dondon151

I think that in itself is probably the main concern in improving Natu's availability. Cottonee had similar utility and was removed, although Magic Bounce is more situational and only works against the proper opponents. Well, I do think there should be enough mandatory trainers such that a player using a 2-or-3-Pokemon team can keep up in levels. If the player is using more Pokemon, then there should also be enough optional trainers such that those additional Pokemon can be somewhat adequately trained without grinding in the grass. As Ame pointed out, I mentioned that the mandatory trainer density early in the game is much higher compared to that in the late game, and her suggestion was to reduce the early game trainer density.

Oh! I do remember one thing that was changed from the main series games. Cain's Nidoran M knows Scratch at L5 instead of Peck, for clear reasons.

Well, I tend to think of it this way. A very small subset of players will use a 2-Pokemon team. A larger subset of players will use a 3-Pokemon team, and then larger still a 4-Pokemon team. I would imagine that most people use something like a 5-Pokemon team, maybe keeping 1 Pokemon in the party for a Cut and Rock Smash slave. More HMs are coming in the latter part of the game, which further necessitates an HM slave slot. I also think that many players will at least exhibit the "Fire Emblem mentality" to some extent in the early game. But in general, if you design the opponent Pokemon teams to accommodate, for example, a player's 5-Pokemon team, then it's going to at least be suitable challenge for 4-Pokemon and 6-Pokemon teams, whereas if you designed them to accommodate 6-Pokemon teams, then they're going to be too easy for 4-and-fewer Pokemon teams. Yeah, this tends to be one of those things where if you change one thing that doesn't stay faithful to the games, there's no good place to stop. Speaking of being faithful to the games, does Reborn use the gen V friendship system, with Friend Balls setting friendship to 200? I know that I had to level up Swadloon 10 times in order for it to evolve into Leavanny, which is consistent with its friendship starting out at 200 and gaining +2 per level up. On this topic in particular, I didn't actually understand what to do on Route 2 until I read some threads and looked at a video. The Crustle puzzles felt more frustrating than it should be due to the lag, and I also think that the stepping rock tiles need to be tweaked a little bit because it looks funny when you walk on the tiles above and below them.

That's correct - I think they can be a little better. Well, no, it's not contradictory. I've provided the reason why it's commonplace in Pokemon games for Pokemon to grow faster at lower levels and slower at higher levels. It's because of the cubic/quadratic/linear relationship between the relevant experience curves. I wouldn't bank on a single 5 PP offensive attack in a game where I haven't yet been able to find an Ether.

I sort of like it, and I sort of don't. On the one hand, it's a novel concept, but on the other hand, the whole idea behind telling the player that he's not allowed to use his favorite Pokemon is very effective at detracting from the fun aspect. Nah, I just wanted to say that Trubbish was garbage. But really, it's pretty bad. You use it for Toxic Spikes to make Florinia easier (you can do this with a freshly caught L14 Trubbish from the slums); it's mostly useless after that because its offense is bad, its STAB is a bad type, Toxic Spikes is ineffective in a lot of major boss battles, and you really don't need Toxic Spikes to win these battles. It's not a contradiction. I've already explained twice why it's not a contradiction. Don't let's pretend that there's no difference between asking to change one badge level cap and doing away with badge level caps altogether. I have already covered all of my bases regarding this issue. If a player wants to grind, then he will pick whatever Pokemon he wants to and grind. Any suggestions that I proposed would not adversely affect such a player (he would actually benefit, because there would be less time required for grinding). If a player doesn't want to grind, the path of least resistance through the game is Blaziken & Friends, and there is an overall lack of incentive to do otherwise. On the L100 cap issue: keep in mind that I actually advocated reducing the lategame level caps, not increasing them. On the trainer balance issue: I'm not sure if you realize that Ame went through all of the trouble to assign trainer Pokemon their levels the first time around. Having to rebalance trainers is not a reason for not... rebalancing trainers. Speaking from personal ROMhacking experience, adjusting trainer levels to anticipate a level curve is very simple to do. Designing maps and scripting events take far more time. The point of communication is to allow other people to understand ideas. I'm simply asking others to verify or deny that I've done a poor job at communication. I've tried my best to be as lucid on this point as I can, and it seems that only you and Gaunt continue to take issue with my intended meaning despite my repeated attempts at explanation.

I do try to keep the big picture in mind. One problem that a game developer has to take into account is the unintentional consequences of introduced incentives. For example, one of the intentions of introducing Brawl's (the Super Smash Bros. game) air dodge system was to encourage aerial combat. The actual unintended consequences were that it promoted camping and provided a way to mitigate knockback. And for what it's worth, aerial combat was better in Melee because of faster falling speed and greater hitstun, but we never identified it as an intentional consequence of those design choices. Here's another example: I was in the process of designing a Pokemon Fire Red ROMhack and had the standard fare of Bulbasaur available as a starter, Caterpie available in Viridian Forest, Paras available in Mt. Moon, etc. I thought, particularly in the case of the latter two Pokemon, well they're pretty bad, so I should give them early sleep-inducing moves to compensate. The intended consequence was to give the player an incentive to use those Pokemon for a short amount of time. The unintended consequence was that they were way better than any other Pokemon at the time, so the easiest way to go about the game was to spam them for their sleeping moves and ditch them once better Pokemon came along. (For reference, this was a hack where all battles were double battles, so sleep inducer could be paired with overleveled starter Pokemon for an easy time.) (Side note: humorously enough, I also had Ralts available in the earlygame, catchable at L7 on Route 2 with Confusion already learned and all that jazz, and all of my playtesters complained to me that it was so bad that it wasn't worth using.) I think this principle can be applied almost regardless of which starter you pick. Torchic is extremely good (with or without Speed Boost), Chimchar is slightly worse because it lacks a good boosting move. Fennekin does well against different Pokemon than Torchic and Chimchar, but it also looks to be fairly good. Most starters can be counted on to steamroll past most opponents save for a subset of bosses it has type disadvantages against. The easiest way to get through the early game is to get by on the bare minimum necessary until better Pokemon show up, and not many of those are usable because of their low starting levels. I don't personally think that Pokemon like Mankey and Makuhita are intrinsically bad. They just require way more time to level up when compared to steamrolling through the Onyx Trainer School with a L25 starter. Trubbish is unfortunately pretty garbage, though. Aside from those guys in the Obsidia slums, earlygame Pokemon (i.e., before the first badge) can't really be underleveled because they gain EXP very quickly. I ended up skipping most of the event Pokemon because at the time, I couldn't figure out how to get a lot of them to appear, or their sidequests took too long and I had enough trouble navigating Peridot Ward to begin with because of the super dark night time palette. So in Reborn, Ame introduced a couple of incentives with the intention to encourage the player to use normally poor Pokemon. The unintended consequence of these incentives is that it's simpler if the player chooses to not use them anyway. The incentive against using normally great Pokemon, i.e. setting their starting level to be very low, worked too well - it's simpler to not use them anyway, especially when decent viable alternatives exist. For players who don't care about grinding, these incentives and disincentives don't really exist. Haha, I'm impossible to reason with? For the final time, I don't have a problem with the level cap system. I think it's great that there is a system in place that strongly discourages starter soloing and is actually not completely ineffective at doing so. I only have a problem, really, with one particular level cap within the system, hence my analogy: your claim that I have a problem with the system because I think L25 is too low for the first badge is like a claim that I hate all Pokemon because I dislike Bulbasaur. I would like to appeal to the audience: have I or have I not been clear with this distinction? Yes, that's if Florinia kept her Pokemon at an average of L24. Obviously, if the badge level cap was raised to L28 or L30, then Florinia's Pokemon would be scaled up to an average of L27 or L29, as will the Pokemon of every other trainer to a smaller extent. Am I not clear about this? I would like to appeal to the audience once more: was I being confusing in any way?

70% is 70% and 90% is 90%. If it feels lower, that's confirmation bias at work. Power-Up Punch is only a marginally better move than Charge Beam. I mean, pretty much the only notable competitive use for PUP in on MKhan, for obvious reasons.

Charge Beam exists and is available as a reward for the first badge.

Category 2 players will just use Blaziken. I apologize for being sassy there, but this is really the best solution for category 2 players, and the overall effect is that lower leveled wild Pokemon will not affect game difficulty because they can simply be ignored. For all of the challenge-seeking that category 2 players do, they're not going to be winning many battles with a Mamoswine that's 18 levels lower than opposing trainers (this is after 2 Rare Candies and a whole lot of switch training to begin with), and the gap is only going to widen. What you're suggesting here is that the game will be harder on average because there exist players who want to shoot themselves in the foot. There are a million ways to shoot yourself in the foot. So this is not true. I've said this before, and I'll say it again: I don't enjoy starter soloing - the Pokemon White 0 EXP speedrun is evidence of that. It's entirely possible to use a team of 2-3 Pokemon in Reborn without being underleveled, mostly because of the level cap. Less available experience for Blaziken is also not a big issue, because the level cap restricts him from being incredibly overleveled. But let's suppose that wild Sigilyph appeared at L51 instead of L45. I would now be far more likely to consider using Sigilyph (possibly ditching an existing team member to do so). Currently, I would not bother using it at all - I ended up doing so, but in retrospect, it was a decision that I regret.

Wow! Thank you for taking your time to read through that quagmire of text. I'll try to be both thorough and brief with my response. This is a fair enough excuse. I'm obviously not the Reborn game designer, but I've done some (Pokemon and Fire Emblem) ROMhacking and I know full well that certain things are deceptively difficult to implement. A few episodes of difference is no small difference. The location guide says that Ralts requires Magnet Powder from 7th street? I seem to recall that I found a Magnet Powder in the other factory in Peridot Ward, but I could be misremembering. Anyway, unless I'm vastly underestimating Magic Bounce, I don't see it as an overly strong ability in-game. There's no use in redirecting Spikes or Stealth Rock (not that there are many, if any, opponent Pokemon using those moves), and its ability to redirect status moves is no stronger than a Pokemon with Thunder Wave, Will-o-Wisp, Sleep Powder, etc. The biggest issue I can think of is that it messes up the AI, but Lightningrod et al. do the same thing. The in-game tier list ranks Espeon below some of its fellow evolutions despite having access to Magic Bounce. Theoretically, the best solution would be to experiment and see if it ends up being too strong, but that potentially wastes time on your part if it does prove to be too strong. I can assure you that as is, no one uses Xatu because its level up movepool is horrid. I think it's a bit unreasonable to assume that players have a team of 6 Pokemon so early in the game. The main reason is that the diversity of Pokemon early in the game is necessarily smaller compared to later in the game. But regardless of this detail, it's still true that Pokemon level up faster early in the game compared to later in the game because of the cubic/quadratic/linear disparities in the experience-related curves. For example, a L16 Combusken might only have to defeat 3 L16 Pokemon to gain a level, but a L56 Blaziken will have to defeat more than 3 L56 Pokemon to gain a level, even if the L56 Pokemon are evolved and the L16 Pokemon aren't. This is a fantastic idea. I understand your intention, but some of these guys are nigh unusable without sinking time into a patch of grass. For the Sandile example in particular, they exist at L21 in a cave where the Sandshrew are L42 - meaning the Sandshrew have Swords Dance already, learn Earthquake in 4 levels, and/or can evolve immediately. Is Sandile really that much better than Sandshrew that it deserves to appear 21 levels lower? Sandslash is probably actually better overall because it has Swords Dance and Fury Cutter. For the Growlithe example, I wasn't aware that Growlithe could be considered to be a strong Pokemon. It's stuck in its unevolved form until the player grabs the Fire Stone from the volcano near Apophyll Beach, or until it learns its Fire type STAB of choice, whichever comes first. It's also in the slow experience group. The converse line of reasoning is that if it's really underleveled, then a better idea is to not use it. I don't think that wild Pokemon should be on par with opponent trainer levels (which are in turn generally on par with player Pokemon levels), but rather than being 11 levels lower, they should be 5 levels lower. This depends on the point in the game, because level differences matter more early on when relative stat differences are greater. (Like, a 5 level difference is okay when the average team level is L50, but not okay when the average team level is L25). Keeping species at a low level just so they don't evolve upon leveling up comes at the cost of making that Pokemon completely unusable without grinding. You're going to have to convince me why instant evolution is a bad thing; I just don't see it... In terms of timing, the current location of the Exp. Share is probably ideal. The benefit is, as you've pointed out, mostly cutting down on tedium, since rather than switch training, I can just plop the Exp. Share on a weaker Pokemon (like that L21 Sandile or L29 Swinub) and change the battle mode to set (and also not waste time going into the bag and using Strawberry Ice Creams). The money spent on healing items really isn't an issue at all by this point in the game. It's definitely a valuable potential sidequest reward, but then again, so are the Bicycle and Running Shoes. None are essential, all of them save time. I may have missed a couple of things. If I've been unclear, please point it out to me. Thank you! I've worked an IT job before and let me tell you something: this answer don't fly. Imagine if you have a problem with your cell phone service, call tech support, and some guy on the line says, "well, it works for me, so I don't understand why it shouldn't work for you." No, I'm actually all right with the level cap system. The system is in place to prevent shenanigans like starter soloing. I'm sorry, but this is like saying that I dislike Bulbasaur, therefore I dislike Pokemon. You must understand how this is a ridiculous accusation. Theoretically, the opponent trainer is allowed to have better moves. If you picked a Fire type starter, or picked up a Makuhita or a Trubbish, who here really thinks that Florinia is harder than Aya? I mean, you have more options and moves against Aya! (She also has more options and moves against you.) Functionally, Makuhita evolves at L24, so the level cap change really doesn't make a difference in this aspect. I did only follow the main storyline, and there was a heck of a lot of backtracking.

Switch training is tedious. Switch training is almost exactly like grinding; I can interchange the two in a sentence and they would convey mostly the same meaning. I can either switch train Vulpix or not use it, and it's far more convenient to not use it. I can either grind Vulpix or not use it, and it's far more convenient to not use it. In practice, they are about the same, too; the player is trying to bring a very underleveled Pokemon up to par. Now, according to Magus, switch training Magikarp was the optimal speedrunning strategy prior to it being removed. Some speedrunning strategies require more grinding than others; those tend to be among the most boring and the least fun. (The Final Fantasy Tactics Advance speedrun strategy involves grinding the main character to L50 in an earlygame mission; that's one hell of a tedious speedrun.) Dobby, perhaps unintentionally, countered this statement previously: And, for the record, I had difficulty remembering badge limit levels as is, and I have read posts here by other users who also have mixed them up before, since they are all divisible by 5. (This is one instance where making the levels more unique might actually make them easier to remember!) The on-site FAQ is also a very good resource. I'm almost certain that I did not have to grind for Aya and Radomus, despite both of them being unfavorable matchups for the Pokemon that I have been accused of using as a crutch.

Really? So if Ame were to make the night palette pitch black, you would have no problem with it because you're not supposed to be able to see anything? Games have to strike a balance between functionality and realism. GSC and HGSS had great night palettes because they conveyed the notion that it was night time while still maintaining visibility. That's not a solution. Playing the game more has nothing to do with fixing the night time visibility problem. Not liking the music? I absolutely did not say that. The repetitive aspect I did mention purely as a consequence of playing the game for 9 hours; the music obviously is not repetitive per se. No, that's not what it means. Try not to put words in my mouth, okay? Please? It does not add to the difficulty of the game. It adds to the tedium. Changing the level cap to L28 (this was only an example, it could have been L27 or L30) doesn't make the game easier if the opponent Pokemon scale up with it, not just in terms of their level, but also in terms of their movesets, or held items, etc. I will address your claim that grinding and walking around adds to game difficulty. I did not find Reborn to be terribly difficult because I could usually count on Blaziken or Barbaracle to get my way out of tough battles. It's pretty clear that grinding is entirely optional, since a compact team of decent Pokemon with boosting moves can mostly get the job done. So how could it be that grinding adds to game difficulty if the player isn't required to do it very much, provided he severely restrict his Pokemon options? Here's time for another analogy to demonstrate how walking around does not add to game difficulty. Say that I designed a game and I want you to test it out. The objective of the game is to follow a series of instructions. The instructions tell you to move from location A to location B, then to location C, and so on. Is this game difficult? It clearly isn't, and you tell me that you found the game to be too easy (also a bit too boring, but I ignored that complaint, because you're just a speedrunner). One week later, I contact you again with good news: I've improved the game difficulty. Excited, you sit down and test the game, expecting something different. Now suppose that I had made 2 changes to the game: I slowed down the player's movement speed, and I doubled the length of the paths between each location. Have I made the game more difficult, or is it just 4 times as tedious?

The best Pokemon in Reborn are typically dual-typed Pokemon with boosting moves and decently powered STABs that run off their stronger attacking stat. I don't believe that limiting TM availability encourages players to dip into the diverse array of available Pokemon. I can make the argument that it does just the opposite: it makes the type of Pokemon listed above much more useful relative to all others. A lot of typically mediocre Pokemon rely on TMs to make functional movesets. In any case, I don't mind TMs like Thunderbolt being denied to the player, but to wit, some of the TMs I haven't seen that wouldn't be OP if they were available are things like Hone Claws, Light Screen, Protect, Return, Reflect, Flame Charge, Bulldoze, and Power-Up Punch, among others.

You brought up some good details that I didn't mention, and I want to expand on this a little bit in a different direction. Some areas have very low encounter rates. I don't know why this is the case. It can't be for the sake of the player not getting into too many wild battles, because Repels are available for precisely that reason.

I hate having to repeat my points over and over again, but it seems like some people either don't read them or understand them. A speedrunner largely doesn't care about event Pokemon. If I wanted to speedrun Pokemon Reborn, 99% of event Pokemon would be useless because they would be too time-consuming to even obtain. I think Magus is the one person here who has attempted to route Reborn for speedrunning, and he will probably agree with me that 99% of event Pokemon are useless for speedrunning (especially now that Gyarados was removed). So before you continue further, let me iterate once more: I do not have a secret agenda to make speedrunning easier and even if I did, I wouldn't care about event Pokemon levels. Did you see the post in which I compared a Reborn night time screen with an HGSS night time screen? In the Reborn screen, I can't see the tree trunk or the cracks in the ground from the distance at which I sit from my screen. A common rejoinder to this is "get eye glasses" or "turn up the brightness." Aside from the fact that this is a poor defense in its nature (see the iPad app developer analogy), I am wearing eye glasses and my screen brightness is at maximum. Finally, you said that you have no problem navigating Reborn after 150 hours of play time. What about someone who's just starting out the game? Why is the game not tailored to be accessible to someone who has not played Reborn for 150 hours? That I'm still bringing up the problems means that they haven't been properly "addressed." If Teleport is glitched, I'll remind you that it's still accessible in the game. Some guy could get an Abra from the 7th street vendor and still use the glitched Teleport. It's clearly not a big enough problem if it can still be encountered - the problem itself could easily be patched up by Ame temporarily disabling Teleport's field effect until she can get it working properly, or by forcing the player to always teleport to the Grand Hall Top. (Side note: what happens if a player uses Teleport and warps back to a non-Agate Circus location after the event with Cain at the gate leading up to Agate Circus has been triggered? Can he not continue on in the game?) This whole "problem for speedrunners" phrase is an epithet that is really convenient for dismissing legitimate concerns. I brought up the Teleport issue because running from place to place is excruciatingly boring. Someone didn't read a previous post. I don't even have an issue with the music; I don't know why people continue to bring it up. It's not even a "problem for speedrunners;" it's just a minor annoyance that can be very easily be fixed. Like, there is no reason not to make Super Repels available earlier. Ever since the new Repel system was introduced in B/W, I don't know why Game Freak is still using 3 different kinds of Repels when they're all functionally identical and the cost efficiency difference is trivial. 1. I never ever once mentioned that I had a problem with the level cap system. I actually really like the level cap system. I think Pokemon should do more to encourage players to partake in the variety that it has to offer. The level cap system is necessary but not sufficient, though, because the effort of expanding my team is simply too tedious. 2. I already stated that the level curve in the main series is problematic. Furthermore, I provided mathematical reasoning to demonstrate why this is true: - The formula for determining a Pokemon's level is cubic. - The amount of EXP required for a Pokemon to reach its next level is quadratic. - The formula for determining EXP gain is linear. You don't need to know calculus or limits to figure out that Pokemon growth naturally slows down over time because of these three facts. 1. I have said, many times by this point, that I have no desire to make the game easier. 2. I'm only lobbying for conveniences that the player should have in the first place. On the Teleport issue (glitch problem aside), here's an analogy: suppose Ame didn't code the Running Shoes or Bicycle into the game. Would you be okay with this? If a user named ponpon151 made a thread in the forum complaining that getting from one place to another is too inconvenient because there are no Running Shoes or Bicycle, is your rejoinder going to be, "this is a speedrunner's problem; also, it's no big deal, just listen to some other music?" If your response to this analogy is, "but the Bicycle and Teleport are two different things," then you must explain why. Both of them (again, glitch aside) serve the purpose of speeding up transportation from one place to another. Because it would be really boring? Barbaracle was pretty damn good, too. By the way, like Lost Lore before me, I must apologize if I sound too belligerent. It's difficult to sound convincing and polite at the same time.

I full well understand this, and in fact I was not advocating this (as I will repeat for the third time). I'll use my Sigilyph example again: I obtained it at 11 levels lower than my team average, and my understanding is that my team was slightly underleveled to begin with. An example recommendation would be to have it appear 5 levels higher, which would still put it 6 levels below my team average, but at least capable of fighting a decent chunk of trainer battles on its own with help from Hyper Potions. Another example would be the wild Pokemon in the Jasper Ward: they appear at an average of L20 when the team average should be around L25. At lower levels, level differences matter more (because damage calculation is multiplicative and not additive), so they would be much more usable, but not completely so, if their average level was around L22. Well, I am a "more experienced" player, and rather than challenge me, it's just encouraged me to not use them. I suspect this is not the intended effect. If I preferred to stick to 1 Pokemon, I would not have bothered with a 5-Pokemon team. I think one of the primary virtues of the Pokemon series is its variety, and it would be shame to not experience that, but I don't want to bend over backwards in doing so. I also linked the Pokemon White 0 EXP speedrun that I completed awhile ago, which uses more Pokemon than any player would on any normal playthrough. So I am not averse to using more than 1 Pokemon on a team. That's no problem at all. It's hard to disagree with someone and not occasionally come across as rude. Haha, Reborn for speedrunners would just have: - Speed Boost Blaziken - Something with Teleport - An easy way to beat Aya and Radomus And even slightly higher leveled wild Pokemon wouldn't matter because the speedrunner would just use Repels all the time.

That's actually not the definition of a challenge. The definition that you're looking for is most likely: chal·lenge [chal-inj] Show IPA noun 2. something that by its nature or character serves as a call to battle, contest, special effort, etc. or 5. difficulty in a job or undertaking that is stimulating to one engaged in it. Explain to me how in any way grinding is "stimulating to one engaged in it." It's the precise opposite, which is why many people dislike it. In general, actual battle difficulty is a challenge the players enjoy whereas grinding is not a task the player enjoys. The reason is simple: the latter is not challenging; it is tedious. I can assure you that reducing the required amount of grinding will not make Pokemon Reborn any easier, and this is more or less ensured by the badge level cap system. Florinia is still going to be tough if you didn't pick a Fire type starter. Aya is still going to be tough unless you got just the right Psychic or Ground type Pokemon. And so on. Did you know that I completed a 0 EXP speedrun of Pokemon White? Especially in the later main series games, the game provides ample Pokemon that do not require much grinding to be usable. This was one aspect that I greatly liked about BW and the 0 EXP speedrun was probably the most fun I ever had playing a Pokemon game since it neither required a starter solo nor grinding. The playlist can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPtcK2f-aIoSA-sNkTz1zw3ENK-Nmv8_i I am not expecting every single Pokemon to be available at an immediately usable level, and as I said in my previous post, it's perfectly fine if a subset of event Pokemon appear underleveled. Since there are so many event Pokemon in this game that they can easily constitute your entire team, I don't think it's a good idea for all of them to appear underleveled. You just said that you breed Pokemon to use on your team. Hatched Pokemon are L1. Opponent trainer Pokemon are several times more powerful than L1. How is this not grinding? Because I would be wasting my time when I could be not wasting my time?

I actually used very few Common Candies past the third gym when I expanded my team to include Leavanny and then Barbaracle. I don't think I can be accused of wasting experience when none of the Pokemon that I used were available until later in the game. I did "waste" a whole lot of experience before then, but seeing as how the player is encouraged to use throwaway Pokemon until better Pokemon are available later in the game, I can hardly see how that experience could be used better. One observation that I had was that training up another Pokemon was far more tedious than just using Combusken on everything (because these Pokemon were quite underleveled). Because of the dearth of earlygame money, training a secondary Pokemon required making numerous return trips to the Pokemon Center, so I just didn't bother with it. There was a decision between "wasting experience" and impeding my progress through the game; the choice was pretty easy to make. By the way, I don't like starter soloing in the main series games, even though I dabble in speedrunning where starter soloing is the best way to go. The variety is a great feature in Pokemon, but it's a bit irksome when variety is discouraged because it takes too much time to achieve. I fully understand the point you are making, and I agree with you, but I am not advocating for that. The choice is something more like a L5 Elekid vs. a L40 Electabuzz when the rest of your team averages L45 and you don't yet have an Electrizer. You strike a balance this way: you cut out 35 levels of grinding, and you get a Pokemon that can hold his own in some battles and does poorly in others until he catches up. It could be that as part of the game design, Ame still wants some Pokemon to be low-leveled rarities, like the starters or Elekid. That's perfectly fine, but you obviously can't treat every Pokemon that has a hint at being good this way. The problem is when the alternatives are stuff like L32 Joltik or L32 Chinchou. So now, if you have a choice between L5 Elekid and those two alternatives when the team average is L45, then no thanks, I don't think I want an Electric type. Grinding is not challenging. You run around in an area with wild Pokemon and potion up or PC up when necessary.

I don't think it should, either. I'm simply advocating for it to become less tedious, not less difficult. I already said that I don't grind. I already pointed out the flaw in this piece of psychology. Rather than grinding a Pokemon, the better idea is to simply not use it, especially since the starter Pokemon can manage most tasks on his own. If you look at my team above, adding Sigilyph and Mamoswine actually hindered rather than helped my team, since Blaziken does better against Samson despite Sigilyph's type advantage. I could have had a higher average team level with just Blaziken, Barbaracle, and Leavanny. So the next time I play through the game, I'm just not going to bother with Sigilyph and Mamoswine. Now, I made the distinction between the two player types in my previous post. One of them doesn't really care that Sigilyph appears underleveled. The other one is simply not going to use it, even though Sigilyph is a really cool Pokemon. It's perfectly possible to satisfy both types of player. And again, I'm not saying that Sigilyph should appear fully battle-ready, but I caught it roughly 11 levels under my team average (excluding Mamoswine, who was at an even lower level). Even a 4-6 level improvement would significantly reduce tedium while not compromising difficulty. Should it be an integral part of the game? I have almost no incentive to grind a team of Pokemon when Blaziken can solo most difficult battles. If you want to encourage players to build full teams of varied Pokemon (which, I think, is one of the goals of Pokemon), my best suggestion is to cut down on the grinding requirement. I am not specifically suggesting Natu because I like Natu. I'm suggesting it because there are literally only 5 Pokemon lines that learn Teleport by level up, 2 of which were already removed for being too OP, and 1 of which is Deoxys. What I'm really suggesting is to improve Teleport's availability. Let me provide an analogy here. You are designing a UI for an iPad application. Some users give you feedback and say that some parts of the app are difficult to use because they are hard to see. Do you: 1. Alter the design so that it addresses the users' problems. 2. Explain to the users that you've picked out a good color scheme and recommend they deal with it. 3. Ask the users to use a third party source to suit the design to their own needs. Once more, I will reiterate that I believe it fully possible to convey the atmosphere while using a palette that is easy on the eyes. Do you agree or disagree with this statement?

I am not only speaking for myself here: if the game expects the player to grind a Pokemon up before it's usable, then it's already made a choice for the player. So in general there are two categories of player: 1. Player who doesn't mind grinding 2. Player who does mind grinding In the case of player 1, a lower or higher starting level is not going to impact the difficulty of the game for him because he's just going to grind it up to par if necessary. He can't grind it past the level cap, so that's nothing to worry about. In the case of player 2, a lower starting level renders the Pokemon unusable. The main attraction of the Pokemon franchise is its huge number of options that are available to the player. Because the level cap exists, I'm sure that it's entirely possible to cater to both player 1 and player 2. I'm not saying that Pokemon like Growlithe should come fully battle-ready with a Fire Stone, but they should at least be able to fit into the party without having to invest time into leveling them up outside of the main storyline. I would like to mention explicitly that the intention behind these suggestions is not to make the game easier but only to make the game less tedious. Florinia would still be difficult whether or not you made Makuhita available at L14 or L18, because one of the dominant strategies is to grind Makuhita to L24. That's actually not entirely what I meant. Glitchxcity employs a certain style in her music and tends to use the same instruments. A soundtrack doesn't necessarily have to be playing the same exact song in order to be repetitive. For example, if I forced you to listen to J. S. Bach for 9 hours, I'm willing to bet that unless you are a classical music connoiseur, you are going to find that to be repetitive, even if I remark in my defense that they are difference pieces and each piece uses different motifs within itself. Also, Bicycle music. I absolutely love her Relic Castle remix, but the theme replaces the BGM in pretty much every location in which the Bicycle is usable. This is as close to a single repetitive track as the game gets. I'm going to point out, first of all, that I did all of this, and then I'll address each point separately. Switching Pokemon in and out is tedious. Using the Exp. Share is not. Introducing a more accessible Exp. Share does not increase difficulty; it only decreases tedium. Since this is gen V Exp. Share, it doesn't increase the amount of experience that you obtain, so there's no way that it makes the game any easier. My team post-Samson was L64 Blaziken, L60 Barbaracle, L56 Leavanny, L49 Sigilyph, and L48 Mamoswine. No amount of "playing my cards right" short of grinding can compensate for the fact that Sigilyph and Swinub appear at relatively very low levels. The same would apply with Growlithe at an earlier point in the game. You may not say that I'm not allowed to bring up the fact that I can't remember the badge limit levels when earlier Ark said this: In fact, your suggestion would resolve Ark's anticipated problem: if the player has trouble remembering that a badge sets a level limit to L36 or something, then he should pay attention to the dialogue. Did you read Natu's Pokedex entries? I specifically quoted them to show that their "natural habitat" is not on the rooftop of ancient buildings. It seems to me that Natu fits the triple criteria of: - Fitting in, canonically, into various habitats - Not breaking the game - Being a huge convenience to the player

I have read that thread, and part of my intention here is to challenge the assumed psychology employed when thinking about ways to make the game harder. Let me reiterate something I said in my previous post: "Let me put it this way: if you design a game such that you offer the player a Pokemon that is too difficult to use without grinding by virtue of low starting level and inadequate tools to train it, then the simple option for the player is to not use it. And that's fine, because the player can get away with not using 99% of the Pokemon in the game. But this is a design choice that unintentionally limits Pokemon options that aren't even broken, anyway." I'll use the Growlithe example again. Suppose that in order for Growlithe to be even moderately useful in the ZEL and Taka battle, it needs to be at least L24. why not just make Growlithe obtainable at L24? Requiring the player to grind these Pokemon before they become useful does not make the game harder. It only makes the game more tedious. Difficulty and tedium are not equivalent concepts. The player who wants to use Growlithe will grind it to at least L24 anyway; setting Growlithe's starting level to L20 doesn't make the game any more difficult, so why not save him the tedium in doing so? It's entirely possible to preserve all of the difficulty that's already in Pokemon Reborn and cut down significantly on the tedium. I apologize if this line of reasoning is unconvincing, but I've observed that several users here go the length to breed egg moves and IVs onto their in-game teams, so it's hard for me to believe that nerfing a bunch of Pokemon's starting levels really has an effect on difficulty at all. It just encourages grinding - and wasn't the point of the badge level cap system to discourage that practice? This really depends on the quality of your eyesight. Compare the following:

The second badge yields a +10 level increase to the limit. But I don't think that a system such as this one should be kept because it's "easier for players to remember;" even with the badge level limits all being divisible by 5, I never remember the limits as they are anyway - I always have to check the FAQ. The suggestions can be combined; for example, it could be perfectly fine for the level limits to increment by 5 later in the game so long as there are some more mandatory trainer battles or the player uses a smaller team of Pokemon. The L25 limit for the first badge is really the one that makes very little sense, though. (It also shouldn't be difficult to change the badge level limits. I'm 99% certain that Ame would just have to change a few instances of 25, or 19 if she has to use hex, to 28 or whatever). I'll take you up on this claim. Growlithe joins at L20 and can be obtained right before ZEL and Taka, who have L27+ Pokemon. The badge limit is L35 and it's almost a given that your Pokemon have exceeded the previous badge limit of L25 by a large amount. How is it that I am overleveled and the Growlithe is not underleveled? Shuppet appears at L20 and can be obtained right before Corey, who has L28+ Pokemon. How is it that I'm overleveled and the Shuppet is not underleveled? Now, as for wild Pokemon examples. Sandile appears at L21 and Swinub at L29 at a point in the game where the average party level should be around L45, if not higher. How is it that I'm overleveled and these wild Pokemon are not underleveled? Let me put it this way: if you design a game such that you offer the player a Pokemon that is too difficult to use without grinding by virtue of low starting level and inadequate tools to train it, then the simple option for the player is to not use it. And that's fine, because the player can get away with not using 99% of the Pokemon in the game. But this is a design choice that unintentionally limits Pokemon options that aren't even broken, anyway. (And I can't be the only person out there who doesn't take pleasure in grinding.) It's great if you don't find walking inconvenient. If you're fine with it, then you have the option to not use Teleport. What about the players who do find walking inconvenient? GlitchxCity's music is great, but I know I'm not the only one who gets tired of listening to it after about 9 hours of game play, a huge portion of which is spent on the Bicycle listening to the Relic Castle remix. (I understand that this figure tends to be a lot higher for most players by the time they finish episode 12, so they would be even more tired of it than I am!) Yes, I understand that it sets a mood. I'm perfectly convinced that it's possible to both set an appropriate mood and establish a level of color contrast that renders a map easy to navigate at night. Think of it this way: what's the point in setting the mood if it's unequivocally better for the player to change his clock and never experience that mood? I thought the goal was to introduce worse Pokemon in the early game? Natu is a perfect candidate for that. I mean, it's not like it can't deal damage, and some players will inevitably find a way to use it; I personally would only use it for Teleport. Functionally it's probably even worse than Woobat, who learns better damaging moves, a special Flying STAB, and Calm Mind. For Natu in particular, it's a bird - you could literally make up an event pretty much anywhere and it would make sense. If you don't agree, look at its Pokedex entries: "Natu has a highly developed jumping ability. The Pokémon flaps and leaps onto tree branches that are taller than grown-up people to pick at the tree's new shoots." "It runs up short trees that grow on the savanna to peck at new shoots. A Natu's eyes look as if they are always observing something." So obviously, it can work as a wild Pokemon in numerous places, provided that place has a ground and some foliage, and since my impression is that event Pokemon tend to be wandering, displaced Pokemon, it would make sense just about anywhere. Baltoy is a harder sell, but again, if you're a good enough writer, you can write it in as an event Pokemon in more than just the Citae.

Hello everyone, Never mind that this is my first post here. I enjoyed Reborn so much that I decided to create an account! As the topic title indicates, I have a handful of suggestions to improve Reborn's gameplay experience. Improve contrast in night time palettes I played this game mostly at night, and it was impossible to see anything, particularly inside Reborn City. GSC managed to seem bright at night time while being dark, and I imagine it's possible here, too. The solution on the player's end would just be to change the computer clock, but I don't think the player should have to do that every time he wants to play the game. It's an inconvenience that can be largely mitigated with a change in the game design. There's way too much walking around I understand that in previous versions of Reborn, Ralts and Abra were available early on and could be used to Teleport for faster transportation. Since they were deemed too strong and thus removed, I propose a handful of other possible solutions: 1. Introduce Natu earlier in the game. Natu learns Teleport at L9. The best part about it is that it sucks! It learns no damaging moves between L6 (Night Shade) and L42 as a Xatu (Future Sight). It's a perfect candidate for an earlygame Pokemon in Reborn. 2. Introduce Baltoy in the mid-game. Claydol learns Teleport via Heart Scale. It actually gets a pretty decent level-up movepool, though, and it's reasonably bulky, so it might qualify for being too good? 3. Introduce HM02 somewhere within the existing game. My understanding is that Ame doesn't want to do this, for some reason. Fly is way more flexible than Teleport and is also a functional attacking move; those would be my guesses. Teleport/Fly would exist purely for the player's convenience at very little cost to game difficulty. Being forced to walk around as much as you do right now almost strictly detracts from the experience. I love the setting in Reborn and I don't think it's at all possible to make the world a little more compact. Introduce Super Repels earlier Again, this is almost entirely a convenience thing, and it comes at no cost to game difficulty. It mostly means that the player has to deal with the "Do you want to use another?" prompt every 200 steps as opposed to every 100 steps with a Repel. The level curve is a bit too Pokemon-esque I appreciate the effort put in by the badge level restrictions. However, as in all Pokemon games, the level curve of the opponent Pokemon tends to be really flat in the early game and really steep later in the game. For reference, I probably had to use somewhere in the range of 16 Common Candies on my starter before getting the third badge, but by the time I was challenging Samson, my average team level (L55) was about 10 levels lower than his. Part of this was because I was trying to use a much bigger team, but I feel like using a bigger team was a huge mistake. Some may not think this is an issue, but I have suggestions nonetheless: 1. Increase the number of mandatory trainer battles later in the game. Early on, the player is fighting Meteor Grunt after Meteor Grunt. Later on, there seem to very few mandatory trainer battles, at least relative to early on. Now, I'm a speedrunner at heart, and I find grinding to be a massive waste of time, so it's fine and all if you make me fight trainer battles, but if you give me the option to skip them, I'll probably take that instead. And I'd imagine so would a lot of other players. 2. The badge level limits don't have to be divisible by 5. (Neither do event Pokemon levels.) I thought the L20 -> L25 improvement for the first badge in particular was way too low. Ame could do something like L20 -> L28 instead and scale up wild Pokemon and enemy trainers before the second gym by 1 to 3 levels likewise. (The second badge could stay at L35.) The level limit increments for later badges hardly even mattered because I wasn't close to hitting them, but enemy trainer levels were still scaling up, which meant that I became perpetually underleveled. Pokemon always level up faster early than they do later because their EXP curve is cubic whereas the EXP given by defeating opponent Pokemon is linear. So I think the badge level limits should reflect that. (This is, incidentally, the reason why all Pokemon games tend to have a flat level curve in the beginning and a steep level curve at the end - because the designers don't account for this very well.) 3. Some of the obtainable Pokemon are underleveled. To wit, most of the interactable Pokemon in Reborn City, Growlithe, Carvanha, etc. are underleveled, as are some of the wild Pokemon, like Sandile and Swinub in Tanzan Mts. or Sigilyph in Citae Arc-d'Astrae Aerie. Considering there's already a badge level limit to discourage excessive grinding, I'm not sure what the intention is in making, for example, Growlithe available ~8 levels lower than the rest of the player's team. 4. A more easily obtainable Exp. Share would be nice! There's something discouraging about training a L48 Sigilyph on trainers with L64 Pokemon. The Exp. Share is mostly a freebie in the main series games, anyway. Apologies for the wall of text. Despite all of the suggestions, there's probably even a larger wall of text that I could write about gameplay elements that I liked, but I'll just leave all of that to be inferred. I'm sure that some of these suggestions will be objected to, and I'll be happy to debate on them.