After having some thoughts after reading a few of the Pokemon Challenge threads, I decided to write up this Pokemon challenge I came up with.
It's still in an infant stage, so I want some inputs on how to make it harder/interesting and perhaps identity some loopholes. Nothing is set in stones. I will most likely play-test it once it gets good.
The core of the challenge is that only Pokemon with base total stats less or equal to 251 are allowed to be played. This number obviously can be changed, but right now I am looking at 251 because this includes Pidgey (Pidgey's base stats is 251), which seems to be the only option to get Fly for some generations.
I believe this forces the player to play smartly, perhaps EV-train early, and utilize type-advantages to the maximum. Also the player is forced to use Pokemon that are usually considered "gimmicks". I suspect the game is extremely hard when over-leveled Pokemon are penalized due to lack of all 8 badges. After all 8 badges are obtained, however, this will be mostly quite easy.
Obviously evolution is undesirable. As far as I know, meshing the B-button will stop the evolution, probably as many times as the player wants (someone confirm this?).
After this, we can also attach some rules about releasing fainted pokemon, no healing items, etc. I do want to allow Pokemon center, though. To make sure this is different from Nuzlocke, there is no restriction on when the player is allowed to catch Pokemon and how many Pokemon of a same species one can obtain.
Immediately, the starter violates this rule (they are about 300ish). To remedy this, one needs to immediately release the starter when a Pokemon with lower stats is caught. I believe every generation has at least one of them available in the first Route.
Also note that Shedinja violates this rule, even though its total stats is less then 251. The reason is that the only way to obtain this is to evolve Nincada, but Nincada's total stats is 266. There are some baby Pokemon that also suffer this problem but those are probably less important.
On July 27 2010 12:42 seRapH wrote: so wouldn't we violate the rule as soon as we start the game?
EDIT 1: WOW I CAN'T USE RATTATA
i'll have to find something else to fear with now >=(
EDIT 2: alright, so i'm going to play this through platinum with:
Starly - FEAR Bidoof
Trade in: Pidgey Togepi (because its beast) Zubat Swinub - FEAR
Wait a second. How are you going to get a Focus Sash in early game? I thought it would be assumed that trading is not allowed.
But yea you are right, we are going to violate the rule as soon as we start (very odd). But this cannot be helped. I considered setting the cutoff of total stats to be ~320. But I think that makes things too easy.
On July 27 2010 13:03 Oceanic wrote: Why not only allow 1st form pokemon?
Because this is vague and many pokemon has only one form (e.g. legendaries, Lapras, Miltank, etc.).
EDIT: before I forget, there are also other problems. For example Scyther is the 1st form and it has a wooping 500 base stats. Sneasel and Wailmer are also pretty superior in statistics. This seems to violates the core idea of the challenge.
On July 27 2010 15:18 seRapH wrote: bellypass. mindreader sheer cold.
well, belly pass is relatively easy to get, but still incredibly strong. mindreader/sheer cold is just cheap, though much harder to get.
unless you get someone to throw you the moves in a link and you steal them from their secret base.
1HKO moves are indeed cheap. Thanks for bringing that up. I guess 1HKO moves should be illegal...
I don't see *too much* harm in Belly Drum, though. Doing a Belly Drum is just as dangerous as doing three Sword Dance, in my opinion.
Except you can survive enough to pull off a belly drum, but Smeargle's never going to make it to three swords dances.
I didn't check, but I am pretty sure we can use Sword Dance without Smeargle.
well the root of the comparison was
smeargle belly pass vs smeargle triple swords dance pass
Alright, I suppose Belly Drum is easier to pass.
I don't see too much problem even if Smeargle is included. Unlike competitive pokemon, we actually need to make Smeargle learn these skills. As far as I know, it is not allowed to reload a save (otherwise all death can be avoided), so we can't actually be sure that the Smeargles can learn these skills on our first try.
slush20: it's actually a little bit less than that. Shedinja cannot be legally obtained without Nincada, which is not legal by the 251 rule. The baby pokemon Pichu, Cleffa, Igglybuff, and Happiny suffer similar problems, although they all appear in the wild in Sinnoh in the Trophy Garden (kind of rare...). There are also some other ones that are so weak that probably no one will consider them. For example Caterpie, Sunkern
If we do use the 251 rule, I believe the most useable Pokemon statistics-wise is Marill. With Huge Power and good IV/EV a high amount of Attack can be achieved. Movepool wise Marill is somewhat to be desired. Aquajet could be useful (egg move), except all possible parents for Aquajet are not legal by the 251 rule (unless we also allow Smeargle).
If we follow seRapH's suggestion and use the 300 rule + Grass starter, then probably the Grass starter will be quite good. Pikachu is also available, which is pretty good.
<300 1st Gen Rattata Spearow Ekans Pikachu Sandshrew Nidoran F Nidoran M Vulpix Jigglypuff Paras Diglett Meowth Horsea Ditto 2nd Gen Hoothoot (one i think that's important if you're playing 2nd gen) Ledyba Mareep Pineco Snubbull 3rd Gen Taillow (one i think that's important if you're playing 3rd gen) Wingull Kirlia Surskit Shroomish Slakoth NINCADA (do we really want to legalize Shedinja?) Shedinja? Skitty Meditite Electrike Trapinch Shuppet Duskull Wynaut Snorunt Spheal Bagon Beldum 4th Gen Shinx Budew Cherubi Bonsly Riolu
looking at the list of eligibles, I'm beginning to have second thoughts about the 300 thing. I'm up for something in the middle, as long as it includes hoothoot and taillow. 270?
On July 28 2010 21:05 seRapH wrote: ok, so a possible way to nerf the grass starter would be to restrict their movesets to include tackle and growl. or at least tackle or growl.
what about the imba items like salac berries? magikarp+flail+endure+salac berry could potentially be... not magikarp-like...
i think some hold items should be allowed, if not all, and recovery items i think will pretty much be required to have a decent shot at winning.
<300 1st Gen Rattata Spearow Ekans Pikachu Sandshrew Nidoran F Nidoran M Vulpix Jigglypuff Paras Diglett Meowth Horsea Ditto 2nd Gen Hoothoot (one i think that's important if you're playing 2nd gen) Ledyba Mareep Pineco Snubbull 3rd Gen Taillow (one i think that's important if you're playing 3rd gen) Wingull Kirlia Surskit Shroomish Slakoth NINCADA (do we really want to legalize Shedinja?) Shedinja? Skitty Meditite Electrike Trapinch Shuppet Duskull Wynaut Snorunt Spheal Bagon Beldum 4th Gen Shinx Budew Cherubi Bonsly Riolu
looking at the list of eligibles, I'm beginning to have second thoughts about the 300 thing. I'm up for something in the middle, as long as it includes hoothoot and taillow. 270?
I thought about Magikarp and the Flail strategy before. Although a 200 base attack is certainly powerful, Magikarp has only 20 base stats for Attack, so it can't be that powerful.
Also, an easier way to use that strategy is to keep the Magikarp at low health before the battle, then use Choice Scarf.
On July 29 2010 02:52 Oceanic wrote: I think the total should be increased to 265. This would add: Ratatta Skitty Wynaut Spearow Hoothoot Shinx Diglett Ledyba
But would still exclude nincada at 266
Or we could just arbitrarily remove Shedinja. I honestly have never used Shedinja before and I am not sure how effective it is (on paper it is pretty overpowered).
It's hard to say what threshold is good at the moment until someone (or me) playtest it... I am willing to go for 300 for a first try.
It's definitely possible to solo the game with just magikarp and flail.
Tell me when you guys decide on a stat level. I might try it on a platinum in a few day/weeks. It may be a good idea to have tiers so people don't all pick the same pokemon and have a choice of what to pick. Eg. 1-250 base stats : pick 2 pokemon 251-300 base stats : pick 2 pokemon 301-350 base stats : pick 2 pokemon
This way we can also use our starter pokemon. The distribution can also be 3:2:1.
Tell me when you guys decide on a stat level. I might try it on a platinum in a few day/weeks. It may be a good idea to have tiers so people don't all pick the same pokemon and have a choice of what to pick. Eg. 1-250 base stats : pick 2 pokemon 251-300 base stats : pick 2 pokemon 301-350 base stats : pick 2 pokemon
This way we can also use our starter pokemon. The distribution can also be 3:2:1.
Does that mean you will only catch 6 pokemon in total?
Tell me when you guys decide on a stat level. I might try it on a platinum in a few day/weeks. It may be a good idea to have tiers so people don't all pick the same pokemon and have a choice of what to pick. Eg. 1-250 base stats : pick 2 pokemon 251-300 base stats : pick 2 pokemon 301-350 base stats : pick 2 pokemon
This way we can also use our starter pokemon. The distribution can also be 3:2:1.
Does that mean you will only catch 6 pokemon in total?
Tell me when you guys decide on a stat level. I might try it on a platinum in a few day/weeks. It may be a good idea to have tiers so people don't all pick the same pokemon and have a choice of what to pick. Eg. 1-250 base stats : pick 2 pokemon 251-300 base stats : pick 2 pokemon 301-350 base stats : pick 2 pokemon
This way we can also use our starter pokemon. The distribution can also be 3:2:1.
Does that mean you will only catch 6 pokemon in total?
Btw that video is crazy
No, 6 that you can use at any given time.
Like that video shows, we only need *one* pokemon to beat the game. If we make into tiers we'd probably just powerlevel the strongest one (probably out of the 301-350 stats group).
I am pretty sure if we play in different regions we will be having different strategies.
taillow and wingull are the only convenient flyers that i can think of for gen 3. but i could be wrong, i feel like theres somewhere you can catch a pidgey or spearow...
i think 270's a good cutoff, but 300 is fine too, just need to test it a bit.
Has anyone started the challenge? I don't want to do it alone. Currently my limit is 350, I felt like any less and I'd have to just power level and that wouldn't be very fun. Any more and I could just get a pokemon with earthquake, surf, body slam, and ice beam and rape the elite four and team galactus at the same time. I'm having fun designing the movesets for my pokemon.
My geodude is going to be doing defense curl and roll out. Roll out has 30 power and 90 accuracy. With 1 x accuracy that 90 goes to 99.6% I think. With StAB the power is 45 on the first hit. With defense curl the power is 90 on the first hit. Geodude also has a nice base stat for attack at 80. I'm wondering if I should have kept rock polish, with that 3 times, geodude would be unstoppable.
His hits would be 90,180,360,720,and 1440 power and he would always go first.
nath, at this point it's about picking a cutoff you are comfortable with and try it.
I want to try this for HG at a cutoff of 265 (but I probably will keep my starter in storage in case I find it too hard and want to modify slightly). However right now I am not sure how to emulate HG on my computer.
Although it's not a major problem (I will play mostly on my handheld), it does create a huge problem when I try to post screenshots, etc. The other problem is that my usual computer is broken; right now I am using an even older computer that does not have a card reader. The clerk told me it would take two weeks to have my computer repaired T_T
Very soon I will lose it and just buy a damned card reader.
On August 02 2010 02:08 Hidden_MotiveS wrote: Has anyone started the challenge? I don't want to do it alone. Currently my limit is 350, I felt like any less and I'd have to just power level and that wouldn't be very fun. Any more and I could just get a pokemon with earthquake, surf, body slam, and ice beam and rape the elite four and team galactus at the same time. I'm having fun designing the movesets for my pokemon.
My geodude is going to be doing defense curl and roll out. Roll out has 30 power and 90 accuracy. With 1 x accuracy that 90 goes to 99.6% I think. With StAB the power is 45 on the first hit. With defense curl the power is 90 on the first hit. Geodude also has a nice base stat for attack at 80. I'm wondering if I should have kept rock polish, with that 3 times, geodude would be unstoppable.
His hits would be 90,180,360,720,and 1440 power and he would always go first.
EPT
![[image loading]](http://a.imageshack.us/img710/5640/pokemonplatinumu3623378.png)
