As some of you may be aware, I've been planning a Pokemon Moon Nuzlocke comic, called Moonlight Wanderers for a long time. You can actually find some promotional art saying it's "coming Spring 2018" or going to "post alongside Rain", and well, you might've noticed that didn't happen. MW is still a big part of my writing plans going forward (it's second on my banner, after all), and I'm still really excited to work on it. What started as a fun fan indulgence, has really grown into a extremely important story for me, personally. Currently, the plan is for this to be the next thing when Rain is over.

But, why do I bring this up? Well, the funny thing is that ever since I finished my initial Pokemon Moon run, on which MW is based, I've really wanted to draw my team (as I've been known to do for other Pokemon games). Unfortunately, I kinda figured that counts as spoilers when I'm doing a comic about it. Like, very late story spoilers. And the longer it takes to start MW, the more agonizing it gets to not be able to share that team. It's taken so long in fact, that a whole other Pokemon game has come out (two if you count Let's Go) with their own teams I could also draw.

So, here I am, finally drawing my Pokemon Shield team: Inteleon, Boltund, Appletun, Hatterene, Runerigus, and Grapploct. Also, included is my trainer character (through whom I can live out my wildest fantasies of looking good with a pixie cut). XD

Of course, that game came out like eight months ago (this piece doesn't even line up with the DLC), so why now exactly? Well, behind the scenes I've been doing this little drawing exercise since early March. Essentially, I'd run a random number generator from 1 to 893, and depending on what number I'd get that day, I would draw that Pokemon. Big or small. Simple or complex. One I like or one I don't. None of that matters. I really wanted to take this time to just get better at drawing Pokemon more consistently before working on a comic revolving around them so I'm more prepared.

Anyway, despite the general randomness for most of this time, I handpicked these ones this time because I'm personally attached to them, and because I've now drawn one hundred Pokemon over the course of this little project!

I haven't been posting these pics along the way because I was a little worried the individual drawings of one Pokemon at a time would just clutter up my gallery. It was mostly for my benefit anyway. But if people are interested, I would be willing to whip up a montage of those first hundred randomly selected Pokemon.

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Bringing this back to Moonlight Wanderers, again, that comic is still on track. And to be clear, it's still based on Pokemon Moon (despite Ultra Moon, despite Let's Go, despite Sword and Shield, and even if Gen 9 comes out before then, I don't care; it'll always be Moon). MW will probably feature nods and references to earlier/later games even if Moon itself didn't, and I do have plans incorporate Sword and Shield's Galar region into MW's story (not a huge presence, but it's there).

I confess that when I finished drawing this, I had considered setting up a scenario where MW's protagonist, Maya, meets my Shield trainer, and battles the team seen above. But I worry about that getting contrived to set up, and might be only actually be fan service for myself and no one else. Not to mention, where does it end? Like, I know I'm just gonna get super attached to my Gen 9 team and my Gen 10 team and more as the games continue if heaven forbid this comic isn't already done by then. So rather than put myself in that position, maybe I won't have this meeting. XD

Anyway, I have yammered quite long enough here. As one final note, I want you all to know I'm scripting Rain as we speak. Nothing's drawn yet, so I'm not ready to announce a return date, but progress is finally happening to get that back in motion. In the meantime, I may continue to post little stuff here and there when I can. And of course, I hope you've enjoyed this one.