It's safe to say that at that point, I've wanted to cruise with Gen III's
signature Electric 'Mon for years; however, there were always flashier
'Mons that caught my fancy, and I kept delaying that run. But no more: it's
finally Manectric's time to shine on the battlefield, and show if it's as
electrifying as its counterpart Luxray. I must admit I had reservations: Manectric always
seemed incredibly frail to me — heck, I cannot remember not one-shooting
it in my runs — and I harboured serious doubts about its viability as a lone
ranger. However, I needn't have worried: Manectric quickly became a force to be
reckoned with, all the more so with Mega Evolution slapped on top — because of
course, I had to cruise with the mega-evolved version. You didn't expect less from me,
did ya?
My little Orage and her Manectite hailed from my Omega Ruby
cartridge — courtesy of X, my breeding cartridge for this summer, not
hosting Electrike in the wild. Luckily enough, I didn't have to worry about
Orage leveling up too fast: Manectric's Slow leveling rate made sure that I
never had to worry about hitting that darn Obedience cap — on the contrary, I
could raise my Orage's affection in Pokemon Amie and use the Lucky Egg like it
was going out of fashion. My lone ranger boasted the Static Rod ability, which
was properly awesome and made her even deadlier on the battlefield —
with the added bonus that she was not paralyzed a single time during my
run. She was blessed with a Brave nature, i.e. higher Attack and lower Speed;
with the latter being Manectric's higher stat and the benefit of overleveling,
it could totally suffer a bit of lowering. That made my Orage a perfect
mixed attacker, which allowed me to make the most of her non-negligible set of
Physical Moves.
And since I'm mentioning Moves, I got a nice surprise in that department — or
more like plenty of them, really. Manectric's learnset is buzzing (har har)
with Electric Moves, both Special and Physical; with a whopping five offensive
Electric Moves to choose from in her leveling-up learnset only, I made the most
of the opportunity and wielded them all in turns. I finally settled on
Thunderbolt for the game's late stages, along with Return and a Dark-Type
Hidden Power; as for the fourth slot, I decided to dedicate it to a Physical
Electric Move, and ran to the Move Reminder to relearn Wild Charge. That's when
I discovered the presence of Fire Fang in Manectric's learnset, and proceeded
to learn it on the spot. Of course, I could have aimed even higher and rolled
with Flamethrower; but Fire Fang did a great job, and I was happy to exploit
Manectric's 'natural' learnset.
And mind you, it's not like I direly needed the most powerful TMs out there:
with Mega evolution in tow, my Orage was basically unstoppable. Cherry
on the cake, I really loved her mega-evolved design — so much so that I wish it
could have been her final evolutionary stage instead of a mere ME. And since
I'm mentioning design, I didn't quite fancy Manectric's looks. Electrike was
quite adorable, and Mega Manectric was sleek and gorgeous as heck; Manectric,
on the other hand, looked pretty unremarkable to me. It's a bit too small, with
too many bits sticking out and a weird posture; and don't get me started on its
ears, which look kinda gross and out of place. Good thing I could switch
to Mega Manectric whenever I wanted to and please my retinas. I don't have much
to add about Orage's battle prowess, really: her lowest point was Cyllage's
Rock Gym, and after gaining the Mega Ring in Shalour, it was pretty much
one-shooting until the end.
And so, Manectric totally exceeded my expectations and proved to be stellar
solo run material; and as far as regional Electric 'Mons go, it certainly fares
better than its statistically-crippled Gen IV counterpart Luxray. And with
that, the Pokemon Summer 2020 keeps rolling; stay tuned for more solo
goodness, dear fellow gamers!
Big props for
using Electrike (one of my favorite evolution lines). Both it and Manectric are
stupidly overlooked despite being actually really decent. Sure, many consider
the Mega evolution goofy but I agree that it looks pretty sleek and cool.
And about Luxray: boy, what a disappointment. I recently replayed Pokémon
Platinum (thanks Corona!) and had one on my team up until the Elite Four but it
was so lackluster.
Thanks a lot,
my friend! Glad you appreciate my choice.^^ The funny thing is, the Electrike
line is indeed so overlooked that I actually forgot it hailed from Gen III and
not VI when I started my run. Had I remembered it in time, I'd have cruised
with Electrike in ORAS instead of X. ( An idea for a future run, maybe? :P )
I had no complaints about Luxray, I must admit; however, it's mostly due to the
solo setting, which alleviated Luxray's weaknesses over time. I totally
understand the disappointment of Pokefans, especially regarding the glaring
disconnect between Luxray's stats and its learnset.
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