Nacrene City

Want some Chesto Berries? Well, you get them. Cheren gives them to you in the city and tells you that the gym leader uses Normal-type attacks. The berries will be useful, so either equip them or feed them to the Pokemon as Awakenings. Go into the westernmost building by the tracks. Talk to the girl with blue hair. She will give you an item. If you want a Grass type item, say you have Snivy. For Fire, say you have Tepig. For Water, say you have Oshawott. The item boosts the power of said type moves by 20% for the Pokemon holding it. Not bad!

For now, let's just skip to Pinwheel Forest. We have things to do.

Go to: Pinwheel Forest

Pidove, Timburr, and Tympole are the Pokemon you will fight when you attempt to enter the gym, as N wants to fight. They are all Level 13. Timburr can hit pretty hard, but no worries otherwise.

Nacrene Gym
A researcher named Hawes gives you a tour of what appears to be a museum, then shows you to the back. It turns out the gym leader is his wife. Go into the gym.

Your personal trainer shows up and gives you some water. He explains that the gym leader is a nerd and you have a puzzle to do involving reading. Wow. Just... Wow.

Go to the bottom-left bookshelf and press A when looking at the blue bookshelf down there. You'll want to pick up the book there entitled "Nice to Meet You, Pokemon!"

Inside of the book will be a clue from Lenora, asking you what the first Pokemon you fought in the gym was and that you should go to the middle row. Go there, then on the left side, search the green bookshelf. There's another clue in the book entitled "The Biology of Patrat."

The next book describes a fiery Pokemon with smoke all around it, hinting that someone is reading it. Go talk to the Scientist up in the back of the room and say that is the book you're looking for (even though the subject isn't a Pokemon like you probably thought). She'll battle you right away, using a Herdier L17 (evolution of Lillipup). Watch out! She may use an X Defend right away! After beating her, she'll move out of the way. Search that bookshelf and you'll find another secret memo with a question. Now go search the green bottom-right bookshelf and you'll find yet another memo with a clue inside. It describes some directions, but you'll just want to head directly north of where you're at and battle the School Kid on the steps. She has three Lillipup at level 15 and is not too difficult to defeat.

After beating her, search the bookshelf she was guarding and answer yes to reveal a secret set of stairs leading down to the Gym Leader! You might want to get some items and heal up.

VS. Lenora
Lenora is a very tough Gym Leader due to her Pokemon's high levels and powerful attacks. She starts off with her Herdier, which has Intimidate to lower your lead Pokemon's Attack stat. Either make sure you're leading with something that uses Special-based attacks, or something to absorb the stat change and that you'll let Herdier take out (so the Pokemon you send in doesn't have its Attack lowered). Herdier can use Bite, Take Down, and Leer. Take Down will hit for a LOT of damage, unless you're absorbing the hit with a solid Rock-type like Roggenrola. Be wary of that! However, Take Down will also hit Herdier for recoil damage, so it comes at a cost that you can take advantage of.

Her Watchog is particularly annoying. It may use Retaliate as soon as you knock out Herdier, which does double the damage if used on the turn after Herdier is knocked out, so your best bet is to switch to a Pokemon to absorb the blow — something like a Roggenrola works nicely, because it has Sturdy and won't be knocked out, allowing you to pull off a Sand-Attack to lower her Watchog's accuracy. Doing that can make a huge difference! It also has Hypnosis to try put you to sleep with! If it hits, you can administer either an Awakening or one of the Chesto Berries you got from Cheren; if you were holding a Chesto Berry, it will wake up immediately.

Some of the Fighting-type Pokemon you can catch in the outskirts of the Pinwheel Forest work great at taking down her Normal-type Pokemon, but if you don't feel like using any of them, at least try make use of TM94's Rock Smash (also picked up in the outskirts of the forest) to exploit her Fighting-type weakness and hopefully lower her defenses.

After beating Lenora, she'll give you the Basic Badge, which makes traded Pokemon up to level 30 obey you without question. She also gives you TM67 (Retaliate).

Before you have much time to celebrate, Hawes barges in, saying that Team Plasma is here and after some of the bones from the museum! Head back upstairs and you'll see a bunch of Team Plasma dudes there. They run off with a big chunk of the big dragon fossil you saw earlier! Yikes!

Outside of the Gym, a mysterious person comes over and knows Lenora pretty well. Lenora introduces him as Burgh, the Gym Leader from Castelia City. They're sort of talking about Team Plasma and some stuff, then Bianca and Cheren show up. Lenora leaves to go find Team Plasma while Burgh heads towards the Pinwheel Forest. Then, Bianca gives you the Dowsing Machine (Dowsing MCHN in game, but they still refer to it as the Dowsing Machine) and Cheren shows up shortly afterwards, both heading to the museum afterwards.

You can use the Dowsing Machine to search for hidden items! That's pretty useful, that's for sure. Unlike the Gen IV games, where it was more radar-like, this one is a lot more like a real Dowsing Machine. It'll have two sticks held apart, but basically it will guide you in the direction you need to go. Just remember that when you're on top of the item, you have to actually face it in order to pick it up, so take a step back and then press A in order to pick up your prize.

There's actually an Ultra Ball hidden on the patio of the Cafe in the northwest part of town, so you might as well pick it up on your way to the Pinwheel Forest (after healing, of course).

Return to: Pinwheel Forest