-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
-
Congrats to the winners of the 2023 Smog Awards!
(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon
- Thread starter BriarRose
- Start date
I vaguely remember that place, are you sure you need Climb? I remember doing some (admittedly tricky) platforming in that area (I had high jump), but I don't remember how far I got. Though still fairly late in the game and WAY too late for Luxray to be getting any decent Physical Electric moves. Not that Wild Charge is all that great (unless they increase it to 120 to make it a proper copy of Flare Blitz); come on GF we need like an Electric version of Liquidation (Circuit Break). Or heck, maybe give Luxray some love after neglecting it all these years: Change its stats to 80/120/80/85/80/105//550 and give it a Signature Move that's an Electric-type Leaf Blade (X-Ray Incision).
Yes Luxray's physical STAB options are hilariously bad, but I'm kinda concerned if this is how you view in-game tier lists. Since when has the F tier been for mons that are outclassed? If a player wants to use Luxray it'll perform just fine. It won't be as good as a lot of other mons but it won't be anything close to dead weight. Its low-power STAB is compensated by its good physical coverage and great mixed offences, it has solid bulk with Intimidate, and its Speed stat is just high enough to work in a game that insists on overlevelling you unless you rotate through extra team members.
see: Trubbish (no Physical Poison moves until too late), Grimer in BW2 (same deal as Trubbish), Magmar in RBY, Lumineon in DPPT, Elgyem in both Unova games. A lot of mons are outclassed in these games. That's generally why they are in lower tiers: yes we do judge on individual merits but sometimes those merits just suck anyway, and ultimately, who's going to pick a Ponyta over Chimchar in Sinnoh if starters were more than once per playthrough? That's right, nobody: it's outclassed.
...people who like Ponyta and want to use it? As I understand it, the tier list write-ups assume that you've already decided you want to use the Pokemon in question and just want an overview of its performance (strength, ease of use) relative to its availability.
Even if I thought these were reasonable comparisons, none of those Pokemon are even in the bottom tier for their associated games, which you said Luxray had a chance of entering for a hypothetical SV list.
False Surrender and Kowtow Cleave feel like the same move. Both have similar BP, similar effect of never missing and even the animation kinda looks similar. The flavor text of Kowtow Cleave is a bit different, stating that "The user slashes at the target after kowtowing to make the target let down its guard". Now one could interpret the Kowtow here to be a false sign of respect, before attacking the opponent while their guard is down, but Kowtowing is also done to signal a surrender, which would similarly still let the opponent's guard down as they think the battle is won, just like with False Surrender. So even the description in this case feels like its pointing to the same thing.
This isn't something I inherently dislike, since Pokemon sometimes get signature "flavor" moves that are similar to others, just something I found a bit odd since the two moves have very little to distinguish themselves from one-another.
This isn't something I inherently dislike, since Pokemon sometimes get signature "flavor" moves that are similar to others, just something I found a bit odd since the two moves have very little to distinguish themselves from one-another.
Incredibly early Thunder and Ice Fangs. Intimidate is still strong. I thought IGTLs evaluated mons in a vacuum. F-Tier is straight up unviable. Shinx might still be stuck in Gen 4, but it's nowhere close to unviable.
You might as well throw most Normal-types in GSC straight into the bushes then. Or pretty much most mons in any game, really.
Kowtow Cleave is a case of a Japanese pun being lost in translation. Kingambit's Japanese name, Dodogezan, and the move itself, Dogezan, combine "dogeza" (a prostration, typically for pleading forgiveness), and "zan" (slash). Kingambit is specifically performing a dogeza, which with the giant head sword would double as an attack method.
That said, False Surrender is "Dogezatsuki" in Japanese. "Dogeza Stab". Grimmsnarl is also performing a dogeza! So really, the only difference is the actual method of attack, hair stabbing vs. slashing. Kingambit has some wordplay going in its favor that justifies the move's existence I feel.
That said, False Surrender is "Dogezatsuki" in Japanese. "Dogeza Stab". Grimmsnarl is also performing a dogeza! So really, the only difference is the actual method of attack, hair stabbing vs. slashing. Kingambit has some wordplay going in its favor that justifies the move's existence I feel.
It also counts as a "slash" move so it'd be boosted by Sharpness.
Personally I'd have swapped out Pressure for Sharpness as a HA.
Battle Royale: the gameplay element where the arena is cooler than the actual gameplay which lags the game to heck, is essentially postgame, and not even fun in said postgame because unless you live in Japan good luck finding four local players (I don't remember if you can do them online?). I think Alola is a great region, but this was by far the weakest gameplay style they have ever introduced. If it was more than one Pokemon per team it might have been okay, but as it is, you'll spend more time loading the battle in than you will in actual battle.
Though the Battle Royale has one of the best designed ribbons in the game imo. I like the Master Rank and Legend ribbons, but nothing really compares to the Battle Royale ribbon's colorfulness and design. It's rare that GF implements a ribbon not tied to some serious mini game grind, post game grind, or something otherwise standard. I'd wish they'd do more ribbons like it in the future.
It's also quite unique beacuse it's one of the rare instances where it's clear GF was reacting to community developments. Throughout Gen 6, there were a bunch of really popular YT videos of people playing in a free for all like format, using multi battles in which anyone could attack anyone else. It wasn't perfect, but the interplay was interesting which is why it became popular. Coincidentally, Gen 7 magically had a true free-for-all format implemented as a significant minigame. It's pretty clear where the input came from, and I quite like that. At least, I'd certainly wish they'd kept doing that, instead of switching to a "I hope they all drown so I can rifle through their wallets" mentality.
It's definitely not perfect, but I think the Battle Royale was overall a positive aspect of Gen 7. It'd certainly be a great boon if we got experimentations of a similar caliber in future gens. But that won't be happening...
Yung Dramps
awesome gaming
It's a damn shame then they completely misread the fan format they were trying to replicate. I promise you all that the community would've soldiered through the lag, the matchmaking difficulties, all that shit if they had made an actual Free-For-All format. For reasons that elude me, they instead went with the points system over the actual last man standing setup that made those videos you talked about so hilarious and fun to watch. Not even as a selectable alternate match type was it made available! This is the primary reason why the official FFA format failed, everything else were just nitpicks in the face of the core problem.
Personally I had a good enough time just getting through the single player using Alolan Muk to stall out the field with Poison Gas and set up to become unkillable before the AI started targetting me to stop my lead. It is definitely one of the more brutally luck based modes to find success in the modern days though because of how opportunistic it was. It was interesting how they made Spotlight a move just for this format and it immediately got removed in Gen 8. The battle spot actually had random matchmaking for the battle royals with options for special pokemon on and off so you could have some very unbalanced battles.
Kilowattrel not learning Rain Dance is dumb and feels like something Game Freak removed after the fact.
Its material is part of the recipe for the TM.
And it's in its 6 star raid extra moveset.
And it is part of the Water 1 group as a seabird and is the only Water 1 mon in the game to not have Rain Dance.
False Surrender: Feint Attack 2.0 (Feint Attack dexited)
Kowtow Cleave: False Surrender 2.0
If you've played the Free For all mode in Showdown, you know that the mode has a lot of issues as is (which I am also guilty of contributing to), like players forfeiting randomly as soon as the match starts, Toxic Spikes being OP af, some players going afk, Infinite switching between Regen mons + Intimidate mon being even more OP since most of the time the opponent won't attack you, etc. etc. I'd imagine all of these problems would be even more noticeable in the actual game since IIRC multi battles end as soon as one player DCs, so I can understand why the did the points system as opposed to a last man standing system, esp since it can take a while before the last man standing actually falls. A points system doesn't reward non-interaction like the last man standing system does.
Fun Fact: Every single pokemon that gets Weather Ball, whether naturally, by TM or by egg move, will get at least one (often 2) of the weather setting moves in its kit.
Except Wattrel
I'm honestly willing to say that they just overlooked that they didn't give Wattrel Rain Dance by TM rather than last minute removal because lmao
The TM crafting system this gen is fun, but needs some slight rework. Just...why does every individual species need to have it's own crafting material? Availability of the good TMs is already limited, there's no need to lock crafting behind "3 feathers from 3 different mid-game birds" when it could have just been "10 mid-tier feathers". It doesn't encourage exploration, since the dex will tell you wear they are, it just encourages watching the taxi load screen.
and some of the spawns are rare (Charcadet comes to mind) or have caveats attached (Spiritomb only appears in 3 spots once a day). Even with Raids it's still not a sure thing and still doesnt give a lot.
I feel like some of the TMs might respawn, though, which is...nice, I guess?
So they're making Charizard the only available Kanto starter again. After what happened last gen I can only describe this as one of the most tactless marketing decisions I've ever seen. Do they really think that anyone who hasn't bought the game already is going to rush to buy it after hearing about the limited-time Charizard event?Bulbapedia said:
There's boxsprites for most "major" forms, and even most minor ones. So like all the colors of Arceus, all the flabebes, all the vivillons, the more major gender differences (not Hippopotas, though), etc
Except Dudunsparce 3-Segment form. Very annoying since it means if you looked away from the evolution or mashed through it out of habiy you have to go into the summary screens instead of just looking at the sprites, like you can with Maushold.
Except Dudunsparce 3-Segment form. Very annoying since it means if you looked away from the evolution or mashed through it out of habiy you have to go into the summary screens instead of just looking at the sprites, like you can with Maushold.
Let me guess, it’s male and thus cannot evolve?
You are not alone about this. Hundred if not millions of Shiny Hunters are unhappy about getting a male Shiny Combee.
I've personally witnessed a male shiny Salandit on a stream last gen. The screams are still fresh in my ears.