Solo Run?

[Phanes]

Anyone ever try a solo run where the ONLY pokemon they use throughout their entire journey is their starter pokemon?
What I've seen other people do is catch a few pokemon for HM uses only while still battle with their starter throughout the entire game, they choose whether or not they let their pokemon evolve. Charmander solo run is pretty good, especially with the new Metal Claw? You'd, of course, have to train a little longer for Brock and what I've seen is that they don't screw around, they go from trainer to trainer, like throughout Rock Tunnel, there's no skipping a single head, Mt. Moon, anywhere there's a trainer, if they can reach them at this point, they'll go for it.

 

[Blisk]

I, like a lot of people, used to do that exclusively. I would play through the game with only training my starter for the majority of the game (pre-league), or if I wanted another Pokemon, I'd trade it over and use it as my starter. Now, I find it hard to do this because I love all the Pokemon so much more. I always have a specific team in mind for when I play through. For example, right now I'm playing through HeartGold right now. I don't even have a badge yet, but I know three members of my future team already, Fearow, Butterfree, and Meganium. I've never used a Fearow before so I'm super excited about it and now obsessed with the species. Back to the subject, I used to do that, but now it'd be really hard to try.

In my opinion, with a couple exceptions, it's not that hard to get all eight badges with only your starter. It sort of depends on the starter a little, but if you grind enough, you'll beat the gym even if you have a type disadvantage. Whitney, for example, is a bitch with Quilava because of Rollout, but I realized once I got her Miltank's HP low enough with Flame Wheel, Quick Attack was the way to go to prevent Milk Drink.

/rant

 

[Secad MS]

I often unintentionally do this. In the beginning, I use multiple Pokemon as I am still weaker in level. However, as my starter seems to increase faster due to the OHKOs I get (it is always in the lead), I don't want to waste time and HP switching out. Because of this, I often have a team of level 70 (insert starter here) and level 10 everything else. Before I head to the E4, I really have to grind to get to a decent point.

 

[Esperion]

Yeah, I normally just have my starter and 5 HM Slaves in my party, but if I'm going to have a Wi-Fi battle, I train up some Pokemon with the Elite 4 because my friends all seem to get the opposite starters than I do. It was a sad sight the first time I found this out and got beaten by a level 36 Monferno. I have also tried some first form only runs, but I don't ever really get serious with them.

 

[SineCosineTangent]

That's pretty much -all- I do XD

The only time I've ever had an evenly leveled team was in the White runthrough that I did an LP of, and that was only because it was noted that Seal was getting all of the battle action. I'm terribly lazy when it comes to switching out, and the only way my other Pokemon end up getting levels is by Exp Share, which must be the best invention ever made. I'm trying to get better for this gen though, because there are some really cool evolved Pokemon that I'd like to train at some point or another~