Pokemon Sun/Moon

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

Given the release in a few months, I thought I'd get the ball rolling.

Who would be your starter?

Sun or Moon?

Who's been keeping up with the news?

I'm torn between Litten (luff me some fire mons) and Rowlet (if the art for the last evo is legit, it's very Green Arrow-ey

[Darkness Ascendant he/him]

Have you noticed that Sun looks just like Pyroar, and Moon is just another bat?

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

That's what I was thinking but I couldn't remember Pyroar's name. Perhaps Lunala is Crobat trained and leveled up at night time holding a moon stone xD

[Darkness Ascendant he/him]

2 minutes ago, AnanasSpren said:

That's what I was thinking but I couldn't remember Pyroar's name. Perhaps Lunala is Crobat trained and leveled up at night time holding a moon stone xD

haha XD.

I love how creative pokemon are getting, *david attenborough voice* Ah yes, the rare key pokemon in it's natural habitat, did you know there is also a sword pokemon, a chandelier pokemon. Not to mention dedenne is basically Raichu among alot more other stuff

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

Not to mention there's an Artificial pokemon now, magearna

[Quiver he/him]

1 hour ago, AnanasSpren said:

Given the release in a few months, I thought I'd get the ball rolling.

Who would be your starter?

Sun or Moon?

Who's been keeping up with the news?

I'm torn between Litten (luff me some fire mons) and Rowlet (if the art for the last evo is legit, it's very Green Arrow-ey

YES

THIS IS MY PROBLEM

I like the water starters for games. You tend to use Surf a lot, and it's a damnation useful HM to have, so attaching it to your water starter is killing two birds with one stone... plus, I rather like Popplip, so I was gonna support the game in the face of overwhelming adversity. #clownseal

...Btu damnation, Rowlett's evoltion is rather Green Arrow-y, and, you know, that might be a deal breaker for me. Because of reasons.

It might come as a shock to you guys, but I'm a Green Arrow fan. Dunno if that's ever come up in conversation before.

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

28 minutes ago, Quiver said:

YES

THIS IS MY PROBLEM

I like the water starters for games. You tend to use Surf a lot, and it's a damnation useful HM to have, so attaching it to your water starter is killing two birds with one stone... plus, I rather like Popplip, so I was gonna support the game in the face of overwhelming adversity. #clownseal

...Btu damnation, Rowlett's evoltion is rather Green Arrow-y, and, you know, that might be a deal breaker for me. Because of reasons.

It might come as a shock to you guys, but I'm a Green Arrow fan. Dunno if that's ever come up in conversation before.

As soon as I stopped gushing over how cool it looked, my next thought train was '...I wonder if Quiver's seen this yet' no lie...

 

...I spend far too much time on the Shard

[Quiver he/him]

Just now, AnanasSpren said:

As soon as I stopped gushing over how cool it looked, my next thought train was '...I wonder if Quiver's seen this yet' no lie...

...I spend far too much time on the Shard

Would it surprise you to know that the second I saw this guy I thought of this guy?

...I mean, I want to say that that similarity won't be enough of a reason for me to train up a Mudsdale, but no promises.  

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

 

12 minutes ago, Quiver said:

Would it surprise you to know that the second I saw this guy I thought of this guy?

...I mean, I want to say that that similarity won't be enough of a reason for me to train up a Mudsdale, but no promises.  

Do it, I mean you can even nickname it after them. I know what I want to call my Rapidash, if I ever get one

Edited August 4, 2016 by AnanasSpren

[Eerongal he/him]

I can't wait to get me an ice vulpix. I really like the idea of the alola forms.

[Pathfinder]

I am having trouble deciding my starter too. I am a newb to the world of pokemon (my fiance started playing pokemon go, and got me to give it a try and now I want to play the actual game). I have done some research, and only one hand I like the way rowlet looks both his original form, and potentially his final evolution, but isn't a grass/flying type weak to a lot of attacks and takes 4 times as much damage from ice? This leads me to lean towards popplio because water and potentially fairy has a lot of resistances, including one immunity, but I am less than thrill about potentially the final evolution. So I am not sure which one I want to pick 

[Eerongal he/him]

14 minutes ago, Pathfinder said:

I am having trouble deciding my starter too. I am a newb to the world of pokemon (my fiance started playing pokemon go, and got me to give it a try and now I want to play the actual game). I have done some research, and only one hand I like the way rowlet looks both his original form, and potentially his final evolution, but isn't a grass/flying type weak to a lot of attacks and takes 4 times as much damage from ice? This leads me to lean towards popplio because water and potentially fairy has a lot of resistances, including one immunity, but I am less than thrill about potentially the final evolution. So I am not sure which one I want to pick 

Grass/flying would look like:

4x:
ice

2x:
fire
poison
flying
rock

1x:
normal
electric
psychic
bug
ghost
dragon
dark
steel
fairy

0.5x:
water
fighting

0.25x:
grass

0x:
ground

 

 

While water/fairy would look like:

2x:
electric
grass
poison

1x:
normal
ground
flying
psychic
rock
ghost
steel
fairy

0.5x:
fire
water
ice
fighting
bug
dark

0x:
dragon
 

 

The latter has more resistances and less weaknesses, so it's  probably the better "type" overall. However, competitively speaking, immunity to ground is nice, as it avoids a lot of big attacks like earthquake, or the (these days) ubiquitous primal groudon precipice blades.

 

That said, realistically, the starters probably won't be worth too much from a competitive angle (they usually arent), so pick whichever one you want! Let the rest of your team round out the weaknesses of your starter.

[Pathfinder]

6 hours ago, Eerongal said:

Grass/flying would look like:

4x:
ice

2x:
fire
poison
flying
rock

1x:
normal
electric
psychic
bug
ghost
dragon
dark
steel
fairy

0.5x:
water
fighting

0.25x:
grass

0x:
ground

 

 

While water/fairy would look like:

2x:
electric
grass
poison

1x:
normal
ground
flying
psychic
rock
ghost
steel
fairy

0.5x:
fire
water
ice
fighting
bug
dark

0x:
dragon
 

 

The latter has more resistances and less weaknesses, so it's  probably the better "type" overall. However, competitively speaking, immunity to ground is nice, as it avoids a lot of big attacks like earthquake, or the (these days) ubiquitous primal groudon precipice blades.

 

That said, realistically, the starters probably won't be worth too much from a competitive angle (they usually arent), so pick whichever one you want! Let the rest of your team round out the weaknesses of your starter.

True true. Thanks for all the info! Its my first time playing pokemon, but I have played plenty of rpgs, so I am excited lol. 

[Eki]

11 hours ago, Darkness Ascendant said:

haha XD.

I love how creative pokemon are getting, *david attenborough voice* Ah yes, the rare key pokemon in it's natural habitat, did you know there is also a sword pokemon, a chandelier pokemon. Not to mention dedenne is basically Raichu among alot more other stuff

Yeah, I heard there's even a mime artist Pokémon nowadays! And a magnet!

The new games look awesome! I'm leaning towards Rowlet as my starter, but we'll see. I have a feeling it will be the weakest of them, though (typing issues, for one)...

I almost wish I had tried to avoid spoilers so these things would be new to me when playing, but I don't think I would have been able to. So if the alternatives are failing to avoid spoilers, or actually taking part in the excitement... I guess I'll go with the latter.

I wonder how the new forms will be handled with regards to breeding and stuff. I assume you'll still be able to breed for the "old" forms by bringing one in from gen 6. But what if every vulpix egg hatched in this region turns into ice, regardless of (presumably) the mother's form?

Oh, and IV training! That is going to make competitive play much more accessible.

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

Alola ninetails is pwedddddddy 

I was hoping Litten was going to be Fire/Dark but it's final evo looks Fire/Fighting..yay another Blaziken but if it was fire/dark then it'd just be the cat version of Houndour/doom

Edited August 4, 2016 by AnanasSpren

[Eerongal he/him]

9 minutes ago, AnanasSpren said:

Alola ninetails is pwedddddddy 

I was hoping Litten was going to be Fire/Dark but it's final evo looks Fire/Fighting..yay another Blaziken but if it was fire/dark then it'd just be the cat version of Houndour/doom

Reminds me of this from when people were speculating on fennekin.

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

35 minutes ago, Eerongal said:

Reminds me of this from when people were speculating on fennekin.

Storms...I feel sorry for that pokemon...could be worse, could always be Alola Exeggcutor

[Quiver he/him]

1 hour ago, AnanasSpren said:

Storms...I feel sorry for that pokemon...could be worse, could always be Alola Exeggcutor

Alola Exeggutor is epic, and if you say otherwise, I'll train one up and fight you!

...no seriously, I'm debating whether to try play this game competitively. Intend to just focus on beating the game, so competitive battling, breeding and IV training isn't my thing... I'm not even sure how most of that works.

So...debating giving it a go this time.

[Eerongal he/him]

 

8 minutes ago, Quiver said:

Alola Exeggutor is epic, and if you say otherwise, I'll train one up and fight you!

...no seriously, I'm debating whether to try play this game competitively. Intend to just focus on beating the game, so competitive battling, breeding and IV training isn't my thing... I'm not even sure how most of that works.

So...debating giving it a go this time.

Good news, everyone! Hyper training might make breeding for IV's irrelevant! That said, I can explain how IV/EV training works if you want.

 

 

 

[Quiver he/him]

Just now, Eerongal said:

 

Good news, everyone! Hyper training might make breeding for IV's irrelevant! That said, I can explain how IV/EV training works if you want.

Honestly, if you don't object, I'd love to hear explanations!

Also... I'm curious about these Alola Island trials. I've heard someone compare them to the Orange Islands, which...

I have fond memories of that arc. And am trying to learn the rules to PTU solely so I could play a game in that league. So Alola has me excited.

[Darkness Ascendant he/him]

14 hours ago, AnanasSpren said:

Not to mention there's an Artificial pokemon now, magearna

Aren't Mewtwo and Genesect artificial.

[Eerongal he/him]

Ok, so a quick primer to EV's, IV's and natures.

 

First off, every pokemon has 6 stats. HP, Attack, Defense, Special Attack, Special defense, and Speed. Each pokemon species has some value in each of stats that corresponds to it. For example, charmander gas 39, 52, 43, 60, 50, and 65 in all of these stats respectively. Every single charmander has these base stats. Suffice to say that "higher is better" for each of these stats, and these values, along with its level, are used to calculate its stats. Exactly how this works isn't important. But suffice to say at its base, every charmander of X level with have a certain amount in each stat derived by the above base stats.

 

This, however, is not the entire picture. We have 3 different modifiers that effect stats.

 

First, we have IV's (individual values). Every time you catch or hatch a pokemon, some value from 0-31 is assigned to each stat. This value is currently hidden from the user (but it's possible to figure them out, but that's not important at the moment). Again, exactly how these stats add in isn't exactly important (it's complicated formula based on level and base stats), but a charmander that has 0 in its HP will have LESS HP than a charmander that has 32. So again, suffice to say, higher is better. Note that the additions of these stats is much higher than 31 at the end of the day. At level 100, pending on your base stats, a 31 in your stat can give you upwards of a ~50-ish point difference. Today, IV's are set when you get them, but apparently in sun and moon, you will be able to modify them according to that hyper training page. 

 

Next we have EV's (effort values). EV's all start at 0 when you first obtain a pokemon. Whenever you fight a pokemon, use a vitamin, or go through super training (as of gen 6) your EV's increase by some amount. Any individual stat has a max of 252 EV points. EV points also increase the base stats of your pokemon species. So a charmander that has 252 EVs in HP has more HP than a pokemon with 0. Note that, because of the way EV's work, it goes in increments of 4. That is to say, an EV of 0-3 has the same effect as 0. An EV of 4-7 has the same effect as 4. Because of this, it's important to calculate your EV's in increments of 4 when training them. Why you may ask? Because any given pokemon only has a pool of 510 EV's to distribute. What does that mean? It means that you have a total of 510 EV points to split up among your 6 stats, and that's it. You could put 252 in HP, 200 in attack, and 58 in speed, and then that pokemon can't gain anymore EV's.

 

Finally, we have the last piece of the stats puzzle. Nature. This one is honestly the easiest of the bunch. After all the above is said and done, and your pokemon has X base, Y IV, and Z EV, it will calculate the pokemon's stat. Once that is done, it will now consult the pokemon's nature.

Every nature increases one stat by 10%, and decreases another stat by 10%. This happens after all EV's and IV's are calculated, so it's a final modifier. There's a nature for every stat combination, including the same stat (neutral natures). That is to say, there's a nature that gives +10% HP, -10% attack and one for +10% HP, -10% special attack. There's EVEN a nature for +10% HP and -10% HP. This is what's known as a neutral nature. It cancels itself out, and doesn't affect your stats.

 

 

After all this is said and done, a perfect IV pokemon with a particular EV trained and the appropriate increasing nature in a stat, you can see anywhere upwards of a 200 stat point difference in that particular stat at 100. So at the end of the day, for the competitive scene, it REALLY matters.

 

 

One more small tip: The attack stat drives how much damage a pokemon deals to itself with when it's confused. In general, if you aren't going to have a pokemon use the attack stat (a physical attacker), you actually want it to have a 0 in its IV's, to minimize confusion damage.

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

4 hours ago, Darkness Ascendant said:

Aren't Mewtwo and Genesect artificial.

In a sense, but to me not really, as mewtwo is technically a mew clone and genesect was altered by team plasma but...you can argue either way 

@Quiver are you making eye contact with me? Don't make me walk these 6 grid spaces! My pokeball finger is itchy! It's time, to d-d-d-DUE-...oh wait, my bad wrong franchise

Edited August 5, 2016 by AnanasSpren

[Quiver he/him]

12 hours ago, Eerongal said:

Ok, so a quick primer to EV's, IV's and natures.

 

First off, every pokemon has 6 stats. HP, Attack, Defense, Special Attack, Special defense, and Speed. Each pokemon species has some value in each of stats that corresponds to it. For example, charmander gas 39, 52, 43, 60, 50, and 65 in all of these stats respectively. Every single charmander has these base stats. Suffice to say that "higher is better" for each of these stats, and these values, along with its level, are used to calculate its stats. Exactly how this works isn't important. But suffice to say at its base, every charmander of X level with have a certain amount in each stat derived by the above base stats.

 

This, however, is not the entire picture. We have 3 different modifiers that effect stats.

 

First, we have IV's (individual values). Every time you catch or hatch a pokemon, some value from 0-31 is assigned to each stat. This value is currently hidden from the user (but it's possible to figure them out, but that's not important at the moment). Again, exactly how these stats add in isn't exactly important (it's complicated formula based on level and base stats), but a charmander that has 0 in its HP will have LESS HP than a charmander that has 32. So again, suffice to say, higher is better. Note that the additions of these stats is much higher than 31 at the end of the day. At level 100, pending on your base stats, a 31 in your stat can give you upwards of a ~50-ish point difference. Today, IV's are set when you get them, but apparently in sun and moon, you will be able to modify them according to that hyper training page. 

 

Next we have EV's (effort values). EV's all start at 0 when you first obtain a pokemon. Whenever you fight a pokemon, use a vitamin, or go through super training (as of gen 6) your EV's increase by some amount. Any individual stat has a max of 252 EV points. EV points also increase the base stats of your pokemon species. So a charmander that has 252 EVs in HP has more HP than a pokemon with 0. Note that, because of the way EV's work, it goes in increments of 4. That is to say, an EV of 0-3 has the same effect as 0. An EV of 4-7 has the same effect as 4. Because of this, it's important to calculate your EV's in increments of 4 when training them. Why you may ask? Because any given pokemon only has a pool of 510 EV's to distribute. What does that mean? It means that you have a total of 510 EV points to split up among your 6 stats, and that's it. You could put 252 in HP, 200 in attack, and 58 in speed, and then that pokemon can't gain anymore EV's.

 

Finally, we have the last piece of the stats puzzle. Nature. This one is honestly the easiest of the bunch. After all the above is said and done, and your pokemon has X base, Y IV, and Z EV, it will calculate the pokemon's stat. Once that is done, it will now consult the pokemon's nature.

Every nature increases one stat by 10%, and decreases another stat by 10%. This happens after all EV's and IV's are calculated, so it's a final modifier. There's a nature for every stat combination, including the same stat (neutral natures). That is to say, there's a nature that gives +10% HP, -10% attack and one for +10% HP, -10% special attack. There's EVEN a nature for +10% HP and -10% HP. This is what's known as a neutral nature. It cancels itself out, and doesn't affect your stats.

 

 

After all this is said and done, a perfect IV pokemon with a particular EV trained and the appropriate increasing nature in a stat, you can see anywhere upwards of a 200 stat point difference in that particular stat at 100. So at the end of the day, for the competitive scene, it REALLY matters.

 

 

One more small tip: The attack stat drives how much damage a pokemon deals to itself with when it's confused. In general, if you aren't going to have a pokemon use the attack stat (a physical attacker), you actually want it to have a 0 in its IV's, to minimize confusion damage.

...yikes. So much math.

Does that all lead to competitive pokemon teams which are rather "same-ish"? I ask since, it sounds like there is a meta behind the games which would let you figure out an optimised team, moves and stats.

[Eki]

16 hours ago, Darkness Ascendant said:

Aren't Mewtwo and Genesect artificial.

 

13 hours ago, AnanasSpren said:

In a sense, but to me not really, as mewtwo is technically a mew clone and genesect was altered by team plasma but...you can argue either way 

Porygon and its evolutions are artificial. We don't know about some other Pokémon such as Magnemite (Bulbapedia tells me they existed 3000 years ago) or Voltorb (possibly created when a Pokéball was exposed to high energies), but we do know about Porygon for sure.

 

3 hours ago, Quiver said:

...yikes. So much math.

Does that all lead to competitive pokemon teams which are rather "same-ish"? I ask since, it sounds like there is a meta behind the games which would let you figure out an optimised team, moves and stats.

There can be quite a lot of maths, but most competitive players don't really do all of it themselves. Basically, EVs and natures are for specializing your Pokémon into different roles, like being more defensive, offensive, or quick. IVs should be as high as possible unless you want a certain Hidden Power, or want to be as slow as possible (generally for a move called Trick Room which reverses the speed order so that slower Pokémon move first for five turns). For EVs, most people just maximize two stats and put 4 points into something else, or copy a standard set and tweak it.

About the same-ishness... It depends. VGC (the official ruleset) has been fairly centralized the last few years at least. Especially this year, when you are almost guaranteed to see certain Pokémon in most battles. But if you play something like Smogon, it's less so, because they try to balance stuff like that out (for example, Aegislash has been banned because it was too centralizing and hard to counter). They also have several tiers based on usage in the upper tier, in an effort to provide variety and make as many Pokémon as possible usable in some kind of competitive play.

All of that said, you can't really create an optimized team in any of the gametypes, because if it really is good, people will expect it and build a team to counter it. Then you have to change your team to counter that, and someone else comes along and counters you both, etc. The metagame changes all the time, it never reaches any sort of equilibrium. Too many variables for that.

Edited August 5, 2016 by Eki