Hello!
I came here from the "Child Care" thread after hitting on a link of doom in the sig of the OP. I took time to register to reply because it's a fun story and it could be useful for other parts of the forums. But I have a few remarks after reading this thread.
First of all, the mention of Ralts as a poor pokémon and the mention of it being better in competitive gameplay : well that's really strange to hear because both Gallame and Gardevoir are really good in PvE and Gallame is particulary interresting in PvP. Alakzam isn't very pratical in PvE, especially in a Nuzlocke run because it requires a trade and it's fragile as glass. However in PvP it still have its place as a glass cannon, although choices are very limited (I don't believe it's reasonable to play it Calm Minder). Alakazam is high speed and high special attack. On the other hand, Gardevoir's awesome movepool is helped by its nice special defence, keeping a big special attack. There's a lot of ways to play a Gardevoir (support, sweeper, dual screener...). But it's not much played in PvP because Azelf does it better. Gallame's additional fight type helped him to have its place in PvP.
Secondly, on the topic of competitive gameplay denaturing the spirit of the game. I disagree profoundly. I understand the argument about min-maxing and diving into metagame to excerpt the best of pokémon, although it's a bit strange to hear that from a DF forum where everyone is discussing how-to's and modding to reach their evil schemes. However I will oppose it that competitive gameplay is what made me know ALL the pokémon far deeper than any PvE trainer. I know all their strength and flaws and that made me love the odd ones a lot more. Before that, Nidoran♂ was just a crappy pokémon along the road, after that I went on epic adventures with my Nidoking. Even if you don't PvP, trying to make a good team for Tower battles teaches you great things about all of them. And competitive gameplay is also about splitting them in tiers so you can have fun figuring out a good team of cute pokémon while some others just throw their legendary cosmos breaking deities against each other.
To go further, I'd say that the Anime series is the one denaturing Pokémon. They spend their time breaking the rules, and when they explain one, that's in order to break it even more blatantly the minute after. Remember how they explain the Focus Punch move fails if the pokémon is hit in the beginning of Gen4? Remember it because from this instant they will use it to counter the foe's attacks by hitting faster with it. Try to do that on your cardridge. Also, in the Anime series they are all admiring the most unpractical moves like Giga Impact or Hyper Beam, just like teenagers only looking at the big number in the "power" column when the constraints are very high. Attention span fail.
So guys, you can be aware of all the mechanisms, know what's best, and still not be a cold-hearted Paul.
Thirdly, about contests and super-contests... personally I love them. You can take the pokémon you want, the pokémon you love, and even if it won't be the champion beater you need for the badge, they have a chance in the contest. Again, you have to know your pokémon, give it good contest moves to shine, prepare poffins... and the rest is reflexes and a bit of luck. The Master level super-contests are a whole different difficulty and it's very achieving to have these badges.
The Pokéathlon is also really great. Some events are more difficult than other, but it's always fun to see how you can break records with "outsiders". I really like to spend time in these mini-games.
The musical on the contrary is really disappointing to me. You do good, you dress your pokémon like a tramp, you do your best or your worse... it's the same result. Nothing achieving behind, no goal either short- or long-term. It's sad.
Finally, about this LP : I like Nuzlocke, I like the sarcastic tone because Pokémon's world is often very absurd and that's funny to point it out. And I like the use of images, it's different from the usual Nuzlocke comics, but it works well. All in all, thank you for the fun!
NB: When I read someone saying thanks to this story, he wouldn't have to spend 50h playing the game, I thought of the time he'll spend reading the forum and it made me laugh!