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Official Pre-Pokémon Sword & Pokémon Shield Speculation & Leaks thread

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Speaking of difficulty, White hit the mark for me. However, feel like it was mostly because I had to funnel experience into Pokemon that evolve at high levels, like Litwick and Mienfoo. Aside from reverting the experience share to what it used to be, increasing the time that certain Pokemon remain in an unevolved form seems to work out rather well in increasing difficulty, at least for me.

(I don't know about y'all, but it took me several tries to beat Ghetsis's Hyreigon, I had to switch and heal multiple times to barely scrape by the Pokemon League, and I was severely underleveled compared to the first trainer encounterable following the end of the main story. Neither HeartGold nor Black 2 were anywhere near as difficult as White.)
 
Having AI opponents switch Pokemon would also add to the challenge, because they would then actively attempt to counter you. For movesets, they pretty much should start hand-designing enemy movesets halfway through the game instead of letting the engine default to whatever the Pokemon's four most recent moves are for their level. Having a higher degree of ability or held item interplay might also help, but it also runs the risk of making the game more complicated.

If you've ever played Pokemon Duel and seen how abilities interact with each other there, they make team selection alone a lot more strategic. I know that it's a spin-off game with a wildly different battle system, but the abilities are so effective and diverse that running a team with 3 Swablus and 3 Stuffuls was a viable strategy despite them having no moves above 40 Power. Swablus cut damage received for all Normal and Flying types by 10, tracked separately, so each Swablu ALONE instantly had an advantage of slicing 60 damage off of an opponent's attack (you can only repeat species 3 times on a team of 6. Each Swablu drops opponents by 20 damage, which is 10 for each type, then they all stack on each other, so 60). Stufful gets covered by Swablu since it is also Normal, ON TOP OF it's own ability which halves enemy attacks anyway, so opponents could only deal 0-30 damage tops even of they had a 120 Power move.

I know the mechanics of the two games are wildly different, but the implementation of the abilities allowed for you to actually stop and strategize, and running a bunch of high power Pokemon didn't always guarantee a win. Having a deeper level of strategy would go a long way, I feel. If a random backpacker in the game threw out a Swablu that cut all enemy move Base Power in half, it would then be in your best interest to Burn or Poison it or something to get passive damage in, or send out a Mold Breaker mon, or something. Even if for a split second, it would make you think a bit more critically about what your next move would be.

I'm not too concerned about making the games more difficult, but there are more creative ways for them to lay out enemy teams and design moves and abilities. Battle Tree in SM/USUM does bother to strategize more than battle towers in previous games, and I thought the summoned Pokemon synergy in the Totem battles was a lot of fun to work around, so GF is on the right track when it comes to balanced difficulty enhancement. They just might want to implement it on a wider scale in the future.
 
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The Pokémon Quest Datamine gave us some cool stuff to look forward to XD
 
https://is2.*********/vp/1528119724618.jpg
Has anyone seen this? So far this has to be the coolest concept for a rabbit starter I've ever seen. Too bad it's fake though
 
Knightwolf09 said:
https://is2.*********/vp/1528119724618.jpg
Has anyone seen this? So far this has to be the coolest concept for a rabbit starter I've ever seen. Too bad it's fake though
Click to expand...
I'm down for another robotic Pokemon.
 
RileyXY1 said:
But, it would be unoriginal because Hoopa exists.
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While I would agree, I remember everyone speculating Lunala's type after it's reveal, claiming that Psychic/Ghost would be unlikely given the fact that there had just been Psychic/Ghost Pokemon the previous generation (Hoopa). If Game Freak could get away with two Psychic/Ghost legendary Pokemon back-to-back (in terms of generations), I think they could find a way of making another Dijinn Pokemon.
 
RileyXY1 said:
But, it would be unoriginal because Hoopa exists.
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We have five Balloon Pokemon, six Mushroom Pokemon, six Mouse Pokemon, six Poison Pin Pokemon and eight Dragon Pokemon. I'm sure they can come up with another Djinn Pokemon that doesn't resemble Hoopa in the slightest.

Hoopa is the only one to have two categories, though, so you're probably not wrong about that.
 
It’s also worth remembering that Hoopa wasn’t the first Genie / Djinn introduced to the series, Lando, Thundy and Tornados are all Genie / Djinn inspired Pokémon and multiple Pokémon can share the same Pokédex category name.
 
Knightwolf09 said:
https://is2.*********/vp/1528119724618.jpg
Has anyone seen this? So far this has to be the coolest concept for a rabbit starter I've ever seen. Too bad it's fake though
Click to expand...

It has to be one of the worst concepts imo. It literally looks like a human wearing a rabbit suit.

The previous fire rabbit concept we discussed here was much better and looked more natural. It seems even more unnatural than Incineroar.
 
PkmnTrainerV said:
It has to be one of the worst concepts imo. It literally looks like a human wearing a rabbit suit.

The previous fire rabbit concept we discussed here was much better and looked more natural. It seems even more unnatural than Incineroar.
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I have to agree. No offense to anyone who digs this kind of style for a starter/Pokemon, but I'm more into the kawaii aesthetic rather than cool, which anyone can discern from my profile pic. Hopefully the Gen 8 games with have something along the lines of Primarina :X3:.
 
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