult to overcome, but certainly hard enough so that they will have to fight hard for their win. Leaders probably keep a decent assortment of Pokémon on hand to handle various trainers' skill levels. Like, Norman knew Ash had advanced fairly far in a national tournament twice, so he was obviously going to pull in some of his strongest. For someone who had only won four Hoenn badges, he probably would have used a team much more reasonable to their skillset. The point for a gym leader is not to beat challengers into the ground- it is to give a tough but fair fight.

In the anime, levels are not a thing. A Pokémon keeps its strength and skill up by constant exercise and practice, as any athlete would. Because of this, strategy and creative use of moves and terrain becomes much more prominent. You may be able to just Mach Punch the crap out of Norman's team in the games with an overleveled Breloom (sorry Norman), but what if gym battles were set like Frontier Battles? What if every Pokémon was identical in level, but different in stats and movesets? That's a bit more like gyms the anime. And then you bring in terrain and out-of-the-box thinking and wow, guess what? It's a living world, unrestricted by data and mechanics.

So yeah, gym leaders are there to give a match that tests the skill of trainers, not power. They usually understand a trainer's power initially. The skill is what proves a challenger worthy of a badge.

 

[Famon]

I wonder one thing , What gym-leader gets from their job ???
Just money , nothing else ????
I mean , The PIA agent think the gym leader should be a strong trainer who good enough to fight a freaking legendary Pokemon .(Broke's DP Special)
But why A strong trainer waste his/her whole life in a gym instate of become something bigger like E4 Or Champion ???
I don't think there any reason for anyone to be a Gym-Leader .
As far I see , Every significance a gym-leader has , They has for the Challenger .
But , The Gym-leader doesn't seem to get anything from their job.

 

[Aquacorde]

You bring up a point I was thinking about yesterday haha. But the thing is, being a gym leader seems to be a steady job and good for people who enjoy that kind of thing but maybe don't like travel so much or want to settle down and have a family. They're probably funded by the League itself, because those tournaments are huge and televised internationally. So what Leaders get out of it is a salary, a place they can call home, and well-earned respect across regions.

 

[mishy.]

To expand on what was said maybe being a Gym Leader was their goal/dream all along. Maybe it's something they wanted to do and once they reached that point they had their dream. After all, being a Gym Leader you're pretty recognized and you get to battle day in and day out. As far as I can tell in the anime the E4 don't really get that privilege to go out and bring out the potential in future trainers. They likely have other jobs to do that doesn't allow for them to do so all the time. But with the Gym Leader that is their job and while it might not be the E4 or the champion (which in the anime is more of a one-time thing. You have the title and then what?) they enjoy it. I guess think of it like those who are primary, middle or high school teachers because they want to be. They could go further and teach higher level courses but they choose to stick with that level because it's what they wanted to. There's nothing wrong with that.

Of course, this doesn't account for the teachers who use lower levels as a stepping stone, but it's the general idea.

 

[Famon]

You bring up a point I was thinking about yesterday haha. But the thing is, being a gym leader seems to be a steady job and good for people who enjoy that kind of thing but maybe don't like travel so much or want to settle down and have a family. They're probably funded by the League itself, because those tournaments are huge and televised internationally. So what Leaders get out of it is a salary, a place they can call home, and well-earned respect across regions.

Still , I think PIA should be thankful to those people for becoming Gym-leader in first place .
I think , suppose You become the strongest gym-leader in the world !
So powerful that nobody can't beat you to get a badge .
But what the point of that !!!
If you become an unbeatable gym-leader then League won't get any challenger from you unless you give out ''petty Badges'' !
Honestly , There no point of being a strong gym-leader .
Plus ,
How many people a gym-leader can battle in a day ???
Both Cilan & Ash bashed Skyla for her Air Battle method But I agree with her .
She was totally right
I mean , There atleast 10 or 15 challenger came to challenge her within One day.
But A good battle worn all her Pokemon So How can she Possibly battle 15 trainer one day .
Not to mention that their will be more challenger next day .
It doesn't make sense unless most of the challenger are really really weak .
Atleast in game , The Player/Challenger has to beat all gym-trainer before facing the Gym-leader .
But In Anime , challenger just Directly challenge them .
I believe the Anime should atleast apply maze & Gym-trainer so Challengers could prove themself before facing the Gym-leader !!!

 

[Pilkie]

I think Ash gets thrown off by the differences between regions and has to learn how Pokémon work in that region. But I am a little frustrated with Ash and his Pikachu. I know they can't make Ash unbeatable because, face it, that would make the anime boring; but can they at least make Ash a little let ignorant. I feel like Ash should have a full understanding of how type advantages should work, but a few seasons in and he was still surprised when an electric Pokémon took down his flying pokémon or water pokémon. I don't know, it's hard for an anime to keep its fan base happy and be interesting enough to bring in new viewers without having to explain a bit how the mechanics of pokémon work. I prefer Pokémon Origins story and mechanics wise, especially regarding gym battles, but I understand why Ash will never be allowed to have extremely powerful Pokémon and clear gyms without taking a single hit.

 

[Dragon]

Hm, well, what I think is that Gym Leaders come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, like pokemon trainers. Well, they -are- essentially pokemon trainers, but, I believe that they were more recognized from the League associations that they were from, because their skills are 'special' enough to have their opponents be a little more creative in order to defeat them. Sure, normally, you can command your Squirtle to use Water Gun on a Geodude anytime, putting you in an advantage, but, let's say you're facing a gym leader's Geodude - these Gym Leaders think about their own weaknesses, and try to make their strategies revolve around covering their own weaknesses. So, how are you going to counter that strategy with your own? I believe Gym Leaders want to test that.

A trainer can also learn from these Gym Leaders just as well. Now, of course Ash isn't the best pokemon trainer around, which stands to reason that he losses to some gym leaders from time to time, like Sabrina, Brawl, or Whitney, but you know, I like to think that it's all part of Ash's growing up. If you remember the episode on where Ash loses to Brawly, he really underestimated him, and it causes him to rethink how he battles with his pokemon. Remember how he lost to Whitney? That Milktank seemed unstoppable, but again, Ash ha to be creative in order to win, and thus he realized, a battle is a battle, no matter what situation you're in, or where you're at. There's a lot more lessons that Ash learned from fighting gym leaders, but all in all, that growing up is what makes Ash a better trainer in the process, imo, and, you know, I think that stronger gym leaders can help him grow up more.

 

[DBZ fan]

In reality leaders and their gyms serve as evaluators, testing chekpoints to determine trainer level of skill and provide access to qualify for pokemon league. Their job
is to test upcoming trainers to see if they're ready to enter pokemon league and not necessarily crush them down which explains why they lose to rookies aswell. Indicating how in that case they either use weaker pokemon or don't go with full force lowering their potential.

Likewise difficulty of some gym and different set of rules they follow whether its through tradition or to give advantage to gym leader when facing challenger also plays role in how hard or easy its going to be earning badge. As its been showed some gyms even allow to have both gym leader and challenger switch their pokemon like it happened with Lenora in Unova, or some gyms in Kanto like against Blaine if battle vs Ash was something to go by.

As far as strength of leader goes they are in most cases gold middle, being above mediocre and average trainers, but below champions E4, Frontier brains and other exceptionally strong trainers which travel around world. Making them thus neither weak, but glorified and unbeatable either.

Speaking of Ash reason why he even nowadays has problems in defeating gym leaders is mainly because of leaving all his older, more experienced pokemon behind when starting journey in new region having to rely on newly caught inexperienced pokemon which lacks skill, sufficient amount of training and power to stand up for challenge like reserves do making job for Ash all that harder resulting in sometime struggling in defeating gym leaders or even losing at times.

Logically he is nowdays stronger than any of them managing to beat much powerful trainers like frontier brains aswell coming top 4 in league.
Sure he could use his older pokemon mopping floor with every one of them but that would defeat purpose of advertizing aswell not being very entertaining for most people.
Along with going against Ash current methodology of wanting on purpose to start from zero in beginning of every journey building his way forward through new pokemon he catch and team formed out of it. By learning how to use all kind of different pokemon, various types he didn't had experience to train and battle with, realize in what way to bring their true strength on surface and achieve mastery of all kind of pokemon species making best use of them.

Though in reality main reason behind this is game promotion. Unless writers decide to throw ball and have Ash develop in deeper, more substantial way by expanding on what other steps beside winning league and battling E4 his master dream entails. Having him go through bigger, more complex challenges which would provide need of using his rerserves and more powerful pokemon developing them further and exploring on potential to be up for chgallenge set infront of him and stand chance vs superior trainers. Which doesn't look to be the case at this point and time.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As for question of why some gym leaders never leave their positions reaching higher level and positions as trainers; reasons are numerous.

Some gym leaders consider gym as their calling, purpose in life being perfectly content with current position. They want to settle down, perhaps start their own family not having any desire or need to become something more and climb higher on ladder as far as knowledge, skills and usage of pokemon goes.

While some use gym as temporary mean, stepping stone toward accomplishing their motives staying there until they gather enough experience and knowledge learning everything they could making them prepared to start their journey. With purpose of developing innovative more complex battle style, find themselves in all kind of unexpected situation seeing different usage of pokemon and strategy which they dont encounter at gym, learn more about pokemon types by exploring world along with entering tournaments with high competition. Building on their skills, knowledge and way to become more recognized and noticed worldwide that way bringing them closer toward achievement of their dreams,. Like Wallace did leaving his gym to travel and improve as trainer becoming champion, top water expert in world and eventually contest master. Or Fantina, Candice(mentioned she plans to become champion), Cilan etc.

On other hand some of them have different dreams and higher ambitions to pursue wanting to become something more, but aren't able to do so for time being due to family issues or their own problems. Like Brock for example who wanted to go on journey becoming top breeder but had to take care care of younger brothers, sisters and gym due to not having anyone to help him out and consign his daily duties until enough eworthy person was provided(his father)who could take things over.

To extent same applies to Misty which had to postpone her dreams of becoming water master,possibly becoming E4(living up to idol Lorelei)to help sisters out and take care of gym for time being due to not having anyone to rely on due to siblinga irresponsibility. Until enough responsible and thrustworthy substitute is provided allowing to leave gym in case she decides to continue pursuing her own ambitions and goals breaking new grounds as trainer.
Etc.