This town and gym are easily some of my favorite locals in Black and White. First off, the town contains the extremely important “Move Family”, which houses the Move Deleter and the Reminder Girl in the house to the far right. The Move Deleter is capable of deleting your HM moves, which is crucial as many of them are fairly useless at this point in the game by the means of fighting. Strength and Cut are overpowered by Return. Fly serves its use outside of battle, but that’s about it. Anyway, this NPC is good to have around. As for the Reminder Girl, she will teach your Pokemon forgotten/hidden moves in exchange for Heart Scales. Another crucial aspect of the game as there are quite a few Pokemon who won’t learn moves by leveling up. For example, Cinccino won’t learn Bullet Seed and Rock Blast unless you visit this NPC (which combined with Skill Link or Technician makes this Pokemon quite deadly). Second off, the whole gym setup is quite creative and intriguing. I love how it’s basically and airport and that you have to launch yourself from cannons all around the gym. It’s one of my favorites in the series :3

It’s good to have your team around level 35-40 for this fight. Flying types were never that amazing in the battle field, but they’re normally quick and can strike a deadly blow with a powerful STAB that has few resistances. There are a number of useful team members you can have at this point; Zebstrike, Gigalith, Excadrill, Tynamo (if you’re lucky) and Beartic to name a few. While some are more useful than others, they all contain moves that will decimate her team. I would suggest going with Gigalith or Excadrill as they’re both sturdy and powerful. They’ll also resist practically all of Skyla’s attacks. It should go without saying, but evolve your starter to its final form, of course. The Rock Slide and Volt Switch TMs are your best friend in this fight.

As usual, prep for this fight by stocking up on as many lemonades as you think you’ll need. If I’m not mistaken, you can receive a Sharp Beak from the woman by the entrance of the town. This will increase the power of flying moves, which can be useful if you have a rather “rare” flying type on your team (I think there is a significant lack of decent flying types in Black and White with the exception or Wargle and Archeops). Teach your teammates the required TMs and you’ll be set!

Now for the actual fight, Skyla will start off with a Swoobat. She comes in at level 33 and should be easily taken out by any of your teammates that isn’t weak to psychic. This particular Swoobat does now Acrobatics, which does double damage if the user is holding at item. Swoobat’s attack stat is quite low and, with Acrobatics being a physical move, it isn’t as effective as a special STAB move. Heart Stamp is also physical, so again it doesn’t pose too much of a threat. KO Swoobat with a single Rock Slide or electric attack and move on to a level 33 Unfezant. This Poke poses a bit more of a threat. She does come with the strong Air Slash and then the even more powerful Razor Wind. Air Slash is capable of flinching, so be wary of using something slow. Razor Wind will take two turns to execute, so use that opportunity to either switch into something that will wall it (Gigalith and Excadrill come to mind), use a move like Protect or Detect, or take her out with a super effective move. Lastly, you’ll face a level 35 Swanna. You should be careful with her, as she can take out your rock and ground type teammates with a strike from Bubblebeam. Aerial Ace is also somewhat of a threat, as it strikes with 100% accuracy and comes with a STAB. However, use its 4x weakness to electric attacks to your advantage. You should be able to KO her quite easily with even a teammate as weak as Zebtrika.