Gameplay Journal Summer's Scramble through Paldea (Nuzlocke)

So, I saw that there was a Nuzlocke challenge in the Summer Scramble. I had been wanting to replay Scarlet with a different challenge in mind so this seems like the perfect opportunity for that!

This thread will be Journaling my (read: Summer's) journey through a Paldea nuzlocke. Let's see how we fare.

 

So! First day of playing. I decided to try and do these little updates in 20-30 minute increments of playtime to ensure I don't accidentally spend the whole day playing away when I have other things to do. That said, I won't update this thread everything I play, just when something interesting happens.

But this is a big update, being the start of the run so buckle up!

So I made a new profile to start my adventure. I named myself Summer to acknowledge why I'm doing a Nuzlocke in the first place. Here she is!



Doesn't she look familiar?

I decided to base her looks off Azelf for even more of a reference. I did the best I could with the given options.

Anyways, after a long slew of cuts ceres that ate up most of my time ( >:/ ) I finally got to something exciting. Picking a starter!

I'm my main run, I chose Fuecoco as my starter, since I adored the little derp. This time, I decided to pick someone different.



This time, I chose Quaxly! I thought that a water type would live near a lake so it fits my Azelf-like trainer well. I named him Valor, as a reference but also because it's something any good fighting type should have.

After that was the fight with Nemona, the battle-happy but reliable president. She chose Fuecoco since I went with Quaxly and we had our first battle on the beach.



Valor easily dispatched of her newbie croc.

After that, Nemona took me out to Poco Path to teach me the basics of catching wild Pokémon. Then a very convenient Lechonk came to help demonstrate.



I'm not sure if I was allowed to skip the intro Lechonk or not, but I didn't want to take any chances. I named him Feast after my first Lechonk in my first playthrough. I didn't really use that Feast though, maybe this one will be different?

Alas, before I could go out into the wild and try to find my next member, my timer was up and I had to put it down to do other things.



Here is where I currently am in the game, and the current state of my team. I will always take a final picture of where I currently am after every play time.

That's it for now! I hope you'll stick around to see what happens to me next in this summer Scramble.

 

I'm back.

Lets continue on with the adventure.

So I went around and gathered as many dropped items as I can. Those things would be life and money savers so I had to get everything I could find. Along the way, I decided to go and use the 'Let's Go!' command to fight a few Pokémon and gain some early levels. Feast was proving to be not very good at this kind of thing and I spent a lot of potions on healing him up. Good thing I found so many on the floor.

Then comes the cutscene part with Koraidon. I know I can't name it yet, but I decided to call him Hamlet. Cause he ate y Ham Sandwich and got all strong. I wish I could use him in my battles, but alas, that wasnt meant to be.

In the meantime I followed him into a spooky cave.


I tried to do the technique where you just cover your eyes and run until you encounter something, but with the whole cutscene thing and the lack of Pokémon I couldnt really do that. I didnt want to return here later after going through the entire academy so I just went and fought the nearest Yungoos at the time.



Meet Dimple. I named her that cause while I was playing, I was watching a video on dumplings. But dumpling didnt sound like a good nickname for that when I remembered dimples (the little indent on the cheek that some people have when they smile.) It was close enough so Dimple it is!

Then we got into the confrontation with Houndoom.



I will be honest, I got scared here. I forgot what happens when you encounter it and I really thought this thing was going to sweep my team and end my entire run right then and there. Luckily, that didn't happen and Hamlet swooped in and saved me from getting chargrilled by a Houndoom.

After escaping and Hamlet going all slumpy from the big rescue, we met Arven. An angsty boy with a weird past with Hamlet.




I beat him, but Feast got SUPER close to fainting on me. I was scared he was gonna end up fainting on me.

After a quick exchange of Hamlet's Pokéball, I made my way to Los Platos and fought a kid. I didn't catch anything yet at this point. I wasn't sure if the lighthouse route counted as Poco Path or not so I just resolved to not encounter anyone there and make my way to Los Platos.

After a quick introduction to the Pokecenter, I tried to find my way to the South Province Area 5. I would be going through Area 1 no matter what, but I thought grabbing another team member would be helpful. Sadly I couldn't find a way to get there by foot so I turned back and just went Pokémon hunting in Area 1.

I decided that for this run, I'd just run around until I ended up bumping into a Pokémon. Trainers cant stop me unless I talk to them so everything should work out fine. I wandered without looking through Los Platos and ended up finding a little Fidough. I was happy since it was a Pokémon I never used before (which would be fun). I caught her and named her Cinnamon because Cinnamon buns are the best.

Sadly I forgot to take a screenshot of the capture. Yes I was banging my head in frustration after that.

With everything said and done, here's the current team and where I am in the story now:

 

A quick thing to note for future posts. Sometimes, even though I may post things one after another, they arent just me trying to bump my post count. Those are two different small play sessions that I ended up just posting next to each other because I felt lazy to update stuff immediately after that.

I just wanted to get that out of the way in case all that becomes a problem later.

Anyways, heres the next mini update.

After battling every trainer I could find in South Area 1 (and nearly losing Feast because of a Builder's Shinx) I made my way to the Mezagoza gate to battle Nemona.

I managed to beat her but it was a surprisingly grueling task. I have gone through Paldea twice before, my main playthrough and a mono-ground playthrough. Both times I had a ground type (Paldean Wooper) to take down her Terastalized Pawmi. This time, I didn't have one. It was very tiring. I had Feast try and work up Echoed Voice to wreak havoc, but he nearly died to her Fuecoco. After healing him, he lost all the charges from Echoed Voice and nearly got KO'ed by the Pawmi. I had to switch him out for Cinnamon and really thought I had to sack someone this early into my run. Thankfully (with a lot of potions) I did manage to beat Nemona.



After that I was able to get my first good look at Mezagoza.

And immediately decided I needed a makeover!



I think the curls look more accurate to Azelf's head. What do you think?

After checking in with the Pokecenter, selling all the revives I had collected, and crying at the expensive Delibird's Presents offers, I finally went up the stairs to find two Team Star Grunts harrassing the new student, Penny.



I beat up the first grunt easily with Dimple's payback, and then got to terastalize her for a cool Yungoos vs Yungoos fight with the other grunt. Obviously my better Yungoos won. I didn't realize how awesome Yungoos could be until this run. She's turning out to be my favorite member of the run.

That's it for this update! No team post because honestly not much has changed since last time.

 

We're back with another update on Summer's scramble through Paldea.

After ggoing through the mandatory school section, I now have four different side quests to my name. Fight the gym challenge with Nemona, battle Titan Pokémon with Arven, defeat Team Star with Cassiopeia, and help Koraidon to full form with Professor Sada.



I only really care about the gym challenge, but I guess it cant hurt to do the other things too.

First, I knew I needed to bulk up my team. If I can get more Pokémon early on, I would have more teammates for any battles I may face.

My first stop was at the Pokémon League. It was the closest place I could go to with Pokémon. Yes, the Pokémon League does count as a separate area with its own location and everything. I know cause I hatched a whole lot of Fuecoco and Eevee eggs there, but thats not important. What is important is my new team member. After stumbling on a Fidough (which I had to pass because of Cinnamon) heres who I caught:



When naming him, I tried to think of a round cute male character. For some reason I thought of Meta Knight first instead of Kirby. But I think that just makes it funnier.

Then I headed west to head to Cortondo. On the way, I closed my eyes and rode Hamlet as far as I could until I bumped into a Pokémon. We fell a few cliffs and nearly went into the water as well, but we did find one.

I unfortunately forgot to take a screenshot of this one too, but I ended up getting a Psyduck I named Wack. Because Quack would be too obvious and it was kinda wack that I got another water duck on the team.

After that I did a bit of grinding to gain some levels. When I picked it up a short while after, I just ended up doing more grinding. Hence the two different screenshots.




Next time, were facing the gym.

 

Major things happened here so buckle up.

I continued to train my Pokémon. I was under the assumption that I wasn't allowed to go past the level of the Gym Leader's highest Pokémon so I did my best to stay under Level 15 for facing Katy.

While training, I remembered the 10 Great Sights of Paldea and the fact that they were named locations. I thought that I could get another member of my team in those places. So I went over to the sign near Cortondo about the Great Olive Orchard and caught myself a Mareep.



Sadly, after checking the memories information, I learned that it doesn't count as a new location and was still labled as Area 2. Since I already had Wack, I had to let this one go. I decided to just release him, that way I wouldn't mistake him for a Pokémon I could/have used.

Then it was time to do they gym test. That went pretty well.



And so I faced Katy.

I wanted to use Valor for this match and I made sure to give him as much stuff as I can to ensure he would win the battle. I taught him Aerial Ace, gave him an Oran Berry to hold and even changed his nature from Impish to Adamant. With Work Up, I thought I would sweep the team easy.

I was wrong.

Nymble gave me trouble since he was faster than Valor and was doing decent damage. I only got one Work Up out, and had to use Aqua Jet to make sure I killed it before it could kill me. Thankfully Tarountula was easier as one Aerial Ace took him out quickly. Then, it was Teddiursas turn.

Teddiursa terastalized into a Bug type and began using Fury Cutter. I was scared. I knew that thing got stronger the more it was used and it might get so strong it would wipe out my team. I thought I was safe when it missed one turn but...



It wasn't enough. I had my first death, and it was on my starter nonetheless.

Devastated but knowing I still had to win the battle, I switched to Wack. Cinnamon might be higher leveled, but Wack had better moves. He had Water Pulse at this point, so if Teddiursa survived, at least he could be confused to potentially spare me some turns. Thankfully it only took one Water Pulse to finish the match.




Katy treated me to some sweets after the match, but in the end, it was still bittersweet. I lost my starter Pokémon so soon and he never got the chance to become the brilliant Quaquaval I knew he could be.

I put him in the Graveyard box and said goodbye...


First gym and already we're down a member and are now a Team of five. One gym down but there are still 17 more trials ahead of us, even though only 7 of those would count to our main goal. Will we make it through the night? I guess we will have to see...

 

And we're back.

After Valor's unfortunate death to Katy, I learned that there weren't any level caps in the nuzlocke challenge I was following.

I wish I had learned that sooner so that I would have has a Quaxwell with me but the past is the past. For now, Its time to continue on.

I was planning on heading straight to the east area of Paldea immediately to find the titan and the gym. But then I noticed that there was a bridge allowing me to go from Area 2 to Area 4 in the South Province. The more team members I had the better, so I made my way there to find a Pokémon to catch.

After running into many walls and nearly losing Feast because the Pokémon was more than 5 levels higher than me, I got a Phanpy.



I named him Orville after Orville Elephant from FNAF. It was the first elephant that came to mind that wasn't Dumbo.

I didn't want ti use him straight away. But he did have Pickup so I did get some benefit from him, even though he didn't battle at all.

Then I headed to Area 3, the rocky maze and the place of the Stone Titan. After running around, I tripped on a Nacli that became my 8th catch.



I couldn't think of a better nickname at the time.

I went and challenged some trainers and Pokémon to level up. Now that I knew there was no level cap, I wanted to be sure that I would not go into the Titan unprepared.

Then the worst thing happened.

I was fighting an office worker with Dimple. He had a stockpiling Jigglypuff. I didn't think much of it, I was just mildly annoyed it kept raising its defenses. Then, it used Spit Up.




So soon after my first death, I faced another loss. It really hurt. Dimple was a really good teammate and my first Terastalized Pokémon. I hadn't even made it to the second boss, let alone the second gym and I already lost someone else.

But I couldn't grieve forever.

After stumbling around for a while, I found myself at Area 5 of the South Province. Another chance to catch a Pokémon. I was hoping to get much farther in so I can get a cool new Pokémon but I stumbled into this lady instead:

Ziggy gets her name from the Goat Kwami of Miraculous Ladybug. It was the only female goat name I could think of.

I needed my team to get stronger. Or rather, I needed Chalk to get stronger. He couldnt be useful for the titan or the next gym, but Garganacl is really good. I wanted to get one as soon as possible. That and he was the weakest team member by far.

I fed him a large EXP Candy and:

He evolved. My first evolution of the game.

I decided to prep just a little bit more. I took a quick detour to Mezagoza, sold some items, then bought a bunch of battle items at Delibird Presents.I made the mistake of not getting some before I fought Katy, so I made sure to get some now.

After making a pit stop at Artazon, just to say I'd been there and maybe also to heal up some, I went back to find the Rock Titan, Klawf. I immediately terastalized Wack into a water-type, making his Water Pulses do even more damage. Klawf wasted time using Block instead of any other move so I easily took care of him. When Arven came to join me in the rematch, I did the same thing. Klawf was no match for Wack and Arven's Shelder.

Then something amazing happened.


Feast Evolved. So soon after Chalk did. This felt even more amazing than Chalk's evolution because I actually grinded for those levels. And he evolved at the end of an important battle.

After that, I had a picnic with Arven and Hamlet learned how to Dash after eating my sandwich. Sada also called me to explain that whole thing too.

This stop may not count in the Nuzlocke Competition, but I'll be damned if it isn't one of the most amazing things thats happened so far.

 

Lets continue shall we?

While I could just go and beat up Brassius right then and there, I decided to go and hunt for a few new members to the team first. More members to the team never hurt anyone. Since it was night time when I went looking I got some atypical encounters than what would normally be found.

In East Province 1, I met Gus The Driftloon

I named him Gus after a brawler in Brawl Stars, cause hes a ghost kid whos associated with balloons. He made me stress out about Wack cause he almost died in this encounter but I'm happy to have him.

After a bit of exploring, I also found a way to go to East Province 2 without triggering the Team Star cutscene and ran into a Murkrow.

Houdini was a nightmare to catch. While he did damage my team somewhat he mostly spent his turns using Haze. I have no idea if that had any effect on catch rates, but he went through Ultra Balls, Great Balls, Dusk Balls and many other kinds of balls before he finally went in the Pokéball. I had Cinnamon lick him carefully si I didnt kill him, and thankfully the paralyze finally put him in one. Hes Houdini cause he keeps escaping crap.

ANYWAYS. After that it was time to do the gym. I decided to not cheat this time by using Hamlet and actually went through the test barefoot. The maze was actually kind of fun, though I was surprised I only had to fight one Sunflora.



After that, I fought the gym. I headed the team with Houdini. He was the only one of my team who had super effective moves (I forgot to add Gus) and I wanted to use the bird who gave me so much trouble. I used Tailwind and air slash to cut Brassius' tiny plants down. When Sudowoodo came out, I terastalized Houdini into a dark type, just in case it had some rock type moves. It only used Trailblaze though.

The problem with that is that Tailwind had peetered out by then and it was doing a lot of damage to my frail bird. I ended up switching him out for Feast to tank some hits and dish out some no-longer-resisted Covets.

I have to admit, despite his initial poor showing, Feast is becoming a very valuable member to the team.

With that, I passed the gym with no deaths whatsoever!


Next up, fighting the Sky titan and the Dark base. Onward to the other side of Paldea!

 

Off to the other side of the world! (Paldea)

After flying to Cortondo, I went and caught the newest member of my team from West Area 1. I probably could have caught it sooner, but oh well.



Here's Ryder! I named her after the inspiration of the Lokix line, Kamen Rider. I was gonna name her something else, but thats kinda a spoiler to one of the things I'm writing. You'll see.

Also, I'm not sure how much I'll mention it in my journals, but I started using a Nuzlocke website to help me keep track of my team, routes with no captures, and bosses I need to face. Its really neat!

With a new buddy on hand (which I promptly put in the box because there was no way I was bringing her to face a big bird) I headed to fight the Titan Bombirdier. With Chalk already being a Naclstack, I felt like I had nothing to fear.

True to form, it died really quickly.



After getting the sandwich and learning about Arven's backstory (it hurts my kokoro everytime) I now had the ability to swim. Even though Im usually all about catching as many potential members as possible, I decided to put catching something from the seas til later. The Paldean Sea is an absolute grab bag with Pokémon ranging from level 10 to level 40. I wanted my team to be able to survive any encounter I may face there before plunging in. Afterall, what good is catching a Gyarados if it ended up taking half my team down with it?

Now I could end the journal entry here, but since it was so close anyways, lets continue.

When consulting the website, it told me that Giacomo (the leader of the Segin Squad) had a steel type. It recommended that I use Orville when tackling his boss fight. So I took him out of the box and trained him. He didnt need that much training since he was so high leveled, but he wasnt the only thing I needed to train. I decided that Cinnamon wasnt enough to tackle the Star Barrage and took out Meta as well. I was gonna bring my two faries and my elephant into the barrage. Training paid off handsomely.




After all the introduction stuff with Team Star (Clive is just... why) I started the Star Barrage. It was a mess. That was probably the longest I took in a star barrage. There were times that my team werent responding to my calls and Meta almost fainted so I had to heal up. But we got through and fought the boss.

That was pretty straight forward. Terastalize Orville the first chance I got and Bulldoze as much as I can. But at some point, I decided to roll out. I guess Buzzdoze wasnt doing enough damage so I put my hopes and dreams on roll out. It got really scary and Orville almost died, but thankfully the car broke first.




Funny enough, this was the first time I fought Giacomo first before Mela. I somehow always end up fighting her even though I knew he was weaker. Oh well.

So thats a wrap. Next up, back across the region again to fight Iono for her badge!

 

Hey!

So, were looking to fight Iono next. As I made my way over to Levincia, I decided to train up my team somewhat. I knew I had Orville and could count on him to sweep Iono, but i wanted some back up in a worst case scenario. I decided to train Ziggy, since Grass resisted Electric. Then the worst thing happened.



I learned later, that the Dreadnaw had Strong Jaw as its ability, which is why it's bite destroyed my goat.



Rest in peace little Kid. I'm sad that I wouldn't get to flex my would be Gogoat on Geeta.

But training wasn't all that bad because Cinnamon evolved!



Then Nemona stopped me before I could challenge the gym.

I had Ryder on my team, because I forgot to set her team in the website. See, when you select your starter there, it automatically updates your rival's team to have the starter that they would pick in that game (weaker or stronger against your starter). I thought I had updated it to state that I picked Quaxly, but didn't think much of it when it showed Nemona had Sprigatito. After all, a lot of rivals had the stronger one. But as I was sweeping through her team with Orville (Who was good against her Rockruff and Pawmo) I was caught of guard when Crocalor came out instead of Floragato. Thats when I learned my mistake.

Well. Mistake on the site. It was perfectly fine for me because it meant I didnt have to switch and I could continue to sweep with Orville. Man I'm so happy I ran into that lil Phanphy earlier.

I wish I could show a picture but I once again forgot to screenshot.

Anyways unto the gym. I didnt bother changing Ryder out since I saw no harm in her getting a few more levels.

And good thing too! Cause she evolved in the Gym Test



Speaking of, the Gym Test was easy-peasy. Clavel's bright orange suit made things incredibly easy for me lol.



The Gym battle itself was also pretty easy. There was a few hiccups with Levitate Mismagius and a Water Gunning Bellibolt, but between Orville and Chalk, Iono went down easy.

This is where I stopped for a few days because of some family business, but since the next part of our journey was pretty small, I decided to add it here too.

After Iono, I decided to bring Wack back to the team and train him up a little. I mean, between Chalk and Orville, Mela should go down easily but you never know.

This Star Barrage went smoothly compared to the previous attempt. Everyone won against the barrage with barely a scratch on them. Then Mela came out and Orville and Chalk teamed up once again to steamroll her. I wanted to use Wack, but with the Sun up I knew he wouldn't get much use out of his water moves.



Next up, The Steel Titan!



Oh also, I tried to get my East Area 3 encounter buuut Orville slammed it a bit too hard.

Rest in pieces little Rolycoly.

 

No witty flavot text here. This is the last post I will make here and its 10am.

I got myself a Larvesta in the Asado Desert. I tried to get a Meowth next but I killed it by accident



Gym Test was easy, but several bad descisions lead me to losing my faithful Feast and the rising Gus.



I did beat the Gym Though, but It seems I forgot to take a picture of the team after.



I wish I could give this run a proper send off right now, but I know that if I didnt do it noe these points wouldnt go anywhere.

Perhaps later in the morning Ill give this thing a proper send off. But thats 4 gyms down and 5 other trials defeated. Kinda wished the Titans and Starbases counted for the total but at least I got halfway through the game.