I Simulated 1,000,000 Pokemon Battles, Here's the Best Trainer
Вставка
- Опубліковано 25 лис 2023
- ➤ Full Results in Spreadsheet: docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
➤ View The Code: github.com/cRz-Shadows/Pokemo...
➤ Note: Showdown footage is a recreation as actual battles were run without a GUI
Join the Discord:
➤ / discord
➤ Twitter: / thesmithplays
➤ Instagram: / thesmithplays
Credits: Craig Livingstone (Production), Weebra (Editing)
Business Inquiries: thesmithplays@ellify.com - Ігри
I Simulated 1,000,000 Pokémon Battles with ALL Teams Level 50:
ua-cam.com/video/lx00W6HsUhg/v-deo.html
especially with how much they keep bringing up how some rankings they like/don't like because level differences would see them changed. Like my man, if that is going to be your harping point, do this a second time with all pokemon at the same level???
How dare you inbrash pickachu 😤😤
That's what I was looking for after this video awesome subscribe 🙌
Curious on how this would look if you even out the levels to 50 or so but didn’t change anything else. Also curious on where Sada/Turo would rank since they’re a pretty infamous post-game fight at this point.
if we were throwing sada/turo in, we need to throw in the evil team leaders as well, such as cyrus.
The level balancing thing was what I wanted to comment about - I'd be curious how some of the earlier Gym Leaders held up if they weren't at an awful level disadvantage.
I was going to come in and recommend this same thing! If everyone had even levels I would like to see how everyone fairs. Gen 6 seems to be a little on the high side but as stated it’s because it has the highest average levels
@@littlecow27 Wouldn't Penny be more fitting in that role? She is the big boss of Team Star, and though their status as an "evil team" is dubious at-best, it still makes more sense than Sada and Turo, who have no organization what-so-ever.
Sada and Turo are most comparable to Ghetsis in Black and White, because they're the final bosses of their games before the credits roll, a thematic placement usually occupied by a champion. Ghetsis was included in this video, but not Sada and Turo.
That raises a lot of questions though. Should Faulkner have a level 50 Pidgey with the same moveset? Or should it be evolved and have level appropriate moves?
You touched on a fact that I've noticed as well: Unova's team composition is some of the best I've seen, but their levels are surprisingly low. I'd love to see this redone with level 100 Pokemon, see if the upsets stay the same.
The levels are low but in a balanced way. When I played the game for the first time I was just two levels behind N's final battle and in my replays I'm usually in a 2 level range from the major battles.
Surprisingly Kalos is also really balanced when you factor in the reworked exp. Share.
ive been playing through Black for the first time this year and holy shit, even with a designed and planned team, im getting my ass piledriven by competent AI.
@@alanmiraanimeyeah the low levels are good for playing the actual game, but in this scenario it hinders it which is the problem
It'd be even cooler if everyone had their teams filled out with the most likely options as well
Not to mention including all battles with named characters, not just the Gym Leaders and people like them
You said it's disappointing, but I think it says a ton about just how stacked red is that he made it that high with essentially 5 pokemon.
+He nerf himself, considering is officially is supposed to have 151 Kanto pokemon, imagine him ditching the Pikachu for Mewtwo
@@guifire9747 If it were Red from Legacy, he'd probably be at 1
@@guifire9747 Red's more of a collector than anything else. He's filled out the Kanto Pokedex, but at the very least all the Legendary Birds and Mewtwo he released afterwards, since they're obtainable from the same locations in Gen 2.
you also need to take into account his massive level advantage over a ton of other trainers
And that he probably didnt have the free permanent hail in the simulation for his 3 blizzards to always hit.
I’m interested to see how it goes if you normalize levels
Good point :O
Yeah, all of these being based on the very first encounter in-game kinda sours this video for me. It's extremely well founded at this point that most Gym Leaders are intentionally holding back with sub-optimal teams and levels _meant_ to be beaten by trainers once they've reached a certain skill level and trained their Pokemon up a bit, with them also having a full team meant to be used for actual competitive matches outside of badge battles. While this technically wasn't a thing until Gen 3, nearly every game since has had some way to refight gym leaders with their full team.
For instance; Falkner from HGSS, the weakest gym leader on the list, *actually* has a competitive team of Staraptor, Noctowl, Pidgeot, Pelipper, Honchkrow, and scariest of all, a Swellow with Guts holding a Flame Orb.
And yeah, not every game's rematch system is going to have consistent level scaling. But if we're talking about competitive viability of these teams, why aren't we sticking with the actual competitive structure with level 50s across the board? That's how competitive works, so not taking that into account isn't really giving the earlier Gym Leaders a fair shake.
Your comment got liked 69 times.
@@pustota7254 Its really your n°1 occupation here? xD
@@NoktarUA-cam if I won't do it who will?
The most surprising is Whitney outweighing it's peers with 2 pokemon. Now we now scientifically why she's a pain
Did you really ever doubt her Miltank?
@@joefarrow1599 hahHah sorry, I'm a spanish speaker, I guess the right way to write it is "now we know"
Never underestimate that Miltank… I had to use I think Lv. 22s the first time time I faced her.
oh god my PTSD, but to kill her miltank i used her own move against her... it was huge Victory as kid
@@Blastwint Seriously… there is no reason for a third gym leader to have that monstrosity of a Pokémon. That’s why I hate Miltank so much… first it attracts, then it stomps, then it stomps against, then it milk drinks, then rollout etc. etc. etc.
I’m really surprised on how far Whitney and miltank made it. This validated my fears of her as a child.
Whitney's even harder in context. Scrappy lets her hit the Ghost that would normally counter her.
Miltank is just surprisingly strong for...well, a friggen cow.
I read a lot of comments about Whitney’s notorious militank, however I can’t remember having problems against her when playing as a kid
The Rollout pain train was legendary in the schoolyard.
Whitney's Miltank almost ended my current soulsilver nuzlocke run. Rip Onix and Drowzee.
As most have said, I would love to see this done again with everyone at Lv.50, as well as using all versions of each character. So many have rematches in post game areas. Heck, B2W2 has almost everyone back in the world tournament. Would be interesting how that would affect things.
First he'd probably have to redo this data to include Roxie, Marlon, and Champion Iris, three trainers missed from B2W2.
@@Zer0_Soul except each of the three you mentioned were in the video and the spreadsheet?
@@Zer0_Soulhe even commented on how he was specifically impressed with Marlon’s performance lol
I'm most interesting in seeing how all of these trainers perform at the peak of their skill - so only using their strongest incarnations in the series, like Brock's postgame rematches in HGSS.
True, including the rival could be nice too, 4g's Barry strongest team is lvl 80 or above, N have his legendary dragon in BW2, and Wally now have a way better team in ROSA (ROSA trainer in general are stronger than the RSE original thanks to Mega and better level), hell USUM post game showed us the different villain leader with their own version legendary too with pretty high level (the two leaders of Team Skull also have pretty powerful team)
Then again that would be unfair for some gen, 1st and 2nd gen have rematches with full team post game, 4g too, but 6g would be stuck with their base level team for example
Normally I be against the idea of Mustard being way stronger than Cynthia but then I realize that Mustard literally had no equal during his prime and the fact that his signature Pokémon is a literal Legendary. Honestly kind of fitting since he’s the wisest and most experienced out of the champions so Cynthia being second to him is actually respectable placement.
I am sitting here wondering if Cynthia's Garchomp got those EVs that it had in the game. She was the first NPC in the games that got the player treatment of having boosted stats due to fighting Pokémon.
It has perfect IV, with max Att EV and a 52/204 split of HP/Speed EV.
That extra Speed and Attack is significant. The HP might be negligible but the other 2 most certainly matter a lot.
@@JaharNarishmaUntrue, the first NPC to use IVs was in gen 7 with I belive the first captain fight.
Cynthia was never something special for NPC standards, and I don't know where this rumors comes from (she only has 30 IVs in all stats for all her pokemon, which is actually standard since gen I (15 IVs for that gen since it was the maximum)).
Tho it's pretty weird that she doesn't use her BDSP team, since her plat isn't very good besides the overlvling.
At least it wasn't the DP version, cuz that version has a completely random AI 💀
UA-cam being fucking shit and doesn't let me edit my comment for some reason?
But meant EVs and IVs
@@charnalk5572 I have been digging. The rumours come because her BD/SP does have that Garchomp. The Platinum Garchomp has 30 IV, 0 EV, neutral nature.
The edit has come through. No IV/EV mixup in your comment.
@@JaharNarishma The nature is actually random too, since it's generated live using the current RNG stat for enemy ram.
Every NPC is like that, so they tend to not be very consistent when it comes to speed for exemple.
Personally, the most suprising placement I found was that just one ability change caused 130 extra wins and 2 placement ranks between Iris and Drayden
Mold Breaker offers Iris no advantage because her Haxorus can only use Assurance to take advantage of it and there's no gym leaders that have Justified as the 1 niche case she could use. Meanwhile Drayden has an advantage against approximately 40% of the gym leader roster (30/74 gym leaders are female and approximately half of the Elite 4 is female so he could eek out a win against some underpreforming Elite 4)
I'd say "why all the hate for Geeta?" but I couldn't say it with a straight face. Considering how so many characters in SV convey a good amount of personality even in the short time you get to interact with them, it's almost impressive how they managed to give someone absolutely NO personality at all.
I mean lets be real is there a pokemon character with... character... before like, gen 4? And they dont put that much effort into it after that either
Poppy outranking Geeta is both surprising and hilarious.
I'm not too surprised. Geeta has no pokemon that hard-counter steel types. Only having two pokemon even knowing a move that hits them super effectively.
@@jonathanflanagan1504i mean yeah but ranking here is more generally how good is the team and less individual matchups, its not her weakness to steel thpes she’s just really bad lmao
i somehow am not suprised and infact really happy. i want her to be the youngest champion rank trainer so bad lol
I think it's lore accurate personally. She deserves to be ranked lower than her own elite four member
Not surprising geeta’s team is horrible
Why not place them ALL at level 100? That way we can eliminate the lvl variable and get a better understanding of their power in equal terms (which, by contrast, would be their power at their respective levels vs the player)
I also want to see this with rematch/hard mode/world championship teams. So many of these gym leaders have proven they have more to offer than just their initial fights.
The issue with that is the movepool, I'd argue. Higher level gym leaders have better moves. Unless you start giving every gym leader the best moves possible, which starts to make the point of using gym leader teams a bit moot.
How about adding the gyms from pokemon stadium and the battles from the gamecube games? And volo from legend arceus
@@MagusAgrippa8nor just move pool, but also number of team members and the power of those members (since early game mostly have pre-evolutions and/or weaker Pokémon). Realistically there would probably still be a general pattern, just more likely to have some upsets and regions with higher or lower level caps would be eliminated (Johto vs Kalos for example)
@@MagusAgrippa8 We have teams for most of them at high level. The only ones we would be missing, IIRC, would be the gen 6 leaders. We know the high level teams of gens 1 through 5 thanks to the world championship teams of B2/W2, we know the rematch teams of the kahunas of Alola, we know the league teams of the leaders of Galar, and thanks again to the rematchs, we also know the teams of the Paldea leaders.
I'd be curious to see N's rematch teams from b2w2. They seem pretty strong
It doesn't surprise me what so ever that Mustard ranked so high! I absolutely loved fighting Mustard. Dude goes pro for 50 years including 18 as Champion, stumbles, finds himself, and now just chills and basks in the fruits of his glory while helping others. As soon as he did the front flip, I knew I was under leveled. The best part is the music. The fast pacing shows the excitement of the student facing the Master. It fits the overall growth them of the Isle of Armor. The music itself starts when HE starts. If you keep him on the battle pose during the final battle, those drums will keep playing until you press the A button for him to proceed. This was the first time they did this, and of course would continue this like in Legends: Arceus.
And regarding Geeta, at least she stepped it up with her Blueberry Academy team! She got rid of both Gogoat and Veluza with Chesnaught and Dragapult. Her Chesnaught has both Leech Seed and Spiky Shield. Instead of Glimmora being the one she Terastallizes, she leads off with Glimmora to of course set up the Toxic Debris. The one she Terastallizes is Kingambit, with a Flying-type Tera! That way, with Kingambit's Supreme Overlord, it's OP to get revenge for its fallen allies!
yeah it never did make sense to me that Geeta's Ace was a setup mon, so i am very glad that she switched it up into something that makes more sense for an actual Champion
As someone who hasn't played Sword/Shield and was expecting Cynthia to reign supreme, I had a good laugh at the the #1 trainer being named freaking "Mustard" 😂
In all fairness, Mustard uses a legendary on his team. Urshifu is broken af
Must be short for mustard gas
Mind, some of Cynthia's challenge was her interest in random mythology and lore leading her to some rare pokemon and thus winning the information war that doesn't matter in these simulations. For people playing blind, there's a good chance her Spirtomb was the first one you saw, because while it was possible to catch the single wild one much earlier, it involved a whole puzzle and grind that most players did not do, so you just had this kinda bulky pokemon that most people only had guesses at the typing along with three immunties, some people lost a lot of ground in that fight trying to find a super-effective move against a pokemon that had noe. Likewise, unless you caught a Gible in a small off-the road area with a low encounter rate, then hers was your first Garchomp(Which, insidently, has real potential to outspeed and use a SE STAB to OHKO the box legendaries you may have brought but probably not EV trained), Sure, at that point you've seen trainers use Gabite, but it's still a rather spicy way to meet Garchomp. Most of the rest of her team had known pokemon, but were still kinda rare ones that you likely hadn't seen a lot in your playthrough, and mostly remember as moderate 'boss fights' from past gens.
I’d be interested to see a Round 2 with all of them using their World Tournament/Rematch teams so we can see how they stack up when they’re actually trying.
Same
Yes!! This would be awesome! Especially since their levels and everything would essentially be equalized for their “true” team.
It‘s a must!
That would be unfair to mustard, as his partner Pokemon died and he Can't be at his strongest
Yea if he does another one of these i REALLY hope its this
Iono having a Mismagius is quite OP, let alone the Bellibolt. By terastalizing her Mismagius, she changed its ghost type's weakness into an electric type's weakness, but it has Levitate as its ability, meaning that a Ground-type, the bane of Electric Pokémon is useless against it (unless you have a Pokémon with Mold Breaker or Smack Down). Iono is honestly one of the most incredibly written characters in Pokémon. Truly matches her source material, down to even thanking a viewer for a donation. I laughed when she did that. Also, Poppy and her team outranking Geeta is another reason why you should never judge a book by its cover, because she delivers!
And Whitney's Miltank sure....traumatized a generation (of course besides Cynthia). I think the worst part is that when you FINALLY beat her, she doesn't even give you the badge at first!! Like, I should be the one crying! And Whitney's Clefairy gives players the opportunity to set up (eg with defense curl), and yet it also is the bane of speed runners, because it knows Metronome and easily can end your entire run if it calls on the wrong move
I think that may be an overall reason the Paldea Gym leaders performed so well, because unlike many other peers (with some exceptions) they have an ace pokemon that isn't of their typing, even giving them an arguable buff because they don't terastralize in the tests.
For Johto, you have to keep in mind you're only ranking half of the gym leaders. The Elite Four is fought in the middle of the game instead of at the end.
Marlon being ranked above several elite four members was a bit surprising, I don't remember him being that strong.
I bet having a mon with Shell Smash despite having a 4x weakness contributes to that
@@gabrielclementino2490i think having a ghost type contributes a lot too, some of the other gym leaders struggle with hitting ghosts
It’s AI vs HI. Human Intellect can plan around his weaknesses. AI can’t always do that. Add in a diverse typing and Moveset and it’s not that hard to see why he did so well.
@@RedDragonForce2 Yup, it's why a lot of the electric type gyms faltered so hard. Without the coverage available, they would just get stomped anytime a ground type shows up.
It's also why out of all the ghost users, Morty did so poorly. With only poison/ghost coverage, he literally could not deal with many trainers even in or below his own tier/level.
The Morty placement was the biggest surprise for me; it makes sense that some ghost trainer would get completely walled by a normal type team, but oof... his upset against Giovanni was also insane, the ground + normal immunity made for a very interesting matchup
Honestly I was most surprised by Norman, he seemed so difficult to battle as a kid at least with the Slaking main.
Least surprised but very happy with Cynthia being the second best though, her choices and team structure are a brilliant showcase of both competitive strength and the beauty of her region.
I find it very strange that so many major characters are left entirely out. No AI professors, no Volo (or anybody else from Hisui), only Giovanni and Ghetsis as villain rep even though I see several of them on the list when you show it...and why did you count Nemona as a post game opponent but the other two "end of plot" characters, Arven and Penny, aren't?
Arven and penny aren't ranked in the same teir because the tiers are based on their wins in the simulation. Nemona performed better than them. It's just that because they use their in game levels, the fights that are postgame will almost definitely place higher through sheer level advantage. Nemona just performed well enough to place among higher level opponents
Volo is Cynthia with 1 more Pokemon so he probably would take #1 while push Mustard down to #2 and Cynthia #3
He actually has 2 more, Giratina(Altered) and Giratina(Origin) since it heals to full when it transforms @@widchaponjearaphunt5452
Roxie, Marlon, and Champion Iris aren't in here either, and they're main game characters (gym leaders and the champion of B2W2)
@@Zer0_Soul All three of them are in the video, you must have just missed them. In fact he specifically takes a moment to talk about how Marlon overperformed.
Wulfric making it to the 50-60 bracket is surprising and impressive for Ice-Type Leaders in general.
If they did this again with levels equaled out, Wulfric (and Kalos in general) would fall a ton of spots. The fact that gym leaders top out at 3 or 4 Pokemon on their team, and don’t even always run 4 moves, would hurt a LOT.
@@sashaanne703 yup. Galar and Kalos games tend to have higher levels compared to the other games. (The Paldea and Unova games have WAY better composition and coverage in their teams but because of the level differences, they just couldn't compete)
Honestly would like to see this same thing but with all the trainers with their best possible teams, like the teams they have in the PWT, and having their teams all be level 50 or something, for even odds for all the trainers, and for fringe cases like trainers that have multiple teams because of starters or not having a in-game best team, having a fitting hypothetical team, and using their best, most objectively well rounded pokemon team would have to do,
Also wish we got to hear more about specific trainer matchup odds, like for some of the champions and final bosses matchups against each other, other then that really interesting video and idea.
Check out PokeDad's AI tournament then. Some liberties are taken on team comp though.
@@metalmonstar100 sure, I'll check it out, thanks!
I was very surprised to see Allister as high as he was, he is my favorite gym leader but with the trend of ghost type trainers underperforming I assumed he would be way lower, definitely happy about a top 100 from him
I'd love it if you could rank all the trainer's BEST teams. Because obviously, a first gym leader like Brock would never be able to compete with some trainer with much stronger levels. But we know these gym leaders just use weak pokemon to give the player a fair fight. Their ACTUAL teams would be like the post-game and ultimate teams you witness e.g. in Gen 5 where you see Brock and the others actually use 6 Pokemon, and decent ones at that.
Johto being the weakest actually makes me appreciate the post game more since some of the gym leaders from Kanto make fun of Johto trainers for being known for being weak. If I remember correctly Blue and misty were the ones that got into it the most
For johto i feel like using the HGSS teams instead of the crystal teams would have been be more interesting (same with kanto and every one other game that had a reboot)
Yeah seriouslly. Also typing is a big deal, the gym leaders in ss hg had solid single type teams. Having a tourny of these guys is kinda silly considering fairy didnt exist for the guys of the past. Speaking as a guy who plays many rpgs and all the pokemon games. They progressivelly got easier. From hg ss on. Black and white series was deffinetlly the closest in difficulty maybe even edges out hgss but i feel like it was more to do with the poor selection of pokemon. The power lvl and iv/ev spreads you get in ss hg is relativelly really naturally good.
Considering all Gen 5+ had to deal with Megas and all the bullshit region powerups, it's pretty obvious why their levels are way higher.
@@AA-nn7ehright
It’s weird how he keeps harping on Johto without really mentioning the reason why the gym leaders/elite 4 members are lower level. It’s almost like johto is twice the game and he disregards the second half. I get that he’s looking at this all objectively, but using the weaker gym leaders to say the region needs a rework is dumb. Good video minus the weird hate boner.
I was really surprised by Mustard being the winner, though he definitely deserves it. I'm genuinely surprised Giovanni made it as far as he did with just how depressingly bad his team is. I was also not expecting Geeta and Diantha to do so well, and only because if their high levels
Shame he didn't stick with Yellow teams since he used Platinum, a game with an infamous 3rd ghost gym. It would have given Giovanni and Blaine some justice, but I'm also curious to see how badly would Koga fare with his army of Venonats
because mustard doesn't scale, he felt like a massive pushover when I got to him. gamefreak does a terrible job at scaling trainers especially in postgame
@@bvd_vlvdsurge would have been worse than Brock I fear 🤣 but I agree, they did kanto dirty but not using yellow (even with the ai changes), Giovanni would have placed way higher
@@riccardomosena4162 eh, giving out super frail and weak Pikachu and Voltorb for a Raichu buff isn't even that bad of an idea. Whitney did well it their tier with basically one pokemon. I wonder if he'd do better or worse, although definitely not that much worse
@@bvd_vlvd considering the improvement on his team, most of them at least with earthquake instead of normal moves, and Persian is a heavy hitter too
Fantastic video! I really loved being able to see how the trainers of similar levels but different team compositions placed against each other! Though, where's Hau's final fight and all of the USUM elite 4? If you could include individual starter-dependent teams for Blue, Hop Leon etc. why not include Hau at all?
Me, someone who does machine learning and statistical analysis for a living: Yes, this all makes perfect sense. One thing that could have been done to avoid skewing the data due to Lv. advantage would definitely be to even out the Teams so that all of their levels are on an even playing field so to speak.
Mustard being first came out of nowhere, guess that's what happens when the other gym leaders don't have an Urshifu of their own to demolish his in one hit
I wish there was more info on how the battles were performed, and how it worked out, like the ELO World project
Edit: By far the most surprising to me was Geeta, much higher than I expected given her weak team with glaring type imbalances.
it’s not a completely terrible team…
every type weakness on the team also has at least 1 resist on the team
and all her mons have pretty decent coverage plus a good level cap
also keep in mind that trainers from later games generally feel less difficult to fight as the player, even if their teams are equally good, b/c of higher levels via the xp share mechanic changes, among other things (like player skill)
…if you switched abilities, moves, and order, it’d be a middling hyper offense team too: glimmora hazard stack lead, espathra and veluza as special/physical setup sweepers, gogoat and avalugg as bulky special and physical mons (idk what they’re helping with tho) and kingambit as a swords dance sucker punch late game cleaner
anyway I was surprised by how the older champs held up to newer champs whose opponents (the player) usually have more overleveled teams
well geeta is more bad in her game because if an ai plays it, it can put glimmora as a lead and actually set toxic spikes
That’s the kind of video that I didn’t ask but picked my interest I get so hooked and keep watching till the end. Those are so rare ! Ty I subbed
I actually like the canonical implications of Johto being weak. The story takes place 3 years after RBY's, yet the trainers are still decades behind Kanto's. It gives the impression that raising Pokemon is still a developing hobby and industry in Johto.
Despite the fact that Johto and Kanto are so geographically close, the regions clearly don't influence each other much. That shows that the Pokemon world isn't super interconnected and global. Instead, it's still a wild frontier, ready to be explored, with secluded regions and unique cultures.
Where did you infer that Johto's "canonical implied weakness"? Are you saying that gameplay data dictates the story of the world? Like Lance's Dragonairs evolved to Dragonites but became weaker? That Janine is a stronger trainer than Koga (HGSS)? The level scaling in the game are mere game design choices to make a satisfying journey for the players.
@@bukojoetheslapsoils8273 I can appreciate the concept that pokemon level is a gameplay mechanic that doesn't necessarily reflect world building, but I don't think you can separate level from strength. If kanto's trainers are higher leveled than johto's, kanto's trainers are stronger.
Also, you raised 2 examples of johto teams being more evolved than kanto's, but overlooked the fact that every gym in kanto is more evolved than every gym in johto. Same goes for NPC trainers.
I'd love to see how everyone compares if they were all set at level 50. Some non-boss trainers might rank pretty high, and Diantha wouldn't have a chance then.
Dont understimate a mega base stat total.
But i guess he also didnt simulate dynamax and Z moves.
Or the remake upgraded teams
iirc some pokemons takes longer to level up so it makes sense to have higher level pokemons if you don't have good ones
That would just be a leonfest with Cynthia coming close second.
@@DemiIsNotHere If you include Megas, Dynamax, Terastal and Z-Moves you're going to have 5 different lists. On top of that, due to lack of these mechanics in later games you won't be able to have proper matches between everyone anyway.
@@donbionicleyou absolutely can if you’re using showdown + AI. Anything goes tier, add to the source code that AI always teras/megas/dynamaxes their last mon if their gen had that mechanic, keep the source the same otherwise
The gen 5 battle sprites are so incredible. The best in-game representation of pokemon in the series. Some of the best pixel art ever. Up there with the likes of Metal Slug.
ok no you can’t say it’s up there with metal slug when Pokémon just does pixel moshing and tweening lmao. It does look great of course but it would look even better if they animated with hand drawn transitions
I clicked on this vid from my recommended without reading the channel name, and was had this deja vu feeling with your voice for about 10 minutes before I realized it was TheSmithPlays from my early teens with Black Ops 2 Zombies. Good to see you, gonna revist that channel and look around here!
very fun video! i'd love to hear more about your methodology and to see a sequel where all pokemon are at lvl 50 or 100
I would love to see this same process, but give everyone level 50 versions of their teams. What trainer has the best team building, despite their placement in the stories? Might need to correct for team size as well but that seems like it could get messy.
As far as my biggest surprise: Red. I figured the lack of tools from gen 2 would hold him back but I guess that’s nothing you can’t fix with levels and good coverage.
Many Trainers could use their strongest teams, which in many cases are either their rematch or PWT teams. For those without either, a team of Level 50s is probably a good call.
In that case, I'd recommend you check out @pokedad23
He has done several AI tournaments including various characters from the games.
Pimanrules does that for Gen 1 and 2
I went to the comments to see if someone suggested this. Level norming would remove some statistical noise.
Falkner crying in the corner: what did I do to deserve this 😭
Viola: that's what you deserve for using an underlevel pidgeotto, cheater
Shouldn't it be an underleveled one?
Its even worse, those aren't even his pokemon. There his dads Pokemon 😂
I'd like to see this done again with the refights/cameos many gens feature for the gym leaders. Because the games make it clear you aren't fighting the leaders at their full strength in the gyms. And maybe a bonus tier for the Battle Frontier leaders.
As someone who has been trying to make a fangame but struggled with balancing gym leader team comps this is going to be incredibly helpful, thank you so much! I'm also a huge Hoenn fan so I'm very happy to see Steven rank so high!
I'm curious if you could do something similar but with the different Teams (Rocket, Magma, Skull, etc.) of the games to see who is the biggest threat in general?
Wow, really interesting results, I won't spoil who won, but it actually makes a lot of thematic sense. That said, I am a bit disappointed in the list missing a few heavy hitters like Volo, the AI professors, evil team leaders, and all the post game champion rematches, particularly from remake games. But I guess the list has to cut somewhere and 150 is a nice thematic number.
@@mertensiam3384 No there is no BDSP Cynthia
@mertensiam3384 which is weird bc he missed out on some fights that could have easily been there, especially gen 5, postgame colress and n from bw2 for example, not to mention some rival fights. Personally i also find it odd he used some platinum teams wen the dp teams were stronger. Plus i find it weird since platinum is a remake of dp and he used the gen 1 games for red/blue but didn't use fr/lg teams.
@@mertensiam3384 I think that's meant to be the Cynthia from the BW post game, given his criteria, but it is pretty confusing since he only uses Platinum footage for the brief slot when he's covering the top 10.
@@mertensiam3384 though frlg is the enhanced gen 1, and u can even say hgss if we r talking gen 2 enhanced
Cut out some duplicate teams like rivals with the same starter…
I’m absolutely stunned at how low GSC Lance is and how high RBY Bruno is….
RBY Bruno is indeed surprising
But GSC Lance admittedly has never felt like a champion. Not even remotely.
@@1stCallipostle I just always found those 3 Dragonites tough to beat
@@pluggyvids6228bringing literally any ice type move to the battle destroys lance
@@1stCallipostle GSC lance is not helped by having a low level on top of the gen 2 mechanics giving the player a 12.5% offence, defense and speed boost, as well as another very relevant 12.5% offensive boost to ice moves from defeating pryce.
I was very surprised at how the psychic twins did since they were being considered separately. Very cool!
Everyone seems to be curious about Cynthia or Diantha, I’m wondering how Volo or Turo/Sada are gonna play into this!
They aren't there. That's so weird. He didn't include any Legends Arceus trainer 😔
@@mexyo539 The main reason to not include them would probably be the different battle system and inability to translate that over to battling other trainers well without losing a lot of the strengths
Wait, yeah. Why weren't Turo or Sada on the list? The Gym leaders and E4 were so it isn't a Paldea thing.
@@CanisMythsonexactly this!
I’m genuinely really surprised by that top stop! I did not see that coming! Still glad to see that trainers like Alder and Kukui got to show their skills off!
My most pleasant surprise was seeing Gardenia higher up than I thought. I know it probably cheapened Starters for some people, but I thought it was COOL that she has a Turtwig. We were matching in that regard!
Gen 4 had serious issues with the pool of available Pokemon. The dex was so small, there were a single-digit amount of Fire-types in Diamond and Pearl.
Not just single digit. There was only two fully evolved fire types, Infernape and Rapidash
Gardenia is my wife
@@annpc8266 Congrats Ann
This is awesome!!
I would love to see how everyone would do with their most powerful rematch/tournament teams!
This was such an interesting video to watch! How fascinating to compare the reigons and their strength relative to each other
I'm always surprised that Elesa (the Electric type Gym leader in Unova) is not considered a strong gym to go against because I failed her gym literally 10 times before finally winning (BY FAR the most tries I needed to win). Not even Whitney in Crystal took that long. Those Emolgas really did a number on me 😂
Elesa was hard for me to! But sadly the hardest gym for me was by FAR Bea's in pokemon sword. :)
Man, fuck those Emolgas lol
Honestly, I feel this. I was afraid of Elesa in my W2 Challenge mode Nuzlocke. . .
Then my Gigalith soloed her entire team.
And that was my only real chance at the gym with my other encounters being pretty bad for her.
I think there’s a solid explanation for this - Unova’s lack of a Rock/Ground Pokemon.
As every Electric gym discovered incredibly harshly in this, Ground types are a Problem. However, Elesa fixes this by using two flying types, meaning you have to give her something that isn’t ground to which she can Volt Switch.
Combine that with the selection for BW and you get a mess. The only early game Rock-type, Roggenrolla, isn’t visually appealing, has a poor movepool, and is stuck as a trade evolution. The early game ground types are Drilbur, who’s very rare as a dust cloud encounter, and Sandile, who you had to leave the beaten path to find. And critically there was NO dual Rock/Ground in Unova, which can’t be said for any of the other electric gym leaders.
So Elesa has a decent team with no obvious counters within her region - and struggles here because there are lots of obvious counters *outside* her region
@@shinymmoon4503 how? you just do raids with friends and beat everyone at lvl 100. its the main flaw with the new games.
Would be interesting to see a similar version of this, but more standardized? Have a set level for every Pokemon, and maybe use both first match and rematches teams (or maybe only the rematches team then if we're going for the "strongest team" the character has in game). For example, yeah Falkner's GSC team is absolutely trash and it's not surprising to see him rank so low at all. But maybe with his HGSS rematch team or with his Pokémon B2W2 World Tournament team, he could fare better - especially with every Pokemon being at lvl 50 or 75 or 100 (idk).
Seriously, couldn't we have scaled them or something to at least be at the same level? Because they were only lower levels in the game because you had to start at a low level.
@josephbartholomew move pools and evolutions would change this DRASTICALLY. To get the most accurate date, you need to go in with minimal changes. Too many changes and he's basically making customized teams
@@sergmcmuffin i think we’re only suggesting teams already in the games, and not made-up/customized teams from our mind. For examples, the rematches Gym Leaders teams or for example the teams from the B2W2 Tournament. Keep the movepools and items they have in those teams. No changes.
The levels aren’t even standardized in this one. You say "accurate data" but it isn’t really accurate data when the data isn’t standardized to begin with, in my opinion…
OP is also not exactly above using different teams because they’ve for example used Koga’s Gym team and Koga’s E4 team. It isn’t much different than suggesting you take, let’s say, Falkner’s rematch team (in-game) as opposed to his first match one.
And every Pokemon should be at the same level too, I cannot stress that enough. Imagine you went to an actual Tournament, and had to fight with a lvl 43 Pokemon against people using lvl 88s. In a real tournament/rankings, every Pokemon would have a set level (for example 50) and you determine the champion that way. It’s only fair, I feel like.
Pretty much exactly what I thought, we have the "best" version of each leader from something like the World Tournament for each leader up to Gen 5 and could work out some other tricks for the generations since as really a leader with just two pokemon is at an immediate disadvantage against anyone with more pokemon before taking into account levels or other variables.
Agreed. With the way this video is set up it seems more like a rant on trainers people love to hate
been subbed to the smith plays for years, never knew you had a PKMN channel. glad i found it
One of the coolest Pokemon videos I've ever seen! I more or less forgot about Isle of Armor after playing it - so I was completely caught off guard with Mustard taking it.
I’m extremely happy Red is #4 out of everyone from post game. Dude is working with the oldest gen, and lacking so much the newer pokemons have with traits and ev’s.
Yeah if they ever completely updated his team to have all that I think he’d get 1st place
I also have to say in a way this does definitively prove Pokémon having power creep. Not saying that the old games were easier, but If you factor in the movesets, pokemon available, abilities, and items, the new games hands down have more powerful pokemon and trainers, but with the shared exp and access to a larger move pool and ability spread, make the games while playing them seem easier. I personally believe the reason for the new gens gyms and special trainers being better is a result of the higher expected lvls of the player due to the shared exp system.
@@CrusaderCrunch it’s ironic because the newer games are a lot easier than the older ones too
@@Crackedcripple I think it boils down to the idea of how we played as a kid. In the old games we mostly lvled one or two pokemon, now all your team should be around the same lvl range. In theory we unironically gimped ourselves by limiting our options even further by not evenly lvling our pokemon. So instead of having Six decent mons to fight the gym we maybe had 2 or 3 and 2 Hm slaves. Now days they don't have HM slaves, and all pokemon near the same lvl and your opennent still has only 3 mons but you have six with good levels and coverage. The shared exp system just made the game a complete different beast.
@@CrusaderCrunch Part of it is power creep, but we also have to take into account that a lot of trainers from Gens 1 and 2 in particular had very... Questionable, movesets on some of their Pokemon that meant many Pokemont that could in theory hold up better, fail to do so when put against later stuff.
A good example is Blue in Gen 2. In Gold, Silver and Crystal had fucking *atrocious* movesets where it just felt like most of them had moves that didn't synchronize well at all with their stats (and just a bunch of random weak dump moves,) but his team in Heart Gold and Soul Silver was actually pretty well put together with status moves like Trick Room or Dragon Dance to compliment the strengths of the Pokemon that run them (he also runs a No Guard Machamp with DynamicPunch, which is just really funny.)
I feel like the Trial Captains from Gen 7 should’ve been factored into this
People are really weird about the Trial Captains in Gen 7. It's as if they don't realize they're literally just Gym Leaders only with a different name.
@@LazurBeemz I think it's because their battles are less... challenges. Gym Leaders have you enter a building and finish a puzzle to challenge them, Trial captains just casually battle you. Illima just politely challenges the player in the middle of a port.
Adding in the Team Star students would also be pretty neat to see, though I imagine you'd either need to squeeze the Starmobiles into Showdown somehow or just ignore them. Doesn't change the fact that Eri is stronger than every single gym leader in the region by raw level, though, which is hilarious to me. Your entire gym challenge vs. a tall delinquent.
@@thejoezonelayer829what's really weird is the final boss of Scarlet and Violet weren't added in this but characters like Steven in emerald, red, and ghetsis were
Then gen 8 doesnt have leaders I guess@@quinntessentialskill7414
Smith your the greatest ever bro. My work breaks wouldnt be the same without you bro
Thank you
This is interesting and great! Would love to see them all at the same level to see the composition being the main factor of wins
Im surprised how Pryce kept his job, Bro is weak asf and didn't even notice team rocket had a hideout in his city
The Johto gym leaders(And pretty much all the other major trainers in Johto) desperately needed the buff you gave them in your rom hack
Im also surprised and proud that not only is hop is the top 3 strongest trainers, but he ranked over a majority of the other chamipions, including his brother/champion leon. He has truly came a long way and showed the power he can bring to the battlefield. Respect to the boy 👍
It makes a lot more sense in the Adventures Manga
@@fightingfitz214 I think ik what your talking about
I think the most surprising is Clair falling so low. Her team is adequately leveled and has varying move pools so I expected her to punch a little higher than she did.
Great videos! Really glad to end up to this videos of yours on YT, btw I'm also a very big fan of Trainer Red, I hope that you could use his strongest team where he has a Lv.88 Pikachu with the levels as is, 'coz that's how Game Freak intended for you to battle them.
Given the disparity between the amounts of Pokemon these trainers have, I wonder if the list would've looked much different had they been ranked based on the number of KOs they were able to secure, rather than the number of overall wins.
As someone who has never had to deal with her firsthand, it's good to know that Whitney's power is not just an urban legend!
The problem is most gyms have a lot of trainers before hand that scale your levels but she has like 3 on the route and in the gym. So if your not grinding the wild you get wrecked.
actually its more because the trainer in her gym are very weak compared to her pokemon so you cant really power up on them and she have a fully evolve pokemon with some IV wich really help to take advantage again your not fully evoled pokemon at this point of the game .
@@sweetypredator1067 yep which leads to having to grind or develop a new team.
you can beat her without grind but you need use some tactic.Geodude or onix with mud slap have good defense and can ruin her rollout strategy if you have a pokemon like nidoran or nidorina with poison sting and manage to psn miltank the onix tactic work even better.@@zacharycc1
Bring a female Geodude or be prepared for pain. Her Miltank is an absolute monster.
I was honestly surprised Red only made it to 4th place. it's pretty high, but I never expected Cynthia or Hop's final team to beat him out. Though I can see how that makes sense, he does has a pikachu and the level curve in the Jhoto games gets ridiculously steep once you fight Red, which is probably why I never noticed just how tough Hop and Cynthia really are. if only Red's pikachu was holding a light ball, but maybe that would make Red just to powerful for Jhoto in gen 2
Even then, that doesn't help if it dies to an opening Earthquake
Really Haappy to see Steven, Cynthia and Red my 3 fave champs in the top 5 made my day
Dammit, Gen 1 elite 4 placements are exactly what I expected, I remember than after managing to defeat Lorelei, things got easier until Lance, and this reflects it clearly.
Considering how Wulfric is widely regarded as a joke among gym-leaders, it really warms my heart to see him thriving in the Elite Four tier. Godspeed, you magnificent walrus-looking bastard!
In the context of his game, he is still an absolute joke. His high levels carried him.
In the context of his game, all 8th gym leaders are a joke except for Juan.
He’s getting hard carried by his level alone
@@justadummy8076 Shh, just let him have this.
Honestly I’m actually impressed with Red’s placement considering there IS a Pikachu in that team holding them back.
A lvl 88 Pikachu with a light ball that turns it's mediocre stats into the equivalent of a sheer force Azurill in both offensive stats (around 140~ I think?).
Nah, Red definitely scrapped his way to the top with that rat cuz his team is absolute dogshit besides like snorlax.
@@charnalk5572 well i would be curious to see what the placement would be if Smith actually USED the gen 4 HGSS team. Considering its the inferior gen 2 team, its still a well done placement.
@@shadowdragon714 I think he used HGSS Red, and also weirdly enough BW Cynthia (but showing footage of her from platinum for some reason).
The video is kinda whack near the end tho, NGL.
I secretly wish, given who Red is in the series, that they had been secretly working it so that he was actually the strongest. Also, it would have been fun to find a version of red in the post game of each game. Always a step ahead, that guy.
I think it def makes JOHTO more special as the direct sequel to Red and Blue. Hint fucking hint
I feel like that would feel kind of undeserved and nostalgia pandery lol.
Like let's be real, when it comes to game Pokemon protagonists across the series, Red has one of the least impressive resumes. All he really did was become champion (same as basically every other protagonist,) and stop Team Rocket (who are in the running for least threatening villain team in the series.)
@@Robbie_HarunaOh boy, you forgot about some VERY important things that Red did.
He didn't just become the Champion and beat Team Rocket, he completed the National Pokedex (meaning he captured Mewtwo, Mew and the Legendary Birds), beat all of the gyms in Johto, has the highest level team of all regional champions and was called to be at the top of the Alola Battle Tree alongside Blue. He's a legendary trainer for a reason my guy.
@darthgames3 Once again, completing the Pokedex isn't anything that most other playables haven't achieved.
You're trying to say, "His team is high leveled," also isn't the point you seem you think it is, his Team has levels going for it, but overall it's a pretty lackluster team. Frankly, the fact that he's canonically caught these legendary pokemon and still has a godawful Pikachu on his team is more of a point against him as a trainer than anything.
Your Battle Tree point also doesn't mean anything, either. The Battle Tree guest trainers were just a way to have fun cameos appear in it, if we follow your logic then someone like fucking Wally is comparable to people like Red and Cynthia, which is just clearly not true. (Him being at the top is a testament to how him being picked was for the sake of nostalgia above all else considering his battle tree team is pretty lacking compared to most of the other special trainers anyway.)
He was definitely a cool novelty back in the day, but he really doesn't have a lot going for him that actually makes him stand out from any other player character trainers if we look passed Gen 1 nostalgic pandering.
Honestly, it's kind of funny that despite him being the most recurring Pokémon character aside from maybe Professor Oak, they refuse to give him a team that isn't mid as hell.
@@Robbie_Haruna I don't think that a high-levelled team that has good type variety is "mid as hell". You have to remember that he was the most challenging trainer before Cynthia and didn't have much competition due to the still relatively low ammount of pokémon compared to today. He might have a mid team now, but back then he could pretty much do everything.
And the reason for why it's like that is because the developers wanted Red to be a representative of all players of the first generation by picking all possible starters and inevitable encounters (Snorlax and Lapras). His theoretical strongest team should be Mewtwo, Mew, the three legendary birds (debatable) and maybe Snorlax to add more bulk.
The biggest schock to me was 108 Koga his ace is level 43 and get put with people like ramos is just wild to me
Definitely wasn’t expecting Marlon to be as high as he was between his levels and only having 3 pokemon, good for him.
I was surprised by how high Kukui placed. I never played gen 7, so all of what I know about it comes from watching other people play or talk about it, and I'm surprised I haven't heard more people talk about him.
The thing is, necrozma is so strong it walls almost anything he could throw at you
kukui is really strong in gen 7, but gen 7 also has many extremely good mons so it balances out
@@swablukingwhat are you talking about, kukui isn't even the final battle in USUM 😭
in usum, after you beat hau, youre allowed to defend your title as champion, and kukui is one of the many different trainers you can fight against@@EscarBOOM
also gen 7 includes regular sun and moon, which he is the last battle for@@EscarBOOM
I super enjoyed this, thank you!~
But there is a tier above that... and it belongs to Volo, with his essentially 7 Pokemon team!
I think the most surprising thing was not seeing Red or Cynthia at #1.
Wondering how things would be mixed up if gym leaders used their maxed out rematch teams though.
Great video!
I mean Red is in Gen 2 so I figured power creep between genes would kill him not to mention Pikachu is just a waste of a team slot but I also thought Cynthia would be number one but in hindsight I guess it makes sense for the longest reigning champion to be the strongest.
Honestly I’m more shocked by it not being Volo who is pretty much better Cynthia
@@hardcoreeconomist1089I disagree.
His stone Arcanine isn’t exactly doing much.
@@hardcoreeconomist1089Volo is pretty much worse not better Cynthia, but his double Giratina makes up for that, and he or the strongest versions of Cynthia would have steamrolled through this.
@@marvinkant5205 yeah I count giratina
There were a few standouts to me as most surprising: Morty being so low (but I now see that he has no way to hit normal types thanks to your Crystal Legacy vids!), Diantha being in the top 10 strongest trainers, and did NOT even see no 1 coming (won't spoil who) but makes total sense thinking on it now. Awesome video idea!!
Would absolutely LOVE to see this with each trainers "best team" such as black and white 2 tourney teams and everyone scaled to level 50 stats. I think the comparison's would shift especially in the middle and lower tiers, but I think the champ would still reign supreme
I do think taking out the gimmicks of some of the battle systems of later trainers really undoes their power. Like removing dynamax or tera types which make those gyms what they are and the bigger threats they are supposed to be. Also curious about abilities for gens where they didn't have any yet as well as the physical special splits. Theres a lot that could affect all this but it is still super neat to see regardless.
Iono after placing higher than Kofu: “Chat is this real?”
As a big Pokémon Sword and Shield fan, I'm very happy to see how brilliantly its trainers performed. Marlon from B2W2 was definitely one of the biggest surprises for me!
I'd be very interested in a simulation that takes only the strongest rematches of every major trainers as this list didn't include the Sinnoh rematches nor the Red and Blue Alola fights and how could we forget Cynthia's B2W2 jumpscare battle. Very very neat and satisfying results with this one though!
Good video I really loved being able to see how the trainers of similar levels but different team compositions placed against each other! Though, where's Hau's final fight and all of the USUM elite 4?
Marlon being that high is sick, he really showed up for this one.
Whitney was really a surprise, I loved this ranking.
It's difficult to create a ranking like this, having such level gaps, and different movesets the first ones will have terrible moves and the last ones will have some of the better ones or at least more powerful attacks. I think another point of comparison could be using the VGC level cap, having all the Pokemon trainers to level 50 or 100, so we could compared it differently, but great video nonetheless.
I think an Improvement on this concept could be leveling all pokémons at the same level and maybe utilize the complete rosters like in the True Power series by SilphSpectre
Honestly, I wasn't surprised hugely by any ranking
What's surprising to me is how something as little as a slightly different ability affected the results for Drayden and Iris
Well it just shows how picking the right ability makes a huge difference in competitive!
It’d be really cool to see this with all the trainers using their Pokémon World Tournament teams (obviously means that it’d only be gens 1-5 but it’d be cool to see who would likely win the actual PWT if the player didn’t exist)
amazing list!! mustard deserves the number one spot in my opinion. im surprised there werent some notable battles on here though - namely a lot of ORAS ones like wally in victory road or zinnia, a lot of final rival battles, as well as most villain bosses! i also wish BDSP cynthia was on here just like how steven had 2 iterations, seeing as her team in that game is competitively trained. i cant help but wonder how theyd fare too!
Great vid! Love seeing vids like these mathematically comparing trainers
Some requests
1. Level Normalization (yes everyone else already asked for this)
2. DP versions of the sinnoh leaders alongside the Platinum versions (and any other major difference leaders). If you're separating Dreyden from Iris you can give me Gym 5 Fantina and Octillery Volkner. Also I personally believe the DP version of Cynthia is stronger than the Pt version and it would be cool to have the numbers
I'd love to see this with everyone's rematch teams, so they're on a more even footing
Didn't they use the rematch team for the "rematch" tier? Or was it just the champion and rivals rematch?
@@charnalk5572 well now I have to admit I didn't actually watch the entire video (oops)
I feel like there definitely should have been a few different things to acount for and a few missed as well. Like cynthia's post-game fight in BW2, the gen 1 gym rematches in gen 2, as well as the gen 2 bruno fight as you did account for stuff like the post game steven, elite 4 koga. It may also have been interesting to see the remake teams and skill sets rather than just the third game in the series as the remakes i feel are more of the "final team" as the gen 1 and 2 teams especially improved a lot in the remakes (as well as red)
Would love to see this done again, either simply with the DLC additions, or simply all characters at their very best.
Go Mustard !! , so happy to see him up up there .
as for biggest ( positive ) surprise : Brock , for being the Winston Payne of the very first released Pokemon-game not being the worst is awesome !
Now to see how they all pit off against each other in their own respective game's battle mechanics! Probably an impossible feat... or is it?
Congrats to Hop! Didn't expect him to do so well!
Oh boy, now we're getting more ahead in the generations. Will Cynthia claim the spot ??
I expect most Electric Gym Leader to be at the very bottom, since they, for the most part, can't touch any Ground type Pokémon, but Volkner should do really well, as his level and coverage give him almost no shot at losing against the lower leveled Rock and Ground Gym. Iono is the same, except for the level argument, so she should still do well. We'll see.
EDIT : I. Did not. See Wulfric coming. Ever.
EDIT 2 : Diantha and Geeta placed way higher than I ever expected. Props on them.
@@arpandas2243 read the fucking title these were AI battles credibility and Bias has nothing to do with it
@@arpandas2243 I mean, it's done via matches, so Fairy type for one and great coverage/type chart for the other explains a lot. At this level, this is what makes the difference.
@@arpandas2243 Except she doesn't. Because it's not BDSP but Platinum.
@@arpandas2243bro did you even watch the video
@@arpandas2243 There were no spin off/remakes trainers in the list. The only valid complain would be that they did not include the AI Professors, probably forgetting them I guess. You could also maybe add the Evil Team Leader, but that's about it.
Really cool idea. I would love to see you do this with the Unova World Cup teams
Extremely engaging video. You earned a sub