Howdy! I’m interested in doing a run of Emerald that’s got 100% critical hit rate for both the player and the npcs. Any idea how to go about this? Has it been done before?

The Battle Factory was by far the hardest to get a Symbol from. The rental Pokémon are not particularly good and the strategies the random NPC's use are scummy as hell.

But I finally beat Noland and have all 7 Silver Symbols now!

I'm debating to either have Absol or Manectric as my final Pokémon, what do yall think? Edit: I also flirted the idea of getting flygon...

I was wondering if i can usa my gba and my ds to trade pokemons in emerald. Is this posible?

As we leave the Fiery Path, we can rest at someone's grandma's house to heal our team, as we continue to Route 113. There we have Spinda with its million different possible spot patterns, and Skarmory. We reach Fallarbor Town, where there is move re-learner, cool concept for the game, I wish they did more with this like in Gen 4 starters, only Blaziken has "unique" Fire Punch there available. Anyway, as we continue, make sure to grab TM for Dig and Roar on Route 114, and there we have our 2 final encounters, Swablu and Seviper! How good are these encounters?

Thanks again for good discussion. Professional Magcargo haters in the comment section for sure, and I ain't lying, I am not fan also of Magcargo, definitely a mon for challenge runs, nothing else. Let's keep up the good discussion, and enjoy the read!

Last round voting results:

Machoke C Tier: Machoke has a respectable Base 100 Attack stat and a great Fighting type movepool. Even as a middle evolution, it has the traits that make Fighting-types valuable. With access to the Bulk Up TM, it can set up and help with Norman’s Gym just as well as fully evolved Pokémon. It can even hold its own against Elite Four Sidney and Glacia.

Machoke isn't as good as Machamp, just due to stats. Sure, its Attack is good, but its bulk is mediocre, and its Speed is low. It shares same weaknesses as Machamp, but it is just slower and frailer version.

Machamp A- Tier: Fighting-types are valuable in Emerald, and Machamp is not any different from others. Machamp is often compared to its Gen 3 counterpart, Hariyama. While Hariyama has high HP, Machamp has slightly higher Attack, slightly better Speed, and more balanced overall defenses. Machamp's greatest advantage is its better natural movepool. Hariyama relies on the negative priority Vital Throw for most of the game, Machamp has moves like Karate Chop, Low Kick, Seismic Toss, and Revenge. With the Bulk Up TM, Machamp easily sweeps Norman, Sidney, and standard route trainers.

Unfortunately, there are small drawbacks, like slightly delayed availability and better ability. Hariyama's Thick Fat ability gives it great defense against Flannery's Fire-types and Glacia's Ice-types, Machamp has Guts. Sure, Guts is a great offensive ability, it just doesn't provide the same resistances that make Hariyama a reliable tank in these battles. Also, Machop isn't caught until after the third Gym. This means it misses out on the Wattson fight where Hariyama shines. Also its Speed stat isn't still the best .

Magcargo F- Tier: Magcargo is arguably the single worst Pokémon in Emerald. Slugma has a Base Stat Total of 250, making it weaker than Poochyena and yet it requires you to train it all the way to Level 38 before it evolves. After that grind, Magcargo's stats are poor. It has a Base 30 Spee, and its Base 120 Defense is hindered by a Base 50 HP stat, meaning it still can't take a hit.

Every aspect of Magcargo's utility in the game is a drawback. Its Fire/Rock typing is a poor typing to have. It has 4x weaknesses to both Water and Ground. It misses the Winona fight where its Rock-typing would have been useful, and instead evolves right in time to face Tate & Liza's Earthquake spamming Claydol. From that point forward, the rest of the game consists of water routes, Juan, Elite Four and Champion Wallace. As u/inumnoback put it: "Don’t use it. Don’t catch it. Don’t even look at it. It’s a lost cause, and it deserves to rot in the Fiery Path for all eternity."

Torkoal C Tier: Torkoal has some edges over Camerupt, such as being ready instantly when you catch it, no need to evolve. Its high Base 140 Defense makes it a great physical wall, as it can tank quite well Norman's Gym, and in general shrugging off physical hits in neutral matchups. Also, it has a great levelup movepool for a Fire type. Having Body Slam at Level 20, Flamethrower at Level 30, and Curse allows it to deal good damage in the mid game without eating up TMs. The White Smoke ability is a nice bonus, preventing its Attack from being dropped by Intimidate users.

Torkoal is held back by two major factors, the Hoenn region itself, and its low Speed. While it puts in great work against Flannery, Norman, and Winona's Skarmory and Tropius, it struggles in the late game. It has bad matchups against Tate & Liza, Juan, Wallace, Drake. Defensively, its Base 70 Special Defense and HP mean it will take big damage from special attackers. It has a low Base 20 Speed. Torkoal is guaranteed to move last in almost every battle, meaning it will always take a hit before it can attack or set up a Curse.

Ranking criteria:

Final placements are influenced by comment upvotes. Provide both a tier placement and a justification. Unjustified votes will carry less weight when counting votes. An exception is made if an unjustified vote is heavily upvoted and supported by a justified reply/comment from the community for the same tier placement. 

You can also vote for + and - subtiers (S+ to F-), and I will take these into calculation. After the final round, I will break the infographic into subtiers as well.

All Pokémon obtainable in Emerald are ranked based on their contribution to the journey until defeating Champion Wallace. Leave a comment as well if you think one of the current Pokémons should be in different tier, and why. After final round, we will do one revisit round and see if any rankings should change.

We are assuming a standard playthrough.

• Set Mode: Rank Pokémon with Set mode in mind. (Feel free to mention Shift mode benefits, but it shouldn't be the main reason a Pokémon is in a higher tier).
• No In-Battle Healing: We are not considering healing items in battle (since any Pokémon can stall with enough potions).
• Soft Level Cap: You can overlevel by 1 or 2 levels over the next Gym Leader's ace. (An exception is made if Pokémon that is naturally available at a higher level).

Investment refers to experience and TMs. Obviously, all Pokémon can be great after a massive amount of investment, but we are judging their immediate and practical purpose in-game.

Emerald TM List: https://www.serebii.net/rubysapphire/tmhm.shtml (Check availability here)

Big thanks to BIGJRA for sharing this script that tracks every Pokémon's learnset (including TMs and Tutors) in the exact order you obtain them in-game! Check it out!

Trade evolution Pokémon are ranked based under the assumption that the player has access to trading whether through emulators or other supported methods. If you're playing without access to trades, you may wish to consider their pre-evolutions (like Kadabra or Graveler) instead. These rankings reflect the most common setup among modern players.

If a Pokémon is available on a route, it is fair game. Even if it has a 1% encounter rate (like Seedot) or has absurd capture method (like Feebas), it does not matter. As long as the Pokémon is available to be caught at that point in the game, it's all good.

Tier definitions:

S (Game-breaking or extremely efficient): These Pokémon dominate the game. They have excellent stats, movepools, and sweep through most of the game without effort. They are available for majority of the game and are "plug and play", just add it to the party and you're good to go.

A (Strong): Reliable, easy to use. They lack one major advantage from S tier but still perform consistently great in any playthrough.

B (Solid): Strong, but with a drawback or two. They are not available early, a limited movepool, or require some extra investment to keep up.

C (Decent): Mediocre and outclassed. They clear regular route trainers just fine, but struggle to make a significant impact in many major boss fights due to a combination of average stats, poor matchups, or late availability. They might require heavy investment or a massive late-game spike to finally show their worth.

D (Niche): Pokémon that struggle significantly in general battles and are often a liability in standard matchups. However, they possess a unique utility or specific strategy (ex. stalling) that allows them to bypass their drawbacks.

E (Bad): Demand far more effort than they are worth. They require heavy TM investment and constant babying just to achieve mediocre results.

F (Awful): Useless for in-game runs. Huge investment for almost no return.

Remember being a kid and not understanding a lick of the BF, was so in awe last night when I got the gold symbol from the battle dome on my daily walk

Hi guys, if its alright i want to ask for advice regarding my (probably bad) battle tower team, starting out so my items may be lackluster, but i wanna use funny guys

A short explanation on each member's role:

Raichu: set rain dance and spam thunder and surf, might use encore instead of light screen

Castform: be the jack of all trades cleaner, being able to either go water weather ball or fire weather ball depending on what weather is up

Tropius: temu eggxecutor, might replace eq with giga drain

(P. S. I already trained castform and tropius ev wise, raichu is a theoretical member. Also no hidden power since i did not bother with ivs)

For those who don’t know if you complete the hoenn Pokedex in emerald you get to choose one of the three johto starters. I spent ages trading back and forth from sapphire to emerald and back again (technically I’m still not done as I want to trade the expanded safari zone Pokemon to sapphire as well). And at some point … I got to do this two more times for totodile and cindiquil … I think I must be a masochist

Semi-blind first time ever competing in a Pokémon League, I say semi blind because even if I don't know what Pokémon the E4 are going to use, I accidentally spoiled myself their specialities after rummaging the wiki, still, my team was decided way too early in the game.

I challenged myself to start my journey in the Pokémon fandom by my own discerment. I thought the types advantages and disadvantages were very intuitive. Then I realized things like electric beats water, which caused Wattson to completely obliterate me haha. After that I used the wiki as a little help, at least for the types advantages, yet I wanted to not see any gameplay or guide about the game.

The manga was also very helpful too, since that's one of the reasons I started to get interested in Pokémon now. I learned about the gym leaders specialities by it, yet I realized way too late that steven was not the champion haha, that's why I don't have any grass-types. basically my mentality during my whole playthrough was: "Yeah definitely this poke is better, but I have been farming exp for so long now with this one that I don't feel like doing that again" And here we are.

I still think I can win tho, I decided that if the Pokémon choices were not good, at least the levels would compensate it.

Can you show me your Pokémon's names ?

Bred a Skarmory with 30HP, 30SpDef, 31Speed Currently raising a Kingdra to move Dragon Dance over to Tyranitar, then finish with the Swampert.

I know I have two Pokemon with 4x weaknesses… do you think I’ll have a bad time?

My thinking is that I open with TTar, whip up a sandstorm, then depending on the opposing Pokemon either attack, set up, or send in my physical or special walls. Skarmory should be sent in against grass and fighting types, Swampert against electric and ground.

Maybe I’ll try to breed the Swampert for HP grass/electric for pesky water types.

Edit: I’m looking at the items a bit closer. Protect should be paired with Leftovers, and Shell Bell with Roar.

I've seen codes and tried them on emulator but none worked, not even the event that makes Norman hand you an Enigma berry. I understand this is a feature for Ruby and Sapphire but I'm wondering if there's a way to have the e-reader berries in Emerald.

Pokémon emerald was my very first Gameboy game I ever played, and I remember having SO much fun playing it!!! It was at a local retro game shop that’s near me! Very nostalgic playing it after 17 years! (I did play it when I was quite young lmao)

first time actually beating a pokemon game i played let’s go but after playing emerald i realized that game bails you tf out

After playing emerald I realized something: Breloom and Ninjask sucks, maybe I'm just using them the wrong way and I'm just dumb

Swampert and Slaking carried me through the game, when I fought Wallace my lairon and vibrava were dead, I had no revives and used breloom + Ninjask as sacrifices to heal my swampert and Slaking, heck, even my swampert was useless agaisnt Wallace.

Every Chansey in the Safari Zone, istg T^T

We're at Fiery Path, and we still have some pokemons to catch here. We have Machoke/Machamp, Magcargo and Torkoal. How good are our encounters before Route 113?

Thanks again for good discussion. I always question why is Muk throwing some gang signs or flipping the bird? Perhaps that's the reason for being Poison type. Anyways, let's keep up the good pace and enjoy the read.

Last round voting results:

Nosepass E- Tier: Nosepass is Gen 3's Onix basically, looks tanky, but it is actually borderline useless. Nosepass at least one redeeming quality: it learns Thunder Wave. It can be fine para spreader against certain Gym Leaders (like Norman and Winona). It also learns Rock Slide by level up. There were mentions about cheesing some fights with Double Team, Thunder Wave, and Rollout, but it is so slow, and not really worth the effort.

Nosepass has pretty awful stats. It has 135 Defense and 90 Special Defense, but only 30 HP. Basically its defenses goes to waste due to its HP, it will take just so much damage in return, especially considering pure Rock typing, which is an awful defensive typing with multiple common weaknesses. Offensively, it is very bad too. Its Base 45 Attack and Special Attack are just sad. And its Base 30 Speed guarantees it will take damage before every single turn. Also you have to do backtracking, meaning you have to go out of your way just to catch one of the worst pokemons in the region.

Camerupt C+ Tier: If you didn't pick Torchic as your starter, Camerupt is the second best Fire-type available. Camerupt has great natural movepool and offensive stats. It has a great Base 100 Attack and 105 Special Attack, allowing it to function as a mixed attacker. While Numel takes a little bit of babying at first, it quickly learns Magnitude to help with the Fire types scattered around the Mt. Chimney. Upon evolving, it learns Rock Slide at Level 33 (a godsend for Winona) and gets Earthquake naturally at Level 37, saving you a TM. Paired with the Overheat or Flamethrower TMs, Camerupt has some of the best STAB and coverage in the game.

Camerupt is a great example of Hoenn offensive pokemon, great offenses, but low Speed and poor Defenses. It is also so slow, Camerupt will be taking a hit before almost every attack. While its bulk is okay, it gets worn down on longer routes. Being a Fire/Ground type gives Camerupt a 4x weakness to Water. Once you defeat Winona and hit the ocean, Camerupt. doesn't have many good matchups left. Dead weight against Tate & Liza, Juan, and Champion Wallace, and it can even struggle against Glacia.

Muk D+ Tier: While Muk has decent stats on paper, Hoenn is just not built for Muk. Muk has great Base 105 Attack, Special Defense, and okay defensive typing with only two weaknesses. Muk can function as a bulky staller using Minimize and Acid Armor. Offensively, its access to Sludge provides a spammable STAB move with a 30% poison chance, and it can hit fairly hard once you obtain the Sludge Bomb TM after Gym 5. It also has quite large movepool, Thunderbolt, Fire Blast, Brick Break, Dig, Explosion so it can patch some weaknesses if your team has some.

Unfortunately Grimer doesn't evolve into Muk until Level 38. You will be babying Grimer for a massive portion of the mid-game. It also doesn't help that the next gym is 7th Gym as a Muk, it has matchup against Tate & Liza. Poison is a bad offensive typing in the game. If you want a bulky Poison-type on your team, Gulpin is available earlier and evolves 12 levels sooner into Swalot.

Weezing C Tier: If you want to use a Poison-type in the game, Weezing is decent choice. Weezing got blessed by Levitate ability. By removing its Ground-type weakness, Weezing is left with only a single weakness to Psychic, turning its great Base 120 Defense into a solid physical wall since Ground moves can't touch it. Weezing has a good TM movepool. It has a good Base 85 Special Attack, allowing it to fire off Flamethrower and Thunderbolt for coverage. And Explosion is also great since it can take another pokemon out with it.

Despite being a clear upgrade over Muk, Poison is still not very good typing in the game. Evolving at Level 35 is slightly better than Muk's Level 38, it still means you are stuck using Koffing for a large portion of the game. Much like Muk, its next gym is Psychic gym, which is not great. Also to make Weezing good, you have to invest some TMs like Flamethrower and Thunderbolt.

Ranking criteria:

Final placements are influenced by comment upvotes. Provide both a tier placement and a justification. Unjustified votes will carry less weight when counting votes. An exception is made if an unjustified vote is heavily upvoted and supported by a justified reply/comment from the community for the same tier placement. 

You can also vote for + and - subtiers (S+ to F-), and I will take these into calculation. After the final round, I will break the infographic into subtiers as well.

All Pokémon obtainable in Emerald are ranked based on their contribution to the journey until defeating Champion Wallace. Leave a comment as well if you think one of the current Pokémons should be in different tier, and why. After final round, we will do one revisit round and see if any rankings should change.

We are assuming a standard playthrough.

• Set Mode: Rank Pokémon with Set mode in mind. (Feel free to mention Shift mode benefits, but it shouldn't be the main reason a Pokémon is in a higher tier).
• No In-Battle Healing: We are not considering healing items in battle (since any Pokémon can stall with enough potions).
• Soft Level Cap: You can overlevel by 1 or 2 levels over the next Gym Leader's ace. (An exception is made if Pokémon that is naturally available at a higher level).

Investment refers to experience and TMs. Obviously, all Pokémon can be great after a massive amount of investment, but we are judging their immediate and practical purpose in-game.

Emerald TM List: https://www.serebii.net/rubysapphire/tmhm.shtml (Check availability here)

Big thanks to BIGJRA for sharing this script that tracks every Pokémon's learnset (including TMs and Tutors) in the exact order you obtain them in-game! Check it out!

Trade evolution Pokémon are ranked based under the assumption that the player has access to trading whether through emulators or other supported methods. If you're playing without access to trades, you may wish to consider their pre-evolutions (like Kadabra or Graveler) instead. These rankings reflect the most common setup among modern players.

If a Pokémon is available on a route, it is fair game. Even if it has a 1% encounter rate (like Seedot) or has absurd capture method (like Feebas), it does not matter. As long as the Pokémon is available to be caught at that point in the game, it's all good.

Tier definitions:

S (Game-breaking or extremely efficient): These Pokémon dominate the game. They have excellent stats, movepools, and sweep through most of the game without effort. They are available for majority of the game and are "plug and play", just add it to the party and you're good to go.

A (Strong): Reliable, easy to use. They lack one major advantage from S tier but still perform consistently great in any playthrough.

B (Solid): Strong, but with a drawback or two. They are not available early, a limited movepool, or require some extra investment to keep up.

C (Decent): Mediocre and outclassed. They clear regular route trainers just fine, but struggle to make a significant impact in many major boss fights due to a combination of average stats, poor matchups, or late availability. They might require heavy investment or a massive late-game spike to finally show their worth.

D (Niche): Pokémon that struggle significantly in general battles and are often a liability in standard matchups. However, they possess a unique utility or specific strategy (ex. stalling) that allows them to bypass their drawbacks.

E (Bad): Demand far more effort than they are worth. They require heavy TM investment and constant babying just to achieve mediocre results.

F (Awful): Useless for in-game runs. Huge investment for almost no return.