Challenge Pokemon XD with no Shadow Pokemon (Update in post #10)

[Smoughon Account]

Hello all, Smoughon here. I’m back from the dead for another LP. I said I was going to do a randomizer, but it didn’t seem all that interesting to me. If I was doing a video LP it would be different. But that’s irrelevant, because today I’m going to be doing a different challenge run. I’m going to play through Pokemon XD Gale of Darkness, but I can’t use any Shadow Pokemon. I don’t mean I have to purify them first; I mean I can’t use them AT ALL. Let’s begin.

Part 1/Intro

Since Shadow Pokemon are the main Pokemon you get, what options do I have? For starters you start off with an Eevee that can become one of its evolutions. Because this is a gen 3 game, Glaceon, Leafeon, and Sylveon are unavailable. Next, there are 3 wild spots in this game that give access to wild Pokemon, those being: Sandshrew, Gligar, Trapinch, Hoppip, Phanpy, Surskit, Zubat, Aron, and Wooper. Trapinch, Surskit, and Wooper can all be traded with a trainer for a Meditite, Shuckle, and Larvitar. Additionally, later on in the game you are given a shadow Togepi that can be purified and traded for an Elekid. For the Togepi, I’ll allow it under the stipulation that I can’t use it in battle. Finally, you can get the three Johto starters, but it is very, very, very unlikely I will use them. I have to beat Mt. Battle which requires beating 100 trainers, many of whom are higher leveled than the final boss in the story. The trade Pokemon and the Johto starters even have some special moves which helps a lot. Now you probably noticed something, there are A LOT of Ground types. That will make this even more annoying than it would normally. As an extra layer of difficulty, in this game offensive Shadow moves are always super effective against non Shadow Pokemon. I can’t use Shadow Pokemon to counter this. With that out of the way, let’s start.

I name my character Smough, because Smoughon wouldn’t fit.

The game starts off with a Salamence vs Metagross fight. If only I could use one of these.

One thing I noticed is that this Salamence actually has 0 in every IV lol. This fight is super easy however. You click Earthquake twice and you win. I actually got a crit on this run lol. After the fight we can start the game proper.

Your starter in this game is an Eevee. I end up with a Relaxed nature. I plan on using Umbreon, so that’s not that bad.

After meeting with the Professer and Lily, I have to find my sister Jovi. She’s at this other scientist, Dr. Kaminko’s lab. When I try to enter, I’m stopped by this guy, Chobin, who thinks I’m a burglar. I'm going to be honest, this guy made me laugh a couple times in this playthrough.
Anyways, I beat him easily. He has a level 5 Sunkern. I actually crit him lol. It wasn’t necessary at all. Afterwards my sister Jovi comes outside, says hi and runs back inside. Chobin takes me inside the lab.

This is why Chobin is my favorite character. Anyways, I find my sister and we head back to the lab.

Once I return, I fight this guy outside the lab. He only has a level 5 Sentret, it was nothing. I even gained a level. I receive the Snag machine from the professor. Because I won’t be using Shadow Pokemon, this is basically useless. Immediately afterwards the prof is captured by *SPOILER ALERT* Team Cipher, the bad guys from the last game who’ve come back.

I battle one of the members. Unfortunately, I’m forced to capture the Teddiursa, but there’s nothing stopping me from putting the Teddiursa into the PC.

At the next location, something kind of interesting happens

You get to see a fight between two NPCs. This also happens in Pokemon Colosseum. Ardos, one of the old man’s bodyguards, absolutely destroys Zook’s Zangoose with a single Psychic. Now, I’m not too sure what IVs or items these Pokemon have but Zangoose would have to be level 36 in order to have a chance to not be one-shot by Psychic. It’s still around a 96% chance in that instance, however.

Inside the parts shop, the person running this shop isn’t here, but this guy is. He says he’s traveled around the world and collected all the evolution items for Eevee. That’s convenient. Because there is no Day Night system, they added an item for Umbreon and Espeon instead. (Not sure why they couldn’t have done that in FireRed, but whatever.) I take the Moon Shard. I find the guy running the shop and get the MACHINE PART.

Now would probably be a good time to talk about Eevee in this run. Honestly, almost any of them would be pretty solid considering the small pool of Pokemon available. Vaporeon is one of the two easily obtainable Water types, and is decently bulky, with a Water immunity.

Flareon is the only easily obtainable Fire type, has solid offenses, and a Fire immunity. It’s pretty slow, however.

Jolteon isn’t too great an option honestly. The Elekid available later is arguably much better. It has all of the elemental punches plus Cross Chop. Sure, Jolteon is faster and stronger, but the coverage Elekid provides is too important to pass up.

Espeon is fast and powerful, and it even has special Bite fright from the get-go.

I decided to go with Umbreon for its bulk. It also has STAB Bite right away.

Before I head back, there are a few trainers in the area I’d like to fight first.

I find this guy first. However, when I fight him, I run into a problem. A HUGE problem.

Because the game expects you to have the Shadow Teddiursa, every fight from now on is a double battle. I can’t get any Pokemon until Pyrite Town. I have to go through maybe 20 - 30ish battles with only one Pokemon. This is going to be more difficult than I thought.

I use Tail Whip turn one, and then take out Ledyba and Tailow in that order. I almost lost in the first fight. Even a Shadow Ledyba is a threat. Umbreon may be more important than I initially thought.



But that will do it for this part. This was more of an introductory part. The next part will be up later this week. Have a nice day

 

[QuentinQuonce]

This sounds fun!

Finally, you can get the three Johto starters, but it is very, very, very unlikely I will use them. I have to beat Mt. Battle which requires beating 100 trainers, many of whom are higher leveled than the final boss in the story.

What, you mean you're not going to grind for 80 hours as soon as you reach Mt Battle and solo the entire mountain with your Eevee three times before continuing with the story? Weak.

(I kid, that'd be ridiculous. Though I once did attempt it with a full team of six and gave up out of sheer boredom. Made it to zone 8 IIRC, but it took days and days and I concluded that Cyndaquil just wasn't worth it)

 

[Smoughon Account]

Shadowless part 2: Milk

Reply

green_typlosion: I made to trainer 91 once as a kid, got me and my shit team's ass handed to me over and over, and didn't try to clear it until much later. I did win, and used one team only to find out you have to do it in one fucking go? Yeah. That was fun.

Part 2

Last time I discovered every fight is a Double battle, so now this run is much more difficult than I initially thought. That means every battle is even more important, and difficult.

I start by fighting this trainer at the top of the lighthouse.

Quick little disclaimer; my emulator couldn’t find my first save, so I started a new run. I actually found the first one after I made more progress in the second, so every screenshot from now on is from that second save. Wouldn’t be a Smoughon playthrough without stupid save issues and inconsistent screenshots lol.

I lost. A Poochyena is much stronger than a Ledyba. They just did too much damage. That’s the first whiteout of the run. I then reset on my second attempt at the battle. I was going to lose anyway, so I decided to reset. This is going nowhere, so I’ll come back a little bit later.

I decide to fight this guy instead. I forgot he actually challenged you lol. His Pokemon are much weaker than the Bodybuilder. His Lotad even clicked Astonish twice, but it didn’t matter.

After the battle, Eevee tries to evolve. I cancel the evolution because I want to learn Growl. I’m serious. I think it will be useful. Maybe. Could be a waste of time.

I try the fight against the bodybuilder again, and I think the above screenshot shows how that went.

So I try again, and Poochyena uses Shadow Hold twice in a row. Shadow Hold is shadow Mean Look.

Even with the AI being bad, I do come pretty close to losing. I eventually win, however I did lose 4 times to the 3rd/4th trainer you can fight lol.

Before heading back to the lab, I return to Kaminko’s. Chobin challenges me, but he has garbage Pokemon. His Sunkern did give a decent amount of xp at least.

I decide to go in to watch the TV screen:

Chobin text

My next stop is Agate to purify my Shadow Pokemon that I am totally using.

Inside a kind of hidden room is a Move Tutor. She teaches more moves later in the game. I may use a few, but none are useful right now.

I fight and defeat this lady here. Pretty easy. I imagine trainers without Shadow Pokemon will be all that difficult.

I then fight this guy. I decided to take out Wurmple first, because I thought his AI might be stupid and just use Harden. Bite made Harden a non issue. He actually almost took me down, but that was on me. I forgot to heal at the Pokemon Center. These trainers are underleveled.

I also fight this trainer. I took down his Tyrouge and thought this would be easy.

However, I wasn’t paying attention to how many Pokemon he had, so his Zubat caught me off guard.

His Grimer was annoying because it kept using Harden, and Bite wasn’t doing too much damage.

I eventually take him down. I should have taken Grimer out first, honestly.

There’s also this trainer who was a complete pushover. She had underleveled baby Pokemon. Honestly none of these trainers were as difficult as the Bodybuilder. None have taken more than 1 try.

I speak with Eagun, the village elder and enter the relic cave. However, this guy won’t fight me unless I have a Shadow Pokemon. I had no idea this would happen. Remember this gem from the last post?

there’s nothing stopping me from putting the Teddiursa into the PC.

Aged like milk, holy shit.

I head back to Clyde, the trainer with the Ledyba and KO my Teddiursa. I’m not allowed to use Shadow Pokemon, but I’ve already beaten this guy, so it isn’t the end of the world. I just used the Call function and attacked Teddiursa. Hurt my soul honestly.

However that doesn’t work, so I go back to Clyde, bring my Teddiursa to near fainting and come back.

Turn one I KO my Teddiursa. Using Teddiursa breaks the rules, but I do want to continue this playthrough, so it’s the best idea I could come up with. It also gives the trainer a free turn, so it does at a tiny extra layer of difficulty.

This guy wasn’t too difficult, just annoying. He kept using Growl and Tail Whip. If he was higher leveled, I could have been in trouble. I take out Zigzagoon because it was using Tail Whip. I then use Bite to finish off Numel. This game would be brutal without Bite. Hopefully I don’t have to repeat this process.

FFFFFF-

-ive minutes later and I’m back. I just did the same thing as before.

Once again, she wasn’t too difficult. Snubbull ruined my speed with 2 Scary Faces, however her Corphish used Harden 5 times. I have Bite so it wasn’t horrible. Having to nearly KO my Teddiursa is annoying as hell but other than that, not too bad.

Same as before.

I do level up to level 16 and learn Growl. Never thought I would be excited for that move. I replace Sand Attack. That might be a mistake, but I can just relearn it at the next location. Also, Umbreon doesn’t learn Growl, only Eevee. Level 16 is a ridiculous level to learn Growl, that’s a move you start out with normally.

After the battle, Eevee evolved into Umbreon. This thing is going to be super tanky I imagine.

I have Bite, and trainers in game don’t switch that often, so I reject Pursuit.

You see, I’m doing this thing called a Challenge, I can’t use Teddiursa.

Umbreon already looks pretty strong. I’m curious to see how he performs.

There’s one more trainer, and once again I have to go back and nearly KO Teddiursa. His Abra’s crazy, it has the Elemental Punches. Wild. Now that I’m out of the cave, maybe this nightmare will end.

OH GODDA-

After the same process, I fight Eagun. His Pikachu does have Thunderbolt, but Umbreon is too tanky for that. He dies to a Crit Bite. Glad I don't have Vaporeon. In order to progress, I have to purify a Pokemon, and Teddiursa isn’t ready yet, so I just run around the village.

Hell no.

It wasn’t that bad, I used this process to purify Shadow Pokemon in Colosseum once. I head back to the stone, my game lags during the purification process, and I can FINALLY leave Agate Village. Good riddance.

My next location is Mt. Battle. That’s where I can get the Johto starters. But there’s pretty much almost no way in hell I’m completing that before postgame. I’ll at least attempt it before the run is over.

Once at Mt. Battle, I’m forced to fight a few trainers to speak to Vander. Not much too say about these battles.

“Yeah, you’re strong! Kick this guy’s ass! That’s good experience!”

They were all incredibly easy. Mt. Battle only gets difficult from area 7ish onwards.

Poor dude.

He tells me about the Cipher Lab from the first game. Not sure why it was left abandoned, considering bad people did bad stuff there, but oh well.

That’s it for part 2. Next part will be up on Monday or Tuesday. Have a nice day.

To do list

burn agate down (should have picked flareon)

 

[Smoughon Account]

Shadowless part 3. "Monday or Tuesday"

Part3

I head to the Cipher Lab. Not sure how this place wasn’t taken over by whatever Orre’s government is. Before entering, I have to fight one of the Hexagon Brothers. Their gimmick is that they can’t count themselves correctly.

The first one I decide to fight is Resix.

This was a mistake; his team was a really bad matchup. He has a shadow Houndour that’s close or higher than my Umbreon. I guess I should mention that. Apparently in XD, when the Shadow Pokemon has the plus symbol next to their level, it means that it’s higher than the level shown, but only for the AI. I never knew this until I saw it on Bulbapedia the other day. Just makes Shadow Pokemon even more difficult. Combine that with the chip damage from poison from his level 14 Slugma, and I died too quickly. This might be possible, but I’m going to fight someone else instead.

I go after Browsix.

He was WAY easier. His team consist of a level 14 Hootoot and a level 17 Shadow Baltoy.

His Baltoy died to two Bites, and his Hootoot couldn’t do enough damage. Now I could proceed into the lab, but I think I’ll take all the experience I can get. There are a couple enemies inside I’m scared of.

I fight Greesix next. He has more Pokemon, but they’re extremely low leveled.

I take out his Oddish, Cacnea, Pineco, Shadow Seedot and then his Lotad in that order. That could have been worse because of Paralysis, but I was higher leveled.



I’ll mention here that this game has the Physical/Special Split, but only with shadow moves. I guess they didn’t want special attackers to be wrose than physical attackers. And considering Shadow Pokemon used by trainers can’t use their regular moves like they could in Colosseum, it makes sense. This may have even been a sort of test on the Physical/Special Split.

Next is Blusix. I oneshot his Horsea, three shot his Shadow Spheal, and then two shot his Goldeen. He did some decent damage, but I was never in too much danger. Greesix did more damage because of paralysis from Effect Spore.

Next is Yelosix. I take out his Electrike first, somehow avoiding Static and his Chinchou’s Supersonic. That was lucky.

I then flinch his Shadow Mareep. It wasn’t too important, because it doesn’t do too much with Shadow Blitz. I finish Mareep off and then two shot Chinchou. Looking back at this fight, this could have gone worse. It feels like Static and similar abilities always activate, yet I avoided Staic 4 times. He also could have messed me up with Confusion. That's RNG for you. Attack a Shroomish once? Effect Spore. Attack something with Static 4 times? No paralysis. Now if it was Poison Point it would activate every time because that ability has a 100% chance when I fight something with it apparently.

Next is the Resix Rematch. Umbreon is two levels higher this time. I fight Resix because the last Hexagon brother uses poison types. I crit his Slugma and knock it out with one Bite. That was lucky. His Houndour attacks with Shadow Blitz. I use Growl once and then use Tackle. With similar luck, I could have done this right away.

Last up is Purpsix. He has me the most afraid because he can Poison me, like I said earlier. I got a Lum Berry from an elder in Agate, but I think I’ll save that.

I start the fight by taking out Koffing. His Grimer uses Pound.

I then get another crit and oneshot his Tentacool. Grimer again uses Pound.

Shadow Gulpin comes out, and I use Bite. Gulpin uses Shadow Blitz, Grimer uses Pound.

I get ANOTHER crit, and finish Gulpin off. Grimer uses Disable. That’s not on his Bulbapedia page, somebody should add that. He should have used that move three turns ago instead of spamming Pound.

I use Tackle twice before he decides it would be a good idea to use Poison Gas. He was 4 turns too late. And that’s all of them. I could rebattle them if I want, but I’ll proceed on. I can come back if needed.

Umbreon went from level 18 to 21 during these battles.

I make my way into the lab, encounter two Cipher Peons and a scientist. They were pretty easy, I even leveled up to level 23 and learned Quick Attack. I replaced Tackle.





My game then crashes. Fun.





I’m brought back to before Purpsix. I rebattle him and lose. He must have heard me, because his Grimer used Poison Gas almost immediately.
I’m not sure if this counts as a loss? I already beat him, but my game crashed. Technically a loss, but oh well. I re-battle all trainers from before my game crashed and relearn learn Quick Attack.

I fight another jobber Scientist, and then a Cipher Peon with a Shadow Spinarak. This Peon is noteworthy for one reason only.

In Colosseum, Shadow Pokemon were only available with their set trainer however, in this game Miror B. has missed Shadow Pokemon.

I never knew that this happens even before Miror B. even appears. It makes sense, none of these peons are rematchable, and it would be bad game design to make Shadow Pokemon unavailable. Especially because Miror B's final battle requires all Shadow Pokemon to be caught.

I fight another Cipher Peon, who has a slightly better team. He has a Ralts, Voltorb, Bagon and a Shadow Numel.
Voltorb goes down in two Bites
Bagon goes down to one Bite
Numel goes down to another crit Bite
Ralts goes down to one Bite, it had nothing to hit me.

After exiting an elevator, I take the elevator to my right. There’s a healing machine. There’s also a trainer I was really afraid of.

Digor. In a normal playthrough, he might not be anything of note, more a surprise, but in this run he’s a threat. His team is:

Abra Lv 17 Reflect/Thunderpunch/Ice Punch/No Move/Unknown Move (Not listed on Bulbapedia)
Machop Lv 16 Karate Chop/Focus Energy/Leer/Low Kick
Feebas Lv 16 Tackle/Splash/Light Screen
Makuhita Lv 16 Focus Energy/Arm Thrust/Sand-Attack/Unknown Move or no move (Also not listed)

I think you can see why he’s a threat. TWO fighting types, with Light Screen and Reflect. He could potentially Paralyze of Freeze me with one of the elemental punches too. Fortunately, I don’t have to fight him. If I lose over and over again, I’ll just ignore him. Umbreon is currently level 24.

I decide to weaken his Machop with Growl. Umbreon is faster than Abra, somehow. Considering Focus Energy and Karate Chop increase his crit chance, not the best move. Abra uses Reflect. He doesn’t crit off Karate Chop fortunately.

I decide to use Bite because Reflect is in effect. I flinch him with Bite, that’s huge. Abra uses Thunderpunch. Paralysis would be awful. He doesn’t fortunately. I use Bite again, and nearly KO Machop. Machop uses Focus Energy. Abra uses Ice Punch, it doesn’t freeze. That would be a very easy loss.

I take out Machop and avoid another paralysis from Thunder Punch. Feebas is sent out first. Umbreon still has a good chunk of health left.
I take out Abra and Feebas uses Tackle.
Makuhita comes out and Reflect wears off.

Quick Attack does a good chunk to Makuhita. However, Arm Thrust hurts badly. Feebas uses Tackle again.
I use Growl instead of attacking Makuhita again. Arm Thrust had me paranoid.

I then realize I just threw the entire match. Makuhita uses Focus Energy and kills me with Arm Thrust next turn. I could have finished him in two attacks. I was so God damn close; this is possible.

Attempt two
The fight goes similarly. I 3KO Machop, and avoid status from Abra’s punches. Machop did use Leer, so this could be worse.

Once Makuhita comes out, it uses Sand-Attack. With my accuracy down, this could go south quickly.

Fortunately, I land both Quick Attacks. Makuhita used Focus Energy instead of Arm Thrust. Feebas just used Light Screen and Splash.

Once Makuhita’s down, I do something I almost never do in this game. I use the Call option. It raises the selected Pokemon’s Accuracy by one stage. I didn’t need to do that, but I would rather waste one turn doing that then potentially missing my attacks over and over. I’ll have to remember the call feature. Umbreon levels up to level 25. I’m starting to get overleveled.

Honestly, I got really lucky in this fight again. Abra could have paralyzed or froze me, and I could have missed too many attacks and lost. I was way more afraid of this guy than I should have been. If I was around the same level as him this would have been bad.

I make my way through the lab, fighting a Peon, a Scientist, and another Peon. Umbreon grew to level 26 during those fights. My game also crashed again, but I had saved recently. Weird that the game has started crashing now. I had no issues up until this part.

On my way, I find these two scientists. The most noteworthy thing about them is that I fight them back-to-back. The first guy goes down easily.

The second one was tougher. He poisoned Umbreon with Poison Point.
So, I can avoid Static 4 times IN A ROW, but goddamn fucking POISON POINT still fucking poisons me the first time I attack. I fucking hate that ability so much. He also lands supersonic with his Wingull. Umbreon hits himself in confusion a couple times. The only difficult thing about these fights was status. Umbreon leveled up again.

I fight a Peon with a Shadow Pokemon. His Magnemite and Carvanha were annoying because they resist Bite. His last two pokemon were Remoraid and Psyduck.

I fight another Peon and Umbreon levels up again. Umbreon’s getting pretty overleveled. Might be necessary in order to finish this area, however.

I fight another scientist. He had a shadow Shroomish I wasn’t expecting, and Umbreon got another crit, but that’s about it for him. I have now looped back around to the beginning of the area. On the table by the scientists was an ID card. I can use this to get to Prof. Krane.

There are no trainers until I reach the room with the Professor. Guarding Prof. Krane is Naps, the Peon I was forced to catch the Teddiursa from.

I use Bite on Rhyorn and KO it turn one.
I then KO Murkrow, taking minimal damage. He sends out a Beldum.
I 2KO Beldum, avoiding a Take Down. Slakoth went down quickly after. Umbreon grew to level 29. He was more difficult than last time, but to be fair last time I just used a Poke Ball and won, so. . .
With Krane by my side, I think it’s time to leave.

Of course, it’s not that easy. Before leaving I have to fight the boss of this lab, Lovrina. She asks me if I’ll tell the Prof. to help them. I say no, because of course. (Side note, I’ve had the theme that plays when she appears in my head for the last like, three or four days, please send help. It’s this one: link)

Alright, Lovrina, the first boss of the game. Here’s her team:
Luvdisc F Lv 20 Water Gun/Tackle/Charm/Attract
Beautifly M Lv 20 Gust/Thief/Absorb/Attract
Roselia M Mega Drain/Poison Sting/Pin Missile/Leech Seed
Shadow Delcatty E Lv 18+ Shadow Rush/Shadow Wave

Her team may not look that threatening, but she does have a few tricks up her sleeve. For this run, Attract, Leech Seed and Cute Charm could prove annoying.

I use Bite on Luvdisc, Attract would make this way harder. Luvdisc uses Water Gun, dealing minimal damage. Beautifly uses Gust. Gust does around 5 damage every time.

Luvdisc goes down and Roselia comes out. Beautifly uses Gust again.
I use Bite on Roselia.

However, she manages to land Leech Seed. This is bad.

It heals her enough to cause the next Bite not to KO. Roselia uses Pin Missile, which lands three times. That drops me into the yellow. This is really bad.
Leech Seed doesn’t heal Roselia enough to allow it to stick around. Delcatty comes out and Umbreon only has 17 health left.

I take out around 40% of Delcatty’s health before going down to a Shadow Rush and Gust. Leech Seed was too much. I would have won otherwise.

I decide to select Yes for funsies, but the game just loops back, forcing me to say no.

Take two

I apply the same strategy. Leech Seed chipped me too much, I just have to avoid that. Or get lucky crits.

I use Bite on Roselia, and I guess Umbreon was pissed about the last fight because he flinches with Bite. Roselia doesn’t even get an attack in. Her Delcatty comes in. It’s Female, so Cute Charm could be annoying.

Actually, no it doesn’t because Umbreon decided to choose violence today and one shot with a crit.
Beautifly goes down two turns later. Umbreon levels up and learns Confuse Ray, forgetting Tail Whip in the process.

Krane and I enter the teleportation elevator, because the screen goes to black and we’re magically back at the Pokemon Research Lab. I guess we don’t have to fight the Hexagon brothers? They let us walk by? Whatever it doesn’t matter. Now they want me to look at the purify chamber. It’s completely useless at this moment. I’ll most likely use it to purify the gift Shadow Togepi later in the game. And I do plan on catching all the Shadow Pokemon, as well but that only matters forthe final Miror B fight. Whatever.

After that, I”m off to Pyrite to give a Data Rom the scientist with Lovrina dropped.

That will do it for this part. Next time, wild Pokemon time. Have a nice day.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

In Colosseum, Shadow Pokemon were only available with their set trainer however, in this game Miror B. has missed Shadow Pokemon.

I never knew that this happens even before Miror B. even appears. It makes sense, none of these peons are rematchable, and it would be bad game design to make Shadow Pokemon unavailable. Especially because Miror B's final battle requires all Shadow Pokemon to be caught.

You mentioned you're using Bulbapedia so you might already know this, but just in case: there's a glitch concerning Miror B's Shadow Voltorb - you have to catch it in the initial fight. If you don't, it won't reappear and you won't be able to get all 83 Shadow Pokemon. I've never not caught all the Shadow Pokemon when playing XD so have never personally experienced this, but have seen people posting about it before.

 

[Smoughon Account]

You mentioned you're using Bulbapedia so you might already know this, but just in case: there's a glitch concerning Miror B's Shadow Voltorb - you have to catch it in the initial fight. If you don't, it won't reappear and you won't be able to get all 83 Shadow Pokemon. I've never not caught all the Shadow Pokemon when playing XD so have never personally experienced this, but have seen people posting about it before.

Uhh. . . I've already done that fight for the next part, and I didn't catch the Voltorb. I'll see if it reappears. Never heard of this actually.

 

[Daylight]

Quick little disclaimer; my emulator couldn’t find my first save, so I started a new run. I actually found the first one after I made more progress in the second, so every screenshot from now on is from that second save. Wouldn’t be a Smoughon playthrough without stupid save issues and inconsistent screenshots lol.

I was wondering why your Eevee suddenly changed gender lol. Regardless, this is pretty cool. XD is one of my favorite Pokémon games ever.

Your choice of Umbreon is an interesting one. Because while you can get ‘mons like Flygon and Tyranitar, it’s not gonna happen anytime soon. So you’re kinda stuck with your starter alone for a pretty big chunk of the game. Espeon and Jolteon are the typical choices for a challenge like this ‘cause they’re fast and can one-shot a lot of unresisted foes. And Vaporeon or even Flareon pack a similar punch even if they’re not as speedy. But Umbreon is easily the “least optimal.”

I’m interested to see what you’re gonna do to overcome that (aside from over leveling lol) and which pokespot ‘mons you’re going to pick to help Umbreon out. Good luck!

 

[Smoughon Account]

I was wondering why your Eevee suddenly changed gender lol. Regardless, this is pretty cool. XD is one of my favorite Pokémon games ever.

Your choice of Umbreon is an interesting one. Because while you can get ‘mons like Flygon and Tyranitar, it’s not gonna happen anytime soon. So you’re kinda stuck with your starter alone for a pretty big chunk of the game. Espeon and Jolteon are the typical choices for a challenge like this ‘cause they’re fast and can one-shot a lot of unresisted foes. And Vaporeon or even Flareon pack a similar punch even if they’re not as speedy. But Umbreon is easily the “least optimal.”

I’m interested to see what you’re gonna do to overcome that (aside from over leveling lol) and which pokespot ‘mons you’re going to pick to help Umbreon out. Good luck!

Yeah, the save file stuff was just me being stupid.

Honestly, every starter would work for this. It really depends on what Pokemon you plan on using.

And as a spoiler, I've already spent at least 4 to 5 hours at the pokespots for the next part. I've got both themes in my head lol.

 

[Felis Licht]

I was actually thinking of doing a challenge like this as I was attempting to SR for a shiny Eevee recently, perhaps even attempt at full shiny team since none of the shadows can be shiny.
I played this game for years and I just now learned Eagun and his trainers won't even battle you if you don't have at least 1 shadow mon or have all fainted shadow mon in your party, and that the + symbol actually has a purpose. Not even my old guide book mentions that.

You mentioned you're using Bulbapedia so you might already know this, but just in case: there's a glitch concerning Miror B's Shadow Voltorb - you have to catch it in the initial fight. If you don't, it won't reappear and you won't be able to get all 83 Shadow Pokemon. I've never not caught all the Shadow Pokemon when playing XD so have never personally experienced this, but have seen people posting about it before.

I remember failing the Voltorb once in a playthrough, but it reappeared again because Miror B. had other shadow mons I failed to catch in his party. I've heard of this glitch, but haven't seen any proof of it in action though since it was mentioned.

 

[Smoughon Account]

Hello. I'm just posting an update to let you guys know this playthrough isn't dead, I do plan on finishing this. The next part is finished, I just need to finish the "script". I apologize for the lack of updates.

Have a nice day.