On my Pokemon mentality.

This morning, I promised myself that I would finish The Last Airbender today. That did not happen; maybe tomorrow.

This afternoon, I promised myself that I would keep working on the drawing I started a couple of days ago. Eh, maybe tomorrow.

At nine thirty this evening, I promised myself I would go to bed before midnight. That did not happen; hopefully it will at least some time in the near future, if not tomorrow.

But I did play a whole lot of Pokemon.

...

The way I normally play Pokemon is that I generally try to get six (mostly random) Pokemon in my team up to at least level ten in the starting area, before I move on. That means a whole lot of grinding. In SoulSilver, I did not bother with that. Chose Chikorita as a starter, as I almost always - with the exception of the Mudkip generation - start with grass type; I named him Qwerty. (Usually I name my Pokemon the first word that comes to mind; it makes for some very silly nicknames.) Caught a Pidgey, named her Burlap. The other random Pokemon in my early party did not matter at all, as I barely ever end up keeping any of my non-starter starting-party Pokemon. Actually, I'm not sure I ever have. Anyways. Qwerty and Burlap are the only ones I used up past the first gym, Faulkner the flying-type-guy.

Then I was talking to a friend, who was pre-planning her Diamond team. I have never pre-planned before; I just kind of go with what I get. As I've said before, I sometimes get very emotionally attached to characters in video games..anyways. I started thinking about my Pokemon style. Because everyone has their own techniques, I guess, especially in a game like this. But I think mine is kind of silly.

For one thing, I am not at all defensive. At all. At all. It's like how in WoW, I would not be able to be a healer. I do not have a healer's mentality. As soon as I realize I need heals, I have jumped on my tenth mob in a row and I'm down to a quarter health but oh well, I can just kill it quickly and then heal, right? but oops, I seem to have aggro'd three more better click the rejuve button oops I'm dead. It doesn't get quite that bad in Pokemon, especially since..I remember to heal when I need it. xD But no, I mean I don't use any of those dumb boosting moves, and I get rid of them as soon as possible. It really pisses me off when an opponent uses something like Tail Whip or Growl; sure, it affects my offense or defense, but I DO NOT CARE JUST HIT ME SO WE CAN GET THIS OVER WITH. Growl is annoying because if they have enough time to keep doing it for a while, it takes more and more hits to take them down, and they get in more and more Growls, and it's just a horrible cycle. The only things I can really commend are accuracy-depleting moves, because those are bitchessssssss to deal with. But I am all about the offensive. Hit as hard as you can and eventually you will win.

As for the types of Pokemon I choose for my endgame party..well. I'm a bit mental about it. I guess I am drawn to the four classical elements, or as close as I can get to them, with a bit of Pokemodifications. I must have grass, water, fire, and flying in my party at all times; this is for type matching as well as for the HMs necessary to mobilize. I also see them as the best types, although of course this is not necessarily true. I was recently looking at type matchups, and I realized that steel type is ridiculously resilient against almost all types. Yet I am still not exactly inclined to find a steel type for my party. I resent ground / rock; my starter type is always super effective against them, so I have never seen them as a good type. Fighting and normal fly under my radar. So does ghost, although it shouldn't; some things don't affect it at all, which is good. And I hate bug types, not because I dislike bugs but because I always imagine them being burned or flooded or frozen by attacks, and that is no use to me. I rather enjoy dragon types, although they come around near the same time as the ice gym, in which it is silly to have dragon types.

I don't actually plan which Pokemon will make it into my endgame party. Never the beginning ones; I project upon them an aura of weakness which I suppose is a bit silly, but maybe it makes sense. But I think I've only evolved a Pidgey to a Pidgeotto once, and never to a full-grown Pidgeot. Usually my party is comprised of Pokemon I pick up somewhere mid-way. Never legendaries, or almost never. Occasionally I use them against the Elite Four, but not often. I feel like, since they are introduced near the end and already at high level, you have no real opportunity to care about them at all..

Right now I am doing barely-planning,-really. I caught a level ten Magikarp, and am raising it to Gyrados. Ten levels. Ten long, horrible, painful levels of switching around. But it'll be good when it happens, because it's water and flying type; so I don't have to carry them around separately. (I always thought it was funny that Gyrados is flying, not dragon.) And I hope to get a Vulpix in the nearish future, to be my fire. But that's it. Not much thought at all into it.

...

Not sure why I wrote this.

Olivia