Pokemon Lunatic Crystal v1.6 - Gym Leader Blaine

The penultimate Gym Leader of Lunatic Crystal is the Fire-type specialist Blaine. While Fire types are not usually known for their coverage, it's not the case here as Blaine's Pokemon all have coverage moves to deal with Pokemon types they're weak to, and on top of that his line-up includes two wild cards, making this a trickier encounter than one might expect.

Blaine's team is Houndoom, Clefable, Slowking, Magmar, Arcanine and Charizard. His fire types are all fast, powerful attackers with great coverage, while Clefable and Slowking provide defensive utility with good bulk and Thunder Wave to spread status.

Houndoom is the lead and it packs a STAB combination of Flamethrower and Crunch, as well as a 1 turn 95 Power Solarbeam which is boosted by Miracle Seed. It can also use Swagger to confuse your Pokemon. Houndoom can deal a great bit of damage if it outspeeds you, but a fast Special or Physical attacker can defeat it with a super effective move, as it's very frail. A lead like Dugtrio, Aerodactyl or Starmie is perfect here.

Clefable is next and it has the potential to be really annyoing with good bulk, a good defensive typing, as well as a recovery move in the form of Moonlight. As previously mentioned it has Thunder Wave to try and paralyze your Pokemon and a combination of Thunderbolt and Ice Beam as its' offenisve options, that combo can deal with Water and Ground types. Another frustrating thing here is that the Clefable is holding a Quick Claw which can let it randomly go first. Having a Fighting type here would be helpful as it can be hard to take down with no super effective options,

Slowking is yet another bulky Quick Claw user. Just like Clefable it has access to Thunder Wave and its' offensive options consist of STAB Hydro Pump and Psychic, as well as Fire Blast giving it a very diverse type coverage. Slowking's physical defense is lower than its' special defense so using a move like Megahorn is a solution, just be careful if using Bug types since it does have Fire Blast and a random chance to go first. The best solution would be a Water type like Blastoise or Starmie which either resist all its' moves or aren't weak to any of them and can counter with Thunderbolt or Mirror Coat.

Oh, and in case you were confused about Clefable and Slowking being there, Blaine has Clefable in both Stadium 1 and Stadium 2 and there already is a precedent for Blaine using Water types with him having Octillery in Stadium 2, Slowking also fits the mold of a slow special attacker and it fit better on his squad in Lunatic Crystal due to higher bulk, Thunder Wave and better typing.

Magmar is Blaine's fourth Pokemon and it's got an amazing offensive movepool with STAB Flamethrower, Thunderbolt and Cross Chop which threatens both Water and Rock types which are Magmar's biggest problem. It has Confuse Ray to spread confusion as well and a held Focus Band which lets it randomly withstand moves that would otherwise KO it. Still it doesn't have any super effective attacks against most Ground types, so using a Dugtrio or Nidoking here isn't a bad idea.

Arcanine is an all-out attacker with a STAB Fire Blast, which is boosted by Charcoal, Solarbeam, Outrage and Extremespeed. Arcanine hits hard and can pick off tired teams with Extremespeed, Outrage gives it a powerful coverage option and a much needed super effective attack against Dragon types, Solarbeam is there for any Ground, Rock or Water types which would be tempted to go up against it. The best way to defeat it would be with a fast offensive Pokemon, Typhlosion with Earthquake can deal with it rather well since it's not weak to any of its' moves and it has Earthquake to hit for super effective damage.

Charizard is Blaine's last Pokemon and it can become a force to be reckoned with due it having Swords Dance, as well as STAB Sky Attack, which is further boosted by Sharp Beak and Earthquake. It also has Fire Blast as the second STAB option and a special move. Charizard is fast and can hit hard, it can demolish tired or slow teams after one turn of set up, thankfully it has a massive 4x weakness to Rock, so a fast attacker like Aerodactyl can easily KO it with Rock Slide.