Pokemon Emerald: Battle Frontier Salon Maiden Anabel
I have to say, I honestly thought Spenser of the Battle Palace was difficult but Anabel actually ended up being the toughest of the Frontier Brains I faced! Not only is she difficult to reach with all the powerful AI trainers they throw at you, but Anabel herself has a very powerful team. Her Alakazam runs all of the Elemental Punches which gives it a very wide range of coverage. Then there's her legendary Pokemon Entei which can hit opponents very hard with either Return or Fire Blast (it also runs Calm Mind to restore the special attack drop from Overheat). Lastly, there's her Snorlax, which is a major pain to defeat if you don't have a Fighting-type Pokemon or physical move. It can tank special hits very well, make itself an offensive powerhouse after maxing out its attack up with Belly Drum, use Yawn on your Pokemon which forces you to switch out. To top all of that, it's also holding a Lum Berry which will instantly heal off any status you try to inflict onto it the first time. Assuming that all three of your Pokemon are still alive, it'll end up plowing through each and every one of them if it gets to set up with Belly Drum. I knew that beating her was gonna be difficult, but it ended up being more challenging than I realized. Ironically though, I ended up defeating Anabel herself with ease. But the problem I had was actually figuring out a good enough team to reach her, as I kept losing to AI trainers right before I could even battle Anabel.
I probably spent the most time constructing a team to beat Anabel than any of the other Frontier Brains. Because the Pokemon I used would not only have to be able to handle Anabel’s team, but every other team I’d have to take on to reach her. But no matter what I did, nothing ever seemed to work as I’d end up being defeated before reaching Anabel. It was only after I got swept by an AI trainer’s Walrein (and it wasn’t even the variant that runs OHKO moves, it used Yawn to put my Pokemon to sleep and then used Hail and Blizzard to KO all of them), that I had to resort to my nuclear option. After reading various articles and watching videos of other people’s experiences taking on the Frontier Brains, I’ve come to realize that there are three Pokemon with the best team synergy that can guarantee you victory. Not just in the Battle Tower, but in every Battle Facility in Emerald (except of course for the Battle Factory since you have to use rental Pokemon). These Pokemon are Swampert, Metagross, and Latios. They have excellent typings and stats, wide movepools, and can cover for each other’s weaknesses so that there is little that can stop them. I initially chose not to use these Pokemon on the same team in any of the facilities because I felt it would make things way too easy. I’ve waited so damn long to finally conquer the Emerald Battle Frontier, I felt that I’d be robbing myself of the overall thrill of the challenge by using a team that could guarantee me victory. I’m glad I made this decision because after later watching Poketuber’s Werster’s speedrun of the Battle Frontier in Emerald, I realize those three Pokemon would’ve been able to carry me through all the facilities excluding Factory. Then it would’ve been a boring experience. But after countless defeats and losing my latest streak to a Walrein whose only attacking move was Blizzard, I just couldn’t take it any longer when this was my last battle facility to beat and decided to use Blue team to conquer the Battle Frontier (that’s my code name for the Swampert/Metagross/Latios team since they’re all blue XD). They ended up plowing through every trainer that came their way and Anabel ended up being totally easy to beat.
I know I hyped up how tough Anabel was gonna be, but thanks to the excellent power and synergy of Blue team, she was no challenge at all. Her Alakazam managed to freeze my Latios with an Ice Punch, but the Lum Berry he was holding quickly healed him and was able to damage it with Dragon claw before getting KO’d. My Metagross finished her Alakazam off with Earthquake and then I switched my Swampert in to take care of her Entei. I decided to finish this battle off with a bang and switched back into Metagross and have it blow itself up with Explosion to KO her Snorlax. I really wish I could’ve beaten her with any of the other teams I had planned (especially one composed of Houndoom, Kingdra, and Breloom), but the annoying AI of the Battle Tower ended up forcing my hand. Fortunately, this was the last facility I had to conquer, so at least I didn’t have to use Blue Team again for any of the other ones.
And with that, I have finally completed my challenge and defeated all of the Frontier Brains in Emerald. Of course, I only collected the Silver Symbols from each of them. I’m not gonna go for the Gold symbols, at least for now. Though if I do decide to in the future, I’ll be sure to record and upload my battles for each of them!