Evolutionary Stone Farming in Pokémon XY
One of the things I’ve been working on lately is finally finishing up my Pokedex in Pokemon X, which has been stuck at around 630/721 for about two years now.
With the Pokedex so large now, it’s impossible to get all of the evolutionary stones I need through regular gameplay. This has been a big source of frustration for me. I was searching for information on this and everyone recommended Super Training as the fastest way to get stones - but the rewards are random! After trying a few times and getting a single stone in ten attempts, I figured there had to be an easier way.
I found the answer buried in a post by scenia on the Arqade stack exchange. It was a bit time-consuming to set up initially, but after my preparations were complete, I have been able to get 3 evolution stones per day, guaranteed.
The original post is here, but the link has broken a few times, so for convenience I am posting my adaptation of their strategy.
Obtain an Anorith/Armaldo. If you don’t have a way to gen or edit Pokemon, it’s helpful to trade with someone so you get the EXP boost. I happened to have a traded Anorith lying around waiting for me to breed it, so I used that.
Optional: EV train to increase bulk - HP, Defense, Special Defense. I am too lazy to do this.
Train your Armaldo to level 100. scenia recommends at least 75, but with a Lucky Egg/EXP O-Power, this goes quickly due to Armaldo’s egg group and I think it’s worth it. I would find this difficult at a lower level, especially without good IVs or EV training.
I used a Lucky Egg in the Battle Chateau, and used an Amulet Coin on my supporting Pokemon as well, so I had enough money to…
Stock up on Max Potions. Your prize goes down to 1 stone if a Pokemon faints, and Revives will not make a difference.
Teach your Armando TM 54 False Swipe and give it Leftovers to hold. This is the key to the entire strategy. TM 54 can be found on the third floor of the Pokemon Lab in Lumiose City, and Leftovers is on Route 12 (requires Cut).
Mine also knows Water Gun, Strength, and Rock Tomb.
Balance the rest of your team. I just used my main playthrough team for this, as they were all between level 75-100 and were nice and diverse already. Basically, you want to make sure you can neutrally hit all types during the inverse battle. There is an Inverse Battle type chart on Serebii.
Travel to Route 18, save in front of Inver in his house, and the start the battle. You’ll most likely be soft resetting a bit.
Count your Super Effective and Non-Effective hits during battle. You need a balance of 7-9 super effective hits, but it’s important to note that non-effective hits DECREASE your count!
If you accidentally get 10+ count on your super effective hits, you’ll get rare candies instead of stones. Under 7 hits gets you berries.
Look for Steel, Ghost, or Rock type Pokemon. You want something that Normal-type will hit super effectively. When you find one, use False Swipe until your hit count is at the right number, then use neutral moves to finish the battle.
After the battle, Inver will give you stones! I have gotten Moon Stones, Sun Stones, Shiny Stones and Dawn Stones so far. You can battle him once per day, and it resets at midnight. You can also soft reset to get a different type of stone if you don’t need the ones he gives you.
I have found this infinitely preferable to the Super Training method - while it can be annoying to soft reset to get the right target Pokemon, I find that it’s more useful than Super Training, because you are guaranteed multiple stones at the end.
