GYM 6:
City: Mistralton City
Leader: Skyla
Type: Flying
Badge: Jet Badge
Got a decent level increase plus replace the com mon Unfezant with a much more opposing Skarmory. Starting off, Swoobat has replaced Amnesia with Attract making it a bit of a bother if you're using a male Pokemon against it. Skarmory Defense and Special Defense will keep it in battle for awhile giving it at least one turn to hit with Steel Wing but it's other attacks, Air Cutter, Fury Attack, and Agility, aren't immediately threatening (and if you're using an Electric-type Pokemon (which you should) then even Steel Wing won't be that much of a problem). Finally her Swanna decided to follow in Falkner's Pidgeotto's footsteps and has dropped Aqua Ring and Aerial Ace for Roost and Featherdance... which would be threatening if you weren't using an Electric-type Pokemon using a Special Electric-type attack (hey, did you know you can catch Mareep very early on (like before you even battle Roxie) meaning you could possibly have an Ampharos by the time you battle Skyla 
?). Anyway it might take longer to take down Skyla, but then again they gave you the Mareep family.
GYM 7:
Black & White:
City: Icirrus City
Leader: Brycen
Type: Ice
Badge: Freeze Badge
Black 2 & White 2:
City: Opelucid City
Leader: Drayden
Type: Dragon
Badge: Legend Badge
Well, this puts a new twist on the term "returning Gym Leader". Now while re-ordering the Gym Leaders first happened in Platinum, in that game it was just that 3 Gym Leaders swapped places. However here a Gym Leader has been taken out but not replaced which moves the Gym Leader above them to be pushed down to their position. While replacing and bringing in a new Gym Leader within the same Generation is always looked upon as the biggest changes, I feel that position changes are actually a bit more unique which I'll get into later when I compare Drayden's teams in B&W and B2&W2.
If you had a Fire-, Rock-, or Fighting-type you would do fine against Brycen, and even if you didn't then smashing through his Pokemon still wasn't that hard. And even if he gets a chance to attack, as long as your Pokemon wasn't weak to Ice-types, it would probably be able to take the hit. Drayden on the other hand, well, we'll talk more Dragon-types for the next Gym. For now I'll just say that Drayden's returning Pokemon have some new moves which I'll talk about during his back-to-back comparison, however the biggest change I will note is that he now uses a Flygon instead of a Fraxure which I personally as he already has a Haxorus. As before, as long as you brought an Ice-type you shouldn't have any problems, even moreso now that he replaced Fraxure, who was only 2x weak to Ice-types, with a Flyong, who is 4x weak to Ice-types. Just be careful though, let Druddigon or Flygon move and it might take your Ice-type out with a Revenge or Rock Slide, respectively.
Hmm, something seems off here though. Well, for me and those who have White version that is. To those who played Black version nothing would seem wrong but those those who played White and challenged the Opelucid Gym, well...
GYM 8:
Black & White:
City: Opelucid City
Leader(s): Drayden/Iris
Type: Dragon
Badge: Legend Badge
Black 2 & White 2:
City: Seigaiha (jp. name) City
Leader: Marlon
Type: Water
Badge: Wave Badge
I remember when we first saw Marlon. We assumed that, because he only had 3 Pokemon, he was an early Gym Leader thinking he would be a Gym Leader of one of the new cities that popped up on Unova's southwest corner. But as it turns out, he's not an early Gym Leader, nope, with Drayden being pushed down to 7th the 8th spot needed filling in and Marlon answered the call! Now while I know in Hoenn the last Gym was a Water-type Gym, to me that made a bit of sense as Hoenn was sort of a water-based region. However to me a Water Gym Leader replacing the Dragon-type Gym Leader just seems odd. The last Gym is suppose to be the most challenging and, while I'm not saying a Water-type Gym can't do that, to me it would seem that the Dragon-type Gym which is being replaced was the tougher challenge. Dragon-types resist Grass, Fire, Water, and Electric-type Pokemon. Grass, Fire, Water. The three starter types. Unlike other Gyms where one starter may have an advantage or do neutral damage, in a Dragon-type Gym no starter has the advantage. However Water is one of the starting elements meaning those who picked the Grass-types will have a much easier challenge (because, let's all admit it, out starter is probably the strongest Pokemon we have during the storyline).
Speaking of type advantage, let's talk about the teams. It's not secret that Drayden's and Iris's team were pretty much the same except for two differences: the gender of their Pokemon matched their gender (Drayden's Pokemon were male, Iris's Pokemon were female) and the Abilities of their Druddigons were different (Drayden's had Rough Skin, Iris's has Sheer Force). Now out of these differences you'll think the Ability one would effect the battle more if not the only thing effecting the battle, but this isn't the case. Look over to their Fraxure and you'll see both have the Rivalry Ability which increases Attack and Special Attack by 25% if the opponent is the same gender but decreases them by the same amount if the opposite gender. It's a small thing to notice but I do like that the designers did put the fact their Pokemon being different genders actually have an effect. But overall if you use an Ice-type you should be fine, just don't let Fraxure & Haxorus set-up Dragon Dance, don't physically attack Drayden's Druddigon (in Black version), and careful of Iris's Druddigon's increase attack power and remember it has no secondary effect on those attacks (in White version). But enough about them, let's go into the new Gym Leader on the block: Marlon. As I said, a Grass-type does wonders here especially against his Carracosta, though an Electric-type works just as well too. All of them know Scald so you may want to bring some Burn healing items, Carracosta knows Shell Smash which could cause trouble if let loose, Wailord had Rollout for those people who wtill have Whitley's Miltank nightmares, and Jellicent has Recover so maybe having that extra super-effective type as back-up isn't a bad idea.
Now for those Black version players out there, you might notice an additional person here if you recall to what I pointed out about the last Gym. That's right (or incase you still can't figure it out, I'll just tell you right now), Iris is missing and left sole duty of the Gym to Drayden (who technically retired in White version). Where did she go in B2&W2? That's for another group of trainers for another day...
So, that's all 8 Gyms and their Leaders. The first has been replaced with a returning Gym under new management, the second is a completely new Gym, third to sixth had no changes except in their team line-up, seventh has been replaced with the previous game's eighth, and the new eighth is completely new. Aside from the two new ones and the ones which haven't been changed, to me there's two which stick out: the first and seventh Gym? Why? Because they're both technically returning Gyms yet have changed in what position they came in and, for the first Gym, has completely changed hands. Let's take a bit of a closer look at them:
NORMAL GYM:
Black & White:
City: Nacrene City
Leader: Lenora
Position: 2nd
Badge: Basic Badge
Black 2 & White 2:
City: Aspertia City
Leader: Cheren
Position: 1st
Badge: Basic Badge
The Normal-type has always been considered the "default" type even though it's weak to Fighting-type attacks, immune to Ghost-type attacks, Ghost-types are immune to Normal-type attacks, and Rock- & Steel-types resist it. However since none of those type are available before reaching any of these Gyms at this point I guess Normal-types would be considered the perfect type for a "teaching" Gym. Though what they teach seems to be different here. In B&W, Lenora's Gym taught that you'll have to go out of your way to catch more Pokemon to have type coverage by the people around the city heavily hinting that you should go to the area after Nacrene City, Pinwheel Forest, to pick up one of the Fighting-type Pokemon which are catchable there. However Cheren's Gym is there to just teach you how a Gym works, there's a puzzle you'll need to solve to get through, there are other trainers in the Gym who'll challenge you to a battle, and at the end there's a Gym Leader who's tougher then any trainer you may have battled before which you must defeat to get the Badge and progress through the game. In addition with the Aspertia Gym also doubling as the Trainer School where you're usually taught about the starter triangle, the Aspertia Gym sort of did the role which it took 2 Gyms to do in B&W but in a much more subtle way which I kind of like.
Of course that's all I can say about B2&W2's Normal-type Gym. As I've said before, Lenora is a much more tougher challenge. But wait, of course the 2nd Gym is going to be a stronger challenge then the 1st Gym, that's not really a fair comparison. Well I wasn't really comparing them on strength but rather on strategy. I went through all of Lenora's tactics when comparing her to Roxie, to simply put it, Lenora has a batch of strategies at her disposal. However Cheren's strategy is much more limited to just either setting-up which leaves his Pokemon upon for an attack. His only other strategy is that his Patrat has Detect but even then he has to waste his turn using it so he might as well not have it. Also, to further add insult to injury, his Lillipup has HELPING HAND, a move you can only use in Double/Triple Battles! Maybe instead of Detect and Helping Hand you could have given then something like Double Team so that they'll at least be some sort of challenge.
Overall the Normal Gym has brought up new ups in terms of story progression but a down in challenge. In B2&W2 is has become the sole "teaching" Gym letting the other Gyms become more of a challenge in their own way but lost any challenge because of it. Actually, even as the first Gym it's kind of a let down as at least the Striaton Gym had the gimmick of always going up against the type you're starter is weak against thus making it not really a viable choice when the Gym Leader's Elemental Monkey comes out to play.
OPELUCID/DRAGON GYM:
Black & White:
Leader(s): Drayden/Iris
Position: 8
Badge: Legend Badge
Black 2 & White 2:
Leader(s): Drayden
Position: 7
Badge: Legend Badge
Now comparing the Normal-type Gyms probably isn't fair since it is two different Leaders, Cities, positions, and purposes (though both are as a "teaching" Gym). So let's get rid some of those variables and instead have the only change be in position (and for half of us, Leader... sorta). As I've said, Drayden and Iris's team in B&W has slight differences which sort of had some differences going on if you didn't one shot everything with you Vanilluxe. However now that Brycen has given up his Gym Leader duties, forcing the Opelucid Gym to go down a position, you'd think that Drayden's team would have gotten weaker in B2&W2. But no, infact, Drayden's team level's go up by 5! Thus, it's actually when Drayden (and Iris) were the 8th Gym Leader in B&W when they were the weakest!
As I mentioned, Drayden got rid of his Fraxure and replaced it with a Flygon. Being a final evolution, Flygon is no doubt stronger than Fraxure stat wise but type wise it doesn't fair any better with being quadruple weak to Ice-type attacks. It has Rock Slide presumably for said Ice-type and it's pretty fast so I suggest you either dish out the damage fast or you make sure your Ice-type can take a super effective hit. Going into Drayden's other Pokemon, an interesting thing to note here is that, with Iris gone, Drayden's Druddigon has been given the Sheer Force Ability so now it's it you have to worry about stronger attack power yet now worry about secondary effects. Taking this into note, Druddigon hasn't changed much except in one aspect: it replaced Night Slash with Crunch which not only has a higher power but also has a secondary effect meaning it gets a Sheer Force boost (not that Night Slash didn't, but Crunch has more power then it even if it's only by 10). Last but not least, his Haxorus actually has the same exact moveset as before so, as I warned before, don't let him set up those Dragon Dances! Oh, and of course all his Pokemon know Dragon Tail so if you don't K.O. his Flygon of Haxorus on the first turn be prepared to have your Pokemon, presumably your Ice-type, be switched out for one of your Pokemon that might not be prepared to battle (unless you go in with all your Pokemon prepared/only with you Ice-type).
And with that, those are my comparison and thoughts on the Gym Leaders between Black & White and Black 2 & White 2. What do you think? Next time, I think I might check up on the group you normally battle after the Gym Leaders, the Elite Four & Champion. I mean nothing there could have changed much, then again the previous playable character technically should be the new Champion (even if you didn't re-challenge the Elite Four after beating N, N was Champion at that point so defeating him still makes you Champion), right?
