Warning: The following report contains images and writing of a gratuitously cute nature. If you are offended by cute little animals and Japanese anime, turn back now.

So here is a battle report about Pokemon. I'm sure that most of the people on this site have played one of the games at least once, so you can't knock Pokemon too hard (maybe).

To be able to engage in real competitive multiplayer battling requires not only multiple games, but also multiple Gameboys. However, if you want to avoid shelling out tons of money for several kiddie games, you can download Shoddybattle from smogon.com and play for free without all the hassle. Smogon.com also has a lot of good strategy and tips for more advanced players. Serebii.com is better for people that are starting off and does a little better at explaining some of the basics than Smogon.com does.

If you haven't stopped reading the report yet, I'll start getting into some details.

Two players battle out with 6 pokemon on each team, one pokemon at a time per team. Every pokemon has a 1 or 2 kinds of innate ability, 4 moves and 6 stats.

The stats are Hit points, Speed, physical attack, physical defense, special attack and special defense. The attack and defense stats determine how much damage is dealt and received from various attacks. Hit points are obvious enough, and speed determines which pokemon attacks first. The pokemon with more speed usually moves first unless there is a normal switch, or a move or ability allows the slower pokemon to move first. There are several moves that always attack first, they are typically weaker that other moves, but they can surprise your opponent.

Types, like water, fire, grass, bug, ice and dragon also determine damage. A water-type pokemon that uses a water attack deals 50% more than a non-water type that does a water attack: this is referred to as STAB, or Same Type Attack Bonus. Beyond this STAB damage, is type weakness, and weakness is the factor that influences damage amounts the most. If a grass type pokemon takes a water-type attack, the attack damage is halved, where as if a fire type pokemon takes a water attack the damage is doubled. Not every type combination alters damage, most take neutral damage. With 17 different types it can become complicated to keep track of strengths, weaknesses and immunities, so looking at a chart for reference is helpful. Here is a link to one that I use.

Most pokemon have around 60 moves that they can learn, and they differ from monster to monster, with some movesets being similar. But every pokemon can only have 4 moves at a time, so while many are possible, only 4 will be together at one time.

My Team

	My team leads off with a female Crobat (flying/poison) named Bat Girl. Crobat is known for its good speed and high attack power. Crobat is carrying leftovers, every team member is carrying leftovers (restores 6% of health every turn). Her ability is "inner focus," which prevents Crobat from flinching (missing a turn). Not very useful since Crobat will usually be faster than anything that tries to flinch her, but it is her only ability. Moves: Brave bird: a strong flying type attack that causes recoil damage to Crobat Taunt: opposing pokemon can only use attack moves (no status moves or stat upping moves) Roost: a move that restores health: Crobat also loses her flying typing until the end of the turn. U-turn: a bug type attack that allows Crobat to switch out and do damage. The order of the team does not matter, just the lead (Crobat), the rest of them only come out when they are sent out
	Next is a Miltank (normal) named Bessie, she is used as a physical wall (stops physical attackers) and cleric (restores status to my whole party). She also carries leftovers for health recovery. Her ability is Scrappy, which allows her to damage ghost type pokemon (which are normally immune to normal type attacks) Moves: Body slam: a normal move that does a fair amount of damage and has a 30% chance of paralyzing the opponent. Milk drink: restores half of miltank's health. Heal bell: removes status of all pokemon on my team. Stealth rock: sets up rocks that damage all opposing pokemon when they switch in, a very useful move.
	A male Houndoom (dark/fire) named Grim is my special sweeper, and is used to smash through an opposing team Houndoom's ability is "flash fire", if he is hit by a fire move, his fire damage is increased, it also grants immunity to fire type moves, and this gives Houndoom 2 immunities, fire and psychic. Moves: Flamethrower: a strong fire move that has max accuracy and a chance to burn the opponent. Dark Pulse: a strong dark attack. Nasty plot: a stat upping move or buff that increases Houndoom's special attack by 2 levels. Substitute: uses 25% of houndoom's health to set up a decoy to absorb damage and status for houndoom.
	A male Blastoise (water) called Kreepo is my rapid spinner (uses the move rapid spin to remove entry hazards like stealth rock and spikes), he has leftovers as well for health recovery. His ability is "torrent" and it is not that useful, it boosts Blastoise's water attacks if his health is low. It is Blastoise's only ability choice, some defensive ability might be better, but there are only a handful of pokemon that can use rapid spin, so you have to take them as they come. Moves: Surf: a strong water type attack. Rapid spin: a weak attack that removes all entry hazards (stealth rock or spikes). It is blocked by ghost pokemon. Hidden power ghost: hidden power is an attack that can be any type depending on the random stats of the pokemon, it is ghost type so that it is super effective against ghosts that might try to bock rapid spin. Roar: a move that goes last but scares the opposing pokemon away (forces a switch).
	Spiritomb (Ghost/dark) named Gas Giant is my rapid spin blocker and general cleanup pokemon. Spiritomb is also carrying leftovers for health recovery. Spiritomb's ability is "pressure", it causes pokemon's moves to be drained twice as fast (every move - along with typing, damage, accuracy, and effect - has what is called power points or PP, which decreases by 1 each time a move is used. Pressure causes them to count down by 2 instead of one (when PP reaches 0 the move cannot be used any more)). Ghost and dark types are unique, no attack type is super effective against a dark/ghost type pokemon. Moves: Calm mind: boosts both special defense and special attack. Hypnosis: a 75% accurate move that can put pokemon to sleep. Shadow ball: a strong ghost type move. Hidden power fire: for dealing with steel types (steel is a very good defensive type).
	A Ludicolo (water/grass) I have called TheWateryGrave is a rainy day stopper. This is a UU team, and one team style that runs rampant in UU is swift swim teams. They often cause it to rain, then switch in a pokemon with the ability swift swim (doubles their speed in rain) and use powerful water attacks for several turns (rain increases damage dealt by water attacks, but rain only lasts a few turns ). Ludicolo has swift swim, so it benefits from the speed increase and also takes only 1/4 damage from water attacks because of water and grass typing. Ludicolo also carries leftovers (like the rest of my team) and is a good general cleanup and goto pokemon. Moves: Surf: a strong water type attack. Energy ball: a strong grass type attack. Ice beam: a strong ice attack. Leech seed: steals health away from the seeded pokemon and gives it to Ludicolo every turn.

This team has undergone several changes, and if fact needs to be changed again (Crobat has to go) but I'll explain a few good battles that I had playing on Smogon's ladder.

Game 1

rabidfox vs DragonNinja

I lead with Crobat, and my opponent leads with a Steelix (ground/steel type) with good physical defenses and attacks, but usually slow.

vs. 

Steelix is a ground and steel type, and has great physical defense and decent physical attack, but poor speed and specials, and hence is often used as a physical wall.

I lead with a taunt, and stop his steelix from setting up stealth rocks on me. DragonNinja switches out to a Gardevior and I U-turn out to switch in my Miltank to set my own stealth rocks.

u-turn      switch

Gardevior is a psychic type with good special attack and defense and a wide range of utility moves (status and healing) that is often used for support on a team. Additional notes: Stealth rock sets up rocks that stay around until they are removed with a rapid spin, and as long as they are in play, they deal an amount of damage to pokemon that switch in based on their typing. Pokemon that are weak to rock type take extra damage, while those that resist take less damage.

DragonNinja then switches his Steelix back in to set up stealth rock, and I paralyze it and it poisons Miltank with toxic (toxic poison deals 6% damage then 12% then 18% damage until the pokemon faints or switches out, the numbers reset to 6% every time you switch back in). My Miltank uses heal bell to remove the poison and takes an earthquake from Steelix.

I switch in my Blastoise to hit the Steelix with super effective water attacks and rapid spin away the stealth rocks, but my Blastoise takes a toxic on the switch in.

switch       switch with wish

             The Switches: these adjust the normal order of events. In this case, we both give our orders to our pokemon (I tell Miltank to switch to Blastoise and DragonNinja tells his Steelix to use toxic on me). Then what happens is that Miltank switches out and Blastoise comes in, and then the Steelix uses toxic, so he has a free attack on me. Switching can be good or bad, if you know what moves is coming, you can switch to something that can ignore or even absorb that hit. Switches caused by moves (u-turn or baton pass) or faints behave differently than normal switches.

DragonNinja then switches his Steelix out for his Gardevior (who takes 12% from stealth rock) and I use roar and scare Gardevior and switch in a Houndoom (who then takes 25% damage from the stealth rocks)

   stay        switch

stay        roar

I surf and take out the Houndoom after eating a dark pulse. DragonNinja switches in his Gardevior and uses thunderbolt to kill my Blastoise before I get a chance to use rapid spin.

              KO

KO            

I switch in my Spiritomb to do some cleanup and DragonNinja switches Steelix back in. I decide to try for a sweep and begin using calm mind to up Spiritomb's special attack and special defense. DragonNinja makes a good move and poisons my Spiritomb that will cause me to switch the Spiritomb (and lose all the calm mind boosts) or eventually KO the Spiritomb.

I knew I had a choice to make at that time, I could choose to boost up with calm mind right then or switch out my Spiritomb and restore his health with heal bell (on Miltank) and save him for later. Looking back on this, I could have seen that I lost my rapid spinner (Blastoise), and to start doing a lot of switching would cause stealth rock damage to rack up. But really, I wanted to try out my purple cloud; I just worked him onto my team and wanted to see what it could do with a few calm minds under its belt.

So on that note, I try a hypnosis (and miss) and DragonNinja switches back to his Gardevior to do some wish healing, but by this time I have 3 calm minds boosting me, however my health is steadily dropping. I drop the Gardevior with a very strong shadow ball. DragonNinja then brings in his Steelix and I surprise it with my hidden power fire and take it out in one hit (really it was 97% damage since the Steelix took 3% from stealth rock)

                 KO

Next DragonNinja sends in an Altaria (flying/dragon), and uses dragon dance to boost its speed and attack. But Altaria takes 25% damage switching in on the stealth rocks, and then eats another shadow ball that takes it down.

Altaria is one of the only UU dragons, and it has a lot of versatility, its stats and typing allow it to be defensive and offensive. Once DragonNinja had his Altaria use dragon dance, it became obvious that this Altaria is for attacking.

DragonNinja probably figured that his Altaria could have taken the power hits from Spiritomb, and that's why it used dragon dance instead of an attack, it may have been able to take my Spiritomb out with a good attack (it was already faster without the dragon dance, perhaps he was trying to set up for his own sweep).

DragonNinja sends in another defensive monster, a Venusaur to stem the tide. And even though it does get in an energy ball attack in before my Spiritomb attacks, the calm mind special defense boosts reduce its damage to small amounts. Venusaur falls to a critical hit from my boosted shadow ball.

        
                 KO
              
                 KO

Venusausr is a grass/poison type that is typically used more for defense and stalling with grass status moves, but it does pack some offensive power.                 Critical hits: every attack has a small percent chance to deal double damage. In most games you can expect to see a few critical hits, sometimes they fall at useless moments (hitting a pokemon with only a few HP left with a super effective attack that gets a critical hit), but this is what I'll say was a good critical hit. I'm not sure if I would have killed the Venusaur with out it, I think so, three boosts is a lot of power, but who knows.

After that last KO, Spiritomb finally falls to the poison.

Lets look at the score as it stands.

DragonNinja has lost 5 pokemon: Houndoom, Gardevior, Steelix, Altaria and Venusaur. 

lost:

I've lost 2: Blastoise and Spiritomb. It looks like it was a good choice for me to sacrifice Spiritomb to the poison rather than switch him out and try and heal him with my Miltank. 

lost:

DragonNinja switches in his last monster Feraligatr (water type) and I switch in my Ludicolo, and leech seed the Feraligatr while it dragon dances (ups speed and physical attack). DragonNinja's fate is sealed however, even dragon dances are too little too late and the Feraligatr falls to leech seed and energy balls from my Ludicolo, and DragonNinja leaves the game with a "gg".

Feraligatr is a water type and is often used as a sweeper. It has better physical stats than special, and has the moves to set up for powerful sweeps

thus ends game 1

Game 2

rabidfox vs mahmah

I lead off again with Crobat, and mahmah sends out a Banette (ghost type). I am surprised by this choice for a lead off as Banette is an NU (Never-Used) pokemon, which is a tier below UU, the ladder we are playing on now.

Banette, a Ghost type, is a mixed bag, usually used as a support pokemon. Banette has a wide variety of moves, but doesn't generally fight too well: it sets up status or field effects and then gets out, or dies.

Figuring that Crobat is faster then Banette, I use taunt, and Banette tries to use trick room but the taunt stops it, and that tips me off to his strategy.

Crobat then hits the Banette with a brave bird (83% damage, but takes 22% recoil) and Banette misses with a thunder (Thunder has only 70% accuracy). Banette then switches out to a Torkoal (fire type) that takes another brave bird from Crobat on the switch. Crobat then U-turns out and Miltank switches in while Torkoal sets up stealth rocks.

U-turn         switch

Torkoal (fire type) is a defensive pokemon that has rapid spin, and that is its most common use, but like Banette, Torkoal is also a NU pokemon, suffering from a bad typing/stat combination. Fire is not a good defensive type.               Trick room: a move that switches timing order in turns. While trick room is in effect slower pokemon make their moves before faster ones. If you have a Trick Room team then you often select pokemon that have more power and lower speed since Trick room allows you to attack first. Trick room lasts 5 turns.

mahmah then switches Torkoal out for Banette, who takes a body slam from my scrappy Miltank and faints. mahmah sends in a Porygon2 (normal type) to get trick room off, while Miltank sets up my own stealth rocks. Torkoal is sent back in to spin the stealth rocks away. Torkoal takes several body slams until it uses explosion on my Miltank (this, however, does not KO my Miltank).

                    switch

                   KO

                    switch

                      explode

Porygon2 a normal type, has high special attack, and also a high variety of moves, and can act as an attacker and/or support pokemon.  Porygon 2 is a UU tier pokemon, unlike the others that mahmah has been using.

mahmah then sends in a Hitmontop (fighting type) and that scares me enough to pull out my Miltank and send in Spiritomb that takes a close combat on the switch to which Spiritomb is immune.

switch                    

Hitmontop is a fighting type that can also use rapid spin. It has a good mix of stats that allow it play well both offensively and defensively. It typically carries a fighting attack, but not always rapid spin. Hitmontop is a UU pokemon.   Close Combat is a very strong fighting move that decreases the user's (the user of close combat) physical and special defense.

mahmah then switches out Hitmontop for a Marowak (a ground type). Marowak has very strong physical attacks but low speed, good for a trick room team. The trick room that Porygon2 set up dissipates as Marowak comes out. And unfortunately for mahmah, Marowak takes a hypnosis from my Spiritomb and falls asleep.

Marowak itself is not that great (it is a NU pokemon), but it gets a special item (bone club) that only it can use that boosts its attack to dangerous levels, so Marowak's are always using bone clubs in battles. With a bone club it acts as a powerful sweeper.

Just like in the previous game, Spiritomb calm mind's up twice while Marowak tries to wake up. With 2 calm minds, the sleeping Marowak gets KOed by Spiritomb and mahmah leaves the game without a word.

...And thus ends game 2

Game 3

rabidfox vs. Schedrevka

I lead off with Crobat and Schedrevka sends out a Miltank to start. Crobat taunts, and takes a body slam from Miltank that paralyzes her. Schedrevka switches in a Steelix, and Crobat U-turns out to Miltank. Steelix uses curse to boost its attack and defense at the expense of its speed while my Miltank sets up stealth rock.

u-turn          switch

I switch in my Blastoise that takes a weak gyro ball on the switch, and then Schedrevka sends in a Clefable (normal type) that promptly gets roared out, and Steelix jumps back in. I shoot off a surf, hoping to catch the Steelix, but Schedrevka wisely switches the Clefable back in to take the surf. Clefable powers up with cosmic power before getting roared out again, bringing in a Sharpedo (water/dark type).

                   switch

                 roar

                 switch

                 roar

Clefable is a normal type pokemon that can take several roles, a cleric and wall, or offensive force. Clefable has a unique ability to block all sources of passive damage called "magic gaurd", which includes stealth rocks, poison and burn damage to name just a few.

Sharpedo is a water/dark type that is commonly classified as a glass cannon. It has great attack strength, and even good speed, but poor defenses, so it can deal a great deal of damage, but it cannot take it.

I switch Blastoise out for Ludicolo and it takes a strong crunch from Sharpedo, but then gets in an energy ball to take it out. Schedrevka then switches in a Jynx (ice/psychic) that takes a 25% hit from stealth rocks and then sets up a substitute that blocks the leech seed I send its way. I think that roaring away this Jinx is a good idea and I send in my Blastoise, while the Jynx uses a calm mind to boost up. I set up to use roar (which always goes last) but Jynx puts my Blastoise to sleep using the move lovely kiss (only a 75% accurate move).

                 KO

 switch         

Jynx is an ice/psychic type that I am not too familiar with, it has good special attack and defense, and combined with good offensive typing, makes for a potentially good special sweeper, but can also fill other roles.

Do'h! A Jynx sitting behind a substitute with a calm mind under its belt is a formidable pokemon, and my intent to roar it away failed when my Blastoise was put to sleep. Now I want to wake it up with Miltank using heal bell. Miltank comes in only to be blasted by a powerful ice beam from the faster Jynx, and Miltank gets KOed. If I was screwed before, I'm really screwed now, I have no reliable way to wake Blastoise, and no other pokemon on my team can handle the Jynx that is facing me. So I send in my Blastoise and hope it wakes up soon.

My sleeping Blastoise takes an ice beam (deals 33% damage) on the switch in, and on the next turn Jynx uses another calm mind. But after that calm mind, then unthinkable occurs and Blastoise wakes up and roars the Jynx away and sends in Weezing.

KO                   

            roar

Weezing is a poison type that has the ability levitate, that makes it immune to ground moves. Weezing is pretty bulky (good defenses and HP) and has a good range of moves, and can also induce several statuses. Weezings also typically have explosion, a normal type move that kills them but deals huge damage to their target, usually KOing it.

That wake up probably gave me the game, I was in a tight spot against that Jynx and now all its boosts are gone and I have another chance at the game. We are tied at 5 pokemon each, I'm down a Miltank and Schedrevka is down a Sharpedo.

I switch my Blastoise out for Houndoom to do some sweeping of my own and meet another stroke of good luck: the Weezing shoots off a Will-o-wisp that my Houndoom not only blocks, but uses to power up his fire attacks. Schedrevka then switches out to Miltank while Houndoom sets up a substitute of his own to hide behind. Houndoom then uses nasty plot to up his special attacks and his substitute gets broken by a body slam from the Miltank.

But now it is my turn to bust some heads, Houndoom has 3 boosts to his flamethrower and 2 for his dark pulse. I shoot off a flamethrower at the Miltank and take it out in one hit. Schedrevka sends Steelix in next, only to fall to super effective flamethrower. Wheezing and Clefable also switch in only to fall to heavily boosted flamethrowers. As Jynx comes back in to face my Houndoom (a match favorable to me even without a nasty plot and flash fire boost) It stands at my 5 pokemon against Schedrevka's 1.

1. boost up
2. kill everything

KO's:

Jynx comes in and takes another 25% from the stealth rocks and tries to put Houndoom to sleep with lovely kiss...

But misses...

And with that, the game is mine; another super effective flamethrower puts down the Jynx. Schedrevka says a polite "GG" and leaves the game.

end of game 3

This was a lucky game for me, since several factors that were up to chance came out in my favor, Blastoise waking up quickly and roaring out Jynx, switching in Houndoom to absorb the will-o-wisp, and the Jynx missing with lovely kiss at the end.

So that is a little glimpse into some pokemon battles, I hope that no one was deeply offended, you were warned in the beginning as to the cuteness.

This is Rabid Fox signing off.