Uploaded July 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
After dealing with Fuschia City's Safari Zone shenanigans for a little while, it was finally time for me to take on its Gym!
The Fuschia Gym Leader is a ninja named Koga! He specializes in tricks and traps, generally being Poison-themed! To reach him, you'll have to deal with navigating around near-invisible walls, fighting his students along the way.
*...however...*
Despite this being a Poison-Type Gym, it doesn't come across as this as much it could've.
By "tricks & traps", I mean more than just Poison. This Gym also priortizes other status effects, such as Confusion or Sleep.
Quite a few Pokémon you fight here from the regular Trainers aren't even Poison-Type AT ALL! At most, they may know Poison-Type moves, like Sandslash knowing Poison Sting, and Drowzee & Hypno knowing Poison Gas. There's even a KADABRA here, so the most you get out of that is the CHANCE of being Confused by the Confusion attack, itself (or Psybeam). Remember that Koga's Gym is actually listed before Sabrina's, so this might feel like a warmup towards taking her Gym on if you waited.
At the very least, Koga himself uses all Poison-Types, such as two Koffing, a Muk, and a climatic Weezing.
Ignoring the Psychic-Types & the Ground-Type Sandslash distorting the main them of this place, your basic optimal strategy of beating this Gym is supposed to be using some Psychic- and/or Ground-Types of your own. Let them represent the medicine against these troublesome toxins in different ways.
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After beating Koga, he will reward you with the Soul Badge. It permanently raises the Defense of your Pokémon a little bit, and now you can use Surf outside of battle to ride over water.
You also get TM06: Toxic. It immediately poisons the target, like Thunder Wave causing instant Paralysis. However, Toxic in particular causes a much more lethal version of Poison.
When you're Badly Poisoned, instead of draining your HP at a fixed amount per turn, the poison damage INCREASES with every single turn, eventually leading your Pokémon to Faint even from max HP, assuming you've healed it with strong Potions enough times for the effect to get that far! Switching out will just reset this back to normal Poison, but you should really just have an Antidote (or a Full Heal) at the ready.
I didn't think about this too much and just gave Toxic to Venusaur, for now. Apparently the effect from Toxic stacks side-to-side with the effect from Leech Seed in this game. Their effects build off of each other’s to drain the opponent’s HP at an even faster rate than they would’ve by themselves!
Lastly, almost every single Pokémon in this game can learn Toxic through this TM, including those that have zero business doing so (like why are Pokémon like Magnemite, Machamp, Eevee and Jinx AND EVEN PIKACHU able to learn this?!). Ironically Weedle & Kakuna aren't among them (but Beedrill still is).
----------
The next big point of interest is Cinnabar Island, which contains the 7th Gym.
You NEEDED to beat Koga to use Surf on the field because you can only get to that island by Surfing through the waters to the south at Route 19.
Even before you jump in, you'll be fighting some Swimmer Trainers. Expect A LOT of Water Pokémon to deal with along the water, both from just Surfing and from encountering MORE Swimmers.
There might be some other interesting things along the way to Cinnabar, too, but more on that later...
After dealing with Fuschia City's Safari Zone shenanigans for a little while, it was finally time for me to take on its Gym!
The Fuschia Gym Leader is a ninja named Koga! He specializes in tricks and traps, generally being Poison-themed! To reach him, you'll have to deal with navigating around near-invisible walls, fighting his students along the way.
*...however...*
Despite this being a Poison-Type Gym, it doesn't come across as this as much it could've.
By "tricks & traps", I mean more than just Poison. This Gym also priortizes other status effects, such as Confusion or Sleep.
Quite a few Pokémon you fight here from the regular Trainers aren't even Poison-Type AT ALL! At most, they may know Poison-Type moves, like Sandslash knowing Poison Sting, and Drowzee & Hypno knowing Poison Gas. There's even a KADABRA here, so the most you get out of that is the CHANCE of being Confused by the Confusion attack, itself (or Psybeam). Remember that Koga's Gym is actually listed before Sabrina's, so this might feel like a warmup towards taking her Gym on if you waited.
At the very least, Koga himself uses all Poison-Types, such as two Koffing, a Muk, and a climatic Weezing.
Ignoring the Psychic-Types & the Ground-Type Sandslash distorting the main them of this place, your basic optimal strategy of beating this Gym is supposed to be using some Psychic- and/or Ground-Types of your own. Let them represent the medicine against these troublesome toxins in different ways.
----------
After beating Koga, he will reward you with the Soul Badge. It permanently raises the Defense of your Pokémon a little bit, and now you can use Surf outside of battle to ride over water.
You also get TM06: Toxic. It immediately poisons the target, like Thunder Wave causing instant Paralysis. However, Toxic in particular causes a much more lethal version of Poison.
When you're Badly Poisoned, instead of draining your HP at a fixed amount per turn, the poison damage INCREASES with every single turn, eventually leading your Pokémon to Faint even from max HP, assuming you've healed it with strong Potions enough times for the effect to get that far! Switching out will just reset this back to normal Poison, but you should really just have an Antidote (or a Full Heal) at the ready.
I didn't think about this too much and just gave Toxic to Venusaur, for now. Apparently the effect from Toxic stacks side-to-side with the effect from Leech Seed in this game. Their effects build off of each other’s to drain the opponent’s HP at an even faster rate than they would’ve by themselves!
Lastly, almost every single Pokémon in this game can learn Toxic through this TM, including those that have zero business doing so (like why are Pokémon like Magnemite, Machamp, Eevee and Jinx AND EVEN PIKACHU able to learn this?!). Ironically Weedle & Kakuna aren't among them (but Beedrill still is).
----------
The next big point of interest is Cinnabar Island, which contains the 7th Gym.
You NEEDED to beat Koga to use Surf on the field because you can only get to that island by Surfing through the waters to the south at Route 19.
Even before you jump in, you'll be fighting some Swimmer Trainers. Expect A LOT of Water Pokémon to deal with along the water, both from just Surfing and from encountering MORE Swimmers.
There might be some other interesting things along the way to Cinnabar, too, but more on that later...
