Category: Game Balance/Mechanics Questions

Anonymous asks:

I had an argument with a friend way back when Pokemon first came out. He thought I was wrong when I referred to Pokemon like Vileplume and Venusaur as ‘Grass-Type’ because he thought the type was called ‘Leaf-Type.’ Someone confirmed I was right and that was the end of that. But that’s something that stuck with me. Wouldn’t ‘Leaf-Type’ make a little more sense? Or even better, calling it ‘Wood-Type?’

I think “Plant-type” would have made the most sense, really.  A lot of the languages that the games are translated into go that way, actually – Type Plante in French, Typ Pflanze in German, Tipo Planta in Spanish.  The Japanese 草 or くさ (kusa) really does seem to literally mean “grass” though, as far as I can tell, and Grass is what it’s been for twenty years now, so I doubt they’re ever likely to change it at this point.

Anonymous asks:

In regards to your Seven Types, how do you feel about adding Waste, Wind, and Sonic? Waste represents the trash side of Poison, something that would effect Pokemon heavily in-tune with Nature and Magic. Wind would have a greater effect on in-flight Pokemon and light weights while little to no effect on heavy weight or submerged Pokemon. Sonic would effect Pokemon differently based on how sensitive their hearing is. Can you see these three as having a fillable spot in your system?

In reference to this, where I outline a radical condensation of Pokémon’s type chart into just seven attack types (Might, Finesse, Nature, Water, Energy, Magic, Spirit), where Pokémon themselves have no type at all but have weaknesses and resistances by individual species.

So, in regard to these three suggestions – the point of what I was trying to do was have as few types as possible (well, actually, the real point was to think about how I would do a Pokémon game if I were starting completely from scratch, which I’m still thinking about, with a view to maybe writing a long screed of rambling nonsense at some point in the future, but let’s not go down that particular rabbit hole right now).  I wanted to see how little I could get away with.  So just on philosophical grounds, I don’t think any of these things need to be types.  I do think they can be effects that are attached to specific attacks.  Sonic I would probably deal with by putting in a Deafness status condition that, say, causes Pokémon to disobey (because they can’t hear your orders properly) and make a couple of Pokémon either especially vulnerable to it (e.g. Zubat, who ‘sees’ with sound) or resistant or outright immune to it (anything with the Soundproof ability, like Mr. Mime).  The attacks themselves, I think can just be typeless (which is a thing my system has; they just do normal damage to everything).  Wind is similar; I mostly imagined wind-based attacks as belonging mainly to Finesse, with some being dual-typed (another thing my system has – Hurricane as Finesse/Nature, Twister as Finesse/Magic), and all having effects much like the ones you describe; they’re not universally more effective against certain Pokémon, just more effective given certain environmental conditions.  Waste… waste is a weird one because one of the ways I wanted to flip things on their head was by having pollutant Pokémon like Koffing and Grimer be vulnerable to Nature attacks, not resistant (not all of the Pokémon that are “Poison” in the existing system, mind you, just those specific ones; other Poison-types could have different vulnerabilities).  Poison, like the others, doesn’t need to be a type in itself; just keep it as a status condition that can be worsened or prevented by the traits of certain Pokémon.

batabid asks:

Could you talk a bit about Evolutionary Stones, particularly the more mysterious ones like the Dawn Stone (maybe relating it to your Pokémon Gender/Breeding theory?) and why the Nidos evolve with the Moon Stone

You know, I think I’ve been asked this before, ages ago; hold on a bit…

Yes, here it is; the second half of this question.

…wait, hang on.

That was YOU!  YOU’VE asked me this before!

Ah, whatever; it was nearly four years ago, I’m sure I have different and even more wildly speculative things to say about it now.

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Anonymous asks:

The name ‘Tough Claws’ is such a waste, in my opinion. It could and should have been used for an Ability that increases the damage output of scratching or clawing moves, like Scratch, Cut, Metal Claw, Shadow Claw, etc. (like Iron Fist or Strong Jaw) rather than use it for an Ability that raises any generic contact move. What do you think?

Well, I only think the name would be a “waste” if it meant that they couldn’t then make another ability like that at a later point, if they so choose.  They could just call it something different – “sharp blades,” maybe?  Potential ability names are a pretty broad possibility space.  “Tough Claws” is not the greatest naming choice, I’ll give you that; I think I would have called it something that sounded less specific, like “Brute Strength,” but I’m not particularly bothered by it.

Anonymous asks:

My nidorino was put to sleep in battle and then got its defense lowered by leer. How does that work? How do things like leer, scary face, or mean look work on sleeping pokemon?

I dunno.  Magic?

Truth is, the battle mechanics of the Pokémon games are not really meant as a 100% accurate simulation of anything, and there are probably a million and one things that don’t make too much sense when you look too closely at them, but which we just accept because the game needs to have understandable and predictable rules in order to be playable.  I think this is best illustrated by looking at what happens when you run the exact same imaginary scenario (a Pokémon using an intimidation technique like Leer on a sleeping opponent) through a different set of rules – those of the trading card game.  Exactly what Leer does in the TCG varies slightly depending on the Pokémon using it, but basically it tends to stop the target from attacking, and sometimes also from switching out, during its next turn (Mean Look only seems to prevent switching; Scary Face always prevents both).  So what happens when it’s used on a sleeping Pokémon?  Well, sleeping Pokémon normally can’t do either of those things in the TCG anyway, so the answer is “nothing,” much as you’d expect.  Neither system of rules is ever going to be complex enough to provide the intuitively “correct” answer to every possible imagined scenario; there are always going to be weird corner cases that throw up an interaction that just doesn’t seem to make sense.  I think in those situations the best thing to do is ask “what would probably happen in the anime?” because the anime is less constrained by the need for absolute consistency in the rules – and in this case, I suspect the answer (if anyone ever actually made a move like that, which strikes me as unlikely) is, again, “nothing.”

Anonymous asks:

What IS PP? How is it that a Pokémon can’t use e.g. Cut or Rock Smash in battle because they’ve run out of PP but they can still use them outside battle?

Well, there are gameplay reasons it has to be that way – if field moves were dependent on PP you could become trapped in certain areas and unable to return to a Pokémon Centre.  In any case, for a lot of field moves it’s not like the combat and out-of-combat uses are actually the same or even similar – clearly we’re not supposed to imagine that using Surf (a special attack usually depicted as a powerful wave) involves vigorously swimming at the opponent with your trainer on your back.  Even when the two actions are basically similar, I would imagine that doing something in the middle of a fight is a good deal more stressful and difficult than doing it any other time.  Me, I think of PP as a vague measure of a Pokémon’s energy or exhaustion, the same way as HP is a vague measure of a Pokémon’s health or injuries.  Obviously HP was never meant to be a realistic and precise account of the billion and one different kinds of godawful nonsense that can happen to a Pokémon on a daily basis; it’s just a number that answers the question “can I or can I not keep fighting?” and we accept that without thinking, even though it clearly doesn’t make much sense, because HP is an abstraction that literally everyone has been using for decades.  PP is the same kind of thing.

Rockcutter64 asks:

If you could give any three pokémon mega evolutions, which would you choose?

I suppose ones who need it.  The main benefit to mega evolution is the huge pile of stat bonuses that gets heaped on top of you, so ideally you want to be giving them to a Pokémon who a) mainly suffers from a low base stat total, and b) is an unlikely candidate to ever receive a conventional evolution.  So, for instance, Klinklang is a poor choice because Klinklang’s problem is having a minuscule skill set, not lacking the raw power to use that skill set, while Dunsparce is a poor choice because, as a one-stage Pokémon with lower base stats than Sneasel, Gligar and Tangela, there is still plenty of room to just evolve him.  There are better answers than mega evolution to their problems.  

So which ones do I think would be the best choices…?  Hmm… Scanning down the list of Pokémon in the same general area as Beedrill (the Pokémon with the lowest base stat total to be given a mega evolution so far)… well, I think Ledian, with her interesting and diverse offence/support movepool and total lack of the kind of power necessary to back it up, is a natural choice; Bibarel has a unique type combination and interesting abilities, but they just don’t compensate for the fact that Bibarel sucks all around; and… let’s say Delcatty; Delcatty has a ridiculous movepool that she’s incapable of using, and we have a built-in excuse to rework Normalise into something actually decent while we’re there.   I’m also going to break all of my rules and offer Plusle and Minun, because there you could do something interesting with their teamwork theme by allowing them both to mega evolve off of a single mega stone if you use them together in a double battle (I mean, let’s be honest, they’ll probably still suck but at least it’s interesting).

thephilosophicalsheep asks:

All right; so in gen 6, gamefreak made obscure competitive phenomena like EVs and egg moves more accessible to younger players with additions such as super training and the DexNav. Now what I want them to do is encourage their use by allowing NPCs the same benefits. Rarely in the pokemon games do you even see in-game trainers using ITEMS. That needs to change. I want to see Sun and Moon trainers with EV-trained, egg-moved, battle-equipped mons. That’ll better prepare kids for competitive, no?

Mmm… well, sort of?  I mean, we already have that in, for example, the Battle Maison; facilities like that have used all of those things for ages.  And to be honest I’m kind of happy with that, as a step up in difficulty from what we see during the story portion of the games.  I don’t want to throw all of this $#!t at you from the start; that’s just bloody overwhelming.  And I think the increase in transparency that comes from Super Training is much more important to introducing the EV system than having NPCs with EV-trained Pokémon would be; you can’t see EVs in battle, so ultimately that just winds up as being “everything is now harder for reasons you don’t fully understand; hahahahaha!”  The other thing there is that EV spreads for competitive movesets are often based on calculations around which Pokémon you can take down in X number of hits and which Pokémon can take you down in X number of hits, all assuming equal level and heavily informed by the current metagame, and that’s just not something that’s ever going to have any place in single player.

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Anonymous asks:

What would you do to fix darmanitan’s zen mode ability in a way that’s thematically appropriate?

Hmm. Well, the problems with Zen Mode as I see it are:

1) you’re forced to train one Pokémon to fill two roles, and wind up splitting EVs, nature and move sets so you get this messy hybrid (I think Game Freak did anticipate this and tried to deal with it by giving the two forms extremely high base stats in the areas they specialise in – the problem is you’re better off just piling EVs and a nature bonus on top of the high stats enjoyed by the basic form and pushing his attack into the goddamn stratosphere), and 2) Zen Darmanitan is a tank who inherently starts with less than 50% health, which compromises his usefulness. Well, and 3) the alternative, Sheer Force, is such a hugely powerful ability for a Pokémon with a stat spread as extremely specialised towards physical damage as Darmanitan’s, but there’s not much we can do about that.

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