Cilan Takes Flight (728)

[The Great Butler]

Why are we comparing Clay's actions to Skyla?

I honestly don't see what Clay did was wrong. Outside of delaying a gym. I don't think it's against the rules to delay a gym for any reason.

Clay is also a business man, who is gifted in Pokemon battles, kind of like how Giovanni is Leader of an evil organization but had time to run a gym.

Clay had other priorities. And quite frankly I don't see the problem.

It's kind of ridiculous for anyone to think "Hey you're a gym leader, I'm a challenger, stop what the **** you're doing and battle me."

Which is kind of what Ash did to Clay, just not as rude and pretentious.

This is kind of the reason why gyms do have reservations. Why would anyone expect a gym leader to stop doing what they're doing and then battle them, right there and then. Sure was it rude of Clay? Sure but no ruder than Ash thinking Clay was going to stop doing what he was doing and battle him.

As for the revival herbs, well what would be the better route. Having a "rude" challenger going to get the herbs to prove himself worthy, or having the gym leader drop what he's doing, go to some place to get herbs as a result to an unforeseen reason, and waste all that potential time not battling challengers or running his business. Sure he could've sent someone else but then that person whoever he sent would've had to deal with Team Rocket. And odds are they wouldn't have been able to stop Team Rocket from taking the Kami Trio thus no revival herbs.

How is this Ash's problem? The revival herbs are for Pokemon, it seems quite clear that something happened in the mine, that would require a whole crap load of revival herbs to take care of, something that potentially the Pokemon Center might not be able to handle.

But let's go further and presume Clay is a jerk, and let's say it was to keep the Pokemon continuing to mine, thus notifying the Pokemon center would be admitting overworking the Pokemon.

Regardless of the reason do you think Clay was really in a business position to battle Ash and ignore what the revival herbs were for.

Now Clay isn't omniscient, but through the course of actions from the writers.

- Ash was promised a battle if he got the revival herbs
- Milos Island and the Kami Trio were saved as a direct result of Ash, Iris and Cilan going to the island to receive the revival herbs.
- Ash got revival herbs and got to battle Clay.

Now you can argue the questionable actions by Clay, and argue how selfish Clay was acting, but I think in this instance, what happened was far better than any non selfless course of actions.

Go watch The Mighty Accelguard to the Rescue! again. When Ash first meets Clay at the very start of the episode, Clay refuses his challenge because he has to go work in his mine. The Revival Herbs are never mentioned until Stopping the Rage of Legends! Part 1, the second time Ash sees Clay. They had nothing to do with Clay refusing the first challenge.

So in the instance of Ash's first challenge, we have Clay refusing to battle him purely because he's "got something better to do." He wasn't offering Ash a chance to get the badge and move on, he was simply demanding Ash bend his schedule around his own. If you want to make up scenarios, how is that fair to challengers who might not be able to stay in Driftveil City until he's willing to take the challenge?

I'm perfectly willing to admit the problems with Skyla's actions as soon as someone understands the hypocrisy in both the writers and fandom ignoring Clay's actions.

Or why anyone is getting all upset JUST BECAUSE Ash and Cilan have a problem with it.

That's simplifying it to an extreme. I'm bothered because almost identical behavior was ignored when Clay did it, but fetishized into "oh look how horrible she is she needs to be taught a lesson and put in her place!!!1111" when Skyla did it.

[Yuppirox]

That's simplifying it to an extreme. I'm bothered because almost identical behavior was ignored when Clay did it, but fetishized into "oh look how horrible she is she needs to be taught a lesson and put in her place!!!1111" when Skyla did it.

The difference between Clay and Skyla is that Clay actually battled. That's the point of being a Gym Leader, right? To battle? Skyla did not want to battle at all, so that's where the problem is. She delayed battles too often - no, she did them in her head. How do you know Clay did it as often as she did? Maybe Ash was the only one he delayed it for.

[DMerle]

That's simplifying it to an extreme. I'm bothered because almost identical behavior was ignored when Clay did it, but fetishized into "oh look how horrible she is she needs to be taught a lesson and put in her place!!!1111" when Skyla did it.

Also could I point out that when Clay did delay the gym battle he of his own accord contacted the Pokémon centre to tell Nurse Joy he was ready, that shows at least a little decency on his part. He was rude I agree, but by no means unfair to the level that Skyla was.

[dman_dustin]

Go watch The Mighty Accelguard to the Rescue! again. When Ash first meets Clay at the very start of the episode, Clay refuses his challenge because he has to go work in his mine. The Revival Herbs are never mentioned until Stopping the Rage of Legends! Part 1, the second time Ash sees Clay. They had nothing to do with Clay refusing the first challenge.

So in the instance of Ash's first challenge, we have Clay refusing to battle him purely because he's "got something better to do." He wasn't offering Ash a chance to get the badge and move on, he was simply demanding Ash bend his schedule around his own.

And why should Ash expect Clay to bend around his schedule.

Seriously like I said it would be like Ash said to Clay: "I'm a challenger stop the **** you're doing and battle me."

Did Ash ever try to get a reservation? No, instead he waited until Nurse Joy told him that Clay was able to battle.

Again it isn't just about a gym battle. Clay has a business to run.

If you want to make up scenarios, how is that fair to challengers who might not be able to stay in Driftveil City until he's willing to take the challenge?

Unless the challenger is dying and wants to battle Clay before he dies, and its time sensitive, I cannot see how a challenger would be unable to wait.

Like I said that's what reservations are for. Come back when you can. Just don't expect someone to drop what they're doing unless its some kind of emergency.

That's simplifying it to an extreme. I'm bothered because almost identical behavior was ignored when Clay did it, but fetishized into "oh look how horrible she is she needs to be taught a lesson and put in her place!!!1111" when Skyla did it.

What identical behavior? What Skyla's hobbies are more important than someone's career?

If Skyla was piloting a sick Pokemon to a special Pokemon center I can see how air battles would come in handy in those kinds of situations. And should Skyla be done maybe go back to actually battling challengers.

But as I keep getting reminded in real life, the real world isn't about fun, fun, and fun. Real Life is serious work. Why should Skyla have the luxury to put her hobbies over actual work?

That's not what Clay was doing, he was actually working at his second job, in fact one could argue that Pokemon battling is Clay's hobby, so it's understandable that Clay would put work over fun because again life isn't about fun, fun, fun.

[Vern]

I watched this two-part Gym Leader set because I was actually interested in it. I enjoyed seeing Skyla preform her air battles because it was different from the norm. Of course, Ash could've just went to another gym and battled but he wanted to battle this one. Watching this episode, I have to admit that Cilan's voice actor does a really good job with him. No one seemed to have a problem with Skyla's way of doing things besides the three guys and they didn't need to have anything to do with that gym anyway.

So, Ash sends out three Pokemon to battle the Gym Leader. Let's see what they will be.

[The Great Butler]

And why should Ash expect Clay to bend around his schedule.

Seriously like I said it would be like Ash said to Clay: "I'm a challenger stop the **** you're doing and battle me."

Did Ash ever try to get a reservation? No, instead he waited until Nurse Joy told him that Clay was able to battle.

Again it isn't just about a gym battle. Clay has a business to run.

The logic that was applied to Skyla was that if she was too busy to have battles, she should resign her position. By that same logic, if Clay needs so much time to run his company that he refuses a challenge, contacts Nurse Joy to proceed with the challenge and then immediately refuses it again, he should stop being a Gym Leader and focus on running his company.

Unless the challenger is dying and wants to battle Clay before he dies, and its time sensitive, I cannot see how a challenger would be unable to wait.

Like I said that's what reservations are for. Come back when you can. Just don't expect someone to drop what they're doing unless its some kind of emergency.

There are plenty of scenarios where the challenger could conceivably not be able to wait/come back. According to your logic, it would appear you would think it's okay for Clay to not leave his (many) employees to monitor the mine for an hour to fulfill his obligations, leaving the challenger to simply go off somewhere else to get the badge.

But as I keep getting reminded in real life, the real world isn't about fun, fun, and fun. Real Life is serious work. Why should Skyla have the luxury to put her hobbies over actual work?

Well, why should Clay have the luxury to work two jobs in title but blow off one of them whenever he feels like? When you work two jobs in Real Life you can't do that.

That's not what Clay was doing, he was actually working at his second job, in fact one could argue that Pokemon battling is Clay's hobby, so it's understandable that Clay would put work over fun because again life isn't about fun, fun, fun.

Battling may be his hobby, but Gym Leader is a job.

[Valoo.]

And nobody at all cares about Clay's actions. Now do you see the hypocrisy? Where was Cilan's forced outrage then?

... again, Clay is irrelevant. I'm debating your claim that "Skyla wasn't breaking any rules". I don't care about what Clay was doing, his breaking of the rules does not make Skyla's air battles any more right. Can you please respond to the rest of my post regarding your claim? :\


Clay's denial of Gym battles was just a way of postponing Ash's battle so the writers could have him go frolic with the Kamis; that's why nobody argued with him.

[Haunter227]

Uh are people seriously comparing Skyla with Clay?

Skyla was flatout not battling opponents because she thought battles were pointless since she thought she predict the outcome.

Clay didn't battle Ash for ONE TIME because he needed some Revival Herbs, as soon as he got them, he battled Ash.

Jesus christ, there's a difference between never battling opponents at all, and battling when the time fits.

[Pepsi_Plunge]

Uh are people seriously comparing Skyla with Clay?

Skyla was flatout not battling opponents because she thought battles were pointless since she thought she predict the outcome.

Clay didn't battle Ash for ONE TIME because he needed some Revival Herbs, as soon as he got them, he battled Ash.

Jesus christ, there's a difference between never battling opponents at all, and battling when the time fits.

This has nothing to do with Satoshi or Skyla, its just the usual Dent hate, look who is "talking" about it and people didn't even bother bringing Satoshi name up at the begining.

I can't believe this crap of an argument is still going.

[CuriousHeartless]

Wow, question. I'm not the only one who thought that Cilan losing the battle pretty much destroyed the message totally, am I? Or that Skyla was really stupid with some of her predictions and didn't really make sense, like her imagining Swoobat confusing Stunfisk, when her Swoobat has not used a confusing move in either appearance, confusion has never meant insta-loss, and Stunfisk is an Electric type.

[Haunter227]

This has nothing to do with Satoshi or Skyla, its just the usual Dent hate, look who is "talking" about it and people didn't even bother bringing Satoshi name up at the begining.

I can't believe this crap of an argument is still going.

Tell me about it. It's actually becoming really annoying now. Everybody has the right to enjoy different characters but plain out bashing purposely trying to find reasons to argue about them is ridiculous.

The argument above is stupid. I can't believe some people actually dislike the fact Cilan got annoyed with Skyla but not with Clay when the two Gym Leaders had completely different reasons not to battle.

[Ciccone]

Uh are people seriously comparing Skyla with Clay?

Skyla was flatout not battling opponents because she thought battles were pointless since she thought she predict the outcome.

Clay didn't battle Ash for ONE TIME because he needed some Revival Herbs, as soon as he got them, he battled Ash.

Jesus christ, there's a difference between never battling opponents at all, and battling when the time fits.

If you don't want to use Clay as an example of a bad Gym Leader, then there's always Volkner. Funny how everyone keeps ignoring the Sunyshore City Gym case; Volkner was just giving out badges, yet the fanbase was okay with it. Even the main characters didn't seem to mind; I think Ash might've been shocked, but everyone fails to remember that Brock (who worked in the Gym Leader business) didn't give a damn about what Volkner was doing. You didn't see him throw a temper tantrum, yet our friend Cilan went on a witch hunt the moment he realized what Skyla was doing (and she wasn't doing much harm to begin with).

[Haunter227]

If you don't want to use Clay as an example of a bad Gym Leader, then there's always Volkner. Funny how everyone keeps ignoring the Sunyshore City Gym case; Volkner was just giving out badges, yet the fanbase was okay with it. Even the main characters didn't seem to mind; I think Ash might've been shocked, but everyone fails to remember that Brock (who worked in the Gym Leader business) didn't give a damn about what Volkner was doing. You didn't see him throw a temper tantrum, yet our friend Cilan went on a witch hunt the moment he realized what Skyla was doing (and she wasn't doing much harm to begin with).

I'm not on about any other Gym Leader, i'm just howling at how ridiculous it is that people are comparing Skyla and Clay together when they had completely different reasons for not battling. Volkner was in the wrong and i never said anything otherwise.

About Brock, it would have been nice to see him get angry, but he didn't, and no one can really expect him to either, he hadn't mentioned that he was a Gym Leader since what, the OS? Cilan and Brock are two different characters, Cilan frequently states he's still a Gym Leader not to mention this is his first saga so it's still fresh. If Volkner was a Gym Leader in Kanto then it would have been more likely Brock could have gotten angry, not 8/9 years later when all traces of him being a Gym Leader has vanished.

[CuriousHeartless]

Also, she was doing a lot of harm. She stopped people from getting badges just because they're Pokemon had disadvantages against hers (Even if the disadvantages were crap a good bit of the time like in her Swoobat Vs. Stunfisk thing) which has been shown countless times to not actually count for much.

[Ciccone]

About Brock, it would have been nice to see him get angry, but he didn't, and no one can really expect him to either, he hadn't mentioned that he was a Gym Leader since what, the OS? Cilan and Brock are two different characters, Cilan frequently states he's still a Gym Leader not to mention this is his first saga so it's still fresh. If Volkner was a Gym Leader in Kanto then it would have been more likely Brock could have gotten angry, not 8/9 years later when all traces of him being a Gym Leader has vanished.

You're playing the "Cilan is a good Gym Leader because he mentions his position a lot" card. Can't say I'm surprised. Someone made the exact same argument a few months back, but it was proven to be unsound. The thing of it is Cilan left the Striaton City Gym. That Gym requires three Gym Leaders to be present, yet there were only two left. How is Cilan a good Gym Leader when he left his brothers and the Gym in disarray? How can people defend Cilan's witch hunt during the Skyla episodes when he himself didn't give a damn about his own Gym? Can anyone see the hypocrisy? Cilan left his Gym and practically said "screw the rules," but played the role of Gym regulator in Mistralton City.

And by the way, Brock mentioned that he was a Gym Leader in the Roxanne episodes in AG. He might've mentioned it in DP as well.

[BurningSociety12345543210]

How can people defend Cilan's witch hunt during the Skyla episodes when he himself didn't give a damn about his own Gym? Can anyone see the hypocrisy? Cilan left his Gym and practically said "screw the rules," but played the role of Gym regulator in Mistralton City.

Um, wat. There are two other gym leaders in Striaton City who are perfectly happy to battle their challengers in Dent's place... It's not like there's nobody there.

[dman_dustin]

If you don't want to use Clay as an example of a bad Gym Leader, then there's always Volkner. Funny how everyone keeps ignoring the Sunyshore City Gym case; Volkner was just giving out badges, yet the fanbase was okay with it. Even the main characters didn't seem to mind; I think Ash might've been shocked, but everyone fails to remember that Brock (who worked in the Gym Leader business) didn't give a damn about what Volkner was doing. You didn't see him throw a temper tantrum, yet our friend Cilan went on a witch hunt the moment he realized what Skyla was doing (and she wasn't doing much harm to begin with).

I already addressed that.

Ash was pissed at the idea of getting a badge without battling, just like he is with Skyla.

As for Brock? Brock has never been entirely passionate about being a former gym leader.

The difference is Brock would stare onward in confusion and be like "What? This isn't really how gyms are supposed to work." But won't get bent out of shape.

Cilan on the other hand, has been proven to be a lot livelier and passionate about things (even Brock's crush gag was technically dull and mild). Since he still considers himself a gym leader, of course he's going to be upset when gym leaders don't give challengers a chance of to earn a badge.

Again what Clay did, is incomparable to Skyla.

How is delaying a gym battle for various reasons even anywhere near to the offense level as denying anyone a chance to earn a badge.

Ash was even pissed at Fantina because she wasn't at her gym every time he was at Hearthome.

Seriously stop singling out Cilan just because you people do not like him. It's getting ridiculous.

If Ash gets upset with a gym leader's antics, then it shouldn't matter one way or another if Cilan gets passionately involved because he's a gym leader as well.

Plus there's a difference between inconvenience-not-right-now-refusal (Clay) to straight out denial (Skyla). I mean after all the only reason why Cilan got to battle Skyla was because people wanted to see gym leaders battling each other. Likewise the only reason Ash was able to battle Skyla was because people wanted to see Skyla actually battling a challenger.

Um, wat. There are two other gym leaders in Striaton City who are perfectly happy to battle their challengers in Dent's place... It's not like there's nobody there.

Exactly. Really I mean does it say that Striaton has to have 3 gym leaders in order to be a gym. Or is it simply because there are triplets and wanted all to be gym leaders. And the Pokemon league allowed it.

After all if Black2 White2 are any indication. A gym with more than one leader, isn't exactly desirable.

[Ciccone]

Um, wat. There are two other gym leaders in Striaton City who are perfectly happy to battle their challengers in Dent's place... It's not like there's nobody there.

You're missing the point. The rule of the Striaton City Gym is that there must be three Gym Leaders present so that challengers can choose which elemental monkey they're going to battle against. But with only two Gym Leaders, the rules are practically thrown out the window. Cilan knew this, but decided to leave anyway. It's obvious that he didn't care about his own Gym, so why is it that he gave Skyla a hard time? They were practically in the same boat, yet Cilan decided to display a holier-than-thou attitude.

[Haunter227]

You're playing the "Cilan is a good Gym Leader because he mentions his position a lot" card. Can't say I'm surprised. Someone made the exact same argument a few months back, but it was proven to be unsound. The thing of it is Cilan left the Striaton City Gym. That Gym requires three Gym Leaders to be present, yet there were only two left. How is Cilan a good Gym Leader when he left his brothers and the Gym in disarray? How can people defend Cilan's witch hunt during the Skyla episodes when he himself didn't give a damn about his own Gym? Can anyone see the hypocrisy? Cilan left his Gym and practically said "screw the rules," but played the role of Gym regulator in Mistralton City.

And by the way, Brock mentioned that he was a Gym Leader in the Roxanne episodes in AG. He might've mentioned it in DP as well.

Ugh. Kira I never said anything about being a 'good' gym leader. It's obvious i'm talking about the fact Cilan still treats himself as a Gym Leader constantly, something Brock barely ever did, just like the rare occasion you noted in AG. Again, now you're making up random statements once again. Nothing ever stated 3 Gym Leaders had to be present, ever. Not once. Nope, never. Got that? There's no hypocrisy in Cilan's actions towards Skyla considering there were two Gym Leaders left at Striaton when Cilan departed. Hell, Chili even said at the time in BW006 "you just leave the Gym to us" and no, not in a sarcastic way, they meant it as if they'll take care of things while Cilan improves his Conneisuer skills.

[Vern]

Also, she was doing a lot of harm. She stopped people from getting badges just because they're Pokemon had disadvantages against hers (Even if the disadvantages were crap a good bit of the time like in her Swoobat Vs. Stunfisk thing) which has been shown countless times to not actually count for much.

They simply could've gone to another gym. End of discussion really. It clearly isn't against "the rules" if no one has stopped her from doing it. Just like there seemingly isn't a rule against handing badges away to whoever a Gym Leader wants.