Well, now that we're finally at the league,
let's take one last look at our team going into this.
Signum
(attacks)
is just as much of a tank as always, but could maybe do with a better move or two. Still wondering if I should use that Earthquake TM on her. Spider Web I've been keeping so far as it may come in handy.
SigHansen
(attacks) has a decently powerful Surf with Rain Dance to boost it if need be. She's also got a good, hard-hitting Shadow Ball. Could probably delete Strength in favor of a better attack though, like Brick Break.
Satoko
(attacks)
has remained virtually unchanged. Still incredibly defensive, but the only change to his movepool thus far was learning Magic Coat in place of Snatch.
Raymoo
(attacks)
actually has a decent set-up. Normal, flying, and fighting techniques are a great combination especially when you have STAB on two of them. Just ask Staraptor. Focus Flight with no drawback is nice, too.
Misty
(attacks)
could use a stronger technique than Spark, which I still haven't done. Morning Sun lets her handle those pesky ground and rock types, Fly so I can get around but also because she can put it to decent use. She's also the only member of my team with a status inflicting technique. For the moment, at least.
Melon
(attacks)
finally knows a better fighting-type attack than Brick Break, and has Rock Slide as well. Thunderpunch... works well enough against certain targets. The less defensive ones at least. She doesn't really have the special attack to be using it, but it's one of the better techniques she's learned through level. She also has Ancientpower which is a bit redundant with Rock Slide, but could get her the odd power boost.
Louise C.
(attacks)
is still as powerful on the offense as ever, and she actually seems pretty fast for a Shinki. Could use more variety in her attacks, or at least needs to learn Heart Break so she has a bit more dark-type offense. As a psychic-type, though, she's pretty good. Psychic, the attack, is about as good as it gets. Unless the touhou is lucky enough to learn Psychosis.
Sakuya
(attacks)
is sorely lacking in most of her techniques. She does eventually get something better than Cut, which I suppose I'll need to delete so she can learn it. Slash is pretty much a placeholder, and Double Kick works well enough that I didn't want to use a TM. Eventually I plan to replace that with Rock Smash instead, since it doesn't suck in this hack. Blizzard with her ability makes up for the rest of her moves, though. Her defenses are a nice as well.
Canada
(attacks)
was taught Return recently. With max happiness, Return is one of the best normal-type attacks a touhou can learn. Cut gives her pretty much the same coverage as a fighting-type attack, with the added bonus of hitting those Ghost/Dark types like Parsee. Attack is nice and high and she's no slouch on the speed or physical defense either. Air Cutter is just there, really.
Finally, we have Athena
(attacks)
. Since Mana Charge exists and raises special attack two stages in this hack, you could basically teach her that and sweep just about any AI team just as long as the lead touhou doesn't have Earthquake or a strong water or rock-type attack. Mana Charge once, twice if you can get away with it, and sweep with a combination of fire and lightning. After that, about all you need to fear is an ESuwako or something of that nature.
With all that being said, this
will be our team for this run. With Athena leading, let's head into the first battle.
The ice trainer Lorelei is up first, as always, and Athena leads the charge against this one. With fire and electric attacks at her disposal, she's able to take out three of Lorelei's touhous on her own. The completely not-ice Sanae throws us off a bit here, though nothing Raymoo can't handle. Critical hits help. Cold Steel manages to take on her ELetty without enduring a hit as well and SigHansen takes out her EYumemi.
Easy battle, no damage taken. The AI really needs to try working on a new strategy. It's called "attack".
Ah, the fighting-type. Tragically weak to Psychic-type attacks. All of them. Tenshi was the sole exception, but she was more concerned with boosting her physical defense. Just like Gary's Tenshi, if you recall. Again, AI, try attacking for a change.
Agatha actually managed to throw me for a bit of a loop. I lead with Louise, expecting ghosts. I got a ghost, but she was also dark-type. Agatha then proceeds to send out more dark types. She manages to poison and deal a bit of damage to Canada and... takes out Louise C. Totally did NOT see that Signal Beam coming and, as mentioned, she's tragically weak to bug-type attacks. Raymoo avenges her.
Still, this has been kinda disappointing so far. Maybe going in around level 45 would have been better.
Okay, NOW we're going to get a decent fight! His ESasha is pretty well known for wrecking teams and catching people by surprise, so maybe it will...
...
Deal a fair bit of damage to Cold Steel because she missed with the first Blizzard. I'm actually kinda shocked that Sasha was OHKO'd by that. I mean, in the pokemon games I've seen Lance's Dragonite stand up to ice-type attacks better than that...
And that's pretty much the only damage to be done to my team by one of Lance's touhous, aside from his Tenshi getting a hit in on SigHansen thanks to that Sitrus Berry. And is it just me, or did that rain NOT increase the damage SigHansen did with Surf? Weird...
Guess that brings us into the final battle then. And in this hack, the Champion is...
That's right. ZUN. Complete with his own in-battle sprite. Overworld sprite is still Bill, but I believe that actually gets fixed in that super-amazing Final+ release whenever that comes out.
Zun's team is... kinda interesting, really. Aya, Sanae, Reimu, Yuka, Yukari, and Rinnosuke. Aside from Rinnosuke, those are all characters that tend to be more closely related to ZUN. At least, as far as the fandom is concerned. Though ZUN is the one who coined the term "yukai moe" in relation to Yuka.
Aya goes down to Athena, Sanae to Raymoo, Reimu to Athena, Rinnosuke goes down to a crit Blizzard which is unfortunate since he was the only potential threat. Yuka goes down to Canada after I realized Athena was out of ammo for Fire Blast. And Yukari gets beat up by the goddess of hell herself.
After the battle, Oak shows up to give his usual spiel with very little dialogue changed. All that changed basically is that he doesn't berate ZUN like he does Gary.
And then we get registered in the Hall of Fame.
I probably should have taken that screenshot a bit earlier. You can't really see my team in that shot. Also, actual time spent on the game is a lot less than what you see there. Actually I'm not even sure how the in-game timer got that high. I know I tend to speed things up a lot when playing, but still...
Anyway, that's it for the Elite Four... Round 1. Having looked at their levels, I don't think I'll be doing anymore grinding before facing them. Instead, starting next installment I'll speed my way through the Sevii Islands plot to open up the Elite Four Round 2. After Round 2 I'll be more thoroughly covering the rest of the Sevii Islands, including Trainer Hill. Because Trainer Hill is where our toughest opponents yet will be waiting.
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