Well, there is no "forbidden" way per se, but going Pryce first is not what the game wants you to do first. Ideally it wants you to go Chuck -> Jasmine -> Pryce. This is a bit more lenient here though because of the certain things that can be obtained earlier such as Sludge Bomb and Red Gyarados. The game wasn't really designed this way but the option existed. Most game guides talk about doing Chuck first anyways.I'm sorry, I must've missed the part where going Pryce -> Chuck -> Jasmine is somehow forbidden, especially considering that the literal game is designed to allow you to progress that way and that is how I progressed with the intention of getting Seadra to fight in as many gyms as possible.
Also lol at whinging at me for having a Pokemon only two levels above the leader's ace...while having one FOUR levels or so below them lmao. Yes, because the guy whose margin of error is SMALLER is clearly the guy who's wrong. I know some of you have a fetish for eFfiCieNcY but come on now, it doesn't take a genius to realize that fighting a major opponent while underleveled isn't really going to give you an accurate view of how well you do.
Also, imagine blaming me for nO dEtoUrS when said ''detour'' is an unavoidable part of the main story, dawg. Like this is a travesty, no more nor less.
You know what? Stick to turning up at gyms underleveled and pretending that tells you a thing about how well you do there lmao. I mean, you may as well use only L10 Pokemon against the E4 and then see which ones can actually beat more than a member's one Pokemon lol.
I'm gonna fight every gym, every E4 member, and the rival(s) at comparable levels, be it 2 levels more or fewer, but no more.
Being 2 higher is acceptable. I've stated that already in a previous post ages ago. Johto has it pretty bad in terms of XP Drought though so being underleveled is pretty natural too.
I think Volt is saying you sequence broke really. Not so much a detour as yes, you are forced to go that way eventually. An example of a Detour would be getting Surf in Kanto, flying back to Pallet, going to Cinnabar, and getting your fossil. THAT is a detour. It's not as extreme here though.
Heracross isn't as easy to find as it is in HGSS. In GSC it is what is called Mountain Trees (no joke) and is only found in select parts of Johto. Usually around Morty or so iirc though I am happy to be proven wrong on this. It's kinda like Feebas though. If you don't find one on a route after a couple of trees, it isn't in that route. There should be a site or something that has the list of routes that it exists in/on.Heracross: An absolute beast in my ingame playthroughs, although catching one can be annoying (which is why I recommend having Great Balls and a good number of Poke Balls before you do) but this can be offsetted by soft resetting. Fury Cutter reliably carves through Whitney's team whenever I used her there and she hits like a truck against NPCs with Horn Attack alone even at a level disadvantage while also being fast and bulky for the time you get her. She can make good use of Normal-type STAB to decimate most NPCs and can floor bosses with Fury Cutter spam and/or her bulk, possibly throwing in STAB Rock Smashes to facilitate an easier sweep. I also remember beating Clair with a Heracross once using Fury Cutter. Only real catch is that she's a Slow Pokemon to level up, but she's still good and much more versatile than Stantler, speedier than Granbull, much more timely than Tauros and Miltank, and a lot bulkier than pretty much every one of those Normal-types sans the big cows.