The Gaming Den

I think it would be cooler, for magic, if it worked similarly to technology. So the wizards and so on who came over still have their powers, but without their connection to home they can't gain levels and train replacements or something. So, like the few pieces of old industrial technology that still work, each one is irreplaceable, and wizards are a dying breed.

Mechanically, they can be trainers who have a repertoire of special attacks like a pokemon, plus some out-of-combat powers. Then just don't let them cast their spells while directing a pokemon, and you're good. Actually, that should be a general rule; masters can't use their own pokemon powers while directing a pokemon.

Also, I disagree with making character class advancement == Not Pokemon. First, we need to go case-by-case anyway to convert stats, so it's not like this saves any effort. Second, I think it'd be really cool to have mind flayers have made a colony in the new world, then been driven out and scattered by a slave revolt when their slaves with pokemon training figured out that the masters were pokemon too. Mind flayers advance by character class, so under Frank's system this can't happen. But it should.

IGTN wrote: Also, I disagree with making character class advancement == Not Pokemon. First, we need to go case-by-case anyway to convert stats, so it's not like this saves any effort. Second, I think it'd be really cool to have mind flayers have made a colony in the new world, then been driven out and scattered by a slave revolt when their slaves with pokemon training figured out that the masters were pokemon too. Mind flayers advance by character class, so under Frank's system this can't happen. But it should.

Actually yeah, that's a really good point. Lemme go edit that.

Rather than simply making the Pokeworld humans into Fallout-style techno-savages, how about we just remove fossil fuel deposits from the new world? No oil means that people can't run motorcycles or airplanes. And with electric types being few enough that there is no electric gym and therefore no Power Plant, any science stuff people make is artisan work. And when people send ships back and forth, it's with steam ships that are powered by Torkoals that are fed charcoal that people make from plants.

Also, I think there should be Human trainers in a few of the cities that have substantial nonhuman inhabitants. Orcs, for example, can apparently interbreed with humans so having a human gym leader (and possibly have him explicitly have half-orc daughters) seems pretty reasonable.

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I definitely think no mindflayers is an important ground rule. They eat sapient brains. I know that there are Pokemon who eat other Pokemon (and non Pokemon animals), but frankly most Pokemon are about as smart as dogs or monkeys. The fact that Ninetales can understand human speech makes it special for a Pokemon. And there are also non-pokemon animals in the Pokemon world for carnivores to eat. But Mindflayers eat people and are just Kill On Sight. Part of the point of Pokemon is that there isn't really anything that you need to commit genocide on, making it in many ways a nicer place than the D&D world (even with all the slavery). That shouldn't be sacrificed with the introduction of villains who can't be imprisoned and rehabilitated or even allowed to have children lest a new generation of murderers be created.

Here are D&D creatures that I think should be ported over as Pokemon:

1. Water Naga
2. Dark Naga
3. Guardian Naga
4. Yuan-Ti Abomination
5. Basilisk
6. Archaierai
7. Air Elemental
8. Earth Elemental
9. Fire Elemental
10. Water Elemental
11. Gynosphynx
12. Deva (probably a 3-chain)
13. Quasit
14. Vrock
15. Glabrezu
16. Nalfeshne
17. Balor
18. Succubus
19. Marilith
20. Imp
21. Hamatula
22. Osyluth
23. Gelugon
24. Pit Fiend
25. Kyton
26. Marrash
27. Erinyes
28. Bezikira
29. Red Slaad
30. Blue Slaad
31. Green Slaad
32. Gray Slaad
33. White Slaad
34. Black Slaad
35. Barghest
36. Black Dragon
37. Red Dragon
38. White Dragon
39. Gold Dragon
40. Dragon Turtle
41. Land Shark
42. Carrion Crawler
43. Nightmare
44. Cauchermar
45. Unicorn
46. Chimera
47. Cloaker
48. Cockatrice
49. Couatl
50. Hydra
51. Chaos Hydra
52. Displacer Beast
53. Giant Eagle
54. Giant Owl
55. Dryad
56. Epimeliad
57. Oread
58. Sirine
59. Nymph
60. Black Pudding
61. Ochre Jelly
62. Mephit
63. Elemental Weird
64. Formian Worker
65. Formian Warrior
66. Formian Queen
67. Frost Worm
68. Purple Worm
69. Evil Eye
70. Gauth
71. Beholder
72. Gibbering Mouther
73. Gibbering Orb
74. Girallon
75. Catoblepas
76. Gorgon
77. Lantern Archon
78. Hound Archon
79. Trumpet Archon
80. Howler
81. Kraken
82. Manticore
83. Scorpicore
84. Owlbear
85. Pegasus
86. Asperi
87. Phase Spider
88. Roc
89. Chaos Roc
90. Rust Monster
91. Salamander
92. Shocker Lizard
93. Umber Hulk
94. Xorn
95. Winter Wolf
96. Will o Wisp
97. Peryton
98. Moon Rat
99. Ash Rat
100. Corollax
101. Phase Wasp
102. Dire Toad
103. Titanic Toad
104. Fire Toad
105. Fire Bat
106. Mudmaw
107. Leechwalker
108. Greenvise
109. Razor Boar
110. Shadow Spider
111. Nightmare Beast
112. Megapede
113. Topiary Guardian
114. Battlebriar
115. Siege Crab
116. Blood Hawk
117. Flame Snake
118. Death Dog
119. Ahuizotl
120. Chronotyrin
121. Hullathoin
122. Inferno Spider
123. Sailsnake

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote: Here are D&D creatures that I think should be ported over as Pokemon:

• Yuan-Ti Abomination

This is particularly cool because they're part of the same family as the Half and Pure bloods, meaning a Pure Blood (a Person) could have her own family members in pokeballs. And could do that in a cruel way, in a regular "Lol, they're Pokemon" way, or even in a way where they take the extra effort to look after these ritually-captured brethren.

Some Demons and Devils could also be evolutionary chains. And as for Slaad, well, they do that in regular D&D. Green > Grey > Death > White > Black.

No brainer on the dragons evolving up their age categories, maybe with hilarious name changes. Whityrmling! I choose you! Get that Redvenile!

Nightmare -> Cauchermar seems obvious. Also I dare you to make Sharpedo evolve into Landshark.

Monsters of Faerun introduces a bigger, more spell-like Cloaker called the Cloaker Lord. That seems like a good evolution of Cloakers.

Dryad: not that I have any complaints (I like Dryads for more than the obvious reason: the DR makes them fun to use against low level parties, as they spend enough time chipping away for it to be funny), but aside from the bit where they're intelligent, sentient things that are almost humanoids, what about the tree? Do we call them Tree Spirits who don't die if they wander away? Does the tree go with them? Or is pokeball-capture a way to get around their link, meaning some of them that want to explore will actually seek out "nice people" to carry them around.

Sirine -> Nymph? Or just keep them separate? They are both water fey who look like pretty ladies, after all.

Mephit: these could evolve into Elemental Wyrds, theoretically.

Formians: Worker -> Warrior -> Queen?

Should the worms be linked? I'm guessing not, though using an Ice Stone on a Purple Worm to make a Frost Worm could be cool.

Beholders make a good trio - or more if we add the crazy variants of Calamari Cookbook and Monsters of Faerun. Gibberers make a good evolution duo.

Archons? They seem different enough to keep separate. I dunno.

Moon Rat (Firestone) -> Ash Rat?

Dire Toad:

• Fire Stone -> Fire Toad
• Normal -> Titanic Toad

All three: are you fucking kidding me? Do these exist?

Fire Bat... ____bat + Fire Stone? (Or "level up at max happiness in fire place")

Mudmaw sounds like an alternate Mudkip evolution.

Flame Snake: see Fire Bat, replace ____bat with Arbok or something. Holy shit, it leaves NU tier?

Koumei wrote:All three: are you fucking kidding me? Do these exist?

Yes. People scoff when I say I love the Monster Manual II, but I loves it. Seriously: Moon Rat, Ash Rat, Phase Wasp, Dire Toad, Fire Bat, Asperi, Marrash, Sirine, Catoblepas, Mudmaw, Greenvise, Leechwalker, Razor Boar, Shadow Spider, Elemental Weird, Titanic Toad, Nightmare Beast, Megapede, and Chaos Roc. That's 19 quality Pokemon (not even counting that technically Elemental Weird is 4 different Pokemon depending upon Evolution stone). And it has several sapient races that are more tha a little bit fun, as well as the last installment of palette swap Giants that don't feel really insulting (Say hello Sun Giant!). In the Monster Manual IV we have... maybe the Inferno Spider? The Sailsnake? It's a barren wasteland.

Anyway, as far as evolutionary trees go, I definitely think it should go Red -> Blue (Happy) or Green (Unhappy) -> Gray -> White (Day) or Black (Night) for slaads. Catoblepas evolves into Gorgon. Sirine happiness evolves into Nymph. Succubus evolves into Marilith.

Mephits change from one kind to another by handing them a different plate. So if you hand them a Flame Plate you get a Fire Mephit, and if you make them put it down and carry an Icicle Plate you get an Ice Mephit, or an Earth Plate to get a Dust Mephit. They are like Arceus, but really small. I have no problem with them evolving into Genies or Elemental Weirds or something, with exact type depending upon the plate held at the time.

Mudmaw sounds like an alternate Mudkip evolution.

It's a lot like a Feraligatr, but with extra giant tongues. So basically, I could totally see Mudkip having the opportunity to go Mudmaw instead of Swampert. Or I could see it as an alternate progression of Totodile where it goes Water/Ground.

As for Moon Rats, I think they should be separate from Ash Rats. Pokemon thrives on combat mice to a huge degree. Right now there's no Dark type Mouse or Fire type Mouse. That's a grave oversight. And these things should get their own evolution trees like Sandshrew or Azurill do. I'm thinking that Moon Rat evolves into Tioman, and Ash Rat evolves into Huoshu.

Monsters of Faerun introduces a bigger, more spell-like Cloaker called the Cloaker Lord. That seems like a good evolution of Cloakers.

There's a lot of D&D critters that evolve specifically into a bigger form. But while Nightmare evolves into Cauchemar, most of them evolve into "Greater Barghest" or "Displacer Beast Pack Lord" or something equally stupid. Those things should evolve into something that has an actual name. Even Hydra -> Chaos Hydra or Roc to Chaos Roc is only barely scraping acceptability.

A concerted effort should be made I think to come up with genuine Pokemon names for the Abyssal Basilisk and Truly Horrid Umber Hulk. Real name changes, not just the same name with an adjective to indicate that it has four more levels of badassery.

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote: Succubus evolves into Marilith.

There is that weird Succubus Upgrade in the Demon Codex thing.
Lillithu or somesuch.

But you would be in the Tentakle quarter with that one

FrankTrollman wrote:Rather than simply making the Pokeworld humans into Fallout-style techno-savages, how about we just remove fossil fuel deposits from the new world? No oil means that people can't run motorcycles or airplanes. And with electric types being few enough that there is no electric gym and therefore no Power Plant, any science stuff people make is artisan work. And when people send ships back and forth, it's with steam ships that are powered by Torkoals that are fed charcoal that people make from plants.

I'm on board with that.

FrankTrollman wrote:Also, I think there should be Human trainers in a few of the cities that have substantial nonhuman inhabitants. Orcs, for example, can apparently interbreed with humans so having a human gym leader (and possibly have him explicitly have half-orc daughters) seems pretty reasonable.

Can't think of any reason what that wouldn't work. I'm also imagining that aside from the eight cities you posted that there would be at least one more major one. Probably the original colony, which would lend itself to being predominantly human and be a great mix of Japanesey and European. It would also be the headquarters of the Pokemon League and the Elite 4. There's no pressing reason why any of the Elite 4 would have to be human either, since the Pokemon League as an organization is more of a meritocracy than anything else. I figure at least one of them will be a human though.

FrankTrollman wrote:People scoff when I say I love the Monster Manual II, but I loves it.

That part I have no problem with. I hate the amount of stuff it has which TPKs the party, but it has way more stuff I'd use at all than 4 or 5 do.

I just forgot about all the giant frogs added. It has to be a Slaadi thing.

Anyway, as far as evolutionary trees go, I definitely think it should go Red -> Blue (Happy) or Green (Unhappy) -> Gray -> White (Day) or Black (Night) for slaads. Catoblepas evolves into Gorgon. Sirine happiness evolves into Nymph. Succubus evolves into Marilith.

Works for me.

Mephits change from one kind to another by handing them a different plate.

Awesome. Arceus' weaker siblings. What is the default form for no plate?

So basically, I could totally see Mudkip having the opportunity to go Mudmaw instead of Swampert. Or I could see it as an alternate progression of Totodile where it goes Water/Ground.

Sounds... sound.

As for Moon Rats, I think they should be separate from Ash Rats. Pokemon thrives on combat mice to a huge degree. Right now there's no Dark type Mouse or Fire type Mouse. That's a grave oversight. And these things should get their own evolution trees like Sandshrew or Azurill do. I'm thinking that Moon Rat evolves into Tioman, and Ash Rat evolves into Huoshu.

Sounds good to me. I was just going by the 'rat' theme, but yeah, it doesn't hurt to add more separate species with evo-paths.

There's a lot of D&D critters that evolve specifically into a bigger form. But while Nightmare evolves into Cauchemar, most of them evolve into "Greater Barghest" or "Displacer Beast Pack Lord" or something equally stupid.

Cloaker Lord is a dumb name, but the creature itself has more abilities so is a bit more advanced than "Hey, we gave it more racial hit dice until it grew! Let's dedicate a page to that!" But a better name works. Cloaker -> CAPER!

A concerted effort should be made I think to come up with genuine Pokemon names for the Abyssal Basilisk and Truly Horrid Umber Hulk.

I'm sure it can be done. I always liked the Hexen Centaurs that evolved into Slaughtaurs.

Arceus' weaker siblings. What is the default form for no plate?

Rather than dong the Arceus thing where they revert to Normal type, they should just swap when they pick up a plate and retain it until they get handed another plate. So when you are running around on Mt. Howl, you get attacked by wild Air Mephits and Howlers when you're in deep snow. And some of the Air Mephits have Sky Plates and some do not. But either way, if you catch one and give it a Toxic Plate or a Stone Plate it will "permanently" turn into a Sludge Mephit or Earth Mephit respectively.

On the Magic front, the Pokemon world totally has genuine sorcery in it. Practitioners are expected to run around with top hats, black wands, and opera capes, but their stuff works. It's considered pretty much the same as Psychicness, but is distinctly different - much as how different moves are different types. Having looked at it carefully, I think that "magic" breaks down into several "types" based on what kind of magic it is:

• Dark
• Ghost
• Normal
• Psychic
• Steel

So when Jirachi uses "Wish" or "Hyperbeam" that's normal Sorcery. While "Doom Desire" is Steel, "Curse" is Ghost, Cosmic Power is Psychic, and Dark Pulse is Dark.

-Username17

I'd personally make genies separate from Mephits, but that's just me. Mephits evolving into Wyrds is good.

Genies should probably not evolve or be evolved, though. Mostly, to keep them distinct enough to justify having a specialized pokeball targeted at them (magic lamps. The folklore doesn't adequately explain how the genie gets into the lamp; this does. You beat it up and throw the lamp at it.)

As for the Slaads, how does this naming scheme sound?
Red: Slaad
Blue: Sluue
Green: Slaa-een
White: Slaauite
Black: Splaak

All of them keep the "aa" naming convention except the Blue Slaad. I'm not particularly attached to it, but their names need to be something they can say.

I like Caper for Cloaker Lord.

Displacer Beast becomes Meoraje (Meow + Mirage), Pack Lord becomes Displeast (contraction of Displacer Beast. Sounds like "displeased")?

No fuel works as well as no replacement parts for me. No illithids is fine, even if the initial rebellion idea is cool.

We need legendary pokemon here. Since all of the new pokemon in this world come from D&D manuals, the legendaries should do. Do we want specific classic D&D monsters as our legendaries (Bahamut and Tiamat as Legendary Birds Dragons, for instance), or do we want to invent new ones?

Any particular reason why the Remorhaz isn't on the Pokemon list? I could see it being a nice Ice/Fire evolution of the Frost Worm.

Monster Manual Legendaries of the top of my head:

• Solar
• Tarrasque
• Leviathan
• Concordant Killer (?)
• Garngrath (MM5) it even looks like a pokemon...
• Master of the Hunt and the Hounds of the Hunt (MM5) maybe the old legendary catdogs could replace the hounds of the hunt?
• Kluritchur (FF) (?)

Regi-steel could be an Adamantium Golem, Regice could be an elder Ice paramental with a special freezing aura (apparently the air around it is -328F), Regirock is just a Primal Earth Elemental.

and I just remembered this isn't 3.5, but it still holds that perhaps D&D worlders recognize the regis as those creatures...

What is the system for this, anyway?

Alright so I figure everyone is going to be a "trainer", but it's used more like a title rather than a class template. Mechanically how are trainer classes and their potential abilities (which magic falls into) going to work?

With these as the relevant design goals.

FrankTrollman wrote:

• Classes are Simple and don't get mixed and matched.
• And that means of course, that the class templates are something that you apply after you select your powers.

Are we going to have a few lists of 'trainer only' powers and you automatically get to select which 2 or 3 lists you want, and then at that point you apply your class template? Or (for trainers anyway) is the class template going to determine which lists of abilities you get access to? Or are we going to go some other route entirely?

I mean, it's pretty obvious that your pokemon are where you should get the bulk of your power from. At the same time though I feel like trainers should get to do something other than using super potions and pokeballs without overshadowing their pokes. How do people feel about trainers mostly having buffing and some debuffing? That would make it pretty reasonable to have things like Mystical Man as a class template and give him access to the Normal Magic list, which is going to be chock full of status abilities.

Now as far as magic users actually go, there are plenty of types to choose from from the list of trainers alone. I'll include other potential classes in this list as well. This is just some rough ideas, I'm sure it will be altered drastically.

• Psychic (your typical psychic trainer, full on telekinesis and all that)
• Medium/Channeler (has a strong connection with the spirit realm, probably best at ghost type magic)
• Mystical Man (your top hat and cape wearing magic dude, prestidigitation and normal magic)
• Hex Maniac (essentially a witch, I figure tying them to the dark type works)
• Pokemon Master (I dunno, give them abilities to bring out the full potential of their pokemon?)
• Artificer (from DnD land, possibly craft their own pokeballs and other things like that, maybe even make attuned to steel type)
• Ranger (combination DnD style and pokeworld, can easily interact with wild pokemon)

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I'm a fan of adding in these monsters as well.

• Chilblain
• Ice Toad (may as well since you've got the dire, fire, and titanic)
• White Pudding
• Blackskate
• Lava Ooze

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There's also this.

Social Structure
With a society that combines aspects of pre and post industrial (although with an extreme lack of fossil fuels) and has at it's disposal a powerful workforce that provides labor for somewhere between cheap and peanuts, social stratification probably looks a little something like this:

• Cadre
• Artisan
• Worker
• Peasant

So at the bottom we have the peasants, mostly made up of pokemon who grow the food and, well, are the food. The ones intelligent enough to actually do farmwork get to avoid being dinner, but you can bet that there are ranches full of Tauros just waiting to be eaten. There are trainer races within this tier as well, but the vast majority of them either own and run the agricultural operations, and are therefore not actually peasants, or have more demanding professions. The funny thing is, the pokemon, as long as they're treated reasonably well, don't seem to care that for all intents and purposes they are pretty much slaves. If they're treated extremely well you could maybe charitably call them second class citizens. Whether this is the result of some subtle insidious effect of the magic of the pokeball or simply the result of most pokemon not quite reaching human level intelligence is something to think about. I'd go for some combination of the two. There is source material for starry-eyed wild pokemon hoping to be captured by some up and coming trainer, or wild pokemon being obviously jealous of Pikachu. Actually, it might just work to say that if their Intelligence is too high then they automatically resent being captured by anyone but an awesome trainer and will simply refuse to work on some menial task. High Meanness has a similar effect, but it essentially just means that the pokemon is an asshole or exceedingly arrogant and won't cooperate unless the trainer has a high enough Domination of Willpower or whatever.

I'm not totally clear on the rubric for Int, so correct me if this is way off.

Int	Effect
0-1	You can eat it without feeling bad.
2	Suitable for manual labor.
3	As smart as you, give or take.
4	Don't piss off the supercomputer psychic thing.

The worker class is made up of about equal parts pokemon and trainer races. These are the people who work in the smithy's or assemble the zeppelins or man the fishing boats or construct new buildings. They are the ones who keep the cities running. The conditions of the pokemon who exist within the worker class varies quite a bit. All the way from freedom and earning (almost) as much as their trainer race counterparts to absolute pain and fear based motivation. Again, like the peasant class, the greater bulk of pokemon workers fall somewhere in the middle, they are treated well and are for the most part happy and content. The pokemon league and it's judiciary and law enforcement branches frown on trainers and overseers using violent and sadistic methods to get a pokemon to do what you want. "..and no pokemon shall be subjected to cruel methods or unwarranted violence as a means of training or motivation." Unfortunately for the maltreated pokemon of the world, the Officers and Rangers don't have enough eyes and ears to see everything and they can't be everywhere at once. And the ultimate threat is always hanging right over their heads. Return.
Most worker pokemon are of the strong and tough variety or are able to work in environments that most people could not tolerate. Rhydon and Umber Hulks are popular for mining operations because of their ability to tear through stone and earth like it's shrubbery. Machoke, Machamp, and Hezrou are always in demand for construction projects and often find themselves working in refineries alongside pokemon like Magmar. Squirtle are firefighters (or hellions) and are valuable members of any community they belong to. Other water types can easily help with fishing operations or sea rescue, and flying types tend to be couriers.

Man, I have visions of someone running a campaign where at some point the group enters their squirtle squad in some massive Ranma style Martial Arts Firefighting Competition and it just devolves into a melee and the fire spreads and the whole town burns down around them.

Ah, the artisan. Artisans invent things, or craft things, or think things. They're the ones who make the pokeballs that the entire economy of the world depends on. They also make the beautifully crafted one-of-a-kind stuff, the swords and the Pachirisu powered electronic gadgetry. They also tend to be the ones who own and operate the shops, both to sell their own goods and to sell goods imported from other cities and the countryside. The cadre class also sometimes overlaps with the artisan class as extremely skilled artisans, particularly those who train others, are thought to be both cadre and artisan. Now as far as trainers (PCs) are concerned, artisans are the best thing ever. Given enough time and money they will seriously craft for you whatever you want. Have a hankering for a ton of arrows that explode in a huge burst of ball lightning upon impact, no problem, but you'd better make sure you get them charged up by an electric poke. If you're gonna go up against some ice pokes it would probably be a good idea to have one make you an amulet imbued with the energy of that fire stone you just found. Need a special pokeball that isn't affected by telekinesis? How about bicycle? If you really hit paydirt you might even have a whole workshop build you and your friends an airship. And of course, of course, they make TMs and the much rarer HMs.


Cadre consist of the people who make up the backbones of the various organizations out there. The three most important types of people within the cadre class are these. First and foremost, the Pokemon Trainers, these fellows are the adventurers of the world, and therefore they are the powerful of the world. They're also law enforcement, and criminals, and celebrities, and gym leaders, and pokemon league representatives of all kinds. The people with highly specialized training and lots of education also count themselves in this group. Airship pilots, scholars, and doctors all count, so do bureaucrats and mayors and all the others who run things from on high. And last, we've got the sorcerers and psychics. You can be someone with that special kind of juice and also be a trainer, in fact that's the general rule rather than the exception, but I think they deserve their own mention. Magic users manifest in a variety of ways, from the Faerunian wizard that's had to adapt to a new sort of power, twice. To the Mediums and Hex Maniacs and the Mysticalmen (complete with top hat and cape).
Pokemon in this category are few and far between. They ones that could be in it are either far too intelligent or far too powerful to ever get caught, and any showing they make in trainer society is almost certainly because they wish it. Most of these are psychic types and are fully telepathic. Mewtwo, for example, is the gym leader of Port Friendship and a large number of highly intelligent pokemon work and make their homes there.

Pokemon and Pokeballs

IGTN wrote:Perhaps once a pokemon is caught, it has its pokeball, and can't be caught in others unless the connection is broken first. So then the gym leader at Port Friendship would possibly even have its own pokeball hidden somewhere.

This sounds pretty good, and it actually makes a pokeball almost like a phylactery, or maybe a reverse phylactery? So I'm thinking that while a pokeball can potentially act as a prison it's also the only way that a pokemon can be sure it won't be caught by a trainer. The premise is that once a pokemon is tied to a specific pokeball it can't be captured by another pokeball. The only way for that connection to be broken is for the pokeball to be deactivated or reset in some way or it has to be physically destroyed. That of course creates a safety net for intelligent pokemon and I would assume that most of them that work on the same level as the trainer races have something like this going on. There could even be a vault or something where the pokeballs of "free" pokemon are kept. Looking at Mewtwo, who is actually a powerful gym leader, I can see that it's pokeball is maybe even lost on the other side of the portal. That implies some weird quantum entanglement effect, but if we accept that as plausible then it gives us a way for certain pokemon to never be captured.

Undoubtedly there will be pokemon whose trainers have abandoned or lost them, and that's good for the other layers of depth it can add, but it brings up the question, "what happens when someone loses a pokeball in the middle of nowhere with the pokemon still inside it?" Is it like a genie in a bottle, where the creature is trapped until someone chances by and opens it up? Or does the pokeball degrade over time until it gets to the point where the pokemon can force it's way out? And if that's the case, how long does it take to degrade. The other question is if you open up a pokeball that isn't clearly yours (i.e. you captured it or was gifted it or received it through a trade) does the pokemon inside obey you simply because you have possession. I know that seems to be how it works in the source material, but would making it as simple as that improve this game or harm it?

So, let's look at the existing list of legendaries:
1Gen: Mew, Mewtwo, Moltress, Zapdos, Articuno (5)
2Gen: the three Hamsters, Ho-oh, Lugia, Celebi* (6)
3Gen: Regi-3, Latias, Latios, Kyogre, Groudon, Rayquaza, Jirachi, Deoxys and we'll ignore the other forms (too fucking many: 10)
4Gen: Regigigas, Uxie, Mesprit, Azelf, Dialga, Palkia, Heatran, Giratina, Darkrai, Cresselia, Manaphy, Phionne, Arceus, that little hedgehog (woah holy shit even more wut: 14)

So with 35 of the bastards, they're not so legendary and a few more won't hurt. Tarrasque is a no-brainer. We could also make the Epic book useful (for once) and steal the Prismatic and Force dragons, along with some of that other wacky shit like the abominations. But not the undead foetus.

*Apparently was SUPPOSED to be in 2Gen, but got delayed until 3Gen. Well done, SPIRIT OF TIME.

Pokemon Trainer should probably be a single class, at least at the basics.

To keep the emphasis on the pokemon, it should be difficult (that is, involve a big tradeoff) for PCs to get magic. Possibly, something like: Trainers may not participate in battles between trainers, only against wild Pokemon. Using a weapon or spell takes your concentration to the same degree as directing a pokemon does.

So a trainer might have a sword that gives them the ability to use Slash, but drawing their sword counts as having a pokemon out. Another trainer might wield the Fire Staff or whatever, but when they have their fire spells ready that counts as having a pokemon out. Since it violates Pokemon League rules for you to use your sword or magic in a pokemon battle against another trainer, most trainers don't use them even against wild pokemon (instead training their captured pokemon) unless they have to.

So you might run around the woods with a sword until you catch something good, then you pretty much leave it sheathed except for special occasions.

Maybe trainers even have a penalty to making their own attacks, to encourage the use of pokemon while not weakening trainer defenses.

Maybe something like:
Default Chassis (Master, maybe) gets priority when switching pokemon. So they can push their pokemon a little harder, since they know they go before everyone else's attacks (except things like Quick Attack) when they pull their pokemon out.
Then you have a specialist in each type, the different kinds of magic-users, and a Gadgeteer (steampunk gadgetry; possibly an Electric or Fire specialist, makes items), plus maybe a Ranger; there can be some overlap here. I like the idea of making the Ranger into the personal combat specialist; they get bonuses when matching machete against pokemon, and that alone; they can also get tracking and terrain advantages.

A D&D-style magic artificer seems unnecessary in an actual steampunk society.

The magic classes need some tradeoff. One idea I had is to give magicians the type weaknesses of their school of magic, so a Fire Mage is weak against water. Another possibility would be to list some classes as esoteric, and allow trainers to easily switch between types when in town, unless they're in an esoteric class, in which case they're stuck, and make things like the magic-users, and every class that gives benefits that last longer than class selection, esoteric. So a swimmer (gains some benefit when using water types, maybe a slight damage bonus or something) would be able to become a bug catcher (ditto for bug types) or Hiker (ground and rock types) with a change of clothes, but a full-on psychic isn't going to change to anything.

Hey look, some more move lists.

Deep Sea Creature

• Withdraw
• Icicle Spear
• Protect
• Clamp
• Whirlpool
• Surf
• Brine
• Dive
• Spikes
• Toxic Spikes
• Spike Cannon
• Water Gun
• Hydro Pump
• Aqua Jet
• Bubble Beam
• Water Pulse

Living Battery

• Charge
• Discharge
• Thunder Wave
• Thunder Shock
• Thunder Bolt
• Thunder
• Charge Beam
• Rain Dance
• Supersonic
• Sonic Boom
• Spark
• Zap Cannon
• Swift
• Light Screen
• Volt Tackle
• Thunder Punch

Amorphous Form

• Minimise
• Mean Look
• Lick
• Memento
• Destiny Bond
• Shadow Punch
• Engulf
• Sludge
• Explosion
• Self Destruct
• Haze
• Absorb
• Growth
• Roll Out
• Grudge
• Body Slam

Living Snowball

• Powder Snow
• Hail
• Blizzard
• Aurora Beam
• Icicle Spear
• Ice Beam
• Sheer Cold
• Ice Shard
• Mist
• Icy Wind
• Ice Fang
• Gust
• Agility
• Ice Skate
• Surf
• Avalanche

Cheerleader

• Assist
• Baton Pass
• Lucky Chant
• Helping Hand
• Last Resort
• Charm
• Safeguard
• Encore
• Substitute
• Quick Attack
• Copycat
• Fake Tears
• Trump Card
• Nasty Plot
• Agility
• Return

Brain-Fu

• Meditate
• Zen Headbutt
• Detect
• Agility
• Aura Sphere
• Psi Cutter

Kaiju

• Ancient Power
• Recover
• Aura Sphere
• Hyper Beam
• Stomp
• Heal Block

Honestly, I think that the Trainer Classes are a good place to start for player character Trainer Classes. Of special note as far as trainers with apparent pokemon powers go:

• Psychic
• Hex Maniac
• Martial Artists
• Mystic Man
• Fire Breather
• Medium
• Burglar
• Mech Pilot
• Electrfying Guy
• Icy Guy

It seems pretty clear that you can use, with proper equipment and training, basically any type of pokemon magic there is - as a "regular" human. That's not even an exaggeration, you can be a "poison tongue boy" or a ninja in addition to just plain being a straight up magician. Proper training can allow you to shoot force lightning, use mind blasts, or breathe fire.

It seems to me that the class and powers that a humanoid character gets as a trainer should be available in any type. It wouldn't be much of an imposition to have 17 Trainer Classes:

• Singer
• Fire Breather
• Martial Artist
• Water Master
• Air Ace
• Sage
• Ninja
• Storm Lord
• Digger
• Psychic
• Lithomancer
• Cool Beauty
• Bug Catcher
• Dragon Tamer
• Medium
• Warlock
• Knight

-Username17

That does look pretty awesome. It also opens the way for a secondary gamestyle where the players are looking to better themselves by learning new abilities from pokemon. That would make the "pokemon revolutionaries" campaign pretty interesting.

It occurs to me that I don't really like scaling stats by 3 every level. That makes a difference of one level essentially insurmountable. I think we should triple the number of levels and the advancement rate from whatever we were going to do and drop the bonus to +1 per level.

Well, if one were to stretch levels out like that, it would be the tacit acknowledgment that the differences in min/maxing or team work or even battlefield position were simply larger than differences in level. That's workable of course, but it means that like in 4e you won't be able to tell if something is slightly higher or slightly lower level than you. And it means that like in 4e you straight up will be getting levels where all you get is a +1 to attack and defenses that could seriously never come up between the time you get it and the next time you go up a level.

With bonuses that small for level we don't even need to give stat adjustments for Legendaries - they can jolly well just be higher level than you are (and possibly have a slightly more favorable stat spread where they don't have any zeroes in any defensive stats).

---

In any case: with human trainer classes being a whole thing, it occurs to me that there's really no reason to not let people play as weird D&D-esque humanoids or even straight up Pokemon. Nighon doesn't just have troglodytes in it, it also has Medusa. And if someone wants to be one, why the fuck not? I think the key here is that if you aren't someone who is a badass melee combatant like a Knight or Martial Artist or a Machoke, you could be an old man or a small child - literally your only physical attack is Struggle. So balancing characters who are D&D style Warlords and characters who are actual children seems pretty reasonable.

The center point I think is that of Ars Magica. There are three ranks of PCs: Trainer (Wizard), Companion (Companion), Pokemon/Grunts (Grunts). And like in Ars Magica, you play all three.

-Username17

Frank, quick question since I'm not very familiar with Ars Magica. So you have those three tiers of PCs, but during play do you have access to them all at the same time or not? I can easily see some kind of setup where you have your Trainer PC (who's maybe also a Lithomancer) and your favorite pokemon who acts as your companion since it's more powerful than your other five or so pokemon who are pretty much the grogs.

Is that close or did you have something else in mind?

Jilocasin wrote:Frank, quick question since I'm not very familiar with Ars Magica. So you have those three tiers of PCs, but during play do you have access to them all at the same time or not? I can easily see some kind of setup where you have your Trainer PC (who's maybe also a Lithomancer) and your favorite pokemon who acts as your companion since it's more powerful than your other five or so pokemon who are pretty much the grogs.

Is that close or did you have something else in mind?

Ars Magica has two different presentations, one of which is totally unfair (each person makes a character who is either a Mage, a Companion, or a Grog), and one which is really weird (each player takes turns playing a Mage, a Companion, or a group of Grogs). The second one is especially interesting because when your Companion character (or Mage, or Grogs) are not being actively played, they are passively doing stuff in the background. Ars Magica has an attached turn based strategy game where you hoard resources and fortify your wizard tower and conduct magic experiments. It's limited, but it's one of the more interesting parts of the game.

And while I am not suggesting that players should be queuing up rock smashing orders on their Makuhita before switching POV to Cyndaquil and Azumaril's adventures in the cave, I am saying that Pokemon is perhaps more analogous to the small squad-based tactical games that D&D came from than to D&D itself. That in short, it's probably best to think of a Pokemon Trainer in similar terms to a Warcaster in Warmachine, and to make the tactical minigame similar to a multi-player Warmachine brawl.

Especially if we're going with tiny, almost meaningless levels, I could really see a point system where players were encouraged to have different Pokemon in their Mystery Dungeon Rescue Team be quite substantially different level one from another.

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote:Well, if one were to stretch levels out like that, it would be the tacit acknowledgment that the differences in min/maxing or team work or even battlefield position were simply larger than differences in level. That's workable of course, but it means that like in 4e you won't be able to tell if something is slightly higher or slightly lower level than you. And it means that like in 4e you straight up will be getting levels where all you get is a +1 to attack and defenses that could seriously never come up between the time you get it and the next time you go up a level.

With bonuses that small for level we don't even need to give stat adjustments for Legendaries - they can jolly well just be higher level than you are (and possibly have a slightly more favorable stat spread where they don't have any zeroes in any defensive stats).

I think I'm neutral to this. I can see appealing things about either approach.

FrankTrollman wrote:In any case: with human trainer classes being a whole thing, it occurs to me that there's really no reason to not let people play as weird D&D-esque humanoids or even straight up Pokemon. Nighon doesn't just have troglodytes in it, it also has Medusa. And if someone wants to be one, why the fuck not? I think the key here is that if you aren't someone who is a badass melee combatant like a Knight or Martial Artist or a Machoke, you could be an old man or a small child - literally your only physical attack is Struggle. So balancing characters who are D&D style Warlords and characters who are actual children seems pretty reasonable.

The center point I think is that of Ars Magica. There are three ranks of PCs: Trainer (Wizard), Companion (Companion), Pokemon/Grunts (Grunts). And like in Ars Magica, you play all three.

-Username17

Now this sounds pretty cool. I've read Ars Magica, but never had the chance to play it. This would make for a pretty interesting way of trying out a game where each player creates a pack of characters. It even lets you choose between having a particularly badass pokemon and a trainer who is approximately as formidable.

Avoraciopoctules wrote:

FrankTrollman wrote:Well, if one were to stretch levels out like that, it would be the tacit acknowledgment that the differences in min/maxing or team work or even battlefield position were simply larger than differences in level. That's workable of course, but it means that like in 4e you won't be able to tell if something is slightly higher or slightly lower level than you. And it means that like in 4e you straight up will be getting levels where all you get is a +1 to attack and defenses that could seriously never come up between the time you get it and the next time you go up a level.

With bonuses that small for level we don't even need to give stat adjustments for Legendaries - they can jolly well just be higher level than you are (and possibly have a slightly more favorable stat spread where they don't have any zeroes in any defensive stats).

I think I'm neutral to this. I can see appealing things about either approach.

It's even somewhat the way the video games work. I've had bulbasaur oneshot a rock type several levels above it just because it happened to have learned vine whip that level.

This looks like it could be useful

If anything, to retcon the more stupid shit so your Magcargo doesn't evaporate all the rock beneath it from here to center of the planet immidiately upon summoning.

Yeah, two things occur to me after reading that:
1-They just threw out random big numbers on some this shit.... I mean, Arcanine's speed, I'm okay with, Pidgeot's speed, I'm okay with, though maybe it should explicitly have a "immune to heat (not fire)" ability or something, and hell, normal rats can eat concrete, so I'm not concerned with ratticate.... but Charizard, Wartortle, Larvitaur, Magcargo... yeah those numbers need revision.... though I do like the idea of Charizard melting stone...
2-We need to be looking at the fighting 'mons for ways to buff up fighters, maybe....