POKÉMON CENTER

[covert saffron]

lmk any questions you might have :o

[covert saffron]

maritime theme has a pelipper, a klawf, a crustle, a dhelmise, and dragalge

maybe palossand instead of crustle

[torpid escarp]

palossand is a good way to break up types, yeah

could also swap klawf with crustle if you're married to the little guy

[covert saffron]

dhelmise, palossand, klawf, pelipper, sea monster lapras, sharpero?

gym leader rematch team vibe there tbh

pelipper, klawf, dhelmise, dragalge, sharpedo

[torpid escarp]

yuh

dhelmise is a great pick

triple stab (steelworker you are such a weird ability)

[covert saffron]

if i can add abilities it’ll slap

either way, great promise

[covert saffron]

starmie (steel poison regional form) sharpedo, dhelmise, dragalge, klawf, pelipper onnthe rematch

[covert saffron]

everyone’s top three kanto mons go

[soft isle]

Jolteon, Vaporeon, Flareon /j
(serious answer: Nidoking, Sandslash, Eevee)

[languid lichen]

can i say rhyperior none none?

[mellow robin]

beedrill
onix
electabuzz

[covert saffron]

that’s a gen 4 mon you rube

[mellow robin]

ooh, can I say magmortar

[covert saffron]

vaporeon, zapdos, and snorlax

[soft isle]

that's still a gen 4 mon

[covert saffron]

scyther as a runner up

[languid lichen]

gen 4 but it's a Kanto evo

and the question was kanto

so I'm asking if it counts

[soft isle]

at that point we might as well say Umbreon is our favorite Kanto mon

[languid lichen]

that's a good opinion, though

[torpid escarp]

lapras, bulbasaur, aerodactyl

[soft isle]

actually come to think of it, can we say our favorite Kanto mon is Missingno? It's actually in the RBY data

and you can obtain it in RBY

[torpid escarp]

love fossil mons, can't get enough fossil mons

[mellow robin]

do postgame FR/LG mon count as kanto

(at this point I am merely being pedantic and apologize)

[soft isle]

as long as it's not on the Sevii Islands it counts ioo

Sevii Islands are a different region than the Kanto mainland

[languid lichen]

I guess my favorite gen 1 pokemon are ryhorn, bulbasaur, and eevee

[tiny saffron]

Tentacruel, Zapdos, Slowbro

1. used it a lot in showdown
2. used it pretty much exclusively in pokemon mystery dungeon postgame
3. funny guy

[snow cobalt]

It's true, Slowbro is funny

[languid lichen]

i definitely want to never see another charizard again, though

[tiny saffron]

Venomoths fun to use in rps

stare at players with them big ol' eyes

[languid lichen]

at this point in pokemon's lifespan, i definitely would not mind being a Bug Catcher

gen 5 especially had a lot of cool bugs

between volcarona, scolipede, leavanny, and durant

and then genesect as our first-ever bug legend, iirc

[soft isle]

for some reason we keep thinking Volcarona is a legendary

we have no idea why

[snow cobalt]

stylish enough

[soft isle]

yeah it kind of is!

[snow cobalt]

and it's one of those where you had to find it in the overworld

[manic kindle]

Slowpoke psyduck beedrill

[torpid pivot]

bulbasaur three times in a row, but also Haunter, Sandshrew..

[near flower]

mewtwo, gengar, dragonite
3rd subject to change

[azure crane]

Arcanine, Tangela, Tentacruel.

[south laurel]

Gengar, Dragonite, Tentacruel

[covert saffron]

yes you may

but not umbreon or rhyperior

the criteria here is “any mon introduced in gen 1”

[soft isle]

okay yeah in that case we're going with Eevee, Nidoking, and Missingno

[covert saffron]

okay but. what about gen 2 👀

[tiny saffron]

ew gen 2 mons

let me look at them, I always forget johto

[covert saffron]

😭

[tiny saffron]

oh for SURE skarmory

[covert saffron]

i’m debating it

scizor bangs also

[tiny saffron]

probably wooper (meme in my pokerole sessions)

[covert saffron]

espeon is my favourite pokémon ever

is pokerole good?

[tiny saffron]

ehhhhhh

[languid lichen]

sneasel, larvitar, misdreavus, probably

[tiny saffron]

honestly not really

[covert saffron]

i LOVE porygon2

[tiny saffron]

3rd slot is hard but I might go Tyrannitar / Larvitar

[covert saffron]

okay so i should keep making my own system for pokémon in a tabletop setting?

[tiny saffron]

always

imo

[covert saffron]

very good

[tiny saffron]

I've seen a few

[covert saffron]

tyranitar is a favourite of all time

[tiny saffron]

many of them run into the issue of trying to cleave too close to the game

[languid lichen]

misdreavus is only there because mismagius doesn't qualify

[covert saffron]

quite probably my favourite pseudo

[languid lichen]

but it's pretty cute too

[tiny saffron]

pokerole is probably best with a very small party

[covert saffron]

mine was an interesting system

bit too tired to explain it rn

some light player mechanics and then a fast paced crunchy battle system that isn’t JUST crunch

snappy if u will

[covert saffron]

misdreavus slaps

they gave us one ghost type

glad it was such a good one

[languid lichen]

top three per gen is probably uh

[tiny saffron]

my favorite pokemon system I was watching someone make, sadly unfinished
basically abstracted all the battle mechanics into a tug of war for positioning, and had mechanics to make 2-3 pokemon teams as viable as 6 (or more!) squads

[covert saffron]

very nice

[tiny saffron]

tbh running pokemon for years made it hard to pick favorites

they are all pretty shaped

[tiny saffron]

I will say its better than its 1e was, and also PTU

[languid lichen]

1: Bulbasaur, Ryhorn, Eevee
2: Larvitar, Sneasel, Misdreavus
3: Mawile, Absol, Swampert
4: Riolu, Garchomp, Shinx (i have so many runner-ups)
5: Dewott, Archeops, Lilligant
6: Tyrantrum, Trevenant, Aegislash (there are a bunch of megas that would take places tho)
7: Mareanie, Decidueye, Lunala
8: Hisuian Samurott, Hisuian Zoroark, Clobbopus
9: Meowscarada, Chien-Pao, Sprigatito

megas are sick as fuck though

TPC needs to stop doing type-based regional gimmicks that are immediately discarded the next generation

and go back to megas

[soft isle]

Can we say Umbreon thrice?

Monolith ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) okay but. what about gen 2 👀

If not, then Umbreon, Quilava, Suicune

[languid lichen]

i just want to list sinnoh mons over and over ngl

[soft isle]

We were mega evolution haters when x/y came out but having had some time to think about it, it’s easily our favorite of the gimmicks

topple ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) and go back to megas

[languid lichen]

it has my favorite eevee, my favorite route 1 mons, most of my favorite overall mons

[tiny saffron]

I'm a big gen 5 fan

[languid lichen]

i like a lot of gen 5 stuff too

[tiny saffron]

I think pretty much anytime gen 5 riffed off what gen 1 did, gen 5 did it better

[languid lichen]

dewott is one of my favorite starter mons full stop

i don't think garbodor is good

[soft isle]

Gen 5 fucks

[languid lichen]

i think muk is mediocre, but garbodor fumbles trubbish

which has more definition and personality, imo

[tiny saffron]

I can kinda get behind that

[soft isle]

N is probably our favorite major npc

[tiny saffron]

I like its face / teeth

[languid lichen]

N slaps

i'll also say, gens 3-5 are the ones with like

[soft isle]

N our beloved

[languid lichen]

really good route 1 mons

taillow slaps, starly is based, poochyena, shinx, and purrloin (and their evos) are great

(shinx my beloved)

pants baby

[soft isle]

Shinx our beloved 💙

[languid lichen]

zigzagoon is also the best regional rodent imo

[soft isle]

The Shinx line is our favorite gen 4 line tbh

[languid lichen]

sewaddle and venipede are easily the best regional bugs, as well

DEEDLY-DEEDLY-WOOP is pretty memorable, but i think leavanny slaps

although "violinist vibes cricket" kinda fucks as a design concept

[umbral hound]

Mega Evolutions are cool, but not really interesting from a gameplay standpoint? They were just... other pokemon... that needed a held item, most of the time. And they sort of "blocked off" those pokemon from getting proper evolutions. Meanwhile, Terastallization has really interesting tactical considerations involved. However, in best-of-one closed teamsheet matches, the surprise factor on it can be a little too much.

[languid lichen]

(i don't love wurmple however)

teras are kind of a disaster for balance in pokemon singles

megas allowed for design iteration on a ton of mons, giving you like

visual variants without being regional forms

[soft isle]

We will say that mega evolution gave Sceptile the dragon typing it should’ve had from the start and that automatically wins a lot of points with us

[languid lichen]

and allowed for both "sidegrade mons" like ttar and garchomp, and viability hard-carries

[soft isle]

Also made Mawile good

[umbral hound]

Pokemon has decided that doubles is The Format to be used for competitive play. And that's not a terrible stance to take.

[languid lichen]

like pinsir and mawile

mega evolution also had a ton of positive impact on doubles, afaik

[languid lichen]

mega mawile is an incredible design

[umbral hound]

The problem is that you can only mega evolve once. So that's a decision you make in teambuilding.

[soft isle]

V-max was a surprisingly good mechanic in doubles

[languid lichen]

you can also only tera once

and do the other gimmicks

[soft isle]

We had a lot of fun with vgc in swsh

[umbral hound]

Yes, but any pokemon in your team can tera. You don't have to pick ahead of time which mon will do it.

[languid lichen]

right, which is...a problem

not a good thing

it's random landmine power

that requires zero commitment

[umbral hound]

I think it's a good thing because it enhances the depth of tactical play.

[tiny saffron]

I like wurmple as a design more than the other caterpillars

not sure I like its final evos or middle stages though

[languid lichen]

it enhances unpredictability

but not in a healthy way

[umbral hound]

But, as posted above, a lot of people believe that in order for it to be fair, you need either best-of-3 matches or open teamsheets, so the instance of what tera type something will have isn't a surprise.

[near flower]

totodile croconaw feraligatr

serious answer: totodile, lugia, entei

[soft isle]

We can respect that

Gen 2 has a whole lot of good mons

We’ve done nothing all day but play Crystal randomizer lol

[umbral hound]

And terastallization isn't totally unpredictable, since you can usually guess when something's going to tera, just reading your opponent. That's a skill.

[languid lichen]

it turns everything into a coin flip

there's a lot of "i pressed the tera button and immediately won the game"

[umbral hound]

If the type is known ahead of time instead, that lets you play a bit more effectively, though. And a lot of the time people can guess because the meta set runs a particular tera type, but sometimes you don't know exactly which it'll be, and then the surprise is unfun.

[languid lichen]

because you flip type charts drastically

[near flower]

does he know that i know that hes gonna go supereffective into this tera that will wall his supereffective and therefore know not to do that
type mindgames ass shit

[languid lichen]

it's something that, if it required more commitment, would be healthier

[umbral hound]

Counterpoint: unlike flinches, secondary effects on moves applying status effects, full paralysis, speed ties, and turns sleep lasts, there is absolutely no randomness to it.

[languid lichen]

pokemon has a lot of bad game design, yes

[near flower]

i like tera from a cool factor standpoint and dont know anything about comp though so

[umbral hound]

I agree the degree of randomness is a problem sometimes. I disagree that Terastallization is random, because it isn't. Just because you don't know what an opponent's going to do doesn't make it random.

It's as random as which coverage move your opponent is running. Or, heck, which 4 pokemon your opponent uses in VGC.

[soft isle]

There’s a lot of fine competitive games that boil down to extremely complicated rock-paper-scissors, and that’s not a bad thing necessarily

[languid lichen]

i never said it was random

i said it was unpredictable and volatile

and unhealthy

[umbral hound]

...you kind of did.

[near flower]

tera's way better than dyna/giga if you ask me, though i will admit to not playing swsh (it was sort of the reason i dropped pokemon for a while lol)
which was just 'mega evolution but lamer and also we do more gen1 dicksucking'

[umbral hound]

or this in particular I was parsing as talking about randomness, more than that original message.

[languid lichen]

dmaxing was fucking vile for singles, but surprisingly not oppressive in VGC

[umbral hound]

The first one isn't really about randomness, but the second one I interpreted as talking about randomness. If that's not what you meant, I apologize.

[languid lichen]

the coin flip is "forces many turns into 50/50s", because it's a binary of "does clicking the button end the game or does not clicking the button end the game" way earlier than a lot of other boardstates

coin-flip as in 0 or 1, as opposed to random

[umbral hound]

That makes more sense, and I apologize.

[languid lichen]

there are definitely plenty of other places in pokemon battles where decisions are "50/50 to end the game", but those usually happen a lot farther along a game-state than tera allows for

i.e. the extreme volatility its absolute type-chart control provides

[near flower]

when they announced dexit i joked to my friend 'if they dont put totodile in im not buying it lol' because i fully expected them to put all of them in since well. theyre the fucking starters
and then they didnt
oh but of course they put charmander in as the only starter line at launch lmao
why have your champion's ace be a new pokemon from the new region that you would want to showcase when you can continue to use the same dead horse trick over and over again

[languid lichen]

bo3s make it less fucked, but

having it as an option on all six mons makes it a series of landmines

[umbral hound]

It does increase volatility a bit more than just being able to pivot into a different type. I think part of it is because I was comparing it to Dynamax, where a lot of matches were kind of about the dynamax mon, whereas terastallizing a pokemon doesn't necessarily completely center the match on them... but "better than dynamax" is not an ideal bar to clear.

[languid lichen]

yeah, swsh fully cemented my loathing of gen 1

with the "The three most popular pokemon in Galar are charizard, gengar, and another kanto mon i can't remember"

machamp maybe?

literally zero galarian mons in the top 3 favorite mons in galar

which they had as a canon thing

and then the leader's ace is charizard

[near flower]

thats... so fucking sad man

[languid lichen]

and oh boy, custom gmaxes for the new starters...and also the kanto starters

and no other starters

just kanto, because fuck you

[near flower]

its a shame too because i do like a lot of galar's mon design
oh and also all the regionals also being g1 variants too

[languid lichen]

and then charizard also got two megas

[tiny saffron]

galar had some great design

[languid lichen]

as did mewtwo

the only mons in the game to get two megas are both gen 1

[umbral hound]

...someone pointed out that gen 4 is also kind of missing? Legends: Arceus had a lot of stuff for gen 2 mons, which have been a bit neglected and so that's nice, but the game taking place in ancient sinnoh has no variants of sinnoh mons?

[languid lichen]

rather than any gen 6

and you know who got mega evos?

not the gen 6 starters

[umbral hound]

I could accept Mewtwo getting 2 megas, because it's artificial. Charizard? There's no good reason for that.

[languid lichen]

but yes charizard

they had to give two fucking mega evolutions to zard (and one mega to the kanto starters)

but none to the kalosians

[near flower]

that annoyed me in SUMO. all the alolan forms were g1

[languid lichen]

and then yeah, SM made every regional form kanto

[near flower]

right it was totally deranged!

[snow cobalt]

i'd rather not have this be too much of a complaint-pit, as much as I agree with specific complaints

[languid lichen]

...fair enough

[near flower]

right on

[languid lichen]

i will stop complaining about charizard

[tiny saffron]

I was more fine with alolan forms being more gen 1 heavy, because tbh I think designs like muk needed the boost

[languid lichen]

alolan muk is very cool

[snow cobalt]

rainbow slime......

[soft isle]

Alolan Grimer and Muk were sick

[languid lichen]

as are the ices (sandshrew/slash and vulpix/ninetails)

[soft isle]

Also Alolan Ratatta

[languid lichen]

although it's a fucking crime that they didn't call them snowshrew and snowslash

they ain't fuckin sand anymore motherfucker

they're snow

call them what they is

[snow cobalt]

snow is sand now

it's the law

[near flower]

i just wish theyd stop neglecting johto
the alolan forms were pretty damn cool
i even like a-persian which im 80% sure is kind of an unpopular opinion

[languid lichen]

also, two megas for mewtwo, none for the kalosian legendaries

just had to say it :v

now i will stop

[umbral hound]

I will say that I really like alolan marowak, even if it has been a bit forgotten. That might be because I just like ghost-types, though.

[languid lichen]

and start gushing about things i do like

[near flower]

o7

[languid lichen]

alolan marowak is also very good

[soft isle]

Snow is sand but water

Stepnix ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) snow is sand now

[snow cobalt]

Oh yeah that one's great

[tiny saffron]

gen 6 mightve gotten more megas for its gen if it got a third game (rip zygarde)

[languid lichen]

i will say that, while i really dislike that every alolan form is kantonian

[near flower]

snow and sand are kinda simial
theyre both mineral powders (did you know naturally formed ice is considered a mineral)

[languid lichen]

i do quite like most of the forms themselves

[umbral hound]

All of the Hisuian forms besides Braviary and Basculin/Basculegion, unless I'm forgetting one. (Do you count Kleavor as gen1 because scyther or gen2 because scizor?)

[soft isle]

Yessss we loved Alolan Marowak! It had such a sick design!

Bananatron (She/He (Mix it up)) ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) I will say that I really like alolan marowak, even if it has been a bit forgotten. That might be be…

[tiny saffron]

its a great direction to take the series

remixing old mon

[snow cobalt]

oh yeah has there ever been a full explanation on that or do we have to piece it together from bits of dialogue that may or may not be abandoned plot threads

[languid lichen]

arcanine

and the two non-typhlosion starters

(samurott and decidueye)

also voltorb and electrode

and lilligant

[soft isle]

H-Zoroark

Bananatron (She/He (Mix it up)) ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) All of the Hisuian forms besides Braviary and Basculin/Basculegion, unless I'm forgetting one. (Do …

[languid lichen]

zoroark

sliggoo and goodra

[umbral hound]

...you know what should have been a regional form? An underground Shellos/Gastrodon, which is all white.

[languid lichen]

avalugg

there are a lot of gen 5s

[tiny saffron]

which part, why we didnt get a third game
or zygardes whole deal?

[near flower]

i didnt play arceus sadly

[soft isle]

That would be so sick

Bananatron (She/He (Mix it up)) ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) ...you know what should have been a regional form? An underground Shellos/Gastrodon, which is all w…

[languid lichen]

and a couple gen 2s

[snow cobalt]

Why there wasn't a third game

[languid lichen]

but the gen 2s are just qwilfish and sneasel -> overqwil and sneasler

[umbral hound]

Okay, one, that's a lot of gen5 love which is also very deserved. Secondly:

[languid lichen]

(and typhlosion)

[languid lichen]

there are as many gen 1 hisuians as gen 2

[soft isle]

We have a particular appreciation for Arceus because of how good the music is 😄 highly recommend listening to the Dialga/Palkia music and the Arceus medley

Hero ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) i didnt play arceus sadly

[languid lichen]

and then one gen 7, one gen 6, and the rest gen 5

[near flower]

gen 5 is my second favorite so still a W in my book
i should pick arceus up at some point since it looks super interesting

[languid lichen]

yeah, it's really good

[umbral hound]

And stantler->wyrdeer, and ursaluna. And Kleavor, depending on if you count it as an evolution of a gen1 or a sidegrade to a gen2.

[languid lichen]

oh shit, thanks

[soft isle]

Arceus is our favorite of the post gen-5 games

[languid lichen]

i forgot about stantler and ursaluna

i'd call kleavor a gen 1 evo

i really do want some gen 4 regionals, however

and a return to megas (not more gen 1 megas :x)

[soft isle]

Honestly playing Arceus makes us want to replay Platinum

[languid lichen]

fun fact: there's exactly one mega from gen 5

it's audino

and it's pretty cool honestly

[soft isle]

But we’ve got too many playthroughs already going on

[languid lichen]

just wish it'd kept regenerator

[near flower]

man thinking about gen 6 again
so much missed potential
x/y were so clearly unfinished and/or undercooked
but kalos as a region is so cool
like they had a few locations based on places i had actually visited! like mont saint michelle clearly inspiring shalour city

[languid lichen]

i really, really want a regional gible line

[tiny saffron]

I assumed it was just a rush to get the next region ready, and with gen7s release coinciding with the 20th anniversary

[languid lichen]

and regional gen 4 starters frankly

[tiny saffron]

seems the most likely

but idk for sure

[languid lichen]

regional lake trio 👀

[umbral hound]

...I want N to show up sometime. Cynthia shows up a lot because she's Iconic, and that makes sense. But N is also Iconic, and he feels like he'd definitely be a cryptid in-universe.

[languid lichen]

lumineon evolution that makes people actually fucking remember it

[soft isle]

The fact that Typhlosion got a Hisuian form blew our mind 😄 Cyndaquil is our favorite starter across the series

[tiny saffron]

gen 5 remakes seem to be on the horizon

[near flower]

id love to see N again
i want to see how he's grown after everything that happens

[tiny saffron]

🙏 PLEASE be like HGSS instead of like BDSP

[languid lichen]

that'd be rad

what both of you said

[umbral hound]

...also "tall guy traveling alone except for his pokemon in the middle of nowhere, with long, pale greenish hair" describes both N and Arven. I'm not claiming they're derivative or too similar or anything, just that they describe similarly, and I could imagine someone randomly running into N, describing him online, and being told "oh that's Arven".

[languid lichen]

but what i really want is for a game to do to sinnoh what gen 4 did to kanto and johto

give some weaksauce mons juiced up evos

give me a carnivine evo, a lumineon stage 3

[umbral hound]

I think part of the problem is generation 5's automatic narrative footgun. (this is not a new sentiment; I just wanted to state it in a humorous harder-to-understand way.)

[languid lichen]

a full-orchestra kricketune

[near flower]

real
so crazy how they hit it out of the park with HGSS and then never really did anything of that magnitude again

[near flower]

what would that be?

[near flower]

thatd be really cute
we need more strong bugs
despite being pretty scared of bugs irl im kinda fond of bug types

[umbral hound]

The narrative is a clash between truth and ideals, neither of which can be defined, since the same position has to be able to be described using both terms.

[tiny saffron]

I didnt play gen 9 but a theres a lot of good ideas or little bits in the pokemon games

its really just a time thing imo

[soft isle]

We were super disappointed by ORAS tbh

Hero ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) real
so crazy how they hit it out of the park with HGSS and then never really did anything of that m…

[near flower]

world if whoever did the schedluing for pokemon's game development didnt suck and/or didnt have oppressive mandates hanging over them like a sword of damoclese

[languid lichen]

yeah

the pokemon company needs to be like

put the fuck down

except the art teams

[near flower]

i thought oras was really cool
and was kinda shocked when years later i found out it was kinda divisive

[soft isle]

We’ll keep our complaining about it to a minimum but it didn’t run super well on the 3DS and it has a much much worse postgame than Emerald

[languid lichen]

and nintendo needs to ASSUME DIRECT CONTROL

and do what they keep doing with like, mario and zelda

[near flower]

no battle facilities was a huge L

i think scarvio is a good step in the right direction
it just needed like another few months to cook in terms of stability

[languid lichen]

(regular innovation and refinement, continuous love-letters to the entire series, passion for the worlds and the emotions that they inspire)

the entire fuckin mario wonder thing

[soft isle]

We also didn’t like New Mauville but that’s just our “they changed it now it’s bad” talking

[languid lichen]

"hmm, we feel like we've been kind of phoning it in with 2d mario lately, time to re-revolutionize it"

[soft isle]

Really what we wanted was Emerald in 3D with megas and the physical/special split

[snow cobalt]

i had fun with New Mauville but I also like putting together the mega energy lore bits

[languid lichen]

god, can you imagine if the pokemon goobers loved pokemon and wanted its soul to shine through in the way the mario devs just

[snow cobalt]

sensible

[languid lichen]

so obviously love mario

[soft isle]

Yknow what we’d love to see them make is a new colosseum sequel

[languid lichen]

that would fucking slap actually

[soft isle]

Oops All Doubles is really fun

[languid lichen]

gale of darkness was incredible

[soft isle]

Yesss

[languid lichen]

i'd love to see like

that vibe with a fully-updated game

but god, give me like

[tiny saffron]

I wonder if they could do Ranger again, with the Switch

[languid lichen]

water/fairy lumineon stage 3

[near flower]

the all doubles nature of indigo disk was really neat and really made me think about spending an exorbitant sum to try and pick up copies of colo/XD before i remembered i have a crazy rig and can just. emu it

god id love to see ranger again

[languid lichen]

grass/fire carnivine that's less of a "spicy pepper plant" mon like the gen 9 one

and more full on lava plant creecher

[snow cobalt]

Are they doing fewer spin-offs now or am I just out of the loop

[tiny saffron]

the original pokemon ranger was possibly my first video game lmao

[near flower]

they definitely are doing less spinoffs

[languid lichen]

nah, they're definitely doing fewer overall spinoffs

[near flower]

insert obvious 'more pmd please'
but id be down for another pokemon conquest game

[snow cobalt]

huh

[soft isle]

Wait what? Indigo Disk was all doubles?

Hero ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) the all doubles nature of indigo disk was really neat and really made me think about spending an exo…

[near flower]

yup!

[soft isle]

We haven’t gotten to that stuff yet

Fuck yes that makes us so happy

[languid lichen]

pokemon conquest really suffered from the fact that like

the game starts once you've cleared it once

[near flower]

yeah

its funny that way

[languid lichen]

you have to slog through an entire (admittedly not super long) playthrough

to get to what makes it really good

and it took me years to do that

[soft isle]

Kind of related, we want a new PMD but with the brightness and saturation toned down a bit

Hero ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) insert obvious 'more pmd please'
but id be down for another pokemon conquest game

Rescue Team DX was actually painful to look at with our migraines :$

[near flower]

i liked how bright it was but then again im a sucker for saturation and i dont have any eye strain issues

[languid lichen]

GEN 4 DID IT BEST, AS WITH ALL THINGS

[snow cobalt]

i want PMD character creation in TTRPGs

[languid lichen]

explorers was so fucking incredible it's unreal

[soft isle]

We get visually overstimulated very easily unfortunately

[languid lichen]

singlehandedly making two entire generations of people love grovyle

[soft isle]

Gonna go listen to Dialga’s Fight To The Finish again

topple ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) explorers was so fucking incredible it's unreal

[languid lichen]

what a stellar track

[near flower]

explorers the GOAT
crazy how they never made any other pmd games except for the rescue team remakes after that

/j

[soft isle]

Gen 4 wasn’t a gen we liked very much overall but it has the best music in the series

[languid lichen]

god i just

adore so many gen 4 mons

[snow cobalt]

super mystery dungeon was good

[near flower]

twas pretty fun
though if i remember from my playthrough i thought the story was kinda undercooked

[snow cobalt]

It's probably my favorite recruitment system

[languid lichen]

garchomp, riolu & lucario, the turtwig line (turtwig is the single best-designed stage 1 starter imo), the shinx line, giratina, skorupi & drapion, the starly line, the bnuuys, bastiodon, fuckin spiritomb

[soft isle]

The Explorers games always succeed at making us cry

[languid lichen]

croagunk and toxicroak are rad

[snow cobalt]

reasonable

[languid lichen]

weavile is an incredible progression on sneasel

[soft isle]

We loved the story of Explorers, and we still have Grovyle brainrot even a decade later

[near flower]

LMAOOO

pmde was the first game i cried at

[snow cobalt]

I really appreciate how "gotta complete two missions between story points" helped you settle into the world

[languid lichen]

yeah

[snow cobalt]

i should take all my game design notes from Explorers

[tiny saffron]

I did it once!

[near flower]

i wish i were better with computer stuff
because my dream is like. pmd: eos but with every new pokemon and new move up to the current gen

[tiny saffron]

for a CofD occultists / hunter thing

really only dictated what type of homebrew Lore you were tied to at the start

[snow cobalt]

Incredible

[tiny saffron]

and all the lores were riffing off the cultsim stuff

so it was a good way to get the vibes exact

[near flower]

and maybe stuff like megas thrown in somehow
but im completely incompetent with tech
if someone were crazy and talented enough to do that id get a job immediately to singlehandedly fund them

[tiny saffron]

stuff like "Theres a bookstore, dusty, old, rows of tomes undisturbed. Scanning the shelves, one book alone catches your interest: which was it?"
and then just a few options with very different feels to them

wasnt a long quiz

but It was very fun to do

[snow cobalt]

yesssss

[tiny saffron]

makes it feel more personal

[near flower]

that sounds cool as fuck
whats cofd?

[tiny saffron]

Chronicles of Darkness, related to World of Darkness

same stuff games like Vampire-Masquerade or Mage are from

[near flower]

ahh

[tiny saffron]

this was pretty divorced from setting though I just wanted a system to run cultsimmy stuff

[soft isle]

Honestly we long for a good Pokemon ttrpg

PMD style, we mean

Oh fun fact for those not using tumblr: the main tag people use for their rp blogs is “rotumblr” and we think that is adorable

[azure crane]

Gen 2: Dunsparce, Misdreavus, Azumarill

[umbral hound]

randomly thinking about pokemon competitive team stuff and the potential merits of Gastrodon/Sinistcha/Heatran as a defensive grass/fire/water core. I'm not sure if Heatran should swap out for Incineroar or Gouging Fire, or what the rest of the team should be... I'm thinking Ursaluna (Sinistcha having Trick Room), and then... maybe Raging Bolt and whatever paradox Terrakion is called, maybe?

Gastrodon just feels really, really well positioned, honestly. Ogerpon beats it up and spits on its corpse (until you terastallize to fire), but otherwise, it can get enough bulk to live neutral hits, and it's immune to a lot of meaningful stuff and makes its partner immune to Surging Strikes or a water-type Ivy Cudgel.

I think Iron Boulder goes here, for sure. Rock's a pretty good defensive type, and while Ground hits a disturbing amount of our team Gastrodon and Sinistcha can both just eat it up.

[covert saffron]

holy shit i got the discourse going

hot take: z-moves are cooler than megas

[languid lichen]

counterpoint:

[covert saffron]

counterpoint: z-conversion

[languid lichen]

I mean, z-moves are definitely more compelling than dmaxing and tera types

but

eh

[covert saffron]

this will always fuck

[languid lichen]

there's nothing exciting to me about clicking a button harder with a really bad animation

compared to dropping a mega abomasnow or pinsir

[covert saffron]

megas are cool but my beef is that they were, unlike even weather, exceptionally centralising

and also mostly given out to shit that didn’t need it (scizor, tar, metagross, mence, garchomp, but not dragonite who was likely the worst of that bunch), latis, gengar, alakazam, but not golem and machamp, diancie

[languid lichen]

dragonite was better than scizor and gross tho

diancie was kinda dog without its mega

and there were also megas for things like cross, pinsir, beedrill, audino, camerupt, abomasnow, etc.

[covert saffron]

gen3ou is my fave meta bc it’s so simple

[languid lichen]

oh god, I would have an aneurysm trying to go back to pre-gen4

[covert saffron]

yeah i’ll agree it made a lot of stuff actually viable

mawile for instance

gen3 slaps take my word

[languid lichen]

having played gen 3, and also gen 3 singles tiers, no

[covert saffron]

it does

[languid lichen]

the benefit of like...types not being worthless if your attack stat is wrong

[covert saffron]

someone clearly isn’t very good at gen 3 ;)

[languid lichen]

just cannot be overstated

[covert saffron]

types ain’t worthless smh

you be nice to gengar

STAB overrated

gen 3 is like playing a roided up pokémon stadium it’s great

[languid lichen]

gen 4 made the formula demonstrably better, and coming back to anything prior lets you feel the creaking arthritic age

[covert saffron]

okay but consider:

Gengar @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 248 HP / 44 Def / 8 SpA / 112 SpD / 96 Spe
Timid Nature

• Will-O-Wisp
• Taunt
• Thunderbolt
• Ice Punch

normal gengar set

Gengar @ Leftovers
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature

• Thunderbolt
• Ice Punch
• Hidden Power Grass
• Explosion

the other normal gengar set

not a shadow ball in sight

working within such jank limitations is extremely engaging

you end up coming up with some really charming sets

like a lot of T-Tars will run HP bug or flying, sometimes even ghost, for physical coverage against certain stuff (heracross, breloom, etc)

bc dark is special if you want a dark type offensive Tar you gotta invest

some wacky mixed metagross sets out there

jirachi, celebi, and in theory mew become incredibly strange but compelling mons to use

Tyranitar @ Leftovers
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 248 HP / 80 Atk / 180 Spe
Adamant Nature

• Dragon Dance
• Rock Slide
• Earthquake
• Hidden Power Bug

love this shit

it’s dumb as fuck

[covert saffron]

i live for this shit!

i’m dracula, i’m 12 million years old

[verbal shoal]

holay molay

smogon thread???

i played some s/v nu when the dlc first came out because the tier was. very funny at the time

quick draw/quick claw slowbro so silly

i haven't touched showdown in a while though i've been meaning to start s/v ou

[hidden kraken]

I’ve become a bastard who jail broke a 3ds to get a shiny genesect

Shame I can’t use him in S/V

[umbral hound]

Hot take: the pokedex is a neural network. You're catching a bunch to provide training data, and then it looks at a picture of an animal and collates information about what it is, where it lives, and some facts about it. Unfortunately, it's known to occasionally wildly screw up numbers, or mix together myths, urban legends, and "stuff someone said on the internet" with actual scholarly data... but just being able to identify the pokemon and find stuff about it at all is impressive.

[snow cobalt]

sure yeah that sounds consistent

[umbral hound]

There's already some stuff for leaf identification in real life, but you can pretty reliably take a picture of a leaf from a constant angle, and it's not moving. And those usually point at a single database rather than pulling together a whole bunch of information from everywhere.

(But "neural net losing track of things" is probably the best explanation for some of the really, really absurd numbers that show up.)

[near flower]

ive always thought that the exageration and shit was just a result of the pokedexs we see being compiled by children

[umbral hound]

That also makes sense, but I still think "collect them all for a neural net training corpus" is a good explanation for that part at least.

[near flower]

so of course little joey is gonna see some crazy stuff and write down whatever he thinks is going on regardless of whether thats actually whats happening

[umbral hound]

Yeah. All the weights are too low and all the other numbers are way too high and occasionally you get weird myths like Kadabra's gen 1 entry or Lombre's Kitakami entry. But there's still some useful stuff in there.

[umbral hound]

I wish Gamefreak didn't hate special-attacking flying-type pokemon.

[languid lichen]

you're going to take your 75 bp stab move that doesn't even have 100% accuracy and you're going to like it

[near flower]

wait is hurricane not special

[umbral hound]

Hurricane is. It also has 80% accuracy outside of rain. (I wanted to look at Enamorus-T, but Enamorus-I with Contrary Tera Stellar Tera Blast is probably just better.)

[languid lichen]

70%

if it was 80% it would be pretty solid

[umbral hound]

(especially since Enamorus-T really wants Trick Room, and possibly Tera Flying Tera Blast as is sometimes done.)

[languid lichen]

would be stronger than stone edge, certainly

but it's 70 like thunder and blizzard

[umbral hound]

The team I should try to actually throw together is Gastrodon/Heatran or Incineroar/Sinistcha/Ursaluna/Iron Boulder/free space, probably Flutter Mane? I'm a little worried about Urshifu-Single Strike.

I'm also considering Raging Bolt. The theory is that Sinistcha+Ursaluna can allow for a trick room mode, Gastrodon walls a lot of relevant stuff and protects its teammate from Water-type moves with Storm Drain (and boost in the process), Iron Boulder is just Pretty Strong and Petty Fast, Heatran completes a grass/fire/water core, and then Flutter Mane is the best mon in the game. Gouging Fire and Ogerpon-Hearthflame also feel like considerations.

[pliant violet]

I wanna run a team with Hydrapple because

It’s cool

I like that they made 3 very different grass dragons

[umbral hound]

There's the apples, but don't forget Exeggutor-Alolan.

[pliant violet]

I try to forget all variants of this

[umbral hound]

I love how they gave its former signature move to Raging Bolt just to be funny.

[pliant violet]

Wait really

God that’s brutal

[umbral hound]

Yes, and hilarious.

[languid lichen]

necc

[umbral hound]

I... need to calc and/or look up some actual numbers for this stuff.

I remember someone talking about how the fundamentals for a team are:

• Some form of speed control
• Some sort of sweeper that's immediately threatening
• ...a useful defensive pivot I think? I don't remember the third thing exactly 😅
  Thus far, I have a trick room setter for the first, and for the second, uh... Iron Boulder? But Iron Boulder might want to set up with Swords Dance. Ursaluna? But I thought Ursaluna might be outdated... and besides, I want a team that can function outside Trick Room meaning some other form of speed control maybe?

And, oh, how I wish that Springtide Storm had 100% accuracy in rain like the other storm signature moves.

[pliant violet]

Blood moon ursaluna is not outdated

Are you planning for singles or doubles

[umbral hound]

I was considering regular ursaluna, and I'm planning for VGC because I've been looking at a bunch of stuff, and I've discovered that Springtide Storm not having 100% accuracy in rain doesn't matter as much as I'd thought seeing as it also doesn't get Hurricane.

Blood Moon Ursaluna as an immediate special-attacking threat makes sense and is probably bulky enough that risking going second is not the end of the world?

I'm also gonna do some investigation into Iron Boulder sets, for the non-Trick Room mode? Or is having two modes just equivalent to being worse at both?

I might steal a trick I saw from WolfeyVGC and try to toss in Sap Sipper Farigiraf as a second Trick Room setter who also can hit hard with Throat Spray Hyper Voice and also pivot from Gastrodon in front of Ogerpon.

I need something that can handle Urshifu-Single Strike, though.

Convince me not to run Falinks.

The answer for Urshifu is more likely Galarian Zapdos. Or a Flutter Mane that's faster than it.

[pliant violet]

Falinks fucks

[umbral hound]

Defiant is better than Battle Armor against everything except for exactly Urshifu - Single Strike.

[umbral hound]

oh yeah this pokedex entry.

Minior that fall to the ground try to return to space, but their wish will not come true—all they can do is fade away.

[pliant violet]

Battle Armour is useful for consistency

Also I secretly love minior

[umbral hound]

Falinks seems so close to runnable... and then you see its stats. It gets a lot of cool moves like First Impression, Upper Hand, Coaching, Throat Chop, Brick Break, Knock Off, various coverage options... and none of that changes the fact that it has 75 speed, which is square in the middle of the "faster than trick room mons, slower than everything else" zone. And 65 HP. And 60 special defense.

[pliant violet]

Oh you left out it’s signature move

No retreat

[umbral hound]

Yeah, which is... less bad, in Doubles, but still only okay.

[languid lichen]

falinks would be good if it were anything other than falinks

i don't really like non-stab first impression, most of the time

[pliant violet]

Topple I will not tolerate this slander

[languid lichen]

it's definitely not bad

[pliant violet]

They’re 6 great little dudes

[languid lichen]

but it's not a huge impact, and unlike offstab sucker punch and espeed, it doesn't threaten anything outside of its predictable revenge-killing turn

you want it to hit like a truck, because it's too telegraphed

and no retreat is a painful gimmick

[pliant violet]

I’m pretty sure Falinks gets megahorn

[languid lichen]

because it also makes things too predictable, by virtue of being titanically overcommittal

without recovery or the bulk to make the wanton risk less painful

it does, as well as lunge

unfortunately, bug coverage ain't enough to make its unoptimized 470 bst put in the work

[pliant violet]

I’m a big fan of no retreat what can I say

[languid lichen]

and there are so, so many mono-fighting mons in the game, a number of which have better stats and/or more consistent priority

and certainly plenty of far better multitype fightings

[pliant violet]

Skill issue I’m here for the silly little guys

[umbral hound]

Yeah, it has a decently good movepool, good abilities, a non-terrible typing, and just really really bad stats.

[languid lichen]

no retreat is a strong move that suffers from being on falinks

[pliant violet]

I will get the Karen quote

[umbral hound]

...honestly? It would be nice if it got an evo, not just for the sake of a hypothetical evo, but because if it could hold eviolite that would help a good amount.

[languid lichen]

too many good psychics still, tbh

indeedee, the iron swords, the latis, armarouge

idr what current vgc banlist is, but there's a lot of strong psychic in the meta

both in singles and doubles

and no retreat makes it rough

[umbral hound]

Yeah, I just made a team with no answers to Urshifu-Single Strike short of outspeeding it with Flutter Mane and/or going Tera Fairy and got overly paranoid about it, and then saw Falinks got Battle Armor.

[languid lichen]

i suggest great tusk

if it's in the same pool

[umbral hound]

It should be. I just... don't know what I'm doing. This is in part "I like Sinistcha, and it seems good" and in part "Gastrodon seems really, really well positioned into the current meta" and then I had 2/3 of a grass/fire/water core and a Trick Room setter + a slow mon. And then I considered Sap Sipper Farigiraf which I stole from Wolfey as another Trick Room setter who, like Sinistcha, can switch in on grass moves... which is kind of redundant.

[pliant violet]

Tbh most of my knowledge is in Little Cup

The objective best format

[covert saffron]

he is right

no berry juice rn tho

[pliant violet]

i like that tyrunt is good in a few different ways

strong jaw dragon dance with elemental fangs sweeper

[covert saffron]

mienfoo

koffing

[pliant violet]

pawniard

tbh that right there is not a terrible core

mienfoo is nasty good

[ancient owl]

Le Numel has arrived

...I peeked briefly into LC a while back, thought Simple was good, and found out a couple other people had the same idea

[pliant violet]

i see we have some Little cup enjoyers in chat

i just think it rides the line of restrictive but restrictive enough to breed creativity

[covert saffron]

and has been since it arrived

[pliant violet]

Doduo is one of my favourite LC "what the fuck are you doing" picks

though in SV it loses HJK for low kick

which is a very big deal

[covert saffron]

that’s p huge

in LC esp

[pliant violet]

sorry jump kick not hjk

but still

so it's probably not gonna be as big of a deal

[azure crane]

My LC team is Scyther, Sneasel, Dunsparce, Girafarig, Duraludon, and Aipom.

[pliant violet]

i think literally all of those are banned

[azure crane]

Yep. They were also Pokemon that didn't evolve in their original generation.

[pliant violet]

yes so they have higher stats

murkrow also

[azure crane]

There needs to be an LC Ubers.

[covert saffron]

murkrow was banned p early from LC right

is porygon still viable

[pliant violet]

porygon is legal i believe

but it's only just come back in the newest dlc so unsure how good it is this meta

[pliant violet]

and yeah like straight away it's absurdly good

like mienfoo is considered the out and out best in lc but it's not banned because it can be countered

murkrow cannot be

[covert saffron]

murkrow was kicked out as soon as possible right tho

[pliant violet]

ye

[covert saffron]

like as soon as it HAD an evo

it was relegated to bottom tier status

i’m doing okay gen3ou wise today

[south laurel]

I should finish my hypothetical SV OU team

[umbral hound]

I love how Duraludon was legal in LC for... I want to say 15 minutes?

[umbral hound]

I feel like someone somewhere lost the plot on Hisuian Lilligant.

It's known as the Spinning Pokemon. If you look at its design, it has "shoes" clearly reminiscent of ballet slippers, with an outfit suiting a ballet dancer with gradient legs emulating tights, and its feet are even placed in... I want to say fourth position? (I took one dance class and remember very little of it.)

So how, you might ask, does it move at high speeds, when you're controlling it with the synchro machine? Simple: it ice-skates.

[south laurel]

Maybe it’s a figure skater?

[umbral hound]

Yeah, it just. Seems kind of weird that it's more ballet dancer than figure skater for everything else I feel like?

[umbral hound]

Also apparently there already was a "solved" reg e gastrodon set 😔

And now I feel like an idiot for not realizing this.

I was going to run calcs but I guess that's just unnecessary huh.

Anyway after looking at the numbers the existing standard tank can survive a choice band urshifu-single strike close combat and can occasionally survive a 252 SpA choice specs modest Raging Bolt Draco Meteor! So... bulky enough. Bad matchup into Ogerpon and Rillaboom but who else is gonna be running grass moves?

[covert saffron]

anybody wanna play some gen3 OU with me?

feelin kinda really really sad

[covert saffron]

national park sounds so genuinely unironically great

like what a nice little piece of music

[soft isle]

https://youtu.be/SZp0vSMT52Q got a remix to recommend! The album this is on is so good

harry, five years running ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) national park sounds so genuinely unironically great

[covert saffron]

https://on.soundcloud.com/rbZaDgP4WtHj9J4Q6

if we’re sharing remix

[soft isle]

oooooh

we love listening to Pokemon music, remixes in particular

the music is actually the thing we like most about Legends Arceus, we think we've talked before about how we love what they did with the Dialga/Palkia theme and the Arceus theme

[covert saffron]

if you guys could move to a region where you moving and what town/city/other locsfion

[soft isle]

Johto, not particularly picky which one though we'd probably choose Ecruteak City

[covert saffron]

johto, azalea town. i wanna chop firewood

protect the slowpokes

make pokeballs with kurt

celebi my boy

smoke some of that oddish

farfetch’d soup >:)

[soft isle]

ooh yeah Azalea's our second choice

We'd go camping in Ilex Forest all the time

[manic kindle]

Sinnoh, Hearthome.

[covert saffron]

me too

[soft isle]

Our first OC we ever made was from Johto

[covert saffron]

:)

[manic kindle]

Beautiful walkable city

[covert saffron]

one game i’d love to see some day is a game that’s like

johto gaiden?

like kanto and johto AFTER the events of gen 2

with a slightly broader pokédex

[soft isle]

oooooh yeah that'd be sick

[covert saffron]

but johto focused

starts you in a different area

maybe with chuck first or smth idk

[soft isle]

We'd love to see a GSC2 ala B2W2

[covert saffron]

LITERALLY

[soft isle]

if we were to make a romhack there's a very real chance that's what we'd make lol

[manic kindle]

I ran a ttrpg campaign with that premise

[soft isle]

what system did you use?

[manic kindle]

PTU at the time

[covert saffron]

i’m making a tabletop system of my own

[manic kindle]

The idea was the tower sages were getting bad omens and signs, and needed some approved trainers to journey to refind ho-oh. Set it 15yr post games

[covert saffron]

i’d be game

where would it start

assuming kanto + johto

[manic kindle]

Azalea or Ecruteak make fun starting spots

[soft isle]

Azalea honestly wouldn't be an awful idea, or maybe Ecruteak yeah

[broken hare]

https://www.pokemon.com/us/pokemon-news/pokemon-tv-to-discontinue-in-march-2024

[covert saffron]

azalea but union cave has had a bit of a shakeup

ecruteak is maybe TOO central?

[soft isle]

Exploring Celebi wouldn't be a bad plot focus

yeah we think Azalea is probably the best choice

[manic kindle]

I think the key to starting Ecruteak is to give defined quests to keep you moving in 1 direction

[covert saffron]

true

or just say mt mortar had a big avalanche and that the only way east is surf

[soft isle]

if you want to be less interesting about it you can have the different directions locked off for one reason or another, but that's boring

[covert saffron]

not boring

gated

that’s what’s good in theory about old pokémon

they are metroidvanias

about the world design i mean

[soft isle]

oh we meant literally like "the way east is having construction done and there's the faceless evil team blocking the way south"

because modern pokemon does this regularly and it annoys us 😛 compared just having mechanical stuff like HMs

something kind of fun would be having a game where you get a fairly early Surf

[manic kindle]

I like it when routes are blocked via quests, in the sense of "hey your #1 priority should be going to olivine, dont go elsewhere yet" sort of stuff

I think water traversal early is fun esp as games get rid of HMs

[broken hare]

Hey, so I've been itching to play some mainline Pokemon lately but I'm a little hesitant on getting SV (idk if all the glitches got fixed up by now)

[soft isle]

so like, we ourselves have been kinda distant haters of S/V because of the performance issues and glitches and what not

but we picked up Scarlet recently and it's really fun even with the jank

the world's fun to explore and we like the characters a lot

the issues are absolutely still there, but they're the "make you laugh" kind of issue rather than the "you lose your save and your pokemon" kind

[manic kindle]

A big help is to make sure theyre installed on the Switch and not an SD card

[broken hare]

I see, part of me does want to go back and play some ones I missed (like BW2 and SunMoon)

[manic kindle]

I think BW2 are a really fun time, especially if you liked a lot of what BW had to offer

[soft isle]

We're in the middle of a gen 5 playthrough at the moment actually, since we got basically every other generation done except that one

[manic kindle]

Gen 5 has been received better with time, and there's some very neat romhacks you can do with them now too

[umbral hound]

Speaking of music and gen 5: who here remembers the Victory Road music, which is impossible to show in a video, because there's badge check gates and a new instrument pops in with each gate.

[soft isle]

the blaze black/volt white hacks are great though they're quite a bit harder than the vanilla games

[umbral hound]

(And it has only now occurred to me that this is linked to the same thing they were doing where you could talk to an NPC in a town to have them play their instrument and it'd add to the background music.)

[manic kindle]

i am a difficulty hack enjoyer, i am the kaizo destroyer

[umbral hound]

A cool thing which I genuinely cannot remember if S/V did: make it so that the battle music either transitions smoothly into and out of the field music (which I'm pretty sure System Shock did decades ago so the technology absolutely exists), or else it's just an extra layer on top.

[soft isle]

we've never deliberately sought out and run a difficulty hack. They seem like they're grind-fests, and that's not something we want to spend a load of time doing

the nuzlocke with level caps and rare candies thing is relevant to our interests however

[manic kindle]

The trick is to find the difficulty hacks that add those QoLs, like free levels / reset EVs anytime stuff

Inclement Emerald is still my peak for that

[soft isle]

ooooh we'll have to give that a look

with all the Crystal Rando we've been running lately it'd be nice to play some gen 3 for a bit

there was a different hack we were going to play but they removed the ability to play as May for some fucking reason >.> and we're really picky about that since the gen 3 female trainer directly contributed to our transfem awakening

ooooh we're looking at the info for this rn and it looks really good 👀

murdoc (he/him) ↩️

[Reply to:](#1160615504562638910 message) Inclement Emerald is still my peak for that

[umbral hound]

Personally, in my mind, everything before the physical/special split qualifies as The Dark Ages. And I say this as someone for whom Pokemon Ruby was basically my first video game, period.

[soft isle]

we hated the physical/special split when it first happened, but now we miss it when we play gen 2/3

the main Emerald hacks we've found that add it in are kinda buggy

[covert saffron]

pop pokémon orange did this

it was great

you got surf before the first gym because it was set in the orange islands

so game world traversal is basically entirely player led

imagine GSC if GSC were on a bunch of islands

imagine the whirl islands routes but good and that’s it that’s the game

jam packed with fun island locations, dungeons, towns, wild encounters, and lots of loot and notable NPCs scattered about

i just got done with some gen3ou

it slaps

doesn’t NEED the split

[soft isle]

Umbreon UUBL in gen 3

[pliant violet]

it needs the split

[torpid escarp]

1. it needs the split
2. why didn't they switch sceptile's atk and sp.atk after the split

[covert saffron]

re: 2.

it’s a lizard

and thus

very special :)

pilot net designs a pokémon game let’s go

let’s do it

the celnar region (i wonder what that could possibly be an anagram of)

STARTERS

WHATS THE GRASS TYPE

[pliant violet]

are we doing like... the legends arceus thing?

[covert saffron]

SURE

[pliant violet]

don't yell at me i'm fragile

[covert saffron]

sure

[pliant violet]

Grookey

[covert saffron]

MONKEY SELECTED

someone else, the fire type

[snow cobalt]

chimchar

[covert saffron]

MONKEY SELECTED

[pliant violet]

there's no water monkey but i love where your head is at

[covert saffron]

some other third person pick the water starter

getting a tropical vibe w the monkeys

[snow cobalt]

panpour

[covert saffron]

so i can think of a few viable c

[pliant violet]

step no

[snow cobalt]

mad with power

[covert saffron]

pick a real water type starter

[pliant violet]

never those monkeys

[covert saffron]

[gunshot]

step is not heard from again

[pliant violet]

Feraligator

[covert saffron]

anyone else got any bright ideas? :^)

gooood.

OKAY MONKEYS N GATORS

LANCAS TOWN, on LANCAS ISLAND

[pliant violet]

no no

Bayou

[covert saffron]

swomp

okay

we are in THE SWOMP

route 1: a bird, a bug, and a rodent

surskit for bug

[snow cobalt]

bidoof for rodent

[covert saffron]

BEAVIN

[torpid escarp]

fuckin

toucannon

[covert saffron]

AWW YEE

okay

RIVAL:

• scornful angsty tool
• snivelling piss baby

[pliant violet]

both at once

rapidly vacillating

[covert saffron]

two or one persons

[pliant violet]

one person

[covert saffron]

i see

[torpid escarp]

can i have a sniveling angsty tool instead

[snow cobalt]

starts as tool ends as baby

[covert saffron]

ROUTE 1 leads into ->

• TOWN
• DUNGEON

[torpid escarp]

i want them to sob and go "UWAAAAAAH WHY CAN'T I WIN"

uhhh

dungeon

[covert saffron]

DUNGEON THEME/TYPE/AESTHETIC

[snow cobalt]

lava dungeon

[pliant violet]

maze of trees

[torpid escarp]

tomb

[pliant violet]

step we're in a swamp

[snow cobalt]

it's a swamp volcano

[torpid escarp]

SUNKEN GRAVEYARD

[covert saffron]

another gunshot, cries of “why won’t you die”

[snow cobalt]

This one's good I like this one

[covert saffron]

MAZE OF TREES AND SUNKEN GRAVEYAED have won

[pliant violet]

can't have ghost types early in a pokemon game because things rely on normal type moves early

[torpid escarp]

fill it with uh

[covert saffron]

fuck you, drops duskull in there anyway

[torpid escarp]

dual type ghosts

[covert saffron]

next

[snow cobalt]

that doesn't make them less immune

[covert saffron]

DUNGEON ENCOUNTERS:

• Pikipek
• Surskit
• what else?

[torpid escarp]

woobat

[snow cobalt]

nosepass

[covert saffron]

okay wow terrible taste but sure

Bellsprout

[torpid escarp]

okay fine dreepy

[pliant violet]

woobat is a good choice despite being the lesser bat

[soft isle]

Aron

[covert saffron]

no go back

[torpid escarp]

explode immediately

[covert saffron]

i was aged physically earlier today when someone played the wtfboom sound in a video

[torpid escarp]

i'm still going woobat
not for any particular reason, i just think the typing is neat

[covert saffron]

Pikipek, Woobat, Surskit, Bellsprout, Nosepass, Aron, Duskull,

okay, DUNGEON ->

• route
• town ?

[pliant violet]

oh i've just discovered a malamar hydrapple team that trickrooms and gives hydrapple contrary

[covert saffron]

ruh roh

[pliant violet]

it's got leaf storm and draco meteor

[covert saffron]

i was gonna say

me when gen 9

[pliant violet]

and big special attack

[manic kindle]

I lost to that earlier today reggie

Its neat

[pliant violet]

doubles or singles?

[covert saffron]

hahahaha

[manic kindle]

Vgc doubles

[pliant violet]

wait i'm silly

has to be doubles

and vgc makes sense

[torpid escarp]

oh yeah, i saw that set

[manic kindle]

I mispredicted their team choices and lost my Entei early but i love the energy of the big apple

[tiny saffron]

woobat hating

[manic kindle]

Harry has strong pokeopinions

[tiny saffron]

I say town

depends on dungeon size

but 2 routes early, ones a dungeon with a lot of little nooks, town acts as a break

[torpid escarp]

i agree with town

[tiny saffron]

maybe add a funny trade in the town

[umbral hound]

just realized infernape has toes... another tragedy. Anyway.

[pliant violet]

?

[umbral hound]

Infernape is a monkey. And yet, it has toes, like a human would.

[covert saffron]

good

[covert saffron]

laddering going poorly lads

gimme a mon and i’ll try make it work

[soft isle]

you already know what we would suggest

[covert saffron]

you’re right

duskull

gen 3 so compelling

porygon2 has such a cool niche

comes in on dug, traces its arena trap, lives a hit, KOs with ice beam

but this can also play so well on claydol, flygon, some other shit

[umbral hound]

porygon stocks spiked in gen 5 with Porygon-Z and Eviolite.

[languid lichen]

pz was gen 4

evio was gen 5

[umbral hound]

yeah but without eviolite, porygon-z existing wasn't as meaningful.

[languid lichen]

idk, pz's been consistently as high or higher-tier than p2

man exists on his own merits

stead of eviolite's

[covert saffron]

4: pz >
5: p2 >
6: p2 = pz
7: pz >
8 ???
9 rough equals idk

[languid lichen]

nah, gen 5 they were both smogon uu

gen 9 p2 is PU and pz is UU

at least right now

[umbral hound]

...really? I thought porygon-z didn't do much of anything but I was apparently very wrong.

[languid lichen]

gen 8 was the only one where p2 ended higher-tier

there's basically always a market for a wallbreaker

unfortunately, gen 8 added indeedee

and there was a bunch of other stuff hanging around RU that made it terrible

so "135 spatk adaptability" was kind of made irrelevant by its low speed + lack of good stab types

whereas p2 still got to be the bulky one

[covert saffron]

p2 was superior

[azure crane]

[manic kindle]

Porygon-Z is the closest you can get to reliving gen1 hyper beam

[covert saffron]

god pZ hyper beam is actually so good

eliminate all ghost types

proceed to murder

[umbral hound]

Isn't Blood Moon the same thing, but you can skip the first step?

[torpid escarp]

p much, yeah

arguably better too, with 10% more accuracy and the option to do something on cooldown turns

[umbral hound]

watching a playthrough of the Scarlet/Violet epilogue, and... okay, I've seen the famous screenshot of ||Penny||, but I didn't realize it was talking about ||the PC's mom?????||

||Penny|| having a very normal one.

Also it is only now fully coming together in my head that the resolution of not only suggestive teasers but also major plot threads is locked behind a limited-time Mystery Gift.

[manic kindle]

No end date on the mystery gift as of yet, i thought?

[umbral hound]

I don't know for sure... I sure hope not.

[manic kindle]

yeah no end date as of rn

[umbral hound]

quote from the playthrough I'm watching:

The lore goes nuts in this game... people are related now, just like in real life. When I see someone's cousin in real life, I go "wow, this is just like Pokemon."

actually every character is having a very normal one

[umbral hound]

pokemon is just determined to obliterate a certain section of its player base huh

[umbral hound]

on a completely unrelated note, Gallade has... kind of a wide movepool. Makes sense, since it's a physical attacker which inheirits moves via its evolution from a special attacking semi-supportive pokemon, but it's still unexpected to see it with Life Dew, Encore, Taunt, Trick Room, Heal Pulse, screens... it doesn't want to run most of those things, but it sure does have them.

[covert saffron]

GUYS

did they get rid of hail??

[umbral hound]

Yeah, it became snow

[south laurel]

Wait does it still deal damage?

No it does not

Huh, guess that makes Alolatales easier to use

[manic kindle]

yeah its better now

In Generation IX, snow replaces hail. It lasts for 5 turns if created using Snow Warning or Snowscape, or 8 turns if created by a Pokémon holding an Icy Rock. The move Chilly Reception also creates snow and switches the user out. It raises the Defense stat of all Ice-type Pokémon by 50%. Unlike hail, snow does not damage non-Ice types.

Chilly Reception is such a funny move.

Slowking got the funniest signature move now

[covert saffron]

blizzard effected?

[manic kindle]

Generations IX

When used during snow, Blizzard bypasses accuracy checks to always hit, unless the target is in the semi-invulnerable turn of a move such as Dig or Fly.

Blizzard is considered a wind move, and will activate Wind Power or Wind Rider if a Pokémon with that Ability is hit with it.

in the very first competition event, i did snow Blizzard snow cloak strats

[umbral hound]

I think it's because in Japanese, a bad joke is referred to as "chilly" rather than "corny"? This explains a portion of this move. It does not explain why Slowking is a comedian.

[manic kindle]

He's a funny guy!

[umbral hound]

He evidently isn't, if he's telling jokes so bad that he consistently gets the cold shoulder.

[covert saffron]

totally superfluous pokémon symphony update

[iron lake]

huh??? what screenshot???

[umbral hound]

Uh, I don't have it, just a screenshot of penny saying the line ||"she's so hot my brain got fried"|| or somesuch (I don't remember the exact wording).

[iron lake]

WHAT

THAT'S NOT REAL

[umbral hound]

Regrettably it is.

[iron lake]

we do not believe you (we believe you but WHAT)

[umbral hound]

well, it wouldn't be regrettable, except for the context.

[iron lake]

Having a very normal one indeed

[manic kindle]

Hey, sometimes you have a hot mom

Penny calls it how she sees it

[pliant violet]

psyduck

[manic kindle]

I love psyduck

[pliant violet]

https://www.tumblr.com/livyamel/738463059958497280/interesting preview sucks but consider this

[covert saffron]

it’s considered

[umbral hound]

That's actually an interesting idea! ...hm. What birds are there in Alola?

I'm trying to figure out if the prominent cheek pouches on electric rodents would just be an example of convergent mimicry on a method of electricity generation or storage, or if it's also evolved as a common method of signaling predators across all the different electric rodents. (It could also be evidence of some common ancestor; are the cheek pouches convergent or divergent?) yes I am overthinking this, but consider: I'm also having fun doing so.

!!! I have evidence for another theory. So: Mimikyu disguises itself as Pikachu; this is well-known. It is stated that it does this to make people like it and this is completely and totally successful... but we also know that the Pokedex contains plenty of unverifiable just-so stories due to being written by kids and/or being an improperly trained neural net that doesn't do a great job distinguishing cultural and scientific explanations for stuff.

In the games, Mimikyu is found in the Thrifty Megamart, along with Klefki, Haunter, Gengar, Shuppet (in Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon), and... Golbat. Golbat is a Poison/Flying type, meaning that it's strong against Fairy-type Pokemon like Mimikyu, but weak against Electric-type Pokemon like Pikachu.

So, perhaps, rather than trying to imitate Pikachu simply to make people like it more, it's trying to do it in order to take advantage of the common Electric-type visual signaling to protect itself from predation.

Also... uh, the Pokedex entries doen't even explicitly state that Mimikyu disguises itself as Pikachu to make people like it more, just that it does it to look less scary, and...

A lonely Pokémon, it conceals its terrifying appearance beneath an old rag so it can get closer to people and other Pokémon. (Moon)
It is very possible that it would want to get closer to people or pokemon for reasons other than wanting to have friends (link preview suppressed because there's a drawing of an anglerfish which is probably okay but might jumpscare someone?).

(there's also a picture of a spider further down the page)

[umbral hound]

The main problem with the Batesian mimicry theory is that I'm not sure if it works as well anywhere other than the Thrifty Megamart.

[near flower]

i like the idea of mimikyu imitating pikachu to ward off certain pokemon just as much as it does it to get others to go near it

it could also be that uhh
idk what its called. where an animal has a trait thats meant for a specific thing, then its introduced into another environment that doesnt have that thing, but the trait is useful for something else in taht environment

[umbral hound]

I want to say "spandrel" or "exaptation" but I don't think either of those is exactly correct?

Exaptation was correct, it turns out.

That might actually make sense; Mimikyu originally imitated Pikachu to drive off predators in Alola (note: we are assuming Mimikyu is actually originally from Alola, although there isn't hard evidence for that). In Galar, though, it only seems to come out when it's foggy, meaning it's avoiding detection through simpler means and relying on fog and poor visibility to supplement its camoflage. That would imply that the mimicry might have changed purposes to be more about approaching humans or other pokemon, possibly to feed on them in some way?

[pliant violet]

Well reasoned

[umbral hound]

As always, the question is: how reliable of a source is the Pokedex? We know it includes some things which are outright explicitly stated to be legends, like the thing about a child turning into Kadabra, or most of the paradox things. (Interestingly, the Legends: Arceus pokedex entry for Kadabra mentions a rumor stating that a child became a Kadabra, and the Sun entry for it goes from describing it as a "rumor" to describing it as a "theory"...)

There's also the utterly nonsensical stuff, usually in terms of height, weight, or temperature. So it makes sense to assume that the Pokedex isn't 100% reliable. That said, however, how reliable is it?

how long ago did Legends: Arceus take place?

...okay. The Kadabra thing is treated as an example of patent absurdity all the time. However:

• We know that some pokemon can hatch from eggs despite having evolved from other pokemon; typically, the parent needs to hold incense for the egg for the baby form to be laid (this was at least a thing in previous generations). Therefore, the idea of an evolved pokemon never having been its previous stage is not impossible.
• Many pokedex entries describe humans becoming pokemon, albeit typically posthumously. Again, this toes the line between "serious consideration", "vague idea", "just-so story which impresses a moral upon people and/or provides a satisfying (if not necessarily accurate) explanation", and "urban legend".
• The Canalave City Library famously implied that once, the distinguishing lines between pokemon and human were less firm than they are now.
• Various official Pokemon media outside of the games has directly depicted humans becoming pokemon.
• The idea of Kadabra having once been a human has appeared as early as in Hisui, and independently in both Hoenn and Alola with the latter going so far as to call it a "theory".
  Conclusion: the oft-maligned oft-ignored "a kid became a Kadabra!" theory is, in fact, plausible.

[covert saffron]

spoon

[south laurel]

I mean, a huge cross-section of Pokémon’s iconography treats them as spirits/energy beings and trainers as technology-assisted onmyoji, and the idea of a human becoming a spirit is not that wild

Especially given humans in Pokémon can have psychic powers

[snow cobalt]

i can't believe Kadabra is a Pokemon Mystery Dungeon protagonist

[south laurel]

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1115790083828756581/1137837269298974781/Sir_Aaron_art.png?ex=65ad7788&is=659b0288&hm=6842f9585ca240b8df9855484cf54388b86d58e6c97f21170c9d99fc099852e6&

An ancient trainer

[covert saffron]

coolest mfer

[umbral hound]

okay "technology-assisted onmyoji" is not a take I was expecting but it also isn't a take I disagree with.

it also gives me a great excuse to use this

[languid lichen]

I love lil char

[covert saffron]

anybody following the development of pokémon yellow legacy?

[snow cobalt]

Hadn't heard of that one before

[covert saffron]

by the crystal legacy team

VERY excited for emerald legacy, but no clue yet what that’ll look like

some cool changes so far:

• surge’s pikachu is busted
• scyther catchable next to vermillion
• oddish and poliwag in viridian forest
• vulpix route 3
• ghost to special, has moves
• slam is dragon type

[umbral hound]

Official pokemon channel video about the new mythical pokemon ||https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njA84xxxe8o||

I really like their commitment to ||not really having any outright evil pokemon. Even Pecharunt, who totally could have been evil! and controlling people and pokemon to its own ends... nope. It just wants to be loved and has no idea what it's doing.||

[covert saffron]

bless

new mythical

[umbral hound]

Yeah, it's in the new epilogue to Indigo Disk available via Mystery Gift.

Side note, but which member of the Loyal Three do you think is coolest? Personally, I like Munkidori, even though it might be the weakest of the three mechanically.

[manic kindle]

Okidogi is funny to me i love him

[umbral hound]

So apparently Dragon Cheer is banned for online competitive play because it's bugged (the crit boost stays around when the recipient switches out, and it's not supposed to) and will be patched mid-January. And I was brewing with it but then saw someone else's version? I was using Iron Jugulis to cheer Garchomp who would then spam Earthquake, but the alternate version cheered Regidrago to spam Dragon Energy which is probably better?)

[covert saffron]

what are those moves

[manic kindle]

Dragon Cheer is a new doubles buffing move, Dragon Energy is Regidraco's move

https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Dragon_Cheer_(move)

https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Dragon_Energy_(move)

[pliant violet]

First move exclusively by TM required to evolve a Pokémon

Dragon cheer I mean

[snow cobalt]

wack

actually we've had move tutor evolution moves before. so this isn't worse than that

[covert saffron]

don’t like that

[covert saffron]

? which

[snow cobalt]

I think they were in Gen 4?

like, Mamoswine

[covert saffron]

those were TUTORABLE??

[manic kindle]

Yeah

[covert saffron]

i’m GRINDING in ss to level lickitung, yanma, swinub, aipom, the other one

i’m gonna PISS

tangela, that’s the other

[manic kindle]

Harry Learns About Pokemon Mechanics, the journey

[snow cobalt]

Tangela can learn in through level-up

[manic kindle]

but yeah a Heart Scale was the quickest way to evolve a lot of them in gen4

[snow cobalt]

Piloswine->Mamoswine is tutor only tho

[manic kindle]

Egg move if youre dedicated enough too but usually not for a playthrough

[south laurel]

I love Mamoswine

Pig wearing snow goggles

[covert saffron]

FR?

okay noted

bc i was thinking of using one for my SS e4 team

rn my only solid picks are espeon, houndoom, and heracross

houndoom served us well in crystal legacy nuzlocccke so figure a re-up is good since my girl traded me one over from heartgold

any votes for picks 3-6?

[languid lichen]

yeah it learned ancientpower exclusively at level 1, so you had to heart scale it lmao

actually, I think that's still the case?

that or breeding

[verbal shoal]

I love heracross

[umbral hound]

To be fair, it's a TM you get from a story-mandated battle (like a gym leader but technically not).

[covert saffron]

nobody with the teammate 4-6 suggestions 😔 snakes the lot of u

[manic kindle]

Wheres your starter friendo

I think you should add a Golduck

[covert saffron]

i dropped bayleef earlier to get evolving stuff to fill out my dex

ehhhhhhhhhhh

something i REALLY wanna do, seeing as the games are basically worn completely thin now, is play pokémon red/blue... but like

as if i'm PERSONALLY going on an adventure and filling out a pokédex