Noland

Factory Head
Noland
Species	Human
Hair color	Brown
Eye color	Brown
Base	Battle Factory
Debut	Pokémon: Emerald Version

Noland is one of the seven Frontier Brains of Hoenn's Battle Frontier appearing in Pokémon: Emerald Version. He is the Factory Head in charge of the Battle Factory.

Background

With the Battle Factory being a place that focused more on the research of the trainers who challenged it, Noland naturally valued intelligence. However, he believed that knowledge was more than just studying and that experience just as important in achieving true knowledge. Noland played fairly and battled the trainer using the same conditions that the trainer was fighting under, in that he used a team composed of completely random rental Pokémon. He also had access to the Battle Swap data of incoming challengers and would analyze them to prepare for battles.

In Emerald, Brendan/May would face him in their 21st and 42nd consecutive battles of the Battle Factory. He would at first lecture them about the importance of experience in knowledge, and after being defeated the first time he gave the winner the Knowledge Symbol for their Frontier Pass. In the second battle, he was excited to see that his challenger looked tougher than earlier, and after being defeated he bestowed a gold symbol upon them. He promised he would not lose again and wanted to battle again someday.

Pokémon Roster

His Pokémon roster is chosen completely at random from all the Pokémon available in as of the third generation games, with the exceptions being legendary Pokémon such as Mewtwo, Mew, Lugia, Ho-Oh, Celebi, Kyogre, Groudon, Rayquaza, Jirachi and Deoxys.

Other Appearances

Other Media

• Noland appears in two episodes of the Pokémon anime, where he was an inventor who would often ride around in an airplane he made. In this version he allows challengers to pick which Pokémon they will battle, but when Ash Ketchum challenges him he chooses to battle Noland's Articuno (whom he befriended, rather than owned) with his Charizard in a one-on-one battle.
• Noland appears in the Pokémon Adventures manga, where he is the first Frontier Brain whom Emerald faces in his challenge of the Battle Frontier. He is in charge of taking care and raising all of the Battle Frontier's rental Pokémon. He is defeated by Emerald but quickly comes to respect him and discusses strategy at length with him. He was temporarily put out of commission after Guile Hideout attacked him to steal the rental Pokémon, but he eventually recovered to help in the later battles against Guile. The Frontier Brains reappeared in the Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire arc, where they helped in the fight against Neo Team Magma and Neo Team Aqua as well as in the effort to destroy Grand Meteor Delta.

Trivia

• Noland's name may be a play on "knowledge".
• He shares his title with Thorton from Sinnoh and Johto's Battle Frontier.