nuzlocke Ultra Calamity - A Pokemon Ultra Moon Nuzlocke: Episode 6 - The Ultra Cooking Episode

[NyxAvatar69]

To be honest, the upcoming trials worry me quite a lot.  After the trainwreck that was the Alolan Marowak disaster, I did some training to prepare.  At the same time, I've finally broken the cycle of having a party full of males by adding Mailbird and Mother to the party.  While I have no real idea why I chose to use Mailbird outside of the upcoming Grand Trial, I figured I could get some milage out of Mother.  At the same time, though, I swear I'm blind or something.  I had looked on Serebii to see when Mother will evolve and instantly assumed it was Lv. 27.  It's actually Lv. 28 at night, and with how Ultra Moon has a twelve hour time difference from Ultra Sun, I ended up evolving her in the middle of the afternoon since it was night in game.  That's nice, and with our team rebuilt and grinded up, let's go to Route 8.

On another note, it turns out that Alolan Marowak learns it's exclusive move, Shadow Bone, at Lv. 27 despite evolving at Lv. 28.  What kind of backwards logic is that?  That means I can't teach it Shadow Bone until the literal end of the game, and that's even if Mother survives that long.  Nice movepools you got there, Nintendo.

But of course, before we go anywhere, some weirdo has to interrupt my progress.  This time, it's a weirdo in a hat who gives a short ramble about Poke Pelago before just leaving.  Honestly, I should've covered that last episode, but I was too overcome by despair to care.  Anyway, that's a thing that honestly has next to no bearing on the story...or anything, really.  It's a feature, it's there.  This is a nuzlocke, not a Let's Play, so I don't think it needs explaining.  Let's just slide on over to Route 8.

So I'm pretty sure the giant random tunnel to Route 8 wasn't in the original games.  I would check, but that requires me to grab my copy of Moon, and I'm writing this segment at almost 3 AM while I want to sleep, so I'll check later.  And now, for some ungodly reason or another, the Ultra Recon Squad is lurking about in this random tunnel to Route 8.  You know, thinking about it now, if they're here, that's a sure sign this tunnel was added in this version.  Welp, that sure saves time.  As usual, they go on about cryptic nonsense involving light in their world and Z-Moves, then leave because they're suppose to be meeting with some scientist.

So Route 8 is pretty standard for this point of the game.  Big, fairly straightforward road, some trainers to battle, grass for an encounter, and a Pokemon Center towards the end.  The only weird thing would probably be the small Aether Foundation building, but it's not that important unless you want to go through hell for a bit of money.  Trust me, it's not worth it.  That's not important, either.  Along our brisk walk along Route 8, we come across the Ultra Recon Squad talking with a...fabulous man.  This is the best character in the game, ladies and gentlemen.  Presenting Colress.

Just look at this fabulous man and tell me he isn't the best character in the game.  He'll even hand over a free TM because he's one of the only people in this game who understand the finer things in life, and that thing is TM to help with my overall survival.  Sadly, he'll have to go, but we'll see him again...but anyway, enough of that.  If people can gush over Miles Edgeworth like he's god's gift to prosecutors, I can gush over Colress.  Anyway, that aside, how about that encounter?  We can get one here, after all.

I want to die.  I got a Yungoos.  I mean, on the bright side, it means I can't get screwed later by it's evolution...but at the same time, I'm pretty sure there are much better things in the grass on Route 8 than this.  Whatever.  It probably won't be seeing use, so it's just more power in the PC.  I just need to hope I don't accidentally kill it since my whole party is at least ten levels higher.

With the almighty power of Ultra Ball technology, we got it.  I'd rather not talk about how bad Yungoos is, but since we're on the topic of Ace Attorney, I named it Gumshoe.  Looking at it's nature, I swear I'm cursed to only get things with natures that raise Speed and lower something useful or necessary for survival.  I'm not using him even though I could fit in a sixth team member, so it's to the box with him.  Other than that, there's nothing noteworthy on this route outside of trainers and items, so...I'll slide on over to the Route 8 Pokemon Center.

While I was battling the trainers, I realized there is a place worth mentioning on Route 8, but we don't have any reason to go over there yet.  At the same time, it looks like Hau somehow beat us to the Pokemon Center.  He's only there to talk about the online feature, the Festival Plaza.  It sucks, by the way.  The PSS in X, Y, Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire was a much better thing than the Festival Plaza...but I'll save that rant for another time.  There is a girl who will trade an Arbok for a Trumbeak in the Pokemon Center if you want that, but I don't have a Trumbeak, so yeah.  The next trial is coming up, so stock up on your potions and Poke Balls for post trial captures.

So before we slide into Lush Jungle for the next trial, there is a Pokemon worth noting.  This is Wimpod.  It sucks until it evolves and it's a pain to get, but if you really want it, this is one of two locations you can score yourself one.  Anyway, Lush Jungle is another one of those "you can't leave until you're done" trials, like Kiawe's, so prepare yourself before you go in, because it's time for...

Trial #4: The Trial of Mallow! Cooking...in Hell!

So this trial...I hate it solely because of the totem.  Yes, it's that bad.  We'll get to that, though.  Let's talk about this trial, because it was actually changed quite a lot from before.  In the original games, you had to gather ingredients, all of which required Stoutland to find, and then you would be forced into an encounter for each ingredient.  This time, if you play your cards right, you should (in theory) be able to do this without any unnecessary battles before the totem.  Anyway, today on Cooking with Mallow, we're making the Super Mallow Special.  Get those pens ready, boys and girls, because it's time to list the ingredients.

To make your very own Super Mallow Special, you need to run out to your local Lush Jungle and grab yourself a Mago Berry, some Honey, and a Big Root.  Bring yourself a seperate bag so you don't mix your ingredients up with your normal junk.  So how this trial works is that while you need to gather these ingredients, you may or may not end up taking one that a wild Pokemon was aiming for, and they may come after you later.  You want to avoid these confrontations, but I'm not using a guide for this trial, so I may have to do two encounters.  Why did I say two?  Well, it's because the last answer is so obvious.  Fomantis will be your first, but Fomantis is no real threat.  Your second problem will (I think) be a Comfey, something we've yet to encounter.  I think I picked the right place to grab the Honey, so I should be alright...I hope.

The Big Root is easy, because you just need to find the tree that isn't obviously a Sudowoodo.  I also found out that I'm wrong about what I said earlier.  You can leave, but you'll have to redo the trial.  I guess you can cheat this one that way unless the spots for the first two items are randomized.  Anyway, once you got all the ingredients, it's back to the entrance, where we have a big pot ready to go...somehow.  I'm going to chalk it up as Nintendo logic and ignore it.  Fresh Water is another ingredient for the Super Mallow Special, so add that to your shopping list, folks.

Be sure to mix that Honey in with a Thick Club.  Not sure where you'll get one, but it's totally important for this to work.  Last but not least, throw that Big Root in there and add in some of Mallow's "super-special secret spice" that I'm not allowed to talk about for confidentiality reasons and potential life threatening danger due to attracting mutant plant monsters from a video game.  With all of that, you got yourself a nice and clean Super Mallow Special.  Congratulations on your cooking efforts.  Sadly, if you chose to use the super-special secret spice I didn't talk about for confidentiality reasons, you have no choice but to fight off...

 

This abomination!  Say hello to my least favorite totem in the entire game.  +2 Speed with a Power Herb, so it's first Solar Blade is free.  With the wrong team, this thing will Solar Blade through everything.  As someone who used Popplio as my starter in my casual runs of Moon and Ultra Sun, you can believe this one gave me some trouble.  It gets worse, too.  This thing has Synthesis, a reliable recovery move that restores half it's HP.  In the sun, it restores 75% instead.  Guess what kind of Pokemon this monster calls as allies?  If you guessed "Pokemon that can set up sun so it can spam no wait Solar Blades and 75% recovery Synthesis," go get yourself a cookie, you earned it.

I was scared of this thing despite having a Fire type, so it's part of the reason why I overleveled.  Leading with Tiny was my best bet so that most of it's moves didn't mean much.  Although, it seems they changed it's SOS choices because Lurantis called over a Comfey.  On it's own, Comfey isn't too intimidating.  It's annoying in doubles because it has options to heal it's ally.  To make matters worse, it also has an annoying move to raise the Lurantis' Defense so it'll tank hits better.  A couple of Fire Fangs brought the Comfey down, but not before it set up that infamous sun we all hate so much against this totem.

The second SOS partner did prove to be a much bigger threat to Tiny since it had Ancient Power and nearly killed him with a crit Dizzy Punch.  Lucky I had a Roto HP Restore to save on items.  With Kecleon gone, it's down to a one on one showdown between Tiny and Demon Lurantis.  Like an idiot, I wanted to kill it as fast as possible and went for endless Fire Fangs, even after a crit X-Scissor, thinking it would just heal spam.  Nope, it turns out the AI is somewhat smart and instead, it went for the Power Herb Solar Blade and killed Tiny.  Welp...I'm honestly not too surprised.  I wasn't expecting him to last too long, but at the same time, he was my starter.  I do have to care a little bit.  This is why I hate this island.  These totems all suck.  Anyway, even with Tiny's fall, we have our long term survivor, Spark Plug, ready to clean up Tiny's mess.  Sure, it took stalling it out of Synthesis since Acrobatics did so little thanks to the Defense boost from Comfey, but we still vanquished the monster...even at the cost of our starter.

With the last trial clear, we score a Grassium Z, some Nest Balls, and suddenly Kukui.  Hmm, I wonder where he's been.  At the very least, he'll slide over a surprisingly useful TM before basically forcibly guiding our path towards some Dimensional Research Lab.  I swear this man just wants to watch my team suffer.  He doesn't care that Tiny is dead.  He'll give us the rundown that Olivia uses Rock types, which is what I've been scared of this whole time.  Before we get to that, let's go and get something in Lush Jungle.  Hopefully something decent.  We'll put Tiny to rest after that.

Trash, also known as Bonsly.  There goes my hopes of getting a Grass type.  Sudowoodo won't fit on my team at all, especially since it's...eh, stat wise.  I guess it's something, but I could've easily gotten something better.  I would've taken Fomantis at this point, to be honest.  Whatever, I guess.  I'll name him Miror B. because he has a Sudowoodo in Pokemon Colosseum and the Lotad line isn't in this game.

So...his Speed sucks, and his nature makes his Speed suck even more, but it gets more Defense.  That's something, right?  It also has a move I've never seen before called Tearful Look and already has Mimic, so I can evolve it straight away.  A shame I have no intention of using him.  Anyway, it's time for the moment I'd rather not do, but we don't have a choice.

Tiny...while you were my starter, I'm going to be blunt here.  You were a disappointment, as I expected.  You hardly put in work except in the rare instance when half of my team got obliterated.  Even Spark Plug is putting in more work, and my low expectations for his survival surprisingly isn't raising his death flag.  Your lackluster movepool makes you harder to use to me than Brionne or Dartrix at this point of the game.  I bet someone has taken an Incineroar to the end of their locke, but sadly, it shall not happen today.  May you rest in peace.

So...we're in a situation now.  I've got a team of four and I don't really have anyone I feel the desire to add to the team right now.  We'll just see how encounters play out.  But, before we do head on, how about that MVP photo shoot?  Since Tiny unfortunately died, that can only mean we have one MVP for this totem encounter, and we all know who it is.

Spark Plug, once again claiming his title as trial MVP.  Tiny had his chance and I threw it away with a gamble.  That's the game we play, though.  It's too late to change the mistake.  We just gotta keep going on.

So after a quick heal in Heahea City's Pokemon Center, it's time to pay a visit to this Dimensional Research Lab...only to find Lillie pretending to be a trainer with Nebby.  Poor, poor, Lillie.  Do I have some choice words for you later.  I'll get to that later.  It's time for some exposition.  We get to meet the professor of this place who also happens to be Kukui's wife.  Anyway, after the exposition about the Ultra Wormhole and Ultra Beasts and hear a bit of backstory of Lillie three months ago and how she came to acquire Kukui's loft, we're guided to Digglet's Tunnel and Konikoni City.  What's with the town names on this island?

So after a brief encounter with a crack in the sky, Hau's going to go satisfy his malasada fetish and I'm off to satisfy my desire for encounters that don't suck by heading into Digglet's Tunnel, where there is only one thing I can encounter since I already had a Zubat.  Before that, though, we find Olivia with a couple of Aether Foundation guys.  She wants us to meet her at her shop, so let's get to it...after an encounter with a Digglet.  So Digglet got kind of worse when they introduced it's Alolan Form.  No Arena Trap and now it has all the weaknesses of a Steel type.  It's stats are pretty much the same, otherwise.  I guess it's an alright Pokemon, but it's frail and now it gets hair.  Yes, the series of bald Pokemon getting hair that started with Mega Ampharos is continuing here with Alolan Digglet and Dugtrio.  As for a nickname, I'm going to name him The Third as a reference to the moles in Earthbound who all said they were the third strongest.

Bad nature.  The curse continues.  While at the same time, I can't dismiss The Third as being completely useless right away.  After this upcoming Grand Trial, our next trial is going to feature Electric types.  Having The Third may not be a bad idea...but his nature sucks.  I'll consider putting him in the team, but for now, let's press onward.

You know, I just realized that I haven't said a single noteworthy thing about the new team members yet, and that's mostly because I've had no real chance to use either of them.  Mother lacks a Fire move and Mailbird is just sort of there for now.  They really haven't been useful yet, but that could always change.  Anyway, walking up some stairs, we have a nice first real encounter with members of the Aether Foundation, who work to support Pokemon conservation.  You know, the last time people said they were doing something for the good of Pokemon, it was Team Plasma.  We know how well that went.  Of course, Team Skull is involved with the Digglet going wild because of course they are.

Speaking of Team Skull, a couple of random Team Skull grunts are in Digglet's Tunnel.  I'll take out my frustration that there are wild Larvitar in this cave and I got a Digglet on them, and Hau's going to help.  Mother's Bone Club punished them with no problem.  It punished them so badly that they ran off like cowards.  Hau's going to slide over an item that isn't totally useless this time, and we can be on our merry way to Route 9.  Sure, this is prime encounter territory, but we're going to swing by Konikoni City first for some shopping, mainly of the clothing variety.

But of course, before that, it's tradition that some random dude needs to interrupt progression not even ten steps out of the cave.  This guy is Looker, but he has zero importance to this game's plot.  Sure, he'll hand over a Thunderstone, but he still has no importance in this game at all.  Now, with that aside, let's go to Konikoni City.

Herbs, super expensive TMs, an apparel shop, and an Alola Photo Club.  This place is pretty stacked on good stuff, but my first order of business is the apparel shop.  Personally, I like some of the shirt options here, and while the Pleated Miniskirt is nice, there's a nicer version that I prefer coming up in the first town of the third island.  At this point, I've got the black and white color scheme going outside the Vacation Hat.  Anyway, clearing Mallow's trial allows you to buy the once almighty Hyper Potions along with Ultra Balls.  Hyper Potions sadly saw an extreme nerf in this generation, so they're not nearly as overpowered as they are in every other game.  A shame, really.  Let's go across the street to Olivia's shop.

When we walk in, a Probopass immediately shouts at us.  This is some terrible customer hospitality when a big Pokemon with a huge nose shouts "Nopass!" to a customer who just waltzs inside, minding her own business.  But on a serious note, this is Olivia's Probopass, and it watches the shop when she's away...even though there are two human clerks behind the counter not even ten feet away.  Anyway, plans have changed.  We need to head on up to the Ruins of Life on Memorial Hill.  But before we take off, I guess the Probopass is trying to butter me up by giving me a free Max Potion.  This makes up for it shouting at me when I walked inside...this time.  I won't let it slide next time, just like I won't let slide how dangerous Skyla's gym designs are in Gen 5.

Olivia's shop actually has stuff that's worth checking out, though.  First, you can buy hair accessories.  You can't wear a hat if you're wearing hair accessories, so pick your favorite.  Next, evolutionary stones, but you can only buy Fire, Leaf, Thunder, and Water Stones.  If you want to evolve your Eevee into not Flareon, here's your chance.

Last, but not least, is a woman who will sell you fossils.  "Only one per customer," she says, and the ones you have access to are depending on the game.  In my opinion, Ultra Sun got the vastly superior options outside the Dome and Plume Fossils.  Root and Armor will give very bulky mons, and as we've seen, I'm more of a hyper offense kind of guy, so I chose to buy the Plume and Dome Fossils.  Buy them all if you want, but they are pretty pricey, especially if you're saving your money for items and clothing items.  With those fossils in tow, let's go and get a couple of encounters before we end it off, starting with Route 9.

Route 9 has no grass, so fishing is the only encounter option here.  I got a Corsola as my encounter.  It's pretty trash, to be honest, but better than another potential encounter on this route.  I'd rather have Corsola than Luvdisc.  Anyway, I named this one Coralite.  If you know what that's a reference to, you deserve a cookie.  It's nature is...alright.  A shame that Corsola kinda sucks and I can get a better Water/Rock type in the next five minutes.  Let's move onto the next encounter.

So earlier, I said there was an area of interest on Route 8, but there was no point in going there yet.  Now that we have fossils, we have the perfect excuse to head over there.  Welcome to the Fossil Restoration Center...which is actually just some dude's trailer  That's not important.  This guy can restore our fossils, giving us some new Pokemon.  I'm counting these fossils as static encounters, so even though I already got the Yungoos, these don't count against that fact.  First, we'll go with the Plume Fossil, which will become an Archen.  As a memento to my fallen Archeops from my Dark Rising Nuzlocke, I shall name him Extinction.  He's Rash nature, but I didn't have much hope in his ability to take hits anyway, so we could call this a decent enough nature.

As for the Dome Fossil, we score ourselves the real messiah, Kabuto.  As such, he shall receive a glorious nickname.  Presenting Lord Dome.  He has a nature that lowers his Speed, because of course.  Both of the revived Pokemon are only Lv. 15, so that's a shame.  I might consider using one of them, but I'm not quite sure yet.  For now, I'm gonna end it here to do a bit of grinding, maybe get a new team member added to the squad, and we'll go and take on Olivia for our second Grand Trial.

[lVergill]

Question! Which one of those takes more time for you Nyx? The Nuzlock itself or writing a story about it? xD

[NyxAvatar69]

1 minute ago, lVergill said:

Question! Which one of those takes more time for you Nyx? The Nuzlock itself or writing a story about it? xD

I'd say a bit of both since grinding and generally playing the game since characters love to interrupt you every 10 seconds while trying to put together some random series of rambles to make it interesting yet informative since I'm not using screenshots takes time and has the threat of writer's block getting in the way of progress.  To answer your question, I'd say both, but I somehow manage to get these done weekly.