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[victreeb3l]

When hologram technology gets good enough and people can have real life Pokemon battles, it will become the biggest sport in the world.

Stadiums will sell out and the yearly Elite 4 tournaments will be bigger than the Superbowl.

 

[PreyingShark]

Because everybody be salty about the time I won a GAF VGC tourney with a fuckin' Lanturn.

Spoiler

I also had a Mega Kangaskhan.

But no actually, things were fine in VGC land until someone went, "You know what's a great idea? MEGAS!" and then everything sorta went to hell from there. And just fuck VGC '16.

P.S. RIP Pokecheck.

 

[Azuran]

Because you can just cheat beforehand to get the best pokemon and there's no way to tell? Am I correct on that?

Still doesn't help a bad player be good at the actual game. Hacking only removes the mindless grinding of running around in your bike for 10 hours a day.

 

[JoeM86]

Because everybody be salty about the time I won a GAF VGC tourney with a fuckin' Lanturn.

Spoiler

I also had a Mega Kangaskhan.

But no actually, things were fine in VGC land until someone went, "You know what's a great idea? MEGAS!" and then everything sorta went to hell from there. And just fuck VGC '16.

P.S. RIP Pokecheck.

Megas aren't a problem. Parental Bond and the 33% boost of the -ate abilities are.

 

[DrArchon]

They really do remove barriers of entry. Look at Sun & Moon. You can now max out existing Pokémon's IVs so that's no longer a valid complaint.

I applaud Gamefreak for taking such steps, but there's still a tremendous barrier to entry that doesn't exist for other genres like fighting games and MOBAs. You've still got to get your Pokemon to level 100 to train IVs I believe, you've still got to make sure the nature is right, you've still got to breed for certain moves, etc. It's a far cry from something like DOTA where every version of the game has every character meaning that the players can focus entirely on studying the metagame and practice their skills.

 

[Kurita]

Cause it'd boooooooooring as fuck to watch, and I say that as someone who loved to play competitive Pokémon

 

[Haly]

Honestly, they should make a spinoff game where you take control of your pokemon in real time during battles. Top-down or over-the-shoulder. This would be streamable and esports friendly for sure.

The mainline games are fundamentally opposed to what makes games watchable. Too rock-paper-scissors. Too much behind-the-scenes metagaming and number crunching. Too far removed from what the games play like for the average player (and these make up the majority of spectators).

 

[emb]

Honestly, they should make a spinoff game where you take control of your pokemon in real time during battles. This would be streamable and esports friendly for sure.

Direct control of your Pokemon sounds like a fighting game. Pokken fits kinda close to the bill and is pretty eSports and viewer friendly. Also it's super fun, so that's a plus. n_n

 

[JoeM86]

Honestly, they should make a spinoff game where you take control of your pokemon in real time during battles. Top-down or over-the-shoulder. This would be streamable and esports friendly for sure.

 

[Sanjuro]

Remember the treehouse.

 

[Carl7]

you realize that this shit can never be compelling as a game where a) player decisions matter more than having the right team composition at the right time and b) the best players consistently win.

That being said, I still love Pokemon.

You are 100% wrong and any tournament analysis can prove that. I would even say that the better player will win more consistently in Pokemon that in most major sports out there, specially the most pupular one: soccer.

 

[Griss]

I can't believe it has taken them this long to remove the influence of IVs and now that they've done it I can't believe they haven't replaced IVs with something else to differentiate your pokemon.

No wait, actually... I can believe it. Because I've never seen a series evolve at such a glacial pace as Pokemon.

Also, megas were a terrible idea and always will be.

 

[DrArchon]

Honestly, they should make a spinoff game where you take control of your pokemon in real time during battles. Top-down or over-the-shoulder. This would be streamable and esports friendly for sure.

That's Pokken Tournament. No one streams it at all anymore and no one watched the streams when they were a thing. It was baffling.

 

[CrunchyFrog]

"Turn-based" plus "exciting to watch" don't belong in the same sentence, imo

Pretty much. Most of Pokémon's complexity derives from breeding and team composition. The act of battling is only a small percentage of game time. On top of all that you have significant amounts of RNG involved, spoiling a lot of its competitive fairness.

 

[Haly]

That's Pokken Tournament. No one streams it at all anymore and no one watched the streams when they were a thing. It was baffling.

Yeah I know about Pokken and what I'm thinking of is less fighting game and more ARPG.

 

[JoeM86]

I can't believe it has taken them this long to remove the influence of IVs and now that they've done it I can't believe they haven't replaced IVs with something else to differentiate your pokemon.

No wait, actually... I can believe it. Because I've never seen a series evolve at such a glacial pace as Pokemon.

Also, megas were a terrible idea and always will be.

They haven't removed the influence of IVs...

 

[Mael]

Half of the fun is actually building your team and seeing if it works or not.
It's probably more fun to follow a streamer trying to build his team and showing the results than just the tournaments.
It's a few step away from being a streamable game, I mean current gen started in 2013 and twitch started in 2011.
You can already share replays of your match online (I'll grant that it's no way near usable but it's still there).
Of course they could have provided a conversion tool or something.
Single is kinda boring if you ask me compared to the other options.
Heck the games in single player have too much singles already (makes no sense that the competitive scene in the games is single when the outside world is double btw).

As for being boring to watch or not, people watch chess, baseball, football(both kinds) and other stuffs.
As long as the games are fun to play they'll be fun to watch I guess.
A legendary-less version of the game would probably be more interesting to watch though.

 

[Wichu]

Compared to the time spent getting competitive in other games (and learning the meta in Pokémon), the time to obtain a competitive team is tiny.

~1 hour per Pokémon for breeding
~20 minutes per Pokémon for EV training
~1 hour per Pokémon to train to level 100

You can get an entire team ready in one day. This time is further reduced by being able to trade, meaning you don't always have to do the first step if someone has a spare.

Hell, cheat if you want. It doesn't give you any advantage that I can't get legitimately, so I won't complain if you skip all that and just edit your Pokémon with a 3rd party tool.

Anyway, Pokémon just isn't that interesting to watch, as a lot of people have already pointed out. A lot of the fun is in the mindgames during decision making, which you can't see on the screen.

 

[Kyzer]

In a way it is...so big it has its own venue and championships it doesn't even bother sharing arena space

 

[Caffeine]

a pokemon moba would be the esport tons of heroes to choose from, destroy the opposing gym Kappa and you can level to gain abilities , and skins, the fact that it hasn't been done yet blows my mind.

 

[Haly]

What you need for a streamable game are two things:

1) People to be invested in their choice. The mainline games do this very well. The whole thing is about forming a bond with your pitfighters and taking them on adventures. People should be excited to play with the Pokemon they built up (which should be viable in a ladder/multiplayer environment) as well as seeing their favorite Pokemon get represented at the upper echelons. Examples of this in action in other games: Favorite heroes in League/Dota/Overwatch, favorite decks in Hearthstone/MTG. Favorite characters/dark horses in fighting games.

2) Gameplay mechanics that are exciting to watch and play and, most importantly, preserves 1). Examples of this in action in other games: Macro level strategy + micro level tactic in MOBAs, variance and explosiveness in Hearthstone/MTG, exciting displays of mechanical skill and "clutch" moments in fighting games.

The mainline games have very little of what makes a game spectator friendly. It's niche for the same reason WoW arena is niche. The game proper was not designed for multiplayer competition.

 

[platocplx]

Compared to the time spent getting competitive in other games (and learning the meta in Pokémon), the time to obtain a competitive team is tiny.

~1 hour per Pokémon for breeding
~20 minutes per Pokémon for EV training
~1 hour per Pokémon to train to level 100

You can get an entire team ready in one day. This time is further reduced by being able to trade, meaning you don't always have to do the first step if someone has a spare.

Hell, cheat if you want. It doesn't give you any advantage that I can't get legitimately, so I won't complain if you skip all that and just edit your Pokémon with a 3rd party tool.

Anyway, Pokémon just isn't that interesting to watch, as a lot of people have already pointed out. A lot of the fun is in the mindgames during decision making, which you can't see on the screen.

how the hell are people training pokemon to 100 in an hour?

 

[dezzy8]

It's boring as fuck to watch. Both the RPG and the TCG.

 

[Kurdel]

When hologram technology gets good enough and people can have real life Pokemon battles, it will become the biggest sport in the world.

Stadiums will sell out and the yearly Elite 4 tournaments will be bigger than the Superbowl.

I hope that when holograms become the norm, we won't be playing 20th century games.

 

[PreyingShark]

Megas aren't a problem. Parental Bond and the 33% boost of the -ate abilities are.

And Mega Zard Y. And Mega Mawile. And, in BS Singles, Mega Gengar.

While I agree that it's not the Mega concept itself that's the problem, my issue (and I believe Firestorm's too) is that they executed it horribly. I'm optimistic for Sun and Moon though, they're doing so many things right. I'm reasonably confident they'll undo the fuckery that I consider Gen VI to be.

 

[backlot]

how the hell are people training pokemon to 100 in an hour?

Get some QR codes for secret bases with 3 level 100 Blissey. Give the Pokemon you want a lucky egg and use an EXP O Power. Most of the time spent is just hammering the A button as your Pokemon levels up dozens of times in a row.

 

[Mael]

how the hell are people training pokemon to 100 in an hour?

?
100 in 1h may be pushing it but you can go past 50(from lvl1) in something like 10 to 20min in X/Y if you know what you're doing.
I don't really see the point of going all the way to 100 if you play at lvl 50 and have already the full moveset anyway at lvl 45 or so.

Get some QR codes for secret bases with 3 level 100 Blissey. Give the Pokemon you want a lucky egg and use an EXP O Power. Most of the time spent is just hammering the A button as your Pokemon levels up dozens of times in a row.

I really need to finish my plathrough of ORAS.

 

[PreyingShark]

how the hell are people training pokemon to 100 in an hour?

Though I don't expect it to be that easy in Gen VII. lol. But it actually wasn't that bad in XY either if you used Lucky Egg + that one restaurant + Exp Share lvl 3 (ideally you'd have done some walking that day so you can use it pretty much constantly).

 

[platocplx]

Also imo its boring as hell all people do is just battle with the same exact pokemon and then push for speed advantages to get the upper hand on people.

If it were a game say you could pretty much use any pokemon you were fond of build a team etc and certain factors were altered like speed etc, it could be pretty awesome. I wish training wasnt so deliberate and had a level of randomness to it where the pokemon you get is the one you get and you deal with whats good about it and whats bad about it with their stats.

at times pokemon can be a chess match. I still love it but for me the farthest id go is just playing people online and friends.

 

[Mexen]

Holograms. Fill IRL stadiums with IRL people watching IRL pros go at it in the center with their hologram Pokémon.

Edit: beaten!

 

[Griss]

They haven't removed the influence of IVs...

Well I didn't say 'remove IVs' I said 'remove the influence of IVs'. I should have expanded that to mean 'on the post-game / meta-game' but I thought it would be implied. My bad for not being clear.

Essentially, my problem with pokemon was always that I had to dump the good friends I had met along the way for 'uber-bred monsters' if I wanted to seriously compete. That was bullshit. That was the influence of IVs that killed the game for me once the story was done. If we can now max out the IVs of our creatures using some in-game device, that horrible game design feature is now removed.

Obviously they're still used in battle calculations themselves.

 

[Empty Space]

This might have been answered already, but what's exactly wrong with the genies? I see complaints about them a lot.

What's the state of balance in Pokemon games? I realize the games don't get balance patches but are Pokemon outside of legendaries generally balanced? I'm vaguely aware of the Smogon tiers. I feel like when I flip through the various generations there are certain Pokemon who are perpetually Uber Tier like Blaziken. If Blaziken was a moba character he would have likely seen a nerf to his stats, move pool, or abilities at this point. Does Game Freak not tweak Pokemon stats between generations? I mean you can't trade back why wouldn't they?

I've only played the Pokemon games super casually and skipped over Gen IV and V.

 

[Pokemaniac]

I think if Pokemon had a mode closer to the online simulators, it would be bigger competitive thing. Being able to choose your items, IVs, and EVs would be great for player accessibility. It would devalue most of the end game involved in actually playing and collecting Pokemon. They could combine the two a bit, but I think it'd still be hard to strike a perfect balance.

Regardless, it's a hard thing to really keep up with as a spectator sometimes. Stats are hidden and it can be hard to infer what build things have, or what moves they might have on hand (commentators and streamers could get this stuff ahead of time though, I guess). Less dedicated crowds might not even know things as simple as the type chart.

It's not an awful spectator game, I just think it's something that would always be hard for a non-fan to get into watching.

X and Y exposed EVs to the player, and Sun and Moon appear to be doing the same with IVs. It's not as simple as adjusting the values in a menu, but it is a pretty decent compromise so as to not devalue the single player mechanics too much.

 

[platocplx]

Get some QR codes for secret bases with 3 level 100 Blissey. Give the Pokemon you want a lucky egg and use an EXP O Power. Most of the time spent is just hammering the A button as your Pokemon levels up dozens of times in a row.

thats freaking crazy.

?
100 in 1h may be pushing it but you can go past 50(from lvl1) in something like 10 to 20min in X/Y if you know what you're doing.
I don't really see the point of going all the way to 100 if you play at lvl 50 and have already the full moveset anyway at lvl 45 or so.



I really need to finish my plathrough of ORAS.

X/Y definitely i can say it was the easiest to train i def had a whole team of pokemon 70 plus. yeah i dont see the point if you play at 50.

Though I don't expect it to be that easy in Gen VII. lol. But it actually wasn't that bad in XY either if you used Lucky Egg + that one restaurant + Exp Share lvl 3 (ideally you'd have done some walking that day so you can use it pretty much constantly).

thats insane. lmao

I'm playing my way back through the games right now to bring pokemon I like over to sun and moon by the time it comes out.

Im playing soul silver right now I literally have put in like 70+ hours into the game and im barely near 70, so it threw me the hell off its that easy to train now(totally forgot about when i played x\y) lol

I have soul silver then finish platinum move all those pokemon to black then finish black then put all my pokemon into X/Y and then play ORAS lol.

 

[Dusk Soldier]

The balance is horrible. If you go read some of the banlists and "clauses" competitive communities like Smogon have had to add to make it more than a series of coinflips, you realize that this shit can never be compelling as a game where a) player decisions matter more than having the right team composition at the right time and b) the best players consistently win.

That being said, I still love Pokemon.

Single player pokemon has 3 basic team building strategies....

1. Stall Core: Using a core of 2 or 3 defensive pokemon to shutdown your opponents offense, and set up the field with weather, hazards, etc to make it favourable for your own offensive pokes
2. Hyper Offense: Use a fast suicide lead to quickly set up hazards, weather, etc OR deal heavy damage, then use your free switch to send a pokemon with a type advantage to your OP, plus the power to 2HKO virtually any pokemon in the game
3. Baton Pass: Use stat buffs, status, field/weather to create a super pokemon that can't be taken down easily

The problem with many unofficial communities(like Smogon) is that they've taken the stance that strategy 1 is the "correct" way to play, and that the other strategies are gimmicks.

So whenever pokemon/abilities crop up that shift the balance of the meta away from Stall, they get banned.

The actual balance issues with single player are a bit overblown. But players don't want to change up their strategies or think a bit outside the box.

 

[PK Gaming]

They really do remove barriers of entry. Look at Sun & Moon. You can now max out existing Pokémon's IVs so that's no longer a valid complaint.

YO WHAT?

 

[PadWarrior]

YO WHAT?

I think you only need to make the Pokemon level 100 before doing that.

 

[platocplx]

Single player pokemon has 3 basic team building strategies....

1. Stall Core: Using a core of 2 or 3 defensive pokemon to shutdown your opponents offense, and set up the field with weather, hazards, etc to make it favourable for your own offensive pokes
2. Hyper Offense: Use a fast suicide lead to quickly set up hazards, weather, etc OR deal heavy damage, then use your free switch to send a pokemon with a type advantage to your OP, plus the power to 2HKO virtually any pokemon in the game
3. Baton Pass: Use stat buffs, status, field/weather to create a super pokemon that can't be taken down easily

The problem with many unofficial communities(like Smogon) is that they've taken the stance that strategy 1 is the "correct" way to play, and that the other strategies are gimmicks.

So whenever pokemon/abilities crop up that shift the balance of the meta away from Stall, they get banned.

The actual balance issues with single player are a bit overblown. But players don't want to change up their strategies or think a bit outside the box.

What do you think the correct way to play should be? I think one thing that throws me off is I see that in tourneys they allow legendaries. I would think they normally would have the hugest advantages in most tourneys.

 

[n0razi]

Its like watching a Lets Play JRPG that doesnt skip random battles and grinding.

 

[Empty Space]

Single player pokemon has 3 basic team building strategies....

1. Stall Core: Using a core of 2 or 3 defensive pokemon to shutdown your opponents offense, and set up the field with weather, hazards, etc to make it favourable for your own offensive pokes
2. Hyper Offense: Use a fast suicide lead to quickly set up hazards, weather, etc OR deal heavy damage, then use your free switch to send a pokemon with a type advantage to your OP, plus the power to 2HKO virtually any pokemon in the game
3. Baton Pass: Use stat buffs, status, field/weather to create a super pokemon that can't be taken down easily

The problem with many unofficial communities(like Smogon) is that they've taken the stance that strategy 1 is the "correct" way to play, and that the other strategies are gimmicks.

So whenever pokemon/abilities crop up that shift the balance of the meta away from Stall, they get banned.

The actual balance issues with single player are a bit overblown. But players don't want to change up their strategies or think a bit outside the box.

So is the competive meta in official tournaments different from Smogon? Are any Pokemon banned in official tournaments? I had always assumed Smogon was kind of the face of competive Pokemon.

 

[Yaphett Kotto]

XY is evidence that they do care about balance though. They increased stats, they made more Pokémon viable. They limited Mega Evolution. Just because Mega Kangaskhan is OP (and they'll probably fix Parental Bond) doesn't mean they give "no fucks"

As mentioned before, there are way too many power creeps in XY for me to see that even when including the small tweaks to some Pokemon's stats that made little to no impact to the metagame.

And there are definitely more offenders to the metagame outside of Kangaskhan and some abilities. Most of them being Megas that would run through teams if not prepared. Hell, some can do it unboosted.

 

[Mael]

What do you think the correct way to play should be? I think one thing that throws me off is I see that in tourneys they allow legendaries. I would think they normally would have the hugest advantages in most tourneys.

I'm by no means an expert but I would say the strategy that anything goes outside of obvious bug is fairgame.
I don't think it's fair to have an issue with Legendaries when they're available to anyone after all.
Mythical should really be banned though, they're unfair in that they're severly limited and not everyone can access them.
They could be rewards for lowkey tournament and stuffs.
Also some legendaries are obvious crap that no one should have an issue seeing used too.

So is the competive meta in official tournaments different from Smogon? Are any Pokemon banned in official tournaments? I had always assumed Smogon was kind of the face of competive Pokemon.

The way I understand it, smogon is singles.
The official tournaments are double anyway.
So as far as tpc is concerned, they give no fuck about smogon and if you care about official tourney you shouldn't either.

 

[.JayZii]

Turn based games, as others have already said, probably won't ever be the most popular things to watch if there are action games available to spectate. Though, American Football is very popular, and that is basically turn-based. Never say never.

Also, it looks way too cutesy for an owner of rippling muscles and huge genitals such as myself to be interested in watching.

Spoiler

/s?

Persona says hi.

Tokyo Mirage Sessions says hi.

I have no idea why they dropped by this thread, but can you tell them I said "Hey"?

 

[brinstar]

Essentially, my problem with pokemon was always that I had to dump the good friends I had met along the way for 'uber-bred monsters' if I wanted to seriously compete. That was bullshit. That was the influence of IVs that killed the game for me once the story was done. If we can now max out the IVs of our creatures using some in-game device, that horrible game design feature is now removed.

Obviously they're still used in battle calculations themselves.

Yeah I've felt the same way. I hate having to shelf the team I had all my adventures with. I don't mind breeding new Pokemon but it sucks having your main dudes or shinies you found in the wild be mostly useless. If in Sun/Moon you can really max out the IVs of your Pokemon after leveling them to 100 then that will definitely make me play online more.

 

[Jumeira]

Gosh, what a terrible idea. Can't think of anything more unsuitable

 

[Yaphett Kotto]

So is the competive meta in official tournaments different from Smogon? Are any Pokemon banned in official tournaments? I had always assumed Smogon was kind of the face of competive Pokemon.

Most people run with Smogon rules for singles. They are ran by the community, not Nintendo. Though, the community is pretty large and there are some Youtube channels that post live commentary on Showdown or in-game battles, thoughts on metagame balance/bans/suspects, and more.

 

[dity]

It's boring as fuck to watch. Both the RPG and the TCG.

Watching the TCG is a snoozefest.

 

[Sou Da]

Single player pokemon has 3 basic team building strategies....

1. Stall Core: Using a core of 2 or 3 defensive pokemon to shutdown your opponents offense, and set up the field with weather, hazards, etc to make it favourable for your own offensive pokes
2. Hyper Offense: Use a fast suicide lead to quickly set up hazards, weather, etc OR deal heavy damage, then use your free switch to send a pokemon with a type advantage to your OP, plus the power to 2HKO virtually any pokemon in the game
3. Baton Pass: Use stat buffs, status, field/weather to create a super pokemon that can't be taken down easily

The problem with many unofficial communities(like Smogon) is that they've taken the stance that strategy 1 is the "correct" way to play, and that the other strategies are gimmicks.

So whenever pokemon/abilities crop up that shift the balance of the meta away from Stall, they get banned.

The actual balance issues with single player are a bit overblown. But players don't want to change up their strategies or think a bit outside the box.

This.

 

[psyfi]

I used to really want to get into competitive Pokemon, but man, all the tedious busy work necessary to build a competitive team totally turned me off. I know all games take time to good get at and/or level up, but most of the games are fun in the meanwhile. Pokemon just makes you download spreadsheets and run around in circles for dozens of hours.

 

[Empty Space]

The way I understand it, smogon is singles.
The official tournaments are double anyway.
So as far as tpc is concerned, they give no fuck about smogon and if you care about official tourney you shouldn't either.

Im a little shocked at the fact official stuff is doubles. I have to wonder why the single player doesn't reflect that.