i was originally just calling it a "no grind nuzlocke" but ive started calling it butterspeed on account of a shiny butterfree i happened to get on my 3rd or 4th attempt at doing it in emerald, which also happened to be my first successful attempt. my shiny butterfree survived the whole time without fainting which is more or less a miracle. i protected him s much as i could but did send him in when it was my only good option.

if youre not familiar, basic nuzlocke rules are that pokemon have to be retired if they ever faint, and youre only allowed to catch the first pokemon you encounter in a given area. its a pretty fun way to force yourself to pay more attention to the game and to use pokemon that you otherwise might not use. however the issue is that you can prevent things from fainting by simply grinding them all to level 100 (or the max level where they'll still obey you with however many badges you have) which renders it kind of boring if you play safely. so i decided to see if i could do it without "grinding" at all -- i wasnt allowed to re-battle any trainers (in games where that's an option) and i was only allowed to either catch or fight the first wild pokemon i encountered in a given area, unless my fastest pokemon failed to run away from it. this leads to really fast playthrough because theres no way to spend time to get stronger, you just have to use what you have.