The Pokémon games have certainly served up some memorable moments and battles over the years, but some have been much more difficult than others. The difficulty of a Gym Leader battle isn't necessarily measured by the overall level of their Pokémon, but by how it scales to the point of the game at which they feature and how they compare to the player.
Some of these tougher Gym Leaders implement tactics that make for tricky situations, while some are just pure power with high-level Pokémon and very few weaknesses to exploit.
10 Raihan Uses The Cover Of A Sandstorm To Launch His Offense
Raihan is by far the toughest Gym Leader in Pokémon Sword and Shield. Not only is it a double battle but Raihan also utilizes a Sandstorm strategy. His Sandaconda and Gigalith both have abilities that cause sandstorms, guaranteeing that sandstorms will last for most of the battle.
Duraludon and Flygon are also strong Pokémon in their own right, having several different-type moves that can launch an offense on the player.
9 Winona's Altaria Can Dragon Dance Your Dreams Away
Winona is the Gym Leader of Fortree City in the Hoenn region and uses Flying-type Pokémon. In Ruby and Sapphire, she has Swellow, Pelipper, Skarmory, and Altaria, while in Emerald she has Tropius and Swablu instead of the Swellow.
In both cases, the entire team can be dealt with fairly easily apart from the problematic Altaria. Her Altaria can be lethal if it builds up enough Dragon Dances, sweeping teams. Sometimes, however, the AI can get greedy and do too many Dragon Dances, giving the player more of a chance. Dragon Dance was removed altogether for the remakes, making it a much easier battle in Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire.
8 Roark's Cranidos Is One Tricky Customer
Just like Brock, Roark is his game’s first Gym Leader who uses Rock-types, specifically Geodude and Onix. However, the similarities end there with Roark’s Cranidos. Geodude and Onix are easy to take care of but if they aren’t knocked out in one, they will always set up Stealth Rock, hurting any party member that gets brought in.
The Cranidos lies in wait, normally using Leer and Headbutt to inflict major damage. If it hits all these moves, chances are that the player will try and swap out to another Pokémon. Not only would that new Pokémon get hurt by Stealth Rock, but Cranidos knows Pursuit, which takes priority over a change of Pokémon. This wouldn’t normally be too much of a problem but this is towards the beginning of the game with limited options for counters.
7 Elesa's Volt Switch Tactics Are Impressively Annoying
In Pokemon Black and White, Electric-type trainer Elesa is Nimbasa City’s Gym Leader and the fourth of the game. In this case, the difficulty lies most of all within the tactics that she applies. She has two Emolga and a Zebstrika, all of which know the move Volt Switch, allowing them to attack and then switch out. Due to the quickness of all of Elesa’s Pokémon, this will more often than not go first.
The AI is able to anticipate the move the player wants to use, switching to the Flying-type Emolga to make a Ground-type move ineffective or switching to Zebstrika to tank a Rock-type move. Alongside abilities that negate the use of Electric types against her, not to mention Static that will paralyze the player’s Pokémon, Elesa can be a bit of a nuisance.
6 Fantina's Mismagius Is Nightmare Fuel Itself
Fantina is the Hearthome Gym Leader in Sinnoh and uses Ghost-types. In Diamond and Pearl, she is the fifth Gym Leader and has Drifblim, Gengar, and Mismagius, while in Platinum she is the third Gym Leader with a slightly weakened team of Duskull, Haunter, and Mismagius. This certainly does not mean that her battle in Platinum is any easier though.
The Mismagius is a problematic opponent in both battles but facing it earlier on in the game in Platinum makes for a much tougher outing. It has a very high base stat total for a third Gym Leader and can ultimately wreck teams with Confuse Ray, Shadow Ball, Psybeam, and Magical Leaf.
5 Norman's Slaking Is A Brute With The Bulk Of A Legendary Pokémon
In Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire, The Petalburg Gym Leader Norman is not only the player’s father, but he is also a problem. He has two Slaking and a Vigoroth. While the Vigoroth is easy enough to dispatch, Slaking has a base stat total equaling that of a Legendary Pokémon, and Norman has two of them.
Slaking is incredibly bulky and scarily strong, but luckily it can only move every other turn. If the player doesn’t prepare for this by bringing Pokémon that know Protect, Norman’s Slaking have the potential to decimate teams. In Emerald, one Slaking is sacrificed for a Spinda and Linoone, which doesn’t actually make things that much easier.
4 Clair's Kingdra Has Very Few Exploitable Weaknesses
Clair is the second hardest Gym Leader in Gold, Silver, and Crystal, behind Whitney. She has three Dragonair, each having a differently typed fourth move, Ice Beam, Surf, and Thunderbolt, to try and counter different teams. In reality, however, these are all easy to sweep aside. It’s the Kingdra that is the main force of the team. In the Gen II games, Dragon is only weak to Dragon and Ice, and since Kingdra is also a Water-type, that negates the Ice weakness, making it harder to get any type advantage over it.
3 Whitney and Miltank Make Everyone Cry
Whitney is notoriously the toughest Gym Leader in the Johto region, solely because of her Miltank. Her Clefairy is easy to take care of but the Miltank is known to decimate teams at this early stage of the game.
Its move-set is infuriating, especially if your Pokémon are male. If that’s the case, Miltank will use Attract, causing the player’s Pokémon to be immobilized by love and effectively useless. Stomp can flinch and Milk Drink restores its health. This is all forgetting Rollout, which gets stronger each turn it is used.
2 Blue Isn't Restricted To One Type And Exploits This With Sheer Power
In Gold, Silver, and Crystal, Blue is Giovanni’s replacement as the Viridian Gym Leader. In some ways, he is the perfect warm-up for battling Red at Mt Silver, as neither of them focuses on a specific type. Blue uses Pidgeot, Alakazam, Rhydon, Gyarados, Exeggutor, and Arcanine, all-around level 60. As there is no consistent theme in this team, it is safe to assume that there are no real tactics at play here, just pure power.
After the player has completed the game in Pokémon Let’s go Pikachu and Eevee, Blue has taken over the Gym and has even higher-leveled Pokémon in his team, with Tauros, Charizard, and Aerodactyl coming in. He is not to be taken lightly in any of his Gym battles.
1 Sabrina's Psychic Team Is No Joke
Psychic-type trainers are not so difficult to defeat in the modern Pokémon game, but going back to Pokémon Blue, Red, and Yellow, Sabrina of Saffron was a notoriously tough Gym battle to overcome. In the anime, Ash gets the help of a Haunter to overcome Sabrina, with the moral of the story being that Ghost-types are effective against Psychic-types.
However, in the original games, an error was apparently made so that Psychic Pokémon actually resisted Ghost moves instead. What’s more, is that the Gastly-line are the only Ghost Pokémon in Gen I, but their being weak to Psychic moves due to their poison typing renders them useless. That leaves the weak Bug-type moves being the only super-effective weapon to use against Sabrina’s Abra-line, Mr. Mime, and Venomoth.